The 15-minute lead response playbook

01Set a response target — and give it an owner

Customers on lead platforms usually contact three or more businesses at once and choose in the first hour. Set a target your whole team knows: 15 minutes for platform leads, 30 minutes for everything else, inside business hours.

A target without an owner is a wish. Name one person per shift who owns the lead inbox, and a backup for when they're on site. If a platform gives you a short window to accept a lead, that window needs an owner too — it's the most common gap we see.

02The anatomy of a first reply

• —Their name and the job in their words — proves a human read it.
• —One line of relevance — "a two-storey exterior repaint is exactly what we do".
• —Two or three qualifying questions — never more.
• —One clear next step with a time — "I can have someone out Thursday morning".
• —A sign-off from a real person, with a direct number.

03Qualifying questions that matter

Ask only what changes the price or the booking. Everything else can wait for the site visit.

• —Painting — interior, exterior or both? Roughly how many rooms or storeys? Occupied or vacant? Any timing pressure (sale, lease, handover)?
• —End-of-lease / bond clean — how many bedrooms and bathrooms? Carpets steam-cleaned too? Keys handed back on what date?
• —Builders / construction clean — what stage is the site at (rough, final, sparkle)? How many units or square metres? Handover date?
• —Commercial / recurring — what's the floor area and fit-out? How often? After-hours access?

04Follow-up cadence

• —No reply after 4 hours — one short nudge in the same channel.
• —No reply after 2 days — a different channel (call if you emailed, text if you called).
• —No reply after 7 days — a polite close-out: "I'll take this off our list — reply any time if it's still on." This line gets surprising responses.
• —Log every lead's outcome — won, lost, no response — so you can see your real conversion.

05Measure two numbers

Median time to first reply, and lead-to-quote rate. If the first is over an hour, fix speed before anything else. If the second is low, your first reply isn't asking for the site visit clearly enough.