The lead response leak calculator
Work out what slow replies to inbound inquiries cost your business over a year. Put in your own numbers and the answer takes about thirty seconds.
The inquiry you paid for goes to whoever replied first
Most service businesses spend real money generating inbound inquiries. Paid channels, directories, referral programs, a website that took months. Then the inquiry arrives, and it waits.
It waits because whoever would answer it is with a client, on another call, or offline. By the time somebody picks it up, the prospect has already contacted two or three competitors and committed to one of them.
None of this appears in reporting. The inquiry was received. Somebody responded. It simply did not convert. The spend that generated it is gone, and no line item anywhere explains why.
Why this problem stays invisible
Most operational problems announce themselves. A system goes down, a deadline slips, an invoice goes unpaid. You find out because something stops.
This one never stops anything. Inquiries keep arriving, the team keeps working, the numbers look broadly consistent month to month. The loss consists entirely of things that did not happen, which is why it is almost never quantified.
Your numbers, not ours
The calculator runs entirely in your browser. Nothing is transmitted, nothing is stored, and there is no form to complete.
Calculate your leak →Calculate your leak
Five inputs. Approximate figures are fine, the output is a range rather than an audit. Everything updates as you type.
How the number is derived
No hidden assumptions. The entire calculation is four steps:
- Your response speed sets the share of inquiries where a competitor reached the prospect first
- That share is multiplied by the proportion of deals won by the first responder
- That gives lost inquiries, multiplied by your close rate to give lost engagements
- Lost engagements multiplied by average value gives the figure
Both assumptions sit on sliders because they are estimates, not laws. Move them to the most conservative position you find credible and see whether the number still concerns you.
Now establish whether it is bad
A number in isolation means very little. The next section shows where your response speed sits against the market.
Read your number →Read your number
Response speed falls into bands, and the band matters more than the exact minutes. Here is what each one means.
| Response speed | Where that places you | What it means for the inquiry |
|---|---|---|
| Under 5 minutes | Top 7% of all businesses | You are almost always first. The prospect speaks to you before deciding to shop around. |
| Within an hour | Better than most | Competitive on anything arriving in working hours. Evenings and weekends remain exposed. |
| Same day | Roughly average | You reach prospects after they have spoken to someone else. You are arguing against a decision, not shaping one. |
| Next working day | Below average | Most inquiries are committed elsewhere. You are working the remainder of your own spend. |
| Two days or more | Bottom of the market | Close to the point where most inquiries have been committed elsewhere. The inquiry is effectively transferred to whoever responded. |
Three factors that skew the figure
Sanity checks before you trust the figure
- Audit one real evening. Look at what arrived after 6pm last Tuesday and when it was answered. Most operators are surprised.
- Count the channels. If inquiries land in a shared inbox, a personal mobile and a web form, nobody owns all three, and the gaps are where the loss sits.
- Ask who responded first. On your next won engagement, ask how many businesses the client contacted and who came back first. One question, and it tells you more than any report.
If the number is uncomfortable
The final section covers what closing the gap involves, how long it takes, and what it does not require.
See what closing it takes →Closing the gap
The remedy is not additional headcount, and it is not another CRM nobody adopts. It is a single intake system that captures every inquiry and responds before the prospect moves on.
What gets built
One destination for every inquiry
A response inside five minutes
Missed calls answered by message
A named owner for every inquiry
Booking and reminders
A record of every one
What it requires from you
Access to the systems you already run, and roughly an hour of somebody's time to explain how inquiries move through the business today. No change to how your team works, no new software for them to learn, no process to roll out.
A typical build takes about three weeks. Response times drop in the week it goes live, because acknowledgement is the first component switched on.
What this is not
- Not lead generation. This concerns the inquiries you already pay for.
- Not a chatbot attached to your website.
- Not a rebuild of how your team operates.
- Not a monthly platform subscription with nobody to configure it.
Want this assessed properly for your business?
Fifteen minutes walking through where inquiries currently drop, and what closing the gap is worth at your actual volume. No deck.
Book fifteen minutes →