by Travis Farnes
When choosing your service area, choose wisely. It is important to choose a service area that will be beneficial to you and serve your business for years to come.
It may seem a little counter intuitive, but I would suggest that you narrow your service area and choose a small area to service. It is almost always best to pick an area close to where you live (assuming that you live somewhere at lease somewhat densely populated).
When I started out I wanted to cover a pretty large area – and I did. I would have jobs spread out miles and miles apart and it could take me up to an hour to get from one job to another. At the time, it seemed like the right thing to do. I figured if I covered a huge area I would have more jobs than I could handle and life would be good. It seemed to work out fine for a while until I realized I had spread myself too thin. I was getting tired of spending so much time in my car and I really didn’t like having regular customers so far away. Frankly, it was just too much hassle and hard to provide great service.
I realized that I didn’t need to be covering such a large area to keep jobs coming my way. I decided to narrow down to just one city – the city I live in. A lot of things happened when I finally narrowed my service area and they were all good things.
For instance:
My drive time decreased to 15 minutes max.
I could respond to customers’ needs quicker.
I knew my area well and that helped me service my customers better.
Referrals were often right down the street.
Profit increased because it costs less to service an area close to you.
My business started running smoother overall.
After narrowing my service area to just my city I started wondering what would happen if I narrowed even more. What would happen if I narrow my service area to just my neighborhood and the surrounding neighborhoods? Well, I went ahead and narrowed my service area again and the benefits are the same as when I narrowed my service area the first time. Less drive time, less gas usage, I can respond to my customers even more quickly and therefore I am increasing customer satisfaction, and my business is running more smoothly than ever.
I highly encourage you to start playing around with your service area and see what suits you best. Don’t let your business control you. Feel free to change things often to keep making your life easier and your service business much more enjoyable to run.
For more from Travis Farnes visit www.handymanedge.com.
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