Twelve dollars back for every dollar spent, and what that means for pricing

The situation

An HVAC business wanted to know, not guess, what its marketing returned, so it could decide how much to spend and how to price. Many trades companies set a marketing budget as a percentage of last year's sales and never check whether the spend produced work. The challenge was to build acquisition that could be measured end to end, from the first click to the booked job, and to report the return in a form that drove the next month's budget.

What was done

• Built offer-led campaigns and landing pages designed to be measured
• Connected enquiry tracking to booked and completed jobs
• Reported cost per lead and return on spend monthly
• Used the return figure to set the following month's budget rather than a fixed percentage
• Kept the offer and the pricing aligned so discounting did not erode the return

What it means for value

A measured return on spend is one of the most useful numbers a growing company can own. It tells the finance lead how much to budget, how much margin each job must carry to pay for its own acquisition and when to stop spending because capacity is full. It also exposes discounting, because a lower price with the same acquisition cost shows up immediately as a weaker return. We bring that measurement into budgeting and pricing for trades companies, alongside your CPA.

Figures as published at https://hvac.agency/case-studies.