How to Build a Local Brand as an Electrical Contractor – Step-by-Step Guide - Master The NEC - PODCAST

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Master of the NEC podcast, the ultimate
destination for anyone passionate about the electrical trade. Whether you're
a season electrician, an eager apprentice, or just someone who
wants to dive deep into the world of electrical work,
you've come to the right place. Join your host, Paul Abernavi,
a true authority in the industry with over thirty eight

(00:22):
years of trade experience, as he electrifies your mind with
in depth discussions, expertips, and valuable insights that.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Will keep you ahead of the curve.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
Each episode, Paul will illuminate the complexities of the trade,
decode the national electrical code, and share the latest industry trends,
all while empowering you to take your electrical career to
the next level. So gear up, plug in, and get
ready to supercharge your knowledge because with the Master of
the NEC podcast, the power is in your hands.

Speaker 2 (00:54):
Now get ready. Here is your host, Paul Abernavi. Up.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
What up?

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Everybody? Welcome to another episode of Master the NEEC podcast.
My name is Paul l Abernathy, your host. As always,
thank you for joining me here on the podcast. Remember,
if you've never heard our podcast before, you're a first
time listener. We have podcasts on all different topics when
it comes to the National Electrical Code of course other
electrical things related, much like today's topic that we're going

(01:22):
to be talking about, which is talking about branding your business,
the importance of branding your business and why everybody, if
you're electrician, plumber, mechanical, it doesn't matter. If you're in business,
you need to do something that sets you apart, makes
you stand out, and you're on the tip of the
tongue of your customers and your clients. So we're going
to talk about all that today, building that business, building

(01:44):
that brand. But before we do that again, I want
to remind you that these podcasts are all available on
all of your favorite listening platforms Spotify, Spreaker, Deezer, iHeartRadio,
Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, but also available over on our
mobile app just free, doesn't cost you anything. All you
gotta do is go to Fast Tracks System and that's

(02:06):
tracks folks, t r a X Okay, not tr ac K,
it's Fast Tracks System dot com. Go over there, go
to the menu. You'll see where it says mobile app.
Go there. If you're on your phone, just simply click
on the link it'll ask you if you want to
save it to your homepage. Obviously, yes, it's not gonna
download anything onto your phone. It's just a link. Because

(02:28):
everything that we do is mobile based. Why because it
allows me to update things, change things in real time
so that you don't have to keep downloading software onto
your phone from the Google Store or Apple Store. I
don't believe in all that. I don't want to put
that garbage in your phone. So it's all mobile based.
We shifted to that a couple of years ago. Okay,

(02:50):
so thanks for joining me, and make sure you watch,
oh excuse me, listen to all of our podcast episodes
that are available on all those platforms. Okay, so today
in this episode, we're going to kind of step off
topic a little bit from what we sometimes do when
it comes to talking about the National Letical Code and

(03:11):
the codebooks and and exam prep and all that stuff
that I'm known for. But I also am a mentor
to many contractors that are going into business, whether they're
talking about grassroots shoe string marketing techniques or how to
build their business brand awareness, all those type of things.

(03:32):
What the kind of the potholes in the road, I
kind of give them some guidance. So I have people
that that I that can that use me as their
consultant to help grow their business and give them ideas
or even if something that just bounce something off of
somebody else rather than just feel like you're alone in
the industry, that type of thing. And so what came
up to me was a topic that that's kind of

(03:56):
overlooked and everybody's out there hustling to build their business
and you know, trying to determine what makes company A
better than company B, or why should I call company
C to have something done? And I will tell you
that this isn't specifically to electrical contractors, because it can
be broad or broas plumbing, mechanical builders, roofers, anybody that

(04:18):
has a service related business. These things I'm going to
talk about today can be beneficial for them. But of
course I'm an electrician. I'm an electrical guy, so I'm
focusing on electrical contractors at this point. So that's what
we're talking about today is something a little different. We're
going to talk about growing your business, and it's a

(04:38):
word that many people don't think about when they start
their business. Okay, they don't think about they're so busy
getting all the permit, you know, getting all their licenses,
getting everything together, but they don't think about their long
term goal, and that is branding your company to the
image that you want it to be. And it starts
off real early, as you'll see, we'll talk about right

(05:01):
in the early stages branding. What do you want other
people to perceive your company? What do they want to
what do they want to see when they see your
trucks or see your name, or see your logo or
even see or your employees. What impression that you want
to give them. So now I'm not talking about marketing
gimmicks or empty slogans. That's that's not the topic of

(05:21):
this lesson today or this discussion. I'm talking about building
a real local reputation that makes people think you are
who they need to hire to have their electrical work
done or whatever servicing product that you offer. Okay, so
this episode is for every electrical contractor, every electrician who's
inspired to be an electric contractor and wants to get

(05:45):
all the knowledge up front before they really start putting
their money where their mouth is and getting into contracting business.
So we're going to talk about that and you know what,
I am more than sure that you guys and gals
that listen to our shows are savvy enough to build
a name, understand a legacy, and want to build a

(06:05):
brand that people respect. Okay, I'll tell you a little
funny story and how you're sometimes going to get backlash.
It was probably fifteen years ago that I created the
concept on building a brand called the Electrical Guru. And
I was working on a brand. I was working on
a concept and I literally in a logo. And I

(06:29):
remember that from a company standpoint and from my you know,
my perspective, not being you know, talking about being a contractor,
but just in building a brand alone. I built this
thing called the Electrical Guru, and I took a lot
of heat. I'm not lying. I took a lot of heat,
mainly from the the wannabes overall. Mike Holt's forum not

(06:50):
have nothing to do with Mike, because Mike doesn't really
go on his forums. It's the people that are. I
got so much grief. They were like, Paul thinks he's
the guru, Paul thinks he's the best, Paul thinks he
knows it all. And I'm sitting there going these are
people that don't get it. They're gonna always work for
somebody else. They're gonna have a hard time being their

(07:10):
own boss. They don't understand branding, they don't understand marketing.
They just don't get it. They'd rather sit on a
forum and take potshots at people. And they don't understand
the business principles of building a brand, building something that's
recognizable so that they don't just call you once. You

(07:31):
want them to call you over and over and over
again for anything they need. And you want to be recognizable.
So when I was doing the Electrical Guru, I took
so much heat and I'm like, you know what, people
remember the Electrical Guru and the logo before they're gonna
remember Paul Abernathy. And so that's so true when it

(07:51):
comes to building a brand and a reputation that sometimes
you're gonna have to block out your peers. You're gonna
have to block out some of the things that people
say because they don't trust me, they do not have
your best interests at heart. I know that sounds to
some people that are like, whoa, what do you mean?
People don't care? No, they do not care. Okay, so

(08:13):
don't let anybody here, Paul is here to tell you
right to your face. Paul is honest, and I'm always
going to tell you what you maybe don't want to hear. Okay,
people don't give a shit about your problems. They really.
They may act like they do. They may oh, I'm sorry,
I'm sorry to hear that, but once that's over, they
really don't give a damn. They really don't. The rare
few do because if you've helped them at some point,

(08:36):
they have a connection. But most people they don't want
to hear about your story and the customer doesn't care.
But what they do care about is what kind of
image you bring and how you care yourself and what
kind of branding you're bringing to the table. So let's
talk about that in a little more in depth. And
you know what, it's also a point where you don't

(09:00):
don't want to be invisible to your customer. Right where
they go flipping through the phone book or flipping do
we even have phone books now? They go looking online,
they go doing some things and then you just your
name doesn't ring a bell. It just doesn't remind them
of anything. So when we're building this brand and we're
going to talk about this in multiple steps. Okay, but

(09:23):
you want to stop being invisible to your customer and
you want to become unforgettable to your customer. That's what
we're going to be talking about doing today, and we're
going to break it down in some steps. And by
no means that this is an all inclusive list. This
is just some things that I put together that they
can help you in your journey to build your brand. Okay,

(09:45):
So the very first step that we'll talk about today
is called define your identity? Who are you? Okay? You know,
the first step in building a brand is getting clear
on who you are and what you represent, especially to
your customer. The key points that you got to think
about is you got to ask yourself, what do I

(10:06):
want to be known for? For me, the Electrical Guru
was a known for electrical guide teaches electrical code. Who's
the go to person if they have a code question?
Sounds to me like the Electrical Guru was a home run,
even though I took a lot of crap for it.
It was a home run because it was building that brand.
But you have to ignore your peers. I did not

(10:29):
ignore my peers early on, so that's why I let
the domain go away. I started moving away from it
because I had to learn, and I'm trying to save
you from the same mistakes. I had to learn that,
just like a race horse, I have to put the
blinders on and see what the goal is and stop
worrying about all this outside influence that's going to derail me.

(10:51):
And that's the problem we all have. We want to
pin and that's why I say get opinions from people
that will be honest with you, not people that'll just
coddle you. Okay. So I am brutally honest to my students.
I'm brutally honest to everybody I meet, and because I
don't think they want to be a bullshit Paul. I
want think and want the real Paul. And whether it

(11:12):
rubs some people's feathers the wrong way, that's okay. Like
I said, I didn't get into this business to make friends,
but I did get into this business to help people
be successful. Okay. So you have to think about is
what do you want to be known for? And then
ask yourself these real honest questions. As we're getting started here,
are you the most code savvy electrician? Do you feel

(11:33):
you're the most code savvy electrician in your area. Are
you very punctual is that one of you? Are you
super clean? Are you very safety conscious? Do your vehicles
or if you work for yourself for somebody else, is
your vehicles? Are they exquisite? Do you keep everything? Are
you a nitpicky about the way things look? Obsessive? Compulsive?

(11:56):
Absolutely nothing wrong with that, Okay. Now what I say is,
after you lay down what key points in your mind
that you want to be known for. For example, I'll
use me as example, so electrical and when it comes
to education, not so much contractor, but education. I want

(12:16):
to be known as reliable. I want to be known
as accurate, okay. And I want to be known as
somebody that is honest those things that I go for, Okay.
So the knowledgeable comes from making sure I answered things
correctly for people and provide good services to people. Okay.

(12:40):
Knowledgeable means I give them very accurate answers, Okay, research
them based on data. Sometimes opinions involved in it, but
it's opinion that's based on many years of working in
the field that type of thing. So all those things
in you put together and try to try to find
for your brand to start out what are the things

(13:03):
that you want to be known for? Now? If I'm
an electual contractor, I want to be known for a
fair price, Okay. I want to be known for punctual Okay,
Reliable okay, I want to be known for on time. Okay,
we're the neatest okay, whatever you feel. Again, I can't

(13:23):
speak for you, but you have to determine that now.
Once you do that, you need to choose three words
that define your brand. Okay, define the brand that you
want to carry forward here as we start to develop this,
are you accurate, reliable? Professional? I mean, do you always
look the part that's part of the brand? Early on,

(13:44):
I told you, folks many many times that one of
my nitpicky things as a contractor was the look. I
felt like I put enough time in myself and my
profession that I didn't want to look like a scrub.
I didn't want to look like somebody that works out
the back of a El Dorado. Okay. I wanted to

(14:05):
look the part, and so nobody could say that's a
scabby ass electrician who ripped up jeans and holy shirts
and it's always dirty. Yeah he may be cheap, Yeah
he may be nice. Yeah, hey, may be reliable, but
at the back of your mind there's always that customer going, yeah,
but you know what, it just something doesn't look right.

(14:27):
And if you say that's not true, you're full of shit.
I'm just honest with you people. So you have to
define the three words that that are you going to
be accurate, reliable and professional. If I'm going to be professional, right,
then I'm gonna act like it and I'm gonna carry
myself like it in the field. Okay, neat truck, neat
marketing advertisements. Okay, I'm going to make sure my truck,

(14:51):
you know, always have your your labeling on your truck.
Everything like pick what you want to be. Okay. Now
the next thing is Okay, Accurate means that I don't
waffle on my charges. I don't jump all around. When
I give a price, I hold to it, so I
hone my skills at pricing. Reliable. When I tell somebody

(15:13):
I'm going to be there, I'm going to be there. Okay,
those are the words important. Professional. I'm going to look
the part talk the part. Don't get into arguments with customers.
They're the old saying the customer is always right. They
may not be right, but there's a way and a
tactful way you can address it professionally with that customer
that doesn't embarrass them make them feel bad. And that's

(15:34):
part of those soft skills. And we actually have a
course on soft skills type of thing. But at the
end of the day, it's those things are important for
all you as well as any employees to understand soft
skills when dealing with a customer. Okay, now I understand that. Again,
I have attention deficit disorder. I go all over the place,

(15:55):
so sometimes I got to wring myself back in. We're
still talking about defining your identity. Okay, I'm still talking
about it. So I want to be known for accurate, reliable, professional,
super clean, super neat those type of things. Now, the
next thing that you're gonna have to do early on, okay,
in this identity phase is you need to decide what

(16:18):
the name of your company is going to be. Early on.
This is before you even you know got your you know,
your contractor's license before for anything, before you've even determined
if you're going to be an LLC, a Chapter S corporation,
or you're going to be a sole proprietor it doesn't matter.
At this point. You need to decide on your name.

(16:38):
What is it going to be? Is it going to
be more personal? Abernathy Electrical Services That's what I used, Okay.
When I was in Virginia, it was electrical service Specialists
in the name. I had two choices. I either could
go personal and add my name to it, or I
could be business centric, okay, like voltage pro Systems or

(16:58):
electrical services. But when I moved to Texas and opened
up the contracting business there, I wanted to be more personal.
Uh one, because I nobody knew me. But as I
started getting more involved in the community, like I served
on the Building Code Standard Council for the City of McKinney,
more people were going to learn my name. The more

(17:21):
people that learned my name, because the more I was
going to be out there, involved in events and putting
myself out there, then I wanted them to recognize the
name Abernathy and Electrical Okay it was it was again.
I didn't look for some snappy name that nobody knows.
Red Dog LLC. Nobody knows what the hell that means.

(17:43):
You know what I'm saying, No offense to Red Dog
let's say, who joins us. I'm just saying, is a
company name that is not the way to go.

Speaker 1 (17:51):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (17:52):
You don't have to be so clever in your name.
As long as you pick a name that conveys what
you do, and you have choices. You can do it
personal or you can do it business centric. I in
Virginia it was business centric. In Texas it was personal.
It was Abernathy Electrical Services. And you know what, It's

(18:14):
just a name, but you have to think about the
name and the branding and how it's going to tie
into your promotion and when people get to know that name,
you want it to be synonymous with what you do.
All these things you got to think about up front. Remember,
keep it simple, keep it memorable, and make sure that
it aligns with what you do. Okay. And in this case,

(18:37):
it could have been Abernathy Plumbing. It could have been
Abernath the HVAC. And that's you know, cliche because people
do that, they name their companies after themselves. Although I've
seen tons of people create business names that that if
you looked at it on the surface, I wouldn't know
at all what you do, what you bring to the table.
You know, what I'm saying, they wouldn't know anything about it.

(18:59):
That is not a good recipe for success if you're
going to be going into business. I'm just saying, especially
if you're trying to build a brand identity so somebody
sees it. So that's a first step. Okay, So keep
it simple, keep it memorable, and align it with your
services and what you do. Okay, Now, remember your brand
is your reputation in a uniform. You're not just wiring

(19:22):
homes or buildings. You're wiring trust at every connection. Okay.
It's a quote to live by. So you're the embodiment
of your brand. And I think a lot of times
with companies who start out this way, they look the
part they start doing it that they do not emphasize
enough to their employees that they are an extension of

(19:45):
the brand. I have had tons of employees. You've heard
the famous story where one of the employees that work
for me was working on a multimillion dollar house and
there was I went there and it was a stairwell
and they had it was a big, multi million dollar
house and it had these lights in the stairwell, and
he had fingerprints. Even though we provide them with gloves

(20:05):
and all when they're doing the finished and he had
his fingerprints everywhere. And I got there and these lights
were crooked whatever, and I said to him, I said, dude,
why didn't you use the gloves I provided? And I said,
are you planning on coming back and wiping these down?
And he was like, no, I can't see it from
my house. That is the wrong thing to say to

(20:25):
somebody like me, because you are extending my brand and
right now I'm not happy with it, and it's not
going to send a good message to a customer. And
in this case, it was a multi million dollar home
from a developer who was building many homes that I
wanted to be the preferred contractor on. Okay, not the exclusive,
but the preferred, And so I fired that guy on

(20:47):
the spot. And then people say that's harsh. But you
know what, if you're willing to say that to my
face and I'm the owner of the company, then what
are you going to do behind my back? Okay? And
you're an extension of my brand. So the first thing
I say is, once you identify yourself, you identify it, okay,
and you know what you want to go for, you

(21:08):
know how you want to carry yourself, You develop a name,
you decide those key things you want to be known for. Okay,
and keep those in your mantra. Now you have to
go on to step two, and step two is about
designing your look. That's a key component that we're going
to be going into next. All right, So now let's

(21:30):
see here. So the next thing we're going to talk
about is designing your look. And really, if you think
about it, it is the way you present yourself visually
to others and is often that first impression before you
even speak. Your design your look everything sets the tone.
Now you've often heard me say before that can you

(21:52):
overcome a bad first impression? You can, but it takes
a lot of effort to overcome it, and with some
people it's just a huge hurdle to get over. Customers,
I'll give you an example. You show up on a
job smoking. You show up on a job. I mean,
if you're a smoker and you can't do a service
call and not have to suck on a cigarette long

(22:14):
enough to just do the service call, then something's wrong.
You need to maybe seek out something because again that's
not healthy. Okay, So at the end of the day,
you want to make sure that you give the best
first impression you can. It's not that it can't be
overcome by something, but you want to make sure you're
always giving that first impression. So when we're designing a look,

(22:36):
we make sure we say this upfront to our employees,
even to ourselves. So we practice. What we preach is
that we're going to keep a clean vehicle, We're going
to take the time to keep a clean job site.
We're going to be clean cut. Where the company protocol
or policy you know, may allow beards or mustaches, whatever,
but there is a policy you have to put in place,

(22:57):
and if you're a small company, it's just principles that
you need to do to set that first impression. Okay,
so we're gonna look at all that type of stuff today,
But again, you can overcome a shaky first impression, but
at the end of the day, it's so much harder
to come back from that. I'll give you another example,
since I like giving you examples. So I had an

(23:19):
HVAC company come out in Texas. Everybody's probably heard my
my long stories about my experience with a train unit
that was brand new and a year into it, we
just started having so many problems, and so we'd have
technicians come out and the first technician or second technician
come out working for a company, and they look like crap,

(23:43):
look just dirty, just everything just looks like Anybody say, well,
that means they're a worker. No, it's bullshit. That's bullshit.
Don't fool yourself. Anybody that says that that's in contracting.
It means you're just damn lazy. That that's all it means.
I'm sorry, sorry, don't you unsubscribe to me today if
you think that's you're just laziest. Shit. There's no reason
you should go to a job site looking like a scrub.

(24:04):
Now at the end of the day, after you're done. Maybe,
But when I had my service guys, they would have
extra sets of shirts, they would have tivex suits, you know, coveralls,
they would have what they need to make sure that
if they're going from one job to another job, they
didn't look like a scrub. Okay, it's all about the brand,
it's all about the vision. You say, well, that's a
lot of work. Well, you know, acquiring somebody as a

(24:27):
customer and retaining them as a customer is expensive. Okay,
that acquisition costs to finally get that phone to ring
to somebody to call you up as an owner. That
has cost you money. You might have had to advertise
multiple times, you may have done door hangers, you had
to work for that customer. The last thing I want

(24:49):
to do is set such an impression that they that
I only get money from them one time, or they
don't refer me to other people. Because word of mouth
is still king right, but it can also put you
in the ground as well. Because people today and I
don't know what it is, but people today are so
quick to be evil. I'll give you a great example,

(25:11):
Hulk Hogan. Whether you believe in Hulk Hogan was great
or not, racist, whatnot, or made a mistake in it
doesn't matter. What he did for wrestling, nobody can deny.
But the moment that he died, people went all over
social media saying shit like I'm glad He's dead and
all this stuff. What kind of world do we live
in where people have to go openly, you can not
like somebody but still keep your mouth shut. You get

(25:33):
what I'm saying, And they go all over social media
and post this stuff. It just blows my freaking mind.
How evil people can be so when it comes to customers,
if you set a bad impression or you do something
that the customer does not like, they're going to go
out of their way to tell other people. And that's

(25:54):
not a good thing. But you want them to say
great things about you. Now, they're not always going to
agree with you, they're not gonna like your price. They're
but if you keep it professional and don't try to
get defensive at it and just you know, and I
will talk about in other episodes, I'll talk you about
how to defer blame on a site. So it's a

(26:14):
skill that you have to learn. We'll talk about that
maybe in a future podcast where it's also covered in
our soft skills. How you divert blame to ownership, even
if you are the owner, you divert it to the company,
and you kind of explain how you understand. I agree,
but you know, I'm forced because of this is how
it is. Either way, there's ways to work around a negative. Okay,

(26:38):
So at the end of the day, try to try
to give that best first impression. But when I said
I had a contractor come out, they were dirty, they
were nasty, and he was bad mouthing his boss or
his company the entire time. Even when they would say
something about having to do this or something, he would say,
I wouldn't do it this way, but my company, the

(26:59):
company forced you. He was at odds with what his
wishes were versus the company. And that's not how it
can be. Your employee or you have to be in
line with the mission. You can't give your opinion as
diverse to what the company's opinion is. It has to
be one model, one opinion, one brand. Okay, and you

(27:22):
have to have if employee is not happy and they
don't want to work there and they can't, you know,
follow the process and help build your brand and be
a part of the team, then you get rid of them.
They're a cancer to your company. They may be the
greatest employee you got, but if they're out there running
their mouth against your vision, against your brand, they need
to go. You need to fire them, find somebody else.

(27:44):
Get your ass out there and take their place until
you can get it somebody else. If you're a contractor
and you have multiple employees, do not let somebody taint
your taint your brand. Okay, okay, all right, let's talk
about designing this look okay. Umber. One action is you
need to create a logo, whether you hire a designer
to do it or use a tool you use whatever, Chat, GTP,

(28:07):
whatever you want, because they're now very very these AI
tools are amazing. Whatever you do, you need to come
up with the logo simple, just it's got to send
a message, okay, and it doesn't have to be too complicated.
But you need to have a logo. Now. When you

(28:30):
have a logo, you need to make sure that when
you develop this logo is that you need and my
printing folks out there will tell you. When you create
these simpler logos, you want to make sure that you
have two to three colors or fonts, and you want
to make sure that you're very consistent in the use
of those fonts. The first thing I made a mistake
early on in creating is that my fonts were all
over the damn place. My colors were all over the

(28:50):
damn place. Still not the best in the world at it,
but at the end of the day, you need to
stick to some basic colors for your logo design and
stick to it. Next, you need to make sure whether
you're a one man show, and again I can tell
you you can order shirts one at a time with

(29:10):
your logo on it. Hats like I have hats. You know,
I wear hats. I'm a hat lover. I like flat
bill hats. Then I bend them myself to give them
a little bit of a curve. I don't like the
true baseball ones that are curved so bad. I like
straight ones, and then I bend them myself. That's just me,
always been that way. I don't know why so, but

(29:30):
you need to make sure now design your logo. You
understand your name, You picked your color schemes. Now you
need to think about shirts and hats and jackets. If
you're gonna offer jackets depending on where your climate is,
and you have to make sure that you wear them
consistently and that you get enough of them that you
can wear them multiple days, unless you're gonna wash clothes

(29:51):
every day. You need to set an image now. I
don't care if it's for shirts it's just your name
on it and just one color in you know, engraving,
or if there's silk screen it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.
When I started out, all of my stuff was the
inexpensive T shirts with the silk screening. My name but
I started out with the name on my shirts. Me

(30:14):
and my brother started out with a company called Double
A Electric because it's A and A, Abernathy and Abernathy.
So we had double A Electric. Okay, it said what
we did, and it was a nice to always explain
to people that when we go there, that was the
two brothers and that's where the double A came from.
So we did that, and but we had electric in

(30:36):
the name, so people kind of knew what was going on.
The good news for us that I was kind of
well known in the area for winning the national VICA
and stand out at the vocational school, and I was
in the news a lot or in the paper doing projects,
and you know, I was lucky that I had that
kind of exposure. Not necessary, but I was lucky to

(30:56):
have it. That helped us grow. Plus my brother was
great electrician vocational school as well, so that helped everybody
knew him. So at the end of the day, even
if you have just shirts with just your company name
on it, things like that, you need to have that branding. Okay,
next whatever vehicle you're using, whatever, it doesn't matter whether

(31:18):
you had the fancy vans or you just have your
pickup truck. You need to make sure that you either
wrap it and that's expensive, or you can get some
type of magnets. When I started out, we had the
magnet mounts that mount on the side of the vehicles
a truck. We started out with the van and we
had magnets on the side that's with double A Electric
and had our number. We had two, one on each

(31:40):
side of the van and one in the back because
if you were driving around, that was a mobile advertisement. Baby.
If you were stopped at a stop sign, somebody behind
you would see what was in front of them. They
would see it was double A Electric. Now you might say, well,
I don't think that that gets me many sales. Whether
you're not doing it right. Okay, And by the way,
it's passive. You don't have to work hard at it.

(32:00):
You get them made today. You can get the I
remember in Texas, that's what I did because I had
an F one fifty and I did not want with
the bins on it. I did not want to get
a work truck. I wasn't doing that much work by
that time, and I was trying to focus on service,
more service work, and I had bins that I would

(32:21):
take with me, depending on the call. I got the
magnet mounts and I was able to put them on,
and when I came home, I took them off because
I don't like to leave the magnet on there for
the paint. But anytime I was taking that vehicle out somewhere,
I slapped those magnet mounts on there. Right now, if
you want to get your truck wrapped or whatnot, that's
up to you. But I went with the magnets and

(32:44):
they were big, big, you know big. I can't remember,
but like I'm thinking, I don't remember, like twenty by
twenty four or something. I don't know, but they were
nice magnet ounts. You can get them at Vista Print.
They're cheap. It's very inexpensive, but you're missing an opportunity
to brand yourself as you move around from point A

(33:05):
to point B. Okay, all right, and keep it very professional,
very neat, and that means you always keep your vehicle neat.
By the way. Uh. The next thing is you know
business cards, and you want to make sure that you
get business cards because you're going to give them out
like water. I did all my business cards at Vista
Print again because I could get it done very cheap,

(33:27):
and the templates online allow me to simply add my
logo very simple. Keep your logo, can brand anything. I
remember one time with it was I was with on
Core Wire and it's a guy that worked at on
Core Wire that was talking about marketing. He was he
was their marketing guy. He's not with him anymore. But
I used to have so many arguments with this guy

(33:47):
because he would he would he would really scrutinize the
Encore Wire logo and in the size of it and where.
And I said, you know, putting that logo, if it
was recognized enough, like Nike, for example, then you could
put that on anything and that instantly brands. It doesn't matter.
The color doesn't matter to the scheme, doesn't matter. The

(34:08):
brand as shirt, you know, Adidas or whatever. You you
could take an Adidas shirt and put a damn Nike
logo on it and people recognize it as Nike even
if it had that it was made by Adidas. You
get what I'm saying. You could become a recognizable brand.
And I used to tell him, I used to He
used to really scrutinize even putting an Encore's logo which
looked like a you know, a reel of wire on something.

(34:31):
And I would argue with them and say, you know,
he would say, no, it can't go here, it can't
go like you know what, It's still branding no matter
where you put it on something, if people recognize the brand.
And I said, it's just like any other any other
thing out there that if you throw the logo on something,
it doesn't matter what the pieces you throw it on there,

(34:52):
it's branding because you built that logo. Same thing you
know with business cards, you throw that logo on there,
you throw your bra on there, right. And you also
have to remember at the same time, is we're going
to go into the next step, which is online presence
and the importance of things you gotta do. But this
is in the physical presence. So if it looks slap together,

(35:16):
it feels slapped together, and people do notice that. So
take the time to design a logo, even if you
have to hire somebody, design a logo that's very centric
with you. What you do. Pick some colors, stick with
your color schemes, get shirts made. If you want hats,

(35:38):
get hats made, but focus on the shirts. Put your
identity on your vehicles. Okay, and again, if you're early
contractor and your wife has a vehicle, don't be afraid
to say, wify, I'm putting a smaller magnet mount on
your car. Okay. She may not like it, but again,
she's invested in it with you. You can always take

(36:01):
it off when they get home, Okay, but when she's
out running errands and riding around. I want people to
see my company name. I want them to see my brand.
And if slowly they're going to see a logo that's
going to be consistent with your mission, whether and again
whether your mission was to be what, accurate, reliable, and professional.
They're going to put all these things together and it's

(36:21):
going to be memorable. They're going to see the name,
it's memorable, and they're going to see hopefully a logo
that's very memorable, not too complexed. Okay, whether it's just
a light bulb with your name Electrical, Abernathy Electric, and
it says a message, it says this is what we do.
I think a lot of times when it comes to logos,
people try to get too damn clever with a logo

(36:42):
and you're just trying to send the mission. Okay, that's it. Okay,
so that is what we're dealing with again. Cards, get
them made up this to print or somewhere that get
them made like water and maybe you have a local
printer that can give you a good deal or something
and you can get some printing done and get your cards.
The other advice i'll just tell you real quick, since

(37:03):
we were talking about cards, is a lot of people
only get one side of the card printed because it
may be a little cheaper. Don't do that. Don't do that. Please,
don't do that. Do both sides of the card. If
at the least on the backside, you show people how
they can give you a review, maybe on on Yelp

(37:24):
or Google review. Maybe you say, please give us a
five star rating, and this is the address they go to. Again,
if you're going to do anything, use the real estate
that you have. Okay, I'm just saying, Visa print, allow
you to print on both sides. Don't lose an opportunity.
Pay the extra to be able to print on both
sides of a card. All right. So the next thing

(37:47):
we're going to get into is we're talking about your
online presence and today why it is so important for
every electrical contractor when you're building your brand to have
that online presence. So we're going to go over that
right next. All right, so well, let's talk now about
the next step, which is uh own your online presence.

(38:09):
As we're talking about so in today's world, it can
If they can't find you online, then they just may
not find you at all unless you've got a really
good word of mouth presence. And if you're a new
contractor getting started and you're trying to build this brand,
you're not gonna have a big word of mouth presence, right.
You have some people that don't know you. But you
know what, you ever heard me talk about tooting your

(38:31):
own horn. I'm sure y'all heard that. And I got
accused of this many years ago. And again, people just
don't understand branding. It's like Paul's just tooting his own horn.
He thinks he's the greatest. Well, he's the electrical guru.
I laughed at him because I said, you know what,
you probably don't own a business, and you probably have
low self esteem. I do not, by the way, and

(38:52):
I believe that I put my time in and I'm
very proud of my achievements. But when it comes to customers,
they're not gonna they don't know who you are. And
unless you have a brand, unless you're spending copious amounts
of money online to put yourself in their face every
waking minute, and some contractors have that kind of money.

(39:14):
You have to build your name and the first thing
that you need to do today is that you have
to build Sorry about that. You have to build an
online presence. You have to So what can you do
to build your online presence? Now? The first thing you
do is you need to remember that you need to

(39:34):
claim all of your free listings online, whether you've done
it or not. First of all, for all of you
out there that are listening that have done it, I'm
going to talk about what you really need to do
with it, because I think people don't do it right.
They get it, but that they don't do it right
and then they wonder why they don't show up. Let me,
I'm gonna explain some stuff to you because I do
have a bit of a background and understanding SEO because

(39:55):
I've been building websites for thirty years now, but also
understand standing SEO and I struggle with it every day.
People heard me say that our websites don't show up
in the search engines because I'm competing against so many
other domains that are trying to do the same thing.
Whether I think they're good at us or better than
us or not, shouldn't be even doing it. It's irrelevant.

(40:16):
They're out there. But it's all about SEO and the design.
And there's a big difference between SEO online and getting
found in search engines. That is local SEO, which is
very easy for your company to get involved in quickly
and have results in quick amounts of time. Let me explain.

(40:37):
So the first thing you need to do is your
to do list, and if you're listening out there and
you've been in business and you've already felt like you're
working on a brand, you need to think about your
online presence. Number one Google my Business, Listing being business listing, YELP,
business listening, and any directories that are available out there
that you can list, like the Yellow Book or something

(40:59):
like that. You need to spend a week going through
and really update your local SEO. So when you go
get your Google my Business and you claim it, hopefully
nobody else has claimed your business. But once you get
your business or you add it or you claim it,
because it may already be out there in the ether.
Once you claim it, you need to embellish it. You

(41:21):
need to make sure that you add some photos of
some real job sites. That new logo that you created
that you're staying consistent with, you need to add it immediately,
brand awareness immediately, your hours that you work. Make it
very clear they have a segment in there where you
can add your hours. Put your hours in there. Please.

(41:41):
Licensing information, don't hide from people with your license. Trust me,
I tell people all the time, don't hire a contractor
unless they show you a copy of their license and insurance.
I'm not here to hire a handyman to do my
electrical work. I want a licensed contractor. Okay, So put
your license information, any of the other things that they

(42:01):
ask you in there. When you're creating your profile, answer it.
Try to add as much information as you can. Some referrals,
some job site applicant, you know, images from other job sites,
some photos, and be consistent with adding stuff in there.
If it's once a week you do a project, snap
a couple of pictures. It could be a simple project

(42:22):
service call snap a couple pictures, that type of thing.
But you constantly want to be updating your Google business profile,
your Being business profile, your Yelp business profile, and any
other directories that you can find out there that are free.
And if you just take a few minutes and google
them for a second, you will find there are many
directory listings out there because they all work together and

(42:46):
they pull information back and forth when people do searches.
That's why it's important. And the more detailed your profile is,
the higher probability it's going to bring back a result.
When somebody searches, like they're in Pine By, Farkansas and
they go find me an electrician near me, there's a
higher probability if you filled out all those information properly,

(43:08):
you put your zip codes or the areas that you service,
all of that stuff in your listings, it's a high
probability that you're going to get more visibility. There's no
guarantee sale, there's a visibility is all you can offer
somebody is say, look, I can I can raise your
visibility because if you're not in there and you don't
put your stuff in there, you're not going to be found.

(43:28):
You just not people today customers. I'm my customers that
the ones that when I was doing electrical they would
tell me they found me just doing a Google search.
So at the end of the day, it is a
real thing, and it's growing and growing and growing, and
with the AI and expansion, people are turning to the
Internet for answers on their phone quickly. So you've got

(43:49):
to be there the next thing that you need to do.
And again you've heard me say this and people cringe
because they don't know how to do it, or they
shy away from it. Every every business must have a website,
very simple, guys. Simple a front home page, an about
us page, your services page, and contact info. That's it.

(44:13):
Four pages. You can do this for free with wis.
There's ten plates. You just can delete what you don't
want fill into blake with But you need to. If
it means that you pay somebody fifteen hundred dollars one
thousand dollars whatever to create you basic website for your company,
you gotta do it, guys, trusts me. Today it's bigger
now than ever is the presence. And the reason is

(44:38):
because once you have this website, and you may say
I'm in business, I've never done any of that, Well,
good for you. You're not hungry. You're with that statement.
You're you're satisfied, You're not hungry. I'm an electro contractor.
I'm hungry. I want business. I want to grow my business. Okay,
so I want a homepage. They're very simple. You can
go to wiswix dot com. You can one real cheap

(45:00):
pay somebody whatever you gotta do. Get a home page
which is going to have your logo, a little bit
about your business, uh, maybe some pictures, a couple of
quick pictures of installs or whatnot. And then it's going
to have links to the about page, which you're going
to say a little bit about your company, your background,
your history, your commitment, your you remember, you're gonna you're

(45:21):
gonna highlight those things that you want to be known for.
Your professional, reliable, those things, those key things that we
talked about that were part of your identity. That is
where you're going to start putting this information so people
can learn a little bit more about you. Okay, and
obviously a contact page that they can reach you. Your
phone numbers got to be there, your email's got to

(45:42):
be there. And then you have a page for the services.
This allows you to add different services. Maybe you do
service work, maybe you do troubleshooting. Maybe you just do residential,
maybe you do whatever it is you need to let
your customers know. Now. The other reason that you need
a website is because remember those business cards we talked about.
You want to make sure that you include your ur L,

(46:03):
which is your web address, on those business cards so
that the customer can go there to find out more information,
or maybe even put a QR code on there where
they can scan it with their phone. It takes them
right to your website. The reason for this, guys, is
because advertising is expensive. And back in the day when
I would run ads on various advertising sites and things

(46:26):
like that, or in the newspaper or in magazine or
whatever it was a local paper, local you know advertising
thing like what are those things that used to convow
packs and things like that, that's expensive and you can
only and usually get charged for the word. Right, there's
this thing I used to do. It might not be

(46:46):
in your in your town, but I don't know if
y'all remember there's this this publication. It's it's really ruled.
I don't Some of you may remember this or may
remember it's called Coffee Time. Coffee Time was a very
blah publication it's usually just brown. It's just words, not color.
It's black and white, very blah. But where I was from,

(47:08):
it was everywhere at every restaurant. It's free, but you
paid to get advertising on it. Well, you got charged
by the number of words. You got charged by how
much you put in there. So if you have a website,
you can capture an audience by getting them from point
A to point B. And once you've got them at
point B, that's where you've got them captured, and that's

(47:30):
where you get to elaborate on your services. Or it
convinced them why you need to hire me over somebody else. Okay,
that type of thing. So you got to have a website, folks. Next,
social media, as much as I hate it. As much
as I loathe the social media, you need to make
sure that you create a social media account for your company,

(47:53):
not your personal for your company. Now, I'm different because
everything's evolved around me, and I'm not a local contractor.
We're talking local contracting, okay, electrical contractor local. You want
to make sure that you create social media accounts. You
want to make sure that there's a next door neighborhood
that you're connected with, that next door neighborhood with your logo. Remember,

(48:15):
stay consistent, keep your colors, keep keep the mission. But
make sure you get on social media and don't be
afraid to post job site pictures. Do a safety tip
once a week. If you're electrician, do a do a
code tip. It's a week, you know, try not to
keep it so cozy, but maybe something like post something

(48:36):
about keep the clearances in front of your electrical panels
clear for safety, YadA, YadA whatever O gfciyes, fciyes. Make
sure that your posts or your little quick videos on
a job site or a little hey this is so
and so with so and so. Electric just want to
remind you it's time to you know, check your GFC
eyes or whatever it is, because you want to share

(49:00):
those things, not just on your website, not just on
all of your business cards where you put your social
media icon. But you want to you know, you want
to keep it short and uh so people will go
there and join it and look at stuff that you
do because they will use that to determine whether or
not they should hire you or not. Hey, guys, we

(49:21):
just finished putting in this ceiling fan for this customer.
Look at that ceiling fan. That's amazing. If you have
an interest in a ceiling fan like this, give us
a call. We'll give you a great deal. And in
sometimes we even throw in specials in those type of things,
like if you call us today, you'll get ten dollars
off for fifteen dollars. However you do it, the point
is you're consistent with it, and you're going to say, well,

(49:41):
that's a lot of work. It is a lot of
work being in business, especially if you're hungry. Dude, y'all,
think about the stuff that I do. I do podcasts,
I do videos, I consult with people. I'm ahead of technicals.
I'm the director of technical services for Encore and Prismium.
I do podcasts, I do morning show every day. I

(50:02):
have to answer hundreds and hundreds of questions a week
on technical stuff from people that send it. Okay, i
have clients that I'm their consultant to and then I've
got trips I have to go to. How do I
do all that? Because I have to be a good
keeper of my time, Like for today, this is Sunday.
This is my block that I had set up for

(50:23):
me to do podcasts, and I'm sticking to that mission.
Because I know that I can get overwhelmed with all
the things that I like to do as a contractor.
You're working, working, working, But you know what, when you
get home, it only takes a few minutes to do
a social media post. In fact, they even have software
now that you can do them ahead of time and
they'll launch on their own when you get that sophisticated.

(50:44):
But right now, social media, and we're not talking about
you worrying about being connected with people all over the
country like I'm trying to connect with people all over
the country. Right you don't care about that. You don't
care anything about that. As a local SEO, you're only
worried about your local so you join Facebook groups for
your local folks. Okay, you hear what I'm saying. You

(51:08):
keep it very short, you keep it very and you're
not about the clicks. You don't care about the followers.
People have said to me all the time. I said, now,
I get thousands of people that watch the stuff that
we do. Not all of them are subscribers. Okay, they
don't all subscribe, but somebody may see it. Okay. I
had one guy ask me one time, says Paul, why
do you replay a lot of your videos because I

(51:31):
realized that people are going to be coming in new people,
old people, transience in and out always constantly. If I
get one person that sees one of my videos and
they buy a course, then I make a sale. You
have to put your product out there, and so if
you're a local contractor, you have to keep your product
out there. I'm just saying, it's just, it is what
it is. You got to be hustling all the time. Okay,

(51:54):
all right, where are we at here? Okay, so there
we go. Now, next thing that we're going to talk
about is the customer experience. And you've heard me say
it a little earlier. Again, bad impressions they can be overcome,
but it's difficult. It's so much better to set a

(52:14):
good impression. So the next step we're talking about is
focusing on the customer and the experience. Remember, now, you
can do the best code compliant work on the planet,
but if the customer had a bad experience, that job
won't lead to another job. That's a quote, right. You
could be the best in the world. I can be
the best code guy in the world. I can be

(52:35):
the best service tech in the world, but if I
look like crap, cuss like a sailor, look like a scrub,
set a bad impression. It doesn't matter how good I am,
it's not going to lead to another sale. It doesn't
matter how good you are to them. They don't care
about your life. They don't care about where you come from.

(52:56):
Don't share your personal experiences with them. They don't care.
The quicker that you can understand. Everybody likes to talk
about themselves, I get it. But when you're on a job,
they don't care about you. They just want you to
fix the ship that's happening that they don't want to happen.
So stop thinking that they care about you. They don't

(53:17):
care about it. And that's okay because we're not here
to make friends, right, We're here to get the job done.
So remember it doesn't matter how good you are. Okay,
I can have the best technician in the world work
for me, but if they are terrible with a customer,
they're not gonna make me money. Even though they're great,

(53:38):
they're not going to get that read because that ROI
that return on my investment with that customer has to
pay dividends in the future. So if they need something
else done. I need them to call me. They know
somebody down the street, I need them to call me, okay,
I need them to share my information. If you could
be the greatest in the world, but you have the

(53:58):
worst attitude or you project that to the customer, you're
not going to get more business. You're just not I've
been to restaurants, for example, where the food was awful,
but the help was amazing. I will give them another
chance just for the help alone. Right. So, anyway, things

(54:19):
to think about now core habits to remember. Anytime you
give somebody an appointment, make sure you confirm that appointment.
Make sure they understand clear times. Make it clear when
you expect to be there, and then be there. You
know that old saying is if the appointment at eight
o'clock and you arrive at eight o'clock, that you're already late.

(54:39):
That is absolutely true statement. In my mind, you have
to be early. If it's an eight o'clock appointment, you
need to be pulling up on that job site at
about seventy ten excuse me, sorry, seven point fifty, with
your clipboard, everything ready, getting your truck ready, so that
you can be up there at that door at a

(55:00):
eight o'clock and you ring that doorbell. Okay, So I
believe you have to be there early to be ready
because if you're always running late and you're always just
arriving now again, circumstances canna happen. I get it. I
mean realistic, I get it. But the goal should be
tactfulness and be on time. And be on time really

(55:21):
today means be early. Okay. Uh, make sure your tools
are clean, make sure that if you're going to come
in their house. You know, companies that are not buying
these little shoe protectors, you need to be buying these
shoe protectors. If you're not going to buy shoe protectors,
then you need to buy your your employees the like
slippers or the full slippers like you know that that

(55:43):
they can put on their feet that are clean bottom
or whatever that you only use when you go in
somebody's houses. Uh, maybe you take off your shoes and
go in your socks whatever. I think that that one
of the things that we used to have is those
little shoe covers in a box. You can get a
box up and I don't remember how many within a box.
Always go and put that on right in front of
the customer. Always if the customer says, oh, don't worry

(56:06):
about that, you go no, ma'am. It's our policy. We
you know, we pride ourselves on clean and making sure
we leave the location as clean as it was when
we came here. That's a great start, dude. It just
sets a tone that you're professional. Okay, all your tools clean,
not mucked up. I was talking to some folks over
on TikTok a little while ago, and they were talking

(56:27):
about tools. Again, it doesn't matter where your tools come from.
Their tools are tools. You have a reason for your tools,
but make sure they stay clean, tidy, and neat and
presentable and anytime you do work. Dude. This is always
a joke in the industry when it comes to electricians,
you know. I see these little memes on social media
that the electricians don't like to clean up after their mess.

(56:50):
I don't know what electricians they're talking about, because I
cleaned up, and my guys always cleaned up their job site.
And if there's nowhere to throw it, they at least
swept it into a pile. Every truck or van that
I had had at a wide three foot or wide
body brush on it, and they would sweep it. Whether
or not they would. You say, well, Paul, we didn't
make this mess. I don't care if it looks like
a mess, you clean it. I didn't believe in having

(57:12):
staples all over the job site. I didn't believe in
them wasting wire nuts on the job site. Shit them
things cost me three bucks a three cent apiece. So
again frugal, but made sure that everybody was on the
same page up front. Don't mixtup up as you go.
Set the tone up front what your expectations are. But again,
tidy neat work. If you go and work, give your

(57:35):
guy that works on a service truck, give them a
little vacuum cleaner that they can take in WHI are cordless,
and they can clean up whatever mess they make, put
it back the way it was before they leave. I'm
just saying, those are the little things that that's the professionalism, right,
those are those core things that we were trying to do.
That's you carry and you look the part. Your shirts,

(57:56):
your everything you wear says who you are. You look
the part. Next, make sure you communicate throughout the job.
Don't lead them in the dark, unless, of course, it's
like a panel change or whatever. And you know you're
leaving them in. You're literally leaving them in the dark.
But don't be afraid to convey what you're doing. It's
not you're not trying to hide the special sauce. Okay.

(58:17):
I always communicate with my customers because they're always watching.
If they're interested and they're watching and following you around,
then I keep them interested. I'm like, if I'm going
to replace a GFCI it's not working, and I go
to them and and GFC is not function I saying, Okay,
what we're gonna do is we're gonna take this so
old GFCI out it's not functioning, uh, and we're going
to replace it with a new one. And then I'll
walk you through how you test it, and if you

(58:38):
want to watch me put it in, I'll show you
what the line and load is. Kind of got any questions,
but don't be so scared. People don't want to share
things for some weird reason. I don't know what it is.
Maybe some electricians don't just don't communicate well. Well, I
encourage you to do mock things at your company in
order to encourage your employees to be a little more vocal. Okay,

(59:00):
not condescending, but vocal explain what they're doing. They don't
have to go technically too deep like me, I'm gonna
I'm I'm gonna end up telling them what's the difference
between the A F C I and gs C I,
What a GFCIs, class A, class B, class C, class D,
you know, all this kind stuff. But at the end
of the day, they don't want to know all that.
They just want the basics. And you're only communicating with
them to let them know that they're engaged in what

(59:22):
you're doing. Uh and and maybe they don't follow you around,
then you don't have to communicate with them. But if
they do, embrace it. Don't don't kind of be snarky.
Don't be like you don't need to know what I do.
And there's no hit, there's no hiding anything here. Just
be honest with your customer. Also, this can go a
long way, folks. Listen to me, thank the customer, and

(59:48):
follow up with the customer the next day. Okay, now
you're gonna ask me what does this mean? What is this?
This is a psyche tool. First of all, you are
thankful as a customer and your employee that may be
doing this. If you've got a couple guys working for you, whatever,
or it's you, you always leave with thank you for
the service allowing us to do this for you. We
appreciate it. We're a growing company and again we appreciate it.

(01:00:10):
And this is a great time to say something like
do you mind doing a Yelp review or do you
mind doing a Google review? Or do you mind doing
a being review or whatever? Okay, do you mind? It
really helps me out that type of thing. And so

(01:00:32):
that comes into the next thing, and that is reviews,
and we're going to get to that in a second.
But don't be afraid to say thank you to the customer.
Here's the other thing. Here's the other thing. Follow up
the next day. So what you should do is every
customer that you go to, and I don't know if
you do this already, every customer you go to, you
make sure that your name or their number and their

(01:00:54):
name personal their their name is recorded and obviously that'll
be on the sales ticket. But if you're doing service
work for example, or doing what anybody you're doing work for,
make sure that your office or if it's you personally
follow up the next day and say hey, I just
wanted to follow up yesterday. Everything's still working. You'd expect
it to be working, but it does give you another
opportunity to make that contact with the customer, who is

(01:01:16):
again a paying customer who you want to pay you
more in the future, or to share with other people. Remember,
a good job ends with the satisfied customer, but a
great job creates a referral to another customer. So don't
be afraid to say, hey, thank you for the thank

(01:01:37):
you for the work, allow me to do this work.
I appreciate it. As you know, we're growing our business
and we're really trying to, you know, to do good
things for a community, and we're really focused on it.
But we do appreciate you calling us and having us
do it. The next day, you follow up and say, hey,
missus or mister whatever. Just wanted to follow up, make
sure everything's okay, that we met all your expectations and everything,

(01:01:57):
and you're real good and we again, I just wanted
to let you know how much we appreciate you giving
us a call. Now there's some people out there that
say I'm not going to that level of pandering, Well,
then your ass really don't need to be in business.
I'm just saying it. I know I'm gonna offend some
of you, or some of you. Maybe your company's too
big that you're like, I don't need to do that shit.
That's fine. Hey, then I'm not talking to you then,

(01:02:20):
because I'm talking about me creating a brand. I'm talking
about me creating an image. I'm talking about my image
or where that customer goes. I'll be damned. They did
such a neat job. They did it and met my expectation.
And guess what, they even called me the next day
to make sure everything was still okay and that they
appreciate it, and that goes a long way to that
customer potentially telling somebody else how good you did. Okay,

(01:02:45):
now let's talk about reviews because this is becoming major,
major today when it comes to local SEO or people
seeing your business or people sharing things, because people are
actually looking at reviews. Now. I do I look at reviews, Okay.
Anytime I buy something on Wayfair, I look at a review.

(01:03:07):
Anytime I find something on Amazon, I look at a review.
Those type of things. I'm always looking at reviews. And
you can tell a fake ass review, okay, you can tell.
But look, five star reviews aren't just for fancy restaurants.
They are going to fill your business. How many times
have you taken an uber ride or you've taken a
door dash? Whatever they say, do you mind giving them

(01:03:29):
a review? And I would appreciate five stars. Don't be
afraid to ask for it, guys, I don't know what
the deal is with people that are afraid to ask
what And you know, when I tell people about the sale,
I don't know if you've heard me talk about when
I say what makes a good salesperson? It's basically people
can sell anything. I can sell ice to an Eskimo,
but if I don't ask the Eskimo if you're willing

(01:03:50):
to buy, they're not going to buy the damn ice.
So you can go through everything, but you ultimately got
to say, okay, are you in? You know, after you
go through your whole spiels like I've got some ice
right here, you know what, are you interested in this ice?
Ask for the sale. If you don't ask for the review,
you're not gonna get the review. So and you want

(01:04:13):
five star reviews because that's the image you're setting, that's
the brand you're setting. You're doing everything right now. If
you were shitty, you weren't good on the site, you
ran your mouth, you set a bad impression, and then
you ask for a five star review, I'd be damn
if you're gonna get it. In fact, it'll probably trigger
me to give you a one star review because I
wasn't even thinking about giving your review. So my best

(01:04:33):
advice for you out there, if you're not gonna be
that person, you're not working on your brand, and you're
not doing a good job at the site or the
job site or the service call, then you might not
want to mention anything about reviews because then that's gonna
make that light bulb. Go up to that customer and say,
you know what, I can let you know what I
think of you without saying it to your face. They'll

(01:04:54):
give you a one star and that's not gonna help
your business. I'm just saying, Okay, so you need to
ask for the review, whether it's Google being or whatnot.
And you know what, I'm going to tell you what
I did. Okay, this may help you, may not. I
made it easy for them, Okay. I created a website
on a web page where when they scan this QR

(01:05:16):
code on the back of my business card that says
give me a review, that they would go to the
page where it would allow them to put the information
in or to go to the different services being Google
all of I made it easy for them, okay, to
be able to give me the review. I didn't want
them to go hunting for it. I made it easy
for them. And then later we started doing stuff with

(01:05:38):
the NFC cards and y'all see me talk about those
coffee hour NFC cards where you can have an NFC
card where you can say, hey, can you give us
a and you tap their phone and it takes them
right to the area where they can give five stars.
And don't be afraid to say, you know, ask for it, okay,
ask for a review and say I hopefully and you

(01:05:59):
liked our service. Are professionalism. We would love a five
star review, and we'd appreciate a review and that type
of thing, all right, and let them do it that way,
because every five star review is a sales rep working
for you twenty four to seven. Dude, trusts me, trust me.
It is definitely I'd much rather ride in an uber
driver that's got a full point nine or greater than

(01:06:20):
I would one that's down in three point nine. I'm
just saying, and I did a lot of Uber driving
and riding with Uber drivers, and there is a distinct
difference in the two. Okay, there's a reason why they've
only got a three point nine. I'm just saying. Plus
a lot of times Uber won't even push those drivers
to you if your rating is real high, because they
rate you as well. That type of thing go anyway,

(01:06:43):
So encourage those reviews. Google reviews are great, YELP reviews
are great. Being reviews are great. But Google is the king.
Remember that Google is the king. So your Google my
business listing, and your Google reviews are going to take precedent.
That's the majority of the engines. Soak up that information
from Google. Also, what you can do is you can

(01:07:04):
text them or email them a link. Okay, because again
if you follow up the next day and you get
that email information from them, again, don't be afraid to
get that information and say, do you mind if I
text you or email you a link to do a review.
Don't feel like you're being pushy, especially if you did it.

(01:07:25):
If you did everything right, you know, you just did stellar,
You just hit a home run. You can tell that
conversation with that customer that you just knocked it out
of the freaking park and you want that review. You
need to make sure you get that review. Okay. Now,
when you do get that good review, don't be afraid
to screenshot it and post it on your social media,

(01:07:45):
post it on your website, post it everywhere you can,
because once you get that review, that is gold. And
share it everywhere, not just on the review site like
the Google sites or what. No, you screenshot that thing
on my phone, I can swipe the screen, take a screenshot,
minimize so it just gives me the review, and then
I would share that on my social posts. I'd share
that on my websites. I would share that everywhere. Okay, Now,

(01:08:10):
ask for video testimonials if they feel comfortable, and ask
them if you have permission to post it. So like
what I would do before, I would leave and I'd say,
do you mind giving me a review? An they said yeah,
I said, hey, do you mind giving a video testimonial review?
It only take a few seconds. I can do it
with my phone and I'll just hold it up like
a selfie and you can say, you know, you know,

(01:08:30):
we can have a quick little conversation and say how
did you like our service today, and they can say something,
however you want to design that. However you come up
with your little niche to do that, to get that
video testimonial, or maybe you just want to video them
and ask them, say what did you think about your
service today from Abernathy Electrical Services and they say it
was great, so professional. We appreciated they solved our problem

(01:08:52):
right away. Dude, if you can get videos short, little short,
little video testimonials like that that you can share in
social media, doesn't have to be but about ten fifteen
seconds long, that's it. Golden, golden, and back that up
with a Google listening. And I think the problem with
the day is too many electrical contractors, plumbing contractor mechanical
don't want to take the time to coddle their business

(01:09:15):
like this. And if you don't, you're not going to grow.
It's my opinion. You're just not going to grow unless
you're willing to work it. Okay, the next thing that
we talk about is being seen in your community, because
now you're building your brand. Now you need to be
seen a little bit out in the community. You need
to be that face of your brand. They need to
know what your logos look like, so you need to

(01:09:37):
be seen in that community. And again, if you want
to be the go to local electrician, then be local.
What does that mean you have to be involved? Then
it is inexpensive, folks. It does not cost as much
as folks think. You just got to look into it.
Maybe you sponsor a Little League team, maybe it's one
hundred and fifty bucks and your name is put on
the back of their jerseys. Or maybe they have an

(01:09:59):
outing at the end of the year and you sponsor
the outing. Or maybe they have banners that go on
the outside fence that you could be very descriptive. Put
your logo, your phone number, and make it clear on
the banner what you do electrical services. That's all you need.
Don't put so much crap on it that somebody's got
to use a binocular to see it. Be the simple

(01:10:20):
is best. Put your logo, make your webs put your
website on there as big as possible across the bottom. Okay,
put your phone number and say what you do. That's it. Okay. Also,
don't be afraid to volunteer at local events, trade school panels.
If you have a trade school in your air be involved,

(01:10:40):
join any business networking groups and may you have a
chamber of commerce. It's it's a one time fee or
an annual fee, but you get exposure. They'll put your
name into stuff that they send out. Again, if your
logo looks great, it depicts what you do and your
company name is very clear. It describes what you do,
and you're able to get your website there. You might

(01:11:00):
only get three lines in these things. For these chambers
of commerce, they may only give you three lines, but
at the end of the day, people can then go
to your website or your social media posts and they
can learn more about you. That's the other thing I'll
tell you about social media. I'm giving you all these
little tidbits. When you develop a social media handle, make
sure you stick to a handle and use it across
all your platforms. So for example, I am master the NEC.

(01:11:23):
I am on master the NEC on TikTok. I am
mastered the NEC on Twitter which is now x. I
am mastered the NEC on Facebook, I am mastered the
NEC on Instagram. Okay, I am mastered the NEC on kicks.
Stick to it Okay, the stick to it. The only
one that I am not master the NEC on is
my LinkedIn account, which is a business profile account, and

(01:11:45):
it's not to me the same as social media. Those
are business contacts. Those are not what you're going to
use to grow your local SEO. You're not going to
use LinkedIn. Still should get an account for your business
because exposures king, but those are not the ones that
you're going to be using develop your brand locally. That's
going to be the social media that people will use
all the time. Facebook on Facebook, I'm master the NEC.

(01:12:06):
So be consistent. Pick it. You know, you can have
a personal account if you want to play around on them,
but your business ones, develop them now, and stay consistent
across all of your social platforms. If you're going to
make it very business centric, means that these accounts are
for me to share things about my business. And here's
the beautiful thing. When you share something, you create something

(01:12:29):
for one of them, you can use it on all
of them. Same with YouTube, Get you a YouTube account,
get you a very specific, keep it simple, keep it
the same. Mine is master the NEC on that as well,
and then do the video shorts, ten second videos, fifteen
seconds testimonials, keep it that all of that stuff is
going to benefit you and building your brand locally. But

(01:12:52):
you've got to share it. Okay. It's not like field
of dreams. If you build it, they will come. But
you have all these avenues that you can share and
build your brand. Okay. The other thing I'll tell you
is don't be afraid to partner. Okay, some companies are
so scared to partner that I don't understand it. For example,
if I'm an electrial contractor and I'm working on job

(01:13:13):
sites and I find a good plumber, or I find
a good HVAC guy, or I find some good real
estate agents or some home inspectors, whatever I find, I
go right after them, and I'm saying, look, I like
to partner with you. And they could say no, but
chances are they not partnering with anybody. Say look, I
would like to, you know, partner with you. In other words,

(01:13:37):
build our own little networking. Whereas I'm going to give
you some business cards. Hopefully if somebody needs electrical work,
you'll share it. I'll take some of your cards. And
if they say no, don't do that. I don't align
with anybody. Then all I say to those folks say
is that's okay. Let me give you some cards anyway,
Maybe somebody that you normally would recommend is booked up
and they can't get to something right now. I don't

(01:13:57):
mind being the number two guy. I don't mind. I
don't mind at all being the number two because you
know what, sometimes the number one is going to be
tied up and the number two is waiting right there. Okay,
Also real estate agents. Don't be afraid to give your
cards to real estate agents. Let them know. In fact,
I've even created plans for real estate agents whereas I

(01:14:19):
can do a freshen up, whereas I'll replace all the
receptacles it covers switches. Luminais that they would like to
be replaced ad recesses if they want fix issues that
might come up on a home inspection. You know, they
might already have an electrician. But what you do is
you don't approach it with I want to be your
number one. You want to approach it and say, look,
I want to be here in case your number one

(01:14:41):
can't meet your needs. I just want to be that
person here for you. Again, I'm not pressuring you, I'm
not trying to. I just would like to build this
relationship with you. You'd be surprised that you're not going
to get something unless you don't ask for it. And
rejection just part of the deal, right, You might get
rejected by somebody, but it's okay, who cares, So you know,
get used to it. It's not a big deal that

(01:15:03):
type of thing. And mention to these people that you'll
refer them as well, that you have any business cards.
I'm more than happy to refer that type of thing. Okay.
So you don't just want to be their home, you
want to be part of their town. Okay, you just
don't want to be in their home, you want to
be part of their town, part of their community, all
those things with the charities giving and make sure and

(01:15:26):
here this is where you got to be selfish. I
want to make sure that I'm getting something in return.
I'm not going to sponsor a Little League team just
out of the goodness of my damn heart. Okay, there
is always something I want out of this. And you
can say, well, Paul, that's not very honest, bullshit. Wake
the hell up, people, stop being so damn woke. I'm
in business to make money to feed my family. They're

(01:15:49):
gonna pay somebody anyway, So yes, I feel good about
helping the Little League. But if it means I can
put a banner on that fence and I'm gonna get
money out of it, then I'm gonna put the information
I need to have on there and I'm gonna make money.
But I'm still helping the team. I'm still helping the charity.
Get off of the high horse. Folks, you got to
be hungry to build your business. Okay. It doesn't mean

(01:16:12):
you screw people. It means that you're building your business. Okay,
I'm just saying, all right. The next step that I
think is really important. Again, this is a long podcast,
so hopefully you're still with me, is build authority with education.
What do we mean by that? Well, I want to
build fast, trusted, fast than any billboard, teach something. Okay,

(01:16:35):
So if I want to trust faster than any billboard,
then I want to teach them something. So how do
I educate people locally? Record short little videos answering common
questions and safety questions that you post on your social media,
post on your website. Become that authority. Okay, write blogs.
Some people don't like writing blogs, but it doesn't have
to be a long block. Maybe you know something that

(01:16:57):
you're familiar with, that you've got a knowledge. You're a
lie electrician, you know little things. Write an informative blog.
Write it in the way that it's going to help
the customer. Okay, the faces the things that they issue
that they run into. Host a free home safety check
event where you'll do a little event for the community.

(01:17:17):
And maybe you can do that through the Chamber of
Commerce at a meeting and say, look, I'd like to
do a fifteen minute little home safety check thing and
you can have a little PowerPoint with things that they
need to check around their house, all those type of things. Okay,
maybe you write a simple guide or checklist for the
first time homeowners and you provide this to the real
estate agents from the professional electrician or professional plumber, things

(01:17:40):
that they need to look for, a little checklists. Okay. Remember,
an educated customer becomes a loyal customer and they'll bring
others with them. Trust me, when they feel like they've
learned something from you. You're not trying to turn them
into tradesmen. You're trying to just educate them on the
things that they're going to encounter as a homeowner. You
hear a breaker if you ever hear a breaker arcing

(01:18:00):
call us. Okay, anything like that, you know you could
be creative. The next step, I will say is and again.
This is the last one is and again I appreciate
you for taking the time. This is a rather long podcast,
but this one is. Stay consistent and authentic. Okay. Branding
is like wiring a house. It has to be planned, structured,

(01:18:22):
and repeated over and over again. Okay, So stick to
your brand across all your platforms, use their logos, use
your color scheme, stay consistent with your message. Again, this
is different than trying to reach worldwide. You're just trying
to reach local. So all those things that we talked
about in step one, okay, your professionalism, your accuracy, your

(01:18:43):
your promptness, whatever you're focusing in on, stay consistent across
your brand. Okay. Keep showing up online and in person.
Be consistent. Don't just do one event, don't go just
do to one open house. Be consistent. If you're doing
a social media post, be consistent. Mark your calendar that

(01:19:05):
you're gonna do something. A picture from a job site
or a customer or a testimonial at least twice a
week on certain days, and stay consistent. With it. Next,
stick to your values. Do not compromise your professionability to anybody. Okay.
If you promise professionalism, you need to live it daily.
Walk the walk, talk the talk. Don't be that one time,

(01:19:27):
that one time that you let your guard down. Is
that one time that's going to be an impressionable moment
that could ruin your brand. So if you're gonna wear
company shirts, you're gonna wear your van's got your name
on it. It stays clean, professional, stick to it, keep it, okay,
stick the part, live it, learn to live it, absorb it.
Let's become part of you. Okay. Always be code strong,

(01:19:51):
stay educated, stay sharp, and enforces your incredibility. Again, you
don't build a brand in a week. You build it
over dozens of jobs, dozens of impressions, and dozens of
moments of trust between you and your client. That's what
it does. Now. The other great advantage to master electricians
or company people that own their company is to get

(01:20:13):
additional credentials and certifications that you can stand out amongst
your peers. CMECP program, for example, is a very cheap
way of solidifying yourself as that knowledgeable contractor in your community.
You have it on the side of your vehicles, you
wear it on your shirt, you have it on your hats,
you have the lapel pen, you put it on your

(01:20:33):
business cards. You promote the professionalism that you've gone over
and above, and you make it a point to remind
people you did go over and above the average electrician
or the average electrical contractor. You took that extra step
of knowledge and incorporate that into your business. That that
doesn't just mean our CEMECP program. That means you continually learn,

(01:20:55):
you continually take courses, you continually educating yourself, not just
a lectrical but in HR courses, marketing courses, constantly enriching yourself.
You're the business owner, you're developing your company. This is
yours and everything you learn by doing that extra effort,
you're going to be able to convey down as your
business grows to the people underneath you. Okay, all right, folks,

(01:21:19):
that wraps up today's episode here at Master Thedac podcast. Now,
if you're serious about growing your electrical business, don't just
master the code. I'm sure you attend our live streams
and our educational programs and all that kind of stuff.
You got to master how your community actually sees you
the steps that I've given you, I promise you you'll

(01:21:41):
stop being just another electrical contractor in the phone book
and you start being the person that folks call first. Okay,
if you found this valuable today, folks, share this episode
with other fellow contractors. Don't forget to leave a review.
Let us know what you thought, give us a thumbs up,
share it, and if you have future episodes that you'd
like to see come up on you here and do

(01:22:01):
me a favor. Just go to Paul Abernathy dot com
and please, by all means give us suggestions on things
that you want to hear, and we're more than happy
to produce podcasts and even video content for you based
on things that you need. We're here for you. If
you want to learn more about being a Certified Master
Electrical co Professional. Again, it's all about image. It's all

(01:22:22):
about taking your game to the next level. If you're
interested in that, go to CBCP dot org and check
that out. You can read all about it. It's only
available to master Electricians or equivalent. But we think it's
the next generation in making you stand out. And maybe
you're already in business and you're like, well, I've already
established I don't know. I don't know what else I
can do. Maybe this is where it's time to jump
start your business and then raise its elevation. And it's

(01:22:46):
never too late to start branding your company, maybe in
a different direction than where you are now. Maybe you're
not new, maybe you've been around for twenty years, but
you'd like to get from point A to point B
a little better, and you'd like to create a little
better branding. And hopefully my tips have helped you today.
Until next time, folks, stay safe, God bless them. We'll
catch you on the next episode a Master the NEC Podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:23:06):
Thanks for tuning into another electrifying episode of The Master
of the ANEC podcast. We hope you're feeling more powered
up and ready to tackle the electrical world with the
knowledge and confidence you need to succeed. Remember, in the
electrical trade, knowledge is power, and we're here to make
sure you stay flogged into the latest insights, tips and

(01:23:27):
code updates. If you enjoy today's episode, don't forget to subscribe,
leave us a review, and share the podcast.

Speaker 2 (01:23:35):
With your fellow electricians and industry pros.

Speaker 1 (01:23:39):
Until next time, keep your tools sharp, your circuits clear.

Speaker 2 (01:23:43):
And you're my focused because here at the Master of
the ANEC.

Speaker 1 (01:23:46):
Podcast, we're all about sparking your success. Stay safe, stay smart,
and keep mastering the trade. From all of us here
at Electrical Code Academy, thank you for all your support
and we will see you on the next amazing Master
then EC podcast episode

Speaker 2 (01:24:09):
Mm hm

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How to Build a Local Brand as an Electrical Contractor – Step-by-Step Guide

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}How to Build a Local Brand as an Electrical Contractor – Step-by-Step Guide