About Free Agency
Free Agency is a fractional CMO service for the trades, working with independent HVAC, plumbing, and electrical companies — typically $10M+ businesses looking to grow 20% or more. Their clients include Guild Garage Group, Lickety Split Air, Plumbing & Electric, Bobby L Greene Plumbing, Heating & Cooling Co, and Brody Pennell Heating & Air Conditioning.
Founded by Bri Skiffington, the company rejects the traditional agency model in favor of something more accountable: no contracts, no commissions, month-to-month engagements, and growth targets that are reverse-engineered mathematically.
"We always reverse engineer the growth. If you want to grow 24% this year, we will tell you exactly how to hit it. We figure out mathematically how to grow people, bring on the partners and tools we need, and hold everyone — including ourselves — accountable."
For this story, we spoke with Bri about how Hatch has become a core part of the growth architecture Free Agency builds for every client.
"It's mandatory, literally. Every client gets Hatch."
The Problem
The problem Free Agency sees across nearly every client is the same: leads are coming in (web forms, phone calls, messages) but they're not converting. There's no system to resurface missed opportunities, follow up consistently, or make sure every lead gets worked.
"It's a universal problem. You get a phone call and you miss it, or messages come in online, and you don't have a great way to resurface these things and reconnect with them."
For a company whose entire model is built on driving measurable growth, that gap between lead volume and lead conversion is the first thing that needs to close. Bri recalls one client who had a 2% booking rate when they onboarded and thought a seven-minute response time was fast enough.
"We showed them that three other companies had already reached out in that time. They obviously didn't get the job."
The Solution
Hatch is one of the core tools Free Agency deploys for their clients. Not just for speed, but as the operational layer that turns lead volume into booked jobs. Whether it's a new onboarding or an existing client looking to close the gap between leads and revenue, Hatch serves as the conversion engine.
Free Agency encourages its clients to build campaigns across the entire customer journey, from first touch to long-term retention:
- Speed to lead: Immediate outbound on website leads and missed calls so clients engage prospects before competitors
- Estimate follow-up: Campaigns for estimate rehash, estimate opened/sold/dismissed notifications, and financing pre-approval to keep deals moving
- Customer care: Automated communication for job scheduled, rescheduled, canceled, unbooked recalls, and referral requests to deliver a consistent experience
- Customer recontact: Job completed follow-ups (12 months, 24 months, etc.), calls for maintenance, recurring service reminders, and membership expiration outreach to drive retention and lifetime value
"Hatch gives you the ability to catch people when they didn't book a job — you can still outbound them and have a dynamic audience for that and a campaign consistently running. The possibilities are endless."
The Results
For a company that reverse-engineers growth targets down to the dollar, the results have to be measurable. And they are.
$70M in Client Revenue Influenced
The revenue impact across Free Agency's client base speaks for itself.
"We have about $70 million in the last 12 months that has passed through Hatch. Hatch contributed to that number in sales, which is huge."
That's $70M in lead volume converted into booked jobs and closed sales.
Team Adoption
One of the most telling results isn't a number — it's adoption. Free Agency's clients don't just tolerate Hatch; their teams actively want to use it. CSRs love it and use it every day. Inbound sales teams choose to manage their leads through it. That kind of buy-in is what turns a tool into infrastructure.
"Our clients actually adopt it and their CSRs actually love it and use it every day. Their inbound sales team actually wants to reach out to people and utilize it to manage their leads."
Part of what drives that adoption is that nothing in their existing tech stack fills this role.
"There is literally nothing else natively in their CRMs that allows them to manage their entire pipeline and automate or initiate direct follow-ups in a user-friendly way."
Favorite Features
As someone who deploys Hatch across multiple clients, Bri has a clear perspective on what makes the platform work at scale.
- Centralized lead management: A single platform where CSRs and inbound sales teams manage and convert leads across channels. "The interface is so intuitive for lead management. The AI handles the bulk of conversations, but when a human does need to step in, it's seamless. That's why our clients actually adopt it."
- White glove support: "I feel spoiled with Hatch because it's very white glove. You guys take the time to know us and the architecture we want to build for our clients, and make sure every time we sign somebody up, it's ready to go, running, and tested."
- Intuitive interface: "The interface is so intuitive. It's very easy to spin up a campaign for any need at any time."
The Bottom Line
For Free Agency, every engagement starts with a growth target and a plan to hit it. Hatch is a non-negotiable pillar of the infrastructure that makes their growth strategies work: converting leads into revenue, giving teams a system they actually use, and scaling across every new client from day one.
With $70M in client revenue influenced, the math speaks for itself.
