What To Do When A New Landscaping Lead Comes In If You Want To Increase Your Chances Of Closing Them

  First Impressions Matter

The first impression someone has of your business can make or break your opportunity of closing them. This is why it is so important to always ensure that people have a positive experience when getting in touch with you or your business.

 Speed To Lead

When a new lead comes in, you have to give them a call within 10 minutes of them coming in. Every minute you wait is a lower chance for this person to book an estimate and closing.

This is called speed to lead. If you wait too long, assume the lead is lost. This is why we like to implement systems for our clients that help them get in touch with leads automatically even if they’re busy at a job site or estimate – but you can do what you believe is best for your business.

Just ensure you’re getting back to leads quickly!

Tonality & Professionalism

How you answer the phone matters. If people need to ask “is this X Company?” or “Who is this?” you’ve already lost.

The second the phone rings and it’s not a phone you have saved, your response needs to be “Hi, this is COMPANY. How can I help you today?” This is great because you are confirming that they called the right number, and you’re getting straight into the information you need.

It doesn’t need to be more complex than this.

But you cannot pick up the phone and say “Hello?” or “Who is this?” or “What’s up?” or anything similar. You are a business and you need to embody the professionalism of a business people can trust. That’s what will help you improve your close rate as well.

Look back to our “Adding Marketing Barriers” training and you’ll see where we talk about external barriers. This is exactly what we mean.

 Attitude

Your attitude and mood can translate very easily through your voice. That’s why you need to always pick up the phone, or call incoming leads, with a smile on your face.

This will immediately improve your mood and it will lead to a better first impression for your potential customers.

Another important aspect is your patience and willingness to help. You cannot go off on people when they call for a quote or to ask about doing some landscaping work. If their questions don’t make sense or you realize they’re not a good fit you need to politely turn them down in a way they don’t even realize.

A good way to do this is to tell them that you’re busy until 6+ months from now. This will make them go look for someone else right away and you’ll be able to end the call easily.

But always aim to be helpful, respectful and have a smile on your face. It will make a huge difference.

 Asking The Right Questions

When you’re talking to an inbound lead that has not been qualified yet, you need to know which questions to ask and how to ask them. There needs to be a clear process of how you handle new leads that is repeatable.

What Questions To Ask:

You want to have 2-3 questions that will allow you to identify if this lead is qualified or not. And once you decide if they are, you can inquire more about their project and book an estimate.

The questions will depend on how you run your business, but we recommend the following:

• Where are you located?

• What are you looking to get done?

• How soon do you want to start this project?

• The type of project you’re looking to get done can take an investment of something between $X and $Y. I can’t give you an exact number because we’d have to go to your home and take measurements and a few other details but we do offer financing – would that range I gave you fit within your budget?

Download Our Script Here.

 Speak As Little As Possible:

One thing I see very often when clients talk to leads on the phone is that they start going into detail about what they need to dig and add and move and all these details that people don’t care about. This is what we call thecno-babble, and you need to avoid it at all costs.

People only care about if they can trust you, how much it’ll cost to do their project and how soon it can get done. If you’re able to provide answers they like for all those doubts, you will have a good chance at closing them.

For that reason, your goal should be to speak 20% of the time whenever you’re talking with a lead or potential customer. This allows you to gather as much information as possible and allow them to feel heard and comfortable.

People love to talk and give you all the details in the world, you just have to let them.

 Proposing The In-Person Estimate

Once you’ve spoken to the leads and pre-qualified them you want to book them in for an in-person estimate.

This is not a complex thing to do. At this stage you want to ask if they’d like to book an in-person estimate so that you can give them a formal quote for the project.

Once they say yes, ask them if mornings or afternoons work best for them and then offer them your next available slot.

Then double check address and contact information and meet them on the agreed upon date and time.

Once you’re there, it’s time to put your sales skills in action, and if you need it feel free to check out our free sales training to help you close 20%+ of your estimates.

Now that you understand how to work new incoming leads and book them in for an estimate, the next thing you need to work on is your sales skills! Check out our sales playbook so that you can start closing at 20-30% consistently →