Pest Control Marketing: How Service Businesses Win More Customers | Gabriel Bustos - Pest Perspectives

Hello there and welcome to Pest perspectives #48 the first one over the year. So happy New Year to everyone. And if you have, if you're tuned into Pest Perspectives for the first time, Best Perspectives is a podcast where we try and entertain and educate at the same time. It's all to do with the pest control industry and related and relating things to business. It's all it's all tied into being a pest control, but technician and running a business as well. So we try and get on a variety of different guests.

Today's guest is somebody that I haven't actually had anyone on that's got expertise like this before. So this week for the first podcast of this year, a year, we're a year old now a year old we have we have Gabe Bustos from hold on a minute. It's kind of like along the screen. There we go. Gabe Bustos, Co founder of Hector Home Service Marketing. How are you doing? I'm doing great John, thanks for having me. Congrats on a year and I'm I'm honoured to be the 1st guest of 2026. No, cheers. Nice. Thanks for because you're games one of the people that emailed me to ask to come on.

I do get a lot of people e-mail me, but they don't all fit. And I thought you had a fit. You did because obviously with your marketing experience and what you do as a job, it does relate. Because I'll be honest, I've been to a lot of pest control shows. You know where they took it's like workshops and unless it's just a nervous thing, a lot of people they said, they actually said who has Googled my business? And I think 5 people understood what it meant. And I thought they hand up and actually just they didn't, they didn't want to put their hand up.

Maybe that, maybe it was that, but there's a lot of things that people could learn. So how did you get into the mark marketing side of the business? As in, is it something you just worked out over years of experience and set up yourself, or was it how did you get into it all? To start with, yeah, no, totally appreciate the question. Yeah, so I had, I've been an entrepreneur now for about 15 years and for the 1st 10, which is the 1st 10 years of my career, I was, you know, founded and was a, a key part of four different businesses of different, different kinds.

And they all, you know, we, we cared so much about providing a great service, right, which I'm sure a lot, a lot of our audience can, can relate to. And we and, and they all didn't work out because they didn't focus on the marketing And we never found somebody that we trusted. We didn't know it ourselves, right. So we could provide a great service, but we couldn't find, we couldn't consistently get people to find us. So I, I, and it was hard to find people. Like we tried to hire people and it didn't work out.

Not to say they don't exist, but we didn't find the right ones. And then after, you know, four times going at it and failing as a business owner, I said enough. So I got into learning marketing myself. And then about two years into that journey, I was doing marketing for, you know, all different industries, whoever would hire us. And that was a mess. So we were trying to make everybody, you know, trying to do everything for everybody. And we were like Nah. And we had had some success with home services.

So we were like, let's just say no to everyone else and focus in. Oh no, it's it's because it's it is a minefield because obviously it changes from week to week day-to-day. And a lot of this stuff the no one really knows the algorithm. They will tell you, but I don't believe anyone who funny knows it. You can try your best, can't you? No, no one knows it. You keep changing it, but totally a lot is is all of them things. But so obviously you wanted to come on to offer some insights in into what you do.

So what what would you say is? I'm going off some questions and topics you provided because they seem fitting. What is the most important to your audience? What did you mean with that? I think. No, I wanted to ask you. I wanted to ask you what was most important to your audience of, you know, related to marketing, kind of where you know, different businesses of different sizes have different challenges with marketing, right? So I think generally it's a lot of people don't understand how a lot of them don't understand how to get work as such, because obviously you've got Google click, ain't you?

But you click, you paper click, you've got Google guaranteed and you've got like social media just cover the whole let from breath. Because I know the fact I know it's it's changing and and it is about Google search still. That's the main thing. But I do know and I've tested recently on all the AI apps that my business is, is ranking in my area on a ice, which is that's the thing now ChatGPT, you've got to try and get all your services to show up in AI because a lot of people now are just asking AI.

So EG I live in Oakham, Rutland, UK, what's a good pest control company? And and it will tell you, but that's probably going to frighten the head out of people that will because it's not like Google, Google search. Yeah. Well, well, you know what one thing that I had on here, right, is, you know, you and I had talked about this and we get this question a lot is how is AI changing search marketing and and whatnot, right? So I'll talk about search specifically. When I talk about search, I'm talking about you said it, I'm talking about Google and I'm talking about AI search when people ask for recommendations, right?

And while AI has, is obviously having a big impact, it hasn't really changed the fundamentals of, of what of, you know, So the the same things that like if you do the same things to rank at the top of like Google Maps, like you're talking about your local SEO, right? If you're doing it right, you'll also be ranking in AI, right? I mean, there's some, there's some technical differences and whatnot, right? But like fundamentally it hasn't really changed that much in terms of what to focus on, right?

What has changed is like the speed and the volume, right? So whereas like, let's say, you know, creating content for your website is a big part of, of SEO and search marketing, right? Whereas before maybe you needed to do 2 pieces of content a month and now you have to do 4, right? But the AI tools allow you to do 4. You know what I'm, if you're using them, right? So it's kind of like it's speed things up, you know what I mean? It's kind of raised the stakes a little bit, but kind of when you look under the hood, the fundamentals haven't changed all that much that I would say the other key component that that is big, which again, it's, it's not really a change.

It's just a doubling down. But like in the age of AI, you know, reputation, authenticity, trust is more important than ever, right? 'cause now, now people know that you can just like make stuff up and make up videos and things. But you can't make up like getting on screen at your job, you know, being a, a real person on screen and just telling your story on the, you know what I mean? So can't make up Google reviews, right? Google reviews are as as important as ever. People see, Oh, somebody else is saying that about them.

I trust that, right? So a lot of the fundamentals haven't really changed, right? It's just kind of the, the volume of things have turned up and speed of things have turned up. OK. Because even in, correct me if I'm wrong, even in a normal Google search and most searches even in normal, I believe AI is running it anyway now. But it's not as common in local searches, right? So if you're looking for a pest control company in Oakham or you know a pest control company near me, a lot of times the AI overview on Google does not show up there.

It shows you the Google guaranteed ads. It shows you the pest, the the pay per click ads, and then it'll show you the maps, the Google Maps where people see your reviews. And that's really where you want to be. Because whether people find you on social media or they find you through an ad, most people are going to go to that reviews section to look at to at least check your reviews. Who's got good reviews, right? So for local for local search they the AI overview is really not as common as it is for most other kinds of searches.

Yeah, no, you are right, because we're not. I obviously test mine because I we use, I don't know if it's still called Google Guarantee, but we use Google Go, but where the customer clicks it and it rings, rings you and it says Google 1st and connects that. But you see you are right, it doesn't AI it doesn't show up there, but in other parts it does as such. Well obviously reviews. Oh I wish they'd just be nicer. They would because I built my reviews up to 87 now from the previous year because I got loads of reviews and Google wipe loads off.

They did and backup days and it's not easy to get people to actually leave a review even if they're happy. Doesn't take doesn't take very long to do 1. Totally. And obviously you can't incent. You're not. I don't think you're supposed to incentivize people because there's laws on that kind of stuff. There is. Totally, totally. It's like paying for reviewing it is we get enough, we get enough. I think I'm the highest in my local area currently by second. 57 yeah, that's huge. It's one of the big biggest pieces for and again, this plays into AI recommendations, right?

Like your reviews, Google reviews specifically are one of the biggest pieces that's going to get not only Google to recommend to you when somebody searches for your service in your area, but also ChatGPT, Gemini, like they look at that and that's one of the biggest things they use to recommend who to call. That's good because it's that part of the trust and authority. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And so, you know, I always tell people like the, that Google, like the Google Maps, right, is like a billboard, right?

It's, you know, it's just visibility, but it's a billboard where it's a, it's better than a billboard 'cause it's billboard like in front of people when they're searching for your service, right? And same thing with an AI recommendation. Every time Chachi PT recommends you to somebody, like that's way more valuable because they're recommending it in the moment that somebody is looking for your service, right? So reviews are big, that's definitely for sure. And then another thing that's kind of been interesting about how AI has, you know, changed things is like, it's almost been this like kind of horseshoe effect, where like before having a bunch of website content, you know, blogs and pages on your website and whatnot was important in the early days of SEO.

And then it started to become a little bit less important because people weren't really reading blogs anymore. They were watching videos and things like that, right? And now it's becoming important again because even even if humans like don't read, you know, the, the tonnes of pages and blogs that you put on your website, these AI tools, when, when somebody asks chat chief BT can you recommend me a pest control company, the AI tool is definitely reading every word on your website. You know what I mean?

So it's weird because it's like, and, and that's part of the thing that's hard about doing, you know, marketing, especially through the algorithms is like you have to both speak to the algorithms who are recommending you and getting you in front of people. And of course also the people who are actually reading your stuff and you know, have have their phone in their hand. Yeah, it's, it's because like obviously I do. I start, we've got a new website, I start to do blogs and like, obviously you have to do a lot of messing around with SEO and the way they want you to make it sound isn't always what you think reads the best.

It's like this would sound better. Rather, it's like the five top ways, you know, I think you've got to put a number in it and get your SEO math score up and things like that. And it's it's not easy, but it. Definitely can help. It definitely can help. And yeah. And then you know what one other thing that's important, that this is a common miss, a common misconception is like, you know, a lot of people focus too much on blogs and a lot of times when you think about a blog, it's a general topic. It's not like specific to a a certain area.

So it'll be like, you know, should I use heat or chemicals to kill bedbugs, Right. People searching for that are like searching from all over the UK, all over, you know, the US. It's not like they're not in Oakum. You know what they're not in your versus getting in front of people who are searching for, you know, termite control in my city, right. So as so like creating content on your website is as important as ever, but we always recommend people to focus on creating content that that's going after searches for your services in your area, right they.

Just start changing things then obviously. As a cause, yeah, right. We see it all the time. We're like, we'll, we'll, we'll meet a new business and like, they'll be getting lots of traffic to their website, but that traffic's not actually turning into leads because most of that traffic is coming from people all around the country that are not actually their people, you know what I mean, in their area. So that's a, that's an important, you know, thing that's good to remember. If you have a, if you have an agency or a marketing professional working with you, you always want to prioritise local searches for your service over like general informational searches about your service.

You know what? I obviously do get in the blogs and stuff. I do put search terms as in I do mention local areas within the post, but I think, I think they're, I think they're aiming for your title should have the town in it as well. I'm not right now, so I've got to put that in. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. Sometimes it isn't like wincing repeat because, but you could have. If you got to do that, you might have to make six different versions of it. You're exactly right. I'll say, OK. You're exactly right.

And like that's what, that's what we often do is like for the first, you know, six months of working with somebody, we'll end up creating 10 different versions of their termite page because it's all targeting different searches in different areas. Now you can't just, you can't just like copy it. You can't just like copy the page and like change out the location. Like Google's smart enough and AI is smart enough to to recognise duplicate content, right? And they'll penalise you for that. So, so you do end up having to, you know, rewrite a lot of it.

Of course, AI tools can help you do that. But you know, you have to get new images, you have to write new content, right? It's very similar, but it can't be identical. Otherwise they'll penalise you for that. OK, that's another good tip. That is because now I've got some jobs to do. I have, but yeah, it's I just did a couple of faithful in chat. Thanks to Jason from Ask Pest Control for popping in and Graham on LinkedIn. Thanks for popping in. OK, I mean, sorry, yeah, we have got a couple of the listeners, watchers, whatever.

But yeah, no, that's, that's that's a good round up on AI. He said. You just basically got to do a mix of everything basically, because I get a lot of success on not website related, but over the past year or year or two, I've built up a bit of a following on the next door. I've actually been called the next Door celebrity to customers. I've turned up because I post under my personal name, but I have linked to the company and then I have got tonnes. I've never paid for an advert on there, but I've built up a lot of weed.

So I do personal branding till LinkedIn, etcetera, but I've done that. It's not always sales focused and then they kind of that kind of works. I'm not saying it's 100%, but definitely in the Wasp season it gets me some work. Definitely it does. Awesome. Yeah, I don't have first first hand experience with the next door, but it's something that it's been on our radar for a little bit. Well, some people have good experience, some people have total bad experience. I've had good experience with so far.

That's great. I haven't had no one calling me all sorts. Apparently that's what a lot of people. It's so toxic, but I don't react to people like that. When someone replies often I kill them with kindness. It's like there's a chap who tells me off every year for killing Wasps and they always say I made it into public health to keep people safe, to call me out. And I always thank him, but every time he does, I love it because the views on the post rock it right up. They do. But I know how to react to people.

I know when someone's after the ones I wear and know that they really want to fight, I don't reply, right. I don't. You can. I can tell. But I've learned that over time, right. I have. But yeah, Next door was probably on your radar, but it's probably not a big thing. You know, it works or don't. It's. Yeah, it's harder to, I know. That's the thing about Google that and, and, and search like AI search, right? There's nothing that replaces getting your name and your reviews in front of people when in the moment that they are searching for your services, you know what I mean?

So that's why we just doubled down on on on Google and AI Search because it's just predictable and it works. And you can really focus in on where you know, you can see where the search traffic is. You can see how many people in Oakham are searching for termites versus rodents versus you know that the town next to 1. Thing I know it's the example but a bit miracle we don't have termites here. Oh wow. No, no, we don't have term, but we, we, we, we. Most of our buildings are all but maybe brick too.

Oh wow, that's great. Termites are awful. They're. I know I've had loads of pick up on the podcast because obviously to see I do have people from America and people from all over the world, I do. But yeah, they can't get over it. We haven't got termites. That's great. Termites are a nightmare, man. Like, I mean, yeah, 50 grand in renovations and repairs because of termite, you know, like it's crazy. It is. It is. Well, I bet it's big business when it comes to SEO marketing and stuff, I imagine. Yeah, bed bugs.

Yeah, bed bugs are a big thing here too. You know, people pay a lot of money. Now we have bed bugs, right? It's not an area I seem to get a lot of cold, but there are a lot of people that get a lot of work when you're watching. He gets a lot of work in it. He just hate treatments as well. But even with bed books, we mainly do rats, mice, things like that. But we don't seem to get a lot of work for bed books. But it it, they are here, you know? Yeah.

Well, you know another thing that could be helpful. So you know, you had mentioned the the Google guaranteed, right? And now it's called local services ads, right? So. Yeah. So to anybody listening when you do a local search on Google, like if you know you can test it with any local serve, it could be dentist right in your area, any local business search to an area, right? You're usually not going to see AI overviews. You're going to see 4 sections. The first section is the the Google guaranteed local service ads.

The second section is the pay per click ads. The third section is the Google Maps where it shows you the people's reviews and whatnot. And then the fourth section is all the websites, the, the, the organic listings, right? And I thought it could be helpful, Sean, I've, you know, we're working with a couple pest control companies right now. One of them we're doing all, you know, local service ads, pay per click and local SEO. And I can just go through like kind of what the cost per lead on each one of a real.

If you want. To a real example. If if you're allowed to, yeah, that's fine. Oh, I'm not going to say their name, but they're a, they're a pest control. They're a real company obviously in, in, in Pennsylvania, in, in, in the United States and family owned business, right. And so anyways that they're currently running the, the, the local service ads the Google guaranteed and they're getting about they're they're getting leads at about 4340, five U.S. dollars a month, not a month a lead, sorry, a lead they're getting.

So in in October, they got 53 leads. This is the one I last pulled this data. They got 53 leads at $45.00 apiece. OK. That's from that local services ads. OK, that's cool. Wow. OK. Yep, the this company actually also focuses on a lot of bedbug work and heat treatment to somebody who said was listening. And so they have us do PPC, the pay per click for bedbugs, their bedbug service. It's a bit more expensive because bedbug leads are more expensive. They're higher value jobs, so we're currently getting them bedbug leads at about $110 a lead.

OK. So you know a little more than twice the price. Because I asked you something about that in general if you were a competitor. Not saying I've ever done it, but can you actually click your competitors off by just keep click click clicking or does it not work? Yeah. Does AI detect someone's messing around? Yeah I just, I just wondered. I've heard about it. No, it's definitely a thing. 1 of this client actually we had, they were like we had to deal with that. I don't know, halfway through last year.

And yeah, no, there's, there are tools where like, I don't know if it's native to Google. I don't know if Google does it unless you do something about it. We had to install a tool, like a software tool on their website that essentially tells like when that's happening. So it'll tell like if somebody from the same IP address keeps clicking an ad, right? Or, or it'll, you know, there's, there's different things it does to block spam and to block attacks like that. It's called click cease, like to cease clicking, click cease.

That's what we had to install for them. And, and and yet that's what stopped that. That's good then. Sorry, carry on. Just forward ask that was. All no, it's true. It's that's actually, it was actually a learning curve because they were they were getting a lot of spam and like this kind of like competitor attacks. And so there were a couple months there where we were like, we got to figure this out like fast, you know, anyways. And then, and then they do local SEO, right? So when people find them just organically not paying to be at the top, right?

And they got in the couple months, we still work with them. But I just pulled this data a few months ago. So in the month that we did this, it was $35. They got 62 leads for $35 a lead, right? So with, with organic, as I'm sure many folks know, it takes time to kind of build up to the, to get up to, to the top of the rankings. But then once you're there, you're not paying for each of those leads, you know, directly like the same way you do from an ad or what not. So each the local service ads, the Google guaranteed has its pros and cons.

The paper click as a marketing strategy has its pros and cons and the organic SEO has its pros and cons. And really they're, they're useful in different situations. But the organic piece, you know, if you're really have a, you know, it doesn't even take that long if you do it right. But it might take three to six months to get to the top. A little bit of an investment, but then you can see they're getting leads for 35 bucks a piece as opposed to 45 or $100 a piece. You know, it depends on the, with ads, certain services are more expensive than others, right?

But just to share, you know what's possible out there? No, that's good. Obviously I'm watching. Google knows how I look because of each service is and they charge accordingly. Not much exactly like. Roofing clicks are super expensive, you know what I mean?

No, that's some good shared, some good day today you have. Yeah, yeah. And then, you know, there's pros and cons to each. I'm happy to go to go through that. I'm, you know, I'm happy to go through what what you think would be most valuable for folks. Obviously there are a few people that I've had a few people on my last podcast last year, someone asking it was about Google. I'll keep calling it Google Local then and Google clicks and I was and I recommended Google local the one that used to call but I'm not an expert but I said I know one thing that if you do pay per click you will get work but you need to know that you will be paying for it as well.

Expensive. Yeah. So I said, I said that's to risk. It says, but that's business. Well, and I I also always recommend people to start with the local service ads that Google guaranteed because with pay per click, it's like it sits in the name you pay per click. So you could have 20 people that click your ad and not a single one turns into a phone call. You know what I mean? If you're if, if you know they're not the right people or your, your messaging is not right with the local service ads, it's pay per lead.

So the one you're talking about the Google guarantee, right? You only pay, you know, you said you have experience with this, right? So you only pay when your phone actually rings and when Google system detects that it's actually a real lead and not just spam or solicitation, right? So it's really good starting point for two reasons. One, it's low risk, right? It's paid per lead, meaning that you know, again, you're not going to waste money because you only pay when you actually get real leads. And two, there's it's not that hard to set up like you've done it right?

Like you have to upload some documents and you have to prove your. Say it, say it is now because we've been established over 15 years, you see. So, but I do know people that I don't know if it's same in America, but there are people that are having to get their mobile phone. And actually obviously a lot of these people as whole traders that they do it from the home. They're having to make a video of them at the house walking down the street to the street sign to prove that they live there. And you, I've had a lot of people telling me about that.

I mean, having to make a video to prove that's where they actually live and they're actually on the street. And that wasn't a thing when we we first started doing it. Totally, totally. And and that's for it's similar, right? It's that is for that is for having a Google business profile like a verified address, which is also really important. I mean it's really important. So you're right, like in order to have like a verified address for your Google business profile, which is which is very important.

Now, they make you take a video and you know, show your signage and show where your mail comes in and things like that. And it's, you know, it's to prevent people you know, from the consumer end, like to prevent people that are fake or, you know, aren't actually, you know, aren't actually who they say they are. No, I totally understand it, just I I've heard it from a lot of people. I know they. Weren't happy I was on wiki video walk down the. Street, I know one of our but from before we switched to doing home services, we were working with a bunch of local businesses and one of our clients then was a Co working space.

You know, like a we work kind of like wasn't we work but like that and and they had you know so they had people that had offices there 2020 some businesses that had offices there and they all wanted to like get verified their address at the Co working space and it was like it was a whole mess that they had exactly what you're talking about. You know what I mean? Doing the video and making sure the signage is right here and making sure the mail, they show the mail here and their logo is there and it's like it was this whole big mess of trying to get people verified at this Co working space that we need to help them with.

Did it work in the end? For some of them, for some of them, yeah.

So yeah, it's pretty interesting. But you know, for for Google that that Google business profile piece is super important. You don't necessarily need to have a a verified address. You can have a service area business, right. So like, you know what I'm talking about your, you can work out of your house. You can have a Google business profile and still get reviews and all that and have it rather than it shows your address, have it be like a service area. It doesn't work as well, but it's still way better than not having a, a profile at all.

So that, that's actually the first thing I always tell people to start with, and you don't have to hire anybody to do that, is to complete your Google Business profile, right? And you mentioned this earlier, right to you, you can use tools like ChatGPT or Gemini to help you write the content for it so that you've got some of those key phrases in there, right? Like if you're trying to focus on rodents and Ocum, as you're filling out your Google Business profile, you want to make sure that you're including those phrases in there, right?

Yeah, I mean, I I've actually used it for the Google, Google Business profile. I've used it for the website, but obviously you've got to adjust to make sure that information is correct because it can mess up, it can mess up that line. That long line isn't in there because that's how people, a lot of people. That. Long line hashes. Yeah, yeah, for sure. No, I know. Yeah. Every time I'm writing with AI, like literally every single time, I specify like no hyphens, no dashes. And like if I don't do it once, it gives me the freaking dashes.

It's like every time. I'm like, no, you just have to keep reminding it. Yeah, hasn't, hasn't. Keep your mind on the wild, but just got to keep playing with it. Yeah, but you have. Really. But so those are the three like filling out your Google business profile and putting keywords in it, right? For your area, your services in your area. Super important #2 getting five star reviews. We talked about that, right? Super, super important #3 is setting up the local service ads. And for the each of those three things, you don't need to hire anybody to help you with that stuff, right?

Like all three of, you know, getting reviews is a pain in the butt and it's hard in its own way. But even if you were to hire somebody, like, they can't really do that for you anyways. I mean, they can set, they can, they can set up text messages that go out. But that doesn't replace like the technician being in the home doing a good service, getting the review before they leave the house, you know? Oh. No, it's definitely true. I get. We get emails everyday son. I can get your reviews. I'm not.

Don't want your reviews. Thanks. Exactly. Hard enough to be on Google without someone offering to fake review you. Oh, I know. They annoy me. I know, don't know, don't. Reply to most, it's hard enough as it is valid. When we work with people or, or, or deciding whether or not we want to work with people, it's like that's one of the biggest things we look for is like, do they have good reviews? Because we can't fudge that for you. And if you don't have good reviews or you can't get good reviews, even if you bring us on to do our work, it's still not going to be enough to beat your competition because the reviews are such a big piece, you know?

Oh. No, they definitely are because I didn't realise until like I always asked a lot, a lot of them. How did you find? There's a lot of them. They say Google reviews. I read your Google reviews because now on the website, we've got them on the website now they all the latest hot ones. They all roll, roll through exactly looking or whatever it is. But they are quite important. I know a lot of people that don't have many Google reviews and they're well busy, but it's it's how it, isn't it? So I'm for.

Sure, for sure. And, and and they, well they probably get a lot of their business through referrals and word of mouth and repeat business. I mean, how do they get business? My my actor got a friend who's been on the podcast. I've shot him, I've shot Sam Tricky and he does mainly just farm work. He doesn't even have a website, but he's got that much work. It's unreal, but he hasn't actually got a website or a presence. How's he? How's he get? How's he get leads? Farmers because he works for farmers, right?

All all the farmers recommend him and that's he's honestly got that much work. Well, that's awesome. That's the power of specialising. That's that's a testament to the power of specialising. I said to him, it says you've done well. It says we're in 2020, well last year, we're in 2025 and you haven't got a website. Well bloody done as you went. He's taking the mix. It says, well no, not really. I said it's unheard of. Most FIFA have a website, but no, he's a good lad to get on from really well. But he's he's in, he's in farming mainly, but he does all right.

He does. Well, that's a, you know, I mentioned that up front. It's like even for our business when we were working with everybody, it was hard going. And once we decided to just start focusing on one type of business, you know, everything got so much easier and our, our work, our results for people improved so much because now like that guy's the expert on farms, you know, he's the best at far. Yeah, it's pest control. He's, he's, yeah, he's got like dogs and stuff as well. Right. So it's like what you're going to hire?

Yeah. But yeah, I said to him, I said no, I'm really not. I said you've got no marketing, you've got no nothing to pay for. I said it's it's great. It is, but it's not. It's not. It's quite unheard of, but it can happen. Yeah. And yeah, like I said, I chalked that up to specialising. You know, not everybody wants to do that or, you know, right, but. I'm not into having loads of farm contracts, I can assure you. Right, right, right. I do too, and they're not they're OK. They're not like farms get muddy in.

But also, sorry there, Jason says. That's pest control. But he hasn't got a website. He mainly has word of mouth on the local trading standard site. But you can't do it. You can. Absolutely, Absolutely. But obviously Jason's been around a long time. He's got a reputation. I'd say if you're starting out, you'd struggle a bit. You wouldn't, right? Right. And, and, you know, really like when I think about Mark, when I think about what it makes for good marketing and are like, what, what the result is like even before growth, it's really about predictability, you know what I mean?

It's it's about like, do you, you know, do you know, you've got enough flow coming in each month, right? In order to make bets, in order to make decisions in order to, you know, And so if you've got that after being in the, in the industry for a while and building up reputation like that counts, you know what I mean? But if you're new to the game, you know, you need predictability, right? Otherwise you're going to get chewed. I mean, as I've never run a pest control company, but I've run several companies before about that and I got chewed up, you know, and I burnt out.

That's, that's fair. That is, do you do anything with, do you deal in any social media aspects of the business or not? We don't just because you know, we specialise in our lane, but I know people that run social media ads like Facebook ads and Instagram ads and, and find success with it. You know the generally you can get leads cheaper on social media, but the, the lead quality is not as good. You know what I mean, 'cause you're interrupting like people, people are watching cat videos and then they see your ad as opposed to searching for a pest control company.

So it can't, it can work, you know what I mean? But it's like, I know that it's, it's going to, it requires more resources from your sales team or, you know, as a salesperson, because you've got to chase more leads, you've got to qualify more leads, you know what I mean? But if you're looking for volume, it's cheaper than Google. It's just at the at the end of the day, I don't think it's as efficient. No, I mean, yeah, it worked. Some people have made success. Yeah, some people don't. It's it's not, it's not easy because I don't know if you've ever heard of I watched a lot of Gary Vee stuff, he said.

Gary Vee. Of course. I think he said a lot of people give it a month for say, Gary Vee. You're wrong, he says. You've got to be doing it a years got know what you're doing. You know, I'm not telling you you could be overnight success. Totally. Totally. Just get better, get good. Yeah. But you know, it's, it's part of it. It's a brand. A lot of people do it for brand presents for. Branding, but. Yeah, but you're there. For sure. Yeah. And what was I going to say about, you know what? I lost what I was going to say.

It'll come back to me about social.

It's because he said that if you've got a good organic video that gets high reach, but then take that advert and put it into paid, paid right adverts as it will work better. Totally. Well, but he because he works for companies like Cosy Controller, etcetera, yeah. No, that and yeah, Gary V's audience is different. You know, it's huge and it's different than local pest control, you know, family run pest control business. Like exactly but that. That you know, like even for local services, right, like we find that if people like if you're in a competitive, if you're in a really competitive area, right, at least in in the in the United States, there are some huge I'm sure you have them too.

There are some huge pest control companies turning this and Oregon and whatnot, right? And like they do dominate, they do dominate some big markets, like in the, in the big markets where they are, right, there's only a few spots at the top of Google and it's going to be hard to to beat Terminix, you know what I mean? In Google rankings. So where social media can be good is if it is, if you're in a really saturated area and a really competitive area on Google, then you know, you can look to social media ads to get leads and it'll be a lot less.

It'll be a lot more affordable than trying to go up against these big budgets of Orkin and Terminix and whatnot, you know? Oh, yeah, but some of the some of the big boys are here. We've got Rent to Kill, right? We haven't got Terminix anymore. Terminix were quite well. They were part of Rent to Kill. But because they got acquired. Yeah, but in America, but the UK, the UK mergers and acquisitions department were not happy and they called out monopoly. That's a good. They made they made them sell it off.

Another company bought them and they kind of the name doesn't really exist anymore, just they got sucked into another big company. Right. Well, I think. Virgo, I think, I think Virgo bought them and they kind of. You don't see Terminix bands anywhere. You guys don't have termites and and you have good antitrust laws. That's a good thing. I wish, I wish there was more of that here, honestly. But, but, but, but, but you know, you know, I say that about the big guys and like, you know, it's, it's true, of course.

And, and you'll be able to speak to this better than I can, honestly. But there's so many customers, customers out there that are looking for a family owned, they're looking for like a neighbour or family owned thing. Like they'll, they'll scroll past Terminix and like, or because they know that they're just, they're just going to number, they're just treated like a number, you know what I mean? So like one of our, you know, in the, like the, the pest control client I was sharing about earlier, the one in Pennsylvania here in the States, they've got Terminix and Orca in there, you know what I mean?

And like, they're not, they're not above them in terms of the rankings. They're, they're right below them, but they're still getting lots of flow because people are, you know, they want a local family owned company, you know, so. Yeah, that's kind of I know, I know there's a lot of a lot of family owned ones out there. I know a lot of them have been bought up. I know that's a big thing in America. We. Definitely. But a lot of the big American companies have been have been coming here and trying to buy at firms here.

It's getting a bet as well, but it's Cazorkin here. But they're not, they're not under Orkin. They're like they buy a company and it would say so and so company and it would say owned by Orkin. It will. But. They are here. They're obviously there must be some kind of money in it, but they are, they are starting to buy them here as well. You know, I read or I sorry, not read. I went to a conference, a pest control conference here once at the NPMA actually, I saw that you're involved with some pests, forget what what it was called, but.

Yeah. I'm, I'm a board member of the National Pest Technicians Association, OK. So it's kind of probably like that. I I've had somebody on that is part of is, is part of that as well MPMA. I go to these events sometimes, you know, here and, and I said, I remember hearing this guy speak and he was talking about the res like the reason why it's such a good business is because of the residual, the recurring, you know, if you get people on the quarterly contract and whatnot, right? It, there's a lot of predictability in it, you know, as as opposed to like doing kitchen remodels where you might get one big job this month, but next job next month you, you know, so.

See, there is there lies a difference, Gabe. They're talking about residential quarterly contracts homes, aren't they? That was that was about residential. Yeah, that was my guess. So I'll tell you something now that doesn't happen in the UK. People do not door knock. Then you need pest control. We have a few quarterly contracts, not much, lots of people we've serviced, but we did an issue and I've wanted to keep some monitoring stuff down for a period. But in America, it's every man for himself.

It is when it comes to these areas, but it's not a it's not a thing. You you, you'll probably get told to where to go if you knocked on someone's door and said do you need pest control? No, no, no, I mean you. Might get a. You might get a slap on the face so. Door knocking is the worst. I mean it's. Massive in America and it's. Super annoying. It's super annoying and I don't think it work. I mean, some people make it work, but no, it's not what I recommend to people at all. But but, but like a lot of times people will call for a, for a service A1 time service and then you know, they'll, they'll turn them into a monthly visit or a quarterly visit.

Quarterly, usually quarterly, but, but no, not door knocking. I hate door knocking. You knock on your door and you're like, I don't want to pay for you now. You're like I need pest control but I could do you a favour, give me free pest control. I know, I know. Whenever I need work done on my house, I'm like, I'm doing research ahead of time, who's coming over and I'm like, they need some help. I can tell.

Thanks KKR passed away for joining the chat. You'll find this episode quite interesting. I know you've joined a lot of way through, but if you watch this one, especially towards marketing, getting yourself out there, you really find the information valuable. This is the chap that was asking me about what to do. He's not been going very long, so you can roll back and there's less information there. Google profile five star reviews. Google guaranteed local service ads. Great place to start those 3.

Great place. That's right. That's exactly the one. But is there anything else you wanted to cover? You'll cover quite.

Just, you know, I guess just the just to, to go on that last bit, right? We, I talked about kind of the first three things to do if you're trying to get more visibility on Google and AI search, right? That's a, you know, complete your Google business profile, get 5 star reviews, set up those local, those local service apps which are pay per lead, meaning that you know, it's you're, there's not much risk 'cause you're only paying when you get leads. The other thing is that it only takes a couple hours to set up yourself.

You don't need to hire an agency to do that for you, right? So you save money from not having to hire people and you can still get leads through that local service, Google guaranteed, right. If you want to kick it up to the next level, right, then the next most important thing you can do is to get a website a local and and to have it locally optimised. So to make sure that the the information on your website is speaking to your services in your specific area, right? Yeah. And then you can look at doing like ongoing content, you know, creating new web pages and blogs.

And then the other big piece of of SEO is it's called off, it's called backlink. So it's getting other websites that Google already trusts to link and reference your website. You could think of it like press, but for Google purposes. So anyways, those are more technical, those are more advanced, they're more like ongoing services. That's to really grow, right? But. If you're in an area where it's not super, super competitive and you're like you're not in the heart of London or something like that and you've got a, a strong Google business profile that's filled out well and has some of your key phrases in there.

You've got lots of great five star reviews. You've got local services ads running and you've got a locally optimised website, right. Those four things are going to be they're going to get you off to a great, great start. Yeah, no, cheers. I've got a question for you. So do you think it's worth me mentioning or in my pest control business website about my podcast, do you think it's worth doing putting on in a blog or do you think it's worth me mentioning it? I know it's I know it's an industry focused 1 but someone told me that that would make it would help or something.

I don't know if it. It would definitely help, again, it would help the out like you mentioned this earlier, that trust and authority are a big thing that the algorithms look for when they're looking to recommend someone. And so if you've got, you know, I wouldn't put it like front and centre, but you know, a page about it or a blog about it, even a page about it that you can link to is it would be good. And it would tell, it would tell the algorithms the search recommendation that you know, your company is an expert in this industry, right?

And you, you know, and if you're like, another thing you can do is you can take the, the transcriptions from the podcast, you know what I mean? You can use AI to turn it into a transcript. And then you can put that in the ChatGPT and say, can you just write a short little blog from this transcript and put that on your site? You know, it's not going to tie directly to people searching for your service because we're talking about all kinds of things. And we're not talking about Oakum right now, right?

But it is something to have to show Google and the algorithms that like, you're an active business, you're constantly, you know, putting out new content. You're an expert and a trusted authority in your industry. So it's not, I wouldn't say it's like the highest priority thing you could do, but given that you're already doing the podcast, I think it's worth adding, adding on to the site. Oh, cheers. I'll, I'll do that because someone told me it would help. But yeah, I'll do that. I will. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And then the other thing I would recommend you may already do this is in your descriptions of your podcast, like when they go out on Spotify and Apple and whatnot to link to your website. Because again, that's another one of those signals when Google and search algorithm see that, that's another thing that that that that they use to say, OK, like, you know, this many different people and this many different authorities are linking to Oakum. They must be, they must have something going on. You know, let's let's look at them more, you know what I'm saying?

So would you say link that to the blog post on my oakum pest control? I haven't actually got a pest perspective website yet. No, not a pest. Yeah, no, you don't have to link it to the each blog post. No, just just you know, in the description of your podcast link to the Oakum Pest control, you know at the bottom. OK. Yeah, yeah. All right. I will try that then. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I have obviously linked, I've got the associations I with and the CPD bodies I have to have backlink to them.

That's as well. Yeah, I have as well. Yeah, it's funny how much you know, again, you think of Google as a recommendation machine, right? Think of chat CPT. It's just a recommendation machine. And if you think about what they look for when recommending to people, it's similar to what people look for when recommending to other people, right? Trust, authority, reviews, reputation, authenticity, you know what I mean? X, are you a, a leader in this industry?

So it's the fundamentals, you know, haven't changed that much. It's really about trust and reputation authority, right? Both for the algorithms, for the people, it's just the algorithms, just a bit more of a technical. There's got to do, you got to do more technical stuff to, to do it right. But at the end of the day, it's saying to them, like, look at all the different trust signals we've got, right, You should trust. Us, yeah, no, I've got some really good advice to be honest. You're giving, you're giving some.

Is there anything else you'd like to cover on this? Any any kind of subjects or I don't. Think so? I really appreciate you having me on. No, it's been a long time in the making because, because at first we were in contact when I forgot to reply. Then we got back and sorted it and I wasn't sure whether this podcast could happen. I don't mean today, I mean because I know I normally I'm a lot more prepared. I don't know. We put the events up on the day. I don't have it advertised but that's my fault for not emailing you.

Oh man, no worries. The end of the year, you know, I always look forward to this new see, you know, like the end of the year is always a million things going on. And I feel like by the end of January, it's still January, you're recovering and getting the new year set. But then by like February, March, things really start picking up and people lock in so.

So if you wonder what that code is at the bottom, I've just put people in the UK that do BPDA scheme called the British Press Register. So when you when do people go in and use that that system go to CPD training, click on this episode and you'll need it will ask you like different codes. You need to type this one in 2309 and you'll get your it'd be one point with nearly an hour, but it's all learning towards, you know, helping people. I'll leave that up till the end. But yeah. So thanks for coming on.

I will link you in this your website in the description. It's on your LinkedIn isn't it your your website? It is, yeah. You're not. You're not as active. You're not as active as I thought you'd be. I know on. LinkedIn. I was like, I was like, oh, no, you. You did. You did, actually. You. Are I posted? Four hours ago you did. Actually. Four hours ago. Then it was three months ago. Come on, sort it out. I know I don't. You know, we get most of our business from referrals and also SEO people find us through like people call me through they because the chat CPT recommended us to them, right.

So we get a lot of our business from SEO and right. If you, I mean you're this though, if it works, it works. I mean, I've never got an ounce of work off LinkedIn. Never. You know, yeah, it's a different thing. But it has got me the contacts within the industry really helped us podcast. And so it has. It has benefited me, just not in the sense of pest control work, but in, in terms of the industry, yes, massively benefited. Yeah, yeah. No, it's a goal of mine this year to do more LinkedIn, you know, just to at least just start sharing a bit more and connecting a bit more on LinkedIn.

You know, there's so many different things to do and so many different things competing for your attention. I'm trying to just focus in on a few things that I know will work best for me. Exactly, but I asked the right thing to do that is but no, I've got a cough a cold at the minute, but thanks for thanks for giving up your time on this Tuesday night. Absolutely and thanks. And if you need, if we need to get hold of Gabe, I will put once it's up, I will change the description and put his website in and your contact details and put a few more links in, get it back linked.

That's right, I will. But, but please check out all the information inside tonight's podcast because this was a new angle for the podcast so. Awesome. Thanks for reaching out in the first place. Thanks for having. Me. Yeah, all. Right. All right. Yeah. Cheers, John. Thanks everybody for listening. And thank. You OK? Take care y'all.

Pest Control Marketing: How Service Businesses Win More Customers | Gabriel Bustos

Tonight's Episode

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