Author Archives: Roofing Webmasters

The Google Homepage For Roofers (Podcast)

Do you ever worry about what shows up when people search your company on Google? While there are all kinds of results that benefit your brand, it pays to pay close attention to local search results! In today’s podcast, Nolen and Jason discuss these topics and other aspects of your Google Homepage. So if you’ve struggled with low traffic or poor reviews, be sure to listen in.

Helpful Tips on Google Homepages:

Regular GMB (Google My Business) updates make your site more valuable to Google.
Make sure you create enough content that other people aren’t controlling the narrative for your company and brand.
Avoid concentrated negative feedback by consistently asking for reviews.

What is a Google Homepage?

When a potential customer searches your company name/brand, the result that pops up is what’s known as your Google Homepage. You’ll see a knowledge graph on the right-hand side that contains crucial information about your company, including contact information. The listings on the rest of the screen may arise from many sources, such as:

Your Company Website
Your Most Popular Published Articles
Social Media Posts or Profiles
Citation Companies (Yelp, BBB, etc.)
Listicle Articles (“Best Roofers in Dallas” if you’re lucky!)
Listings from Lead Sellers (like Homeadvisor)

The sum of all these listings and features is your Google Homepage. From this homepage, consumers or commercial prospects will build a perception of your business. That’s why you must control what shows up when people search your name.

The Knowledge Graph

Think of the knowledge graph as a hub where people can access info on your company without ever stopping on your website. There’s a wealth of contact and location-based information. Potential customers can even contact your team directly from the knowledge graph by phone call or instant messaging. The Google Homepage feature also provides convenient buttons that link directly to maps and your homepage for those needing directions to your office or your website.

Those are just a handful of the features housed in the knowledge graph.

FAQs

Frequently Asked Questions

Did you know that your knowledge graph contains a section for direct questions to your business? This handy feature allows local consumers to interact with your company almost directly, learning handy tidbits and history about your brand. While anyone can post answers to these questions, this feature offers one fantastic opportunity.

You can post questions to your FAQ, then answer them!

Think of some of the most popular topics people bring up about your company. Then, you can proactively answer questions about your roofing team’s services, your experience, and your warranties. Answering questions might encourage someone to investigate your services further or even prompt a call directly from the Google Homepage!

GMB Posts

Google My Business Posts

Businesses can also use their GMB accounts to create posts within the knowledge graph. You can use these posts to promote your latest blog articles further, show off ongoing promotions, or even introduce your team members. There’s only one catch: posts disappear off the knowledge graph after seven days. Consumers can still access them, but they won’t be visible after that period.

Try posting at least once a week if you want to get the most out of the GMB posts.

You can further improve their functionality by adding pre-programmed calls to action at the bottom of each post. For example, “Learn more” is perfect for segueing into a blog article, while “Call now” is an excellent option for encouraging impulse calls. Again, experiment to see what sort of formatting works with your audience.

How to Enhance Your Google Homepage

Want to take back control of your Google Homepage? Start by reviewing all the materials that Google likes to see for your business. Then, you can start creating positive mentions of your brand through various channels.

Great Listings for Your Google Homepage

Better Business Bureau profiles and reviews
Facebook Business profiles and recommendations
Yelp listings and other citation sources
Your company website
Popular blog articles from your team
Entries in “Top X Roofers” articles

Any of these listings look fabulous for your brand. However, you don’t want negative social media posts showing up because your company hasn’t been active online! Of course, it’s not the end of the world if that happens, but you’ll need to get busy if you want to improve your reputation.

Steps to Improve Your Company Image

Take an active stance on updating your Google My Business account. Start posting regularly, and take some time to upload some quality photos of your work and staff! These create a more personable feeling for your brand, and they look great in the knowledge graph. Be sure to make that FAQ we talked about earlier too.

Next, you’ll want to get start regularly posting blog articles each month. “How To” posts are powerful fuel for website traffic, and you can tackle some pressing homeowner issues. Competent contractors can make these posts travel farther by sharing them on social media.

Finally, be sure your company appears on all the popular citation directories. The BBB, Yelp, and Manta are all great listing companies for roofing contractors. It will make it easier to collect reviews from all your happy fans as you complete your projects.

Roofing Marketing for Newbs (Podcast)

So you’re a newb when it comes to marketing for roofers—big deal. The reality is that everyone has to start somewhere, and there’s no better time to start than now. Embarking on a new business venture can be both exciting & intimidating. There’s the lure of the unknown and the challenge that comes along. At Roofing Webmasters, this podcast wasn’t created to earn new clients (we have a line out the door) but instead to impart our knowledge of what it takes to become a successful roofing contractor in 2021.

No Money, No Problems

Nolen Walker, the founder of Roofing Webmasters, started from humble beginnings. Like those of you reading this post, he didn’t have the money to invest in big-time marketing right away. So instead, he spent his time mowing lawns & painting curbs to build enough cash to parlay into a long-term investment.

Planting your flag as a digital footprint, albeit a comparatively minuscule one, lays a foundation that you can build on many years later—Google factors in tenure when assigning trust to a particular brand or entity. Claiming a domain name now (even if it shows a dirt cheap website) is still a step in the right direction for prospective roofers. Here’s what you need:

Website

It would help if you had a website and domain name ASAP. Although you can’t expect to succeed on Google organic with a template website, having any website at all is better than not having one. Why? Tenure matters in the eyes of Google. So while you won’t directly benefit from your website today, you will be setting the stage for future endeavors in terms of lead generation.

Remember, you have limited funds, and so you have to make the most of them. You can’t compare yourself to other roofers with massive budgets because that will only discourage you from trying. Even if it is a baby step, the first step can start a meaningful push to lead to sustainable success. Domains usually cost 9.99. Go for a roofing domain name that has a dot com extension.

Google My Business Listing

If you do nothing else with your web presence, make sure you at least claim & optimize your local Google listing. GMB listings account for both your Google My Business profile & Google Maps address. Every business owner in the world can do this free of charge if they have a legitimate business.

Google explains how to claim your business which is the simplest way to establish a web presence with no money. Make sure you add company photos to your profile as you take them. As a newb, you may not have many to start, but your GMB can be continuously improved over and again. First, maps addresses must be verified, which is most commonly done via postcard mail. Once verified, you can rank on Google Maps.

Google Reviews (And Other Reviews)

Once you’ve claimed & optimized your Google listing, you should pursue as many reviews as possible. Even if you have a dirt-cheap website, consumers can find appeal in a GMB listing with several positive reviews. If a prospect searches your brand name, they will see your GMB listing in the knowledge graph on the top right of search results.

Google is not the only platform on which you should generate reviews. You also want to disseminate them to business directories like Angie’s List, BBB, MapQuest, etc. But perhaps more importantly, you want to get them on Facebook, which serves as a social media platform as well as a top business directory.

Social Media

Speaking of Facebook, social media platforms are free to market and present a powerful web entity for roofing newbs with no money. Sure, you can’t advertise on Facebook or Instagram without funds, but you can certainly market yourself on them. Facebook marketing is primarily about establishing a business page that will show up on Google search results.

With Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube, you have a chance to generate some organic impressions on the platforms themselves. Unfortunately, Facebook no longer empowers brands to show up on organic feeds as a way to discourage the clickbait that has plagued the social network over the past decade or so. But you can still use it to your advantage, as a newb roofer with no $.

Transitioning to a Higher Level of Marketing

Once you transition from newb to moderately successful roofer, you should take your earnings and re-allocate them towards superior marketing. The first step will be contacting a professional web designer who can replace your old site with a newly customized one coded for SEO.

Since your domain will already have tenure at this point, you can leverage its age to hit the ground rounding with your newly designed website. Yes, that’s right, you keep the domain that you bought for 9.99 some years ago but now energize it with a superior design. Combining tenure with SEO creates a perfect storm of digital promotion that one can enjoy the benefits of for years and decades to come.

Roofing Webmasters Can Help

Remember, this post is not for people who already have a dominant online presence; it is just a reminder to those who want to reevaluate once they gain that position. Roofing Webmasters has been working with roofing contractors for years, and our data supports consistent excellence in roofer internet marketing. We attend to detail, review the latest algorithmic trends, and constantly look for advantages to put our clients over their competitors on Google organic rankings.

Monthly vs PPL vs Nothing vs Ego (Podcast)

Most roofers have an “off-season” because of weather changes, and this hiatus can last quite a while, depending on the region of your business. Some contractors ditch their marketing during down seasons to save money. However, their logic is wrong, and such a decision costs them money in the long run.

Still, roofers don’t want to pay for marketing services while they’re not working. The team at Roofing Webmasters came up with a solution by offering a payment plan known as; Pay Per Lead. The PPL format allows companies to generate roofing leads and pay on a per-lead basis.

Pay Per Lead Marketing

Monthly services require a fixed fee at the end of each month—services like web design, SEO, social media, and more. But for roofers in the off-season, paying for these tasks seems wasteful. PPl plans provide an intriguing alternative for this very scenario. With PPL, the roofer pays ONLY when a lead is generated.

That means that when no leads are generated during the off-season, the roofer pays nothing. Still, they allow their website to continue to be worked on by the team at Roofing Webmasters. With PPL, contractors receive all the same website work as monthly clients but don’t have the burden of paying a fixed fee in the months when zero money is coming in. Advantages to pay per lead marketing include:

Seasonal Payments

Payments will parallel leads, meaning down seasons will cost you far less, and off-seasons will cost you nothing. Sure, when the leads start flooding in your inbox, you will have to pay for them, but that only occurs once the marketing campaign works. With the PPL payment plan, you only pay for qualified leads.

Ongoing Marketing

Receive all the same online services as monthly clients. Some contractors ignore the necessity of ongoing marketing and choose to put off their marketing for long periods. They suffer the consequences in the Spring when the demand for roofers ascends, and they have lost out on leads to companies that have year-round optimization for their website and online presence.

Assessing Your Competition

A particular company has earned the top spot on Google because they’ve invested in year-round marketing that has solidified their trust and authority with Google. Furthermore, users who navigate their website enjoy their experience based on how they behave on the website. For example, they might stay on the site a little longer than a typical website because the call to action or design engages them.

The saying goes that you get out what you put in, and while it’s a cliché in many cases, it is highly poignant when it comes to marketing roofing services online. At Roofing Webmasters, we can do as many services as you like. The more you pay us, the more services we can do. We provide SEO, website design, Local SEO, Google Maps, and more.