SEO Tips for Better Online Marketing in Field Service
One of the biggest challenges with running a field service business, like any other, is there can often be several competitors that you are positioning yourself against within your locality. To compete with these other businesses, it is imperative that you can clearly differentiate yourself and place your business in front of your audience first. SEO is a great way to do this and can present itself as a real opportunity for you as a surprising number of businesses fail to do this well.
Online marketing is vital in gaining a share of the market. If you can learn the basics and work out how you can adapt it to the greatest effect for your business, you will immediately be putting yourself at an advantage over others.
Here are some practical ideas that will make a big difference to you gaining visibility in the search engine results pages:
Make your site mobile friendly
Today, most people look for products and services using their mobile devices. Currently, more than 55% use mobile devices, and 2% use tablets globally. This number is quickly increasing while the use of desktops for searches is in decline. (1)
Having a mobile-friendly website is now so important that Google rewards sites that are optimized for mobile over those that are not. This is all to ensure optimum user experience online, so that users can find the information they want conveniently and quickly.
When ensuring that your site is mobile friendly, make sure that it is also user friendly so that once users land on your site, they are immediately able to tell who you are and what products and services you offer, as well as how to obtain these products or services. The better you can present your business; showcase the work you are doing and demonstrate social proof from past and present customers in the form of positive testimonials – the better you will be at converting sales.
Another way to generate traffic to your site is to use it as a client hub where customers can log in and pay their invoices, request jobs, see past payments, generate estimates and more, 24/7. Business management software suites such as Jobber are excellent at doing this for you.
By integrating this into your site and driving traffic in this way, you are signaling to the search engines that your site is an important destination for your audience, that it provides a service where users will come and spend some time, and that it can be accessed on mobile devices – all helping to increase your overall visibility.
Conduct audits of all your SEO efforts
Sometimes, some SEO tactics will work better for you than others. In order to identify what these are and work as efficiently and effectively as possible, measure what you are doing and adjust your activity where appropriate for maximum SEO benefit.
An SEO audit is a set of processes or checklists you need to go through to identify, find, and resolve any superficial or core issues on your site. (3)
Know the best keywords and search terms for your site
Identifying your keywords and search terms is the first step into understanding what you should be optimizing your site for. This should be the first step, before you create any content or marketing material. Considerable thought should be given to which keywords each page should rank for so they aren’t competing with each other and each page has a specific purpose.
Thankfully, even if you’re not a marketer or an expert, you can do keyword research yourself. Essentially, think of keywords and phrases that you would enter in a search engine to find a company that offers the same services as you. Google suggests it is helpful in predicting what you might be searching for. If you’re a bit techy, there are some free keyword planner tools on the web to help you do this.
Make your business available on listings and directories
SEO’s relevance to your online marketing campaign doesn’t just stop focusing on your website. External factors play an important part too.
Consider getting yourself listed on online maps, business listings, and aggregate review websites. This can be a very effective way of putting your company in front of your audience and encouraging them to visit your website. Often, this is free and will only cost you a few hours of your time.
More often than not, if people have arrived at your site with a particular service in mind, they will want to get a timely and professional quote. How you present this and price your estimates is not necessarily within the remit of SEO but something you will want to get right if you are to convert the traffic you are working so hard to generate. The Jobber Academy has a wealth of information to help you with this.
Focus on image content as well
A big benefit to companies operating in the field service industry is that every job presents itself as an opportunity to acquire before and after photos of your work. Pictures often speak louder than words in landscaping, construction, roofing, cleaning or whatever niche you are in. Use these to maximum benefit, but don’t forget to get consent from your customers first.
Search engines are able to index images so ensure they are tagged correctly and are searchable. This can be a quick win for SEO where you can appear on image results pages as well as informational ones. (2)
Conclusion
A set of robust SEO tactics will significantly boost traction for your field service business online. Try different techniques and measure what works best for you. Remember – you don’t have to be a techy to be good at SEO. All activities are essentially aimed at enhancing the user experience of your brand online.
References
- “Desktop vs Mobile vs Tablet Market Share Worldwide”, Source: https://gs.statcounter.com/platform-market-share/desktop-mobile-tablet
- “What Is Image SEO? How Is It Done?” Source: https://screpy.com/is-image-seo/
- “What Is an SEO Audit? Why Do an SEO Audit? How To Do One?”, Source: https://www.bruceclay.com/blog/what-is-seo-audit/
