Where does your domestic work come from?

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

On 22 September 2017 at 07:45, Tom D said:

Kevin, I'm genuinely interested that you get so much work from door knocking, you must have a very trustworthy face and the manners of a vicar. 

 

Are you a typical door knocker: "excuse a me luv your fern tree needs trimming"

You started the ball rolling Tom!  

 

Mr Eggs was first out of the stocks with his characteristic satirical wit and real world humour, closely followed by Dave with his mock disbelief!

 

What I actually said was "...seeing' a job that needs doing whilst out and about and making an introduction and describing the requirement to the tree / land owner then letting them decide if the logic makes sense..."

 

I can see how it's happened, but my original statement doesn't translate directly to 'door knocking!'

 

Examples - 

 

(1) Last week at the nipper's swimming lesson (me wearing tax efficient branded jacket!) nice lady with daughter in swimming class says "...Oh, do you do trees..?"  Me - "...No, why do you ask...?"  She - "...but your jacket...?"

Me - "only joking, what's the situation...?"

 

Result - Had a couple of hours with her walking around the holiday park estate, had another couple of hours doing the same with her husband today - net result = QTRA survey, management plan, quote for works (he's already told me what the local clown quoted (and he is a clown, and I hope he's reading this because this will be the second time I've encountered his dodgy dealings)

 

(2) Nipper started school last September.  Big ugly Euc in woodland school area, I took some pictures, wrote some words, gave it to the Head.  The 'need' was obvious, but not urgent.  I recommended factoring it into the 1-3 year budget.  After a little while they got round to thinking about it and decided to get some quotes.  1 came from the other side of Exeter (50 or so miles away), another was the clown mentioned above who did the classic disappearing screwdriver trick which resulted in a panic and cordoning off of the entire playground area (until I got there to pick the nipper up and told the Head she'd been duped by a con artist)  We did that take down at the next half term break.

 

(3) I'll talk about 3 after the end of this week but it's a beauty!

 

(4) Having a mate who's a busy architect generates a fair amount of work too.

 

So, it's not quite "door knocking" in the do-as-you-likey fashion that has caused Dave such mock horror...  It actually is 'seeing' a job that needs doing whilst out and about and making an introduction and describing the requirement to the tree / land owner then letting them decide if the logic makes sense..." and it fits well with the 'choose the customer' ideology that I've found works for me.  I can understand and recognise that this sort of laid back approach wouldn't work for an outfit with FT staff, overheads and costs to service but it kind of works for my part-time, low intensity scenario.

 

 

[geoffers]

I think ours is roughly 50% word of mouth, 40% repeat customers and 10% advertising in local parish magazine. No faceache, no website been going ten years this year.

[oldwoodcutter]

I've got a website, and Facebook, get recommendations,and spend the equivalent of a third worlds defence budget on advertising, but I think pushing fliers for treework through letterboxes in high rise flats is the way forward for today's professional company.

[Richard 1234]

It's a semi interesting poll, but I fear there are factors at play that skew it a bit.
 
1. When people say they never advertise any more, how do we know if they're charging good rates or just being busy for the sake of it.
 
2. If you're fencing or dabbling in landscaping/grass cutting you only need one "yes" and you have potentially a few weeks work, in domestic Arb you often have to find 5 jobs a week.
 
Not an attack on anyone in particular, just thoughts on the poll.
 
FWIW, local press/word of mouth mostly.

Number 2 is spot on.
1 yes can mean recurring work weekly for years!
I only advertise now as I want more work for my big mowers and 2 acre plus gardens are not easy to get.
Word of mouth is best though as clients already know what kind of money it will cost them (for what I do which is grass cutting and hedges!) as they have obviously talked to other clients and know from that roughly what costs will be, so I'm not wasting my time going to places that want stuff done cheap!

[Mike Hill]

Website for me,followed closely by referrals.

  

[John Shutler]

I get a lot of work through recommendations, some from the arb approved contractor scheme and a bit from checkatrade, I advertise in a local paper periodically but usually come out of it when I get busier, I also find that the paper generally brings the work I'm not really interested in doing anymore. My website is outdated and not really relevant to the work we do now 

[Mick Dempsey]

What is interesting (to me at least) is how little a role the internet seems to play in many people's answers.

 

A few years ago one would have been forgiven for thinking that that's all there would be by now.

[Steve Bullman]

It perhaps plays a bigger role than people realize.  For example, all the word of mouth customers may also have checked out the companies website after being given the referral prior to calling them

[Gary Prentice]

2 minutes ago, Steve Bullman said:

It perhaps plays a bigger role than people realize.  For example, all the word of mouth customers may also have checked out the companies website after being given the referral prior to calling them

Probably get four or five enquiries from the contact us part of our website a week, as an email enquiry, but on asking customers who initially phoned many had looked us up online after W.OM or seeing vehicles etc.

[Mick Dempsey]

Perhaps, just to get the number/check they exist. Difficult to quantify.

 

A bit like sign written vans, I doubt many people actually write down the numbers there and then, but probably google the name they've seen around town for a while on the side of vans when they need work done.