Transcript:
Well, good morning Robbie that you got laid you can make it coming in fast. Well, good morning. Good morning Daniel. No Dan don't calls me Daniel. My mother is telling me off literally no one calls me that. It's not good. Not even when I know they're all coming in. So let's kind of good. I was told to work at what they'd like to tell you, but you can't hit them all wrong kind of like kind of going on a date. Yeah well Dan and I were just saying I just said a kid a couple months ago, and I didn't really understand any of these jokes until then. But now they're all just sort of coming to me and say, what's funny. How do you why a millennial how an Instagram. That's the truth. It's not bad. It's actually not bad. I called for those who are coming in. We just talk, talk about nonsense for the first minute. But we'll start in a minute is the numbers the number stabilize and then new. And then we'll get going. What happens when an adult has trouble finding inspiration while he draws a blank. He's a Darling. But oh so terrible right. I think the numbers have stabilized or one or two more snakes and sneaking in. Well, good morning. For those who've come. This is on marketing. Joining us is Robbie Robbins head of marketing. And Robbie has been here for, what three years or more women on the street is actually three years three us today. And so Robbie what Robbie doesn't I bet digital's probably call not not with them knowing about. But before we start to limit. I think just the housekeeping your lines are on mute so it doesn't distract us. But please talking your questions into the Q&A box and by any and we'll answer them as we go. Will or at the end of the notes and the broadcast will be seen at the end. So you'd have to worry about taking notes. For those of you might you don't know me on Dan Hubbard founder of Fergus but also try me for a long time 24 years. I was a plumber and had a plumbing business. Those to destroy the first who didn't go so well the takes trouble and the business got the fear me at st. But the third one that did quite well with 25 staff and two branches and it triggers it's going quite well. We've got a 50-50 staff in two countries now outside. But Robbie why don't you give it like 1 minute on who you are and how you sort of go into marketing yes. I've been with Fergus for three years now. But prior to that, I was working for an ad agency in Sydney. Working across a variety of industries and different businesses. And then look back to good ol' nz butts. But a lot of experience marketing across print does predominantly in digital because we work in software and digital marketing is really cost efficient channel for us. But digital marketing. I think is kind of hailed as being one of the go to channels these days. And I think people forget about a lot of the other top smuggling that is definitely worth your time. So we'll cover a bit of that today as well. But yes, the reason we want to talk about marketing is because New Zealand and Australia have had the benefit of being a building boom for the past few years and a lot of businesses just haven't really needed to concern themselves with anything marketing wise. But in the event of an economic downturn or even just a slowdown or even if you just want to grow your revenue it does come in handy. It helps you marketing tricks up your sleeve. Clapping that's right. You can keep yourself busy on word of mouth and referrals but it's kind of hard to grow. If you want to grow a little bit quicker. Well, if you say you get more work and keep yourself quite busy it can be how having some form of marketing. You know, I think you know since I mean, you know since she'd come and go and last three years you my understanding of marketing went from like uts it seek him to what you do to now understand that marketing is everything we do is as. As it leads to some of the first question what is marketing. So what shall we start. Because I think she's explaining to people what marketing is. It's not just a it's not just a logo right. It's isn't it. I think people often think that McCain advertising the same thing, but marketing is really broadly how you decide on a market that you guys sell to. And then you craft what you're doing or what you're selling in that market, whether it's product or service to suit that market, whereas advertising is more specifically, the practice of figuring out how you communicate what you're selling to that market. So that's why we thought it was a good idea to go through some fundamentals first. This is a well-known framework called for peace. You're going to back up a bit to marketing because I think I think you'll be thinking marketing. Let's I'll get a name and I'll get a colour and I'm like, this in songwriting on my brain and what would you call that. I mean, it is. It's pretty artwork right. Yeah, it is. It's a very small part of their brand. I mean your logo is nothing. If your business doesn't live up to it if you don't have a business structure to back up and we'll cover a bit of that. I think on a couple of slides there. OK because I think that's because I think what I want to talk about the marketing like marketing is the way you seen the invoice, the way you the quote, the way you answer the phone like it's all of it's all of the space of loot. Now keep marketing communication the way you communicate to your staff and your customers in the marketing is how that's done would be my way to try and make it understandable. That's a good way of describing it. Yes, sir. Fundamentals so this framework is called the four pays and the co-pays are basically the levers that you can pull to influence your success in the market. So basically, these are all the things they need to get right. If you establish yourselves in the market, you're in. Which is really what marketing is. And usually they're in no particular order, but I'd put them in order or in the order in which they should really be considered for traders. So on the right, you'll see we've got placements eastern suburbs Sydney as an example. So placement is where you sell. And in this context, you can't really do much about that in most cases traders can only service the local market. So the only instance where you really consider changing placement would be if you don't think you're getting traction in your trade where you are. So for example, if you're installing solar panels in your Melbourne I'm not sure what the weather's been like in Melbourne. This year. But if you're not having much luck you decided you wanted to move to the rules that would be a good example of a modified placement but otherwise placements pretty much set in stone. Obviously, you usually just copy a local market because it's not cost efficient to cast too wide a net. So that's that not rocket science. The next one we've got is product. So this is about figuring out what your value proposition is. So on electricity value proposition, what are you selling. So the value proposition is what are you proposing to the market. What are you offering them. So it goes without saying that you need to be very clear about what you do well and become known for doing that saying whether it's quicksand day work or detailed craftsmanship and that's why it's important to consider on the left, you'll see competitive advantage. So to those of you who don't know what a competitive advantage is it's something about your business structure that gives you an unfair advantage over your competitors. So it's good to take that into your product. Make sure that what you're selling is something that you do uniquely well. And then the next one down. I'll jump on something they say to give me an example was this. I was talking to a guy a few weeks over a month ago. And about to get more work and keep busy looking at what he does. And it turns out. He's a specialist commercial servicing of like high end oil is an appliance as he knows with the digital. And I'm like, do this really rare is highly enough people in the market. And so he wasn't really aware of the old skill that he really had over everyone else. And so it's about getting into focus on that part because you don't want to be like a general guest. But with inverness in the market right. You want to just say that honing in what do you do really well, you don't want a little be competing for this, which would change you. But all the hot water Sondra. Right right. You want to be going a bit more niche that you can market really well. Yes, of course, it's about finding a place in the market that you do well. But not too many other people are doing well, where you will get good volume of jobs. And we've got a point there just about the name of your company. Ideally you would name your company. So you already have business names already obviously. But it's good practice to have a functional company name, which is a company name that tells people what you do well without you having to explain it to them. So there's not really any point in being Jim plumbing, for example. But if your e not electric then straightaway everybody knows that an electrician and you service the Melbourne market. And I head. I mean, I've had some great names. You really fool them Robbie. The first one was somewhat services Limited and hearing this name because it's this plum this plum that plans that no one can remove what sort of plum what you would. Then I had to pull the plumbing and that was equally as bad as I got the name Dane the plumber and it took me a good decade and a half to shake that name from people. And then I've had men have a plumbing that was that was a phenomenally successful name nominal name. And then your local plumber. And that was very good for Google searching. But even jump on that bandwagon. And the thing. I mean, still is about the change it. So we keep coming. Because when we were quite big and travel to a broad area. And I wanted lots of maintenance work. So therefore, the new name was going to have was weak here to tell customers what sort of business. They were going to call. So Yeah sorry Fellows you might have you. This is my mate your name. It's Yeah. Well, it's never too late to change it. I mean, if you've got a lot of brand built up behind your name, then it doesn't really make sense to change necessarily, but if you're just a place like trades business and you've just started out you'd think that maybe it's not the right name and you can change your service a bit. And you think you can probably rename the company to something that you do really well, then in that case, it's worth considering. Yeah, it's all about high quality clean the pricing you've got high quality finishes what's that customer service. You don't touch on that. Yes But that's just an example of what you should consider. So when you're considering what your product is going to be. You just need to consider whether you're going to have high quality finishes or whether what's going to be the most unique thing about your business, whether it's a competitive advantage or not. You should try and find a unique value proposition. So you can also be lowest price right. We guarantee the cheapest, fastest change in the market right. So you don't always have to be going for top of the market top price. It's like, hey to go full volume and to make money by just selling tons of small jobs right. Yes, absolutely not. So once you've figured out what you're selling and what you want to become you need to figure out how you get the prices jobs down. I imagine you me in the trade businesses figure out how to price themselves based on cost plus margin. But obviously, this depends on what your local markets. So this is something you already know is your interactive in Melbourne or Riviera and Oakland is obviously a bigger market. High quality work. Whereas in areas that are popular say first home buyers there'll be more of a market. So a cheap one off jobs and there's nothing wrong with that. Leslie if there's a massive volume of those jobs, then these might very profitable business. And I think there's the biggest distinction one of the big problems. I find talking to trade business line is Robie is that they want the market to meet them with the rent. And so the big learning. If you can is to labor until throw away what you want and make the market where it's at. And then actually is the quickest way to get work because you work out how the market's prepared to pay for that. Here are the customers and here's my offer and that's how marketing is. Well, that's the point, which is that it's the best way to get the most successful outcome for the if you're marketing 100% Yeah, you need to become known for doing jobs at a price that's realistic. So the market you're in the market, you're in not what you want. And I think that would be the hardest because some people say, well, I just want to change what someone does. And I just want to do all the easy stuff. That's really good money. Well, so does everyone else. And so that measure was heavy be fighting, fighting over this over that same pie. And so I saw a couple of things that we got into. Robbie was we sort of getting known for doing water would apply for preschools. We certainly can specialists at doing really, really cold water play areas for the different techs and it was cool with great work. Very nice. Very specific right. And in good fun and good money, but a little bit off of that Maxine's so that it was going to find those little adjuncts to the main work. Yeah So once you have all these T's crossed and I dotted for the top three on it, then can you start considering promotion which will jump. And so done attract. But the long and short of all of this is that it's imperative for you to know what you do well, what does selling and at what price. Before you start considering promotion or advertising go. If you haven't got the top three sorted, then you're basically just going to be a dead horse once. So it's important to get those top three right. These the all. It sounds like it's not really a marketing decision. But they are marketing decisions. Well, this is marketing right. It's in marketing isn't rocket science, is it really. It's like basic common sense of good does good business fundamentals of like actually having a think about what's going on in the market. 100 percent. I wouldn't usually say this or any Dan but after two years of working with you. I've come to say that you're actually a natural marketer and as you've had a couple of successful businesses and a couple of failures. It shouldn't really be a surprise. That's the thing with you know it or not by virtue of managing or running a trades business you're actually learning about marketing every day. You don't need to go and do some expensive marketing course. Pretty much everything you need to know about marketing is online. You just need to go after it at least can you just cut and paste in that comment from exactly where I do. I'm going to make that my ringtone. Go All right we'll move on to what is my brain. We had a bit of chat about this because I'm pulled on this actually, I'm really this. If you want to talk about we can't we beat a competition right. But just talk about what the Ferguson such a unique name for job management and others very conscious of knowing the grief. I was causing myself by starting out with a really weird name. The really weird logo because I did my first one was job. Shake right. We've until this job. So even kind of understood what it did. But what it was like job shit right. Like what a shit name because it was so boring and dull we looked like everybody else right. And so I read some good articles about brains everything they can try to prove you from. The trade. Is it takes years and years to build a brand, but once you have it, then it's amazing right. Yeah, I. I didn't know that, but you know it's a good point. If I was going to start services business today, then I probably would have given it a name just like jobs because it's functional and says, what it does. But to contradict what I was saying earlier on having a different name like circus is definitely helps us distinguish ourselves. Everybody knows Fergus is the company. I did a job software with a dog. Everybody remembers the dog. And it has a lot of positive brand associations. Yeah, it's about figuring out a strategy and in a brand that works for you. The big thing about the brain right is we've been able to attach a personality to that to the dog inside. What is brain right. So we talked about this like, well, what's your interpretation of like. Even in this world. He didn't bring him up in your brain as you being always be on brain. He's always going to be on brains. It's more than just the dog right. So don't explain what being on brain actually means. Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted to go to. So people often think that the brand is just their logo, but it's actually far more wide reaching than that. So anything that your customer can see and will remember about your business is essentially your brand, your company name your logo is just what you've named that experience. Yeah but if you're a plumber and your company is called professional plumbing. But it took three days to respond to the job request and the boys turned up on site led and they're all spirit on each other. It's not professional, I think it's not on brand. Everything about your business that your customers can see needs to be consistent with what you're saying about your business. Otherwise, there's no point even naming yourself after being professional. Why did you decide to make a decision on. And for those who are wondering some of the cool brain values of Ferguson's friendly and reliable because that's what dogs are. Right and so this, you might know some communications, the way we interact. Everything we try when you for help and support We're always friendly. We're always reliable right because that's kind of cool. It's a cool brain and the dog is representative of a cool brain. That's why we can't get to grumpy right. So we've kind of a cat brain. Yeah Well, let's keep stirring the pot. Go Yeah. I don't have anything else to say on the slide here. I think you want to talk. But I don't I lay with a point too much. But I do want to talk about your brain should be you know. So I do think freemium reliable. I like just core characteristics that every business should head. Right But what that means is that you've got star you say when you answer the phone a friendly you know when we're talking every reliable that means we've got to call people up for light. And so that's part of the brand experience right. That's how you bring a brain to life as you reinforce the behaviors you want to see in your day to day interactions with. Well, I with your staff and with your customers right. That it's bringing that personality to life like we talk about invoices going out and emails going out and quotes going on. It's all got a little ahead. But the way you write the quotes like how you do. Do you write a friendly implication or would you just write it in a big label what comes to mind right. So brain and Mikey's thinking being really conscious of how my communicating to my customers. So it reinforces that experience. And so I think this is where if you really want to get into it having brand values can be helpful. So it's not any use for just you and your business to know what your brand is and what the implications are on customer service and all the other aspects of the business. So if you have brand values and you're very clear about what that is across your business with your employees then they'll know in a black or white fashion whether they're being on brand or not. And so what is. So what do you reckon so the customers who sit on this slide all customer expensive a big on uniforms. I don't take on balance on writing they go on baked guys looking tidy like, you know what. I mean, so far as I had my guys names printed on each of the highlights. So the customer always know who they were talking to. Yeah, I still see a lot of trainees that don't do good advance on writing or good uniforms watch your comments on that. Yeah I think it definitely helps if you love your band as you go on and on. It makes it much more memorable. And this thing and all these little things definitely helps bring if you do have a really strong brand. You've got a lot of opportunities to bring to life. So yeah. The behavior of your staff the way that they can conduct themselves the way that your brand presents itself is why we've got nuts here about collateral and invoicing and email signatures, et cetera. But also the way that you use those things. And the way that that you interact with the customers. It is a really pivotal part of your brand. There's also the reverse is true. You don't do it. What are you actually saying to your staff and your customers. And I think that's the other thing to always be conscious of is if you don't do it to me, it snakes can be so bold to say kind of unprofessional and kind of not serious about your job like handling a major Reno. Reno here at home and the guys the guys coming through the waterproofing today. And he's just come in and blow a regular t-shirt bon Jovi in and I'm like lucky I sort of known but I'm like, man, this is I don't trust this guy you know me. Yeah, I suppose it and to an extent if you're not marketing your business that. Well, it sort of reflects a lot about the rest of the business. Hopefully right. Next one customer experience marketing on big on this. But you do you take it off. Yes, sir. In software we have this expression product led growth, which basically means that if you build a good product or service that will literally sell, sell it sells. So at Fergus on the head of marketing. It's my job to get in touch with as many people as they tried as possible and let them know about various and what we do. But we have thousands of happy customers out there. So do you think that I mean, how much how big of an impact do you think I'm having versus the amount of happy customers that we're having. I wouldn't say that I'm having about 5% the impact that they're having. So this is a concept that is limited to software. I'm not sure there's a similar term and try to service businesses. So let's call it service lane growth to now. But time to work comes first a surprise to any of you that referrals are the best way to get new jobs. But I want to talk about this because of how important it is, even if it seems obvious if you don't have your customer experience nailed down. You're doing to distinguish between some marketing will get you a lot more work than you were anticipating with word of mouth will keep you busy consistently and allow for small growth right. So that's how the two of them together. Yes Yeah, exactly. So if you don't have your customer experience. Now down. You can forget your website to get paid advertising to get all of that. That's your biggest problem. The diagram that I've got here on the right as a flywheel you know what a Huawei was but it's a good way to think of it. So if you've got your customer experience. Now down, then you should invest in it. But if you have unhappy customers and you're spending a lot of money on marketing what you're doing is essentially like trying to keep bucket of water full that has a gaping hole in the bottom of it, and you're trying to turn the tap on instead of 6 0 0. And if you're a plumber and there's a lot of you are going to go with an open water shortage. So can't be done anything. Like a good customer experience looks like answering a fine tuning up on time completing the job seeing the invoice quickly and then making just at the end of the call someone will get some program to all this. Send him an email, a text or a phone call to say like I said, what was the outcome in the job and the price. Like you literally actually have to ask them. Yeah, exactly. Call your customers ask jobs and say was everything up to expectations. And that's not sexy because they are unhappy customers will be the first people to be happier than anything to tell you if there's anything about the service or they experience that wasn't good. And so suggests that because if you don't guarantee that a bunch of other customers that you have down the line will have the same experience. And also that phone call is your cash flow problem, because if they tell you they are not happy. And if they were happy, then we're going to pay you and say thank you to see an invoice. They're not happy. You know follow up for six weeks, you've been got eight weeks that payment was behind someone an office person can be remote just calls every aiming charge at dawn the next day and says, hey, did we meet the expectations are you happy. The customers say Yeah your name. They say yes. And you can ask how we can be budget on time. And it's like say now you go back and fix it. And then that triggers payment right. So if you don't follow up well well that's what lead to. Well Right right. So if this when my business started to grow. So we drive-through. So I started now. So I did. I did a lot of my hobbies through 2008 2011 through the recession that were at least still quite messily through the recession. Right because the customer service was on point. And we were called every charge up till the next day to make sure they were happy enough the repeat customers every time because the big thing there is also the. That means that you will try to you know that you're checking up on the and that accountability that you're checking up counts for a lot and making sure they lift the brand values in the customer experience right. Which means all your problems go down. But you've got to back it up with them. I have so many pithy little statements probably even heard this one. You really never want it down in between. Another blog post. What's inspected is respected where it runs. Yeah, it's a good one. Write another book. I can't see you laughing. So you say it's true that if you don't actually check have you done inspectors then the staff won't respect x It's like, oh, well, we talk about it. But we don't. If you live it right. This code that's called living your brain values actually checking up on it. So that would be my single biggest thing I would do. I would recommend it is actually getting someone to find a customer and saying what was it like to experience your food. And the results might shock you. That was click. But there was no that's given right. Wood creaking on through the wrong was done well. Yeah right. The cosmic ending based on customer experience, not just the long shot of the sliders that you get the best return on marketing investment. If you're just services crystal clear. So if your customers feel that they expected more than what they got. And they're paid more than what was a little then you bet the bottom dollar bottom dollar they won't be happy. Warren buffet you probably want to call me next time on this list that desperate listen. But if you intend if you're spending money on paid marketing you don't get repeat business. So this was very expensive way to get work. Right So marketing you command's website site. So big questions here is like should you have a website and sort of how much money should be spent on a website, then like they talk the talk about the touching off like a maintenance firm. This is a commercial high rise. And the difference in between the which let's say they would need if that makes sense. So I think it's important to touch on this an important concept really for the rest of the way. But it's important to touch on your average contract value. So I'll leave a message. Well, it's high rise construction companies. They depend on these huge projects coming through and they depend on one project will be with millions of dollars to them. So that they can afford to spend a lot more. Try to convert one inquiry into a job whereas smaller businesses unless you're doing massive job volumes and it usually all you need to have on a website is just your contact details a little bit about you and some photography just adds a layer of credibility. But yet generally, you should have a website that helps people learn a bit more about the people that they're working with. The type of work you do. It goes without saying that it's highly likely that a website will improve the amount of inbound job requests you get. And a lot of people think they need to invest in a custom built website. If you want total control and flexibility of our system that might be the best option for you. I wouldn't recommend spending any more than, say K. You should be able to get a good enough website. But less than flies but Yeah. Alternatively, some of you will have heard of wicks and Squarespace watch what is called a seamless content management system. Don't get too deep into that. But basically, the just websites that you can build and manage your own website. So this is an example of one our customers tried once applying it to and take a look and good trade winds plumbing combat you. But this website just took a look. And it looks like it was built entirely and works. So if you're pretty tech savvy in general then I'd recommend this. It's not rocket science. They basically have plenty of templates. You can just float with photos and information about your business. And it's pretty easy once you get the swing of it. They are pretty. And I would think play the most plumbing fumes do a little fiends do not require a custom built with a design. If you've got 20 30 staff and just doing huge volume. It's kind of not needed roughly at my speeds would be ideal. Yeah, exactly. And this. You don't need to spend. I'm sure there'll be some people out there who just you making some good money you really want to base a lot of your brand. But I would say any more than 10 grand You you're putting money down the drain. Yeah, I mean, I mean, when I started, we did. We didn't spend about probably 12 15 count getting it. But this was before all these templates, which once were available. Right I mean, these things were amazing. Yeah Did you have a website from the outset and your local planner. Oh, Yeah Yeah Yeah I had a one page landing page for me no plumbing but you'll look upon that we have we've seen a lot of money on that website. But I wasn't too know we were doing 24000 jobs a year. Sorry we just you know now 6,000 jobs a year 6,000 jobs. So I have a really well. I wanted a really good reach like I wanted to make this work. Good some good some good margin. So I like a lot growing right. So it's a lot of money on that website, and it got paid off lots of landing pages. So did you want to quickly talk about what is a landing page for those who may not have any idea website business the landing page. Oh, Yeah let's cover it now. So this is the best example of that. That's the that's a home page. And we'll go into Google Ads down the lines that might be happening. But you can have landing pages, which are custom built for a particular type of website traffic. So if you're running an advertising campaign to your website, then and you want to do one thing Let's say it's like an inquiry or I don't know what it is. Get it quiet then might just have one page that forces them to do that thing. And won't allow them to sort of hover around the site and procrastinate quite good. But they need someone who knows what they're doing wrong with that some stuff. Yeah, exactly. But for your home page. If you're unsure about what's put on a website if you want to get started, just find 10 websites. The businesses that are similar to yours in Tim websites that you like and copy the structure you running the attending fund two or three that you like and just copy the scratch. Try not to copy it exactly. But But I mean, this guy is now not right. It's got a phone number on the front on the front page. Olson how did you find them under Contact Us. It's like what you see this business. You want your find number like and they want to tell you what they do. They say Brisbane based plumbing contractors and maintenance technicians and it's so critical. If you think you fool pays right. They told you exactly where they are and what they do. Well spot on. What the system is it doesn't even in wilderness. But if you don't think that that's up your alley going and building your own website that's I mean, a lot of people don't. And that's totally fine. But I've just put a night before Squarespace marketplace, which is you can go back to sleep. Yeah squeeze my eyes. That's it's a marketplace. You can go to and you can find Swiss space professionals or specialize in helping you do what you want. Far cheaper a developer. Autonomy is a corporate fly me away if I were charging more than $100 or so to build a website for you. But in any case, it's definitely cheaper and getting a developer to do it. They'll dump it and get it done right. Right So this is Google says, I keep on about this as we were going through it. What is Google My Business. So I give my business is something a lot of you will have seen before, whether you know it or not, some of you may have already set it up. But it's super easy to get going with it. Again adds a layer of credibility to your business. But more importantly, it just makes it really easy to find. You and contact you on top of that, people can also labor views, which adds a layer of trust you'll see our views on the right there. You usually get these reviews organically but if you set this up. You should also follow up with your best customers and ask them to review you on Google. Now usually do it happily again adds a layer of credibility. People can say that other people have used you that it's not just some bogus company that's just run by some nitwit who has no idea what he's doing. So all you have to do is Google Search, Google. My business. And the first results should take you to the page. Just follow those steps and get set up. They'll basically just send you an authorization packet just to make sure that you'll get to a business address and you just follow the steps and then you're also. So I set this up on my own. As you can see, it's got directions. It's got a snippet from Google Street view of what our building looks like. If someone needs to come to the building want to know in advance what the building looks like. I think I'll probably add some photos of our team to this later on just to humanize the business a bit. And you'll see where it says appointments you can actually add a calendar booking link. So I'm using free software called calendar leaf of Ferguson's cale in the Ly. It's super easy to use integrates with Google Calendar. So that people can book appointments with you. But only book appointments with you when you're free. It makes us much easier to get in touch with shows that we want to talk to and we want to do business with you, which is always good. And so this is just kind of free right. The system gets totally free. You don't actually even need a website to get the set up. Google just needs to know that you're a legit business. And I think your coach you are dressed right. You takes a bet or something. So they know that you're an excellent race, right. Yeah, exactly. Yeah right. Emily just Google buys all these things are great. Why do you think they do it. I charge just to get just to get traffic right. Yeah, I think it's just to get you in the door. But the thing is Google also want the way that Google makes money is that they improve the experience of people who are searching for things. So Google want if people are if you're searching Google Google want you to find what you're looking for because it means you enjoy the software you enjoy Google you think it works well. And you'll come back and you'll keep searching for other things that you want, which means that they can sell ad space on those pages. So we'll kind of that Tom Google Google wants to help you find what you're looking for as long and short of it. And so this is just another good marketing. Just another one like sign other quiver in your body. So when we slow down. You can give it another era in the quiver isn't it, that you do. Yeah, totally free already free right now Google AdWords should you shouldn't you if you do. How much. Oh my goodness. When did you start running good some local plumber. No, I mean plumbing all point. Some probably doing Google Edwards on it for 20 years. Yeah, I don't think I did it. And if pipes comments for about 20 years. Yeah like this is just not my skill. It never has been never will be. But you just think it's going to get easier. Yesterday used to be some people call it Edwards simply because it used to be Google AdWords. Now it's Google Ads. But if you don't know much about how Google works if you search electrician plumber or builder and Google Google just find the best websites to show you at the top. So I've listed a little trick. If you have a website already and you want to see which pages of your website are on Google then you can Google search your site, you are also, if you search sites the you put type in the website, then call on. And then dot dot dot what have you, or your business you are less than Google show you all of the pages that are on Google that Google knows exist on your website. And so the distinction between organic versus paid is that if you took all the right boxes, you'll shop at the top organically which just means that you aren't paying to be there. But it takes a lot of time and effort in something that's called acr which we won't cover today. So if you're a small business. There's a lot of you will be. And you don't have the marketing manpower you can pay to be at the top, which is totally fine. We do it most digital businesses do it. And tons of trades businesses. And that's what Google Ads. Is it just means that you don't have to spend all this time trying to figure out how to shop the tops of free, which actually costs a lot of money in R&D of itself. So as Dan saying I wouldn't ever recommended setting up Google Ads a couple of years ago because it's quite complex and it's easy to waste a lot of money. But now they have something called Google Ads express and I've just put the name there, which is a light version and makes it really easy to go and click Campaigns together. Even if you don't know what you're doing. You can go on Google and just search how to set up Google Ads express campaigns. It's not too difficult. You can sort of get your head around it over the course of the day. But I've just put an example, there of the amount of searches that I was looking in Brisbane for this is this thing called keyword planet, which is afraid to let Google Ads has where you can look for the amount of times that somebody searches a particular thing what they call a keyword. And so I searched electrician and Brisbane and you can see that it sort of hovers between 2,529 such as a month. And so it's realistic that if you have a website and you set up a campaign. Let's say you're in Brisbane you're a Sparky. There are 2,400 searches a month. It's realistic that you get about 120 clicks. And on the right, it says it's sort of between seven and $14. So let's say it's 10 Australian dollars a click, then it costs you about 1,200 a day to get what would probably result in being about 20 requests for jobs. So depending on your average contract value and how big your jobs are this may or may not suit you. 1,280 days, maybe too much. But it might be very little one might be worth the amount of requests. So we're looking to convert those leads but then as phased as I can tell, this is the next day right. If someone like us says, this is my no, no. By being. But like what I got on about all the time. People who then go to the effort of doing this. And then they don't answer they find Yeah. Yeah, exactly Yeah. you have to have a business model to support it otherwise they won't get their way. So it beggars belief right. So generally people like people are searching you. They'll call you and you just find within 10 seconds with a person or they'll bounce and go somewhere else, right. And you've just wasted by 660 bucks. Well, I know too much labor for a school that converts. You notice the difference right. And so if you're going to do digital marketing and spend you do actually have to find a way to answer your phone. That's just that's just the deal. Because I have many people. I don't think in this. The people looking for trainees. Most of not going to send you an email request for work right. Most of the going to jump on the phone and say we'll give you a ticket right. And so you've got to think about what we call that confusion that we call it top of funnel and conversion from the. From the interest to the sale you've got you've got to think about that process of like, well, am I making it easy to get hold of me and easier to buy right. Yeah, exactly. That's really good point. So this is where the investment in your website and having making it as easy as possible for people who want you want your business. So people who want to do all the jobs services that you're offering you need to make it as easy as possible for them to get in touch with you. So that's where having landing pages what Dan was mentioning before or just even just you don't really need to have landing pages. It might help. But even just having a very clear home page and basting and making it really easy to use and very clear about what you're doing. That's where you'll get the return on that investment. Big find no nice and not big numbers. Why can't reach more numbers any more websites where it's in Sydney point font. I'm like, why the one thing you want to do is call you. Put your number in like '15 point font. So I can read it. And then answer your phone. It just beggars belief still people think just don't answer the phone or they don't. They haven't even got it set up of so-called forward to an answer see this rare case not something like I know from my days plumbing just the difference that might when the missed calls went to an answer services person spike and then you just got every call like you just even wasted a single layer coming your way. And if you don't do that. I mean, obviously, people get full, sometimes they can take on more work. There's no point in continuing to run as good. Another good thing about Google Ads is that you can just go on at any time as literally the flick of a button. And the ads also you stop back until you have the capacity to take on more jobs and you want to talk about it. So you can. You can then you can put the team electrician in right. Yes the trick is trying to find light switch repair or else you'll see the lights right. The cheaper ones that still give the work because it's best the trick in that. Yeah, definitely if you can. So the electrician is just as wonky but obviously, you play it. Just do a bunch of searching around things that anybody might search when they're looking. So what you're selling. So after a while, you sort of have a bunch of terms and there are some of them competitive which means that a lot of people are trying to advertise on that keyword which means that they're more expensive. But as Dan saying often if you can find less competitive ones they might have less volume but they're cheaper and it might be a good place to carve yourself out of it. Now I thought you could get a list of those words from Google would give you a list of common tunes also that were search all the time around electrical. Yeah, exactly. Yeah So if you plug-in your website and gerbils put out a bunch of those terms that you should for. And I think if it's your first time doing it. I really would just pay someone to help. Wouldn't you agree doing yourself is really hard. Those first few times. Yeah, I would recommend using Google Ads express just for ongoing maintenance once you know what's going on. But yeah definitely I would agree with you on that. And you should just get. There are tons of people that consider it up to. It shouldn't cost too much. We're talking in the hundreds not thousands right. You're talking hundreds to seal it up not thousands. Yeah All you need is particularly if you're a plumber in a local area or a builder. What have you. Well, it is two or three campaigns that should take somebody two or three hours. Yeah not a big deal not a big deal. Tony was doing. But only once you've got your customer service sorted some brain sorted regional website being campaigns that you've got to layer it out right. You can't just say all stuff I'll do it tomorrow. It's like it's not it's not going to work. Well, it, it will work. It just won't be an effective return on your investment. Yeah Yeah. But I'm so Yeah. So we thought it might be good to cover email marketing and CRM so CRM as a customer relations or customer relationship managers. They basically just help you manage and communicate with all the customers that you have in your let's say your customer list was a database. But an easy way to do this is most of you would be using zero or MYOB. I'm not sure if it might be has I think cookbooks might have a similar marketplace. But they'll basically show you a marketplace full of email marketing softwares that you can plug at your accounting automate accounting integrations into. And then you just exploit your customer list. And you can build email templates or again hire some things we're making just seconds right. Right need to explain and it just syncs it right through. Yeah, they're good integrations. Yes Should should just suck it straighter. And then you can send out if, for example, you're in the beginning or coming to the end the opt out. So we've been through here and you wanted to send out an offer. Just say, you know, maybe get your filters replaced or something. This is a really good way to just get some quick business. Yeah, so here's my old plumbing company for those who wondering why won't you get your local plumber. So there's the dog again. So people always love the dog. And so what's the difference between a see a green mocking me since Bruce is just doing an email blast for those who don't get it right. Because the you don't want to send an email. This has got a politics. You want to have some sort of logo written and offer some brands that actually catches your eye like this. Yeah, exactly. So the Sarin is really just the system that manages your customers for you. But email marketing like Mailchimp will help you build an email template. So that you can get your brand in there. You can change all the takes that you have in there as Dan or science often is to get somebody to come in and help you get set up with these names if you feel like your company or not you can you can manage and/or on an ongoing basis. But people are talking hundreds to see these campaigns and not sales and right. And these are team plates. Then why not someone have one star of you know is actually really good software right. We're talking at the one store. This isn't fair. Milton's amazing. Yes Yes. So my be prison it's 100 to like a campaign to do the branding and the colors and set this up. So not thousands right. Yeah Yeah. Spot on. I say somebody got a question about whether Fergus is integrated with this, we don't integrate with market formation software. But we obviously integrate with zero. So if you're using zero, then you can just export from export from zero. Yeah So for those who don't get it. So Fergus sees the customers to 0. And that's it. Every time there's a change to a customer day. It's changed in 0 and like immediately. It's automatic. And so the reason we do that, that way is that if you go to Martina you can then put at any CRM integration from zero to use. Right and to go that way. So all the cons. So all the customer contacts are maintained accurate and zero that you can then use. And they work like marketing campaigns like this to your existing customer likes work really well. Right So that is a super cost effective. They work. It's not often that you still get the old email from an unsophisticated person a CCD you know 100 people onto the same email marketing message. And it's like the if not that wasn't very good. Yeah Yeah. So that you these systems will just help you do it in a sophisticated professional way. It definitely reflects the best of it gives us so much better than just sending out email blasts 1,000 people and Google. Yeah, that's good. Yes, that's a good question. Doesn't this only seem to build customers to zero. That's correct. We only seen build customers to zero. But if you did want to export all your customers from Ferguson you can't get a customer sitting and export your entire customer database and then apply that into the sea or you wish to use and all the Syrians also have a function for duplicates. So it would ignore it would overwrite duplicates. So you wouldn't end up with the same contacts or happen overnight. They should have prevented temps question do you think these are worth doing Robbie doing during this email marketing campaign as a market. Absolutely Yeah. Particularly in the context of times like if you're in New Zealand or Victoria, the lockdown of adventure if you've got a lot of operational costs fixed costs that you feel like you need to recover its debt. If you just need a quick revenue boost. There are tons of little jobs obviously, that a lot of your regular customers might want. But I use the example of getting a photo change if you can just offer a discount on a job that anybody needs done regularly. And so now's a good time to get a tan and then that's a great way to get a small boost of revenue just to tide you over. Yeah And it keeps you. It also keeps your brain front of mind for the customer right. How often you know someone asked Martina Helfenbein would you seen an email newsletter that's a good one. It depends on the type of business that you're running. Usually if you're using an email marketing tool they can show you your unsubscribe right. I haven't got it anywhere in the presentation, but if you'll unsubscribe right. Those are the 1.5 percent. Then you know that you've probably seen intimate emails. I would say once a month should be fine. People get too fast about you for a campaign and you say that I can probably twice a year for a newsletter where I apply them. And this is got keep dogs and cats for animals as I read really funny funny about it. But usually there's no campaign is a seasonal like you know summer you know water filters water lakes winter drains cleaning. So making the seasonal work the team is. Last topic and then will summarize social media showed you shouldn't you Instagram, Facebook snapchat. My goodness yes. So the idea that we've discussed this a lot over the past few days is long and short of it is really good. It shouldn't be the business on it. But it's definitely worth setting up. So having a lot of content online that shows the quality of your workmanship particularly if you're a highly involved in your local community pages you get a lot of work out of that. It's a good way of engaging repeat customers and getting referrals. People can tag each other and particularly if you're a builder, you get to sort of take credit for the old job on new builds and it's good to invest in getting good photography you get a good photographer and take photos of the finish of the house. People love that content. So yes, it's definitely worth your time. Yeah, unfortunately for those of us who don't like it. We do have to build a bridge and get over it. There's a lot of customers who do use Facebook to find customers, and they do chicken instead. I've never done Instagram in my life wouldn't I wouldn't know how to let my snapchat. Thank goodness. I got Robbie in the wonderful team that figures to do that for us. But it does work. Unfortunately, it does actually work. If you say don't bet the farm on it. But it does bring you in a certain type of work like you probably are going to get in your household. But if you want to fix text and filters and switches and Abdul what seats is all this more jobs. You will get lots of that sort of work from people tagging you. They were quite active on it. Yeah the key benefit of using social media is that it's social and everybody's connected. And so it's never going to be easy for anybody to share content than it does on social media. So if you've done a good job and you can make a post that starts trending then a bunch of people take each other. You get really good exposure better exposure that you will get from an email being photographed out, for example. So that's what it's good for. Him a really good question. By 10 minutes really. I think it's actually a really better question is when these probation actually what. And fact, will say this is part of the summary actually really because you know good question. By 10, which was this question is sitting up all the ads and social takes time. And then they go stale without being updated. Do you guys recommend third parties for taking on the role of overall step maintenance. Yeah, I mean, I think setting up the ads actually doesn't need to go style unless like we had a lot of ads running. So serious on Google Ads that probably been there for about two years and haven't been changed because we aren't changing anything significant about the business. No less relevant today than they were a couple of years ago. But with social Yeah. That's definitely that's definitely a consideration. Well, I suppose if you're talking about social ads. It depends on the content. If whatever you are advertising is something that's time specific and at some point become outdated and Yeah though they'll require some upkeep. I think if you're going to go down the avenue of really starting to invest a little bit if you're going to get somebody to come in an office lady or a marketing girl to kind of one day a week and just take care of all the stuff, then it makes sense to get them. Yeah, it wouldn't be one thing. Wait right. I think the way I with him is I hate it. I wouldn't I wouldn't. I know it needs to be done. It's not my skill set. And before I would totally outsource that to keep things up every week to week in and out all these agencies totally would do an hour or two hours a week or fortnight right. So there was just a little job in, out. So you don't like it outsource it. That's my question right summarizing it. I got a ton what's the last one. Neil Patel company. So I'll just it up. Get the basics right. So that's what we're talking about beginning just fundamentals. Make sure that you have all that sorted out. Make sure you're pricing yourself properly for the market you're and make sure that you're selling jobs that people want a lot in your area. So that's so it goes without saying. And then focus on what you can manage yourself. And outside of that, if you don't think you can manage it yourself. And if you don't think it's I mean, a lot of you will go down the path. A lot of people go down with you interested in it and you want to set up some campaign campaigns. But in a lot of cases, it's not cost efficient for your business, for you to spend five days looking good. So it's often this really is the best option just to outsource it. And then you can sort of once it set up, you can learn as you go. Yep And I think for those who is marketing is there's a lot to it right. I mean, the fundamentals are not rocket science, but to do it. Well, it does. It does require you know what we've got for a full team in marketing probably runs a full time team and we could do with why more. But you know, we had a dedicated not dedicated marketing person who would do work every week for us in the plumbing through outsourced and it's much easier to do a consistent amount every week and after a year you websites looking amazing. Your Edwards are working well. But the whole thing is he's been a little bit every week over the course of the year, the whole thing gets into tip top shape and it's I mean, in most cases, it's really just operational expenditure the amount of time that you spend marketing the business. You'll get that my back not doing it. Well, you get that money back real quick. Yeah, you should probably get probably a fog to entertain for every dollar you spend if you spend it. Well, you will get phone calls back. But yet. We won't need to god do again. You don't need to go do some expensive marketing course. I think particularly in digital marketing which is just online marketing. I think a lot of digital marketers and agencies that they talk that you'll talk to they'd like to try and over complicate things in some cases, that sort of just try and cloud out conversations with jargon. So that they give off the impression that they're hyper technical. But realistically marketing can be as complicated or as simple as you need it. Granted there are definitely some disciplines inside marketing that are a bit more complicated and you should go ahead and get somebody to outsource that too. But there are plenty of ways that we didn't cover today much print examples, but I know a bunch of people who are landscapers who had lived in residential areas that were quite affluent and so they just went around the neighborhood around where they're living handed out brochures put them in everybody's letterbox and said, I'm a landscaper. I do this. And everybody was glad to know that everybody wants to know if there's somebody that lives close to them. That's locals somebody I can trust that can good for quality landscaping work. So you don't need to go and set up a website if you think that it's all completely over your head. There's lots of easy things you can do like that. So yeah and that last example Neil Patel so if you feel like today was the sort of palatable for you and you think that it's pretty easy to be a manager god set those things up and you're looking for ongoing steps. Neil Patel is. And he's just a digital marketer he runs a business that helps consult people on digital marketing, but it's really just digital marketing tips for entrepreneurs. If you sign up with them for free adults injury tips every week super useful and over the course of the year, you'll be blown away by how much of that, and thank you for joining us. Robbie that's been great for those of you. Be good to get your feedback to know if you want more and do it. Because if you see those emails we can do more in-depth marketing. He has good feedback on it. And is very Connie. I'm going to give you all his personal cell phone number. You can call him any time he'll solve all your banking problems for you. So thanks for offering to do that. Now it's a big day. We're not giving you a number. It would be great, wouldn't it. But I'm no. We'll send you these notes and thank you so much for attending. I hope we added value to you a day. Robin, thank you for taking the time, and we actually put a bit of thought into this didn't wait to try and make it through a lot. Make it useful not too overwhelming. So thank you for your time. You put this, Robin and I think we will. We will wrap it up at 1258 on the dot. Thanks, guys. That's coming up right here in the wake.