13 Marketing Ideas For Plumbers

To become successful in the plumbing business you own or manage, you need to bring in a good amount of money. And to bring in a good amount of money consistently, you need to have customers coming in at a steady pace, or even better, a growing amount each month.

Customers keep your business going and if there are no enquiries coming in, you have nobody to sell your services to.

If you target people the right way, you should be able to bring in a decent amount of customers. It’s all in the marketing!

People are searching for plumbers every single day. Are you showing up online? Take a look at our 13 Marketing Ideas For Plumbers below to see if it can help you!

Reasons Why Plumbers Should Use Online Marketing

As you probably already know, plumbing is a very competitive market, and your customer base is usually limited to local people within a set radius. So ideally, you need to be targeting people specifically in that area.

In the age of social media, traditional marketing methods such as placing ads in newspapers, distributing leaflets and radio advertising may not work all that well, and it can be very expensive.

The generation we are working with today will usually always use a search engine to find what they’re looking for quickly. If you’re not appearing on search results or on social media, you will most definitely be losing customers.

We’ve helped a lot of plumbers increase their presence online and this has generated new and recurring leads for them.

We’ve compiled this list of marketing ideas that will help your plumbing business stand out.

Online Marketing Strategies For Plumbers

It’s not enough nowadays to always depend on word of mouth. People generally do prefer searching online first, having access to your services and reviews will help them make the choice of hiring you. This also helps your business look more legitimate.

1. Create A Professional Website

All businesses these days need a good website that not only can be found online, but attracts customers and generates leads. Having a website increases your online visibility and builds trust with your potential customers.

There are things you must keep in mind when designing your own website. Making sure your website is easy to use, targets the right audience and has clear call to actions throughout, making it really easy for your visitors to get in touch.

Another thing that’s really important is to make sure your contact information is always kept up to date on your website, including your address, email address and phone number. Make sure these match your details on Google My Business and any other directories your company uses.

According to BroadbandSearch, as of January 2022, over 55% of traffic comes from mobile phones, so it’s very important to make sure your website is responsive, meaning it works and looks good on all devices.

If you’re unable to create a website yourself and would prefer a professional web design company to do it for you – take a look at our web design for plumbers page. We can help!

2. Add Your Company To Local Directories

With plumbing being so localised, your customers are probably going to find you through local business listings, so it’s absolutely essential to make sure you appear there. As mentioned above, make sure your name, address and phone number matches the ones on your website and all other directories, as this will also help your SEO!

No one tends to look through directory books like The Yellow Pages anymore, it’s all done online. It’s faster, easier and just all round more efficient to do it this way.

Adding your business listing to these websites will make your website seem more trustworthy and will also increase your traffic:

They’re the main ones that you want to be adding your listing to first. But there are loads more:

And here are some specifically for lead generation, usually for tradespeople:

3. SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)

A marketing technique that helps rank your website higher on search engines. On-page optimisation is where you add relevant keywords to your website’s content. When doing this, you really need to get into the mind of your customers. What do they search for on Google to find your company? In most cases this will be “plumbers in your location” e.g. Plumbers in Wigan, but not always. They could be searching for a boiler replacement or someone to fix their pipes. Specific search terms like that are not unheard of, and are quite popular, so it’s always important to optimise for those as well as the main ones.

Google Search Console, once set up, can monitor your website and report back to you what keywords people use to find your site. It also shows what position your website ranks for those keywords. So by looking at the report and finding keywords, you can optimise your website with them, so that your ranking increases.

4. Social Media

According to Smart Insights, more than half of the world’s population use social media. That’s over 4.5 billion people. If you’re not using social media for your business, you will be losing a huge chunk of potential customers.

Not only is social media a great way to show off your work, it allows you to interact with your customers. It helps you build relationships and trust. When you interact with your audience, you get to really know them and they’ll come to know you too. You’ll be the first they’ll call if they need help with plumbing.

By putting a bit of time into social media, you can increase your brand awareness massively, build trust and get more leads.

Share DIY videos that can help your customers. They will trust you more because of your transparency and willingness to help. There’s a lot of things they can’t do themselves when they have a bigger plumbing emergency, and they’ll probably give you a call!

It’s important to find out what platform your target customers usually use and focus on optimising and engaging on that platform. Facebook is usually good, and Instagram is great for showing off work and engaging with customers and other plumbers.

5. Google Ads

Paying for Google Ads will make your business show at the top of Google search results, which in a way, acts as instant SEO. The great thing about Google Ads is that you only have to pay when someone clicks on your ad. It doesn’t matter how many people see the ad, you don’t need to pay more. Just when people click.

And your ad will only show for people that are specifically searching for that search term. So straight away you’re in front of your target audience.

Running ads on Google is quite a common practice and it comes with a lot of benefits:

You get results quickly. With SEO, it can take up to 6 months for results to start showing. But with Google Ads, it’s pretty much instantaneous. You set up your account, specify your target search terms, provide a budget and then they’re ready to go.
Reaching your target audience. Unlike ads on social media, you can really specify who your target audience is, with factors such as age, occupation, gender, location, keywords and even by what device they’re using.
Measurable results. When you’re spending on ads, you want to know what’s working and what isn’t. If it’s not generating any profit, it’s a waste of time and money. As soon as your ad goes live, you can measure everything from clicks, views, visits and cost.
Full control. When analysing your results, you can find out which ads are performing best, during what time of the day and adjust your ads accordingly.
Increase brand awareness. So, you now know you only have to pay when someone clicks on your ad. But not everyone will click on your ad, but they will see it. Thousands of people could see your ad and business name and you wouldn’t have to pay a penny for it.

It’s important to note that Google Ads is quite easy to learn, but that doesn’t mean you will be able to optimise it or make them run as efficiently as a professional company that have been doing it for years. Knowing how many ads to run, what keywords to use, what keywords to not use and everything in between is something that you probably will need help with.

6. Blogging

Every business should have a regularly updated blog on their website. It’s your space, use it to share updates, news, experiences and valuable information with your website visitors. Keeping a blog is great for SEO, especially if you share tips and tricks for common problems that people look for answers to.

Creating unique and engaging content, including your keywords, really helps to grab your audience’s attention.

Plumbers can write blogs on topics like:

How to save money on water?
How to bleed a radiator?
How to fix a blocked drain?

Keyword research is important here, you need to find common problems and provide an easy fix. Well written blogs generate a lot of traffic and social shares, which will get you more backlinks, which will increase your ranking on Google. All of this will help to bring in more leads.

7. DIY Videos

Social media especially Facebook, Instagram and Youtube are full of DIY videos, and it’s because people like them, and search for them a lot.

From our extensive research, we’ve found that most people when dealing with an issue with their plumbing will look on Youtube for a fix. Creating informative video content is a sure way to build trust, show transparency and your willingness to help people, even if they don’t hire you. 9/10 people will decide they don’t want to risk trying to fix it themselves, or they might not have time to after watching how its done. But they’ll still have your video open, and you’ll be there for them to get in touch with.

8. Live Videos

As opposed to DIY videos, live videos allow you to engage with your audience in real time. People can ask questions, send their reactions and share your video to their profile, getting you more viewers. The good thing is that you can react right away, as soon as a question comes through you can answer it. Again, this builds trust with your audience, shows that your a legitimate company and that you’re qualified and knowledgeable in the subject.

9. Online Engagement

Showing your knowledge and expertise online is a great way to raise awareness of your brand. There are a lot of Q&A communities out there, that regularly ask plumbing related questions. It’s your time to shine! Here’s a list of our favourite Q&A communities:

Quora
Answers.com
Facebook groups related to plumbing (we like PlumbChat™️)
Reddit

10. Build A Great Reputation

It can take years to build a good reputation online. But over 90% of customers will read your reviews first, so it’s really important to start asking customers for them as soon as possible. Google reviews also tell Google’s algorithm that you’re legit and trustworthy. An important thing to note is that it could do your business damage if you receive too many positive reviews at once – it looks like spam. It can also look like you have bought reviews. This can flag your company to Google and they can penalise your rankings.

Offline Marketing Strategies For Plumbers

As well as working on your marketing online, you still need to market your business offline too. There are lots of ways you can do this!

1. Network locally

Networking allows you to build a lot of relationships with other businesses in your area. Take business cards with you and promote your business! Attend meetings, meetups and organised events to really get known for what you do in your area.

2. Vehicle Signage

A moving billboard for your business, and a great way to get your name out there for all local people to see. We advise that this is one of the first things you do if you’re just starting out, it really is a great investment that keeps on giving over years and years.

If you’re based in Hertfordshire, we’d definitely recommend using a company like DSigns, but there are vehicle graphic companies all over the UK that can help too!

3. Partner up with another tradesperson

Collaborating with a builder, tiler or anyone else that works closely with plumbers is a great way to bring in more work. Provide competitive rates, but don’t undersell yourself and make sure you set terms and conditions with your partner.

4. Branding

Your brand is everything. For example, you’re driving along and see a massive, brightly lit letter ‘M’, it’s definitely McDonalds, right? You want people to see your logo or an element of your logo such as an icon or specific colour, and instantly associate it with you.

5. Referrals

Creating a referral scheme is a great way to reward your customers for recommending you to their friends and family. It brings in new, regular customers. And people always trust referrals coming from someone they know and trust, instead of just selecting a random plumbing company off the internet.

Referral schemes can generate more leads than cold calling.

Maybe you can offer cash in return for leads, or money off their next boiler service. It doesn’t have to be a lot. Just something to show you appreciate them.

A lot of major companies do this, so it’s definitely worth thinking about!

Conclusion

It can be challenging finding customers for your local plumbing company, but it’s not impossible. By putting in some time and effort, or outsourcing these services to a company like us, The Busy Trader who specialise in plumbing web design and marketing for plumbers, you can start generating leads in no time at all.

If you prefer to do it yourself, set time aside each week to work on the things mentioned above. It’ll be a great start!