Water damage restoration marketing glossary
Plain-English definitions of the marketing terms restoration owners hear from agencies, Google and lead sellers. Each one starts with what it is, then why it matters to your phone.
- Map pack
- The map pack is the group of three local businesses Google shows on a map near the top of results for searches like water damage restoration plus a city. Most emergency calls for restoration companies start there, which is why ranking in it is the first goal of local SEO. Read more
- Google Business Profile
- A Google Business Profile is the free listing that controls how your company appears on Google Maps and in local results. It holds your category, services, service area, hours, photos, reviews and phone number, and it is the main thing Google uses to rank you in the map pack. Read more
- Primary category
- The primary category is the main business type you choose on your Google Business Profile. For water damage work it should usually be Water damage restoration service. It is one of the strongest signals Google uses to decide which searches your profile appears for.
- Service-area business
- A service-area business is one that travels to customers instead of serving them at an office, like most restoration companies. On Google you can hide the street address and list the towns you serve, though Google still uses your address to judge distance.
- Local Services Ads
- Local Services Ads are Google ads that appear above the map and regular ads, where you pay per lead instead of per click. Google offers a water damage restoration category, and businesses must pass license, insurance and background checks before the ads run. Read more
- Grid scan
- A grid scan checks your Google Maps ranking from many points across your service area at once, shown as a grid of numbers on a map. It reveals where you rank in the top three and where you disappear, which a single ranking check from your office cannot.
- Citation
- A citation is any online mention of your business name, address and phone number, such as on Yelp, Bing Places, Apple Maps or an industry directory. Consistent citations help Google trust your details. Mismatched ones, like an old phone number, weaken that trust.
- NAP consistency
- NAP consistency means your business name, address and phone number are written exactly the same way everywhere they appear online, from your website to your profile and directories. Inconsistent details can confuse Google and send customers to old numbers or addresses.
- Call tracking
- Call tracking gives each marketing source its own phone number that forwards to your main line, so every call can be counted and recorded by source. It is how restoration companies prove which channels produce calls, rather than guessing from traffic or rankings. Read more
- Whisper message
- A whisper message is a short recorded line that plays to you, not the caller, when you answer a tracked call, such as call from Google Maps. It tells you the source before you say hello, so you know the call came from marketing.
- Tracked call
- A tracked call is a phone call to a call tracking number on your website, Google profile or ads, which is counted and recorded. Tracked calls are the measure RestorationFlow uses for its guarantee, because they show real demand rather than clicks.
- Qualified lead
- A qualified lead is an enquiry for real work you do, inside your service area, from someone who can book the job. Job seekers, sales calls and requests for services you do not offer are not qualified, even when they ring a tracked number.
- Exclusive lead
- An exclusive lead goes to only one company. Calls from your own Google profile, website and Local Services Ads account are exclusive by nature, because nobody else receives or resells them.
- Cost per booked job
- Cost per booked job is what a marketing source costs in a month divided by the number of jobs it produced. It is the fairest way to compare lead sellers, ads and SEO, because a cheap lead that rarely books can cost more per job than an expensive one. Read more
- Water mitigation
- Water mitigation is the emergency work that stops water damage getting worse: extracting water, drying the structure and removing wet materials that cannot be saved. It usually comes before restoration, which repairs and rebuilds what was damaged.
- Water damage categories
- Water damage categories describe how contaminated the water is. The IICRC S500 standard separates clean water, such as a burst supply line, grey water, such as an appliance overflow, and contaminated water, such as a sewage backup, because cleanup and safety steps differ.
- Third-party administrator
- A third-party administrator, or TPA, manages restoration work on behalf of insurers and sends jobs to approved contractors under set pricing and rules. TPA programs bring steady volume, usually with lower margins and strict reporting.
- Service-area page
- A service-area page is a website page about your services in one specific town, with real local detail such as neighborhoods, housing stock and common problems. Done well, it helps you rank in that town. Thin pages with only the town name swapped can hurt the whole site.
- Negative keyword
- A negative keyword stops a Google ad from showing for searches you do not want, such as jobs, DIY or equipment rental. A long negative keyword list keeps restoration ad budgets on real emergency searches instead of wasted clicks.
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Thirty minutes on a call. We look at your Google Business Profile, your map rankings and your website together, and you leave with the three fixes that matter most, whether you hire us or not.