How to Get More Solar Customers

Make your company easy to check

If you sell in homes, after a knock on the door or a phone call, you're working in the setting FTC consumer advice warns homeowners about: contractors who show up at the door or call, push for a decision on the spot, or ask for cash or full payment up front ^{1 2}. The same advice tells homeowners to check a contractor's license and insurance, compare written estimates and sign a written contract before work starts ¹. Make every one of those checks easy:

• Put your license number where homeowners look: your website, proposals, door hangers and truck. Which licenses cover solar work differs by state, so list each one yours requires.
• Have your certificate of insurance ready to send the day someone asks.
• Show credentials accurately. If you or your installers hold NABCEP certifications, say so, but never present them as a license. NABCEP describes its certifications as voluntary and says they don't replace state licensing requirements ³.
• Use photos of your own installs, captioned with the town and system size, not stock images.
• Invite comparison. Tell homeowners what to compare between quotes: system size in kW DC, price per watt, equipment, warranties and the assumptions behind each production estimate. How to write a solar proposal shows how to lay those out so yours is the easy quote to compare.

Take the federal tax credit out of your pitch

If any of your marketing still promises homeowners the 30% federal tax credit, it's out of date. The Residential Clean Energy Credit (section 25D) equaled 30% of the cost of qualified clean energy property installed from 2022 through 2025, and no credit is allowed for expenditures made after December 31, 2025 ⁴. The IRS treats an expenditure as made when installation is complete, so a system finished in 2026 doesn't qualify even if the customer signed or paid in 2025 ⁵. Battery storage was on the same list of qualifying property, so the cutoff applies to batteries too ⁴.

Check everything a prospect might see for credit language about homeowner-owned systems: web pages, ads, social posts, door hangers, mailers, door-knocking and phone scripts, referral emails, and proposal and financing templates, especially any "net cost after tax credit" line.

Then retire the urgency that came with the credit. "Sign before the credit expires" no longer has a deadline behind it, and inventing a new one is worse. Give real reasons to decide, such as open dates on your install calendar or a utility rule change that has actually been announced.

The claims that replace the credit need the same care:

• Savings. Base estimates on the customer's own 12 months of usage and the utility's current rates and export credits, call them estimates, and state the assumptions.
• "Free" offers. Don't call a lease or power purchase agreement free solar. The customer pays for the system's use or its power either way, and the FTC tells homeowners that "free" or "no cost" solar offers are scams ⁶.
• Affiliation. Don't name an offer after a government program or suggest that a utility or agency backs you unless it has agreed to that in writing. The FTC warns homeowners that sellers who claim to be from, or affiliated with, the government are lying, and that the federal government doesn't install solar systems in homes for free ^{7 6}.
• Third-party ownership. Leases and power purchase agreements follow different tax rules because a business owns the system; how to price solar installations covers the deadlines there. Let the financing company describe any tax benefit it claims, and send customers' tax questions to a tax professional.

Knock doors without tripping the Cooling-Off Rule

Door knocking can fill a calendar with bill reviews. Run it so no homeowner could mistake your team for the people the FTC warns them about.

• Check whether each town requires a solicitor permit before your team goes out, and skip houses with no-soliciting signs.
• Say who you are and who you work for. Never suggest you're from the utility or a government program.
• Ask for a bill review appointment, not a signature. A proposal built from a year of usage and a look at the roof and electrical panel beats a doorstep number, and it gives the homeowner time to compare.
• Leave information on the door, never in or on the mailbox. The Postal Service says no part of a mailbox may be used to deliver anything that doesn't bear postage ⁸.

The cancellation window

When a contract is signed in the customer's home, plan on the FTC Cooling-Off Rule applying. It covers sales of $25 or more at the buyer's home and $130 or more at temporary locations such as a convention center, fairground or hotel room, which matters if you sign contracts at home shows ⁹. The buyer can cancel for a full refund until midnight of the third business day after the sale. Saturday counts as a business day; Sundays and federal holidays don't ⁹.

An invited visit can count too. The rule's definition of a door-to-door sale includes sales made "in response to or following an invitation by the buyer," when the buyer agrees to buy somewhere other than your place of business ¹⁰. A homeowner who booked a consultation on your website and signed at the kitchen table can still be covered.

Solar paperwork moves fast after a signature, so sequence it around the window:

1. Hold the permit application and the utility interconnection application until the window closes.
2. Wait to order equipment or put the job on the install calendar.
3. Build the cancellation notice and form into every contract you sign away from your office, and have a lawyer check them against the federal rule and your state's rules. States can add requirements of their own, so ask your state attorney general's office or consumer protection agency what applies.

Example: A homeowner signs at their kitchen table on a Friday evening. Saturday is business day one, Sunday doesn't count, Monday is day two and Tuesday is day three, so they can cancel until midnight Tuesday, as long as no federal holiday falls in between. File the permit and interconnection applications on Wednesday. If you file on Saturday and they cancel on Monday, the plan set, the fees and the design hours are a loss you can't bill to anyone.

Get consent before you call or text

Marketing calls and texts are regulated, and much of the risk turns on consent. How to follow up on quotes covers the federal consent and Do Not Call rules; check your state's rules too. In a solar business the risk points are predictable:

• Collect consent where you collect the number. On your website form, bill review request or home show sign-up sheet, say plainly that you'll call and text about solar, and keep a record of the wording, the date and the source.
• Get paperwork with bought leads. Get in writing how each person's consent was collected and whether the form named your company, and keep that record with the lead.
• Treat a referral as a name, not permission. When a customer refers a neighbor, ask the customer to pass along your number or make the introduction, and reach out once the neighbor has agreed to hear from you.
• Stop means stop. Record every opt-out the day it arrives, and make sure every rep and every texting tool honors it.
• Get a legal review of your scripts, texting setup and consent language before you scale up.

Turn installed systems into referrals

A finished solar job keeps working for you. The array is often visible from the street, and the owner can show a neighbor what it produces and, after a few billing cycles, what their bills look like now. Ask while that proof is fresh:

• After permission to operate, when the system is running, rather than at signing.
• After the first bill under solar. Walk the customer through it, which also heads off confused calls about credits and charges, then ask who else should see it.
• At every later service visit or monitoring check.

Set the program rules in writing:

• Pay when the referred system is installed, not when a name comes in. A signed solar contract can still be cancelled in the cooling-off window, fail financing or fall apart at the site survey, so paying at installation means you only pay for jobs you build.
• Keep rewards separate from reviews. Don't make a reward depend on a review or on what it says. How to get more reviews legally covers the FTC rules on review incentives and disclosures.
• Ask referrers to mention the reward when they post. A customer who praises you on social media or a neighborhood forum while earning rewards should say they get a thank-you from you, so readers can weigh the recommendation.
• Ask your CPA how to report referral payments to individuals.

Example: Say you spend $4,000 a month on bought leads and they turn into 2 installed systems: $2,000 of lead cost per install, before anyone's sales time. A referral program that pays $500 per installed system costs $500 per install and nothing for referrals that never sign. Even at one referred install a month, that's the cheaper job to win. All numbers are made up; run the comparison with your own costs and install counts.

Trade leads with roofers and electricians

Other trades meet your future customers first, at the moment the house is changing.

The roofer relationship protects the customer as much as your pipeline. An array stays on the roof for many years, and if the roof wears out first, the array has to come off and go back on for the reroof, a job the homeowner pays for. Before you trade referrals with a roofer, agree on:

1. Who checks the roof before you sell, and what condition means "replace it first."
2. Scheduling, so a reroof and the install run back to back.
3. Warranties. Ask how your attachments affect the roofer's workmanship warranty and the roofing manufacturer's warranty, agree on the flashing and attachment method, and put it in writing, including who responds if a mount leaks.

With electricians, settle who designs the interconnection, who pulls which permit, who meets the inspector and how a panel upgrade shows up on the customer's price. Put any referral fee in writing so both sides know when it's owed.

Publish plain guides to each utility's rules

The questions homeowners ask about solar are local: how their utility credits the power they send to the grid, what they'll still pay each month and how long approval takes. Net metering and other export credit rules vary by state and utility, and they change. Answer those questions on your website, with one page for each utility you serve. You answer them at every kitchen table anyway, and a clear page earns trust before the first call.

Each utility page should cover:

• How the utility credits exported power today, the name of the rate schedule or program, and its effective date.
• Any charges that stay on the bill no matter how much the system produces.
• Whether credits carry over from month to month, and when they settle.
• The interconnection steps, what the homeowner signs and whether the meter changes.
• How long permission to operate has taken on your recent jobs in that territory, from your own records, with the dates covered.
• What the system does during a power outage, with and without a battery.

Link each rule to the utility's tariff or the state commission's decision, add a "last checked" date, and check again before you quote. Describe today's rules without predicting future rates, and update the page as soon as a change is announced. Then send the page after every bill review in that territory, so the customer can reread it with whoever else is deciding.

Follow up on every open proposal

Solar proposals stall for reasons that have nothing to do with your price. Write down what each one is waiting on:

• the rest of the year's bills, or the utility's usage download
• the site survey, or a redesign after it
• financing approval
• HOA architectural review, where there is an HOA
• a decision about the roof
• other quotes the homeowner is comparing
• a spouse or co-owner who hasn't seen it yet

Follow the event, not a timer. Ask when the HOA meets and check in the day after; call when the financing decision should be back. When an input really changes, such as a new rate schedule or an equipment substitution, update the proposal, resend it and say what changed. If the answer is no, ask why and log the reason (price, roof, financing, timing or another installer), because those reasons show you what to fix.

The general cadence, and what to say at each touch, is in the quote follow-up guide linked above. Keep the list of open proposals where you'll actually check it, whether that's a spreadsheet or field service software. Redline, which is chat-first field service software, includes quote follow-up for this.

Count installed systems, not signatures

Between a solar signature and a finished job sit the cancellation window, financing, the site survey, the permit and interconnection. A channel that signs plenty of contracts that never get built can look better than it is. Record the source of every lead (door knocking, referral, trade partner, bought leads, home show, website) and measure each one by installed systems: the share of its leads that become installs, and its customer acquisition cost per install.

Example: Over one quarter, door knocking costs $12,000 in canvasser pay and materials and produces 20 signed contracts, 14 of which are installed. Referrals cost $4,000 (seven $500 rewards plus $500 of printed cards) and produce 8 signed contracts, 7 of which are installed. Door knocking costs $600 per signed contract but about $857 per installed system. Referrals cost $500 per signed contract and about $571 per installed system. Made-up numbers, for illustration only.

Door knocking can still be worth it when you need volume. The numbers tell you what that volume really costs, and customer acquisition is a cost every price has to carry, as the solar pricing guide linked above explains.