Mike Minutes Mastermind 10/10/2023

And we're live. Everyone's doing good. Let's go get started. I didn't have any announcements today, but let me just drop this into Facebook.

And we'll get started.

Numero Uno Nick Marysville on our websites, would it make sense to remove property clips instead put yard cleanup. When I search property on Google, all that comes up are junk hauling businesses. And I believe most of our clients are searching yard clamps. So maybe it will help with ranking.

Based upon everyone's markets that we've seen. We the yard is not used as often. Based on what we have seen across like the country.

The the thing that sometimes is distinguished yard cleanup is like actually organization like cleaning up their yard like their toys maybe, I don't know. But based on what we've seen, they're either neck and neck or property cleanup wins out. The thing we realized a little bit of property cleanup is it gives you a little bit wider of a scope of services. So a property cleanup could include, you know, cleaning out the gutters, it could include pressure washing. It could include other things that typically during either drought season or winter, when you're trying to get property cleanups, you want to have a little more longitude.

But based on what we've seen just in general, search terms are about the same if not slightly weighed in the direction of property cleanups.

We usually look at that like a couple times a month. So I'm pretty confident saying that you could look at, you could look at Google Trends, for example, in your market and see if it's substantially different. But as a whole, we've seen property cleanup be the one that converts the best, mostly because I think it implies a scope of services wider that allows you to sell more, upsell more services. So.

Nick from Marysville. Oh, long question. Okay, I've been thinking about clients pausing during the most profitable time of the year. I have identified about 25 that I will raise prices on going into next season. The question is how do you quantify an appropriate price increase for them? Would you increase the price to account for the total revenue we will lose? Assuming they pause again next summer, is the goal to maintain them as a client extra at a higher price that we can justify? Assuming they pause again or raise price so high they to the point they cancel? It really depends on how much is annoying you, right? If it's annoying you so much that you just don't want them as a customer, raise it to the point where they cancel, right? It is just a matter of like oh man, it stinks. And the reason it's annoying me is because I know I'm losing profit on it because they're canceling during the month when I make the most money, that's when I would just raise the prices to accommodate that. So if you're losing out on 3 or 4 mo's out of 25 or 30, well you need a solid 15 increase at least just to make up for that extra loss in revenue.

Assuming they are 45.67 and we started service for them in April, they paused the end of July for the season. We are basing our pricing on a nine month season and losing five months of revenue for that client. Would you take that revenue for those five months and divide that over the four months we actually service them? That would over double their price. If someone really does not mow their lawn after July, end of July, I probably don't want them as a customer because the lawn is going to be overgrown by spring. They're not going to have property clips, they're not going to do any other service. They're very, very cheap. So I, I think any price crease they might be more price sensitive. This type of customer, especially in our market, like you do need to mow your lawn a little bit even after the drought, unless you literally let it go like so dead that it like ruins the grass and doesn't grow.

So in this case, you know, I know that it's probably not a good way to go about it, but I'm just trying to find a formula instead of just being arbitrary. Or should I just not overthink and raise enough to make them profitable in the spring? Assuming they cancel in the summer? Yeah, I just not overthink it. I'd raise enough to make him very profitable in the spring rush and assume that they can cancel in the summer and you're like, well now I'm raising prices helping the guys on P4P too much. The same thing is true for your guys. They're losing out on a customer that during the summer they make great P2P. So raising the price makes it fair to them that now they're accommodating that earlier in the year. Also I'm going to change my estimate verbiage to say something along the lines of prices are based on a weekly, bi weekly schedule for March, November, pause in service or deviation from the schedule may cause price increases. You can, it's just a matter of like how many people are actually reading that.

Along with the other things that you might be adding in there just depends like if that's all you're adding. Probably good. What happens though is people forget four months after they've been in service and they call in, they switch to bi weekly and then you're raising prices on them because of that. I, I wouldn't tie that. Changing their schedule in with it will increase your price. I just raise their price. Otherwise you're getting this like back and forth with the customer over that. It doesn't take you any longer, the grass doesn't need it, all that sort of thing. I would just, hey, look, based upon the customer's behavior, I will appropriate their price instead of trying to convince them otherwise. In terms of behavior, like if someone's penny pinching, they're going to penny pinch you no matter what, whether you are raising prices, whether you restrict service months, etc. Like this person's just more price sensitive. So either A, I raise my prices and they leave, or B, I raise my prices so I can make money on them in the four or five months I am able to service their property. I wouldn't. Like, that's what the question you got to ask yourself. Like, are you going to actually defend the line in the estimate? Like pause in service or deviation for the schedule may cause price increases. You know, in four months, is the customer going to remember that and be. Therefore, I will not change my schedule, my price, my mowing schedule, if they even have that thought, that means they're price sensitive. So just consistently raising prices on those type of people will typically weed them out. Or you'll at least be able to accommodate the price.

Price sensitivity in the months that you do mow. But something along those lines. I actually don't like that verbiage. But how would you let people know that without turning them away before they even accept the quote? Yeah, like I would. I think that this, this verbiage is perfect. I just don't think people remember five months later when they look at their lawn like, I want to, I want to save money, I should cancel mowing service. I'm more interested in getting the person that's like, oh, the grass isn't growing. I'm glad they blew off the driveway edge of the lawn looks great. I'd rather go for that customer and then let the customer do their behavior. And I am able to control the full cycle, which is I raise my prices. I react to what they want instead of trying to convince them like, oh no, no, like if you change, it's gonna like just, you know, that'd just be my two cents because you can fully control that pricing situation.

But I'm not opposed to it. Like you could definitely do it. Just one man's opinion is like, just look at the numbers, raise the prices and let the chips fall where they may. Kyle Tarvin Moore, Oklahoma what are your thoughts on running local service businesses? Running remote I came across this guy, it's always a good sign. I came across this guy that built a $60,000 per month cleaning business all by using contractors and running it remote overseas. Seems like an interesting business model if you can figure out the systems and checks and balances to ensure it runs smooth.

What would I say to this?

I would say because one person does, it does not increase the probability that it will happen time and time again. And so because one person is successful doing this does not mean that the probability of success for everyone else is high.

Just because.

Elon Musk can fly rockets to, to the moon or into space does not mean that because he can do it, I can do it.

What is not being talked about is the skills that is required to do this. The knowledge of the industry, the knowledge of the contractors, the relationships built up with the contractors. And.

I have not seen this predictably succeed. That's probably the best way to put it. I have seen this happen one offs and typically the people that do this, they are able to sell a lot of courses and therefore they can run their, their cleaning business at a loss or at a break even and overpay their contractors because they can then go sell the dream to other people that are willing to pay for courses, books, et cetera. Running after this idea, when I hear the word remote overseas, I hear I want to work and make money without working. And 95% of the time that does not work out well.

Based on my experience, the one out of the one out of 20, they will, you know, say how great it is, how amazing it is. I'd rather just bank on that. 95% of my locations I'll be able to make successful and I'll be able to do it time and time again without any knowledge of, of a market.

Versus I sure hope I can figure this out. I'm one out of 20. I hope I'm the one. And it's tough to go duplicate that in a market where I don't know the subcontractors. I don't know about the market.

But it's easy and that's what sells. And I would be, I would be running away from anyone that says that sort of thing just personally. Kyle Tarvin Moore, Oklahoma how long does it take the Christmas Light page, add to our site, send the request via the website and sent an email to the media team following up. I haven't heard anything back yet. Not trying to pressure anyone, just want to make sure they know we want that done for both our locations. Hoping to get done before the end of October. The media team, you're probably emailing the wrong people. So you need to email webgustalongerservices.com if you submitted the request via the website. You might want to check in with them if you haven't heard back within a couple days because typically within 48 hours, 48 business hours, we get them all done. So yeah, send an email web@augusta longers.com it's potentially that that form did not get sent through potentially or maybe not for both locations. But Web augustalongerservices.com is the place you're going, not the media team.

Kyle Turner, Madison, Alabama we sent out opt we sent out opt out emails last week as our mowing season is set to end on the 20th of this month. So so far about 50% have opted out. All right. There has been some confusion on the customer's end that have opted out because they are redirected to a page that says thank you, we will see you in the spring. But we haven't stopped mowing yet. Yeah, we have a fix coming for this. The way the redirect page reads, the customer thinks once they opt out the season is over. We showed up to mow this week and several customers said they got something saying we were already done for the year. Is there a way to edit the redirect page after the opt out to let them know they are opt out for these services only. But we are still mowing. Yes. Great. So the change is going to happen if not happened already. Let me just check. So there what you're really referring to is augustalongerservices.com winter services. Currently it says we have opted. You have thank you. You have opted out of winter services. We will start mowing your lawn again next spring. Most of the time people get it because your email states clearly that you're going to continue mowing till the end of the season. We're going to add that part also to the thank you page. But your email should make it clear like we are mowing until this date. After this date if you would like to opt out of services, click on this button. So you for now like definitely check your email. Obviously you've already sent it out just for everyone else. Make sure your email is clear that you are still mowing to this certain date, but we are going to add it to that page and what it's going to say is we will continue servicing your property until the end of the mowing season, pause the winter, and return again next spring. So it'll make that clear distinction that, hey, we're not done mowing season yet, so you don't lose out an extra one or two mows at the end of the season. We are adding it to that page, but I would definitely make sure in your email it makes it very clear that we will continue servicing your property until this date when we end mowing season. And then if you'd like to opt out, here's the button for that, etc.

Cool. That's all we got for the day, folks. Tuesday, we are simply what? Wednesday? Thursday? Friday we are three masterminds away from being at conference. Let's go. All right, guys, looking forward to seeing you all next week and have a great day. Take care.