As a contractor, your success depends heavily on your service technicians' success as salespeople. What are some of the impediments to service technician sales, and how can we get people who don't want to be salespeople to sell more?
Lack of product knowledge
One of the biggest impediments to service techs selling is a lack of product training. Techs often feel that such things as Indoor Air Quality Products (IAQ) and service agreement sales are just something bosses want them to sell to make the company more money.
When I train on IAQ sales, even in companies where I'm told in advance that their techs know all about them, I always start with technical training. I use my education in chemistry and physics to explain in laymen's terms exactly how such products as UV lights, ionic air purifiers, and humidifiers work, and why they are absolutely necessary. I also include my own first-hand experiences with these products and how they have enhanced my life.
I always know I've done my job when the techs I'm training ask the owner of the company how much these products would cost them, and install them in their own residences.
At the company I helped start and run, I made our techs such believers in UV lights, that every single employee in the company had at least one UV light in their system (including renters) and recommended them on every call.
When I first started in the business I didn't believe in service agreements. I was one of those people who thought their sole purpose was to make the boss more money. Then I bought my own home. After living there just a few days, I came home on a Friday evening and discovered that the main electric breaker had gone bad. I went into a panic as I opened the Yellow Pages® (this was a while ago) and wondered what kind of extra surcharges I'd have to pay to get an electrician out to my home on a weekend after hours. Then I saw the ad for the electrician I'd been subcontracting to do the electrical upgrades I'd sold as part of a job. I immediately felt a sense of relief. Even though I felt pressed for time, I took a moment to digest the thought that the true value of a service agreement is the fact that, when you've got one, you've got an established relationship with a service provider. That's when I became a believer in service agreements and started adding them to my Paper Towel Close (PTC), and selling one on just about every job.
I didn't recommend IAQ or service agreements for the extra money, I recommended them because I felt they were a necessity. When your techs truly believe in their necessity, they're more likely to bring it up during service calls.
It takes too long to sell.
It does take too much time to sell when you don't know what you're doing.
When you let your PTC do the talking for you, it doesn't take long at all. Most of the replacement systems I've sold, I did it without even bringing up the topic of replacing their equipment.
The procedure is simple. All I do is perform a thorough inspection, and write up the PTC, listing things in order of priority. More specifically, at the top of the list I write what it would take to get them heating or cooling, and a service agreement, then strike a subtotal.
Next, I list any additional deficiencies I see that do not necessarily require addressing today, but will be giving them trouble and additional expenses in the near future, and another subtotal.
Below that, I write the additional amount it would be to replace their system, without even pointing it out. They'll see it, and ask, "What is this? That's how much a new one would cost?"
I say, "Yes. Usually, when someone sees how much it would cost to keep their old equipment, they ask me how much a new one would be, so I just wrote it down for you."
It's very common for them to say, "Well, I'd be foolish to put this much money into the old one when it's just going to keep giving me trouble."
I just say, "So, you want the new one?"
They want to get home at a decent hour
I find this to also be the biggest impediments to service technician selling. I give customers the opportunity to get their equipment as close to its original operating condition as possible, so two out of three of my service calls resulted in pulling and cleaning the blower, which usually also resulted in me having to clean their indoor coil. If they want to avoid those expenses in the future, they can also get some IAQ.
It takes time to do all that, and it results in a higher average service call, but you can only do that much work on a call two or three times per work day. If you're insisting that your techs run 6-10 calls per day, or no one goes home until we see everyone who's called that day, your techs are going to try to get away with doing one simple task per call, and you'll probably lose money on every one of those calls.
They may be properly incentivized
When you ask most people if they're money motivated, they'll typically give you a knee-jerk reaction and say they are. I have actually met very few service techs that are truly money motivated and, unfortunately, a lot of those are, are the type that "over sell."
Even though our current generation of workers appear to be broker than ever, I still don't believe they're money motivated. Time and again I hearing that time off work is one of the best incentives.
A sales incentive I've seen work especially well is setting a policy where, once a technician hits a certain dollar volume for the day or the week, whichever you decide, they get to go home.
Ride-alongs are key
Every contractor wants their customers to have the same experience, no matter which tech runs the call. The only way to do that is to find out what they're doing on calls, and sharing with your team the things they're doing that work, and the things they're doing that aren't working. The only way to find that out is to actually see what they're doing in the field. That means ride-alongs.
One of the quickest and most effective ways to increase the volume from your service trucks is to ride with each tech, then conduct a service meeting on the following day.
The agenda is simply for everyone to turn in the paperwork generated since the last meeting. You or their supervisor quickly review each service invoice. You then pick out two or three of the calls that look interesting, and have the techs tell you what was said and done during the call, from the greeting at the door, to the final good-bye.
Charlie Greer is the creator of “Tec Daddy’s Service Technician Survival School on DVD,” the video series that provides contractors with a year’s supply of short, pre-planned technician training meetings. For only the second time in history, it's on sale for half price. For Charlie’s speaking schedule, information on his products and seminars, call 800/963-HVAC (4822), visit www.hvacprofitboosters.com or email him at [email protected].