I am accredited and I KNOW I have gotten jobs that I bid higher than my competition becasue they felt being accredited made them feel a little more secure. 100% write off as well.
I have been thinking about joining one in my area also. I meet someone last year but did not join, it would be good to probably be associated with them.
Just thinking out loud here but we are thinking of joining the Chamber of Commerce simply because the BBB is just there to accredit your business. The Chamber of Commerce here holds meetings once a week with all the other members and has special outings about once a month. We think this would give us "more bang for our buck." Cause it gives us more local exposure to mingle with other businesses big and small. Also going to join the local Realtor association. With this you basically go in and buy the Realtor, doughnuts and such, and you give them a pitch of your business. What do you think??
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exteriorcleaning@live.com Columbia, MO 65201 573-239-8401
Chamber is good for networking but the BBB lends credibility to customers that are not chamber members. This will be most of your customers. You do have to be in business for at least a year.
I think the chamber of commerce and realtor assoc. are great ideas.... but for me locally i do very little work. My home town has pop 3500 county 15000. There are towns within an hour of 180000, 30000, 30000, 40000, and 40000. Not to mention the folks that live in the country. Im looking to target those areas and my local chamber cant do that for me.... Having said that i think your local chamber and assoc. are musts for ESTABLISHED businesses.
The local BBB called me last week and made me remove the link I had ON my website TO their website! I told the guy he was silly, because my site(s) rank much higher than theirs.
Anyway, I only stay in the BBB because my biggest competition here is also a member. But here's my selling point: We maintain an unblemished record of ZERO complaints with the BBB, while he has three this year alone!