Roofing SEO Podcast

Do you ever feel like things would be easier if digital marketing companies just lumped roofing SEO and PPC together? Unfortunately, they do, and it’s a colossal disaster! Find out about subtle pricing scams, conflicts of interest, and shocking markups that will have you rethinking the idea of bundling. Jason and Nolen reveal all this, plus how to make sure you get your money’s worth with digital marketing!

Helpful Insights Into Roofing SEO:

• Make sure you get itemized billing for your marketing company’s PPC spending!

How does your online marketing company make money? It’s a simple but provocative question that we don’t think about very often. Marketing firms make money by retaining clients. To do so, agencies must consistently provide evidence that their efforts produce a return for those businesses.

That all changes when a company introduces the upfront, flat fee contract.

In a way, a flat fee contract is the ultimate judge of a marketing firm’s character. When they already have your money, will they continue working hard to produce results? Or will they coast along with just enough effort to get by? While some companies try their best no matter what pricing they offer, others practically abandon their projects until they have to show progress.

So how can a roofing business wade through the crowd of dishonest marketing claims? It all starts with recognizing the red flags! So if you hear any of the following lines from a digital advertising firm, it’s probably time to look elsewhere.

• “Noticeable results in organic SEO may take up to a year.”

The best digital marketing firms will always be happy to explain their process in a way you can understand. They don’t claim unbelievable capabilities, nor do they trade their service for pennies. After all, you wouldn’t trust a brand new roof that only costs you a hundred bucks! If you want a trustworthy marketing service that offers SEO for roofers, look for teams that provide measurable goals, believable time commitments, and justified costing reports.

What happens when your marketing company bundles all of its services into one convenient package? You quickly lose sight of where the money goes! We’ve heard it countless times: a firm promises PPC and SEO for roofers in a bundle, but they only end up spending 50-70% of their budget! Here’s another hard-hitting truth:

A company that bundles organic & paid search has zero incentive to improve your SEO.

PPC services offer a dependable stream of income for marketing companies. They can easily create primary campaigns in a short period and choose what keywords your business targets. Thanks to Google Ads and similar platforms, digital marketing teams can access reports that show campaign results without revealing how much they spent. That’s how they get away with unbelievable budget markups. Your advertising company can then provide just enough leads to keep you hooked.

A company that provides success in SEO, however, produces more sustainable growth for your business. For example, if an advertising company creates a highly optimized website that gives you cheap yet quality leads, why would you keep spending money on PPC? Unfortunately, that’s why firms that bundle PPC and SEO for roofers almost always spend all their time on paid search and neglect the company website.

At Roofing Webmasters, we always keep our organic and paid services separate from each other. Our clients also pay month to month; no flat fee pricing! Different packages encourage accountability and drive us to continue providing measurable success in both categories. Not only do we provide highly effective paid search campaigns (which you receive full cost-reporting for), we produce unique custom websites that make sustained growth.

Our roofing SEO customers continually rank phenomenally well in local search results, all while paying less than average for great leads.

Don’t let a dishonest marketing firm string you along without providing real growth for your business! Our team at Roofing Webmasters offers reliable, measurable results for your company. 

The post Why Flat Fee Pricing Is Bad For You (Podcast) appeared first on Roofing Webmasters.

Do you ever feel like roofer leads are just slipping through your fingers? Has your business suffered from the industry shift towards online marketing? It might be time for a new approach to advertising your services! In today’s blog, Nolen and Jason discuss the consequences of clinging too tightly to traditional marketing practices. If your business has avoided working through the internet until now, be sure to listen in closely.

Important Tips to Listen For:

• Investment produces a reward. SEO doesn’t work without trying it.

We’re living at the end of an era. The end of the period came about ten years ago. The only thing changing today is the number of roofing contractors accepting that industry marketing is dominated by online search. Even so, we still receive several calls from companies firmly planted in the past of traditional advertising, Yellowpage-type listings, and door knocking.

This attitude is damaging their business, and it hurts to watch the consequences.

It’s not even the fault of digital marketing companies. In truth, consumers have widely adopted a habit of researching everything online. They aren’t watching television ads to find their contractors. They aren’t scrolling through local newspaper ads. They rarely pay attention to radio salespeople, and they most certainly aren’t answering the door (unless it can’t be helped).

Marketing changes, and so should help businesses. While Google is certainly a more complicated channel than radio (for instance), it also provides dramatically more leads for local roofers. Your most successful competitors probably rank very well in local search results. Again, people look online for their essential home services these days.

Even if you’ve had a terrible year (or five), it’s not too late to get started on local roofing SEO. Even if you have an incredibly outdated or nonexistent website, it’s entirely possible to begin developing a productive online marketing strategy now. But it’s going to take consistent work. Your high-ranking competitors didn’t climb the Google ranks by accident. Instead, they invested time and money into making their organic (unpaid) online marketing work.

Enough preaching. Now, let’s create a plan to get your business earning more substantial leads again!

There are three key pillars that every online marketing strategy depends on:

• A complete Google My Business listing

Without these elements, your marketing strategy won’t take off like you want it to. We’ll briefly talk about each element and how to ensure maximum results (leads) for your roofing company.

Let’s start with the easiest step: completing your GMB listing. If you haven’t already, go to the Google My Business starting page and fill out as much information as possible. You will need a physical address for your business. Most startups use their home address, but you’ll have to use only official company offices if you have two or more locations.

If you want to show up in Google Search – you most certainly want to show up in Google Search! – this listing provides the search engine with crucial information about your business. It’s as simple as that. Want to show up when potential clients look up “roofing companies in Fort Worth, TX”? Fill out that listing. Just make sure that you use the same GMB address for all future Facebook, Better Business Bureau, and other citation profiles. Even differences in abbreviations make a difference!

Our guide, “What Does Google Want For Roofers to Optimize Online?” (link at the bottom), goes into detail on the critical parts of search engine optimization. Just because a website looks nice, that doesn’t mean it performs well in local search. An optimized website has:

• Schema Coding

We highly recommend you read our guide. A quick word of advice: Even if you have to ultimately throw away your website design, hold onto the domain name. Too many roofing companies make the mistake of throwing away their URL (web addresses). Trashing your URL is tantamount to erasing all your online marketing progress and starting from square one. It takes months to recover, so hold onto that domain!

One of the easiest but underperformed tasks for online marketing is simply asking for reviews at the end of every successful job. Client reviews make a huge impact on any business’ success! That’s because it shows dependability, trustworthiness, and accountability for your brand. Roofing companies that don’t ask for reviews inevitably rank poorly because only angry clients take the time to go online and rate them.

There’s no other way to say it. Ask for reviews!

One of the easiest ways to ensure a higher response rate is to text clients a link to your Google My Business and Facebook Business pages. Try and collect reviews from both sites if possible, as Google respects feedback from multiple sources. If you prefer the old-fashioned method, provide your business card with the links printed at the bottom.

Those are the three simple steps to starting your online marketing presence. Whether you like Google or not, your clients love it! It may take some time to adapt to this new advertising channel, but leads are worth pursuing. Of course, our team at Roofing Webmasters would love to make the transition process as easy as possible for you. 

The post Clients Who Don’t Think The Internet Produces That Many Leads (Podcast) appeared first on Roofing Webmasters.

In a healthy roofing industry, it may seem wise to drop all of your low-dollar services in favor of more extensive profit services. Don’t throw away that roof repair page just yet, though! Nolen and Jason discuss the current market and how contractors can protect their business during the recession with SEO for roofers. So if you’ve got concerns about the future of your roofing company, be sure to listen in carefully!

Key Points to Listen For:

• Economic indicators point towards a potential recession in the next few years.

While there’s no exact timeline predicted for the next recession (we’re hoping for never), it pays to prepare your business against potential economic downturns. That’s especially true for roofing contractors, who live and die by the whims of the housing market. We can easily predict what would happen for the average roofing professional in the event of a recession.

The Traditional Slowing of the Roofing Industry:

• Phase #1: Home sales start to decline.

It’s a sad but recurring process that many roofing companies don’t survive. Companies go into the stricter economic period unprepared for the surge in competition. While storm seasons and the odd hail market may provide relief, a company can’t count on random storms.

So what should your business do to prepare for the next recession? Start diving into SEO for roofers, and establish your presence online now! A year or two years from now could be too late to start preparing. Below, we’ll explain why developing your organic search program currently could save you in the next few years.

So business is booming, and for the first time in a while, you have some company cash saved up. That’s where you come to a fork in the road. Do you spend the money on traditional marketing, paid search campaigns, or organic development? We’ll explain in a bit why the typical advertising (including door knocking) might not work so well shortly. For now, we’ll focus on PPC vs. Organic SEO!

Pay-per-click campaigns offer more control and customization than ever before. For one, you can target the precise geographic radius that you want your ads to appear in. You can also refine your target audience on platforms like Google Ads and Facebook Ads. These solutions work so effectively that many roofing contractors forgo continued website development and double down on PPC.

Focussing exclusively on PPC is generally a bad idea, but it could hurt your business even more during a recession.

Why? Because ads cost money. Thanks to a healthy housing market, most roofers do well enough to avoid using paid ads (even when they shouldn’t). However, when the housing market starts to dry up, businesses without an established organic presence flock to Google Ads and other ad platforms in desperation. The surge in competition leads to incredible spikes in costs-per-click (CPCs), which could quickly eat up your marketing budget!

You could try to buy these leads from a lead selling company. If the numerous complaints we hear from roofing contractors are any indication, however, that’s a sticky and expensive situation you’d be better off avoiding. So that leaves SEO for roofers.

Ranking #1 in Google Search is a dream many contractors share, but it’s not one many know how to pursue. The most effective SEO strategies begin with website optimization because most curious readers turn into actual leads. Once your roofing company website is up, running, and ranking up in Google local map results, however, you’ll notice something unique:

Organic search generates higher quality leads than PPC and is cheaper!

While search engine optimization certainly takes a concentrated effort during website development and content marketing, you won’t have to spend all your time managing the site. A well-crafted company portal will naturally generate leads with only moderate updates required every so often. Cheap, high-quality, and relatively easy leads. What’s not to like?

In healthy roofing industries, homeowners call in for a variety of services. Unfortunately, with so much business to choose from, many contractors turn down low-dollar jobs to favor high-profit installations and replacements. At the Roofing Webmasters, we even have clients who think about taking off their “Roof Repair” pages so they can focus exclusively on installs. We strongly advise against that strategy, however, especially when it comes to recession markets.

During recessions, installation numbers plummet to the point that mostly repair jobs remain.

If only roof repair projects remain in the market, will contractors compete for those leads? You better believe it! Unfortunately, too many ride the wave of healthy-market projects without ever investing in their long-term online performance. Even a little effort here and there can reap huge dividends once your brand earns more experience online.

What sort of activities can you complete now to become an established contractor?

• Complete your Google My Business listing.

Even if you don’t have the resources to create a fully optimized website, you can efficiently perform these actions without breaking the bank. If you complete the work now, you can reap the rewards down the road when other unprepared contractors (who neglected their SEO for roofers) are struggling for business. Make it easier to earn leads and reinforce your business against a likely recession; that’s two birds hit with one stone.

At Roofing Webmasters, we support contractors from all around the United States. Our dedicated team of web designers, content writers, social media analysts, and strategists work together to deliver outstanding SEO for roofers. As a result, clients regularly enjoy front-page rankings, higher site traffic, and better quality leads.

The post The Impending Recession for Roofers (Podcast) appeared first on Roofing Webmasters.

Do you feel like you’re not getting enough leads? Do you ever wish you could start earning more of your own business? In our latest podcast, Jason and Nolen discuss the struggle of overcoming leads addiction and acquiring new clients online. Learn how to start developing your brand instead of growing the other company’s.

Key Points to Listen For:

• Leads aren’t just something you buy. You can earn leads.

It’s an age-old adage: “Give a man a fish, and he’ll eat for a day.” You probably know the rest. Unfortunately, however, that story almost always seems to have a different ending when generating business. Roofing Webmasters fields all sorts of calls throughout the year, and we hear the same request repeatedly.

“I need leads!”

Every business needs stable sources of incoming customers. When it comes to roofers, however, many have no idea where to start. They have loose knowledge of Google and other search engines, but they possess the insight to run their roofing SEO strategy. So, where do they run to for an immediate influx of leads? Lead sellers.

Supposed you go to one of the three or four major lead selling companies (you know the ones) and enroll in their services. You may have some control over how much money you spend, but you don’t have much say in the quality of each individual leads. Perhaps the individual is genuinely in need of a shingle roof replacement and is already wanting to buy. Or they’re just shopping around for prices.

Too many roofing companies find their leads volume swollen with shopping homeowners and commercial organizations. In our experience, most contractors earn just enough from these leads to get by and complain about their lead buying situation! When we suggest that they create a new means for themselves to earn their own clients, that’s when we find out the real, sad truth: they’re addicted to buying leads.

Some roofing companies go years without ever taking the initiative to graduate out of lead sales. But you can save your business from this frustrating cycle. Here’s how!

Why? Because it’s so much cheaper! Take the amount of money you would have spent buying leads and investing it towards creating your own. Not only will you start growing your own brand through local SEO, but you’ll also increase the likelihood that any clients you earn will return for repeat business (or recommend you to their friends).

No, you don’t have to be a programming or coding genius to start your organic search engine optimization (SEO). In reality, most of the tools your business needs to start earning calls are freely available to anyone who wants them. Just start taking the first steps, and you’ll be amazed at how much progress your business will achieve naturally. To get started.

• Claim and fill out your Google My Business listing.

Google My Business is essential for getting considered in local map results. Without it, there’s little to no chance of your company showing up when that coveted “metal roofing installation” search goes up in your service area. Considering Facebook’s impressive volume of over 2.4 billion monthly active users, it only makes sense to start exposing your brand on the popular social media platform. Add in a Better Business Bureau (or a similar citation site) profile, and you’ve got three places ready to start collecting reviews!

You’ll also need to build a website. If your roofing team doesn’t currently have the talent to produce a website optimized for search, you can always hire a trusted company to do it for you. Just make sure you know what your money’s buying.

Regardless of what some marketing professionals may tell you, there are some benefits to supplementing your leads by purchasing them. However, there are better ways to control the quality of your leads and stop sharing them with other local plumbers. One fantastic paid method of generating business is PPC. Maybe you’ve already experimented with Google Ads; maybe you haven’t. This platform makes it easy to enjoy premium placement at the top of local search engine results pages (SERPs).

Of course, there are many ways to invest in online advertising that don’t involve Google Ads. Facebook Business makes it very easy to turn content into ads. You also can customize your target audience, forward the ad to your Instagram account, or redirect people to your website. Highly tailored ads at low prices with a high rate of return are a recipe for success.

At Roofing Webmasters, our team of SEO specialists, content writers, web designers, and programmers all work together to produce higher traffic, better leads, and more substantial growth for roofers like you. As a result, our clients dominate local search, expanding their brands and raking in sweet new business.

The post True Client Stories: I Need Leads! (Podcast) appeared first on Roofing Webmasters.