The US has been experiencing a landmark shortage of tradespeople for over a year, with electricians leading the charge for most in-demand. While this is a problem for many businesses, this is also an opportunity for budding electricians emerging into the field.
Freelance or contracted work as an electrician has never been more lucrative – but how should you promote your brand to ensure a solid start to a promising career?
Refining Your Service
As an electrician, your work is highly specialized by nature – whatever the specifics of your studies or niche. As it stands, the layperson has difficulty understanding what it is they need and who they need to call.
As such, you should approach your business from an outside perspective – and refine your offering to better suit your target audience. This has ramifications for your initial budget and equipment investment just as it does your marketing direction.
If you are positioning yourself as a domestic electrical repair technician, you will need to stock yourself with common components and items to streamline repair work and bring better value to your customers.
By kitting out your van with spools of multiconductor cables and spare outlets, you can perform a variety of household tasks within a single call-out.
Alternatively, if you are aiming to specialize in project-by-project domestic installs, your investments may be better made in equipment than components.
The value you provide would instead be through your skills and networking relationships with commercial suppliers.
Building A Website
By refining your brand to a specific niche, you have made your marketing job much easier. The next step is to provide yourself with a base for marketing, in the form of building a simple website. Your website is, in essence, your portfolio.
You can use your website to detail the work you undertake and the experience you have gained. It can also host pictures of prior work and testimonials from happy clients.
Some investment in a third party may be useful to increase the value of your site digitally, though. Your site will need to be SEO-compliant to rank highly against local competitors, something a marketing expert can guide you through.
Advertising, Online, And Offline
Your website is not the totality of your digital presence, though. You will also need social media accounts to engage more directly with potential customers.
With platforms like Instagram, you can post a photo and video content, advertising your skills and demonstrating the quality of your work in the process.
Together with a targeted offline advertising campaign, you can catch a wide demographic locally and nationally. Flyering local neighborhoods will put you in contact with older clients who might not use the internet regularly.
Even the simple act of applying a decal to your work van can improve brand visibility.
Customer Service
The final piece of the puzzle is customer service. When it comes to domestic jobs and call-outs, word-of-mouth marketing is arguably the most effective form of marketing you can receive.
You win positive word-of-mouth as a result of positive customer service just as much as quality results. By engaging warmly and politely with customers, you ensure they feel safe – and increase the likelihood of getting recommended.
Word Of Mouth
When it comes to freelancing it is all about getting good references. Ironically references can work wonder for your business.
So if you want to promote your business as a freelance electrician then it is important that you gather good testimonials.
However there is no need to just stop at getting testimonials. You should ask your clients to refer yourself to other people who may need your electrician services.
This is the sure-short way to getting more clients for your electrician business without even applying for any job. Referencing is all the game in freelancing and you should try it to boost your electrician business.
Do Not Be Unreasonable With Budget
Some freelancers make the mistake of asking for the higher price right at the start of their business. In freelancing this is not always workable. Yes there are scenarios where people even hire you even if you have a fairly high price.
But most of the time it does not work. So if you are a beginner in freelancing electrician then make sure that you do not set your budget on a reasonably high because this will turn off most of the clients.
Conclusion
Freelancing is the ultimate game and you can master it by following our above mentioned strategies.
