Google makes tens of billions of dollars off of search Ads every year. Is any of that even yours anymore? If you’ve wondered whether or not you’re wasting money on Google Ads, then you’re not alone. If you’ve actually stopped spending money on it altogether, then you’re in the majority in the roofing industry. But it’s not time to throw in the towel and look for other lead sources just yet.
Today, I’m going to share the top 5 reasons roofers like you lose money on Google Ads and how you can make it profitable again. Let’s get started!
5 Reasons You Lose the Money You Spend on Google Ads
It is possible for roofing contractors to make money instead of losing money on Google Ads, but they have to do things right by avoiding these 5 common mistakes pictured below.
1. Roofers Write Ads That Are Easily Ignored
If Google Ads (formerly Adwords) is going to work, people have to leave their Google search page and actually visit a roofing website. Just placing ads isn’t enough. They need to be good enough to attract attention.
For that matter, your ads need to stand out with a robust message that’s hard for anyone to ignore. Effective ads make the benefits of your services obvious. They should also separate you from your competitors.
2. Driving Prospects to Your Home Page
The home page of your roofing website might be the first thing many homeowners see when they visit your domain. However, that doesn’t automatically make it a great place to direct PPC ads. You should test, measure and optimize your landing page experience to get the most out of the traffic you already have
Ideally, your roofing website has quite a bit of content and pages. It’s great for SEO, but those long-form pages aren’t always best for PPC. In fact, it can result in distractions in an age where online users have short attention spans. They might just forget why they’re visiting, which is usually to get an estimate.
It’s better to direct PPC ad users to a specific landing page. That landing page should offer them the true value and benefits of your services before asking them to contact your business or fill out a form.
Plus, what if they’re looking specifically for a metal roof or commercial repairs? Putting that person on your homepage may make them think you only do shingle roofs and it might not be very apparent that you want to do commercial work either depending on your content.
Instead it’s best to match up your:
- Keywords
- Ad Copy
- Landing Page
Simply create a new ad group only targeting metal roofs, write effective ad copy that talks about metal roofing and finally, make sure that ad group points to a metal roofing landing page. Do the same for commercial work and any other specific service you offer and your site visitors will know they’re in the right place instantly after they click on your ad. It’s that simple!
PPC ads pointing to your home page might only net you 3 percent in conversions. A properly established landing page targeting specific keywords might do triple that.
3. Failing to Measure Results
Don’t leave the conversion value at zero. Make it a minimum of $1. If you don’t, you’ll never know how much of your business came from ads or not. You need to know:
- If Google Ads is even working for you or not?
- How well Google Ads is working for you?
- Which ads work better than others?
- Whether to put more or less money into each campaign.
Through conversion tracking, you can figure out an exact return on investment from your efforts. If it’s profitable and you know it, you’re less likely to have heartburn over those high costs per click prices in the roofing industry.
4. Letting Costs Intimidate You
Roofing clicks are expensive, and Google Ads isn’t cheap to start with. Depending on your market, you might spend $10 for a click in a low-end area to $20 to $50 in high-end regions. That’s a lot of money just to ask for a visitor to your website.
However, if you do things right, then your conversion rate can be in the 10- to 20-percent range. Worst-case scenario, you might spend $500 in ads just to land one roofing gig. Even if your cheapest roof is $4,000 in profit, that’s a 7x ROI, isn’t it? I’d take those numbers any day for my business and I’d be looking to invest more!
5. Keyword Errors
There are three common keyword errors roofers make:
- Too Many: Overdoing the keyword list risks irrelevant contacts and phone calls that waste time.
- Not Enough: If you’re only using the same keywords as competitors, you’re not getting unique traffic to just you.
- Wrong Ones: Include your service locations in your keyword list. Also, get specific about roof repairs, because you aren’t targeting someone looking for ‘best roof repair materials’.
No, you’re after people looking for the ‘best roof repair service’ instead. Understanding which keywords you want versus the ones you don’t requires a good deal of research, but here’s a list of a few terms all roofers should exclude from their campaigns to serving up ads to the wrong people and wasting money:
- jobs
- careers
- jeep
- car
- camper
There’s many more we could list out just based off past experience in your industry. Those first two are most likely people looking for a job and unless you’re running a recruiting campaign, you should exclude them. The rest show up a lot when people have a leaky sunroof on an older car and unless you’re moonlighting in auto repair, don’t waste your hard earned dollars on those clicks either.
What You Can Do Right
To get better at Google Ads, do the following:
- Target specific keywords that result in more conversions than the others.
- Put time into your account and analytics once a week to make sure results are actually improving over time.
- Scale when the numbers line up. Effective ads mean more business, and you should reinvest your earnings into your best ads.
Or even better…Hire Us!
It Might Not Be Google’s Fault
Keep in mind that your leads are only as good as your website. It has to be optimized and in a good position to convert traffic into the actionable business that puts you or your people on roofs doing projects.
Sign up for our free website audit today. We’ll look through your website top to bottom to find anything keeping you from converting prospects into clients, and we’ll also have a list of steps to correct anything we find that can be improved.
