January 28, 2025 • 50 mins
The podcast dives into using data analytics and AI in the home service industry, featuring Phil Risher, who shares actionable insights for improving visibility, conversion rates, and retargeting strategies. Listeners discover the importance of personalized customer engagement and learn how to optimize their business processes to drive growth.
• Importance of KPIs for business insights
• Three pillars of growing a home service business: visibility, conversion, and retargeting
• Urgency of timely customer follow-ups and personalized communication
• Strategies for collecting and leveraging customer reviews
• Utilizing automation and AI for lead management
• Training technicians to spot and convert sales opportunities
• Cultivating a culture of success within business teams
From the Zoo to Wild is a book for entrepreneurs passionate about home services, looking to move away from corporate jobs. Chris Lalomia, a former executive, shares his path, discoveries, and tools to succeed as a small business owner in home improvement retail. The book provides the mindset, habits, leadership style, and customer-oriented processes necessary to succeed as a small business owner in home services.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
He hit on this so you can do it, but you can't do it,
or you can do it.
I mean, maybe one of you canright yeah, get your retargeting
down, get your callbacks down,get your follow-up callbacks
down, layer it with AI.
I'm telling you, man, thatstuff my mind's been blown yet
again.
My mind's getting blown likeevery week on AI and how close
(00:20):
it's becoming.
Welcome to the Small BusinessSafari, where I help guide you
to avoid those traps, pitfallsand dangers that lurk when
navigating the wild world ofsmall business ownership.
I'll share those gold nuggetsof information and invite guests
to help accelerate your ascentto that mountaintop of success.
It's a jungle out there and Iwant to help you traverse
through the levels of owningyour own business that can get
you bogged down and distract youfrom hitting your own personal
(00:42):
and professional goals.
So strap in Adventure Team andlet's take a ride through the
safari and get you to themountain top.
All right, alan, it is on,believe it or not.
It just muted on you becauseI've got AI taking notes.
(01:03):
That's why the recordingstarted.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
The bots are taking over the world.
Chris, I don't like it.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Right.
So I botted my way out to Vegasthis weekend, baby.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yes, you did.
You had a big weekend and I amimpressed that you even bothered
to text me.
Thank you, I did.
Well, it was a response to mytext.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
But I made it, yeah, and I made it.
What I mean I made it.
I mean I made it.
My lions lost, uh, but I'lltake the bills.
Win, uh, and I came back withuh almost as soon as I had
before when I came out back.
So, uh, but I didn't lose myass.
Did you break even?
Speaker 3 (01:35):
I did really that's a win in vegas.
Oh hell, yeah, dude, that wasyou.
Guys were going big, you couldjust see in the photos.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, I was, um, yeah , I had, I didn't have.
Like these big dogs had.
At one point one of them hadfive grand and just bets on
games.
And then during the game andyou know, in in between the
games they love the craps theyput another three out there and
play.
I'm like, oh my god.
And so the little dog over here, just uh, I think I can, I
(02:06):
think I can, I think I can.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
I got there.
Maybe our guests will help youbecome a big dog that's right
and that's what.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
So I'm excited that we've got phil risher, who
reached out to me because he hadtalked with dave mormon.
We've been doing this now for alittle over three and a half
years.
Dave was one of our very firstguests because I saw Dave out
there and I really liked what hewas doing, and I think we
(02:32):
probably ought to have Dave comeback on because I know we're a
lot better at what we do now.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
We know what we're doing.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Yeah, but he is such a great dude and great guy and
I've stayed.
I mean, I keep up with him onsocial and every once in a while
we ping each other.
You know he's got this.
He's got a pressure washingbusiness and does pressure
washing coaching.
I know I've referred him to atleast three people.
Um yeah, now, whether or notthey had, uh, the balls to use
it I don't know, but it's, he'sworth a great, he's a good
(02:58):
conversation man, so it's atleast talking to.
So dave mormon hooked us up.
Phil says hey, I think I'd becool to come on your website or
come on your podcast.
And I was like, oh man, I mean,we get.
I mean, I get five of these aday.
I mean, seriously, right nowwe're getting this is kind of a
big deal.
Yeah, I mean our podcast.
We're in the top 5%, we'redoing all right man People kind
(03:27):
of.
You know.
I think we're a big deal, uh.
So I said, well, let's see.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
And then he sends me his bio and I'm like, oh, this
is a slam dunk.
And I'm like you're making waytoo much out of it.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
We have got to do this.
One of the things alan and Ihave talked about on this
podcast is our backgrounds havereally formed a lot about who we
are and what we do, and one ofthe things that alan has brought
up a lot of times is hisenterprise training and just the
enterprise culture and how goodit was for him is that he
actually felt entrepreneurialwhile he was there at the green,
at the what do you guys call it, the green?
Speaker 3 (03:51):
I don't know the green, I don't know, the big
green gorilla at one point.
Yeah, and so phil says I workedat enterprise too.
I'm like all right, see, hegets so excited about it, phil,
I mean it's just not that big ofa deal, I.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
I mean, we know what it meant, but yeah, you know
getting our ties sucked up invacuums as we clean cars.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Oh my God, yeah, cleaning a car in a suit with a
tie right there.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Exactly, exactly.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
So, phil.
So the best story, alan, that Iremember Alan telling me was
was it bullet holes in the carand the gun in the car?
Well, the uh the county had uhimpounded the car that the the
sheriff, the guy running forsheriff for dekab county, was
gunned down in by his rival.
That was one of them, that waspretty good.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Yeah, I mean that that's pretty legendary.
Because I told, I told somebodythat story.
They they fact-checked me.
I said, do you know that?
I mean, I moved to atlantaafter this happened but the
sheriff one sheriff gunned downthe other sheriff and they're
like what kind of podunk townwas this?
I'm like, no, no, it was rightnext to downtown atlanta.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Yeah, look at you know who else was one of my
customers I don't know if I evertold you this that prick who,
uh, flew the plane into thetrade center.
He actually rented a car beforehe did that.
Around him he was casingAtlanta.
You know, he got the CDC andall that Right, and didn't he?
Speaker 1 (05:08):
take flight lessons here.
Yeah, oh my God.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
That's great, get a profile.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Alan, you can now in our new administration.
That's a topic for another dayand that's a different podcast.
Let's go to True Crimes podcast.
Phil, what was the craziestthing that ever happened to you
at enterprise, except gettingyour tie sucked up, which is
nothing, that wasn't good yeah,I would say I had two.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
so one of my branches we actually ran the undercover
division for a large county likeundercover cops about 120 cars
out on rent for them and theywere all undercover.
So we would have lord guns incars, drugs and cars that they
would leave when they wouldaccidentally drop their stuff
off.
They also would get seen by thepeople they're trying to trace
(05:49):
and they need to come in andswap their cars.
That was pretty crazy.
At that same branch I actuallyhad my branch literally broken
into and the safe broken intoand they stole my truck a brand
new Dodge Ram 2500 or whateverdrove it to a 7-Eleven, hooked
up the ATM, dragged it out andthen went on a wild police chase
(06:10):
with police in one of my cars.
So yeah, those are some of thecrazy ones, more crazy ones that
are out there, but that wasprobably the two big ones.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, there's a lot of things that you can use a
rental car for.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, hot boxing.
Hot boxing was a really popularone.
You get the car, you know youdo whatever.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
It's ridiculous, it is amazing how often we pulled
guns and drugs out of the cars.
Yeah, I'd be like you know.
Hey, just, can you not rememberthat you have guns and drugs in
the car before you return it?
I mean, that's kind of alwaysblew my mind.
Can you not remember that youhave guns and drugs on the car
before you return it?
I mean, that's kind of alwaysblew my mind like, hmm, what do
I need to get a car before?
Speaker 1 (06:51):
I turn it back in.
Oh, here's another.
Are you not a teenager tryingto hide shit from your parents
at one point in your life?
I mean seriously, can't youclean your car?
See things you learn atenterprise.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Here's another one.
You know we did these trunk totrunks.
When you go out and inspect thecar, when someone drops the car
back off to you to make surethere's no damage, right, one of
the things that we would lookat is in the glove compartment.
You open it up and in there waslike a bunch of sex toys and
stuff.
And it's like a woman.
I have to go back in there andI'm like, did you leave
something in the car?
(07:22):
And she's like like, oh yeah.
I'm like how does this evenhappen?
How does this end up in yourrental car and you leave it in
there.
It's ridiculous.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
Chris, I know you take customer service calls from
people who aren't very happy,so how would you answer the call
where somebody calls up andsays my toddler reached under
the seat of your rental car andpulled out a Glock?
Speaker 1 (07:43):
and pulled out a Glock.
Okay, so that does trump theone I got, because I do rent out
my place in the mountains.
So obviously, first thing yousay no shit, I apologize
completely, this is unacceptable.
Then it's like is it loaded?
Yeah, exactly, oh, my God, Imean.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Exactly, oh my God, I mean seriously, yeah, stuff
like that, that was terrible.
So what's ever happened in yourcabin?
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Have you ever had ritual sacrifices or anything
like that, yes, Well, or achipmunk got in and died
underneath the loft upstairswhere the kid was and honestly,
it was almost at the level ofthe Glock.
That's the way she reacted.
The mom was telling me that herson could have been bitten,
could contract rabies from this.
(08:29):
This is unacceptable.
How do you let this happen inyour cabin?
I thought you guys had acleaning protocol.
I mean just giving it to me.
I'm like, damn baby, you werein the middle of the woods.
I mean this is, that's thewhole reason why you rent a
cabin.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Yeah, get close to nature and she is just like
letting me have it.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
I'm like, okay, you know, I mean, at some point I
just finally went, would you getthe chipmunk out?
Okay, good, I mean seriously atthat point.
If you here's how, how sheshould have handled this, though
and this is a great customerpoint if she just would have
said hey, I, you know, I knowI'm in the mountains, I just
want to let you know we got, wehad a chipmunk upstairs we take,
(09:06):
we took care of it, though I'mlike I would have said I so
apologize.
Can I at least give you anextra night?
Can I comp you something?
But she was such a b about itthat I was like you know, what
do you want?
Speaker 3 (09:17):
that goes back to that customer service, uh pod,
that we dropped a couple ofweeks ago.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, when you went to went to Ooni and you hit them
with great customer service tothem.
They want to help you, Right.
Well, this lady hits you upwith that and you're like, I
mean I'm going to give you theleast I possibly can.
I guess I should have said Phil.
Well, at least it wasn't aGlock, right?
Hey, look at me, all right.
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Phil's like where's this going?
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Why did I come on this podcast?
I don't know what the hell I'mgoing to talk about I might
laugh, the reason I'm excited tohave you two enterprise guys on
me.
So, phil, in your background,did you feel like it helped set
you up for success as you movedon to the entrepreneurial world?
Did you feel like it was a goodbasis?
What do you think?
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Nowadays, like in my company today, we use the same
things that I use at Enterpriseto track performance, because we
got paid off the bottom line ofour branches.
So it was basically runningyour own branch and you just you
know, get profit distributions.
So the same reports that we usenow.
We actually use them for ourclients.
And my trajectory afterEnterprise, I went and worked at
a home service business thatwas doing three million dollars
(10:22):
and when I went there I'm like,well, how do you track your
year-over-year jobs?
How do you track youryear-over-year this service
versus that service?
And there's nothing in there.
So I'm like, okay, we need tostart tracking this stuff so
then we can benchmarkperformance and help us grow.
So that in and of itself,helped me tremendously.
The other thing, when it comesto enterprises, since I was
running a local business thatwas a couple million dollars, I
learned how to manage 15 peoplewhen I'm 25 years old, a $2
(10:44):
million business, whatever.
So definitely like that stufftremendously set me up and I
wouldn't be where I'm at now ifI didn't have that experience
for sure.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Should we let people know where he's at now?
Speaker 1 (10:54):
So let's get into that Well so, bill, where are
you at now?
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Yeah, so well.
I own a company called FlashConsulting.
We work with home servicebusinesses to help them increase
their sales, keep theirschedules full.
When I was in the trades, a lotof times there's these digital
marketing frou-frou people thattalk about likes and impressions
and they never actually useyour CRM to grow, and so when I
started the company, I actuallyat that home service business we
were crushing it.
(11:19):
I crushed it for him for thefirst year and he referred all
of his friends and was like, hey, you need to talk with this guy
.
And basically it was like youneed to go help these people and
I'll be your first client.
So he kind of pushed me outthere and then I started
building out this playbook.
I know it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
So the guy you went to work for said, hey, get the
hell out of here.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Yeah, this is the crazy part.
This is my enterprise.
This is really my enterprise atenterprise, you know, like
we're just going hard, likewe're trying to book deals, sell
clothes, stuff, no excuses.
Like I was a high performerwhen I went to work in home
service I was pushing the meter.
I was like why can't we bookmore jobs?
Why can't we run more routes?
Why are we doing this?
And the first year he went from3 million to 4 million in
(11:56):
revenue and he's like this guyneeds to chill, like he's doing
way too much and he's pushingtoo hard.
So he's like I need to get thisguy out of here and like go
work with other businesses andjust do the other stuff for me.
So, yeah, he basically fired mebecause I was a disruptor.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
I love it.
So what was it?
What was the home servicebusiness?
Speaker 2 (12:12):
It was an air duct cleaning company.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
Air duct cleaning.
Oh my God, it's $4 million inair duct cleaning and they
weren't even tracking their KPIs.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
So get this Chris, Get this the guy used to work in
HVAC in the 90s.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
And everyone used to ask him about duct cleaning.
It was this new indoor airquality push.
So in 1995, he started a ductcleaning company and the way
that he got business waspartnering with HVAC contractors
all over the DC metro area.
So when I started working therein 2018, he had 36 Google
reviews and he was nowhere to befound and he was doing $3
(12:47):
million just from all these HVACcontractors referring him.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
So he didn't think about marketing advertising.
So let's talk about that.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
It's frustrating though I mean, let's just take a
second.
It's like you bust your ass andI mean and this guy just
doesn't care about Googlereviews, he's not tracking
anything.
He's not tracking anything,he's $3 million in business.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Yeah, so you know where we're at right now.
Just so you guys all know.
I am at the cusp of 1,000.
1,000 reviews 1,000 Googlereviews and what I've had to
build from was I was on a thingcalled Kudzu which is here in
Atlanta.
Google came in, took out my 300reviews because Kudzu went out
of business.
(13:25):
Here comes Google and I did areally crappy job of asking for
reviews and getting my guys toget reviews, because today, what
do people do when they gofigure out if they want to work
with a home service company?
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, yeah, they read reviews.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
Of course, thank you.
So.
So this guy goes out there andyou know what I have to give him
kudos because he he networkedwith the hvac guys.
He knew where, where his breadwas buttered, but he was doing a
lot.
That's just.
That's personal time andnetworking, man, uh, that's good
holy shit too.
Uh, so you grew him from threeto four.
What were some of the thingsyou just enacted?
(13:59):
What were some of the thethings you guys did?
Speaker 2 (14:01):
yeah.
So with those hv.
Well, first he was running 15routes a day, three jobs a day,
so he had a ton of work.
So the first thing was likelet's come up with a process to
get Google reviews with allthese jobs.
So what we did was we set up aQR code, a little thing, that
then all the customers couldscan and then each technician
would get $10 for every reviewthat they got.
(14:22):
So the first thing was like geta bunch of reviews, so now we
can get residential clients.
The real unlock here was thatall of the HVAC contractors that
were referring were giving hewas giving them a cut for the
referral.
So he's basically saying likeyou can do duct cleaning without
doing duct cleaning and justrefer me and I'll be your duct
cleaning partner.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
So he was paying for that.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Okay.
So he did have a marketing cost, whether he thought about it or
not.
Okay, exactly.
So every job that he was doinghe was giving them like a
hundred dollars off of a $500job he was given the HVAC
contractors.
So I'm like, well, why don't wejust take all these jobs that
we're doing, get reviews, turnthem into just COD, residential
type customers, and then nothave to pay this hundred dollars
but do it all organically andthat shift right.
There was an unlock, becausethat additional million dollars
was another $600,000 in profit,because it was you don't have to
(15:10):
pay all this money anymore.
It was basically unlocking thisstuff.
That was just one thing.
There's a bunch of other thingslike online scheduling,
estimate calculators,automations, following up on all
his invoices that they weren'tcollecting on.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Oh, that's always a fun one.
So, uh, obviously you took thisguy and uh, it's funny he says
you know what, phil, you got togo yeah I can't handle this
success.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I can't handle this intensity.
You are burning.
I just got this countrybusiness.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
I have got to get a million dollars and so phil has
mentioned he's from maryland, soI'm assuming this guy had a
boat and he wanted to get out ona lake.
That's a crab.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Yeah, he was in Virginia so I'm like in the DMV
DC metro area, but yeah, he hadlike a mountain house and stuff
like that Really good dude.
His thing is like he was sogood at sales, like he was, you
know, he's going out getting allhis HVAC contractors.
He wasn't an operator, hewasn't making sure his stuff was
was tight, so his numbers wereall over the place.
He just needed someone to comein and put some structure in
place, which is what we helpedwith.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
Hey, phil.
So this will go back toenterprise.
You remember when we used to dothe ESQI, the surveys, and if
you weren't completely satisfiedsomewhat satisfied was a no it
counted as a negative score.
It had everything to do withyour promotion and all that
stuff.
And in Google review.
But we tried very hard to makesure that all the branches did
(16:26):
that pure.
We wanted to get actualfeedback, not just pump
ourselves up with a score.
In Google Reviews.
You're starting to see a lot ofhey, if you can't give us a
five-star review, tell us.
So are you manipulating that ordo you have a process to try to
get five-star reviews or do youappreciate just the?
(16:46):
Let's see where we're at.
We just want reviews.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
Yeah.
So they would call that reviewgating, which is basically, you
know, don't leave us a five,don't leave us a review.
That's not a five-star.
So very funny thing.
At Enterprise, what we talkedabout a lot is like if the
customer doesn't know your name,then they're most likely not
going to give you a review.
Like, if the customer doesn'tknow your name, then they're
most likely not going to giveyou a review, but if they
remember your name, they're morelikely to leave you a review
Chris or Phil, you know.
Because then they're like hey,phil did such a great job, I'm
(17:11):
leaving him a review, notEnterprise or whatever the
company is.
So what we did first was Iturned on automations, which was
you know, after the job theyget a text message blah, blah,
blah.
That was okay.
Then what we did was we turnedoff the automations and we
created the QR code with thepostcard and we told all the
technicians ask for a review andmake sure that they know your
name and they leave you a reviewspecifically.
(17:32):
And then what we did this wasreally cool.
Where they go to clock in, wecreated these little like mini
cards for each tech.
That was like a little truckand we put their name on it and
then each review that they got,they moved to the next step and
once they got to a hundredpoints they got a hundred dollar
gift card.
So 10 points and once they hitthat hundred they would get a
(17:53):
little like star, you know, likefootball.
You put little stickers on yourhelmet and stuff.
They would get a star on theirtruck and they'd start back from
the beginning.
So everyone would see theirtrucks moving and getting all
these stars on there and it justcreated this snowball.
So, like the first year, theywent from 36 to a thousand
reviews.
Now they're at like 4,500 or5,000 and they still run that
same playbook to this day.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Just a simple competition.
It's so funny how that works.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Yeah, the big unlock for me.
I was in there for a techmeeting and one of the guys come
in doesn't speak any English.
I see him taking a picture ofit and I'm like, hey, you just
like keep a track of my statshere or what's going on.
He's like, no, I'm sending itto my wife.
She's going to be really proudof me, nice star.
So I'm like, okay, we got it,we got it I love it yeah okay.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
So you, uh, I'm typing, I'm typing notes because
, uh, I've got to start thatwith the AI, pick off the things
I like.
You did something that I thinkis so key.
People ask me, and again we getcalled.
I'm getting ready to go out toDallas and I'm going to go meet
with another handyman wholistens to the podcast while I'm
out there.
Why haven't him come to you?
Well, because I'm going outthere to move Austin into Waco
(18:59):
and then go back to Dallas.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
Oh, that's right.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
So Chris is not going to Austin, he's moving his son,
austin, to Waco, then goingback to Dallas.
I'm very confused but not goingto Austin.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
I'm going to have another sip of bourbon.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
I did not know that my son Austin would actually end
up in the same the damn Texasarea.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
And you think okay, the damn Texas area you just
offended, one of our greateststates.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
I know Well, I'm going down there, so come find
me.
I'd love to duke it out withyou.
I'm going to give you somecowboy hats and everything.
Anyway, back to this Keepdigging.
Here's what people ask mewhat's the best thing you've
found to get reviews?
I said having my guys ask forit, right in front of the person
, exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Really.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
Like yeah, no, it's not like I know they can't, but
when you tell them to do it andthen all you have to do is give
them one button on your CRM tosay, send a text message with
the Google link, and thecustomer gets it and you just
stare at them while they do it.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
That's right, and they do it.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
And that pause was not your phone, that was not you
driving down there, that wasChris pausing to tell everybody.
You just sit there and stare atthem when you send it to them.
Yeah.
But, that's it, though.
Because they know your name,phil, you hit that.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
That's right.
What we coached them was kindof the enterprise model, which
was hey, so my name's Phil.
How did we do today?
How was the service that youreceived from me?
Oh, it was great.
Is there anything I could dobetter next time or any feedback
for me?
No, all good here, cool.
Well, I have two things for you.
First, do you mind leaving me areview here?
Let's my boss know I'm doing agreat job here you go, Pause and
(20:28):
stare at him.
Yeah, scan the QR code.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
So that'd be fun to watch this on YouTube, because
Phil and I are staring at eachother and Ellen's going.
This is awkward.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
Yeah, and then the second part is.
Here's your you know invoice orhow you're going to pay
whatever, but you just make it apart of that ending script.
And my name's Phil.
How was the service?
Blah, blah, blah.
It just ties it all together.
It's perfect.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
Yeah, our line is and this has been dynamite when
they use it.
Now they.
When I walked up as the owner,I'm like you know.
I hope you like what our guysdid today I said I'll tell you
what it would mean the world tohim if you went out there and
gave him a good review.
But if he didn't earn fivestars, you let us know and I'm
here to help him and I'll dowhatever it takes.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
Review gate right, Phil, he just managed it.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
I did baby.
Little review gate, and so, tobe fair everybody needs to know
this I do have a review gate too.
So if we think the servicereally didn't go well they think
that they pulled a Glock whenit really was just a chipmunk
underneath their thing I sendthem a link to my website where
they can go through there and Ican suppress all my four and
(21:31):
less, but I can respond to themso they feel like they got their
voice heard, because that's thething that's awesome about
these keyboard.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Wait a minute, you don't you don't let like threes
show up.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
No.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
So on my website, no on.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
Google I can't control that, Right.
And then Google let me tell youguys everything.
You can't control shit when itcomes to Google.
You can, and if you ever getone taken away that you fought
for guys, you got a gold starand you can send me an email,
Chris, at the trusted toolbox,and let me know.
I said because I've had legitreviews taken down.
Yeah it's bad.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So I feel you were jumping in.
What was that?
You can set up an automation soit will send an email and
you'll have, like the stars andthen you'll say click on the
star.
If it's five star, when youclick on that star, it goes to
your Google business profile.
If they click on four, if it'sfive star when you click on that
star, it goes to your Googlebusiness profile.
If they click on four, then itgoes to your website where they
can fill out a form.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
So that way you're kind of like segmenting them out
, but based on the stars, and ifit's a two it goes to you.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
No, actually, four and lower goes to all of us.
Yeah, no, four, four and lower.
We react that, yeah and I.
How about this?
You're a little off.
One, there are two, three andfour in there.
You could have picked adifferent one.
Was it literally a one?
Speaker 3 (22:46):
I wish we'd go to 10, because I don't review anymore,
because to me, like when you goto a restaurant, I mean I'm
only going to give five stars.
If I had my world rock, fourstars is good to me, but now in
Google, world four is not thatgood.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
No, I agree with you.
I thought I would be a hardgrader too.
I thought I would be theRussian grader, maybe the German
judge in the Olympics.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
You just dated yourself hard, but I love that
reference.
That was so big.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
But you're right, it's hard because, man, we're
out there and this is how wemake our living.
And we're out there and this ishow we make our living.
And you want to get behind yourkeyboard and, instead of
engaging with me and having aconversation, you want to just
go out there and slay me and notgive me a chance to fix it
Again.
In home services, phil, youtalked about duct cleaning.
I know you work with a lot ofother home services.
We'll get to that, but in myworld, drywall.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
I can't tell you how many times people just get
absolutely just set off ondrywall.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Nothing pisses me off more than drywall, is that
right?
Yeah, really.
And you're like this is so easy.
No, I can fix this.
I mean, they make it sound like, your world is weird you know
what my world is weird?
You want to.
You want to buy it it's up forsale?
Not yet, baby no, all right,all right, so All right.
So back to Phil.
Okay, back to.
Can we please?
Speaker 3 (23:58):
Hey, Phil, your bio.
I'm not going to say you'rebragging, but it's pretty
confident, Like I'm going tohelp you just really increase
the multiples on your businessso you can exit and be a big
daddy, like Chris wants to be,and you focus on the home
services space.
(24:18):
Are you that confident becauseso many people in the home
services space don't use KPIsand don't do these things or I
mean, Chris runs a verysophisticated business Can you
actually take a business likehis with that confidence and
know that you can move theneedle?
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, so there's like three pillars that we look at.
There's visibility, so reviewsis one part of it where people
are going to find you, whetherit's SEO, running ads, whatever
they need to know about you andfind you.
That's the one pillar.
The second one is conversions,and most companies don't have a
lead problem.
They have a lead managementproblem.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Sorry, we just talked about that before we got on the
air with you.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
Okay, so, like the duck cleaning company, they're
getting all these leads, theCSRs.
Who knows if they're callingthem?
They're not answering.
But what's the process looklike for nurturing the leads?
That's the second problem isconversions.
Most of the times, that's theissue, and they need automations
inside of their CRM to helpwith that.
Speaker 3 (25:12):
Are you saying take the human people part of that
out?
Speaker 2 (25:19):
I'm saying layer AI and automation on top of the
humans that they can pick up,like if, for example, let's say,
you get a lead that comes inand you call them and they don't
answer, what happens?
Nine times out of 10, nothing.
There needs to be an email textmessage sequence that starts to
happen, that when they respondto that, then the CSR picks it
up and can communicate back andforth with the client and then
the last pillar is retargeting.
(25:39):
So all your prospects andcustomers that come through your
database, maybe you close 50 to60% of them.
The other 40% you don't close.
They all need to go into anemail newsletter text message
marketing campaign to cross sellservices, to bring them back
into your funnel.
The reason that I'm soconfident is because most people
, from a marketing perspective,don't do conversion rate
optimization or automations,they don't do retargeting to
(26:01):
their past customers and theybarely do visibility and they
don't even know if it's workingbecause they don't use their CRM
halfway.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
So you help implement all these processes, but do you
actually teach people how toconvert?
Speaker 2 (26:14):
No.
So my company is a done for yousystem where we have the
playbooks and processes that aredone.
If they want the how they cango to our youtube channel and we
give it away for free I canpromise you what he's just
talking about.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
This is the heart.
Um, as a business owner, wehave a lot of shit going on
exactly right and so now I'mgoing to tie it into what I just
said.
I can teach you to replace yourown toilet, alan, and that way
you can flush your own shit.
Or after you watch my YouTubechannel, you'll let us come
change your toilet out.
So that's what Phil's saying.
It's like look come on, you wantto do it yourself?
(26:49):
Good, here you go, I'm going togive it all to you.
Then you got Marcus Sheridan upthere.
They ask you answer.
I'm going to give you all theanswers.
Now.
Do you have the time to do allthat?
Because I'm writing down thosethree things and retargeting is
a great example, or hey?
Uh, ladies, did you call themback?
Yeah did they answer?
Speaker 3 (27:08):
no, I just left a message by the way, I liked it a
lot better when you wrote on alegal pad I well, I'm, because
when you get, when you get onyour phone, I don't know if
you're like placing a bet?
Speaker 1 (27:17):
No, I'm not placing a bet.
Speaker 3 (27:18):
You can't place a bet here in Georgia, by the way,
which is the only reason I'mstill acting or contacting
somebody out of state to place abet, or if you're dealing with
a customer service issue.
I just feel like you're justdistracted.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
No, I'm taking notes, but when you have a legal pad
and a pen.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
This is why I hate AI .
Speaker 1 (27:41):
But you have a legal patent to pen.
Then I know you're engagedbecause you're excited, you're
taking notes.
Now I don't know what you'redoing.
That reminds me of my firstboss.
I used to come in way back inthe day this is way before the
internet people and we'd havethe newspaper In the dark times,
the dark times, and I was aengineer and we did drafting,
but I had just moved to a CADstation but I would read the
newspaper and he grabbed me andpulled me inside and said Chris,
look, he goes.
I know you're one of thesmartest guys here, he goes.
(28:05):
You're a master's inengineering, you're really smart
, he said.
But reading the paper at yourcube is, it's just not a good
look.
When I learned, right there,I'm like shit, he's right.
So I never read the paper at mycube ever again and couldn't go
to the internet.
But I found other ways.
But on my computer I hadSolitaire.
So, fuck you, I didn't learn adamn thing, but I played
(28:26):
Solitaire.
I don't know where that storywas going.
No, you're right.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
So here, no, I'm on my phone, phil, normally just
gives me the finger, but todayhe just absolutely said it.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
I did too, because that one set me off.
I did too, because that one setme off.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
That reminds me of that and there he is.
He's on his phone again, butI'm trying to break this shit
down.
Oh, got a parlay with it.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
No, no parlays, although I did win a parlay this
weekend, did you really?
Oh my God, it was a crazyparlay too.
That must have been fun.
Speaker 3 (28:47):
It was Because you just got to keep building and
building and building I millionsof dollars.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
I made like $81.42.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
But you celebrated like it was 1999.
You should have seen me.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
You know what?
You've never seen a guy gocrazy at a $20 bet than Chris.
I can promise you that I cansee it, I know it, and so if
it's $20 or $2,000, I'm in.
But that's the business ownermentality.
Speaker 3 (29:16):
Let's get back to Phil, shall we?
I've been with phil the wholetime.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
I was just scolding you for just, but I'm paying
attention I'm writing his shitdown because, uh, he hit on this
so you can do it, but you can'tdo it.
Or you can do it, you can.
I mean, maybe you want to, youcan right.
Yeah, get your retargeting down, get your callbacks down, get
your follow-up callbacks down,layer it with ai.
I'm telling you, man, that stuffmy mind's been blown yet again
(29:40):
my mind's getting blown likeevery week on ai and how close
it's becoming.
Tommy mellow, who one of yourbooks up there?
Uh, he and I were talking twoyears ago.
No, year and a half ago, no, uh, less than a year ago.
He said two years from now, no,but no human will answer the
phone and home services.
And I said I don't know, I homeservices.
And I said I don't know.
I didn't say bullshit, I justsaid I don't know.
(30:02):
Man, that seems like a bigstretch, bro.
I said because my business isjust so different.
He said well, I can't speak toyour business, but I know garage
doors.
He goes nobody, I'm not goingto have a call center, ai is
(30:23):
going to answer first.
I'm like no, no, no.
So I was at a presentation lastThursday by Victor Antonio.
Guy's an amazing salesperson.
Go look him up,victorantoniocom.
You want to learn about sales,you go there and you just go to
the temple, my friends, becausehe is amazing.
He said it's coming and it'salready here.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
It's already at.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
AI.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
Yeah, so.
So Air AI is good, but for thetrade specifically, there's like
three big players.
There's one that's calledZyraTalk.
Zyratalk integrates with yourservice, titan, and basically
they can, or that's one of theCRMs for most of the big home
service businesses.
But it integrates with otherones.
It answers the call, answersquestions, can book it right
into your CRM for you right intoyour CRM for you.
(30:59):
Same Day AI is another one doesa similar thing, but they're
actually turning AI sales agents.
So they're going to be doingyour rehashing on your estimates
, they're going to be callingyour spring and fall inspections
, blah, blah, blah, that kind ofstuff.
And then the Jobber I'm prettybig into Jobber with Dave too.
Basically, jobber has their ownAI answering service that will
answer questions and book stuffright onto your calendar all
inside of their platform.
(31:19):
So it's already pretty muchhere.
It's just about people using itis what it comes down to.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
And I mean it sounds good, it doesn't frustrate you.
I mean I still think about,like decision trees, that kind
of AI.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
I would say that the cool thing.
So same day I interviewed himon my podcast Aaron, he was the
founder.
He said that his AI has abooking rate of around 90%, and
that's again the plumbingindustry and other industries
like 90% of a booking rate.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
That's insane.
Yeah, we have Uzi on Uzi's comeon our pod and talked about AI
and answering phones for theHVAC overnight and then he sent
me an example of one where Icouldn't tell it was really good
and they had a-.
Speaker 3 (32:03):
I remember him saying that and I just couldn't
believe it.
But then he told he's the onewho told the story about his AI
actually refunded a customerwhen that wasn't part of the
program because it just madesense.
Yeah, the customer had enoughlogic.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
We're like the customer had enough logic.
We're like okay, I'll give youyour money back, some ways that
you can use AI and then kind ofpick up the CSR side.
So this is some of the thingsthat we implement for clients.
So like when someone fills outa form on your website there's a
study that says that 44% ofwebsite forms never even get
responded to but basically, whena web form happens, what was
(32:39):
that number?
44%.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
I heard that, oh my Lord, I'm going to kick
somebody's ass tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
So is that 44%?
Did you write down or kickingsomebody's ass that you wrote?
Speaker 1 (32:50):
44% KOA.
44% KOA.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Basically, what you want to do is, when someone
fills out a web form, you wantto send them a text message and
an email right away.
That, basically what you wantto do is when someone fills out
a web form, you want to sendthem a text message and an email
right away.
That way, you acknowledge andthe text message is most
important because it gets a 95%open rate.
So when you call them and theydon't answer, now you have a
text message, communication.
And another very importantthing is with the text, you want
to send a follow-up text thatsays hey, if you have any
(33:14):
additional pictures orinformation, text them over to
us.
This allows to start theconversation and send you a text
right away.
Then, when you call them theydon't answer, you can put them
into an automation sequence thatwill text and email them and
nurture the leads through thefunnel.
So that's the basic setup, andthen AI doesn't have to be
responding to the customer.
It's just an AI automationthat's running them through this
nurture sequence.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
And so you actually provide that as well, or do you?
Speaker 2 (33:40):
refer that out.
Okay, no, we build that insideyou build?
Speaker 3 (33:43):
that, and so you can customize it to whatever company
.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Exactly.
It's fully customizable and webuild it in their CRM.
So if they use Jobber Service,Titan, Housecall Pro, we're
basically running stuff in theirCRM and outside of it to
automate that conversion process.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
So are those the three CRMs you work with right
now to automate that conversionprocess.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
So are those the three CRMs you work with right
now?
Work is Housecall Pro JobberService Titan.
That's like most of the onesthat home service companies are
going to work with.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
Well, I guess I'm not most.
I'm on FieldPulse.
You're an outlier, fieldpulse,okay, and I'm going to meet them
next week.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Okay.
So yeah, we don't work with anyclients that use FieldPulse,
but I'm sure if they have an APIintegration it all will work,
it's like you're a leper, I justmoved to them.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
Maybe Phil can help me get my exit.
He won't even work with youbecause you don't work with
FieldPulse.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
Well, you know what.
He's going to work with you.
They've got an.
They're good people.
You tell me what to do.
Let's go rock this shit.
Yeah, I'm actually meeting withthe CEO next week.
In fact, I'm going to let himknow that.
I don't know if he knows this,but I'm kind of a big deal, but
service-tightened I mean.
They're getting ready to gopublic.
That's obviously the big dogyou got to play with, especially
when you're doing your work.
Housecall Pro.
(34:54):
I was coming out of the darkages.
I was with a company thathadn't done a lot for me and
I've been with them for nineyears and I really didn't want
to have to change, but I reallyfelt like I needed to.
I looked at Workiz.
I liked them.
I kept calling them Workiz, bythe way.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
Yeah, either one Workiz, workiz.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Okay, thank God, I thought maybe they hated me, but
I just felt a little bit toomore locksmith for me, like duck
cleaning locksmiths that lookgood.
My handyman and remodelingcompany is kind of a hybrid.
It's really well, let's justget to it.
It's a really hard business butI figured it out and we scaled
and then so I'm going actuallyout to Dallas to see the other
(35:30):
company that's as big as us.
That's why I'm going out thereand to move Austin to Waco, to
go back to Dallas.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Yeah, the big, the big thing with the CRM.
So when I was at the duckcleaning company was we were
working with this digitalmarketing company and I would
ask them like, well, is thisactually working with our Google
ads or whatever?
And they're like, well, youneed to look in your CRM.
And I'm like, well, you need tolook in our CRM.
We're paying you to do ourmarketing stuff Like you need to
.
That's a big part of what we dois tying everything from a
digital perspective into yourCRM reporting and data and then
(35:59):
making decisions based off realdata, and that's why we tie so
hard into CRMs and we're bigabout CRMs wow, this is killing
me.
Speaker 1 (36:10):
All right, I love it.
This is um.
Data is powerful.
This is what's I mean.
This is the part uh, somebodyasked me uh, one of the
questions I did get asked from asmall handyman guy was uh, do I
really need to invest in thecrm thing?
I'm like, yeah, you really do.
I said they they, especiallythe one-man shops they'll give
you something.
There's a couple of good onesout there.
Market looks pretty good.
(36:31):
Um, I can't vouch for them, butyou know just, you got to have
it though.
You got to have it for that andI had one from day one and I did
not, I mean, and that has beenvery powerful for me.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Yeah, I mean if it's a couple hundred bucks a month
and it helps you run yourbusiness.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Yeah, it's great, it's so worth it.
Yeah, it's great, it's so worthit.
Yeah, look, you just hit on acouple things, and one of the
things we'll talk about in sales.
Your priority is not theirpriority.
Especially let's face it ductcleaning is not a necessary, you
don't have to.
And so here's what I learnedlast week from Victor Antonio
victorantoniocom.
So if your close rate is 40%,I'm going to get Victor on, I'm
(37:20):
going to make him listen to thissucker just about becoming
ricky bobby.
Ricky bobby, so, uh, 40.
If you close 40, 60 said noright.
Exactly a study in 2022 bytether um, using a ton of
interactions.
I can't even quote the numberand attributes of those 40.
Those 40, only 20 went to yourcompetitors.
The other 40 of those 40%, only20% went to your competitors.
The other 40 of the 40 decidednot to do anything.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
Because, especially when you're a non-.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Because why.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
Because of indecision and uncertainty, because you
didn't make it a compellingenough case.
You didn't make it a compellingenough case.
You did not bring them down andmake them understand what you
can do for them and why it's soimportant to them today and in
my world as a handyman, hey, Iwant to put these doors in my
office.
Okay, you know, back our COVIDdoors that we talked about back
(38:01):
four years ago.
I put a lot of COVID doors inbecause people started working
from home and they had to putthe doors in.
But what we told them was doyou want your kids flying in to
the room?
Do you guys remember thatYouTube video where the guy
comes flying in?
We used to use that as a joke.
I can't tell you how manyFrench tours I ended up putting
in.
Really, I never heard that.
Yeah, so we called them COVIDdoors.
(38:21):
So we did a lot of COVID doorsand then, whoops, hang on, phil,
I'm still here.
I just hit something Ishouldn't have hit.
I'm back.
So the other thing you talkabout is uncertainty.
You've got to be able to getyour sales team ready to make it
happen right there on the spot.
And if you can't do it on thespot, at least bring them up to
make that decision when they'reready to.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
That's right and I would say another big one, even
for your business.
Like, let's say, you go out todo some handyman work but then
someone's like yeah, I'mthinking about doing this
kitchen remodel, this bathroomremodel.
Now you need to turn yourtechnicians that are out there
into actual sales people.
So we had a company that was anHVAC.
They turned their techniciansinto estimate creators and then
we set up an automation sequence, so every single estimate or
(39:05):
opportunity that they created onthe job site then we ran them
into an estimate nurturesequence to help them convert
more leads.
So a lot of times you get thesepeople in place.
Like you go out for a handymanjob to replace a toilet but you
don't see that this is anoutdated bathroom and you're
like, hey, have you thoughtabout replacing this?
Actually we have.
You know I haven't really gotany quotes.
Okay, well, do you mind if Isend someone out here to take a
(39:27):
look?
At it from my company Nowyou're turning that $200,.
At it from my company Nowyou're turning that $200, $300
job into a $20,000 job.
All just by incentivizing thetechnician to pass leads back
and forth for your bigger ticketitems.
Speaker 3 (39:39):
So that seems really obvious to me as a sales guy.
Back to our enterprise days.
But Chris has talked about forover three years that his lone
wolves are artisans and they'renot salespeople.
Lone wolves are artisans andthey're not salespeople.
Speaker 2 (39:57):
And he struggles getting them to get over that
hump.
Okay, so a lot of them knowabout annuities and residual
income, potentially Like hey, doyou want to get paid when
you're not working and you'resleeping?
This is how I go about it.
Do you want to get paid whileyou're sleeping?
Yes, here's a way to get paidwhile you sleep Every single
lead that you pass over to thesales team, you're going to get
(40:17):
a residual income for work thatyou didn't have to do.
All you have to do is just sendme the lead.
We're going to pay you 2% ofany job that sells that you
originate.
Speaker 3 (40:26):
Genius.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
You could be sleeping and you're going to get paid,
dude.
I am quiet right now becauseI'm writing that shit down,
because I will agree, what'shard is my technicians, my
artisans in the field and theytruly are artisans they think
sales is a bad word.
They think if they tell you todo something else, it's kind of
like, well, it's up to you, butthey're writing the check for
(40:50):
the customer and that's one ofthe things I train the guys on
Don't write the check for thecustomer.
I had a guy where we fixed thedoor because and he thought we
were going to have to plane itdown and redo it all, and we
have a technique in the handymanworld of being and you should
know this if you put doors in,you know how to line up a door
better by just putting in longerscrews.
(41:11):
You know how to line up a doorbetter by just putting in longer
screws.
Um, it's actually a pretty easything where you can shim out a
um, shim out your, your jam ordo whatever you're gonna do.
We did it.
He was done an hour and I guessI can't pay him.
He goes.
Well, uh, why?
Why can't you pay me?
He said well, your guy told methat he said it wasn't really
worth it for what he did.
I said, no, man, you owe me 80bucks because that was an hour
(41:34):
of my guy's time.
I said it was 15 minutes, butit's.
It's the training that I put myguys through yeah he goes uh,
and actually the guy understoodand he said, yeah, I'll pay you
guys.
I said that's how I pay my guys.
He gets a percentage of what hejust sold you.
He goes, I'll pay him.
I'm like, all right.
So, because it was a buddy ofmine, because he called me and
my technician told him yourbuddy was going to say I'm not
(41:56):
paying for the hour.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
The guy was paying.
He was joking with me.
No, he's being totally joking.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
You need new buddies.
You know, what I do need newfriends.
Speaker 2 (42:02):
Yeah, another good way, like the scorecards at
Enterprise where everyone's upthere ranked based off of their
stats.
It's like, okay, we're going tostart ranking people off how
many leads they generate whenthey're out on jobs, maybe
they're motivated by, you know,being praised in public or
everyone's up here.
the number of leads Wow, thisguy's really crushing it.
It's not just about money.
Another really good one that wedid at Enterprise.
(42:23):
We had this thing called Fiveand Fly.
If you sell five full boats ona day, you get to go home early.
Full boats is like fullcoverage, so if you sell five
full boats, you get to go homeearly.
It's called five and fly.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
I knew exactly what that was Five, and fly, that is
nice.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
Yeah, so imagine if you submit five, Five and fly.
That's awesome.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
If you submit five leads, you get a free day off or
you get to leave Friday early,that's outstanding.
Speaker 3 (42:48):
Are you writing that down or I?
Speaker 1 (42:50):
got it down.
Five and fly.
I'm not doing that.
Five and fly.
Look at it.
All right, it's a little printthough, can you see?
Speaker 2 (42:56):
Yeah, Cause a lot of people might not be motivated
about money or they think it's asticky thing, but they might be
motivated by getting Fridaysoff or whatever you know, a
soccer game or who knows what.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
That's genius, phil.
Man, you're onto something Ilove this stuff Helping a lot of
home service companies, so tellus a little bit more about
which companies you're workingwith.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
Yeah, so our bread and butter is 1 to 10 million
home service business owners,and the reason that we're really
good there is because a lot oftimes they can't hire a full-on
marketing CMO or something andthey also need the support that
a traditional digital agency isnot able to provide, like they
need someone to pull the reports, build the automation,
strategize, learn about theirbusiness.
So we kind of fill that gapthat most people are feeling,
(43:34):
and so that's the companies thatwe work with HVAC, plumbing,
electrical, gutter cleaning, airduct cleaning, custom closets,
lawn care a bunch of differenttypes of companies.
And I see you have your ownbobblehead right.
Yeah, so funny story about this.
We do customer appreciationgifts and we send out
bobbleheads to our customers asan appreciation gift when they
(43:54):
work with us, but all of ourteam has them as well.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
It's pretty fun so I have my own bobblehead too.
Alan, is it a lala miabobblehead?
Speaker 3 (44:02):
it is.
Yeah, actually I have one ofthose.
One of my guys made a bobblearound.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
No, I'm not.
You're not even coming near mybobblehead now.
You will not be touching mybobblehead, sir.
Oh my gosh, that's horrible.
All right, guys, this has beenawesome.
I mean, phil is full of it andfilled is filled it up, phil.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
Are you making pH jokes?
I'm trying to.
I knew you thought it wasP-lashed.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
Did I.
I'm like, if this dude's goingto come on and start talking
about extending lashes, we gotthe wrong podcast dude.
No, it's Flash Consulting.
That's P-H Lash Consulting.
Go look him up.
Phil's got a dynamite businessgoing on.
Man, if you didn't learnsomething that's on you, phil,
how can everybody find you Comeout and talk to you?
Speaker 2 (44:56):
Yeah, we up a free meeting there and go from there.
Speaker 1 (44:59):
So that is not for lash extensions, which I was
looking for.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
So the guy that fired me that said, go out and do
this stuff.
He named the company Flash.
He said it needs to be calledFlash Consulting, phil with a PH
like PH.
And then my wife's name isAshley, but I call her Ash, so
he's like you could be FlashConsulting.
Speaker 3 (45:19):
So that's where it came from.
So you're fired, but I'm goingto give you this gift.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
And two referrals, and I'm your first customer.
Speaker 1 (45:26):
Do you still work with him?
Speaker 2 (45:28):
Yeah, so cool story.
He went from three to 6 millionand then sold a private equity
and made a ton of money.
And I still work with thecompany to this day.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
Nice, Well done man.
That's awesome.
All right, guys go out andcheck out flash consulting, but
I think we've got to go for thefour questions.
All right, Number one what isthe favorite book that you would
recommend everybody?
Cause you got four sitting upthere, so what's your favorite
one?
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, uh, I mean home service millionaire, your
favorite one.
Yeah, I mean Home ServiceMillionaire.
Tommy Mello is always greatbook.
Building a story brand isreally good for people that
don't really know how toarticulate what they do to the
customer.
It's really hard for the tradesbecause they think they're the
hero but they're not.
So building a story brand isreally good.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
Donald Miller building a story brand, that is
big.
Nice, all right, shall, wecontinue, all right.
What's the favorite feature ofyour home?
Because I'm in home services, Ilove this stuff, I love working
in homes.
What's the favorite feature ofyour home?
Speaker 2 (46:15):
yeah, we have a really nice kitchen that we
redid when we moved in.
Uh, so definitely the kitchen.
It's like an open floor plan.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
It's nice all right, what's your favorite feature in
that kitchen?
Speaker 2 (46:24):
um, yeah, we have this we have a really nice
island and then an extendedisland that overlooks, like
where you eat and stuff.
So it's just like very openconcept, but it feels nice, do?
Speaker 1 (46:34):
you have a pot filler , uh no, we don't yeah, I don't
think.
So I don't think I'm gonna doit.
Speaker 3 (46:40):
I I think that's when you've arrived.
Is you have a pot filler?
Speaker 2 (46:43):
really you gotta have one you're an italian, you
should have a pot filler allright it is pretty cool, like I
think it's cool, if I were to dodo it again, I'd probably add
one.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
I do a lot of cast iron frying, though, and, man,
that shit goes everywhere.
I got to figure out Somebodycan invent a cast iron frying
counter.
That doesn't.
Yeah, oh my God.
All right, so that's awesome.
All right, phil, one of thethings we got a big question for
you, because you guys have thisenterprise background, but one
(47:17):
of the things al and I talkabout a lot is that we are
customer service freaks.
Absolutely.
We love this stuff.
We talked about it earlier.
What is the customer servicepet peeve of yours when you're
out there and you're thecustomer?
Speaker 2 (47:22):
yeah, so when I was in the trades, it was literally,
you know, support at emails andI'm like we will never have a
support at email ever in mycompany that people email
because you need to have a realperson that you're actually
working with.
So that that was my big petpeeve a real name instead of
support.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
I like that one All right, so I send out all my
emails for Phil.
Look, we have.
Now we have effects of ourpodcast.
God, we've arrived, we're 5%top.
Hey, we're five percent top.
Hey, we're gonna make whatever,but anyway.
Um so, cindy at the trustedtoolbox is where you get your
emails from now.
But I've always been admin atthe trusted toolbox, because one
(47:59):
of the things I didn't know is,especially in the beginning,
when I first started, I didn'tknow how long they were going to
be with me yeah, so I just so,and and the fact is is it
doesn't matter I know I shouldjust have rox, everybody,
roxanne, yeah, roxanne, I shouldhave been Roxanne, whatever
name makes you Roxanne, not Sam,so it can't be Roxanne.
Okay, all right.
Last thing Give us a DIYnightmare story.
(48:21):
We love fire, flooding, youknow, maybe a little, you know,
not, not dismemberment, butmaybe you just lost a finger.
Just some emergency services,one or three, yeah like me, like
me diying stuff.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
Yeah, not, not a contractor story.
Okay, covid, I actually builtthis desk and if you're on
youtube you can see how the deskholds up.
It's not very good oh, he isrocking.
Speaker 1 (48:42):
It is wiggling a little bit.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
He's out in california and I still keep it
just to remind myself that Itried to build this.
It looks atrocious like.
It looks terrible like I run Irun an agency with a bunch of
people Like I, should be gettinga new desk, but I should humble
.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
I love that.
That is exactly what you do.
You keep that thing forever andthen you give it to your kids
and you say look, daddy builtthis.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
That's what I'm doing .
Speaker 1 (49:04):
Oh, I love it.
Oh, my God Phil reaching out tous.
Thank you to my enterprisebrothers for sharing some
enterprise green knowledge.
You guys rock.
Hey, everybody go out there,make it a great day.
We gotta go keep going becauseit's.
I don't want to time dateourselves, but it's really
freaking cold out.
All right, it's really freakingcold out.
This is my slow period.
Let's get the shit moving andwe gotta go take care of people
(49:26):
because we got a great 2025happening.
Speaker 3 (49:28):
Let's make it happen, cheers everybody.
He hit on this so you can do it, but you can't do it,
or you can do it.
I mean, maybe one of you canright yeah, get your retargeting
down, get your callbacks down,get your follow-up callbacks
down, layer it with AI.
I'm telling you, man, thatstuff my mind's been blown yet
again.
My mind's getting blown likeevery week on AI and how close
(00:20):
it's becoming.
Welcome to the Small BusinessSafari, where I help guide you
to avoid those traps, pitfallsand dangers that lurk when
navigating the wild world ofsmall business ownership.
I'll share those gold nuggetsof information and invite guests
to help accelerate your ascentto that mountaintop of success.
It's a jungle out there and Iwant to help you traverse
through the levels of owningyour own business that can get
you bogged down and distract youfrom hitting your own personal
(00:42):
and professional goals.
So strap in Adventure Team andlet's take a ride through the
safari and get you to themountain top.
All right, alan, it is on,believe it or not.
It just muted on you becauseI've got AI taking notes.
(01:03):
That's why the recordingstarted.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
The bots are taking over the world.
Chris, I don't like it.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Right.
So I botted my way out to Vegasthis weekend, baby.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yes, you did.
You had a big weekend and I amimpressed that you even bothered
to text me.
Thank you, I did.
Well, it was a response to mytext.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
But I made it, yeah, and I made it.
What I mean I made it.
I mean I made it.
My lions lost, uh, but I'lltake the bills.
Win, uh, and I came back withuh almost as soon as I had
before when I came out back.
So, uh, but I didn't lose myass.
Did you break even?
Speaker 3 (01:35):
I did really that's a win in vegas.
Oh hell, yeah, dude, that wasyou.
Guys were going big, you couldjust see in the photos.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, I was, um, yeah , I had, I didn't have.
Like these big dogs had.
At one point one of them hadfive grand and just bets on
games.
And then during the game andyou know, in in between the
games they love the craps theyput another three out there and
play.
I'm like, oh my god.
And so the little dog over here, just uh, I think I can, I
(02:06):
think I can, I think I can.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
I got there.
Maybe our guests will help youbecome a big dog that's right
and that's what.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
So I'm excited that we've got phil risher, who
reached out to me because he hadtalked with dave mormon.
We've been doing this now for alittle over three and a half
years.
Dave was one of our very firstguests because I saw Dave out
there and I really liked what hewas doing, and I think we
(02:32):
probably ought to have Dave comeback on because I know we're a
lot better at what we do now.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
We know what we're doing.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Yeah, but he is such a great dude and great guy and
I've stayed.
I mean, I keep up with him onsocial and every once in a while
we ping each other.
You know he's got this.
He's got a pressure washingbusiness and does pressure
washing coaching.
I know I've referred him to atleast three people.
Um yeah, now, whether or notthey had, uh, the balls to use
it I don't know, but it's, he'sworth a great, he's a good
(02:58):
conversation man, so it's atleast talking to.
So dave mormon hooked us up.
Phil says hey, I think I'd becool to come on your website or
come on your podcast.
And I was like, oh man, I mean,we get.
I mean, I get five of these aday.
I mean, seriously, right nowwe're getting this is kind of a
big deal.
Yeah, I mean our podcast.
We're in the top 5%, we'redoing all right man People kind
(03:27):
of.
You know.
I think we're a big deal, uh.
So I said, well, let's see.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
And then he sends me his bio and I'm like, oh, this
is a slam dunk.
And I'm like you're making waytoo much out of it.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
We have got to do this.
One of the things alan and Ihave talked about on this
podcast is our backgrounds havereally formed a lot about who we
are and what we do, and one ofthe things that alan has brought
up a lot of times is hisenterprise training and just the
enterprise culture and how goodit was for him is that he
actually felt entrepreneurialwhile he was there at the green,
at the what do you guys call it, the green?
Speaker 3 (03:51):
I don't know the green, I don't know, the big
green gorilla at one point.
Yeah, and so phil says I workedat enterprise too.
I'm like all right, see, hegets so excited about it, phil,
I mean it's just not that big ofa deal, I.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
I mean, we know what it meant, but yeah, you know
getting our ties sucked up invacuums as we clean cars.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Oh my God, yeah, cleaning a car in a suit with a
tie right there.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Exactly, exactly.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
So, phil.
So the best story, alan, that Iremember Alan telling me was
was it bullet holes in the carand the gun in the car?
Well, the uh the county had uhimpounded the car that the the
sheriff, the guy running forsheriff for dekab county, was
gunned down in by his rival.
That was one of them, that waspretty good.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Yeah, I mean that that's pretty legendary.
Because I told, I told somebodythat story.
They they fact-checked me.
I said, do you know that?
I mean, I moved to atlantaafter this happened but the
sheriff one sheriff gunned downthe other sheriff and they're
like what kind of podunk townwas this?
I'm like, no, no, it was rightnext to downtown atlanta.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Yeah, look at you know who else was one of my
customers I don't know if I evertold you this that prick who,
uh, flew the plane into thetrade center.
He actually rented a car beforehe did that.
Around him he was casingAtlanta.
You know, he got the CDC andall that Right, and didn't he?
Speaker 1 (05:08):
take flight lessons here.
Yeah, oh my God.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
That's great, get a profile.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Alan, you can now in our new administration.
That's a topic for another dayand that's a different podcast.
Let's go to True Crimes podcast.
Phil, what was the craziestthing that ever happened to you
at enterprise, except gettingyour tie sucked up, which is
nothing, that wasn't good yeah,I would say I had two.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
so one of my branches we actually ran the undercover
division for a large county likeundercover cops about 120 cars
out on rent for them and theywere all undercover.
So we would have lord guns incars, drugs and cars that they
would leave when they wouldaccidentally drop their stuff
off.
They also would get seen by thepeople they're trying to trace
(05:49):
and they need to come in andswap their cars.
That was pretty crazy.
At that same branch I actuallyhad my branch literally broken
into and the safe broken intoand they stole my truck a brand
new Dodge Ram 2500 or whateverdrove it to a 7-Eleven, hooked
up the ATM, dragged it out andthen went on a wild police chase
(06:10):
with police in one of my cars.
So yeah, those are some of thecrazy ones, more crazy ones that
are out there, but that wasprobably the two big ones.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, there's a lot of things that you can use a
rental car for.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, hot boxing.
Hot boxing was a really popularone.
You get the car, you know youdo whatever.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
It's ridiculous, it is amazing how often we pulled
guns and drugs out of the cars.
Yeah, I'd be like you know.
Hey, just, can you not rememberthat you have guns and drugs in
the car before you return it?
I mean, that's kind of alwaysblew my mind.
Can you not remember that youhave guns and drugs on the car
before you return it?
I mean, that's kind of alwaysblew my mind like, hmm, what do
I need to get a car before?
Speaker 1 (06:51):
I turn it back in.
Oh, here's another.
Are you not a teenager tryingto hide shit from your parents
at one point in your life?
I mean seriously, can't youclean your car?
See things you learn atenterprise.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Here's another one.
You know we did these trunk totrunks.
When you go out and inspect thecar, when someone drops the car
back off to you to make surethere's no damage, right, one of
the things that we would lookat is in the glove compartment.
You open it up and in there waslike a bunch of sex toys and
stuff.
And it's like a woman.
I have to go back in there andI'm like, did you leave
something in the car?
(07:22):
And she's like like, oh yeah.
I'm like how does this evenhappen?
How does this end up in yourrental car and you leave it in
there.
It's ridiculous.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
Chris, I know you take customer service calls from
people who aren't very happy,so how would you answer the call
where somebody calls up andsays my toddler reached under
the seat of your rental car andpulled out a Glock?
Speaker 1 (07:43):
and pulled out a Glock.
Okay, so that does trump theone I got, because I do rent out
my place in the mountains.
So obviously, first thing yousay no shit, I apologize
completely, this is unacceptable.
Then it's like is it loaded?
Yeah, exactly, oh, my God, Imean.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Exactly, oh my God, I mean seriously, yeah, stuff
like that, that was terrible.
So what's ever happened in yourcabin?
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Have you ever had ritual sacrifices or anything
like that, yes, Well, or achipmunk got in and died
underneath the loft upstairswhere the kid was and honestly,
it was almost at the level ofthe Glock.
That's the way she reacted.
The mom was telling me that herson could have been bitten,
could contract rabies from this.
(08:29):
This is unacceptable.
How do you let this happen inyour cabin?
I thought you guys had acleaning protocol.
I mean just giving it to me.
I'm like, damn baby, you werein the middle of the woods.
I mean this is, that's thewhole reason why you rent a
cabin.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Yeah, get close to nature and she is just like
letting me have it.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
I'm like, okay, you know, I mean, at some point I
just finally went, would you getthe chipmunk out?
Okay, good, I mean seriously atthat point.
If you here's how, how sheshould have handled this, though
and this is a great customerpoint if she just would have
said hey, I, you know, I knowI'm in the mountains, I just
want to let you know we got, wehad a chipmunk upstairs we take,
(09:06):
we took care of it, though I'mlike I would have said I so
apologize.
Can I at least give you anextra night?
Can I comp you something?
But she was such a b about itthat I was like you know, what
do you want?
Speaker 3 (09:17):
that goes back to that customer service, uh pod,
that we dropped a couple ofweeks ago.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, when you went to went to Ooni and you hit them
with great customer service tothem.
They want to help you, Right.
Well, this lady hits you upwith that and you're like, I
mean I'm going to give you theleast I possibly can.
I guess I should have said Phil.
Well, at least it wasn't aGlock, right?
Hey, look at me, all right.
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Phil's like where's this going?
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Why did I come on this podcast?
I don't know what the hell I'mgoing to talk about I might
laugh, the reason I'm excited tohave you two enterprise guys on
me.
So, phil, in your background,did you feel like it helped set
you up for success as you movedon to the entrepreneurial world?
Did you feel like it was a goodbasis?
What do you think?
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Nowadays, like in my company today, we use the same
things that I use at Enterpriseto track performance, because we
got paid off the bottom line ofour branches.
So it was basically runningyour own branch and you just you
know, get profit distributions.
So the same reports that we usenow.
We actually use them for ourclients.
And my trajectory afterEnterprise, I went and worked at
a home service business thatwas doing three million dollars
(10:22):
and when I went there I'm like,well, how do you track your
year-over-year jobs?
How do you track youryear-over-year this service
versus that service?
And there's nothing in there.
So I'm like, okay, we need tostart tracking this stuff so
then we can benchmarkperformance and help us grow.
So that in and of itself,helped me tremendously.
The other thing, when it comesto enterprises, since I was
running a local business thatwas a couple million dollars, I
learned how to manage 15 peoplewhen I'm 25 years old, a $2
(10:44):
million business, whatever.
So definitely like that stufftremendously set me up and I
wouldn't be where I'm at now ifI didn't have that experience
for sure.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Should we let people know where he's at now?
Speaker 1 (10:54):
So let's get into that Well so, bill, where are
you at now?
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Yeah, so well.
I own a company called FlashConsulting.
We work with home servicebusinesses to help them increase
their sales, keep theirschedules full.
When I was in the trades, a lotof times there's these digital
marketing frou-frou people thattalk about likes and impressions
and they never actually useyour CRM to grow, and so when I
started the company, I actuallyat that home service business we
were crushing it.
(11:19):
I crushed it for him for thefirst year and he referred all
of his friends and was like, hey, you need to talk with this guy
.
And basically it was like youneed to go help these people and
I'll be your first client.
So he kind of pushed me outthere and then I started
building out this playbook.
I know it's crazy.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
So the guy you went to work for said, hey, get the
hell out of here.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Yeah, this is the crazy part.
This is my enterprise.
This is really my enterprise atenterprise, you know, like
we're just going hard, likewe're trying to book deals, sell
clothes, stuff, no excuses.
Like I was a high performerwhen I went to work in home
service I was pushing the meter.
I was like why can't we bookmore jobs?
Why can't we run more routes?
Why are we doing this?
And the first year he went from3 million to 4 million in
(11:56):
revenue and he's like this guyneeds to chill, like he's doing
way too much and he's pushingtoo hard.
So he's like I need to get thisguy out of here and like go
work with other businesses andjust do the other stuff for me.
So, yeah, he basically fired mebecause I was a disruptor.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
I love it.
So what was it?
What was the home servicebusiness?
Speaker 2 (12:12):
It was an air duct cleaning company.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
Air duct cleaning.
Oh my God, it's $4 million inair duct cleaning and they
weren't even tracking their KPIs.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
So get this Chris, Get this the guy used to work in
HVAC in the 90s.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
And everyone used to ask him about duct cleaning.
It was this new indoor airquality push.
So in 1995, he started a ductcleaning company and the way
that he got business waspartnering with HVAC contractors
all over the DC metro area.
So when I started working therein 2018, he had 36 Google
reviews and he was nowhere to befound and he was doing $3
(12:47):
million just from all these HVACcontractors referring him.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
So he didn't think about marketing advertising.
So let's talk about that.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
It's frustrating though I mean, let's just take a
second.
It's like you bust your ass andI mean and this guy just
doesn't care about Googlereviews, he's not tracking
anything.
He's not tracking anything,he's $3 million in business.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Yeah, so you know where we're at right now.
Just so you guys all know.
I am at the cusp of 1,000.
1,000 reviews 1,000 Googlereviews and what I've had to
build from was I was on a thingcalled Kudzu which is here in
Atlanta.
Google came in, took out my 300reviews because Kudzu went out
of business.
(13:25):
Here comes Google and I did areally crappy job of asking for
reviews and getting my guys toget reviews, because today, what
do people do when they gofigure out if they want to work
with a home service company?
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, yeah, they read reviews.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
Of course, thank you.
So.
So this guy goes out there andyou know what I have to give him
kudos because he he networkedwith the hvac guys.
He knew where, where his breadwas buttered, but he was doing a
lot.
That's just.
That's personal time andnetworking, man, uh, that's good
holy shit too.
Uh, so you grew him from threeto four.
What were some of the thingsyou just enacted?
(13:59):
What were some of the thethings you guys did?
Speaker 2 (14:01):
yeah.
So with those hv.
Well, first he was running 15routes a day, three jobs a day,
so he had a ton of work.
So the first thing was likelet's come up with a process to
get Google reviews with allthese jobs.
So what we did was we set up aQR code, a little thing, that
then all the customers couldscan and then each technician
would get $10 for every reviewthat they got.
(14:22):
So the first thing was like geta bunch of reviews, so now we
can get residential clients.
The real unlock here was thatall of the HVAC contractors that
were referring were giving hewas giving them a cut for the
referral.
So he's basically saying likeyou can do duct cleaning without
doing duct cleaning and justrefer me and I'll be your duct
cleaning partner.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
So he was paying for that.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Okay.
So he did have a marketing cost, whether he thought about it or
not.
Okay, exactly.
So every job that he was doinghe was giving them like a
hundred dollars off of a $500job he was given the HVAC
contractors.
So I'm like, well, why don't wejust take all these jobs that
we're doing, get reviews, turnthem into just COD, residential
type customers, and then nothave to pay this hundred dollars
but do it all organically andthat shift right.
There was an unlock, becausethat additional million dollars
was another $600,000 in profit,because it was you don't have to
(15:10):
pay all this money anymore.
It was basically unlocking thisstuff.
That was just one thing.
There's a bunch of other thingslike online scheduling,
estimate calculators,automations, following up on all
his invoices that they weren'tcollecting on.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Oh, that's always a fun one.
So, uh, obviously you took thisguy and uh, it's funny he says
you know what, phil, you got togo yeah I can't handle this
success.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I can't handle this intensity.
You are burning.
I just got this countrybusiness.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
I have got to get a million dollars and so phil has
mentioned he's from maryland, soI'm assuming this guy had a
boat and he wanted to get out ona lake.
That's a crab.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Yeah, he was in Virginia so I'm like in the DMV
DC metro area, but yeah, he hadlike a mountain house and stuff
like that Really good dude.
His thing is like he was sogood at sales, like he was, you
know, he's going out getting allhis HVAC contractors.
He wasn't an operator, hewasn't making sure his stuff was
was tight, so his numbers wereall over the place.
He just needed someone to comein and put some structure in
place, which is what we helpedwith.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
Hey, phil.
So this will go back toenterprise.
You remember when we used to dothe ESQI, the surveys, and if
you weren't completely satisfiedsomewhat satisfied was a no it
counted as a negative score.
It had everything to do withyour promotion and all that
stuff.
And in Google review.
But we tried very hard to makesure that all the branches did
(16:26):
that pure.
We wanted to get actualfeedback, not just pump
ourselves up with a score.
In Google Reviews.
You're starting to see a lot ofhey, if you can't give us a
five-star review, tell us.
So are you manipulating that ordo you have a process to try to
get five-star reviews or do youappreciate just the?
(16:46):
Let's see where we're at.
We just want reviews.
Speaker 2 (16:50):
Yeah.
So they would call that reviewgating, which is basically, you
know, don't leave us a five,don't leave us a review.
That's not a five-star.
So very funny thing.
At Enterprise, what we talkedabout a lot is like if the
customer doesn't know your name,then they're most likely not
going to give you a review.
Like, if the customer doesn'tknow your name, then they're
most likely not going to giveyou a review, but if they
remember your name, they're morelikely to leave you a review
Chris or Phil, you know.
Because then they're like hey,phil did such a great job, I'm
(17:11):
leaving him a review, notEnterprise or whatever the
company is.
So what we did first was Iturned on automations, which was
you know, after the job theyget a text message blah, blah,
blah.
That was okay.
Then what we did was we turnedoff the automations and we
created the QR code with thepostcard and we told all the
technicians ask for a review andmake sure that they know your
name and they leave you a reviewspecifically.
(17:32):
And then what we did this wasreally cool.
Where they go to clock in, wecreated these little like mini
cards for each tech.
That was like a little truckand we put their name on it and
then each review that they got,they moved to the next step and
once they got to a hundredpoints they got a hundred dollar
gift card.
So 10 points and once they hitthat hundred they would get a
(17:53):
little like star, you know, likefootball.
You put little stickers on yourhelmet and stuff.
They would get a star on theirtruck and they'd start back from
the beginning.
So everyone would see theirtrucks moving and getting all
these stars on there and it justcreated this snowball.
So, like the first year, theywent from 36 to a thousand
reviews.
Now they're at like 4,500 or5,000 and they still run that
same playbook to this day.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Just a simple competition.
It's so funny how that works.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Yeah, the big unlock for me.
I was in there for a techmeeting and one of the guys come
in doesn't speak any English.
I see him taking a picture ofit and I'm like, hey, you just
like keep a track of my statshere or what's going on.
He's like, no, I'm sending itto my wife.
She's going to be really proudof me, nice star.
So I'm like, okay, we got it,we got it I love it yeah okay.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
So you, uh, I'm typing, I'm typing notes because
, uh, I've got to start thatwith the AI, pick off the things
I like.
You did something that I thinkis so key.
People ask me, and again we getcalled.
I'm getting ready to go out toDallas and I'm going to go meet
with another handyman wholistens to the podcast while I'm
out there.
Why haven't him come to you?
Well, because I'm going outthere to move Austin into Waco
(18:59):
and then go back to Dallas.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
Oh, that's right.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
So Chris is not going to Austin, he's moving his son,
austin, to Waco, then goingback to Dallas.
I'm very confused but not goingto Austin.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
I'm going to have another sip of bourbon.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
I did not know that my son Austin would actually end
up in the same the damn Texasarea.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
And you think okay, the damn Texas area you just
offended, one of our greateststates.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
I know Well, I'm going down there, so come find
me.
I'd love to duke it out withyou.
I'm going to give you somecowboy hats and everything.
Anyway, back to this Keepdigging.
Here's what people ask mewhat's the best thing you've
found to get reviews?
I said having my guys ask forit, right in front of the person
, exactly.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Really.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
Like yeah, no, it's not like I know they can't, but
when you tell them to do it andthen all you have to do is give
them one button on your CRM tosay, send a text message with
the Google link, and thecustomer gets it and you just
stare at them while they do it.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
That's right, and they do it.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
And that pause was not your phone, that was not you
driving down there, that wasChris pausing to tell everybody.
You just sit there and stare atthem when you send it to them.
Yeah.
But, that's it, though.
Because they know your name,phil, you hit that.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
That's right.
What we coached them was kindof the enterprise model, which
was hey, so my name's Phil.
How did we do today?
How was the service that youreceived from me?
Oh, it was great.
Is there anything I could dobetter next time or any feedback
for me?
No, all good here, cool.
Well, I have two things for you.
First, do you mind leaving me areview here?
Let's my boss know I'm doing agreat job here you go, Pause and
(20:28):
stare at him.
Yeah, scan the QR code.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
So that'd be fun to watch this on YouTube, because
Phil and I are staring at eachother and Ellen's going.
This is awkward.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
Yeah, and then the second part is.
Here's your you know invoice orhow you're going to pay
whatever, but you just make it apart of that ending script.
And my name's Phil.
How was the service?
Blah, blah, blah.
It just ties it all together.
It's perfect.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
Yeah, our line is and this has been dynamite when
they use it.
Now they.
When I walked up as the owner,I'm like you know.
I hope you like what our guysdid today I said I'll tell you
what it would mean the world tohim if you went out there and
gave him a good review.
But if he didn't earn fivestars, you let us know and I'm
here to help him and I'll dowhatever it takes.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
Review gate right, Phil, he just managed it.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
I did baby.
Little review gate, and so, tobe fair everybody needs to know
this I do have a review gate too.
So if we think the servicereally didn't go well they think
that they pulled a Glock whenit really was just a chipmunk
underneath their thing I sendthem a link to my website where
they can go through there and Ican suppress all my four and
(21:31):
less, but I can respond to themso they feel like they got their
voice heard, because that's thething that's awesome about
these keyboard.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Wait a minute, you don't you don't let like threes
show up.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
No.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
So on my website, no on.
Speaker 1 (21:45):
Google I can't control that, Right.
And then Google let me tell youguys everything.
You can't control shit when itcomes to Google.
You can, and if you ever getone taken away that you fought
for guys, you got a gold starand you can send me an email,
Chris, at the trusted toolbox,and let me know.
I said because I've had legitreviews taken down.
Yeah it's bad.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So I feel you were jumping in.
What was that?
You can set up an automation soit will send an email and
you'll have, like the stars andthen you'll say click on the
star.
If it's five star, when youclick on that star, it goes to
your Google business profile.
If they click on four, if it'sfive star when you click on that
star, it goes to your Googlebusiness profile.
If they click on four, then itgoes to your website where they
can fill out a form.
Speaker 3 (22:22):
So that way you're kind of like segmenting them out
, but based on the stars, and ifit's a two it goes to you.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
No, actually, four and lower goes to all of us.
Yeah, no, four, four and lower.
We react that, yeah and I.
How about this?
You're a little off.
One, there are two, three andfour in there.
You could have picked adifferent one.
Was it literally a one?
Speaker 3 (22:46):
I wish we'd go to 10, because I don't review anymore,
because to me, like when you goto a restaurant, I mean I'm
only going to give five stars.
If I had my world rock, fourstars is good to me, but now in
Google, world four is not thatgood.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
No, I agree with you.
I thought I would be a hardgrader too.
I thought I would be theRussian grader, maybe the German
judge in the Olympics.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
You just dated yourself hard, but I love that
reference.
That was so big.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
But you're right, it's hard because, man, we're
out there and this is how wemake our living.
And we're out there and this ishow we make our living.
And you want to get behind yourkeyboard and, instead of
engaging with me and having aconversation, you want to just
go out there and slay me and notgive me a chance to fix it
Again.
In home services, phil, youtalked about duct cleaning.
I know you work with a lot ofother home services.
We'll get to that, but in myworld, drywall.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
I can't tell you how many times people just get
absolutely just set off ondrywall.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Nothing pisses me off more than drywall, is that
right?
Yeah, really.
And you're like this is so easy.
No, I can fix this.
I mean, they make it sound like, your world is weird you know
what my world is weird?
You want to.
You want to buy it it's up forsale?
Not yet, baby no, all right,all right, so All right.
So back to Phil.
Okay, back to.
Can we please?
Speaker 3 (23:58):
Hey, Phil, your bio.
I'm not going to say you'rebragging, but it's pretty
confident, Like I'm going tohelp you just really increase
the multiples on your businessso you can exit and be a big
daddy, like Chris wants to be,and you focus on the home
services space.
(24:18):
Are you that confident becauseso many people in the home
services space don't use KPIsand don't do these things or I
mean, Chris runs a verysophisticated business Can you
actually take a business likehis with that confidence and
know that you can move theneedle?
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, so there's like three pillars that we look at.
There's visibility, so reviewsis one part of it where people
are going to find you, whetherit's SEO, running ads, whatever
they need to know about you andfind you.
That's the one pillar.
The second one is conversions,and most companies don't have a
lead problem.
They have a lead managementproblem.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Sorry, we just talked about that before we got on the
air with you.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
Okay, so, like the duck cleaning company, they're
getting all these leads, theCSRs.
Who knows if they're callingthem?
They're not answering.
But what's the process looklike for nurturing the leads?
That's the second problem isconversions.
Most of the times, that's theissue, and they need automations
inside of their CRM to helpwith that.
Speaker 3 (25:12):
Are you saying take the human people part of that
out?
Speaker 2 (25:19):
I'm saying layer AI and automation on top of the
humans that they can pick up,like if, for example, let's say,
you get a lead that comes inand you call them and they don't
answer, what happens?
Nine times out of 10, nothing.
There needs to be an email textmessage sequence that starts to
happen, that when they respondto that, then the CSR picks it
up and can communicate back andforth with the client and then
the last pillar is retargeting.
(25:39):
So all your prospects andcustomers that come through your
database, maybe you close 50 to60% of them.
The other 40% you don't close.
They all need to go into anemail newsletter text message
marketing campaign to cross sellservices, to bring them back
into your funnel.
The reason that I'm soconfident is because most people
, from a marketing perspective,don't do conversion rate
optimization or automations,they don't do retargeting to
(26:01):
their past customers and theybarely do visibility and they
don't even know if it's workingbecause they don't use their CRM
halfway.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
So you help implement all these processes, but do you
actually teach people how toconvert?
Speaker 2 (26:14):
No.
So my company is a done for yousystem where we have the
playbooks and processes that aredone.
If they want the how they cango to our youtube channel and we
give it away for free I canpromise you what he's just
talking about.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
This is the heart.
Um, as a business owner, wehave a lot of shit going on
exactly right and so now I'mgoing to tie it into what I just
said.
I can teach you to replace yourown toilet, alan, and that way
you can flush your own shit.
Or after you watch my YouTubechannel, you'll let us come
change your toilet out.
So that's what Phil's saying.
It's like look come on, you wantto do it yourself?
(26:49):
Good, here you go, I'm going togive it all to you.
Then you got Marcus Sheridan upthere.
They ask you answer.
I'm going to give you all theanswers.
Now.
Do you have the time to do allthat?
Because I'm writing down thosethree things and retargeting is
a great example, or hey?
Uh, ladies, did you call themback?
Yeah did they answer?
Speaker 3 (27:08):
no, I just left a message by the way, I liked it a
lot better when you wrote on alegal pad I well, I'm, because
when you get, when you get onyour phone, I don't know if
you're like placing a bet?
Speaker 1 (27:17):
No, I'm not placing a bet.
Speaker 3 (27:18):
You can't place a bet here in Georgia, by the way,
which is the only reason I'mstill acting or contacting
somebody out of state to place abet, or if you're dealing with
a customer service issue.
I just feel like you're justdistracted.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
No, I'm taking notes, but when you have a legal pad
and a pen.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
This is why I hate AI .
Speaker 1 (27:41):
But you have a legal patent to pen.
Then I know you're engagedbecause you're excited, you're
taking notes.
Now I don't know what you'redoing.
That reminds me of my firstboss.
I used to come in way back inthe day this is way before the
internet people and we'd havethe newspaper In the dark times,
the dark times, and I was aengineer and we did drafting,
but I had just moved to a CADstation but I would read the
newspaper and he grabbed me andpulled me inside and said Chris,
look, he goes.
I know you're one of thesmartest guys here, he goes.
(28:05):
You're a master's inengineering, you're really smart
, he said.
But reading the paper at yourcube is, it's just not a good
look.
When I learned, right there,I'm like shit, he's right.
So I never read the paper at mycube ever again and couldn't go
to the internet.
But I found other ways.
But on my computer I hadSolitaire.
So, fuck you, I didn't learn adamn thing, but I played
(28:26):
Solitaire.
I don't know where that storywas going.
No, you're right.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
So here, no, I'm on my phone, phil, normally just
gives me the finger, but todayhe just absolutely said it.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
I did too, because that one set me off.
I did too, because that one setme off.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
That reminds me of that and there he is.
He's on his phone again, butI'm trying to break this shit
down.
Oh, got a parlay with it.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
No, no parlays, although I did win a parlay this
weekend, did you really?
Oh my God, it was a crazyparlay too.
That must have been fun.
Speaker 3 (28:47):
It was Because you just got to keep building and
building and building I millionsof dollars.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
I made like $81.42.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
But you celebrated like it was 1999.
You should have seen me.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
You know what?
You've never seen a guy gocrazy at a $20 bet than Chris.
I can promise you that I cansee it, I know it, and so if
it's $20 or $2,000, I'm in.
But that's the business ownermentality.
Speaker 3 (29:16):
Let's get back to Phil, shall we?
I've been with phil the wholetime.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
I was just scolding you for just, but I'm paying
attention I'm writing his shitdown because, uh, he hit on this
so you can do it, but you can'tdo it.
Or you can do it, you can.
I mean, maybe you want to, youcan right.
Yeah, get your retargeting down, get your callbacks down, get
your follow-up callbacks down,layer it with ai.
I'm telling you, man, that stuffmy mind's been blown yet again
(29:40):
my mind's getting blown likeevery week on ai and how close
it's becoming.
Tommy mellow, who one of yourbooks up there?
Uh, he and I were talking twoyears ago.
No, year and a half ago, no, uh, less than a year ago.
He said two years from now, no,but no human will answer the
phone and home services.
And I said I don't know, I homeservices.
And I said I don't know.
I didn't say bullshit, I justsaid I don't know.
(30:02):
Man, that seems like a bigstretch, bro.
I said because my business isjust so different.
He said well, I can't speak toyour business, but I know garage
doors.
He goes nobody, I'm not goingto have a call center, ai is
(30:23):
going to answer first.
I'm like no, no, no.
So I was at a presentation lastThursday by Victor Antonio.
Guy's an amazing salesperson.
Go look him up,victorantoniocom.
You want to learn about sales,you go there and you just go to
the temple, my friends, becausehe is amazing.
He said it's coming and it'salready here.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
It's already at.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
AI.
Speaker 2 (30:34):
Yeah, so.
So Air AI is good, but for thetrade specifically, there's like
three big players.
There's one that's calledZyraTalk.
Zyratalk integrates with yourservice, titan, and basically
they can, or that's one of theCRMs for most of the big home
service businesses.
But it integrates with otherones.
It answers the call, answersquestions, can book it right
into your CRM for you right intoyour CRM for you.
(30:59):
Same Day AI is another one doesa similar thing, but they're
actually turning AI sales agents.
So they're going to be doingyour rehashing on your estimates
, they're going to be callingyour spring and fall inspections
, blah, blah, blah, that kind ofstuff.
And then the Jobber I'm prettybig into Jobber with Dave too.
Basically, jobber has their ownAI answering service that will
answer questions and book stuffright onto your calendar all
inside of their platform.
(31:19):
So it's already pretty muchhere.
It's just about people using itis what it comes down to.
Speaker 3 (31:24):
And I mean it sounds good, it doesn't frustrate you.
I mean I still think about,like decision trees, that kind
of AI.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
I would say that the cool thing.
So same day I interviewed himon my podcast Aaron, he was the
founder.
He said that his AI has abooking rate of around 90%, and
that's again the plumbingindustry and other industries
like 90% of a booking rate.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
That's insane.
Yeah, we have Uzi on Uzi's comeon our pod and talked about AI
and answering phones for theHVAC overnight and then he sent
me an example of one where Icouldn't tell it was really good
and they had a-.
Speaker 3 (32:03):
I remember him saying that and I just couldn't
believe it.
But then he told he's the onewho told the story about his AI
actually refunded a customerwhen that wasn't part of the
program because it just madesense.
Yeah, the customer had enoughlogic.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
We're like the customer had enough logic.
We're like okay, I'll give youyour money back, some ways that
you can use AI and then kind ofpick up the CSR side.
So this is some of the thingsthat we implement for clients.
So like when someone fills outa form on your website there's a
study that says that 44% ofwebsite forms never even get
responded to but basically, whena web form happens, what was
(32:39):
that number?
44%.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
I heard that, oh my Lord, I'm going to kick
somebody's ass tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
So is that 44%?
Did you write down or kickingsomebody's ass that you wrote?
Speaker 1 (32:50):
44% KOA.
44% KOA.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Basically, what you want to do is, when someone
fills out a web form, you wantto send them a text message and
an email right away.
That, basically what you wantto do is when someone fills out
a web form, you want to sendthem a text message and an email
right away.
That way, you acknowledge andthe text message is most
important because it gets a 95%open rate.
So when you call them and theydon't answer, now you have a
text message, communication.
And another very importantthing is with the text, you want
to send a follow-up text thatsays hey, if you have any
(33:14):
additional pictures orinformation, text them over to
us.
This allows to start theconversation and send you a text
right away.
Then, when you call them theydon't answer, you can put them
into an automation sequence thatwill text and email them and
nurture the leads through thefunnel.
So that's the basic setup, andthen AI doesn't have to be
responding to the customer.
It's just an AI automationthat's running them through this
nurture sequence.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
And so you actually provide that as well, or do you?
Speaker 2 (33:40):
refer that out.
Okay, no, we build that insideyou build?
Speaker 3 (33:43):
that, and so you can customize it to whatever company
.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Exactly.
It's fully customizable and webuild it in their CRM.
So if they use Jobber Service,Titan, Housecall Pro, we're
basically running stuff in theirCRM and outside of it to
automate that conversion process.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
So are those the three CRMs you work with right
now to automate that conversionprocess.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
So are those the three CRMs you work with right
now?
Work is Housecall Pro JobberService Titan.
That's like most of the onesthat home service companies are
going to work with.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
Well, I guess I'm not most.
I'm on FieldPulse.
You're an outlier, fieldpulse,okay, and I'm going to meet them
next week.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Okay.
So yeah, we don't work with anyclients that use FieldPulse,
but I'm sure if they have an APIintegration it all will work,
it's like you're a leper, I justmoved to them.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
Maybe Phil can help me get my exit.
He won't even work with youbecause you don't work with
FieldPulse.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
Well, you know what.
He's going to work with you.
They've got an.
They're good people.
You tell me what to do.
Let's go rock this shit.
Yeah, I'm actually meeting withthe CEO next week.
In fact, I'm going to let himknow that.
I don't know if he knows this,but I'm kind of a big deal, but
service-tightened I mean.
They're getting ready to gopublic.
That's obviously the big dogyou got to play with, especially
when you're doing your work.
Housecall Pro.
(34:54):
I was coming out of the darkages.
I was with a company thathadn't done a lot for me and
I've been with them for nineyears and I really didn't want
to have to change, but I reallyfelt like I needed to.
I looked at Workiz.
I liked them.
I kept calling them Workiz, bythe way.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
Yeah, either one Workiz, workiz.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
Okay, thank God, I thought maybe they hated me, but
I just felt a little bit toomore locksmith for me, like duck
cleaning locksmiths that lookgood.
My handyman and remodelingcompany is kind of a hybrid.
It's really well, let's justget to it.
It's a really hard business butI figured it out and we scaled
and then so I'm going actuallyout to Dallas to see the other
(35:30):
company that's as big as us.
That's why I'm going out thereand to move Austin to Waco, to
go back to Dallas.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Yeah, the big, the big thing with the CRM.
So when I was at the duckcleaning company was we were
working with this digitalmarketing company and I would
ask them like, well, is thisactually working with our Google
ads or whatever?
And they're like, well, youneed to look in your CRM.
And I'm like, well, you need tolook in our CRM.
We're paying you to do ourmarketing stuff Like you need to
.
That's a big part of what we dois tying everything from a
digital perspective into yourCRM reporting and data and then
(35:59):
making decisions based off realdata, and that's why we tie so
hard into CRMs and we're bigabout CRMs wow, this is killing
me.
Speaker 1 (36:10):
All right, I love it.
This is um.
Data is powerful.
This is what's I mean.
This is the part uh, somebodyasked me uh, one of the
questions I did get asked from asmall handyman guy was uh, do I
really need to invest in thecrm thing?
I'm like, yeah, you really do.
I said they they, especiallythe one-man shops they'll give
you something.
There's a couple of good onesout there.
Market looks pretty good.
(36:31):
Um, I can't vouch for them, butyou know just, you got to have
it though.
You got to have it for that andI had one from day one and I did
not, I mean, and that has beenvery powerful for me.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Yeah, I mean if it's a couple hundred bucks a month
and it helps you run yourbusiness.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Yeah, it's great, it's so worth it.
Yeah, it's great, it's so worthit.
Yeah, look, you just hit on acouple things, and one of the
things we'll talk about in sales.
Your priority is not theirpriority.
Especially let's face it ductcleaning is not a necessary, you
don't have to.
And so here's what I learnedlast week from Victor Antonio
victorantoniocom.
So if your close rate is 40%,I'm going to get Victor on, I'm
(37:20):
going to make him listen to thissucker just about becoming
ricky bobby.
Ricky bobby, so, uh, 40.
If you close 40, 60 said noright.
Exactly a study in 2022 bytether um, using a ton of
interactions.
I can't even quote the numberand attributes of those 40.
Those 40, only 20 went to yourcompetitors.
The other 40 of those 40%, only20% went to your competitors.
The other 40 of the 40 decidednot to do anything.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
Because, especially when you're a non-.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Because why.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
Because of indecision and uncertainty, because you
didn't make it a compellingenough case.
You didn't make it a compellingenough case.
You did not bring them down andmake them understand what you
can do for them and why it's soimportant to them today and in
my world as a handyman, hey, Iwant to put these doors in my
office.
Okay, you know, back our COVIDdoors that we talked about back
(38:01):
four years ago.
I put a lot of COVID doors inbecause people started working
from home and they had to putthe doors in.
But what we told them was doyou want your kids flying in to
the room?
Do you guys remember thatYouTube video where the guy
comes flying in?
We used to use that as a joke.
I can't tell you how manyFrench tours I ended up putting
in.
Really, I never heard that.
Yeah, so we called them COVIDdoors.
(38:21):
So we did a lot of COVID doorsand then, whoops, hang on, phil,
I'm still here.
I just hit something Ishouldn't have hit.
I'm back.
So the other thing you talkabout is uncertainty.
You've got to be able to getyour sales team ready to make it
happen right there on the spot.
And if you can't do it on thespot, at least bring them up to
make that decision when they'reready to.
Speaker 2 (38:42):
That's right and I would say another big one, even
for your business.
Like, let's say, you go out todo some handyman work but then
someone's like yeah, I'mthinking about doing this
kitchen remodel, this bathroomremodel.
Now you need to turn yourtechnicians that are out there
into actual sales people.
So we had a company that was anHVAC.
They turned their techniciansinto estimate creators and then
we set up an automation sequence, so every single estimate or
(39:05):
opportunity that they created onthe job site then we ran them
into an estimate nurturesequence to help them convert
more leads.
So a lot of times you get thesepeople in place.
Like you go out for a handymanjob to replace a toilet but you
don't see that this is anoutdated bathroom and you're
like, hey, have you thoughtabout replacing this?
Actually we have.
You know I haven't really gotany quotes.
Okay, well, do you mind if Isend someone out here to take a
(39:27):
look?
At it from my company Nowyou're turning that $200,.
At it from my company Nowyou're turning that $200, $300
job into a $20,000 job.
All just by incentivizing thetechnician to pass leads back
and forth for your bigger ticketitems.
Speaker 3 (39:39):
So that seems really obvious to me as a sales guy.
Back to our enterprise days.
But Chris has talked about forover three years that his lone
wolves are artisans and they'renot salespeople.
Lone wolves are artisans andthey're not salespeople.
Speaker 2 (39:57):
And he struggles getting them to get over that
hump.
Okay, so a lot of them knowabout annuities and residual
income, potentially Like hey, doyou want to get paid when
you're not working and you'resleeping?
This is how I go about it.
Do you want to get paid whileyou're sleeping?
Yes, here's a way to get paidwhile you sleep Every single
lead that you pass over to thesales team, you're going to get
(40:17):
a residual income for work thatyou didn't have to do.
All you have to do is just sendme the lead.
We're going to pay you 2% ofany job that sells that you
originate.
Speaker 3 (40:26):
Genius.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
You could be sleeping and you're going to get paid,
dude.
I am quiet right now becauseI'm writing that shit down,
because I will agree, what'shard is my technicians, my
artisans in the field and theytruly are artisans they think
sales is a bad word.
They think if they tell you todo something else, it's kind of
like, well, it's up to you, butthey're writing the check for
(40:50):
the customer and that's one ofthe things I train the guys on
Don't write the check for thecustomer.
I had a guy where we fixed thedoor because and he thought we
were going to have to plane itdown and redo it all, and we
have a technique in the handymanworld of being and you should
know this if you put doors in,you know how to line up a door
better by just putting in longerscrews.
(41:11):
You know how to line up a doorbetter by just putting in longer
screws.
Um, it's actually a pretty easything where you can shim out a
um, shim out your, your jam ordo whatever you're gonna do.
We did it.
He was done an hour and I guessI can't pay him.
He goes.
Well, uh, why?
Why can't you pay me?
He said well, your guy told methat he said it wasn't really
worth it for what he did.
I said, no, man, you owe me 80bucks because that was an hour
(41:34):
of my guy's time.
I said it was 15 minutes, butit's.
It's the training that I put myguys through yeah he goes uh,
and actually the guy understoodand he said, yeah, I'll pay you
guys.
I said that's how I pay my guys.
He gets a percentage of what hejust sold you.
He goes, I'll pay him.
I'm like, all right.
So, because it was a buddy ofmine, because he called me and
my technician told him yourbuddy was going to say I'm not
(41:56):
paying for the hour.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
The guy was paying.
He was joking with me.
No, he's being totally joking.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
You need new buddies.
You know, what I do need newfriends.
Speaker 2 (42:02):
Yeah, another good way, like the scorecards at
Enterprise where everyone's upthere ranked based off of their
stats.
It's like, okay, we're going tostart ranking people off how
many leads they generate whenthey're out on jobs, maybe
they're motivated by, you know,being praised in public or
everyone's up here.
the number of leads Wow, thisguy's really crushing it.
It's not just about money.
Another really good one that wedid at Enterprise.
(42:23):
We had this thing called Fiveand Fly.
If you sell five full boats ona day, you get to go home early.
Full boats is like fullcoverage, so if you sell five
full boats, you get to go homeearly.
It's called five and fly.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
I knew exactly what that was Five, and fly, that is
nice.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
Yeah, so imagine if you submit five, Five and fly.
That's awesome.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
If you submit five leads, you get a free day off or
you get to leave Friday early,that's outstanding.
Speaker 3 (42:48):
Are you writing that down or I?
Speaker 1 (42:50):
got it down.
Five and fly.
I'm not doing that.
Five and fly.
Look at it.
All right, it's a little printthough, can you see?
Speaker 2 (42:56):
Yeah, Cause a lot of people might not be motivated
about money or they think it's asticky thing, but they might be
motivated by getting Fridaysoff or whatever you know, a
soccer game or who knows what.
Speaker 1 (43:06):
That's genius, phil.
Man, you're onto something Ilove this stuff Helping a lot of
home service companies, so tellus a little bit more about
which companies you're workingwith.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
Yeah, so our bread and butter is 1 to 10 million
home service business owners,and the reason that we're really
good there is because a lot oftimes they can't hire a full-on
marketing CMO or something andthey also need the support that
a traditional digital agency isnot able to provide, like they
need someone to pull the reports, build the automation,
strategize, learn about theirbusiness.
So we kind of fill that gapthat most people are feeling,
(43:34):
and so that's the companies thatwe work with HVAC, plumbing,
electrical, gutter cleaning, airduct cleaning, custom closets,
lawn care a bunch of differenttypes of companies.
And I see you have your ownbobblehead right.
Yeah, so funny story about this.
We do customer appreciationgifts and we send out
bobbleheads to our customers asan appreciation gift when they
(43:54):
work with us, but all of ourteam has them as well.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
It's pretty fun so I have my own bobblehead too.
Alan, is it a lala miabobblehead?
Speaker 3 (44:02):
it is.
Yeah, actually I have one ofthose.
One of my guys made a bobblearound.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
No, I'm not.
You're not even coming near mybobblehead now.
You will not be touching mybobblehead, sir.
Oh my gosh, that's horrible.
All right, guys, this has beenawesome.
I mean, phil is full of it andfilled is filled it up, phil.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
Are you making pH jokes?
I'm trying to.
I knew you thought it wasP-lashed.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
Did I.
I'm like, if this dude's goingto come on and start talking
about extending lashes, we gotthe wrong podcast dude.
No, it's Flash Consulting.
That's P-H Lash Consulting.
Go look him up.
Phil's got a dynamite businessgoing on.
Man, if you didn't learnsomething that's on you, phil,
how can everybody find you Comeout and talk to you?
Speaker 2 (44:56):
Yeah, we up a free meeting there and go from there.
Speaker 1 (44:59):
So that is not for lash extensions, which I was
looking for.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
So the guy that fired me that said, go out and do
this stuff.
He named the company Flash.
He said it needs to be calledFlash Consulting, phil with a PH
like PH.
And then my wife's name isAshley, but I call her Ash, so
he's like you could be FlashConsulting.
Speaker 3 (45:19):
So that's where it came from.
So you're fired, but I'm goingto give you this gift.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
And two referrals, and I'm your first customer.
Speaker 1 (45:26):
Do you still work with him?
Speaker 2 (45:28):
Yeah, so cool story.
He went from three to 6 millionand then sold a private equity
and made a ton of money.
And I still work with thecompany to this day.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
Nice, Well done man.
That's awesome.
All right, guys go out andcheck out flash consulting, but
I think we've got to go for thefour questions.
All right, Number one what isthe favorite book that you would
recommend everybody?
Cause you got four sitting upthere, so what's your favorite
one?
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, uh, I mean home service millionaire, your
favorite one.
Yeah, I mean Home ServiceMillionaire.
Tommy Mello is always greatbook.
Building a story brand isreally good for people that
don't really know how toarticulate what they do to the
customer.
It's really hard for the tradesbecause they think they're the
hero but they're not.
So building a story brand isreally good.
Speaker 1 (46:03):
Donald Miller building a story brand, that is
big.
Nice, all right, shall, wecontinue, all right.
What's the favorite feature ofyour home?
Because I'm in home services, Ilove this stuff, I love working
in homes.
What's the favorite feature ofyour home?
Speaker 2 (46:15):
yeah, we have a really nice kitchen that we
redid when we moved in.
Uh, so definitely the kitchen.
It's like an open floor plan.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
It's nice all right, what's your favorite feature in
that kitchen?
Speaker 2 (46:24):
um, yeah, we have this we have a really nice
island and then an extendedisland that overlooks, like
where you eat and stuff.
So it's just like very openconcept, but it feels nice, do?
Speaker 1 (46:34):
you have a pot filler , uh no, we don't yeah, I don't
think.
So I don't think I'm gonna doit.
Speaker 3 (46:40):
I I think that's when you've arrived.
Is you have a pot filler?
Speaker 2 (46:43):
really you gotta have one you're an italian, you
should have a pot filler allright it is pretty cool, like I
think it's cool, if I were to dodo it again, I'd probably add
one.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
I do a lot of cast iron frying, though, and, man,
that shit goes everywhere.
I got to figure out Somebodycan invent a cast iron frying
counter.
That doesn't.
Yeah, oh my God.
All right, so that's awesome.
All right, phil, one of thethings we got a big question for
you, because you guys have thisenterprise background, but one
(47:17):
of the things al and I talkabout a lot is that we are
customer service freaks.
Absolutely.
We love this stuff.
We talked about it earlier.
What is the customer servicepet peeve of yours when you're
out there and you're thecustomer?
Speaker 2 (47:22):
yeah, so when I was in the trades, it was literally,
you know, support at emails andI'm like we will never have a
support at email ever in mycompany that people email
because you need to have a realperson that you're actually
working with.
So that that was my big petpeeve a real name instead of
support.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
I like that one All right, so I send out all my
emails for Phil.
Look, we have.
Now we have effects of ourpodcast.
God, we've arrived, we're 5%top.
Hey, we're five percent top.
Hey, we're gonna make whatever,but anyway.
Um so, cindy at the trustedtoolbox is where you get your
emails from now.
But I've always been admin atthe trusted toolbox, because one
(47:59):
of the things I didn't know is,especially in the beginning,
when I first started, I didn'tknow how long they were going to
be with me yeah, so I just so,and and the fact is is it
doesn't matter I know I shouldjust have rox, everybody,
roxanne, yeah, roxanne, I shouldhave been Roxanne, whatever
name makes you Roxanne, not Sam,so it can't be Roxanne.
Okay, all right.
Last thing Give us a DIYnightmare story.
(48:21):
We love fire, flooding, youknow, maybe a little, you know,
not, not dismemberment, butmaybe you just lost a finger.
Just some emergency services,one or three, yeah like me, like
me diying stuff.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
Yeah, not, not a contractor story.
Okay, covid, I actually builtthis desk and if you're on
youtube you can see how the deskholds up.
It's not very good oh, he isrocking.
Speaker 1 (48:42):
It is wiggling a little bit.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
He's out in california and I still keep it
just to remind myself that Itried to build this.
It looks atrocious like.
It looks terrible like I run Irun an agency with a bunch of
people Like I, should be gettinga new desk, but I should humble
.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
I love that.
That is exactly what you do.
You keep that thing forever andthen you give it to your kids
and you say look, daddy builtthis.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
That's what I'm doing .
Speaker 1 (49:04):
Oh, I love it.
Oh, my God Phil reaching out tous.
Thank you to my enterprisebrothers for sharing some
enterprise green knowledge.
You guys rock.
Hey, everybody go out there,make it a great day.
We gotta go keep going becauseit's.
I don't want to time dateourselves, but it's really
freaking cold out.
All right, it's really freakingcold out.
This is my slow period.
Let's get the shit moving andwe gotta go take care of people
(49:26):
because we got a great 2025happening.
Speaker 3 (49:28):
Let's make it happen, cheers everybody.
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