Do you remember what motivated you in the launch of your own company?

I’m sure you decided to launch it first to create something that lasts and also to have free time for you and your family. But what happened?

You seem trapped in your office or, worse, inside your truck.

Every day you are obliged to spend more time working, to face fuel costs, landfill costs, living costs, and more.

You’re idea to create something that would give you more time for you and your loved ones, day after day, started to become like a mirage during a Sahara tour…

Do you want that to go in that way?

I think not.

You invested all your energies and strengths in your company to create a good life for you and your family and, if you have employees, for them too.

Now, I know is becoming difficult.

Something changed.

Probably after the pandemic, probably during the pandemic, or probably it was changing before. I don’t know.

I can tell you that knowing the field as the back of my hands, something started to change in 2009 after the Wall Street crack.

Indeed, if you read the data available here, (https://apps.bea.gov/international/bp_web/tb_download_type_modern.cfm?list=1&RowID=31001) of the importation of goods and raw materials from other countries started to grow. China, India, and other countries became the largest exporters in the US market. 

I know you are asking yourself, “What the hell it means?”

I’m arriving at it.

The exportation of raw materials from these countries created a dependence that affected the Country's balance, creating an important unbalance between internal production and foreign production. 

On the other hand, the US started to export tons of raw materials as waste in other countries where the facilities were interested in processing them to produce new goods.

It created a gap between the production and the consumption.

But it was only the beginning of the process.

At the same time, if you watch the number of landfills, something started before the 2000s. The reduction that arrived nowadays with 3,000 active landfills in the US. (The table below clearly shows the decrease in landfills.)

Number of Landfills in the US (Source: Municipal Solid Waste in the United States: 2000 Facts and Figures)

Unfortunately, only a few people in waste management have read these numbers and data.

The result?

It’s under your eyes…

Or better, it is something that you’re living.

The prices of landfills are growing, and prices of fuels are growing too, the inflation changed drastically the value of your money and the money of your clients; everything is going in a way that is transforming your dreams in the mirage of an oasis in the desert.

Prices of Landfills 2020-2021 (Source: Statista 2023)

Seeing the numbers it was predictable and manageable, but I don’t want to stay focused on the past; let me tell you that there is a way to go ahead without forgetting your dreams and without changing job or, worse, leaving the country.

And I want to share it here.

I know that you can think it is the typical marketing approach, but it isn’t. 

I’ve decided to share with you the strategy that at Marketing4Waste we use for our clients, step by step. 

Let’s start.

1st Market Analysis and Buyer Persona Identification

As you see here, we start with numbers.

It’s crucial to know the market where you want to work or if you are already working on it, you should know it over simple empirical data.

Fortunately, EPA and BEA collect a lot of data about waste quantities, the different types, the production for the state, and more.

These are very useful.

And I’ll tell you why.

First, knowing these data, you can identify a specific sub-niche of waste types you can collect and/or treat. You can identify the niche starting from the volume of waste produced in the area, the source of this volume (you can find it by identifying the type of shops that sell the items that can generate the waste and monitoring how many of them are in the area), and the number of facilities that are collecting/treating it.

That’s the first essential step.

Only by identifying the market can you launch a profitable business or manage the profitability of your business.

This step also allows you to create an offer crafted around the problem your potential customer is facing.

But before doing that, you must identify your potential customer and transform it into a “buyer persona.”

To do that, start from the source of waste.

Identify who typically buys it and how to use it if it's a product.

Work to define his/her typical journey around the product.

Let me give you an example.

Let’s talk about an aluminum bottle for water. It’s not disposed of with a high frequency, but it’s a good example.

I start asking some questions:

– Who typically purchases this type of product? 

– Where did he/she purchase this bottle? How many?

– What he/she does with this bottle? 

– Why he/she decides to dispose of it?

– Why did he/she buy an aluminum bottle instead of a plastic one?

I know you're thinking, "Who am I asking these questions to?"

The answer is that nowadays, you can use ChatGPT to find the answers to these questions or, if you prefer, you can create a survey that you can leverage on social media groups of your country, city or you can do it live, waiting for people that bought this product outside of supermarkets or specialized shops.

Once you have these answers, you can identify who your potential customer is and what problems it faces in disposing of the waste originating from the product. 

Knowing its problems automatically moves you to the next step.

The question for the creation of the offer.

2nd Offer Creation

What kind of outcome he/she wants to achieve?

The answer can be, coming back to the aluminum bottle, he/she wants to give the waste to a company that recycles it to create a new bottle or save the aluminum to generate other goods.

Maybe he/she wants also to receive a certificate for his/her contribution to saving the environment or things like that.

Once you have this information, it’s time to craft your offer.

To craft it, you must consider all the data you have in your hands.

Start from the type of waste you want to collect by considering the market and its actors. 

Coming back to the aluminum bottle, start with an offer that says something like

“I know your commitment to saving the planet motivates you to decide on a fully recyclable aluminum bottle.

But what happens when you have to dispose of it?

You don’t know where it will finish.

You don’t know what type of treatment it will receive.

It will likely finish in a recycling process or not.

That frustrates you.

You see all your strengths to avoid the consumption of plastic bottles, finishing in a black hole. And worse than that, there is the fact that you feel powerless about what happens to your old aluminum bottle. 

And it’s thinking to people like you that we created our ABCollection, a service crafted for people who want to sustain the planet from purchasing to disposing of. 

Our service adds to the collection and recycling a certification that you’ll receive back every single time you decide to dispose of your old aluminum bottle. 

If that is not sufficient, you can register on our website, and every month, you’ll see how many tons of Aluminum Bottles are transformed into other items, like bike frames, fishing rods, and other goods. But most importantly, you can see where this process took place.

Indeed we are committed to reducing the CO2 footprint of our company and our processes.”

With that beginning, you can now talk with your audience about what they must pay for the process and how it works (if you want), but consider that everything starts here.

Having that ready, you can finally launch your lead generation process.

And knowing your target audience, believe me, it’s easier to attract them with paid ads using platforms like Facebook and Instagram. 

I suggest using paid ads because they help you understand the cost of acquiring a single client. I’m talking about clients and not leads. Indeed leads are interested, but how many of them can you transform into clients?

I’m sure you are a great closer, but the average percentage is 30%.

Everything changes thanks to the highly qualified leads you’ll receive, thanks to a clear offer and target audience, but your energies impact 50% of the negotiation. 

By the way, this 30% means that the cost of your new client should also include the cost for the other 70% you are not converting right now.

The advantage of paid ads to generate leads is the creation of predictability for your business. Indeed when you arrive to know how much you have to invest monthly to generate leads, and starting from that, you can also know how many of them will be converted into clients, which means that you can say what will be the month's turnover.

If you combine that with the offer perfectly crafted on the needs of your leads, and you add a warm-up process where with an email sequence, a paper letter sequence, or a weekly call, you inform them about the opportunity that you are offering or a reserved offer, I’m sure that the 30% rapidly will grow (I have the number on my side).

3rd The Sales of Secondary Raw Materials

The last but not least aspect that we implement in our clients’ companies is the sales of secondary raw materials.

Indeed leveraging a specific niche and creating a process that generates a monthly flux of clients (the 30% of conversion), you can predict the quantity of secondary raw material obtainable.

That’s something that reduces the amount of material you have to move to the landfill and creates a positive cash flow. You’ll sell these materials to some recycling facilities interested in them. But, the predictability added to the lead generation process impacts transforming that phase by creating long-term supply agreements with the recycling facilities. 

How can you create these long-term agreements?

Contact them, saying you have a monthly flux of XXX tons of aluminum (continuing with the aluminum bottle). I’m sure they will ask you to create a professional agreement that defines the supply of this material.

Applying this process to your waste company, I’m sure you’ll restore the clear and defined image of your life since you launched your company. 

As Eleanor Roosevelt said: "The Future Belongs To Those Who Believe in The Beauty of Their Dreams.”

All the best

Sam

#wastemanagement #junkremoval #recycling #marketing