My wife has always been great at the finishing touch. Whether it be baking a cake, decorating for a party, or wrapping a present. She has an incredible knack for making the finished product look amazing. Before we got married, my idea of wrapping a present was a colorful sack and — if you were lucky — some matching tissue paper. That doesn’t fly anymore in the Hagan household, mainly because my wife has taken over in that area and everyone has benefited from it. The time and detail she takes to make a gift look “perfect” still to this day blows my mind. A gift wrapped by my wife says, “You are important to me,” and “I took extra time and care on your present because you are worth it.”
In the service world, we spend a lot of our time and training on getting the call, closing the call, and collecting on the call. But what we’re missing could be costing us thousands of dollars on callbacks, repeat business, and referral business. My question to you is: Are you putting the finishing touch on every service call you make? If your answer is no, then you might want to follow these five recommendations.
Note: All five of these items should come after you have cleaned up and collected payment. In other words, these are the very last things you do before you get into your truck and drive away.
1. Walk the job with the client.
There are several reasons why this is, and should be, crucial/mandatory on every service call.
- Take the client to your work area and show them what you did and point out that you cleaned and vacuumed the area. This builds so much value, especially with the clients who may have felt the price was higher than expected.
- Explain how to reset a GFCI and a breaker. Also, tell them the reasons why it would trip in the first place.
- If you installed motion-activated lights, explain how to reset the sensitivity of the sensor because there is a high likelihood that someone will mess with the switch at some point.
These acts will help decrease the amount of callbacks and could save your company time and money.
2. Explain your warranties and guarantees.
We offer an on-time guarantee, 100% satisfaction guarantee on any work we do, and a 5-year warranty on any repair. Those far exceed anything our competition offers. We like to tell our customers that they have a “no-lose” proposition with us. But I’ll be honest. When we first joined the franchise and found out we had to honor a 100% satisfaction guarantee, along with an on-time guarantee, it scared the “you know what” out of me. I thought we would get raked over the coals by our clients taking advantage of those guarantees. I’m happy to report that this hasn’t been the case. When your clients see those warranties and guarantees, it helps them understand that they are getting a premium service, and they appreciate it. I want our customers to be so wowed by what we offer that they would never imagine doing business with anyone else.
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3. Ask for reviews
I talked about the importance of online reviews in one of my past articles (see the April 2016 issue). This is something that needs to become one of your top priorities. You should be tracking your online reviews just like you track any other key performance indicator (KPI). We take time to cover reviews every week in one of our training classes. We praise the guys with good reviews, and we learn from any negative reviews we may receive. Spend time training your electricians on how to ask for reviews and have competitions throughout the year where you reward your electricians for good reviews.
4. Ask for referrals
This is not as tough as it may sound, but it is without a doubt a training issue. If you don’t train your people to ask for referrals, they simply will not do it. Here’s a scenario of how easy it can be.
“Joe, I know you just said that you were very happy with the work that we’ve done here today and that you would be writing us a review. I really appreciate that. I have only one more thing I’d like to ask, if you don’t mind. If you have any friends or family that may have electrical work they need done, will you please pass our number along to them? Remind them to ask for me. I’d love to help them, too. Here are a few referral cards. Your friend can get a discount, and we’ll send you a $25 check for the referral.”
5. Self-evaluate
This is very important for the electrician’s professional growth. When they’ve completed their job, drive to the nearest parking lot and find a place to park. Have a notepad available to jot down some notes and review the job in your mind step-by-step. Write down the positive parts of the call that you remember. It’s also very important to jot down things you could’ve done better. I always train our guys that when they’re doing a self-evaluation to not play the blame game. It won’t help anyone if you lie to yourself. In other words,
- Don’t blame it on a bad call.
- Don’t blame it on a bad customer.
- Don’t blame it on the time of year.
- Don’t blame it on the customer’s financial situation.
Just be honest with yourself and find the things that you could do better. That’s the only thing you can control.
Hagan is a second-generation electrician. He owns and operates the Mister Sparky locations serving Northwest Arkansas, Oklahoma City, and Tulsa, Okla. He oversees a staff of 30, which includes electricians and technicians. He can be reached at [email protected].
