7 Ways to Begin Solar Marketing to Generate Leads

Solar energy is gaining momentum as people worldwide become more conscious of how energy use affects the environment. As a solar business, now is your time to shine as you create oppor­tu­nities to use a powerful renewable energy resource.

Reaching your audience and gener­ating leads is how you can attract and access poten­tially high-paying customers who will help you gain your foothold in this industry.

But how can you get started with solar marketing? Keep reading to learn about 7 ways to start gener­ating leads for your solar company:

• Define Your Target Audience
• Implement Content Marketing
• Harness Organic Social Media
• Invest in Search Engine Ads (e.g., Google Ads)
• Keep Your GMB Profile and Local Lists Up to Date
• Grow Your Google Reviews
• Consider an Online Solar Calculator

1. Define Your Target Audience

To get started with content marketing, you need to define your target audience. Whether you’re a solar installer marketing to a local audience or a national solar panel distributor hoping to generate more B2B sales, you must define the audience you want to reach.

Ask yourself questions such as:

Simple questions like these can help you determine who you should market to for the best leads.

2. Implement Content Marketing

Now that you have your target audience in mind, it’s time to implement effective content marketing strategies. Content marketing often focuses on search engine optimization (SEO), but you will also need to use solar adver­tising ideas as part of your overall marketing strategy.

Let’s take a look at some of the most effective content marketing strategies.

Blogs/​Help Guides

Blogs and help guides are the perfect way to reach your audience.

If you’re a business trying to sell to consumers, you can put together how-to guides on how to buy and save money with solar products. If you’re selling to other companies, you can create B2B pamphlets with statistics to encourage business owners to buy your products or use your services.

Blogs are a great way to reach your audience members and educate them on what you offer. You can include step-by-step instruc­tions on calcu­lating the cost savings of turning to solar power, for example, or explain exactly how your products differ from others.

Customer Testi­mo­nials

Nothing says, ​“This product/​service rocks!” like a great customer testi­monial. To get testi­mo­nials, ask former customers what they think about your products.

Don’t assume all your testi­mo­nials have to be 5‑star recom­men­da­tions. In fact, having too many positive reviews can be a big red flag for consumers and make them wonder if you’re being honest. Just be sure to have more positive reviews than negative ones.

Case Studies

Have you had solar business oppor­tu­nities that allowed you to collect data? Did you conduct a survey of your clients to find out more details about what they want? This gives you the perfect foundation for a case study explaining how a customer used your product or service to achieve a desired result. For example, if a consumer reduced their utility bills by 65% after installing your solar panels, that’s an outcome you should advertise.

Email Marketing

Email marketing helps you get leads in several ways. It targets customers based on their stage in your sales funnel, keeps your company at the top of customers’ minds and can help you build relation­ships with new customers. Simple drip campaigns can be surpris­ingly effective when building new relation­ships, as well as nurturing ongoing ones.

3. Harness Organic Social Media

Many businesses don’t realize how important social media is today. It’s estimated that 4.9 billion people use social media all around the world — you only need a small segment of that population to support your business for it to thrive.

Organic social media is free, but what should you post?

Share Blogs, Case Studies, and Testimonials

Any blogs, case studies and testi­mo­nials you have on your website should also be shared on your social media pages. Share links, create new video content and see your follower count rise.

Promote Free Solar Estimates

You can also use organic social media to help promote your business’s estimating service. One great way to bring in leads through social media is by providing a link to free solar estimates. Since there’s no cost to provide this service, offering free estimates is a simple (and poten­tially high-converting) option to gather contact infor­mation from potential customers.

4. Invest in Search Engine Ads (e.g., Google Ads)

While organic social media is certainly the cheapest way to market, you’ll probably need to market with paid search engine ads. Google Ads is a great resource for this type of adver­tising. With these ads, you normally pay per click (PPC) to get your solar company’s name out to the masses.

Not sure how to use your ad spend effec­tively? Give Rocket Media a call at (800) 339‑7305 and let us share how our PPC pros can help you!

5. Keep Your GMB Profile and Local Lists Up to Date

Don’t forget the impor­tance of keeping your GMB profile and local lists up to date.

Google My Business helps people find important infor­mation about your business, such as when it’s open, where it’s located, and more. To get started, you should set up your Google Business Profile and local listings management. Then, fill out every section of the profile. Be metic­ulous, and ensure your contact infor­mation is 100% accurate.

Using your GMB profile, you could see anywhere from 40 to 70% of the organic traffic searching for your services reach out to you directly. You want to take advantage of that as you grow your business.

6. Grow Your Google Reviews

Remember that Google is usually the first place people look when researching a business and looking for infor­mation about its offer. If you don’t have Google reviews now, there are a few things you can do to improve the likelihood that you’ll get some.

To get started, focus on improving your customer service and deliv­ering an amazing experience every time. That way, your customers will be more likely to leave reviews for your company. Many of those reviews will likely be positive, influ­encing others to buy from you.

When to Ask for Reviews

The next thing you can do is start talking to your customers about the impor­tance of receiving feedback. At the end of recorded calls, ask for online reviews or tell customers you’d appre­ciate it if they completed a survey about your business.

At opportune moments, such as right after a caller explains how much they love your service or when your techni­cians get done working with someone on-site, ask for a review on Google. Customers are more likely to leave you a positive review when they are happy.

Another good time to ask for reviews is after you solve a problem. The customer might not have been happy with a service or product, but they will be happy that you positively resolved the problem for them.

7. Consider an Online Solar Calculator

When it comes to a solar instal­lation, we’ll bet the #1 thing you get asked about is, ​“how much does it cost?” To save time and generate high quality leads, consider adding an online solar calcu­lator to your website. Customers can quickly enter in their infor­mation (location, home size, power needs, budget, etc.) and then get a ballpark estimate. All without picking up the phone or sending an email.

You’d be amazed at how effective this method is. In fact, we’ve written a case study on how we helped a solar company generate signif­icant lead volume and $4.75 million in sales within 6 months of using their new online calculator.

If you want to add a solar calcu­lator to your website, contact Rocket Media today: (800) 339‑7305.