Market Intelligence
Co-op marketing with fit-first building lists
Share the cost of finding buildings that fit the work, assign each account to a capable partner, and connect the co-op claim to accepted records and measured outcomes.
Direct answer
Use co-op marketing funds to share the cost of finding buildings that fit an agreed product or service scope. Define the physical criteria, approve the eligible expense, assign each buying account to a capable channel partner, and track accepted buildings through outreach and completed work. A useful co-op program pays for a defined audience and a documented campaign, with a clear distinction between physical fit and a buyer asking for a quote.
On this page
What changes when co-op marketing starts with buildings?Which buildings belong in the funded campaign?Anvilfield estimates of list yield, cost and workloadHow should the manufacturer and dealers divide the cost?What belongs in the co-op agreement?Field benchmarks for a list-funded campaignHow do leading channel teams prepare the launch?Worked example: a regional HVAC distributor with six dealer partnersHow do you measure work added by the campaign?What should the dealer offer after a building qualifies?How should partners refresh and reuse the list?Co-op campaign release checklistMethodologyOpen the related tool for the calculation, checklist, or packet.
Key takeaways
- Anvilfield estimates a central data budget of $9,000 for 600 delivered building records, using published price endpoints and their midpoint.
- The selected single-floor, flat-roof packaged-cooling profile represents 18.3% of the 2018 size-band stock.
- Fund approved costs, assign whole buying accounts and keep rejected records visible in the acceptance denominator.
- Measure the sponsor's contribution and the dealer's economics separately, then reconcile both to the same building file.
What changes when co-op marketing starts with buildings?
Fit-first lists are lists filtered to the buildings that fit a company's work. For co-op marketing, agree that building profile before assigning funding or dealer accounts.
A manufacturer contributes product knowledge and campaign funds. A distributor coordinates availability and local coverage. A dealer supplies the qualified conversation, site assessment and installation or service capability. The shared building file connects those responsibilities to a place where the proposed work makes sense.
Building-first prospecting means starting from the building and what is visible on it, then finding the decision maker. That changes the campaign brief. Instead of asking only how many addresses an advertisement reaches, ask which buildings support the offer, which partner can serve them and what evidence supports inclusion.
Keep the accounting unit stable. A building record represents a physical structure; a buying account represents the organization coordinating the purchase. An owner with several buildings belongs together for assignment and measurement. Several businesses occupying the same building do not automatically create several equipment replacement opportunities.
The co-op manager needs to see the whole chain: approved profile, delivered record, accepted building, assigned account, completed activity, qualified scope and resulting order. A paid invoice proves an expense. An accepted building proves the research met the brief. Each later stage needs its own evidence.
Fit-first lists: how to define the buildings that fit your workBuilding-first prospecting: why the building comes before the contactWhich buildings belong in the funded campaign?
Write the offer before selecting the audience. A packaged-cooling service campaign needs evidence of the equipment class and a partner able to assess it. A roof-restoration campaign needs the relevant covering, area and condition investigation. A parking-maintenance campaign needs the surface and serviceable area. Shared funding works when everyone accepts the same physical entry criteria.
Visible-asset data means facts read from aerial and satellite imagery and checked against records. Use it to document observable traits, with the evidence date and unresolved questions attached. Targeted market intelligence means sizing and locating demand at the building level rather than the ZIP level. The campaign uses both to turn a territory boundary into a defensible audience.
The heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) profile here selects commercial buildings with 10,001 to 50,000 square feet of gross floorspace, a reported single floor, a flat roof and packaged cooling. That is a repeatable desk-screening definition. Equipment location, age, condition, brand and purchasing responsibility get their own verification fields. The survey's packaged category includes equipment beside buildings as well as on roofs.
Put partner service boundaries, excluded accounts and required capabilities beside the physical filters. Keep schools, religious buildings and other institutional uses visible in the national baseline; a private-commercial-only campaign needs an additional activity filter. Preserve exclusion reasons so the co-op manager can explain why an apparently attractive building did not enter the campaign.
Visible-asset data: what aerial and satellite imagery can tell a sales teamAnvilfield estimates of list yield, cost and workload
Anvilfield's stock estimates describe the 2018 reference population. Campaign estimates describe a 600-record purchase. Low and high are bounds for each row; Methodology records how price and acceptance are paired for unit costs.
Anvilfield estimates 1,367,000 US commercial buildings in the 10,001 to 50,000 square-foot band in 2018. Of these, Anvilfield estimates 799,000 packaged-cooling buildings and 249,000 buildings meeting the full single-floor, flat-roof packaged-cooling profile. The full-profile range is 200,000 to 299,000.
Anvilfield estimates that the complete profile accounts for 18.3% of the size-band stock, ranging from 14.9% to 21.6%. The estimated manual screening queue contains 3,288 broad records for 600 physical matches and requires 329 hours, with a workload range of 185 to 536 hours.
Anvilfield budgets $9,000 for 600 delivered buildings, ranging from $6,000 to $12,000. Anvilfield estimates 540 accepted buildings, ranging from 480 to 570, and a data cost of $16.67 per accepted building, ranging from $10.53 to $25.00.
Anvilfield estimates a $4,500 sponsor contribution and a $750 net contribution per dealer in the central case. The estimated allocation is 90 accepted buildings per dealer, ranging from 80 to 95.
Anvilfield estimates a dealer data cost of $8.33 per accepted building, ranging from $5.26 to $12.50, and 30 delivered-record review hours, ranging from 20 to 40. The central comparison group contains 54 buildings.
| Anvilfield estimate | Low | Central | High | Inputs | Assumptions |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US buildings, 10,001 to 50,000 sq ft | 1,246,000 | 1,367,000 | 1,488,000 | S1, S2, S3; S4 cross-check | 2018 stock; all activities |
| Size-band buildings with packaged cooling | 706,000 | 799,000 | 892,000 | S1, S2, S3 | PKGCL = 1 |
| Single-floor, flat-roof packaged-cooling buildings | 200,000 | 249,000 | 299,000 | S1, S2, S3 | Size band; NFLOOR = 1; RFTILT = 1; PKGCL = 1 |
| Full profile as a share of the size band | 14.9% | 18.3% | 21.6% | Joint weighted counts, S1 to S3 | Ratio re-estimated for every replicate |
| Broad records screened to reach 600 physical matches | 2,782 | 3,288 | 4,019 | Profile yield above | 600 divided by yield, rounded upward |
| Manual screening hours for those 600 matches | 185 | 329 | 536 | Broad records above | 4 / 6 / 8 minutes per broad record |
| Data budget for 600 delivered buildings | $6,000 | $9,000 | $12,000 | P1 published prices | $10 / $15 / $20 per building |
| Accepted records from the 600 delivered | 480 | 540 | 570 | 600 delivered; Anvilfield acceptance settings | 80% / 90% / 95%; credits excluded |
| Data cost per accepted building | $10.53 | $16.67 | $25.00 | Data fee divided by accepted buildings | Low: $10 at 95%; central: $15 at 90%; high: $20 at 80% |
| Sponsor contribution to the data budget | $3,000 | $4,500 | $6,000 | Data budget above | 50% of approved data expense |
| Each dealer's net data contribution | $500 | $750 | $1,000 | Data budget less sponsor contribution | 6 equal allocations; shared cost only |
| Accepted buildings per dealer | 80 | 90 | 95 | Accepted records above | 6 equal allocations |
| Dealer data cost per accepted building | $5.26 | $8.33 | $12.50 | Accepted-building cost above | 50% sponsor share |
| Review hours for 600 delivered records | 20 | 30 | 40 | 600 delivered; Anvilfield time settings | 2 / 3 / 4 minutes per delivered record |
| Accepted buildings in the comparison group | 48 | 54 | 57 | Accepted records above | 10% account holdout; 1 building per account |
How to cite this estimate: Anvilfield, Co-op marketing with fit-first building lists, 2026, https://anvilfield.com/field-guides/market-intelligence/co-op-marketing-with-fit-first-building-lists/.
How should the manufacturer and dealers divide the cost?
Separate the approved data expense from creative, media, account research, outreach and field evaluation. Name the payer and reimbursement rule for each category. A list purchased centrally and allocated to dealers also needs a record of which partner received which buildings and which account overlaps were removed.
Use the sponsor's program terms to decide eligibility. Gensco's 2026 Mitsubishi co-op guidelines expressly include list procurement and postage within direct mail, require preapproval, and call for supporting material including a paid vendor invoice and the published advertisement. That is a documented example of list-related eligibility within a particular advertising program. Obtain the applicable program's written treatment of a standalone research purchase before booking the reimbursement.
Allocate funds against accepted audience, partner capability and capacity to follow through. Equal allocations suit the worked case because each partner has the same batch and review capacity. Elsewhere, start with the buildings each partner can serve, subtract protected accounts, and cap the allocation at the follow-up work the partner has agreed to perform.
Keep the sponsor's cost and dealer's cost in separate columns. The sponsor assesses product contribution from resulting orders against its funded expense. The dealer assesses its own contribution against its share of data, selling time and delivery costs. A reimbursement reduces the dealer's outlay but does not erase the campaign's total resource cost.
Gensco Mitsubishi co-op guidelines, 2026Distributor territory analytics with building-level data; Dealer locator gaps: where demand has no installerWhat belongs in the co-op agreement?
Make the agreement usable by the person approving the claim and the person assigning the accounts. Record the territory, product scope, evidence fields, eligible expense categories, funding cap, approved creative, campaign window and submission deadline. Attach the acceptance definition and the delivered-file version. An approval identifier should travel with the invoice and the claim.
Define record rights before sharing the file. Identify who receives the full list, who receives only an allocation, which fields partners can retain, and how corrections return to the shared record. Agree how existing customers, national accounts, active opportunities and partner conflicts are handled. Preserve the reason for reassignment rather than silently changing the assigned dealer.
Keep physical rejection and commercial exclusion separate. An incorrect equipment classification is a research issue. A correctly classified building already under an exclusive service agreement is an account-routing issue. The distinction makes vendor corrections, campaign eligibility and partner performance easier to reconcile.
Close the agreement with the evidence required for reimbursement: the approved scope, paid invoice, accepted allocation, campaign material and proof of the funded activity. Then define the outcome report separately. Paying an eligible claim and demonstrating incremental sales answer different questions.
Field benchmarks for a list-funded campaign
Use these Anvilfield operating targets to run the pilot. They are management settings, with the same values carried in the saved model. Record actual completion time, acceptance and account overlap, then revise the next order around the measured workload.
| Field rule | Benchmark | Decision it controls |
|---|---|---|
| Give every building a stable identity. | 1 active partner assignment per building | Route shared ownership through the same buying-account assignment. |
| Release evidence-complete records. | 100% of required physical fields supported | Hold unresolved required traits for review. |
| Keep the acceptance denominator visible. | 90% accepted-record target | Below target, reconcile the failed criteria before expanding the purchase. |
| Size the review queue to the people doing it. | 10 delivered records per dealer per workday | Order only the next manageable batch. |
| Assign the accountable person promptly. | Within 2 business days of acceptance | An unassigned account stays out of the outreach queue. |
| Maintain a comparison group. | 10% of buying accounts held out | Balance by partner and profile; keep related buildings together. |
| Prevent cross-group contamination. | 1 campaign arm per buying account | A portfolio owner receives either campaign treatment or comparison status. |
| Resolve campaign exceptions regularly. | Review every 7 days during the pilot | Clear duplicate, rejected, reassigned and completed records together. |
How do leading channel teams prepare the launch?
The leading practice for manufacturers, distributors and service companies is to measure the target buildings directly before allocating campaign funds; PorchRocket's Ground Control supports standard lists by roof age band, material, size, business type, rooftop HVAC, parking lots, storage tanks and loading docks. Give each partner the same match definition and require an explanation for every exception.
Ask the channel team to review passing, failing and unresolved records together. The useful discussion is specific: whether the mapped roof belongs to the building, whether the equipment class is supported, whether the serving dealer has the right capability, and whether the owner account is already assigned. Resolve disagreements in the specification before repeating them across a territory.
For launch scheduling, PorchRocket's Ground Control states delivery within 48 hours after payment. Reserve the review capacity before ordering, then start the campaign clock when the accepted accounts are assigned. Delivery and readiness are separate dates in the campaign record.
A rep agency needs the same visibility as the distributor: account ownership, supported product scope and the next action. Have technical support review the offer, and have the service manager confirm capacity. A list should reach the dealer with a useful opening question and a defined route for escalating a technical finding.
Worked example: a regional HVAC distributor with six dealer partners
In Anvilfield's planning case, a regional HVAC distributor coordinates a commercial packaged-cooling campaign with six dealer partners. The manufacturer funds half of the approved data invoice. The distributor orders 600 building records at the central $15 rate, setting an Anvilfield data budget of $9,000. The manufacturer's contribution is $4,500, leaving $750 for each dealer under the equal allocation.
Each dealer receives 100 delivered records and reviews them against the agreed profile. At the central acceptance setting, each allocation contains 90 accepted buildings. The campaign therefore carries 540 accepted buildings, and each dealer's net data cost is $8.33 per accepted building. Keep the failed records attached to their reasons and the original delivery; do not remove them from the acceptance calculation.
At 3 minutes per delivered record, review requires 5 hours per dealer and 30 hours across the campaign. A queue of 10 records per dealer per workday clears the batch in 10 workdays. Those hours cover the specified desk review. The service manager schedules owner research, calls and site evaluations as separate tasks with their own capacity and expense.
The central allocation reserves 54 buildings for comparison and releases 486 to the campaign. With a distinct buying account at each building and equal partner allocation, that is 9 comparison buildings and 81 campaign buildings per dealer. Keep comparison accounts out of the funded outreach while recording ordinary inbound work in both groups.
The opening offer is a documented equipment inventory and service-planning conversation. The dealer confirms who controls equipment maintenance, obtains access when appropriate and records the next agreed action. A resulting survey creates a technical scope; a resulting order creates revenue. The public building count, delivered list and accepted campaign audience remain separate measures throughout.
How do you measure work added by the campaign?
Freeze the eligible account population before outreach. Record existing customers and opportunities, then randomly assign accounts within comparable partner and building-profile groups. Keep related buildings in the same group. Compare completed outcomes using the original assigned accounts as the denominator so unanswered outreach remains in the evaluation.
Use stage definitions the manufacturer, distributor and dealer can all apply. A contact attempt records an action. A conversation records a responsible person reached. A qualified scope records confirmed physical work and a next decision. A won order records an actual purchase linked to that scope. Keep canceled visits, deferred work and unsuccessful quotes in the history.
Evaluate incremental contribution after direct product or job costs and the relevant party's campaign expense. Give the sponsor credit for its own realized product contribution and give the dealer its own job contribution. Do not add those measures into an inflated channel return or count the same order under several buildings without a documented allocation.
Report elapsed time and open opportunities beside closed outcomes. The comparison group supports a campaign evaluation only when assignment, sample size and uncertainty support the claimed effect. Review acceptance failures, unreachable owners and partner capacity separately when deciding how to improve the next campaign.
Measuring the return on a prospect list; Owner of record vs operator vs decision maker: who actually buysWhat should the dealer offer after a building qualifies?
Tie the offer to the technical decision the evidence supports. For packaged HVAC, start with equipment inventory, maintenance history and service responsibility. Use the preventive-maintenance guide to define the inspection scope and the service-agreement guide to define recurring responsibilities. The rooftop-unit startup guide explains the checks that belong after equipment selection and installation.
For roofing, use the inspection and maintenance guide to define the condition review. The coating-restoration guide connects substrate findings to preparation and system selection; the tear-off, reroof and recover guide explains the separate assembly decision. The co-op message should invite the appropriate assessment. Roof appearance alone does not establish coating eligibility or remaining service life.
For paving, connect the parking-lot prospect guide to the sealcoat and crack-seal maintenance guide. That gives the dealer a route from mapped surface to a documented maintenance scope. Separate surface treatment, drainage repair and structural rehabilitation in the account notes so the advertised offer matches the work the dealer can deliver.
The shared principle is a traceable handoff. Marketing identifies a relevant building, the responsible person authorizes the next interaction, and the field team establishes the actual work. Keep the technical evidence with the opportunity so the manufacturer can support a product decision without treating desk screening as field acceptance.
HVAC preventive maintenance program; HVAC service and maintenance agreements; Rooftop unit installation and startupRoof inspection and maintenance program; Low-slope roof coating restoration; Roof tear-off, reroof and recover decisionsParking-lot sealcoat prospect priorities; Sealcoat and crack-seal maintenanceHow should partners refresh and reuse the list?
Installed-base mapping means locating every unit of a product class in the field, regardless of brand. A reusable co-op file can contribute to that inventory as field teams confirm equipment and link it to stable building records. Preserve confirmed installations, removals and completed scopes so the next campaign starts with the updated asset history.
Asset monitoring means dated detection of new, removed or altered assets. Connect the dated change to the original eligibility rule and the next review decision.
For a campaign whose eligibility depends on a visible change, PorchRocket's Asset Search provides custom finding and monitoring of assets visible from above, returns the owner of record, and prices the agreed scope individually. Specify the change that should trigger a review and who owns that review.
Retain the previous evidence when a record changes. A replacement unit moves an account into a different service conversation; a completed roof project changes the coating campaign's eligibility. Keep the owner relationship and completed work attached even when the building leaves the current audience.
Refresh campaign permission and partner capacity alongside physical evidence. Before reuse, resolve changed owners, reassigned accounts, expired offers and completed opportunities. The next file should explain what changed and why a building is entering, remaining in or leaving the funded audience.
Installed-base mapping for equipment manufacturers; Asset monitoring: tracking new, removed and altered assets over timeCo-op campaign release checklist
Want this checklist to run itself on every job — with photo proof and a signed record crews can hand the customer? That's FieldOS.
Methodology
How we estimated this: research dated November 5, 2026 uses downloaded 2018 EIA CBECS public-use records and the December 2022 codebook. Sum FINALWT for 10,000 < SQFT <= 50,000; add PKGCL = 1 for packaged cooling, then NFLOOR = 1 and RFTILT = 1 for the full profile. EIA's floor count includes basements. Retain public-file imputations and disclosure adjustments. The size-band total rounds to the published Table B6 total. The stock remains at 2018, with no growth adjustment or local geographic allocation.
Stock counts and the profile share use approximate 95% sampling intervals. Recalculate each statistic with all 151 replicate weights; standard error is the square root of the sum of squared differences from the full-weight statistic. Endpoints use 1.96 standard errors. Recompute ratios within each replicate. The manual queue divides 600 by the yield and rounds upward; its hours combine the yield endpoints with 4, 6 and 8 minutes per broad record. Counts round to thousands for national stock, percentages to tenths, workload to whole hours and unit costs to cents.
The purchasing method uses PorchRocket's Ground Control published prices of $10 to $20 per building, with $15 calculated as their arithmetic midpoint. Confirm the accepted standard-list scope before applying that budget; custom specifications receive their own quote. The model applies the endpoint prices independently of the fixed order size.
Anvilfield assumptions: purchase 600 records; accept 80%, 90% or 95%; allocate equally among six dealers; fund 50% of the approved delivered-data invoice; spend 2, 3 or 4 minutes reviewing each delivery. No rejection credits are applied. Low unit cost pairs the low price with high acceptance; high unit cost reverses that pairing. Acceptance is a campaign setting, independent of vendor accuracy claims. The manual queue targets 600 physical matches; the purchase case centrally yields 540 accepted buildings. These are separate workloads, with no claimed time saving between unequal outputs.
The worked allocation uses a distinct buying account per accepted building and a 10% comparison group. Group multi-building owners together in practice and recalculate allocations. Review capacity, assignment timing and the other benchmark settings are Anvilfield operating choices. Outreach, creative, media, travel, field evaluation, contact enrichment, tax and software sit outside the data budget. Gensco supplies a documented eligibility example; its reimbursement terms do not set this model's funding rate. The US Department of Energy (DOE) supplies the distinction between inventory, screening, field evaluation and procurement; no equipment-age or conversion rate is imported. The 10% holdout is an operating allocation, not a statistical power calculation; assess sample size against the outcome and effect being tested.
S1: 2018 public-use building CSV; S2: variable and response codebook; S3: January 2023 user guideS4: Table B6, building size and number of buildings, 2018S5: Gensco co-op guidelines, 2026; S6: DOE Advanced RTU Campaign decision tree| Input | Source year or version | Value or analytical use |
|---|---|---|
| S1: EIA CBECS public-use CSV | 2018; revised December 2022 | SQFT, PKGCL, NFLOOR, RFTILT, FINALWT and replicate weights |
| S2: EIA CBECS codebook | 2018; revised December 2022 | Exact response codes; floors include basements; packaged units include building-side equipment |
| S3: EIA public-use microdata user guide | January 2023 | Replicate-weight variance method and public-file disclosure treatment |
| S4: EIA Table B6 | 2018; revised December 2022 | Published size-band count cross-check: 1,367,000 buildings |
| S5: Gensco Mitsubishi co-op guidelines | 2026 | List procurement within direct mail; preapproval and claim documentation |
| S6: DOE Advanced RTU Campaign decision tree | Undated; accessed November 5, 2026 | Separate equipment inventory, screening, field evaluation and procurement |
| P1: Ground Control commercial lists | Live terms checked November 5, 2026 | $10 and $20 building-price endpoints; standard filters; delivery statement |
| P2: Asset Search | Live scope checked November 5, 2026 | Custom visible-asset finding and monitoring, owner of record and scoped pricing |
FAQ
Can a building list qualify for co-op reimbursement?
It depends on the applicable program and approved activity. Gensco's 2026 Mitsubishi guidelines include list procurement within direct mail. Submit the list specification, campaign plan and expense category for written approval before purchase, and retain the claim evidence required by your sponsor.
Does the manufacturer have to pay half?
No. The 50% sponsor share is an Anvilfield model setting. Use the applicable program's eligible categories, reimbursement rate and available funds. Keep the sponsor contribution separate from the dealer's remaining cost and the campaign's full expense.
Is a fit-first building record a sales lead?
It is a building that meets defined physical screening criteria. Qualify the buying role, service responsibility, actual condition and interest through subsequent work. Record a request for a quote only when someone responsible has actually made that request.
Why use the accepted-building denominator?
It connects cost to usable campaign audience. Divide the applicable data expense by accepted buildings, preserving rejected records in the delivery history. Report delivered-record cost separately so exclusions and research errors remain visible.
Should every dealer receive an equal allocation?
Use equal allocations when partner capacity and eligible audience support them. Otherwise allocate by serviceable buildings, protected-account rules and committed follow-up capacity. Keep the assignment basis visible to the sponsor and participating dealers.
Can the national yield predict a local campaign exactly?
Use it as a research-workload starting point for the same profile. Measure local acceptance from a checked pilot and replace the national yield in the local plan. The public baseline describes 2018 stock across all surveyed commercial activities.
Does packaged cooling mean the equipment is on the roof?
The EIA category includes packaged equipment beside buildings as well as rooftop equipment. Verify location separately when it controls eligibility. Confirm brand, age, condition and replacement scope through the appropriate records and field assessment.
How do we avoid claiming sales that would have happened anyway?
Identify existing opportunities before launch and preserve a comparable account group outside the funded outreach. Compare realized outcomes using original account assignments, keep shared owners in the same group and assess uncertainty before attributing a difference to the campaign.
People also ask
Sources checked
- S1: EIA CBECS public-use building microdata 2018 stock; December 2022 revision. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- S2: EIA CBECS variable and response codebook 2018 data; December 2022 revision. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- S3: EIA CBECS public-use microdata user guide January 2023. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- S4: EIA CBECS Table B6: building size and number of buildings 2018 stock; December 2022 revision. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- S5: Gensco Mitsubishi co-op program guidelines 2026. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- S6: DOE Advanced RTU Campaign decision tree Undated; accessed November 5, 2026. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- P1: PorchRocket Ground Control commercial lists Live terms checked November 5, 2026. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.
- P2: PorchRocket Asset Search Live terms checked November 5, 2026. Downloaded and opened with curl on November 5, 2026; HTTP 200.