Marketing Your Roofing Business on Social Media

When looking for business advice online, you will frequently hear that social media marketing is necessary. However, most of the available advice about social media is intended for retail businesses where customers are more likely to make multiple purchases each year. How does that translate for a roofing business whose customers might call them to work on the same roof twice in a decade, at most? With a longer sales cycle and less repeat business than retail, roofers need to bring a different strategy to their social media engagement.

Social media marketing can still be valuable for roofers as it can support their business and sales goals. Still, you need to be highly strategic to make the most of social media as a roofer. This article will help you understand what social media can accomplish for you, how you can use it most effectively and when to shift your strategy.

Opportunity Cost: Is Social Media Valuable for Roofers?

The principle of opportunity cost is important in marketing. Whenever you’re spending time or money on a marketing strategy, you’re not spending it on something else. Social media is time-consuming and can become a drain on your resources. If it isn’t yielding better results than those you can get from other marketing strategies, you shouldn’t pursue it. That said, smart social media can yield results for roofing companies and support other related marketing techniques.

In supporting sales directly, social media can help with these efforts:

• Referrals: Your social media account may be a great vehicle to ask for referrals and to make it easy for your current customers to pass on your contact information to future customers.
• Paid advertisements: Social media platforms may offer valuable paid advertising opportunities, and having an active account can make them more successful.
• Search engine optimization (SEO): A social media account is not a ranking factor for your website, but it can help boost site traffic, which will help SEO.
• Content marketing: Sharing your content marketing on social media will boost viewership and engagement, helping to win over more customers.

Social media marketing can also support other business goals that aren’t directly tied to sales and revenue, but are still important for your success. For example, engaging with your community and offering highly knowledgeable content can help improve your business reputation and indicate that your company is a standout thought leader in the industry.

Which Social Media Platform Is Best for Roofers?

When choosing your social media platform, you should focus on your audience. Where are you most likely to find homeowners who need a roof? The homeowner demographic is typically active on social media sites, such as Facebook and Instagram. Yelp and Houzz are also options you may find valuable to target your audience. Here is a quick breakdown of each:

• Facebook: Facebook remains the most popular social media platform globally. It has a broad user base with a useful age spread for roofers. According to Sprout Social, almost 20% of users are 25-34 years of age, which means a fair portion are first-time homebuyers. There is a significant number of older homeowners on the platform as well. In addition, Facebook has a relatively cost-effective paid ads scheme that allows you to target by neighborhood, which is highly valuable for roofers.
• Instagram: Instagram is the second most used social media platform in North America. According to HubSpot, 71% of U.S. businesses use Instagram. Roofers interested in using before and after photos to promote their business will appreciate the platform’s visual nature.
• Houzz: As a home-focused social media option, Houzz is an excellent option to target homeowners who are looking to make home improvements.
• Yelp: Yelp isn’t a typical social media platform, even though it does allow for some conversation between local users. It is useful as a tool to show off your business’s rating and reputation.
• Pinterest: Pinterest is an aspirational platform, making it a great space to share photos of beautiful roofs. However, the platform is not localized or lead-driven, so it may only be a cost-effective platform for larger roofing companies with multiple locations and larger geographic footprints.

Whichever social media platforms you choose, be sure not to invest in too many at once. Doing so can spread your resources thin and make you less successful on each platform.

What Should Roofers Share on Social Media?

Keeping your pages fresh and engaging is likely to be the most challenging aspect of marketing your business. Cultivating an audience on social media is all about publishing useful, engaging and shareable content. When using social media for marketing purposes, be sure your content relates to roofing in general, your business and homeownership. When you evaluate the content you want to share, try to assess whether your ideal customer would find it valuable. To do so, you must have a clear idea of who that customer is.

Here are some general ideas that can help you spark great content for your business’s social media account:

• Roofing questions and concerns: Those interested in roofing and contacting roofers will naturally have questions that you can answer. Post the answer publicly and offer useful information to your followers.
• User-generated content: Do your customers have things to say about their roofs? Encourage user-generated content and share it on your page.
• Your business: Who are you? Who works for you? What are you doing today? Share information about your business to help customers connect with you on a personal level.
• Roofing-adjacent content: Housing, weather, DIY and other roofing-adjacent content can help engage customers.
• Seasonal and community content: Wish your customers a Merry Christmas or show your staff attending the local fair. The more local and relevant to roofing this content is, the more useful it is for you. For example, give useful tips, like advising homeowners to clean out their gutters as fall arrives.
• Discounts: Offer exclusive discounts, services and contests through your social media page. Not all roofers offer discounts or membership-based services, but if you do, then social media is an excellent place to promote them.

Other Social Media Tips for Roofers

Here are some more tips that can help you improve your social media marketing strategy:

• Content calendars: Use a content calendar to plan and organize your posts weeks or months in advance. Posting consistently is important; however, posting too often can be off-putting to customers. Try to share only when you have relevant, engaging content. Daily posts are often too much, but posting only once every six months is likely too little. Experiment until you’ve found a schedule to which your specific audience responds well.
• Keywords and hashtags: Use hashtags and keywords on every social media platform to help your posts have a wider reach.
• Keep learning: The world of social media is always changing, as trends for who uses which platforms shift. Spend time regularly updating your strategy for the latest changes.

Assess Your Social Media Success

As you begin to invest in social media marketing, it is important to assess your results and make sure that it is still worth your time and financial investment. Don’t just look at vanity KPIs (metrics) that social media marketers like to emphasize, such as views, followers and likes. Focus on metrics that have a more direct impact on your bottom line, such as:

• Leads.
• Referrals.
• Engagement.

Growing Your Roofing Business

Social media can be useful for roofers. Be sure to strategize with your specific audience and sales cycle in mind.

Marketing your business on social media is just one aspect of running a successful roofing business. Our Roofer Marketers can help.