What customers expect
In Jobber’s 2026 survey of 1,050 US home service business owners, owners said more than half of their customers expect a reply within an hour, but only 20% of businesses reply that fast (Jobber Home Service Trends Report).
When a homeowner sends the same request to three companies, the first useful answer starts the first conversation. A better answer that arrives second may find the job already booked.
List every place leads come in
Most shops get leads from more places than the owner thinks. Write them down, with who sees each one today:
- Phone calls, including the ones nobody picked up.
- The contact or quote form on your website.
- Google Local Services Ads: calls and messages.
- Facebook and Instagram messages and lead forms.
- Email, including the address printed on old flyers.
- Lead services like Angi, Thumbtack or Yelp.
Any source where the answer is “whoever happens to look” is where leads go cold.
An instant reply, then a real one
Nobody can call back in five minutes from a crawl space. You can make sure every lead hears from you right away, and that a person follows up within the hour.
Set an instant reply on every source
It says who you are, that you got the request, and when a person will be in touch. Make it sound like you.
Send everything to one place
One shared inbox or one phone for all lead notifications, so nothing depends on which app someone opened.
Name an owner for each part of the day
The office mornings, a lead tech at lunch, you in the evening. A lead with no named owner waits.
Check the gaps every week
Look for leads that waited more than an hour and find out why. See how to count missed calls.
Website form
Hi Dave, it's [Business]. We got your request about the AC. Our office will call you before 3 pm today. Is this the best number?
Facebook lead
Thanks for reaching out to [Business]. What's the address and what's going on? A real person reads this and will reply within the hour.
Local Services Ads leads count twice
Since October 1, 2026, Google can charge Local Services Ads advertisers for business-hours calls that go unanswered for more than 20 seconds, and Google says missed calls can hurt your responsiveness, which feeds into your ad ranking (Google, Google). A slow answer there costs you the job, the lead fee and placement. See Missed calls on Google Local Services Ads.
How we handle it
Instant replies to website, Facebook and email leads are part of every plan, and the monthly report shows how fast each lead got an answer.