Write down your top three most profitable job types before you spend a single euro on lead generation. For a plumber that might be full bathroom installs, boiler replacements and hot press upgrades, not dripping taps. For an electrician it might be consumer unit upgrades, EV charger installs and rewires. If your marketing is pulling in the wrong jobs, you are busy and broke.

Set a minimum job value and do not chase leads below it. If a full garden landscaping project starts at 3,000 euro and someone rings wanting two small hedges trimmed, that is a polite no. Protecting your diary for the big work is a marketing decision, not just a scheduling one.

Identify the one or two seasonal peaks where your best jobs cluster and plan your lead generation push around them. Roofers get slammed after autumn storms. Heating engineers spike in September and October. Knowing this lets you ramp up spend and effort at exactly the right time.

Claim and fully complete your Google Business Profile so you appear in local map searches for your exact services. A roofer in Kilkenny needs to show up when someone searches ‘roofer Kilkenny’ or ‘roof repair near me’, not just have a half-finished profile with no photos and no opening hours. This is the single highest-return free tool available to any local service business.

Make sure your website has a dedicated page for each high-value service you want to generate leads for. One page for all your services means Google does not know which one to rank you for. A separate page for ‘Attic Conversion Dublin’ will outrank a single catch-all ‘Our Services’ page every time.

List your business on the key directories that buyers in Ireland actually use, including Golden Pages, Yelp Ireland, and Houzz if you are in a trade like kitchens or landscaping. Consistency matters here, your business name, address and phone number need to be identical across every listing or you confuse Google and lose ranking.

Put a click-to-call phone number at the top of every page on your website, not buried in the footer. Most people searching for a local tradesperson are on their phone and want to call immediately. If they have to hunt for your number, they will call the next person on the list instead.

Add a short contact form to your website that asks for name, phone number, the job type and their town or county, nothing else. Long forms with ten fields get abandoned. You just need enough to call them back with context. Every extra field costs you leads.

Set up a WhatsApp Business number and mention it on your website and social pages as an option for people to send photos of the job. A homeowner with a damaged fascia or a leaking roof can send you a photo before you even speak. You arrive knowing what you are dealing with, and they feel heard before the first call.

Call back every website or form enquiry within 30 minutes during working hours. Research consistently shows that your chance of speaking to a lead drops sharply after the first hour. A larger company might take a day to reply. You calling back in 20 minutes wins the job before a quote is even mentioned.

If you genuinely cannot call, send a text within ten minutes saying you have seen the enquiry and will ring within a specific time. Something as simple as ‘Hi, got your message about the guttering, I will call you at 5pm today, John’ stops the person ringing the next person on Google.

For leads that do not answer your first call, try again twice over the next 24 hours at different times of day before you write them off. People are at work, in meetings or driving. One missed call does not mean they are not interested. Many jobs are won on the second or third attempt.

Send every quote in writing, even a simple one, with a clear breakdown of what is included and what is not. A written quote sent by email or WhatsApp looks professional and gives the customer something concrete to compare. Verbal quotes disappear from memory and cause disputes.

Follow up on every quote that has not received a response after three working days. A quick message saying ‘Hi, just checking you got the quote okay, happy to answer any questions’ is not pushy, it is good service. Most people who do not reply have just got busy, not gone elsewhere.

Ask every satisfied customer for a Google review before you leave the job or within 24 hours of finishing. The best time to ask is when they are standing there happy with the work. Send them a direct link to your Google review page by text so they only have to tap and type. Reviews directly increase the number of calls you get from Google.

Ask happy customers directly if they know anyone else who might need your service. A simple ‘if you hear of anyone needing a new bathroom or has a damp problem, I’d really appreciate the recommendation’ costs nothing and produces some of the warmest leads you will ever receive.

Keep a simple record of every customer, the job done, when it was done and their contact details, so you can reach out at the natural repeat interval. A boiler service is due every year. A driveway seal coat lasts three to four years. A simple spreadsheet or free CRM like HubSpot’s free tier lets you send a timely reminder message instead of waiting for them to think of you again.