Your services are top-notch. Your employees are professional. But clients are slow to come in. What gives? It looks like it’s time for a shiny new plumbing marketing strategy. And you’ve come to the right place.
Last year, 90% of consumers used the internet to find a local business.
Translation: everyone and their mother is heading online to seek out plumbing services. If your digital presence is lacking, then another plumber is passing you by in the search results.
Stumble along in digital wilderness no more! We’ve compiled a list of six plumbing marketing ideas that are backed by data and beginner-friendly.
Read on for actionable tips on attracting clients to your business.
- Set up social media
- Get published in local newspapers and online publications
- Incorporate SEO to take your plumbing business to the next level
- Get on Google’s good side with a Google My Business profile
- Get listed in plumbing directories for improved local SEO
- Build a blog with user-friendly content
- The plumber’s progress starts with a solid marketing plan
1. Set up social media
Okay, we know what you’re thinking. Who follows plumbers on social media? While it’s true that most people don’t scroll through their feeds in search of plumbing accounts, follower count is not the primary aim of this tactic.
So why should you bother with social media?
For one, it allows you to build up your brand and establish authority in your field. A customer needs to trust a company, especially when that company will be sending workers into his or her home. So displaying your knowledge and showcasing your employees is a great way to personalize your company and bolster your brand awareness.
Cary & Daughters Plumbing often features light-hearted pictures of employees on their social media profiles.
Another benefit of keeping active on social media is that your profiles can help increase your visibility. Social media pages are not confined to a specific platform. They can show up on the search engine results page (SERP) when someone searches for a related term. For example, the Facebook page of a local plumber pops up on the first page of results when we search the term “texas plumbing experts”.
Additionally, social media affects your local SEO. Local SEO is a form of search engine optimization that focuses on increasing your company’s visibility to people in your local area. We’ll give more tips on local SEO later in this article but for now, let’s take a look at how social media can strengthen it.
New York plumbing account @copper_capo includes a location in his Instagram posts. This video, in particular, is geotagged from NYC. Since users can search for locations on Instagram, this gives his profile an increased chance of being seen.
Another important feature in this post is the use of plumbing related hashtags. Social media platforms work like search engines and allow users to look up posts using hashtags. So adding #newyorkplumbers is a great way for this account to be found by others searching for that hashtag. You can utilize hashtags for your own plumbing company based on your location and based on relevant hashtags.
Want to know more about hashtags? Check out this guide to selecting the right hashtags for your business.
2. Get published in local newspapers and online publications
Next on the list of plumbing marketing ideas is publication.
Getting published provides a way to get in front of potential customers. Whether you live in a big city or a small town, getting featured in the community newspaper means an increase in publicity. But how do you get the reporters to pay attention to give you the time of day? Here are some tips.
Have a meaningful story to tell. Reporters and editors won’t feature a story that is a thinly veiled advertisement for a business. Consider what your business can share that readers would actually care about. This can include a spotlight on a specific employee with an inspiring story or a story of a partnership your company has with a charitable organization. Alternatively, you can contribute an informative article about common plumbing issues that your local community would find useful.
Send your story to journalists in the area. Ask around your business to see if anyone has connections to local newspapers. If so, you can gain an introduction to a reporter through this mutual connection. Many publications include contact emails and information of reporters on their websites, so you can send your pitch through this avenue. Because reporters receive loads of pitches, it’s important to align your story with the publication’s voice and audience.
Smaller community newsletters are usually more than happy to receive any articles local businesses write themselves. As long as you’re submitting helpful content and not an advertisement pitch, you should find success.
Start small. Gaining the attention of a smaller newspaper is easier than securing a spot in a widely known paper. Of course, the latter will get more eyes on your company but starting small can lay the groundwork for larger placements later. Plus, if the smaller paper appeals to your target audience, working to be featured is a worthwhile endeavor.
Getting featured online
If only there was a way to improve your website’s authority so that it has an increased chance of ranking at the top of the SERP. Allow us to introduce digital PR.
Simply put, digital PR works to increase the number of brand mentions that your business has online. Each time a website mentions your business and links back to your website, you earn a backlink. The more backlinks you have from reputable websites, the higher your site authority is. This translates to higher rankings in search results.
So building backlinks should be among your plumbing marketing strategies.
3. Incorporate SEO to take your plumbing business to the next level
Over 55% of consumers run an online search before scheduling an appointment with a home services provider.
When it comes to plumbing-related searches, 76% of searchers did not have a company in mind when they began their search.
These statistics have a lot to say about the rise of consumer reliance on search engines to find businesses nearby. And they indicate the importance of strong search engine optimization (SEO) practices.
SEO refers to certain tactics and optimization strategies that improve your rankings in search engines. The higher you rank, the more traffic comes to your site, which means more people are likely to convert into customers.
After all, if consumers don’t know what company they are looking for, then being a top result gives you a prime opportunity to convince them to utilize your services.
How is it that some plumbing companies pop up at the top of the search engine results page (SERP) while others seem to have no visibility? This is no accident. Companies that hold those coveted spots on the first results page are continually improving their SEO strategies.
Here’s how you can improve yours:
- Have a content-rich website. Your pages should be filled with information that is useful to users. Google suggests that you “write pages that clearly and accurately describe your topic”. This is because search engines care about user experience above all. Make sure you clearly explain your services and provide detailed information about related topics on your field.
- Make keyword research a part of your strategy. When someone types a phrase into a search engine, they are looking up a specific keyword. A competitive keyword like “plumbers near me” is one that many plumbing companies are competing to rank for. In order to target a keyword (difficult or easy), you need to build content around it. Selecting what keywords to target should be a structured and methodical process. But you don’t have to start from scratch. Keyword research is a large part of SEO and there are tools like Ahrefs keyword explorer that can help you uncover what to target. Free tools like Google Suggest are also a source of potential keywords to form content around.Get the details about free keyword research tools in this SEO content strategy guide.
- Improve your technical SEO. How quickly do the pages on your website load? Is your site mobile friendly? These questions and more fall under the umbrella of technical SEO. These behind the scenes aspects of your website affect your rankings and performance as well. Consider the fact that 78% of local searches on mobile devices lead to a purchase within 24 hours. If your site is not optimized for mobile usage, you could be missing out on a large portion of potential customers. You can analyze your website and learn how to improve it using Google Search Console. For instance, the mobile-friendly test reveals whether or not your page is up to snuff for cell phone visitors.
4. Get on Google’s good side with a Google My Business profile
In the social media section of this article, we promised to provide more in-depth tips on improving local SEO. So let’s get into the nitty-gritty.
Local SEO provides not one but two methods of appearing in search results. One is through the SERPs and the other is through Google Maps. In order to reap the benefits of local SEO, you must set up a Google My Business (GMB) profile.
Here is the Google Maps search result for the term “ best plumbers in Portland”.
If we click on any of the results, one familiar theme emerges. All of these businesses have a GMB profile. A GMB profile is like a listing in a plumbing directory. The profiles contain contact information, the location of the business, hours of operation, and other relevant details a searcher would find helpful.
To see how local SEO works outside of Google Maps, let’s search “top plumbers in Jersey City” in the regular search bar. Because the search is still locally focused, the top results are pulled from maps onto the SERP.
Again, these companies each have optimized Google My Business profiles that help them to earn these prime positions. You can go beyond the usual GMB profile by adding posts from your account. These posts offer an engaging element to your profile.
So what are you waiting for? Give your business a boost by adding a GMB profile to your list of plumbing marketing strategies.
5. Get listed in plumbing directories for improved local SEO
You set up your Google My Business profile. Now it’s time to make it shine.
Remember when we discussed backlinks as earlier on this list plumbing marketing ideas? Well, gaining brand mentions is important for your GMB profile ranking as well.
To improve your local search results ranking, aim to accumulate citations across the internet. Citations refer to online mentions of your business that include your name, address, and phone number.
Here is an example of a listing in the Best Plumbers directory for a Portland-based plumbing company.
Best Plumbers is one of many plumbing directories that offer listings and a link back to the company website. Users can filter plumbers by location and specialty. Listings are free to plumbing companies looking to gain exposure.
Here are three plumbing and home services directories to secure listings in:
Plumbing-specific directories are more targeted towards your niche, but you are not limited to them.
General directories with high domain authority also offer a great place to earn a citation. Certain directories do charge a fee for a listing while others give users the option to pay for premium listings and higher visibility.
Here are a few general directories to consider:
6. Build a blog with user-friendly content
We’ve made it to the end of our plumbing marketing ideas. And we’re closing out with a powerful strategy. Content marketing is a pillar of any successful digital marketing plan.
Every day, consumers hop online and search for solutions to their problems. The websites that accurately address the specific questions earn traffic and conversions. Rather than waiting for someone to search “plumber near me” why don’t you target a much larger pool of searchers?
You can produce content that answers questions like “why are my pipes making noises?” or “how to tell if your sink is leaking?”.
Take Mike Diamond, for example. The plumbing company has a content filled website that ranks well on search engines. The site is user-focused and answers common plumbing related questions on the blog.
As you produce content regularly, search engines have more opportunities to pull your website onto the results page. That is if you’re keeping SEO best practices in mind when crafting these pieces.
This blog post from the Len The Plumber blog features clear formatting and internal linking to other pages on the site, two important elements in a quality piece of content. There is a wide array of plumbing blog topics to cover, so start typing!
The Plumber’s Progress starts with a solid marketing plan
We hope these six plumbing marketing ideas give you some direction as you seek out new clients!
As you’ve noticed, many of these strategies require a lot of behind the scenes work to ensure their effectiveness. Juggling current customers and managing employees while trying to bring in new customers can be unsustainable. Shift the focus fully on your business and let a skilled SEO agency take the marketing reigns.
At Markitors, we specialize in lifting the rankings of small and medium-sized businesses. If you want front page results but don’t have the time to work for them, schedule a consultation with us to see how we can be of service. We’d love to show you what’s in our plumber SEO toolbox.
