How lead portals really work
ePoptávka, NejŘemeslníci, Wilio and similar sites all promise the same thing: “We have customers looking for a tradesman.” Sounds great. But the model is almost always the same: you pay up front (credits to see an inquiry, a monthly flat fee, on some portals a commission on the job as well) and only then do you find out whether anything comes of it.
And above all: the same inquiry you’ve just “bought” is seen by dozens of other firms too. The customer gets a pile of quotes within a single day. You spend an evening on an honest quote, and meanwhile they have picked whoever wrote the lowest number.
Three reasons it doesn’t work out
1. It’s a race to the bottom on price. The customer doesn’t know you. They haven’t seen your work and they haven’t heard a recommendation, so all they have in front of them is a list of numbers. The winner is whoever bids lowest, not whoever does honest work. Unless you want to “work for free”, you’re at a disadvantage from the start.
2. You pay for a chance, not for a job. You spend credit on every inquiry you reply to, including the ones where the customer has already decided elsewhere or never replies at all. Nobody gives that money and time back.
3. The best customers aren’t there. People who look for a tradesman through referrals and word of mouth don’t go to portals. Portals mainly attract people who are “just comparing prices”, and that’s exactly the game you can’t win on quality.
When a portal does make sense
To be fair: at the very start, when you have no customer base and no recommendations yet, a portal can bring the first jobs, and from them the first happy customers who recommend you on. But treat it as a temporary crutch, not a foundation. Once you have a few jobs behind you, every crown you put into your own visibility earns you more.
On a portal you compete with dozens of firms for the lowest price. On your own website you’re the only one the customer sees.
What works instead of portals
A Google Business Profile. Free, and done in an evening. When someone searches “plumber + your town”, a profile with reviews is the first thing they see. I’ve written up how to set one up in How to set up your Google Business Profile.
Your own website with photos of your work. A simple one-page site is enough: what you do, where you work, photos of finished jobs, fair prices and a big “Call” button. A customer who comes this way has chosen you directly: no competition, no credits, no commission. What exactly a tradesman’s website should do is in A website for tradesmen: how to turn it into a source of jobs.
Recommendations that keep working. A website and a profile don’t clash with recommendations, quite the opposite. A happy customer recommends you to a friend, the friend googles you… and if they find a website with photos and reviews, they call. If they find nothing, they’ll call someone else instead.
What it costs compared with a portal
A one-page website from me costs CZK 5,900 as a one-time payment, with no monthly fees, no credits, and it’s entirely yours. That’s less than a year of flat fees and credits on some of those portals. The difference: the website works for you alone and nobody can switch it off. More on the websites for tradesmen page.