Top 10 Tips to Running a Successful Construction Business

All right. Now I do have about 10 tips here that I'm going to share with you if you're a new contractor and you're looking for ways that you can become successful in the trade. Now, the first tip that I have for you, if you're a new contractor is I believe one of the most important and one of the easiest things to do in order to secure work and answer your phone and not just answer your phone, but answer your phone and be present because most customers that I talked to, tell me the same thing. I've called three people. I've called two people. I've been calling around and I can't get ahold of anybody. Nobody wants to call me back. I've had clients say, listen, Kyle, you were the only one that called me back. The job is yours. Just get me a price and when can we begin? Answer your phone. Tip number one, in my opinion, one of the most important tips. Now tip number two kind of goes along with answering your phone and it is getting back quotes or bids or estimates in a timely fashion. Everybody gets busy, but you got to remember that the client is out there waiting for you and all they can think about is their job. You are obviously thinking about multiple things. You've got multiple jobs, maybe going on. You've got subcontractors, you've got employees, whatever that you are thinking about. However, your client or potential client is only thinking about their job. Now this next one involves the financial side of running a business. A very common thing for contractors to do is to shoot for the moon. They want to make a ton of money as we all do. However, I've always been of the mindset, you know what? I'm going to take the Walmart model. Now I'm not going to save money, live better, but I'm going to try to keep my schedule full by having volume and keep my cost down. So by driving a lower price to my customer, hopefully they'll go with me. I can stay busy because also I want to stay relevant. I want to keep doing work, honing my craft. And it's important when you're young and you're starting off that you've got to be working all the time because you don't get good at anything by sitting on your butt waiting for that million dollar job to come along. You got to work and do even the small jobs. Cause I always say, and this is another tip, the small jobs will lead to big jobs. And what I mean by that is somebody might call, they might want a door replaced. They might want a sink, faucet, whatever, some little tiny handyman job. Don't think you're better than that. If you're getting started, do all those little jobs because they will make connections with people that want bigger jobs. And when you're a good person, when you do a good job and you're a fair rate, they're going to remember you first. Now this next tip is something that just bothers the heck out of me. And it's so prevalent in the trades is people giving bids and then coming back at the end of the job and saying, Oh yeah, you owe me more because I didn't figure this or we did this. And now you owe me more money. Don't do that. Don't do that. Your customer should not pay for your poor bidding. You should pay for that and you should learn from that experience is always the best teacher. So don't make your customer pay for your poor bidding. Obviously if they make a change, they should pay for that. But if you were given a scope of work and you give them a price, you can't go back and ask for more money because you messed up on the quote. It's just a personal opinion. Obviously a lot of you might argue with me, and I'd love to have that discussion down below in the comments. However, for me, when I give my client a quote, unless they make a change, that's what it is. It is what it is. Now, along with that, you gotta be honest during the process. If you messed up, if you ordered something wrong, you can't hold it in. You can't wait till the last minute. You gotta be open and honest and always keep that line of communication going with your client. Don't keep them in the dark on anything that's going on. They will appreciate that and they will remember the way you treated them. So one huge tip that I would like to leave with everybody is communication, communication, communication. It's the root of all evil when used improperly. Now, thankfully we have this thing called social media and YouTube and Instagram has been great for really, you know, strengthening the community of trades people and sharing all the tips and tricks. And as a contractor who thought I knew a lot, I always knew I didn't know it all. And then I went on Instagram and YouTube and I was slapped in the face and said, yeah, man, you aren't that good. There's a lot of great, great people out there doing amazing things and you can learn from them. So what that means is don't think that the way you do it is the only way to do it. And just because your dad did it before you, and that's the way it's always been done, that that's the way it should be done. Always be open to new ideas, constantly be looking for better ways to do whatever it is you're doing. And that will definitely make your clients happy and it will make you set yourself apart from your competition. Now I've always chose in my line of work to stay small and that is a choice. I wanted to be a boutique builder. I want people to come to me knowing that they're going to pay a premium, but they're going to get a certain standard and they're going to see that because they've been following me on social media. They know what they're getting and they're willing to pay for that. But there's a lot of people out there that they want to grow their business. They want to be able to walk away from that business because they put the right people in place to also grow that business. So what I would say is if that is your mentality, if you're looking to just start the brand and then, you know, run it but pass it off and let the other people put the tool bags on, make sure you're going out and you're hiring competent people, not always experienced people, but people that are willing to learn, people that are willing to work hard. And then the most important part is you've got to treat them well. You have to remember that they're working for you, not themselves. Therefore, they're not always going to put you in their best interest, but you have to put them in your best interest. And what that means is you pay them appropriately and treat them properly. And that is the way to grow a business. I keep it small because I'm not interested in growing a big business. I want to grow a big brand and maybe that will change over time. But for now, you know, I want to stay small and just kind of specialize. And I think there's a different path for everybody, but that's, that's my take on it. If you're going to grow big, you have to hire the right people in order to do that. And you got to pay them appropriately. Now, my final word of wisdom for anybody out there that's looking to get started in the trade, start a social media account. In fact, start multiple social media accounts. And the reason I say that is because I understand that everybody wants to get in front of the camera. Like I am right now, not everybody wants to take pictures, but what I will tell you is that you have the greatest opportunity in front of you compared to every trades person before you, because you have the ability to post your work in the exact light that you want it to be posted in the exact description that you want to describe your work. You can post it to the people you want to see it. And you can do that all freely all while sending the message that you want to share. And there's no greater way to do that than social media. You can pay for ads. You can pay for radio spots. However, when you put up a post on social media, these algorithms are so smart. They're sending those messages to the people they think are most apt to like that message. And those are the people that you want to hire you to do their work. It is a great tool. Do not waste time. Take pictures, take video, share your message, tell your story, whatever that is. And I promise you it will come back to you tenfold. So those are my tips if you're looking to get into the trades. And I'm assuming if you're looking to get into any business, a lot of these might apply. So make sure you share this with somebody that's looking to get into the trades. Holy cow, it really started raining out. So make sure you share this video with anybody you think might enjoy it or learn from it. I am by no means an expert. I am only experienced in what I've done in my life. And these are my opinions and what I've learned to work and not work. So I hope you enjoyed this. I hope if it's something that you want to see more of you drop a comment down below to let me know what you want to see and hit that subscribe button. I'll catch you guys on the next video. I am going to go check out that rain.