5 min read
Background
One of our clients from the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area founded their boutique remodeling company, 35 years ago. They are one of the most reputable design-build companies in the city and have created some of Pittsburgh’s most noteworthy custom renovations and remodels.
As one of the longest-running remodeling companies in Pittsburgh, they are known for high-quality craftsmanship and design throughout the area. Their design-build process fosters a team spirit approach to focus on the budget and construction of every project they encounter.
These remodelers partnered with Builder Funnel in March of 2016 and came to us looking to expand their online presence and create a strong marketing plan for years to come that would naturally bring in qualified leads. For 6 years Builder Funnel partnered together with them to do just that. Most recently, we noticed new marketing trends and opportunities with paid ads. We then expanded our marketing activities by creating and running Facebook Ads for their services.
The Challenge
This particular client is known in Pittsburgh for its fine craftsmanship and luxurious remodels. The challenges we faced and conquered over the years have always been ever-changing with this market. Most recently we came across a new challenge to differentiate from the competition and get ahead by generating qualified leads that will set the company up with great job opportunities in the coming years. And Builder Funnel has consistently found new ways for them to remain ahead of the competition and continue to bring in their ideal prospects.
Our Strategy
Builder Funnel has worked toward increasing this clients' brand awareness through social media, but this was the perfect time to amplify their online presence beyond what we had already achieved through a holistic inbound marketing strategy. The Facebook Instant Ad Experience has allowed us to create detailed, customizable audiences that can be utilized. Ad Campaigns using this feature let us go directly for the leads we know will fit well with this particular client's process, as it captures and prequalifies leads at the same time.
Remodeling ad campaign goals:
- Strategically market to our target audience and illustrate the excellent design-build firm to distinguish us from the competition.
- Drive more qualified traffic to their remodeling website and increase brand awareness for their specific area - the fine neighborhoods around Pittsburgh
- Nurture the leads coming into the sales funnel leading to more qualified leads over time and subsequently, amazing customers.
Remodeling Advertising Process:
Before starting on the ad campaign, we developed our advertising budget and schedule for promotion. We then narrowed down our audience by selecting the key neighborhoods and zip codes where they live. At this point, we began the ad setup.
This ad showcases a' project photos demonstrating the high-quality renovations and attention to detail put into every project. We were sure to include various photos of kitchen, bathroom, and living room remodels which are some of the most popular renovations and parts of a whole home renovation that are highly sought after projects. We didn’t just want to target one type of renovation with this ad but instead display multiple types of projects that can be done.
We have CTA’s (call-to-actions) throughout the ad along with the photos that take the viewer directly to our service page. Each photo is linked so when the user clicks on the photo it takes them directly where we want them to go! We want the viewer to have an easy time getting what they want and this results in more engagement over time.
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Remodeling Blog Post Gone Viral
While our ad campaign resulted in most of the lead increase during this 30-day period, our traffic increase mostly came from a blog post, 7 Popular Bathroom Vanity Colors for your Home Remodel, which went viral after little to no traffic for months! This is why blogging is so important.
You create content consistently. Some will rank slowly and generate a bit more traffic each month. Some will take time and then blow up. But if you're not blogging consistently, you won't be able to get compound results over time nor should you count on one-off massively successful blog posts.
The Results
282.28% Increase in website traffic and an 8.3% increase in new contacts in 60 days
With the creation of this ad, constant optimization, and measuring analytics in addition to our content marketing efforts which resulted in a blog gaining a massive amount of traffic in September and October, our client's website traffic increased by 282.28%, and new contacts increased by 8.3% in just two months!
New Web Sessions were up 13.9%, the mobile session rate increased by 26.89%, and Landing Page views increased across the board in views, submissions, new contacts, CTA Clicks, and Click Rate!
The screenshot below represents just the traffic from one blog post that had incredible success. As you can see, traffic to this one post increased by 5,700% from July to October. In September alone, the blog post received 1,183 page views. To put this into context, think about how much traffic your home page gets in a month. This blog post likely received more page views than more design-build remodeling company home pages would receive in a given month. This is the power of content marketing!
The blog gained a ton of traction and ultimately our client's website sprung to the top of Google directly below the Paid Ads in the Featured Snippet for the keyword phrase "most popular bathroom vanity color"! This is a national search engine results search not specific to any one location - that's why it gained such massive traffic in such a short period!
Not only did they show up in the Featured Snippet (dubbed position zero because it shows above the normal 10 search results, but we also saw this blog ranking in position 1 as well. This means our blog ranks nationally in the two best spots in Google Search Results (not including paid ads)!
With this spike in our client's website traffic, landing pages across the website benefited as well. We had an overall increase across the board in landing page views, contact submissions, contacts from submissions, CTA clicks, and click rate! It is clear the audience was more actively engaged with the website!
The screenshot below shows the results our two-pronged approach generated. From our content marketing strategy and social media ad campaign, we received this great lead that came in through organic social for our client within the first 30 days of setup!
This person is looking for a whole home renovation and is clearly ready to get started. Based on the time frame the lead came in and the details provided we are sure this lead came from our Whole Home Renovation Ad Campaign.
Direct traffic to this website was the highest it's been in a year! We had our audience directly going to their website with the purpose of action.
Here you can see how our audience engaged with the website for the last three months. We saw a significant increase throughout September. Direct traffic, referrals, and organic search all went through the roof, and organic social and email marketing had a steady increase as well!
On the advertising side, we also checked our Facebook analytics. Our Facebook page reach was up 6,000% in 60 days.
With this bump in reach, the Facebook Page Visits went up 394% as well.
Key Takeaways
Content marketing along with Facebook Ads (Now Meta) work for us and the design-build remodeling and custom home-building companies with whom we partner. When implementing these types of strategies into your marketing and advertising, you can see quick wins, but they also provide consistent results over time.
Blogging can help your company maintain consistent traffic over time with surprising spikes as we showcased above. You can also utilize social advertising which can be especially helpful when your business is going into a slow season (which all have at some point). With proper strategy, implementation, and analysis, campaigns such as the ones we discuss above could set your company apart from your competitors and set you up with jobs in the coming months and years.
If you're interested in improving your marketing and advertising strategies, contact us to start the conversation, or simply scroll down to book a meeting with Builder Funnel CEO, Spencer Powell. We'd love to help your design-build company find success!