Mike Andes leads a short mastermind session (Mar 30, 2023) covering practical local-marketing tactics and internal compensation design. He recommends instant-quote door hangers (with planned video capture via spy glasses) as a low-cost lead channel and discusses nuances of measuring digital ads versus offline exposure. In a Q&A he explains GM pay: salaried role not tied to an eight-hour day, modest base pay with strong upside via profit-sharing (up to ~25% and structured so second-year salary is based on first-year revenue), and that a committed GM could reach ~6-figure pay by year three. He also reviews a Performance Max/Google campaign (CTR, ~$1+ CPC) and shares a hypothesis to bid competitors' names rather than only the business name to better attribute reach and avoid skewed tracking.
Chapters
Hey everyone, Happy Friday. Let's go and get started.
Didn't have anything specific in terms of announcements. Make sure if you have not. Yesterday Chuck posted a four or five minute video in the Facebook group highly, highly, highly recommend talking about door hangers as well as his.
Results over the past several days from doing instant quote door hangers. And then this morning he posted sorry, I'm trying to post this on Facebook.
He also posted what they actually look like and some of the results that he was getting. So definitely recommend you do that. It's gonna be great because in June when I go and start my location, we actually got these spy glasses. They're great, they're Ray Bans. You can never tell that they are video cameras. And I'm gonna do instant go door hangers and you'll be able to see the whole process. And I actually think Chuck has been recording some of them himself. Not with the spy glasses, but so I'm looking forward to get that to the media team and then share that with everyone. But it works, especially if you do not have marketing budget to spend on, on ads. It's, it's just a matter of pounding the pavement and doing the work. And so yeah, definitely recommend watching that video in the Facebook group from yesterday. And then he posted some of the result pages today. So highly, highly recommend. All right, let's jump into.
Questions. See me for you, person. Nobody.
When being a gm, is your salary based on an eight hour day? If, if you're working more than eight hour day, is there other compensation? You know, so it's salary, it has nothing to do with an eight hour day. I expect them to run the location well. And if that takes them six or seven hours a day and they are making massive amounts of profits and everything is going smoothly and their team is happy, I'm happy. If that takes them 10 to 12, 14 hours a day at times during spring rush, so be it. I expect them to run the location as their own. And the compensation is very much dictated that way. And that is, it's not a great salary. It's not like you're making gobs of money, usually getting maybe a 20% increase than if you worked out in the field. But if someone stays their second, third, fourth year, it gets very attractive as that location becomes profitable because they're literally getting a quarter of all the profits as that location grows, plus their salary.
And so it really is much more of like thinking like an owner because a gm, like if you start your own location, you're not going to make money Usually the first year or two and there's like take home pay. The gm, they make a salary which is nice, but it's not a lot. It is all upside is based on profitability. And so we've built even their second year's salary is now based on their first year's revenue. So we really gear that for growth and if someone wants to go for it, they can make pretty good. I would say that someone could hit six figures as a, as a GM in their third year. Again assuming that the first year they crush it in terms of growth. Second years they really stabilize and start making it more profitable. And third they just really start to suck on profits and go all profit mode. Absolutely could be making 100k a year.
So assuming that they started the location not themselves because that's when they get 25% if you bring a new GM into an existing location, I don't recommend giving them 25% of profit sharing. The sacrifice that first year or two where they're not really making a lot is why then in year three, four and beyond they'll make a lot more. And so I'm really looking forward to being able to have it have down the road a GM that has been a GM for a few years and be able to actually testify to that. Because Most of my GMs have either gone and started their own location or like I took Chuck, obviously made him a regional manager and coach and he still participates in profit sharing but he's not a GM necessarily. So I'm looking forward to that. That someone's like, hey, I don't really want to own my location. I want to just keep growing this one. I'm happy, make it really profitable and make you know, 90, 100, 120k a year. And that's, that's I think very possible with someone that's willing to stick around for three to five years.
Logan from grand island attaches a screenshot of the Max campaign. Done. According to the done view ads, currently the budget is 50 per day. I just set up the search campaign. It'll probably put these split spend around $50 as well. How do these numbers look? Any advice to really grow in the spring? Thanks. Okay, so this is a Met performance Max.
So you're paying about.
A dollar per click? Well yeah, just over a dollar per click. Your click through rate's pretty good. The fact that that's in your market during March, that's not bad because I bet during April this will go to 2% simply because your market because as spring rush Starts kicking into high gear. So this is a very small like a month is a relatively small sample size in terms of comparative, like comparative against February or April, for example. But and it's also like, you know, ultimately comes down to.
What number of leads you have coming in. And that's why it's just.
One of those things where I see a lot of times, especially with Google, Google gets the credit for leads when really someone saw your truck for the first time or they seen your truck a hundred times in their neighborhood and they just decided to give you a call. But they searched you on Google, they clicked on the ad.
And so that's why I like performance Max if you have the money for it because it's reaching outside of people that are just searching like Augusta Lawn Care in your market. Right. It's funny, this is to go very contrarian thought. I know you guys probably remember at conference Tommy Mellow said like you definitely need to have in your keywords your business name.
I'm more proponent of putting your competitors names in because if they're putting in my name, I know I'm going to show up in native already. Also, it's going to really murky the waters because if someone ever sees my trucks or my uniforms or a sign on the side of the road, they're just going to search it and they're going to click my ad. And so it's just going to be harder for me to track again to maximize reach. Yes. You would run ads against your own name. I'd be very interested. I haven't done this. This is me thinking off the top of my head. I'd be very interested to see what happens when you actually exclude your business name so you can put exclusion keywords in. I'd be interested to see what happens.
Because obviously your click, your click through rate will go down. Obviously your cost per click will go up. But the thing is, if someone's searching for Augusta Lawn Care and then they're just clicking my ad, they're already trying to get to Augusta Lawn Care. Like yet like by if I just. For example, if you run a campaign just targeting your Augusta lawn care. Yeah. Your click through rate's gonna be high. Everyone's looking for it. They literally searched it. They're going to click on your ad. Yes, your, your cost per click is going to be very, very low. Why? Because everyone that came to that page is looking for Augusta Lawn Care. So I don't know, I feel it kind of murkies the waters when you put them all together again. This is a hypothesis I haven't tested that. That's just me thinking out loud.
Because what we struggle with the most is the fact that someone sees a truck, they Google, they see ad, they click ad. And then there's like, oh, great, there's a click from Google. There's a lead from Google. When in reality, they simply saw your trucks. They saw your. Saw your, your guys working. They saw a door hanger that you left two weeks ago, but they just saw it and they just quickly, oh, let me search. Augusta Lawn Care. And we attribute, because we see that click to Google, and Google likes that because it shows them doing better for you as an advertiser, when in reality, it was the door hanger, it was your trucks. And so that's why it's. It's consistency gets rewarded when it comes to advertising, because good advertising done consistently leads to brand. And brand awareness is what leads to the lowest customer acquisition cost. Right? So, all right, guys, have a fantastic, A fabulous Friday. And no, today's not Friday. It's Thursday. I don't know why I keep thinking it's Friday. Anyways, happy Thursday. I'll see you tomorrow on a fabulous Friday. All right, guys, take care.
