So what's the best online marketing plan for a roofing company?  Let's talk about it. 

Now this is exactly what I would do for most industries that have a product or service that needs customers, but in this blog post I'm going to use the commercial roofing industry as the example.  

If you had a restaurant, a hotel, or a construction company, I'd follow these same steps with only minor tweaks. 

Here is What You'll Learn

By the time you are done reading this article, you should have a clear picture of how to "market" your roofing business online. Where the best places are to advertise right now, the best way to maximize your advertising dollars, and get your ads in front of your ideal clients.

Because let's be honest, in today's market it's getting more and more competitive, which means advertising costs are rising.

Especially on Facebook. 

If you don't have a good clear strategy in place for your the online marketing side of your business, you're most likely going to get beat up, think it doesn't work, and maybe even quit marketing online altogether. 

But if you do it right you can become very successful with finding customers online, without wasting tons of money by "boosting" a Facebook post. 

I also want to note, this is only what I would do in the ONLINE side of growing your business. If you're also advertising offline, keep at it if it's working!

What Makes Someone Decide to Take Action? 

I'm talking about when they see your ads online. What makes them reach out to you saying, "Hey I need my roof repaired, can you give me an estimate?"

That is obviously your goal with ads, right? Get them to reach out to you and ask for an estimate. 

But as you may or may not have found out already, it's not easy to do that. 

Let's Look at Some Numbers

The 80%...

They are looking for information. They are probably thinking that sometime in the next year we are going to have to replace or repair our roof. 

So let's give them the information! This is the largest percentage of people and we need to keep in mind they are only looking at this point.

That's why it's so powerful to have a blog and write a blog post every week or at least once per month educating people on how you do your roofing, why one kind of roof is better in certain cases versus others....etc..

Videos are also great for educating people, when you are out on the roof somewhere consider doing a Facebook Live or just record a video and tell people why you do this like this. 

Facebook is All About The User Experience

On Jan. 11, 2018 Mark Zuckerberg announced that he's making some changes to the algorithm to better focus on the user experience. 

So if you can keep that in mind when you run ads, create content that people love!

According to bufferapp.com here are the 3 positives and 3 neutrals about Facebook's algorithm  today. 

So commenting, sharing, and reacting are the 3 best reactions you want to get from your content. Also replies to comments are also great! So make sure you respond to all the comments on your ads.

So the Best Ad is a Value Based Pc of Content

Something that is so awesome that people can't help but comment or share your STUFF! That usually takes time and energy to create. 

So put some serious thought and time into creating that awesome ad (video is probably best)! Because it only takes 1 great ad for you to make thousands or hundreds of thousands dollars. (maybe even millions)

Keep in mind that you want to stay in front of your interested people that weren't ready to buy yet. Here's how we are going to this.

How you stay in Front of Them

Remember those guys that were somewhat interested in your roofing services but their roof isn't leaking TOO bad yet? (not ready yet) 

Here's where you should create and use custom audiences to now only run your ads to the people that showed interest in your services to begin with. 

Let me walk you thru a scenario of an actual ad run I'd do. 

Let's start with an engagement or a traffic ad.

You're going to target business owners that live within a certain distance of the city you want to cover. (Depends how far you want to drive)

Now let's say that area and that targeting has 20,000 people in that audience. You are going to spend probably a couple hundred dollars to get that ad in front of all those people. The more engagement and the better your ad the less expensive it'll be to show all 20K people. 

Now remember only a small percentage will actually need a roof now or in the near future. Let's say 100 people actually clicked on our ad and visited our website. (hopefully it'll be more, but we'll use 100 in this example)  

This is where it starts to get really good!

Now you create a custom audience of only the people that visited your website and you start another ad that you only show to those people. 

This is referred to as a re-targeting ad.

This time you can show your ad to those 100 people for only a few dollars. (maybe $10-$20) Remember these are the people that showed enough interest in your ad to actually click on your website and check out your business!

Very powerful!

This is Also for Branding Purposes

Your BRAND is not your logo! Yeah I know I should write a whole nuther blog post on that one! 

Or if someone asks for a referral for a commercial roofer, who is the first person that comes to their mind? 

Will it be you or your business?

If you run retargeting ads and keep your name and your ads in front of the ones that showed interest, they are much more likely to refer you to others!

Especially if your ads are CONTENT that is awesome!

How do you Set This Up?

It's really not that complicated! Inside the Facebook ads manager there's a piece of code called a Facebook Pixel. (Also known as a cookie)

You copy and paste that piece of code into the Header section of your website and then every time someone visits your website they get added to this "bucket" or custom audience you can now create and hit them with re-targeting ads. 

Every time the  pixel "fires" it allows you to have that person in your custom audience for up to 180 days. That's the max that Facebook allows you to have them in your custom audience. 

​​In this video I show you how to grab the Pixel code and copy and Paste it into your website.

You can also create custom audiences in other ways as well. People that watched your videos, people that engaged with your page or posts, email lists of your customers... etc...  

I just personally think re-targeting with the Pixel is probably one of the easiest and quickest ways to do it.   

In Summary

Facebook ads and marketing are a great way to get your name out there and get in front of your ideal customers at a decent price. 

10 - 15 years ago it was Google. But the price of Google ads today is much much higher than it was back then. What used to cost $.05 - $.15 per click on Google is now $10-$20 per click. The glory days of Google adwords has passed and now it's Facebook's time!

According to experts like Gary Vee, the next 18 to 24 months will be the great yet for Facebook ads. But eventually the competition for ad space will be so high it'll drive the price up and people will start advertising elsewhere again.

But until that happens.... make the most out Facebook ads right now and build yourself some Custom Audiences and run yourself some COOKIE ADS! 🙂

If you can stay in front of your interested audience long enough with GREAT CONTENT you will get results with your ads!

Click here if you need help getting that set up!

Happy Advertising and don't forget to leave a comment below with your thoughts and share with others that need to hear this!