Jack Jostes [00:00:00]:
Last week, we hosted the 5th Annual Landscaper’s Summit, a full-day virtual workshop with sales, marketing, and leadership takeaways to help snow and landscape companies prepare for 2025. And in today's episode, I'm going to share some of my favorite highlights you don't want to miss.
Joshua Gillow [00:00:18]:
Think about the power that comes through the relationship.
Tyler Lombardo [00:00:22]:
We let our guys know how important they are and how it would pain us if something ever happened to them.
Jack Jostes [00:00:28]:
I'm excited to see who's going to win.
00:30 - Steve Bousquet on Using CliftonStrengths for Leadership
Jack Jostes [00:00:30]:
One of my favorite takeaways was Steve Bousquet's presentation of Clifton StrengthFinders to help employees work within their strengths.
Steve Bousquet [00:00:40]:
There’s four CliftonStrength domains, and this is what we really want to focus on. There’s 34 CliftonStrengths, and they make up the four domains. There’s the executing domain, which makes things happen. There’s the influencing domain. It’s the take-charge, speak-up, but they also make sure that others are heard. And there’s the relationship building, which builds strong relationships that hold a team together and make it greater than its sum of parts.
Steve Bousquet [00:01:16]:
And the strategic thinking, which absorbs and analyzes information that informs better decisions. The executing domain includes strengths that relate to accomplishing tasks. It’s very valuable for leaders that need to meet deadlines, goals, who excel. That domain excels the strengths that they’ll have, the achiever strength and the focus strength.
Steve Bousquet [00:01:35]:
And the influencing domain relates to persuaders, others which can be valuable for leaders who need to influence decisions and motivate their team. Leaders who excel in this domain have strengths such as communication, right? And they also have the only acronym in the CliftonStrength, WOO, which is winning others over. So that is a very common theme strength for influencing. And the relationship domain includes strengths related to building and maintaining relationships, which can be valuable for leaders who need to foster positive work environments and create a sense of belonging.
Steve Bousquet [00:02:22]:
Leaders who excel in this domain may have strengths such as empathy or developer. And developers like to see people grow. And the strategic thinking domain includes strengths related to analyzing information and making decisions.
Steve Bousquet [00:02:38]:
It can be very valuable for leaders. They need to plan for the future and make sound decisions. Leaders who excel in this domain may have strengths such as strategic and analytical. I'll share a story. So I had, before I even took CliftonStrengths, had inadvertently surrounded myself with strategic thinkers. And I took the CliftonStrengths and I had my business associates, friends, people on my team, my wife, family.
Steve Bousquet [00:03:09]:
And when I don't have strategic thinking, I lead with influencing and relationship. And I had surrounded myself with people with strategic thinking. So it was very interesting that we inadvertently will surround people around us that support us with strengths we don’t have. So when we complain, why aren’t they like this? And why are they not like us? They can’t be. We need people who don’t have our strengths in our lives to support us. And it’s a very powerful strength in things that when we do CliftonStrengths, you're like, oh, that makes sense why we’re friends.
Steve Bousquet [00:03:46]:
Because they bring what I don’t have and I bring what they don’t have And it’s the same things with teams. And in the CliftonStrengths report, there's actually a part where you can match people up on your team and it will say, this is what I bring and this is what I need. And it will say, this is what they bring and this is what they need. It’s a super powerful tool on teams.
Jack Jostes [00:04:10]:
While I’ve used DISC, D-I-S-C, and I’ve learned about the COBE method, I learned a lot from Steve about the CliftonStrengths and I think it could be really helpful to a lot of landscape companies.
04:22 - Lex Mason: Treat Your Landscaping Like Asset Management
Jack Jostes [00:04:22]:
Lex Mason shared a great mindset for thinking of yourself as an asset manager instead of just a landscaper.
Lex Mason [00:04:31]:
We’re seeing landscape companies across the country starting to adopt this kind of phraseology. But I was asking him, man, why do you call yourself an asset manager? I go, that’s like a banking term. He goes, yeah, it’s exactly a banking term. When you get into being a high net worth individual, there’s asset managers that manage millions of dollars of real estate in the commercial real estate space.
Lex Mason [00:04:56]:
Asset manager is literally the title of the people responsible for the P&L of the major commercial buildings that we see all over town. And so he goes, when I started speaking the language that, hey, your landscape for an HOA, your landscape is your largest asset that you’re responsible for. If everything burned up, went to heck in a handbasket, how much would it cost to replace all the turf, all the trees?
Lex Mason [00:05:25]:
I mean, good Lord, up in Arizona, a Royal Palm, every one of those Royal Palms that you drive by in Phoenix or Vegas, I mean, they’re 20, 30, $40,000, $50,000 for a tree that’s at full maturity like that. So he started just correlating asset management to really kind of raise the stakes on, do you really want to go with the cheapest guy or gal down the street who’s going to kind of mow, blow, and go and get out of there? Or do you want to protect and improve the value of your asset?
Lex Mason [00:05:58]:
And so just that, like kind of speaking it into existence a little bit, I’ve loved the term. And I think that more maintenance companies out there should refer to themselves as asset managers more than landscape contractors.
06:23 - Joshua Gillow: Ditch the Swag, Focus on Relationships
Jack Jostes [00:06:12]:
The word of the day was paraphernalia from Joshua Gillow, who gave the highest-rated talk about having a hospitality approach to your previously service-based business. I really advocate for gifts, client gifting. And I love the story of the pizza oven because it’s something the client wants.
Jack Jostes [00:06:37]:
And I think you used the word paraphernalia, right? So I think a lot of people, I think there’s room and I have some branded stickers and I’ve branded some notebooks that I’m giving out to people and I have my brand on things. And I think landscape companies should have a hat and a vest and a mug, but it’s not really a gift, right? It’s paraphernalia.
Joshua Gillow [00:07:02]:
And I use that word specifically because I wanted to elicit that.
Jack Jostes [00:07:06]:
I like that. And I think the power of gifting goes well, and it could be something that the client mentioned that they wanted. And yeah, it might be a $500 thing, but if you have a $50,000, $75,000, $100,000 client, why wouldn’t you buy them that gift?
Joshua Gillow [00:07:27]:
If you think about the cost of acquisition of a lead, right? You say you do, I don’t know, 100 projects a year and you spend, keep it simple, like, you know, $100,000 on advertising. You’re like, okay, so that’s $1,000 a client. You can either give it to Jack. I say this out of love. You can give it to Jack, or you can go out for a thousand bucks and buy something for that client.
Joshua Gillow [00:07:46]:
And you know that’s going to become something much more powerful for them. But again, that’s why I use the word paraphernalia because there’s nothing wrong with having branded stuff, mugs, and all of that. But if you’re at the end, you’re like, hey guys, thank you for your money. And here’s a bunch of my shit. They’re going to be like, what do you want me to do with this? Like, seriously.
Joshua Gillow [00:08:00]:
But think about the power that comes from not power over someone, the power through the relationship. If you listened about that pizza oven or that sign, or if they had a pet that just passed away and they want to dedicate a certain area to have a little plaque made for them, it can be the simplest little thing.
Joshua Gillow [00:08:16]:
My, we do this all the time in our practice. We love this, uh, Becky, she runs everything at Master Plan and she loves looking for this stuff. Joseph and her are always looking for ways to gift. And one time, there was a lady recently, actually, that we thought about what kind of gifts. We don’t really like, we know our cost per acquisition is probably about 1500 to $2,000.
Joshua Gillow [00:08:37]:
So that’s the case. What can we do? It probably costs us less than that, but it’s more personalized. And here through our sales process, we learn that the customer loves, they actually bought or not bought, but got their dog from a no-kill shelter and they supported animals and like that. So they get homes and all this stuff. So we said, what if we would donate $250 to the animal shelter of her want, right?
Joshua Gillow [00:08:59]:
So we actually did it and left the $250 check with a blank line on it and said, you just put this to any animal shelter you want. And then also Becky was listening and she says, the customer said, I love sitting in my backyard. I would dream of this during our process. We uncovered this. I dream of sitting in my backyard with a, with a nice warm blanket over us. The dog sitting next to me, it’s a single woman. So the dog sitting next to me with this blanket over top, Becky’s like, I know the perfect blanket for her.
Joshua Gillow [00:09:23]:
So she got her the blanket, this opportunity to gift this to the humane society or some shelter. And in that, that was when we went for our final walkthrough, we actually gifted that to her at the end, and she was in tears because it wasn’t about our mugs and our t-shirts and our hats and all of our bling and all of our paraphernalia. This was about listening to the client deeply.
Joshua Gillow [00:09:45]:
But if we’re just focused on constantly cranking revenue, we don’t, we miss all these cues. They’re giving them to us. They’re handing them to us on a silver platter.
Joshua Gillow [00:09:53]:
But we’re only focused on generating revenue. If we slow the sales process down and start taking notes and listening by asking great questions, most incredible things happen. You actually become connected in a human relationship and then you can actually get into that. That’s what sets you apart is the list.
Jack Jostes [00:10:09]:
I agree. I love it. Are you giving your customers plastic junk with your logo on it and thinking it’s a gift?
Jack Jostes [00:10:17]:
Well, you’ve got to buy the replay of the summit to hear Joshua’s full presentation about thinking of yourself as a hospitality business. I see this relevant to my business. I had a ton of takeaways and it’ll absolutely help you thrive as a landscape company.
10:34 - Turning Core Values Into Culture with Tyler Lombardo
Jack Jostes [00:10:34]:
Kelly Slater from Pleasant Landscapes, Tyler Lombardo from MVP Snow n’ Lawn, and Scott Lawn from Greenway Landscape Design & Build competed as finalists in the Landscape Leader of the Year presentation. Here are a few nuggets from their talks.
Tyler Lombardo [00:10:52]:
Results after day one, our core values were born. We got respect, safety, pride, honesty, and teamwork. My first thing was like, okay, more words, more, we’re just going to throw them on our meeting notes. And phase two of the process was creating an actual being for them. So here come our heroes. So these are our culture heroes that we created off of those words.
Tyler Lombardo [00:11:12]:
So this is Senorita Pride. She makes sure everybody looks good. Mentomano is get to work. Again, that looks good is something that our team was saying after they were done with the job. They go, that looks good. So when they’re done with jobs to the day, and that was by an employee who is no longer with us, but it’s still said today.
Tyler Lombardo [00:11:37]:
So that’s pretty cool that the guys still do that. Mr. Safety, he’s our boy. We love this guy. He knows unsafe horseplay up in here. You see something, you say something. And I think the most part that resonates with me is I protect this team with my shield so they can come home safely after every shift.
Tyler Lombardo [00:11:55]:
Like we let our guys know how important they are and how it would pain us if something ever happened to them. If they didn’t come back in one piece. In this industry, there’s a lot of moving parts. Safety is very, very important to us. So having that shield is something that we put almost on every employee memo by the time clock. So this shield kind of represents us protecting each other. Next guy, Honest Abe. So honesty was a big one. So we tried to figure, hey, everyone knows Honest Abe.
Tyler Lombardo [00:12:25]:
The truth will set us free. Some of the guys in that seminar talked about, you know, when they did something bad, how did it made you feel? And it made them feel like terrible. We’re like, we don’t want you to feel terrible. We understand stuff’s going to happen. Just let it go. We’ll deal with it. Like, and then yeah, no BS, just straight to the truth.
Tyler Lombardo [00:12:44]:
Like, we don’t need this long saga of this, this, and this. Like, yeah, it happened. I screwed up and this is what it is. All right. So this is the team favorite, actually. Mucho Respecto. He’s Atiempo, which means on time.
Tyler Lombardo [00:12:59]:
Habibi, which is my business partner, Eddie. Miss you, bro. He’s Arabic and Habibi is a form of ultimate respect. We have transformed the way that the slang these guys are using to call each other, which I don’t think I could call them that without getting, you know, punched.
Tyler Lombardo [00:13:17]:
And how they, we just turned all of those slangs into Habibi. So, hey, what’s up, Habibi? Nothing much, Habibi. It’s evolved into Habizzle. So, you know, I got my Habizzle back home, Mikey.
Tyler Lombardo [00:13:28]:
What’s up, bro? But yeah, so these are all ways that we just took some ways that they were communicating, not negatively, just how they talk. But now we’re included by calling it, you know, them Habibi.
13:41 - Why Radio Ads Work for Landscapers: Kelly Slater Explains
Kelly Slater [00:13:41]:
Radio advertising is, terrestrial radio advertising specifically, is essential for any landscape company. We have been doing it for years now. It’s fantastic.
Kelly Slater [00:13:54]:
So I’m gonna take you back to summer of 2020. So the borders had closed and the majority of our workforce, a little over 50% of our workforce at the time, we were without them with the borders closed. We participate in the HDB program.
Kelly Slater [00:14:10]:
So with lacking so much of our, missing so much of our production team, our sales were starting to struggle. Without the manpower to do the work and install the work, we were starting to see a big decline in our sales. So trying to think outside of the box, we had done social media advertising. We had done all the traditional help wanted ads. So we thought we’re gonna take a stab at radio advertising.
Kelly Slater [00:14:35]:
So we hooked up with a local radio company. We did some help wanted ads. We ran them for about 90 days. They were 30-second spots and minute spots. Fairly inexpensive overall. In the ads, we had a dedicated phone number for people to text if they were interested. It was very successful overall. We were able to hit the right demographic with where to find these people.
Kelly Slater [00:15:05]:
Again, it was summer of 2020. A lot of people were out of work from their regular job. So they were looking for something just temporary till the world got back to normal. And nobody knew how long that was gonna be. So for us, the texting was probably the game changer in what made it so successful.
Kelly Slater [00:15:24]:
Because people would hear the ad. They would text the number, hey, I’m interested. And then that would start the dialogue. So we didn’t overcomplicate it. We made it as easy as possible because we were desperate at the time. We wanted to make it easy for people. So that helped fill the void for us. So our temporary need and people needing temporary work, those radio spots made the difference for us.
15:48 - The Power of Your Website: Scott Lawn’s Advice
Scott Lawn [00:15:48]:
The power of your website. Ramblin Jackson taught us that your website is your number one sales tool. And that your website needs to tell your story to your prospective clients. More than just who you are and more than just what you do, but most importantly, why they should do business with you.
Scott Lawn [00:16:06]:
How are you different? We accomplish this through sharing our professional commitment throughout our website. To quality installations, to certified staff, consistent communication practices, and award-winning customer service. Every homeowner wants to know what’s next. When is their next meeting? What to expect? And how you’ll work with them.
Scott Lawn [00:16:26]:
So of course, we share our proven process throughout the website as well. On the homepage, service pages, on its own page, and certainly every time someone is kind enough to fill out a contact form. We go above and beyond to ensure that every person knows exactly what to expect while working with Greenway. Every client we work with raves about how well our process has simplified the experience and turned something that’s often quite stressful into something surprisingly wonderful.
Scott Lawn [00:16:56]:
Tell me, who wants that client? You know who I’m talking about. The six-figure dreams and a four-figure budget. No clarity. No agreement between decision-makers. Maybe just quote seekers. All of us want that Hell Yes client. The best way to optimize your leads for this outcome is to over-communicate what you do.
Scott Lawn [00:17:18]:
Be transparent with your service offerings and clearly provide associated costs related to the installation. Basically, let them know what the project’s going to cost. We provide our website visitors with crystal clear budget ranges for all of our design and build installations. This way, our first conversation is productive, honest, clear, and a real partnership in the making. Which leads us to the discovery call.
Scott Lawn [00:17:44]:
If you’re not pre-qualifying your leads, in my opinion, you’re missing the boat. A simple, qualifying call, maybe 10, 15-minute conversation allows you to truly build relationships through listening, building rapport with personalized question and answers, build trust by expressing professional concerns. Always, always, always determining their investment.
Scott Lawn [00:18:07]:
What’s their budget? The goal is to pre-qualify the prospect and build value so you can determine if they’re a good fit for you and if you’re a good fit for them. Find any red flags that might be there. And of course, attract your Hell Yes client.
18:23 - Landscape Leader of the Year: And the Winner Is...
Jack Jostes [00:18:23]:
Congratulations to Scott Lawn for winning the Landscape Leader of the Year award. You all did a phenomenal job. So first of all, thank you guys for presenting.
Jack Jostes [00:18:34]:
I’m excited to see who’s going to win!
Jack Jostes [00:18:37]:
I’ve got it! All right. Well, very good. Congratulations, Tyler. Wait, wait, wait. Tyler in third place. Tyler gave an amazing presentation on culture. In second place was Kelly Slater with radio ads. And Scott Lawn, congratulations for winning the Landscape Leader of the Year award!
Jack Jostes [00:19:05]:
So guys, excuse me. I have a special thing for you.
Jack Jostes [00:19:12]:
Ladies and gentlemen, big round of applause for Scott, who has won the Landscape Leader of the Year Championship Belt. And we need to wear this through the airport.
Scott Lawn [00:19:22]:
All right. Thanks, Jack. Oh my god its heavy! We get a picture?
Jack Jostes [00:19:29]:
Yeah. Congratulations!
19:31 - Balancing Fitness and Business Ownership with Scott Lawn
Jack Jostes [00:19:31]:
One of the other things that I learned through this process that's inspiring about you is just your personal lifestyle and the way you treat health and exercise. So you're not only the tallest, but I think you're the wisest, right? Can we agree he's the wisest of the speakers here?
Scott Lawn [00:19:46]:
Clearly the oldest, Jack.
Jack Jostes [00:19:49]:
Yes, but this is the key thing. Tell us about how often do you work out?
Scott Lawn [00:19:55]:
Oh, yeah. Every day. I try to work out twice a day. So I work out in the morning before I go to work. Cardio, bike, treadmill, legs. And then every evening, my girlfriend and my son Alex and I hit the gym for at least an hour every day.
Jack Jostes [00:20:15]:
That's incredible. And when in this busy schedule of running your landscape do you read? Because two things I hear from people, oh, I don't have time to read. I don't have time to exercise. And you're crushing it. You're running this multi-million dollar company, and you're both reading and working out twice a day. So tell me a little bit, how do you get it all done?
Scott Lawn [00:20:35]:
Well, yeah. Nighttime or morning is a great time to read. I have to admit, I lean on audiobooks a lot. So all of the lists that I showed today are all available on audiobook, including yours. I've listened to most all of them multiple times.
Scott Lawn [00:20:51]:
But this gives you an opportunity then to go back. But I had learned from one of my coaches early on that audiobooks in combination with reading the book really implants the ideas, and it’s easier to implement.
Jack Jostes [00:21:03]:
I enjoyed meeting Scott and his son and business partner Alex. We got to enjoy some great meals together and sort through some of the challenges they're facing in their business, an opportunity for Ramblin Jackson to raise the stakes in our work together, and dream up some marketing ideas to help them reach their aggressive sales goals.
21:24 - Jack Jostes’ Keynote: Google Algorithm Leak & Summit Reflections
Jack Jostes [00:21:24]:
In case you're new to this show, my name is Jack Jostes. I'm the host of The Landscaper’s Guide Podcast and the CEO of Ramblin Jackson, the snow and landscape marketing agency. In my keynote presentation, where to focus your marketing now to win 2025, I shared the findings of the 2024 Google algorithm leak, some trends on usage of AI versus Google search, and that it’s fall.
Jack Jostes [00:21:52]:
It’s an election year. Inflation is rampant. But we’ve been through market cycles like this before, and it’s essential to stay in the game and focus on marketing that’s going to produce results.
Jack Jostes [00:22:05]:
Another highlight of The Summit was getting my landscaping completed here at the studio. So thanks to Lyons Lawn and Landscape for helping build a new patio and privacy screening fence at the studio. And shout out to Foothills Painting for refreshing the paint. It created a great atmosphere where we had our three finalists, Joshua Gillow and two Ramblers.
Jack Jostes [00:22:27]:
Spending time with everyone in person, doing a business mastermind, shooting professional videos and headshots, using our new teleprompter, and working together to show people how I use chat GPT to create processes. And overall, just to hang out with people in person was one of my highlights. And I plan to host more small group masterminds at the studio here in Colorado.
Jack Jostes [00:22:52]:
And we also have one coming up in Breckenridge in February that’s exclusive to Ramblin Jackson clients. So reach out to us for information about that. So we surveyed the audience and found that 45% were interested in an in-person Summit, but a lot of people love the remote one. So we’re toying with the idea. Will there be an in-person Landscaper’s Summit coming to a city near you? Stay tuned and reach out to me.
Jack Jostes [00:23:19]:
Let me know if you think that would be a good idea. I presented a lot of new material in my keynote. I felt like it went just okay, even though it was rated a 4.7 out of 5 stars. I know with more rehearsal, I could have done a better job. The weeks leading up to The Summit, I was a bit distracted on hosting seven people here, finalizing the landscaping, painting, and then also writing and researching a brand-new keynote. And my delivery could have been better polished.
Jack Jostes [00:23:48]:
But I also shared a lot of new information I know people need to hear. The cool thing is that The Summit overall had a 4.7 out of 5-star rating from the audience. Five years ago, I presented the entire Landscaper’s Summit by myself. This year, we had some of the best speakers in the industry collaborate on what I believe is some of the highest quality sales, marketing, leadership, customer service content that will give the audience a competitive advantage.
Jack Jostes [00:24:21]:
If you missed out, remember, like my favorite marketing author Dan Kennedy said, your car is like a classroom. So you can buy the replay and listen to this while you drive to job sites or watch it from your office sometime. Instant access is available at landscaperssummit.com. Thanks again to our sponsors: SmartLink by Weathermatic, Yes Express Sales Academy, Green Profit Academy, Ramblin Jackson, and Profit 911, our direct mail partner.
Jack Jostes [00:24:54]:
I love these events and I can't wait to see you at some of our upcoming ones, including NALP's Elevate in November, the TNLA webinar on November 14th, the TNLA Hort Forum in Dallas in January, and Green and Growin’ in Raleigh, North Carolina on January 13th. Make sure you get invitations to our events by signing up at landscapersguide.com/podcast, where you’ll get access to our top three podcasts right away, plus invitations to our upcoming events.
Jack Jostes [00:25:27]:
My name’s Jack Jostes, and thanks for listening to today’s episode of The Landscaper's Guide, and I look forward to talking with you next week.
Show Notes:
Watch the full episode + see the transcript: landscapersguide.com/podcast
Tell us where to send your beef jerky: landscapersguide.com/toolbox
???? Get access to the full Landscapers Summit replay: landscapersummit.com
Meet Our Guest Speakers:
???? Steve Bousquet: www.linkedin.com/in/steven-bousquet-93278b10
???? Lex Mason: www.linkedin.com/in/lexmason
???? Joshua Gillow: www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-gillow-04ba89a7
???? Landscape Leader of the Year Finalists:
???? Tyler Lombardo - MVP Snow n’ Lawn: www.mvpsnl.com
???? Kelly Slater - Pleasant Landscapes: www.pleasantlandscapes.com
???? Scott Lawn - Greenway Landscape Design & Build: www.grnway.com
???? Big Thank You to Our Sponsors:
???? SmartLink by Weathermatic: www.smartlinknetwork.com
???? Yes Express Sales Academy: www.yes.express
???? Green Profit Academy: www.greenprofitacademy.com
???? Profit 911 (Direct Mail): www.profit911.biz