From Warehouse Cleaner to $4M in Sales
Price objections at the end of a sales call are probably because you skipped the budget conversation that should have happened in the first ten minutes. Sales isn’t all about talent, it’s about process. The shops closing at a high rate right now aren’t the ones with the smoothest pitch; they’re the ones running the same disciplined steps on every call and every job.
In this episode of Cracking The Code, Jason Walker sits down with Brad Barron to trace his path from shop warehouse cleaner to writing over $4 million a year at a 67% close rate. Jason covers the questions his call center asks, where to start your conversations, how to take control of a call before the homeowner takes it from you, and the three tie-downs he uses to close without pressure.
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00:00:00:01 – 00:00:12:00
You asked the hard questions up front. The budgeting questions. The questions that no one likes to ask up front. And if you don’t ask up front, you get the objection at the end.
00:00:12:02 – 00:00:44:19
Welcome to Cracking the Code with your host, Jay Dub, and my co-host, Brad Barron. And I’m super excited because he’s the firecracker bow bow bow bow bow. Right. Call him the shooter. Well, anyways, I’m super excited because what I’ve seen in the field is the importance of sales and being efficient with sales and same day clothes is something that’s really important, but things that people and business all across the different country have probably the biggest obstacles and challenges with.
00:00:44:19 – 00:01:03:19
What I want to talk about with Brad real quick is talking about marketing lead sources to get your foot in the door so we could capitalize on these type of opportunities. I’m going to one up you on this, Jason, before we do that. Yeah, this is what I do. Sometimes I hear it and I’m like, nope, I’m going to I’m going to raise one.
00:01:03:19 – 00:01:24:20
I want to hear a little bit about your sales background because I think we’ve touched on it, but I think it would be great to again with the listeners on this podcast, share a little bit about your upbringing and how you got to the point where you’re at, because I think it’s a really cool story. And then if you’d like, I’ll share a little bit about my background as well.
00:01:24:21 – 00:01:48:03
But how about I kick it over to you? I want to hear before we dive into the nitty gritty of leads and sales, I want to I want to know a little bit more about you. Absolutely. Well, the story of how I got to being a master closer. Right. We’ll call me the master closer. I never thought 17 years ago when I started in the trades of age fact, that fast forward, I would be to where I am today.
00:01:48:03 – 00:02:12:03
Now, I started 17 years ago as your indoor air quality shop warehouse cleaner. Right? And when I say shop warehouse cleaner, there wasn’t a lot of duct cleaning opportunities going on, so I was developing that department. Fast forward six months, I was able to grow that department where I now saw a lot of opportunity in the company that I was at that I said, you know what?
00:02:12:04 – 00:02:36:09
I want to learn more. I want to indulge myself within the industry and the trades of HVAC, and I’m going all in. So I did service, I did installs, but what really created that name for myself is when I started selling HVAC systems, and that’s where I really was able to learn that there’s just not financial freedom, but there’s generational wealth that you could get right.
00:02:36:10 – 00:02:58:07
And it’s wild because at this point, this is where I really found out that, hey, you really don’t have to be the business owner to make the most money in the company, right? And so I was able to fine tune my skills as a comfort advisor. My first year, 12 years ago, I did over 2 million. I had a company that was established 35 years.
00:02:58:07 – 00:03:25:10
Never had a guy hit 2 million in their organization. Did that. In my first eight months I was showcased in air time 500 for multiple different years and got crowned champion multiple years. My last year was seven years ago. As a comfort advisor. I had an average ticket about 19,500. You put me into a marketing call, closed at 67%, turnovers from a technician, 72% with that average ticket.
00:03:25:10 – 00:03:43:09
That’s all of a sudden when I noticed that there was a want and there was a need. Brad, when I talk about a want and a need, business owners would hear those numbers and they’d say, you know what, Jason? Let’s go to a steak dinner. Let’s go to a baseball game. Let’s go to a sporting event. Who would not like to do that?
00:03:43:10 – 00:04:06:22
Right? So once I discovered there was a want and a need, I started the podcast HVAC Masters of the hustle about seven years ago. It months into that, all of a sudden a business owner that’s been following the content and listening all of a sudden reached out and said, I listen to your stuff. Have you ever thought about doing a on site all of a sudden defining moment right now?
00:04:06:22 – 00:04:34:21
All of a sudden I took that leap of faith. I did the on site. When you sell HVAC systems, okay? And I happily involve homeowners, it’s really rewarding, right? Especially when it’s an old couple or elderly family or a young family with a baby. Right. But I’m telling you, when I got off the phone and that technician, he was a single father, had two girls in high school, told me that I changed his life and doubled, almost tripled his income his first quarter.
00:04:34:21 – 00:05:09:00
That’s when it was game changer. That’s when I hung up the boots of being a comfort advisor, and everyone thought I was crazy. Leaving a job. I was making 10% commission sold over 4 million so you could do the math. And they thought I was wild. Crazy because I had a dream and a mission. And all of a sudden, fast forward today, I’m in front of you all with cracking the code, and this has been a dream of mine for the last couple years, to be able to get information from people that have it and deliver the information to the people that need it.
00:05:09:01 – 00:05:31:18
Man, I love that philosophy. That’s awesome. And so what does your day to day look like now? I mean, I know you’re traveling all over the place. We were you were up, you know, a little while ago, and we were having a conversation over dinner about how at one point, it sounds like half the year you were on the road and you’ve maybe in a really good way, created better work life balance, been able to create efficient systems, right?
00:05:31:19 – 00:05:51:22
To get your knowledge and your wisdom out and your talents out into the field, which is great. But what’s your day to day because you also own royalty, heating and air. Great question Brad. My day to day is extremely busy. You know, not only are we with HVAC masters of the hustle cracking the code national trainers on both sides as well.
00:05:52:01 – 00:06:17:11
But yeah, I was in on the road 150 days out of the year. That means more than half the year. I’m away from my family. I’m sacrificing today in order to live the life I want to tomorrow. Okay. And I understand that it wasn’t forever, but now that I was able to create royalty heating and air a couple years ago, that’s more of walk the walk and talk the talk, right?
00:06:17:12 – 00:06:38:10
If you’re a national trainer and you’re training different business leaders and operators, how to run an efficient company and how to set yourself up for private equity and things like that, then you also got to kind of talk the talk and walk the walk. And I’ve never had my own company. Okay. So I started Royalty Heat and there from ground zero.
00:06:38:11 – 00:06:58:20
June 4th or June 1st, 2024. Hit the boots run in and we’re able to grow where we just had our record month of over 300,000 of installed revenue, and we’re going to do over 2.2 million this year as our second year full calendar year. If I was there right now. I give you a big old bear hug, buddy.
00:06:58:22 – 00:07:20:18
I just give you a big hug. I’m proud of you. Yeah. Boom. That’s awesome. Cool. Well, you know what’s interesting? Hearing your story. You know, mine’s a little bit on the flip, right? So I came in to the post high school world, and I wanted, you know, nothing to do with the family business. So Baron’s been around for 55 years now.
00:07:20:18 – 00:07:37:03
I didn’t really want a lot to do with the family business. Didn’t think a lot about it because I like to build things, design things and make things better, right? So I went the engineering route, but really quickly I learned I hated sitting behind a desk, and I know episode one, I talked about that and there was something missing.
00:07:37:04 – 00:07:58:16
Like I wasn’t like the best way to put it is like, I feel like I was taking breaths, but I wasn’t able to take like full breaths and breathe. Right. Like that was part of me that just wasn’t there. And so I made a leap in the sales engineering, and it was an awesome leap. I was able to to sort of lean into some of the things that I loved about contracting, which was working with contractors.
00:07:58:17 – 00:08:24:03
Right. Being able to rub shoulders and and help them with the solutions to the challenges that they faced and ended up being a sales engineer for a while, and then a manager of a for state sales territory. But all that to be said, when I made the switch to Baron, which it’s funny you said going from, you know, a, you know, a four, $4 million a year, 10% sales guy to then like, hey, I’m going to, you know, take that leap of faith.
00:08:24:03 – 00:08:41:02
I’m going to see what happens. I did a little bit of a similar thing, right? I was making, you know, really good money as a sales engineering manager for an international company. And my dad’s like, hey, you should join the family business. And when he sent me the offer, it was like, you know, less than half of what I was making.
00:08:41:03 – 00:09:04:18
I was like, man, how am I going to do that? But I just that. Yeah, well, how do I justify it to my wife? Like, can we still do the things we want to do? But luckily I was I was blessed with some good mentors that said, hey, look at what your dad did, what your grandpa did, the opportunities you have to take, what you’ve learned in operations and what you’ve learned in sales, and to be able to apply them to change lives.
00:09:04:18 – 00:09:26:04
And I think one thing I picked up on working with you, and this is so, so true, if you ever get a chance to meet Jason in person, is that you genuinely want to change people’s lives. Like, I remember you were talking about that story when you were with one of the guys that you had trained earlier on in the East Coast, and you saw him again a year later and you’re like, this guy’s a different guy.
00:09:26:06 – 00:09:40:23
The thing that stood out to me, though, because you shared that story, but what stood out to me is the fact that you cared enough to ask what was going on. Like what? Yeah. Why are you not having fun? Life’s too short. If you’re going to sacrifice, you got to have a good time while you’re doing it. And.
00:09:41:02 – 00:10:01:22
And by the way, I think that translates into sales and leadership, too, right? I think that you need to be a leader that shows your team that even though you’re grinding, you can have fun, like aspire to learn how to learn, but have a good time. So you’ve been in the sales role. You’ve obviously you’re currently also managing salespeople right now.
00:10:01:23 – 00:10:29:22
Let’s let’s dive into that real quick. So you originally asked the question leads right. You go from leads to sales quick high level. From my standpoint I’ll share this I think that and we could do a whole episode on lead Generation. We could probably do a whole series on lead gen. But what I will say is this from my operators seat, as CEO, you need to be looking at all the different platforms and looking at your return on Aspen, right?
00:10:29:23 – 00:10:48:04
You got to see what returns you’re getting and what makes the most sense. Like what are the lowest hanging fruits? I know we talked about this in the past, but you know, we got to look at Google LSA. You got to look at, you know, paper click. You should be tapping into things like meta because a lot of the millennials and Gen Zers are using those platforms.
00:10:48:05 – 00:11:10:08
Right. There’s still a place for mail. I mean, by the way, Barron does a quarter million dollars a year out of our phone book numbers. Still, if you could actually believe that, why? Marketing manager talk about old school, old school. Now we live in an area that has some retirees up here too. But when I say that, people laugh at me like it’s a BS number $250,000.
00:11:10:12 – 00:11:29:08
Now, it’s not a big part of our revenue, but quarter million dollars is out of the phone book. So you got and by the way, that’s based on a $6,000 investment. That’s pretty good return on investment, I’d say when you look at the scheme of things, that’s a great investment right there. Right. So all that to be said, lead source matters.
00:11:29:08 – 00:11:52:19
But what I think matters more, Jason, than just leads is how you handle them when the call comes in and how you handle them in the house. So I think we should talk about those two things now. I think you’re an expert on both of those areas. So I’m going to ask you a question really quick. First, when you get a call at royalty, you get a sales lead, right?
00:11:52:20 – 00:12:18:11
What is your process and what are like 2 or 3 things that you want to make sure your call center is doing to set your comfort advisors up for success? Oh great question. So first off, it’s all about the customer experience. And that’s step one right there. That’s one of contact. So at Royalty Heating and Air when you call our company you’re going to hear the tagline okay thank you for calling royalty heat.
00:12:18:11 – 00:12:40:08
And there will be bring comfort to your kingdom. How can we make your day special right. So obviously when they answer, we want to genuinely make them smile. We want to say something that allows them to remember who we are. And then once we deliver that, it’s passing the baton to the technician. What questions are you asking to set them up right?
00:12:40:13 – 00:13:08:22
Are you the owner of the home? Are you a tenant? Where’s your thermostat located? What temperature do you like to keep the thermostat? Does your system continuously run when you keep it set at that desired temperature? How old is your current system? Where’s your system located? Right. Those are all questions that we are setting up to allow our technician or our field comfort advisor to get the best solution or results possible when they’re out in that home, right.
00:13:08:23 – 00:13:38:05
The more information that we could gather at the beginning of the appointment will allow the outcome to be 100 times better as well. But again, the first touch is experience with the client is most important because that’s the customer experience, right? How many times do you call a competitor just to see how they answer the phones? And if you haven’t called the competitor right, you should probably do that today to see either where they’re lacking or what they’re doing.
00:13:38:05 – 00:14:09:00
Good. Right, right. Iron sharpens iron I agree. I love that, by the way. I, I preach that all the time. The better that the industry can do as a whole in raising the bar and customer experience, the better, again, that each individual contractor is going to do. Like a rising tide raises all ships. And I it’s really interesting, you know, when someone comes in and says, hey, you know, so-and-so that, you know, one of your competitors, they seem like, you know, they’re doing well or they put out a good ad or, you know, you know, they picked up a new person.
00:14:09:00 – 00:14:34:13
And I’m like, yeah, like when they raise the bar, the industry’s bar is raised. And then instead of it being HVAC against HVAC or plumbing against plumbing or electrical against electrical, it’s we need electrical and plumbing contractors to be disruptive and sexy. Right. Because it’s a financing game right now. Like people cannot afford to just paste us right out of their bank account.
00:14:34:14 – 00:14:57:03
Most people can’t. And so we have to realize that it’s not just our trades competitors out there that are fighting for the same work. It’s anything that’s financed. I brought that up before, but I think it’s important. Like there’s so many people that do one of two things with competitors. I think they either have fear right of what they’re doing and they’re going to do it better, right?
00:14:57:04 – 00:15:20:08
Or at the end of the day, they are afraid to say something because they think their competitors are going to steal it. Well, first off, imitation is the best form of flattery, right? Why do you think that car companies all line up on the same road? They line up on the same road because of the fact that they want someone to buy a car and they know the odds, games that someone’s going to be on that car, they’re going to buy a car, right.
00:15:20:09 – 00:15:37:21
And so the same thing to me goes with competitors like drop your shame, share what you need to share. Let’s raise the industry together. But I love that because don’t be afraid to make the call. Some people are like, oh, I don’t want to call because they might be doing it better than me. Great, then learn from it.
00:15:37:22 – 00:15:58:15
You know what I mean? Yeah. Another thing you know, I talk about is if you want to be the 1% in closing jobs, I call it the no. Before you go. And so we have CRM programs, right, that have gathered of information of years and years and years that could help technicians and comfort advisors before they go into the call.
00:15:58:15 – 00:16:19:15
But what happens is technicians, I say you get depleted and defeated because maybe they go through notes and it’s years and years of deny, deny, deny, deny, deny. Or maybe the last time they were out, they got deny, deny right. And all of a sudden it plants that seed of being depleted and defeated before you go into the ink and to buy anything from me, right.
00:16:19:15 – 00:16:42:19
You have to shift your mindset. You’ve got to replant those seeds. You can’t allow the notes that you’re deciphering from years prior to dictate the outcome of where you’re going with that appointment. So mentally, you got to prepare yourself before going into the appointment. That is fire, by the way. So much of sales is mindset. I actually argue 90% of it is mindset, right?
00:16:42:20 – 00:16:59:00
You got to get your head right. Yeah, absolutely. I always tell everyone, manifest the outcome. Oh I love it, man. You’re just dropping it here today buddy I love it. It’s like yeah. Hey, that’s why I love doing it with you, man. Oh, yeah. I haven’t winked at you in a while. I needed to do that in a little while.
00:16:59:01 – 00:17:23:07
Do you feel that? Yeah. All right, well, you just segway beautifully into, I think, the next section, which is. All right, we’ve answered the phone, right? We’ve set the appointment, we’ve taken the notes, we’ve created that first customer experience, that handoff that’s warm and fuzzy from your CSR or your ISR over to your sales team. All right. That lead comes over.
00:17:23:07 – 00:17:40:14
It’s the day of the appointment. What are you coaching whether it’s your sales guys or other company sales guys, what are you coaching them to do at the morning of their sales appointments? Like what are they doing in the morning? How are they getting their head right? How are they engaging the customer before they even get to the house?
00:17:40:14 – 00:17:59:05
What are the things they doing? So a lot of our comfort advisors are our technicians. They start at the office and just culture alone. When you walk in, we got music going. And when I say music, we got music throughout the whole office, right? They know that they could eat breakfast, lunch and dinner at the facility as well.
00:17:59:05 – 00:18:25:23
So they usually like to come in, get snacks, get food, get ready for the day as I’m in the office or my management team. Right. We’ll go decipher through whatever their first appointment is and prepare and engage with them. Right? Mentally prepare them and allow them to understand the importance of, hey, when you go out there, I see a lot of technicians fail at taking control of the call, and they allow the homeowner to take control of the beginning of the appointment.
00:18:25:23 – 00:18:42:13
So allow yourself this scenario, right? You’re a technician. You just bang on the door. The homeowner answers, how often does this happen? Where they go, hey, I got to go jump on a zoom meeting. I got to do this. Do your thing or the unit’s around back. I’ll pop open the garage and you allow them to control the beginning.
00:18:42:17 – 00:19:12:23
Well, I’m telling you, if you allow them to control the beginning of the appointment, they’re going to control the close as well. So how do you respectfully gain control? Right. You do your introduction. Dornoch introduction. But instead of going to the thermostat like 90% of technicians go to okay or 98 man like me at all. Yeah. And I see it every time I do right along in every state, every company technician goes to the thermostat and they start asking their questions at the thermostat.
00:19:12:23 – 00:19:37:09
But also, if you think about it, where you start is where you finish. So I like to start at the table because also if I finish at the table as a technician, even k, I’m also where do people do business? Typically at the table somewhere where they’re comfortable, right? Also, if you put yourself in the homeowner situation and scenario, I’d say majority of the time were strangers.
00:19:37:10 – 00:19:57:10
Okay, I’m a grown ass man. I’m almost 40. I hate to say that, but man, when I go into and understanding who I’m marketing to. So at royalty, we mark it. I’d say 70% of women. So I know when my technician walks into that call, they’re probably going to be greeted with the the wife of the home. Probably the children are going to be there as well.
00:19:57:10 – 00:20:19:12
So how do you, instead of being a stranger, walking around their house doing the tune up because it’s usually your first second time out there. How do you build that relationship and focus on relationship before business? That’s the key question. Hey Jason, before we keep going, we have a quick message from our sponsor.
00:20:19:14 – 00:20:52:09
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00:20:52:11 – 00:21:10:20
Relationship trust. And you can do those things even before you get to the house, right? You know, at the end of the day, one of the things that we coach our guys and gals in the field to do is, you know, call ahead of time, right? What? And by the way, even if they’re running late, like, I’ll get five star reviews on Google where they’re like, hey, you know, the tech was great.
00:21:10:20 – 00:21:31:12
They were running 20 minutes late, but they called ahead of time and absolutely loved that, right? You can turn lemons into lemonade and begin that, you know, halo effect experience prior to even getting there. So letting them know they’re on their way, letting them know that you’re there to take care of them, making sure you don’t, you know, park in the driveway, you know, so you don’t drip oil.
00:21:31:12 – 00:21:55:05
You don’t block the car coming out of the garage. You said something that I think is really important. Friends knock, right? Strangers ring the doorbell, you knock on the door, you step back, you give them space. You do the things that you don’t walk through their plant garden. Don’t walk on their lawn. By the way, these are things that sometimes when we get into the monotony of the mundane of process, we get less sharp, right?
00:21:55:06 – 00:22:21:02
And we forget that, you know, one plus one plus one plus one plus one equals five, right? As you’re moving toward, you know, being a 100 out of 100, and you got to do those little one percenters to be able to create that halo effect. But also, you’re not the first person that’s coached, which I love, by the way, getting yourself to the table, because that’s where friends sit, where family set, that’s where people are comfortable having a conversation.
00:22:21:02 – 00:22:50:13
And you’re so right. So many technicians, even when they’re told that, still goes straight to the thermostat. Who the heck wants to do it? They don’t even they want to set it and forget it. Why are you doing business in front of the thermostat? What are you doing? You know, a lot of times as I go out to we’re talking about how are you efficient with, you know, same day clothes or from marketing to closing the opportunity when your foot in the door, it’s involving your homeowner, a part of your process.
00:22:50:14 – 00:23:11:04
Right. How often do I go to companies where the technician doesn’t even engage right from their initial meet and greet, right? And then all of a sudden, they want to overwhelm their client on the end and vomit all their solutions or all their findings on them. And all of a sudden telling the selling homeowners walls are up and they’re going, hang on.
00:23:11:05 – 00:23:34:07
Now you’re trying to sell me something no one wants to be sold. Validate, educate. Establish the position of trust. Make sure they understand intent. You got to do the right things and you got to walk through those. You know, I was having a meeting with my my sales team. And every once in a while, even though I’m the the CEO and I got a lot of different hats, I’m wearing a barren and whole home and, and all the things we do.
00:23:34:11 – 00:23:50:21
I like to come into the sales meeting from time to time and talk to them. And really, my goal is to knock down barriers as one of the things. Right? Like as the owner and leader of a company, can I remove barriers from my team to succeed? But the second goal, and I think that this is important for leaders on on the podcast, listening in to no.
00:23:50:22 – 00:24:17:05
Two, it’s okay to challenge your team to be better. A lot of times, and I think Covid did this to a little bit because there were so many opportunities for people to jump ship or leave or go to whatever the next shiny company was. Right? Like, that all exists. And we were all invite, invite, invite. So what? Bear and Jason, one thing that we talk about is invitation challenge, and that’s how you build a healthy culture.
00:24:17:06 – 00:24:39:01
Invitation is trust, relationship intent. Warm and fuzzy, right? Like you got to have that. But if you don’t challenge your team from time to time, right at the right time tactfully, you’re going to create a culture where people are lazy and spoiled, right? Like, they’re they’re just not going to be those producers that you want them to be in your company, and they’re not going to align with your culture.
00:24:39:01 – 00:25:00:11
So there’s times to challenge. And one of the reasons I like to jump in from time to time to my different meetings with sales folks, technicians, electricians and plumbers is I do have good trust with my team. I’m transparent. I show who I am. I admit my mistakes. I’ll do it publicly at quarterly meetings like they know the raw Brad Baron, like they know who I am.
00:25:00:12 – 00:25:16:20
And because I’ve created that trust, I can come in and I can ask those hard questions, right? And when we came out of Covid, by the way, Covid was, you know, shooting fish out of a barrel sales, it was like you could walk in and hand them an estimate. Yeah, it was like the question wasn’t, can I afford it?
00:25:16:20 – 00:25:35:14
It was how soon will it be installed? Right. You know, I mean, it was like it was that and I and I only share that to junks to pose with this, we have to continue as business leaders and sales leaders to up our baseline. Like, do not assume that where you’re at is good enough. It has to be better.
00:25:35:14 – 00:25:54:03
Do you want to be good or do you want to be great? And great is doing all those things from, you know, skews my French. But put your damn phone away when you’re in the house. The most important person in that call is the person standing across from you. Do not put power. Move the phone. I don’t know if you teach your people that, but like, put the phone away.
00:25:54:03 – 00:26:18:11
Piggyback off of that, right? If your technicians are not using iPads and they’re using their phones to present solutions and financing, absolutely fail fail fail fail fail fail. Yeah. I mean, well, by the way, I also see I don’t know. Have you ever been to a wedding where someone is reading their their remarks off a cell phone? I’m like, are you texting someone while you’re.
00:26:18:12 – 00:26:36:17
It just it feels so wrong. I love that, by the way. That’s fine. But like, everything from that to, like, are you checking up here? We have attics and crawl spaces. Right. And are you checking attic? Are you checking the static? Are you checking the crawl? Right. By the way, things that we knew pre-COVID, like. Are you doing that again?
00:26:36:18 – 00:26:56:02
Like, are you making sure, you know, are you utilizing technology to do load calculations? Are you showing what that means for equipment sizing? Are you by the way? The list goes on and on. But if you are not also creating a level of knowledge and expertise right through your actions, you’re going to have a lot more challenges when you’re in the home with people.
00:26:56:02 – 00:27:17:04
So at the end of the day, those are all things. I want to ask you a question, though, because I think this is always one that comes up with, especially folks that are transitioning from the field into sales. We’ve talked about sales being, you know, the five letter swear word, right? Like technicians, you like treasuries and plumbers are like, you know, oh, he’s a you know that Jason.
00:27:17:05 – 00:27:40:19
He’s a sales guy. You know. Yeah. All he cares about his money and but you know, anyway. By the way, they don’t say that many exactly know. But at the end of the day. Those are the people that can struggle with asking for the sale. And there’s a lot of sales training out there. And I appreciate it that, you know, build trust, establish intent.
00:27:40:19 – 00:28:02:09
And by the way, all things I agree with, but they lack the end, which is you. It’s the invitation challenge idea. You do at some point have to make the clothes right. Like you have to talk to them about why they should be doing business with your company and why that should be. Now, what are you doing and training Jason?
00:28:02:09 – 00:28:21:14
Because you do this day in and day out across the US. What are some maybe you’re like top 2 or 3 ways that you take a customer that’s maybe still hemming and hawing at the end of a call and you go, let’s get started. Like, what are you doing? You got to use tie downs. So there’s certain questions that I ask.
00:28:21:15 – 00:28:43:20
If you could have a client agree that you’re the right company based off their research. Right. There’s a reason why they called you out there. You build value and trust as the technician or comfort advisor, and they trust you that you diagnose the system or gave them the right solutions. And then you ask the hard questions upfront, the budgeting questions, the questions that no one likes to ask upfront.
00:28:43:20 – 00:29:06:19
And if you don’t ask up front, you get the objection at the end. But if you can make it affordable, they trust you and they trust the company. Let me ask you a question. Why wouldn’t they do business with you? And I use those as tie downs. And I asked the homeowner, hey, earlier in our conversation, you said that you found us because of our amazing Google reviews and that you trust us.
00:29:06:20 – 00:29:35:23
Write me here as the comfort consultant or the comfort advisor. You also said that you trusted me engineering the system based off my heat load calculation. You walk in around the house with me, you being a part of my process. And then earlier you told me that $200 was affordable without taking food off the table. Again, I just want to make sure and be transparent that nothing’s changed, that you still feel like we’re the right company, you still feel like I’m the right comfort advisor to engineer the system, to hit your comfort level.
00:29:35:23 – 00:29:57:12
And then lastly, based off our conversation, is it affordable without taking food off the table? And again reiterate, regardless if you choose me, another contractor, you do business today, tomorrow, next year, five years down the road, you’re always going to ask yourself those three questions. Shut up, hand the agreement over and see what happens. I love it, I have goosebumps right now.
00:29:57:13 – 00:30:18:13
Jason, you do that today. Love it. First off. Amen, brother. I love everything you said and I like your term tie downs. I’ve heard it said different ways, but that’s a really good way to put it. I like that, and I think that it’s important to when you’re training sales guys or technicians that transition to sales, don’t overcomplicate it at the end.
00:30:18:14 – 00:30:38:01
Right. Like you pick three things, right. Those are three simple things. You already talked about them at the beginning of the call. Right. So like you’re just you’re recalling it back. It’s awesome. But you hit on something that I think is really important though. And you said it shut up. Right. Like after you’ve made that conversation, just stop talking.
00:30:38:04 – 00:30:58:15
The first one to talk loses. Yeah. Well, and I think really what it is, is the first one that talks is the one that casts doubt in everything that’s just been said. Right? If it’s the customer, doubt might be in the form of a question. And then you can go down a different conversation and hopefully keep moving in the right direction.
00:30:58:15 – 00:31:14:01
If the doubt comes from you, then all of a sudden, all that work you did to build trust, to build intent, all those things, now it sounds like you’re just trying to get them to sign and make the sale. And you ruined all of that at the beginning of the call. So I love that sometimes you just got to shut up.
00:31:14:01 – 00:31:33:06
So we should probably make a shirt. Just shut up. Just shut up. Right. Hey, there you go. I want to leave all the listeners with something real quick. I got this blank piece of paper in front of me. Right. And as you’re listening and watching the podcast right now, you might be in a development season of being lost, and you feel like your teeth are getting kicked in.
00:31:33:06 – 00:31:56:01
And I just want to let you all know I’ve been there. I felt it, and I know a lot of technicians that are going through that right now. And one thing I talk about is this represents your process. And in summertime, or just like Brad was talking about in Covid, we were order takers, especially in summer. Okay, we don’t have to be good sales professionals to happily involve homeowners with whatever results we’re presenting.
00:31:56:01 – 00:32:17:13
But when we start taking away from our process and then all of a sudden we start rolling in September, October, where we need the process, and we didn’t go in the attic. We looked at half the system, I didn’t hook my gauges up, and then all of a sudden we got a broken process. We got confetti right here, and we try to piece it back together like a puzzle.
00:32:17:13 – 00:32:39:05
And I’m not saying it’s impossible because puzzles are done all the time. My wife loves puzzles, but it takes work, it takes effort, it takes energy. And then all of a sudden, if we’re not getting the results that we want, we start putting that pressure on the homeowner. So keep consistent with whatever processes you guys are running. If you don’t have any processes, reach out to Egea.
00:32:39:07 – 00:33:30:01
We have the best trainers around to help you guys maneuver so you could overcome any challenges out there. 2026 rolling into the fourth quarter should be your quarter. The quarter shouldn’t own you as a business owner or an operator. You should be owning the quarter of 2026 rolling into 2027. Man, I love that. The only other thing I would add, and I think that was beautifully stated, is in in body curiosity, I think if you are a technician, electrician, plumber or comfort advisor, if you come into a home and you are genuinely curious, curious about the person, curious about their situation, curious about the system, curious about why they called you genuinely and you’re able
00:33:30:01 – 00:33:51:15
to lean into that. When you’re having a conversation, you’ll create an authentic connection, and I think that’s something that’s missed because curiosity is the opposite of selfishness, right? Like, if you’re selfish, what you’re doing is everything you’re saying or asking is about you. Curious is making it about them, right, and about you guys together. So that’d be the last thing I’d leave is that’s something that we coach.
00:33:51:15 – 00:34:10:13
Our technicians, electricians and plumbers and sales guys is in body curiosity because at the end of the day, I think it was a Ted Lasso, wasn’t it? Ted Lasso said, be curious. And I think that’s a really good thing to apply to sales and HVAC, electrical, plumbing. You know, when you say Ted Lasso, you’re talking about the TV show.
00:34:10:17 – 00:34:17:08
Yeah. Love it, love it. Well, until next time. I’m cracking the code. Signing off late.
