How HVAC Contractors Build Loyalty & Referrals
When customers say, “I’ve got a guy,” they are revealing this person is trustworthy. For contractors, the real question is whether customers see you as just another quote, or as the company they call first and recommend without hesitation.
In this episode of Cracking the Code, Tom Casey, Master Advisor at True Legends Advisors, joins the show to break down what really drives customer loyalty and referrals. He explains why homeowners look for trust signals before making decisions, how contractors can move from being evaluated to becoming the default choice and why long-term growth depends on building relationships customers want to talk about.
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00:00:00:06 – 00:00:12:07
You’re not competing against contractors. You’re competing against. I’ve got a guy who.
00:00:12:09 – 00:00:40:18
So let me ask you something. When someone says, don’t worry, I’ve got a guy. What are they really saying? Because they’re not talking about equipment. They’re not talking about Sere ratings. They’re not even talking about price. They’re talking about trust. And today we’re going to talk about how you become that guy. The one customers call first trust instantly and recommend without hesitation.
00:00:40:20 – 00:01:05:21
I’m joined today by my good friend Tom Casey, someone who spent years becoming an award winning contractor and helping other contractors understand what actually drives customer decisions and long term loyalty. Welcome to cracking the code, Tom. Thanks, man. Appreciate the invite. Yeah, man, I’m looking forward to this is going to be fun. So, Tom, let’s start with this.
00:01:05:23 – 00:01:34:12
When someone says, I’ve got a guy, what’s really happening in that moment? Well, people don’t like change, Dave. And so they’ll accept mediocrity in their guy, actually, versus the potential pain of making a change. So if they’ve used somebody in the past and they showed up, hey, they did an okay job, chances are they don’t want to venture out into the world and get another guy or do more research.
00:01:34:14 – 00:02:01:12
So the guy is sort of like a comfort feeling, right? It’s it’s I know, maybe I like, sort of trust, versus the alternative for sure that I don’t know. So do I trust them versus the ? Probably. And that’s like usually the, the entry level of I’ve got a guy just like a default way of thinking, safe thinking versus, you know, I’d rather go to what I already know.
00:02:01:12 – 00:02:21:13
The known versus the . Yeah. Even if the known sucks. Right? Because at least they know how it sucks, right? It can be bad on them. You know, it’s it’s like McDonald’s doesn’t make a good hamburger, but you can count on that same crappy hamburger everywhere you go to McDonald’s. And so, you know, rather than risking a burger joint in some time intervening, I’m a I’m going to get a crappy McDonald’s burger.
00:02:21:15 – 00:02:46:14
And what ends up happening when you earn that position in the homeowner’s mind, the customer’s mind, it’s like they trust the guy without even thinking about it, right? Pretty crazy. Kind of a shortcut for decision making, too, in a way, because it’s like, all right, think about it. We’re in the process of doing some renovations at our home, and, we started asking around at our church and saying, hey, have you got a guy?
00:02:46:15 – 00:03:11:20
And, and we got a guy and Kelly, my wife just came in a little while ago and said, we got a guy. I said, we do. That’s it. That’s funny. I’m getting ready to do a podcast about that. So, it’s it’s kind of hilarious because in getting a guy from a person that we trust, the beautiful thing is the trust that they have in that person automatically gets transferred to us, doesn’t it?
00:03:11:23 – 00:03:27:22
Yeah. You want the, sort of the herd mentality, right? Like, I don’t want to try a new watering hole. So I don’t know if there’s tigers or alligators or crocodiles or whatever is going to get me. So if all the other, people in my pack go to this watering hole, it must be a good watering hole.
00:03:28:00 – 00:03:46:21
And so the idea of that guy is there’s an immediate trust transfer, right? Like if, if, if Bob and Mary used him, he must be a decent guy because we have respect for Bob and Mary. And particularly, you’re, you’re situation in a church group where you have like a really high level respect and trust for your fellow parishioners.
00:03:46:23 – 00:04:03:15
But people do this with people they don’t even know, right? They go on Facebook and say, I’m looking for a guy and complete strangers they don’t know, so they call XYZ and they go, oh, okay. I’m I’m going to trust them because a stranger I have never met or spoke to in my life said they’re the guy.
00:04:03:17 – 00:04:21:11
It just it takes like responsibility off of our brains to stress out over. Did we pick the wrong guy because he had the default? And that too is like you could say, I listen to that Facebook person say, call, call ABC, x, y, z one, two, three, whatever. And then it didn’t work out like, well, man, that was terrible.
00:04:21:13 – 00:04:47:02
I took a recommendation. So I am giving myself an out by trusting your guy. You’ll be picking my guy, right? It’s like this. This is, this is well beyond normal behavior, but yet it is the default behavior for a lot of people, for sure. And you think you you think about the last time that you said I got a guy, you know, maybe it was a mechanic, maybe it was a doctor or whatever.
00:04:47:04 – 00:05:13:07
You weren’t evaluating them necessarily as a service provider, you’re actually well beyond that point because you already know what level of service they provide, right? You were transferring that trust that you have in your guy to the person that you’re speaking with. And that’s and that’s that’s pretty powerful. That’s a big deal. It is. And I think you transfer trust, but you also, you transfer expectations.
00:05:13:09 – 00:05:33:19
So like, hey, David, I got a guy to see, you know, great guy, really good pricing, quality work. But he’s not the greatest at returning phone calls. So I just set expectations for for my guy with you so that you won’t hold his weakness against him because I’ve disclaimed it. I’ve defaulted and said, hey, he’s not great at returning phone calls.
00:05:34:00 – 00:05:55:00
So you’re now your expectation isn’t he’s not calling you that. You’re like, oh yeah, Tom said. He’s not great returning phone calls, but we still decided to move forward anyways. So now we’ve accepted that it’s just part of the deal we’ve made. So there’s so many like psychological things in the guy, right? And so, I’m big, I’m the marketing guy and the strategy guy.
00:05:55:05 – 00:06:23:18
But I think everything business, leadership, sales, marketing, everything virtually in life comes down to psychology in some ways. Right. And then maybe connect psychology to brain science and just how humans how we make decisions. And this guy thing is like the ultimate fight or flight brain work, right? Our brain just doesn’t want to risk anything. So we’re going to go to whatever we think is safe.
00:06:23:18 – 00:06:44:17
So but we’ll flight over to your guy instead of fighting to find my new guy. And the brain is very good at protecting us from those things. So. Yeah, you said you just accept mediocrity because at least I know the expectation. The same thing happens with, employees, right? Employees who work for a terrible company because they.
00:06:44:18 – 00:07:02:11
It’s a known thing. And so a new company trying to lure them away and talk about all the great things, they’re kind of like, yeah, you know, they’re just afraid to trust that thing. But that same employee has a buddy, goes with the company first and says it’s the greatest place ever, and boom, he’s over to the company.
00:07:02:16 – 00:07:18:21
Right. So it’s this transfer of of trust, this transfer, making the risk less. I’m not. You already jumped off the bridge. I can follow now because you didn’t die.
00:07:18:23 – 00:07:47:10
So think about this. So, so as we’re as we’re going through this and obviously we’ve both been contractors and had done this stuff for a decade or two. It it’s a dream, right? It’s a dream to have a homeowner. Customer. I don’t care if it’s like commercial heavy commercial homeowner. It doesn’t matter. But what has to happen for, let’s just say, a homeowner in this case, to stop comparing quotes and just call you as the guy.
00:07:47:12 – 00:08:10:15
I will back up first to say, why do people get quotes often to solve the problem that’s in front of us? We have to go and say, is that the real problem? Because I would say 8 in 10 times, the thing we’re talking about is not the real thing, right? You gotta keep peeling those layers off. So the first thing that my brain goes to is, why do people get quotes?
00:08:10:17 – 00:08:28:15
They get quotes because they don’t get ripped off and I want to pay too much. They don’t know anything about what they’re what they’re buying. So they figure and they’re somewhat, conditioning. Right. The world is at oh, you get three bids. But really, when I ask people when I do a lot of sales training, you seen it and, you know, they’re like, oh, I’m getting quotes.
00:08:28:17 – 00:08:48:02
And so one of the questions we would ask would be like, a member of a segment. So you’re probably getting quotes because you don’t want to get ripped off, right. And they go right. So that the motivation is that paying too much. Of course, I don’t want to pay 10,000 for a $5,000 thing, but they’re often not going for the cheapest price, right?
00:08:48:03 – 00:09:06:11
They’re, they’re they’re paying a little bit of a premium because once they dig in and start to learn things, they know, they they understand. You get what you pay for. And so cheap is cheap. And if I buy cheap, I’m probably gonna have things. And the reason I’m shopping. So here’s the here’s a kind of a moment of shopping because I don’t want to get ripped off.
00:09:06:11 – 00:09:25:10
I don’t want to buy the wrong thing. But then we think you’re going to buy the cheapest thing. No, they’re already in the protection mode of, don’t like, ripped off. So they just need to be be, get that that level of trust. Right. So the whole way to me that people are shopping is they’re looking for a trust signal.
00:09:25:12 – 00:09:51:11
And so how do they start? They’ll ask some friends, they’ll they’ll do some, guideline and they’ll look for things like, you know, pulmonary AC or any really whatever. How much a new assistant AC system cost. And then people will pop up, right? Companies will pop up, they’re all competing or it’s paid or it’s SEO or a I doing things and then their brain will kick in and go, oh, I recognize that brand.
00:09:51:11 – 00:10:11:14
I’ve seen that brand before. And that the fact they’ve seen the brand subconsciously, that’s a trust signal, right? So there’s there’s the importance of being out there in marketing to be, known already. They don’t know. They don’t like you yet necessarily. They don’t trust you, but at least they know you. The first step into the to to the being the guy is I have to know you.
00:10:11:16 – 00:10:34:16
And so but then they are to call 2 or 3 salespeople, they might have got some of their neighbor recommended. And all these things are like, I vision of like, gauges in a, in a car, right. Is a gas tank full or empty. And so the more I know this brand somebody recommended, I guess gauge is filling up and filling up and filling up to be like, I really want to use that guy.
00:10:34:16 – 00:10:56:07
I just got to make sure he’s not going to charge you too much money. But then, when you’re presenting the pricing, they’re already, want to use their guy once they figure who their guy is. You know, when I buy things for my house and I already know that’s the guy, I’ve had people come to my house, and I tell my wife, hey, then that’s the guy we’re using.
00:10:56:09 – 00:11:20:16
It’s just a matter of like, how what? What the terms of the deal are like, that is the guy who knows the most, I trust the most. He took the time, all those things. So people are trying to shop to find the guy. But often in our trades, because it’s complicated, they’re not really sure. What they should be asking or how to identify the right guy.
00:11:20:21 – 00:11:41:10
So it’s it’s not uncommon for us to be like, okay, let’s let’s kind of anticipate just like, why are they shopping? What do they need to know? Like how long does this job take? What’s the warranties? You know, talk about the brand, talk about the company, talk about the sports, talk about whatever the things that the discover other happens, you know?
00:11:41:10 – 00:11:57:12
So, like, a question I always ask is, hey, David, when you’re making a decision to do this renovation here at your house, what’s what’s 2 or 3 of the most important things to you? Will you work with a contractor? And then you tell me those 2 or 3 things that I don’t give you the whole, like, show up and throw a blurb with my company.
00:11:57:12 – 00:12:14:22
You’ll hear about a business from. I just talk about the 2 or 3 things you said are the most important to you. Because I want to, so the trust signal of I’m respecting your time. I’m asking what you’re looking for. I’m catering exactly to it. And then you’re all of a sudden feeling heard, right? You’re like, wow, this guy really gets me, because I really do.
00:12:14:22 – 00:12:32:05
I’m really trying to get you. And, And someone there, I’m actually approaching it. I know you do the same thing. I’m actually approaching it to be like, what if I’m not the guy? What if we’re talking David? And I’m just like, man, you know, I, I understand exactly you’re looking for him, but that’s not really what we do.
00:12:32:05 – 00:13:03:15
We’re not the best at that. And so, I might know the guy, right? So this is, like, very like this, this dance of going from known to light to trusted. Once you do those three steps, you’re at trusted. Now, prices not completely off the table, but it’s not at the forefront. They’re definitely gonna pay more for somebody they know like and trust period.
00:13:03:17 – 00:13:22:00
Yeah. And think about it. Homeowners kind of in an evaluation phase, right? When they’re trying to get the no part and the like part, they’re trying to get the evaluation. The trust becomes, if you flip the switch over to now you’re my default choice, right? Just like you said about you and your wife. This is the guy, right?
00:13:22:00 – 00:13:48:02
We’re using him. It’s now details. Right. And when you when you can identify that you’re not the guy. Right. And we had a we had a standard presentation. We had a standard phrase we are, you know, basically a phrase we used, when we, when we found out that we weren’t the right guy, we’d say something like, you know, Tom, sometimes we’re just not the right company for every project, and sounds like we’re not the right company for your project.
00:13:48:02 – 00:14:14:13
Would you like me to introduce you to somebody who is better at that type of project than we are? Yeah, it’s the old. I call it, the miracle on 34th Street principle. Right? With Santa Clauses sending him over to Gimbels. Hey, they’ve got a better deal over there. And Mr. Macy freaks out saying, oh, my God, but people become more loyal and pay more because the the transparency, the honesty.
00:14:14:15 – 00:14:43:02
And that’s a lot to do with the guy, to what what people are looking for from the guy is, I don’t wanna be taken advantage of. Don’t sell me. Just tell me the truth. Let’s have a real conversation. And so, all these things going to be in the guy. And I think when you’re the guy, you’re trying to build such a relationship versus a transaction that you’re making it real easy for the existing people you work for to talk about you.
00:14:43:04 – 00:15:03:16
I got a guy you got to use. My guy don’t do anything to you. Talk to my guy. And that’s the referral that if we take a survey from any of the decades and in the trades of contractors in a room said, what’s your future best lead? They’re going to say referral before digital, after digital, during the I mean, they’re just going to say referral.
00:15:03:18 – 00:15:23:01
And so what changed hasn’t changed. Amazingly, like a lot of things in this industry, there’s all this type. But blocking and tackling is still blocking and faculty. Absolutely. Is it? Absolutely. It’s just like when your dad got involved in the business, when my granddad got involved in the business, I guess. Did your granddad was your granddad in the business as well?
00:15:23:07 – 00:15:47:21
Yep, yep. My grandparents started delivering coal and ice back in the day. Okay. Gotcha. So thinking about that default position, that’s where you know, the the homeowner, the customer has gained enough confidence in us to basically, you know, move ahead with a decision. And like you said, it’s detail of of how much you know, what’s how are we going to pay for this and all that kind of fun stuff.
00:15:47:21 – 00:16:08:08
Those are details that confidence though, when you think about it, that’s that’s the goal. Right. And it’s actually more important than price when it comes down to it. So if we can gain that confidence and become the guy where they’re confident in our recommendations, they’re confident in our delivery methods, they’re confident in our solutions, all those kind of things.
00:16:08:10 – 00:16:35:14
You know, price is just another it’s just another piece. Right. And so for sure we want to make sure that we’re relevant and within reason, from a value package standpoint. But here’s an interesting thing. And I think it’s it’s a sad thing. Do you think contractors build this? I’m the guy thing intentionally or do most stumble into that designation.
00:16:35:15 – 00:17:05:06
Contractors put on their contractor glasses and they think like contractors. And, that’s how homeowners think. That’s a how commercial business owners or commercial managers think. And so I think they’re trying to become a got the guy, but then they’re frustrated. You can see it in all the threads and all the Facebook groups all over the, you know, the meta about people struggling with this because they’re they’re trying to push forward their agenda every time.
00:17:05:08 – 00:17:17:03
You know, a lot of guys are going to and saying, I need to make this commission. They’re not saying it, but what everything is really about is they start with, I need to sell this deal. I need to make this commission, they need to make this. And it’s always about the money and the profit in the commission up front first.
00:17:17:03 – 00:17:45:22
And and even though they’re not saying that, they are saying that. So they think we’re doing things like we have a you got a new brand. We wrapped our trucks, we built a new website, and we’re thinking to do all these things to become the guy. But then we’ve ignored all the the buying habits, all the things that homeowners looking for, which is like, did you show up on time, you know, or you friendly, my son just reset up in the business and I’m helping those guys out.
00:17:45:22 – 00:18:05:02
And I was like, they’re younger guys. They’re in a very competitive market. It’s not. It’s not this market. It’s garage doors. But like long term companies. So it’s like a it’s like definitely a David and Goliath situation. And so I’m like, you know, one of your most important things you could be when you go see customers is to be likable.
00:18:05:04 – 00:18:23:13
Just be likable. Just be friendly. Just and that’s that’s their brand persona too. So I think it’s like they are trying to be like I, but they’re trying to do it for their own agenda. I want to sell more IQ. I want to sell high sear, I want to sell duct renovations. I want to sell out of insulation.
00:18:23:15 – 00:18:44:00
So I have a very clear agenda, which is me first, you second. And you will never become the guy without agenda. What all boils down to is if you can be the guy in your market, you can be the guy in the neighborhood, then you’re going to have growth. You’re going to you’re going to get customers, you’re to keep customers.
00:18:44:02 – 00:19:08:22
And then you just use your your persona as a guy just going to grow and grow and grow and grow and grow. So it’s it’s more like strategically, how do you become the guy and understanding that it’s not a thing. You can’t fake it. It’s this entire vertical integration of the brand and the trust signals to make sure you really are delivering things from the perspective of the client.
00:19:09:00 – 00:19:28:04
Put our client glasses on and serve them first, and then it’ll return back to us. We can dive into this and dig deep, deep, deep, deep, deep. And I promise you guys on this podcast we’re going to do that. We’re going to actually dive into this. But here’s your move on this one. Here’s what you need to be thinking about.
00:19:28:04 – 00:19:54:13
Stop measuring success by job’s closed. Start measuring your success by how many repeat calls are you getting? What’s the referral language sound like? Are you getting referrals? Do your customers talk about you in your market? What’s the confidence level that your customers have in you? That is a whole lot more powerful than I’m just looking at how many closed jobs I get.
00:19:54:13 – 00:20:15:06
I love it when people just say, my closing rate 42%. That’s pretty good, isn’t it? It’s like you’re it sounds like you’re churn rate is 58%. That’s not so good, right? So think about this. Look at your last ten jobs. What would they say. Would they say I’ve got a guy now or I’ve used someone once right. Are they coming back?
00:20:15:06 – 00:20:43:02
Are they a part of the family or was it just a transaction because I used someone once is a transaction I’ve got a guy. Is a relationship right? This whole concept isn’t logical. It’s really an emotional notion. The whole thing that Tom has been talking about is hitting at the heart of the relationship that we have with those customers, and you think about what actually triggers someone to say, I’ve got a guy.
00:20:43:02 – 00:21:02:16
I want you to think about that. I want you to really think about that in your business. Think about it in your daily walk through this industry. And what are you and your team doing to trigger one of your customers? To say, I’ve got a guy on your behalf? You got to be that guy to get that kind of recommendation, man.
00:21:02:16 – 00:21:19:10
That’s it for this episode. Tom, thanks for being here. Thank you. Appreciate the opportunity to work alongside you. It’s been a long time coming. It’s awesome. Please subscribe, like, share and comment. Keep great content like this alive and well on the web. Until next time, keep on cracking.
