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Million Dollar Electrician - Sale to Scale For Home Service Pros
Rewiring Our Mission: (Electricpreneur Secrets)
Helping Electricians Achieve the $1M Service Van so they can experience ultimate control over their futures.
Join Clay Neumeyer & Joseph Lucanie for a new electrifying episode & High-amperage action item each week to spark up your service van sales to $50K, $70K, $100K, $150K months, and beyond!
Million Dollar Electrician - Sale to Scale For Home Service Pros
Ep 23 - Scaling Success: How DT Electric Grew to 9 Vans and a $2.65M Business in 2 Years
Dan Totten shares his inspirational journey of scaling his electrical business from $1.1 million to $2.65 million within a year, highlighting the importance of technology, mentorship, and customer service. He offers actionable insights for aspiring electricians looking to enhance their own operations.
• Scaling from 1.1M to 2.65M in one year
• Importance of mentorship and coaching in growth
• Transitioning CRM tools from Jobber to Service Titan
• Achieving organic marketing success without ad spend
• Emphasis on exceptional customer service pre and post-job
• Utilizing KPI tracking for performance management
• Exploring benefits of new technology like AI and advanced software
• Role as a client coach ambassador to support others in the industry
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Hello, hello, hello and welcome to the Million Dollar Electrician podcast, where we help home service pros like you supercharge your business and spark up those sales.
Speaker 2:I'm Joseph Lucani and, together with my co-host, Clay Neumeier, we're here to share the secrets that have helped electricians sell over a million dollars from a single service van.
Speaker 1:Now it's time for sales, it's time for scale, it's time to become a million dollar electrician. All right guys, welcome back. It has been a year, and quite a year. We are so pumped. Oh, what's happening.
Speaker 2:Stop, stop for a second. Yeah, clay, can you say something again? Hello, that's good, you came in super garbled at first, oh really you hear that as well, dan it sounded good on my side maybe it was just on mine, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to you mean to create but literally like I heard a and then you started talking, so I was like whatever that is, let's try that again hopefully eureka catches this part in editing.
Speaker 1:Just run it, just run it, all right, no worries. All right, guys, welcome back. It has been one heck of a 2024 big year and today we've got a two-year anniversary with our client and now coach, ambassador Dan Totten, who's back to tell us not only how he grew from the 1.1 million one year ago almost exactly a year ago today but grew his company now to 2.65, I believe you said million in 2024, dan, and that's just your second full-time or full year in business, is that right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So it's been about a year now. We over doubled last year, so it was a huge growth for us just over 1.3 million in 2024 in sales.
Speaker 1:How Dan's team was able to do all of this on Jobber as a CRM, not be distracted by the shiny objects. How they're beginning to transition now to Service Titan. If you've ever thought of Service Titan's right for you this would be a great episode. To listen to Dan's thoughts on Ciro AI. As you guys know, we did an interview recently. Dan's been chatting with them as well and getting excited to move his team to it, something I'm super fond of. Dan runs two CSRs. We've got two people in the office helping that team and he's got some great feedback for that. Dan's worked with Joe one-to-one, so he's going to give you some insights on that and insights on what it's like to be a client coach ambassador. And insights on what it's like to be a client coach ambassador, dan, you just purchased, I think you said before this call your ninth service van Is that right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. So we've got two more heading this way, new vans to get set up. We're a primary of last year we had five to six vans. So coming to the end of the year and starting this one off, we're definitely ready to give it a good run.
Speaker 2:So that's, that's just how proud of you I am.
Speaker 1:It's absolutely amazing that how far and how fast you've been taking this one of the things I think we touched on maybe a year ago, but if not, I know you've talked about it in classes what kind of vans do you buy and why?
Speaker 3:yeah, we buy the uh, mercedes sprinter vans. It's something where when we first started we looked at the Ford Transits, we looked at the Pro Masters, we looked at the Sprinters and from a price comparison you know they're very close and for my aspect of a premium service provider it just the Mercedes pops out. It looks really good. You know they're really nice riding vehicles, they're comfortable, they've got the same room. Know they're really nice riding vehicles, they're comfortable, they've got the same room. Um, you know they just they popped out to me.
Speaker 3:We got a good connection with a local um dealer that you know happens to be living in the same state for us. That's the regional manager. So we made a really good connection with them early on and at this point now they already have all the settings saved for exactly what we want for build out. You make a phone call and he said hey, sounds great, I'll drop, I'll drop it by the shop. He comes by, you know, with a loaded trailer, unloads it right in front of the shop and hands us the keys. So it's really smooth.
Speaker 2:Talk about premium service, even your dealer. I love that, like you don't have to do a single thing, I'll just bring in the keys and you just got to sign your name.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. I know a lot of electricians get stuck on the rent versus buy versus lease financing of vans. What do you guys choose to do, dan? If you don't mind me asking yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:So we end up buying these vans and it's one thing where we do loan them out Most of the time. Early on we were putting significant down payments on. It's something where it's like we could pay for them, but leveraging the money. The last couple that we have, we found that the dealerships actually give really good deals towards the end of the year. So these vans totally interest-free for the full duration of zero interest, zero money down. A year's a van. So we use that payment to basically just look at it like, hey, this is just a rental fee of having this van, but it's 0% interest and that's pretty you know, pretty cheap money. So we're basically taking them, loading them out, getting all the shelves and their tools material. We have, you know, exact lists for every single van. We just copy paste it to our you know people say, hey, look, we need this, this, this, and then it shows up a couple of days later build them out.
Speaker 2:So you know absolutely nothing to lose and the fact that you're having a training in place to get your team ready to go out and convert very quickly, it's not going to take very long for you to recoup and just be able to make that per month.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:If it weren't for this premium service effort that you're on, do you think you'd still buy the Mercedes service effort that?
Speaker 3:you're on, do you think you'd still buy the Mercedes? You know, when I first started and before I was, you know, fully up with everything, you know I just had a little 40 Connelly and I still have it actually to this day and it's loaded out with tools. It doesn't really get used much but it's more of the spare van in case someone gets in a car accident or, you know, breaks down or something like that, which is going to be pretty rare for a couple-year-old van. But we just have it as a spare. I was working with that one for a while and I looked at the Ford Transits and I looked at the ProMasters and it just from the price per value. The maintenance might be a little bit more with the Mercedes, but I just think it's a better vehicle and it's so close in price. That may as well. You know, in some aspects they have higher availability too, depending on who the dealer is.
Speaker 1:So have you still shopped around with other brands? Do you know the price difference or curiosity?
Speaker 3:it really depends. What I've found is that our specific dealer we work with is a swicker dealer. So they, they do mercedes, they do toyota, they do hondas, they do a lot of a wide range of them, but their main one is Mercedes. So these two vans that we have actually coming a lot of them are converting to EV and it's not something that we're really interested in at this point. So these specific ones are actually coming from Alaska. So they put them on a boat and they're bringing them to us for the same price as the other ones and saying hey look, these are our last two gas ones, unless you want to pre-order them for the following year, which you can't even get your hands on right now. So they're slowly converting to diesel only and electric. So they actually put them on a boat and sent us to us and said, okay, you need a couple more vans, we'll bring them to you. We have them at our Alaska dealership, so it's awesome.
Speaker 1:Nice, nice. Really good stuff. All right, so gritty of this. Help us understand how your field staff are positioned for you to have grown so much to over double your revenue from 1.1 to 2.65. I mean, that's substantial. Are there different tiers? Or these just service techs out there that sell and do their own work, or what does that look like for you guys?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely so. We're currently. Right now we've got two guys that are mainly doing opportunity, demand calls, what we call them, but sales and services is really primarily of that. We've got one guy that's in training right now, that is converting over, so he should be full time sales within the next week or two. So we'll have three vans selling, in theory, doing demand and opportunity calls, meaning service calls, sales calls, things like that and then at that point we'll also have three vans potentially doing the work, so installers, if you will.
Speaker 3:Two of them have apprentices, one don't just for a decent ratio. In case one guy's not there, then we don't have an extra apprentice. And then we also have two CSRs in the office. Basically the phone rings one of them and if they're on the other line it rings to the next one. So one of them is more back in, focuses almost strictly on marketing, back in doing payroll, things like that, accounting and then from the front end she takes care of all the scheduling, answers every single call, and if she's on the other line, then it's kind of having a backup. So that's been a huge asset for us as well.
Speaker 1:Really good, really good. And have you been in the field in 2024 then, to make sales as well, or have you transitioned out? What does that look like for you?
Speaker 3:You know, very minimal. Last year I was definitely a fair amount in sales as far as 2024 in its whole. You know there was a few calls that I did here or there. It's mainly ones that were like, hey, we really need someone out there, you know, for whatever reason, hey, we someone out there. Um, you know, for whatever reason, hey, we got a whole home generator. Well, the sales guys are booked out a couple weeks. We just need to get out there. We've got, you know, a service upgrade. We need something.
Speaker 3:I'll definitely hop in when we need to if we have someone that calls in. From the most part, you know, I'm stepping back to just a visionary position where I'm in the office most of the time, you know, filling in for trainings, check-ins, things like that. We'll have regular check-ins with each individual on the team. See how they're doing. I definitely talk with the sales guys mostly, but from most standpoints, since they're the ones selling the jobs. They're kind of from a project manager standpoint. They're the ones that are getting the material, they're setting up the jobs If the installers have any questions, and they're calling them directly.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow. So if you had to guess, like, how much of the sales do you think you did yourself in 2024?
Speaker 3:I would say 5%, maybe a very small amount.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow, okay, so pretty small that's really amazing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, 5, 5, 10% maybe at max, I would say.
Speaker 1:And it sounded like. Maybe I misunderstood, but it sounds like you've got really two main sales guys then in the field doing most of the opportunity calls.
Speaker 3:Yep Opportunity calls, and then they also do service calls as well. They pretty much just look at three to four calls a day, just depending on what they are. If they're demand calls, we'll kind of hedge it down a little bit. If they're opportunity calls and really close together, then we can get four in.
Speaker 1:And if one did 1.3 out of the 2.65, does that mean that the other one's also roughly a million dollar selling tech?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, really close to it. You know he's. He's right around 900,000 for last year. We have, you know, other fees, that kind of build those numbers up and some of it is you know subcontractors here or there, or you know making profit on generators or things like that that aren't necessarily associated in that. You know dispatching fees, membership fees, things like that that might not be associated with that, but both of them are ones over a million, ones just under. So really close.
Speaker 1:Wow, okay, well, this is. This is really remarkable. And both these fellows are training with Joe, right? You're doing some one-to-one stuff with them, Joe. What's? Your take on working with these guys.
Speaker 2:You know, it's rare to find students who make it like I want to say they clicks, but they want it. You can tell very, very early that it's not that they just want to learn how to sell. It's that they want to learn how to do better at their jobs and how to really help the customers. So when I talk about them with building options, they have a really good perspective because they're able to say well, hey, I know that this person really wanted this and I want to try and find a way to get them for it. And that's great. They have good character, they've got good determination, they're following the process the right way. I'm very, very proud of them and I'm grateful for the honor to serve.
Speaker 1:So something I've heard in industry maybe you guys have heard this before. A lot of owners with experience might call this even like these guys are whales, someone that comes in. They really rise the tide for you because they display so much. Right, they just do so much with such little effort. That's almost incomparable. Sometimes I think we have trouble comparing the big sales tech to the service guys in a lot of regards, if that makes sense, and but the thing is, when that whale leaves, a lot of guys kind of fear the whale in that regard and they just aim for the even keel service techs that can really just kind of keep chugging along. Right, in this case you've got two Dan, and so it's a really interesting case, but do you feel they're maxed out?
Speaker 3:No, no, absolutely. And looking at the numbers for how the year started to how the year ended, you know it's just an uphill thing where it's like oh hey, you know I hit 150K this month out of this van, oh, got 115 this this month. You know, when they first started it may have been 80, 90. It just it's, it's a progression thing. So coming into this year, you know, if we can keep that progression going, even stay where we're at, I mean those are great numbers, but you know it's all uphill from here as well.
Speaker 2:I wanted to add one additional thing to that, because I personally want to vouch to say that they're not done, and here's why the reason being is that my whole goal me and me able to create people who could sell 1.3, like myself. I want that to be the floor of what's capable, and I really, really feel that your techs have every potential of being better than me and I'm incredibly grateful for that. That makes me happy because it means that we're good at our jobs. I want people to be better than me. I want to make that the standard, so just the fact that they're able to produce and really serve at a very professional level. Real honor to be able to help that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's massive. It's massive, so you can see them growing. You mentioned that there's some stuff that helps them fluff that up. One of the words or terms you used was subcontractors. Just to be clear, though like how much? What percentage of your work is residential service, would you say?
Speaker 3:realistically, you know, probably close to 95%. We have these commercial jobs that slide through, but anything that's, you know, more than a week or two worth of work, we're pretty much just kind of passing on to the next guy. I mean, you know, when I started this a couple of years ago I had a huge background in commercial. You know a fair amount of residential as well, but mainly commercial based. And our lead sales tech that's at 1.31. Before he started with me, he never toucheda piece of Romex before he started and I just knew he was an awesome guy and I said look you can ride in the van with me for a month and you'll be my apprentice and we'll figure this out.
Speaker 3:I'm going to teach you how to wire houses. And now he's selling 1.31 million within two years of just learning residential. So before that he never, he never wired a home before he's like oh yeah, I've. You know, receptacles can lights. I mean, that's about it, you know, in my own house a couple of times. But other than that he's just been done. Big industrial buildings, commercial and things like that.
Speaker 1:So he was never trained sales before.
Speaker 3:Never sales, never wired residential homes. He's never wired a whole home, start to finish. So in order to sell those jobs. I mean, you know it was a big learning curve off the bat and even to this day there's still little learning curve, little things. You know where. Some of the guys that you know are coming onto the team have been wiring homes for 20 years. You know they've got a really really good background. But he's just such a good guy. You know he connects really well with other people and he's a really quick learner and a real hustler too. So it helps.
Speaker 1:That's amazing and it sounds like you're building a great culture there. Really good stuff. We touched on you being able to do this all. On Jobber Most people kind of disregard Jobber as maybe the simplest CRM at kind of an even rate to Housecall Pro. Did you also mess with Housecall Pro in the beginning? Why did you ultimately choose Jobber?
Speaker 3:You know, I got a trial of both of them. I did both of them at the same time, just messing around with them, and I just liked the look of Jobber better. It just seemed like. You know, this is just clicking with me. It's very easy to use.
Speaker 3:There's a lot of features that have expanded since then, but I mean up until this point. I mean really they're still even great to this day to use. Everything's working really well. I just see the growth in the near future going. You know, hey, we're adding a couple more vans on. We've already interviewed the people, the prospects that are going to join us, and it's I'm just looking at it going. Hey, look, you know, there's a reason why the people that have five or 10,000 reviews that have been around for 20 years are on service Titan. And you know that's where you know we're pushing to be at some point. So that's where I'm seeing it just getting a little hectic at this point. But up until this point, I mean even, even as of right now 2.6 million last year. You know I'm very confident in Jobber and everyone really loves using it.
Speaker 1:So that's remarkable. I've gone on record saying a few times like I love how easy it is to just bring into, especially a business that doesn't have Jobber. By the way, jobber doesn't sponsor us yet they could. Maybe we'll send this interview to them. It's just my personal experience going into different home service companies. You could take a team of five who are all paper-based't, had a crm before on monday, sign up for jobber and by wednesday have full adoption, people using it for scheduling and dispatching and the whole the whole thing. So I know it falls short, uh short in many places for people. Where where do you see the limitations of jobber den when you start to say, well, maybe we're maxed out here and service tightens the way now?
Speaker 3:you know a good portion of of it is just when you have a physical day on there and when you've got so many users, you know we'll be up to 12 users here soon. It just looks like a rainbow and at times you know when it says 730 here and you've got a bunch of different people on there at 10 o'clock here. It's just a lot to look at. So you so Service Titan has ways with when the CSR gets a phone call, it can say next available time and you can book the time slots, which is gonna be a huge asset. And we found ways to adapt around it where we'll put tasks at the top of the schedule, saying "'Hey look, we've got openings this day and then we'll just delete them as we go", and it really has worked out quite well.
Speaker 3:Certain things like KPI tracking through service type really looking forward to that. There's definitely a lot of other things that they have, but Jobber is adapting day to day too and they're getting better and better. So it's something where you know they learn from other CRMs as well. So they're definitely adapting. Their schedule is changing and it's getting better. So it's hard to say. I mean for some people they could probably take it to this, to exactly where we are now possibly even longer.
Speaker 3:It's hard to say in a year where they're going to be at.
Speaker 1:So you mentioned KPI. So if Jobber doesn't have that great a sales KPI for service, what have you done to adapt to that then you know we've got one that SLE made in-house.
Speaker 3:You guys have one that we use and we've had great luck with it. So the CSRs will put in there, key in there, every single job that we have, whether it's sold, unsold, what option they pick through, and we really love it. So it's something we'll probably use both and see how Service Titan adapts, and if it's going to fill our needs, then we'll just disregard it and go with that. But up until this point, I mean, we're still going to use your guys' KPI that we've been using for the last two years and then if we feel, like Service Titan's top notch and, can you know, be at that same level.
Speaker 3:Then we'll say, okay, well, we need to just pick one at this point, but up until then, until we're really confident, we're just going to keep plugging numbers into both. So, thanks, I appreciate that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thanks, I appreciate that, yeah, it's a good plan. You never want to lapse in that KPI. How has the KPI helped? If you don't mind, just candid review here how has that helped you guys with your focus and your sales and your understanding of what's going on out there?
Speaker 3:You know, I look at it every single day. I look at it, check and see how we're doing as far as call volume. I can look on there and say, okay, how we're doing as far as call volume. I can look on there and say, okay, well, we, you know, last month we were averaging 12 calls a day, or 15 calls a day. Now this month we're only getting seven calls a day. I can look at where the calls are coming from. Oh, hey, it looks like Facebook's been hitting really big this month. Oh, google's down a little bit. You know, I look at it and say, okay, well, so-and-so is not selling really well this month. Maybe it's. You know what. Why is that reason? Oh, it looks like we ran a lot less calls this month. Oh, he was sick, he was off. We only ran, you know, 20 calls this month. Oh, this one, we ran 50 calls. Okay, that makes sense. You can look at the close ratios, average tickets. I mean all of it really plays a huge role.
Speaker 1:Massive Sounds like it helps you make decisions in your business, then Absolutely.
Speaker 3:It's definitely something I look at directly, you know, for having issues with salespeople or someone that had a really good month, really good weeks. You know, I try to key on that and say, man, you know, things are going really well. What's changed this month from last month? Some say, oh, I just had a lot of generator calls, I just had a lot of service upgrades. I'm not sure. Some of them just say, man, things are just clicking. You'll notice, sometimes when that confidence builds up, a lot of them will be paired closer where, oh man, you just had four really good days in a row. I don't think that it's exactly the call. You had a really high confidence week and you're on fire, you're building them up. So I'll definitely congratulate the guys and try and key it on that as well.
Speaker 2:I love that you're doing that and the fact that you're so focused on KPIs. It brings back to the statement of what gets measured, gets managed, and the reason why I feel like that's worth bringing up is because it also keeps your eye on the scoreboard of where you need to be Now. Luckily, your team has been really really good at progressively moving the ball forward, but at least the fact that you're constantly on your KPI would determine okay, now what is the consistency, what's changing and how do we get them back on path?
Speaker 1:So I love that you're really dedicated to that as well. Yeah, I agree. I agree so with the service Titan transition, and we'll put this one to bed. I am curious, though what are you most excited about? You know why not stay with Jobber, why this time to transition?
Speaker 3:Help us understand that. You know, next year we're just we're hiring a lot of people right at the start this year. So I want to fire things off running and I know that we're gonna. I know that we're gonna need it at some point. I think right now, before we're getting new guys in may as well, get that transition rolling as soon as possible.
Speaker 3:I think the scheduling aspect is going to be a huge thing. I know that right off the start it's definitely gonna be a little bit of a headache transfer and everything over. They've got some key features that I'm really looking forward to. The scheduling is one of it, where it's like oh hey, we can book certain time slots in there. Okay, you know, when's the nearest available, when's the nearest available? That's going to be a really big one for us. Kpi tracking I think the scoreboard is going to be really big to where the techs can see the KPI actively live every single week, every single day, every single month. So they can say hey, look, you know so-and-so's doing this, I'm doing this, where's my numbers? At? You know, not to put competition into it directly, but you know, if you put it open so everyone can see it, it seems like something where like oh, this is motivating, maybe I can do this, maybe I can do that. I want the tech to work together and be team driven, but at the same time, a little friendly competition is always fun.
Speaker 2:Nothing wrong with having to compete against each other. As long as you're all moving the ball forward together, let them compete.
Speaker 1:And that seems like a really natural progression to this AI ride-along software. We've been talking with Ciro, of course, built partnership with them and bringing that in-house. Dan, I know you're one of the many that were very excited about that. How do you see this AI ride-along software helping you and your team progress and beat these already amazing sales records?
Speaker 3:You know it'll be really great being able to you know right off the bat when we implement it. We're definitely going to give it a little bit of time. I'm not just going to look at it and be like, hey, you said this word, you said this word. I'm definitely going to let it kind of do its own thing for a little bit and then kind of reassess where we're at. You know, key some little things in, let it help them. But I'm really excited to bring it into the meetings with Joe so he can listen to them. You know we have biweekly one-on-one meetings with directly our sales guys, so that'll be a huge help for us. I'm definitely looking forward to being able to help the guys a little bit. There's times where they run into specific service calls they're having issues with, or maybe verbiage and things like that, and I definitely can help key in on. So I'm looking forward to listening back to it and seeing, hey, how'd this call go? How did this go? There's anything I can help Then? I'm really looking forward to doing that.
Speaker 2:You know, Dan, it's cool that you and I actually share that, because I was thinking that's the one thing I'm excited for when it comes to working with their team as well, because they're already great. They're already really really good techs. But the fact that we're going to be able to hear exactly what the customers are saying, it's going to be like having me right behind them every single call and we can give them exact feedback of the customer said this, you said this, but they were really saying that and being able to give that extra depth, I think it's going to be game changing for your team.
Speaker 1:Some things come up for me that wasn't necessarily in our list of topics here, but I'm actually really curious. I'm going to put you on spot here for a moment. At this point, doing $2.65 million in sales, you're not using a price book, right?
Speaker 3:No, we don't have any price books, so we basically have a service rate. That uh what we got from service loop electrical when we first started, you know. We went through the pricing and where we need to be as far as our direct company and the guys are able to, um, basically build their prices themselves on the spot.
Speaker 1:So so, so candidly, I mean I I want to hear from your perspective at this point Do you see yourself moving to a price book anytime soon, with the transition to service Titan and everything that you guys are doing, or is that even on the radar for you?
Speaker 3:You know I've heard Service Loop really likes their price book and they really like people to use that. But I'm going to push against that as much as possible, just because I really like the simplicity and the guys really flow well with this specific system. You know, not to say I won't look into it or, you know, do some study myself and see how it looks, but at this point I'm not planning on switching over.
Speaker 1:Interesting. Do you worry about how accurate your guys' estimates are and their ability to quote service work? Or is that become a concern for profitability, Like at 2.65, are you guys just breaking even? Like tell me about that and your experience?
Speaker 3:No, I mean, the business was really profitable last year. We made great margins, you know, and it's something we check on every single job. They put in the notes, say here's what I put in for material, here's what I put in for time. We look back and we have post-call facts built into jobber notes where the guys fill them out. How long did it take? Is there anything you wish you would have known before you got here? Did you ask for review? And it's a little checklist yes, no, yes, no, yes, no.
Speaker 3:Any notes for the estimator maybe? Oh, hey, you know, it would have been nice to know that. I just didn't have this specific breaker, I didn't have this. So not something to throw them under the bus, but just something they can learn from and they can look back and say, oh, okay, yeah, for the next one, I should put that note in there for the guys, or I should make sure to have this, because they lay out the material, they set it up and everything. So if anything they forgot, then you sharpen the pencil for the next one a little bit. If we're over on one a little bit, under on one, as long as we're meeting in the middle, then we're looking really good.
Speaker 1:What do you think of that question, joe, I love that first question. You mentioned that's in the post-call facts Anything you wish you would have known before you got here.
Speaker 2:You know, the thing that stood out most and the reason why I don't know if you guys caught me beaming in the background was that I'm thinking of it and saying you're either winning or you're learning. In that setup, there's no possible way to lose, because you win means you sold the job, great, everything's done. But then you coming into it and saying, well, what could I have known or wish I could have known? That will allow you to have a better process going into it. So every time you miss something, you now incorporate it into your process, which makes every future call better. So it's kind of like an ever sharpening tool. It just makes itself better just by using it. So I love that. I think it's awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love having a skillset over a crutch because I feel it gives us the market advantage. So obviously we're biased here, but it's something that we've also referenced as the casino principle. Bias here, but it's something that we've also referenced as the casino principle, which is to say it's not that people don't leave the casino with pockets full of even people leaving with a briefcase full of cash. People do go up sometimes and in residential service price book or not, they get one up on us in value too. Dan, are you the type of company that will try to come back and renegotiate a price if you find something that you didn't realize was first there with the estimate, or do you guys keep your price locked in and complete the service as originally agreed upon? Dan Heldman, md, phd.
Speaker 3:No, we complete the service every time. It's something where, if we say a price, that's what we're standing by and that's what we're going to do, and that's part of it. Some people say it's an estimate, as in like it's an estimated cost, but whatever we go out there, this is a firm price, this is what we're doing it for, even if something drastically changes, if it's on something that we could have foreseen or we missed, then we're going to eat it every time, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I love that. And that ties in perfectly, because a casino doesn't operate on hopium right, that nasty drug hopium it operates on principles of mathematics and just doing the math and making sure that the house is going to win, and I think every business needs that strength. We've got to know, we've got to do the math, we have to set our pricing right, as you said, dan, and I'm super pumped for you, man. I think that that's obviously worked really well to get you to where you're at today. That said two CSRs you mentioned. Tell us about these roles. You said one's a little more front-end, one's a little more back-end. They both answer the phones. At what point did you even realize you needed a second in?
Speaker 3:the office and how has that gone since you've transitioned to two? You know, starting this year we just had the one CSR, or I guess last year it's January 22nd now, but last year basically we decided, hey look, you know, this phone's just ringing too much, we need to get a second person in there just to answer the phones. But the biggest thing that I was trying to leverage was well, how much could you spend into marketing and have someone there full time to say, hey look, my biggest focus is going to be strictly marketing. I mean, coming into this, last year we never touched Google ads. We never paid any kind of advertising. We simply wrapped our vans. We have ads. We never paid any kind of advertising. We simply wrapped our vans. We have our uniforms. Other than that, then we were completely organic. For the entire last year we never paid for any kind of marketing and a big portion of that is from where our calls are coming from.
Speaker 3:So csr number two really focuses on um. You know marketing there's a lot of. You know she does accounts payable, she does um. You know that gets all the guys paid salaries. You know hourly and things like that. So we get that taken care of. But, uh, you know she takes care of all kinds of payroll as far as marketing things like that, but she just answers the phone if the other one's on the line. So our main person, kylie, that's in there. She does a great job and she's got a really good background. She actually was a business owner previously before coming into this. So, um, she's great as far as scheduling goes. I mean, in a lot of ways she's, you know, really navigating the ship. You know the phone calls come in. She's the main um front line for taking those and she really sets the guys up for success.
Speaker 1:So we can vouch for them right, kylie and caitlin? We've seen them in many classes. Kylie is just so dedicated to your brand and the success of DT Electric. I mean, she seems really unshakable in that. Please, Joe, jump in, brother yeah.
Speaker 2:I was going to say. When it comes to those two, I have to give a particular shout out, because I literally just gave them a shout out in class yesterday and this is why they're CSRs. But their dedication to your team and to the progression of your team is like nothing I've ever seen. They come to options class with no need to build options. They come to role play classes for the techs just so they understand that the techs are doing their job better. They come to marketing, they come to operations. They're in everything and the thing is, having that level of dedication is almost contagious, like I. I see. I see that people want to be more like them. So, dan, you have an amazing team with you, but I feel like your main strength is just attracting these a players and motivating them to become their highest selves, because those two are absolute rock stars.
Speaker 1:Quite a team around you quite a team around you. Maybe, maybe Dan's going to be the first one to master six options from the inbound call.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they're definitely really good you know, and when, when they came in, or when Kylie first started, you know we didn't really have a whole lot. You know it was just, uh, you know me, two other guys and I was answering the phones and when she first started, you know it was like, well, we're going to have to answer the phone and they didn't really have a whole lot of tasks. And now, at this point, I mean it's permits, it's ordering generators, it's answering the phone scheduling, um, you know, with someone that has no electrical setup at all, doesn't really know anything about it. I mean she's really adapted pretty far as far as that goes. I mean she can talk to inspectors, she knows a lot of the sizing things. She, I mean not an electrician by trade, but when the guys call and have issues, I'm running into this and run into this. I mean she really understands what needs to go. I mean she coordinates all the subcontractors, what it's going to take, timing, I mean it's definitely a huge asset.
Speaker 1:I love that. Yeah, and you mentioned the marketing role that they have. I know in the last episode that we did together one year ago you'd basically done 1.1 million organically, right. And you just mentioned ad spend again. Have you increased? Are you spending on ads now or is it still a mostly organic push? Tell us about your marketing efforts today.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we're. We're full organic for the entire 2.6. So we never, never, turned Google ads on. We never paid for any marketing. We just have the van wraps, we have our uniforms. You know a good portion of our leads are Facebook. You know there's. There's a few other ways. You know a good portion of our leads are Facebook. You know there's a few other ways. You know Nextdoor Reddit there's. You know Caitlin really goes through all these different forms. Refresh goes through them. You know Instagram stories she posts on there every single day stories, posts, things like that. So really hits that heart where we previously had someone taking care of marketing that did a good job. But having someone that's directly attached, goes through all of our pictures she goes to job sites, takes pictures, things like that we hit that really, really hard. So really leveraging that second CSR to where we don't have, you know, any kind of monthly fees for marketing, seo, anything like that A hundred percent organic at this point.
Speaker 2:Wow, 2.6 full organic Clay. Did it blow your mind as well?
Speaker 1:Yeah, let me ask you a question too Do you think that you'd be able to grow at this level without all the social media posts and the efforts there on the, dare I say, free side, because I know it takes time? Right, there's an investment still. It's just, like you said, an in-house investment. Do you think you'd be this far and this able to scale that quickly without it?
Speaker 3:Definitely not. I mean, it is something where, you know, in the future I can definitely see us turning on a couple of these other things. I have a huge, wide array of things that I've gotten the books for. Hey, look, here's when we're going to really crank it up, so as we're getting a couple more vans here, um, you know, realistically, this week, so when in the next month or two we should have them rolling. I've got a lot of things up my sleeve as far as cranking that up a notch.
Speaker 3:Um, but up until this point, I mean, facebook's been a huge, um, you know, really a leader for us and the leads that we get are so good. Everyone that calls, oh man, everyone was ranting, raving about you guys on there. You know, here's why I called. By the time we get there, um, you know, the, the close rate is going to be so much higher because they already like us. If it's someone random on google oh, I saw you on google and it said recommended, so I I called you. I mean those can be pretty good leads as well, but in theory, I mean, if you have a recommendation or referral for someone else, they're going to be much better especially if their their friend used us and said oh, dt Electric is so great to work with.
Speaker 3:Oh, that's my friend. They like you. I'm on Facebook. Someone else comments you. I mean, there's huge odds that they're going to use you as well.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of social validation with your brand, where it seems like when people want to work with you, they enjoy referring you as well, and that's really really cool, because, in fact, you're so much on social media, you're really creating this, like almost this presence where people get to know you without ever having to meet you and because of that, they already like, trust and respect you. Because that's already the case, their close ratio is naturally just going to be higher, because you are the person they want to work with, compared to this stranger they don't know.
Speaker 1:What do you feel overall, as an average? They're ranting and raving about when someone says dt. Why are they so, so excited about working with you guys?
Speaker 3:I would say quick turnaround time. Um, generally we can squeeze people in pretty fast and that's uh. At times we're so busy that you know that that does become an issue at times for us. But we always try and squeeze people in as much as we possibly can, but it's always the service. At the end of the day. They just, they rant, rave about the service, whether we're you know, it's not saying we're going to be the least expensive one. We might not get there the absolute soonest, but we're going to try and give them the best price we possibly can, get there as soon as we can, but no matter what their service is going to be great.
Speaker 3:The phone gets answered instantly if they have any questions. The guys go there on time every single time and you know if there's anything that we can do to make their service any better. You know we call them before, we call them after. I mean, there's a lot of check-ins before and after to make sure they had a great experience and I think that's really the biggest part.
Speaker 1:Predictable service, if you're coming back. Yeah, and predictable service if you're coming back. Yeah, and the before and after caught caught my attention there too, so even after calls, you guys.
Speaker 3:You guys follow up with your clients as well. Yeah, absolutely so. Um, before the call, I mean we're checking in on quotes, anything like that. As soon as it gets approved, we're calling them to schedule. Before that, we call them in advance and just double check hey, that day's still working for working for you. You know, we're coming at this time when they're on their way, they text them that they're coming. Hey, we're arriving in 15 minutes. We're arriving in 30 minutes. They show up and do the work and then, after the work's completed, the office will also call and check in. Hey, you know, how was your experience? Did everything go well? Any you know, notes for us, any questions, anything like that? They'll. They'll give a a good check-in, a happy call and make sure that everything went well, and if anything didn't, then we're going to make it perfect.
Speaker 1:Love the commitment. Yeah, that's really good. At one point, we brought in one of our friends, I guess, and industry experts in Google business profiles, and they brought up some heat mapping and we were talking about your brand as one of the examples that we used, and on that heat map, with just a couple of the keywords that we used, it looked like you guys were really highly ranked all over your specific target market as well. Is that stuff that you've just done in-house, then, and what efforts do you guys take to keep your ranking high on Google?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, absolutely so, in Oregon City is directly where our office is located. We're number one on the list as far as that goes, and there's some people that have more reviews, different things like that. But there's a lot of things that play into it. I mean, we regularly post pictures every single week on our Google page. We're getting reviews regularly. You know we have QR codes on the back of the guys ipads that you know. They ask how their experience was, if they had a good experience. They're asking for them in person. So it builds those reviews up.
Speaker 3:Um, to this point, we've only had five star reviews, so that's definitely a thing that plays into it as well. But, um, you know, huge market on there. We, you know there's, uh, certain applications that you can get that'll help you kind of refine that. Hey, I noticed on, noticed on your page. You're lacking a description on this, you're lacking this, you're lacking this. You can go through and actually fix those things, change those things and you know kind of you know kind of adapt. That where you are located plays a big portion in that. So you know far, if we were in the heart of Portland or a nearby city, it was going to. It's a little bit higher to rank over there it's a little bit easier. So where we're at right now in Oregon City, I mean being number one and there's a whole lot of electricians there that's definitely great.
Speaker 2:Did I hear you correctly when you said you only have five-star reviews?
Speaker 3:Yep, we don't have anything less than five stars, so not to say we haven't, you know, had one or two that went through, but no matter what, oh hey, we had a bad experience. We've always reached out to those people and made it right one way or another and, um, you know, a lot of them converted to five stars. You know, we had some people that you know said oh hey, you guys came out and it was like oh no, we're DT electric, not green tree electric, or we're not this electric. Oh okay, yeah, sorry, I thought out there and end up doing the work. So we've had a couple of those fall through, but nothing crazy.
Speaker 2:But at this point, I mean, we just have five-star reviews, so I'm incredibly proud of you to do that, because it takes a lot of consistency. It's not just someone who swings for the fences. To have constant five-star service that doesn't quit requires you to be very, very diligent in either following the processes or just knowing how you're going to do the thing on a daily basis, like, do you have anything in particular that helps you with that consistency?
Speaker 3:You know it's, it's something that, uh, we really just hit the guys hard. You know, soon, from the day that we interview them, um, you know a weekly check-in, monthly check-in, Anytime we have meetings, our biggest thing is just great customer service. You know, I tell the guys, hey, if it's going to take a little bit longer, um, you know if, if we're going to have to put in a little bit extra effort, if we have to go back there, you know, at the end, customers that aren't as easy to work with, but no matter what, we're going to make them the, you know, the best experience we possibly can.
Speaker 2:Yeah, white glove services, you showing up your best self every time for them, and it seems like that's what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Something Joe called attention to and I think this will take us to the final stretch here, guys is I just want to address your magnetism, dan. There's something about you that you just keep bringing good people your way and people keep realizing that the people around you are magnetic as well. I mean, your brand is magnetic. There's just something here. Did you always know that you were destined to do something big? Is this something you felt as a kid? Do you just feel like an average person just answering to your daily calling? Tell us a bit about that.
Speaker 3:You know it's something that I knew was going to. You know I knew there was going to be something at the time. I didn't always know it was going to be an electrician per se. You know my dad's an electrician.
Speaker 3:It's something where, you know, I grew up around it, so it really it really fit my calling, but it's something where I wasn't always you know, a hundred percent, sure, but you know, as I became older, you know my lower twenties, I'm 28 now it's something that, going into it, I definitely saw you know a bigger picture. So it's something where it definitely it's definitely been a great experience and something that I've been looking forward to, so about just over two years ago.
Speaker 1:Just over two years ago, then you would have been about 26 and we first connected and just started working. I think we spent 90 days together working on your pricing and just some basic service principles to get this going. At that time, it might've been just you and a helper. Uh, end of 2022, right? Did you think you'd be here in 2025 from that standpoint?
Speaker 3:No, definitely not. When I first started. Like I said, when I reached out to you it was just me, by myself. I had the old couple thousand dollar van with a really bare amount of tools and material in there. Really set me up for success. So I guess if I could tell anyone else, just get the coaching, get the mentorship as soon as possible. You know, invest a little bit of money.
Speaker 3:Because it'll definitely exponentially help you in the long run. You know, when I started this I was thinking you know, in the next few years maybe I'll get it. You know an apprentice or a guy to help me, or something like that. We're now, you know, we're looking at a 12 person staff after two years. So it's definitely. It's definitely grown a lot.
Speaker 1:Do you think it's exceeding what you want, the way you say that it's almost like a surprise that you're here, or is this exactly what you're comfortable with now and what you want now and tell us a bit about where you think you're headed as a brand.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely, you know, and I think I think, um, when I first started, it was me, by myself. As soon as I got about two to three vans rolling, I knew it was going to be all uphill from here. As soon as everything clicked together and I got everything well-rounded and all the systems in order, I mean it's something that's been ongoing, for sure, but realistically, this entire last year has just been scaling. You know, once you get everything in order and everything's building on top of it, I mean there's it's scaling at this point, not just necessarily growth. Where growth is like oh, I'm learning these things, I'm adapting these. Scaling, it's like, okay, we're buying the vans, we have systems in order to get the people trained up and it's just a, it's a well-oiled machine.
Speaker 1:At this point, yeah, it's a really good point. That's a really good point, that difference between growth and scale. I mean technically. One way to look at that is if you have that stable gross profit margin and you know what you're able to do with the processes you have in place and you're able to train, you've got the people around you to help train that team up, then adding a van and adding a person could be something that's really just your next logical decision, not a big emotional hurdle. Just on that quick though. Have you felt a speed wobble at all, dan? Quick though. Have you felt a speed wobble at all, dan? Are there times where you maybe wake up with the sweats in the middle of the night, like most of us have many times before, and you go oh god, what am I doing? Can I really do this, or is? Are you immune to that at this point?
Speaker 3:you know this, last year it's been a lot less of that, as, um, when I was a small one-man person, it was definitely a lot more. When I had a couple of people it's like, oh man, this is a lot, as the more people go in and the systems get better and better in order, it's a lot less you know, it's not times where I don't have stressful days or stressful weeks, for sure, but it's not nearly as much as it used to be.
Speaker 3:There was times where I was like, oh man, you know, keeping me up at night, not sleeping, where now the systems in order so well that things are flowing awesome. I mean, uh, you know, to end this year. Basically, you know, it was the end of December and I said, you know what? I can see where this growth is going. I'm ordering two vans. Didn't tell anyone. I said we got two vans in order. And then, you know, last week I said, oh yeah, well, we've got two guys started, we've got two vans, we're switching to service type, and we, with it, Like we know where this is going.
Speaker 1:Um, so we're we're ready to really hit the ground running. That's remarkable. We mentioned in the beginning of this. You've become one of our first client coaches as well client coach ambassadors. You've been able to lead a couple of classes with us, and you're really the first person to ever do that with us. Although we realize it's a, it's a strength and something. We're really the first person to ever do that with us. Although we realize it's a, it's a strength and something. We're really proud to be able to help you as well be in that position. Why is it important, though, for you to give back to this community and to give back to other electricians? Why do you put skin in that game? You know.
Speaker 3:I, I love it to. You know, think back to where I was and when. You know, when I had just me by myself and I just started, or when I had a van or two vans or three vans. I know those pains that I felt at that time. And you know, having someone I could lean on that says, hey, you should do this, you should do this. It's such an awesome feeling to be able to help people and give back. You know, when people reach out to me directly and say, hey, look, you know I've got this, what do you think I should do? I'd say, well, tell me a little bit about your business, what do you have going? And you know, as soon as they start saying different things, you can directly key on key points and say, well, this is what I did, but here's what I'd recommend. You know a good man, dan, you really are.
Speaker 1:Really good stuff. Dan, do you have any last minute advice, something that you would like to tell all the people out there that may be watching or listening to this?
Speaker 3:I would say get the mentorship, get the coaching as soon as possible you know, wherever it may be from, if it's someone that's doing better than you are um, anyone that's, you know. Put yourself around the right type of people. It's all about who you surround yourself with. So you know, if you can surround yourself by people that are like-minded, that you know have businesses, whether it may be a plumbing business, an HVAC business, you know a landscape business surround yourself around the right side of people, get yourself the mentorship and the coaching and you know it's all a lot of growth from there.
Speaker 1:I love that. Thank you so much for that. If someone were wanting to reach out to you, Dan, are you open to speaking with people if they're curious about your growth or how they might need to take next steps?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. You know we've got social media. As far as Facebook, instagram, you know my personal one's a great way to reach out. My email's danieldtelectriccompany spelled out com, so that's a great one as well. Or you can always reach out through the SLE group directly and I can help out on there.
Speaker 1:I really appreciate that man. This has been so much fun having you for a second year. We're so proud of you. And if I can just say on the topic of coaching.
Speaker 1:we do it too Right. This is not a paid advertisement. This is another case study, another example of how you could really expedite your journey, and we love nothing more than bringing cases like Dan forward. No-transcript. If you guys are listening to this and you've ever been part of a Reddit or a Facebook group and you know the pain of asking a question and you know the pain of then getting 90 different ways to skin that cat, why is that still an expression? We should cancel that one. I don't know why, but you get 90 different ways to do a thing.
Speaker 1:Well, one of the nice things about being part of any better practice group, whether it's ours or someone else, is being in the room with people who are trying to do the same style of things as you in the same way, and that can be an absolute superpower. Dan, I want to thank you so much for your contribution, not just today but to our teams, to our other clients, to this whole group and all the growth that we've experienced. And Joe, of course, my partner, super grateful for you, super pumped that we get to work with your team direct in, and I can't wait. I cannot wait to hear what's next from you, brother.
Speaker 2:Love you both guys. Thank you guys.
Speaker 1:We'll see you guys next time, and that's a wrap for today's episode of the Million Dollar Electrician Podcast.
Speaker 2:We hope you're buzzing with new ideas that charged up to take your business to the next level.
Speaker 1:So don't forget to subscribe, leave a review and share the show with fellow electricians Together. We'll keep the current flowing.
