Guides for Ontario trades owners

How the guides are written

Every guide follows the same rules, so you know what to expect.

• Answer first. Each section opens with the short answer, then explains it.
• Worked numbers. Where money is involved, we show the arithmetic so you can swap in your own figures.
• Official sources, linked and dated. When we mention a provincial body, a federal law or a program, we link the official page and note the date we checked it.
• No compliance advice. We summarise what official bodies say about themselves; we never tell you what your obligations are. Ask the body concerned.

If you spot something that has changed since a guide was last checked, tell us by call, text or email, and we'll review it.

Presenting TSSA, ESA, WSIB and other credentials

How to present credentials on your trade website explains how to show registration, licence and workplace-insurance details accurately. It covers listing what you actually hold, wording each item the way the issuing body does, placing it where homeowners look, keeping your Google profile and ads consistent, and reviewing it every year.

It's most useful for trades in regulated areas, such as fuels, gas appliances and electrical work, but any trade can use the template at the end.

Following up without breaking anti-spam rules

The CASL-aware follow-up guide shows how to reply to calls, texts and quote requests promptly while respecting Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation. It explains the difference between replying to a customer and marketing to them, how to keep a simple consent record, what every message should include, and a three-step quote follow-up you can copy.

It includes worked numbers showing what a better close rate can be worth, often more than buying extra leads.

Setting a marketing budget that makes sense

The marketing budget worksheet walks through seven steps: what a job contributes, what you'll pay to win one, the maximum you can pay per lead, a monthly budget based on capacity, comparing follow-up with buying leads, spreading spend across Ontario's seasons, and a monthly review.

If you only read one guide, read this one. The number it produces, your maximum cost per lead, makes every other marketing decision easier.

Which guide to read first

Use this quick test.

What the guides deliberately leave out

Knowing what a guide won't cover is as useful as knowing what it will. None of these guides tells you whether your business meets a licensing, registration or workplace-insurance requirement; that's for TSSA, ESA, WSIB, Skilled Trades Ontario or the relevant body to answer. None of them interprets CASL or privacy law for your circumstances; for that, read the CRTC's and the Privacy Commissioner's guidance or speak to a lawyer. And none of them promises a result. They give you the method and the arithmetic, and you decide what to do with it.

We also avoid writing a separate guide for every town or trade. Thin pages that swap one place name for another don't help anyone, so regional detail lives on our five region pages instead, from the GTA to Northern Ontario.

When a guide isn't enough

Sometimes you'll read a guide and decide you'd rather someone else did the work. That's what our services are for. Each service page explains what's included, how long it takes and how we'd measure it. For regional context, such as how competition in the GTA compares with Northern Ontario, see the areas hub.