PorterVac’s Journey Of Growing 500% By Partnering With Business Assist
PorterVac specialises in Gutter Cleaning throughout Melbourne. They were inspired to pursue Gutter Cleaning as their flagship service through observing a lack of service providers in major Australian cities offering this. PorterVac had reached a pivotal point in the business where they had to expand their marketing efforts to further grow the business.
PorterVac’s Challenge
When they commenced in 2013, PorterVac was just a four-person business. However they quickly reached a critical stage where the business needed to achieve substantial business growth to take up a leadership position in their industry. Recognising the business was heavily reliant on lead generation through traditional media such as local newspaper advertisements, and that key competitors were shifting to a digital approach, Portervac made the decision to partner up with a digital marketing agency to lead them through the next phase of their business growth.
I was seeing my competitors moving into digital marketing, and that’s when I approached Steve and the Business Assist team who have helped make PorterVac what it is today.
– Dave Porter, CEO and Founder of Portervac.
Why Business Assist?
Understanding PorterVac Through Collaboration
At Business Assist, we genuinely believe that excellent results require strong client collaboration.
And whilst our focus is on all-things marketing, it is our ability to foster close working relationships with our clients, that truly allows us to help them succeed.
In terms of significant partnerships in our business, one of the strongest examples is our work with PorterVac.
Business Assist has worked side-by-side with PorterVac to help Dave Porter and General Manager Brayden Cameron for over seven years. Together, we have built a range of effective digital marketing strategies and a solid lead-generation machine to help PorterVac access a torrent of leads.
PorterVac’s success with digital marketing has not come from one single source. Nor was it the result of picking a few keywords or throwing together a few digital ads. It was and still is the product of a consistent and ongoing collaboration between our two companies.
Business Assist helps PorterVac push the boundaries of their digital marketing, and through this collaboration, we have come to understand the ins and outs of the PorterVac business.
Constant and continuous communication with the PorterVac team over the years has allowed Business Assist to grow with the business and fully understand how the they operates.
“I call Business Assist our internal marketing team,” Dave said.
“Whilst they’re an external digital marketing firm, it feels like they’ve become part of the furniture in our business.”
Dave Porter
Director
Brayden Cameron
General Manager
Empowering through Education
Defining, executing and refining digital marketing strategies is one thing, however, at Business Assist we place a strong emphasis on helping our clients understand what we do, how we do it and most importantly, why we do it.
According to PorterVac’s General Manager, Brayden Cameron, the time spent by Business Assist on educating the PorterVac team on the ‘why’ and helping them understand key marketing concepts has resulted in more informed decisions and allowed PorterVac to make the most of the leads generated.
“We were looking for someone to streamline our whole digital marketing process, and Business Assist was that team for us,” he said.
“If you’re looking for a business to educate, to get to know you and your business and help your business grow, Business Assist is the right partner.”
Business Assist Account Manager, Peter Mav, said this was a crucial differentiator between Business Assist and other digital agencies.
“We want to be that partner for them” Peter said.
“We go through the journey with our clients. We’ve been with PorterVac for seven years, so we’ve been on that journey of growth together.”
“I co-ordinate our team to ensure everything is delivered promptly. It’s about being proactive and ensuring we’re in constant communication.”
Seven members of Business Assist’s staff work on the PorterVac account in a range of roles, ensuring daily contact with the PorterVac team. Peter also works as a Growth Strategist for Business Assist’s clients, and PorterVac is a key account in Peter’s portfolio.
“My background is mainly working with startups and helping them grow into large organisations, so I’m able to take a step back and look at it from an outsiders perspective and provide our clients advice on growing their business,” he said.
Understanding Portervac’s Customers
Business Assist has developed an intuitive understanding of PorterVac’s ideal client, and the customer journey their clients undertake.
- How frequently do they get their gutters cleaned?
- What opportunities does that create for more comprehensive roof maintenance?
- How long after one gutter clean are customers most likely to enquire about another service?
- How can PorterVac use these touchpoints to remain top-of-mind with their customers?
The product of this understanding and the answers to these questions mean that Business Assist has been able to guide PorterVac on their digital marketing journey with incredible results.
Business Assist’s Strategy
Digital Channel Strategies
Business Assist digital strategist Pip Baddock helps our clients find the right strategies across the full range of digital marketing channels they pursue.
“It’s about identifying the best strategy for the client and their market, whether that’s an email marketing strategy, utilising campaign landing pages, SEO or marketing automation, our focus it to find the best fit for the client,” he said.
“There’s also an element of gap analysis. That is, looking at what they’re already doing strongly and working out where we need to fill those gaps to ensure a balanced suite of digital marketing campaigns that are right for the client and their customers.”
Digital Brand Perception
After taking over the PorterVac account, we had a good look at their branding and clients’ perception of that brand.
“Even though they had achieved strong growth, their branding and their website made it look like they were still a smallish business. So, we also make sure that their website is updated regularly with the latest design trends and user experience improvements to ensure PorterVac stay ahead of their competitors” Peter said.
“If you look at the business now, they’re a market leader. They’re positioned much more professionally now than in the past, so building the brand and brand awareness as well as improving client perception was key to ensuring they were able to leverage their strong brand to gain access to larger commercial contracts.”
“We built a new website for PorterVac and produced a range of corporate videos and client testimonials. Not only did this really opened up access to those better jobs, but another piece of the puzzle was making them more attractive to potential staff as well, which was crucial in supporting their growth” said Peter.
Marketing Automation
Business Assist’s Marketing Automation is one of the major strategies that delivered a significant boost in quality leads for PorterVac.
“When we started talking to PorterVac about marketing automation, it was based around weather,” Pip said.
“PorterVac knew they get a lot of enquiries when it rains a lot. They wanted to be able to send a communication out to their database when it rained. It was an isolated activity, but we looked at that and their customer list and identified that there was a bigger opportunity than just these ‘point-in-time’ emails blasts.
“In particular, the gutter-cleaning part of their business is the lead-in to more lucrative jobs, such as roof repair or restorations.
“PorterVac had a very long list of people who had their gutters cleaned in the past, but it was not consistently staying in touch and following up these people to reactivate the need for another gutter clean.
“We saw an opportunity for a more structured process to reactivate that need for another gutter clean.” said Pip.
The solution was the development of a series of emails sent out to past clients on a scheduled basis, at predefined points in time after their last gutter clean.
From reminders to have their gutters cleaned twice a year, to educating clients about signs a roof may need repair or restoration, and even a personal message from the CEO, Business Assist helped PorterVac create a range of touchpoints for their domestic and commercial customers.
And the best bit? PorterVac’s sales team barely have to lift a finger. The system is consistently following up ‘cold leads’, allowing the sales team to focus on handling engaged leads.
Google Ads & SEO Strategies
Whilst marketing automation has been a significant addition to the PorterVac digital marketing machine, the implementation of this has not come at the expense of a focus on the overarching strategy.
PorterVac continues to see fantastic results from Google Ads and SEO with both strategies focusing on targeting valuable commercially-focused keywords while building PorterVac’s share of Google searches and converting these to customers through an effective website.
Facebook Strategies
Facebook has been the most recent channel to be explored by PorterVac. Business Assist has designed an effective set of Facebook’s campaigns utilising Facebook’s machine-learning algorithms to generate brand awareness with PorterVac’s ideal customers and employ retargeting to keep the PorterVac brand in front of them – leading to higher conversions and a lower cost per lead.
The Result
Nov 2019 – Oct 2020 vs Nov 2018 – Oct 2019
159%
increase in contact page conversion rates
24%
increase in contact page goal completions
755%
increase in request a call back conversion rates
309%
increase in request a call back form submissions
In 2020, PorterVac is now a 40-person business generating hundreds of leads each week. That’s a powerful transformation in just seven years, even by founder and CEO Dave Porter’s reckoning. That seven-year journey has culminated in PorterVac growing 500 per cent in revenue, and regularly winning large commercial contracts opening up new and significant avenues of growth.
Marketing Automation
The results have been incredible from this strategy, and it’s delivered a tsunami of leads. Before the implementation of this strategy, email marketing accounted for just under two per cent of PorterVac enquiries.
That has since grown to a whopping 15 per cent.
“They’re getting more than 100 enquiries a month, just from email follow up,” Dave said.
Jan – October 2020, All channels, All goals.
| Bounce Rate | Pages / Session | Avg. Session Duration | Goal Conversion Rate | |
| Website Average | 78.72% | 1.35 | 00:00:48 | 5.19% |
| Marketing Automation | 60.93% | 1.65 | 00:01:29 | 21.87% |
| Performance Comparison | -22.60% | 22.22% | 85.42% | 321.39% |
Google Ads
“We’ve seen a 60% increase in visitors to the PorterVac landing pages from paid traffic and a 110% increase in enquiries overall from paid search,” Dave said.
Contact Form Submissions – 62.50% increase PoP (Oct 20 vs Oct 18)
Gutter Cleaning LP – 2,200% increase PoP (Oct 20 vs Oct 18)
SEO
“On top of that, we’ve seen a 150% increase in website visits from SEO over the last 12 months, with a 75% increase in enquiries achieved.”
October 2018 – October 2020
Request a call back form submission – 1,316% increase PoP (October 2020 vs 2018)
Users – 213.68% increase PoP (October 2020 vs 2018)
Facebook has been one of the latest additions to PorterVac’s digital marketing mix, and has seen MoM growth since launching in April 2020 with Gutter Cleaning enquiries increasing 345% Quarter-on-Quarter.
Gutter Clean LP Enquiries, Jan – October 2020
It all comes back to trust
When reflecting on his 13-year relationship with PorterVac and their CEO Dave Porter, Business Assist Director of Strategy, Steve Foura said more than the fantastic results he and his team had achieved for PorterVac, he has valued the trust and friendship that has developed.
“There’s a lot of trust there,” he said.
“They come to us with ideas, and they trust us enough to ask us questions constantly.
“I met Dave Porter 13 years ago. I was presenting a marketing workshop where I was training tradespeople in how to write their marketing plan and I remember very clearly then thinking, ‘this guy’s gonna go somewhere’.
“He was young, not long since becoming qualified, but he was hungry for growth and hungry to build a business.
“To know Dave for 13 years ago and see where he’s got to, it’s been very rewarding to have shared in that journey.”
And that trust goes both ways.
“I use PorterVac for all of my gutter cleaning,” Steve said.
“In every house I’ve been in, I’ve always used them. I like the security of having qualified roof tilers on my roof, and I trust them to do a great job every time.”
