Plumber SEO: The Ultimate SEO Guide for Plumbers in 2024

The term “plumber SEO” sounds intimidating, but it’s really simple when you grasp what it is and why it is important. At Plumbing Webmasters, we’ve been working with plumbers on SEO for more than 10 years. Over that span, we’ve launched thousands of search engine optimization campaigns for plumbers.

The following guide will detail the best SEO practices for plumbers in 2024. At Plumbing Webmasters, Our practices evolve alongside Google’s regularly updated algorithms to serve our consumer base of plumbing professionals.

We consult with Google’s general guidelines along with our own proprietary data to deliver cutting-edge SEO campaigns for plumbing businesses. Feel free to regularly consult this guide when performing SEO tasks and to stay updated on the latest recommendations.

Plumber SEO is the optimization of your plumbing business (including its website and business listings) for search engine results. The goal of SEO, or search engine optimization, is to get new customers from search engines like Google and Bing. There are various techniques that fall under the umbrella of SEO.

While most plumbing companies think about SEO for their website, other web entities also require SEO, most notably; Google Business Profile (aka Google My Business listings).

Learning the fundamentals helps organize different aspects of optimization and helps plumbers better understand the process. If you are going to achieve optimal results in 2024, you must study the basics first.

Contractors who already understand the basic SEO components can move on to the next section.

For those just learning SEO, read through the following fundamentals to get a better feel for what comes next.

On-page SEO is the most common form of search optimization and includes keywords, meta descriptions, and title tags. These are a few of the many components of an on-page SEO strategy

Some primary features of on-page SEO are:

• Header Tags: H1s, H2s, & H3s
• Keyword Placement: Insertions of top keywords for plumbers within different page elements
• Meta Descriptions: 158 characters (928 pixels) shown beneath search results
• Title Tags: SEO titles shown on search results and the browser
• URL Structure: URLs displayed in the web address

Although off-site SEO tasks are discussed less frequently, off-site SEO is critical to an online presence. Examples of off-site SEO include citations, link building, and social media activity.

Google values trust and authority, which is something you mostly establish away from your website through link building, citations, and review generation.

• Brand Mentions: References to your brand on external domains
• Link Building: Inbound links to your website from external domains
• NAP Citations: Business citations from directories like Angie’s List, BBB, & HomeAdvisor
• Social Media: Business profiles on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, & YouTube

Local search engine optimization has become increasingly critical over the last decade, and plumbing services are one of the top industries that can benefit from local SEO. Components of local SEO include Google Maps and Google Business Profile (Google My Business).

As Google has integrated location data like geo-coordinates into their search algorithm, they can now display results dynamically based on the searcher’s current location.

The emergence of mobile devices and WiFi internet access has also encouraged more frequent search queries and more relevant search results.

Here are some of the primary components of local SEO for plumbing companies:

• Google Maps: Verified business location on Google Maps
• Google Business Profile: Verified business page on Google Business Profile
• Online Reputation: Branded and optimized profiles throughout the web, preferably with reviews
• Online Reviews: Customer reviews on Google, Facebook, and elsewhere

The most understated aspect of search optimization is technical SEO. Technical optimization occurs behind the scenes, so only those affiliated with web design and programming understand how it works.

These technical refinements are sometimes hidden from the user and only apparent to someone with a web development background.

However, remember that this doesn’t make them any less critical. The technical element is imperative for the other SEO components to reach their fullest potential.

Examples of technical SEO include:

• HTML / CSS Coding: Internal coding for clean, responsive web display and navigation
• Mobile Display / Optimization: Optimal display and coding for mobile devices
• Schema Markup: Microdata tags that help Google interpret website content
• Site Speed: Minimized loading times for websites and their pages
• Website Design: The website design itself, including aesthetics and navigation

Now that you understand the SEO basics, it’s time to dive deeper into the tasks that influence rankings. Every plumbing company wants to rank #1 on Google, which is why SEO is so competitive in 2024. Performing the correct tasks consistently is how you earn top rankings.

Although SEO is not something you can implement overnight, its long-term sustainability is one of its most appealing characteristics. Plumbers who can master SEO will reap the rewards forever.

Content is one of your greatest tools for ranking on Google and one of the most critical SEO elements in 2024. Unlike other components, content does not require your company to have a massive brand name or tons of online reviews.

At the same time, content can also damage plumbing SEO when it fails to provide value to the user. In August 2022, Google rolled out the Helpful Content Update to crack down on thin and low-quality content in search results.

Since that release, tools for mass-producing low-quality plumbing content have become more prevalent, including through ChatGPT. While AI can be a valuable tool for plumbers, it is unable to produce content that meets Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines on demand.

Plumbing Companies that produce the best content for users can outrank competitors with larger budgets, bigger names, and more employees. However, it does require producing a higher level of quality that includes E-E-A-T. Let’s take a look at some content tactics.

Plumbers who write individual pages for each service will benefit mightily on search. When you craft original content for each service type, like plumbing repair, burst pipe repair, slab leak repair, etc… you can build topical authority on your website.

The key is to interlink service pages to one another so that Google crawls your website and understands the depth of its content. The more services you can cover, the more authority you can gain without link building.

Most plumbers make mistakes with their blogs from day one. They either write thin and low-quality posts that waste their crawl budget, or they don’t write any blog posts at all. The key to blogging for SEO is creating linkable assets that appeal to a large audience.

Unlike service pages, blog posts should not target only your target consumers. Instead, it should target a larger range of readers who might find an interest in what you have to share with them.

Like blog posts, plumbing companies often produce the wrong kinds of city pages. For example, they will mass-produce hundreds of locations with similar or duplicate content and publish them all under a service area subfolder.

Google can detect spam in 2024, and they know spun content when they see it. You have to build regional authority in order to rank for specific locations, which means crafting unique content for each city page and supporting them with related blog posts.

As we’ve noted, it’s important to demonstrate experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness within your website content.

The most effective way to achieve this is with a tool called DataPins, which populates geo-coordinates, check-in schema, and mini-maps of your recent jobs.

Some plumbing companies already have a “recent projects” section on their website, but it lacks the SEO signals that communicate with search engines about what your company actually does.

DataPins is extremely powerful because it routes jobs to service and city pages based on the job type and location.

Link building can be a controversial subject for SEO, but Google openly admits to using links as a ranking factor. The problem is that earning links naturally is rare, as most websites don’t want to link to a blog post about plumbing and certainly not a service page.

Your best chance of earning natural links is through your homepage, as other companies might list your business as a recommendation. Still, the link-building process is far more complex than anyone would like to admit.

NoFollow links are valuable for plumbing websites, and they pose a minimal threat of penalization. Since Google counts these types of links as a hint rather than an endorsement, they can ignore the worthless ones and acknowledge the worthy ones.

Plumbing companies can easily build NoFollow links by listing their business on directors like Angi, HomeAdvisor, and Yelp. The same is true of social media profiles like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

DoFollow links hold the most ranking influence for SEO. When an authoritative website links to a page or post on another website, there receiving site gains authority.

Google views these types of links as an endorsement, which transfers part of the link equity from the sending site to the destination site.

As you can imagine, professionals have found ways to manipulate this process by buying links or engaging in link schemes, both of which violate Google’s guidelines.

In 2024, the algorithm is better at ignoring spam links, and those that do slip through the cracks may result in a manual penalty to the website. The best way to get white-hat DoFollow links is to create long-form blog posts.

Internal links refer to links built from one page of your website to another. Plumbing companies have the most control over these links since they exist on their own website. Too often, web admins ignore the value of internal link equity and focus only on external links.

For best SEO practice, internal links should serve the user experience. For example, a service page about garbage disposal repair might link to a blog post about the most common causes of garbage disposal problems.

This way, the reader can consume informational content and then make a purchasing decision.

For home services companies, in particular, Google really values trust and credibility. It is in the search engine’s best interest to deliver the most credible plumbers to its users so those users return to the search engine the next time they need a service.

With this in mind, managing your online reputation is an increasingly critical aspect of SEO. There are various ways to enhance your online reputation and a bunch of things to think about when approaching the tasks.

One of the faster ways to build credibility is to list your business on local directories. You can use services like Whitespark or Yext to submit listings in bulk to a variety of directories. Most directories include a NoFollow link back to your website, which strengthens your link profile.

More importantly, a consistent stream of NAP citations (name, address, phone number) proliferates your contact information through the web.

Reviews are critical to your online reputation, as most consumers trust them as much as personal recommendations. Platforms like Google, Facebook, and Yelp can filter out spam and fake reviews, instilling trust that the feedback is legitimate.

Plumbers can increase reviews by using tools like DataPins, which automatically request reviews from recent clients who were satisfied with the services.

Social proof documents things like previous work, awards, and testimonials on your website or another digital platform. An example of social proof would be a digital badge showcasing your award for best local plumbing company in 2024.

DataPins can publish social proof automatically by pinning recent jobs to your city and service pages, along with reviews from the customers you served.

Google’s recent Page Experience Update further cements its pledge to focus on users first and foremost. To achieve SEO results in 2024, you must keep the user first.

There are various ways to enhance the user experience for your plumbing company, many of which deal with your primary website.

As plumbing companies serve a wide range of clients in terms of age and technical acumen, meeting everyone’s needs becomes an imperative aspect of SEO.

Users expect sites to load in less than 3 seconds, maximum, and that threshold will only decrease each year. Your plumbing website must load quickly, which requires a well-designed website and a technical SEO process.

You can test your website speed with various tools like Google Pagespeed Insights and address potential deterrents with plugins like WPRocket. Consider investing in a content delivery network (CDN) to further speed up your website.

Serving a wide range of clients, your website must maintain easy navigation across all device types, from mobile to desktop. Design elements like the navigation menu must cater to all users so they stay on your website as long as possible and invest in your services.

Mobile users, in particular, will grow frustrated with poor navigation and bounce from your website quickly.

Websites are held to a higher standard with ADA compliance, which ensures that disabled users can use websites. You must now consider things like text size, alt text, and voice recognition to meet the needs of all possible users.

There are WordPress plugins that can help make your website compliant, but it helps to consult with a professional web designer too.

We mentioned AI in our content section to provide some context as to how AI-generated content impacts search rankings. But the reality is that AI is going to influence every aspect of SEO from this point forward.

Google is now testing its new search generative experience, which will soon go live.

Although AI will change SEO for plumbers, it’s important to note that an AI-driven search experience does not make AI-generated content more appealing. In fact, the new AI-driven algorithms are designed to highlight human content that demonstrates first-hand experience.

Learn more about AI and SEO below:

Google will soon feature an AI chatbot as part of its search engine. This chatbot will display blocks of texts called snapshots, along with sources (like websites and organic search results) where it found its information along with further reading that can enhance the user’s search journey.

Snapshots will highlight human-created content that demonstrates E-E-A-T in the subject matter related to the query. As a result, plumbing companies must continue to focus on creating high-quality content.

Google Perspectives is a multi-layered search filter that has already been rolled out in some capacity. The filter will pull human-generated content from YouTube Shorts, Reddit, and other places that were once harder to find through traditional searches.

Plumbing companies can immediately leverage Perspectives by creating short-form content and especially video content through YouTube Shorts.

While the filter rollout is already live, the Perspectives concept will continue to influence future Google algorithms.

The idea of Perspectives won’t be limited to the search filter and will impact which search results appear in the traditional results. The focus here, once again, is on first-hand experience.

With this in mind, your website content should focus on experience, too, in addition to your YouTube Shorts. The best way to automate the experience process on your website is to utilize DataPins.

As a long-standing member of the plumber SEO community, Plumbing Webmasters is committed to helping businesses thrive on search results. The concepts outlined in this guide will give you a great understanding of how to approach your SEO strategy in 2024.

If you determine that you need further assistance in taking your plumbing company to the next level, do not hesitate to reach out to the experts at Plumbing Webmasters. We’ve worked with thousands of companies like yours and are prepared to create a custom optimization strategy for optimal performance.