Mammoth Plumber Podcast with Tyler Williams

Everything About Marketing for a Plumbing Company

September 02, 2022 Mammoth for Plumbers Season 1 Episode 4
Mammoth Plumber Podcast with Tyler Williams
Everything About Marketing for a Plumbing Company
Show Notes Transcript

Jered Williams of PlumbSocial talks with us about everything marketing for Plumbers. It's a big episode and since Jered has his own plumbing company he grew to 10 vans and still going, we think you'll find a lot of insights from his side as well.

He's also changing the game when it comes to social content for his Clients and we think you should check out what he's doing over at https://socialmediaforplumbing.com/

If you have any questions about our marketing company check out:
https://mammothforplumbers.com

Get a consult with our team to talk about your plumbing business.
https://lpmm.net/plumbingconsult

Find me on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/@tylervideos

Find more marketing resources for plumbing companies of all sizes.
https://mammothforplumbers.com/

Mammoth Plumbers Podcast

Episode 4 – Everything About Marketing for Plumbers 
 
 

Tyler: so for this episode of the mammoth plumber podcast, I really wanted to give a little bit of extra context before we dive right into it. Um, then this Jared Williams over at plum social, uh, and I come together to talk about marketing in general for plumbers. Uh, what Jared's doing over at plum social is taking the experience that he has in running his own business, prospector plumbing. 
 
 

Tyler: And, um, really trying to elevate social media content for engagement and for the business and ultimately for the user, because that way everybody wins. Um, I really like what he is done. We go over that a little bit in here, but we also go over kind of the, the overall spectrum of marketing for plumbers. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, if you have any questions about anything in here, go ahead and reach out. We'd be happy to talk to you, but on the other hand, take. And because if you find a few elements, a few nuggets in here that really work for you, uh, you know, often it's just, it's implementing a couple little things that can get you 2, 3, 4 steps ahead from where you are today. 
 
 

Tyler: So listen in, jot things down. If you think that you need to implement them in your own business and let's get listening. Thanks for tuning in bye.  
 
 

Jered: so, Hey guys. Welcome. This is, uh, Tyler Williams. He owns mammoth marketing. Uh, and that's mammoth for plumbers, correct?  
 
 

Tyler: Yeah, it's like an arm. We, we split off cause uh, helps us focus in quite a bit  
 
 

Jered: more spread off. And so you guys do marketing specifically for plumbing companies and you do the marketing for my plumbing company. 
 
 

Jered: Um, prospector plumbing and heating. You guys can go check that out. You want.  
 
 

Tyler: Um, you absolutely should. Yeah.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah. Prospector plumbing.com. You can see kind of the website and how they lay it out. Um, and it works really, really well. So today I wanted you to talk about to my audience, um, because I get a lot of times I meet with these guys and they wanna start social media and they understand they need to be on social media, but they don't understand how all the different pieces of marketing kind of play together. 
 
 

Jered: And so in my mind, um, there's a few things that we do for my plumbing company. We do Google AdWords or paper click, and we do, um, Google local services. Um, and you've got, you know, your organic rankings, like your Google, my business, and your SEO and your website. And then you've got social media. So can you just kind of talk about the different pieces of marketing that we should be in as plumbing, business owners and how they all  
 
 

Tyler: kind of tie together? 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. So I think the, the way we approach it is depending on market, you're never gonna know exactly what's gonna push the needle more than another. Like we've seen different things work in different markets. Mm-hmm so, um, and so it's, it's nice to have all those options, all those tools in the toolbox at our fingertips. 
 
 

Tyler: But, um, and I think they are all related. I think the more that a company speaks, the more they're gonna get traction is really what it boils down to. Right. So, um, so you put all these things in your box of tricks and they all kind of hinge on each other in our interconnected. So, you know, your, uh, Google business listing only goes so far. 
 
 

Tyler: If you don't have a. Because then on Google cert page, you're gonna have your Google business listing rank, but then you're also gonna have your ranking in the map pack. If you're running Google search ads, you're gonna have that ability up there. Um, but you need a website for that, right. At the very least landing page. 
 
 

Tyler: Right. And then you're gonna have the organic listings below the map pack and the whole Google game, uh, is trying to control as much of it as humanly possible. And, and that that's a moving target and all those signals feed in now. So then you talk about social. Um, Google also goes ahead and indexes your social channels. 
 
 

Tyler: So what you're looking for is if somebody Googles your name, or if somebody Googles plumbing in your area and you are the key source for all this information for Google, you're gonna end up commanding pretty much all the rankings aside from all the ads and all the GLS, a ads, um, Like in there. So you're building this massive, like visual footprint on the beginning of the cert page. 
 
 

Tyler: And it takes all these little signals for Google to go. That's why they're all, they all play a part. Um, so you kind of pick your priorities, you get, you get 'em where you need 'em to go, but they, they all funnel into the same thing, which is how is a customer gonna interact with me? And you never know where that's really going to come from. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, because everybody's got different habits. Now, there are definite like boxes of, there's more people here than over here. So this is a priority, but that even that changes depending on region.  
 
 

Jered: Right? And so then some of those, like some of those plays are more long term plays and some of 'em are more short term plays as well. 
 
 

Jered: Mm-hmm um, how does that play an effect to how you should go about your marketing?  
 
 

Tyler: So I think, I think every business has to be looking at both. Right? So the, the short term play would be like Google AdWords. It would be. Um, ads on Facebook, things like that ads are short term play. Cause when you turn 'em off, suddenly your overall awareness suddenly goes it dips. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. And so, but, but on the, on the flip side, the positive of that is it's extremely controllable. Like you can say, okay, I'm gonna, I I'm doing fine. Or I have too many jobs right now. I'm gonna dip this down so that we can catch up on the work and then, and then run it back up. Like you have that ability with, with ads, you don't with organic, but organic, um, organic and, um, SEO. 
 
 

Tyler: Those are real long term plays. And so it can take anywhere from six to 18 months before you, you start seeing those things. Um, and, and you, the thing that I tell everybody is your SEO is only as good as the next guy. A little bit less good, right? Yeah. So if you've got two people on the market, you are doing rocket on SEO, but this guy is like right here or Google thinks they're, they're basically like second tier. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, you have to stay up on it or this guy's gonna leap frog. You and, and that does happen like SEO changes from day to day. Yeah. So you're, you're trying to give Google this like better average. Um, and, um, so it, it really depends on who the players are in market. We've seen markets where it's not super competitive and it's real easy to get somebody, boom you're at the top. 
 
 

Tyler: But then we've seen markets where it's like, okay, this company over here is really hammering it. And this is where you run into fighting with some of the larger national things like rotor, Rooter and all those. Um, because they, they like, they have a big search presence and they have a lot of longstanding. 
 
 

Tyler: And so it ends up being like, you have to take advantage of the most recent plays by Google in order to try and stay up, because they're such a big company, they can't innovate as fast across all their different websites. So it takes them longer to get there.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah. So kind of the path that we took for my company was when we first started out, it was those short term plays, right? 
 
 

Jered: It was, um, Google AdWords, PPC, and, um, Google local services. That's really what got us all our calls at first. And then we slowly started building our SEO and we started showing up organically. And then we slowly started building our social presence to gain, you know, brand awareness. And now it's to the point where we've actually turned off our AdWords because our SEO and our brand awareness works so well were so well known in our market that we don't have to rely on those as strong. 
 
 

Jered: um, so for somebody just starting out, um, would you recommend just going, like, what are the first things they need to get going? Like if somebody's just started their plumbing business, or even if they have a plumbing business, but they're not doing anything right now, what are kind of the first steps moving forward to get  
 
 

Tyler: marketing? 
 
 

Tyler: So there's a handy Dan checklist that I have the lead magnet. I don't have it as quick reference here. So I'll regurgitate as best as I can. yeah. So, but, um, so first thing you need to do is make sure you get goo your Google business listing running. Like if, if you start business today, mm-hmm, , every business needs to get their Google business listing. 
 
 

Tyler: That's more important than social, um, when they first start out, but really you need to go get all your accounts starting with Google business. And that's because the verification process, cuz they wanna verify that you're a real business. So they want documentation. They wanna send you a postcard in the mail and you gotta like put in this code. 
 
 

Tyler: It's a bear and Google is behind. So if someone was starting today, Google business first, like even if they're entertaining the idea, go to business, do google.com and put in a listing because they're gonna send you a postcard and it could take you three. That's gonna be your biggest barrier when you start out is making sure that that thing is there. 
 
 

Tyler: So then you go through, get all your socials, even if you're not gonna use 'em at first, like Facebook, Instagram, those are the heavy hitters. First TikTok is coming up real fast, but get your Snapchat, get your LinkedIn, get your LinkedIn page, get all of that there because they're all gonna rank at some point. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. You just don't know when exactly they're gonna lift to the top. Um, and that'll also make sure all the information on those is 100% the same. So if you abbreviate street on one, you need to abbreviate street on the other. Uh, and what that does that helps Google say, this is all one entity, and if it starts seeing conflicts in those, it'll, it won't recognize them all as being the same entity. 
 
 

Tyler: So you wanna make sure your name, address, phone number are exactly the same. It's called nap super important. Um, and then that'll funnel out into directory listings later, like, um, you know, Yellow pages, data axle, and all these other like data aggregators that just pick up people. Um, so having those like, and a lot of people don't realize that when they start out and they have to go back and do a whole bunch of stuff. 
 
 

Tyler: So, uh, then after you have all those, because you can have those done what three hours? Um, yeah, like, you know, at least have them started. Um, next is website. Um, and you should have your domain. I mean, realistically, that is the first thing. It's your domain. I guess I skipped a step, but, um, get your domain and then start building out your website. 
 
 

Tyler: Don't overthink. Just build a one page site first, just start with one page, get something up. So many people I run into and they're like, yeah, I need to get my website. We've been in business for two years. Uh, we got a domain and then I go to the domain and it's like a parked under construction page from their domain authority or wherever they bought their domain. 
 
 

Tyler: And it's like, all you had to do was put like your logo and like, Hey, here we are with one contact form and phone number. Like, and, and that would've done way better than this like website coming soon powered by go daddy. Like that's the worst because as soon as you get all those other platforms up and running, you wanna have something that gives you a Lego credibility. 
 
 

Tyler: And your website's gonna be that. Um, and, and then it's gonna help funnel your leads as well. Uh, and you can slowly start building out the rest of the content on your website over time. That's the other thing is your website's gonna evolve. So don't get too hung up on it, being perfect when you launch. Um, but those are, those are the, the mainstays, uh, after you get those things ready, then you can start looking at running Google ads, getting your GSA running, um, and starting to, to actually run social ads as well. 
 
 

Tyler: And I think we should, I imagine we're gonna talk about like social ads in general awareness and how those central are connected. Um, yeah, but, uh, that's, that's, that's where I think people should start. Like if you're just starting out, get those things  
 
 

Jered: done, get those things. So GMB, socials website, then start hitting Google ads and G L S a you're gonna get quite a bit of work just from those in general. 
 
 

Jered: Um, I think those. Those did us pretty good and up  
 
 

Tyler: until, especially when you're small, like yeah. You know, most of the time it's a one man band. Oh yeah. And so you don't, you don't need a lot out of em.  
 
 

Jered: No, I think we got to three or four trucks just on those alone. Mm-hmm before we really started seeing the results of the others. 
 
 

Jered: Um, so then, you know, moving forward, once you get in that kind of medium stage plumbing business, when you start getting to 4, 3, 4, 5, 6 trucks, you start needing a little more than just relying on Google ads or GSA. Um, and a lot of the guys that I talk to, they think SEOs just a total rip off. They think it's like, it does. 
 
 

Jered: It's not even real. Right. They're just charging you for some fake service. What would you say to  
 
 

Tyler: those guys? Um, okay. S se and I, I understand because SEO is not a money and money out sort of thing, right? It's it's not like ads, like I'm a big fan of ads, but SEO definitely has its place. Um, And so what happens is you dump money into SEO and you don't see the results until later. 
 
 

Tyler: And often the results feel like something else. And people don't realize that. Um, so you wanna look at, yeah, you look at your organic traffic and, and what you're naturally getting over time, but here's the big thing about SEO is it doesn't only affect your organic rankings on the webpage. It also affects how credible Google will run your AdWords. 
 
 

Tyler: Like Google, Google will help that with quality scores and things like that, especially when you start, um, uh, connecting all like your analytics into your AdWords. And the, the other thing is it helps your Google maps profile. And I think any plumber you talk to these days, if like you, you will say like, yeah, you need to be in maps and they'll go, oh yeah, I need to be in maps. 
 
 

Tyler: Well, your website helps you get there. Mm-hmm like helps you rank there. So the more. Effort you put in your website, the more which is SEO mm-hmm , um, the, the better that's gonna be, but your, your website has this bleeding out effect to everything. And then of course it gives you a lot of credibility and there's a lot of cool things you can do when you get your website as well, with targeting and retargeting and running funnels and, and stuff, capitalizing on the traffic that it gets is a huge deal. 
 
 

Tyler: And, and so you, you really do wanna not ignore it. And SEO is not just a, a random service. like, you need to be ranking for all the different services that you do, and that takes a page per service. And then it takes supplemental articles about those in order to build like this zeitgeist of traffic. But it does, it does take a long time. 
 
 

Tyler: And that's why we, we bundle everything together is because a lot of people we work with don't wanna wait on that. So we make some quick ones over here with like, Atlantics and, and ads and, and things like that. Um, but it's all part of the, the, the bigger, the bigger problem of awareness. And that is like the ultimate one. 
 
 

Tyler: And I think you and I are both we one to one, we think about that. Yeah.  
 
 

Jered: So can you go into just a little bit of like what SEO actually is? Cuz I think a lot of people are just confused on what it actually  
 
 

Tyler: is. So SEO influences like the overall goal of SEO is visibility on the first page of Google. 
 
 

Tyler: That's it like? That is the ultimate goal. What influences it are over 200 signals that Google looks at and we maybe have like little knobs and dials we can turn on about anywhere from like 40 to 60 of them. So, um, and I'll give you sort of the highlights cuz there's a lot that goes into it. Yeah. So you've got your website, you've got the structure of your website. 
 
 

Tyler: That influences SEO. And you can put in, uh, special files into the back end of your website to tell Google, this is the structure of the website. Please look at it this way. You've got things like schema, which give Google like a shorthand in order to recognize what your website is and where it serves and the services that it has on top of the overall structure, like site map. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, and then you've got your content. So when, when you build a website, if you're doing everything in like paragraph text, um, and just modifying the size, Google doesn't understand what is a headline, what is a sub-headline um, and, and, and what is paragraph text? So you have to tell it that, which is why, and you see this in word processors for the past, what 10 years or so, but what Google's looking for is your keywords in specific places. 
 
 

Tyler: And it's smart enough now because Google's basically a robot. Um, it's smart enough now to sort of. Look at the structure of your headlines, your which is called H one tags, your H two tags, and then your paragraph text and understand if that's all related. And, and ultimately what Google's trying to do is protect their user, right? 
 
 

Tyler: So they, they want the user to have a good experience. So they put in these like criteria for, for us to abide by. But a lot of people don't know this, then you've got metadata. So each page you've got like the title of the page. So that's, what's gonna show up in blue on the search and then the description, a little of supplemental image for the page. 
 
 

Tyler: You've got, um, all the, all the extra metadata of like location and things like that that are in there. You've got your slugs need to be done in a D a specific way. Like there's, there's so many thi tiny things that add up to a giant hole and it's, and it's never. It's never like there's, I've never seen a website where I go, ah, yes, you've finished SEO. 
 
 

Tyler: It doesn't happen. so, yeah. Um, so then you got like really technical things with like the way coding is infused and, um, whether or not data like location specific data is getting in. You've got ADA compliance stuff. So Google wants to make sure that you have, um, image descriptions for everything and, and there's just so much, and it all comes up. 
 
 

Tyler: And so, you know, what we end up doing is we work on, okay, what are our priorities and how do we influence those priorities? And what's a top priority. Today is not gonna be a top priority in another month. So we, we end up with this just overall progress that we just keep hammering away at in order to try and give Google everything. 
 
 

Tyler: We want every little detail. Um, but the thing is Google changes the game all the time. Right. Right. So, uh, an update came out last week or this week, and it's basically, it's called the helpful content update. And, and you've got all the people who deal with SEO and websites and lead generation on their pages and brand awareness going like, uh, what's gonna happen. 
 
 

Tyler: And it's because Google basically said, Hey, we don't, we think that you are trying to, some of you are gaming the system. So we're making the, the system a little bit more specific towards what our users are actually looking for. And so I have a theory. You wanna dive into that? Sure. Yeah. So what a lot of people have done in the past, and we've already seen this influence go down and I had a client call me just the other day saying like, Hey, what about, uh, I can't remember. 
 
 

Tyler: It was called. It was nearby. Now is the one he was looking at. And I, I remember pitching this to you when it was a hot thing. Um, basically you sign up for the service, you tie it into your website on specific pages. And then when your tech finishes the job, you send a review from that place. It like when you are in the geography. 
 
 

Tyler: So that's the proximity data and it goes and populates on that page. So then you end up with a lot of juice going for like a specific neighborhood, right? So if you're trying to get into a specific neighborhood, you could theoretically use the software to get in in there. Now, when, uh, I first started working with plumbing companies, it was kind of a big deal and people were getting a lot of traction from now. 
 
 

Tyler: They aren't. And I think that Google's most recent update is to stop things like this and AI driven content. So because the, the reviews for a specific location, isn't really all that helpful. You, you get Google reviews and Google wants you to push Google reviews. They don't want you to push some random review over here. 
 
 

Tyler: So, um, because they wanna control the review platform. And then the other thing is the AI ed content. So there's AI bots now that you can use to write. And a lot of people are just being like AI bought, write me a, a, a drain, a drain cleaning article, and then it writes it it's terrible. but it, but it satisfies the old Google bot, uh, criteria. 
 
 

Tyler: And then Google goes, okay, we'll rank it. Well, Google change their algorithms. So those won't rank as well. So now it's paying more attention to language. It's paying more attention to like colloquialisms and all that. So your, your audio is gone. How about now? Yeah, there you go. So what I'm  
 
 

Jered: GA what I'm gathering is that basically SEO is Google going and looking at your webpage and saying, okay, are these guys legit or not? 
 
 

Jered: And they have a huge criteria of how they meet that. And if I'm understanding, right, like basically people are writing blog content for our webpage, right. To help us rank in SEO for certain things like water heaters, water, softeners, that kind of stuff. And we're continually  
 
 

Tyler: doing that. Yes. Awesome. 
 
 

Tyler: Because the more content you have given towards a service, the more ammunition you get in the Google bar. Right. So, gotcha. It makes sense to just keep it going. Um, and, and always, you basically pick the, where you think the volume is or where your margins are as a business mm-hmm and then work towards those as prior. 
 
 

Jered: Yeah. And that's kinda what we've done over the past is we've said, Hey, we're not ranking very well for these things. Typically we would attack the higher dollar items first, like water heaters and water softeners. And then we would go after kind of the lower  
 
 

Tyler: hanging fruit. Yeah. And what ends up happening is even with your site, you know, we look at the SEO data and it, it does this for certain keywords. 
 
 

Tyler: So if I look at a month, like in a month is all I look at, I, I either go, holy cow, this is amazing. Or I go, oh, snap, this is terrible. But when you look at the trend over the course of six months, mm-hmm, you start seeing this, like it's like stock market, right? Yeah. It's like it stopped trying to buy the dip mm-hmm and, and ride the wave up. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, yeah, cause we're put, we're putting the feelers out, but. It takes time. Every, every business is gonna be a little bit different. There's no one size fits all approach. You have to, you have to develop your priorities and work against them and be consistent with that, or you don't get anywhere. But I think the, the biggest thing is Google's not just trying to make you trying to determine if you're legit a legit business. 
 
 

Tyler: That's not really what they're doing Uhhuh . I think that plays a factor. What they're trying to do is they're trying to say, Hey user, continue using our search engine because we're giving you good results and we're giving you what you want. So, gotcha. I think ultimately use the company and me as a market in, in case of prospector, right? 
 
 

Tyler: Mm-hmm you as the company, if you are taking care of Google's users, if you have the same priorities that Google does, when it comes to users and giving them useful legitimate content that, uh, helps solve a problem. You're going to win and you're gonna win long time because Google's not gonna change that priority. 
 
 

Tyler: They're not gonna change taking care of the user because they need the traffic in order to sell ads that we buy for other like portions of the marketing. Right. Right. Google's a product is incredible. Um, it makes them tons of money. It's an incredible, like incredibly smart way to start a company and make money before anybody else had done it. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. So, um, but that's the big thing is you need to take care of the user. I think that, uh, a lot of people forget that and have forgotten it, which is why AI content and that review stuffing sort of stuff worked for a while. But then Google went, oh, snap. No, that's not what we want you to do. So they changed the. 
 
 

Tyler: You're like, no, you don't do that. You do this other stuff over here that we that's what we wanted you to do. We told you. But if you, if you had done that with your priorities first, anyway, you would've been okay. Right. So right. That's, that's what I think people need to really focus on, not what is the hot tactic of the day, but what is the overall goal of Google and how do you dovetail into that in order to make your own company successful? 
 
 

Tyler: Because you're writing on the coattails of a massive global organization,  
 
 

Jered: right? Yep. It's kinda the moral of the story is you need to do SEO period.  
 
 

Tyler: Yes. Yeah. End of story. So, I mean, that's the, that's the thing, people and you and I have seen this and one of, one of the best things that I saw with you, and I think one of the things that contributed to your quick success, comparatively, you know, it's not overnight still, but, um, was the fact that you understood that marketing needed to happen, even when things were good. 
 
 

Tyler: Yep. Like you never stopped.  
 
 

Jered: And what that did consistently spent lots of money on marketing.  
 
 

Tyler: Yes. Yeah. And it, and it just built and it kept building. And anytime that I've worked with a company that has done that, the net is good. Um, but I tell people all the time, it took you to figure out the business model before you could actually do that. 
 
 

Tyler: True. Yeah. Now a lot of the time when I talk to people, I'm like, if you have a problem spending on marketing, you have a business model problem more than you have a business influx problem. Cause you weren't gonna be able to solve the influx problem until you solve the, uh, model problem.  
 
 

Jered: Do you wanna run? 
 
 

Jered: Yeah. If I was running a really crappy business, then marketing's not gonna do me any good. Right. Mm-hmm you kinda have to have your business structure and your kind of your business design laid out. So that it's a well-functioning. Profitable business. And then you spend on marketing to get the people into that business, the customers. 
 
 

Jered: And if it's already profitable and well running business, then it's just gonna explode. If you don't have one or the other, then you're gonna be limited. You're either gonna be limited by the abilities of your business or the amount of marketing you do. I mean, when, like it boils down to it, business is just offering a service and actually doing the service well, and then spending money on marketing to get people in the door. 
 
 

Jered: That's basically the gist of it. Right?  
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. And, and people tend to think that the marketing part doesn't need to happen. True. You know, I've been in this game for 20 years and silence my cell phone and where I see companies hurt are the ones who went, oh, we can stop marketing. Now we're big enough. 
 
 

Tyler: Mm-hmm but then they get, and then their, their, their influx of cash goes down. And then when they need to spend money on marketing, again, they're like, oh, we don't have the cash now. And they end up in this spiral. I was talking to my staff about an old client that we had, um, you know, they spend 150 to 170,000 a year on TV ads, way back in the day. 
 
 

Tyler: And when they shifted over to digital, they were like, digital's cheap. We don't need to do as much. It'll be fine. And they're trying to cover, uh, 400,000 person like population base mm-hmm and, and digital was cheaper, but it's not now, now it's parody with what broadcast used to be. And they, they, they just refuse to believe that that's what they need to do. 
 
 

Tyler: So I'm like. I, yeah. So I saw them over the years, the conversation went from like, wow, we're rocking it. Things are going so well. And then, um, when they made the shift over into digital, they were like, I, okay, well, we don't need to spend that much. And then they, um, they started losing ground in their market and they, they wouldn't, they did never rebuilt back to where they were before. 
 
 

Tyler: Guess what? The company's smaller. And they're always going, like, we gotta get people in the door and the things that they did not stop spending money on still work. But those were very like pinpoint things and time and they go dark. That's the worst thing a company can do. And that's why, that's why you need to do ongoing. 
 
 

Tyler: If you go dark, you aren't talking. If you aren't talking, people can't connect with you. They don't understand you. They forget you awareness it spikes when you advertise and it starts to decay over time. And if you go back to zero, you gotta spend a lot of money to get back up. And so it it's, it's silly, but it's, it's a thing that happens when it comes to marketing. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. It's just people not quite understanding and putting all the pieces together. I don't wanna like, they're cool people. I love working,  
 
 

Jered: but they, yeah. Yeah. Well, it's kind of confusing, like for a plumbing company to come in and understand how marketing works. It's kind of confusing. Um, and that's kind of what I wanted to do this call today is just to kind of go over all those points. 
 
 

Jered: And so we've gone over your GB, your socials, your website. You know, company's got Google ads, their GSA going they've started working on their SEO and none of this stuff should do yourself. If you're running a plumbing business, you don't have time and you don't have the expertise to do this stuff. So you need to just hire somebody to do it and put it in your expenses as your business and put it in the cost of doing business and charge your, your customer for that. 
 
 

Jered: So, because if you don't hire it out, it's not gonna get done and it's not gonna, and if you do do some of it, it's not gonna be done well. And consistency is really the key just to consistently market. And then kind of the next step would be, I mean, you have a few options when it comes to, um, branding. I kind of split up marketing in two different categories in my head. 
 
 

Jered: I think of it as marketing and branding. I think of them as different marketing. I think of like ads, like short term, like Google AdWords and that kind of stuff. And then marketing. Branding I think is more of like branding play, right? Like, so getting my message out there, not necessarily getting a new customer, but just getting somebody to be aware of my company. 
 
 

Jered: So then you start moving into, um, you know, social media content and, um, you could go old school and go TV or radio. Um, what do you think about like, let's talk about that. What nowadays you can spend on social. Um, like I know a guy who just, he spent 10 grand a month on TV mm-hmm and I don't know. I'm like true, man. 
 
 

Jered: I wouldn't, I don't know if I would do that or not. Um, what  
 
 

Tyler: do you think about that? Okay. So there's cause the landscape is shifting so heavily and I would say it's shifting this year after COVID mm-hmm like finally feels like COVID is no longer part of the factors of people doing business. Um, and what I think happened with COVID is a SP up digital adoption. 
 
 

Tyler: And lots of different hotspot in the world. And then that is bleeding out and speeding up digital adoption everywhere. Like I live in a rural market and digital adoption just shot through the roof now. Whereas I used to have to drive around to meet with people in our, in our market. Like now I just hop on a zoom call like this. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. And that used to only be for people that I was serving outside of our market. So I think everybody's kind of changed their baseline with that. And so what that also means though, is the way people are consuming media is tied to the digital adoption and that has changed as well. So, um, what people have done is they've sat at home and they, they realize that, oh, I have time to learn some of this stuff and they go in and now bam, their habits are changed over. 
 
 

Tyler: So I think the big thing with TV is I I think with any platform. Does it still work? Sure. They're still doing it. It costs money to run these things, which means somebody's advertising, which means somebody's getting the return. Does it work on a local scale? Sure. But you really need to be very decisive about where you are spending on, on broadcast right now, how much you are spending and whether or not it's getting you the actual result that you want. 
 
 

Tyler: And it's very hard to figure that out because historically it hasn't been trackable and it's not trackable in the same sense, unless you're doing some direct response marketing. Right. Um, but you have to realize even with direct response marketing, you measure your result, but your actual awareness and bleed off is even bigger than that result. 
 
 

Tyler: Right. Right. So, and it's, it's hard to direct response with like TV and radio. Yeah. Um, mailers it's much easier. So I, I think mailers are still really good. So TV. Always look at your market and determine, you know, you're, if you're a plumber and you're serving residential, your market is the stay at home mom. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. Your market is the, the person who has to stay and keep the house. Okay. So what do those people do when they have a free moment? I would argue they're not watching TV on a schedule because they're busy. Like those, that sector of our society is busier than ever. It's not getting easier for them. It's getting harder. 
 
 

Tyler: As they're, as the expectations have risen against like stay at home moms and working from home, even, um, having that second job, uh, for all that. And that is one of the primary market drivers for plumbers. Yeah. So where are they? I would not say they're on TV. I would say they're on the phone.  
 
 

Jered: Oh, most definitely. 
 
 

Jered: And so then one of the, you know, talking about where are they, one of the best parts about social is if you're gonna advertise on social, you can target that person. Specif. Right versus TV. You're just going out to whoever's watching TV, whether your audiences are not. So yeah. You kinda get more bang for your buck  
 
 

Tyler: in that way. 
 
 

Tyler: You, you can, but you, you do need in a local market. I mean, on the size of it, you do need to be careful about targeting too far in, right. But like Asian agent, gender, go for it. Yeah. but what, what drive you don't necessarily  
 
 

Jered: wanna be? Like, I want,  
 
 

Tyler: uh, only parents, uh, only homeowners and only within this age bracket and only this gender, you just took your market from this big, to this big. 
 
 

Tyler: Right. And there's a lot of people in between that you can still serve and still you should, they should know about you. And granted, if you have properly wrapped vans, that helps a lot too. So, uh, like, you know, I see people go like, oh, I can spend like, you know, 200 a month and do okay. Right. No, not usually, um, not if you're in a market over 50,000 people, maybe if you're in a market of 20,000, I could see that working, uh, be big on 
 
 

Tyler: But, um, the other thing is because you can do that, you can selectively target to people. I don't care what platform you get. 'em all, if it's on YouTube and there might target demo, if it's on Facebook or TikTok or Instagram or Snapchat, doesn't matter if you're, if you're, if you're targeting within the bounding blocks and not too, again, um, it's just becomes a matter. 
 
 

Tyler: Well, how much does it cost? And do I think I'm capitalizing on that market, on that platform where I think the bulk of them are, and then capitalizing on all the other ones where I don't need to spend as much money. Do I feel like we've covered it? Yeah. And there's no 100% sure way to know, but you look at your, what I I told do is look at your impressions. 
 
 

Tyler: And your reach according to your market. And then you're gonna be able to determine your frequency. Yeah. And the frequency is what really matters. If you're hitting somebody once a month, that's not enough to build awareness. And what you're trying to do is you're trying to go, like you wanna be the person, the company that people think of when they wake up and suddenly there's a leak underneath their dishwasher. 
 
 

Tyler: Mm-hmm right. You can't manufacture that interaction. You have to wait for it, but you wanna be one that gets it, which means you have to manufacture the familiarity, not the actual transaction. And people tend to forget that. And that's where social plays a massive, massive role.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah. And that's kind of the, the, um, mindset we've adopted over it is, you know, we're not trying to just get somebody to call you right away from your ad on Facebook. 
 
 

Jered: Really getting, trying to get people to know like, and trust you as. You know, the plumbing, the premier plumbing contractor in your area, and we've done a pretty good job just doing that on just Facebook and Instagram for our business. And, um, it's worked out really, really well for a relatively low cost. 
 
 

Jered: We're able to, people are able to see our ad a few times a month, um, compared to Google AdWords where, you know, we're spending 10 times the amount of Google AdWords, um, for really not that many phone calls, when you actually look at it, the actual cost to get a phone call in your door from Google is pretty high right now. 
 
 

Tyler: So, yeah. And it's, it's gone up again. It depends on market. It depends on all this other stuff. Like some calls are being had for 15 bucks, some calls are being had for 120. And that makes sense. Right. Some of 'em are 200 bucks. Yeah, yeah, yeah.  
 
 

Jered: I know that. Um, And right now with Facebook and Instagram, um, we can target, you know, a certain age range that lives in our area. 
 
 

Jered: And, um, if you can build that knowledge that they, you know, get 'em to know like, and trust you before you get to their door. It does a couple of things. First of all, when they need a plumber and they already know like, and trust you, they're gonna call you not the other guy. And when they already know, like, and trust you, once they call you your CSR, you know, if they have no idea who you are, they just Google you and they see your ad and they click on it. 
 
 

Jered: They don't know who you are. They don't know anything about you. Um, there's no trust built yet. Your CSR and your technician has to work really hard to build that trust in the customer. Whereas when you get a customer that's already has that built in them, you've already built trust. When they call you, they already trust you. 
 
 

Jered: They already know you. They already like you. Your CSR just has to reinforce that. So it's much easier for your CSRs and then your technician as well. When he shows up at the house, they've already seen all your technicians on Facebook, they've seen the kind of work you do. They see what people are saying about your company, and they already have this expectation and this kind of image of you being that you're really, really good. 
 
 

Jered: Your technicians are great. And all your technician now has to do is he doesn't have to build that from scratch. He just has to reinforce that. And so what we found is that by kind of shifting and spending a bunch of money on Facebook and really trying to pre educate our audience, we've got less price, objection, higher average tickets. 
 
 

Jered: And it really just helps our company overall and profit margins go up and everybody's happy, um, versus like a, uh, Google AdWords, you know, they, somebody searches plumber and they're in Fairbank and they see our ad. They click on it. They know nothing about our company. And, you know, we're top tier company, top price, and they may not want that. 
 
 

Jered: And they'll call us outta their house thinking that's what they're gonna get. And when we show up and we're top tier top price and they wanted, you know, bandaid fixed bottom dollar price, then they're not a happy customer. So you're really not doing, uh, yourself or your customers, any favors by not jumping on the opportunity to get on social and really pre educate your audience about who you are, what you do and why, you know, they would wanna hire you over somebody else. 
 
 

Jered: What do  
 
 

Tyler: you think about all that? So I think that was. You know, in your, in your journey with your company, like, cool, we got you up and running, we got your mm-hmm, your lead generation stuff working. Then it became a brand awareness play. We started on working on some brand stuff. And then you really, you really took on your own social and then like nurtured it into a new level that like an agency just can't reach without, um, without a, a really high level of contact mm-hmm and that's what you're, providing now for others. 
 
 

Tyler: Right. Right. So, um, and that, that play has been really interesting to watch because it, I, I love the idea of you pick your primary objectives of what your customer needs to know about your company. Yeah. You're gonna create social around that. Then you're gonna turn those into ads, which I think is the big key. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, I think that people, people are like, need to need to realize the difference between the reach of organic and something that's paid. Um,  
 
 

Jered: you can only reach  
 
 

Tyler: so much organically. Yeah. Yeah. You only reach for every hundred people. You're only gonna reach three to six of 'em and, and you are not a cheeseburger, you're a plumbing company, so you're not gonna be, you're not gonna inherently be shareable out of the gate. 
 
 

Tyler: Right. So you have to play for engagement. And, and I think that's, that's the, the thing is like you're developing things that deal with the objections that a customer has. So you're educating them, but you're also giving them enough fun to pay attention. Right. And, and that's, that's a hard thing to do. Um, and, and you need sort of like a laser focus in on, okay, cool. 
 
 

Tyler: This is how we're gonna do it. You've built a system around that, which is really neat, but I think, um, The overall, like the brand awareness that you get out of social is massive and incredibly important. Are there other ways to, to get brand awareness? Yes. But you don't see the level of, um, commenting and discussion and referrals anywhere else. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, typically, so, and Facebook and Instagram obviously are the, are the biggest heavy hitters on this. Yeah. Um, currently they know that could change at some point, but right now that is, that is where I think people need to be putting, if they, if they're like, what should I do on social? I'm like Facebook and Instagram do that. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. And if you had to pick between those two, it gets really dicey, but I'd say probably Instagram, but then when you turn something into ads, they're gonna go both, both networks. So yeah. They're all part of the same. Um, yep. So, uh, Oh, man. In that case, maybe you go Facebook first because then your ads will end up on Instagram. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. Yeah. That's that's kinda what I was thinking. Yeah. so, um, but uh, the, I think the brand awareness plays huge because you're building, you're, you're building a relationship and that's marketing, that's the core of marketing. You're building a relationship with potential customers. So that way, the day that they need you, they call you you've already helped them. 
 
 

Tyler: You've given 'em some sort of value. Yeah. So they feel like they should give some sort of value back, right? Yep. There's this, this, this buzzword in the advertising space, um, called, uh Valuetainment. Yeah, like, and it's, it's the dumbest word in the world, but I think the concept of it is, is, is good. And that's because if you entertain somebody, entertainment is value. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, if you engage with somebody, engagement is value. You gotta remember people are on these feeds to have fun and check out. So don't tell them like, don't, don't, don't, don't sell right out. Right. Instead of educate, cuz education is interesting. They feel like they're growing, they're helping grow them. Um, and then they have a, a positive association with your brand. 
 
 

Tyler: And I think that it's one of the best ways to build a long term loyalty because Google ads are, I need you right now. And if you don't pick up the phone, I'm gonna call the next guy. Right. Um, and anytime you're trying to do like offers, same thing. Like if you do direct response still, same thing, you're only as good as your offer compared to the next guy's offer mm-hmm 
 
 

Tyler: But with, with building a valuable conversation, the relationship, if you build that well, no other company can get in there. You just have to nurture and maintain it. And it's cheaper in the grand scheme.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah, it's kind of like, um, I mean, you look at the biggest companies in the world and they're not doing Google AdWords. 
 
 

Jered: Like Coca-Cola  
 
 

Tyler: you Google soda, a  
 
 

Jered: Coca-Cola ad doesn't pop up but everybody knows who Coca-Cola is because over the years they've just done massive branding plays. Right. Um, well, and people  
 
 

Tyler: like some of the companies that I talk to think that that's impossible for them  
 
 

Jered: and, and I, well, that's, I'd say that's kind of where social comes in is that yeah. 
 
 

Jered: Now we kind of have that opportunity to do that, especially now that we can target a local market and create a massive amount of content to educate that market and then spend money to push it out to them constantly.  
 
 

Tyler: Um, I think it goes back to,  
 
 

Jered: I like, I think advertising has done this weird  
 
 

Tyler: full circle thing where  
 
 

Jered: in  
 
 

Tyler: print radio, TV days, I was, I was active in those days before social took off. 
 
 

Tyler: We made a bunch of TV ads, the TV ads that really worked for the people whose a spent consistently month over month to be in front of people. And B had ads that were fun, which provided value or were educational, which also provided value. Like it's the same play. And so we've come back full circle into sure you got your lead gen stuff, but that's for business getting off the ground for a business that is trying to really get to the next level. 
 
 

Tyler: It is it's, it's going back to listen. I'm gonna be here. So that way, when we need to do something together, we're gonna be there. Um, and, and new companies somehow, uh, or even companies have been around for like three, four years. The, uh, I run into a lot of people going, yeah, brand awareness doesn't work for me. 
 
 

Tyler: I don't need that. That's not something I should focus on. But the thing is the reason why you don't wanna focus on it is because you haven't done it. So you haven't seen the results of it. Right. Um, you have to start that and that a huge component of social media. Yep. Massive. Um, you know, so because then you're playing in your community and that's, that's what people want. 
 
 

Tyler: They want to know that you're down the street.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah. Yep. You become like the, like we've become probably, you know, the premier plumbing and heating provider in Fairbanks, I would say. Yeah. And we've been able to accomplish that in just a, a couple year span. Mm-hmm mostly because we were willing to constantly spend on advertising, um, and then hitting social media. 
 
 

Jered: Um, we even hit YouTube bumpers for a while and we just constantly had stuff going out there along with, you know, giant  
 
 

Tyler: vans. You there. Okay. Uh, one of us froze. Oh, one of, I mean, Richard's here, my videographer. So it's possible. He's uploading just a ton of stuff. so that could be it too. Um, yeah, I think it like watching your growth is really fun. 
 
 

Tyler: Mm-hmm because I started with you where I don't start with people. I start with people when they're an established company Uhhuh and they get to the point, they need an agency for the most part with you. Like we started from ground zero. Yeah. And I started and, and we watched the, the small starts before you found the business model. 
 
 

Tyler: And then it was like, cool, let's do this. And we get you up and running. And then you're like, now let's really do this. Yeah. Because you had, you had the model behind you mm-hmm and it changed everything. And then it was like, okay, well let's really do so. And then it was, it's like, it's fun pulling up your GMB stats, which I still have access to. 
 
 

Tyler: Right. And going over the course of a year and a half. Yeah. And, and going like, where's the ceiling , you know? Yeah. I remember being, I remember calling and being like, okay, don't expect that this whole plateau eventually, but that plateau was way further down the road than I thought it was gonna be. Yeah. 
 
 

Tyler: And then I thought that it would be a much longer road to owning the market and becoming ubiquitous as like the plumbers in town. And it, it didn't take that long, but I would say that your willingness to invest in your marketing and understanding that it was not an optional, like nice to have to run a business is what really led to that. 
 
 

Tyler: Yep. And then you've, you've just, and then you've taken, like taken, taken the social side, level it up even further, um, by, by adding just interesting stuff for people. To, to, to deal with, um, and, and doing things that like you're extremely suited to, because not only did you turn a wrench for 20 years, like you were in the van, you built your company, like you understand the, the work and the company, and what's truly valued by the audience. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah.  
 
 

Jered: So, yep. Yeah. That's extremely important. And you've actually had people come to you and say, Hey, I wanna do what this guy's doing. Haven't you?  
 
 

Tyler: Oh, all the time. Yeah. Like, yeah. So what's interesting. Cause I like, I work in the market like, right. So Fairbanks is where your company is. And then, uh, Fairbanks is where I still have a bunch of local clients as well as like the plumbers. 
 
 

Tyler: So, um, it's really interesting, like the, the changes that you made to your social media package, like what's going out. Um, I now have some of our other clients going like, man, this is this. They're rocking this and I go, ah, yes, I know exactly what's going there. And we can manufacture that before you for our local guys. 
 
 

Tyler: Um, because it, it like, it's, it's a harder play on a, on a, like a remote basis for an agency that's structured in my way. Right. Cause we do the things that you don't. Um, and so, but if I got somebody down the street, like suite, we'll send Richard over and he'll just grab some videos. Atail that in? So, um, so it's, it's pretty cool. 
 
 

Tyler: Like the people noticed when you shifted strategy on that. And I think the, the level of investment on time that you are able to put in, um, because you were able to grow your company to the point where you, you had it, um, and then the level investment you do in order to back it up. Is really what makes it sing. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. And most, most owners aren't where you at. And they don't have the time. I think, I think that's important to make sure people know. Right. Yep. Cause you are, you are one of the few who are able through the decisions you made to your own credit or able to work yourself out of the business. Now you manage it from an extremely high level and that's why you're able to offer the plum social side. 
 
 

Tyler: So, right.  
 
 

Jered: Yes. The whole reason I was even able to develop the plum social side in the first place. Cause it was kind of a hole in my business and I could not find anybody to fill it in a way that was doable. And so I said, okay, well I'm gonna go figure this out on my own  
 
 

Tyler: and just make it happen. Yeah. 
 
 

Tyler: You're taking an extreme level of familiarity that almost nobody else could do and offering a service around it. that I think is where sort of like, that's your secret weapons for, for developing social content for people. Yeah. And it's, and you're able to, um, use what you learn on one company over the course of others, right? 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. You're taking what you learned with your company and you're applying it over and we do that too, but social happens to be a spot that is, it takes a sort of the next level of, of stuff to do what you're doing with.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah. It really takes a ha you, you pretty much have to have that as your niche, right? 
 
 

Jered: Yeah, yeah,  
 
 

Tyler: yeah. Just so, yep. There's, there's, it's, it's really cool to see. And it's a cool, because I see the effects of it. I see the effects of it from the community. I see the effects of it from the stats, um, from the data that we pull and it's like, oh, click, this is working. Um, and I, you know, one of the things that people don't realize is when they, when they crack the brand awareness, they can take their Google ad, spend out. 
 
 

Jered: Yeah. I mean it really, and that's kind of the whole thing is once you crack that brand awareness and you start getting that brand awareness, it doesn't just, do you good on social media? It does. You good everywhere, right? Yep. If you've got brand awareness and  
 
 

Tyler: somebody sees your Google ad, they're  
 
 

Jered: 10,000 times more likely to click on your Google ad because they already know who you are. 
 
 

Jered: They already like you and trust you. Um, or even you get your SEO to where you're ranking top of the page every time. And they Google you and they already know who you are. They're so much more likely to click on you and call you. And then just to trickle down effect of that, like we talked about before now, they already trust like you you're, you've already built that value in the customer. 
 
 

Jered: They're so much more likely to value your service and much more likely to buy from you much more likely to you five star review. It just creates this. You know, environment where just everything kind of starts to just work together  
 
 

Tyler: in rock and roll and it's yeah. It all influences each other. And then like, I it's an old adage, but rising tide, 
 
 

Tyler: all these things and a way that is better than the rest, you're gonna win. Mm-hmm you need same time and then you'll get there. Um, and then you'll have a company that you never dreamed that you were gonna have. Right. Um, and, and it's, it's cool to see when clients reach that. Right. Yeah. And we gotta play a part of that. 
 
 

Tyler: I think, I think that takes proper management takes a business model, but it's really fun to see businesses grow. And we both are, are working with businesses that we can see growth. Yeah. We can see them like reach these, these barriers that we're helping them run. And, and that's, that's where, well, that's, that's why I'm in this business. 
 
 

Tyler: That's why I stay this business. I, I enjoy the tech. I enjoy the, the servant side of it. Yeah. Um, so, and really service based business service based business, like your plumbing company was a service based business. And I watched as, like you grew into, like, I can, I can create the best plumbing company, Fairbank, Uhhuh and then take that and go, I can offer the best social media in the plumbing industry. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah. And, and when the real, the end goal is the same. Yeah. If the something of value and give them, um, it make them happy and help them reach their goals. Yeah. Does everyone feel good?  
 
 

Jered: Yep. So we should probably wrap this up so quick recap, you've got all these different types of, you know, um, advertising or marketing that you should be doing. 
 
 

Jered: You've got website GMB, um, Google ads, GSA, SEO, social content, and you really should be on all of those and you should be maximizing all of those. And when you do, they're all gonna kind of work together to help each other out. So one advice to a plumbing business owner, I would say, get on all those and just make 'em happen. 
 
 

Tyler: Yeah, I, yeah. Do it in stages and steps. Don't try to bite it all off at once too much. Yeah. Um, you know, figure out where your company is or your time is start. A lot of people will just wanting to start and that's, that's the biggest issue and, and realize it does take it either takes manpower to start, or it takes money. 
 
 

Tyler: Yep. And ultimately you need to get to the point where you have enough money coming into where you can hire it out. Not, and I say that, not just because I run an agency, it's because a plumbing company. Is not gonna be as good at marketing internally as an external source. Right. Um, and that, you know, whether that's SEO, whether that's social content, all that, like, it's, it's important to realize where your strengths are and focus in on those and let somebody else's strengths play into your own business. 
 
 

Tyler: I do that as well.  
 
 

Jered: Yeah. Hire the pros.  
 
 

Tyler: Yep. And then the, the idea, the overall end goal is not more leads through Google. It's not cheaper leads through Google it's Omni presence in your market. So you are the ubiquitous option for every need that you service. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. Yep. And then you win. 
 
 

Jered: Yep. Well, cool. Um, thanks for being on today. Um, again, this is Tyler Williams. He owns mammoth for plumbers. If you guys need a marketing company, he's done all my marketing. He's done an excellent job. You can go check out my website. I'll leave some notes in the comments and, um, I'll leave some links. If you wanna go check out Tyler's stuff. 
 
 

Jered: Appreciate  
 
 

Tyler: it. Cool. Thanks for having me. It's yeah, it's always fun talk shop, so I I'll do it for hours.  
 
 

Jered: Cool. Okay. See you, Tyler.