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  Liam Booth July 19, 2015 at 10:38pm

  Hi,

  I agree with the concept of facebook especially the local buy and sell groups for advertising your services within the local area, especially if a job photo of previous work is shown ie another hedge cut today for a happy customer" and joe public sees this and thinks i like that or didnt know they did hedge cutting ill inbox them to do mine.

  However from my point of view from experience i have seen a lot of opportunists and non professionals saying i do gardens, have a go chancers, and people seem to either want services yesterday or for free. For example someone may say how much to cut grass, given my hourly rate this would be so much, however 30 people may comment on the post and will offer an amount which is ridiculous which i dont understand how they can be doing it legitimately.

  I have to say non of my clients use facebook and additional work comes from reccomendations. I do not advertise on facebook as i dont feel clients gardens should be featured on the public domain.

  Facebook good for some things but for my clients and the future of my business i dont see it being much use,

  Would be great to hear comments on how it works good or bad for other companies, business'.

  cheers
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  Paul McNulty July 19, 2015 at 10:44pm

  There's a huge debate to be had about how close you become to your clients as "friends".
  
  To me, things like FB need to be kept away from work. It's either used for personal relationships, which are too close to invite clients in to, or for businesses to spam, which doesn't do us any favours.
  
  FB is great for closed groups, arguably better than forums like this, but I'd keep my business out of it personally.
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    Liam Booth > Paul McNulty July 19, 2015 at 10:52pm

    A great comment from Paul, didnt look at it from that perspective, was only thinking about advertising as part of groups, but adding clients as friends is completely different, although i consider some clients as friends, and i see them more than family members, to remain professional i feel its important to keep things separate.
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  Phil Seabrook July 20, 2015 at 6:42am

  I've got a business Facebook page and a Twitter account. I've got business through both. Facebook is purely business and my personal page is set to full privacy so only my friends can see it, though I barely use it. Twitter I've used to connect to fellow horticulturists and I don't encourage my clients to follow me as it's mainly for personal enjoyment. I have made some very useful contacts through Twitter including two that led to contracts with the National Trust and local horticulture college.
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  James Brett July 20, 2015 at 8:12am

  I have both. I keep my work and personal Facebook separate. Although I will share updates from my work page via my personal page sometimes.
  
  Twitter. I have both again. Keep them fairly separate. Although sometimes one will RT the other where appropriate.
  
  I don't actively get my clients to follow me on these platforms but they are free to do! Some of my clients I have quite close relationships with them (good friends), these have come through work!
  
  I post updates to my blog/projects via both platforms. Although I haven't gained work via either of these. I just find it is good to have a presence on multiple platforms so that potential clients can see you.
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  Robbie July 20, 2015 at 8:21am

  I was at a seminar a couple of weeks ago about using social media. 

  They were strongly recommending Twitter and linkedin.

  Facebook - Any leads i have had from facebook have always been from the lower end of things and never lead to good paying work. That being said I know my clients use it to look at other some of the other gardens/lawns I work in & it can prove to be a good way to share my blog posts.
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  Rory July 20, 2015 at 8:28am

  The thing I like about fb is you aren't limited to photos or words, handy when your posting pics of jobs your undertaking currently and to be honest I've hard a lot of my singular jobs come from fb or friends of the page sharing.

  Twitter and linkedin are better as a business but I'm yet to work out how to optimise it to suit me.
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  Russ Francis July 20, 2015 at 8:30am

  Haven't  got around to setting up my website yet so my main online presence is my business FB page.  Find it good to showcase my work, and on bigger jobs fencing, decking, clearances etc often I'll post daily photo updates, my followers seem to like the 'makeover' element of it.

  This year I have picked up a couple of regulars via FB and also some one off jobs, this is through past customers recommending me on local residents group pages, and some have kindly left nice reviews on my page also.

  You always get chancers popping up offering silly cheap prices, and also there are customers that want cheap and don't care about anything else, so they are perfect for each other.  I don't compete at that end of the market, nor get into bidding wars online.

  I guess to sum up it's just another route for customers to find me,wouldn't have them as friends on my personal FB page tho :)