Remodelers On The Rise

"Self-awareness is the gateway to all personal growth." - Tony Woodall Today I talk to Tony Woodall, the founder of Rootstock, about building self-awareness through DISC assessments in the areas of: Dominance - How you handle problems Influence - How you win people over Steadiness - How you pace your life Compliance - How you handle rules set by others By utilizing the DISC assessment, remodelers can strengthen themselves and their teams by: Recognizing your strengths and weaknesses  Raising awareness within your team so that you can manage effectively Using the DISC assessment as part of your hiring process Here's a copy of my DISC mentioned in the episode:  Tony is the founder of Rootstock, a company dedicated to helping organizations multiple brand value by developing strong leaders. Call or email Tony at 630-338-6018 or twoodall@irootstock.com Like many companies, Rootstock was born out of passion and necessity. During his twenty years of delivering substantial bottom-line results in sales, marketing and brand strategy - Tony "kind of stunk" (his words) as a leader. He "wasn't the worst leader of all time" (his words again) but after falling short yet again to get his teams to gel, he took a break from leading and went back to '"just selling". Over time a nagging feeling that he had to get back to leading got the better of him. Humbled by his shortcomings, he sought to learn. Early in the journey he became utterly obsessed with all things leaders and team. He uncovered game-changing resources, new methods and great mentors along the way. He became thoroughly convinced that there are a vital few skills and methods that, when combined and applied, get uncommon results. He assembled a powerful tool kit. He's now dedicating his life and career helping values-driven organizations develop great leaders and unleash the power of their teams.

Bryan Sebring of Sebring Design Build and I go 'around the horn' with my questions discussing his top tip/best thought that has positively impacted his remodeling business in these areas: Marketing (4:15) Sales Process (13:34) Managing Your Team (21:00) Financials/Job-Costing (26:38) Systems/Software (34:02) Work/Life Balance (35:59) Bryan has been in the construction industry since 1993 and opened his Sebring Design Build in 1999. He lives in his hometown with his wife, Jenny, and their four children.   

Am I using my website effectively?  How can I improve my online presence? I want to improve my SEO - what are some things I can do myself? What are some more advanced things that I could get some assistance handling?   In today's interview with Spencer Powell of Builder Funnel, we answer these questions and focus in on some small, actionable things that seem to move the SEO and conversion needle that remodelers can implement.   Spencer and I will discuss: Using services pages to build your SEO (3:10), keeping your old content fresh (6:40) the importance of opt-ins (12:00), why your blog matters and how to make it work for you (19:28), and how to utilize your Google Business page (20:40).    Spencer comes from a long line of builders who have been in business for over 100 years now, dating back to his great-great grandfather.  Spencer got started in marketing when his uncles' business made a shift from purely home building to adding a remodeling division.  When the crash hit, they needed remodeling to support new home revenue until building came back.   Spencer took the reins on their digital marketing efforts and helped them grow their remodeling division from $2M to $5M over the next few years.  Since then, Spencer has proven his expertise in helping builders, remodelers, and contractors generate more leads and sales using the power of their own company websites.     For the last 8 years, Spencer has helped hundreds of companies around the United States and Canada build better marketing and sales systems and turn their websites into lead generating machines that work for them 24/7.   Education is at the core of everything his company, Builder Funnel, does.  Their widely followed blog has thousands of subscribers, and Spencer also hosts an active podcast called Builder Funnel Radio where he interviews industry experts.   Spencer holds many digital marketing certifications including the Inbound Marketing Certification, Inbound Sales Certification, and his company is a Platinum HubSpot Partner.   Outside of helping the construction industry, Spencer loves to play beach volleyball, hike, weight lift and see how many times he can eat at Chipotle in a week.

Shawn Van Dyke is a construction industry business coach, speaker, and author and has taken the core concepts of Mike Michalowicz's Profit First and customized them to address the specific needs of the construction industry in his book, Profit First for Contractors.   Shawn is a great and knowledgeable guy and in this recording, once I get past talking about his vs. my hair, I interview him on:   - Making Cents of the Financial Statements - Why it's so important to understand your numbers   - How Profit First for Contractors Works - What it is, the basic format of it, and why it works.   - We dig into the Initial Assessment Exercise from Profit First   - And then do some rapid-fire questions about helping you forget about Industry Standards, Destroying Debt, and other key takeaways we'd like to you walk away from this recording with.   Enjoy! You can find a copy of the book at: www.ProfitFirstContractor.com  

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Two lead scenarios: which would you prefer? "Hi Kyle, my name is [     ] and I was referred to you by one of your happy clients." "I found you online when searching 'kitchen remodeling' can you come out and look at our project?" Most of our attendees chose number one. But why? The lead is already somewhat qualified. They understand the work that you do, and have the trust of a friend (the referrer). Why are referrals so powerful? Getting someone who has a need to know like and trusts you People like to give them Great ROI Better qualified lead and shorter sales cycle Find more on referrals here.

Have you been staying in touch with your previous clients? Learn why you need to make those relationships a priority and how they can help your current marketing efforts. 

It's a good idea to regularly meet one-on-one with the key team members in your remodeling business. The tricky thing is that these meetings can easily turn unproductive. When you meet one-on-one with people like your production manager, estimator, designer, or office manager, you can quickly start talking about ongoing projects and get stuck lamenting about that cranky client or the mistake Bill made (again) out in the field. I've seen these meetings quickly become unfocused, drag on longer than they should, and not be productive. I wanted to share an outline for you to consider to make your one-on-one meetings more focused, powerful, and effective. It's important to have the employee submit responses to these topics the day before the meeting:

With all the choices for how you should market your remodeling business - which is the right ones to choose that will have the greatest return? It's often this question that keeps us from doing any marketing. Below you'll see my answer to this question in an interview I did with Vicki Suiter. Enjoy! Check out Vicki's Vlog here

"I'm busy! There's so much to do to keep up." Perhaps you can relate? A piece of advice that I've been giving often lately is to make sure that you are focused on $100/hour and $1000/hour work – and delegating out the $10/hour work.