Ecmweb 7023 Electrical Home Inspection Promo
Ecmweb 7023 Electrical Home Inspection Promo
Ecmweb 7023 Electrical Home Inspection Promo
Ecmweb 7023 Electrical Home Inspection Promo
Ecmweb 7023 Electrical Home Inspection Promo

Creating Customers for Life

Jan. 22, 2014
Training your electricians how to communicate the benefits of a safety inspection will help you establish a loyal customer base.

As an electrical contractor, you’re probably always looking for new customers to keep your residential services business busy and profitable. That’s smart, but make sure you don’t overlook the customers you already have. It’s been estimated that there is a seven-year cycle time between service calls for a residential service electrician. Couple that with the high cost of marketing for new customers, and it becomes obvious that we need to do our best to keep the ones we have and create value for our services so our existing customers will want to see us more often.

Make it routine

As most of us know, our automobiles are recommended to undergo an annual safety inspection, and it’s common to perform maintenance then or at shorter schedules as dictated by the indicators on the dashboard. We’ve become accustomed to this yearly safety inspection. But in the electrical trade, we haven’t created a similar understanding of maintenance requirements for home electrical systems. When we bring our car in for its annual inspection, the mechanic usually recommends work to be performed now in order to prevent more costly repairs later.

Similarly, the HVAC industry has shown their customers that the value of an annual tune-up will result in optimum performance and lower fuel and electric costs during the season. If we are to become a full-service residential electrical contractor, then we need to truly elevate the level of our services and offer clients a value-based reason why they need to use our services more frequently. A properly performed electrical safety inspection can be just such an answer.

Bill Murdy
It’s not that this recommendation hasn’t already been made. The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) has a full standard focused on this topic: NFPA 73, Standard for Electrical Inspections for Existing Dwellings. This is an excellent reference for use in creating a technician checklist. The Electrical Safety Foundation International (ESFI) also advises homeowners to have their homes electrically inspected. The ESFI says this is especially important for homes more than 40 years old, homes that have added appliances or gone through a major renovation and are more than 10 years old, and recently purchased existing homes.

We can follow these guidelines and encourage customers to have their electrical systems inspected every year. An inspected system can indicate safety hazards and find breakdowns before they occur — saving costly repairs and at the same time show customers we really care. Proper scheduling of these calls can also help fill slow times. By adding in incentives during these inspections, we can encourage work to be performed while our technicians are on site.

Points to consider

Keep the following three things in mind when you are trying to convince your existing customers of the need for an annual safety inspection.

1. Educate and create value from the initial phone call. Have your customer service representative lay the groundwork for your service technician by mentioning and differentiating your company from the competition by offering an abridged version of your safety inspection for all new customers.

2. You are the electrical expert. Make sure your electricians are properly trained, and convey this to your customers. When your electrician leaves the home, a customer should have the peace of mind in knowing that his or her house has been at least visibly inspected and any issues have been brought to mind. Most customers don’t read the latest electrical code or pay attention to new products that could make their homes safer and their lives easier. It’s your job to educate them on what’s available.

Train your electricians on how to sell the value of an annual safety inspection.

For example, new technology in smoke detectors, AFCIs, GFCIs, tamper-resistant receptacles, and other life safety devices are all important products that you should make your customers aware of. Show them the safety benefits these products offer and why they need an expert to install them in their homes. If serious safety issues exist that your customers don’t wish to address, at least have them acknowledge that they’ve been informed about them and chose to forego repair.

Remember that your technicians are the key to making this work. They must understand and believe in the importance of safety and need to be trained on how to talk to your customers about it. A technician who rushes through a job (i.e., has a mind-set to find the problem quickly, repair it, and move on to the next job) will not create a customer for life. Train your technician to take his time, communicate with the customer, make recommendations, and then offer the customer different options for upgrading or improving an electrical system. Customers appreciate having options and the ability to choose what is right for them and their budget.

3. Create incentives for safety repairs or upgrades. It’s important to make your customer feel appreciated. By offering them special discounts toward safety upgrades, you create a win-win situation. Your company benefits by increased sales with no additional cost of acquisition, and your customer benefits as you pass savings onto them while increasing the safety of their homes.

As you build the importance of annual safety inspections, you’ll be rewarded with loyal customers, a more steady flow of work, and increased profitability — all with no increased cost.                   

Murdy grew up in the electrical industry and holds a degree in electrical engineering. He has been in the residential electrical service industry for 30 years and has been a business owner for more than 25 years. He independently owns and operates the Mister Sparky electric franchise serving western Long Island, N.Y. He can be reached at [email protected].

About the Author

Bill Murdy | Owner

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