Outbound for Commercial HVAC Contractors
We run outbound for commercial HVAC contractors, and for the roofing, electrical, and plumbing trades on their own pages. Email, LinkedIn, and phone to property managers, owners, and GCs, all about one specific building, run by someone on our team who’s on your account. Your estimators take the walkthroughs with people who already said yes.
At most contractors, the follow-up is done by whoever’s in the office, between dispatch calls, and it doesn’t happen. The estimator is in a truck. The owner is on a job site. The email went out, the property manager meant to reply, and three weeks later she hired the roofer who called. We do the calling. The list is built every day from permits filed, buildings sold, facilities managers hired, storms recorded, and leases signed in your service area. The email goes first, about that address. Then we call and connect on LinkedIn about the same address. When the manager says “come take a look,” it goes on your estimator’s calendar. Starts as low as $2,999 a month, month to month, for the email, with the calling layer priced for your volume.
Why the call works when it’s about one address
Property managers get called by contractors. The call they hang up on starts with “I’m with a commercial HVAC company and I wanted to introduce our services.” She has 30 buildings and four HVAC contractors already. She doesn’t need an introduction. She needs the third floor at 1400 Commerce to stop being 80 degrees.
The call that works is about one building. “Hi, Ray here. I sent a note Tuesday about the rooftop units at 1400 Commerce, the ones from the 2008 permit. Has anyone looked at those since you took over the building?” That’s not a pitch. It’s a question about a piece of equipment on a roof she owns, and she’ll answer it. Sometimes she says “yeah, we’ve got a guy,” and we close the file. Sometimes she says “no, actually, who is this?” and the next thing she says is “can you come out Thursday?”
The call works because it’s the second touch, so she’s already seen the email with the address in the subject line, and because it’s about one specific thing on one specific property. There’s nothing to introduce. We’re asking whether anyone’s looked at the units.
LinkedIn matters less in this industry than in software, but property managers and facilities directors are on it. A connection request from the person whose email about 1400 Commerce is in her inbox gets accepted more often than you’d think, and then your estimator has a second way to reach her when the service agreement comes up.
Who does the calling, and what to ask about them
On our programs the person making the calls is one named member of our team, on your account. They see the list every morning. They know which property got which email about which permit or sale, what trades you run, what your service radius is, and what your minimum job looks like.
They also know enough about your trade to survive the first question. If a facilities director asks “are those Carrier units or Trane,” the answer is “I’d have to check with Ray, but he’s the one who’d be out there anyway. Does Thursday work?” That’s a truthful answer and it books the walkthrough. What doesn’t work is a caller who’s never been on a roof trying to bluff through it. The first week is spent learning what you do and don’t take.
Whoever you hire for this, ask them:
Who’s actually going to be on the phone, and have they ever talked to a facilities director? A caller who’s only ever sold software will call a property manager “the decision maker” and lose her in the first sentence.
Is that person dedicated or shared? Shared across two accounts is normal for a single-county contractor, because the list is small. Shared across six means your properties get called on Thursdays.
What happens when a manager says “come take a look”? The answer should be “it goes on your estimator’s calendar the same day, with the address and the permit history.” If the answer involves a CRM stage, keep looking.
What the sequence looks like
Here’s 14 business days for an 80,000-square-foot office building that sold last month, where the last mechanical permit was 2008. Every touch is about the rooftop units on that building.
Day 1. Email. Saw the sale of 1400 Commerce Dr closed last month. The last mechanical permit on the building was 2008, which puts the rooftop units at about 18 years going into this cooling season. We do an assessment on units that age for new owners. Want a slot before the first hot week? Day 2. LinkedIn. Connection request to the property manager. No note. Day 3. Call. “Ray here. I sent a note about the rooftop units at 1400 Commerce, the 2008 ones. Has anyone been up to look at those since the sale?” Day 5. Email. Reply to day 1. One line: units that age usually have one or two that fail in the first heat wave, and a replacement-versus-repair number in hand before that is worth having. Day 7. LinkedIn. If she accepted, a message. “Sent you a note about the units at 1400 Commerce. Still happy to take a look before it gets hot.” Day 9. Call. Second attempt. Voicemail if no answer, under 20 seconds, names the address and the year. Day 12. Email. Last one. Asks whether to close the file or check back before the heating season. Day 14. Call. Final attempt. If nothing, the building goes back into monitoring, and it gets a fresh sequence the next time something happens there.
Eight touches, three channels, three weeks, all about one roof. The moment she says “come take a look,” the sequence stops and your estimator takes over.
The five signals
The list gets rebuilt every day from these. Whoever’s calling sees which one fired for each property before picking up the phone.
A permit filed or a project awarded. The email offers a bid on the scope that matches your trade. The call asks whether the sub list is still open.
A building changing hands. That’s the sequence above.
A facilities or property manager hired. The email offers a walkthrough and a service agreement quote. The call asks when the current agreements come up.
A storm recorded in the service area. The email offers an inspection and says plainly we don’t know whether the building was hit. The call asks whether anyone’s been up on the roof since.
A lease or buildout announced. The email offers design-assist or a budget number. The call asks whether the GC’s been picked.
What we mean by “lead”
An owner, property manager, GC, or developer with a specific property that fits your line wrote back or picked up, and agreed to a walkthrough, a site visit, or a bid. It’s on your estimator’s calendar with the address and the permit history.
We don’t count form fills. We don’t count a property manager saying “add us to your vendor list.” We don’t count a GC saying “send us your prequal package,” though that one goes to you as a note because it’s worth doing.
Before anything sends we write down the line with you: trades and scopes you take, minimum job size, service radius, building types, and whether service agreements count or only installs. For HVAC, electrical, and plumbing, service agreements are usually the goal. Roofing programs usually run on assessments and storm work.
You see every reply and every call outcome. We don’t report dials. We report what the property manager said.
How it runs
Week one we set up sending domains and mailboxes in your name, agree the line, turn on permit, recorder, and storm monitoring for your service area, and assign the person on our team who’ll be on your account. They spend part of that week learning your trade and your radius.
Week two the first emails go out. Calling and LinkedIn start in week three, once the email’s shown us which signals are getting replies, so the calls go to properties that are already warming up.
Replies and booked walkthroughs go to your estimator the same day, with the address, the permit history, the thread, and the call notes.
Every morning we look at yesterday’s walkthroughs and bid invites against the target. If we hit it, we send more and we dial more. If we missed it, it’s one of four things: wrong properties, not enough of them, the message was off, or it didn’t land. We find which, fix it, and that’s what goes out today. You can follow it in the log, by signal and by channel.
When you leave, the domains and mailboxes are yours, and the call notes go with them.
What it costs
Starts as low as $2,999 a month, month to month, for the email program on domains you own. No setup fee, no minimum term.
The LinkedIn and calling layer is priced per program, based on how many properties a month your service area produces and how much of a person that needs. We’ll give you the number on the fit call. It’s a flat monthly figure, not per walkthrough and not per job.
If you’ve been paying a lead marketplace, compare what you spent last year against one service agreement.
Results
Those are software, logistics, and restaurant clients. We'll put a contractor number here the first time a contractor client lets us use their name.
Book a 15-minute fit call
Tell us your trade, your service radius, and who's doing follow-up today. We'll tell you whether we'd take the account, what the calling layer would cost at your volume, and, if it shouldn't be us, who to call instead.
Other ways we work with Commercial HVAC Contractors
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if you haven't picked a channel and want the qualification line and the walkthrough count first.
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if you just want the email and your estimators will make the calls.
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if you want to retarget the same owner and manager list with paid social while the sequence runs. Property managers are on Facebook every day, so the ads do real work in this trade.
Outbound Sales for other industries
Questions people ask us
Our office manager does the follow-up now. Why would we outsource it?
Because your office manager is also answering dispatch calls, and the follow-up is the first thing that stops when a truck breaks down. We do the part that has to happen every day. Your estimators do the part that requires standing on the roof.
Can whoever’s calling actually talk to a facilities director?
About the building, yes. About the equipment, at the level of “the 2008 permit says rooftop units, has anyone looked at them,” yes. Past that, they say “Ray’s the one who’d be out there, does Thursday work,” and book the walkthrough. A truthful handoff books more visits than a bluff.
We do residential too. Does this cover it?
No. The signals are commercial permits, commercial property transfers, and commercial storm paths, and the person we call is a property manager or an owner. If most of your revenue is residential, a homeowner lead program is a better use of the money.
Most of our work comes through GC bids. Does the call help there?
Yes. The permit often names the GC weeks before the sub list is built. The call to the GC’s project manager asks whether the mechanical sub has been picked, and if it hasn’t, you price it off the permit set and you’re on the list. The bid invite still comes through Procore or BuildingConnected. The call is how you get on it.
Is the storm call going to make us look like storm chasers?
It goes only to owners of buildings inside the recorded path, names the street, and asks whether anyone’s been up on the roof since. It doesn’t say the building was hit, because we don’t know. That’s a call from a local contractor. Calling every building in the zip code with a hail scare is what storm chasers do, and we don’t do it.
How long until the first walkthrough?
Usually weeks three to five. Sales and permits go fastest because the manager’s got a building and a date. The call speeds it up more than in most industries, because a lot of property managers meant to reply to the email and got pulled into something else.