Sell More Landscape Enhancement Work and Boost Your Bottom Line

As a landscape maintenance company, your goal is simple: get more jobs that lead to higher profit, and contribute to your bottom line. 

 

A company’s success is based on its ability to make a profit. Profitability influences whether a company can acquire financing from a bank, attract investors to fund its operations and continue to grow. Company survival depends on the ability to turn a profit.

 

Though the goal is straightforward, achieving it is much more complicated. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, right?

 

In this article, we discuss one of the most effective areas that landscape maintenance companies can focus on to increase their profitability, and how to employ active sales techniques to boost your bottom line. 

 

We share the tips and tricks that have been proven to work in the field, as well as the technology you should be using to take your profits to the next level. 

 

The Benefits of Selling Enhancements

 

Expanding the services you offer to your current landscape maintenance clients is one of the most effective ways to grow your business. It costs less to upsell or cross-sell an existing client than it does to acquire new business and requires far less effort in terms of looking for sales. Because you’ve already established a relationship with these decision-makers, adopting this strategy is more likely to result in a much higher response rate. And because they already understand the benefits of your landscape maintenance service, it’s much quicker for you to close the deal.

If you’re looking for a high-profit, easy-to-pitch service to cross-sell to your existing maintenance customers, then look no further than landscape enhancements. One of the benefits of enhancement work is that there is a service to suit every client, big or small. From patios to foundation planting, mulching to pruning, the possibilities are endless when it comes to enhancing an existing outdoor space. 

 

Many experts in the landscape industry estimate say you can double your profits by focusing on landscape enhancement sales. Read that again: DOUBLE your profits! As well as creating more sales, selling enhancements can help encourage customer loyalty and gives you an edge over your competitors. 

 

The most successful landscape companies aim to add between 30% and 100% of their contract value in enhancements each year. For example, if a maintenance client pays $100,000 per year, then you should be aiming to sell them between $30-100k in enhancements in that time. 

 

According to business consultant Kevin Kehoe, increasing your enhancement output is the only thing you need to do if you want to double your net profit. In his Forecast 2021, he states that by decreasing your construction volume by 8% and increasing enhancement sales by that same amount, you can raise your net profit from 6% to 12%.

How to Sell Enhancement Work

 

If you’re reading this thinking, “that’s all well and good, but how do I boost enhancement sales by 8%?” then you’re not alone. Landscaping is a competitive business, and the chances are that wherever you are, you will be competing with plenty of others to secure work. 

 

When it comes to boosting the number of enhancement jobs you sell, the key is to be proactive. If you sit around waiting for the client to figure out they need a new patio then you could be waiting yourself into a loss. Most non-landscape folks don’t think about things like hardscaping or planting unless it is suggested to them. 

 

Or, to quote Kevin Kehoe directly:

 

“The challenge with enhancement sales is that it is inherently time-consuming. When I looked at $3b worth of data in Aspire I found that $2,700 was the avg size enhancement sale. These are impulse purchases, very simple. However, it takes almost as much time to do a $2,700 as it does for a 10k job. 

 

Enhancements don’t get sold because of the routine, pattern, and data required. You have to marry a pic to a design, measure, estimate, submit a proposal, follow up, get approved, etc. So enhancement sales are yes, good salesmanship, but if I can be more proactive I will be more successful selling them.”

 

Be Visual

A picture speaks a thousand words, especially in a visual field like landscaping. Never show up to a residential bid without photos of your previous work. Putting together a catalog that showcases previous enhancement projects allows customers to visualize themselves with a yard as good-looking as those in the photos. 

 

Get Specific

 

The more detail you can give the customer about enhancements, the easier they will find it to picture themselves reaping the benefits. Software like LandOne allows you to create detailed takeoffs in minutes, so when you show up to a bid you can show the customer where the patio could go, what it would look like, and exactly how much it will cost. 

Put Innovation Front and Center

 

If you’re looking to woo a client, then think about ways you can stand out from the crowd. To demonstrate to customers that your company is knowledgeable and capable of completing their job exactly the way they want, LandOne Takeoff allows you to draw designs onto photos of the proposed site. That gives you several opportunities to address areas outside the scope of the proposal and to show the customer why they should invest in landscape enhancements through your company. 

 

Don’t Ignore the Numbers

 

With LandOne, you could increase your enhancement work by up to 50%. Our combination of clever technology, straight-forward interface, and clear graphics means that with us, you can’t help but stand out in the crowd. 

 

From planning to project management, our intuitive technology is easy to use, lightning-fast, and updates every measurement and estimation in real-time. Thanks to our landscaping takeoff software, it is now easy to boost your bottom line.