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Gravy's Hustle Thread: $100k/mo or Bust!

Panda__

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First off, congratz on your venture. That's a leap most people will never take. So props to you.

The issue was you couldn't produce enough income to replace coorporate America salary in time, and had to go back.

The cleaning biz, commercial and residential, has to be one of the hardest service businesses to run right now. I have multiple friends that have gotten out of the cleaning business (commercial and residential). Some last year, more this year.

I still know a few that are functioning in the commercial sector, but they have pivoted. They're doing COVID cleans, window cleaning, pressure washing (exterior cleaning) which is what we do.

Like anything, you just have to adapt to the current climate. There will always be changes that destroy businesses. Most don't survive because they get lazy.

If you're intent on running the cleaning biz (I think you can still make tons of $ here, more than enough to replace salary), I would first focus on hiring. Because you can do the back end work (scheduling, customer back and forth, quotes etc) from your coorporate job. Then you can send employees on the jobs and collect the $ off top.

You're actually in a further ahead position than I was when I started, because when I started, I had zero dollars to my name. I literally could not afford to hire someone to do the job for me, I had to do it myself. I would have failed if I had hired off the bat. But you can use your coorporate salary, ESPECIALLY if you're working from home, as a sort of "passive income" to work on your cleaning biz. You can easily multi task.

Get on Google Guarenteed (Local Services). Get on Yelp, start running Yelp ads @$750/mo. If you can't close jobs in the first month there's something wrong. You should go in the green within a few weeks.

If you can't, I would pivot to exterior cleaning in your city. Basically the same biz I'm doing. We have not had an issue with COVID at all this year. In fact, if anything, it's helped us immensely. People are home. Working on projects they've put off for 2, 5, 10 years. We wear a mask when greeting the customer, or do a contactless service (person stays inside, communicate by phone). Either way works for us! Collect the $ through check under door mat, cash, or in your case, Venmo, PayPal, Credit Card (stripe). Use whatever you can to figure it out. If you need more help let me know. Go watch my YT vids on how to perform the services so you can make sure your contractors know what they're talking about.

Best of luck. Hope you crush it. Time to get this biz off the ground once and for all.

David

First, thank you for taking the time to respond. Since COVID, do you think that people are still not wanting people in their homes cleaning? Now that people are home more, would they really want to pay and have someone come in and clean? So what you're saying is that I should hire immediately and I do the backend work?

I am definitely going to check out your YT channel.
 
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reedracer

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First, thank you for taking the time to respond. Since COVID, do you think that people are still not wanting people in their homes cleaning? Now that people are home more, would they really want to pay and have someone come in and clean? So what you're saying is that I should hire immediately and I do the backend work?

I am definitely going to check out your YT channel.
If you offered to clean and make safe AirBnB type rentals starting right away you could grow your business as people start using these units again. Anything to support AirBnB owners should be viable.
 

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Since COVID, do you think that people are still not wanting people in their homes cleaning?

We are going into plenty of homes to do interior glass cleaning (windows, showers, mirrors etc).

Of course there are SOME people who do not want you to come inside. And wear a masks. But it's a numbers game just like anything else.

Instead of asking me the question, you should go and FIND THE ANSWER for yourself. I don't mean that to be a dick. I mean, in your market, the answer will be different than mine. You have to find the yes/no for your situation on your own. No amount of research will help past a certain point, only TAKING ACTION and trial and error will tell.

I know some cities like San Francisco are MUCH more afraid of the Virus than here... but people also have more money than here... who knows. There are so many different factors at play. Yes people are staying home more, but there's also a higher emphasis on being clean in general, fighting germs etc.

So what you're saying is that I should hire immediately and I do the backend work?

You can go that route yes, that would allow you to keep working your day job while building this on the side. Otherwise you can take a leap of faith (I found that this pushes me much harder when I don't have a fall back 9-5 income), although it is difficult because if you're strapped for cash, you can't make moves as quickly or as meaningfully. Right now I have cash reserves like I've never had before, I can throw money at problems until they fix themselves. That is a VERY powerful thing.

Anything to support AirBnB owners should be viable.

Agreed. In my city the Air BnBs are still poppin, constantly booked etc
 

GravyBoat

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Just a little update for everyone, I know I've been quiet on here for a while.

I moved to a new part of my city during the beginning of the summer. For the past few years, I always thought I had wanted to live in the party zone, right by the beach. So I did that.

Very quickly, after only a few short months, I've realized that this type of environment is NOT what I want, or need, to continue building businesses and crushing it.

So I am planning on moving either downtown, to immerse myself amongst other hustlers who are actively taking steps to improve their lives, or up north, amongst more wealthy, upper middle class families (where my business does most of it's service).

The "beach life" sure sounds great at first, but it feels like you're on vacation 24/7. Everyone is partying, chilling, with no goals or ambition.

Some probably could have seen this before they moved, but I had to experience first hand in order to have the realization for myself.

I don't regret the move, but I'm now with 100% certainty that I need to be in a hustling, crazy environment, not living the "laptop on the beach" lifestyle. It doesn't work for my personality type.



That being said!

I've gone through 3 more employees, altho this time most of them have stuck around longer. My training is getting better. I'm realizing what is and isn't important.

I also moved into targeting HOAs, and trying to mandate exterior cleaning in their organizations (can be anywhere from 10-1,000 houses). I sold one with 32 houses, which was around 7k profit in a few days of work. So that was awesome.

I am going to continue expanding the home service business, while also working on the consulting/coaching side of things. I currently have 13 people that I teach the same business to. These people are all across the world (since home services are needed everywhere). It has been VERY fulfilling for me to help other people in similar situations to myself go from $0 to making $5k, $10k, $20k/mo.

I always knew part of my mission was to help others, and this is the way that manifested in the past few months.

My goal is to get to 30 clients/students by the end of the year with the coaching/consulting biz.

We are also hosting a seminar here that teaches the biz, so I am having my buddies film it, and I will publish it for my clients to see that couldn't attend. Looking forward to that in a few weeks.

The industry is also grossly underserved in terms of software automation, so that's the next step I will be looking into. If anyone has any feedback on that front, please let me know (I'm clueless where to start in terms of hiring devs for my ideas).

Hope everyone is crushing it, I will be on here more checking in as this forum has been a huge part of my life.

David
 
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I'll be happy to talk with you about hiring people to develop software. PArticularly if you're thinking mobile applications. I've developed my own, developed other people's for a bit, and presently I pay people to develop mine. It's not something I know everything about, but I might help you avoid some pitfalls.

I love that you've figured out you like teaching people. That can turn into a great business.
 

GravyBoat

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I'll be happy to talk with you about hiring people to develop software. PArticularly if you're thinking mobile applications. I've developed my own, developed other people's for a bit, and presently I pay people to develop mine. It's not something I know everything about, but I might help you avoid some pitfalls.

I love that you've figured out you like teaching people. That can turn into a great business.

So there are other players in the space, such as Housecall Pro, Jobber, responsibid, etc. These are all great and do mostly everything you could want. However, there are several tools, or things I want these softwares to do, but they don't...

My goal here is to amass a customer list, then basically build a similar tool to these, and sell this to them instead. Since I'm already paying for traffic, leads, and ultimately customers/students, teaching how to run the business, and setting people up for success, is there any reason I shouldn't just build similar software, brand it something new, and sell it to them? Should I have a Unique Selling Prop for my software over the others?

Maybe this is a stupid question, but, since there are already established competitors in the space, WHY are they not implementing the features that I would have built, if I were to design my own? Is there a REASON these companies with development teams are unable to deploy these features?

I need to know if the features are even possible I guess, before jumping into software development, only to find that they are in fact NOT possible, down the line, and building the same product as my competition with no Unique Selling Proposition.

Is there an easy way to do this? I can PM you the exact features as not to bore others lol
 

GravyBoat

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Hit $2275 profit today. Not my fattest day but fattest in the last two months for sure.

I cannot describe the feeling when EVERYTHING goes right in a day. From wake till sleep, it couldn't have gone better. I felt like an absolute King the entire day, walking around with a beaming smile on my face while working hard, managing people, coming home etc. It was absolutely wonderful and I just wanted to make a note in my log so I don't forget this day. Wow.
 
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Rabby

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So there are other players in the space, such as Housecall Pro, Jobber, responsibid, etc. These are all great and do mostly everything you could want. However, there are several tools, or things I want these softwares to do, but they don't...

My goal here is to amass a customer list, then basically build a similar tool to these, and sell this to them instead. Since I'm already paying for traffic, leads, and ultimately customers/students, teaching how to run the business, and setting people up for success, is there any reason I shouldn't just build similar software, brand it something new, and sell it to them? Should I have a Unique Selling Prop for my software over the others?

Maybe this is a stupid question, but, since there are already established competitors in the space, WHY are they not implementing the features that I would have built, if I were to design my own? Is there a REASON these companies with development teams are unable to deploy these features?

I need to know if the features are even possible I guess, before jumping into software development, only to find that they are in fact NOT possible, down the line, and building the same product as my competition with no Unique Selling Proposition.

Is there an easy way to do this? I can PM you the exact features as not to bore others lol

I can probably tell you if a feature is possible. Most features are possible, if the way they work can be described.

As for why other companies aren't implementing the feature you want, there are several possibilities there:

1. Most of their customers don't want it
2. They don't know people want it
3. They don't care what customers want because they have their own agenda
4. They know about features customers want even more, so they develop those with priority
5. They're all copying each other, and none of the people they're copying have implemented the feature
6. It would be crazy expensive for some reason
7. The feature violates terms of service for some maj or platform, and they havent found a way around that.
8 etc

At least you can probably find out if customers want the feature.
 

GravyBoat

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@Rabby thanks a ton. I spoke with @Jon L about one of the things I'm trying to have built. It seems like a good starting place and seems possible in the next few months to get going on it.

I also have a totally separate idea that could be used in the info marketing space I'd like to discuss. Do you have time for a call at some point? Even a 30 min call would really help me.

Appreciate your help and advice so far both of you guys.

David
 

Rabby

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@Rabby thanks a ton. I spoke with @Jon L about one of the things I'm trying to have built. It seems like a good starting place and seems possible in the next few months to get going on it.

I also have a totally separate idea that could be used in the info marketing space I'd like to discuss. Do you have time for a call at some point? Even a 30 min call would really help me.

Appreciate your help and advice so far both of you guys.

David

Yep, just send a message so we can exchange contact info and let's talk :)
 
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GravyBoat

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It’s been a while since I’ve updated this thread and I sincerely apologize for that.

I will do my best to update this more regularly, because I know the impact reading threads here had early on in my journey.

Last month, we had our first 50k profit month, including my first 10k profit day, followed shortly after with an 11k profit day.

I have gone through over 15 employees in my quest to divorce myself from doing the work. Currently have 3 very good guys working for me, plus one full time assistant.

Just fired the new sales girl after she didn’t show up for work twice the second week! Sad!

Hired another sales girl starting Monday.

I haven’t done any of the work myself in months thanks to some pushing from guys in a few mastermind groups. If you don’t have a good circle to surround yourself with, you will get caught up and not pushed forward. My advice is cut anyone who doesn’t actively want to see each other win, and only allow positivity inside your headspace, because you only get so much energy in a day.

I plan to take the service biz to over 100k/mo potentially by the end of the year, if not, next year.

I will admit to not going as hard as I should have this year. I am also working on 2 other businesses, the info/consulting biz (in home services) and a totally unrelated gym product biz which I think I have another progress thread on. That launches in a month, and we just re launched the info biz with sick new ad videos. Also working on personal branding stuff to boost credibility in the space.

I am semi burnt out on the service biz, but that has been solved by automating the work and sales processes. I spend about 1 hour a day on the service biz currently but it’s hard to force myself to work on it.

I’ve also done a fair share of F*cking off since my last post. Gone on 10+ “vacations” or fun trips disguised as business trips including 4 Vegas trips. Mexico trip. Skiing. Etc. Moved into a brand new nice apartment paying almost 3k/mo for a one bedroom. Haven’t exactly been going balls to the wall, but I guess I’m working “smart” instead of hard?

I still don’t feel even remotely “successful” even though I made in one month what most people make in a year.

My next moves will be bigger. I am currently working on a short film that will be possibly the coolest thing I’ve done with my life to date. Once it comes out, I will for sure post here.

My next few weeks consist of an investor conference in Miami on a 40M boat, a trip back home to see my parents, and lots of filming. I am also training new sales girl and trying to ramp up volume.

I feel like I need more to do. I’m hungry as F*ck. I don’t feel the slightest bit satisfied. My basic needs are met but I know I’m meant to do big shit so it’s time to work on that.

Value I can provide / Things I’ve learned:

If anyone is involved in any type of service business, we have a Telegram chat that pops off daily discussing how to help each other. DM me and I’ll add you so we can bounce ideas off each other.

Working IN your business = you value your time at $20 bucks an hour, and you are kidding yourself with any excuses to not hire immediately.

Surrounding yourself with people that truly want each other to win, so they can share in successful, fun times is paramount to success. Find a squad and get in a group chat. Daily accountability.

Nightly meetings with yourself or housemates/accountability partners will change your life. It makes it so you can’t go too far off the path you should be on. Write down your to do list each day, take a picture to look back on. Erase once done and move the next most important task up the list. Simple as that.

Money past around 15k/mo seems very similar...

Money sitting in cash is actively inflating away and needs to be put into an asset ASAP.

While I don’t have millions yet, I should by next year if I keep going at this trajectory. I’m keeping no more than 30k cash and putting the rest into assets (other businesses, crypto, buying items that won’t depreciate). This is the first time in my life where I’ve actually had any “investment” money and I am seeking professional help to ensure it doesn’t get pissed away somehow.

If it doesn’t make you money, or can be written off, you CANT afford it!

Do yourself a favor and go on Groupon. Find the nearest “float tank” or sensory deprivation tank to you. Go in that shit. It’s like meditation on steroids. My friend and I were at the bar one night a while back and decided to go in the float tank every day for 30 days. It was one of the most life changing things I’ve ever done. Totally changed my trajectory in life. Made me rethink my path. I beg of you whoever is reading this to hit a float tank and thank me later.

Above all, take MASSIVE action and don’t pussy foot around your goals. You’re only getting older the longer you wait. There is absolutely zero excuse for not taking action despite what your mental gymnastics might tell you. It’s all bullshit. Get an accountability partner that doesn’t have YOUR programming, because they will see right through things that your own brain can’t figure out. It will shortcut your path to action.

Till next time.

David

PS: I have finally achieved my goal of never working from a laptop or computer again. I used to be an IT guy in my slow lane job, and I realized it was the most inauthentic thing I could ever be doing. I was still GOOD at it, because I had work ethic, but I had zero computer skills, and was mostly good on getting other people to help me do the technical side.

Fast forward a few years, I realized the last thing I ever wanted to do was be on a computer. I am NOT good at working computers. What I am good at is communicating and connecting the right people together to make things happen. I’m BAD at doing the actual work. Through this realization, I vowed to one day never use a computer again.

Ive gone several months without opening up a laptop at all. The next step, after maybe a year without it, is to throw the laptop off a 4 story building, and never buy another one. Actually I’ll donate it to some young hustler looking to get in on the game.
 
Last edited:

Raja

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It’s been a while since I’ve updated this thread and I sincerely apologize for that.

I will do my best to update this more regularly, because I know the impact reading threads here had early on in my journey.

Last month, we had our first 50k profit month, including my first 10k profit day, followed shortly after with an 11k profit day.

I have gone through over 15 employees in my quest to divorce myself from doing the work. Currently have 3 very good guys working for me, plus one full time assistant.

Just fired the new sales girl after she didn’t show up for work twice the second week! Sad!

Hired another sales girl starting Monday.

I haven’t done any of the work myself in months thanks to some pushing from guys in a few mastermind groups. If you don’t have a good circle to surround yourself with, you will get caught up and not pushed forward. My advice is cut anyone who doesn’t actively want to see each other win, and only allow positivity inside your headspace, because you only get so much energy in a day.

I plan to take the service biz to over 100k/mo potentially by the end of the year, if not, next year.

I will admit to not going as hard as I should have this year. I am also working on 2 other businesses, the info/consulting biz (in home services) and a totally unrelated gym product biz which I think I have another progress thread on. That launches in a month, and we just re launched the info biz with sick new ad videos. Also working on personal branding stuff to boost credibility in the space.

I am semi burnt out on the service biz, but that has been solved by automating the work and sales processes. I spend about 1 hour a day on the service biz currently but it’s hard to force myself to work on it.

I’ve also done a fair share of f*cking off since my last post. Gone on 10+ “vacations” or fun trips disguised as business trips including 4 Vegas trips. Mexico trip. Skiing. Etc. Moved into a brand new nice apartment paying almost 3k/mo for a one bedroom. Haven’t exactly been going balls to the wall, but I guess I’m working “smart” instead of hard?

I still don’t feel even remotely “successful” even though I made in one month what most people make in a year.

My next moves will be bigger. I am currently working on a short film that will be possibly the coolest thing I’ve done with my life to date. Once it comes out, I will for sure post here.

My next few weeks consist of an investor conference in Miami on a 40M boat, a trip back home to see my parents, and lots of filming. I am also training new sales girl and trying to ramp up volume.

I feel like I need more to do. I’m hungry as f*ck. I don’t feel the slightest bit satisfied. My basic needs are met but I know I’m meant to do big shit so it’s time to work on that.

Value I can provide / Things I’ve learned:

If anyone is involved in any type of service business, we have a Telegram chat that pops off daily discussing how to help each other. DM me and I’ll add you so we can bounce ideas off each other.

Working IN your business = you value your time at $20 bucks an hour, and you are kidding yourself with any excuses to not hire immediately.

Surrounding yourself with people that truly want each other to win, so they can share in successful, fun times is paramount to success. Find a squad and get in a group chat. Daily accountability.

Nightly meetings with yourself or housemates/accountability partners will change your life. It makes it so you can’t go too far off the path you should be on. Write down your to do list each day, take a picture to look back on. Erase once done and move the next most important task up the list. Simple as that.

Money past around 15k/mo seems very similar...

Money sitting in cash is actively inflating away and needs to be put into an asset ASAP.

While I don’t have millions yet, I should by next year if I keep going at this trajectory. I’m keeping no more than 30k cash and putting the rest into assets (other businesses, crypto, buying items that won’t depreciate). This is the first time in my life where I’ve actually had any “investment” money and I am seeking professional help to ensure it doesn’t get pissed away somehow.

If it doesn’t make you money, or can be written off, you CANT afford it!

Do yourself a favor and go on Groupon. Find the nearest “float tank” or sensory deprivation tank to you. Go in that shit. It’s like meditation on steroids. My friend and I were at the bar one night a while back and decided to go in the float tank every day for 30 days. It was one of the most life changing things I’ve ever done. Totally changed my trajectory in life. Made me rethink my path. I beg of you whoever is reading this to hit a float tank and thank me later.

Above all, take MASSIVE action and don’t pussy foot around your goals. You’re only getting older the longer you wait. There is absolutely zero excuse for not taking action despite what your mental gymnastics might tell you. It’s all bullshit. Get an accountability partner that doesn’t have YOUR programming, because they will see right through things that your own brain can’t figure out. It will shortcut your path to action.

Till next time.

David

PS: I have finally achieved my goal of never working from a laptop or computer again. I used to be an IT guy in my slow lane job, and I realized it was the most inauthentic thing I could ever be doing. I was still GOOD at it, because I had work ethic, but I had zero computer skills, and was mostly good on getting other people to help me do the technical side.

Fast forward a few years, I realized the last thing I ever wanted to do was be on a computer. I am NOT good at working computers. What I am good at is communicating and connecting the right people together to make things happen. I’m BAD at doing the actual work. Through this realization, I vowed to one day never use a computer again.

Ive gone several months without opening up a laptop at all. The next step, after maybe a year without it, is to throw the laptop off a 4 story building, and never buy another one. Actually I’ll donate it to some young hustler looking to get in on the game.
Welcome Back
 

MJ DeMarco

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Thread updated to GOLD! Incredible!
 

GravyBoat

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Hopefully I can provide some more value for anyone involved in service business:

I have had a lot of success running Yelp ads in the past. I turned them off last year because the ads accounted for only 30% of traffic, and I figured if I could still get 70% for free, I’d allocate the cash elsewhere.

Turns out Yelp is a crooked a$$ company who literally extorts the people paying them, and even those who don’t. (Look up stories all over the internet).

I get a call from them several months after turning off my ads saying I had a bill of $6500 about to go to collections.

I got back to them with proof that I had in fact turned my adspend OFF, and shouldn’t have been charged.
They still sent me to collections. I refused to pay the bill out of principal. I hired a credit repair company to scrub my file of the bill, and told Yelp to blow me.

Fast forward until now... I am trying to scale up and need all traffic sources firing...

I call Yelp as someone else, telling them I had just bought the business, and was “wondering why I couldn’t run ads...?” I told them I am willing to start paying them right this moment, but I didn’t want to be responsible for the previous owners “mistakes” etc.

Knock on wood but I am pretty sure they’re going to put the account back in good standing.

If I felt the least bit bad for Yelp I would gladly pay the bill and bend over... but I don’t. You can do a quick search and find literal hundreds of stories of Yelp extorting businesses right and left. Their CEO is a crooked F*ck and I will do everything in my power to not succumb to their extortion.

Lessons:

I toed the line of Commandment of control here in the past. Had all my eggs in Yelps basket (85% of my leads).
You violate the commandment of control, and you pay the price.

Instead, invest in as many other channels as possible including SEO for your site, Google My Business (Local Service Ads), regular Google ads (tho very expensive), Home Advisor, Thumbtack, Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace and boosted FB posts to your local area.

Do run Yelp ads, because they are wildly profitable. But take some profit and spread yourself out.

Also don’t be afraid to play dirty with these companies. Don’t get jerked around. I think I wrote this in the past but when I need something done from a tech company, I call them 20+ times. If the first customer service person or account rep is unwilling to do what I want, that’s cool. I just hang up and call again. I literally spend DAYS calling these fools because I KNOW at least one person will help me get it done. Just because the first 5 people told me it “can’t” be done, doesn’t mean shit. Just keep calling and don’t get discouraged.

Will report back with the Yelp fix and see if it works. Keep crushing it.
 
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GravyBoat

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The biggest ahha moment for me was switching my service business to commercial.

Let’s just say we charge on average $300 per house for residential.

To make 3k/day, you’d need to do 10 houses.

Each worker can do roughly 3 houses a day reliably. Sometimes 4 or 5 but let’s say 3 to be safe.

To get 10 houses, you’re looking at around $20-30 per lead. So let’s just say it costs $250 for the 10 houses.

I need to pay the guys at least $75/house to keep them happy. So that’s $225 per guy x 3.

$3000 - $675 - $250 = $2075 profit for the day. Not a bad day, but check this out:

We call Property Management companies and get foot in the door. Also send them snail mail. One bites.

We do a small apartment complex for them for $1375. Turns out it’s critical and they were having leaks. Worker goes and busts it out in the same time as a residential. He can do 3 a day but let’s just say I pay him $200 for the entire unit. $1175 profit.

Because of the dope “systems” we have in place, such as awesome before/after video footage of the property, The property manager turns around and asks if we can clean her other 9 properties. AOV on these is $1775 per property.

So now we just made around $15,000 profit from ONE point of contact.

A residential home owner could never pay you $15000 dollars. It just doesn’t make sense. Even if they had 10 single family rental properties you’d be getting a few grand for servicing them all.

Dealing with 10 customers whims and becks and calls each day becomes a gigantic headache... all for 2k profit... hmmm. There’s a better way.

Make 2k profit by dealing with ONE point of contact thru commercial... OR... make 10k profit in the same day of work still dealing with 1 or 2 property managers.

So the sales girl I hired, her goal is to call every property management company within a 2 hour drive of us. I need to build relationships with all of them and become their one stop shop for all their properties. We give deals if we can do multiple at a time.
 

fgcazares

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More value:

The biggest ahha moment for me was switching my service business to commercial.

Let’s just say we charge on average $300 per house for residential.

To make 3k/day, you’d need to do 10 houses.

Each worker can do roughly 3 houses a day reliably. Sometimes 4 or 5 but let’s say 3 to be safe.

To get 10 houses, you’re looking at around $20-30 per lead. So let’s just say it costs $250 for the 10 houses.

I need to pay the guys at least $75/house to keep them happy. So that’s $225 per guy x 3.

$3000 - $675 - $250 = $2075 profit for the day. Not a bad day, but check this out:

We call Property Management companies and get foot in the door. Also send them snail mail. One bites.

We do a small apartment complex for them for $1375. Turns out it’s critical and they were having leaks. Worker goes and busts it out in the same time as a residential. He can do 3 a day but let’s just say I pay him $200 for the entire unit. $1175 profit.

Because of the dope “systems” we have in place, such as awesome before/after video footage of the property, The property manager turns around and asks if we can clean her other 9 properties. AOV on these is $1775 per property.

So now we just made around $15,000 profit from ONE point of contact.

A residential home owner could never pay you $15000 dollars. It just doesn’t make sense. Even if they had 10 single family rental properties you’d be getting a few grand for servicing them all.

Dealing with 10 customers whims and becks and calls each day becomes a gigantic headache... all for 2k profit... hmmm. There’s a better way.

Make 2k profit by dealing with ONE point of contact thru commercial... OR... make 10k profit in the same day of work still dealing with 1 or 2 property managers.

So the sales girl I hired, her goal is to call every property management company within a 2 hour drive of us. I need to build relationships with all of them and become their one stop shop for all their properties. We give deals if we can do multiple at a time.
Amazing work! Thanks for sharing
 
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harlansjobs

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First, thank you for taking the time to respond. Since COVID, do you think that people are still not wanting people in their homes cleaning? Now that people are home more, would they really want to pay and have someone come in and clean? So what you're saying is that I should hire immediately and I do the backend work?

It’s been a while since I’ve updated this thread and I sincerely apologize for that.

I will do my best to update this more regularly, because I know the impact reading threads here had early on in my journey.

Last month, we had our first 50k profit month, including my first 10k profit day, followed shortly after with an 11k profit day.

I have gone through over 15 employees in my quest to divorce myself from doing the work. Currently have 3 very good guys working for me, plus one full time assistant.

Just fired the new sales girl after she didn’t show up for work twice the second week! Sad!

Hired another sales girl starting Monday.

I haven’t done any of the work myself in months thanks to some pushing from guys in a few mastermind groups. If you don’t have a good circle to surround yourself with, you will get caught up and not pushed forward. My advice is cut anyone who doesn’t actively want to see each other win, and only allow positivity inside your headspace, because you only get so much energy in a day.

I plan to take the service biz to over 100k/mo potentially by the end of the year, if not, next year.

I will admit to not going as hard as I should have this year. I am also working on 2 other businesses, the info/consulting biz (in home services) and a totally unrelated gym product biz which I think I have another progress thread on. That launches in a month, and we just re launched the info biz with sick new ad videos. Also working on personal branding stuff to boost credibility in the space.

I am semi burnt out on the service biz, but that has been solved by automating the work and sales processes. I spend about 1 hour a day on the service biz currently but it’s hard to force myself to work on it.

I’ve also done a fair share of f*cking off since my last post. Gone on 10+ “vacations” or fun trips disguised as business trips including 4 Vegas trips. Mexico trip. Skiing. Etc. Moved into a brand new nice apartment paying almost 3k/mo for a one bedroom. Haven’t exactly been going balls to the wall, but I guess I’m working “smart” instead of hard?

I still don’t feel even remotely “successful” even though I made in one month what most people make in a year.

My next moves will be bigger. I am currently working on a short film that will be possibly the coolest thing I’ve done with my life to date. Once it comes out, I will for sure post here.

My next few weeks consist of an investor conference in Miami on a 40M boat, a trip back home to see my parents, and lots of filming. I am also training new sales girl and trying to ramp up volume.

I feel like I need more to do. I’m hungry as f*ck. I don’t feel the slightest bit satisfied. My basic needs are met but I know I’m meant to do big shit so it’s time to work on that.

Value I can provide / Things I’ve learned:

If anyone is involved in any type of service business, we have a Telegram chat that pops off daily discussing how to help each other. DM me and I’ll add you so we can bounce ideas off each other.

Working IN your business = you value your time at $20 bucks an hour, and you are kidding yourself with any excuses to not hire immediately.

Surrounding yourself with people that truly want each other to win, so they can share in successful, fun times is paramount to success. Find a squad and get in a group chat. Daily accountability.

Nightly meetings with yourself or housemates/accountability partners will change your life. It makes it so you can’t go too far off the path you should be on. Write down your to do list each day, take a picture to look back on. Erase once done and move the next most important task up the list. Simple as that.

Money past around 15k/mo seems very similar...

Money sitting in cash is actively inflating away and needs to be put into an asset ASAP.

While I don’t have millions yet, I should by next year if I keep going at this trajectory. I’m keeping no more than 30k cash and putting the rest into assets (other businesses, crypto, buying items that won’t depreciate). This is the first time in my life where I’ve actually had any “investment” money and I am seeking professional help to ensure it doesn’t get pissed away somehow.

If it doesn’t make you money, or can be written off, you CANT afford it!

Do yourself a favor and go on Groupon. Find the nearest “float tank” or sensory deprivation tank to you. Go in that shit. It’s like meditation on steroids. My friend and I were at the bar one night a while back and decided to go in the float tank every day for 30 days. It was one of the most life changing things I’ve ever done. Totally changed my trajectory in life. Made me rethink my path. I beg of you whoever is reading this to hit a float tank and thank me later.

Above all, take MASSIVE action and don’t pussy foot around your goals. You’re only getting older the longer you wait. There is absolutely zero excuse for not taking action despite what your mental gymnastics might tell you. It’s all bullshit. Get an accountability partner that doesn’t have YOUR programming, because they will see right through things that your own brain can’t figure out. It will shortcut your path to action.

Till next time.

David

PS: I have finally achieved my goal of never working from a laptop or computer again. I used to be an IT guy in my slow lane job, and I realized it was the most inauthentic thing I could ever be doing. I was still GOOD at it, because I had work ethic, but I had zero computer skills, and was mostly good on getting other people to help me do the technical side.

Fast forward a few years, I realized the last thing I ever wanted to do was be on a computer. I am NOT good at working computers. What I am good at is communicating and connecting the right people together to make things happen. I’m BAD at doing the actual work. Through this realization, I vowed to one day never use a computer again.

Ive gone several months without opening up a laptop at all. The next step, after maybe a year without it, is to throw the laptop off a 4 story building, and never buy another one. Actually I’ll donate it to some young hustler looking to get in on the game.

Truly remarkable.
So when do you think that you will have enough clients for a monthly retainer and not have to worry about getting new clients anymore? When do you think it can all done remotely so that you maybe just have to check in 1x a week or less?
 

MJ DeMarco

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Damn, some incredible value bombs in here, thank you @GravyBoat -- love the mathematical analysis!
 

reedracer

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Nightly meetings with yourself or housemates/accountability partners will change your life. It makes it so you can’t go too far off the path you should be on. Write down your to do list each day, take a picture to look back on. Erase once done and move the next most important task up the list. Simple as that.
Epic! It really is "Simple as that." INE courseware to help parents teach their kids these simple truths. Bonus: You learn best when teaching to someone else.
 

GravyBoat

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Truly remarkable.
So when do you think that you will have enough clients for a monthly retainer and not have to worry about getting new clients anymore? When do you think it can all done remotely so that you maybe just have to check in 1x a week or less?
That’s the issue with this business and one of the main reasons my brain still wants to FOMO out this far in... barely any customers repeat service.

For one, most residential customers that call to get cleaning haven’t had them done in 5, 10, 15+ years sometimes. They only call when there is flooding or growth seen (big issues).
The ones that call about preventative maintenance are able to be repeated. But not every month, maybe once every 6 months at the most, usually once a year is more standard.

So the goal is to get them on repeat contracts. But barely anyone repeats because we haven’t pushed actual contracts where it automatically pulls from their bank account every month or every year etc.

I am still stuck in the mindset that if I pitch this, I will lose the job to someone that doesn’t lock them in etc. For commercial.

Because commercial, as we saw with the past 2 years, sometimes doesn’t know if they’ll have extra money to spend each year.

Maybe I should offer a huge discount for getting them to pay up front...

I honestly just went through and blasted every previous residential customer and I would say about 5% of them repeated service in a years time.

Definitely something I need to work on.

As for your other question about checking in once a week... it was never really my goal to “check out” of business and go sit on a beach. I already have plenty of vacation time as it is, so I would be spending that “free time” on another business or other investment ops etc.

Any ideas for repeat would be much appreciated because I’m 100% leaving $ on the table here.
 
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GravyBoat

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Last night I decided “if one sales person costs x for y many calls in z amount of time, why not just hire 5 sales people right now?”

So I hit up all old interview applicants and posted more jobs.

Have 4 interviews today.

Goal is hire 5-10 sales people over the next few weeks. Have them call like no tomorrow. Fire anyone who sucks within 3 days. Let the winners duke it out. Either way the calls are getting completed at a much faster pace.

How I see it is I’m basically spending $ to try something (calls) and see the ROI. If I’m planning on doing it anyway, why not just spend ALL the $ as quickly as possible so I know the ROI sooner...?
 

BD64

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That’s the issue with this business and one of the main reasons my brain still wants to FOMO out this far in... barely any customers repeat service.

For one, most residential customers that call to get cleaning haven’t had them done in 5, 10, 15+ years sometimes. They only call when there is flooding or growth seen (big issues).
The ones that call about preventative maintenance are able to be repeated. But not every month, maybe once every 6 months at the most, usually once a year is more standard.

So the goal is to get them on repeat contracts. But barely anyone repeats because we haven’t pushed actual contracts where it automatically pulls from their bank account every month or every year etc.

I am still stuck in the mindset that if I pitch this, I will lose the job to someone that doesn’t lock them in etc. For commercial.

Because commercial, as we saw with the past 2 years, sometimes doesn’t know if they’ll have extra money to spend each year.

Maybe I should offer a huge discount for getting them to pay up front...

I honestly just went through and blasted every previous residential customer and I would say about 5% of them repeated service in a years time.

Definitely something I need to work on.

As for your other question about checking in once a week... it was never really my goal to “check out” of business and go sit on a beach. I already have plenty of vacation time as it is, so I would be spending that “free time” on another business or other investment ops etc.

Any ideas for repeat would be much appreciated because I’m 100% leaving $ on the table here.
Commercial customers:

You mentioned the primary pushback for commercial as being future uncertainty around money but I imagine it also depends on WHO is the one actually paying for the gutter service...

If it's the tenant paying, chances are they don't put as much consideration or priority into budgeting for maintenance costs. The building is not theirs and so any $ that goes to upkeep is seen as a waste. Going back to the objection: You may try to rebuke by showing them how, if they plan on staying in that location, it will be worth it in the long-term. Spending a little bit of money every year will prevent an expensive, large issue down the road. If uncertainty is an issue then surely the former option is preferable since it's easier to budget for?

On the other hand, if the landlord pays for expenses like maintenance and Capex then ideally your service should already be budgeted for as these are critical expenses that can make or break their yield. It's just a matter of showing them why you are the best option. If they don't already include gutters into the equation then it may be as simple as showing them why they should and then sliding yourself into their books as a line item.

Residential customers:

I think the 2 buckets, tenants and landlords, still hold true as they did with commercial but in this case the residential tenants are probably really hard to sell on reoccurring services. Most of them won't be sticking around long-term and even if they do, most people don't care to think about future expenses. Maybe just focus on the landlords, if they are business savvy then you should be able to make a similar case as with the commercial ones.
 

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