Damp Proofing & Timber Treatment
Marketing for damp proofing & timber treatment
Damp proofing has a trust problem it did not entirely earn and cannot entirely deny. Every enquiry arrives half expecting to be over-sold, which makes the survey, the qualifications and the willingness to say “this is only condensation” the whole of the marketing.
In short
Marketing for damp proofing & timber treatment in the UK turns on three things that are specific to the trade. Damp proofing has an unusual shape: the entry product is a survey, and how you price that survey decides what kind of business you are. A contractor survey is normally free and exists to produce a quote. Google search wins damp proofing outright, and organic content does more of the work here than in any other trade on this site. The biggest source of wasted spend is tenant and legal, searches such as landlord will not fix damp and housing disrepair claim, which has to be negatived out before the budget means anything.
The economics that should drive the budget
Damp proofing has an unusual shape: the entry product is a survey, and how you price that survey decides what kind of business you are. A contractor survey is normally free and exists to produce a quote. An independent survey, sold on the basis that you have nothing to sell afterwards, runs at £250 to £450 and is a product in its own right. Both models work. They need completely different advertising, because one is selling a free appointment and the other is selling impartiality.
The work behind it ranges widely. A chemical damp-proof course on a terraced wall with replastering is commonly £600 to £2,500. Woodworm treatment sits around £500 to £2,000. Dry rot, once floors are open and structural timber is involved, runs £1,500 to £8,000. Basement tanking with a pumped drainage system is the large job at £4,000 to £15,000. Condensation work — a ventilation unit and some mould treatment — is a £600 to £1,200 job most firms cannot be bothered to quote, which is exactly why quoting it earns trust and referrals. Survey-to-job conversion of one in two is normal, dropping to one in three where the customer is collecting second opinions after a mortgage valuation.
Seasonality
Damp has the sharpest seasonality of any trade on this site, and it has two separate peaks that want different advertising. The first is the heating season. From late October through February, houses are warm, sealed and full of drying washing, and black mould appears on bedroom walls and behind wardrobes. That is a condensation and ventilation peak, and enquiry volume can comfortably double. The second peak runs the other way round: spring and summer, when house transactions are heaviest and mortgage valuations start flagging damp. Those enquiries are deadline-driven, arrive through agents and solicitors, and convert quickly because somebody wants to exchange. A wet winter or a flood adds a third and unpredictable spike. The practical answer is to move budget between the condensation and survey campaigns twice a year rather than run one flat campaign that is wrong for half of it.
What we configure
- Separate condensation, structural damp, timber and basement campaigns
- Tenant-dispute and housing-disrepair negatives in place from day one
- Survey fee and exactly what it includes stated plainly on the page
- PCA membership, CSRT qualification and guarantee terms above the fold
- Diagnostic content hub built around symptoms rather than services
- A referral path and landing page aimed at agents and surveyors
- Budget moved between condensation and survey campaigns twice a year
What people actually search, and what it is worth
| Intent | Typical search | Value | How we handle it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mould and condensation | black mould on wall, condensation in bedroom, damp specialist near me | Low to medium, fast | Own campaign feeding diagnostic content. Cheap clicks, strong survey conversion, and it produces referrals. |
| Structural damp | rising damp treatment [town], damp proof course cost, cellar tanking | High, medium | Core search campaign with PCA membership and guarantee terms above the fold on the landing page. |
| Mortgage and survey-driven | damp report for mortgage, timber and damp report, independent damp survey | Medium, deadline-driven | Separate ad group stating same-week availability. These buyers are working to an exchange date. |
| Timber | woodworm treatment, dry rot specialist, wet rot floor joists | Medium to high | Dedicated pages per problem. Low competition and the enquiry is nearly always genuine. |
Where the budget leaks
Every sector attracts searches that can never become a customer. These are the ones specific to damp proofing & timber treatment, and they go into the negative keyword list before launch rather than after the first invoice.
| Category | Example searches | Why it costs you |
|---|---|---|
| Tenant and legal | landlord will not fix damp, housing disrepair claim, council mould complaint | High volume, emotionally charged and never a paying customer. Claims firms bid these terms up, so they are expensive too. |
| Myth and reassurance | is rising damp real, rising damp myth, do damp proof courses work | People arriving to have it confirmed that you are a fraud. That is content territory, not something to pay for by the click. |
| Retail and DIY | damp proof membrane roll, damp proofing cream, mould spray, dehumidifier | Product intent. They want a £20 tin from a shed, not a surveyor in the house. |
| Training and trade | PCA course, CSRT qualification, damp proofing jobs, surveyor training | People entering the trade, plus competitors researching accreditation. Steady, useless and easy to exclude. |
Want this checked against your own numbers?Two minutes on the phone is usually enough to say whether the arithmetic works for a damp proofing & timber treatment business your size.
Call 07443 392243WhatsAppWhat the buyer is actually checking
The damp customer arrives suspicious, and with some reason. The trade has a genuine reputation problem: decades of free surveys that always found rising damp, injection creams sold where the real fault was a bridged cavity or a blocked airbrick, and a steady supply of articles telling people that rising damp barely exists. A good share of your enquiries have read one of those articles before they ring you.
So they check things other trades are never asked about. Property Care Association membership. Whether the surveyor holds a CSRT or CSSW qualification. Whether the guarantee is insurance-backed, and what happens to it if the company stops trading. Whether the person doing the survey is paid commission on what they find. Reviews get read for the word honest rather than the word fast. What wins the job is diagnosis instead of a pitch: photographs of moisture readings, an explanation of why the damp is there, and a willingness to say that this one is condensation and does not need a damp-proof course at all. Firms that behave this way collect the estate agent and surveyor referrals, which over a few years are worth more than the advertising that started them.
Which channel wins here
Google search wins damp proofing outright, and organic content does more of the work here than in any other trade on this site. People search their symptom long before they search for a contractor — damp patch on the chimney breast, black mould behind the wardrobe, tide mark above the skirting — and a page that diagnoses each of those properly picks up cheap, high-intent traffic and turns it into surveys. Paid search then covers the terms where competition is real, and Google Business Profile handles the near-me searches.
Meta prospecting does not work here and it is worth being blunt about it. Nobody discovers they have damp because an advert appeared between two holiday photographs. Damp demand cannot be created, only captured, and the interest targeting available is far too broad to find a household with a wet wall this month. Cold calling and door-knocking are worse than useless, because they are precisely what gave the trade its reputation in the first place. The channel with the best return is not a paid channel at all: relationships with estate agents, letting agents, surveyors and solicitors who need a firm they can send a client to without embarrassment. The advertising should be built to make you look like that firm.
Questions from damp proofing & timber treatment
Should I offer free surveys or charge for them?
Both models work, but you have to pick one and advertise it properly. A free survey brings volume, and the customer discounts your diagnosis because you profit from it. A paid independent survey at £250 to £450 brings fewer enquiries, better ones, and lets you lead on impartiality. What fails is a free survey advertised as though it were independent advice, because buyers see through it.
Why do my damp ads attract tenants complaining about their landlord?
Because damp and mould are searched far more often by renters than by homeowners, and housing-disrepair claims firms have made those terms expensive. A tenant cannot commission the work, so every one of those clicks is wasted money. Add landlord, tenant, council, housing association, disrepair and compensation as negatives, and read the search terms report every week.
Does the ‘rising damp is a myth’ argument hurt my business?
It changes who you have to be. Arguing with it looks defensive. Addressing it directly works: publish a page explaining what causes damp, how often it turns out to be condensation, a bridged cavity or a failed gutter, and how you rule those out before recommending a course. Being the firm that says no to unnecessary work is a commercial position, not a sacrifice.
How do I get estate agent and surveyor referrals?
By being safe to recommend. Agents refer the firm that turns up when it said it would, writes a report a buyer can hand to a solicitor, and does not frighten a sale into collapsing with a five-figure quote. Give them a one-page referral route, fast survey availability during the moving season, and a copy of your guarantee terms. It builds slowly and it outlasts any campaign.
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