Operating
The marketing KPI dashboard every PE-backed home services CEO should run
Sponsors don't want a 30-page deck. They want one page they can read in four minutes that tells them what's working, what's not, and what's about to change. Here's the dashboard — twelve KPIs, the benchmarks, and the trip-wires that should trigger the operating partner call.
Sponsors don't want a 30-page marketing deck. They want one page they can read in four minutes that tells them what's working, what's not, and what's about to change. The reporting cadence is monthly, the format is consistent, and the KPIs are the same every month so trend lines are obvious.
Here's the dashboard. Twelve KPIs, the benchmarks they should hit, and the trip-wires that trigger an operating partner conversation.
The 12 KPIs that belong on every home services scorecard
- Sourced revenue by channel (the line that ties to financial system actuals)
- Marketing spend as % of revenue (4-8% typical for home services platforms)
- Cost per booked call (CPBC) by channel — the unit that ties to job profitability
- Booked-call rate (calls that convert to scheduled appointments)
- Cost per acquired customer (CAC) by acquisition source, normalized for service mix
- LTV-to-CAC ratio for new customer cohorts (target 3:1+ for service trades, 5:1+ for membership-driven)
- Membership penetration rate (target 50%+ for HVAC, 25%+ for plumbing, 70%+ for pest)
- Local pack share-of-voice (rank tracking across priority service-keyword + city combinations)
- Average rating and review velocity by location
- GBP impressions and direction-request volume
- Repeat customer rate (year-over-year retention)
- Marketing-sourced EBITDA contribution (the sponsor-level number that aggregates the others)
Spend efficiency: marketing as % of revenue
Healthy home services platforms spend 4-8% of revenue on marketing, with variation by trade and stage. Pest tends to run lower (heavy door-to-door legacy). Roofing tends to run higher (storm-driven and retail-replacement both demand spend). Platforms in active growth mode (year 1-2 of a hold, integrating add-ons) often run 8-12% temporarily — sponsors should expect that and plan for it.
Channel KPIs: where they mislead
Cost-per-lead (CPL) is the most-cited and most-misleading channel metric. A $40 CPL channel that converts at 20% to booked jobs is materially worse than a $120 CPL channel that converts at 70%. The right metric is cost-per-booked-job — which requires call disposition data and proper attribution. Sponsors who only see CPL are seeing only half the picture.
Funnel KPIs: impression → call → booking → completed → membership
The funnel has five stages, not three. Impression to call (channel performance), call to booking (CSR performance), booking to completion (operational reliability), completion to repeat (service quality), repeat to membership (retention discipline). Each stage has different owners, different drivers, and different fixes. Reporting all five gives the operating partner the diagnostic resolution to know where the next 100 bps of EBITDA actually comes from.
Leading vs. lagging indicators
Most marketing dashboards report lagging indicators — sourced revenue last month, CAC last month, MQLs last month. Adding leading indicators makes forecasting possible: review velocity (predicts next-quarter local pack visibility), GBP impressions (predicts organic-driven calls), search-share trend (predicts paid efficiency), email engagement (predicts membership conversion next quarter).
Reporting cadence
Three rhythms: weekly ops review (operational marketing team, channel performance, tactical adjustments), monthly board pack (CFO + COO, the 12 KPIs, narrative on the variance), quarterly sponsor review (operating partner + sponsor, EBITDA-contribution model and forward-look). Each format escalates in summary level and reduces in tactical detail.
Benchmark targets and trip-wires by trade
Generic benchmarks are misleading; trade-specific benchmarks matter. HVAC: cost per booked replacement under $400, membership penetration above 50%, repeat-customer rate above 60%. Plumbing: cost per emergency booked call under $80, average rating above 4.7, GBP impressions growing month-over-month. Electrical: average ticket above $1,800, replacement-vs-service mix shifting toward replacement, branded search trending up. Roofing: storm-response time-to-market under 72 hours, retail close rate above 25%, financing attach rate above 40%.
The platforms that report against trade-specific benchmarks compound. The platforms that report against generic marketing metrics get surprised at exit by buyer-side diligence.