The pool industry is in the midst of a big shift, and it’s mostly happening online. This year alone, our State of Pool Service Report uncovered a 61% increase in paid search and a 19% increase in SEO.
Ryan Flannery was at the forefront of this shift, having used these very methods to grow his own pool business from 0 to 700 pools in the span of 18 months (and eventually sell it). Today, he’s helping pool pros across the country do the same through Pool Monopoly, a digital marketing agency specifically tailored to pool pros.
As you can imagine, Ryan has lots of great ideas on how pool pros can leverage online marketing to grow their business. He stopped by the Between Two Stops podcast to share 10 of them with hostess Niki Acosta.
10 tips for growing your pool service business
1. It’s time to leave lead vendors in the dust
Overall, investments in paid search are going up while investments in lead vendors are going down. According to Ryan, this is a great thing. “If I had it my way, [lead vendors] wouldn’t be in business at all.” Why? “The lead cost is insane.”
As he sees it, when everyone is trying to lower their prices to be $10 cheaper than the next guy, it creates a race to the bottom where no one wins. Thankfully, paid search is a much better use of marketing dollars, and pool pros across the country are finally catching on.
2. Building a route is cheaper than buying one…
Many pool pros who are starting out wonder which growth method makes more sense: spending the money to buy a route, or spending the time to build one on their own. Ryan’s advice? If you can, build it on your own. “It’s slower than buying a route, but if you can acquire new customers at $300-400 per account and they’re worth $1,500-2,500, you’re getting a 6-7x return on your investment,” he says.
3. … But sometimes buying a route makes sense
There are a select few situations where it makes more sense to buy a route, but they do exist. Some pool pros, for example, want to buy 50 pools to get the hang of pool service quickly. “It’s more of a training and learning process than a good business decision,” says Ryan, and for most of us, it doesn’t make sense to buy unless you get a really good deal on it.
The one obvious exception to this rule: private equity firms. “They’re racing to a certain number,” says Ryan, which justifies buying accounts at 8-12x. “They’re instantly worth more than that because they’re rolled into a massive brand.”
4. If you want to close leads, pick up the phone
They say you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take, and 100% of the clients whose calls you don’t pick up. In the pool industry, this is all too common. Pool pros miss a whopping 30-35% of phone calls from their leads, which is a huge loss when you consider that the pool pros missing those phone calls paid money for them with their marketing dollars.
Ryan’s advice is simple: If you’re spending money on leads, pick up the phone when they call you. Doing that alone will put you ahead of 95% of your competition.
5. If you can’t pick up the phone, make sure you have lots of great online reviews
All’s not lost if you do miss a call from a lead. If you have enough reviews, you’ll have one more chance to grab their attention before they move onto the next Google result.
Think about it: if you’re trying to choose between two businesses, you’ll usually go for the one that has 100 reviews over the one that has 12. People want to know that you’ll make them happy, and the biggest clue is that you’re already doing that for your current roster of customers.
6. Figure out your service area strategy
There are two approaches to service areas that pool pros can try. In the first one, you take on every account that reaches out to you, even if they’re not contained within a tight geographical area. This results in lower margins, but can make sense if, for example, you’re operating in a suburb with low search volume.
In the second approach, pool pros have a smaller, well-defined area. This results in fewer accounts but yields higher margins. As Ryan reminds us, you just have to figure out which approach is best for you.
Trouble crops up when you fail to choose a strategy at all. As Niki points out, “Many small companies take any new customer, but then their service area becomes huge and they lose time and money.”
7. Be realistic about marketing spend
Getting a pool account is more expensive than ever. When Ryan was running his pool business, an $80 cost per lead was par for the course. Now, he says, “If you can get an account for $300-400 of ad spend, you’re killing it.”
Lead cost has gone up by 400% in the last two and a half years, and even then, most people aren’t spending enough to get on Google Ads. Overall, if you want to grow your business by four to five accounts per month, you should expect to spend $1,500-2,000. It may feel expensive now, but it’s still far below what you could make when you eventually sell your route.
8. Slow down spend during off-seasons
Keep in mind that the money you spend doesn’t have to stay at a steady rate year-round. You’re much better off ramping up marketing spend for the months it makes sense, then tapering off during slower seasons. As Ryan notes, many people pause in the winter and then turn their marketing spend back on for the other eight months of the year.
People are getting off organic social. Kind of a waste of time nowadays. The algorithm shows you stuff that’s being paid to show you.
9. Keep an exit plan in your back pocket
No matter how you feel about private equity firms, there’s no doubt that their acquisitions are driving a lot of change in the industry right now. Ryan’s advice? It’s in your best interest to start planning your exit strategy now.
“If you do want to exit,” he says, “Get to 1,000 pools and cash out.” Private equity will pay a premium for those pools, and as lead cost keeps being driven up, it will be harder to scale and keep competing for attention.
10. Position yourself against private equity
On the other hand, it’s not impossible to compete with the very private equity firms that are buying up so much of the competition today.
The bigger any company is, the harder it is for them to offer nimble, personalized service. This is where owner-operated businesses shine. Being able to honestly say, “I’m going to take better care of your pool than the big enterprise that’s going to charge you a ton of money,” is a real advantage, and people like to see that messaging.
If you’re not growing, you’re dying
If Ryan has one piece of wisdom to leave pool pros with, it’s this: If you’re not growing, you’re dying. “People need to invest in marketing,” he says. In today’s market, it’s simply table stakes.
If you want to learn more about how Pool Monopoly can help kickstart your digital marketing journey, visit their website today.
Don’t forget to catch the full conversation with Ryan below.
