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Do you understand the difference between sales and marketing in the water damage restoration industry? Differentiating between the two may feel like nothing more than splitting hairs, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth. While it may be true that both sales and marketing aim to achieve the same goal — bringing in more floods for your water damage restoration business — they achieve this goal in vastly different ways.

When you understand the differences between the two, you can develop more effective strategies for business growth. Understanding what each operation brings to your business will enable you to make better choices about the future of your business, including who you hire as you grow your team.

Sales: Relationships and Referrals

At their core, the sales efforts your water damage restoration company is making should revolve around one thing — building strong relationships that could result in sales or referrals for sales. One simple way to differentiate between sales and marketing is by noting that sales targets one-on-one interactions and relationships. Marketing reps work on cultivating these relationships over time in hopes of bringing in multiple jobs from one source, like an insurance agent or plumber.

For example, marketing reps in the water damage restoration industry should typically be responsible for creating and maintaining your referral program. These employees will have building relationships with insurance adjusters who could be sending homeowners your way in their job description. They will also network with plumbers and other local contractors who could become a source of consistent referrals for your business.

Marketing: Message and Reputation

When you think about marketing and what sets this business operation apart from sales, it is helpful to think of it as the big picture approach to creating more leads for your company. The marketing employees working for your business should be spending their focus on building your reputation through branding and messaging. Marketing is all about spreading the word about your company to your ideal customers within your region.

As you already know, marketing can involve a number of approaches. Many small businesses are still using more traditional marketing efforts like direct mailing, commercials, and print ads. In the age of digital marketing, there are also extensive methods you could use to market your business online.

Digital marketing can include:
● Search Engine Optimization: Using a high quality website, the development of online content, optimization of your Google My Business page, and more to boost your ranking and visibility in search engine results.
● Social Media Marketing: Building a platform online through social media channels. This includes creating a social media account on major platforms, posting valuable content on a regular basis, and engaging with your potential customers daily.
● Email Marketing: Using information and interesting emails to reach more people in your target market.
● Paid advertising: Participating in pay-per-click advertising or paid ads to generate more leads for your water damage restoration business.

Building Strong Marketing Teams

No matter what industry you work in, marketing your business is a time-consuming approach. There are practically endless ways you could spread the word about your company. As the owner of a water damage restoration company, it is important to understand how hiring the right people for your marketing team will be essential to your success. It is important that you have individuals who understand what marketing is, how it is different from sales, and what their jobs will involve if you really want to see your business grow.

What are you looking for in a marketing employee? In a perfect world, it would be great to find a marketing professional with experience within the water damage restoration industry (with no bad habits you’d need to break!). If you are finding this difficult because of the limitations of your location, we suggest focusing on finding someone with strong marketing skills. The right hire can be taught about water damage restoration, but the knowledge of marketing they bring to the table will be invaluable.

As you set about interviewing candidates, use open ended questions to be certain that you and the candidates you interview are on the same page about what is expected of a marketing employee. These questions can include:
● Can you give me an example of your previous success growing a small business brand?
● What were your daily tasks in your last position?
● How would you approach local marketing of our business and the services we offer?
● Can you tell me one thing you learned about marketing small businesses in your last position?
● What do you know about water damage restoration?

We founded More Floods with the vision of sharing marketing and operational resources with water damage restoration professionals all over North America. As the owners of Power Dry, our own restoration business, we’ve learned countless lessons about marketing and building a marketing team. To learn more about how we share those lessons with our network members, click here or call 1-866-667-3356.

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