How This Plumber in Houston, Texas is Marketing His Way To Success. Richard Saad of Nick’s Plumbing

Interviews with the nations leading plumbing businesses. Discover what marketing efforts actually work and how you can grow your business to the $1M + mark & beyond.

On this episode of the Plumbing & HVAC Marketing Podcast I interview Richard Saad from Nicks Plumbing & Sewer Services on how they grew to 16 trucks. Learn how they keep their phones ringing, trucks running & business booming! You’d be hard pressed to find a local market more saturated and competitive than Houston, Texas. Richard Sadd of Nick’s Plumbing says that it seems like there’s a plumbing company on every corner these days. It’s for that reason the company’s that are going to dominate the market are the ones that refine their messaging and build a great reputation within a specific geographic area. In this episode, Josh asks Nick to walk through the Nick’s Plumbing story – from 2000 when Richard bought the company to today – and to explain how Nick’s has positioned itself as one of the best plumbing companies in the greater Houston area.

Is your plumbing business suffering from training techs well only to see them leave at the first better offer?

In a competitive market like Houston, Texas it’s not uncommon for home service companies to invest a lot of time, energy, and money in the training of service technicians only to have other companies make those techs a better offer and steal them away. Sound familiar? On this episode, Josh speaks with Richard Saad from Nick’s Plumbing about how they are changing their recruitment and training approach to keep the techs they train. You’ll appreciate the way Richard describes the struggle and will hear how Richard is taking his time finding and hiring the right techs for the sake of serving customers over the long haul.

In a massive metro area, specific targeting and messaging makes a difference

When Richard took over Nick’s Plumbing in 2000, he inherited a well-established company but saw that the market around was changing. The marketing and service methods that had carried the company for so long were not going to work as well any longer. More and more plumbing companies were cropping up in the Houston metro area, more services were being offered, and Richard had some hard decisions to make. On this episode, Richard explains how he decided on a specific customer avatar and a smaller geographic area as targets for his marketing focus – and how those decisions enabled him to be more effective and grow the business. You’ll learn how the team at Nick’s is using online marketing, email, and Facebook LIVE to establish a greater reputation and reach new customers.

Online reviews make a huge difference – both positively and negatively

If you are not placing an extreme amount of attention on gaining great reviews in all of the online portals, you’re likely going to wind up being the victim of review terrorism. What’s that? It’s when a disgruntled customer uses online review systems to slander and degrade your company, oftentimes with a heavy-handed approach that almost forces your company to make some kind of concession to the upset customer, whether they deserve it or not. But if you have loads of positive reviews already, it’s easier to deal with the occasional naysayer. You can hear how Richard and the team at Nick’s Plumbing are focusing on getting more positive online reviews for their techs and services, on this episode.

Referrals are still the best way to get the best customers

When asked what his number one source of referrals is, Richard answered without hesitation. In spite of the many effective channels he’s using to market his plumbing business, referrals are still the best way he’s found to get new customers. More importantly, the type of customers that come from referrals are already sold on your services because they were told how great your company is by someone they trust, a friend. You can hear how Richard’s team seeks and gains referrals from existing customers, on this episode.

Outline of This Episode

[0:32] Richard Saad and the challenge of finding and training technicians that stick
[3:55] The path Richard walked to get into Plumbing in the first place
[10:09] From the year 2000 to today: How Richard has built up his business over time
[14:19] How Richard chose a specific target market and geographic area to serve
[19:58] The new focus on the internet only: SEO and PPC are the gold mine
[28:20] Facebook LIVE is a new approach that’s having good results
[36:19] The power of online reviews – both positively and negatively
[42:28] The #1 lead source for Nick’s is referrals
[47:02] Nuggets of wisdom from Richard: Don’t ever give up. Learn from mistakes