EP4: Does The Perfect Contractor Business Group Exist?

No, well, you know, it's funny because they weren't necessarily contractor business style groups, but I remember reaching out to other contractors in my trade, like trying to connect with them and go out to lunch. You know, it could be start as simple as like that, meeting one person that's alike and then meeting another and then joining up and things like that. I've always been inspired by communities, if you will, from all my hobbies, from fish to reptiles to plants. So I think I'm attracted to being around people to communicate and share and learn and grow and all that stuff. So I'm still in a lot of groups now that it's all digital and on Facebook and things like that.

Well, clearly Facebook is dominating the space. I think they just have a nice platform that enables anyone to set up a group anywhere, anytime, search out people, market to people, find people with similar interests. It pretty seems to be the platform.

I've had, you know, from super great... amazing experiences to scratch my head. What the heck am I doing around here? And kind of experiences. So it's all across the spectrum. And the topic is like, what is the perfect contracting business community look like? Or does it exist to me? It's hard because I feel like I have to be involved in a lot of different groups in order to kind of be fulfilled. If that makes sense.

want to dig into. what the perfect group might look like, because I've been putting a lot of process into that. But I mean, you know, one group, I might learn something about the trade, let's say, for example, or one, one, I might learn about marketing or one, I might learn about how to apply, you know, maybe some sales, maybe something numbers. So they're all all over the place. It'd be cool if I didn't have to go to like 10 different places to really hone in my skills and be surrounded by cool people.

Absolutely, man, for sure. You know, at one point, and this is kind of business related, because what I was trying to get at earlier is like, I'm in a pawn community group. I'm in a contractor group. I'm in a business group. I'm in a marketing group. I'm in all these different groups. And it's like, you know, if I blink an eye, I miss something, right? You know, or I'm chasing down all these different things. It seems to be a real time suck sometimes trying to keep up with them all. And it seems like the groups that have more people in them seem to be the ones that are. Getting more of that stuff that you described because there's just so many people. They just, it's almost like the seagull leadership technique, but it's like the seagull group, you know, into enter the group, fly over shit on someone and fly out. You know, they create all this havoc and it was fighting and that they're, they're sitting up on the deck, looking from the sky, looking at all the shit right there. It's, it's terrible.

Well, dude, I think everyone's a little guilty of that. And that could be because they're in so many different groups. It's like, you're in a lot of groups and like, it pops up in your feed and you're like, oh, I think I interpreted it, but you didn't really give it enough thought. So you're calling it a drive-by. You gotta be careful. You don't talk about drive-bys in Southern California, bro. I mean, it's like. You don't do that in Southern California. Too many gangs and too many guns. We don't call it that. But the seagull fly over, take a shit, land on someone's pizza. That actually happened to me when I was in high school. I was eating a piece of pizza on the high school bench. And I was getting ready to slide that pizza right in my mouth and the bird shit right on the pizza. Right as it was almost to go in my mouth. I was like, what the heck? So that was in Long Beach. I was like right on the shore. Anyways, that's why it sticks with me. It's like people just fly by and shit on you and cause havoc and everyone's laughing and, oh my God, as the bird flies off into the trees. So I do want to tell you about, if I could still have the floor, I want to tell you about a really poor experience I had in a group. And now this was somewhat business related because it had to do with my koi business and my pond business. Literally, I was in like 50 groups. So one of these groups I was in, there's like... A couple thousand people. That's a lot. You know, administration, it's hard to manage that many people and kind of keep everyone on the same page. Anyways, the guy made me an admin. He's like, Eric, this is what's, you know, I want you to help me out around here. I was like, oh, okay. Yeah. Like, all right. I'm just agreed to it too easy, I guess. And then one day he just got fed up and left the group and I was the only admin left. Meanwhile, there's 2000 people in there. Imagine like an auditorium of all these people. you know, going crazy and saying whatever they want to. Anyways, someone, they got in this big old fight and everyone's talking shit on each other. And then I get a notification from someone that they're like getting ready. They're going to sue me because there was defamation of character and all this stuff is going on. I'm like, what are you talking about? And so because I was the only administration person in that group, because this guy. basically signed me as an admin and had left the group, it looked like I was just letting everyone go crazy in the group and cause shit. So that was a really pissed me off. I was really upset. And I think that night I dumped myself off of like 50 groups, literally like 50 coy community, coy business style groups. Just, I just bounced out later. I don't want the headache.

I don't remember my exit strategy. I'd put a lot of thought into it. This was a few years ago, but I remember, you know, I didn't want that person to win. I'm like, well, I'll just make you the admin then, you know, and I'm out. But I basically drew a line in the sand and stood up for myself. And I either somehow closed the group or I somehow, I just took myself out of the admin possibilities and assigned it some other people with them knowing what was kind of going on. Because it's a pretty big community. I mean, over 2000 people in a community, that's a lot. There's a lot of content on there.

I mean, there's a lot of information on there that people have poured their hearts into that group. Just because there's a couple of bad people in there, you don't want to spoil the whole thing. So even though I was super, super uptight about it, I had to take in some deep breaths and go, okay, let's think about this here. Let's not just act off a total emotion.

Oh, shit. Outrageous.

are you going to do? So here's part of the problems, man. This is what makes it so aggravating and so annoying. You know, does the perfect group exist? Because it's like if you get too many people, it becomes problematic. You have to have more admin. And, you know, you call someone out and you become a hypocrite. It just looks terrible. So that's what's super frustrating about that. I'd like to tell a story about, I have a patent on a pond skimmer. I know you know that, but I know not everyone realizes that, but there's a relation between how I got this patent and kind of how I think about groups. If you're cool with that, I'd like to expand on that.

So at the time I was building a lot of ponds, I probably installed like 30 different types of skimmers from all different types of manufacturers. And so... And one day I was super frustrated. I kind of was into this, this one skimmer. It's like, okay, this is going to be my go-to skimmer. And then, so anyways, I was, I was working on that and I started having problems with that. And I became super frustrated. And one night I was just like writing down all the pros and cons of all the skimmers across the board. Okay. And everything I liked about this skimmer and that skimmer and this skimmer, I kind of put in the, in that column of like, Hey, these are the pros and everything I didn't like, I threw to the other con section. And when I was done, That night I had a dream and I came up with my skimmer, the Helix Pond skimmer, and I have a patent on it and everything. But I really like by putting it down on paper, it manifested. And I figured out how to create this cool skimmer. And so I think about that when groups, it's like this group's great at that. This group's great at this, but bad at that. And so I feel like I've put a lot of thought into the pros and cons of different groups to try and figure out like, where's the real sweet spot? Where could that be? Maybe we can make it. that perfect business contractor community.

Well, that's part of the group mentality, too, because, you know, let's face it. I love my brother to death. We have a lot of stuff in common, but sometimes he just annoys me. Right. When you get enough of it. And like the more I hang out with you, the more I like you, but you know, you, you probably annoy me more than I like you most of the time right now.

That's probably true with everyone that you're friends with. You annoy me

Well, the point I'm getting at is in a group being surrounded by people that press you, challenge you. inspire you, give you ideas, all this kind of stuff. I think it's a good, I think it's a good mix, especially as a contractor, because you have to communicate with a lot of different people. So you kind of have to learn how to, to get along with people and to, if everyone has the same core values, you know, if everyone has, they're good people, you can get past a lot of these things.

That was just the tip of the iceberg. There's way more than that.

Well, some of them are in different climates. You know, some people have extreme weather and so they want to communicate people in the same climate. Some people are in different. continents and countries, you know, they, they want to reach out and talk to people in different countries and see what they're doing. I mean, it's kind of geeky. You can go down a deep path like that, but then there's, there's business communities and professional communities. And like some of them are private and some of them are public. And so for me, you know, part of my career is like, I want to help a lot of people. And so like me going to those groups, I look for questions that I can help support people and, or. For my Pond Digger podcast, I might want to share parts of it there or my YouTube channel or anything that I'm marketing as value to people to learn from. I want to be able to try and push some of that stuff out there. But the reason why there's so many is maybe probably what we're talking about too. Maybe no one's found the perfect community and they just keep making new ones, but they haven't really put the pros and cons down on paper to figure out what it is that they're looking for.

Yeah, I'd like to talk about that. I mean, I think clearly we've identified the problem clearly. Right. And I think from us talking to some of our peers and, you know, extrapolating all the pros and cons out of the groups, I've kind of narrowed it down to like three things. that I'd love to talk about that kind of describe what the perfect contractor business community can look like. It's like the foundation of it. And so to just give you a brief, the three bullets, I'll just shoot them out there and then we can go back and kind of dissect them if that's cool. Yep. Let's do it. So number one, I mean, we need a place. Clearly it's probably Facebook, right? A place for people to gather with fellow contractors that are like on a journey to their own journey to self-mastery in both business and life. Because I think those combinations tie together, right? So we got the place, we got the people. And the second thing is in the community, we're looking for inspiration, ideas. I think you can find accountability, friendships, people that are going to challenge you, people that are in the grind, like the same, experiencing the same problems and wins with everyone else. And the third place would be once you're finding those inspirations and ideas and accountability, this is a place where you can become a practitioner, where learning and studying, We're practicing how to market and sell and ultimately communicate with your clients and creating a great experience for your journey. Does that make sense?

I think scale is important here because as this community grows, and I want to be clear, everyone, I mean, we're working on creating this community right now. And I think it's important for me to say that right now, because as we talk about scaling, I want people to realize our approach. So let's be clear on that. Lay it out. Okay. I think scale is important. You know, it doesn't just, it will be a private group. So there's a little bit of control and just like people aren't coming in and doing the seagull shit going on. Start out with a small group, maybe 25,30 people. Get it set up, get the community going, and then scale it slowly. Maybe open it back up. Hey, we're letting 25 more people in. Close it down. Stay tight. Stay clean. Make sure everyone's cohesive. Everything's cool. Scale up again, maybe another 25. But at some point, there will be a cap. That's how I feel about it. Having 2,000 people in a group like this could be really complicated.

I'm in a coaching program right now. There's 700 people,700 people. And instead of having all 700 people in one group, there's seven groups of 100. Interesting. And so that way it's, you know, you can't really get to know 2000 people. You're like, who the hell's Brad Hebner? Like what? Who's what? Oh, did he's that guy? He's in California, right? No, no. He's in Indiana. Like what? You can't remember 2000 people. So I think there has to be some kind of. levels where you can maintain close relationship. It's more intimate in those levels. Like you start to figure people's personalities out so you can actually help them better.

It'd drive me crazy.

Look, I literally had 50 groups and trying to communicate with all these people. And then you end up looking like a jackass because it's like you talk to someone three times and then you don't talk to them for three months and you come back on. They're like, oh, hey, Eric, what's up? You know, I'm like, who are you? Like, I'm trying to talk to 2000 people. I mean, how is that a benefit?

That was on a Sunday, bro.

No, it was an off day, I remember, because I was like, oh, this is a mellow day for me.

Oh, it could be 50 plus, man. It could be 50 plus.

sure. I mean, my gut tells me it's around 150 to 200. That's what my gut tells me, but I don't know yet. We have to, we have to scale it slowly. That's my, my plan is to 25,30 starters, you know, then get to 50, get to 75, get to a hundred and then just relax, chill, get to know each other. Let's, let's let it marinate.

Well, I mean, because with that slow pace, you get a little bit of stability. We're going to have some bugs to work out. I mean, we want this to be the perfect contractor business community. So I want time to focus on value. And if I'm focusing on getting to learn 200 people's businesses and names and... doing what I can to provide value to them on that scale, I think I'll ruin that big value piece of the puzzle that we still want to throw out there.

For sure. I mean, also even like helping out with, I don't know, it just came to my mind, like directories almost like, so imagine we're going to have 25 contractors in there. You're going to have one or two pond guys. You're going to have a couple of carpenters. You're going to have a painter. You're going to have all these different contractors. And so you get a chance to learn their businesses, what have you. And then when you bring in 25 new people and another pond guy comes in, you're like, oh, hey, Eric's a pond guy too. I don't know if you know it, but you should probably make sure you start. following him and talk to him and that would be a good place to start. You can ask him for help. It might make him feel more comfortable coming in and talking to the pond guy than talking to the carpenter. Cause then there's more, it's, it's more not only relation wise kind of cool, but it also is relatable in their craft and in their trade. And that's what we want to do. Help them in their trade.

No, not, I mean, if I was, it was like 20 years ago. It wasn't there for very long. I heard about it.

No, it's an amazing idea. And, you know, it's interesting because in the groups that I've been in, you find guys that are clicking up, having the same vibe, hitting it off, becoming friends and stuff like that and helping certain posts. create momentum. You know, someone throws a post up of a fish, like, oh, check this out. I'm going to post a picture of my fish too. And then all of a sudden, like 10 people are posting fish photos or whatever. But it related back to the contracting business, it could be like, hey, here's a door hanger I used. I got a lot of success out of it. And someone might be like, hey, my door hanger didn't work very well and throws that picture up. And now they're having a conversation like, well, this is what I might've done different on your door hanger than mine. And then all of a sudden they're talking about what the how the scale of the homes looked like maybe that had something to do with it and so like all of a sudden it starts to marinate and now you're cooking with fire and growing from that that's where all that's where a lot of the fun comes from

There's a lot of value in that.

No, like, listen, I paid, I mean, I'm in California. It's extremely litigious state, but I paid five grand for a contract written up specific to my trade and to my business. And I've shared the complete contract with several guys over the years. It locally and across the country, I've shared clauses. with people in different industries. For example, when YouTube came on the scene 10 years ago, it's not that big of a deal, but within the past like five, six years, all of a sudden it's kind of blowing up, right? And so I've been asking people on their contract, like, hey, did you put in a clause for a photo and video release? And they're like, no. I'm like, bro, you better get that in your contract. Then I'd send them over a little piece of the clause. So you know the Helix group I connected you. I had you come in and take a look at that group. kind of for evaluation purposes, right? So like one day I did, like, I put up a post just to kind of get people inspired and that kind of stuff. I'm like, Hey, can you share what you did last year? Can you share, you know, as a total gross revenue and what your first quarter goals are? I'd love to talk about that. Here's mine, throw it out there. Right. And I had like three people in the group. There's, there's less than a hundred people in there. Three people in the group hit me up directly on the side. They're like, hey, this is my numbers from last year. I didn't want to share it in the group because I didn't want anyone else to know. And it's not because they were embarrassed. It's actually because they felt this competitive piece in there. You know, there's people that are competing in the group because they're kind of close by each other or they're kind of fighting for the same market space or they've been screwed over by another contractor. And so they're like, screw that. I'm not going to tell them my inside scoop secret shit. So that's been a little bothersome. And that's definitely a con that I have from that group that I admin, I created, and I put it over in our group when you were trying to figure out what the perfect group looks like.

Well, I think accountability part's going to evolve a little bit once this group gets started. And that's why I don't want it to scale too fast because I really want to focus on this part. Accountability is, to me, it's a big deal because I know that when you have an accountability partner, whether it's a personal trainer or one-on-one, someone you're paying or your wife, dude, where was that thing? I sent you something like, if you say something about a goal, It's like 8% that you're going to get it done. But if you, if you write it down, it jumps up to like 20 or 30%. If you share it with someone or put it out in the public, it jumps up to like, you know,50 to 60%. And then when you get an accountability partner, you're 85% more likely to actually get the shit done. And so with, with those kinds of stats involved, just by getting onto our group and you're actually typing in. what your goal might be, that's writing it down. And then you're sharing it with the community of peers. You're already pushing that level up, but just by that action right there, it, now it makes it real. And so whatever that goal might be, whether it's a, you know, a marketing goal, a revenue goal, whatever. And we kind of have to, I think we're gonna have to compartmentalize some of this stuff. So it's not all this, you know, melting pot of stuff, but, but just by getting it on the group and then I'm going to be like, Dude, Brad wants to get this shit done. I'm going to step on his toes a little bit. And every now and then I'm going to flick some matches at him to light a fire and keep him going. I'm going to check in on him in a month. I've done that in groups. Someone says something, Hey, in a month, I plan on doing this a month later. I'll put a note in my phone and I'll hit him up. I'm like, Hey, did you do that? They're like, Oh, you know, like, well, I really wanted to. So like. But they're not going to remember, they're not going to forget the fact that I was that way. So I might have a different approach in our group where I'll be like, okay, you want to get this done in six months? Well, I'm going to check in on you monthly and see if you're on track to hit your goals. So I want that to marinate. That's what accountability looks like to me.

I'm not denying that. What do you think I got the idea?

I'd like to create some challenges too. Absolutely. There's going to be some challenges that we'll create in there. And that's what keeps that activity going. I think that's, that's part of the community that you have to have those challenges, the inspiration, ideas, accountability, the friendships, all that stuff kind of, it all helps create such a great experience for everyone involved.

Let's talk about the third spot.

So it's a place to learn and study and practice. And I want, I mean, I'm a practitioner in all the things that I do. I'm the type that'll read a book and then I'll go out and try and apply it. You know, it's if you're not applying the knowledge, if you're not putting that stuff into action, then, you know, might as well not have read the book. So ultimately, we want to help people, and not only help people, but in teaching and in doing the practitioner part, we're becoming better ourselves in how to market, how to sell, how to track numbers. Ultimately, creating a great way to communicate with your prospects, ultimately making the best experience for your clients and for yourself and your family and all that stuff. All wrapped up.

Well, practicing is role-playing. I mean, that's it in a nutshell. Didn't you ever see that Office episode when they did the role-playing of the sales on the phone calls and stuff like that? It's so funny, man. It's hilarious. So, I mean, ultimately doing some role plays and helping understand how to communicate with customers. I mean, I'd like to just let the cat out of the bag and talk about the Hammer and Grind Profit Sales System. Why don't you open up that box?

Yeah, and a lot of that has to do with understanding psychology of customers, understanding their personality profiles. We can dive into that on a different episode of, of understanding the way people think, the way they want to be spoke to, the way that they'll likely speak to you, all those things. And so part of the role play experience that we're going to be unraveling is, or unveiling, I should say, is it's part of that practice. And with practice comes perfection.

it's crazy. We've been throwing so much content on the table, man. It's all interwoven. It's like a rat's nest of content and ideas in my head. And I got to lay them all out. It's like a puzzle piece. So that's a 2,000-piece puzzle all on the floor. I got to start to separate all the stuff. But that's definitely something I want to talk about.

Well, so it's been years since I've done a free estimate. I mean, I've probably thrown in one or two here, but I've been charging for my estimates for over 15 years. You know, it started out at 65 bucks and what have you, and it kind of goes from there. But I got to be honest with you, I never really figured out the best way like to communicate that to the client. And there's really, there's really a nice little psychological twist and a nice little, package of how to deliver it to where the customer says, okay. And if you just do it wrong, you know, it could, they're hanging up on you or it's just, you're losing the deal. And so there's a real sexy way to make it happen. And the role play practice is going to help it work.

Yeah. Countless, countless times. I'm pretty, pretty experienced at making myself look like a fool. I'm really good at that. Yeah.

Ethical way, for sure. And also like. You know, we want this to be like an emotionally profitable experience for the client. If you can even put those two words together. Right. Is that accurate?

Well, that experience with the client is to me that the happier I can make the client. in my career today, it's just, it's a fun experience. And a lot of that has to do, that's going to be taught and trained in the hammer and grind profit sales system is how to make that experience the ultimate. Yeah.

It's unbelievable experience. Actually, if you guys could see Brad's face right now, he's actually smiling. He doesn't do it very often. Not very often, but he's smiling right now because it's an amazing experience. And I think if you've never felt it, then we're going to help you experience it. And if you have experienced it, we're going to help you how to dive into it deeper. That's what this is all about.

But let me tell you this. The three things that we talked about here, those are the foundations of the group. So what you said right there is if someone's not humble enough or if they think they're not going to do the work, that doesn't align with step number one, a place to gather with fellow contractors that are on a journey to personal self-mastery. A person that doesn't want to put in the work and it's not humble, they're not truly on a journey to personal self-mastery, so they don't really fit the group. Does that make sense? So this is our core values is our foundation right there, those three pieces. So I don't think that person is going to want to be around us because they're not on the same journey as we are. Are they going to show up sometimes and we're going to have to navigate through and see how that works out? Probably. But we're going to be able to lean into our core values of what we're doing here and have a conversation.

You got that right. You got any final thoughts? I think we wrapped this up pretty nice.

If you want to find out more about the Hammer and Grind Profit Club, you need to head on over to hammerandgrind. com. There'll be a spot right there where you'll be able to find out more about it and get an invitation on into the group. And that's going to be the best way to do it. Unless you have any final thoughts, I'd just like to take this home. Let's do it. All right, man. Hey, thank you so much for hanging out with us today on the podcast. If you're finding value, share the Hammer and Grind podcast with a contractor you know and love. Hit that subscribe button so you don't miss out on up and coming shows. Smash the five star to show us your love and support. And I want you to know this. Even Brad gets a smile on his face when he reads the reviews you send in to us. So keep them coming and stay connected with us on the daily on Facebook and Instagram at Hammer and Grind Podcast. Over and out.