Every Homeowner Is Yours Alone
By Luis Johnson, founder of Lunere Digital. Published
Every homeowner who reaches your calendar through this came from an ad in your own account, pointed at your own ZIP codes, and he is never sold, shared or passed to another shop. There's nobody else racing you to the phone.
That word gets used loosely though, so the useful part of this page is how to tell whether anyone selling you "exclusive" means it.
The short version
- Shared means the same homeowner is sold to several shops, and the first caller usually wins.
- Exclusive should mean one buyer, forever, not one buyer for an hour.
- The hard test is who owns the ad account the homeowner came from.
- Exclusivity over a lead isn't the same as exclusivity over an area, and I don't promise the second one.
The three things a vendor can mean by exclusive
| What they say | What it can mean | What to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Exclusive lead | Sold once, to you, and never again. Or sold once now and recycled into a shared pool in 30 days. | Is it ever resold later, and is that in writing? |
| Exclusive territory | They only take one shop per area. Usually one shop per area per plan, and the area can be redrawn. | Who else do you already serve within 50 miles, and what defines my area? |
| First look | You see it before anybody else. Everybody else sees it 15 minutes later. | What happens to it if I don't respond in the window? |
The test that settles it: whose ad account is it
A lead can only be resold if the person holding it has a reason and a right to resell it. When the ads run in a vendor-owned account, the homeowner is the vendor's inventory, and inventory gets sold more than once eventually, because that's what makes the model work.
In your own account, pointed at your ZIPs, there's no pool for him to fall into. He submitted a form that belongs to you.
So the question to ask any vendor isn't whether the lead is exclusive. It's: whose ad account did the lead come from, and can I log into it. That one is hard to answer vaguely.
What I don't promise
I don't promise you a territory. No radius, no one-shop-per-city claim. The leads are exclusive, the map isn't.
If I told you I'd never work with another shop in your state, you should want to know what happens when a better-paying shop two towns over asks me the same question. The honest version is simpler: the homeowners who come through your ads are yours, and nobody else gets them.
How do I know a lead wasn't sold elsewhere?
Open the ad account. It's yours, and every form fill in it's traceable back to your campaign. That's a check you can run without me.
Do you work with other shops in my state?
I might, and I'll tell you the truth about it on the call rather than selling you a territory I'd have to break later. What stays true is that your homeowners came from your ads and reach only you.
Is an exclusive lead worth more than a shared one?
Usually, because you're not racing anybody and the homeowner hasn't already talked to three shops. Whether it's worth what it costs is arithmetic on your close rate, and the calculator does that in a minute.
Read next
- Shared Lead Services: What You Are Really BuyingShared lead services sell the same homeowner to three or four shops, and say so on their own pages. Here's the published proof and what the alternative is.
- Cost Per Signed Job CalculatorWork out what one lead source really costs you per signed job, using your own spend, booking rate, show rate and close rate. Nothing is saved or sent.
- Shared vs Exclusive Leads for Foundation RepairShared vs exclusive leads for foundation repair, by how many shops call the same homeowner, what each really costs you per signed job, and which one to buy.
- Stop Paying for Shared Foundation Repair LeadsYou are buying a phone number three other shops already called. How to work out what shared foundation repair leads really cost you, and how to get out safely.