Lead Attribution Window Explained: How Long Should a Call Count?

An attribution window is the number of days a call stays tied to the campaign or source that produced it. If the homeowner signs inside that window, the source gets credit for the job. If they sign after it closes, the job goes unassigned or to whatever source they touched last. You choose the window, and it changes your cost per job.

This page is part of the contractor lead cost per job guide, which covers moving from cost per lead to cost per customer. Everything in that guide divides spend by jobs. The attribution window decides which jobs are allowed into that division.

Why the window matters

A phone call and a signed contract are rarely the same day. A homeowner calls about a leaking roof on Tuesday, gets an estimate on Friday, talks it over with a spouse, collects two more quotes, and signs three weeks later. If your window is 7 days, that job never gets credited to the call that started it. Your tracking sheet shows a call that went nowhere and a job from "unknown."

The reverse problem exists too. A very long window credits a source with jobs it only touched in passing. A homeowner who called a source once in January and then signed in April after a neighbor's referral probably didn't sign because of that January call.

So the window has two failure modes: too short and you undercount a source, too long and you overcount it. Neither is a measurement. Both are guesses, which is why the goal is to make the guess consistent and tied to how your sales cycle actually runs.

The three pieces of an attribution rule

A usable rule answers three questions.

1. What starts the clock?

Usually the date and time of the first qualifying contact: the call, the form submission, or the click. For phone leads, it's the call itself. If you're buying pay-per-call volume, the start of the clock is the billable call, not the day the campaign launched.

2. How long does the clock run?

This is the window length in days. Common choices are 7, 14, 30, 60 and 90. There's no industry standard that fits every trade, so treat any single number you see online as a default and not a rule.

3. Which touch gets the credit?

If a homeowner contacts two of your sources inside the window, one of them has to get the job. The usual options:

• First touch: the source that produced the first contact gets the credit.
• Last touch: the source the homeowner used just before booking gets the credit.
• Split credit: each source gets a share of the job.

For a small shop, pick first touch or last touch and write it down. Split credit is more accurate on paper but harder to run in a spreadsheet, and the extra precision rarely changes a buying decision.

Match the window to your sales cycle

The right length depends on the time between the first call and the signed contract. Pull your last 20 or 30 signed jobs and write down that gap in days for each. Then look at where most of them fall.

Use the table only to pick a starting point. Your own gaps override it. If 90% of your signed jobs close within 21 days of the first call, a 30-day window covers you and a 90-day window mostly adds noise.

A worked example (illustrative numbers)

These numbers are hypothetical, so replace them with your own.

You run two lead sources for roof replacements. Over a quarter, Source A sends 60 calls and Source B sends 60 calls. Each cost $5,400 in total. You sign these jobs, counted from the first call to the signature:

Cost per job at each window:

Look at what the window did. On a 7-day or 30-day view, Source B wins. On a 90-day view, Source A wins. Same calls, same spend, same jobs. The only thing that changed was how patient the rule was.

For roofing, a 90-day window is the honest one, because Source A's customers simply decide slowly. A 7-day window would have told you to cut a source that was producing more total jobs. That's the cost of picking a window shorter than your sales cycle.

Windows and repeat callers

A single homeowner can call more than once. They call, hang up, call back the next day with a different question, and call a third time to schedule. If every call starts a fresh window, you count one customer three times and your cost per job looks different depending on how you handle it.

Set a rule for repeat callers from the same number: the first qualifying call starts the window, and later calls from that number inside the window attach to the same record. Many pay-per-call setups apply duplicate handling for this reason, which is covered in what is duplicate caller filtering. If you're buying calls, ask any vendor how it treats a repeat caller inside a window, and how that affects what you pay.

Another wrinkle: the homeowner may call from a different phone than the one they sign with. A spouse's cell on the call and a home number on the contract is common. Your matching routine needs a second field, such as the service address, to tie the two together. How to tell which leads became jobs walks through that matching step.

Attribution window vs. billable call length

These two get mixed up. They answer different questions.

• Minimum call length decides whether a call is billable. RankLocal bills qualifying calls that run over 60 seconds. See minimum call length for billable calls and what is a billable call.
• Attribution window decides how long a billable call can take credit for a signed job.

A call can be billable and still fall outside your window by the time the homeowner signs. It can also land inside your window and never have been billable. You need both rules defined to read your numbers correctly.

How to set your window in four steps

1. Pull 20 to 30 recent signed jobs and record the days from first call to signature.
2. Find the point where most of them are captured. If 80% to 90% of the jobs fall inside a number of days, use that number or the next round number above it.
3. Pick first touch or last touch for homeowners who contact more than one source. Write it on the first row of your tracking sheet so it doesn't drift.
4. Apply the same window to every source and every month. Revisit it once or twice a year, or when your mix of work changes.

Then run it with your normal reporting. If you're not yet labeling calls by source, start with call tracking for contractors, because you can't apply a window to calls you can't identify.

Reading vendor reports

Lead vendors, ad platforms and call tracking tools all report conversions, and each has its own default window. When a report says a source produced X sales, check three things:

• What window was used?
• Is credit given to first touch, last touch or a share?
• Are repeat callers counted once or each time?

If you can't get answers, convert the vendor's numbers to your own rule using your own records. Your signed-job log is the one source you control. A report built on your window, with your jobs, is the number to put next to your cost per call when you work through cost per job and the customer acquisition cost formula.

What to do next

Pick a window this week, using your own closed jobs. Put it at the top of your lead log. After a full cycle, check whether any source changed rank when you widened the window by 30 days. If one did, that source is slow-closing, and you'll want more patience in your test period.

If you'd like to test exclusive inbound calls against your current sources using the same window, you can apply here.

Frequently asked questions

What is a lead attribution window?

It's the number of days a call, click or form fill stays linked to the campaign that produced it. If a homeowner signs a contract inside that window, the job is credited to that source. After it closes, the job is credited elsewhere or to nobody.

What attribution window should a contractor use?

Match it to how long your sales cycle runs. Fast-turn trades like plumbing repair can use a short window, while roofing, fencing and remodeling usually need 30 to 90 days or longer. Pick one window and apply it to every source.

Does a longer window make a lead source look better?

Yes, because it gives the source more time to collect credit for jobs. That's why you compare sources on the same window and never compare one vendor's 90-day number with another's 7-day number.

Is the attribution window the same as the minimum call length?

No. The attribution window decides how long a call can earn credit for a sale. Minimum call length decides whether a call is billable at all.