HVAC Marketing Strategies to Help You Grow Your Business
Are you a heating, ventilation, and air conditioning professional looking to grow your business? When it comes to getting HVAC leads and booking new clients, word-of-mouth doesn’t quite cut it anymore. While a loyal customer base is essential, your business won’t thrive without putting some modern marketing techniques in place. Often times, partnering with a company that provides HVAC leads is a great place to start. It can jumpstart your business to get it up and running with minimal effort on your end and great return.
But that’s only the beginning. Updating your marketing plan with a few basic techniques is essential, and they’re a lot easier to implement than you might think. With a solid website design, general SEO knowledge, local search optimization, active social media accounts, and paid ads, you’ll be well on your way to scaling your business. Get to know these five proven HVAC marketing strategies and learn how to give your business a much-needed boost.
1. Give Your Website Design Some TLC
More than likely, your website is the first impression that most of your potential clients will have of your HVAC repair company. That’s why keeping it up-to-date with a clean, easy-to-navigate layout is crucial. Most importantly, the design of your site should provide visitors with a clear explanation of the services you offer while showcasing why your company stands out from the competitors. Ultimately, this will help you generate HVAC and appliance repair leads.
The design of your site should be secure, mobile-friendly, and focused on conversions. A secure website URL will have an HTTPS encryption and a lock symbol in the address bar, which implies that your site is safe to visit. Almost 70% of people in the U.S. access the Internet through a smartphone or tablet, so if your site isn’t mobile-friendly, it could have a substantial negative impact on your website traffic and overall engagement with your company. When viewed on a mobile device, your HVAC website should have accessible navigation, readable copy that’s not too small or large, no overlapping text or images, and front-and-center contact information.
Once your customer is able to navigate your website with ease, you’ll need to provide them with some necessary information. In order to provide unmatched customer service, your customers need to be able to reach you without having to search your website up and down. Be sure to include a phone number, email address (or online contact form), and your business hours, if applicable.
2. Get Familiar With SEO
97% of consumers use the Internet to find local services and 90% click on the first set of results in an online search. If your website doesn’t appear in the first page of results for a local search, you’ll miss out on a ton of potential business. So, for a successful HVAC marketing strategy, there’s no getting around search engine optimization (SEO) and other vital digital marketing techniques. By optimizing your site, you’ll boost your organic search engine ranking, which will provide you with more visibilibility on the Internet.
Your website should include high-quality informational copy with relevant keywords, title tags, meta descriptions, optimized headings, and calls-to-action. Make sure to utilize internal links (within your site) and outbound links to non-competing authority sites, as well. Be sure to review each page of your site and optimize the content for search, including your home page as well as your services, about, FAQs, and contact pages.
Additionally, you can upload blog posts once or twice a month, which is an excellent opportunity to include keywords and other optimized content. For example, you might write a blog post titled “How to Troubleshoot Your Air Conditioning Unit” and include helpful tips as well as information about calling a local HVAC technician (i.e., you) for professional service. Not only will you be an educational resource for your customers, you will also be driving them back to your website to potentially use your services.
When you get familiar with the basics of SEO and implement a few strategies into your website’s content, you’ll drive organic traffic to your site, which is a critical step in successful lead generation.
3. Implement Local SEO for Your Site
One of the best ways to get new leads is through local search. Once you’re familiar with basic search optimization, you’ll want to begin implementing local SEO for your site. Local SEO is a must-have for HVAC marketing because it helps homeowners and business owners find you when they search for a home improvement contractor or HVAC professional in their service area.
As mentioned above, you can improve your organic search engine ranking by optimizing your website copy –– title tags, meta descriptions, headings, and calls-to-action –– but in this case, you’ll want to include geo-targeted keywords, including the city (or cities), state, county, and metro area in which you provide HVAC services.
Another local SEO strategy is getting set up with Google My Business, a free profile designed to help business owners reach local customers in their service area through search and Maps. You can optimize your Google listing by filling out your business description with relevant keywords, providing a phone number and address, entering your hours of operation, adding photos, and acquiring reviews. You will be well on your way to being found by potential customers in no time.
4. Elevate Your Social Media Game
In 2019, most businesses can’t get away with not having social media accounts –– even HVAC companies. But the good news is that social media marketing is an excellent way to increase your visibility on the Internet, create brand awareness, promote your business, engage current and potential clients, get customer reviews, and drive traffic to your site. If you’re not very savvy on social media, you might feel overwhelmed with the idea, but it’s a lot easier to get started than you may expect.
The first thing you’ll want to do is set up business accounts across all major social media channels, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and make sure the information on each page is up-to-date and consistent. For extra credit, you might also want to create business profiles on LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, and Nextdoor.
Video marketing may seem a bit out of place when it comes to HVAC companies. However, YouTube is the second-largest search engine after Google. Video content is one of the best examples of HVAC advertising, so if you’re able to create YouTube content, it can lead to a significant boost in your website traffic. Nextdoor is a social media platform that connects people within their neighborhoods, and it can be ideal for marketing a local HVAC company.
Once you’ve got your social media profiles set up, the next step is to start posting content and engaging with your audience. YouTube videos, special offers, company announcements, and blog posts on your website can be shared to your social media pages either through organic or sponsored posts.
Running ads on social media is one of the best ways to generate HVAC leads. Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter each offer targeted ads for businesses. The sites allow you to pick your budget and the time frame of the ad, allowing you with the power to leverage this as part of your digital marketing strategy.
For example: Facebook ads make it easy to fine-tune your target audience by location, interest, and behavior and retarget people who have already visited your website. Most social media ads allow you to set up a call-to-action within the post, which will generate clicks that link back to your site.
5. Run Local Ads or PPC Campaigns for Local Search
Speaking of HVAC advertising, one of the most effective and straightforward marketing strategies is running Google Ads or PPC (pay-per-click) campaigns for local search. When someone enters keywords into a search, the first results will be Google’s verified Local Services, followed by PPC ads, and then organic search results. Simply put, it’s becoming more and more challenging to rank in a search without one of these options.
Google’s Local Service Ads is a pay-per-lead advertising platform in which your rankings will be determined by the customer ratings and online reputation of your business. You can apply online to see if you qualify. Once you’re verified through the screening process, you will get a Google Guaranteed badge, which is ideal for HVAC companies and other contracted residential services. Next, you can invest in Local Service ads to secure your spot at the top of the page of search results.
Since you can expect a waiting period before getting verified by Google, another option is PPC ads, which also provide prime-time visibility. With PPC, you are essentially buying visits to your site. Each time someone clicks on your ad link, you’ll pay a fee. Keep in mind that even if you run paid search HVAC ads it does not mean you should forget about on-site SEO. You won’t be running ads 24/7 so keeping your website up to date with high-quality content is still an extremely important element of running your HVAC business and generating leads.
Activate Your HVAC Marketing Plan
At this point, you should have a pretty good understanding of some primary components needed to acquire more HVAC and appliance repair leads. All that’s left to do is implement these techniques and you’ll be on your way to building out your business and client base. If this seems like a lot of information to process, don’t sweat it.
Begin with the basics and work your way up to executing a knockout HVAC marketing plan. While some contractors are able to tackle these tactics on their own, others might opt to hire an expert. Do what works for you, your budget, and the unique needs of your business.
If you’re just starting out, it may take a little time to successfully market your company and apply each of these HVAC advertising ideas. Give your business the jumpstart it needs and partner with Billy.com to book new clients fast. It’s easy to sign up, and you won’t be tied to any contracts. Start getting leads today and sign up as a pro!
