A Call Isn't a Call: Why Some Plumbing Leads Are Worth 10X More

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Two plumbing companies can get the exact same number of calls in a week, and one still walks away with twice the profit. Dennis says it has nothing to do with sales tactics. It's about the quality of the calls you're letting in the door.

He breaks down five kinds of calls worth chasing, from jobs you lost that still paid off later to the review strategy that pre-sells your next customer before they even call. He also gets into why staying small and focused on a five mile radius beats spreading thin, and tells the story of how sponsoring a cycling team for seven years became one of the best marketing decisions he ever made.

Topics discussed:

(00:00) - The mindset shift: a call isn't a call
(01:28) - The trust peddlers eating into contractor profits
(04:34) - The Mr. Bowman story: the job he lost that turned into five
(10:22) - Why reviews pre-sell the next call
(12:56) - Why staying inside a five mile radius makes you look everywhere
(15:32) - Purpose driven marketing and the cycling team that took off
(23:47) - Your real responsibility as a business owner

This episode was produced by Podcast Boutique

The Podcast that helps plumbing and heating service contractors stop working for free and actually turn a profit. 

Connect with Dennis:

Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/dennis-hamon/?skipRedirect=true
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Apple Podcast:
https://podcasts.apple.com/es/podcast/the-trade-traction-podcast-with-dennis-the-apprentice/id1648541208

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What if I told you that two plumbing companies could receive the exact same number of calls this week and one would make twice the profit? And I'm not talking about sales tactics. It's the quality of calls you get. Welcome to Trade Traction, the podcast for plumbing contractors who are tired of treading water and are finally ready to build the company they once dreamed of. Remember those dreams? Let's do this. I'm Dennis, Dennis the Apprentice on most socials. For more than 25 years, I owned and operated a large residential plumbing heating service company. We grew it into a business with over 60 employees, millions in annual revenue, and ultimately sold it in an eight-figure exit. Now it's your turn. My goal is simple. Help you avoid the mistakes I made, accelerate your business apprenticeship. Remember that one? And build the company you once dreamed of owning. Today we're talking about one of the biggest mindset shifts in marketing. A call isn't a call. Some calls are worth far more than others. And if your job is simply to get more calls, you're chasing the wrong goal. In this episode, we'll discuss five kinds of calls you wish every call would be like and strategies on how to get more of those. A little hint: the last two are really my favorite. Let's get into it. But first, let's talk about the calls I don't want. Of course, I'll take them to fill the schedule, but these are calls of last resort. And they're from the trust peddlers. You know who I'm talking about, trust peddlers. What are trust peddlers? They're these organizations that say, don't trust a contractor, trust us. We'll find you a contractor. And then they charge us contractors money to put us on their list of trusted contractors. Like Yelp, Angie's List, Thumbtack. They're popping up everywhere, it seems like. Like, what are they doing? They're actually anti-technology or anti-progress. Like the internet's trying to eliminate middlemen, right? And make things more efficient. And then here these guys come in and step right in between the customer and the contractor and turn a profit. Some of these guys are on the stock exchange, right? They're big. They've got they've got ads all over TV. And you know what they're doing? They're competing with us. In my market, I was one of the very first that was invited into one of these, and we were like the top five in our market, and we're invited to this special conference. They're going to give us all this stuff. And I'm like, wait a second, where do you advertise? Well, they advertise on Google, right? And they advertise everywhere I advertise. And so I say, You want me to pay you to go put your ads to compete with my ads on Google. Is that what you're telling me? You want me to pay you so you can be more my competition, and then you want to take more of my money and tell customers to trust you, not me. That's why I call them trust puddlers. They're literally puddling trust. Now, don't get me wrong. Like, I'll take those calls, but if you think about it, those customers literally don't trust a contractor. And so they're going saying, hey, who do I trust here? I don't know who to trust. Why don't you tell me who to trust? And you know as well as I that it really doesn't weed out bad actors, right? Like anybody be anybody could be on there. So it's really quite the mess. And they're really just costing us, contractors and customers and marketing. It's driving the price up everywhere. They're not serving any benefit. But yes, if I need some calls, I'll take them. So inevitably, a lot of people put some money in there, and you can build businesses there. I've seen it happen, but it's pretty tough to scale off of that because those people attract customers that don't trust. And then they're probably looking for bottom dollar. And there are strategies like, yes, you can make it work. And if I get one of those calls, trust me, I'm gonna do really good with it, as bet as good as anybody. But the last call I want. Does that make sense? So compare that customer call to these next five, and you'll see what I mean. The first kind of call I like to get are from calls I didn't sell. Let me tell you about Mr. Boatman. Mr. Boatman, I was on this kick. I was I was doing the free estimates for our company. And so I was really, like if a call was any decent size, like over $10,000, I was putting a lot of energy to really put forth a presentation like no other. And at that time, and this is before iPads and stuff, but I was putting together a little book that I had one of those binder machines. So I could print out a cover, uh I made a cover uh page, and then I had some reviews, I had our better business bureau rating, I had some pictures of the crew, and then I had my estimate, and then I had my warranties in there, right? And I made a little booklet, and then I would go out there and I'd meet the customer in person. And this is when email had popped off. And so people were emailing everything, and so I was trying to go kind of against the grain, trying to be a little bit different, a little unique, uh, a little extra, and going out and meeting the customer and going over the project with them. And I went over this project, he's like, hey, Dennis, I'd really like to use you. This is great, but the other company is half the price. This is a big sewer job. The other company is like half the price, and it was. And he actually showed me the estimate. And there was some vagueness in the estimate. And I'm like, so I took it home, I took it back to the shop and looked at it. And I came back, I made an appointment, and I went out there and I said, There, this is not a legit estimate. Like my estimate covers everything. Look at the vagueness here. They're gonna do this and they're gonna get gonna get to a certain point, and they're gonna come knock on your door, and they're gonna say, We need more money. I guarantee it. And he just didn't see it. He just didn't see it, and he kind of thought I was trying to sell him. And you know what happened? I didn't get the job. I didn't get it. And then one day I went to a house and I'm addicted to discovering as an owner of the company, and this is a little hint, you should be too. You should be, you should be incredibly curious about how on earth did you get to be in the front porch today? How are you so privileged? Out of all the companies out there, out of all the plumbers out there, how is it that you got to be on the call, right? Like it's a freaking miracle. How'd that happen? You want to know. So I asked every customer, how'd you how how is it that I got to be here today? And you know what this one man said? He said, Mr. Boatman, my friend Mr. Boatman told me to only call you and do whatever you said because you were the only honest plumber out there. I'm like, who's Mr. Boatman? He's like, Well, you tried to do a job on a uh sewer job, and you you told him that other people were lying, and turns out you were right. I'm like, oh yes. Now I remember what happened. And so he told me the story. Told me the story about exactly what I said was gonna happen, that there was vagueness in the estimate. And sure enough, a couple days into the job, they stopped the project and they demanded more money, and it got into a big, huge issue. He went to the city, got involved with the city. It was a big mess. And it ultimately cost him more than my bid, which was twice as much as their bid. So he would have got a better deal with me. So you know what he did? He told all his co-workers, call Dennis. And that led to five jobs. I would go to an estimate for a sewer, and I'd say, by the way, out of all the sewer and plumbing companies out there, how is it that I got to show up today? And they said, Oh, I work with uh a Mr. Boatman, and he said uh to call. I'm like, Oh yes, Mr. Boatman. Yeah, I remember that. He said, Yeah, you're the only guy to trust. Like you were really honest with him, and he didn't use you, but he said he it was the biggest mistake of his life, cost him tens of thousands of dollars. And so he said, just call you because you know what you're doing and you're honest and you're straightforward. And um, so yeah, five jobs. I got five sewer repair replacement type jobs from one job I didn't sell. So here's the moral of the story whether you sell a job or not, when when our customers go back to work or go to the barbecue on Friday after work or whatever's happening, like like at work, think about it. At work, everyone knows that they took the morning off. And why why? Well, I had to have a I had to have a plumber out of my house. And they're gonna tell a story. And what kind of story are they gonna tell? Is it gonna be a good story or a bad story? So I bet Mr. Boatman told a stressful story, like when he was trying to figure out who to use, but ultimately he told a story that put me in really good light for several years. And so our customers are telling stories. Even when you don't sell the job, they're telling stories. I tell my guys, hey, even if we don't sell the job, hopefully they'll use someone else that was cheaper and they'll have a bad experience, and they'll remember and they'll want us when they can finally afford us or whatever the situation is, they'll they'll come and remember the way we were and they'll want that, right? It's like a car. Have you ever been in a situation where you don't have the best car, and then you drive in a really nice car and you're like, oh wow, that's nice. I want one of these. And you always think about it. Our customers are the same way. If we are showing up professional and clean and on time, honest, approachable, comfortable in their home, even if they don't choose us and they choose the cheap person who shows up late and is dirty, the job doesn't go well, and communication's bad, they skip a couple days, they're gonna think, oh man, this sucks. I wish I would have used the other guy. They'll remember. So be careful to leave a good impression, even if you don't sell the job. The second kind of call are those that are pre-sold because of our reviews. That might sound basic, but you'd be surprised how many don't understand this yet. Like they don't ask. How is it that a plumber goes and you don't ask for a review? How is it that you don't do really good work to earn a review? So that you should ask for one, right? It's it's laziness and it's it's overwork and it's going, going, going, doing, doing, doing work, work, work, work, and you forget the purpose. But the purpose is we want to take care of every customer. We have to slow down. That's one of my major principles is one call at a time. And we have to take really good care of this call, the call that we're on, so that we can earn the right to ask for review. And we actually have to. The truth is, here's the deal about reviews. If if you said, I'll do this project for this price and you do this project for that price, we're even Steven. Like, they don't owe us anything. Why would they do anything for us? What's a review? Review's extra. That's like a tip. Why would they tip you if you just did what you said you'd do? Do you hear where I'm going? We have to do more than they paid for. We have to be better than expected. Have you ever been to a restaurant and things are just to go a little bit, things might just go a little bit edgy and they just say, by the way, that dessert's on us, right? Or, or by the way, I brought that second drink out. It didn't seem like you liked the first one. So I'm the second one's on me. If you ever notice that kind of thing happens at a restaurant, do you know why it is? They're trying to go the extra mile so that you won't leave a Native review, but just as importantly, you might leave a review. They're trying to get a review. It's super important. It might not be important to you, but it's important to everybody else around you. Like everywhere I go, like my I'm always shocked how many reviews my wife looks at for everything. I just, if I want, if I went Mexican, I just go to a Mexican restaurant and eat. But no, my wife's been re my wife's read three or four reviews, three or four different companies' reviews to see which one to go to, right? It's that way everywhere. So if you, if you're trying to build a business, why would you not be after every review you can get? And the way you do that is you gotta go the extra mile. You gotta do a little bit more than you're paid for, a little bit more than expected. Do something unexpected, surprise them with better, with extra, so that you can ask for the review. And when you have all those and people see those, they call you. Those are great calls when they see your reviews and they call and say, hey, everybody thinks these people are good. They must be good. The third kind of call are from customers that want to be like everybody else because everyone uses this because we are everywhere. A couple of my clients, we were looking at the review, what looking at their sites online, and two of my clients were shown three times above the fold. Does that make sense? So before you had to scroll on the computer, you saw them in the Google ads, you saw them in the maps, and then they were number one organic. That's three times above the fold. They're doing a lot of things right. The trucks look good, the trucks are memorable, they're branded well, and then you see them everywhere, right? When customers see you everywhere, it sends a signal out that you must be good. Bad companies don't grow. Good companies grow, right? And so when they see you everywhere and everybody's using you, and they go online and you're everywhere, you're three times above the fold, right? That that looks good, that feels good, that feels safe. Wow, these people know what they're doing. They've been around, they are everywhere, they are growing, they must be good, right? Why would they grow if they weren't good? And so they pick up the phone and they call. Now, one way to do that is, and here's here's a key point in marketing, in my opinion, is we focused in my company, we focused on a five mile radius. We did not market outside of a five mile radius till maybe the last 10 years. And that was when COVID happened. When when COVID happened and everything, remember everything shut down and there was no cars on the road. Then our plumbers started calling saying, hey, we could travel twice as far in the same amount of time. And so we started. Here's the deal. When you're small, you might have three, four, five trucks. But when you're serving a five-mile radius, like you're you're all right here, you're all over the place. If you cover three counties, they'll never see you. They'll never see you because it's so spread out, it's diluted. Your presence is diluted because you're serving such a big market. But if you'll focus on a smaller market and focus on it, then your trucks are moving around inside that smaller, that smaller market, and you're gonna be seen everywhere. And people's impression of you will rise. So focus on that five-mile radius. Good brandy with your truck, make your truck clean and look good. And then some marketing material in the mail, right? Or on email and mail. The companies that are seen everywhere are more focused on a tighter market, and that makes a better call. Now, like I said, the fifth kind of call is my favorite and maybe the most powerful. They call us because they want to support us because we support them in some way. Let me tell you about our cycling team. So we were, as we were getting bigger, we were starting to look for a cause, like this idea of could we get involved with a cause and could we support a cause with some charity? Like we wanted to get involved with something. So we're in the Seattle, we're in the Pacific Northwest. And so we actually, there was a big car dealership that was involved in some greenway project, and they were like planting trees and restoring streams, and that kind of seemed like it resonated a bit with our market and us. And so we're kind of we're looking at some different things. Like, what can we? We wanted something that was heart that was heartfelt. Like, what are we? What is our brand? What do we want to support? And that's when I don't know if you know this or not, but if you know me for long, you'll you'll discover I love cycling. Like Tour de France cycling, like Lance Armstrong cycling. Everybody doped, by the way. They were all doping. Now they're not. We think they're not. We're pretty sure they're not. But I was a big fan. I was a fan of Greg Lamont before then. I'm a fan of all the guys now. So I was out on a train ride one morning. Let me, this is a little bit of a story, but this is going to lead to something really powerful for you if you're paying attention. I was training and I met this young girl. She was on a college team. She had a college jersey on and she was riding. She was doing really well. She was kicking my butt. I was doing all I could to keep up. And we started talking. And she's like, I told her that I owned a plumbing company. She's like, why don't you sponsor a team? What you guys don't understand in business is that we wear these jerseys all the time. We're super proud of the hard work that we do. We're training every day. We're taking selfies every day. We're posting our numbers and what we did all over social media and different sites. Like you could get a lot of exposure. And that got the wheels turning. And then another company in town, um, he was a pro uh pro rugby player, an ex-pro rugby player. And he happened to manage the pro team in Seattle who had just won the national championship. And so I went and visited with him and I asked him what was going on. And he said, Well, you know, rugby players don't get paid like pro football players do. So um they have jobs. And then when they have a job and these these rugby players come from all over, all over the world, actually, to play. We were, I guess in Seattle, we were the, I don't know much about rugby, right? But we were the, we'd won the national championship. So there's people coming from all over. So they'd play and then they'd won a job, and they'd ask manager, the coach, hey, where should I get a job? And he would say, well, go support who supports you. Go, go work for companies that are supporting your team. Rugby. Well, guess who happened to sponsor and help sponsor that team? This plumbing company in town. And guess what? They had a huge sewer department. They had a hot, they had all these big, strong, strapping guys. They had this huge sewer department. Where'd those guys all come from? They were ex-rugby players. Or they were rugby players that played rugby, but that's just where they worked. And then when the rugby career winds down, as it always does, they've been working for five or six years for this company and now they're a licensed plumber. And now they've got a licensed plumber who's loyal to the company because they are passionate and connected to what they do, right? Rugby. So this lunch, this coffee hour with this other plumbing company that sponsored rugby, he referred me to another guy who had just started a bicycle racing team, had had a made a custom racing bike and used to be an ex-IRS pro cyclist. So I called him up and we went out and had a beer. And guess what happened? We struck up a friendship. I met some of his bike racers. There was, I think there were four people on the team. And guess what? I love cycling. I love plumbing. I own a plumbing company. And so they needed a sponsor. And so um I paid a little bit of money and became the title sponsor of this little cycling team. Here's the little miracle. The little miracle is the leader of the cycling team did social media. So he started doing our social media for us. And what happened was so then because we're supporting what he loves and I like it too, and I'm involved, our plumbers weren't really interested, right? But because the owners of these two different things started working together, we ended up sponsoring this team for seven years that grew to be the biggest cycling team in the Northwest. We went to pro races, we went to several pro races in America. We flew to Florida to race and all over Washington. So how's that all matter? The amazing thing was everywhere I went, when I would be at any organization race of any kind, people would come up to me and say, Are you the owner? And I go, Yeah. And they go, Thank you so much for supporting the cycling community. And we use you guys, and you guys were great. People, everywhere I went, people would come up to me and say, Are you the are you the owner of yeah? And then they would say, Hey, we had you guys out, and be like, Oh no, it's gonna be good. And they were great. They would always say, They were great every time. Even my competitors, even that, even the opposite teams, even my rivals, people would walk up to me and say, Thanks for supporting the community. We had you guys out and they were awesome. And so I don't have numbers. It took off on us so fast that kind of took us by surprise. So I don't have numbers to tell you what that brought in, but I know for sure it brought in way more than we paid. And also, there was 150 team members taking pictures of themselves in their jersey. We had our logo splattered all over that jersey, and they're taking pictures and selfies of themselves wherever they go and doing stuff and biking every day and putting it all over their social media, and people have seen that. And guess what? The cycling community in Seattle is large. And so our logo and our brand is being seen all over. And now we're getting into interest media. You've heard of social media, but there's interest media. And so, what are you passionate about? What are you involved in? What is your heart? What do you do besides plumbing? Like everybody's putting out plumbing content. Like we've we kind of got the idea we got to put out some content, so we do plumbing content. How many of our customers are watching plumbing content? Not very many. If they need something fixed, they're looking to see how to get something fixed. And do they have do they have to call us? Can they fix it themselves? They're looking at that, but other than that, no. But in Seattle, a lot of people are looking up cycling stuff and following cycling stuff, and we popped up everywhere, right? And so this is what I call purpose. It's purpose-driven marketing. It's it's like branding, it's like brand marketing. But how many of those people called us? They didn't go to the trust peddler. They didn't go online and say, plumber near me. They said, What is that team that isn't there a company that supports cycling? I love cycling, and there's this company that supports cycling, and they would type in and we would pop up and they would call us and they would use us. It's called purpose-driven marketing, and it's powerful and it works. So plumbing's great, but what else? If you had extra money, what would you support? And is there a community large enough there to support? Can you get involved and support that and build that? So find your purpose. I I was super lucky to be a part of a big cycling team that did really cool stuff that was paid for by my company, and it wasn't, it wasn't frivolous that made all the sense in the world. So if this episode changed the way you think about marketing, you need to hit like, subscribe, leave a comment. I want to help other plumbing contractors who deserve to build profitable businesses instead of just staying busy treading water. You know what I mean? And share this episode with another contractor who's working hard but could use a little better direction. Remember, in my view, your responsibility as a business owner isn't just to get more calls. Your responsibility is to get the best calls you can. The ones that already trust you, the ones that already want your company, the ones that are buying your reputation before they ask your price. It's actually like they're investing in your company. That's how you stop competing on price and start building a business that's actually worth owning. Imagine that. If you're ready to go through the apprenticeship most of us skipped, the apprenticeship one, the business apprenticeship, click the link in the description or comments to learn more about trade traction.