croberson
(Chip Roberson, WA HI# 371 & SPI# 68542)
#1
This is my first post with this forum so I would like to say a quick hello!
An agent spoke with me about my personal presentation during the inspection process with my clients. She thought my personality was a little dry and could use more humor to easy the tension. She thought that by including an attractive fun personality it could attract more business. I agreed with her and thought it would be a good idea and a fun thing to do, to present this question:
What techniques, approaches and bag of tricks do you use to easy your client’s fear and tension to make the inspection process creative and fun?
There must be some great jokes out there that are timeless. Most times you meet your clients one time, so you could use these same jokes, tricks and techniques over and over.
I suggest making up a few lines that lighten the situation… You may have one of mine for starters. (on something not really important) “If your friends notice that you have got the wrong friends…”
My advice, if you’re not normally a funny person with humour, don’t try to be. It just doesn’t come off well IMO. Be you! Don’t be so serious all the time, but open to new ways to present yourself and your services.
You may have been very nervous about your presentation, which for most people the funny stuff doesn’t come out. You’ll ease up in time and become more of the person you really are. How you interact with people of all personalities will get you business, not how funny you can be.
So relax, prepare and be you!
Good luck. Now I’m off to continue to market to Realtors for the rest of the day.
Stolen from RR.
“I am a generalist, which means I know a little bit about a lot of things and a lot about nothing.”
More important than having a bunch of one-liners at the ready is really just to be yourself. People are paying you to inspect their home, not do comedy. While there may be times that you may say things to “ease the tension”, all of the time you will be a professional inspector.
Don’t try to change your personality based on one agent’s view.
I am 6’ 8", wear a size 15 shoe and have a deep voice. I found that this tends to intmidate some people. So, I chose my logo shirts in orange. When I book the inspection, I tell the client to "look for the tall, dorky guy, with glasses and in an orange shirt. Breaks the ice, they can easily identify me and I am no longer seen as the imposing figure, but more as a big bear grandfather type who is just there to help them. I also have about 30 jokes about the orange color.
“It’s so you can find me easy, if I die in the crawlspace”.
They ask about issues of style, color or cosmetic issues. I say, “Yea, I’m the expert on style” (pointing to my shirt).
Especially on St. Patrick’s day. “Hey, I’m William of Orange”.
“I charge a little more. This is both a home inspection AND a stand up comedy routine”.
But one thing with this. Be careful to always be PROFESSIONAL, even when you are being funny. Clearly deliniate the jokes from the serious stuff. Develope a “serious face” for when you are being serious.
I tell my clients that I have a club for them. Free to join. It’s especially for the male clients. It’s called the “cheap lazy bastards club for home maintenance”.
This means that I will give them tips to properly maintain their new home (always refer to it as a “home” if it is OK. Emotional bonding thing). These tips are not really about being “cheap” but about doing maintenance or repairs properly, and paying for it, because in the long run a cheap repair is more costly than a properly priced (and long lasting) repair.
“It is very easy to get less than you paid for, but you will NEVER get MORE than you paid for.”
Have the coils of the A/C compressor blown out and wrap it in window screen fabric. In this way, it is easy for them to clean, it ruls more efficiently and lasts longer.
Seal floor tile grout with silicone grout sealer. It’s not so much for water but to keep all the dirt out of the grout. Cleaning tile grout is not fun.
Pour gel type (Drano gel max) drain cleaner down the drains, about every 3 months. This is a preventative measure.
Use the cheap, blue fiberglass disposable furnace filters and not the expensive “Filtrete” or “HEPA” filters. The expensive ones (like the cartridge filters) are expensive, you still have to replace them every 30 days and they are not recommended by the ASHVAC group. Too big a pressure drop before the blower.
Have standard, canned jokes, and stories, for diffent situations that commonly occur. People just role their eyes when you throw facts and figures at them, but they will listen to (and learn) from a story. It’s like a good bar joke. People listen, learn and remember.
