Open Facebook and search for a roofer in your area. Plenty of the pages you find will have a last post from a year or more ago. Customers see that too, and it changes how they read the firm: busy, or quietly gone. Social media for a trades business is mostly about not looking gone.
What each platform is for
- Facebook is where local groups, neighbours and the older homeowner live. A recommendation in a local community group can bring a week's work, and your page is what people click to check you out. Start with setting up a Facebook business page.
- Instagram suits visual trades: kitchens, landscaping, decorating, tiling. Reels do well when they show a transformation.
- TikTok and YouTube are optional. Skip them until the first two run on their own.
What to post
The job you have just finished is the content. Fifty ideas are in the post on social media post ideas for trades. Short list:
- A before and after from the same spot, see before and after photos
- The awkward bit of the job, like a boiler moved to a new wall
- Seasonal reminders: service your boiler before October, check the gutters after leaf fall
- A review the customer is happy for you to share
- The lad on the crew getting a qualification
Ask the customer first, and keep the house number and car registrations out of shot.
How often
Once or twice a week keeps a page looking alive. The guide to social media for tradesmen goes into it. Missing a week matters less than disappearing for a quarter.
Where the time goes
Most of the cost is not the posting. It is the evening afterwards, thinking of a caption. That is what automation helps with, and AI and automated social media for small businesses is an even-handed look at the options. Pay attention to whether the tool lets you approve before anything goes out, and whether it writes about your actual job or about "home improvement" in general.
Paying for it
If you outsource, ask what is included and who owns the page afterwards. What social media management costs gives the typical ranges. If you are VAT-registered, check the quote shows VAT separately.
Ads
Boosting a post or running Facebook ads is a separate budget and a separate skill. Mitch does not run ads. If you are thinking of it, read when Facebook ads make sense for a trades business first. Plenty of builders and roofers get further with ordinary posts and a good Google profile.
A weekly pattern for a firm of two or three
- Anyone on site takes a photo when the job is done. Same spot as the "before".
- One line in the notes: what, where, one detail.
- On Friday, someone looks at what is queued and approves it.
That is about ten minutes. If you have a lad, make taking the photo his job and stop being the bottleneck. Link the posts back to your reputation work: Google reviews and your Google profile.
For the bigger picture, read the pillar post social media for tradesmen.
Plan: On every Mitch plan
Each job you send in becomes Facebook and Instagram posts, stories and reels on a content calendar, with a crew app for photos on site. Posts are drafted about a minute after you submit, you can dictate the note, and nothing goes out until you approve it. Social is £79 a month with 3 seats, 14-day free trial, no card. See [social posting](/uk/platform/social-media).
Post the job, not the evening
Send in today's job and read the drafts. 14-day free trial, no card.