Plumbing · ChatGPT ads
Burst pipe at 6am: the ChatGPT ad they read first
A pipe has let go under the kitchen sink and water is running across the floor. Phone in one hand, towel in the other, they ask ChatGPT what it is and whether it can wait. They are picking a plumber in that minute. Your ad can sit under the answer they are reading.
What someone types while the water is still running
- "water coming up the shower drain when the washing machine empties"
- "no hot water this morning, is it the element or the whole tank"
- "i can smell gas near the stove, what do i do first"
- "burst pipe under the house, do i need an emergency plumber tonight"
- "toilet keeps running after every flush, how much to fix"
- "tree roots in the sewer, do they need a camera down the line"
- "how much to replace a hot water system same day"
None of that is ad words. It's how a person talks with a wet floor under them. You have answered every one of those down the phone at a bad hour.
Split last month's jobs into 2 piles
One pile could not wait an hour. A burst pipe, a blocked sewer, no hot water in winter, a gas smell. The other pile was booked in. A new hot water system, a bathroom rough-in, a camera down the line.
Those piles want different ads. The can't-wait ad names your call-out and how fast you get there. The booked-in ad offers a price this week.
Put 24 hours in the ad only if someone really answers at 3am. You pay OpenAI for every click, which is someone tapping the ad. A burst-pipe caller who gets your voicemail rings the next plumber on the list.
The ad a wet-floor caller needs to read
Here's one I'd write for the can't-wait pile.
Title: Burst pipe? Licensed plumber, out today
Copy: Burst pipes, blocked drains, no hot water. You get the call-out price on the phone before I leave.
Put your licence number at the end of that copy. In NSW it has to be in the ad itself, not only on your page. Other states have their own rule, so check yours.
It names the job, then the money, then who you are. The link has to land on a page about that job, because ChatGPT reads the page as well as the ad.
Your licence, your gas ticket, and the call-out price
- Your plumbing licence number, up top, before anyone has to scroll.
- Your gas fitting ticket, if you hold one. The gas-smell caller looks for it first.
- A phone number they can press with a wet thumb.
- The same job the ad named. Ad says blocked drain, first line says blocked drain.
- What the call-out costs, and whether after hours costs more. Say the number.
- The suburbs you drive to, and how long you take to get there.
Let the call-out fee carry the clicks
Picture a Tuesday night. Someone taps your ad at 9pm with a blocked toilet. Another taps it at 11pm with no hot water. The burst pipe comes in at 6am.
You get to two of those three and charge your call-out on both. Two call-out fees can cover every click the ad took that night, before anybody books a bigger job. The small stuff is the float that keeps the ad running.
Then one of them turns into a hot water swap worth, as an example, $1,800 to you in our dollars. Put the number you really invoice in its place. OpenAI suggests a starting bid of US$3 to US$5 a click. US dollars, so a bit more here. Say 15 clicks before one becomes a booked job. At US$5 that's US$75 of ad spend against the $1,800 example.
The 15 is a number I picked to show you the shape. What a plumbing click costs in Australia has not been published, and I haven't got a number either. Month 1 gives you yours.
Who gets the blocked drain call now
I have no number for this, so take it as what I would expect. Google and the map, then whoever answers on the second ring. The strata manager who already has a plumber on the books. An agent working down a maintenance list after a tenant rings. Then the insurer, who sends its own trade out after the water damage.
No plumber in Australia really knows about this yet, and if they do, they are doubtful because it is new. Which is why the answer on that wet-floor phone most likely has no plumber under it.
Let ChatGPT show your business to high-intent customers
- ChatGPT has released paid ads, and this changes the marketing game absolutely.
- If you missed out on Facebook ads in 2007, where anything you posted would have popped off, don't miss out on the next big ad platform.
- Unlike Facebook, where people get interrupted mid doom-scroll, ChatGPT shows your business to people who are already researching something related.
- That makes ChatGPT a cheat code. The engine your customers ask for advice shows your business right under its answer.
- Most marketing agencies charge you thousands before you see any results.
- We work for you, for free. You just cover your own ad spend. The first month is free, so you see the results for yourself before you pay us anything.
- Then, if you want to keep getting those results month after month, we sort out a rev-share or a retainer. A rev-share is a cut of what it makes you. A retainer is a flat monthly fee. Agreed in writing before month 2 starts.
- In the free month, we don't get paid if you don't get paid. After that, it's the rev-share or the retainer you chose.
- Only 10 a month. The work up front is heavy and brings us no income at first. That is all we can take.
If the ads make you nothing, you pay us nothing and we stop there. You will have paid OpenAI for the clicks, and that is all.
3 things plumbers want to know
Can the ad say I do gas?
Only if you hold the ticket. In NSW the licence number goes in the ad itself for plumbing and gas work, so we write it in. The person who can smell gas reads that line before anything else.
I'm flat out this month. Can I wind it back?
Yes, and how much a tradie should put behind ChatGPT ads covers the daily cap and how quickly you can pull it back.
How would I know a call came from the ad?
The ad points at a number we can count. I tag the link as well, so the clicks and the calls sit in one place instead of two. How to know which calls came from the ads walks through it.
Worth a read after this
A burst pipe won't wait while you read the lot, so the short version of what I do sits on the ChatGPT ads page. To see what has to happen between the click and your phone ringing, read how a ChatGPT ad turns into a lead.
Electricians get woken at the same hours you do, and their page splits the work by danger instead of by water. If you fit hot water and splits both, the air conditioning page is the seasonal version. The wider case for trades sits on ChatGPT ads for service businesses. How the sum shifts from a call-out trade to a quoted one is on ChatGPT ads for tradies.
30 minutes, then a straight answer
30 minutes on the phone, mostly questions about your business and your customers. You get 2 straight answers. Do people ask ChatGPT for what you do? And is it worth a run, where we only get paid a rev-share or a retainer, sorted once you have seen the results, to find out?