For most professionals in the roofing and solar industries, lead generation is one of the toughest parts of the job. As a roofing company, you may provide a great set of services at reasonable prices — but there’s just too much competition out there, and you’re not getting as many roofing appointments as you should.  

Things are even more difficult in the solar industry. While the increasing affordability of solar has been great for installers, vendors, and customers, it’s also meant that everyone is trying to get in on the game. 

As a result, solar leads across the country have been bombarded with more marketing than they’re interested in hearing — making them less responsive to traditional methods like door knocking, television advertising, and telemarketing. 

So, how are you supposed to find solar and roofing leads in 2022? What’s the trick to reliable, long-term lead generation? 

In practice, there are a few things you can do to make sure you’re still getting more customers than the competition. And we’ll walk you through these methods right here!

Unique Approach To Qualified Leads

As in most marketing and sales efforts, the key to getting more roofing and solar appointments is messaging. 

What this means is that you need to find a way to stand out from the competition. Chances are that there are plenty of other roofers or solar companies in your area — and they’re looking to cater to the same homeowners that your company is after.

You can do this by finding a single key differentiation; for many roofing companies, this is actually offering solar. Or, on the other hand, you could try multiple small ones — like storm damage services, a wider range of products, being family-owned or local, etc. 

Generally, streamlining this into one or two crucial ways in which your company differs from the rest is ideal. That way, you’ll be able to clearly articulate this in your lead generation and marketing efforts. 

And it’s not just about getting any kind of contractor leads either — many roofers and solar installers run into the problem of low-quality leads. You may think your marketing is killing it, as you keep getting a bunch of leads consistently. 

However, once you actually meet with them, it turns out that the homeowners aren’t really looking for the specific services that you provide. If most leads are turning out to be dead ends, you need to qualify them better.

A great way to do this is to ensure your exact services are clearly stated on your website. Also, a submission form that includes certain qualifiers is always a good idea. For instance, you could have potential customers fill out their location, home size, and budget — and give them a way to explicitly state the services they need. 

That way, you’ll waste a lot less time on leads that don’t end up panning out — while spending more energy on those that are worth your time and energy. 

List Your Company On Directories

These days, most people find all the products and services they need online. And that’s why you need to ensure that they can easily come across your business while searching for “roofers near me” or “best solar companies in ____”. 

Of course, this is tough — the competition for the first Google results page is enormous, and being on the second one practically means you don’t exist. So, you need to ensure Google “likes” you. And its search algorithm generally favors websites with tons of traffic and continuous posting of relevant content. 

Among other things, this means listing your company on the right directories. Here are some examples:

Customers also trust industry associations as sources of information — so being listed in their directories is important as well. 

Build A Social Media Presence

Regardless of how much time you prefer spending on social media personally — you’ll need to harness the full power of these platforms to get more customers as a roofing or solar business. 

Social media has become so ubiquitous that people instinctively distrust companies without a rudimentary presence at the very least. Among the sea of reputable companies that maintain active business accounts on various social media platforms, your business will seem sketchy in comparison.

And if you’re unsure of where to start when it comes to social media, Instagram is probably a good place. It’s become the go-to place for companies that are trying to engage with their leads on a more personal and — more importantly — visual level. 

When people can actually see the results of your work, they will instantly perceive you as a more trustworthy company. So, post as much content as you can to attract followers through Instagram’s algorithm — start with once a week at first, and gradually ramp up the pace to about three times per week. 

Here are some content ideas for Instagram and other social networks that focus on visual content:

Incentivizing Referrals

As with any other client-based business, your existing customers are your most powerful engine for lead generation. Even in the age of the Internet, word-of-mouth is a tremendously effective avenue for new leads. And referral-based prospects are generally better informed, more inclined to trust you, and more ready to convert compared to most other leads.

Remember, they’ve learned a lot of positive stuff about your company before you’ve even made contact — so they’re already inclined to make a purchase. And that’s important when it comes to expensive investments like solar panels or services like roofing. 

Luckily, existing happy clients are typically quite motivated to refer — especially if you throw in even the smallest incentive for them to do so. Even with all the government rebates and various financing options, going solar is still a sizable investment for the average homeowner. So, they’ll try to knock off a bit of that price any way they can. 

If you make a few referrals worth their while, you’ll quickly make that money back and then some. Cash rewards and discounts are excellent motivators, and you can make them even more enticing through tiered rewards for multiple leads. 

Use Google Ads

One of the best ways to reach highly qualified leads that are practically ready to purchase is to run targeted online ads, specifically designed to reach them. 

One of the best methods of doing this is by running Google Ads, which allow you to target the right people with the following methods:

Buying Solar And Roofing Leads

Bear in mind that all of the strategies we’ve mentioned above take time and money. And a small installer or roofer can’t afford to spend as much on online marketing and original content as a bigger competitor can. 

These days, even the biggest solar installation companies don’t get most of their leads from their own inbound marketing efforts. Instead, they simply buy solar leads from other companies that specifically focus on solar lead generation. 

Mind you, this doesn’t mean you should forgo every effort to generate some leads on your own. You just need to realize that even if you start today, it will take you literally years of publishing original content on your blog and social media to start ranking higher on Google organically. 

And while having a clean, functional website will definitely help you convert prospective leads — you still need a way of generating those leads in the shorter term as well. You can and should invest in long-term lead generation strategies, but only while recognizing that a huge chunk of your contractor appointments will always come from buying solar and roofing leads from others.

If you’re interested in quickly scaling your business with highly-qualified leads you won’t find anywhere else — contact us today and we’ll help you grow your solar or roofing company.

LL Media can help your solar team grow. Below is an explanation of Different Types of Solar Leads. There aren’t many sectors that are standing closer to the cutting edge of futuristic technology than the solar industry. Right now, this is one of the fastest-growing markets in the world; quickly gaining a larger and larger market share compared to more traditional power options. In fact, the job of an installer of solar panels is one of the most prospective jobs in the US — saying

that it’s got a sunny disposition would be an understatement.

Jokes aside, there are plenty of reasons why this industry is absolutely booming — from the rising affordability of commercially-viable solar panels to government incentives that favor solar investments.

Naturally, the rising demand for residential solar panels also means that competition is higher than ever before — everyone is looking for their place under the sun (this is the last pun, we promise). With that in mind, a solar company has to ensure that they’re using the most effective way to reach potential leads; the days of door-to-door sales are long-gone, replaced with complex digital marketing strategies.

Still, in markets like these, finding the most prospective leads is incredibly important; seeing as people who are actually ready to make an investment into solar panels know that they’re making a long-term purchase. Even with the falling costs, solar panels are still not cheap; which is why most people willing to buy them are also willing to spend enough time deliberating on the best possible option.

Understanding the different types of solar leads that are available on the market is a necessity for any successful marketing strategy in this industry; which is why we’re going to explain everything that you need to know about leads in the world of solar right here!

Solar Leads 101

Just like any other type of lead out there — solar leads are potential customers that might “convert” to buyers at the end of your interaction with them. Much like traditional leads, you can get them in a wide variety of ways — from website landing pages to local TV commercials, and just about everything in between.

However, before you invest all of your money in an ad running after a morning show on local television stations that no one watches; you need to understand that the name of the game in 2021 is digital leads.

These days, people find all of their required products and services online. And that’s especially true when we’re talking about products that are more expensive, and represent a more long-term investment. You can probably already see where we’re going with this — that’s precisely what solar energy is.

Considering that, you need to make sure that you have an online marketing strategy; it’s basically a necessity. And it’s not enough just to find leads online; you need to have a better lead generation strategy than your competition because you can bet they’ll be hot on your heels. If you really want to succeed in this business, you’d be smart to buy leads online!

Why is buying solar leads a good idea?

Okay, so you know that you’ll need leads in order to get the biggest possible number of customers from your marketing strategy. But can you generate leads on your own and avoid the expenses of buying leads altogether?

After all, as any online marketing expert will tell you — creating the right content, optimizing your website for search engines, and running a proper AdWord campaign should do the trick; plus, it’s cheaper!

In reality, things aren’t as simple. Firstly, everything on that list can take months of hard work before it bears fruit in the form of concrete leads; after all, managing a digital marketing campaign is not simple, and there’s an entire industry centered around that.

And you need to remember what your competition is doing as well — at the end of the day, it’s a number’s game. Seeing as a majority of leads doesn’t pan out into an actual sale, the safest bet is to try your luck with the biggest possible number of leads in the first place.

However, deciding to buy solar leads online is not the end of the road when it comes to learning about leads for this market. You’ll soon find that there are plenty of different kinds of leads you can buy, each with their own pros and cons. Here are the Different Types of Solar Leads:

Preset Appointments

One of the main things that you’re trying to achieve by buying leads online is to reduce the amount of work that you need to put in for generating them. And, apart from that — you want to increase the certainty that these leads will actually lead to sales.

Buying leads in the form of preset appointments get you both of those things if you find a source willing to perform lead screening as well. That way, you’re outsourcing the lion’s share of the work to someone else, because they’ll also be handling the appointments.

All that’s left for your in-house team is to close the actual sale. Of course, that’s not easy either — but not having to deal with the prep before that is certainly a relief. This is great in terms of lead acquisition and your ROI; however, this type of lead may be more expensive than the other options in the beginning.

Live transfers

After the pre-scheduled appointments, you’ve also got the next best thing — live transfer solar leads. What you’re buying here is basically information about pre-screened leads that have already expressed interest in obtaining a solar panel solution.

This kind of connection between you and the customers removes a lot of the legwork as well because you won’t have to do any actual prospecting.

Real-time shared and exclusive leads

One of the biggest advantages of buying Different Types of Solar Leads online is that you have access to many different kinds of leads. However, the flip side of that coin is — so do your competitors. That’s why shared real-time leads are one of the most competitive and hard-to-get leads in the solar industry.

The reason for that may be clear from the “shared” part. In essence, shared leads are those that lead generation companies to sell to more than one solar company. So, yes, you know who’s interested enough to warrant a call — but so does everyone else.

Compared to the Different Types of Solar Leads, which cost a couple of bucks each — you’ve also got real-time exclusive leads. They go from a few dozen bucks to a lot more, depending on the market in question — and as you might have guessed, these are leads that no one else has.

Aged Web Leads

Finally, we’ve got the last type of leads that some other industries may frown upon, but could represent a good choice for solar providers: aged leads.

These are solar leads that have “aged” because they’ve expressed interest in solar appointments before — but not recently. Now, while this might mean a cold lead (and thus, a less useful one) in some other sectors: it’s actually not a bad kind of lead in solar when it comes to cost-effectiveness.

Aged leads are some of the cheapest you can buy, because they’re generally less prospective than real-time, current ones. However, that’s not always the case with solar leads. Remember, people often spend months deciding on what solar contractor they’ll go with; meaning that aged leads are often not cold at all. And yet, their price remains the same!

So, while aged leads are still a bigger gamble; they could very well turn out to have the biggest ROI if they pan out.

Closing solar leads

When you do buy the leads that are prospective enough — the question is, how do you close them effectively? How do you ensure that you make the largest possible number of sales? Seeing as solar isn’t as old as insurance and mortgages, it requires a relatively different approach.

First of all, you will need more patience. Even the most interested solar enthusiasts may be clueless about the actual technology and the costs involved with installation and maintenance; explaining everything thoroughly is something you need to be prepared for.

And before you go into the explanation, find out what the main motivations and concerns are for this particular buyer. Do they want to use solar to increase their power savings in the long run? Or maybe they just want to reduce their dependence on the local power grid — while also preserving the environment?

All of this will inform your approach to the lead, and ensure that they’ve got a clear overview of the immense benefits of solar energy; ultimately helping you close the deal!

LL Media Leads and Appointments

LL Media Leads and Appointments equals more sales for your solar, roofing, and home improvement teams.