Lead routing rules for a small service business

Lead routing means deciding what happens next to each inquiry, based on what it says. These six steps work for any small service business that answers its own website inquiries.

Who is this for?#

This is for a business where the same few people do the work and answer the inquiries. Think of a plumber, a design studio, a wedding venue, or a small software team. Inquiries arrive faster than anyone can read them. Some need a call today. Some can book a time next week. Some are not a fit, and those people deserve to hear that quickly.

You should already know what makes an inquiry worth your time. If you do not, start with the guide to qualifying leads from your contact form. It covers the questions and the scoring. Routing is the step after scoring. It turns a number into an action.

You do not need a sales team or special sales software to use routing rules. You need a short list of replies you can really give. You also need a way to decide which inquiry gets which reply.

What is a lead routing rule?#

A lead routing rule is a written instruction. It says: when an inquiry scores in this range, do this. Each rule has three parts.

1. Where it starts. The lowest score that puts an inquiry on this rule, like 70.
2. What the visitor is offered. A call, a time to book, a promise to follow up, or a polite no.
3. Who hears about it. The person or place that is told the inquiry arrived.

Rules work because you decide them once, before any inquiry arrives. Nobody has to judge each inquiry in a hurry. Two inquiries with the same answers get the same next step, whoever is working that day.

A routing rule is not the same as a lead score. The score says how well an inquiry fits your work. The rule says what to do about it. You can change a rule without changing the score, and the other way around.

Step 1: Which replies can your business really give?#

List every next step you can honestly offer. Do this before you think about scores. For most small service businesses the list is short.

• Call the visitor back right away.
• Offer the soonest open time in your calendar.
• Offer any open time this week or next.
• Say someone will be in touch, and then do it.
• Say kindly that the job is not a fit.

Cross out anything you cannot keep up. A promise of a call within the hour only works if someone is free to make that call. If the owner is on a roof all morning, a time to book is the more honest offer.

Here is the check for this step. For each reply, write the name of the person who gives it. A reply with no name beside it is not a rule yet.

Step 2: How do you turn those replies into rules?#

Put the replies in order. Start with the one you most want to give. End with the one you give least gladly. Each reply becomes one rule. The top rule is for inquiries you would drop everything for. The bottom rule is for inquiries you cannot help.

In Qualiform the score puts each inquiry on one of five rules, from called right away down to politely turned away. The reason is written onto the inquiry. So you can see why an inquiry landed where it did.

Keep the number of rules small. Every extra rule is one more reply to write and one more cut-off to set. If two rules lead to the same action, join them into one.

Step 3: Where should each rule start?#

Set the score where each rule begins. Start with the top rule, because it costs you the most time. Ask yourself: how good does an inquiry have to be before I would call right away?

The answer depends on the trade. A design studio may want a large budget and a clear plan before it books a call. A plumber may want to call anyone with a burst pipe inside the service area, however small the job.

Then set the bottom rule. Ask yourself: below what score is this clearly not a job for us? Everything between the top and bottom gets the middle rules.

Write down each cut-off with one sentence about why. "70, because an urgent job in our area is worth a call even when it is small" is a rule you can check later. "70, because it felt right" is not.

Step 4: Who should hear about each inquiry?#

Decide who is told about each inquiry, and how. The top rule usually needs someone told at once. The bottom rule may need nobody told at all.

In Qualiform this is on the Routing tab, under Who hears about new leads. A form with nobody to tell still saves every inquiry. But someone has to remember to go and look. Set this up before you send anyone to the form.

Match the alert to the rule. An inquiry that should get a call in minutes needs an alert that reaches a phone. That could be a Slack alert or an email someone really watches. An inquiry that can book its own time can wait until someone reads it in the morning.

In Qualiform each rule can tell its own people. A rule with nobody named tells everyone under Email recipients.

Step 5: What should each rule say to the visitor?#

Write the closing line for each rule in plain words. The visitor reads this line at the end of the conversation. It should say exactly what happens next.

• For a call: say who will call and about when.
• For a booking: say what the meeting is for and how long it lasts.
• For a follow-up: say when the visitor will hear back.
• For a no: thank them, and say kindly that it is not a fit.

In Qualiform the AI is told what to offer, never why. When a rule offers a time, the AI says your closing line exactly as you wrote it. If your form books with your scheduling link, the AI puts the link beside it. No time is offered to anybody until you save the Booking tab once. Until then, a rule that offers a time says you'll be in touch instead. A rule that offers times can use your own hours, or your own scheduling link instead.

Keep this honest. Never tell someone a call is coming unless a person will make it.

Step 6: How do you test the rules before going live?#

Try every rule once, as a visitor would, before anyone else does. Check that each closing line reads well. Check that each rule offers what you meant it to offer.

In Qualiform, Preview has an Endings button for each rule on your Routing tab that is switched on. Each button shows that rule's closing. Press Save first, or the preview will not have your changes.

A preview sends nothing. No email, Slack message, or connection goes out. To see those arrive, put the form on your own site and have the conversation there once.

What does a set of routing rules look like in practice?#

Here is an example for a small plumbing business. The questions, points, and cut-offs below are only an example. They are not Qualiform's defaults.

Example scoring (out of 100)

Example routing rules

Say a visitor two towns away has a slow drip. They get 30 points for the job and 10 for timing, and none for location. That is 40, so they are offered a time this week, and only the office inbox hears about it. If you would rather not go that far, you can set "out of the area" to turn people away. Then they get the kind note instead, whatever else they said.

What are the common mistakes?#

• Promising a call nobody can make. A top rule that says "we will call you now" fails the first afternoon nobody is free.
• Too many rules. Five replies that differ by one word confuse your team and the visitor.
• No one named for an alert. The inquiry is saved, but nobody reads it for days.
• Setting cut-offs once and never again. A score that meant "worth a call" in a quiet month may not in a busy one.
• A cold bottom rule. People who are not a fit still took the time to write. Thank them, and point them somewhere useful if you can.
• Skipping the test. A closing line that looks fine in the editor can read oddly at the end of a real conversation.

When is this not worth doing?#

Routing rules help most when inquiries arrive faster than one person can read them. If a business gets two or three inquiries a week, the owner can read each one and decide. A written rule adds little there.

Rules also matter less when every inquiry gets the same reply anyway. If you call everyone back, one alert to your phone does the job.

Rules also cannot fix a score that measures the wrong thing. If the questions miss what really decides a job, routing only sends the wrong inquiries to the right places faster. Fix the questions first, using the guide to which questions a contact form should ask.

In Qualiform an inquiry is saved after every message, so a visitor who leaves partway still leaves what they said.

How do you know it is working?#

Read two weeks of inquiries. Next to each one, write the rule it landed on and what happened after. Look for two things. If you won a job that landed on a low rule, a cut-off or a weight is too strict. If you called an inquiry that went nowhere, the top rule starts too low. In Qualiform each inquiry carries a line saying why it landed on its rule. Change one number, then check the next two weeks again. To see how the score itself is built, read about lead scoring.