ROI of a Lead List in 2026: Four Contractor Money Models

Say you give the same salesperson 300 buildings and 100 selling hours. One version produces 12 proposals and three signed accounts. The other burns most of those hours sorting unsuitable properties and finishes with one proposal and no sale.

The budgets, conversion counts, job margins and renewal rates throughout this comparison are planning assumptions to replace with your own records. For the roofing version, three wins produce $157,500 in gross profit. The targeted campaign costs $9,840, including the list and selling time.

Measure at the end of the test	Buildings selected for fit	Unfiltered addresses
Starting buildings	300	300
Sales hours available	100	100
Buildings passing sales qualification	240	60
Proposals delivered	12	1
Signed accounts	3	0
List purchase budget	$4,500	$300
Total acquisition budget	$9,840	$5,640
Roofing gross profit from wins	$157,500	$0
Profit after acquisition cost	$147,660	-$5,640

Ground Control by PorchRocket supplies the buildings selected for fit, so the investment question is how much account gross profit that selection can support after your team reaches the buyer and prices the work. Start with the lead-list ROI calculator, then work through the inputs below.

What is the ROI of a lead list?

Subtract list and outreach costs from the accounts’ gross profit over a stated period, then divide by those costs to calculate the campaign’s return.

Written out: lead-list ROI = (account gross profit minus acquisition cost) / acquisition cost. Multiply the result by 100 to express it as a percentage. Acquisition cost includes the property file, contact research and the labor spent pursuing every prospect, including the ones that never buy.

Use gross profit. The SEC’s guide to financial statements explains that gross profit remains after cost of sales, with operating expenses deducted later. For these trade models, job costs include delivery labor, materials, subcontractors and job-related travel; after subtracting acquisition costs, the campaign’s contribution still has to cover remaining company overhead and financing costs before taxes.

The targeted campaign has this budget:

Acquisition item	Calculation or allowance	Cost
Building list	300 buildings x $15 planning price	$4,500
Owner and buyer research	Budget allowance, replaced by the quoted add-ons and staff research costs	$600
Outreach labor	60 hours x $42 loaded hourly cost	$2,520
Survey and proposal labor	40 hours x $42 loaded hourly cost	$1,680
Campaign expenses	Mileage, phone allocation and survey supplies	$540
Total	Property purchase plus research, labor and expenses	$9,840

The $42 labor input covers wages plus employer payroll costs and benefits; this budget assumes no separate sales commission. Use your payroll records. The BLS June 2026 employee-benefit table shows paid leave and insurance alongside retirement costs and required benefits, which belong in the cost of a selling hour even when they do not appear in the employee’s hourly wage.

The $600 research allowance covers purchased research and any separate staff research time beyond the 100 selling hours. If the salesperson researches contacts during those hours, record that time under outreach instead of charging it twice. The $15 property input is a budgeting midpoint within Ground Control’s published range; checkout supplies the price for your order.

For the unfiltered version, only the assumed list purchase changes, from $4,500 to $300. All other campaign costs remain $5,340. Its $5,640 total buys fewer qualified conversations within the same hours.

A 300-building funnel with the sales hours included

Three wins require 12 proposals in the base funnel, with each stage measured against the immediately preceding stage rather than all 300 buildings.

Funnel stage	Buildings selected for fit	Stage conversion	Unfiltered addresses	Stage conversion
Starting records	300	Starting count	300	Starting count
Sales-qualified properties	240	80%	60	20%
Buyer conversations	120	50%	18	30%
Qualification meetings	24	20%	3	About 16.7%
Written proposals	12	50%	1	About 33.3%
Signed accounts	3	25%	0	0%

Sales qualification means the building also fits your route and minimum account requirements. Keep that separate from whether the property satisfies the ordered imagery and record filters, because an address can match the requested building features while failing your later access or purchasing requirements.

The overall signing rate is 3 / 300 = 1%. The 25% proposal close rate applies to 12 qualified proposals. Applying it to the entire list would invent 75 wins and enough work to bury the crew.

Each signed account in this comparison is a different new customer with one building. That makes the three building contracts three customers when calculating acquisition cost per account.

Define a buyer conversation narrowly: a two-way exchange with someone responsible for the service or able to route you to that person. Delivery alone does not qualify. A meeting establishes the proposed scope and approval responsibility, with a buying date to determine when the authorized site survey belongs on the calendar.

Allocate the 40 survey and proposal hours across opportunities worth quoting. If a roof survey or estimate consumes more time, charge the extra hours to the campaign before judging its return. The sales pipeline math guide expands the reverse funnel: required account wins determine proposals, meetings, conversations and the starting building count.

Account value for roofing, HVAC, paving and landscaping

Roofing and paving start with project gross profit, while HVAC and landscaping also earn renewal-adjusted value from scheduled service over five years.

Customer lifetime value, or CLV, means the gross profit one account contributes during the period you expect to serve it. You can multiply annual gross profit by expected years when you have a credible service-life estimate, or use a defined five-year horizon and add each year’s gross profit after multiplying by the chance the account remains.

At an 85% annual renewal assumption, the five service-year weights are 1, 0.85, 0.7225, 0.614125 and 0.52200625. Their sum is 3.70863125 expected account-years. Multiply that by annual gross profit. This keeps year five from carrying the same value as the signed first year.

Trade	Revenue input	Gross margin input	Repeat or retention input	Five-year account gross profit
Roofing	One $187,500 project	28%	One project; no later work counted	$52,500
HVAC	$13,200 annual agreement	42%	85% annual renewal through year five	About $20,561
Paving	$31,000 first package	32%	65% chance of one equal package in year four	$16,368
Landscaping	$28,800 annual agreement	35%	90% annual renewal through year five	About $41,279

Prices and direct costs stay level in these calculations. Each service agreement earns its full first year’s gross profit, with renewal probability applied before each later year. The five-year figures stop after year five and use no discounting. Carry full precision through the calculations, then round dollar totals to cents and percentages as displayed.

For present value, MIT’s customer lifetime value framework weights future profit by retention and discounts it for time. With year-end receipts and service commencement as time zero, divide each year’s expected profit by (1 + your annual discount rate) raised to that year number, starting at one. Use the contractor lifetime value guide to compare payment horizons, including any delay between acquisition spending and service commencement.

I would begin with the gross profit already present in your job-cost reports and keep expansion into another building owned by the same buyer outside the base case until you have a named opportunity to price. Count each building’s delivery costs. One owner can open several doors, but each additional contract still needs its own scope and delivery budget.

Roofing ROI on a $187,500 project

Three roofing projects at $52,500 gross profit each produce $157,500, leaving $147,660 after the $9,840 acquisition budget and about 1,501% ROI.

The target is a 38,000 square foot warehouse in Fort Worth with an older membrane roof. A repair-and-coating proposal follows an authorized assessment. The building criteria get the estimator to a relevant roof; the survey establishes the scope to price.

The project budget is $187,500 revenue less $135,000 in direct costs. That leaves $52,500, or a 28% gross margin. Price the coating system with all preparation and repair tasks, then include crew labor and the access equipment needed to deliver that scope, with the job’s travel costs charged against the same $135,000 delivery allowance. Charge selling effort once.

The arithmetic is (3 x $52,500 - $9,840) / $9,840 = 15.0061, or 1,500.6%. One project alone produces ($52,500 - $9,840) / $9,840 = about 433.5% ROI; two projects produce $105,000 in gross profit, which is 23.3 times the $4,500 list invoice before selling expenses.

That last comparison explains why the property purchase can be small beside account value. Report the full campaign return beside it. The list-only multiple and ROI after acquisition expenses answer different budgeting questions.

Use commercial roof prospect lists to select roof material and age band, with a floor on building size. Write the exclusions before ordering. A minimum size and the materials your crew services belong in the request alongside the territory boundary, so an estimator can look at each matched row and understand why that building deserves a call.

No future replacement or referral revenue is needed to make this roofing campaign work. The first project carries its return. If your company mainly sells smaller repairs, substitute the repair gross profit and recompute how many wins the campaign needs.

HVAC agreement ROI over five years

Three HVAC agreements generate $16,632 in first-year gross profit and about $61,682 over five renewal-adjusted years, producing roughly 527% five-year campaign ROI.

The target is a light-industrial building whose site inventory confirms 12 rooftop units, with an annual PM agreement that brings $13,200 in revenue against $7,656 in direct delivery costs, leaving $5,544 annual gross profit at a 42% margin. Start with the covered tasks.

Price the task schedule before assigning that margin. The DOE laboratory’s 2025 Rooftop Unit Maintenance Guide covers commercial RTU maintenance and says its guidance does not replace manufacturer-specific instructions; use that equipment-specific scope and the site inventory to establish service hours and materials after the visible unit count starts qualification.

Annual renewal is 85%. Five-year gross profit per account is $5,544 x 3.70863125, or $20,560.65 rounded to cents. Three accounts contribute $61,681.95. Subtract $9,840, then divide by $9,840: 526.8% ROI.

Check year one, too. Three agreements produce $16,632 gross profit minus $9,840 acquisition cost, leaving $6,792 and about 69% first-year ROI, which gives the service manager a return to put beside the first year’s staffing budget before counting any renewals.

Start with buildings that have rooftop HVAC, using the 5+ visible-unit filter and the business types you service. Track access arrangements and the current maintenance renewal date during qualification. A manager who wants to discuss next year’s renewal belongs in a scheduled follow-up queue.

The commercial HVAC maintenance agreement guide shows how to budget the visit and write the covered scope. Keep repair revenue outside this agreement calculation. When separately approved repairs occur, attach their gross profit to the account without adding the same service visit costs twice.

Paving ROI over two service cycles

Three paving accounts contribute $29,760 from their first packages and $49,104 after one probability-weighted repeat cycle, giving about 399% five-year ROI.

The target is a commercial property in Columbus that needs a priced crack-fill, sealcoat and restriping package. The proposed first package is $31,000. Direct costs are $21,080, leaving $9,920 gross profit at a 32% margin.

Measure the paved area. A property showing paved parking earns a place on the prospect list, but the site visit must establish repair quantities and access restrictions before you can price the proposed work, including mobilization and the planned number of trips in the direct cost sheet.

Count one possible repeat package in year four, with a 65% chance of retaining that work. Its expected gross profit is $9,920 x 0.65 = $6,448. Add the first package: $9,920 + $6,448 = $16,368 per account over five years.

For three accounts, (3 x $16,368 - $9,840) / $9,840 = 399.0% ROI. The first packages alone return ($29,760 - $9,840) / $9,840 = about 202.4%. The second cycle increases value without being required to rescue the campaign.

Do not treat year four as an automatic maintenance interval. It is the repeat-purchase timing selected for this account model. The owner’s budget and the assessed pavement determine what work gets proposed and when.

Select properties with paved parking areas inside the route you can serve. I would review shopping centers with accessible work windows before scattering estimates across a wider territory. If a property requires extra traffic control or several mobilizations, put those costs against its margin before ranking it beside another account.

Landscaping ROI on a tighter route

Three landscaping agreements contribute about $123,836 in five-year gross profit at 90% annual renewal, leaving roughly 1,158% ROI after the campaign budget.

Each agreement brings $28,800 annually. At $18,720 in direct annual costs, gross profit is $10,080, or 35%. The five-year retention weights sum to 1 + 0.9 + 0.81 + 0.729 + 0.6561 = 4.0951.

Account value is $10,080 x 4.0951, or $41,278.61 rounded to cents. Using the unrounded account value, three accounts contribute $123,835.82. The ROI calculation is ($123,835.82 - $9,840) / $9,840, or about 1,158.5%. Gross profit is 27.5 times the $4,500 list purchase before acquisition expenses.

The $18,720 delivery budget assumes nearby stops. Travel is paid time. Give a two-person crew 18 extra travel minutes on each of 26 annual visits to a distant account, and the $31 per person-hour labor input adds 18 / 60 x 26 x 2 x $31 = $483.60 to annual delivery costs. Add $180 in annual vehicle expense, for $663.60 more cost to serve.

That reduces annual gross profit to $9,416.40 and five-year account value by $2,717.51. Across three distant accounts, expected gross profit falls by $8,152.53. Campaign ROI drops to about 1,076% despite unchanged selling prices and signing rates.

Contribution margin is the money remaining after the variable costs of serving the account. Include paid travel and vehicle expense alongside the work on site when comparing routes; the route density calculator lets you price that travel before extending the service boundary and committing the crew’s hours to a distant stop.

Order commercial grounds prospects around existing stops, using visible lawns and planting beds. Confirm maintenance scope and visit requirements in the field. I would rather add two properly priced stops near the current route than chase three scattered agreements whose travel erodes the crew’s available hours.

Sensitivity table for four trades

At a fixed $9,840 campaign budget, one lower-value win still covers acquisition costs in all four trade models, while zero wins loses the full budget.

The low case combines one signed account with account gross profit 20% below base. The base case has three wins at the calculated values. The high case combines four wins with account gross profit 20% above base. Signing rates are 0.33%, 1% and 1.33% of the starting 300 buildings.

Trade	Low ROI: 1 win, 80% account value	Base ROI: 3 wins, full account value	High ROI: 4 wins, 120% account value
Roofing	327%	1,501%	2,461%
HVAC	67%	527%	903%
Paving	33%	399%	698%
Landscaping	236%	1,158%	1,914%

These columns use the five-year account values, including retention for service agreements and the paving repeat probability. The high case changes account economics rather than assuming every proposal suddenly closes. Keep the same 100-hour budget only while that fourth win fits inside the survey and proposal allowance.

Test the inputs independently before approving a bigger list. Set wins back to three and reduce margin. Restore margin, then cut renewal. That tells you which uncertainty threatens the purchase. Combining every favorable input can hide a campaign that needs one unusually large job to look attractive.

Price matters less here than account selection. For 300 Ground Control buildings, the published $10 to $20 range puts the file at $3,000 to $6,000 before add-ons. Keeping the other $5,340 constant changes total acquisition cost to $8,340 or $11,340. Roofing ROI remains about 1,788% or 1,289% at three base-value wins.

Enter the exact quote shown before checkout; Ground Control pricing explains the purchase. Save both cases in the calculator. I would size the pilot so the business can fund its full budget before any job signs.

What moves list ROI most?

Property fit comes first because it decides who enters the funnel; buyer contact comes next because a qualified building produces no proposal without a conversation.

Hold all downstream rates at the targeted funnel’s assumptions. With only 60 of 300 buildings passing qualification, expected wins are 60 x 50% x 20% x 50% x 25% = 0.75. With 240 qualified buildings, the same calculation produces three expected wins. Fit alone creates a fourfold difference in that calculation.

Next, hold fit at 240 and reduce the conversation rate from 50% to 25%. Expected wins fall from three to 1.5. Fractional wins describe the planning average across repeated campaigns; the sales board records whole signed accounts. Replace the planning rates with your measured counts before the next order.

Start with your ideal customer profile for contractors. State the buying and delivery requirements for each building type. A required property feature needs a financial reason: enough rooftop units to justify the visit, enough project gross profit to cover estimating effort or a location close enough to the existing route to fit the service budget.

Contact research then needs a job title and responsibility. Ask who controls the roof budget, HVAC agreement, parking work or grounds contract. If the tenant cannot authorize that scope, record the owner or manager who can. Another phone number is valuable only if it improves the chance of reaching that role.

The broader local service market sizing guide helps define the territory before buying rows. Use account selection to improve the numerator, then reduce waste in the hours and expense denominator. A cheaper file cannot compensate for buildings your crew cannot serve profitably.

How many signed accounts break even?

Divide the full $9,840 acquisition budget by gross profit per account, then round up to find the number of wins needed to recover it.

The SBA’s break-even analysis divides fixed costs by selling price less variable cost. For this campaign decision, apply that structure to the acquisition budget and the gross profit each account contributes. State whether the contribution comes from the first sale or several years.

Trade	Gross profit from first project or first service year	First-sale wins needed	Five-year gross profit per account	Five-year wins needed
Roofing	$52,500	1	$52,500	1
HVAC	$5,544	2	About $20,561	1
Paving	$9,920	1	$16,368	1
Landscaping	$10,080	1	About $41,279	1

Roofing breaks even at $9,840 / $52,500 = about 0.187 account, rounded up to one project; HVAC needs $9,840 / $5,544 = about 1.775 accounts, rounded up to two for first-year recovery. One HVAC account covers the budget only when you count its longer service horizon.

Paving’s first-package cushion is just $80: $9,920 minus $9,840. An extra survey or a small margin miss removes it. That is a reason to budget two first packages as an operating target even though the arithmetic break-even count is one.

Set your own decision rule before ordering. For this pilot, I would require the base case to recover acquisition costs within the first service year and keep the modeled break-even count within the salesperson’s available proposal capacity. If only lifetime renewals make the first campaign affordable, reduce the opening order or raise the minimum account value.

CAC, lifetime value and payback

The base campaign’s customer acquisition cost is $3,280 per account, and the HVAC agreement earns that back in about 7.1 service months.

Customer acquisition cost (CAC) divides all sales and marketing spending assigned to a period or campaign by new accounts won. Here, $9,840 / 3 = $3,280. At company level, include the other selling costs and channels as well; the contractor customer acquisition cost guide covers that allocation.

For HVAC, monthly gross profit is $5,544 / 12 = $462 when service profit is earned evenly through the year, so CAC payback is $3,280 / $462, or about 7.1 months. Count from service commencement; a three-month prospecting period occurs before that service clock if the agreement starts at the test’s end.

LTV:CAC compares account lifetime gross profit with its acquisition cost. The HVAC model gives $20,560.65 / $3,280 = about 6.27:1 over five years, and because the same three accounts generate both figures, campaign ROI is that ratio minus one: about 527%.

Cash recovery needs its own schedule. The Illinois SBDC financial statements guide explains that a profitable business can still have negative cash flow, and that growing sales can require working capital. Put customer payment dates beside payroll, material deposits and the acquisition spend.

I would track earned gross profit separately from collected customer cash, with campaign payments in their own column so the next list order does not borrow money already needed for materials on the job the first list produced. An accepted roof proposal belongs in the pipeline. Keep its estimated margin in the forecast until job costs establish the earned result.

Why a lead list ROI report goes wrong

The largest errors count revenue as return, leave sales hours unpriced or attribute existing customers to the new campaign, which overstates profit from the list.

Revenue makes a weak campaign look strong. The $31,000 paving package carries $21,080 of delivery costs. Entering $31,000 in the return field instead of $9,920 counts money already committed to producing the work.

Owner time disappears just as easily. A Saturday spent reviewing parcels or preparing estimates consumes selling capacity even when no new payroll check is written. Assign those hours a cost and use the same convention for every channel. Do not add the owner’s opportunity cost again if the loaded rate already represents that time.

Watch attribution at the property and owner levels. If an existing customer appears in the purchased file, mark the row before launch. If one owner signs for two properties, record one new customer and two building contracts. That prevents a flattering building count from silently becoming an inflated customer count in CAC.

Charge every unsuccessful pursuit, too. The budget includes calls that went nowhere and surveys that produced no order, and where an earlier channel introduced the buyer, use a written attribution rule rather than letting both channels claim all the profit from the same signed work.

Renewal arithmetic can also double-count value. A five-year CLV already includes the first year’s gross profit. Adding first-year profit to CLV counts the signed year twice. Use the contractor gross margin guide to check what belongs in delivery cost before comparing channels.

Timing causes a different error. A 90-day report can show qualified proposals before an owner’s capital approval arrives. Keep those proposals open under the original campaign, with the same next review date. Write off opportunities that fail your qualification rule; leave documented buying decisions on their scheduled dates.

How to run a 90-day lead list test

Use one property segment, a 300-building ceiling and eight recorded steps to measure fit, buyer access, signed work and gross profit within a defined sales budget.

1. Days 1 to 3: set the account economics. Pull recent jobs for the service you want to sell. Record revenue and delivery costs separately. Set the minimum first-year gross profit and calculate the wins needed to cover the pilot before choosing a list size.
2. Days 4 to 5: write the territory and fit rules. Select one business type or service segment and the area your trucks can cover. Choose roof criteria, rooftop units, paved parking or commercial grounds according to the trade. Assign one salesperson and reserve the 100 selling hours.
3. Days 6 to 8: order the matched properties. In Ground Control, select the territory and available property filters for your campaign. Commercial buildings cost $10 to $20 each, with delivery within 48 hours after payment. Review the exact quote and add-ons before paying; reserve $4,500 for 300 buildings in this budget.
4. Days 9 to 14: prepare the campaign records. Import the file, preserve each matching reason and tag the batch. Remove existing customers and duplicates from the new-account count. Review the first 30 rows against the written criteria and identify who manages the service budget.
5. Days 15 to 45: work the buyer conversations. Use the 60-hour outreach allowance in scheduled blocks. Ask about responsibility, scope and buying timing, then record the next action. For commercial email, follow the FTC’s business email requirements, including accurate identification, advertising disclosure, a postal address and an opt-out. Its guidance covers business-to-business messages.
6. Days 30 to 70: survey and price qualified work. Allocate the 40 survey and proposal hours to prospects with a defined scope and buyer. Record visit expenses and expected gross profit on every proposal. Keep estimating effort attached to the campaign whether the quote wins or loses.
7. Days 60 to 85: resolve the buying step. Ask for the approval process and the next decision date. Classify a signed agreement, a documented future decision and a lost opportunity separately. Put a service start date on each win so payback has a clear starting point.
8. Day 90: reconcile and decide. Replace the budget with invoices and logged hours. Calculate campaign CAC, first-year ROI and renewal-adjusted value. Compare each funnel stage with its starting assumption, then fund the next batch only after identifying what earned the return.

Keep the test small enough to work every row. If 300 buildings exceed the selling capacity you can reserve, Ground Control orders start at 10 buildings. Reduce the order and recompute the budget rather than leaving half the file untouched while the report blames conversion.

The month-three scorecard and next order

At day 90, expand the property segment that produces affordable signed accounts; repair the weak funnel stage before buying more of the same records.

Observed result	What to inspect	Next action
Many properties fail qualification	Territory, business type and minimum account economics	Tighten the written fit rules
Buildings fit but buyer conversations lag	Responsible role, research and outreach hours used	Correct buyer routing and finish the planned outreach
Conversations happen but meetings stall	Service offer, approval responsibility and timing	Change the first proposed buying step
Meetings produce proposals with weak margins	Scope, access, route and job-cost assumptions	Reprice or narrow the property segment
Signed accounts cover first-year acquisition cost	Collected cash and delivery capacity	Fund the next measured batch

Do not rebuild the entire campaign after one objection. Compare properties that reached a meeting with properties that did not. If the same business type repeatedly fits but rarely has authority on site, improve ownership research before changing the roof or lot filters.

Record gross profit per selling hour as well as cost per account. The base roofing campaign produces $157,500 / 100 = $1,575 in forecast gross profit per sales hour. Keep that forecast beside earned job profit as projects finish. A smaller service campaign can have a lower return per hour and still fit the recurring revenue the business wants.

For public buyers such as school districts or city and county agencies, use Bid Control by PorchRocket to follow opportunities with their documents and past award history. Track that campaign separately. Public pursuits need their own bid costs and decision dates.

When the first list works, repeat the filters in an adjacent route area before widening every criterion at once. The next order should preserve the property traits that produced profitable work and the number of accounts your crew can take on.

Building a measurable campaign with Ground Control

The fastest way to start a lead-list ROI test is Ground Control by PorchRocket, which supplies commercial buildings selected for the work you sell. Choose your territory and filter by business type, building size, roof age band or material, rooftop HVAC, paved parking, lawns or planting beds. Commercial records cost $10 to $20 each and arrive within 48 hours after payment, often sooner. Each row explains why it matched; report wrong property matches within 30 days for credit back. Owner information and decision-maker research are add-ons. These are buildings that fit your work; the owners have not requested quotes.

Pair the delivered file with your sales records to track:

• The selected area and property filters to repeat in the next order.
• A reason each building matches, preserved beside its campaign identifier.
• Owner information and decision-maker contact where found when you order that research, with no charge for contacts not found.
• CSV and Excel records your team can import into its CRM with the campaign fields mapped.
• A quoted property cost to enter beside the research allowance, sales hours and visit expenses.
• A building-level record to connect with conversations, proposals and the gross profit of signed work.

Price the first batch in Ground Control, put the quote into the ROI calculator, and give the salesperson buildings worth spending the next 100 hours on.