Marketing for Plumbers: Top 15 Strategies to Dominate Your Market

Nobody has to tell you this. As a plumber who wants to grow your business and attract new customers, you know how important it is to stand out from the competition. And there’s plenty of competition!

Unfortunately, it’s often easier said than done—especially since plumbing is such a competitive field. It takes more than just good plumbing business service software to stand out.

Leading a team of skilled and dedicated pros is an awesome start. You also need a clever way to brand yourself and get your business out there in a big way.

Successful marketing in 2024 and beyond requires managing your reputation both online and off. This means a healthy mix of digital and traditional marketing channels. Whether you’re new to marketing or just need a fresh take on how to promote your plumbing business, we’ve got you covered!

These tips will help you grow your plumbing business, flush the competition, and build a stronger reputation for your brand.

15 Ideas You Can Use to Market Your Plumbing Company

There are many ways to get your name out there and promote your plumbing services. If you want to dominate your market, you must put in the work and be patient. Marketing a plumbing company doesn’t happen overnight, just as it doesn’t for any other business.

Results take time, but you will see increased leads and sales when done correctly. As you monitor results and performance, you can adjust and improve your marketing campaigns and efforts. There is always something to improve on or change. That’s part of being in business.

1. Create a Website for Your Plumbing Business

The most crucial step to growing your brand is creating a plumbing website. This step is vital as most of your marketing efforts will lead potential customers to it. It’s your chance to shine and explain why you’d be the customer’s best choice. According to NerdWallet, in 2021, 81% of shoppers research online before purchasing, and 92% of business owners believe that a website is the most effective digital marketing strategy.

To maximize the effectiveness of your plumbing business website, follow these best practices:

Optimize Your Website for Conversions

Display contact information and ensure your phone number, email address, and contact forms are visible on every page.

Encourage visitors to contact you with clear CTAs like “Request a Quote” or “Schedule an Appointment.”

Add features for easy service requests like booking plugins, chatbots, and appointment scheduling tools to make it simple for visitors to request service via any mobile device.

Ensure Your Website Loads Quickly

Compress and optimize images, minimize heavy graphics, enable browser caching, and reduce external scripts to reduce page loading times.

It’s also recommended you regularly check your website’s speed and choose a reliable, fast web hosting service to enhance online marketing efforts.

Optimize for Search Engines

Use keywords to optimize titles, meta descriptions, and body content. Make sure they sound and fit naturally, your site has a mobile-friendly design, fast loading speed, local SEO, structured data, and high-quality backlinks.

Keep your website fresh with relevant content, such as a blog, which acts as a digital business card showcasing your expertise.

Create a Trust-Earning Landing Page Design

Communicate reliability and convey that you are a trustworthy, fairly-priced plumber.

Include essential information and business details about your services, and credentials, and display positive reviews. Make sure your contact details are easy to find, along with contact forms or a quote request form.

Use Clear and Visually Striking CTAs

Use concise, action-oriented language to tell visitors exactly what to do. Make CTAs stand out with contrasting colors and buttons, and place them strategically throughout the site, especially above the fold and near relevant content.

2. Claim Your Free Google Business Profile

Since potential customers perform research before choosing a plumber, it is imperative to claim your FREE Google Business profile. This step allows your business to appear in local search and Google Maps results.

A Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business) includes a page about your business that appears in local listings and search engine results pages (SERPs). When someone in the area searches for plumbing services you offer, your chances of exposure increase leading to potential clients. The page features valued information, such as your business hours, address, phone number, location, directions, a website link, reviews, and more. You can add offers to gain attention, photos, and even a “Get a Quote” button. You can also add your logo, specific services, and more.

Book More Jobs With Housecall Pro’s Reserve With Google Integration

With Housecall Pro’s Reserve with Google features and Google Business Profile integration to save time and ensure you get all options to the fullest extent. Housecall Pro has joined forces with Google to offer booking/reserve functionality, enabling you to maximize brand recognition through your profile and give customers direct access to booking an appointment through your Housecall Pro calendar.

Reserve with Google works with your Google Business Profile, allowing customers looking for you to book directly with your business. Your potential customers can book anytime from any device, including smartphones, the most popular one. You can be anywhere worldwide and still get scheduled appointments on auto-pilot 24/7.

3. Work on Improving Your Website’s SEO

Whether you already have a plumbing website or just built one, SEO is essential to gaining traffic and potential leads. According to Zippia, in 2023, 81% of shoppers researched a business online before making a purchase, 55% searched for online reviews, and 47% searched for the business’ website.

Think Local SEO

To improve your plumbing business’s search engine rankings, it’s essential to follow effective SEO practices. Start by ensuring your website is optimized for both local and organic searches. Utilize keyword-rich content, optimized titles, and meta descriptions to increase your search visibility.

You should think “local” when determining your keyword phrases, as this can help get you listed in the local listings and SERPs.

For instance, use “Nashville, Tennesee faucet repair” and “Nashville, Tennesee garbage disposal installations” as keyword phrases that help your plumbing business rank for specific services in your area. Try to include valuable keywords related to all your services on your website.

Use Analytics Tools To Spot Trends & Optimize Content Regularly

Regularly update your site with relevant content and maintain a mobile-friendly design. Tools like Google Search Console and Google Analytics are invaluable for monitoring your website’s performance and refining your SEO efforts.

Leverage Online Directories

An essential aspect of SEO for plumbing businesses is managing your online reputation. Encourage satisfied customers to leave positive reviews on your Google Business Profile and other online directory listings. These reviews significantly impact your search visibility and attract more qualified leads. Finally, ensure your business details are consistent across all online directories to improve your credibility and ranking on Google Search.

Another crucial practice is leveraging online directories and directory listings to boost your SEO. Being listed in reputable directories can enhance your online presence and drive more traffic to your site. Make sure your business information is accurate and up-to-date on all platforms. This consistency helps Google recognize and trust your business, further improving your search engine rankings and helping you attract more qualified leads.

4. Use Google Ads & Search Engine Marketing (PPC)

Google Ads is a pay-per-click (PPC) bidding system where you set your maximum bid per day for each keyword phrase you want to target. You can get listed in the promoted section whenever someone searches for anything related to your targeted keyword phrases. You’ll pay for each click on your link up to the maximum bid you set.

Using Google Ads does not guarantee that you’ll appear in searches due to competing factors (bids) and Google’s Quality Score ranking system algorithms, which calculate your expected clickthrough rate (CTR), the ads’ relevancy to the searched words, and whether your ad matches the searcher’s intent.

Search engine marketing, in general, is vital to getting your name, website, and services out there in front of potential customers on various search engines. Each search engine offers PPC ad campaigns to promote your plumbing services, as well as social media sites and apps like Facebook, X, Instagram, etc.

5. Share Helpful Organic Content on Facebook & LinkedIn

You should not only have a website and PPC ad campaigns in place to promote your plumbing business but also create rich, organic content on social media like Facebook and LinkedIn.

Organic content means creating unpaid and natural content, another element of effective SEO practices.

Search engines index organic content, including content on social media platforms, to display in search results related to a viewer’s search phrases. Facebook and LinkedIn also index organic content to appear in searches within their respective platforms.

Regular posting on Facebook and LinkedIn keeps your business visible and shows prospective customers you are active in the community. It’s also a great way to promote services with special deals or opportunities and provide helpful information to the audience that makes you an authority in the industry. Furthermore, people tend to follow others. If someone raves about their experiences with you, others may want to experience it, too.

6. Promote Discounts & Offers Through Paid Social Media Ads

You are not restricted to only having PPC campaigns for offered services on social media platforms like Facebook, X, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. You can also draw in customers using promoted discounts and special offers. This marketing type includes things like saving $100 on a water softener installation, free estimates, financing promos, special offers for email-subscribed customers, and more. It’s your chance to grab the audience, create an urgency, and get them to hire you for their plumbing needs.

7. Start a YouTube Channel With Helpful DIY Plumbing Videos

One excellent way to stand out from the competition and make your business a leader in the industry is to create a YouTube Channel, providing helpful tips and recommendations to your audience. It’s also an opportunity to promote your services.

If a potential customer sees your helpful videos, it can persuade them to choose your plumbing services over others. The more exposure you have for your business, the more your name sinks into the audience’s mind and motivates them to choose you whenever they need a plumbing repair or installation.

For example, suppose people constantly see exposure to Joe’s Plumbing through ad campaigns, search results, social media, and YouTube. In that case, they are more likely to choose Joe’s Plumbing instead of a company they know very little about, even if the other company says it is the leader in the industry, offers a satisfaction guarantee, etc.

You’ve probably seen commercials for gutter cleaning services from a particular business several times. Would you choose them or take your chance on a company you’ve never heard about, doesn’t provide helpful content or videos to the community, or isn’t actively exposed to various marketing channels?

Helpful YouTube videos make a significant impact on consumer decisions.

Free download: Unlock The Full Potential of Your Plumbing Business E-book

8. Start a Blog to Post Helpful Plumbing Tips & Content

Another great way to market your plumbing business is to start a blog on your website. When consumers see what you offer, in addition to helpful content that solves their plumbing problems, you become a well-respected business and an authority in the industry. You also become their go-to company for plumbing repairs and installations. They feel they can trust you to deliver results and appreciate you taking the time to help them with great information.

Ask yourself this question: Would you choose a plumber who is only looking to take your money or one who actually cares about your issues and also helps you solve problems by providing free, helpful information?

9. Invest in Google Local Service Ads (LSA)

Google LSA is similar to PPC, except you pay based on leads versus clicks. You only pay whenever a potential customer contacts you via the ad. These ads appear at the top of search results, including above PPC ads that appear further down.

This marketing tactic gives you an advantage over others who don’t utilize it. However, it is still imperative to incorporate PPC campaigns into your marketing efforts. Just because you can appear at the top of search results doesn’t mean you should disregard having other ad campaigns and organic search placements. Remember, exposure is the key to marketing your plumbing business.

Would you choose a plumber who shows up on Google in three places or just one? Those three places create mental persuasion by making people think the company is more successful and desired in their area.

Also, having more exposure could mean raising your quality scores on various platforms.

10. Send Postcards Directly in the Mail

Sometimes, old-school tactics are still valuable today. If you have leads from various marketing efforts, such as those LSA campaigns above, you could utilize postcards to remind the customer of your services and create the mentality that you care. Remember, the more exposure a consumer gets, the more they remember your name and the more they might choose your business when needed.

11. Invest in a Robust Email Marketing Strategy

Even with today’s scam artists and abuse of emails in general, email marketing campaigns are still essential to your marketing strategies. If you’ve obtained a potential (or existing) customer’s email by permissive actions, you can use it to send regular emails with helpful tips, blog article links, special promotions, and more. Show them that you care and are not just after their money. You can also use emails to help increase plumbing lead generation results.

12. Participate in Local Community Events

Attending community events is a significant way to broaden your marketing efforts. Many people won’t be interested or just want freebies, but that also exposes your name more in the area, such as when handing out notepads, pens, keychains, and more.

You will gain valuable leads, regardless of free-takers, primarily if you use the event to offer promotions. You can even get emails to add to your email marketing strategy that helps keep your brand in the back of people’s minds for months. Remember, repetition can be a good thing!

13. Partner With Local Contractors

One of the fastest ways to obtain more job opportunities and dominate the market is to partner with local contractors, such as home builders, remodelers, construction contractors, etc. Those businesses often require plumbing professionals to handle some of the work involved in completing a project. Businesses in those industries frequently subcontract a lot of work, meaning you have a better chance of gaining more business.

If you target commercial/multi-family residential work, partnering with property management firms that manage apartments, condos, and townhomes can also provide a steady stream of plumbing jobs. These businesses handle various repairs and maintenance themselves, but sometimes, they don’t have the expertise, tools, or time to perform such repairs and installations. This technique can become a golden opportunity for your plumbing business.

14. Invest in Vehicle Wraps and Signage

Since you have one or more vehicles to travel from one location to the next, it is a great marketing opportunity for your plumbing business. Vehicle wraps and signage provide constant public visibility, another way to deliver repetition to people’s minds all over the area.

If a neighbor or someone driving by a home sees your van at a customer’s property, it boosts your visibility and motivates the “follow” factor in people’s minds. They could feel that if someone uses your plumbing business, you must be a good choice for their plumbing needs.

Your marketing strategies get boosted when using vehicle wraps, including:

• The ability to switch appearance if you need to change the logo, phone number, or add a new service
• Keeps the appearance of your business looking great and impressionable due to easy replacements for damaged graphics
• Delivers 24/7 advertising
• Provides repetitive brand exposure to the public
• Offers an opportunity to gain new leads from callers who grabbed the company name and phone number off the vehicle
• Provides free website advertising to increase traffic
• And much more!

15. Use Call Tracking Software To Improve Customer Service

Call tracking software is another great benefit to add to your marketing arsenal. This software is NOT for tracking as in caller ID, recording phone calls, or viewing location information, as you might think. The software lets you monitor, analyze, and manage incoming calls to your business through intelligent data collection and information. The best part is you see what source led to the call, such as a specific website, marketing campaign, email, postcard ad, PPC ad, etc. In addition, it identifies what keywords lead to the action, what pages on your website they visited, what other actions they took, etc.

Dynamic Data Elements

Call tracking uses dynamic elements that replace the actual phone number on your website for each visitor, letting you track where the calls come from, what keywords led to the call, how long the call lasted, and even what was said (transcription services, if included).

Cookie Data Integration

Call tracking software utilizes cookies, which are then attached to a profile with all the user’s history (browser activity, ad campaign IDs, keyword searches, previous calls and information, etc.). Can you see the advantages of using call-tracking software?

The software provides detailed information about the caller and gives you precise tracking information on your marketing efforts. Without it, your return on investment (ROI) for marketing campaigns and the sources you use run blindly without any relevant information to determine what is working and what is not.

Identifying Callers

Call tracking provides data-driven information to determine if each caller is an existing customer or a potential one, along with their action history. Did they fill out a quote form? Did they send an email inquiry? Have they called before? How long were they on the phone with you? What was the topic or service discussed? Have they received a quote?

All historical data helps you prioritize the calls coming in and also helps close sales or gain new leads.

Effective Marketing Solutions

Housecall Pro’s CallRail software integration is a great solution that helps track your marketing results and integrates the data into HCP’s plumbing service software. You’ll have extensive customer information integrated into everything you do with a customer, including invoices, appointments, quote follow-ups, customer profits, and much more.

CallRail features include but are not limited to:

• Call tracking details (keywords, ad IDs, website page visits, call duration, and more)
• AI call transcriptions with clarity that you can easily interpret, plus auto-integration into valuable data within Housecall Pro’s business software
• Form tracking that attaches to all other customer actions and communications
• Lead Center for phone calls that lets the team view data about the callers and manage calls as a team
• Lead Center for texts (SMS/MMS) that lets the team view data about the customer and manage messages as a team using mobile or desktop
• Lead Center for web chats that lets the team view customer data and respond to the chat session, keeping everyone on the same page

According to Business Wire, 86% of consumers will leave a brand they trusted after only having two lousy customer experiences. McKinsey & Company states that the customer experience (a.k.a. CX) captures everything a business does for customers to deliver superior experiences and value. They say it’s crucial in an age where customer delivery is just as important as the products and services the business provides.

Housecall Pro’s CallRail software integration takes your customer experience to a new level and ensures you provide the best service for all your existing and potential customers. You have the right tools and know the customer before talking to them.

Plumbing Software That Helps Your Business Dominate Your Local Market

Looking for another way to gain a professional edge over the competition? When choosing software for your plumbing business, you want something that lets you gain an edge and tracks results and ROI on your marketing efforts. Integration and feature packages, such as CallRail, review management software, and online booking integration for consumers, are the keys.

Housecall Pro offers plumbing service management software designed to help you manage your business finances and invoices, customers, and profit, giving you time to focus on other important business matters. Take Housecall Pro for a free 14-day trial to test out the capabilities for yourself.

Combine the plumbing business management software with our marketing integrations, and you have a complete system that offers a user-friendly interface and scalability to meet the evolving needs of growing plumbing businesses.

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