Ep 204 - Email or Bust

Hello, hello, hello and welcome back to yet another episode of Electric Pinner Secrets, the Electricians podcast. I'm your host, Clay Neumeyer, with me, as always, my esteemed co-host, joseph the Salesbot, luke Canny, and we're here to help you master your sales, simplify your pricing and deliver premium level electrical service. I feel like I was a little bit faster coming into that today.

You were, but you know what it lined up with my cadence internally metronome. So we're all good.

Awesome, man, awesome. How are you doing today, brother, by the way, I'm feeling absolutely amazing.

The conversations that we've had earlier today, the program improvements that we're talking about, like all the value ads that we're planning on putting in it, really makes me look forward to every single day that we're doing this. So I'm feeling we're going to live on Cloud9 right now.

It's exciting stuff, right and honestly, I think this is a whole different podcast topic than what we're getting into today, which is deep diving on the email or bust. What we're going to see from today. This tactical Tuesday session is going to be hard and fast and coming at you with a very deep dive on this email problem where people are really. Maybe you get the second cold book for presentation and they pull out, which is what happened to one of our clients over the weekend, last Friday, I believe it happened. And so we wanted to reintroduce this email and the objection and the handle and make sure you guys have a complete understanding of why and if really let's answer it first if we should ever email that over. But I can see this also going into this burnout to driving upward, because there's another whole concept that you just touched on which I feel like we're kind of in right now. You know it's end of year. We had our big proof of concept. We've been driving this program and driving value up and up and up and trying to see how much we can serve, and it's been going great right. We've been showing up five days a week for electricians, not just in here but also in our silver group where guys are getting a class every day of the week. So it's like nonstop culture and nonstop support and just nonstop wins, it seems. Joe, I know I'm absolutely loving it.

It feels great to be able to contribute to the access to it.

And I know other people listening, engaging with us on Facebook or just listening to the play. Other people feel that burnout too. Yeah, I know that that is a place of like you just want to quit, sometimes pull your hair out, jump back and say I'm out of this for a bit. I mean, I talked to someone yesterday apologies if you're listening. Brother, all the respect to you, but in that place of burnout, even after doing close to 400 K in sales for the year for himself, still took a job just to shut the noise off for a bit, took a job. Isn't that crazy? Isn't that crazy what burnout can do to us?

It really is, because and I'm not ever trying to, you know pose in total to that situation. But the thing about burnout is that it makes you, it shortens the window. It's almost like when you're out of burnout, when you're in a place of clarity, you can see on an open day with no fog. Being in burnout isn't just it being a foggy day, it's like you are utterly enmeshed in your own zone, like you're wearing a basket over your head because everything feels tight, everything feels close, everything feels real right now and all you want to ever do is take that helmet off. And sometimes you'll do anything you can to take it off. It doesn't mean you make the right choice when you do, but we have to at least understand and be like burnout's a real thing and it really affects people to where they think they're making the right decision and they're not, because if they take off the helmet and they look at it after the fact, they're like, yeah, no, I get it, I understand where we did that.

That's huge man. That's huge. Did you want to say something else, because I actually push that till tomorrow. If we can Go ahead, fire off. Okay, let's get back to email or bust. Here's the situation, joe. We've talked about it before and are happy to cover this just quick. Why is it bad to email over our quotes for the service work that we're hoping to get?

Okay. So the problem with email when, especially when it comes to service work, is that you yourself Need to be the sale, like you yourself are the thing that they're purchasing, the person not, yeah, the relationship, the connection with the company, the service you're actually doing. It's not just a commodity sale, like it's not like I'm offering you a 22k w generator, generator with a 200 amp whole home ETS like that's the product, yeah, but the service itself is. I have a five-year maintenance agreement with this. I am a Generac certified technician, I'm a licensed master electrician. I can been doing this for this many years. This is my relationship, this is my cubs, my office behind me, this is my staff. Like this is what you're buying. You're buying the experience and If I just email this over, the whole experience is derailed.

Because, since you're saying that, if I can jump in, I'm visualizing this and I'm picturing, like it doesn't matter how much of what you just said that you typed, it could be the best sales letter in the world. As soon as there's a number at the bottom, what happens people?

look right to the number first. Skip, right down right exactly, and that's actually one of the reasons why, when we do our presentations, we have one that screen shot it without price and one that is screen shot it with price, so that when the customer looks for that number, they realize that that number is not there and they realize that you're the person the number comes from and, as a result, it shifts their attention from product and commodity to relationship and service. It's a very intentional moment because if you have a situation where a customer call for a trip gfi and my top option is me changing your federal Pacific panel, it's totally justified for me to do that. But in the customer's mind they called me for a hundred and fifty dollar quote that they think is there and I'm coming there with $1,500 to $15,000. They got to understand why, and if I just email that over, it's up to them to translate it and understand why it's relevant. It's not fair, it's actually terrible customer service.

Yeah, man, no, I agree hundred percent. That service is so important that face-to-face contact plus there's this added thing of like. I want to know what's happening when I leave here. Mm-hmm because we have this thing we call the law of open cycles, and what that means is that all the things left undone, or vampires to my livelihood. So if you've ever felt like, oh man, I don't know what's happening. I haven't heard from them in two weeks. I texted but I don't know if they saw it. I sent the email. I'm not sure if they got it. They're not responding. Do you think they're ghosting? I think they're ghosting. You're talking to your wife now, right, I think they're ghosting. Do you think they're ghosting? And this is probably at like 10 45 pm In bed, naturally should I do now? maybe in the morning I'll drop by and I'll just knock quickly. No, I don't like doing that. Maybe I'll email them again. No, maybe I'll try and phone them. I phoned but they didn't answer. All this craziness like that is leading to the very burnout they were gonna deep dive into tomorrow.

Yeah, and there's also a major concept that I think people are forgetting and that is where the power exchange happens, up to the moment where you hand over your quote. You do have all the power in this moment Because right now you're the professional, you're the ones who evaluated the home, you have all your years of technical expertise, you've got all your years of design, you've got everything put together in an easy to understand menu and they know that if they get that menu in their mind, that's their solution. You can set the stage and the conditions of you handing them that presentation. But the moment that you say you know what, like earlier when you said, oh, I go to do a two-call close and they cancel the second presentation, but they still want to hear about it- yeah for lack of better words. Bullshit, lack of better words, it's really truly bullshit. Yeah, because what they're saying in that moment is clay. I think you're valuable and I really like what you're doing and I like that. I trust that you know what you're doing, but I'm not interested in being sold on anything. I would like to assume control of this, where I have your knowledge, in a non-confrontational situation to where I could dissect your information with maybe me myself, my Electrician cousin who might know something about contracting, and we'll break apart the number and either I'll compare with someone else or I'll come back to you and decide whether I thought it was good or not, or, if I don't like it, I'll just keep the relationship and never call you back. Because if I never call you back, I can pretend like oh, I did never got your email. I so it takes everything out. Everything that every control, every level that you have to pivot out drops like a rock when you email it over. Joe, do you want to have?

some fun with this.

Oh God, yeah, do it.

Like I'm sensing something like real conversations is maybe like a theme name for this. I just want this to be a superpower for people and to have real, actionable advice on this tactical Tuesday. Would you be opposed to us doing a bit of a role play with the actual conversation? I have a screenshot next to me of how this text went.

Send it. I've never differed transparency. I don't know what he's going to say. This is fully live. So if it's not me, great.

If it doesn't batter up, buddy, I'm ready you will, but I find I feel did a wonderful job here. I made some light suggestions, but he really stuck to his offer STYO right. So I'm going to paraphrase using my name Otherwise same text. Okay so this is first off. This is my text, though it was a screenshot of a text so the guy canceled the call. The presentation and text.

Okay, my first thing that I would say before that is try to avoid doing business over text, because if someone texts you, you could reply with a call, but if you've texted them and then they text you back, you've set the presence that texting is acceptable and therefore you're going to do it again.

So that would have been your first piece of feedback, because that's where our process was slightly altered here. So, hi, brad, this is Clay with service sup electrical. Are you still available for a call today to go over the options I put together for you? So, as you just said, in our process that's actually a call point right.

Correct. That would have been a moment of, and even further, we would have done it when we're on our way, Like hey, just letting me know I'm planning on coming by. Is that still going to be good for you and Mary? Oh, two o'clock today.

Awesome, love it. So Brad says back Hi, clay, actually something has come up. Please email your proposals to me. Here's my email. Thanks so much, okay.

So the guy's name is Brad. Yes, okay, brad, I've. So I'd be like first thing that I would do is if I hadn't texted him first and he texted me. What I would be like is I'd respond with sorry to hear that that happened. Let me know when's a good time we can talk. I'm going to reach out to you in the next five minutes that would have been the first thing Moving into a call immediately, immediately, to a call.

Okay, because right now texting, in this case no, we would not at all.

The reason why I wouldn't recommend texting back is, once again now we're setting the precedent that this is okay and the problem with text is that it's not an actual conversation. It's more of an advanced form of sending letters, which means all inflection, tonality, facial expression is completely lost. So I could say something which is entirely accurate and authentic, but if he reads it in the wrong way, I can come across as a jerk.

So I would honestly my rule of thumb is that all text comes off in the worst possible tonality. Correct Every time.

Correct. So the first thing would be like I'm so sorry that here that happened. I'm still happy to support you. What? Let me know when it's a good time to talk. We'll be reaching out in the next five minutes Now. After that, I would give him a call. It's up to you to determine whether he answers or not, because if he answers, there's one response and let's just do the short answer, which is he doesn't. He doesn't respond. I would send a message back with. I tried reaching out. I hadn't heard back. Please let me know when you're available, as we prefer to do business over the phone or in person to ensure that you have the best customer service. If he tries to go back to text. I appreciate you wanting to reach out. I do genuinely want to work with you. Let me know when we can talk. I will not give him this power over me. You do not get to control how I do my business.

I love that. Actually, I appreciate what our client said. Can I share that with you? Yeah, by me. So his response was the guy asked for the proposal again reminder. He said I'm so sorry to hear that we aren't able to connect on the phone today. Honestly, sending my options over via email would make my job much easier, but I refuse to cut corners on customer service to accomplish that. Next week for us is jam packed. So if there is a better time, we can meet up in person after Thanksgiving to go over the options Sorry, is there a better time? Or we can respectfully bow out of this relationship and part as friends. How would you like to proceed? I love that.

I really do, and the reason being is let's break down what ended up happening in that conversation. So the first thing that had happened was an acknowledgement statement. Now remember how we handle our objections. Acknowledge, reframe ask again. So it was. I'm sorry that that happened. Okay, acknowledge Reframing is, of course, doing. This would make our job way easier. But I would want to tweak it to be like, because here at Service Rappelectrical, we focus entirely on providing you with a world-class level of customer service, and if I just email it over, I'm forcing you to do my job for me, because I designed a full range of choices, from the finest money can buy to the most bare bones you possibly can have. So, with that being said, I refuse to do a disservice by making you do that job for me, but I would absolutely love the honor of coming back and explaining it to you and Mariel. Wouldn't it be the best time that we can get together? Would you prefer before Thanksgiving or after Thanksgiving?

And Brad says I'm sorry, you'll have to email it today, since I'm going to make a decision in the next day or so.

Okay. So if he says you'll have to email it or I have to make a decision, well, I do respect that. You have a timeline and as much as I would love to help you, I am unable to do so if it means compromising on our values. If it's something you'd like to work through together and you feel like we'd be a great fit, I'd be more than happy to come out to accommodate your schedule. If you feel like you need to make a decision immediately, would you want us to come and do an evening appointment with you, or would you rather that we bow out and you can choose to go with another provider who's willing to have you do their job for them?

Nice and our client had said again, I believe every presentation comes with an explanation. I'd be happy to put you in touch with another electrical company that might have a little more availability, if you wish.

I like the first part. The second part is it almost makes it seem like they're trying to push it onto someone else, because it's not that we don't have the availability, it's that we refuse to the cutting corners on the service that we provide, like it's really not stressed enough what service actually is. It's not just doing a better physical installation, it's not just showing up on time. It's you saying that I'm going to control the experience from beginning to end and I'm gonna do everything in my power to adjust anything that could go wrong. I'm gonna ensure it goes right. And you cannot do that when you're removed from the situation. What this client is doing is he wants to make a decision. He likely already got a quote or another quote from someone he already likes and he wants your quote to compare, to see. Well, I've already gone with John. I think he does good work or good-ish work. The price is close to what I wanted to be, maybe a little more than what I wanted to be. Let's go and we'll talk to Clay's company and see if they're gonna be lower or if they're a little bit more, and we can understand the price and compare from there, cause after you email it over, I'm very certain, if you email it in our typical fashion, he's gonna be like well, where's the breakdown? And now, because you already sent them a little bit, now it's questionable why you won't send them more.

Yeah, I would agree with that. My personal view on this is because and let's answer it in the question form, because the next question we usually get is okay, well, if I don't send this over and I withdraw from this completely, I've got a 0% chance of landing this job, whereas if I send this over, be it maybe just five to 10%, I've still got a chance here. And my argument to that is always a chance at what.

So I want to touch on that because I feel very, very strongly about that negative mindset, because some people are like, if I don't take it, I have 0% chance of getting it. If I send it, maybe I have a five to 10% chance, maybe even go up to 50% not that you will, that's a thought but you're really only between five to 15% chance of getting this job. The odds are actually much higher that you're educating your competition for free Because someone's gonna be smart enough to get in touch with this customer. Maybe it's not you, but someone is going to be smart enough to get face to face with this person. And I know myself I have looked at other people's quotes after being there. Like there was one situation where a customer told me you need to email it over and I said, no, I'd love to work with you and I'll even look at everyone's quotes and I'll do a side-by-side comparison. And I came at like 11 o'clock at night and I went and did a side-by-side comparison with this customer and I saw three, four other quotes and they still went with us, even though we're thousands more. So the thing is, is you emailing that quote just made my company better? And I guarantee. When someone asks why you didn't come and I did, I could say I don't know. Maybe they didn't know, maybe they didn't care as much, that's okay. But what I can say about us is that, service-oblectrical, you'll always get that personal experience because it's not just a service, it's an experience.

Man, we could keep deep diving on this for hours. I'm sure I think we're gonna be able to tie this right into this topic of Overwhelmed Tomorrow, because exactly what we're saying here, in that scarcity mindset, is what leads us to take jobs from customers who we did not have, that stronger bond with stronger connections, stronger qualification with which tends to be the jobs that are PIA right Pain in the freaking ass. Next thing, you know, we're back to Overwhelmed and we're thinking the problem is maybe a two-call close, whereas the emails are what's giving you all the crap that you don't even want on your calendar in the first place and all the problems. So you're spending more time handling this price objection because they saw other people's numbers than in person just justifying your value.

I just wanna add one thing to that, because everything you said was right, but I wanna address a thought that's going through people's minds right now that I wanna just break in half.

Call it out elephant in the room. Here we go.

Okay. So the problem that I've heard when people say I don't like two-call closes is because they're like I spend so much time on it and if I don't get it I've put in all this time. I actually wanna say something different. If you do two-call close, yes, you put in time, but with a much higher likelihood of closing. So it's more directional time, like it's consistent time 50%, 40%, 60%, 80%, it doesn't matter the percentage, but it's gonna be higher than someone emailing it over. Now, on the email oversituation, though, you may think all well and good that you're not spending the time, but let me tell you exactly how it goes down. You meet the customer the first time. You went through. You bonded, you connected, you learned, you designed things. You went back to your house, your shop, you designed your choices. Now you're gonna email this person over, but it doesn't end there. You email a little further and now there's a follow-up. There's a text, there's a thought, there's a call, but there's also the mental equity. That open cycle is the dangling carrot that always makes you feel well, there's something in the pipeline. There's something in the pipeline. There's something in the pipeline. So you follow up and you follow up and you drag and you follow up and you're chasing an opportunity that they already went with someone else on. So all the time that you spent is equivalent to the time you went to do a two call close. Except at least there you walk away with a yes, no or follow-up date for when they are making the decision.

Really powerful argument, man. It's just unaccounted for. I mean, it's the same principle we see in marketing all the time, where the cost for lead is $50, $75, $100. No, it's not your time. Investment in getting a job is much more, and you know what. I'm on your team there, man. Let's crank out a couple of action items and wrap this one up, brother.

I'm ready.

You want basic or all-star today?

I want the all-star on this one, because this is one that's near and dear to the heart.

Easy, then Basic Make a commitment to yourself not to email any quotes. I'm going to give this a timeline, since maybe you're not convinced this will work for you in a beneficial way for your business. Try it for 30 days, see what happens. If you don't know what to say when someone says, hey, just email it over, then listen to this podcast again and again, and again, because we got hyper-tactical today and literally went through a conversation that you can manipulate and make work for any email and over case. I promise you that that's the base action, brother.

The all-star action requires you to be in the mind of the customer because, let's say, you reverse the situation. Now we're all electricians ideally listening to this, so if I made an electrical reference it wouldn't make complete sense. But let's say I'm your plumber and you needed me to come to your home and you're looking at water filtration systems or you're looking at water quality systems. Now you don't know anything about this situation. You're a layperson. You maybe don't own any tools. So if I designed six choices and then I gave them to you to translate, what are the odds that that uninformed client will not only make the right decision but won't be so overwhelmed that they say I'll put it on the counter, I'll get back to it? Those are the two most likely outcomes. If they make a decision, it's not likely the right decision because it's an uninformed decision, or they could overwhelm and they do nothing until they find someone who will take the burden off of them, whether it's more expensive or less expensive than you. The all-star action is to say this if you're truly trying to serve your client, this is the layup moment. You've dribbled all the way down the court. You're there. You've taken the time to get the lead. You've taken the time to market it. You've taken the time to show up. You've taken the time to design it. Just get under the basket and put the layup in. Why are you saying I should do a three-point shot because I don't have to go that far down the court? It's harder making a three-point shot. Go for the layup. Go over the two-call close, get in front of the customer and capitalize on the relationship you've nurtured.

Boom, you heard it here first, guys, on episode 204 of Electricpreneur's Secrets email or bust I think you've got our strong opinion on this one. Guys, we just want you to succeed at the highest level. That's why we keep showing up five days a week to help you master your sales, simplify your pricing and deliver premium-level electrical service. We're going to see you again tomorrow with more chat on overwhelm, how to defeat it and how it just like Monday's topic with low-call volume how it is actually going to serve you. We'll see you then. Can't wait to see them.