Whether you sell Pest Control services or are a master Plumber, you have customers and those customers want to give you their feedback. It may not always be positive feedback, but it needs to be received and evaluated so you can continue to provide the superior level of service that customers have come to expect of you.

In a prior post we examined email marketing tips for your service business. An email is a perfect and easy way to reach out to customers for feedback. Using software for your service like Pestpac (pestpac.com), to stay on the Pest Control example above, you can export a list on a recurring basis to send out an email to customers. Start off your email with an engaging subject line like "Tell Us About Your Recent Service Experience" or "Tell Us How We Are Doing". Then bring them to a form on your website.

Once they land on the form, we need to attain some level of understanding with the customer.

First, acknowledge that their time is just as important as yours. No one wants to be tied down all day answering questions. Think of what is important to ask them.

• Email Address - This is very powerful as it provides you with a ton of information. For instance, from an email you can usually tell what company they are from and sometimes even their name. Plus, if they want to be contacted later about their experience you can!
• Service Order # / Date of Service - You have lots of customers with lots of jobs. Maybe they do not know the numbers off hand, but at least this way you know the date. This tells you what was performed and what technicians were out in the field at that job site.

Once the basic details are established, you need to get the most out of your customers with the least amount of questions and hassle. It's important you ask the right questions. Let's examine what you can get from the most popular type of questions:

• Multiple Choice / Selection - Use these when you want to find out multiple answers to a single question. for instance, maybe you offer additional services and want to gauge if they have an interest in any of these services.
• Open-Ended Questions  It's usually good to ask one of these. It gives the user the chance to speak their mind. Maybe they were excited and want you to know or maybe there was an issue after the job was completed that they just did not have time to call back about.
• Likert Scale - These are the questions where someone says whether they Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree or Strongly Disagree. Notice I left out "Neutral" or "N/A". It's best to leave those options out if you want an honest assessment. Here you can ask everything from rating the "Professionalism of the Technician" to the "Likeliness that they will use your service again".

It is a good idea to keep the total number of questions to less than 10. this way you increase the possibility of getting your response and it is less data for you to sift through at the end of the day.

Once you have the data you need, be sure to end your Feedback Form asking if the user would like to be contacted. Whether it's good or bad, you have an obligation to make sure all open requests are solved and your Feedback Form becomes an open means of communication.

This can be the opportunity you needed to prevent the loss of an account simply by reading a customer's feedback and acting upon it. A little information can go a long way in growing your service business through increasing customer retention rates!

More and more often, service businesses are turning to email marketing as an effective means of communicating with their customer base. Despite many reports to the contrary, the majority of these emails are read by consumers, even if they only make it as far as the subject line. This is why it is important to understand what you can do to make sure that your emails get read and that prospects take action on them every time.

Tip 1: Create an Engaging Subject Line

Everyone, you and I included, get bombarded  with emails all day long whether it's from friends & family, or from other businesses. Your customers and prospects are no different. Why then, do we gravitate towards some emails while ignoring others? This is due in part to reading a meaningful subject line.

Imagine the following scenario of subject lines in your inbox:

1. 4 Ideas Friday - We've Got You Covered
2. NFL Playoff Pool
3. FREE STUFF INSIDE OPEN NOW
4. It's a New Year! Schedule Your HVAC Maintenance Appointment & Save!
5. Get 60% Off Sale & Clearance Items + Free Shipping!
6. How Clean Rewards Members Reap the Benefits

Even in limited results, you have multiple offers for sales and a corporate playoff pool to compete against. That is a lot of competition!

So first, treat email like a conversation. There is no need to yell at your customers, they get the point! That eliminates email #3. Next, be specific. "We've got you covered" could mean a lot of things. What it doesn't say is that you are a service company and what you are offering. Let's eliminate #1. And let's just assume that everyone opens #2 because we all read what is sent to us in the office, right?

So the bottom 3 is where we want to focus on because they highlight key objectives for an engaging subject line including: being aware of your environment - knowing that it's a new year and yearly spending begins again; being specific - offering 60% off and free shipping; and, establishing a connection - by offering a rewards program to establish a relationship and level of confidence.

Tip 2: Don't Trap Your Readers

So they clicked, now we need to stop them from clicking delete. Be sure that your email body, whether in text form, or utilizing images, is on target with your subject line. While April Fool's Day jokes can be fun for some they are not fun for all and this can be a major turn off for email readers not getting what they expect.

For an example, let's say that you are offering the Maintenance Appointment subject line. Be smart about the content you put in the email and don't limit the direction that your customers can venture off into. Some users may be interested in the scheduling, while others may want to learn about the services being offered. If you only allow for one exit you eliminate the possibility of converting that prospect into a sale. You can even go as far as offering a second service that can be scheduled that your prospects are unaware of.

The key here is to make sure you offer the bare minimum to stay on point with the subject, but never be afraid to offer a little more because you may be able to spark an interest that was not there before.

Tip 3: Read Into Statistics

Statistics are there for a reason and you should use them to your advantage. Most Email Service Providers (ESPs) allow you to track simple things like Opens and Clicks of your email campaigns. These are very good indicators that you should use to determine whether your subject lines and email content are on target. But they only tell half of the story.

You can go one step further with analytics tied to your website services. To see whether your campaigns are truly creating ROI, analytics from your website services can be used to tell what happens once that user takes action on your campaign. See their actions from the moment they step foot on your website to the moment they leave and every step in between.

Before We Go

Email marketing is not an exact science it is always important to understand your customer/prospect base. Test out different subject lines and text/images in your emails to find out what works best for your service business. By understanding your statistics and gaining the whole picture you can become an expert email marketer in no time at all!

Reasons To Use Online Lead Generation Instead of Direct Mail

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Yellow Page Advertising Vs Online Advertising For Local Businesses

Yellow Pages advertising has been a mainstay of marketing products for local businesses for many decades.  Before the rise of the internet, the yellow pages was the one and only directory for local businesses, and the only place that people would look for a local provider.  While this type of printed material continues to help some consumers looking for a particular service, the effectiveness of the media for the business owner has declined making it more expensive and less profitable over time.  The decline in Yellow Page advertising effectiveness is directly related to how many people still use it.  With the increase of internet ready devices and low cost of internet access, people can search for local businesses quicker and faster online then flipping through a large book.

Why Use Online Marketing Over Print Ads

Not too long ago, businesses advertised their products or services by running advertisements in newspapers, creating attractive descriptions in the Yellow Pages, and distributing flyers or coupons. But today advertising is primarily conducted online, simply because of the sheer number of people connected to the internet. The meteoric rise in online buying is directly proportional to the interest created by online advertisements. Marketing a particular product or service through the internet is an industry that continues to evolve as new strategies are put into place, allowing retailers and other merchants to connect with prospective consumers through social networking sites as well as advanced search links.