An HVAC lead service sells you contacts from a funnel it owns. HVAC leads generation run for you builds a funnel you own. They cost roughly the same per lead on the published figures, and they leave you with completely different things when the relationship ends, which is the difference that decides the choice.
What you are renting
A lead service's funnel is its asset. You rent access to it by the contact, at the published tiers of $100 for a repair enquiry and $150 for a replacement, and when you stop paying the flow stops the same week. That is a fair trade for a contractor who needs volume this month and has no marketing capability, and it is why the model exists. It is a poor trade for a contractor with three years of runway who is paying the same rate in year three as in year one.
What you are building
Advertising run in your own accounts, on your own domain, with your own remarketing lists, is worth something when you stop paying for management. In the nearest trade with both sides published, self-generated leads are put at $50 to $120 against $80 to $150 bought exclusive, and the lower figure assumes competence. The premium for buying is therefore roughly $30 to $60 a lead, which over a year of any volume is a great deal more than the cost of hiring somebody who can run an ad account.
The hybrid most contractors actually run
Buy leads to fill capacity now, build a channel you own in parallel, and measure both on cost per job rather than cost per lead. The bought leads pay this quarter's wages and the owned channel lowers next year's cost. The failure mode is running only the first for five years and discovering that the whole customer relationship, including the maintenance base that is the cheapest work in this trade, belongs to somebody else's funnel.
Questions people ask about hvac lead services
What is an HVAC lead service?
A company that generates HVAC enquiries in its own funnel and sells them to contractors by the contact, at published tiers of $100 for repair and $150 for replacement work.
Is HVAC lead generation better run in-house?
On published figures, in-house is $50 to $120 per lead against $80 to $150 bought, and only if you have somebody genuinely capable. The bigger difference is that in-house builds an asset and buying does not.
What do I keep if I cancel a lead service?
Nothing but the customers you already won. The funnel, the ad accounts and the remarketing audiences belong to the service, which is the real cost of the model rather than the per-lead rate.
Can I do both?
Most contractors do, and it is usually the right answer: bought leads fill this month's capacity while an owned channel lowers next year's cost per job.