There are thousands of people searching for commercial roofing services in your city. Are you taking advantage? Here are some stats will blow your mind with Google AdWords:
- 85% of people use the internet to find local businesses.
- Over 1.2 million businesses are advertising on Google
- 75% of people who find local, helpful information in search results are more likely to buy the product/service from their local business
- For all commercial intent searches paid ads get 65% of all clicks
Companies like CentiMark, Tecta, Baker Roofing and Nations Roofing have spent millions over the last few years on AdWords.
Slow To Adopt
Roofers have been slow to adapt to online marketing. They’ve been lucky enough to work in a space with an increasing demand and a decreasing in supply.
Young people are not as interested in the trades so there is a big labor shortage. This hasn’t stopped the demand since roofers rely on new construction and stormy weather for new business.
Every building has a roof. Eventually, the roof will need repair due to a storm or just the wear and tear of the roof. The challenge facing roofers is finding a system and strategy that consistently brings a steady stream of commercial leads
Enter Google AdWords.
AdWords has been around for a while now. Gone are the glory days of $1.00 (CPC) Cost Per Click Now, most roofers are paying an average of $20 per click.
AdWords has gotten a lot more competitive and as a result, a business can quickly waste thousands of dollars in a short period of time.
If you have the right strategy in place you can have inbound qualified commercial roofing leads within 24-48 hours of starting a campaign.
The Right AdWords Strategy
There are three main things to keep in mind to have a successful campaign.
- Right Message Match
- Attention Ratio
- Not spending enough money
Right Message Match
If your ads and landing page do not match with the same message then you’ll lose money.
Let’s consider the mindset of a user searching on Google. It’s different than traffic from organic or social media.
For example, if someone is searching for metal roofing and when they hit your landing page they only get information on asphalt shingle roofing how do you think this will make them feel?
By not providing them with the right information this will hurt your campaign and people will feel misled. Ideally, the headline should match the keyword being typed. For example, if someone searches for Dallas metal roofing and they get Dallas roofing this will hurt your campaign.
Attention Ratio
Are you sending your paid traffic to your website’s homepage? Just because your homepage has your contact information should not mean that you should send traffic to a homepage.
A homepage is supposed to be like a business card it should clearly summarize what you do. The problem is that your homepage usually has lots of links that distract the person viewing your page.
When a visitor comes from a Google Ad they are looking for specific information. Your job is to get these people to call you or opt in with their contact information.
Your landing page should contain a single call to action. It should be clean and simple and direct people to a specific action.
Not spending enough money
If you are only $20/day then you might not get any clicks from Google. Google has a suggested bid for each keyword and if you are constantly below the recommend bid then you’ll likely be ignored.
In most cities, the minimum cost per click is $15 for a commercial roofing keyword. Usually, the more expensive the keyword the better quality of the lead.
If you are spending $20/day you might only get 1 click per day which is not enough to make any difference in your business.
Make sure you have the right things in place
Commercial vs. Residential
In most cities, commercial roofing is less competitive than residential roofing. However, if your city is small there might not be enough demand for commercial roofing services.
If a city has a population of at least 200,000 people then there should be enough volume to justify an AdWords campaign. However, this is not a big issue with most roofers since a lot of roofers are willing to drive a long way for a commercial job.
Types of Prospects
You might be worried that the leads you are getting are just random people searching online. This is not something to worry about. In our experience, people will search for commercial roofing services because they have a need.
If you target the right keywords people are specifically looking for commercial roof repair, roof replacement, and re-roof services.
To make sure you are not getting quality leads you should develop an extensive negative keywords list.
What are negative keywords?
One key to a highly-targeted campaign is choosing what not to target. Because keywords can target a broad set of phrases, it’s important to see whether every term is related to your business.
Example
Let’s say that you’re an optometrist who sells eyeglasses. In this case, you may want to add negative keywords for search terms like “wine glasses” and “drinking glasses.”
For more information on how this works check out this article from Google
The people that you will get are people like property managers, local business owners, and businesses after they have settled an insurance claim.
Keywords to use
A big mistake I see a lot is bidding on the wrong keywords. As a general guideline, the more expensive the bid for the keyword the better quality of the click.
Here are some examples of keywords that you can use:
Follow Up
The key thing in making these types of lead generation campaigns successful is the follow-up and the lead nurture process. If you have a solid sales conversion process than this can make a big impact in your business.
According to the insidesles.com study done a few years ago
“The odds of contacting a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 100 times. The odds of qualifying a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 21 times.”
From another study
“The odds drop off dramatically by the first 30 minutes. Specifically, a rep is 100x less likely to make contact if the first call is made 30 minutes after submission. The odds of making contact drop by 3000x if the first call is made 5 hours after lead submission.”
Be ready to pick up the phone and/or be ready to contact the person once they’ve submitted a request for more information. Companies like Call Drip automatically connect the form submission to your phone.
Conclusion
Once you have everything set up correctly you can have leads coming within 48 hours. A lot of roofing companies have used AdWords and have had such success that they’ve switched their focus from residential to commercial.
You can do the same.