If your goal is to increase your maintenance accounts, does it ever make sense to let some of your clients go? Find out what happened when Kelly Slater, the vice president of Pleasant Landscapes, let over 100 clients go and how it actually helped her, in the long run, increase her client retention to over 85% and reach her number of clients goal.
Plus, Kelly shares her zero-tolerance policy for rude clients and how that increases her employee retention. She shares what's working for marketing, and what happened, and why she was banned from Google, like blacklisted, for 18 months when she hired a shady SEO agency. And then what happened when it got fixed?
00:48: Welcome to the Landscaper’s Guide Podcast
Hey, everyone. Jack Jostes is here, and welcome to the Landscaper's Guide podcast, where we share sales, marketing, and leadership lessons to help you grow your snow and landscape company. Today, I'm excited to invite one of my clients on the show who's been a guest on the podcast. This is now her third time. She's also going to be speaking at the upcoming Landscaper's Summit on Thursday, October 26th, in a competition for what's working, where she'll be presenting against two of my other clients who are also going to share what's working. So check that out in the full speaker lineup. We have an amazing show this year at landscapersummit.com. See our show notes for the Landscaper's Summit. Save your seat. And now, let's dive into the interview with Kelly Slater.
1:41: Welcome Kelly Slater to the Podcast
Hey everyone. Welcome back to the Landscaper's Guide podcast. Today, I'm excited to bring a repeat guest, Kelly Slater. She's the vice president at Pleasant Landscapes, and I've been working with Kelly for many years, and she's been on the show in the past. You should check out her interviews. I'm going to put them in the show notes. I interviewed her about Do four-day Work Weeks Really Work. And they do, and Kelly shares why. And also, Kelly's company has a nonprofit that helps rehabilitated felons transition back into the workforce. But Kelly, what else should we know about you that I haven't already said?
Kelly Slater:
Well, I absolutely love what I do. The landscaping industry was not my choice. It chose me 14 years ago now, and I couldn't imagine myself any place else. The industry's been extremely welcoming and very good to me, and I absolutely love it.
Jack Jostes:
I feel the same way about the landscape industry. And I just got back from ELEVATE, and I was at another trade show in Florida the week before. And I have some new people on my team, and they all agreed that it's one of the greatest industries we've worked in. The people in this industry are incredible.
One of the things that I like about the green industry is people share. People generally seem to share ideas about what's working. And so today, I wanted to talk with you about what's working. How did you break your second Ring The Bell goal with us? So why don't you tell me what the Ring The Bell goal is? What was the first one, and then what was your second one?
3:18: Kelly Shares her Goals Before Working with Ramblin Jackson & How She Reached Them
Kelly Slater:
So when we started working with Ramblin Jackson many years ago, my two Ring The Bell goals, which were also my personal goals, were to breach 3 million in sales, and we're a residential landscaping company as well as sustain 500 maintenance accounts. And a couple of years ago, we hit that 3 million.
That was our first Ring The Bell goal, and that was just by completely overhauling our web presence and changing our marketing strategies, and really honing in on our processes and improving on that as well as our staff, and investing in our staff. But most recently, we just hit our 500 maintenance account goal this summer, actually a little bit past that. Now we're at like 526, and that was our big second Ring The Bell goal that we hit.
Jack Jostes:
Well, congrats. I brought the big ass bell to the interview today. Woo-hoo. So congratulations. We have a big ass bell at Ramblin Jackson. And one of the really cool things when you texted me and it was so cool to get a text from you when you broke 500, I was actually at lunch at Smokin' Dave's BBQ in Lyons, Colorado with the whole staff of Ramblin Jackson. We flew everyone out for our retreat, and I got to read that to everyone. And so that was a really cool experience. And just minutes ago, we were in the Landscape Executive Mastermind, and you shared you're now past that. So where are you at today? Because that was one of the-
Kelly Slater:
[inaudible 00:04:56] we're at 526 today.
Jack Jostes:
- And I mean it was only maybe six weeks ago that you broke 500, so-
Kelly Slater:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
... that's amazing. What would... Well, how many maintenance clients did you have when you started at Pleasant Landscapes? And then what would you say you'd attribute reaching 500 to? It's not just marketing, but what else are you doing that's working?
Kelly Slater:
So when I... The number isn't really as exciting as it sounds. When I started at Pleasant Landscapes 14 years ago now, we were right around 400 accounts, but I'd say 20 to 25% of those accounts were not profitable. They were either a break-even or a loss. So I spent the first couple of years kind of going through and getting rid of the accounts that were not profitable, and we were probably as low as about 300 or just under 300 at one point, and then kind of had to reset and build back up because 500 accounts doesn't mean anything if you're not profitable. When we came to Ramblin Jackson years and years ago, our website was an absolute mess.
06:10: How Kelly’s Web Presence Impacted Her Slow Seasons
The season before I met you, we actually spent 18 months, which for us was two full seasons kicked off of Google. So our web presence was almost non-existent, and that really hurt. So we had to revamp our entire website to attract the right customers, to have a website for people to go to that was searchable on Google without being in violation or in Google jail. Teaching our crews how to properly maintain the yard, making sure that they're clear on what our expectations are, and what our client's expectations are and what we sell to them, and then keeping that up throughout the year. So our maintenance accounts are 12 months accounts. We don't just do seasonal maintenance.
We've tried different types of marketing throughout the years besides just website SEO stuff. We've done social media marketing. We don't spend a lot of money on that. It doesn't seem super effective in our market. We kind of use it during slow seasons. Territorial radio ads have been by far my second... second or third best return on my investment when it comes to my marketing. It's been phenomenal. We've been doing territorial radio ads in our Charleston market here for coming up on four seasons, and it's been fantastic for sales recruiting, just brand awareness as a whole.
07:49: Why Pruning Clients is Necessary for Business Growth
Jack Jostes:
There's a lot to unpack here. I wanted to start with pruning out bad-fit clients. So in order... before you made the effort to get to 500, you took a step back in some ways by getting rid of some clients. What was it about those clients that made them not a fit? Were you just maybe pricing incorrectly? Were they just not being charged enough, or was there something else that made them not a fit for the company?
Kelly Slater:
It was a combination of a couple different things. I'd say of the about a hundred accounts that we dropped, they were either legacy accounts that we had had for 10 and 15 years, and their prices had not been increased, although their landscaping may have increased, and there were a good handful of clients that just didn't fit the mold of what we were trying to create.
It's important to this day that our clients appreciate the hard work, not just in the quality but in the professionalism that every single team member of ours displays. And I have a zero tolerance for a client that's going to be rude to any staff member. I am not afraid to fire our client. I don't care how much their account's worth if they don't fit that mold. Every single staff member of mine respects what they do and respects the client's property when they're there, and we expect the same in return from our clients.
Jack Jostes:
What kind of confidence do you think that gives your team knowing that you have their back?
09:31: Kelly Shares Her Policy for Dealing with Rude Clients & How it Affects Her Retention Rate
Kelly Slater:
Yeah, it's funny you asked that question. I actually got a phone call this morning from my maintenance field supervisor, and he had just spent 15 minutes being berated by a new client, being spoken to absolutely horribly. And she was a new client. We had only had him for about 30 days, and he said, "Can you help me?"
I said, "I'm going to send her an email right now, and I'm going to give her a call, and we're not going to service them anymore." I don't want to take the wind out of their sail when they're out in the field, and they're working tirelessly day in, day out to make money for this company and then to be disrespected. And they know I don't tolerate that. And I think that gives them a tremendous confidence when they're out in the field.
Jack Jostes:
I believe it does. And I've had to get really clear with some clients at Ramblin Jackson or even fire some, and my people know that I would do that for them. But despite that, because some people might be thinking like, "Oh, this lady's out firing clients and stuff." What is the Pleasant Landscapes' retention rate?
Kelly Slater:
We currently have a retention rate of 86%, and the majority of the losses that we have, about 75% of the maintenance losses we have are real estate losses, homes that have been sold because market's a pretty hot market here. We are picking up... Almost every single property that's sold, we're picking up the new owners. But when we count retention, we count with where we started for the year and how many we've lost until now. Retention is not what you've gained. It's where you started and what you've lost. That's where our retention rate numbers come from.
11:18: Kelly Shares The Implications of Using the Wrong Providers for SEO & Google Rankings
Jack Jostes:
I like it. And one of the things I wanted to ask about was being banned from Google. So what does that mean? Tell me. It was a long time ago, but what happened? I'm not going to ask you to say who made it happen, but I was on the cleanup end of it. But what happened?
Kelly Slater:
Well, we trusted the wrong people. So ultimately, from what I understand is there was a bunch of duplicating and replicating of pages that went against Google's rules, and they banned us. We weren't indexed anywhere. You could keyword search are in complete business name and address, and we just weren't there. And that started in the beginning of a spring and lasted for about 18 months. So it was two full springs that we had zero web presence, and it was pretty debilitating at the time.
Jack Jostes:
Wow. How much do you think it cost you in business?
Kelly Slater:
I don't even know if I could put a number on it. I mean, our website at the time wasn't the greatest anyway, and I think that's why the previous company that did our SEO and WebWork did what they did, maybe was to gain some traction. We weren't ranking well. Our website wasn't fantastic.
Our closing ratios were horrible because we were attracting the wrong types of clients, and the wrong types of leads were coming in. So it's tough to say. I mean, on average, I'd say it's probably close to about a million dollars overall in revenue between maintenance and landscape construction that we missed out on for those two seasons.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, that was one of the worst cases I've seen in the landscape industry. So there were multiple Google listings that were fake, so they were at fake addresses. I think they were residential addresses. Anyways, your Google listing, you had multiple of them, and then there were also these really spammy links pointing to your website, and then you had a lot of duplicate content. So I get questions often from potential clients or current clients like, "Hey, can I just open up a Google listing all over the place?" Or, "Hey, why don't I use ChatGPT to just... like produce all of this spammy content?" And the answer is no, you shouldn't do that.
13:52: How Ramblin Jackson Helped Kelly Get Out of Google Jail
And Google doesn't tell us a lot about SEO, but it's explicitly on their website that you can't use either a PO box or somebody's home address and display it like you were doing and that you can't have they call them doorway pages, which are kind of these fake pages that lead into your site. So it was a mess. And so I wanted to share this story because we were able to make some progress with it. We launched a new website with clean content, with a quality host. We went through the process of removing those listings and got you down to the one true one, and we got some of the results.
So there was a period where we were working together where you're like, "Cool, I'm ranking on Google, but I'm not getting the leads. I'm not seeing the result I really want." And I remember having to come to you and be like, "Well, look, let's look at your competitors. And they had way better photos." So some of the photos that you had were just, they weren't the best. And I think the review average was like a 3.6. I remember just having a meeting with you, Kelly, and be like, "Kelly, why would you hire Pleasant Landscapes?" And I think when I finally showed you, there was a point where you're like, "Okay, I got it."
And there was a turning point where we worked together then on getting Google reviews, and I remember tracking that with you every week. And it started climbing up, and once it bumped over four and then you got the photos, that's when I feel like it really started working. But that took some time to go from blacklisted from Google to ranking to then getting business results. So I wanted to hear your side of that. And our photos and reviews, how do you think they impacted things?
15:47: Kelly Shares How Google Reviews & Professional Photos Led to Better Qualified Leads
Kelly Slater:
Well, I think at first, when we first launched our new website with you guys, I think the excitement of just being back on Google and having a well-established website that really portrayed the type of clients we wanted, it was kind of like, "Ugh, finally we're back, and it's going to be great." And you had told me we need to do these additional things. And I think that I was so blinded by that excitement at first that I just kind of was going to let it ride. But you were right. And as we started asking for reviews, which was huge. I mean, we... our reviews at the time were not indicative of the work that we did.
There were so many clients that were happy with our work, but we weren't asking for reviews. We weren't sending emails, making phone calls, doing that, doing those things that you had recommended. So once we started doing that, the reviews got better, and then the leads started to increase. And they were better quality leads because they were looking at a website that portrayed more of what we were looking for. And then we started with the photos because I am a little embarrassed to say we actually had scanned pictures at one point. They were scanned. They weren't even digital pictures. They were-
Jack Jostes:
Right.
Kelly Slater:
... scans of photographs.
Jack Jostes:
And they looked like it.
Kelly Slater:
Yes, yes.
Jack Jostes:
Right. And, yeah.
Kelly Slater:
Yeah. So once we started getting better quality photos, and that's an ever-evolving thing for us, now is we do it on a regular basis. It doesn't have to be tens of thousands of photos [inaudible 00:17:28]. Even if it's just a half a dozen or a dozen every month, it's helpful to keep the content fresh. But once we started asking for the reviews, we saw that increase. Doing better quality photos to put out there, that's when we really started to see the phone ring more.
And we were already getting better quality leads. Now we're getting more better quality leads. We had to expand our sales department and bring on more people. And it was a night and day difference. So we could have done it a little sooner if I hadn't have just, ugh, our website's back. If I had listened to you from the beginning and put the additional work in, we could have done it a little sooner, but I'm just grateful that it's working.
Jack Jostes:
Well, I'm grateful that it's working too. And I'm glad that you took action on those ideas. And it's a lot of work. It's a lot of different moving parts from the website and the text, and then reviewing all of the text with us and the process. It's a lot of work on your part too, to get that done. And it is kind of frustrating to realize then, "Wow, there's this whole other part of work that I need to do in addition to building the website and SEO, getting photos, and getting reviews."
But I put photos and reviews in the category with invoicing. To me, it's like mission-critical for a landscape company to be getting new photos regularly, to be getting new reviews, and to be invoicing their clients. I really put it in there, and I have a client. I have a tree care client who... the person who does their scheduling and their invoicing is the same person who sends out the Ramblin review request, and she's killing it. And so they're getting that client feedback.
And what they're doing is when they schedule, they say, "Hey, at the end of the project, I'm going to request some feedback. I'm going to send you a link, or you can give me a score. Will you do that?" And they're like, "Oh, yeah, sure, I'll do that." And then when they get it, they're a little bit more likely to do it. One of my favorite stories is the time that you personally called an account that gave you was it a six out of 10.
Kelly Slater:
Yes.
19:42: How a Low Feedback Score Resulted in a $85,000 Project
Jack Jostes:
So tell us about the client that when you sent out a request for feedback, "On a scale of zero to 10, how likely are you to recommend us?" What score did they give you?
Kelly Slater:
It was fairly low. It was low enough to warrant a phone call from me, and I had reached out to them and started listening to their grievances on the phone. And it seemed pretty valid why they were upset, and just through conversation, it wasn't the service that they were necessarily upset about. It was the way that they were able to use their backyard, which they [inaudible 00:20:15]. And it resulted in a $85,000 complete landscape renovation in their backyard. And they're ecstatic.
They love their backyard now, and they actually sent me a really cute 8x10 picture of their grandkids playing in the backyard once we got everything done. So just that phone call, "Why the low score? Why are you upset?" Listening to them? They're upset because they couldn't use their backyard, they didn't like their backyard, and our job is to find a solution. And we did.
Jack Jostes:
Well, I love that because a lot of people, I think, are only on the hunt for the five-star Google reviews, but to me, the gold is really in the four-star reviews, the five-star reviews, the six-star reviews, and the opportunity to call a client and listen to them and hear why are they unhappy. What's going on? And then, not every time will it result in a big upsell, but in this case, it certainly did.
And I've even seen, and I mentioned this in my book, and I've seen it. I've been managing reviews for a long time that when the owner or a principal of the company calls, a lot of times, people will edit their review and say, "Hey, I originally posted a two-star review, but I'm changing it to a four because they called me and took care of me, and they're really good at what they do" kind of thing. So that's amazing that you got that $85,000 upsell and a framed photo. So that's a happy client. What else would you say from sales and marketing standpoint? What do you coach your team to do from a sales standpoint, both from new accounts and then also to keep this 85% plus retention?
20:22: Kelly’s Sales Secret to Closing Two Projects in One Consultation
Kelly Slater:
So our sales team that is dedicated to selling day in and day out is told because we're a full-service maintenance company as well as design, build, install, and on the design-build install side, there's no reason we should ever do a landscaping project without also selling a maintenance program with it. So we offer a warranty. We extend the warranty if they sign up for our maintenance because we're more likely to keep everything alive if we're [inaudible 00:22:32]. So just that little bit of sales training has been priceless in that they're getting two sales in one.
And our average... Again, with our real estate market, it's a little different, but our average maintenance client is between seven and eight years. So the landscaping job that you just sold is fantastic, but I'm also getting that recurring revenue for an average of 70... seven to eight years. So that's been great. Educating clients, our middle management, and our management staff, when they're out in the field and a client's home and they talk to them, upsell them, talk to them about the palm tree pruning, let them know the other services we offer besides just the maintenance itself.
A lot of maintenance clients think, "Oh, you're just the landscaper that cuts the grass." So it's our job to over-communicate the additional services that we sell, and training my labor staff as well as my middle management and upper management to constantly be a salesperson has been great too. And people say, "How many salespeople do you have?" Every single employee, every single person that works for me is a salesperson.
Jack Jostes:
I love it. Kelly, do you have any questions for me?
Kelly Slater:
Not that I can think of. No. Where do I get a big ass bell?
Jack Jostes:
We'll have to ship you one because you've broken two Ring The Bell goals. This one is 11 pounds. It's very, very loud if you ring this around other people. I mean, you got some sustained ring here, so we'll get you-
Kelly Slater:
Yeah.
24:13: How Hiring Outside The Industry Can Bring Fresh Perspective to the Business
Jack Jostes:
... a big ass bell. And one of the things I like about you is that you're not a landscaper, actually, right. So you were hired into this role, right.
Kelly Slater:
Yes
Jack Jostes:
I like... To me, that's a great thing because look at what you've achieved. And I want to highlight that because so often I feel like people who are listening to this show or clients are like, "Oh, I need somebody with 14 years of experience." And it's like, "Do you? What might happen if you hired a Kelly or if you hired Reinhardt." One of my clients hired Logan, who is a data analyst, had no green industry experience and has revolutionized their company.
So, sometimes, hiring people outside of the industry can bring a really fresh perspective. But one of the strengths I think you have is you know your numbers. And so I'm curious, so you knew your lifetime value is seven to eight years. Your closing percentages, you know your retention rate. What am I going to interview you about 18 months from now? What are some of your goals for the future that we should talk about?
25:27: What’s the Next Ring the Bell Goal for Kelly?
Kelly Slater:
Well, I need to come up with some new Ring The Bell goals now that I've achieved the two that we talked about years ago, and I have it... I thought a little bit about it. I like the goals to be attainable but not easily attainable, something that I really need to work at. I don't know, about 18 months from now, that's going to be tough. So 5 million and 750 accounts is probably going to be my next jump, but 18 months from now, we might be talking about that 5 million at the rate we're going right now.
Jack Jostes:
Kelly, thanks so much for coming on the show. We'd love to have you back. And yeah, let's get to 5 million and 750 accounts. And again, everyone check out Kelly's other interviews. They're really good. See the show notes. Kelly, for people who might want to network with you, where can we connect?
Kelly Slater:
You can always reach me through our website at pleasantlandscapes.com. Just hit us up through the Contact Us tab that we have, and those will get filtered to me. You could also reach me at my email address, which is kelly@pls6.com. Be happy to talk to anybody out there.
Jack Jostes:
Cool. Well, thank you, Kelly. I'll put that info in the show notes, and thanks again for coming on the show. Kelly is one of the people that I'd love to introduce to all my clients because she's doing it. She's leading her company. She's making big decisions. She's supporting her staff and firing clients who are rude to them. She's setting big goals that are realistic and attainable, but they're stretch goals. So she's doing so much on the leadership front, and she's participating in marketing. She's making sure that customers are getting reviews. She's calling people when they're giving negative feedback.
She's investing in photography, and I'm not surprised that she's getting amazing results. So I'm excited to have Kelly back on the show, and I'd love for you to come and see Kelly and some of our other clients at the Landscaper's Summit. It's a full-day virtual workshop focused on sales, marketing, and leadership. We've got presentations from aspire Software on know your numbers. We've got a great presentation on management and leadership from McFarlin Stanford. We've got a presentation from Team Engine on recruiting and retention, and I've got three of my clients who are presenting what's working, like what's really working.
Three real landscapers are going to present and compete against each other. You guys get to vote, and whoever wins, I'm going to donate to their favorite nonprofit. So we had an incredible event last year. I can't wait to see you there. So save your seat at landscapersummit.com. Hurry and get your tickets because early bird tickets are going to end soon. So, if you want to save, get your ticket now, landscapersummit.com. See our show notes for a link. My name's Jack Jostes. I look forward to talking with you next week on The Landscaper's Guide podcast.
SHOW NOTES
Watch the full episode + see the transcript at: https://landscapersguide.com/podcast/
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Check out Pleasant Landscapes & connect with Kelly Slater: https://www.pleasantlandscapes.com/