Ep 241 - $1M Launch Series 2024 - Loop Method Pt I - Financial Solutions

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to yet another episode of Electricpreneur Secrets, the Electricians podcast, and this is episode 241. If you can believe that, joe, I'm your host, clay Neumeier, with me, as always, my esteemed co-host, joseph Lucchani, and we are the Electric preneurs just a couple of master electricians with business addictions. I wanted to say business first this time. Welcome to our daily freemium coach. Call the costs for this. Sit back, give us some time and promise to take everything we give. Just promise to take action. Report the winds back to us. Let us know how it's going out there so we can continue to help at the highest level, as we're on this mission to help you master yourself, Simplify your pricing and deliver premium level electrical service. Joseph, how are you doing today, my brother?

Man, it's an interesting one today. I kind of still feel unblessed, but have you ever had one of those snowstorms that when you were a kid they would have called school out for, but then it only ends up being like a fraction of the time, or it ends up being like it's just a fraction of the snow that you thought you were going to get.

Disappointing.

Yeah, so the girls are home today, which is wonderful. I love being a full-time dad and hanging out with them. But, man, let me just tell you we got like two inches of ice and they thought it was supposed to be like 68 inches.

So talking about a line on the size there, yeah, that used to happen a lot as a kid. Hey, you're snowed out and then actually the buses are running and it's time to go to school. Now, oh, dang, disappointment, man, disappointment. What are you holding up today? Good, no snow, no snow that I can see. It has been chilly, as we established the other day, near the freezing point, which is 32, not 20. Fair enough.

Why do we do that? Canada cold is a little different, though. We've had clients say oh yeah, it's a scratch one. It was negative 50 the other night. It's like that's a whole different level of cold.

It is chilly, man. It's chilly in spots, for sure. But no, I'm pumped up for this episode as we continue this million dollar launch series and really what we're diving into is this loop method thing again. You want to jump right into that?

Yeah, I'm Paul man, let's make it happen.

Okay, well, today is part one of two part series on the loop method and we're calling it the financial solutions piece because of what's involved with it. Now we're going to break all this out, but first and foremost, let's discuss just one more time like what is the loop method? Why and it ties right into our name service superelechcal over there right, that little bit extra for future serviceability and everything we've put together in our program, in our process, helps us build relationships sustainably for the future so we can continue to serve over and, over and over again and ultimately solve this shallow today's sale problem once and for all. Because if you guys have been following for any length of time, then you know we do not condone the big home run swingers every day.

Yeah, that's one of the worst things you could be doing, because when you shop to a home and your goal is to say I'm going to sell them something, you remove the most key aspect, which is the relationship. People won't buy from you unless they like, trust and respect you. And even if you did home run that one call, that one time, if they felt sold, what are the odds they're going to call you again for the future projects?

Low man, very low, like some of the objection handles and some of these sales tactics we see out there in our space, like on Facebook, even in some of the groups. I mean this stuff gets downright pushy, yeah, like nails on a chalkboard cringy. I get chicken skin sometimes when I read this stuff. Just knowing that our approach is entirely wholesome with integrity, from the bottom of our hearts, trying to serve someone at the highest level and literally asking them is it wrong of us to want to do that for you?

And the answer is always no. It's not wrong. I'm sorry that you wanted to serve my family. I'm sorry that you wanted to give me options and solutions. I'm sorry that you wanted to finance me so I wouldn't have to liquidate all my assets up, you know what. So be it right.

Troubling to say the least. Man, when I see that stuff, I love our method. Obviously, we're biased, though yeah, I love how you've handled this, how you developed it in your business and realized that goal, because ultimately, your goal was to be loved, I mean accepted. Sorry to call you out, man, but that's what it came down to. You didn't want to face being salesy, right.

Yeah, one of the biggest things was as an autistic individual. We struggle with trying to fit in and I knew that communication was the hardest part of any kind of relationship that I experienced and I needed to create a framework that would allow me to communicate with others because I wanted to do good work. But you can't do good work if you're not charging more to accommodate it and you can't get that job sold unless you can communicate why you're worth it. But at the same time I didn't want to come across like some guy chewing a toothpick and flicking a nickel, like I wanted to be better than a lot of what the industry had told us we had to be.

Yeah, man, and I love that, and I love how this naturally came together, organically, really, because you've been teaching sales for years, I've been working with electricians for years and all of this just met up in 2023 and created this iceberg, this glacial mass of what is now the loop method. But what we learned through teaching sales really was there's these seven pieces that, when extracted from that sales process and put up front, we could rapidly accelerate this identity crisis that a lot of electricians are having, where maybe you're still nervous at the door and don't know what your value is. You don't really know what you're going to say. Right, you knock, or you're going to see someone for the first time. You're like I hope they like me. You ever felt like that Joe on the doorstep.

Man. You know what? There's a long period of time in my life where I just wanted to be liked by others, but it was because I didn't like myself. Once you become comfortable with who you are, the need to be liked decreases, but the thing that never changed was the desire to serve. It was, instead of I want you to like me, it was I want to help you in the ways that I can. If I'm not able to help you, then it doesn't matter whether you like me or not, because I can't help you. But if I can help you, then let me serve you at the best levels that I can, and you can choose the level of relationship we have based on these options I provide.

And that's where you and I have had similar backgrounds and kind of a similar intersection in this. Because I would just add a piece I'm an access service guy too, so that you'll love me, so that right, there's an implication there. I want to serve you so long as I have faith in this relationship that you will reward me with your love. Essentially as cheesy as that sounds, guys this is like root issue, therapeutic bullshit here, where it's like, hey, my core need is really to serve so that I can earn that love from you. Now, if you're like us and feeling that at all, then you likely it has like a serious consequence if you're to do access service and not be recognized in that way and were you gonna say something and I cut you off, Joe.

Yeah, but it's okay, because I don't remember what I was gonna say, because it's directly on point to it.

So it's all good, Steamrolled. Your brother didn't mean to that's all good man.

You know what, when you're partnering with someone with a lot of good things to say, you don't mind that they interrupt every now and then, right?

Yeah, yeah, I can appreciate that too, likewise. So what the irony really here is that when we put all these pieces together in the way that we're gonna explain on this episode is really half of it, and on part two tomorrow the other half when we get those pieces together, we get to step into our known articulated value. At that point, and that is just such a welcome man. It's like having a two can minus 30 up here north of the border right. It's like, oh my gosh, all of a sudden I feel like I can stand this. That is so important for so many, so would it be wrong of us to wanna share that with them on this episode.

It's not wrong, it's just that first part, when you said you're standing out there at negative 30, saying you can stand it, I'm like you put me anywhere at negative 30 and I'll freeze to whatever I'm touching.

Man, it's a whole other episode, but that's what I worked in for like 15 years.

Yeah, we're gonna have to talk about that we're gonna have to get it at some. You know what? Maybe we'll have an episode where we get to trade war stories.

It's the worst cold trade. I will just say that because you need dexterity, you got to have your fingers, and when you're working on like a junction box outside little WDU weedmiller, four terminals trying to use your tweaker and, oh my gosh, man Can.

I share one magic secret and then we'll pass it. Go ahead Fishing gloves. Anyone who's ever experienced ice fishing, you know that you need dexterity in order to hold your line right. Like you cannot re hook and re sink your line if you can't grab, but at the same time, what sensible person is gonna put their hand into cold water to pull the fish out? So I was gifted a really good pair of thin fishing gloves and at the time I was learning that when I was working on generators in the cold, when you're connecting your terminals to the back terminal on the control board, my knuckles would always bleed because my nose so cracked. So I started using fishing gloves anytime I was doing exterior dexterity work. So if anyone ever is out there in the cold, you have a pair of fishing gloves. Thank me later.

Yeah, fair enough, man. Good hint, good hint. All right, we better jump into this. There's a few components of the loop method that are kind of like financial solutions. It gives you some stability, some know-how. We already covered one of them, but there's some pieces that will tie directly into this. So forgive me for saying it again, but it's pricing the first thing we always fix, or at least look at, review, and it always changes to some degree, whether it's we forgot to incorporate our personal salary or we forgot some growth items, or we weren't realistic about those growth items because we were feeling like we're maybe charging too much and pulled back Right it. Or it's the material component and realizing our simple service rate. There's always some work to do on pricing. Thankfully, in this million dollar launch series we already did it, so we get to move on from that from the moment. Trip charges isn't is another one. There's a bold statement here. Do you want to make it? Yeah, I love that.

Okay. So the fun thing about trip charges is that it's going to be different than what the typical industry Standard tells you, where people are like you've got a charge for this, you've got a charge for that, it's got to be the full hour, it's got to be this, you, ours is so much simpler and more digestible to the custom. So, if I can just lightly touch on them, we're going to whatever detail you feel necessary 100%. We charge for our Diagnostics, meaning that we're going to have a flat rate. I Charged 150, but anyone can charge whatever rate they feel comfortable saying I'm going to charge for the time forming our service. We have an advanced diagnostic which goes to the next level that has a higher charge when you touch on the differences there. But the real difference when a lot of things you'll hear is that we're not charging for what we consider to be opportunity calls. So many other companies are saying I should charge any time I physically knock on the customer's door. But the reason why we call them opportunities is because that's exactly what they are. These are opportunities to build relationships in a situation where, if this customer does bond with you in the right way, you not only have the job they're currently asking for. But you've established roots into the relationship so that as projects grow in the future and as their needs grow, you're already strongly positioned to be their go-to person for life. So we're not charging for opportunities. I love that.

Yeah, and there's so much I could say about that. Maybe the better language for some people that aren't quite up to snuff with the opportunity demand, call, opportunity would be you know anywhere where you might even hear them say well, I'm gonna get estimates for this, yep, hey, we're just getting estimates, so they'll say it right on the phone. And that might bring us back to this marketing language that we see so many people do, which is, at this point, actually doesn't have a lot of value. But you ever see someone waste some space on their, on their business card or on their Website or on their van or whatever, just saying yes, and that's free estimates. Yeah, you know it's really mean anything. It's kind of what we call a platitude. At this time it doesn't, it fails the I guess so test, which is like hey, we do free estimates, I guess, so everyone does.

Yeah, additionally, the fun thing is is that, if we can give a little sneak peek in here is we actually don't call them estimates, because part of what makes us so established is that when we provide solutions, they're firm numbers that are actually calculated in the exacts. So, instead of saying this is my estimate, this is our solution. These are a range and a full menu of solutions that we provided that are custom to you and your family's direct needs. I'm not estimating anything. I'm assuring you that the cost will not exceed the numbers that you see on paper. How would you like to proceed?

Love that man. Really. Really good correction there. Yeah, being specific means so much. I think people miss that a lot. When we talk about pricing, every once in a while we see a comment. Someone says something like well, if I was charging hundreds of dollars an hour, I'd be rich too, and I think people fail to see that we're talking about a flat rate pricing that will not change and it includes all of the aspects we're talking about in this loop method. So if that's you and you're feeling that pull or compelled to say that or think that, then please stick around for the rest of this too and tomorrow's episode, because there's a ton of value in this and it's not always such a sure bet that we win if we don't do it correctly.

Casino's gotta win.

That's the thing that was absolutely win absolutely.

If you have a situation to where you're not consistent or that you're not knowledgeable of what you need to charge, suddenly the method has a lot less teeth because you need to make sure that it works in a way where the house will always win. I'm okay losing every now and then, provided that it always ends up positive 100% man love that.

So we've discussed the pricing a bit and the trip charges now for demand diagnostics or opportunity calls and how we're not gonna charge on those why? So we can create six options for a new friend and hopefully develop a relationship on that. And even if they don't hire us today, there's some superpower in there in how we carry that out to make sure that we maintain the friendship. And we've still got those six options. We still know what they need and in my opinion, having a list of what people need specifically is a superpower in itself. So you've got my vote, man. That's how we're gonna run this. Deposits.

I love deposits.

Everyone but California is gonna love this section.

Yeah, but even then, there are ways of getting past it in that regard. So if you're from California, please let's get in contact, because there are ways of actually bypassing your deposit laws. So, going further into this. We believe and I'm going to insist, and I'm dying on this hill that unless your customer is financing your project which we will get into later we are going to collect a 50% deposit. The logic behind it is this Way too often you're in a position where you take commercial work and it's either net 90 or net. In some cases I've been as much as net 120. Yuck, the fact is is that you need to fund the project in order for it to continue being an honor to do so. Now, clay, have you ever experienced this? I'm sure you have in your line of work where you wanted to work with this client. You took the project and at the beginning you're like I can't wait to serve them, but then, when the money's not there, every additional request they have feels like a waste of time instead of a. I'd love the opportunity to help you with this 100%.

Oh yeah, definitely Remember that love problem we were talking about earlier. I could feel those little chunks of our glacier slipping away. When someone's not paying, it feels like, okay, I did an act of service and I'm not getting any love for that. No respect whatsoever. It's really challenging for my demeanor.

It is, and you know what I share with you as well. Well, the deposit is what allows you to continue serving your client at the highest level without it becoming a burden. Because, let's say, you start working with someone and then halfway during the job you're realizing that they're very difficult to work with. They've got a lot of change orders, they've got a lot of project additions, they have difficulties with scheduling or respect time or whatever it is. If you're unpaid and experiencing these things, it's a pretty big personal hit and it's hard to regain your emotional points. But if you know that the bank is secured and that you're already, no matter what happens, even if they ghost you on the remaining payment, you're not losing money on this job. Your ability of serving at a higher level is far greater than in any other process that I've personally experienced. We must always say it is a pleasure to be of service to you and mean it. The moment we stop meaning it is when it stops actually being of value to the customer. So I will always say when you have a job, the job is not sold unless there is 50% in your hand.

Yeah, I love that. And to tie this back to the first piece, pricing, which we haven't dealt a ton with on this episode, but we did touch on it. If the pricing set right, then most often our residential electricpreneurs will find themselves somewhere between 50% to 60% gross profit margin in an ideal situation. So if you're collecting, what that means is that if you're collecting 50% upfront, then you're already covered for your labor and your material for that project, and that is huge. I've heard Joe say this before. Just to put this on the schedule that's an interest-free loan from your customers to make sure that you've got a spot for them. So isn't that huge for them too, correct?

You know. The fact is that if my schedule is so full that I'm going to rearrange it in order to accommodate you and yet then you decide to pull out because you had no financial commitment such as a deposit, technically I rearranged other people's lives. I've rearranged, I took office admin time, I've paid to get that schedule free. But if I say you know what, I want to help you. But in order to help you, it's now going to take office resources to even give you that time, because I can only serve people who truly need or want my services. This is what secures your place on that calendar. Now it's not a. I'm just doing it to cover material, because some customers will be like, well, material can't possibly be 50%. You're right. Part of this is also included in our service and the ability that we come to serve you before, during and after. And in order to serve you before, we need to be present and therefore that's where your deposit comes into play.

Absolutely, Absolutely. John's joined us live in the Facebook engagements there. It makes the job run smoother with a clear mind. 100%. John, couldn't agree with you more. Thank you for joining us with that. The last piece we have to touch on this we've got to fit it in today. Yet is this financing piece that you already did. Just skip over there quickly, Joe. How important is financing to this loop method and what we're trying to do in this million dollar launch series?

It's, I want to say, essential, but I feel like it's a little bit more than that, and the reason being is that, could you imagine? You took the time to bond with a customer, you sat down with them, you designed a range of choices. You put six different options together. You've bonded, you've built, you sat down, you presented. They loved it. They were like Clay, this is the best option I have ever seen. How much does this cost? I want this. And then they say if I had 10,000, I would 100% do it. Clay, I would do that one today. I just don't have the means of doing it. And then nothing happens and they have to take your $200 bottom fix because it's all they could swing. It's like filling a balloon and not even popping it. It's just that long, drawn out, annoying squeak as you let the air out of it.

Yeah.

On that topic of love.

I feel like it's like two cruise ships and you're reaching out and touching each other's fingers and they're just slipping away. Oh no, mama, that's an interesting thing. We have looking at it too, right.

Yeah, exactly so continuing on with it. It's the concept of if the customer wants to work with you, there has to be a reason that makes you different than someone else. So at the time when I started getting into financing, no one was financing in our area. It was you're in electrician. You're charging $100 an hour. I'm going to pay you cash or I'm going to write you a checkmate out to cash and that's how business is done, but I'm not going to show up and quote you a $9,000 job and expect you to tear open your mattress with a knife and start pulling $100 bills out of it. There's got to be something that allows you to move forward. So the financing was an additional tool. That said, if you want to invest in your future because clearly this is more than what you were expecting to run into today, but you can agree that this is going to solve your problems before, during and after this will give you better comfort. This will be for better convenience, this will be better use, better enjoyability, and it's only $300 a month. Now the person who would have taken a $200 total job can swing a $300 a month because they can see the enjoyment and they can get the benefits now, while also not having to gut their assets and sell their car in order to pay for it 100%.

man couldn't agree more. Also, just a little tidbit, not that I want to take this one too far off or too long, but if they do happen to cut open the mattress and start providing you with cash, we would deposit it in the bank. I just want to say that. If it wasn't accounted for, it didn't happen. Guys, we're aiming for a million dollar launch. I want the KPI. I want to know how we did. I want to be squeaky clean at the end of this year not looking for money, but looking at it, and for that reason, any cash payments are going into the bank, just so we're clear, legit, squeaky clean. Now John said something credit cards fixed 95% of those problems. Here's an interesting one. I'll tie it right into financing. We work with hearth. Not everyone's a huge fan of hearth. We are. Here's the main reason I don't want to add any resistance items to this flat rate proposal, meaning I don't want to add any fees at all. What you see is what you pay, nothing more. Therefore, I want to actually account for financing fees ahead of ever offering it, so that financing with us is a seamless experience. One of the things this is an unpaid advertisement, by the way we just really prefer hearth. One of the things hearth does is they can do a soft credit check and just see what credit items do they have. Do they have a credit card worth $30K? If they're a homeowner, they likely do. If they do, hearth will just match it with their own little line of credit card. It takes minutes. It's a super simple method. It's one of the reasons as well, as they're a flat rate company, meaning you pay up front for the service, not a bunch of fees every time you use it down the road. Did I miss anything there, joe?

No, I feel like the best part about hearth was the fact that you could roll it into your service price. As a result, you know for a fact that I don't have to add anything because it's already accounted for. Then I can truly offer an ethical 0% to my customer and be able to be like there are 0% options, there are choices you can take. Saying we don't charge interest is a great benefit, because now your customer has less risk less emotional risk as well of locking themselves into something that they're paying extreme amounts of interest on.

It's just an additional tool in your tool belt 100% and John Stain might need to check into them. If any of you listening whether in the replay, or live with us, if you're interested in finding out more about hearth, we actually have a contact that you'll be able to reach out to direct through us using our link. That could save you hundreds of dollars on that. If you're interested, please reach out to us again, either on Facebook or even on our website in the contact form. Just let us know you're looking for that hearth referral. You save some money. Everybody wins just a little industry bonus there. Joe, let's wrap up a couple of action items and get ourselves out of this loop. Method part one, before we go any deeper with any of these topics, sounds good to me. All right, man. So do you want the basic or the ulcer?

I could take either one. Do you have a preference?

You know what I'm going to take the basic. Okay, come on, and I think it's near the end. I think this one's huge, I think one of the biggest things we can do today. Of course, aside from, obviously, in this launch method we're using the loop method. I mean, it's proven. Dan was just on. He did a million dollar launch. We're doing some of the same stuff here, most of the same stuff. I mean, if it worked, why do anything different?

So I prefer really prefer consistency and predictability over you winging it like a cowboy 100%.

So what this is going to help us do biggest thing we're going to acknowledge, define our loop method specifics and step into that value, and what that means for me is so big. I think this is one of the biggest things that we do for people honestly, entrepreneurs specifically is help them step into and claim that value. So, as a basic action, we're starting the loop method and we're doing that by making sure our price is defined and articulated on a worksheet. We're going to make sure that those trip charges are laid out and articulated so that you and I are on the same page and that's literally written down so that everyone who joins us on this mission gets to know that too, in this value Right, we're absolutely committing to deposits and we're absolutely going to sign up for hearth financing. Now, that was just the basic. I'm hoping I didn't take everything from you as an All-Star.

No, no, we got a good one. So the All-Star action is more of a mental exercise, but it's going to have big impacts as you run into service calls All right. So naturally, using the loop method, we are going to be more of a premium investment than the competitors that are likely in your area and, as a result, it may make sense that someone's going to come to you and question why you charge what you charge. Now, the important part here is you all of us right now will say yes, we agree what we're doing, we believe in this and we're willing to articulate it. But it's much harder to articulate something to a customer who's red in the face and telling you they're taking advantage of them and not being able to access that memory of why you're doing what you're doing. So the All-Star action, I hear, is not just doing the method but mentally coming up with three to four reasons why you're doing this method that would directly benefit the customer. Things such as I understand that we're more of an investment, but because here at Service Electrical we never cut corners on quality, reliability or customer service, was it wrong of us to want to provide that for your family? Things along those lines allow you to detract and take away from you know what? You're trying to take advantage of me. No, I'm trying to serve you and here's how. If you can position that around, you'll cut away the needs of multiple objections because you're solving it from an emotional standpoint and once they're in logic, you're clearly the right fit.

So why not take that out? I love that man. Good finish, we got to get off here. We are absolutely out of time Overtime. This has been another episode Episode 241 again, joe, part one of the Loop Method, and another episode in the Million Dollar Launch Series, which has now been absolutely crucial for so many people. We're getting tons of wins, lots of feedback, so keep on listening guys, keep joining us for more episodes, more interviews and more value here as we help you master your sales, simplify your pricing and deliver premium-level electrical service. We'll see you again on the next episode for part two of this Loop Method. Hang on, see you all soon. Bye-bye.