If the website is where a lead is captured, the CRM is where it is remembered. In a heating company the CRM decides whether a missed call is returned, whether a $12,000 boiler quote is chased after a week of silence, and whether the ad accounts ever find out which campaigns produced sold jobs. We set it up as the record layer that the rest of the stack reads from.
What the record layer is
It is one record per customer, with every enquiry, quote and job attached to it. Each record answers four questions at any moment: where did this lead come from, what stage is it at, who owns the next step, and what is it worth?
Those four fields are what the other layers need. Ads need source and value. Review requests need stage. Your office needs owner. Without them, the CRM is just a digital address book.
Who it is for
This service suits heating companies where leads arrive from several places (calls, website, Google Business Profile, Local Services Ads, referrals) and nobody can say with confidence how many were lost last month. It is especially useful for companies that sell replacements, because replacement quotes are large, slow and easy to forget.
It also suits owners whose CRM was set up for dispatch and invoicing only. Many field-service tools handle the job well once it is booked but know nothing about the marketing that produced it.
What's included
- Pipeline design. Stages that reflect heating work: new enquiry, contacted, assessment booked, quote sent, sold, installed, invoiced, reviewed. Service calls and maintenance get a shorter path.
- Source capture. Tracked calls, texts and website emails create or update records with the source already filled in.
- Missed-call follow-up. A missed call gets a text within minutes and a callback task for the office.
- Quote follow-up. Reminders at set intervals after a quote goes out, with a task for a person to call before it goes cold.
- Job value and status sync. Sold and invoiced values are sent back to Google Ads and Meta so bidding can learn from revenue.
- Review trigger. When a job moves to "invoiced", the review layer is told to send a request.
- Office training. Short, recorded walkthroughs so new staff learn the same process.
Timeline
Most CRM integrations take three to six weeks. Week one is pipeline design and field mapping. Weeks two and three connect calls, website and texts. Weeks three to five connect the ad accounts and review trigger. The last week is training and a check on live leads. A migration from one CRM to another adds time, mostly for cleaning old records.
How results are measured
We report on what the record layer controls:
- Response time: median minutes from enquiry to first human contact
- Missed-call recovery: share of missed calls that were reached back the same day
- Quote-to-sold rate: by system type and by source
- Record completeness: share of leads with a source, a stage and a value
A worked example shows why this matters. If your office sends 40 replacement quotes a month, closes 30% of them, and the average sold job is $8,000, that is $96,000 in monthly sales. Raise the close rate to 36% with steady follow-up and the same 40 quotes produce $115,200. Nothing changed in the ads.
Mistakes to avoid
- Too many stages. If staff have to choose between eleven stages, they'll pick one at random. Eight is plenty.
- Optional source fields. Make the source required or filled automatically. Optional fields stay empty.
- Automating messages without consent. Texts and emails to leads and customers must follow Canada's anti-spam law. The CRTC's CASL guidance explains consent, identification and unsubscribe rules; we keep automation to people who contacted you or are your customers.
- No owner for stale quotes. Automation reminds; people close. Every quote needs a named person.
Going deeper
For teams that want hands-on training in a specific CRM, our sister site HVACCRM.ca covers setup and office training in more depth. For the dollar value of each fix, see the stack math guide. To talk about your own pipeline, call, text or email, or read about pricing first.
Frequently asked questions
Which CRM do you recommend for a heating company?
We don't push a brand. The right CRM is the one your office will actually use that can also record lead source, job status and job value and pass them to other tools. If your current system can do that, we keep it.
Will this change how my office books jobs?
A little. Stages and a few required fields get added so that every lead is recorded the same way. We keep the changes to what the stack needs and train your team on them.
What follow-up do you set up?
Typically a same-day text and call for missed calls, a reminder sequence for quotes that haven't been accepted, and maintenance reminders for past customers. Every message is sent only to people who contacted you or are already your customers.
Is this included in a plan?
CRM integration is part of the HVAC.Agency Growth plan, alongside review generation and multi-channel ads. The pricing page explains what each plan includes.