The start of the holiday season is usually the start of yearly slump for home improvement companies. Few homeowners want to handle the stress of renovations or repairs when they’re scrambling to get gifts for everyone and planning cookie exchanges. Thankfully, there are some things that you can do during the downtime that could round out your revenue. Even as the weather turns colder and homeowners start counting their pennies before the clock strikes 2021, we’ll look at how you can start shaping a better bottom line.
Even if people don’t decide to use your company until next season, you can still promote your company now. The more repetition you have, the more likely it is that a homeowner will call you when they’re ready.
If you’ve been itching to revamp your marketing, the holiday season can be the right time to test out new tactics too. If your revenue per lead (RPL) or net sales to leads issued (NSIL) hasn’t been as high as you’d hoped, the slower months gives you the chance to research and experiment with a different CRM software — one that can keep up with an influx in projects and optimize leads.
Are there holiday trade shows coming up in your area? Can you partner with related companies, such as an appliance supplier or even another home improvement company? It’s easy to think of other businesses as competition, but teaming up can be a more profitable way to go. From industry networking groups to roofers, there are so many opportunities to open yourself up to potential deals.
As with any partnership, the key is to look for a way to trade services, optimize leads, and improve efficiency. One way to go about this is to look for incentives for consumers, such as a discount during the slow season. This is also a great time to work your referrals. Whether it’s former customers or fellow business owners, you want your business to be on people’s minds and in the conversation. (People certainly follow-up with businesses online, but they often start with internal sources.)
Many businesses will look for new services when their regular customers start to slack off. Can you move into a new service category? Maybe something more practical, such as insulation or plumbing? Can you put staff on-call to take care of emergencies? If you have the resources to do it, there’s no reason not to provide more to customers and improve your audience reach. (You might have to train employees or hire seasonal workers for this, but the extra revenue will be worth the effort.)
You may be able to generate more revenue if you can dig into your data a little more. This is a great time to start analyzing everything from your assets to your employee’s skills. Just because a specific process has been getting you by for years now, doesn’t mean it can’t be optimized. Are there certain areas where your business is exploding while others could be doing better? Could you make more headway in certain neighborhoods if you upgraded the quality of your materials?
Fine-tuning your business starts with looking at the numbers. If your budget has fluctuated over the years or you had some slower-than-expected months, having the right tools can make all the difference. Examine your data internally, connect with other business owners, and investigate new ways to expand your business.
Long Home Products chose to implement the Think Lead Optimizer (TLO) software to better match their sales associates with leads, increase close rates, ticket prices, and their ROI. The Think Lead Optimizer was launched in one market and Think Unlimited began a comparative report between the market with TLO enabled and without.
Only 4 weeks after implementing the Think Lead Optimizer by Think Unlimited, this client saw growth in every area targeted area. With Think’s proprietary AI lead score and assignment process, the higher quality scored leads led to an 8.6% growth in assignments compared week-over-week. With a higher assignment rate, the close rate grew by nearly 4% in the first month. The RPL value of each assigned lead added an additional $277 per lead & the actual gross sale per lead issued cost increased by over $491.
