Talking to colleagues in the landscape industry, it's pretty clear that labour shortages have prevented several businesses from expanding. Which is frustrating.
As you know, my primary business is as a landscaper (Holland Landscapes from Essex). I've been innundated with enquiries in the last 18 months or so, which has been brilliant but frustrating. Brilliant because I know that my investment in marketing has been worth it. Frustrating for two reasons really. The first being that at least 60% of people who enquire about landscaping, just don't have the budget for the work they want done. Secondly, I've lost some really good jobs simply because competitors offered to do the work quicker.
What does that mean for the business in terms of the bigger picture? Well, I want my landscaping business to be as efficient (profitable) as possible. I'd like to be in good heart when I pass it on to my children (assuming they want to follow in mine and my Dad's footsteps). And with the shortage of skilled landscapers, I can't build my business by taking on more staff to help reduce the lenght of my waiting list....I'm sure I'm not the only one in that position.
My Garden Design allows landscapers to win better work and therefore make better profits. When you use My Garden Design, you can increase your service offering. Instead of landscaping, you can offer a garden design and build service. The design bit might sound scary, but you don't need to be a garden designer yourself if you can outsource the design to a trusted supplier and still make a margin on it.
Let me explain.
To build a garden design yourself takes quite a bit of experience at using the design software and a knowledge of pyschology (how people use their gardens), aesthetics (what looks good with what), planning regulations and of course, practical landscaping techniques. But, if you invite a trained garden designer to help you with the project - it can sometimes feel as though the relationship with your client changes. Plus, of course there's likely to be a time delay, because the best garden designers have waiting lists too.
What we do at My Garden Design, is we ask YOU to gather all the information that's needed to create a design. The client brief, survey details etc. That way you keep control of the client relationship. (Don't worry, we give you all the tools you need to do that)
Once we have all the info, we'll get the design done, dusted and back in your email inbox within 4 weeks.....less frustrating for the client if they can see you are getting things moving.
The design will carry your logo and contact details. No mention of MGD whatsoever - the client will assume you've done the work, unless you tell them different.
Pricing - because we are not carrying out site visits or taking phone calls from the client, we can charge you trade prices. Which means, that there's room to add a margin for yourself.
Bingo! there we have it - you can run your business more efficiently without actually taking on any extra work. All of the information gathering stuff is what you do on a site visit anyway - you're just sharing it with our secure platform so that we can crack on with the work. It takes very little time to upload the info and you certainly don't need to be a computer whizz to master it. It's not much different to posting to LJN.
The blog I'm linking to, gives you some tips on adding a garden design service to your website and social media platforms. There's even a downloadable document that you can use to base your text on.
Take a look here.
https://mygardendesign.co.uk/how-to-add-garden-design-to-landscaping-website
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