sales person or service techs??

Steven Button

Steven Button

Administrator
open question to all...

If you have employees (or are planning to), what did you or would you have first - sales staff or service techs? (why?)

Need to get my business priorities sorted...

It's probably different for everyone, but would be good to hear some thoughts and discussion.

Any info on pay scales/salaries, WC expense, payroll expense, insurance and training is appreciated.
 
Well you may look at what you want to do and what your strengths are. I would probably go with Techs first. One, no one I have found yet can sell my company and my services better than me. Two when I line up work I like to have people in place to fo the work. I will tell you a secret, I don't like cleaning hoods, sometimes I get wet and dirty, I would much rather be home sleeping and making money from my bed. Also, your techs could end up being great sales people for you down the road because as they learn first hand what you expect on a job they may be a natural fit in selling that to your customers. Some times a salesperson will just go out and try to make a dollar no matter what and line up a bunch of crap work that maybe you really would have rather passed on. Just a couple of ideas.
 
Sentinel said:
Well you may look at what you want to do and what your strengths are. I would probably go with Techs first. One, no one I have found yet can sell my company and my services better than me. Two when I line up work I like to have people in place to fo the work. I will tell you a secret, I don't like cleaning hoods, sometimes I get wet and dirty, I would much rather be home sleeping and making money from my bed. Also, your techs could end up being great sales people for you down the road because as they learn first hand what you expect on a job they may be a natural fit in selling that to your customers. Some times a salesperson will just go out and try to make a dollar no matter what and line up a bunch of crap work that maybe you really would have rather passed on. Just a couple of ideas.
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I have to agree with Trey, I like being home sleeping, playing with the kids or on th BB's instead of getting wet washing LOL

Really I agree with Treys post. My guys make me money every day. I do all my own sales and do see a day when I might bring in a salesperson, for one reason to get more jobs and hire more Tech to do all the extra work

There are some businesses that need salepeople right away. I think the PW biz if you can do the sales at first and continue to grow thats cool. If you arent good at all at doing sales a saleperson is an option you should look into. Steve I have a feeling you are pretty good at sales thou

Jeff
 
Jeff, can I hire you as a sales person? You get me sales down here, bring your equipment (cause mine def. isn't made for all the bigger jobs), and Ill buy you lunch and dinner everyday and you make 35%. How does that sound?

All kidding aside, I see myself as a very very poor sales person, so far I let my flyers and website do the talking. It's getting to a point where that doesn't neccesarily work anymore, so probably next year I will be looking into some help in the sales aspect of the business.
 
I would definitely hire sales first. In fact, that's where I've seen myself going wrong up to this point, not doing it sooner. That is my situation though, I am a very quiet person and sales is definitely not my forte. I agree with Jeff and Trey that I'd rather be with my kids or something else instead of washing. I just need to get there a different way by hiring sales first so I can in turn hire techs and enjoy the high life like Jeff:)
 
Thanks for the thoughts guys...

If I had the means - I would hire both sales and techs!!!

Need to have a definite focus for the first 6 months of next year and am leaning towards having someone sell - at the moment my priority is exposure, growth and recognition (just isn't happening with only me doing the face-to-face).

Did many/any of you start your biz with 'staff' from the outset... or did you grow from 'owner/operator' to the level you are now at?

Anyone want to share what their main hurdles/challenges were in growing their business - not just securing contracts, accounts and work.

What were your weaknesses and how did you deal with them?

What were your strengths and how did you play to them?

How much planning did you do? did you sit down and write down goals/milestone/targets, or was it take anything and everything as it comes to you?

again, thanks for thoughts and input!
 
Steven,

I'll get to a few more of your questions a bit later when I have a moment.

But I'll quickly say something regarding goals----

We've gone through the Emyth Mastery Program (not sure if you've heard of that--basically biz coaching). We were taught with our goals to start with your long range plan (say, sell biz in 5yrs), what your desired level of activity within the biz would be (manage/no involvement, etc), and finally and MOST IMPORTANTLY, how much money do you want to make? And then you balance what you want to make vs. your other goals.

The key is to always start with your desired compensation. High, low, whatever.....now you've got something to measure by, and something with which to align your goals.
 
It's going good - not quite to the original projections. With the downturn in commercial real estate and all that it brought to budgets, cleaning frequency and scopes of work a few contracts fell through the cracks. Business is good though. We have good relationships with our customers so have picked up new centers as bank-owned and auction centers are getting bought by them.

Occupancy is up in our market, but gross rental revenue is down... According to my customers.

We are confident that we will pick up a bunch of new centers when the new budgets are in place.

As far as sales and techs go... I'm the sales guy and still wash the majority of the time. I've got one great employee who is one in a million, and another part time guy. Holly runs the office.

... Just over 3 years now and the pressure washing side grew through the downturn, just keep charging on!
 
Thats pretty much the same report here, we have expanded customer base with lower volume per customer. Look out when the economy comes Back!!!
Steven Button said:
It's going good - not quite to the original projections. With the downturn in commercial real estate and all that it brought to budgets, cleaning frequency and scopes of work a few contracts fell through the cracks. Business is good though. We have good relationships with our customers so have picked up new centers as bank-owned and auction centers are getting bought by them.

Occupancy is up in our market, but gross rental revenue is down... According to my customers.

We are confident that we will pick up a bunch of new centers when the new budgets are in place.

As far as sales and techs go... I'm the sales guy and still wash the majority of the time. I've got one great employee who is one in a million, and another part time guy. Holly runs the office.

... Just over 3 years now and the pressure washing side grew through the downturn, just keep charging on!
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I won't any comment regarding to the discussed ideas but just answer the asked question and as I could get it,
I will try to make my business optimized using the IT means and hopefully and have got it.
regards
 
Steven, I have 2 full time techs and 3 part time, a office assistant and myself.

The sales is all handled through me.

The problem I am having is the customer service side and schedule new work ticket orders through current customers.
I am planning to hire an accounts manager next season as well as move all my book keeping to my CPA. I will move my admin assistant to be my personal assistant and the accounts manager will come into to play the roll of customer support, quality control, answering phones, filling new work orders from current clients, and being my eyes and ears in the office. I am moving my lead tech to operations manager and i will be able to focus on sales 90% of my time versus about 20% right now.
 
DJ Carroll said:
Steven, I have 2 full time techs and 3 part time, a office assistant and myself.

The sales is all handled through me.

The problem I am having is the customer service side and schedule new work ticket orders through current customers.
I am planning to hire an accounts manager next season as well as move all my book keeping to my CPA. I will move my admin assistant to be my personal assistant and the accounts manager will come into to play the roll of customer support, quality control, answering phones, filling new work orders from current clients, and being my eyes and ears in the office. I am moving my lead tech to operations manager and i will be able to focus on sales 90% of my time versus about 20% right now.
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I missed last week's episode. Who did you fire? And is the finale going to be live again this year? :)
 
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