Somebody has told you to run Google ads. Somebody else has told you the website needs redoing first. They both want paying. Here is the order that actually makes sense, and how to work out which step you are on.

The mistake that costs the most

Advertising sends people to your website. If the website does not turn visitors into phone calls, advertising just sends more people to the same dead end, faster and more expensively.

So the order matters. Ads make an existing problem bigger. They do not fix anything.

But the opposite mistake is just as common and nobody warns you about it: spending £4,000 on a beautiful new website when your old one was fine and your real problem was that nobody answers the phone.

Both mistakes come from the same thing. Buying a solution before working out which part is broken.

Four steps, in order

There are four things between a person needing a roofer and you getting paid. They only work in this order.

  1. They find you. Search, Google Maps, a recommendation, a van driving past.
  2. They contact you. They ring, or fill in a form.
  3. You respond. Somebody answers, or rings back quickly.
  4. You follow up. The survey gets booked, the quote gets sent, the quote gets chased.

Advertising only improves step one. If your leak is at step three, more advertising makes things worse, because you pay for enquiries you were already failing to handle.

So the job is to find your weakest step first. Start at the bottom and work up, because the later steps are cheaper to fix and usually more broken.

How to find your weakest step

Answer these honestly. No marketing knowledge needed.

Step 4, follow-up. Of the quotes you sent in the last three months, how many did you chase more than once? If the answer is "hardly any", this is your weakest step. It is also free to fix. Start here.

Step 3, responding. Look at last week's calls. How many rang out and were never returned? If it is more than two or three, this is your leak. Fix it before you buy traffic.

Step 2, contacting you. Open your own website on your phone. Can you see a phone number without scrolling? Is it tappable? How many boxes does the contact form have? If your number is hidden or the form asks for eight things, people are giving up here.

Step 1, finding you. Search your town plus "roofer" on your phone. Are you anywhere? Is your Google Business Profile there with photos and reviews? If you cannot find yourself at all, this is your step, and it is the only case where advertising is the right next move.

Do these four checks today. It takes twenty minutes and it will tell you where your money should go.

The cheapest fixes first

Here is what each step costs to improve, roughly, cheapest first.

Follow-up (step 4): free. A notebook and four calendar reminders. No purchase needed. This is where the most money is hiding for most roofers, because your jobs are worth thousands and one recovered quote pays for a year of anything else.

Answering (step 3): free to moderate. An automatic text when you miss a call is free and takes five minutes to set up on your phone. Getting somebody to answer properly costs more.

Your website converting better (step 2): usually small. Putting your phone number at the top, making it tappable, and cutting the contact form down to name, postcode and problem is often a one-hour job on a site you already have. It is rarely a reason to rebuild everything.

Google Business Profile (step 1): free. If you are not showing on Google Maps, this is the highest-value free thing in local trade marketing. Photos of finished roofs, correct opening hours, and asking happy customers for reviews. Costs nothing but time.

A new website: thousands. Worth doing when the site is genuinely broken on phones, has no way to contact you, or does not exist. Not worth doing because it looks a bit dated, if it is still producing calls.

Advertising: ongoing, forever. The only one you pay for every month with no lasting asset. Correct when steps two, three and four are working and you simply want more people at the top.

So, ads or website?

Here is the honest answer, and for most roofers it is neither.

Fix follow-up and answering first. They are free or nearly free, and for a trade with jobs worth thousands they are almost always the biggest leak. Do this month one.

Then make the website easier to contact you on. Not a rebuild. A phone number people can tap and a form with three boxes. Month two.

Then sort your Google Business Profile. Free, and it often produces more calls than paid ads for local trades. Month two or three.

Then, and only then, consider advertising. By this point you can measure it properly, because you know your enquiry-to-job rate. Before that, you cannot tell whether ads failed or whether you just did not answer the phone.

If someone is selling you advertising and has not asked how many calls you currently miss, they are not doing the job properly. Ask them that question and see what they say.

When to skip straight to ads

To be fair to advertising, there is a case for it. Go there first if:

  • You have just moved into a new area and nobody knows you exist.
  • You have a receptionist or office already, so answering is genuinely covered.
  • You have a specific service with strong demand, like emergency leak repairs, and you can answer at night.

In those cases step one really is your weakest step, and advertising is the right tool.

Do this today

  1. Do the four checks above. Twenty minutes with your phone. Write down which step is weakest.
  2. Open your own website on your phone. Time how long it takes you to ring yourself from it. If it is more than five seconds, that is your first fix.
  3. Search your town plus "roofer". Write down where you appear, if you do.
  4. Fix the free one first. Whichever weak step costs nothing, do that one this week before spending anything.

The honest summary

Most roofers do not have a traffic problem. They have a handling problem, and traffic is what gets sold to them because it is what agencies sell. Work out which of the four steps is weakest, fix the free ones first, and only buy attention once you can handle the attention you already get.

If you want a second opinion on which step is actually costing you most, bring last week's missed calls and your last 90 days of quotes. We will tell you where the leak is, including when the answer is that you do not need us.