Slow PPC Traffic? Spring into Action!

Spring is just around the corner. With the winter weather coming to an end, it’s the perfect time for your customers to prepare their HVAC system to transition to the warmer months. But it’s not just your customer who needs to gear up for the spring. Be advised that the Google and Bing Pay-Per-Click (PPC) market demand will fluctuate as people become less motivated to act on their HVAC needs.

What your customer needs to know this spring

Let’s start with your customer. Now is the perfect time for a smart consumer to schedule an AC tune-up along with other important maintenance efforts, like checking air filters and making sure thermostats are accurate. It’s important to remind your customer that now is the time to do that. Informing your customer base what they should be doing is best utilized in mass media campaigns, direct mail or email campaigns, and social media outreach.

Specifically to PPC, consider adjusting the ac tune-up offer you’re advertising. Stay on top on what your competitors are doing by researching what they are advertising on PPC, radio, TV, etc. Your competitors may be running old offers, but you can beat them to it before the weather gets hot by dropping your price a little.

Don’t forget, your maintenance plan has a ton of value. Recurring maintenance plans provide consistent revenue and repeat customers. By servicing clients’ HVAC units on a regular basis, the customer saves money in the long run by avoiding a major repair down the road. Pick out one or two pieces of the maintenance plan to highlight and share that message across the board in all your advertising. This can be accommodated in the PPC world, without up and changing advertised offers, through multiple ad extensions.

What you can expect of search demand this spring

It happens twice a year in the fall and in the spring. We see HVAC lead volume decrease while the Cost Per Lead increases. You may see this in your other marketing media, too. This occurs due to search market conditions, how you adjust to those market conditions and users’ lack of motivation.

People search differently when the temperatures are mild and pleasant. When it’s really hot or it’s really cold, people are super motivated to pick up the phone or send you an email to ask for service. They may pick up the phone within the first search, possibly their first or second click. But when people can solve their problem by opening a window or putting on a jacket, they’ll do that to avoid spending money to fix the actual problem. They’ll shop research and click around for a few days before picking up the phone. This user effect leads to more clicks absorbed, but not necessarily more leads. Our goal through our PPC strategy is to get one lead within an average of three clicks. During mild weather that ratio can increase to four to five clicks in order to get one lead due to people’s lack of motivation.

At the same time, other HVAC companies in the search market will raise the bids when temperatures get mild to try to place higher in an attempt to get more leads. The VitalStorm PPC approach is similar, but in a different way. We may ramp up by casting a wider net of keywords, but when search demand is down that approach doesn’t always bring in more leads. To be more strategic, we may ramp up the keywords that work the best in your account. It’s up to our PPC Team to utilize our keyword strategy to pick and choose keywords that are “worth” the money. That’s how our average Cost Per Click fluctuates throughout the month. And when average Cost Per Click increases, so does average Cost Per Lead.

Rest assured, VitalStorm is here to help you during your spring transition. Reach out to your Success Team Member to ask how to get geared up for spring. Or give us a call to learn more about our services at 972-961-7380.