SPEAKER_00 0:00

Shine the sun on the Sunshine Coast. Welcome to Simplified Sparky Marketing. I recently had the pleasure of heading up to the Sunshine Coast and catching up with two of the three Simplified Sparky members who have got businesses up there and work with them inside the mentorship. And I had a great time, caught up with them, had some chats, had some drinks, and yeah, it was fantastic. And in this occasion, I sat down with Ryan from Axon Electrical and soon to be Sunshine Coast Blackout Protection, which is awesome. And we speak about that in the podcast as well. I think the first few minutes that you listen to of this podcast on the intro are extremely powerful. I hope you enjoy. And if you're in Ryan's situation or you are thinking about starting a business or you're in a business and you may have a staff member and you're just spinning wheels, my details are in the description below, and I hope you enjoy this one.

SPEAKER_01 0:50

Not only how your systems have helped my business become more streamlined and more profitable, but how they have helped get honestly my life back on track. A year ago. Every Saturday, we come down to the beach and then go and I'll go and get breaky while my missus is working. A year, like it's a her birthday's on Wednesday. So a year ago, like on the beach, all I'm thinking about is the stress of having no work, making no money, just how shit everything is, just super negative. Can't get out of my head ever. Was just forgetting that her fucking birthday was even coming up, didn't organize anything for it, everything was just last minute, it was so shit. On the day we tried to go and have lunch together, but again, I could not get out of my head about shit, so I'm just not present, all that sort of stuff. And here we are a year later, I'm walking down the beach, and instead of being stressed about how shit things are, I'm just fucking excited about how things are. Next weekend, the reason why I'm not available is because I have booked us a weekend away in the hinterland, in some accommodation in the rainforest. It's got a sauna down by the river. Like fucking exactly the sort of thing that she loves. And because she's working on the Saturday, we're going away like Saturday night and Sunday night. So in a position where I can take the Monday off, which a year ago, there was just absolutely no way I could do that. And one of the reasons was also because working for the builders and real estates, I was so stressed out that if I was to take a day off and they needed me, then that was it. I'd be out and they'd find someone else. And now, like gotten rid of the real estate, so don't have to worry about that shit. And you know, if the builder needs me on that Monday, well, too bad, you should have been more organized, and they're about to get the flick as well. So yeah, it's not just about how the systems have helped get money in the bank, but how the systems have helped get yeah, honestly, my life back. Life is fucking enjoyable now, so yeah, it'll be something good to touch on because again, that was the whole thing was about getting time freedom, and they didn't help with that at all, but your systems truly have.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

Yeah, it's fucking amazing. Ryan Glearham from Axon Electrical. Ryan, thanks so much for coming. Thanks for having me. All right, Ryan, another member of Simplified Sparky. We had a big chat over coffee. Again, should I put the cameras up? Tell us before we get into it all, tell us about you before you came to Simplified Sparky, essentially where you started electrical and how you ended up in Melbourne up to the wonderful sunshine coast.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

Yeah, so commercial electrician down in Melbourne. So I started yeah, started my apprenticeship so the three and a half years, got signed off early, a few years later, foreman for the company, doing quite a large job. So and then yeah, I just had enough. It was yeah, had enough of that and wanted to move up here. The plan was to move up here and it was just perfect timing. So put everything down there. How did you get signed off quickly, or how did how does that work? So you as long as you've done they it's 42 months you have to do on your apprenticeship. So three and a half years. If your company wants to sign you off early, they can sign you off early. So obviously they had faith that uh you're yeah, yeah. And then it was like a few guys after me as well. Everyone was just doing really good work, so they just yeah, we're happy to sign us off early. Did you do much residential when you were in Melbourne, or was it only a few cash and uh yeah, like a couple of jobs for other electricians, yeah? Jumping on as their apprentice kind of thing, but that was about it.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

When you moved up to the Sunshine Coasts, you quote unquote told me that that was one of the most difficult things you've ever done. Obviously, starting the business from zero, gaining your network, getting work in the door, stressful times.

SPEAKER_01 4:50

So I've had six months of subby work lined up, commercial. As we're driving up with all of our stuff, the day before I got here, it fell through. He uh got asked to re-quote it because it was a bunch of extra work, someone undercut him and the job fell through. So the day before I arrived here, all of a sudden it was like you're coming up here with no work, don't know anyone.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

What did you do there? What what was your it was obviously called red. What what happened then? What was your next goal tour?

SPEAKER_01 5:18

Well, so from there, yeah, it was just like work it out, yeah, get up here, get settled, just chill out. Again, from you know, being from commercial in Melbourne, it was EBA, so I had my long-term uh long service leave and my got them to do a redundancy pay for me. So I had a decent sized packet, like get me started up here. So it wasn't too stressful to start with. It was pretty relaxed, but then it was working out what am I gonna do from here. And then I decided to make it easy, was just get a job with someone else. Started looking for jobs, started applying for jobs on Seek, all that sort of stuff, and then took an interview with someone up in Noosa, even though that was gonna be a 45-minute drive up there every day, but still it was Air Con and Electrical. So it was gonna be like a supervisory electrical role. And I was like, great, I can come in and help you build your business on the commercial side of things, that's where I come from, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That was on a Friday over the weekend. I just thought, like, why the fuck would I do that for someone else?

SPEAKER_00 6:19

So you were you were nearly going into a part, like kind of a partnership with as an employee.

SPEAKER_01 6:24

So I would have been like 50 bucks an hour, but like giving his business a whole new division, essentially. Yeah, yeah, being the supervisory electrical role. But yeah, I just thought, why would I put all that effort in for 50 bucks an hour and build someone else's business when I know I can do that successfully for myself?

SPEAKER_00 6:40

I think there's a lot on that as well. It's kind of like what I hate is the franchise model because people join a franchise because they're unsure of what to do in business, or they're like, it's sweet, they give you everything. And I've heard a few horror stories where people go across to a franchise, sign up, and then they're like, once they're in the door, it's just like you're on your own, see you later. And the worst thing is is if you build up that company, or let's just say it's a branch or something like that, you build that up, and the next thing everybody wants to use your services and stuff like that, you're essentially building the reputation of somebody else's company. And you might I don't know if that's even a thing with them, if they can have two or three vans under that banner. I think that comes to a stage where people click, it's like, well, hang on, why am I building somebody else's thing? You're knee-deep in that, you probably have to pay contracts to get out of it, and then it's just a waste of time. But I it's something that blows my mind is people that go the franchise route. But it's similar to your story, you were essentially just like building up somebody else's business, but you just don't get the reward that you should as a partner in that. You're just getting paid your 50 bucks an hour. Yeah. From there then, like, when did you start to get your own work or like what happened after that?

SPEAKER_01 7:47

So then it was at the same time. So my mate had also from the same company in Melbourne, he'd years before moved up to northern New South Wales, was running his own electrical business, and then he started telling me about all these business coaching businesses and the podcasts that go along with it. So I started listening to these podcasts of success stories of people running their own businesses because the idea of running my own business scared me as well. Yeah. It's just like the stress that comes with it, the being owed money all the time, and then hearing these stories from people who are running their businesses successfully. And I just thought, if they can do it, I can definitely do it. So this is what I'm gonna do. Yep. And so then it was starting from scratch, knowing no one, try and build a business. Luckily, I already had my contractor's license from Melbourne, so I was able to transfer that across. But even that was really bad timing because Queensland being Queensland finally went from paper to electronic. Yeah. So they shut it down for it took nine weeks to transfer my contractor's license because while they were uploading the system, they decided we're just putting everything on pause. So yeah, so for nine weeks, no contractor's license to try and start it. So I was just like I was on air task, uh begging people to let me clean their gutters, like hanging doors a day as a uh assistant, like builders labourer. But $40 an hour on ADN, yeah, it's all destroying.

SPEAKER_00 9:14

With every good time, you have to go through the shit times. Like you always have to go through the shit times. The first years of business are fucked. It's like it's it can be super fucked or it can be just a little bit fucked, depending on what pathway you go with help and guidance and stuff. But if you try to go it alone or you try to wing it or try to become successful by just fucking it'll work itself out, I don't know what I'm doing, it'll it'll figure out one day it's going to become extremely successful. But then, interestingly enough, you moved to a coaching company, which I had actually spent a bit of time under as well. And what you told me about that coaching company, which I see it's notorious in the coaching game, is they work with all types of trades. So it doesn't matter if you're a sparky, bricky, gardener, whatever you want, they will work with you. And you mentioned that your coach was a builder, and even though you've learned things and credit where credits do, you learn stuff from that coaching company, but at the same time, like the carpet didn't match the drapes. It was you were dealing with a builder instead of a sparky that could actually be like, Oh, this is what I'm doing in my business, or you should do it this way because I know because I've done it this way, but instead they're just kind of winging it that I think this is how an electrician would operate, and not only that, something that that deeply gripes me is the push to get staff. So, one of the major things that they do or they did was say, for ultimate motivation to kick yourself up the ass, you need a qualified staff member. I can't fill my own week. Now you're wanting me to get a staff member and fill both of our weeks. And they seen this as a tactic of motivation. And I had the exact same experience with that said company. I even mentioned on my podcast last week about that incident. And it was just like hire, hire, hire, don't get apprentice, get a tradesman. And I took their word for it, I believed it, and I actually hired somebody, and it was a horrible experience. And look, if that person hadn't been Mr. Wright, it would have been it could have been a totally different game. I could be still with that company, getting coached from them now and have a team of 50, but it just went south, and it was just I took their advice, which I believe is wrong. And I'm not I'm not opposed to having staff, and I actually regret not having staff in my electrical business. I I regret not having at least an apprentice or two come through just for a pair of hands, but it was the way I was brought up in all my employments was just like go in, rip in, get it done. As I mentioned to you guys, like when I do like a rewire PowerPoints, I'm like shoving six tongues up the wall, so it's like a one-trip wonder up into the roof. Under houses, just getting shit done. Like, whereas I think if you grow up in your apprenticeship with an apprentice, you get used to it, and you're just like, I'm jealous and envious of that. I I speak to guys that they start their business, and immediately the first trigger in the head is I need an apprentice, rather than like, if I breathe out, I can pull myself under that floorboard, you know. I'm not opposed to that. And something we spoke about as well was you are potentially looking at getting an apprentice sometime soon. And as we said, it's just for a pair of hands, it's for you know, someone that's young that you can mold into the way you like things done and the systems of processes your business have. But yeah, tell us about your experience with um with that said coach.

SPEAKER_01 12:46

Yeah, so that was that was it. Like they they certainly helped get me on the right track to start with. But yeah, I was told you cannot do it on your own. You'll be completely snowed under with all the work. Basically, it's impossible to do it on your own. You have to hire. And yes, it was basically don't worry about not having work. If you hire, you will find the work. And I'm going, I'm working 80 hours a week right now on trying like everything I can, and I can't even give myself two days worth of work. How am I meant to magically find work for them? And then yeah, that was the issue. Once I did start to get enough work, I immediately went and hired someone, and then all I was doing was getting them to do the work, and then I wasn't working. So then I'm paying them a wage and I'm paying myself nothing. Yeah. And there's nothing left at the end of the month because I'm not charging enough either. Yeah, it just uh you can't the the problem was as well, because I again I went from commercial electrician in Melbourne, no domestic background, no service and maintenance background. I've now realized that it wasn't until it took a lot to realize that service and maintenance electrical is where it's at because the margins are up here. And I like working with no middlemen straight to my customers. If I don't know what I'm doing as a service and maintenance electrician of how to run a business properly, what am I doing bringing someone into that? So it was a mess. I was completely unorganized. And also because you don't have any work, you're so reactive. So it's like, yep, we can come and do that for you tomorrow. It's like, well, now I don't have the materials for it. You so I'm scrambling to get the materials, then I'm just sending him to do the work, paying him to do the work.

SPEAKER_00 14:28

You scale chaos, is what you do. And like that's that's why with inside my mentorship, is what I focus on is like getting guys back into the business and getting the bit the core of the business running correctly. So it's like, cool, I want a staff member. Let's plug them in now because we've got the basics running, the basics and the necessities and the stuff that's going to make money and save you time. And you mentioned about like keeping that guy busy, your job has become finding them work. I spoke to one of the members during the week. It's funny, he had the exact same predicament, and it was like a fucking penny drop moment when I said it to him. His big worry with work and stuff was like he had a gun, he has a gun apprentice at work, and he's using him on weekends to do the work. So, what he was doing, so he is doing, I think, two, three, four days a week sobby, and then his own work for a day or two. But then what he was doing was working a Saturday with the apprentice because the apprentice is available, he was hungry for cashies on Saturday. And then I just dropped this one thing to him. I said, How about you don't subby for like three days and you actually instead of rushing through the job with an apprentice, do it over two days. If it's a two-day job and you need the apprentice with you, don't rush, like that's your work. Why are you now taking a slice of your cake and giving it to the apprentice just because he's hungry for work on Saturdays? And he was like, I never fucking thought of it that way. And it was just such a like, and I'm that's the moments that I fucking live for is like such the simple little things that I said to me, he was just like, I never thought of it that way. That he was worried about where's this work gonna come from? And then he sort of tee up work for an apprentice because he's he wants to do a cash on a Saturday or whatever. I'm like, all you have to do is like subby two days and then work these three days. The belief in a lot of our heads, we think the client thinks that this is gonna be done like rapidly the same day. If a job takes two days, it takes two days. What about? If it takes three days, what about it? You just have to accommodate that house or that person to say, look, the power is going to remain on from Monday, Tuesday. Wednesday, we're gonna power down to all the connections into the circuits that we've run. Whatever you're doing, if it's aircon circuits or if you're relocating a switchboard in Sydney, that's how I do it, is I do it over, do one big day, and then the next day I do the changeover. So the first day I'll get the board on the wall, get all the sub circuits, run through the cavity, into the roof neatly, over to the at the top of the old switchboard, get the level two cables in, get the metering, everything ready, all the cables for the meter ready to go. And the next day I warn, I goes, day one, power's not gonna go down. Day two, it's gonna be down for two to three hours in the morning. And it's like once their advisor's communicated to them, they're just like perfect, brilliant. That's all I do is communicate these things to the homeowner that it's gonna take three days. So I think it's funny the mind shift of as you're saying, you're scrambling to find this guy work, and then you're not even working yourself. It just makes no fucking sense. It's like when you've got the work and you can't keep up with it, or you need a pair of hands and you've got your systems dialed in, that's when you're like, okay, I'm gonna take a staff member on now. From your experience with that coaching company, you kind of, I believe you went down a rabbit hole of my podcasts, then you ended up into my web. How did you come across my stuff? Why did you choose me more importantly? Why why did you think, okay, Alan can help my business?

SPEAKER_01 17:42

So, yeah, it would have been probably some Instagram videos that I would have seen, which was you commenting on yeah, how to market your business, the making the right sort of videos, and yeah, touching on messaging, which is what I hadn't heard anyone else talk about, was messaging for your business. Everyone talks about find your client avatar, but they don't talk about the messaging. So it was seeing that, then starting listening to your podcast and talking about that as well. And then yeah, it was seeing how genuine you are on podcast, none of it's bullshit, you're not trying to sell anything. And it's also the honesty where you're admitting where you sucker.

SPEAKER_00 18:24

It's like fuck the everybody has a bad, everybody's we're all fallible human beings. Nobody's business is perfect, and like as it like I'll go under the hood in in the live session and stuff, I'll show you my service and I'll show stuff. And like if something goes wrong or something glitches, I'm I'm an open book about that. And I think like honesty is the best policy. That's where the the game is changing, where I think like the more honest and open you are about your electrical business, because what shits me the most is people that don't even have an electrical business are telling electricians what to do in their business that have no trade experience whatsoever. It's mind-boggling.

SPEAKER_01 18:59

Yeah. And then same deal, where because you're a service and maintenance electrician. So, like you were saying, the other coaching system that I was a part of, when my trade coach in there is a builder, well, that builder's not going to tell me fuck the builders off and start doing service and maintenance because it's where the money's at. No one inside that coaching system is going to tell you that, not to work for real estates, not to work for builders, no middlemen, because those trades exist inside their coaching platforms. Of course they can't. But when you talk to a service and maintenance electrician who tells you the truth, like there's way more money in doing the builders off. Like off any any middleman. It's just, I have that all the time. Whenever there's a middleman, it's chaos. It's a mess, it's unorganized, it's bullshit. You waste so much time. If it's me and my customer, it's organized, it runs smoothly, no problems.

SPEAKER_00 19:46

I had this during the week, I had um I had a really good client of mine done a lot of work for him, and he's in a block of, I think there might be eight to ten townhouses. Really nice, clean block. I think they're all single story, they're villas, sorry. And he emailed me and he said, We're looking at doing smoke alarms. The smoke alarms are almost 10 years old. We're aware that they need to be done. Do you want to quote this? And then he said, Then I was like, Yeah, sure, yeah, that sounds good. Because I was like in my head. So I'd swap them all over, being mindful of putting a clause in there. If if number seven and number 10 aren't home, and well, I've got to come back, that's gonna cost the extra kind of thing. So then it turned into just replacing alarms to some owners may only want to replace one alarm because it's compliance, because it's just on one level, but other owners might want one in the garage, and it just started frying my head, and I was like, not doing it. I was like, fuck it, it's not worth the stress of quoting this because what's going to happen is I could spend, I could go out to the job, go to each and every one of their townhouses or villas. What do you want? Or you only want this one. And next to I was getting emails saying, like, I was like, I was pushing a brand that has a seven-year warranty on the smoke alarms, seven-year warranty, 10-year lithium-ion battery, you're to replace every 10 years. I was getting an email back saying, why is it there's a seven-year warranty and it's not a 10-year and it's expires in 10 years? You would think it's 10 years. Why you Ford have a fucking five-year warranty and the thing will last you fucking 70 years? Why is it on a 70-year warranty? I'm just like, I don't know. So I just based it politely back to when I said, Look, I am happy to do your apartments, your townhouse, do that if you want me to do it, do further work in your place. But I said, I don't like dealing with middlemen, exactly as you said. It's strata's real estate builders, anywhere where there's too many cooks in the kitchen that have to make too many decisions, that you're possibly getting your quotes getting bounced off other people as well. I absolutely despise it. And it's just it's such a time suck. And like one thing that I love about my business is just efficiency. It's like Lee comes in, quick quotes, out the door, booked in, paid, onto the next one. Where did that take you to then in regards to jumping across and making that decision?

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Yeah, so then it was, I guess, from there as well. So it was it was yeah, one of the key things was the focus on messaging and how to market properly. So then I think I jumped on your website, and that was just like I've never seen messaging like this on a website. Every electrician, including myself, who because I had it built by someone who just grabs a generic template. That doesn't tell the customer a single thing about what you do that says, Yeah, I do residential commercial. Too small. Yeah, all that bullshit. So just the same bullshit that every single electrical business says that doesn't speak to the customer at all. And yeah, it was seeing what the messaging on your website. And it was just like, this guy knows what he's talking about. Because even with all these other coaching systems, none of them have those websites. They all have generic websites. Even this other coaching platform that I was a part of, and even in their system of how to build a website was just like build it for SEO to the point where it doesn't read properly, and you just go like that doesn't make any sense.

SPEAKER_00 22:59

That kills me with SEO companies as well, is and web developers, they build the website with SEO in mind, and that's all well and good. Things are going to change drastically with the movement of AI and how everything's going to be searched and found. And I honestly believe that dumbing things down even more on your website and being more humanistic on the website is actually going to bring leads in because the AI is crawling these websites and it's going to go what looks the least robotic and what looks human, getting searches, getting phones and stuff. Messaging is single-handedly one of the biggest things in marketing that people do not speak about. And it's just having we went for coffee on a Sunday to a cafe downstairs called Coffee Sundays. I was like, coffee on a Sunday? It's fucked. That's messaging 101. Obviously, it all happens the other days of the week. My example that I always speak about is the frizzy haired person that goes down the aisle of woolies and it sees a bottle of shampoo and it says, one says shampoo, the other says shampoo for frizzy hair. The person with the frizzy hair is obviously going to be attracted to the bottle that says frizzy hair. They're going to buy it and they're going to wash their hair so their frizz is going to remain or get rid of whatever they want. If you don't have clear messaging and you're not speaking to the client's problems, they're not going to know, and you're just going to get blended into a CNIs. You're going to become a commodity. And that's that's what happens so much with electricians. And as you said, these generic programs, they'll give you a website or they'll give you guidelines of a website that it's like, oh, just basically slap it together, put this up there, say best electrician in that area, and no job too big or too small. And yeah, just plant your review somewhere down the bottom or something. I don't know. And then you'll get work. Yeah. And it's just, it's not the case. What I found very interesting as well, something I speak about heavily is niching, niching down and becoming a specialist. Now, you enter my world, then you DM me on Instagram. We had a little bit of back and forth, and I said, What's the key takeaways you've taken from the podcast and the email? You gone down the Robit All of the Podcast, you had gone through some of the emails, and you came back to me and you said some of the biggest things you've taken from it are niching and your messaging. You said to me specialists get paid more was a big takeaway, which then brings us into your new venture, which is Sunshine Coast Blackout Protection. And I think this is phenomenal. So not only have you got Axon Electrical, you've now got probably one of the best domains snatched up as well. So can you tell us a bit how you had this shower idea drop into your head and how you how it all came about?

SPEAKER_01 25:28

Yeah, so I had I had customers already that wanted backup solutions for their homes. They didn't want solar. They'd been quoted from solar, but to add a battery is a crazy amount of money. So they wanted generator backup. So had installed a couple of generator backup systems for some customers. And then from speaking to those customers because they live out in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast, that's where I've learned that blackouts in this in the hinterland, especially, is super frequent and it's an absolute mess for people, especially as I'd mentioned to you, people in the hinterland are on tank water. So when they have no power, they have no running water in the entire house, which is just crazy. So they need some sort of backup solution. It also coupled with two massive storms that ripped through the Sunshine Coast just days apart, and people were left without power for days up to like a week. People without power. Up in Coulomb, the whole town was without power. A lot of people will already have generators, but that's the thing. They're running leads all through the house. So they've got no lighting, they've got no fans, they've just got their fridge on. Hazardous as well to triple.

SPEAKER_00 26:40

It's a shit solution to a problem.

SPEAKER_01 26:41

Yeah. But yeah, that big storm that ripped through. And yeah, I had loads of customers who were just without power for days. So I just saw that as like there needs to be a solution to this for people to have backup power for their homes. And again, being from a commercial background, every distribution center, every shopping center, everything we do has a generator backup system attached to it. So yeah, wanted to do that for people's homes. So I saw that as a big problem here on the Sunshine Coast. And that is the solution I've come up with is to do generator backup power for homes.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

Very, very excited with that as well because this is one I love and this is what I geek out. And I was like, you came, you came into the Simflight Sparky system. When you jumped on the call, you were like, you were telling me about this idea you have and to push it. And it it excited me because I'm like a fucking geek out for start is an awesome idea. And now the next stages was like branding, domains, messaging, how you're gonna launch it, how I'm gonna help you launch it. And just the other day you were filming some stuff around that as well, and we're going back and forth with some scripts and stuff like that of just how we're gonna market it. And I think like I think it's something that you're gonna build a moat around yourself for because like it's something that you're very knowledgeable on. You've the solutions that you've given the different packages and stuff that you're providing. It's over my head, it's it's quite complex to me because I'm just a boring spark that just does PowerPoint slates and switches and stuff, switchboards. I think it's gonna be fucking awesome. Before we jump into the systems and processes that you've taken from me inside and simplified spark, and you've implemented them to your business. I want to rewind it just a little bit. You sent me an extremely powerful voice note on just an early May, and it literally stood the hair on my arms. And essentially, you were down the beach, you were I could hear the waves in the background, you were walking your dog, and I think what triggered the whole thing was it was coming up to your partner's birthday, and then you talk back this time last year, and you were like, you thought of just how fucking shit time was stressed, no work coming in, being reliant to builders, being reliant to real estate, just fucking everything. And I I know exactly the feelings you were going through because it's the feelings I was having back in 2017 when I was in between two builders, like the anxiety and pressure, we're pouring that tomorrow, and you need to get your conduits in there or whatever. And you said, like, one of the most fucking satisfying things is because your partner's working Saturday, you were taking them one day off, and you didn't give a shit, and you're like, What about I'm taking one day off? How good businesses now versus 12 months prior to that was just a stress fest and just not being present, forgetful, yeah. The whole shebang, take me through that time.

SPEAKER_01 29:30

Yeah, that time a year, a year ago from now. Yes, super stressful time because you're just putting in so much effort and nothing is coming out of it. I mean, doing everything you can to try and get work in. It's just not coming in. So, yeah, my girlfriend was always working Saturday. So generally I'll take my dog down to the beach on a Saturday morning. Yeah, go for a walk on the beach and then go and have breakfast. And at that time of year, yeah, it's just it's stress, it's not enjoyable at all. Like I'm taking them down the beach, but it's not like the mind's just your body's there, but your mind is just yeah, you're just worried. Just worried about everything you think you've made the worst decision you've ever made. And then yeah, fast forward a year because things are now turned around, the systems are in place, everything's running really well. Going down the beach and just like still thinking about work. You can't ever switch off. Really positive minds about it, like excited about what's happening and what's coming, versus yeah, the year before where it's just stress about just how shit it is. It coincided with my girlfriend's birthday. So it just reminded me, because it was a few days out from it, where this year I had actually organized something for it and able to take the Monday off because a year prior, like I said, yeah, there was no way I was ever going to take a Monday off because maybe the builder needed me, maybe a real estate needed me to run out to do something. And if I wasn't available, they were going to move straight on to the next person.

SPEAKER_00 30:53

That's the churn and barn mentality. A client that's won on price is lost on price. And I think it's so true. Like your example of the real estate or builder, if you're going in there and they're just like you're working cheaply for them, and they're like, you can't show up a day or two, and it's just like fuck, we'll just go to the next one. And it's kind of like a fox in a hen house because I feel like builders have a monopoly that they're the the ones that are savvy to it will go to the likes of high pages, they'll put their job up there. The worst thing is they will find probably one of the best electricians that's after starting their business who's the worst businessman, and they are licking their lips saying, brilliant. Like you come in, you do a really good job, get you some more work. I'll get you more work. And then they come in, go in a bit of a cheaper price, even though they're probably losing their box on it already, they'll go even cheaper to get the next one. Then the builder will just churn and burn them again. And it's just it's a horrible, horrible, horrible space. And it's like, look, there are going to be great builders out there, but they're few and far between, in my opinion. And I think the good builders have their trades locked down, they're not the guys churning in between Spark because something's up if they're churning in between them. Have you you're after ditching one of your builders, if not two, or you're it's about to about to get the cut off?

SPEAKER_01 32:06

Yeah, I'm still working for them at the moment, yeah, but looking to get away from it. Only because it's just it's just not as profitable. And it's tricky because sometimes it is, because sometimes it's quoted work. And they're they're actually now pretty loyal to me because I've done such good work for them. Yeah. However, a lot of it's hourly, and the hourly rate is just it just doesn't cut it. So yeah, trying to move away from that. And again, it's that middleman thing of I just want to work directly for my customers, not have someone in between. So yeah, I had just gotten rid of all the real estates, which was a huge stress relief. Again, thinking that you need to be like available, super reactive, and I would always be super responsive to them. But then you still just get those little niggly things, but you just get those comments about how expensive you are, and you're like, I'm not at all. I'm way undercharging compared to my great customers who don't question anything and they pay two days later, if not on the day.

SPEAKER_00 33:01

If you don't show up, it's like a vicious circle. Spoke to an electrician about this the other day. He's like, Do you reckon the people that are undercharging will get like whittled out of the system, they'll go back on wages, they'll think it's too hard. What's gonna happen is they'll go back on wages, and then the people's jobs are taking will start their own businesses, and then they'll undercharge under coat, and then they'll go back and wage, so then the other guys will come through. It's gonna keep happening unless they're educated, leaving their employments going to start their own business. I tip my hat to a lot of the guys that have come on board with Simplified Sparky. A lot of guys are like literally employment and they're pivoting into starting their own business, and those guys are gonna hit the fucking ground running, that they have got all the systems in place, they're aware of what they have to charge. That's my lane that I stick in as well. And like you came to me at a stage where you were about a year or so into business, but I think what you had, you had all the building bricks of the Lego in your head, but you were just slightly spinning wheels as to like how do I click this all together, get into the gear, get it this all into gear. You have all the answers in your head. I just have to help you get the answers together, click them together, and it's it's slowly coming into play. What I would say is like you are crushing it now, and you're only scratching the surface, and you haven't even launched properly with the second business yet, which is very, very exciting.

SPEAKER_01 34:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:17

So what when you came on board with Simplified Sparky, what drastic changes did you make in your business, or what what were the core systems you took from that without giving too much away, and implemented into your own business?

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Jumping across, I was using TradeFy, and admittedly I wasn't using it properly, but jumping across to service made, service mate just clicked a lot better. I think the automations and the integrations in service work a lot better, especially for service and maintenance. And then again, yeah, some of the systems that we've implemented, some of your little tricks that we use and building out all of the because I was already doing fixed price stuff, but I was manually entering it into a quote each time because I looked at it and was like, oh, it's gonna be so time consuming to build this, but then you have something with inside happens like that. So actually building out the systems means my quoting is so quick now, instead of spending hours every night plugging away, doing it all manually, trying to like calculating prices. Yeah, having it all built out. So that saves so much time. All the automations that you've got in service mate, along with all the templates, all that sort of stuff, has just cut down on so much admin and just made things just run so much smoother. So I just didn't have any of those systems implemented in my business at all. And so now things are just running way more smooth.

SPEAKER_00 35:41

People don't realize like if it's just five minutes there, ten minutes there, rewriting that email every time, or just doing a manual follow-up to somebody or something like that. It just all those little minutes, it could be four hours a week you save depending on the automations you've got set, depending on the templates you've got set, depending on the bundles you've got built, even for proposals. You you've only started using proposals recently and you're having success with those as well. Even essentially upselling from proposals as well. Yeah, 100%. The proposals is a game changer.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

Yeah, having the customer be able to select the items themselves is yeah, is massive.

SPEAKER_00 36:16

One of the big things as well, there's so many little things in this that satisfy me when members come to me with stuff. I think December, you had a big month, like revenue-wise, profit-wise. And in December, you for the very first time, because we did a session, I believe, in maybe November about wages. You for the first time paid yourself like a proper wage and super superannuation as well. That's one of the biggest things. We spoke about it during Coffee was electricians starting a business, and we compared it to the guys that are working for EBA getting, you know, three, four grand a week on wages, and then you you're busting your ass doing twice the amount of work, you've got multiple times the amount of risk, and you're not even paying yourself a proper wage. And then what's a key thing, and I hope people watching this take this on board, is your business is not profitable unless you're paying yourself a wage. I've had so many people come to me and I'm like, what are you doing profit-wise? And they're like, Oh, well, I'm making about five grand a month. And I'm like, Are you paying yourself a wage? And they're like, No. It's like, so if they're not paying yourself themselves a wage, that five grand a month isn't even enough to cover their wage, they're actually in the negative. So that's the kick up the ass that people need to be like, maybe I'm not charging enough. Maybe I need help with this, maybe a hundred bucks an hour doesn't cut anymore. And yeah, but I think that's that was very fulfilling for me that when you came to me and you sort of finally started paying myself a proper wage. And I went through my system as well with you guys on that live session of like, I've got it set up that it automatically links it, gets a payment out from Combank across to the superannuation, Combank to my personal wages, Combank to tax. And it's just having a system in place again that it just happens weekly without me worrying about it. The biggest shifts as well in the mindset is if that money goes out of the business account and it gets sent to the tax and it gets sent to your personal account, brilliant, you've got personal money, so you can pay your mortgage, pay your bills, actually have something to show for running a business. And what that does, it kicks you up the ass. Because if your business account is deteriorating, you're like it makes you hungrier to get that work. It's like, okay, I can't just sit back and get leisurely because that's what happens with people is they get leisurely if there's a big lump of the business account. And it's like, like your situation and a few other situations, if you get like a big redundancy or you've got you come into the game with cash in the bank, it's probably one of the worst things as well because the hunger isn't there. It's like I've got more, I've got savings, I can I can live off it, I can pay the rent. You get used to living. I wouldn't say frugally, but like you're not living a baller lifestyle. I don't live a baller lifestyle, but I'm just saying, like, you know, if I want something nice, I'll go buy it or whatever. But it's like when you're at that stage of business, you're not spashing the cash because you're not paying yourself a proper wage. You get paid a lump, you get paid your materials and all that, it goes into the account. It looks like you've got loads of money. Next thing you pay your BAS, the suppliers, any subscriptions, overheads, and next thing you're you're left with a little bit and you haven't even paid your wages. So, how did that feel to actually start paying yourself a proper wage as a business owner?

SPEAKER_01 39:13

Yeah, it felt amazing because it was it was one of those things because it had coincided with jumping across to you, learning what I'm really meant to be charging now. Yeah. Because pre-that it's half of what it should have been. So yeah, you do all those hours every week and there's nothing left to pay yourself because you're not charging them. And yeah, looking at I never really looked at the bank account. I did early on, but I quickly learned how to use a PL statement and understand what was really in there. But because I wasn't paying myself a wage, I would look at that. And for instance, say October last year, there's $8,000 showing as net profit. And you go, well, how good is that maybe $8,000? And then I go, hang on a second, I haven't paid myself. So now times that by $12, that's $96,000. Yeah. That's shit. Yeah, that's really shit. Two-thirds of what I earned working for someone else.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

Yeah, you're in the negative massively. It's it's false numbers because as you say, if the wage isn't coming out, you're going to come up in the green, you're going to be profitable because you're not paying yourself a wage. However, if you're paying your wage, your tax superannuation and tax is a fucking killer. We all have to pay it. But like, particularly on wages, it has to be paid, and that's 30%. And then as well, you're invoicing with GST, 10% goes straight away. Anything that's left over gets what, 28% taken off it. And it's just like that's why we charge what we have to charge, particularly for service work. We're not doing the eight hours a day, we're ducking and diving. You're driving around this the hinterland here in between jobs. It could be like a 40-minute trip or something. Well, I'm curious, did the owner of a coaching company actually give you an already rate or did you work off an hourly rate, or did they they do?

SPEAKER_01 40:47

So it was great because they teach you how to calculate it by putting in all the figures. They've got like an Excel spreadsheet that works it all out. However, they don't just honestly tell you that's not enough. Double your rate. Just fucking tell me. Tell me what I need to charge. I have no idea. I've just got it from someone else, and I started with 120, then I went up to 120, then 130, then 140, then 150. And at 150, I thought I was an expensive spot.

SPEAKER_00 41:13

Yeah. It's so subjective as well because let's say, for instance, you were content with paying yourself 80,000 a year and you put that into their charter, their system, and then it's like you go through like your overheads and stuff like that. It might come back and it might be 100 bucks an hour, might cut it because you you haven't catered for what you want to invest in the future or plug in SEO, marketing, whatever you want to do, and then it comes at a lower hourly rate. They might look at that and go, Yeah, good on you. You've got your hourly rate, but they sh they're not there going like that's fucked. You need to you need to jack that because realistically, as a business owner, you want to be taking 150, 180, 200, whatever you want to earn, it should be more than what you can get on an EBA job, or you can get like on an average job, even. And like the first year or so business isn't going to be phenomenal. And that's why the first year of business, like what I advise is you take an above industry wage. If you can, if your business is doing well enough, you take an industry wage. But your goal the next year should be like, let's crank this up like another 30, 40, 50 grand. That should be the target set. Okay, we've earned this much this year, let's crank it up. But then you can get really bad advice from accountants as well. Let's say, pay yourself a big wage. I've had this recently, someone I know very well, their accountant told them to take like fuck all as a wage. What that does is let's say you want to get a loan for a property or something like that. They look back at your record, you're paying yourself like 60 grand a year or something. You're not going to be able to borrow jack shit. It has a huge impact on the future as well. If you want to borrow money or if you want to get a loan for a even a truck or a Ute or a van or whatever, that all that stuff's going to be looked at. Can they afford to repay this? It all goes hand in hand. It's super interesting the different rates and stuff that people give you. And as I said, if you were like, I'm happy with 80 grand a year, then their hourly rate that they calculated, which is probably going to be extremely low, they're probably like, yeah, brilliant. That's we can rock with that.

SPEAKER_01 43:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:03

You were part of a BI group as well. I want your give us your rundown of the BI group. I think there was good and bad, but like I personally don't like B and I. I see it as a little bit of a like a click in a cult. Some people love it. I know the hidden thing behind the scenes is you have got to spend a lot of time networking, passing work, learning about other people's businesses, going to BIs, prepping, doing all of that stuff. That that's where it might be not too bad of a sign-on fee or like an annual fee, but your time is money and your time gets expended into that as well.

SPEAKER_01 43:38

So it worked really well at the start because I had no work. So it was great joining that. You've still, as soon as you join, you're not just handed leads, you've still got to prove yourself to everyone in the group because they're smart enough not to just recommend you and have their own reputation ruined by your sheer work. But yes, it does take a lot of time. And at the start I had that time because I had no work. But then the busier you get, because it was up so on the Sunshine Coast, it's basically long and skinny. It was say 30, 40 minutes north to where the meeting was, and the meeting's at midday on a Wednesday. So to start with, that's fine. I got all the time in the world. But when you get busy, midday on a Wednesday for a meeting is awful because As surfs and maintenance electrician, you can't book anything before it because every job blows out. You turn someone's power off and you don't leave until it's back on because you're finding all sorts of shit, especially up here. It's the wild west. So I would then miss it or you'd be late to it or whatever. And then you've got you've got paper, so there's certain things you have to do every week that they tell you you've got to do, and then you just find out that everyone's just kind of bullshitting anyway. But it's the relationships that you build within it that that are good. And I know you've spoken about it because you've been to ones in Sydney. People that were in my group were great because it's just different up here. People are more down to earth. So all the people in the group were fantastic. The relationships I built with those people were great, and they've continued on. Like my painter, I was out quoting a job with him the other day, even though I've left the group now. The solar guy in the group as well. I've done a lot of work along with them. The plumber in the group, same deal. The property manager that I worked for in there, she was fantastic as well. Because up there, great properties, the landlords were great as well. They never questioned anything. So that was she was one that was really good to work for. However, yes, you still have to show up every Wednesday, otherwise, you're gonna end up out of the group. So I think only allowed a certain amount of absences. Don't say it as it's proof that B and I works. It's proof that networking works. But if you're doing good networking, you don't have to turn up to somewhere and hold this two-hour meeting every single week. The parts of it that work is the building of the relationships within that group. So if you build relationships with people, then that's the only part of it you need. So yes, networking works. You don't have to sign up and go every single week and all that sort of stuff. You just meet people, build relationships with them, and then it yeah, it works well from there.

SPEAKER_00 46:10

That's one thing I I noticed about you as well as you're quite charismatic. Is that where Rizdog comes from with your hand? That's that's from my school. So I actually meant to ask you about that. So the you're quite charismatic, and I think like you're you're a what I would call like a master, mingler, and networker, like you're very approachable, you're a friendly guy, and I think that that goes wonders. Because if you're an electrician and you're a cold person, you don't want to talk to anybody, just go work in commercial where you just deal with one person and you can just draft the people around. If you're doing face-to-face, you work in residential, it's vital that you you're a friendly person, you're approachable, you're kind to the homeowner, you're respectful of their property, all that goes such a long way. But with the B and I as well, as you said, it's a two-way street. If you're not referring these people work as well, they're gonna see that and be like, Well, stop, but I'm gonna find another electrician that's gonna refer me work. So I think like it can be cut through, but I think you're dead right. Like, I've noticed even walking around the Sunshine Coast here of like a jump in the lift, everybody's like, Good morning, how are you? How's your day? And I think I'm the Sydney prick now because I'm like my head down, like I'll just get into the lift and not say anything to anyone. I'll go into the shop, say, Hey, good A, like how's it all going? And I'm just like, fuck it, this is this is just like being back in Ireland, but I've been signified that I'm just like I'm just like I'm now that snobby burst that doesn't talk because Sydney is is drastically that way. You barely know your neighbours because it's all built up and they're always interchanging. But here is just it's a different down-to-earth level. Yeah, it's kind of like I'd spoke about Queensland or particularly the Gold Coast being like my happy place, and now I've seen the Sunshine Coast is almost too quiet for me. You've got like happy medium, the Gold Coast is a quieter version of Sydney, it's way nicer, and then you've got like here is like sleepy, just chilled out next level. But I can totally see how you would have it have really good people in that group. And I know as well, you've you've said that your painters referred to loads of work. You've had the solar guy, the plumber. That's a paramount part of business as well. And which is one of the sessions we did on finding work was like your warm network, which is like people that you know around you, and also who can you find a network with? So be it a BI group, be it literally finding a local trade, getting them going for a coffee with them, finding that you align with them. Because what can happen as well is like you might meet with somebody, but you mightn't click at all. And one of the worst things is if you do do that and you meet like a plumber and they're drastically undercharging, you can be dramatic or it can be very bad for your business because next thing they're referring you to their clients, you're charging your legitimate pricing you need, and you're three times the price of that plumber. You always need to align with them as well. You've since left BI and you've retained some of the relationships that you've had in there.

SPEAKER_01 48:51

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, built really good relationships within there. I suppose it also helps that no electrician has replaced me in the group yet. But I still think, yeah, some of the relationships I've built will be ongoing. Like the plumber had left before me, the painter's still in there. Yeah, it's a bit of it's a bit of a revolving door there with trades and stuff anyway. But yes, these relationships will keep going because they've been built on. They know they can trust me and I trust them with the work we do. Yeah. And that's the other thing. It's not just about making relationships with people that will give you leads, it's about making relationships with people that you trust care about my customers. I want them to be looked after, and I want another trade to come in and do a good job. And it helps to have those people you can refer because there's nothing worse than people go like, Oh, do you know a good plumber? And you go, No, good luck finding one. No, I've yes, I do. I've got an excellent plumber who I can recommend. I've got an excellent painter who's gonna make your house look immaculate. My aircon guy, same deal. Got everyone. So that's the main thing that came out of BI was just the trades that I connected with. But again, you can just connect with trades because you you have no idea that there's plumbers out there who don't even have an electrician they work with. And so every time they get asked about an electrician, they just go, Oh, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 50:02

That's the part of mingling and putting yourself out there. And that's like the process we went through in the session with like there's a step-by-step way to do it, and there's a right way to do it, and there's a wrong way to do it. And it's just about meeting that other trade and then just communicating to each other like how your businesses operate, and then the type of work you do. You're not competitors, you both have got the same client. So there's nothing better. And like with the email marketing system, which is finishing off next week, one of the emails that we do suggest is you're and the reason you do that is you now are alleging that not only help their electrical work, you're also helping them find other trades as well. And as you said, most importantly, it's trades that you trust within your that that aren't gonna rip them or do a bad job in their house. It's people that care about their business, your business, and it's a circle. And those trades are hard to find, but they are out there and they're in the exact same boat as you or I or anybody watching this or listening to this, and it's like they are there for the exact same reason. If you can send them work, they will send you work. It's a fantastic way to get leads into your business because the core ways to get leads into your business, obviously organic, there's through the website, there's referral partners coming in, there's direct as well, which you're knocking on the door of a lighting company, which we've put a strategy into place at the moment where you are knocking at the door and you're about to become a preferred electrician with them. There's all these strategies, and it you need all those things coming in because one of these people panicking and then just like, let's go run some Google Ads. And it's like, won't even get into it, but you're running Google Ads to a shit website, and then that that is one to then absolutely churn through your cash, waste your money because, like we spoke about the messaging, it doesn't have the correct messaging on there. It's generic shitty website, they're gonna click to yours, click to somebody else's, somebody else is gonna probably mention zero dollar call-out fee or some shit like that, and then they're gonna end up going with them because you got judged on the commodity, not the messaging. One very powerful thing you said was not only have the systems changed your business, made it more streamlined, they've also changed your life as well. And like that to me is extremely fulfilling. If you were to do the move up to the from Melbourne up to the Sunshine Coast again, what would you have done differently to get off the ground quicker? That's a tricky one.

SPEAKER_01 52:19

Probably, yeah, understanding the right marketing for the stage you're at. Like you just touched on with Google Ads. I did a program that teaches you how to do Google Ads and stuff like that. But yeah, I was sending them to a shit website. And if you don't have the budget for it, it just stresses you out more. So every time I got a call for someone that said, I've got a refrigerator that needs repairing, and I just went, that just cost me 30. I don't have $30 to waste on someone whose fridge I can't repair. And then you're trying to do negative keywords and try and like do all this bullshit. Whereas the type of marketing that works early stage, that's yeah, that's what I would have done. And it's funny because some of the stuff that we've gone over of how to get work, I was told by the other coaching program doesn't work. It's a waste of time. And I had all the time in the world when I first started. It it drives me crazy because I asked them, I said, I get flyers in the mail, I get magnets in the mail, everyone's been doing it forever. Does it work? Because I have all the time in the world to print these things off and walk my dog and drop them in people's boxes. I don't need to pay for it. I don't have the budget to pay for it right now. I've got time. And they said, we've had members try it, it doesn't work, don't bother. You have to do digital.

SPEAKER_00 53:33

You've got to like. Yeah. In regards to flare drops, I'm not going to give away your idea because I thought it was phenomenal, but you mentioned on one of the live sessions that you did a strategy. It was almost like waiting in the ditch to deploy the magnets uh to a specific place. Yeah. And you got a few leaves out of that. And I thought that was a master stroke. And again, you you just simply dropped off a magnet or whatever. Yeah. Well, the coolest thing about your magnets is you've actually featured the gray hair in them as well. It's very personalized. It's been fantastic speaking with you. I know you were skeptical when you first joined up of jumping on Simplified Sparky. If anybody's in the fence or whatever, someone's in your position or they're just starting the business, like what would your advice to them be?

SPEAKER_01 54:13

Yeah, well, 100%. Like I said, I felt a bit burned from the last last coaching program. So I was a bit hesitant, but yeah, 100%. If you're in this position, you're an electrician who's at this level, you work on your own, you're trying to build it, or you want to go out on your own. 100% this is the coaching system. Like you said, this is your niche within the coaching, is for guys in this exact position. And all the systems that you implement and your online coaching, step by step online coaching program that doesn't distract you of do a bit of this and do a bit of this. It's like, no, you've got to, you've got to build the foundations and build from there. The system is just unbelievable.

SPEAKER_00 54:52

Appreciate it, Ryan. Thanks for watching for coming on too.

SPEAKER_01 54:55

And uh let's catch up for part two with blackout protection.

SPEAKER_00 54:58

Yeah.