In last week’s Nexstar News, we shared that all Nexstar staff will be participating in “a day in the life” of a Nexstar member. Over the past week, many of us have spent a day riding along with technicians. We’re doing this so that we have a better understanding of your experiences, insights into the effectiveness of our training, and to gauge opportunities for improvement.  The knowledge gained over the last few days has been eye-opening and we’d like to share our observations with you.

• Service System training is more apparent in technicians who have recently attended a Service System Retreat. We found that technicians who have not attended in over two years are missing some basic steps in their calls, such as:

1. Offering a business card
2. Asking permission to enter the home
3. Asking if their truck is parked in an acceptable spot
4. “Selling” the fact that they are putting on shoe covers before entering the home
5. Setting the agenda for the call

• Technicians should be focusing more on the benefits and features of products and services before alluding to the price. We’ve witnessed technicians bonding with their customers, and we’ve been impressed with the fact that the technicians really have a healthy respect for their customers. However, many are bypassing the “Explore” step. They are not asking open-ended questions to better understand the underlying needs and wants of the homeowners, and they are missing sales because of it. Often, when asked about a product or service that was not immediately related to the call, the tech would offer to write up an estimate rather than exploring the situation and offering a solution.
• Your technicians are an extension of your marketing department. They should be reinforcing your brand excellence on every call. This can be done with little things that will strengthen customers’ loyalty to your company.

1. Cross market your services. Sometimes, there is not a great opportunity to make a sale. However, this can be the right situation to promote your other services. In example, if your technician is repairing a boiler, and the customer has decided that they do not want to replace it, you might want to place a sticker on the water heater and promote your plumbing and other services.
2. Have your technicians use business cards and put their photo on them. Train them to hand a business card to customers, and tape a second card next to your stickers.
3. Don’t prejudge a customer and assume that they will never spend money. Even if you know your technician cannot sell equipment on every call, they should still be working hard to develop and strengthen loyalty to your company.
4. Work with technicians and train them to use very non-technical language. It takes practice to do this, but your customer will trust you more if they understand the services you are providing.

• Ongoing training is key. It should not be optional. Without ongoing training, how will techs retain the information and keep their skills sharp? Nexstar marketing strategist, Ed Cerier, observed, “One thing I’ve noticed in my lifetime is that virtually every hall of fame athlete has one thing in common: they work harder than anyone else. Pro baseball players, for example, spend time in the batting cage every day, and the best ones log as much time as possible. Why? Even though it’s a repetitive action, and these athletes are the best of the best, it takes constant practice to maintain skills and improve.”

These are our observations and they will help us as we work with you to create even more robust services and training opportunities. We’d love to know what you think, so make sure to comment and join in the conversation. If you’d like to explore future training opportunities, visit the events page of the members’ side of www.nexstarnetwork.com.

Jim Hamilton Working With Nexstar Members

By: Jim Hamilton

At our Super Meeting, we participated in many discussions and honed in on many activities that you can be doing to improve your business. As a recap, I’d like to recap the most important sales and operations activities that you need to be doing. These tips were shared by the panel of members featured during the Tools for Top Performance segment, but were also echoed by other members throughout the meeting.

High Impact Management Activities – Sales and Operations

•Identify the person responsible for training within your company

•Send employees to appropriate training on sales, customer service, technical and/or management

•Conduct regular staff meetings

•Show employees you want to help make them successful

•Have a proactive approach to your call center, focused on making outbound calls

•Regularly record phone calls and use them to train your CSR’s

•Dispatch the right tech to each call

•Ride along with your technicians on a regular basis

What’s your top sales and operations tool? If it’s not on this list, let us know about it!

by: Denise Swafford, Nexstar Business Coach

At Nexstar’s Super Meeting, I spoke at the breakout session titled, “Driving An Accountable Business.” One of the key points I focused on during this session was the importance of goal setting. What kind of goals are you setting for your business in 2012? Do you have a clear cut, defined vision?

Here are some helpful steps in helping you make sure you are setting clear cut and attainable goals for yourself and your business.

1. Have Desire. Know why you do what you do every day.
2. Write down your goals. They must be in writing. If it’s not in writing, it’s just a dream. Writing them down and sharing them with others makes your goals real.
3. Identify Obstacles & Enlist Assistance: this is where the power of the Nexstar Network comes in. We’re here to help each other work through issues and also to celebrate our successes.
4. Your goals must be anchored to a due date. This will help you to stay on track and motivated.
5. Use visual images to remind yourself of your goal. Tape a picture of what you want somewhere where you will easily be able to see it many times during the day.
6. Persistence: Stay on course and keep trying! You will triumph!

You’ve experienced Nexstar’s Super Meeting – now what?

You’ve had an unforgettable weekend – filled with great business advice, strategic marketing, and plenty of time to engage with your peers. So, how do you make the most of your experience?

1. Set Goals: Were you inspired by any of your breakout sessions, by Victor Antonio, our Tools for Top Performance Panelists, or by Dan Friesen’s presentation? Great! What specifically inspired you and what do you want to do about it?

Once you have set your goals, you need to write them down. Both master trainer Dave Boduch and business coach Denise Swafford touched on this during Super Meeting. Make these S.M.A.R.T.goals: specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely.

2. Get Trained: This year, we unleashed many new training opportunities at Super Meeting and we hope you are revved up to take some action. Think about the needs of your staff and the needs of your business. Keep you eye on the next calendar of events for upcoming Service System 2.0 Retreats, Boot Camp, Business Planning Workshops, Marketing Planning Workshops, and more!

The addition of two more key members to Nexstar’s staff, Tom Merriott as the Nexstar Call Excellence Coach and Keith Mercurio as our new Sales Trainer, will help you maximize the potential of your staff. Would you like to revolutionize your call center? Reach out to Tom and he will be happy to help you identify the key strategies to motivate your CSRs. Do your technicians need sales training? Keith will work with you to grow your staff and raise the bar of accountability across your team.

3. Connect With Your Peers: Super Meeting is one of the best opportunities we have to network with each other. Continue to reach out to each other via email, the Nexstar Bulletin Board, your Personal Board of Directors (PBOD), or by attending one of the five peer groups that will take place in 2012. We are truly blessed to be part of the best training and development organizations in the world. Nothing is impossible with the power of Nexstar!

Does your Call Center have an attitude problem?

Before you go through the trouble and expense of replacing members of your team make sure that you are doing everything possible to provide a great work experience for your Customer Service Representatives.

Try and look at their work environment with a different set of eyes.

• Is this somewhere that you would want to go every day?
• Does your team need more call coaching? Have they received training?
• If you were sitting at their desks could you get excited about answering every call?
• Does everyone in your company treat the CSR’s as PART OF THE TEAM?
• Do your customer service representatives know how important the job they do is to YOU? 

If you are looking for some more ideas on how to create a great CSR team, keep in mind that the Nexstar Vault, The Nexstar People Project idea book, and of course, your Call Center Excellence Coach are great resources that you have at your fingertips. You can also reach out to your fellow members to find out what works and what doesn’t.

Sometimes taking a look at problems from a different perspective can lead to easy and dramatic improvements.

Small Business Advice from Nexstar® Coaches

Ask any successful residential plumbing, HVAC or electrical contractor and they’ll tell you that there are strategies in the numbers. That’s why our Nexstar business coaches continually preach the importance of studying them daily, weekly, monthly and annually.

While it’s easy to set this task aside as you focus on the day-to-day operations of your business, it’s imperative for managing and growing your business.

Contractors across the country saw an increase in service agreements, customers, revenues, and profit within a down economy. Why? Well, in addition to getting small business support from outside their company and having good systems in place, they are tapping into these Five Financial Beatitudes for Business. 

#1 – Be diligent about month-end close

Produce an accurate set of financial reports by the tenth of every month. A timely, accurate financial month-end close is critical to your bottom line, so find your roadblocks and remove them. 

#2 -Track what you want to manage

When adding a new line item to your chart of accounts, ask yourself: Do I truly need this each month?

#3 – See where you’re going through comparisons

A P&L Variance report is a must. If you’re not seeing one of these every month, you don’t know what you’re missing!

#4 – Departmentalize to distinguish the gold mines from the land mines.

Your sales and direct costs should be departmentalized down to the Gross Profit/Margin line.

#5 – Include accurate depreciation in your monthly P&L

Depreciation expense is one of those “stealth costs.” You can’t touch it and you don’t know how much it is, unless you understand it and dig for it.

If you’re driving for a boost in your bottom line, we recommend that you begin with the beatitudes!

There are so many resources available to you as a member of Nexstar. You have: The Vault, the Marketing System, the Operations Playbook, recorded Webinars and Podcasts, Strategic Partners, Training Events, Nexstar Staff and Coaches—it goes on and on. But when was the last time you called or reached out to another member to discuss a challenge or learn about another member’s successes? Nexstar was built on Success through Education and Sharing. Lean on the network. It’s a powerful tool.

Here’s a couple of ideas on how you can make the most of the network, TODAY:

• Call a member
• Post a question on the Nexstar Bulletin Board
• “Friend” or “like” other Nexstar members on facebook
• Spend a couple of minutes scoping out the Nexstar Vault: Is there an ad campaign that could work for you?
• Sign up for a business planning or marketing planning workshop (there are plenty of options over the next three months)
• Improve business and enlighten your staff by sending them to training
• Think about attending (or hosting!) a Nexstar member peer group–we have five scheduled for 2012

Do you have an addition to this list? Post it in the comments section!