No Frankensteins: How Streamline Electric is keeping all of its marketing and scheduling tools under one umbrella

For a moment, imagine that Streamline Electric is a big fishing boat.

Tim Leonard, CEO of the Detroit residential and light commercial company (and captain of the ship), casts lines in the water and waits for his new and existing customers to bite. He’s had some big catches and lots of success in his 20-plus years in the industry. But now, he’s using a brand new tool as bait.

Marketing Pro.

“I call it the dragnet,” Leonard said. “It just kind of goes out and then just scrapes the bottom.”

That’s because, instead of the painstaking manual follow-ups where Leonard and his team had to reach out to new and existing customers and offer discounts, Marketing Pro allows Streamline to automatically follow up and generate opportunities with customers via email and direct mail. 

This works great, because along with the tried-and-true methods of putting out daily estimates and having his technicians offer value-add solutions whenever they do an inspection, Marketing Pro is always drifting in the background for Streamline, catching the business that wasn't caught in the first run.

“Not everyone says yes to everything, but we always leave them something in their hands,” Leonard said. “And then once we do that, we just let the dragnet—Marketing Pro—do what it does.

“We've gotten a lot of people email (us) back saying, ‘You know what, I do want to schedule this work,’” Leonard added. “I really like that automated (aspect).”

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No Frankensteins 

Email marketing at Streamline hasn’t always been this easy. Remember the fishing metaphor? Scratch it. Now, we’re talking about monsters.

“(My previous software), outside of creating an email-type situation, we just didn't have the platform or the know-how to be able to put together that massive list of (customers) to do it,” Leonard said. “I know there's other ways, but it's nice to have it all under one umbrella and be able to track it. I didn't want a Frankenstein when it came to our services.”

Not wanting “a Frankenstein” was crucial. Leonard made the switch to ServiceTitan in November 2022 after he was inspired by a small-business class he took through Goldman Sachs. The course made him realize that he was running his business incorrectly. 

“I was running (it) like an electrician. And that course helped me look at my business from a CEO perspective,” Leonard said.

Having the proper toolkit was a must, which is why Leonard added Marketing Pro.

• Hyper-target your audience: Marketing Pro allows Streamline to create audiences based on customer information that it already has in ServiceTitan—like unsold estimates, aging equipment, and memberships that are expiring. This information automatically updates in real-time so Leonard and his team can truly “set and forget” their email campaigns.

• Direct mail: Marketing Pro also allows Streamline to automate and build targeted direct mail postcard campaigns to existing customers and prospects in minutes—not weeks.

Here’s an example: At the start of May, Streamline easily sent out an email campaign to all of its customers offering a 15% discount on its diagnostic fees. “It was simple,” Leonard said.

Here’s another: A couple months ago, there was a big power outage in Detroit. Streamline’s area lost power for a few days. Naturally, everyone was thinking about generators when the power was out, so Leonard sent out a direct mail campaign to roughly 2,500 customers. He and his team are still monitoring the success of that campaign.

“That's one thing I love about Marketing Pro; you can see what the campaigns are doing. That's fantastic,” Leonard said. “These are all things that we thought about doing before and just couldn't do because we just didn't have the capabilities that ServiceTitan has.”

‘Proof in the pudding’

Marketing Pro isn’t the only feature that’s helping Leonard run his business more like a CEO.

He also added Schedule Engine, whose live services and online booking solutions make it easy to deliver a convenient, reliable customer experience and book more qualified jobs—anytime, night or day.

“We just implemented that awesome, awesome ‘Book Now’ button on our website,” Leonard said. “It's been really good because people can just obviously book without (calling) anyone. (Schedule Engine is) another automated feature.”

• Online scheduling: A smart online scheduler for Streamline enables complete online appointment booking, day or night. Customers self-diagnose their issue, upload photos or videos and request their desired arrival window, converting more of Streamline’s web traffic to real appointments.

That’s not the only benefit of Schedule Engine. There’s also the live services feature.

“(With Schedule Engine), we have the backup call center. They pick up the phone over the weekends and take the information down and that's great. We're capturing all that traffic,” Leonard said.

Prior to Schedule Engine, a typical Monday for a CSR at Streamline would include listening to customer voicemails. But if there was a missed call without a voicemail, the CSR would call the customer, who very likely had already called a different company. Now, that’s no longer a problem.

“We'll show up on Monday morning, and we've got people just sitting and ready to be placed with an electrician. That just would not have happened (without Schedule Engine),” Leonard said. “We have people that call the office (on the weekend) and then the backup call center will answer or they'll just go online and book. 

“The fact that we have some (customers) waiting for us on Monday morning, that's proof in the pudding.”

Capitalize on all of your hard work

Leonard loves that he can track critical metrics with ServiceTitan, Marketing Pro and Schedule Engine. He knows that all three of these tools are allowing him to run his business more like a CEO, and less like an electrician.

“I've just learned that every dollar you spend, you should know what it's doing,” Leonard said. “And I think that ServiceTitan gives us that.”

In 2022, between construction and residential, Streamline did $3.6 million in revenue. This year, Leonard is projecting $4 million to $4.5 million, and next year, he thinks he can do $6 million in revenue.

“I'm trying to get to $10 million in revenue,” Leonard said. “That's my one- to three-year goal for now. (Also), I want to stretch our footprint across Southern Michigan.”

He’s excited to dig into more features within Schedule Engine and Marketing Pro, like the reputation feature, which allows Streamline to take control of its online reputation with more reviews and consistent listings.

But for now, he’s just thrilled that he’s no longer leaving work on the table.

“(These tools allow) you to capitalize on a lot of the work that you did previously,” Leonard said. “It just doesn't go in the waste basket.”