Ready to Win the Job? What to Bring to Every Paint Estimate

Michael Murray: Hey everybody, welcome back to the Price. Sell. Paint. podcast. We're really excited to talk about what you need to bring with you when you go on site to do an estimate to maximize your potential sales. John, how are you today?

Jon Bryant: Doing fantastic, Michael. Help yourself.

Michael Murray: Doing well. It is cold in Cleveland, Ohio. I imagine it is the same where you're at.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, it's pretty chilly. I got a chance to go to an outdoor spa this week and I just reminded myself how nice it is to be in warm places when it is cold. Pretty good week for me.

Michael Murray: Yes, we invested in a sauna. We have friends who own a really nice sauna company. So we invested in one a year ago, and I will say it is a really nice thing this time of year.

Jon Bryant: How often do you go in? Are you a daily guy?

Michael Murray: A few times a week, not daily, but three times a week. I'm thinking about...

Jon Bryant: You got one of those little sauna hats, Michael? You got to protect that big brain of yours from the heat.

Michael Murray: I absolutely have a sauna hat. Yeah, we got a few of them. I think it's just to make you look extra cool.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, like you've got a tea kettle on your head. I learned about the sauna hat from Dave Scaturro at Alpine Painting when I was with him and his brother doing their daily activity, which is to go do a 30 minute CrossFit workout and then go in the sauna, which is like an absurd temperature. I don't deal in freedom units like you guys do. I deal in Celsius, but it was a lot of freedom units. I felt like my brain wanted to be free from my body. That's how many freedom units.

Michael Murray: Did you have a hat on to keep your brain in? No, they didn't give you one of those.

Jon Bryant: I did without the hat though. I would have been in there for two minutes. I think they were trying to keep me staying for hours. At about the seven minute mark, I'm like, I gotta leave guys. This is too much for my body. But anyways, let's get back to the topic at hand. We've talked before about what makes a good sales presentation in home and kind of contemplating all the things that you should bring as a sales rep to that experience in order to stand out, build trust, build confidence with the customer that you're the one for the job. Some of that comes with the equipment we bring. Some of it comes with what we wear, how we show up, but some of it also is happening on site and we need to have the right tools. I know this was something on your mind, so I wanted to make sure we're on the same page.

Michael Murray: Yeah, for sure. So we're actually revamping our sales system here at Textbook. We've got some hiring goals going on next year in terms of new sales reps and looking to expand the team and just kind of evaluating. It's kind of a good time maybe before we bring in new people and train them, evaluating, hey, is the sales system as dialed in as it could be? And we decided a couple months ago that it wasn't. We wanted to just kind of fine tune it and make it better. I don't know, dial in is the right word, but it's just like document it and leave less up to chance. One of the things that we've been talking a lot about is what are the things to bring? You can definitely not bring enough. I think you can definitely bring way too much. I thought this is something I don't think we've ever talked about, might be kind of helpful for others and helpful for me as we're working through ours. So yeah, I'm excited to chat about it today.

Jon Bryant: Awesome. Well, let's go to the very start then. You've got some of this documented and I think for today, let's maybe go through a checklist of stuff. What's important when you show up? In your mind for the Textbook team, obviously you guys have branded vehicles, so you're showing up in a branded vehicle. You are showing up in a uniform. Walk me through all that stuff.

Michael Murray: I think the number one most important tool is PaintScout software. You're welcome. I just have to feed your ego. Yeah, I think with that, we're doing the quote on an iPad. That is a big differentiator still, which is kind of crazy. We've been doing quotes on iPads for a long time, a decade or something. And it's still how often we hear from people that they feel more comfortable seeing us doing what looks like actually doing some work, which it is, right? We're putting stuff into a software, but they can't tell exactly what we're doing on the iPad. But man, does it look a lot different than the person who just kind of walks around and then sits down and gets out a piece of paper and writes a price on it. So yeah, I think a lot of what we do is almost like putting on a little presentation or a little performance, maybe is the right word, for the prospective client, the homeowner, the commercial property owner, whatever that might be.

Jon Bryant: So iPad, I love that. Love PaintScout, super smart, very intelligent. When we've thought about this whole thing, I mean, even the sales part of it is a bit of a role playing type thing. I'm the salesperson, you're the customer, let's figure out how this works. Let's dance. It's the identity role, like this is the role that I play. It's not who I am, but I'm gonna do the best I can at that. But there's a bunch of props, let's call them, or things that can help or things we want to do. So again, going back to start, I mean, company vehicles, you guys have that. You've got, I imagine like a branded jacket, something. Do you have, what should be, what is the tone you're trying to set right off the bat?

Michael Murray: Yeah, I think the tone we're trying to set, and I think this is gonna be a little bit company specific, but we are trying to set the balance of professional but not overly formal. I think in our industry, we don't wanna come across as overly formal. I think to use an extreme, it's like I'm not showing up in a suit and tie. And I don't think most people would, but I also don't wanna show up maybe in ripped pair of jeans and a hooded sweatshirt or something like that. It's a little different for our painting crew. They probably can go to a job site in a hooded sweatshirt. But for our sales experience, that first impression that we're trying to make with a homeowner, that's not going to be what we're looking for. It's going to be a little bit more polo shirts in the summertime, some kind of maybe branded sweater or button down, or like you mentioned, jackets. Because a lot of times when you're going on these estimates, even though you're going to the house, you don't need to take your coat off because you're freezing this time of year. And so just having some sort of nice coat with a logo on it. We try to get our team members things that they're proud to wear, nice brands, nice fabrics, and things like that, which again, I think helps from the employees' experience. And I think it also lends to the impression we're trying to give to homeowners.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, I think totally. And the reason it resonates is because the service that we sell, painting is a want. It is, I would consider it kind of a luxury item. Like it's not something everybody can pay for. And so we need to match the type of people who are willing to invest in this kind of thing. And also I think when you go too far, like you show up and I'd be in a company Ford Escape branded, and the guy who showed up after me was in a Lamborghini. And there's something about that that communicates to everybody that they're probably getting overcharged or there's something else going on here. And so we want to position, I think in the customer's mind as this is reasonable. This is what I expected. Not too far down the line of unprofessional and not so far above that it feels disingenuous to the experience.

Michael Murray: I don't have any problem with somebody wanting to drive a Lamborghini, but you don't drive a Lamborghini if you're not trying to tell somebody something about yourself. And it's like, you just be okay with that.

Jon Bryant: And there might be actually a place where that works. I'm not sure. Like maybe there's a market out there for home improvements where driving that Lamborghini connects you with the customer in a way that I haven't seen yet in painting. But yeah, just considering that perception of what the other person's seeing on the other side. So what we wear, how we show up matters. Do you guys have business cards, Michael?

Michael Murray: We do have business cards still. I actually don't go on appointments anymore, so I hardly ever have business cards, but yes, we want our team to have something that they're going to be able to leave with the homeowner in the form of a business card with the contact information. We like it that it has their picture on it, a little headshot. We find that it's a little more personable, trying to make that human connection, not just like, who was that sales rep from Textbook Painting? It's more like, oh yeah, I remember her, that facial recognition kind of thing.

Jon Bryant: Do you present it like this or do you present it like this?

Michael Murray: For those that are listening, that would be the one hand or the two hand. I guess you could get down on one knee and hand it to them. No, it's pretty informal. We'll get to it. I think what actually we include that as like it's attached to a leave behind that we provide.

Jon Bryant: Interesting. That's a good segue. Let's talk more about the leave behind.

Michael Murray: We created, super high end, a lot of design cost went into it. And it's like a little eight page booklet, roughly the size of a piece of paper. And it's got just a bunch of really high end photos of work that we've done, reviews, talks about the different services, talks about me as the owner of the company, a little bit more about my background and history since I grew up in this area, local, talking about my family and just why I started the business and things like that. That's pretty much what it is.

Jon Bryant: And does that get presented to the customer walking in the door or is it at the end? How does that work?

Michael Murray: It's actually towards the middle. When we, the way that we think about the quote, just from a really broad perspective, we can get as detailed as we want. I don't want to go too far down that road since we're trying to focus on the what to bring part. But anyway, so we think of it as essentially three main steps. The first part when you first get there and all the conversations that you have, and then you separate yourself from the homeowner to some extent and you go and put together your quote and you get all your measurements and you get in your pictures and you're typing in numbers into PaintScout and walking around and doing all the measuring. Oftentimes you're separated from the homeowner or you're less focused on that engagement. And then you've got your quote, you're ready. Now we're going to sit back down with the homeowner. We're going to go over that. We're going to find the objections, handle the objections, sell the job or set up a next step. So it's kind of like those three phases with the customer, not with customer, with the customer. We coach to give that leave behind when you make that first separation point. Hey, I appreciate this conversation. Thanks for answering all my questions. I'm gonna go walk around and start getting a bunch of measurements. Before I do that, I did bring this little booklet. Let me show you what that's all about and hand that to them. I do have my business card attached to it. So here's the best way to get ahold of me. Give me 15 minutes, I'll have some numbers for us to look at. That's a super simplified version of how we would script that.

Jon Bryant: I think it's really helpful though. You said it's well, this episode is about what you bring, but also how you present that information is really important. If you say at the end of the estimate, you just pile on a whole bunch of papers. Here, this is us, talk to you later. I think it loses a little bit of its luster for the experience. All of this is communicating something. Like you said before, you're in a bit of a scene, right? You're acting this out and there has to be a reason for what you're doing. And at that moment, the customer is still engaged. You're still in their home. There's probably still a little uncomfortable you're there and it gives them something to do. I think a lot of people in that 15 minutes, I always just imagine leaving. When I'm playing the role of salesperson or project consultant and I go and meet with the customer and they're like, I'm going to be back in 15 minutes. I just imagine them kind of like the old Sim game where the customer goes to the kitchen and kind of walks back and forth to each wall. And then I come back and they're just relieved that you're finally back in the room. So I've always thought it's nice to have something to do or just helpful prompt of like, here's what you can do while you're waiting for 15 minutes.

Michael Murray: Yeah, it's almost like the magazines in the doctor's waiting room before we all had smartphones. Like at least I have something to do. Yeah, and I think though, again, I hope we're providing, we want to be showing our value, right? And providing that value and even just, I mentioned it, but it's an expensive piece and it's a differentiator. It doesn't look like everyone else's. And I think that's important.

Jon Bryant: For sure.

Michael Murray: I think most people's is like a folder with a bunch of papers in it.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, exactly. And I'm curious to talk about that. I mean, the leave behind itself has progressed, I think. And I know we're going to talk a little bit about that towards the end of just what a modern experience looks like and what maybe a modern sales leave behind might look like. But before we get there, just for everybody listening, other things we bring. I know the team that I've worked with, whenever they're coming to the house, they've got typically their iPad, they've got a measuring tool of some type. We use a small laser measure. I know you guys are using, what is it? We have meter sticks here in Canada. What's the equivalent in the US?

Michael Murray: We have yardstick.

Jon Bryant: Yardstick. How many feet is in a yardstick?

Michael Murray: Three feet. They put me on the spot here. I'm going back to middle school math.

Jon Bryant: Three feet in the yard. Hey, it's your country. So you guys are bringing a laser measure as well? Like small?

Michael Murray: Yep, looks like a cell phone, smaller than a cell phone, but similar. Like 30 bucks on Amazon.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, they've gotten so good. They're pretty cheap. I know we use a Bosch one. It's like tiny. It goes to like 100 feet. It's mostly all you'd ever need.

Michael Murray: We had this guy, just real quick, we had this guy come out and do a quote. We've just moved into this new commercial space and we need some walls built and we're getting HVAC and all this stuff done. So this guy comes out to quote building these walls and he's got his handy dandy tape measure, right? Your typical, and it's like 25 feet long. And the wall that we need built is like 50 feet. We're trying to separate some big warehouse spaces. And I'm watching this guy do this and he pulls it out and he's fumbling with it. And he kind of tries to mark a spot with his foot on the floor and then go to the other side with it and try to... After a few minutes, I'm watching this guy try to fumble around with this thing. And this is how he does it every day. He's got his spiral notebook. He's just taking notes on a piece of paper and he's fumbling around with it. And it's kind of painful to watch. And I just walk into our sales office where we keep a couple extra laser measures, cause it's just mandatory. We've got extras like if something breaks. Here's another one. And so I just went out there and I grabbed it. I was like, can I help you out? Let me just get some measurements for you real quick. And he had seen a laser measure before. I'm not pretending this is like an epiphany, but he's never really thought of that as a replacement for what he was doing. He's a contractor guy and nothing, gotta have your tape measure. If I'm cutting wood or building stuff, I'm using my tape measure too, but when I'm measuring something like this, especially when it's like a 60 foot wide wall, it's 10 seconds. Boop boop, there you go, it's exactly this measurement. And then he's like, wow, how much is one of those? I'm like, they're like $30 on Amazon. I wanted to just like, dude, what's your address? I'll just buy this thing and make your day for you. But that's a really good example, right? I'm watching this thing happen and his credibility is coming down a little bit in my mind. It's better than if he just walked in there and was just kind of like, I think this will be about $8,000. I appreciate the fact that he's measuring, which is more than I think happens in our industry. Measure twice, cut once. I was just like, I think this is a really good example of what the messaging we're trying to get across is he could get the measurement. At the end of the day, he probably would have gotten pretty much the exact same measurement. And it doesn't matter. The accuracy of it or even the amount of time it takes, that's not the important part here. What's important is what is the perception that the homeowner has watching that happen? And I can tell you, me watching it happen, I felt bad for the guy. I wanted to save him from this awful fumbling experience and it was not overly confidence-inducing.

Jon Bryant: Did you hire him?

Michael Murray: We did not actually hire him.

Jon Bryant: So there you go. If you're listening and you were just at Michael's shop with a tape measure, you now know why. Some insights.

Michael Murray: Had you invested in the $30 laser measure, you might have sold the $20,000 wall building project.

Jon Bryant: What a better chance. So what's interesting is I've seen this question asked numerous times, which laser measure should I buy? And I mean this whole conversation feels funny because it's like just buy one. But I will say the thing that has made a difference to me is buy the smallest one you can with the furthest distance. That's probably the most professional brand you can find and one that has a wrist rope, like a thing you can put around your wrist that dangles down like a little lanyard. And then you can actually type and then grab it again. It's so efficient.

Michael Murray: Instead of setting it down on the customer's dresser and then you leave and you've lost it. And I'm speaking from experience as the one who has to buy these things for the sales team.

Jon Bryant: Exactly. Yeah, I'm saying I've lost a couple and that's not helpful when you have a couple estimates in the day and you go to the next one. And then what do you do? Well now you just brought your feet with you. So now you're counting with feet and you look like an absolute psychopath.

Michael Murray: That's how we did it when I was in college and we were taught how to do estimates using production rates on paper. And we would count and it would be like we'd take a three foot long step and we had to know how far. After you did it for a while you just kind of knew and you count your steps multiplied by three. That is a way, but I can tell you if I'm a homeowner watching you count your steps, I am not thinking this is a really professional accurate modern experience.

Jon Bryant: And those little things have been helpful for me in my life. You don't have it, you can make it work. But I always look behind my back. I'm like a caveman looking for a predator behind me. I'm like, no one see me.

Michael Murray: Oh yeah, is anybody watching?

Jon Bryant: There are ways, I've tried to do this, and it just feels clunky and takes longer than the laser measure, but you can use your iPhone, and it has the measuring tools in there. I think even, maybe I've seen that, like, Company Cam even offers something where you can do that now. But it's just the laser measure thing works so simply and it's just so fast. Once you use it and you do it, it's like, how was I doing quotes without this?

Michael Murray: Totally. The interesting thing is there's been so many apps that have come out where they're like, just take your phone and go around the room and it'll add it up. And it's like, that actually is way harder at the end of the day than just a measure. When you stand in the corner of a room and you just literally have to turn zap, turn zap, enter. We've had all these discussions over the years with people about this kind of like, it would be awesome if you could just walk around the house and it measures for you. It's like, yeah. And did you realize that it'll take you two or three more steps in the process to literally walk around or do that to every wall. So I think it's the most simple way. And until I get introduced to a new way, prove me wrong. Like in the comments, prove me wrong. That's not the most simple way, laser measure.

Jon Bryant: So laser measure works great on the inside, it does not work on the outside. And so when we're doing an exterior quote, we bring a measuring wheel. And again, don't know, 75 bucks or something on Amazon, and it works great. All of our reps keep them in their cars. Yeah, it's super accurate and it is super professional looking. It looks like, wow, these guys have done this before.

Michael Murray: Totally. One of the little hacks that we've talked about before is that our team would actually go and use Google Maps to get the exterior measurements or the measurements of the thing using Google Earth, use the measure feature, and then it kind of gets them ahead of the project. They know what they're looking at. And then when they get to the house, they talk to the customer and they're like, so the front of your house is 55 feet. And the person's like, how do you know that? It's like, well, I was here last night watching you and your family.

Michael Murray: That's creepy. I came over at 2 AM and measured it. Thought I'd save us some time. That's how good we are. And then the customer said, okay, I'll give you a call. Yeah, we'll give you a call. Don't call me.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, we'll call you. Yeah, do not call me ever. It's really funny how these little nuances of these tools are funny because we've gone through this enough to realize what works. And I always feel like a crazy person when I'm sitting around, especially with just with friends, and they realize how deep my knowledge is about things like laser measures and I can see in their eyes how fast they lose respect for me. They're like, why do you know this? I always wondered what you did for a job and now I'm starting to get a better picture of it.

Michael Murray: Yeah, you put, that is like the 10,000 hours rule. I put 10,000 hours into a lot of really stupid, really silly things. So, okay, so let's go back to the leave behind thing. You said you have a leave behind, which is like a nice glossy kind of company booklet.

Michael Murray: I would describe it as like almost like more than a pamphlet, less than a book. What is this booklet?

Jon Bryant: Yeah. Be so nice if you had an example within arm's reach of your booklet.

Michael Murray: I don't think I do. We're not that organized. We don't actually prepare this stuff. I don't think anybody listening expects a whole lot of preparation from the two knuckleheads on the Price Sell Paint podcast.

Jon Bryant: I think they expect a follow-up episode though to see your shiny pamphlet.

Michael Murray: I think, here's actually, here's the thing. I'm happy to share it, but the problem isn't, somebody doesn't need to see mine and then copy off it. This is something that actually, we see this all the time with websites, and I know I'm getting off on a tangent a little bit, but I think we all care way too much what our local competitors are doing, or even just maybe they're not even local, but they're just other painting companies. And it's like, my argument is stop looking to what are the best painting companies doing or what are the mediocre painting companies doing. It's like, no, don't even worry about that. What are the Fortune 100 companies doing? What are, where do you go shop? Where do your customers go shop? Where are they spending money at Starbucks or Target or Costco, like whatever those experiences are? What do their pieces look like? What does their branding look like? What does their marketing look like? Is it high gloss or is it on like a Word document looking thing that they printed off on the printer in the office? Anyways, we know the answer to that question. It's like start to model off of those companies and the things that resonate with you. I have a whole file drawer in my office that I just call marketing inspiration and there's some painting company stuff in there because there's painting companies out there doing some cool stuff locally and nationally. But I've got HVAC companies, I've got electric, I've got nothing to do with home improvement stuff in there, banks, so many different things that I've picked up over the years. I go into the bank and I see this booklet and I'm like, well, that's really cool. And I'll take it as an inspiration piece for the next time we need to create a booklet like this. So anyways, kind of went off on a tangent, something I'm kind of passionate about, I guess, but there's so many cool examples out there and just find the one that really resonates with you, your brand and the experience that you're trying to show your customers that you provide.

Jon Bryant: So I'll go one level beyond that, which is go find a good designer. I think a lot of us, I mean, a lot of us, I am very abnormal in that way. I'm very passionate about design. But the thing I learned early on is that find a good designer is gonna make a huge difference to your materials and how your customers feel because they can build the right feeling for your customers. I think where I've seen people go wrong is you go to Fiverr.com or you go to Upwork, you go to something like that and you get somebody who is just spitting out some random stuff and you just take it and consider that to be good. And I think there's real value in finding somebody who can replicate the experience you're looking to give customers. You don't need to be the designer. I think a lot of us get that wrong. Just find someone you respect and you think is good and that's a good start. Yeah, tangent for sure, but yeah.

Michael Murray: Yeah, well, I'm going to take what you said and just elaborate one more little point, but it's just like, you need to spend money on this. This is an investment and it's a significant one. And so how much money you should spend? I'm not going to answer that question because it depends on what kind of business you're trying to build? What kind of business are you? But the answer is probably more. It's more on this type of stuff. This matters. And if we said that spending, like having a piece that is exceptional would increase your win rate by five percentage points, how much revenue would that drive? Hundreds of thousands, millions? I mean, for some companies listening, it's millions of dollars in sales. And it's just like, so what are you willing to spend to have that piece designed? If it's 500 bucks, you're probably not gonna, you might change your win rate by 5%. It just might not go in the right direction.

Jon Bryant: Right, right. Yeah, you can do some damage here. Let's talk about the leave behinds. You mentioned it early on that you thought it could be done wrong. There was a way to do too much. There's a way to do it that replicates about a similar experience to the suit, so to speak. Am I getting that right?

Michael Murray: I don't know. I feel like most of the industry, most of home improvement, not just painting, is like a folder with a logo on it and a bunch of papers in it. That is good. That is better than nothing. It is better than just handing somebody your business card. It's, again, I don't want to completely knock it, but I'm about to. It is not great. It's time. Again, it is played out. You are not special as a painting contractor when you leave your customer with your folder with four or five pieces of paper in it that tell them how awesome you are and here's our insurance and whatever. That's what we did five years ago when I was a college student. That's when you hand that to your customer, is little tiny college kid Michael Murray in 2003. That's where your level is. And I think there's something above that.

Jon Bryant: So when you, I want to talk about your new and revised sales experience. Let's go back to 2003 when you were handing that out, you were also probably handing out a paper estimate too, right? So everything was just, that was the best medium we had available to us. It was the only one.

Michael Murray: As opposed to what on a smartphone? We barely had the internet. I mean, this is like the Stone Ages and then the internet came and then like a day later. No, yeah, so no, we had like a flip phone. Yeah, it's like what are we talking about? So yes, we had our carbonless form, our three-part contract. We were really fancy. It was white and yellow and pink, like everybody else's. And we'd fill out the little thing and rip it off and put it in the folder. That's how we did it for a long time.

Jon Bryant: Yeah. Call me. Please call me. Fax me. Fax me back acceptance.

Michael Murray: Yeah. And again, it was, I mean, it's better than, it is an upgrade over some of what our competitors are still doing today.

Jon Bryant: For sure. Yeah, so it's like a baseline, some leave behind that you're talking about with something well designed that reflects well on your company. The folder is good, but I think we've talked about a little bit of this elevated experience. And so it's something that I was acutely aware of when we launched PaintScout. You can build this estimate, you can get it accurate, you can have great rapport with the customer. But one of the only things that are left with at the point of decision of whether they want to work with you is a piece of paper or a PDF. And so that's what you're sending as your email item, right? And you might have the leave behind. This is now supposed to be printed off and put in that folder. And it was kind of a truncated experience. So here's some stuff and here's another thing. This thing that I just sent you doesn't reflect as well as that other stuff I gave you. And so it was really about thinking through the customer experience of what it's like to get an estimate that led us to this presentation feature. And one of the things, you know, we talked about before this podcast is what does a modern experience look like? And I have my theories on how this is supposed to be used. I know you've been using it for a while and are just changing up how you're using it. So maybe you want to walk through that a little bit.

Michael Murray: So yeah, we're talking, this is obviously a PaintScout feature. Somebody doesn't use PaintScout, I don't know why they wouldn't, but they could try to recreate this by putting in a lot of extra effort. But it's essentially almost like a slideshow, like if you've never seen the presentation feature, and you're not sure what we're talking about, it's almost like a slideshow interactive, like mini website is probably the right word for it, that is sent as part of the link that includes the quote. So it's like, you know, however you want to organize it, but it's one of the pages is the quote or the estimate with the actual pricing and the details and the included and not included and terms and conditions and all those things. But then there's all these other pages. I think the best if you've never seen it, the best way to think about it is a mini website. And you can have, I'm sure there's a limit, but you can have a handful of pages and you can customize them just like you would a website with pictures and videos and text and colors and all those types of things. And so yeah, what we've always historically seen that as is just the attachment to the email or to the quote that is sent to the customer, hoping that when they, you know, are ready, like let's imagine they didn't book on the spot and they, give us a week or they're trying to evaluate the different quotes that we've gotten, give us a couple days or whatever. When they get that email from us, nice to meet you, here's your quote, click on this link, they open that link and yet again, they're presented with something that doesn't look like the paper contract that they have from the other company that they're looking at, but it is our nice quote, but also a page that includes some information about us and some before and after photos and some of the customer reviews and awards that we've won and how long we've been in business, and just the things that you'd probably put them on your website as this is what makes us different, this is what makes us stand out, these are the added value props that we are gonna provide. That's what that tool is. And so we've always created it, don't really update it all that much, it's probably been a couple years since we really updated it, but it was really just kind of a, hopefully somebody will look at it after we send the email.

Jon Bryant: Now what's changed? You guys have looked at this whole process and I'm hoping I know what you're gonna say because I think it's so powerful, but tell me, cut the suspense.

Michael Murray: So what we're going to do is actually just present this to the homeowner. Just like if we went and said, hey, I want to show you a PowerPoint presentation, just to kind of get a visual. And sitting with the homeowner at their kitchen table and basically walking them through, let me just explain a little bit more about the company, how long we've been around, where we're located, here's some of the things that people say about us, here's some of the awards that we've won, here's our Better Business Bureau rating, all the things that we at least believe, and I think pretty rightfully so, customers care about, so that we're trying to give them that positive sentiment and things like that, as well as some maybe pictures of this is what it's like when we're at your house and how we're gonna do the work. But instead of just assuming that the customer's gonna look at it after we leave, we want the sales rep to actually sit down, maybe it's 10 minutes or however long, and just walk the homeowner through, again, through these pages on the presentation feature of PaintScout to make sure that they're explaining it, answering any questions that they might have about it, as well as obviously including it afterwards if we don't close on the spot.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, I think it's a massive deal. It's a massive deal for a couple of reasons. One is that it lets sales reps hit all the important parts of the conversation in a structured way. Right? A lot of times, if it doesn't come up, like the company history is when do you bring it up? It doesn't, if someone is asking about your Better Business Bureau rating, when do you bring it up? Do you randomly just blurt it out? How's your day? I have an A plus Better Business rating. We're good. So it gives you that structure of knowing that you've hit the target things you want to hit that you think are important. But two, it walks them through what the experience is like when they're gonna get the estimate. And I think that's really critical because when a lot of people get these documents, they're not 100% sure what they are because they've never interacted with something like this before. And so they're getting new information and they're trying to sift through it. I think it's great because it is a reiteration. It's a reminder of these important details now at the point of decision. So you're getting ahead of it and you're like, look, here's some important things. And you know what's really helpful is when you get this, you're also going to get this package of stuff with your estimate. And maybe just some of those things we talked about that were important. This is a good reminder to just check those out with those other companies. Cause we want to make sure you're getting what you want. And then you're just getting a double hit of this type of really quality information, building that trust, that rapport and all the stuff we talk about and ultimately building confidence that you're a good fit. And I think, you know, my brother, when I talked to him about this feature, he does exactly what you're talking about. He walks them through it, shows them all the critical points. And then he even goes as far as actually showing them how to accept it. And it's kind of an interesting piece because I think it's one that we forget. So make it easy for the customer to accept it. And like, here's the button you're gonna push and here's where you're gonna sign when you're ready to work with us. And it's like a really nice segue actually to asking for the sale. It's like, is that something you're comfortable with today or do you wanna wait? And he's been so successful with that, with having customers go on it all hours of the night and accept it because they now understand the process. And I think even when someone has to sign an estimate and get it back to you or e-sign or whatever they're doing, a lot of us don't know exactly how to accept an estimate. What is this going to do? How do I accept it? And it's like another point of communication, another question. So that's where I've seen huge value for him and that's ultimately just, I think it'd be so powerful for you guys.

Michael Murray: Yeah, no, I'm excited. Yeah, I appreciate you never telling me that we were supposed to do that from the beginning, but here we are. So thanks, Jon, for holding on to that.

Jon Bryant: You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him use the presentation feature correctly.

Michael Murray: That's right. I am curious to hear your thoughts on this. One of the things last year, I was getting some quotes to have some work done on windows in my house. And it's actually really, you know, we talked about looking to other industries. It's something I would recommend. Go get some quotes from other large home improvement companies. There's probably a $50 million, $100 million home improvement, home service company in your local market, whoever's listening, and get a quote from them, even if you're not in the market, and just see what it's like, and what parts do you like, what parts don't you like? I've gotten a lot of quotes from large companies that I was like, that was awful. But I've gotten some where I was like, oh wow, I can really see what they're doing there. But the thing that's interesting, especially if you go do this window quote, it became like a running joke for us, is the heat lamp demonstration. And if you've ever gotten a window quote, I don't know if it's just a Cleveland thing, it's probably everywhere, but you know what I'm talking about. And they come in and they often will have like a sample window. It's not like, but it's like a full size window. It's like a, I don't know, two foot by three foot or something, small window. And they'll show you like maybe a cheap window, kind of like here's what our competitor might offer you, just a cheap vinyl window or whatever. And then here's our window. They have another window thing and it's got these big bags and I got like four quotes and they all, they all shop at the same sales supply shop or whatever. And so I was like this is obviously a thing. And so it got me thinking, right? I'm like all right, well if they're, these are all bigger companies than us in terms of revenue and otherwise, maybe there's something here, I don't know. And so they get out now their second window and then they get out the heat lamp. And the heat lamp's very important, it's part of this whole presentation apparently. And then they show you, they put the heat lamp behind the generic cheap window, and you put your hand and you can feel the heat and you're like, yeah, definitely feel the heat. And then they do it with the nice fancy window that they're trying to sell you, and you can't really feel the heat coming through the window, and that's their way of showing the energy efficiency and how much, you're spending money, but you're actually gonna save money. And by the time as you go through a couple of these, you're just like, it's time for our heat lamp demonstration. But what's interesting is that they're bringing the product. I can see the difference. And they're basically saying, so you're going to get other quotes, maybe whatever. OK, well, let me ask you a question. If I could sell you this cheap window, or this not so good window, I could sell that for some amount of money. Or you could go with this really nice window. Do you think you would ever accept this cheap window in your house? Like, would that be okay to you? And after you look at it and you're just, well, I think for most of, what they're hoping, if you say yes, I think they realize that this isn't our customer and that's probably okay, hopefully. But if you say no, then when you get later in the appointment and they're like, yeah, it's a billion dollars to get your windows replaced and they can say, okay, well, where do we go from here? Because you told me you don't want that super cheap window, which I could use to save you money. But you already said you don't want that, right? And I find that interesting, because there's something about that hands-on, tactile feel that I can experience the end result during the sales presentation that, to manage with you, we have a hard time replicating. We do that with our cabinet painting. We bring a sample of one of our painted cabinet doors so people can see it and feel it and understand this is the quality that you can expect. But for your painting quote, we have a hard time bringing a piece of wood and saying this is what a painted piece of wood looks like. Most people, anyway, we've had a hard time figuring it out, but trying to demonstrate the quality that we're providing. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this if you feel like there's any value to trying to do something.

Jon Bryant: I mean, the cabinet thing makes a ton of sense. That one, the before and after cabinets, be able to actually feel it, scratch it, see the difference. That one is what we do for cabinets as well. And it's been great. There is something to it for sure. I mean, can you smell the quality difference in paint? That would be a weird one. That doesn't work. I'm just spit balling here.

Michael Murray: Yeah. But I mean though, to be fair, I think most people listening know that there is, I'm just gonna make it like, well, we love Sherwin Williams. We love Benjamin Moore. We love them all. But it's just like if I'm quoting somebody with Sherwin Williams Emerald and my competitor's giving them, I'm trying to think of the equivalent like Sherwin Williams ProMar 200. There is a quality difference that anybody in the painting industry can understand. There is a price difference. There is a time and a place for both of those. But if I'm in the, if I'm providing somebody a quote and my price is higher than my competitors, I'm using Emerald, they're using ProMar 200, we're not comparing apples to apples here. And I need, I know that. Everybody listening to this podcast generally knows that. My homeowner has no idea. They know that Sherwin Williams paint, that's really good paint. Benjamin Moore paint, that's really good paint. What's the difference between Benjamin Moore Aura and Benjamin Moore whatever, I can't even, just put me on the spot. But you get my point, right? And it's just like, how do we demonstrate that? How do we explain that to a customer? Or is it just like, well, because I said so. This paint's really good. And then my competitor comes in with the ProMar 200 and they're like, yeah, we use really good paint. It's from Sherwin Williams. And customer's like, OK, well, that's what they said too. So I guess they're the same. Sounds the same to me. This one's less money. We might as well go with this one.

Jon Bryant: Yeah, the classic example is you're using Emerald and then someone's using the lowest contractor grade from Benjamin Moore. And the person says, well, they're using Benjamin Moore. Yeah, customers have no quality understanding, nor should they, that's why they're hiring you. So I'm gonna put more thought towards this. Maybe we can do a future episode of how to show the quality differences in your company or what you're using. Because you're right, it's really helpful to see that visual and I don't think we figured it out.

Michael Murray: Sure. I think that's a challenge. Again, we haven't either. So I'm not sitting here saying this is exactly what we should do. But I think it's something everybody should be thinking about. I think another, you mentioned the word visual, something that has come up over the years we've done and not done is bringing a color deck with you to look at paint colors at the estimate appointment. Do you feel like that's something that should be in the arsenal? Or is that a yes or a no? Where do you come down?

Jon Bryant: I feel like it's distracting sometimes. Too much discussion of color up front. I think we want to figure out if we can work together and let them know we have the ability to help them with color. Because ultimately, is the color fan selling the job? Is the sales rep expected to be the color expert? There's a bunch of questions there for me. What's been your take?

Michael Murray: Yeah, so the way that we coach it now, I've been in our company, we've had it where you walk up to the door with a color deck. We don't currently do that, and I would say we won't. And the reason for it is, one, it's clunky. It's one more thing that's going to be in your hand, and you might not even use it most of the time. And so what we teach is have it in your car. Because probably less than 10% of the appointments, it can be a great sales tool. Because I think once you get somebody excited and committed to the color, that is a big hurdle to just moving forward with a painting contractor. But to your point, it can really get in the way of the appointment and we can get way down the weeds of trying to pick out colors. It can, for a lot of homeowners, it can be stress inducing. Oh my gosh, I got to pick out the color right now. I don't want to do this. I don't have, I need more time. I need to marinate on this for days. I'm gonna be put on the spot to have to pick a color, which will induce a sense of stress, which is not the place we want customers to be when they're trying to sell them a painting job.

Jon Bryant: Totally. There's only three options I feel like in my mind for the right customer, which is either they choose you, they choose a competitor or they do nothing. And I'm trying to avoid that do nothing part by introducing as little complexity into the decision as possible. It's like, you can choose me or the competitor, that's fine. But if 30% of the time you're actually doing nothing, that might be actually my biggest competitor.

Michael Murray: I think it is. I've long made that argument that I think a bigger chunk, more customers, I think, do nothing than go with our competitor. And I think the reason they do nothing is because it's scary. Picking the wrong color is scarier than keeping the current color. That's part of the reason that we pay an interior designer. I mean, the worst outcome for a homeowner is they pay us a lot of money and they end up with a color they like worse than the current color. That stinks. And we've talked about, you interviewed Sue Wadden on the podcast. We've talked about how important it is to make color selection an important part of the sales approach. But I think that's a multi-step. I think if we try to accomplish all of that in the first appointment, I think we're overreaching.

Jon Bryant: Absolutely, yeah. That's probably a good spot to end it today. Educational as always. I've learned some things about your life, mostly about sauna usage, but a few things about paint too. So that's always helpful.

Michael Murray: Very important. That's why people tune in.

Jon Bryant: And for those of you listening along, that's why they tune in. They wanna know those hard, I mean, the intricacies of your life. But yeah, if you enjoyed the podcast, feel free to like and subscribe. Michael really enjoys personal LinkedIn messages, so feel free to shoot him one.

Michael Murray: Perfect.

Jon Bryant: And yeah, we appreciate everybody listening. We thank you and thanks for all your questions and support. And we will see you again soon on another episode of Price. Sell. Paint. Thanks, Michael. Take it easy.

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