Jesse James’ Advice for Service Contractors
Jesse James, Train Robber I have been to multiple events in the past several months where service contractors from many trades (food equipment repair, fire safety, specialty cleaning) lament the insertion of one or more parties between themselves and their customers. It seems that when they do not directly influence the terms of service with […]
The Tesla Lesson: 4 Takeaways for Service Contractors
I am a big believer in market signals. I think Tesla is one of those signals. As a breakthrough company with a skyrocketing stock value, Tesla is clearly doing many, many things correctly and making very few mistakes. I believe there are some lessons in the Tesla experience that service contractors should be learning. As […]
It Pays to Know: How Service Contractors Get Paid For Expertise, Not Just Labor
The best service contracting business model is based upon customers paying a premium for expertise instead of simply paying a markup on parts and labor. When true expertise is offered, the customer perceives that in the long term they will have better outcomes for less money – no callbacks, fewer breakdowns, less energy consumption, higher […]
The Labor Market is Speaking – Are You Listening?
In early 2001, I had just been appointed to be the Vice President of North America sales for Red Hat. Many of my early meetings with prospective customers were geared toward understanding what was going to drive buying behavior for large scale adoption of Linux technology. One meeting in particular sticks in my mind today […]
Ripe Bananas, Seat Miles, and Service Labor Hours
What do these things have in common? They all represent “perishable inventory.” Ripe bananas have a short shelf life – sell them or throw them out. A flight that takes off without being full means seat miles were available and not sold. A service labor hour without a corresponding service invoice is likewise “perishable inventory” […]
Why Cloud Applications are Perfect for Small Service Companies
If the thought of new software for running your field service business brings on pain, remorse, indigestion, or any other unpleasant malady, this blog post is for you. Software that is well designed and delivered to you as an Internet application (or cloud based application) should not bring on any of these symptoms of distress. […]