passing flyers vs. yelllow book

dirt

New Member
Hey gang!
What do you guys recomend Yellow pages or the old beat the streets and pass out flyers. I have never placed an ad with the Yellow Book and was wondering if you've had any success with this type of marketing relating to window cleaning.(I have an ad coming out relating to my auto detailing company coming out in the next printing).I have had great success with pasing out flyers but i am sick of it, it can become so drainig that I would like to consider other ways to promote my new venture with window cleaning. I also dont have a ton of time to get out there and pass flyers. Let me hear your experience with both or if you've had success in another area of marketing I would love to get some advice.
 

Bridget

New Member
We do both. Yellow Pages is always a sure bet. No question.
As for flyers this year I created a postcard promoting the Spring Cleaning Season. Black and white, postcard stock. I took it to our corner printer, went to InfoUSA.com and within seconds I had an excel sheet with a mailing list tailored to the homeowners I was targeting.

Got our teenagers to put the labels & stamps on them and for under $700.00 I had a postcard campaign underway.
The results have been OUTSTANDING!

My suggestion MAIL EM don't walk em'
 

windowman

New Member
I agree with both posts here. While new to the pressure washing industry, we've been in the residential window cleaning business for over 10 years. The Yellow Book is a must, and our experience with post cards has been excellent, we sent 7,500 out as a test, and we were flooded with calls, had to bring in a temp for three days. We also have our crew put out door hangers in neighborhoods where we have done work, then ask the homeowner if we can put a yard sign out for three days, this has worked well too.

Good Luck

Gary
 

jon chapman

New Member
I dont have an add in yellow book yet, comes out in june. I have been hanging door flyers for about 2 months now. Have had 3 calls/3 jobs from them. close 800 flyers out now. weathers getting too hot for that now so on my last 2 jobs I sent post cards to the entire neighborhood. No response-yet. I hope that works.
I also ran an ad in the flyer magazine, (runs in tampa too) you can pick your zones and how much you want to spend, but there are as many PW busnesses that run there as in YP. my add worked modestly for 8 weeks but the last 5 not a call. but i had enough calls to make it worth while.
you can call Patty at 727-507-0809 Tell her I sent you, Maybe she will give me a discount next run.
 
P

pldoolittle

Guest
Postcard people: I started my biz a week after the yellow book came out. Can't get in again till next year. I've been flyering, running ads in the local newspaper, and in the a local 16ppg ad magazine. I'm considering going direct, and am wondering about the following issues.

What is your total cost per piece (i.e. printing, poly stage, etc...)?

What is your conversion rate? i.e. 1 sale per 100 postcards.

Philip
 

windowman

New Member
We have had excellent response on the window cleaning side of our business with postcards, and continue to send them out abuot once a quarter. I used to print my own postcards on a highend Xerox Phaser printer, they really looked great, but we recently outsourced the printing to a company called Vista Print www.vistaprint.com, and for alot less money you can get professional, glossy postcards, which have incresed our response rate.

Gary
 

Bufnwax

New Member
I've set my son-in-law up here in C.Florida...This area is SMOKIN but customer reception to services such as window cleaning/PW is dicey. I believe in every area of the country, conditions for sales vary...Keep these things in mind.
#1.Senior citizens have the largest disparity of "wages". RELOCATE
a. seniors consider traditional values FIRST when considering your biz.
*beards*sloppy dress*trashed vehicle*goofy company names etc.
b. if you're NOT in an area with high #'s of seniors consider ALL forms of
advertising...NEVER advertise without a coupon or offer.
c. Use bold headlines for YP ads - keep it brief, not wordy!
Price should be competitive but not LOWER than your competition, except through a coupon offer. EXCLUSIVITY is where it's at...If you're priced the lowest, got the trashy or so-so truck and outfit, wear a moustache/beard, call yourself "A&B Pressure Washing" expect to get the bottom rung of cutomers that'll beat you up on damages and price and they'll have the nastiest homes to clean!
People with money...will ALWAYS have money.

Lastly, spend the absolute MINIMUM you can get by with in the yellow pages.
Do NOT use door-hangers, windshield flyers or items that make trash can liners. And ALWAYS give them a limited time to act on their coupon offer...usually under a week...Depending on your audience...choose several methods of advertising. I'll talk more about promotions later on...good luck!
 

timhays

New Member
i agree with an offer with a very short deadline,we performed a market test by submitting marketing materials into neighborhoods with 3 different price offers within the same subdivision, very low,moderate,market price,believe it or not we got more calls on the market price advertisment than the rest.

we then integrated a "this offer expires" that was 2 weeks from mailing or delivery,and the responce percentage went up even more.

we would like to test delivery at different times of month but dont have time from too much working to do so.

one thing i have learned from data analisys,you have to have a repeatable baseline to judge your performance otherwise you dont know what when why or how.

confusius say make one change at a time,document your results.
 

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