9 Digital Marketing Challenges Landscape Industry Businesses Face & Tried-and-Tested Solutions
—
The Content Team,
HALSTEAD.
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Sometimes running a business feels like a rollercoaster. Challenges can have that stomach-dropping sensation as you quickly begin your descent into the unknown. But consistent marketing efforts help create stability over time, and the challenges that once felt like gut-wrenching moments when you questioned your choice of career, and maybe even your sanity, become more like little bumps that quickly even out.
Lawn, landscape, and outdoor living businesses face challenges as trends shift, algorithms evolve, and competition intensifies. Top-performing businesses know that it's all about mastering the art of adaptation and seizing every opportunity to drive results, which is exactly what we do at HALSTEAD. Staying ahead, and maintaining a sense of control, in today’s competitive market means more than just keeping pace—it means adapting, thriving, leading, and innovating amidst constant change.
Businesses across every industry continue to grapple with ever-changing digital marketing challenges. With over a decade of experience in marketing, specifically in the landscape industry, we are very familiar with these challenges and have tried-and-true strategies that we use to help our clients find success. Let’s explore some of the top challenges that businesses face today and the solutions we’ve found help maintain business stability and drive growth over time.
CHALLENGE #1
Increased Spam on Facebook, Website Forms, and Calls
Spam calls and form submissions are frustrating, and they waste your time. With more than 50 billion robocalls made to Americans yearly, you’re no stranger to them. While spam happens to everyone, including business owners like you, there has to be a way to reduce it, right?
The HALSTEAD Solution: Implementing Robust Spam Prevention Measures
Spam is a nuisance to your business operations, but at HALSTEAD, we employ a combination of advanced techniques that can help minimize the intrusion of spam calls and form submissions into the daily workflow. Here’s how.
Enhanced Call Verification
Calls originating from toll-free, anonymous, and international numbers can be subjected to additional verification challenges. These callers must navigate through an extra step, such as pressing one to proceed, ensuring that only genuine leads reach the local small businesses we serve. This way, our clients can confidently answer the phone knowing someone is calling to inquire about their lawn care, landscape design, and build services.
Robust Lead Tracking
HALSTEAD clients have access to a lead-tracking system that’s equipped to identify and block various forms of spam, including robocalls, inactive numbers, and telemarketers. By leveraging this technology, we help our clients safeguard their communication channels against unwanted solicitations and irrelevant inquiries.
Dynamic Blocking Capabilities
If a client encounters persistent spam from specific numbers, this platform empowers them to take action. If you’re a HALSTEAD client, you can simply report the offending number to your dedicated project manager, and we will implement targeted blocking measures to prevent repeat spam from reaching you.
Integrated Spam Recaptcha
To fortify a website's defenses against spam submissions, HALSTEAD seamlessly integrates spam-recaptcha functionalities into the online forms. This additional layer of security ensures that only authentic leads can engage with the business, enhancing the quality of incoming inquiries.
Continuous Monitoring and Adaptation
Spam prevention is an ongoing battle, so it’s essential to continuously monitor and analyze emerging trends and refine strategies accordingly. Having a proactive approach helps our clients avoid evolving spam tactics, allowing them to focus their time and resources on meaningful interactions with genuine prospects.
CHALLENGE #2
It’s More Difficult Than Ever to Recruit and Hire Great Employees
With nearly half of the U.S. states increasing their minimum wage requirements for employers at the beginning of 2024, your employees may be asking for higher wages—whether you pay them minimum wage or not.
These necessary costs affect overall revenue, making marketing even more critical to ensuring a consistent number of projects on your schedule. Strategic marketing helps you attract higher-earning projects, increase profitability, and attract talent, which is something we are passionate about helping our clients with.
The HALSTEAD Solution: Enhancing Recruitment Strategies
Recruiting and hiring top talent in the evolving landscape industry job market is complex. To address this challenge effectively, a multifaceted approach that combines innovative technologies like an applicant tracking system (ATS) with strategic recruitment marketing initiatives is most effective.
CrewRecruiter ATS Integration
Integrating HALSTEAD’S CrewRecruiter ATS into our clients’ recruitment arsenal provides a powerful platform for automating essential hiring processes. This time saver integrates applicant tracking, communication, and workflow management, enabling them to respond to candidates promptly and efficiently. With CrewRecruiter, they can leverage advanced features such as automated candidate texting, real-time calendar scheduling, and employee referral automation to expand their talent pool and attract high-quality candidates—making finding their next foreman or irrigation technician easier.
Strategic Recruitment Marketing
Strategic recruitment marketing to enhance hiring efforts is essential. At HALSTEAD, we help amplify our clients’ employer brand to increase visibility amongst potential candidates and help them differentiate themselves from competitors. This may involve targeted advertising campaigns, engaging social media content, and participation in industry-specific job fairs or events to attract top talent. Afterall, recruiting is marketing, and businesses need to impress their potential recruits with their company culture just as much as the candidate needs to impress the business with their skills. But there is more to recruitment marketing that’s not directly related to recruiting, but rather your company as a whole. Enter: the next few items on the list here.
Create Connections With Your Brand
People want to feel connected with their employer and to feel a sense of belonging—branding is the vehicle to make that happen. A well-crafted brand helps communicate company values, giving job applicants and employees something to align with.
At HALSTEAD, we believe that branding goes beyond logos and slogans—although those are important too. We help create branding that helps job applicants and employees connect with our clients’ brands so that they feel a deeper sense of connection and pride in their work. It extends beyond the services offered and encompasses clear communication of values, culture, and a sense of belonging to a larger community.
Professional Videography to Demonstrate Company Culture
One of the most effective ways we showcase company culture is through culture videos. Our team of professional videographers helps create a video that tells the company's story, offering a glimpse into the day-to-day operations and overall atmosphere. By featuring employees sharing their experiences and perspectives, these videos humanize the company and help create the needed emotional connection.
As an example, the HALSTEAD team created a company culture video for BTS Landscaping, which gives a glimpse into the values, environment, and team dynamics. They feature the video on the About section of their website, which helps foster deeper connections with job applications than simply text and photos do. The professional videography has helped set them apart from the competition.
Optimized Job Postings
Crafting compelling job postings is essential to attracting qualified candidates. At HALSTEAD, we begin the job posting with what might entice the applicant, rather than the duties and responsibilities. For example, we may share how the applicant will enjoy working with their hands in the great outdoors, or about the amazing benefits package offered.
Optimizing job descriptions with relevant keywords, highlighting competitive compensation and benefits, and clearly outlining job responsibilities and qualifications can attract candidates who align with a company’s culture and values. Providing comprehensive information upfront reduces ambiguity and ensures that applicants clearly understand the role and expectations. It’s always helpful to include a salary range, as that’s what most job applicants want to know anyway.
Embrace Employee Referral Programs
Harnessing the power of employee referrals can be a valuable asset in any recruitment strategy. Encouraging current team members to refer qualified candidates expands the talent network and fosters a sense of ownership and engagement among employees. Offering incentives or rewards for successful referrals incentivizes participation and can lead to the identification of high-quality candidates who may not be actively searching for employment, whether they’re in management positions, part of the office team, or those who work in the field.
The Power of Consistent Digital Marketing Efforts
Perhaps the most important factor isn’t directly related to recruiting but has a huge impact on job applicant perception. At HALSTEAD, we recommend our clients have a complete website redesign about once every three years. This is because design trends change and business websites can quickly look outdated, which reflects poorly on the business. A sleek, modern design with a smooth user experience matters more to potential job applicants than many people realize—it’s not just prospective customers who are impacted.
Consistent digital marketing efforts, including search engine optimization (SEO), Google Ads, Facebook Ads, Linkedin Ads, Email Marketing, Social Posting, Videography, and website design/updates, help show everyone that a business is invested in growth. This is important to talented job applicants who will truly care about their job and want to grow their careers.
CHALLENGE #3
Leads are Normalizing to Pre-Covid Numbers, Combined With it Being an Election Year
Understanding these fluctuations, from the stable pre-COVID era to the disruptions brought by the pandemic and subsequent economic uncertainties, is crucial for sustaining growth. During COVID, people were stuck at home more and looking for ways to improve their outdoor living experience, so leads went up drastically. Now, and really starting in 2023, leads began to normalize again—which may feel like a drastic change, but is a reflection of people being away from home more and not as focused on their backyards as they may have been when they were at home all the time. We’ve returned to Pre-COVID lead generation numbers. .
In response to the ever-shifting landscape of market trends, landscape businesses must adapt their lead generation strategies to maintain a competitive edge. Ensuring a steady influx of high-quality leads in times like these requires personalized solutions that empower businesses to navigate these challenges effectively.
The HALSTEAD Solution: Enhancing Lead Generation Strategies
If you've observed that closing deals in the past year required more effort than before, rest assured, you're not alone. At HALSTEAD, our data-backed insights confirm these observations, shedding light on the nuanced changes in consumer preferences and purchasing patterns, especially amidst rising minimum wage requirements.
Consistent Monitoring
Using SemRush (a leading tool for overall SEO strategy, as well as other SEO industry leading tools, to perform market research and delve into the intricacies of consumer behavior and market trends, we consistently analyze fluctuations in search volume for keywords related to landscape design, outdoor kitchen, and pool builders. This effort has kept HALSTEAD aware of SEO and helped us keep a close eye on the market.
Prior to 2020 the monthly search volume for landscape design was approximately 50,000. In May 2022, the search volume jumped to 113,500, followed by a notable decline in May 2023 to 40,500. These numbers show that economic uncertainties of 2023 affected consumer confidence and purchasing power, making prospects more cautious.
These keyword trends show what is going on in the market, and we use this data to create an effective strategy using our insights. We educate our clients on the importance of investing in marketing consistently to stand out amongst competitors, be found online, and close more sales—especially when the market is down.
Adapting Lead Generation Strategies
The economic uncertainties of 2023 further exacerbated the fluctuations seen around COVID, impacting consumer confidence and purchasing power. This led to variations in the number of prospects and potential projects, prompting adaptations to lead-generation strategies. At HALSTEAD, we help position businesses for sustained growth and success amidst evolving market dynamics. The next few items will explain how.
Optimizing Google
With a blend of proactive strategies and adaptive tactics, we help our clients navigate times that may seem more difficult for lead generation, and capitalize on new opportunities to drive performance and deliver meaningful outcomes. These strategies help ensure they grab their audience’s attention and stand out in the competitive market.
One key aspect of our strategy involves utilizing a mix of ad formats within campaigns. This includes leveraging Responsive Search Ads, which dynamically adjust based on performance and relevance, and Call Ads to drive direct interactions with potential customers. As well as more advanced strategies on intensive usage of negative keywords, competitor campaigns, call outs for unique value statements, and images.
Google Ads doesn’t know the difference between landscaping and landscape design, so we make sure our campaigns are set up to minimize the wrong clicks from Google Ad’s confusion, helping our clients ad spends go toward clicks that are most valuable and relevant. And finally, applying the StoryBrand framework helps resonate with audiences through compelling storytelling, and using hyper-focused CTA Ads helps drive specific actions to enhance the overall effectiveness of campaigns, helping you stand apart in the sea of Google Ad search results.
Incorporating Video Ads
As the digital landscape increasingly prioritizes video content, incorporating video ads into the client strategy can be impactful, particularly for retargeting purposes. With platforms like YouTube offering robust targeting options and expansive reach, video ads present a powerful opportunity to engage audiences and drive conversions in a video-first environment. HALSTEAD has always leveraged the power of video ads on Meta, through Facebook and Instagram, as well as Linkedin, but now more than ever, is time for video to go further.
Leverage Outreach Marketing With Facebook Ads, More Than Ever
Meta ads, via Facebook and Instagram platforms, offer a potent avenue for reaching interested clientele and nudging them toward conversion. Leveraging advanced targeting capabilities, crafting compelling ad creatives, and rigorous A/B testing ensures optimized campaign performance, delivering maximum return on investment and accelerating the conversion process.
When search volume decreases because general interest drops, as we saw starting in 2023, fewer people are actively searching for your services on Google. Now, more than ever before, it is important to reach potential prospects that aren’t searching, to get them into your digital sales funnel. Nothing is more effective in doing that than Meta Ads.
Branding Initiatives
With lead generation becoming more challenging in the current market, it’s more important than ever to set your business apart from the competition. We help our clients do this with strategic branding, including creating logos, taglines, color selections, and website designs that make their brand more memorable. Our custom websites are unique, aligned to the clients brand and their goals, with advanced designs strategies with StoryBrand copy. 2023 was a year we pushed our design approach to new milestones. You won't find websites with these details anywhere else. Take a look at a couple of recent ones to see what we mean for yourself!:
https://www.kennedybluemountainstone.com/
Investing in SMS Marketing
Since staying top of mind is essential in a crowded market, we believe there is some potential in SMS marketing. Personalizing texts to their customers on a massive scale and using AI to make it as seamless as possible, clients can reach new prospects and bring existing prospects through a sales funnel, not to mention the retention opportunities for lawn care and landscape maintenance companies. It’s an incredible and strategic tool for growth and efficiency. By leveraging AI's capabilities and continually refining our approach, we are trialing this in 2024 to help our clients unlock new opportunities to stay ahead of the competition.
CHALLENGE #4
It’s More Challenging to Close Sales
Closing sales amid market fluctuations requires a laser-focused approach aimed at driving conversions and maximizing revenue. In a digital world, the customer journey begins online, so it’s important to meet prospects where they’re at and begin building a relationship online.
The HALSTEAD Solution: Precision in Conversion Strategies
Converting social media followers into enthusiastic buyers of luxurious outdoor living spaces demands strategic precision, particularly in uncertain economic climates, like we’re currently facing. Adapting lead generation strategies to seamlessly transition prospects into loyal clients helps deliver tangible business growth.
Branding to Create Loyalty
Customer loyalty is especially important for recurring lawn care and landscape maintenance services. We recognize that these services aren’t just about actually mowing a lawn or installing plantings, what’s even more important is the experience that you deliver and ensuring it aligns seamlessly with your customer’s lifestyle.
Attracting the affluent market requires a precise branding strategy, which is why we help our clients create branding that speaks to their prospects. This branding helps reflect their status and aspirations, setting the clients apart as the top choice for discerning homeowners and helping ensure a steady stream of high-value projects. From luxury aesthetics to StoryBranded copy that speaks directly to their desires, our strategies effectively set our clients apart and help foster brand loyalty and increase conversions.
Strategic Engagement for Conversion
The cornerstone of successful conversions lies in engagement. Proactive interaction with potential customers through comments, direct messages, and captivating social media content showcases expertise and primes them for conversion. Augmenting these efforts with targeted paid advertisements on Meta platforms (for residential and commercial) and LinkedIn (for commercial services) significantly boosts conversion rates, driving sales and revenue. Your sales efforts begin months before you speak with a prospect, sometimes much longer! How you build that relationship and what you say and sell - well before you get on a call or go on a site visit, will help determine how fast and, how good, your close rates are.
Empowering Conversion Through Impactful Video Marketing
Investing in professional videography is an indispensable tool for enhancing conversion rates. Despite many business owners’ initial apprehensions about logistics or camera presence, it’s safe to say that all would agree that embracing video marketing yields substantial dividends in closing sales. We help our clients showcase the beautiful outdoor living spaces they build, helping effectively persuade potential clients to make a purchase. There’s nothing like a vibrant video showing an impressive poolscape featuring pergolas, fire features, and an outdoor kitchen that tells a compelling story to draw prospects in and help them imagine spending time in a similar space of their own.
Elevating Conversion Through Emotional Branding
Effective branding establishes emotional connections with homeowners, paving the way for increased conversion rates. By tapping into desires for luxury and aesthetic appeal, HALSTEAD helps businesses foster customer loyalty and create opportunities for closing sales. Professional photography and videography are essential in this aspect.
As a Certified StoryBrand Agency, HALSTEAD is highly trained in creating content that tells a story, helping make emotional connections and have a lasting impact on the audience. Messaging is strategic and customer-focused, making the customer the hero, rather than your company. Instead, your company is positioned as the helpful guide that leads the hero to success.
Increasing Conversions With a Professional Website Design
A strategically designed website is instrumental in driving conversions. A modern design and aesthetic help show that your company is relevant, up-to-date, and focused on quality. By helping our clients provide a seamless user experience with a fast-loading website featuring content that appeals to their target audience and by using SEO tactics, we help their businesses stand out and effectively guide prospects toward setting up a consultation or signing up for their lawn care services.
Exemplary Customer Service for Closing Sales
Exceptional customer service plays a pivotal role in closing sales. Timely responses, personalized communication, and attentive support build trust and confidence, facilitating the conversion process and solidifying customer relationships. Having a reliable CRM tool helps you stay on top of your communications so no one slips through the cracks. Automated responses are a time saver and help you provide the best service possible.
CHALLENGE #5
Customer Expectations Continue to Rise
By embracing proactive marketing initiatives, leveraging social proof, and prioritizing customer feedback, businesses can enhance brand reputation and exceed customer expectations.
The HALSTEAD Solution: Adapting to Evolving Customer Demands
As customer expectations continue to rise, businesses must adapt to meet evolving demands. As mentioned earlier, in 2023, the landscape industry witnessed decreased potential prospects and projects, accentuating the need for strategic marketing initiatives to stand out in an increasingly competitive market and to adjust to customer expectations so that you don’t get pushed out! External factors have a huge impact on customer service efforts, but there are tried and true solutions to help navigate these challenges effectively.
Strategic Marketing Initiatives to Attract The Customers That Most Align to Your Values and Delivery
With the market experiencing fluctuations due to external factors—like the pandemic and the economy—it's crucial for businesses to adopt proactive marketing approaches that resonate with their target customer. This is something HALSTEAD has specialized in from its inception over a decade ago. Helping you to determine who is really the target customer. For a landscape design and construction company, it’s not just patios. That’s not even scratching the surface. We guide clients to answer questions such as which projects do you enjoy most in terms of size, quality, and of course, location! Then go deeper in terms of job titles, materials, and so forth. This combined with our research and marketing efforts, by aligning yourself with your target customer, you are, from the beginning, attracting people that are more likely to be happy working with you. And more likely that you are able to meet their needs!
Review Building
Negative reviews can damage credibility and deter potential clients. Comprehensive review-building solutions can help combat negative feedback and help your business maintain a positive brand image. Businesses can build trust, enhance reputation, and improve search engine rankings by consistently gathering customer reviews and responding promptly to feedback. Automated review-building platforms streamline the process, ensuring maximum efficiency and effectiveness.
At HALSTEAD, we see so often a client getting a bad review for a bad driver or someone who didn’t answer the call. Now how does a review from someone who never worked with you, but didn’t like your foreman’s driving skills, get to review you? They do. And this, along with many similar situations, will just keep rising! Customer demands are increasing from non-customers! How do you combat this? Well, obviously, you train your drivers on this, but of course, you take preventative review building measures: make getting reviews a regular process! If you have 25 positive reviews, 1 bad review won’t mean as much. HALSTEAD includes review building into every SEO package, because it's not really optional in 2024+!
Harnessing Social Proof
Social proof plays a vital role in influencing consumer decisions. Businesses can leverage social media as a powerful persuasion tool by showcasing success stories and case studies, highlighting positive testimonials, and encouraging satisfied clients to leave reviews. Video testimonials offer engaging content that resonates with potential customers, reinforcing brand credibility and trust.
Adapting to Real-Time Customer Needs
Consumer expectations have shifted towards real-time responses, personalized interactions, and convenient solutions. Social media platforms serve as hubs for gathering feedback, insights, customer service, and customer engagement. By actively engaging with prospects on social media, businesses can address inquiries, provide solutions, and foster positive relationships, ultimately driving lead generation and revenue growth. There are many automated ways to help you to conquer this through automated replies and other tools. See the AI section below for some more tips.
CHALLENGE #6
There’s an Increasing Interest in Sustainability
The HALSTEAD Solution: Embracing and Marketing Your Eco-Friendly Practices
While this can be a challenge, it’s actually more of an opportunity to grow your business. In response to growing environmental concerns and shifting consumer preferences, leading businesses embrace sustainability and differentiate themselves in the market. Especially true for commercial work and in states that are passing regulations to enforce increased sustainability practices among landscape businesses.
By leveraging eco-friendly initiatives and strategic marketing, businesses can build credibility, attract environmentally-conscious customers, and thrive in an evolving market.
The landscape industry is undergoing a profound transformation as businesses pivot towards sustainability to address environmental challenges and meet consumer demand. Recognizing the importance of adapting to eco-friendly practices and utilizing strategic marketing, including SEO, to drive brand differentiation and customer engagement is key.
Embracing Eco-Friendly Practices and Showcasing it in Your Content Marketing
With increasing restrictions on gas-powered equipment and a growing preference for organic lawn care, many businesses are finding they must pivot toward sustainability to remain competitive and meet local regulations. By aligning with consumer values, businesses can enhance brand reputation and attract a loyal customer base.
Content marketing is a powerful tool for connecting with target audiences and showcasing eco-friendly practices. A great way to get started is by creating educational blog posts highlighting sustainable lawn care and landscaping methods and positioning businesses as industry experts. Additionally, professional videography and photography can visually communicate the benefits of sustainability, showcasing successful projects and initiatives to engage prospects and customers.
For example, HALSTEAD client Great Outdoors demonstrated its commitment to eco-friendly practices by showcasing its all-battery-powered fleet via professional videography. This video told a compelling story.
SEO Strategies for Sustainable Businesses
Effective SEO techniques ensure that your business is visible to consumers searching for eco-friendly lawn and landscape services. Optimizing website content with relevant keywords related to sustainability, organic lawn care, and eco-friendly landscaping will help your business get discovered when prospects search for these terms. By incorporating these keywords strategically into blog posts, service pages, and meta tags, businesses can improve their search engine rankings and attract organic traffic from environmentally conscious consumers.
Branding for Environmental Responsibility
Branding plays a crucial role in conveying a business's commitment to sustainability. Revamping your business’s visual identity to reflect eco-conscious values, and using nature-themed imagery and eco-friendly colors will help position your brand within this market. Crafting a compelling brand message highlighting environmental stewardship can further differentiate your business and resonate with target audiences.
Community Engagement for Conservation Efforts
Engaging with the community demonstrates a business's commitment to environmental responsibility. Participation in local environmental events, tree-planting drives, and community clean-up efforts helps foster goodwill and establish partnerships. You can enhance your reputation and attract like-minded customers by actively contributing to conservation efforts. And then showcasing it on your website and social media! If no one knows what you are doing, are you really doing it?
Green Certifications and Social Proof
Green certifications and affiliations with environmental organizations bolster a business's credibility as an eco-conscious entity. Prominently displaying these certifications in marketing materials differentiates your business from competitors. Leveraging social proof through customer testimonials and positive reviews further strengthens brand credibility and attracts environmentally-conscious clientele.
CHALLENGE #7
Search Rankings Continue to be Volatile
Search volatility is a constant challenge for businesses striving to maintain an online presence in the ever-changing digital marketing landscape. Understanding and navigating search volatility ensures your website remains competitive and visible to your target audience, so when your prospects search for keyword terms such as landscape design or outdoor living services, they’ll find your website.
The HALSTEAD Solution: Consistent and Proactive Strategies
Search volatility, characterized by fluctuations in keyword rankings on search engine results pages (SERPs), affects websites across industries. Navigating these fluctuations and maintaining sustainable rankings through proactive strategies and continuous monitoring helps combat the effects.
Understanding Search Volatility
Search volatility refers to the unpredictable nature of website rankings on SERPs, which can vary due to factors such as algorithm updates, news events, and changes in user behavior. The specific solution largely varies by client and requires a personalized approach. At HALSTEAD, we collaborate with clients to analyze search volatility trends and adjust SEO strategies accordingly, ensuring long-term success in an ever-evolving digital landscape.
Quality Content Focus
You can maintain your competitive edge in search rankings by focusing on creating quality content, having proactive SEO tactics, and investing in data-driven decision-making. Mixing in high-quality, non-duplicate content is crucial in maintaining rankings despite search volatility. Providing valuable information to users is most important, aligning with Google's emphasis on helpful content. And where applicable, by utilizing the StoryBrand framework to craft unique copy tailored to the client, we ensure that your content stands out and continues to drive organic traffic.
Proactive SEO Approach
Google's algorithms are constantly evolving, requiring a proactive approach to SEO. Staying ahead of the curve by monitoring industry developments, analyzing algorithm updates, and adjusting strategies accordingly is an effective plan. Again, the SEO approach varies by client and location, so at Halstead, we customize SEO solutions for each client and leverage different tools based on their unique needs—maximizing the potential for long-term success in search rankings. We are an anti-dinosaur, “always done it this way” agency. Trial, innovation, research, and what really shows results, leads the way.
Monitoring Trends & Data
Continuous monitoring of trends, data analysis, and strategy refinement are essential to effectively navigating search volatility. Tracking key performance indicators (KPIs), such as website traffic and conversion rates, helps gain insights into the effectiveness of SEO strategies. This data-driven approach helps you identify patterns, seize opportunities, and proactively address challenges, ensuring sustainable rankings.
CHALLENGE #8
AI-Generated Content Poses Questions & Concerns
The HALSTEAD Solution: Embracing AI and Making it Work For Your Business
As artificial intelligence (AI) continues to permeate various industries, including the landscape sector, it’s important to understand and harness its potential to drive innovation and enhance business operations. From revolutionizing customer experiences to streamlining workflow efficiency, AI offers transformative possibilities for lawn, landscape, and outdoor living businesses.
Since the emergence of OpenAI's generative AI-powered chatbot, ChatGPT, in late 2022, the landscape of AI has evolved significantly. AI's presence is ubiquitous and transformative, from autonomous vehicles to personalized customer service chatbots.
Understanding AI's Role in the Landscape Industry
At HALSTEAD, we see AI as a helpful tool that can help companies increase efficiency, but it’s not meant to replace human ingenuity. From a content standpoint, it takes a strategically engineered prompt to even create content that’s worthwhile and it takes human skill to do that.
AI's influence extends beyond ChatGPT; it encompasses many applications, from predictive analytics to customer service. You can optimize operations, enhance customer experiences, and drive growth by leveraging AI-driven insights. Whatever you choose, embracing AI strategically is essential, recognizing its potential to revolutionize your business and help save time and resources.
AI as Your Personal Assistant
At HALSTEAD, we use Otter.ai, an AI meeting note taker and real-time AI transcription tool. Otter.ai automatically joins our Zoom meetings with clients and team members and takes detailed notes, which can then be emailed to all of the attendees. It’s a helpful tool to remember exactly what you’ve talked about with clients and as a team. And helps people in meetings to be even more present, rather than taking notes, which in the end provides clients more value.
Chat GPT technology is also great for design assistance, and is capable of generating concepts and 3D renderings and recommendations based on user input. It can provide lists of plantings for a certain planting zone and provide materials lists, the capabilities are amazing. While a human is still needed, this tool can save time and speed up the design process.
Google Organic and Paid Search Rankings and AI-Generated Content
While AI-generated content offers efficiency and scalability, HALSTEAD recommends that businesses exercise caution to maintain quality and relevance. We advise against overreliance on AI content, emphasizing the importance of human intervention and quality assurance. Prioritizing high-quality, original content—even if created in tandem with AI —can uphold your business credibility and enhance search engine rankings. Especially when it comes to communicating what your company really does, believes, and values.
We use smart bidding on Google Ads to maximize conversion and clicks, over more old school methods such as cost-per-click. Overall, we use a more AI-driven approach, including for copy inspiration.
Using AI to Provide Exceptional Service
AI can be a powerful tool in customer service, sales, and data analysis. You can deliver exceptional service and build lasting customer relationships by leveraging AI-powered chatbots, predictive analytics, and personalized marketing. Businesses can create meaningful connections and drive success by combining AI's analytical capabilities with human empathy and creativity. However, training your chatbot to produce the results and responses that are branded for your business is essential, and tools like Chatbase can help in that task.
At HALSTEAD, we recommend Chatbase to help with customer support and lead generation. Chatbase operates as a digital assistant and serves as a foundational layer in your business. It can be integrated with other tools to enhance functionality, including Acuity Scheduling.
CHALLENGE #9
Upcoming Elections, Increasing Cookie Tracking Limitations, and Ongoing Privacy Concerns Causing Increasingly More Obstacles in Paid Media
While social media platforms don’t always share when they are making algorithm updates, it is possible to maximize the impact of your paid advertising campaigns and achieve your marketing objectives effectively by pivoting as needed.
The HALSTEAD Solution: Integrated Solutions for Adapting to Algorithm Changes in Paid Media
As social media platforms continue to evolve, so do their algorithms and advertising capabilities. A HALSTEAD, we know it is essential to stay abreast of these changes and leverage them to maximize the impact of paid advertising campaigns. From utilizing conversion API to embracing video-first strategies, the HALSTEAD approach is rooted in adaptability and innovation, which we find is most effective.
Utilizing Conversion and Marketing System Tracking
In response to cookie depreciation and shifting user preferences, using conversion API and video-first strategies in paid advertising campaigns can be helpful. By harnessing the power of conversion API, we help ensure accurate tracking and optimization for quality leads, while also considering the results from your overall marketing system. We all know that people need to see the same message over and over again. This repeat number has increased from approximately 3x to now at least 10x. That means your prospects need to see you over 10x before contacting you. That will not be on one platform such as Facebook Ads or Google Ads. This will spread across multiple platforms, allowing your marketing system. Therefore, while looking at results from just Facebook Ads, or just Google Ads is extremely helpful, it is crucial to look at the overall system and how the different efforts work (or aren't working) with each other to drive you stability and growth, getting you closer to building your legacy!
Embracing User-Generated Content and Personalization
User-generated content (UGC) plays an increasingly significant role in paid advertising, allowing businesses to leverage authentic content created by customers and previous clients. Incorporating UGC into your advertising strategies, whether through client-submitted content or content captured out in the field, is helpful.
Adapting to Changes in Paid Media Platforms
Facebook and Google have undergone several updates and enhancements in their advertising features. To stay ahead of these changes, we have consistently been testing new features such as multiple headlines on Google and auto-placed text on Facebook, while also being discerning about applicability to the industry. Manual testing of ad elements helps ensure optimal performance and avoid unintended consequences. In many cases, we don’t accept Google Ads recommendations due to relevancy (and possible increase to your spends). And while Facebook now automatically applies automated features, we disable many of them to allow for relevance to your company and industry. Our least favorite 2023 Facebook release is automatically pulling copy from a website into an Ad.
Navigating Retargeting and Geo-Targeting
Retargeting remains a cornerstone of the HALSTEAD paid advertising strategy, allowing our clients to maintain top-of-mind awareness and engage with potential customers across various touchpoints. Navigating location targeting changes and ensuring accuracy and effectiveness in reaching relevant audiences is also important. With nuanced adjustments and strategic optimization, we help ensure paid ads continue to deliver impactful results for our clients.
