Work record / Brand / Contractor Gorilla / Questions answered
Contractor Gorilla: questions answered
What people ask me about Contractor Gorilla, and my answers. The project itself has its own page.
What was the first search tactic you started, and why did it push the firm toward page one?
We joined Cision, the network reporters use to find people to quote. It came first and it did more than anything else we tried. A couple of reporters on the construction beat began phoning me all the time for comments on their stories. My theory was placement and backlinks: each mention adds up, wherever it ends up. At one point an Ohio local news station was quoting something I had said in an article, and I never learned how it got there. That was the point. We wanted wide placement, built on real relationships with reporters.
How did the other target phrases perform, and what did tracking them teach you?
When something worked, we left it alone. We built a system around reporter outreach and wide placement, and we listed our projects in every place we could. Sticking to the process was what counted. We tried other approaches here and there, and some simply got pricier. Design-build beat general construction because it was the more specific term, as green building had been, and that was where we first bought AdWords.
What showed you that design-build beat general construction?
Ranking results, read straight from the analytics and from where we were placed. Few firms had moved to genuine design-build early, and we were one, able to say we controlled the whole process. The sales pitch improved, and since fewer companies did design-build the way we did, we also ranked higher. It was simply a better way to run a business too.
What did working as the operator inside the agency give you that an ordinary client would not have?
Construction is about control. The agency served contractors, and we were a big one, so I was the use case and I knew the territory. That gave us more freedom than a normal client has. I steered part of the strategy, and everything was open-book.
What changed in the strategy once open-book access showed the agency's first approach would not suit contractors?
Mostly the sales story. The picture was an outdoor assembly line. Whoever holds the design holds the front end of the job, so you know how a project started and where it stands with the city, with no need to rely on outside parties. The story got stronger and the online pitch changed. The pages used wording we were very early to, so we reached the market first with a good idea, much as when I ran the first green-building construction company in Southern California.
Which term were you early to, and what did it help prospective clients understand?
That was in-house design-build, meaning the architects worked on our own team. In LA the term was brand new when we began, so several of our websites were built around it. It told a client that one company held the design and the construction together. Comparing it to an outdoor assembly line drew the picture, and it worked because visual material backed it up, showing each step of the process and where things can go wrong.