Check one: does it count calls?
For a service business where most enquiries are phone calls, a report covering only form submissions is describing the smaller half of your leads — and it makes every channel that mainly produces calls look weak.
If calls are absent, that is the first thing to fix, and it changes every conclusion drawn so far.
Check two: do the conversions match reality?
Compare last month's reported conversions against enquiries you actually received.
If the report says forty and you remember eleven, something is wrong — usually tracking firing on page load rather than on submission, which counts every visitor as a conversion.
This single comparison catches the most common reporting failure there is.
Check three: submit a real enquiry
Go to your own website and submit one. Then call your own number from a mobile.
Check within a day that both appear where they should. Five minutes, and a surprising number of setups fail it.
Check four: what comparison is being used?
Month against previous month hides a longer decline and rewards seasonality.
Ask for twelve months, and for the same month last year. A business that looks up on last month and down on last year is being shown the flattering half.
Check five: is branded search counted as success?
People searching your business name were already coming — from a referral, a van, a previous job.
Counting those as marketing wins overstates results, particularly for search work. Ask for branded and non-branded separately.
Check six: could this report have looked bad?
The most useful question available. If the only version of a bad month is the same charts rising slightly less, the report cannot fail — and a report that cannot fail cannot inform anything.
Check seven: is anything negative ever reported?
Real months contain setbacks: a page that did not work, a campaign cut, a mistake. A report that has never contained one has been edited.
A provider willing to say what they got wrong is worth more than one producing forty polished pages.
The uncomfortable possibility
Sometimes reporting is vague because the data genuinely does not exist. Nobody set up call tracking, nobody records which enquiries closed, so there is nothing else to report.
That is a fixable problem rather than a dishonest one — and it is worth establishing which you have before assuming the worst.
What to ask for
Enquiries by source including calls, and cost per booked job by source. If the answer is that the data does not exist, that is the real finding, and it can be fixed within a month.
Getting yours checked
Bring your last report to a call on 832-338-2926 and we will go through what it does and does not tell you.
Frequently asked questions
What is the quickest check?
Compare last month's reported conversions against enquiries you actually received. If the report says forty and you remember eleven, tracking is probably firing on page load rather than submission.
Why does branded search inflate results?
People searching your business name were already coming — from a referral, a van, a previous job. Counting them as marketing wins overstates results, especially for search work.
What comparison should I ask for?
Twelve months, and the same month last year. Month against previous month hides longer declines and rewards seasonality.
What if the data simply does not exist?
That is a fixable problem rather than a dishonest one. Call tracking and a record of which enquiries closed can both be in place within a month.