How Groundwater Strengthened Their Market Position with Strategic Marketing

In Sioux Falls, summer is short — and a great backyard makes every weekend of it count. Homeowners want a patio they're proud to host on, a fire pit that pulls everyone outside in October, irrigation that just works while they're at the lake, and a landscaper who will still pick up the phone three years after the install.

Groundwater Landscape & Irrigation has been that landscaper for half a century. A Sioux Falls landscaping contractor with deep roots in design, installation, hardscape, water features, and irrigation — the kind of company that builds backyards that age better, not worse. The craftsmanship was already there. The challenge was making sure the next homeowner searching "landscaping Sioux Falls" actually found them. That's where Complete Media came in.

About Groundwater

Groundwater Landscape & Irrigation is a Sioux Falls landscaping contractor offering a full menu of outdoor living services — landscape design, landscape installation, plants/trees/shrubs, paver patios and fire pits, water features and ponds, plus irrigation and sprinkler systems. Their philosophy is simple: we're committed to your plans, not ours. Every project is fully customizable, every install is built for the South Dakota seasons, and every customer gets a team that stays in constant communication until the job is right.

From a downtown lakeside patio to a backyard waterfall in McKennan Park, the Groundwater portfolio has shaped what a Sioux Falls outdoor living space actually looks like. Fifty-plus years in, they're still the team neighbors recommend by name.

The challenge

Groundwater had everything a Sioux Falls homeowner should want — local ownership, decades of craftsmanship, a deep service portfolio, and a portfolio of finished backyards to prove it. What they didn't have was a marketing presence loud enough to drown out the national directory sites and out-of-market lawn franchises competing for the same searches.

The challenges stacked up quickly:

• An older website that didn't reflect the quality of finished projects
• Google searches for 'Sioux Falls landscaping' dominated by national directory sites
• A wide service menu (design, install, hardscape, water features, irrigation) buried under generic copy
• No clear plan for the growing share of homeowners using ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity to vet contractors
• A team focused on jobsites, plants, and sprinkler heads — not on running marketing campaigns

The strategy

We started where every Complete Media engagement starts — by listening. Who is the Groundwater customer? A first-time homeowner who finally wants a patio? An empty-nester investing in a water feature they'll enjoy every morning? A property manager standardizing irrigation across a portfolio? What do each of them type into Google when the lawn finally gets the green light? What do they need to see to feel confident calling a local landscaper instead of a national app?

The answers shaped a marketing program built around local craftsmanship, transparent service, and one brand voice that scales from a sprinkler tune-up to a full backyard reimagine. Every channel, every touchpoint, every word would do the same job: prove Groundwater is the Sioux Falls landscaping contractor to call — big project or small.

The work completed

Branding & identity

We sharpened the visual and verbal identity around the idea of reimagining your landscape. Logo usage, color palette, photography style, and tone-of-voice guidelines made it possible for the Groundwater team to keep the brand consistent across yard signs, quote sheets, social posts, vehicle graphics, and every print piece — without having to be designers themselves.

Print marketing & on-site materials

Landscaping is a word-of-mouth business — but it's also a word-of-sign and word-of-flyer business. We helped produce the pieces a contractor like Groundwater actually uses every week:

• Service brochures for design, install, hardscape, water features, and irrigation
• Direct mail and door hangers for active neighborhoods
• Jobsite yard signs and "Landscaped by Groundwater" plaques
• Business cards for designers, installers, and irrigation techs
• Vehicle graphics and equipment branding
• Trade show and home show booth materials

Website & digital presence

We designed and built groundwaterinc.com — a clear, mobile-first website organized around the way homeowners actually shop for landscaping. A dedicated page for every service (design, install, plants/trees/shrubs, patios & fire pits, water features, irrigation), a real photo gallery of finished projects, an easy quote request form, and click-to-call from every page. Page speed, accessibility, and Core Web Vitals were tuned so the site performs as well on a phone in the backyard as it does on a desktop at the kitchen table.

SEO & local visibility

Service pages and on-page SEO were structured around the keywords that actually drive Groundwater's business — landscaping Sioux Falls, Sioux Falls landscape design, paver patio installer Sioux Falls, sprinkler system installation Sioux Falls, backyard water feature, and dozens of supporting variations across every Sioux Falls neighborhood and ZIP code. We optimized the Google Business Profile, layered in review generation, and made sure the company appears in the local map pack when high-intent searches happen anywhere in the Sioux Empire.

AI visibility optimization

More homeowners are skipping Google entirely and asking ChatGPT, Gemini, or Perplexity, "Who's the best landscaper in Sioux Falls?" We restructured Groundwater's on-site content, schema markup, and external citations to make sure the company is recognized — and cited — by AI assistants as a Sioux Falls landscaping authority. It's the same playbook we run for Sioux Falls businesses that want to show up where buyers are actually asking.

Ongoing marketing support

Groundwater doesn't have to be its own marketing department. Every month, our team handles the strategy, the creative, the digital advertising, the reporting, and the quarterly check-ins — so the crew can stay focused on patios, plants, and sprinkler heads.

The results

The growth has been steady — and, more importantly, the right kind of growth. Qualified Sioux Falls homeowners, the right project sizes, and a brand that finally matches the craftsmanship behind every backyard.

Why it matters

When a local contractor like Groundwater thrives, the whole community benefits. More homeowners get a backyard they're proud to host in. More neighborhoods get the kind of mature, well-irrigated landscapes that hold value year after year. The dollars stay local. The relationships stay local. And the next family designing their dream patio gets to call a company that will still be here a decade from now to maintain it.

That's why we do this work. Strong local marketing isn't about chasing trends — it's about making sure the businesses that actually take care of people are the ones that get found.

About Complete Media

Complete Media is a Sioux Falls marketing agency that's been helping local businesses grow since 2002. We're an outsourced marketing team for 250+ small and mid-sized companies across landscaping, construction, real estate, healthcare, retail, professional services, and more. Branding, web design, SEO, AI visibility, print, and digital advertising — under one all-inclusive engagement, with no long-term contract. Learn more about what we do or read more client success stories.

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