As someone who works with small business owners every day, I know just how important marketing dollars are. As someone who works with heating and cooling professionals every day, I know just how valuable a successful HVAC digital marketing campaign can be and how its success translates to your bottom line.
As we head into 2020, digital will become even more crucial to helping you increase leads, booked jobs, and revenue.
Digital marketing can be a scary term—I get that. From not knowing what it is, who you should reach out to for help, or even where to start, it can be quite overwhelming. I commonly get questions like, “What is digital marketing? What does it include? Should I invest in HVAC digital marketing? Is it worth it?”
Take a look at a few examples of results digital marketing has gotten for HVAC contractors just like you:
So, the short answer is—yes. Investing in a digital marketing campaign (AKA “internet marketing” AKA “search engine marketing”) is ABSOLUTELY worth it, but only if you do so wisely, with the right company, and with the right strategies in place.
BELOW IS A LIST OF THE TOP HVAC DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGIES, WEBSITE TIPS, AND TO-DOS EVERY HVAC BUSINESS OWNER (AND OTHER HOME SERVICE CONTRACTORS) NEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT INTERNET MARKETING.
Have questions at the end? Give us a call and we’ll be happy to discuss!
Now, let’s get to it.
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1. Do a Competitive Analysis of the HVAC Digital Marketing Landscape
Did you know that 81% of B2C shoppers conduct online research before they make a purchase? (Source) This begs the question, “how is your company positioned online?”
Unless your company is located in Middleofnowhereville, Montana or Nobodyliveshere, Idaho, chances are you aren’t the only heating and cooling company in your city. To fully understand how much time, money, and resources to devote to your HVAC digital marketing campaign in order to generate new business from the web in 2020, you need to do a digital competitive analysis:
Evaluate your website and locate areas of improvement (assuming you have a website, of course)
Determine available search engine real estate and social visibility
Identify digital assets used in the buying funnel (blogs, videos, team pages, etc.)
Evaluate how you present your services and value proposition, including the sales funnel you and your competitors push potential customers down
Pinpoint online advertising strategies across various channels
Assess your customer satisfaction and employee feedback, including your online reputations
2. Build a Mobile-Friendly Website
As of the end of 2019, more than 64% of searches for HVAC services happen on a mobile device. As if that wasn’t enough, Google has a mobile-first search index (memory bank of web pages to populate search results), meaning if the mobile version of your HVAC website isn’t as great as your desktop version, you’ll lose rankings.
Having a mobile-friendly website will serve as a cornerstone of your entire HVAC digital marketing campaign.
3. Build a Conversion-Friendly Website
The entire reason you and your competitors even invest in an internet marketing campaign is to generate more business. An essential part of your website is ensuring it is conversion-friendly, offering potential customers easy solutions to pick up the phone and call or fill out a contact form and send you a message.
A website’s conversion rate can increase from 200%-400% with a well-designed interface. What does that mean? A conversion-friendly website has:
A phone number visible at all times
Multiple contact forms throughout the site
Subtle design features that encourage the user to take action
4. Launch a Secure Website (“HTTPS”)
94% of all page one search rankings are now HTTPS, meaning websites are “https://www.website.com” and not “http://www.website.com.” Google started giving ranking boosts to secure websites in 2014 and even said themselves they are moving towards a more secure web—and HVAC websites should take notice.
Given recent trends and Google’s push for site security, part of your HVAC digital marketing campaign should without a doubt include moving your website to HTTPS protocol*.
*Note: this is a complicated process and should be completed by a professional web developer or internet marketing company to ensure best results.
5. Make Your Website FAST
Like HTTPS and site security, site speed is an important factor of your website performance.
Think about it, how often do you leave a website on your phone or computer because the site takes forever to load?
Quite often, I’m sure.
According to Kissmetrics, a one-second delay in page response can result in a 7% reduction in conversions (form submissions and phone calls) and:
47% of consumers expect a web page to load in two seconds or less
40% of consumers abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load
Once your website is built and your competitive analysis is complete, it’s time to create an actual marketing plan (or work with a company to do so). A successful HVAC digital marketing campaign should be backed by research and data, continually tracked and measured, and optimized if needed for better performance.
7. Claim Your Local Search Listings
The success of your internet marketing campaign doesn’t only depend on what your website says or how fast it runs. Offsite factors like your local search listings provide ranking signals and provide valuable information about:
Where your business is located
What services you offer
What your contact information is (address, phone number, etc.)
As an HVAC contractor you should claim your local search listings on the following platforms (in order of importance—find the full list here):
Google My Business
Facebook
Yelp
Thumbtack
Yellowpages
Angie’s List
HomeAdvisor
BBB
For best practices on how to claim and build your local search listings, click here.
8. Build Social Media Profiles
Social media marketing for HVAC contractors won’t result in hundreds of leads from Facebook each month—the value is elsewhere. We encourage our heating and cooling clients to use social media to:
Earn reviews (get as many reviews as you can!)
Run campaigns to energize a fan-base
Drive traffic to Facebook
Raise awareness for new products and services
Give your brand a personality
Show that you’re a company, with real employees, with exceptional and friendly service
9. Invest In Content Marketing
In the words of Content Marketing Institute, content marketing is, “…a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience – and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.”
In other words, content marketing is the process of creating, publishing, and sharing web pages, blogs, videos, images, social media posts, and other content to advertise your company’s products and services.
In an HVAC digital marketing campaign, your website is the most popular place to publish new web pages and blogs as well as show off your latest products, images of your team, and company profile videos. It’s your all-in-one place for anything and everything you publish!
For heating and cooling companies, it’s important to invest in content marketing and search engine optimization together to maximize your search engine real estate.
10. Invest In Local SEO
Ever wonder why your competitors show up in the maps listings and you don’t? The answer: local SEO.
Local SEO is the process of optimizing your website, online business listings, and social media profiles for local search results on search engines. Combining local SEO with content marketing gives your website the best chance to rank in the Google maps listings and in the top three organic search results.
In a nutshell, local SEO services include:
Completing a local competitor analysis
Building and monitoring local citations
Publishing localized website content
Optimizing and managing Google My Business (GMB)
Publishing localized website content
Tracking your local SEO campaign
Tweaking your local SEO campaign
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11. Test Google Local Services Ads
If you haven’t heard, Google’s Local Services ads are pay per lead ads that appear right at the top of the search results when someone searches for your services.
Unlike traditional paid search ads, you don’t target keywords—you target by services:
Learn more about Local Services ads here: Everything You Need to Know About Google’s Local Services Ads
12. Get Reviews & Respond to Them
Online reviews are the new word-of-mouth referrals for HVAC companies and are essential to any HVAC internet marketing campaign. At Blue Corona, we recommend getting as many online reviews in as many places as possible, and here’s why:
90% of consumers read online reviews before visiting a business
88% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations
72% say that positive reviews make them trust a local business more
To get more online reviews we recommend asking! Seems simple, doesn’t it? But it’s often overlooked. In my experience, the most common reason HVAC contractors don’t have any reviews on Google or Facebook is that they fail to ask. Plain and simple.
Don’t have time to manually ask every customer for reviews? Invest in a review platform to do it for you, like Review Us Now.
13. Blog
Yes, you need a blog. Not only will it increase your chances of ranking in the search engines, it helps attract potential customers to your website and enhances your HVAC digital marketing campaign.
If done right, your traffic trends should look something more like this:
This is a real screenshot of one of our client’s Google Analytics profile. In one year alone, this client generated 160,000+ organic visits to their blog—149,000+ were from unique visitors.
How much would you pay to place your business in front of 160,000 customers? Blogging presents a unique opportunity to market your heating and cooling company and its services, for virtually $0.
HERE ARE A FEW HVAC BLOG IDEAS FOR YOU TO START WITH:
Seasonal topics, like why an air conditioner makes a buzzing noise
Holiday topics, like money-saving home heating tips for the holidays
Company topics, like when you hire a new employee or participate in a community sponsorship program
Those are just a few to start. Need more ideas? Our team of SEO and content marketing experts can help—just send us a message!
14. Invest In Pay Per Click
Pay per click for HVAC companies (PPC) is a form of internet marketing that places your company at the top of search engines, instantly. It’s a pay-to-play system that is also highly scalable for heating and cooling companies, which is why it’s so beneficial.
Have an extra few hundred dollars (or a couple thousand, for you larger companies out there…) to spend on your HVAC digital marketing campaign? Invest in PPC.
Pay per click is a recommended strategy because:
PPC campaigns can be turned on and off at any time
PPC campaigns are highly scalable, allowing you to increase or decrease your ad budget at will
PPC ads generate visits from qualified visitors who have a high intent to request service
PPC ads are timely, allowing you to run ads whatever days and times of the week you’d like, including after hours and holidays
15. Build an Email List & Invest In Email Marketing
HVAC email marketing is a highly effective way to grow your business. Let’s face it. Not everyone who fills out a form on your site isn’t going to become a customer.
But, this doesn’t mean they’re lost forever. Instead, add a checkbox to your contact forms for visitors to opt-in* to your email marketing campaign.
Email marketing allows you to nurture unclosed leads and keep in touch with past customers, and it can be automated!
*Note: Opt-in email marketing is the direct opposite of sending unsolicited messages to unsuspecting random prospects and opt-in messaging is far more effective than unsolicited.
16. Make Videos & Invest In Video Marketing
In the past 30 days, more online video content has been uploaded to the web than the past 30 years of TV content.
Wait, what? Let’s revisit that fact.
In the past 30 days, more online video content has been uploaded to the web than the past 30 years of TV content.
Holy moly.
SO WHY DOES VIDEO MARKETING MATTER TO YOUR HVAC DIGITAL MARKETING CAMPAIGN?
What’s even more important is that companies that use videos in their internet marketing experience a 27% higher click-through rate (CTR) and 34% higher web conversion rates than those that don’t.
This means that video can:
Improve your SEO efforts
Increase customer engagement with your website (further improving your SEO)
Give your brand a personality
17. Asses Your Website Performance Monthly
Like any marketing strategy you need to know the value of your HVAC digital marketing campaign and every aspect of it. If you work with an online marketing company, meet with your dedicated account manager on a monthly basis to discuss what’s been done the past month, the results, and how things are pacing.
Not knowing if your investment is working for you or against you results in poorly-informed decision making when projecting end of the year revenue and crafting your growth strategy for the following year to come.
18. Track, Test, Tweak & Repeat (TTTR)
TTTR is our mantra here at Blue Corona. It stands for Track, Test, Tweak, and Repeat.
Here’s a more detailed breakdown:
Track – Track your website’s performance using analytic software, keyword tracking tools, and more. This gives you a baseline for data and allows you to measure the true performance of your campaign.
Test – When running a campaign you should always test variations of the strategy to determine what works and what doesn’t to attract more visitors to your website. Strategy B works 350% better Strategy A, but Strategy C works 120% better than Strategy B? Then Strategy C wins—but you wouldn’t know it until you test.
Tweak – Continually tweak and optimize your campaigns for enhanced performance and better results.
Repeat – Repeat various tests (with slightly different variations) to improve the results of your campaigns on a monthly and yearly basis.
Take Control of Your HVAC Internet Marketing Campaign
Every day you ignore your HVAC online marketing campaign is another day your competitors distance themselves on Google and Bing, making it harder for your website to rank well and limiting your ability to generate new business from the web.
Give us a call or contact us online. Our HVAC internet marketing experts will help you get your website ranking and help put your company on the right path for maximum growth.
Brandon is Blue Corona's Sr. Director of Marketing and host of BlueTube, the home services podcast powered by Blue Corona. With more than a decade of marketing experience, Brandon leads the charge on Blue Corona's growth strategies and works closely with our partner organizations like ServiceTitan and Nexstar. When he's not analyzing marketing data, you can find Brandon enjoying the outdoors with his wife and two daughters (or if he's lucky, on the golf course).
we build your strategy to help you outrank and outperform the competition
// Home Services Marketing
SEO (search engine optimization) and paid media are the two most effective ways to increase qualified visitors to your website. If your business doesn’t dominate the first page of search results, you’re losing business to your competition. We help you maximize your search engine real estate across both paid and organic listings on search engines like Google and Bing. This drives more qualified website traffic, calls, and leads to your business (and not your competitors’).
At Blue Corona, we take care of your website for you—from start to finish. The best part? You own 100% of everything we create—the code, content, design—everything. Our websites capture the uniqueness of your brand, deliver a seamless user experience, and serve as the launchpad for your digital marketing campaigns. We provide:
Marketing is only successful if your operations team does its job. At Blue Corona, we help your team capture and convert more leads by providing 24/7/365 call answering services and AI-powered website chat to help you:
As of the end of 2019, more than 64% of searches for HVAC services happen on a mobile device. As if that wasn’t enough, Google has a mobile-first search index (memory bank of web pages to populate search results), meaning if the mobile version of your HVAC website isn’t as great as your desktop version, you’ll lose rankings.
Having a mobile-friendly website will serve as a cornerstone of your entire HVAC digital marketing campaign.
Learn more about Local Services ads here: Everything You Need to Know About Google’s Local Services Ads
HVAC email marketing is a highly effective way to grow your business. Let’s face it. Not everyone who fills out a form on your site isn’t going to become a customer.
But, this doesn’t mean they’re lost forever. Instead, add a checkbox to your contact forms for visitors to opt-in* to your email marketing campaign.
Email marketing allows you to nurture unclosed leads and keep in touch with past customers, and it can be automated!
*Note: Opt-in email marketing is the direct opposite of sending unsolicited messages to unsuspecting random prospects and opt-in messaging is far more effective than unsolicited.
As of the end of 2019, more than 64% of searches for HVAC services happen on a mobile device. As if that wasn’t enough, Google has a mobile-first search index (memory bank of web pages to populate search results), meaning if the mobile version of your HVAC website isn’t as great as your desktop version, you’ll lose rankings.
Having a mobile-friendly website will serve as a cornerstone of your entire HVAC digital marketing campaign.
Given recent trends and Google’s push for site security, part of your HVAC digital marketing campaign should without a doubt include moving your website to HTTPS protocol*.
*Note: this is a complicated process and should be completed by a professional web developer or internet marketing company to ensure best results.
As an HVAC contractor you should claim your local search listings on the following platforms (in order of importance—find the full list here):
In other words, content marketing is the process of creating, publishing, and sharing web pages, blogs, videos, images, social media posts, and other content to advertise your company’s products and services.
In an HVAC digital marketing campaign, your website is the most popular place to publish new web pages and blogs as well as show off your latest products, images of your team, and company profile videos. It’s your all-in-one place for anything and everything you publish!
For heating and cooling companies, it’s important to invest in content marketing and search engine optimization together to maximize your search engine real estate.
Learn more about Local Services ads here: Everything You Need to Know About Google’s Local Services Ads
Yes, you need a blog. Not only will it increase your chances of ranking in the search engines, it helps attract potential customers to your website and enhances your HVAC digital marketing campaign.
If done right, your traffic trends should look something more like this:
Have an extra few hundred dollars (or a couple thousand, for you larger companies out there…) to spend on your HVAC digital marketing campaign? Invest in PPC.
Pay per click is a recommended strategy because:
HVAC email marketing is a highly effective way to grow your business. Let’s face it. Not everyone who fills out a form on your site isn’t going to become a customer.
But, this doesn’t mean they’re lost forever. Instead, add a checkbox to your contact forms for visitors to opt-in* to your email marketing campaign.
Email marketing allows you to nurture unclosed leads and keep in touch with past customers, and it can be automated!
*Note: Opt-in email marketing is the direct opposite of sending unsolicited messages to unsuspecting random prospects and opt-in messaging is far more effective than unsolicited.
Like any marketing strategy you need to know the value of your HVAC digital marketing campaign and every aspect of it. If you work with an online marketing company, meet with your dedicated account manager on a monthly basis to discuss what’s been done the past month, the results, and how things are pacing.
Not knowing if your investment is working for you or against you results in poorly-informed decision making when projecting end of the year revenue and crafting your growth strategy for the following year to come.
