What should a builder change with their client acquisition process when the market gets tough? How do prospective buyers change when the market turns in their favor?

With competition increasing for fewer new home and remodeling leads, it’s hard to know what strategies are best for bringing in new clients.

Whether you’re starting out with no leads or need help reigniting interest from dormant ones, understanding how to lay the foundation for marketing success is essential. So if you’ve been asking yourself “What’s the best way to acquire clients in a tough market?” then this episode is just for you!

In this first part of the episode “What’s the best way to acquire clients in a tough market?”, we tackle how new home and remodeling buyers change when market conditions deteriorate and some tips on how builders should adjust their marketing to attract the leads that have a need to remodel or build a home.

With some knowledge, creativity, and effort, you can make sure potential customers choose you over your competitors! Watch/Listen to this episode, and stay tuned as we dig into these strategic tips–you don’t want to miss out on the next part of this episode!

Builder Lead Converter captures & converts leads for home builders & remodelers so they can grow sales revenue and margins. Find out how at https://www.builderleadconverter.com

 

Transcript:

Rick:  Today On Conversations That Convert, we’re gonna talk about what is the best way to acquire new clients in a tough market. Let’s get started.

Welcome to Conversations That Convert. Every week, we’ll spend about 10 to 15 minutes tackling relevant lead generation, marketing, and sales topics for remodelers, home improvement companies, and home builders. Conversations That Convert is brought to you by Builder Converter, your perfect sales assistant. And now here’s Rick and Daiana. 

Rick:  Welcome to Conversations That Convert. Everyone. Hi Daiana. 

Daiana: Hi. Welcome, everybody. Welcome. 

Rick:  So what are we talking about today, Daiana? 

Daiana: Today we continue the series of what a builder can ask, and the question for today is what’s the best way to acquire clients in a tough market?

Rick:  Yeah.

Daiana: And this is part one. And next week we’ll discuss about part two. Of course.

Rick:  Part two, exactly. yeah. So we’re, we’re tackling the most frequently asked questions on lead generation marketing, lead conversion, and sales management. And today, you know, we’re gonna look at where a lot of people builders are experiencing is that their markets are really contracted in different parts of the country and, and the world. And so there’s less, there are less leads out there today. And so they’re getting a little bit higher to harder to acquire new leads. And so we’re gonna talk about what you can do to pivot. To make yourself a little bit more attractive and maybe to, find those needles in the haystack, which are not so plentiful, as they once were.

Daiana: Yeah. Let’s go ahead and get started. 

Rick:  Let’s do it. Yeah. So I think, Daiana, this brings us to the, you know, the real question here is how do new home and remodeling buyers change? How do their behaviors change when market conditions deteriorate? And the answer is right now we have buyers who have wants and they have taken themselves out of the market. So case in point, anybody that refinanced or bought a home that is sitting at maybe a three or sub 4% interest rate, when they look at today’s interest rates of six plus, they are saying, you know what? I’m not gonna double my interest rate. I’m gonna sit and wait. And so what they do is they put themselves on the sidelines. They take themselves out of the market.

So it reduces who is in the market today, down to those buyers that have needs. So somebody has a need, they’re still going to buy. So a typical need would be, there is a say, a job change where I’m moving from one part of the country, there could be a need where there’s, a growing family. So, children on the way, there could be a need where they want, someone wants to move into, culture to a different school district. Needs can also come from remodeling. That’s saying there’s a repair that needs to be done in the home, and that’s a pretty major repair has to be done because the home is deteriorating and part of that repair, they’ll go ahead and do some improvements that they’ve wanted to do. So those buyers are, are still out there.

They’re still going to buy. But the difference, Daiana, is that they’re asking, okay, well what are you gonna give me? right? What’s, what’s your discount? What’s your incentive? Because they know there are less people out there hiring builders right now. So I had a client just the other day said to me, well, I’m still talking to people that, you know, they’re not asking about what are our incentives or discounts. And I, my question back to ’em was, are they buying? To which she said, well, no, they’re not buying. I said, well, they’re not buyers. There are people that have wants that are just talking to you, but they know they’re not gonna do anything because they’re not willing to pay the price.

The ones that are going to buy are the ones that are asking, what are your discounts? What are your incentives? What are your promotions? What are your specials? And that’s just typical. That’s just human behavior. So don’t get turned off by that. There’s a way to handle that and, we’ll talk about that a little bit, a little bit today, a little bit more next week, but what we do wanna talk about is what a lot of builders now are starting to do. And because there are less buyers out there, than builders are, they’re taking on jobs that are outside of their typical scope or their service area.

So they’re, they’re spending more time commuting, perhaps, driving to a job site, they might be looking at like a different type of jobs such as commercial or perhaps smaller jobs, like more handyman type jobs. And this is Daiana, really more of a survival instinct. This is something that you don’t wanna go there unless you absolutely have to. So the whole point of putting together this topic today was really looking at alternatives to this, what do you, what are your thoughts, Daiana? 

Daiana: Yes, I noticed the survival mode versus the, abounded, abundance, abundance mindset that it’s, it’s plenty for everybody and we, we are, I, I noticed that we are, we are staying on the safe mode. So only what’s safe. And we, we, we are very careful with our spending and only if it’s necessary, but only if necessary, necessary, necessary. After that, we act and indeed we are asking for incentives and gifts and, and many other extra bonuses that we can receive to feel that we are complete. Okay. Is this worth it?

Rick:  Yeah. That’s good, that’s a really good point. No, a couple of things that came to mind is, what we’ve talked about as a, as a, as a business owner right now is that we, we typically say, oh, okay, I’m gonna pull back on my marketing when, when a business can be sold. Cause I want to conserve money. And really it’s the opposite. What we talked about in our, in our how to recession proof your business series is we talked about now is where you wanna put your foot on the gas. You’re gonna have to, you’re gonna have to put more effort, more energy, and more dollars into lead generation and client acquisition and you’re gonna get poorer results. Then of course you did when the market was hot. When the market was hot, a lot of billers just stopped.

They couldn’t handle the business, and so they just stopped doing any sort of client acquisition outside of what was knocking on their door. Essentially now as a consumer as well, right? It’s like if we right now do not feel comfortable with our job, with our savings account, with taking on additional debt, we’re not going to buy. And those are the people that really have more wants. So the people that have needs, they’re gonna figure out a way to make it happen, and obviously, they have to have the resources to make it happen. But we need to find those people that have the needs. So really, I, I think the next question to tackle here is, is that how should a builder adjust their marketing to attract leads that have a need to remodel or build a home.

So that person that needs to move, that needs to remodel their home, and I, I wanna put an asterisk here because there will always be a set of buyers that have cash. They have the resources. Cash buyers are not affected today because they don’t care if the rates are 7% or 6% or 3%. They’re paying cash and they’re affluent buyers most time. And so they can do what they want. So I understand there are always those buyers out there, but there’s always been fewer of those buyers out there. You know, the vast majority of people are going to have to borrow to be able to build a home or, or to remodel their home and so, we’re looking at those people that have a need to do something that probably still need to borrow.

And what do you need to do as a builder to attract those people to your, to your offer? And I, I, I wanna simplify this as much as I can. Focus on who you know. Okay? So let, let me clarify this, Daiana, I am not talking about who you don’t know such as that lead you haven’t met yet. I’m talking about who you already know, who you have already met, and perhaps who you have already served. So, with that in mind, what you wanna focus on, is you wanna focus on unsold leads, your current database of unsold leads. You wanna focus on the clients that have already made a purchase from you, whether it was a year ago or 10 years ago. And you wanna focus on referral partners. So, your B2B referral partners.

So if you’re thinking out there right now, I need to go out and I need to run some ads, or I need to do some mailers and that sort of thing. It’s like, maybe we’ll get there, but this is where we wanna start, unsold leads sold clients that maybe you can resell and then referral partners developing referral partners from a business-to-business standpoint. What are your thoughts, Daiana? 

Daiana: Yeah. So I think that’s, that’s, that’s a very good switch of the mind. So who do you know? And ask and start from there. Start from the people you already served and maybe they will know somebody and you can ask them, okay, who do you know that can, can, can I support or can I serve or a Yeah?

Rick:  And, we do this for really two reasons. One is, Referrals are always the highest converting type of lead. So that’s the best lead conversion source. So if you’re gonna get somebody that’s gonna go, you want to go after somebody, that’s already a high probability of, of converting, but number two, that lead that unsold lead that you have in your database. Well, that person that may have already been thinking about doing something for one or more years. And so they’re already well under the process and so they’re more likely to make a decision sooner than later. So, if they have some needs in their housing choice to build or remodel their home if there have been some needs there.

They’re most likely to buy now, and so they are, you already have a relationship with them, whether you understand that or not. You know, if they’ve already, talked with you if they’ve already investigated you, if they, perhaps you’ve already developed a relationship with them, just not a business-to-client relationship or a builder-to-client relationship, they still, there’s some trust there. There are some, they see some value in what you’re doing. So those are the people that you want, you want to target, for those, for those two reasons. And next week, we’re gonna, you know, take a look at some more ideas to reactivate those cold leads or to resell those past clients and create partner programs with other local businesses.

And, we’re gonna talk more about this in the whole incentive thing. You know, you should be asking yourself the question right now, should I have a discount? Should I have an incentive? Whether it’s real or perceived? These are questions that you need to be asking right now. Because they’re gonna come up, your leads are gonna ask you. So you need to have the right answer for it. And there are different ways to do this. So we’ll talk about some more ideas, next week. Any final thoughts? Daiana? 

Daiana: I think that’s a very good strategy. So focus on who you know, and then activate and reactivate cold leads and just have conversations with them, and then you’ll know their interest. And from that simple conversation, you will get business probably because you will find out what they need and where they are and how they can, how they, they handle this situation right now. The context. 

Rick:  Yeah. That’s, you know, that’s, that’s so true. That’s just as simple as that. Just have a conversation. 

Daiana: Yeah.

Rick:  So really all we want to do is have that, is have that conversation. See where they’re at. See we can meet ’em where they’re at. We can fulfill their needs and get a sale done. 

Daiana: Yeah.

Rick:  Not have to go into survival mode. That’s what we wanna avoid. So if you would like to talk more about how to start acquiring clients in a tough market, go ahead and schedule your strategy. Call with a link right down below and find out how we can help you capture and convert more leads. So for our brothers and sisters in Christ, may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Be with you all, always. We will see you next time on Conversions that Convert.