There are many tips and tricks for getting totally free advertising for your propane company from Google. However, advertising for new customers might but not be the number one priority for most propane companies these days. With today’s tank supply shortage, many propane companies have more prospects than they do tanks. Therefore, retaining customers is typically a higher priority than new sales for a substantial number of propane companies. The cost of picking up tanks, bringing them back to your yard, and cleaning them up so you can bring them back out to a new customer is significant. It’s a lot more profitable to simply keep every customer rather than incur the costs of transporting tanks from old to new customers. This is why many propane companies are trying to reduce customer loss (AKA churn) as a higher priority than acquiring up new customers.

For some companies there’s still a higher priority than that. For many, the number one priority is managing and protecting their company brand. Considering how many years it takes to build a strong brand and the millions of dollars we all invest into tanks, tank equipment, tank installation, trucks, signage, offices, and staff, it makes great sense to protect our brand image. While eliminating churn should be among our highest priorities, managing our brand in this new digital age might be paying the highest dividends for propane companies. You see, in this digital age, if you have a strong brand, it can withstand negative customer complaints online and it can project or create an image that you are the best in your marketplace. Then there will be no need for potential customers to shop around, making you the number one choice for propane companies in your area. And the best news yet… it can be done for free.

Getting a 1.5 trillion-dollar company like Google to advertise for you for free sounds too good to be true. But it IS true and, better yet, most of your competition doesn’t know anything about this. So, if you want a competitive edge in the propane industry and if you want a free way to market your company, bring in more business, protect your image, and reduce churn, then this might be for you.

Listed below are several ways to get Google to market for you for free. I will save the best for the last. So, if you’re in a rush, just go to the last one (number 5) and check it out. It’s the king of all marketing methods right now and because it’s free, the ROI on it is superb. Here are the top ways to get Google to advertise for you for free:

1. Have a professional upgrade and maintain your website. You use a trained mechanic to fix and maintain your cars and trucks; you don’t let just anybody work on them. So, how could you conceive of using an amateur to manage your company’s image online? It’s ludicrous. Contact a pro have them update your site with videos, lead capture mechanisms, and articles with information that Google wants and like. Then Google will refer your company more often and place it higher in every search. If you need some recommendations, feel free to contact us at propanequarterback.com for a free list of great fuel company web developers.
2. Get a pro to do search engine optimization on your site. This is expensive and takes a long time; however, once you’ve done it, Google will advertise your site for free. One of the positive aspects of this is that the more you invest in this, the greater your return will be, and it will provide solid returns for many years to come. Again, this is no quick fix. It takes time, money, and a lot of effort but will be well worth the investment in the long run.
3. Get an expert to help you with paid search. Google doesn’t charge very much, and they will advertise you at the top of the search results page – yes it is pretty nice to be the number one company shared by Google for your market area. Google continues to be the number one search engine in the world, so why wouldn’t every propane company be paying a few bucks each day to get themselves placed on the number one slot? It’s not free, but it’s very inexpensive and provides great return on investment.
4. Fix your Google Company Listing. This is free; however, it takes work, so get a professional to do it for you to help ensure that it’s done right the first time. Any smart business doesn’t do their taxes by themselves; they have a CPA do it. Why? Because they’re an expert and they’ll save you money. Likewise, have a professional to do these things for you. It’ll save you money and you’ll get much better results. So, fix your Google Listing and fill it with information customers really want, including pictures. It makes a difference when people are searching online for propane companies. If you are not sure what a Google Listing is then you Really need a pro to help you out. Contact us for a list of companies who can help.
5. And now the king of all online advertising and marketing, which just happens to be free and just happens to be something your competition is doing a horrible job at. It is fixing your image on Google Maps via Google Reviews. Google Reviews is a truly free way to advertise your business! Fixing your online image starts and ends with your Google Reviews and pays higher dividends than anything else you can do. It’s a more strategic move than any of the other items mentioned in this article. It is free, but it does take some work. That is, unless you know a couple critical secrets that, fortunately, your competition doesn’t know yet….

Reason number one to fix your Google Reviews: Today’s new homeowners, new business owners, and new customers in your marketplace don’t like calling companies and don’t have time to shop. They have learned that they can speak four little words (“propane companies near me”) into their smartphone and can instantly get a listing of all their local propane companies and what their ratings are! They don’t need to call around for good propane company recommendations; they simply ask Google or Siri and they can see how Your company scores in customer reviews compared to all your competitors. From there they will call the company that scores the best. The few companies that are filling their Google Reviews with four- and five-star ratings from customers call this their little ninja secret for free marketing.

Reason number two to fix your Google Reviews: It is an unfortunate reality that sometimes you might get an occasional bad review. These are extremely hard to ever remove from your Google Reviews and can really damage a good company’s reputation. To prepare for the day that you’re going to get some bad reviews, you need to fill your reviews with positive customer ratings in advance. You need to do this ahead of time to preserve your brand image, reduce churn, and to protect your margins/ selling price.

The thing that makes these reviews so valuable to you and your company is that Google is constantly advertising your company 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. The number one place that people go to online before purchasing is to Google Reviews, so to get Google to give you free advertising in their number one online forum, you just need a lot of stellar Google Reviews.

You now know the best free online way to grow your business, reduce churn, bulletproof your brand, and set your company up so you can raise your prices. But how do you get all these great Google Reviews?

Obviously, you can ask people to give you five-star ratings on Google. You can send postcards out to customers asking them to do this or you can even hold contests. However, these methods all take up valuable time and have not been found to be extremely effective. In fact, companies have found that it’s difficult to get ratings, especially five-star ratings, which is why most propane companies don’t have very many reviews. Many propane companies have found that the simplest and most successful way of securing great reviews is to get an app that helps you do it. A good 5 Star rating app allows you, with just one click, to send an invite for customers to give you a five-star rating. It goes right to their smartphone and email, so all they need to do is click it and it takes them to your five-star rating. Anytime you or your employees see a customer who says, “Thank you for delivering to me in the snow storm” or “Thank you for installing my tank” or “Thank you for helping us when we ran out of fuel”… that’s the opportunity to click the button on your smartphone sending them the invite to give you a five-star rating, because at that moment they will do it. If you have trouble finding an app that will help you do that, feel free to contact us or go to   tankspotter.com. We have successfully built a free five-star rating tool so you can increase your five-star ratings starting today and consequently rank better in Google Reviews.

Fortunately for you, not many propane companies know this trick, so you have a chance to get more five-star ratings than anybody else in your marketplace. Unfortunately for you, some propane companies are now learning this trick and they are going to have more five-star ratings than you — unless you get moving ASAP. It’s an arms race. The company who has more four- and five-star ratings online in the Google Reviews will look bigger, smarter, more reliable, and will get the lion’s share of the phone calls from online searchers. And, even better, they can charge higher prices because their ratings online back up and prove that they are worth it. With this third-party endorsement by fellow consumers on Google, companies are getting more and more phone calls than their competition, and they are seeing unprecedented growth as a result.

​So, now you know a few new tips and tricks to gain free advertising from the top search engine on the planet – Google. And you have learned the number one best way to advertise your company, reduce churn, increase your selling price, and protect your brand image, all while saving money in the process because it’s free. Now the race is on. Who in your marketplace is going to have the best online image and the most five-star ratings? Whoever has the best image on Google Reviews controls the digital marketplace and owns the future propane growth for their area. Go to tankspotter.com today and let us make this a reality for your company. Let’s get on it!