January 24, 2025 • 31 mins
Unlock the secrets to transforming your painting business with insights from Julien Laplante, the founder of Home Run Marketing. Julien takes us on a journey through his personal connection to the painting industry, inspired by his father's career as a painting contractor. His expertise shines as he shares tailored marketing strategies specifically for painting contractors, pointing out common pitfalls like underestimating the investment scale needed for success. Discover why scalable marketing efforts and substantial lead generation are crucial to hitting significant revenue targets and learn practical entry points such as door-to-door methods and leveraging Facebook ads.
Dive deeper into the metrics that truly matter for painting contractors aiming to optimize their marketing ROI. Julien breaks down the importance of focusing on cost per estimate and cost per deal closed rather than just cost per lead. Quality trumps quantity when every lead can evolve into a valuable estimate and a closed deal. Explore benchmarks for lead-to-estimate and close rates, with an emphasis on the power of Facebook ads and the critical role of sales coaching in transforming these numbers. Hear how different lead sources can make or break your close rates and why aligning your ad spend with job costs is a game-changer.
Finally, the conversation shifts to enhancing sales process efficiency with Julien's real-world examples illuminating the gap between generating leads and closing deals. He reveals strategies for boosting close rates, such as providing on-the-spot quotes and engaging in pre-closure calls. Understanding the vital difference between acquiring leads and securing sales, Julien underscores the power of a robust sales strategy backed by self-accountability and comprehensive training. With these insights, you're equipped to refine your sales processes and drive not only client satisfaction but also substantial business growth. Don't miss this opportunity to elevate your painting business with Julien's expert guidance.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Daniel, the founder of Bookkeeping for
Painters, and today I'm reallyexcited to be here with Julian,
the founder of Home RunMarketing.
Julian is the founder of HomeRun Marketing, a marketing
agency built by painters forpainters.
His team generates qualifiedleads, schedules, estimates and
offers one-on-one sales andbusiness coaching to make sure
(00:23):
deals get closed.
Welcome to the podcast, Julian.
How's it going?
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Good man, Good Happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yeah, I'm excited to discuss all things marketing,
sales, branding but I'm reallyinterested on your origin story.
How did you get started workingjust with painting businesses
and helping them with theirmarketing?
Yeah for sure, great question.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
I actually get that quite a lot because it seems
like it's such a small niche,right.
So my father was a paintingcontractor.
He had to kind of give up onhis dream, which is part of the
reason why I'm so attached toworking with painters so around
like I think in the 80s.
He was doing that mostly to payfor college, which you know can
be pretty expensive even herein Canada.
(01:10):
And when I was growing up Iheard that story multiple times
of him having to kind of give upon his dream and you know
pressure from his parents at thetime.
And he said that you know, ifthere was more deal flow coming
in at the time, he could have.
Probably.
You know, if there was moredeal flow coming in at the time,
he could have probably provedthat hey, this was viable and
done something that he actuallywanted to do.
(01:31):
And when I kind of got you knowon the online world and all
that, it's kind of just put twoand two together and was like I
should totally do this right.
So that's what really broughtme into the game and now we're
here.
So it's been a fun journey.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
That's awesome.
What are some of the mostcommon mistakes you see painting
contractors make with theirmarketing?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Oh, I think well.
So this is a good question,because there's a lot of
mistakes that paintingcontractors tend to make.
I think the biggest one is thatthey look too small.
I talked to a lot of paintingcompanies that say, oh yeah, we
invested $500 in SEO here.
We invested, you know, athousand dollars in this thing
there, and you know they'restill stuck under 500,.
(02:20):
You know 700, 800 K.
And whenever I talk to companiesthat are doing way above that
which is you know, most 800 Kand whenever I talk to companies
that are doing way above thatwhich is, you know, most of the
people that I talk to on a dailybasis they always have done
some sort of bigger scalemarketing, like have a door to
door team or tons and tons offlyers going out, and I think
it's one of those things of likeyou got to find something that
(02:42):
turns a dollar into more than adollar, and then you can scale
that thing to be really bigCause I mean SEO.
Even Google ads it's not.
Are you sure you could scaleGoogle ads?
It doesn't go that far.
So you have to look bigger, dosomething that's going to bring
in more revenue later.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Yeah, I think I think you're right.
That is a common misconception,especially for painting
businesses that are juststarting out, as like
underestimating how much youactually need to put into
marketing to hit you know$500,000 in revenue for the year
.
That's like what is that?
(03:31):
I got a hundred jobs, yeah, ahundred jobs for.
So that's you got to sell ahundred people on that.
How many estimates do you needto actually do to get a hundred
jobs, like 300, at least youknow somewhere in there.
And then how many?
leads do you need to actually doto get a hundred jobs like 300
at least you know somewhere inthere?
And then, how many leads do youneed to get in to actually get
300 estimates?
You know maybe 600, dependingon what your lead source is.
(03:53):
So, yeah, that's all, that's acouple of leads a day,
potentially.
So how, what are you going todo to get that that volume of
lead flow and you get to putyour money towards something
money or time?
But uh, I think a lot of folksstarting out underestimate how
much they effort and time andmoney that actually needs to go
(04:15):
into marketing to get that kindof lead flow coming in to really
scale up the business.
So you're asking me what Iwould do.
Yeah, what are, what are somethings that you would recommend
or like?
How can, how can folks avoidthat that pitfall of of under
like low balling marketing?
What should they, what shouldthey be spending on it or what?
(04:37):
What sort of time or tacticsshould they be applying?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, I'm, I'm a big, you know, I'm really big on
money over time.
Like, if I have money lyingaround, I'm going to put that
instead of my time.
I know a lot of people maybenot a lot in your audience, but
I'll still mention it aren'tthere yet where they have just
money lying around.
So I would say, if you're notthere, just do door to door and
start getting really good at it.
(05:01):
Go watch YouTube videos.
There's plenty of you knowpeople out there that are going
to show you how to really getleads.
And once you have, like youknow, a couple grand lying
around maybe you know three,four or five grand then I would
just say look at Facebook ads.
Now I get asked to why Facebook?
Why not?
You know TikTok or YouTube orall these things?
Well, facebook is the mostwidely used one, so it's easier
(05:24):
to learn on your own online.
There's more coaching readilyavailable if you plan on doing
it yourself.
And the other thing too is withthe other ones, you know the
average income of a viewer onthose platforms.
This is just data, right?
Like, if you look at YouTube,it's actually the highest, but
there's not a lot of peoplegoing on there for like stuff
(05:45):
like painting your house orwhatnot.
Mostly it's social media, sothat's why it's good.
And then it's also the aspectof building your brand right.
So when you put your face outthere, when you're not just
putting videos of your guyspainting, that builds, you know,
the brand that is one day goingto bring you to a million, 2
million, 3 million people aregoing to trust you, to a million
, two million, three millionPeople are going to trust you.
(06:07):
It'll become easier to closedeals and as soon as you can
start getting your face outthere like you should, I know
people that say, oh, I don'twant to put my face out there.
Well, you know, it's welcome to2025.
You want to make money or youwant to be left behind, you know
.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
So I would say that's the the best way to go, at
least at this point in time okay, so maybe start something with
with door-to-door, get good withthat door-to-door sales piece,
save up some money a fewthousand dollars and then and
then start investing that intosomething like facebook
advertising using.
(06:41):
Yeah, okay, one of the thingsthat we actually discussed with
or discussed right before thepodcast, which I thought was
interesting, was you know,there's a misconception out
there like oh, I'm in a small,small town and I Facebook ads
don't really work for me becauseI'm in a really small town.
What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
So I, obviously not.
Every market is the same andmaybe in some markets that's
true.
I do think, though in verysmall markets, if you've got the
resources to do so, I wouldjust hit as many homes in as
many different ways as possible.
So I would have some basic lowbudget Google ads, so your
name's always at the top.
(07:24):
I would hit door to door onliterally every single door in
the entirety of your city everyyear.
Hang, does you know?
Attract the higher qualityhomeowners that are looking for
(07:46):
somebody they can trust, andthat usually helps, like build
enough revenue to start reallymass like hitting those areas,
cause some of the bigger, like Isaid also something I said
before the podcast is, like someof the bigger companies that we
work with, they hyper-focus onthe markets, like the micro
markets, that most kind of jobs.
(08:06):
They're going to look at anentire city and they're really
just making one to a millionfrom like five different
neighborhoods.
So once you get to that pointwhere you've isolated like where
the money is coming from,usually you just start hitting
them in tons of different ways.
But to get to that point,typically companies use social
media advertising Rarely do theyjust hit the entire city with
(08:31):
door to door until they find it,you know.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah, that makes sense.
So basically, I really honingin on what is your key niche or
your key demographic that you'regoing for, what's your target
market, before just blanket,like trying to reach out to
paint anybody's house, reallykind of narrow in on the
specific neighborhoods that youwant to target and then go after
(08:57):
those specific neighborhoods.
I think that's really goodadvice.
I often a few weeks ago justhad somebody out of new jersey
they were kind of just paintinganybody's house and they had
their average job size, whichwas kind of low, like two or
three thousand dollars per job.
Okay, yeah, and and so we kindof dug into it.
(09:19):
It was like, oh, we're just kindof painting anybody's house,
like we have some really goodclients that we like working
with that we charge, you know,five, six, seven thousand
dollars, but we don't get thosetoo often.
And I was like, maybe look atthe neighborhoods that those
folks are living in and justfocus on those neighborhoods.
And so they just started kindof doing that strategy of just
(09:40):
kind of focusing and that can bea huge, a huge uh like improve,
improvement to your revenue butalso your profit, because
usually they're they're a lotmore, um, profitable.
And then, additionally, whenthe with the hired job size,
it's often better for yourmarketing because you'll get a
(10:01):
better return on investment onyour marketing.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
Yeah, Like one company that we signed up two
days ago, their average job sizewas seven grand, which is like
pretty solid and they're doingexactly that.
The other thing too is becauseyour jobs are all super close by
, like naturally less drivingtime, staff is happier, they're
always in the same neighborhoodsand it's yeah, it's more
(10:26):
profitable, Like you said.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
That's awesome, yep, cool.
In your experience, what sortof things should folks be
tracking in their paintingbusiness to measure how well
they're doing with marketing?
Because, just to use theFacebook ads, for example,
(10:51):
there's a lot of differentmetrics that Facebook throws at
you and it can be overwhelming.
Rose at you and it can beoverwhelming.
What are, like, the key thingsthat you really like to hone in
on to make sure that you're ontrack to give someone a good
return on investment for theirmarketing?
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Yeah, it's a great question.
There's well, okay so, returnon investment, because there's
this might be two differentanswers.
There's how do you determine ifyou've got a winning ad and how
do you determine if you've gotwinning marketing?
So I guess I'll just go withwinning marketing because that
seems to be the best way toanswer your question.
(11:26):
So, surprisingly, I don'treally care about cost per lead,
which, coming from you knowmarketing agency, maybe sounds a
little crazy For me, as long asit's, you know know, reasonable
enough.
I I start to care more aboutthe cost of getting an estimate,
like scheduled in the calendar,and then the cost of actually
(11:46):
giving somebody a quote whichisn't necessary to track.
The next best one is just goingto be a cost per deal closed,
right from the ad specifically,and then I try to get that under
10, which usually is is, youknow, the case, unless, like,
there's something else wrong inthe business.
And if you track those you know, on top of close rate, of
(12:08):
course, usually you canbacktrack, like exactly what
numbers you have to hit once youfigure out your average job
size.
So those numbers are likepretty important.
Okay so, cost per deal closed.
Can I re-answer that question,cause I just thought of a better
(12:29):
answer.
Yeah, go for it.
Okay.
So, yeah, good.
Question the numbers that Ithink somebody needs to track.
I don't think cost per lead,unless it's like unreasonable,
so above $100, $200, I don'tthink that that's super
important.
I think people start optimizingfor cost per lead.
They just try to lower it,lower it, lower it, but they
don't think about the quality ofthe leads.
That's coming through right.
(12:50):
If an ad is getting $150 leadsbut every single one is getting
scheduled into an estimate andthe estimator is closing 80, 90%
of those, that's a crazywinning ad.
Let's put everything in there.
Now, the numbers that I track toget to there is number one how
many leads are getting turnedinto estimates?
Now, industry average, I'd say30, 40, 50%.
(13:13):
If you've got above like 40% ofyour leads being scheduled,
especially from Facebook, you'redoing something good, unless
it's like hyper-targeting forhigher quality leads.
And once you got that, then Ilook at the cost of getting an
estimate.
Then the close rate.
So what's the close rate?
You can also track close rateper area, but that's maybe a bit
(13:35):
advanced there.
So just track close rate andalso track, of course, average
job size and cost of getting ajob.
Try to get the cost of gettinga job from the ads right.
So let's say on a given monthyou close five jobs, you spent
five grand thousand dollars perjob.
Then you want to try to getthat under 15, 10, 15% of the
(13:56):
total job cost and try to get atleast like 30% net on every job
anyways.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Awesome.
So first of all, the lead toestimate rate, basically the set
rate, like once the lead comesin, getting that set on the
estimate calendar is somethingto really pay attention to.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
You said somewhere around 70 or better is right
actually 30 40 being scheduledand showing up right, not
canceling, is industry averagefor just broad targeting like
there are some people we'veworked with that are getting 70
80, but it seems like it's moreof a unicorn than an average
(14:41):
gotcha okay, just, it's justnormal with social media ads
honestly yeah, so for forfacebook ads, the set rate
somewhere around 35 or better.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Yeah, is this kind of what you should be?
Okay, gotcha, all right.
And then.
And then the cost per estimate.
So so how much ad spend do youhave to Facebook ads to actually
get an estimate?
And so, if you're spending,just use easy numbers $100 per
(15:26):
lead, that's $300 maybe perestimate.
Right, yeah, okay.
And then the next one youmentioned was the close rate,
which is how often are you ableto close the deal from the
estimates that you're actuallydoing?
Yeah, do you see, like atypical, what's a typical close
(15:47):
rate?
Speaker 2 (15:47):
of a painting business.
It depends on the lead source.
I'd say.
For social media ads,specifically, which, you are
playing a big numbers game.
The average I see is about 30%.
In my opinion, though, I'vedone a bit of estimating sales
myself just to learn it We'vegone coaching from huge painting
companies to learn their salesprocess.
(16:08):
If you're running social mediaadvertising and your close rate
is under 50%, you definitelyneed sales coaching, though,
just like or you're still in thelearning process, because those
are the kinds of numbers thatyou, as an owner, need to be
able to train a sales team thatwill even come close to doing
that right.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Okay, so average is 30%.
So trying to get it probablyover average is a good target
there.
And then you mentioned thedistinguishing between, like, a
social media ad and then someonethat went to your website and
scheduled an appointment.
Oh yeah, it would be twodifferent quality of the lead
like yeah, obviously the onethat went to your website
looking for you.
You better, you like you shouldhave a high close rate with
(16:51):
those types of leads versussocial media.
It's kind of like they weren'tthinking of pinging their
business but they saw yourFacebook ad and then, okay, well
, maybe I'll look at this and sothat's going to be a lower
close rate, which makes sense,yeah, okay.
And then the other one youmentioned was the cost the ad
cost per job.
So to continue the example Iwas running, so if we do, uh, if
(17:17):
we have to get three leads toto get an estimate out, maybe we
got to just kind of useballpark your number there
another three estimates to toget um, a closed deal.
So that's basically three timesthree.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
so that's like nine leads that we would need to get
yeah one ten percent, twentypercent of leads closed is, I'd
say, pretty standard for companyyeah, yeah, and you say getting
under ten percent.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
so, uh, if you get nine leads and you close one of
them, you get under 10% there.
So that if you're spending,just use easy numbers.
If you're spending $100 perlead, which I know you said is
kind of borderline, too high,yeah, because it's usually lower
than that, but that's $900.
Yeah, $900 for a closed deal.
(18:15):
Yeah, $900 for a closed deal.
And if you have a decentaverage job size, like a higher
job size, that might work, ofcourse.
What is kind of like thetypical for Facebook ads.
What should you be spending onleads typically?
What's the range you shouldexpect?
Speaker 2 (18:37):
leads.
Typically like what's like therange you should expect.
Yeah, if it depends on thequality, honestly I would say
cost per estimate.
Though if you're under 150 costper estimate like you're,
you're good, you're good you canjust put more into marketing.
Of course, if that's like yourfirst try, then you can
definitely optimize that lower.
Like we always try to keep itunder a hundred dollars, maybe
even as low as we can.
(18:58):
Right, like 30, $30 is probablythe lowest we've ever seen
estimate, but even then, likeyou mentioned, right, it's $900
per job closed If you have ahundred dollars per lead.
Typically, if you have ahundred dollars per lead, though
, the quality is higher, you setmore estimates and then
sometimes you end up closingmore too.
So I feel like numberstypically balance themselves out
(19:20):
at around $500 per job closed,and some people find that that's
really high.
Right, like I pay Angie's $500a month and I closed three jobs.
Right, well, obviously there'sthe cost of scaling behind this.
Right, like, you have a systemthat you can predictably put
money into.
But and this is maybe, you know,going to sound crazy but I
(19:40):
don't think that ads alone isprofitable.
I think once you start getting,you know, referrals from these
people.
You start upselling them, youget repeat business.
That's where, like the real,more money in the margins are
made because you didn't payanything to get those jobs.
And even if you have a referralincentive like a hundred bucks
well, a hundred is a lot lessthan 500.
So you know you have highermargins, more profit.
(20:03):
You can usually charge evenslightly more for referrals.
So I think the real keyindicator of a massive painting
company is what is your referralrate?
How many referrals do you getper client that you acquire from
your advertising?
And that typically determineshow big you can actually scale.
(20:25):
That's just some niche thingI've observed over the years.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
That makes sense.
Yeah, I think a lot of folksignore their customer list and
don't really pay much attentionto it, which is you're basically
sitting on like a goldmine ofpotential work there Just paying
attention, sending out emailsor text messages to those folks
that you've worked with in thepast, can definitely get you
(20:54):
more work pretty inexpensively,like you said.
So that makes a lot of sense.
So, to wrap up the kind of thelook at the metrics there, you
said about $150 per cost of adcost per estimate $150.
Yeah, ad cost for per estimate150 bucks yeah, that's a.
(21:22):
You're in a in a good um,that's a good spend there.
And then the other one wasabout a 500 for ad spend to
close a job, yeah, which, if youhave a five thousand dollar, uh
, average job size, that's like10 percent spent on marketing,
which makes sense, yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
So, okay, and I want to clarify too, I want to be
really clear Like these numbersare.
If I was still running apainting company, you know,
today and I had these numbers, Iwould be more than happy to
just pour more money intomarketing and just keep
optimizing here and there.
You know, we work withcompanies that have a $200 cost
(21:57):
of acquisition to get a client.
It's so area dependent.
I, you know, like on, honestly,if you, if you have a good
relationship with yourcompetitors, like, ask them how
much it's costing them and tryto aim for those kinds of
numbers.
Or, um, you know, if you're ina coaching program, ask other
people in your area too, or yourcoach, maybe they have some
insights.
So it's, yeah, I would say likethose are like standard numbers
(22:20):
, but it's almost never exactlythat yeah, what should folks?
Speaker 1 (22:25):
what should someone do if, if their cost per
estimate is super high or theircost per job is super high, what
are some things that theyshould look at?
Speaker 2 (22:34):
to get.
Well, get that lower, for sure.
I mean.
Number one is track yournumbers, like I hear a lot of
people talk about.
Oh, this isn't profitable, andI asked them why, and they can't
give me an answer.
Right, so what you track iswhat you improve and, of course,
if your cost of estimate is toohigh, you're setting above 35
40 percent of your estimates.
(22:55):
If you're double dialing allyour leads, you're calling them
twice a day, five days minimum,before giving up.
If you're doing all that, thenthat probably isn't the problem.
If your cost of getting leadsis too high and you can usually
tell this by if you don't testenough creatives or different
types of creatives right, like,all your creatives look the same
and you're wondering why that'snot working probably because
(23:17):
you haven't tried enough newthings then that might be the
problem too.
Or if you have some ads thatare getting, like I don't know,
$50 leads, but most of them aregetting $100 leads, then try to
look at why is that ad doing somuch better?
Like, how can I double down onthis strategy?
Yeah, yeah, does that answerthe question?
Speaker 1 (23:36):
yeah, so take it, take a look at your, your speed
to lead process.
Oh yeah, it's like making sureyou're you're doing the right
things to get that set rate isas high as you can.
So, yeah, I think a lot ofpeople underestimate how quickly
you need to respond to leadscoming in.
Yeah, so like not having ananswering service or a set or
(23:58):
somebody dedicate dedicated towhen a lead comes in, like going
after that aggressively, Ithink people underestimate what
you need to do to close a leador, I'm sorry, to set a lead on
on the calendar yeah, like theteam that we have calling for
our clients and setting theseappointments, our SOPs is, you
(24:18):
know, we call within 90 secondsof a new lead.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Unless we're already on the phone, then it's you know
, with as soon as possible.
We try to reach them right away, double dial.
If we don't reach them, we callthem later, the same day, and
then we continue to follow upfor at least five days, twice
per day and then, depending onthe kind of lead, right, like if
it's a beautiful house, theysaid they wanted to do it as
soon as possible Like we justcontinue to follow up.
(24:42):
We almost never give up andespecially if we see, oh, they
opened one of our emails.
Like we continue to follow upeven then it is a full-time job,
honestly, like it's a full-timejob.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, that's a, I think, a big point, because I
some folks said we're going todo facebook ads, but if they
don't have, if not working withsomeone like you, where you're
actually, it sounds like youguys are actually setting the
appointments for the folks youwork with that's not always the
case.
That's not always the case forfor marketing and companies,
then they'll.
They'll.
Sometimes some marketingcompanies will just run the ads
and then it's on the paintingbusiness owner to actually set
(25:20):
the appointments on theircalendar.
So, yeah, that's a bigoperation.
A lot of attention needs to bepaid to it, so I think that that
can't be understated.
Yeah, and then some of theother things you mentioned were
making sure the you know, doingA-B testing, like making sure
(25:41):
you have multiple ads to seewhat's performing better.
So if your ad is not good, youknow you get a better ad up
there.
So that makes sense, of course.
Cool, all right, awesome.
Well, you've been supergenerous with your time.
I've learned a lot as well.
Is there anything else that youthink is key to running
(26:05):
Facebook ads?
Marketing?
And we talked a little bitabout optimizing the sales
process Anything else that you'dlike to kind of dig into?
Speaker 2 (26:18):
else that you'd like to kind of dig into?
Yeah for sure.
So a lot of people want leadsbut they're missing sales and I
see that so many times, evenwith you know companies doing
one, 2 million they have youknow they, they're getting good
leads and that's why they'reable to continue, you know,
being profitable and growing.
But I see so many people, youknow they're emailing their
estimates.
They're not giving quotes onthe spot, they're.
(26:43):
You know they're not doing aset call where they are, you
know, asking questionsbeforehand, doing a pre-close,
like these sorts of things where, if you actually learn how to
do the right process, like youknow, just going from 20% close
rate to 40%, which is super, youknow, it's super doable if you
have the right training and theright process.
I mean we're talking aboutyou're doubling your business if
that's your only source ofacquisition, right, like it's
(27:04):
not a small jump and a lot ofpeople will think they need more
leads.
But then they close 20% oftheir estimates, right, and
that's also why we do salescoaching, by the way, just like
if we didn't, I don't even knowif we would be making any money
(27:25):
because our clients justwouldn't be closing deals.
I feel it's, it's, yeah, it's,it's probably, I would say sales
and, like most service basedbusinesses, is almost like the
most important thing becausewhatever marketing channel you
do, if you got sales then youcan close deals.
So it's, it's super vital.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
That makes sense and I I have heard like folks you
know, especially online uh,painting business owners will
kind of complain about marketingcompanies is like the, the, the
leads weren't any good, um.
But I think the first thingthey should probably do is just
reflect on their sales process,cause if you have a strong sales
(28:03):
process, you know that thatmight actually be.
The issue is not not the leadsweren't any good.
In some cases the leads aren'tgood, I mean for sure.
But if it's a, especially witha marketing company that has
been working with just paintingbusinesses like yourself, and
you can know what works it'smost times, I would venture to
(28:25):
say that it's probably the salesprocess that needs to be
improved and not necessarily theleads need to be improved.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Yeah, and like just to drive that home, that home.
I've been in business for longenough to where we've had
instances where we've hadmultiple clients in one single
city almost offering the sameservices.
We had two clients doingcabinets in the same city.
One of them was closing about40% of their estimates.
The other one was closing about20% of the estimates.
(28:56):
Now you could argue the leadswere different and everything,
but it was the same kinds ofadvertising and whatever.
And one of them, the guyclosing 40% I'm not going to put
names on these people, but oneof the guy closing 40% he was
always saying I need to beclosing more deals.
I need to be closing more deals.
What can I do, julian?
Can you review some of my calls?
And then the other guy was likeyeah, I think it's the leads
(29:22):
and you know, when you have thatbird's eye view, it's like it's
hard not to like see this andgo like I wish I wish you know
you could just see what I'mseeing.
I go by full self accountability, like extreme self
accountability.
Some people think that's, youknow, toxic, whatever.
So whenever something happens,I always look to myself first
like what did I do that I couldhave done differently, like even
(29:43):
if, like, my employee messes up, it's like how could this have
been my fault and what can I doto actually avoid this from
happening?
So, even internally, like wehave crazy levels of procedures
and SOPs and training, just soeverything is solid.
But yeah, extremeself-accountability is what's
taken us so far, honestly, andalso the reason why we do call
(30:07):
leads and set them for ourclients and also why we do the
sales coaching, because, quitefrankly, if we only did leads,
then there's no way we canactually guarantee satisfaction
for our clients.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
Yeah, that makes sense and I think it's
definitely needed and I thinkit's pretty awesome what you
guys are doing over there.
Where can folks learn moreabout what you're doing over
there at Home Run Marketing?
Where should they go?
How should they link up withyou if they're interested in
(30:41):
learning more?
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, for sure.
I mean, we're pretty much onevery social media platform.
So we have some YouTube videos,we have Instagram, facebook.
They can just search Home RunMarketing.
But if they want to look at ourwebsite, for example, they can
just search the Home RunMarketing so T-H-E, home Run
Marketingcom, and then they'lljust have all the information
(31:04):
that they need to see if theywant to reach out or whatnot.
Yeah, actually, for anybodywho's watching this, thinking
about reaching out, getting somepersonal trust, building
Facebook ads, having us settletheir estimates, helping them,
you know, go from 30, 40, 50% tomaybe 70% close rates on their
estimates, then we'd be morethan happy to give them a month
(31:26):
extra free if they sign up, youknow, through you guys.
So if you hop on a call with us, mention bookkeeping for
painters, then be more thanhappy to give you guys an extra
month for free.
Awesome.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
I appreciate that.
I appreciate your time today,julian, if you're listening and
you need some help withmarketing, definitely check out
Home Run Marketing and with that, we will see you next week.
This is Daniel, the founder of Bookkeeping for
Painters, and today I'm reallyexcited to be here with Julian,
the founder of Home RunMarketing.
Julian is the founder of HomeRun Marketing, a marketing
agency built by painters forpainters.
His team generates qualifiedleads, schedules, estimates and
offers one-on-one sales andbusiness coaching to make sure
(00:23):
deals get closed.
Welcome to the podcast, Julian.
How's it going?
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Good man, Good Happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yeah, I'm excited to discuss all things marketing,
sales, branding but I'm reallyinterested on your origin story.
How did you get started workingjust with painting businesses
and helping them with theirmarketing?
Yeah for sure, great question.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
I actually get that quite a lot because it seems
like it's such a small niche,right.
So my father was a paintingcontractor.
He had to kind of give up onhis dream, which is part of the
reason why I'm so attached toworking with painters so around
like I think in the 80s.
He was doing that mostly to payfor college, which you know can
be pretty expensive even herein Canada.
(01:10):
And when I was growing up Iheard that story multiple times
of him having to kind of give upon his dream and you know
pressure from his parents at thetime.
And he said that you know, ifthere was more deal flow coming
in at the time, he could have.
Probably.
You know, if there was moredeal flow coming in at the time,
he could have probably provedthat hey, this was viable and
done something that he actuallywanted to do.
(01:31):
And when I kind of got you knowon the online world and all
that, it's kind of just put twoand two together and was like I
should totally do this right.
So that's what really broughtme into the game and now we're
here.
So it's been a fun journey.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
That's awesome.
What are some of the mostcommon mistakes you see painting
contractors make with theirmarketing?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Oh, I think well.
So this is a good question,because there's a lot of
mistakes that paintingcontractors tend to make.
I think the biggest one is thatthey look too small.
I talked to a lot of paintingcompanies that say, oh yeah, we
invested $500 in SEO here.
We invested, you know, athousand dollars in this thing
there, and you know they'restill stuck under 500,.
(02:20):
You know 700, 800 K.
And whenever I talk to companiesthat are doing way above that
which is you know, most 800 Kand whenever I talk to companies
that are doing way above thatwhich is, you know, most of the
people that I talk to on a dailybasis they always have done
some sort of bigger scalemarketing, like have a door to
door team or tons and tons offlyers going out, and I think
it's one of those things of likeyou got to find something that
(02:42):
turns a dollar into more than adollar, and then you can scale
that thing to be really bigCause I mean SEO.
Even Google ads it's not.
Are you sure you could scaleGoogle ads?
It doesn't go that far.
So you have to look bigger, dosomething that's going to bring
in more revenue later.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
Yeah, I think I think you're right.
That is a common misconception,especially for painting
businesses that are juststarting out, as like
underestimating how much youactually need to put into
marketing to hit you know$500,000 in revenue for the year
.
That's like what is that?
(03:31):
I got a hundred jobs, yeah, ahundred jobs for.
So that's you got to sell ahundred people on that.
How many estimates do you needto actually do to get a hundred
jobs, like 300, at least youknow somewhere in there.
And then how many?
leads do you need to actually doto get a hundred jobs like 300
at least you know somewhere inthere?
And then, how many leads do youneed to get in to actually get
300 estimates?
You know maybe 600, dependingon what your lead source is.
(03:53):
So, yeah, that's all, that's acouple of leads a day,
potentially.
So how, what are you going todo to get that that volume of
lead flow and you get to putyour money towards something
money or time?
But uh, I think a lot of folksstarting out underestimate how
much they effort and time andmoney that actually needs to go
(04:15):
into marketing to get that kindof lead flow coming in to really
scale up the business.
So you're asking me what Iwould do.
Yeah, what are, what are somethings that you would recommend
or like?
How can, how can folks avoidthat that pitfall of of under
like low balling marketing?
What should they, what shouldthey be spending on it or what?
(04:37):
What sort of time or tacticsshould they be applying?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Yeah, I'm, I'm a big, you know, I'm really big on
money over time.
Like, if I have money lyingaround, I'm going to put that
instead of my time.
I know a lot of people maybenot a lot in your audience, but
I'll still mention it aren'tthere yet where they have just
money lying around.
So I would say, if you're notthere, just do door to door and
start getting really good at it.
(05:01):
Go watch YouTube videos.
There's plenty of you knowpeople out there that are going
to show you how to really getleads.
And once you have, like youknow, a couple grand lying
around maybe you know three,four or five grand then I would
just say look at Facebook ads.
Now I get asked to why Facebook?
Why not?
You know TikTok or YouTube orall these things?
Well, facebook is the mostwidely used one, so it's easier
(05:24):
to learn on your own online.
There's more coaching readilyavailable if you plan on doing
it yourself.
And the other thing too is withthe other ones, you know the
average income of a viewer onthose platforms.
This is just data, right?
Like, if you look at YouTube,it's actually the highest, but
there's not a lot of peoplegoing on there for like stuff
(05:45):
like painting your house orwhatnot.
Mostly it's social media, sothat's why it's good.
And then it's also the aspectof building your brand right.
So when you put your face outthere, when you're not just
putting videos of your guyspainting, that builds, you know,
the brand that is one day goingto bring you to a million, 2
million, 3 million people aregoing to trust you, to a million
, two million, three millionPeople are going to trust you.
(06:07):
It'll become easier to closedeals and as soon as you can
start getting your face outthere like you should, I know
people that say, oh, I don'twant to put my face out there.
Well, you know, it's welcome to2025.
You want to make money or youwant to be left behind, you know
.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
So I would say that's the the best way to go, at
least at this point in time okay, so maybe start something with
with door-to-door, get good withthat door-to-door sales piece,
save up some money a fewthousand dollars and then and
then start investing that intosomething like facebook
advertising using.
(06:41):
Yeah, okay, one of the thingsthat we actually discussed with
or discussed right before thepodcast, which I thought was
interesting, was you know,there's a misconception out
there like oh, I'm in a small,small town and I Facebook ads
don't really work for me becauseI'm in a really small town.
What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2 (07:04):
So I, obviously not.
Every market is the same andmaybe in some markets that's
true.
I do think, though in verysmall markets, if you've got the
resources to do so, I wouldjust hit as many homes in as
many different ways as possible.
So I would have some basic lowbudget Google ads, so your
name's always at the top.
(07:24):
I would hit door to door onliterally every single door in
the entirety of your city everyyear.
Hang, does you know?
Attract the higher qualityhomeowners that are looking for
(07:46):
somebody they can trust, andthat usually helps, like build
enough revenue to start reallymass like hitting those areas,
cause some of the bigger, like Isaid also something I said
before the podcast is, like someof the bigger companies that we
work with, they hyper-focus onthe markets, like the micro
markets, that most kind of jobs.
(08:06):
They're going to look at anentire city and they're really
just making one to a millionfrom like five different
neighborhoods.
So once you get to that pointwhere you've isolated like where
the money is coming from,usually you just start hitting
them in tons of different ways.
But to get to that point,typically companies use social
media advertising Rarely do theyjust hit the entire city with
(08:31):
door to door until they find it,you know.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah, that makes sense.
So basically, I really honingin on what is your key niche or
your key demographic that you'regoing for, what's your target
market, before just blanket,like trying to reach out to
paint anybody's house, reallykind of narrow in on the
specific neighborhoods that youwant to target and then go after
(08:57):
those specific neighborhoods.
I think that's really goodadvice.
I often a few weeks ago justhad somebody out of new jersey
they were kind of just paintinganybody's house and they had
their average job size, whichwas kind of low, like two or
three thousand dollars per job.
Okay, yeah, and and so we kindof dug into it.
(09:19):
It was like, oh, we're just kindof painting anybody's house,
like we have some really goodclients that we like working
with that we charge, you know,five, six, seven thousand
dollars, but we don't get thosetoo often.
And I was like, maybe look atthe neighborhoods that those
folks are living in and justfocus on those neighborhoods.
And so they just started kindof doing that strategy of just
(09:40):
kind of focusing and that can bea huge, a huge uh like improve,
improvement to your revenue butalso your profit, because
usually they're they're a lotmore, um, profitable.
And then, additionally, whenthe with the hired job size,
it's often better for yourmarketing because you'll get a
(10:01):
better return on investment onyour marketing.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
Yeah, Like one company that we signed up two
days ago, their average job sizewas seven grand, which is like
pretty solid and they're doingexactly that.
The other thing too is becauseyour jobs are all super close by
, like naturally less drivingtime, staff is happier, they're
always in the same neighborhoodsand it's yeah, it's more
(10:26):
profitable, Like you said.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
That's awesome, yep, cool.
In your experience, what sortof things should folks be
tracking in their paintingbusiness to measure how well
they're doing with marketing?
Because, just to use theFacebook ads, for example,
(10:51):
there's a lot of differentmetrics that Facebook throws at
you and it can be overwhelming.
Rose at you and it can beoverwhelming.
What are, like, the key thingsthat you really like to hone in
on to make sure that you're ontrack to give someone a good
return on investment for theirmarketing?
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Yeah, it's a great question.
There's well, okay so, returnon investment, because there's
this might be two differentanswers.
There's how do you determine ifyou've got a winning ad and how
do you determine if you've gotwinning marketing?
So I guess I'll just go withwinning marketing because that
seems to be the best way toanswer your question.
(11:26):
So, surprisingly, I don'treally care about cost per lead,
which, coming from you knowmarketing agency, maybe sounds a
little crazy For me, as long asit's, you know know, reasonable
enough.
I I start to care more aboutthe cost of getting an estimate,
like scheduled in the calendar,and then the cost of actually
(11:46):
giving somebody a quote whichisn't necessary to track.
The next best one is just goingto be a cost per deal closed,
right from the ad specifically,and then I try to get that under
10, which usually is is, youknow, the case, unless, like,
there's something else wrong inthe business.
And if you track those you know, on top of close rate, of
(12:08):
course, usually you canbacktrack, like exactly what
numbers you have to hit once youfigure out your average job
size.
So those numbers are likepretty important.
Okay so, cost per deal closed.
Can I re-answer that question,cause I just thought of a better
(12:29):
answer.
Yeah, go for it.
Okay.
So, yeah, good.
Question the numbers that Ithink somebody needs to track.
I don't think cost per lead,unless it's like unreasonable,
so above $100, $200, I don'tthink that that's super
important.
I think people start optimizingfor cost per lead.
They just try to lower it,lower it, lower it, but they
don't think about the quality ofthe leads.
That's coming through right.
(12:50):
If an ad is getting $150 leadsbut every single one is getting
scheduled into an estimate andthe estimator is closing 80, 90%
of those, that's a crazywinning ad.
Let's put everything in there.
Now, the numbers that I track toget to there is number one how
many leads are getting turnedinto estimates?
Now, industry average, I'd say30, 40, 50%.
(13:13):
If you've got above like 40% ofyour leads being scheduled,
especially from Facebook, you'redoing something good, unless
it's like hyper-targeting forhigher quality leads.
And once you got that, then Ilook at the cost of getting an
estimate.
Then the close rate.
So what's the close rate?
You can also track close rateper area, but that's maybe a bit
(13:35):
advanced there.
So just track close rate andalso track, of course, average
job size and cost of getting ajob.
Try to get the cost of gettinga job from the ads right.
So let's say on a given monthyou close five jobs, you spent
five grand thousand dollars perjob.
Then you want to try to getthat under 15, 10, 15% of the
(13:56):
total job cost and try to get atleast like 30% net on every job
anyways.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Awesome.
So first of all, the lead toestimate rate, basically the set
rate, like once the lead comesin, getting that set on the
estimate calendar is somethingto really pay attention to.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
You said somewhere around 70 or better is right
actually 30 40 being scheduledand showing up right, not
canceling, is industry averagefor just broad targeting like
there are some people we'veworked with that are getting 70
80, but it seems like it's moreof a unicorn than an average
(14:41):
gotcha okay, just, it's justnormal with social media ads
honestly yeah, so for forfacebook ads, the set rate
somewhere around 35 or better.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Yeah, is this kind of what you should be?
Okay, gotcha, all right.
And then.
And then the cost per estimate.
So so how much ad spend do youhave to Facebook ads to actually
get an estimate?
And so, if you're spending,just use easy numbers $100 per
(15:26):
lead, that's $300 maybe perestimate.
Right, yeah, okay.
And then the next one youmentioned was the close rate,
which is how often are you ableto close the deal from the
estimates that you're actuallydoing?
Yeah, do you see, like atypical, what's a typical close
(15:47):
rate?
Speaker 2 (15:47):
of a painting business.
It depends on the lead source.
I'd say.
For social media ads,specifically, which, you are
playing a big numbers game.
The average I see is about 30%.
In my opinion, though, I'vedone a bit of estimating sales
myself just to learn it We'vegone coaching from huge painting
companies to learn their salesprocess.
(16:08):
If you're running social mediaadvertising and your close rate
is under 50%, you definitelyneed sales coaching, though,
just like or you're still in thelearning process, because those
are the kinds of numbers thatyou, as an owner, need to be
able to train a sales team thatwill even come close to doing
that right.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Okay, so average is 30%.
So trying to get it probablyover average is a good target
there.
And then you mentioned thedistinguishing between, like, a
social media ad and then someonethat went to your website and
scheduled an appointment.
Oh yeah, it would be twodifferent quality of the lead
like yeah, obviously the onethat went to your website
looking for you.
You better, you like you shouldhave a high close rate with
(16:51):
those types of leads versussocial media.
It's kind of like they weren'tthinking of pinging their
business but they saw yourFacebook ad and then, okay, well
, maybe I'll look at this and sothat's going to be a lower
close rate, which makes sense,yeah, okay.
And then the other one youmentioned was the cost the ad
cost per job.
So to continue the example Iwas running, so if we do, uh, if
(17:17):
we have to get three leads toto get an estimate out, maybe we
got to just kind of useballpark your number there
another three estimates to toget um, a closed deal.
So that's basically three timesthree.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
so that's like nine leads that we would need to get
yeah one ten percent, twentypercent of leads closed is, I'd
say, pretty standard for companyyeah, yeah, and you say getting
under ten percent.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
so, uh, if you get nine leads and you close one of
them, you get under 10% there.
So that if you're spending,just use easy numbers.
If you're spending $100 perlead, which I know you said is
kind of borderline, too high,yeah, because it's usually lower
than that, but that's $900.
Yeah, $900 for a closed deal.
(18:15):
Yeah, $900 for a closed deal.
And if you have a decentaverage job size, like a higher
job size, that might work, ofcourse.
What is kind of like thetypical for Facebook ads.
What should you be spending onleads typically?
What's the range you shouldexpect?
Speaker 2 (18:37):
leads.
Typically like what's like therange you should expect.
Yeah, if it depends on thequality, honestly I would say
cost per estimate.
Though if you're under 150 costper estimate like you're,
you're good, you're good you canjust put more into marketing.
Of course, if that's like yourfirst try, then you can
definitely optimize that lower.
Like we always try to keep itunder a hundred dollars, maybe
even as low as we can.
(18:58):
Right, like 30, $30 is probablythe lowest we've ever seen
estimate, but even then, likeyou mentioned, right, it's $900
per job closed If you have ahundred dollars per lead.
Typically, if you have ahundred dollars per lead, though
, the quality is higher, you setmore estimates and then
sometimes you end up closingmore too.
So I feel like numberstypically balance themselves out
(19:20):
at around $500 per job closed,and some people find that that's
really high.
Right, like I pay Angie's $500a month and I closed three jobs.
Right, well, obviously there'sthe cost of scaling behind this.
Right, like, you have a systemthat you can predictably put
money into.
But and this is maybe, you know,going to sound crazy but I
(19:40):
don't think that ads alone isprofitable.
I think once you start getting,you know, referrals from these
people.
You start upselling them, youget repeat business.
That's where, like the real,more money in the margins are
made because you didn't payanything to get those jobs.
And even if you have a referralincentive like a hundred bucks
well, a hundred is a lot lessthan 500.
So you know you have highermargins, more profit.
(20:03):
You can usually charge evenslightly more for referrals.
So I think the real keyindicator of a massive painting
company is what is your referralrate?
How many referrals do you getper client that you acquire from
your advertising?
And that typically determineshow big you can actually scale.
(20:25):
That's just some niche thingI've observed over the years.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
That makes sense.
Yeah, I think a lot of folksignore their customer list and
don't really pay much attentionto it, which is you're basically
sitting on like a goldmine ofpotential work there Just paying
attention, sending out emailsor text messages to those folks
that you've worked with in thepast, can definitely get you
(20:54):
more work pretty inexpensively,like you said.
So that makes a lot of sense.
So, to wrap up the kind of thelook at the metrics there, you
said about $150 per cost of adcost per estimate $150.
Yeah, ad cost for per estimate150 bucks yeah, that's a.
(21:22):
You're in a in a good um,that's a good spend there.
And then the other one wasabout a 500 for ad spend to
close a job, yeah, which, if youhave a five thousand dollar, uh
, average job size, that's like10 percent spent on marketing,
which makes sense, yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
So, okay, and I want to clarify too, I want to be
really clear Like these numbersare.
If I was still running apainting company, you know,
today and I had these numbers, Iwould be more than happy to
just pour more money intomarketing and just keep
optimizing here and there.
You know, we work withcompanies that have a $200 cost
(21:57):
of acquisition to get a client.
It's so area dependent.
I, you know, like on, honestly,if you, if you have a good
relationship with yourcompetitors, like, ask them how
much it's costing them and tryto aim for those kinds of
numbers.
Or, um, you know, if you're ina coaching program, ask other
people in your area too, or yourcoach, maybe they have some
insights.
So it's, yeah, I would say likethose are like standard numbers
(22:20):
, but it's almost never exactlythat yeah, what should folks?
Speaker 1 (22:25):
what should someone do if, if their cost per
estimate is super high or theircost per job is super high, what
are some things that theyshould look at?
Speaker 2 (22:34):
to get.
Well, get that lower, for sure.
I mean.
Number one is track yournumbers, like I hear a lot of
people talk about.
Oh, this isn't profitable, andI asked them why, and they can't
give me an answer.
Right, so what you track iswhat you improve and, of course,
if your cost of estimate is toohigh, you're setting above 35
40 percent of your estimates.
(22:55):
If you're double dialing allyour leads, you're calling them
twice a day, five days minimum,before giving up.
If you're doing all that, thenthat probably isn't the problem.
If your cost of getting leadsis too high and you can usually
tell this by if you don't testenough creatives or different
types of creatives right, like,all your creatives look the same
and you're wondering why that'snot working probably because
(23:17):
you haven't tried enough newthings then that might be the
problem too.
Or if you have some ads thatare getting, like I don't know,
$50 leads, but most of them aregetting $100 leads, then try to
look at why is that ad doing somuch better?
Like, how can I double down onthis strategy?
Yeah, yeah, does that answerthe question?
Speaker 1 (23:36):
yeah, so take it, take a look at your, your speed
to lead process.
Oh yeah, it's like making sureyou're you're doing the right
things to get that set rate isas high as you can.
So, yeah, I think a lot ofpeople underestimate how quickly
you need to respond to leadscoming in.
Yeah, so like not having ananswering service or a set or
(23:58):
somebody dedicate dedicated towhen a lead comes in, like going
after that aggressively, Ithink people underestimate what
you need to do to close a leador, I'm sorry, to set a lead on
on the calendar yeah, like theteam that we have calling for
our clients and setting theseappointments, our SOPs is, you
(24:18):
know, we call within 90 secondsof a new lead.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Unless we're already on the phone, then it's you know
, with as soon as possible.
We try to reach them right away, double dial.
If we don't reach them, we callthem later, the same day, and
then we continue to follow upfor at least five days, twice
per day and then, depending onthe kind of lead, right, like if
it's a beautiful house, theysaid they wanted to do it as
soon as possible Like we justcontinue to follow up.
(24:42):
We almost never give up andespecially if we see, oh, they
opened one of our emails.
Like we continue to follow upeven then it is a full-time job,
honestly, like it's a full-timejob.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, that's a, I think, a big point, because I
some folks said we're going todo facebook ads, but if they
don't have, if not working withsomeone like you, where you're
actually, it sounds like youguys are actually setting the
appointments for the folks youwork with that's not always the
case.
That's not always the case forfor marketing and companies,
then they'll.
They'll.
Sometimes some marketingcompanies will just run the ads
and then it's on the paintingbusiness owner to actually set
(25:20):
the appointments on theircalendar.
So, yeah, that's a bigoperation.
A lot of attention needs to bepaid to it, so I think that that
can't be understated.
Yeah, and then some of theother things you mentioned were
making sure the you know, doingA-B testing, like making sure
(25:41):
you have multiple ads to seewhat's performing better.
So if your ad is not good, youknow you get a better ad up
there.
So that makes sense, of course.
Cool, all right, awesome.
Well, you've been supergenerous with your time.
I've learned a lot as well.
Is there anything else that youthink is key to running
(26:05):
Facebook ads?
Marketing?
And we talked a little bitabout optimizing the sales
process Anything else that you'dlike to kind of dig into?
Speaker 2 (26:18):
else that you'd like to kind of dig into?
Yeah for sure.
So a lot of people want leadsbut they're missing sales and I
see that so many times, evenwith you know companies doing
one, 2 million they have youknow they, they're getting good
leads and that's why they'reable to continue, you know,
being profitable and growing.
But I see so many people, youknow they're emailing their
estimates.
They're not giving quotes onthe spot, they're.
(26:43):
You know they're not doing aset call where they are, you
know, asking questionsbeforehand, doing a pre-close,
like these sorts of things where, if you actually learn how to
do the right process, like youknow, just going from 20% close
rate to 40%, which is super, youknow, it's super doable if you
have the right training and theright process.
I mean we're talking aboutyou're doubling your business if
that's your only source ofacquisition, right, like it's
(27:04):
not a small jump and a lot ofpeople will think they need more
leads.
But then they close 20% oftheir estimates, right, and
that's also why we do salescoaching, by the way, just like
if we didn't, I don't even knowif we would be making any money
(27:25):
because our clients justwouldn't be closing deals.
I feel it's, it's, yeah, it's,it's probably, I would say sales
and, like most service basedbusinesses, is almost like the
most important thing becausewhatever marketing channel you
do, if you got sales then youcan close deals.
So it's, it's super vital.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
That makes sense and I I have heard like folks you
know, especially online uh,painting business owners will
kind of complain about marketingcompanies is like the, the, the
leads weren't any good, um.
But I think the first thingthey should probably do is just
reflect on their sales process,cause if you have a strong sales
(28:03):
process, you know that thatmight actually be.
The issue is not not the leadsweren't any good.
In some cases the leads aren'tgood, I mean for sure.
But if it's a, especially witha marketing company that has
been working with just paintingbusinesses like yourself, and
you can know what works it'smost times, I would venture to
(28:25):
say that it's probably the salesprocess that needs to be
improved and not necessarily theleads need to be improved.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
Yeah, and like just to drive that home, that home.
I've been in business for longenough to where we've had
instances where we've hadmultiple clients in one single
city almost offering the sameservices.
We had two clients doingcabinets in the same city.
One of them was closing about40% of their estimates.
The other one was closing about20% of the estimates.
(28:56):
Now you could argue the leadswere different and everything,
but it was the same kinds ofadvertising and whatever.
And one of them, the guyclosing 40% I'm not going to put
names on these people, but oneof the guy closing 40% he was
always saying I need to beclosing more deals.
I need to be closing more deals.
What can I do, julian?
Can you review some of my calls?
And then the other guy was likeyeah, I think it's the leads
(29:22):
and you know, when you have thatbird's eye view, it's like it's
hard not to like see this andgo like I wish I wish you know
you could just see what I'mseeing.
I go by full self accountability, like extreme self
accountability.
Some people think that's, youknow, toxic, whatever.
So whenever something happens,I always look to myself first
like what did I do that I couldhave done differently, like even
(29:43):
if, like, my employee messes up, it's like how could this have
been my fault and what can I doto actually avoid this from
happening?
So, even internally, like wehave crazy levels of procedures
and SOPs and training, just soeverything is solid.
But yeah, extremeself-accountability is what's
taken us so far, honestly, andalso the reason why we do call
(30:07):
leads and set them for ourclients and also why we do the
sales coaching, because, quitefrankly, if we only did leads,
then there's no way we canactually guarantee satisfaction
for our clients.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
Yeah, that makes sense and I think it's
definitely needed and I thinkit's pretty awesome what you
guys are doing over there.
Where can folks learn moreabout what you're doing over
there at Home Run Marketing?
Where should they go?
How should they link up withyou if they're interested in
(30:41):
learning more?
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Yeah, for sure.
I mean, we're pretty much onevery social media platform.
So we have some YouTube videos,we have Instagram, facebook.
They can just search Home RunMarketing.
But if they want to look at ourwebsite, for example, they can
just search the Home RunMarketing so T-H-E, home Run
Marketingcom, and then they'lljust have all the information
(31:04):
that they need to see if theywant to reach out or whatnot.
Yeah, actually, for anybodywho's watching this, thinking
about reaching out, getting somepersonal trust, building
Facebook ads, having us settletheir estimates, helping them,
you know, go from 30, 40, 50% tomaybe 70% close rates on their
estimates, then we'd be morethan happy to give them a month
(31:26):
extra free if they sign up, youknow, through you guys.
So if you hop on a call with us, mention bookkeeping for
painters, then be more thanhappy to give you guys an extra
month for free.
Awesome.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
I appreciate that.
I appreciate your time today,julian, if you're listening and
you need some help withmarketing, definitely check out
Home Run Marketing and with that, we will see you next week.
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com