A residential solar installation company was generating 80 to 100 leads per month — more than enough volume for their three-person sales team. But the close rate was 9%, which was unsustainably low. When they tracked why leads were dying, the answer was consistent: most failed basic solar eligibility criteria that should have been checked before the lead was ever delivered. Fixing pre-qualification cut sales waste by 60% and tripled the working close rate.
3×
Close Rate Improvement
−60%
Sales Time on Ineligible Leads
28%
Close Rate on Delivered Leads
The Problem
This company installed residential solar panels in a two-state territory with strong sunlight hours and active utility incentive programmes. The market opportunity was real. Their installation team was capable. Their pricing was competitive. But the sales process was broken — not because of poor sales technique, but because the team was spending most of its time on leads that could never close.
A typical sale required: an initial call to establish interest and collect basic property information, a site assessment to check roof orientation, age, and shading, a utility bill review to calculate ROI, and a financing pre-check to confirm creditworthiness or cash purchase ability. Most of these checks were happening after the initial contact rather than before it.
When the company tracked where deals were dying, the pattern was stark. Approximately 55% of leads were failing on one of four pre-sale criteria: roof younger than 10 years remaining usable life, significant tree shading on the south-facing slope, utility rates below the threshold where solar ROI was compelling, or homeowners who were renters or had recently refinanced and couldn't act on a large capital improvement.
None of these were surprises discoverable only late in the process. All four could have been identified in a 5-minute pre-qualification conversation before the lead was ever delivered to a salesperson. The sales team was doing 60% of its work on leads that should have been filtered before they arrived.
"My sales team is expensive. I've got three people who know solar inside out and are good at closing. But half their day was spent chasing people who didn't own their roof, were in an HOA that wouldn't allow panels, or had utility rates that made solar a bad financial decision. That's not a sales problem — that's a filter problem."
The Analysis
The problem wasn't specific to this company. It's a structural issue in how most solar leads are generated — general ads attract interest broadly, but solar eligibility is narrow. The gap between "interested in solar" and "eligible and economics make sense" is larger in solar than in almost any other home services category.
Roof condition and age: A roof with less than 10 years of remaining life needs to be replaced before panels can go on — which typically ends the solar conversation. Confirming roof age before the sales call eliminates a significant portion of ineligible leads immediately.
Shading: Solar panels on a heavily shaded roof (mature trees, adjacent structures) have significantly degraded output. A shading assessment can be done with satellite imagery before any site visit. Leads with obvious shading problems are eliminated at qualification.
Utility rate: The ROI case for solar depends on the homeowner's current electricity rate. In markets with low utility rates, the payback period may be too long to be compelling for most buyers. Confirming the utility provider and approximate rate eliminates leads where the economics don't work before any sales effort.
Ownership and HOA: Renters can't install solar. HOAs that prohibit panels create legal barriers. Confirming homeownership and HOA status before delivery eliminates leads that are impossible to close regardless of interest.
When eligibility screening happens before a lead reaches the sales team, every conversation the salesperson has is with someone who has already been confirmed as a candidate for installation. The sales team doesn't discover the disqualifying issue — it was already addressed. What they receive instead is a pipeline of genuine prospects who meet the minimum criteria for a viable installation.
The close rate change is a direct result of this filter. When the 9% blended close rate was recalculated excluding the ineligible leads that should never have been in the pipeline, the effective close rate on genuinely eligible contacts was already 27%. The company wasn't bad at selling solar. They were bad at not wasting time on unsellable leads.
A three-person solar sales team earning $75,000–$90,000 per year each is generating roughly $240,000 in annual labour cost. If 60% of their time is spent on leads that will never close for eligibility reasons, that's $144,000 per year in sales labour producing zero revenue. Pre-qualification before delivery doesn't just improve the close rate — it recaptures the labour hours that were being wasted and redeploys them on prospects who can actually buy.
For this company, the same sales team that was closing 7–8 deals per month started closing 22–24 per month after the lead quality improved. No new hires. Same team. The output changed because the input did.
The Solution
The company moved to a Leads.cx subscription built around a solar-specific pre-qualification protocol. The protocol was developed in collaboration with the company's sales team, based on their actual experience of why deals were dying. It screens for the four eligibility gates before any lead reaches a salesperson.
Every lead goes through a pre-screen that covers the four eligibility gates: roof age and condition (self-reported and cross-referenced against property records where available), shading assessment using satellite imagery before the call, utility provider identification for rate confirmation, and homeownership and HOA status.
Leads that fail any single eligibility gate are discarded before reaching the sales team. For this subscriber, roughly 58% of raw leads were discarded at pre-screen. The remaining 42% were confirmed-eligible and moved to the full qualification call.
Eligible leads are then qualified on intent and timeline: are they actively looking to install, or passively curious? Is the decision theirs alone, or does it require a spouse or financial partner? What's their target timeline — within the current incentive period, or open-ended?
Leads with low intent or unclear timeline are scored lower in the AI model and may be held until the next delivery cycle. The sales team receives leads where both eligibility and genuine intent have been confirmed.
Each lead is delivered with the pre-screen data attached: roof age estimate, shading rating (low/medium), utility provider and rate tier, homeownership confirmation, and HOA status. The salesperson doesn't start from zero — they already know the basics are in order and can skip directly to the economic case and product discussion.
This pre-loaded context also reduces the average call duration for the initial consultation. The eligibility groundwork has already been covered. The sales conversation can start where it should — on value and fit — rather than on feasibility.
The Results
3×
Close Rate Improvement
From 9% blended to 28% on delivered leads — the same sales team, working the same territory, closing three times as many deals per lead worked.
−60%
Sales Time on Ineligible Leads
Eliminated through pre-screen. Sales team now spends its time on confirmed-eligible prospects — where their skills actually produce revenue.
22+
Deals Closed Per Month
Up from 7–8. Same sales headcount, same service area. The output tripled because the input quality changed.
Solar lead eligibility waste is one of the most consistent problems in the industry. Signs that your current lead source isn't screening before delivery:
A significant portion of your sales conversations end because the homeowner is a renter, has a problematic roof, or is in a no-solar HOA
Your blended close rate on all leads worked is below 15%, even though your close rate on site-assessed prospects is much higher
Your sales team's time is consumed by leads that require significant effort before they can even be assessed as viable prospects
You regularly do site assessments only to find the roof is too shaded or too old — information that could have been screened before the visit
Your utility ROI analysis regularly shows payback periods that are too long to close the deal — because the lead's utility rate was never checked before delivery
Sales team morale is lower than expected given your market position and the genuine demand for solar in your area
We use satellite imagery to do a basic shading assessment on the south-facing roof slope before the qualification call. This isn't as accurate as a formal shade analysis tool, but it catches obvious cases: large tree canopies directly over the roof, adjacent multi-storey structures causing winter shadow. Leads with apparent heavy shading are flagged and discussed with the subscriber before delivery or discarded if the installer's threshold is clear.
If the site assessment reveals a condition that was not apparent from the pre-screen and makes installation infeasible — roof damage not visible in satellite imagery, structural issues, HOA restrictions not disclosed during qualification — the lead is replaced at no charge. The guarantee covers the accuracy of the pre-screen data we delivered. It doesn't cover factors that could only be discovered through physical inspection, but those are significantly rarer after the pre-screen filters are in place.
The subscription guarantees 30 delivered leads per month — the pre-screen doesn't reduce that count. It increases the raw number of prospects we need to source in order to deliver 30 eligible leads, but that sourcing volume is absorbed on our end. What you receive is 30 verified-eligible prospects, not 30 raw inquiries of which 55% will fail eligibility on the first call.
Yes. During onboarding we document your specific eligibility thresholds: minimum remaining roof life, maximum shading tolerance, minimum utility rate, minimum system size you install, and any regional factors specific to your market. If your business has a stricter or looser threshold on any dimension than the default criteria, the pre-screen is adjusted to match. Your salespeople should never receive a lead that your installation standards would reject.
Residential solar is the primary focus of this product. Commercial solar has a substantially different qualification process — utility tariff structures, decision-making chains, financing structures, and installation scale are all different. Commercial solar pre-qualification is available on a custom basis for installers whose primary business is commercial; contact us to discuss your specific requirements.
If your blended close rate is well below your eligible-only close rate, you're subsidising bad lead delivery with your sales team's time. Let's fix the filter before the call.