How To Approach Commercial Roofing Marketing

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Commercial roofing differs from residential roofing and requires a unique marketing approach. This is true whether you’re a new company branding yourself as “full commercial” or a residential business trying to expand into the commercial sector.

Think about it; a commercial roofing job can range from $100,000 to over $1,000,000. Because so much money is involved, the sales cycle is much longer. It can take six months to a year to get the contract signed.

The money also increases the stakes. While a residential roofer is primarily accountable to a single homeowner per job, a botched commercial job can cost millions of dollars in inventory, shut down factories, and spark aggressive litigation.

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At Roofing Webmasters, we’ve helped roofers expand into commercial roofing and have also worked with commercial-exclusive roofing companies. Based on this experience, we’re going to share the approach to commercial roofing marketing that has generated the best long-term outcomes.

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Build Your Portfolio With Smaller Commercial Jobs

Commercial roofers need credibility and experience to even get considered for large-scale projects. There’s no way to fake this or to apply residential roofing job experience to a commercial appeal.

The best way to get commercial jobs for your portfolio is to target projects without a “GC,” such as churches, standalone retail, and strip malls.

That’s where longtail keywords can really come into play, such as one of our clients who ranked #1 for commercial church roof repair based on one of their real jobs.

Once you get 5-10 smaller commercial jobs in your portfolio, GCs start to look at you much differently, and the conversation changes.

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Target Technically-Adept Searchers

Perhaps the most overlooked contrast between residential and commercial marketing is the technical depth of the queries.

Homeowners seeking residential roofing services are often vague, using terms like “roofer near me” or “roof replacement,” making them ideal consumers of Local Services Ads (LSA).

Conversely, commercial-based searches are way more technical and almost always include specific terminology such as TPO, PVC, GAF, coatings, etc.

Your commercial roofing website, or the commercial section of your website, should specifically optimize for technical, long-tail terms.

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Triple Down on Experience, Expertise, Authority, and Trust (EEAT)

Google’s search quality raters are instructed to evaluate websites in the context of experience, expertise, authority, and trust (EEAT) as a way to improve future algorithm updates.

As a result, all local service providers, including residential roofers, can benefit from a strong demonstration of EEAT on their websites.

However, for commercial roofing companies, the importance of EEAT is even greater, not just for meeting Google’s standards but for earning the trust of your prospective consumers.

As we noted, commercial jobs often have a long sales cycle and a high barrier to entry. Your website should feature a portfolio, system comparisons, manufacturer designations, safety metrics, etc.

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Here are some examples of EEAT:

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Get in On The Ground Floor of Asset Management

Commercial building managers may not initially want to hear about a $100,000 reroof project, but they are absolutely open to asset management (preventive roof maintenance that extends its lifespan), which can ultimately become the high-ticket reroof.

From a marketing perspective, asset management does multiple things simultaneously; it secures a lifetime customer, blocks out competitors for life, and sets you up for high-ticket jobs down the road.

One of the most effective ways to secure these kinds of contacts is to create a page for thermal imaging or roof health diagnostics. This allows you to show people where the moisture is in their roof before they commit to any project.

You can strengthen your campaign in this area using direct mail and canvassing, as many building managers are open to a relatively low-stakes imaging evaluation, even if they aren’t actively seeking it through a Google search.

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Achieving Long-Term Commercial Roofing Marketing Success

Entering the commercial roofing industry is a long game, whether you’re a new company or expanding from a residential background. From a marketing standpoint, it’s more of a marathon than a sprint.

Targeting direct-to-owner relationships through long-tail query optimization and EEAT signals can be a great place to start your campaign.

You’re going to need to take on some smaller-scale, non-GC commercial jobs to build your portfolio and establish your company (and website) as a legitimate player for higher-ticket projects.

Ultimately, commercial roofing is a higher-stakes, higher-reward industry that can become extremely profitable with the right approach. It’s a matter of understanding the nuances of marketing in this space.

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