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Is PPC Worth It for HVAC Companies?
When I first decided I wanted to do an HVAC marketing week on the Blue Corona blog, I had two goals. First of all, I wanted it to be just as cool as Shark Week, albeit with fewer deaths. Unfortunately, nothing will ever be as cool as Shark Week—but at least we’ve managed to keep the casualties to a minimum. My second and more important goal was to be able to cram as much valuable online marketing info for HVAC contractors into one week as possible.
So far we’ve covered:
- How to get your HVAC business on page 1 of GoogleÂ
- How blogging for local audiences can get your HVAC company more leads
- What makes a good HVAC website
Though I briefly mentioned paid search as a valuable online marketing tool for HVAC companies earlier this week, I think the topic definitely warrants its own spot during HVAC week. Why? Because I think in general, paid search (PPC, pay per click, Google AdWords, the ads in the search results you see in the light yellow box, etc.), is misunderstood. In fact, there are so many misconceptions about paid search, that one of our HVAC PPC specialists filled an entire blog post with them.
So for all of you HVAC business owners out there looking for a way to get more low cost, qualified leads, don’t knock PPC ’til you’ve tried it, or as we say here at Blue Corona, don’t trash it ’til you’ve tested it (just kidding, no one says that. Can we start saying that?).
Reasons Why Your HVAC Company Should Test Out Paid Search
1. Paid Search Allows You to Steal Traffic from Your Competitors
It’s common practice for your competitors to bid on your brand name. This allows their website to show up even when searchers are specifically looking for your brand.
So what are you gonna do about it? Bid on your own brand name. Oh, and all of your competitor brand names as well. That’ll learn ’em.
2. Paid Search Allows You to Maximize Your Online Real Estate
The most effective search engine marketing (SEM) strategies take advantage of both SEO and PPC. Think of the Web as real estate—you want to cost-effectively maximize as many listings on the first page of search results as possible.
Even if you already rank in the organic (non-paid) listings, having both a paid and non-paid listing on the first page of Google for keywords related to your HVAC services and product offerings in your service area reduces the chance that searchers will click on one of your competitors.
3. Paid Search Allows for Geo-Targeting
Most HVAC companies we work with are local—meaning they only service a specific area (as opposed to a manufacturer or commerce business, which offers products all over).
While there are plenty of SEO campaigns for HVAC contractors we use to attract more local business for these HVAC companies, geo-targeting is a lot more precise with paid search. You can tell Google exactly where you service and where you don’t (what’s up, negative keywords? More on those another day!).
The great news about these geo-specific campaigns is that targeting only the cities, counties, states, and zip codes you serve with your PPC campaign will help you generate more relevant traffic—which will ultimately help you increase your account’s Quality Score, lower your bounce rate, increase online conversions, and get more qualified leads from the Web. By limiting your PPC advertising to a defined geographic area, you can focus your marketing budget on the areas that matter most to you. This is extremely ideal for small businesses with small marketing budgets. In general, the more focused the keyword, the more qualified the traffic.
4. Paid Search Allows for Mobile Targeting
If my air conditioner breaks down in the middle of the summer, you can bet your bippy I’m not going to go find a phone book or even my most-likely dead laptop to search for an HVAC company to repair it. I’m going to search for one on my phone, which is probably already in my hand because I’m using it to stalk my boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend on Facebook or something else equally stupid.
You want your ads where your customers are, and more and more often, your customers are searching on their mobile devices—not on their desktops. With more and more searches turning to mobile, having mobile ads can translate to more clicks. In fact, Marin Software recently released a study which projected that mobile would account for 50% of all paid search clicks on Google by the end of 2015.
As you move down your sales funnel, getting more clicks could mean more conversions, as long as your ad and your landing page are well tailored for mobile display (if you’d like more info on optimizing your ads or your website for mobile, just give us a call).
5. There Are So Many Great Extensions to Put in Your Ads!
Google AdWords offers a lot of great ad extensions that work especially well for contractors like you. For example, one proven way to get more people to click on your ad is through review extensions, which display reviews of your HVAC company right within your ad.
Read more about the best PPC ad extensions for contractors.
So Is PPC Worth It for HVAC Companies?
I could list endless reasons why PPC is most likely worth it for your HVAC company, but ultimately, it’s impossible to know for sure until you test it—or at least until you do a little bit of math.
The math includes:
- What are you willing to pay for a new customer?
- How much do you want to grow?
- How well do your sales reps convert leads into sales?
- How effective is your HVAC website at converting visitors (or clicks) into inquiries (leads)?
If you can’t accurately answer each of these questions, it’s impossible to answer the question, “is pay per click advertising worth it for my HVAC company?”
One of the beautiful things about pay per click advertising is that it’s far more science than art. Savvy marketers love PPC because they usually “know their numbers.” Once you identify what you’ll pay for a sale, your inquiry-to-sale conversion rate, and your visit or click-to-inquiry (lead) conversion rate, deciding what you should pay per click and if PPC is worth the cost is a no-brainer.
If you own an HVAC company and you’re willing to pay $200 per sale and your lead-to-sale conversion rate is 50 percent, you should be willing to pay $100 for a lead. If you then find out (through accurate tracking) that your HVAC website converts 10 percent of pay per click visits into leads, you’d know that you could afford to pay up to $10 per click.
Ready to test it out?
Let us do a FREEÂ analysis of your current PPCÂ campaigns!
About The Author: Blue Corona's Editorial Staff is determined to help you increase your leads and sales, optimize your marketing costs, and differentiate your brand by passing on our tribal knowledge. The team vigilantly stays on top of the latest in digital marketing, bringing you the top insights with expert commentary. Want to see something on our blog you haven't seen yet? Shoot us an email and our marketing team will get to work.
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The information on this website is for informational purposes only; it is deemed accurate but not guaranteed. It does not constitute professional advice. All information is subject to change at any time without notice. Contact us for complete details.
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