Whether for large- or small-scale contractors, calls are the ‘best’ first point of contact with your leads. Being able to take them all and respond accordingly can not only bring up the sales but also build up the image of your company to your potential customers.
Vito Maretzki is someone who has built up his gutter repair and maintenance company in Denver through outsourcing call-taking. In this episode, I talk to Vito about handling calls, outsourcing the job, and how it led to his company’s larger success.
In this episode, we explore:
02:31 Brief run-through of Vito’s gutter maintenance company
- How he created his own gutter replacement company
- How he found his niche market
04:20 Change of branding
- How he changed Colorado Gutter Company to Gutter Maintenance Pro
- How he found more opportunity, profit, and success in the niche market
- Insights on approaching different business opportunities from your competitors
07:15 Services of Gutter Maintenance
- What is gutter maintenance for Vito Maretzki
09:12 Process of outsourcing the call handling to an external party
- The setup for taking calls for Gutter Maintenance Pro’s outsourced CSRs
- How he uses a response to bid website calculator for estimating services (a way of automating bookings)
10:55 Automating customer bookings in comparison to taking calls
- How booking automation on the website differs from the traditional customer call
- Advantages of calls over automated bookings
12:56 Process from taking his own phone calls to almost never getting any calls on his phone
- Pain points of small entrepreneurs/contractors who rely on calls to get customers
- His method of outsourcing calls
18:08 How outsourced CSRs handle calls for Vito’s company
- How to maximize interactive forms for the receptionists without knowing all details about the company
21:53 Insights about the service of outsourcing call-taking
- Reactions to people knowing it’s a call center business
23:23 Handling calls beyond the form that Vito provides
- How he automates and systemizes the process
- How calls are filtered depending on the purpose
24:49 How to handle specific requests
- When to patch the call through to the entrepreneur
26:34 Mistake to avoid after calls come in
- How soon to follow up or respond to people
- Proper mindset to responding to calls
28:45 Handling valueless calls
- Changing things up in your website to prevent calls that don’t bring in leads
- The value of outsourcing inbound calls to CSRs
31:45 Volume of calls for Gutter Maintenance Pro
- Number of calls and leads Gutter Maintenance Pro gets
- Amount of spending for outsourcing calls
34:22 Opportunities of outsourcing calls vs having a trained receptionist specific to your business
- Benefits of outsourcing calls for a small business
- Limits in outsourcing calls
38:38 Insights on live chat
41:17 Live chat vs. phone calls
42:10 Benefits of getting people to call