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Why Search Trends Are Important To Contractors

How great would it be if you knew not only what ads to run, but when?  No more wasted money placing ads, handing out fliers, etc. when potential customers are not in the market for your services.

When it comes to online marketing or any marketing for that matter, making the most out of your business’s presence, it is important to understand keyword trends. Before starting any endeavor, there is data readily available that can show you the popularity history of a product, service, industry or specific term.

The term keyword trends refers to the process of analyzing keyword searches to find which keywords are trending at the present time or a time of year. Determining when and which keywords are trending for your product or service is important in being able to target marketing campaigns for the best results. Researching trending searches is an important first step to determine if interest in your service is going up or down.

There are a number of ways you can use keyword search and SEO is probably the main reason to do the research.  But, I like to do the research for all types of marketing.  Below are 7 ways I use keyword research to help my clients.

7 Ways to Use Keyword Trends in Marketing

1. Know when to run Facebook, Google, Bing and Instagram Ads.
2. What and when to schedule blog posts, videos and social media posts that people are actively searching for.
3. Knowing what time of day to make posts, send emails or run ads.
4. A way to know what keyword or phrase is being searched. (Are they looking for a painting contractor or house painter?)
5. Helps with email and newsletter marketing headlines.
6. Gives me timely content to upload to my clients Google My Business page.
7. When to do traditional marketing such as postcards, flyers and other direct advertising.

Before we go into how I use these 7 tactics, I want to explain market timing.  Marketing time is not right before the busy season for many services as one might believe.  Marketing time has to do with the customers journey.  Everything from holiday gifts, to lawn care services has a customer journey and using keyword trends puts you ahead of when you think you should be marketing your service, to when you SHOULD be marketing your services.  It is the journey of when your customers start looking or researching you.

You see, my competitors, they were fixated on sucking it up and monetizing via social media. They thought that search engines were a map of what people were thinking. But actually they were a map of how people are thinking.

A great example of market timing was for a tree service client of mine.  Brennan’s Tree Service out of Vauxhall, NJ.  It was right before Christmas, his season was over for the most part.  With all the seasons firewood sold and the phone slow to ring, I dove into trends.  Comparing all the likely keywords, I found a small gem in emergency tree service.  Performing a five year search history and cross checking to storms in his area, we found the spikes in searches.

I made three ads and had them on stand by.  One video, one image and one text ad was all we needed.  Mid February, we had a wet snow, we ran the ads and from that day until now he has had a consistent flow of calls and sales.  Because we developed a marketing plan around trends in his area, for his services. The best part, his yearly marketing expenses dropped from $11,000 a year to just under $7,000.  More sales, less money invested, win-win.

How to use the trends data.

Knowing when to run Facebook, Google, Bing and Instagram Ads.

Let’s face it many contractors waste a ton of money and time running ads that don’t get results and then say, “Facebook ads don’t work” or  “I never got one call from my Adsword Express”.  Most marketing guru’s would say you had the wrong target or your ads didn’t appeal to people.  Although, they are half right, my data shows it is more to do with timing.  You don’t see them running snack food ads right after dinner, no, they run them in the evening.  Marketing timing is important.  Another thing to note, ads are only for the first two parts of the AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire and Action) formula.  Knowing when people are hungry for your service and running ads then saves you a lot of money and also gets better results for the investment.  No sense in running a pizza ad, when the view just ate a steak dinner, they aren’t hungry, they are not in the market.

What to create and when to schedule blog posts, videos and social media posts that people are actively searching for.

By knowing search trends, you can plan your content marketing way in advance.  When I look at a data chart for a contractor and bathroom remodeling is one of his services, I know that the fall is the prime time for that service in his area.  So, with that marketing trend data, I know that in July, I need to get videos made, write keyworded blog posts and get my social media posts ready and scheduled for the rush of people who will be actively searching for bathroom remodels and renovations.

No sense in wasting my client’s money advertising bathrooms in June when people are busy with summer or spending their money on other projects like patios or deck projects.  They are not in the market for his bathroom services.  Not yet, as the data shows.

Knowing what time of day to make posts, send emails or run ads.

No matter what PPC (Pay Per Click) or PPI (Pay Per Impression) campaign you run, you can adjust your ads to run at certain times of the day or on certain days.  Why this is important to your business is it saves you money and again, gets you better results for your investment.

If you have a budget of $20 a day and the average cost per 1000 impressions is $10, why blow your impressions money when people are not actively looking for your service.  I know I would rather have my ads running when people are wanting the ads and the data, like a compass, guides you to the right times of day or days to run these ads or posts.

One data point that has help my clients is for emails.  A painting contractor client of mine, his data showed more people searching for painting contractors, house painting and Sherwin-Williams in the wee hours of the morning.  Who knows maybe it is keeping them up at night.  Anyhow, we went against all the marketing hype of sending out emails during the day and scheduled his newsletters and emails to arrive in the prospect’s inbox at 6-7 am.

His open/conversion rate jump 4X.  More business for the same work, who wouldn’t want more miles per gallon?

A way to know what keyword or phrase is being searched. (Are they looking for a painting contractor or house painting?)

When doing trend research, it amazes me how the same services search wording changes by the time of day, month or year.  What I mean is people use different search terms at different times of the year.  Without search term data, we would never know.  Are they looking for a painting contractor, house painter, house painting, wall paint, interior painting contractor, etc.

Knowing these important keywords is vital to the success of your marketing.  You may hit a single without the data, but with it, your bat is loaded and are more likely to hit it out of the park.

Helps with email and newsletter marketing headlines.

It is the end of the year and you are scrambling to get your receipts and tax stuff off to your accountant.  You open your email and a subject line “Write Off Your New Super Duty, Don’t Pay Until Next Year” is sitting there waiting for you.  Market trend data shows that this is when people are actively searching for business write-offs and company truck purchases.

That headline or subject line isn’t going to get the same open rate or conversion if it was run in September, to early or January, to late.  The old saying “Timing is Everything” holds true in successfully marketing your business.

Trend data has help me write successful email and newsletter campaigns for my clients, there is not reason why it can’t work for you too.

Gives me timely content to upload to my clients Google My Business page.

Everyone has or should have a Google My Business account.  But, the set it and forget it mindset of most businesses is hurting them.  Your GMB is a powerful marketing tool in many ways, but for the sake of this article we will talk trends and using your GMB.  With GMB you can make offers, add video, images and short article posts (300 words or less) that link to a webpage, learn more, a message or call now button.

With trend data, you can make sure you are publishing the right content, images and video when people are looking for a certain service you offer.

Imagine, you are a contractor and someone is in the market for a bathroom remodel.  They see one of your posts or ads for bathrooms and then go to your GMB to check your reviews out.  But, the most recent images are all roofing pictures.  Does this help you?  Not really, it sends a mixed message.  Even though you may do roofing you should be displaying what is the trending service, the service that you are advertising elsewhere, which is bathrooms.  You want to upload and post bathrooms at the moment.  I guarantee you, you will get more opportunities to sell your bathroom services.

When to do traditional marketing such as postcards, flyers and other direct advertising. 

Say your business uses postcards, doorhangers or flyers to market your service.  Trend data also helps out greatly with these types of campaigns.   I have seen many businesses with the mindset of being the first to canvas a neighborhood, thinking they get the jump on competition.  Being first is not always the right attitude.  The first mouse doesn’t always get the cheese.  Here is why and how trend data helps.

Let’s say you are a lawn care company.  Your season starts in March with clean-ups. You know your competition will be targeting your areas too.  So, you think, I will get a jump on them and start hitting the neighborhoods in January to be first.

As smart marketers we see that homeowners, the wall of data starts to upswing in late February.  We have all our materials printed up in January, but we wait until mid-February to hit the streets.   Here is what happens, the service provider who did the handouts in January, well most of his went into the trash, sure a few got saved, but he was too early, homeowners said, not yet, the ground is still frozen, we are still in winter mode.

But, because we have the data, we know in a few short weeks, waiting until the time is right, our handouts will get a better response, because that is when homeowners are search, the data shows this trend.

Wrapping it Up

I hope this article pointed out some important reasons to use data trends in your marketing.  It is a foundational tactic in my marketing and why I get above average results for my clients. You should be using marketing keyword trend data not only in your SEO and website pages, but in all your marketing.  It’s one of the best ways to strategically plan your marketing.  No more poking and hoping your content, posts and ads work.  Stack the deck in your favor, use trends.

Get your FREE Marketing Trend Data Report

(Includes video on how to use the data)

Offer Good until September 25th, 2018

($300 value)

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