December 2024 Live Q&A with Tommy Mello

What this episode is about

In December 2024, Tommy Mello discusses upcoming developments in his podcasting endeavors, including a new show focused on business strategies outside the home service industry. He shares insights from the past year, highlights the importance of improving booking rates in call centers for financial growth, and addresses listener questions about his experiences and future plans with his current private equity partnership.

Key takeaways

• A 1% boost in booking rates could net a $100k windfall for a $10 million business—no pressure!
• Absent a solid marketing obsession, you're basically inviting stagnation to your business's party.
• Responding to clients in under a minute? That’s not just fast; it's a rehashing revolution waiting to happen.
• Recruiting is the backbone of growth—without solid onboarding, you’re just spinning your wheels.
• Transform your sleep routine with nose breathing and no phone in bed; your productivity will thank you.

Who speaks in this episode?

• Tommy Mello (Host) · 59 min speaking
• Unknown (Host) · 7 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 10:00: Home Service Expert, A1, Dopamine Nation
2. 20:00 – 30:00: Five Dysfunctions of a Team, How to Win Friends and Influence People
3. 40:00 – 50:00: Service Titan, The Seven Power Contractor, Joe Chisara
4. 1:00:00 – 1:05:05: Home Service Expert, Freedom Event

Notable quotes from "December 2024 Live Q&A with Tommy Mello"

• Called the Mello millionaire I think that's what it's going to be called and it's so we're going to be bringing home service expert all Home Service 100% Home Service I've got…

  about Home Service Expert · at 0:21

• So that's number one number two is marketing there's always that's where I live is marketing people say how did A1 grow so quick I have an obsession with marketing obsessed I'm obsessed with it and you should be too Al Le time me.

  about A1 · at 2:42

• This gal I was I had her on the podcast if you guys want to hear a pretty cool podcast it was the lady that wrote dopamine nation and she explained that when there's true…

  about Dopamine Nation · at 8:50

• Located in Phoenix great company I really you know they're a lot they're they come to the freedom events and other things they do a fantastic job they're big part of our…

  about Freedom Event · at 19:03

• Growing their business from a million to 10 million other than yours which I have read multiple times you know I really like the five dysfunctions of a team for that size I…

  about Five Dysfunctions of a Team · at 20:46

• Guys have heard me say this but not a lot of you guys have actually done it this is Al's book The Seven power contractor he also wrote a section in the home service millionaire.

  about The Seven Power Contractor · at 44:09

• Those systems those are standard operating procedures there's checklist we built out a very badass CRM which is service Titan that have checks and balances built in we know how…

  about Service Titan · at 45:05

• World is packages so you got to have the best package and you got to give options I would read the book what should we do by Joe chisara because he talks about packages if…

  about Joe Chisara · at 46:38

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Joe Chisara — Person · Referenced expert · 1 mention · first at 46:44
  Recommended as a sales authority; the speaker points to Chisara’s framework on offering packages/options rather than ultimatums, especially relevant to big-ticket sales like roofing.

Books & papers

• The Seven Power Contractor — Book · Primary recommendation · 1 mention · first at 44:14
  Recommended as a key book for scaling and growing a business, especially in the home service industry.
• Five Dysfunctions of a Team — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at 20:52
  Recommended as a key book for understanding team dynamics and scaling a business.
• How to Win Friends and Influence People — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at 21:18
  Recommended as a great book for sales and personal development in the context of business growth.
  Written for Home Service How to Win Friends and Influence People is a great book any book by Gina Wickman about EOS getting your management style dialed in is important Napoleon Hill wrote a book thinking.
• Think and Grow Rich — Book · Referenced work · 2 mentions
  Mentioned as a book that focuses on personal development and mindset, important for business success.
• Dopamine Nation — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at 8:54
  Mentioned in the context of discussing discipline and the role of dopamine in human behavior.

Companies & orgs

• A1 — Company · Business focus · 1 mention · first at 2:45
  The company is the main subject of discussion, focusing on its growth, marketing strategies, and future plans.
• Home Service Expert — Company · Business focus · 4 mentions · first at 0:24
  The company is mentioned as the platform for the podcast and coaching program, focusing on home service businesses.

Products & tech

• Service Titan — Product · Case study · 1 mention · first at 45:09
  Mentioned as a CRM system used by the company to manage operations and ensure checks and balances.

Places & events

• Freedom Event — Event · Business focus · 1 mention · first at 1:04:08
  Mentioned as an upcoming event where the company will showcase its best practices and network.

Full transcript with timestamps

0:01 all right welcome back to December's Q&A podcast uh one of my favorite podcast of the month uh had a very good conversation yesterday I just have I have a full-time person this girl's absolutely phenomenal she's going to be working on the podcast and we're going to be coming out with a second podcast called the Mello millionaire I think that's what it's going to be called and it's so we're going to be bringing home service expert all Home Service 100% Home Service I've got a lineup that takes me all the way through May um so it's going to be great and then the Mellow millionaire is going to be all about how people have made lots and lots of money in life and more business strategies not just home service and Home Improvement Home Service Home Improvement will continue to be home service expert um man what a hell of a last month and just the hell of a year it's already December uh we've been with uh cortech partner

1:02 now for two years and as you guys probably know with private Equity they have to hold you for three years minimum uh for tax s uh purposes sometimes a PE group will sell under three years but it doesn't make a ton of tax sense to do that uh so I've got a lot of questions here if I don't get to all of them uh you guys go to Home Service expert.com questions I know that wasn't working before it's fixed now uh I'm going to read the questions out loud and go through them slowly I want to talk about a few things actually quite a bit of things in advance I'm just going to talk about some of the epiphanies I had what I'm GNA be working on in 2025 so 2025 uh I got four major things call center I want you guys to write down your booking rate if you're listening right now think about your booking rate now let's just say you're doing $10 million a year for every percentage you uh every percentage point you get an

2:10 extra booking rate that's $100,000 if you're a $10 million business uh so call center I want to be able to call my Call Center and feel like the person treated me like gold like literally like a family member like I want to be blown away I just don't want a call center that books the calls I'm beyond that that's that's what I wanted for 2024 let's get up to 90% booking rate now I want it to feel like these these people are like the best thing I've ever met in my life it's it's like just it's like talking to Mom so that's number one number two is marketing there's always that's where I live is marketing people say how did A1 grow so quick I have an obsession with marketing obsessed I'm obsessed with it and you should be too Al Le time me be obsessed with your your financials obsessed with marketing so marketing is super important and and as I chat GPT the best grro company in a bunch of my

3:08 markets I wasn't at the top it's using user uh generated content which are reviews so I just got off the phone we're going after every one two and three star review that we've ever had in the company and that's important uh it's a big big task but also what else is important to stop the negative reviews from coming in now they're few and far between but at some point the client either thought they paid too much for the service because they looked up the parts online and they don't understand uh how business Works they think they think it's all profit because they never been in business they might be a school teacher it's your job to educate people uh or just maybe you didn't show up on time whatever it is you got to make it right so marketing lots of time effort and energy like this is where I'm going to win uh the other thing is rehash you know I work you guys know I work with chirp I've been really confiding in

4:00 chirp a lot to find out what is the easiest best way is it sending the client a video is it sending them a text message is it sending them uh a calendly link what's the best way to get a hold of the client in real time and what they told me was the people that respond to the clients within one minute 247 are the ones that are winning so rehash campaigns I've got millions and millions of dollars sitting there the goal is to recoup that money uh and the final thing is recruiting and uh I can't explain how important recruiting is but recruiting then onboarding correctly and then orientation um and then training and then retaining I mean once again I sold from alev but these things are easier said than done so how do you make sure but think about this there's a lot of Financial coaching that needs to take place they've never made this kind of money before uh so getting into their mental psyche I was with a guy named um Mark

5:11 Lavine or was it was it Mark Lavine yesterday um the Navy SEAL guy I was with Joo yesterday morning and then I was no no Mark Divine Mark Divine and this guy was all about just his breathing techniques and meditation and no breathing nose breathing and taking less breaths per minute to stay focused and to handle your tough moments and it's something I'm starting like I was talking to my EA Ashley and I'm like look first thing I'm doing this month major is I'm making sure my sleep is right we're going to test a bunch of different sheets a bunch of different pillows we're going to test a bunch of different temperatures in the room I'm going to get the nose tape or I'm sorry lip tape um and I'm going to try to breathe through my nose when I sleep and I'm going to make sure not to look at the phone over an hour and I've got a little light coming in to read before bed and I take this thing called

6:17 dream water and I'm just going to make sure I'm in bed by the right time I think that that alone and then I got a couple other problems um Fox News I'm only going to watch Fox News on the treadmill that's the new deal for myself if I want to watch TV you're going to do it on the treadmill and number three I used to say I'm on social media because of business and I can communicate with people but I find myself screwing off so I'm not going to be on I'm G to have certain minutes in the day for social media and that's it because everything comes back to discipline this is what I don't think people understand if it's not physically disciplined and we're working out and walking and getting your sleep it's Financial discipline and living below your means for a certain amount of time and it's agreeing with your significant other that you're going to do this for your future selves and you'd be surprised that if you get with somebody

7:14 and you make a deal with them and they understand what's in it for them long term what will happen so this is all very very important things guys that I hope you're paying attention to because at the end of the day if you don't have dis displine in your life it's going to be a very very tough life um so I asked jao yesterday I said how do you build this muscle of discipline and he goes you think I want to get up every morning at 4:30 a.m. and it's one of those things where once you do it it gets stronger it gets it's gets better it's amazing what happens when you continue to flex this muscle called discipline and you Flex it as much as possible man I I can't you want to have a better life you got to flex this muscle better things will happen in your life so but think about this you know what was easy for me to do a cold Plunge in front of four people when I go by myself it's so easy to get out after one minute or or make

8:18 an excuse or not do the sauna so what's a cheat code start inviting a couple people over to do the cold plunge every morning you know there's uh I I say this as humbly as possible when my driver gets up super early I gotta have him bring me a cup of coffee at 5:00 a.m. I mean what's a cheat C to make things easier for you to perform the discipline you're trying to do now when you start enjoying the cold punch it's no longer discipline when I had this gal I was I had her on the podcast if you guys want to hear a pretty cool podcast it was uh the lady that wrote dopamine nation and she explained that when there's true discipline being done like you run long distances you work out hard you get up early uh what ends up happening dopamine is what what happens so dopamine Nation uh trying to think here uh Anna lpy Lem BK she's an MD and it's absolutely phenomenal uh but dopamine is made to be creative

9:29 through doing very difficult things as human beings throughout the last Millennial we did hard things we'd have to go hunt before we figur out how to farm we'd have to hunt to get a meal our bodies were used to not eating for very long periods of time and our digestive systems were for developed to handle that so I just want you guys to to understand that start doing hard things start accepting change start going a different way to work start making change part of your everyday process get into really good morning routines and habits but also make enough changes tweak things here and there I'm telling you guys I can't explain how easy it is to get out of rhythm to to drink one night to get a bad night's sleep to do something to to to start lying to yourself and it's the biggest mistakes you could ever make um a life of discipline is the best life now listen just like you could have a cheap million

10:29 you could have a cheat day where you're going to sleep in you could have certain things that you might not work out that day that's okay but don't lie to yourself do not lie to yourself anymore start fulfilling the promises you make write them down think about them reflect on them Journal about them and understand why what what does my life look like if I maintain this discipline what's in it for my future self and really be write down the real reality of what what will happen to you you'll get stronger you'll be more uh you'll walk in a room and you'll have more self-respect for yourself you'll think clearer you'll have more money in the bank your relationships will deepen your kids will admire you more it it just doesn't stop keep writing all those things down so when you're confronted with falling out of this cycle you've got enough ammunition to convince yourself not to screw off I'm going to read this uh I could

11:29 just keep talking I'm going to read this question by Ari when you open a new location how long does it take typically how long does it typically take to reach a point of where you're doing solid numbers like $5 million plus per year so here's the question Ari how much money do you have to put into marketing um so if I'm if I'm spending 35% and my goal's 10 million that means I'm gonna spend 3.5 million in marketing which I will hit the goal of getting into the black on my financials quicker the more money I spend now if I only want to spend 15% in marketing it might take me two years see I'm willing to to pay to play I'll pay more into the marketing to get into the black quicker to take more market share so a lot of people don't have $3.5 million to put into a market straight into marketing and get no Roi that first year you're still in the red you're still losing money so what I would say is a good

12:37 number is nothing less than 25% of your target goal so at five million if you want to hit five million it's 250,000 per million it's 1.25 million oh no five I'm sorry 5 million would be a million dollars at 20% 25% is 1.25 million that's right 25% um does your system and process allow you to get there within the first year does it usually take a bit more time so like I said we will get there the first year but that comes through really great recruiting uh there's a few other things you'd want to do like uh get great reviews very very quickly meaning that you might do tuneups for $9 for the first three months and not even try to sell on those jobs you're trying to get as many reviews as possible uh people need to know who you are and that happens through reviews that's one of the ways um and then conventional SEO is really really important as well we had a salesperson who previously worked

13:41 for one of our suppliers and was fired due to attitude issues particularly when things went wrong they would argue shift blame and be difficult to manage we believed in their potential so we recommended them to another supplier but they were let go for the same reasons when we did then decided to them ourselves hoping they could turn things around why we don't want to see them go through another job uh job loss we're facing the same challenges now we believe change is possible but when we don't want to be unrealistic what would you suggest he is excellent salesperson and easy to deal with for the majority of the time I think this is where you got to take them out to dinner and you need to invite their significant other and this is where you need to have fierce conversations extreme honesty because right now what's happening is a lack of communication so I think what needs to happen is you need to sit him

14:37 down and you need to say here's where we're at this is why you lost your job on the first one we got you a job here what would you like me to do when you're acting this way and he's if you guys have these honest conversations and you might even say listen when you're acting this way I'm going to give you a code word I'm going to say uh the Lions you know the lions are playing in Detroit or figure out a code word and say this is the this is what you're doing you're making it very hard for us and when you're good you're great but when it's bad it's really bad how would you like me to respond what's the best way to do this talk to his wife figure out a way to break through this because if he's great performer and he's great at sales and he's great to get along with most of the time how do you just handle that a little bit and have him help come up with the solution or he'll self- eliminate uh Clyde said how much

15:38 operating Capital should you have in your account before moving into a new city uh roughly bare minimum four months four months of payroll and everything else that could go wrong um I I'm just not a big fan of fast expansion not like I used to be um because I got a lot of Pop stance I got a lot of places where we haven't we haven't taken market share I looked at my powerbi I looked deep at them this weekend and man my top five markets if I had just double if if my second five market like out of the 43 markets we're in we slowly creeping up but if I had less markets and I could focus more on the ones we're in just I would say suggest being very careful you better have a lot of market share before you expand what is the best way to pay salespeople and how did he divide the sales team's territory what is the best way so I don't have outbound mine's all inbound so they get dispatched and I think what you're doing is you're more

16:48 B2B so there's conflicting on you know you're doing it in territories and that's okay I mean outbound sales is completely different than inbound and how it's dispatched um I don't really understand exactly what you're trying to do but yes I think dividing them into certain areas is the best way to do it uh I'd have to look at the scenario to figure this out Clyde Brian said how do you compensate structure pay base plus commission for csrs who answer inbound and follow up on leads so that it fits within your budget well what I do is look at the previous history of the booking rate and if it's 80% and I get them it's just all it is is simple math I just told you if I could increase my booking rate and I'm a $10 million Company by one% that's $100,000 for the company right so ask myself if I give these people more money based on history is it costing me more than giving them this bonus now typically

17:57 you're going to split the profit so if you're making an extra 100,000 you might want a bonus 10,000 what does that do to your call center now that's 1% what if you could find 20% there what if you can find 30% there not to mention every time you get a cancellation percent it's another 100,000 if you're a $10 million company so fixing those things is important Daman said do you have a good Software System to manage devices like iPads iPhones yeah so there's a company if you want to email me it's called e squared they do a fantastic job e squared I've been using them for the last decade I am not I don't sign a contract for Verizon Sprint T-Mobile none of it my devices they they they they they get found by the nearest cell tower um and they get me all refurbished equipment almost new but refurbished they Sav me a fortune because they get these buy rates of like ridiculously better rates than I could ever get so

19:02 it's called esquared I think they're located in Phoenix great company I really you know they're a lot they're they come to the freedom events and other things they do a fantastic job they're big part of our network but I haven't found anybody that even comes close to their service and they'll manage all that stuff for you also what do you find the best Apple or Samsung I'm looking for a better device management system I appreciate it so Damian I I personally I like Samsung way better because the devices are way cheaper and you're upgrading them all the time technicians break them so anybody that knows how to use an apple could use a Samsung and you're opening up just a couple things on there uh I'm not saying there's anything wrong with I iPads but they're way more expensive and they come out with new ones way faster so it's like they you know Apple got in big trouble for making their batteries die quicker when they come out

20:05 with a new unit there's something in their old software that makes the battery that I I've never met an Apple user that said I'm so happy about the battery life with technicians that matters a lot so just some stuff to think about I mean listen I know the Apple users out there I get it they're they're simpler there's some good things about them there might be something better about them but as far as when they break it's more expensive the screens cost more money uh I've never really seen a technician say oh it's an apple I'll take care of it extra special it's not how that works they are breaking quite a bit the screens break I pay a lot less to get the screens replaced Robert what top three books do you recommend for someone scaling and growing their business from a million to 10 million other than yours which I have read multiple times you know I really like the five dysfunctions of a team for

20:56 that size I think businesses tend to you care more about your own Department than you care about the whole company um obviously eliv the seven power contractor um I like for sales I I like jok crar what should we do I think it's one of the better sales books ever written for Home Service um How to Win Friends and Influence People is a great book um any book by Gina Wickman about EOS getting your management style dialed in is important uh Napoleon Hill wrote a book thinking Grow Rich it's not necessarily about business but it's about yourself here's the deal I'm going to tell all of you guys you don't deserve to make as much money as you want to until you get educated until you think you're worth it until you're ready it's not going to happen to you the world's not going to give it to you Jesus is not going to give it to you you're not ready yet you need to educate yourself you need to walk into work and

21:58 know what to do every day you need to come in there with a plan you need to be ready to manifest what's coming next in your life some of you just you don't spend any time you don't think about yourself you don't know what you want you're not really sure you're living someone else's dream maybe it's Mom or Dad's maybe it's your Big Brothers a lot of you say I want to do what you did I want to do 100 million why you give me 20 reasons why oh so I could help out the church and I could help out my mom help them out now you have enough money to help them all out now you don't not need to live my dream you don't need to live my dream maybe some of you might want the same things that I've wanted but don't you you shouldn't do this because of me well you you showed us it's possible you wouldn't know what to do with the money came you would not know when that money hits your account that it's going to change everything and

22:48 here's the facts you might not change but everybody around you is going to change just be prepared the kind of money you're talking about if you really want that be prep prepared be prepared you're not going to like it I don't think a lot of you are ready for it you're not going to like what it what what it makes you you're not going to like the way that people treat you you're not g it's good and dandy when it first happens and then you'll see so make sure you're living your own dream blue said are the days of starting a garage door business or any home service business with $20,000 over yeah blue uh I I'll tell you $220,000 is a fart in the wind um you could start with $5,000 but the first five to 10 years is going to be Sweat Equity so first thing is have perfect credit fix your credit starting now any of you guys thinking about starting a business make sure you've got perfect credit the SBA

23:53 loan is a great vehicle I would start off I personally would work two jobs I start my business and I'd have a full-time job where I'm doing my business I would just work more hours I would need a steady income I I I've had three jobs when I started the garage door business you don't think I was still painting garage door bartending I was still selling flipping cars like for the first four or five years I had to do both I didn't have enough money I still had my landscaping business that I was getting 30 grand a month from I needed seed Capital to grow uh if you don't have money saved you're going to have to work two jobs or you're going to grow really slow and you're going to go man I had a great month last month and then next month is going to be it's feast or famine and it's going to be famine you're gonna go there's no leads I don't have enough money to buy more leads it's a shitty position to be

24:44 in blue Drew said best marketing book recommendations for HVAC or Home Service best marketing marketing marketing here's I I all of Roy Williams books are great about TV radio Dan Antonelli's book uh branded not blanded getting the right your wraps look like your trucks I mean your trucks look like your Billboards look like your yard signs look like your valp pack look like your business cards look like your cataloges look like your building that needs to fit the story brand is a great book uh by Donald Miller and you know here here's the deal I've not read a book that was very comprehensive that had how to build copy how to do PR how to build a website how to build master LSA gmbb PBC uh social uh uh SEO social media how to build in a competitive place like vpac and Clipper how to do well lead aggregators like Angie or home adviser which are the same thing and and the hundreds of other lead

25:55 aggregators how to dominate those everything's different Word of Mouth uh affiliate deals influencer marketing I've never read a book that had it all and if I did read a book that had it all I think they're a jack of all trades and master of none uh if there was everything in this book and what it would be unfortunately is a lot of definitions of what the differences are see I know how like I study how to dominate each and every one of these and if there's a new marketing source that comes on I'll figure it out you know if there's a way to dominate on Pinterest and house I'm in the process of dominating there too so you know where does the majority of your leads come in and then how do you 10x that right I think there's a lot of people that want to get leads they're like I'm GNA try everything and you should only go after one marketing Source at a time and master it make sure you got it working right and then go on

26:49 to the next one and what happens though listen to this when you get good at one marketing and then you add another one 1 plus 1 equals three then you get good at another two so 3 + 2 equal 10 then you get good at another five 5 + 10 equals 30 because the people see you more there's more Impressions it's crazy how that works okay now I've got these questions it looks like we might have had a few comments here um do you like commercial or residential ashphalt um Colin I think there's a lot of money in ashalt I really do uh I think there's money in residential and Commercial I love that business I love it because it's big tickets I think the problem is you submit two or three bids a lot of people are getting bids and sometimes it's hard to differentiate yourself um there's not a whole lot of craftsmanship now I know there's things that go wrong with the cheap people that come in uh and they're not bidding

27:54 properly that you got to be able to differentiate yourself so as long as you're differentiating yourself and it's not all about price I like the industry I guess to have a 90% call booking rate you need the right leads coming to the call center yeah I mean you do need the right leads not everybody with a garage door is my client I like a fluent neighborhoods I want people that want their [ __ ] fixed right I don't want people looking for a bargain a deal 4% of the population buys off price 96 just wants something to be done right that's going to last because I don't care if you paid the best price if every week you're calling it it's breaking it wasn't the best price was it if you if it breaks in a year and you got to spend another $300 wouldn't you rather pay 600 the first time in the last 10 years so there's a lot of confusion out there who's going to show up when I actually need need you to show up is it on my

28:59 timeline or is it on the companies because if it's on mine I know I'm going to pay a little bit more I bought the original Adam West Batmobile right it's a replica and they said if you want it done in one year it's 54,000 or whatever it might have been 65 or let's just say 65 if you want it done in a year and a half it gets cheaper well lucky for me I don't really have a place to put it right now I got a lot of stuff in the works we're building I don't really have a spot for I would have went in a so I'm like take a year and a half I save money so I sacrifice time for money and that's how business works if I'm calling and my pipe's broken I want somebody to get out of here now and I'm willing to pay more for it because there's an opportunity cost so do you coach um Home Service freedom is our coaching program and yes we coach in this program I personally am involved but it's not only me

30:03 so George said give us a call we'll book The call no matter what I just want to know how big the guns are now yeah I don't know these guns gotta be I don't know I got to measure I'm definitely saving your number for late night fun perfect um hey Tommy huge fan during the growth of your business did you ever get home from work and relax or did you jump straight into working on the business until you fall asleep so look look I want you guys to do me a favor real quick how much money you g to make next year write that number down write down the number of what you're going to make next year and then I want you to say what would need to be true for me 10x that number 10x it's going to start changing the way you think well the first thing is you probably have to delegate more you'd have to work less because if there's 20 of me or right now there's 800 of me right there's 800 people that work at

31:15 A1 I don't care who you are how are you going to outwork 800 now you could say easy I got a thousand you could outwork us with a thousand so the question is how do I get the top performance out of the 8800 how do I get them working and enjoying what they do and seeing what's in it for them you see what would need to be true for me to 10x well number one I would have to read and continue to read every freaking book and every single podcast on recruiting I possibly can I'd have to become the number one recruiter in the world what would be true I would need to be the best interviewer in the world right I would need to interview the best I'd have to continue to hone those skills I would have to trust 10 times more which most of you here unfortunately that's your problem you don't trust anybody to do it as good as you because you've only hired people dumber than you those are the facts you either can't afford to pay people better

32:09 or you're afraid to because they're smarter than you which is a problem within itself the next thing I would have to be 10 times more appreciative I would need to give way more complic compliments so I went through this task the other day I came up with 12 things that would need to happen and what I'm working on is I've got accountability between my executive assistants and Bri and I'm really focused now on how do I make these things into reality I know what I need to do what would need to happen for you to have a six-pack write it down you know what you need to do most of you won't do it in fact everybody on here right now I don't I don't know there's 70 or 80 people maybe a 100 just just said be said look you guys know what you need need to do write down what you need to do and figure out a way figure out a way to want it so bad that you're actually going to do it but here's the problem you know one of my things I put

33:07 down is trust and once I have billions of dollars which I will you really can't trust anybody anymore and it's sad because I didn't change I made more money they changed and now you become and by the way if a girl starts working out it gets prettier it gets sexy and gets hot no nobody gets mad at her and says you took care of yourself you're pretty now you know people start liking her more you know the guys are more attracted to her and as a guy makes more money and a woman you know people are more attracted to them you know they're more successful this is not something that's bad but they change you know this this ugly girl that became really beautiful that started taking care of herself that started getting in shape it's a lot more Smiles now she's got to be a little more protective because now she's getting hit on more so just understand that that's that's going to happen so I need to be

33:59 able to you know I I've got a family office we formed a committee that I I just can't say yes to everything people want me to get involved with way more things now and that's actually a thief of my time so I no longer am taking those calls for the most part and I just can't say yes as much as I used to let me get back into this um moral the story there stir frry I uh I work a lot but I I whiteboard a lot and I I I more try to get my my mindset my my my brain my my thoughts and I look at them and I say can I delegate this who have I not hired yet what would these person's kpis be how do I get them involved is there a way for them to earn Equity what would need to happen but I used to say how could I do this work what is the project I still outline the project but no longer am I the guy that I feel like I've got to do everything and it's hard for me because I still think I'm competent I still think my

35:05 brain works well but this is the next level of leadership that most people will fail at because they feel like they're inept they feel insecure they feel like they're not good enough anymore to run the projects but that's not true they're the one running every project ultimately it all falls on them but they're better at getting other people to do the work like some of the best people I know they don't wash their own cars they have their kids do it it's smart they got their kids to insurance they pay them some type of allowance but like how do you get other people motivated to do the things that help you make more money but they've got to make money too that's the secret thanks Brandon I'm looking to make a change in my marketing specifically Google marketing any suggestions where to look it's a service business in scust Arizona listen there's a lot of great companies out there Christiano um great um

36:06 listen here's my best advice Mike find the biggest Home Service Company you could find and it's not A1 by the way it's it's probably an HVAC company and find out type in HVAC repair where you live and in Scottsville where your business is and find out who's number one organically and find out who they use find out who's number one on the lsas and what who's number one on the gmbs and find out what they're doing for for that like start asking a lot of questions one thing I don't like to do is really recommend any marketing companies because here's here's a little dirty secret it's just like you have your best employees every marketing company has their best you might be with the best marketing company but the shittiest person on their team so the ability to get the top people on people's teams is an ability in itself find out who is their uh who's their Tom Brady on their team almost every company has a Tom

37:05 Brady you just got to figure out who they are and it's very important when you're work with marketing companies 3.5 million on acquisition and enter on a cash flowing business that can make maintain 15 to 20 million or 15 to 20% cash flow okay Brandon said that you know here's the deal by the way let's go Acquisitions versus Greenfield let's say you want to build a $1 million ebi company uh you might pay six million for it right now you've got to integrated it it takes about a year to do a complete integration now we we talked about we we just 6 million now if I wanted to do a million dollars of eida and I was running at 20% that means I got to get to $5 million of Revenue now I gave you guys a rule let's just use 30% that's 1.5 million versus 6 million for the acquisition green Fielding is far more valuable than waiting to get lucky and find a company to buy and have to integrate it and have everybody going

38:27 well you got the old owner there that's kind of an [ __ ] he thinks it's his way or the highway that's why you bought him you got their their general manager who doesn't like sales he doesn't believe it you got a few of their people their call center that they've never had to answer this many calls in their life now they now they're asked on day one to answer way more calls Integrations are tough they are so you want to hear if I'm a buyer yes I will say you could acquire a lot of companies if you do it well there's a time and a SP spot and it it it is faster but if you get become a master of Greenfield and your bottom line is high enough and you've got EMP you know you've got tens of millions of dollars to play with there's nothing better than Greenfield don't ever let anybody try to convince you otherwise I don't care what private Equity if you if if they say I've got a company growing just as fast

39:22 everything else being equal one's green Fielding one's buying companies the one green Fielding is worth way more money in my opinion what kind of a mindset skills and habits do I need to develop to grow my business from a million to five million in Revenue you know at a million dollars you need to be able to walk away first thing you got to master is time management you need to get an executive assistant you need to master not doing the tasks yourself you need to find smart people and you need to learn to delegate trust if you just get that 5 million's easy 5 million is not a hard number to hit um the main thing is that you start to do a Time analysis of where you're spending all your time and I bet you you're wasting a lot of it and I'd read as much as I could on marketing read marketing marketing marketing marketing marketing and sales because between those two things I don't care how good you are at payroll

40:24 and if you got the best CFO in the world CFOs are all a lagging indicator uh yes they'll make great Insurance deals they'll help you buy right they'll help you get co-op but you still need to sell and you still need to make the phone ring so don't let anybody fool you I think the CFO for me was the most important role it really was but that's after I made the phone ring off the hook and we were answering form fills and we had schedul engine going crazy and and we knew how to convert service into sales and we know how to knock on the door and close deals you know by the way I don't really care what any of my competition's doing unfortunately that's what makes people do worse in life is comparison is the thief of all joy if I continue to push and hire consultants and continue to hire great people and continue to maintain a vision that's been growing faster than anybody ever in my industry you know and and and apparently

41:29 according to some people I'm the big bad wolf but when you get to know me I I open up my heart and my building and my home for you um but I don't really care what other people are doing I care more about what HVAC Plumbing electrical is doing because it's a $200 billion doll market cap so I pay attention to the number one industry which Raj will never be the the it just won't uh as long as I'm keeping an eye on that and I'm buddies with the Buddies I'm Buddies with uh it's not going to matter because losers focus on winners and winners focus on winning remember that I'm too busy trying to win I don't care I don't need to look at every one of my competitors every day it's important to know what's going on in the marketplace and yes there are people on my team that look at the competition you know if we're in the same money mailer as someone else we want to make sure we've got a competitive price compared

42:26 to theirs you know so there is some competitive analysis but just remember that Tommy you are looking good what have you been doing you are Slimmer and healthier we need systems what do you recommend Miguel number one just walk just walk more just get up every morning walk one mile and before you go to bed walk one mile but stay consistent watch what you eat because that one minute of joy as you eat that candy bar or that ice cream but I know myself so I had to get the ninja creamy and now all my ice creams all protein it's a way for me to kind of Stack the deck in my own favor uh but I stayed consistent that's probably the most important thing is I just I I stayed relentlessly committed to what I was going to do and I the results are still coming but one of the things I did is I got a blood test um I checked out my hormone levels I've been paying attention to my sleep and water intake and saliva test blood test urine test

43:39 making sure everything's working first you got to make sure your body's working so make sure everything's working naturopath is what I'd recommend some peptides possibly testosterone therapy I'm not saying you take a ton of it you just get your normal levels to where they should be as if you were 25 years old once you got all that working you're eating you're sleeping right you're going to want to work out you're going to feel more energy you're going to enjoy going out in the sun and doing stuff uh so that's that's the best advice as far as systems go you know you guys have heard me say this but not a lot of you guys have actually done it this is Al's book The Seven power contractor he also he also wrote a section in the home service millionaire I have ADHD I needed alevy to sit me down and say this is what we're going to finish today this is the agenda people are going to know if they

44:37 could grow a beard they're going to know if they could have tattoos they're going to understand how to do PTO they're going to understand what happens if they need to buy a tool they're going to understand what needs to happen if their truck breaks down they're going to need to know exactly what happens of how to move up in the company they're gonna be able to explain to their significant other how they get paid and it's all going to come from the manual they're going to understand the morning Mojo calls what what time what does tardy mean what does late mean what are the ramifications if you're late all these things we went and did we did that in 2017 and we still continue to perfect those systems those are standard operating procedures there's checklist we built out a very badass CRM which is service Titan that have checks and balances built in we know how long it takes we know that if you walk in a

45:18 job and you gave a door quote and you left within 30 minutes you didn't do your job those are kpis we tracking so um I just thought of another kpi I want to track um hey Tommy I own a roofing business and I'm trying to implement more of an HVAC model how would you go about doing that if you were to be in Roofing and having a hard time making the logistics work um you know I I've never been a roofer or an HVAC guy I think my business is very similar to HVAC that was intended to be I think um Roofing is a big ticket you know usually the problem is with Roofing is you use a bunch of subcontractors and if you don't have amazing subcontractors it's very difficult uh the whole roofing business was kind of built off of cheap labor um it's cheaper labor than aack than specialized labor that's for sure so the majority of it is the presentation what makes you different how do you build a I want you to think about what what

46:36 what we learned how to sell from the automotive world is packages so you got to have the best package and you got to give options I would read the book what should we do by Joe chisara um because he talks about packages if you're not giving uh you know different options you're giving ultimatums and uh the Fulfillment takes longer than HVAC I mean a big roof takes a long time to installed then even if you got three Haack units most teams I know across the country could do that in a day and they've got automated system see what the difference is with HVAC is they started really pushing each other in the early 90s so now they got these people that'll fulfill the stuff they're in their shop they'll actually build a store within your own shop they'll handle all the logistical things I don't have that in a garage tour you know my garage tour manufacturers just came back to me and can't guarantee any one of the things

47:35 that I've asked them to guarantee like you're gonna have it on time or this and you're GNA be able to get my guys in and out of there with this time or this HVAC Plumbing they guarantee all these things or they give money off or whatever it is my vendors aren't willing to do any of that so it's not really Apples to Apples I don't think it's it's fair but I would continue to push for that I keep asking I keep proving that what we're capable of doing and they keep offering me more I really admire how you've transformed your growth both both in business and personally you've elevated the standards in the way you think communicate and approach everything thank you aliv said what are you willing to sacrifice like Tommy did to go to 10x you speak to so you know I was on a meeting earlier and JD reminded me and a bunch of people in garage door Freedom uh he reminded me that I stayed in the apartment far after I could have moved

48:36 out he reminded me that we stayed in our office building when we could have afforded something more he reminded me that we stayed purposely we didn't try to pretend to be somebody we weren't like try to prove to people we in a big facility and Warehouse we're a big business yeah and we'd walk into rooms and talk about revenue and ah we're growing no me and my buddies we get on the phone we talk about profit only profit is the name of the game that's all we talk about is profit no longer do we care I do not give two shits about your Revenue I talk about profit now listen I can talk about market share that's another important thing and and revenue is kind of would sit under market share is revenue um but I really care about profit and you know I was I was willing to have have a lot of discipline and delayed gratification if there was two words that's three words delayed gratification and discipline you nail those couple things

49:38 you live below your means for a few years you start stacking the deck you're gonna make so much freaking money here's something else that wealthy people think about I think about compound interest I've got a lot of money okay let's just be very I say this as humbly as possible I try to like try not to sound like a douchebag but there's compound interest coming in and I think okay if I was able to put this money over here how much more compound interest see I don't mind spending as long as there's more compound interest going towards the principal I don't mind spending compound interest and it's a good way of being disciplined if you start stacking the deck and so I I don't think about money in the bank I think about compound interest interest and I think about what that means to me daily weekly and monthly of how much money am I going to make next year I don't think about A1 I don't think about draws out from the

50:37 company I don't think about anything else but the money I have which obviously I've had one exit I think about what and I've made a lot of other investments into other things that are going to be exiting I think about okay when that money goes into this account how much compound interest does it mean and is it well Diversified and I've got somebody that's not very liquid some's going to take five or seven years to pull out and I think about the irr internal rate of return write that down internal rate of return how much money am I getting on my internal rate of return what's the cash flow when you start asking yourself that see poor people say when I win the lottery here's what I want to spend it all on wealthy people say if I won the lottery here's what I'd be investing it and diversifying it and making sure here's the cash flow and that cash flow something I could probably spend so different way of

51:32 thinking what can we do to set up systems we need to run our company on systems Miguel if I were you I would just look at some sample manuals um what are the checks and balances for a system that you have because systems only work when you have checks and balances like you could say greet your clients like this but how do you check that well you might need real voice or Sero or or your own software that records calls in the field if you wanted to make sure that every part that needed to be replaced was replaced you'd build a checklist and make sure there's someone probably in data Integrity is what you'd call it and you'd have them checking all these things to make sure there's pictures of everything and make sure it's very easy you know I remember when in 2017 I started looking at all my my technicians jobs and I kept seeing the same sticker pop up same drywall same little Mark on the drywall and I realized that they

52:34 were just uploading the same pictures because they're lazy so I called service and I got a hold of one of their developers and I said can you make sure you can't upload pictures it's got to come right from your camera there's no way to upload old ones well that put an end to them faking the so lazy you wouldn't put a new sticker up like why but they will they'll find a way unless you create a system and have checks and balances to make sure that system is being followed let's see something here okay 2024 was our first really good year in the exterior cleaning mobile Fleet wash industry once you have your first year of massive improvements how do you determine what areas to focus on and prioritize to have the best in 2025 so Kristen there's one of two things I'm always trying to do grow Revenue fast or grow profit fast very rarely am I trying to do both that's like saying Hey I want you to

53:41 gain as much muscle as possible in 2025 and get as ripped as possible in 2025 I want you to be shredded at 5% body fat but you need to gain 40 pounds of muscle it'd be like wait I can't do both do you want me to gain a ton of M and I say you get shredded when you're going to sell a year in advance so don't get shredded yet focus on growth but always to stay healthy make sure your profits above 10% so when I say I put money back into my business for growth where do you think I'd put that money you think I'd put it into Fleet and trainers and and different management and recruiters yeah probably some of that but I'll tell you the number one thing I'd be putting it in is marketing cuz certain things take time look SEO takes time the best things take time Word of Mouth takes time you know going to bnii meetings every single week or maybe three different BNI meetings take time to actually get the referrals

54:42 coming in these things all take time so I tend to say if I'm going to reinvest in the company I'm gonna raise the amount I'm putting into marketing um I think people spend way too little on marketing but I don't think they have good attribution either some people are spraying and praying they're wasting a lot of time energy and money on marketing that's not delivering a return on investment so when I say I'm putting money in my creative's got to be perfect for TV radio Billboards if my creative's great and I'm putting a lot of money into it I know I'm building a little I'm borrowing a little bit of space in your brain for when your garage door breaks that's the secret running great creative read all of Roy Williams books The Wizard of ads before you come up with a TV radio or or or billboard any type of commercial whatsoever you got to make sure it's converting and then read there's a book called no BS

55:36 about direct marketing by Dan Kennedy I highly recommend that book as well uh but yeah the these things what I could tell you is if you want I I would highly recommend you focus on growth next year if you're happy with your profit now there there's a caveat to that I want you to run out of money so there's a lot of questions I'd have if I was in business with you I'd say how much money do we have in the bank do we have any lines of credit available if a good company comes along that we could buy um what are some lwh hanging fruit that cost us the least amount that we could grow the fastest to make the phones ring off the hook and I look for opportunities to be you know I think with the window or car washing type business you waste money in the drive time so I'd want to be more route based so I talk to pest control companies I would be talking to pool cleaning companies I'd be talking to landscape

56:32 companies understand how you optimize routes routing is everything when you're cleaning cars and try to get on the same schedule you you know I probably talk to a guy like me and say Hey listen is there a way to leave their cars at home in their garage them give you a one-time access code to get in the garage and maybe they'll pull maybe they pull it out I I pull it out of the garage I don't know um but I'd want to be as efficient as possible efficiency efficiency efficiency efficiency another thing that I do in your industry in particular is I would start selling agreements like I start telling them selling them in 20 packs and even you're allowed to make me four payments but I'd want 20 I'd want some type of contract that they can't just end one day because if too many people end because something happens in the economy something stupid you're kind of left holding the back so i' want to

57:25 have certain agreements to put me into a situation where you can't cancel on this day you owe me 50 bucks for canceling because you drove out there you were ready to go they canceled when you were three minutes away like that's not fair to you so you got to make sure to put these contracts in place that's where a good lawyer comes in place um let's see we're about to launch an H company in January completely agree with your discount tuneup for reviews but what are the one or two other campaigns specials you would run right away when starting to establish a reputation or build a customer base right out of the gate Daniel first thing I would do is build the best website on the planet and I'd invest a lot in a new blog post once a day I put pictures I get testimonials I would focus a lot of time energy and money on getting the right back links uh the right campaigns here's the deal I want you to do this

58:28 Daniel open up your mail every single day open up the newspaper the largest newspaper I want you to have neighbors in other areas your friends family I want you to start asking them to give you all the mail I want you to record on the main channels NBC yeah I want you to talk to someone that does media buys and find out where the biggest guys are buying what if I told you success leaves Clues find out what everybody else is offering what's working in that market I can't give you one thing that's just boom it blankets if you run an H company in North America these are the three ads you're going to put it depends on how long's the summer how long's the winter what are the variations of degrees are you working on here's what I would do I would focus all my time energy and focus into 3500 foot or more I I would make sure those are the neighborhoods I'm marketing the most because you know they have more than one

59:21 unit so if I could get in front of people with two units that were installed at the same time you know there's there's these different tools you could use called Domo or powerbi or grow.com and you could start one of the things Lance did a long time ago with his hii company is took into consideration the temperatures for the week and the humidity of the week and he'd learn what days were going to make the phone was going to ring off the hook and he'd make sure they were set up for it and these tools they take together all this data these data streams and they they have a way of systematizing it to look look at it a certain way to understand capacity planning those are some things I'd be thinking about and you'll find some Revelations there uh business it's not easy until it is like for me right now uh if I had to start over again and I had five grand in the bank and I'm I'm 41 right now I

1:00:24 would it would be hard man first thing I do is go get a job first thing I would do is go get a great job somewhere bringing in a couple hundred grand a year maybe even a 100 Grand a year and I try to be somebody's Mentor I mean literally like if it's me Tommy melow today and I know what I know I would still go get a job I need more money I would need to figure out a way to make way way way way way more money I i' literally tell Bri I'm really sorry but I'm gon to be working double shifts six days a week and I'm working a single shift on Sunday I would need to get my hands on as much money as possible and I'd be making sure my credit is dialed in perfect and I make sure if I put a dollar in I get a buck 25 out if I put a dollar in to get a buck 25 out I'm winning and as I could start to scale that up and I make the few right hires I'd be very careful on who I recruit to start my business I'd make sure there

1:01:16 are 10 out of 10 there people i' die for that I'd go to war for I'd make sure I'm in love with these people I can communicate well with these people I can lead from up front and I know that they're willing to put in as much sacrifice as I'm willing to put in to grow something together and I'll make sure they win at the end I would need to make sure to hire perfectly your first few hires are going to make or break the company well that's kind of how I'd start then I go knocking on every neighbor's door I'd find out the HOA president I said let me just look at your system I'm not even GNA charge you I'm already here if there's something I see great let me put a sticker up if you need to get a hold of me I'm honest I've got Integrity I will come in I won't charge you a service call when you need me I want to put a sticker up there and Hey listen I got this Deco Hardware kit if you want me to put this on here

1:02:01 I'll B two of them for a 100 bucks I'm probably making 80 bucks on that at least I didn't waste my time I figure out a way to figure out how to make door-to-door work because I don't have enough money to spend in marketing so listen guys I know there was a lot more questions and they're fantastic questions what did uh what does this say Al said Alan said to give them a great game to play or they'll play their own game and you won't like it if the game is to put stickers up they need accountability and what's in it for them heading into a call Great live show Tommy all right so that was L you guys get a hold of L go to the sowc contractor.com he still works a little bit of time most of his stuff is all automated he he won't do what he did for me you know seven or eight years ago and come work with you personally but then again you probably don't have the few hundred grand to pay him so I'd highly

1:03:01 recommend a lot of you guys have already done it you just haven't done the work yet so do the work every day Adam was such a genius he say turn to page 40 in your manual your answer is right there he started coaching people on what page in the manual when they'd ask a question and if it wasn't in the manual he'd create it right then and there and then he'd update everybody he we we always left it in our payroll system so the manual is constantly being updated and if there was a question he got asked more than once he'd put it in the manual um if you guys want to order Elevate the the website's Elevate win.com um million dooll Tex is the performance pay uh home service expert.com and then it's p4p p the number four and then P I'll have uh I'm going to have just seie put this in the notes because a lot of you guys are still trying to figure out how to pay for perform performance pfp or p 4 P pay

1:04:05 for per pay for performance and uh if you guys want to come to the freedom event next year I highly recommend you guys do that we lined it up for Vegas we were supposed to have it in Nashville Vegas ended up working out way better some people wanted it in Florida but it's hurricane season and it's just not a good thing so Vegas it's not going to be a big drunken Fest or party I promise you we just got one guy signed up today that's going to be there I think you guys are GNA love it um I'm gonna stack the deck at this one it's GNA be the best of the best but um anyways if you guys got any questions and I didn't get to it I'm sorry go to homeservice expert.com questions and uh make today a fantastic day I appreciate you guys go work out get some good sleep drink some water and just go for a long walk tonight just start start today start small see you guys soon

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "December 2024 Live Q&A with Tommy Mello"?

Tommy Mello (Host), Unknown (Host).

What is "December 2024 Live Q&A with Tommy Mello" about?

In December 2024, Tommy Mello discusses upcoming developments in his podcasting endeavors, including a new show focused on business strategies outside the home service industry. He shares insights from the past year, highlights the importance of improving booking rates in call centers for financial growth, and addresses listener questions about his experiences and future plans with his current…

What is mentioned in this Home Service Expert episode?

10 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including A1, Home Service Expert, The Seven Power Contractor, Service Titan, Five Dysfunctions of a Team, How to Win Friends and Influence People. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "December 2024 Live Q&A with Tommy Mello"?

The episode runs 1 h 5 min; the transcript is about 11,621 words in 64 timestamped sections.

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