Local Business Domain Name Selection

One of the biggest tasks when opening a local business is buying a domain and website. It can be a tough task as most .com’s websites domains have been taken. I highly recommend purchasing one ending in com if you can find one to purchase. The reason for this is because most people associate with this high-level domain. I have several times typed in com only to realize that it was supposed to end in net, org or some other of the numerous endings now.

Tips on buying your business’s domain name:

•  Make it easy to type (Slang and hyphens can be hard to type. Avoid numbers also as they can be confusing)
•  Keep it as short as possible (Less than 15 characters preferably)
•  Use Keywords (If you’re a bakery then try to put bakery in your main domain. Just don’t keyword stuff! It is better to go without keywords then trying to force them.)
•  Target your location (If your business is local try putting in your city or state name in the website domain)
•  Be easy to remember
•  Check the name to make sure it’s not trademarked or copyrighted by another company
•  Try to use the name extension .com
•  Try to protect your domain brand name by buying the different extensions and spelling
•  Don’t wait too long as domains come and go quickly

what’s a website domain? Or also known as a web domain or an internet domain.

The simplest way to explain a website domain is it is the address a website is located at. A domain name will be translated into an IP. IP stands for Internet Protocol. The IP address will be associated with a server. On the server resides the website. Servers can be located around the world. For a small business, it is recommended your hosting server resides in the same country as your business.

How do you register a domain?

Don’t rush to register at any company. Keep in mind many times after registering most of these companies will charge you for extras.

First, keep in mind that when buying your fully managed hosting they usually allow you one free domain. Another great way to purchase domains is from Google Domains (https://domains.google). Google Domains gives you Private Registration for free. Where almost all other providers like Godaddy and Namecheap charge extra. Don’t be fooled by their low introductory rates. Also private registration I do not recommend having especially for small local businesses.

Purchase your web domain for the main website from your hosting provider it will make it easier to set up your business website. Especially for those businesses wanting to build their own websites. Any other name variations of your main domain the best domain name registrar Ignited Biz uses is Google Domains.

What happens if the domain I want is not available?

You can use whois to look up the domain owner. Then offer to purchase it. The problem with this is greed. There are a lot of domain squatters out there hoping you’ll pay them a fortune for the domain name.

For local businesses, I would highly suggest putting in your city or state location. For instance, if you own Joe’s Pizza and joespizza.com is taken and you live in Kansas City. You could put JoespizzaKC.com or JoespizzaKansasCity.com do keep in mind the last one is getting a little too long. Hopefully, this will allow you to start thinking of ideas.

Get a website domain today. Put up an under construction page and start building. Setting up a business website correctly takes many weeks of dedication. Google has gotten smarter over the years and the slapping up of content thin sites that aren’t properly updated won’t rank well anymore.

 

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Fully Managed Hosting in the USA

Why do I need fully managed hosting? Hosting is one of the most important features and you don’t want to skimp here. Ignited Biz prides itself in being one of the top Small Business Marketing Companies. Our agency wants to make sure you start with the best.

First, you need to know how websites work.

Here are the basic terms:

– When you open a web browser and put in a website address like Google.com your browser sends a request to the hosting server for the information.

– The Web browser (Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Chrome) connects to the server through an IP Address. The IP address is obtained from translating the domain name Google.com into 126.56.54.38.

– The server sends back the requested page code to form the page being displayed on your web browser.

Web pages are written in HTML, Hypertext Markup Language.

Hypertext markup language describes the layout, format, and content of a page.

The Web browser then renders the page according to the HTML code.

Hosting servers are computers whose job is to respond to a browser’s request. Then deliver a web page through the Internet. A hosting server is like a hard drive that stores your website files and images.

To display your company website on the internet, you need a web hosting provider. Of course, you will have to pay a fee for this hosting. Quality hosting is crucial and is the foundation for building an excellent website.

Can’t I go with free or cheap hosting?

Web sites that run on cheap hosting servers often rank at the bottom. Think of hosting as a neighborhood. Free or cheap hosting the shared server will be filled with cheap and questionable websites.

When the search engines see’s your site on the same server it calls into question the quality of your site.

Paying for quality fully managed hosting service offers you a leg up when it comes to ranking your local company.

Cheap and Free should not be in your vocabulary when searching for hosting for your local business.

Choosing a Fully Managed Hosting Provider:

There are a lot of web hosting providers to choose from.  When ordering hosting, you need to pick a domain name.

In fact, there are so many that people can get stuck and bogged down before their site is even built. This is what causes many small businesses to pick the wrong hosting provider. Often choosing simple builders like Wix and Squarespace and limiting their ability to create a well-ranking website.

Keep in mind we use WordPress for a reason. It’s ranking ability and its flexibility. If you choose to go with these easy designer websites, you will create a nightmare to switch later. Once you learn the power WordPress has compared to these simple website builders, you will want to change.

So, choose carefully! Or you could face slow servers, periods of malfunction, no support, bad support or bad rankings.

What is fully managed hosting?

Fully managed hosting means the service provider keeps all software and security systems up to date.

What company has fully managed hosting here in the United States?

There are many companies to choose from: Bluehost, Hostgator, SIteground, eHost, iPage, JustHost, FatCow, GoDaddy, One and One and many more.

The problem is most don’t have high-quality fast support. Many hosting companies can get rather expensive with all their add-ons. They lure you in with a cheap teaser rate. Most of the time the pricing you see you have to pay for years in advance.

Who has the best customer service when it comes to hosting?

Customer service is a very important topic. I have tried many of the hosting providers mentioned above. Only to become frustrated with their lack of expert support. Or their support is slow to respond. After trying out several fully managed hosting providers, we finally found one that provides top level customer service.

What is GEO Hosting?

Geo hosting has to do with the location of your hosting servers. If you run a local business located in the United States, you don’t want your web hosting coming from Canada or worse yet Russia. Picking out a fully managed hosting option for your local company just make sure the hosting is located in the country your business is.

Conclusion

After using and trying out many different hosting providers I came to the conclusion of only one hosting provider would meet the quality objective and pricing objective – Siteground: FYI the link is an affiliate link and we do appreciate it if you purchase your hosting through the link.

Why did we go with Siteground? Price – Https – and the fantastic support they offer. Chat almost answers questions immediately. Their staff has also been very knowledgeable! Unlike other providers where you even have to explain https to them.

We would appreciate if you use the affiliate link above. If you do just contact us via our contact form. Provide your information including what type of business you’re in and copy and paste your receipt info into the comment section. Make sure the date and time of fully managed hosting purchase shows. We will try to shoot you some information that will help you rank your local business for using our affiliate link.

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Local SEO Company – Do it Yourself or Hire Someone?

Bad Moves to Avoid When Hiring a Local SEO Company

The Secrets they don’t tell you can tarnish your local company website causing it to lose or be banned from the search engines.

In this guide, Ignited Biz will help you to avoid some of the bad mistakes that otherwise smart people make when hiring a local SEO company. We will also point out why it’s not wise to use the free website builders when trying to ignite your online marketing.

Simple questions that you must keep in mind when looking for a local SEO company.

The First question any local SEO company should answer:

Are you located in the United States?

Why is this important? In one word SPAM.

Most of these SEO agencies located outside the USA will try to sell you link building.

Link building is an imperative part in ranking a website.

If link building is done correctly, it will skyrocket your site.

The correct way (White Hat) to build links to your local business is to reach out to other local businesses. Contacting them to see if you can write an article for their site. Then Point a link back to your site. This is called guest posting.

As an owner of a local SEO company, I (Chris Jones) get regularly hit with offers for guest posting. These people are of course wanting money which is considered a black hat technique.

Here is an example of a site they are trying to sell links from.

They claim high DA (domain authority) and high PA (page authority). These are two important ranking factors now that Google did away with PR (Page Rank).

The site had a pretty good DA and PA the problem can be seen in the picture above. The sites linking in are questionable spammy sites. One site that is linking to this domain is in a foreign language which is a cautionary flag.

This is why you need an SEO expert:

This where an SEO expert comes in handy. We have access to the tools to do research on sites before accepting links. As an SEO consultant with Ignited Biz, this is part of my job to be on alert for your company’s website reputation.

When doing website localization, you want someone who speaks English. How can someone who speaks a foreign language relate to where your business is located? Again, remember this article is about local SEO firms for businesses located in the USA. If your company is outside the United States, then you will want to hire someone local from that country.

Buying links for United States companies is a risky venture. If you buy from someone overseas, it is easy for them to take your money and run.

Another example: This SEO Firm in the picture above spends big bucks on paid search. None to minimal Organic Search traffic? Yet they claim to be organic search experts?

The second question any local SEO company should answer:

How does their website stack up to optimization and SEO tests? Do their sites pass well? Or do they flounder?

One important test you want to do before hiring any local SEO establishment is through Google’s mobile-friendly test. https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/

This site separates the SEO professionals from the talkers. If their scores are in the red, it is time to run. It is evident they only throw up junk.

The third question any local SEO business should answer:

From a high level, they should be able to describe how they will go about getting your company results. They should be able to describe that they start with a solid foundation through great web hosting along with a well-optimized site. Then onto website content generation, SEO optimized content, citation building, Schema, link building, PR releases and so forth.

The final questions any local SEO firm should answer:

How do you measure your effectiveness?

If any company is saying, they will get you to the top of Google searches. Just turn and run in the other direction as fast as you can.

It’s impossible for any local SEO consultant to guarantee a number-one ranking on any search engine. SEO experts do make such bogus guarantees. Just consider it a red flag if the candidate claims to have an insider relationship with Google or any other search engine. Only Google, Bing and Yahoo can control how high or low web sites appear in their search results.

To gauge the success of the SEO company’s efforts, you must see tracking results. How much has traffic increased? What keywords is it coming from?

Consultants should be experienced in using software to track improvement in your site’s search engine rankings. The report should also include the number of links from other websites.

Who knows you might not even need to ask for a report. If you see a significant jump in customer traffic. Another great way is just asking your clients. How did you hear about us? They should be able to tell if they searched online. If they were using a mobile device or desktop.

Other Questions:

Who’s my point of contact? If you have questions who will you be dealing with?

Why do customers leave you? I doubt there is any local SEO agency out there that has a perfect record. Customers change their strategies. Companies go out of business for various reasons. I like discussing how I sold services for another company only to realize how awful their service was. That is when I built Ignited Biz, LLC because I wanted to feel great about what I was offering my customers.

The final question to any local SEO company should be:

What sets you apart from other SEO companies?

Do they have another answer besides we will rank you #1? Hopefully, they have a product and special techniques they use and can demonstrate to you.

The Biggest Mistake Business Owners Make:

Is paying to little….

Everyone wants something for nothing, or at the very least.

We want something for a very low price. So why should shopping for a local SEO company be any different?

Let’s compare this to a Roofer. Roofers always try to up sell you to their more expensive shingle. You could say no but would this be wise? A 30-year shingle might be able to stand 120 mph while the cheap shingle only 60 mph. The smart money, in my opinion, would go with the 120-mph shingle. Who wants something that will be damaged by the first storm?

Same goes with cheap local SEO services the first search engine change or review, and your site will go to the bottom or worst yet be blacklisted.

Most people reason to themselves that if they pay thousands of dollars to a local SEO company, that’s money they’re losing.

Whereas when it only costs a couple of hundred bucks for a site, then that’s money they’re saving.

Of course, this is not correct.

The ultimate purpose of a website for local companies should be to be found online, not to cost money.

Here are some common mistakes when people try to skimp. Plus the pitfalls that come with it.

Using “Free” website builders such as Squarespace or Wix:

I use “free” in quotes because I want to bring it to your attention that it truly is not free.

A lot of people ask me about all these simple do it yourself websites. They wonder if I’m not concerned about these “free” sites available now. That they might cut into my business.

The truth is free site builders pale in comparison to a real local SEO company.

Sure, a business owner might be able to drag a picture and put in some text. But does the business owner know how to do search engine optimization? Do they know how to make their site load fast? Do they have the time to monitor, update and build an online marketing campaign?

Then on top of that, we haven’t brought up the limitations these Free sites have. The biggest one being it’s not free unless you want their advertising all over it.

The answer is simple!

If you’re building a real business that you’re looking to make serious money with these do it yourself sites are a waste of money and time. Now if your business is a part-time venture and you never plan on being serious about your business then I could see using the free site builders.

If you have a small or medium sized business the opportunity cost of having a leading industry website. Versus a just good enough site could be a big difference. That amounts to hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue.

Takeaway: Don’t just think of the instant result of saving yourself a few bucks. Think of the long-term impact to your business caused by having an unprofessional site.

Even if you build a website what then? Are you going to do the maintenance?

Free Websites are Time Consuming

On top of that, the DIY (Do It Yourself) website builders will be very time-consuming. Choosing the right SEO strategy is not easy for someone who has never ranked a site before. There are tons of misleading information scattered all over the web.

Another point is a local SEO consultant has to be fine tuning their localization skills regularly. This because search engines and customers search techniques are always changing. Do you want to be studying Search Engine Optimization and Website Optimization?

There are a lot of cheap companies out there that want to make you believe ranking a website is easy. That would be like me saying a plumber’s job is easy or a lawyer’s job is simple.

It’s not easy to rank and build a site correctly. If they say, it is easy most likely their selling you something you don’t want to buy.

The questions you need to ask yourself:

How much time can you devote to build and constantly update a site?

Do you have the desire to learn SEO marketing skills?

Would a cheap site be beneficial? Cheap equals low rankings – low rankings equals waste of money.

What kind of money do you think it should cost? Keep in mind your business – Roofing is cheap… Dental work is cheap… Whats your thoughts when customers say that to you?

If you want to do all those things for your business, you might be in the wrong business

Hire a local SEO company today. Just make sure the agency is up to par.

Give us a call today and have a free consultation with us. After you see the rates and the work going on your site you’ll realize you got a great deal.

There are more MOBILE SEARCHES then compared to desktop and laptop computers and this is likely to keep increasing….  Give Ignited Biz a call today and explode your local marketing.

 

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source https://ignitedbiz.com/local-seo-company/

Best Roofing Website Design Top Rated

Ignited Biz has designed and enjoys building websites for Roofing Contractor Companies. The best roofing website design is simple and I mean simple! Website designers have gotten out of hand when it comes to company websites.

When someone is searching for a roofer in their city:

Do you think they need big bandwidth intensive pictures?

How about a quick loading site? Wouldn’t that be more important?

A simple site where they can find your contact information? Easy to see you offer free estimates?

How about being able to find information about your company and history?

It’s really simple – Keep it simple simple (K.I.S.S) and have it load blazing fast.

Along the way, Ignited Biz identified a few features that not only make roofing contractor websites stand out. But also lead directly to an increase in sitewide engagement and conversions!

Whether you’re a small two-person roofing business or a larger company with multiple locations. Having these features incorporated in your website’s design can be the difference between profit or a loss.

1) Responsive web design

With over 60% of all search engine traffic coming from mobile users. Responsive design ensures that you have a tailored experience for devices of all sizes.

Alienating mobile visitors with a site that is cumbersome to navigate on a phone or tablet. Pinching and panning aren’t acceptable anymore. Responsive web design means the site can scale to different screen sizes. The content will reorder and look good if it is a tablet, cell phone, laptop or a desktop computer.

The benefits of responsive web design for a roofing company are especially significant. Roofer leads drastically increase with a responsive website design.

Frustrating mobile users can lead people to navigate back to search engine results. This is giving your site a black eye in the search engine eyes because they didn’t spend any time on your website.

Responsive design also demonstrates to current and potential clients that your firm is on the cutting-edge of new technology. This will differentiate you from a lot of your competitors with less mobile friendly websites.

Not to mention a responsive design is excellent for SEO. Google not only recommends responsive design as the best way to target mobile users, but it now demands it after the Mobilegeddon algorithm. The search engines favor mobile-optimized sites when they generate their search engine results for mobile devices. Marketing for roofers has and will continue to get more complex.

2) Speed – The Best Roofing Website Design is Quick

Nothing irritates customers than a slow loading site.

Think about this for a second. Do you think they really care about a fancy flashy site? Or do you think they want a clean quick site?

Keep in mind:

Some clients using mobile still have data limits

Cell phones don’t always have the best reception

Some people are stuck on slow internet like AT&T DSL – Uverse – High Speed Internet (What an Oxymoron)

Satellite connections are hit and miss and have download limits

Here is my point by having a website that is data intensive (slow loading) your contractor business will be missing out on all the people with these issues.

3) Quick, convenient methods to contact

Some roofing websites seem to hide the contact information. The best roofing website designs should always give users several ways to quickly get in touch with the business. Those are the one’s I can think of quickly off the top of my head.

In fact, when a user is on a desktop the phone number needs to be displayed easily for them to find. This is allowing them to pick up their phone and dial. When a user is on your roofing site using a mobile phone, it should display a click to call button.

it’s also important that users have options. Using contact forms, click to call, email just giving the customer options will increase your conversion. As humans, we are all different some would rather email while others want to talk to a person. Having options will keep potential customers in their comfort zone.

4) Blog for content creation

Content marketing can get overwhelming. But creating and distributing valuable, relevant and consistent content on your website is a great attraction for the search engines.  When the search engines like the new content they tend to rank your site higher.  This has to be quality content though as artificial intelligence gets smarter and smarter, it is hard to trick them. Even if you did manipulate the search engines with poor content, they would eventually catch you causing your site to crash.

This is where it is important that if you’re not going to do the work yourself. Make sure to hire someone who is going to do the job right.

5) Linking and Reaching Out

Next, a website doesn’t exist without backlinks. Having the best roofing website design does you no good without backlinks. Backlinks are where other sites link to your site. You will have to reach out to other sites to see if you can write an article that they will post and link it back to your site. This is a time-consuming task but is one of the most valuable items in contractor marketing.

6) Social media on Roofing sites

Roofers are definitely not early adopters of social media. This is where you can shine with the correct material. Social media usage for roofing contractors is on the rise. Including social profiles will give your team members personality, builds their brand and provides direct access to prospective clients. FYI the social profiles on Ignited Biz are my own. I think this shows I am here for the long haul and will do my best. I wouldn’t want my friends and family to find out differently. By a company owner hiding their profiles it always makes me wonder if they stand behind their work.

7) Don’t use stock photos

It’s easy for your visitors to spot stock photography. Putting a face with the roofing company and showing off your offices by using your team builds credibility. Make sure when taking shots that you have location services turned on. Using this will Geo Tag the photo and greatly helps with local search.

Conclusion

The best roofing website design will include all 7 of the above. These 7 tasks anyone is capable of doing with time and perseverance. Keep in mind this is only scratching the surface to building the best roofer website.

Here at Ignited Biz, we not only include these but also have a proprietary theme that is very mobile optimized. Having the best website is an ongoing task and gets pretty complicated once you go beyond the basics.

Interested in learning more about rebuilding your roofing company’s website? We’re here to help! Learn more about Ignited Biz’s website and SEO services.

 

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source https://ignitedbiz.com/best-roofing-website-design-top-rated/

Marketing for Roofers – 3 Inexpensive Steps

A big discussion topic among roofing contractors is marketing. How do I get more roofing leads? Marketing for contractors doesn’t have to be hard.

There seems to be a lot of small business owners wanting to find the “magic bullet”! Some dirt-cheap way of generating leads consistently.

It amazes me how many small business owners use the word cheap in their searches. But yet these same business owners complain when customers want to get the best deal.

Cheap marketing for roofers doesn’t exist. However, there are ways to generate leads inexpensively.

This article will examine two inexpensive, yet very effective methods for marketing your roofing business.

3 Steps to Inexpensive Marketing for Roofers

These actions are powerful and cheap ways Contractors Market.

The first major step in proximity marketing is usually skipped. This method involves marketing around an existing or one of your upcoming projects. The strategy here is to create multiple exposures for your company in a very targeted area and in a very short period of time. There is a huge chance that if your customer needs roofing repair, that their neighbors do as well.

There are a few ways to market to the neighbors. You can mail postcards to a select number of neighbors. Building brand awareness and forge memory of your business. This way even if they don’t need a roof right away they will remember your company every time they look at their neighbor’s new roof. An excellent way to get your business name to stick is to mail to the same homes multiple times. Using different message each time you send an advertisement. First, you could announce that you will soon be starting a new roofing job in the neighborhood. A second card could announce that you are offering free roof inspections. The third card could entail the consequences of not getting their roof checked out.

Signage in the Yard

The second step to proximity marketing is to put a sign in the yard. The longer the sign is in the yard, the more exposure you will get.

The third step of proximity marketing is door hangers. Just spend a few minutes each day distributing door hangers to the neighboring houses. You are already in the neighborhood, so the only cost to you is the printing of the hangers. Just doing 10 to 20 a day will create major exposure for your roofing company.

The combination of the sign, mailings, and door hangers will help stick your company’s name in potential customer’s minds.

Despite the effectiveness of these steps, many contractors fail to do the steps.

When advertising a roofing business don’t overlook the power of proximity marketing. Include them in your advertising mix. When combined with a strong online marketing campaign you’ll have more roofing leads then you know how to handle.

I hope you enjoyed the short post on marketing for roofers. I would appreciate it if you share the article if you found it useful.

 

The post Marketing for Roofers – 3 Inexpensive Steps appeared first on Ignited Biz.

source https://ignitedbiz.com/marketing-for-roofers-3-inexpensive-steps/

Roofing Leads Exclusive Contractor Marketing

Could you use exclusive roofing leads?

Want to grow your residential and commercial roofing company?

Are you a Roofer looking for new customers?

Advertising for roofing companies can be expensive, and you never really know the number of quality leads you will generate from traditional advertising methods. In the past construction contractors including roofing contractors would advertise in local newspapers, on radio, place a sign on the front lawn of the house they are working at. Some would even canvas the area and hand out pamphlets and door knocker flyers. That is a rough way to generate leads. The yellow pages are not where people look anymore to find an AC repair man or roofing contractor. They now turn to Google, Yahoo, or Bing search engines.

Promotions like direct mail for roofing leads is hit and miss. If you target an area recently affected by a hailstorm you might be too late. Most people will have called a roofer already by the time your mail is printed and sent. The majority of homeowners have already signed a competitors contract.

Online Exclusive Roofer Leads

Quality exclusive roofer leads come from having your own online lead generation system. This means you’re not having to deal with other painting contractors trying to sell your customer. There is no race to see who can give the roofing customer the lowest price. This will allow you to maintain your margins while at the same time creating goodwill with the customer as they are not receiving numerous calls.

The lead system starts with a highly-optimized website that is specifically designed to generate roofing leads. Nearby towns you serve will have specific optimization done for them.

Next, promoting the local roofing company through search engines. We promote it to all the major search engines Google, Bing, and Yahoo, and in online directories. Additionally, your business will be advertised on other favorite sites frequented by area residents. People use these sites in search of residential and commercial roofing services such as Yelp, Merchant Circle, and Kudzu.

Select Roofing Leads

The biggest difference between Ignited Biz and other large lead companies is they rely on generic leads and sell a single lead to multiple roofing contractors. At Ignited Biz we develop leads that pre-sell your painting company, and your brand. We only market one roofer per 50-mile radius! That means quality exclusive leads!

Through the massive online promotion of your roofing business, area customers will find and call you directly. Generation exclusive roofing leads will allow you to be more selective. Imagine, private roofing leads directly to your phone and email! Plus the best thing is the longer you use our Lead Generation System; the more roofing leads you will receive each month!

The best part of Ignited Biz’s Contractor Marketing Program is it includes building you a proprietary website. An incredibly fast site continually optimized for local search. It will come with feature rich content about your roofing business. The design will talk about your local market, your employees and so much more.

Best Part? We do all the boring online work!

Do you know the best part of being in our exclusive Contractor Marketing Program? We build the website, do all the online advertising, marketing, SEO, social media. We handle the A to the Z for your online marketing with our Premium Marketing Plan.  This allows you to handle what you do the best roofing! Just pay a fixed rate each month for exclusive roofing leads. No matter the number of leads you get. You have my word (Chris Jones, Owner) we will explode your marketing.

 

The post Roofing Leads Exclusive Contractor Marketing appeared first on Ignited Biz.

source https://ignitedbiz.com/roofing-leads-exclusive/

Contractor Marketing

Contractor Marketing That Generates Quality Leads!

After jumping through the fire hoops to start a contractor business. Picking what type of business entity, licensing and insurance is enough to drive most people insane.

It’s now time for the rubber to meet the road. It’s time to market your new contracting company to acquire clients. As a contractor by trade, marketing is probably not something you look forward to. Most People can successfully market their business with the right tools and with the right guidance. Being the owner of the company you will have to decide if you want to add these tasks to your plate or hire someone.

Questions to ask:

Will I have time to do the marketing when I get busy with my actual trade?

Do I want to learn and study how to successfully market online?

Time as any person knows is scarce especially with being a business owner. Once you get busy are you going to be able to keep doing everything necessary for contractor marketing?

• Website Updates
• Posting
• Interactions Online
• Link Building
• Guest Posting
• Citations and so forth….

If you don’t keep doing the above things and improving your business leads will dry up possibly causing you to close your local business.

Ignited Biz, LLC put this guide together to help ignite your contractor marketing. This will provide the starting information and resources on marketing for contractors. This article includes the basic information on how to establish your business presence online and simple online marketing tactics for attracting business leads. We also will discuss traditional marketing and what still works. This post will also discuss other various ideas to set your marketing campaign in motion.

This information can be used one of two ways:

As a guide to hiring a business marketing coach. That way when talking to the marketing coach you will have a basic grasp of what is required.

Second way is if you are willing to devote the time and effort this will be the beginning guide for the DIY (Do It Yourself Crowd)

In This Marketing for Contractors Post:

·         Why Marketing Correctly is so important for Contractors

·         Contractor Website Design and Setup

·         Online Marketing: The ABC’s

·         Local Advertising

·         Dinosaur Advertising

·         Conclusion

Why Marketing Correctly is so important for Contractors

Marketing your contracting business is going to be an ongoing effort. If you decide to handle the online advertising yourself then you will have to keep up to date with all the ongoing changes.

Gone are the days of throwing a website online and ranking it high on the search engines.

Most business owners realize that marketing their services is a top priority for maintaining a steady pipeline of work. The thing is most business owners are often unsure what promotion initiatives are best-suited for reaching their target customers.

First of all contractor marketing isn’t as simple as it was in our parents and grandparents time. You would run a big ad in the Yellow Pages, Newspaper, Direct Mail or Homes Magazine. Of these, I would say direct mail still works when in combination with an excellent website.

Fancy Slow Website = Poor Rankings

FYI – Great website doesn’t mean fancy graphics with huge pictures. A great site is one that is fast loading providing your potential clients information quickly. Just as I mentioned before time is one of the scarcest things we all have and who wants to wait for a contractor company site to load?

Second, the online landscape has changed drastically in the past few years. With people carrying mobile devices around some with small screens and some as big as my old tube TV screen. Gone are the days of desktop and laptop computers. The mobile device is now the number one device used to do online searches.

With mobile devices being the number one device to do online searches it is important to have a fast loading site. Can you imagine a customer out driving around and see’s one of your yard signs and they do a search then? Only for your site never to load or that it is unusable….

Another factor in a great site is having the mobile site and desktop site in the same format. You don’t want customers using their mobile devices having to hunt for the information that was so easy for them to find on the desktop computer.

Social media is also a valuable tool for construction contractors to reach customers. This post will concentrate on website promotion with a social media marketing post to soon follow.

Contractor Website Design and Setup

Promoting your contracting business online requires you to set up a business website. A website is an expanded business card. People are always researching online, and a company without a website just doesn’t exist in most people’s eyes today. A site not only gives them more information but it can show stability and knowledge.

Think for a minute would you hire a company with a site over one without? No matter how good of a salesperson the person you talk to is, the contractor business without a site would leave a lot of questions in a potential customers mind.

Questions that a great website can help alleviate:

Is this company around for the long haul?

Is this contractor company one of these card table firms that will fold up and move to the next town? Leaving me high and dry with uncompleted or shabby work……

Quality well-optimized sites are not easily setup, but it can be quite cost-effective to hire an online marketing agency to build a professional website.

There are many sites out there that say it is as easy as 1,2,3 to setup a website.

If you are looking for a inexpensive way to go that someone might be able to take over and market for you down the road. Then go with WordPress. WordPress is the most versatile site builders out there.

Be cautious of Wix, Squarespace and other sites offering simple business website builders. Often these big companies don’t use the newest technology and to get the most bang for your buck you will be disappointed in the long run.

In the picture above I used Google Insights to show WordPress vs Wix vs Squarespace. As you can see WordPress (blue) wins.

WordPress has a huge community of independent developers and not to mention it runs over 25% of all websites online today.

Again, choose wisely as once you start your site, it is very difficult and expensive to switch.

Online Contractor Marketing: The ABC’s

Online marketing is a complex field. With so many marketing channels and opportunities to engage with potential customers, it can quickly get confusing and frustrating. It is especially overwhelming for new contracting companies and ones too busy with other work activities.

After building a website, you will need to claim other online properties. For instance, Google My Business, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram and much more.

Contractor marketing will include setting these other sites up along with generating content.

FYI – Content is King – The more quality content your site has, the easier it is for someone to find you.

For inbound marketing to be successful in generating leads, you will need to build links. Local citation building along with content for guest posting and press releases.

These above activities are all things you will need to do after build a website. If you don’t your website will never rank high in search engine rankings.

Local Advertising

Offline advertising is one of the most efficient ways to get new business, especially when combined with online marketing. You will want to use local advertising to boost your business. Here are some tactics to use and how to use them.

Start participating and attending local affiliations and build relationships to help earn referrals from other professionals. Networking at local business events is one of the best ways to drum up new business leads.

Referral rewards are very helpful for encouraging customers to recommend your services to friends and family. Maybe you can use your relationship that you established at a networking event to offer gift cards to your new friends’ business. They will then feel obligated to help you earn more business for helping them out.

Take out ads on local blogs. Hometown bloggers are a lot more persuasive than people give them credit for. Just reach out to the blog owner and send them a message to ask how much to advertise on their site. Who knows maybe all you must do is write an article for them and they might post it for free.

Sponsor a youth sporting team. Saving the parents, the cost of the uniforms will be a huge plus for your company. It’s a great way to show that you care about your local community.

Start a single YouTube channel with instructional videos that inform people how to do small construction tasks. While they may decide to “DIY” instead of hiring you for this one task. You will earn their trust and hopefully any future projects.

Run a contest. People love free things (even the chance to win something for free). By running a contest for something like decorations for their home, you will potentially collect hundreds or even thousands of leads.

Dinosaur Advertising

The yellow pages have been around for decades and once was considered the standard in advertising.

When was the last time you used the Yellow Pages?

For me, the Yellow Pages go directly to the recycle bin.

Newspaper ad’s are not a good ROI for a business anymore. In fact even my parents who are in their 70’s don’t get the newspaper anymore.

Direct mail is the only traditional advertising I would spend my money on. Direct mail when combined with a great offer/incentive and a strong online presence can work very well for contractor marketing.

Conclusion

With so many steps for marketing your contracting business, it’s no surprise that many contractors simply don’t know where to start. I hope this post helped you in grasping the complexity to online marketing. The methods and advice above barely touched the surface. If you decide to do it yourself you will need to dig further and start learning about https, H1 title tags, Schema Markup, Amp, Meta Tags, Geo Tagging, Keywords and much more to be successful.

Running a website is much more work than most people realize. Building it doesn’t mean people will show. Which road do you want to take? Long curvy DIY road? Or do you want to leave the marketing to a expert and do what you love?

Just like people finishing a basement. They can do it themselves. Will they do it right? Do they really realize the amount of work it takes? What about costly mistakes? Will they have the time to finish it?

Running a contractor business and handling day to day activities is enough to drive a business owner insane. Ignited Biz is here to manage your business’s marketing just contact us for a free consultation.

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