2 metrics that make or break a home service Business
When I evaluate a home service company, I look at two simple metrics: 1 - Response Time 2 - Customer Retention That's it. Get these two right, and you'll dominate your market. Get them wrong, and you're just a commodity fighting for scraps. Why response time? The first company to respond wins. It is that simple. - Contacting a lead within 5 minutes makes you 100x more likely to get a response - Up to 78% of customers buy from the company that answers first - A missed call is a lost customer. A slow form response is a lost customer. Ask your team: - Do we offer 24/7 communication? If not, why? - What is our actual average response time for a missed call or web form? - Who handles that first response? An instant reply is the only thing that matters. Next up, retention. Acquiring a new customer is 5 to 25 times more expensive than keeping an existing one. If you lack a retention strategy, you are burning your marketing budget. Ask your team: - What is our "win-back" strategy for churned customers? Is it a call? An email with a compelling offer? - What is the follow-up cadence for a lead who did not buy? - Why did they leave? Are we systematically asking lost customers for feedback to fix our problems? I've solved these exact problems for service companies. Sometimes the fix is an AI workflow for instant responses. Other times, it is a dedicated overseas hire to manage follow-up. Which of these two metrics is your biggest bottleneck right now: response time or retention?