Tell it what you do not do
Every business carefully lists what it offers and almost none writes down what it does not. That gap is where the worst answers come from, because the adjacent thing you refuse sounds exactly like the thing you provide to anyone who is not in your trade.
The expensive near-misses
A service you dropped two years ago is still assumed by customers and still implied by a page nobody updated.
A plumber who does not do gas, a salon that does not do extensions, a garage that does not touch electrics. To the caller these are the same category.
A twenty-minute call-out you would never send anybody out for.
Property types, vehicle ages, anything your insurance excludes. This is the one that costs real money when it is got wrong.
Why a near-miss is worse than a gap
If nothing is known about something, the honest answer is that it will be checked. If the adjacent service is known, the answer sounds informed and points at something you do not sell — and the caller books, takes a morning off work, and finds out on the doorstep. That is not a disappointed enquiry; it is a complaint, a wasted visit, and somebody who tells people about it.
Write the refusals down
Five minutes, alongside your price list: the things people ask for that you do not do, and the sentence you would say. "We do not do gas work — you will want a registered engineer for that" is better than a hedge, and it gives the caller something usable. A refusal delivered well is a referral, and in most trades referrals come back around.
It also makes your yes worth more
A business that says no clearly is believed when it says yes. Callers are used to being told everything is possible and discounting it accordingly, so a specific, unembarrassed no is a strong signal that the rest of what you said was accurate — which is exactly the property you want on a first call from somebody who has never used you.
Frequently asked
Because the adjacent thing you refuse sounds identical to the thing you provide, to anyone not in your trade. That is where confident wrong answers come from.
Work you stopped taking, work that sounds like yours but is not, jobs below your minimum, and customers your insurance excludes. Plus the sentence you would actually say.
It is worse than a gap. The caller books, takes a morning off, and finds out on the doorstep — that is a complaint and a story, not a lost enquiry.
A clear no delivered as a referral tends to come back in most trades, and a business that says no clearly is believed when it says yes.