Local SEO, Google Ads, Google Business Profile, portfolio content, and web design for residential GCs, custom home builders, and design-build firms. We book qualified bid opportunities, not clicks that close at 2%.
Plumbing, HVAC, and electrical work is bought in panic. A burst pipe, an AC failure, a sparking panel triggers an immediate Google search, and the trade who shows up first wins. General contractors sell planned projects, and the buyer behaves like a researcher, not a panicked searcher.
The buyer of a $90,000 kitchen remodel or a $1.2M custom home researches for weeks. They look at 10-20 portfolios. They collect three to five bids. They ask about NARI membership, AIA contracts, lien waivers, and warranty terms. They are usually a committee (two spouses, sometimes a designer, sometimes an architect). The decision cycles run 3-12 months from first web visit to signed contract.
This changes the marketing strategy. Emergency-style Google Ads produce tire-kickers at GC scale. The right strategy is a long compounding engine: project-galleries that rank for project-type + city, content that answers the buyer's research questions, Google Business Profile tuned for service-area dominance, paid search for the bottom-funnel queries that signal budget and timeline, and a portfolio site that builds trust on first visit.
If you run a residential GC, a custom home builder, or a design-build firm and your marketing is producing leads at $80-$200 each that close at 5%, you are paying $1,600-$4,000 per signed project. The fix is rarely "more ads." The fix is better buyer-fit signaling, better portfolio pages, and content that pre-sells the buyer before they call you.
City-level ranking for "general contractor [city]", "kitchen remodel [city]", "custom home builder [city]", "addition contractor near me", "ADU builder [city]". Hub-and-spoke content tied to neighborhoods and project types. GBP optimization, citation cleanup, review velocity.
Search campaigns targeting bottom-funnel intent: "kitchen remodel cost [city]", "ADU builder near me", "second story addition cost". Service-specific landing pages for kitchen, bath, addition, custom home, ADU. Negative keyword lists covering "DIY", "how to", and low-budget terms.
Complete profile with primary "General Contractor" category plus 4-8 supporting categories (kitchen remodeler, bathroom remodeler, custom home builder, addition contractor). Weekly Google Posts mixing project updates, awards, and process content. Monthly photo uploads with geo-tagged project imagery.
Review request automation tied to project milestones (substantial completion, final walkthrough, 30-day follow-up). Negative-review interception. NARI and Houzz Pro review funnels alongside Google. Targeting 12-20 new reviews per month across all platforms.
Conversion-optimized GC websites on Cloudflare Pages. Sub-1-second load, mobile-first, schema-rich, click-to-call prominent. Project gallery pages ranked for project-type + city. NARI/NAHB/CGR credentials highlighted sitewide. AIA contract familiarity called out.
Project galleries, case studies, process content (design-build vs design-bid-build, AIA contract types, lien waivers explained), comparison content (NARI vs NAHB, CGR vs CGR-A), and city-specific neighborhood guides. 1,500-2,500 words per page, photo-rich, internally linked across the project-type and city graph.
Photo and video shoot coordination for completed projects. Project-page authoring (challenge, scope, resolution, square footage, budget range if shared, testimonial). Houzz Pro and Instagram sync. Project galleries turned into lead magnets via "see projects like yours" landing pages.
Long-cycle nurture for RFPs and design-bid-build inquiries: 5-7 email sequence covering process, AIA contract types, portfolio highlights, timeline expectations, FAQs. Past-client loops for referral requests, warranty registration, anniversary check-ins, and second-project offers.
The portfolio is where most GC websites fail. They have a generic "Our Work" tab with eight mosaics and a gallery lightbox. They do not have 30-40 individual project pages ranked for "kitchen remodel [neighborhood] [city]", "custom home build [neighborhood]", or "second story addition [city]".
Each project gets its own page. Eight to fifteen photos. Square footage. Scope summary. Challenges and how you resolved them. A client testimonial. Schema markup. Internal links to the related service and neighborhood. These pages rank, and they close. Buyers spend 8-12 minutes on average studying portfolio pages before requesting a bid.
Most GC Google Ads accounts are a tax on the owner. They bid on "remodeling ideas" and "home renovation" and produce unqualified clicks that bounce in 4 seconds. Bottom-funnel intent looks like "cost to add a second story [city]", "ADU builder cost [zip]", "kitchen remodel contractor reviews [city]". These convert at 10-25% because the buyer has budget clarity.
Service-specific landing pages per project type (kitchen, bath, addition, ADU, custom home). Call tracking numbers per campaign. Form tracking with project-type, budget range, and timeline fields. Cut queries that do not convert in 14 days. Scale queries that do.
Certified remodelers close higher-ticket projects at higher rates. NARI membership, NAHB membership, Certified Graduate Remodeler (CGR), Certified Aging-in-Place Specialist (CAPS), Universal Design Certified Remodeler, and AIA contract familiarity signal training and ethics to buyers who research carefully.
We surface these credentials in the GBP business description, on a credentials page, in portfolio page sidebars, in schema markup, and in Google Posts. None of this is fluff. It is the difference between the buyer who calls three remodelers and the buyer who calls you first.
Most GCs put Houzz Pro on the website and ignore it. The right use is an active publishing schedule. New project uploads weekly. Ideabooks tied to neighborhoods. Reviews requested through the Houzz Pro review flow alongside Google. Houzz ranks well for high-intent queries like "kitchen remodeler [city]" and "bathroom remodel cost", and the platform signals authority to Google when paired with consistent updates.
For residential remodelers with even modest Houzz Pro traffic, the platform can produce 15-30% of monthly booked consultations. It is a channel most competitors ignore, which makes it disproportionately useful when used well.
We do not run marketing for building product manufacturers (builders concrete, lumber yards, window brands, siding brands). We serve the contractors who install those products for end consumers.
We do not handle your project bidding, your design work, your AIA contract administration, or your lien waiver process. We do not operate as a designer-builder. We do the marketing so your project managers stay focused on jobs in flight and your sales team stays focused on qualified opportunities.
We do not promise project leads in week one. GC SEO is a 6-month minimum commit before pipeline normalizes. We do promise honest reporting on bid requests booked, project-type mix, and source attribution so the owner knows which dollars produced which signed contracts.
Residential remodel and custom home build is the bulk of GC marketing, but each sub-niche has its own buyer behavior and content stack.
Kitchen and bath remodelers. The highest-volume residential GC sub-niche. Average ticket $45K-$150K. Buyers research heavily online, look at dozens of portfolios, and want credentials (NARI, CGR, CKD for designers). Marketing here runs on portfolio pages ranked by city + neighborhood, project galleries with before/after photos, and Google Ads targeting "kitchen remodel cost [city]" and "bathroom remodel near me".
Custom home builders. Tickets $800K-$5M+ and decision cycles run 6-18 months. The buyer is sophisticated: often a couple relocating, building on owned land, working with an architect. Marketing here runs on long-form portfolio case studies, design-build vs design-bid-build explainers, NAHB Builder of the Year positioning, and a credentialed team page. SEO takes longer to compound but lands bigger projects.
Addition and ADU builders. Tickets $80K-$400K. ADU demand exploded post-2020 with state-level zoning reform in California, Oregon, Washington, and several Northeast states. Marketing here targets zoning and permit content, neighborhood-by-neighborhood ADU pages, and Google Ads for "ADU builder [city]" and "garage conversion cost".
Residential remodel lead generation (mixed-scope). GCs running whole-house renovations, basement finishes, attic conversions, second-story additions, and aging-in-place modifications. Marketing here runs on a service-type page per project type, a city hub for each service area, and AIA-contract-aware process content.
Design-build firms. The integrated design-build model is growing 8-12% per year. Marketing emphasizes the single-contract, single-team advantage through case studies, process explainers, and design-build vs design-bid-build comparison content. The buyer profile skews higher-budget and more time-pressed.
Commercial general contractors. Tenant improvements, retail buildouts, restaurant and hospitality construction, light industrial. The buyer is a property manager, facility director, or franchise owner, and the projects run $200K-$20M. Marketing here pivots to capability statements, LinkedIn outreach, project-bid publications, DBE/MBE/LEED credentials, and case studies with GMP contract references.
Insurance restoration contractors. Fire, water, storm, and mold restoration for residential and light commercial properties. Marketing here targets emergency response ("emergency board-up near me"), insurance-claim content ("does insurance cover water damage restoration"), and direct outreach to insurance adjusters and property managers. GBP and Google Ads matter more here than residential remodel because time-to-call is shorter.
Design-bid-build remodel specialists. Traditional delivery method. Owner contracts separately with designer/architect and GC. Marketing emphasizes transparency on the bid process, AIA contract document familiarity (A101, A201, A401), and trust signals like NARI membership and "we never bid-shop" language. Long-form content on the bid-process risks for owners lands well here.
Most GCs underestimate what good marketing costs because they compare it to single-trade budgets. Residential GC marketing is heavier because the content needs are heavier (project pages, case studies, credential surfacing, neighborhood content), the sales cycle is longer, and the close rate per lead is lower (5-15% versus 30-60% for emergency trades).
The right baseline for a mid-size residential GC in a mid-size metro: $3,500-$6,500/month for full-stack marketing (SEO, GBP, Ads, content, reputation). Smaller markets: $2,000-$3,500/month works. Large competitive metros (Austin, Denver, Seattle, Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville): $5,500-$10,000/month is realistic at full scale. Custom home builders typically run higher than kitchen-bath remodelers because the content load is bigger and the cycle is longer.
45-minute call. We review your GBP, your portfolio site structure, your current ad spend, your review velocity across Google and Houzz Pro, your top three competitors, and your credential positioning. You leave with a prioritized 90-day plan, whether or not we work together.
Book the auditGeneral contractor marketing retainers typically run $2,000-$8,000 per month. Starter covers local SEO and GBP. Growth adds Google Ads and reputation. Pro adds paid social, content, dedicated strategy, and portfolio development. GC marketing is usually more expensive than single-trade marketing because the sales cycle is longer (3-12 months), the content needs are heavier (project galleries, case studies), and the buyer decision is committee-driven. Custom home builders typically budget higher than kitchen-bath remodelers.
General contractor local SEO shows measurable improvement in 90-180 days in smaller markets and 6-12 months in larger metros (Austin, Denver, Nashville, Charlotte). High-intent keywords like "kitchen remodel contractor [city]" or "addition contractor near me" typically rank in 90-150 days. Portfolio-driven queries like "custom home builder [city]" take longer because authority signals (reviews, links, project mentions) compound slowly. We ship content weekly and report ranking movement monthly.
Both, with different roles. Google Ads captures bottom-funnel intent: "kitchen remodel cost [city]", "ADU builder near me", "cost to add a second story". These convert at 10-25% for qualified GC leads because the buyer has budget clarity. SEO compounds for research-phase queries: "design-build vs design-bid-build", "NARI certified contractor [city]", "AIA contract types". A GC running only Google Ads burns budget on one or two projects per month. A GC running only SEO waits six months for pipeline. The right mix is 30-40% Google Ads, 60-70% SEO and content.
Plumbing and HVAC are emergency-driven. A burst pipe or a failed AC triggers an immediate Google search, and the contractor who shows up first wins. General contractors sell planned projects. The buyer researches for weeks or months, looks at dozens of portfolios, collects three to five bids, and chooses based on trust and fit. GC marketing therefore leans heavier on content (project galleries, case studies, process content), longer SEO cycles, and reputation across Houzz Pro, Google, NARI, and Yelp.
Complete GC GBP: full street address (not just service area), primary category "General Contractor" plus 4-8 supporting categories (kitchen remodeler, bathroom remodeler, custom home builder, addition contractor, home builder, etc.), weekly Google Posts mixing project updates and process content, monthly photo uploads with geo-tagged project photos, Q&A seeded with project-process questions, reviews with responses within 48 hours. NARI, NAHB, and Certified Graduate Remodeler (CGR) credentials should appear in the business description and posts.
Yes, and it is the single highest-converting asset on a GC website. Buyers choose remodelers based on visual proof: have you done a kitchen like mine, a project in my price range, a project in my style? A GC website without strong project galleries converts 40-60% less than one with case-study-style portfolio pages. Each project page should include 8-15 high-resolution photos, square footage, budget range if discloseable, the challenge, the resolution, and a client testimonial. We build GC portfolio pages optimized to rank for project-type + city queries.
NARI and NAHB certifications function like trade credentials: they signal training, ethics, and professionalism to buyers who research carefully. National Remodeler of the Year, NARI Contractor of the Year, NAHB Builder of the Year, CGR (Certified Graduate Remodeler), CAPS (Certified Aging-in-Place Specialist), and AIA-contract familiarity all move the needle on close rate for projects over $100K. We position credentials prominently in copy, schema, GBP, and portfolio pages.
Currently we serve US and Canada. International GC and design-build firms in English-speaking markets (UK, Australia, NZ) can be accommodated; pricing adjusts for currency. We do not serve continental Europe or non-English markets at this time. If you operate in multiple US states, we serve all 50 with a focus on the Sun Belt (Texas, Florida, Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee) and Pacific Northwest (Washington, Oregon).
Residential GC marketing is portfolio-driven, locally focused, and depends on reviews, GBP, project galleries, and home-buyer intent queries. Commercial GC marketing is relationship-driven, RFP-oriented, leans on LinkedIn outreach, project-bid publications, capability statements, certifications (DBE, MBE, LEED), and case studies with cost-plus or GMP contract references. The two require entirely different content strategies. We run them as separate programs and tailor everything from copy to ad channels accordingly.