Angi Pro Leads

Home Advisor is an effective way to fill gaps in your schedule, but it can be expensive. Lead prices have increased over the past year, and we receive more and more leads that do not answer, claim they never submitted a request, or are completely manufactured leads. Over the past month we have received at least a dozen leads with fake names, addresses, and invalid contact info. Also included in that number are many people with no idea how we received their info, and those who say they are just trying to figure out how Home Advisor works and do not need projects completed. Requesting credits for such leads should be simple, but often the credit requests are denied, despite being completely useless or obviously fake. If they worked as hard at protecting contractors as they do protecting customers we would use their lead service more often than we do now. For the most part we try to use it sparingly because we may take 10 leads in a week and only be able to make contact with half. The prevalence of fake leads has caused tremendous frustration, and that is only exacerbated by the fact that in most cases I am still responsible for paying on a lead who has a nonexistent address, or no interest in even setting up an estimate when it is a real person submitting a request. In volume the service will work okay, but if you’re a small company trying to spend a few dollars a week on leads, it may be a waste of your money.

HomeAdvisor is a great tool, but a poor customer service tool. Many times you may receive great leads, but majority of them will not be worth the money. Their rules to getting credit back for bad leads is ever changing, and is like pulling teeth. I have paid more money than I would like to count on leads which I begged to get money back it felt like knowing I was in the right. This is a good starter tool, but remember to turn your leads off and accept opportunities ONLY as they come. This will stop most of the financial bleeding. It has however helped me grow, but I am disappointed by how I have been treated in this short time with them. I pray this company can find a better way such as their competitor “Thumbtack”. I can at least see what I am getting into before I choose to fight for the lead, and only pay once the customer chooses me. There is no scrapping between contractors, because the lead will be just yours if chosen. Meaning I don’t pay for a lead I won’t get! HomeAdvisor......I hope you can fix your system, because the potential can be great, but also a NIGHTMARE for new businesses. Please do better by your loyal contractors like myself, and vet the customers needs better before giving them out to be fought over.

response required

When I signed up I was told since I was an Angie’s List A Rated Contractor for the last 6 years they would merge all my reviews and promised a lot of things just to get me to sign up! I asked about the sales manager that I spoke to would always be there for me and my company if we ever needed her and trying to get her on the phone is almost impossible. As far as the leads go they are super expensive and we are constantly fighting to get a credit for the leads that are no good or even talk to a customer. Half of the calls we receive from the Home Advisor 800 number are dead (Pick the phone up and nobody is there and the call disconnected) if they fix those issues I would be a lot happier. I don’t like to have to spend money on leads that are no good and then pay my office manager to spend 2 hours a day trying to get us a credit! We are probably charged $500-$1000 more a month than what we should pay. Its been 6-8 months and still never had our reviews transferred as promised. We have went back and forth threw emails to where I was told that if I give her my login information and password to my Angie’s List account she would transfer the reviews and then the next day I received an email about how she has to have some IT guy take a look and that it might not work and now we will not get the reviews transferred if they can’t figure it out! Funny because they own Angie’s List. Just be ready to pay $1500-$2000 at minimum and you are on your own as far as the rest goes.

The app works great! I have no qualms with the app. HomeAdvisor as a company is awful. I would say that 4 in 10 leads aren’t actual jobs. Some of those will be other contractors “testing the system.” Some will be disgruntled contractors putting in fake requests. Some of the leads are just shoppers that don’t even want you to come out for a free estimate. “Can’t you just give me a quote over the phone?” Sometimes, these leads are new contractors trying to figure out what to charge. If you’re a sole proprietorship and you don’t have someone available to reach out to the lead immediately, you’ll have a difficult time competing with those who do. Also, you’ll get a lead that costs $30+ but it’s a really small project that you could only charge $30 for, then you would actually lose money on if you do it. They don’t do any sort of vetting. They do have a way to request a credit when you encounter the “bad” lead but, if you ask for all the ones you deserve you’ll spend more time on the phone complaining to them, again not working and losing even more money. I’ve heard of people having great success with HomeAdvisor but, that’s not the case for the owner/operator. The membership fees and the cost of the leads aren’t worth it, in my opinion.

response required

I’m getting tired of paying for leads that I don’t serve. I am specifically a “Geothermal HVAC” installer. I get leads for boilers, swimming pool heaters, no one returns the followup call (or e-mail), or people who don’t really want an installation they just have questions, etc... I’m getting fed up with the unfriendly way Home Advisor deals with lead credit requests! First of all- you can’t find where to go to ask for it. Then it is an automated process that does not allow for selections that apply and get instantly rejected. If I need a person to talk to who can review and is authorized to make a decision. Typically the response is no credit is forthcoming because it’s a valid lead... when the client themselves apologize for costing me $23-$92 and they know they aren’t a lead or worse yet... HmAdv says they takes to the customer when we couldn’t get a response and so we still need to pay. I have 5 in the past couple months. Because of the unfriendly methods for credit request I’m not getting my refunds. As the business owner I am becoming increasingly angry with Home Advisor processes and am at the verge of abandoning the service after a long relationship that has never been better than moderately happy to more often feeling taken advantage of every month or two. StephenVW