Metrix Score™
Glossary
Plain-language definitions of every term used across these guides.
- Qualified opportunity
- A lead you actually presented an estimate or proposal to — not every inquiry, only the ones that reached the quoting stage.
- Close rate
- The percentage of qualified opportunities that turn into signed, paid work.
- Direct job cost
- A cost tied specifically to one job — labor, materials, subcontractors, permits. Does not include overhead.
- Overhead
- Whole-business costs not tied to any single job — rent, insurance, office staff, your own salary, marketing spend.
- Gross margin
- Job revenue minus direct job costs. Does not account for overhead.
- Break-even margin
- The gross margin per job needed, on average, to cover your monthly overhead given your typical job count.
- Callback
- A return visit to fix something related to a job you already completed — not a new, unrelated failure.
- Callback cost
- The full dollar cost of a callback: labor, travel, materials given at no charge, and the billable work that visit displaced.
- Displaced productive capacity
- The value of billable work a technician could have done instead of the time spent on a callback.
- Baseline
- Your own current measurement of a metric, used as the comparison point for future measurements — not an external industry number.
- Lead response time
- The time between when a prospective customer first reaches out and when your business first responds.
- Technician utilization
- The percentage of a technician's paid time spent on billable work.