by Kerri Wilkinson and Diane Lovine
Background Information and Presenting Problem
The owner of Northcoast Roof Repair, Tabetha Pierce, found 99 Calls in April of 2021 during a Google search of roofing lead generation providers. After reading about the company and checking out the positive reviews, she decided to call and learn more. Tabetha reported frustration with other roofing lead companies she tried in the past. She had not found success with any of them and felt that her direct needs were not being addressed. Her goal was to maximize the number of quality inbound roofing leads for her company as quickly as possible.
After discussing her goals and concerns with a roofing lead generation specialist, Tabetha decided to try the less expensive SEO lead generation services, for roofing leads, knowing that it would likely take several months to rank on Google and other searches and begin to receive leads.
SEO and Organic Lead Site Development and Setup
Tabetha decided to give SEO Lead generation a try in early May and was very excited for help with growing her Ohio business. We reviewed her service offerings, business hours and specialties. From there, a site was built (https://northcoast-roof-repairs.com/) and made live within a couple of days.
They wanted to focus on roof repair services in Ohio for all kinds of roofs including shingle, flat, and slate. They also offer 24/7 emergency repair services. The SEO site was customized around their goals with service pages that reflect their offerings, and a design to incorporate their brand. A logo, photos, and reviews from happy customers were placed on the site and within a couple of days, the site went live.
99 Calls also took on managements of her listings, such as Google My Business, Yelp and Bing in order to fully optimize her total online presence and help the business rank highly on Google searches. Within just a few weeks, Northcoast Roof Repairs received 3 organic leads, which is rather uncommon, but can happen. Tabetha was so pleased that she called her lead specialist to inquire about the 99 Calls Google Ads PPC program in the second week of June.
The organic lead generation performance between May 1 and August 30 are as follows: May: 3 leads, June: 1 lead, July: 2 leads and August: 3 leads. As of this writing, they have received 8 leads so far in the month of September. These results are just a bit higher than typical for an SEO lead generation program. It is our experience that over time, rankings increase and lead volume follows.
Google Ads Setup and Campaign Development
After seeing the quick results of 99 Calls’ SEO campaign, Tabetha signed up for Google Ads as well in hopes of ramping up even faster. She started with a modest budget of $500.00 and wanted to specifically focus on roof repair leads for shingle and slate roofs. We set out to build a highly targeted campaign to focus on her goals and because of the low initial budget, had to be very careful to construct a comprehensive negative keyword list. Northcoast was thrilled to receive a lead on the very first day that the campaign was launched. Throughout the rest of the first month, they were able to garner 17 leads. They achieved this by increasing the budget several times as it was hit and had the confidence to do so once they were able to confirm the high quality of the leads and close several jobs.
Initial Obstacles and Challenges
During the first month of the PPC campaign, Northcoast quickly received roofing leads and hit their $500.00 budget within the first couple of weeks. When customers reach their budget limit, the Ads campaign is automatically paused and they have the opportunity to keep the account paused or add more money to the budget. Once a positive ROI was established, Tabethy became more and more confident that she could safely increase the budget, but there were stops and starts as trust was established initially.
PPC Roofing Lead Results
As Northcoast Roof Repairs found their footing and realized that their ROI was solid they decided to continue their progress throughout the month of June with an increased monthly budget of $1,000. Knowing that August is often a busy month and feeling solid about having enough help to handle the uptick in new customers, Tabetha decided to trust her instincts with 99 Calls and increased her budget to $1,600.00 for the month of August. This decision yielded a total of 27 exclusive qualified leads in August and “raised the roof” for her expectations of what 99 Calls was able to do for her company. From 15 qualified leads with a late start in June to 21 exclusive leads in July, their August month was the best yet.
Google Ads Performance Metrics for Northcoast Roof Repair June 9 – Sept. 11, 2021
- Total Investment: $4,755.17
- Total Conversions: 63
- Conversion Rate: 34%
- Average Cost Per Lead: $75.47
For more information on Google Ads typical and exceptional conversion rates, see this article: https://blog.99calls.com/?s=conversion+rate
Summary of Results and Plan for Business Growth
During her first four months of organic lead generation services and her first three months of running Google Ads, Northcost received 9 organic leads and 27 leads from Google Ads. 99 Calls charges just $49 for exclusive roofing leads and was able to achieve PPC leads at $75 each. At these prices for qualified roofing leads, they would love to increase the budget and double, even triple results. However, the biggest obstacle at this time is labor. Tabetha states that she is constrained by the number of qualified roofing employees she can hire. Her immediate plan is to continue to service the leads she has while building her workforce. Once armed with enough roofers to service the leads coming in, Tabetha states that Northcoast Roof Repairs will be ready to increase their budget even further, and the lead team at 99 Calls is looking forward to the challenge!