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As a result of more people staying at home, the residential pool market is experiencing a spike in business and sales. While it can be tempting to ride the spike of sales, we must use this boom time to reach a new plateau to continue growth. As shown in the graph, Brand Builders essentially use boom times to propel their business, while Market Riders suffer the market downturns with no long-lasting benefits.
So, how can your pool business be a Brand Builder? The key to keeping a competitive advantage is aligning your brand with your customers' values. Today's customers are not purchasing products — they are purchasing home life experiences. By leveraging smart pool vendors that build your brand, you can guarantee the coming years will be your company's best yet.
WHAT YOUR CUSTOMERS WANT
It wasn't so long ago that we expected to pay for two-day shipping or went to the grocery store ourselves. Today's customers are motivated by experience more than ever, and it is crucial to offer them solutions that provide real value to their lifestyles.
A simple example of this is customers' increasing demand for the healthiest swimming experience possible. More than ever before, customers are searching for products and solutions that protect their health. Today's customers have too much information at their fingertips. They need a trusted source to help lower chemical exposure while still maintaining a clean, clear pool.
The rapid rise of Advanced Oxidation Process (AOP) solutions is built on the health and experience needs of your customers. This new twist on pool chemistry simplifi cation offers pool pros an opportunity to meet customer health-conscious demands, grow customer loyalty and become a Brand Builder.
Until recently, AOP pool systems were considered a premium upgrade for a niche customer segment. Today, AOP is leading pool care into a simpler, more reliable world of water treatment. The earliest attempts to deliver an AOP pool solution combined ozone with ultraviolet light to create hydroxyl action in the water. The challenge was that the two systems, ozone and UV, whether offered separately or bundled in a box, doubled the system maintenance, complicated the installation process and made system care an overall chore.
As a simpler alternative, a new direct Hydroxyl-Based AOP pool technology has gained popularity by providing better results with one system. In addition to residential pools, this AOP technology has been proven to easily scale from spas to pools to waterparks. Brand Builders have learned to leverage these simpler, better-performing AOP systems. The vendor, Clear Comfort, has always focused on delivering brand value for your business while building the value of the solution. In fact, the company provides materials to help align your brand and the technology's value simply with tools, like BestAOP.com.
"I'm using less chemicals to treat the water. The water is always crystal clear and feels nice and soft. The customers are completely satisfi ed with it," Mandy Jelinek, service manager at The Pool Doctor, says about Clear Comfort's AOP. "They never have to worry if they're gonna have a party the next day or what the pool is gonna look like after the party — it always looks miraculous. From a maintenance standpoint, it's very easy."
BRAND BUILDERS BUILD BRIDGES
Now that you have decided to be a Brand Builder and not a Market Rider, what's next? In addition to making your life easier and your customers happier, vendors should elevate your business. Here are some ways that aligning customer values and vendor offerings can help build your business' brand (and sales):
1. Expand your reach with less effort.
We all know that getting the word out takes time, but your vendors' resources can help speed up the process. The buzz of your business' new offerings will go farther and faster if you use your vendor as a resource for marketing, sales and support. By putting its dealers first, Clear Comfort helps communicate value by providing customized marketing content, sales training, support resources and more.
2. Meet new expectations to meet new customers.
While you might be the best in your territory, you shouldn't limit yourself there. Building your brand with new, healthy and easy-to-use options could open new doors for a new customer base. You never know which potential customers — who were contemplating owning a pool — will now be interested in your new offerings that better align with their values. By offering health-conscious and easy-to-use sanitation methods, like AOP pool systems, you can overcome many customers' doubts and reservations.
3. Future proof your business.
Brand Builders know that yesterday's methods won't work forever. Think of smart vendor offerings as your secret weapon after the surge in sales has died down.
By offering today's best practices, you can safeguard your business and create stability with next-step solutions. For example, The Ultimate Pool Kit marries the power of Clear Comfort's AOP with slow erosion poolife® NST® cal hypo feeders as well as the convenience of pHinTM Smart Monitors. In addition to giving customers $1,000 of free product on every pool, this bundled kit helps dealers fulfill the demand for healthy, easy and complete water care. With enough chemistry for a complete season, the Ultimate Pool Kit delivers a swimming experience with drinking water chemical levels and without the harsh effects of salt chlorine, high cyanuric acid or high chlorine levels.
No one knows your customers like you do and in order to stay ahead of the competition, you must build customer relationships based on their values. When you align customers' values with what your vendors have, you become a Brand Builder.
For more information on how you can become a Brand Builder with AOP, please visit clearcomfort.com/brand-builder.
