Lesson B201.3 · Business Finance 201: Grow Without Breaking
Leads: eight ways to get them
5-minute read · Figures checked October 2026
Photo: NAVFAC / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
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The short answer
Alex Hormozi's $100M Leads lists eight ways to get leads: warm outreach, cold outreach, content, paid ads, referrals, employees, agencies and affiliates. A local pavement contractor doesn't need all eight. Pick two that fit your customers, work them every week, and track what each one costs per customer. Before you send a marketing text, get the customer's written consent.
The eight methods, in pavement work
| Method | What it looks like for a local contractor |
|---|---|
| Warm outreach | Call past customers before the season; check in with property managers you've worked for |
| Cold outreach | Hand flyers around the blocks near today's job; call churches, schools and HOA boards |
| Content | Before-and-after photos, short videos on why cracks get filled before winter, answers to common questions |
| Paid ads | Local search ads, social media ads, postcards to the neighborhoods you already serve |
| Referrals | Ask every happy customer who else needs work, and thank the people who send it |
| Employees | An office person who follows up on every estimate; crews who hand a card to a curious neighbor |
| Agencies | A marketing firm that runs your ads or website under a written scope |
| Affiliates | Other businesses that serve your customers: paving, concrete, snow and ice, pressure washing |
Warm outreach and referrals are the cheapest place to start, because these people already know your work. Cold outreach and paid ads reach new people, but they take more tries per job. With affiliates, put any referral fee in writing and be open about it with customers. Check your city's rules on handing out flyers and soliciting before a crew walks a neighborhood. Keep flyers out of mailboxes; federal law fines anyone who leaves mail without postage in one.
Texts and calls: get consent first
Federal rules treat a text message as a call. Before you send marketing texts, or make marketing calls that use an autodialer or a recorded or AI voice, get the customer's written consent. If a customer ever disputes it, you have to prove you had consent, so keep the record with the date. The National Do Not Call Registry's protections cover texts too.
The simple way: put an unchecked box next to the phone number on your estimate request form and on the signed estimate, in plain words: "Yes, you may send me marketing texts, including automated texts, at this number. Agreeing isn't required to buy anything. I can reply STOP at any time." Don't make it a condition of getting the work done. When someone replies STOP, stop that day and note it. Keep job texts, like arrival times and invoices, about the job; don't slip offers into them. Never text a bought list. Some states add their own rules, so have an attorney look over a text campaign before you start one.
Track every lead to see what works
A lead tracker can be a notebook or a spreadsheet. For each lead, write the date, the name, how they found you, the service, whether you sent an estimate, and whether they signed. Then compare methods by cost per customer as well as cost per lead.
Example (made-up numbers): Ray tried two methods this spring.
| Method | Spent | Leads | Jobs signed | Cost per lead | Cost per customer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Postcards | $600 | 12 | 3 | $50 | $200 |
| Referral thank-you cards | $100 | 5 | 4 | $20 | $25 |
Swipe the table sideways to see every column.
Cost per lead = money spent ÷ leads. Cost per customer = money spent ÷ jobs signed. The postcards brought more calls, but each signed job cost eight times as much. That doesn't mean Ray drops postcards. It tells him what each new customer from that method costs, so he can decide with numbers.
Then set a weekly number you control: 15 past customers called, two posts with job photos, or flyers on every block around each job.
Your Move
Do this week
- Pick two of the eight methods that fit your customers.
- Set one weekly number for each, like 15 past-customer calls and two job-photo posts.
- Start the Lead tracker: date, name, source, service, estimate sent, signed or not.
- Add a written consent line to your estimate request form before you send any marketing texts.
Log it: Two lead methods and a weekly number.
Common questions
What's the cheapest way to get sealcoating customers?
Usually warm outreach and referrals: calling past customers and asking happy ones who else needs work. Track it anyway, because a lead only counts once it becomes a customer.
Can I text past customers about spring crack repair?
Get their written consent to marketing texts first, and stop as soon as anyone asks. Federal rules treat a text as a call, and automated marketing texts need written consent.
Should I hire a marketing agency?
Maybe, once you know your numbers. Get a written scope, keep ownership of your ad accounts, website and customer data, and judge the agency by your cost per customer.
Watch out for
- Bought phone lists and mass texts sent without consent.
- Personal payments to a property manager or board member for steering an owner's work to you. It can be illegal, and the owner never agreed to it.
- Agencies that won't give you access to your own ad accounts or data.
- Lead services that sell the same request to several contractors. Ask before you pay.
Free help
- America's SBDC: Find Your SBDC for free business consulting
- SCORE: Free business mentoring
Free practice
Lesson check
5 questions on this lesson, one at a time, with the answer and the reason after each. Pass with 4 right, including every must-know question.
This is general education, not tax, legal, investment or insurance advice. Rules change and every situation is different. Check the sources below, and talk to a qualified professional before you act on it.
Sources
- Acquisition.com: Affiliate Black Book
- Federal Communications Commission: FCC Fact Sheet: Combatting Illegal Text Messages (November 22, 2023)
- Federal Communications Commission: Implications of Artificial Intelligence Technologies on Protecting Consumers from Unwanted Robocalls and Robotexts, Declaratory Ruling FCC 24-17 (February 8, 2024)
- eCFR: 47 CFR 64.1200, Delivery restrictions (prior express written consent)
- Legal Information Institute: 18 U.S. Code § 1725, Postage unpaid on deposited mail matter
- America's SBDC: Find Your SBDC
- SCORE: Free Business Mentoring, Workshops & Resources
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