While there are many different ways to get clients as a home inspector, I think we can agree that most successful home inspectors get the majority of their clients through referrals from real estate agents. As we’ve discussed in an earlier post, the agents already know who needs an inspection and when they’re going to need it. As a result, …
Real Estate Agents versus Us
As we’ve touched on many times in these articles, it’s imperative for a small business owner to stay current on the constantly changing landscape of their industry. Continuously educating yourself is almost a requirement if you’re to have a chance to remain relevant in your niche. Being part of the digital age has certainly made it easier for us to …
Is There a Market for Quality?
Give the people what they want. George Jessel It’s an often-quoted line, and it’s typically used as an excuse for doing inferior work. Many businesses fall back on this old axiom to justify providing a mediocre product. They say that they’re only doing second-rate work because that’s all they’re clients want; it’s all they’re willing to pay for; it’s what …
Imitation and Mediocrity
It’s kind of funny, if we stop and think about it, but most people are surprised when they find out how hard it is to break into the world of small business. Common sense should tell us that. I guess that it’s the blinders that we all come into the business with that do it, but we would think that …
Riding the Elevator
The elevator pitch. It’s a phrase we often hear in the business world, and unfortunately it’s something that we all do in our own businesses. Is giving the elevator pitch always the right thing to for us to do? How’s that working for us? And what the hell does it really mean, anyway? Wikipedia says an elevator pitch is a …
Getting Better Home Inspection Clients
Get better clients. If we stop to think about it, this simple three-word sentence should be the ultimate goal for anyone running a small business. Better clients offer many different benefits for the small business owner. Better clients are easier to deal with in our business. Better clients force us to produce a better product. But, arguably the most important …
The Value of Providing Value
While I’m certainly not an attorney, it’s fairly easy for the average person to learn almost everything they need to know about the law from a small amount of quality internet research. While doing a bit of investigation to see if there were any ways that I could improve my current home inspection contract, I came across a site where …
Action, Not Just (Paying For) Words
One of the biggest hurdles a small business owner faces is figuring out how to get clients through the door. Whether your company has an actual front door in a building, or you operate a service-based business without a physical location for customers to visit, the goal is still the same: to get customers to call on you so that …
The 7 Pitfalls of Small Business (conclusion)
This article is the second part of a two-part series. Click here to read part one. Running a small business can be a wonderful experience, bringing with it a sense of excitement and fulfillment when things go right. At the same time, things don’t always go the way we’ve planned. When things do go wrong, those feelings of happiness can …
Lessons Learned
We all know that exercise is good for us. It helps to keep our bodies (and our minds) healthy as we age. Unfortunately, for many of us, making a conscious decision to exercise is difficult. It’s easy to reason that, instead of exercising, we could be working and making money, or relaxing from all the work we’ve already done (and …