You can tell whether Reddit brings you customers with a spreadsheet and one habit: log every thread you answer, and ask every new customer how they found you. No pixels or tracking links are needed. Give it sixty days, then compare the jobs you won against the hours you spent.
Reddit is a hard channel to measure with software because most people who find you there never click a tracked link. They read your reply, look at your profile, and call or search for you a few days later. So you track it by hand, which is fine at this scale. The example is Ines, who runs a window cleaning and pressure washing crew and spends about twenty minutes a day on Reddit.
What to count
Count the steps between answering a thread and getting paid, because each one tells you something different.
- Threads answered: the work you did.
- Responses: the poster replied, upvoted or thanked you, which says the answer was useful.
- Direct contacts: a message, call or email from someone who found you there.
- Quotes sent: the contacts that were real jobs.
- Jobs won, and what they paid.
Hours spent goes next to those, since the point is comparing effort with results. Don't count upvotes, karma or views as results. They are nice, and they are not customers.
A tracking sheet with five columns
One row per thread you answered. Five columns are enough to start:
- Date and thread link
- Community
- What they needed, in a few words
- What happened: no response, they replied, they contacted me, I quoted, I won (with the amount)
- Minutes spent
Add a column for the date of the last update. Open the sheet twice a week and check old rows, since a thread you answered on a Tuesday may send you a message the next Monday. Don't try to build a dashboard. A table you actually update beats a system you don't.
When a conversation moves to a message, copy the key facts into the row, so your records still hold if you lose the Reddit message later. A record of leads also helps you follow up. You don't have a lead problem argues that many owners lose more to what happens after the first contact than to the lack of contacts, and your sheet will show it quickly.
Ask every new customer how they found you
This is the cheapest and most reliable measurement you have. When a new customer books, ask: "How did you find us?" Write the answer down in the same sheet or a separate column on your job list. Ask it in the same words every time, and ask every customer, not only the ones you think came from Reddit.
The reason is that Reddit leads often don't say Reddit. A customer might say "I saw your name in a thread about window cleaning" or "someone online recommended you", or "I googled you". Ask a follow-up if they mention a name or a thread: "Which thread? I'd like to thank whoever started it." You'll learn the real source, and sometimes a customer mentions Reddit only because you asked. For another view of the same habit, stop measuring opens explains why counting activity metrics misses what pays.
Time to first lead
Expect a delay. A new account answering a few threads a week might see its first direct contact after several weeks, if at all. Reddit rewards a track record, and communities are suspicious of new accounts that appear and promote. So set your expectations before you start: the first thirty days are mostly about being useful and learning the communities, not about leads.
Write down the date of your first reply and the date of your first real contact. If that gap runs past six weeks with a steady effort, look at the communities you've chosen, the kind of threads you answer and the quality of your replies, before concluding the channel is dead. Call your own business before you buy ads is a good companion check: make sure that when a Reddit lead does call, the call gets answered.
Replies per week versus jobs won
Here's what 60 days could look like for Ines, using made-up numbers that add up. She answers 44 threads, an average of about five a week. 19 posters respond. 7 contact her directly. 5 turn into quotes. 2 are won, at $450 and $380. She spent roughly 20 minutes a day for 60 days, which is 20 hours.
Revenue: $450 plus $380 is $830. Divided by 20 hours, that's $41.50 per hour of Reddit time. Her normal rate for work on the job is higher, so this alone is thin. But two things change the picture. Both wins came in the last three weeks, so the trend is rising. And one of the two customers has since booked a quarterly contract, which isn't counted in the $830. A single sixty-day number tells you little. The direction, and what happens to repeat business, tell you more.
Compare the conversion between steps, too. 44 threads gave 7 contacts, about one in six. 7 contacts gave 5 quotes. 5 quotes gave 2 wins. If the weak step is contact-to-quote, look at how fast you respond. If it's thread-to-contact, look at which communities and what kind of threads. How to write a Reddit reply that does not read like an ad is the place to start if answers are getting no response.
When to stop or double down
Set rules before you start, so you aren't deciding from mood. A workable set: after sixty days, if you have no direct contacts at all, change the communities or thread types and run another thirty. If you have contacts but no jobs, fix the follow-up. If you have jobs and the hours-to-revenue number beats your other sources, spend more time, but add communities slowly, since your reputation in each takes time to build.
Stop if the effort is costing more than it returns for ninety days and nothing is improving, or if the rules of your best communities turn against business owners. There is no shame in that. Reddit works well for some businesses and poorly for others, and the sheet is how you find out which kind you are. If it doesn't work, the same hours are better used elsewhere.
Where Reddit fits with email and calls
Reddit is one source of conversations among several. It tends to be slow, public and honest. Email you send to named people is faster, private and more predictable, and calls you answer turn interest into bookings. Treat the sheet as part of a single list of leads from all sources, not a separate world, so you can compare sources side by side.
Conversations, inside Rocketship, can supply the Reddit side. It finds Reddit threads where people ask for what you sell and drafts a reply and a message in your voice. You post from your own account, and it never posts, messages or votes for you. Whatever source a lead comes from, the same account follows up by email from your own Gmail and answers the number you already have.
Rocketship finds the buyers, emails them from your own Gmail, follows up, and books the meeting on its own. Plans that get you customers start at $24.99 a month (Launch), and every monthly plan starts with a 7-day free trial, card required. Answering your existing number is included; a dedicated line is $5 a month. Read about the AI workers, and if you want to compare tools that watch Reddit, Reddit lead generation tools: what to check has a checklist. For the full start-from-zero version, finding leads on Reddit for a local service business.