Influencer Marketing Tips for Pest Management Professionals

When Travis Bottoms, co-owner of Polite Pest, in Mesa, Ariz., started his own pest control business in the beginning of 2020, he already knew of one way to attract a new customer base: social media influencer marketing.

Before Bottoms started Polite Pest with Erick Estrada, he worked for a pest control company that focused largely on door-to-door sales. As he worked to find new marketing avenues for the company, Bottoms and that company’s owner had an idea.

“[We] realized that our wives and [women] on Instagram [normally] buy everything that people post about, so we were thinking [influencer marketing] was a natural step,” Bottoms said. “For them, it was small, but I saw the bigger picture on it. I knew the snowball effect it would have and especially [with] a brand that is pushed to a certain demographic, we would have success.”

When Bottoms and Estrada started the business together, they knew hyperlocal influencer marketing would be the first step in their efforts before investing in paid social media and online advertising.

The company currently partners with 107 social media influencers who live predominantly in the Mesa, Ariz., area who promote Polite Pest when a technician arrives for a residential service through posting on their feed, Instagram stories and partnering with the company on video reels.

Bottoms doesn’t expect results from an influencer’s first post. He knows it takes months to build trust with the influencer and their audience.

But eventually, he does expect to get at least one new customer from each influencer post in order to deem the partnership a success.

DEFINING YOUR PARAMETERS. The key to successful influencer marketing is defining your business demographic and specific service areas to know which social media influencers will likely have the most followers in your market, Bottoms said.

“For [our company], we use moms that are hyperlocal,” Bottoms said. “Most of my influencers have between 10,000 to 50,000 followers. It doesn’t matter if they have 50,000 followers, that doesn’t mean they are real followers. We’ve worked with those types of influencers, and you look at the statistics on the back end, and their true reach is like 2,000 followers.”

Bottoms said most of the company’s influencer partners are on Instagram and Facebook, adding that the company’s top-producing influencer brought in 86 new clients last year.

“We know about 80 percent of our [company] following on Instagram is women because that is who we market to,” he said. “With that influence, we know our following’s followers [are also] 80 percent women [who are] 25 to 45 years old and 20 percent who are male.”

Bottoms said not all influencers produce successful followers and customer retention results, which he learned early on.

“There are 30 influencers that we used and have not had great results with by looking at the data on the back end and come to find out that they’re not good [for our demographic],” he said. “[An influencer] moved here from Kansas City six months prior, she had like 50,000 or 60,000 followers, but most were from that city. She was posting [our services] for six months, and we didn’t get any traction whatsoever.”

BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS. The relationship between Bottoms and the influencers is mutually rewarded, as most influencers receive discounted services, and some are paid $50 to $100 per post that converts into a new customer.

In 2022, the company gained 1,400 new customers, and 800 of them came from influencer marketing, Bottoms said. Instagram is the company’s No. 1 platform for customer leads, and Facebook is second.

Now, the company is at well over 2,500 customers with a goal of reaching an additional 2,500 new customers this year.

Bottoms said there are never “clear-cut directives each influencer needs to hit.” If the influencer’s experience with the company is genuine, it will show through on the screen.

“It’s when people show their face, the technician and the work being provided,” Bottoms said. “Our goal is to build the relationship first.”

Although not all influencer marketing relationships work out for the company, Bottoms said he is a “three strikes and you’re out” type of person.

“The people we have separated from, we have done it in a way where we knew it was coming and felt it the last couple months,” Bottoms said, adding it’s all about transparency and that they will never end the relationship without effort to make it work.

Bottoms’ advice to PCOs trying influencer marketing: never expect something the first time.

These guys always go above and beyond for their customers and treat them like family! If you ever need any recommendations for your pest control needs, we highly recommend Polite Pest Co 10 out of 10!!! Reach out to them and get a free quote!!” — Review of Polite Pest by Can Be Fresh (via Facebook)

“No one’s going to automatically jump on board the first time. The following also knows they are influencers, so those followers want to know that they are using those services religiously,” he said. “I don’t consider it a success until after the third service, which is four months. They just have to bring me one customer for each [visit after their third one].”

Posting does not normally translate to same-day results.

“It’s all about relationship building without it being transactional. The audience can tell how [influencers] feel about the company,” Bottoms said.

SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNT. One main question Bottoms is asked regularly, “Where do you begin when first trying influencer marketing?” His response: Be active and engaged on your company’s social media first.

The company pushes its service technicians in the field to do fun and interactive videos with customers or ask customers to post about upcoming service visit.

“If we weren’t on social media ourselves, it would not work,” Bottoms said. “I have influencers now reach out to use [us] because of our activity. We had a ton of influencers in the beginning that didn’t trust us because our Instagram and everything wasn’t up to [par].”

Bottoms said the company has seen more customer leads by asking regular customers to post on their social media accounts and tag the company page.

“Let’s say an account has 460 followers on [their] social media, they found us from an influencer that has 50,000 followers,” he said. “Those [customers] with a smaller following trust what they have to say because their followers are all family and friends.”

The author is PCT’s digital editor.