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Earlier this month, thousands of home service business pros gathered for Jobber Summit 2023. Jobber Summit (formerly known as Jobber Professional Development Day) is a free, virtual event created for home service business owners and management teams to network and learn how to grow their businesses.
The speaker list was awesome! Some of the speakers included:
- Alex Rodriguez, former MLB player and Founder of A-Rod Corp.
- Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin, Founders of The Home Edit
- Roger Wakefield, plumber and YouTube star (he also hosted the event!)
- Luke Hansen, CEO and Founder of CompanyCam
- Lars Kristensen, Founder of NiceJob
- Dave Moerman, Founder and CEO of Revive Washing
NiceJob Founder, Lars Kristensen, hosted a panel called “Become Top-Rated: How to Automate a Sales-Winning Reviews and Referrals Strategy”.
He was joined by Dave Moerman (Home Service Business Coach) and Jess Bannister (HVAC Jess), who spoke about how they’ve had success growing their business using reputation marketing.
Here’s a quick recap of the learnings and takeaways from our session at Jobber Summit. You can watch the full recording here.
The session kicked off with a simple but important question…
Why are reviews so important to business owners?
Jess highlighted that reviews are an essential part of someone trusting that your company will provide the services they said they would.
“Reviews are an essential part of your business in 2023, that’s just how it is now. These days, I think people are looking for some way to trust the people we’re giving our money to, and trusting with our homes. Your current customers already like, trust and know you – but if you’re looking to get new customers or leads, who don’t know you and don’t know if they can trust you, that’s when reviews come in.”
Dave offered another perspective:
“It all comes down to the digital economy: it’s so integral to the business process to have your business ranking well on Google and to provide some social proof there. Anything I buy, from pizza to sushi to painting my house, I’m going on Google and reading the reviews. I’m no different than our consumers who are looking for reviews as well. Google is your megaphone to the world shouting, ‘hey, check out this company, they do awesome work’. If you like business and revenue, you gotta get on the train or you’re going to be left behind.”
What kind of results have you seen from implementing a reviews and referrals strategy in your business?
“We’ve really attacked reviews since the start of our business, and it’s really at the ethos of our company to do an incredible job,” said Dave. “If you really knock the socks off your client, they’re going to want to review you because you did such a great job.”
Lars did a quick Google search for “pressure washing in Surrey, BC” to see how Dave ranked against his competitors. Dave’s business has 403 Google reviews. His closest competitor has 139.
Companies that are top-rated win up to 2x more customers just by being top-rated in their area.
Jess commented that leads who came in via reviews and referrals had a higher close rate than those who came in via traditional marketing channels, because their trust levels in her company are much higher.
Dave attributed his reputation to his ability to keep his marketing budget below 7% of his revenue, because he relies on reviews instead of paid spend.
“I would wager we’d be half the company we are today with higher ad spend without our reviews. I really believe that’s because we’ve steered away from paid ads and focused on customer-driven growth. And when you talk about referrals, those are warm leads being served to you from an already happy client, so they definitely convert better and they’re better clients to work for. It’s very tangible to the bottom line. Your Google Business Profile is a very valuable thing as a business owner, your reputation cannot be replaced. If you’ve got employees, celebrate reviews with them!”
We all want to be top-rated and get more reviews, but how do we actually get there?
According to Jess:
“You can either take a third-party approach like NiceJob, that makes it so seamless and easy. I feel like every time I send out a request for a review on NiceJob, I get one in return. The second way is to do it yourself manually, but if you’re going to do that, make it as easy as possible for your customer to do that, like including a direct link. NiceJob has made it so easy - you can set it up to do it automatically or you can do it manually. It’s just so easy: a single click and off it goes, 5 minutes later I have a review in my inbox.”
Dave, who’s been using NiceJob for several years now, shared a similar sentiment.
“When you marry up software with a human experience, it’s cooking for dynamite to blow your company up on Google. Jobber has a beautiful plugin with NiceJob: you close the job in Jobber and that customer will get a text asking for a review, and then they go into a sequence of emails. It makes it super easy for your clients - put the ball on the tee for your client, so all they have to do is get up and whack the thing.”
▶️ Watch the full recording of the NiceJob panel.
4 More of our favorite Jobber Summit sessions
Be sure to also check out some of the other Jobber Summit recordings to maximize your knowledge!
1. Winning and Keeping Repeat Customers with CompanyCam
Winning new customers and earning their repeat business doesn’t happen by accident. Get expert tips, firsthand insights, and easy-to-copy processes for finding customers and building relationships with them in this fireside chat with Paul Jamison, host of the Green Industry Podcast, and Luke Hansen, CEO and founder of CompanyCam.
2. Connect Your Essential Business Software With Jobber
Learn how Jobber connects all your favorite tools seamlessly and in one place. This session highlights integrations in Jobber, including Wisetack, CompanyCam, NiceJob, and Fleetsharp.
3. The Business Edit with Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin
Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin, founders of home organization business The Home Edit and stars of the popular Netflix show Get Organized with The Home Edit, share their experiences rising above the stress of business ownership and how you can run your own business more effectively using their proven home organization methods.
4. Achieving a Legacy with Alex Rodriguez
MLB All-Star Alex Rodriguez (you may know him as A-Rod) shares his insights on how he has reached the ultimate levels of success in the competitive worlds of business and professional sports and how you can apply his strategies to your business. Learn how to create a big-picture vision, take your business to new heights, and build a legacy that lasts.
