WHAT IS SEO FOR Deck Builders?
SEO for deck builders is about optimizing your online content so your website and decking business pops up higher in Google’s results page.
This eventually gets you more online visibility, more prospects calling you, and eventually, more qualified leads ready to buy a new deck.
- Starting SEO for your deck building company means finding the right phrases that homeowners type on Google to find deck builders. Add these keywords throughout your website, and Google will show your decking business higher and higher.
- Another key move for SEO is to make sure your Google Business Profile is easy to find for people in your area, so you need to optimize that profile as well.
- Getting other websites to link to yours makes Google see your site as reputable, which further increases ranking.
- To maximize SEO results, also make sure your website runs fast, is organized, and it's easy for visitors to use.
SEO Terms For Deck Builders
Here are some essential SEO concepts simplified:
Focus on these areas to make your deck building business stand out online, attract more clients, and showcase your expertise.
- SEO - SEO means Search Engine Optimization, and it refers to optimizing your website so Google understands it better.
- Crawl - This is when Google looks through your website to figure out you're building decks in your city.
- Positioning – This represents the place your website shows up when prospects look for 'deck builder near me' or other relevant keywords.
- Index – When a page is 'indexed' it means Google found it and will now show it to people interested in the topic on that page.
- Keyword – These are the words or phrases people use to find your deck building services.
- Organic Search – All SEO is organic search, because you don't have to pay to show up on Google. You just need good, relevant content.
- Paid Search – This refers to advertising on Google Ads, where you pay a certain amount for your page to show up first on Google.
- SERP – Or Search Engine Results Page, is the page you see after you search for something on Google.
- Local pack – The top three local deck building companies that pop up on Google and Maps when you look for 'deck builders in my area'.
- Featured snippets – This is the result that Google's AI displays, without it leading to any website. However, it links to multiple websites, and yours need to be there too.
- Backlink – A backlink is when another website recommends your service by linking to your site.
- Search volume – Represents the number of people searching on Google for a particular word or phrase.
- Meta descriptions – Short descriptions under your website’s title in search results, giving a sneak peek of what you offer.
- Bounce rate – The rate at which website visitors move from one page to another. A healthy bounce rate is low, as it means people spend more time on that page.
- Click-through rate – Refers to the number of people who click on your website after seeing it in the search results.
- Conversion rate – Refers to the percentage of prospects who after clicking on your website, end up becoming a lead after submitting a quote request.
Why Do Deck Builders Need SEO?
Because today, 80% of people use the internet weekly to find information about local businesses like a decking company.
More than that, roughly 40% of home services consumers who call after finding a business decide to make a purchase.
That being said, you want your deck building company to be on the internet, and SEO is the best way to make that happen.
Besides, it makes selling easier because you won’t have to wait for referrals, do door to door knocking, cold calling, or wait for the phone to call.
SEO for Deck Builders: Basic Concepts
To make sure your decking company shows up on Google and your prospects see it, you need your SEO to work right. Here are a few basic concepts that anyone can learn.
Keyword Research For Deck Builders
The most important thing you can do is find out what words and phrases (keywords) are your prospects typing on Google to search for deck builders.
From our experience, some of the best keywords to target are ‘deck building companies near me’, ‘composite decking installation’, ‘wood deck construction’, and others.
Targeting the right keywords can also get you better quality leads. For example, you’ll get more expensive projects if you target ‘premium decks’, ‘luxury decks’ instead of ‘cheap decks’.
Want to look for your own keywords? Check out this free tool and do your own keyword research for deck builders. It’s easy, fast, and free, perfect to start doing SEO for deck builders!
Another place you can start is with Google’s Keyword Planner, a free tool that helps identify the popular search terms related to the decking industry.
Paid SEO tools like Ahrefs can offer more depth and insights into keywords, but it’s a much more complicated (and expensive) tool.
Content Optimization For Decking Companies Sites
Once you have the right keywords to start doing SEO for your deck building company, it’s time to optimize your content.
You’ll want to include those keywords throughout your website.
Here are some tips:
- Include the most important keyword in your website's title.
- Add more important keywords in every headline, on every page
- Use the keywords throughout the page
- Add the name of your city or town, and the areas you service
- Use images that show decks or people building decks
Link Building For Decking Companies Sites
- Internal links, which lead from one page of your website to another page
- External links, which lead from one page of your website to another website
- Backlinks, which lead from a different website to your website
Out of all, the most important one are backlinks, as it shows Google that your website is valuable to others.
Backlinks also increase your Domain Authority, which shows Google you have expertise in the deck building field and you are to be trusted.
Local SEO For Decking Companies
Local SEO for deck building companies is a must, and you’ll want to put this as a priority.
It all starts with creating a Google Business Profile and optimizing it for your desired service.
For example, you’ll want to use your correct name (even better if you have a keyword in the business name, like Riverview Decks). Set up your business address (if you have a showroom or an office, add that), choose your main category (deck building company), add some images, and that’s already a great start!
After you set up the GPB, the next step is to get reviews on it, add the cities you service on the website, and start building citations.
Building Citations For Decking Companies Sites
Citations are a big part of SEO for deck builders, but they’re also very time consuming if you decide to do it all by yourself.
Having a citation means having your business name, address, and phone number on a business directory. Think of Yelp, NextDoor, Angi, HomeAdvisor, YellowPages, etc.
You’ll want to be extra careful with citations because they need to be consistent throughout all these sites. If not, the citations doesn’t count. Even worse, people might call the wrong number, and you could lose a lead.
We have a post about the best business directories for deck builders. These are the most valuable websites where you should add your business.
Ads Vs SEO For Deck Builders?
This is the million dollar question that everyone wants to know.
However, we’re not comparing apples to apples here.
And whether you should ‘pick’ SEO or ads depends on what’s your game plan.
Let’s see two scenarios.
You want to Grow Faster And Make More Money
Say you’ve been in business for a while, you have the social proof, you have a nice portfolio of decks done, but you’re not growing the way you wanted.
In this scenario, your best bet is to invest in ads. Here’s why…
At this point you want some quick wins. You want your phone to ring, you want more leads, and you want more predictability.
This is what ads do.
And after you discover your average cost per lead, you can sort of anticipate how much you’ll pay for a good lead, and make ads highly profitable.
You Want A Future-Proof Decking Company
Say you’re starting out or you’ve been in the decking industry for 1-2 years already. You prefer to grow steady and predictable and not break anything.
In this scenario, your best bet is to invest in SEO. Here’s why…
SEO is a weapon that’ll help you stay relevant throughout the years, regardless of what’s happening in the industry, the market, or the economy.
It builds momentum and earns you increasingly more real estate on Google, and that’s free real estate.
Besides, you’ll also get more qualified leads through organic search (SEO), because these are people with very high intent that look for a decking company.
How to Start SEO for Deck Builders
If you’re completely new to SEO and you want to get your feet wet and see what it takes, here’s how to start doing SEO for your decking company…
Check Your Website (Is it Indexed?)
If you don’t have a website, get one. The whole point of doing SEO is to have your website on Google, and if there’s no website, there’s nothing to show.
If you do have a website for your deck building company, great. Let’s see if it’s indexed and if it ranks.
Go on Google, and type “site:yourwebsite.com”, where yourwebsite is the name of your website. If we were to do it, we’d type “site:contractingempire.com”.
If the search doesn’t return anything, then your website is not on Google and no one can find it.
It the search returns results, those are the pages that exist on Google, and it means your website is visible. Congrats!
Log In To Your Website And Start Adding Keywords
Whoever built your website should’ve shared the credentials to log in with you. If they didn’t, you’ll need them.
Wether the site is built on Wix, SquareSpace, WordPress, or other place, you need to log in to be able to make changes to it.
Once you log in, you’ll want to add relevant keywords to decking.
Some valuable keywords to add are:
- Deck Building Company In [City] in your site title and headlines
- The services you offer, like deck repair, deck replacement, deck building, deck demolition
- Brands you use, like Trex decking, TimberTech decking, Fiberon decking, etc.
- Materials you use, like wood decking, pvc decking, composite decking
- Cities and areas you serve, like deck building in Omaha, deck repair Knoxville, TN, etc
- Other keywords that are relevant to decking and outdoor spaces, like pergolas, patios, outdoor living spaces, porches, covered decks, railings, etc.
This is a time-consuming process and can sometimes be overwhelming. If you don’t want to spend your time doing this constantly, you’re better off hiring an SEO expert to do it for you.
Add Images Of Decks On Your Website
Imagine you’re typing on Google ‘toyota cars for sale’, you click on a website, and the first thing you see is an image with a Kia.
If your prospects go on a decking company site and what they see first is a pond, they’ll probably hit Exit before they read anything.
You’ll need to add images relevant to what your business is about.
This also lets Google know what your website is about, and it’ll show it to more prospects interested in what you have to offer.
Tip: make sure the images you add are small in size, otherwise you risk slowing down the website with huge images that take a lot of time to load.
Tip #2: Always name your images and give them an ‘Alt-Text’ that’s very descriptive so when Google reads them, it knows what they’re about.
Create Service Pages For Your Decking Company
Service pages are pages specifically built for the services you offer.
As a deck builder, you probably offer deck repair, deck replacement, decking installation, deck demolition, deck inspection, porch construction, covered decks, etc.
This is a great opportunity to take one of those high-value keywords and drive home the reason why you are the perfect fit for their projects.
Besides using keywords on this page, you’ll also want to be convincing and give the user a series of good reasons to hire you.
Think of your unique selling proposition, an offer, and your core values. Add images of your work, pricing, frequently asked questions, reviews, process, and whatever else you think your prospects will find useful.
Technical SEO And Optimizing It
Technical SEO is more difficult than on-page SEO. Like the name suggests, it is more ‘technical’, and requires you to dive deeper into things that maybe you never dealt with before.
If you’re tech savvy already, maybe you’ll like it. If not, better to leave this to the experts.
Website Loading Time
Your deck building website should load within 2-3 seconds. Any longer, and the prospect might close the page.
Our attention span is so low that if we don’t get what we want in these first seconds, we move on to the next page, reel, TikTok, or result.
Google also uses website speed as a key factor in its ranking criteria, part of what it calls Core Web Vitals.
To check your website’s speed, try Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool. Just type in your website’s URL and hit “Analyze” to get started.
Optimizing for Mobile Devices
Did you know that almost 65% of internet traffic comes from mobile devices?
That means that if your website looks good on desktop but it’s messy on mobile, you could be losing a ton of potential clients because they simply couldn’t navigate your website.
We’re big on making websites easy to discover, navigate, and use, for both you as the owner and the users.
In fact, we get a lot of praise about how good our websites look like. Check out what our contractors say about their websites and SEO with us!
Intuitive Website Design
Think of your website as your own personal salesperson.
It should guide, educate, and inform people about your work, while also using different methods of persuasion to convince them to buy.
Our websites will take your prospects from cold to hot in one sit, and will guide them to book a consultation with you.
We do this by…
- Clear and uniform design features
- Fonts that are easy on the eyes
- Minimal steps to get things done
- User-friendly for a diverse audience
Start Building Links For Deck Building SEO
Having other websites link to yours makes a huge difference in your SEO.
This is mainly because it gives Google the right signals that your website provides value and is trustworthy (otherwise others won’t link to your website).
However, getting others to link to your website is not easy.
Here is some advice to achieve that:
- Provide real value that's hard to find anywhere else on the internet
- Create pages and articles for the newest trends in the industry
- Create useful tools that others can use, like pricing calculators
- Exchange links with other websites
- Add your business on online business directories
- Add your business on online business directories
Tracking Deck Builder SEO Progress
Investing in SEO for your deck building company but not seeing the results is awful.
This is why tracking your SEO progress is non-negotiable.
It will allow you to see how well is your website ranking on Google, the number on visitors on your site, the number of views it gets, how much time people spend on your website, what pages they view most, and most importantly…
How many of these users become leads after submitting a form or calling.
Here are some tools we use to track SEO performance for all of our deck building companies.
Google Analytics
Google Analytics is the most complete tool for tracking SEO results, but it’s also the most difficult to master. To get access to your website stats in Google Analytics you need to install a code on your website, and then it’ll start recording data.
This is a free tool that every website should have installed. If yours doesn’t, you need to ask yourself some questions.
Ahrefs
Ahrefs is a paid tool that allows you to track SEO results, do keyword research, and more. It is one of the best SEO tools on the market today, and all SEO experts use it.
However, this tool is way more than you need, especially if you’re starting out. It is also difficult to master, and you can get the job done with other, free tools.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console is the easiest tool to track your deck builder SEO results if you’re just starting out. It’s easy to install on your website, easy to read the data, and very easy to use it.
Even for us, as SEO experts, Google Search Console is a vital tool that gives us great insights into our clients websites and SEO.
Need Professional SEO For Your Deck Building Company?
Wearing all the hats in the company is never sustainable.
If you’re also managing leads, selling, project managing, building the decks, answering the phone, and doing SEO…
You risk burning out and that’s how things start collapsing under you.
Doing SEO requires a lot of time and knowledge, and you’re a business owner, not an SEO expert.
If you want someone to take this off your plate, we can help!