Depending on the type of lawn care service you offer, you might require between $1,000 and $8,000 to start your business. These expenses will increase manifold once you start actively promoting your service. While it isn’t recommended that you don’t forego the quality of your service to reduce expenses, you can choose low-cost marketing techniques.
Here we’ll share tips which you can implement to promote your lawn mowing business on a budget. But first, how can you save enough money to actually start marketing?
A budget will give you the direction and clarity you need to manage your finances. In order to create a budget for your lawn mowing business:
As a lawn mowing service, you will be working in close contact with families, at their home. It’s possible for your clients to be accidentally injured while you’re performing your job. Stray grass can be slippery and they may become falling hazards. As a result, your clients may sue your business for negligent service, which can result in thousands of dollars in legal fees, court fines and damages. You’ll be losing a lot of your hard-earned money if you’re not careful.
If you protect yourself with Public Liability Insurance, you can indemnify yourself against these losses. This insurance offers coverage to businesses in the event any customer or third-part gets injured on-site or during the course of your service. A public liability insurance is inexpensive too. For less than $65 each month, you can prevent thousands of dollars in expenses. Check here to purchase your insurance.
If you’re just starting out, don’t waste money on buying new equipment. Just use the lawn mower you have at home. If you’re providing commercial lawn mowing, then get your equipment second-hand.
Finally, instead of hiring employees to work with you, ask your family and friends to chip in a few hours each day. This will allow you to get work done at low charges.
Now for the marketing tips:
Google My Business listings are the listings of business you see when you search the platform for a particular service. These listings contain your name, location, services offered and telephone number, making it easy for customers to contact you. The best thing about Google My Business is that it is completely free-of-charge. You don’t have to pay anything to list your business here. By including your location in the listing, you increase chances of being found.
Usually, people search for businesses closer to where they live. For example, if they live in Bloomfield Avenue, NJ, they may search “lawn mowing in Bloomfield NJ”. Using the neighborhood name in your own website domain name, can increase the chances of you being found online.
For example, consider keeping your domain name www.njbloomfieldlawnmowing.com . Sites like WordPress offer the first domain name free-of-charge, making this a great marketing move.
Whether you choose to create a Facebook page or an Instagram business account, you can start your social media outreach without paying a dime. Regularly posting interesting tidbits of information about lawn care or offering lawn design ideas, you can position yourself as the thought leader in your niche. Should you want to increase the following of your business social media’s, you could look into the services you can find offered at nitreo.com and similar social media growth agencies, this can provide your new social media with new followers that could turn into prospective customers in the future.
Also, get yourself a good quality camera and take pictures of the lawns you mow. A picture speaks a thousand words and it can be the greatest endorser of your service.
Even if you wanted to advertise actively on social media, the ads are really inexpensive:
Did you know that you can get a premium-quality business flyer printed for as little as 50 cents? To promote your lawn mowing service within your neighborhood of say, 20-30 households, you may need to spend just $25-$30. Posters are budget-friendly too. Glossy posters cost about $50, while paper ones are approximately $37-$40. A well-placed poster, say on the Church bulletin board or inside the local café or pub, will be very visible to residents too.
One of the biggest advantages of a lawn mowing service is it gives you the opportunity to introduce yourself to your prospective clients and garner their trust. In fact, it’s imperative that you visit each house and introduce yourself and your business.
Door-to-door contact is a great way to put-into-practice your charm and salesmanship skills. This time is great to promote very specific services like sod repairs, weeding and pest control.
Also, remember to request your neighbors for their email IDs. It will help with the next step.
Email marketing is one of the most-effective and personal ways to promote your new lawn mowing business. You can share welcome offers and discounts for first-time orders through this email.
Emailers are great not only to send across offers, but to educate people about your expertise. You can share informative articles or blurbs that highlight your expertise in lawn mowing. Additionally, you can personalise the emails and offer specific services, such as spring cleaning or winter lawn maintenance, through timely reminders.
There are tools like Sender, Omnisend and Mailchimp which offer free email services.
A wearable sandwich board is a great way to get eyeballs for your new lawn mowing business. You can get a sandwich board created for under $70-$80, depending on the service you use. Typically, wearable sandwich boards last many years and the colors are designed not to run in the rain/snow.
Either you can wear your sandwich board and walk across the neighborhood or you can get a friend/relative to do it. This is also a great summer job for older kids and you won’t have to pay a lot for this service either.
Finally, a really great way to promote your lawn mowing service for free is word-of-mouth advertising, we recommend Get the Referral System. Once you complete a service, request the client to refer you to their friends and relatives. Ask them to give you a review on your Google listing or social media page. You can also share with them discounts and offers to subsequent services, for every referral they provide. To double-end this, you can provide discounts to referrals when they contact you for their first lawn mowing service with you.
