Sorting 140 leads by source turned up one source outperforming the rest

Take an operator who underwrites every deal that comes in and keeps a clean record of lead source and outcome. A year end cut across 140 leads from four sources can turn up an uncomfortable pattern worth examining rather than dismissing. Say direct mail produces 71 leads, 3 under contract, 2 closed. Agent relationships produce 38 leads and 4 closed, though every one of those came in listed and priced at market accordingly. A wholesaler list produces 22 leads and 0 closed. And a single bird dog, paid $600 on delivery plus $2,000 at close, produces 9 leads and 3 closed. That bird dog is 6 percent of lead volume and 33 percent of closings. Total cost across the year, $5,400 in delivery fees plus $6,000 in close fees, $11,400, against direct mail costing around $19,000 for two closings. The obvious move is offering more money for more volume. The caution is that 9 leads is a small sample, and a story where those three closings were partly luck is easy to construct. If two of them came from the same street, that often means the bird dog found one situation and worked the neighbors, which is a smart and possibly non-repeatable pattern rather than a scalable process. A flat monthly retainer converts a variable cost that's currently working into a fixed one, and if the hit rate reverts toward average, that retainer could end up paying for far fewer results than the fee-per-close structure delivered. A reasonable approach is raising the delivery fee to reflect performance while staying variable, and asking directly how the three closings were actually sourced before committing to a retainer structure.