You might be the best landscaper in the vicinity and yet see your competitors earn more. This can happen if there is a lack of marketing. However, amending the situation is not tough. You can do it with simple techniques of digital marketing for landscapers.
Digital marketing for landscaping companies is a rather wide avenue of online promotion that leverages multiple channels to reach its goal. With the right strategies, you should be able to get a large volume of website traffic, better publicity and more sales.
However, as its purview is rather large, the chances of error is rather wide. Hence, it is perhaps better to have some knowledge before embarking on the journey.
If you are keen on launching an internet marketing campaign for your landscaper business, you are in the right spot. In this blog, we have discussed a plethora of strategies that will lead you to the zenith of popularity as a landscaper in the industry.
Peruse this blog till the end to discover the challenges Landscapers face and ways to overcome them through digital marketing.
What is Digital Marketing for Landscapers?
Digital marketing for landscaping businesses comprises multiple strategies whereby landscapers can gain online prominence, generate revenue, and attain brand recognition through better online visibility. It entails strategies like SEO, Paid ads, social media marketing, content marketing, online reputation management, email marketing, and more.
5 Challenges of Online Landscape Marketing
Setting up foot in the landscaping industry can be an uphill battle, especially for those who are new to digital marketing. After taking a thorough survey of the landscaping market, we have come to understand that there are majorly 5 problems that landscapers find in the way to their business’s growth.
Let’s take a look at the five challenges that landscapers face;
- Immense Competition
One of the biggest challenges of a landscaper is to stand out among its competitors. There are about 647,741 landscaper companies in the USA alone. Hence, it can be assumed that the global data would be a much larger figure. Now most of these businesses are using some of the other form of digital marketing strategies to reach to the zenith. So, you have to come up with an unbeatable marketing campaign to dominate the market.
- Service Frequency
Yet another challenge in the landscaping and lawn care industry is the frequency at which existing clients require services. These are generally a one-time thing or a seasonal affair. For instance, once you perform a landscape maintenance service for a client, chances are they will require the service after half a year or one whole year. Hence, revenue generation can be an uphill thing if you don’t generate new leads constantly.
- Generating New Leads
Landscape business depends on generating revenue. No profit for a long time, and you will end up with no business either. However, for this you will need new leads. However, this can be a challenge for newcomers to the landscaping business as people tend to trust old & established names over startups.
- Fixing a Budget for Marketing
Digital marketing for landscapers has many avenues. If you are new in the arena, choosing which marketing channel would work the best for you can be tricky. Selecting the wrong marketing strategy can result in useless expenses without generating any revenue.
- Consistent Monitoring
As the purview of digital marketing is pretty wide, monitoring all the channels can be a hassle. Taking your eyes off tracking the marketing campaign can result in unexpected loss. Nonetheless, it cannot be avoided. Hence, it is another big challenge for landscapers, especially ones who are new to digital marketing.
6 Best Digital Marketing Channels Landscapers Can Leverage for Better Visibility
The term’ digital marketing for landscapers’ is not limited to one process or technique. It is a multifarious strategy and has many avenues. As a landscaper, who wants to boost client inflow and ROI, choosing the right online marketing strategy is important.
We are discussing six digital marketing strategies that bear the best results for landscapers. While you can choose to market yourself through all the below-mentioned techniques, it need not be the case always.
If you are new to digital marketing, choosing one or two of the marketing techniques can work well for you. The important thing is to start building your brand image;
- Search Engine Optimization Drives Organic Traffic
Search engine optimization for the landscaping business is a wide avenue. It is perhaps the most opted-for digital marketing strategy. This is because SEO for landscapers is cost-effective, and holds the potential to drive a staggering number of organic leads when done right.
According to data collected in 2019, 68% of online experience starts with search engines.
Hence, SEO should be the primary digital marketing strategy for any landscape company that wants to dominate the online market. SEO can help you understand the relevant keywords. Infusing these search terms helps you augment the search engine rankings.
While content is undoubtedly the king, however, it is targeting keywords that get you a seat at the table among the top rankers!
Of course, there are off page optimization strategies like acquiring backlinks, social media optimization, that earns more credibility. Technical SEO optimization tactics like mobile optimization, web speed enhancement, website designing, on the other hand augments the user experience.
Local SEO optimization holds a special place for landscapers. This is because landscaping businesses primarily depend on local customers for revenue generation. Hence, make sure to optimize Google Business Profile, NAP SEO along with targeting local keywords for more popularity in the local market.
Checklist on SEO for Landscapers:
- Target relevant keywords
- Content is always the King
- Acquire credible backlinks
- Enhance user experience
- Optimize local SEO for landscapers
- PPC Advertising Gets More Qualified Leads
PPC and SEO are two sides of the same coin. While SEO helps landscaping businesses get a wider reach, paid advertising takes a narrow approach to reach people who are genuinely interested in getting landscaping services.
Pay-per-click stands tall as yet another vital strategy when it comes to Digital marketing for landscapers. As the name suggests, it is a paid advertising technique where landscaping companies pay every time a potential customer clicks on their advertisement.
As people’s requirements are acceding towards luxury from bare necessity, the demand for landscapers are increasing. According to Statista in 2023, the landscaping industry generates a whopping revenue of 153.56 billion U.S. dollars in the USA alone.
However, the sad reality is only the top 10 results in the first page take away all the clicks. If you are finding it difficult to rank on the organic search results, surely pay-per-click can come to your aid.
You can run PPC for landscapers on platforms like Google ads, and Bing ads. Generally, the paid search Ads rank above the organic search results, which makes Google ads highly discoverable.
While running a paid marketing campaign, remember to bid on valuable keywords that actually take the CTR through the roof. Also choosing the type of PPC ad that works best for your brand.
While optimizing a paid ad campaign for landscapers, demography and location targeting plays an important role. This requires a thorough market study on the demographic cohort or locality that is mostly looking for landscaping services. Not using demography or location targeting can result in a high number of bad clicks!
Another noteworthy thing here is to add compelling ad copies that earn more clicks. Remember to add a CTA to your paid Ad. The best call to action are clear and concise, and one that guides the customers on what to do next.
Checklist for PPC Advertising for Landscapers
- Bid on keywords people are actually searching for
- Create compelling pieces of Ad copies
- Choose the type of PPC ads that work for your business
- Use demography and geo-targeting
- Set a budget capping for a specific duration of time
- Generate High Profit with Social Media Marketing for Landscapers
Social media houses more than 5.07 billion people. Hence, it is imperative for landscaping companies to leverage the mainstream social platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc. to their advantage.
SMM for landscapers is one of the core digital marketing strategies. Landscaping businesses can aim this marketing channel to boost their virtual presence. It is also a superb way to generate business revenue via social platforms.
With 76% of local businesses using social media, the competition is already a breakneck one. If you do not channelize a robust marketing campaign on social platforms to prospective landscaping customers, you might lag behind your competitors.
Every other landscaping business resorts to SMO with basic approaches like profile optimization, comment interaction and frequent posting. If you want to break the rut a more robust approach like running social ads should be your priority.
Although optional, social ads can be of great help if you are looking for immediate results. Social media ads like meta ads, YouTube ads, etc. can garner a high profit. The best part is, social ads are relatively cost effective than search engine adverts.
Social media use their own unique algorithm to ascertain to whom your ads are shown. This is based on the search history and user intent of the social netizens.
Checklist on Social Media Marketing for Landscapers
- Open business pages on all social media platforms
- Optimize social media pages with basic business details
- Mention the website link in the bio
- Run paid ads campaign on social media
- Ensure the Ad copy has a clear CTA
- Set a budget capping for social media paid ad campaign
- Content Marketing Connects All Digital Marketing Streams
Content marketing is one of the most prominent digital marketing streams for landscapers. It includes the creation and distribution of written and visual content that interests the readers to probe into the brand in detail. It establishes authority and expands brand recognition.
Search engines and social media algorithms mainly use content as the fulcrum on which they base their rankings. Hence, it is imperative to take up a smart content marketing strategy. Be it in the form of blog posts, Ad copies, emails, or eBooks, creating high quality content is imperative.
Ensure that the content communicates the purpose for creation. For example, if you have a blog section on your website, create informative blog posts that are valuable for the readers. Write high-quality content that follows SEO guidelines to rank high in search engine results. Content used for email marketing for landscapers should easily re-target the audience with its personal approach. A paid ad copy, on the other hand, should be brief yet impactful.
User-generated content, such as online reviews, is another powerful aspect that can skyrocket the brand awareness of any landscaping company. You just have to know the way to create the best impact by channeling it.
When it comes to content marketing, you can either do it on your own or not. It completely depends on your prowess of writing. If you need assistance, contact a content marketing company.
It is crucial for the content to strike the right chord of the heart.Text content might be informational, but these do not have the necessary engagement factor. This is where the necessity of visual content arises.
Visual content is crucial because 60% of people consider it as a deciding factor for doing transactions with a business. Therefore, support the written content with proper images and infographics for better impact.
Checklist for Content marketing for landscapers
- Get to know the target audience
- Understand the intent of the content
- Craft high quality content that serves the purpose
- Avoid plagiarism of any kind
- Email Referral Marketing is Best for Lead Nurturing
Email marketing works as a core component of any form of digital marketing. It is the act of sending out emails to a list of website visitors, leads, or prospective customers who may be interested in the services of a landscaping company. It is a solid lead nurturing strategy and acts as a strong bridge that connects landscaping businesses with potential clients.
Not just this, email marketing strategies hold the power to establish a personal connection with the target audience, even though it is essentially a commercial strategy. You can directly resort to a direct mail campaign with a transactional motive. Such emails can include welcome offers, emails on discounted lawn care services, limited-period offers, etc.
While doing email marketing, be sure to choose the right template for the right purpose. As landscaping pertains to the artistic avenues, your template is better off being a little colorful. Choose the words wisely. The email should communicate the intent. It is an effective way.
Although email marketing is a relatively easy channel of digital marketing for landscapers, it is still the sheer load that can be burdensome. Consider switching to automation to lessen the burden.
Checklist for Email Marketing
- Comprise a list of potential buyers
- Choose the right template for the email
- Craft the perfect email copy that communicates your intent
- Nurture leads through email marketing
- Encourage satisfied customers to send referrals
- Include a CTA that encourages potential customers to take action
- Review and Reputation Management Determines Business Revenue
As Google considers online reputation as one of the driving factors of search rankings, reputation building should be the core focus of any landscaper. Online reputation management for landscaping business refers to influencing and enhancing the prominence of landscapers on various online platforms. ORM can be done on the business’s website, third party websites, social media and GBP.
You can start with a brand audit. This helps in scouting the brand mentions to get a thorough overview of what people are saying.
If we go by statistics, 85% people trust online reviews, whereas 60% opine that they will not do business with a company if it has too many negative reviews.
Taking the above statistics into consideration, we can deduce that online review management is vitally important for a landscaping business.
The good news is that if you do a good job at landscaping for your clients, getting positive reviews can be easy. 77% of people will leave a review when asked for it. You can ask them manually after a landscaping project is over or leave it to automation to serve the purpose. Either way, make sure to ask for positive feedback on Google or other platforms.
While asking clients for positive ratings & reviews can help, but that is not the end of story. Hence promoting yourself through earned, paid, owned and shared media stands prime.
ORM is an ongoing and time consuming process. It requires monitoring at every step, each day. As an owner of a landscaping business, your hands can be full. In such cases, consider taking the help of an online reputation management agency.
Checklist for Online Reputation Management
- Search for existing company reviews
- Form an outreach strategy for clients who offered negative feedback
- Reply to reviews
- Focus on getting earned, owned, and paid brand promotion
- Track online reviews at regular intervals
7 Digital Marketing Tips for Landscapers: Promote Your Business & Boost ROI
Digital marketing is the most important channel of promotion in today’s world when most people are looking to connect with businesses online. Did you know, Also,76% of consumers look at the online presence of a business before hiring them.
Hence, a strong digital presence is of primary importance, especially to businesses like landscapers.
Now that you know the strategies you can employ for a better online presence, let us share some of the tired and tested landscaping marketing ideas.
- Understand Business Goals & Formulate Marketing Strategies Accordingly
While venturing into the online work of marketing for your landscaping company, it is important to understand your business goals.
For instance, if you want better brand visibility, bolstering your social media presence and organic ranking are of primary importance. Such marketing campaigns have a wider approach and give better brand visibility.
However, if your business wants immediate sales, then resorting to paid ad campaigns can give a landscaping & lawn care company desirable results. For lead nurturing and retargeting, a stout email marketing is perhaps the best solution.
Hence, understanding the business goals is especially important for companies to make the best utilization of resources.
- Get to Know Your Target Audience
Having a clear understanding of the target demography, their taste, the current trend for landscaping people are opting can help you come up with the best marketing strategies.
According to Financial Express, most people between the age of 30 to 40 years are the ones buying properties. Hence, targeting this section can generate new leads. Do a thorough market research to find out people who already avail landscaping services (even if it is from your competitor). Market your USP to them for better business revenue.
A thorough comprehension of your target audience helps refine the business ideals, be at par with the landscaping trends, and stay ahead of your competitors.
- Create a Dominant Presence
Focusing on revenue generation alone can backfire for landscapers as people tend to trust companies that have a solid online presence. A major section of people also trust information from organic search results.
So, paid advertising is certainly a good way to get new customers, but not paying heed to PR, ORM and SEO can be major mistakes on your part. Follow SEO guidelines while optimizing your website. As it is a rather cost-effective marketing strategy, most Landscapers can afford it.
As a solution for your online reputation, you can either build an in-house PR team who takes care of the business’s reputation. A hassle-free way to do PR is taking the help of a professional public relations company. These PR agencies have some of the best industry connections and can solve complex issues in the blink of an eye.
- Share valuable Insights on the Internet
As you are into the landscaping business and have some expertise, you can help so many others by starting a blog section. This concerns the section of people who are trying to do landscaping on their own, or they may be trying to cut-cost and maintain their landscape.
Share valuable tips and tricks on lawn care and landscaping. Select topics people are already searching for. You can use Google Trends to learn what people are looking for and craft blogs according to the topics you discover.
You come across as an industry expert when you share-worthy articles that genuinely help people. When search engines discover these through crawlers, they automatically give you a better position on the SERPs.
- Visual Content Impacts More
People believe what they see!
As a landscaper, whose job is to beautify sites, sharing stunning images and videos impacts the sales. However, do take care of website speed by compressing heavy files like these.
If you can work with the lenses, that would be great! If not, hire a professional photographer to take shots of before and after work the landscaping sites you work on. Such images establish trust, get more views, and facilitate business growth by making the landscaping services more discoverable.
- Stay Within Your Budget
While digital marketing for landscapers is important, so is staying within your budget. Ideally, you should not spend more than 15% of your business profit on landscaping marketing. Anything more than that and you are on your way to a downward spiral!
If you are employing more than one digital marketing strategy, it is best to ascertain a fixed budget for each. Obviously, PPC costs the most if you go into aggressive marketing, followed by SEO, while email marketing costs the least.
The cost of social media marketing for landscaping businesses falls somewhere in the middle, it depends on whether you are running social ads or not. If you are not sure how to budget or are on the verge of over-expending, it is better to have a talk with a digital marketing company. A little research can lead you to agencies that offer expert digital marketing services at an affordable price.
- Keep a Tab on your Digital Marketing Strategy
Tracking & Monitoring are essential parts of any marketing campaign, and landscapers are no exceptions. Tracking the performance of each marketing strategy helps a landscaping business owner gain insights into how the campaign is performing. Such data can form the basis of future strategy formulation.
Landscaping and lawn care business owners can use tools like Google Search Console, SEMrush, Ahrefs, etc., to track the performance of SEO, PPC, Email marketing and other campaigns. However, you must note that some of these tracking tools cost money. You can either take the premium subscription to each of them or choose a leading agency that can do digital marketing for landscapers.
FAQs
It may take 3 to 6 months to see considerable results for digital marketing campaigns for landscapers. This is so because strategies like SEO take a while, while with paid ads for landscaping businesses, you will start seeing more impressions within a few days. The results for ORM and email marketing completely depends on how you approach the marketing strategy.
A good budget for landscaping marketing is 5 to 10% of your business revenue. For most landscaping companies, this marketing budget suffices. In case you are desperate and looking for quicker business growth, do not spend more than 15% of your revenue on digital marketing.
Yes, you can do marketing for landscaping businesses by yourself. However, for that, you will need sufficient knowledge on SEO, PPC, SMM , ORM and email marketing. If you have some knowledge you want to follow the trial and error method of acing it, you can. But be cautious with expending business resources.
There are tons of marketing agencies that make tall promises. But to get a good digital marketing company to boost the revenue of a landscaping business, you have to keep the following factors in mind:
a) The company should be an established one
b) It should employ ethical tactics
c) Pay attention to online reviews about the company
d) The terms and conditions should be transparent
Final Takeaway
As the owner of a landscaping business, you already know that there is a lot of competition in the domain. And not marketing your business online will keep you several steps back from your competitors.
It is a myth that digital marketing for landscapers costs a lot of money. You can start with baby steps and very little budget. If you are new in the industry, try to opt for simpler digital marketing strategies like search engine optimization and bolstering the social media presence. Save the paid ad campaigns for time when you start generating enough revenue.
If you are already an established landscaper looking to establish your authority over the entire landscaping industry, opt for aggressive campaigns like PPC and social ads that maximize online visibility within a short span.
Whether you are new in the business or an established name, hiring a professional digital marketing company is always a good choice. These companies have digital marketing packages tailored to the budget of every business scale.
Additional Resources:
SEO for Landscapers: Top Strategies for Higher Rankings
