Season 2 · Episode 2 The Craft & Calling Podcast

Why Most Home Service Leads Never Convert and How Systems Fix It

Rethinking follow-up, visibility, and leadership when missed calls and broken systems quietly cost home service businesses real growth.

Many home service businesses invest heavily in marketing but still struggle with low conversion. Leads come in, phones ring, and opportunities quietly slip through the cracks.

In this episode, Christene Marie sits down with Leandra Grenier-Green to unpack why most lead loss is not a marketing problem. It is a systems problem. Together, they explore how follow-up, visibility, accountability, and operational clarity directly impact revenue, customer experience, and team performance.

This conversation is for owners who feel busy but uncertain, who are generating demand but not seeing consistent results, and who know their business needs structure to grow without chaos.

• Why missed calls and slow follow-up cost more than bad marketing
• How systems create consistency across the customer journey
• The hidden leadership gap behind low lead conversion
• Why clarity and accountability matter more than volume
• How operational structure protects growth, teams, and reputation

0:00 Intro

0:45 Guest Intro

3:06 Why most leads never convert

6:57 Missed calls and silent revenue loss

9:24 Call tracking to improve marketing ROI for home services

14:58 Lead scoring and inconsistencies in the call center

18:59 Designing a customer journey that converts

23:47 Google Ad campaigns and where to start

28:28 Data checklist from Foundation First Marketing

Customer & Marketing Data Checklist A practical, field-tested checklist designed to help home service businesses track the data points that directly impact revenue, customer trust, and long-term growth.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KxGYWYuak0R10JR777jC8rsp8ETX7jem/view?usp=drive_link

Leandra Grenier-Green is an operations leader with a passion for building strong, scalable systems and empowering high-performing teams. With a decade of experience in agency environments, she specializes in turning chaos into clarity so founders can focus on growth.

Leandra has helped scale digital marketing agencies by leading operations, people development, and internal strategy. Her work sits at the intersection of process and people, helping businesses grow sustainably without burning out their leaders or teams.

The Craft & Calling is a community built for trades leaders who care deeply about both their work and the life they are building alongside it. Through real conversations and practical insight, the show explores leadership, legacy, and what it means to build businesses that last.

Explore resources, conversations, and the community at: https://thecraftandcalling.com/linktr/

This conversation reflects the kind of leadership and strategic thinking that also informs the work of Foundation First Marketing, where Christene Marie serves as a co-founder.

Foundation First partners with home service businesses to build marketing strategies grounded in clarity, systems, and long-term vision, helping owners grow without losing trust, culture, or control.

Get a free marketing quote, grounded in real performance data. Request a free website design to see what is possible when your digital presence is built on a strong foundation. https://foundationfirstmarketing.com/

Season 2 · Episode 1 The Craft & Calling Podcast

The Future of Visibility Is Being Built Now: How AI, Content, and Trust Are Reshaping Home Services

Rethinking how home service business owners should approach AI, visibility, and trust as search and customer behavior rapidly evolve.

As AI, automation, and new search behaviors reshape how customers find and choose service providers, visibility is no longer just about rankings or ads. It is about trust, consistency, and showing up where decisions are actually being made.

In this conversation, Christene Marie sits down with Jennifer Bagley to explore how home service businesses can adapt without losing credibility, connection, or control. They discuss why content is becoming training data for AI systems, how Google Business Profiles and daily publishing influence discoverability, and what it means to build a brand that stays relevant as technology accelerates.

This episode challenges owners to rethink visibility not as a marketing tactic, but as a long-term leadership responsibility.

• Why visibility is shifting from websites to daily content and real-world signals
• How AI and automation are changing how customers search and decide
• The role of trust, consistency, and credibility in modern home services marketing
• Why content now functions as training data for search and AI systems
• How leaders can stay visible without losing authenticity

0:00 Intro 0:45 Guest Intro

2:27 Why visibility is changing

3:52 What first steps and tools trades owners can take with AI

10:08 The first prompt you should use with conversational AI

18:02 The difference between a bot and a companion in AI

24:36 Mastering AI and leveling up to agentic AI

32:22 Jennifer's story: rethinking the business structure and implementing AI

39:45 Running a business from your own MCP

44:41 What leaders must rethink now to gain more time, money, and freedom

Knowing Show – Prior Conversation With Jennifer Bagley Christene mentions a previous conversation on The Knowing Show that explores Jennifer Bagley’s background and the genesis of how she arrived at her current work in AI, strategy, and business transformation. This episode provides additional context and depth for listeners who want to understand Jennifer’s journey and perspective more fully.

🔗 https://youtube.com/live/A2CC2EDGfsE

Jennifer Bagley is a nationally recognized expert in AI enablement, digital strategy, and business transformation. She is the CEO of CI Web Group, where she helps contractors and service-based businesses scale with strategy, automation, and measurable results.

Jennifer is also the Co-Founder of JustStartAI.io and serves on the board of OnePath.ai. Her work focuses on aligning leadership, operations, marketing, and AI to create real business outcomes.

The Craft & Calling is a community built for trades leaders who care deeply about both their work and the life they are building alongside it. Through real conversations and practical insight, the show explores leadership, legacy, and what it means to build businesses that last.

Explore resources, conversations, and the community at: https://thecraftandcalling.com/linktr/

This conversation reflects the kind of leadership and strategic thinking that also informs the work of Foundation First Marketing, where Christene Marie serves as a co-founder.

Foundation First partners with home service businesses to build marketing strategies grounded in clarity, systems, and long-term vision, helping owners grow without losing trust, culture, or control.

Get a free marketing quote, grounded in real performance data. Request a free website design to see what is possible when your digital presence is built on a strong foundation. https://foundationfirstmarketing.com/

Blue-collar grit. White-collar systems. A path to freedom, presence, and legacy.

In this episode of The Craft & Calling, host Christene Marie sits down with Mike Abramowitz, co-founder of Better Than Rich, to unpack what it truly means to move from constant hustle into a Time Rich life.

Mike shares his personal journey growing up in the trades, watching relentless work ethic come at the cost of presence, relationships, and emotional health - and how he chose to break that generational cycle. Together, they explore how business systems, emotional intelligence, nervous system regulation, and intentional leadership are inseparable when building something that lasts.

This conversation is for trades owners and operators who are tired of firefighting, want their time back, and are ready to build a business that fuels family, freedom, and legacy - not burnout.

What if your business could support your life instead of consuming it?

🔍 WHAT WE TALK ABOUT

• How trades leaders move from survival mode into predictable, scalable businesses
• The hidden cost of hustle culture on family, health, and legacy
• Emotional intelligence as a leadership skill, not a “soft” add-on
• The Time Rich Six Framework for buying back time and building systems
• Why implementation beats ideas, and how immersive “war rooms” accelerate growth

0:00 Intro

2:25 Growing Up in the Trades

5:16 Out of the Grind and into Creating a Predictable Business

13:12 Generational Legacy: Reparenting, Healing & Emotional Maturity

15:20 Buy Back Freedom for Inner Work and Emotional Health

21:41 Simple Emotional Intelligence Frameworks

24:42 Nervous System, Boredom & Creativity

30:36 The Time Rich Six Framework Explained

39:29 Why Immersion Beats Coaching

47:27 Books and Next Steps You Can Take

⭐RESOURCES The Time Rich Six Framework by Mike Abramowitz:

• Founder Lifestyle

1. Boundaries
2. Communication Guidelines

• Business Predictability

1. Systems
2. Playbooks
3. Team
4. Tech

🎁Complimentary Offer:

Mike will Build 4 Systems. 30 minutes. No Pitch.

Book your Call Today:

https://betterthanrich.com/gsd/

📚Books Recommended in this Episode:

• Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter
• Buy Back Your Time by Dan Martell
• The E-Myth Revisited by Michael E. Gerber

https://thecraftandcalling.com/linktr/

Mike Abramowitz is the co-founder of Better Than Rich, where he helps high-earning home service and trades business owners buy back their time, scale predictably, and lead with intention.

Drawing from his upbringing in the trades and decades of experience building systems-driven companies, Mike developed the Time Rich Six Framework, which blends business systems, AI-powered operations, and leadership boundaries to help owners grow past $5M without burnout.

Through immersive installs and proven playbooks, Mike has helped hundreds of businesses reclaim tens of thousands of hours - allowing owners to build profitable companies while staying present for family, health, and life.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeabramowitz1/ Website: https://betterthanrich.com/ Offer: https://betterthanrich.com/gsd/

💡 THANK YOU FOR WATCHING

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