Let’s face it. Growing a plumbing business is hard. It takes more than being skilled in your trade. In the beginning, it implies that you will have to wear multiple hats. It means you will have to deal with everything on your own from marketing, sales, and corporate compliance to filing taxes. You will also be interacting with your clients daily. Successfully growing a plumbing business is all about doing the fundamentals and having the energy to see it through.
If you are struggling to grow your plumbing business, we have good news for you. Sure, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all business growth strategy for plumbers. But with the right marketing strategy, obtaining qualified plumbing leads doesn’t have to be daunting. The growth of your plumbing business depends on the efforts you put to increase revenue or profits by utilizing various methods. From hiring the right employees to plumbing services marketing, every area of your business requires attention.
There is no surefire formula for instantly scaling your plumbing company, but you can improve your business’s growth with these secrets from successful plumbers. From getting five-star reviews and establishing a vibrant online presence to diversifying the range of plumbing services you provide, here we give our proven tips that can help plumbers grow their business.
How Can I Grow My Plumbing Company?
If you want to grow a plumbing company, you need to know what kind of clients you want to service.
Every plumbing business has two kinds of customers:
- Maximizers refer to prospects who want quality content to compare their options and make informed buying decisions.
- Satisfiers refers to potential clients who don’t have time and prefer to find the best plumber available to resolve their problems urgently.
Satisfiers require help almost immediately, ASAP.
They have leaky faucets, clogged toilets, and flooded basements. These are the kind of leads who turn to Google to find solutions to their problems and hire one of the plumbers they see. They are not interested in reading your blogs or understanding more about the service. All they want is a) can this plumber help me and b) is the plumber within my price range.
On the other hand, maximizers are the opposite.
They need to stop and think about their options, and they cannot decide on the spot. They also need to compare plumbing contractors, read online reviews, and know more about you before they hand over their money.
Most of the resources you will find on the internet are written to help plumbing contractors obtain more satisfaction. They offer tips to persuade people on the spot, but your plumbing company is different. Your client won’t select you on a whim or rankings or based on your price point.
Plumbing clients care about their home-and they want to choose a reliable, trustworthy, and proven plumber.
Let’s face it, every client has a horrible story about a dodgy plumbing contractor. Maybe they lost hundreds of dollars while trying to repair a leaky faucet, maybe they hired a plumber without having the right insurance, or maybe they hired a friend and achieved a shoddy job.
The idea is that your client isn’t going to choose you without learning about your plumbing business first.
That’s why you need to apply different lead generation and growth hacks to your plumbing company.
The following 13 secrets are designed to assist you to attract more qualified leads whether your plumbing company was recently launched or has been in existence for 3 decades now.
Easy Tricks on How to Grow Your Plumbing Company without Door Knocking
There are a few key strategies in growing a plumbing company, which may vary according to the current status and size of your business. Without further ado, let us dive into the tips to help grow your plumbing company from zero to hero.
Start with Launching a Professional Plumbing Website
If you aren’t using internet marketing and haven’t launched a website to promote your plumbing services, then you are losing lots of new leads or business to your competition.
30% of prospects will not hire a plumbing business without a professional website. Simply put, customers expect you to have a professional website, even if the site only lists your services and contact information. The internet is the heart of everything your clients do, from online shopping to online banking, ordering movies to ordering food.
And your clients want to learn and research possible plumbing businesses online too. It doesn’t matter how great your plumbing company is – a poorly designed website will set you back. 38% of people will click off your website if the content is not pleasing or does not meet their needs. But you don’t have to spend a fortune, just ensure that your site reflects a few features of modern plumbing website design including but not restricted to:
- Add clear and compelling call-to-action buttons so that it’s simple for clients to navigate.
- Include testimonials on each page
- Simple & attractive design
- Boosts your search engine visibility with SEO
Establish The Brand Identity That Sets You Apart from the Competition
Whether you are just launching a plumbing company or you have an established plumbing company for some time, this step is vital. A strong plumbing brand differentiates you from rivals, establishes trust, and helps you to charge a premium for your good plumbing service.
You will require to create a strong brand identity if you don’t have one. This includes choosing your business name, your values, your logo, and your tone to mention just a few. It is simply the personality of your plumbing company, describing what you have to provide to your clients.
Establishing a strong brand doesn’t have a fancy plumber marketing exercise. Figure out what you would expect from a customer from a plumbing contractor. More likely, it is a trustworthy, reliable, quality, and friendly service, so allow these values and qualities to shine through your plumbing brand.
To help you stay aligned with your branding, it can be helpful to create a plumbing brand book. This book includes everything you need to understand about your plumbing brand, and it’s a helpful book to refer back to and includes:
- A blurb explaining your company’s values admission.
- Color palette with secondary and primary colors
- Typography
- Relevant images
- The tone and voice of the business
- Logos, icons, secondary logos
With your plumber brand book, you can use them to roll out your brand across your business, for instance, on your business cards and van to mention just a few.
Submit Your Plumbing Website to Local Online Directories
After creating a professional website for your plumbing company, then you should submit your business to the local online directories. We highly recommend that you contact a reliable plumbing marketing agency to list your plumber services on several business listings.
Some of the famous local listing online directories that you can utilize for serving your purpose are:
- Yelp
- Angie’s List
- Bing
Listing your plumbing business on these online local business directories will help you identify relevant clients for your business, saving you from the time-consuming of screening relevant clients from the whole incoming traffic.
So, the many times people come across your plumbing company conducting online research, the more they will be persuaded to hire your plumbing services.
Optimize Your Plumbing Website for Local SEO Services
You always want local plumbing clients since they are easy to reach out to, and they are more likely to spread word-of-mouth buzz in your community. If you want to grow a plumbing business, then focus on your local plumbing SEO. And to focus on your local SEO efforts, you should optimize your Google Business Profile (GBP) and your plumbing website.
If you have ever searched for plumbing service in your area on Google, for instance, “Florida clogged drain experts” or ‘Sydney toilet repair,’ you will have seen local SEO results on a map with the plumber listed below. Clients love these organic local results since they can see how far your plumbing business is, and identify the closest one to contact.
92% of clients will choose a plumber listed on the first page of local organic search results, so if you want to book local jobs, you will require to optimize your Google Business Profile and plumbing website. Here are simple tips that can help to boost your plumbing local SEO:
- Include location pages to your plumbing website so Google and your clients understand what service areas are in.
- Encourage your clients to leave online reviews on your Google Business Profile and website.
- Update your business information so it is correct and incorporates your full business name, address, and Phone number (NAP).
- Ensure your plumbing business operating hours are accurate (especially since they have changed during the Covid-19).
Know Your Ideal Clients
Getting your plumbing company off the ground is daunting, and continuing to grow a plumbing business once it’s launched is just as challenging. Knowing who your clients are and what they require is crucial. You went through a process of identifying a target market when creating your business plan. But now you have an active client base that you need to engage and improve your plumbing business.
Whether it is via user reviews, direct customer service, or a quarterly survey, you need to ask for honest feedback. Note the consistent grievances amongst your clients and use them to launch new features, make internal adjustments, or any number of fixes.
And while client reviews may be invaluable, you should also focus on your competitors and market. Conducting regular market analysis makes sure that you are aware of competitive moves and how various economic moves may impact your clients. Combined with insightful reviews from your clients, it offers a full picture of potential plumbing business growth avenues.
Grow a Plumbing Business with Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing is an excellent way for plumbing businesses to reach clients and prospects. People discover, follow, learn about, and book jobs from plumbing brands on social media, so if you are not on platforms such as Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook, you are missing out on lots of qualified plumbing leads! Great plumbing service marketing on social media can bring success to your plumbing business, create devoted brand ambassadors and even drive plumbing sales and leads.
Social media marketing is a type of internet marketing that leverages the benefits of famous social media platforms to attain your plumbing marketing and branding goals. With widespread versatility and usage, social media is one of the free avenues for growing a plumbing business today.
By thoroughly investing money and time into social media marketing, you can increase brand awareness, drive traffic, establish trust and relationships with your clients, build a vibrant online presence and generate more clients or leads online.
Plus, you will have better insights and the capacity to attract more leads and convert them into loyal, paying clients for your plumbing business.
Use Google Ads to Grow Your Plumbing Business Online
Sometimes you will be required to use the money to make more money as a plumber. If you are determined to grow a plumbing business right now, you will want to invest your money and time into some paid search marketing campaigns.
Google Ads can be very effective for small local plumbing businesses, particularly those targeting online conversions or traffic. Local keywords such as “plumbers near me” or “plumber in Murfreesboro” are generally less competitive than non-geographic, broader terms like “plumber.”
Any client or prospect who requires help with their drainage is going to turn to Google. They will look for reviews, comparisons, articles-pretty much any resource that assists them to see where to get the best deal and which plumber offers quality services.
You can use plumbing SEO to ensure your articles are on top of Google, but SEO takes time before you see any noticeable results. Instead, use plumbing Google Ads to put your plumbing business at the top of Google search results instantly. You can bid on specific keywords that will trigger your ads, for instance, words like ‘drainage repair,’ ‘plumbing repair,’ and ‘plumbing installation.’
When clients search for these plumbing keywords, your Google Ads pop up, and you can tap into the kind of client who is out there searching for help with their plumbing systems-which makes it easier to get a free quote or call back.
Manage Your Online Reputation to Grow Your Plumbing Company
Research shows that more than 80%of clients research a company online before making a purchasing decision. When prospects research your plumbing business, this will include your social media presence (if you have any), as well as online reviews that pop up when they type in your plumbing business name on Google. Part of managing your online reputation is knowing how your clients are using the internet or web, and your plumbing website may be the last place they turn to find out more about your services.
Nowadays, people are savvier about marketing and sales from plumbing businesses. Customers are beginning to value the opinions of other clients and online reviews higher than anything they may say about your brand. Clients not only value online reviews but are willing to pay more for a service from a plumber with higher ratings and reviews.
Here are some tips that can help you build a positive reputation online:
- Solicit for more positive reviews from sites like Google, Yelp, and Thumbtack
- Respond promptly and professionally to negative criticism from your customers.
- Monitor anywhere your plumbing brand is mentioned online
Create a Blog and Deliver High-Value Content
Creating quality content is crucial whether it is a business blog or a plumbing service description. It’s all about engaging the target audience and offering them what they require: information. This information should be provided in a way that keeps readers hooked.
Every plumbing business, no matter the size should have a blog section on its website. A blog is an effective way to obtain followers for your plumbing business, and these followers can then be utilized to market your plumbing content. Since blogs are typically specified in the category and type of content they publish, they are bound to attract new clients and grow your plumbing company online.
Remember that, for your plumbing blog to be successful, you should optimize it to rank higher on search engines like Google or Bing. Also, ensure that the topics are solving your target audience’s doubts.
Invest in Video Marketing to Grow your Plumbing Company
One of the most efficient ways to grow a plumbing business successfully is through video marketing. Clients tend to respond much faster after watching a plumber video than any other type of advertisement.
Videos are one of the fastest consumed content online today, and people nowadays search for anything to everything on YouTube. For example, a homeowner having a flooded tap in the middle of the night will turn to YouTube to get a solution ASAP.
In fact, more than 60% of clients are more likely to respond after watching a well-branded plumbing video. Video marketing is an efficient and effective internet marketing strategy mostly conducted via platforms such as webinars and YouTube.
Use Email Marketing to Scale Your Plumbing Business
When it comes to promoting your plumbing service company to a target market, email marketing is one good way to connect with the current and gain more new clients.
Furthermore, email marketing can help your plumbing target homeowners looking to hire professional plumbing contractors. However, when creating an email marketing campaign, you must consider several factors, it begins with what is the right client base for your target audience.
Are they ready to hire services provided by your plumbing company? Do they find your plumbing service rates reasonable?
You got to make sure that you are not sending irrelevant content that doesn’t make sense since you will end up losing your potential clients.
In reality, never send emails just for the sake of doing it, if you don’t have to connect with your target market, you can contact a credible plumbing marketing agency like Blackstorm Design + Marketing to handle your email marketing campaign.
Offline Marketing Strategies to Grow a Plumbing Business
The best plumbing marketing strategy is the one that combines both offline and online ideas to skyrocket your brand exposure to your target market. If you are searching for innovative and proven conventional plumbing marketing strategies, here are some tips that can help you get started:
Increase Client Retention to Expand Your Plumbing Business
It is not sufficient to just sign in new customers for your plumbing company. You also make efforts to keep your existing clients coming back for more services. When you increase client retention, you are increasing client loyalty, which in turn, increases sales.
Understanding that it costs five times as much to obtain a new client than it does to maintain an existing one, focusing on retaining clients implies that your plumbing business won’t spend money on something that is not a guaranteed investment.
You can increase client retention by:
- Prioritizing customer service: If you fail to treat your clients right, they will not be in a position to support your plumbing company. Ensuring that your address their issues and offer them the best possible experience shows that you value them as a client.
- Keeping your promises: If you tell a client that you will follow them up with more details or reach out to them at a future date, do it. If you don’t, it can give your clients a poor impression of your plumbing company.
Hire the Right People
Before you can figure out your plumbing business growth trajectory, you will require a solid crew to assist you to attain your objectives or goals. Hiring the best and most qualified team is a good way to make sure that you achieve the growth of your plumbing business fast.
With experienced and hardworking employees dedicated to your plumbing company’s success, your business will be well equipped for continued growth. Besides, delegating plumbing tasks to focus on crucial work will free up your energy and time, helping you to do your best and develop collaborative work culture.
Invest in Systems to Grow a Plumbing Business
You are a jack of all trades at this plumbing business ownership thing. We understand that. But if you are trying to micromanage everything on your own, you may be limiting yourself for potential growth. A plumbing company powered by systems can deal with multi-layered demands for growth or expansion.
Investing in robust systems like a solid plumbing CRM in place can help you concentrate on crucial parts of expansion and growth. Review your existing operations to know what aspects are monotonous or repetitive, and aim to outsource or automate as much as possible so that you can put your efforts into growing your plumbing business.
Grow your Plumbing Company by Focusing on Branding
If you want to be more visible in your local community as a plumber, branding is one of the few ways that can help prospects begin to recognize your plumbing brand. There are great paid ways of getting exposure to your plumbing brand online. But there is a free way too, here are some of them:
- Wearing branded staff uniforms: Staff uniforms offer consistent visual branding that is affordable to promote your services out in the public domain.
- Vehicle signage: Including your company name, logo, and service details is a great way of branding your plumbing company. This is a cost-effective way of getting your brand out there, particularly if your van is on the road for a larger part of the day.
Consider Franchising Your Small Plumbing Business
Business franchising is one of the best growth strategies for small plumbing businesses. This implies that you sell the rights of your business to an independent owner. They later open and run their franchise of your plumbing company. When such happens, it increases the number of locations of your plumbing business, which helps to generate more revenue.
Form Strategic Partnerships with Other Plumbers
Strategic partnerships with the right plumbing companies can be a game changer if properly done. It can help you reach a wide range of clients quickly. However, identifying such partnerships may be a tall order for your plumbing company. But, search for plumbing companies that can complement yours. Reach out to them and propose opportunities for collaboration.
Attend Workshops and Networking Events
Increasing your brand visibility can help to attract new clients and grow your plumbing business. An effective way to attain this is by attending networking events. Check local plumbing professional organizations, and don’t be afraid to attend a few networking events to spread the word about your plumbing business.
You can play a role in these events by:
- Meeting other plumbing business owners
- Setting up a booth to promote your plumbing business
- Talking as an industry expert.
Focus on Customer Experience
Client perceptions can break or make your plumbing business growth. Deliver quality plumbing services and experiences, and they will instantly praise your business on social media, mess it up, and they will let the world know in real-time. Fast plumbing company growth depends on making your potential and current clients happy with their experience.
While engaging with your target market is important, personalizing your experience can strengthen and boost that relationship. Small plumbing companies can instantly respond and adapt to their client’s needs, and this agility offers them a unique advantage over large plumbing businesses.
Measure What Strategy Works and Refine as you Go
While there are multiple strategies you can utilize to grow your plumbing company, it is essential that you measure what is working or not working. For instance, if you develop a client loyalty program and find it’s not enhancing customer retention, you may require to revise your strategy. Maybe it is obtaining a plumbing CRM and engaging with your clients on a regular basis or engaging with them via an email campaign or on social media.
Frequently Asked Questions on How to Grow a Plumbing Business
How do I get more clients for my plumbing company?
Here are our best and proven ways for plumbing contractors to begin marketing in ways you have never thought about before including; Google Ads, managing your online reputation, investing in plumbing SEO and issuing local business cards, and establishing a vibrant online presence.
What is the best platform to promote your plumbing services online?
There are multiple platforms that you can use to advertise your plumbing business online including your professional website, Facebook, Instagram, Linked, and other online business directories including Google, Yelp, and Thumbtack.
Why should people select you over your competitors?
When you know your competitive advantage, it assists you to promote your plumbing service in a way that particularly appeals to a client’s needs and also shows why your service offering is unique to your competitors. This leads to the most effective plumbing marketing and more new business or leads for you!
Why should your customers choose you?
You offer superior customer service. Plumbers who are knowledgeable, friendly, and respond to clients will develop a reputation for their plumbing service. If you are focused on your clients, they will feel well taken care of and that you are assisting them to solve their issues or fulfill their needs.
Who is your ideal target client?
A target client is an individual that’s most likely to book jobs with your plumbing business. And it is a subset of your broader target market.
All the above-discussed ideas are hard or easy to implement when you want to grow your plumbing business in the virtual online world.
But, you don’t have to try all of the above strategies, you can choose one that is best suited to your plumbing company’s model. You must choose the marketing strategy that your plumbing business use to drive sales and leads without putting a huge burden on your bank account.
Above everything else, you need to know that the internet nowadays plays a crucial role in the growth of a business, which is also true for your plumbing company. So, you need to use digital marketing to promote your plumbing services business and get more new clients.
Let Blackstorm Design + Marketing Help You Grow Your Plumbing Business
Do you want to boost your revenue and grow your plumbing company? No matter whether that implies more clients, more leads, or improved brand awareness, our team can assist you to get it. As a leading plumbing marketing agency, we have a proven track record and can deal with all aspects of your internet marketing. From social media marketing campaigns and search engine optimization to website design, we can help you get more.
Your success is important to us. We know that success doesn’t occur by accident, it is repeatable and deliberate. At Blackstorm Design + Marketing, we leverage the latest in technology and design combined with a true and tried process that focuses on and consequently delivers desired results.
Schedule a free discovery call with Blackstorm Design + Marketing to learn more about how we can help you grow your plumbing business today.