Need to Make some money with my Tractor.

[davidseaquist]

Hear is California we have a fire season and the fire dept gives land owners notice to clear brush away from their property. If the owner does not clear the brush the fire department hires contractors from a list of contractors that said they do brush clearing. The fire department pays the contractor and then they bill the homeowner.

 

[Dougster]

I tried a few networking groups basically you have breakfast agree to use each other's services and refer each other. Have you tried property management. For my Plumbing business I had a friend help me we called up all of the property managers in the area to confirm their business address phone number and contact person. Than we typed up a letter explaining my services and rates. Than we did a big mass merge mailing. It only cost me postage and I got at least three property managers I did work for years and they referred me to their friends and other Realtors. I also went with "Neb's" business system and printed up a thousands of door knob flayers with the tear off business cards some with 10% off and senior discounts. I walked around Aries I wanted to work and hung them up on doors and talked to the customer when I got a chance. I had quite a bit of success and some new customers with this. Get some door knob fliers, business cards magnet cards etc. Of course get some magnetic signs and put them on your vehicles you would be surprised how many people will come up to to you and pick your brain or ask for estimates.

Some of those formal networking groups scare me... kinda like being part of a secret society or club... and I would never want to be a member of any club that would have me! Your other ideas are very good... but working out of my residence on a conditional business permit, I am restricted in a number of ways. Basically, I need to keep a somewhat low profile with advertising generally having to be remote to my home and parked vehicles.

we have a fire season and the fire dept gives land owners notice to clear brush away from their property. If the owner does not clear the brush the fire department hires contractors from a list of contractors that said they do brush clearing. The fire department pays the contractor and then they bill the homeowner.

What a great state! We don't have that here in Taxachusetts... not that I am aware of anyway... except for declared public nuisances and hazardous conditions, typically relating more to commercial & industrial properties.

Dougster

 

[RoyJackson]

Advertise on your local Craigslist too. That's free...

 

[Dougster]

Advertise on your local Craigslist too. That's free...

Oh absolutely! That goes without saying. I'm not sure I could even exist in these times without Craigslist. What did we ever do before Al Gore invented the Internet???

Dougster

p.s., Roy, gotta tell you... I absolutely LOVE your signature line!!! Truer, funnier words were never spoken!!! But you have revised it... yes? -d

 

[davidseaquist]

Get yourself a Post Office box, and a cell phone. Make sure your cell phone message refers to your business for leaving messages. Have all of your business mail and business cards refer to your post office box. Try sighs when your vehicle is not on your property. Park a car in the shopping center etc, move it around. I am not comfortable with public speaking, but in a small local business network group I only had to do a small presentation for my business about once every two month. The dues were reasonable payed for our meals and once a year for a Christmas party. I did get some work form the people in my group to. Do you have a name for your company ? Decide if you want to use your name or a DBA and advertise with it. Do you need a business licence ? Also check with the small business administration, you could get some pointers or talk to a retired counselor. Try networking with successful people doing what you want to do. by the way this advice is also good for me I started advertising a few days ago and haven't had any calls yet. When I first started out I made a lot of mistakes, I started with no working capitol, but I was willing to make my business succeed at all costs I didn't want to work for anyone anymore. For me when I started out and didn't have any money I had a lot of time to go out and meet people make cold phone calls and hang up door knob flyer's. don't forget to keep plenty of business cards on you to give out to your prospective customers. Good luck David

 

[Dougster]

Get yourself a Post Office box, and a cell phone...

Hi David - I am with you on virtually all of your points. You've done your homework! But remember that I started planning for this as far back as the winter of 2004/2005 and... despite a rather slow and rocky time getting going last year... I have officially been in business now for almost 10 months. This even includes a couple of side businesses we haven't even talked about. It certainly doesn't mean I am successful yet... far from it... but I've at least gone through the basics.

Now... if you could teach me how to become a wealthy plumber, that's a whole 'nother story!!! When do we start???

Dougster

 

[Kendall69]

...I get lots of calls and give out plenty of price quotes... but have actually gotten pitifully little paying work so far.

Here's a clue, your price is too high. Try this tactic next time you go out, either cut your price by 25%, or just flat out ask - " whatdaya wanna pay for the job" Get a dialog going with the customer, the days are long gone where you quote a price and people buy. If customers aren't calling you to waste your time or their time, they obviously want SOMETHING, and it's your job to find out what they need and what they want to pay, and if it's in the ballpark BINGO!

You keep dropping your price till you start getting more sales than you get tire kickers. Yea, yea, yea, not to the point where it's costing you money, and if that still doesn't work then your in the wrong business, at the wrong time, in the wrong place.

Yes before your head explodes and everyone starts flaming, if you need work and need it bad you have to do drastic measures, or sell the whole shootin match and drop applications at Mickey D's.

 

[Dougster]

Here's a clue, your price is too high. Try this tactic next time you go out, either cut your price by 25%, or just flat out ask - " whatdaya wanna pay for the job" Get a dialog going with the customer, the days are long gone where you quote a price and people buy. If customers aren't calling you to waste your time or their time, they obviously want SOMETHING, and it's your job to find out what they need and what they want to pay, and if it's in the ballpark BINGO!

You keep dropping your price till you start getting more sales than you get tire kickers. Yea, yea, yea, not to the point where it's costing you money, and if that still doesn't work then your in the wrong business, at the wrong time, in the wrong place.

Yes before your head explodes and everyone starts flaming, if you need work and need it bad you have to do drastic measures, or sell the whole shootin match and drop applications at Mickey D's.

First off... that would be "Taco Bell"! I'm already practicing speaking into a microphone so that I can't be understood!

Second, no flames whatsoever. The approach you describe is exactly the approach I was forced to take with last winter's snowplowing. The competition was bargain basement and I was at fair. Fair lost. Bargain basement won. I didn't make any money... barely enough to pay for fuel... but at least I was pushing around what little snow we had. But the TLB thing is a very different animal, at least for me. Snowplowing was the appetizer... this is the main course.

That being said, I get the impression that these people are calling me more for ideas than for prices and... believe it or not... at this stage of my business education I am happy to go look at their projects and volunteer my ideas. As I have mentioned before, a lot of these jobs are not well suited to my equipment. It's disappointing, but I really don't care. I am happy just to go out and look at their projects and talk with them. If paying work comes out of it, great. If not, I have lost nothing and furthered my education.

As mentioned previously, I have offered to do a number of jobs for free or a trivial fee just for the experience and to prove myself for later, more lucrative work. My prices can't get much lower than free. Any worse, and I would be paying them. Can't afford to do that.

Clearly, some jobs have been lost due to price... so I do offer a written low price guarantee... complete with a mechanism for refunds. I can't compete with uninsured, unlicensed illegal aliens, but that's another whole story. But too many other jobs were just not suited to what I have to offer. That is too bad, but it's a fact of life. If another kind of equipment can do a job faster, cheaper or better than my equipment... I tell the folks straight up where they should go. For now, I want to do the work that I can do best... and hopefully better than the others. Later I might get desperate and take anything that comes along at any price... but for now, I'm still holding to slightly higher professional standards. Doesn't make me any money at times... but I do feel better about myself.

Dougster

 

[AlanB]

Doug, I think next year we will start charging for large estimates. We have already been charging for drawings and detailed plans, and so far, what it has eliminated has been the folks we would not have gotten anyway, and the folks that want us to design their landscape so they can hire day labor to install it.

With the costs of gas etc going up, and us getting busier, the discussion now is to charge for the estimates themselves. So far, the folks that are serious, are willing to pay for it, and the folks that are not willing to pay, are not serious enough to worry about anyway.

 

[Dougster]

Doug, I think next year we will start charging for large estimates. We have already been charging for drawings and detailed plans, and so far, what it has eliminated has been the folks we would not have gotten anyway, and the folks that want us to design their landscape so they can hire day labor to install it. With the costs of gas etc going up, and us getting busier, the discussion now is to charge for the estimates themselves. So far, the folks that are serious, are willing to pay for it, and the folks that are not willing to pay, are not serious enough to worry about anyway.

That's great that you can do that, but remember that our respective businesses are very different. I can understand why people would pay you to do their landscape design whether or not they had you do the actual work. On the other hand, I am not a landscaper or landscape designer. In fact, as we discussed before, my business liability insurance specifically forbids me from doing any sort of "design" work. I believe the word "engineer" in my insurance application probably brought that on. No way they wanted to cover me for any sort of "errors and omissions" in regard to any kind of design work I might be tempted to do.

The advice I am giving these potential clients is all about the options they've got for accomplishing their particular design or functional goals. No way I could ever charge for that sort of advice. That's the most basic first step toward defining and proposing the work to be done.

As I said, I am enjoying getting out there and meeting these people with yard problems, redesign ideas and any other kind of TLB-related work to be done. It is part of my education and indoctrination into this dirt and debris moving world. No regrets yet... but for now, the water's still running and the lights are still on.

Dougster