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Stan Consulting · Problem · Construction Marketing

Every lead asks the price before they tell me the job.

Every lead asks the price before they tell you the job. Here is what the score actually looks like and where the buyers got filtered out before they ever reached your phone.

Get the Diagnostic · $999

The complaint

The version of this you would write to your buddy on a job site.

You answer the phone. Before the guy says hi, before he says his name, before he says what kind of job he has, he asks "how much does a roof cost." You bite your tongue. You say it depends. You ask what type of roof. He says he is just shopping around. You ask his zip. He says he is two hours out. You hang up. The next call is the same.

You ran the numbers. Out of every ten calls, six are price-only. Two are "how much for a quote, also can you do gutters and a fence and a deck." One never picks back up. The one job you actually want is buried under nine that are not worth the truck roll.

You watched a video that said "every lead is an opportunity." The guy in the video had a different problem. You hung up on a lead this morning who asked if he could just buy the materials from you and install them himself.

Your wife asked how the day was. You said "good." You meant "I answered the phone ten times and one call was a real job and the rest were people trying to figure out how much a roof costs because Google said you would tell them for free."

The agency says the lead volume is up. The phone records say so too. The bank account says the same number as last quarter. Something is filtering buyers out before they get to you and you are paying for the leftovers.

What you already tried

Things you already did. None of them filtered the calls.

  1. Posted prices on the website so the price-shoppers stop calling. The price-shoppers still called. The buyers were the ones who hesitated because the website made it look like a commodity.
  2. Removed "free quote" from the ad copy. Lead volume dropped. The price-shoppers found a different ad. The buyers were not the ones who self-selected out.
  3. Started saying "this job is probably outside our pricing" on the call. Saved some hours. The honest disqualify was good. The structural fix was somewhere else.
  4. Asked the agency to target "high-intent" keywords. They changed the keyword set. The audience changed slightly. The intake script did not. Same mix arrived on the phone in a different costume.
  5. Tried lead-form questions before the call goes through. Some platforms support this. Most do not. The form questions either get ignored or filter out the real buyers along with the tire kickers.

The diagnostic questions

Six questions to answer alone. The answers tell you where the mix actually breaks.

This is where the page changes register. Answer these on paper. Most contractors have never separated the call mix this way.

  1. Of your last 30 calls, how many opened with a price question before naming the job?
  2. What source did each of those price-first calls come from, and is one source dramatically heavier on price-first behavior?
  3. What does your first 60 seconds on the phone sound like for a price-first caller versus a buyer-first caller?
  4. Who told you that more leads would solve the price-shopper problem, and what did they base that claim on?
  5. If you turned off the source producing the most price-first calls, what does that do to your revenue, and what does it do to your hour count?
  6. What would have to be true for you to keep answering ten calls a day, nine of which are not real, for another 12 months?

If four of these come back blank, the mix has never been measured by source. The audit measures it in seven days and names the three changes with the largest expected lift on closed-job rate.

What is actually happening

What the audit finds in cases like this.

The voice shifts from here. This is the structural read. Five things show up in almost every account that opens this complaint.

  1. One source is producing 70% of the tire-kicker volume. The aggregate number hides the mix. Once the calls are broken out by source, one channel is usually doing the damage. Turning that channel off does not lose buyers; it loses the cost of qualifying nine bad calls to find one. See Lead Quantity Is Not Lead Quality.
  2. The ad copy is pulling commodity-buyers. "Get a free quote" attracts a different buyer than "Roof inspection with photo report, scheduled this week." Same trade. Different self-selection. The ad copy decides the mix before the call ever lands.
  3. The intake script is treating every call the same. The first 60 seconds on a price-first call should look different from a buyer-first call. Most contractors run the same opener. The buyer-first calls survive the script. The price-first calls run it to the floor.
  4. The qualifying questions arrive too late. Job type, timeline, decision authority, and budget range belong in the first 90 seconds, framed as questions you ask every caller. Late qualification reads as a sales tactic. Early qualification reads as professional.
  5. The price-anchoring is missing. Without an anchor, the price-shopper compares your number against a fantasy. With an anchor, the price-shopper either becomes a buyer or excuses themselves. Either outcome saves the truck roll.

The three layers to read

What the diagnostic actually scores against.

01

The grading layer

A 100-point scorecard against your last 30 to 60 calls. Trade match, geo match, intent signal, budget signal, decision authority. Output is a per-call grade and an aggregate.

Read the Reference →

02

The source layer

The mix broken out by ad source, by ad set, by referral, by direct call. One source is usually doing 60 to 70% of the damage. Naming it changes the spend allocation.

Read the Reference →

03

The anchoring layer

How price gets framed before the price-shopper asks. The anchor sets the comparison and filters out the buyers who were never going to pay. Anchoring is the second-half close.

Read the Reference →

What most contractors get wrong here

Three readings that look right and are off by a mile.

  1. Misreading 01

    "All leads are tire kickers now because the economy is soft."

    A soft market changes volume. It does not turn buyers into price-shoppers in the same proportion across every source. The mix is changeable. The source mix is what the audit fixes.

  2. Misreading 02

    "If I just answer faster, the close rate fixes itself."

    Faster answering helps the buyer-first calls. It does not turn price-first calls into buyers. Speed-to-call is one variable. The mix and the script are two others.

  3. Misreading 03

    "The agency said I have to wait three months for the data to mature."

    Three months of running the wrong mix at the wrong cost is three months of waste. The diagnostic reads the mix from the first 30 calls. Waiting for "the algorithm" to fix what the source mix is producing is an explanation, not a plan.

What gets diagnosed

The seven readings inside a 7-day audit.

Last 30 to 60 calls scored individually against the lead-quality scorecard. Per-call grade and aggregate.
Source mix broken out. Which channel produces the most price-first volume, which produces the most buyer-first volume.
Ad copy reviewed against the buyer self-selection it produces. Three rewrites named if needed.
Intake script audited. Opening line, first 90 seconds, qualifying frame, anchor sequence.
Disqualify-on-purpose script. Three lines that move the wrong caller off the phone in 60 seconds.
Spend allocation reviewed. Where the dollars currently sit. Where they should sit after the diagnostic.
Three prioritized moves with the largest expected lift on closed-job rate. Each has a 60-day timing estimate.

What you get

The value stack at $999.

  1. Written diagnostic report

    Seven days. PDF and editable doc. Names the three moves with the largest expected lift on closed-job rate.

    $2,400 value
  2. Lead-quality scorecard against your last 30 to 60 calls

    Per-call grade with reason. Aggregate score by source. The sheet keeps running after the audit ends.

    $900 value
  3. Ad-copy rewrite for buyer self-selection

    Three headline rewrites with the matching landing-page rewrite. Pulls a different mix without lowering the budget.

    $800 value
  4. Intake-script and disqualify lines

    Opening line, first 90 seconds, anchor sequence, three honest disqualify lines that move the wrong caller off the phone fast.

    $600 value
  5. Spend-allocation map

    Current vs target distribution by source. Names which line to turn down and which to turn up, with a timing window.

    $700 value
  6. 60-day follow-up review call

    One hour. Re-score the calls, check the moves that landed, name what to do next. Included.

    $400 value

Total named value: $5,800. Price: $999. The math defends in 15 seconds.

What you are already paying

Price math against the alternatives in your inbox right now.

Hours qualifying price-shoppers

$3,600/mo

60 hours at $60 / hour fully loaded. Most of those hours die on price-first calls that were never going to close.

A new lead-platform contract

$2,000/mo

Different logo, same mix. Different rep, same script. The source mix is the variable; the platform name is not.

The diagnostic

$999

One time. Seven days. Written report you own. Three named moves. Keep it whether you hire us or not.

Common questions

On record.

What counts as a tire-kicker lead?

A buyer with no budget, no decision authority, no timeline, no job clarity, or a combination. Most contractors call any non-closing lead a tire kicker. The grading scheme separates real tire kickers from leads that could close with better handling.

Why do my ads keep pulling tire kickers?

The match between your ad copy, landing page, and intake script determines who self-selects in. Tire kicker traffic is usually a result of ad copy that does not pre-qualify and a landing page that asks for the call before the qualifier.

What does the diagnostic actually find?

The lead-quality score broken out by source and by ad set. Where the price-shoppers come from. Where the budget-qualified buyers come from. The three changes to ad and intake that shift the mix toward the buyer side.

Can I just disqualify them faster?

Yes and the diagnostic shows you how. A 60-second disqualify on the first call recovers hours and protects your closing rate by source. The script is part of the deliverable.

Do you work outside California?

Yes. Stan Consulting works with construction operators across the United States and a few international markets. The office is in Roseville, California.

What if I post prices on the website and the tire kickers still call?

Posted prices are a partial filter. They knock out some price-shoppers and also knock out some buyers who read the number without context. The diagnostic separates the two effects and names the right move for your trade.

What if my close rate is fine but the volume is too high?

Volume is a hour-count problem. The audit names the source mix and the right ceiling for your team. Turning the volume down on the wrong source recovers hours without lowering closed-job revenue.

The engagement format

Stop answering the phone for price-shoppers.

Seven days. Written report. Three named moves. Scored against your last 30 to 60 calls. You keep it whether you hire us or not. The math defends in 15 seconds and the phone gets quieter on the wrong calls, not the right ones.

Get the Diagnostic · $999 Or write with one specific question first.

The phone is not the problem. The mix on the phone is.

Related reading · Marketing Atlas

If you want the structural reading before the audit.

Position · Doctrine

Lead Quantity Is Not Lead Quality

Why the source mix decides the close rate, and how grading produces a real number against the right denominator.

Reference · Concept

Contractor Lead Grading

The A / B / C / D scheme. How to score a call in under two minutes. The cost gate that protects your hour count.

Reference · Concept

Price Anchoring for Trades

What anchoring is, what it is not, and how a 90-second anchor changes who buys, who walks, and who pays full price.

California operators

Construction operators near our Roseville office.

California · Sacramento metro

Folsom

High contractor density, high ad-spend density, high tire-kicker call volume across roofing, HVAC, and remodel trades.

California · Coastal

San Diego

Year-round trade season. Price-shopper volume is highest in the warm-season months and the mix is fixable.

California · Sacramento metro

El Dorado Hills

High average ticket. The wrong source mix sends low-ticket inquiries that waste a high-ticket estimator's hour.