Advertising On Angie’s List – Everything You Need To Know
Customer reviews can make or break the whole deal for any home services business. As a majority of home services are pretty expensive, people turn to online reviews to ensure that they are not being tricked.
With more than a million visitors each month, Angie’s List, now known as Angi, is one of the leading home repair review sites that definitely deserves all the attention. People are more likely to leave negative reviews or positive reviews after their experience with different service companies. In order to keep a bad review from impacting your business, make a habit of collecting Angie’s List reviews from satisfied customers.
In this article, we will cover what is Angie’s List, how to use the site to promote your business, how to get customer reviews on it, the Pros and Cons of Angi, and a few important things to know before signing up.
What is Angie’s List?
Started in 1995, Angie’s List, which is now known as Angi, is an online database that helps potential customers find home service providers. In simple words, it is a customer review-based search engine looking to hire service professionals free of charge. Whether it is a handyman or a house contractor, they have got it all. Customers can easily log in, rate local businesses, write honest reviews, or look through customer reviews of companies they are planning to hire.
Once Angie’s list used to charge homeowners or even new customers to access the “list”, but recently they have changed to a freemium model. In this new business model, anyone can browse the list of contractors, handymen, house cleaners, pest control, and many other home service providers absolutely free of charge.
The leading home repair review site makes much of it’s money from the home service professionals who pay to advertise on Angi Leads or Angi Ads. Nonetheless, homeowners can also pay for a monthly subscription or a yearly membership to access special discounts and coupons. It is a great place for small business owners and local businesses to run promotional advertisements. For this purpose, you may want to increase the budget of your marketing strategy with a focus on advertising on the website to boost your visibility and online presence.
To get started, visit their site and follow the prompts to create your business listing now.
How To Use Angie’s List To Promote Your Business
Here are a few ways how you can use Angie’s List to promote your business.
1. Choose Angie’s Pro Network
To begin your process, click on the “list my business” button to get the setup wizard started. Firstly, add your business category and ZIP code, just so that you are placed in the high search results for potential leads in your local service area.
2. Add Business Information
Once you are done with the basics, enter the contact information of your business, including the full name, business name, phone number, and ZIP code. This particular information will help homeowners to get in contact with you or submit quote requests, so make sure to use your business phone number.
3. Create Your Account
Add an active email address and create a strong password to use in order to log in to your account. It’s a must to check the box to agree to the terms of service and their privacy policy. However, receiving emails with special offers, discounts, and coupons from Angi is optional.
4. Write Business Description For Your Angi Company Profile
Write a clear, concise, and engaging business description for your Angi profile as that is your chance to make a great first impression with potential customers. Your business description can include what your company specializes in, what makes you stand out from the crowd, and other trust-building stats like industry experience, certifications, etc.
5. Select Service Areas
The next step is to select your service areas. In case, your company’s service area goes beyond your ZIP code, then just select the other areas where you provide your home services. Once you’ve selected all your service areas, the website will ensure your business shows up in searches in those surrounding local areas.
You can also download the Angi app, which is available on both iOS and Android, to manage your account from the mobile app. It is a great way to manage your Angie’s account while being on the road to fulfilling orders.
6. Include More Details
There are several ways to make your profile stand out by giving potential customers a closer look of what your business offers. For instance, add more business categories (if they apply), if you offer emergency services, speak other languages, or if you have a minority-owned and operated company.
Not only this will give you more exposure when Angi customers search for specific services but also help them make an informed decision as to if you are the right one.
7. Access Your Angi Dashboard
Once you are done with all of the above steps, you will be able to access your dashboard as a pro on the Angi network. Angi dashboard will display all the deals, messages, quotes, and reviews. It will also show your quote requests from new customers, and messages from other members and provide a specific sector for you to request online reviews from existing customers.
8. Complete Your Angi Business Profile
You can take several actions to help homeowners decide whether to choose your business instead of other home service providers. A few great examples are: add licenses or insurance for your business, payment methods, any accreditations you’ve received, or health and safety measures.
Moreover, this is a good place to create photo galleries to show off success stories, projects before and after, and any major changes in your business. It is a great option for home service providers like home improvement, housecleaning services, lawn care companies, and pressure washing businesses.
9. Get Certified and Start Advertising
For exclusive lead generation through Angi, you will have to become Angi certified and pay for advertising. There is a very limited amount of information available on Angi’s site or your dashboard about ads and their cost. One may have to connect with an Angi client success manager or their advertising department for more details.
To maintain certified status, you need to have a 3-star review or higher and keep all your licenses up to date.
How To Get Angie’s List Reviews
Below, we will discuss how you can get more positive reviews from your best customers.
1. Always Remind Your Customer To Leave A Review
As many influencers and successful companies on social media often remind their viewers to like, comment, and follow every post, you are also free to use the same tactic. An easy way is to add a line to your email signature which reminds customers to rate and review you on Angie’s List.
2. Ask, Ask and Ask
There is absolutely no need to be shy about asking for reviews. Whenever chatting with new customers, make sure to ask them to rate and review you on Angi.
Why? You’re a small business owner and you thrive to greater success on word-of-mouth. Just generally talk to your client about how positive reviews can impact your business and ask them to leave one. Remember not to be pushy.
3. Make The Most Out Of Social Media
In today’s digital world the good news is, it is way easier to connect with potential customers even if you are not working with them, thanks to social media. Engage with your targeted audience by sharing fun and helpful tips & tricks and content on your own website blog or your social media feed.
Once you have built a considerable amount of following, it will not take much time to create a post asking them to rate and review you on Angie’s List.
4. Tap Your Email List
If your company collects emails from clients and uses them to send out a newsletter, then Angi has a feature that you can use to collect honest reviews. After your job is done, simply send out an email with a form link that your customer can use to write an Angi review.
Furthermore, you can include a personalized message to remind your customers that reviews are extremely important and you appreciate their feedback.
5. Respond To Negative Reviews
Every once in a while, you may end up getting a negative review. This is something that happens when you have been in business long enough. A great way to deal with this is to respond to negative reviews. It will show other customers that you care about quality and are dedicated to providing better and higher quality services.
The key to responding to negative reviews is to stay calm and find a way to solve the issue. If you know the customer in question may have had a bad experience, apologize, address the issue, contact them, and ask what you can do to resolve the issue. Don’t be defensive, it’s no big deal.
Additionally, you can also respond to great reviews with a thank you adding a touch of class on the customer service side of your business. Being responsive to good reviews, as well as bad, is the only way to show future customers how much you care. While you could feel this to be somewhat overwhelming, having a speedy response times to posted reviews will serve you well in resolving any bad experiences a client may have had so that perhaps it is not the last time they choose to use your business or service and reduce incoming phone calls.
6. Advertise
The best way to get a countless number of reviews is by joining Angi Ads and considering advertising. It may cost you a few dollars but it is worth it. Although Angi listing is free of charge, the website promotes local businesses that advertise with them more often. Even though being more visible on the website won’t automatically generate reviews, it will help your business pop up more in search engines.
With Angi Ads, you can also create attention-grabbing posts that showcase your best work to potential clients. Make sure the post doesn’t include any client details or anything in the picture that people could use to find the project.
7. Automate The Process
One way to get people to leave Angi reviews about your business is to make the review system easier. A few ways to achieve this are:
• Offer a template with standard questions that customers can answer quickly.
• Use open-ended questions for the best feedback.
• Always ask about what you can do to improve your services.
Bottom Line
Consumers are using Angi to help them find local service providers, reliable contractors, and to access service pros, so participating in this free business listing, particularly for small businesses, is one way to increase your visibility without spending much money. Reviews on Angie’s List are becoming the “consumer reports” of the service industry, similar to the “Better Business Bureau” in the home advisor space. While you could claim your free listing, you may find that building your business page becoming part of the larger of the Angies List business directory will generate more leads to future business. Consumers have several membership options which allow them to receive discounts on services, so organizing your promotional marketing campaign should be considered.
Customer reviews on Angie’s List or any other website are key to your business. As the customer has all the information they need about your business in one place. They are more likely to trust online reviews to decide whether or not to hire you.
Considering other search engines, Angie’s List is custom-made for local companies to find or even pay for higher-quality leads in their service areas. Not only it is free to use, but also you can pay for advertising to get the most out of it. Whenever a customer uses your service, you can ask them to leave a review on Angi, which could in turn, result in more leads.
