Mike Minutes Mastermind 03/09/2025

Augusta Nation welcome back to Mike Minutes Mastermind. It's been a while. The longest hiatus we have ever taken in the Mike Minutes Mastermind ever recorded in history. Thank you for giving me the time away last week. We are actually still flying back. Flight got canceled, delays. We'll be in the airport all night. So it's going to be great.

But we'll jump right into it. There was there's 19 questions. So marathon Monday is going to become Marathon Sunday but you will probably watch this on Monday so we'll just consider it marathon Monday.

Again. Appreciate you giving me the time. Last week is the first time I've ever not done the Mike Man's Mastermind and I was planning on doing it but many of your feedback was don't do it. So we, you know, we live and learn. So let's go ahead and jump right into questions. Good stuff. First one up is from on our Google business profiles under business information there's a tab that says contact where we can put in a phone number. If we fill that in with our locations phone number, will command center respond? Would it go into the abyss and do nothing? Do you recommend having this off? No, I would absolutely put your locations phone number in there. 100 it will go to command center. If you ever see a different number it's usually Google local services. They create a random generated number.

If you are using them it has nothing to do with command center because they record the phone line. But yes 100% in your business listing I would be putting a phone number.

Next one up. Shamarko if you had to come up with a good better best model for property clamps you send to customers whenever they ask for a property estimate, how would you structure it? I would structure their the better model as always of what they asked for. So if you actually talk to them I would always say okay, these are the things they asked for. That was my better. I would then scale it back to the most.

Like if you're doing drive bys it's easier to be like hey this is my good. This is my better. This is my best. And this is what includes when if you're going to meet people in person or you talk to them when you're doing a drive by and you knock on the door, you talk to them real quick. I, I like to ask like what's the most important thing to you on the, on the project. Because if they say if they tell you that like well the bush in the front yard are the main thing. I just need to look good in front of neighbors. But please give me, you know, bids for this other stuff. That's when I'm gonna be like, okay, good. My better model is gonna be everything that they specifically asked for. My best model is gonna be probably installing mulch or something next level. Good is gonna be the thing that they bare bones wanted done. So it's a budget conscious. I can always downsell into that.

So that is the advantage of like even when I do drive bys I knock on the door. Mostly because I don't like walking someone's backyard without them knowing that I'm on the property. But secondly is the ability to move. Like hey, what's most important to you? It's obvious to property cleanup we're going to be looking at all these other options. I'll give you several different options in your estimate. So that's probably what I would be doing. Most people just give the estimate to the center like what they ask for. But I would ideally like to break it like, you know, I wouldn't even call it good, better, best. I would just say like optional, right? So I would be optional items for the better and the best model. And then I have my good and knowing what they need and done. So typically on a property cleanup it is going to be weeds and bush trimming and those are the main things they want done. That's probably going to be the equivalent of my first line item. Even though I don't call it good, better, best. I don't like using that terminal. I would rather just be like the base and then optional add ons. That's how I look at it. Eric, Largo, Florida what would you say is too low of an amount on unpaid invoice to submit to collections? I would submit it. When you've done everything possible. Empire still only takes a percentage. So it's not like it's too small. It's just that like I'm just. Because it's my scene, you know, it's difficult for them to make sense of if they're going to make $20 for them to like even do a bunch of postage and sending stuff to the bureau, et cetera. So. But I would submit it because it's a percentage, right? And you can just tap the fees onto it as well so that they actually have to pay for the extra fees. Mr. Anonymous, is there another SOP for submitting a max AI call in review other than the form for feedback? The form requires a call file. Should we be reaching out to CC to get the call file and then fill the form? Get the form filled out.

I think you might be. You might be asked, you might be submitting feedback on maps instead of wanting a call back to you. Please review other than the form.

I'm not looking at it, so I don't know. I would say it's probably going to be like they're looking for like a screenshot so they know what you're talking about. So if you have a screenshot of like the visit that was created or something like that, just attach that. But I could be completely wrong here if it say for example, it requires an audio file. I don't think it does. Liz will watch this tomorrow though, and just make sure that's a simpler process if needs be. I don't think you have to attach an audio file though. I think what they're looking for is some sort of file to so they know what you're talking about when you ask for a specific call to be mentioned. So they got screenshot of like the to do they made for you or call notes or something like that. But I could be wrong there.

Morristown. If my intention is to raise prices on weekly services and laundries by around 15% for existing clients, should I send a personalized letter, mention the new prices before we start doing cleanups, or is there a better strategy to accomplish this? We did not wait in 24. Normally we just email saying popular dates and if anyone wants to change anything, then we will keep doing the usual services. Thanks, Anthony. So again, this comes down to are you at capacity? If you're at capacity, you raise prices, period. Their timing is not important factor. If you're like, well, I'm close to capacity, I would probably get them started. I would raise prices in a month or two. Once you're in the middle of spring rush, you're actually starting to exceed capacity. Leads are pulling in and if you lost a bunch of customers, you know you'll be able to refill it very quickly. Your confidence level in your price. Like people overthink price increases all the time because it's a function of you will be forced to raise prices because if you don't, you are going to require people to start working on the weekend. And so if that's not the truth, then you aren't at capacity. And if you're not at capacity, I would just be grown to capacity until you're literally forced to raise prices and then be like, literally, I don't care if people leave. I don't care if it's the right time or if it's the right Weather I need to raise prices so I don't have like otherwise I'm going have to turn off leads. So I would say if you're just like I'm not necessarily there but I do need to increase profits a little bit then I would time it a little bit. Timing becomes a little more important. But again remember like all your profits are seen between where now and capacity. And so because you're already paying your fixed expenses and your net profit margin becomes your gross profit margin becomes your net profit margin. And so we've talked about that in length. So I, I would say like if you really needed to time it and you're like hey I'm not ecobast but I need to make more profit. Like I don't understand that's another reason to raise prices. Even if it's not maximizing profit, you need to get more profit because you might be in a tight spot. So if that's the case then I would time I'd wait a month or two. Industry rush when leads are pouring in you'll have more confidence because you'll know that there's a 10:15 new customer signing up a week and if you lost 10 or 1520 customers on the price increase, you're going to get them back in a couple weeks. So if you had to time it that's what I would do. But again I am much more looking at are you at capacity and if so I'm raising prices. Period. End of story.

Delta or Sorry Matt Videla from Delta how much does contract length? 2 to 3 years versus 1 year impact company value. Oh, this is a good question. Our HOA commercial businesses all use one year contracts that we renew annually with price increases. I started offering two year contracts to select clients and I'm considering expanding this to all possibly even 3 year contract options with built in annual price increases 4% per year. I see the upside for stability and valuation are the downside significant downsides. The main risk seems to be stuck in a bad contract. But since our agreement currently allow either party to cancel a 30 day notice for any reason that feels low risk. So this is what I was thinking would happen. Would be smart to adjust our 30 day cancellation clause so clients can only cancel for cause breach of contract rather than at will. We love your thoughts on how much. Okay, this is great. How much length contract valuation? If you're looking for valuation, yes a longer term is helpful but by putting the 30 day cancellation clause in there you nullified the contract so it would therefore have no impact on the Valuation whatsoever. What it does do, but when you it's required to three new contracts, it would add more friction to the sales process because they have a bigger amount of risk now. But by having a 30 day cancellation clause, you're really going once a month, let's be honest.

So you know it won't, it will not impact your valuation if you're allowing the people to cancel a 30 days notice because you don't actually have a concept. You have a.

Work order agreement or a.

A scope of work that you perform on a monthly basis for a 12 month period of time and you get paid on a level billing contract. But unless someone, unless you take that 30 day clause out, it's not going to impact your valuation. And sometimes people buy a company, especially if you're looking at selling to a sophisticated buyer, they want to raise prices right away and they actually can look at contracts that are locking you in as a negative thing. So I would not make a determination based on length of product, simply based on valuation unless you knew the shadow of a doubt you were selling, you had a potential buyer in mind and they asked that you do that. That's the only time I would probably like we're going to change. I just don't think there's a lot of value if you're having a 30 day cancellation clause. It has hardly any value. So whether adjusting the cancellation terms is a good move. I think that if you're going to have two or three year contracts, there's no point in doing that unless you do get rid of the 30 day cancellation clause where it's only breach of contract. Because right now it's like, hey, we have this, it's like.

We'Re really long term but you can cancel anytime. It makes no sense. And so you're going to have friction by having it longer, but then they can bail on you anytime. And then you're also stuck with a 4% increase which if you hit capacity you might be raising your residential by 15, 20% twice in that period of time, in a three year period. So yeah, you, so I would, yeah, I just want to see huge value in that because I see you hit capacity now. It's a low price option, low margin option where you're able to raise price on everything else, but not this one contract. So you could eat for two years where otherwise would have been. Like if you have a three year contract and you wanted to raise prices next year and you do every other contract, every other residential customer, now all of a sudden you're eating technically 15% margin because you couldn't raise price in that one contract. So I don't think it's a bad thing. I would only do this personally if I took out the 30 day clause and I had a buyer. If you're actually trying to find the valuation that specifically like wanted that as reassurance. So I'm like, hey, we're looking to sell. Great. Here are the terms, here's some options like if you see value in this, you can increase the value. We will, we will charge extra in the acquisition if we get these all extended two and three year terms over the next three months or something like that. But again if they're a decent negotiate, they're going to look at the 30 day clause like oh, this isn't worth anything.

Matt Delta again, what do you think of Trump's gold car idea with proper vetting the applicants I think has potential. As a Canadian who might want to live in the US someday, own real estate, run a business and eventually retire or at least snowbird there, what do you think is the best path to make that happen? One long term idea considers opening best location in the US or managing my Canadian locations remotely from there. This idea, nothing I've put much time and energy into. Thanks Mike. Thank you. There's been a couple people have used E2 visa with.

Because basically material investment inside the United States you can get in and then go through the process while you have the businesses. So we do get involved sometimes with like writing to immigration attorneys etc. Explaining their investments. We usually go through it with them so we can help with this process. I did it a couple times, we've done it a few times now with potential and I think a couple of actually joined using this program with the E2 visa. The new Trump card I think is going to be much more for very large firms, large companies that are trying to retain AI talent.

You're only willing to pay $5 million for an employee up front just to get them here if they are a strategic risk to stay in China, for example. So.

AI, for example was able to do what they did is like a lot of their, their top AI folks came from the US schools but because they are visa, they couldn't get a visa. They have to go back to China because what they're going to do over there, they're going to do the same research and they're going to create innovative stuff. And so I do think it's a way for the best of the best talent to be retained. You know, whether it's 5 million. You know, I think it'd be cool to have like different tiers. So for example, like 5 million would be like, hey, you get expedited to the process, you go through the same vetting and then have like a million and then have like 500,000. By 500,000 would start to become like where someone could realistically, you know, use that to start, say a executive model or like executive model, you know, 5, 800,000 of required investment upfront. I'm thinking that also that's like the entry level for say like a, a small franchise, like a coffee shop or a gym, like any, about a million dollars to start one. So like if you have a million dollars, that starts to make some sense. I think you can increase the amount of people who use it, but then it dilutes the $5 million one. So like they have to do that very strategically.

And you know, there's, you know, when people would say, you know, whether or not someone should be able to get the money, but it's just a matter of like, is it a win for the US they're going to, that person will come in, they're going to pay taxes if they have $5 million, they're fighting to create jobs or they're going to be producing IP for a US company. So I think it's a good idea. Let's just see if it's used. Things are moving so quickly. I think people are going to wait a while, in my opinion on a lot of these things, even once they're institute, even with the tariffs. I see a lot of the people I'm talking to that are manufactured just waiting because they're like the tariffs are moving around so quickly. Let's just wait and see how things settle down. I think it'll probably happen even with this program, but I would love to see this instituted. I think, I think it would be a win for IP of the United States economic productivity. And you know, if they actually took the $5 million and go towards the debt, I'd be having one. Jason Murphy. I'd like to keep equity shares to employees on top of the current profit sharing. Can you suggest any good resources, something like this up? There's a couple, couple options. You can do an esop. So employee stock options program. You could do A. If you really want to do all, you could create. Instead of becoming S Corp, you actually become a B corp. So I'm just throwing these out here, Jason, because you can do research on these things. There's pros and there's cons. Keep in mind, sometimes when you give people ownership of something, they do feel entitled. So if you made the program, what you want to be careful of is people that make. No, that's not mine. No, you can take it. Thank you so much. No, thank you.

I would really be careful. The reason I like profit sharing and I'd rather index highly on that is because it can get messy when people leave the company. If I've done some sort of like stock ownership.

And it can get messy when I, if I ever want to get sell. It can get messy on a lot of different things. And so I personally like, I like doing, only doing stock options if I know there's gonna be a liquidity event like you're gonna sell. So if I recall correctly Jason, you're trying to build this for your sons. So as long as like that is, is pretty ironed out and how you want that transition to go, whether it be handing it to them or just needs to run and produce cash flow for them, that that becomes a different topic because then stock options could be, you know, meaningful. So for example, what you could do, you can have like profit sharing merges into an ESOP.

And or you do a B, a B corporation and you're just an employee of the corporation that gets, you know, a piece of the company. So look into those two different ways. This is very, very much top of mind when we're talking seven figure club in July. In terms of like ways to. This is a tax in my opinion. It's a tax thing. It is like altruistic is what I want to do people. And there's also a massive tax equation that comes into play here. And so I would look into those two different methods. ESOP stands for Employee Stock Options Program.

Number 9. Kyle Carvin from Oklahoma. We are looking to grow as fast as possible this spring to $500,000. What does the process look like for the crew getting PPP if they are on a two band truck? And it is very difficult, non possibly PPP due to artificial low price and get our foot in the door. My concern is that we will not be able to hit on a two man truck anyway. On top of that the prices are so low it would be a stretch to make 250 on a solar route until they are raised. I want the fleet to be able to make PPP but not sure how to go about this and are in gross mode. You have a higher percentage like 40, 50% in spring until we raise prices in June. For conducts we currently pay 33% but we will be raising to 40% April to June. Just not sure if it will be enough to compensate the inefficiency of the two MAN three and low prices. So don't overthink this. Just know you can only go up, you can't go down. What I mean by that is this. You tell your crew we're going to 40%. We don't make money at 40%. We make it. We start to make money at 33% like we've done in the past. However, when we start route, this new location, etc. We're back in growth. I don't want that to impact all of your paychecks. So keep you at 4%. Now you're going to watch this like a hop the first several days of spin rush because you can always get a 42. You can always go to 45. I would just, I would warn against going to 50. And then all of a sudden they're making crazy amounts of money and you're kind of stuck. You can't go to bring. You can't walk this back. I would start at 40. Explain that to the crew. And then if you're gonna go up, go incrementally. But you can do it relatively quickly because you can watch the first three to five days of the spring rush, you're like, okay, half the crew is above base pay. I think we're going to be okay. If one of 10 people are above base pay, now you got a problem because now you're going to lose the crew and you can just watch the daily reports. I wouldn't even wait for the first paycheck to make the adjustments. I would just like, hey, I've been watching. It's still like, I want, I want everyone here to make above base pay. I want everyone to make money. We're going to move to 42%. And they just got to know that it's coming down to 32% as soon as you raise prices. As long as they know that and you're on the same page, but everything fine.

Question number 10, Mr. Anonymous. At some point this year, do you see a feature being added to coflat where it asks several questions, refill them in, and sent? Instead of going through ccc, at some point, do you see a feature being added? Coflat will ask several questions, we fill them in and then it's sent instead of it going through cc. I'm guessing you're talking about estimates. And so there's several things that would need to be done before this.

Right now, the Parts of estimates, that's me going out later this week is going to be customer side, like the customer what they see in the customer portal down the road. When we start talking about estimate components, etc. That's going to be much more where eventually we can cut commands that are out of this. There's a couple things that they do though that I actually like, like attaching the video that is probably somewhat manual right now. You can actually attach it to the video to the email also. When I look at the incremental cost of them doing it right now, it's still so quick compared to even you clicking through and doing like a drop.

Through it. So even if you save two minutes and takes them four minutes, the time of the estimator is so valuable. So right now it does pay me because I think that we can absolutely cut this stuff out eventually.

And just increase the speed essentially. But right now I still like the video being attached to every single estimate email. I like the PDF being attached on there and there's not. It's super smooth when the mobile app does like quickly do drop downs of all the things you want, pull it in, pooling metric template, et cetera. So it's definitely my horizon though it's definitely our roadmap this year I would say, not in the next year. I'd say that this is something that we start actually thinking about like how do we actually cut this whole step out of the process.

Mr. Anonymous, is web chat on the website worth the money? Do you have, do you have any additional thoughts on this? I do have it at my locations. If I remember correctly when I was doing the numbers the other day, the average location spends around 50 to $100 per month on chat. I've seen some as high as 200 when they're getting a lot of leads through it.

The nice thing about web chat.

People.

The phone call, email, web forms, they can Facebook message you. It's just giving them another outlet and some people really like it. So the challenging part is it does use about 50 to 100% longer than a phone call because you ain't way slower at typing than communicating. We can helps. Uh oh, did I lose?

Okay, well hoping you're good. It does cost a little more than phone calls. I think that's usually the first thing people will cut out in terms of the web chat if they are trying to save some money. I do have it on my locations. I do see the value.

It's usually worth it every month. Okay, $150. Oh man, I froze Sorry guys.

On wi fi.

But.

Let'S say you got two. Two new customers. Audio quality very bad. Me. I'm sorry, one second. Check 1, 2, 2. Okay, sorry everyone, we didn't hear anything you're saying. Audio quality is bad.

Not sp.

Okay. It is the key to. I'm going to do my wi fi hotspot.

And then.

And we're back. Okay. I'm on my hot spot. Don't know if it'll be any better. Let's give it a shot. Sorry about that.

Oh no, you're good. Thanks for letting me know.

Okay, where are we at? Where are we at? Where are we at?

Next question is from do you have any data on max phone call improvement in the last 12 months? Is it improving? So we actually on something I'll have a bunch of.

We actually switching the model.

AI we need to update the model Matt is using to a different model and inside ChatGPT is very OpenAI's model upgrades, you know rebuilding actually the entire so yeah I've really tightened down maps in terms of when you can take calls and leverage. We have a lot more trained better staff at.

Once.

So there's no reason to have matching Android phone if they're available. So there's several capacity.

So I will.

In half or something like that. Okay, next question though.

Misgracious.

Okay I'm switch back to the regular and if not.

I can't join that wifi network.