When to advertise

[clandscaping44]

I live in NY and we just got over alot of snow storms. The snow is prob about 2 feet high on the grass. Question is when is the best time to advertise spring clean ups and regular weekly lawn maintenance??? keep in mind there is still 2 feet of snow on the ground. does it matter?

[cleancutlawncare5382]

Lawn care business tips

I live in NW Pa. where our climate is similar to yours. I start mowing about the first week in April. My newspaper ad will start running middle of March. Paper has a special if you run it for 13 weeks. That’s in efforts of new customers. Last years customers will be contacted first part of March to confirm services. Clean ups and other up sells will be offered then also.

__________________
www.montgomerysqualitylawncare.com

[shahoo80]

I agree with Cleancut,

I am around Kansas City area, I started advertising mid March. What people have said here on the form is watch for the Home Depot, Lowes Spring sale ad.
I noticed last year for me end of March I was tilling gardens and by Mid April I was slammed with bids.

[stevef1201]

The absolute best time to advertised is ALWAYS. I never let my add expire. Sure its cold the grass aint growing, but the snobirds always read the newspaper. Beleive me when I tell you they always call with "I saw your ad, do you do_____?". Then I tell myself i should have put that in the ad becaseu yes i do install gardens, or plants, or rake leaves, or trim trees, etc., I have gone to look at some jobs that are just way too big, a 50 foot tree with limbs over the house, and tell them no sorry I can't do that but I know another guy who does and give them his name and number ( I have gotten two jobs from him too. They were too small for him to do cheap enough).
Advertise every day, put in everything you do, you never know what people will want. Do you have all of your services listed on you card? I did a power washing job, and after they looked at my card, I got a hedge job, and a lawn contract.

[Steve]

The absolute best time to advertised is ALWAYS. I never let my add expire.

Do you change the wording of your ad at all throughout the year? If so, what do you suggest?

[TheGoat]

I agree that the best time to advertise is all the time, but there are also times when it is beneficial to "step it up" for a period of time.

So the question becomes, How do I maximize my advertising impact with a short term spending increase. The goal is to fill up the space so that competitors are crowed out, and to temporarily raise your exposure.

I use google to determine when to turn it up a little.

This link shows the Search volume for the term "lawn care" in New York state.
From the graph you can see that search traffic (people looking for service) spikes starting the last half of Feb through the end of April.

http://www.google.com/insights/searc...o=US-NY&cmpt=q

For your area I'd start Feb 17 and ramp ad spending to slightly lead the historical search performance. Give them the answer before they have to ask the question.

Deland Lawn Service

[Steve]

That is a very interesting tool! When you look at it, how do you know when you should ramp up your marketing? Should it be before the uptick, in the middle of it or at the peak?

Also, what is your view on increasing your spending on google ad words during that time?

[TheGoat]

I pull the raw numbers for each year, copy them into a single spreadsheet and average all the years worth of data together to develop a average interest over time.

I try to lead the increase in interest by about a week.

As far as adwords, I think it is an effective tool for advertising and I increase spending there as well.

[Steve]

I agree that the best time to advertise is all the time, but there are also times when it is beneficial to "step it up" for a period of time.

What is your view on how long that period of time should last?

So the question becomes, How do I maximize my advertising impact with a short term spending increase. The goal is to fill up the space so that competitors are crowed out, and to temporarily raise your exposure.

Also what is your view on the best method to do this? I am sure some readers are thinking, what space you are referring too and how can they crowd out their competitors?

[TheGoat]

Originally Posted by Steve

What is your view on how long that period of time should last?

Well, the goal will be to maintain that increased ad spend indefinitely, but shift the targeting of the ads as the seasons change. For now I will focus on acquiring new service, as we transition into fall I'll shift the ad focus to selling landscape installs.

Originally Posted by Steve

Also what is your view on the best method to do this? I am sure some readers are thinking, what space you are referring too and how can they crowd out their competitors?

When I talk about space, generally, it's about the amount of attention a person will give to advertising on a given day. My flyer on their door, or my add on their screen. I have been advertising on facebook targeted to my area and demographics I developed based on my most desirable clients which gives me a target audience of about 25k. over the past two months I have gotten over 500000 "impressions" for an average of 20 impressions per user at a cost of about $90. This is good for me because as part of a total advertising stragety, I can saturate the demographic I am targeting in the areas I want to get more work, so when they see my flyer on their door, they'll say, "that's familiar, what is it?"

I rank highly on google as well but I still advertise with adwords because that is one advertising space a competitor cannot occupy.