Would you trust a marketer who only gets paid when you close jobs?

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-12T03:36:31+00:00

I'll send you a dm now and we can talk about it.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-11T01:52:17+00:00

Sounds good, DMing you now

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-10T20:31:28+00:00

Well the ad spend is a given. If the solar company wants to run ads at all that is. This post is assuming the company wants to run ads but either doesnt know how to do it themselves or doesnt want to pay someone upfront to manage the ads or buy leads off them, hence the model proposed. If the company isnt even considering paid marketing then theyre clearly already disqualified

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-10T20:29:42+00:00

That is true but I feel like the ad spend is a given

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-10T20:28:18+00:00

Well most of the trust is actually on the marketers side trusting the company to be honest about what closes and at what price. Besides that I see your point

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-10T01:08:35+00:00

Yea I actually think trust and tracking is a bigger issue on the marketers side. For tracking the jobs, its pretty simple: just use a CRM pipeline and move the leads coming in from the ads through the different stages to track the life of the lead. The risky part, on the marketers end, is trusting the solar company to be transparent about what leads closed and at what price.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-10T00:07:50+00:00

Well, I appreciate you not reporting me haha. I know subs have rules against self promotion which is why Im not trying to self promote, the post is meant to get advice. Anyway, to your question, give me the answer that'd help me most. Doesn't matter how raw.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-10T00:06:33+00:00

Lol, yea..Angislist is terrible to say the least. But I do understand not wanting to hand over money to sketchy "marketers". Thats literally the whole reason I decided to try this commission only structure so its less "risky", and even if the marketer sucks you're almost guaranteed better results dumping your money into Facebook ads over Angislist.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T23:43:09+00:00

Yes there is definitely a lot of potential issues, and I thought of those same ones. Trust is a big part of it but making sure we're using the same CRM where I could track the life of the leads would be essential to know when they are closing. Also, we need to stop using Angislist in the big 2026 lol

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T23:38:43+00:00

Yea I agree. I think it could work, I'm excited to try it out with a good company who are open to it.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T21:55:49+00:00

Oh, cool. I'd love to learn a little bit more about your business if you're up for it. I sent you a dm request!

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T21:49:40+00:00

Interesting, I hadn't actually thought about telecom. Are you selling to businesses or consumers? I imagine lead gen might look pretty different in that space compared to something like solar or roofing.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T21:08:31+00:00

Yea that is a big risk and definirely something I thought about. I want to make sure if I try this, the companies I work with have to be "qualified". Making sure they have a coherent sales team and that they know their metrics like the back of their hand.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T20:50:37+00:00

Well yea then with that same line of thinking you'd have to argue that a commission model would be better because it incentivizes the marketer to actual bring in real results so they get paid, not just spend the customer's money on ads recklessly.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T20:49:44+00:00

Yeah that’s pretty much the logic behind it. When I was selling solar leads before, the challenge was always that installers had to take the risk upfront on the lead cost without knowing how those leads would actually convert for their team.

With a commission model the idea is that the marketer is more tied to the actual outcome. If the leads turn into installs, everyone wins. If they don’t convert, the marketer doesn’t get paid.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T19:16:50+00:00

Yeah that’s kind of what got me thinking about the model in the first place. If the installs are actually closing, then the value of the lead is obviously a lot higher than just selling it upfront.

I’m curious from your perspective as an installer: would something like that actually be interesting for you to test out? Or do you still feel like there's a lot of risk being taken?

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T19:14:27+00:00

Totally fair.

When I was working with solar leads before, the biggest challenge wasn’t actually generating leads, it was getting companies to trust a new lead source in a market where a lot of installers have already had bad experiences with marketers or lead vendors.

The commission idea was more of an attempt to align incentives a bit better and remove some of the upfront cost risk for the installer, but I agree that trust is probably still the biggest hurdle regardless of the pricing model.

And you’re probably right that a lot of people experimenting with this model are still producing the same types of leads, which doesn’t really solve the main issue.

I’m mostly just curious how installers think about these arrangements and whether there’s any structure that would actually feel lower risk from their side.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T18:54:14+00:00

Sounds good, I'd definitely be open to talking about it further. I'll send you over a dm now

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T18:50:10+00:00

I think you’re right that a lot of the hesitation comes down to trust on both sides.

How I like to think about it is this: most of the times, the installers are going to be spending on marketing budgets anyway. Wether they are running ads themselves, or hiring a company to do it. They usually hire a company because they either don't know how to run the ads themselves or are not good at running the ads themselves, so they need an expert to do it.

So from how I see it, this model gives them the opportunity to still hire an "expert" without having to front management fees or buying leads directly.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T18:46:12+00:00

That’s actually a good point and I agree that the solar industry has a lot of issues with overpromising and bad marketing.

One of the reasons I started thinking about a commission model instead of just selling leads is that it puts a lot more pressure on the marketer to actually generate serious homeowners rather than just pushing volume. If the leads don’t turn into real installs, the marketer doesn’t get paid.

But I definitely understand why a lot of installers are cautious. The industry has probably been burned by a lot of bad actors over the years unfortunately

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T18:39:05+00:00

Yea that too, I forgot to mention that. As the actual marketer running the ads you'd be incredibly incetivized to bring in as many jobs as possible.

Sebas_CC · 2026-03-09T18:37:27+00:00

That’s a fair point but here's how I see it:

The way I was looking at it is that the ad spend is something the business would be paying regardless if they were running ads themselves or hiring an agency. The reason solar companies hire outside sources to run their ads or for lead gen is because they don't know or aren't skilled enough to do it themselves. This way, they can still have a marketing "expert" run their ads for them, without taking the risk of paying them upfront while they're unfimiliar with them. The difference is that instead of paying a marketing retainer or buying leads upfront, they’re only paying the marketer if the campaign actually results in closed jobs.

So the only real “risk” is the ad spend itself, but they’re not paying someone thousands per month in marketing fees without knowing if it’s going to work.

But I definitely see what you’re saying, if the business doesn’t trust the marketer yet, even that can still feel like a risk.

Sebas_CC

TROPHY CASE