Ep 262 - Am I Premium Yet?

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to yet another episode of Electric Preneur Secrets, the Electricians podcast. I am your host, clay Neumeyer, and with me, as always, my esteemed co-host, joseph Lucani. We are the Electric Preneurs, a couple of master electricians with business addictions, here and ready to serve, serve how Well. We're going to help you master your sales, simplify your pricing and deliver premium level electrical service. We've been doing that five days a week, so welcome to today's daily freemium coach. Call the admission cost for you, sit back in the hot seat, take everything we give, just promise to take action and let us know how it's working out for you. Give us that feedback because we'd love to hear it. We live off it. We're absolutely seething for it, joe, how are you doing today, brother?

Man, I'm doing great. I love seeing you get animated over things. It's like one of my favorite things. We're like, you know what, Receiving over. We need it. It's like we need that, but you know what? What I do need is this very strong coffee, which has been like I almost could just give it a hug today. On camera it's like, oh, I love my warm coffee.

I've got my stomachs right here.

You know what? It's funny. It's like people ask how you like it. I'm like black and strong enough to show up on a drug test.

There you go. You want to have the shivers for a few hours after right.

You already know man.

Oh yeah, man Speaking of which, you must be sore on this day from all the shoveling snow.

You know what, though? I have a really top tier snowblower that just eats the snow, and I'm really okay with it, but it's so old and it's so heavy that I'm actually sore physically pushing it. Right, that's funny, at least as long as I'm not shoveling snow, that's all that matters.

That's funny. Well, today's episode we got great stuff. We're going to answer this question Am I premium yet? Am I premium yet? And if you're asking that, it's possible that we're missing a couple of things. So why don't we go over those things today and really outline what it means to be a premium service provider? I mean gosh, I may have got complacent on this. I feel like the whole podcast is about premium. I hope we've defined this before, but let's take a crack at it again. Man, how do you define a premium service provider?

So it's often, if you don't know what something is, I've often found the best thing to do is look at its inverse, like look at what the lack of premium service would be, and then you compare us in notes. Then you can establish your base. So what would the opposite of premium service be? It would be you're not showing up on time, don't answer phones. Yeah, don't answer your phones or you got a cricket phone that you turn off every now and then, Leaving a mess. Leaving a mess. Are you making sure that? Are you showing up on consistently? Are you able to give options in your choices? Does the customer know the price is in advance?

Let me tie into that one. Let me tie into that one, good. And or is this like a time material situation where we keep upping the ante, in other words, changing the price that was agreed upon in the first place?

Oh, that is awesome, you know, like as an example, like, let me let me, how was your warranty? I ended up getting my entire office redone and I had all new flooring put in and the person that I used I thought was a good contractor and he installed everything really nicely. But when it came time to warranty things because somehow now the floor is cracking after a year, oh well, you're going to have to go through the manufacturer. Oh, but the manufacturer needs to do that. Yeah, I didn't save any of the receipts, sorry. Hmm, are you that guy? Or are you the kind of person that says you know what? We did install it and you know what? We were the ones responsible for saving the receipts. Let me coordinate this on your behalf rather than oh well, if you need to hire me for something, I'll do it for less, but like you know, sorry, yeah, brutal, here's one.

Do you open up drywall and leave a hole for the homeowner to figure it out?

Or even worse, do you not tell them that there's going to be a hole, like how many times have you gone through where the customer says, well, what are you doing? Well, I had to get the wire here somehow. Well, how do they know that? Did you preview the box? Obviously, we can go further and further into what are you not doing so like we've gotten these things? If you're, that guy probably isn't the place for you right, Don't stop me just yet.

I've got a really good one that needs to come up. Oh all right, Go for it. Then it's like vomit here. I'm fast forwarding to the objection handles. Does your objection handle just point to other people being shittier than you? Oh, that is not premium service. Oh yeah. We can both agree, you don't want Chuck in a truck to do this and reach out for a handshake. Oh, oh, wait, or slide the pen across the table. Yeah, yeah, just sign here.

Just sign here, right? You take your time with this.

Okay, yeah, so I'm done.

Okay. So knowing that we're trying to figure out what does it look like in its inverse? So knowing what the customer did not receive, allows you to establish your base. The way that I consider premium service is is your intention to help them before, during and after. If you can do that in one sentence, that is premium service.

Can I add like two nuggets to this, just to make it a little bit rounded Sure With values and tension? Ooh, To maintain integrity throughout the before, during and after and to maintain consistent communication and accountability. I think if you have those three things and what you said before, during and after, you can wholly say that you're premium service, Correct?

So the logic would be let's say you start with the before. What does before look like If the customer calls? Do they hit your voicemail? If they do, either you yourself need to get on the phones more consistently or you need to hire a CSR. That would be the first. That would be premium service. Second, can they schedule them same day, or is it give us a call back? If you can't schedule them, at least not do the physical work. If you can't get them on the calendar, that's an issue as well. So does someone answer the phone? Can you get me on the calendar? Are you transparent with your pricing over the phone so they have an understanding of what the dispatch is going to be? Do they understand you're going to provide them with options? Do you show up in a uniform? Doesn't have to be something that you physically make. It could be literally I'm wearing a basic button down and a pair of Dickies pants and matching your boots.

I think that's important. It doesn't have to be crazy, that's a massive importance. Because at some point and we're getting into this on this one you've got to act as if, too, when you're early into this, if you're bootstrapping premium service, as we talked about on the million dollar launch, it doesn't necessarily mean that you've got a brand new van with a full van wrap. Yes, we're trying to get there. Why? Because it looks clean, it shows clean, it's got premium curb appeal. But service is an activity, it's an action, a verb that we're taking. It's not the look, that's the noun of it. Does that make sense? It does.

Yeah. So, in other words, what you're trying to say is that, though we all believe like we've heard it from people as well where they're like well, I'm not premium yet, because I think premium would be having a full staff and having vans and a lot and making sure that we can get everyone in the same, Of course. Yeah, that sounds like a pretty established organization. But the fact that they even want that for their customers and that they're making active efforts every day to get towards that, I feel that itself is already the premium mindset. Because what would the typical contractor do? Are they always forward thinking on how to improve the experience of their customer, or are they thinking what can we do to just improve margins? How can we get in and get out faster?

I love that you said that Forward, thinking for sure about the experience of the customer, not just the margins, and without going too much detail. The value driver formula that we've referenced a few times really has just four components. We need the ability to create custom options that enable our clients to have a greater desired outcome, or dream outcome, as you might call it. Then we need the matching, reviews and testimony and guarantees and offer and warranty, like you said, to maximize the probability of success and minimize the risk to our client. Then we need to remove time delay, like you said, answering the phone, getting back to people right away, communicating always so they're never guessing what's next or wondering when you're going to finish or what's going to happen. And then, lastly, is the effort and sacrifice tying right back to that dream outcome. Can you tie a complete job into the picture? Can you tie in a service that doesn't leave people hanging, with more phone calls to make, more checks to write, more personal efforts to take? And I think, if you have the intent to provide those values in your service, that that's the general framework for premium service. To begin with, it's not that they all choose that whole platinum level, but it's that they all have the choice.

That's key right there, and I love that because that ties into something I was thinking. Have you ever heard someone say, well, they don't pay me for that, or they don't want to pay me for that, meaning like, hey, well, why don't you dig the trench? Well, they're not gonna wanna pay an electrician to dig. Well, why aren't you receding the lawn? Well, they're not gonna pay an electrician to do that. Well, why aren't you sparkling in painting, like you see where we're going with that, where it seems like a lot of not my job mentality. Yep, cause you just assume that they wouldn't wanna pay your rate to do something that's not physically twisting wires. Go ahead.

I don't wanna interrupt your flow, but there's something that's like a stake in the earth here, cause I was on a call with someone the other day and I know a lot of people have this going on but they had the aha moment with the reseeding and the making sure that grade was correct in the next season, right, or the next spring season, summer season. And they had the aha moment with me on the strategy call and they said literally out loud they're like gosh, I've got that in my contract that that work is by others to make sure that I don't get stuck with it. And the aha was truly we can reduce contract and increase options. And it becomes so obvious with the choice they selected and you confirming that they're aware there were better and lower choices available that it's right above. You didn't choose that grade correction and seeding. We would be happy to provide that for you.

Yeah, cause if you think about it like you're going through and saying, well, if it's not me, who's it going to be? Also, if it's up to, if it's to be, it's up to me, with the thought processes, going through and saying, you know what? What I can do is, yeah, I may be able to think that they're going to find a cheaper painter maybe a guy who paints on the side. Maybe they want to do it themselves. Or, wild thought, maybe they'd be willing to pay the additional to have you do it. So it's done on schedule, it's on time, it's a controlled outcome and they know it's a complete package. Would they be willing to pay premium for it? You won't know until you ask. Simply just put the offer there and say this is what it looks like for me to do everything and entirety for this project. You will literally sit back, I'll pour you a drink and you could watch me work and the only thing you have to do is write the check. Everything else is accounted for. Love it. That is a premium experience. So, instead of saying I'm not going to do this because they won't pay it, find out if they're willing to pay it by simply offering it.

Yep. And then I think what you said earlier and tying this full circle back into the aftercare is super important. As we've discussed many times, there's nothing worse than that feeling after a big sale or a big purchase, as a homeowner, as a person, as a consumer, than being left to the cliff where the experience drops off and there's just nothing after that. I assume this person didn't choose the highest option or an option that included a club membership, where they could expect us to reach out and we could expect to also make further offers in that relationship. So why wouldn't we? That's the obvious one. How about we're nothing more as expected and we're just servicing that relationship? How about the aftercare intent to just make sure the client's happy and continually thinking about us still as we are them and all of their future needs?

So think of that as a good example. I think that's awesome. A good thing that just comes to mind is our outreach program. Imagine they didn't choose any kind of additional relationship with us, but we just installed their panel for them. We just changed it, did a service change. Obviously, they don't think it needs to reach our maintenance. Would we be justified one year anniversary later saying, hey, I know that we've installed this for you and we offer a lifetime guarantee on everything we do, just to ensure that everything's been settling correctly over time? We just wanted to do a one year anniversary inspection on the system, as well as everything that's connected to it, just to ensure that everything's working the way it needs to. Then, while we're there, we could be bringing up the additional options that they didn't choose the first time. Because you know what? Hey, while we're here, I want to guarantee that no prices ever get raised on you. I know you had these offers made and they're only valid for this year's time. So before, is it safe to say that you just don't want any of these and you're not ever going to take action on this? Oh, you will when? Then you can move forward and transition to an even further relationship.

Love it, man, love it. Is there anything else we need to add to this one? We're going to get a bit long here, for my careful If we're getting long, then we can always cut it short.

There's always more time for more.

Maybe one of the action items can tie in the act as if and maybe that's where we'll start as basic. How does that sound? I'm down with it.

You want to have your own ticket.

I'll start it If you feel I left anything out. Jump on in Kind of a combined effort here, because act as if is really important and we did mention it briefly in the bootstrap in the early stages of becoming premium and just deciding. What we've found is that people jump on the inside track and with our loop method it becomes very apparent, like this podcast, what premium service maybe thoughts were versus what they are now, when you realize, oh, here's all the moving pieces and this loop method creates that repeat business through repeat sales with repeat clients. That's a wonderful thing. And in realizing that, it doesn't mean you have to go full wrap your van today before you can step into that role. And it doesn't mean you have to, as you mentioned, buy the whole uniform or even have a new van or have brand new boots and belt. You don't need brand new. The only thing you need is to act as if, embody that body of knowledge, step into the role and believe in yourself in actually taking action on it. Does that make sense, joe? Do you want to add it onto it?

It makes sense. I do want to add something that I think people can tangibly work on with it, and that is have you ever experienced someone, or like you just walked into like a trade show or into like a contractors conference and you can just kind of tell who the confident ones were?

Absolutely. Yeah, some people are maybe shy and a little bit just timid and you're like do they believe in their product?

Yeah. So the thing is is that? Imagine you were walking past a booth and you're going to judge whether you want to give the person attention based on their level of confidence. That's the thing about acting as if you're not selling a product. You're selling the experience of your confidence, which is the thought of someone saying you know what I want to be the best, and the only way to be the best is by choosing to be a 1% better every single day, and it has to start somewhere. You can be at zero, agree to be 1% better every day and still end up premium, or you could be at nine and you just need a little more steps to get to 10. Regardless, acting as if is simply saying I am going to do everything in my power to embody, as you said, the knowledge that I do contain.

Yeah, you know what? Can I jump right into the All Star then? Because that was a good question and I just got to say you don't need to be on the inside track to be premium. That's not the suggestion here. Yes, we tied the loop method in here, but honestly, this podcast may have been the most direct, with great questions in the beginning of what is not premium service. And if you truly reflected on this podcast, if you went back and listened again and wrote those questions down and you truly put intention into answering the inverse of the first questions and following with all the second the suggestions of premium service then you too could implement your own systems just by this suggestion. That would be premium service and I 100% believe that. So why not go ahead and do that as the All Star? Yeah, I like that. Just get started. That's simple, guys, this has been another episode of Electricpreneurs Secrets, the Electricians podcast, where me and my partner Joe show up five days a week, try to help you master your sales, simplify your pricing and, of course, and especially today, deliver premium level electrical service. I don't doubt that we've helped you with that, but, of course, leave some reviews. Let us know your feedback. Are you premium service provider. Yet we're going to see you guys again tomorrow. Thanks, joe, be well, it's wonderful seeing you.