Latest / Owned and Operated - A Plumbing, Electrical, and HVAC Business Growth Podcast / The REAL Systems That Take You From $1M to $10M

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The REAL Systems That Take You From $1M to $10M · Owned and Operated - A Plumbing, Electrical, and HVAC Business Growth Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes people step over dollars to pick up guns and it's just like having the judgment to know like have I nailed my fundamentals.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: Ten years ago, one of the first decisions that we made was, hey, we're gonna put uh software in place.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: It's a place where you can see your performance.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_02: You can't affect change on things you can't measure.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: What's your average ticket?
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: What's your closing rate?
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: What's your book rate?
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: How many calls?
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: No matter what size of a business, you're still a loosely functioning disaster.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: If you're trying to scale your business, at a certain point you have to start creating the structure to focus on how to achieve that next stage of growth versus just trying to keep your head above water.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: So how do you think about like systems and tools and like my investing for the next decade or the next two years?
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think the way that I think about it is uh welcome back to Owned and Operated, a top 200 business and entrepreneurship podcast.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, John Wilson.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: During the day, I run a home service company in Ohio, Indiana, and Tennessee.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: And for fun, I bullshit on the internet on this podcast.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: On this show, we talk about how to build home service companies, how to buy them, how to market, and how to run a better business.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Today on the show, I'm joined by Dan Eigner, the chief growth officer from Field Pulse, where he helps home service businesses design a better system and process to run their day-to-day business.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Dan, welcome to the show.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_02: John, thanks for having me.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's awesome.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: Love what you guys are doing here with the show.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: This is gonna be fun.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: This is gonna be fun.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna we're gonna have a good conversation here.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: We're we're at breaking five.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: Our uh this is our fifth workshop.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: You got to provide.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: I actually I really enjoyed your feedback yesterday.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: We were talking about hiring.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, just like sort of the right fit uh on a company.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it it's fun.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: We've got 40 people in the room.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think it's like 38 contractors, but like 38, 40 contractors.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we've got sizes from actually, I don't know what the smallest one was, maybe a million and a half.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: It was around there, I think.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: And then the biggest was maybe 10 or something.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was just north of 10.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: Which was kind of funny because this is the largest group of people that we've had through the program.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: But it's also the average business size is the largest, where I think there was like more than five or six people above five million.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, hey guy, you already broke five.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what are we what are we here to do?
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah, it's it's been a lot of fun so far.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Have you enjoyed the folks you've met?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I I think it's been terrific.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_02: I think what you guys are doing here is awesome.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that uh seeing the swath of contractors that are in the room and the people who are here like across the energy.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_02: It's a good energy.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_02: It was tons of engagement.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, I think also the fact that you did have businesses as small as 1 million, some with no software at all, all the way up, you know, past 10 million.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_02: To me, it's proof that scaling a business, like it's a constant challenge, right?
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_02: It's and there are certain things that you need to do to sort of break through your first thresholds.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_02: The best example that I I've heard this one over years of contractors at different stages.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: I think that there's so much thought leadership about like you got to get your inventory management dialed in.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: And how much money are you losing on inventory?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And like I've talked to so many contractors over 100 million who have absolutely no fucking clue what their inventory is.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: And and it's kind of incredible.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's on purpose though, because I think that they're focused on the sale, they're focused on the things that drive the business.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_02: And I think at different stages of your business, like this is a proxy, like insert whatever else kind of fits this mold.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_02: But it's like, I think a lot of smaller contractors are like, oh, like this is what this$50 million company is doing.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_02: This is what I need to do to be successful.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: And you get like lost in the sauce a little bit.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: And it's you're you're it's like, have you the reason the$50 million company is doing that is because they nailed their booking you know procedures.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, they nailed their follow-ups, they nailed their sales process.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_02: And now they're like ready for that next stage to get them to the next thing.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: But even then, there's also certain things where different industries, different all the caveats, but uh it's like sometimes you realize like in order to actually run like an inventory operation where I'm self-managing and I have a big warehouse and I have employees full-time and all that stuff, like it's expensive, and sometimes it's more expensive than whatever your loss or breakage is.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I know some very large contractors that was the case for us for a long time, where we had two full-time employees to manage$50,000 of inventory.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: And it at a certain point, it was like, oh, actually, this makes zero sense at all.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I I one one other phrase, and I'll actually credit uh Ellen Rohr if you know who that is for for this phrase is like I think that sometimes people step over dollars to pick up dimes.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_02: And it's just like you need to be focused on the things that are driving the dollars and not getting lost sometimes until you're ready, right?
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: There will be a time when you're ready to take that leap on your growth journey, but it's having the judgment to know like, yeah, have I nailed my fundamentals?
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, like have I nailed the big movers of my business first?
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: And do I have the ability to see that data and have confidence that my teams are doing what I expect them to do?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the the best example from this week, you know, we give everyone the shop tour, and it this happens every time.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like I get it, we're like a bigger mid-company.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so you, you know, it's a big warehouse, it's fun, it's exciting.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: And we see the packout system that we use and created two and two or three years ago.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: It it was brilliant.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: They did an amazing job at it.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: I can take almost no credit, and uh, but they did a great job.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so, and everyone just like gravitates towards it, and they're like, Oh my god, this packout system, like it's so good and so elegant, and it is so good, and it is so elegant, and it is powerful, and it is all of those things.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: And two hours later, we're like, How many calls did you get last week?
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: And half the room can't find it.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: And it's that's where you need to focus.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like like we are it's so easy to get like see something or hear something and like yeah, you you said it.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, not pursue the fundamentals.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: What's your average ticket?
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: What's your closing rate?
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: What's your book rate?
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: How many calls?
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: What's your can you see it?
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_02: Do you know?
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_02: Do you have confidence in the data?
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_02: Like, do you believe your team is following the process in the system that you want set up?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: And like we have people grilling us on like our sales how to how to bring on sales reps to run through a sales training.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like they're using Excel as their CRM, and it's like, we are not like you are focusing on the wrong thing.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a constant effort.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think um I remember we were um I was visiting some shop and but it was like a nine-figure home service business.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I think we all um I think we all imagine, uh, I know I did.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: So like when when I was the size of the folks of of that room, which like was not that long ago, um, which I think I have a little bit of like a message out there today that I that I think is kind of fun.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's fun to like I I introspect probably too much, where it's like, you know, five years ago we were like four million dollars and say we're 40.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like that's like you can do it, like people can do it.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like if I can do it and I'm not that smart, uh like I'm just like generally stubborn.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Give yourself some credit, you know.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean uh you know, great hair, yeah, I don't know, like uh decent personality, but like not that smart.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: So like so I people can do this, but um no, they totally can.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_02: I've I've seen like I've been around home services and on the software side, and I've even, you know, before this, I was yeah, you have seven years of service Titan and also uh experience before that with like the major utility providers and their field service operations.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_02: And it's you know, from a million dollars, I've seen contrasts at 10 million.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_02: I've seen folks go from starting at zero and three, four years later, you know, it's similar stories to you.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_02: I've I've seen dozens, hundreds of these stories.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_02: Like, yeah, it's it's inspiring to me.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like what I love doing is like helping provide the things that empower the success.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's like you know, some some of the things in the world today are tough, but like one of the places I feel like the American dream's most alive is like in the trades businesses, and there are so many successful stories of entrepreneurship all over the place, and hard work, yeah, the right people around you, yeah, you know, get the right partners involved.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_02: Like you can achieve like what you've achieved with uh excuse me, with Wilson, and yeah, what all the time.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully we can go a lot a lot further.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and all the contractors in the room trying to achieve the same thing.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I remember um, you know, we were like a million, two or three million, and uh there was a competitor here that was like 15 to 20.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I I remember looking at them uh and and being like they're so dialed in, they're so locked in, they have to be perfect.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when I get to 20 million, we're gonna be perfect.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like we bl you know, we are a couple years past that now.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, you know, no matter what size of a business, you're still a loosely functioning disaster.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like any day of the week, you're a loosely functioning disaster.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's the nature of the universe, everything kind of regresses towards chaos, and it's our job to like, yeah.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: We're all just like groups of humans.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I I remember going, um, so it's sort of funny because it you always envision like the people here are looking at uh me aspirationally of like, oh my gosh, like these guys are locked and loaded.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm in my mind, I'm like, we're just this is chaos.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then I went and I visited a hundred million dollar home service operation, and I'm like, these guys are you know locked in.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then I talked to their owner, he's like, dude, this is chaotic as hell.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: It's true.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: I it was like early in my career, and uh it was like one of the most uh illuminating things I think I've ever seen, where it was like I I had an opportunity to like meet with people at Google and Amazon for these big projects.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, oh my god, this is Google.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's like this is the epitome of where the smartest people in the world work, and oh my god, and then they were sort of running a project that we were participating in, and it was I was like, these guys are just as disorganized as we are.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_02: What's going on here?
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_02: And you realize like there are there's you know, there are really smart people, but people are people, and like it it's with effort and like focus and knowing what you're going after, like that's how you try to solve it, but the chaos always comes back somehow, right?
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, put the structures in place to help you.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: Homeowners want your services, but they do need a better way to pay for it.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm hearing more and more contractors talking about Comfort Connect.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Comfort Connect gives your team access to powerful payment options all in one place.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: It includes traditional financing, lease-to-own options, and their premiere program, which bundles everything from equipment, maintenance, and covered repairs with ongoing support all wrapped into one predictable monthly payment for the customer.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: Contractors using the platform are seeing higher close rates, bigger average sales, and stronger long-term customer retention because homeowners stay connected to their brand long after installs.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: So stop treating financing like an afterthought and start using payment options your customers need as a part of your sales strategy.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: So so today we're gonna be talking about like operations chaos and how to turn that into a scalable growth, which is really like what we've spent the last you know day and a half on.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: At this point.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: So you're uh what what's uh well, how do you want to start this?
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: We've got I've got a couple thoughts.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Where do you want to start?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_02: Uh uh like I'm happy to start if there's like a particular like question or area.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_02: You know, obviously I'm a software guy, so um, I'm I'm a let's talk like most of the contractors in the room.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: So if we're at a million to three million dollar contractor, sure.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: What's the chaos that you're usually like running into?
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I think it's a couple of things.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_02: I think one of them is you know, smaller businesses, you sort of rely on heroes, I think.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, whether it's it's the owner or the GM or there's that one person, you know, an employee or a family member, whoever kind of just like make sure the office runs as it's supposed to, or you're one uh guy in the field, you know, for example, that everybody relies on to help solve their problems.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_02: And and that can work at that stage, right?
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_02: And you can continue to find some success where you're just relying on individuals, the knowledge and their building, their capability, their talents to solve problems and to sort of keep the chaos at bay.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: But if you're trying to scale your business, like at a certain point, you have to start creating the structure and giving yourself, uh, if you're the owner, the decision maker, whoever it may be, giving yourself the leverage to focus on how to you achieve that next stage of growth versus just trying to keep your head above water.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so I I I see that a lot.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_02: And then a lot of times that structure is missing, where I think what you you know, you and your team have talked about over the last couple of days like resonates completely where it's like you can't affect change on things you can't measure, right?
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: And you have to have a goal and a target, and you have to have the telemetry or like the ability to see are we are we achieving that or not to even know where to go.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and I think that these smaller businesses like don't always have the tools or they haven't haven't yet decided to take that leap and sort of invest in themselves and in their systems the way that they ought to.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um that will like we just talked about all these examples of people achieving meteoric growth.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_02: It's yeah, that's how you do it.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: I I remember um it it was like 10 years ago, and I I had we I was beginning my entrepreneurship journey and I don't remember I'm sure there was a book that helped.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it might have been like emyth or it was something like that.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I I I don't know why, what in inspired me to think this way, but I do think that this was the right way to think about it.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um because what when I see when I see other people, it it's so like it it seems obvious, but um I'm trying to remember how I even got that in my brain.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I bought the business and I wanted the ability to sell the business in five years.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, I did not sell the business in five years.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: I am 10 years into it, but I wanted the ability to sell it in five years.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I think like emyth and probably a few other books sort of walked you through like how you should be thinking about that.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: And if you think of the business as an asset instead of as a direct uh reflection of you or part of you, which I think most very small businesses do, like they're the salesperson, they're the the driving force, you have to think of it like I can't get that deep into this because if I'm an integral part of the day-to-day, I will not be able to achieve the goal of selling this business in five years or having the ability to sell this business in five years.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that like one little sentence that somehow I got obsessed with the idea of was the meteoric rise.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm air quoting if you're listening.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: But like we've obviously had success, but I I think it wasn't um to my point of like I don't think I was the hero, and I'm certainly not brilliant, but I do think I was very stubborn on I didn't want to be the reason it succeeded.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_02: Uh like I I I love the phrase that people use when they say it's like it's really about working on the business and finding ways to stop working in the business if you're trying to achieve growth and start working on the business, yeah, and putting people, process, technology in place that's gonna enable that and actually, you know, help you you define your goal.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's like I want to have the business in a place where it could sell in five years, and then you I'm assuming you had to break that down into its whatever four or five, six, you know, biggest components or pieces and start breaking it down into those smaller goals of like yeah, the biggest thing.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_02: There should be a manager, yeah.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: Rough me, rough revenue, rough like it wasn't even as sophisticated as that, to be honest.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: It was just like stubbornly I wanted the ability to do that.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it worked, and I think that philosophy, like, um I never got that deep into anything because the tar the goal was to not get that deep into anything.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think that that was sort of like the answer, especially as I'm like talking to more and more contractors out there today, as I'm thinking about the topic we're going over today, operations chaos, and scalable growth.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm thinking about the 40 people in that room.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: Most of them are just getting in their own way, and it is hard to pull yourself back.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to pull yourself back because it's urgent, it's important, it's your business, it's your baby, and maybe even most importantly, uh, you don't want to take the loss of income to pull yourself back.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: And because it takes investment.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: I the a funny, like a funny uh story I have is there was a a good friend of mine, and he launched a plumbing business a year after I bought the plumbing business that I bought in 2016.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: And the plumbing business never got very large, uh, like a million, half, two million of revenue.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but for most of his career and mine that we built together, uh he took home significantly more money than me.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: It was comical, like oh like a hilarious level of more money than me, despite the business being much smaller.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so like you know, if I was at five million and he was at a million, like he was taking home 300 and I was taking home like a hundred or eighty or something.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like really, I always tried to like minimize it because the goal was like, I want the ability to sell it.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: I want to reinvest, I have to reinvest.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, I mean, today even is 10 million this year.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: So like we did win.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's amazing.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: But it took yeah, yeah.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_02: It's you can optimize for different things.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_02: Like you can optimize for your like you could do what I think is now quite unpopular across many sectors, whether it's home services, technology, it's like growth at all costs, and it just didn't even matter.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I don't think that works that well anymore, and probably never did.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_02: But uh well, I think during COVID, it it and and maybe in some, yeah, like and that was the time, but like time.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: Threw out PPP money everywhere.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like it was an interesting time.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_02: It was an interesting time.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of people were successful in it.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um I'm glad you brought that up.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_02: But then uh, you know, some people really just want to optimize for like efficiency and bottom line.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and uh, you know, we're in the business of trying to help contractors grow, but we're also in the business of some contractors don't have that goal.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's yeah, and you've probably seen like there are, I think, some of these kind of natural breaks where you can really run an efficient operation.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_02: And if you don't want to grow, there's a lot of bottom line extraction that you can do.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I think we're at one right now.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think like 40 to 45, we seem to have this like perfect sweet spot.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_02: It's about do you want to take that next leap of hiring more people, right?
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_02: Or investing in more systems, or you know, doing the things that you need to do to break, and where that you re-enter sort of the period of discomfort to sort of get settled at that next you know, place where you can take a break and mature.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_02: Because yeah, I've I've seen it at many stages.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_02: Like I think there's one that's usually at that, you know, six to eight million range.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_02: I think you hit one of those.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_02: I think at around 15 you hit one of those.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then you have to sort of re-enter that period of you know a little more discomfort uh to get there.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_02: But there is like always light at the end of the next tunnel uh that you can get to.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: So I remember this is just like a lot of like we're we're in this cot like boot camp workshop thing surrounded by people that just remind me of myself like seven to ten years ago.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just you know it's a lot of me reminiscing.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm sorry about that.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's fine.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: But um, you know, 10 years ago, one of the first decisions that we made, we have a photo of it somewhere, but the company was like six employees, uh like and then my dad and I, so eight people.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we had our very first, we call it state of the wilson, and it was like we still do it 10 years later, and it's like a once annual here's what we're working on, uh, conversations.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: But I think the you know, the room had eight total people in it, and uh our big projects that we were working on, like that infrastructure, and we were a million dollars of revenue, was hey, we're gonna put uh software in place.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't we didn't really know what we had to track or not track, or we didn't really have a big opinion on that.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um we were going to implement flat rate pricing, and we were gonna move to QuickBooks Online.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like that was our big objective for 2016 was like those three tasks.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, which I think a lot of people are like uh still sort of evolving along, you know.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, it it it's uh there's like these foundational pieces.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: What what are some other like foundational pieces that you've seen?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I I love this question too.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think you touched on a phone.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_02: And I I have a particular point of view that I've formed over, you know, just you talked to thousands of times.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_02: You know, strategized a lot of smart people trying to solve these problems.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: Like I I think it's a handful of things, and I think they really are like fundamental.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_02: It's sometimes the things that are common sense maybe or feel a little more clear and obvious, people can arrive at this.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, I think you then are understand also the difference between like knowing what to do and like how important execution is, yes, and uh actually getting through and delivering on the things that you're trying to do in your business.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_02: But I think it's a few things, uh at least in you know, certain trade specialties, like this may be different, um, but maybe around more of the HVAC plumbing electrical.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: garage door and some of the subspecialties that I think that fit inside of that, whether it's you know, sewer and septic, you know, that's adjacent uh sometimes to plumbing or chimney, you know, sweeps and fireplaces that are kind of similar to HVAC.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: But I think it's a few things like, and you touched on one, like flat rate pricing in your price book, like really your sales process.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: I forgot until someone yesterday was like, hey, what did you do about Pricebook?
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, holy shit.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's that was such a pain point for like a long time.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_02: And it's and it's it look I I think even still today there are some tools out there in my opinion some of the tools that you can kind of buy off the shelf are flawed and at least that's tough.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_02: It's still a tough problem to solve.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_02: And it's a tough problem to solve but like I have I have yet to really talk to a business that like decided that they were going to put the person on it.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_02: They were going to maybe pull that you know service manager kind of like out of the day to day for a month or so to like just focus and get this thing set up.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's rare that I've actually had to do that last year.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_02: Uh it's rare that I've seen somebody regret doing it.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_02: And and and and here's why it's like you now have a like system that can scale because you can hand new technicians you can train technicians on a process and you actually make their life easier.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's like what's a more precious resource than the time of the guys in the field it's like probably arguably the most precious thing that you have yeah resources wise.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like if you're not working on the things that are going to empower them to be more productive and follow sort of a a guideline and a process that's proven to work with like the multiple options you know approach and having a price book that supports that there are so many derivative things that come out of it.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's one of the most important things I think you can do another one not to jump off the topic too quickly but like another one is I've seen a lot of like the very fundamentals of just CRM management like fall down and smaller businesses I think this is a gigantic like future multiplier thing is be really really good about capturing your customer data, tracking your customer data get an email it's unbelievable how many people don't collect an email when they book a job.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_02: And it's just if you ever in the future want to be able to market and call on those customers like you have to capture and track that information and good hygiene on it.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I think this is one of my I used to have a much stronger opinion about this but um today I feel like how data gets input and the it takes a lot of resource to put a CRM into place.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: And like we're talking to people in the room over there they're like a million and a half dollars of revenue and they're just like well how are we going to how like you're talking about like hey are we investing the resources and they're over there like what resources?
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah what can we invest into this massive CRM uh project.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: So like how do you have an easy solution to towards it?
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: But I I agree with you.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: That was one of the most fundamental decisions we ever made was getting on a platform.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah I look I I think it it is a big investment but um you know even to quote you about it it's like I think looking at a system or a software like that as a cost is in a way the wrong way of of looking at it.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: I think it really it is an investment that pays dividends and and return on that investment down the road because you start to it's the infrastructure of the business.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I I do think that a lot of people maybe look and assume at a software as like the magic solution that if I just buy it but it's you you have to really start to like take it very seriously and you're investing again going back to this like you're investing with your people to make sure that it's getting set up that you have a system that you're trying to make sure that the software is complimentary to and is empowering.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: But it's like everybody wants to talk how do I get more leads?
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah how do I close more revenue like the system is what really can drive like you knowing where you need to focus and to like know whether or not you're making the most out of what you you have today or when you make future investments down the road like it's it's the place where you can see your performance.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think uh people are smart and they know their business.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm a believer where it's like instinct and intuition when you know what you're doing is like you're gonna get 50% of the way there most of the time on that.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_02: But like it's only 50% of the way there.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's like if you have a goal that you want to go from a million to two or two to five, it's like are you going to be happy if your goal was to go to two to five and you landed at three like yeah if your goal was five and like I think that's totally achievable for so many contractors like out there.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh do you have like the tools in place where you can actually know where am I struggling?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_02: Am I struggling am I actually struggling with leads even though I sort of feel like that's the case.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_02: Am I actually struggling with my average ticket and like would investing in my my price book and knowing when people present multiple options or use financing.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_02: Actually seeing that data know like if if I had a nickel for every time it was like yeah yeah all my guys offer financing all the time and then you could look at the data and see how that was not true.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's it it kind of blows your mind sometimes.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: I mean and that's a problem yeah that specific problem is something we still feel occasionally too which is kind of funny.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: It it is yeah for um an example that we've gave yesterday uh is if you had a hundred more of something like what would break like if you had a hundred more leads if you had a hundred more texts maybe that's really dramatic uh a hundred more calls hundred more invoices from suppliers a hundred more invoices to customers like where would be the gaps yeah and on my drive in this morning I was like thinking back on that just as I like you know I was sort of like sharing that with a group and then I was thinking back to just like my own business and just like yeah what what actually would break in my business with a hundred uh more things and I realized how much of the business was built around things that made it so it never broke when you got a hundred more things.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that was not on purpose.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm sure it looks great but like that part a lot of that was like I'm really glad that worked out because that was not how I thought about it five years ago.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_02: I I think when like maybe you didn't think about it that way but it it seems to me that you've invested like your time and your thought and hired also the right people to come and help with it.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yes I'm somebody else had it in mind.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_02: And it's it's an organic byproduct of like when you when you're thinking about like building for scale yeah um and you're investing what feels like a lot of money in you know I thought it was very funny when we were kind of walking through some PL stuff and you're like look how much I spend on you know software and look how much I spend on marketing and look how much I'm spending on bonuses but like do you regret any of that?
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_02: Like maybe there's little examples but I think on the whole 5000 month on software I'm like okay yeah but it's it's it like and maybe there's ways to like tune and optimize that right over time and try to find efficiency.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_02: But like I think what you said is pretty powerful.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's like yeah the byproduct of investing in these things is like when I did add a hundred more people or we added a hundred more calls a day yeah it was like fairly resilient.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: And I even think about our business sometimes like at field pulse it's even though we're in a different space you know in and have different sets of challenges in some ways like also many of the things are the same.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah it's like we're bringing on you know in some cases 25 salespeople in a quarter right that's crazy.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I think what we've realized is like I don't know if we had the right system in place to be able to like train those people effectively and get them ramped and up to speed and that was like a struggle for us a little bit and I was like okay what do we need to do now because we don't have any intentions of like not ever hiring 25 more salespeople.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_02: It's like we want to increase that and get to a point where we can even bring on more than that.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: Like 25 and a quarter is pretty baller.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_02: And then feels baller.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_02: It it it was a lot and it it definitely feels baller like on paper.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Didn't necessarily feel baller when it was like I'm like that's kind of that's kind of nope actually.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah but it it's it but it you know it's just like you said you're walking around a hundred million dollar shop and like you think these guys got to figure out like no it's like we have our own you know challenges that we try to solve and that we try to face like um and it's really the same thing.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_02: And like I think that was some reality check for us.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_02: And then we we you know get our nose on the grindstone start figuring out like how do we how do we fix this and build a more resilient system so that we can do this going forward.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_02: And some of that was investing in tools.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_02: Some of that was hiring a person.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_02: You know some of that was like evaluating and in and maybe in one case like realizing we didn't really have the tools to evaluate was like was this task or was this function really being done well?
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_02: And you're kind of like I'm actually not sure.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah we're not sure yeah and so well that that was a good lesson yesterday.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know we're going through like we did a little section on like KPIs and um like the homework was tell me just over lunch how many phone calls you received last week.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: And which like tells you a lot you're gonna be able to measure your marketing maybe your call so like you you it gives you a lot of information.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: And like half the group was which like was the point of this exercise but like half the group could not do it.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah uh which was yeah it's like okay how how are we measuring kind of something pretty important that's like are you track yeah yeah are you tracking revenue are you tracking calls in and yeah it it is interesting.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_02: I again like I I see it all the time and we have some of the same things in our business.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes people ask me about metrics I really care about like yes part of my role is helping on the payment processing side right I think it's a pretty important function.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah um that sometimes gets overlooked to you know maybe people are always frustrated that they gotta you know pay fees but uh I do think people forget sometimes that like the convenience of making it really easy to pay and like and accelerating your cash flow and like what that can do for you.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_02: But um like I look around I'm like I need to know this metric.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have it.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_02: I can't find it.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_02: And like what do I do?
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_02: Like I turn around like that is maybe it's not the number one thing on my prior list but it's definitely in the top five.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's like a real metric that I think drives the business and I don't have the ability to like yeah know it.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_02: I'm getting to work to say like how am I going to solve this so I can see that because again another thing that I I haven't really heard this one before but I love how you say this is like if it's an important like KPI for you or to know whether or not you're winning on something whether you look at it daily or weekly or monthly it's like you should be able to know in like 15 seconds.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_02: And like know how to do it.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah you should know the score in like 15 seconds or less.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I think if you don't like you have a system problem somewhere.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_02: And and that's that that's exactly right.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_02: It's like and so then it's like how do you solve your system problem and like realizing how important that is so these are like systems can be frustrating for people and like you do have to invest time.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah no you know no company knows software is perfect.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's kind of the thing about software you could do anything in the world with it but it's like are you doing the right things with it?
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_02: Does it get too complicated?
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_02: Are you is it too simple?
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_02: Totally but the thing that it does extraordinarily well is like track and surface data for you.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_02: It's like what it's built for.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um the thing the 15 second thing I I'm gonna I'm gonna flush it just so the like the listener can grab hold of it because I do think it is helpful.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then I have a couple questions on like overbuilt.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: The 15 second thing was meant to be which I I think as a as a as a philosophy is good.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like as owners as service managers as technicians as call takers as whatever your role is inside the company you should be able to know the score.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like this is all just a big fucking game you should be able to know your score and the company score quickly most uh like primarily around comp plans and this is what drove this into our business like almost a decade ago was I had a very complicated compensation plan for it was the first one or two comp plans that I designed was like you gotta there's a lot of spreadsheets.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: Which if if someone doesn't know their score which is their money in 15 seconds or less they're not gonna give a shit about your comp plan no matter how elaborate or beautiful it is.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: So it just has to be easy.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah it was started with comp plans but it did turn into basically everything else which I I think is good.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_00: How do you think about like um so I I'm you know we're talking about how fundamental the right tools are which I I totally agree with uh I do think there's a a danger and I see it a lot of the uh I almost want to say overbuilt but it's like overbuilt for you at this stage like um I think one of the easiest ex easiest examples is the some of the AI ride-along technology that's out there right now sure if you are a locked in sales team AI ride-along technology is incredible yeah if you are not it is like absolute it is less than worthless to you yeah and I think it's it's just such a perfect example of like it's not overbuilt for the right team it's probably incredible but it's absolutely overbuilt for you.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: So how do you think about like systems and tools and like investing ahead but not too far ahead because I think that's the thing is like am I investing for the next decade or the next two years.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: Your Google business profiles are either printing money or they're losing it.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where big reputation comes in.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: Big reputation turns your GBP into a true lead machine without adding more work to your plate.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: It runs in the background with automated posting review generation and fast responses so that your reputation compounds over time.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: And this is huge if you're multi-location.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: They make it dead simple to manage and scale your reputation across every branch.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: So every location shows up and wins in the map pack.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually using Big Reputation right now as I grow and scale my newest acquisitions.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: Plus you get real insight into what's actually happening you get to spot gaps with location health monitoring track reviews and sentiment and see which zip codes you're winning and which ones you're losing better insights stronger trust more calls from an asset you already own.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_02: Go check it out at bigreputation.ai slash OAO I think the way that I think about it is uh to me there's such a thing as like your critical path right it's like what absolutely must happen and what is the most essential and fundamental things.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_02: And do I have those like locked in yeah um we talked about you know a couple of the examples I think on the trades like FSM or CRM side yeah it's some of those things.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's like your CRM you want to have dialed in.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_02: I think your booking you know performance and how your phone or call takers are performing is the second thing which typically means having some phone system yeah that is connected with the like system of action or what drives revenue to be able to track the results through.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: So like a VoIP is going to be connected to field pulse.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah exactly and then uh and so and I think those are two that's you want to know booking rate you want to know what average time on phone.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly number calls yeah and even like again for the smallest businesses that are maybe really at square one it's like it's really just booking rate.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: Like you just want to have booking rate and you want to be able to track your customers like who who are my customers and am I booking them and the opportunities that I have.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: And then the the second I would add missed calls but yes because missed calls for the very small contractor is like you can double yes yes you can just double that is that is actually called that is a great point.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_02: I was looking at usage data from our VoIP product that we have and we've got some opportunity to like improve the product to like help with that.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: It's crazy.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's crazy how much of a lift like it's lift the business.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah just like every point of that is worth a lot of money.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_02: So um so you have that piece then the like the second really big chunk for me is like your field execution and that's where the price book and the sales process really comes in like how is how are the folks in the field able to do their part to actually close business right and do it efficiently.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_02: And then the third piece of it I think is financials right you want to have really good confidence that your financials are accurate.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah you can rely on them and you can access them when you need them.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah and so like something that I think is interesting I don't know if you guys have this as a part of your platform or not but I was talking with um I was talking with Brock and Brock runs a septic tank installation business in Ontario and uh which is interesting for a few reasons.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: One it's pretty big like two and a half million dollars of like slugging in septic tanks which I didn't even know that you could slug in that many septic tanks uh but on two and a half million dollars his average job is like 25 grand so he does a hundred jobs a year and Brock is thinking about hiring a sales guy and I was like okay I mean amazing like how are you thinking about commissioning this person because in septic installation the uh material cost like on a$25,000 job materials might be like$15 so they have they're really it's a$10,000 of gross profit on that job which is not like super high percentage but obviously a lot of dollars like$10,000 you know you do a lot of gross profit there.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_00: And um and he's like yeah I yes but we struggle with job costing which I'm I I think most contractors do.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not like tossing a rock at Brock.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's funny.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_00: What I think what I think is really interesting about his business and also struggling with job costing is he only has a hundred jobs a year.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're a normal like an HVAC business not normal but if you're an HVAC business a plumbing business that two and a half million dollars you might have 1500 jobs a year or two thousand like there's a lot of jobs that go into that size of a business but Brock is running a hundred jobs and struggling to job cost.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it feels like uh on the I'm I'm on the financial thing because I was that's just relevant.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was talking to him about this yesterday.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: It feels like that sort of automated job costing component uh like I is that something you guys do know oh yeah yeah absolutely I actually wasn't even trying to miss it I wasn't even trying to like serve that up for you that was me just like hey you guys should do this because I don't that like even today that's really hard for us.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh like I think it's critical it's yeah and it's one of those things I look at it it's kind of this fundamental building block.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_02: If you can cost out one job yeah and then you can build that process for scale like think about all the like broader departmental yeah monthly annual like results like you can you have all your metrics you know if you that you're gonna want to have if you can use the unit like use each unit of a job.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_02: How does it work?
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: Like an invoice sort of comes in like yeah so TV or something the the way I so like we have functionality like this in Fieldpull so it's important.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_02: It's also something that we like we didn't just like build and then oh we have it we're done with it.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_02: It's like it it our software grows and evolves yeah and we continue to like invest in making it more capable and better because I think about this is also the advantage of sort sort of your all-in-one system if you will yeah where it's like what are the components that go into it you need to know your revenue right you need to know your material cost and like what was costed onto the job that you had to buy yeah what the cost of it was what the price of you know that that piece of it you know your labor right and what goes into it.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_02: And I I think those are like the bigger components.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_02: I think there's some other components that you can try to add to it when you get more sophisticated.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_02: But like that's what you need to have that's harder if like you track time in a system over here.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah you track materials actually you don't really track materials you just go to your vendor's website and order and and pay and pay and you pay separately which is what which I bet you know back to Brock like that's I was trying to help him like figure out how to solve this problem.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because he's like it's a it's a small team and job cost like someone has to manually go in and job cost which is kind of a big pain point.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_00: So he's trying to figure out how to hire the salesperson to go in and he now has to job and he's the salesperson now.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like he's like I know my cost so like I'm not gonna screw around but like a sales guy might get a little bit more you know froggy with pricing.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: And um yeah it it was interesting a good reminder of like how much resource goes into like yeah accurate financials just on a job.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it is and it I think like the ideal state of it is where you're building up the system where just the organic process actually drives the outcome.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_02: Where it's uh you know would I go out to the job my system is tracking like what the revenue was and what discounting I applied to it if if any.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: Then you know, we have an order, you know, for the parts or like uh at least the tracking on the invoice of the parts and supplies and equipment that was used.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_02: We track the time and or the labor component of what that role, whether it was a salesperson, whatever, and uh, you know, something that we have, you know, some commission tracking, you know, and commission calculation features as well.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_02: So in skillful, so you can also understand the performance pay piece of it.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_02: That's cool.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um and like if that's all sort of driven organically, where you clocked into the job, tracked the revenue, you have the order tied to it, the job costing's there, it's just done, right?
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_02: And there's always some tuning, and there's sometimes things that can't be included, or there's you know, exception processes, but if you can get your your 80 versus your 20 like sorted automatically, like think how much effort you've just reduced, yeah, right in what you have to do.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, which again, I'm just back on this the group in the room, and like that's like people and money, and like yeah, yeah, it takes a lot to it takes a lot to the back to the hundred more, like what would happen if you get a hundred more.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_02: So if you get a hundred more if Brock had a hundred more jobs all of a sudden, like that could he job cost two hundred jobs instead of one hundred a year, like yeah, totally.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe not.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, I mean he's not job costing a hundred.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but like yeah, it's a great example.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_00: Or like uh yeah, I mean that's a great example if he doubles.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, it'd be a hundred more payments, a hundred more, whatever.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_00: It it's it's a funny exercise.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm I'm like, yeah, it just came to me yesterday, and now I'm like starting to even just this morning, like pick apart different parts of my business of like, yeah, actually that is a real friction point for us, and I need to be thoughtful about that.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and you know, I I like again, I'll I'll own I'll own this part of it, whether you love me or hate me for it.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I'm a software guy and I'm like always interested in how technology is evolving, and like I also think it's like there's one thing of having that data and then looking at it and understanding it and analyzing it.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_02: Like, you know, the direction I think the industry is headed is like AI can do a lot of this analysis stuff for you.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yeah.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_02: And you need to have the data in like a structured, yes, reliable format, because then instead of you needing to go and spend you know an hour each day reviewing your your sales side, an hour each day or Splod, hey, what happened with whatever?
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_02: Or it's just organically surfaced you.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's just like all of a sudden it's like, hey, we're we're noticing a trend where like your you know job cost margins in your HVAC service department are starting to you know decline a little bit.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_02: And it might indicate to you that like maybe your pricing from your vendor is starting to rise and like have you responded in kind of what you want to do with that, whether you want to absorb that, whether you want to adjust your markups or your pricing to deal with it, like yeah, you know, that's it's the type of thing can start to create like suggest action and follow trends for you in like large volumes of data, yeah, which is what it's really good at.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I agree.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think um it'll be interesting to watch.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that that for better or worse is gonna create disruption in software because I think like if I can query or make an automatic query where it just spits off the data and suddenly reporting is easier, like that's amazing.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it it's uh there's applications at all different levels, right?
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_02: Like I think about the things where I see it's best at.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_02: It's like it's really good at natural language and like writing, and it's really good at analyzing like your call recordings and transcripts, things like that.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's quite good at like processing large volumes of data and like seeing trends as long as it's structured.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's getting like pretty good at finance like related tasks, and I know that that's a pain point for that's gonna be so many businesses.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we have um yeah, I mean, so much it it's kind of there's like a right way to do it in rules, it's pretty good at it.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, okay.
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_00: Would have you uh like what what's the tools that you found to do that?
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm talking to more friends and we're trying to figure out how to automate different parts of our like finance stack, and like we had things that were automated, but like QuickBooks has so many APIs, but like we moved from QuickBooks to Sage Intact, and there's just less tools available.
• 48:24
  SPEAKER_00: So we had like we had like our AP inbox went from a very automated process to very manual because we had to switch over to get better reporting and um but yeah, it it yeah, I don't know.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like what are you seeing inside finance to help?
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_00: Finance finance or accounting?
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I mean I think it it can be both.
• 48:49
  SPEAKER_02: Like I I think that I see more like startup businesses also that are trying to solve more problems.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_00: I'm seeing a lot of like AI native ERPs.
• 48:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, an ERP is like a QuickBooks agent tax.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_02: I and I'm I'm we're starting to see that.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I think there's like in the industry itself, there's there you're starting to see some exposure where people are also trying to mess this in with the system of record, right?
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so with system of record being what the FSM or the ERP, it's it's sort of it can depend on your industry, like which one you would you would call that.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_02: But okay, um, I'm starting to see more of it.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's still nascent, I would say.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's not quite at the level where I would like go out recommending like everybody needs to get on this today.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_00: But it's it's like starting to pop out.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a watch.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_00: It does feel like the last bastion for something as um for something as rule-based as accounting can be.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_00: It it's interesting how it hasn't been that touched.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_00: Compared to like booking calls, which is almost the opposite of rule based.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's a very like, who knows where the call is gonna take us.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_00: But we yeah, it it's kind of interesting how it hasn't gotten there yet.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I like the evolution or you know, that I see with it is like it was natural language, is you know, where these AI models like live and so maybe that's calls is like and so it's really strong there, right?
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_02: And then I feel like the next frontier of it was uh software engineering and coding, right?
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_02: And so and that's also become unbelievably strong there.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_02: And like these next frontiers are starting to get opened a little bit more.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, yeah, finance and accounting is definitely one of them.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_00: It it is uh with uh a you know, the natural language on like a call, like booking a call or um what was the other application?
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh like coding.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_00: So like if I want to go like vibe code something, my risk is low.
• 50:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like if I if it doesn't work, I'll say undo that or whatever.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_00: But like the risk in accounting is very high.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the risk in legal is very high.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so I do think that that probably is what makes it take longer, is like the risk is high.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_02: There's a much higher like threshold for it.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_02: And I I keep coming back to this and and harping on it, but it's like it will only be as good as the data that it has access to, yes, right?
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_02: And so if if there are any leaks uh or gaps or any junk sort of going in, you are going to get compounding of that coming out.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_02: It's not even just that it's if it's bad and it will be bad out, it'll be worse out, yeah, uh, most likely, because it will start to compound uh the issues.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think it makes the systems important to be like in a position.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, what what we you know at Field Pulse are doing, like we are spending a lot of time and energy and resources into like thoughtfully investing into like how do we help customers like not have to just like go and like navigate the wilderness on their own and try to figure it all out on their own, but actually just kind of like create the path for them, yeah.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and do it in you know, pieces, you know, parts in ways that make it easy, right?
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um and like it really it's all in service of like trying to give leverage and scale.
• 52:01
  SPEAKER_02: It's we understand sitting in this room with 40 contractors, like hearing what the challenges are or like where they're focused, what the questions are, where they just want like confidence and benchmarks of like what should I be shooting for?
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, we what's gross margin supposed to be.
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_00: What it's supposed to be.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then it's like, okay, once I know what it's supposed to be, where am I?
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_02: And then how do I get there?
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_02: And some of those ways, like I I love the exercise we did where it was like, what are all the things you do on a daily basis?
• 52:26
  SPEAKER_02: And then it's like, what are the true essential core things, and then what's you know, I I could do hired, and what can be hired, what can be handed off and automated.
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_02: And like these are the applications and the use cases we're trying to solve, right?
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, how can we actually make it easier for you to automate or hand off that thing where you don't have to go and go through like a software sourcing process of like how do I find a tool?
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_02: How much does it cost?
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's always things like no, we're trying to put that right, you know, right in your hands as quickly as we can.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's great.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_00: So as companies are thinking about scaling, um, I think we gave the AI right-along uh feature.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's it's easy to over maybe over plan.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like on a on a yearly, like just I know I'm I I'm asking for me.
• 53:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, as you're talking to contractors, do you think people should be investing for like, hey, this this is good for two or three years, or this is good for like 10?
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_00: Or like what do what do you think?
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_02: Ideally, um uh I I like this phrase where it's like you do want to sort of begin with the end in mind, yeah, but you don't want to get so obsessed about like the needing to think of every single eventuality that might happen and never having to like make an adjustment to how you're deploying systems.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_00: I I'll bring up a totally out like not relevant to this conversation at all example.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_00: I was uh so we're like doing our tr uh like trust and will stuff, like hopefully I don't die, hopefully I have a long time.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_00: But uh we're like prepping our paperwork uh for our kids and we're updating it.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_00: And my attorneys that are like helping me through this process gave a very similar answer.
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_00: We're like, hey, my kids are five and seven.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_00: And if I compare that to a business, maybe like I'm a million-dollar business, and I have a long way to go before like they're adults and before we even know who these you know little humans are gonna be.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_00: And like what their needs are, what lives needs are.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 54:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so so the advice from my state attorney was ever the hey, you're not thinking about the next 10, 20, 30 years.
• 54:38
  SPEAKER_00: You're thinking about the next five.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like if you pass and your kids are like 12 and 10, what has to happen?
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, okay, well, that that makes so much more sense to me because I don't know how to plan 10 years out.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_00: Just like 10 years ago, I would have never thought that we would be three states, four locations, and 200 some people.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's good to think about those things.
• 55:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 55:02
  SPEAKER_02: And uh to even kind of carry off of your like a state example.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's like it's good to think about my kids five.
• 55:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's like good to think about that.
• 55:09
  SPEAKER_02: It's and it's like, okay, maybe I need to think about that.
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but then pull yourself back, like rein yourself back in.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_02: And I always think of it's like horizons.
• 55:15
  SPEAKER_02: It's like yeah, there's stuff that's right in front of you can see very clearly, and you know you need to address.
• 55:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you can then see sort of out to your second like horizon, and it's like, I know I need to start preparing for these things, and these things are there.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_02: You should think about a little bit how am I preparing for like that next like third horizon afterwards.
• 55:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but it should be a minority of your concern.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so you want to think ahead some.
• 55:41
  SPEAKER_02: And the way I like when it comes to like an FSM decision, right, it is expensive and like switching cost, you know, to move, and you don't want to be doing that extremely frequently.
• 55:52
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think it's important to have like as a criteria, maybe not the most important criteria is can this support me 10 years from now?
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_02: But an important criteria is to think about like, can this grow with me and how?
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_02: And does it have like my critical path, my essential tools in a frame and a level of uh maturity, let's call it, yeah, that fits with my business now and into the next two years that I can see quite clearly and know what my goals are.
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_02: And then you should have pretty good confidence that like two to five years, you know, from now, or whatever that growth goal, if you're thinking about it in revenue stages or whatever, um, should be able, or you have high, you know, fairly high confidence that it supports you.
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_02: And then it's like bonus points.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_02: If it's like if my goal is to go from eight employees and million, two million bucks to a hundred million, like I don't know if there's a ton of solutions like across narrow parts of your business or broad parts of your business that like well I think the best option for you is the same thing out of one million is the same thing at a hundred million.
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_00: And and I'm saying it because I think look, one, I'm a part of the problem, right?
• 57:01
  SPEAKER_00: But I think there's uh there's other really inspirational entrepreneurs from the home service industry that share the tools they're using and they share the strategies that they're using, just like I share the tools and strategies that I'm using.
• 57:14
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not it was not relevant to me 10 years ago.
• 57:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like it just wasn't.
• 57:20
  SPEAKER_00: And like at 200 team members in 10 or 8 or whatever, I you there's no crystal ball to tell you what's going to be useful.
• 57:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there's no way to anticipate your need.
• 57:31
  SPEAKER_02: You know, to plug Field Pulse a little bit, I think this is what Field Pulse does extremely well.
• 57:35
  SPEAKER_02: Is it's a tool that is like kind of in I consider this Goldilocks zone of it's it's quite customizable, it's very powerful, it's quite broad, it can do a lot of things, but we invest a lot of thought and energy into like how to make it simple and easy to use, where it doesn't become this overwhelming or have this feeling of being overbuilt to the point where it's like, I can't even use any of this.
• 57:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 57:58
  SPEAKER_02: And like, you know, we have a we have this one feature, clear path, that's like really built with text in mind, where it's like you have our mobile app, which is very powerful and can do all sorts of functions and features and lots of buttons, lots of things that are cool and fun.
• 58:11
  SPEAKER_02: But we actually create this ability to make a view where it like keeps your tech on the path you want them on and almost like reduces the amount of decision complexity that they need to make.
• 58:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, what's my next action?
• 58:24
  SPEAKER_02: I gotta go, you know, cover my inspection for them and do a really good job assessing what's going on in the home, take my pictures.
• 58:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 58:30
  SPEAKER_02: And then like the only thing that's on the screen after that is like, all right, well, now let's build our options, right?
• 58:34
  SPEAKER_02: And then the only thing on the screen after that is like, all right, let's proceed to payment, collect payment in the field, get the cash in the bank onto the next job.
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so like that, these are the ways I think we approach it where it's like having a powerful system that can grow with you and really thinking about how do we make something customizable but easy to use at the same time.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's easy to go over build and it's easy to like hear something that I say or something that Tommy says.
• 59:03
  SPEAKER_00: And Tommy's like five times my size, right?
• 59:05
  SPEAKER_00: So like if I'm I'm listening to Tommy and be like, well, it I mean, he has 800 employees, like I have 200.
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_00: So he has four times the amount of team members.
• 59:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like the things that are relevant to him may be relevant to me, but they also just might not be.
• 59:19
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we're an HVAC and plumbing like service business.
• 59:23
  SPEAKER_02: We're not a massive inventory operation and logistics company.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_02: Like, why am I investing resources into something outside my core competency?
• 59:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 59:32
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it's well, the the phrase that we used when we were building it was if I become the best warehouse and logistics business in the entire industry, in the entire fucking world, it would not move my revenue a dime.
• 59:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 59:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that was such a powerful, that was such a powerful insight.
• 59:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 59:51
  SPEAKER_00: Of like, oh, well, that's the absolute wrong thing to try to figure out.
• 59:56
  SPEAKER_02: And there comes there comes a point where it's like, I mean, you guys have a system where even though it's nested inside your business with VMI and everything, it's it's outsourced in a way, right?
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_02: Where the the functions that make you a great inventory and logistics operation are handled by Yeah, we we negotiated it.
• 1:00:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're and it's handled by a partner that's doing that for you.
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_00: Doing a great job.
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, like I think it's a good sort of lesson that you could try to apply in other ways too.
• 1:00:21
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, am I focused on my core competency and have that nailed before I move on to my next thing?
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_02: So I think marketing is another thing.
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's a Ray Croc thing.
• 1:00:28
  SPEAKER_00: What business are you in?
• 1:00:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, are you in the logistics business and warehousing business, or are you in uh marketing and sales business?
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think yeah, uh you gotta pick.
• 1:00:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:00:37
  SPEAKER_02: So like I I think there's some similarities in it, you know, if I and if I were advising contractors again, it goes back to like some of the core metrics.
• 1:00:44
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, is your your booking and lead generation process like nailed?
• 1:00:49
  SPEAKER_02: And I I would start with bookings and then like then you get into leads and marketing, and yeah, you know, we're quite excited about what we're uh what's coming next for us on the marketing front at field pulse.
• 1:00:58
  SPEAKER_02: But um, like you nail that part, you nail your field execution part.
• 1:01:02
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like when you get those parts nailed, it's like then is a great time to start thinking about your inventory and your payroll or yeah, uh like getting more sophisticated in your comp structures than you are today or whatever.
• 1:01:13
  SPEAKER_02: But simple can be quite good.
• 1:01:15
  SPEAKER_02: And uh it's just knowing that you have like you're getting the most out of the things that you're uh most focused on.
• 1:01:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's a good place to start.
• 1:01:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I agree with you.
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for coming on today.
• 1:01:27
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate like walking through the story and walking through sort of the fundamentals of running a home service company.
• 1:01:33
  SPEAKER_02: No, I I appreciate the opportunity.
• 1:01:35
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, you guys have been great partners, uh, you know, for Field Pulse and also uh just everything you're doing that owned and operated for the industry.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_00: Give back to the industry.
• 1:01:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's fun that it's become something real.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's what I love most that you know, my my decade or you know, plus that in you know, field services and skilled trades is uh some other industries don't operate like this.
• 1:01:56
  SPEAKER_02: People are way more closely guarded about what they do and how they operate.
• 1:02:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I think it's uh it's awesome what you guys are doing.
• 1:02:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I think it uh something we really support like fits with us too.
• 1:02:06
  SPEAKER_02: We want to lift up the industry as much as we can.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_00: Heck yeah.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.