How To Go From 6 Figure Contractor to 7 Figure Business in 6 Months!
Jim Johnson outlines how contractors scale from six to seven figures by fixing leadership, culture, and financial systems first. Most contractors fail because they skip the foundation and jump straight to marketing and hiring. He walks through the order: build backbone systems, then layer in operations.
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Foreign. So a lot of you may be aware that I wrote a book, I wrote a book called the Contractor's Blueprint. It's this thing that we learned that there was a framework to what we were doing in this industry that flips the 70 to 80% of contractors going out of business in the first three years on its head. We've been coaching contractors for almost eight years now and 95% of those folks are still in business. And the ones that aren't have pretty much sold their businesses. So we want to help you do the same. Want to give you some information today and hopefully give you a bit of a roadmap to follow for you to take your business from that six figure world into that seven figure and beyond world. So let's go ahead and get started. So the goal today, obviously let's talk about what it's like to be a six figure contractor and some of the hurdles and obstacles that we have to get there. I want to give you control. I want to give you control of your business through great leadership and great processes and systems and foundation. So that way you can actually grow your business. And if we can grow our business, we get other people involved. And if we do it right and we grow a few leaders, we gain some freedom, which is why we all started our businesses in the first place. So the goal here is to prevent failure, provide you with a roadmap, make it a little bit easier for you to make decisions and do the things you need to do so that you can achieve your goal faster. I want to share with you a bit of an epiphany that we had and this idea of a mind reset when it comes to our businesses. And then finally some of the results that you can expect if you implement what it is that we're talking about today. So what are the top three outcomes that you would like to see from this day? You're out there, you're trying to grow your business. You have some areas that are of concern to you. What's the top three things you'd like to learn today? And just type in one. That's all we need. And I want to make sure I get you covered. I'm going to keep those notes and make sure I cover that as I go throughout this conversation. How to effectively delegate that is very fantastic. Good deal. I'm going to grab a pin here. I think I'd already have one, but. Okay, so how do I effectively delegate? Second that. Okay, I want to give some clarity there, Ian and Leslie. Is it delegation or is it actually hiring that first person to delegate to. Hiring. Okay. Okay, cool. I'd like to only wear one hat, so hiring would be best. Okay, cool. Great. Kyle. Both. All right, good, good. So I'm definitely going to cover that today. Anything else? When it comes to, you know that those first steps we got to do to scale our business, what are you thinking are the top three things that you need to understand? So we got to understand how to hire people, we got to understand how to delegate to people. What else we got to do? Kyle's typing. I'm waiting for that. Anybody else having ideas? Like think about your pain points, the pain points in your business as you train. Training. Okay, good. We're gonna cover that too. Automation, we're gonna cover that too. Good, Great. All right, cool. I think we have some things if you guys want to keep entering some of those in. I want to make sure that I cover what it is that you're looking for. Whenever you said, hey, that six figure, seven figure thing seems pretty important. So. Cool. Great. I think I got one more coming. Maybe here. We'll see. Yep. Lead generation. Ooh, good one. Lead generation. Customer retention. Now we're thinking the creative juices are flowing. This is what we love about doing these things, is this interaction with you guys and relationship with you folks. It's awesome. Cool. It looks like I got quite a few now. I'm going to cover all those. That was part of the game plan today. We're going to cover a lot in a short period of time. Timing of hiring people, how to know it's a good idea and that you can afford it. Boycott Home Advisor. I actually got some things for you there that you might be interested in. Some big announcements coming out about that and about that particular thing. So stay paying attention to what we're doing here at Contractor Coach Pro. We're working on some big things for you guys. So awesome. Let's move on the home improvement industry. Let's get a little bit of ground rules and some understanding before we get into the real meat of what we're talking about. But we need to understand where we're starting from first. It's a 400 to $500 billion industry. When you take all home services together, roofing, painting, electrical, plumbing, all of that, you put it all together and that's the market that's out there. So probably if not the biggest market that's out there, besides anything to do with technology. So 70 to 80% of the businesses that get started in the home improvement industry are out of business. Within three years. And they make pretty common mistakes. We're going to talk about those today. 10% of the contractors do 50% of that number. That should tell you something right there. There's a lot of folks out there that started their business with this idea of it being a great thing, and it ended up being a situation where that business kind of owned them. And I want to make sure that we understand how to get out of that employee for our company and a owner running our company, Two thirds are sole proprietor. So that eliminates a lot of folks doing a whole lot of volume out there. And less than 3% break a million dollars. So 97% of contractors that do 4 to 5 billion, or 4 to 400 to 500 billion, 97% of them are doing less than a million dollars. That means there's a lot of contractors out there. Tons and tons and tons of contractors out there. And we can change this. We can flip this. It just takes a little bit of work. I'm gonna be honest with you. There is no silver bullet out there. Anybody trying to sell you some kind of distiller bullet program, you should instantly go, nope. There's hard work involved, and I understand that. But I'm willing to make that sacrifice and do that because I want this thing called freedom, which is what we're all about when we start our businesses. So there's stages of a contracting business. I want to kind of help you guys understand what those are. We've coached a little over 400 contractors in our one on one another, 1500 or so on our learning platform. I've gotten the opportunity to speak to a little over 100,000 contractors over these last eight years. In my prior life as a software guy, I got to go in the back office of another thousand contractors and really see a lot and kind of understand a lot about what's going on in our industry. But if you look these first really four stages, Startup, all the hats, friends and family and growing pains really aren't doing a whole lot of revenue. You know, there's about 12 and a half million and below right there. And some of those can be in that. You know this from this number. So from about 5 million to 12 million or so. That's kind of growing pains. Most of us are in these sections right here. Startup, all the hats and friends and family. That's why I have them kind of in orange and you can kind of see them split right there. Because that's usually how we will start our businesses. We start it. I'm wearing all the hats. I hire a family member or a buddy and I'm trying to grow my business. And because we're so connected as family members or good friends, we kind of know how each other thinks. And I'm trying to take that next step to push my business forward. I'm going to bring this new person into my world and that's where everything gets squirrely. Because we do some things that are some pretty common mistakes. We're going to point those out today, hopefully help you eliminate them and solve some of those problems so you can get into this solid and expansion aspect of business where you're breaking that seven, $8 million number and moving into wherever it is that you want to be as a contractor. You know, I hear all the time we have two things that people come to us for. I want to be a hundred million dollar contractor and I want to hire a bunch of people and grow and scale my business. And I'm like, all of those sound great, but have you thought about these things? And that's what I want to talk to you about today, is a little bit about what those things are that we tend to lose sight of because of one very key factor. So what we all want, we all want clear direction. Like, dude, just give me the roadmap, tell me exactly what I need to do, when I need to do it, and I will do this thing well. So we're looking for the right advice at the right time. We're looking for fast results. I don't want to take five years to grow my business into this thing and beat myself to death. I want to do it as quickly as I possibly can. I want to be able to follow a proven blueprint, something that has been out there and something I can follow and go boom, boom, boom. Get it done step by step. All good. So we need a breakthrough. That's what we all want is like, hey, what is the linchpin, the key that helps me break through this? And then time to focus on what matters most. And all of us probably have different things that we consider success. But I'm going to guess and I'll ask you guys, what does success look like to you? Is it millions of dollars? Is it a big house? Is it retirement? Is it family? Why are you guys doing this in the first place? I'll let you guys kind of type in a little bit. What's the end game? I'm going to bet Ian Davis puts in again. Boycott Home Advisor. I'm teasing you. Financial freedom. Yeah. Freedom to grow. Okay. Yeah, exactly. Anybody else like, why are you doing this for your family? You're doing this for your own and wants. What do you got going on out there? You're doing it because you think you can do it better than anybody else. You had a bad experience somewhere before. Challenge myself. I like it. Okay. I like the challenge. That's good. All right. To be able to move into other adventures and supplement income. So we have other things we want to do besides this whole roofing thing. Oh, cool. Let's talk about that a little bit. Who and what prevents us from getting what we want? These got all these challenges in front of us, obstacles. We think we got it nailed, and the second we do, it jumps up and bites. We run into a lot of roadblocks. Well, some of those roadblocks are needy clients. Like, I got these needy clients, and I'm really like, I'm doing everything I can just to sell a job. So I'll take on just about any client, and that client becomes needy. And that's because I don't really have any other answers. Time suckers. Things that I have to do that I'm not great at. So it takes a lot of my time, whether that's writing invoices or putting estimates together. If you're in the insurance restoration world, it might be supplements. Calling insurance companies, creating work orders, doing production. There's all these things that are in there. That is in addition to the fun stuff, which is, hey, I got a customer and they paid me. That's the thing that we all want to do, but there's a lot of things it takes to make that happen. Drama creators, we do take the risk. We go, okay, I'm going to go ahead and try hiring somebody. This person comes into our world, and they're not one of us necessarily, and they create a lot of drama. They got problems, whatever it is, in their world, and they're bringing it into our business, which distracts us from what we need to focus on. Because now I'm going to focus on that person, that person, making us all focus on everything else. We, the industry gurus are the culprits. We are out there telling you, hey, you should be doing this and doing that and doing this, and you're running all over the place trying to gather information and put it in some kind of fashion that works for you, and we confuse the heck out of you. There's so much information out there. It's information overload. And you can hop on YouTube, go on Facebook groups and go to events and all these other things and you're just bombarded with all of this information and it can be daunting, can be overwhelming. It can cause a lot of different things to happen to us. We'll talk about in just a second. Andrew said 100%. Yeah, exactly. And secret recipe hogs what I mean by that. Somebody's got it figured out, but they're not wanting to share it. They might share a piece, they might say, hey, you should do this in marketing. But they don't share everything else that that marketing relates to. And then last is fear of risk. One of the things about being a great entrepreneur and you did it when you first got into it is you took a risk, you went, okay, I'm risking it, I'm going to go for it and I'm going to start this thing. But then it becomes this thing that you're like, I'm scared of taking more risk. I don't know if I have the money, I don't know if I can hire somebody. I don't know if I have the things in place. And so all of those fears cause doubt and we get caught in this loop of doubt and we don't do anything. And so we have to have some tools in place to help us make those decisions. We'll talk about some of those tools today. So all of this causes confusion. And the confusion that we normally follow with is this school of hard knocks thought process, like, hey man, I'll just beat my head against the wall, you know, a bunch of different times. Two steps forward, one step back. Sometimes one step forward, two steps back. And we get into this like repetitive thing that's very frustrating and confusing, which creates a lot of doubt. And when we have doubt, we procrastinate and we don't do what needs to be done. And a lot of times we procrastinate because we don't know what to do and when. Then there's stress. Like now all that procrastination, all that doubts building up on us builds up a bunch of stress. And maybe I've got a lot of work and I don't know how to get all that work done. And we're having problems with our clients and all this stuff is happening, creating a lot of stress, which creates a sense of failure. Like, man, I'm failing. This sucks. I don't like it. And it's really all because of this thing we call the ignorance cycle. Now this is the part where you guys might go, I am done with this webinar because that guy just called me ignorant. Ignorant is not A bad word, number one. And number two, it's just a situation where it's having something that we just don't know. So ignorance is the lack of knowledge. It is not being a lack of intelligence. So I want to kind of describe it to you, this ignorance cycle that I see so much in contractors. First off, we'll start up here. Lack of knowledge, we don't know what we don't know. And so because of that ignorance we struggle through every day just trying to figure out what we need to know. Then we gain a little bit of it and that's why it kind of turns green. Like, hey, I got some knowledge, I got that knowledge without understanding. So I try and take that thing and I try and go do it. I don't know when to do it, I don't know how to do it, do it, exactly why I'm doing it. And it causes a lot of breakage, failure. And that starts to cause us to have a bit of a fixed mindset that we allow our ego, our pride, greed maybe to prevent us from learning the skills we need to apply what we learn. I've seen so many contractors that don't invest in their own learning by going to events and getting in courses and learning from mentors and coaches, that holds them back. They're scared to make that investment, not realizing that if they do, it may make a difference in their business and they think they have to do it on their own. It's like, hey man, I didn't achieve anything if I didn't do it on my own. So I'm going to be hard headed about this and I'm going to do this all by myself. Well, I'll tell you one quick thing about that. Very few people ever succeed with that attitude. There isn't a person out there that was successful that did it by themselves or a business for that matter. And so looking for help and saying, hey, swallow my ego a little bit, I don't know something, swallow my pride a little bit that I'm not the greatest thing since sliced bread and swallow my greed a little bit that hey, you know what, I'll spend a few bucks to get the skills I need. I've spent half a million dollars on courses, mentors, coaches, those type of things. And they have radically changed my life. And I would 100% suggest that you guys look into those types of things. Not necessarily with us. This isn't a sales pitch, but start looking, get the help you need in the areas that you need them. A lack of capacity so you've got this. You got two pieces to what you have. You have skill or ability, right? Contractor Boost. Can't wait. Hey, man, glad to have you on board for that. It is going to be Rockstar. Kind of give a little insight to it at the end, what it's going to look like for everybody. But this lack of capacity is the other aspect. We have two things. Skill that we have or abilities that we have. And then we have time. And if we don't have enough of it, we get limited by it, and we can't go any further. There's only 24 hours in a day, so we like this time and resources to grow and the understanding of how to increase both. And so that's some knowledge that we've got to gain. And so then we end up with insanity. We repeat the same thing over and over, expecting to get a different result. All right, I don't know what I don't know. So I gotta go get that, and I get some new knowledge, and that didn't work. And, man, I'm not gonna go any other way than beat my head against a wall, and I don't have enough time to get everything done. And boom, boom, boom. This business owns me. I'm now an employee of IT because I'm lacking some really key information that I need and I want to share with you guys today. So I'm going to debunk the myth that failing forward is just plain wrong. It's actually asinine, and it comes from my favorite leadership coach of all, all time, John Maxwell. Failing forward is the ability to get it back up after you've been knocked down, learn from your mistake, and move forward in a better direction. And while I agree with that statement, I don't believe you have to do that. If somebody has done it before, if the information exists and somebody has gone the path before, why would I do that? Why would I go beat my head up against a wall when I could literally just go get the blueprint, get there faster and easier, and, yeah, it might cost me a couple bucks. Big deal. It's not that much of an investment to get to where you need to be so you don't have to figure it out all alone. There's all kinds of people out there. There's great people with really good information. What I want to teach you today is the order in which you need to get that information. Okay, so time for a breakthrough. I said there was a big epiphany, and the epiphany to us was that we knew a Lot of the facets or components of building a great business. How to market a roofing company, how sell in this industry, how to recruit and hire, how to train, how to hold people accountable, how to develop job descriptions, how to build processes, how to lead a company, how to have a great culture. And when we first started coaching, that's what we did. We coached on those things and whatever the thing was that we felt like that person needed at that point in time. Well, what we came to find out is that there was an order. There was an order in which those things need to be done that I don't believe anybody's ever shared before. And I believe in it so much that I wrote a book about it. I wrote a book because I'm tired of watching guys go out of business. I want to give you the roadmap so that you can go, okay, I got that thing in place now, this thing, and have a very successful business. So the first thing we have to understand is contractor DNA. So every one of our businesses has a DNA much like human DNA. You can see a picture of the DNA here I've got in the background. And it's got two backbones, okay? So that's the main outside part of that, what's called a double helix. And then you've got these strands that are connecting or components of that DNA that make up our business. And so if we look at our businesses the same way, we have foundational backbone and operational backbone. And I see the biggest mistake in our industry, the biggest mistake that I see contractors make, is that they focus on the operational backbone first in technology, marketing, sales, production, training, recruiting and hiring and onboarding before creating their foundational backbone of leadership, culture, process, organization, hr, finance and accountability. So when they shove a bunch of stuff in here, the foundation cracks and breaks. They're not ready for it. They don't have the things in place that they need. And they may have some initial success. You might go out and sell a whole bunch of business. Awesome. How are you going to hold everybody accountable to performing that business? How are you going to manage your finances? How are you going to hire people to do those things and make sure there's great communication throughout your organization. What process is it going to go through normally verbal, with most contractors, what kind of culture you're going to have so everybody's aligned, there's no backbiting and turnover and fighting. And can you actually lead a company like that? So I want to. I want to walk you through those different things today and help you out a little bit on some understanding of why these come before those. And if we get smart about things, we can build some pretty amazing businesses. So let's talk foundational backbone. Let's talk about your leadership strategy. The number one thing that puts a business out of business is a lack of leadership, skill and capacity. Lacking in skill, lacking in capacity limits you from being able to recruit, be magnetic to people and have the time to grow that business the way that you need to grow it. So let's talk about it. What do you guys think? Are leaders born or made? Let everybody type for a second. Made. All right, good. Anybody else got any other answer? Everybody agrees with Ian. All right, Ian, gold star for today. Leaders are made, and anybody can be one. And one of my favorite leaders, Vince Lombardi, his quote is, leaders aren't born, they're made. And they're made just like anything else through hard work. And that's the price we'll have to pay to achieve that goal or any goal. And it is the number one skill set that you're going to need if you're going to really grow your business. And one of the best ways to get that information, you don't have to use Contractor, coach, pro or anything like that. Read. There's some great leadership books out there. Anything by John Maxwell is fantastic. Brian Tracy, and you've probably read some of those things. But there might still be some confusion. And I want to clear it up a little bit about how easy leadership can be while performing leadership is a bit difficult. So what are your motives? You're leading your thing and really, are you motivated as a hero where, hey, everybody else comes first, or are you more the villain? And your own personal needs is why you're leading your business. And there's nothing wrong with either one of those. I want to be honest with you on that. We watch a lot of these Marvel movies, and sometimes the bad guy is really the good guy. In a lot of cases, you can see throughout history people that you might have considered a villain. All those people following him didn't necessarily believe there was a villain. And so who are you as a leader? If you can understand what's motivating you, you're also going to understand who you're attracting. And you're going to attract people much like you. So that's one side of leadership. The other side of leadership is your method. So motive and method. What motivates you? Are you motivated by people and solving problems, or are you motivated by results and getting things done? Goals and stuff like that? That's really the difference between hero and villain. But on authoritarian, that's more of your method. Authoritarian versus magnetic or democratic. And so how many of you can tell me who the guy on the left is? Anybody want to type that in? Who's the fastest? Steve Jobs. Very good. Anybody know who the guy is on the right? Other than that he works for Google? Nathan. No, it's not Nathan. And that's the funny thing. Most people don't know who this guy is, but I would argue that he has one of the most magnetic cultures on the planet. There's a line every day to go to work for Google. People are constantly filling out applications to be able to work for Google because they've created a magnetic culture. And that was because of a magnetic leader. And his name is Larry Page. He wasn't looking for glory, he was looking for a thing. And that thing was to be magnetic to folks out there. Now, Steve Jobs, on the other hand, great leader as well. Both of these folks, great leaders. There is no such thing as a good or evil leader. There is either poor or great. I want to be really clear about that. Leadership is simply the ability to get a bunch of people to follow you with the same goal in mind. That's all it is. Doesn't have anything to do with you being good or bad or evil or any of those things. Has to do with your style and who you are and what you're about to do. And can you get other people to believe in it and follow you? And a lot of people believed in Steve Jobs too, but he was very authoritarian. It was his way or the highway. We are going to do this in this manner and get on board or get out. And it works too. Both of those work. Both very good companies. Two of the largest companies in the world. The guy on the right's the richest by a long ways. It's not even close between what his net worth is versus Steve Jobs net worth. When he passed, Steve Jobs was fired three times from Apple. But he got results and they hired him back. And so what are you about as a company? I would say that company, little villain motive. Okay? They're motivated by results, not by people. Where on the other hand, look at Paige over here. Motivated by people and changing a world. I would say both were motivated by changing world. As a matter of fact, I think he wanted Steve Jobs famous quote is I want to crack the universe. And he did. Changed the way we do everything. So there is no right or wrong here. There is just a who we are. And the cool thing about it is. If you don't like who you are, you can move the needle on that. Your method or your nature, if you want to think about it that way, really hard to move. You tend to be that way based on how you've been raised, what you've been surrounded by, your early experiences in your life, and it tends to make you one way or the other. And to move the needle takes a lot of education, mindset, diligence, discipline to move in the other direction. And when the chips are down, you will tend to fall back to whichever one you are. Unlike these two, where it can flip a switch and change overnight. How many times have you seen the hero become the villain or the villain become a hero because of an event? And so those types of things I've gone through in my life, I went from being a villain. I actually know Andy. That's on here. He knew me as a villain. That was hard, man. We're out after it. We're all about making sales, making money, hitting numbers and all that other good stuff. I didn't really care about the people the way I probably could, but my nature was this. I really did care about people, but I was letting my motive overrun it. So I want you to think about that as you lead your businesses. I'm going to talk about leadership more than I talk about anything else, because I think it's so important to understand it and if you get nothing out of this today, that you can actually go and lead your business as well, because that's the thing where we see the most struggle. And so you have this impact equation. And that impact equation, the way it works is ability. So your skill and what you know and learn about leadership and the usage of it and your capacity, the amount of time you have available is going to affect your impact. So the more skill you have and the more capacity you can create, the bigger the impact that you will have. And it's not your capacity, the amount of time you have available is going to affect your impact. So the more skill you have and the more capacity you can create, the bigger the impact that you will have. And it's not like adding one plus one. It's like exponential impact. Each time you move up along this scale, it isn't just affecting four more people, it's infecting, affecting hundreds of people. And so you can have a broader and broader impact. The more that you gain skill and the more that you gain capacity. With the goal being, hey, I want to get to a 10 level of skill and leadership. I want to get to a 10 level in capacity. That 10 level of capacity, that's the ultimate freedom. I have this well oiled machine that my people are running. They understand the ownership of it. And I'm hanging out on an island somewhere and our business is changing the world. That's super cool. So how do we do it? I want to break all the books that you read down into one graphic here. Okay? It's connection. When we connect with our people, we become magnetic to them. And I believe that connection is the super skill of leaders that if we can do this and take this to a 10 on that scale I showed you earlier in our abilities, we can have a pretty amazing impact on the people that work for us. That impact will be determined by how many of those people you raise up as leaders to gain capacity to move from working in your business to on your business. So it all starts with engaging. I gotta engage people with my vision. I've got this vision. This is where we're going. This is what we're gonna accomplish. This is how we're gonna make a difference. And this is how you play a part of it if you come to work for us. And so I share that vision with people first. There's actually somebody on this today that I got to share a bit of my vision with Contractor Coach Pro. And they, I believe are starting to buy in a little bit that hey, these guys might be on the right path and I might want to be involved with them. But if I don't follow through and educate you and myself while I'm at it, that buy in starts to lag. So with engagement and education, I start to get some buy in. Okay, he said this and then he backed it up with that. So man of his word. I'm starting to believe a little bit. I'm starting to buy into this thing. This guy's selling this passion that he has and I'm aligned with it and I want to be a part of that passion too. But then you got to set the example. One of the things about being a leader of your business is everybody is aspiring to be you. And whoever you are is who your people will be. And so if you are somebody that expects everybody else to do the work, you're sloughing off, you're bringing drama into the office. Guess what? You're the one creating all the problems. But if you set the example, that hard work is expected, that you're going to outwork everybody else, that you're going to put in the effort, that you expect everybody else to put in People will tend to follow, and that's where you start to get some activity. Okay? And then we have empathy. We actually care. And this is one of the key components that villains are missing. They don't care. They really don't. You're just a pawn. You're a number. You're a. You're a piece of the equation. And if you aren't on board, get out. I'll get somebody that will be on board. But I believe that we should care a little bit. We should have a little bit of understanding. We should actually care enough to be engaged with what that person's after. How do they want to grow? What do they want to accomplish in life? And understand a little bit that when they're not hitting the mark and when they're not making it, some of that ownership is probably on us and we're not following through the way we need to be. Giving them the things they need to be to be successful. Understanding that it takes some time to learn a few things, building out a bit of an action plan and helping them through those struggles. We allow for empathy, but we don't allow for excuses. That's a big difference. Sometimes I see too much of this and I call that entitlement, not empathy. We end up caring so much that we allow people to do whatever it is for us and be okay with it and just say, hey, maybe they're not a high achiever, but I don't want to give up on them at. Well, you shouldn't give up on them. You should give them the tools they need to be successful. But if you don't set some barriers that they need to achieve, it sends a message to everybody else that that's okay. Number one, damages your culture like nobody's business. And it's actually the opposite of empathetic. It's unloving. You're putting somebody in a position where they're not good at, they're failing at, and all they're going to do is go down a darker and darker and darker road. It would be better to cut your losses. Tell them that there's probably something better for them to do in the world that they're passionate about and let them go. If you really love them enough, you'll do it. And then we need to encourage people so we start to get this discipline. When we have empathy and we care, we see some discipline. They're investing, they're learning, there's time involved, they're bought in their activities up, they're putting some discipline to it. We see that Discipline, we recognize it and we encourage them to achieve. Hey, great job. Well done. Keep going. I know you got this. And the encouragement bolsters them. They become more disciplined. It's what they want to hear. We all want to be recognized for our efforts. And because of that, we start to get some results. And when we get those results, we empower people. Hey, you're doing a great job. That's awesome. I think you've got some talent. I want you to have some ownership of something. I want to empower them to grow a little bit. Could you teach a class? Could you teach on how to doorknock? Could you teach on how to do your marketing thing? Could you teach on that and give them little tasks that are related to the thing that you think they might be a good fit for you for as a leader and see how they do. Coach them through it, help them grow in it. And we grow people from the inside. And once we empower people, we need to expect from people. We expect people to hit certain things. You should have minimums. You should have expected performance levels. And if people aren't hitting them, we will coach. We will give action plans. And if they don't hit it with that, it's a bad fit. And I gotta let you go. But when we expect people to hit certain barriers and certain numbers and certain accountability measures and we hold the line to it and actually make that hard decision, we gain respect. And when we get respect, we get belief. And these things are repetitive. That's why they're called habits. I'm constantly engaging, educating, setting the example, caring with empathy, encouraging, empowering, and expecting. Constantly, all the time. It's the thing I'm focused on as a leader every day, all day long. How do I do that with my team? Because if I do, we start to gain momentum and it creates torque. If you look at this shape like a tire, these seven leadership habits, that's you. You're the axle, drivetrain and engine. You're the one that's going to determine how fast this wheel turns. And in turn, that wheel that's connected to the tire is going to force that tire to turn as well, which creates torque. And the key to that torque is to do just enough, just enough to get going, but not so much you slip. It's called healthy tension. People need to be pushed. People like to be challenged. As a matter of fact, I believe Ian even said challenge myself. That's why I want to do this. It's our nature. It's what we want. So this is how simple it can actually be as a leader. Now, that doesn't mean you quit learning and adding other skills to your leadership. But if you start here, you can do some pretty amazing things. And then this part, I might lose a few people here too. We'll see. Shepherd, not lion. I don't know how many of you have seen the lions, not sheep, paraphernalia out there. Anybody. Kyle says yes. Drives me insane, just to be honest with you. When I first saw it, I was like, man, that's cool. I like it. I was like. That attracted me. And whenever I get attracted to something, I've been very disciplined in my mindset about this is to ask myself, why? Why am I attracted to that? And what it did is it spoke to my pride is what it did. And funny enough, what are lions a part of? They're a part of a pride. What do lions do to sheep? Lions devour them. And if a bull elephant runs into a pride of lions, what are those lions going to do? They're all going to split and run for it, right? And they'll be like, peace out. I'll catch you later. But a shepherd, on the other, ask myself, why? Why am I attracted to that? And what it did is. It spoke to my pride is what it did. And funny enough, what are lions a part of? They're a part of a pride. What do lions do to sheep? Lions devour them. And if a bull elephant runs into a pride of lions, what are those lions going to do? They're all going to split and run for it. And he does something different. Ah, Ethan, that's great, man. You should. It is very enlightening, like, why am I attracted to that thing? But a shepherd, what does he do? A lion comes after his sheep. He'll lay his life down for him if he has to. If one of his sheep is lost, he'll bring it, right? And they'll be like, peace out. I'll catch you later. But a shepherd, on the other hand, he'll herd them in the right direction. He cares for them. So this idea of being a shepherd as a leader, something I'd like to contend he does something different. Ah. Even continue to propose out there to the world, because I think it is the way to do things. I think it is the way that we get magnetic with our people. They want to be a part of. Servant leader. Amen, brother. I 100% agree with that, Kyle. Well done. So that's leadership strategy. Let's talk culture. We're going to move a little quicker now, all right? Ian says, amen. Perfect. So culture, not what, but who before why. Okay, great book out there written by Simon Sinek, says, start with why. I think it's a great book. I think we should all understand it and it's super important for us. I just think it's titled wrong. I think we should start with who. Start with who we are, our dream and what our ideal lifestyle, our passions, what fulfills us, what gives us joy. We start there and that'll help us determine what our why is. I think so many folks out there go out and say, hey, my, why is this thing without it really being aligned with who they are, which creates this giant gap which causes friction, and at some point while they're doing what they're doing, they don't have the perseverance or persistence to finish and do it well. Or if they do succeed, they feel unfulfilled. So let's figure out who we are first. And so some of the questions you can ask yourself to figure out who you are and what your dream is all about is, what do you love to do if money's not involved? What are you doing that you are enjoying life the most? What does that thing look like? What type of character are you? Or what type of character do you have? What are your values? Where it's important to you? And with that, we can start to build out our lifestyle that we're looking for, because that tells us a lot about who we are. And from there we say, hey, we've got this business that we have. I want to align who I am with that business and why we do what we do. So I need to create a vision. That vision is what your company is going to look like in three years. It's going to look exactly like this. It's written down. You are 70% more likely to achieve something that is written when it comes to a vision and you've told somebody about it, you got to tell somebody because it holds you accountable than just having it in your head. We help people build those all the time, and they turn out to be amazing things that they are the core of somebody's business, which then allows us to develop our why or our purpose or why we do what we do. And if we do that right, it's aligned with who we are and we will be persistent. We will not give up. We will do what is necessary. We will be disciplined because it's so important to us. It's so important we jump out of bed every day to go to it. And then we got to define the core values of our business, so the behaviors we expect. And then last but not least, our mission. And so those are the things that kind of make up your culture, who you are, where you see yourself in the future, why you're doing what you're doing, how everybody should behave. And then this mission that in a year we're going to do this, this is your rally cry. Andy may remember some of these. We had all kinds of missions each year, like, hey, we're going to go do this thing and hit these numbers and solve these problems and change this thing about our business and do cool stuff so that becomes the thing that drives your vision. In a year I'm going to do this because it's going to help us get to that in three years. Okay, I'll show you a little bit of how to build one here before we get done. That mission is that rally cry for your team. Achieve something amazing together that everybody's aligned on and they're all about it because they help you build it. And then we've got process. So we needed to develop a step by step repeatable process from start to finish. Marketing, sales, production, collections, customer service. It must be in writing. Milestones are great markers to start. Think of it as like building an outline. I know my job has to go through these big milestones. And what do those milestones look like? Well, it could be lead appointment, inspection, presentation, sold in progress, completed, invoiced, closed. And then for each one of those milestones, I'm going to go build out every task, the instructions to do that task, the tool that's used, the role that does it and the time it takes. Ah. Ian says like a franchise structure. Yeah. If you want to make your business valuable, you want to make this thing something that you can pass on as a legacy or sell, it better be repeatable. And like a well oiled machine. Ian says, let's go. That's what we do, man. We teach you exactly how to do this and walk you right down the path to getting it done. Organizational strategy, how are we going to be organized? The structure of our business, is it going to be friends and family? Is it going to be executive professional? Is it going to be a sports team, multi level market? What kind of structure are we going to have for our business? And I see all of them succeed. As long as that thing is aligned with who they are, it's part of their vision. If it's not like they say they are, family culture, but they're not truly a family like family man, you can't get rid of family. They're still related to you. No matter what they do, they're still related and you gotta be invested in them at some point. I've only seen a couple of companies pull that off. The whole family thing. Executive professional, hey, we're gonna be suit and tie. Really? Really, you know, like uber professional. I see a lot of companies pull that off, a lot of different ways to do it. Which one's the right one for you? You gotta figure that out. And then human resources. Now, one thing I want to keep really clear here. Remember those stages of the business, you know, you got the smaller thing, we're starting to grow, and then we got the bigger thing, we're starting to expand. While we're in that growing stage, all of this stuff we just need to figure out very high level the basics of it. Just get the basics down so that whenever you start to build it out for the future, the foundation's in place correctly. Human resourcing resources, qualifying handbooks, forms and documentation, onboarding, job descriptions. Like, what do those things look like if we don't have those things in place? We're just making it up as we go. Ethan says amen. Too much diving in can be overwhelming. Yeah, it can. And the thing is, you got to build this thing over time. And so like with our boost program, that's small group. Get the basics in, grow a little bit, then come back and let's do the one on one and really kill it and take it to the next step. Because that comes a lot more custom. Then we have our services. So we've got the services we're going to perform. What trades are we going to do? Are we going to do maintenance programs and repairs? Are we going to be a consultative type business? And then what about our various departments? Legal, insurance, technology, products, vendors? There's a lot to running a business. And that's the thing. This is where we see the error of our ways. In most contracting businesses, we're usually good at something. We're good at sales, we're good at recruiting, maybe we're good at the work we do. Like we're high quality. And so word of mouth is built our business. That's how we got started in a lot of cases. But if we can't put in structure and start to build out what our businesses look like, it'll never grow. You won't have a chance. We don't have the business acumen, we have sales acumen, we have workmanship acumen, but we're missing leadership and process and culture and these other pieces. And this is a big one. Hr. This is one of the ones I see most people fail at. And it shouldn't be boring and dry. It should actually be a lot of fun. We went through it here. I've gone through it in my businesses. And it's really. I hate the word HR human resources, but how about employee experience? And how do we make compelling job descriptions that people go, man, I want to work for that company. So we work through those things in our programs with our clients. But those are certainly things that you can do on your own. Just know the order. These are all in order for a reason. I've got to do one before I do the other. Because they. I hate the word HR human resources. But how about employee experience are related to each other then financial strategy, finance, Cover your assets, all right? Because that's the number two reason we see these companies go out of business. They don't know their finances. They think they do. If we ask them their numbers and they say the word well about boop, you don't know your finances immediately. I know that right away. You should be able to tell me exactly what's going on in a variety of different areas of your business. Because it's like the dashboard for your. Your business. You're not looking at it every second, but while you're driving, you're glancing down to it. Oh, God. Okay. Everything's good. Everything's good. So old school versus software in house versus outsourced employee versus 1099, cash versus accrual. Those are all decisions you got to make from a financial standpoint in your business. And then profit. And with this thing we call profit fight, we actually trademarked it. How much to who and when. So I got all these various people involved in my business. How much am I going to pay them and when am I going to pay them and how much do I pay myself? And if you're doing this job and you're not paying yourself, get out now like you should. Literally, that should be the number one thing that you're doing. Because if you're not paying yourself, you're going to lose the energy over doing it. Funny thing is, when you incorporate paying yourself into doing it, you're amazing how much more you'll get done to make sure you get paid. Reporting. So profit, loss, balance sheet, cash flow trade, profit analysis, sales, team analysis, marketing, roi. Those are all things you got to know as business people. I'm not trying to scare you. I'm trying to tell you that, hey, you probably need to get on top of this stuff. If you don't, if it's not something that you go, man, I love that. That's okay. We gotta get a good CPA or a good bookkeeper that knows your industry. As you grow, you might step into a cfo. How do you handle your taxes? I know as my business has grown, I've had to go do different things for taxes. Tracked performance is improved performance. Amen. And tracking your finances will be the thing that helps you make decisions. Like I said, it was a dashboard. Right. I'm pressing the gas a little too hard. I let off of the gas. I'm not pressing the gas enough. I will press it down further to go faster, to stay around the speed limit. Right. Same thing with your finances. I'm looking at my reporting to say, hey, can I invest or should I slow down a little bit? Makes sense. Everybody got that? I hope. And then accountability strategy. Exactly. How am I going to hold everybody accountable to their activities? So key performance indicator. I got a bunch of thumbs up. Everybody's learning how to use the emojis. Awesome. Well done activities. So KPI's key performance indicators. These are the things that indicate whether somebody is doing something well or not and achieving the results. We're looking for production. And when I say production, I don't mean like putting a roof on or building a patio or doing a driveway. I'm talking about performance. Production. What's the minimum expected from somebody working from us in that role? What is expected from somebody in that role and what is the goal for somebody in that role? If we don't set minimums, we allow human behavior to take over and people will fall to the least that they have to do because that's how human behavior works. Job descriptions. So an overview. Training requirements and expectations. So we set standards in those job descriptions. Compensation. Are we going to pay off a profit or not? Time to money. How are we going to get people paid quickly in this industry? What do we got to do? Because if people don't get paid soon, they're going to go find something else to do. And there are ways to do that by giving people a little piece of something that they did. Applying compensation to activities that we can do that will solve a lot of those problems and keep people working for us longer. And then when am I going to pay them and how am I going to pay them? Hiring. What attributes and skills do I need from somebody? And set those expectations. These are the standards. This is what we're looking for. Whenever we hire somebody, their Talents and their skills reviews. How often am I going to do reviews like, hey, I wanted this person to do this thing. I set these standards. If I don't review them, I'm not tracking whether they're being done or not. And when we do that review, how are we going to improve each person that we work with and then the tools we use and setting the standard and what those tools are and how they are used. For example, like a CRM, you got a CRM. My advice to you, if it's not in the CRM, it doesn't exist. It didn't happen. So if you say, hey, I told you about that file and you should have done that file and it's not in the CRM somewhere that you said that you didn't, doesn't exist. That's the commitment, the standard that you need to set when using a CRM, and you need to set those standards for all the things that you use for tools. So that's just the foundational background. This is going to take a little longer. I hope you guys can hang out a little bit longer. I'm sorry that I didn't get it done in an hour, but this is a big thing, a big concept, and super important for your business. If you guys are cool with hanging out, I'm going to continue. So, technology, what's my technology strategy? I got a lot of. Let's go. All right, cool. Good. In 2011, this is. I want to talk about tech, stack and what you need for your business. Need is the key word. They're not want, but need. Especially when you're small. Keep it, Keep it lean, man. Don't let all these software companies convince you that you need this magical thing that's gonna solve all your problems. You may not need something quite like that just yet, but in 2011, this is just marketing technology. This isn't CRMs and all that other stuff, just marketing technology. There was 150 technology companies in 2011. In 2020, 8,000. Do you think it became a little bit harder to make decisions on what you should use? I mean, a lot harder. I'm absolutely confused, and I'm up on technology. I'm still confused. Sometimes we've put in an inordinate amount of time to ensure that we align the right client with the right people when it comes to their technology. And really assessing, like, do you need that thing or not need that thing? Need is the most important. If it doesn't save you time, create clear communication, or make you money, you don't need it. That's that simple. Yeah, that's neat and it's fancy. It's a waste of time. You're not ever going to use it and it's going to waste a bunch of money. Ian says that's been one of my biggest struggles. Well, we're going to help you with that, Ian, in our Boost program. Thank you for being a member. 7 Steps to Choosing the Right Technology I've been through a couple of CRMs. Yeah, boy, what a pain, right? But it is crushing. So you guys want to take a screenshot or shoot a picture or whatever of this one? This is a great way to choose the right technology. Know your objective, why are you getting it? Is it a process? Is there a pain point? Does it bring some value to you? Know the objective of this thing that you're getting? Create a list of requirements, functional functional requirements, usability requirements, tech preference requirements. Like do I want to use an iPad or a phone or do I want to use a desktop budget? Like how much can I afford for it? What does it do reporting wise? What's it going to give me back if I use it? Scalability. Can it go like that CRM thing? You probably change because one wasn't as scalable as the other. Or maybe it was because of usability. Like, hey, I thought it was cool and I could use it, but none of my people could. And so all of those things need to be considered and then your vendor and how they support you and take care of you relevant applications. So where am I going to apply the CRM? So it should be a long list. And then I compare that to all of the applications that can actually do it. And then I exclude solutions to get down to a list of 5 to 10. Then I do a trial to assess versus requirements and criteria that I listed above. Then I do my due diligence on my vendor requirements, like hey, what kind of support? What are you going to do? What happens there? And then negotiate every time. I don't care who you're talking about with software, they want to make a sale, negotiate with them. You'll be surprised how often you can get some discounts there to get your software in place. And actually through contractor Coach Pro, we have lots of discounts with lots of software suppliers. So marketing strategy, lead generation, hey man, we got to be different out there. And one of the things that we can do to be different is think outside the box a little bit. Look around you, look at what's being successful, in other words industries, and ask yourself, can I replicate that here so how are you going to approach it? Is it going to be direct? So telemarketing, canvassing, biz, dev, person working for you, maintenance, selling maintenance programs, networking, door knocking, those type of things. Like all those are like direct. Like I'm, I'm outbound marketing. Okay. And then there's indirect. So guerrilla marketing. If you haven't read that book, I want to give you that today. Go read that book. It's called Guerrilla Marketing. I think there's actually one called Guerrilla Marketing for Contractors maybe or home service contractors. But read the main book, the first one that ever came out. It will open your eyes to how creative you can be and how much money you can save to do it. There's a lot of guerrilla marketing. I'm doing it right now. I'm guerrilla marketing you right this second. I put out this cool webinar that I really want to bring you value with. And I hope that if you see value, you go, Ian said, I knew it. Exactly right. But that's not my goal. My goal isn't that you become our client. My goal is to give you some strong value and content today and build some trust with you and then continue to do that over time. And if I do, you go, hmm, I kind of like these guys. I want to be a part of it, doing well at it. Thank you. Appreciate that. There's all kinds of. How many times have you walked into a doctor's office and saw some type of little form to fill out to win a six month cruise or to win a two week cruise and filled it out? That's guerrilla marketing. They know those people that fill that out want to go on a cruise. You get a call back and says, hey, I got a three day cruise for you. It'll only cost you this. You didn't win the two week one, but hey, you get this special discount. That's guerrilla marketing, third party services. So hey, we got all kinds of people beating our doors down to do marketing for it. I'll get you 30 leads a month and I'll get you 10 sales this week and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, Right? And we just, it's like information overload. Who's good, who's not, all that kind of stuff. Got to do your due diligence big time. You got to talk to other people that have used them and make sure that they're not just their buddy. Right? Stay away from the guys operating out of their basements. They're the worst culprits, but there's a lot out there that are Just to make the sale and really take advantage of you. And know that if you're going to use a third party service, it's going to take some effort on your side to supply them with what they need to be successful too. And if you do get it, all right, can you sell it? Don't just say they're bad leads if you don't have a good sales strategy, which we'll talk about next. Technology. So are we going to use technology to get our leads? Google, you know, there's ads, Google, my business, Google Preferred. There's all these different ways on Google nowadays. Social. Are we going to leverage social media? And if we are, is it going to be paid or is it going to be organic? Are we going to build landing pages built around a particular product that we do? And initiatives, sales funnels, email campaigns, maybe using a platform like a HubSpot or activecampaign, Infusionsoft. There's all kinds of market. Sharp is a big one in our industry. That's just to name a few. And you really got to think about that and how it relates to who you are, what your capabilities are, what your culture is all about. Because if you pick something that doesn't align with what you guys do, you're not going to do it very well. So, hey, now we can market. How are we going to sell it? And so I want to share with you guys the framework of a pro presentation more than willing. You guys take a picture, screenshot of this. There's nothing here that is necessarily unique. I would say this information is out there. We didn't recreate the wheel, we just put the wheel in order. So what does the framework of a pro presentation look like? Well, we got to build rapport, credibility, set expectations, create validation. So validate it with a pro inspection. Then we got to prepare the field. So after my inspection, I got to get ready for going back and talking to them and going over what it is that we need to discuss and then we need to have that discussion, which is the problem. Here's the problem. And this is how I, this is how I solve it. And it's a one of a kind solution. Nobody else can do what I do. Yeah, there's all these GAF guys that can do all this stuff. They're all GF master elites. Great. They're all the same. They have no competitive edge over the other. But if I do it my way and my way alone, I have a competitive advantage. Ask for the business number one reason why we don't make sales, because we don't ask for the deal. We did a great job, great presentation, they love us. And we don't say, hey, when should I put you on the production schedule? This week or next week? Simple. Give them a choice, make sure you ask the question, always provide options, usually two. And none of them are no. And then shut up. You've done your part. Let them think. Let them go through the effort of what they need to do to figure out, can they afford it, can they finance it, do they have their money for a deductible? If that's the case, what is. There's a lot of things going through their mind. And the second you say something, you distract them from their that thought process, that logical decision that says, yes, you were great, you were good. It's the right price for the right thing, and yes, I'm gonna sign with you. You stopped him right in the middle of getting to that conclusion, and you started overselling. And now they have doubt and they go, why is this guy doing that? He's trying to trick me into something. Best advice I can give you on sales, those last two. And then whenever you give them this one of a kind solution, it should be a super duper system. How can you do materials and warranties different than anybody else? How can you protect a home? Communicate, install, safety, cleanup, final inspection guarantees. How can you do all those things better than anybody else? And then stop with the good, better, best thing you show good, better, best, and you usually show them in that order, and people go, good is this. Better is more expensive and best is really expensive. Do it best, better, and then fall back to good if you have to. Here's our. Sell the best thing you have. This is it. This is what we've got. That's out of my budget. Okay, We've got this better thing that's a discount. Discounts feel good. Discounts are great. I like discounts. I save some money. Yes, I'll go with you. And very rarely will you ever have to fall back to good. Seven steps of marketing strategy. Who's the target? And sales strategy. Who's the target? So answer these questions. You write these questions down and probably build a pretty good marketing and sales strategy. Who's a target? Where are they? How do we get in front of them? That's the key. How do I get in front? Okay, so my target is homeowners with roofs over 12 years old. Where are they? Let me hop on Zillow and go look up all these houses and go, hey, all these houses in these neighborhoods are over 12 years old. Great. I'm gonna go after that. How do I get in front of Facebook ads? Google Ads targeting them. All kinds of cool, fun stuff. Doing well, Ethan. Stacking something. Sorry about that. What's their problem? So what's the problem they're dealing with? Hey, Ethan, you're going to get a recording of this. Everybody that's on here will get a recording. You'll be able to watch this over and over and over again until we. We take it down, which. Which I'm not planning on doing anytime soon. How can you do all those things better than anybody else? And then. Oh, good, my hand is cramping. It's like writing those like crazy. So once we identify what their problem is, like finding quality contractors, they have an older roof and they're worried and they're losing sleep over it at night. Whatever their problem is, how do I solve it? What is the thing that I do better than anyone else? And what's in it for them? So I do this thing in this system, this inspection, and if you do, you get this thing from. If you do this with me, you get this thing from me. It could be an inspection report. It could be the pictures and video of it. It could be whatever it is. But make sure you give them something for you. It could be some incentive. We used to give out $25 gift cards to everybody that let us do an inspection. And if they went with us, they get a hundred dollars gift card. Boy, that worked really well. How do we get a commitment? So how do we ask them for the sale? How do we ask them for this particular thing that I'm selling? How do I get the commitment? Usually it comes down to giving them a couple of choices and shutting up. It's that simple. And how do we make them ambassadors? When I remind you that you have multiple sales in this process, it's not one. My first sale is to sell me and my company. My second sale is that I should do this inspection because it's important to you. And my third sale is that you have a problem. I need them to believe me that they do. And my fourth sale is that we are the right solution for it. And so sell each one of those pieces in order. Think about it that way. I'm selling this first. I gotta get that. Okay, you got them there. Now I gotta sell this piece, then this piece and this piece. And finally, how do we make them ambassadors? I'm doing a webinar tomorrow on sales if you guys want to join that. That's great. I'D love to have you there as well. How do we make them ambassadors? Like, I got them. We did the work there. We did awesome work and they love us. How do I make them an ambassador of what we do? Because people buy based on social proof. The more testimonial. Like, we got testimonials all over our website. We got our five star ratings everywhere. That stuff starts to lend credibility to us and creates these ambassadors. Ethan, go to my feed or go to the contractor community group and it's in there and I can send it to you here shortly. May have even gotten an email about it. If you're on our email list, give me two. If you'll hang out till the end, I'll drop that link in here for you as well. Okay, perfect. I got a bunch of thumbs up. I like thumbs up. Production strategy. How are we going to produce everything that we just sold? So we're going to deliver on that super duper system. It needs to be an experience. It needs to be like, holy cow, man, this was the most amazing thing. Oh, my God, these guys are unbelievable. And I can't stop talking about them. Ian says, I don't think I'm on mls, but I'd like to be. Okay, great. I will make sure that you guys get added. Guess what? Just by joining this webinar, I told you guerrilla marketing, you're gonna be on email list. So. And we really, really try to give you guys value in those emails all the time. So exceed the expectations of your super duper system. Breed pride and reward great craftsmanship with your crews. Finish with a flourish, finish strong. Pay attention to what's happening with your client and who they are and what they're about, what they're into, and finish with that. If their kids are into baseball, get them a couple of baseball tickets, maybe a pack of baseball cards. I mean, it doesn't have to be anything big, it just has to be thoughtful. Like, you know them movie tickets for the older couple that likes to go to movies. Coffee club thing for people that love coffee. You're going to have lots of conversations. You're going to learn about these people, let them know that you listen. It'll be amazing what it does for you. For referrals, make an A plus. I don't know how many contractors I've gone on sales calls with to go, hey, we build the manufacturer specs and building codes. Like, that's some freaking big deal. That's literally a passing grade. You just made a D in school. Well done. Congratulations. Make an A Plus exceed those manufacturer specs and building codes, because satisfaction equals meeting mediocrity. And mediocrity means you're a commodity. And if you're a commodity, it comes down to price. I got five roofers I'm talking to. You're all the same. Who's the cheapest? You don't want to be one of those people. And then how will you do it in house versus subcontractor crews? Job progress management. How are you going to handle that? Is it going to be boards on the wall? CRM communication? How are you going to communicate on these jobs to make sure that everybody's in communication so there's no mistakes? How are you going to document the job? How are you going to supervise it? How are you going to automate it? And so there's a lot of the parts of those things that you can automate with CRMs and technology. Learning a little bit about technology, One of the best tools that you can get out there. Oh, boy. Skipping my brain as I'm talking right now. It's the one that connects two pieces of software together. Oh, man, I can't believe I forgot Zapier. Yeah, Ian, thank you, brother. I appreciate that, man. I had a space cadet moment there for a second. Zapier is a powerful tool. You can go find out anything and everything you ever wanted about that on YouTube and use it and automate a ton of the stuff that you do. And then finally, customer service. What does that look like? It could be just, you know, a couple phone calls from your sales guy, or it could be something different. We've helped contractors, as they grow, to put in a customer service department. That customer customer service department ends up making them more money than all their salespeople combined. And then training strategy. How are we going to train everybody to all this cool stuff we just built? Well, we need a quick start thing, because that's time to money. Remember that time to money thing? How fast can I get somebody making money? I need to get them some education really fast. Whenever we bring somebody on here, we're trying to educate as fast as we possibly can. We're usually giving them information before they even start working for us. Sales guys the same way. Administrative people, production people, same thing. I got to get them educated on my culture, how we generate leads, how to do an inspection, how to hold that discussion and do our presentation, how to ask for the sale and close, how to get referrals, how to use our technology, how to use our paperwork and forms and all the other good stuff. I Got to do that in a week. I got one week to get them somewhat proficient with those things to have some success. If they have some success, they will stick it out. If they don't, because you don't give them the tools to be successful with, they're probably not going to spend very long with you. And then in 90 days, I want to get them to 80%. I want to get them to 80% as proficient as they can be in our business. And then I'm going to apply weekly practice at a minimum. I strongly advise daily, but I'm going to give them weekly practice to master paperwork, terminology, construction products and upgrades, sales techniques, self improvement and everything else. Our job as owners and leaders of our business is to grow the people that work for us in a fashion that helps them achieve their goals and aspirations. If I don't give them these things, we have just a job. I learned an amazing step this past year that 90% of people plan to quit the job that they took the very first day they took it. And the key word in that is job. And that's what they decided it was. It was just a job. It was the next thing until they could actually find their career. And that is very expensive. Great insight. It is. It's extreme. The average cost of hiring an employee flat out cost 5,000 bucks. Additional cost, $50,000 in lost opportunity. All the time that you spent training and bringing them up, you could have been doing something else to generate revenue and sell more jobs and help more customers. You're going to lose $50,000 on each person you hire if they plan on quitting the very first day they come to work. In 90% of the cases, you're flushing money down the toilet. We need to invest in our people. When we put them first, they'll put your business first with your customers. It's amazing. And finally, now that I got all that stuff in place, I can actually hire somebody. So what's our hiring strategy? So the first thing we always ask everybody is, would you work for you? Like, seriously, like, take a look at yourself. Are you a good enough leader? Do you have the magnetic aspect that people want to be involved with you? Do you have a vision that they're a part of just as much as it is for your business? Coming to work at your business is a place I want to be. Do I enjoy it? I always ask people why they enjoy coming to work because they were hanging around. It's fun. We enjoy this. It's competitive, it's challenging. So first question, you have to Ask yourself is, would you work for you? If the answer is yes, then you gotta get, hey, what's the stages? This role is responsible for who works for you, the traits and skills that they're gonna need, the hiring, ads and placement that you're gonna put out there, that's marketing. Okay, so I gotta market for people. Phone, phone and video interviews. Assessment and qualifying, like making sure there's some kind of assessment, something they have to do to qualify. If you make it just like, hey, come interview and hey, you sounded good, come to work on Monday, okay? You're nothing special. The more special and elite and premier you make yourself, the more magnetic you'll become. People want the things they can't have. Personal or group interview. And so hey, I'm going to do an interview. I'm selling now. My job is to sell you on the idea of working for my company because of my vision, your growth here and the things that you'll achieve and the potential you can reach and that I'm a big part of your future. Then I hire them and I onboard them. Which one do I prefer? Personal or group interview? Depends on the situation. If I have a need for a bunch of people in a hurry, I would prefer to do a group interview because I can do the selling part to a bunch of people all at once and then I can do the individual interviews privately in a shorter period of time. I only have so much time in the day. I'm trying to create capacity and I need a bunch of people fast. If I don't need a bunch of people fast, I certainly prefer the personal interview. I think I get more out of it and I make better decisions on who to hire based on their traits and skills. Things to remember, hiring is not emotional, it is logical. They either fit or they don't. They either have the skills and traits you need or they don't do nothing. Hire anybody that doesn't. Is it okay to use a personality test? Personality tests are okay. I don't hate them early on, small company, yeah, not a bad way to go about doing things. But as you grow your business a little bit, you're going to want to start to find a sales assessment if that's the person you're hiring, or a admin assessment or a production assessment format that you can use because that's what they're going to be doing for you. Personality tells you how you communicate and if they'll fit in your culture. Doesn't necessarily mean that they can do the job. Disc assessment works great for communication. I now Know who you are and how you're wired. And I know who our customer is. And so will your personality fit our customer? We're good on fit for the most part, if they qualify on the disc. But do they actually have the skills, the will, the drive, all that stuff that we need to have that person work for us? There are other assessments out there that are amazing. We provide what you have to be certified to provide these objective management group assessments. We're certified through that because I believe that it is the best one out there. It's not even close. I've used all the others. Especially if you're hiring sales guys, it will tell you, are they good or not? Once I know they're good, then I'm going to check and see if they fit my culture. If they fit my culture, they're out. It's not emotional. It's not a, hey, man, Ethan, reach out to me by email and I can get somebody on the line with you about that. This thing is not emotional. You sound good, you look good. You pass the screen door test. So, you know, people open the door for you and they'll answer the door and you sound amazing. You're hired. No, that's emotional hiring. They either have the skills and the traits I need and the abilities I'm looking for, or they don't. I have many people that work for me that I didn't like very much, to be honest with you, but they were great. And he's like, I was hired. Qualify with a questionnaire or assessment test. Make them do something. Don't just allow anybody in your door say, hey, I need you to fill this out. I need you to tell me why you want this job. I have this questionnaire for you to fill. I have this assessment for you to take. Make them do something. If they're not going to do something to get the job, what are they going to do when you hire them? Interview questions to identify attributes and skills. So when I figure out what the attributes and skills are that you need and then ask questions wrapped around those without being leading questions. Worst question I've ever heard anybody ask, do you consider yourself a hard worker? Who's going to say, no? No, I'm not a hard worker. Everybody says, yes, that's a terrible question. But a question like, you know, if. When you're under pressure, how does that make you feel? It makes me feel anxious. I get flustered. Well, maybe this isn't the right thing for you. Describe for me the hardest day you ever had at work and they tell You a little story and you ask them at the end, how did it make you feel? You know, it was a lot of work. It was hard. I was stressed. But man, I felt like I accomplished something. Hey, maybe that guy's a good fit. Never hire at the interview. You look desperate. Remember, we're elite. We only have a couple of positions open and I don't know if you qualify for a team. I have to make sure I interview the rest of everybody. I will call you back on this date and time to let you know if we're gonna hire you or not. People want what they can't have. Sell the opportunity and growth. So hey, man, we have this big opportunity here. There's a lot that you can do this industry, man. You can make an enormous amount of money and do some really cool things for people and we can help you grow. We have the tools to help you grow as an individual. Whether you're on our bus forever or just on our bus for a short time. Our job is to give you the tool, skills and talents that you need to achieve your goals in life and then onboard like a care, actually give a rip. Give great training, give great coaching, provide the tools they need, invest them, spend time with them, go in the field with them, give them the support they need. And if you onboard like you care, like, make it a big deal that they're coming to work for you, they'll be in the 10% that decide to stay. But this could be a career, so let's bring it all together. I want to recruit, hire an onboard for my business and hire a bunch of people. I better know how to train them. How am I going to do that where they can make money quickly and have success quickly with my business? Because if I don't, they're not going to stay very long. And if I'm training them, what am I training them to? Whenever we produce something, sell something, or market something, I gotta have those pieces in place before I can build a great training program. If I'm gonna market and generate a bunch of leads, exactly how am I gonna sell it so that I get the most bang for my buck out of those things? I see so many people go to events and get hooked in by some marketing company that says, hey, you need to do this thing with marketing. And they actually succeed. There's a bunch of leads, but they don't know how to sell them. And they say they're bad leads. They're not bad leads. You're bad salespeople with bad systems. Or maybe you do Get a bunch of leads and you actually are able to sell them. But you have no accountability, you have no process and everything breaks on you. Your cash flow goes crazy and you don't have a finance strategy. I don't know how many profitable businesses I've seen go out of business because I didn't know their finances. So these things all work together. They're done in an order to start. So leadership culture, process, organizational strategy, numbers, accountability, technology, marketing, sales, production, training and then recruiting. Go get them all in place and then they all interact with each other just like your DNA. And you have a choice. You're either going to have a beautiful baby or an ugly baby. You want an ugly baby? Keep failing forward. Keep going to the school of hard knocks. Want a beautiful baby? Do the things in order. You'll be successful and you'll be have something you're proud of. So how do we get all this stuff to happen? We actually do a tool with our clients called the map. This is what we call our basic tool. For smaller contractors, it's a mission achievement plan. As they grow, we move them into what we call a mission meeting. But this is a great way to track what you do. I've got a mission, I name it. And I have a goal. That one year thing, remember, I got a one year thing. I'm going to rally all my troops around. It's Operation Domination. And my goal is to double my revenue. What are the numbers that are going to help us achieve that? Leads, appointments, demos, contracts, jobs built, whatever it is, get those numbers down. And then what are the top two or three priorities that you have to get done that year? Oh man, I got to build a training program. I need to build a leadership program. I need to get my processes put in place. What are those big priorities that need to be done for that year? They're going to take a whole year to do. I'll give you a great example. Right now I've got a one year project. My one year project is to establish all of the HR that we're going to need for our business as we expand next year and the following year. And I'm meeting every week, doing it with my team and getting it done. It's not fun, it's not the thing I get all tripped and excited about. But I know I have to do it because it's going to eliminate thousands of questions. There's not going to be any confusion. It's going to create great communication. I got to do it. And sometimes if you're passionate enough about Something and your who is aligned with your why. You'll do the dirty things you need to do. And so I'm doing it. What assets will you need? Okay, so a scoreboard. The task and ISS weekly. So it looks a little bit something like this. I have my front page, which is all of the goals and numbers and my big priorities that I'm working on and what we call smart actions that are getting done. I have my scoreboard here. I have the assets that I have and need. So these ones that are in need, I'm looking at them going, hey, when can I put them over here or down here in my task list? And so each week I'm looking at this. Am I progressing towards my goals? Am I knocking off those big priorities? Am I doing the tasks that I need to do that week? You'll notice these tasks have a very important aspect to them. There's an owner, a due date and a status. Somebody owns that task might be you, might be somebody else, but there's a due date. When you put a due date on something, people are accountable because they don't like to come to that meeting once a week and go, hey, that thing's not done. Would the action matrix be most similar to the task list? The action matrix is similar. Action matrix is something that allows you to actually create this. It puts your priorities in order. And that's a big thing. It's actually one of the aspects of that we teach in in our boost program. It helps you prioritize the things that then go into that meeting. So here's your takeaways for today. Thank you, guys. This took an hour and a half. I thought it was going to take an hour. My apologies. Making what you learned practical. So you learned something today. Let's make it practical. There is a blueprint to success. So do we all understand that? Like, yes, I see there's a blueprint. These things need to be done in order. A light bulb went on for me and now I see what I'm been making some mistakes. There's an order. There is an order that creates Control, growth and freedom foundation before operation. So many of us do operation and then try to go back and fill in the foundation. Thanks. Great info. There is a lot. Yeah, James, there is man. And you know, you can certainly do this on your own, but we can help guide too. You know, if you're looking for stuff like that, we can certainly help you with that. Lack of leadership, culture and financial acumen kills most businesses. Learn who you are before, why you're doing what you're doing. Strategy before action. I see so many gurus out there. Take massive action. Take massive action. Yeah. That means fail forward. And every time you fail, learn from it and do this thing. No, go build a strategy. Have a great. And then try to go back and fill in the foundation. Thanks. Great info. Plan and execute that plan. You have a lot less failures. Proactive steps prevent. There is a lot. Yeah, James, there is, man. And, you know, you can certainly do this on your own, but we can help guide too. You know, if you're looking for stuff like that, we can certainly help you with that. Lack of leadership, culture and financial acumen kills most businesses. Reactive mistakes. We tend to be most of us reactive. Oh, I got a problem. We're gonna put this new thing in place to solve that problem, and that creates so many other problems for us because we didn't think about it up front. That's what we do as coaches here. We help you guys think about it up front and solve those problems before they ever happen. Because not only have I been down the road, learn who you are before, why you're doing what you're doing. Strategy before. As a contractor myself, but I've been in the back offices of thousands of contractors, coached hundreds of other contractors, gotten to see a lot, and we implement those things with the action. I see so many gurus out there. Take massive action. Take massive action. Yeah. That means fail forward. And every time you fail, learn from it and do this thing. Now go build a strategy. Have a great guys. Steps you need to take right now. First, you need to decide to stop the ignorance loop. Like that loop that keeps having you in this fail forward thing. Got to stop that. You got to make a decision that. That today is going to be the day. I'm done doing that. I'm tired of beating my head against a wall. I'm not doing it anymore. Then determine what stage you're in. Are you a smaller contractor? Trying to figure it out? Are you a little bit bigger? And you want to plan and execute that plan. You have a lot less failures. Proactive steps prevent. Take it to the next step. What stage am I in? Assess your situation. Reactive mistakes. We tend to be most of us reactive. Oh, I got a problem. We're going to put this new thing in place to solve that problem, and that creates so many other problems for us. Where do I need the most help in these 12 areas that I just gave you because we didn't think about it up front? That's what we do as coaches here. We Help you guys think about it up. It's marketing. Marketing is causing all my problems. Well, find the root cause. Go back and look. Well, do I have a great sales system? Do I have the processes to handle it? Do I have the right people? Like go find the root cause, develop a map. I gave that guy to you guys, the map. Go and you see how to build a plan. You don't have to build it exactly like ours, but hey, you got underfront and solve those problems before they ever happen. Because not only have I been down the road, stand the structure of it. Go build it, calculate risk. There's so many folks that we work with in this boost program, they're scared to death to hire somebody until they put the numbers to it. Because you put two things to it. You put numbers in top. As a contractor myself, but I've been in the back offices of thousands of contractors. So if I was to say, hey, I'm going to go hire a salesperson, maybe a salesman, maybe a sales manager, let's put sales manager. I own the business. I'm handling all the sales, all the finance, all the production, all the everything. And the thing I dislike the most is leading the sales thing. Okay, that tells me I need to go hire this person. Coached hundreds of other contractors, gotten to see a lot and we implement those things with you guys. Steps you need to take right now, first you need to decide to oh man, they're gonna be expensive. I can't hire that person. I gotta keep selling. And we're stuck in the ignorance loop. The reality is if you hired that person, it would afford you an immense amount of time that you could put towards the other things to work on your business. And if you set expectations correctly for them, they'll far outdo what you stop the ignorance loop. Like that loop that keeps having you in this fail forward thing. Got to stop that. You got to make a decision that, that today is going to be the day I'm done. You can do trying to do everything at once and we walk people through doing that. I'm tired of beating my head against a wall. I'm not doing it anymore. Then determine what stage you're in. Are you smaller contractor trying to figure it out? Are you a little bit bigger? And you want exactly how to calculate that risk. And actually we put in a spreadsheet and say that risk is worth taking. And then finally that's when we take action. All right, I got these things figured out, I'm going to take action on them. So our six month journey to that seven figures looks like this. We do this in our boost class. I've got it laid out for you. Quick start. Basics. We go through a little preparation from week one, and then the mission leadership basics, culture, process building, your team basics, accounting basics, accountability basics. Take it to the next step. What stage am I in? Assess your situation. Where do I need the most help in these 12 areas that I just gave you? Marketing basics and reducing your risk basics. We don't want something to come back and buy. It's marketing. Marketing is causing all my problems. Well, find the root cause. Go back and look. Well, do I have a great sales system? Do I have the processes to handle it? Do I have the right pdu? Because a lot of things bite us in the rear end in year three that we weren't aware of because we don't know business. So we got to teach you what those things are. Then weeks 11 through 25 are taking those basics, building off of them and saying, okay, how do I then start to put people in place? So communication, sales building. Like, go find the root cause, develop a map. I gave that guy to you guys. Great sales team, production essentials, administration, budgeting, management, finance, holding meetings that work and you're not having a meeting just to have a meeting. Some technology insights, customer experience, effective growth, how to grow that thing, the map. Go you see how to build a plan. You don't have to build it exactly like ours, but hey, you can understand the structure of it. Go build it. Calculate risk. There's so many folks that we work with in this boost program, they're scared to death to hire somebody. And then the last class is the coaches roundtable. Then finally, we review the journey. So all of our coaches hop in. We answer every question you could ever have under the sun. That one took like two hours. You guys had a lot of questions, and it was great. So that's our roadmap. You could literally, like, take a screenshot of that and follow that roadmap until they put the numbers to it. Because you put two things to it. You put numbers and time. If you want a guide, you need some help. It's what we do. It's how we help. Our goal is to help you achieve control of your business so it can grow and achieve freedom. The best thing you can do is go fill out the assessment on our website or just take that link right there. Contractor, coach, row, backslash, assessment. And. And take the time. So if I was to say, hey, I'm going to go hire a salesperson, maybe a salesman, maybe A sales manager. Let's put sales manager. I own the business. I'm handling all the sales, all the finance, all the production, all the everything. And the thing I dislike the most, assessment. When that assessment comes to us, we go, great, now we know what they're dealing with, who they are and the situations that they have in their business. Let's talk about it. And we're going to do a coaching session. It's free. It doesn't cost anything. Our goal is to give you some advice that day that helps you with your business right away. If you like how coaching works, maybe you. Because it's leading the sales thing, okay. That tells me I need to go hire this person. I'm a customer. If you don't, that's okay too. We're here to serve this industry and do it well. We're here to help you guys achieve that thing that you're after. Oh man, they're gonna be expensive. I can't hire that person. I gotta keep selling. We're stuck in. But if we're not the right fit, we're not the right fit. We don't do high pressure sales pitches. It's not our goal. Our goal is to give you the right thing at the right time. So our boost program, the ignorance loop, the reality is if you hired that person, it would afford you an immense amount of time that you could put towards the other things to work on your business. Contractors under a million bucks trying to make their first jump in. Scaling one on one is more custom where we're meeting with you once a week. This is once a week with a small group of people just like you that are going through the same things you are. You do breakouts with them, you get connected with them. You're working on projects. There's a whole workbook that we go through in that boost program. You walk away with it. It's like 3 inches thick whenever you're done. And then one on one coaching is custom coaching with one of our coaches. Our blueprint is what we coach off of. We have our top rep program that is for sales. If you want to get great at home service sales, come to one of our events. Our top rep aces group is where we meet once. And if you set expectations correctly for them, they'll far outdo what you can do. Trying to do everything at once. And we walk people through exactly how to calculate that risk and actually put it in a spreadsheet and say that risk is worth taking week with salespeople and help them get better. And then finally when does the next boost program start? Patrick asked. Next boost program starts here in a couple weeks. It's coming up right now. We've already got several people in it. And as soon as we get that thing to the point where it's filled, we'll. We'll get it running and then we have. And then finally that's when we take action. All right. Our contractor strategy conference that we do once a year. Yeah. Ian says next week. Yep. Okay. So we are. We're pushing to get everybody lined out in that boost program. We're here to help you guys, whatever it looks like for you, to help you get better. I'm going to continue to do these webinars. I'm going to continue to do training. Make sure I got these things figured out. I'm going to take action on them so that you follow us. I want to put that in there for you real quick. Hey, if you want to follow us on what we do, you need to email me. You can email us@helloontractorcoachpro.com Our six month journey to that seven figures looks like this. The contractor training room is our learning platform. Our group is actually not Contractor Coach Pro is Contractor Community. I don't know why that wasn't updated. Instagram is Contractor Coach Pro. Twitter, ccpwims and then follow our contractor radio podcast because we have amazing information in there. Thanks, everybody. I think I'm done. Yeah, I am. James, we do this in our Boost class. I've got it laid out for you. Quick start basics. We go through a little preparation week one, and then the mission leadership basics, culture process building your team basics, accounting basics, accountability basics. I appreciate that, man. I enjoy this as much as I enjoy and anything else in what we do. I hope it helps you. I hope it gives you some insight. I hope it allows you to do what you need to do in your business and be successful. Hey, marketing basics and reducing your risk basics. We don't want something to come back. No problem, Cesar. Appreciate it, man. Thanks for hopping on today. Oh. Because a lot of things bite us in the rear end in year three that we weren't aware of. And one more thing. Don't leave. Don't leave, everybody. I hope you're still here. Anybody today that signs up for Boost or just shoots me an email that you want to sign up for boost, there's a $500 discount on the first month because we don't know business. So we got to teach you what those things are. Then weeks 11 through 25, we're taking those basics, building off of them and saying, okay, how do I. So you just use code boost500. I believe it is boost500 on the signup page on our website under services. And you can then start to put people in place. So communication, sales, building. I can say 500 bucks. All right. Hey, thanks, everybody. That's our webinar for today. I hope you found value in it. I hope it helps you with your business and get great sales team. Production essentials, administration, budgeting, management, finance. Holding meetings that work and you're not having a meeting, just to have a meeting helps you get a little control, growth and freedom. And we look forward to seeing you guys in the future. Technology insights, customer experience, effective growth, how to grow that thing.
