Jim Johnson argues small contractors should stop saying yes to every request. When his roofing company narrowed focus to just roofing, siding, gutters, and insurance claims, sales velocity, profitability, and employee satisfaction all improved.
Who and what prevents us from getting what we want? Needy clients stop signing them up. Because once he gets outside of what it is that we do very well, we're having to figure things out. So if you're out there at that homeowner's house and you're looking at their roof, I would assume all of you are roofing contractors. And they say, hey, you see that piece of trim up there? Can you fix that, too? Oh, yeah. No, you can't. It's a hundred years old. It was custom cut. You don't even know where to find it or who can do the work. But, man, you're going to say yes. And because you say yes, it actually slows you down, takes up your time, and prevents you from achieving what the ultimate goal is, which is freedom. So defining what you do is super important. Best move I ever made my business. We did roofing, siding, gutters. That was it. Nothing else? Insurance claims. We did a lot of those. So there's all kinds of stuff, right? Screens and everything else, and we feel like we got to do them all. No, you don't. Do you want us to be a master of one thing or a jack of all trades? Who do you want working on your home? All it is is changing the dialogue with your client. My sales reps, I remember whenever we told them, hey, we don't do all that stuff anymore. We only do this, they were like, whoa, man, we're never going to be able to sell anybody. Our sales went up, our velocity went up. We were able to complete jobs quicker and faster. Our profitability went up, our people were happier, our clients were thrilled because everything went well because we did what we knew well to do.
