Discussing The Cost of Contracting Jobs on Your Website

I am going to let you in on a lit­tle secret. What you charge to paint someone’s home, fix a leaky pipe, or remod­el a kitchen is not top secret. In fact, it nev­er has been! I know you do not want your com­peti­tors to know your hid­den tal­ents, but the fact of the mat­ter is this: If a com­peti­tor wants to know what you charge for your ser­vices, they will find a way. 

Guess what? It is ok that they know. There is not real­ly any­thing to hide.

What I would like to accom­plish in this post is to encour­age you guys to do some­thing that might be out of your com­fort zone. I would like your com­pa­ny to begin open dis­cus­sions with your prospects online about the cost and prices of your line of work.

Let me explain a bit more of what I mean. If you begin to post ideas of what things cost to your poten­tial cus­tomers and do this more than your com­peti­tors (stay on top of this), you will build more trust and cred­i­bil­i­ty with your prospects. You can become the go to place that con­sumers vis­it to learn what it costs to paint an aver­age size bed­room, repaint kitchen cab­i­nets, or what a price range would be on a kitchen remodel.

Exam­ple from a Pool Contractor

This is not some­thing that I just came up with on my own and am pray­ing it works. Believe me, it works. Take for exam­ple, Riv­er, Pools and Spas. This com­pa­ny start­ed blog­ging back in 2009 and start­ed post­ing arti­cles that dealt with cost. They held noth­ing back. They were an open book, answer­ing ques­tions con­sumers had about their line of work (installing fiber­glass pools). Over the next sev­er­al years, their blog became the most pop­u­lar pool blog in the world. It also made them the most trust­ed pool com­pa­ny in their area, mak­ing it so much eas­i­er to sell work. When they got a lead, peo­ple had a gen­er­al idea up front of what a pool cost, so their clos­ing rates went through the roof!

My friend, Mar­cus Sheri­dan, (now a con­sul­tant) who start­ed the Riv­er, Pools and Spa’s blog, spends most of his time ​“preach­ing” a very sim­i­lar mes­sage to what my blog top­ic is all about: being trans­par­ent and hold­ing noth­ing back from your audi­ence. (Fol­low Marcus’s blog here)

So with­out going into much detail in this blog post, the take­away is sim­ple: start think­ing through what ques­tions con­sumers have about your line of work and the cost involved, and start cre­at­ing con­tent that will answer those questions.

“But David, a kitchen remod­el could cost $15,000 or $200,000. There are so many variables.” ​“You know that paint­ing an exte­ri­or could be as sim­ple as $3,000 and as com­plex as $100,000. How on earth can we edu­cate a prospect on what it cost to paint an exterior?”

If you have a ques­tion sim­i­lar to the above, you are think­ing too big. Start much small­er! Think about how you do this on a dai­ly basis now when you go to a prospec­t’s home or busi­ness. They explain what they want com­plet­ed and you typ­i­cal­ly begin edu­cat­ing on a price range of what it will cost. Am I right? Edu­cate the prospect before you get called to do an esti­mate. It will save you both time, and you will close more jobs. 

Your Turn

Am I just blow­ing smoke, or do you agree that post­ing more about the cost of your ser­vices is a good idea and will work? Think about how easy it is to shop prices online for prod­ucts. We then buy from the sources we feel are most trust­ed or con­ve­nient, like Ama­zon, Apple, Home Depot, etc.