Marketing for HVAC companies that books the service calls and sells the installs behind them
HVAC is two businesses with one phone number. The repair business lives on the hottest and coldest days of the year and goes to whoever answers first. The install business, where the real margin is, is mostly sold by a technician standing in front of a fifteen-year-old unit. We build the marketing so the repair call comes in cheap, the tech shows up with the replacement conversation ready, and the shoulder months aren't dead.
What’s different about selling hvac
Demand arrives as weather, not as a trend
“Furnace repair” more than doubles in January and “emergency ac repair” spikes in July. Budgets, ad schedules and call coverage have to move with the forecast, and the campaign that's paused in April needs to be live the first week of the heat rather than built that week.
The repair is the lead; the install is the sale
A $200 service call brings a technician to a unit that may be worth an $8,000 to $15,000 replacement. Marketing that treats every call as equal undervalues the ones on old equipment. We track which calls turn into replacement quotes so the ad budget follows the money.
You're up against consolidators and franchises
Private-equity roll-ups and national brands pay $45 to $70 a click and own the Local Services ads at the top of most HVAC searches. The independent can't outspend them, so the edge is reviews, a faster phone answer, a membership base, and owning the neighborhoods and service pages they ignore.
How your customers search
Real numbers, because the plan depends on them. These are the phrases we build hvac campaigns and pages around first.
| Search phrase | US searches / mo | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| ac repair near me | 201,000 | The cooling-season money phrase. Decided by the Google Maps results, Local Services Ads and whoever answers on the first ring. |
| furnace repair | 201,000 | Same annual volume as AC repair but stacked into winter; January alone runs more than double the average. Low competition for the size. |
| heating and cooling near me | 165,000 | Flatter across the year than either season's emergency phrase. The brand and maintenance-plan search. |
| hvac companies near me | 110,000 | Replacement and second-opinion searches. Reviews and a financing page carry it. |
| emergency ac repair | 14,800 | The most expensive click in the trade and it spikes in July. Phone-call ads on a schedule, never an always-on campaign. |
| ac installation cost | 4,400 | Research-stage and cheap. A real price page by tonnage and efficiency tier wins the replacement shopper. |
Search figures are Google Ads Keyword Planner averages for the United States over the trailing twelve months, pulled August 2026. Your market will be a fraction of these; the shape of the demand is what transfers.
When the demand comes
HVAC has two peaks and two troughs. Cooling searches run from July into October and “emergency ac repair” spikes in July; “furnace repair” climbs from November to a January peak that runs more than double its annual average and then drops to a June low of roughly a third of it. The shoulder months, roughly March to May and late October to November, are the cheapest clicks and the slowest phones, which is when maintenance-plan, tune-up and replacement-financing offers get run and the seasonal campaigns get built and parked for the next peak.
Where HVAC contractors get leads, in order
- 01SEO & Website Optimization
Every HVAC phrase that matters is a “near me” search decided in the Google Maps results. Business Profile, a steady flow of new reviews and per-city service pages are the one asset the consolidators can't buy faster than you can earn it.
- 02Paid Advertising & PPC
Repair searches are immediate and worth the click, and Local Services ads sit above everything on HVAC searches. Search, Local Services Ads and phone-call campaigns on weather-driven schedules capture the peak days.
- 03Conversion Rate Optimization
At $45 a click in July, the page that gets a call in ten seconds beats the page that explains your history. Click-to-call, live hours and a booking slot are the difference between a lead and a bounce.
- 04Content & Authority Building
Installation cost, SEER and heat-pump rebate questions are the cheap searches that become $10,000 replacements. A price page and a rebate guide catch the shopper the repair campaign can't afford.
What we’d do first
Split heating, cooling and replacement in tracking
Separate campaigns, landing pages and call tracking for repair by season and for installs. The first report shows cost per booked call for each and which calls turned into replacement quotes.
Build both peak campaigns and park them
Emergency AC and no-heat campaigns written, scheduled and paused with a weather-triggered budget rule. They go live the first hot and first cold week instead of being built in a panic.
Fix the Business Profile and the review ask
Categories for heating, cooling and installation, services listed, a review request on every closed ticket. Consolidators can outspend you on ads; they can't out-review a shop that asks after every call.
Put replacement pricing and financing on the site
A page with installed cost ranges by system size and efficiency tier, rebates, and monthly payment examples. It ranks for the cost searches and gives the tech something to point to at the kitchen table.
01 / 03
Weeks 1–3
The calls get counted right
Tracking split by heating, cooling and replacement, Business Profile fixed, site click-to-call and booking live. You know what a booked call costs in each season.
What changes in the first ninety days
How the work unfolds for HVAC companies, in the order it compounds.
Common questions
Should we be on Local Services ads or regular Google Ads?
Both, usually. Local Services Ads sit at the top of HVAC searches and bills per lead; search ads give you control over season, copy and the replacement offer. We run Local Services Ads for repair and search for installs, and dispute the junk Local Services leads every week.
How do we stop spending in the shoulder months?
You don't stop; you switch. Repair budgets drop to a floor, and the spend moves to tune-up, maintenance-plan and financing offers at the cheapest clicks of the year. That's also when the peak campaigns get rebuilt.
Can marketing help sell more replacements?
Yes, in two ways. Tracking shows which campaigns bring calls on older equipment, and a pricing and financing page gives the technician a credible number to show. The close still happens in the home; the marketing makes it easier.
A national brand is outspending us. What then?
Stop trying to outspend them. Own the Google Maps results with reviews and service pages, run phone-call ads on the hours they're slow, build a maintenance membership so the next call doesn't need an ad, and market the neighborhoods they don't bother with.
What does this cost?
Management fees for most clients run between $1,500 and $5,000 a month depending on how many markets and channels we run, plus whatever ad budget you choose. You get a number before you sign anything, it’s month to month, and every account stays in your name.
Related trades
Run hvac marketing that you can read the numbers on
The free diagnostic shows where your current leads come from and what they cost, before you spend anything new.