The 9 Mistakes I Made When Starting My Lawn Care Business! (SO YOU DON'T HAVE TOO)

Hey everyone, it's Mike Andes and today I'm talking about nine different things that in your lawn care landscaping business will keep you from growth, will keep you from ever stepping away from daily operations. It'll keep you locked in to always being in your business and, and never working on your business. And this comes from a lot of experience. Starting literally every couple months, I start between three and five new locations with the owners and I'm very involved with them from training and onwards. And so I kind of know what are the things that people overreact to and what are the things that as you're starting your business aren't big deals, but we make them big deals and a lot of times leads us to keeps the business from growing because we're so locked in and we get so focused on something that doesn't really move the needle. And big shout to one of our franchisees that has recently started their business. His name's Jeff and he asked me to make this video and he's very self aware to realize that there are things that he overreacts to and he asked me to make a video about some of the things that I see consistently people overreacting to when they're first getting started. Things that really are not a big deal, they don't move the needle yet we make them massive problems in our mind and it really keeps us from growing the business. So let me first off say this. I did all nine of these. So I'm not saying like, oh, you are so bad for doing this. I've done every single one of these and if I could look back and redo it all again, I'd probably grown Augusta twice as fast if I wouldn't have had to go through all of these mistakes and known from the get go that these do not matter. And it's funny because since he mentioned this to me, I've caught myself 18 times. I started marking them down on my phone 18 times when I was talking to other franchisees and I said this one phrase, it doesn't matter. And it doesn't mean to say to be complacent or just like just flip a coin. It's not going to affect anything in the business. But what it means to say is I don't want it to be debilitating. It doesn't matter means make a decision, move forward. It's not going to change the destination or the future of the business and therefore you shouldn't be spending your time on it. Alright, so these nine things I've done all of them I'm the chief of the mistake maker when it comes to all of these things. But this is consistently what I see owners doing as they are getting started and as they begin to grow their business. And the things that when I ask them why they're not growing or why they're not successful, these are the things that a lot of times they bring up. And in my mind it doesn't really matter. It does not move the needle. The number one first thing is negative online reviews. Now I know it is painful as all get out when you are like me and you like to make other people happy, you like to make sure other people are happy with you and you like them to know that your business is really customer centric and all the rest of it, all right? And when someone puts a negative online review, you might even in yourself know they're wrong. But yet it's extremely debilitating and it's extremely, it just completely locks you up from growing your business. Cause you're afraid of getting more of those online reviews. And I see people make bad choices in their business and they'll even eat thousands of dollars worth of mistakes or cost because of the fact they don't want a bad or a negative online review. When in my mind a negative online review is the opportunity I need as an owner to demonstrate how professional I deal with customers. That I might not be 100%, they might not be 100% satisfied. Cause you're just not going to be able to please everybody. And if anyone ever says that they please everybody, let me be very clear. They are a small, small, small business. If you look at Apple or Google or any very successful company in a capitalistic society, there are people that hate them. There are people that hate their products, there are people that hate the things that they do. There's people that make very negative online reviews about their services, about their employees, about their services, about their brand, et cetera. But guess what? They've all won the game of building a great business. And so if your goal is to build a great business and to be successful in business, you've got to realize that you're gonna have people or have customers that you cannot make happy that you do make mistakes on and that your response to those online reviews is extremely critical. I made a couple videos about this topic. How to respond in a good fashion, a professional fashion. Cause when someone comes to your site and our local shop has over 150, 165star reviews, guess what? The people. And most of you have gone and read the three or four negative one star reviews. Everyone's gonna go there first. So why look at a negative online review as a really bad thing and is a debilitating factor when really it's a massive opportunity that I can actually show to my customers, my potential customers, the people that are coming to look for business from me and basically show them how professional I am, how we tried to resolve the issue and that we do not get mad or call people names online and all the rest of it. Number two, another thing that is debilitating and I just want to tell a lot of people, just move on, like just go for it does not matter is employee mistakes. I see so often the times businesses will stay small because they're afraid that their employees will make mistakes. The bottom line is a lot of times solo operators stay solo is because no one else can edge like them, no one else can blow off like them, no one else can go as fast as them, no one else can do whatever as good as the owner. And guess what, you're right. You're 100% correct as the owner. There's probably no one going to care as much as you because your financial future depends on you surviving and making the business successful and making the business profitable and efficient. So guess what, you're 100% right. Employees will not care as much as you, period. End of story. No matter how you compensate them. And so the bottom line is no one is perfect. Everyone's gonna make mistakes. This is why so many people do not allow someone to take over their email, don't allow someone to answer the phone, don't allow someone else to take over office tasks. And they're st emails at 12 o' clock in the evening on a Sunday afternoon. Because they've got to get the emails done when they should be handing all of that off to an employee. But they won't because they're afraid that employee will make mistakes. And guess what, they're right. They will make mistakes. People will answer the phone incorrectly, people will set up the wrong estimate. People will make mistakes on credit card invoicing and billing or scheduling, they will make mistakes. And my rule of thumb as I've begin to grow my businesses is look, if an employee can be 90% efficient, if their efficacy is 90%, by the way, when we look at the vaccines that have been rolled out, people are thrilled with 90% efficiency, 90% efficacy. If my employees can be 90% of what I am at their role, I need to delegate that task. Now, if there's something that is so I have so much intellectual property that only I can do it and handing it off to someone else. They're gonna make mistakes 80% of the time, then, yeah, I should probably make sure I do that. I should create a system around it before I delegate it. But if anybody in your business, even when you're starting out, can do a 90% good job, as you mean that 1 out of 10 times they will make a mistake, I would delegate that. I would give that off to that person and let them run with it, knowing that they will make mistakes. But the reason most solo operators and most small businesses stay small one, two employees and then they retreat back to being solo is because they're afraid of employees making mistakes. And. And guess what? That is part of the territory. Employees will make mistakes and you make mistakes too. So don't get so high in mind that you think you're great because you make mistakes as well. Number three. And when I say we, I mean just business owners, because I make plenty of mistakes. Number three, equipment purchases and maintenance of that equipment will not move the needle. It's important. Yes, it's important, but it's not going. It should not debilitate you and you should not overreact to things happening in your business. When a mower goes down, guess what? There's 100,000 other mowers and you could probably go get one tomorrow. It's not a big deal. It's not going to change the destination of your business. And you definitely shouldn't be making business changing decisions because of a mower that went down one time or because I've got a people who overreact to. I've got to buy a new mower. What type should it be? Like flip a coin. It doesn't matter. It really doesn't. And I know when you're small it can seem like a big deal. And I know people in the comments. Easy for you to say, you're big and all the rest. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I've started two new locations in the past 12 months and all of these things have applied to me starting these two new locations myself. I've never been. I've been once, one time have I been to these locations for less than 20, 30 minutes in terms of at the shop for these two locations. One's in North Carolina, one's in New York. And the reason those have been ran well and now are both profitable is because of these nine things I had to learn the hard way, and that is that making equipment decisions doesn't matter. One of Our general managers is asking me right now about a leaf cleanup, a leaf vacuum. And I'm like, look, if you think we need it, let's go for it. And they were like, what kind of should I get? I'm like, I'll leave that up to you. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter to the future of the business. Those decisions doesn't mean that they're not important. It's an important decision. What equipment you have in your business, make sure it matches up with the type of properties and whether you're gonna be using enough and all the rest of it. But. But you should not overreact to it and lock you up and overreact to the fact that it's not going to actually move the needle to your business. What's gonna move the needle to your business, by the way, is hiring, branding, and making sure as you bring on team members, you delegate. That's what's gonna move the needle. That's what's gonna grow a business. All right, the fifth thing. I'm sorry, the fourth thing. The fourth thing that is a lot of times people will overreact to is jobs that go wrong. Cause guess what? All of us will make mistakes on a job, and we'll do a project that we shouldn't have done. And we had no business getting into doing this job. And yet we somehow got started and this project just went miserably incorrect. And all of a sudden it could just lock you up. You know, you've lost. Man, I've lost $2,000. Cause I misbid this estimate. And now I don't know what to do. And literally it just wraps you up. And all of a sudden you're like, okay, I'm just gonna constrict the mechanism, the safety mechanism when things go wrong or when we overreact to something is I'm going to draw back into myself, I'm going to withdraw, and I'm gonna stop growing the business. And that's why most people stay small. And so when a job goes wrong, one employee, one customer, one big project that goes wrong, or a lawn mowing job that goes wrong, oh, man, I'm not gonna do that type of service anymore. Never more will I do mulch. The customer that thought we were installing 20 and I thought it was 10 yards, and I'm not doing mulch ever again. And because one job goes wrong and it sucks all of your attention, your emotion and your energy into this job, that you might have lost $1,000 or $2,000 on or lost time or sleep or whatever over. And you just. It debilitates you from growing the business because one job went bad. Another thing, the fifth thing, why a lot of people overreact to in their business is employees leaving. Now, employees leaving is extremely difficult. I get it. I understand. I know what it's like to lose half of your team very quickly. It can really put you in this sense of, like, well, I'm just gonna do it myself. Like, I'm just gonna go back to being solo. I'm just gonna withdraw, and I'm gonna go out and do the jobs myself. And it can be very, very damaging, just even psychologically, when employees say really, really hurtful things and walk off a job or they leave. And I know it can. A lot of times you question yourself and like, man, am I wrong. Maybe I'm a bad boss. Maybe I'm a bad leader. But I truly believe a lot of times the reason people stay small is because they've had a time when an employee has left them when they need them most. And it puts you into a defense mechanism. Well, I'm never gonna put myself in that vulnerable position again to where I am in need of other people. And this is absolutely crazy. You will never be able to grow, you will never be able to expand if you are always doing everything. Therefore, when an employee leaves. Yes. It's extremely emotional. Yes. And they say, I want more money. I'm leaving. Or they say something really bad about you and what your morals are or whatever, and they go against you. That can be very, very hard. I've seen it. I've been there. I've been sued by previous employees. I know what it's like. But you have to realize that when you walk out of that experience, you're not going to overreact and withdraw and be like, okay, I'm not hiring anyone else. Cause I don't want that hurtful experience to happen again. And a lot of times, when you look at the psychology of people that have certain abnormalities or mental deficiencies or they struggle with certain things in their mental side of things is because they've gone through certain things, and they try to avoid that topic as much as possible. So when an employee leaves and they say hurtful things, our inclination is, oh, I want to avoid that at all costs. Therefore, I'm not going to hire more people. I'm not going to delegate, and I'm going to do everything myself. And that is. Is gonna keep your business small. All right. The sixth thing that keeps businesses small, because we overreact to these is weather. I see it all the time when people start complaining about weather and making that the excuse as to why they're not gonna grow. Well, the weather's just unpredictable. Or you know what? I'm just tired of having to push off these jobs for mowing cause of the rain. And so I'm just going to not schedule any more mowing services on Thursdays and Fridays and Saturdays. Because I need to make sure that when it rains, I can move them off. You've got to realize that weather comes and weather goes. Weather is not going to be ever on your side. It's always going to seem like it's against you. All right? We're part of the green industry. We're going to be outside all the time. Weather will always be either too wet or too hot or too cold. It'll never be on your side. So to overreact to the weather and be like, okay, well, I'm scheduling everything differently because the weather in my climate is different. Guess what? Everyone's climate has different weird idiosyncrasies. If you're down south, it's really, really hot and then you have flash floods and you live in certain areas, like Louisiana, Florida, it rains all the time. And it's crazy. It can rain for half the day and then be 95 degrees the next. And then going to a market like ours, we literally have rain for the winter months. Like literally half the time it's freezing cold and it doesn't snow. So we can't really do a whole bunch of plowing. It's very difficult in our climate. But your weather can never be the factor that allows you to overreact and then withdraw. Because I'm not gonna grow. Cause we live in the Pacific Northwest and we can't do snow plowing. So therefore I'm just gonna like, I'm not gonna grow my business. Cause I don't wanna get in too many employees. And in the winter I don't know what I'm gonna do. Cause I don't have any snow. These are excuses. These are things that do not matter, do not move the needle and will keep you from growing if you keep letting them fester in your mind. Number seven things that small business owners, especially new ones, really they overreact to is unpaid invoices. All right? Yes, you should have a credit card on file. Yes, you should collect 50% down before you start a big project. All of those things are true. But there's gonna be times, regardless of how good you try to get with upfront payment is you are going to have people that do not pay. And guess what? That's part of doing business. Usually half a percent to 1% of your invoices. You won't ever see the money because people's credit cards don't go through. They closed the account and moved across the city or across the country or to the other side the universe. They don't pay. Whatever the check bounces, whatever it might be, that's just part of doing business. To let that 1% or half a percent get in front of you and the success and the future of your business, it's not going to move the needle, like, get over it, right? And I know a lot of people are gonna be like, it's easy for you to say, I went through all of this. If I could know this now, like I did in the past year with two new locations that I've literally met the people, met the owners twice, and hired them before ever seeing them in person. That was only done because I knew these nine things. And not to overreact to when they make a mistake, when the office makes a mistake, when employees leave the job site, those things happen, and they've happened in the past year. But I don't overreact to them. Oh, well, we're stay small and oh, stop the advertising. We're not going to get any more jobs. Like, no, these are the things that I've had to learn because I made these mistakes. I did it back in the day, and I did okay. I'm gonna do it all myself. I'm gonna be the only one that washes out the trucks and makes sure the oil's done correctly because we let one person do it. And now it's messed up a truck. And that's, guess what? It's part of life. We're all human. We make mistakes. So number seven, unpaid invoices. Do not let one or two or a couple jobs that don't pay be like, okay, well, from now on, I'm not accepting a job over $2 without having 100% paid plus 50% on top of that. Something goes bad in the job, like, I'm sorry, you're going to restrict your growth by adding more layers like that on the upfront. You're going to restrict your growth. And you might be at the point where, from a perspective of where you're at in the business, that you want to make sure you kind of put the brakes on growth. And a way to do that is collecting more upfront, having more contracts, signatures, all the rest of it before. But if you're wanting to grow your business, it's going to be a big hurdle if you don't trust people in order to collect payment. So I know people will disagree with me on that. But if you want to grow your business, you're going to have to realize that 1% or half a percent of people just are not going to pay. That's part of doing business. Number eight is that people say marketing is not working. All right. I've run numbers time and time again before on the whiteboard, showing how commitment to your marketing budget is what works long term and how when you actually break down the numbers and know your numbers in terms of close ratio, in terms of cost per lead, that you can really spend quite a bit of money on marketing and it still work out fine. You can do a half decent job doing marketing and the numbers will still work out. But the problem is, when we're first getting started, I understand it, you don't have as much money. I remember getting a loan from my brother to make payroll. That was in my second or third year of doing business at Augusta Lawn Care. That was tough and he didn't know it. But if I would have got that money, I wouldn't have been making payroll that week. I know what it's like to be in that spot. But the problem is when we start having those sort of pressures, we overreact and we make decisions in the business that are really, really bad. And one of them could be, for example, okay, well, marketing, that's the first thing I'm gonna cut. Well, if you're trying to grow. Yeah, like, marketing is gonna be the thing that allows you to grow. So if you're trying to grow, stop saying, oh, marketing doesn't work. I'm just going to stick to word of mouth. I'm not gonna set up a website. I'm just gonna do only the people that know me and the people that cut my hair and I go to groceries and at the restaurant. Those are the people who be my customers. Okay, great. But you're just not gonna grow as fast if you don't have a website. You're just not gonna grow as fast if you're not committed to website, to SEO and to marketing and advertising, online, offline digital print media like flyers. You're just not going to grow if you don't stay committed to marketing. And a lot of times people overreact because they'll have a month or two where I only got like 10 estimates accepted and I spent $1,000 on marketing. It doesn't work. It's crazy. It's, it's a scam. Google's counting clicks without actually getting clicks. And I'm paying for leads that are trash and whatever. All right, number nine, last thing that people overreact to when they're starting their lawn care business is employees stealing. Now this one really, really hurts. It stings to your core, but you have to trust other people. And I've had employees steal from me. Is it horrible? Is it hard? Is it painful? Yes. But you have to realize you cannot overreact to that situation. Cause if you do, you're now going to mistrust every employee. And if you mistrust them, they will mistrust you. It's always reciprocal. That's why we have open book management. Because, look, I'm going to try to be as transparent as I possibly can be, and I expect the same from you. The same thing goes if an employee steals and you immediately have barriers up to all of your crew and they don't trust them. You make sure they have to sign out gas cans or put their name on things or you won't trust them with driving the truck, or you won't trust them with talking to your customer. Like, oh no, no, you can't talk to the customer. Why you don't trust them? The reason you don't trust them is because one employee went rogue and stole something from you or they damaged something on purpose, or they were being malicious when they were leaving. These are the type of things that will scar business owners and then prevent them from trusting other people. And you have to trust other people, employees, vendors, customers, if you're ever going to grow a successful business. And if I knew these nine things, what was it, eight, nine years ago when I started Augusta? If I knew them today, I would have grown so much faster. And that's why this year, two locations that have only been to one time have grown very well and are profitable today. Because these nine things I didn't overreact to, people making mistakes, people making the wrong estimate, numbers, customers somehow getting a one time job accepted when I don't want one time jobs accepted for mowing. I just want only recurring. Sometimes it happens. Guess what? It's not going to change the outcome of my business. In 10 years, I'm not going to be looking back at that one customer that didn't pay their invoice. It just doesn't matter. So don't overreact. And that's not an easy thing to say when I tell franchisees in their coaching calls not overreact or just flip a coin. And it doesn't matter what type of mower you get, doesn't matter what you know, the type of blade you have. Like, stop stressing about it. It's not. I get it. It's not easy when you're in the moment, when your funds are strapped to stay committed to marketing. I understand. But if I knew these things, and I hope that by sharing them, you're able to grow your business and stay committed to that growth. So you're not always in the field, that in 10 years you're not still pushing a lawnmower without having maybe one or two employees, when you could have delegated, trusted other people and not allowed these things, these circumstances, to make you overreact and lock you up from growth and keep you from providing jobs, keep you from providing a profitable business that your family can live off of. These are the type of things that I care about. And I see time and time and time and time again business owners, when they're small, when they're first getting started, these are the mistakes they made. And I know that because I made them, too. I'm Mike Andes. I hope that was helpful. Check out landscapebusinesscourse.com, lawncaremedia.com and lawncarewebdesign.com for more information. We'll see you tomorrow, Sam.