The Sharpest Tool™

Vice President of Franchise Marketing Dasch Schenberger has a background in history, but that didn’t stop him from becoming an expert in building successful digital marketing campaigns. In his role, he acts as a communicator, strategist, and analyst while interfacing with franchises and employees to make sure targets are hit and revenue goals are met.

“The best way to think about the online local ecosystem is all of the major platforms and channels you need to be listed on to be found by search engines.”

Dasch says that while your website is important, it’s not the only way Google connects searchers with your business. From Google My Business to Yelp to Angie’s List, these third-party directories verify how credible you are, building trust with Google and your customers when they conduct a local search.

Make sure your business has consistent information on every platform for each of these points:

This includes making sure that your data is maintained correctly and that platforms aren’t giving misinformation on your business.

Data aggregators are directories like Google My Business and Yelp and they act as phone books and data hubs that house the records for businesses. Verification of information and having physical addresses have become increasingly important as local searches like “plumbing near me” become the norm.

Google does not rank businesses that operate from a home or a virtual office, only have a P.O. box, or share a location with a business in the same industry. Your business must have a legitimate business address in order to rank. While this can be challenging, it is part of Google’s effort to provide better results and is an important detail to take into consideration when building your business.

It’s important to indicate where you are physically located and list areas that you are familiar with and serve within a certain radius, or specific towns. By including these details on your directories and site, you give Google the information it needs.

If you have multiple physical locations, consistency across all platforms is important.

“If I’ve got 3 locations, A, B, and C, I’ve got three records on all platforms of A, B, and C, and none of the information on A, B, or C is the same except for the name.”

Dasch also emphasizes that it’s best to have one website that has all of the information about each of your locations rather than separate sites for each location.

Point being: stay simple and consistent to perform the best in search results.

Sami Kretz is the Vice President of Project Development at Scorpion. She keeps a sharp eye on the market and the latest developments in tech and customer experience to make sure that they are constantly offering clients the best marketing tools and strategies.

The customer experience is made up of every interaction that takes place between a business and a customer. It’s the job of the business owner or business to have every customer walk away with a positive feeling.

“Something that I like to do when I think of a client experience, is I think of it as a series of touch points. And every touch point has the possibility, you know, of being a green grade, green dot, which means they had a good touch point, or maybe a red one, so that’s a bad touch point… If your string of colored dots at the end of the experience is almost all green, then your customer should be happy, and looking back on their experience in a positive light.”

Sami emphasizes how important it is for business owners and businesses to intentionally take every chance to make every touch point green.

The customer experience is separate from the product or service your customer receives. Even if your customer is satisfied with your product or service, if they hated the process of buying it or had an unpleasant series of interactions, they will be upset and unsatisfied.

Sami offers the illustrative example of when a customer calls a plumber to fix their overflowing sink. Even if the sink is ultimately fixed, the customer will not associate that fact with your business if details like these are part of their experience:

“The customer experience is what brings people back to your business. The customer experience is what makes your customers tell their friends about your business… Your customer experience is everything when it comes to growing your business and winning against your competition.”

An exceptional, memorable customer experience impacts your business financially by increasing your repeat business, referrals, and bottom line.

Sami recommends utilizing surveys, talking to your customers about their needs, and experiencing the customer experience yourself in order to truly understand what your business’s customer experience is like and where to improve. By listening to them and engaging with them, you will gain insight into the little touches and details you can implement that will make your business stand out. If you are only focused on efficiency, your customer experience will not improve.

As the Senior Marketing Manager at Scorpion, Travis Hobbs oversees campaigns and partners with businesses to help manage their workflow and refine internal processes. His background as a business consultant for small businesses and Director of Marketing at Fleet Feet Sports gave him a deep understanding of the importance of a great customer experience. When he joined Scorpion and embraced the opportunity to break into the home services space, he was ready to take the customer experience to new heights.

The ideal customer journey begins with introducing your audience to your brand in a way that ultimately leads them to become a champion for your business.

Between building awareness and lifetime advocacy, there are many important details and stages of the customer experience. This is where a strategic marketing partner can advise you on where and when to show up for those customers and retain them.

At the end of the day, if your branding is great and captures attention, but your customer experience is not full of value and great service, you’ll end up losing leads or having one-time interactions instead of creating lifetime advocates.

You have two types of customers. Your intentional customers who are proactively researching and looking for your specific service or product, and those who need you in an emergency.

Be open and ready to work with different marketing strategies in order to meet those customers where they are at in their buying journey, and invest in an expert who will guide you to those places and help you cultivate trust.

A marketing mix is your set of chosen avenues where you’re meeting the customer, from print to digital content and relationship development.

“You have to look at it from where you’re investing money effectively. If you’ve got an avenue that’s not producing any results and you’re wasting money, you have to be honest with yourself.”

In this area, Travis emphasizes the importance of thinking on your feet and thinking strategically to pivot your focus to where your resources are paying off. There’s never a one-size-fits-all answer in marketing because people and technology are changing constantly.

For example, a strong marketing mix for one business might include social and video content to help drive traffic to their website, and another company may invest more in social and blog content to drive SEO and Google rankings. One marketing truth that does apply to every business, is the importance of gathering reviews. This builds brand reputation and shows potential customers that you are trustworthy.

Your business will quickly and more effectively when you work with a marketing partner who has expertise in planning and strategizing to track trends and data.

“Understanding how to report back on that (technology) and how to produce the actual product to fit those platforms is... incredibly vital to the success of a marketing plan.”

Look at your processes right now and see where you are losing money. Ask yourself: “Where can we grow as a business? How could marketing help?”

Steve Levitt heads up Scorpion’s sales team and is passionate about the art and science behind successful sales strategies.

In the home services industry, he shares how he often sees owners afraid to let go of the sales part of the business that they have been primarily responsible for. It seems easier to just continue doing it yourself, than training someone. However, investing in and training a strong team to fill that role is one of the best things you can do for your company.

Steve says that if you are spending too much time working in the field, rather than on the business, it’s time to focus on getting a new plan for sales.

First, determine your goals, strengths, and the unique differentiators that set you apart from the competition.

Steve emphasizes that finding someone who is responsible for this whole plan is crucial. Invest in that person. They should understand what you do, have clear goals, be able to ask the right questions, and take full responsibility.

“To me, the most important thing that salespeople really want to feel is that they are playing a game they can win, period.”

Stretch goals, goals that are challenging but not impossible, are ideal for cultivating an exciting, engaging sales culture. When the sales team has goals that are attainable and measurable, they will be able to focus and feel supported.

Early on in your business, one person can be responsible for sales in order to understand the whole picture holistically. However, as you scale, you will need to build a team that specializes in each part of the sales strategy, from communicating with customers about services and scheduling to closing the deal.

In home services businesses, techs are often in the role of both determining the problem, closing the sale, and then fixing the problem. Steve says that hiring the right people is hard, and you have to put in the work to find them. Good techs are:

These qualities build trust and comfort with the client. As you identify techs who are good at determining the problem and closing the sale, it may be time to have them make that their sole focus and send a different tech in to actually fix the problem. This all depends on how you want to run your business, but don’t underestimate playing to your team’s strengths.

“Consumers are showing up to all sorts of buying cycles with far more information, with far more research and competitive analysis done, even for things as simple as finding an electrician...They are more educated.”

Your sales team backs up your marketing strategy and business goals. Make sure your sales and marketing are aligned and consistent to create a positive customer experience.

Set a goal for being where you want to be in a certain time frame. Start with the end in mind and work your way back into how you will achieve this from a sales and marketing perspective.

As Chief Operating Officer, Dan Bedell spends his day working closely with his marketing teams to make sure that all of their clients have excellent plans that are helping them grow. Dan emphasizes that an important part of their success is their omnichannel marketing strategy.

Omnichannel refers to the multiple ways for businesses to get in front of their ideal customers. In the past, it was a race to see who could gain the highest organic SEO reach to be found first when searched. But now that everyone is doing this, it’s important to have a more well-rounded approach to marketing.

This includes:

Dan explains that each of these pieces work together to reach your audience in the right place and at the right time in a way that resonates.

Part of this shift to omnichannel marketing is occurring because of the changing buying cycle. People are spending less time searching because they are discovering what they need before they need it, thanks to platforms like Google and Facebook understanding user preferences, past activities, and interests.

While PPC can be valuable for businesses and is known for producing high conversion rates, it is most effective at the bottom of the funnel. This moment is called the “Zero Moment of Truth.” It is when customers know what they want to buy and who they want to buy from.

If you only focus on PPC, you could miss out on the rest of your audience who are just at an earlier point in the buying funnel.

To take advantage of this evolving buying cycle, it’s important to have a pre-conversion plan, made possible through omnichannel marketing.

To illustrate what a pre-conversion plan is, Dan uses the example of Christmas shopping.

If he is targeted with ads in August for various products, like a robe for his wife, even if he doesn’t buy it that early, when he is scrambling at the last minute on Christmas Eve he will be more likely to go back and buy it.

“Get me to buy the robe prior to me doing the PPC search, and you’ll have me as a customer.”

This pre-conversion plan not only sets you up for success by reaching your audience before they need you, it also decreases the chance of your competitors booking your potential customers.

Although there is no cost per click associated with SEO, it is actually often more expensive than PPC because it is a very technical, time-intensive speciality. Dan says that while it is always valuable to have your business show up organically through SEO, it does take a serious investment of time and money.

Dan highlights how Facebook is now being treated like a portal to the internet. Customers are able to find product recommendations and do searches before they even go to the internet. This makes Facebook a very valuable pre-conversion point of connection for your business to meet potential customers.

Facebook and Google are anticipating the “Zero Moment of Truth” and are getting brands in front of an audience before they are ready to buy.

Unlike a cost per click model, LSAs operate on a cost per lead model. LSAs appear at the top of Google search above the PPC ads, which is prime real estate on Google. If you’re a local business, you can’t decide how often you show up, but you can optimize your business information and practices to boost your profile. For example, when choosing which businesses to show a customer after they do a local search, Google takes your business’s location, ratings, and how often you answer your phone into account.

After taking all of these different avenues of marketing into account, Dan emphasizes why it is so important to have a marketing strategy that combines each of these tactics in a way that fits your home services business goals.

“The purchasing decisions are being pushed further and further up the funnel by the way technology is working... There is too much opportunity to get in front of the ideal customer sooner in the buying cycle. We tell our advertisers is we need them to be doing an omnichannel approach so they capture business so that business is not being poached by their competitors, prior to their PPC search.”

Dan Dowdy is the General Manager of S & D Plumbing in Taylor, Texas. This family-owned, second-generation business is known for their outstanding customer experience and high-quality service in residential plumbing.

Growing up in the business, Dan says plumbing was practically in his blood. His father always encouraged him to go to trade school or college, with the reminder that if he did go into the trade business, he would have a job for life. After attending college for a while, Dan returned to work for the family business. He ran a service truck for several years before his father gave him a push to take on a leadership position.

While Dan shares that transitioning from a service role to leadership was challenging at times, his key to success was cultivating a mindset that was focused and committed. He knew he didn’t have much experience in leadership, so he set out to learn and find guidance from mentors and best practice groups.

Learn From Others

“If I can bring somebody in smarter than me in business to teach me how to run a business, then that’s what I did. So I got plugged in, got some coaching, and I’ve never looked back.”

With his focus and commitment to learning and leadership, Dan has seen the company grow. He shares how he learned from his competition and larger companies about the importance of presenting a strong, confident brand impression, from the cleanliness of your service trucks and the quality of your customer service, to the rates you charge.

Lead with Innovation

“Really what leads my innovation, what leads my vision... is really my quiet time I spend in the mornings reading my Bible or praying. I give God all the credit for my ideas.”

Dan says that this perspective sets the tone for the culture he creates in the business. While it can be tempting to focus on money when you are chasing success, he emphasizes the importance of staying rooted in your values. When this happens, innovation and quality thrive.

**Create an Accountable Culture **

At S & D Plumbing, Dan has invested seriously in the culture and training of his employees. They work hard, have fun, and hold one another accountable to the core values of the company.

However, at one point he saw that as much as he was investing in his employees, they were never satisfied and there was a growing sense of entitlement. To quell this, he successfully refocused his team by increasing accountability and appreciation for the opportunity to provide high-quality service.

While some may point to Millennials as the reason for this entitlement challenge that Dan faced, he offers a different perspective. He thinks that in many ways, Millennials are focused on the right things. They care less about the money, and more about the family atmosphere, how much you invest in them, the fulfillment they experience in the work they are doing, and the overall experience. When recruiting the right team, Dan says he looks for people who fit the values of their company, and then invests in them.

Invest in Yourself and Your Team

Dan’s faith, competitiveness, and books/audio books have been important drivers in his leadership journey, giving him the courage to step out of his comfort zone and shake up the industry.

“What I’ve found my secret weapon is, is effort. Is stepping out in faith and saying, ‘Hmm, maybe today I’m going to get out of my comfort zone and come shoot a podcast or go turn on my iPhone and shoot a live Facebook video.’ I’ve been doing it for years and I get nervous every time. And that nervousness is what drives me, and excites me. It’s what keeps me ticking.”

Dan also credits his good friend who passed away three years ago, for teaching him how to perfect his craft outside of work, like listening to audiobooks and always putting in the effort to be your best self in order to serve your team.

“Great leadership comes from servant leadership.”

This concept of servant leadership informs how Dan trains his team to be strong and successful. To Dan, this training is not an expense, but rather an investment that you will see a huge return on. A team that works well together, shows empathy in each interaction, and truly listens and communicates with customers, is S & D’s recipe for creating a service experience that is truly life changing for customers.

“The biggest takeaway is just that competitive edge in your team. It is your team. You got to stop saying it’s too expensive to train. You’ve got to stop saying I can’t hire people. You have to build a company with great core values, with a great service system, and really just start investing the time in your team, knowing that it’s not going to be instant gratification for you. It’s going to be a long-term investment.”

A funnel is the path a consumer takes from stranger to customer. This path exists for every business, from a plumber to an electrician to a lawyer, and is one of the best ways to secure leads.

A stranger enters the funnel and is a visitor on your website.

“And that’s really what top funnel marketing is: providing educational resources to establish your brand and your company as the authority, the know-it-all, the expert in that field. You’re really establishing your credibility as a brand getting in front of that consumer when they’re searching for education.”

When you’re providing the answers to the consumer early in their research, you are putting yourself ahead of your competitors when it comes time for the consumer to make a purchasing decision.

Someone who is ready for purchase today has a high intent to make a purchase immediately. They are at the bottom of the funnel. Search engines know that those consumers are the most valuable to you, so they will charge you the most to get in front of those consumers.

So when you go back to the top of the funnel, your cost per acquisition is smaller. Meaning that your investment in reaching viable customers goes farther when you are working at the top of the funnel. He shares the example of how this ROI pays off when your consumer watches your how-to video on how to fix a drain but is not able to fix it. When he needs to call a plumber the next day, you’re top of mind thanks to your valuable content!

“Employing these strategies not only benefit you now, but it’s really laying the foundation for you to develop your brand and grow your brand and continue to provide business for months and years to come, because again, you’ve created the path for a stranger to become your customer.”

Eric Reuveni is the Chief Delivery Officer at Scorpion. The Delivery department delivers Scorpion products, including websites, advertising campaigns, and landing pages.

Eric explains that you don’t want to deliver the same information on mobile as on desktop because customers are in different stages of the buying cycle. Typically, if they are visiting on mobile, their need is more urgent and your call to action needs to be tailored to that need.

“We have to make sure that the user intent is taken into account so that someone on the mobile device isn’t necessarily taken through the same funnel than someone who is just kind of looking for information about plumbers or plumbing…”

You want to give customers the information they need right away. Matching user intent as closely as possible will help your users find what they are looking for on your site quickly.

There are two major ways that having a mobile responsive site impacts your business success:

A high percentage of people using mobile want to contact you so it’s crucial to have your phone number readily available and ensure that scheduling a consultation is easy. Information about your services and company history is often of secondary importance on mobile.

His advice: You will increase your jobs and revenue when you reduce confusion and clutter.

Marisa DeArmas is a Senior Content Marketer at Scorpion. Her typical day is filled with studying clients, their region, and their industry, and then creating content that their audience will like.

For example, if you’re a plumber, you want to create and share content that answers how to fix a specific plumbing problem that your audience might be searching for. Utilizing tools like Google Trends to see what people are searching for in your industry or area, and talking to your customers to understand what their needs are, are great ways to inform the content you create.

Facebook allows you to target people based on a robust set of attributes, including:

• Interests
• Location
• Demographics

“It really matters… because you’re building your audience at the top of the marketing funnel.”

Marisa highlights that while doing paid advertising is valuable because you can target people who are looking for you at that specific moment, content marketing allows you to build awareness for the future. Content marketing connects you with the audience who might not need you now but will in the future.

The type of content you create should be informed by the topic it explains or explores and the medium you want to share it on.

“Facebook is where people are. As much as people say they don’t go on it anymore, stats say otherwise... Facebook also owns Instagram, so with that, your ads can go on Instagram as well.”

Marisa’s advice for home service business owners is to create content that will get your audience to believe in you.

Travis Carter is the Vice President of Home Services Business Development at Scorpion. He is passionate about helping businesses get their story out in a unique way, subsequently growing their profits and revenue. As a former home improvement company business owner himself, he hopes to be the marketing guide that he wished he had.

Travis highlights how online platforms allow you to show your brand in action and tell your story with a very low barrier to entry. By using marketing technology to grow your business, you’re making a smart decision, financially and from a marketing standpoint.

“Technology has allowed the small guy, the mid-sized guy, to do exactly what the big guy is doing and see a major return without having to go broke.”

“You make your life easier… you make your transactions easier by leveraging and being online at the right time.”

For example, with a smart marketing team’s help, you can cut through the noise with powerful messaging specific to your audience at the perfect time. This is called the micro moment: the moment your customer is ready to buy.