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For town planning consultants

Win the DA-preparation search. Open the council-specialist pipeline.

In-House is your AI marketing team. It actually wins the homeowner '[suburb] DA consultant' search against the bigger firms on the long tail, opens the $50K+ major-project pipeline with a per-DA case study library, and gets your PIA Certified Planner accreditation loud where the architect-referrer can see it without scrolling.

No charge for 7 days Cancel in two taps Live in 9 minutes

Three options. Only one actually works for your business.

Agency
$2,500 to $4,000 / mo
Slow. Expensive. Removed from your business.
You get a stock website with a generic council-chambers stock photo, a quarterly Google Ads PDF, and an account manager who has never sat through a pre-DA meeting or read an LEP from cover to cover. Meanwhile Urbis and Ethos Urban win the major-project work and the homeowner DA enquiries route to whoever wrote a Section 4.55 modification page first.
DIY tools
$120 to $250 / mo + your weekends
Cheap, but it just hands you a dashboard.
Squarespace, Google Ads, a LinkedIn page, ePlanning subscriptions for the actual work. Cheap, but you write the DA case studies on Sundays and they never finish, the PIA accreditation never gets above the fold, and the council-specialist pages (one per LEP and DCP you read every day) stay unwritten.
ACTUALLY DOES IT
In-House
$299 / mo flat
Cheap, and it actually does the work.
The AI marketing team writes the captions, ships a council-specialist page for every LEP and DCP you actually work under, drafts case studies for every approved DA, runs the homeowner DA-preparation ads and posts the pre-lodgement and approval-letter wins from the inbox. You upload one photo, approve the week, get back to writing the next Statement of Environmental Effects.

The DA pipeline is a council-specialist business and most planners market it like a general practice.

The reality

Town planning is a council-specialist business with a generalist marketing problem. The work doesn't follow suburbs the way trades do; it follows councils, LEPs, DCPs and the SEPPs that overlay them. A planner who knows Inner West Council DCP cover to cover, who's had ten DAs approved under the Marrickville LEP, who knows the Section 4.55 modification thresholds and the heritage-conservation areas by street name, is worth twice the generalist on every DA they prepare for that council. But the website almost never reflects this. Most independent planners have one 'services' page covering DA, CDC, Section 4.55, appeals and pre-DA meetings, with no council-specialist pages, no per-DA case study library, and no PIA Certified Planner accreditation above the fold. So the homeowner Googling 'inner west council DA consultant' lands on a generic page, the major-project developer routes to Urbis or Ethos Urban, and the appeal-and-modification work goes to whoever the architect already had on speed dial.

What good looks like

Good town-planning marketing is three things, in this order: a council-specialist page library (one per LEP and DCP you actually work under), so when a homeowner Googles 'inner west council DA consultant' they land on a page that names the LEP, the DCP, the relevant SEPPs, and a sample DA-approval letter from that council; a per-DA case study library that compounds (each approved DA gets a write-up: brief, council, LEP and DCP clauses, pre-DA pathway, conditions of consent, timeline), and a tiered service split between $5K-$20K residential DAs (search-led, homeowner-facing) and $50K+ major-project work (referral and tender, developer-facing). PIA Certified Planner accreditation, your Bachelor or Master of Town Planning, your years in council or consultancy, and your sector specialisations (heritage, industrial, mixed-use, child care, seniors housing) live above the fold on every page.

Council expertise is invisible
A planner who reads the Marrickville LEP every week is worth twice the generalist on Inner West DAs. Most planning sites have one generic services page with no council-specialist content, so the homeowner searching 'inner west DA consultant' lands on the same page as everyone else.
Major projects vs DA volume vs appeals
Three economies in one practice: $50K+ major mixed-use and industrial DAs (referral and tender), $5K-$20K residential DAs (search-led homeowner), and Class 1 Land and Environment Court appeal preparation (architect and lawyer-referred). Each needs different pages, different ads and different proof. Most planners write one page for all three.
PIA Certified Planner badge is below 'about us'
The PIA Certified Planner accreditation is the credential that separates a planner from a draftsperson submitting a DA. Most sites bury it in the bio. Homeowners and developers can't tell who they're hiring without it on every council-specialist page above the fold.

Real work. Not a slide deck.

In-House publishes to your real accounts and your live site. Here is what a town planning practice sees in the first weeks, in the actual format it lands in.

Web Agent
Live · yourpractice.com.au/da-consultant/inner-west-council
yourpractice.com.au/da-consultant/inner-west-council

New council-specialist page: 'Inner West Council DA consultant' H1, PIA Certified Planner credential above the fold, Marrickville LEP and Inner West DCP clauses referenced by section number, heritage-conservation areas listed by name (Newtown, Stanmore, Annandale, Lewisham), sample approval letter from a recent Inner West heritage DA as a downloadable PDF, a 280-word write-up of the council's typical DA timelines, the most common reasons for refusal, the pre-DA process and the Section 4.55 modification thresholds, six anonymised diagrams from recent Inner West DAs (a heritage rear extension, a child-care SEPP application, a granny-flat CDC), price band ($8,500 for a standard residential DA, $25K+ for major-project work), and ProfessionalService schema. Indexed in 48 hours, ranking page 1 for 'inner west council DA consultant' inside three weeks.

One per LEP and DCP you actually work under
Advertising Agent
Live · Google Ads · council-specialist DA campaign
Ad · yourbusiness.com.au
Inner West Council DA Consultant · PIA Certified

Marrickville LEP and Inner West DCP specialist. Heritage, CDC, Section 4.55 modifications, residential and mixed-use DAs. 10+ Inner West approvals, pre-DA strategy included, sample consent letter on request. From $8,500.

Separate ad set for major-project developer queries with higher CPC
Social Media Agent
Scheduled · Wed 9:00am · LinkedIn + Instagram
Your photo
Caption written from the approval letter you uploaded

"DA approved at Inner West Council yesterday for a Federation rear extension in Annandale, 14 weeks from lodgement, no objections at the heritage referral stage. The trick was front-loading the heritage SoEE with the original detailing intent and the proposed reversibility logic; the heritage advisor flagged it as the cleanest heritage DA they'd seen this quarter. This is what reading the Inner West DCP cover to cover looks like in practice." Drafted from the approval letter you uploaded. You approve, it posts.

Real DA approvals, anonymised addresses
SEO Agent
Auto-applied · approval rules
Google Business Profile reconfigured for council-specialist depth
Primary category corrected to 'City Planning Department' (the closest Google Maps category for an independent town planning consultancy, validated against PIA-member competitors). Secondary categories added (Legal Services for the Land and Environment Court appeals tier, Architect for the architect-referral pipeline angle). Services list expanded from 5 to 20 (DA preparation, CDC Code Assessment, Section 4.55 modification, Section 4.16 designated land, pre-DA meeting facilitation, Statement of Environmental Effects, heritage approval, SEPP 65 mixed-use, Class 1 appeal, community consultation, +10 more). PIA Certified Planner accreditation attribute added, sectors-of-practice attribute added, eight council areas of practice listed.
Live in your profile within the hour
$299 / mo
Flat. No tiers, no markup.
9 min
From sign-up to live marketing.
60+
Pieces of content a month.
0
Contracts. Cancel any time.

Six agents, working in your accounts.

Account Lead, Web, SEO, Advertising, Social Media, and Content. One platform, one bill, you approve the work.

Account Lead

Builds your annual plan around the three economies (residential DA volume, major-project referral, appeals work) and weights the agent work to the council areas and sectors that actually pay best for your practice. Briefs the others so the council-specialist pages, the per-tier ads, the per-DA case studies and the architect-referrer LinkedIn posts all push toward the right mix, not a generic 'town planner' position.

Answers: major projects vs da volume vs appeals
Web Agent

Imports your existing site so you stop paying Squarespace plus hosting plus a Houzz Pro subscription, and makes spinning up a new council-specialist or per-DA case study page a five-minute job. Ships a clean page for every council you actually work under (with the LEP, DCP and SEPP references), every service line (DA, CDC, Section 4.55, appeals, pre-DA), and every approved DA as a case study, with PIA Certified Planner accreditation above the fold and the right schema, to your live site in two taps.

Answers: council expertise is invisible
SEO Agent

Goes through your live site for the things that actually move rankings in a planning-consultant search: council-keyword optimisation on every page, ProfessionalService and Architect schema, PIA Certified Planner accreditation in markup, council-name internal linking (Inner West linking to heritage approvals linking to Section 4.55 modifications), and a Google Business Profile that beats the bigger firms on completeness, sector depth and council-area coverage. Auto-applies the low-risk fixes.

Answers: pia certified planner badge is below 'about us'
Advertising Agent

Launches tight Google Ads campaigns on the queries that actually convert ('[council] DA consultant', '[council] town planner', '[council] heritage DA', '[council] Section 4.55 modification', '[city] mixed use DA consultant'). Separate ad set for major-project developer queries at a higher CPC. Filters out homeowner queries if you're a major-project practice, or vice versa. Drops Meta unless you specifically want community-consultation work where founder visibility matters.

Answers: council expertise is invisible
Social Media Agent

Turns every DA approval, pre-DA win and appeal outcome into a post in your real accounts: a LinkedIn post on the latest Inner West heritage DA approval, an Instagram carousel of the schematic-to-approved-DA story, a story on the Section 4.55 modification approved in four weeks. Builds the trust signal that keeps architect referrers warm and pulls developers into the LinkedIn DM about an upcoming mixed-use project. You upload one approval letter or pre-DA outcome, the agent drafts the post in your voice, you approve.

Answers: pia certified planner badge is below 'about us'
Content Agent

Drafts the long-form pieces customers and referrers Google before they brief a planner: 'how much does a DA consultant cost in Sydney', 'CDC vs DA: which approval path is right for your project', 'what is a Section 4.55 modification and when do you need one', 'how to prepare for a pre-DA meeting at [council]'. Two drafts a month, in your voice, that pull in the careful customer (homeowner, developer or architect-referrer) months before they're ready to engage.

Live in your accounts, fast.

The heavy lifting comes off your plate the day you sign up. Here is what you see by the end of week one.

  • PIA Certified Planner accreditation and your years in council or consultancy hoisted above the fold on every page.
  • Council-specialist pages indexed for the three councils you do the most work under, with LEP and DCP clauses referenced.
  • Per-DA case study library kicked off with your three most-recent approvals (one heritage, one mixed-use or major-project, one CDC or modification).
  • Section 4.55 modification page built with the threshold table and Local Court appeal process explainer.
  • Heritage-DA specialist page surfaced if you do conservation-area work, with sample approval letters from local councils.
  • Major-project ad set live with the higher CPC the developer enquiry value justifies, separated from the homeowner DA campaign.
See pricing No charge for 7 days Cancel in two taps Live in 9 minutes

Your first 30 days.

  • Annual plan split across residential DA, major-project referral and appeals work, with the council areas and sectors weighted to your practice's revenue mix
  • Three council-specialist pages indexed for the councils you do the most work under, each citing the LEP and DCP by section
  • Per-DA case study library live with three approved DAs (heritage, mixed-use, CDC or modification)
  • Section 4.55 modification page live with threshold table and appeal-process explainer
  • Homeowner DA-preparation Google Ads live on council-specialist queries, with major-project ad set running at a higher CPC
  • Google Business Profile rebuilt with council-areas-of-practice attribute, PIA Certified Planner accreditation and 20 service items
  • Architect-referrer LinkedIn cadence running with every DA approval, pre-DA win and Land and Environment Court appeal posted in your voice
  • First fortnight of approval-letter and pre-DA-outcome captions queued from outcomes you uploaded
The bottom line

Town planning is a council-specialist business and most independent planners market it like a generalist consultancy. Urbis and Ethos Urban win the major-project work because they have the resources to tender; the homeowner DA enquiries route to whoever wrote a council-specialist page first; the architect-referral pipeline goes to whoever stayed visible on LinkedIn between approvals. The fix is splitting the pages by council, building a per-DA case study library that compounds, and getting the PIA Certified Planner accreditation loud enough that no one mistakes you for a draftsperson submitting a DA.

Agencies are too dear to actually run the per-council page set, the per-DA case study library and the residential-vs-major-project ad split for $3.5k a month. Tools are cheap but the case studies stay in Dropbox and the PIA accreditation stays in the footer. In-House is the third option: for $299 a month the agents ship the council-specialist pages, draft the case studies, run the per-tier ads, post the approval-letter wins and draft the cost guides. You stay in the driver's seat, two taps to approve, minutes a day. Stop losing major-project tenders to bigger firms with better websites and homeowner DAs to whoever wrote a Section 4.55 page first.

See everything In-House does
No charge for 7 days Cancel in two taps Live in 9 minutes

Frequently asked.

Will it actually outrank Urbis and Ethos Urban?
On the council-specialist long tail and the homeowner DA work, yes, within a few months. The bigger firms win the broad '[city] town planners' query because of brand recall and major-project portfolio. They lose the long tail ('[council] DA consultant', '[council] heritage DA', '[council] Section 4.55 modification') because their pages are written at a corporate level, not the council-by-council depth a specialist independent can provide. A PIA Certified Planner with eight council-specialist pages and a real case study library outranks them on the searches that book residential DA and modification work.
I do almost entirely major-project mixed-use and industrial DAs, no residential. Is this still right for me?
Yes, and Account Lead will weight the plan that way. Onboarding asks for your revenue split and your sector specialisations; if 80% is major-project mixed-use and industrial, the page set leads with sector specialist pages (mixed-use, industrial, child care, seniors housing, retirement village), the ads target developer-language queries ('mixed use DA consultant [city]', 'industrial DA consultant [city]', 'SEPP 65 mixed use specialist'), and the LinkedIn cadence focuses on major-project approvals and pre-DA wins. Residential DA pages get built (they help with council relevance signals) but they don't dominate.
I'm a sole-practitioner PIA Certified Planner and only have four DAs a year. How do I generate enough case studies?
Four DAs a year is enough. The library doesn't need to be huge; it needs to be deep. One case study per approved DA, written in detail (brief, council, LEP and DCP clauses, pre-DA pathway, conditions of consent, timeline, the heritage or sector angle), outperforms a generic portfolio of thumbnails. Web Agent also drafts case studies for older approved DAs you've never written up, so the back catalogue contributes. Pre-DA wins and Section 4.55 modifications get their own case studies too, so the library compounds faster than the DA count would suggest.
I'm PIA Certified and I specialise in heritage DAs. Will the marketing actually mention that, or is it generic?
It's the opposite of generic; that specialisation is the differentiator. Onboarding captures your PIA Certified Planner accreditation, your Master of Town Planning or Bachelor of Urban and Regional Planning, your sector specialisations (heritage, child care, mixed use), your council experience by name, and the LEPs and DCPs you read week to week. Every council-specialist page hoists the relevant specialisation above the fold, every case study leads with the sector angle, the Google Business Profile gets the sector and council attributes. That's what wins against a generic 'town planner' listing.
Will the social captions sound like AI?
They will sound like you, because the Social Media Agent learns from your existing posts during onboarding and you approve every draft before it ships. You upload one outcome per week (an approval letter, a pre-DA outcome, a Section 4.55 modification approved, a Land and Environment Court appeal won), the agent drafts the post from what's in the document (the council, the LEP and DCP clauses cited, the timeline, the heritage or sector angle), you approve in two taps. Voice updates with every correction you make.
Can I cancel if it isn't working?
Two taps, any time, no exit fees and no notice period. You keep your imported site, your council-specialist pages, the per-DA case study library, the Google Business Profile work, and the LinkedIn cadence. There is no $3.5k-a-month agency lock-in and there is no six-month minimum.

Bring your marketing in-house this week.

Six agents planning, publishing and optimising your social, SEO, ads and web, full-time on your business. $299/month. No contract.

Contact us
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