LOCAL BENCHMARK · SPARSE
Plumbing in Des Moines, IA.
Every business below was observed on Google Maps for "plumber" targeted at Des Moines. Review counts, ratings, and ranks are from the IMPIOUS benchmark snapshot (internal benchmark, Apr 2026).
MEDIAN REVIEWS — TOP 3
1915
P25 — MIN TO COMPETE
58
AVG RATING — TOP 3
4.62
DENSITY TIER
SPARSE
TOP-3 MEDIAN REFERRING DOMAINS
371
TOP-3 MEDIAN DFS RANK
173.5
AI MENTIONS — TOP 3 CITED
2 / 3
AI PLATFORMS
GPT
| # | BUSINESS | REVIEWS | RATING | REF. DOMAINS | AI CITED |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Holt Plumbing & Heating, Inc. | 3493 | 4.8★ | 502 | — |
| 1 | Clog Busters Drain Cleaning & Repair | 2812 | 4.9★ | 373 | cited |
| 2 | Bee Line Sewer Cleaning | 27 | 4.0★ | — | — |
| 2 | Plumbing Technologies | 5 | 3.4★ | — | — |
| 3 | Richardson Plumbing Company | 58 | 4.7★ | 369 | — |
| 3 | AM PM Plumbing | 196 | 4.8★ | 444 | — |
| 3 | Des Moines Drain & Sewer | 134 | 4.4★ | 45 | cited |
| 3 | True Comfort Heating, Cooling and Plumbing | 1017 | 5.0★ | 248 | — |
| 4 | Des Moines Plumbing | 4 | 4.3★ | — | — |
| 4 | Iowa Drain Cleaning | 27 | 4.7★ | — | — |
| 4 | Bell Brothers Heating, Cooling & Plumbing | 3865 | 4.9★ | — | — |
| 5 | Roto-Rooter Des Moines | 398 | 4.3★ | — | — |
| 5 | Bob's Septic & Portable Restroom Service | 76 | 4.3★ | — | — |
| 5 | Midwest Comfort Heating & Cooling | 836 | 4.9★ | — | — |
Market read
Des Moines plumbing ranks as SPARSE density, yet top-3 median reviews reach 1915 (internal benchmark, Apr 2026)—suggesting concentrated market power rather than fragmentation. The p25 entry floor sits at 58 reviews, a 33x gap to leadership. Top-3 average rating of 4.62 pairs with modest GBP completeness at 60/100, indicating profile optimization lags behind reputation strength. Review velocity averages 6/month (internal benchmark, Apr 2026), with a notable 25% spam rate flagging quality control issues. AI citation data shows ChatGPT names 2 of Google's top-3 for "best plumber in Des Moines"—meaningful for discoverability. Median referring domains for top-3 reach 373 with DFS rank 194. A p25 business requires sustained review accumulation and profile completion to close the gap, with AI mention potential tied to organic authority signals.
See "The Review Gap Is Smaller Than Everyone Thinks" for the cross-city pattern and "What the Top-3 Actually Have on Their Backlink Profile" for the backlink + AI-citation breakdown.