$6+MM (for 3 Years in a Row) in Res HVAC Sales: Tech David Wilson Reveals His Sales Process & More

Welcome to The Successful Contractor powered by CertainPath, a show for residential contractors about residential contractors. We chronicle business journeys, share insights, and celebrate successes in this wonderful industry. I'm your host, Bob Houchin. For more information on how CertainPath can put your contracting company on a certain path to success, visit our website, www.mycertainpath.com. I hope you enjoy today's show and take away another or two. David, thank you so much for being here. I greatly appreciate it. For those who haven't had a chance to meet you, could you share with everyone your name, your company name, where you guys are located?

Yeah. So we're out of Mesquite, Texas. Baker Brothers Plumbing, Air and Electric. And David Wilson is my name. There he is.

Very good, David.

What do you do for Baker Brothers?

So I am a selling technician. I've been there almost 8 years already. So But been a selling tech ever since I was there.

8 years. Hard to believe a guy who's like 20 years old.

How'd that happen? It's been, it's been crazy.

We're talking for a great reason. You had a fantastic year last year. Let's brag about it. So what did you do last year?

So roughly $6.3 million. So of that $6.3 million, only about $600,000 of that was from flips from other technicians. So it's mostly just demand service.

On-demand service.

Yes.

You've been a high producer for quite a while.

For a little bit, yes.

Yes. No, let's, let's talk about it. This is your chance to brag. What have you been— I mean, in the last, what, 3 years or so?

You've been over 6.

Over 6.

Yes, sir.

So consistency.

Yes, that's a— well, that's the name of the game, I guess.

Right. That's right. That's why you're the top dog. Yeah. Want to learn about your service and sales process? We'll get into that in a minute. But I love to learn people's personal stories. I think a lot can be learned from that. So let's talk about you. So how did you get into this industry? Was it right after high school? How was, you know, how'd that go?

So I've always known hard work growing up, you know, with my dad and stuff like that. What'd your dad do? Well, he was the first person in Texas to spray foam insulation.

Okay.

So growing up, I was a small, you know, small kid over there spraying the foam in the, in the small areas of the attic. So I guess I've always been in attic spaces and hot spaces growing up. But Did that, you know, grew up, did some roofing for a little while and then got into HVAC probably at 22 years old, which I'm 34 now. So I've been doing a little while, but I love the industry.

What now? What was the attraction to HVAC? How did you get that bug?

So I wouldn't say there was an attraction because who wants to be in a hot attic all the time? But yeah, you know, it was, hey, they're always going to have a job. You know, a robot can't replace somebody that needs to crawl inside of an attic. So it was mostly just, you know, I guess they need us.

So, so how did you get to Baker Brothers?

So that's been a little bit of a journey, I guess. A couple of different spaces in between then, but it was all in God's will, I would say, to be where I'm at today. But so—

and you've been there 8 years. How did you start?

You start sales right away at Baker Brothers?

Yes.

Yes. So they actually did not have a sales tech position at Baker Brothers. So that was a new thing for them at that point. They just had service techs and then they had some, I think, 1 or 2 comfort advisors at that point is what they were called. And they opened up the position of a sales tech whenever I was plugged in there. And I think we had 3 or 4 different people from their service side join me at that point. And there's only me and another guy left now. But yeah, it's something they had to open up and It's been great ever since.

Yeah, I love you guys. Got a lot of high performers at your company.

We do.

Talk about what do you guys do for training? How frequently are you training?

Yeah, what's that look like? So I'm going to brag about myself a little bit at that point, but one of my coworkers, Matt McFarland, that's there with me, he, you know, we could tell he had some potential there. He was on the service side. He was probably doing $800,000, $900,000 a year as a tech, flipping stuff, doing UV lights, you know, duct cleanings and stuff like that. And Me and the sales manager at the point were like, hey, this guy, this guy's pretty good. So at that point he moved into sales, did, you know, $1.5 to $2 million, I believe. And then he rode with me for a full year. Is that good?

Yeah.

Well, we didn't have any calls. It was real slow for whatever reason. He rode with me for a full year and then went from, you know, $1.5 to $2 million to $4 to $5 the past couple of years. So that's fantastic. I would say training, you know, it's very important. And, you know, if you can learn from top producers, it's definitely something that should be done.

Absolutely. So are you guys getting together in the morning to do training regularly?

So we do training, I would probably say once a week on Thursdays, you know, just kind of toss stuff back and forth in between the different people we have on a team. We do have quite a few people. I think we have 12 now on our sales team. So we've grown quite a bit since we all started. But yeah, everybody kind of bounces stuff off each other.

I was gonna say, who drives that training? Or is it just more or less a group discussion? Like, this is a situation I'm running into?

I think it was just kind of open discussion of, hey, what are y'all running into? You know, hey, I couldn't close this job for this reason. What would you have done, you know, different to make that happen? Jimmy Dale, our president, is very big on training and constant training, which is good because it is important.

Yeah.

So absolutely.

All right.

Let's talk about the process. You said you mostly go on demand calls, older equipment.

Demand calls and flips and estimates, but it's mostly demand service calls is what I primarily run.

All right. Let's say you get a demand service call. How do you prepare for that call?

Well, it's my job, so I wouldn't necessarily say I have to prepare for it. But what I guess my process, what I would do is, first off, we do have somebody that calls the homeowner to let them know that we're on the way, or we send them a picture of, hey, who's coming out here? But I always call the homeowner before I show up. So that way they can hear my voice. That way you kind of have that communication stuff with the homeowner at that point. Maybe start to help break down any barriers that they might have. You don't have to talk to them for a long time, but just say, "Hey, I'm 20 minutes out. You know, I'm ready to ready to come fix your problem." Do you?

So can you get a lot from that? Even a short conversation if someone's hot as in angry, yeah, something's broken or they're real soft and timid. Oh, for sure.

I mean, there's call recordings on everything that we do, so we can listen to the call recording before. We go on site that they've talked to with the person on the phone at our company. You can kind of tell where they're at there. I mean, they're without AC typically, so it's either they're hot or they're cold at that point. So they're not in the best of moods. But just if you can, you know, show them your light and brighten up their day, you know, that's a very important thing to do.

So do you do any kind of like rapport building at that point over the phone?

No, just no. It's real straight and to the point. Hey, I'm 20 minutes out. I'm 15 minutes out. I'm on your way kind of thing. At that point, you show up at the house, you know, park where you need to park. Don't park in their driveway. I hate when people come to my house and park in the driveway. If my wife can't get out of the house, it stresses me out. Like if she needs to leave, we have 3 kids, so they're always doing something. So just, just be mindful of where you're parking at that point.

Sure.

But walking up to the door, you know, act like you want to be there. Don't be on the phone. Don't look, you know, don't have a bad, you know, well, smile, you know, whenever you're walking up kind of thing.

Right.

Be presentable, which is one thing homeowners are calling you out there for a reason. So solve their problem. So then once you're inside at that point, you know, I'm not telling everybody to do this, but I will pick up their dog. I will, you know, give the dog a treat, stuff like that. If you can win the dog over, you're, you Your your chances of success are pretty high. Yeah, at that point.

So so you have a pocket full of dog treats in my bag.

So ready to go for.

Do you now? Do you ask? Is there you can?

Oh, for sure. You have to. I mean, I want to get that on. Yeah, some people are like, you know, no, he doesn't do treats.

He's on a special diet.

Exactly. So you have to be mindful of that. But just kind of breaking down those barriers, you know, I would say that process of walking into the front door right can take thirty seconds or it can take twenty minutes.

Right.

It just depends on the homeowner. Every homeowner is different.

Sure. So let's, let's dig into it a little bit more. So when you walk in, maybe there's not a dog.

Yeah.

So what are some things you're looking to break the ice? Are there certain questions you always ask?

I wouldn't say certain questions, but I'm just looking around the house at that point. Maybe they have beautiful landscape outside.

Yeah.

Oh, somebody here has a green thumb. That landscaping looks great. Or if the yard is, you know, a mile high, oh, I need to cut my grass too, kind of thing, you know. But, you know, You know, stuff like that. Just don't talk about why you're there necessarily unless the homeowners roll direct about it, because you do have those homeowners that right when you're there, hey, here's a thermostat, here's the unit, here's that, go take care of my problem kind of thing.

Right, right. So I really— you're using that time to pick up body language, type of personality, right? Do you try to mirror that personality and body language, or are you kind of you and you just like, okay, I see what you know?

I'm just me. So I'm the same. And, you know, Every house. Yeah, same me going in kind of thing. So just read in the homeowner at that point, you know, you'll, you'll know what to do.

Yeah. So, all right. So, you know, it's a demand call. There's a, there's an issue. It's hot in there. You know, a lot of homeowners are like, let me drag you to the system. So how do you take control? I know we've had some friendly conversation. You start asking questions at that point about what's going on. How do you— what's the next?

I ask them what they tore up.

Do you just go, what'd you tear up?

Yeah. And they have that response. They laugh. They, oh, you know, so, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Yeah.

You have to get the homeowner laughing to break the ice a little bit at that point.

So, okay.

Hey, what'd you tear up? Oh, well, you know, my outside unit's not running or, you know, whatever the problem might be.

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Then you go with the thermostat.

Yep. So go thermostat, turn it on, you know, figure out if it's an outdoor issue or indoor issue. Obviously, you take a look at the unit at that point. Let's say the issue's outside. Look at it, look through everything. You know, you'd be surprised how many high voltage wires are burned going into the disconnect outside. Look at all that stuff. It doesn't take that long, but look at everything. If the issue's outside, bring the homeowner out there, say, hey, here's what I found out here. If it's a new homeowner and we've never serviced our house before, what I'll say is, hey, you know, this is the first time we've ever been out to your home. I'm going to take a look at everything that you have here, including the indoor unit, because I don't want you to do these repairs outside and then me find something else that's wrong inside your home.

Okay.

For you.

What's the thought process? Like, just to try and plant the seed. I'm here for your best interests. I mean, you are.

Yeah.

But just so you know, I'm being as thorough as possible.

Yeah. I mean, I don't want the homeowner to spend, you know, X amount of money and then we find something else where, oh, the unit needs refrigerant now.

Right.

Well, refrigerant prices are, are so high to begin with. So it's like, hey, if we have a coil that's leaking upstairs in the attic, why not tell the homeowner that, hey, you have this problem. I don't know how much refrigerant it's going to take until this unit outside is working. Even if it is going to work, you have to get those little different seeds together to make your laundry list of repairs at that point.

How much are you— are you physically documenting this on paper?

It's a great question. So, you know, a lot of people go back and forth on what they should do here. Should I do an iPad? Should I do paper? You know, I'm taking a bunch of pictures with my iPad and writing up a final invoice with it. But at that point, the iPad is done. Once I have a laundry list of repairs in my head of what needs to happen, I'm writing it on paper for the homeowner so they can see it and process it. And then if they want to talk about replacing at that point, an option is built on another piece of paper for different system options.

Okay. So let's talk— you, for full transparency, you showed me one of the samples, one of your sheets. It was very interesting. You really listed out every single thing that was wrong, it seemed like.

Correct.

With the system. And at that point, you don't— you don't give them options. You just say, hey, this is everything. Yeah, the repairs are and this is what it costs. And then you shut up, right?

That's correct.

And then you're— what you're hoping for, what from the homeowner?

Well, pretty much every homeowner is going to ask you at that point, well, what does a new one cost? Right, right. I don't tell homeowners to replace units. That really very rarely comes out of my mouth. Unless the homeowner just cannot read what we're putting down.

Right, right.

They'll ask, hey, how much is the new one?

Right.

And then at that point you say, okay, well, let me build you some options. I try and do it in front of the homeowner. That way you're not, you know, pulling some number out of the air at that point.

Yeah.

Doing a lot of stuff inside the homeowner's house with them, they're sweating with them at that point. Yeah. Is important.

So when you show that list of repairs, you said you took all these pictures. Do you take video or is it really just pictures?

Yeah. So like if the coil's leaking or something like that, you're showing them all the rust on the evaporator coil. If it's leaking, you're not going to see the leak unless it's real bad at that point. But showing them a video of, you know, hey, my leak detector going off in this spot multiple different times is a leak on this coil. So we definitely need to get that addressed.

Okay. As you're, as you're showing them, if they've got the list in front of them, you're showing them pictures. How do you explain to average Joe what all that means? Like, do you try?

So the homeowner really doesn't care, you know, I mean, You kind of got to dumb it down for them a little bit.

Right.

A lot of people give homeowners way too much info on certain stuff. I mean, I live by the KISS rule, keep it simple, stupid kind of thing, right? You know, I'll take the homeowner outside, show them, take them up in the attic if they can physically get there at that point. But hey, here's your major stuff that needs to be done. You know, I'm not telling the homeowner, hey, you have to re-insulate your copper lines outside or stuff like that. These are major issues that you found with the system. I'm not hitting them with, you know, little knickknack type stuff.

But do you explain what those parts do or you just say, hey, this is a lot of expensive stuff? That's— say it, they can see it.

Yeah.

So it's all about how you explain it to the homeowner, right? So if the coil is leaking, I don't necessarily say the unit, the coil is leaking. I said the coil is busted up in the attic at that point. It's a very important word when you say busted. The homeowner is like, oh, that sounds bad. Yeah, right. So it's all about how you explain it to the homeowner. Showing them the pictures of, you know, a blower motor leaking oil or stuff like that, fan motor dripping oil outside or a condenser coil being completely plugged up, showing them the pictures. But, you know, also if they're able to see it in person is another thing.

Yeah, for sure.

If you can see it, it makes it more real because homeowners, you know, nowadays they're always questioning, well, is that my house? So in a, in a video, like if I'm taking a picture of an evaporator coil, I'm being sure to show the attic access, or if they're standing right there with them, this is your deal. This is your golf clubs.

This is your—

this is your Marlin upstairs in the attic. That's, you know, right. Whatever. Right, right.

I always forget that in Texas you guys got to deal with that attic stuff. Where I'm from, it's in basements. You know, it's a little more— it's a little more comfortable.

It's 160 degrees up there most of the time. You—

you— I want to be sure to point out something that you do on that. That sheet says Aker Brothers on it.

It has our logo, which is great.

But what do you write at the top of it?

So a very important word or very important phrase. One thing that, you know, that picture that you saw doesn't— you can't tell, but the paper that that's written on is very heavy too, which is great. It's not a flimsy piece of paper. It's very heavy cardboard stock, which is nice. But up top it says failed inspection on it. You know, you're out there for a reason. The unit is broke. You know, you go get your car repaired anywhere, they're going to give you a You know, typically a multi-different colored thing of, hey, here's where everything looks on your car. If it passed inspection or failed inspection, hey, this thing failed inspection for these reasons. We should get that addressed. Right.

All right. So I go, okay, this clear, David? I see all these dollar signs. What's a new one cost? Yes. Now, you know, you went right into, you know, I like to build the options out from— do you talk about or ask the homeowner at that point what are certain things you value more, like energy efficiency or—

Yeah.

Comfort or there, you know, I other tip. I know your system is broken right now, but are there other spots that are hotter than others? You know, talk through your process at that point.

Yeah.

So I mean, all the stuff that you're bringing up is very important things to ask a homeowner at that point.

Yeah.

You'd be surprised how many times a homeowner will buy a unit off of just airflow issues in their home.

Right.

You know, two speed is going to help out. Variable speed is going to be even better at that point. Humidity issues. You know, we do have a lot of homes that are pure beam and Alice. So having something that can control humidity on the inside of the home so it doesn't feel as hot and sticky inside there when it's 100% humidity outside kind of thing.

So do you do a manual heat load calc or what do you do?

Yeah. So on every job that we install, it is important. It's not code to do it, but it protects us and it, you know, be sure that the unit— be sure that the unit's going to cool properly when it's 110 degrees outside. I mean, every single summer it feels like it's getting hotter and hotter. So sure, people want to keep their home comfortable when it's so hot outside. So that's another thing is to ask the homeowner, hey, what do you keep your thermostat at when it's 105 degrees outside? I keep it at 78 or I keep it at 68. Very important things to do at that point for sizing units because the BTU output of some air conditioners now is lower than what it was before.

Now, as you're doing these measurements and stuff, you have the homeowner along with you?

I mean, it's so hot, typically not.

Okay.

And I can do a heat load in about 8 minutes. So we have a real easy process at Baker Brothers for doing that. So it's not a long drawn out, you know, computer thing or anything.

I didn't know you use it as additional rapport building while you're doing it.

You got to think on a service call type deal like us, you know, the homeowner really just wants their stuff fixed. Yeah, right.

Yeah.

So on a free estimate or a flip or something like that, yeah, it's definitely something that you can use to show the homeowner, hey, You have a 3.5-ton unit now or a 4-ton unit that's not going to cool on a 105-degree day, you know, with the different standards that we have now. So here's why we're going to put a bigger system. Here's why we have to run a new copper line or high voltage line or something that goes along with the system at that point.

I want to back up a little bit and let's distinguish how your approach maybe differs between different types of leads. On a marketed lead, when you get to the house, do you approach it any differently? Is there anything you do differently? I know you're not, you know, it's not as hot, but, you know, which—

I think the only difference at that point would be me not carrying a tool bag inside.

Okay.

Right. So what I do works. So I just do the exact same thing every single day, pretty much on every single call. I mean, it's either I'm carrying a tool bag or I'm not carrying a tool bag. So just being real with people, you know, getting down on their level, you know, keeping it simple and going over options with them.

You won't evaluate their current system. You don't do that as a value add.

On a free estimate?

Yeah.

You know, some people say you got to be at a house for 2 or 3 hours. I mean, I'm pretty quick. It's 45 minutes to an hour max, and that's with diagnosing the unit or, you know, in and out kind of thing.

So on a, on a flip lead to you, what are maybe some things that great— your great service techs do to set you up for success?

Yeah. So first thing is going to be giving the homeowner a ballpark. Some people don't believe in giving the homeowner a ballpark when it comes to replacing the unit. It's important to do it because you're getting that homeowner to understand that this is going to be expensive. I mean, units are not cheap anymore. I mean, they used to be $6,000, $8,000. You're double that now. And so getting that objection handled to begin with is important. So that also goes back to another point of a paper option sheet, right? If you're going back and forth on an iPad at that point, right, you're not really giving the homeowner time to process all their options. When you have it on a piece of paper, they can see those 4 or 5 different options that you're giving them.

Yeah.

With a monthly payment and the price, and they're able to process it before you're even done talking.

Right.

So.

Right. Very good. Anything else that your techs do great to, you know, to help you be as successful as possible?

I mean, definitely diagnosing the unit right is very important. You know, we run a lot of free second opinions and stuff like that. So treating the homeowner right, You know, it definitely helps us whenever we walk into a home. But warranties is an important thing. The equipment that we install is some of the best equipment that you can go back with and that we can get the install done very, very quickly. And so which is another important thing.

Absolutely. All right. So before we get to the option part of it, you've sat down, you're writing the options in front of the homeowner, which is cool. What is it? Quiet time?

Are we talking about how it depends on the house? Right. I mean, my house is never quiet anymore with 3 kids, but, you know, every house Every house is different. Sure. I wouldn't necessarily say it's quiet time. It's definitely kind of a, you know, some homeowners process things different than others, right? I mean, some people are not happy that we're there or talking about this. Some are crying. But, you know, the people that are crying are hugging you after you're done and you're walking out, be able to put a unit in today for them kind of thing. So every house is different.

Do you, do you get into— do you have any kind of sales material at that point? Okay. So what does that look like?

Yeah. So, you know, some homeowners care about that stuff. Yeah, some homeowners don't. Right. You'll have the homeowners that want to know about how much is this going to save me on my electric bill? How quiet is this thing going to be? How, you know, what's the warranty and stuff like that? But yes, we have pictures of before and after, which is very important to have. Hey, this is the way your unit looks right now. This is the way it's going to look after we're done. Yeah. These are why these rooms are hot. You know, this is why you're having airflow issues in this part of the house. We can address that at that point. And showing them the before and after is very important too. So having, you know, some homeowners like to ask questions, well, how did you get to this price? Well, we have a breakdown roughly of, hey, here's what stuff costs. This is how we get to this price to take care of you.

Well, how? Okay, I'm intrigued by that. So is it like a sheet in the book?

Yeah, it's kind of like a pie chart. Oh, so it just shows, hey, this is how we—

So get to the percentages or something.

Kind of. So a rough estimate.

Yeah. Oh, that's interesting.

It's a good tool.

Yeah, very. So what else is in that, in that sales presentation booklet?

One of the most important things is having quotes from other companies in our marketplace.

Okay.

So probably have 60 quotes in there of other companies they could choose from to do business with. And anytime an objection comes up, it's all about money. It always is. So how you deal with that is important.

Okay.

I want to put pause on that because I'm going to get back to that. But let's take a step back. When you built out your options. Yeah. How many do you typically like to build?

Typically give 5.

5. What differentiates the most expensive to the least?

Yep. So you're going to have your single-speed equipment at that point. You're going to have 2-speed equipment, then you have variable-speed equipment. So homeowners typically choose middle-high just because you're going to have those homeowners that want to go bare bones. You have the people that want the Cadillac, but most people find their way in the middle. So the more options that you build, the better. I'm not there to tell the homeowner what to, what to install in their home. I'm there to tell them the benefits of why you should do this system versus this one and let the homeowner ultimately decide what they want to do.

In the galley, I had the luxury of seeing some pictures here. At the bottom, you also have like the builder grade.

You got a basic builder grade option. You know, we, we have—

And it's handwritten. I want to mention this, whereas the others are like little boxes.

So yeah, obviously we don't want homeowners to go there. Yeah, but we have units for everybody, which is important. I mean, DFW is a big marketplace and you can go to a multimillion-dollar house and they don't have any money. You can go to the, the brokest house in DFW and they have money underneath the mattress. So we're— we have units for everybody at Baker Brothers right now.

Another, I think, powerful differentiator is some of your guarantees you were telling me about. There's a lifetime guarantee on one of those. Maybe measure— or can you share with everyone what your guarantees are?

Yeah. So, I mean, your basic builder grade is going to have your 10-year parts, 1-year labor warranty. Your single speed, like Elite Series or so, step up above the basic builder grade, going to have a little bit better labor warranty on it. Then if you go 2-speed or kind of your middle of the road variable speed option, it's going to have probably a 5-year labor warranty. And then your top-tier stuff, maybe 10 years labor. And then even past that is going to have your lifetime, which when they told us that we're going to have a lifetime warranty at Baker Brothers, I was like, what do you mean lifetime? These things, they don't last forever.

Yeah.

So what do you mean? And no, it's a real thing, which is great. And our homeowners love it. I mean, you'd be surprised whenever somebody sends you a tenant-landlord call or something like that, you're like, they're not going to spend any money with us. But you'd be surprised how many people that are landlords are putting variable speed units in with lifetime warranties because they never have to worry about it ever again. Right, right.

So when you, when you show those, those options and hit those, but the cost, is it a finance price or is it full system price?

So on an option sheet is going to have a monthly payment option available for them. It's also going to have a job total. You know, you never know if the homeowner wants to finance it or not. My job is to give them options and let the homeowner decide what they want to do at that point. But it's always on there at this point.

You give them the price and you shut up.

Correct.

And you're just reading body language. Yeah.

Whoever talks first loses.

Okay. So, so all of a sudden they go, you know, they're starting to get that look.

They can— you can read that. Well, ultimately, when you flip that, that's a great thing about having it on a piece of paper. When you flip that piece of paper to them and push it in front of them, you're watching the homeowner and how they react. Some people lean forward, some people lean back. The ones that are leaning back, you're probably going to have to work on a little bit harder. The ones that are leaning forward, they want to know what this includes, what it's going to do for them at that point. So yeah, it also gives them time to process it.

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Store.

Let's say, well, Dave, this is— I thought these things were like $5,000.

Yeah, we hear that a lot. Right, right.

So what do you— what's your response to that?

Well, I mean, if you're getting that a lot, you're probably not doing what you need to do in a home at that point. I don't hear it a whole lot, but, you know, I do hear it from time to time. And so at that point, that's when you have to have tools to back up why this price is this way. Right. You called us out for a reason, probably because of our wonderful reviews online. We've been in business almost over, you know, 80 years at that point. So, you know, this is why— this is how we get to this price.

Right, right. And you're like, we're going to be here to service this equipment.

Right.

So if it's going to be a lifetime—

Yeah. So if I'm giving you a lifetime warranty, but we've been in business 5 years, does that make sense?

Right.

Probably not. So when you've been in business as long as we have, It's a, it's a good selling tool.

So, David, obviously there's going to be people that are like, I really should, you know, I grew up, my dad said, oh, I should always get 3 bids.

Yeah. And Bob, let me ask you, who are you going to call out besides us?

I don't know. I know Milestone's out there. Rescue's a good company.

Yeah.

You know, Swan's a good company. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So those are great companies to choose from. Would you like to see some of their pricing?

Do you, do you have that?

Of course I do. Yeah, so I have about 60 different quotes from other companies if you'd like to see them. That way it can help you make a decision. Okay, so go ahead and pull them out. It's in a red folder.

Wait a minute, you missed the sound effect. Yeah, I'm going to get this out.

I thought you were going to do it.

No, I'm going to let you do it. It's your sound effect.

When the homeowner says they want to do that and they want to see the other quotes, it's in the red folder at that point. And then I'll just go like a siren. I pull it out, open it out, and it's a stack. Quotes, and if I have those quotes from that, from those companies that they're listing out, it's an awesome selling tool to have.

Yeah.

Now, if you can't, you're not going to close every single call. Sure. If you're going to go ahead and get some other quotes, okay, you can get up to three, up to three quotes, and I'll give you $100 off for each quote that you get me. So up to $300. Okay. What that's going to do?

Okay.

Well, yeah. Why? Why are we going to do that? Well. I can take those quotes and use that on the next homeowner if that's going to help close the deal.

Yeah.

At that point.

Yeah.

Do you say that to them or you just say, I just want to collect the other quotes so we know what our competitors are doing?

No, I'll tell them, hey, this, this, this didn't work on you, but it might work on the next one.

Yeah.

So.

Okay, very good. All right. Well, what are, what are some other common objections? I know it always comes down to price, but how about, you know, nowadays with the internet, You can find about the price of equipment.

So it also goes back to price, right?

Sure.

So then at that point, you know, or I have a home warranty. Okay. We hear that a lot. A lot of homeowners moved to Dallas in the past couple of years, so they get a free home warranty when they purchase a home. At that point, I have multiple quotes in that, in that binder of home warranty companies. They'll jack the price up by a couple thousand dollars and then they're going to put their home warranty price on there. which is pretty much the same price as ours anyways. But they're getting a lot better equipment, a lot better install, a lot better, you know, after-the-sale type deal, you know, with us versus a home warranty company at that point.

Okay.

But typically it always comes down to price or, you know, maybe they didn't like the brand of the equipment that we're installing or something like that. You know, brand's not a huge deal to me. It doesn't matter what, what brand that we install. Yeah, but having it done the right way, you can put the most expensive equipment in a house the wrong way and it's not going to last as long as a cheap piece of equipment installed the best way possible.

Does it give you a chance to talk about your install team and how great it does?

So we've got an awesome install team here. We got over 20 crews at Baker Brothers, so we can take care of our homeowners very quick, which is very, very important. You know, it's a demand service now type deal. So yeah. Our crews are awesome.

So very good.

All right.

So trying to think if there's any other objections. That pretty much is all of them. All right, David, I like you. Let's, let's move forward. What, what do you do to make sure— obviously you want to get that equipment in as fast as you can.

Yeah.

But sometimes it might take—

sometimes it's a day or two.

Right, right. So, so what do you do to wrap up that, that kind of what I call post-close process to keep someone happily engaged and not calling somebody else? Maybe You know, maybe I can get someone out tomorrow instead.

Yeah. So, I mean, the tough part, right, if it's like a Saturday and you're out there on Saturday and they have to go Sunday with no air and we can put it in Monday at that point. Yeah. You know, if, if the homeowner is being bombarded with different AC companies that they're watching on, on TV, sure. You know, it's hard to combat that sometimes, but all you have to do is just try and be the best that you can be inside of a house and make yourself different than everybody else to make them not want to call anybody. At that point, very good.

You know, I forgot to ask you, and I want to backtrack. This is important. Are will you discount equipment much, or do you try not to do that?

No, I try not to do that. So I'm not a big discount closer.

Yeah.

You know, a lot of people use that as a selling tool. Yeah. You know, I don't. You really combat that with having other quotes from other companies.

Okay.

It all goes back to that.

Yeah.

I don't want to beat a dead horse.

No, that's right.

Having that. Is a huge tool.

Sure.

It's like, hey, here's where we are, here's where they are. You know, whether we're putting in a more efficient unit for $500 or $1,000 more, the homeowner is going to— they'll justify that. You know, they don't want to call somebody else. They want to use us. They want— they want to do business with me inside of a home. So, yeah.

So that's how you near— I should have followed up earlier about this. So you can go, hey, here's X company. I won't say all our friends, but yes. Baker Brothers. I mean, it's the same equipment. We're within a few hundred dollars.

Efficiency ratings are on there.

SEER rating. Yeah.

Warranty. It's all on there, which is great. So having quotes from other companies in your marketplace and people don't take advantage of that, which I don't understand. Even people on our team don't use it.

Yeah.

And I, you know, I don't understand why.

That's interesting. And I also should have reminded— we talked about financing briefly, but, you know, for some of that's, you know, it's a lot of money, David. Yeah. How much flex? What are, I guess, some popular financing packages that you use these days?

So just, you know, this is a weird past, probably 6 to 8 months for any type of financing anything. I've never had this scenario where you submit for a 6.9% or an 8.9% plan and it comes back at 15%. I've never had that in 13 years. So that's something new for us that we've kind of had to navigate a little bit, right? Because that's also something that's not fun either. It's like, hey, If you, if you talk somebody up to a variable speed unit and it's $240 a month for their home or something like that, and then they get a counteroffer and it's $400, how are you going to combat that?

Right.

So it's a weird time when it comes to financing, but we do a longer-term payment plan for homeowners. We try and stay away from the 0%. We have some 0% stuff available that homeowners can use, but it hurts us as a company to use that stuff. So We try and stay away from it as much as possible. You know, if a homeowner is dead set on getting their ducts cleaned or something like that, you know, if they're spending over $20,000, we can probably toss that in at that point. But I'm not going to offer a $2,000 discount just to sign right now because I feel comfortable enough with the pricing that I have and that Baker Brothers has come up with that if I don't get that job right now, we're going to get it on a follow-up.

Right. Okay. Now, what happens if someone gets bounced on their financing? They can't get financed. What's, what's your follow-up or what do you do in that circumstance?

So that's always an awkward conversation, right? You're sitting there and the homeowner's like, yeah, let's go ahead and get this stuff taken care of. And then they get denied credit, which is not fun. You know, at that point, your only saving grace is going to be if they have a cosigner at that point, if they're going to pay by check or credit card, you know, people that have a credit issue probably already know that they have a credit issue. So if they get approved, great. If not, they might have another course of action there. Or it's, hey, let's just go ahead and repair this unit for you. You know, there's been scenarios where a homeowner has no money, right? That's why they're not repairing the unit. Well, let's go ahead and do these minimal repairs and maybe how much can you afford? You know, $200, $300 or what are we talking here? We've done stuff at no charge to take care of our homeowners, you know, If, if feasible.

Sure. Sure. Now, I know you closed at a pretty high percentage.

It is high.

Well, what do you close at?

So on a demand service call, it's going to be around 90%. So that's collecting something on that call.

Right.

So that's not, you know, that's not a free estimate close or a flip close at that point, but that's collecting something other than the service fee at that point.

How are you doing marketing? You know, off the top of your head?

So I'd probably say on free estimates and stuff is probably around 40% would be my guess. Flips is probably going to be around 70 or so.

So. All right. So we talked about what happens, how you kind of pitch those. Now there's every once in a while someone's going to be no, you know. Yeah.

This one thing, you're not going to close everything.

Right, right. So what's your, your post— what's your process for after that follow-up?

Yeah. So the first— well, the first process while you're there is just if they are going to say no, you kind of know that to begin with. So making yourself different than the other person. One thing that's big for me is if they don't buy, Like I had a lady last week where she was going to get some other quotes. Well, the next day I texted her and said, hey, I know you're going to get some other quotes here, but we would love to take care of your home for you. Stuff like that to make yourself different helps out.

Okay. How many times will you follow up before you go, all right, this is not like—

if they don't answer at all? I mean, probably 3 and then that's going to be it. I mean, most of the time if I don't close it on site, you know, I'm already running 6 to 8 calls a day to begin with.

Right.

It's a lot to keep track of sometimes.

Sure. How do you, how do you keep mindful of those? You just write them down. You like every Friday you're—

So that's the great thing about our iPad, right, is we, yeah, we can see the history of the calls that we've ran. So yeah, I mean, if you have some downtime on lunch or something like that, you can go back and see info. You can text the homeowner at that point and say, hey, have y'all made a decision yet? You have any questions, anything like that to help you make a decision.

So very good.

All right.

Kind of wrapping up. What, what's some advice that you would give to young technicians that are hungry like yourself? Maybe think of yourself 15 years ago. What's something maybe you wish you would have known back then that you know now?

So just be driven, you know, don't be afraid to work and show up. You know, my wife is amazing. She had to put up with a lot whenever I was young in this. I'm still young, but Early in this industry, you know, I mean, I had some real long days and, you know, having her by my side was the best thing there. But don't be afraid to show up. I mean, I don't technically have to work weekends, but I'm there when they need me to. You know, when it's busy, I'm here, right? If they need help, I'm there. Other people, you know, they might be like, oh, well, you know, man, it was a long week. I kind of just want to chill out at the house. You'll be on the couch anyways watching whatever. So might as well go make some money, right? But show up. So very good.

Why do you think people ultimately buy from you?

Because they like me. So, you know, people buy from who they like. There's, there's not necessarily a secret sauce out there, right?

Correct.

It's, you know, you're the person in the home. Yes, you're representing the company at that point, but people buy from who they like.

Very good. Very good. And I guess the last question I have is what motivates you to, you know, to take those weekend calls?

Yeah.

to perform at a high level, you know, day in, day out? What drives you?

That'd be my family. So I got 3 kids. They're the number one salesmen in the nation, I'll tell you that. Just because, you know, showing pictures and stuff like that, you know, homeowners love that at that point. But it's all family. I mean, if you don't have family, what else do you have? Yeah, right. So money drives me too. That's a big factor.

Sure.

You know, some people are Okay with making X amount. They'll hit that number and then they just, you know, cruise.

Yeah, right.

That's not me. So it doesn't matter how big my paycheck is for that week, right? I'm there on Sunday or there on Saturday working on that next following week to get that, get that ball rolling.

So, so you're watching your number. How many times are you checking your numbers? In what way? Just like, see where am I in total sales for this month and that? Keeping a close eye on that?

Very much so. So every Thursday we have a meeting and they show us what our closing percentage is, how many calls we ran, where we're at versus other people on the team. Yeah. You know, that's ultimately the, you know, that's the— what's the word I'm looking for? Your number is everything. Yeah, right. So that's how you grade yourself, you know, on how you're doing. But no, I'm watching every single month. Versus last, you know, last year or the year before prior. I have everything written down in a notebook of, hey, here's where you're at, here's what you did the month before. I'm down about $100,000 this year and it's eating me alive because I don't like to lose.

Sure, sure. So you're just definitely internally motivated.

You're very driven.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, David, thank you so much for your time today and all the great information you shared.

Yeah.

Appreciate it.

Thanks for having me. Absolutely.

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