Well, it’s all gone a bit, Pete Tong, hasn’t it?
The cost of food is up. My Friday night Kebab costs more, and the tasty IPA I’m currently drinking is £7.20. The diesel for my van is £1.92, and the minimum wage for my apprentice is more than last year.
Copper, flux, radiators, boilers and “serviceable parts” well, let’s not go there.
Everybody will agree that £100 in your pocket this month is not the same as £100 a year ago. Undoubtedly, the answer should be to increase the prices for services to our customers? The £10 per service increase we did 2 years ago has now been wiped out by the changes to Building regulations part L, and with all the recent price increases in every industry, we must consider increasing our prices again. But how? What will happen if we put another £10 onto every boiler service or another £100 onto each boiler swop?
Increasing pricing periodically is not a bad thing. Your best and most loyal existing customers will expect and accept this from time to time.
But, without any forward thinking, planning and action, you will probably find that this added £10 per service or £100 per boiler swop might lose you more of the quotes for new customers than needed. There are two choices for you to make here. Accept losing some old customers and quotes for new customers, or try to avoid losing customers & quotes by stepping up your game and improving your marketing, product or service. Let’s explore both routes.
Losing customers is that a bad thing?
We are always told we must keep customers happy, but what if 10% of your customers are holding your business back?
Time is money, and money is time. Given that we are all daft busy, wouldn’t losing a few existing customers help free us up to only work for those who don’t mind the price increase? You know, your best current customers and new customers that do not know your past costs?
Increasing your prices and accepting a small purge may be the best. You might work less, get paid the same in less time and find time to spend with loved ones or invest in your future business focused on customers that are happy to pay more than the 10% of customers that did not want to pay the extra?
Stepping up your game
Let’s now look at the other route. How can we step up our game and improve our product, service and overall marketing?
Improving your product and the value attached is possible by understanding what we call perceived value. Understanding that your customers should be split into groups, with each customer group having “common” essential requirements that need addressing in your marketing to them. Add additional value by finding the bells and whistles your competitors do not know or talk about. Here’s an example:
“Free Central Heating Thermography Inspection” or
“Free 90-day Cosy Home Help & Support.”
Adding lines like this to your boiler quotations will add value if you provide educational material explaining how this helps the customer. Stepping up your products & game.
Improving your customer service to your existing customers may not improve profits but most certainly will change your value to new customers when choosing who they will do business with.
Last month’s Boiler Business Article (May/June 2022) covered The Customer Journey, so I will not go into much detail here. The 101 on improving your service is to take some time to map out your customer journey from start to finish and look at how you can enhance every contact you have with the customer.
Take Control of Your Marketing
Investing in your marketing knowledge will be the best thing you can do to step up your game. Businesses that know the difference between marketing and advertising will invest in websites and improve their customer journey. The experience of those first few customer connections will build perceived value and help you charge more money whilst keeping expenditure down.
Those that don’t understand marketing may try expensive short-term advertising. Although this works for the largest heating companies, who have the budget to spend with well-built websites and have the customer journey nailed, most small businesses don’t have these essentials, so they find little reward from advertising. To step up your game and take control of your marketing, head to theboilerbusiness.co.uk website for a free five-part masterclass.
FREE FIVE PART MARKETING CLASS
Head on over to our website for the free marketing & sales masterclass
Also, surround yourself with like-minded, forward-thinking businesses discussing all things business within our industry. Engage with 1500 other engineers on The Boiler Business Facebook group. We’d love to connect! www.facebook.com/groups/theboilerbusiness
Tom Lee-Zmuda
Hey buddy. My name is Tom, a former heating engineer turned marketing Jedi. My team and I specialise in helping local HVAC and Solar business owners dominate Google and sell their most profitable services. We are committed to building the best ROI through local SEO, kick-ass websites & sales communications that attract, sell and keep your best five-star customers.
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