- Send one enquiry the way a stranger would, through the form, the phone or the email address on your site. Don’t tell the team.
- Write down when you sent it, when each reply lands, who sent it and what it said.
- Do it again after hours. Fix the biggest gap before you spend another dollar on ads.
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You can’t fix what you can’t see. So before we look at ads, rankings or the website, we try to buy from the business the way a real customer would, and write down what happens.
You can run the same test yourself. It takes ten minutes to set up, then a week of noting what comes back. Rather we ran it? It’s the first thing we do in the Growth Audit.
Pick the way in
Use the route a new customer would find: the enquiry form on your website, the number on your Google Business Profile, or the email address in your footer. Test one route at a time, so you know which one let you down.
Use a name, number and email nobody in the business would recognise. And don’t warn anyone. The point is to see what a stranger gets on an ordinary day.
Send it and start the clock
Ask what a real customer would ask, with enough detail for someone to quote: the job, the suburb, when you need it done. Note the time you sent it, to the minute.
Then keep a log for the next week. Every reply, every follow-up, every missed call back.
| Touch | Time | Channel | From | What it said |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 First reply | __:__ | Call, text or email | Name, or no name | A price? A next step? A time? |
| 02 Second touch | __:__ | Did they chase, or did you? | ||
| 03 Third touch | __:__ | Still trying, or gone quiet? |
Ring it out
Call during business hours and let it ring. Note what happens: someone answers, it goes to voicemail, a text comes back, or nothing. Then call again after 5pm, when nobody’s watching the phone.
Space the tests out. Two enquiries from the same number on the same day gets noticed, and then you’re testing a team that knows it’s being tested.
Read it like a customer
Now read the replies as if you were the one with the leaking roof. Would you book on the strength of that reply? Was there a price, a next step or a time? If you had to chase, so will your customers, and not all of them will.
- Did anyone reply at all?
- How long did the first reply take?
- Did the reply give you a next step?
- Did anyone follow up without being asked?
Fix the biggest gap first
If nothing came back after hours, start there. If replies came fast but said nothing useful, fix the reply before you spend more on Google Ads. And if every route worked, good: test again next quarter, because staff, numbers and forms change.
Every fix on this list is part of Growth Systems: marketing that brings in customers, all in your name.