Getting found on Google.
Your website is built to be found. These are the things only you can do to help it along. Most are free, and none takes more than an afternoon.
The latest version of this page is always at sitesfortrades.net/getting-found
- Set up your free Google Business Profile. Nothing else on this page matters as much.
- Ask every customer for a Google review, the day you finish the job.
- If you want to pay for leads, try Local Services Ads before regular Google Ads.
- Put your web address on everything: the truck, your signs, your cards, your invoices.
- Hang up on anyone who calls promising you first place on Google.
1. Your Google Business Profile
This is what puts you on the map when someone searches “roofer near me”: the box with a map and three businesses, above the ordinary results. For a local trade it is worth more than anything else here, and it costs nothing.
- Start at business.google.com, signed in with the Google account you want to own it. Use one you will still have in five years.
- Use your real business name, the one on your license or business certificate. Adding words to it (“Best Roofer Suffolk County”) is against Google’s rules and gets profiles suspended.
- If you work at your customers’ homes, set it up as a service-area business. You list the towns you cover, and your home address stays hidden.
- Pick your main category carefully. Choose the one that says what you mostly do, then add others for the rest.
- Fill in everything: phone, hours, your web address, the services you offer, and a short description in your own words.
- Add photos of real jobs, and keep adding them. A profile that gets new photos looks like a business that is busy.
- Google will ask you to verify it. Often that is a short video showing your truck, tools or signage; sometimes a phone call, text, email or postcard. Do it as soon as they ask. The profile does not show until you do.
2. Reviews
Reviews on your Google profile are what people read before they call. They count for far more there than anywhere else.
- Ask every customer, the day you finish. Your profile has an “Ask for reviews” link. Text it to them while they are still pleased.
- Reply to every review, good and bad. A calm, polite answer to a bad review does more for you than a string of perfect ones.
- Do not offer anything for a review: no discount, no gift card. Google does not allow it, and offering anything in exchange for a good review breaks federal rules as well.
- Ask everyone, not just the happy ones. Asking only the customers you expect to be pleased is also against Google’s rules.
- Never write your own, or have family or friends write them. Google removes them, and it can suspend the profile.
3. Paying for leads: start with Local Services Ads
These are the listings at the very top of many trade searches, with a badge showing Google has checked the business. You pay when a customer actually contacts you, not every time somebody clicks. Before you are listed, Google runs checks on the business: usually background, license and insurance, depending on your trade.
For most home-service trades this is the better first thing to pay for. You set a budget and can pause it any time. It is not offered for every trade in every area yet, so check whether yours is covered.
4. Regular Google Ads, carefully
Regular ads charge you for every click, whether or not the person ever calls. They can work, but they are the easiest place on this page to lose money, because Google’s default settings are built for reach, not for a two-truck business.
- Start with a small daily budget you would not miss.
- Show the ads only in the towns you actually serve.
- Turn off the “Display Network”. That is banner ads on other websites, not search.
- Add the words you do not want to pay for as “negative keywords”: jobs, salary, DIY, how to.
- Try Local Services Ads first, and come back to these once you know what a lead is worth to you.
5. Free listings, fifteen minutes each
Each of these is another place people look, and none of them costs anything.
- Apple Business Connect: Apple Maps and Siri, which is what an iPhone shows by default.
- Bing Places: it can copy your Google profile across in a few clicks.
- Nextdoor: where neighbors ask each other who to hire.
- Facebook and Yelp: claim your free page and link it to your website. You do not have to buy ads from either of them to be listed.
Use the same business name, phone number and web address everywhere. Listings that match each other look more trustworthy, to Google and to customers.
6. Your web address on everything
Most people who see your truck will not call from the road. They look you up later. Put the web address, not just the phone number, on the truck, on your yard signs (with the homeowner’s OK), and on your business cards, estimates and invoices.
7. Answer fast
The first contractor to call back usually gets the job. An enquiry from your website goes straight to your inbox, so turn on notifications for that email on your phone and reply the same day, even if it is only to say when you can come and look.
8. Send me photos
Photos of finished jobs go on your website as part of the monthly service, usually within the week. A site showing last month’s work reads as a business that is working. Before-and-after pairs of the same job are the best of all.
What to ignore
- “Your Google listing is about to be removed unless you pay.” Google Business Profile is free, and Google does not phone to demand payment for it.
- “We guarantee you first place on Google.” Nobody can guarantee that, including me. Google says so itself.
- Anyone selling reviews, or offering to make bad ones disappear for a fee.
What your website already does
The technical part is done for you. Your site tells Google what kind of business you are and which towns you serve, in the format Google reads. It loads quickly, works on a phone, and gives each page one clear address. None of that needs anything from you.
What it cannot do is the list above. That part is yours, and it is what decides whether your site gets seen.
Questions
If something here does not make sense, or Google asks you for something you are not sure about, ask me. Mike@sitesfortrades.net, or 631.681.4129.