BUILDER MARKETING

Three times more people search for a granny flat than for a home builder, and almost no builder in the country has a page for it.

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What your suburbs actually search for, which of the three channels you need, and which you do not. Fifteen minutes, and you keep it either way.

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Google Partner   Licensed trades   No lock-in
No lock-in contracts
Booked jobs, not clicks
Google Partner
Brisbane based

YOU WILL BE IN GREAT COMPANY

14,800

“GRANNY FLAT” DOES 12,100 A MONTH. “HOME BUILDERS” DOES 3,600.

Three and a half times the volume of the trade term, and a buyer with a completely different reason to build.
A granny flat is not a smaller house. It is either a rental yield calculation or somewhere to put an ageing parent, and both of those are decisions people research for months. Add knockdown rebuild at 1,900 and house extensions at 1,300 and you have three distinct projects, none of which is served by a page that says New Homes. The word builder is the least useful word on your own website.

WHAT CUSTOMERS ACTUALLY SEARCH FOR

Australian search volumes, Semrush.

“Builder near me” at 1,900 is the map pack end of this trade, and it is the smallest number that matters here. Nobody chooses a builder for a four hundred thousand dollar project because they were the closest pin on a map.
Everything above it behaves differently. Granny flats, knockdown rebuilds, extensions and custom homes are researched for months, compared on displays and finished work, and decided long before anyone fills in a form. Those searches are won on content and can be ranked for from anywhere in the city.
WHAT THEY TYPE
MONTHLY SEARCHES, AU
granny flat (12,100)
home builders (3,600)
home renovation (2,400)
builder near me (1,900)
knockdown rebuild (1,900)
custom home builder (1,900)
house extensions (1,300)

CREATE THE DEMAND. CAPTURE IT. THEN OWN IT.

Three channels, three jobs. A business usually needs all three, staggered rather than launched at once. It is the same model our Brisbane digital marketing agency runs across every industry we work in, only the numbers underneath it change.

01

Creates the demand

META ADS

This is the longest sales cycle in the hub, often a year from first idea to signed contract. Meta is what keeps you present across that year, and finished builds are the best material any trade has to work with.

02

Captures the demand

GOOGLE ADS

Catches them the moment they start researching, including the ones Meta warmed up. Fastest of the three to produce an enquiry, though on this trade an enquiry is the beginning of a long conversation rather than a booking.

03

Owns the demand

SEO

Takes over the same project searches Google Ads is paying for, permanently and for free. Slowest to arrive, cheapest to keep, and on a trade with a twelve month sales cycle the only channel whose value compounds.

The bit that makes it more than three separate things

Google Ads tells us within about six weeks which searches actually produce genuine enquiries, so SEO gets aimed at those rather than guessing for six months. Meta retargeting picks up everyone who read your granny flat page and did not enquire, which on a project this size is almost everybody first time round. And as SEO ranks for a project type, we pull the paid spend off it and move it to the next one.

WHAT EACH CHANNEL ACTUALLY INVOLVES

The work behind each one, so you can tell whether a proposal is describing effort or just naming a platform.

01

THE SLOW ASSET

A real page per project type rather than a Homes list, each carrying finished builds, inclusions and an honest starting price range. Google Business Profile built properly, categories right, and a review process that runs after handover. This is what moves the project terms.

02

THE FAST LEVER

Campaigns split by project type, not one campaign called Builder. Negative keywords so you stop paying for builder jobs, apprenticeships, builder salaries, kit homes, Bunnings and the very large volume of people looking at floor plans for entertainment. Form and phone tracking, plus the patience to judge a campaign over quarters rather than weeks.

03

THE ONE THAT CARRIES THE YEAR

The channel that holds a twelve month decision together. Finished builds, progress on current sites, and the suburbs you work in. It is also the only realistic way to reach someone who is thinking about a granny flat but has not yet searched for one.

How we decide what you actually need

We start from which projects you want more of, not from which service we would like to sell you. A builder wanting granny flats rather than custom homes needs a granny flat page and Meta Ads, not more generic traffic. A newer builder needs Google Ads while the SEO catches up. We will tell you on the call if one of the three is not worth running for you.

THE FIRST THREE PAGES WE WOULD BUILD YOU

Not a strategy document. These are the three pages we would put up first for a Brisbane builder, why those three, and the numbers behind each one.

01

Granny flats

Built around “granny flat”

SEARCHES/MO 12,100NOBODY OWNS IT

The biggest number in the trade and the most neglected page in it. Two entirely different buyers sit behind it: an investor running yield numbers, and a family working out where a parent will live. Answer the council questions, the minimum block size, whether it can be rented separately and what it costs per square metre. Nobody is doing this properly and the volume is sitting there.

02

Knockdown rebuilds

Built around “knockdown rebuild”

SEARCHES/MO 1,900ALREADY OWNS THE BLOCK

Smaller volume and a much better customer, because they already own the land and have decided to stay in the suburb. There is no competing against a house and land package here. The questions are demolition, whether they can stay in the house during, what the council allows on that block, and how long they will be renting elsewhere. Answer those and the enquiry is warm.

03

Your suburbs

Built around “house extensions”

SEARCHES/MO 1,300COMPETING WITH MOVING HOUSE

The smallest of the three and the one where you are not really competing with other builders. You are competing with the idea of selling up and moving, which is what most of these people will do instead. A page that compares the cost of extending against the cost of moving, stamp duty included, is a better sales tool than any gallery.

We will do this with your business, not a generic example

Tell us your suburbs and the jobs you want more of. We will come back with the real search numbers for your patch and the three pages we would start with. Fifteen minutes, no obligation, and you keep the research either way.

THE TWO CUSTOMERS THAT BEHAVE DIFFERENTLY

Someone pricing a granny flat for rental income and someone rebuilding the family home are at completely different points, and neither of them is searching the word builder.

Our Brisbane SEO team builds the slow side and our Google Ads team covers the gap while it ranks.

Building for a return

“Granny flat”, 12,100 a month.
Investors and families housing a parent. They are running numbers on yield or working out how to keep someone close, and they will read for months. Almost nobody has written this page properly, which is why it is the best opportunity in the trade.
Show up when locals are searching

Your Google Business Profile, suburb pages, and local listings optimised so customers in your area find you first.

A website Google wants to rank

Technical fixes and service-focused SEO that make your site easy for Google to understand and trust.

Reviews, rankings, and real results

Build your reputation through reviews, with monthly reports tracking rankings and leads from organic search.

Building to live in it

Custom homes, rebuilds, extensions.
A year of research, display visits and three quotes, all riding on whether they trust you with the largest cheque they will ever write. The map pack does not decide this one. Finished work, real inclusions and an honest price range do.
A technically sound foundation

Site speed, crawlability, schema markup, and Core Web Vitals sorted so Google can index and trust your site.

Content Google and customers love

Service pages and suburb landing pages written to rank and convert, not just fill space.

Authority that stacks over time

Backlink building and on-page optimisation that compounds month over month.

READ THE PROPOSAL PROPERLY

WHY BUILDER MARKETING IS DIFFERENT

Three things come up in nearly every proposal we see a builder bring us.
✕ THE USUAL

A site built around the word builder

Home builders does 3,600 searches a month and builder near me 1,900. Meanwhile granny flat does 12,100 and nobody has the page. The most common word on a builder website is the one fewest people search.
✓ WHAT WE DO

A page per project type

Granny flats 12,100, knockdown rebuild 1,900, house extensions 1,300, custom home builder 1,900. Four projects, four buyers, four pages that can rank from anywhere in the city.
✕ THE USUAL

Judging it after one quarter

This trade has a sales cycle measured in seasons. An enquiry in March can sign in December. Agencies get sacked in month four for a campaign that was working, because nobody agreed what to measure at the start.
✓ WHAT WE DO

Measured over the cycle

We track enquiries into your pipeline and follow them to contract, because on a twelve month cycle leads this quarter and contracts this quarter are two different campaigns. Judge it on the enquiries that turned into builds, not on the month they arrived.
✕ THE USUAL

A licence number nobody can find

QBCC licensing matters more here than anywhere, because a domestic building contract is the biggest financial risk most people take. People do check, and half the builder sites we audit put the number in six point grey in the footer, if it is there at all.
✓ WHAT WE DO

Licence, insurance and a price range

QBCC number, home warranty insurance and an honest starting price range on every project page. Builders hide price because every job differs, and the effect is that nobody enquires until they have found someone who will say a number.

HOW WE DO BUILDER MARKETING

We start with the projects you want more of and work backwards to the searches.
01

We ask which projects you want

Not “more leads”. Granny flats, knockdown rebuilds, extensions, custom homes, duplexes. Each is a different search, a different buyer and a very different margin. We check what your suburbs actually search for before recommending anything.
02

We build a page per project type

Real pages, not a gallery. Council requirements, inclusions, timelines, an honest starting price range, and photographs of builds you have finished. QBCC number where people can see it.
03

We measure over the real cycle

Google Business Profile rebuilt and a review process after handover. Then reporting on enquiries followed through to contract by project type, over quarters rather than weeks, because that is the cycle this trade actually runs on.

REAL BUSINESSES. REAL LEADS.

Here’s what happens when paid ads and SEO are done properly for service businesses.
KWR Roofing tradesman installing guttering on a Brisbane roof
ROOFING

Brisbane roofer gets 69% more leads year on year.

69%
Increase in Leads
16%
More Jobs Booked
9%
Conversion Rate
The Dominate Digital team on a video call in the office
REMOTE STAFFING

From 0 leads with a previous agency to averaging 16 leads p/m

88%
Increase in Organic Traffic
16
0 to 16 leads in a month
24
Keywords on page 1
Happy buddii customer giving a thumbs up from their new car
FINANCE BROKER

Consistent lead growth for 4+ years!

294%
Increase in Leads YOY
6.2%
Close Rate
84%
Pure Organic Traffic

WHEN A BUILDER SHOULD NOT SPEND ON MARKETING

Worth saying before you enquire, because it saves everyone three months.

If your build slots are full for eighteen months, more marketing buys you a waiting list of people who will go elsewhere. And if you are not prepared to publish a starting price range on anything, expect a thin pipeline, because the enquiry goes to whoever answered the money question first. That is a positioning decision, not a marketing one, and no campaign fixes it.
We would rather tell you that on the call than three months into a retainer. Get in touch and we will look at your suburbs and your project mix and tell you what is realistic.

WHAT ELSE DO I GET?

You’ve seen what we can do. Now let’s talk about how we deliver our dominating results.

Direct access to your strategist

Fast answers, clear decisions.

Monthly reporting and live dashboards

Spend, leads and trends at a glance.

You have full admin access

Your data, your accounts.

Lead quality analysis

Budget goes to what converts.

Long term partnerships

4+ years average client retention.

A team of experts

Specialists across each platform.

FAQS

Got questions? We’ve got the answers.

Because it is where the demand is. Granny flat does 12,100 searches a month against 3,600 for home builders and 1,900 for builder near me. It is also almost entirely unclaimed, because most builders treat it as a small job rather than a lead source. It brings two buyers you would not otherwise meet: investors running yield numbers, and families housing a parent.

Agency fees usually work one of three ways: a percentage of ad spend, a flat monthly retainer, or a base fee plus a percentage above a threshold. Percentage models get expensive as you scale and quietly reward the agency for spending more of your money. Ask which model an agency uses and why before you ask for a number.

Longer than any other trade in this hub, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something. Enquiries arrive within weeks. Contracts follow six to twelve months later, because that is how long people take over a decision this size. The campaign has to be judged over quarters, and both sides need to agree that before it starts.

A starting range, yes. Builders resist it because every job differs, and the effect is that nobody enquires until they find someone who will say a number. You do not need a price list. You need enough of a range that someone can work out whether to keep reading.

Because they already own the block and have decided to stay in the suburb, so you are not competing against house and land packages. The questions are demolition, council, and where they live during the build. Answer those and the enquiry arrives warm.

Not other builders. You are competing with selling up and moving, which is what most of those people end up doing. A page comparing the cost of extending against the cost of moving, stamp duty and agent fees included, is a better sales tool than any gallery.

Builder jobs, apprenticeships, builder salaries, kit homes, owner builder courses, Bunnings, and the very large volume of people browsing floor plans for entertainment. On broad match an account buys all of it and the clicks are not cheap.

They matter, but less than elsewhere in this hub, because builder near me is only 1,900 searches a month. Nobody picks a builder for a four hundred thousand dollar project because they were the closest pin on a map. Finished work and a licence people can verify do more here.

Yes. Search behaviour is the same across Australia, though granny flat rules and council requirements vary significantly by state and that has to be reflected on the page. The volumes quoted here are national.

We look at whether you have a real page for any project type other than new homes, what those terms do in your suburbs, whether your QBCC number and a starting price range are findable, and how long your current enquiries actually take to convert. You get it in writing and you keep it either way.