Let's TalkLet's TalkThe estimate is the expensive part. Filling the diary with inspections that nobody attends is not lead generation, it is a cost.
Send us the last hundred leads with what happened to each. We come back with how many could never have bought a roof, your estimate no-show rate, how claim-stage leads were followed up, and the three changes worth making first. Recorded walkthrough, no call required.
Four failures we see repeatedly in this vertical, and what each one actually costs.
Free inspection is the default roofing offer, and it converts a form fill into a drive, a ladder and an hour of someone's day. When a meaningful share of those enquiries are renters, repair-only or outside the area, the estimate becomes the most expensive qualification step available - and it is being used as the first one.
Booked estimates where nobody is home come straight off the margin, and the cause is almost always upstream: a lead captured with no commitment, no confirmation, and days between the enquiry and the visit. Reporting counts that as a converted lead. The business counts it as a wasted morning, and nobody reconciles the two.
A homeowner waiting on an adjuster is weeks from a decision and entirely winnable in that window - it is when they are most confused and most receptive to whoever explains the process. Most contractors either chase them like a cash buyer or forget them entirely, and the one who stayed useful through the wait signs the job.
Event demand arrives in days, and the constraint is not leads but crews, ladders and estimators. Volume beyond that capacity does not wait - it goes to whoever calls back first. Buying more of it without a plan for absorbing it converts marketing spend directly into unreturned voicemails and public complaints.
Business outcomes rather than dashboard metrics. None of these is a guaranteed number - where we do guarantee something, it is written into the offer above.
The real deliverables, not a list written to make a proposal look thicker.
Not the general agency pitch. The reasons that only apply to this kind of business.
An estimate is a conversion to most reporting tools and a cost to you, which puts the agency's headline number and your margin in direct opposition. We reconcile to signed work and average job value so the campaigns producing cheap inspections nobody signs get defunded instead of celebrated.
Qualification cuts enquiry volume immediately and visibly, and in a trade where an unqualified lead costs a drive and a ladder rather than an email, that is plainly the right trade. We show cost per signed contract next to the drop so it reads as the improvement it is.
Event demand is limited by estimator capacity, not by leads. Deciding in advance how many can be absorbed, what the callback commitment is and what happens to the overflow turns a surge into contracts rather than into unreturned voicemails and a bad review cycle.
Last hundred leads, outcomes, and how many estimate slots went to enquiries that could never proceed.
Ownership, roof age, repair versus replacement and location, asked in the funnel rather than discovered on site.
Immediate confirmation, a day-before reminder and easy rescheduling. Unglamorous and frequently worth more than any campaign change.
Useful contact through the adjuster wait - what to expect, what not to sign, what a short scope looks like.
Intake capacity, callback commitment and overflow handling agreed before an event rather than improvised during one.
Spend and effort follow signed work at the value you want rather than the diary looking busy.
The parts of this that come from having run it in this industry before rather than from running it well in general.
A roofing estimate booked and unattended costs a drive, a ladder and an hour. Immediate confirmation, a reminder the day before and a one-tap reschedule recover a large share of those, cost almost nothing to configure, and improve margin without touching the advertising budget at all.
The homeowner waiting on an adjuster wants to know what happens next, what a supplement is and what they should not sign. Sending that is useful rather than pushy, it arrives during the exact window competitors go quiet, and it positions you as the contractor who understands the process they are stuck in.
Storm-chasing operators have made homeowners wary, and recent local reviews describing a company that turned up and finished do more work here than in most trades. Timing the request to completion, while the relief is fresh, is the difference between asking and receiving.
Many roofers run door-knocking alongside advertising and track them separately or not at all, which produces double-contacted homeowners and arguments about credit. One pipeline with a source field ends both problems and shows honestly which channel produces signed work.
The closest engagement we can show is a multi-location service network rather than a roofing contractor, and we will not dress it up. It is the right comparison for a specific reason: its 44% show-rate improvement came from the gap between a booked appointment and an attended one. A roofing estimate falls into exactly that gap, except that here the cost of the no-show is a crew slot rather than a chair.
Read the full case studyShorten the gap between booking and visit, confirm immediately, remind the day before, and make rescheduling easy rather than embarrassing. Most no-shows are not people changing their minds - they are people who booked casually and forgot. In a trade where the visit costs a drive and a ladder, this is frequently worth more than any change to the ad account.
Yes, but not to everyone who asks. Attach ownership and scope qualification to it so the free inspection goes to homeowners who could actually proceed. Offered as an open invitation it fills the diary with visits that were never going to convert, and the cost lands on crew time rather than on the marketing budget where it would be noticed.
Stay useful through the wait. Explain what the adjuster visit involves, what a supplement is, what a short scope looks like and what they should not sign. That window is weeks long, competitors mostly go quiet during it, and the contractor who was helpful when the homeowner was confused is usually the one who signs the job.
Decide the intake capacity before the event. Work out how many estimates you can genuinely run in a week, what your callback commitment is, and what happens to overflow - a waitlist with an honest timeframe beats silence. Buying more leads than you can process converts marketing spend into unreturned calls and public complaints.
Cautiously. Shared leads are sold to several contractors and reward whoever calls first, which only works if your intake is genuinely fast. They are also disproportionately unqualified, so buying them without ownership screening imports the exact problem you are trying to remove. Fix qualification and speed first, then test them as their own measured line.
Leads, qualified, estimates booked, estimates attended, contracts signed and average job value. The two gaps that matter most are qualified-to-attended and attended-to-signed, and neither is visible in a cost-per-lead report. Most roofing businesses find their largest loss is the first of those.
This is one part of a bigger service. Here is the whole of it, and the closest neighbours.
No pitch deck, no discovery call you have to sit through. Tell us the situation and we will tell you whether we can help.