Last week I called ten Orlando home service businesses after 9pm. Real companies with great reviews. Almost every call went to voicemail. Here is the math on what that actually costs, in plain English.
Picture a homeowner in Winter Springs at 9pm. The AC just died and it is 88 degrees inside. She Googles "AC repair Orlando," calls the first result, and gets voicemail. Industry studies consistently find that the large majority of callers who reach voicemail simply hang up and dial the next result. She is not leaving a message. Her kids are sweating.
The second company answers. They get the job. If it is a capacitor swap, that was a $300 ticket. If the system is twelve years old and tired, that call was the start of a $6,000 to $8,000 replacement. The first company never even knew she existed. That is the part that stings: a missed call does not show up anywhere. There is no report for jobs that went to the other guy.
Say your shop misses just five after-hours calls a week. Assume only two of them were real jobs, and take a conservative $350 average ticket. That is $700 a week, about $36,000 a year, walking to competitors. If even one of those calls a quarter is a system replacement, add another $25,000 or so. For most owner-operated shops, the after-hours leak is bigger than the entire marketing budget.
When did you last call your own business after hours? Try it tonight. If you reach a voicemail, so does every customer with an emergency and a credit card. Missed calls become booked jobs when someone, or something, answers. That is the whole product we build.
Get a free demo for your business →