Data reveals top 3 traits consumers want in a solar installer

Acquiring customers used to be much easier when they had fewer choices of solar installers. As the field has become more crowded, with new competition seemingly popping up on every street corner overnight, differentiating one solar installer from another has become more challenging.

So what are the three traits most consumers are looking for when shopping for someone to put solar on their homes? It turns out consumers prefer smaller, local companies with deep roots in the community.

SolarReviews.com, a website that provides a full range of tools to help consumers decide which solar installer fits their needs best, allows consumers to review the more than 2,800 solar installers and currently has 2,800 participating companies that participate.

The site’s CEO Andrew Sendy decided to examine the reviews consumers provided for the top-rated companies to see if they shared any characteristics – and Sendy said the following three were shared by all the best-reviewed companies:

• they were family owned;
• they employed fewer than 100 people; and
• they had deep ties in the communities they serve.

On the other hand, the three worst-rated companies on the site were national installers and are all publicly held, Sendy reported.

“Our data reinforces that in general, consumers prefer companies with deep roots in their communities, owned by people they know and see around town,” Sendy said. “Companies like these receive the highest rankings in customer satisfaction and are often praised for their laser-like focus on customer service—and that makes sense. Once companies reach a certain size, it’s harder to maintain a personalized customer-service experience.”

SolarReviews.com allows customers to review installers on a scale of 1 to 5 stars. The average review score for all 2,800 installers reviewed on the site in 2017 is 4.63 out of 5 stars, which Sendy believes is an indication that solar electricity is still popular among the general public.