Author: Dick Wagner

A couple of times a month I get a call from a fairly new contractor wanting to generate more leads and job opportunities. Usually, the questions include the topic of Plumbers and if they are a good lead source.

IS IT FRAUD?

I’m all in favor of a contractor developing great lead sources. Even more so, I want contractors to build a steady stream of job opportunities. My frustration has always been with the issue of paying a referral fee. And, more specifically, exorbitant fees. Sure it’s done all over the US. But just because it’s done doesn’t make it right.

Most businesspeople have to ask themselves at some point; “how much of a referral fee should I pay to plumbers?” In many of the major cities (think Miami, LA, NY) some plumbers are demanding – and many contractors are paying one thousand dollars per lead! Yikes

WHERE DOES IT STOP

Because the dollar amount is so high, you can’t help but wonder if this is right, ethical, fair, or even legit! With the average water-damage mitigation project averaging around $4,900 nationally, a $1,000 “finders fee” does one of two things – neither are good. First, it potentially increases the invoice on the project by $1,000, or about 20%. Second, if you truly do not raise your price, you really end up with very little or no profit when the job is done. The amount paid has to be reasonable, fair, and appropriate.

You can’t have it both ways. Either you raise your prices, or you make no money on your work. (Or do other things for the plumber that are big for them, and less for you).

WHAT IS FAIR

Since I am not a fan of “finders fees,” referral fees, bird-dog fees, or “spiffs” being paid out, I won’t tell you how much is “fair.” I am willing to recognize that for a long time, referral or finders fees have been, and are currently being paid in many industries. We don’t tolerate this as a society when politicians accept money for “bribes.”

If we really analyze the concept from a different angle, we could justify that we are paying a “commission” to an independent plumber. Just remember, you wouldn’t pay a commission to an employee where the commission represented 20 – 30% of the actual job! Furthermore, they would at the minimum receive a 1099 tax statement from you at the end of the year, or else you’re going to pay tax on the money you give the plumber.

DESPERATE

Too often, business owners are so desperate for a job that they willingly concede their integrity and find unique ways to justify these payments. It’s called “situational ethics.” When you engage in situational ethics – you will always be compromised!

I urge you to talk about the entire referral fee – commission payment idea with a trusted financial consultant. When you do this, you at least understand the true position and what the potential ramifications are.

Author:  Dick Wagner, Co-founder of the CREST Network

Dick Wagner is a Nationally recognized marketing coach, consultant, trainer, and speaker

Creator of the renowned PREP™ pre-disaster program

Copyright© 2023     AskDickWagner, LLC   All Rights Reserved

No Part Of This Document May Be Reproduced In Any Form Without Written Permission

Many restoration marketers call on and solicit plumbing companies and plumbers. The hope is to be able to convince them to send your company leads and jobs when they arrive at a plumbing job and see a flooded home or a mold-contaminated property.

IT’S NOT THAT SIMPLE

However, it’s not as simple as just telling the plumber you’ll give him a couple of hundred bucks for his referrals. A marketing approach to this kind of prospect requires more than a one-size-fits-all program.

As a marketing rep calling on this vertical (plumbers), it’s important that you recognize the different “types” of plumbers so you can increase your success. Not all plumbers are the same. Some only do repair work, some only do sewer and drain clean-outs, and some do only “new construction” work.

THERE IS EVEN MORE THAN THIS!

In addition to the basic differences listed above, there are three additional factors you must consider. Identifying what their corporate (or business) structure is. Here is a simplified list of the 3 most common plumber types:

1. The one-man-band. (Chuck in a truck) or a man with a van. They may sometimes have a helper but usually work out of the home or garage. Rarely do they have a warehouse or any office space (other than their kitchen table). Their “business phone” is their personal cell phone – so they will almost always answer it. And it’s often listed on the side of their truck or van.
2. The small shop. Often 3-10 people are on the payroll. They have several trucks and crews and are much more visible in the community. They often try, with limited success, to emulate the “big boys” so they may have lettered, and wrapped vans, and their crews may wear a uniform or company shirt. Almost always, they will have a small shop or warehouse, and possibly even a small office with an office support person. They will have a designated company business phone and likely a gate keeper.
3. The Big Boys. These are plumbing companies with significant brick-and-mortar shops, warehouses, offices, and probably several business phone lines. You might see their billboards around town. They tend to operate much more like a corporation with multiple office staff, back-office help, and many crews. Their wrapped vans dominate the community. You may try to get in front of their entire plumbing staff, but remember: when they are this big, their plumbers often each have different specialties. That means some will never see a flooded home.

CHALLENGE FOR #1

As a marketer, getting in front of the Chuck-in-a-truck plumber is a major challenge because you cannot (SHOULD NOT) go to their home! Also, you can’t wait down the block and then follow them around town until they stop for gas or coffee. Approaching them at a plumbing supply house, or at the big-box stores (Lowes or Home Depot) is doable, but you can’t sit in those parking lots all day.

CHALLENGE FOR #2

The small shop with a handful of employees usually has a small building or shop location. Your challenge here is that they may not staff it during the day, so it’s really lucky to find someone there to talk with. Once you are able to talk to the owner/manager or an office person, you should be trying to get the contact info for all their techs and also try to schedule an early morning breakfast for the group. This is your perfect opportunity to talk with all of them and promote your company and referral program. You will also see some of them at the big box stores and the plumbing supply houses often, so once you know them, stay in touch!

CHALLENGE #3

The big plumbing companies that operate more like small corporations may be a little more challenging to convert. They will usually be very protective of their “big” name and more hesitant to give out tech contact info. They also may NOT like a referral program because they can feel that associating with your restoration company could potentially hurt their reputation. (A plumber tech refers one of their customers to your company and the job goes south!) Ideally, you want to get them to allow you to bring in breakfast for their team. This is the best way to present your referral program and touch a lot of techs at the same time.  The big boy companies will be very receptive to your Summary Move (elevator pitch) about making the plumbing company the hero.

We Have A Complete Certification Course That teaches These Important Distinctions And More.

It would be great to expand more on the many nuances and strategies you should employ to develop great relationships with plumbers. Since most people won’t read more than a few minutes, we developed a certification course Restoration Marketing Specialist® (RMS™) 3-day course to teach you all the many ways to solidify your plumber opportunities. (It also includes Insurance Agent strategies as well).

Author:  Dick Wagner, Co-founder of the CREST Network

Dick Wagner is a Nationally recognized marketing coach, consultant, trainer, and speaker

Creator of the renowned PREP™ pre-disaster program

Copyright© 2023     AskDickWagner, LLC   All Rights Reserved

 

No Part Of This Document May Be Reproduced In Any Form Without Written Permission

There have been many approaches to marketing restoration services and as many different ideas as there are coaches out there to promote them. My ideas are a strategy that is used by hundreds of marketers all over the country with great success.

Long gone are the days of basic route marketing where your best strategy is “Stop, Drop, and Roll” – visiting someone on the route, dropping off donuts, and rolling on to the next prospect. It is certainly good for the donut shop but doesn’t get you more business. That’s simply a form of bribery.

The topic of collaborate is all about working with a prospect or client to help them help their own customers! It’s so much more than ”what you can do for them” and is really what you can do for your prospects’ customers!

SUMMARY MOVE

Every elevator speech that I hear when a marketer is in one of my classes is “my name is Susie with XYZ Restoration and we do Fire, Water, Smoke, and Mold.”  Sadly, they think they are bringing value by saying this, but NO ONE cares! Nobody is interested in ‘what you do.’  They want to know what you are going to do to help them “get more business” and that’s all they care about.

We call the ‘elevator pitch’ the Summary Move because it is all about the client and their client! It focuses on how you help them and their prospect or client. The summary move strategy is to be thinking several ‘moves’ ahead and anticipating what they’ll say and be prepared to make the next ‘move.’  That’s what good chess players do – think several steps ahead.

COLLABORATE

By making it about their client, you are effectively taking the “salesyness” out of the conversation and are acting more like a ‘trusted advisor.’  Neither you, nor I like to be sold and we are not fond of salespeople! Don’t be one of the obnoxious salespeople that you dislike.

Find ways to make the conversation about them and their customers. When the client (or prospect) feels that you are mostly interested in them and their business, they’ll be far more likely to seriously consider working with you. Since you have their interest at heart, they will want to refer business (jobs) to you.

VERY DIFFICULT

Yes, it’s quite a challenge to think only about “what you can do for your clients client, but until you get into that mindset – you’ll come across as salesy or worse. For most of us, that mindset is a big struggle to achieve because we are in the mode of “getting jobs.”  Our boss or owner wants you to get more referrals so he or she is constantly pushing you to do this – even reminding you of how many referral you got last month!

TRUSTED ADVISOR

You want to be considered a ‘trusted advisor’ but you often don’t take the time to know something about them or their business or even about their industry!  You can’t be considered a Trusted Advisor to them if you don’t have any advice.  Donut dropping candy jar refilling services don’t make you a trusted advisor!

If you want to become an expert and a million-dollar producer then be sure to attend an RMS™ class, held throughout the country two or three times a year. The Restoration Marketing Specialist course will teach you how to be a marketer that knows how to collaborate and get more business.  See you soon! We strive to get you producing $1 million in annual revenue for your company. (And yes, many of our clients are at that level)!

Author:  Dick Wagner, Co-founder of the CREST Network

Dick Wagner is a Nationally recognized marketing coach, consultant, trainer, and speaker

Creator of the renowned PREP™ pre-disaster program

Copyright© 2023     AskDickWagner, LLC   All Rights Reserved

No Part Of This Document May Be Reproduced In Any Form Without Written Permission

Aside from management wanting their marketer to be really productive, the challenge is always for the marketer to generate referrals to the tune of about $1mil each year. We work with many marketers that do this and what it takes is determination, passion to succeed, and working with a quality coach each week.

When you think about it, a marketer that generates even a half million dollars a year, is bringing in profit of around $250k or more.  A good, qualified marketing coach or advisor will cost you about $20k each year. Not a bad trade off of cost vs profit! In reality, your marketer should be coachable to generate closer to a million dollars – going into year two.

So, What Makes A Marketer Productive?

There are numerous things that help make a marketer productive and generate good revenue for your firm.

First and foremost, simply put good marketers are strategic with their time and resources. Good marketers are important because they help businesses create long-lasting and profitable relationships with their clients. Good marketers know how to navigate the nuances of a changing field, (and the restoration field IS changing). They have to manage different aspects of marketing and understand how those aspects interact. We can develop these characteristics and the many other skills that make a good marketer with practice and work experience.

Here’s a short list of things to look for, when hiring a marketer:

• They need to be focused,
• Be good at active listening,
• Be good at storytelling,
• Know their customers and markets,
• Show good time management skills,
• Manage large workloads,
• Create memorable client experiences,
• Understand their competitors,
• Set clear and actionable goals,
• Be able to adapt to changing client needs,
• Have good observational skills,
• Be accountable to themselves and the company,
• Readily complete daily and weekly reports,
• Track activity in a CRM,
• Willing to accept a lot of rejection,
• Understand and use social media,
• Have good communication and computer skills,
• Work with management to set goals and targets,
• Know how to nurture relationships,
• Develop a “trusted advisor” or Maven strategy.
• Have a desire to keep learning new marketing strategies,

 

I’ve listed a lot of items that marketers must be good at – or at least be willing to perform! All too often, several of these on the list don’t exist with the marketer, and we have to teach them each of those things. Take the item “willing to accept rejection,” if they can’t hear a “NO” graciously, and realize it’s probably not directed at them personally then they aren’t the right candidate for the position.

Most marketers don’t know exactly what their role and responsibilities are, and certainly don’t know how to interact and engage their “internal” staff. I’m specifically talking about ALL the employees in the firm.  If you don’t have believability and credibility, you aren’t going to build vital relationships – which are based on trust.

Humans can’t actually multitask. We think we can, but we can’t. We can only focus on one thing at a time. What we mean by multitasking is focusing on one thing for a period of time (as needed), then on another and another, etc. When you hear someone saying they are multi-tasking, they’re hurting themselves and you. Marketers should schedule time for performing certain tasks. If marketers get “caught up” in doing considerable admin type projects then either you’re dumping the wrong things on them, or they prefer to be behind the safety of a desk.

Great marketers construct their marketing strategy around client needs, and one way you can recognize these needs is by producing a customer persona. This persona tells you how, when, and where to impart your target audience.

As marketers, we all work hard to relationships for our owner or client, but it can be tough to stay on top of everything we are accountable for. Luckily, there are a few modest tools you can use to be an extra productive marketer and use your schedule much more effectively. Regardless of which of these methods work for you, by applying these approaches and suggestions to your workload, you will see more productivity and improved task completion on many levels.

By Dick Wagner, Co-Founder The CREST Network, LLC

Nationally recognized coach, consultant, trainer, and speaker

Creator of the renowned PREP™ pre-disaster program

Owner of AskDickWagner.com BLOG

 

Copyright© 2023        The CREST Network, LLC

      All Rights Reserved

So, who is the real client – the homeowner or business that had the loss, or the insurance company?  I think we will ALL need to be planning on how our services can be afforded by the end-user because one day there will be premiums but there will be few payments just like in the medical world.

The insurance company has the upper hand and will continue to depress prices to restoration companies, and restoration companies are swallowing the bait. They are not stupid, and they have lots and lots of POWER by spreading lots of money into the coffers of politicians.

The best thing for all of us in the restoration field to do is to observe and recognize what insurance did to the medical field.  Layer upon layer of paperwork, (think, Xactimate, PAs, consultants, etc.) lower and lower prices back to the people who ACTUALLY DO THE WORK and spend the money on equipment and training.  And then we’re all supposed to be happy because the profits get shared by the insurance company’s “stockholders” in their retirement investment funds.

Physicians several years ago were well-paid professionals that were paid by their clients.  Medical insurance changed that and made the insurance company the check writer and the doctors had to team up and get in line to withstand the relentless pressure for lower prices while still delivering quality care.  As you all know medical care has as many clerks and recordkeepers as practitioners.  Soon, if the insurance firms get their way, you will have more recordkeepers on the payroll than WRT”s

I don’t pretend to have an answer, but just how often has ANY insurance adjuster actually asked you anything about your technical ability?  Questioned on thermal imaging, the standard for drying?  I would guess 99% of the contact you have with any adjuster is only about how quickly I can close this file and how much will it cost.

All the bottom-feeding insurance bootlickers that are finding new ways to get a piece of our profits will only grow and succeed if we let them.  These companies are wooing the insurance companies and telling you that you can’t survive without THEM.  Actually, they cannot survive without the US. The insurance firms are not paying for XYZ’s services out of their profits they are paying for XYZ’s to increase THEIR (the insurance company) profits by cutting YOURS (you, your wife and children, your kid’s college, your fishing vacation trip)

So, when I hear people say, “It’s business” and realize at the same time that “business” impacts my loved ones; No friend, it’s personal!  And if XYZ is successful it will spawn some new alien creature to fleece YOUR company.  The company is part of your and your family’s future.

By the way, I don’t have problems with adjusters, I have only been questioned twice in ten years on any invoices, have no beef with adjusters that will communicate with me.  Adjusters are actually going to be on the chopping block too if the insurance firms can figure out a way to eliminate them.

Guest Author: Mike Conroy, CIEC – Master Restorer

Owner Expert Dry  850-777-6655

http://www.expertdry.com