Every tradesman has heard the pitch: sign up, pay per lead, and the jobs come to you. Angi (which includes the old Angie's List and HomeAdvisor) and Thumbtack are the biggest names. Some pros do fine on them. Plenty don't. The difference is usually whether they know what a job really costs them, not what a lead costs.
The price of a lead isn't the price of a job
These sites don't publish one price list. What you pay depends on your trade, your area and the type of job, and it changes. On Thumbtack, you're charged when a customer contacts you. On Angi, pros pay for leads and can also pay for other services and ads.
Here's the math that matters. Say a lead costs you $40, and the same homeowner also went to two or three other pros. If you win one job out of every five leads, that job cost you $200 before you picked up a tool. If you win one in ten, it cost $400. On a $350 repair, that's the whole job.
So track three numbers for one month:
- What you spent on leads.
- How many leads you got.
- How many turned into paid jobs.
Spend divided by jobs won is your real cost per job. Most pros who do this are surprised.
What the FTC found about HomeAdvisor
In January 2023, the Federal Trade Commission announced an order requiring HomeAdvisor to pay up to $7.2 million and stop deceptive marketing of its leads to service providers. The FTC charged that HomeAdvisor had made false or misleading claims about the quality of its leads, including whether they matched the work and areas pros wanted, and how often leads turned into jobs. It also said pros were told the first month of HomeAdvisor's mHelpDesk software was free when they were charged $59.99 for it. The order became final in April 2023, and in November 2023 the FTC sent more than $3 million in refunds to businesses that had paid for HomeAdvisor memberships. Read it yourself: FTC press release and the refunds.
That doesn't mean every lead is bad. It means you should judge leads by your own numbers, not by the sales pitch.
Speed decides who wins
When the same homeowner reaches several pros, the one who answers first has a big head start. If you're on a ladder and the lead sits for three hours, you paid for someone else's job. This is where an AI phone or text helper pays for itself. See AI phone help for a one-man shop.
What to build instead
Every dollar you spend on leads is rent. Every dollar you put into your own name is equity:
- Your own Google Business Profile, with real photos and real reviews. See getting more reviews with AI.
- Your own phone number, answered every time. See tracked phone numbers: who's really answering.
- Your own past customers, followed up and asked for referrals.
That's the long game, and it's what Fixer School is built around. For the bigger picture, see how lead-gen sites steal your customers' calls.
Photo by falco on Pixabay.
