Nobody wants to work with D-grade clients; they don’t listen to your advice, they don’t respect your authority and they pay late.
Unfortunately, people might underestimate you or label you as “just like the rest”, even before they start working with you. This is the reason why they might ask for a cheaper price and expects you to do so much for them.
As an owner of your construction business, you only want what’s best for you and your company, and that includes better clients. But how do you attract better clients?
Here are some tips on finding better clients for your construction business:
1. Know Your Worth
This is not just knowing how much you should price your service or products, it’s knowing how much your time is worth. Time is a very expensive resource that once used, you can never get back again. You don’t want to just give away your time for nothing.
If you want to get high-quality clients, you have shown that you are a high-quality, professional builder or tradie.
So be confident about your service or product. If you price what you have too low, that would mean that you are not confident with your service, or you think nobody would pay for a higher price. Either way, cheap prices are the best way to attract the wrong type of client.
2. Know Your Customers (And Where to Find Them)
If you want to look for something, you first have to have an image of that item in your mind.
So if you want to find A-grade clients, you should have an image of your ideal A-grade clients on your mind. List out what kinds of things you want your ideal client to have, for example, ideal income, age, attitude, etc.
Once you have a picture of them, think of the situations that give them intense emotions like what are the problems they have? What gets them frustrated? What do they really want or desire?
Then mold your service or product to resolve those emotions.
You also may want to research on what kinds of features attract your ideal clients and apply those features on your service. Basically, really know your ideal clients. People like it when you pay attention to them and how they feel. So don’t think only of yourself and getting paid, think how you can help your clients.
3. Have a Clear Message
So you have everything set… you’re confident of yourself and your service, and you know who and where to find your ideal clients. Now the thing that you need to think of is the message that you are going to send to them so they’ll work with you.
Having the right message and setting it out clearly, is a major factor in getting your ideal clients. So make sure that your message is everywhere that your ideal clients are, and that it’s written in a way that makes it seem like it was literally written about them. After all, you should think of the benefits they can get when they work with you.
4. Show Them Proof
People look for builders and tradies to help them create their dream house or renovations. They only want the best and they expect you to deliver them that. However, you yourself know you can deliver, but they don’t… at least not yet.
So you need to show them what you can do. The best way to do this is to show them before and after photos, and some raving testimonials from your previous clients.
If you tell them that, “I’m a great builder!” Nobody would believe you. They’ll just see you as someone arrogant and unreliable, but if you have lots of other people saying that you are a great builder, clients would more likely flock to you.
So make sure that you take lots of pictures of the projects that you’re doing and get lots of testimonials from your previous clients.
5. Deliver What You Promise
No matter how good your message is, no matter how many clients you have, it will all be for nothing if you don’t deliver what you’ve promised. You wouldn’t want to get on a client’s bad side, because that will mean they won’t refer you in the future, and they could tarnish your name… and we all know the power of Word of Mouth.
Attracting better clients means you have to better yourself too. You are basically a mirror, what you are and how you think is what you get.