Slow months
January won't look like May. It doesn't have to look empty.
Hail fills the spring. The slow months run on repairs, past customers, home sales and retail re-roofs that don't wait for a storm. That work gets set up in the fall, so it shows up in January's calls.
What still comes in
The work that doesn't wait for hail
- Leaks. Winter rain finds the flashing and the pipe boots that got skipped. A repair call answered live is often the next replacement.
- Home sales. Inspections flag roofs, buyers ask for repairs, and a sold house may need its warranty transferred to the new owner.
- Retail re-roofs on old roofs. Homeowners who've been putting it off, with no adjuster in the middle.
- Past customers. The people whose roofs you already know, if you've kept in touch the right way.
- Estimates from the spring that never got a yes or a no.
Nobody can make January busy for a storm shop, and anyone who says they can is selling ads into a quiet market. What you can do is soften it: answer every repair call, stay in front of past customers, and have retail pages that rank before the season when people decide. Your own call log shows how slow your slow months really are. The free audit pulls it.
Fall to February, in order
The slow-season plan
The order matters: each step sets up the next, and most of it has to start before the calls slow down.
- September
Your past-customer list, cleaned up
We build the list from your CRM export: every finished job with its address, roof, warranty and date. Your office fills the gaps, usually an hour or two. Then we mark how each customer can be contacted:
- Email is the simplest channel for a past customer, with an unsubscribe link on every note.
- Texts that promote anything need prior express written consent. Your contract may or may not include it, depending on its wording, so we flag the clause for you to check.
- Calls follow the do-not-call rules, and the 18-month window after a purchase.
We bring a draft note and the questions to ask. Whether a given note counts as marketing is your lawyer's call, not ours.
- October
A fall check-in to past customers
A short, useful note: what to look for on the roof before winter, and a number to call. Only to people you're allowed to contact, with an easy way to opt out. No discounts, no countdowns.
- November
The estimates that went quiet, and the winter calendar
We pull the estimates from the spring and summer that never got an answer, by source, so whoever does your sales can work them before the holidays. A bid signed in November is a January install. We report it; the follow-up calls are yours.
- December
Warranties registered before the year ends
We check your finished jobs against the registrations in your manufacturer portal and send your office the list of what's missing. Your office registers them, since the portal is yours. The windows run from install: 45 days for GAF's enhanced warranties and 60 days for Owens Corning's. GAF's top certification tier counts only warranties registered by December 31, so the November and December installs go first. Metal panel and paint-finish warranties have their own terms, so we check each maker's.
- January
Retail and repair pages, and the busy season's reviews
Town pages for repairs and retail re-roofs. Photos from the jobs you finished in the spring rush on your Google listing. A review ask to anyone from the busy season who didn't get one.
- February
The storm plan, built
Storm pages, the ad surge plan you approve ahead of time, and after-hours coverage tested before the first hail. Storm season →
Booked out?
Fill January from the fall
If you're booked eight weeks out in October, your slow season isn't a lack of calls. It's a calendar that empties out after the holidays. The fix is bids signed in the fall for winter installs: the past-customer note, the quiet estimates and town pages for retail re-roofs all feed it. For metal and specialty work, a winter install is often an easier sell, because there's no storm crowd competing for the same crews.
What lands on your office
Who does what
- Us: the list, the consent flags, the draft note, the quiet-estimate report, the warranty check and the pages.
- Your office: an hour or two filling gaps in the list, then registering any missing warranties.
- Whoever does your sales: the follow-up calls on quiet estimates.
How it's counted
Slow months next to last year's
A slow January looks bad next to May. So once you've had a year of tracking, the report compares each slow month with the same month last year: calls, booked inspections, and what each one cost. Repairs get their own line, so a leak call that turns into a replacement shows up as both.
What we won't do
No winter blasts
- Texts or calls to people who never agreed to hear from you
- "Winter special, this week only" pressure
- Ads into towns you won't drive to in January
- A maintenance-plan program before we've seen whether your repair customers come back on their own. Roofers disagree on whether those plans pay, so we measure first.
Thinking further ahead
The slow months are a good time to check your accounts
If the business will change hands one day, to a son, a partner or a buyer, every account it runs on should be in the business's name. The handover checklist goes through all of them: the Google listing, the domain, the main number, the CRM and the manufacturer portal that holds your registered warranties. When you're done, you'll have one page for the next owner.
Questions
Will ads fill January?
Usually not for a storm shop. Fewer people search when nothing's falling on them, and the ones who do are often looking for a repair. We'd rather spend the winter on repairs answered live, past customers and retail pages than push ads into a quiet market.
Should I offer a roof maintenance plan?
Maybe. Roofers disagree on whether they pay, and nobody publishes good numbers. We'd look at your repair customers first: if they already come back, a plan might help; if they don't, it's a cost with no proof yet.
Is this part of a plan, or extra?
It's part of the Maps and Maps and site plans. The past-customer note and the warranty check run in the fall, and the pages go up in winter.
Free audit
See where your calls come from.
A free 30-minute call audit: where you show up on the map, what your listing and site get wrong, and two test calls to your own line. You keep the written audit whether you hire us or not.