And these aren’t some crappy Angi’s List or Home Advisor leads that have been generated on a generic website and hounded by 5 other builders before you call them.
They’re genuine building inquiries from real people, who want to do significant projects, have been pre-sold on YOUR expertise and who want to work exclusively with YOU.
Even better, these people have explicitly told us they want to get started with a new build in 3-6 months.
Check this out:
“2x House & Land Packages Sold – $3,800 ad spend into $2.5m work” – Cam Diack
“Managed to get in 2 x $600k renovation/extension jobs, next door to each other and being built at the same time.” – John Dickson
“100k contract signed with a 25% margin Monday, received the deposit and started the job yesterday. Good week for me comparing it to before I started. Thanks guys!” – PhiII Smith
"Massive shout out to Cameron Upton for his efforts on the marketing front! to be honest i was skeptical at first as we've been burned before with 'marketing'.. but after just 1 week we've had 5 enquiries for potential work! cheers mate I'm still buzzing"
Ben Emery
"We had a flood of 32 leads this month"
Mark Ward
"Had 5 leads from the new campaign - and the best bit - one of those leads is PAYING me to do a quote & kitchen renovation design"
Alan Macaulay
"Finally going on honeymoon is my win of the month, jobs are running smoothly. Won a new job that came through the lead generation from Cam."
Anthony Awkar
"8 leads through this week thanks to Cam, awesome setup. Soooo stoked going into this weekend!!"
Cameron Diack
Ok, enough preamble. Let’s get to it.
Let me share my screen and actually SHOW you how this “Elite Project Engine” ACTAULLY works.
And, while that might not look like much, it really holds the secret to dominating your local area with online advertising in 2023. And here’s why…
How many times have you heard from a prospect…
“I just want to know how much this is going to cost me.”?
It’s literally the number one thing people who are building a house want to know, right?
And most builders make them jump through a whole heap of hoops to get an answer, because it’s not a straightforward question. I mean you have to chat to them about their requirements, go through a site visit and then cost-out the whole project to prepare a quote. It’s a massive job for you and a massive commitment for the client – I mean, they basically have to marry you as their builder before they even have a ballpark for how much it’s gonna cost. It’s intimidating. And it is costing you leads… let alone the hours it takes to figure out what they want
So I came up with this little Instant Estimate system here…
And even though it looks simple, it took me 9 months to put together.
But essentially people can come through here and get an instant estimate on what their projects are going to cost—as a ballpark – with you as their builder.
I went through and did all the math and it’s all custom and tailored to each company and their pricing structure and the local area etc etc. So it’s quite a complex calculation.
But if you’re wondering how accurate it is… i’ve got a funny story actually:
Not long ago. I started working with a custom home builder in Monticello, Georgia.
I set this Instant Estimate system up for them and he basically said “oh, you’re probably about $40k off.”
And then I was like, “You sure? Maybe we should go through the answers again”?</mark
So we went through the submitted answers…
And he was like “Oh, no, there was a basement included… I didn’t see that… this price is actually bang on, exactly what we would have priced it for.”
I’ve even had Quantity Surveyors say how bang on this thing is. [quote].
So it was a horrible, horrible part of my life getting this thing to work. I’ve spent the better part 6-9 months going through estimating software and working out ratios and prices and all that kind of stuff.
But, it was worth it, because it’s now super accurate and it’s been revolutionary when it comes to generating high-quality inquiries online.
Ok, so our prospect has clicked your ad, and they get to this very visual and very fast flowing questionnaire with the promise of an “Instant Estimate”.
And there’s actually a lot of psychology in play here with the way this is designed because people who are in motion are more likely to stay in motion. I mean, you can see why, it kinda sucks you in. It’s almost like a game.
Anyway, as they’re clicking through, we’re asking them all the details about their build. like what style of home? Have you got a single story or double? What kind of build, right? Obviously it’s all branded to your business here so they know who they’re dealing with.
Postcode, right? I can fill this in. How many pages? Rooms, bathrooms, etc. Yada yada.
They can basically figure out exactly what they’re looking for.
And, in the background, this system is using all this information to calculate materials, and labour and square footage etc. and it’s filtering all that information through typical prices in YOUR area, to work out a ballpark price.
Pretty cool, right?
But, then you’ll notice that we get to here:
So we’ve kind of talked about the specifics of the home and what they’re looking to build.
And now we do a bit of a ninja move, and we jump to a different style of questions that are all about lead quality.
Okay, if someone says they’re after an “economy” build, you know they’re a cheap ass and you can probably exclude them. Or approach them differently.
Most people will choose “Standard”, a small portion of people will choose “Premium”. And again, this feeds into the estimate. And it also lets you know who the hottest leads are and who’s worth your time.
So, they’re kind of tapping away on this. It’s very easy to flow through. But now we’re moved into these qualification questions.
“I’m the authorized owner.”
But if they say they’re just gathering info or it’s gonna be 6-12 months before they get started, we push them to another page, which is like, “hey, just looks like you’re gathering info. Here’s some info”
Then we push them into this automated email and text follow up system so we stay front of mind while they get their ducks in a row and you dont need to spend the time speaking with them and answering all the FAQs right.
If they choose “as soon as possible” or “3-6 months”, we put them through a calendar – you can use something like Calendly or Schedule Once or we like to use our own customized system here.
Essentially you just send them to your calendar and say “book a consultation”.
So, pretty straightforward, right?
Well the benefit of this Instant Estimate is threefold:
So, check this out…
You might have noticed this whole thing is pretty ugly, right?
The reason for this is pretty funny – we actually tried to make it look pretty but the conversion rate dropped in half. Isn’t that crazy? Ugly actually works better.
And the reason we need conversion rate to be as high as possible is simple:
Remember I said the website will convert it under 1%?
Well, this is converting between 8 and 12%, consistently… with some longer term clients its sitting at 24%
But yeah, the average is converting at 10%.
And so what that means is, everyone else that’s competing against you, they’re only getting a 1% conversion rate or less.
So, even if you get the same amount of people to click your ads as everyone else, you’re converting 10 times the number of leads.
But in reality, clicks are a lot cheaper too – the average for this system is about $3.70. And that’s because you can say in your ad “get an instant online estimate” which is what people want – so you click through rate goes through the roof…
Google loves that you’re giving people a solution & makes your clicks cheaper because they want their users to find what they’re after. They dont care about you making a sale, its all about the user experience
And suddenly you are no longer competing on economics because essentially the cost is 10 times smaller for you than it is for all your competitors.
In other words, you can outspend them every day of the week!
And it’s all thanks to this Instant Estimate system.
Cool. So let’s quickly finish this off.
Have you selected a designer / architect
So, when they hit “submit” there’s a three second delay in here because there’s obviously a lot of math in the background that it’s got to go through.
And then they just click this button and it takes them through the next page.
And we say:
“Congratulations on taking the first step”. blah, blah, blah.
“Based on that, we’ve estimated your project to be around about this.
But, as there’s so many variables, just remember, this is just an estimate and should be finalized.
The best way to do that is to get professional advice.
And so we can get a plan together. Blah, blah blah. You can book a consultation on the right hand side here. Right. Choose a time that works.”
So when you’re positioning people this way, they feel like they’ve been understood. They feel like they’re getting personalised information – because they are. And they go, “oh great. This guy gets me and I have an understanding of what this is going to cost with this builder, so yeah, I’ll have a chat”.
If it’s way over their budget, no skin off your nose, they’ll just say “oh, that’s too much”. And you’ll know it’s not a good fit. And that’s not to say that you don’t want that lead, but it just means that you don’t have to talk to them right now. You send them to your automated follow up system. And it saves you a heap of time.
Ok, lets keep moving…
So after the estimate, all of those people come into the CRM (which is setup exactly for you) that looks like this…
And then we want to manually qualify them based on 5 key criteria. And I like to look at: Where they’re based – you want them in your area; when they want to get started – ideally it’s in the next 3-6 months; What level of build they’re looking for – again, it’s either standard or premium, any “economy” builds can go find someone else; and, of course, that they are the authorised owner of the home they’re looking to build – cause we only want to deal with decision makers.
If they’re good, we drag them into the “Qualified” bucket so we know to call them asap. And it they’re no good, we either throw in the bin if out of area, or wrong type of work or tag them if they look good but are not ready so they get sent to the automated nurture system.
And so, the goal here is to just getting two to three good leads out of 10…
I jump into one of these people, just top of the list here, you can see everything that they’ve filled out here at a glance.
You’ve got all of their information, what they’re looking for, right. So they’re looking for a standard quality, four bedrooms, three bathrooms, basement, 1-car garage 2,000 square foot.
And we have square meters as well, obviously. And so, sort of shapes that whole picture there.
And you know how to approach them when you speak to them on the phone. So, the last piece to this whole thing is when I mention quality.
When looking through the reporting, I don’t like to obviously look at how many leads and cost per lead. That’s one part of it.
But if you imagine all those guys that were paying $250 for a lead. They’re typically getting a name, email, a phone number and details of the project and that’s it.
So, now, with all of those people, they’re judging success based off cost per lead. But when they look at the leads, they don’t know who is qualified or not. So they might be paying $250 per lead but 9 out of 10 of them are junk. So it’s a false economy.
With this system, we can match that up with the ads manager and we can look through and see we had 28 of these leads that came through here. Then we can look and go, this one, this one, this one and this one are all marketing qualified.
This one and this one are no good. And it allows you to actually work out how much you’re paying per QUALIFIED lead.
Okay. Let’s just say that this one’s bad as well. We’ve got one, two, four, five, six, seven, ten leads, through. Cost per lead was $31. But when I got rid of the bad ones, our cost per qualified lead was close to $75.
See how that works?
Not only are you getting leads for a fraction of the cost of most builders, but they’re also hugely more qualified… they want bigger jobs… they have more money to spend… they’re ready to get started asap… and they already know, like and trust you to some extent.
So, let me ask you, based on what you’ve seen, do you think you could close 1 out of 10 of these guys that come through? Maybe 1 in 20?
Well, the guys I work with are closing an average of 12-22%. Now, obviously it varies from builder to builder, but on average, if they’re spending $75 per lead and closing 10%, that’s $750 in marketing spend for each new job won. Then if you consider that the average value of their jobs is in the hundreds of thousands of dollar range – you can see why they’re getting a crazy-good return on their marketing spend.
That’s why we call it the Quick Grab Strategy!
And I really want to highlight this Green section of the system because, it really is the secret sauce to this whole strategy. Once you get that going, you have a huge advantage. You have more cash coming into the business, more stability and you have more time and resources to invest in longer term marketing strategies that will actually build your brand over time.
Then there’s a whole heap of other proven marketing assets you can create.
You can build out this eBook funnel…
Which is designed to capture and convert the “Big Fish” building clients in your area who aren’t ready to build just yet but will be in the next 12 months.
And build out a world class website like this…
So, real quick, a good building website showcases your work, answers your customers 5 main concerns – like budget, timeline, communication, trustworthiness & quality of work This is how you really differentiate yourself and build your brand in the local area.
You can also “strap on” additional traffic sources to drive even more enquirers through this main qualification process. Like these social ads here:
As we’ve already touched on, the top 2-3 listings get the vast majority of free traffic, but it takes time and effort to get there – you need to get all your “on page” technical setup and content right, you need to build quality “authority links” to your website from other sites, you need to create a certain amount of good blog content, targeting the right keywords.
In other words, good SEO takes a lot of grunt work and a lot of time, but once it’s going, it’s essentially free money!
So the Quick Grab funnel really is designed to keep everything ticking along, and the cash coming into your business and your guys busy on profitable jobs – all while you build out longer term marketing assets to really establish your business.
Like these guys have…
"Website launched & got a new lead that same day. The same lead is also paying for my first preliminary budget"
Florin Barbu
"Been a good week. New marketing campaign last week and am fully loaded with 8 qualifying leads to visit"
Mark Taylor
"Have had really good leads through our geo-fencing campaign nice work Cameron Upton"
Mat Moore
"Just thought I'd share our win from this week. We put up our homeshow Houdini ad last night and have had 2 leads come through this morning, which we will qualify tomorrow. We've had no success with Facebook previously so we are stoked at having 2 leads come though in the 1st day. Thanks Cameron Upton, u da man!"
Scott Todd
"Cameron Upton and the team marketing is being put to the test tomorrow after a week of targeted ads I have 4 phone interviews with potential new leading hands/foreman. I got 0 leads on my own accord last time we did this. So dont catch yourself saying its dry out there for talent. Get onto Cam & the team... We are so impressed we have options. I will keep you posted.."
Michaela Papst
This 3-Step Elite Project Engine really is the most powerful system I’ve ever come across to generate business for building companies. And I wish there was more time on this video to talk you through all the nitty gritty details – but as I said at the beginning, you’re no doubt busy enough without having to worry about marketing.
So, instead of trying to learn this stuff for yourself, how would you like me to just do it all for you?
Right now, I’m looking for a few more builders to install this system inside their businesses.
My team and I will do absolutely everything to get this thing running – we’ll do everything to get your Elite Project Engine working quickly and generating leads for your business.
We’ll write all the copy, create your own custom Instant Estimate calculator, set up all the emails and text messages and all the technology to keep track of leads, and we’ll even run all the ads on your behalf.
And then, once that’s working and you have a steady flow of qualified inquiries, we’ll even create for you a world class website, we’ll build out a Facebook funnel and ebook and even work on your SEO so you start ranking on the first page of Google.
And, of course, we’ll set you up with a personal pipeline so you can see where all your leads are right now, how much they are costing and how much they are bringing in, so there’s never any doubt about how your marketing is performing.
In other words, we’ll do absolutely everything you need to generate a consistent flow of quality leads, and a consistent flow of good jobs in the short term AND the long term. So all you need to do is progress the leads through the funnel and deliver the work.
And look, this isn’t just about generating inquiries – because, when you get your marketing dialed in, and you have a consistent flow of jobs, it brings you a whole host of additional benefits that makes running a building company a lot more enjoyable.
So the impacts of this system go FAR beyond just getting more leads. It really gives you control over your entire business.
So, if that sounds good to you…
And if you’re interested in discussing how we can potentially work together, hit the button below and schedule a time to chat.
If you’ve got this far and there’s no banner in the top… let’s have a chat.
Now, that’s not false scarcity or anything like that. I wish I could work with everyone. But I’m very serious about capping my client number at 25, so I can deliver a premium service and so I can keep the weekends and evenings free to spend with my family.
So, right now, at the time of filming this, I’m already working with 19 builders…
See, here in my invoicing system…
I have 20 current clients on retainer. So there’s 5 spots left.
So, if you’re interested in working together to install this “Elite Project Engine” in your business, let me know asap.
You can DM me on Facebook, or fill out the form below this video or send me a carrier pigeon for all I care. I don’t really mind.
The main thing is that you get in contact with me sometime before I fill up. Otherwise, I’ll have to ask you to join a waiting list, and no one wants that!
Ok, that’s all from me. I hope you’ve found this video valuable. Feel free to share it with any of your building mates who might find it interesting.
Hit me up if you want to discuss working together or if you have any questions.
Have a great day and I’ll chat to you soon.