If trust is started online, along with showing the value of your services, the day of the site visit is arguably the most important part of the sales process. This is where a builder will confirm they can be trusted and their services are worth more than the money asked.

Join us in the fifth part of the series, “Why Builders Lose Sales to Competitors – Part V Sales Process: (Initial Consult/site Visit)”, and discover what you need to be doing before, during and after the first face-to-face meeting for maximum success.

Read/Watch/Listen to this episode, and get our clear insight that will take you to get ahead of the competition, you’ll be well on your way toward a more successful sales process than ever before.

Builder Lead Converter ATTRACTS, CAPTURES & CONVERTS high-quality leads for builders so they can pick & choose their clients & jobs. Find out how at https://www.builderleadconverter.com

Transcript:

 Today. In Conversations That Convert, we will be talking about why builders lose sales and what they can do about it. About it as it relates to the initial consultation or the site visit. Let’s jump in.

 

Welcome to Conversations That Convert. Every week we’ll spend about 10 to 15 minutes tackling relevant lead generation marketing and sales topics for remodelers. Home improvement companies and home builders conversations. That Convert is brought to you by Builder, lead Converter, your perfect sales assistant.

 

And now here’s Rick and Diana. Welcome to Conversations That Convert everyone. Thank you so much for joining us. Welcome, Diana. Nice to see you. Nice to see you too. Welcome everybody. How are you? What’s our topic today, Diana? Today again, how we can not lose sales, and this is part five of our sales process and we’ll see how the initial consult and site visit can help us.

 

That’s right. And this is again, continu with our series of why Builders lose sales. So here is where we are at. We have qualified the lead on the phone, and we will now set up a face-to-face meeting. What should we do next? And again, we’re looking at some best practices here to make sure that we’re not tripping up here and potentially costing us a a sale.

 

So this is again, focusing on that. Initial consultation. If you’re a home builder, most likely they’re coming to your office, your model home, or if you’re a modeler, that means you’re going to their home. So we’re gonna break this down as simple as possible. Starting with after you’ve made that appointment, what should you do before the meeting?

 

What do you think, Diana? What would be a good idea that you, before the meeting, Before the meeting, maybe to better prepare how I like it, setting expectations. Right. Let me show you something that I put together. It is called a send ahead. So the send ahead is something that would be emailed to the client in either a PDF or it could be on a web form as, as well.

 

But it’s really g we’ll set expectations of what will happen. So this would go along with a confirmation of the appointment. And this is again, as one for remodeling. I also made one for home building. Let’s walk through this and look at some of the key things you should have in your send ahead. First of all, again, we’re, we’re, we’re gonna start off with setting expectations.

 

Okay? What will happen. At that meeting, where will the meeting take place is next some things that the lead should be thinking about? So we’ve created five bullet points here. Everything from what do you like Your home about the way it is. Also too, what concerns do you have about remodeling? I. You know, and what kind of remodeling experience do they want?

 

They may have never remodeled before. We will then also incorporate some important resources for them. So some information more about us, some photo galleries. We want them to spend time looking at our projects. Also what our clients are saying. So this will be links to reviews, testimonials, so on and so forth.

 

This will then talk some more about how to make a good choice. Budget and then given a link back to our website, your contact information as a salesperson. If you’re going to include lender information here, you can include that. One thing we used to do is create a finance worksheet and show, you know, we would walk people through a finance worksheet and I’ll show you an example of that here as well.

 

Again, your links to your client testimonials. Put those all into a nice P D F. Attach it to the email or create it on a webpage. We’ve done actually the webpage. So it’s simply a link less likely to get end up in someone’s spam if it’s not a a pdf. Now, next part on here is if you we’re gonna assume that you will interview.

 

Two, maybe three different remodelers. So we’re gonna give them a list of questions and tips of what they should ask any remodeler. And the important thing about this, Diana, is the reason that we wanna bring it up is cuz we’re prepared. But if they bring in someone else and they start asking these questions, we want that other builder not to be prepared where then we look more professional and look like a better fit for the job, assuming it’s a job that we, that we want.

 

What do you think so far, Diana? I think that looks good. And it really raised the credibility in front of the client, if you That’s correct. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and that’s a, I love that word, you use credibility. Because again, we’re not being compared so much to the b their, the, the next builder that’ll bring in behind us.

 

We are being compared to their favorite place to do business. So if they’ve had a really good customer service experience with whatever sort of business place, that’s what we want them to think of. And so they, they get the warm fuzzies when they, you know, hear from us doing things that our competitors aren’t going to do.

 

People just don’t do this. Yes. You know, so this is we what we really wanna focus on. So we’re giving them all these tips here. Again, talking about budget, how that’s going to be comprised, making sure people ask about references. We created, what is it? 22 questions of what they should do. But the last, the most important thing, Diana, that I want to finish with here is what I call the needs, wants and wishlist.

 

So prior to that meeting, I will ask the lead to look at their project in three. Lenses, what do they need to have done in that project? In other words, they’re, those are must haves. They’re, they will not be taken out of the scope of work. And then I want them to look at it from what do I want to have on the project and what do I wish I could have on my project?

 

And this is very important cuz this is how I suggest you break down your pricing as well when you come back to give them a budget proposal. That it would have more of a lump sum for their needs, and then you would itemize out or break out their wants and and wishes. Most, more likely than not, you will come in within their budget with all of their needs and then they can decide to remove any wants or, or wishes.

 

So that is really step one that I would do is sending up that, that at send ahead. Any other thoughts, Diana? I’m just noticing that for me in remodeling especially, wants and wishes are at the same level, so I can make the distinction between, so, okay, I need to get things done that’s in my head, and then what I want is what I wish.

 

Then I will, I will want to implement it no matter what. So I don’t think this is good for the budget, but I realize that. My wants and, and, and wishes are in the same place. I can’t distinguish between them. Well, you know, and that’s, that’s a, so what you just said is the exact mentality that we want the lead to have.

 

We don’t want to come back and include the wants and wishes in the initial budget number because that might push them over where they want to be. I want to come back and say, look, I can do the project within your budget. It will include your must-haves. And then you can decide if you want to take some of these wants and wishes and add them to that, but ultimately it’s your choice.

 

So then it’s, they’re, they’re working against themselves versus I’m the bad guy because the price is too high. Do you see where I’m coming from? Yes. Yes. That makes sense. So let’s look at one more thing that I like to send out. I think it’s a good idea Prior to that first meeting, this is something like a a frequently asked question.

 

These questions should really be comprised of the most common objections you get. At that initial consultation. So I put together this document when I was working with a a client. We had seven questions that were really just veiled objections that we had heard over and over and over again from our, our, our leads.

 

And so let’s say the question is, you know, why is pricing so high so I can break one down on, on pricing? Well, in this case, they were. You know, talking about the questions they have, they were a custom builder and they were being compared to, say semi custom or production builders. So builders that had a base price.

 

So why don’t you, you know, what’s the base price, your plans? Well, we don’t have a base price. Then we broke down and we talked about different types of builders. But this again, is a document that’s going to address those things that the majority of your leads will ask or at least have an objection over.

 

So that’s something, again, can get attached. To your send ahead and then you can let the homeowner work through it. If you, that objection comes up while you’re at the meeting, you can pull out this sheet and you can say, Hey, we sent this to you ahead of time. Did you get a chance to review this? No.

 

Okay, great. Let’s take a look at it right now. What do you think about that one, Diana? I think it’s very smart and they can really support the client to visualize what’s going on. So what’s the road? They can clearly see the road. Let ’em see the road. I love it. All right, so that was before the meeting.

 

Now let’s go to and have the meeting. So we’re face-to-face now, either at. Our office, our model home, if it’s if we’re home building or we’re at their home doing, doing a site visit. So what do you wanna have happen at the meeting? Very simply here, I want to shift their focus away from their favorite question.

 

How much project can I get for how little price everyone wants the most and they wanna pay the least? I just, it was last couple of days looking at purchasing a new car. And so of course I’m trying to get the most amount of car for the least amount of money and making comparisons and trying to understand what I’m getting.

 

And so yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s human nature. I don’t wanna overpay for, for something. Now cars, it’s a lot easier because I can look at. Brands of cars and trim packages and I can try to make that quote unquote apples to apples comparison. So the point here is during the meeting is you wanna make yourself stand out as that you are unique, you are specialized, you are something that cannot be compared.

 

And we are gonna use another visual here. I’m gonna go ahead and show this and bring, bring it on screen. This is something we came up, which is really more or less just a breakdown of what you’ll be talking about at that first meeting. So this is a former client of mine who is now retired. But this is a breakdown of what they used to review on an iPad with the client at the first meeting where this is again, an example of a remodeling.

 

So we would give an overview of the time together. Again, consider this an interview. You’re interviewing us, we’re interviewing you a little bit about that, the builder. Doing some definitions and. Talking about what is the next step. So if you are happy with us, we will ask you if and if we think you’re a good fit, we’ll ask you one simple question.

 

Would you consider partnering with us to remodel your home or build your home? Yes or no? As soon as the customer or the lead says, yes. I would consider you. Now they’ve shifted to your process. So now you can start bringing up your design agreement or your proposal preparation agreement or your scope and range agreement, which is like what this client did.

 

So that’s what we’re tr we’re trying to get is a simple yes or no from the, from the lead. So this went into, again, little background on the builder, and you noticed that we’re using visuals. We have some bullet points here. There’s also a script that went with this. And this script is something that I went ahead and, and created so that the salesperson could.

 

Follow along as they as they went through this and ask really pertinent questions during specific slides here. So the next thing, if you remember, we’re gonna go through and we’re gonna go through definitions. So, what is a draftsperson versus an architect versus a lead designer? We’ll talk about the breakdown of what comprises the price of your remodeling project.

 

We’re gonna talk about bidding and, you know, trying to get that low price versus design build. Where we’re, you know, looking at a low cost versus a low, a low price. And what the difference is there, we’ll give examples of different types of kitchen remodels in, in this case, this is an example of a finance worksheet.

 

So we would help the, the homeowner understand, you know, if they were gonna borrow against their home, how much money they could get out of it. Again, we would, we would use this again to go back and reconfirm this is how pricing is put together. Then we would talk about some unique aspects of the client.

 

So you have an onsite manager, a lead carpenter, how we communicate how the quality control is, is handled and and the inspections. We would even go in and introduce our project managers here and say, Hey, you know, if you elect to work with us, you’re gonna be working with. Rob or Justin or you know, whoever.

 

So we would give them a little background here. And then we finished up asking that question, would you consider hiring Powell Custom homes in this case to partner with you to build or remodel your home? Yes or no? And that’s how we move them away from product and price and to our process. Thoughts, Diane?

 

That’s amazing. So I, I’m you, you basically support the client a hundred percent and you help them choose you. Absolutely. And it’s as simple. It’s as simple as just trying to be a what? You have to look at this as an educational opportunity. Yeah. So we’re not selling, we have to educate first. Yeah. So once the client or the lead is educated, Once they do that, then they have the ability to say yes or no.

 

I like your process. I don’t like your process. Cuz you may go through the education process and they might say, I don’t care what you say, I want to get three bids. And you might at that point have to say, Hey, I really appreciate the opportunity here. That’s not how we operate. If you change your mind, you’ve got my contact information, you know, but you know, we’re gonna withdraw ourselves from the running.

 

And you go on to the next one. Never ever, ever do I recommend getting into a bidding situation. You know, some billers are forced into it, but again, if you’re doing your lead generation and capture right and converting enough appointments, you do not need to bid. So let’s move on to after the meeting.

 

Should we do that? Yes. What’s happening? Clearly I have to give them what are the next steps. So again, once I’ve shifted their focus into, okay. Diana, we like you, we would consider partnering with you. What’s the next step? The next step then is we’re they’re going to your process. So I like to use something called the process map.

 

You pulled that out and say, here’s where we’re at right now. It’s a visual. This is what happens next. So it’s our scope and range meeting. And in order for me to produce a scope and range for you, I will need to collect this much money. We will provide this, this, and this for you, and I will come back and we will give you a narrowed.

 

Budget. And to do that, we need to go through the next process, which is I need to, you know, Do measurements for your home. I need to look around and, and review your needs on some wish sheet, which we talked about coming in. I may need to go look at their land if they have land, if they’re a home builder, but there’s always a next step in the process.

 

But I want to get a commitment right here not only a verbal commitment that yes, I would consider using you, but also a financial commitment. So then it’s what, what we’re doing essentially is we’re getting incremental commitments for incremental work. So you’ve done enough work to get to this point.

 

Next step is get that deposit, that fee, to start your budgeting process, and then move into the budgeting process. Final thoughts, Diana? And it’s done before, during and after. And then where, where do I sign the contract? Yeah, it’s done. Well, we’re getting the details. So we’re making the unknowns known at this point, cuz everyone wants to know how much project can I get for how little money?

 

So the process will answer those questions, but they have to buy into the process and they have to buy into paying you to provide that information. And I’m a huge proponent of. I am a consultant first, I’m a builder second, so you’re gonna hire me as a consultant first to give you the information you’re looking for.

 

Once you have that information, if you’re happy with my work, then you can say, Hey, I’d like to not hire you as my builder, and I’ll sign the contract next. That’s exactly right. And then just a, a quick note. It’s a simple note. Send a thank you note. Send a handwritten thank you note. I appreciate the time.

 

I look forward to partnering with you. Whether you have someone else in the office, write it, you write it. But send out a handwritten thank you note. Why? Because nobody does it, right? I mean, you just wanna do things that nobody else does, right? Good. I like that. Thank you. Note. So if you’d like to schedule your strategy call today, talk about these things and, and how we can help you attract, capture, convert high quality leads.

 

So you could pick and choose your clients and jobs. Go ahead and click that link right below. Thank you so much for joining us today on Conversations That Convert, and for my brothers and sisters in Christ, may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.

 

Always we’ll see you.