Most contractors don’t set out to do a job with mediocre end results. They want their work to shine. To speak for itself. To look so good  that homeowners can’t stop talking about it with their friends. This seems obvious when we stop and think about it. The problem is, we don’t often stop and actually think about it.

You may find yourself caught up in the rush of the day-to-day events and tasks, getting from one job to another, picking up supplies, and tending to your own family’s needs that the quality control check list of any project has the potential to fade and fall by the wayside.

Well, 2011 is behind us. Smart contractors will look back on 2011 and spot trends in their industry so they can make changes for 2012. And we wanted to help by providing some demographic data for all the house painting leads we received in 2011.

Here is a breakdown (highlights below the chart):

Total Leads: 24,724 – 12,208 female (60%), 8,047 male (40%)Most Common age: 34-44Top 4 states: California (13%), Texas (7%), Florida (7%), New York (7%)Most Common home market value: $100k-$250kHome ownership: 86%Marital status: 54% married

Ah, the winter. A festive season full of holiday joy, family bonding, and gift giving. And while gift giving tends to mean the high-point for many retail stores, it also means a major dip in home improvement spending.

November through January tend to be the slowest three months for almost every home improvement trade as people save their money for holiday gifts. Add to that the fact that the winter makes it near impossible to do any exterior home work in many parts of the country and you can understand why your lead volume drops this time of year.

I was speaking with a contractor a little while back who was explaining to me the whoas of not being hired for several job because the homeowner only wished to work with fully licensed contractors. The state in which he works is not one that requires all contractors to carry a license so he never felt he needed to spend the extra cash and time dealing with acquiring one. Upon asking about the costs and time involved in becoming licensed, it quickly became apparently clear that he had not inquired at all and therefore knew very little about the whole process, but had decided long ago that it was not worth it.

If there were one trait that I feel is most important for a person to have, it’s reliability. Knowing you will be there when you say you will, or having a friend who will drop what he is doing to help you out is immeasurable and invaluable. I imagine you will also find that you value those friendships above others. Now imagine what that could do for your own companies reputation.

When bidding a job from a lead you received from a lead-gen company, chances are the homeowner is going to hire a company that called soon after requesting a quote, showed up on time to the estimate, and left them with an overall good feeling about the nature of their business. Keeping that in mind and following those practices, you are likely to see great results from the leads you receive. Homeowners tend to hire a company not because they undercut the cost of the work by $100, but because the contractor they spoke to made them feel comfortable, showed a sense of pride in what they do and how they go about doing it, and felt a commitment and respect toward fulfilling the homeowner’s needs.

If you are a home improvement contractor, chances are you get a good number of sales calls, emails, postcards from a lead generation company trying to sell you their leads.

Assuming that a lead generation site is a good strategy for your business, you may be wondering how to decide which company is right for you. Here are some important things to consider when working with a home improvement lead generation company.

This is always an important factor. How much does each lead cost for you service? There can be a wide range of prices among lead generation companies for the same service. So one company may charge $45 for a painting lead while another may charge $29.

There was a time not too long ago when email started to seem passé. But all of that went out the door when fantastic technology companies recently started popping up and began conducting wildly successful email marketing campaigns as the foundation of their business growth. People have started truly relying on their email more than ever before often checking it periodically throughout the day. Now that there is a captive audience, here are some tips for home improvement contractors on creating an email marketing program for your contracting business.

One of the technologies we offer contractors who use CraftJack is the ability to automatically track every call they make to each lead. This makes it easier for contractors to keep track of which leads have been called, when the last call was, and how long it took them (or their sales team) to make the first call. In the future it will let our system help contractors improve their follow up process by analyzing call data.

Today I was browsing through the call logs in our system. I was shocked when I saw a call that a contractor made to a lead we sent them that lasted 105 minutes!

When it comes to taking on new work, some contractors only want to do big jobs while other prefer smaller jobs. Larger companies may feel that they are too big to deal with small jobs, and that may be true typically, but lets discuss the matter.

Bigger Not Always BetterBig jobs are great. They can keep your crew busy for a while, increase profit and potentially generate followup work with the same homeowner. However, one should consider what is needed to properly complete a large job and whether their company is able to do so before taking on the work. Getting yourself into a situation where you may find that your crew is not large enough to complete the necessary work in the timeline you gave the homeowner could very well soil your reputation and leave you with a less than satisfactory review on networking sites.

With over 1.3 billion accounts and 145 million daily users, Twitter is one of the most popular social media platforms around. Bite-sized content draws user in who are looking for news, humor, and information from their favorite businesses and brands. If you’re a contractor looking to connect with your audience, learn the latest in the industry, and network with other professionals in field, you should be on Twitter too!