Service Magic

[Nate10928]

Anyone ever heard of this company Service Magic or done any work for them? I was contacted by them today and everything sounds great but you usually know what that means. There a lead company that I would pay $10.00 for every lead that I sign up through them. Thanks for any help.

[picframer]

Lawn care business tips

Google Service Magic Review...read a few, it is not something I would be interested in based on contractor comments/experience.

__________________
Andy
Halifax, Nova Scotia

[mac83]

do not use them ! i used them last year for ( 1 year ) and all i got was ( 1 ) lead/customer . it's not worth the money at all . the best thing that you can do is just go out and advertise your self .

[dpld]

service magic is crap. i know about 10 contractors that have used these clowns rangeing from landscapers to roofers and plumbers and service magic sucked for all of them.

the very lead they send you that you pay for they send to several other companies at the same time and it becomes a horse race to who gets to the customer first and gives them the lowest price.

think about it, thats what you do now answering calls from your own ads.
you got to call them back and give them the best price except with service magic you got to pay for all those leads, so in the end what are they really getting you other than a stupid homeowner who can think for themselves and got to use a nation wide scam service to find their contractors.

personally, anyone who does their shopping through a service like that i don't want as a customer.

the best customer is a educated customer and it is so much more easier to deal with someone that knows exactly what they are looking for and where to get it.

[pfreeman]

I have heard the complaints. I have had a great experience with Service Magic. You pay an initial startup fee. It offers access to the internet market that most of us do not have a real presence in. I pay between $7 and $22 per lead, not per closed contract. I have a closure rate of 35%. When I consider that a contract is worth an average of $2,000 annually, it seems like a no brainer. I have added 9 mowing customers, 4 tree trimming customers, and 2 fertilizer customers. That represents a tremendous amount of revenue for this year and I will maintain them next year. The key to success seems to be responding to the lead immediately, not letting them flounder or search for another provider.

[Steve]

Does a lot of the results you may or may not get from this service depend on the level of competition in your area and how many of them are signed up with the service as well?

[pfreeman]

In my market, there are 7 other providers. All of my landscape maintenance leads, I am the only provider. That also is true with tree pruning and fertilization. I set a budget of up to $250 in leads for a month. It works well for me. Our market is only 235,000 in the 2 counties that we service. I bid 2 large landscape maintenance project today from Service Magic leads. I will probably land them both. The initial bids total more than $1,200 plus options for additional work.

[lov2mow]

I have heard of all the bad comments, but I got to tell you I have spent $2,000.00 with direct mailing and news paper and recieved nothing. Service Magic I get up to 10 leads a week. Yes you dont land 100% some are just thinking about it and some dont answer the phone. But the ones you do get for me have been good customers with repeat work. In 1 year I spent maybe $300.00 with service magic and have 25 customers from it.

[dpld]

Originally Posted by lov2mow

I have heard of all the bad comments, but I got to tell you I have spent $2,000.00 with direct mailing and news paper and recieved nothing. Service Magic I get up to 10 leads a week. Yes you dont land 100% some are just thinking about it and some dont answer the phone. But the ones you do get for me have been good customers with repeat work. In 1 year I spent maybe $300.00 with service magic and have 25 customers from it.

newspapers are a waste of time because no one reads them anymore and as time goes by they get smaller and smaller because there are less businesses willing to advertise in them.

direct mailings are useless and are the biggest waste of money out there you might as well get a sharpie and pull your pants down and right sale on you *** and stand on a street corner, you would probably get more results.

you need to create your own mailing list and target market directly to them yourself.
in your travels and day to day life when you come accross a well maintained home that looks proffessionaly maintained right the street name and house number down and if there is a name thats even better but all you need is a physical address.
stick to homes you know are proffessionaly serviced that pay someone to do their work and stay within the area's you want to work in.

viola, you have a mailing list, now go to a postcards.com or other site and have your own mailers made and get several styles with different specials for different times of the year and get a postage machine because postcards cost a fraction of a standard letter.

once a month open the floodgates and bombard your mailing list with your mailings and make it where every month they open their mailbox and your name is in their face.
mix it up so you are not sending the same exact postcard every month and eventually you will reap the rewards.

it costs about 50.00 for 500 postcards and they only cost about .17 cents each to mail and average about 135.00 for every 500 homes you mail to includeing the cards and postage.
it don't get any cheaper then that, and the best part is your material is getting to people you know use these types of services and there is very little waste in regards to your material getting sent to homes that don't use these services as well as competitors like mass mailings do.

i been at it for 22 years and i have made a fortune off of this and i have made 10 times the money off of it compared to newspapers and the internet as well as mass mailing companies and it is all local to my area.

we are doing a half a mil a year in business and 90% came from this type of advertiseing and the furthest i have to drive to do a job is about 4 miles from where i live and the only thing i will add is that it only works if you do it often and it takes a while so if after 3 months you are not seeing the results and quit doing it you will have prematurely gave up on it.

like i said, find a cheap source for the cards, get your own postage machine and get a mailing list software so you can enter all the names in your computer and once a month print the self stick address labels.
it takes us about 40 minutes from start to finish to send out 500 cards each month and a 135.00 to reach 500 homes in your local area to people who use your services is priceless and a investment in your future.

the key is to do everything in house because that is how all the big companies do it and it obviously works for them and it has worked for me and anyone else who tried it and stuck with it.

[Upscale2]

Good information dpld!

There is an easier way to send postcards right from your computer. No stamp machine required. No labels to print. Ink ain't cheap!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And what about all of that time spent on putting your mailings together. I can mail out 5000 postcards in less than 30 minutes. Oh, and I do!

The rest of your info. is spot on.

Hope you guys are as busy as I am this spring! It's out of control! Buying a new truck next week. 2012 F-350, should be nice!