7 Most Profitable HVAC Marketing Tactics for 2023

Oleksandr Rohovnin

12 minutes read

More and more of our neighbours are installing new HVAC systems and solutions. You’re right, but not only are these neighbours bothered about indoor temperature and air quality — so are most people worldwide, making HVAC marketing a priority for thousands of crafty business owners. And if you’re on the advertising side of the business, the numbers don’t change the game’s name: win the hearts of your prospects and leads to turn them into paying customers. It’s as simple as that, except it isn’t simple in the face of the ever-growing competition and ever-evolving technologies you must keep pace with. Tough isn’t impossible, though. Below are five bulletproof marketing ideas for HVAC companies to stay ahead of the competition.

1. Before Everything Else, Devise an HVAC Marketing Plan

Regardless of how you will advertise your HVAC business — word-of-mouth, social media, email marketing, through an affiliate management platform, or everything combined — you cannot launch your HVAC marketing campaign without a well-thought-out plan encompassing how, where, and to whom you will advertise. Here’s how you can devise your HVAC marketing plan:

1. Define the sources for your HVAC advertising: Depending on your business and market, you may use conventional HVAC marketing strategies (printed media, postcards, direct mail, etc.), HVAC digital marketing (website, search engine optimisation, email, social media, affiliate network, etc.), or combine both. To decide on your most productive advertising for HVAC, you have to shop around and quantify your possible exposure with each of the HVAC marketing tools you plan to use.
2. Take into consideration the peculiarities of the industry: Marketing for HVAC companies is similar to marketing for other companies, but you cannot blindly copy it. Compared to other industries, HVAC is subject to seasonality, so heating and cooling marketing will work differently throughout the year. Winter will likely be more successful for heating advertising, whereas summer may be the time to bring your air conditioning advertising ideas to life. 
3. Decide on your budget: Regardless of how you allocate your budget — by season, marketing channel, target audience, etc. — you should get realistic numbers for realistic goals so you can be sure you have enough money to capitalise on your HVAC business opportunities.

A well-defined HVAC marketing plan will revitalise your marketing ideas for the HVAC business and maximise the ROI from your endeavours while ensuring the best customer journey for your clients.

2. Start With a Compelling HVAC Website

Did you know that 96% of your website visitors aren’t ready to buy? Even those fluttering in your sales net need a final push. Here’s your on-site HVAC marketing strategy to convince more prospects to buy from you:

• Focus on value: The ever-shortening attention span leaves you around eight seconds of action time before your prospects leave you for good. Deliver here and now without foreplay, lengthy introductions, and meaningless paragraphs. Keep it to the point, engaging, and conversational.
• Entice with spot-on calls to action: Let your customers instantly know where they can get what they came for. Short, descriptive, and surrounded-with-valuable-content CTAs will increase your sales. See the example below – descriptive, concise, and inviting.
• Add compelling hooks: With 95% of purchase decisions taken subconsciously, psychological triggers work across all business avenues and with most HVAC business ideas. Use these tricks to convince your prospects you are the one they need:
  • Fear of Missing Out: The thought that we are missing out on a product that could improve our lives hard pushes us toward the purchase. Limited offers, time counters, and other FOMO elements will help you convert more.
  • Loss aversion: We hate to lose what we already have even more than we love to get what we don’t possess. To capitalise on loss aversion, let your subscribers get used to your products or service — for example, offer a free monthly subscription  — and then rightfully require payment.
  • Fewer options: Counterintuitively, offering fewer products may increase your conversion rate by preventing decision paralysis. Overwhelmed prospects are not what you need, so limit the offer to several relevant options.
• Reciprocity: Offer your customers something valuable; many will reciprocate: subscribe, share, leave feedback, and even buy from you.
• Customise: HVAC is always a grudge purchase, meaning you must be precise with your content. Tailor-made content accurately placed in relevant website sections is a must, which you can do if you’ve segmented your audience well. Make sure your website has sections for all target buyers — no generalisation allowed.

Remember, your website is your primary conversion tool and the focal point of your business.

3. SEO-Boost Your Website and Advance in Local Search

Most HVAC seekers start their journey with Google search, making search engine optimisation — especially local SEO — extremely important. Your basic on-site SEO instruments are: 

• Clear website structure: A proper XML map, title tags, and meta descriptions will make your website more enticing for crawlers, likely improving your rankings across all keywords.
• Spruced up Google Business Profile: Properly filled out Google My Business page – a platform enabling direct communication with customers –is the surefire way to advance in local search and get an idaea of how your customers found you.
• Smart geofencing: With geofencing targeting, you can focus on high-intent local customers, limiting the ads display to the chosen GPS radiuses and radio frequencies. For example, amidst the summer heat, you can target every lead within a 20-mile radius to promote your limited-time offers on air cooling systems.
• Relevant transactional keywords: Not only should your keywords be SEO-optimised, but they should be relevant to your local searches. For example, if you’re from Florida, you’re much more likely to attract customers with the “cheap HVAC systems in Florida” than “HVAC systems in the US.” Likewise, you should always factor in the level of competition when choosing whether this or that keyword is worth promoting.

As is with emails, every SEO trick of yours must reinforce the value of your content. You may trick Google crawlers, but not your prospects and leads.

4. Nurture Your Email Subscribers

Since the first emails were blasted in the 1970s, email marketing has grown into a $10-billion industry of unlimited potential. With 306 billion emails sent and received daily, you need only a tiny drop of that to thrive. Three pillars of compelling HVAC email marketing include:

Basics, though, may not be enough. You may need an extra to become visible in a flood of email letters. What could it be? For example, AMP-powered emails.

• AMP technology enables in-email purchases and content updates when the recipient can get precise information at every open — for example, the number of seats left on a flight — and buy from you (or perform any other target action) without leaving the mailbox.

Likewise, you can stand out with intriguing subject lines, CTAs, and interactive content like quizzes, calculators, and infographics. But then again, regardless of the tools, you should stay focused on the relevance and quality of your content, as nothing but these two drive sales.

5. Tap Into the Power of Social Media

With over 82% of Americans running at least one social networking profile — with the user base growing at around 2% per year — you can’t miss out on over three-quarters of your audience.

(Source: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/182395853638587876/?mt=login) 

Here’s what you can do to elevate your HVAC social media marketing:

• Create a business profile for each of your social accounts: Social media business profiles enable more features to convert your followers. Luckily, running a social media profile is not more complicated than running a website: put quality over quantity, be consistent, and maintain your brand image.
• Use paid social ads to win more customers: Slideshows, carousels, images, and paid ads alike can help you attract more prospects with little commitment and no risk. There’s no minimum price for paid ads, and you can put the campaign on halt anytime you want.
• Create a buzz: Shareworthy visuals, contrarian ideas, thought-provoking facts, interviews with influencers, pre-launch contests, giveaways, etc. — there are myriads of ways to engage your followers.

HVAC-centred content may be less engaging than food, clothes, and kitties, but that doesn’t mean you should be silent. Buzz-generating HVAC social media posts can boost your brand awareness and collect valuable customer data, let alone convert some of your followers.

6. Get as Many Online Reviews as You Can

Online reviews are one of the HVAC promotional ideas that lie on the surface. When people shop, they look for reviews, recommendations, and experiences of other buyers with the product. 

• Online research precedes 87% of buying decisions.
• Prospects read around ten reviews before making a purchase decision.
• 88% of customers trust user reviews as much as personal recommendations

To incorporate social proof in HVAC marketing, add case studies, testimonials, reviews, awards, integrations, feedback from customers and influencers, and user-generated content. Websites like Google will allow you to request reviews — do it unobtrusively, pushing your customers to reciprocate rather than coercing them. Here are a few tricks to get more reviews for your HVAC company:

• Activate all major HVAC review websites. From the already mentioned Google My Business to Facebook to Yelp to Home Advisor — register on as many review sites as possible and maintain them, answering positive and negative reviews.
• Provide incentives. Whether you like it or not, bonuses are one of the best advertising for HVAC businesses. Nothing motivates consumers better than a discount on an air conditioner in the summer heat. Most of your customers will be eager to leave feedback in exchange for saving a few hundred dollars.
• Ask for reviews after the service. Add a review link to your invoices and receipts as a reminder of the opportunity to leave feedback.

7. Engage in SaaS Affiliate Marketing 

The U.S. affiliate marketing spending reached $8.2 billion in 2022,  making affiliate networks one of the best marketing ideas for HVAC companies. And why not? An affiliate network will unlock thousands of high-intent leads for you and allow you to manage affiliate links and track affiliate sales to ensure you get what you’ve paid for. Whether you’re willing to buy or sell HVAC leads, affiliate software will allow you to do it automatically while taking into account your settings: the number of leads to buy or sell, the price per lead, and the lead’s profile (demographics, exclusivity, etc.).Here’s how you can find a suitable affiliate programme:

• Cheque the feedback about the programme. To safeguard against low-quality programs and downright scams, check the programme’s background and reputation before proceeding to the technicalities.
• Cheque the technical part of the programme. 

1. Revenue model. Among various payment models — Pay Per Click, Pay Per Sale, Pay Per Impression, and Pay Per Lead — select the one that resonates with your goals and fits your budget.
2. Expected conversion rate. There’s no way to accurately predict the conversion rate of the chosen revenue model, but even a ballpark figure may be enough to understand whether it’s worth it.
3. Toolkit. Estimate the program’s lead generation tools and affiliate tracking systems to get what you need.

• Read the agreement itself.

The good news is that you can always enrol in a free trial affiliate programme to understand whether this type of HVAC business marketing works for you and only take action when you’ve factored in all risks and possible gains.

Maximising Your Affiliate Income with an Affiliate Tracking System

Tracking your affiliates makes perfect sense, as it will allow you to compare the performance of different traffic sources — quality and quantity — for more informed marketing decisions. This, in turn, will increase your ROI and position you as a reliable affiliate partner.

• Any automated affiliate tracking programme will import all affiliate data into an affiliate marketing dashboard so you can assess and adjust your strategies on the fly.

Affiliate tracking programmes have brought HVAC marketing to the next level, where advertisers and publishers can rely on numbers rather than guesswork.

Automate Your HVAC Marketing with Phonexa

Automation is king in today’s marketing, and HVAC is no exception.

• Over half the businesses use automation to improve their marketing.
• Automation software generates four times more qualified leads.
• 77% of marketers convert more leads using marketing software.

Whether you are a local or international HVAC company, you can only scale if you automate what can be automated. Among other products, Phonexa’s software suite comprises 

• LMS Sync for lead tracking, distribution, and analytics. As you depend on steady leads to keep your business running, you need to tap into your lead data to determine which HVAC marketing channels drive the most traffic and how many leads convert to customers. LMS syncs will help you unlock the full potential of your leads and open up new revenue streams.
  • First, you track your leads to see which marketing channels are successful.
  • Next, you distribute the captured leads to the most relevant sales rep, ensuring a fulfilling customer journey.
  • Finally, you adjust ongoing campaigns and model new ones using analytics tools like real-time reporting.

• Call Logic for call tracking, distribution, and analytics. Whether you captured your lead with your pay-per-click campaign, offline HVAC marketing, or social media, you’ll know how every caller made it to you. Real-time reports will allow you to spot trends, allocate resources wisely, improve the customer journey, and identify strategies to generate more call leads.

• E-Delivery for email and SMS HVAC marketing. E-Delivery simplifies email and SMS outreach and measures the result of your campaign for all groups of recipients. Likewise, it seamlessly integrates with your Email Service Provider (EPS) to collect data, create reports, and measure deliverability.

Frequently Asked Questions

Schedule a free consultation to learn more about how Phonexa can help you market your HVAC business.