£800+ to Join Trustatrader!

[Nicebloke]

I rang Trustatrader today to enquire about joining them, and was a bit surprised that it is about £830 a year and despite how confident they are that I will get lots of work, they don't allow you to sign up for less than a year to give it a trial run (not that confident then).

I guess it's worth it if you get lots of work, but with so many other such trade advertising companies going (checkatrader, which trader, rated trader etc), it's hard to know who to join (if any)?

Has anyone got any experience of of the trade advertising companies, and if so which ones are worth a try?

 

[Octopus]

£830 for 1 "advert" is a lot of money.... my total spend in the last year on ALL marketing activity was £546!

 

[Leesparkykent]

My pal is on checkatrade and swears buy it...About £600 a year and says he gets about 10K-15K worth of work from it a year. Hes not the most proactive at keeping it updated either.

 

[PEG]

I can beat that...total cost of advertising for any of the work i have done,since i first began accepting paid work,in 1974 at age ten...zero

 

[Nicebloke]

My pal is on checkatrade and swears buy it...About £600 a year and says he gets about 10K-15K worth of work from it a year. Hes not the most proactive at keeping it updated either.

Sounds like it's worth a try, I would be happy with an extra 10-15k of work. I have left a message with them to call me tomorrow to get some more info.

 

[rolyberkin]

I put in my postcode and 100+ traders came back, I suppose it is streamed by the first part of the postcode but still very well subscribed by traders. I say get some leaflets printed and go old school or try local parish magazines etc!

 

[Des 56]

I think £800 is a bit on the cheap side,however,if they were to pay me just a little more I might consider letting them include me on their list

 

[FatAlan]

If the scams were doing their job properly they should be the one stop shop for Joe public. They charge enough!

 

[Andy78]

I put in my postcode and 100+ traders came back, I suppose it is streamed by the first part of the postcode but still very well subscribed by traders. I say get some leaflets printed and go old school or try local parish magazines etc!

Which site did you try that on ?

 

[Dan]

Sound the money on your own websites.

 

[simpson93]

Joined similar site recently £800 inc vat paid over 4months
£2500 of work 2/3weeks in
All local work

 

[rolyberkin]

Which site did you try that on ?

Trustatrader, there is no one in my postcode listed so it reverted to the next nearest postcode, so for example if you put in Chelmsford it has 100+ traders, if I put in CM3 it comes back with CM1 10 pages and 100+ listings, one of the first listing is from a trader who is in Southend although they have listed a Chelmsford postcode. All seems a bit of a con to me, what if you were the trader on page 10, hardly a good investment!

 

[rolyberkin]

Checkatrade looks a much better website and setup, you can search and stream the results by nearest first etc.

 

[simpson93]

Think with checkatrade I think they do change the order in which your name comes up from day to day

 

[Wilko]

I just put my exact post code into Checkawhatsie and got 606 Sparks to look at. I'd like to have more paid work, but I'm not sure I'd be happy to pay £800 to be the 607th in my local area.

 

[Dave OCD]

I'm very lucky I suppose, only advertising ever was £230 for some van signing, that was only because people kept telling me it was a good idea. Every single job I get is via recommendation, even then I have to turn some work down due to being too busy but a good problem to have I guess.

 

[Des 56]

I'm very lucky I suppose, only advertising ever was £230 for some van signing, that was only because people kept telling me it was a good idea. Every single job I get is via recommendation, even then I have to turn some work down due to being too busy but a good problem to have I guess.

No,I don't think you were lucky,its probably because the work you have done has been of sufficient standard that word of mouth recommendations has kept the need for advertising to almost zero

Now,the above should be food for thought for those who pay through the nose for services that others never require

 

[Colin33]

I can beat that...total cost of advertising for any of the work i have done,since i first began accepting paid work,in 1974 at age ten...zero

I think I can beat that, I've never advertised since I started paid work over 30 years ago, not even a sign written vehicle, and once I found 50 Pence on top of an old CU I was replacing and I was allowed to keep it...

 

[PEG]

...you were lucky...ower dad would thrash us t' sleep wi' 'is belt...

 

[Colin33]

...you were lucky...ower dad would thrash us t' sleep wi' 'is belt...

Luxury.