Lead Handling Process

Purpose: This is the single process every new lead follows from the moment it hits GoHighLevel until it lands with a salesperson. Rosa owns the first touch during business hours; Marcus owns everything after qualification. If a lead falls through a crack, this document is where we find the crack.

The one number that matters

First contact within 15 minutes during business hours. Leads that come in overnight get called the next morning, first thing. Emergencies are the exception: the emergency line is answered 24/7 by the answering service and triaged immediately.

We track this because leads go cold fast. A homeowner who filled out a form is often filling out two or three other forms at the same time. First real conversation usually wins the estimate appointment.

Where leads come from

• Google Ads and Meta Ads (run by the outside agency, landing in GHL)
• Google Business Profile calls and messages
• Website form fills and SEO traffic
• Referrals (past customers, realtors, insurance agents, property managers)
• The 24/7 emergency line

All of them end up in the same GHL pipeline. No lead lives in someone's personal inbox or a sticky note. If it is not in GHL, it does not exist.

Pipeline stages (GHL, exact names)

New Lead → Contacted → Estimate Scheduled → Estimate Sent → Follow-Up → Won → Lost

Emergency jobs skip straight to Estimate Scheduled after triage — the dispatch itself is the first visit.

Step by step: business-hours lead

1. Lead arrives in GHL as New Lead. GHL fires the instant text acknowledgment automatically.
2. Rosa calls within 15 minutes. Goal of the call: confirm the basics (name, address, what is going on with the property, how urgent) and book the estimate visit on the calendar.
3. If Rosa reaches them: run quick qualification per Lead Qualification, book the visit, move the card to Estimate Scheduled. Log the notes on the contact record, not in your head.
4. If no answer: leave a short voicemail, send the follow-up text, and set a task to try again within 2 hours. Three attempts on day one, spread out. Card stays in New Lead until we actually connect.
5. Once we connect and they are qualified but not yet booked, move to Contacted and hand to Marcus's team to book the visit.

Sample first-call opener: "Hi, this is Rosa with Summit Home Services. You reached out about your roof a few minutes ago — do you have two minutes so I can get a couple details and get someone out to take a look?"

Step by step: overnight and after-hours leads

1. Non-emergency after-hours leads sit in New Lead overnight. GHL sends the automatic acknowledgment so the customer knows we saw it.
2. Rosa calls them first thing the next morning, before anything else on her list.
3. Emergency-line calls go through the answering service. The service collects address, callback number, and the nature of the emergency, then pages the on-call number. Triage per Emergency Job SOP. Quote the $450 flat dispatch + tarping fee on that call — it is credited toward the repair if Summit does the permanent work.

Rules that keep this clean

• Voicemail is not "Contacted." A stage only moves when the thing it describes has actually happened.
• Never quote firm prices on the first call. Ranges only, per Pricing and Estimating Rules, until Tara has done a site visit or photo review.
• Every call attempt gets logged in GHL, even the failed ones. That is how we know whether the 15-minute target is real or a story we tell ourselves.
• Referral leads get flagged with their source so we can thank the referrer. Partner referrals (realtors, insurance agents, property managers) go to Marcus directly.
• If a lead is a bad fit per Bad Fit Customers, we say so politely and mark Lost with the reason. We do not string people along.

Related

• Lead Qualification
• Estimate Follow-Up
• No-Show Process
• GoHighLevel CRM Rules
• Emergency Job SOP
• Pricing and Estimating Rules