| Q. |
Describe your business and how you got started. |
| A. |
Parker Electrical Maintenance started as a home based Electrical Do-it-Yourself Consulting firm in New Jersey in October 2005. My original objective was to assist solving the complicated technical and electrical installation requests of homeowners (do-it-yourselfers). Since then, I have expanded to perform licensed and insured residential electrical installation, maintenance, and repair to Delaware homeowners and property owners. |
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| Q. |
What is unique about your company? |
| A. |
Not only do I offer personalized free electrical consultation and detailed estimates, and residential electrical services, but I always customize my services based on the homeowners' budget, time, and design/ installation ideas. In addition, Parker Electrical Maintenance offers competitive pricing to all customers due to our low overhead and operating costs. Lastly, I offer after-work and evening hours for the customer's convenience - something not found with most contractors. |
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| Q. |
What is the craziest experience you've had on the job? |
| A. |
One crazy experience was when a customer thought they lost power to a bathroom circuit, due to old faulty wiring. Normally, bathroom circuits are wired through a Ground Fault Circuit Interrupter (GFCI) which protects the occupants of the bathroom, and is normally located within each bathroom. Well, after extensive testing, troubleshooting, and inspection of the old wiring and bathroom circuits, it turned out that the wiring needed to be upgraded but was not defective. After several hours, the circuit was traced to a GFCI located behind a bookshelf in a bedroom (OF ALL PLACES!). By resetting the GFCI, the bathroom circuits were operable again. Word to the wise: install apparatus in their intended locations for their intended purposes! |
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| Q. |
How do you find and keep good employees? |
| A. |
I currently operate as a sole proprietor, as most jobs currently can be completed in one day by one electrician. As future projects become more demanding, I plan to hire employees accordingly. In order to keep good employees, I would encourage them to perform their individual jobs as entrepreneurs, giving them a sense of ownership and self worth within the company. As a reward for example, I would give them certain incentives such as paid time off for producing more revenue. When you care for your employees, they will take care of you and the company. |
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| Q. |
What advice would you give to another pro about keeping his costs down? |
| A. |
The best advice to keep costs down is to watch your operating expenses, material costs, and to perform each job right the first time. Also, try to schedule multiple estimates/ visits with customers on the same day if practical: i.e. a customer cancels a scheduled visit while en route to their residence is lost productivity and resources if only one visit is scheduled for that day. Lastly, qualify the customer before you go to visit them. This keeps you from spending money on traveling to broken opportunities and separates the “tire- kickers” from the “ready-to-hire” customers. |
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| Q. |
What is the one thing you wish you would have known before starting your own business? |
| A. |
Advertising is a key issue for me. Before joining ServiceMagic, I spent and wasted hundreds of dollars trying to attract customers and promote my business through pay-per-click sites. These methods wasted valuable resources, which could have been spent purchasing much-needed tools, materials and stationery to run my business efficiently and economically. ServiceMagic has been a true source of producing customers by producing real-time leads, thus saving me time and money. |
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| Q. |
What mistakes do you see your competition make over and over again? |
| A. |
One of my pet peeves is when the competition overprices customers for doing shoddy work. I experience this time after time when performing electrical “rework” of a previous contractor’s installation. Another mistake is when the competition is not “professional” in their approach with the customer. Presentation matters! Proper dress, clean vehicles and tools, proper grooming and hygiene makes that first impression of you the determining factor in whether the customer does business with you or not. In addition, excellent customer service starts with the first engaging phone call or e-mail to the potential customer, and lasts throughout your relationship with the customer - even well after the project is completed. This is how you create repeat customers for life and surpass the competition! |
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| Q. |
What is the one tool you could never live without? |
| A. |
My cell phone - because I am always mobile. As I am becoming increasingly mobile, a laptop computer is also an important tool to have because I can give customers electrical estimates, electrical product details, and prices of any materials needed for their electrical installations on the spot without having them wait hours or days for a reply. |
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| Q. |
What do you enjoy doing when you're not working? |
| A. |
I enjoy spending time with my family. My family is the support system of my business and my life. |
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| Q. |
What are the three most important things a contractor needs to know or do to be successful? |
| A. |
In order to remain successful, a contractor must: a) Produce professional workmanship - this helps create repeat customers and word-of-mouth referrals; b) Communication with the customer: up front budget and pricing concerns, installation problems, time constraints, etc; c) Maintain a professional image: proper dress, hygiene, organization, marketable business name and logo. |
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| Q. |
Were you skeptical of joining ServiceMagic and/or using the Internet to garner leads? If so, why? |
| A. |
I was skeptical of joining ServiceMagic at first because I didn’t want to waste hundreds of advertising dollars like I did before with pay-per-click services. Once I joined ServiceMagic, my customer base grew exponentially because of its tried and true method of generating real leads for me in real-time. I can see where my money is being spent and adjust my advertising budget accordingly. |
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| Q. |
Were you happy with previous advertising/marketing methods? |
| A. |
I used pay-per-click services such as Google Adwords which generated no solid leads. Eventually I eliminated these services because it was a waste of money through false “clicks” to my website. |
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| Q. |
Since joining ServiceMagic, have your marketing costs decreased and if so by what percentage? (How much are you now saving?) |
| A. |
My marketing costs have decreased by at least twenty percent because each lead that I receive is priced according to the size of the job, whereas each pay-per-click was based on how many clicks I received to my web site at prices which fluctuated like the weather. |
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| Q. |
How has ServiceMagic helped you grow your business? |
| A. |
ServiceMagic has helped me spread the word about my business faster through its ease of advertising with multiple websites, submission of project photos on my portfolio’s tab, allow me to offer customer promotions, and development of my business profile to market to potential customers. This remains a valuable tool in creating new customers for Parker Electrical Maintenance. About ninety percent of my customers say that their decision to hire me was based on my business profile presentation at ServiceMagic. |
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