In times when your lead pool seems to be shrinking, it’s critical to maximize every opportunity that comes your way. In a recent ServiceTitan webinar, Tommy Mello, Owner of A1 Garage Door Service and renowned industry expert, shares strategies for increasing profitability no matter how many leads you have and how to generate a steady stream of leads using AI Pro Products for marketing, dispatching, and scheduling.
His session covers:
KPIs that matter
Leveraging Pro products
Implementing AI into your business
KPIs that Matter
Mello started the session by sharing what KPIs matter for profitability. Those include:
Booking rate
Conversion rate
Opportunity job average (OJA)
Cost per lead (CPL)
With those numbers, you can calculate your marketing expense based on a goal. For a $10 million goal with a booking rate of 70%, conversion rate of 65%, OJA of $800, and CPL of $100, your marketing expense would be $2,747,252, making your cost of marketing as a percentage of revenue 27.5%.
It’s calculated like this: Goal / Booking Rate as a decimal / Conversion Rate as a decimal / OJA x CPL
But if you adjust those KPIs to look like the following, keeping the same $10M goal, your marketing expense would go down to 8.7% of revenue.
Booking rate: 90%
Conversion rate: 85%
Opportunity job average (OJA): $1,200
Cost per lead (CPL): $80
“A lot of us are not taking advantage of the leads we’re getting,” Mello says.
To improve opportunity job averages and booking and conversion rates, Mello recommends utilizing ServiceTitan.
“ServiceTitan is a Ferrari. The problem is you're stuck in first gear,” Mello says. “You have to master the software. You have to get good at your booking rate, you have to get great at your conversion rate, and you do that by dispatching for dollars. And then you need a high opportunity job average. You do this by giving options, which ServiceTitan does, using financing, which we call promotions.”
The #1 newsletter for the trades.
Leverage Pro Products
To maximize booking rate, Mello recommends utilizing Contact Center Pro.
“I know my booking rate down to the T. I know how many minutes it takes for our average call,” Mello says. “I understand all the capacity built into ServiceTitan, and I know every single CSR and what their booking rate is. Booking every call matters. We fight for the call. Call center software helps us do that.”
Marketing Pro helps businesses generate more reviews through automated review requests and shows attribution so you know how to spend your valuable marketing dollars. And Scheduling Pro enables users to book directly from Google.
“What I just found out is that Google actually makes you rank better when you've got Scheduling Pro hooked directly into Google My Business and Local Service Ads,” Mello says. “It puts you up in the algorithm, you rank better. I don't know how ServiceTitan did it, but they're a big player in the home service space, and they're working directly with Google. I can't say that about any other CRMs. It's fantastic.”
Dispatch Pro enables A1 Garage Door Service to dispatch for dollars.
“It finds the best opportunity for the job,” Mello says. “The goal is not to get rid of your dispatchers. It's to get them economies of scale, make them do more with less time. We went from one dispatcher for every 12 technicians to one for every 20, which is amazing.”
Build a Winning Culture
Pro Products add fuel to the fire, but it’s the people who matter most.
“Understanding how to recruit A-plus players and drive them is so important,” Mello says.
Mello recommends implementing performance pay to motivate your team.
“Performance pay is not just straight commission,” Mello says. “You've got to get a low callback ratio. You've got to get five-star reviews. You've got to use the financing tools. The better you perform, the more you make.”
To cultivate these A-players, focus on training and culture.
“My best advice for culture is to buy a barbecue and cook for your people twice a week,” Mello says. “Break bread with your people and get to know them. If you just do that, you're going to see a huge improvement in your company.”
When it comes to training, Mello believes in home-grown techs. He hires for attitude and trains the skills. Each manager holds one-on-one meetings with their reports to hold them accountable. And he offers an equity incentive program to retain top talent.
You can’t just talk the talk, though. Owners need to work on themselves, too.
“Go to Pantheon, listen to podcasts, read books, go do shop tours,” Mello says. “Work on yourself and get your team working on themselves more than they're working on the company, and you'll have explosive growth.”
Lastly, to do the best, learn from the best.
“If you want to get to the No. 1 on Google, type in ‘HVAC repair in your city’ and find out who's number one on the ratings and the three-pack. Who's doing PPC the best? Who's doing LSA the best? And who's doing organic the best? Go visit them,” Mello says. “Success leaves clues. You just have to ask.”
