4 ways to be a stand-out tradie

Delivering a great customer experience can be as simple as being visible, reputable and reliable – but how do you stand out from the pack?

Combine visibility with a great customer experience, and you’ll start to get oh-so-valuable referrals, as well as the prospect of repeat business from your happy clients.

So how do you make it happen? Here are some simple steps you can take:

1. Become easy to find

Clients want to be able to research you online before committing to the job.

Cover the basics and make sure that your Google My Business listing is up-to-date, including a contact phone number and the hours during which customers can call you.

If you’re happy to take calls seven days a week, make sure your listing reflects this.

2. Add an ‘extra’

Being a stand-out in your field is often as simple as offering one feature that your competitors don’t.

When you’re thinking of ways to make your customers happy, put yourself in their shoes.

They’re spending a lot of money, on their home, and they’re trusting someone they might not know very well to do it.

Plus, they’ve heard lots of horror stories along the way. What can you do to put their mind at ease, and help them to enjoy the experience?

Some ideas include:

• A complimentary cleaning service

One of the biggest complaints following jobs is the mess that’s left behind- especially if the clients haven’t moved out during the renovation job. If you find a cleaning company to partner with, you can remove this worry with a complimentary clean once your part of the job is done.

• A hamper delivered when your clients move into their new or renovated home

Moving day is a huge milestone for your clients. This is something they might have been looking forward for years.

Celebrate this with them by delivering a hamper, complete with a bottle of champagne so that they can enjoy toasting a job well done.

• A follow up email

Once the job is done-and-dusted, get in touch to make sure that everything’s as they expected. This shows that you stand behind your work, and that client satisfaction is genuinely important to you.

When they get back to you, now is also a great time to ask them for a photo that you can share on your social media.

• Using a phone answering service

It’s hard to get to the phone when you’re on the job, but it’s really important that your customers can get a response.

An answering service like Office HQ is the solution to giving every customer an immediate and personal response.

3. Let customers pay on the go

To make things easier for your customers, and to keep your business buoyant, make sure that you can collect payments on the go.

The ability to send and receive invoices from site means that you’re not losing whole days to ‘doing your invoicing’ but it also makes life easier your customers who can choose to sort out their payments on the spot.

4. Collect feedback and act on it

If you’re really committed to providing better service, considering using a service like Survey Monkey to collect feedback.

Ask your customers for their honest responses and be prepared to follow up with them on any negative feedback to make sure that this isn’t going to stand in the way of future work or a referral.

Follow these simple steps, and choose the right systems, and you’ll be well on the way to repeat business. Don’t forget to ask your happy customers for a testimonial for your website!