In several recent surveys of the roofing industry (including one TAMKO completed), many contractors are choosing to look at the current business environment as an opportunity to revamp their marketing efforts and take a giant leap into the future with enhanced digital marketing.
Here are five ways roofing contractors can use this time to improve their digital marketing efforts:
Update Your Website
This is a great time to do some housekeeping and update your website. Here are some basic steps to consider during this time:
Get a website — First of all, make sure your business has a website. There are a variety of inexpensive, easy-to-build templates available, some of them at no initial cost, including options like Wix, WordPress, and Squarespace.
Site banner with “Open” messaging — Consider adding something to your site that shows you’re open for business and have measures in place to help keep people safe while still completing work.
Add Chat — Make it easy for homeowners doing research to get simple answers about your business, even if they’re only in the beginning stages of their customer journey. Enhance your contact options on your site by adding a chat feature on your site where potential customers can start their first level of contact. Many sites have chat features as part of their standard offering and other low-cost (and sometimes automated) chat bots are available through other plug-ins.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Make sure that when people are searching for local roofing contractors in your area, your site comes up. Achieve this through Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – making sure search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing can “read” your site, understand what it offers, and serve it up in search results for people searching for the services you offer.
You can achieve this several different ways:
On-page SEO — make sure to prominently feature the words (search terms) you want to show up for on search engines in headlines and titles on the pages of your website.
Content creation — Creating quality content for your site on an ongoing schedule can help increase your website’s relevance in the “eyes” of search engines. Adding a blog to your website could provide a great place for this ongoing content to live on your site. To come up with article ideas, look to your customers and write pieces that provide answers to their most common questions.
Writing for voice-search — When creating content, remember that voice-search is a growing segment of search engine traffic so write to answer questions, not just offer information. For example, you could title your article, “What are the best types of residential roofing?,” instead of titling it, “5 different types of residential roofing.”
Expand your subject matter — Don’t just think roofing. Expand your content to general home improvement tips as sometimes people are searching online, but don’t really know what they need.
Stay in compliance — Many search providers have a set of “Terms and Conditions” that control the use of their platforms and services. Be sure to review and comply with those terms and any relevant laws.
Email Marketing
You probably have a list of past customers, and hopefully that list includes email addresses. If you haven’t been collecting email addresses as part of your customer information gathering process, start today. Email is an increasingly popular form of communication and provides lots of opportunities for marketing automation.
Get started with email marketing by implementing a few basics:
Create connection points — Creating places on your website where homeowners looking for information on a new roof can submit their email address to “connect with us” or “stay updated,” can make the process of email collection even easier.
Automate welcome emails — Invest in a platform that will enable you to automate welcome emails to those who submit their emails through your website. Some popular low-cost options for email marketing include Mailchimp, Constant Contact and HubSpot.
Follow-up — Don’t forget to follow-up with past customers to see if they have new roofing needs. Since the last work was completed, it’s possible those past customers have experienced storm damage and may need your services again.
Ask for reviews — Use those email marketing platforms to get new customer reviews of your business. More people than ever are at home, and working, shopping and communicating socially on their computers. Use your email list of customers to reach out to past customers and get reviews for your business on sites like Google, Facebook, Houzz, HomeAdvisor or Angie’s List.
Know and follow the law — Some jurisdictions have laws regulating the collection and maintenance of emails and personally identifiable information. There are also several important spam laws relevant to email marketing. Be sure to review and comply with those relevant laws and regulations.
Social Media
In 2019, researchers estimated there were 2.95 billion people using social media worldwide, and projections estimate that could jump to almost 3.43 billion people by 2023. Social media is increasingly being used by consumers to research, contact and stay connected with the businesses they frequent and brands they favor. A social media profile on some of the largest platforms can help add legitimacy to your business with consumers and provide additional ways to contact you and to promote your business or special offers to potential customers.
Here are some easy ways to take advantage of social media to benefit your business:
Pick your platform — If you aren’t currently operating on social media, don’t try to embark on all platforms at once. Look for where your customers are and choose 1 to 3 popular platforms to be present on and actively pursue.
Keep content relevant, visual and short — Make sure to keep your content visual and to think about what makes you, as a consumer in your own right, stop scrolling and read a post or ad, and then model your content after that. In general, humorous or heartfelt content that includes beautiful or attention-grabbing imagery performs better on social media. Also, videos between 6 and 15 seconds perform better as social ads than longer video options.
Do a social audit — If you are currently operating on social media, take this opportunity to audit your profiles and make sure your profile and cover photos reflect the imagery and messaging you want to communicate with customers, and confirm your “About” sections have the most updated contact information and description of your business.
Read the fine print — Many social media platform providers have a set of “Terms and Conditions” that control the use of their platforms and services. Be sure to review and comply with those terms and any relevant laws.
Digital Ads
Digital ads are some of the most targeted and cost-effective forms of advertising available and a great way to find new customer leads.
Here are some tips to get started with digital advertising:
Start small — For as little as $5 a day, you can try targeting Facebook ads to your local community based on a variety of interests and demographics. Not sure what makes a good digital ad? You can cheaply A/B test Facebook ads against each other to determine which audience or ad artwork gets the best engagement locally.
Target your audience — Consider creating ads that target different customer needs – storm damage, spring or fall maintenance, aging roof, new business construction, remodeling, historic renovations, etc.
Choose your ad platform — Through the Facebook Business Manager, you can also use the Facebook ad creator to simultaneously target Instagram audiences as well. Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest also have digital advertising platforms that may be a good fit for your business.
Leverage Google’s network — Google also has a giant advertising platform and boasts more traffic than any other digital platform. Google offers a variety of ad types, including text search results ads and banner-type display ads on various sites through the Google ads network. And don’t forget that Google also owns the YouTube video streaming platform and has a whole host of its own advertising options. The Google ad platform requires a little more work to be proficient, but Google provides a host of text and video tutorials on using their platform.
By looking at the current business climate as an opportunity to ramp-up and revamp your marketing efforts, rather than just a challenge to overcome, you could come out of this time prepared to take advantage of increased business. And if you aren’t using or taking advantage of any of these digital marketing tools, there’s no better time to start than today!
If you’re a roofing contractor and have questions about how you can improve your digital marketing efforts, send an email to Marketing@tamko.com.
Disclaimer: The information provided does not, and is not intended to, constitute legal advice or a recommendation of any specific product, service, provider, business or platform; instead, all information and content presented are for general informational purposes only. As information may not constitute the most up-to-date legal or other information, readers should contact their attorney to obtain advice with respect to any particular legal matter.