If too many of your quotes go to people who were only collecting prices, the fix is not a better quote. It is a five-minute check before you write one. Ask four questions when the enquiry comes in, decide from the answers whether it gets a full quote, a price range or a polite no, and keep the full effort for the jobs that can actually happen.
The four questions
Ask these on the first call or in your first reply. They work for trades, agencies and other service work, with small changes in wording.
- What do you need done, and why now? "The boiler is 20 years old and making noises" is a job. "Just getting an idea of prices for some time next year" is research. Both are fine; they need different amounts of your time.
- When do you want it done? A date, a season, or "when we sell the house". No date at all is a signal, not a reason to say no.
- Do you have a budget in mind? Many people will not give a number. Offer a range instead: "Jobs like this tend to land between $4,000 and $7,000 depending on the finish. Is that roughly what you expected?" Their reaction tells you more than the answer.
- Who else decides? If a partner, a landlord or a board has to agree, find out now, and try to get them to the visit or the call.
Write the answers down where you track the lead, even as one line. They become the reason for every later decision.
Decide what the enquiry gets
With the answers in front of you, sort each enquiry into one of three groups:
| Answers | What they get |
|---|---|
| Clear job, a date, budget in range, decision-maker involved | Full quote, site visit if needed |
| Real job but no date, or budget unclear | A price range by email and an offer to quote properly when they are ready |
| Wrong type of work, budget far off, or only wants a number for comparison | A short, polite reply, and no visit |
The middle group is where the time goes. A price range costs you ten minutes; a full quote with a site visit can cost half a day once travel is counted. Sending a range first lets the customer self-select. The ones who come back after seeing it are worth the visit.
Be careful with the third group. "Just comparing prices" is not always a bad lead: some people are getting three quotes because their insurer or landlord requires it. Ask. If you are one of three required quotes, decide whether that kind of job is worth your time at all.
What to send the ones who don't get a full quote
A short reply keeps the door open and costs you nothing:
Thanks for getting in touch about the garden wall. For a wall that size, the cost tends to land between $2,500 and $4,000, depending on the material and access. If that works for you, reply with a couple of dates and I will come and measure up for an exact quote.
Thanks for asking. We only take on commercial fit-outs over $20,000, so we are not the right fit for this one. You could try a local handyman service for a job of this size.
The first one turns "maybe" into either a booked visit or a quiet no. The second saves both of you a week of waiting.
Signals worth taking seriously
None of these is a reason to refuse on its own, but two or three together are worth a pause before you drive anywhere:
- They will not say when, even roughly.
- They want a detailed itemized price before anyone has seen the job.
- They push for a quote "in a couple of minutes" for something complex.
- Nobody who decides will be at the visit.
- They want the design worked out in detail as part of the free quote.
For the last one, some businesses charge for the design or survey and deduct the fee from the job if the customer goes ahead. That filters out people collecting free designs without putting off serious buyers, though it suits larger jobs better than small repairs.
Keep it to one routine
The questions only work if they are asked every time, by whoever takes the enquiry. Put them on the call notes template or the reply template. After a month, look at the jobs you lost and check how many of them were in the middle or bottom group. If a lot of your losses are enquiries you would have sorted out early with these questions, the routine is paying for itself.
Where a CRM helps
A spreadsheet with a column for each of the four answers is enough while one person handles enquiries. A CRM helps when enquiries come in from several people and you want unqualified ones kept apart from the jobs you are actually quoting.
Pipedrive has a Leads Inbox for that early stage: an enquiry sits there as a lead, with its own owner and labels, until you decide it is qualified and convert it to a deal in your pipeline. Pipedrive's plan comparison lists the Leads Inbox and custom fields on every plan, so the four answers can be fields on the lead. It will not ask the questions for you, and it does not know which enquiries are serious; the sorting is still your call.