Is your business showing up in AI search? đâ¨
Have you ever asked AI something like âWhoâs the best plumber in [your city]?â or âFind me a landscaper near meâ just to see if your business pops up? If you appeared, what are you doing to make sure you maintain visibility? If not, PhilRisherâ has a few website tips that could help. đ In this Masters of Home Service episode, he covers website best practices that can help your business stay visible as search changes, from answering real customer questions to sharing pricing and local information and putting more work into your âknowledge baseâ. đ Want to put these tips into action? Download our free website optimization playbook for this episode. Never miss an episode of Masters of Home Service. Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Should you pause ads when youâre short-staffed?
I donât think the answer is always to shut everything off. But running ads like normal when your team is already stretched can create a mess fast. More leads donât help much if response times slow down, quality slips, routes get overloaded, or the owner has to jump back into the field to save the schedule. When weâre tight on capacity, Iâd rather adjust the ads than pretend nothing changed. That could mean lowering the budget, keeping branded search on, focusing only on dense route areas, pushing new jobs further out, or temporarily stopping low-margin one-time work. Marketing should match capacity. If the ads are bringing in work the team canât serve well, the campaign might look good on paper while the customer experience gets worse. But the other side is maybe this is the perfect time to hire and be over capacity instead of scrambling. When youâre short-staffed, do you pause ads, reduce spend, or keep leads flowing?Are You Selling Your Service⌠or Selling the Experience?
Customers have more choices than ever. Sometimes the difference isnât just the service you provide, but how you make people feel from the first interaction to the final follow-up. What are some ways your business creates an experience that keeps customers coming back?Any tips for making YouTube videos that actually bring in customers?
If you're creating videos for your business (or thinking about it), what's one thing you've learned that makes a difference? In this Masters of Home Service episode, Jacob Palmer (Palmer Electrical) talks about how simple YouTube videos became one of his biggest lead generators. He shares practical advice on filming real jobs, building trust before the first phone call, and using video content to win more local customers without relying on paid ads. Never miss an episode of Masters of Home Service. Subscribe on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Have you ever fired a marketing channel?
What's something you used to spend money on that you finally said, "Never again.â Google Ads? Flyers? Something else? What made you pull the plug on it? In this Masters of Home Service episode, Gabe Chrismon of Oply unpacks why throwing more money at marketing isn't always the answer to landing new customers. Learn about customer acquisition cost (CAC) and how to get more value from every marketing dollar. Never miss an episode of Masters of Home Service. Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Are reviews more useful than a marketing agency?
Iâve been thinking about this a lot lately. A good marketing agency can absolutely help a business. They can help with creative, targeting, campaigns, landing pages, reporting, and getting ads in front of the right people. But before you pay someone to write your message, itâs probably worth asking: Have you actually studied what your customers already said about you? Because your reviews may be one of the most useful marketing assets in your business. A lot of owners look at reviews as proof. 5 stars. Good testimonial. Nice thing to put on the website. Thatâs useful, but itâs only the surface. The better part is the language. Customers will tell you exactly why they hired you, what they were afraid of, what they noticed, what made them trust you, what almost stopped them from buying, and what made them stay. For us, reading through our reviews changed how I thought about our marketing. Customers kept repeating things like: âworth every pennyâ âone less thing to worry aboutâ âlike clockworkâ âthey text before they comeâ âthey send a picture of the closed gateâ âthey take the waste with themâ âI was embarrassedâ âmy last company left the gate openâ âthere arenât enough hours in the dayâ That language is better than anything I could have guessed from sitting at my desk. It showed me the real buying triggers. Some people hired us because the yard got away from them over winter or they're busy families who didnât have time. Others had health issues, pregnancy, injuries, or physical limitations. A small handful switched from cheaper competitors because they were tired of missed visits, poor communication, or gates being left open. Those details matter. If I only market the task, I sound like every other company. âWe scoop dog poop.â Thatâs true, but it doesnât explain why someone is willing to pay a premium. The reviews showed us what people actually valued: Communication. Reliability. Thoroughness. Gate safety. Waste hauled away. Professional scheduling. No judgment when the yard is bad. A clean yard without having to think about it. That becomes ad copy, website copy, quote follow-up language, sales training, social proof and also helps with pricing objections. When customers repeatedly say âworth every penny,â âmore than fair,â or âIâd pay twice as much,â that tells me price is not the full story for the right buyer. It tells me I need to explain the value better, not panic and discount the service every time someone asks about price. A marketing agency can miss that if they donât understand the business deeply enough. They may write clean copy, but clean copy doesnât always match the customerâs internal conversation. Your reviews give you that conversation. They tell you what people were already thinking before they bought or what made them feel safe enough to hire you. They show you which parts of the experience matter more than you realized. For us, gate photos became a bigger marketing point because customers kept mentioning them. Hauling waste away became a bigger marketing point because customers kept comparing that to companies that leave it in their trash can. Communication became one of our strongest selling points because people brought it up over and over again. Thatâs the kind of information every business owner should be paying attention to. Before you rewrite your ads, rebuild your website or hire someone to "fix your marketing", read your reviews. Print them out. Tag the repeated phrases. Look for patterns. Group them by pain point, objection, trust factor, and reason they stayed. Then use the customerâs language in your marketing. Your best customers are often telling you exactly how to sell to more people like them. Have you ever gone through your reviews and pulled out the exact phrases customers keep repeating?
How are you building your local contractor lists?
Iâve been looking into how home service companies and marketing teams find new opportunities. A lot of people are using Google Maps to research local markets, but the challenge is usually: Finding the right businesses in a specific area Keeping contact information organized Identifying companies with growth opportunities For example: âHVAC companies in Texasâ You can quickly build a list with: Business name Website Phone number Email Address Reviews & ratings Business category This can be useful for: Local SEO research Market analysis Competitor research Sales outreach Iâm testing different ways to collect and structure local business data and would love to hear how others in the home service space are doing this. Curious: How do you currently find and research local contractors in your market?What Marketing Actually Works for Outdoor Service Businesses During Slow Seasons?
I run a small land clearing/brush clearing business in Ohio, and with how wet itâs been in our area lately, things are starting to slow down a bit. Iâm trying to be proactive and focus on marketing so I can keep work coming in and continue growing the business. For those of you whoâve been in a similar spot, what marketing has actually worked best for you to bring in more customers and keep jobs lined up? Facebook ads, Google ads, yard signs, referrals, local networking, something else? Iâd especially love to hear whatâs worked well for seasonal or outdoor service businesses when weather starts affecting the schedule. Appreciate any advice or ideas youâre willing to share.
