Huge Transformations

24: The Marcus Sheridan Episode

In this episode of the Huge Transformations Podcast, Sid Graef interviews keynote speaker and best-selling author Marcus Sheridan, known for his book They Ask, You Answer and his newest release, Endless Customers. Marcus dives deep into the changing landscape of trust in marketing, emphasizing why home service businesses must focus on radical transparency and self-service experiences to win customers in 2025 and beyond.
Listeners will learn why traditional marketing tactics are becoming less effective in the AI-driven world, how to use video and pricing estimator tools to generate 3–5x more leads, and the "Big 5" questions every business must answer to earn trust and drive conversions. Marcus breaks down the four pillars of a known and trusted brand and shares powerful real-world examples that business owners can implement immediately.
If you're a service business owner ready to stand out, dominate your local market, and future-proof your lead generation, this conversation is a must-listen.
Resources
The Huge Insider newsletter signup
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
The Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
Facebook Group
Marcus Sheridan's website
Marcus Sheridan on LinkedIn
Endless Customers book site
River Pools
Price Guide AI
 
Transcript:
 
 Hello everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I'm Sid Graef Outta Montana. I'm Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee. And I'm Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina, we are your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in.
The industry folks that have already built seven and eight figure businesses and they want to help you succeed. Yep. No fake gurus on this show, just real life owners that have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience.
0% theory. We are going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guest will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece. Thanks for joining us on the wild. Journey of entrepreneurship.
Let's dive in.
Welcome back to the Huge Transformations podcast. This is Sid. I'm your host today, and today we've got a really special treat, and that is Marcus Sheridan. Marcus Sheridan is best known for his, uh, bestselling book. They ask You Answer. He just published a new book in April of this year, 2025, and it's titled Endless Customers.
Marcus is going to be keynote. Presentation or the keynote speaker at the huge convention this year in Nashville, Tennessee. Tennessee, uh, August 22nd. 2025. So Marcus is really sharp. When we did this recording, uh, we were actually on our live stream for the huge convention. So it's not a traditional interview like we normally do, but really insightful Guy knows his stuff when it comes to generating customer leads and making sure that your calendar's full.
He's got it down. But the most important thing that he teaches is how you can become the most trusted. Company in your industry, in your marketplace, and that carries a value far beyond just getting more leads. So I hope you have the opportunity to take notes or listen to it twice or whatever. 'cause Marcus said really shares some gold and drop some value here that, uh, is hard to overstate.
All right, so he is really great. I hope you enjoy everything about this episode. Meet Marcus Sheridan. They ask you answer endless customers. This one is red hot. Talk to you soon. Welcome to the show, Marcus Sheridan. This is the huge live show. I'm really glad you're here. How, aside from the storm at your house, how are things going man?
Well, thank goodness for home generators and uh, the thunder is rolling outside. We've got a tree down across the driveway. Uh, but it's all good, man, and I'm excited to be, uh, talking about the subjects that we're gonna be discussing tonight because. It's a big deal. There's a lot of change happening in the world right now.
Uh, businesses feel a little bit confused, right? So this is an important time in the history of the world, and there's a lot of opportunity for those that understand how to take advantage of those opportunities. So, yeah, I'm ready to get into it, buddy. Oh, okay. Good. So, excuse me, uh, for those of you joining us live, thank you very much.
Our guest tonight as Marcus Sheridan. Marcus, you're gonna be our. One of our keynotes at the huge convention on Friday, August 22nd. I hope I did that. Yeah. August 22nd. And, uh, I'm really looking forward to it. It was a couple years ago, a buddy of mine's got a, a substantial business in Denver. He's like, Hey, you gotta check out this book.
You're probably familiar to you. They ask you answer, and this is the first one that you published in 2017. Um, and I'm like, well, that, that sounds so simple. And he is like, it is. Like the concept is like, it's just truth and it's way human nature works. So, um, with that, you, you mentioned, uh, you know, like things are moving really fast right now and I was excited.
I did get a copy of your second book, the one that's just released, uh, April 15th this year. Endless customers with. The speed and challenge of changes in business and internet and ai and in short attention spans. Let's start with what are the principles, uh, for business or for the, the methodology you teach?
Like, what are the principles that are never gonna change no matter what technology does? Yeah, and I think that's, I, I like the question a lot because you can build businesses on, on, on platforms temporarily. You can build them on principles forever. And when it comes to your sales and marketing strategies, you really wanna be principle driven.
So that's why if I said to you as a business, uh, is trust gonna be fundamental to your organization in five years, you'd say yes. 10 years you'd say Yes, 20 years you'd say yes. If I said, is Facebook gonna be fundamental in five years? You'd say, I have no idea. Google. I don't know. Right? Yeah. Because these are platforms that are gonna come and go, but trust is the centerpiece of every business.
It's the battle that we're in every single day. So endless customers, the payoff of that book, it is a system that shows you how to become the most known and trusted brand in your market. And these are, these are. Uh, components of business that are truly built to last, and they're gonna be evergreen in terms of their importance.
And that's why, you know, whenever you're debating about a sales or marketing strategy, one of the first questions you should start with would be, yeah, but if we did this, would it induce more trust? The answer is yes. Well, you need to go in solution mode and stop saying to yourself, well, there's no way we could do this.
Yeah, a hundred percent. So, uh, and I'm gonna segue a second, uh, as you're joining us live, guys, thanks for being here. First of all, uh, go ahead. We're gonna give away a couple of tickets to the huge convention later in the show about about 15, 20 minutes from now. And if you would like to win a ticket, all you need to do is this one.
Go ahead and take this live stream and share it into a group or two that you frequent. And then just report back and hit the comment and say, Hey, I'm here. I shared in the group. And, uh, then we're gonna ask a question later. The first person to answer of course, wins the ticket and it's gonna be fun. So we're gonna do that in just a few moments.
Excuse me. So, um, we go back to like the, the root of the issue is trust and the, the old sales strategy forever, or just business strategy or saying. People do business with people they know, like, and trust. That's right. Yeah. It's never gonna go away. It's more true than ever today. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So, um, I've got a, I've got a handful of questions for you and we'll just like, if it's okay with you, we'll just run and see how, how the conversation goes, see where it goes.
Try not to make it super standard, but with, uh, with one of the core principles in they ask you answer and, and what you did with the pool company in 2000. Did you start the, the concept in 2008 when the economy tanked? That's right. That's right. I started a swimming pool for those that are listening, I started a, a swimming pool company called River Pools in 2001.
Uh, you know, we have the crash of 2008. Looks like we're gonna lose the business. I. We ended up really leaning into the changing buyer and this thing that today we might refer to as content marketing, inbound marketing, whatever you wanna call it. But make a long story short, we became obsessed with our customer's.
Questions, worries, fears, issues, concerns. We said, we're going to be the best teachers in the world when it comes to, in our case, fiberglass swimming pools. And we became like the Wikipedia of pools, if you will, the most traffic swimming pool website in the world. And that framework, which I called, they Ask You Answer, became a book.
That book became a bestseller. Now the third edition is actually called Endless Customers. So that's the, that's the timeline of what has been 20, you know, 20 years. Yeah. There's some up two decades in a sentence. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So with one of the, the, uh, you know, the, the principles there, it was, uh, extreme transparency.
Mm-hmm. Lot of people are not really, you know, maybe they're not, eh, they're so, so comfortable with being transparent. You know, in the world of social media, people like to look good and be, you know, you see the highlight reel online, extreme, transparent, like, how far do you go? Well, I mean, to me this is just really, really common sense.
I mean, if you are being asked the question by your potential customers. I believe it's your, it's your fiduciary to address those things online, to not ignore them, to not be the ostrich with your head in the sand, right? Yeah. And really, um, in the book, endless Customers, we teach that there's four pillars of a known and trusted brand.
So if you wanna become the most known and trusted brand in your market, really you can follow this system. On the surface, it's gonna sound simple, Sid, but as we get into it, you'll see the complexity. So number one, first pillar, you gotta be willing to say what others aren't willing to say online. All right?
Mm-hmm. We'll talk about that in a second. Number two, you gotta be willing to show with video what others aren't willing to show. And that's, again, sounds simple. Most aren't doing it. Number three, you gotta be willing to sell in a way that others aren't willing to sell. And then finally, number four, you gotta be more human than others in your space are willing to be.
So those are the four pillars of a known and trusted brand. Now, getting back to your. Transparency question. Let's look at say for a second in show, but what we teach and they ask you answer. Now, endless customers, it's basically five subjects that buyers are obsessed with. You, me, all of us. When we research stuff online, we wanna understand five fundamental things.
It's what we always research. It's what we want to know before we reach out here are the five. Number one, as buyers, consumers, we wanna understand costs. Mm-hmm. The first question of the buyer's journey, once someone realizes they have a problem, so the second somebody says, I think I might wanna, you know, like, redo our kitchen, I think we might need a new roof.
Whatever the thing is. First question is roughly how much? How much is it gonna it cost? Yeah. That is the gateway of the buyer's journey, my friends. That's the gateway. Unless people move through the gateway, you got nothing. So that's the first question. Many people, if they don't get that addressed in a way that helps them understand, okay, I get a sense now for where I am.
They won't move forward. So that's the first one, cost. Second one is problem slash worries or fears. You see, when anyone is thinking about buying something, now all of a sudden they say, yeah, but what could go wrong? Mm-hmm. Okay. Problems, worries, fears. So we'll call it problems. That's number two. Number three of the big five is comparisons.
We as consumers, buyers, we're obsessed with comparing stuff. We're constantly comparing this versus that. Company versus company. Brand versus brand. Method versus method. Material versus material. I mean, it just goes on and on. We love to compare. Number four, reviews. We're obsessed with reviews. The thing about reviews is we want the good, the bad, and the ugly, not just the good.
And finally, number five, best, best, most top. Anything that allows us to rank what we're looking at in some type of order so we get a sense for what's the best, what's the worst? Think about how many times, if you're listening to this, have you gone online and researched best? Plus another phrase happens all the time.
Yeah, so cost problems, comparisons, reviews, best. Those are the big five. That's what people wanna know and incredibly, most businesses still don't wanna talk about it. You look at most folks in the home improvement space, home contracting space. If I ask them right now, if I said to them, do you address, uh, do you, do you heavily address and teach about the cost and price of your products and services on your website right now?
Most are gonna say no, no. If I said, do you address some of the biggest fears that people have when it comes to that thing? So let me give an example of that. Um, let's say you sell metal roofing, right? So, uh, some of the biggest fears are what are the problems of the metal roof? Uh, does the metal roof rust?
Is a metal roof ugly? So these are things, have you addressed those online? Probably not. Comparisons, are you comparing your product versus the other major products that people are looking at? Probably not. Right? It's like this is the thing. This is the thing. But that's what everybody wants to know. So when we talk about radical transparency, that's what we're seeing, Sid.
Yeah. Well, when, when I first read they asked you answer, um, one thing. I mean, it, it seems so simple, but it, it surprised me. You guys do fiberglass pools, they, everybody else doing concrete pool or whatever, like those are the two main categories. And you just answer the question, what can go wrong in fiberglass pool?
Oh yeah. I mean, listen, anything that you could think of, we address it. Our fiberglass pool's ugly. Our fiberglass pool's cheap. Do fiberglass pools pop out of the ground? Does a fiberglass pool look like a bathtub? I mean, if somebody was worried about it, we are gonna address it because if we didn't do it, guess what?
We're giving the ownership of that conversation to someone else. I don't know about you, Syd, but I don't, I don't have any desire to have my potential customers learn from my competitors or from some third party site. No, sir. Yeah, to learn from me. Okay, that's, and I actually hadn't thought about it that way, but I mean, who's the expert in your field?
Like whoever's watching and listening, like if you're the expert in window cleaning or roofing or whatever, like for God's sakes, don't let 'em learn about it from someone else. That's always the choice you have. Now, some people might say, well, that really doesn't matter now, Marcus. They're getting their answers from AI anyway.
Oh, well I would push back because. For those that are getting it on ai, guess what? Ai, especially chat, GBT does a pretty solid job sourcing where gets its information from. Yeah. And so I know Sy, you've clicked links off of chat GBT to go to the website. I have clicked links. I probably do it every single day and I'm getting leads constantly from chat BT right now.
So the fact is you wanna own the conversation. Let's look like this. For 20 years, we had to get recommendations by two essential parties to be a successful business. Number one, the homeowner. Number two, Google. Mm-hmm. The way we got recommendations from Google was twofold. Number one, SEO slash content marketing.
Number two, paid ads. Then suddenly November, 2022 chat, BT comes out and it's starting to immediately shift people away. Everyone that's listening to this right now is using Google Less today than they used it in November of 2022. Because if you have half a brain, you quickly realize, oh, I have a better user experience over here.
And so what does that mean? What it means is. A, you shouldn't build your house on Google, at least for the future, because if you do, you're gonna be sorely disappointed at some point, okay? Mm-hmm. And many of you are listening to this and saying, geez, I'm paying more on Google ads right now than I've spent in a long time.
I'm getting less results and I'm having a harder time from a SEO perspective to get visitors to my website. Well, that's because of all this stuff that is ai, AI answers and where the buyer's headed, right? Yeah. What does that mean? It means that you must get AI recommendations. This is gonna be a thing that's gonna drive your business in the future.
And then you say, well, what drives AI recommendations? We call 'em trust signals. These are all the signals that are put out to the digital universe. Essentially say, is your company trustworthy? An example of a trust signal is Google reviews. An example of a trust signal is the information, the content that you have on your website, and I could go down the list.
In fact, I have an extensive list. I probably shared it Huge of the fundamental trust signals that matter the most to get AI recommendations. Okay. Okay. So you're, you're, you're already crossing, you're dipping into what I was gonna ask next was like in the, and you've got a chapter about it in those customers, like in, what do you do in a No Click world where you do a search and you just get the summary and you read the AI summary at the top, and you're like, okay, got my answer.
And you move on. Like, what's, what do we, let's start with trust signals of reviews. Like where's the. The value and how much importance should we put it in, in these transitional times with, um, like focusing on if don't version ai. If don't have, yeah. If you do not have a, a, a engineered program of some type right now within your company to get reviews from every single possible customer you can, then you're missing.
The opportunity right now, customer reviews are the number one, at least what I have on my list, the number one trust signal for AI recommendations. All right? Uh, this is especially true for home contractors. Now, if you're listen to this, you might say, well, that's kind of the way it's been with Google Maps and reviews and whatnot.
Yeah. Alright. It's a major trust signal. Yeah. Which also means though, that every single review you get, you should be answering Yeah. As a standard. Automatic, right? Yeah. Good, bad, ugly. But the problem is, as we know, a lot of folks in the home improvement space aren't even, like, they're not soliciting the reviews like they should be, you know, and they might have done a thousand jobs and they have 75 reviews.
Come on y'all. That is, that is not the way it should be. We gotta do better than that. And, um, I'll use our company as an example, uh, on that. It was like, I think four years ago we said, dude, we got, I just made a goal for us. I'm like, we have Window clinic company in Montana, like. We gotta focus on reviews.
'cause that mm-hmm. Is like, what does everybody do if they're looking at a restaurant, whatever, they're like, look at the reviews and people are like, eh, no, no. Word of mouth. I'm like, we're gonna kill it with reviews. Yeah. We made it a contest and now my goal then was we should always have 10 times more reviews than the number two player.
Beautiful. And that became more difficult as you know, it's like that guy gets one and we gotta get 10 more. But now we've got 650 reviews. The next guy's got 90, the next guy's got 40. Everybody else in the marketplace, there's not that many. We small town, but 18 window cleaners, everybody has 10 or less.
And I just can't fathom why you wouldn't like capture something that's Yeah, just free for the asking to make yourself, you know, to like to boost your online reputation. It's just. Well, I love, see, but you notice what you said there, right? And for our listeners, Sid designed a program. He made it a contest.
He incentivized it, and now he's at 600 plus. That is, he's crushing, right? He's 500 ish ahead of his closest competitor. Lights out baby. I mean, you know, and that's because you've been so intentional about it. So yeah, that's the number one trust signal. There's many, there's many others. Um, I have, uh, some that are in my top five.
Uh, one of my top five is helpful or original thought leadership style content. Mm, specifically the big five. All right. The big five. That's another one that is, uh, in my top one. That might surprise everyone right now. But this is gonna be table stakes for home improvement, home services. And that's, uh, pricing estimators.
Pricing estimators. Yeah. I talk about this a lot in the book. There's a stat that is so powerful, sidd, 75% of all buyers today say they would prefer to have a seller free sales experience. So this number's growing by the day. What it means is. It's not that we hate salespeople, we just don't wanna talk to a salesperson until we're confident, comfortable, and we feel like we're not gonna make a mistake.
Yeah. And so with that being the case, as a business, you say to yourself, all right, I can either complain about this or I can take action on it. I can do something about this. And of course, the way that you can do something about it is, uh, leaning into this self-service 'cause buyers want control. Yeah. Now, in, in the book we talk about five types of self-service tools.
Of course, I'm gonna lean into this at huge, but let me just talk about one right now, which is so powerful. Self pricing tools, IE calculators on your website. Now, before anybody freaks out and says, there's no way I could do that, because I was talking to an agency the other day who, who only works with um, uh, uh, contract home contractors, builders, et cetera.
And he said, I talked to my community and I said, how many of you think we should be addressing pricing on our website? And. 70% said, no we shouldn't. And I said, you asked the question the wrong way. Yeah, because, and I could hopefully, everybody here, you know, reads, they ask you answer endless customers because you're gonna see some mind blowing case studies on this.
Um, if I said to you, if you could right now increase your leads from your website by three to 500%. Automatically do it. Would you put a pricing estimator tool that gives a general range so that the homeowner can say, okay, now I have a sense for what it's gonna cost? Yeah. Now, if you're still saying no to that, I can't help you any further.
I've got the data on this. You know, I, I started a, a software company called, uh, price Guide. And this is what it does. We have a mountain of data on this now, Sid, three to 500%. When companies and home improvement add a pricing estimator to their website, this honestly is the biggest no-brainer in the history of earth and it is immediate.
It almost costs you nothing to add. Yeah, it's extremely inexpensive and it, you get so much financial impact quickly. So. The problem is when people hear this conversation of pricing, and oh by the way, when we go back to those pillars, when you discuss pricing online, that's saying what others aren't willing to say, showing what others aren't willing to show and selling in a way others aren't willing to sell.
This is all three of those, and I could argue be more human, but when it, when it comes to pricing, you have these like group that says, oh, I'm gonna put myself in a corner. You're not giving an exact quote. There's a difference between a quote or a proposal and an estimate. An estimate, yeah. My friends. And you gotta gotta understand the difference.
Yeah. So if you look at an estimator tool, what it does, it's just gonna give a range. So if you went to the River Pools website right now, river Pools and spas.com, you can build and price your pool. Now, we were the first manufacturer of fiberglass pools in the world that had a pricing estimator tool on on the website.
And everybody said, well, you can't do that 'cause you got dealers and they set the end price. There's no way you can do it. I'm like, of course we can do it. We just gotta give a range. Yeah. So you might go on there, you build your pool out and you'll get a range. That range might be 110 to $150,000, but guess what?
That range is way more than any other contractor or any other manufacturer's gonna give you. It allows us to capture the lead. That's the beauty of the trade. The trade is you're giving the homeowner much more value than they're able to get anywhere else, right? Because they're giving a, they're getting a general estimate, which is that first gateway question.
Right? That's the entryway. Yeah. And now they are thrilled. You got the email so you, you can remarket, you can re nurture and, uh, everybody wins for it. My promise, and I mean this, Sid, within five years, 90% of all. Home improvement home services businesses are going to have a pricing estimator on their website.
Mark my words, and I'm not, I've not been wrong very much with most of my digital marketing predictions over the last 10 years. Yeah. So can you see that on the bottom of our screen? Is that correct? That is it, sir. Yep. Okay. Yeah, I looked at that earlier and I was like, okay, this is it. Because at first I thought, well, this is, you know, it's a price quota.
Uh, not an estimator, but I mean, it's, it's ca if you're the first to answer the question, it gives automatic trust and it, it's like most customers just have an itch if you help scratch it. But I, I didn't think about it and I'm glad you mentioned it, like they can get that itch scratch, but they gotta give me their email so I can continue to follow them.
That's correct. And now you've got a bigger database and you've got, you can nurture. It's just incredible. And you'll see a lot of people. You'll get leads earlier now, and you'll get leads that are further down the funnel. I mean, you get all types of leads from an estimator. This is just one type of self-service, but self-service is the future.
And listen, guys, as people are doing more of their research on AI and chat, GBT mm-hmm. The website becomes more of a conversion asset. Okay. Potentially less of a teaching asset. And so, you know, somebody might, might go to chat GBT and they say, Hey, I'm thinking about an in ground pool. I don't, I, I need your assistance as to what type.
And they go through a series of like, experiences with chat to the point where they realize, okay, I think I wanna get a fiberglass pool, let's say. Then what they say to chat is, okay, well I live in Virginia, um, which, uh, fiberglass pool company would you recommend near me? Then they're gonna get their recommendations.
Now they're gonna go to different websites. The question is, when they come to your site, are they gonna get what they want? By this point? They're ready to get the thing, like the estimate. Yeah. And they're ready. They're much, much further along the journey than they ever were. And what's interesting is since the internet started, typically most people were already 80% through the buyer's journey.
By the time they reached out. Oh, now because of ai, they're gonna be even further than that 80%. It's gonna get closer to that 90% range because of the availability of information. Yeah. Yeah. And so, and I don't think this will ever go back. I don't think it'll ever lessen. Oh, no, no. Not unless we all become Amish, which is totally.
Yeah. And I remind, you know, our, our contractors a home service business. I'm like, you're not competing with just the guys across town. You're competing with Amazon with the experience. Correct. That's frictionless. Where you go, Amazon, I want this, click clack and it's done. And any barrier or friction you add to the process, such as how much did it cost?
Well, we'll have a sales person come out and talk to you like, Nope. It's just too much. That's right. Yeah. That's right. And, and it's, this is, listen, it's 2025 and, and I would just say this, do you believe in the golden rule? If you believe in the golden rule, and if you say, yes, I do believe I should treat my customers as I myself would wanna be treated.
Mm-hmm. Well, I would say to you, do you appreciate it when you can get a general estimate as to what the thing might cost on the company, a company's website, the answer is gonna be yes. If I said, you will induce more trust, you're gonna say yes. If I said to you, is it more likely that you give them a call?
You're gonna say yes, and this is why. Here's one other stat that's crazy. Because again, I got the, I got the data. Do you know that the average, um, monthly churn for SaaS products is about, uh, seven to 10%. Okay? Okay. For price guide, and this is because of what it is, the average churn 0.7%. What? Okay, now here's the reason though.
Once a contractor starts seeing the amount of leads. They're like, why in the world would I stop doing this? They literally stay with it forever. Yeah. And just like when I added it to my site at River Pools three, four, maybe four years ago, and everybody said it was crazy. I'm like, this is unbelievable.
And I'll get over a hundred leads a day during the summertime. Yeah. Yeah, that's moving. Hey, um, I, I want to ask you this question with this co So you've with, uh, with Impact Group, with your public speaking, not just talking about the book, but like real in person in the consulting, you've helped thousands of companies.
I. In, in this process and they ask you answer and becoming the most trusted in the marketplace. What's a a as would love to hear an example of what's a time where radical transparency went wrong? Well, I think, let's go back to this pricing thing. Um, when you, if, if, if you talk about pricing, what you want to do also is you wanna help them understand value.
And I've always said that you should have a pricing page and a pricing video. Mm-hmm. The pricing page should be very robust. It should really explain what drives cost up in an industry, what drives cost down, why some companies are expensive, why some companies are cheap. Really help them see all of what would define value and value proposition.
Well, if you only just slap a couple numbers. That's all you do, and you don't teach them well then at that point you might be commoditizing because they don't understand really, okay. Here's the difference. I understand the differences between these things. You, if you build an estimator the right way, you can do that type of same education.
I. As they go through the estimator. So that's an example of it. Uh, another mistake that somebody could make. Extreme example, if you, you know, I don't suggest that you talk really negative about other companies, but I do suggest in the book that you compare yourself to other companies mm-hmm. Without going negative, but just give honest comparisons as the difference between them.
Um, I would say that, but rarely. I mean, I'm telling you, it's almost impossible. It's like 0.01% of all the, you know, people I've ever seen do this, have gone into the too transparent zone. That just doesn't really happen. Yeah. Yeah. So when you're, when you're coaching people or when you're, you know, in a conference setting, like even like the huge coming up, um.
People that already have a business established. Yeah. What are the areas that are there? Like they're most resistant or they just screw it up? If they're gonna try to implement, they ask you answer. And those customers, well, I mean, yeah, there's a few different ones here. Number one, I. Almost always, their content strategy is wrong.
They're not following the Big Five, and therefore, because of that, they're not really popping off on social. They're not popping off on YouTube. They're not popping off on their website. Number two, they're not taking a video nearly as seriously as they should be, and they're probably not doing video the right way.
And so I'm gonna talk about that Summit huge. But you gotta start thinking, I'm serious about this, y'all. You have to start thinking. Much more like a media company. Mm-hmm. Every single job. You should visually show the before and after. There's a video behind every single job, uh, multiple videos. In most cases.
Uh, most folks that are listening to this, I'd say 98 to 99% of the companies listen to this, don't have a full-time videographer on staff. Yeah. Uh, that one position, if you hired it, would revolutionize your business. 'cause if you're popping out videos every single day, it's a game changer. And users, your brand's gonna blow up.
Yeah. So most folks aren't doing it, uh, like that. Then they're, you know, blaming things like, oh, you know, I've got a, a face for a radio. I'm like, yeah, but the problem is you still go to that home and ask them for their money, and they gotta look at you at some point. So you got no excuse. I mean, no excuse at all.
And like you said earlier, Sid, people buy from those they know I can trust. If the first time they see your face and hear your voice when you're walking up their driveway and you shake their hand, you have failed them. Yeah. They should recognize you and they should say things like, you, you, you look just like you looked on video, or, you know, you're a little taller than I expected after seeing you on camera, whatever the thing is.
But that's what they should be saying. They should, you should be familiar to them. So that should happen. It's so surprising how, like in a, you don't have to be Alex Ozzi to get that done. You're not, we're not dealing with national audiences like we're dealing with, I've got a marketplace, I have a marketplace of 70,000.
Most people have one. You know, like there's half a million or a million people in the marketplace, so it's not that hard to become known. I want to pause one second. I'm sorry because I, I got a question from Jason. Hoffner, and this is very specific to the show. Jason's been to the huge convention the last four years.
He's grown a really successful business in Florida. His wife is a super fan of yours. Are you gonna be around to sign his book? Uh, I'll sign his book. I'll address it to his awesome wife. If she's there. I'll give her a hug. I'll take a photo. Um, we'll call grandmother, whatever. Whatever we need to do, whatever we need to do.
Heck yeah. Okay. Um, a couple of years ago and to the point of being known, like your people should know you beforehand, it was when we first started that, uh, the strategy of getting, you know, like focus on reviews and I had a, a woman called we, it was when I used to go out and give personal, you know, estimates in person and I showed up at the door and she went, are you Sid?
And I'm like, yeah. And she, there you go, hugged me and said, I would never call anyone else. I read every one of your reviews. Let's go. I was like, that's what we want. Right there. Okay. Double down, you know, and, and it's, podcasting is another example. This one's extreme, but I'm gonna share it 'cause it's kind of a wild story.
I'm at a conference, uh, this lady, uh, comes up to me, she's like, Marcus, ah, you know, I'm such a fan. I'm like, oh, that's so great. She's like, you were with me in the shower this morning. I'm like, really? What? She said, yes, I listened to your podcast. Every time I'm in the shower, I'm like. Oh, that definitely clarifies it.
Right? Yeah. So it's like these are the things that you should be hearing because you're putting yourself out there. And then, you know, I've got the same sentiments as like, in terms of, I just, people I feel like, I know they don't know me from Adam or Eve, but I know them. And that's what matters here. Yeah.
That's what matters. That's what we're trying to, that's what we're trying to achieve, man. We got so much to like, get into it. Huge. I am so stoked about it. It the, the amount of takeaways and that's the thing. It's one thing to make an audience feel good. That's easy for me, but it's another thing to move them to action.
My commitment is that you will have a plan and you're gonna immediately say, we're going to do this, like in the hotel room tonight. We're gonna start. That's what, that's the feeling you're gonna have after you attend my keynote. That's my promise. That's awesome. Hey, we're, we're coming up, but we're approaching our end of our time, so I wanna be respectful.
I, I did have this question in specifics with like, if you're making video regularly or, or every day, and you talked about like, you know, basically having a videographer on staff, but not necessarily, so if we're we're pushing video, pushing video, is that, does it have the same or similar effect if those, let's say I'm doing a daily video on.
Facebook and Instagram, that that doesn't have the same gravitas as your website does it, or does it? Well, let's start with YouTube. There's a strong argument, Sid, that your YouTube channel will be more important to your brand than your website will be in five years. Ooh, this could very well happen. If you look at everything that's just.
Happening in the market. For example, you've had a ton of companies that have said, gee, we've really been, our website's really been affected by ai. Have you heard one person say, man, our YouTube page is getting its teeth kicked in by ai? Nope. Not at all. Yeah. You see what I'm saying? And so this is why.
YouTube pages and just your video presence in general. So you gotta look at it like, you know, your website in many ways was always your content hub, and it will still be your content hub. YouTube is gonna be a core video hub for you, and those videos are gonna be spread across and repurposed on social media.
And that's, that's when you're cooking with gas is when you're, you know, when you are creating. Um, you know, one, let's say longer form video, and then you're repurposing it and you're putting out multiple videos a day on the TikTok, on the Instagram reels, Facebook reels. Maybe it's a YouTube reel, maybe it's a YouTube long.
Right? But these are the things that we wanna be doing, and this is where you've gotta get, and this is what, you know, problem is. It's not really a problem. It's great in the world of home improvement, like as a pool guy, everybody was always just busy digging a hole. Yeah. And I said, instead of digging a hole.
I'm going to create awareness by creating content, and that's available to all of us today. Your brand will matter more in the future than it's ever mattered before. You got to create these trust signals, my friends, and so much of that is the content that you're producing across that multiplicity of channels.
But unless there's people on staff, at least one that owns content and is obsessed with it. Then you're gonna lose traction. You just will. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, um, as, as we wrap up like with that, in that context, like what would be your recommendation too? You got the, the guy's got three employees. He's, he's digging the hole every day.
He's trying to get off the truck, but he knows he needs to do content. What could he do? What are some like just some options for this guy to actually get content made that hits A lot of people stop because they think it's gotta be perfect. It's gotta be, oh my gosh. In fact, it works against you if it's perfect.
Okay. Um, that guy has a camera in his pocket that is better than anything Hollywood had 20 years ago. Yeah. Literally anything they had 20 years ago, he can start producing right now. He can go live right now. He can do now. If you really wanna take it a step up, do that. And hire yourself A videographer that's in the Philippines, like I have for $1,500 a month.
Mm-hmm. Who's working full-time for me and he's got a degree in videography. He's actually very, very good. He's living large because he's making 1500 bucks a month, which is a huge amount for him. He can buy a house with that. And I'm getting an incredible videographer. Everybody wins and I'm not having to do the editing.
The thing that holds a lot of people up isn't necessarily the shoot. It's the edit and upload. So get somebody to do that for you. You get a full-time person these days, 1500 bucks, no brainer. That's what you should do. Boom. Okay. Um, well, let's see. What's, what's the ideal way for people to, how can they connect or follow or like, how do, as almost said, how do people get in touch with you?
What's your cell phone number? Yeah. Yeah. 8 0 4, right? Other people follow you? Yeah. Yeah. Uh, check me out on LinkedIn. That's where I put my best stuff. Okay. Always LinkedIn. Um, you can also go to endless customers.com, Marcus for the book, or Amazon for the book. Marcus sheridan.com is my website. If you're interested in never having me speak to your group, your event, your company, and, uh, you've also got, uh, price Guy, ai of course, for that.
Incredible. Three to 500% of immediate lead increase. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. That's excellent. Okay, so I, I would love to get into more with your, your journey because you know, I read the entire bio starting in 2001, digging holes for a swim pool, and then became partner, then owner, and then up and down and like you probably, did you ever have a plan to be a keynote speaker and consultant?
And write a book. It's wild, man. I never dreamt any of this. Right. You know, my wife tells me all the time, she's like, how did this happen? Yeah. You know, and, and you know, we were struggling so much financially for many years and my only goal was that she could go to the grocery store and wouldn't get anxiety by looking at the prices.
And, you know, today she can go there. She doesn't have to worry about what the food costs, and she can get what she wants for her family. To me, that's, that's the essence of financial peace and prosperity. And that's really why we're saying all this is so that you can have that financial peace and prosperity in your life.
You deserve it. Um, you just can't do it like everybody else. You gotta be willing to think a little bit differently, act a little bit differently. That's what this is all about. And that's what I'm gonna be discussing when I come to Huge. Yeah. Well, I can't wait. I'm really excited and really grateful for your time now.
And on August, uh, 22nd, when we see you again Friday morning. Nashville, Tennessee. I'm looking forward to it. Thank you, Marcus. Thanks very much. My pleasure. Sid. Hello my friend. This is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today's episode. I hope you got some value from it. And listen, anything that was covered, uh, any of the resources, any of the books, any of the tools, anything like that is in the show notes.
So it's easy for you to find and check it out. And also, I wanna let you know the. Mission for the huge convention and for this podcast is to help our blue collar business owners like you and I, to gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. And we do that in four ways. Number one is our free weekly newsletter.
It's called a Huge Insider. I hope you subscribe. It is the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry. Period, paid or otherwise, and this one's free. Next is the huge foundation's education platform. That is, we've got over 120 hours of industry specific education and resources for you, and every month we do, uh, a topical webinar and we do question and answer with seven and eight figure business owners, and it's available to you for a $1 trial for seven days.
Next, of course. Is the huge convention or the huge convention? If you haven't been, you gotta check it out. It's every August This year it's in Nashville, Tennessee. That's August 20th through 22nd and 2025. And it is the largest and number one rated. Trade show and convention for home service business builders.
We've got the biggest trade show, so you can check out all the coolest tools and meet the vendors and check out the software to run your business. And it's got, we've got, um, education, world class education and educators and speakers that will teach you how to run a better business. And it's the best networking opportunity that you can have within the home service business.
And then lastly, if you wanna pour jet fuel in your business. Check out the Hughes Mastermind now. It's not for everyone. You gotta be at over $750,000 of revenue and you're building toward a million, 5 million, 10 million in the next five years. And it is a network, and a mentorship and a mastermind of your peers, and we help you understand and implement the Freedom operating system.
We can go into more detail, but you can get all the information on all four of these programs and how we'll help you advance your business quickly just by going to the huge convention.com. And scroll down, click on the freedom path. Or of course you can find the links here in the show notes. So, sorry, I feel like I'm getting a little bit wordy, but I just wanna let you know of the resources that are available to you to help you accelerate and advance your beautiful, small business.
So keep on growing, keep on learning, keep advancing. And if you'd like to show. Go ahead. I mean, if you would go and take 90 seconds and give us a review on iTunes, then subscribe and share it, man. It would really mean the world to us. It would help other people, and as we continue our mission to help people just like you and me.
So thanks again for listening. We'll see you in the next episode.

23: The Brian Gottlieb Episode

In this episode of The Huge Transformations Podcast, Sid Graef hosts a powerful and candid conversation with Brian Gottlieb—founder of a $155 million home service company and author of Beyond the Hammer. Brian shares how he built a massive business from $3,000 and a folding table, emphasizing key lessons about discipline, culture, and scaling through simplicity. With refreshing humility and tactical wisdom, Brian walks through everything from surviving the chaos of early entrepreneurship to becoming a leader who builds people, not just profits. If you're a business owner aiming to scale, avoid burnout, or develop a rock-solid team, this episode is full of valuable, experience-driven insights that are actionable right away.
Featured Guest:
Brian Gottlieb, keynote speaker for The Huge Convention 2025
Author of Beyond the Hammer
Website
Book available on Amazon
LinkedIn
Engage presentation tool
 
Resources
The Huge Insider newsletter signup
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
The Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
Huge Foundations Facebook group
 
Transcript:
 Hello everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I'm Sid Graff Outta Montana. I'm Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee. And I'm Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina, we are your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in.
The industry folks that have already built seven and eight figure businesses and they want to help you succeed. Yep. No fake gurus on this show, just real life owners that have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience.
0% theory. We are going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece. Thanks for joining us on the Wild Journey of Entrepreneurship.
Let's dive in.
Hello my friend. It's Sid with the Huge Transformation Podcast. Welcome back. Today's episode's a little bit different, so I want to give it an introduction. So Brian Gottlieb. Brian Gottlieb is going to keynote at the huge convention this summer and he's, uh, kind of a unicorn in the home service industry in that he built $155 million a year revenue home service business.
He started with $3,000 and a folding card table, and he built this thing big, beautiful, strong. Fast. He did it in 12 years and he recently published a book titled Beyond the Hammer, and this is a book, it's about more than culture, but that's a big focus of it men. It's a, it's a easy read, it's a fun read and it hits home if you have a home service business.
But we had a conversation on the live stream, uh, that we did a Facebook Live, live stream last week. And just had a wide range of conversation about his journey as a business builder and as someone who understands how to scale a business to nine figures, um, because that conversation was so good, we wanted to release it as an episode right away because it's incredibly valuable.
And Brian is also humble. He's got a servant's heart and he knows his stuff. So I want to get out to you right away. With that, I hope you enjoy today's episode with Brian Gottlieb. I. The author of Beyond the Hammer and a hell of a great guy. Good evening everyone. We are live, it's it's Sid Graph with a huge convention.
We got Brian Gottlieb on with us and Brian's the author of Beyond the Hammer. I got my copy right here. Um, great story. But we're tonight, Brian, first of all, thanks very much for being on with us. I really appreciate your time. Oh, I'm really looking forward to it. You got, you do such great work in the industry and you have such a cool convention coming up, so Yeah, we have some fun things to talk about.
Okay, good. Well, it's always funny when we get ready for the huge convention. I mean, our team, we're preparing for it from the, the second day after last year's ended. We take a day off and then we don't talk about it, and then we start back up and we're like, we've been. Working and working and working, but really not much happens publicly until about 90 days before the show.
And then attention goes up and that's when all the ticket sales, uh, start happening. So it's starting to get really exciting. Me and, uh, two of our teammates, we call, we refer to our wives as the huge convention widows at this point in, in time because we're, we're just so busy doing stuff. But, so on Thursday the 21st, you're gonna be our keynote speaker.
Right, which is excellent. Um, it's, but before I ask, say, ask this question, people are jumping on live. Thank you very much for joining this evening. When you pop in, just take a second and say hello in the comments and let us know where you're joining from. And in 15 or 20 minutes or so, we're gonna give away two tickets to the huge convention.
I've got a little trivia question for everybody. So with that, so a, a lot of people, Brian think of like, they're like, Hey, if somebody built a nine figure business, pretty much in, in the industry, but specifically in home service, they're like, yeah, this guy's a unicorn. How like is, do you ever consider yourself remarkable and special or you just go, I don't know, I was just doing the thing.
You. You know, I think the thing that like most businesses, business owners have in common, especially in the blue collar, the home services industry or the home improvement industry, it's not like we built this giant business plan with this great concept on how we're gonna build this massive business.
What happens is we probably were working for, somebody didn't like working there anymore, so he started doing some stuff on our own, and next thing you know, we get a little traction. And before you know it. We've got ourselves a business and, and, and quite often in that process, we don't actually know what we're doing or how to grow and all that stuff, by the way, is perfectly normal, you know?
But, but for me it was about how do I go from survival? Like where the. Only rule of business is to stay in business, to, okay, now I have a job, but you know, nobody would want my job 'cause it's a nightmare. But then how do you get to a business where you actually have to start adding people and processes and all those sorts of things.
And there are certainly steps to it. But, but look, I think once you have some success with it, then you can really start to build momentum and, and that's when fun things really start to happen. Yeah, for sure. We're here. We've got, um, a handful of people jumping in. This is Kyle from Austin, Texas, hopping in and uh, Hey Kyle.
Good to see you, man. And our friend in Houston, Texas, we got all our Texans coming in strong right now. Perfect. What was outta outta curiosity when you say, you know, like, and, and it's, it so resonates when you start, you're like, I just gotta survive. And then you go, it's this utter freaking chaos. I don't own a business and a job.
Um, but then like, what was your first goal when you started? Because you know, the story is like $3,000 and a card table. Yeah, right. It was $3,000 on a plastic folding table, and there wasn't a lot of $3,000 more to put into the business, just to be clear, right? Because you got a bunch of kids and all that stuff.
But look, I, in the beginning, what I actually started to realize, one of the early principles of, of business was that if nothing else, the lead is sacred. If nothing else, the lead is sacred. And I think what happens with a lot of business owners, by the way, we get so caught up. You can go on social media and everybody's talking about, you've gotta document your processes and all these sorts of things.
But the truth is that's a very difficult thing to do if you don't first understand what are your business disciplines. As an example, it's much easier if I say, okay, the lead is sacred, then I can say that's a discipline. Then I have to an ask the question, so how does a sacred lead get treated? Well, we have to respond to it in 10 seconds.
What technology do we need? Uh, we have to convert it to a sales call. What scripts do we need? Then all of a sudden, your systems and processes start to get a lot easier once you first identify your disciplines. And we're gonna talk about that at your conference to show you some ways you can really think about that.
Yeah. Okay. Interesting. Um, so with. What, what several people in our mastermind wanted to ask is like, what were some of the inflection points as you were growing from that, the desperation to chaos, to actual systems and like the, the primary question that came up was, as your business grew, how did you work with or help?
Like you've got, you've got staff, you've got people that were great, but now the business has either outgrown, nom, or outgrown their skills. How did you help them? Yeah. Well, sure. Well, as I write about in my book, you know, you, one of the keys to, to leadership and to business is that leaders model their business as a training organization.
You know, I used to think, well, when you, when I first started the company, I would've said, well, we we're a construction company. As we grew a little bit, I would say, well, we were a sales and marketing company. That happened to be in home improvements. But what really allowed us to, to grow was becoming a training organization.
And, and you know, when we do that, then we have to say, okay, what does a training organization do? How do we train and develop people? How do we, how would we not be held hostage by rules that you can't find good talent out there? How do we grow people? Yeah. Yeah. So what was the answer early on and how did that change?
I. Well, like the answer early on with understanding, you know, just as your team changes your, and, and it is true that sometimes the people that get you to one level aren't the same people that get you to, to a whole nother level because the skill sets have to change. But also we as leaders have to change our role changes our, our purpose changes too.
You know, in the early days of business, like I said, your purpose is survival, but over time your purpose is then, okay, how do I. How do I make sure my team is successful? Because in the early days, the success of a business comes down to me. If it's just me, the success of the business is all about me. But the moment you start to have to add people to your team, and whether you are, whether you're washing windows or it doesn't matter, our power wash, it doesn't really matter what you're doing, but, but we have other people doing that.
Now, the success of your business is very much tied to how well your teams. Perform both when you're watching and when nobody's looking. And, and that's kind of the art and science to business, to how do we get in the line team that performs consistently at a high level. Yeah. And that's, that's the art of business.
Yeah. Okay. For sure. So, um, the, um, the lead character in your story in the book Beyond the Hammer is, um, oh gosh, I wrote down so I can remember. George Warren. George Warren. How, how autobiographical is George. To you. You know, people ask me that all the time, right? So the first thing you should know is his mentor named Marty.
Okay. If, when he gives a tour of his office, that's actually my office. So it was a nod to anybody that's ever been through our facility. Okay. They would know that's what it was right away. Okay. So that was a nod. But what I also share with you, you know, and again, for the, for the people that are, haven't read the book yet.
It, it's, it's the first, the book is in two parts. The first half is a parable, it's a business parable about this contractor that's really struggling with all kinds of stuff coming at him in all directions. Something we all can relate to. Yeah. And he meets his mentor. So the first half of the business, the book is a business parable.
And, and in Georgia's struggle is me and in Marty is me too. So I, there's a, there's a bit of me in both characters at different points in my life. Yeah. Yeah. So I, I wanted to ask you, so, um, your background before. The starting, uh, tundra land, uh, I'm not sure what it was, but you're, you built the business in about 12 years, from zero to nine figures, which sounds like riding a rocket ship.
Did you, did you bring some leadership skills with you, or did you just grow really, really fast? Yeah, well, well, a combination, right? A combination. One of the things that happened was prior to me starting my business, I, I, I, I've always carried the bag into the home and sold at the kitchen table. Ever since I was 18 years old and selling pots and pans.
Mm-hmm. So I knew the sales side of things, but prior to starting my business, I was a consultant in the, in the home improvement industry. And I got to visit a whole lot of companies across the country over my years. And I got to see two types of companies and I kept a list of it and in my journal that I carried with me all the time on one page.
I had, if I ever open up a business, I'm definitely doing these things. And on the other page was, if I ever open up a business, I'm never doing these things because I also gotta see a lot of problems out there. So that was kind of really helpful to me. You know, it was really helpful, but also it was really helpful in, in scaling my business and, and I think you do this really well, is that I, I didn't, I didn't want to be in a bubble in my business all by myself.
I wanted to network. With like-minded business owners that are also trying to grow together. Many of us, well, it's interesting. We started our own little, our own little mastermind group, and we, when we started, there were 12 of us. We originally called ourselves a dirty dozen, and then it became the big 12, but, but we all grew our businesses together.
Back in the days when we started in total sales, all 12 of us represented. Probably under a hundred million dollars in sales. Yeah. Today those same 12 businesses represent about $3 billion in revenue. Wow. When you talk about growth, it's just incredible when you, when you put your mind together with other people.
Yeah. So a quick question on that with, um, were, were those were the Dirty 12 or the, the, the Super 12? Were, were you all in the same area, in the same town? Did you meet in person or was this, you spread out? Uh, we, we, we were all over the country in non-competing areas across the country. Okay. We, we sold similar products.
We sold bath remodeling and that, that sort of thing. Yeah. But look, you know, it was important that, that, that we met on a regular basis. We trusted each other. We left our egos at the door, and, and we, we shared what we were struggling with or where we were winning. And you know, the thing is when you have that kind of a relationship, and then, and then when you get your production managers to know each other and your marketing managers to know each other, and then all of a sudden this ripple effect that happens inside of the organization, is it, it's powerful.
It's powerful. Yeah. And that, that's why your event is so important, by the way. It's, it keeps people outta their bubble. Yeah. Yeah, I, I couldn't agree more. And I mean, this is about you, not me. The first time I ever went to an industry event, I'd been in business for 15, almost 16 years before I ever went. I thought industry events were probably a waste of time.
I should be home earning money. And I went and it was this big eye-opening, like I began to network with. I met people that. Understood the struggle. I met people that were further along the journey than I was and people that were, were up and coming. So I was able to help others and then get mentors and, and it was literally, it was a turning point for me and my business to turn it from chaos to a business and not a job.
And that's a great word. Chaos. You know, one of the early lessons I had to learn. Is that in the early days when I launched the business, I, we just, we had one rule. Just, just sell it, you know, just sell stuff. Yeah. We, we didn't use the word stuff. We used a different word, but it was just sell stuff and, and what we learned is that chaos can produce revenue.
Boy, we were able to generate revenue. We didn't make any money, but we sure sold a lot of stuff. Chaos produces revenue. But discipline produces profit, profit, and a lesson to learn that that's, and to have discipline, you need an aligned team and a strong culture. Yeah. Yeah. I love that. 'cause I, I, I do hear frequently people say, you know, you don't have any problems that, that more sales won't solve.
And I'm like, I don't believe that's true. Having more revenue is, is helpful in a lot of ways, but you can have things going on in the background that will kill you no matter how much money is coming in. Yeah, sometimes more revenue will kill you because you can't keep up with it. And that's, that's another problem, you know?
And I think another lesson I learned early on also was that. We, when I started my business, we were a sunroom company, sunroom editions. And boy did we build some beautiful sunrooms that we didn't make any money on. And what I learned also in business is complexity is the enemy of execution. That you need your business as simple as possible, but making a simple business is very, very hard.
Mm-hmm. And making a complicated business is very easy. It's EAs there's always a reason to make things more complicated than they need to be. It's very hard to remove that complexity from your business, but once you remove the complexity, that's when you have a real scalable business. 'cause complexity requires unicorns as managers, and we both know how hard unicorns are to find.
Oh yeah. So simplicity wins. Wow. So when you were, you know, in your, your early growth was, was your growth because it was fast. It, it was fast. Did, was it hockey stick, like you went, uh, boom rocket, or was it like a pretty good curve? It was, it was a hockey stick because the first few years was figuring things out.
It was really proving the fact that we could actually make a lead, sell a lead, and install a lead with any level of consistency. Once we understood that, you know, if you ask me what is the most important discipline in business of all the disciplines there are, look, I, I bet, I bet just about everybody.
That's going to be at your, at your convention, and I, and I'm gonna ask the question when I'm there, how many people. Need to hire somebody inside of their organization, but they're afraid to take on the overhead to do that. Okay. That's a real concern for most businesses across the nation. Yeah, but that's a symptom of a much bigger problem.
The real truth is that the company isn't, they're not confident that they can hit their forecasting targets that they've created. The single most important discipline in business is understanding not just how to create targets. But how to hit them with consistency, because when you're good at that, the willingness to invest in the business, well, you got that all day long.
If, I don't know if I'm gonna hit my targets, I'm not so willing to invest in the business because I don't wanna put that money at risk. But if I'm confident I'm gonna hit my targets, investing in the business becomes easy. It becomes easy, and that's when things really start to scale. Yeah. Okay. Um, hang on one second.
I'm gonna give a quick shout out to everybody that's joining us live. Yeah. We got Sheila Smelter, we got Florida in the house, and now we got Jeff from Virginia and, uh, Ethan in Branson, Missouri. We, we held a camp conference there. Our conference there is in, in, uh, 2019, I believe. And, uh, that's great. Then our, then our Texas contingency.
You guys, everybody, thanks for joining. Go ahead and, uh. Uh, yeah, I don't even know how to do it, but share this live stream into a couple of groups that you frequent so other people can jump in, ask Brian questions. If you guys that are on live, if you've got questions that you want to ask, just type it into the comments and, uh, we'll see if we can get to 'em.
So I want to, let me get my list of questions from our mastermind, um, Brian, one second. Yeah, because they're like eight. Alright, hang on. I gotta make sure we, we've already answered a bunch of these. Um. Okay. What was a key strategy or what was a favorite strategy to increase your revenue per technician?
Like thinking on a technician level? Yeah, so, uh, a couple things. First of all, that margins. Only tell half the story, right? A margin only tells half the story. What we wanna look at is in business, we wanna look at revenue per crew day, right? When we send the team out, I send the team out, how much revenue are they bringing back, right?
Because mm-hmm. I could sell like this pen, you know, I could buy this pen for a dollar and sell it for $10 and I can celebrate a 90% gross profit margin. But if I only sell one a day, I'm in trouble. I'm not gonna have a business very well. Right? Yeah. So, so, so margins only tell half the story. What I need to do is I need to only do things where I can maximize my revenue per crew day.
So I was very careful, even as I started adding different products and services. To our businesses that, that I, I was very, very conscious of that. And look, and I think also when we think about how hard it is to generate a lead to begin with, and we finally get an opportunity to earn somebody's business, how can we sell 'em other products and services that we have?
Because then you don't have that same repetitive marketing cost. And that's also super important. How do we keep, how do we keep the customer involved in our business for, for a very, very, very long period of time without being obnoxious. You know. Okay. Used to send out, we used to sell Ann, we send out anniversary cards to our customers, so if we did a project for 'em, it was, you know, we, we do all kinds of other drip campaigns to keep top of mind, but then we send out an anniversary card letting 'em know, Hey, it's here one year or your four year anniversary.
It was just kind of cool. It really helped a lot. So, and, and I'm sorry, to be clear, this is the anniversary of the time you remodeled for them or Correct? They're okay. Okay, great. Because at first I was like, wow, you, you know, kept track of their wedding anniversary. That's cool. Yeah. Alright. But I think, by the way, I think the thing in business too is this, look, business owners have to try stuff.
You know, business owners are great decision makers by the nature of it. Okay? And I think it's you. You've gotta try, you've gotta try different lead sources. I can't tell you which source is gonna work in every single market. What I can tell you is this, it's okay to be wrong. Just don't be wrong for long.
Yeah, don't kidding. Right, right. Go ahead and get stuff out there. Try stuff. Mix it up, see what's working, see what's not working. I, I would rather try a lot of things and have a few things work than be caught in analysis paralysis, not trying anything at all. I know that not everything's gonna work, and again, it's okay to be wrong, but I'm not gonna be wrong for long.
I think it's a core business discipline also. Okay. Where do you, where do you see owners? 'cause you help and mentor a lot of people now? I do. Where do you see typically the, the bottlenecks or maybe the resistance to letting something go? 'cause you, you talked about earlier, like the beginning, it is chaos, but it's easy to build a chaotic business and hard to build a simple business.
Yeah. I think one of the, one of the issues, and I was guilty of it in my early days, is, and especially when we're all in on our businesses, we're all in financially, we're all in on our business and, and we. We don't want to be a micromanager, but we tend to default to that accidentally. We want to make a lot of decisions inside of the business and it really stifles people's growth and we have to give people an opportunity to make mistakes.
We gotta, we gotta, we gotta let people grow. We have to empower people because otherwise. The business is only gonna grow to the, to the capabilities of the leader of the business. And that's really a problem. Yeah. And, and I think, but I think connected with that is also understanding that as you build a team, the truth is this, that the lid of the business is directly connected to the lid of the team.
The business can only grow to the, to the, to the, to what the team can grow to. So when we think about what is our role as the leader of the organization is to help people not just only realize that potential, but truly reach it and it means empowerment and all these other things that are so necessary for business skills in business leadership.
Yeah. As you were growing your team like that in the leadership and helping raise the lid, did, I mean when you introduced ways for people to grow personally. Did you get pushback or, or resistance, or had you already built a culture as a place where We're always learning, we're always growing where it was expected.
Look, you know, it it, so it's more difficult when you bring in people with a lot of experience because then they think they know it all. And you know what comes with that is also a very different culture. They bring their culture with them. They bring all that stuff from the last company. Yeah. When you start to really become a training organization, you can, then you need to hire people that are trainable.
If I'm gonna be a training organization. I better hire trainable people, otherwise I'm not gonna be much of a training organization. That then becomes a lot easier. And you know, we got to the point where we, ve very seldom wanted to hire anybody with experience. We would rather groom and train them ourselves because I.
E experienced people that know what they're doing. Not only, not only do they sometimes resist training, they also keep their skillset very much to themselves. It's like their own little trick, their own little secret that they don't like to share. Yeah. And a organization is collaborative. Okay. Did you, when, um, did, did you generally, uh, get your leadership from within, like people RA rising up.
Yeah. I wanted to give everybody an opportunity to grow within the organization. You know, it's, it's, as we saw, as you read about in the, in the book, you know, George made the horrible mistake of instead of posting an ad internally, first, he posted something online and got this pushback from his team.
Rightfully so. If people don't think there's an opportunity in your organization, guess what? They're gonna go somewhere else. Yeah. You know, they're gonna go somewhere else. Look. But, but ultimately to build a business, you just. You have to commit to building people, and that's that's what it is in, in the service industry.
Unlike other organizations and other businesses and technology or manufacturing in the services industry, 99.9% of everybody on your team is interacting with the customer. One way or another, either, either on the phone, face-to-face, they're interacting with the customer. So, so individual performance really matters.
Culture really matters. How we customer journey really matters. How people think about the business and about their role. You know, how what we, the way we think of what we do is how we do what we do. Yeah. So mindset, culture, all that stuff really, really matters. When you were talking about, um, hiring from within, hiring from without.
And, and George posting, you know, the job ad outside of the, the thing, uh, Kyle popped in and he said, gut punch. I think he experienced the same thing. And he goes, I hear you. All right. Um, a couple questions. Kyle actually asked a question earlier where you're talking and, and it's related to your tech stack.
Do you recall, or do you know what your tech stack was like at 40 million? What was your CRM? How were you managing stuff? Yeah, so look, when I first started the business. I, I, I, when I started the business, it was another sunroom company that had our market and there was all this, uh, there were all these old leads that we got, okay.
When we took over this territory and the lead list was so old. My son used to, we used to come. Over to my office after school. He was, he was 15 years old at the time, and he would go through and call these numbers that were on this little tiny, all printed out on a piece of paper and he'd call it number by number by number.
We had no CRM at all. Yeah. And some of the people died. I mean, we're talking about a dead lead. These leads were so old, they died a long time ago. But Okay. Eventually, yeah, we got into a CRM, but even back then, it was like, even in, it's amazing how much technology has leaped forward today. Yeah. Versus how it was even, even, even eight years ago in the home services industry.
So, but at $40 million, look, we had to have a, we had to have a good phone system where we could, you know, record calls. So we can do training. We had a, you know, robust CRM and then, you know, we had, we had a great presentation tool that we used that was called Engage. Uh, it's a great presentation tool. Uh, and, and of course financing from a, from a, from, I mean, I looked at financing as part of our tech stack because it was truly a technology play to help us sell more deals.
Yeah. So, you know, and today there's just so many great options out there, but, and there are, you know, but I also think that when you think about the core of a business, right, to get to $40 million. First and foremost, I think a company needs a very, very well designed website that's designed for conversions.
It's designed to catch a lead and convert a lead, catch a name, and convert it. And you know, and everything else can stack on top of that. But I think that's a really important, also, discipline inside of the business. Yeah. And that's where you started was talking about the speed to lead or like how you, the lead is sacred.
I love that. All right. Um, let's, let's do this. I, I had put on screen a little while ago that we're gonna give away a ticket, um, in a couple minutes. This is the time. Let's give away a ticket. And here's what I always do. I like, I just have some silly trivia question, and the first person to type the answer incorrectly as it shows up on my feed.
I'm not looking at Facebook, I'm looking at different software, and we've got viewers, uh, live on, on, uh, YouTube and on Facebook. So I don't know. How it shows up on Facebook or YouTube. But the first person that I see with the correct response gets a free ticket to the huge convention this year. That's $299 that you don't have to spend on a ticket.
You can spend on food or beer or taking Brian out for cigar. Yeah. So, um, the, the question is this, so we've, the huge convention has been going on for quite a while. It's actually our 13th convention. Where was the first one held? Not the, not the venue, but what city was the first huge convention held?
First one to type it in and get it right and, uh, you know, and or I may just give the ticket to Rob because he's so kind to tell me how cool I am today. Like, that's probably worth it to get right there. Rob. Rob, you already have a ticket as part of the mastermind. Um, okay. First submission here. Kyle says, Orlando is not Orlando.
It was, but it was definitely in the south. So we'll keep going until somebody pops it in. Uh, Jeff, if you know Ethan, if you know, I don't even know if you can Google that and find out where the first one was. I, I don't know if that's, it's fairly common knowledge because we say it a lot, but here we go.
Let's see. We got Sheila down in Florida with Nashville, and Nashville is the correct answer. So Sheila. You win a free ticket to the huge convention, congratulations. But guess what? You already have two free tickets because you're part of the Mastermind. So what do we do with that? Who, who would you like us to give it to of, uh, anybody that's on here live?
Just look at the comments and pick somebody. If it's okay with you, we can give it away or you can give it to some of your team members. Sorry, I didn't mean to take it away from you like that. So, Sheila, I'm gonna watch for your comment here. Tell me what you'd like to do with your ticket. If you wanna bring your daughter or someone from your team, or if you wanna give it away.
It is, Ethan is winning on the comments that I said. Give it to Brian. We're gonna give, we're gonna give you a free ticket, Brian. Awesome. It's great. Okay. I hope, I hope Ethan is bringing that cute little baby with him. That's a cute little kid in his picture there. That's, that's his son Finn. And um, oh.
Last year at the, he Finn was at the convention last year in Nashville, Tennessee. Oh, that's fantastic. That's great. Um, Sheila said, anyone who's never gone, and uh, Jeff says, I highly recommend this guy right here. So what do you say, Sheila? Is it this guy right here? She goes. Any first timer? Okay. We're gonna park that and see if, if anyone hasn't been, that's on the live feed and you want this ticket, I.
Type it in to the comments and it's yours.
Oh, Rob, give it to a Brian. Not to, no, Brian, you're taking my ticket away. I thought I got a free ticket now. I don't have a free ticket. No, you, now you're gonna have to arm wrestle somebody. The, the, uh, the bouncers to get in the show. Tell you what, let's do this, Jeff. Just to Jeff. I know you don't have a ticket yet this year.
We had chatted earlier online, so you have a ticket to the huge convention. I'm gonna shoot you a message after we're done to give you the code so you can claim it. Sounds good. And thank you very much Sheila. And I picked, how's that? Great. That's amazing. That's amazing. All right, cool. Thank you. Um, hey, here's a, another question from, uh, one of our mastermind guys, and I love this question.
He said is, what are some of the most important things for. A home service business to get right in its first 5 million of annual revenue to set it up for long-term success. Yeah. Well, it's a series of things, number one. You have to be able to make data-driven decisions at $5 million. You have to be able to make very specific decisions based on the data, not on our gut.
We get, we get to the first million on gut, that's what we do. We don't know what we're doing. We get to the first million by gut. But as you start to get, uh, volume, your financials, being able to read a p and l and balance sheet mm-hmm. Is very, very important. Making sure your financials are set up right.
You're able to close out a month. Effectively, and you're able to see what did we learn from this and where are we going with this? And so that's one thing. The second thing is that at $5 million you have a team. Okay? And you might, you might, you might think that you have great systems and processes, but lemme tell you something, if it's not written down, it doesn't exist because you'll have iterations of that as, as the business grows.
If you think it's being done this way and you find out it's being done a totally different way. So that's another real key discipline in really trying to scale, is make sure, you know, if it's not written down, it doesn't exist. Having that, having that mindset. And I think the third thing is the idea that, that when you're coaching people, okay, different people are coached differently for effectiveness.
And when it comes to coaching people, there's a big difference between being right and being influential. There's a very, very big difference. I might be right that somebody isn't doing something a certain way. It doesn't mean they're gonna learn a lesson from it. I have to be influential with people.
It's the same as true with with customers. You might be able to go to somebody's home, you might show up at somebody's home that has filthy windows and really needs their windows cleaned, but they're not hiring you because there's a big difference between being right and being influential. Mm-hmm. And I think that's the, that's the key in business in general when it comes to dealing with people.
I. Did early, earlier on, and I, I know, I, I keep reflecting early on, 'cause most of us can relate to a business that's doing, you know, 20 million or less. 'cause we've never gone to that extent. But did you have the confidence to be influential with your team? Or did you ever feel like, kind of like an, an imposter with your own company?
Yeah, I look, imposter syndrome is real. You bet. I did. I, I felt like these were, again, like there were a lot of times in the business. I didn't know what I was doing and I'd never run a $20 million company. I never ran a $5 million company. I never ran a 10 million, never ran a 20 million company. So the voices in our head can really start to speak to us, you know, and, and we hope that we're giving.
The team, the right advice, but what I'll also say is that you, you just gotta not pay any attention to that noise. This is your business. You gotta, you've gotta run your business, you gotta drive your business. And, and, and self-doubt is real. But, but ultimately, you know, ultimately over time you start to get some, some wins and you can really start to build momentum off of the wins and just, just, you know, just give yourself a break on stuff.
Yeah. Is what? Yeah. All right. Wouldn't, well, uh, I mentioned earlier like your, your growth, uh, in 12 years is pretty phenomenal. Did you, yeah. After you kind of got where, like, okay, I'm not fighting for my next meal where I'm not in desperation mode. Maybe it's chaotic. Did you just, did you have a, a moment where you're like, I'm gonna put my foot on the fricking pedal and just see how hard can I be drive?
Like how big can we grow? Or was, what was the catalyst for really driving big growth? Right. So a couple things to that. I used to do this to my team all the time. I put my fingers like this because my goal was to bend each department. I wanted to bend each department at any given point without it breaking.
Because what I wanted to do is create a problem. To fix a problem, to create a problem, to fix a problem. I have too many leads, okay? I don't have enough salespeople. Let me fix that problem. And now I have plenty of salespeople. I don't know if installers, okay, now I got plenty of installers, but now I need more leads.
Let me. Let me constantly figure out how do I create a problem to fix a problem? And that was really the methodology to grow the business. Yeah. Interesting. Okay. Did, were there times, when did it, did anybody break? I. Or did you like put 'em back together, put a splint on 'em and go, it's gonna be okay. We can do this.
Yeah. Well, yeah. Let's just say I probably could have kept on a full-time therapist for my team. I kept them busy. Yeah. For me, you know, look, I'm all gas and no break. And the other part of it is I need to also surround myself with people that are able to challenge some of the, the crazy ideas that I have.
You know? Yeah. And that's also important. I just gotta listen to that and not, not that I'm gonna follow everything, but I need to be at least open to it. Okay. At some point you're like, like you're the successful guy. Even in your business, in your community, people look up to you. You're like, you've accomplished something really, um, impressive or important.
And did you struggle at that point, not having, like if, did your, did your circle end up being a lot of Yes. Men or Yes. Women that were going, oh, Brian, you're so cool. You're great. How did you like find the people that speak the truth? To you. Yeah. Well look, you, you, it's very easy to get in a meeting and you, and if I say something or if I ask a question, there are gonna be a lot of people that are gonna try to, you know, have the right answer and then look to me to see what I'm set to see if I approve.
Yeah. But what's more valuable, and you have to, you have to just publicly. A appreciate it and celebrate challenging questions. I would rather have a challenging question than the right answer, right? Mm-hmm. Because that's what you really need as a business leader. You need, and so I think that also is part of the culture though.
Look, I think I've been very fortunate that that because we were figuring out stuff together and we were growing the business together, and I, and I would share that. Look, you know, if we're working a home show and we're trying to set leads, I'm out there as a co-producer in the early days. So, you know that, that brings credibility.
And also when we don't get things right, we gotta talk about why we didn't get it right. You know? But not about the people. Because look, if Syd, let's say you and my production manager and I got a problem with some customer and then, and I say, what happened with this job? How did things go wrong? And you say, it wasn't me, it was them.
But you're gonna immediately point your fingers to other people. Yeah. So instead I've gotta approach it, Hey Sid, we got a problem with this job. You know, I know we have the right people. Help me understand, where do you think our process is broken that's creating this? I really want to get our team to focus on the process because when you focus on the process and where the process is broken, people don't take it personally.
But then they're also not afraid to challenge the process because the ultimate goal. Is how do we have a better process? And that is open to anybody to challenge it. Okay. Okay. That's really good. I want to, um, ask Rob's question he posted in here and then I have sort of a, we need, you know, it's uh, wanna be respectful of your time.
I have a closing question for you right after that. So he was talking about where as you were bending people. And that balancing act of more leads, more installers, more you know, sales. How do with that scale, department by department, how did you get it to grow more steadily in all three departments? I don't know if.
Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Well, look. Okay. In, in the early days when you, when you have, when you have two or three salespeople, you almost have to schedule to perfection to keep everybody busy. You almost have to schedule to perfection. It's a lot easier when you have more salespeople and you have more leads.
I can have a, I can have a couple of people at the bottom of a batting order and a couple of people at the top of the batting order. And, and the way I found balance is that if. And especially on the sales world, if I have the philosophy that my, my best sales reps are gonna get the most leads and my bottom sales reps are gonna be back in the house for training, that automatically gives me a buffer in, in if I have too many leads or, or if I have, or, or too many salespeople.
That gives me a buffer. I think if you think about being overstaffed for the sake of training and the betterment of the business in different areas as you're growing, that's kind of what helps to add balance. But also it's a matter of which is the, and it's different for everybody. Which area in your business is the hardest for you to scale?
Okay. Which area of your business is the hardest for you to scale? Some people struggle finding in installation people or technicians. Other people struggle trying to find people that can generate leads. Other people try struggle, trying to find people that can sell. Look, I think if, if you know the hardest area to scale, scale that area first, because that's the one that's really gonna get you in a bind if you're not growing.
Yeah. No, that makes sense. It makes a lot of sense. Okay, so a after you, since you've published the book and, uh, yeah. To remind everybody like Beyond the Hammer, it's a, it's a quick audio book and it's in print. They can get the audio book to, the audio book is terrific. You listen to it, it's fantastic. Did you record the audio?
I recorded, I recorded the second half of the book in on the audio book. Okay. The strategy side, I used, uh, a very professional narrator, Eduardo Ballerini. He used to be an actor on The Sopranos, and he Oh, really? Did the parable side with all these characters is a real, it's a great, it's a great listen, if you like audio books, that's on Amazon.
Okay. Yeah. Okay, good. So with like, and now like, I mean, you get interviewed a lot and, and you're helping a lot of people. You're mentoring, you're speaking at different events like the huge convention. What's a. What's a one question that you really wish somebody would answer, but it's your, like, you rarely or never get asked.
What a great question, right? What a great question. Um, why Brian, you had such a successful business. Why did you sell it? Hmm. And so when I repeat that question back to you, Ryan, you had such a successful business, why did you sell it? I'm not gonna answer that. No, I'm kidding. Okay.
Because what I, what I found, and this is really interesting, is that as the business was growing, once I got to, I had 600 employees, right? Mm-hmm. And I found that, that, and I was 62 years old at the time too, by the way, with 600 employees. What I found is that, that, that, I wanna call it chutzpah. The, the energy, the chutzpah, the, the courage to take a lot of risk as a young entrepreneur.
Was waning and I started and I started to become a little more risk averse. Okay. You know, I've got this big business and I'm just trying to keep it all running together. And I thought, if I ever get hit by a bus, is my wife gonna step in and run this business? That's not fair to her. Yeah. Combined with private equity, they were jumping over each other to get in our space.
We were in a well positioned, uh, business. Uh, it was, they were great businesses. All three of them that I sold and. You know, it was, it was the right time. It was the right time and, and I needed to write a book. So, but that was, that was primary. The two primary reasons was I was getting a little risk averse and I was worried that about my wife having to step in and run the business.
Yeah, yeah. Very fair. Well, then I said, that was the last question. You brought up the book. What was the motivation to write a book and how has that motivat, like how is, is it met expectations? How's it turned out compared to what you had in mind where you're like, I. The, the motivation was, I feel like. I feel like a lot of, uh, leadership books aren't applicable to the home improvement industry or to the home services industry.
Yeah, and I, and I feel that they don't, I feel they tend to be a little preachy, and I wanted something that was very relatable, that, that spoke to people, was approachable and actionable and, and, and, and people could do it, and then they can see the result from it, because I'm all about. You know, if you want to build a business, you have to build people.
And, and look, the entrepreneur affects so many people. That's why I love working at the entrepreneur level because they, they hire people. They, they, and they just, they're, they're life changers. They really are. Yeah. And so the, the, and, and, and for me, look, my thing is that when I started really going all in on building people, here's what I realized.
I realized the two most important days of your life are the day that you're born. And the day you finally figure out why. Wow. And I realized that I'm on this planet to make a positive impact in this world, and I do it through the entrepreneur and through helping and developing people. Yeah. The result of the, the book has been terrific.
On average, about four, four or so thousand books a month are being purchased month after month after month after month. I, I've got, I'm actually heading to London in September for an award, for a, uh, book award, for International Book Award, which is really cool. So it's been a fun ride. It's been a very humbling journey for me.
It's been great. That's great. Congratulations. Great. Thank you. With, with that amount of book sales since I, there was, there was an obtuse, uh. Factoid, but I didn't, that I found online because I was doing a little homework in 2018, uh, tand was awarded a Guinness Book of World Records. Yeah. But I didn't but it, but I couldn't find for what?
Yeah. So what's interesting is we, we, when we. One of our businesses was putting windows in people's homes and we always looked for cool ways to interact with the community, right? Whether it was, you know, people singing in our shower or whatever we did for our shower displays to send a kid to music school.
But one of our products was replacement windows. When you put new windows in people's homes, you typically take the old windows out and you throw 'em in the trash. And we thought that was such a shame. So we started doing, let me show you something. Hold on. Yeah. We started, started. With local artists and community members, and we would give people these old window sashes and we would ask them to turn them into beautiful art pieces like this one right here.
Wow. So these, okay. Beautiful art pieces. Okay. And then what we would do is we would take all these window sash art pieces and we, we would do, we would display 'em in our town in a big community center. Yeah. And we would do a giant public auction. All the money raised would go to help somebody in our community that really needed it.
So it was a really cool thing. So we did a lot of cool stuff with it. Well, I wondered, we, we set, we would set up like a hundred windows, 200 windows. So I wondered what the world record was on it. So I called Guinness to find out, and Guinness, we could do a whole podcast on Colin Guinness. But, uh, they didn't have a category, so they said.
Okay, it's 1500 windows you have to display. I'm like, 1500 windows is two tractor trail fulls of windows. That's a tre. I, I, I, where am I gonna put these things? Yeah. I mean, so we rented this convention center and now I need to get these things painted. So I did a giant community calling to have, look, I had.
This whole convention center was full of plastic folding tables. Yeah. And, and window sashes, the windows paint. And people came out with their kids, their grandkids painted windows all weekend. And yeah, then we set Guinness World Record. So it's pretty cool. Well, bravo. That's fun. Yeah. That's fun in so many ways.
Yeah. Well, good. What I, I gotta tell you, thanks again. This has been a lot of fun, but like, thanks for your time. Like I recognize that, you know, it's, it is a big deal and I'm truly excited. I mean, thanks for, I. In advance for coming to Nashville. Um, for those of you, you're still on like August 21st, Thursday the 21st.
Brian's gonna be on stage, take the stage, I believe it's 9:00 AM we've already got it scheduled, um, to lay out some wisdom and then maybe have time for some q and a. But really appreciate it and look forward to meeting you in person. Yeah, yeah, likewise. Thanks so much Sid, and thanks to everybody.
Appreciate y'all. Look forward to seeing you in Nashville. Hello my friend. This is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today's episode. I hope you got some value from it. And listen, anything that was covered, uh, any of the resources, any of the books, any of the tools, anything like that is in the show notes.
So it's easy for you to find and check it out. And also, I wanna let you know the. Mission for the huge convention and for this podcast is to help our blue collar business owners like you and I, to gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. And we do that in four ways. Number one is our free weekly newsletter.
It's called a Huge Insider. I hope you subscribe. It is the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry, period. Paid or otherwise. And this one's free. Next is the huge foundation's education platform. That is, we've got over 120 hours of industry specific education and resources for you. And every month we do, uh, a topical webinar and we do question and answer with seven and eight figure business owners.
And it's available to you for a $1 trial for seven days. Next, of course, is the huge convention or the huge convention. If you haven't been, you gotta check it out. It's every August this year it's in Nashville, Tennessee. That's August 20th through 22nd and 2025, and it is the largest and number one rated.
Trade show and convention for home service business builders. We've got the biggest trade show, so you can check out all the coolest tools and meet the vendors and check out the software to run your business. And it's got, we've got, um, education, world class education and educators and speakers that will teach you how to run a better business.
And it's the best networking opportunity that you can have within the home service business. And then lastly, if you wanna pour jet fuel in your business. Check out the Hughes Mastermind now. It's not for everyone. You gotta be at over $750,000 of revenue and you're building toward a million, 5 million, 10 million in the next five years.
And it is a network, and a mentorship and a mastermind of your peers, and we help you understand and implement the Freedom operating system. We go into more detail, but you can get all the information on all four of these programs and how we'll help you advance your business quickly just by going to the huge convention.com.
And scroll down, click on the freedom path. Or of course you can find the links here in the show notes. So, sorry, I feel like I'm getting a little bit wordy, but I just wanna let you know of the resources that are available to you to help you accelerate and advance your beautiful, small business. So keep on growing, keep on learning, keep advancing.
And if you'd like to show. Go ahead. I mean, if you would go and take 90 seconds and give us a review on iTunes, then subscribe and share it, man. It would really mean the world to us. It would help other people, and as we continue our mission to help people just like you and me. So thanks again for listening.
We'll see you in the next episode.
 
 

22: The Drew Larison Episode

In this episode of the Huge Transformations podcast, host Sheila Smeltzer interviews Drew Larson, founder of Five Door Media—a full-service marketing firm tailored exclusively to home service businesses. Drew breaks down what makes effective marketing partnerships work, especially in the trades. He shares his agency's unique five-door system for diagnosing and optimizing marketing campaigns, dives into how to convert one-time customers into long-term revenue through recurring services, and emphasizes why understanding your brand story and customer pain points is essential for marketing success. This episode is packed with real-world marketing advice, insights into customer acquisition cost (CAC), and the strategies that separate high-performing service brands from the rest. Whether you're scaling your cleaning business, launching digital ads, or just want to make marketing finally "click," this conversation delivers valuable, actionable wisdom.
Show Notes
Guest:
Drew Larson – Founder, Five Door MediaWebsiteInstagramFacebook
 
Resources Mentioned:
The Huge Insider newsletter
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
The Huge Convention (August 20–22, 2025, Nashville)
Cleaning & Cocktails event info
Facebook Group – Huge Foundations
 
Transcript:
 
 Hello everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I'm Sid Graff outta Montana. I'm Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee. And I'm Sheila Smeltzer From North Carolina, we are your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in the industry, folks that have already built seven and eight figure businesses, and they want to help you succeed.
Yep. No fake gurus on this show, just real life owners that have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience, 0% theory. We are going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece. Thanks for joining us on the wild. Journey of entrepreneurship. Let's dive in.
Hello, hello, hello. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast today, everyone. Sheila Smeltzer here, the interviewer of Drew Larson. On today's show, drew Larson owns Five Door Media and we are gonna dive deep into marketing. This is a great conversation between a home service business owner, yours truly, and Drew Larson, owner of Five Door, who is a full service marketing firm based outta Indiana.
Um, the really cool part of what you're gonna learn today is I think this conversation will set a new standard in regards to what that marketing firm home service company relationship can look like, because Drew really takes it to a deep level in regard to. Really getting to know the home service space.
But I think it creates a lot of opportunity for us to listen, whether we were engaging with five door media or not, to know what types of questions and what type of expectation should we have. When, when working with a marketing company, what does effective marketing look like? What are all the different channels?
What is, what are the KPIs that we should be tracking? We talk about how customer acquisition costs is the holy grail, KPI for marketing. Um, drew takes us through a number of things, his five door platform. Um, we talk a lot about, you know, the different aspects and the like. Again, the different channels of marketing.
Um, but again, he really resonates with the pain points of home service companies and talks about how marketing can help solve those pain points. And, um, the best part of what we discuss today is how it can lead to recurring revenue and how recurring revenue is so important, um, in any business, in any industry.
So what a killer conversation we have with Drew today. I'm so excited. Excited that you're here to listen and sit back, relax for the next 45, 50 minutes 'cause Here we go.
Hello everybody. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I am Sheila Smeltzer out of North Carolina, and I am interviewing Drew Larson. Today with Five Door Media. We are gonna dive into some marketing and learn about what. It looks like to create a marketing plan for your company, to hire a marketing firm to develop your story and to broadcast it to the world.
So, uh, drew, welcome to the show. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. Um, super, uh, super pumped to be here. Yeah. So Drew, you and I have known each other for a little bit, um mm-hmm. We are both members of the huge, uh, I'm sorry, the AMP group and, uh, the Mastermind for Huge. And so it's really fun sitting in the room with you every quarter and, uh, getting to know you on a personal level, on a business level.
And, um, this is a great opportunity for me to interview you today because my company as well is, um, has started to work with a professional marketing firm. And this is a big step for a lot of companies. And so I kind of wanna relate to you and, and get in your head about what it looks like for home service companies to, um, to work with a company like yours.
So, five Door Media, tell us about yourself. Yeah, so Five Door Media. Um, we, so I've owned an agency, actually it's June, uh, it'll be 10 years this year. This month, June 25th is our 10 year anniversary. We have, um, Risin Media, which Risin Media, we started off as a generalist agency is commonly known in the agency world, where we really helped out anybody and everybody that needed marketing.
And then around three to four years ago, we really found a home in home services. And ironically enough, it started at that BBB Mastermind, which is now amp, which I might be called like the Home or the Huge Mastermind. Now, I don't know, it's had a lot of names since I've been there. It's still amp, right?
Yeah. Uh, and, but we've really found a home with home services, uh, inside of that mastermind and just met some fan, fantastic people. And just quickly, I learned the home services industry as a whole and there's a lot of like sub-niches of the home and, you know, home service industry, but the home service industry as a whole really.
Was needing an agency, was really needing an agency, um, that was different, that offered different things, that had a different outlook on things. Um, so we kind of like just dove into that. And then three years later, 80% of our client list at LAR and Media was home service companies. So we kind of made this strategic, uh, pivot to create this thing called Five Door Media, which Five Door media is strictly only for home service.
Companies. So if you service a home, we service you. Um, some of our biggest sub-niches are definitely the cleaning world, whether that's, you know, um, made services for residential and commercial clients, but also exterior cleaning, pressure washing, uh, soft washing companies, window cleaning companies. And then we also do quite a bit in that green industry space.
Um, so lawn and landscape companies, um, things of that nature. Um, that sub niche as well. But I mean, we are a full scope. Digital agency. So we handle everything from branding all the way to website design and development, to obviously social media management, social media, ads management. Um, we do SEO services on Google.
We do Google paid ad services and as well as we do videography and photography services too. Um, so we actually travel out to clients, um, multiple times a year, get content that is real, that is raw. It's, we try our best to use the smallest amount of stock video or photo as possible. Um, and those trips help us with that because we just see that real content, whether it's an ad form or organic content form, is converting so much better, um, than anything.
Stock photo. I mean, like in the cleaning world, everyone has used the exact same photo of a person with a mop in a bucket a billion times. Um, so when they see like potentially like a house that they know that house. Like they know where that house is and a piece of content, or they see a testimonial from maybe one of their neighbors that content's translating, um, a lot better and converting into leads and sales a lot better too.
So really, we're a full scope agency. Like if you're just starting off and you need a website, um, we can help out with that too. Or if you're diving into the, you know, ongoing lead gen marketing world, we can help out with that as well. Um, or if you need help with like the art side of things that photography or videography services we're really well stocked internally to handle whatever you're looking for.
Great. Um, I wanna ask you some questions, but first of all, tell me what does your team look like? Yeah, so our team, um, we have roughly around like 20 people, um, in house at Five Door Media and ris and media. And um, we have teams of brand strategists. So we work in a structure called a pod structure. So how that works, and it's a common structure for agencies, but you have like a account manager, we call them brand strategists, and then they are the main point of contact for that client.
They really are what their job title says. They are in charge of the strategy for your brand online. Um, and moving forward they're your main point of contact. And then each and one of those pods we have like an SEO specialist, we have a paid ad specialist, we have a graphic designer. Um, and then we have a art department as well, which is the photographers and videographers.
Mm-hmm. They handle all of our photography and videography in-house. Um, actually one of our editors lives in South Korea. Wow. He's an American that, uh, worked for us. When he lived in America, he got married to his wife who teaches English in South Korea. So they moved over there and he stayed on board.
And, and at first we were like, well, how's this gonna work? But it actually works out pretty darn amazing because we are a 24 hour video factory now. 'cause they work almost exactly on an opposite schedule. How about that? So as long as we have footage to him to edit, by the time we go to sleep, we wake up and it's probably done or close to it.
So that actually worked out really well. Um, but we, I mean we have, you know, those pod structures internally and then we do have like a leadership team, um, as well. We run, we're an agency that runs on EOS. Um, we just launched that around three months ago. So working on EOS structure. So we have a leadership team and then we have that fulfillment team as well.
That's great. Talk about maximizing efficiency when you can. It's unreal. Run 24 hours around the clock. It's, and you know, and I could tell another story too, but like that. That structure of having that, um, employee that just moved to South Korea randomly has been the coolest thing. Actually, he was just back in the States.
We actually had a staff wedding, um, last weekend and he was in the wedding, so he flew home for that wedding. So it was great to see him in person and not over like a Google meet or a Google Hangout for a bit. Yeah. Um, but like, yeah, we've had, ironically enough, there's been a client locally in Kokomo that is, uh, Korean based.
It's actually like a Samsung type of company and we're doing some video work for them. And we've been actually been able to use like his wife for like translation things and captions for that video. So like the, the, the ironic things that have come off of having an employee in South Korea have been awesome.
But yeah, it's been great. Yeah. That's really, really cool. So I wanna, I wanna back up just a hair. 'cause you talked about. There being a difference with working with home service companies in regards to marketing and media and all that sort of thing. What is that pain point that you saw that you could deliver to, you know, what is it about home service companies that kind of made it your niche?
Yeah, great question. Um, what we were seeing from the stories that I heard, whether it was at that Mastermind or you know, other connections I've made. The, what we're able to provide is just another level of like, intentionality to our clients. A lot of times, um, agencies that have worked in this space in the past, they were like, they were bulk agencies where they really just wanted as many clients as possible and the work didn't get as deep as it does with us.
Okay. Um, with us, like we really dive into your story. When we onboard with you, we wanna find out like what makes you tick, what makes you different. Um, but I think also. I am personally like really active in the home service world. I mean, like, I'm in, I go to that mastermind in Nashville. I'm constantly like going to other educational opportunities.
I'm going to, um, listening to webinars that aren't for marketing agencies, but they're for home service companies. And I think we come in with, we really are passionate about learning as much about our client's industry as they're learning. You know, and I, I want to know their pain points. I want to know their customer's pain points.
I want to know, you know, I don't wanna know just the services we're, you know, advertising. I wanna know what solutions they're providing for your cu your clients. 'cause in the end of the game, like that's really what makes your marketing different is like when you start talking solutions for your clients rather than services you're providing.
Marketing gets a lot better from there. Um, so I've, I'm, I've really just been very invest invested in this world. Just learning from my standpoint, what makes our clients tick, what makes our our clients customers tick? What are the pain points internally that might hurt marketing efforts or what are some things going on internally that they have no idea would be great for marketing efforts because they're in that daily grind.
Right? Um, so I've spent years now like attending things, being intentional about things to learn as much about these industries as possible to where when you work with five door media. You might be surprised how much we know about your world. Um, because we're, we're very active in it. We know a lot about it.
'cause I, I take what I learned on these, you know, educational trips or these masterminds that I go to and immediately I go back to the office and I tell the team about it too. Like, you know, and we're, we're just very aware. What are some, you know, red flags or green flags for a cleaning company? What are some red or green flags for lawn and landscape companies?
And then we're able to, with that knowledge, create a service that's more impactful. You know, 'cause that's really, we believe our purpose or like our, our reason to exist is to partner with these home service companies. So we can increase their impact, what we like to say internally, locally, and beyond.
Because we truly do believe, like these companies that are servicing homes, they're changing the world, you know? And we get really excited about the opportunity to play this small role with them, to help them grow, to help them scale, to help them see things about themselves that maybe they never would see before.
Um, and we love playing that role for them. So really what makes home service different is it's such a personal service. And I think the biggest thing I've learned about home service companies is we'll take cleaning for example, right? What you're selling as an interior cleaning company, an exterior cleaning company, what you're selling is not cleaning.
What you're selling is time, right? You are giving back time to families across the country, and. I don't think we're talking about that enough. I think we get, we get wrapped up in conversations about how to become better cleaners. Whether that's products, whether that's strategies, whether it's anything like that.
But like we forget like what we're actually doing and we're providing families in this country more time to be a family. Um, and like we, we have that mindset here. We're not selling services, we're, we're selling time. Mm-hmm. And that goes into our client's marketing and we're seeing great things from it, you know, so it's been able to be in those circles of home service, but then really like from kind of the outside looking in view, right?
Being able to see, oh man, they're doing so much more than they think they're doing. The impact they are having internally, locally and beyond is so far beyond what their actually services, what their actual services are. It's so much more than that and we're able to see that from our vantage point and relay that to our clients in a way that blows their minds and reminds them like of what their actual purpose is.
And then we can weave that into their marketing and make great impact from it. Yeah, that's so incredible. So, so much to break down there, I just have to give you just huge applause, drew, because you know, you've obviously, you're invested in learning your customer avatar, which is home service space, and.
Across the board. We are all it. It is a, it is a labor service. It is, it is diving into not just the thing that deliverable that we do, which is whatever that service is that we provide, but looking at it on a more, on a bigger level of Yes. Selling time. I also think about things like, um, like for my particular market, we have a lot of retirees.
I sell safety. Mm-hmm. One of our biggest marketing campaigns that have crushed it is stay off the ladder. Old folks, and we didn't say it like that, but stay off the ladder. Do you know how many and, and it was listening, which is exactly what you're doing to the home service space is you're listening to us as owners because we listen to our clients call in and say, oh my gosh, I just don't want my husband on the ladder anymore.
It took so many times to hear that is like, this is a campaign folks, right? Yeah. Yeah. Um, and so what is it that you're selling? I think another big thing is selling convenience. And this is a whole new, I think, trajectory for the home service space is how do we package our services into a convenient model so that people can engage more frequently.
Mm-hmm. Um, so yeah, kudos to you for, you know, really getting to know your target and, you know, I look at that Drew as being just a very supportive role for our industry, um, and helping us out because yeah. I wanna, and I wanna get into some creative stuff because you talked about telling the story and you know, when you think about most companies that start a home service, uh, home service company, um.
We are, a lot of us didn't go to school. We don't have degrees. Yeah. We didn't have, you know, some master's in something. Uh, we have this craft that we know and decide to turn it into a business. So we're an owner operator and then we decide we want to, you know, grow it into, into a company. And, um, I'm so sorry.
And so I, uh, I, I wanna kind of dive into, so like that, that creates a really unique opportunity for you because there's a lot of stories to tell 'cause everybody has their beginning. Like, where did you come from? How did you get started? And everybody has that unique story. So what is the process for Five Door Media with a new client?
So you're bringing on a new client. Let's say it's my company. How do you bring me in? And how do you learn? What is your onboarding process, I guess? You probably have a better name for it, but what does that process look like for how you get to know that client so that you can most effectively tell their story?
Yeah. Um, and no onboarding is a great title for it. That's what we call it. Okay, great. Um, you know, our, our onboarding process, there's parts of it that are pretty, you know, standard. You know, we have like onboarding forms where we want the owner to answer some, obviously it's probably some boring questions of like, what's your targeted, you know, cost per lead, you know, or what has worked for you in the past?
What do you, what has not worked for you in the past? Things like that. But where we really start to get into the nitty gritty is we do a kickoff call, um, with our clients, which also is not like a revolutionary idea, but I think what we talk about on that kickoff call is really unique. 'cause we're asking these questions like, how did the company start?
You know, and we just let the client talk, you know, we don't really interrupt much. Um, but a lot of times in interview fashion, as you're, you know, seeing with this podcast, the gold. Of answers. The gold of things always happens in like the follow-up questions. So I always tell our team on those kickoff calls, do not just go through a list of questions, write down the answers and call it done.
Be. Be curious in those kickoff calls, like when they're telling that story of how you got started. Really be listening. Find little things that you might be able to ask a follow up to that. That's where the gold is. But a really big thing for us too is um, just finding, I mean, we follow the Simon Sinek method of finding start with why.
Sure. And you know, we actually do y consulting for companies too, where we can actually come in with your staff or maybe just a personal y discovery with that owner and we'll help you like discover your actual why. Um, which a lot of people will say like, oh, my family is my why, or, you know, all those other answers.
But reality, no, your family is your family. You know, your why is something deeper. Your why is not something that will be developed later. It's something that's always been inside of you that has been leading decisions for the rest of your life, right? So like we, we actually can come in and like help you find that why.
And once you have that, why it becomes kind of your north star for everything in your business moving forward, including marketing, right. So, I mean, I kind of snuck it in there earlier, but like I said, our why LAR and media and the five door media, we exist to partner with home service businesses so that together we can increase their impact internally, locally, and beyond, because we believe that home service companies are changing the world.
That's why we exist, right? That is our why statement. It is not, we exist to do marketing campaigns, or we exist to create Facebook graphics, or we exist to do websites. No, that's what we do. And we even have some creative ways on how we do. What we do, but why we do it is really the gold there, right? And a lot, I think we do a really good job of digging into our clients to help find that why as quickly as possible, and let that be the North star for everything that we do for them.
Um, and a lot of times the client doesn't know that, or has never even like, thought of that before when they, you know, when they onboard with us. So maybe it takes a while. We're not gonna figure everything out in that 45 minute kickoff call. But a unique thing about us is like our communication is very consistent.
Um, a lot of times we're talking to you intentionally on a weekly basis. Um, we really want you to look at us, kind of like your marketing department that just happens to work in a different building. So we think if you did have a marketing department internally, you'd probably have a weekly marketing meeting, right?
Mm-hmm. So we talk about things, what's going on on your end? Here's what's going on ours, where do we meet in the middle? We'll talk to you next week. Um, but we really think that communication structure helps us really find out. Not just like that kickoff conversation, but also like day to day, what are some things you're struggling with?
What are some things you're hearing back from the leads that are coming in? It blows my mind when we have clients that tell us, no agency has ever asked me about lead quality before. Hmm. Which, in my mind, lead quality is the most important metric. For anything sales and marketing. How can you be making future decisions on your ad campaigns if you're not having conversations about the past lead quality from the last one, right?
Like that lead quality is the biggest variable on what you're going to make decisions for in the future, right? So, I mean, we, we ask the hard questions. We, we try to dig deeper other than just what services do you provide? I'm like, no, I want to hear some of your stories that made you the most proud of doing the work that you do.
Tell me those stories. Tell me what that, like the happiest customer you've ever had. What was their feedback? But I also wanna know, tell me about the mattes customer you've ever had and what was their feedback? Right. So I think there's just very intentional, um, questions that we ask in that onboarding process that get us to like that next layer of like finding out who you really are.
Mm-hmm. Because that was honestly one of the biggest feedbacks I heard when I jumped into this home service space is. Oh, the agency I work with, like they use our, our content they post for us is the exact same that they use for everybody else. There's really nothing unique and that might work really well for that agency to help scale them, right?
Because it's a lot less work for a lot, lot more people, right? Um, but you're not doing the best service for the client. And I, I think any business doesn't survive off of just doing a service for a, a client once. And we're here for the long haul and, um, we wanna make sure that we're treating everybody uniquely differently, different, because they are, I mean, the same industry you're in, there could be a company in, honestly another company in North Carolina and you are a completely different business from them, right?
And it would be unfair as us, as the agency to come into that wor in your world and just assume that you're just like everybody else and move forward in that direction, you know? So I think like really figuring out what makes you tick, what makes your customers tick, um, and we have like specific questions to help dig into that, that really makes a big difference.
Yeah. And, you know, talk about lead quality. I mean, if there's anything that directly impacts conversions. Oh my gosh. Yeah. It's lead quality. Yeah. And if I'm a company that's looking to grow and scale, um, if I have a revenue expansion plan, if I am looking to, you know, be that big fish in a small pond to, you know, really target a certain segment, um, market and, and, and then, and, and penetrate it, um, that conversion is everything.
So how, uh, what does that look like? So I, I, I wanna back up just a hair. So you onboarded a new, a new company mm-hmm. Home service company. You learn about them and you tell the story. And we could talk about telling the story for a while, but I kind of wanna dive into the more of the business and the growth plan aspect of it.
Sure, sure. And how your company can really assist with that, because this is, in my mind, as a, as a business owner, this is one of the. Most difficult things to figure out. Hmm. Um, new client, you've learned how to tell their story, and there's this whole creative, which a marketing firm like yours can deliver.
Um, so, and then with that, you've got all of your, you digital, you've got your, um, your all, just all the things, the branding, the SEO, the videography, all of those things, right? Great. So now you present this to your client, and at this point, your client is probably saying, okay, great. Maybe you've rebranded them.
Maybe you've just highlighted them, made them look better, whatever that looks like, right? Mm-hmm. This is what it looks like, right? Mm-hmm. It can absolutely. Yeah. Okay. And so now I'm saying, okay, drew, now this is where I'm trying to go with my company. This is the market segment I'm going for. This is my expansion plan.
How can you help me get there? Yeah, so that, that conversation would also be inside of like our onboarding. So we're talking about that right off the bat, you know, um, we're talking about like, what are your business goals? What are your one, you know, your one year goal, what is your five years goal? Um, what revenue are you currently at?
What do you want to stay at? What is your current cost per lead? If you are doing any sort of advertising now, like we try to get a good baseline of information, like before we really start anything. Um, but I mean, that's when we really, you know, just turn on those paid ad campaigns and start the lead generation.
But it's something unique about how we look at. You know, lead generation and like paid ad campaigns and just marketing as a whole. So the name of our company is Five Door Media. Um, and I'm glad you didn't ask where that came from 'cause now I'm about to explain it and it fits into this question. Well, so we have this, um, five door system that we have where it is our methodology to diagnose any sort of like lead gen, um, ad campaign.
We believe that any customer has to walk through five doors before they become a paying customer online. The first door is platform. Are we actually advertising on the right platform? Are we on Google when we should be on social media? Are we on social media? When we should be on Google? Should we be looking at things like Nextdoor?
Should we be looking at things? You know what I mean? Are we on the right platform? And we have different metrics and, you know, KPIs to look at as the campaign gets started to see is that the right platform or not? Second door is creative. Is our creative stopping the scroll? Are we making people stop in their tracks when they are on Google, when they are on social media, when they are on whatever platform we're on?
Is it good enough? You know, and like something we're seeing right now, some of the best campaigns we have running with our clients right now are raw, real video ad campaigns on social media. You know, I think gone are the days, unless it's a really good graphic. Gone are the days of just a graphic ad campaign because you look at like the expectations of consumers when it comes to content online.
I. This little thing called TikTok started when we were all locked in our homes for two weeks in 2020. And the expectation now is short form vertical video content. Okay. So why would we not think, oh, I should make my ads that way too, right? So some of the best campaigns we're seeing right now are, um, short form video, really raw, um, video ad campaigns.
Real, but that's creative. Real. Yeah. Real reels, yes. Yeah. You don't need, honestly, some of are the best campaigns. The owner has been sitting out and it's a cleaning company in New Mexico. It shout out Molly. Um, her videos are literally her sitting on the steps of her business outside. She doesn't have a mic, she does not have editing.
The literally only editing we did was add her logo to the bottom left quarter and it is her just talking about a special. And if you're interested, click the link. That's the best campaign we have, right? Um, people don't want these very overproduced, you know, videos because the best advertising is the advertising that doesn't look anything like advertising, right?
So they think they're just watching a selfie video of someone talking and then it, you know, it is an ad. But that second door is creative. The third door is targeting. So we're on the right platform. Our content is definitely getting, you know, engagement. We're seeing leads come in, but are we targeting the right people?
Right? Are we targeting the right demographics? Are we in the right locations? Um, we're doing some really creative stuff with specific neighborhoods right now for some of our clients, like hitting some bigger neighborhoods and offering specials just to the people that live in that neighborhood. Um, are we doing the right income levels of targeting?
Are we doing homeowners when we're getting a lot of people that live in apartments? All that kind of targeting, right? Are we actually targeting the right people? Yep. Fourth door is post ad engagement, is what we call it. So what that ends up being is like, are our forms up to speed? Are they too long? Are they not long enough?
Um, are we asking for too much information? Are we not asking for enough information? Are we seeing people click over to that landing page but then not convert into a lead? So then we've got landing pages issues. Are we seeing that people are having a hard time finding our form? I think one of the biggest business lessons that Amazon has given us is make it as easy as possible for people to do business with you.
Right? They have that one click purchase. Yeah. It is the easiest possible thing in the world. Mm-hmm. Business owners at small levels should be looking at that too. How easy is it to do business with your company? And I think landing pages are a big part of that. That form should be right up front, right up.
You know, the top of that page. They should not have to work very hard, but I mean, if you have a certain service, that definitely takes more research. Do you have enough information on your landing page? It kills me when I see people's ad campaigns go to their homepage of their website. Because there's probably some creative and some language happening in that ad that you have to be continuing that story when they click over to your website, right?
Yeah. Your website. We're talking like 50% off. You know, if you book now and then you just go to the homepage and where'd that 50% off go? Am I actually gonna get 50% off? How do they know if I signed up for the 50% off? Rather than having a designated landing page that tells that story that was being told in the ad?
I think there should be that same video they saw on Facebook or Instagram on that landing page too. Or maybe it's like, Hey, you saw my Facebook on social or you, my video on social media. Here's another video. Here's how you sign up for this. Right? Continue that story that you're telling online when they get over to your website.
So that's the fourth door is, um, post ad engagement. So right, we're through four doors. Platform, creative targeting, post ad engagement, the fifth door. Can you guess what it is? Uh, it has something to do with the close sales. Darn. Right, right. Okay. The fifth door is the sales. Um, and this is a cool thing.
We've actually just getting more and more involved in, um, 'cause marketing agency usually like, Hey, we got you the lead. Good luck. Right? Right. Um, but at the same time, we do understand if those sales aren't happening, we become irrelevant. Right. There's, there's a certain part of responsibility we have to take with that because we know we could be getting you a thousand leads a month, but none of 'em are converting to sales.
We lose relevance because there's no money to pay for us because no leads are, or no leads are being converted into sales. So what we're starting to do more and more of is we're diving into, um, response times. Speed. Delete is massive. That is not a catchy phrase that you hear at conferences. That is a real thing.
If you're not getting back with your leads with under five minutes, you're losing. I think Jonas Olson, a good friend of mine, told me like 90% of his leads close if they get with him under five minutes. When that lead comes in, speed, delete is real. Wow. But also if it's a Google, if it's a call for maybe a Google ad, we're listening to these sales calls, we're diving in and we're like, di, jumping in to see how your CSRs are actually talking to your clients that are calling in.
And I hate to say it, but I kind of brag about it. At the same time, we've gotten many CSRs fired because we've listened to these calls and we, they're just letting money slip through their hands. Like these people that are calling are just begging to become your client and your CSRs are just letting them slip through their hands.
So when you have that sales process really dialed in, that's when those like cost customer acquisition costs, numbers are gonna look better. That's when you can start justifying, you know, spending money on marketing and seeing cost per lead come in. But without that sales, the rest of the four doors don't matter.
Right? So we really look at it as our job. You know, during onboarding and then when we start, how do we make sure all five of these doors for our clients are the most big, beautiful, inviting, welcoming doors. We want the best, what's it called? We want your doors to be, have like the best curb appeal they can possibly have.
So when we're doing these ad campaigns, your clients are gonna fly through these doors with ease, you know? So is it revolutionary to break it down with platform creative targeting, post ad engagement and sales? No, but I think visually, and I'm a visual person. Yeah. And you make it like that, it's cool.
'cause if we're running a campaign and we're not getting the results we want, we're able to look at metrics and look at data and be like, they're stuck at door two, let's try a different creative. Or they're stuck at door four. What's wrong with the landing page? Right. So that, like I said, the first thing I said, we use this to diagnose paid ad campaigns for our clients.
'cause a lot of times. What the client will hear. It's like, I don't know, maybe it's just the economy or I don't know. Maybe it's just the platform. Maybe Facebook just is down right now. No, there's so many better reasons. With digital marketing in general, you have access to a ridiculous amount of data that you can go through and find out any answer of what's going on with your ad campaigns.
The problem is that takes time. That takes work, and a lot of agencies that are doing this at scale, that just want to take the least amount of time for every single one of their clients, they're not doing that work for you. For us, that's how we do everything day to day. You know, we are constantly looking at those doors.
Which doors are your customers getting stuck at? How do we tweak those doors until they're making it all the way to five and they're happy, and you're happy everybody's happy. We want everybody to be happy, and it all starts with like having that mindset of how do we make these doors the most beautiful things in the world that people feel so excited and welcome to walkthrough.
I love it. How, I mean, how much time, how much time does it take and what does a healthy conversion look like for tracking ROI of how five door media is performing for my company? What does that look like? Sure. Yeah. I mean, there's definitely a period, a learning period, but there's not, I can't give you an exact time because it so much depends on where that company is starting, right?
I mean, if we're starting with somebody who has never done paid advertising before, or we're starting with somebody who I don't know, maybe has spent 50 bucks on boosted post in the past is very different from somebody who's leaving and they, they're spending 10 grand a month. They know their cost per lead averages.
They know their customer acquisition cost on average, right? Because the, it's, there's gonna be a period where if we're starting with somebody who hasn't been intentional about that in the past, there's gonna be a period. It's like, we just need to find your base level. We need to know where we're at, and then we can measure moving forward.
Um, but I mean, in reality of it. You're, you can see leads pretty quickly, right? Um, but we're looking at every ad campaign on a weekly basis to seeing what needs tweaked look, going back to those five doors, what door are people getting stuck at? And then we start making those tweaks and things start going up from there.
But I can't say, oh, it's nine days and you're gonna be happy with it because every client's different. Their starting point with us is always gonna be a different thing. And there's also like the, the reality of Mark different markets, you know, if you are the only pressure washing company in your city, you should have different expectations mm-hmm.
Than somebody who lives in Dallas, Texas and they have 200 competitors within a 20 square mile radius. You know what what I mean? Right? Yeah. Your, your expectations of lead numbers, your expectation of, um, co like your budget is gonna be different than if you're the lone wolf. But that's something we do a lot of actually, in every proposal that we create, we do that research ahead of time.
And in our proposal, we're giving suggested paid budget minimums. Um, where like we really think if you're not gonna be able to spend this much. One, it's just not a good fit for us, but it's because you're just not gonna see the results that you need to, you know? Um, and a lot of people get frustrated at that, but what's even more frustrating is coming into us and not willing to spend what we say the minimum is for paid budgets.
And then you spend money and it doesn't work out the way you wanted it to, but we kind of told you that was gonna happen. So we talk paid ad budget suggestions in the proposal process. Like that's not something we talk about in onboarding. We get that agreed upon before we even start work and the contract is signed, um, just because it's, it's better to be on the same page as quickly as possible rather than later.
But I mean, every company, every client of ours is in a different market, is in different customer situation. And, um, I often tell my staff is a good Gary v quote from way back in the day. We have to have the mindset of like a business and marketing practitioner. And what I mean by that. A medical practitioner, right?
A doctor, like literally what they do all day, every day is practice medicine, right? That's all they're doing. They are practicing medicine because every patient that walks through their doors has different variables, has different symptoms, and there's not just one shot that takes care of everything.
There's not just one pill that takes care of everything. As business owners, as marketers, we need to have that same mindset. You know, we, there is not one solution to every problem. We need to be practitioners, we need to be practicing things. And we truly believe whether you're in the same industry or not, or there's some variables that exist, um, with all of our green industry clients.
Yeah. Are there some variables that exist for all of our cleaning clients? Absolutely. But everybody's different. Everybody's in a different market. Everybody has a different customer base, um, whether it's demographically or financially, and those are the stuff we have to figure out as we go. Um, by just having that practitioner mindset.
Right. Because when you have a practitioner mindset, you can diagnose, right? You can diagnose what the issues are. Um, if I am hiring a marketing firm, what are the top and, and you know, we need to keep track, right? We need to have scorecards, KPIs. Yeah. What are the top marketing KPIs that a company should be?
Totally. Well, 'cause first of all, with KPI, you have to be able to track it. You have to be able to produce the data, right? Yeah. So these systems have to exist within the company. Um, whether that's a way to, every lead that comes in, that lead is assigned a, a specific campaign from where that lead generated from.
Mm-hmm. We need to be able to start to generate this data to be able to know how marketing is performing in the first place. Yeah. So if I can produce this data, what, what are these top KPIs that I know? Yes, my marketing is effective. Yeah. The holy grail of data is that customer acquisition costs.
Customer acquisition, how much, how much are we spending to not just get a lead, but to actually acquire a customer. You know, and this is something we're diving into deeper with a lot of our clients now. Like, I almost wanna require, I need your access to your CRM because I want to see the names of the leads that we have sent in and how many have actually converted like they're paying you dollars.
Mm-hmm. And I, but at the same time, I don't think every customer acquisition cost is created equal. I think if a service is a one-time service, there should be a goal for a customer acquisition cost for that service. But I think also in the world of home service, recurring services is a real thing. Yeah.
And I think there should be a different metric for customer acquisition costs for recurring services. Yeah. 'cause a lot of times we get hung up on, um, I mean we'll use like the residential cleaning world and you know Right. If peop somebody is signing up for a cleaning twice a month, um. They're usually the metrics that we and the data we're seeing, a recurring cleaning residential made service client usually sticks around for two and a half years.
Usually it's around 500 bucks a month for two and a half years. We're talking $15,000 in revenue total from that person over two and a half years. Sure. Mm-hmm. That should not be looked at the same way than someone that just wants a move out cleaning. Right. So like I think that next level of intentionality with that customer acquisition cost is really important because if someone is just hiring you for a move out cleaning, and maybe that cleaning is $800.
And let's say your customer acquisition cost for that was a hundred, right? Or whatever it ended up being. That's different than somebody who is gonna be a $15,000 client over two and a half years on average. Mm-hmm. And paying a thousand dollars for $15,000. I don't know about you. I'd do that all day.
Right. So it's, it's a different mindset for recurring services than there are for one time. Um, 'cause I think we get hung up on that CAC cost where we're struggling because it might be higher. And honestly, ads are costing more than they ever have. I think Google and Facebook ads have gone through inflation just like everything else has.
Mm-hmm. Um, as well as like economy and things like that. But I think we're seeing higher ad costs and we're starting to freak out 'cause they're higher. But at the same time, we need to be looking at this as like lifetime value of a cu a customer. And we're, I don't think that's talked about enough, to be honest, um, to where, like I said, if your customer acquisition cost is a hundred bucks, but you're making 15 grand on 'em.
I'm stoked about that, but also I think it's a great opportunity for like any home service company, how can we turn everything into recurring revenue too? You know, if we're cleaning someone for an out or a, um, a move out cleaning or maybe we're just doing their exterior cleaning, I think we need to be really thinking about how can we end that conversation or that transaction and already get them on the schedule next.
Because I, I'm a true believer, even if you don't, if you only service that customer twice a year, that's a recurring client. Sure. Right? Because they're on, if recurring to me is when you get done with one service, they're already on the calendar for the next, that's recurring revenue. Absolutely. So I think customer acquisition cost is obviously the holy grail of all things marketing.
How much is it costing you to acquire a customer? Um, but going through those five doors, sales plays a huge role in that, you know, if your sales process is subpar. That could be the issue for your customer acquisition cost. It's not always, and of course the marketing guy is saying this, it's not always the marketing.
Right. That fifth door plays a vital role in how much we're spending. You know, if you're, if if you just increase your close rate by 10%, that could drastically change your customer acquisition cost. Right? Um, so, but at the same time, I do think it needs to be talked about more customer acquisition cost for a one-time customer is a whole different conversation than we're talking about customer acquisition cost for a recurring client.
Yeah. Great. So it gets granular and I'm, I'm with you 1000%. We are diving so deep because we, I'm trying to create a sub subscription model within my own company, and it is all based on recurring revenue. It's based on, you know, we're, we're diving deep and looking into what, what our, if we run a lifetime revenue report mm-hmm.
Who is on that report? What type of client is on that report. And it's, it's so revealing and it absolutely tells you where you need to focus, right? Because these are the clients that over time are giving you the most money a hundred percent on a continual basis. And so why would we not drive everything there?
Um, the reactionary cleaning, it's always gonna be there. Mm-hmm. There's always customers that need to move out, clean or need, oh my God, it's so dirty. I'm having a party. Like, whatever that is. But, um, to, to be able to establish that relationship with the client, that they continue to come back and then to build a model and that sales, that marketing and sales funnel, that when they have that, that first interaction or that first, whatever that first interaction is that leads them towards your company, that your entire process is leading them towards that recurring to being that recurring client, whatever that looks like.
Um, yeah. To me, this is, this is where the money's at a hundred percent recurring revenue. And it's, it's so much less stressful to run a business on recurring revenue than those one times. Right. And I think too, I think a strategy that needs to be talked about more as well is how do we turn more of those one-time projects into recurring services?
Mm-hmm. Um, what is the strategy there? What are we doing to convert so many more of those one-time cleans that you're talking about, right? I have a party coming up, or the holidays are coming up, or I need my house cleaned. Or maybe it's a one-time like lawn, big lawn and landscape project for like our green clients.
What can we do to get them on our mowing schedule as well? What can we do to get them quarterly to come get the weeds out of the, the landscape that we just did? And I think there is so much room for a conversation about how much more of a discount or offer can we give after that first time project. To where if we get them latched in for two and a half years.
So let's, I mean, cleaning example again, right? Let's say they hire you for a $1,000 deep clean of your home for the holidays, or maybe it's outside cleaning. What can we do to, maybe they're moving to a different house. What sort of deal or offer can we give them to get them signed up for recurring cleaning at their new home that maybe the first few months of that recurring we're gonna be less profitable?
Right? We're gonna like take a hit on margins a little bit because we gave that big discount, but we're gonna make up for it because they average stick around for two and a half years and that average is actually even higher for mowing clients. So maybe you have like a, a big lawn and landscape project.
What type of deal can we get them to get 'em in your mowing schedule as well, even though you might lose money or maybe break even, you know, for that first few months mowing clients are sticking around for like three to four years. Mm-hmm. You're gonna make your money back and like that's where gold money is just sitting there waiting to be discovered.
We're not trying hard enough to get these one-time projects to be turning into re recurring revenue. And for me, like I said, I would give a hell of a discount. Off of that one time project. They're happy, they love it. They're in the best mood with you probably than they're ever going to be. Right? Get them to like transfer into a recurring client by giving 'em a good deal.
'cause you're gonna lock 'em in from years for years to come. Is it always a good deal though? Or is it, can it, can the same thing be achieved drew by the messaging, the content, content marketing in regards to how you're really solving the problem, how you're selling them time? Can you achieve the same thing without just doling out discounts?
A hundred percent. You know, and maybe that those discounts happen when they're less, you know, attracted to the idea. At first, I'm just saying you've ma you've got an opportunity sitting right in front of you with someone that paid. You're in, they're in your world, right? You spent time with them. Like they're during that big, deep cleaning.
Like they see your, um, your service and the solutions that you're providing for them as fresh as it's ever going to be. Do whatever you possibly can to get them on some sort of recurring schedule there. 'cause that's when they stick around for forever. That's when they're really happy clients. 'cause they feel like they won by hiring you.
That's when they're gonna tell their friends. That's when you can ask that question. Um, do you know anybody else that would be, you know, interested in this solution that we provided for you today? Like, it's not hard. It just takes time. And to be intentional about how can we turn every dollar we're getting into a dollar that we're gonna get every month for their, like for years to come.
Right. I like if that mental switch can change everything. Yeah. It's like the lowest hanging fruit. Like to get 'em back. Yeah. You continue to perform for them, you're gonna keep 'em, do everything you can to get 'em to keep coming back. You know, I think we've talked about that in the restaurant world for forever.
Like no restaurant survives if you just customers just go there once. Right. You need those repeat customers. Yeah. I think that's true for every industry. I. Sure. I don't think there is any industry that thrives and survives by just servicing somebody once. Right? Think about like a car dealership, right?
Car dealerships. You buy the car there, then they're giving you those oil change coupons. They want you to think they are the only person in your town that they can provide automotive services to you, right? That's that recurring revenue. You're gonna come every 3000 miles or 6,000 miles or whatever it is, depending on what kind of oil.
That's what they've done forever. I mean, dentists are the best at this, right? Yeah, I understand. It actually probably is good for oral health to get your teeth cleaned every six months, but we are recurring revenue for them, right? Uh, Amazon does a fantastic IT or, uh, job with this, with their subscribe and save.
They will take a hit, they will give you that little bit of discount if you sign up to get that product every month from them. Right. They are. It's such a great example of this, like, oh, if you sign up for subscribe and save and you get it delivered to you once a month, we'll give you that 10% off. Right?
They'll take that hit because they know you're, they're gonna get you, and it's a pain in the butt to cancel that, subscribe and save, and they know it is. Yeah. So they're gonna get you for a long time. It's worth that. Hit the beginning. So, I mean, there are, there are so many industries that do this. Home services is such a beautiful place to like really switch that mindset.
How can we turn everything into recurring revenue? And it's there because like you said, Sheila, if your messaging is on point, um, and you're talking about like, Hey, I know we saved you a bunch of time with this one-off project. Imagine if we could do this for you every month. Mm-hmm. Like how many hours, what would you do with an extra five hours into your month every month?
Right. What would you do if you didn't have to spend this many hours quarterly cleaning up your house or cleaning up your yard or cleaning up your exterior? Yeah. Think about that. Right? And if your message is on point, it's a lot easier. Um, but it's also the best possible time is when they're the happiest with you after that one time project is done.
Yeah. That's awesome. You know, I think about, I think about contractors, builders, um, really tough space, right? And they do, they're kind of, they're kind of like one-off projects. I mean, they build a new home. But how can, how can we in the home services create opportunity for contractors? So that, so that they can generate recurring revenue.
They probably wanna do it through warranties and things like that. Sure. If we can service warranties and be strategic partners with them on that. I mean, and then obviously this just keeps you in. Like you're, you're, you're driving towards the same thing all the time. It's just a different, different segment.
But, um, yeah. I mean, contractors warranties are a great way to do that. But I mean, personally I know I can't be the only one that's like this. I am always in desperate need of like a handyman Yeah. To do like little odd jobs, you know? So, I mean, maybe there's a subscription service there that contractors can provide where we can do, we'll do annual things or biannual things in your company, in your home where you don't have to worry about it.
We'll send out a handyman for that. I mean, everybody's got an opportunity to service their customers more. Like there's gotta be something out there for everybody. But it's just a mindset shift of like, it's not just a one-time project anymore. There is no company in the world that survives and thrives just servicing their clients wants.
How do we turn this into a recurring revenue and make it make sense for the customer as well? Yeah. Such a great conversation. I wanna ask you, um, I think there's a lot of, uh, varying opinions on this or belief on this, but what is a healthy marketing budget? Percentage of revenue for a home service company, let's say in the housekeeping space?
Or does it matter? Does it matter? It does matter. Um, and you, you won't like this answer 'cause it's kind of similar to the ones I've given you before. It's, it's, there's, it's so hard to say. Well, yeah, I mean, it's gotta be a range, like, depending on what you're trying to do in the company, right? If I'm trying to grow and scale, am I looking at spending nine, 10, 11%?
Is it more, um, if I'm, if I'm really happy with the clientele that I have, my, my database and the market segment that I, that I have. And like, I still need to stay in front of people and continue that. What does that look like? Sure. Yeah. I think those are kind of the two ranges, right? Yeah. And all of this is really, once we really can help someone figure out their numbers, um, it really is just kind of re reverse engineer math problem, you know, because I understand some companies they, I don't know, maybe they go to a convention or a conference and they come home and they're just pumped to scale.
But reality, they're not ready yet. Like their backhouse is not ready to scale yet. So like we've actually had clients that wanted to spend 15% of their top line with us, and it kind of screwed things up because they got so many leads and they weren't ready to scale yet. So there's a lot of conversations that need to be had before you say like, let's scale.
To make sure you're actually ready to scale. Um, but I mean, I don't know. There, there have been certain studies that say like a three to 5% is to where stay where you're at, uh, six to 8% is to grow steadily and safely. And then anything like eight to 15% is like real, you know, grow fast scale mode. Okay. But like, really what matters to me is going back to that customer acquisition cost.
'cause you can spend money so quickly in marketing, it'll make your head spin. Yep. I wanna make sure if we're spending a thousand dollars or $10,000, we are treating those dollars. Well, we are tracking those dollars. Well and um, we're being good stewards of that budget, you know. Um, but I wanna make sure, one of the common questions we ask is, how many leads could you take on a month?
Because a lot of people are like, oh, as many as a can. That's not the reality. No, that's capacity. That's a capacity question. A hundred percent. Right? But we wanna know ahead of time what is the capacity, right? Like, how many new customers could you take on Right now? There's a lot of, like I said, I think a lot of people, they get hyped up about this idea of marketing that they, and I'm a visionary, I get it.
I don't think about details. I have an amazing staff that I am slowly getting more aware of how awful I am at details and to hand things off to them. But like, I think we have to be that reminder sometime or like, Hey, we love that you really want to do this. We wanna make sure you're ready to go. And not just like mentally, like physically is your company ready to scale.
Because I mean, once again, if we punch out a bunch of bunch of leads and they're overwhelmed and they're backlogged and like they, now, they have to like worry about hiring that that's, that's a burden, right? And it's a good problem to have, but there's a smart way to do it. You know, and we can reverse engineer this math too.
Yeah. What is your ideal customer acquisition cost? Alright, let's start there. Let's start with this budget until we get to that point where that customer acquisition cost is really happening and happening well at scale. And then let's add budget, right? Let's take the time that it needs to be taken to figure things out.
Your market, your company, your messaging. And then we increase, you know, I don't wanna start off the gate with someone who's just getting into marketing and we're spending 15% of top line. That ain't gonna work well for them. You know, I, I need to know your sales systems. I need to know your sales processes.
What's your lead flow like currently, what's it going to look like? Are you sure you can handle a hundred leads a week? You know, like there's a lot of questions that have to go into that. But I mean, there are studies that say like that three to 5% is to stay steady. Five to 8%, or five to 7% ish is the good steady growth.
And then any from that, like eight to 10, eight to 15 is like your, you're scaling. But I highly. Do not recommend someone who's just getting into marketing do that last option, right? Fake, because you're gonna break things and they're gonna break quickly, and some things are not fixable, right? So let's really make sure you are ready to scale before we say let's scale.
I love it. I cannot believe that we have almost exhausted an entire hour. I gotta tell you that the, my biggest takeaway and what I've learned about you today, and I, I thought I knew you really well, drew, but what I've learned about you is that you really dive into knowing your. Client and you really dive into knowing how to, um, like the, the fact that you, you and five door media goes so ul granularly with companies to help them solve the problems in this like holistic nature is really awesome.
And I just really applaud you for that, drew, because, um, that's a very unique opportunity for a home service company in regards to taking on this, this big step. Yeah, right. This big step. And, um, so I mean, yeah, you've just really opened my eyes today about how like, what a true marketing relationship can look like for a home service company to engage with a marketing firm and, um.
Five, four. It sounds like you guys are crushing it. Yeah, we're doing well. Um, I mean, it's fun. We suffer from everything else that everybody else suffers from. I mean, growth is really hard. Um, but you know, launching EOS it was everything they told me it would be. The only thing you'll regret is not doing it sooner is what everybody told me.
And they are so right. So. Right. Um, I am so lucky and blessed. My wife is actually the integrator for us, and like her and I have never been more on the same page as a married couple and as like coworkers than we are right now. And, um, it's, it's a fun time. It's, it's good. I'm enjoying it. Yeah. And, and you know, operating systems, no matter what it is, and Drew and I, you and I are engaging.
Like we're, we, I think we've both, uh, hired, uh, EOS implementers, like basically at the same time we're on the same journey together, um, which is so eye-opening and supportive, but there's, there's several, right? Um, I know within the huge, they've got the freedom operating system. Yep. And a number, another, a number of other operating systems out there that really just give your company that backbone and that structure to know how to operate.
And it gets the, all the right people in the right seats. And it, it's amazing how that clarity and structure can. Can give you the open door to say, okay, now here's where we can go. Because you've got that, you've got that vision in mind. Um, you know who you are, you've got the right people. It helps you weed all of these things out.
And so, um, anyway, yeah, I'm glad you brought up. That's a whole nother podcast, by the way. A hundred percent. Yeah. All right. Well thank you so much for joining us, drew, and I look forward to seeing you in Nashville again. Actually, it's gonna be in August at the huge convention. That's right. And, uh, drew, do you have a booth or anything?
You just going to, uh, not yet. We thought about it. I'm speaking at the huge this year, so I'm pumped about that. Uh, my, actually I'll be going through our entire five door system that I talked about today, just more in detail. So help you guys can diagnose your ad campaigns that you're doing as well as, uh, cleaning and cocktails, which is happening the day before the convention.
Um, this year in Nashville at the Gaylord, I'll be there as well. So all my cleaning friends, I might be listening. Sign up for that because that's gonna be a really cool event tied with the huge this year. It should be a really good time. It's gonna be, I met with um, Ricky who runs that event yesterday and it's the most unique sounding, cleaning, specific event I've ever heard in my entire life.
So look that up. Cleaning and cocktails. It's the day before the huge come in, a day early. Go to that as well. It should be great. Okay, great. Thanks for sharing that. And so it sounds like we can find you at the huge convention in Nashville in August, and then we can also find you at Five Door Media Online.
You've got a number, all of your social is up to par. I've checked you out and you've got some really cool content out there. So please everybody check out Drew and Five Door Media. And again, drew, thanks so much for this conversation today. Absolutely. Thanks for having me. All right. Awesome. I'll see you soon.
Bye-Bye. See you.
Hello my friend. This is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today's episode. I hope you got some value from it. And listen, anything that was covered, uh, any of the resources, any of the books, any of the tools, anything like that is in the show notes, so it's easy for you to find and check it out.
And also, I wanna let you know the. Mission for the huge convention and for this podcast is to help our blue collar business owners like you and I, to gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. And we do that in four ways. Number one is our free weekly newsletter. It's called a Huge Insider.
I hope you subscribe. It is the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry, period, paid or otherwise, and this one's free. Next is the huge foundation's education platform. That is, we've got over 120 hours of industry specific education and resources for you. And every month we do, uh, a topical webinar and we do question and answer with seven and eight figure business owners.
And it's available to you for a $1 trial for seven days. Next, of course, is the huge convention or the huge convention. If you haven't been, you gotta check it out. It's. Every August this year it's in Nashville, Tennessee. That's August 20th through 22nd and 2025. And it is the largest and number one rated trade show and convention for home service business builders.
We've got the biggest trade show, so you can check out all the coolest tools and meet the vendors and check out the software to run your business. And it's got, we've got, um, education, world class education and educators and speakers that will teach you how to run a better business. And it's the best networking opportunity that you can have within the home service business.
And then lastly, if you wanna pour jet fuel in your business, check out the huge mastermind. Now, it's not for everyone. You gotta be at over $750,000 of revenue and you're building toward a million, 5 million, 10 million in the next five years. And it is a network and a mentorship and a mastermind of your peers, and we help you understand and implement.
Freedom Operating System. We can go into more detail, but you can get all the information on all four of these programs and how we'll help you advance your business quickly just by going to the huge convention.com. And scroll down and click on the Freedom path. Or of course, you can find the links here in the show notes.
So, sorry, I feel like I'm getting a little bit wordy, but I just wanna let you know of the resources that are available to you to help you accelerate and advance your beautiful, small business. So keep on growing, keep on learning, keep advancing. And if you'd like to show, go ahead. I mean, if you would go and take 90 seconds and give us a review on iTunes, then subscribe and share it, man.
It would really mean the world to us. It would help other people. And as we continue our mission to help people just like you and me. So thanks again for listening. We'll see you in the next episode.
 

21: The Amanda Powell Episode

In this episode of the Huge Transformations Podcast, host Sheila Smeltzer sits down with Amanda Powell of Contractor in Charge to tackle one of the biggest challenges in the home service and marketing industries: mid-management training. Amanda shares how to turn your best technicians into confident leaders, a crucial step for growth-minded service businesses.
Show Notes
Guest: Amanda Powell, Mid-Management Trainer at Contractor in Charge📧 Email: apowell@contractorincharge.com🌐 Website: https://contractorincharge.com
Key Topics Discussed:
Why training for mid-managers is critical yet often overlooked
Transitioning from technician roles to true leadership
Why most SOP implementations fail and how to fix it
Amanda’s 3-step training framework:1️⃣ Start with the “why” – show how changes benefit the whole team2️⃣ Practice together – hands-on implementation and demonstration3️⃣ Assess – confirm understanding and set up accountability
The importance of trust, consistency, and clear expectations
Strategies to foster feedback and accountability
Avoiding the “flavor of the week” trap in new initiatives
How Amanda’s Project Implementation Worksheet helps businesses vet and plan new ideas
How to identify if your mid-manager is struggling to let go of technician work or has a “knowledge hoarding” mindset
Referenced Resources:
E-Myth by Michael Gerber (concept of technician → manager → entrepreneur)
Freedom Operating System (EOS alternative) – integrating structured change in businesses
ServiceTitan software – setup and consulting support through Contractor in Charge
The Huge Convention – August 20-22, 2025, Nashville, TN: https://thehugeconvention.com/
Other Resources (always included):
The Huge Insider newsletter signup: https://thehugeconvention.com/insider
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide: www.thehugeinsider.com
The Foundations platform trial offer: https://thehugeconvention.com/1foundationstrial
The Huge Mastermind info page: https://www.thehugemastermind.com/interest
Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/hugefoundations Transcript:
 Hello everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I'm Sid Graff Outta Montana. I'm Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee. And I'm Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina, we are your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in.
The industry folks that have already built seven and eight figure businesses and they want to help you succeed. Yep. No fake gurus on this show, just real life owners that have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience.
0% theory. We are going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece. Thanks for joining us on the Wild Journey of Entrepreneurship.
Let's dive in.
Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I'm your host, Sheila Smeltzer. I am so, so, so excited to be able to present to you today, Amanda Powell with contractor in charge. Amanda Powell is gonna talk to us about mid-management training, how training is such a difficult topic and one that all of us in the home services business, um, struggle with.
But we're talking about training at a mid-management level. So how do we take people within our organization. Train them to be managers. Um, because the biggest hurdle is that whenever we're technicians, we're very task oriented, but we need to train them how to be leadership and strategy oriented. So this is where Amanda comes in and this is where her expertise is, and she's gonna share this with you today.
So we're also gonna talk about SOPs and how to implement and hold people accountable to them. Amanda's gonna provide you framework that has three components that must happen to successfully implement standard operating procedures within your company. We also take a look at why 70% of the changes within your organization fail and how to unlock people's potential.
I know that this podcast is gonna. Get your wheels turning and think differently about training in general, but also it's gonna provide a ton of insight on how to integrate positive change in your company's organizational structure. Let's dive in.
Hey everybody. This is Sheila Smeltzer with the Huge Transformations Podcast. I am so glad to be back with you today, and I have a very. Awesome guest. Uh, her name is Amanda Powell. Hi, Amanda. Hello. Thank you for having me. Yes. Oh, I'm so grateful for this interview that we're getting ready to have because.
We are gonna talk training. Yes. And we are talking to an expert trainer right here. And as a matter of fact, Amanda is a, what you call, consider a mid-manager. How do you say that? She's a specialist. And mid-management training? Yes. For, uh, contractor in charge and contractor in charge is gonna be at the huge convention.
Mm-hmm. And they have a number of services they offer for home service businesses. And so we're gonna kind of. Hone in on one very, very important, um, uh, need that they fill for contractors, and that is training. And Amanda, I want you to just introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself and your history and how you know so much about training.
And I really wanna dive in to talk about. How do we train? Yeah. Like what works? Absolutely. So tell us, tell us about yourself. Yeah, so I've been in the home service industry for, oh, going on eight, eight years now. Uh, my background is in education, funny enough, which translated well to training. That's what I got my degree in.
I taught for a little bit and then found myself to the home service industry and just. Fell in love with it and have been here since. Uh, I'm currently getting my master's degree in organization Development and Change. So all about how to make a company run, how to implement change. Uh, and so really my, my passion for training comes from that teaching background and knowing that.
The way you give information to someone, the way you help them succeed in it makes a huge impact on their career, uh, their growth and what they're able to accomplish. Mm-hmm. And training is, so much. Training is not about the trainer. Trainer training is about the people in the room and facilitating a discussion so that they can grow and really internalize what they're learning.
And it's, it's not about you as the trainer, it's not about being on the stage or in front of a group and telling your own stories. If you're training Right, you're talking 50% of the time and you're letting the group Yeah. It's like an engagement. Yes, it's an engagement. Yes. Exactly. Exactly. So yeah. And then I've been with contract.
Great. So, um, of course. Oh, sorry. I think I might have had delay on my end. Okay. I, yeah, no, I think we did. So I just wanna back up real fast. So, um, so the, you have eight years in the home service industry. Yes. Um, but prior to that, you're an educator. Yes. And you focus highly on organization development. And, um, change.
Change. Yes. Yes, yes. And so now you've been with contractor in charge for how long? Uh, for, uh, two years now. They've been two years. Fantastic. Yes. Okay. Yes. Great. And, um, I wanna, so. Oh, geez, sorry. The joys of technology, right. I got, I got booted outta my screen. I'm so sorry about that. That's fine. You're just fine.
Um, so, so, um, I wanna, let's do a quick so that everybody understands about contractor in charge. Can you just. Plug them briefly. Yes. And then I really wanna dive back into what you do. Yes. Um, and how you can help our, our listeners. So tell us about Contractor in charge. So, contractor in Charge is an amazing organization.
Lynn Wise is the owner. Um. It's great because it's just people wanting to do right by the customers and providing services to help contractors grow. So we have a call center. Uh, we also have an accounting team that does accounting and bookkeeping for companies. Uh, we do service site and consulting and then, uh, help with lead management.
And now leadership. Our, our goal is to be your one-stop shop for what you need to grow and improve your business. Great. So these are kind of like these fractional roles mm-hmm. That when companies are in that developmental stage and they're not to the size where they can actually go out and hire A CFO or a COO or, or whatnot, then they can, they can partner with contractor in charge and they provide these on a fractional level.
Yes. Yes, exactly. Um, we have some people where they go, look, we need a, we need a CSR, uh, or we need something for our rollover. We don't have people at nighttime. And so we come in on the, on the CSR level and we'll help, uh, accounting will be your accountant and help you, um, leads management. ServiceTitan setting up ServiceTitan is it can be a journey, and so we can, we can help with that.
Uh, and so yeah, we're, we're just that resource for the training needs that you need and the things you need in your company to grow. Okay. So, um, so let's talk about now what you do for, with contractor in charge or just. What you do in regards to training. Yes. Um, when I met you first, it was at a Sales Boost conference and you were a speaker.
Yes. And I just remembered, I mean, first of all, I was entranced with what you were talking about in regards to training. 'cause it was very clear to me that you knew what you were talking about and that, um, you didn't just have some kind of magic potion about what works. Like you, you really understood the, um, the, the psychology behind training, the accountability behind training, the setting, setting up of procedures and, and things like that so that it's structured.
And, um, so I mean, I just went to you after, after you got done speaking, I'm like, Hey, can I hire you? Sounds great. Yeah. And so, um, just for our listeners, and so, you know, um, Amanda has worked with, uh, my company a plus Pro Services. For what, going over a year now? Yeah, over a year now. Year, yeah. Um, and, and so, and, and to help develop our training program.
And it's been a great success. And so let's talk about that. Um, if, and, and let's talk about mid-management to start. So what does that mean if you're a mid-management trainer, what does that mean? Yeah, so I will help mid managers and in our industry that usually means your gm, your office manager, your field supervisor, things of that nature.
Uh, and my experience and what we see is someone's, usually, those positions are filled by someone that we know that was really good at their job. A really good CSR, really good technician. Uh. They're meeting their KPIs, they're doing fantastic. And we go, great, let's put them in a leadership type role and move them up.
Mm-hmm. And what happens is a leadership role has different components to it than when you are a technician or a CSR or some other entry level position at at the company. You go from doing very operational tasks, right? Taking phone calls, being in the field, fixing things to more of leadership. And people development and strategy development for a company.
Hmm. And the higher you move up in management, the more you shift from operational tasks to more people and leadership. And then when you get to the level of an owner, you're more heavy on the strategy side of the company. Sure. What happens is we miss this training to take place for these managers to help develop their leadership skills or their management skills and just to.
Separate those two. Management is about the things in your business. So mm-hmm. People get led, things get managed. Uh, no one wants to be managed as a person. Right? And with the things, it's going okay, how to, how do we structure the things in our company so that we can use it to our advantage? What data do we need to collect?
How do we do use the data to perform? To inform our decisions. And the leadership side is how do I develop my people? How do I give them a career path? How do I help them improve at what they do? How do I invest in them? Mm-hmm. Do I give feedback? All the human components. So there's two skill sets that take place and sometimes people know a little bit of both, and they're right in the middle.
Some people are really strong with the management side and don't have the leadership side. Or vice versa. Mm-hmm. And so my role is to come in and go, okay, where are we at right now? And how can I help you develop those skills so that ultimately you, your company and the team can be successful? Amanda, do you, do you lean on any type of personality assessments?
Prior to working with somebody who we are, um, bringing up into a mid-management role. I mean, does that come into play at all or are you kind of like no matter who you are, I can do, I can help. Yeah. I think it's no matter who you are, I can help. Now, an important thing is if you're looking for a specific goal, then you want to do a pre-assessment of.
The company to make sure I would wanna do a pre-assessment of the company to go is what you're looking to change, really what is needed. Um, so for example, sometimes an owner over will come to me and say, we need this done. And that's really a symptom of a bigger problem, right? They might say, my, I need to have my manager hold people accountable.
But we may look into it, do some, you know, interviews beforehand, little focus groups. I get a picture of what's going on, and that's one example. Someone said, Hey, we need, we need them to hold people more accountable. But the real problem was we need to set clear expectations and have a structure up front, and then we can talk about how to hold people accountable.
But if they didn't have those SOPs and structures in place first. You can't hold someone accountable if you don't have a framework first. So the real need was let's talk about how to build your structure first. Sure. And then we'll, we'll go from there. So in that way, yes, I'll do those assessments.
Personality, I think, I think anyone can do it. And it just depends what you're looking for as a company, what will thrive better, and so that's really on an individual basis. Okay. All right. That's great. Let's talk about the structure and SOPs. Um, I mean, one of the. Biggest, the most value that we've gained from working with you is really simple, SOP framework of having beginning of day procedures and end of day procedures, um, you know, truck checklists, like things like this.
Just very basic, basic things. It's one thing to develop these SOPs, and as business owners we're always trying to build up our playbook. We are trying to, you know. Put our, make our business in writing. So it's like, here's how everybody is trained by, and this is how we follow procedure so that we can start to scale.
Right? Yes. But this is where your gift comes in. 'cause we can all sit down and write SOPs. Yes. So, oh great. I need an SOP. We can sit down and write an SOP. Um, but. Following, adhering and holding accountable to the SOP is a whole nother thing. Yes. So how do you teach mid-management to do that? What does it look like?
Yes. So number one, make sure you have the SOPs. We talked about that. We can all do that. And then it goes into implementing it and how you present it. Okay. So I can't hold anyone accountable if no one knows what exists out there. Right. And I hate to break it to everyone, but standing in front of the room and reading an SOP to the group and then saying, everyone got it.
Great. You're gonna fail. It's not gonna happen afterwards, uh, because there's no buy-in. So when you go and train on an SOP, I always say you gotta start with the why. Why is this being created? Why does the company need it? How does it personally affect the, the. The audience you're presenting it to. So let's just use having a clean truck as an example.
We come up with a whole SOP for how we're gonna have clean trucks, what it should look like. If I go to the team and I go, okay, everyone, here's how you clean your truck and what we expect and we're good, it's not gonna resonate. But if I go in front of that team and I say. I want you to look at two pictures of a truck.
I have one that's really clean and one with the McDonald's wrappers or fast food wrappers in the dashboard. And I say, which these, which of these, uh, trucks with the technician would you trust more? And they're gonna tell me, and then I'm gonna say, well, why, why do you say that? Mm-hmm. And the truth of the matter is perception's reality.
Got it. For, for customers. So there's, there's a whole way you can present it that gets buy-in that makes them think and take ownership. And then you can talk about. How long it takes to look for tools, and if they're spending that much time, how much money did we lose in a day? How could we have gotten one more job?
And how would've that have affected your commission? They need to see the impact. So that's kind of step one, is let them understand and discover the why behind your process, and then you're gonna try and so your second step is to. Present it to them. Um, now you can do this a couple ways, but I'm a big fan of goes back to the education days show and tell and saying, okay, here's what you do.
We're gonna do it together. Here's how you have the clean truck. Let's go out to the trucks and actually clean them together. And follow this process. Let's actually practice a phone call in how we want that phone call to sound and go. And you're going to do it because it's the whole idea. You can read how to ride a bike, but until you're actually riding a bike, you don't, it's not internalized.
You don't really know it. You just know about it. So they need to go through the process of whatever you're teaching them, get hands-on experience with them. Mm-hmm. And then your third and final step is you need an assessment. And this is huge. Yes. This is the most commonly misstep. Mm-hmm. If you find yourself saying, well, I showed them how to do it, or I told them what to do, it's not enough.
If you didn't say, well, did they actually learn it? So you need to have an assessment of some time type. It can be you're observing them, do the task, and you have a rubric where you're scoring them and making sure they hit all the components you wanted. It could be a little, I. A Kahoot game at the end, or a quiz game at the end where you're checking for key factual information.
Uh, it could be having them teach it to the group and you make sure they can teach it to someone else correctly. There's endless possibilities, but if you aren't marking off they know this, then you have no leg to stand on when they say, well, no one ever told me. If you've ever heard that, which we've never heard.
No one ever told me. Yeah. But if you say, Nope, here's your assessment. You completed it on this day. You scored this amount, you showed us you do it. The excuse is gone now. Right. And then you can, you can go from there, uh, you can go from there. That, those are kind of the key steps go about the why behind it.
Interactive. Training where they're, they're doing the task, they're asking questions about it, they're involved in it, and then as an assessment to check what they were able to retain. Great. So that is the, basically the three step framework to successful training. Yes. Look at you. I mean, it's so awesome.
One thing I love about working with you is you're very focused on feedback. Yes. And in regards to training, um, with technicians especially, um, or even mid-management, is. You know, how was your training, you know, how did you feel about this training process that you went through? It could be anything, but feedback is a gift and it should always be received as a gift, even if there's something that's painful that's being told to you.
But, um, but it's, it's been really wonderful at a plus pro to be able to approach my technicians in the morning huddle. We hired a. Slew of new techs this season and to approach them and say, Hey, how was your training? Oh my God, my training was amazing. Like, I feel so supported, I feel so good about what I'm doing.
Um, there's always things to learn and we try to incorporate training on a daily basis into our morning huddles. There's always something to train. Um, and but the follow up and the feedback is, like you say, that is, that is the, that is the missing, often missing piece to the puzzle. Yes. I have an idea. Um, actually.
And I, I told Jason this, um, sorry, Jason's my ops manager and um, production manager, and I said, Hey, Jason. Um, I want everybody to have their window cleaning tool belts on, on Monday morning's meeting, uh, huddle. And I want everybody to hit the window wall behind me. And I wanna see, we're gonna do a speed round of cleaning and interior window, and I wanna see how.
They're all doing it. Are they doing it the same? Are they not doing it the same? But even so that's a fun way to. Hold accountable, see the feedback, to see how is this training actually going because I, I'm not out in the field, you know, watching how they're cleaning all these windows. So I think there are fun ways to do that.
Yeah. And, um, I'm looking forward to this exercise, by the way. Really good. And what's great about that. Exercise that you're talking about too, is we are not always, we don't have to be the smartest person in the room. So the great thing about the feedback, and especially some of those technicians that have been in the field, but they may do something slightly different that saves them time or is really effective and you're going.
Wait, that's really good. We want to make that standardized across the board, so it is always good to kind of check back in and see what little adjustments they may have made over time to either go, no, you have to reset. Remember, this is how we do it. Or, oh, that's really great. Let's make that a thing across the board for our team.
And so I love, yes, yes. I love that. Like, oh, you just taught me a trick I didn't know in 25 years. Why didn't I think of that? It happens all the time, by the way. I mean, it does. Yeah, we know what we know and until we know something different, then that's what we know. Yes, yes, exactly. Um, so like, management is, and, and we're talking about taking, because we go back to the E-Myth, right?
Yes. Where you have a technician, a manager, and an entrepreneur. Mm-hmm. And there's people like myself, I started as a technician. And I was managing this company and, but now I'm an entrepreneur, more of the visionary and, and, and that creator. Right. So, you know, what we're talking about right now is where you specialize, is taking that technician and bringing them up to a management level.
Yeah. And I gotta say, it's so hard, and you're right, because a lot of people feel like, yes, we're we just, there's all these things. To manage. Yes. Um, but the leadership component is, that is very special. Mm-hmm. And, um, because until people respect you. Yes, as a manager, if they don't have respect for you, if that follow through and that follow up and the accountability piece and the feedback isn't present, then I feel like people lose respect for the manager.
Am I, am I on the right page? Can you talk about hundred percent? Right. So there's a big thing with that. Um, especially if you're bringing someone that was with their peers in that position. Now they're moving up. There's a. Big jump that has to happen of we are, we're friends outside of work. I can be your friend outside of work, but I have to be the leader and manager first and not, not lead or manage based off of likability, but what is best for the company.
Mm-hmm. And have the company's interests at heart. So when you make that, that jump, you have to have structure in place and you have to be consistent. Uh, there's a saying out there that trust happens with consistency over time. Hmm. I'm not consistent and I'm not consistent. Over a period of time, you will lose trust in me.
And then what happens is managers will come to me and they'll be like, well, I tried it and it didn't work. I'm like, well, how long did you try it for? Two days. Well, your team has now gotten used to, we used to call it like. The flavor, the flavor of the week. Like if we just write this out, it will disappear.
And so just, we like to think we grow up as adults, but we still have some childlike tendencies. We will push the boundaries and go, do you really mean this? Like, is this really gonna happen? Mm-hmm. And so we wait to see is this around to stay or is this just something we're trying out and we don't really have to do?
And so if you aren't consistent in it and giving that feedback, then. Then they might not pick up the new implementations you go to implement right away because they're waiting because history has taught them, Hey, they don't really check up on this all the time. This we eventually slack off on on this.
So you have to be consistent with, it gives them regular feedback and it also helps consistency also, uh, counteracts favoritism. Because if you go and check my trek this week, we'll just. Stick with that example, but you aren't checking everyone's regularly or you aren't always randomly choosing people.
I'm gonna feel singled out, or if you write me up for something, but I saw someone else get away with it for a month. I don't feel like it's fair. So whatever. Going back to that SOP, whatever you implement, you also need a, how am I gonna track this? How am I gonna hold people responsible for it? Because without that, to your point, Sheila, you're gonna lose respect from your team over time because they go, you aren't consistent with what you're implementing.
Right. And it factors in. Yeah. Okay. So there's, there's a couple things I wanna talk about there. You know, first of all, um, this whole thing about trust and change, and, you know, we hear this all the time, but serial entrepreneur is the chasing the shiny things all the time. And we like, oh, we have this new idea and ditch what we were doing before.
We're gonna go in this direction now, and I can tell you my team. I mean, it, it, it, it literally became a problem. Yeah. But like Sheila, I mean, nothing's taking hold because we're not staying focused. Mm-hmm. And so this was a big change that we are going through in the company and I. Um, and so now, yes, like as a leader, I'm trying to stay very focused on the direction we're going and trying to get everybody heading towards the same goal.
And so now getting management behind, you know, implementing these things that we're staying focused on. Um, because implementing all the, the structure, right? Because how can we grow on scale without the structure? And one tool that you gave us that. Changed. It really changed the way that we, that this happened at, at a plus Pro, and that was your project implementation worksheet because you trained us like, okay, we've got this idea.
Great, let's run it through the implementation worksheet. Let's vet it all the way through because. It, it, it takes you through the steps of let's dissect this idea and then let's collectively as a team say, is this worth the time and the effort? Yay or nay? Yes. Great. Now we've got all the steps and let's set this as a goal, and then let's, let's attack the goal.
And that is something that was absolutely lacking before. It's kind of like beginning with the end in mind. Yes. You taught us how to just. Think differently about all these grandiose ideas and say, all right, let's put it into a pr. Like let's start with a procedure. Let's say, let's run it through the, the implementation worksheet.
Yes. And we had a lot of fun as a team doing that. Um, Jason, mid-manager, like as, as you have trained him, I mean, he loved running it through and he was holding me accountable to that all the time. Yes. So, you know, by design it, it's, it's beautiful. It's a huge deal because, okay, I'm a giant nerd. I love my stats, but one of them is 70% of changes in companies fail.
So that means you go to make a change at your company and 70% of the time is the average that it will fail. And the reason that happens. Generally speaking, and most of the time is poor planning. Yeah, because let's be honest with ourselves, planning is not the exciting part of change. You want to be like, I have this great idea.
Here's the outcome I want, let's jump in and do it right, like make it happen. That's great. We don't wanna lose the enthusiasm, but we also have to go, okay, well what's our timeline? Who needs to be involved in this? Who is going to lead this change? Um, what are the potential roadblocks we might not be seeing or thinking about that we're gonna get weak in?
If we had just paused and thought we would've been able to go, oh yeah, that's gonna be a hiccup we're gonna have to work through. Mm-hmm. How are we going to measure this? Another thing that can happen is we as owners can have something brought to our attention and we think it's happening everywhere, right?
Like we get that upset customer call, we get, um, a bad review and we go, we got, we kind, it's our baby, it's our company. And we go, okay, we got. You know, code red, everyone come together. We got, we gotta make a big change. And that is why we talked about earlier. Data is so important because the first thing you should do is go, okay, let me take the emotion out of this where I'm not acting.
Off of emotion. Mm-hmm. Lemme go see how many bad reviews do we really have. Does this, does this justify a change in our process? Right. Or is it an exception that yes, we have to address and we have to take seriously? Was it more of a one-on-one conversation with the individual then? Whole, everyone come together.
We're, we're gonna redo everything or we have to regroup. You wanna be realistic in what's really going on in my company was the data. Tell me now that I have that, let's make a plan. How are we gonna implement it? What are the roles? What are our timelines? What are our responsibilities? Now go run with it.
Mm-hmm. And sometimes that can be done in an hour meeting. 'cause the change is simple enough. Sometimes it's, we're gonna need a couple days to think through this and plan it out. So just sequence. Yeah, no, that's, that's awesome. And you know what I'm thinking about too, and it never even dawned on me and um, you know, a lot of, a lot of companies are learning about EOS Yes.
Or Freedom Operating systems. Mm-hmm. And, you know, these are when as we continue to grow our companies, we need to have structure just like what we're talking about right now. Yeah. And something like. Going back to the project implement implementation worksheet and whatnot. I mean, that is teaching. So if you have your visionary and your integrator and like you've, you're bringing this person up into this integrator role, those worksheets basically train them how to be an integrator, right?
Three. Three. Here we go. How do we take this vision that so and so had and how do we like make this happen? What? You know, how am I gonna, how am I gonna do this? And it, it literally is the framework and the guideline to get them to start thinking that way. Yes. Yeah. And, and it clarifies those expectations because an integrator change agent, you, there's all all different terms out there for the same type of role, but they have to know.
Do I have freedom to run with this and you just expect this outcome and however I get to the outcome is good, or do I need more? Mm-hmm. Be more detailed. Is there a certain thing specifically you're looking for? So the example I give with this is if everyone listening to this, and I took a P piece of paper and I said, draw a house, everyone's house is gonna look a little bit different, right?
Like if we all held up our papers, they'll all be a little bit different. And if I am the person going, whose expectation is to build a house, and I'm going, well, why didn't you put a roof on that? I thought it was common sense. Every house would have a roof. Or why didn't, why didn't you draw four windows?
You, we know we need four windows. If you don't think what the end objective is, it's gonna change what? What instructions you give. Do I need an exact replica of my house and I'm giving detailed instructions and measurements so it turns out exactly how I'm visioning? Am I going? As long as it has a roof and a door, go with it.
Got it. And if we got find that it's gonna be different for everyone and then there's gonna be frustration. 'cause someone's going, I thought you just wanted a roof in a door and you're going, no, I wanted these measurements. The it to look exactly like this, it, it changes. So, yeah. And, and that's where as the leader mm-hmm.
Um, whether you are management, integrator, visionary, owner, whatever it is. Yes. But when you're in that leadership role, being as clear about the expectation is the kindest that you can be. Yes. Right? Yes. And that is, um, to, to say, okay, everybody, I want you to go and. Do you, it's time for your morning truck, truck, truck, truck checklist.
I was having a hard time with that. Um, so I, everybody knows the procedure. Everybody's gonna come back here and I wanna be able to see, um, 10 inspections on my desk with like, like just being very specific about how much time and what needs to be there or. I mean, hopefully they've already been trained on that, but I think that, yeah.
'cause otherwise people will go out and be like, eh, whatever. You know? Yeah. I thought you meant this. Exactly. And so I thought, I'm thinking I did a great job. And you're going, no. It's like when I tell my daughter to clean her room, her version of clean and my version of clean are two very different things and stuffed animals shoved under the bed doesn't.
Quite meet my standards, right? But I have to, I have to really go through, this is what I mean when I say clean your room and, and how it will look. That, that plays into it. So, Amanda, what is your why? I mean, you obviously love this, you're passionate about it and you fell into the home services space, but what is it that, what is it that you love about training?
You're, you're essentially a trainer. Yes. Of trainers. Yes. Yes. I love unlocking people's potential. Because what it is, is it is there, someone just needs to give them the tools to be successful with it. Mm-hmm. So being able to unlock it and give them the tools to be successful and then have an impact not only on their careers, but whoever their is on their team.
It, it has a trickle effect. It affects everyone. Mm-hmm. Uh, if I can help them be better managers, leaders, then their team gets better training their team gets. Better development, and then they're progressing in their careers. And so I get a ton of fulfillment from that. Uh, and so that's, that's why I'm passionate about what I do.
I love it. I love it. Um, and what can, I mean, I'm gonna kind of ask this question, but Yeah. What is the hardest kind of protege you've ever had? Like, what is the hardest, um. Obviously not calling names, but a situation where like the hardest to transition somebody to get that train, uh, to that the management mindset.
What, what, what is like the worst scenario? So there's two traits I can think of that people often have, have to overcome. Okay? One is letting go of the task because in their mind, I got this position because I was good at these things. And if I give those things up to other people. What's my role, or who am I or what's my value?
Uhhuh, and that's always a fear. And so they can really hold onto these tasks where I'm going. You need to make time to lead your team or coach your team, and they won't give up those tasks because no one can do it as good as I do it. And you have to change that mindset. And if no one can do it as good as you guess what that's on you for not developing your team.
Right. That's what it comes back to. So that's, that's one thing that is kind of a, a change of mindset that has to happen. Sure. Uh, the other one that can come into play is just defensiveness of I know it all. And if I don't, they use, they use knowledge to. Be the expert. Mm-hmm. And so there's some holding onto the knowledge of, I don't wanna give this away, or I wanna be the only one.
'cause then you depend on me and they isolate themselves. Got it. Gosh. Share it like, okay, your goals to, to build your team. So those, those two items can cause the most hiccups. Okay. So is that kind of a hint? Like if I'm an owner and I am, have somebody that maybe I would want you to train. Um, if I identify these, um, um, these, you know, uh, traits or whatnot, yeah, this person, then I maybe kind of like, okay, wait, is this the right person kind of thing, right?
I put a timeline on, right? Like be, I think anyone can overcome it, but if you haven't been clear with them, like, I need you to let this go, or Here's what I want your role to be, they don't know what they're working towards, right? Then it can be hard. So I always put, I say, put an expiration date on it. Go, okay, we're gonna try it for this long.
We're gonna see what happens. This is the benchmarks we want to see, then you're good. But if you're gonna keep pouring time and someone doesn't want it, it's not the right position. And you and you. You've had those clear conversations of the, with them, of this is what I expect, this is where I want to go, then yeah, it is time to look at, do I have the right person in the right seat on, on the bus?
Sure. Sure. Awesome. Well, um, so are you gonna be at the huge convention? I am. Come find us. Contractor in charge will be there. Okay. Are you speaking. I am not speaking this time. Okay. Lynn. Lynn will be okay. We'll be talking about leads there, but uh, as was mentioned, we have different components of, uh, of our business.
So if we can help you come find us, uh, great. And I'd love to see you all in person. Great. And are you gonna have a booth at the trade show? We are. Okay, good. Good, good, good. All right. Well that's amazing. And I just, um, I, I love. Being able to share this level of experience and knowledge and just that you have in regards to this very painful topic.
I can't tell you how many times over the years I've been at different conventions or with other business, it doesn't matter what kind of business it is. No, um, training is such a major pain point and such a very difficult thing to figure out and implement into a company. Um, and you know, the, the biggest takeaways that I get from you, Amanda, are I.
That setting the expectation, being very clear about the expectation and um, and, and that holding people accountable, having a way to be able to that follow up and that feedback. Um, those are really like the two components that again, we like, oh, come into my company, we're gonna show you how to do this thing.
Yes. Okay, great. Then throw you out to the wolves and you get devoured, right? Yes. So set them up for success. Yeah, sure. Awesome, awesome. Well, is there anything else that you'd like to share with our guests today? No, I have been so grateful to to be here. Thank you for having me. If anyone has any questions about.
How do I train, how do I make my training more effective? Or you need training for your managers to help them fulfill that role and reach their potential. Please reach out. Okay. Please come find us. But yeah, I'm great to be here. Yeah, make sure that, so of course I know how to get ahold of you, but make sure that you have, will you share with me, um, what your, you know, just like your.
However you want people to contact you if they wanna reach out to you before the huge convention in August. Yes. Otherwise, of course they can go see you at the trade show booth, um, for contractor in charge. But if you'll share that with me, I'll put it in the show notes. Perfect. Then that way people can reach out to you, Amanda.
Yes, yes. I will give you my email so, uh, I can get it here real quick too. So my email is a Powell, P-O-W-E-L-L, at contractor in charge.com. Perfect. There you go, everybody. Well, thank you again, Amanda. This has been such a fruitful conversation, so well needed, especially for the home service space. And there's no doubt I'm talking to one of the best in regards to, um, you, you bring such a personal relationship to your, to your training, the way that you work with people.
And I know that firsthand and I really feel like you're part of our team. Here at a plus Pro. And, um, I mean, you are, you, you're part of my leadership team. That's the way I look at it. And, um, so anyway, I'd love to see your value grow with other companies and, um, and just encourage people to, to dive in it.
One final question. Yeah. When working with Amanda Powell or anybody that could come in and, and teach and, and really teacher train mid-management, is there a point where you say like, okay, we're good, or is this like a continual, like a continuous education? Yeah. Um, and how long does it typically take? I think that's an important question.
Yeah. So the, the answer is, it depends on what your goals and objectives are, right? If you go, I wanna get this person here, then we're gonna build a timeline with it and say, great, here's, here's our expiration date of when we will. We'll meet that or aim to meet that. Then there might be just check-ins for maintaining, right?
Everyone needs, needs a coach. You're gonna have someone constantly. So there are people I work with where they go, this is what we want, let's cover this topic, and then we're gonna run with it from there. And that's all we do. And then there's some that go, you know, we want the ongoing, just so we can maintain and talk about the different scenarios that pop up so we have a sounding board.
Sure. Um, so the answer to that is, I know it's not a final. But it, it does depend on, on what you want. It all depends. Yeah. But I do have a set training program that's like, we will give you the tools and the information, and if you want support with it afterwards, we'll support afterwards. So, hello my friend.
This is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today's episode. I hope you got some value from it. And listen, anything that was covered, uh, any of the resources, any of the books, any of the tools, anything like that is in the show notes, so it's easy for you to find and check it out.
And also, I wanna let you know the. Mission for the huge convention and for this podcast is to help our blue collar business owners like you and I, to gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. And we do that in four ways. Number one is our free weekly newsletter. It's called a Huge Insider.
I hope you subscribe. It is the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry. Period, paid or otherwise, and this one's free. Next is the huge foundation's education platform. That is, we've got over 120 hours of industry specific education and resources for you. And every month we do, uh, a topical webinar and we do question and answer with seven and eight figure business owners.
And it's available to you for a $1 trial for seven days. Next, of course, is the huge convention or the huge convention. If you haven't been, you gotta check it out. It's every August this year it's in Nashville, Tennessee. That's August 20th through 22nd and 2025, and it is the largest and number one rated.
Trade show and convention for home service business builders. We've got the biggest trade show, so you can check out all the coolest tools and meet the vendors and check out the software to run your business. And it's got, we've got, um, education, world class education and educators and speakers that will teach you how to run a better business.
And it's the best networking opportunity that you can have within the home service business. And then lastly, if you wanna pour jet fuel in your business. Check out the huge Mastermind now, it's not for everyone. You gotta be at over $750,000 of revenue and you're building toward a million, 5 million, 10 million in the next five years.
And it is a network, and a mentorship and a mastermind of your peers, and we help you understand and implement the Freedom operating system. We can go into more detail, but you can get all the information on all four of these programs and how we'll help you advance your business quickly just by going to the huge convention.com.
And scroll down, click on the freedom path. Or of course you can find the links here in the show notes. So, sorry, I feel like I'm getting a little bit wordy, but I just wanna let you know of the resources that are available to you to help you accelerate and advance your beautiful, small business. So keep on growing, keep on learning, keep advancing.
And if you'd like to show. Go ahead. I mean, if you would go and take 90 seconds and give us a review on iTunes, then subscribe and share it, man. It would really mean the world to us. It would help other people, and as we continue our mission to help people just like you and me. So thanks again for listening.
 

20: The Jon Karmazyn Episode

In this episode of the Huge Transformations Podcast, hosts Sid Graef, Gabe Torres, and Sheila Smeltzer introduce the show’s purpose: bringing on seven- and eight-figure business owners to share genuine insights on running a home service business. Gabe interviews John Karras (from the Allentown, Pennsylvania area) to explore his journey from a one-person hustle to operating a multi-crew exterior cleaning company with 15–20 employees. John highlights pivotal moments in his business growth, the importance of peer support, and how taking quick action—and sometimes big leaps—can help you push through challenging stages. Finally, Sid wraps up with resources for listeners who want to grow and find mentorship opportunities through The Huge Convention, The Foundations platform, and The Huge Mastermind.
Show Notes
Host & Guest:
Hosts:
Sid Graef (Montana)
Gabe Torres (Nashville, TN)
Sheila Smeltzer (North Carolina)
Guest:
John Karras, owner of a large exterior cleaning business in Pennsylvania
Key Topics:
Origin Story: John stumbled into pressure washing by fixing a used pressure washer; grew from a solo side-hustle to a multiple-crew operation with an office manager, operations manager, and a sales team.
Scaling Challenges: Overcoming “bottleneck” phases by hiring strategically, seeking outside perspectives, and taking big, decisive action.
Entrepreneurial Mindset: John stresses the importance of community—connecting with other business owners for support, ideas, and expertise.
Advice: “Dream bigger than you think you can,” then find people who have done it already and learn from them.
Mentioned Resources:
The Huge Convention
The Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
The Huge Insider newsletter signup
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
Facebook group
Transcript
Sid Graef:Hello everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I’m Sid Graef out of Montana.
Gabe Torres:I’m Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee.
Sheila Smeltzer:And I’m Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina. We are your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in the industry—folks that have already built seven- and eight-figure businesses, and they want to help you succeed.
Gabe Torres:Yep—no fake gurus on this show, just real-life owners who’ve been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably.
Sheila Smeltzer:We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience and 0% theory.
Sid Graef:We are going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece.
Gabe Torres:Thanks for joining us on the wild journey of entrepreneurship. Let’s dive in.
Gabe Torres:Hey guys, this is Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee, with the Huge Transformations podcast, and you guys are in for a treat today with my buddy John Karras, who’s joining us from somewhere in Pennsylvania.
John Karras:You got it.
Gabe Torres:Where is this “somewhere”?
John Karras:Allentown area.
Gabe Torres:Okay, I still don’t know where that’s at, but—
John Karras:It’s an hour north of Philadelphia.
Gabe Torres:Okay, I’ve been there. I’ve been to Cherry Hill, Philadelphia area. Cool, so yeah, excited for you to join us. Thank you, John, for taking some time. I know you have a lot going on. You have a big company, been in business for a while, but for the folks who don’t know who you are—which I’m sure people will get more familiar, as it seems like you’re doing some more speaking stuff—for those who haven’t met John, what’s the quick backstory on how you got started in the service industry?
John Karras:So, my background originally is in the construction space. I graduated college and was working for a general contracting company for about 10 years, but I’d always had side hustles and an entrepreneurial spirit. Back in 2012, I got tired of construction and was really looking for something else. One night in New Jersey, we were on a little family vacation, and inspiration struck—pun and no pun intended, because there was a big thunderstorm that night. We had little kids, they were up all night, and I was just brainstorming what I could do. I started going down the path of exterior cleaning, pressure washing, carpet cleaning—somewhere in that realm. Before we knew it, two months later we established a business plan, contacted a local bank, got a small SBA loan for some equipment, fired up a website, and business was on.
Gabe Torres:Side note real quick—what was one of the side hustles you did in college?
John Karras:Yeah, so I was into cars, Volkswagens in particular. I had a VW GTI and I was into lighting—this was before all the LED stuff was good, so it was xenon headlights and whatnot. I’d take the headlights, disassemble them, upgrade them, and then sell them on eBay for like five or six hundred bucks. I was doing this in college, putting the old ones in our oven in our dorm room to bake them so I could take them apart. In college, that was great money, so that was a fun side hustle.
Gabe Torres:That’s awesome. So, on that dark, stormy night in New Jersey, how did you land on exterior cleaning?
John Karras:There was a guy at my construction company who had an old pressure washer in his shed. He brought it in and said, “If you can fix it, you can keep it.” I got it running via YouTube, pressure-washed my house (not knowing what I was doing), started my deck, and halfway through, the thing exploded—smoke everywhere. So I was left with a half-finished deck. I went on Craigslist looking for a cheap used machine to finish my project, but I saw a listing that said “Commercial pressure washing business—we’ll train you to start your own company.” And I thought, “Wait, this is a real thing?” I did some homework, and that’s how I found out about the entire industry. I ended up contacting that guy, buying a truck from him, and he subcontracted me a few bank drive-throughs so I could get my feet wet, literally. That’s how it started.
Gabe Torres:Fast forward to today—size, number of people, years in business?
John Karras:We’re starting our 13th year. We’re in the Lehigh Valley area, about an hour north of Philly. We run six service trucks and at peak season we’re 15–20 employees: office manager, operations manager, sales team. It’s been a ton of fun—lots of ups and downs, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world.
Gabe Torres:What has been one of the hardest points for you? Was it the startup, or now that you’re much bigger?
John Karras:There are a few pivotal moments, but early on it was tough because I didn’t jump in full-time. It was a side hustle for around eight months. I had a website, was pounding the pavement with flyers, mailboxes, signs, anything to match my nine-to-five income. It was a lot of sacrifice—two little kids at home, a wife, a full-time job. Eventually we pushed through that, but after we grew a bit, I was still doing it all—field work, sales, scheduling—total bottleneck. I hired someone to help in the field, then trained him to go on his own. Then we realized I needed an office person, at least part-time. We got fractionalized at maybe $500k to $650k in revenue. In 2018, I got into a room with some bigger owners—a mastermind—and realized I needed to hire a full-time office manager, an operations manager, a full-time sales guy, all in about 45 days. It was crazy but an unlock. It really opened my eyes to the power of structure.
Gabe Torres:Yeah, and just seeing someone else say, “Oh, that’s normal,” right?
John Karras:Exactly. You feel stuck but they’re like, “Here’s what to do.” You write everything down and then go implement. It’s the fastest way to get where you want to go. Suddenly, I’m no longer the bottleneck, and it was just a big epiphany. I remember the first time my new sales guy sold a $2,000 package—I struggled to do that! When someone you hire performs better than you did at that role, that’s a great feeling.
Gabe Torres:So if you had to give 2012 John Karras a piece of advice?
John Karras:(1) You’re capable of far more than you think. My thinking was so small in 2012. We’re beyond my wildest dreams now. (2) To tap into that potential, don’t try to figure it out alone. Build relationships with people who’ve done it. Learn from them and implement. Not everything will work for you, but it’ll get you ahead so much faster than banging your head against a wall trying to figure it out alone.
Gabe Torres:Man, that’s great. Thank you so much for spending time with us, John. Thanks for sharing your story.
John Karras:Absolutely—always a pleasure chatting, Gabe.
Gabe Torres:Same here. Talk soon.
Sid Graef:Hello my friend, this is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking time to listen to today’s episode. I hope you got some value from it, and anything we covered—resources, books, tools—is in the show notes for easy reference.
The mission for the Huge Convention and for this podcast is to help blue-collar business owners gain financial and time freedom by running a better business. We do that in four ways:
Our free weekly newsletter, the Huge Insider. Subscribe—it’s the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry, paid or otherwise.
The Huge Foundations education platform—over 120 hours of industry-specific education and monthly topical webinars with Q&A sessions featuring seven- and eight-figure business owners. You can try it for $1 for seven days.
The Huge Convention. If you haven’t been, check it out. It’s every August; this year it’s in Nashville, Tennessee, August 20–22, 2025. It’s the largest convention and trade show for home service business builders—world-class education, an enormous trade show, and unbeatable networking.
Finally, if you want to pour jet fuel on your business, check out the Huge Mastermind. It’s not for everyone—you need to be at over $750,000 in revenue, building toward $1 million, $5 million, or $10 million. It’s an elite network for mentorship and implementing the Freedom Operating System.
You can get information on all four of these at thehugeconvention.com. Scroll down or click on the Freedom Path, or check the show notes here for direct links. We want you to keep learning, keep growing, and keep advancing your business. If you like this show, please take 90 seconds to give us a review on iTunes, subscribe, and share—it means the world to us, and it’ll help other people, too.
Thanks again for listening. We’ll see you on the next episode.
 

19: The James Hatfield Episode

Get ready to rethink how you connect with customers. In this episode, Chief Revenue Officer James Hatfield shares how he went from starting a simple painting and pressure-washing business to leading sales at LiveSwitch, a cutting-edge video-communication platform. His story covers building companies from nothing, teaching entrepreneurship to people in prison, and ultimately discovering the power of fast, real-time video calls in industries ranging from law enforcement to pro sports—and now home services.
James explains how this near-instant video technology gives service professionals a huge advantage: it saves wasted drives to job sites, increases speed-to-lead, and generates better customer interaction (and more sales). Whether you’re in window cleaning, plumbing, painting, or anything else, you can “claim your property” with a simple QR code sticker so clients can instantly reach you via video. He also dives into building a strong network, harnessing LinkedIn to connect with industry leaders, and positioning yourself as the face of your business online.
If you’re looking for tips on how to amplify your sales, streamline your workflow, and stand out in a crowded market, James’s insights will help you knock on virtual doors and grow your service business faster than ever.
Show NotesGuest and Company:
James Hatfield, CRO at LiveSwitch
References and Mentions:
ABC Television Show: Free Enterprise (about teaching entrepreneurship to incarcerated individuals)
WWE Thunderdome (example of LiveSwitch’s large-scale live video)
Tennessee Titans (security and event management insight)
D2D (Door-to-Door) experts in Orlando
LinkedIn (key platform for building your professional network)
Resources (Mentioned Every Time):
The Huge Insider Newsletter Sign-up
The Huge Insider Podcast Downloadable Action Guide
The Foundations Platform (Trial Offer)
The Huge Mastermind Info Page
Facebook Group
Sid Graef:Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations podcast. I’m Sid Graef out of Montana.
Gabe Torres:I’m Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee.
Sheila Smeltzer:And I’m Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina. We’re your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in the industry—folks that have already built seven- and eight-figure businesses, and they want to help you succeed.
Gabe Torres:Yep. No fake gurus on this show—just real-life owners who have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience, 0% theory. We’re going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece. Thanks for joining us on the wild journey of entrepreneurship. Let’s dive in!
Sid Graef:Hello, my friend! Welcome back to the Huge Transformation podcast. It’s Sid Graef. I’m so excited today. I get to introduce you to James Hatfield. James Hatfield is the CRO—that’s the Chief Revenue Officer, essentially the money guy—over at LiveSwitch. LiveSwitch is a real-time video platform with a lot of applications. You’re going to learn about it, but here’s the thing that you’re going to love:
We go through James’s journey from right out of high school (even before college) when he started a painting company and a power-washing company. It was really humble beginnings—he started knocking on doors. He’d say he always expected people to say “No,” so he was never disappointed. That eventually built into a business with employees and a team, all based on knocking on doors and just going for it.
Then he “accidentally” got into financial technology—FinTech—and helped build a company up to a 10-figure (that’s billion-dollar) business. They sold that business, and afterward, he and the founder started doing philanthropy, teaching entrepreneurship to people in prison. So incarcerated folks learning about entrepreneurship, and ABC Television actually made a show about it called Free Enterprise. Fascinating story. Now James is back in business as CRO at LiveSwitch, and he’s done so many things. One thing I admire most is that if he believes in an idea that has merit and value, he’s willing to knock on the door, pick up the phone—he says, when he started doing this, he was making 120 cold calls a day—and it transformed how a lot of us in the home service industry do business.
I hope you have as much fun as I did interviewing James and getting to know him. So here we go, our guest today, James Hatfield, CRO of LiveSwitch.
Sid Graef:Welcome back, everybody. This is Sid Graef, and this is the Huge Transformations podcast, part of the Huge Convention. I’ve got a great guest on today. We were just chatting offline about the secret background of the service businesses and trades—like, “Why hasn’t anybody made a documentary about the guy that climbed a ladder and painted a house?” Right? I get to introduce everybody to James Hatfield. James is currently the CRO (Chief Revenue Officer) at LiveSwitch. James, thanks for being here; it’s good to see you, man. How are you?
James Hatfield:I’m great, Sid. Thanks for having me. I’m excited to share a little bit and talk about some good, bad, and ugly stories of transition.
Sid Graef:Cool, cool. So right now, if people peel back the layers a little bit: “He’s got a position with three initials in a technology startup—what does that have to do with home services?” But instead of starting where you are, let’s go back. You had a business painting houses and a power-washing company. Tell us about that—what are the humble beginnings for James?
James Hatfield:Yeah, usually they say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, right? My grandfather—his dad died really young, and he was the oldest of many kids, so he dropped out of high school at 16, went to work at a tire shop, and he’s a self-made man. Then my father—his dad also died young—and built his own home, coming from nothing. So their dreams for me were very simple. My grandfather said, “Hey, you need to be a painter.” My father said, “You need to be a plumber. That’s how you’ll make ends meet.”
So I went the painting direction. I was like, “Alright, time to start paying my own way.” I have no fear of going up to any door, any house in any neighborhood, and knocking on it asking for a job. In this case, it was painting a house. I learned how to paint a house, apprenticed myself, and didn’t take too long to do it the right way. I put a process together, and then I went selling. That’s where it all began. I ended up growing that into a painting and power-washing company with multiple crews. We painted homes in different neighborhoods of all sizes, even corporate companies, so we did okay.
Sid Graef:You said you have no hesitation about knocking on somebody’s door and asking for work—like, “Do you need your house painted?” Was that something you learned or was it inherent?
James Hatfield:I just don’t have any shame. I’m not worried about people telling me “No.” In fact, I expect everybody to tell me “No,” so it just rolls off my back. I heard this story about Jack Nicklaus, the golfer, one of the best of all time. They asked him, “What’s the difference on a Sunday round?” He said, “When I hit it in the woods, I just pop it back out and forget about it. The other guys, they dwell on it for the next three holes.” It’s the same with knocking on doors—I expect a “No,” and I’m never disappointed. Eventually, you get a “Yes,” and that keeps you coming back for more.
Sid Graef:That’s a great perspective. Most people—the thought of knocking on doors or cold-calling can paralyze them, but you say, “I expect a ‘No,’” so you’re hardly ever disappointed.
James Hatfield:Never. I expect it.
Sid Graef:So how did you transition from building that painting and washing company into the corporate world, banking, and eventually LiveSwitch? What happened? Was your dad disappointed you didn’t become a plumber?
James Hatfield:Definitely disappointed! I didn’t want to be under the house, dealing with all that. I was up on a ladder, but still…
What happened is, while running those companies, I found a weakness: I didn’t understand my financials well. So I put myself through state college, running my companies and taking night classes—back when college was affordable—so I could learn bookkeeping and accounting. I wanted to make sure the numbers added up. Right as I was graduating, I met a guy who had a landscaping company and laundromats. He had created this expert system at Duke University. You’d input a financial income statement and a balance sheet, and it would give you a plain-language report for small-business owners like me who didn’t really speak “accounting.” This was before AI, so we thought, “Let’s give it a shot.”
Back to my door-knocking mentality, but over the phone, I started making 300 cold calls a day to CPAs around the country—just hunting for a “Yes.” We turned that little startup into an Inc. 500 company for three years straight. It’s a multi-billion-dollar company now, sold to KKR.
Sid Graef:Nice jump—great job. Did you go from that business straight to LiveSwitch?
James Hatfield:No, after selling that financial technology company, I went into philanthropy. I started churches, and my partner started “Inmates to Entrepreneurs,” where we teach thousands of incarcerated men and women entrepreneurship. Because we both came from home service-based businesses, as well as FinTech, we had roots in that. We wanted to teach it and believed we could. It became an ABC Television show called Free Enterprise. After that, we wanted to build another billion-dollar company, so instead of starting from scratch, we bought a small one. We looked all over the world for a tech company with a unique “Coca-Cola recipe,” found one four years ago—LiveSwitch—which is actually 16 years old.
Sid Graef:Right, so that leads us to LiveSwitch. For people who don’t know, what is LiveSwitch?
James Hatfield:It’s something called WebRTC—Web Real-Time Communication—a super nerdy type of video streaming. It’s all about live video, connecting two people anywhere on the globe at extremely high speed, with real-time audio, data, or video streams. A big example is that we powered WWE during COVID—when they couldn’t have fans, we put big screens in the Florida Thunderdome so that fans at home could instantly react to a body slam. That’s the kind of real-time performance we handle.
Sid Graef:That’s amazing. When we first talked, you mentioned law enforcement usage, so how’d you get from WWE to home services?
James Hatfield:We started by working with the Washington D.C. Chief of Police to reinvent the 911 call, streaming right from a citizen’s phone to the responding officer. Government stuff takes forever, though. So we looked for other opportunities. We got in front of an NFL security guy for the Tennessee Titans—he loved it but also asked if it could solve small problems like checking across a stadium without driving his golf cart over. We realized we basically had a video walkie-talkie.
Then I have a friend in self-storage, a self-storage Hall of Famer. He said, “Bring this to self-storage,” so I ended up going to a big Las Vegas conference. While there, I accidentally ran into moving and storage companies, calling them 120 times a day. Finally, one guy, Wade Swikle, said, “James, you’ve no idea what you’ve got. Let me tell you how I’d use it in my moving business.” He explained how the biggest cost is driving out to a quote that might be a dead-end. Now he could simply take a live look over video first, then decide if it’s worth coming out. That was our tipping point. Then it spread to painters, power washers, plumbers, holiday-light installers, and more.
Sid Graef:Yes, that’s the neat thing about how everyday folks find new uses for a technology. So from your perspective, with your background in door-to-door, phone sales, and now all these new ways to communicate—what advice do you have for early-stage business owners trying to get more business?
James Hatfield:It depends on the type of business, but speaking to painters, power washers, that sort of thing: sometimes you just have to go knock on doors. Don’t rush into big loans or Google Ad spending if you don’t have the budget. Get scrappy. If I lost everything and had to start from scratch, I’d pick my neighborhoods, knock on doors, get those first sales, fulfill them, and then turn those into referrals and recurring revenue. There’s nothing fancy about it, but it’s how I’d do it. And if you want to build fast, once you’ve got some momentum, then you layer in marketing, networking, hiring, and so on.
Sid Graef:So let’s jump to where you are now at LiveSwitch. Something you said earlier that just blew my mind was how you can literally “claim” a water heater or breaker box with a QR code, so if something goes wrong, the homeowner scans the code on that piece of equipment and it connects them instantly to your business. That boxes out Google so they don’t call a random plumber.
James Hatfield:Exactly. That’s the new normal, I believe. All thanks to QR codes and smartphones. Put a sticker with your business name, phone, and a QR code on that water heater, breaker box, furnace—whatever. When it acts up, the homeowner sees your code right there, scans it, and a live video feed opens up. Or if you don’t have 24/7 coverage, it’s a drop-box video that they record for you, and you call back after reviewing. It’s all about instant connection and speed—race to the face. Thanks to Amazon Prime, people won’t wait around anymore, so if you’re not there fast, they’ll call someone else.
Sid Graef:In your crystal ball, how soon before that becomes the norm?
James Hatfield:It’s already here. It’s just a matter of mainstream adoption. But technology-wise, it’s ready to go right now.
Sid Graef:One mind-blowing scenario: You can have a technician who hates selling simply hand a tablet to the customer. Then your sales rep—wherever they are—instantly appears and does the upsell in real time. That’s brilliant.
James Hatfield:Yes, we see that every day. You make sure the right people do the right job. Don’t make your shy tech play both roles. Give them a simple device or an app on their phone, and someone else who’s great at sales can do it from anywhere—maybe even South Africa. It’s game-changing.
Sid Graef:So what pushback do you get?
James Hatfield:People say, “My customers won’t like it,” but that’s rarely true. Some say their team doesn’t want to be on video. Or they say, “We’ve been doing it the old way for 30 years,” but guess what—someone else is moving faster. People who adopt it end up saving hours of drive-time per day, closing more deals, so it speaks for itself.
Sid Graef:This is so interesting. As we wrap up, anything else you’d like to share?
James Hatfield:Yes, quickly: People underuse networking. Whether you’re in a new industry or established, build your network. Use LinkedIn. Post updates, connect with 20 people a day max, share your insights and your progress. You’ll be surprised by the opportunities that come your way.
Sid Graef:That’s fantastic. James, thanks so much for your time. We’ll put in the show notes how to find you. For those who want to learn more about LiveSwitch or your approach, where should they go?
James Hatfield:Head to LiveSwitch.com, book a demo, and specifically request me if you want to chat. Also, you can connect with me on LinkedIn. I love giving more than I take. If you start doing some of these new approaches, let me know how it’s going.
Sid Graef:Thanks again for coming on. I appreciate your time and expertise, James.
James Hatfield:Thank you, Sid.
Sid Graef:Hello, my friend! This is Sid Graef. Thank you again for listening. I hope you got some value today. Anything mentioned—resources, books, tools—are in the show notes, so it’s easy for you to find. Also, remember our mission: helping blue-collar business owners gain financial and time freedom by running a better business. We do that in four ways:
Our free weekly newsletter, The Huge Insider, which is the most valuable newsletter in home services—paid or otherwise.
The Huge Foundations education platform with over 120 hours of industry-specific content, plus monthly topical webinars and Q&A with seven- and eight-figure business owners. It’s a $1 trial for seven days.
The Huge Convention, held every August—in 2025 it’s in Nashville, Tennessee, from the 20th to the 22nd—the largest, top-rated trade show and educational event for home service business builders.
The Huge Mastermind, for businesses over $750K who want to accelerate growth toward $1M, $5M, or $10M in the next five years using the Freedom Operating System.
You’ll find all of this at thehugeconvention.com—just scroll down and click on the Freedom Path. Or check the show notes. If you like this show, please review us on iTunes, subscribe, and share. It really means the world to us. Thanks again for listening, and we’ll see you on the next episode!

18: The Scott Brothers Episode

In this episode, host Sid Graef welcomes the Scott brothers—Derek Scott and Colton Scott—of Scott’s Mobile Wash. They share their journey of moving from a scrappy, one-man weekend operation to a growing fleet-washing business employing multiple team members. The brothers talk candidly about restructuring their company twice, learning how to implement core values (“hungry, humble, professionalism”), and realizing that building a solid foundation of systems and culture is crucial for long-term success.
They also dig into the family element—Derek left Arkansas to start a power-washing venture in Tennessee, and soon convinced Colton to join him after high school. While it wasn’t always smooth sailing, the brothers emphasize how vital it is to build the business the right way from the start, rather than hustling forever without clear leadership or processes. Their motivation to succeed is further fueled by personal responsibilities—Colton was recently married, and Derek has a growing family on the way. Anyone at the earlier stages of business-building (or going through a rocky period of “people problems”) will resonate with their honest, boots-on-the-ground perspective.
Show Notes
Guests:
Derek Scott & Colton Scott, co-owners of Scott’s Mobile Wash (Fleet-washing & Power-washing, Nashville area)
Key Discussion Points:
Origins of Scott’s Mobile Wash – Derek’s leap of faith moving to Tennessee and spotting opportunities in the fleet-washing market.
Working as Brothers – The eight-year age gap, living together, and evolving from “just employees” to true business owners.
Scaling Up – Growth from a weekend hustle to a recurring-revenue model with multiple employees.
Facing Restructures – Outgrowing informal setups, implementing structured systems, and adding core values that weed out the wrong hires.
Core Behaviors – “Hungry, Humble, Professional,” and how this new clarity affects hiring, team alignment, and day-to-day operations.
Advice for Newer Entrepreneurs – Start strong with systems and vision to avoid costly do-overs later.
Resources
The Huge Insider newsletter signup
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
The Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
Facebook Group
Sid: Welcome back to the Huge Transformations podcast. This is Sid; I’m your host today, and I get to introduce you to the Scott brothers, Derek Scott and Colton Scott. They are the owners of Scott’s Mobile Wash—a fleet-washing, power-washing company just outside of Nashville, Tennessee. They’ve been at it for about seven years.
I really wanted to have them on the show, and I hope you enjoy this interview. Here’s why: because these guys are in the trenches, they’re in the fight, and they have rebooted and rebuilt their company. In their words, they have transformed it twice. They realized at one point they were making good money just through hustle and grit, but they didn’t have the systems they needed to reach their bigger goals. So they found a place where they could learn from business builders who were further down the road. They changed how they structured the company. Then two years later, they did it again, refining their processes and emphasizing core values—core behaviors.
We dig into that for a while, but the thing you’ll appreciate most—what I appreciated most—is that it reminded me of my own early bootstrap days, trying to figure it all out. Maybe you’re in that stage, too. Derek and Colton share how they grew from one guy with a truck to multiple employees and rapid growth, but they’re still in that build-it mode. You get to see how the sausage is made rather than only seeing someone’s polished results after a decade of hard work.
We’ll follow up with them in a year to see how far they’ve come, which I’m really excited about. So, without further ado, you’ve got to meet Derek and Colton Scott. Our audio quality isn’t amazing, but the content is rich. Stick with us. Thanks for joining—meet Derek and Colton.
Sid: Welcome back, everyone. It’s Sid with the Huge Transformations podcast. And today is a two-for-one, like we have never done this. We’ve got Colton Scott and Derek Scott, brothers from the— you’re in the Nashville area, correct?Derek Scott: Yes, sir. Yes, Nashville area.Sid: They’ve got a power-washing company that focuses on fleet washing, and we’re going to talk all about their journey and see what we can learn. Good afternoon, gentlemen—how are you?Colton Scott: Good to see you, we’re doing good.
Sid: So Derek and Colton I know from The Huge Convention, but primarily Derek and Colton are part of The Huge Mastermind—that’s where I’ve gotten to know them better. We see each other every quarter in Nashville, doing something cool and learning ways to expand your business. Let’s start off by talking about your company: the name of it, approximate size—whatever metric you want, whether employees, revenue, or the number of trucks you wash—just to give us a framework of where you are now. Then we’ll go back in time and pick up on your journey.
Colton: Yeah, so our company name is Scott’s Mobile Wash. We wash roughly 400 trucks a week, is where we’re at. Size-wise, we have about six employees.
Sid: Perfect. And which of you guys is primarily in charge of sales?Colton: That’s me, Colton.Sid: So when you walk into a place and say, “I’m from Scott’s Mobile Wash,” do they go, “Oh, are you Scott?”Colton: Yeah, they do. And I just say, “Yeah, that’s my name.” [laughs]
Sid: Exactly! So you guys are in the Nashville area. Let’s talk about family for a second. Derek, have you and Colton always worked together, or is this your first venture together as brothers?
Derek: Definitely our first. There’s an eight-year difference between us, so I’m eight years older. He was still in high school when I moved to Tennessee. I started the business in 2018, was doing it on the weekends, and had an opportunity to buy another company. Doing so gave me a chance to see if he wanted to come down and work full-time in the fleet-washing business. That happened in June of 2018.
There was some stuff we had to work through—not only as family, but also because of the age gap. He’d have been 18, I’d have been 26-ish. When there’s that age gap, you’re in different stages of life. But we worked through it. I’ll let him share his perspective on coming down at that young age.
Colton: Yeah, I definitely had to work through my immaturity from 18 to 24. At that time, I was just an employee; I had more of an employee perspective than an owner’s perspective. It’s definitely different now, that’s for sure.
Sid: So Colton, you’re 24 now and about to be 25?Colton: Yeah, in a couple of weeks.Sid: Best part about turning 25 is lower car-rental rates, right?Colton: Yeah, finally! [laughs]
Sid: Derek, you guys have been at it for about seven years. You built from a one-man operation to two, and now six employees. What were some of the biggest challenges early on? Actually, let me back up further: Derek, why did you pick mobile wash? Why was that your path?
Derek: Prior to owning my own business, I was a mechanic in Little Rock, Arkansas, and I was in charge of taking equipment to get washed. I saw how much money was spent on that, and I thought, “I could do this!” On a whim, literally, I said, “I’m moving to Tennessee and starting a power-washing business. I don’t know if it’ll be fleet or houses.” I bought a trailer in Arkansas that I knew I could run my systems off of, loaded it all up, and moved to Tennessee.
I had a job lined up but wanted ultimately to be my own boss. I’d work weekends and after hours to grow the business. Then I found someone looking to get out of the fleet-washing industry, so I bought his business. I had been doing more houses; I switched over to more fleet after the purchase. Then Colton graduated high school, came down, and the rest is history.
Sid: Wow, so when you told friends and family that you were going to move to Tennessee and start a power-washing business, who said you were crazy, and who said, “That’s awesome, go for it”?
Derek: [Laughs] You know, your parents try to be supportive, but also question if you’re sure. Because our parents live in Illinois, so we had no family down in Tennessee, no friends. It wasn’t like I could rely on local family, you know, “Hey, can I wash your car or something?” So that made it difficult and forced me to hustle. Social media was my advertising—just Facebook.
Sid: Colton, when you moved down, how gritty was it? Were you sleeping on couches, or in storage units? [laughs]
Colton: So when I moved, I lived in Derek’s apartment in Murfreesboro for a week, sleeping on his sofa, then he bought a house. I had no money—I was 18—so I lived with him for the first couple of years. We rode to work together every day. It was pretty vanilla in those first couple of years.
Derek: Yeah, basically my last day at my mechanic job was a Friday, I closed on a house on Monday, and we started full-time Tuesday.
Sid: No way, that’s wild. The bank underwriter was probably like, “Don’t say a word about quitting your job!”Derek: Exactly! [laughs]
Sid: Let’s talk about responsibilities now. Colton, you said you do sales, but are you also on the operations side? Derek, how do you divide everything?
Derek: You’d think with Colton being the “sales guy,” that’s how it goes. But we get a lot of word-of-mouth leads, so we haven’t had to do heavy prospecting. I do more of the mechanical side, behind-the-scenes stuff, and finances. Colton definitely has landed some big contracts that are our bread and butter, but we’ve been pretty fortunate with word-of-mouth.
Sid: So let’s talk about word-of-mouth. Do you encourage your clients to refer you? Or is it purely “do a great job and hope they spread the word”?
Colton: We don’t have a super-formal system. We show up consistently (because everything we do is recurring), do good work, and build trust. I’m checking in on our customers to make sure things are good, and that’s usually when I’ll ask, “Do you know any other companies?” But we don’t have a set referral program or anything.
Derek: The guys will also approach folks at gas stations. If they see a dirty company truck, they’ll ask, “Hey, do you have someone washing your stuff?” We also sometimes do a little incentive for them if they bring in new leads.
Sid: Awesome. So you’ve established a business, providing jobs for others, which is fantastic. Where do you see yourselves in three to five years?
Colton: I hope to be less in the field. We were out of the field for a bit, but we had to jump back in recently. So for me, I’d like to be done with being behind the gun in two or three years.
Derek: Yeah, that’s the plan. A little backstory: about three years in, we got comfortable because we were making enough to pay bills and take a vacation. But we realized, “What do we really want?” because there’s still the headache of owning your own business. Then we had an opportunity to buy a truck from Nate in Michigan. He introduced us to what’s now called The Huge Mastermind. We’ve been in it for about two years, and it’s completely changed our business. Before, we only knew how to show up and do the work. But as the business outgrew us, we didn’t know how to manage people or the day-to-day side.
Colton: Exactly, we’ve learned a ton. We’ve sort of restructured twice. Most recently we added real structure to the business, and it shook things up. Some employees didn’t like the new direction. We lost about three employees in three weeks, which was tough. But in the long run, it’s good. We’re focusing on building a stronger foundation now rather than just “go, go, go.”
Sid: That’s often how it goes. If you have people who don’t want structure or accountability, they self-select out. Let’s talk about culture and core values. One thing we discussed in the Mastermind recently was core behaviors. Did you just define your own?
Colton: Yeah, we thought we had core values two years ago, but they weren’t really there. We can’t even remember them. We basically just grabbed random words off the internet. Now we have them drilled down to “humble, hungry, and professionalism.” Our guys hear it all the time, and they’re held accountable to it. Some employees stayed on board; others left. That’s how it went.
Sid: That’s great. Are you finding it easier to recruit the right people now by referencing these core behaviors in the hiring process?
Derek: Yes, in that we’re taking our time to hire and not rushing it. Short-term it’s painful because we’re down employees, but in the long term it’s better. The new hires are coming into an environment where the existing team lives those values—rather than learning bad habits from some old bad apple.
Sid: Exactly. And I can’t wait to see where you’ll be in a year—especially from our quarterly meetups—just to see how the business evolves once you’ve put these fundamental building blocks in place.
Derek: Absolutely. My advice for anybody just starting would be to lay that foundation early so you don’t have to restructure later. That’s what we’re doing now—kind of undoing the old and setting a new structure.
Sid: Couldn’t agree more. I love talking to entrepreneurs who began with hustle and grit. Let’s wrap up on a personal note. Colton, you recently got married, right?
Colton: Yes, last July—coming up on a year.Sid: And Derek, you’ve got a child on the way?Derek: Due in May.
Sid: Great motivators to get that business hammered down! [laughs] You’ll have a whole new lack-of-sleep reality, Derek.
Derek: Oh, for sure. We also have a three-year-old, and an 11-month-old right now, so it’s a busy time. My wife’s definitely looking forward to having the business more systemized so I’m not out in the field all night.
Sid: Indeed. Parenting is a big motivator for many entrepreneurs—it pushes them to get serious about building a stable, profitable business.
Well, gentlemen, thanks for sharing your journey. Some of this is in real-time, so I can’t wait to catch up and see how it all plays out. Derek and Colton, thanks for being on the show!
Derek: Thank you for having us, Sid.Colton: Thanks, Sid.
Sid: Hello, my friend—this is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today’s episode. I hope you got some value from it. Listen, anything that was covered—any resources, books, tools—anything like that is in the show notes, so it’s easy for you to find and check out.
Also, I want to let you know: the mission for The Huge Convention and for this show is to help blue-collar business owners like you and me gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. We do that in four ways:
The Huge Insider: a free weekly newsletter—most valuable in the home service industry, paid or otherwise, and it’s free.
The Huge Foundations education platform: over 120 hours of industry-specific education. Every month we do a topical webinar and Q&A with seven- and eight-figure business owners. You can try it for 1 for seven days.
The Huge Convention: if you haven’t been, you’ve got to check it out. Every August (this year in Nashville, August 20-22, 2025). It’s the largest, top-rated trade show and convention for home service business builders—huge trade show, world-class speakers, best networking in the industry.
The Huge Mastermind: for those doing over 750,000 in revenue and aiming for 1M, 5M, or 10M in the next five years. It’s a network and mentorship group of peers where we help you implement The Freedom Operating System.
You can find all the info on all these programs at thehugeconvention.com—just scroll down and click on The Freedom Path. You can also find links in the show notes. If you like the show, please take 90 seconds to give us a review on iTunes, subscribe, and share. That helps other people find us and supports our mission.
Thanks again for listening. We’ll see you on the next episode.

17: The Gregg Hiller Episode

In this episode, host Sheila Smeltzer interviews Greg Hiller of Sundance Window Cleaning in Park City, Utah. Greg shares how he left a comfortable corporate career to start his window cleaning business at age 50, driven by a desire for freedom and control over his future. Despite early challenges, he grew Sundance Window Cleaning into a seven-figure company within five years by focusing on hard work, strategic marketing, and building a strong team.
Greg credits his success to perseverance, resilience, and maintaining a positive mindset—especially when facing major hurdles such as losing employees or handling unexpected accidents. He emphasizes that home service businesses need to view themselves as marketing engines, not just service providers. By reinvesting heavily in customer acquisition early on, Greg was able to build a robust client database and then reduce his marketing spend once the company reached a “cruising altitude.” His passion and optimism shine through, leaving listeners energized and motivated to push through challenges and scale their own businesses.
Show Notes
Guest
Greg Hiller – Owner of Sundance Window Cleaning (Park City, UT)
References & Resources Mentioned
Window Washing Wealth (Coach: Jim DuBois)
Busy Virtual Receptionist (AI-driven answering service in development):
Resources
The Huge Insider newsletter signup
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
The Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
Facebook Group
 
Transcript:
Sid Graef: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the huge transformations podcast. I’m Sid Graef out of Montana.Gabe Torres: I’m Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee.Sheila Smeltzer: And I’m Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina. We’re your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in the industry—folks that have already built seven- and eight-figure businesses, and they want to help you succeed.Gabe Torres: Yep. No fake gurus on this show. Just real-life owners that have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100% experience, 0% theory.Sheila Smeltzer: We’re going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece. Thanks for joining us on the wild…
Sheila Smeltzer: Hi, I’m your host today on the Huge Transformations podcast. I am Sheila Smeltzer. Today’s guest is Greg Hiller with Sundance Window Cleaning out of Park City, Utah. You’re going to love this extremely uplifting conversation that Greg and I have about how having a positive mindset can absolutely get you through the tough times that we all experience as business owners.
Greg shares how he built a seven-figure business in five years. He did it with some coaching, but he also did it with a lot of perseverance and a ton of hard work. Greg provides some really tactical marketing strategies that ultimately lead to a “database goldmine.” I love that! I am super excited to have you join us today because I promise you are going to leave this podcast feeling motivated and totally excited to go out and crush it. Let’s get started.
Sheila: Hello everybody. Welcome to the Huge Transformation podcast. I am Sheila Smeltzer located out of North Carolina. And today we have Greg Hiller. Greg is with Sundance Window Cleaning out of Park City, Utah. Yes, I’ve loved going to Park City and skiing, Greg.Greg Hiller: Yeah. Thanks for having me. Glad to be here.Sheila: Yeah, this is great. So I met you recently at a Huge Mastermind, and so I’m looking forward to interviewing you today and getting to know you better. Can you start off by just telling our audience who you are and what you do, and we’ll take it from there?Greg: Yeah. So, yeah, I have a window cleaning business in Park City, as you mentioned. We’re here in Park City, so it’s kind of more high-end residential, which is what I started with. And over the years, we’ve added some commercial, hotels, do a little pressure washing, gutter cleaning—kind of the regular services. And yeah, it just continues to grow every year. And it’s been a hell of a ride getting here these years later.
Sheila: I hear you. What did you do before you got into the window cleaning biz?Greg: Yeah, well, primarily my career was in corporate, mostly logistics distribution in the end—used to run warehouses. But I’m kind of old-school. Started my way working night shift in a grocery store and then started picking orders in warehouses, and moved up to management, drove trucks. So I never went to college; just always been a grinder and a hustler.Sheila: Very good. Yeah. Well, I resonate with that story. Same, same—never been to college. Isn’t it amazing how all of the different—from the time we probably got into the job world—how every single role that we’ve had throughout our career and our evolution as human beings has just absolutely given us the talents and the skills that we need for what we do today?Greg: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think more importantly, just the appreciation to be able to run my own business. I mean, like you said, the corporate career I had was great. It taught me a lot, took care of a growing family I had over the years. But I always yearned for freedom. I yearned to be out of the corporate bureaucracy, giving all my time and energy into that. And so, yeah, when the opportunity came to take that risk, to kind of go for it…you know, we live in a country that allows us to take those chances and succeed. So yeah, that experience—when I started my business, I was able to leverage a lot of that. But boy, there was a whole lot to learn to be an owner-operator, that’s for sure.
Sheila: Absolutely. And tell me, how has that freedom worked out for you?Greg: It’s good. I mean, that was the motivator, right? Towards the end of my corporate career, I had a good career going. I had come off of a project that put me in Europe for two and a half years, implementing an SAP operating system in manufacturing centers. And when I got back, they gave me a job back in the corporation, working from home, making six figures a year with bonus. I had—it was like the corporate dream. But I was like a caged animal. I couldn’t take it. Being on that project changed me to the point I realized, “Hey, I can do anything. I always wanted to have my own business.”
When I was younger in Washington state, a friend of mine had a small window-cleaning business, and I would help him out a little bit on the weekends to make a little extra money. And so it was just kind of like, “All right, life’s too short, I’m just going to go for it.” And I literally gave two weeks notice to this corporate job, put a ladder on my Prius, and off I went. Life is short; I’ve got to go for it. I was 50 years old, staying up till two in the morning, studying marketing on YouTube—I mean, whatever it took to be successful.
Sheila: Good for you, Greg. So tell me, what does Sundance Window Cleaning look like today, eight years later?Greg: Well, the freedom—I guess I never really answered that question. But yeah, almost eight years later, probably the last three years we’ve been doing seven figures. And for the last three years, so probably the fifth year in business, I hit seven figures. And my goal was to build a management team that would run my business for me to give me the freedom. And that’s kind of what happened the last few years is—I was really an absentee owner.
I bought a little property in South Carolina on a couple acres. It’s a fixer-upper, and I spent winters out there working on that, and I go out there once in a while—that’s kind of my getaway. I started doing a little coaching for my original coach. So I do a little bit of that. So yeah, I got the goals that I was going for—that’s what I was doing when I went for it, why I risked everything, is I wanted to build something that would give me the freedom and flexibility to have a different life. And yeah, I’ve been living that.
Recently I had a manager leave, so I’m kind of back in the business restructuring things. And that’s just kind of natural. But I’ve got really good people in my business right now that can take things over. But yeah, it’s been a ride. Those first few years, it was hard work. It was literally blood, sweat, and tears. There were times I just didn’t know if I was going to be able to make it; it was so hard. And then you start hiring employees, and you get so many disappointments through that process. You’ve got to have a mindset of hanging in there and not giving up, and that’s what I did. I stuck with it and finally was able to put a team together that could run the business.
I’ve got to pinch myself; I live a life today I could have never imagined. It’s incredible. It’s opened up other ways of thinking because I’m not the same person I was when I started the business. Yeah, I mean, when I left— the reason I waited till I was 50 to start a business is I honestly didn’t think I was smart enough or capable enough all those years to really run my own business. It just seemed overwhelming. And it took what it took to finally take that leap of faith and go for it. But it changed me. And now today I’ve got some other things going—I’m working on this AI receptionist business on the side, I have my place in South Carolina, I have these other interests that I’m doing, and also just continuing to kind of coach my own business, I guess, to try to improve it.
Sheila: Sure. Okay, okay. So there’s a lot there. I want to backtrack real quick back to Sundance. What does your team look like? If you were to kind of paint a picture for us of what your org chart looks like, what is your structure in your company? Because I’m sure a lot of our viewers are thinking, “Okay, great, absentee owner, he’s living a life of freedom, that’s why he started his business.” You really scaled it up quite quickly, Greg. I know that it feels like a long time in the grit and the grind that you’re talking about, but you really did it quite quickly. What does the business look like where you are able to step aside and do some other things that you love?Greg: Yeah. Well, I guess I could go a little bit through the progression of it—what led to today, I guess. First and foremost, it was me and my Prius with a part-time helper. The first year, I did a whopping 70,000 in sales, my first year in business. And that was me, a helper, me on the cell phone, 30 feet up a ladder with a scratch pad every time I’d get a call come in.
Then maybe the next year, I believe I got a part-time person in the office. I was able to grow it by another 200, 250,000 in revenue the second year. And that was due to, one, having a coach that I hired that first year—a shout out to Jim DuBois at Window Washing Wealth—just a fantastic guy, fantastic program. It helped propel me to where I am today, having that coach that first year. It seemed like an enormous investment, but I didn’t start this business to be mediocre. I started it to build a seven-figure business that ran itself. So I invested in the coach.
So I went from basically hiring a part-time office administration to, when I could afford it, finally taking some of the calls and going into my CRM, booking things. Then each year, I grew about a quarter million in revenue. And that was tough—that’s no joke trying to grow at that rate. It was not easy, especially in my business in the mountains. It’s super seasonal here. We go through—we’ve got to hire up hugely in the spring, roll through summer, and then you crash in the dead of winter to nothing. And then you’ve got to redo it, rinse, repeat, every single year. Tough business to run. Those seasonal folks out there—I get it.
Then I added—I took one of my really good technicians and made him an operations manager. Then I finally got an office person while still using Jill’s Office another year. I can’t remember exactly the stages, but basically today, my org chart is a general manager, an office manager, an operations manager, and a virtual assistant. And I still use a call center as a third backup because I always want somebody answering the phone.
Then I will come in physically to the office in May and June—that’s the peak of the season—only because we’ll hire 12 technicians. We will literally hire 12 brand-new people with no experience and have them ready to run routes within two weeks.
Sheila: What does your training program look like?Greg: Well, it starts with videos. You want to just build videos. I just did simple little clips of everything we could think of and just hosted it on YouTube. That was just easy at the time—I know there’s lots of other ways to host it now. And then, yeah, we start them out with YouTube, going through a series. And then we physically have them learn the fanning technique right out the gate. They might even spend a whole day just learning the fanning technique. Then we send them out on jobs. Basically, we pay them 20 bucks an hour for a week—that’s their training. It costs 800 out of pocket for each brand-new person, and then they convert to a percentage-based pay at 15% after that. They’re expected to hold their own after a week of training.
Sheila: Okay, so you are doing performance pay.Greg: Yep, yep. We’re trying for 25,000 of revenue per month out of a two-person crew. When you look at the ROI on that training, it’s still good. So that’s also why I’ll come in in May and June just to help support that training effort. I’ll look for technicians that might be struggling, and I’ll work personally with them a little bit. That’s just kind of my way of helping the team out. We used to do a lot of jobs, but I told them, “I’m retired from climbing ladders anymore.” But now I’m like, “Okay, I think I’m done, but I will help with the training every year.”
Sheila: Awesome. Very good. I wanted to dive back in—thanks for painting that picture. I think it’s really important that people and our listeners understand what the company looks like. Because whenever we go to conventions or we’re listening to podcasts, we really size ourselves up a lot to what other companies are doing. But it’s a good thing, in my opinion, because it really allows us to benchmark and be like, “Okay, wow, Greg’s doing 25,000 for two technicians per month.” That’s really good stuff to share because that tells another company that’s listening, “Oh my gosh, that’s possible.” We can do that.
Greg, let’s talk about—I’ve heard you use the word “faith” a lot. I’ve heard you use “perseverance,” “hard work,” and before we got on, you told me you were “old school.” I’d like to dive into that a little bit. In the window cleaning/pressure washing/home service industry, it’s a really low point of entry, right? There’s a lot of people. I think I was interviewing someone—they said they went on Google and typed “What is the easiest startup business?” and window cleaning was number five. Doesn’t surprise me—600 bucks, you’re out the door, right? But where I’m going with that is, where do we want to…? We’re talking about the old school. There’s a lot of new guys in the industry. That’s really what I’m saying. So take us back. What do you feel is the ingredient to success? What are the ingredients to success? Because you and I both, I mean, I’m 49, you have a little bit on me, but we’re in the same age range. We’ve been around a little bit longer—there are probably a lot of young viewers listening. But let’s talk about what you feel it takes to succeed.
Greg: Yeah, well, I say “old school” because I came out of high school in 1985. I don’t know if you were a little younger than me back then, but that was a recession back then, right? If you could get a job, you kept a job. So my first job out of high school was rooming with some of my high school buddies and moving to the big city and working a graveyard shift in a grocery store. I ended up doing that for almost seven years, grinding away, making 10 bucks an hour to scrape enough money to buy groceries and pay rent. That went on for years.
I tell a story though, too: the grocery store I worked for was owned by a retired Marine sergeant. It was an IGA, and there are 2,000 IGAs in America, right? Man, we had to learn every customer by name. We had to stop everybody in the aisle, ask them if they needed help, take out groceries, mop the floors every day. We had to do everything perfect or we got yelled at. Couldn’t get fired because it was a recession/depression. But after working there for three years, this little IGA in Tacoma, Washington, got first place in the United States for the fastest growth, the best customer experience from all these KPIs in the United States. It taught me what hard work and service can do for a small business. I learned it from Ken Adams—Ken Adams IGA.
That’s a whole other story, but old school. Then I went from there—working seven years in a grocery store—to then picking orders in a warehouse, and then driving a semi-truck, unloading 40,000 pounds by hand down a ramp into restaurants on a graveyard shift for 12- to 15-hour shifts back then, driving a semi. Hard work. So when I finally got into management, my corporate career was all about putting in long hours, having that work ethic.
So when I decided to start my own business, I brought that work ethic right there. Yeah, window cleaning, pressure washing—it’s a low barrier to entry. Yeah, a lot of people can do it. There are a lot of guys and gals out there starting it up every year. But what separates those from a real company, from a real successful business, is the work that’s put in behind it. Like I said, when I started my business, I had the Prius, I had a ladder, and I got on my mountain bike and hung door hangers until it got dark every single night. Then I would jump on the computer and study everything I could find online in marketing until I finally got a coach a year later, which helped me with marketing—because you’ve got to get marketing going. We’re not just in the service business, we are in the marketing business. If you want to be successful, you’ve got to learn how to market.
But that work ethic—plus in my personal life, I had some failures. That time I worked graveyards in a grocery store, I was 26 years old, living in a single-wide mobile home with a beat-up car. I started drinking too much. I lost my wife and three kids at the age of 26, and wanted to end my life. My life was broken; everything was destroyed. I hit a bottom. Thank God I found recovery, which also found me a higher power, which found me a God, which gave me faith. Because I’ll tell you what—if I hadn’t had faith, I don’t know if I would be where I am today with my business.
It’s one thing to go out and make a nice hourly wage cleaning windows by yourself. To take it to growing into a seven-figure business and putting up with all the bullshit you’ve got to put up with to get it there—it took faith. It took faith in God. And I understand—I never believed in God growing up. I don’t judge anybody for anything; if it’s faith in yourself or faith in your community or faith in your family or whatever your faith is, find some faith because you’re going to need it. You’re going to hit some walls, and you’ve got to get past that. I believe success—this is what separates most people from success and not success—are the ones that don’t give up, that keep going no matter how hard it gets, that keep going.
I’ve had times where I lost my entire crew. I’ve hired people that took drugs and crashed my truck into downtown and a bunch of other cars. Right? I used to hear stories from these big companies, and I’m like, “Oh my God, I hope that doesn’t happen to me.” Well, it all happened to me. You just have to get through that day, get to bed, wake up the next day, and keep on going.
Sheila: We all could. I was just thinking we could write a book—10 small business owner contributors, writing a book of all the crappy stuff that we’ve been through. I think I’ve learned pretty much everything I’ve learned the hard way. I feel like that, and I’m starting to finally get smarter than that. But there’s also this element of going for it and not being afraid to take that leap of faith and to go after the thing. Whenever you choose to do that, there’s just a lot of responsibility that comes along with it. So that’s where that grit and perseverance and faith comes in. I love your story about the IGA.
I think about my very first job at a high-end men’s clothing store in downtown Davenport, Iowa, fitting men with these really high-end suits, all that stuff. Talk about learning service—how to serve that high-end clientele, that sort of thing. It was sales, too—I had to sell merchandise. I had to convince these stingy old guys to buy this stuff. It’s fun to rehash that at this stage in our career and say, “Wow, that really did help me out,” right? I love that story so much. I really appreciate you sharing that with us.
Sheila: Can we go in a little bit different direction? You’re talking about marketing. Marketing is very important, and it doesn’t come easy to a lot of us. Some of us have to hire out certain portions, and there are so many different marketing channels, plus having to have repetitive campaigns to be able to hit those channels over and over again. But what has worked for you in regards to marketing? Give me a little bit about branding. By the way, I’ve been to your website—awesome website. I really thought it was great. I encourage any of our listeners to check out your website at Sundance Window Cleaning. Just a really good model—very clean, easy to navigate, to the point. It was great.
Greg: Yeah, and boy, it took me a while to really understand marketing. I threw so much money out there sometimes just to see what would stick on the walls and got disappointed. It took a while to really get my head around understanding the principle of what you’re trying to accomplish with marketing.
With the basics, what you want to do is—Google is king in most cases, right? You’ve got to have—ideally you want organic SEO coming up in your market. There are ways to do that by having a good website, having everything tagged appropriately. This is where third-party, once you can afford it, to help support your SEO is important because there are keywords and videos and different things you can do to organically boost your SEO. I don’t want to get too much in the weeds, but at the end of the day, you’ve got print, EDDMs, you’ve got Google, you’ve got Facebook. It’s not hard to figure out all those avenues. It’s all out there today. The key thing is you want to track everything. You want to have a tracker. You want to have a list of all your marketing avenues, what your spend is. You want to ask every customer that calls you, “Where did you hear from us?” You want to capture that ROI on your marketing spend. That’s the basics of it because that then informs you of where in your market and what’s working and what’s not.
What I’ve come to learn over the years in trying different things—and I also used HomeAdvisor when I first started. It was a love/hate relationship; mostly I hate. I don’t use it anymore because what I hated about it was having to quickly answer the phone and be the first one and put up with all kinds of crap. So I don’t use it anymore, but it helped boost me. What I learned in HomeAdvisor was, after the first year, I’m like, “Why am I doing this? Why am I spending the money?” All these leads I lost…well, when I went and looked at it, I had a slightly positive ROI after that first year with HomeAdvisor. Of course, the light bulb goes off: “Wait a minute. As long as I keep those customers happy, the following year I get to profit. My margin will be good on all of those acquired new customers.”
The way I view it today is, when I’m in growth mode—even if I break even on the ROI or the cost of customer acquisition—it’s not ideal; I always want to do better than that. But even if I break even, that’s not such a bad thing because your database becomes your goldmine. When you acquire that customer and it’s in your database and you service that customer, you can then begin to market directly to that customer. Once you have a customer, it’s easier to raise your pricing on them than trying to get a higher price to get a new customer. So your database is gold.
So tracking your marketing spend… When I was early in my marketing days, if I had the capital, I now would have probably known to spend upwards of 30 to 35% of my revenue on marketing because I’m in that growth mode. I’m buying customers. I am going out and paying a customer to come on board with me to hopefully stay with me for five to ten years so then I can upsell them and raise prices on them. Part of my success was just massive customer acquisition every year. I can’t tell you how many estimates I run around and do every year—it’s crazy. Obviously, if you can do estimates remotely on Google, great, but I’m in a custom-build market and I prefer to be there. I get excited.
Sheila: Hey, I love that. You’re really passionate about that.Greg: Customers are everything.Sheila: I love it. I love it. I love it. Basically what I’m hearing is your growth plan was high customer acquisition, big marketing budget in the beginning, load up that database, then you dialed down and focused your marketing on that recurring revenue.Greg: Yeah. Once—I used to say, “Hey guys…” And I don’t want to—talking a lot about me, but I can’t speak to the success of my business without talking about all the employees that I’ve had over the years that helped get me where I am today. But I would tell my team, “Hey, once we get to that seven-figure mark—once we get to that million dollar—we’re kind of in that plane taking off, right? We’re burning a lot of fuel. You’re burning a lot of customer cost acquisition to get up to cruising altitude. Once you get to cruising altitude…”
For the last few years, my marketing budget dropped to even 5% because I hit a point in my seasonal market that outside of adding winter services, the growth always comes in my busy season. I want to cap out at a certain point and then focus on cost reduction, margin improvement. Once I got to cruising, my marketing spend dropped, and then I was able to leverage that cash towards better wages for my employees, 401(k), healthcare. That was a great thing to finally achieve—a certain revenue mark we as a team were trying to get to. Then I started adding benefits into my organization to share the wealth a little bit with my team.
Sheila: Wow, that’s great. On your seven-figure business, what type of marketing budget do you have? How much of that today?Greg: We’re hovering about 10% because being in a resort market, there’s a lot of turnover, a lot of people that sell, a lot of people that move. It’s a higher turn rate than more of a stable environment, I find. Over the years, Park City has grown so fast. When I first came in, I didn’t have a ton of really talented competition—there were tons of bucket bobs running around all over the place. But now I have a lot more competition that’s sophisticated, that has consultants, and they’re doing really good marketing in my market. So I have to bring my spend up a little bit on my marketing to maintain what I have. But we dominate, organically, SEO. That’s a plus I have as well.
Sheila: Very good. For non-marketing dollars—somebody just starting out and needs to start getting their name out there—what do you recommend?Greg: Doing what I did: door hangers and yard signs. That’s your biggest bang for the buck. Like I said, when I started my business, I would spend several hours a week, sometimes a whole afternoon if I had the time, just riding my mountain bike to neighborhoods, leaving it up against a tree, jogging to doors. I would blast hundreds and hundreds of door hangers on all kinds of properties. I even door-knocked a few times when I was like, “Okay, I’m ready to make some money.” So that, to me, was the best bang for the buck.
Obviously, you’ve got to have a Google Business page—get that organic SEO going, get a website, get keywords in there, get your services in there. You’ve got to start building that immediately. If you can afford to spend a little bit on Google ads, a little bit on Facebook ads, just to get your branding going in your market…
I saved up for my first EDDM campaign—Every Door Direct Mailing through the U.S. Post Office. It can be kind of pricey, but that’s one avenue to get new customers. It took me a couple of years to save up enough for that, and I didn’t do it right. You’re supposed to target a targeted area two or three times over a couple of months, and I broke even on my first EDDM campaign. I think that cost me 4,000 in a small market. But I got one big job out of it that I had for years and years and years, and it more than—Sheila: More than paid for your 4,000 investment.Greg: Oh my God, I saved up for two years, I spent 4,000, and I got one job out of it. But that job ended up feeding my business a lot of money.
Sheila: I love that. I love that. I don’t know about HomeAdvisor anymore—the buying leads. I learned something a long time ago—and we won’t stay on that, but I did it for a short while as well, and it felt very cutthroat. I kind of got to the point where I thought, “I don’t even want to compete with these guys. I’m better than this,” so I just…
Paying for a lead—I learned something a long time ago from a colleague: a referral is sending someone you care about to someone you trust. And I’ve always believed that when you build that trust with people organically—because I’m sure that you have this because of the type of person you are and the type of culture you probably have in your company—you probably have a lot of existing client referrals.Greg: Yeah, and I should add that to the marketing. When I was smaller, I was on every single job, and if my customers were home, I always tried to strike up a short conversation, get to know them a little bit, be really friendly, and then not be afraid to ask them for the referral. I would just say, “Look, I’m starting up this business, I’m trying to grow it, it’s a tough market. Anything you could do to help me—tell any of your friends or neighbors about me—I would really appreciate it.” It doesn’t hurt to ask, and you’d be surprised if you put it like that how many people are willing to help you out, especially when you’re first getting off the ground.
Sheila: Yeah, I agree. Making it part of your end-of-job procedure for your technicians… It’s a question; it’s an ask. All we’ve got to do is ask. What are they going to do—say no? “Hey, if you really love what we did for you here today, do you have any friends or neighbors that might be interested in our service, too?” If they had a good experience, they are so happy to turn you over that lead. That is the best way to grow your company, in my opinion. It takes longer, but when that lead comes to you, there’s already a sense of trust. You’re not competing with the other guys; you’re not having to worry about your price as much. You’re able to put your best foot forward and be like, “Okay, well, so-and-so referred me, so here, I’ll do the same thing for you.” Usually they’re high-margin jobs because people are just willing to do business with you because they trust you.
Greg: Right.Sheila: Greg, we have covered so many really cool things today, and I love learning your story. I love that we went down the marketing path, too, because marketing—it’s a grind in itself, right? Trying to figure it all out. Everybody comes at you: “Do this, do that.” You could spend a lot of money. It’s really great that you shared your marketing experience, and you gave some very direct solutions for our listeners. I really appreciate that.
Are there any final thoughts you have as we wrap up today’s podcast?Greg: Yeah, just kind of on that marketing note, probably one other thing I’d add is try to be proactive. I used to be reactive: “Oh no, it’s slowing down in August. Oh my God, quick, let’s send some postcards out, pay for a Google ad.” No—look in advance a couple of months before gutter season, a couple of months before window cleaning, a couple of months before your pressure washing. Be ahead of it. Get it ready, get your materials ready, get your print ready, get everything set up, and launch it in advance. Be proactive in your marketing, not reactive. That’s one other thing I thought of.
Sheila: No, that’s fantastic, and I love where you’re going with that because it really starts with how much money do we want to… You’ve got to spend money to make money, unfortunately. That’s why you do as much footwork and referrals early to build up momentum, and then save some of that profit to reinvest back into marketing, right?Greg: Exactly.Sheila: Because it’s that percentage of revenue—we have to decide what type of mode are we in? Are we really trying to grow this year, or are we wanting to do it maybe a little bit more organically? Whatever that looks like. Coming up with that revenue and then backing it into what is that specific market you want to serve, and what is that potential there, and then how are you going to get to them through the marketing channels? And then knowing that you need to hit them up several times throughout the year for that repetitive branding. At that point you’re just building out a calendar. If you follow your calendar—like we all do as business owners—you can stay on track with that. Really, you’re kind of beginning with the end in mind and then backing it into a plan.
Greg: Exactly.Sheila: I love it. Such good stuff. I’m thankful—thank you for leaving us with that final marketing tip. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know you better today, Greg.Greg: Yeah, well, thanks for having me, Sheila. It’s fun. I get excited talking about the business. I guess my final thing is yeah, thank God for America. Thank God for the opportunity where we all have a chance to live the American dream and to go for it and put it all out there. I just wish all of the folks that watch or listen to this absolute success. Just believe in yourself, put in the work, don’t give up, get mentors, listen to good people—just go for it.
All of the pain—it’s temporary. Every time you’re faced with a problem, it’s just an opportunity to get stronger. It’ll change your life, and success will come, and it opens up doors. Early on I was like, “Oh, how did I walk away from that paycheck every two weeks I had coming in?” Now I’m like, “Man, I would never go back.” There’s not a problem in the world that can come along that would stop me from being in this world. It’s the best thing. God bless America, man. I’m telling you.
Sheila: Your passion is absolutely contagious. Even me—I’ve kind of had a rough day today, but you’ve got me feeling really good, Greg. I love it! I think our listeners are probably feeling really good, too, and I really appreciate those words of inspiration because we need that. We all need it, and I really, really thank you for sharing that today, from the bottom of my heart.
Okay, well, we’re going to knock off for today. We thank all of our guests and listeners for learning some more about Greg Hiller. If you want to look him up, it’s Sundance Window Cleaning in Park City, Utah. Also, Greg, real quick, can we just do a quick plug for Busy Virtual Receptionists?Greg: Yeah, so part of the beauty of this is I have a little extra time, so I’m starting another gig—artificial intelligence phone receptionist. I’m in the process of building it, so it’s not quite done yet, but it’s going to be called Busy Virtual Receptionist—B I Z Z E—virtualreceptionist.com. Hopefully I’ll have it rolled out in a couple of months, and basically it’s going to do what a call center does, but it’ll just be an AI. They’ll be able to take appointments, put it on a calendar for you, lower cost, works 24 hours a day, gives you no grief as an employee, hopefully. Hopefully some of you can take advantage of that. Because when I look back early on—man, I love the call centers, but oh my gosh, the overages and some of the costs associated with having that call center broke me a little bit financially back in the day. I think the future is really AI receptionists, especially for small companies just getting off the ground—low cost, can answer the phone, answer questions.
Yeah, that’s part of the beauty of being an entrepreneur now—I can try stuff like this. So look it up—it’ll probably be out there in a couple of months.Sheila: Love it, that you share that. It absolutely fills a need, especially in busy season. To hire another person in-house or to go with VA or call centers can get costly, especially hiring somebody, and then to hire somebody temporarily, that’s payroll taxes and all that. So you’re absolutely filling a need. In busy season we could use—I don’t know how many “busies” we have to bring on, but we could probably bring on three or four easy in the next three to four months. That’s awesome! I congratulate you for the innovation itself and the boldness of starting something totally new in the AI space. That’s awesome, Greg.
Okay, well, thanks for sharing with us today, Greg, and thanks to all of our listeners here today at the Huge Transformation Podcast. We’re going to sign off, and we hope you guys all crush it.Greg: Yeah, thanks, Sheila. It was great. I appreciate it.Sheila: Absolutely. We’ll see you soon, Greg.Greg: Okay, take care. Bye-bye.
Sid Graef: Hello, my friend. This is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today’s episode. I hope you got some value from it. And listen, anything that was covered—any of the resources, any of the books, any of the tools—anything like that is in the show notes, so it’s easy for you to find and check it out.
Also, I want to let you know: the mission for The Huge Convention and for this is to help our blue-collar business owners like you and I to gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. And we do that in four ways:
Number one is our free weekly newsletter—it’s called The Huge Insider. I hope you subscribe. It is the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry, period—paid or otherwise. And this one’s free.
Next is the Huge Foundations education platform. We’ve got over 120 hours of industry-specific education and resources for you. And every month we do a topical webinar, and we do question and answer with seven- and eight-figure business owners. It’s available to you for a 1 trial for seven days.
Next, of course, is The Huge Convention—or The Huge Convention if you haven’t been. You’ve got to check it out. It’s every August. This year it’s in Nashville, Tennessee—that’s August 20th through 22nd in 2025. And it is the largest and number-one-rated trade show and convention for home service business builders. We’ve got the biggest trade show so you can check out all the coolest tools and meet the vendors and check out the software to run your business. And we’ve got world-class education and educators and speakers that will teach you how to run a better business. And it’s the best networking opportunity that you can have within the home service business.
Then lastly, if you want to pour jet fuel on your business, check out The Huge Mastermind. Now, it’s not for everyone. You’ve got to be over 750,000 in revenue, and you’re building toward 1 million, 5 million, 10 million in the next five years. It is a network, mentorship, and mastermind of your peers, and we help you understand and implement the Freedom Operating System. We’ll go into more detail, but you can get all the information on all four of these programs and how we’ll help you advance your business quickly just by going to thehugeconvention.com and scrolling down to click on The Freedom Path. Or, of course, you can find the links here in the show notes.
Sorry, I feel like I’m getting a little bit wordy, but I just want to let you know of the resources that are available to you to help you accelerate and advance your beautiful small business. So keep on growing, keep on learning, keep advancing. If you like the show, go ahead—if you would—go and take 90 seconds, give us a review on iTunes, then subscribe and share it. Man, it would really mean the world to us. It would help other people as we continue our mission to help people just like you and me. Thanks again for listening. We’ll see you on the next episode.

16.5: Bonus - April Host Meetup

 Hey, welcome back to the Huge Transformation podcast. Guess what? Today's a really fun episode because I got Sheila and Gabe here. Hey Sheila. Hey, Gabe. Hey. Hey. What's up Syd? What's up Sheila? Alright. Is everybody home or are you still on the road? Gabe, you were in Oklahoma City last week. What's up on the I'm back home before I get back on the road next week, but yeah, back in Nashville for this week.
And then is Sheila, are you, like last time we spoke you were just, you had just gotten back from an epic snow trip into Idaho, which is like right up in anywhere. Yeah. Idaho back country, yes. Oh, cool. It was fun. Yurt stays and. Wood-burning saunas and solar and totally off the grid with no cell phone, no internet.
It was fabulous. Tons of snow. It was great. Exactly what I needed. God, that's beautiful. I saw the pictures. How, how you, you mentioned it when we were, uh, texting how many miles you guys back? Country cross country speech. We were just having fun. I mean, we did like 26. Smiles, 27 miles, something like that.
But it, but there was a lot of, um, I mean we were pulling those, uh, what do you call the sled that you pull? What do call that? Yeah. It just, I don't know what it's called. Your gear is that all your gear on it and you're trudging and pulling that huge sled full of all your stuff. I mean, it was, I got a heck of a workout.
That sounds like a void. It was called a fun. Called a Yes. How far in did you have to, to, uh, pull your gear to get to the yurt? About three miles. Oh, we lost you, Sheila. Oh no, there's your miles. I'm back. Three miles. Three miles? Yeah. It was three miles. Yes. Not far. It was fine. Okay. Yeah. That's cool. And then Gabe last week, you're in Oklahoma City and from what I understand, you're considering moving there.
Is that right? Absolutely not. It's the flattest place on earth. Like literally it, there's nothing blocking the wind and dust. And so, uh, my flight got delayed 'cause there was a dust storm. And even when we went to fly out the, uh, stewardess said, Hey, I don't wanna scare anybody, but just make sure, double check.
You have a barf bag in front of you. Right. I. Um, and everybody was like, what? And it was because it was so windy when we took off. The plane was shaking as we were going on the runway, but it was fine. But yeah, Oklahoma City is fun. Cool little city, like a lot of cool stuff to do around it, but would would never live there.
Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. They kind of flat, great Plains, high Plains area. Um, I grew up, you know, close to Amarillo, which is. Uh, roughly the same terrain. It's not that close, but it's just, you know, we go, oh, it's gonna be windy today. What does that mean? That means it's 50 mile an hour all day long with gusts up to 80.
That's windy. Not like, that's when blocking the wind like nothing. No freeze. You can see, you look right and you see everything that's to the right or the east of you or the west, whatever direction you look. Mm-hmm. Like, I can't, I look in my backyard and I just see my trees. I can't see my neighbor's house.
Or like, whereas here, you could see the entire city of Oklahoma City. Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. So let's, let's catch up a little bit. So, six weeks ago was the last time we saw you guys. We were all together in Nashville at the huge Mastermind and we actually recorded an introduction to this podcast. This podcast in a phone booth.
We were like stuck in this little bitty, bitty phone booth. Bye. In the last six weeks. I mean, we've kind of, how seasonal is your business, Sheila? You're in, in North Carolina? Yeah. Uh, our, we have really four slower months, but my goal is closing in that seasonal gap. Right. And just being slam ball the heck of the wall all the time.
Yeah. Um, but uh, yeah, I mean, so January, February, and then we get a little slow down August, September because we have hurricane season, but you know. Yeah. It, it starts off slow the first couple months, and then otherwise we stay pretty, pretty solid. Okay. So you kinda, do you have, do you have a distinct spring rush?
Oh, big time pollen season. Okay. Um, yeah, we, we are entering from really April, mid-April, all the way through August 1st. Um, yeah, we're, we've got 300, 350 calls coming in the office a week. Wow. Okay. Yeah. Something I wanna loop back around to that in just a minute. Let me ask you, Gabe, so the majority of right hand rhino is, is storefront window cleaning?
Is there a seasonality to it? No. I mean, the springtime, I think it's a little busier because that's when people pay attention more or the patios are getting used more and the dust and pollen, especially in Nashville, is really bad. Like, I don't know if how it is with you guys, but you go outside right now and your, your car is yellow.
It's just so covered. Yeah. So, so yeah. But, um, yellow gold. I like to call it yellow gold. Yeah. It's, it's awesome because I, I think people do pay more attention to it, but we don't see any kinda spike like that that is Okay. 350 we get, on average, I think we get 53 calls a week. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, and it, so, and I'm in Montana and we get like, it's very seasonal.
So December, like we worked into mid-December this year 'cause it was pretty mild, but January, February, ain't nothing going on. Like the phone is not ringing. We have some winter contracts, but not very much. And even those that we have, you know, like. It's eight degrees or it's minus 10. It's like Yeah, everyone's just trying to not die, right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Surviving the winter. Right? But so, so we were at, uh, we were together at the Mastermind and one of the concepts we went over, not this most recent, but prior we, we talked about, we learned about total addressable market. Yeah. And then, you know, the past, um, mastermind in February, was it February?
Yeah, February when we were together. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Um, we are looking at strategic development and mm-hmm. On our other podcast, the huge insider, somebody shared, um, Mike Dalkey, he's like, when we ran blue skies, you know, $5 million, you know, winter Clinic company said, this is what we did every February to bring work forward and to pre-schedule and to try to fill, you know, like he was in Minnesota here in Montana.
You know, March is a shoulder season. It might as well still be winter. Because you might have a sunny day, but you might have, you know, eight inches of snow and it, you don't know. But I, I, uh, was so excited. We, I talked to my office manager and Emily and I'm like, Hey, I want you to do this. We always try to pre-book our, our, uh, all of our commercial work, like we do that in February.
And pre-book 'em. It doesn't matter when they book. We booked for the whole year. So all those big jobs are secure and they don't get, uh, you know, muscled out by the flood of phone calls when people start wearing their houses cleaned. And I did not check up on her, but I shared the, the episode of the Insider and like the end of February, I said, Hey, how's March looking and context?
Last March was our biggest march and we did like $52,000 of revenue. In March. Mm-hmm. Which to me is phenomenal because it could be zero. 'cause it could be, you know, frozen. It's so cold. Yeah. Yeah. So when I checked her I was like, Hey, how we looking? She said, we have 84,000 booked for March. Hey, good job.
Nice. Yeah. Oh. I was like, oh, that's amazing. So we just, between she and I, we didn't talk to the team about it, but we set a goal. It's like, if we can make a hundred thousand for March, that'll be, you know, a big record and uh, yeah. She ended up, she scheduled 102,000, and then the, the 31st was on Monday. We had a job on Friday for $2,500.
They canceled because they, they started construction project, so we're like, oh, we're, we're like $600, nine.
We finished the month at $100,060, so we, we beat the goal. Oh, you so beat the goal. That's great. Yeah. Not the, and then everybody got, we, we bought, um. I bought a fancy coffee maker for the cave, for the cave. That's our warehouse called the Cave. Um, it's like a $900 coffee maker that grinds and does all the, you just push a button and it's like Zo.
And, uh, day one, our production manager, he went from drinking two coffees a day to seven. He's like just living by the coffee maker. Going go, go, go. Oh my gosh. But so a hundred thousand. Everybody just drinks seven cups of coffee a day. I love it. I know it. We got a thousand dollars of coffee a day going down the go through the crew, but man, their production rate jumped.
I tell you that. Caffeine? Yeah. Yeah. That's exciting. Sid. Congratulations. Yeah. Congrats. That's awesome. Thanks. So, um, Gabe, I know you guys are in heavy growth mode. Tell me what's going on there. What have you, what have you seen, what have you learned in the last, you know, four to six weeks? Um, I think, uh, the value of doing something like, you know, taking the, the other thing Dalkey calls it, uh, is you know, your ip, like we're all generating IP in our businesses.
And actually using it. And I think like that's one thing that a lot of times even we, we fall victim to not doing is we know we should be doing something or we know this happened last winter or last December, um, but we forget, or we don't systemize or we don't make it something that that happens in Q4.
So I think like always trying to think through that is just super helpful. But the one thing that we did do really well was that a couple years ago. We got slammed in December by a lot of companies wanting to close out the books, and then they had these huge balances because their AP department is separate from the onsite sometimes.
And so the general managers hire us and they're just letting the bills rack up and then their AP department has to pay it off. Mm-hmm. So it was just such a mess, uh, for, uh, my office manager, for our admin, they had to take a ton of time, but also. We realized, hey, let's get on that really early in December and November because these people wanna pay their bills off.
So let's get like, let's get them caught up and let's get everybody paid off. And it's less stressful for them and their AP team. And so we did a really good job of that. So we, uh, we collected, uh, in every month of this quarter, in the first quarter, we collected more money than we actually even produced.
Because we were collecting Oh, wow. Stuff that was past due. Yeah. So it was really cool. March we collected I think 170,000 and we produced 150 or, or a hundred some close to one 60. But it was pretty cool. 'cause typically in our business there's a lag. We never collect everything we produce. Yeah. On net thirties or net sixties, so Especially with storefront, right?
Yeah. I mean, yeah. Yep. It's all delayed typically. What are you guys seeing or what are you doing personally with your business with there? There's, you know, there's so much volatility in the marketplace right now, and like we had tariffs and everybody hated America and then they delayed it for 90 days.
But like, and we, I've saw, I would just watched my little stock portfolio go down 20% and then back up to, you know, like it's just all over the place. Um, with that kind of economic uncertainty. Like what do you guys think about that with your business? Number one or the, or just with accounts receivables, like how you're manage managing that?
Or are you doing anything to shorten the cycle so you don't have a lot of ar? Yeah, it's interesting. I've been trying to dream up this kind of tagline, slogan that is something to the effect of labor does not have tariffs. Like labor does not come with tariffs. Like spend your money at home, right? I mean.
I don't know what that looks like, but, um, we've heard it a little bit from our clients. And our clients are typically, um, retirees that are living in their dream home and, you know, so they're on fixed incomes and things like that. Um, so we're hearing a little bit, but I gotta tell you, we have a huge uptick, um, from collecting, um, credit cards upon booking.
Yeah. Um, so that we can charge like immediately when we're done with the job. We're selling service agreements where people are paying in full for an annual service agreement. Really? Um, we're seeing huge uptick in that. Yeah, I mean, we, we launched service agreements, um, two months ago. I think we've sold 20 plus right now, but I mean, Hey, I, I'm happy with that.
So we have a goal, um, uh, of selling. So each of my salespeople are supposed to sell 10 a month. At an average of $2,000 each. So they're, they're starting out pretty good. They're starting out pretty good. Yes. That's great. Would you mind walk, like, kind of walk me through the process or the, the sales presentation?
How do you do service agreements? How do you break it down? How do you sell it? Yeah, sure. Um, service agreements, really what we're trying to do is, it's a, it's a, to enter a service agreement, it's a minimum of four visits per year. And those four visits per year probably are gonna be quarterly. Some clients on the ocean front may want 6, 8, 12 visits per year just doing their, um, you know, ocean front, main view windows or whatever that may be.
But what we're doing is we're, um, when we go and do an estimate, we're doing a full site assessment, property assessment, and we're identifying all of the services that we can provide to that client. So we're giving them what they're asking for on that estimate, right? What they called for initially.
Originally, maybe a house wash or whatnot. But then we're also presenting to them a actual service agreement package that shows them how by us coming this frequency, they're actually buying labor hours instead of full blown service rates. So we're selling them labor hours at 95 to $110 an hour, and we're just building visits into that service agreement.
They get one big number and all they're seeing are these visits and what's being done on those visits, and we're trying to create a holistic cleaning package for their property. And, um, and then they have an option to pay all up front, which they get perks and bonuses for that. Um, they can do monthly billing.
It's all set up and it's, I'm somewhat spoiled because it's all a function of ServiceTitan. Okay. So we have the capability of doing all this through ServiceTitan, so it's. It's pretty trick. It's pretty trick. That's cool. That's cool. Yeah, and I'm really trying to incorporate, um, you know, being 25 years in business, it's like, okay, let's think, how can I reposition and think outside the box of just cleaning windows and washing houses?
Because I'm leaning into our southeastern climate, being next to the coast. We've got oxidation, corrosion. We have these, what I'm identifying as like these environmental threats. And so all my new marketing positioning is around these environmental threats and how we can build services in that help protect the long-term investment of the home.
Mm-hmm. I'm calling it our 10 x dream outcome. Um, and so like you kinda get the gist, I could keep talking about it for a while, but that's, um, it's something very exciting because obviously you're building recurring revenue, you're building, um, you know, great relationships with your clients. And you know, I mean, I'm always thinking about my employees too, and back to the seasonality, like how do we get these services when people don't typically call us?
We have to sell 'em. Yeah. We have to sell services in the off season and roll 'em into packages because they need things done at their house that time of year. They just don't know it. So yeah, we have to, we have to educate them. Right. So. Yeah. So that's a, that's a big new launch for us and we're getting ready to do a whole new creative and rebranding and everything around that.
Um, and this kind of re repositioning that I've dreamed up. Okay. Yeah, that's really great. And especially like if you're selling into the slow season, you know, like an ideal time to do that is when it's really busy and they're thinking, oh, I need to have this. Yeah, like selling wintertime, cleaning in April as a bundle or a, you know, a service agreement so that they've already said yes.
Because, you know, we have a hard time selling squat in the wintertime because it's winter. Nobody's thinking about it. Think about other stuff. Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's really cool though. Sheila, sorry to cut you off, but I just, I remember you talking about this idea, I think it was maybe a year ago or you, when the first, like the inception came up and you like had said, I'm going to do this and we're gonna reposition and this is what I'm thinking.
So it's cool to hear you talk about, like, you guys doing it now. Yeah. Thank God. Yeah. That's, no, it's, that's cool. No, it was cool for me to hear from like the, when you hear an idea. Just as in like the, the hatchling of an idea to now like executing and what you're doing with the service agreements. It's like, oh man, that's so cool.
Yeah. Subscription model. I mean, um, it's just, I feel like it just solves a lot of craziness, right? Um, to be able to automate things more and. Just to be able to forecast your revenue. I mean, who doesn't love going in and looking at the revenue you have set up in your future months? I don't know about you, but that's one of my very favorite reports to run.
It's like, where are we? Okay, what is the gap to where we need to get? How are we gonna get there? But I love seeing the jobs on the schedule ahead of time. Like there's nothing that gets me more excited than that. Yeah, for sure. So here's some cool, um, I was speaking to an accountant a year and a half ago, and we are talking about our regular revenue versus recurring revenue and the value of the company.
And this is what she told me, it broad strokes, this is not accounting advice for anybody but. Here's what I learned. That blew me away. So let's say you've got a million dollars in revenue and your, your EBITDA is 150,000, and hopefully it's more than that, but you got 150 net. And so as a business, you know, you own the business, it can run on its own.
You sell that, it's worth two to three times that ebitda. So just say it's worth. 450,000. That's it. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That's, that's nice. But that's it. She said if you took the exact same revenue from the same customers and made it monthly recurring, like a subscription model like you're talking about, and nothing changed, like million dollar, top line, one 50, bottom line, now it's worth eight to 10 times.
Woo. I like that. You go from four 50 to possibly 1.5 million. For the value of your company if you wanna sell it, just because you changed the way people pay. Is that crazy? Nothing else is different. That is crazy. Awesome. Yeah. So service agreements, service agree. You need to start marching. Yeah. Service agreements.
Yes. Yeah. Essays. We call 'em essays. Yeah. But, um, we've, we've started doing those. We, we do not have 20, we've sold two. So far since we started and, but it's like, I, I don't know that it's difficult to sell it because it's difficult sell or it's just 'cause we've done it a different way for so long that we're not confident that people should switch.
Yeah. Or they're just used to. What are you, what do you I think it's, I think it's scary to ask people, um, and you know, from a sales positioning, um, 'cause I can tell you my salespeople are scared to start and I have one CSR that's like, I still don't wanna touch service agreements. I'm like, well, we're gonna have to because, but I'm telling you, as soon as they got their first, like, yeah, I'll do that.
And sure, I'll, I'll, here's my credit card. I'll just go ahead and up upfront pay. Then now it's like, oh my God. We're gonna ask this all the time. No problem. So I think it's just getting over that hurdle and it is a different conversation because you are talking about long-term care and maintenance and, you know, it's, it's a different conversation and I think you have to build the value in that.
Um, but I'm gonna pull up, I actually have a service agreement dashboard on service type now. Okay. And so, yeah, I'm gonna pull it up really here real fast. I think I'm switching to a ServiceTitan owned company, by the way. It's called Field Routes, but they're Oh yeah. By ServiceTitan. Yeah, I think we're to 'em.
Cool. That's cool. Love that. Give it to your storefront. Is it all service agreement or is it just month to month? It's all month to month. Um, so we don't do any agreements, uh, I guess except for just month to month agreements. Um, but we have, I think 30% of our customers prepay. So I think we're, or close or we just surpassed the 40,000 a month in prepayments mark a couple months ago.
Um, so that was really cool. And you know, what was, what was helpful, um, was, I don't know if you guys have this with like how you guys are launching the service agreements, but I used to like, I. Uh, not paying attention to this 'cause I'm just not like a marketing guy and I don't think that way. And, but naming it, like giving it a name.
We used to just say subscription. Hey, can we put you on subscription? Yeah. And like at the Mastermind in July last year, shout out to, um, Kyle, uh, Kyle Ray from Austin. 'cause he said you should name it. And so we called it the always clean. Always clean program. A CP. Yeah. Uhhuh. And, and then we, we got rid of the word subscription.
Yeah. And we said nobody ever says subscription, say membership. And um, and I didn't realize how powerful that would be for my people. Like, I'm confident having the conversation I don't like, or, but for my admin, she is just crushing, putting on so many people on, on prepayments, on subscriptions. Because she's like, oh yeah, let me get you on our best program.
It's the a CP membership. You wanna be on this because you get X, Y, and Z. And giving her that name or that like title of it, just, she's rocking 'em out. It's been awesome to see that. That's cool. Love that. Yeah, that's very cool. And I like when you're so close to your business, like we did this, we, we kicked around two or three years ago, like, we need to get subscriptions.
And so we called it subscription then. Our company name is Spectrum. So we, we named it Spectrum Select like you could be on the Spectrum Select program. We thought that'd be great. And everybody's like, we, every time we bring it up, they're like, what is that? I don't get it. Like, it didn't make sense. And so now Gabe, we call ours always clean plan.
It's the acp, just like we just copied cotton. Like yeah, we tried probably five different names like Clearview. Co connect. I don't know. We had, you know, trying to make it catchy. Yeah. But nobody cared. And we, as soon as we said, always clean plan, it's like, set it and forget it. It's like the most convenient thing you can do to always make sure your home is maintained and people go, oh, I'm in.
That's it. Yeah. I mean, all two of them, we haven't had, we haven't sold 200, but the first two went. Love it. Thank God I never have to think about this again. It's just done. Yeah. Well, I'm looking at the dashboard. We haven't sold 200 yet either, so, but we're, we're in motion. We're in motion. I see numbers on this, on this dashboard.
We're, we're good. We're gonna keep rocking and rolling. That's cool. Um, yeah. I love that. Yeah. We're ours are clean and protect. Clean and protect service agreements, but. Um, I'm terrible when it comes to creative stuff like that. I either have to hire it or I have to, you know, chat. GPT is probably one of my best friends right now.
Right, right. Really great for stuff like that too. And so there, there are many ways you can do it in marketing world. Sometimes doing a catchy or making sure that you have alliteration. So it's the Spectrum Select or the Clearview Connect, whatever. Uhhuh. Sometimes that's right. And sometimes. It's just keeping it so basic.
Like if you go and a, a buddy of mine, big marketer, he said sometimes like if you're selling a horse, you don't need a headline, deadline, call to action, all that. You just go horse for sale, call this number. That's it. Yeah. You don't have to complicate it. You're like, you know when, when people have dirty windows and it's pollen season, they already know they want it clean.
You don't have to. Do anything. Yeah, you just go, we clean windows. That's, yeah. I literally just went out and trained one of my guys 'cause he's really good at talking to people, but his close rate is down and I had watched him on a couple doors and I was like, oh man, you just, you just gotta simplify it man.
Like it is maybe not as complex as the industry you came from. 'cause he was selling like some environmental service something. But, um, but yeah, it was just like, hey. You wanna get your windows cleaned? Alright. Like, yeah, we do a lot of the neighbors and so, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Years and years ago, well, 23 years ago when we started, we started with a simple flyer.
It was so ugly. I, I, I, I'm embarrassed to think of how those are the best ones. And yeah, it was like this stupid logo that like I made with Mac paint or whatever on old laptop, but it just said dirty windows we can help. And then Spectrum, here's the phone number. Fast estimate, whatever. It was just simple.
And it always, like, every time we distribute 'em, we get a one and half to 2%, uh, call, you know, response rate. People call Uhhuh Uhhuh and uh, like, and it's, we use the same message now, but a prettier picture and still it's a one and a half percent response rate no matter what. What was the best postcard you ever did, Gabe?
Best postcard. Yeah. Um, I don't think we've done any, we've never done mailers 'cause with the B2B. Okay. Whoever we, if it goes to the business, they typically, like the, the decision maker will not get that piece of mail. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Um, but I'm trying to think of one of the best pitches or something that we've done.
What about you, Sid? What's the best mailer you've done? While I think about our mailer. Okay, so it, it, it is not a mailer. It is one day, I, I had taken one of my vans to the car wash and it was early in March, mid-March, and I just thought, well, I'm gonna make a, a quick video and just put it on Facebook and promote it a little bit and just see what happens.
And I don't remember if we saw that this is a, a holiday or it's a made up holiday. It's clearly a made up holiday. March 23rd is National Chips and Salsa Day. So I literally, I stood on top of my van and did a face video of me with the mountains in the background. I'm like. Hey, one week from day, it's national chips and salsa day.
We know you love chips and salsa. It's my favorite snack. If you call this week and schedule the winter clinic, I'm gonna bring you a jar of homemade salsa and a bag of organic corn chips and that's it. I put it out and we got like 15 calls just from that, but one of them was a bank we had been trying to establish a relationship with for 10 years.
A guy called, and he is, we at that point, they had one big branch and we cleaned it once every year, and he's like. Let's schedule it in March instead of July. And I'm like, sweet. We went and I brought him his chip and salsa and he goes, you know what, we need this thing scheduled. And I was like, you need it twice here?
And he is like, no, three times we need it spring. And I'm like, fantastic. And then he's like, you know what? All the other branches, how often do you clean 'em? I'm like, only on request. We, we would love to do 'em. You know, like twice a year. He's like. I do 'em twice a year and they're like six other branches.
So that one bag of chips and salsa turned into a $900 job that day, but turned into a $9,000 a year contract for the last eight years. For less than $9. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Gimme that. Chips and salsa, we do it every year. We, we have so many that we give away now. We go buy salsa from this place by the gallon, and then we, you know, pour it up into jars and hand 'em out.
It's our big commercial contract. It's such a, such a great idea. I love that. Yeah. That is like, people just need a reason. It doesn't really matter what it is. Yeah. Okay. So the very first postcard mailer that I ever did was, you remember, and I'm probably WCR still do, does this, but you remember how like when you signed up for WCR R back in the day and like you had access to all their marketing stuff?
Yeah, and it had like the templates and all that. So I did one of their templates and it was. The spring cleaning checklist and it, but we modified it, so it's me, my face, like here up and I'm holding the clipboard. And then on the clipboard is like the spring cleaning checklist and I'm holding it like this.
Yeah. And we, we printed it on an eight and a half by 11. Postcard. Like a huge like regular sheet of paper size. Yeah. And we sent those out just to our customer database. Okay. Just to our customer database. And I'm not kid you customers, like I would go to clients' houses and they filed them away 'cause they were a regular size piece of paper.
So they would put 'em in their file cabinets and they pull. We had those things circulating for years. I'm not kidding. Oh, that's awesome. For years. And so I thought like, oh yeah, mailers, mailers, mailers. I've never had another one that had that much hype. Yeah. You should do like a follow up off that like, Hey, if you still have this thing, you get a discount.
Whoever's, I really feel like it was the size though, because like they felt like it was big enough they needed to hold onto it or something. I don't know. I don't.
We got a, a mailer in our mailbox, I think it was two years ago, and I swear, like when I opened the mailbox, there's just this thing, it's just a, it's a letter with a handwritten signature on it, and it was from some tree service like. Hey neighbor, this is Bob's Tree Service, and we've been doing a lot of work in your neighborhood, and we're gonna be working in your neighborhood for the next week.
Yeah. If you need any, you know, any trees taken down or stuff taken away, just let us know. And it was signed and I thought somebody just stuck it in the mailbox. And as a business owner, like I went to call the guy and say, Hey, you, you know, you're gonna get screwed. The, the fines for sticking people's, you know, stuff in people's mailbox is obscene.
Um, you might not wanna do that. Uh, and then I turned it over. It was, it was a, an EDDM. Yeah. Every door, direct mail, but it was just a sheet of paper, thick paper. I was like, that is brilliant, because it, yeah. I was like, everybody's gonna pick it up and read it. Yeah. Good job. Yeah. Alright, love it. So let's shift gears a little bit and, and then, um, I do have to wrap it up.
So let's start landing the plane with, what do you guys have going on? Like, we're first quarter's over, we're in the second quarter in Spring Rush. What do you focus on? In April and May or a quarter two, generally, we were talking earlier about, you know, the, it's the same cycle year round. You go around, the same things are coming up.
You need to remember what happened last year, the year before. What are you focusing on now for this quarter? I, I'll tell you what I'm, oh, go ahead, Sheila. Okay. I'm focused on revenue, revenue, revenue. I'm focused on quality. I'm focused on creating the. Because we see the most amount of clients this time of year.
And from following that whole entire customer life cycle, creating the absolute best high class experience for them from the lead generation all the way through to getting them back on the schedule again. And so quality and just like turning. 'cause if I can turn all of these customers that we're getting ready to touch into recurring clients, like that's, mm-hmm.
That's my goal. That's my goal is to, you know, hit a certain percentage, turn 'em into recurring clients, make sure that all of them know about our service agreements, all of them know about how to rebook again, that it's just happening throughout that whole customer life cycle. Um, that's what I'm focused on right now.
Hell yeah. Okay. Gabe. Um, similar to Sheila Revenue, just looking at what we did in Q1. So the big thing is where do we fall behind? And if we did, how are we gonna get caught up? Especially because this is an easy time to get caught up where customers are thinking about it. Like we were talking about with the spring cleanings and the pollens and the patio washes.
So that's our big focus. Um, where did we miss, like in Nashville, we missed our sales goal per week. By one salesperson. We have two full-time and three, we had a third that would fall off and on. And if we just had that third locked in, Nashville would've hit its sales goal every single week. Mm-hmm. And so that's the big push right now.
And then I think, going back to your question earlier, Syd, like the economy and how people are feeling. Um, that's one of the things that we've been pushing in the company because I think. I think we could feel it from our customers. We, every January I, I typically see it where the end of the year and the beginning of a new one is when a lot of businesses we're all commercial.
So that's when a lot of business owners decide, we're not gonna do this again. Like December is like, we're gonna shut our business down. Mm-hmm. And so, um, I think in Q1 we had 60,000 in annual revenue cancel, and 30% of it was due to business closure And. Another 30% was due to people just cutting back expenses.
Yeah. So the big push for us has been, hey, like people are looking at their dollars and what they're spending it on, and we gotta make sure that they don't question the value that they're getting from us. And so we've been pushing, like Sheila mentioned, just, Hey, we gotta do a great job every visit. Um mm-hmm.
So that people don't start to think about, maybe they could cut this. Maybe they don't need to go without it if they're already right. Giving us their dollars. Yeah. Yeah. That's interesting. We, um, same here, you know, revenue. So like the, the biggest time of year for new clients to, like, the easiest time to catch a fish is when the fish will buy.
Yeah. Mm-hmm. And that's spring cleaning. And we've never been able to expand our capacity enough to take, you know, like to capture all the leads that come. We end up booked too far out and people are like, I had to call somebody else. So we're working really hard to make sure that we've maximized our capacity.
Yes. And one, one thing we're doing this year that's been pretty effective, we, one, we did a 15% price increase for all of our residential clients. And if somebody says, if they complain about it, they're not happy, like, oh, blah, blah, blah. We, we give 'em an option. Right? Then it's like, if you wanna keep your same price book now for July or August, 'cause that's when we dip.
We're like, we will not raise your price if you book in August. Mm-hmm. And plus in August we donate 10% of our, our proceeds to a children's shelter. So like it's a double win for you. And so what we are doing with that is if we can push off our spring rush, you know, if we put 10,000 into August, that helps August.
Mm-hmm. But also gives us $10,000 more space for people that do not care about price. They're new customers and they're calling in, they're like, we go, here's a quote. And they go, let's do it. Yeah. They're not price conditioned to a lower price. They're just like, that's price. Let's go. Um, and then figuring out how we can push capacity.
We've, we've get like our, uh, everybody on the team this year is required to be on call one Saturday a month. So that gives us eight more days Yep. Of cleaning it for April, may, and June that we can push more capacity so that. Little things. We're having the same conversations. Yeah, we're having the same conversations and strategies in my company, Syd.
And it's like just coming in 45 an hour earlier in the day, like how can we just squeeze the most out of, um, that, and we, and having minimum stop charges this time of year is a no-brainer. Um, you won't go do a job unless it's X amount of dollars based on like, you know, what you just said. Um. Why, when, why, when you can keep the schedule open for that customer that's gonna pay your premium.
Why are you gonna book a $200 job to go do something? And we also took some of our services that we don't wanna do this time of year because we can be doing a lot of more lucrative services this time of year and just said, we just don't do 'em. Between April and July, I think it was said, um, May 1st through August 1st.
We just don't do that service and they're booking anyway. For later. For later. That's great. Totally. It's like, no, it's crazy. We don't, we just decided this is not a great service for this time of year and, um, we, it's better off at this time of year and they're just booking. I love that. It's so we, I, hmm.
We tend to, I complicate stuff or I'll go, oh, nobody will go for that. And then you turn out, you just offer it and people go, yeah, that sounds great. Yeah, just do it. Hey, well, I'm gonna look at my crystal ball into the future over the next, uh, the next few weeks, the next six weeks. We, we've got episodes are already already recorded and coming out.
Uh, Sheila, your interview with Jared Skinner, you got Larry Benham? Um, Greg Hiller. Greg Did Gabe, or Sheila, did you interview Greg? I interviewed Greg. Greg. Okay. Yeah. Great. That was such a great conversation. Oh. What a good guy. Yeah. And then, uh, James Hatfield, he's the Chief Revenue Officer of Live Switch, that he's got a really interesting story.
Um, and then John Zen and, uh, Gabe, you interviewed him, right? Oh, yeah. I've inter interviewed John. Yeah. Yeah. What a good dude. Those are just, that's just in the next, uh, few weeks coming up, and then I'm looking forward to. More interviews, more fun, more stories about growth and transformation from folks just like you and I that like started with a bucket and a dream and then they got crazy.
Now they've got two buckets, like you're really killing. Yeah. Yeah. You're, I loved your conversation with Brandon Vaughn. Syd. That was great. He, he's such a great guy and, and like he's got a big story from. You know, one guy to 40 trucks or 70 p what? Like a lot of, A lot of growth and lot of pockets. Yeah.
And then when you talk to him, you go, oh, he's just a regular guy. He did that. I could do that. Yeah. Like, I thought you had to be super human to grow something cool. Nope. You know, well just have to know what to do. So, so I have one more que I have one question. Yeah. How do I get a cool background? Like you have a cool background.
Yeah. How do I get that? I, I will send you this image so you can use it for your, yeah. Okay. Does it show up forward or, or reverse type the way you're seeing it, right. Can you read it says the huge mm-hmm. Yeah. It's, it's for me to read Yes. Left to right. Yep. Yeah. For, for me, it's reverse like you're looking in the rear view mirror, reading it backwards.
I'm like, oh, what does it say?
This is the huge. Well, cool. Well it's, it is great to see you guys. Thanks for spending a little time for, uh, just to catch up. As the host of the show, we're always asking the questions and getting other people's stories. We rarely get to share our story. Or, you know, nobody's asking the interviewer. Like Sheila, like you said, the interviewers are interviewing the interviewers today.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't try this at home if you're driving. Yeah. Don't this, not that out loud, aneu. Alright, everybody's listening. Thanks so much for spending your time with us. It's always a ton of fun. Um, hopefully you find value even in a silly conversation like this because we're talking in real time about what's working now about.
Things that we're seeing in our own business and not just, you know, with the interviews that we do. Um, and also, you know, we're like, I'm, I was taking notes, Sheila, while we were talking about your service agreement and am like always learning from you guys. Thank you very much. Yeah, thank you guys. This was fun.
 

16: The Larry Benham Episode

In this episode of the Huge Transformations Podcast, host Sid Graef interviews Houston-based entrepreneur Larry Benham, who has spent nearly a decade in the power washing and soft washing business—and recently launched a successful trash bin cleaning service. Larry explains how he grew multiple home service businesses by leveraging relationships, seeking out commercial contracts, and diversifying his offerings. He shares his “Ross Perot” sales strategy of securing sales before equipment purchase, the importance of asking for deposits, and how simple demonstrations can reel in additional customers on the spot. Larry also reveals a unique fundraising idea—partnering with local youth sports teams to sell his services door-to-door—which quickly added hundreds of new customers. He emphasizes consistent branding, exploring new income streams, and always continuing to learn from mentors, masterminds, and peers.
Show Notes
Guest:
Larry Benham – Houston, Texas-based entrepreneur in power washing, soft washing, and trash bin cleaning.
Key Topics Discussed:
Transitioning into Power Washing: Moved from real estate to landscaping and then accidentally discovered lucrative builder contracts.
Ross Perot Sales Method: Sell first, then acquire equipment—don’t be afraid to test demand.
Asking for Deposits: Ensures clients have skin in the game and prevents wasted scheduling.
Diversification: Jumping into trash bin cleaning for recurring monthly revenue and potential franchising.
Unique Fundraising Approach: Enlisting local sports teams to sell trash bin cleaning services door-to-door, creating win-win community partnerships.
Working with Commercial Clients: Seeking municipality and commercial contracts for stable, larger-ticket work.
Importance of Mentorship: Consulting with peers and experienced professionals to navigate obstacles.
References & Mentions:
Ross Perot (entrepreneur and founder of EDS): 
IBM 
Bimbo Bakeries 
Alex Hormozi 
Marine Corps 
Founders Podcast 
John T (industry educator)
Resources 
The Huge Insider newsletter signup
The Huge Insider podcast downloadable action guide
The Foundations platform trial offer
The Huge Mastermind info page
Facebook
 
Transcript:
[Sid Graef]:Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Huge Transformations Podcast. I'm Sid Graef out of Montana.
[Gabe Torres]:I'm Gabe Torres here in Nashville, Tennessee.
[Sheila Smeltzer]:And I'm Sheila Smeltzer from North Carolina. We're your hosts and guides through the landscape of growing a successful home service business. We do this by interviewing the best home service business builders in the industry—folks that have already built seven- and eight-figure businesses, and they want to help you succeed.
[Gabe Torres]:Yep. No fake gurus on this show. Just real-life owners that have been in the trenches and can help show you the way to grow profitably. We get insights and truths from successful business builders, and every episode is 100 percent experience, zero percent theory.
[Sheila Smeltzer]:We're going to dig deep and reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our guests will share with you the pitfalls to avoid and the keys to winning. In short, our guests will show you how to transform your home service business into a masterpiece.
[Sid Graef]:Thanks for joining us on the wild journey of entrepreneurship. Let's dive in.
[Sid Graef]:Welcome back, my friend. Good to see you again. This is Sid with the Huge Transformation Podcast. As you can hear, I kind of lost my voice a little bit today, so I don't want that to be distracting for you. When you hear the interview with Larry Benham, I got Larry on the show today. He's a member of our mastermind. He's been in business for 35-plus years, but he's a guy that's not afraid to make changes. He had a career in real estate, and then he sort of accidentally got started in the landscaping business, and then he really accidentally got started in the power wash and soft wash business, at which he's done exceptionally well in the Houston marketplace. Then he added a new business line less than two years ago.
There's a ton to learn and glean from Larry. One thing I want you to look for is when he talks about the “Ross Perot Sales Method.” It's so simple but overlooked—and so incredibly valuable. I won't reveal what it is now; you'll hear it on the show. And again, everything we talk about in the show is going to be in the show notes. I appreciate you being back and listening. Please meet my friend, Larry Benham.
[Sid Graef]:Well, hello, everyone. This is Sid with Huge Transformations, and I have my friend Larry Benham on the show with us today. I met Larry only a year ago at the Huge Convention. He came to one of our mastermind visitors’ days, and then he joined the mastermind. It's really interesting. And Larry, I don't know how long you've been in business. You've definitely got a journey behind you. Your current business—Larry’s in Houston, Texas, and he's got a large trash bin cleaning company with…you told me how many trucks you had ordered. So here's what I'm going to do, Larry: would you fill in the blanks? I know you're in trash bin cleaning now—you've been in business for a good long while. Tell me, tell everybody a little bit about yourself currently. Then I'm gonna go back in time and see where you started in business.
[Larry Benham]:Okay. My name is Larry Benham, as it says. I am actually in the trash bin cleaning business in addition to soft washing and pressure washing, just like everybody else in the industry, it seems like. I've been doing this for nine years straight now. This is my ninth year. Sid was correct: we met just about a year ago, but that was my second convention at the Huge, and it is something I will never miss again.
[Sid Graef]:That's good to hear. We didn't run you off. We didn't send you down the flogging lane, you know, that we take people down—no. So you've been in the home service industry for nine years.
[Larry Benham]:Yes, sir.
[Sid Graef]:Tell us a little bit about your journey. Like, how did you get into home services? What were you doing beforehand?
[Larry Benham]:Well, actually, I've been in it a little longer. Many years ago, I was in the real estate game and investments. I sold my business and decided to sit back a little bit and then take time. I actually started doing landscaping and lawn yards again—just started cutting grass, bored, because I didn't have anything else to do. I took that company and grew it in three years from one lawnmower, one weed eater, a blower...and we were doing 486 residential yards a week, 77 commercial contracts, and we were handling seven homebuilders as well before I sold it.
Somebody wanted to merge with me; I didn't want to do that, and I ended up turning around and selling it. The main reason why I sold it—which really may be a good thing for other folks in our industry to look into—one of the homebuilders asked me one day if I would pressure wash a driveway. I said, “I don't even own a pressure washer.” I asked him how much he was going to pay me to do the job, and he said, “Oh, I'm gonna pay you 150 bucks.” I said, “It's not worth my time. Not going to do it.” These were new home builds, so basically all you're really doing is rinsing it off. He goes, “No, no, you're coming back to each house. You're going to do it four times.” I'm like, “So 600? We can do this.”
[Sid Graef]:Wow.
[Larry Benham]:I said, “How many houses?” He goes, “All of them in this community—just that one community.” They were building like 300 houses, I think. So I ended up just starting with a little itty-bitty one from Tractor Supply Company, and saw the writing on the wall and figured, “This is better than cutting grass.” And that's how it all started. I have one homebuilder to thank for opening my eyes to it. Then my single biggest customer still to this date is Bimbo, who gave me an opportunity for the commercial bids, and took off running.
[Sid Graef]:Wow. Well, one thing—that's a pretty exceptional first client: somebody that says, “We've got 300 of these.”
[Larry Benham]:Yeah, the homebuilder. I was actually managing seven homebuilders at the time, so I picked up all of them and ended up going from that little itty-bitty machine I bought at Tractor Supply to buying a trailer and just running all around and doing it. Then it snowballed and just kept getting bigger and bigger every day.
[Sid Graef]:When that happened, did you see it as a big opportunity, or just a good opportunity?
[Larry Benham]:I saw it as a really great opportunity. Just like everything, from the landscaping thing to coming into the pressure washing business, I hate to say it, but there are—someone pointed this out to me a long time ago—there are three kinds of pressure washing companies out there: there’s Chuck in a truck, there's contracts, and there's professionals. You work your way up, and you just become one of the top dogs. The opportunity is there. There's nothing wrong with competition, but you have to continually learn and educate yourself and make yourself stand out above everybody else.
[Sid Graef]:Yeah, for sure. What are some of the ways that—early on or now—you and your company with your soft wash and pressure wash stand out? What’s your difference?
[Larry Benham]:I guess we've been around so long, we have a good name here in the Houston area and beyond. A lot of commercial contracts, residential. When I first started, I did the builders and a lot of contacts I had. I was fortunate to get some commercial deals as well. Then even—I did the whole Angie’s List thing back then. I really figured that was the right way to go. It definitely wasn't, because you’re basically working for them. But then it was just word of mouth—keeping your commitments, keeping your business straight, and getting your name out there. As a matter of fact, I didn't have a website for two years when I first started pressure washing because I sold it when I sold the lawns, and everything. I let that one go, didn't even have a new one, and didn't have time to really sit down and do it. I was so busy with friends, family, and all the other business that was coming after us.
It was great—great times, and still is today.
[Sid Graef]:That's a great position to be in, where business is coming in fast enough and reliably enough that you don't have to stress about, “Gotta find some work, gotta find some work.”
[Larry Benham]:Yeah. It's so funny. I just thought about it the other day. I didn't do it this year, but last year, the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo is this time of year. They called me last year, two days before the rodeo was set to begin, and—ironically about this—they said, “Can you come see us to show you something, see if you can handle it for us?” And I said, “Okay.” I went over there. I don’t know if you're familiar with where the Texans play football, the NRG Stadium. Every year for the rodeo, they bring dirt in for the rodeo on the concrete. I was actually there when they just started rolling it in. I said, “Well, what's the problem?” They're like, “Do you see that dust cloud starting?” I said, “Yeah.” I asked, “When are they going to be done with the dirt?” They said, “Two days.”
They were literally running dump trucks straight, 24 hours a day, for two days—a little over two days—which created a dust cloud. They wanted the whole stadium, all the seats, washed down before the rodeo started. They said, “We're going to finish—” I had about 48 hours to get it done. Luckily, we had lights and we never stopped, and we got it taken care of. To be honest with you, 35,000 in two days is not a bad ticket.
[Sid Graef]:That's not a bad ticket. That's really cool.
[Larry Benham]:It was a great experience. It was a great experience.
[Sid Graef]:Most of your early business was built on relationships. Did that come about by an existing relationship, or did they find you some other way?
[Larry Benham]:A lot of existing relationships, but then a lot of friends and family were calling me, and my name just got out there. Even—a lot of people don’t understand this because I'm in Houston, but the coast is not far away. Maybe in the coastal areas or other parts of the country, they need to realize those beach houses have to be rinsed off every year. They have to be cleaned every year because of the salt air. I literally have customers now, for five, six years, I've never met in my entire life. We're on schedule. They call me, or I call them, and just go do it, send them a bill, and they pay it. I've never met them. That's a huge recurring business for us—it really is.
[Sid Graef]:That's fantastic. Also, there has to be something along the way that built and developed enough trust between that person and you that they trust your company to get it done sight unseen, as far as them not having to be there—you've never met them, you’ve done it for five years, and they keep doing it.
[Larry Benham]:Correct.
[Sid Graef]:Where did that come from? Is that still word of mouth?
[Larry Benham]:Word of mouth, yes. Now the website, obviously, is up and moving, and you're always going through hiccups with that—always fine-tuning it. But the name recognition is out there. I did do the radio for about a year, which even got me more phone calls. But it wasn't the best because some of the phone calls, I'd get a lot of elderly folks that couldn't afford to pay us. Or they all need discounts or help, which is part of life. You do your best to help everybody, and maybe I'm just a sucker because I do help the elderly more than anybody—I really do—because I understand the fixed income. If we have to take a little bit of a hit, we're going to do it for them, which goes a long way.
[Sid Graef]:It does go a long way. There's something I heard one time from an ancient text of wisdom that said, “Give, and you shall receive.” You're probably familiar with that.
[Larry Benham]:Oh, yeah, it's true. As a matter of fact, I did that today. I actually had a lady call me yesterday—or call in, or whatever she did—and I went over and looked at the house myself. They're an elderly couple, and they wanted the house cleaned because of HOA. I told her a price, and she said, “Oh, that's out of our budget.” I understand that. I said, “Well, tell me what we can do to make this work for you. How much can you afford?” She told me. So we're going to do the job for that. So it took a hit, but sometimes you just have to do that because it does go a real long way.
[Sid Graef]:That's true. That's true. Good. So along the way, you've grown a couple of different businesses. You were in real estate, then you transitioned to lawn maintenance and landscaping, and then accidentally but now very much on purpose into the power wash and soft wash business. Along the way, you added trash bin cleaning. When did you add that?
[Larry Benham]:Just last year. I just started. Yes, brand new for us, really. We got started with it. We sort of hesitated for about a year; I had a little bit of a health scare, so I got slowed down a little bit. But it is an up-and-coming industry—it really is—and I'm trying to captivate all of it here in Houston.
[Sid Graef]:Yeah.
[Larry Benham]:You know what it does—there's a lot of folks ask me, “Why don’t I do Christmas lights?” There's a lot of folks that do them. I don't care to do them. I think the guys need a break in December—that downtime—but also the trash bins are 12 months out of the year. It's a 12-month contract you sign with those who do it, so you have revenue coming in every month. And then we go back to the commercial customers a little bit. Municipalities always call us at the end of the year where they have to spend money.
But back to the trash bin thing—great, great business: recurring residential, and it just keeps building. The best single day was when I was still driving the truck the first two weeks. I showed up at one appointment and ended up—before I even moved the truck—I ended up doing five houses because they heard the truck, they saw the truck. So one neighbor called, another neighbor called, another neighbor called, and they all just started walking out. It's a very catchy thing. Right now, we have two trucks here, a third one is being built right now, and we also have our first franchise going in Miami next month.
[Sid Graef]:Oh, no kidding. Congratulations. That's great.
[Larry Benham]:That is great.
[Sid Graef]:I’ve been listening to the Founders Podcast—it's all about great business founders and their biographies, mostly U.S.-based but they're all over the world. Estée Lauder built, from poverty, a multibillion-dollar empire, and she said, “The best advertising will never, ever beat an effective demonstration.” And when you said, “I was cleaning one and then got four or five more before I moved the trucks because people saw what was going on. They’re like, ‘Oh, crap—do that for me,’” that’s a built-in, get-paid-to-market marketing campaign on its own. I like that.
[Larry Benham]:Matter of fact, the very first truck I went to pick up, I was driving it back from Michigan. I just got into Houston, and it was ironic—I had to call the maker of the trucks. I was laughing because there was literally somebody calling off of the advertisement on the side of the truck, and I hadn't even gotten back to my shop yet.
[Sid Graef]:That's so good. That's great. It seems you haven't had a horrible struggle to get more business—people call you before you even start.
[Larry Benham]:No, but you're always going to have to try new things. I'm not a real big fan of print ads anymore because people don't really read magazines anymore. Google ads do well, especially down here; they have done a really great deal for us in the trash bin industry. Believe it or not, Facebook campaigns— I always tell people, I believe in the Ross Perot method of selling. If you remember who Ross Perot was…
[Sid Graef]:I remember. What’s his method?
[Larry Benham]:Well, his method was quite ingenious. He worked for IBM a long, long time ago, and he left them and went on his own. He went back to IBM a short while later and said, “I need you to build me a thousand computers, and I want them built this way.” They laughed at him. They said, “We'll build them, but good luck selling them.” He goes, “Oh, I've already sold them. I just need you to build them for me.” So I did the same thing with the trash bin deal. A week before we even had the truck, we launched a Facebook campaign, and before the truck even arrived here, we had 128 new customers.
[Sid Graef]:That's fantastic.
[Larry Benham]:And of course, you gotta remember your current base and your cross-selling. That's the big thing about it. I have—what—6,700 current customers that I started calling, too.
[Sid Graef]:I'm going to back up and ask you a different question: you shared this with me briefly—we talked about it in the mastermind a couple of weeks ago. One of the things we were talking about was a revenue expansion plan. You've got this plan for growth, and that means more revenue—and hopefully more profits. You had a very unique thing that you implemented and tested this year, to great effect. For everybody else in the world: you know how your kids have to go sell candy bars to raise money for gymnastics or soccer teams? Well, you took a spin on that, and it's been very effective. Can you walk us through it? Tell us about it. Tell us what the results have been so far.
[Larry Benham]:Okay. As you said, all of our kids have had to sell something at some point in time, and they're not making that much money off of the product they're selling. I'm 61, and I remember selling those candy bars; they're still selling them today. So what I came up with is: why not help the kids get your name out there? What we've done is we've teamed up with a Little League baseball team—actually three teams. There's 30, 11 kids on each team, three teams—and instead of them selling candy bars, they're going to be out there selling our trash bin service. I cut a deal with them because we're doing a one-time special for 35 for two cans, and we're going to give the kids 10 bucks for every house they do.
Is it a high-ticket item for me to pay that kind of money? Yes and no. I mean, you're going to pay for marketing in any which way, but you're also helping the kids. So our first go-around, we did it—great success. The kids guaranteed me, and they've exceeded it, 300—and each kid, 10 clients, 10 customers. So we’re at 330, and I think their count right now is over 400.
[Sid Graef]:Wow.
[Larry Benham]:It's great. I mean, nobody's going to say no to a kid. Your neighbor’s not going to say no to your child who's selling something they want—I mean, no offense. The wife may want the trash can cleaned; the husband doesn't want to do it. It's a great avenue, and you're doing something for the community. It was my test market, and now I'm going to be pushing it to other schools and other organizations around here.
[Sid Graef]:I just think that's fantastic. The annual revenue for a customer, if they stay for one year, is…
[Larry Benham]:It’s 35 for one time, so the way I came up with this—and we thought about this in our original mastermind that I was at—you know, we wanted a 10,000 idea. For me, revenue-wise, that was almost 12,000. It'll be greater than that now. I don't even have a bottom-line number; I'll get back to you when we finally close the books on that one. But it's a great deal. Another aspect of it is—like in any industry, if it's pressure washing or soft washing or windows, you're driving from point to point to point to point. The best part is these kids are all in the same neighborhood. They all live there, so once you get into a neighborhood, you're there with all the kids and with all the parents. It's really a helpful thing.
So that's what we're doing.
[Sid Graef]:Yeah, I like that. That's fantastic. So I'm going to step into something slightly different because you've seen enough business cycles. I'm sure you've had times when you ran into an obstacle so big you didn't know how to solve it. Maybe you tried something that just fell flat on its face, you picked yourself up, moved on. What did you learn from that?
[Larry Benham]:I don't know if it was a failure, but it was an opportunity I can tell you about. One of the reasons why I went to the very first Huge was a couple of years ago, just to listen to John T teach about the garage business—the garage cleaning business. That's why I went. I wanted to see him and understand what it's all about. Houston has a very big market for that—had, let me say that—had a very big market for that. And I'm so glad because I came back, excited, and was getting ready to purchase all the equipment. It's a really big investment to get a division like that set up. That's when the commercial real estate just took a dive here in Houston. If I would have moved forward—I was going to spend anywhere from 250,000 to 300,000—I would not have gotten that money back.
It’s a great time now. We have parking garages here that you can get, and you do get, that are 100,000 a pop, but they're just not doing it when you’ve got a 15 percent occupancy rate. Downtown Houston has just taken a massive hit in general. I do tell people we have a firm policy—I don't care who you are anymore—we will not start a job unless we have half our money up front. I did lose some money on a property management company that I'd been doing work for quite a while, and one of their properties went under. I took about a 5,400 hit just on that one property.
[Sid Graef]:Do you get very much pushback on commercial contracts when you say, “I need half up front”?
[Larry Benham]:No, I don't. Don't be afraid to ask for it. Some of them, I will tell you, there's one at Bimbo—I'm sure you know who Bimbo is. They're my single biggest customer. I don't ask them for a thing because I've never had an issue with them, and they wouldn't do it anyway. But most folks understand—even individuals, we do the same thing with residential jobs now, just because we don't know. That's a valuable lesson because many years ago, I remember going out there to give an estimate on a house. I gave it and made a deal with one lady, and her neighbor was catty-corner, so we made a deal on both the houses. While I showed up the following week to do the job, one of them was done and the guy was on the other house.
[Sid Graef]:Oh, wow.
[Larry Benham]:The homeowner was kind of funny. He was standing in the driveway looking at it. I said, “I'm here to clean the driveway.” He goes, “Well, he made a better deal with us.” I said, “Well, you didn't bother to call me and tell me. I'm not mad about that,” but they just worked me, worked my numbers, to get to them. They got what they wanted. The bad part about it is, it taught me a valuable lesson right then: make sure people have skin in the game. If you're giving a number, stick to your number—don't cave. And don't be afraid to ask for more than what most people do. I'd rather have higher-paying tickets—fewer numbers, greater return—instead of having to run all around town. I can do five houses a day versus ten houses a day.
[Sid Graef]:For sure, for sure. Years ago, we lived in Florida—my wife and family—and we were window cleaning and power washing, and I started doing roofs, but I didn't charge enough. I was “Chuck in a truck.” When I'd sell a job, I'd just say, “We'll power wash your roof, it'll look great, it's going to be 900.” I was articulate enough, I'd dress nice, I'd get the job, but I didn't really have a technique. I sold that business to a friend of mine, and then I went with him on one of his estimates. He did the exact same thing I did, except he said, “When we do your roof, we have a seven-step process: we do A, we do B...” He described them. I'm like, “Why is he calling them that? That's what we do. We do the same thing.” But he said, “It's a seven-step process,” and his price was triple what I charged, and they said yes to him faster than I'd ever gotten a yes. Then he said, “We need a 50 percent deposit in order to schedule you,” demanded it.
Skin in the game, selling for three times as much—I was like, “Man, have I been missing something big?” It taught me about sales and commitment. That's cool.
[Larry Benham]:I like doing it that way, very much so.
[Sid Graef]:Okay, good. During the course of what we've talked about, your businesses—I can't say they've grown themselves, but you've done things in a principled way, so they've grown with your impetus but kind of on their own. It sounds like you haven't had horrible struggles to get more business. People call you before you even start. I'm sure there's something else along the way, so let's get into that bigger question. We can’t always control the market or the economy. Storms come and go. You can only control what you do. You can advertise more, you can ask for referrals, but you can't control a huge recession if it comes. From your perspective, you've at least been through the real estate burst and crash from 2008, and other gyrations in the last 20 years. What's your perspective on, “When stuff happens, how do you respond?”
[Larry Benham]:I hate to say it like the old Marine Corps saying, “Adapt and overcome.” You have to figure out what's going to make you better and keep you afloat when you see these hard times coming. That's one reason—honestly—why you shouldn't be afraid to diversify into another field. Going back to COVID for a second: COVID was devastating to the world, but unfortunately, a lot of folks lost their job. A lot of folks went to Home Depot and Lowe’s and bought pressure washers. Did they hurt me personally? Nah. But did they hurt some other folks? Sure, because you had folks wanting or needing to get their houses cleaned; more folks were home, more folks saw things that needed to be done, so they wanted it done. But then you were competing against guys saying, “A hundred bucks.” That’s just not us. Hold your guns, and if you have to diversify and figure out another way to keep a stream of income coming in—maybe a lower ticket item. People are not going to spend two or three thousand to have their house cleaned, but will people turn around and spend 35 to have their trash can cleaned? Sure, they'll do that. Think outside the box—really think outside the box. Don't be stuck on “I have to get more of this job or that job.” Think of other ways you can actually bring more income to yourself.
[Sid Graef]:Very good. In that context, you said you've got your first franchise starting in Florida—you said Miami.
[Larry Benham]:Yes, sir.
[Sid Graef]:When is that officially open? You've got a truck order on the way…
[Larry Benham]:The truck is being wrapped, I think, next week. It'll be up and running in probably two weeks maximum. The other thing is, I didn't really plan on franchising. They approached me about a year ago, and I said no. My whole thing is, I wanted to capture Texas. I wanted to have Houston, Austin, Dallas, maybe San Antonio—just be happy with it here. But then they came to me again, and I said, “I'm not going to open up in all these other cities. I've got four million people here in Houston; we’re doing fine.” Then they came in and saw me and talked me into it. It's something where I can grow the company and make other people money and have fun doing it, and not have the investment of opening other cities.
So it's a great thing. One of the things that we're offering and helping people with the franchise is, when you buy a franchise, you have to fork up some money up front, but then you also have to buy equipment. Unfortunately, I've learned this when I was doing trash bins—banks don't like loaning money to companies that are starting something. If you walk into a car dealership, they'll give you a loan because the car is there. Same thing with this industry. Fortunately enough, I was able to get my equipment, but I'm actually building one for the franchises. I've already got one sitting on the ground all the time for my franchise.
[Sid Graef]:Oh, wow.
[Larry Benham]:So I'll always have a steady stream of them.
[Sid Graef]:Great. As we wrap up here today, think of the guy…a lot of people come to the Huge Convention, they're newer in business, or maybe their big goal is: “I did a quarter of a million revenue last year, I need to get to a million,” or “I'm at half a million, I'm trying to figure out how to break that million-dollar mark or go beyond.” What advice would you give to someone who is newer in business and in growth mode but doesn't have the experience? We'll call him “Mr. Young Hustle.” He's trying to grow. He doesn’t know all the steps. What's your advice?
[Larry Benham]:Mr. Young Hustle is probably out there knocking on doors, going after the residential jobs. Those are fantastic—they're your base, they're long-term—but you've got to start searching out facility managers. You've got to start searching out folks with the city. Municipalities are everywhere, spending money every year, and they're always good for October, November, last-minute, “Spend that money before we lose it.” Don't be—I mean, yeah, that’s just how our government runs. And don't be afraid. I learned a long time ago, you’ve got to get ten no’s before you get a yes. Don't get discouraged. Wake up every day, grind at it, and pick up the phone. Call friends, call mentors—find you a mentor, find you a good guy that'll help you, teach you, and just listen. Always good advice. I have a gentleman I still listen to, to this day, and if I needed help or advice, I'd call him. I've called you; I've called John as well—calling for information. I don't know everything, and I don't know anybody that does. You've got to depend on each other, and that's what I think the Huge Mastermind that we do is fantastic for. There are folks I met there two years ago—the very first mastermind I did—that was fantastic. Like with the door-to-door sales thing—I know we're cutting or wrapping up really fast—but the door-to-door deal, I was apprehensive about doing it because I had the stigmatism from the vacuum-cleaner guys, the encyclopedia-selling guys, but there was a couple of different guys at the show you told me to talk to, and I did. They explained to me the whole process, and now we're launching that here next week as well. We have tablets for everybody; we've got a door-to-door program, and it is fantastic. There's even parts of that that I didn't know. The young lady asked me about something: “How many do you want them to sell every day?” and I really didn't have a clue of the numbers I'm expecting each person to sell yet. So there's still a learning curve every day that we have to overcome, but don't be afraid—pick up the phone and ask for help.
[Sid Graef]:Especially as we grow or mature in business, that's just such good advice. You have to constantly read and study your industry and not just the industry but how to run a business—what to do.
[Larry Benham]:One of my high school principals taught me when I was in high school: every morning, you wake up and write down your deals—what you have to do today. I still do it every single day. I have a list that I run off. I have three separate lists I run off every single day. Will you accomplish everything on that list every day? No, but you're going to delete some and add more every day. Have a plan. When you build a house, what do you have? You have blueprints. Same thing when you're running a business: you have to have a plan every single day when you wake up.
[Sid Graef]:Agreed. Agreed. Great. Well, listen, thanks—first of all, thanks for being on the show and taking your time.
[Larry Benham]:Thank you.
[Sid Graef]:Yeah, I really appreciate having you on, and really appreciate having you as part of the mastermind and your willingness to help other people as well, to help them grow along their journey.
[Larry Benham]:Thank you very much.
[Sid Graef]:All right, pal.
[Sid Graef]:Hello, my friend, this is Sid. Thank you again so much for taking your time to listen to today's episode. I hope you got some value from it. And listen—anything that was covered, any of the resources, any of the books, any of the tools, anything like that is in the show notes, so it's easy for you to find and check out. Also want to let you know: the mission for the Huge Convention and for this podcast is to help our blue-collar business owners like you and me to gain financial and time freedom through running a better business. We do that in four ways:
Number one is our free weekly newsletter. It's called the Huge Insider. I hope you subscribe. It is the most valuable newsletter for the home service industry, period—paid or otherwise—and this one's free.
Next is the Huge Foundations education platform. We've got over 120 hours of industry-specific education and resources for you, and every month we do a topical webinar and we do Q&A with seven- and eight-figure business owners. It’s available to you for a 1 trial for seven days.
Next, of course, is the Huge Convention—or The Huge Convention. If you haven't been, you got to check it out. It's every August; this year it's in Nashville, Tennessee. That's August 20th through 22nd in 2025, and it is the largest and number-one-rated trade show and convention for home service business builders. We've got the biggest trade show so you can check out all the coolest tools and meet the vendors and check out the software to run your business. And we've got world-class education and educators and speakers that will teach you how to run a better business. And it's the best networking opportunity that you can have within the home service business.
Lastly, if you want to pour jet fuel into your business, check out the Huge Mastermind. It's not for everyone: you've got to be over 750,000 of revenue, and you're building toward 1 million, 5 million, 10 million in the next five years. It's a network, mentorship, and mastermind of your peers, and we help you understand and implement the Freedom Operating System. We go into more detail, but you can get all the information on all four of these programs and how they will help you advance your business quickly just by going to thehugeconvention.com and scrolling down—click on the Freedom Path. Or, of course, you can find the links here in the show notes.
Sorry—I feel like I'm getting a little bit wordy, but I just want to let you know of the resources that are available to help you accelerate and advance your beautiful small business. So keep on growing, keep on learning, keep advancing. If you like the show, please take 90 seconds and give us a review on iTunes, then subscribe and share it. It would really mean the world to us. It would help other people as we continue our mission to help people just like you and me.
Thanks again for listening. We'll see you on the next episode.