He Films His Work and Spends $0 on Ads

Jacob (00:00):
Growing portion of my business is my YouTube content. I get a lot of people who find me on YouTube and discover that I’m close by and call me to come and do their project. It’s a great sales tool for me to send them a YouTube video that I made that has 400,000 views and all the comments under it giving me praise. 

Adam (00:22):
Spending thousands and thousands of dollars on Google Ads and Meta Ads and wherever else you figure out how to spend money digitally is not the only way to get leads. Today my guest is an electrician and he doesn’t spend any money on any of that stuff ever. He gets all his leads from social media content and other free ways. So Jacob, thanks for being here. 

Jacob (00:45):
Thanks for having me. 

Adam (00:46):
You’re going to give us the secret sauce today, okay? So we’re going to get deep into the trenches here on how you do what you do because you’re very successful at it. So you don’t do any paid ads. 

Jacob (00:54):
None. 

Adam (00:55):
And you are busy, right? You’re busy. Okay, good. So tell us about that. Was that a conscious decision or did that just gradually happen and one day someone was like, You don’t have any paid ads? And you’re like, What’s paid ads? So how’d that happen? 

Jacob (01:08):
I did also in the beginning try to use Google Ads and Meta Ads when I was first starting. As of now, I haven’t paid for any paid advertising for almost two years. It wasn’t doing what I wanted it to do for the pay-per-clicks and stuff. I found that at the end of the month I would see my bill that I would get from Google and I was like, Listen, I don’t know if I got this much. This wasn’t worth the lead. So another thing about that that really drove me away from both of those platforms is the ease of use. My experience as I was trying to set those up and run them was a one of confusion. 

Adam (01:47):
It’s just too hard. Yeah. 

Jacob (01:48):
And it’s not like it can’t be learned, but it seemed needlessly complicated for what my goals were. I’m talking to the homeowners in my very tight geographic region that I serve. It wasn’t doing what it needed to. So at some point I decided I’m not doing this again. 

Adam (02:08):
So then how did you start getting business? Because eventually your warm market, your friends at church and your parents’ families, those dry up eventually and you have to get real new customers that don’t know you at all. How’d you start doing that? 

Jacob (02:20):
I mean, referrals kept me going for a good little bit. And part of the reason people were happy to refer me so much and still are is because I always make sure to tell them my story. I’m a local kid. I’m a young entrepreneur and I always make sure to deliver them a higher quality experience. And then also in that, I include when people post about me in the community groups and stuff. I call that personal referral. I get a lot of business through community Facebook groups. I found that it creates a compounding effect whenever you have so many of your customers in this one little tight area. Whenever somebody makes that Facebook group, they’ll usually get two or three people replying saying to call Palmer Electrical. The others are natural Google web search. 

Adam (03:07):
Just organic search. 

Jacob (03:08):
Organic search. 

Adam (03:09):
Yeah, website. 

Jacob (03:09):
I have been getting a lot more people telling me that AI was they asked ChatGPT who they should call and ChatGPT told them to call me. I’ve had that several times recently. 

Adam (03:19):
That’s solid. 

Jacob (03:20):
And then the last one, which is a big growing portion of my leads and also a growing portion of my business is my YouTube content. I get a lot of people who find me on YouTube and discover that I’m close by and call me to come and do their project. 

Adam (03:37):
Are you serious? 

Jacob (03:38):
A lot. 

Adam (03:39):
Because they’re trying to do the project themselves? Is that why they’re on YouTube watching electrical videos? 

Jacob (03:43):
Yeah. 

Adam (03:44):
Tell me more about that. 

Jacob (03:45):
They find my video and I go into great detail. You could follow it along, you should not, but you could. 

Adam (03:54):
I watched one of your videos. It was very step by step. 

Jacob (03:56):
Yeah. 

Adam (03:56):
But what’s really said underneath the undertone of it isn’t – This is way too complicated. 

Jacob (04:02):
Yeah. 

Adam (04:02):
That’s what you’re doing. 

Jacob (04:03):
That’s what I was leading for. 

Adam (04:03):
You’re showing them how hard it is and they should never do themselves. 

Jacob (04:05):
Exactly. 

Adam (04:06):
And that’s a good strategy. 

Jacob (04:07):
Yeah. 

Adam (04:07):
Something you said earlier was people like to watch you work. Is that the main gist of these videos is just watch me work? 

Jacob (04:16):
My most successful videos, yes. Is just watch me work. And it really is just that. I mean, I set up the camera and I do a job. 

Adam (04:23):
From start to finish. 

Jacob (04:24):
It makes it easier because I’m less of a stranger. It builds that relationship before we’ve ever made contact. 

Adam (04:32):
You’re showing the customer a journey before they even call you. They see what’s going to happen at their house. 

Jacob (04:38):
Exactly. Turn around, show your face, show who you are so people know who they’re calling. They’ve seen them. You’re less of a stranger that way. Also, I would say try to capture you executing the work if you can. It’s not always feasible, but if you can set up a camera and just record you working, that’s also valuable. I mean, the biggest piece of feedback that I get is cleanliness. 

Adam (05:04):
Really? 

Jacob (05:04):
Both in person and also on YouTube is like people love to make the joke that electricians don’t sweep. And if you’re doing work in somebody’s home, leave it clean. If you’re not cleaning, if you’re doing work in somebody’s home, that’s disrespectful. 

Adam (05:22):
But you are very certain on every video to show you vacuuming because you know that’s the most important thing that matters to your audience because they’ve told you that so many times. 

Jacob (05:32):
Yes. Yeah. I’m trying to show that. I like to show using the level. I try to be very consistent and people see that consistency. 

Adam (05:42):
Jacob, this is great. I love what we’re talking about here, but I want to pause for a minute because I think a lot of our listeners may or may not be using Jobber. I think they should be. What’s your favorite feature about Jobber? 

Jacob (05:51):
One of my favorites and one of the most beneficial to me has been the automated review requests. I’m always sure to ask in person before I leave the job, which is important. But as a reminder, when it comes through a couple hours later, it delivers them the link. They can just click it. It makes it very easy, low friction for my customer to deliver me their review. 

Adam (06:11):
If you count on people to leave a review without any prompting, you’ll be about 5%. If you follow up, it’ll be at 20%. If you’re not following up on your jobs and your paid invoices to get reviews, then you need Jobber. Jobber makes it so simple and so easy to set up and you’ll get more reviews than you ever imagined because of the automated follow up of Jobber. So go to jobber.com/podcaststeal, get the exclusive discount and start getting more reviews with Jobber today. 

(06:37)
What about the content that goes under the video? What do you even call that? The video description? 

Jacob (06:42):
The description and stuff? 

Adam (06:42):
Yeah. What goes in there? Any tips on that or does it even matter? 

Jacob (06:46):
Well, if your goal is leads, make sure to include your geographic location. That’s very important. Include what type of work you want because people will call you for off the wall stuff. Make sure you make it clear what business you’re going after. 

Adam (07:01):
Okay. Do you use more than one phone or just one phone? 

Jacob (07:05):
I use standalone cameras for recording. 

Adam (07:07):
Oh, you do? 

Jacob (07:08):
Yeah. 

Adam (07:09):
Okay. A lot of times we’re like, You don’t need a fancy camera, just get a phone. But you use a camera. 

Jacob (07:13):
Okay. So let me be clear. The camera that’s attached to your modern phone is plenty good enough for YouTube content. Do not go out and buy a camera if that money is going to stretch you thin. So yeah, you can absolutely just use your camera. Set it up on a tripod, yes. And back it away, show the work area, show you doing it. Show the work that you want. So don’t go record the job that you don’t want. That’s giving you a hassle, whatever it is. Film what you do want more of and show how good you are at it. 

Adam (07:50):
Do you ever repackage your content? Do you use it for different applications? Do you ever tell people to go watch a specific video? I’m curious if you reuse it somehow. 

Jacob (07:58):
Oh, definitely. They’re great sales tools. So if I’m at a customer’s house who wants new recessed lights put in and they’re talking about, I want six lights in here, I want a dimmer switch, all this. And I’ll give them a quote and they’ll say, oh, maybe they’re on the fence or something. It’s a great sales tool for me to send them a YouTube video that I made that has 400,000 views and all the comments under it giving me praise and with laying out all the plastic. So the drywall dust doesn’t go crazy. And all these things, it shows them what they’re paying for. I have multiple EV charger installation videos on YouTube. That by far is the biggest lead that I get from YouTube is EV charging. And they can see. Most of the time when they contact me from those videos, they’re already sold. They already want me. 

Adam (08:54):
All right, Jacob, rapid fire round. I’m just going to ask you some questions. Give me your best shot, okay? Out of these watch me work videos we talked about, what is the one angle or one shot that you’d never leave the work job site without capturing? 

Jacob (09:07):
I always like to get a shot of me with my little mascot next to the rap. Nice. That’s one of my favorites. 

Adam (09:13):
What is the one question that you ask the homeowner and the client at the end of the job to make sure they’re happy? 

Jacob (09:18):
I always ask for my Google reviews. It’s important to ask sincerely and make a moment of it. Look in their eyes and tell them that you want them to give you a Google review. 

Adam (09:26):
What time do you wake up in the morning and what do you do first? 

Jacob (09:29):
Okay, what’s up? Well, I get up at seven. I always schedule a job first. I don’t like to do admin stuff first. I like to go out and get something done in the real world first and then I come back to the office. 

Adam (09:38):
You mentioned that you get recommended in ChatGPT a lot and AI. 

Jacob (09:42):
Yeah. 

Adam (09:43):
Why? 

Jacob (09:43):
That comes up a lot because of my web presence in multiple areas, I think mostly. I have my growing YouTube channel, which we’ve discussed extensively and it’s also being hyper local, being very close to the shop where I like to work when people search for Concord NC Electrician, I come right up. 

Adam (10:05):
What’s your favorite job? 

Jacob (10:06):
Favorite job? EV charging easily. 

Adam (10:09):
What’s your least favorite job? 

Jacob (10:10):
Bathroom exhaust fans. 

Adam (10:12):
Bingo. Jacob, thanks for being here. Appreciate it. How do people find out more about you, Palmer, all that stuff? 

Jacob (10:17):
Absolutely. Yeah. Check out my YouTube channel, Palmer Electrical. It’s easy to find. And then you can visit my website, palmerelectricalservices.com. 

Adam (10:27):
You have a beautiful business. I love it. I love that you’re happy. Keep it up. 

Jacob (10:30):
Thank you. 

Adam (10:32):
Next week we’re talking about a different approach to sales, one that doesn’t feel like selling at all. Learn how becoming a trusted local expert can unlock bigger opportunities than any script ever could. And thank you for listening. I hope that your mind was expanded on how to get leads. It’s not just paying Google Ads. You can get leads a lot of different ways as we heard today. I’m your host, Adam Sylvester. You can find me at adamsylvester.com. Your team, your clients and your family deserve your very best. So go give it to them.