Hiring a marketing agency as a roofer: what to ask first

Mid-January is when roofing companies get pitched. The phones are quiet, crews are fitting leak repairs between cold snaps, and every agency with a home services package knows the owner finally has an hour to sit down before hail season opens in March. Some of those pitches are worth hearing. A fair number are a storm-chaser playbook with a monthly retainer attached, and the owner who signs one tends to find out in May, when a regulator, an insurer or Google takes an interest in something carrying the company’s name.

Here are the questions we would want a roofer to put to any agency, including us, before signing.

Why roofing ads carry legal risk most trades never face

For many home services, the rules an agency needs are mostly ad platform rules. Roofing has state laws that reach into the ad copy itself, because so much of the work is paid for by insurance claims. An agency that has not read them can write an ad that sounds persuasive and is illegal where you work.

• Texas. Business and Commerce Code 27.02 makes it a Class B misdemeanor for a seller to advertise or promise to pay, waive or absorb a homeowner’s insurance deductible.
• Colorado. A roofing contractor may not advertise or promise to pay, waive or rebate any part of a deductible. If it does, the insurer is not obligated to consider that contractor’s estimate.
• Minnesota. Residential contractors may not advertise deductible help, or offer anything in return for letting them inspect a roof or file a claim.
• Florida. Statute 489.147 bans gifts, gift cards, cash, coupons and deductible waivers offered for an inspection or a claim, with fines of up to $10,000 per violation, and requires three printed disclosures on any door hanger, magnet, flyer or email that nudges a homeowner toward a roof claim.

None of it is obscure to people who work with roofers, and all of it gets missed by agencies that treat roofing like any other contract work.

Questions that expose a storm-chaser playbook

Ask these in the first meeting.

• “What will my ads say about deductibles?” The only good answer is nothing. Ask to see sample roofing ads they have written; any line about “help with your deductible” or “we cover your out-of-pocket” ends the conversation in four states.
• “Where will my license number appear?” California requires it in all forms of advertising, a definition that covers electronic ads, directories and vehicle lettering. Florida requires it in every advertisement regardless of medium. An agency that answers “in the footer” has not looked.
• “Which cities will you target, and where will my Business Profile be?” Google says a virtual office is not eligible for a Business Profile, and a service area should stay within about two hours of driving from where the company is based. An agency that offers to open profiles in towns where the latest hail fell is offering you a suspension.
• “How will you get me reviews?” The FTC’s final rule from August 2024 bans buying reviews and bans incentives tied to a review saying something positive. Gift cards for five stars are out. A request to every customer after every job, with a reply to every review, is in.
• “Will you set up Local Services Ads, and what will Google check?” Roofers has its own category, and since October 2025 the ads carry a single Google Verified badge. Google checks liability insurance, a verified Business Profile and the state license where the law requires one, and puts average screening at three to four weeks once documents are in. An agency that promises ads live next week is describing a process it has never been through.
• “Will you advertise a tax credit on new roofs?” The IRS energy efficient home improvement credit covered improvements made through December 31, 2025, and its list of qualifying items named doors, windows, skylights and insulation, never roofs. A tax credit line on a roofing ad this year is wrong twice.

What the first ninety days should look like for a roofing company

The order matters more in roofing than in most trades, because the gap between a hail week and a January week is wide enough to fool anyone judging results without tracking. A plan we would sign off on looks like this:

• Weeks 1 to 3: tracking. Every call and form tagged by source, and by job type: repair, replacement, insurance or retail. License numbers checked on every ad, listing, page and truck.
• Weeks 2 to 7: reasons to choose you. Review requests after every finished job, replies to all of them, photos of your own roofs on the site and profile, and a page that explains how an insurance job works without promising anything about deductibles.
• Weeks 5 to 10: being found. Service areas set inside Google’s limits, Local Services Ads applied for early enough to clear review before March, and search ads on leak and storm-damage terms.
• Weeks 9 to 13: keeping the work. Follow-up on every unsold estimate, and a referral ask on the street after each job.

A plan that starts with ad spend before tracking exists will report a great April and a terrible December, and neither number will mean anything.

What a monthly report should show a roofer

A report worth reading follows the path from call to signed contract, split the way your business actually works.

• Calls answered and calls missed. CallRail’s January 2025 analysis of 1.1 million leads put the missed call rate for home services at 14%.
• Inspections booked, estimates sent and contracts signed, by source. Leads alone flatter every channel.
• Insurance and retail jobs side by side. They close on different timelines and should never share one cost-per-lead figure.
• Cost per signed roof. LocaliQ’s 2025 home services benchmarks, covering April 2024 to March 2025, put the median cost per lead for Roofing & Gutters search ads at $228.15, the highest of 16 home service categories, with a median conversion rate of 3.70%. At that price, an agency that reports leads without contracts is skipping the only number that pays the crew.

What we are telling roofers this month

• Pull every ad, flyer and door hanger you ran last year and read each one against your state’s deductible and license-number rules before reusing any of it.
• If Local Services Ads are part of the plan, start the application now so Google’s review is finished before the first storm.
• Ask each agency you meet for a sample report with signed contracts on it, not just leads.
• Write down which cities you can drive to and legally work in, and hold every proposal to that list.
• Ask every customer from the winter repair season for a review now, while the job is fresh.

An agency that answers these questions plainly, and puts compliance before volume, is worth a second meeting. If you want to see how we would approach your company, our page for roofing companies sets out the plan, and our Google Ads and Local Services Ads work shows how the paid side runs alongside your local search presence.