Your online marketing can get your Fire & Security company found in a city 20 miles away but it’s very hard to get people to click on your listing – unless they already know your name.
How consumers use Google to search
Back in 2005, Google users spent an average of 23 seconds to scroll down the first page of the search results and choose a listing.
By 2014, it took just 8-9 seconds on average. How rational is that speed of decision?
When they are looking for a service, people want to choose. They will look down the first full page (not the 2nd).
Their brain is thinking:
‘Do I recognise anyone? Do I know something about one of these companies?’
So you want your Fire & Security company’s listing to be on the 1st page but you also want it to be the familiar name that is recognised.
According to a talk at the Local Marketing Summit, there is a relationship between proximity and familiarity. And it directly affects web marketing for local contractors like Fire & Security installers.
Proximity and familiarity for Fire & Security companies
A study was done of HVAC (air conditioning companies) in the US. It showed that 35% of all their website traffic came from within a 0-5 mile radius of the premises.
Another 20% came from 6-10 miles, 15% from 11-15 miles and 11% from 16-20 miles.
Think about that.
80% of all their website traffic was from homes and businesses located within a 20 mile radius of the office.
Analyse your Fire & Security customers with your 80/20 head on. Would you agree that 80% of your business is done in 20% of the postcodes that you service?
And why is that?
Familiarity.
But how?
I want more mobile business cards
One of our Fire & Security customers measures his success by how many vans he has in his fleet.
But they are so much more than a method of getting personnel and equipment from the yard to the site.
Each van has the name and logo of the business. It is a mobile business card or flyer.
The majority of your branded vans spend most of their time close to home. The more vans you have, the more this happens.
People see your vans everywhere without really registering them; your brand gets into their subconscious. But when someone needs some more CCTV cameras or to have their office fire extinguishers serviced, you can be sure they start noticing and recognising your vans.
It’s the same with your bell boxes.
They blend into the background until there have been a few burglaries. Then, suddenly, everyone is noticing the homes that are protected… and by whom.
The impact of Voice Search
People want to go with the known rather than the unknown.
Voice search is becoming more and more common – through mobile phones plus Siri, Alexa and Google Home.
The way to win these hearts and minds is to focus on becoming familiar. That way, when they want an intruder alarm, they will ask Alexa for your company’s name, rather than hunting on their computer for a list of intruder alarm installers in [your town]
Vans, familiarity and leads
And all your ads will work better when you become the company with which your community is familiar.
We had a direct experience of this a couple of years ago when we worked for a Fire & Security start up.
He had a good basic home security starter pack at a great price. He wanted to invest in marketing and we thought his budget would be enough to get a quick start in a small location.
What we didn’t know was that he had NO branded vans. This meant he had no local visibility. No one knew who he was.
It took a concerted Facebook ad campaign targeting local people and the addition of his logo to two vans. Then his company started to be recognised in his community and quality enquiries began coming in.
Familiarity AND ranking equals sales
So you need to get your branded vans out there. And you need to do some paid advertising to boost awareness of your business on Facebook and Google. It’s a double whammy that will increase the success of your organic rankings.
Can Lollipop help your Fire & Security business to get more leads and sales?
There is an easier way to get
The Right Message in front of
The Right Person at
The Right Time
Click the link to answer a few questions so we can see how best Lollipop can help. And then book your call.