Short, specific writing about the business side of a trade — getting leads, answering them fast, pricing without guessing, hiring in March, and staying on the right side of the texting rules. No growth hacks. No listicles.
We are a small agency that builds and runs software for home-service contractors, so most of what is here comes out of a real conversation with a real fence builder or pressure washer who was losing money in a specific, fixable place. Every number we cite is sourced or labelled as our own assumption. Nothing here requires you to buy anything.
A monthly pool price is the minutes at the pool, the minutes driving to it and the chemicals that go in it, spread over about 4.3 visits a month. How to build it, how sanitizer type changes it, and the extras that belong on their own price list, storm visits included.
What a 2 a.m. call really costs you once overtime, paid drive time and on-call pay are counted, three ways to price it, how to state the premium before you roll, and where emergency price laws start.
Three priced options change what customers choose, and two classic studies show how: the middle option gains, and a clearly weaker option lifts the one that beats it. How to build the three from your own price rules, honestly.
An hourly rate with a minimum protects you on small calls; a flat price per task is what homeowners can compare. How to build both from your own timed jobs, your truck time and your supply runs, and when to use which.
Charging to show up is normal; the question is whether the number covers the trip. Work out what a truck roll costs you in time, vehicle and overhead, turn it into a minimum or a trip fee, and say it the same way on the phone and on your website.
Price a maintenance plan from the bottom up: define the visit with the ACCA 4 QM checklists, cost it from your own loaded rate, price each perk before you promise it, and schedule the visits into the spring and fall when the phones are quiet.
A driveway or patio price is built from quantities you can measure before the pour: yards from area and thickness, the base, the tear-out, the finish, and the delivery extras that eat small jobs. The math, the published specs behind it, and a worked example.
A truckload price works when it is built from three costs: the crew's time, the truck, and the landfill's fee by the ton. Measure your box in cubic yards, weigh a load with EPA's conversion factors, add item and stairs surcharges, then check it against a published range.
Two trees of the same height can be a morning's work or two days of rigging. The factors that set a removal price, how to build the number from your own crew and equipment costs, stump grinding as its own line, and why the homeowner should hear a range first.
The customer added work halfway through. How to price the change at your full rate with its schedule effect, what a one-page change order says, the state rules that make an unsigned change hard to collect, and when an electronic signature counts.
Lumber, steel and copper prices moved hard in the past year and tariffs keep changing. When an escalation clause is worth putting on a small-job estimate, how to tie it to a public BLS index, and the cheaper fixes that often work better.
A pest plan is three prices, not one: the initial service, the recurring visit and the re-services you promise in between. Price each from your own minutes and materials and the frequency discount becomes arithmetic instead of a copied number.
Six subjects, because those are the six places we watch contractors lose money.
Why traffic is not leads, and what has to be on the page before a homeowner will hand over a phone number.
The five-minute rule, missed calls, voicemail, and why a text beats a callback almost every time.
Getting the formula out of your head and onto paper so somebody — or something — else can run it.
Finding crew who are already employed, screening without resumes, and cutting interview no-shows.
TCPA and A2P 10DLC without the legalese, so you can text customers back without worrying.
Seasonality, margin by job type, and the winter decisions that decide how March goes.
If something on the business side of your trade is costing you money and nobody has written it down clearly, send it over. We would rather write the post you actually need than guess at a topic. No email capture required — just ask.
Or email support@tailgateoffice.com.
Step two takes about thirty minutes: instant quotes on your site, and every missed call logged and answered from one inbox. Free for 30 days, no card.
