Smart Marketing: We’re the Experts. Let’s Act Like It!

There’s a big difference between us (pest management professionals) and our customers. We’re experts and they’re not. Therein lies an opportunity for us to enhance our image, grow our business and become more successful. The question becomes: How best to do it?

Let’s start with the basic premise that we know a great deal more about what we do than our customers do. We know, for example, that just because you don’t see termites eating the wood in a home, it doesn’t mean that the home is safe. We also know that there are different types of ants and that no single treatment method works on all of them. And, we know that sometimes the treatment necessary to get rid of a troublesome weed in a lawn could do damage to otherwise healthy turf.

Our customers don’t necessarily know these things. They might believe that because they don’t see or hear termites at work that their homes are not infested. They also might believe that an ant is an ant is an ant. Pharaoh, carpenter, ghost, fire … all the same, right? And they may think that we have some miraculous product that can kill or suppress dollar weed without killing the grass around the weed.

SETTING EXPECTATIONS. There are a couple of ways we can use the knowledge we have to overcome the myths that might be in the minds of our customers. We also can help to set reasonable expectations in the minds of our customers.

First, we can prepare printed pieces explaining why over-the-counter “one size fits all” products (labeled as “ant and roach killer,” for example) simply don’t get the job done over time. We can explain, in plain language, that because of their particular biology, Pharaoh ants require a different type of treatment (and product) than carpenter ants. We can also explain the biological and habitual differences between subterranean and drywood termites and that while one species can be eliminated by bait or barrier treatment, the other requires fumigation and/or direct wood treatment.

Second, we can offer to make free, non-selling presentations to homeowner associations and civic groups (like Rotary and Kiwanis Clubs). We can put together easy-to-understand informational flyers to hand out to those in attendance. Our product suppliers can often provide us with these handouts.

Third, we can obtain membership lists from local organizations (assuming we ourselves are members) such as chambers of commerce, hotel/motel associations, homebuilder associations, restaurant associations, commercial real estate associations, etc., and we can mail this informational material directly to them. Or, we can ask to be put onto a program during a board meeting or a general membership meeting in order to provide information about matters of importance to the membership.

Fourth and finally, we can put the information we assemble into a press release and send it to local newspapers, and television and radio stations with the goal of stimulating a news story in which we would participate as the resident expert. This becomes especially significant in advance of termite swarm season or any of the reasonably predictable biological pest seasons.

WE ARE THE EXPERTS. All of this activity serves to position us as “experts” without “hard selling.” It also, hopefully, plants other seeds with individuals and businesses who will seek you out when they have issues related to pests, termites and/or lawn care.

The major investment here is your time. You can, of course, create and produce high-end, four-color handouts if you so choose, but the most important element is putting the knowledge your experience has given you into a simple, easy-to-understand format or presentation and then getting in front of groups of people.

In our business, as with many other businesses, we know a great deal more about what we do than our customers do. They secure our services because we’re the experts. Let’s take advantage of the status they have bestowed upon us.

The author is senior vice president of Massey-Persons-Brinati Communications, a subsidiary of Massey Services Inc., Maitland, Fla. He can be reached via e-mail at bbrewer@pctonline.com.