How These Rankings Work

What criteria decide the rankings?

Six criteria, evaluated together. We deliberately publish qualitative judgments instead of a fake-precise score — there is no defensible difference between “94.2” and “93.8” for a local contractor, and we won’t pretend otherwise.

1. Licensing & insurance

   A company must hold the registrations its work requires (Indiana has no statewide gutter-contractor license, so Marion County and municipal registrations apply where relevant) and carry current general liability insurance. We record what was verified and when. Companies that can’t demonstrate insurance don’t rank, period.

2. Reputation pattern

   We look for a consistent pattern across at least two independent review platforms — not a single score, not testimonials a company hands us. Volume, recency, distribution, and how the company responds to problems all count. A handful of perfect reviews on one platform is weaker evidence than hundreds of mostly-good ones across several.

3. Service depth

   What the company actually performs in-house: installation, guards, cleaning, repair, drainage. Breadth helps the top ranks; a narrow specialist can still rank well on depth — the profile says which kind of strength earned the position.

4. Warranty clarity

   Written workmanship warranties with stated terms beat verbal promises. We record the length and scope as the company states them, and note when terms are unwritten or unclear.

5. Pricing transparency

   Itemized written estimates, disclosed service-call fees, and honest condition tiers. We don’t require published price lists — most contractors quote per-job — but we do require that quoting practices be clear before work starts.

6. Responsiveness

   Whether quotes, scheduling, and communication actually happen the way the company says they do. Persistent reports of no-shows or unreturned quotes drag a rank down regardless of work quality.

How are ties broken?

When companies score similarly, stronger verifiable local evidence wins, in this order:

1. Longer documented track record serving Indianapolis specifically
2. Clearer written warranty terms
3. More consistent reputation across more independent platforms
4. Greater pricing transparency at quote time

What data sources are used?

• State and county licensing/registration records
• Certificates of insurance provided by companies
• Public review platforms (checked across at least two, with dates recorded)
• Better Business Bureau records
• The company’s own published materials, for service and warranty claims
• Direct correspondence with companies during verification

Each profile carries its own source notes and a last-reviewed date. Where something could not be verified, the profile says so instead of guessing.

How often do rankings change?

Profiles are re-reviewed on a rolling basis and the list is re-evaluated when material evidence changes — a lapsed registration, a sustained reputation shift, a service-line change. Every profile shows its own last-reviewed date; the sitewide date in the header is the last editorial pass over the full list.

What does sponsorship change — and what can it never change?

Three things businesses can pay for, all labeled wherever they appear:

• Enhanced profiles — richer detail on a company’s own profile page (photos, expanded descriptions, direct links).
• Sponsored placements — promotional slots rendered outside the editorial order, marked “Sponsored.”
• Lead or call inquiries — if offered later, disclosed on the page where they operate.

What payment can never do:

• Change a company’s editorial rank, up or down
• Buy entry onto the ranked list
• Remove a documented limitation from a profile
• Appear without a label

If a paid placement ever changes the order of anything on a page, the page says so next to the list — not in a footer. The advertising disclosure covers the commercial side in full.

How do corrections and claims work?

Any company can claim its profile, submit corrections, or request a first profile — free. Corrections need something verifiable attached: a license record, a current certificate of insurance, or an official page. Verified changes get a new last-reviewed date. Disagreement with a rank isn’t a correction; new evidence is.

What this guide will not do

• No fabricated ratings, review counts, credentials, prices, or awards
• No “guaranteed results” claims — workmanship varies and weather exists
• No undisclosed paid rankings, ever
• No fake precision (decimal scores without a reproducible calculation)
• No pretending placeholder data is research: until verification completes, placeholder entries are labeled on every card and ranked-company structured data stays off