Discuss CheckaTrade | MyBuilder | RatedPeople | TrustaTrader etc - Who's with what and why? in the UK Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net
When customers told me they could get it cheaper, I agreed with them. I then asked for a pen an paper, they thought I was going to give them my quote. After they gave me them I picked up my case and turn and said, make sure you get there name and address because you will get a cheap job and possibly dangerous. I then started walking away. The number of customers that called me back. If you can drop you price you overcharged to start with. I never dropped the price.I've used both mybuilder and ratedpeople to find tradesmen for a refurb I did after moving to a new area and not having any recommendations or knowing anyone.
I can only comment on using them as a user rather than a provider as i'm a DIYer.
I found a totally mixed bag from total cowboys (you really couldn't make some of the stories up) to decent qualified tradesmen.
People are reassured by the rating system and seeing feedback from previous 'customers'. I found this to be fairly worthless in actuality as it is easy to game the system (for the unscrupulous) by getting friends/family to leave you feedback or creating fake accounts and leaving yourself feedback. In reality, i'd say as a user, it's as much a stab in the dark as doing a google search or any other random localised search.
I heard from a couple tradsemen that they were always battling with the fact that most people just went with the lowest quote (by no means the main factor for me personally). I'd recommend sticking to your usual pricing and if the customer just wants the cheapest they're probably not the customer you want to work for. They'll soon find out it's not the best tactic when hiring!
Or rank your website higher than theirs. Which should be easy to do for your own business name. I assume some of your customers were trying to contact you via their website rather than your own or something?If registering with mybuilder, be aware that your registered name will be linked to them via google searches (which are usually towards the top of the listings) for years !, even if you never do any jobs through them. To get your name removed from their database is v.hard work which requires letter writing/signatures and its a pita. Moral of the story is dont bother in the first place !
That's the way to do it. Well done.When customers told me they could get it cheaper, I agreed with them. I then asked for a pen an paper, they thought I was going to give them my quote. After they gave me them I picked up my case and turn and said, make sure you get there name and address because you will get a cheap job and possibly dangerous. I then started walking away. The number of customers that called me back. If you can drop you price you overcharged to start with. I never dropped the price.
Or rank your website higher than theirs. Which should be easy to do for your own business name. I assume some of your customers were trying to contact you via their website rather than your own or something?
Reply to CheckaTrade | MyBuilder | RatedPeople | TrustaTrader etc - Who's with what and why? in the UK Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net
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