Mike Andes warns home-services owners that adding service lines and expanding territory feel fast but destroy profit margins. The real growth comes from basics: answer the phone, show up on time, do quality work, get reviews. Nailing these fundamentals beats 95% of competitors.
Owners chase growth and top line revenue because fixing the fundamentals feels boring. The fundamentals in home services is answer the phone, show up on time, be professional, do the work at a high quality rate, and then ask for review at the end and post it on your website. And that website should be looking really good. If you do all those things, you'll beat 95% of your competition. But the reason most people don't do that is because they don't want to focus on the fundamentals. They go after the next shiny thing. And the next shiny thing in home services usually comes in the form of two things, because it's also these two things that allow you to grow the business the fastest in terms of top line revenue. And that is adding more services and adding more service area. In other words, how far away am I willing to travel to do services for customers? Those are the two fastest ways to grow. They're also the two least profitable forms of revenue. As your business grows and is the trap that many people fall into. And in going and chasing after that growth, they fail to do the fundamentals that actually separates them from the package.
