Nearly every service-led business we’ve spoken to recently is struggling to get enquiries and win new clients. Founders, growing businesses, established ones – it doesn’t matter. You may find it reassuring to know that you aren’t alone, but that doesn’t help you sort the issue.

But why now?

The last few years have forced businesses to adapt – and fast! Most are still playing catch-up. But 2026 is still different…

The landscape has completely shifted, and businesses that have figured out how to adapt tend to be the larger ones with huge budgets, teams and data sets. Smaller businesses are still feeling their way in the dark.

If that’s where you are, here are five reasons your enquiries may have gone quiet, and what to do about each one.

1: You’re not doing the right things to get found

If you know what SEO is, you might have heard how it’s changed since the introduction of AI. There still isn’t a unanimous view on how SEO and AI results fit together, but what we’ve seen with our clients is that strong SEO fundamentals still drive visibility in both Google search results and AI-generated summaries and chats. The easiest win comes from getting your keywords right and making sure they match what people are actually searching for. Start by using tools like Google Ads Keyword Planner, Neil Patel’s SEO tools, or Answer the Public to find real search terms that make sense for your business. Look for high-volume and low-competition word combos, as well as a few medium-competition, high-volume. Never forget long-tail phrases that use your keywords, as this is what AI loves. FAQs are your best friend here, you can write phrases exactly as potential clients might search in AI, then answer with authority.

Once you’ve got all that, place those terms where they naturally belong: page titles, headings, meta descriptions, service pages, blog content, and LinkedIn profile copy where relevant.

2: You’re not targeting the right audience

As markets shift, client habits change. What people want and how they engage with marketing is different. People have shorter attention spans, and can see through obvious sales ploys. If you don’t explain how you can improve their lives quickly, concisely and clearly, they are much quicker to click off and look elsewhere. And it’s not just that your audience’s receptiveness to certain types of marketing has shifted – a lot of the businesses we talk to never got their targeting right in the first place. And it’s not their fault! Being so close to the business, especially founders who’ve lived with their business from conception, you end up making a lot of assumptions, or don’t re-evaluate often enough. So if your enquiries have dried up, this could be a crucial area to tackle, even if just to know you’ve got it right.

3: You’re not positioning your business properly

Another very common issue we see with our clients: they don’t invest in understanding where they are on the playing field. If you’re not keeping up with who your competitors are, how they’re approaching your audience, and then differentiating yourself to make sure you stand out, then you are likely falling behind. And the markets are more saturated than ever – there are so many brands to choose from. If you don’t immediately look more appealing than others, you get overlooked. New competitors are popping up left, right and centre – especially with the advances AI have made possible. A lot of businesses deprioritise brand positioning, focusing on improving operational efficiencies, or pumping cash into sales and quick-win performance marketing. But if you don’t address your positioning, nothing will bring in stable returns, long term. You need to clearly stand out. If you aren’t clear on how you stand out – get clear on it, quick!

4: You’re not building trust before trying to make a sale

There was a time when a tempting discount was all you needed to get ahead. But that world doesn’t exist anymore. In saturated markets, what matters is whether your target audience trusts you, and this trust relies on many things. The best and quickest way to give trust signals is to surface your social proof front and centre. Put short testimonials near calls to action, list the best companies you’ve worked with, high up your website homepage, talk about key case studies that do the things you want to be known for in your marketing. Include qualitative results where possible, not just client feelings. Combine this with a strong brand that shows up consistently across all channels over time, and you’ve given your audience multiple touch-points to get to know you, like what they’re seeing, and ‘BAM’ – people are ready to click your ‘enquire’ button.

5: You’re not making it easy for people to enquire

This might just be the easiest one to fix quickly. No matter where your target audience engages with you, you need to remove any friction that’s stopping them from getting in touch. Your audience are busy people, saturated by information more than any time in history. If you do anything to slow someone’s decision to enquire now, you’re losing potential clients. What are the sins of mental friction? You don’t quickly and clearly answer all their worries about using your service, they don’t immediately understand what you do, they can’t easily find the ‘Talk to us now’ button, or you’re not giving them enough reasons to get excited. If you’ve already sorted all of the other issues above, this point alone could be the main reason your enquiry rate is stagnant or dropping. Make the paths to enquiry as short, easy and frictionless as possible, no matter the channel.

The landscape is different now. If you’re not keeping up and adapting then you will struggle – we know, because we see it all the time. It’s why we designed The Read. In 5 working days, we give businesses a report that tells them why people aren’t enquiring with key actions to fix that. It costs £295, and if we can’t work out what’s wrong, you get your money back. You can take on the actions yourself, or ask us to help you – either way is fine. 

The Read has been described as inspiring ‘Lightbulb moments’, and our advice ‘far exceeded expectations!’. We’ve given service-led businesses ‘real, actionable clarity about [their] business and what needs to change’.

If you’re feeling lost and want some expert direction, visit www.milstedandstrange.com/the-read, otherwise, good luck with the rest of 2026, and hopefully our advice does its small part of helping you through the rest of it!

About Tom Milsted

Co-founder and one-half of Milsted + Strange, getting service-led businesses more enquiries.