When business slows down, your instincts to go after your previous customers make sense.
After all, they know you. You did good work. How hard could it be to get them back?
Truth is, it’s harder than you think — and in certain situations, it can be more expensive than most contractors realize. Bringing back a previous customer isn’t the same as customer retention, and HVAC and plumbing contractors are quietly draining their marketing budgets by treating them the same way.
The Leaky Bucket Problem
Consider the leaky bucket analogy: your customer base is like a bucket. New customers go to the top, while customers you’ve previously won but no longer service leak down to and out the bottom. This happens when there are holes in a contractor’s retention strategy — holes that are never plugged and fixed. And when you aren’t focused on retaining old customers, re-acquisition becomes a costly priority.
It can’t be stressed enough: winning back old customers isn’t the same as customer retention. Chasing lead after lead instead of focusing on your current and previous customers sends you falling into this trap time and again. When you’re constantly filling but never plugging, you’re relying on the marketing treadmill to bring in the business. The moment ad spend slows, however, that bucket starts to drain once again.
Messaging and Targeting Old Customers
When targeting new customers, your messaging will be different than when you reach back out to old ones. New prospect ad copy might focus on brand awareness, testimonials, pain points, and education meant to reach a wide audience. But copy targeted at past customers? That’s going to revolve around past connections and services with hints and callbacks to your personal history.
This may seem obvious in terms of strategy, but here’s what you may not understand until you’re in the weeds: the latter takes time. Energy. Research. A sharp memory. You can’t automate a personalized message, right?
Customer retention is almost always a better strategy than winning back old customers because, in short, it’s easier. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to win back homeowners you’ve previously lost. It just means you should prioritize keeping the ones you’ve already got.
Less Ad Spend, More Predictability
Run this scenario: let’s say you’re keeping roughly 40% of customers every year. That means 60% are walking out the door, and you’re paying to replace them every single year.
Now flip it. What happens when retention rates climb from 40% to 60%?
- You acquire more new customers while also growing active accounts
- Your marketing budget goes further
- Revenue gets more predictable
Studies show that a five percent increase in retention can boost profits by up to 95 percent. What would ten percent or more do for you?
Where to Start
You don’t have to overhaul everything at once.
- Redefine what “retained” means, and a one-time tune-up doesn’t count. If a customer isn’t connected to you through a recurring plan or agreement, they’re a potential lapse waiting to happen.
- Look at replacement jobs differently. An install doesn’t have to be the end of the relationship; it can be the beginning. Enrolling customers into an ongoing plan at the point of install is one of the highest-leverage moves you can make.
- Align your team around long-term value. When the whole team thinks about lifetime customer value, not just closing the next job, pricing conversations change, follow-up protocols change, and the business starts pulling in the same direction.
And lastly? Consider adopting a solution for present and future problems that homeowners can’t ignore, like our Premier Program®, then start reaching out to those you’re currently working with and the ones you’ve lost to drift. Customers who bite will get new, high-efficiency equipment plus future service, repairs, consumables, and maintenance included for one fixed, monthly price.
As for you, the contractor? You enjoy the benefits of working with someone you’ve done business with before – someone who is finally locked into a long-term contract with your company.
The Bottom Line
Winning back old customers is a good idea, but you need to have a plan for retaining them in the future. Otherwise, it’s just more expensive. The contractors who get ahead aren’t spending more to chase lapsed customers for one-time services. They’re building the kind of relationships that don’t lapse in the first place. And unless someone is tied to you through an ongoing plan or agreement, that relationship is fragile.
That’s how structured recurring revenue models do something one-off jobs never can. When a customer is enrolled in an ongoing plan, you know they’re staying. You can track it and build around it.
The Premier Program is specifically built to tackle these different pain points. Home Comfort-as-a-Service turns one-time installs into long-term enrolled customers, giving homeowners predictable comfort and giving you measurable, recurring revenue that only brings you more comfort over time.
If you want to learn more about all of this, reach out to our team of comfort experts today.
