Local SEO for contractors: how we go after the Google Maps top 3
Local SEO for contractors comes down to Google Maps. A homeowner searches "furnace repair" or "epoxy garage floor" with their town, sees three businesses on a map, and calls one. Contractor SEO that doesn't start with those three spots is decoration. Below is how we go after one of them for your trade in your county, what it costs, and how long it usually takes.
No sales call · By email · Within one business day
Google Maps SEO: what decides who gets the top 3
Google ranks the map on three things: how close you are to the person searching, how well your profile matches what they typed, and how much Google trusts your business. You can’t move your shop. The other two are work, and most contractors in most counties have never done it. Their profile has the wrong primary category, four photos from 2019, twelve reviews nobody answered, and a website with one page that says “we do it all.” That’s the bar. It’s lower than you think, and it goes up the day one of your competitors hires someone who does this properly.
What our contractor SEO covers, every week
Google Business Profile, worked weekly
Primary and secondary categories set for your trade. Every service listed and described. Service areas set town by town, not one wide circle. Photos from your own jobs, with the town in the file name. A new post every week, and every review answered within two days.
Reviews after every job
After every completed job, your follow-up automation sends a review request, by text to customers who agreed to texts and by email to the rest, so reviews keep coming in the weeks you’re too busy to ask. They’re the Maps signal you control most directly.
A page for every town
One page for each town you actually work in, written for that town and showing the jobs you did there. We start with the twelve towns that bring you the most work, because twelve pages that earn their place beat a hundred thin ones.
Citations, cleaned up
Your name, address and phone made identical on the directories Google checks, and the wrong ones fixed. Boring, and it matters.
A page for every service
One page for each job you want more of: AC repair, water heater replacement, storm damage repair, kitchen remodel, garage floor coating. Titles, headings and schema set up so Google knows exactly what you do and where you do it.
Reporting in positions and calls
One email a month: your Map Pack position for each tracked search, calls and direction requests from your Google profile, and calls and forms from your site. The GoHighLevel app is there if you want to look yourself, and any question you reply with goes to a founder.
The plan behind it: Map Pack Takeover
Local SEO is the base of every Royalso plan. Map Pack Takeover is the plan built around it: everything above, plus a text back to every missed call and an instant reply to every website form, so the calls the map sends you don’t die in voicemail. Revenue Infrastructure adds Google Ads and Local Services Ads, AI chat and the AI voice line on top. Plans start at $3,500 a month.
What the first 180 days look like
Days 1 to 30. Your profile rebuilt, tracking live, the first service and town pages published, and your text registration filed so missed-call text-back starts as soon as it clears.
Days 30 to 90. Reviews building, citations cleaned up, more pages, and the first movement on the map, which usually comes in 60 to 90 days, longer in a crowded county.
Days 90 to 180. The stretch the first three months were built for: holding the ground you’ve gained and turning positions into Maps calls. Every stage has a written milestone in your agreement, with a day-90 exit if we miss.
Who this is for, and who it isn’t
It’s for an HVAC, plumbing, remodeling, coating or roofing company with room on the schedule that wants Google to be a lead source it owns, not one it rents from Angi or a lead seller. It isn’t for a one-truck operation, a company that needs calls this week (that’s what ads are for), or anyone whose county already has a Royalso client in the same trade. If you’re a roofer, our roofing SEO page shows how we get storm pages live before the season.
Your county, your profile, our milestones in writing
- Your county. One contractor per trade per county, named in your agreement. Once you’re in, your competitors can’t hire us.
- Your profile. Your Google profile, website and domain are in your name from day one, and what we build is yours once it’s paid for.
- Our milestones, in writing. Days 30, 60, 90 and 180, with a day-90 exit if we miss.
- A founder on the work. You deal with a founder, not an account manager.
- Clean methods. No purchased links and no private blog networks, ever. Nothing that puts your profile at risk.
Local SEO for contractors: questions owners ask
How long does local SEO take for a contractor?
Maps positions usually start to move in 60 to 90 days, longer in a busy county. Page-one organic rankings for competitive searches usually take months. We write the milestones for your county into the agreement.
How much does local SEO cost for a contractor?
Map Pack Takeover is $3,500 a month plus $500 onboarding, for one trade in the counties named in your agreement. If your profile, tracking and first pages aren’t live within 30 days of signing, the $500 is refunded. Revenue Infrastructure is $6,500 a month with onboarding included, and adds Google Search and Local Services Ads plus the full AI follow-up; ad spend is paid by you directly to Google or Meta. Running several locations? Multi-Market is $10,000 a month, and each location gets its own profile work and pages. Every plan has a six-month minimum, then runs month to month with 30 days’ written notice.
Can you guarantee a top 3 spot on Google Maps?
No, and neither can anyone else. Google decides the rankings. What we put in writing is our side of it: milestones for your county at days 30, 60, 90 and 180, and if we miss the day-90 one, you can leave at day 90 with no fee and keep everything we built.
I already have a Google Business Profile. Do I need a new one?
No. We fix the one you have. Most contractor profiles have the wrong category, missing services and unanswered reviews. Fixing yours keeps your reviews and history, and it’s faster than starting over.
Do I need a new website for SEO to work?
Not always. If yours is on Wix or Squarespace, loads slowly on a phone, or has no service pages, the audit will say so. If you need one, our contractor website design service builds it: included with Revenue Infrastructure and Multi-Market, or $7,500 to $15,000 on its own.
How long is the contract, and what if I stop?
Six months, then month to month with 30 days’ written notice. The first ninety days build the profile and the pages; the next ninety are where that work is meant to turn into calls. If you stop after that, rankings don’t vanish overnight, but competitors who keep working will pass you in the months that follow. Everything we built is yours once it’s paid for.
Find out where you rank, and who’s in your way
The free audit checks your Map Pack position for your main searches, puts your profile and reviews next to the three companies above you, and shows what they’ve done that you haven’t. By email within one business day: a screen-recorded video, a written list, three fixes you can make yourself, the plan we’d suggest, and whether your trade is still open in your county. Every week you sit outside the top 3, those three companies take the calls.
No sales call · By email · Within one business day