How to Get More Plumbing Leads: 9 Lead Generation Tips

1. Design a winning website

A great website is the first step to generating plumbing leads. 

To get quality leads from your plumbing website, you’ll need to make a site that’s easy to use, clearly lists your services and prices, and makes it easy for people to get in touch with you.

You can easily create a professional website with website builders like GoDaddy and Wix. Choose from one of their pre-designed templates and edit them to fit your business needs with their easy drag-and-drop design tools.

Pages to include on your plumbing website

Here’s what your plumbing website should include: 

• A homepage to share a quick overview of your plumbing services, your service area, and your contact information.
• A services page with a clear list of your services and prices.
• An about page that includes details on how long you’ve been in business, the kinds of plumbing jobs you work on, and your plumbing training and certifications.
• A contact page with a contact form, your phone number, and your email address. The more ways you give people to contact you, the more likely you are to get their business. 

Tips for an engaging website

To make your website more engaging to potential customers:

•  Add pictures of you and your team to different pages on your site—this is important for creating trust and building a bond with your visitors. Photos of people’s faces can improve conversions by up to 95%.
•  Share reviews from happy customers. Sharing reviews can up the number of people who reach out to you by 270%. 
• To get more clicks, add a CTA button with, “Get Your Free Quote,” at the top and bottom of your homepage.

Pro Tip: Check if your navigation is user-friendly. Send your site to a friend and ask them how easy it is to find out about your services and request a quote.

Optimize your website for SEO

SEO (search engine optimization) is a process you can use to help your website appear higher on Google’s search results page when potential customers are looking for your services. 

To optimize your website for local SEO, start by making a list of all the potential words and phrases a customer would search in Google to find your services. Your list of keywords could include:

• Emergency plumber [City]
• Residential plumbing services
• Commercial plumbing company
• Licensed plumber [City]
• Water heater repair
• Affordable plumber [City]

After you’ve made a list of keywords, add them to your website content, including your headers (page titles), subheaders, and URLs.  

Adding keywords to your site is the first step to getting found. Once you’ve done that, run through our SEO to-do list:

• Check the speed of your website to make sure it’s loading quickly for visitors. 53% of people ditch a site that takes longer than 3 seconds to load. 
• Make sure your website design is responsive, meaning it’s easy to view on both computers and mobile phones. 
• Add new blog posts with more keywords each month. To keep showing up in organic search on Google, you need to add new blog posts with more keywords to your site each month. To keep bringing more people to your site, share new blog posts each week or month with new keywords. 

READ MORE: SEO for Plumbers: 8 Easy Tips to Help Customers Find You Online

2. Ask happy customers to write a review

Positive reviews on places like Facebook and Google are the main reason why a homeowner calls you over another local plumber. In fact, 90% of customers say reviews influence their decisions to hire a service provider.

To generate plumbing leads with customer reviews:

•  At the end of each job, ask your happy customers to share reviews for your plumbing business on sites like Google, Facebook, Trustpilot, and Thumbtack.
• Share your Google Business Profile review link in follow-up texts or emails. The easier it is for customers to leave a review, the more likely they are to do it. 
• Create a testimonials page on your website. To make them even more memorable—share a mix of written testimonials and video testimonials. 
• Automate your review request process with Jobber. Use this tool to automatically ask customers for reviews over text after they’ve paid their invoice. 

When you make an invoice in Jobber, you can choose if you want to send the customer a review request.

3. Add your business to online directories and lead generation platforms

Plumbing lead generation platforms and online directories are great ways to help get your business found by people looking for plumbing services online. 

• Lead generation websites, like Thumbtack, Angi, or HomeAdvisor, connect customers looking for services (like plumbing) with businesses. For a small cost, you can bid on job requests and send quotes to potential customers.
• Online directories (or local directories), like Google Business Profile, or Yelp, are digital platforms where you can list your business for free. This gives customers searching for plumbers a chance to find you online.

Check out some of the most popular plumbing lead generation platforms and online directories:

Lead Generation Platforms

• Thumbtack
• TaskRabbit
• Angi (formerly Angie’s List)
• HomeAdvisor
• Porch

Online Directories

• Google Business Profile
• Yelp
• Facebook
• Yellow Pages
• Bing Places

To start using lead generation sites or online directories to gain new leads, try these tips:

• Claim your free Google Business Profile listing to get your business to show up on Google search results and Google Maps.
• Create a Facebook business profile and get more people interested in your business by sharing blog posts, photos, and customer reviews. 
• Build a Thumbtack for contractors account—post a free business listing and pay for leads in your area.

4. Turn leads into customers with email marketing

Growing an email list and sending out interesting emails is an effective way to turn one-time site visitors into customers and an essential part of any digital marketing strategy.

To build your list and help turn new leads into customers:

• Let visitors sign up to receive newsletters or discounts right from your website.
• Sweeten the deal. More people will sign up for your emails if they get in return. For example, you may offer a discount on a job or a downloadable booklet on topics like plumbing hacks or troubleshooting. 
• Add email addresses to a CRM. Keep people’s contact information in one place with a plumbing CRM.
• Put a call-to-action button at the end of each email. Set up a button to take customers to your website where they can find out more about your services. 
• Send routine maintenance reminders. One of the best uses of an email list is to use it to send reminders to your past customers that it’s time for a plumbing service. 
• Send a newsletter. Newsletters are a great way to stay top of mind with potential customers. You could write about interesting local news, share reviews from happy customers, or give them your personal DIY plumbing hacks.
• Track your email open rates, and clicks. Track these metrics to make sure your emails are getting results. 

Use marketing automation tools

To send effective marketing emails faster, use a tool that prepares email templates and audiences for you.

When you use Jobber to create email campaigns, you can choose from premade templates that are built for specific goals and customers—and that include your company branding.

5. Create digital ads 

Use plumbing ads to help new leads find you on social media platforms and Google. In particular, pay-per-click ads (PPC ads) are a great way to help people find you when they’re searching for plumbing services on Google—ads on Google reach up to 90% of people on the internet. 

6. Get referrals from customers

Customer referrals are one of the best ways to get more local plumbing leads. After all, customers tend to trust recommendations that come from people they know. 

Here’s how to get new referrals from your customers for your plumbing business:

• Choose a reward. Try out different rewards to see what works best for getting more referrals from your customers. You could try out offering discounts on services, branded mugs or t-shirts, or gift cards.
• Show your customers how referral rewards work. Tell your customers about your referral program in your follow-up texts and emails. To make referrals even easier for your customers, you can share personalized, clickable referral links. 
• Act fast. It’s a good idea to call or email potential customers as soon as a lead comes in. The longer you wait, the less likely you are to get their business. 

7. Build relationships with other business owners

Relationship building with contractors in the trades is another effective way to get more plumbing leads: 

“How I get most of my clients is through social media. I’m very active in trade groups—we have dinners, we have outings and that’s how we share our work around.

Even though there are your competitors, not all of them can do all that work. At the same time, there’s just so much work out there.” Terence Chan, President of Impetus Plumbing and Heating.

Here’s how you can build relationships with other business owners: 

• Make friends through social media. You’ll find plenty of other contractors on Reddit, Facebook, and contractor forums. 
• Go to trade shows and networking events. Try out trade shows like Flow Expo, AHR Expo, and Kitchen and Bath Industry Show and hand out your plumbing business cards. 
• Keep in touch. Drop reminders in your calendar to regularly reach out to business owners you’ve met. Ask them to grab coffee or text them to compliment them on a new business win they’ve shared on their socials. 
• Be generous. Share referrals to get referrals—the more business you can give other contractors, the more likely they’ll be to share your name with their customers.
• Run local giveaways. Don’t just team up with other contractors. You can also run giveaways or contests with local shops, cafes, and restaurants.

8. Send direct mail 

Direct mail is still one of the best ways to get your business in front of long-time homeowners.

Here’s how to create a positive impression with direct mail:

• Make it personal. One reason people love getting something in the post is because it feels more personal. Add a personal URL or QR code to get more people to visit your site.  
• Put in a time-limited coupon or discount. Limited-time discounts motivate people to buy your services because they worry they’ll miss out if they don’t. 
• Go for color and style. Go for fun or bold colors and prints to make getting mail from you more exciting. (Just make sure to match your branding!)

9. Make TikTok and YouTube videos 

Sharing plumbing videos on TikTok and YouTube is a great way to build your reputation—44% of people say their favorite way to learn about a product or service is by watching a video about it. 

Online videos are also a smart way to get leads from different age groups. 60% of people on TikTok are Gen Z, while 87% of U.S. millennials are on YouTube.

Here are some ideas to get you started with TikTok or YouTube videos:

• Post DIY and troubleshooting videos. 90% of DIYers say they watch how-to videos on YouTube. 
• Share video reviews. Video reviews can be even more memorable than written reviews. Get your happy customers to talk about what they liked most about the job you did to turn DIY watchers into potential customers. 
• Share day-on-the-job videos. People love to see the people behind the business—it’s a great way to build trust and show your talents. 

10. Use Jobber’s Marketing Suite

Attract more customers with tools that make you look like the plumbing pro you are.

Jobber’s Marketing Suite helps you build a strong reputation that attracts more customers, and secures more plumbing work with less effort.

Here’s what’s included in Jobber’s Marketing Suite:

• Reviews: Give your online reputation a boost by collecting more Google reviews through automated review requests.
• Referrals:  Simplify the referral process with a fully automated referral program, making it easier for customers to send new business your way.
• Campaigns: Increase sales with a user-friendly email marketing tool that turns old customers into new revenue.

How to get commercial plumbing leads 

Unlike residential leads, which are leads looking for home plumbing, commercial leads are looking for plumbing services for their business. Commercial plumbing leads often result in higher-paying, longer-term jobs than residential ones. 

To get more commercial plumbing leads, you’ll need to take a different approach than you would for residential plumbing leads. Here’s how: 

• Connect with people on LinkedIn. LinkedIn has over 60 million decision makers—this makes it the perfect place to find commercial plumbing leads. The best way to use LinkedIn is to create genuine friendships. Like and comment on posts and spend two-three months engaging with someone before you share your services. 
• Go to business events. Trade shows and local business networking events are a great place to meet commercial leads. Take a look at conventions like BNI and Gartner.
• Hire a sales team to get you more commercial leads. You can only do so much when it comes to landing a steady number of high-paying commercial leads. Trained, experienced sales professionals can help you grow. 

“People are everything. Our team is great. Our leadership is great.  As soon as I shifted to this mindset, my business just exploded. You have to empower people.” Dan Guest, Guest Plumbing and HVAC.