What has changed in the company's own records?
Start with records. A new van, sign or advert cannot prove lost customers, lower margins or a smaller price. The actual performance review must supply that evidence.
The selling hub connects the question to the transaction process. This situation guide focuses on distinguishing observed performance from a possible competitive explanation. The sale process guide supplies the full transaction sequence.
Name dates and records. Compare inquiries, bookings, finished jobs, receipts and defined direct costs. Log tracking, price, staff, hours and report changes that affect comparisons or suggest other causes.
Why do conversion definitions matter?
An advertising conversion is a configured measurement. It is not necessarily the same event as an accepted booking or a paid invoice.
Google Ads' phone-call conversion documentation explains duration-based actions and other call-related tracking. Some recorded mobile actions concern clicks rather than completed calls.
Google's offline conversion guidance distinguishes qualified and converted leads from other systems. They still need clear definitions. Match each event to real company activity before using its count to judge completed work, cash or demand.
Record account settings and changes beside the data. If the minimum call duration or tracked action changed, the before-and-after totals may not measure the same thing.
call-booking-rate definition covers the denominator. Use unique defined opportunities where appropriate. Show duplicate, missed-call, canceled and other statuses. A cleaner-looking ratio cannot make unlike populations comparable or prove what happened to customers.
What should the demand-change evidence panel show?
Build a panel from aggregate or appropriately deidentified company records. Use a common period and preserve the relationship between lead, job, payment, and cost data.
| Measure | Evidence to retain | Question before interpreting a change |
|---|---|---|
| Inquiries or leads | Defined records, dates, and deduplication | Did tracking or channel coverage change? |
| Bookings | Accepted jobs under a stated convention | Did call handling or available capacity change? |
| Completed jobs | Status and completion dates | Were cancellations, callbacks, or timing handled consistently? |
| Collections | Matched invoices, credits, and payment cutoff | Does cash relate to the work being compared? |
| Direct costs | Equivalent included categories | Did labor, materials, or cost allocation change? |
| Contribution | Defined revenue or cash basis less stated costs | Is the comparison on the same basis? |
| Capacity and pricing | Staff availability, schedules, and actual prices | Could these explain part of the observed change? |
The panel is an original analytical worksheet. It does not prove causation or replace the company's accounting records.
The marketing-demand diligence guide explains the broader review. Here, align the definitions before deciding whether the competitor story fits the evidence.
What can a numerical scenario reveal?
Assume hypothetical matched periods with all completed work collected at the stated cutoff and equivalent direct-cost categories. Period A has 600 defined inquiries, 360 bookings, 330 completed jobs, $198,000 collected, and $118,000 of direct costs.
Period B has 540 inquiries, 324 bookings, 300 completed jobs, $195,000 collected, and $126,000 of equivalent direct costs. Both periods have a 60% inquiry-to-booking ratio: 360 divided by 600 and 324 divided by 540.
Defined contribution falls from $80,000 to $69,000, a decline of $11,000. Collections declined only $3,000; the direct-cost increase accounts for the other $8,000.
These hypothetical figures show why inquiry count alone is insufficient. They establish no real competitor effect, benchmark, forecast or price. Overhead, taxes, debt and other unmodeled costs remain outside contribution.
How should comparable periods be chosen?
Use periods suited to the company's activity and explain seasonality, weather, staffing, and job mix. A busy repair period and a slower installation period can differ for reasons unrelated to competition.
Log outages, leave, truck downtime, empty slots and service changes. Missed bookings can reflect staff limits as well as demand. Check dates and scope before claiming customers chose another contractor.
Track price and channel changes. Prices can alter tickets and choices; advertising can alter inquiries. Neither effect must come from the entrant. Compare the actual changes before assigning a cause.
The seasonality underwriting guide develops period review. For this situation, the objective is a defensible before-and-after comparison with limitations plainly stated.
If suitable prior records do not exist, mark the evidence incomplete. Do not manufacture a baseline or call a short period representative of the company's future.
What do attribution and vendor KPIs establish?
Google Analytics' attribution documentation describes how credit is assigned among touchpoints. Different models can allocate that credit differently.
Attribution credit cannot prove added demand or losses to a rival. Record the model, events and tracking changes. The platform allocates credit under its rules; that alone does not establish cause.
ServiceTitan's KPI definitions distinguishes opportunity and total job averages. Included jobs and divisors can change results. Match those groups before comparing. The vendor's definition sets no national target, permitted decline or price premium.
Use those sources to understand the tools' own measures. They do not prove a universal target, acceptable decline, or valuation premium. The company's reconciled records must support the conclusion.
How can operating responses be evaluated without inventing results?
Identify the proposed response and its assumptions: staffing, call handling, service coverage, price, advertising, or another specific change. Estimate required costs from real information where available.
Separate planned responses from past earnings. Booking improvements have not happened yet. A marketing budget cannot prove added collections. Name cost, intended result and evidence needed to assess the plan.
The marketing-cost-per-booked-job guide develops cost measurement. Evaluate the response through completed work and contribution rather than only a lower platform conversion cost.
Set review dates and record what would change the decision. If the owner prefers a sale, the sale-preparation guide can organize the next steps without assuming a competitor-driven emergency.
How should reputation evidence be handled?
Use genuine company records and authorized, appropriately scoped feedback. A rating or review count can inform questions without establishing why demand changed.
FTC's consumer-review rule Q&A covers false reviews, specified deceptive acts and incentives tied to sentiment. It does not treat all incentives alike. A negative review alone proves neither misconduct nor a rival's effect on demand.
Do not create favorable reviews, suppress lawful criticism through false explanations, or claim a competitor caused feedback without evidence. Keep observed complaints separate from unverified attribution.
FTC's information-security guidance supports access limited to legitimate needs. Use aggregate or masked records where suitable. Customer names need their own authority and controls. A sale review does not authorize exposing every record.
What does the evidence mean for valuation and structure?
Use supported earnings, operating costs, customer behavior, and transferability. A nearby entrant is context, not a valuation formula.
Show downside cases apart from past results. Label inputs and evidence that supports or challenges them. Actual costs, work and customer records should drive the analysis, rather than an invented discount.
Compare cash, deferred price, contingent sums and continued work. Their timing and risks differ. Hoped-for recovery is uncertain. Match payments to actual conditions before relying on the headline for personal proceeds.
Talk to your CPA and attorney about the real sale structure, estimated tax consequences, disclosure requirements, and retained obligations. The panel supplies operating evidence, not an individual legal or tax conclusion.
How should the sale timeline and confidentiality be organized?
Start with the evidence review and the owner's objectives. Then prepare accurate materials, a controlled buyer process, and a dependency calendar for real proposals.
Use the sale-confidentiality guide for staged disclosure. Do not publicly signal a distressed exit merely because the owner is concerned about a competitor.
No generic sale duration is proved. Buyer diligence, financing, approvals, and documents affect timing. The evidence review should help define the next step rather than promise a rapid close.
Which mistakes does new competition invite?
A frequent mistake is treating timing as causation. Another is comparing different conversion definitions or reporting periods, then using the apparent decline to justify a price reduction.
Owners can also change prices or spending without measuring contribution, invent lost market share, or present recovery plans as achieved results.
- Define comparable periods and stable funnel measures.
- Reconcile jobs, collections, and equivalent direct costs.
- Record capacity, pricing, seasonality, and tracking changes.
- Separate observed results from hypothesized causes and scenarios.
- Use supported evidence to plan operations or an authorized sale.