You run a trade business. You are good at the work, your name gets passed around the area, and most weeks the phone rings often enough that marketing feels like something other businesses do.
Here is the uncomfortable part. Australia’s trades industry is worth more than $141 billion, and more than 300,000 trade businesses are competing for a share of it. Construction was one of the faster-growing sectors again last financial year, which means more vans on the road and more businesses chasing the same local jobs.
Most of those businesses are still winning work the way you probably do: word of mouth. ServiceTitan’s 2025 survey of Australian tradies found 70 per cent win work through referrals and 76 per cent have a website, yet only 17 per cent do any SEO and 29 per cent use Google Ads. The gap between having a website and being easy to find is where the work is being won and lost.
That gap is the opportunity. Digital marketing for tradies is not about becoming a marketer. It is about doing a few simple things in the right order, so that when someone in your service area searches for a plumber, electrician or builder, your business is the one they find and trust.
Start with your Google Business Profile
Before you spend a dollar on ads or a new website, claim and complete your Google Business Profile. It is free, and it is what puts you in the Map Pack — the map of three local businesses that appears when someone searches “electrician near me”.
Google is direct about how it picks those three. Local results are based on relevance, distance and prominence, and its help centre says businesses “with complete and accurate info are more likely to show up in local search results”. So fill in everything: your services, your exact service area, your hours, your phone number, and real photos of your finished work.
There is another line worth remembering: there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking on Google. You cannot buy your way into the Map Pack. You earn it by being accurate, complete and close to the person searching, which is exactly why this step comes first.
We have a plain-English guide to getting this right: our local SEO guide for Melbourne small businesses.
Ask every happy customer for a review
Reviews are the other half of that prominence equation. Google’s own guidance says more reviews and positive ratings can help your business’s local ranking.
The thing most tradies miss is that you do not need a clever review strategy, you need a habit of asking. Most customers are happy to leave a review; they simply do not think to do it unless you ask. The simplest system that works: the moment a job is finished and the customer is happy, send a quick thank-you message with a link to your Google review page. Do it that day, while the job is fresh.
Do not chase volume for its own sake. A steady trickle of genuine reviews from real jobs beats a burst of padded ones, and it is the honest way to build the reputation Google rewards.
Make your website do the selling
Your website is where the referral and the search click both land, and it is the one asset that has to work every time. It is not a brochure. For a trade business with staff, it is your hardest-working employee: it should tell a visitor in seconds what you do, where you work, and how to get a quote.
Three things matter most. Be specific — name the actual services you provide and the suburbs or regions you cover, rather than “quality workmanship at competitive prices”. Make the next step obvious — a phone number that is clickable on a mobile, a quote request form, and a clear “call us” button on every page. And show you are the real deal — photos of your team and finished jobs, your licence and insurance details, and a few genuine reviews.
If a potential customer lands on your site and cannot instantly tell whether you service their suburb, they will close the tab and ring the next name on the list. A page that says you are an electrician in Werribee has a real chance of showing up when someone searches for an electrician in Werribee — that is the quiet work of local SEO, and it compounds over time.
If you would rather someone handle the search side of it for you, that is what our SEO services are for.
Add paid ads once the basics are working
Once your profile and website are doing their job, paid ads can switch on a predictable flow of new enquiries, but they are a cost, not a starting point. Google Ads puts you in front of someone searching “plumber near me” or “emergency plumber” today rather than in six months. The catch is the price: in Australia, a single click on “plumber near me” averages about $13.88, and “emergency plumber” sits closer to $16.99, and only some of those clicks turn into a real job.
That is why ads work best after the rest of your marketing is in place. If every click lands on a clear, trustworthy site with a phone number and reviews, your spend goes further. If it lands on a half-finished page, you are paying for clicks that go nowhere.
If you would like a hand with this, it is something we do every day: our Google Ads management.
What it costs to get started
Tradies often assume digital marketing is a big, vague expense. It is actually easier to price than most people think, because the numbers are concrete.
For context on what leads cost today: hipages charges its Australian tradies an average of about $2,381 a year, roughly $198 a month, just to be listed in its lead marketplace. That is a useful anchor for what the market already charges for a steady stream of enquiries. Your own digital presence — the profile, the reviews, the website — is an asset you own and keep, not a subscription you rent.
On top of that, if you choose to run ads, the click costs above show you the real price of competing for search traffic in your trade. There is no magic percentage of revenue to spend; anyone quoting you a rule of thumb like that is guessing. The honest version is simpler: start with the free foundations, invest in a website that converts, then test a small ads budget you are comfortable with.
Put it together in the right order
Here is the whole thing, in the order it pays to do it:
- Claim and complete your Google Business Profile.
- Set up a simple habit of asking every happy customer for a review.
- Make your website state clearly what you do, where you work, and how to get a quote.
- Once those three are solid, test a small Google Ads budget.
- Track where your enquiries come from, and do more of what works.
You do not have to do it all at once. Getting the first three right will put you ahead of most trade businesses in your area, because most are still relying on word of mouth alone and hoping the phone keeps ringing.
If you would like a hand deciding what to tackle first and what it should cost, that is exactly what our digital marketing strategy service is for — a plain-English plan for your business, not a generic template. Get in touch and we will map it out together.
