Heat Pump Lead Costs: Work Out What Your Installation Business Can Afford
An affordable heat pump lead price depends on your contribution per completed job and the proportion of paid leads that become completed jobs. There is no single market CPL that establishes whether a programme is profitable for your company.
This guide gives you a calculation you can use before agreeing an ASHP lead order or advertising budget. All worked figures below are fictional planning assumptions, not PoweredLeads prices, market averages or expected results.
Use our installer profitability calculator and trial scorecard to explore your own assumptions and record a trial cohort. It does not predict or guarantee results, and no contact details are required.
Start with contribution, not the installation invoice
Take the revenue attributable to the completed job and subtract its variable delivery costs: equipment, installation labour, subcontractors, consumables, travel and other costs that arise because you do that job. Account consistently for discounts and refunds, and use a consistent VAT basis.
The amount left is the contribution available for acquisition costs, fixed overhead, tax and profit. A large invoice does not automatically make an expensive marketing programme affordable. Use your own job records; do not substitute someone else’s claimed “average installation value”.
Where a grant contributes to the installation price, avoid counting it twice as both part of the quoted job value and extra revenue. Reconcile the complete job once.
Use a conversion rate with a named denominator
These are different rates:
- Lead-to-install rate: completed installations ÷ paid, accepted leads.
- Survey booking rate: booked surveys ÷ paid, accepted leads.
- Survey-to-install rate: completed installations ÷ the relevant surveyed or booked cohort; say which.
If you already know the lead-to-install rate, do not multiply it by the contact and survey rates again. That would count the same attrition more than once.
For staged forecasting, multiply only rates whose denominators genuinely follow one another: contacted ÷ leads, surveys ÷ contacted, and installs ÷ surveys. The result is an assumed lead-to-install rate. It remains a forecast until jobs complete.
Worked example: the same lead price, three outcomes
Assume 40 paid, accepted leads at £50 each, plus £400 in follow-up and survey costs allocated to this group. Total acquisition cost is £2,400. Assume each completed job contributes £1,800 before acquisition and fixed overhead.
| Completed jobs from the 40 leads | Lead-to-install rate | Acquisition cost per installation | Contribution after acquisition, before fixed overhead and tax |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2.5% | £2,400 | −£600 |
| 2 | 5% | £1,200 | £1,200 |
| 4 | 10% | £600 | £4,800 |
The price per lead has not changed. The number of completed jobs changes the economics. None of these rows predicts your outcome.
At zero completed jobs, acquisition cost per installation is undefined, not £0. The programme has incurred £2,400 in this example, while some opportunities may still be open. Show their status without treating proposals or deposits as completed installations.
Calculate a maximum lead price for your assumptions
For an illustrative break-even calculation before fixed overhead and tax:
Maximum price per accepted lead = (assumed lead-to-install rate × contribution per installation) − other acquisition costs per accepted lead.
Using the example’s 5% rate, £1,800 contribution and £10 other acquisition cost per lead:
0.05 × £1,800 − £10 = £80 per lead.
That £80 is a theoretical break-even ceiling under the assumptions, not a sensible default buying price or an ASHP quote. It leaves nothing from that cohort for fixed overhead, tax or profit. If you want to retain £600 per completed job before overhead and tax, use:
0.05 × (£1,800 − £600) − £10 = £50 per lead.
Repeat the calculation with a lower conversion rate, higher costs and slower completion. Use a cash budget as well: paying for leads before collecting installation revenue creates a funding gap even if the eventual contribution is positive.
Compare bought leads and managed advertising fairly
For bought leads, include the lead invoice and your own follow-up, survey and software costs. Do not add hypothetical advertising spend already included in the supplier’s price.
For managed advertising, include actual media spend, management fees and other campaign costs, then the same follow-up costs. Do not add a second invented “lead purchase cost” when the leads came from your own campaign.
Keep solar and heat pump outcomes separate initially. The same company can buy both, but the average contribution, customer questions and time to complete may differ. A blended CPL can hide a weak category inside a stronger one.
Improve the information before promising a result
Use landing pages and follow-up that explain what the customer is requesting. A grant-information visitor should understand when they are moving into an installation discussion. Do not imply every home qualifies, every heat pump saves money or an enquiry guarantees a survey.
Energy Saving Trust explains that running-cost outcomes depend on the system being replaced, energy prices and how the heat pump performs. Use an appropriate household assessment for savings claims rather than a universal headline. Air source heat pump guidance.
For your own installer website, answer practical customer questions and keep service information crawlable and accurate. Google says normal SEO foundations also apply to AI Overviews and AI Mode; special AI markup is not a shortcut to more enquiries. Google’s AI search guidance.
Request a heat pump lead proposal with your service area and capacity. For a supplier checklist, read how to buy ASHP leads. If you want campaigns or a website under your own brand, compare our services.
Written by Forhad Sarker, founder of PoweredLeads. Official sources checked 5 September 2026. The calculations are decision aids, not financial forecasts or guaranteed results.