ARXD Services · September 2026
Most contractors we talk to don't have a lead problem. They have a paying for chances problem. Here's what the main channels actually cost, based on current market data.
Home-services marketplace leads typically run $15–110 each and are sold to several contractors at once — often three to five, occasionally more. You're paying for the privilege of racing the same homeowner, and you pay whether you win or not. Add the annual membership, and effective cost per booked job commonly lands at $300–500 or more in many trades. Contractors report quality is the bigger cost: leads that are stale, wrong-trade, or already called.
ConstructConnect, Dodge, and PlanHub sell access to project lists, not relationships. Prices run from roughly $130–200 a month per market up to thousands a year. The math problem: you're one of dozens bidding, competition is price-first, and there's no decision-maker relationship to build on. Most small commercial shops lack the staff to chase hundreds of bid invites, so the subscription quietly goes unused. Some report win rates near 2%.
For homeowner demand, Google is the strongest channel — local-service leads often run $25–95, with a better booked-job cost than marketplaces. But there are two catches for a commercial contractor: most local-service categories are residential trades, and commercial buyers (facility and property managers) rarely search the way homeowners do. You can spend well and still never see a property manager.
A fully loaded sales hire runs roughly $10,000–14,000 a month, and a new hire typically needs months to produce first meetings. For a 2–10 crew shop, that's usually not a sales hire — it's the owner doing sales at night. Which means prospecting happens last, if at all.
All of them charge you for the chance to compete. Marketplace leads are shared, bid boards are price races, ads chase whoever's searching. None of them put you in a room with the person who buys commercial maintenance: the facility or property manager with a vendor list.
Commercial work is relationship work. The useful unit isn't a "lead" — it's a meeting with a decision-maker who keeps a vendor list. That's why ARXD Services charges per confirmed, attended meeting with a property or facility decision-maker: no retainer, no shared leads, no paying for chances. If the meeting doesn't happen, you don't pay.
One meeting that leads to a list slot or a service agreement is worth more than a month of shared leads — and it costs less than most contractors already spend hoping.
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