The Future Of Marketing For Home Service Businesses With Neil Patel

Welcome back to the show. I'm your host, Phil Risher. And on today's episode, we're going to be discussing the future of digital marketing for home service businesses with Neil Patel. Thanks so much for joining us today, Neil.

Yeah, no problem. Awesome.

So if you don't know Neil, you're probably living under rock. He is the OG SEO expert. Started doing SEO at the age of 16. Now runs an international digital agency with offices all over the world and helps millions of people, including myself, monthly with his content about SEO and digital marketing. So, Neil, people that listen to this show are home service business owners, and a lot of them are looking to get new customers for their business through visibility. And I've heard you talk a lot about this search everywhere optimization and not just Google anymore. So what are some of those new platforms or things that people should be looking out for?

Yeah. So the home services industry is massive and you're seeing consolidation happen in the home services category as well, with a lot of private equity, family offices gobbling up a lot and combining them. Yeah. And a lot of these home services businesses grow just through word of mouth or Yelp or some ads or Google. But when you look at the market, there's roughly 45.1 billion searches a day. Okay. Across the whole web, throughout the whole world. Google has 8.5 billion of them. That's roughly 18%.

Yeah.

Amazon has 3.5 billion. Instagram has 6.5 billion. Heck, even the Apple App Store has 500 million. ChatGPT is at a billion. So people are using all these platforms and if you're not creating your content everywhere, you're missing out. So I'll give you a great example of this. Let's say I'm a roofing company in Southern California. Sadly, there's been a lot of fires lately in Southern California, like Los Angeles specifically. If I was a roofing company, I would talk about the different roofing elements and doing an experiment showcasing like a video, a blowtorch to them and be like, this is what happens to shingles after, you know, when you put it in a fire. This is what happens to clay roofing. I don't know actually the names of the tiles, but making them up at this point. Right. Clay. This is what happens to brick tiles. I know they're not made out of brick, but you get the point, right? Yeah. And then you're showing the just being like before and after, people like, oh, cool. This is how long, you know, these tiles are the most fire resistant. Right. And in Dallas, Texas, if I was A roofing company, because weather patterns have changed over the years. You get more hurricanes, you get more you. You get more tornadoes and stuff that weren't as common, let's say in Texas 10 years ago. You're starting to see a little bit more of that stuff. Now you can start saying like, you know, based on the city, here's the roofing tiles or roofs that do the best during tornadoes, here's the ones that do the best during hurricanes. And you can, you know, do simulation and be like, this is the key, tying it down, all this kind of stuff. But just basic stuff like that will help you create content that's for all the platforms, get your name out there and generate business. You can do the same thing, like with hail, how does hail affect air conditioning units? Right, right. Don't really have to worry too much about that in Southern California, but in the east coast, you have to worry about that more.

Yeah. So from a search everywhere perspective, it's like think about the content you were creating on Google using the algorithm, but it's going to continue to rank on all these other platforms because they all want to give the best content.

Kind of. But think of the content that you create for your website and blog and think about how you can post that content natively on LinkedIn and Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube. Because your customers are everywhere. So when they search on all these platforms, they'll find you just like they would find you on Google.

Yeah. Okay, that makes complete sense. So another part of getting new customers and visibility is about like building brand on social media. Gary Vee's always talking about like the numbers guys, you know, conversions and this. And like you got to be building this brand on social media. So can you talk a little bit about that? It sounds like taking the content that you would normally be posting on your blog and then repurposing it into social content.

That's what you're referring to. Exactly. And the reason you want to do that is you nailed it. It really is about a brand. When you, when you want to, you know, buy a electric car, a lot of people just think Tesla because their brand out there. Right. If you want athletic shoes, a lot of people just think Nike because they've been out there for a long time. Not a Google search, not an Instagram clip. But being on all these platforms gets your brand out there and it creates a lot of word of mouth, just like in the home services business. Let's say if I was doing eight track stuff, I don't know why, but most H vac service providers, when they go and fix the ac, they don't slap their sticker on it. I would. Because when something's broken, what do people do? They don't know how to fix the ac, but they go and look at it when it's not going to do anything. Oh, there's a sticker with the phone number. Let me just call them. That's what you should be doing.

That's right. And even other trades, like imagine roofing, gutter cleaning, just stick one up there with your stuff, even if it's magnetic, put it in the garage or something. Putting your brand all over the place. And I've heard you talk about that. A lot of the ChatGPTs, whatever, they're looking at brands and they're preferring those brands as part of their search queries.

Yes. They're literally looking at how many times your business and your name is being mentioned all over the web. And it's part of the algorithm when it comes to recommending your service or your business, your product.

Yeah. So it's not just Google reviews anymore. You need to be building a brand all over the place and making sure that you're posting relevant content that your customers would want to read.

Yes, exactly.

Yeah. So since there's a shift, what does it look like from an ads perspective? Like is ChatGPT going to start running ads and have their own, you know, ads platform or what is this? What's the future of that? Any ideas?

They definitely will. I think it's just a question of time.

Yeah.

You know, are they gonna do it in the next year or two or three? Maybe not, but they'll definitely do it within 10 years. There's just too much, too many eyeballs and too much potential to not make money from advertising. And it's a high profit business.

Yeah. What do you think about the. The category King Chachi BT is synonymous with AI And Gemini, I feel like, is trying to battle back. Do you think that they'll be able to, to overcome that or do you think it's going to, is there going to be something unique that Gemini or Google's going to be able to do?

I'll tell you this, okay. In the home servicing business, majority of your customers are going to be more on the older age than the younger age. Right. Because most of the homeowners are older. It was much more affordable when my parents bought a home. If you look at the percentage of millionaires in the a lot of them become millionaires because of buying a home and just real Estate going up over time, older age. A lot of those people, yes, they do use ChatGPT, but when I ask them on AI, no joke to our serving and our data, we've seen that they believe that when they just Google something and they get the AA response, they believe it is chat GPT. Now that word chatgpt is synonymous with AI. But a lot of people don't understand that Google's version is different. But I, I wouldn't worry about is Google going to win or lose a race or people going to have to optimize for ChatGPT, optimize for all the platforms. Hence we call it search everywhere optimization. But Google has eyeballs and people are getting used to the AI responses Google's giving and they're becoming satisfied with them because they're drastically improving over time.

Yeah, I definitely get that. I think Gemini search on Google, all this kind of stuff, I think it's going to. People are just going to use Google, the old people and then they're going to get whatever they get and Google's still going to be making their money. From an ads perspective when it comes to social media specifically, Gary Vee talks about like, hey, this is going to be the new search platform that people are searching on. And it sounds like what you're talking about like taking these blog posts and then turning them into social content. A lot of people, they don't want to get on video. Is that something that they could use like hey Jen or AI?

Yes.

Funnel stuff into and you can record a few scripts.

Those tools will tell you what to record. And then your team can then just go and put it in a transcript and automatically records as you and move your lips and everything and it looks like you. So that way you don't have to sit there recording videos 24 7.

So create great content that you would normally create from blog post, use that and then plug it into hey Gen, build some AI influencer of some sort. And now you have this omnichannel video approach.

Exactly. You got it right.

Yeah. Okay. Awesome. I've heard you talk a lot about these social media AI influencers that are out there. This is one way that you could make basically make this. No one's really doing this, but you could dominate your market. If you're like the roofing company in Dallas and you have this AI influencer that's just this hub of content.

Yes. And then it does well and then just go buy another one in the Dallas Fort Worth area. Right. And then. Exactly. The Dallas Portsmouth area is just so Massive.

Yeah. Another thing that I know is one of your big trends for 25 is these micro influencers.

Yeah. So if you're trying to get someone to promote you, let's say if I'm a roofing company in Dallas or H Vac or a moving company or whatever it may be.

Yeah.

Those micro influencers who have a Dallas community, like mothers and stuff like that, we like calling them soccer moms because they're just so plugged in and people look for them for information and they trust them if they plug you. And even if they only have like 20,000 followers, those are the people that drive real revenue versus just being like, yeah, let me get a Kim Kardashian, promote me. Well, Kardashian promotes a lot of stuff and it's not going to be as relevant.

Yeah. So is this something like, hey, you own an H Vac company, you pay an influencer 500,000 bucks, they post for you five, you know, five times a month or something about your business?

Yes. But if I was an HR company, I wouldn't worry too much about influencers right now. I would just focus on. And even most home service businesses, I would just focus on creating content for all the platforms and pushing it out there. Most home service businesses just focus on reviews and focusing on, like, Yelp or Google, which are great channels, but you're missing a lot of the other channels out there. I'm not saying go be on Amazon. Right. Well, if you're plumbing, maybe you can sell some of your products on Amazon, but more so, I'm recommending that you go and create content like the examples we give with video stuff earlier on.

Yeah, okay. And then another vis. Visibility type thing that. I know you've been talking about this for a while, but voice search, Voice search is huge.

So young kids, or let's go back when, you know, we learn to search, we learn to search just by typing, because that's how it worked back then. So now when we search, we still type. When little kids are born and they want to search, they're first taught about search through Alexa and Google Home and all those devices. And they talk. Yeah. Voice search is going to become more and more popular, and I believe over time it's going to be more popular than typing because all these devices, Siri is getting open, or Siri has open AI now. Right. Alexa is becoming more sophisticated with whatever AI company they have a deal with. I think it's anthropic or one of them. I think Google's been investing in perplexity. I could be wrong on that one, but all of these companies are investing in these technologies and they're integrating it into voice devices. So you're going to see them become more and more popular. And the algorithms on how you do well and get recommended on voice are very similar to the stuff we mentioned. Get good reviews, a lot of get your brand out there, create content everywhere, get engagement. All these things can help you get mentioned more often.

Yeah, I feel like voice search right now in the home service space, there's this whole big push for AI answering services because there's so many leads that come in and you miss calls and it's like AI answering service, voice search can all go together. And then they would be able to just book your appointments right from your Alexa or Siri right into your CRM through scheduling. Yeah. So it's like pretty much there. Just someone needs to kind of connect the dots and yeah, even on like your hot water heater, H VAC unit, your thermostat, like your thermostat could just say, like, hey, you need to get service. Where do you want to schedule it? Or something.

Exactly. And like, you think about hot water heaters, there's also tankless heaters. Right. That just keep heating up water and even water softeners. And some of the water softeners now don't require the big bucket. They may not be as good, but they can, you know, soften water. All these things need maintenance. That's right. You know, and just making sure that you're plugged in all these areas, you're getting that business is great.

Yeah. Okay, so that's a little bit from the visibility side. It sounds like it's like, you know, build a solid brand, create content that people want to see. Whether it's Google or some other platform that people are searching for, the brands are going to be what kind of supports it and creating content. So once people get to your website, what are some of the best practices for conversions? Like from a home service perspective, I've seen some of your content about colors and other things, but what do you think are the best things?

Have your phone number up there, click to call, connect to WhatsApp as well. So that way you can do some marketing and remarketing. Because WhatsApp plugs in with meta. Make sure you have form fields, make sure you have live chat in case someone just wants questions. And you can have people man that. Or it can even plug into your phone and you can respond back pretty quickly and have your call to actions above the fold. Showcase your reviews and ratings, the number of years you've been in business. All these things will just help build trust and get you the customer over the competition.

Yeah. Are there any specific conversion rate optimization numbers from site traffic to leads that you've seen as like good benchmark for people?

If you're getting like it's very rare that you're going to get 10% or anything like that, that would be amazing. But if you can get in on the worst case end, low single digits to on the high end, call it mid single digits, you're doing pretty decent. And some people like, oh my landing page converts at 30%. Well that's when people drive targeted ad campaigns to a specific page, which is not going to happen to most your traffic. And if you're able to convert at 20%, 30%, you're not doing a good enough job driving in traffic from multiple sources. Going back to the search everywhere optimization, which means you're losing potential revenue.

Yeah, I completely agree with you. And what, what about the top of the funnel stuff? Giveaways, promos, newsletters. Is that relevant you think for home service based or not? Not really.

So you're saying the newsletters, you, you can, it just, it doesn't drive as much revenue as most people think. See with most home services people call when there's an issue or they need something versus just saying subscribe or keeping up to date with the company.

And what about mobile CTA versus desktop? What is there any.

Mobile and desktop are very similar. You just want a responsive website because you don't want to maintain two. If you just have a responsive website, it'll adapt based on if someone has a smaller phone or a larger one or iPad or a desktop. And that way you can maximize conversions wherever it may be. You don't want to maintain 3, 4, 5, 6 variations of your site. Hence your website needs to be responsive and just adapt to the size of people's screens. Plus Apple or Samsung or someone could come with the new phone that's a different size you don't want to rebuild. Right. So responsive is the key.

Yeah. One thing I have a question on with pop ups and promos on a site, usually it slows down your page load speed and people and SEOs are like don't do that because then it's gonna hurt your rankings.

What are you talking. Not necessarily. You can, you, you can do things like someone comes to your site, don't load it yet and then start loading things as they come to your website. And it can be exit pop up, you know, so exit intent based. And I don't know exactly what it's called, maybe lazy loading or something like that, but you don't have to load up everything. The key is to get the least amount so they can just go to your website, experience faster.

Yeah. Okay, so from a visibility perspective, we talked about that. Come to your website, convert into a lead, hopefully they go through your sales process. Let's talk about, like remarketing with emails and that kind of stuff. How often should people be emailing their customers? I know y' all like to email people all the time. But like, for home service business owners, what have you seen numbers wise or.

At least once a week.

Once a week. Okay. And what kind of stuff are they sharing? Offers, educational mix. Is there anything particular that you've seen?

60 to 80% are going to be educational. 20% is going to be offers and promotions.

Okay. So you can take some of that blog content that you're creating, use that as some of your educational stuff. Then the other stuff can be promos. Yeah.

And then you should also have AI dial a lot of your customers and be like, hey, push. You know, hey, it's time for your annual repair, for your annual maintenance, for your H Vac, click here or press 1 to book an appointment or whatever it may be. And you can start scheduling and get way more business that way too.

Oh, yeah, I love that. So with emails, one of the things that we do is like when we send out an email, we can see who opened it. And then you could even have AI dial those people because, you know, it's kind of a warmer lead. And then work it like that.

Exactly.

Yeah. Okay, cool. I've seen a stat that you put about the number of words.