Work Case study
The sales system before the first sales hire
Steel & Acre, a tech forward company selling engineered steel buildings, had one founder answering every inquiry, writing every quote and chasing every follow up. In two weeks we built the system a first salesperson would inherit, and the first lead from paid ads came in on day 6.
- IndustryConstruction
- TeamFounder led
- TimelineTwo weeks
- Site live
- Day 1
- First lead from paid ads
- Day 6
- Open quoted pipeline, two weeks
- $240K
- Buyers in the pipeline
- 28
01 / Starting point
One founder, every deal, no system
Steel garages, workshops and carports, installed in 24 states. Buildings cost $5,000 to $25,000, and buyers compare several sellers.
On day one
- No website or quote form
- No tracking or ad pixel
- No pipeline or CRM routine
- Every deal lived in the founder’s head
Rules to work inside
- No prices on the company’s website
- No online price estimator
- The manufacturer is never named in marketing
So the site couldn’t show a price. It had to earn a quote request.
02 / The first week
What happened, day by day
- Day 1
Site live
Product pages, buyer guides, a quote form and a lead endpoint, built and hosted the same day.
- Day 2
Tracking on
An ad pixel firing on quote requests and call taps, plus website visitor identification.
- Day 3
First quote sent
A written quote and a picture of the building. Community posts and marketplace listings started.
- Day 4
A silent leak fixed
The spam filter was dropping real leads that the browser autofilled. Now every lead is saved and flagged.
- Day 5
Search and lead ads live
Google search in six focus states, the Facebook campaign rebuilt around leads, three retargeting audiences.
- Day 6
First lead from paid ads, $1.89
A quote request through the new lead campaign. The sales playbook was written the same day.
03 / The turning point
The ads worked, the form didn’t
Before
- Campaign bought clicks
- Quote form sat below the first screen
- Nobody scrolled to find it
After
- Campaign bought leads
- Form on the first screen, photo above it
- First lead from paid ads arrived the next day, at $1.89
The campaign goal and the page changed together, and one lead is too few to credit either change. $1.89 is the cost of that first lead, not an average cost per qualified lead.
Lesson: look at what buyers do on the page before you change the ad.
04 / Channels
Demand from more than one place
Test a few channels, keep what works, cut the rest. Elsewhere that means LinkedIn, events, partners and outbound.
Google search
Six focus states, phrase match, 91 negative keywords.
Meta lead ads
Optimized for quote requests, photos matched to each audience.
Retargeting
Site visitors and people who reached the quote page but didn’t send it.
Marketplace
33 listings across Texas cities, with real photos of each model.
Community groups
Boat, ATV and homestead groups kept the posts. Large buy and sell groups didn’t.
Referrals and print
A referral program and partner one pager, plus yard sign, postcard and flyer.
05 / Sales system
Turning a lead into a conversation
Week one ended with 11 buyer conversations and 4 written quotes, from paid ads, search, listings, groups and referrals together.
Where deals leaked
- A first reply that took five and a half hours
- Replies that asked the buyer nothing
- Follow ups that only sent a website link
- A price before anyone asked what the building was for
The playbook that fixed it
- Reply within minutes
- One question per message
- Use, ground and location before price
- One quote for their address, walked through on a call
- Follow up on day 1, 3, 7 and 14
- Log every lead the day it arrives
06 / The handoff
What a first sales hire would inherit
Everything a new salesperson needs on day one, in one place.
Who to sell to
Focus regions, buyer types and the questions that qualify them.
Leads that arrive
Search, lead ads and retargeting already running and measured.
No dropped leads
Every request saved, alerted and checked daily.
A written playbook
First reply, discovery, quoting, the call and follow up.
A CRM routine
Every lead logged the day it arrives, with clear stages.
Real conversations
11 buyer threads from week one, reviewed for what worked.
A first salesperson should start with a system, not a blank page.
07 / Where it stands
Results so far
Hiring your first salesperson?
We build the system first, so they walk into real conversations.