Educate First, Sell Second | James Moylan with Design Builders Inc.

Meet James Moylan, owner of Design Builders Inc. located in Bethesda, Maryland. James started his journey in construction at just 12 years old, sweeping job sites, and has since built a thriving business specializing in high-end outdoor living spaces. He shares how he grew his company by investing early in marketing, leveraging strategic partnerships, and narrowing his focus to screen porches to dominate his niche. James also dives into the power of automation, the impact of a well-designed showroom, and the importance of educating customers to build trust and long-term relationships.

 

 

Here are some of the key takeaways from our discussion with James:

• Marketing is the foundation of growth
• Building the right team and learning to let go
• Owning your space and becoming an authority

 

Learn more about Design Builders Inc. here: https://www.designbuildersmd.com/

 

 

Own a construction company and want to share your story? Apply to be on an upcoming episode of Builder Stories at https://www.builderstories.com

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to the podcast where we take a deep
dive into the stories behind construction business leaders.We will share how they got started, how they
found success, and the lessons learned along theway. I'm your host, Eric Fortenberry.
Welcome to Builder Stories.
Welcome back, everybody. Today, I am here with JamesMoylan. He is the owner of Design Builders.

(00:24):
They are located in Bethesda, Maryland,right outside of DC.
Uh, James has, has been doing outdoor
living. He's, he's actually kind of niched down a littlebit. He's gonna tell us more about that. But
really excited to have you on the show.Welcome to Builder Stories, James.
Thanks for having me. Looking forward to it.
Yeah. So why don't you give us, uh, a little bit of background?I mean, who, who are you? How did you get into,
uh, into building and, you know, kind of what does,what does your, your company do?

(00:47):
So I started Design Builders in 2006. So we're coming up,kind of crazy, next year will be 20 years. Um,
I had a guy in my neighborhood who run adeck building company, and
I was the 12-year-old sweeping up the job sites on theweekends and the summertime. Uh, I went to
school for business administration, and whenI wrapped up, I went back
right to work for the company, looking for a job,um, and kinda got sucked in. Um, and

(01:12):
worked, worked my way up for a yearor so, then got my
contractor's license, started to do subcontracting.Um, and then from there, just invested
everything we made, um, into our website and marketing,um, to try to, to try to grow our company.
That's awesome. So you, you... It sounds like yousort of grew up, you know, just
being exposed to, you know, construction,and that kinda led to,

(01:34):
led to that lifelong interest, I guess. Uh,
is, is, uh... Do, do you feel like kindagoing through, you know,
college and, and getting that degree, Imean, like, has that
been really helpful for you as, asa business owner?
I think so. Um, when I started the company, I mean, I, I gotthe help of one of my accounting professors.
Um, and, and kinda it was my last year, I'd started to reallykinda think in it. So the last year in school,

(01:58):
everything I did kinda had a little bit
of, you know, "How can I use this to, to start a business?" Soit wasn't, there wasn't one little thing or-
Yeah.
... or this, that, or the other,but it was just
kind of a general knowledge and, and stuff that,um, you know, stuff that, that we,
we've run into. Um, but from the flip side, youknow, doing all the work, um, I, I
did all the installs for the firstfour or five years.
Um, all of that knowledge, you know, I think wasabsolutely invaluable as well.

(02:20):
Yeah. Awesome. I mean, I, youknow, I, I... It's,
it kinda seems like a, a, a pretty big debatesometimes, you know. Is, is that, you know,
college degree, like, really helpful thesedays? You know, I see so many
people who, you know, they, theyliterally just kinda grow up
in the trades, running the business, sorta just naturallyprogress and, you know, obviously, uh,
you know, you, you gotta sorta learntrial by fire and,
and experience I think ultimatelyis the, the number

(02:42):
one, you know, thing that will helpprepare you and help
get you, you know, ready to go. Butobviously, you know,
as entrepreneurs, we know that,you know, sometimes
we, uh, we just gotta figure it out as we go.So, you know, I think it's, uh,
it's, it's great that you did have that background.I, I found it really interesting
though that you talked about, like, you know,
one of the first things that you did is getting yourwebsite and your marketing set up.
You know, a lot of times people don't reallyunderstand, you know, the

(03:04):
importance of marketing and, and even
kind of can, can, can, can get a little confused about thedifference between sales and marketing and, and
how, how unique those, those rolesactually are. You know, tell us.
H- how did you, how did you get the website
going? I mean, did, did, did you figure itout yourself? Did you hire
someone? You know, what, what led to that?
Um, I mean, that... Like, that was always kinda the goal. Imean, that's the... To me, you have to have

(03:25):
sales. I mean, and we... It's kind of a
thing we continue to say. Like, the most important thingis sales and marketing. You don't have
work, you, you don't have, youdon't have a job. So
that was always pretty clear in, in, in, in the beginning,and why we made it, made it such a focus. Um,
initially, I hired a company to build out a webpage, and they took care of, like, the
SEO, um, when it was still a newthing. And, um, and

(03:48):
ultimately we got away from that, and
we just started to learn the differentmechanics of what they were doing. Um,
and started to outsource stuff todifferent people
to handle different pieces. You know,handle YouTube, handle
Twitter when it was Twitter, and Facebook and... Um, butmost of the stuff we, we, we did was, um,
build out our blogs and build out content,um, which is kinda similar,
similar to what you're doing now. So our, our entiremarketing strategy was just to contact

(04:12):
people in the industry, you know, your Trexes, yourTimberTechs, your Danbrook cabinets,
um, and create relationships with their, withtheir marketing departments. Um,
learn about them. We would set up a meeting likethis, a Zoom meeting, and, uh,
interview them. It would help us learn about theirproducts, so it would help our sales team.
We would record the meetings, andthen our marketing
team would take it and slice it and dice it, turn it intoblogs, turn it into PDFs, turn it into, uh,

(04:35):
call to actions for our website,um, and, and just
take that and put it all over the place. Andhaving, you know... After
three, four, five, six, seven, eight years, um, thewebs- you know, the website exploded.
Man, that's, uh... (laughs) That's,
that's, that's so smart, man. Like, you know, being ableto kind of, you know, leverage those other
brands, you know, and get their name

(04:55):
on your website, in your content,so that when other
people are searching, you know, they're in your area. Imean, that's, uh... I- it reminds me of, uh,
you know, something that I read about in, uh, you know,Marcus Sheridan's book, The Ask Your Answer.
Don't know if you've read that book. It's,like, one of my all-time
favorites. Highly recommend it. But, youknow, he, he talked about how
when, when he built the River Pools brand, you know,he started, you know, basically just
creating all these blogs about, youknow, all of the different

(05:17):
players in the space, even in his localmarket. Like, he would have
blogs about, you know, a- all of the competition,you know? And so, like, it, it
was interesting because, you know, you know, people wouldthink, "Man, like, there's no way I wanna publish
a list of all my competitors, you know, in
my area." But, like, what he found is that when peoplewere searching for any one of those
companies, you know, they end up landing-
They'll find him.
... on his blog post, you know, where obviously there was,you know, something about, you know, River

(05:39):
Pools but, you know, they, they would kind of
drill in and, like, now they'relearning all about them
even though they got... You know, they, they,they, they led to their site
through those, through those keywords and the
SEO and the content. So, you know, it sounds likeyou had a really good handle on
the value-
Was that the guy that called himself theLion or something like that?
(laughs) Uh, I, I'm not sure. I hadn'theard that, but, uh...
Well, I think, I think I'm familiar with thatcompany, and in the early stages was

(06:01):
something that we tried toemulate a little bit.
Oh, yeah. That, that would, uh, that, that wouldmake sense. I mean, they, uh,
they've... Again, he's, he, he really has, has set thestandard and, and I think, you know, even
what, what I learned an- and actually had a conversation withhim recently, like, you know, we, we, we used to
have, like, you know, all of this content that wecreated and we recorded, you know, these
meetings with our, you know, with our, with ourcustomers, telling them about

(06:22):
all the updates and everythingthat was happening.
But, like, we kept it, like,closed, you know,
just for the customers. And, you know, in
his, in his book, and when I heard him speak,he was talking about how, like,
you know, the, the, theimportance of, you know,
uh, opening up and making the best decisions
for what's best for your prospects and
the market. And if you're makingdecisions, you
know, because you're scared of your
competition and you wanna hide things
from them, well, ultimately, that's, you know,that, that's... You're doing

(06:44):
a disservice to everyone else and thepeople who are trying to learn
about you and find you, you know, they're-
That's right.
... they're, they're not able to. So,you know, we ended up
just opening everything up. We have,like, I think almost
500 videos on, on YouTube now, and it's been, it'sbeen a tremendous help for us, uh,
to, to have that out there. I'm, I'm, I'm
curious to learn how, how... You know, you, youmentioned YouTube and videos.
How, how have you guys leveraged, uh, videos?

(07:04):
Well, it's funny. So the, the guy, uh,that runs my marketing
program, his name's Tim. Um, he'sfantastic. Uh, when I first
started, again, when I was kindabanging nails and looking
for efficiencies, like, what, you know, whatcan I do to make this thing
work? Um, I got a cold call from Tim and he said,"Hey, I'm a videographer. You know, I do
this, that, and the other. Um, youknow, is there any
way that I can help your business?" Andthis was in, I think 2008.

(07:26):
Um, and I said, "Yeah." I was like, "I've beenlooking for a videographer." Um,
and back then, my plan and my goal was to
make a video so that when I went to a job site, Icould put it in my laptop on a, on a DVD,
and explain the entire company, the entiresales process. The company... The
customer could look at it. They would see metalking, explain the whole process.
I would be out in the back, take our pictures, take themeasurements. Um, so by the time that I got in, you know,

(07:51):
no small talk. They knew exactly how weoperated, what we would do.
Um, and we used a program. I can't even remember what itwas called. It was a super simple deck
drawing program. I would sit downthere and start to,
start to draw the program with them.Uh, but what we'd do is
super cost them. It was never a kinda one-time, youknow, one-time sale. But the idea was to
kinda get them locked in on us being the authority,being the most efficient, being the
easiest to work with, um, to try to, to try togrow, to try to grow out and, and, and

(08:15):
get the sale.Um, that evolvedinto YouTubes. It's
one of my biggest regrets. Um, westopped. We, we ha- did not put
more into our YouTube channel. We probably had 50 or 60 videosout there, but they're all from, like, 2009 to
probably, like, 2015 or 2016. And, and
we didn't quite get, like, what YouTube was gonna be.We just saw it as a way to, you know,

(08:36):
showcase everything we did, you know? So wewould take our blogs and
make a video out of it, you know? The best ways to planout a sunroom. The best ways to plan out a,
uh, to plan out a deck, you know? How touse an outdoor kitchen.
Some of the different companies that wewould, that we would
work with, like Danver, for example, we would goto their headquarters, um, and do
video of how to do the installs. And then just put in, youknow, put videos out all through the internet of

(08:56):
how to do the install, how to do the install. They actuallyused it for a lot of their, um, a lot of their
vendors. They would use ourvideos, send them out.
Um, and, and again, like you said, it's just,it's good information, um, to
get out there. You know, we, wevery much believe in
helping the community, you know, the deck builder area.I mean, it's, it's a bunch of kind of
smaller companies. There's not a ton of behemothsin it. So, you know, all the good

(09:16):
folks have a pretty good idea of the other
good folks in the industry. Andit's, um, it's nice to
share knowledge and it's nice to kinda,to grow together and
see, you know, see the stuff that people are building 'cause,like I said before, we got online, you know,
we used to build grandma's screened porch that youwould think of, and now it's an outdoor
living room, you know, that's, that families spend, youknow, time in and, and, you know, special
occasions. So it's, it's, it'spretty cool to do.

(09:37):
Yeah, um, it's, uh, h- have you... It sounds like you kindof, you put a lot of focus on educating,
you know, the, your, your, your customers,like, going into it and about
what it's like. I mean, has that, you know,
has, has, has that helped sort of, you know,
warm up the leads for you and, and ultimately it, itsounds like it kinda has created that,
that awareness and sort ofstarted to build the

(09:57):
relationship, whether it be, you know, from yourwebsite or from videos that they
found? I mean, how would you say that hasimpacted your ability to close them?
I mean, our number one thing we do is educate theclient. Um, I just had someone yesterday
called in. We did our meeting. I'll explainkinda how we do that in a second.
Um, they had just moved into thehouse two months ago.

(10:18):
And I said, "Look, man,
um, uh, I'll tell you what I would do.
You need to call me back next year. Um,
you need to live in your house. You needto know where the sunlight
comes in. You need to know what you're gonna do in thebackyard. You need to know what that
July 4th party looks like. If you build a deck or an outdoorspace right now, two month- y- you're gonna,
you're gonna screw the whole thing up." So
for us, even if we're losing business,we're educating the people

(10:40):
and then hope, you know, that'll justkind of pay it forward down
the line. I can't tell you howmany times we've
had those meetings with people, we don't get thejob, but they go out and they
talk about how great it was to do the estimateprocess with us. And we've gotten business
from that. So that's, that's really ournumber one thing, is just
explain, educate, and, and, and, and really,to me, that's what sales is.

(11:02):
Yeah. I, I, I love hearing that. Imean, I, I, I, I
wholeheartedly believe too. It's, it's, you know,being, being transparent, honest, you know,
do what is best for the customer at all times and that,that, that reputation, you know, will
w- (laughs) th- that, that will precede you. Thatwill come back, you know, tenfold over
by people sharing that experience,you know? And e-

(11:24):
it's like even if they didn't go through with it, even if,you know, they didn't do it, like, that
experience that you gave them by being, you know, a contractorthat they can trust, who shot them straight
instead of just coming in with ahigh-pressure
sale, you know? I mean, that,that really is so
valuable and, you know, as, as, as, as people want to try tosell, you know, larger jobs, more, you know, the,
the, the design build especially, more thought outlike, "Hey, this, this isn't just like a,

(11:48):
we're gonna come in here and, youknow, do this, this quick
job and you're gonna be up and gone." Like, I mean,this is a transformation of their home
and, and this will (laughs) affect their lifestyle and itwill cost them, but, you know, I think
being able to, to have that mindset isvery, very powerful.
That's right. That's correct.
Um, our, like, the way that we, that wedo our sales, I mean, our
very first meeting, we call, we call it'san online design consult.

(12:10):
Um, and, and it's free, you know? Uh,
we, in the ways before, we had charged, but, um, what wefound is it, it's just better to do it
as, as a free service. Um, instead of charging people,we qualify them by making them send
in 10 pictures of their house andtheir property plat.
Mm.
So to me, if someone can go through that,you know, go through that,
they, they don't need to pay me.They're a serious customer.
They're gonna go out, take 10 pictures, answerthe survey that we send out

(12:32):
so that we can give them goodinformation, and
send in their property plat, then I'm, I'mhappy to talk with anybody.
Um, and then our initial meeting, it-it's online just like this.
Um, and we get into the weeds. I mean,we talk, we, you know, I
look at their project before so youhave an idea of what
they're thinking about and, and whatthey're doing, and, and
we just give them ideas. We say, "Hey, you could,what do you... Have you thought about
doing it over here? What about thinkingabout doing it over here?

(12:52):
What about this?" And we pull up our portfolioand you pull up the different
brands and we can... And it's just aneducation system. So
we don't go into people's houseand do the small
talk and have that awkward 10, 15 minutesthat nobody likes and,
you know, you're out there and you talk,talk, talk, talk, talk.
You leave and you can't remember what youspoke about. We have a solid hour
of good conversation, deep conversation,answering really pointed

(13:13):
questions. Um, everything's documented and then wetake, you know, from there, uh,
we'll go to our design service and estimateservice, um, after that consultation.
That's awesome. So i- it's, you know, kind ofa, a Zoom meeting upfront. Um,
you know, no charge. But it sounds like
after that, kinda once you've, you've kinda
figured out, Hey, this is, this is what itsounds like you'd be interested in,

(13:35):
is the, is that next step, is there a charge forthe, the, the design and estimate?
We don't. Like, w- we found that if we get to thatstage, our close rate's about 80%.
Okay.
So we just, we just need to get them to that nextmeeting, um, and, and, and, and
they'll, they'll do the, they'll do the job withus. Um, and then in that next
meeting, um, it's online again, um, andwe have an estimate and a

(13:57):
design. So we start the meeting, you know, take everythingthat, what we spoke about, have a design
pulled up. It's not meant to be perfect, but at least it's,you know, pencil to paper, they have an idea
of what they're looking at. Um, and we givethem a detailed estimate and then
that is a detailed walkthrough, educationalized on what theestimate is, why you have this, why you have
this, you can do it this ways. There'sthree different ways to do
it. You can use this material, youcan use that material.

(14:18):
Sometimes it's better to do this, sometimes it's better todo that. And ultimately, trying to figure
out, like, what is going to be best for them, you know? Whatare their very, very, very specific needs
that we can try to solve, um, and try tomake it, you know, make it a
good space they're gonna use as much asabsolutely possible.
Yeah, that's-
And then from there, you know, if everything looks good, then,you know, we will, we'll do a, an onsite visit

(14:40):
next just as a kind of a handshakeand, you know, make
sure there's nothing that we missed, likea gas line or a vent or
something that we might not have seen.
It really never happens. We almost do that just becausepeople are like, “Are we really gonna do this
project without ever meeting in person?”
You know, it's people still kinda can't getover that hurdle, so it's really-
Yeah.
... just kind of a hi, how youdoing handshake.
Um, and then finally, we get theminto our showrooms so

(15:00):
they can make their final choices. Um,and then they can s-
Okay, so-
Go ahead.
Well, I, I, I'm curious. H- how long would you sayyou spend on that initial design?
Um, so I have, uh, I have someone that does that designwork. Typically, it takes her about an hour.
Okay.
You know, about an hour to put togethera design, um, and then
our estimate, um, and you know how quick it is todo an estimate in JobTread. Um,

(15:25):
so once you have the whole thing set up, I mean,you can have the estimate done in,
I don't know, 15, 20 minutes. Um, and,
and then it's re- and then it's ready to go.But again, it's not meant to be
perfect. It's meant, you know, it's, it's pretty detailed,but it's meant to at least give them an idea.
Sure.
Then they have an idea, budget. You can break the thing apart.You can make it bigger. You can make it smaller.
Mm-hmm.
You know, just depending on what, you know, what, whatthey're, what they're trying to do.
Do you ever get stuck in, uh, this, thisrevision, uh, you know,

(15:48):
cycle where there's just constant revisions and they'renot, like, kinda moving forward or...
So in, in our whole thing, we, we put in there, it doesn'thappen often, but we'll give them three revisions.
Okay.
So that's, that's kind of like there is alittle, you know, a little
thing they sign off on, but itrarely happens.
Yeah.
And typically, like, I mean, we're, we're, we've beenpretty good at catching the red flags
well ahead of time. And, and typically, once we kinda getto that point, you know, the final red

(16:10):
flag kinda goes up and it's, you know,typically s- somebody that
w- we call, like, they like to shopand think and dream.
You know, and then, you know, there's a small percentage of, ofthe people that come in, like, they don't have
intention of building it, they just wanna
play with the designs, and it's typically those folks.You know, once you get to the number
three, it's, you know, we, we, we kindacut beat just a little bit.

(16:32):
Sure. And so, y- you said that kind of after,after you've given them the, the
detailed proposal, they're comfortable,you know, moving forward.
Are, are you collecting a signature atthat point and kind of
getting that commitment? Or do you bring them to theshowroom, do the selections and then-
I, it's either/or. You know, we try to like, again,we try to... I read something a while
back. You know, people have heardof the golden rule.

(16:53):
Um, there's a book someone wrote, theysaid it's the platinum rule.
So, you don't do onto others the way that
you want to be done. You do onto others theway that they want to be done.
So early in this stage, we try to figure outlike what, you know, what,
how, how are they gonna..........................Some people wanna sign right away,
and boom, that's easy. Uh, we do it right through thesystem, digital signature. We've had
during COVID, I was signing the projectsin that second meeting.

(17:17):
Oh.
So I would do the first meeting, and I would
sell three projects a day. We'd do the secondmeeting and they'd do a digital
signature, and we're off to the races. Um,
after, you know, when things kind of got back to the normal,um, you know, some folks will sign right there.
Ah.
Um, but I, I'd say it's 50/50. Some people willkinda sign off in the, in the showroom.
Sometimes they don't do it in the showroom. Theywanna wait a little bit longer.

(17:38):
Yeah.
Um, it kind of depends on, you know, wehave some customers that
they wanna have everything lined upbefore they start.
Yep.
You know, every tiny thing lined up.
Yeah.
Some people don't. And that's what we try tofigure out. You know, the people that
don't care, they'll sign right away.
You know, we know that they're gonna be very easy to kind ofgo back and forth with, with adjustments.
The folks that wanna have everything lined up, they'repretty easy to pick out early in the stage.

(17:58):
You know, so you can kind of figure out thatthey're gonna want everything lined up.
And we take our sweet time with them and, youknow, and, and, and, you know,
have them sign when they're comfortable.
Sure. So bringing them into the, the
showroom. So, so tell us a little bit about yourshowroom. I, you know, again, I,
a lot of times people debate, you know,
should we get a showroom? Is itworth it? Like,
you know, how does that affect the sale?You know, I've, I've heard

(18:19):
people say like that's like the absolutegame changer for them. Like,
they get them into that showroom as fast aspossible. Like, what, what's
kinda, what, what's the background on you?
I mean, I, so our showroom now is only two years old. And Iwould say it's an absolute game changer. Um,
when I started the company a long time ago,
I, I wanted to utilize technology and not have anyemployees, no offices, have everything, you know,

(18:39):
online. That's why we did the online
meetings. My dream was just to kind of travelaround, do the, you know, the digital
nomad thing before it was a thing. And, um,
and, and, and I've, I've done that. You know, I've, I've soldmeetings, you know, on surf trips in Costa Rica
and Nicaragua. That, that was the idea. Toset the company up for,
for it to be flexible, um, which served uswell in COVID. Um, it, it, I
mean, it, the world came to us wh-when that happened.

(19:02):
Um,
the issue that, and, and again, sothat mentality, um, of
not wanting to have that physical base was alwaysmy hurdle of, of having a showroom.
Um, but our process was pretty, was really good. You know,we, we loved it. You know, the online meeting,
the proposal review meeting, and then an onsitemeeting. But there was like a gap.

(19:22):
You know, there was that final,it's like, "Hey, when
are we gonna do this project?"You know, like,
"What do..." You know, there was, there was that gap andthe close rate wasn't amazing. Um, and, and
couple employees came and said, "Hey man, Ithink we should do a showroom."
(laughs)
And I was, you know, against it atfirst. But, you know, I've
learned when, when the employees come and they got areally good idea, you, you listen to them.
Yeah.
Um, so, so we did that. And, and it's,

(19:42):
I think we have missed one sale of somebody comingin. So like I said before, like that-
Wow.
... peer, that proposal reviewmeeting's about 80%.
They come to the showroom, I think there's one lady that,that still, you know, is kind of famous there,
who didn't, who didn't sign off. Um, so once they getthere, it's, it, it's a done deal. But
the thing is, is it, it gives us alittle bit more credibility.
Where before, you know, we're kind of like floatingaround on the internet. So it gives us

(20:05):
a little bit more credibility on thatside. Um, it helps
the build because they can see everything. Sothey're not seeing the material
for the first time when it comes to the jobsite. We used to try to utilize our
vendors' showrooms, but trying toarrange a meeting and
go there and make sure, um, everything that we wanted wasin there. Now, you know, our online, uh,

(20:27):
setup and estimate that we have built out in Job Tread is thesame thing in the showroom. So we start at the top
and we go to, it's part number one, and hereare the different pieces.
We go to the next piece and it's thesethree different pieces.
Nice.
So that by the end of that meeting,
they, they know exactly what they're getting
into. They've made their finalchoices. Um, and like
I said, the, the close rate really,really, really goes up.

(20:47):
How, how big is the showroom?
It's about 2,500 square feet.
Okay.
So it's, it's, it's not massive. Um, we
put it outside of town a little bit to kind of save oncost. We, and we go there by appointment.
Um, so, uh, we use, we use HubSpot foreverything. We've been using HubSpot
for our marketing. So everything's automated. Everything'sset up with meetings and schedules. So,
you know, the, the whole sequence goes off

(21:07):
for the first meeting, goes offfor the second
meeting, goes off for the third meeting. You know,we don't really touch it and it
just, you know, we get a message on my calendar, "MeetMrs. Smith, you know, at the showroom
10:00 on Thursday." Um, and, and so we'll
utilize it in, in that regard. We're trying to find waysnow to leverage it a little bit more. Um,
out at the IBS the last week, talking to people and saying,"Hey, I wanna put your product in my showroom,"

(21:29):
had a lot more credence than,"Hey, you know, I,
I like your product." Um, so from that end, again,kind of from the marketing angle,
um, getting folks to get interested inus, um, it's, that's part
where we're kind of just exploring that part now. Um, butthat part I think is gonna be very powerful.
Yeah. That's, that's awesome, man. My, again, I, I, I continueto hear that the showroom is, is, is a huge,

(21:51):
you know, game changer for people in just like, again,like you said, it's you're no longer just
some internet contractor. It's like
you have a physical location. If,you know, if, if, if
worst case, you know, whatever, you know,
the, the fear of the homeowner is that, you know,again, they're gonna, they're gonna
make a deposit and then you'regonna, you know,
take their money and run. It's like, "Well, youknow exactly where I'm located."
That's right.
You know, "This is, uh, this is the headquarters." Youknow, it's, uh, I think that, uh, just

(22:13):
helps comfort people and kind of gives them alittle bit more, you know,
grounding in that, okay, this isn't just a fly bynight. This is somebody who actually has
a location that, you know, I, I know wherethey are. You know, I think
getting to go in there and, and, and touch and feel the materialtoo. I mean, it's, uh, that, that's, that's a
huge, you know, huge thing to, you know, if, if theydon't like how it feels, you know,
when, when, when they're walking on it, if they figure thatout the very first time that you're, you know,

(22:35):
you've just installed it, youknow, obviously-
You solved the problem.
... for, for better or for worse, like
if, if, if they have that bad experience, you know, it, itjust makes it harder for you to, you know,
be able to correct the situationversus doing it up front.
That's right.
So I, I'm curious. Can you tellus a little bit
more about, you know, you, you said kind ofearlier on and, and, and
we were talking about how, you know, again, you, you startedoff a little bit more kind of broad. Just

(22:59):
everything outdoor living, in the backyard, kind of the,the full experience. But it sounds like
recently, you know, or, or at some point, youdecided to kind of, you know,
niche down. Can you tell us moreabout, you know, kind of
what led to that transition? Like,did, did something
happen? Were you struggling, youknow, with, with this
wider array of, of, of potential jobs, and kind of how didyou decide, you know, where to go all in?

(23:20):
Sure. Um, I mean, it's, I mean, I think
a couple things in business that are, that aresuper important, and number
one is learning how to say no. You know, that, that'ssomething that's a big challenge. Um, and then number
two, um, just learning, learning how to
do,
uh, do certain things well or do something
very well. Um, so when, when I first started, again, theguy, the guy that I worked for, he built decks

(23:44):
but he, he was also a house framer so he'd kind ofhave like one house being framed
and, and build kind of three decks at a time.
So had, you know, had thebackground of like building
homes or typically custom homes. He was buildingfor pretty nice architects, or
building some kind of pretty cool homes andthen these kind of fancy decks.
Um, so when I started the company, we, we kind of didthe same thing. You know, and, and
again, kind of starting off trying tofind work. You know,

(24:06):
decks were always kind of our main, you know, our mainthing. That's what we're best at. But
we would take a bathroom. We wouldtake a basement.
You know, we would do an addition. You know,we've done four or five additions.
Um, we would do a patio. Any, anywhere to get work.Um, and as we grew the company, um,
we kind of continued to do that. Um, andas we grew the company
and you kind of start to look behind the scenes,you know, where are we making money?

(24:27):
What are we good at? What's causingus a lot of time?
You know, it became very obvious that
like we were not good at doing basements. We werenot good at doing bathrooms.Um,
we
were not good at doing patios, um, and, and just in the areathat we live in, um, their bugs are so bad.
You know, decks aren't, aren't super usable exceptfor a few times of the year. Um,

(24:50):
and we realized, like, what we're really,really good at is building
screen porches. You know, it's a nice enclosure, framed roof,um, and make it look like a living room. Um, so
i- it was really from kind of a, you know, alooking behind the scenes at
what d- you know, where are we making
money? What are we best at? What can we tell folks thatwe're the best at? And, you know, be honest.
Um, and then number two, back to the marketing, isjust being an authority on one thing.

(25:12):
Um, and, and back, you know, forever,our whole goal was
if somebody puts screen porch into this area,we would come up for the entire
first page. Not the first listing, notthe second listing.
(laughs)
Our goal was to have
the whole page and some of the second. Um,
that was, that was our, our entire marketing plan. Um, soyou can't do that if you're doing bathrooms
and you're doing kitchens and you're doing patios, but youcan kinda get it if you really hammer one

(25:38):
thing. Um, so it was, again, real, youknow, just from the
business side of what are we doing a- and
what can we be good at? How do we make money? And then also,like, how can w- how can that help our marketing?
Yeah. That's, uh, very, uh, insightful, like, you know,really, you know, analyzing kind of the,
the, the landscape, if you will, of your, your local market,you know. And f- you know, it sounds like y-

(25:59):
you sort of, uh, I think, took alittle bit different
path. I mean, you know, I, I gotta imagine there's, there'sa lot of deck builders out there, you know.
Yep.
But like you said, you found that there, th- this, this wasan opportunity for you to really be the, the
market leading, you know, and maybeeven only, uh, you know,
market specialist in these, these screen
porches and being able to build these, theseenclosures. I mean, you know,
great, great move, man. Like, that's,that's incredible.

(26:21):
Yeah, I mean, we're, we're lucky in thearea that we live in. Well,
I, I say that now. Historically, we've been insulated withthe, you know, with the federal government, so
you know, the landscape's changing a little bit. Youknow, that kinda remains to be seen, but
we've, we've been lucky that there is a, a
good market, um, of, of affluent homeowners,um, and having, you know, there
are a lot of other good builders in the area.

(26:42):
Um, there's a lot of good builders, you know, a lot of goodbuilders, but it's, it's, there's enough of the pie
for, you know, for everyone to kinda havetheir little piece, but
to add a little bit of the biggerpiece, you know,
focusing on that one, that one piece, youknow, real- really helps out-
Absolutely.
... to, to differentiate.
So what do you do when, when someone comesto you and, you know, they,
they, maybe they do want the, the, the, the,the screen, you know, the

(27:03):
screened in porch, but maybe theyalso want, you know,
one of those other things that, that you nolonger wanna take on? D- do you
just re-
So anything, like, anything inside we just say, "No, thankyou." Um, and, and we, you know, we used to
kinda play the referral game, but we got alittle, you know, it's,
don't love when you give a referral and, like,it doesn't turn out too well. So
I'm, I'm sure you've heard a lot of different people. Somepeople live and die by referrals. We, we don't

(27:26):
like to give out referrals just because it's ourname and, and, and, you know, we can't
perform the way that we wanna perform. Um, so
inside work we just say, "Hey,look, you know,
there's a lot of good folks out here, you know. Take apeek." Yep. And we recommend just go on your
listserv, you know. Find someone that's workedin your neighborhood specific
and, you know, you'll get a good person. Um,
outside stuff, we have a decent network of people that,you know, do good work. Um, so, you know,

(27:50):
patio type stuff, we have a subcontractor mason who'sfantastic. We don't do it in house.
Say it's on, you know, 25% ofour projects, but
we build a lot of screen porches on flagstone patios orpaver patios and they got fireplaces, so.
And the masonry stuff we'll kinda getinto a little bit.
If we're building on it, we'll useour subcontractor
and, and kind of put it all together.If it's a completely
different project, there's a good friend of minewho's run a company. They're called Four

(28:13):
Seasons Landscaping. They're great.
Um, he's somebody that I say, "Hey, you know, talk tothis guy. He'll take care of you."
Yeah.
And we'll pass work back and forth betweeneach other, um, and, and work on
some of these big projects that have apool and a pool deck. But
I don't wanna own a pool. I don't wanna have the10 years that deals with that, so
you know, strategically, um, you know, we'll push,we'll push that stuff off. As far as like

(28:34):
out- like, we do a ton of outdoor kitchens. A lot of ourporches will have, you know, a nice little
deck with an outdoor kitchen, and, um, you know, w-we do do the deck projects. Um, but
you know, it's, uh, most of the people when we dobuild a deck, we make the plan
so that they could potentially put astructure on it in the future
if they want to.
Yeah.
Um, and I can't tell you how many timeswe've built a deck for somebody

(28:56):
with that in mind and four years later they call us and we put aporch on it because they used it two times a year.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, I think that's a really good point that you bringup. I mean, 'cause, 'cause I, I do hear a
lot about how, you know, a lot of times, you know,people w- will sort of find, you know,
couple, a couple other, you know, companies in their areathat they, that they can refer out to, but

(29:16):
you know, like you said, it's, if, ifit's something that
you don't have a good relationship withthat, with that other, uh,
you know, contractor and, and, and you, andyou really, you can't vouch
for their work and, and the experience thatthey're gonna provide, it, it is a
risk to your reputation because, youknow (laughs) again, e-
even at the end of the day, even though they weren't yourclient, you know, they still interacted with you

(29:37):
and your business. And you know, I can't tellyou the number of times I hear
people are like, "Man, this person left mea g- you know, a review,
but I didn't even do the project or do
the work." And it's like, well, that doesn'tmean that they didn't, you know,
interact with you and that, youknow, y- you didn't
have, you know, that they didn'thave an experience
with, with your business. And so Ithink, you know, people
do need to be careful and, and make surethat they're very intentional
about who they refer out. And,and I would even

(29:59):
say, you know, especially early on when youstart doing that, you need to
follow up, you know, both with that, withthat, you know, customer as,
and probably also with the, the contractor."Hey, how did that project go?
Did something not go well?" Like, you know, ifthere was an issue, you know,
you being able to understand, well,
w- why wasn't that a good fit orwhat happened?
You know, I think that will sort of give you a lot moreinsight to decide, you know, that next time,

(30:21):
that next opportunity, d- do you wannasend them their way or not?
You know, and it probably is better to just sort ofbow out and say, "Look, you know, h-
suggest you go look online and go, youknow, find a contractor." But
you know, it's, it's a really good point that, thatyou bring up, James, about being, being
very mindful about who y- you know, you,
you do refer out because they are an extension of youif, if, if you made that referral.
That's right. And I mean, it's toughto get a... I mean,

(30:44):
you have a lot of happy customers, but it's tough to getcustomers to go out there and just talk about how good
you are. It's pretty easy to have someone
go out there and make 'em upset and have 'emgo talk about how bad you are.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, it's, it's a lot easier togo that way, so, um,
through the course of t- you know, 20 year- youknow, almost 20 years now, um,
we're, we're pretty cognizant of that and we tryto avoid it at any, at any cost.

(31:05):
Yeah. I'm curious, what's, what's like theaverage, you know, price of your project
and, and, and kinda what's the average sort ofduration of, of, of how long does it take
to actually, you know, do the build?
So right now, it's, it's rightaround 100,000. Um-
Okay.
... anywhere between, you know, 80upwards of like $150,000. Um,
typically a pretty nice room with,you know, screen
systems, infrared heat, televisions,you know, privacy

(31:27):
walls. Um, some of them will have other, you know, otherfeatures. Um, we, we try to keep our schedule
or as far as booking like four tosix months out
just to give us enough time for our, uh, for ourdesign process. Um, so we, you know,
right now we're booking I think for,for September timeframe,
um, which for us is, is good. You know, clientsdon't like that too, too much, um, but

(31:50):
you know, m- once we explain it to them, like, look, youknow, we have a month of kind of going
back and forth with the plans, you know, makingsure the material looks right.
We have the plans done, you know, they'reengineered, they get sent to permitting.
You know, that process takes about two
months, you know, i- if, if you're reallytrying to go back and forth. So
anytime we get to like a two-month lead time, it gets a l-you know, it gets a little nerve-wracking.
Um, so it's, you know, we haveabout a two-month
process for, for that piece. Like I said, we startthe project sometime between four and

(32:14):
six weeks, and then the build time istypically about five or six weeks,
um, for, you know, start to finish. Um,
almost all of our guys are inhouse, like the main
folks, the carpenters. You know, we dooutsource kind of niche
things, but... And that's something I'm sure you'veheard people kinda go back and forth on. I
think there's pros and cons to both. Um,
for us, having people in house so we can controland make sure that they're there

(32:35):
from, you know, eight in the morning
to, you know, to four in the afternoon and,
and they're gonna be responsible and, you know, take pridein their work, that's super important to
us.Um, but, you know, I also see that the pros ofsubcontractors, when you find a
subcontractor with that skill set and that kind ofmindset, you know, that's golden.
Um, but we keep our core folks in-house, and then kind ofaround the periphery, or if we get super, super
busy, um, you know, we'll start to, start tosub some stuff out to, to

(32:57):
bring the, to bring the lead time back down.
Yeah, well, so what is your... What'sthe full team look like?
So we have, there's myself, um, there is Kathy Ligor, whois, basically she runs, she runs the show.
Um, she's essentially the general manager.
Um, her daughter Jamie works with us. Um, she does, um,accounting and also does some of our
design work. Uh, we have Tim who runsour entire marketing

(33:20):
team. He has people under him, but they're notemployees. It's stuff that we, you know, that
we, that we kind of, uh, that wesource out. Um, and then
from the builder side, we have 13 differentcarpenters, um, that'll form about four teams.
So we keep about four, sometimes fiveprojects going, um, at a time.
Okay.
So not a- not a huge, huge team, but, like, we've,we've kind of strategically kept it there.

(33:43):
Uh, you know, we've thought about the
big ramp up and, and kind of going, but we've,we've kind of kept it here, um,
for, for the time being and, and potentially
look to scale further in the future.
Yeah. No, that's, you know, that...
I think what, what you said about, you know,really keeping the core in-house
but being able to leveragesubcontractors, you know, a-

(34:03):
a- around kind of the, the, the peripheralsthere and being able to, you know,
use that, you know, when you need and, and when you're in apinch or when you need to ramp up a little
more, I mean, like, I, I thinkthat's a great balance
of, of getting the best of bothof these worlds.
You know, a lot of times people do. They s- theystruggle to decide, you know. Do, do I
bring them in-house? Do I, you know,
leverage subs? And, you know, I think there's a really healthymix. I mean, obviously, you know, if, if you

(34:26):
start with them as a subcontractor, that gives you thatopportunity to, to kind of, you know,
get a feel for them, work with them, understand whothey are, test out their work, uh, uh,
if you will. But then, you know, youalways have the ability to, to
try to bring them in-house if, if you want, youknow, to, to, to lock them in and
give them those additional benefits. And, um,
you know, I think, I think that's a, that's agood mindset to, to sort of have

(34:46):
because it doesn't have to be, you know, allone way or the other, you know?
That's right.
It's kind of about, you know, managingthat, that healthy balance.
I agree. No, I agree wholeheartedly. It's,it's, it's worked well for
us. Uh, like I said, there's pros and cons to both,and, and having a little bit of both
is, is definitely, I think, a good thing.
Yeah. So I- I'm curious, you know, when, when you kind of lookback on, on this team that you've built. I mean,

(35:07):
you know, again, from, from anoffice, you know,
kind of the, the back officestandpoint, the, the design, the
accounting, you know, project management,estimating, all that. I mean, like,
how did you decide when to start bringingon those, those people? I-
I imagine early in the beginning, it was, itwas you wearing all those hats.
That's right.
And so, like, you know, a lot of people kind of struggle to know,like, when is the right time to bring on a, a- an

(35:29):
employee to focus on, you know, one of those
functions, you know? How, how, how did yousort of figure out that timing?
I mean, that's, that's tricky. Um, I
mean,
I wish honestly I had done it a little bitearlier. You know, I think wearing the,
wearing the hats, while you think you're kind of saving moneyand saving time, you know, you're really just,
you're burning yourself out and, youknow, you're probably

(35:50):
not being as productive as, as you,you could be. Um,
you know, e- early on, you know, after doing the managing,you know, Kathy was the first person that I
brought in, um, who... And she was brought in to do thebooks. Basically just kind of do the books. Um,
but she's the type of person that just...
She loves to work, um, and, and just kind ofgot herself into everything and

(36:12):
learned the entire company and just kind of kept going andgoing and going. Um, and we were lucky enough to
have her daughter, who's basicallycut from the same
cloth, join us, and she came in fromthe accounting. So they
both kind of had accountingbackgrounds. Um, and then
ultimately
the first one was referred to me from my accountant.And he came up to me and said, "Jamie,
you need to hire this gal." Andhe's like, "Y-
y- you just, you need to hire her." And Isaid, "Okay. If you speak that

(36:34):
highly, I'm, you know, I'ma bring her in." Um, so, sowe were pretty lucky in that regard.
Um, and then I mentioned, you know, with Tim,
um, I met him a long time ago when he reached out, um,with the videography stuff. And we had kept
in touch. You know, he basically was a, youknow, kind of a marketing
subcontractor. Um, you know, would justkind of piecemeal work to him
up until,

(36:57):
man, six years ago now. Um, so sixyears ago, um, I,
I, I brought him in-house, you know. He was doing video stufffor us, he was handling a lot of other stuff.
Um, I had a guy that was working for me
running our, running our HubSpot, and I calledhim and I said, "Hey, look. Um,
you know, I'm
not super happy with how, how this guyis, you know, performing.
I think you would be awesome for the job. I kind ofassume you don't want the job, but

(37:22):
if you want the job, it's yours."And he was like, "I
wish you had asked earlier." So he, he,
you know, he came in and, um, and kind of tookover, you know, that whole marketing
piece and, and kind of ran with it, which was super, superhelpful. Um, and, and then from there, I mean,
we've tried to u- you know, leverage, you know,leverage the technology, you know, from
inout. Like, BuilderTrend is fantastic.

(37:43):
You know, we were with a- another company thatwas, you know, somewhat similar
before and, and we switched over after they, theygot bought. Um, and, you know, just
learning those systems and just going
through each piece. I mean, that would be my big ad- bigadvice to anyone that's getting into this. Just
get the BuilderTrend, go into thedifferent sections, and
learn them. It'll change your business.
Now was it-
Mm-hmm.
Was BuilderTrend what you wereusing before JobTred?

(38:05):
Oh my God.
(laughs)
Keep... Dude, I say
it's the, it's the... We... Like, when we wereswitching over, we were using CoConstruct
and, like, we got switched overto BuilderTrend.
Yeah.
And we hated it. Um, and then m- Cathy came in. Shegoes, "I found JobTread and it's amazing."
And she's like, "This is what I wanna do,this is what I wanna do."
And I'm the jerk who cannot... Hecontinues to just m-
m- mix up the names because wehad, like, actually

(38:27):
moved over into BuilderTrend and itwas a nightmare.
I mean, it was an ab- Like, for a small company likeus, it was just an absolute nightmare.
We had to move us back out of it intoCoConstruct where we
had kind of lived until we, until we had, uh, had JobTread, andthen, uh, now we're building out that system.
Yeah, man. I think it's, it's never easy to sortof feel like you're kind of being

(38:48):
forced, you know, into anothersystem and, and, and,
and I... You know, I've, I've heard that same experiencemany times. It's, uh... You know, I think
n- nobody, nobody wants to be, uh, kind of
forced over to something and, uh, you know,
it, it can make it, it can make it morechallenging. But, um,
yeah. I mean, so, so early on though,I mean, like how did
you... Or at what point did you realize, like, youneeded some sort of a system? I mean,

(39:08):
o- obviously, you know, people kind of go at iton their own, paper, Excels.
You know, sort of doing it manually for along time. But what, what led
you to, to, to figure out the, the system?
Yeah. I think it was one day justlooking in our
office, like, around. We were just like,"What's going..." Like,
you got a whiteboard over here, you got, you know,spreadsheets over here. I mean, you're just like,
"There's gotta be an easier way to do this."

(39:30):
Yeah.
Um, and, you know, and then when we went
into it, the, the company was CoConstruct
and they were... We... I think we were one of thefirst adopters. They're a small
company, and it was just, it was verysimple, you know? It wasn't
super elaborate, it wa- it wasjust what we needed
but it, and it would just c- it would just
be one part of the business that they would, that theywould work on, just like you guys. Um,
you guys are... You know, afterthey got bought,

(39:52):
I think you were way better, but you're probably, you know,where they would have ended up, you know,
later on along the lines. They just solve problems forbuilders. So again, my, you know, my advice would be
go into JobTread and just start going through the differentpieces 'cause you guys have spent a lot of time
figuring out how to make, makethis stuff efficient
for us. And you'll... And it, it'll,it'll change everything.
Yeah.
It'll absolutely change everything.

(40:12):
You know, back to, back to Tim and, and, and themarketing and... You know, I, I, I
know we've spent kind of a lot of time talking about this,but I think it's such an important thing
because, you know, a, a lot of times,you know, people don't
realize or, or, or understand theimportance of having,
you know, that marketing and thewhole... You know, the
marketing automations that you talked about earlier.I mean, you know, a lot of people
come, come to JobTread and think, "We're gonnabe able to kind of do it all

(40:34):
and, and be the marketing CRM as wellas the, the project
management and estimating and allthat." And it's like,
you know, there's so much value in having, you know,those, those marketing automations
put in place and having, you know, that lead
funnel and being able to track that. Because, you know,especially for you, I, I imagine your sales cycle is,
is, is a little bit more lengthygiven the, the, the
size of your projects. And so, like, it isimportant that you keep

(40:55):
dripping on them and that you keep,you know, staying-
That's right.
... front of mind and, and making sure that you'recontinually providing that education.
You know, h- h- how early on did you, didyou kind of, you know,
decide to implement, you know, HubSpotand get that going?
We've been with him for a long time. Um,
again, 'cause with the SEO type stuff, I mean, wewere doing all this stuff manually.

(41:16):
Pumping out blogs and doing, you know, doing thefit, you know, it was just, it was
exhausting. So we're like, "Where... There's gotta besomeone out here that's gonna make this thing
easier." Um, and we stumbled on HubSpot. And
again, same thing, just like withJobTred, go in there and just
start going through their different pieces. They educate youon how to do it, how to set up your system.

(41:36):
And it's, uh, I mean, it was, it- it- it's like, it- it workson its own. I mean, we- we don't, you know...
The- the brand new world coming out now, AI, whichwe're trying to learn about, is gonna
ultimately kinda take those systemsthat we have and
kind of even, make them even more,more efficient. Um,
but, I mean, from the time that someone comesin, I mean, they're dripped
all the way through with call to actions and meetingsset up for all the different parts.

(42:01):
It took a long time to set up, but we don't really do muchonce we enter a name into- into HubSpot.
Yeah.
The last three projects that I sold this
week and last week, our initial meetings were 2001,2002, and the other one was 2002.
Wow.
And it's just because they've, youknow, we've stayed
in front of them with newsletters,other pieces, and,
um, and, you know, ultimately came back. Andthen, that's pretty typical.

(42:23):
You know, a lot of times, again, you know, giveadvice to people, "Hey, man,
take a year off." Anytime someone has a new house, live init for a year. And a year goes by like that.
Yeah.
You know? It's, it goes by really, r-really, really quick. So,
being able to stay in front of them is-is huge on the back end.
Yeah.
Well, I think it was, you know, definitely agreat, great move and, you know, your
h- huge advantage to be able to have anin-house person who- who

(42:46):
really, you know, is helping to manage all ofyour marketing efforts and-
and huge bonus that he is alsoable to do video.
You know, I think, I think that's, uh,
kinda what I would define as oneof those unicorn
type people where, you know, they- they-they've got, you know,
two kind of, you know, very, very distinct and valuableskill sets, you know, where they can not only
sorta manage a bunch of the process and-and kind of, you know, all

(43:07):
those different people who are involved, whetherthey're, you know, in-house or even, you know,
outsourced, you know, contractors, you know,subcontractors there, you know,
but also being able to produceand deliver that
value themselves. You know, that- that's- that'stremendously helpful. And, you know,
I- I think too, you know, we- we see a lot of times, and- andI'm, and I'm a big proponent of, you know,
having that- that marketingautomation system in place

(43:28):
and then being able to connect, you know, to
JobTred, you know, through Zapier or throughkinda whatever integration
means, like, you know, that- that reallyjust streamlines the whole
process so that you can automate everything.
And then I think one of the most valuablethings that, you know, I-
I talk a lot about, but I don't always see peoplekind of go do is, is to close the loop.
You know, in your marketing CRM, you, you know, you're-you're running campaigns and you know, you know,

(43:50):
did- did they come from an ad? Was it word ofmouth? Referral? You know, kinda-
Yep.
... what efforts are you doing to keep nurturing them? Butultimately, what you need to do is get those
final approved dollars, you know, back into
that marketing, you know, CRM so that you
know, you know, what was thecustomer acquisition
cost? What was the return on your ad spendlike? What was, you know, the
ROI of those efforts like? That really helps to- to close thatloop so that you know these are the things-

(44:14):
May thank you, sir.
... that are working, and let's go double down onthose. Let's go do more of those.
You know, and so again, kinda with some zaps backthe other way into the, into the- the
HubSpot or, you know, whatever marketing CRMthey're using, like, that is so powerful
to be able to make those connections. And I- I think havingsomebody on your team who really understands that
and- and- and- and can set that up is-
is so powerful. And- and for those of you out there who-who don't feel like you're in a position to-

(44:37):
to be able to bring on a full time person, like I- Ican't recommend enough, you know-
Yeah.
... go and find a marketing partner, you know, find acompany that- that- that you can hire today
who can bring that expertise, you know, and-and often, you know, uh, uh, a
whole lot cheaper than bringing on a fulltime person. But like-
Yep.
... as- as you've heard here todayfrom James, like
marketing was one of the very first things that you set up, andthat's just been, you know, this- this funnel

(45:00):
that has continued to play out. I mean,the fact that you had-
Yeah.
... you know, people from the, you know,
15 or however many years ago are still becomingcustomers. Like, that is like,
case in point the importance of continuing to
nurture, you know, these leads. Like, just 'causethey say no today, you know, or- or
you tell them no today doesn't mean that, youknow, tomorrow they won't be
in a position and they won't be, youknow, that- that- that-

(45:22):
that next customer of yours. Soit's so important.
That's right. And I mean, you know, you can lookat it and you can say, "Man, that
sounds super expensive." You know, you're running aprogram. I mean, HubSpot's not inexpensive, but,
you know, you're running this program and youhave a full time employee, but
we don't spend, I don't spend money on advertising. Likethat, like that is my advertising budget.
You know, very, very early on, I mean,we did the magazine
things and we would, like, pay for this orpay for that, and like,

(45:45):
again, we're a small company trying toleverage efficiencies. Like,
my whole goal is like, with anything we do advertising, if wemake it, it needs to stay out there forever.
Mm-hmm.
We can't spend $2,000 bucks on a adthat disappears.
Yeah.
It's a waste of money. We can spend$2,000 on a video, on a
blog, on this, that, and the other, and it's gonna beout there on the internet for- for-
forever. So every- everything we've done isorganic. We don't do any paid

(46:08):
ads. We don't do any Google ads. Like,our advertising budget
is Tim. Like that, I mean, that's it.And- and just building out
that entire HubSpot system, youknow, and- and
leveraging all these otherdifferent pieces. Uh,
so that- that- that's the advertising budget. It's-it's his, you know, it's his salary
plus HubSpot, um, and it's, you know, and it's been,it- it's- it's been very, very helpful.
Well, uh, and- and, you know, I- I'd say I think the-the- the strategic move you made to

(46:33):
enable you to not have to spend money on advertisingis by differentiating your offering
and basically being, you know, one of the onlykind of full focused, you know, uh,
enclosure, you know, screen porch. You know, like that-that, I think, really sets you apart where now
you don't have to advertise. You know, I think for thepeople who, you know, if- if you stay kind of
just decks or- or just remodels and kind of like, y- you'vegot a much more competitive landscape where

(46:57):
you go search for what you offer in your area and, youknow, there's a bunch of, you know,
pages of results. You know, that'swhere it might be,
you know, even more important to make sure
that, you know, you're- you're getting to the topof that page. You know, again, I-
I also agree with you, like, you- you gotta,you know, invest in the content
and continuing to put out content, you know,whether it's on a blog, whether it's on
YouTube, whether it's just continuing toadd, you know, pages.

(47:18):
You know, uploading videos and photos of- of allof your work. I mean, feed that
Google Business profile. Like, what a great-
That's right.
... phenomenal, free resource that peoplejust don't do as much-
Yep.
... as they should. You know, that'sso, so important.
I- I'm curious, how do you, how have you leveragedsocial though? May- maybe talk a little bit
more about, you know, Facebook and Instagram.
You know, what- what sort of investment have youmade, you know, being active over there?

(47:39):
So that's my, that's my biggestmistake. Um, I honestly, like
five, six years ago, I- I didn't quite...I don't think I got it.
Um, you know, I didn't see a huge... So we- we did it,but w- we just kinda did it to do it.
Um, and it- and it, we had built out our websiteso much that we were, we were
just kinda lucky to have, justleads flying in.

(48:01):
You know, it got to the point where, I mean, itwas, it was just coming in so much
because of- of how much we had doneover- over a decade. Um,
and we kinda rested on our laurels a little bit,you know? It was kinda like, this is
too, this is too easy, you know? Thephone just rings. Um, so
we're a little bit late to the socialgame. Um, you know, we-
we've had the, we've had the accounts forever,but... And that's been our big

(48:21):
focus. You know, now, you know, before, you know, I'm-I'm old enough to remember when like,
the cell phones took over the computers.
You know, when I first started in marketing, it was, you know,expert... I remember them saying like, "Five
years from now, people are, all of the ads are gonna be in, onmobile. You know, you gotta be ready for mobile."
And now, we're past that time of thesocial's past search.
Um, and search is about to get completelyjacked up with AI search. Um, so

(48:46):
we're
really, well, I mean, w- that's what I spend the majority ofmy time doing now, is trying to figure out
kinda what's- what's gonna be going on with- withthe AI search. Um, and then also,
really kinda getting into the, gettinginto the social. Um, so
now, I mean, we outsource some of that stuff.
Tim handles a lot of it, and it's actually somethingthat I've done to start to get back,

(49:06):
kind of back engaged and back out to the, to the jobsites. Um, just because I, you know,
don't make it out to the job sites asmuch as I would like to.
Now I'm making it a point and that'skinda becoming my
role in the company, is to go out there and start to pullthese, you know, start to pull these videos and
start to give a little bit more of insight intowhat it looks like kinda day to day-
Yeah.
... on a design builder's job.

(49:27):
You know, I think the- it- you do bringup a good point. I mean,
social hasn't always had the- the influence
and- and the power that it does today, and I thinkthat's one of those things that, you know,
a- a- again, you've been doing this for solong that it didn't necessarily
move the needle for you early on. You know, the- the- thething that I've learned too is that, like,

(49:47):
it's- it's very important to have, um,
you know, kind of really understand the differencebetween, you know, leveraging a personal
Facebook account and- and building the- the- kind ofthe personal brand, if you will, versus
the company brand. You know, we- we can go andpost the same exact thing on my
Facebook versus the JobTreads Facebook,and I'll, you know... So-

(50:07):
some of these things all get,like, hundreds of- of
likes, comments, engagements, you know, andthen over on the- on the
company, you know, profile, you know, maybe, you know, 10,20, 30. Like it- it's just, like, crazy
the difference. But I think the- the- the importantthing to understand about social
is that, you know, where people are gonna use it is- isreally kinda they're looking for that social
proof. They may have already found you, theymay already be looking at

(50:30):
you, and then they click and they go lookat your social because
they wanna see your work, they wannasee, you know, how
active is this company. If they go and theysee an empty, you know, social
page or something that hadn't beenposted on in five
years, they're gonna think, "Man, this-this company might not even
be in business anymore." And so I think it's about justthinking about you're chronicling the story
of your- your- your company and the work and thethings that you've done. And so, you know,

(50:51):
to the extent that, like, you can just, you know... Anytimeyou're posting on, you know, your- your-
your Google Business review, or your-your Google Business, uh,
page, or- or- or just anytime you'recollecting, you know,
photos and- and- and- and getting reviews andtestimonials, like, you know, you-
you've already got the content, you know.
You- you're just, you know, doubling down onit by posting it, you know, on
Facebook, on Instagram, on TikTok,

(51:11):
Twitter, kind of all these different
avenues. Like, I think it's just so important to kind ofbuild that into your- your day-to-day process
to make sure that you're maximizing the valueof that content. And, you know,
I- I- I'm also big- big believer,you know, the- the
Facebook groups, you know, the Nextdoor groups. Like,being active and involved in there is
such a great way. You know, that's where
people go when they're like, "Hey, I need arecommendation for someone," or, "I'm-

(51:34):
I'm looking at this type of project." You know,that's where you get, like, the
real time. You know, I don't think peoplenecessarily go search,
you know, just their generalFacebook, you know,
feed, because, you know, obviously they don't know whothese people are, these contractors.
They're gonna miss words.
Or, you know, or they would'vealready had that
relationship. So it's, you know, it's really about, Ithink, getting involved in those- those
groups and being as active as you can there.

(51:54):
Yep.
And, you know, I think for, you know, forus, I mean, the or- i- i-
until this year, we didn't spend a dime
on advertising or anything. Like, our entire growth, youknow, to- to over 5,400 customers has been
inbound, organic, you know, people just
word of mouth, people finding out about us, you know,from Facebook, from, you know, the- the
social sites, from, you know, the- the

(52:15):
reviews. And so, like, I think it's soimportant that, you know,
people do invest their time, youknow, in that, and- and-
and ultimately that, like, that it- it just- it creates thispresence for you, you know, both on your- your
personal side. And I go and I- I friend
as many possible clients as- as I can, youknow. Now, Facebook won't... Like,
like, maybe every, like, five friendrequests, you know, 'cause
I just friend the people who go torequest to join our- our

(52:36):
JobTread Pros group, you know. Like probably oneout of five they let me do is like,
"You don't know this person." It's like, "Well, I- Ido. They're a customer, but fine." Uh,
you know, but I- I think that's really helped
to build up that- that- that following and- and- and, youknow, people need to think about their-
you know, creating their personal brand,you know, in addition to the
company brand, because again, it's- it's- it's allabout maximizing that- that reach. So,

(52:58):
you know, I- I think social's huge, you know, I'm-I'm big- big proponent, and it's free.
It's absolutely free. You know, so.
I mean, I think a lot of it too is like,
I mean, look at... Everyone can lookright now how much
time they've spent on their screen, and a lot ofit's on that social. So that's where
people are spending just time, and ifyou're not constantly
going, you know, the rule of 27 in branding, like if you'renot constantly, constantly, constantly going,

(53:21):
they're not gonna think of you to putit into the search.
You know? So like, it's... To me, it'salso just being top of mind.
You know, it's more branding, it's not
super advertising, it's just being top of mind so that whensome- You know, when, you know, come home
for dinner and say, "Hey, you know, let's build ascreen porch. What do you think?"
"Oh, I- I saw a pretty cool ad by DesignBuilders, um, let's check them out."
Then they go to the search. So that-that's my- that's my

(53:42):
thought, and that's kind of the waythat I- I- I've seen it.
You know, I've seen it playing out and I- I'm- I'm- I'mwatching other companies, how they've leveraged it.
Mm-hmm.
Um, but it... For all the reasons for you aswell where if they find you on
search, all right, let's find a little bit more aboutthis company, um, you know, going to the
social and- and, you know, it gives them alittle bit more credibility.
Y- you know, too, I- I think there's, you know... There-there is a lot of research that says, you know,

(54:03):
social can- can- can cause, youknow, a lot of kind of
negative, you know, feelings and reactionsand- and kind of, you know, even
lead to- to depression, especially in young
people. But like, I think at the end of the day, if yourealize like that's entirely in your control
with the people that you friend and the people thatyou follow, like, you're building your
own, you know, the- your own content stream.
Yeah.
And, you know, if- if I didn'thave JobTread and

(54:25):
wasn't following all these, you know, con-construction people, like,
yeah, like I'm- I'm sure, you know, the...
My- my- my friends from high school and- and
college and who knows what, you know,
wherever else in my life, like, you know,
yeah, there's- there's a ton of kind of thingsthat- that- that aren't like
a positive influence in your lifethat you might not
just wanna see every day. But like, when you goand you kinda really, you know,

(54:45):
curate your- your fri- your friend list and the-the people you follow, like, go find
those- those people in your market or- or in yourindustry, like who are the influencers?
Who are the- the- the brands, the companies,
you know, that- that are doing great things?Like, every product that you build,
you know, or that- that you use to build,like, go follow those companies.
Go keep up with the things that they're doing. Like, thiscan be such a great education source for you-

(55:09):
100%.
... and a way to keep up with new andinnovative things coming out.
You know, and ag- and again, like,when- when you start to
kind of follow along with these things, like, it-it... You get so much more value
out of it as a tool. And- andagain, it's- it's free.
I don't- I don't spend my day on there. Imean, I usually, you know, in the
morning and, you know, maybe, you know,
kind of here- here and there, butlike, you know,
in- in the evenings, you know, it's not likeyou gotta like, you know,
let it, you know, get in the way of gettingyour work done, but it- it

(55:32):
is a great tool. So I- I do encourage people toreally think, you know, a little bit
more about how they're using it and how they can,you know, really embrace it and- and
see how it can add value to, you know, to- to the business,'cause th- th- there's so many, you know, really
great nuggets out there that you just gottasort of follow along. And-
and Facebook will get really good at, and I- I feel likeI... You know, it's super dialed in for me.
You know, it knows what I wanna seebecause it knows-

(55:54):
It's wild.
... what I'm gonna engage in. Andso, like, it's-
it's just like this... You gotta use it for awhile, but man, you know, I- I can go
post out on- on there, I can go respond in- in aFacebook group and we'll just like
instantly have people sign up forJobTread or schedule demos.
And so like I- I can tell you, if you gojoin the right groups
and- and you start to engage with the things that, youknow, that- that- that are, you know,
gonna ultimately lead to finding the right

(56:16):
prospects and the right people and drivingthem to you, you know, it- it
can be such a great tool. And eventually it'll getbetter and better with the algorithm
once it, you know, really knows you and-and- and what you care about.
That's right.
Awesome, man. Well, look, you know,
it- it- it sounds like you have, you know, you- you'vereally made a lot of the right moves early on
that's- it's- it's been awesome to seeyour success and- and how

(56:36):
you've- you've- you've been able tobuild this. And- and again,
it- it's a reminder that, like, successdoesn't just happen overnight.
It- it is a lot of hard work, it is agrind. You're gonna start off
doing everything yourself, wearing all the hats, youknow, just- just like you said, you know,
at- at times you wish you would have sort of
maybe taken one or two of those hats off earlier to bring on,you know, some people to help you, you know, to
build out your team. Like, you don't have to goat this alone, you know. But

(57:00):
a- again, it's- it's been really awesome to
see how you've been able to build, you know, such a greatcompany and- and- and- and how you've really
focused it, you know, down onwhat you want to be
really great at, you know. It's very hard to be great ata lot of things, you know, so find that
one thing, you know, that you can be awesome at, you can bethe market leader, you can dominate, you know,
and- and just double down on that, dothat. You know, y-

(57:21):
you've done a great job of that,James. I- I'm curious, so
kind of in wrapping up, like, youknow, if- if you
had to think back, you know, from,you know...... way
early on from the beginning of when you started this, like, youknow, what advice would you give to others who
are earlier on in their, you know, in their
journey, starting their businesses, you know, isthere anything that, like, you know,
you, you wish you would've known back then that you know nowthat, like, you think might have, you know,

(57:44):
changed the trajectory of your business,i- it could've helped you
get- get up that curve quicker ormaybe, you know, skip
over a few of those hard knocks that- that- thatyou took- took along the way?
Um, I mean, I think something that I-
when I- when I first started thecompany and frankly, I would
recommend this, I was part of a group called Vistage, um,where it was basically, uh, a bunch of business
owners got together once a month,you had a chair and

(58:05):
I- to me, I- I looked at it as an MBAand it was also therapy.
So you could... we would both learn andwe would both talk about
the stuff that was- that wasdriving us crazy, so
I- I- I don't do that currently but I did it formore than 10 years and it was
invaluable and every day, I say I'm gonna goback and do it. One day I
will, um, just because it's- it's- it'sfantastic. Um, and so that's Number 1,

(58:28):
and my chair, who was absolutely fantastic, he had a sayingthat was, um, "Fire fast and hire slow." Um, and
that's, I mean, if- if y- you're a small business, youknow, you're trying to... if you don't have
somebody that has your best interest, ifthey're not producing for you,
um, you're not gonna change the world,you're not gonna change
people, unfortunately. You know, wethink we can. Um, you know,

(58:48):
make sure you have people that aregonna be high performers
and then on the flip side, h- you know,hire slow, make sure you have
somebody that's good, um, and do it sooner than you think.Like, you need help, make that- make that hire.
You know, go through the process early on. You might have to gothrough a few, you know, and try it out, but-
but take that leap of faith, getout there, hire
someone and- and kind of get out of the fieldas- as soon as you can and- and

(59:11):
things will start to take off fromthere, even though it looks
like it's gonna be a massiveexpense and undertaking.
Yeah, that's, uh, g- great- great advice all around. Imean, you know, it's- it- the- the- the team
you build is- is ultimately, that is the thingthat will determine your success
and how quickly you get there and how enjoyable of ajourney this is. Surround yourself by- by

(59:32):
really smart, hardworking, passionate people
who are better than you and can take onthose- those- those tasks that
you know you're not best suited for. You can't do itall, you gotta build a team, and that team
is- is what will make or break your company, so,you know, I- I wholeheartedly agree.
Take the time to find the rightpeople, don't just
put any warm body and don't- don't put the firstperson that comes along into that seat.

(59:55):
Make sure it's the right person thatyou put into that
seat. And look, at the end of the day,if- if somebody is not
a good fit for the team, you know, I- I think it's- it'squite possibly the hardest, you know,
job of any business owner is- is tolet somebody go, but
ultimately, the buck stops with you.You cannot let one
bad apple spoil the entire bunch. You- you
have to, you know, make that tough call, youknow, to- to- to remove those people

(01:00:18):
and, you know, again, it's- it's- it's-it's so important. Uh, a- a-
and I also very much agree with you. You
know, find, you know, that- that- that group,you know, those- those coaching
groups, networking groups, like, you know,again, you don't have to go at this
alone. Like, you can leverage, youknow, the- the experience
from everyone else who's been there inyour shoes, who's- who's-
Yep.
... gone before you, who's going through it right now.You know, i- it often can feel very lonely

(01:00:42):
at the top and- and- and- and I just, Iencourage everyone. You know, there's-
there's a ton of these- these- thesegroups out there. Find
the one that's right for you. Youneed to interview
a lot of the leaders, talk to their members, you know,really make sure it't the right group. You-
you- you know, they're- they're doing similarthings, going through similar, you know,
processes and- and- and working in similar, you know,arenas as- as you, but like, once you

(01:01:03):
find that tribe, you know, i- it is sohelpful and- and- and I tell you,
e- e- everyday I see the trajectoryof these businesses.
When they join that group, it just shoots up andit's so valuable. So I think that's
really great advice, James. Again, I- I wanna thank you forcoming on, taking the time here to- to share your
story and your experience. You know,really appreciate it
and, uh, you know, I'm glad- glad-glad to have you, uh,

(01:01:24):
you know, here with us at JobTred. You know, can't wait tosee what the future holds for you, man.
Thank you. It's been a blast.
Awesome. Thanks, man. See you.(heavy metal music)
Thanks for joining us for this episodeof Builder Stories.
We hope you enjoyed the conversation
and gained valuable insights that can help youin your journey along the way.
Don't forget to subscribe to the show and leave usa review, and as always, if you

(01:01:46):
or someone you know has a story to share,
please contact us at builderstories.com.We'd love to hear from you.
I'm Erik Fortenberry, and remember, every builder hasa unique story. Keep building yours.