Automating and Digitizing Your Sales Workflow Process with Matt Radford

Hey everybody, it's Jim Johnson, your host here at Contractor Radio and we're super excited today you're gonna start to see some new stuff with us. It's been a lot of fun our first year and getting 52 episodes out there and really gaining some traction. I think a lot of the reason that we're gaining that traction is because we're doing what we said we were going to do. We're going to entertain you, we're going to educate you, we're going to help you get control of your business so that you can grow your business and start to find some of that financial freedom and personal freedom that you're looking for. That's what we're all after as entrepreneurs. So we concentrate on tools, tactics, strategy and some of those things that help us to create a better business that we can manage a little bit more in this fashion of working on it instead of in it every single day. As contractors, we tend to create jobs for ourselves instead of businesses for ourselves. And Contractor Radio is here to help you start to turn your job into a business. Today we are going to be bringing on a guest that we're going to talk about automation and digital aspects of your business. How we can start to put those into our workflow and our processes to speed things up, become more professional and to start to really drive our business. And we always start out with this two minute drill. And I want to talk to you today about that automation side of things more than anything else. One of the tools that are out there, there's a couple of different ones. You've got Zapier or Zapier and you have if this then that and you'll see that as iftt. These tools are tools that you can use to link things together. Like maybe your email to a form that gets filled out, a spreadsheet to a document, or a document to a spreadsheet, a form that gets filled out on your website that creates a spreadsheet for you. And I strongly suggest, you know, as technology is moving forward faster and faster, not everybody is API together where this thing is just off automatic, click a button, everything works but these tools like Zapier and if this, then that will allow you to connect those two things with just some simple technological skill. You can go watch a YouTube about about it and learn what you need to learn in about five seconds. It's really quick. You can set up these things called zaps that do those type of things for you. So maybe each time somebody fills out a form on your website, you could Zap it over to your CRM to automate an email. So it's cool. Things like that that will take some of that workload off of us because we're all about creating capacity. The more things that we can automate gives us more time to work on our business. So let's talk a little bit about that automation and digitizing your workflow and what that can do for your business day. We have a special guest, this guy, we've gotten to know each other over the last year. We not just in the business side of things, but in a group that we have on Facebook for contractors called Contractor Fellowship. And he's wise beyond his viewers and he's got a great story. I can't wait to get into it with him. We are going to bring on the superstar of all things Roofer related, Matt Raffert. Matt, welcome aboard, buddy.

Good to have you. I'm humbled by your introduction there. Thank you very much.

Yeah, you. It's one of those things I noticed, like, as you're in conversations with groups of people, you tend to be quiet at first and you kind of take in that information and then you're able to wrap it all up and really apply a lot of wisdom to it. And I've been listening. I don't know if everybody else is, but I've certainly been paying attention to what you had to say in our fellowship group as well as on some of the business stuff that we do together. So today we're talking about digitizing your workflow process and some automation type things, making things a little bit easier for these contractors. But before we get there, why don't you just give us from, you know, now to back in the day. How'd you get here? What ended up driving you to get to all things, everything over there at Roofer?

Sure. So I started roofing back in 1999, and the story of how I started roofing was it usually starts out the same way. I was dating a girl. Yeah. So I, I actually, I was getting into web design and I designed my first website in 1999. It was a Star wars website. Huge Star wars fan. And I taught myself HTML and I was learning how to code and whatnot. I was dating this girl and her dad's a roofer. So he told me the Internet is just a fad. It's not going anywhere. And I needed to get a real job if I was going to date his daughter. So he took me roofing. So I got out of web design and. And got into roofing and did industrial commercial roof flat roofing for 14 years. And, and I've been a shingler for, for 21 years. Last year, I can honestly say, was the last year I'm going to step on a roof. I'm done.

It's.

But so I did roofing for most of my, my life and a few years back I was working for Mr. Roof Repair Company out of Toronto and I started using the roofer measurement tool and I got really good at it. So they, they hired me. Now I'm here. It's kind of. And to me it's like, it's a, it's a marriage of two of my, my interests. Right. I love roofing. I'm really good at roofing. Better than most other roofers. And it's tech, you know, it's, it's. You've seen I have five computer monitors here in front of me and all kinds of gadgets and stuff. So it's. I'm very happy. I'm right where I'm supposed to be.

So you're like me, you got all the gadgets and everything. I got like this podcast camera over here that picks me up and does different front frames and stuff. I got my webcam up there. I've got three different screens, all kinds of stuff going micro. It's funny, like, it seems like us that are in this industry tend to like that techie kind of stuff too.

Yeah, yeah.

Like what? The cool stereo I want the great sound surround sound system.

And those times we're slowly being microwaved, but at the same time it's fun.

You say Toronto, Canada, right?

Yeah, yeah. I'm in southwestern Ontario, Canada.

That sounds cold. Am I correct?

It's very cold.

It's very cold.

Yeah, it's very cold. That's, that's another reason I'm not stepping on another roof. It's. I don't know what it would be in Fahrenheit, but I think actually it's. It's warm today. It's zero. That's warm.

That's 32 degrees Fahrenheit, if I remember.

Yeah, yeah, I think so. I never, I never, I never paid attention to Fahrenheit.

Well, I live close. Close enough to you to understand what that means. Right?

Gotcha. Yeah.

Lived in Wisconsin for about 18 years and I said, man, I'm tired of snow, I'm tired of cold. It is time to get back to the great state of Texas. Yeah, that's where I'm at today. Now we got a little bit of the background before I get into all the questions, always like to ask my guests a few questions, kind of more about them. What's your greatest achievement today? The thing that Matt has done that he's maybe most proud of, that's not getting married and having kids, like we all know that's number one or better be, or we're in trou. Besides that, what's the greatest achievement today?

I would have to say overcoming my addictions. I've been sober now. This is my 10th year of being sober. I quit smoking six years ago. And, you know, it's. I don't want to say I'm proud of these achievements. These aren't any achievements that I've done on my own. I've only done them through, through the Lord. God has given me the strength to overcome my addictions. Romans 6 says, the old man is dead, and I'm a new creature. So I'm not an alcoholic. I was an alcoholic. That man is dead. So my greatest achievement is overcoming my. My alcoholism. I lived on the streets for a while. I've been poverty stricken. Ten years ago, I was playing my guitar on the streets of Toronto for money, you know, going to the. Going to the bars, getting drunk. And I was homeless. And so overcoming those addictions, coming to the Lord, has helped bring me to where I am today.

Okay, I got more questions about the automation, digitizing stuff, but, yeah, you said something there that was counterculture a little bit. There's this thing with alcoholism. Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic, right? Always going to be one of those people. I just have to do these things to make sure that I don't fall back into that trap. You said instead that that man is dead, like, yeah, no longer an alcoholic. That's so different. How did you get to there? I understand that God's part of that, but I'm going to guess you were in some programs and things like that, and. No, you're on.

Yeah, I just. I just realized, you know, I'm not an alcoholic. See, I got into trying to really figure out who I was and what my identity was. And I found that when I was saying I'm an alcoholic, I. I was saying that is my identity. So I started saying, I'm Matt Radford and I have alcoholism. So that way, my alcoholism wasn't becoming my identity. And then once I learned that my identity is actually in Jesus Christ as my savior, then he became my identity. I am not an alcoholic because I can't have that identity. My identity is in Christ. So there's no room for that identity. So I pushed it away. That old man is dead. I understand why some people have to stand up to say I'm an alcoholic. And I don't. I don't begrudge them that. Every person is different. Everybody's on a different walk. Right. So that's just how I was able to overcome it.

Yeah, that's one of those things with me, too. I don't care how you overcome it. Whatever is right for you, I am good with. You're on your own, man. I'm just here to support you. And I just am impressed. That's. I haven't heard that before. That is a new one. Usually you hear the whole Alcoholics Anonymous, 12 steps and get to where they are. For you to do this the way you have through Christ and salvation through that, it's impressive. Really cool. I did not know that. All right, we'll get back to some of those questions. The Atlas Pro plus Contractor program is designed to help you build your business. It gives you tools and resources, training, industry insights, bonus structures, technical knowledge, the brand, power and science of 3M Scotchgard and what we think is the best product and warranty in the industry. Become part of the family that is succeeding and growing their businesses. We went from nobody ever heard of us to the number one roofing company in our region.

And we've gone from 12 roofs a year to 2035, and we did over 400 last year.

We're on track right now to do a thousand roofs this year. You'll begin earning Atlas bucks and rewards as you move up to even greater reward levels. Become an Atlas Pro today. But let's talk about how these contractors can get better at what they're doing. So I, I've said digital, digitalizing our work process a few times now. What does that mean? Like, can you explain that? Like, I read it on the website and went, I kind of get it. But what does that mean to you whenever you hear that?

So workflow digitization, it's a mouthful to say. Like, I have 15,000 contractors that I work with, and I can tell you honestly, a lot of them are still doing pen and paper. You know, they're going out on the roof. They're. They're measuring with the tape measure, pen and a paper. They got to drive, you know, for an hour, half an hour. It's saving time. Is basically what workflow digitization is. From the lead generation process to the point of sale, digitizing that workflow across different CRMs and different lead generation software, roof measurement software, financing software. It gives the Homeowners a more streamlined process. It's done online, it's done contact free, which is great. Up here in Ontario, Canada, we're in, we're in COVID lockdown right now. So it's very important for roofing contractors to be able to have that workflow digitization so they can have that contact free way to sell. So basically that's, that's what workflow digitization is. It's, it's using different software CRMs and stuff to digitize your workflow from the sales to the, to even purchasing your materials. I know some roofing contractors are still doing their estimates, you know, pen and paper, old school. There's nothing wrong with that. I don't begrudge anybody doing things the old way. You know, there's still people that drive horse and buggies too, teach their own right. I just prefer to get places faster than others.

So you mentioned the whole Covid thing. Pandemic. We're all dealing with this and everybody's kind of in a different place on this too. Wear a mask, not wear a mask. Government and anti government and just all the mess that's going on. But when it comes to our business, it is affecting businesses, how we engage with the consumer. Do you think this is something that's going to change business forever? Let's just walk under the assumption that we solve the whole Covid thing and for whatever reason it goes away, like some say, or where you get the vaccinations and all that stuff and it's not a problem anymore. Is this what has happened for the last 12 months or so going to affect businesses ongoing? Like did they learn anything from it?

100%. I'm reading a book right now by Klaus Schwab. He's the director of the World Economic Forum and it's called COVID 19 the Great Reset. And there's a whole economic plan to completely revamp the world economy based on people and planet. And in the book, I don't know if it's going to affect the United States so much. I know being in Canada, being in the British Commonwealth, we're kind of the guinea pigs for this great reset program that they're, they're. It talks about digitization. You know, basically if you don't get digital and get online, you're going to go the way in Blockbuster Video. And this is the future contact free, you know, not just with COVID 19, but people's trust is also broken right now. People are scared. They're living in fear. And it's going to take A long time for that. For that people to get over that fear. Right. But this, the whole economic plan, I do believe that we are on, like, a cusp right now of a completely different economy, world economy. So it's totally going to affect how everybody does businesses across the board.

So here comes our fun question.

Okay.

Was it planned or just an opportunity that presented itself to allow us to be careful here?

I have to be careful. I don't. Let me put my conspiracy tinfoil hat on. Yeah, well, they say. They. They say it wasn't planned, that it actually kind of was planned. It's been planned for the past 20 years or so, and they. They've been kind of rolling it out with, like, carbon taxes, and we've seen it kind of trickling up. And now that COVID 19 has hit. I don't believe COVID 19 was planned, don't get me wrong. But since COVID 19 hit, it's become like, that's like the catalyst for change, like a springboard. Okay, this hit. This is our opportunity to, you know, push this great reset agenda. I mean, Prince Charles from the Royal Family, he's. He's a big fan of this great reset and us being, you know, you guys got lucky back in 1776. And funny story, segue, okay? My family's actually Pennsylvania Dutch from Pittsburgh. And in 1776, they remained loyal to the Empire, the British Empire. They fled the United States for Canada as empire loyalists.

So that's how you. All right, we're done talking about now. Just.

I'm a. I'm a turncoat.

Oh, man, that's funny stuff. It's. So this thing called the Great Reset, this is interesting to me. Number one, like, I never heard that term until this pandemic thing came on. And I see most of it being used more as a conspiratorial type thing than it is a. Like, hey, this is something that's been coming for a long time. And funny enough, I've been one of those people pushing this type of stuff for quite some time. I started building software for my business in 2000. In 2004, I started taking that and putting it onto a server that everybody could access. In 2006, I started putting it on the cloud. 2009, we started springboarding it out to contractors all over the nation in the world. And realizing that this is the way things are going to go, all you have to do is watch the Jetsons as a kid and go, hey, this is where things are going. With technology, you're going to be able to see people like in 2000 having this concept of you and I talking. Like we are right now. You're in Canada, I'm in Texas and we're on video. Like we're sitting right next to each other. That was space age stuff.

Yeah. Like dick. Like Dick Tracy talking into his watch. Right. I watched that back in the 80s and I was like, whoa, that's. That's awesome. That'll never happen in my lifetime now. Here we are.

Yeah. Everybody with their Apple watches and Android watches. And I've got one of those in the house I don't use anymore because I got this other piece of technology.

Oh, Fitbit.

No. This thing is called a whoop. It's actually super cool. It's the first one of these fitness things that actually it almost like is sitting there going, hey, you didn't work out. I noticed you didn't work out.

I don't need. I don't want that.

Yeah.

I don't need somebody to remind me, I didn't work out.

It's not what you did, it's what you didn't do that's causing this need for you to go do this now.

Yeah, yeah.

It's been pretty cool. But that's the whole thing is this reset is going to happen organically anyway. This idea of people using technology, I started to notice it really, when it really, really hit me is when somebody can buy a car online.

Yeah.

You go online and buy. I'm like, there is no way in the world I'm buying a car online. I gotta go drive that thing. I want to see if it clunks and has any you ticks to it or anything like that. And you could just go buy a car online. But people were doing it. When I started saying people are doing it, that's going to be something that becomes the way. Back in 2009, nobody wanted anything on the cloud. Like, what are you talking about? I'm not putting my stuff on. I want a server. I want to protect it, you know, behind firewalls and all kinds of other stuff. Now, if you're not behind the cloud or cloud powered, you're at a disadvantage.

Yeah.

So this is super interesting stuff and it's something contractors need to be aware of because in our industry, if we're honest with ourselves, we tend to be a little dark ages.

Yeah.

And like Matt said, no begrudging that. But you need to be aware. You need to listen to the warnings, you see the early signs and start to learn what you can. Whether that's simply Starting to use email, which is something that's important. But CRMs and automations and those type of things are going to help your business. And I've seen so much of a move forward in that over the last five years or so has really started to get legs underneath it and then a pandemic comes along.

Yeah.

And that's the way I see it. Kind of like you do.

It created that urgency and a lot of contractors that I've talked to actually thrived last year because with people being at home, stuck at home on lockdown, oh crap, my roof's leaking. They didn't notice before, before, oh, my roof needs to be done. So more people were investing into their homes last year and making them more livable because they're there all the time. Right. So I talked to so many roofers that did fantastic. And the ones that didn't are the ones that didn't digitize their workflow. The ones that still wanted to do old pen and paper. Old school. Right. And, and a few companies here in Ontario actually went under because they couldn't keep up with the, the other companies that had already moved forward with the automation. And that's like, and for automation it could be something as simple as ordering roof measurement reports, you know what I mean? Like that saves so much time and energy and money depending on who you buy them from. I know a good company that has ten dollar roof measurement reports that you can order and you can get them back within a couple of hours and they're $10 and you get, you know, you get a full measurement report. But it saves you time, it saves you from driving to the job site, pulling out your ladder, climbing out on the roof, risking a slip and a fall, you know, then you got to buy your coffee on the way there, buy your lunch, gas money. So the cost savings are. And then it's time, right. You can punch in an address, order a roof measurement, have somebody else draw it up for you while you're on a sales call. So getting into stuff like this really, really helps and you don't have to jump in. Like a lot of people are scared of automation. Like workflow digitization scares a lot of people. But it's. Once you learn, it's actually pretty easy. And people like me and, and yourself and you know, there's others out there, John Bros. And I got a bunch of friends that are in the industry that are there to help roofers stay relevant in the digital age.

And here's the cool thing about this change is scary, just is right Everybody has a fear of change, but if you approach it with that type of mindset, it's going to pass you by. It just is one of those things. So I've always been pretty open minded about it, but I'm also pretty calculating about about it. And whoever I'm working with as far as technology goes, I want to make sure that they're there to support me. And the good ones are, they're there to walk you through it, to teach it to you. It's in their own best interest if they do. If you get where you are, using this as the way you do business, it's almost like a drug. Once you start using, you can't stop because it does things quicker, it does make things faster, does make things more professional. And that's one of the biggest things I got a funny story for you. You may not know this. To the best of my knowledge, I was the first to start creating roof measurements for this industry back in 2006.

Wow.

We had to manually do it, but you could draw a roof on a screen, take one measurement, pop the whole thing, give you, scale it to you and all the whole bit. And the reason I was doing it was for my salespeople. I could see, hey, if we could do that, they could speed up and their inspection process, they could speed up their estimating process. We could get to more people faster than the competition. The very first company that started really doing this, Eagle View came out and I went, wow, they can automate that. That's what I'm trying to do is automate, can I get their stuff into my software. And we API. That was the first API for Eagle View was to send it into our software called Silver Lining. And that thing started to help our salespeople move faster.

Nice.

Helping other salespeople move faster by selling that. That thing became popular now as part of Acculinx and Acculinx. That's how I got started. I had the front end, they had the back end. We put the two together and we had a good tool for contractors to use those. Fairly simple. You mentioned something that was really important. Keep it simple. Start with the easy stuff. One of the best tools out there for this roof measurements, like Roofer, obviously, but company camp, this tool that allows you to take pictures and share those pictures to your customer while you're actually up on the roof if you want to. I mean, that's a simple thing. It takes five seconds to learn and it steps you above everybody else is not willing to take some of those moves. And there's some others like that. People can go out there and check out the catalystgroup.org there's all kinds of vendors there that do it right. There are people you can trust that are going to follow through, not scam you on things.

Yeah.

You see a lot of, in our industry.

Yeah.

So when you're talking with a contractor that hasn't used technology before, what, what are some of the, the hurdles that you have to get through with them to, to get them on board? I get the fear. But what's stop.

First you gotta get them to turn on their computer. I got one contractor that I work with in New Jersey. I think he's like 73 years old and he's, he's not too tech savvy. So I actually took it upon myself to help him and he texts me the addresses that he needs measured because he knows how to use his phone. He's got a, the old flip phone. He texts me the address and I do the measurement report for him. So it's, you know, that's, that's going above and beyond what I'm, I'm supposed to do here at Roofer. But that's the type of customer service that you get. And so trying to train, trying to train roofers who aren't tech savvy is. I will tell you one thing, using videos is great. I've become a video guru here at Roofer where I use Streamyard, Vidyard and Filmora and I create roofer 101 how to videos. And these will give roofers the opportunity to revisit them so they can watch them trying to do it in a screen share like this, you know, they got to look at their watch, they got sales meetings to go to. So creating videos and giving them video content that they can revisit on their own free time is huge. And I've helped so many contractors get online, you know, get websites designed through, through friends of mine who do, who do web design. Brad Akers is one of them over at Elevated Solutions. Does phenomenal work. And there's a plug for you, Brad. You owe me money. Now. The. But yeah, getting, just sending videos to these contractors and really educating them, teaching them, you know, step by step. And like you said, like I said earlier, to keep it simple. One of the best pieces of advice I ever got from, from a mentor as a former pastor of mine, he said when things get difficult, give it a kiss. And I was like, what do you mean? He said, kiss. Keep it simple, stupid. And that's probably one of the best pieces of advice I ever got because I tend to over complicate things over, you know, overthink things. If you just keep it simple and just find a starting point, have an end point that you'd like to get to, but just take steps to get there. Don't try to build roam in one day. And using video sales and communicating to contractors is the best way to take those steps and help them keep it simple. Not overthink it, not overcomplicate it. You don't need, you know, multiple CRMs and multiple softwares. You can just do everything in one compact little location. And it's pretty simple. Especially if you got somebody to help you along the way.

Yeah, I mean that's why Contractor Coach Pro exists is we help people do that, like start to automate their stuff, start to put in the systems they need. So you mentioned something there, this video thing.

Yeah.

And that's something I think is a really good entry level type thing for contractors as well. And really the reason for it is anything that you're saying more than two or three times you need to start looking at how can I document that? Whether it's training, whether it's a piece of information that you're giving somebody, if you're having to do it 2, 3, 10, 20, 50 times over and over and over again, start creating the video content for that. And that way when somebody says, hey, how am I supposed to flash that chimney again say, go watch this video, here you go, it's done. Which gives you more capacity to work on that business instead of in it. Starting to automate things for yourself. It's a fast and most everybody has a phone nowadays that can do amazing things. I got a new phone yesterday.

Yeah, me too. I got the Samsung Galaxy S20, there's another plug Samsung, you owe me money.

Pixel 5. And these phones can do amazing things today. Time lapse photography, they've got astronomy photography in it now. Like what? It can shoot pictures of the stars. Cameras suck at that. And so technology is moving fast. When you see things moving fast like that, you need to pay attention. You need to go, maybe try to learn some of that stuff. I see myself today, 10 years ago, man, I'm all over it on everything that's out there. I'm trying to learn as much as I can.

You want to hear? Ten years ago I had my friend trying to get me onto Bitcoin at $10 a coin and I was like, bitcoin, that's dumb. That's like my, my ex father in law saying oh, the Internet, it's never going to go anywhere. It's just a fad. I did the same thing with bitcoin. Bitcoin. Now it's at 30, $30,000 a coin. So, yeah.

Figure out how I, like, turn the bitcoin into cash. Like, how do I get that?

Oh, I'll show you. I'll show you. I got. So I don't. I use different cryptocurrencies in the app that I use. Cryptocurrencies, they actually issue you a metal crypto. You can't see my number, so they issue you a metal crypto Visa card so you can spend your cryptocurrencies anywhere. That takes Visa. It's pretty slick. Wow. Okay, so basically, for the. For the past hundred years or longer, the banks have had a monopoly on being able to create fiat currency out of thin air. So now the common man can do that with cryptocurrencies. I invested 150 bucks in cryptocurrencies, and within two weeks, it was 700. So basically, we'd get free groceries and stuff.

We could get into the whole podcast.

Yeah, yeah, it's a whole different podcast.

I try to stay away from that if I can, but, you know, it's $2 trillion in stimulus stuff. Where does that come from? It just magically appeared. All right, you asked. Thank you, by the way. You answered the questions that I tend to ask, which is, what's the best advice you ever got from a mentor?

I got another one.

What's that? What do you got?

Another. Another brilliant piece of advice that actually helped me get through the COVID pandemic is you can't control every situation you're in, but you can control your reaction to every situation you're in. And, you know, when Covid first hit, there was. I was afraid and I was angry, and I got mad at the government, and I was afraid because Covid was going to kill my kids. And, you know, I got that piece of advice from a pastor, and it helped me realize, you know, I don't need to have fear. I don't have any reason for. It says fear not in the Bible, like, 160 times. So what am I afraid of? What am I worried about? I can't control the situation, but I can control how I react to the situation. And it becomes, who can I serve? Who can I help? Who else is feeling afraid or worried or angry? How can I help them, you know, get out of that and actually push through this and be successful and thrive through it? So that's That's a really good piece of information or advice I've gotten in the past year.

Yeah, that's a, that's a big one to me because while I do tend to have a piece of me, a little piece of me that has some anxiety and stuff there, I don't really deal with fear or worry like most people. Like this whole pandemic thing has been like just another thing, another challenge. Let's go. Yeah, I've always been wired that way. Yeah, I thank God for it every day. Like, thank you for not making me that way because I know so many other people that they do struggle. I haven't been in their shoes, so I don't know what they're dealing with. And it's frustrating for me because I want to say, hey, just blow it off, let's go, come on.

Yeah, well, and for me, I don't like the government to begin with. I was a candidate for the Ontario Libertarian party back in 2014 or something like that. So I'm very, very much anti government. So at first I was afraid of the pandemic and then I started researching the numbers and stuff like that and I'm like, okay, this is, it's a serious disease, but not as many people are dying. It's still pretty serious. But being a father, I have an 8 year old, a 7 year old, an 18 month old and an 18 year old. So then I start thinking about the future for my children and that's where my fear came from. And I'm a problem solver. So when there's a problem, I sit down and I try to find a way to solve it. And when I can't solve a problem, I get anxious or upset and, or frustrated. It depends. A whole bunch of emotions go through my mind. Right. Anger as like the culmination. I got angry at the government and, you know, I, I've learned to step away from that, get away from that. I can't. There's nothing I can do about it. The government, there's. It's the government. It's always going to be there. I just have to learn how to react and control my reaction. And so now with government, it, I just ignore them. It's easy to do in Canada. It's not so easy to do in the States.

A little out in front of your face here.

Yeah, all the time. Yeah. Your government is in front of our face.

So there's a funny thing about that. I've gotten really good at it. I don't pay any attention to it. I, I literally do not watch television at any point when there's news on. Like, we, we don't watch that in our house. Just brings too much negativity in my world. And, and I think that's part of it. I'm inherently kind of a positive person. I go, hey, this Covid thing is maybe an opportunity, an opportunity to help some people, opportunity to serve some people. Opportunity to maybe springboard a few companies that are willing to, you know, take that jump off the diving board. Yeah. And it's been really good for our country. Our contractors have done really, really well. Want more 5 star reviews from your customers? At Signpost, we make it easy for your customers to give you great reviews on Google, Facebook, Yelp and more. Our software connects with industry specific solutions, driving even more reviews from your customers. Drive loyalty and repeat business by sending the right messages at the right times to your prospects and customers. Message your contacts from anywhere, anytime, using text, photos and video all in one app. Check on progress with campaigns and review generation across Google, Facebook and Yelp. Visit signpost.com and get your demo today. All right, I got one more question for you, man. It's been a great interview, by the way. Oh yeah, Like I told you, you never know what question is going to come out of my mouth here. Yeah, I actually got two questions.

Yeah.

One question is, what makes you tech?

Oh, boy. What makes me tick? Well, you know, I like to be challenged. I like challenges. If I'm not challenged with something, I get bored really quickly. So I'm constantly, you know, reaching out to people, taking on new things, trying to solve different problems. I'm constantly learning. I got a Kindle for Christmas with Kindle Unlimited. So I'm reading and reading and reading. What makes me tick is I'd have to say my willingness to serve God. That's my beginning and my end. God is what makes me tick. I do everything for him. I serve him. I do volunteer work for the homeless here in Woodstock. The COVID 19 has done a number on jobs here. I think we're getting up to a 20% unemployment rate or something like that, if not more. We have, I think about 1500 homeless just in Oxford county right now. And 60% of those are just from the last year. So we have a huge homeless problem here. And so I've been helping them and serving them. And that's what makes me tick, is just I want to serve. I want to help people. I used to be homeless. I used to be a drunk. You know, I want, I'm a success story. That's come out of that. So what makes me tick is wanting to help other people overcome their problems.

What a great testimony. You don't want to hear it from Jim Johnson that was an alcoholic and didn't live on the streets. You want to hear it from Matt Raffert, the guy that was in your shoes that knows what you're going through.

I've had great opportunities to share the gospel and really give them a message of hope. Like, you're not homeless, you're houseless, you have a home. It's just not here on earth. So don't. You're not homeless, you're just houseless. Temporarily. Look beyond the horizon. You know, that's. That's the message of hope that I've been sharing with them, and it's been great.

Yeah, but that would be a great conversation. I'd love to bring you on for an interview just to kind of have a conversation about some of that stuff. Like I said, you're a thinker and.

Yeah.

You've got a lot of wisdom there from, from the mean streets. Right. Like, through it. So there's some experiences you've been through that a lot of us haven't. And that homeless stuff is a big problem. Yeah, we deal with it pretty dramatically here in the States, probably to a higher extent than I would imagine. In Canada, a little warmer. Here, you can be homeless.

Yeah, yeah. Well, we got, we got people in San Francisco and they tell us about the homeless situation they have there. San Francisco is like beautiful weather year round, from what I hear. So they have a. They have a lot of homeless people there that, you know, there's no winter, so they don't freeze. So they go there and they kind of congregate there. And it's a big, big issue.

We deal with it quite a bit in Houston, Texas, same thing.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

That cold. And so it's, It's a big problem in these Southern cities. And I don't know what the answer is. Yeah, I do. I do know that, you know, God and his kingdom is my answer in the end.

Yeah.

And a lot of those folks have lost hope. Share that hope with those folks and let them know, hey, they haven't been forgotten. Yeah, it's a big thing in our family. We, we, we. We spend a lot of time focusing in that arena as well. All right, last question for you, Matt. Yeah. Have a feeling this might have a theme to it, but all of my guests, I like to ask them, we're only going to be here for a certain period of time. Right. We all know that it all comes to an end at some point. There's going to be that day and that day when people come to celebrate Matt Radford and his life. What do you want them to remember? What legacy do you want to leave behind?

You know, it's. It's funny you asked that because I used to be all about building an empire and like wanting to build a corporation and leave behind my legacy. I don't, I don't know. I don't think I want to leave behind a legacy other than I want to be remembered for somebody who just loved people and just loved to help people. That's it. You know, I don't. I used to want to be a politician, getting into politics and, and build up a multi million dollar business and incorporate my family name and be like the next Rothschild. You know what I mean? And that was a material legacy. But now the legacy I want to leave behind is to be remembered as somebody who loved people, wanted to serve God.

Funny, there's a guy that's got like 2.5 billion followers right now and growing that lived about 2,000 years ago, and I think that's what his legacy was. Yeah, when you say you don't want to leave a legacy, that's a pretty big one. It's much bigger than any material or worldly legacy that we can leave. So kudos to you on that, Matt. Great interview today. If people want to find out more about Roofer, what do they need to do? Is there a website? Is there roofer.com?

Just roofer. Add a.com to the end of this and. Oh, sorry, I'm backwards. This one here. Add a.com to that. Go to roofer.com. there's a contractor portal there. If you're a contractor, you can go in there and get signed up for free. It's a free account you have. We have a free draw it yourself measurement tool. You can go in and draw your own measurement reports. Doesn't cost you anything. You can upload drone images for free. Doesn't cost you anything. You can order the reports from us for $10. We also have financing partnerships with Mosaic and we have a lead generation tool that you can put on your own website. So go to roofer.com, sign up for free, create a free account, check it out and we'll get in touch with you and walk you through it.

Awesome. Matt, great job today. Went into areas I didn't even know we were going to talk about, but it was, it was fantastic. Good to have you. I Think you got some chili waiting on you.

Yes, my wife's making homemade chili, and she just made homemade bread. So if I leave behind a legacy, it will be this big fat gut right here.

All right, Matt, a great, happy day. Thanks for joining us on contract.

Yeah, thanks for having me. Take care. Bye.

All right, everybody. That was Matt Radford, and we were talking about automation and digitization of your business. And here's kind of golden nuggets from that. Number one is don't have fear of it. This is one of those things. It's a mindset thing. Instead of thinking of it as an issue or an obstacle, this technology stuff that's out there, think of it as a challenge. Matt talked a lot about what drove him. He said what makes him tick is challenge. And he sees challenge in all kinds of places. One of those places is fear of technology. And so start small. Get this little thing and use that little thing. Get it to where it starts to do some stuff for you that frees up some more time to maybe learn a new little thing. Some of those things that you can probably start with are, you know, simply getting some measurements that would save you some time, using tools that will maybe automate your photos, like a company cam. There's all kinds of tools out there that for the expense, you look at them as not an expense, but an investment. It's an investment in my time. My time is valuable, and I want to use that time in the best way possible. Last but not least, the golden nugget that I think Matt kind of brought, that was the undertone of the whole thing, is hope. He has this hope, and that's through his salvation. And this podcast isn't about you finding faith or anything like that, but if for any reason you've lost hope, you can find it in God. It is what gives us this lack of fear. I'm not worried about it. This isn't the thing we're chasing on this planet. We're chasing a kingdom that's everlasting, not just 80, 85 years on this little blue ball of water and gas. And it gives us confidence. It gives us comfort, not complacency. Those two things are different. We're still going to move forward. We're still going to push. But the thing that he really was honed in on was serving and giving. And I really am in line with people that want to give. It's funny. The more you give, the more you receive. It's just almost contagious. It's weird. It's hard for people to be mean to kindness people. And so if you're kind, you're giving, you're serving, it's amazing what you get in return, even though you're not looking for it. That's not why we should be serving. We should be serving because we want to. And so those would be my golden nuggets. Find your way to serve your people today. Find a way to serve yourself today, to gain more time so that you can work on your business instead of in it. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of Contractor Radio. We're going to bring even more and better ones to you this year. We're super excited about all of our new sponsors. You get to hear from them throughout our show today. I hope you enjoyed it. Glad to have you. And we'll see you next week at Contractor Radio.