2026 Tri-Cities Home Services Digital Visibility Study
A systematic audit of 75 company-industry entries, representing 68 HVAC, plumbing, electrical, roofing and tree service businesses across Johnson City, Kingsport and Bristol, Tennessee, measuring website health, Google Business Profile quality and combined digital visibility.
Highlights
out of 100 possible points
GBP avg 82.8 – Website avg 65.8
robots blocks, noindex, or HTTPS not confirmed
None reached 90
Executive Summary
We audited 75 company-industry entries across HVAC, plumbing, electrical, roofing and tree service in Johnson City, Kingsport, Bristol and the surrounding Tri-Cities region, 15 per trade. Businesses that work in more than one trade appear once per trade, so the 75 entries represent 68 distinct businesses. Each entry received a Website Health Score and a Google Business Profile (GBP) Health Score, combined into a Combined Visibility Score (CVS) on a 0 to 100 scale.
The average CVS was 72.0. No entry scored 90 or above; 11 entries (14.7%) scored 80 or above, and 25 (33.3%) scored below 70. Scores ranged from 41.6 to 89.8.
GBP scores ran well ahead of website scores. The average GBP Health Score was 82.8, compared with 65.8 for the Website Health Score, a difference of 17.0 points that appeared in every trade (14.0 to 19.4 points). Both are our own audit scales, so the difference shows how these businesses scored on them, not how much they invested in either.
Tree service and roofing had the lowest averages: tree service at 67.7, with no entry reaching 80, and roofing at 70.8. Plumbing had the highest average at 74.2.
15 entries, representing 14 businesses, carried a critical risk flag: 10 robots.txt files that disallowed all crawlers, 2 homepage noindex directives, and 3 sites where HTTPS could not be confirmed at the time of the audit. These issues limit search visibility in different ways, and each should be confirmed manually before acting on it.
Key Findings
📊 GBP Scores Ran Ahead of Website Scores in Every Trade
Average GBP Health Score: 82.8. Average Website Health Score: 65.8. The 17-point gap appeared in all five trades, from 14.0 points in electrical to 19.4 in roofing. A customer who taps through from a strong listing lands on the website next.
⚠️ 15 Risk Flags Across 14 Businesses
10 sites had robots.txt files disallowing all crawlers, 2 had noindex on the homepage, and 3 could not be confirmed on HTTPS (two connection failures and one certificate that did not match its domain). One business was flagged in two trades. Each flag should be checked manually before acting on it.
⭐ Review Volume, Not Ratings, Is the Real Differentiator
Mean star rating across 70 entries with review data: 4.81, too tight to separate competitors. Review counts ranged from 1 to 3,690, with a median of 68.5. Plumbing averaged 602 reviews per entry; roofing averaged 77.
🏷️ Schema Adoption Is Wide but Shallow
59 of 75 entries (78.7%) had some structured data. Only 39 (52.0%) had LocalBusiness schema, and 5 (6.7%) had FAQ schema. FAQ schema is optional, and Google stopped showing FAQ rich results in May 2026. Average schema score: 9.1 out of 15.
Average Scores by Trade Category (out of 100)
Average Review Count by Trade
Industry Score Summary
| TRADE | AVG CVS | WEBSITE | GBP | AVG REVIEWS |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plumbing | 74.2 | 67.9 | 85.6 | 602 |
| HVAC | 73.7 | 67.2 | 83.5 | 479 |
| Electrical | 73.6 | 68.0 | 82.0 | 390 |
| Roofing | 70.8 | 63.0 | 82.4 | 77 |
| Tree Service | 67.7 | 62.8 | 80.3 | 82 |
CVS = Combined Visibility Score. 15 entries per trade category. Website averages exclude two entries without full measurement. n=75 entries.
Schema Markup Adoption (n=75)
Methodology
The 2026 Tri-Cities Home Services Digital Visibility Study was conducted by 1-FIND SERVICES between January and May 2026. The study evaluated 75 company-industry entries representing five trade categories — HVAC, plumbing, electrical, roofing, and tree service — drawn from businesses identified through structured Google Maps searches across Johnson City, Kingsport, and Bristol. Each trade category contained 15 entries. Companies operating across multiple trades were evaluated independently per category.
The Website Health Score is a composite of five components: schema markup (up to 15 points), technical SEO signals including sitemap, canonical, robots.txt, and meta configuration (up to 25 points), HTTPS security (up to 10 points), Lighthouse lab score aggregate (up to 30 points), and Core Web Vitals field performance (up to 20 points). Data was gathered via the Google PageSpeed Insights API and direct HTTP/HTML parsing of each company's homepage.
The GBP Health Score covers profile completeness (up to 35 points), category selection quality (up to 20 points), review volume and rating (up to 25 points), and NAP consistency between the GBP listing and the website (up to 20 points). The Combined Visibility Score (CVS) weights the Website Health Score at 60% and the GBP Health Score at 40%. This formula reproduces every combined score in the dataset.
PageSpeed data could not be collected for two entries; their website scores were calculated from the components that could be measured and excluded from website averages. Category selection and NAP consistency were each rated 0 to 5 and multiplied by 4.
| COMPONENT | MAX PTS | WHAT IT MEASURES |
|---|---|---|
| Schema Markup | 15 | Type presence, LocalBusiness, FAQ |
| Technical SEO | 25 | Sitemap, canonical, robots.txt, meta |
| HTTPS Security | 10 | TLS on primary domain |
| Lighthouse Score | 30 | Performance, accessibility, best practices, SEO |
| Core Web Vitals | 20 | LCP, CLS, INP field data |
| Website Health Score | 100 | Combined website component |
| Combined Visibility Score | 100 | 60% Website + 40% GBP Health |
Corrections in this edition
- Technical SEO is scored out of 25 points, not 20, so the website components total 100.
- The Combined Visibility Score weights website 60% and GBP 40%, not 50/50.
- The 15 critical risk flags represent 14 businesses.
- HVAC, not electrical, ranks second on average CVS. Plumbing, not HVAC, leads in average reviews.
- The top score of 89.8 belongs to one business that appears in two trades, not two tied companies.
- 27 of 70 entries with review data had fewer than 50 reviews.
- Entries without retrievable PageSpeed data were scored on the components available, not given zero website points.
Limitations
Sample size and selection: The 75-entry sample identifies market-level patterns but is not large enough for granular statistical inferences. Businesses with low existing visibility may be underrepresented.
Point-in-time data: All measurements reflect conditions at the time of collection. Configurations, GBP listings, and review counts change continuously.
Homepage-level scope: The Website Health Score reflects homepage technical signals only. It does not assess internal page quality, content depth, backlink profiles, or keyword targeting.
Core Web Vitals field data: Real-user CWV data was available for only 6 of 75 audited sites. Most CWV component scores reflect lab-based estimates, not measured field performance.
GBP data access: GBP data was collected via the Places API and may not capture all profile attributes visible to consumers, including photo count, Q&A completeness, or service item detail.
Category double-counting: Companies operating across multiple trades appear as separate entries per category. Readers comparing company-level results should account for this structure.
No organic ranking data: The CVS is not a ranking predictor. This study collected no keyword ranking data and makes no causal claims about the relationship between CVS and search performance.
Automated detection: Automated checks can miss structured data or sitemaps, misread crawler rules, or fail on a temporary connection problem. Validate any flag manually before drawing conclusions about a specific business.
Casey Carmical
Owner, 1-FIND SERVICES – Johnson City, Tennessee
1-FIND SERVICES is a digital marketing agency based in Johnson City, Tennessee, serving the Tri-Cities region. This study was produced independently; no audited company paid to be included or excluded.