CurbSide Search versus generic marketing agencies
This is a page where we compare ourselves to our competitors, so read it the way you would read any sales pitch. What follows is the honest case for hiring a specialist, the cases where a generalist is the better call, and a checklist you can run against us as easily as against them.
What makes an agency generic
A generic marketing agency serves dentists, law firms, restaurants, and roofers through the same core process: keyword research, content calendar, monthly report. None of that is wrong. It is just not specific.
Roofing has its own search behavior, its own demand curve, and its own trust problem. A homeowner about to spend five figures on something they cannot inspect, sold by a trade with a reputation problem it did not entirely earn, searches and evaluates differently than someone booking a teeth cleaning. A playbook built to work for everyone was not built for that.
The gap
Where generalists fall short for roofers
01
The same playbook, every industry
The content templates and keyword approach that work for a dental practice rarely account for how a homeowner actually searches for and vets a roofing contractor.
02
No sense of storm timing
Roofing demand spikes hard and without warning. Content needs 60 to 90 days to rank, which means it has to be published before the storm, not after. Generalists learn this the year they miss it.
03
Your competitor is also a client
Plenty of agencies will sign three roofers in one city and sell each of them the same strategy. You are then paying someone to compete against their own work, which nobody wins.
04
Content that stays on the surface
Writing produced without trade knowledge stops at the obvious. It misses the specifics, on insurance claims, decking, ventilation, and warranty language, that convince a homeowner you have done this before.
The difference
What we do differently
We turn down your competitor
One roofing client per market, and we mean it enough to decline revenue over it. The roofer down the street will not be on our list while you are.
The price is on the page
Every tier and every number is published. Builds, overhauls, and retainers. You can work out what we would cost you tonight without booking a call or talking to anyone.
We will not promise page one
No honest agency can, because nobody controls Google’s results. Any agency that guarantees a position is either misunderstanding the work or counting on you not noticing.
We recommend the smallest tier that works
The audit ends with the cheapest option that solves your actual problem, which is frequently not the one we would rather sell. Sometimes it is the overhaul rather than the build.
Project first, retainer only if it earns it
We start with a one-time project that fixes the foundation. The monthly retainer is optional, has no lock-in, and has to justify itself every month rather than every year.
Storm content ships early
Seasonal pages are written and indexed months ahead of the weather, because content published the week of a hail event will rank comfortably in time for the next one.
Free, no obligation
See what a roofing-specific strategy looks like
The audit tells you where you stand and which tier fits, including when the answer is that you do not need us yet.
The honest part
When we are the wrong choice
Specialization cuts both ways, and there are roofers we should not take on. Knowing which ones saves everybody a wasted quarter.
Your competitor got here first. One roofer per market means exactly one. If your market is taken, we will tell you rather than quietly working around it, and you should go hire someone good.
You need leads this month. SEO does not do that. It takes 60 to 90 days for new content to gain traction and longer to compound. If the phone has to ring in three weeks, you need paid ads, and an agency that runs them well is a better use of your money than we are.
You want full-service marketing. We do search and the website. We do not run your paid media, your fleet wraps, your direct mail, or your radio spots. A roofer who wants one agency holding all of it should hire a generalist, and that is a legitimate preference rather than a mistake.
You are not in an exterior trade. We do not work outside exterior home services. The focus is the entire point, and it stops being worth anything the moment we start making exceptions.
The checklist
Five questions to ask any agency, us included
Our answers are in the last column so you can hold us to them. Ask the same five of anyone else you are considering and compare.
| Ask | What a good answer sounds like | Ours |
|---|---|---|
| Do you work with other roofers in my market? | A specific written exclusivity policy, not “we keep things separate” | No. One per market. |
| What does it cost? | A number, now, without a discovery call first | Published on the pricing page |
| Will you guarantee page one? | No. A yes here is disqualifying. | No, and nobody honest will |
| What am I locked into? | A clear term, or none. Watch for auto-renew clauses. | Nothing. No long-term contract. |
| How do you report? | Calls and booked jobs, not rankings and impressions | Leads and calls, never a report |
If you only ask one, ask the first. Whether an agency is already working with your direct competitor tells you more about how much real strategic attention you will get than any pricing page, case study, or proposal ever will. An agency serving three roofers in one city is not giving any of them its best thinking, because its best thinking would put two of them out of the map pack.
Common questions
Choosing an agency, answered
We work across exterior home service trades, roofing, siding, gutters, landscaping, pool builders and similar, but never more than one company per trade in the same market. The roofing work draws on the same trade-focused approach applied to every trade we serve.
One roofing client per defined market. Your direct local competitors do not get our strategy, our content, or our attention while you are a client, because we decline them. It costs us revenue, which is what makes it worth something to you.
We start with a one-time project rather than an open-ended monthly fee. Website builds run Starter, Growth, and Domination tiers, content overhauls run the same three, and the monthly retainer is optional afterward at either the Growth or Command level. Every number is on the pricing page.
Yes, particularly one with genuine local SEO depth. Specialization is an advantage, not a requirement, and a strong generalist will beat a weak specialist every time. It usually takes longer without the trade-specific angles and seasonal timing already built in, but “longer” is not “never.”
If your market is already taken, if you need leads within the month, if you want one agency running every marketing channel, or if you are not in an exterior trade. In the first case we will tell you. In the others, a paid ads specialist or a full-service generalist is a better use of your money.
Whether they work with your direct competitors, what it costs before a call, whether they will guarantee rankings, what you are locked into, and what they report on. Vague answers to any of those are the warning. A yes to the rankings guarantee is not a warning, it is an answer.
Keep exploring
Related
Free audit, no retainer required
Find out if your market is still open
One roofer per market. The audit tells you where you stand, which tier fits, and whether we can take you at all.