The ServiceTitan Certified User Advantage | Podcast Ep. 10 | Mastering ServiceTitan

Welcome to Mastering Service Titan, where we get expert advice from power users. I'm your host, Josh Lu, and today I'm joined by two special guests. First, we've got Randy Thompson, who's the Service Operations Manager at Bill Joplin's Air Conditioning and Heating. And second, we've got our very own Danielle Combs, who's our program Manager of Customer and Partner relations. And today we'll be diving deep into the topic of stcu. And to kick off here, Danielle, we're going to. Can you first let us know what is stcu?

Yeah, I'd love to. So STCU is our brand new Service Titan Certified User Program. It's actually an evolution of our Certified Administrator program. We started off with just having a certified administrator role that we had available for our customers. And we saw an amazing improvement for all of our customers that completed that certification. And we really wanted to extend that because coming from the industry, I found that we. One of the hardest things to do was onboard new employees to different roles. And so what we've done is now created the Certified User Program instead of admin so that we can expand that to all different roles within the office and the field.

I went through the first STCA program and I learned so much about the product and the product has just grown so big. So this is an awesome evolution to help specific user paths really master their product area instead of taking on the entire thing. So, Danielle, how does the STCU relate to the Academy? Can they get credit for some of the Academy footage and how does all that work?

Absolutely. So the STCU program actually lives within Academy and so it all works together. So if you complete certain courses for another training, so say like prepare to launch or any of those, those all will show as completed when you go into the certification. So you'll be able to see all of your courses, no matter if they're part of certification or not completed within the perfect.

So that way you don't have to do it twice and you get credit in multiple places. And you also mentioned for the first time, some of our live event footage will be included.

So it's not live event footage. What it is is that starting with this year's Pantheon, our live events like Pantheon and Toolbox, live events that we have regionally, we're actually going to have certain sessions, so breakout sessions or keynote session count towards certification. So instead of having to take one of those tests, you can actually go to a live session and learn about it instead in real time and then have that count towards that certification. So it Marks it off that you've completed that test. So it makes it a lot more interactive so that you're not just having to use the attempt.

I love how, you know, went from mostly text based now to include other avenues that people like to learn with video. And then some people like to watch people talk about it on stage as if you were actually there. And so I love that it combines all of that into the program. Randy, when did you decide to get involved with the program and what's been your experience so far?

I actually heard about it at pantheon in 2021 and I did the little kiosk that they had set up there and was like, oh, I've got this. And I didn't do well at all. And I was really surprised. And so I was like, well, I gotta get signed up. So we got back to Texans and got got it going and I went through the whole program and I' internal support. So it really helped me to help everybody else within our shop and not have to contact support for every little thing.

So many great things come out of Pantheon. The number of times I've heard people say, like, oh yeah, I finally started this or that at. Because I learned about it at Pantheon and right away they just like their whole business transformed.

I had never even heard of it and maybe it was new there. I don't know when it started, but I was super excited about it.

Yeah. What do you think are some of the benefits you've experienced from getting involved in the program?

Our Titan score definitely went up because we learned how to do things better. I learned how to do things better and then could translate that to our team. Danielle has the statistics for you, but we don't have to do as many support cases and I'm the only one that really sorts them because everybody comes to me, I try to answer their questions. If I can't answer it, then I go to support and it's. I do maybe one support case a month and it's usually like something's not functioning properly. Not that I can't answer a question.

Gotcha. Yeah. Danielle, before we started recording, you shared some pretty impressive stats about those who get involved in stsu. Would you mind sharing that with our listeners here?

Absolutely. When we have somebody that's been certified from a company, 30 days after certification, we've found that their support cases drop 35%. And with that, the even more astounding one is that when they do contact support, still when they contact us, it only takes one time, 92% of the time to complete that transaction and get that help completed instead of going back and forth because they have more knowledge to help the agent help them. And just like Randy said, the Titan Advisor score is huge because that directly impacts your revenue. And we've seen that after 30 days we've seen a 4% increase in Titan Advisor score all the way up to 120 days after certification and going up 11%. So that directly translates into a huge benefit to every company that completes it.

Those are some hard hitting numbers. And I have to put a disclaimer out there. We are not doctors. We don't know. We can't guarantee these kinds of results for you know, each company is very different. Legal is probably like what the heck. That is not how you do a disclaimer. But either way it sounds like support volume decreases significantly and then the few times that you do have to go to support the the first contact resolutions 92% which is super impressive.

Is it a secret that we also get to bypass the Tier 1 support?

That is something that is something that we are launching. Is that with being certified as a certified admin role we are actually doing priority routing. So you don't get priority support, it is just priority routing. Since you've proven that you know, you know about the entire platform and that you can really be that support person internally for your company, we've started launching a pilot of allowing those support cases to skip tier one and tier two and go straight to a specialist. And so yes, that is in pilot right now. It is not fully launched so it is something that is only available via email. Support cases opened in the help center by some a user that is designated as a certified administrator. With this it allows us to then we're branching it off to multiple different roles. So it's going to be role based. So not only that administrator role but also we are launching the CSR dispatch role. We're doing accounting for both residential and commercial as well as inventory manager, purchasing manager. And a fast follow will be the technician certified certification as well. So then that way we can actually certify people in the field, not just in the office. And the really neat thing about it is that in the past we just had that certified admin and it was daunting. It was a huge, you know, undertaking to complete all of the tests. So we've actually broken it up into levels now. So it's going to be level based. And so we start with the explorer. You'll notice that we go with that Titan Advisor theme. So as an explorer you learn the Fundamental, you know, product knowledge that you need to know. And then you graduate to be able to complete the navigator tests. And that's where you get that deeper understanding of product and features and more complex workflows. And then you, to get this full certification, you complete that advanced level that what we call the commander. You're the commander of the service Titan ship at that point and it really shows exceptional product mastery and leadership that you can take back to your company and Excel.

Do you think some people will do all of them or is it more? You're just supposed to focus on one.

So the goal is to have everyone complete all of them. It's just a matter of breaking it up into bite sized pieces to make the learning easier and make it more foundational so that you learn those beginning steps before you, you know, walk before you, you know, start running. Type situation.

Totally. And for those who are just listening, Randy raised her hand. I did all of them. Can you tell us a little bit about what that's been like to go through all those modules?

I haven't done all of them yet. I've done the whole certified user. But once the CSR comes out, the technician comes out, Inventory, accounting, I will do them all. But I'm really looking forward to my CSRs being able to do that. Plus mobile, the technician mobile side, because they are the front line for our technicians and for them to be able to answer the question of, hey, why is it doing this? Where do I find this? It'll be huge. It'll produce the amount of questions I have to answer to get them trained up. So I'm super excited for all of the different segments to come out and.

I want to throw in there that Randy was amazing and she volunteered to help actually create some of these new certifications for us, guiding us in giving us feedback with several other certified admins. And so she's actually already taken the residential version, the commercial version and construction. So not only are we doing just standard res, you know, the residential anymore, because we've expanded and we are now a commercial platform, we now have a full commercial track of certifications that we'll have available as well.

That is great news. And Randy, earlier you, it's a great point you mentioned about having your teams also go through the program. Are you having all your employees do it when they first onboard or just some of the managers? Like, what advice would you have on like rolling this out to the team?

I don't, they're not out yet, so I don't know yet. But my plan for sure would be to have all of my CSRs do it immediately because I think that's the first one coming out. I might even turn it into like a contest where like whoever gets it done first gets a prize and whoever has the highest score gets a prize. Something like that, just to encourage them. And then definitely onboarding. I have a pretty good tenure with my folks here, but if I have to hire somebody new, it'd be a great, you know, self paced, get all the knowledge in there and then my department heads for the other ones. Accounting manager, inventory manager. All of those folks, yes, I 100% will have them do it.

That makes sense. And when you first jump in to do it, what should you expect? Like what, what are you reading things? Are you taking tests? What's the experience of it?

They have videos and learning content that you get to go through and then after each section there's a practice test and you can take the practice tests. You can retake those as many times as you need to go back and re watch the video or reread the content if you missed something. And then there's like the master test at the end of each section until you get to all the way to the end and get certified.

Perfect. And Danielle, do you have any advice? Are there like some common challenges that you heard that you want to just give people some advice on as they get started?

Yeah, absolutely. And number one is that I have to thank a huge thank you to our digital content team that actually does all of our content for our academy, for our customers. They have been working tirelessly to update our learning content. So you'll notice that with the evolution of the STCU program, we're actually, they're updating all of the content to be more video based and less text heavy and less articles to make it more interactive and easier to digest. So huge props to them for really listening to our customers and taking that feedback from those who have completed the certification already. So that's one big thing is to, you know, really look at the learning content as well as if you have two monitors. It is so much easier if you can have the content on one and then your practice or next environment up on the other because then you can click through. Because a lot of people, especially in a trades environment are very hands on. I know I am, I know my husband is. And so don't feel like you're cheating. It's something that's there for you. And in those two environments you can play around and update things and work in the settings and do different things without worrying about hurting any of your data for your company. So definitely use those resources. And again, a second monitor always helps.

That is such a good point about having it, the practice environment up. Because it's one thing to, like, learn it in your head and another thing to actually go and do it and then all of a sudden it makes sense, actually doing it. I think, I think that makes it stick better.

Absolutely. It's a proven learning technique. If, you know, read it and then you can do it yourself, it helps it really stick and hit home. And then you can explore something like maybe you're not the expert in that area, you know, normally, and you're reviewing something that you're not used to. It's a great way to visually see that versus relying on, you know, articles or those trainings that may not look exactly like your account. Because we all know that there's many different versions of service type.

Totally. Randy, how about you? Any advice for first timers who may be a little nervous jumping into it?

Just do it.

Just get started. Take that first step and get started and go at your own pace. It doesn't have to be done overnight. It doesn't. You know, just because somebody did it in a month doesn't mean that it's not okay for it to take you six months.

Go do it.

When you have a minute, you know, get in there and do a module here and there and you'll get through it, you'll feel better for having done it and you'll be really proud of yourself at the end.

Awesome. Just go do it. The theme of Nike. Right? Just take that first step. And I love. Now that there's leveling, so it might be not. It's probably not as intimidating to be like, oh my gosh, I gotta go all the way and get the certification. But hey, maybe I can just do that foundational level first and just, just take that very first step, which is usually the hardest one.

So if you're interrupted, it's not a big deal. Like, technician walks in and I've got to stop. That's okay. I can get back to it later.

Actually, that's a really good point. Do you have any recommendations on when people should do this? Is it like at the end of the day thing? A few minutes a day? Do you try to do like. Yeah. How do you schedule doing the training?

I just had it up. I just had it up on a screen. So if I was, you know, had a break between doing whatever I was in the middle of doing, I would go and you know, read through and work on one of the tests and then at the end of the day, If I had 20 minutes before I needed to go home, I would work on it. And then if I wanted to do it when I got home, because I try not to work at home, we could do it there too if you need a quiet space or whatever.

Gotcha. Awesome. So Danielle, if someone's interested, they heard this, they want to take that first step. Where do they go to get started?

Yeah. So first of all, this is completely free and you can have as many users as you want enrolled in as many different roles. So there's no excuses. And all they need to do is go to servicetitan.com/certified, that's our landing page. And you just fill out the quick registration form. It will ask you some easy questions and then that gets submitted and I enroll you in the course. You get an email saying you're ready to go and it's your turn to really shine and go learn and take those tests.

Perfect. Simple enough? Yes. Servicetign.com Very simple. Forward slash certified.

Certified.

Yep.

Perfect. We'll put the link in the description of this episode so you can easily get started there. And before I sign off, anything else I should have asked that I missed.

One thing that I like to highlight is that this is an industry standard certification. Now, we've had it for years and it's an amazing career opportunity. So this is something that you can help, you know, level up your current staff to. If you have people that you're trying to get to be able to move from technician to service manager or CSR to a CSR manager or office manager, things like that. These are, this is a great opportunity to help you invest in your team to be able to give them that ability to move much easier to those different roles within your company as well as it's an amazing thing to be able to recruit with. So if you use Service Titan and you want to make sure and hire somebody that you know really knows the product so that you don't have that big onboarding process as much, this is a certification that you can easily see on their LinkedIn profiles and social and things like that, because we do offer a validatable credential online so you can go see those there and they can also share them on the resume. So then that way we, they can get even better jobs. And we've seen amazing results with our customers that have a center of excellence. Having all of their center of excellence employees be certified as well.

That is as legit as it gets. Randy, any last parting words of wisdom or advice you want to share with our listeners before we hop off?

Take the leap. You do get a pretty little certificate you can frame and put on the wall, too, and it's transferable. So if I was to leave Joplin's, I'm not going anywhere. But if I was, I can take it with me. And like Danielle said, it is, you know, if, if I go to hire somebody and they've got that STCU certification, I'm going to bring you in today. I'm not going to wait till tomorrow. I'm going to be like, come on, let's chat.

That is such a good point. Thank you both so much for coming on today. And yes, just get started. The link is in description at least. Just click on the link and take a look. And yeah, if you get started, like I said, the first step's always the hardest, and we hope to see you in the program and see more certificates on people's walls and stamps on LinkedIn everywhere. So thank you all so much for listening today and we will see you on the next one.