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The handyman services industry is at the front end of what is projected to be a decade of exponential growth. In 2023, the U.S. market for handyman services was valued at $390.9 million. By 2033, it is expected to be five times larger — reaching $1.8 billion.
Several factors are behind this anticipated trend. For one, as homeowners see the value of their homes increase due to limited housing inventory, strong demand, and inflationary pressures on construction costs, they are more likely to engage professional help when redecorating, switching out appliances, adding electrical outlets, and performing general maintenance.
Demand for professional assistance for home maintenance and repairs is also rising as the population ages. Lack of time and skills is also a key reason many individuals and businesses seek out the pros for help with everything from ceiling fan installations to drywalling. And in-home smart devices have created the need for a whole new array of handyman services, including smart lighting and smart lock installation.
While this is all positive news for midsize and large handyman companies eager to expand their client base and generate more revenue, these outfits often face fierce competition for jobs with individual practitioners and hyper-local businesses. Many of these smaller operators have long-standing relationships with their clients and benefit from word-of-mouth referrals.
Effective handyman advertising is crucial for larger firms to gain an edge over smaller competitors and become the preferred go-to for consumers and businesses in need of professional help for repair, maintenance, and improvement tasks. In this post, we offer nine handyman marketing strategies that can help your midsize or large business rise to the top.
Handyman services is a highly competitive industry. Midsize and large businesses in this space have an advantage, though: They have resources to dedicate to handyman marketing. Word-of-mouth referrals, while always welcome, are not likely to help larger businesses achieve sustainable growth. Instead, they need to use an array of handyman advertising strategies.
According to The CMO Survey from September 2024, for-profit businesses devote 10.1% of their overall company budget and 7.7% of revenues to marketing spend. Amazon spent a hefty $44 billion on marketing in 2023. Your budget will likely be well below that figure, but it also may be more or less than the percentages cited in The CMO Survey based on your business goals.
Whatever your budget, you want your marketing dollars to work hard for you. With that in mind, here are nine handyman marketing ideas that can help your midsize or large enterprise attract and retain clients while also helping you achieve marketing efficiency.
When seeking information about a service provider, most consumers and businesses today will turn to the internet first, using search engines like Google or reading reviews on service pro sites and apps like Angi or Yelp.
You can increase your chances of reaching potential customers and driving conversions for your handyman business by using a local search engine optimization (SEO) strategy. SEO involves using relevant keywords and content to help ensure your website is technically maximized for search. With local SEO, you get more granular with your approach, optimizing your business’s online presence to enhance its visibility in local search results.
SEO and local SEO efforts help boost your site’s ranking on search engine results pages (SERP), making it more visible to potential customers. So, if you operate a plumbing business in New York’s five boroughs, you could use relevant plumbing keywords, like “faucet repair” and “emergency plumber” throughout your site, as well as terms like “five boroughs,” “Queens,” “The Bronx,” “Manhattan,” and so on.
You can also optimize for local SEO by listing in local directories and filling out and updating your free Google Business Profile. Additionally, you can use Google Analytics 4 to track online performance and identify effective keywords and content to sharpen SEO.
Paid advertising via Google can also enhance the online visibility of your handyman business and help your marketing team with lead generation. Commercial and residential property managers, as well as property owners and real estate agents, routinely scan local service ads, including Google Ads, to identify handymen and other skilled professionals close to the properties they manage or are looking to renovate and sell.
Google Ads are pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, which can be a cost-effective handyman advertising strategy for your enterprise. That’s because you (the advertiser) only pay Google (the publisher) when a user clicks on your ad. These ads display on SERPs so, assuming that you are using the right keywords, the user who sees your ad already has an interest in the type of service you provide. Google also provides tools for Local Service Ads that allow you to set your budget before embarking on a PPC campaign.
Learn how tracking phone call conversions can help you enhance Google Ads data-driven attribution.
Nearly two-thirds of consumers seeking handyman or home-related services are more likely to call a business than transact with them online, according to Invoca’s Buyer Experience Benchmark Report. This underscores why collecting and analyzing data from customer phone calls can be so valuable for your business.
When you combine the customer insights contained in actual conversations with online customer activity, you can develop a complete picture of customer behavior and preferences that helps to inform your marketing content and strategy.
Tracking, monitoring, and analyzing customer calls can also help you achieve accurate attribution for your handyman marketing campaigns. Without call tracking, you effectively overlook attribution for transactions that occur during phone calls. An AI-powered call tracking platform like Invoca provides the tools to capture 100% of calls and call data and then analyze them quickly and at scale to support data-driven decision-making and boost campaign performance and return on investment (ROI).
Partnering with property management companies, senior living communities, and apartment landlords provides scale as well as a steady stream of repeat business. While larger firms often have in-house repair and maintenance teams, they often contract out for specialist jobs like electrical rewiring, tiling, or carpentry.
You can find partners by researching and joining industry associations. Large national associations representing property managers include the National Association of Residential Property Managers (NARPM) and the National Apartment Association (NAA). The Building and Office Managers Association (BOMA) represents owners and managers of office buildings.
Senior living associations include the American Seniors Housing Association (ASHA) and the American Health Care Association (AHCA).
Happy clients are handyman advertising gold. However, most customers won’t proactively provide a testimonial or review, so be sure to ask for one. Make it easy by prompting them with two or three questions, such as, “Were you satisfied with the quality of the work performed and the price charged?” and “Did our team clean up and remove debris promptly after the project?”
Make sure to scan relevant online review sites and social media pages for your business regularly and always respond to comments about your handyman services, whether they are positive or negative. (Online reputation management is a must for building trust and credibility.) Be professional and move swiftly to try to cure a customer’s complaint if you come across an unflattering review. If that’s not possible or the customer is unreasonable, clearly state your view to try to neutralize the impact of poor feedback.
This is a popular and effective strategy for handyman businesses of any size, and it’s one you are likely already using for your company. But if not, here’s why you should try it: Customers requiring handyman services tend to shop locally. So, networking with local businesses, such as hardware and building supply stores, can be a great way for your firm to raise its profile. These stores can be a pipeline for qualified leads since their customers purchase materials and appliances for home improvement and other projects.
You can also network more widely by joining your local Chamber of Commerce or other business groups in your area. This can lead to your company’s participation in or sponsorship of community events like renovating a veteran or senior citizen’s home or managing a food drive. Participation in these types of events can increase your brand’s visibility in your target market while creating goodwill.
In the world of handyman services, content is king. Providing informative, engaging content across all channels, from your website to your social media pages, is essential to stand out in a competitive playing field where smaller operators are also taking full advantage of these outlets.
Content marketing demonstrates your expertise, commands trust, and amplifies your branding.
Some of the best content you can offer helps your audience address minor, everyday problems.
For example, perhaps your plumbing business posts a YouTube video showing viewers how to fix a leaky faucet in their home. A local manager of several senior living facilities or apartments sees this video and applies your guidance to successfully fix a faucet at one of their properties. A few weeks later, that same manager, remembering your practical advice, reaches out to your handyman business for assistance with a larger and more complex job.
Don’t forget so-called “traditional” methods of marketing to advertise your midsize or large handyman business and connect with clients. “Small business” efforts like email marketing campaigns, newsletters, and “snail mail” flyers can all be effective ways to promote your brand with target audiences, even if you already operate a sizeable enterprise.
Your outreach will be even more effective if you make the content educational and informative rather than salesy. As an example, you might provide details on how to safely replace a light fixture or stop a constantly running toilet. You can even make your content seasonal by providing tips like how to avoid burst pipes in extreme cold or how to waterproof a window.
Customer experience guru Shep Hyken’s latest Achieving Customer Amazement report confirms what we should all already know: Most consumers today want a personalized experience with the companies they do business with. Hyken found that 81% of customers favor companies that provide a personalized experience.
To do personalization right, you need big data — or, more specifically, high volumes of accurate and timely data for analytics. Analyzing customers’ online and offline activity, including phone conversations, can provide the insight your handyman business and its marketing team needs to personalize and continually improve customer experiences.
Invoca PreSense, for instance, integrates with websites to create a bridge between a customer’s online and offline journeys. PreSense captures pre-call digital journey information and passes that data to a call center agent. Armed with this data, the agent can greet the customer by name and have immediate visibility into which pages or products the customer has viewed and why they might be calling. This not only increases call efficiency but also makes the customer feel like a VIP.
Watch this short video to see how it works:
In a fast-growing market, midsize and large handyman services businesses must use all the tools and strategies at their disposal to gain an advantage over their competitors, which include small businesses that benefit greatly from word-of-mouth advertising. It’s not enough to simply rely on seasonal email campaigns or customer reviews to elevate your company’s profile. They are important, but consumer demand for personalization, immediacy, and relevancy means your handyman business must also create seamless marketing efforts across all relevant channels.
Using AI-driven tools like Invoca to bridge the gap between consumers’ online and offline journeys is critical to your company’s success in achieving the above. Invoca’s call tracking and analysis software provides the data your marketers need to personalize content for customers across channels. And with powerful tools like PreSense, you can extend personalization to the call center by equipping agents with the details they need to help your handyman business turn every prospect into a client and keep your existing customers satisfied and loyal.
Want to learn about other effective strategies that can help elevate your handyman marketing efforts and increase revenue? See these additional resources from Invoca, and when you’re ready, consider booking a customized demo to see our technology in action:
Use online resources such as Google Business Profile and Google Local Search Ads and advertise and post on social media platforms to reach potential leads. Optimize your website to generate more traffic. Network face-to-face locally through industry associations, like the Chamber of Commerce, and through community events and sponsorships. Also, be sure to analyze data from online activity like clicks on digital ads as well as offline interactions such as phone calls to develop a complete picture of your customers so you can create more effective handyman marketing efforts.
Your ad should contain all the contact information someone responding to the ad might need, including a phone number, email, and physical address. List all the services your handyman business provides to offer a clear picture of your team’s skills and expertise. Try to differentiate your firm from competitors by emphasizing your years in business, promoting industry accolades and certifications, or highlighting your availability (such as if you provide 24/7 emergency repair services). Use “before” and “after” images to show workmanship, quality, and creativity. Consider including a customer testimonial if there’s room.
Your target audience should reflect the size and capabilities of your handyman business. Midsize and large companies can service individual homeowners with large project needs as well as investors, owners, and property managers of individual commercial facilities or with large real estate portfolios spread across a region or several states. Within these businesses, the individual making purchasing decisions is typically a primary homeowner, property manager, facilities manager, real estate listing agent, or commercial landlord.
