Today, most home services businesses are flying blind once a tech steps into the home. There are inefficiencies in the field that waste time and hurt your close rates. ServiceTitan helps you automate your business from top to bottom to uncover and eliminate those hidden inefficiencies that are holding you back, so you can tap into ripe opportunities and extract every drop of revenue.
In this blog post, Tom Howard, owner of Lee’s Air and Vice President of Customer Experience at ServiceTitan, shines a light on four inefficiencies commonly found in the field and what you can do about it.
Inefficiency 1: Wasting time on training
Technician training is important, but most of the time “it’s just ineffective,” Howard said. That’s because many shop owners spend money on professional training only to see their technicians fail to follow what they’re taught.
Howard can relate.
“We used to laminate (a handout with sales tips) and give it to our techs, and then it would literally end up with a boot print on it in the back of a truck and in the trash can.
“I've hired all these sales trainers…but if (my techs) don't follow whatever the sales trainer is telling them, then it's useless. ”
THE SOLUTION: Ditch the sales trainers and hold your technicians accountable by using Sales Pro.
Sales Pro automatically records 100% of your sales and service calls, ties them to the right job, and gives you real-time coaching insights—so you can see exactly what’s happening, fix issues fast, and turn every tech into a confident closer.
Howard said Lee’s Air saw close rates increase once they started using Sales Pro.
“Sales Pro allows for accountability,” Howard said. “Both shop owners and technicians can listen to their recordings, and it helps everyone increase their commissions and close rates.”
Inefficiency 2: Sending the wrong tech to the job
Think you know who your all-star technician is? Howard thought so, too.
“You think Johnny's great,” Howard said. “But Johnny's not great at selling water heaters. Johnny's just great at bringing donuts to the CSRs and dispatchers. Johnny's great at sucking up. I had one guy that was giving (our CSRs and dispatchers) a kickback. He was like, ‘Give me the best calls, and I'll give you a hundred bucks.’”
THE SOLUTION: That’s no longer an issue now that Lee’s Air uses Dispatch Pro.
Dispatch Pro’s Job Value Predictor feature uses Titan Intelligence to predict a job's value to ensure the most optimal technician is assigned to the job to capture all revenue and measure performance.
“Dispatch Pro handles it, because it takes it out of (the dispatcher’s) hands,” Howard said.
Inefficiency 3: Awkward, time-consuming ride-alongs
Ride-alongs cost valuable time. But they can also be…awkward.
“It's simply more awkward with two people in the home talking to the customer,” Howard said. “If you ask our top sales supervisor, Phil Filaski, he does not like having a second person in the home. He’ll tell them, ‘Don't say anything. You will blow the sale.’”
THE SOLUTION: Start using Sales Pro.
“Sales Pro is the silent ride-along,” Howard said.
With Sales Pro, you can find the top objection slowing down your team, find examples—in seconds—of reps who have successfully overcome these objections, and empower your reps to use those strategies to win more business.
The result? Higher close rates, bigger average tickets, fewer disputes—and a stronger, more consistent team that drives profitable growth.
“You can easily walk your techs through a call and tell them what they did well, and tell them what they did wrong,” Howard said.
The #1 newsletter for the trades.
Inefficiency 4: Making techs spend too much time driving
Newsflash: Technicians on hourly pay don’t mind high drive times.
“They love that actually,” Howard said with a laugh. “When they're not selling, techs on hourly pay love driving around—forever.”
Who doesn’t love it? Shop owners like Howard.
So if your techs are on hourly pay, wouldn’t it make sense to use their time efficiently? High drive times increase the number of billable hours and decrease the number of jobs completed. It reduces revenue and affects margins.
And asking your dispatcher to come up with the most efficient route for each tech is unrealistic.
“The reality is they just don't have time to do it. They're not going to look up every call and start moving things around,” Howard said. “They’ll just throw them on the board, try to look at ZIP codes and get the tech close enough. It's just so hard.”
THE SOLUTION: Imagine the impact on your bottom line if your techs spent less time driving and could squeeze in just one more job per day in the busy season?
Dispatch Pro uses Titan Intelligence and advanced algorithms to optimize technician routing. With Drive Time Settings Control, contractors can control max drive times between jobs.
*Technicians complete 8.5% more jobs per day with Dispatch Pro. The AI-driven solution can also help you maximize your team.
“DispatchPro and AI are one of the first usable things in the trades that's legitimate,” Howard said.
To get started with Sales Pro or Dispatch Pro, book a demo to see them in action today.
