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Methodology
Last reviewed June 13, 2026 · every statistic on this site links back to this page
We call ourselves proof-led, so the proof should be inspectable. Every statistic on this site lives in a single registry in the site's code, and each entry carries the publication it came from, the year, a link, the date we last verified it, and a verification status. This page renders that registry directly · if a number appears anywhere on the site, it appears here with its source.
What the status labels mean: “primary source verified” means we located the figure at the original publisher of the research and checked the exact wording and scope. “Secondary source” means a trade publication reporting someone else's research. “Internal estimate” means it is our own pricing, target, or assumption · labeled as such wherever it appears.
Corrections. In our June 2026 review, several widely circulated industry figures · including a claimed purchase-rate advantage for whoever answers first, a popular after-hours lead share, and a vendor's sub-minute booking rate · could not be traced past marketing blogs to any real study. We removed them from this site and added them to a banned list that an automated check enforces before every release. Where a defensible replacement existed, we cite the replacement below.
2023 Professional Smart Home Market Analysis (announcement) view source ↗
$29B
The US custom residential AV market is estimated at $29B.
primary source verified
Research by Ancrage Consulting for CEDIA; survey of US residential integrators expanded with D-Tools and Portal project data. The step up from CEDIA's earlier $20.1B estimate reflects a methodology change, not pure market growth.
accessed 2026-06-13
20,000
Approximately 20,000 integrators are currently serving the US market.
primary source verified
Stated verbatim in CEDIA's announcement; no newer CEDIA study supersedes the count as of June 2026.
accessed 2026-06-13
Lead Response Management Study view source ↗
21x
The odds of qualifying a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 21 times.
primary source verified
Original 35-page study PDF, hosted by the 2007 presentation venue (MarketingSherpa B2B Demand Generation Summit). Web-generated leads; three years of data across six companies (~15,000 leads, 100,000+ call attempts).
accessed 2026-06-13
100x
The odds of contacting a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 100 times.
primary source verified
Companion finding to the 21x qualification stat · same study, same dataset.
accessed 2026-06-13
The Short Life of Online Sales Leads view source ↗
42
The average response time to a web-generated test lead, among the 2,241 audited US companies that responded within 30 days, was 42 hours.
primary source verified
Oldroyd, McElheran, Elkington; HBR magazine, March 2011. 37% responded within an hour; 24% took more than 24 hours. Article is metered on hbr.org.
accessed 2026-06-13
23%
23% of 2,241 audited US companies never responded to a web-generated test lead at all.
primary source verified
Same audit as the 42-hour figure.
accessed 2026-06-13
~7x
Firms that tried to contact potential customers within an hour of receiving a query were nearly seven times as likely to qualify the lead as those that tried even an hour later · and more than 60 times as likely as companies that waited 24 hours or longer.
primary source verified
"Qualify" is defined as having a meaningful conversation with a key decision maker. Drawn from a companion dataset of 1.25M leads received by 29 B2C and 13 B2B US companies.
accessed 2026-06-13
2025 Software & Business Resources Deep Dive Survey view source ↗
78%
78% of integrators use spreadsheet software ("Excel remains ubiquitous").
primary source verified
General spreadsheet-software usage among surveyed integrators · not lead tracking specifically. cepro.com is bot-gated; verified on the live page and an archive snapshot.
accessed 2026-06-13
47%
Only 47% of integrators use CRM / marketing automation software.
primary source verified
Same usage breakdown as the spreadsheet figure (accounting 94%, proposal software 83%, spreadsheets 78%, CRM 47%).
accessed 2026-06-13
State of the CI Industry 2025: The Rise of the Middle Market view source ↗
$12,500
The median residential project price was $12,500 in 2024, a 39% decline from $20,357 in 2023 (while residential job counts rose 33%).
primary source verified
CE Pro's own exclusive survey research (Nov-Dec 2024); medians of integrator responses, residential-specific. cepro.com is bot-gated; verified via archive snapshot.
accessed 2026-06-13
2026 Forecast: 5 Field & Home Service Industry Trends to Watch view source ↗
41%
Across jobs booked online on Housecall Pro, 41% come in after hours.
primary source verified
First-party platform data: share of online bookings on Housecall Pro, published by the platform itself (Jan 2026). Single-platform scope.
accessed 2026-06-13
A few numbers on this site are ours, not research findings:
Pricing shown on the services page is our published pricing. Found a number on this site that isn't accounted for here? Tell us and we will source it or remove it.