5 Essential SMS Campaigns for Home Services Companies

In today's competitive market, home services companies are constantly seeking innovative ways to connect with customers and drive revenue. One of the most effective tools at their disposal is SMS marketing. This powerful communication channel allows businesses to engage with customers in a direct and personal manner, ensuring that important messages are seen and acted upon promptly. 

By leveraging well-crafted SMS campaigns for home services, companies that focus on local services for home owners or renters can not only increase customer engagement but also achieve significant revenue growth. In fact, leading brands like Angi, Porch, and Homefix Custom Remodeling have reported over 25% revenue lift since integrating Regal.io's SMS solutions into their marketing strategies. Dive into these five essential SMS campaign ideas, complete with examples, to discover how your home services business can harness the power of SMS to enhance customer relationships and boost your bottom line.

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New Service Request Campaign

• Goal: Welcome leads who submit new service requests. Clearly outline the next steps to take in order to move forward (e.g. review the quote, select a professional, book the service.) 
• Trigger: Use Regal’s Journey Builder to trigger the campaign when prospects submit a service request.
• Tips: Reference customer profile attributes such as {{service requested}} and {{estimated price}}. Be consultative and avoid the hard sell or using discounts at this early stage. Even though customers have been trained to get multiple quotes in the home services industry, the most important thing is to demonstrate expertise and build trust in order to demonstrate value.

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Abandoned Quote Campaign

• Goal: Engage leads who received a quote but have not moved forward to booking in a reasonable time. They are probably shopping around or have some other buying hesitation. Don’t lose them to the competition by “playing the waiting game.”
• Trigger: Use Regal’s Journey Builder to trigger the campaign when a quote is provided, and wait to see if lead does not move forward in e.g., 10 minutes for simple or urgent services like furniture assembly or plumbing, or 1 hour to 24 hours for larger projects. 
• Tips: Reference customer profile attributes such as {{service reason}}. Use the A/B test node in Journey Builder to set up a 3 way A/B test for an “Aggressive Offer”, “Moderate Offer” and “No Offer” so you can learn what offer optimizes revenue (Conversion Rate x Order Value). Remind the customer of your unique value propositions and create urgency by offering a time bound discount to book. Encourage leads to respond back with questions or request a call if they want to discuss

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Canceled Booking Campaign

• Goal: Follow up with prospects who cancel their service booking – for both one-off bookings and recurring bookings. Engage them in conversation to understand their reason for canceling and address their specific reason in order to salvage the customer.
• Trigger: Use Regal’s Journey Builder to trigger the campaign when the customer cancels their service booking.
• Tips: Reference customer profile attributes, such as {{booking data}}, {{service}}, and {{professional name}}. Create FOMO by reminding the customer of the original benefits of the service. Don’t go in with the hard sell, until you understand their specific reasons for canceling. If the customer doesn’t engage in conversation over text, give them a call. It’s much easier to do objection handling over the phone than in a drawn out conversation over SMS.

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Completed Booking Satisfaction Campaign

• Goal: Understand if a customer had a positive or negative experience with their service so you can leverage it into the next best action to increase revenue, while your brand is still top of mind for the customer. For positive experiences, you should solicit a referral or get the customer to schedule their next booking in advance. For negative experiences, you should understand the customer’s reason and see what you can do to make it right. 
• Trigger: Use Regal’s Journey Builder to trigger the campaign when a customer’s booking is completed. You may want to delay until the morning after a booking was completed to give them time to experience the results of the service. This should be a journey with two back to back SMS campaigns. ‍
• Tips: In the first message, ask the customer to first respond with a rating of 1 to 5 where 1= poor experience and 5=great experience. Based on their response, use a Conditional Match Node in the journey to alter your follow up message. For 4 or 5 star ratings, when asking for a referral on Yelp or social media, include a link in the message so it’s an easy one-click action for the customer. For 1 or 2 star ratings, it’s better to immediately call the customer and let them vent to a live agent. This not only mitigates the odds they then vent on social media but it also lets you take advantage of a phenomenon called the Service Recovery Paradox. (When a company is able to effectively recover from a service failure, the customer’s satisfaction can actually increase beyond what it would have been if the failure had never happened.)

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Lapsed Customer Winback Campaign

• Goal: generate revenue by reconnecting with lapsed customers and encourage them to book a new service. Demonstrate your understanding of their needs by customizing your messaging based on their previous services or the current season. 
• Blast: Use Regal’s Segment Builder to create an audience of customers who have previously completed at least two services AND haven’t booked in the last 6 months AND rated their last booking positively. You may also further segment by profile attributes – such as homeowners vs. renters and region – to tailor your service recommendations. Then use a Scheduled Journey to target your audiences with an SMS campaign to nudge for a new booking. 
• Tips: Reference the customer's {{last booking rating}} to remind them they enjoyed your service. Offer a repeat of the service they’ve booked most often previously and also highlight a new service that’s appropriate to the season. If it’s a month where there’s no logical seasonal service to recommend, then offer a service everyone is bound to need periodically (eg. Gutter Cleaning for homeowners or Home Cleaning for renters).

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Start Your SMS Campaign With Regal

SMS campaigns for home services are a game-changer for companies looking to enhance customer engagement and drive revenue growth. By implementing these five essential SMS campaign ideas, your business can create more meaningful interactions with customers and enjoy the same success that industry leaders like Angi, Porch, and Homefix Custom Remodeling have experienced. 

To see how Regal.io can help you achieve similar results, don't hesitate to request a demo. For more insights and success stories, check out our B2C Sales Podcast and explore our customer case studies. Learn more about the impressive impact of SMS campaigns in our detailed Angi case study. Start transforming your customer engagement strategy today with Regal.io.