Should Your Landscape Design Firm Sign Up For Houzz Pro+

Houzz Pro + provides landscape designers Leads

Get impressions and increased lead generation For A Monthly cost.

Your landscape design firm's website is the hub of your online marketing efforts. To drive traffic to your site, you need to have a strategy that incorporates other media channels like blogging, social media, and email marketing. Each of these elements helps you to get found online and drives traffic to your website.

One channel that is a proven winner for companies in the home improvement industry is Houzz. Much like Facebook, Houzz allows home industry professionals to set up a free profile on the site to showcase their company and projects. Unlike Facebook, Houzz is highly targeted and attracts millions of homeowners who are seeking services like landscape design. Houzz is searchable, visual and free for both users and home industry businesses.

Your Houzz profile contains information on your business, photo galleries of projects, contact information and more. Homeowners considering a project use Houzz as a research tool and a resource to find companies that offer the services they're seeking. Visitors can engage with companies, ask questions, and save photos to “ideabooks” as they build their reference materials.

Learn How To Keyword Your Houzz Project Pages

All of this is free, including linking to information and engaging with homeowners. In addition to their free profiles, Houzz also offers a paid service called Houzz Pro+. With Pro+ businesses can get added visibility and target homeowners in your community who are seeking landscape design services. Pro+ members also receive exclusive placement on both the Houzz website and mobile platforms along with enhanced SERP placement. You can also list your business in multiple categories and locations.

Let's take a look at some of the differences between organic Houzz, and Pro+ to help you determine if the paid option is right for your landscape design firm.

First, Complete Your Houzz Profile and Add Projects!  

Your Houzz profile is your public face on the site. Make sure to complete it! Give your reader the chance to get to know who you are, what you do and why they should work with you. Make sure to include ideabooks and project pages. Explore the platform and engage with other users. Houzz can be a great platform to drive traffic, utilize it fully before you invest in paid positioning.

Houzz Pro+ can help you to gain more local exposure for your business, but it's crucial to fully develop your profile. The algorithm they use takes the quality of your profile into account when determining search page rank. The better your profile, the more benefits you'll experience with Houzz Pro+.

The Pros and Cons of Houzz Pro +

There are benefits as well as some drawbacks to consider when using Houzz Pro+. Let's explore some of the pros and cons.

THE PROS

1. Increased Visibility in Search Results within Houzz
Houzz Pro+ will expose you to more Houzz users. Homeowners searching for landscape design firms in your area are more likely to see your profile. In any site search, Houzz lists some professionals on the results page. Ten spots are reserved for Pro+ users.

2. Choose Multiple Categories and Geographic Locations
When you create a free profile, you are allowed to list your business under a single category and location. Pro+ allows you to list under more than one category and location. This is useful if your business has more than one location or market. For example, landscape design and nursery.

3. Gain Deeper Insight with Analytics
Pro+ analytics allows you to see exactly how your profile and pictures are performing. You can gain insight into what is working and adjust your profile accordingly.

THE CONS

1. The Cost
If you are working with a smaller advertising budget, Pro+ may not be right for you.

2. Tracking Leads
To accurately track your ROI you need to know where your leads are coming from. As a general rule, social media is not a huge lead generator. That being said, if you're paying for a premium service you want more out of it. Unfortunately, at this time, Pro+ does not track if leads are generated from the “free” side organically or from Pro+. 

3. Photo Impressions
Houzz is a photo driven platform. While Pro+ seems to increase profile impressions and clicks, which is what you are paying for, it doesn't seem to make a difference regarding photo impressions which is the key driver of the platform.

The bottom line, more impressions and greater visibility increases your prospect for getting leads. Pro+ users get more traffic. If you're profile is incomplete, or you have a small budget you may want to wait before becoming a Pro+ member. If you have a well-developed profile and have already had some success on Houzz, it may be worth checking out Houzz Pro+. Either way, a free Houzz profile is a must and will allow you to engage with the community, generate leads, build authority, and drive traffic to your landscape design firm's website.

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About Michael Conway

I'm the owner and strategist at Means-of-Production. My firm builds Squarespace websites, Houzz profiles, and content marketing and advertising solutions for architects, interior designers, design-build contractors and landscape design firms. Our all-in-one marketing tactics attract the right clients with exceptional architectural photography and brand messaging that sets you apart from the competition.