When a customer calls you for a major painting job, one of the most important things they’re looking for is confidence. They can’t afford to spend thousands of dollars on a job they’ll have to repeat any more than you can – but if this is the first time they are working with you they have no way of being certain that they’ll be satisfied with the outcome.
In fact, for many customers, price-shopping is a stress reaction to this uncertainty. They have to spend a large sum of money on a paint job but don’t feel confident or “in control” of the outcome. The one way they do have to feel in control is to try and get the price down. Of course, saving $50 or $100 won’t reduce their stress nearly as much as being confident that they will get a great paint job.
So how do you help customers believe you’ll do a great job – so they’ll be less stressed, easier to work with, and less likely to haggle with you over price? Here are a few ways:
Offer a Warranty
Warranties carry some risk – if you paint enough houses, you will have to make good on a few warranties. However, they demonstrate to the customer that you stand behind your work in a way that marketing slogans can’t do. That will likely win you business that you otherwise would have lost, and it may allow you to win higher-priced jobs, as well. If you do include a warranty, including a reference to PDCA standards will make sure that customers can’t hold you to unreasonable standards, while also indicating that your warranty is based on the premium standards established by the PDCA.
Get Great Reviews – and Remind Potential Customers to Look at Them
Service companies make great efforts to get 5-star reviews from their customers because they’re worth a lot of money. Many people searching for a painter make on-the-fly decisions about who to call based solely on their online reviews – and if you’re not in the top three, you’re not getting a call from these people.
If you’ve put in the effort to get these great reviews, and you believe you’re on the phone with a potential customer who hasn’t thought to use them, make sure to remind them to take a look at them. You don’t have to attack any of your competitors or promote yourself in order to do this – you can simply encourage them to take a look at the reviews of any company they’re considering before making a final decision.
Let Them See Your Work
It’s hard to believe you’ve got a good understanding of work quality until you’ve seen it with your own eyes. So give your customers every opportunity to do that.
One way to accomplish this is by making sure your website has frequently updated examples of jobs you’ve done. Take some wide-range pictures where customers can see an entire room, or the front of a house. Also take some pictures closer to the wall, where they can see the quality of your work around moulding or other complex surfaces.
Another way is to put a yard sign outside of a house where you’ve recently completed an external paint job. If a person lives in the community and a house suddenly changes color, it will catch their eye. And if the paint job is a great one, and they’re considering one themselves, they’ll see your phone number right in front of them.
To learn how ProPainter Websites can help your company gain more business call us at 855-385-1134 or email us at Team_PPW@ProPainterWebsites.com.