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Case study

Organic Search, Rebuilt Around the Questions Buyers Actually Ask.

Arrow had a blog. What it did not have was a reason for anyone outside the company to read it.

An Arrow Exterminating technician inspecting the foundation of a home

The Problem

Pest control is one of the most competitive local categories there is, and a handful of national brands make it harder still for an independent operator to hold the first page, even one with a long history and a good name.

Arrow already had a blog when it became a client. Because the site also carried a Pest Library, that blog skewed promotional. It was selling against a resource that was already doing the informing.

The trend was going the wrong way. Organic finished the year at 10,616 total site users against 11,461 the year before. Not a plateau. A decline.

The growth was not incremental. The year before we started was lower than the year before that.

What We Changed

  1. Changed what the blog was for

    We moved the tone from promotional to informational and rebuilt the topic list off search data rather than off the sales calendar. Our writers come out of newspapers and magazines, so the standard was clear, concise and worth finishing, not keyword-shaped filler.

  2. Rebuilt the strategy around natural language

    When Google shipped the BERT update, our SEO team read the change rather than waiting to see what happened. BERT improved how a query is understood in context, which rewards content written the way people actually ask questions, including out loud.

  3. Wrote to the questions, not the keywords

    We targeted what buyers ask in search and in voice, timed against Arrow's own pest calendar, and added logical internal links so a reader who arrived on one pest could find the related one.

  4. Built series, not one-offs

    The Handy Guide format made it easy to identify anything in a category at a glance: rodents, ants, stinging insects. Series work compounds, and it reinforces the experience, expertise, authority and trust that quality raters are told to look for.

More work

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FAQ

Questions We Hear Every Week

Straight answers. If something is not here, ask us on the audit call.

How do pest control companies get more calls?

Top-of-page position for urgent searches, map pack coverage in every town, and a phone that is answered inside a minute. In that order.

Are Local Service Ads worth it for pest control?

Usually yes. It is a category where the Google Guaranteed badge and top placement do real work, and position is decided by reviews and response time rather than by bid.

How seasonal is pest control marketing?

Very, and species by species. Budget and campaign structure should follow the season rather than sit flat across the year.

How do you increase recurring plan signups?

Automated follow-up on every completed one-off job, timed to the moment the customer is most satisfied. It is the highest-return automation in the category.

Do reviews matter in pest control?

Enormously. It is a service performed inside somebody's home, which makes trust signals decisive.

Two people reviewing work together at a desk

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