Mike Minutes Mastermind 10/03/2024

Hello, Gusta Nation. Welcome to another Mike Minutes Mastermind. Let's get this thing kicked off. Yesterday I did post a email.

For everyone as kind of a recap of a lot of the announcements have been going out the past few weeks.

So check that out. If you do not get the email, keep in mind that if you've taken my advice about.

Putting.

Filters on your email with the word unsubscribe, that it will probably end up in your archived folder. This happens to me all the time. Like, I haven't got my email and I check my aircraft folder because I have a filter. Anything that says the word unsubscribe goes in there. So, yes, occasionally I will miss something important.

Okay, that's cool. I can move this around now. Oh, nice. Okay, cool. Let's jump in.

Here we go. Whoa, I gotta share it still. Okay, moving things around on me.

Cool. Now I just gotta move that.

Sweet. Okay, first question. Whoa. I don't want that. Goodness. What are we doing, people?

All right, now we're talking. Okay, let's try this again.

All right, first question is from Hutch. Connor Hutchinson, Tips for helping team members open to the idea of achieving more. I believe most people have way more potential than they know. Yesterday we drove by past some very large homes. I asked, what do you think they do to afford that house? My co worker responded, probably scam and rip people off. Bummed me out because this team member has a lot of potential and could make a good living. This is not the first time I've heard things like this from team members, so curious how you handle it. I do believe money solves a lot of problems, or at least helps solve them.

Yeah, it's funny. It's like.

Okay, so you came, you come to a job to make money, and the people that have made money, we somehow demonize.

It's a weird thing. It really is strange. It's like, you need this. You need money to survive, the same way you need oxygen to survive. You essentially need money to survive in this society. And so it'll get you close to your dreams and your goals. And so I think the only thing that I've seen work is aligning making money with their dreams and goals that they currently don't think of anything to do with making money. So, for example, at the local shop back when I would go there for their morning meetings and we talk about this sort of stuff, I wouldn't really talk a lot about money right off the rip, but what I do is like, hey, what's your goals and dreams so like, first and foremost, like, if you don't have goals and dreams, you're aimlessly steering through life. And you basically can't help these people because they don't know what good looks like. They don't know if they've made any progress. And they might have been doing a ton of quote unquote work and going in circles. So, like, they need to have some sort of North Star. So the first thing is like, do you have goals, dreams, visions, targets, etc. Then it's like, how do I get them to understand that by making more money? The chances, like the likelihood of them hitting those are higher and the speed at which they will do so is also faster. Because a lot of times the reason people have this notion is because they've either been taught that money's bad, they feel like money is unobtainable for them, or they don't somehow attribute their goals and dreams. And making money is like very synonymous. So that would be like my two cents. But you really can't, you know, I'd say, like, lead by example, you know, live a life that eventually, like, hey, it's worth working hard enough to achieve what they've done.

But some people can't connect the dots. Like, I wouldn't. You can only do so much. And some people, they, they have certain capacities. Like, I'm, I'm okay with like 1 out of 20 team members, like, sinking their teeth in and taking advantage of stuff. I realize the other 19 will walk by it and that stinks. And I want to see them reach their full potential and make more money and, you know, reach their goals and dreams. But like, most people don't just stats, unfortunately. So I just do my best to like, A, live it in front of them, B, talk about money and make it clear like your goals and dreams will happen faster and more with more confidence if you make money. It's probably all I really do. Garrett from Glendale, Colorado. I've sent out 20 custom loom video price downs for winter services, each with custom thumbnails, titles, imessage, text and email. See attached. Half were sent about 12 hours ago. Half were sent.

Out four hours ago. So literally I have literally zero seconds of watch time. No one has even clicked on these custom videos. CTR equals zero click through rate. I have four clients respond that they didn't want snow and I say they wanted but didn't click on the video. I spent the majority of the last couple days customizing winter service breakdown, setting up Loom with an iPad to annotate why Screen record Creating custom thumbnails with pictures of each client house. And I am offering insane discount to the first 20 clients. But no one has even clicked on the video. What improvements to my thumbnail and text would you recommend? Obviously a small sample size. Okay, so. Okay, I'll just read the whole thing. Obviously it's all small sample size and I have about 140 to go. I don't want to keep sending out a text thumbnail combo that doesn't convert to video views and ultimately Winter Service customers. Yes, I tested to make sure that the view count that I am seeing is an accurate on different devices. So I am positive that these videos are not being watched by my customers. Yes, I know 50% of mowing is a crazy offer. Just testing to see how much better that performs versus $100 off of mowing if they stay on Winter Services. In my head I was thinking if 80% stayed on that offer, it would be worth it because it would almost double our revenue as Winter Services is six months long. Okay, so. Oh, here's a picture.

Okay, cool. So you're texting this out via imessage.

Okay, so I would actually say that, that this, this is going to be less likely to click on because of the thumbnail. I actually think you just with your face is actually going to do better, to be honest with you. Also, if you're going to send it via imessage, I would send the personal video on imessage. Like loom is going to be good if you are sending it through copilot, if you're sending it through email. But if you're going to actually do what you're doing right now, which is sending via imessage, I would make the video an imessage because they don't have to click on anything else and it comes with cost. Way more personalized.

So like this to me, if I got this, I'm thinking this is an ad. I want to word this in a way where this is like, hey, I made a quick video for you breaking down your services at your property and then link to it. If that's assuming you're linking to it now, if you're doing what you're doing, Garrett, I would actually make the video in imessage. Like you're going even ahead. I just think if I got this, I am going to think this is an ad and it says that like, please click the video, let me know what you think. I would just be like, hey, I made a video about your property and the services for this Winter and then make the video here because you're doing imessage. You could actually do the breakdown. Put the video in here without the link with the breakdown.

So I would try that. Garrett, I like the fact that you did only 20. Go ahead and test the next 20. And I would say, I would do is make this text literally say, hey, Olivia, it's Garrett from Augusta. I made this quick video about the services at your property and then leave it. And then if you're going to do it in imessage like this, put the video in imessage, don't link it.

Because then they can watch it from here instead of having to go to a different a spot. So hope that made sense. Give that a try. Garrett. I know it's frustrating, especially when you're like, man, I put all this time and energy. Don't get frustrated. I'm glad you did the sample set. And then you can adapt to it. The fact that you're doing imessage like this is awesome. It's very good. But people are going to be less likely to leave imessage. Like, if you can do the video inside, like, you're going above and beyond. So keep. Keep doing it. Don't. Don't be discouraged. That's all I can say.

One thing for certain, I just know that it'll be a better conversion in the long term than just the fourth stage, which is send the email out, cross your fingers, and the people don't. Don't get it, and don't click on the link. You end up refunding. Right? So you're. You're going, like, at top level. So keep doing that. Do the next 20. Like, if you do 20, you're probably gonna adjust a little bit more. I would assume, like, that third test of 20, you'll probably have this nailed. So just like, stay at it. And I'll also say you could also call them and say, hey, I left you a text message and I sent you an email. Like, I do it both at the same time. So I think what they're doing at Bellingham Shop is they're doing a text and email at the same time. So they can. They can say in the text, hey, I sent you an email, too. And then in the email say, hey, I sent you a text message. So you'll hit them in both ways. And then if you really wanted to, you'd call them.

And most times you're just going to leave a voicemail.

Connor says, how can I put in an imessage? You upload the video from Camera roll instead of copying. Sharing link. Correct. Yeah. If you. What you'd probably have to do Connor, is you'd have to. If you were trying to put it in imessage. I have not done this so big caveat here but I would assume you need to do is download the video then airdrop it from your computer to your phone and then from your phone then you should be attach it. That's probably. That's the sequence I would first follow.

Position Present. Share screen. And we're back. Number three.

Mr. Anonymous. Curious if you or Liz would be interested in having command center trained up on cold calling. Selling winter services to our existing mowing clients over the phone. You could put this in as a project. They could and see if it's something that you could do. They'd have to look at your account and see if you're. If they could. If they could do this for you. Because it. Mostly because I know, I know I've looked at a lot of accounts. Almost all of us edit winter services slightly. For example, customers that have massive properties for mowing. But then winter services people give the. The price is actually less bi weekly because the beds, the. The walkways etc are way less in size and charging the regular mowing price is abhorrent. So it would have. They'd have to take a look at your account. Feel free to submit this as a project but I can't. I'm not going to guarantee anything because I have seen some accounts that are like, it's a. There's a lot of deviation of what you're doing in terms of like, well, we do weekly prices but we do bi weekly services, et cetera, et cetera. But if you follow some sort of system, I think they could probably do it for you. Just don't put my word on it because they're going to look at everyone's account before they promise that.

And I personally would only do that if you are like drowning in work right now. Like if you're just completely buried in like Christmas lights for example. That would be probably the idea here. Like hey, if I can get 40% of people to convert, fine. I know if I did it myself, I'd probably get 50 or 55%. Like that'd be the only way I would do that. And I think for most of us if you're not unless you're buried in work, I would just take the time to really figure out exactly what Garrett is doing is like hone it in. Like figure out what works for you and then just like really Take this time and this opportunity to know exactly what that that looks like.

Dustin from Fear and Pain are you ready to order a ton of door hangers for winter services and are planning to buy the instant quotes from last year. To buy the instant quotes from last year. Okay, one second. Before we do, I was hoping to see if anything new was coming in the next week or so. I'd hate to buy this amount we are planning on and then have new designs pop up in the next week than new designs coming for winter services. Specifically vistaprint I. E. Pro Shop has been an absolute pain for the media team. So I, I apologize. Like I know they put some up the other week. They have more coming then they vistaprint put the fuel text fields incorrectly so the media team will update us on the Facebook group when they know they're good to go. But we, we do have instant pricing for winter services via door hangers coming pretty soon here and they're done just waiting on vistaprint so the media team will let us know when that. When that's coming and then on the docket is also same thing for like snow. So it just unfortunately in addition to us making them, it usually takes between two and five weeks now for them to actually get them on the. On the account for you. So I apologize.

Ken Lynn.

I've had issues with billing ever since I started using a CRM years ago trying to balance the payments out with the timing. So I'll come up with a couple ideas I'd like to poke holes in or affirm. That is a good idea. Okay, so basically you have level monthly billing per season. So for four seasons and then you have the second option is this per service billing. Okay. All right. So let's go through the pros and cons. It looks like of level billing. Okay. So for mowing if there are five weeks in a month then I don't get to. I don't have to explain to the customer why they got charged five times. If there's a drought or at the end of the season there's bi weekly mowing. I don't have to explain that we only came out twice for spring and fall cleanups. It may be a weekly service or a one time service but the price is still the same. For winter and snow service it may be two or three times per week and then nothing for the rest of the month. In my area with this type of billing you are encouraging or even training the customer to assume that you are going to be there to take care of everything. People on fixed incomes will know that the bill is always going to be the same and that you are going to be there to fix the problem. That is yard work. Cons the customer may see you too much and think they are overpaying Customer may see you too much and think they are overpaying if they feel they don't need anything done. B It comes across as kind of a subscription type billing which may subconsciously encourage them to want a more a la carte type of service. See, I'm not sure how to do the time clock for that. Okay, all right, so now you're going to go over per service billing. Every time we show up to do a service we get billed as soon as you complete the service. Pros less explanation to the customer. Every time a service is completed they are billed so they know exactly how much time they're paying for and what their services what service they pay for. 5 weeks a month equals 5 modes etc. Less admin time each employee when they complete a job it'll automatically build so there's a less work to be done in the app. Cons I'm a little afraid this will encourage more of a micromanaging mentality on the customer side. When there is a drought, they'll want to skip mowing. When there's no snow, they won't want us to come out, etc. Let me know when I'm wrong and when I need to adjust or which ideas have merit. Yes, you're 100% right on all the pros and cons. I would say the only thing to think about is like are you in growth mode? Are you in profit mode? I see most of the time the people that are happy with with their level of growth. They are usually using number two. They're doing a per service billing also has a lot to do with whether or not you are your market is it's normal. A lot of times like I've been in markets where no one even thinks about per service billing. It's all 100% level monthly because like everyone just asks like what's the cost per month to maintain my property. This usually is in areas where you have more year round maintenance of their yard.

So for profit from a profit perspective, if you're in profit mode, I see the companies that are used level billing across the board for all their clients. They're the ones that are typically in profit mode and they're the ones who usually enjoy it. They're not trying to grow super fast. They're okay with a lower customer, lower close Ratio because it adds friction to sale, etc. But again, it mostly has to do with what our customers used up in your area. Cause they will shy away from not being able to compare apples to apples usually.

What was I gonna say after that? It's obviously I'd say best for us if we all do level monthly billing. I think the thing that I see people sometimes do is they do a split option and that gets things confused and it gets very, very confusing for customers, employees and admin.

It's harder and harder to be able to delegate off billing an admin work if like some customers are per service, some customers are level billing contracts. And then I see when they start doing that, that's when mistakes come up. They accidentally bill someone that's on level billing. They, they forget their, their contracts in terms of like you don't want someone level billing canceling at the end of summer, for example, once you've been at their property, done their fall cleanups, like everything's been like over the board. And now you're like, okay, great, now we can actually make profit because we don't show up as much during the winter for, for example. And then all of a sudden they cancel. So it's like, well done. Now we've got to do contracts. And that's usually what then creates the friction in the sales process. So I'm not opposed to either one. It's a matter of like, where are you at in your business, what climate and your market kind of demands is usually what I'm following.

Logan Albers from Nebraska.

Can you please discuss including snow removal with winter services? For context, we get anywhere from 0 to 6 snow events per year. Average is probably 3 to 4 over 1 inch. In years past, we've sold snow services on call for both residential and commercial, where we'll come service the property once we get over 1 inch accumulation. I would say we get about $300 to $400 in revenue from the average driveway over the course of the season. But it of course depends on snowfall. In Nebraska, snow is not guaranteed. Three years ago we made $1,000 during the snow season and last year we made over $70,000 in two weeks and nothing more. Outside that. I've always taken the gamble in the winter pricing this way, knowing we'll make only, we'll only make more make money if we get snow. I know this is not sustainable and I'm trying to move away from this model. I think the right answer for us is the offer residential snow services. With winter services, we would service the property whenever we get snow. And that would be their next service even if. If we just did the property last week. Yes. I like this a lot. I'll explain more. You're going to do the pros and cons. Great. Okay, cool. Increase revenue per customer from average of 300 to 400 per season to 700900 per season on which services we can bill out every other week no matter what. Instead of billing only when we service. We have a consistent revenue amount every month. You'll be able to keep properties looking good year round. Cons. We could get a huge storm or back to back events and not be able to bill out extra for it and lose money that eventually some customers might not buy service because it's an increase in price. I expect to sell this model to all residential customers and still offer zero tolerance snow and ice control to commercial customers. I see this as a balance. So if we get snow we will make good profit on our commercial route and if we don't, we will simply do winter services and make good revenue on the side and other projects. I like this a lot. I'll. Yeah, please let me know your thoughts and if this model would work well in our area. I don't see us being able to sell winter services as well without snow removal because we don't have a ton of landscaping and maintain. And if yards do get covered with snow, we can't do winter services either. Okay, this is great. I 100% agree with this assessment and that is if you're going to do winter services and especially if you're doing between zero and like five events a year, I would roll winter roll your snow into winter services because the value prop gets doubled for the customer. And to what Logan just said here is exactly right. If the snow falls, you can't do any other work anyways in terms of outside of snowplowing. So like you're gonna have your crew on all hands on deck anyways. So just take the next winter services and pull it forward. And then you could explain this in your video for winter service like hey, if it snows we will be there within 24 hours. That's our goal. And what we will do is we'll simply take the next winter services and pull it forward. That'd be a huge value add because now if you're. If they know you could even just put in that price comparison. Hey, usually it costs us cost a customer between 500 and $1,000 per winter for their snow service depending on how much snowfall there is. Now you're just going to pay this amount and we're going to actually cover the snow. Yes. The reason that people don't do this is because yes, you could get a foot of snow and then you're going to be crazy busy. Here's the thing. Run the numbers. Let's just say there's three days where you guys are working basically around the clock. Figure out what the cost of that labor is. And then I would venture to believe that even if that happened twice in a year that you would still come out on top in terms of being able to offer, have a higher close ratio winter services. And this is the thing that's beautiful. The amount of revenue per year that you're gonna get from them, you are literally gonna triple, literally triple the value of this customer. And I would say you're probably doubling the average annual value per mowing customer. That is a huge boom to business. So I would be all over this. I would, I really, really think you could also tie this in with like for example, your motto being like, tired of paying for snow removal but not when there's no snow. And I would be running this when there's no snow. I'd be running as like, are you tired because there's people that are out there paying a hundred bucks a month to have their snow done right. You would run, hey, if you're tired of paying for snow removal and there's not any snow, come use us winter services. You pay the same amount and if it snows, we'll take care of it. And if, if it doesn't snow, we actually come trim your bushes, we do your edging, we pull the weeds, we blow off the walkways, etc. I think there'd be a huge, like you'd run those ads when there's no snow and when there is snow and they're getting pelted with a huge bill, you, you, you pitch winter services.

Why is, why is calling not superior for selling with W's?

Oh, I know what you're saying, Connor. I would say I see what you're saying. I think I said beforehand that they're sending the video and imessages like above and beyond. I'm assuming that you're not going to call them and go meet them in person. Like that's always number one. I apologize. I meant.

Sending a personalized video in imessage is going to be superior to just sending a link with a thumbnail that looks a little bit more like an advertisement. So hope that was clear. Great question, Logan. Very, very good. I hope, Logan, if You can do me a big favor. I know you're connected with a lot of the snow guys, and I know almost everyone watched the Masterminds, which is very awesome. I've usually read 100 to 130 people every single video. Watch. However, if, Logan, if you could send this specifically to everyone that does snow, I think it'd be helpful because I really think if you, especially now at the price comparison, I really believe that this is a huge value add for the snow guys to be able to do exactly what we just talked about.

Did I skip one?

No.

All right, Mr. Anonymous, what was your deal structure when you bought the Anytime Fitness gym? Was it seller finance? How much did you put down SBA? Yeah, so they wanted 500,000. I did not negotiate on price. I said, I'll give you 100% of it. I just need to make the financing work. He said, great, I will give you $50,000 in cash so you can afford the 10% down. And.

Basically he financed that by taking the last month of revenue and just giving it to me. So it was around 50,000 that allowed me to do the down payment at closing. And then he moved the. We moved the purchase price to 550,000. So my purchase price is 550,000. Basically, he gave me the 10% down. And really the giving of the 10% down was he gave me the first billing cycle of the month, which is around 50 grand, allowing me to make the acquisition. So I literally just recommended this to someone yesterday, and a deal that they're trying to buy out is like, go get the. Go get the SBA loan approved. You basically kind of lock in the seller. Once you're like, hey, I'm going to put an offer in pending financing. You kind of lock them in and then you go get the deal and they want 10% down. And you go, assuming that the seller is willing to do seller financing, you say, hey, great, I need X amount. Give me. Give me that and I will sign the deal for them. It's a win because, for example, with Anthony, the guy I bought the gym from, he got $500,000. He had to give me 55,000. Good deal for him. Now the bank is going to wonder where you are getting the down payment. So you can't just say, I'm getting it from the buyer, but you could put. For example, what we did is we put together like a consulting contract between my LLC and his. He gave me the money as payment, and I said, hey, this is what I'm going to be using for the Loan, so. And I did have the money. He's just going to run me dry. So I still had Augusta. Like, without franchising. We hadn't franchised yet, but I still had Augusta. I had the $50,000 at the time. I think I had like 90 grand. And so I basically said, hey, this is the money. I have enough money to buy this. And the SBA's like, great, you have 10%. And then later on, like, towards the end, they're like, hey, $90,000, a little squeaky. So how else are you doing it? So I said, hey, I'm going to be consulting the business. And they gave me, you know, a thing to sign on. And that's how I proved I had the 10% down. And that's how we made the deal happen.

We've done snow removal winter services since winter one with residential. We do that residential only after we do our commercial zero tolerance accounts. Two to five storms only, though, about less than 10 inches per year. Okay, Connor, Cool. So, Logan, you might want to reach out to Connor, see how he's doing that. It seems like that's what he already does, so I'm a big fan of that. I think you could sell winter services way more by having the extra value, have the consistent revenue. And I do believe running ads when there is no snow would be great. And then when there is a big snowstorm and everyone's like, I can't get anyone and there's like $300 from the come snowplow, I'd be running ads. Tired of paying $300 for someone to come plow your driveway. Pay us 50 bucks every two weeks and we will come, but we will also do all these other things. So I think it's a huge value add.

Cool. All right, everyone, have a fantastic Thursday. We'll see you.