It’s been a very busy year for ServiceTitan, as we launched our first TWO seasons of our Toolbox for the Trades podcast, as well as a webinar series that proved to be both highly popular AND essential — in terms of trying to navigate the Covid-19 pandemic and its impacts on contractors across the U.S.
By the numbers: ServiceTitan hosted 58 webinars in 2020, with more than 22,000 contractors who either attended live or listened to the webinars on-demand.
In terms of the podcast, hosted by ServiceTitan's Jackie Aubel, more than 30 episodes of the podcast have been released, with Season 3 lined up for early 2021. We’ve already had more than 20,000 “plays” of the podcast, and that number grows every day!
If you missed any of the first 2 seasons, check it out here, and download our Season 2 recap PDF, with key takeaways and links to all of the podcast episodes.
Here’s our Top 5 podcasts of 2020, with summaries of each:
Stacy Fore
Stacy Fore isn’t just an HVAC owner, she’s a mental health advocate. Stacy talked about how investing in your team is always the best business practice, and how community stewardship doesn’t just drive leads, it strengthens your team’s purpose and vision.
Community involvement and company culture go hand in hand for Stacy Fore. She and her husband, Mike, co-own HVAC Solutions LLC based just outside of Oklahoma City. The 15-person business is 70 percent residential and 30 percent commercial and did $1.2 million in sales last year.
Ismael Valdez
Ismael Valdez, at age 32, is a man on a mission. And he’s in a hurry. The owner of Southern California-based Nexgen built his company into a $30 million empire in a short time—and he vows to keep hustling until he gets to the $100 million mark. Valdez talked about the importance of using data efficiently, believes the next generation of contractors will be young guns like him, and treasures the family he goes home to every night.
Weldon Long
Thinking about what to think about can transform your entire life. At least it did for Weldon Long, speaker, mindset and sales expert and New York Times Bestselling author of The Power of Consistency. After spending much of his adult life in prison, Weldon’s incredible success story truly demonstrates the power our mindset can have — and how changing it can alter the entire trajectory of our lives.
Chris Hunter
Chris Hunter, former owner of Hunter Super Techs and now director of customer relations at ServiceTitan, revealed how he grew his HVAC, plumbing, and electrical business from the ground up to create "uncommon wealth" in this podcast episode.
Among his top tips? Hunter said he firmly believes the success of a company rises and falls on leadership, but that a work/life balance is critical.
“No. 1, you definitely have to invest in yourself,” he says. “That can be expensive and it can be very time-consuming—but you cannot give what you don't have.”
Jaime DiDomenico
There’s not much Jaime DiDomenico hasn’t seen or done over a 40-year career in the trades. He’s still president/CEO of Cool Today, Plumbing Today, and Energy Today in Sarasota, Fla. (even though he sold to The Wrench Group in 2019). Those companies include more than 300 employees and generate $23 million in annual sales.
DiDomenico talked about the importance of every department in a company, open communication policies, and the importance of implantation and continual evaluation of business practices.
Top ServiceTitan Webinars of 2020
Our most-attended webinar dealt with the Payroll Protection Program back at the start of the pandemic. More than 2,000 contractors signed up for that webinar.
But in terms of non-pandemic related webinars, here’s our top 5 webinars of 2020:
Angie Snow
» 4 Essential Steps to Help your CSRs Achieve a 95 Percent Booking Rate
“There is so much more to it than just reading a script,” says Angie Snow, CSR Coach with Go Time Success Group and Vice President of Western Heating and Air Conditioning in Utah — and now Director of Customer & Product Training at ServiceTitan.
“You’re not just a CSR,” Snow says. “As CSR, you are the voice of the company. You have a great impression to make for the company, and a lot of CSRs really have a hard time feeling confident in that position.”
“I realized my job is to build a relationship with customers,” she explains. “My job is to get to know them, to find out what their needs are, and to really build that relationship so they trust us to come into their homes.”
“As business owners, we invest so much money in marketing to get the phone to ring, but if your CSRs are not capturing those calls and seizing those opportunities, you’re wasting your money,” Snow says.
How to Sell your Service Biz (SF&P)
President Fred Silberstein and Business Strategist Brian Cohen of SF&P Advisors, a brokerage firm for residential, commercial, and mechanical HVAC and plumbing mergers and acquisitions, explained the nitty gritty of what you need to know for a successful business-selling transaction in a recent webinar hosted by ServiceTitan.
The investment brokers discuss:
Top mistakes owners make when selling their business, and how to avoid them.
The importance of post-sale working capital.
How to properly calculate business valuation.
Private equity firms lining up to buy service businesses
The webinar recap also includes 10 mistakes owners make when selling their business
Kathy Nielsen: How to Run ST and Quickbooks like a Pro
In one of our most-listened-to webinars of 2020, Kathy shared tips, tricks and must-dos for using QuickBooks, and she explained how ServiceTitan and QuickBooks work together to save your company time and money.
Nielsen’s tips and tricks for Quickbooks include knowing:
Pros and cons of employing a self-taught bookkeeper in your office, and how to mitigate associated risks.
Trends business owners should look for in their books, and what business decisions they can make based on those trends.
The difference between QuickBooks and ServiceTitan—who needs access, who is responsible for making adjustments, and how the integration works.
Common pitfalls, including how to reduce the number of manual entries and properly track AR, liabilities and payables.
Travis Ringe: How to Get More 5-Star Reviews
How important are online reviews to your home services business? Extremely important, Travis Ringe says. Your online reputation depends on them, especially in today’s digital world.
Ringe, co-owner of ProSkill Services in the North Valley area near Phoenix, knows quite a bit about reviews and building a good business reputation. He started a one-truck plumbing company with his brother 10 years ago. They’ve since grown it into a $14 million operation that offers full-service air conditioning, electrical, plumbing, water heater and water treatment home services.
With more than 50 trucks, ProSkill Services boasts more than 3,000 Google reviews with a 5-star rating, and nearly 800 Facebook recommendations.
“If you want to drive reviews,” Ringe says, “you have to deliver a full experience worthy of writing a review.”
Ellen Rohr: Back to Basics (on finances)
The times might be complicated, but Ellen Rohr’s message is simple. If you want to run a successful business in the home services industry, you have to know where the money is coming from, and where it’s going. And business is simplest when you focus on the basics.
Rohr sat down with ServiceTitan for a webinar at one of the most complicated times in business history. As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to sweep the globe, changing life and business for almost everyone, Rohr says she has done some soul searching.
Where did she land? In the same place she always does: Business is simplest when you focus on the basics.
“When it comes to the money, honey, I am a master of the basics,” she said. “In times of crisis, going back to the basics is always a good plan.”
Those basics, Rohr said, work in good times and bad.
“Revisit what you are doing, what you swore in the first place — to get back to your mission, back to your why,” she said. “Get clear with the leadership team for starters, and then disseminate that message throughout the organization.
And a bonus track, just released at the end of 2020:
Digital Influence on the Future of HVAC with Carrier
When imagining the future for servicing HVAC systems, contractors need not venture far to find digital technology already in play. Gundeep Singh, CIO for Carrier Residential, joined a ServiceTitan webinar to "geek out" on what's driving the future of HVAC.
The webinar recap also includes “Busting 3 common myths about IoT and other digital trends”
Thank you for reading — and listening! — in 2020, and we look forward to much more to come in the new year!
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