Do clients think what you think? | 78

Ever stuffed up a job and thought it was game over? I’ve been there—more than once. In this episode, I share how fixing my own screw-ups turned pissed-off clients into loyal ones.

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Transcript

“We're not gonna be using him again.”

Welcome to Simplified Sparky Marketing.

I want to speak about what you think the client thinks—they actually don’t think. Try and digest that one.

Let me tell you a few stories about how I’ve stuffed up on my electrical journey over the years, and how some of those situations turned out better than expected.

The first one was installing a range hood ventilation system. Pretty straightforward—I just had to run the flexi duct on top of the kitchen cabinets, drill out through the walls. It was brick veneer: timber and gyprock on one side, brick on the other.

I measured everything, cut the hole on the inside, drilled through to the outside, then cut out a vent in the brick. I had to chop out a little timber to mount the aluminium vent on the wall. But I went a bit too far—and I cut into the neighbour’s side.

These houses were essentially a duplex, mirror images with a dividing fence. I installed the vent and didn’t even realise I’d gone about 50mm into the neighbour's side. I thought maybe they’d be cool with it.

I showed the client. He was a bit uneasy about it, but said they’d check with the neighbour and let me know. I got the invoice paid and left.

Later, the client messaged me saying the neighbour wasn’t happy and asked if I could change it. Like an ostrich, I buried my head in the sand and avoided it for a few weeks—made up excuses, didn’t want to deal with it. But eventually, I knew I had to fix it.

I remembered I’d kept a bit of the brick I knocked out with some paint on it. I went to Bunnings, got it colour matched, picked up timber, became a carpenter for a day, and fixed the whole thing properly. Repainted, moved the vent—made it perfect.

The client was wrapped. They’ve since had me back for multiple jobs worth thousands. If I hadn’t gone back and made it right, I’d have lost that client forever.

Another one—Balmain job. A bit of a disaster. Needed to add some power points, including one in the kitchen island. Tried to fish under the floor, but couldn’t reach. Told the client I couldn’t get there—I had warned them it might not work, but still felt bad.

The house had a Clipsal Wiser system, and the blind controller wasn’t working. A previous sparky had replaced it with a basic up/down switch. I figured I’d install a SAL Pixie smart controller to give them app control again.

Hooked it up—and chaos. Blinds started going out of sync, going at different speeds. I tried to fix it, moving motors up and down individually—eventually, two motors stopped working altogether.

I was sweating bullets, sure I’d fried them. Took a break, figured maybe they’d overheated. Sure enough, they came back after cooling down.

Called a mate who knew more about this gear. He walked me through adjusting the motors manually with an Allen key. Got them aligned, put everything back the way it was.

Four hours wasted. Felt like a failure. I sat in the van after and genuinely questioned if I still wanted to be a sparky.

But three months later, the same client called. Hot water wasn’t working. I thought, “surely they’re not calling me back.” Turned out it was a power issue—damp wall had corroded a power point. Fixed it in 20 minutes. The client was ecstatic.

It reminded me—what you think clients think, they often don’t. He didn’t care about the earlier mess. He was just grateful it was fixed.

Same goes for pricing. You might look at a quote and think, “this is too expensive.” But the client might just be sick of looking at old downlights. They’ll happily pay to get it sorted.

One more example—I was installing a 250mm fan in a heritage bathroom ceiling. The ceiling was old timber slats with render on top. I cut into it with a recip saw, and a chunk of render—about 150mm—fell outside my cut.

Told the client I’d be back to fix it properly. Went to Bunnings, grabbed supplies. Patched it up with timber, base coat, mesh tape, top coat, paint. Brought a blow dryer to speed up the drying between coats. Gave it three coats.

Client was so amazed with the patch job, he forgot about the electrical work.

The point is, it’s not about how you mess up—it’s how you pick up the ball after you drop it. The same goes for staff. If they stuff up, fix it. Make it right.

One of my members recently got a one-star review from a client because of something minor a staff member did. I gave him a simple strategy, and he flipped it into a five-star review.

This is why I love doing this podcast. I'm going to be real, raw, vulnerable—because just like you, I’m a sparky. I make mistakes. But it’s not about never failing—it’s about learning how to recover.

Check the links in the description. If you’re not on the email list, you’re missing out. Join below. The Simplified Sparky Mentorship doors open on the 8th of July. There’s a video below explaining it all. If you’re keen, hit the link—or DM me on Instagram.

Catch you next week.