Friday, March 30, 2012

5 social media SEO strategies roofing contractors should do right now

Social media should definitely be part of your roofing company's marketing strategy, and now is the time to harness the power of your accounts specifically to power your SEO strategy.

Google has long relied on people to endorse relevant and useful links on the internet. Social media has now magnified that tremendously, particularly now with Google Social Search becoming so important, enabling your website or blog post to jump from #50 otherwise into the top 5 in someone's search results page simply because someone they are connected to shares your link on Facebook or LinkedIn, gives it a +1 on Google+, re-Tweet's it on Twitter, etc.

Here are 5 social media SEO strategies roofing contractors should do (or keep doing) right now:

1. Be more active on Google+
Google+ is here to stay for a while, and it is extremely useful for SEO. It's not as big as Twitter or Facebook, but it affects search results much more than the others.

2. Establish even more connections online
Everything you write or share can be seen by those who you are connected to on social media, as well as in their search results. Although any connection is good, the biggest impact comes from people adding you to one of their Google+ circles. For more on this, please see my blog post 'Social media directly influences search rankings'.

3. Post your articles, videos and blog posts immediately on social media
Sharing your content on social media helps it get indexed by Google faster, so make sure you post new content you create across all platforms as soon as possible.

4. Create sharable content
If someone shares a link to your website or other content, it is basically an endorsement (similar to a direct inbound link). Even if someone who isn't connected with you on social media shares a link to your content, their entire network can see the post by searching for relevant topics in Google Social Search. Again, please see my blog post 'Social media directly influences search rankings'.

5. Add the +1 button to everything
The +1 button has turned into an internet-wide Facebook "Like" button. It is quick and easy for people to click, and gives your content huge benefits. Put that +1 button everywhere you can and ask people to click it.

None of this should be considered a replacement to (or even better than) traditional SEO methods, but it is becoming increasingly important. Not everyone knows this, so the faster you do it the more of a leg-up you'll have on your competition.

If you have any questions about social media SEO, please email RoofPal@gmail.com.

Friday, March 16, 2012

Is your roofing website optimized for the wrong things?

The focus of most roofing contractor websites are on the solutions they provide – re-roofing, new construction and repairs, as well as the various types of systems and brands they install. Many of these websites are optimized well for search engines, but is that really what homeowners, building owners, and property & facilities managers are looking for when they search on Google?


Think about how you search for answers to various questions online. Likely you search using words that describe the problem - not the answer. After all, if you knew the answer you wouldn’t have to search for it.

We go through five stages to solve a problem:
  • Stage 1: I don’t know there’s a problem.
  • Stage 2: I know there is a problem, but I don’t know what the solution is.
  • Stage 3: I know there is a problem, and I know what the solution is.
  • Stage 4: I know there is a problem, and I’m ready to implement the solution.
  • Stage 5: I have solved the problem.
If you optimize your roofing company's marketing for Stage 1, you are trying to create awareness of a problem in which you have a solution for. The problem is that there is no pain to address – you have to create it out of fear or speculation (Do you have a roof leak? Was your roof affected by the latest hail storm? Is it time for a new roof? etc.).

Optimizing your roofing company's marketing for Stage 2 is the sweet spot: your potential customer has a problem and no decided solution.

When you optimize roofing company's marketing for Stage 3, you are competing on all the factors that diminish your profits or make you lose jobs to your competitors. The customer is actively collecting bids and you now have to beat the price, value, and conveniences they have already been promised.

To market your roofing company based on Stages 4 and 5 is to fight the customer. You are fighting a decision that has already been made, and you now have to convince them that their decision was the wrong one. It can be done, but ultimately you have to create dissatisfaction with their original decision. The only time you will win bids this way is when the competition completely screws up or is trying to rip off the customer.

Your challenge is to identify what customers issues are when they are in Stage 2 and re-optimize your marketing around the questions they type into search engines when looking for the answer. This includes rewriting your website and blog content to focus around the problems people would be searching for, rather than the solutions you offer. The results should be immediate and significant.

Look carefully at your marketing (both online and offline). Are you focusing on the solutions, or are you focusing on the customer’s problems? If you would like assistance with this, please email RoofPal@gmail.com.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Facebook Timeline cover ideas and examples for roofing contractors

It looks like Facebook Timeline is here to stay (at least for a while), as it is now mandatory for all business pages effective March 30, 2012. Not everyone "likes" it, but we do need to make the best of it. Have you noticed a very valuable piece of real estate at the top of your page? Yes, your cover photo!

How are you using the Facebook Timeline cover photo today? Are you not using anything at all? Is there an oddly-cropped picture of a job you've done, your logo, or maybe your crew or office staff? I think there is definitely an opportunity to get creative with this space. I have a few ideas, but I need your help to come up with a great list of ideas and examples.

For the RoofPal Facebook Timeline cover I show examples of some of the different services I offer roofing contractors and material manufacturers and distributors such as articles I have written and had published, some brochures, a roofing project recap presentation, a video blog, and a magazine ad. There are other examples of my work I will use in future Timeline covers as well, but the idea here is to quickly convey what it is I do and give a sense of the quality of work.


Here is an example I did for Rhino Tuff Roofing in Texas:



Here is an example I did for Starkweather Roofing in Arizona and New Mexico to line up a few nice pictures of completed jobs so potential customers know exactly what kind of roofs (size, slope, system, etc.) they install:

And here is an example I did for Arnett Construction in Indiana to give homeowners a sense of what hail storm damage to their shingle roofs looks like:


The possibilities are almost endless, and I will continue posting more examples on this blog post as I think of or come across more. Please follow or and subscribe to this blog to keep updated on the latest. If you have an example (yours or someone else's) that you think would be great for the roofing industry, please leave a comment in the box below and include a link to the Facebook page.

If you would like to create a Facebook Timeline cover photo for your roofing company, the image should be 850 pixels wide and 315 pixels tall to maximize the space without anything getting cropped out or having unused white space. If you would like me to design one for you, feel free to email me at Chris@RoofPal.com for pricing.

Monday, March 5, 2012

How much would you pay to stay anonymous?

I am going to be launching an experiment soon that has multiple benefits: educate the roofing industry on marketing while either building my private contact list or making money, and to see just how valuable your privacy is. I hope you'll play along.


The experiment involves writing a short but comprehensive e-book that gives the "secret formula" for using social media to create exposure of your roofing company, to engage deeper with your customers (past, existing and future), to improve your online communications, and to increase your sales. It is a formula that I know works because multiple roofing business owners pay me handsomely to do this for them (and they are seeing tremendous results).

Here's the catch: you will be able to download the e-book for free, provided you fill out a form with all the contact information I request (which is verified prior to you receiving the download to ensure you aren't making up a fictitious identity). If you prefer to not give up that information, you can just pay $19.95 and get the e-book immediately without having to provide any information.

Provided you wanted to read this e-book (which is non-transferable and can not be posted online for others to read for free), which path would you choose? Is keeping your information out of my contact database worth $19.95? Is it worth $39.95? More?

Please leave a comment below with your thoughts. I want this to be educational, valuable for all, and a fun experiment. You can also email me at Chris@RoofPal.com if you prefer.