Client Success Stories: Sertorio Homes

Client Success Stories: Sertorio Homes

From Frustration to Growth – Why Sertorio Homes Switched Agencies

Working alongside my team, we’re proud to partner with businesses that want more than just “average” results. One of our most powerful client success stories comes from Sertorio Homes, a family-owned construction company with over 40 years of experience in Perth. Their journey reflects what so many business owners go through: trusting a flashy digital agency, spending thousands each month, and getting little in return.

Anne Sertorio, co-owner of Sertorio Homes, shared her experience in a heartfelt letter to our founder, Greg Milner. Her words speak for themselves, and they highlight why so many businesses choose to switch digital marketing agencies and never look back.

The Challenge: Paying More, Getting Less

For years, Sertorio Homes worked with one of Perth’s biggest digital agencies. At first, the agency looked perfect: modern offices, energetic staff, polished presentations. They promised cutting-edge SEO, high-performing Google Ads, and consistent growth.

But as Anne explained in her letter:

“At first, they were all over us. Inviting me to lunch, showering us with attention… because we were paying many, many thousands of dollars every month.”

Despite all the promises, results fell short. The campaigns they were running delivered just 20 to 40 inquiries a month, and each lead cost well over $100 per inquiry. That meant thousands spent every month for very little return. Worse, Sertorio Homes was almost invisible in organic search results. When potential customers searched for Perth home builders or renovations, Sertorio Homes simply wasn’t showing up.

When Anne asked why, her account manager gave the same line over and over: “That’s pretty normal.”

But for Anne and her husband Bruce, who have built a highly successful construction company over decades, “normal” wasn’t good enough.

The Switch: Finding a Partner Who Delivers

By mid-2023, Anne and Bruce had reached a breaking point. They needed a team that not only understood SEO and digital marketing but also cared about ROI and results that made sense for the business. That’s when they turned to Worldwide Salon Marketing.

From the start, the focus was different. Instead of jargon, we offered clarity. Instead of cookie-cutter campaigns, we built a custom strategy for Sertorio Homes, focused on driving organic search visibility, reducing wasted ad spend, and improving lead quality.

Anne writes:

“Thank you for the huge difference you’ve made to our business since your team took over our entire online marketing processes back in June last year.”

The Results: Real Visibility, Real Leads

With a structured SEO strategy and carefully optimised ad campaigns, Sertorio Homes’ online presence was transformed. Their website began ranking higher in Google for competitive home building and renovation keywords, driving organic traffic that didn’t cost $100 a lead.

Their paid campaigns were restructured to target high-intent searchers, cutting down wasted spend and improving conversion rates. Within months, inquiries increased, quality improved, and cost per lead dropped significantly.

Most importantly, Anne and Bruce regained confidence in their marketing. No more guessing. No more excuses. Just measurable results and clear reporting.

See the Proof: Anne’s Full Letter

We don’t just talk about results—we let our clients speak for themselves.
Anne Sertorio was so impressed with the turnaround in her marketing that she took the time to write a personal letter of thanks to our founder, Greg Milner.

Here’s a screenshot of the opening lines:

Want to read the full letter in Anne’s own words?

Read the Full Testimonial (PDF)

Why This Story Matters

Sertorio Homes’ experience isn’t unique. Too many business owners are locked into expensive agency contracts, dazzled by tech-speak and empty metrics, while their real-world results stagnate.

This is why we share Client Success Stories: to show that you don’t have to settle. If your current agency is costing you thousands with little to show for it, there’s another option.

At Worldwide Salon Marketing, we specialise in helping established businesses:

  • Escape high-cost, low-return agency traps.
  • Build sustainable visibility with proven SEO strategies.
  • Optimise ad campaigns for lower costs and higher quality leads.
  • Get real transparency, not just buzzwords.

Ready to Switch?

If Anne’s words resonate with you, you might be in the same situation Sertorio Homes was just a year ago—spending too much, frustrated with results, and wondering if things could be better.

The answer is yes. And we’d love to show you how.

Let’s create your next Client Success Story.

Critical Issue: Verifying your Google My Business listing

Critical Issue: Verifying your Google My Business listing

Who else gets technology rage?
Let me tell you about the technical gymnastics we often have to go through on behalf of our members, just to get their tech ducks in a row. Marielle, one of my full-time staff in the Philippines, has been wrestling with Google for several days, trying to verify Google My Business listing of our client and live online.

(It can be a tortuous process). Depending on Mr. Google’s mood on the day, he’ll sometimes allow instant verification with an automated phone call reciting a 6 digit code to the business owner. Other days, the only way you can do it is by triggering a postcard, which can take weeks to arrive.
Yesterday, Juliet, was at the airport in Boston, about to fly down to Jacksonville, Florida where she’d set up her new business.
I was in touch with her via text message, and liaising with Marielle via Zoom chat. You’ll see from the screenshots below what a convoluted process it can be.
But essential – getting your Google My Business listing into the “Big Three” at the top of search results is the most valuable online real estate you can have. We know that GMB verification can be tricky, and it is not always a viable method to verify Google My Business by postcard. So, finding out how to verify Google My Business without a postcard could be crucial for some businesses.
Visibility on Google searches is highly crucial not only for online businesses but for all. Google my Business provides its users a vital opportunity to appear in Google search results with relevant information and Google Maps with all the contact details. And this opportunity is free.
How to verify your Google My Business listing 1
verifying your google my business listing
get your google listing verified
verifying your google listing
How to Get 50 New Salon Clients a Month with Online Ads

How to Get 50 New Salon Clients a Month with Online Ads

How to get dozens of new clients for your salon or spa every month using digital advertising

Any salon owner can throw money at Facebook and Google advertising. Many do, in a haphazard way, hoping that “some of the mud sticks.”

But it takes some careful “Sales Thinking” and technical skill to avoid wasting that money, and a lot of time. It’s often a mistake to ask one ad to do all the ‘heavy lifting’ – in other words, asking an ad to bring instant sales straight off the bat.

Advertising a salon’s services isn’t like selling something generic, like a fridge, or a microwave oven. Everybody is familiar with those products, but for personal services? Not so much.

So it’s often better for a salon to use digital advertising to ‘raise leads’ and then up-sell to those prospective customers and clients, rather than try to sell a big-ticket service to them up-front.

Wafaa Karim, owner of Sydney’s Cronulla Skin Sanctuary, needed more clients for her new tattoo removal machine.

So with Worldwide Salon Marketing’s help, Wafaa crafted an offer designed to raise leads.

Facebook ads for salons &s

Wafaa Krim (right) and her team at Cronulla Skin Sanctuary

Here’s what happened: 

1) First, we designed and built a landing page to take traffic from advertising on Facebook. The landing page looks like this…

Landing page for salon Facebook advertising

Here’s a link to that landing page. 

2) Second, we wrote and designed a series of half a dozen ads for testing a Facebook campaign to direct prospective clients to the offer on that landing page. Wafaa’s daily advertising budget was spread evenly across all of the ads. Each ad contained the same text above the image or video. Over a 14-day period, we monitored the relative costs versus the clicks each of those ads produced.

The data eventually showed us that one particular ad was producing the best ‘click-through-rate’ at the lowest cost. So we concentrated Wafaa’s chosen daily budget into that one ad. The ad looks like this:

Facebook advertising for salons &s
That ad campaign – albeit interrupted mid-term by Covid-19 lockdowns – has now been running for several months. In july 2020 alone, it produced no fewer than 58 ‘conversions’. That’s a measure of the number of people who saw the ad, clicked through to the landing page, and filled in the “Yes, Pick Me” form on the page.

That’s a conversion rate of nearly 10%, a huge figure in comparison with the worldwide average for Facebook ads.

(That figure does not include people who saw the ad and instead of filling in the form, picked up the phone and called the salon to make a booking.)

Here’s a graph of those landing page opt-ins for the month of July: 

 

Facebook advertising graph for salons
It’s made Wafaa Karim a very happy salon owner: 

 

Online advertising for salons &s
Need help with your online advertising and marketing? 

Find out more here, and talk direct to the founder of Worldwide Salon Marketing, Greg Milner, about your online advertising goals. Call +61-8-94439327

HOW THIS SALON OWNER USES VIDEO TO DOMINATE HER MARKET – AND MAKE MONEY!

Use your time during the lockdown! 

Find out how to use simple, short videos – just like Carolyn does – to drive clients into your busines, and dominate your local market. 

Book a FREE 30 minute coaching session with me, and I’ll show you, live on screen, how Carolyn does it, and you can too!

Greg Milner
CEO & Founder, Worldwide Salon Marketing
Author, “Rich Salon Owner” and “Simple Salon Marketing”

– G’day, it’s Greg at Worldwide Salon Marketing.

If your business has been closed by the pandemic, then here’s a way you can use that down time to get ready for when   lockdowns are lifted. Today I wanna introduce you to a salon owner who owned an ordinary salon in a suburb of one of our major cities, and using a very, very easy tool that everybody carries in their pocket 24 hours a day, she turned her business into the biggest and most successful in her field within a year.

She did it using this thing, very simple, just an ordinary mobile phone. And within a very short time, Carolyn Evans had brought in clients from all over the world to her suburban business.  

Here’s how she did it.

 

3 Ways to Keep Your Salon Sales Up with “Pandemic Proofing” Against Covid-19

3 Ways to Keep Your Salon Sales Up with “Pandemic Proofing” Against Covid-19

Do you feel the lockdown is a disaster, or…an opportunity

Greg Milner, Founder, Worldwide Salon MarketingGet a FREE 30-minute “Massive Action” strategy session with WSM’s founder & CEO Greg Milner and find out how YOU can take advantage of the downtime to keep the cash register ticking over. 

AND be ready to hit the ground running when the crisis is over. 

Hit the button below now and choose your day and time for a free strategy session with Greg. 

Thousands of salons all over the world have been forced to shut their doors due to coronavirus.

Many owners are frozen in fear.

But the crisis WILL end.

And there ARE actions you can take to prepare yourself for when the lockdown is over – when you can open your doors again.

The salon owners who are using the down-time to fine-tune their marketing and online assets are going to be in the best position to hit the ground running.

As soon as long-time Worldwide Salon Marketing member Effie Tsopolous was told to shut down her big Hobart skin care centre, she was on the phone to us.

“Help!” she said. “I need to make changes FAST to our website and Facebook pages so we can at least sell retail products, gift vouchers, and promote skin consultations by Zoom video.”

So our team of developers went to work. First, a major update to Effie’s home page: 

(Click on image to go to Escape’s home page)

Then, designing a new page and uploading a raft of images of the products she wanted to sell online:

(Click on image to go to Escape’s online shop)

Next, an overhaul of Effie’s Facebook page, with a new cover photo, and tweaking the page to allow for online booking of free skin consultations:

(Click on image to go to Escape’s Facebook page)

seo-salons-and-spas-australia“Being quick to make these changes and updates is already having an effect,” says Effie. “We’re getting sales online, and we haven’t even started making phone calls to clients or emailing them with links to the site.” 

 

Here’s another example of a salon taking “Massive Action” to keep the cash register ticking over during the coronavirus pandemic. 

Karen Skewes is an award-winning owner of Le Beau Day Spa in Perth. This morning, she sent out this carefully-worded email: 

Do you feel the lockdown is a disaster, or…an opportunity

Greg Milner, Founder, Worldwide Salon MarketingGet a FREE 30-minute “Massive Action” strategy session with WSM’s founder & CEO Greg Milner and find out how YOU can take advantage of the downtime to keep the cash register ticking over. 

AND be ready to hit the ground running when the crisis is over. 

Hit the button below now and choose your day and time for a free strategy session with Greg.