Driving Customer Experience – Idan Shpizear

Idan Shpizear:
We really have an opportunity to impact people when we serve them as companies. I can really make it into the culture and the processes and that’s what we can stand for as a company. I said, I’m not pitching my company anymore. My only goal is to add value. I want to ask questions, I want to get to places, I want to get people to feel something. I want to help them see the positive even though they’re going through the negative. And that became our mantra. Part of the training that we used to do for our inspector is before you walk into a house, you stop for a second, you breathe, take all of your problem or the thing that you worry about, put them aside.

Idan Shpizear:
Just you walk walking in to serve.

Dana Robinson:
Exit Plan is a podcast for business owners and those who want to be business owners. I’m always in search of the lesser known stories of entrepreneurship. In the Exit Plan podcast you’ll hear stories from startup to sale and hear from the professionals who helped business owners achieve their exit. Hosted by me, author and private equity manager Dana Robinson, along with my co hosts and guests, you’ll hear real stories, tips and tools that will help you plan for the exit you want whether you are still working at a day job or running a business. Let’s get started with this episode of the Exit Plan podcast. Hey everybody, it’s Dana Robinson coming at you with another episode of the Exit Plan podcast. Today I’ve got a guest with a lot of credentials and I hope will bring us through a variety of entrepreneurial lessons of his own as well as things that he knows that he can teach us to do better. Idan Shpizear.

Dana Robinson:
Shpizear. Yes I did it. Thanks for coming on. The coming at us from not far. For those of you that are that know me from my, my days uh, with ghetto air conditioning, uh, when I was up in the Simi Valley. Idan is runs 911 restoration franchise company up there and has a lot more to, to talk about. But I’ll stop talking and tell you thanks for coming on. And, and, and I, I, I’m, I’m a lover of origin stories.

Dana Robinson:
How did you get to be here? Not, not, you know, the, the, the glitzy story of $100 million. Successes are important. You know I think they’re, I want to get your, your, your success story but let’s go back as far back as you’ll take us to your origin story.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, absolutely. So first of all, thank you for having me. And yeah, so as you hear my accent, I’m originally from Israel. I grew up in a small Farm in the south part of Israel. Most of my childhood I’m, you know, barefoot out in the field, working with the family, tomato, cucumbers, flowers, apple trees and on and on. So I grew up in a way that you get up in the morning, you know, if you go to school, you go to school. If not, you go back to do some work. Right.

Idan Shpizear:
To help the family business in a way. Yeah. And served in the Israeli army. And right after I knew, I’m not going to go to school, it’s not the thing for me. School was not a fun experience. So a good friend of mine came, he’s like, let’s go to America. Like, how we going to do it? We don’t really speak the language, we don’t have any money, how we going to do it? So like this and don’t worry about it. Money grows on the trees.

Idan Shpizear:
Everything is easy in America. Seriously. That’s what we seriously thought. So I finished the service, I worked as a bellboy and as a gardener for about two months, save about $11,000, bought a ticket and came here not really knowing anything about anything really. We didn’t really speak the language. It was hilarious. But we had the mindset in, in a way really I didn’t have a choice, like I have to make it happen here, right? It’s not like I have option B to go back home. Because we went as a family, we went through a lot of financial difficulties and on and on.

Idan Shpizear:
So it was like, I need to come to America, I need to figure out a way to make it happen.

Dana Robinson:
And you go straight to San Fernando Valley. Was that, was that like.

Idan Shpizear:
Lax? Didn’t really know that San Frano Valley. There is a big Israeli community in San Fernando Valley. But we, we kind of knew about it, but we didn’t really understand where is San Frano Valley? Santa Monica and on and on. So we landed LAX trying to figure out how do we get out of the airport. And then we got to Santa Monica, we’re sitting in a restaurant and okay, so what next? And then we are hearing two girls right next to us speaking in Hebrew and he’s like, wow, okay, that’s a good start. So we started talking to him and something work out that she let us use one of the bedroom in the two bedroom apartment that she stayed in. And that’s kind of our welcome to America. We, we bought a Volvo 1978 for 800, 400 each.

Idan Shpizear:
And we found our way to San Fernando Valley. And somebody, an Israeli guy, somebody was nice enough to give us an opportunity to work for his company as a carpet cleaners. So it was like two days training. Here you go. This, this is the ninja is the carpet cleaning machine that we use. Here is a shampoo for the carpet and here and there we went on two days training and then we figure out how to shove the carpet cleaning machine in the back seat of the volume, right. We had a, like a small like roof. So we put the one kind of stuck in stack a little bit outside of the car and, and, and they start to start sending us out there to leads, right.

Idan Shpizear:
So we advertise then I think about 30, $40 for three rooms. And our goal was to upsell to about $100 or something like that, right. So that was the carpenter journey. And it was actually amazing because we learned the culture. We’re out there, we’re driving around, so we pick up on the language. We, you know, start really understanding what’s, what’s happening here. So this was a great training for us. And the other thing because we didn’t have any money is we were five guys in one bedroom apartment on the carpets.

Idan Shpizear:
We really had nothing to sleep on or, or any of it. So we wake up at 4 or 5 o’ clock in the morning. It’s very uncomfortable what we do. We go to the car, we drop to the city. We’re waiting for the first lead. Five, six o’ clock. When everybody else, all the technician went back to their families were like, we have. There’s no rush to go back to the apartment.

Idan Shpizear:
So let’s just wait and maybe somebody is going to call and want to get his carpet cleaning done in the evening. What happened? After a while we were always available to do work. So we became pretty fast. Let if we have any project, let’s set it to Edan, right? Because he’s available. And we just drove everywhere. Always available. So this is kind of how we start building ourselves, kind of start to make some money here.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
Eight months in, we got a call for a flooded house. Now we don’t know nothing about blowers, humidifier, restoration, water damage, mall, none of it. We’re just carpet cleaning. So we went out there and we extract the water and we charge $600. For us, it was, we just made so much money. We celebrate that night. Going to eat. We went to eat Chinese food.

Idan Shpizear:
This is good experience for us. But what really happened as we’re going through extracting the water, another company came in and they’re bringing blowers and humidifiers and the pulling the carpet and the cutting the walls and on and on. Then I figure out that they charge about 15,000$. Now, I’m very thankful for my 600, but I want a piece of the 15,000 because I’m already here. And the second thing that we notice is that didn’t really care about the homeowner. They walked in, getting to sign this long agreement. Don’t worry, insurance company sent us. And they just start making a bigger mess.

Idan Shpizear:
And I’m standing there like the homeowner is really. Is going through an emotional disaster. Why nobody cares about him. So that was my first experience. A month after we got a second call, the third call. And I keep seeing the same experience again and again. Says, you know what, I want to go into this business, but I want to approach it with a different perspective. I want to pay attention to the homeowner.

Idan Shpizear:
I really want because I’m seeing that he’s going through an emotional disaster and they don’t really care about it.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
So every extra dollar we had, we started buying our own equipment. So we bought a few blowers and a few humidifiers and a few more. It didn’t take us that long because we really invest everything back into the business. We had enough equipment to do our own project. So the next call we got, we really paid attention to the homeowner. We took our time, we took him through the process. And I’m start seeing that, wow, we really have an impact about the way he feels.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
And we see that it’s changed. And we see. Because I saw how it’s been done when you don’t really care about the homeowners compared to how it’s done when you really care about the homeowners. I’m like, okay, I think there is an opportunity here. How can we create a unique customer experience and be in this industry?

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
So this is work around mine started going to about probably two, three months after. I’m getting a call over the weekend. At that point we. We bought a van. We had enough equipment and all that. And we got a call actually not far from where. Where I am today. And I’m getting to the house in the weekend and I’m standing outside and I’m hearing people just screaming at each other.

Idan Shpizear:
The husband, the wife and the daughter is back and forth. I’m like, holy, what I’m about to walk into. But I said, okay, just come you’re. We’re going to walk in there, we’re going to serve. And my goal is to try to get everybody to calm down. And this what I did work through everything. Everybody came down. We went through the entire project.

Idan Shpizear:
Everything was great. A week after, I’m getting a call from the dad, right? From the homeowner. Yeah, hey, what’s going on? How are you? How can I help you? It’s like he done. I just wanted to talk to you. I’m having such a hard day and you brought calmness into our house when we went through everything. So I just want to talk to you for a minute. And at that moment, for me that was okay. We really have an opportunity to impact people when we serve them as companies.

Idan Shpizear:
I can really make it into the culture and the processes and that’s what we can stand for as a company. And that’s really started to be our thing. I said, I’m not pitching my company anymore. My only goal is to add value. I want to ask questions, I want to get to places, I want to get people to feel something. I want to help them see the positive even though they’re going through the negative. And that became our mantra. I used to spend, I used to.

Idan Shpizear:
Part of the training that we used to do for our inspector is before you walk into a house, you stop for a second, you breathe, take all of your problems or the thing that you worry about, put them aside and just you walking in to serve, just listen, but really listen. And we start seeing well, wow, it’s working very, very well. We’re getting great reviews, great feedback. We’re getting more and more recommendation. So at this point we became an independent business owners. We did about 250k in revenue. And then few months after, a few weeks after, I’m sitting in a restaurant at night and I’m hearing two people talk about Google advertising that you can advertise online. Now this was around 2003, 2004.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, you mean advertise because everybody wore yellow pages and magazine and on and on. Wait a second. I can advertise on, on the Internet online and that’s how I can generate leads. So that night I went back home, spent hours. How can I put my ads on Google? I want that. I figured it out. I put my first ad on Google. Now I didn’t have a website, so instead of putting the URL, I just put my phone number.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, 24 hours I got my first phone call and then almost every, every day another folk another phone call. And we grew the business to a north of $3 million in less than a year and a half. Now we didn’t have any business experience. It’s not what I Study in school. So we try to figure things out as we’re growing and technicians and we hiring people and how do I supposed to run meetings now? How do I supposed to control everything? So we went through all this thing, crazy experience, amazing experience really. And so that’s really how we grew the business. So there’s two big things that we figure out. One is the online lead generation and the second one is customer experience and business development with a mindset of I’m not selling, I’m adding value.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah. And that applies to every home service. I’ll tell you that. H vac, plumbing, landscape, roof, window doors, garage door, the entire spectrum of home services is, is, can learn that same lesson and transform their business from just a technician who’s doing a thing, fixing a thing to somebody who’s, who’s really looking to solve the customer’s problem. Right. Not, not, not make a sale but bring, bring that level of service. And you had that from the beginning. That’s, that’s a, you know, that’s a.

Dana Robinson:
Obviously to grow from, you know, 300,000 to 3 million in annual income in short period of time is, you know, more than marketing, right?

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. There’s one thing that was very clear to me, like I can be great in marketing, can generate leads, but if I’m not really taking care of my clients and really provide good service, it’s going to go up, it’s going to go down. Right. Because I need. Yeah. It’s basically I want to grow and I want to create something good.

Idan Shpizear:
So basically we start looking at ourselves as a company that we are not a water, mold and fire damage company. We are a fresh start company. We providing fresh start through the services of water, mold and fire. But that’s, that’s not really what I do. When a homeowner called me, it’s not like he cares so much about the equipment and how I’m doing it and all that, but he cares about can you take the headache away? Can I trust you? Can you help me go through my day? Right now I need to feed my kids, I need to get them to school. I need to figure out how I’m going to pay for it and I want to make sure that my assets is protected. That’s what you really care about and I completely understand. I would care about the same thing.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. So we change. We created processes that we’re not being very technical when we get out there. We really try to understand what is it that you’re trying to achieve today and can, can I be part of helping you achieve what is it that you want to achieve. That’s something start using for, you know, even when I talk to adjuster or apartment managers or really anybody that I want to work with, not about me, how can I help you achieve your goals? Right. And then we build our processes into it. So that’s really how we became a full restoration company and was the same thing with becoming a franchise. So the end of 2005 is when Katrina happened, Right.

Idan Shpizear:
Station at this point, we have a lot of vans and equipments, and we got. We had everything. So we sent a few inspectors out there. I flew out there a few days after, and it was devastating to see what people going through. I mean, we have kind of the same experience right now in California.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
With all the fires and everything. It’s just terrible to see what people are going through. So. But the second part that we learned from it is there were so many other restoration companies that came in from the different part of the U.S. right? And there was so much work. So we’re not really competing with each other, so we just start talking. Right. And what I learned is that most of the guys, girls that I met, the contractors that I.

Idan Shpizear:
That I met are been in the business for 10 years, 15 years, some of them 20 years, and the averaging revenues, around 700,000, 800,000, 1 million maybe. And I’m like, what’s going on here? How was able to grow my company? Why they’re stuck? I mean, it’s great people, they really care. They’re on and on, right? Then I’m like, what’s going on? So I’m sitting with the thing in my mind, why they’re stuck. What I notice after some time that when I speak with them, they’re very passionate about the trade itself. So they will spend hours talking about the blowers and humidifiers and how to set up their xactimate and how they fix the van and how to figure out to cut a straight line in the drywall. And I’m like, okay, that’s all amazing, and it’s very important. But that’s supposed to be maybe 20 minutes of our conversation and another 40 minutes on, how do you scale? What are you standing for? Like, how do you get more clients? And on and on. So part of the thing, so I thought about it then, is what if when you go back home after we’re done here with Katrina, we find a way to make one plus one equal five, Right.

Idan Shpizear:
I’m going to help you with the lead generation, the kind of how to approach the business. And we’re going to work a fee between us because I know that your dream is not to build a business that do 7, 800,000.

Dana Robinson:
Right.

Idan Shpizear:
When you start the business, you didn’t think about, oh, for the next 20 years I just want to keep being in my truck and carry blowers and pull carpet or that this was not your dream when you started.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
So my thought was, can I add value to you? Can we do one plus one equal five? And they went back home. I created a very simple license agreement and I did one work second, one third, one fourth one at one point, at about 10 different license agreement that I’m working with people on. And it’s working well. I mean people are growing their business. It’s working very well. And at that point the lawyer that wrote the license agreement told me, look, Idan, you’re becoming a franchise. You cannot keep doing the license agreement because now they’re using your logo and they’re using your systems and on and on and on. And that’s really how we became a franchise with the idea of can we do one plus one equals five? I like the idea of can I get X amount of people in a room kind of carrying the same mission, the same, same logo, the same idea of the fresh start and can we spread it around the country? And fast forward to today, we have about 120 owners recovering, about 330 territories growing into Canada and yeah, having fun.

Dana Robinson:
That’s fantastic. Are most of your franchisees operators that want to get in under your umbrella and use your system or are you mostly bringing in new operators?

Idan Shpizear:
So we have, we have a good mix of operators that want to get under umbrella. They reach a certain limit that saying, listen, I tried and I mean that. Two weeks ago I had a call with somebody in the plumbing business that he’s reached, kind of got to 800. He’s been in the business for about 15 years now. He got to buy 850. And he’s like, listen, I want to grow. And I tried everything. I just don’t know how to get to the next level.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, right.

Idan Shpizear:
With our system putting the right building blocks in place, we know that we’re going to get them there. And we have people that come from the corporate world, right, did business development and other things and they just want to become independent. Especially now, I mean with all the AI and the new tools and everything that comes in, people are thinking, okay, where, where, where is my safe place? I know there’s a, there’s A very good chance that my, the corporate that I’m working for, there’s a good chance that gonna eliminate my position at one point. Especially with all the new tools and everything that comes in today. So where do I go? And, and a lot of people are finding the home services a great place to go to. Yeah, there’s a lot of people. I mean I see a mix of it. I don’t know.

Idan Shpizear:
It’s interesting to see what you see. It says some people look at the home services as kind of no, I’m better than that. I’m not going to be a plumber. Restoration. This is not me. I need to do something that consider to be something else. And a lot of people that coming from that space seeing oh wow, it’s not that hard to build a business that you know, do a million two, three, four million million dollar and take home half a million dollar seven hundred thousand. Right.

Idan Shpizear:
It’s not that hard. Not easy, but it’s not that hard. Especially when come. When somebody comes. I mean where we see a lot of the, where we see that it’s hard for some of the people is really building a team, implementing new processes and systems kind of adopt, adopting a new way of thinking and a new way of looking at the business. That’s where we see that people have difficulties. But doing a, actually doing the work is not that hard right now. There is a science to it, there’s a way to it.

Idan Shpizear:
But you know, you go through two weeks training, you get certified, you have your coaches that will support you and kind of walk hold your hand through it. But after the fifth 6, 7 project, that’s not what hard about building this business.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, I think I agree with you that the, the world’s attitude toward the trades is changing. Right. The, the trades are no longer seen as what you do if you didn’t go to school. All right, The I’m a lawyer. I’3 degrees. You know, I retired from my law practice early and, and tried to buy a plumbing company myself. You know I was running a property management company because I’d done some roll ups and acquisitions in that space. But you know, I got talked into joining a roll up instead of buying a business myself.

Dana Robinson:
But you know the, the there are lawyers, accountants and, and, and finance professionals all over the US that are asking that question can I buy a, a traditional business? And it doesn’t necessarily mean that you become a trades person, right? You, you have a large pool of skilled people who you can you know, provide for a living for their family them and their families by being, you know, a good, good operator, you still have to know the trade or learn the trade. Do you think? You know, I, I see this, this sort of pervasive problem that you saw when you, when you said you noticed that a lot of other operators were stuck at less than a million in revenue that I, I feel like there, other than franchises and, and reading books there, there’s just not a lot of ways for a million to $3 million a year business owner to learn and to be accountable. You know, the, the thing about a franchise that, that benefits your franchisees, that’s hard to find is someone to make you stay accountable to the systems and processes and, and do the thing, you know, every day. And that culture of accountability is, it’s inherent in your, in your franchise agreements. But so many of these, of these small businesses that need to benefit from your wisdom, from your, the way you’ve done things that can’t be in your franchise, I don’t know that there’s enough business coaches and smart people to keep them accountable where, you know, someone out there listening, you know, write me if you disagree with me. But, you know, the E. Myth has a sort of business coaching group that, you know, is probably only reaching a couple hundred people a year. This is the biggest business book of our, of, you know, probably in the last 40 or 50 years.

Dana Robinson:
Early on, I mean, it’s, it sounds to me like that was your, your, your deal was essentially to say, like, I got a system. If you pay me some, you know, fairly for that, I’m gonna, I’m gonna show you and hold you accountable to, to that. And it turned their businesses around.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, yeah. And it’s so a big part for me because I went through, you know, breaking a lot of limitations. Right. So I’m telling people, like, when we go through training or, you know, speak with business owner, I can tell my. In 60 seconds. But if I need to tell you the failures and all the limitation I need to break through and all the, all the hard days when I’m kind of banging my head against the wall, like, why I cannot break through this limitation, I’ll need to sit here for probably three, four months and, you know, tell you all the stories. But so my thing was, so I came here and I started building the business, and I also, I reach a certain limitation that I felt like at one point, like, it doesn’t matter how hard I work, I cannot break through this thing. Like, what’s going on here? Right.

Idan Shpizear:
And, and that really got me on a Par journey as I’m building the business and start looking at, at the, the way I’m thinking and the way I’m approaching and what I’m not conscious of and what is the, another kind of element that in play that I’m not even aware of. But as I brought more awareness to it, I started to break through limitation without me working much, much harder. Right. It’s just really understanding that is the way of thinking that really hold me in a certain way. There’s certain patterns that I’m stuck in that is very hard for me to get into. So in my experience I’m looking here, there’s a building blocks of the business and there is also a certain way of thinking or unaware of the way I’m processing some of the information that comes to me from my experience. So when I’m speaking with, with business owners, I have both of them that I’m aware of. Right.

Idan Shpizear:
I’ll give you, I’ll give you an example. Example that I use pretty often is so there’s a franchisee and he calls me and he’s like, same idea. He got stuck at a certain level. And he tells me, listen, Idan, you can talk to me all day long. My area is a terrible area. I cannot, I cannot grow here. Everybody is negative. It’s very hard to find employees.

Idan Shpizear:
This is just not working. I’m probably, I’m going to get out of the business. I’m exhausted. I’m like, okay, we spend some time, we talk to each other. Then I says, do, do me a favor because I know in my head there’s 10 businesses next to him that do much, much better. So it’s not very honest. That’s the story that we keep buying into. So at one point I’m like, you know what, Just walk me through it.

Idan Shpizear:
Moment you wake up, you get to the office, like, tell me how your day is. Because I want to be able to pull out. What is it that he’s not aware of that he’s stuck in the same story, right? So he tells me, I wake up, drink my coffee, I get to the office. Okay, what do you do when you get to the office? Say I walk into the warehouse and then I’m pointing out to my guys, what is it that they don’t do good or they need to improve on. And then I do the same thing. I go to my secretary and I go that. And that’s what I do with everybody. I want to, I want to make sure that they see what is it that they don’t do good, Right.

Idan Shpizear:
So I point out the positive side. Right? So you’re already laughing, but he’s not aware of. So at one point, I said, okay, I’m not going to say anything. Just pay attention to what you just told me. And he’s like, quiet for 10 seconds. Then he’s holding his head. He’s like, holy, it’s me. Okay, explain why it’s you.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. Look, it’s. He’s just not aware of it because he’s just in the same behavior again and again. Told me, done. Everything can be different if I just go into my office and if. What If I’m going to point what works well, how is going to change? I say, I don’t know, maybe it’s a good idea and give it a try. Two weeks after I’m getting a phone call, he’s like, you don’t understand. My business is different, my attitude is different, my people are different.

Idan Shpizear:
Everything changed. I asked him, so what changed? I’m aware of the way I’m behaving now. Before that, he had all the building blocks. Yeah, but he wasn’t aware of it. Right? And the same. Now I have another experience that I have another guy that he want to grow, and he’s positive and he’s hiring, hiring more people, and he’s hired his best friends to help him, and he’s hired his uncle to help him. And I’m sitting there on the call, and I have five people on the call, and I’m saying, what? Listen, this is amazing. Can you.

Idan Shpizear:
Now I’m asking the owner. Now I want you to be quiet. I’m going to ask the people around you. I want you to tell me what is your responsibility in the business and how he’s supposed to hold you accountable. Nobody have no idea.

Dana Robinson:
Right? Dana Robinson here. Quick plug for my book, the King’s flyswatter. You can see it here behind me. If you’re watching this, I’ve got it in my hand. It’s a beautiful hardcover book printed to make it giftable. Something that you can share with a family member, buy as a gift. So this latest book, it’s a fable about a person who has a really crappy job. Let’s just start there.

Dana Robinson:
This is a book that most people can relate to because we’ve all had crappy, crappy jobs. This is the story of Ubar, a servant in the court of a Babylonian king who masters his boring, monotonous job and then learns to listen to the king, hearing him rule the kingdom while quietly swatting Flies behind the king. Eventually, Ubar becomes the wisest and most successful man in the kingdom. The story is fun and it’s easy to read, but it’s not mythology. It’s my story. And as I shared the idea with colleagues and friends, I learned that it was their story. And guess what? It’s your story. If you’re at a job of any kind, one that you love, one that you hate, one that’s just enough to get by, this little book gives fresh perspective on how to leverage that job to get you something greater than a paycheck.

Dana Robinson:
The lessons in this parable are entrepreneurial lessons, but not what you might think from the current entrepreneurial zeitgeist. If you or someone you know are looking for a real pathway to entrepreneurship, here’s the secret. Your job is the way out of your job. It’s counterintuitive, but once you see how it works, you can’t unsee it. Learn the way of the Fly Swatter from the parable of Ubar and from the stories I share share from my 30 year business journey. You can get a free copy of the King’s Fly Swatter by going to.

Idan Shpizear:
Dana Robinson.com so great attitude, not building blocks, right? Some people saying idan, I have all the building blocks in place. This is not working now. So I’m playing with both of them because I’m, I’m just, I think one of the, I know we can call it good or bad, but it is what it is. I grew through cleaning carpet and try to figure it out and being out there and I start creating the team around me for strength and weaknesses. So I really went through it. I went through the experience. I didn’t read it. It’s not a theory for me.

Idan Shpizear:
So I think everybody have really the capacity to build something good if they really, really want to. We just need to figure out how to work with them. But first of all they need to want to. Yeah, I cannot go convince somebody when I’m, when I’m speaking with a business owner or our support team and I’m telling them if you are in a position that you need to convince somebody that he needs to grow his business, that’s, that’s not in that place.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, well, you said it would only take a minute to, to talk about your success. So we’ll save your, your success story till the end. But I, I like the admission of failure. I, you know, in the 200 interviews I’ve done, I’m always trying to get someone to admit to some failure because we’re all trained as sort of what. As we’re out there talking to our audiences and, and being our influencers and, and being coaches to, to focus on the success stories because they do motivate people. But lessons learned, maybe you, you, you said there was a lot, a lot of them. What would you say are some of the ones that are common threads of the things you see others doing as well? So maybe the things you learned, but also that you, that you recognize become the lessons that everybody else has got to learn that become.

Idan Shpizear:
So I think one. I mean, it took me some time, but the accountability, right, to really understand how you holding your team accountability, there’s a lot of the same thing I saw. Accountability is something that is negative. Like I’m micromanaging. I need to hold people accountable. No, I need to give them the space and they will build what they build. So. And there’s a different level of accountability, right? There’s accountability of, did you get in the morning? Did you get on time? Did you live on time? Did you do that? And there’s accountability around, like, are you moving in the right direction to achieve your goals? Right? Do I get.

Idan Shpizear:
Do I give you enough clarity of where is it that the company is going to and how are you playing a part with supporting the company growth and how are we all holding each other accountable, right? So that’s something I remember. I mean, at one point. So whenever I feel like I’m hitting a wall, right? I like to bring people from outside, right? So I’ll find an advisor. I’ll find somebody that can come into the business that I feel comfortable with, somebody that will have the strength, the courage, I’ll call it, to really point out what is it that I’m doing wrong, right? Because as you build a company, one of the things that happens as you grow is you’re amazing. Well done. You’re amazing. You’re amazing. And so I was always looking for people to tell me, no, Idan, you are screwing up.

Idan Shpizear:
You have blind spot. You’re not following the right thing, right? So, because you can really easily fall into this. Look at me. I figure it out. Figure out anything, right? So at one point, I brought an advisor into the business and he’s like, okay, pull all the job descriptions. And I was like, enough with these job descriptions. Everybody know exactly what they need to do. Oh, no, you’re not going to be able to grow.

Idan Shpizear:
It’s not going to work. They don’t know. And he’s like, you want to see an example? Call one of the people in. Tell me what you’re responsible for. Tell me that. And you see how people answer. They are confused a little bit all over the place.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
So I went through the process of job description. What is the key metrics, how it’s going to work? Sitting with everybody on the team, seeing how everything flows between everybody. How are we going to hold everybody accountable? At one point is when now I’m moved to the founder position as a CEO, I put the key metrics that the company is holding me for on the door of my office. I said the same way that I’m holding everybody accountable. Everybody can come and hold me accountable. We’re working as a team. That was a very interesting change in dynamic because now we’re working as a team. There’s a certain the flow change, a dynamic change.

Idan Shpizear:
So holding people accountable. It’s something that we, we talked a lot about job description. I mean, it’s, it’s something that it thinks that, you know, you can find it in basically all the business books. So I’m not talking about anything that is kind of out of the box, but it’s how you do it. The level of depth that you go when you do it is really understanding the metrics that each one is and how are they affecting the business. And another part I think did well, once I figured it out, is really helping each position to see themselves from a perspective of value to the business and not just the technical thing that they do. Right. So, for example, one day we’re sitting with everybody in the company, each department, and I ask each one what they do, Right.

Idan Shpizear:
And when we got to the customer service, they were like, yeah, where the phone ring, we answer the phone, take the information, we send it out. That’s what we do. We just pick up the phone, send information out. I said, okay, let’s try to look at it from a different perspective now. Let’s bring more emotion into it. Somebody that is going through an emotional disaster, that he have no idea what to do and he’s stressed out, he’s calling you. You’re the first person that he’s talking to. You have the opportunity now to make him feel relaxed, that we got him, that we’re going to be able to get and help him, or you can act like you don’t really care, just take information and make his feeling even worse.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, you have an opportunity every way to impact people that going through an emotional disaster. Now our culture is a fresh start culture. So you know that a franchisee that you’re going to send to his house will continue. Kind of the same feeling, the same emotional space that you, you create for him.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
So look now at what you do. You’re not just answering the phone calls and set information. You are really there helping people, going through a hard situation and making sure that the right people will get to the house to make it even better.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
When the customer service reps hear it, they went from just like I’m doing a technical thing into oh, wow, okay. So I am, I am doing something important every day.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, right.

Idan Shpizear:
And connecting it to the success of the franchisees and the growth of his business and what will happen once his businesses grow, how he’s going to affect his communities, family, and on and on.

Dana Robinson:
I was just going to say the. Some of the best marketers that I’ve talked to and throughout my business career have this common. I call it mythology. The mythology that a good brand tells a story that doesn’t get broken. The magic spell is cast and it doesn’t get broken from the moment you first hear the name of the brand or the brand story until the, the close of a sale and then forever after that, because you want them forever as a customer. And so many companies don’t really think of that whole narrative where the customer service people, you know, you can, you can get cheap ones, you know, you can offshore them. But if you’ve told the brand story, when someone calls 911 Restoration and that customer is in need of emotional connection and empathy and you have a customer service person that connects with them, then they saw an ad, they get that story played out. The table is set for you from the standpoint of your service technician.

Dana Robinson:
Because then when they walk in the house and they have the same training and the same story, you’re able to carry that all the way through. The moment you break the spell, the customer will hate you, they won’t buy. They’ll think that you’ve defrauded them. They, they, you know, like, so you have to have that at the very beginning. Where a lot of businesses think that it’s just top of funnel. We’re, we’re filtering, we’re dispatching, we’re sorting things out. They have an opportunity to really set the table with your brand. So when you’re technician and, and ultimately when you have a closing of a, you know, transaction, that’s often, you know, a very big decision for somebody and a lot of money and a lot of hassle and a lot of worry.

Dana Robinson:
So that. Good on, good on you for identifying that early. I just wanted to point it out. Because I’ve seen it in a lot of businesses that. That don’t understand, like, that the customer does not buy the thing that you do. Right. They’re buying your story. They’re buying confidence that you live out the story you’ve told them in your advertisements.

Dana Robinson:
And you know that that’s. Yeah, that’s the thing you’re delivering. And you know, it’s. It’s solving their problems. You know that it’s delivering excellence in service, but no one really cares how straight the edge is on the. On the line. You cut in their drywall.

Idan Shpizear:
Exactly.

Dana Robinson:
Exactly. But although it does matter, doesn’t it? Like, if you. If you know.

Idan Shpizear:
So I’m not discounting the. The service level. I’m not discounting the being professional. Get their own time. I’m not discounting. Think it’s all important. It’s all important. But you cannot get stuck on this side or that side.

Dana Robinson:
Right.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. I mean, you. You can do whatever you want to do, but if you want to grow a business, I think it’s. It’s good to do and. And it’s not easy, especially when you, you know, when. When the team grow. Right. So you need to be able to.

Idan Shpizear:
So for some time, one of the things that I’m finding myself is just 80 of the day. I’m talking about the fresh start at what it means and how you train and like, how can we portray it into our clients? And where do we. To bring out the fresh starts? And do our customers really feel it? Do our customer experience really provide a fresh start? And it’s a moving target.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
So one of the things that I noticed, and I think it can be. It’s tiring, but I think it’s good as a company because customers will always demand more. Right. So great. I got the fresh start. It’s great. It’s amazing. Next time I want something better.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. And I always remember the story, I think was the first flight ever that they have that the people that flew at Internet on the flight. Right. So before the flight, everybody’s like, wow, that’s the first flight in the world that we’re gonna have Internet on the plane. Everybody’s excited. That is amazing. Fly going on. Halfway through the fly, the Internet stopped.

Idan Shpizear:
Everybody was so disappointment. Disappointed at the end of the flight. Right. So it was so much excitement. But now that I have it, I want more of it.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah. Right.

Idan Shpizear:
So it’s like a moving target. So I think it’s a one thing to. Is. Is a good thing to adopt as A company, because there’s one way to look at it is, okay, I’m always going to try to compete with my competition, or can I be focused on creativity to really keep improving the customer experience? Yeah, right. Which company do I want to be? Do I want to be always online and searching of what my comp. My competition is doing? It’s good to know what they’re doing, but really, I think it’s better if my focus is on my client to see what else. How can I be more creative? How can I get to him faster? How can I communicate better? Right? So I think that is a healthier way to approach things as a company.

Dana Robinson:
How do you keep that. How do you keep that medicine served? You know, how do you keep everybody every day thinking thematically around? I mean, it’s. Humans are humans. We’re inherently going to sort of like, revert to the mean. We’re all capable of great things, but also all have other things on our minds. Your employees have, you know, a kid that yelled, a teenager that yelled at them before they went to school, have a, you know, stress about paying their own bills or making decisions, and you need them to carry this brand through for the. For the brand story to connect and actually deliver to the customer. And you.

Dana Robinson:
You’re saying, and you need to constantly be ready to improve that. So every employee should constantly be thinking, how do I one up my best from last year, next year? You know, do you have tools? Is it frequency? Is it. Is it inspirational posters? What. What are the. What are the ways that you can get, you know, small business team really driving?

Idan Shpizear:
So I think the. The simple way is really just frequency is keep. Keep it in front of the team, right? So that’s the goal. We want to really create a very unique customer experience. How can we improve it? Our customers, some of our customers are happy, some are not happy. This is where we’re failing. Let’s come up with idea how to improve it now. At the same time, we need to create a kind of like a safe environment so people can come up with new ideas.

Idan Shpizear:
That’s another challenge, right? Some people say, I. I don’t want to share my ideas. I don’t know how I’m gonna get yelled at. I’m gonna try things, I’m gonna make a. Mistakes and here and there. So part of the thing that I would say, like, listen, if you’re not making mistakes, we’re not trying new things. So it’s okay if we make mistakes. Let’s try.

Idan Shpizear:
Let’s not go big. Let’s go small, try it for a few times, see how it works, and then if it’s great, let’s build it up. But if it’s not, we learn, we see what, why we thought is good, why it ended up not working. Not saying it’s your fault it didn’t work.

Dana Robinson:
Right?

Idan Shpizear:
Let’s learn from it. So we thought that if we’re going to do one, two, that will improve the customer service experience and this is why we think it’s going to improve it. So we try it, we build a new tool or we build something simple for it. We tried for a month. Okay, improve or didn’t improve? Didn’t improve. Okay, not mad, let’s see why it’s not improving. Why did we had this assumption and we found out that it’s not working. So we can have our own wisdom as a company.

Idan Shpizear:
Right? So for me, wisdom is when you learn from your own experience. Yeah, right. Otherwise it’s all theory, it’s all I believe. No, let’s try it and gain our own wisdom. Right? So it’s not an easy thing. I think it’s just because I and my team, we really believe that that’s, I mean, we see that that is the best way to make things happen and try new things and works. We just stay at it and keep making sure that we are having that safe environment. So that will be one and the second thing.

Idan Shpizear:
Sometime I’m going to try a new video and I’m going to bring a new tool. I have also a development team. Right. So for me, technology and innovation, all that. I always made sure that we have our own development team so we can run and create tools really, really fast. Right. So we can innovate on some things that we see good, good opportunities in. So sometimes we’ll just create new tools and share it with the team just to keep the spirit of innovation going.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, okay.

Idan Shpizear:
They create some new things. That’s great. And now it gets people to think, oh, we can do that with AI. Oh, we can pull information from the CRM system, we can change the way we’re answering the phone, we can route things in a different way. Right. And if we made a mistake, I’m happy to sit there and says, listen, I thought 1, 2 is going to work and it’s not. That’s what we learn from it. That’s how we’re going to adapt it.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. So kind of having the same energy of, look, it’s not like I’m smarter than you or you’re smarter than me. We Work here as a team and we try things and we see what sticks and whatever, we find something that works and works well. Let’s now scale it up.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, I love that. The Culture Code, popular book on culture. Basically, the premise is whatever your culture is going to be the sort of foundation for, it is a place where people feel safe instead of anxious. Right. So the, the work, the, the owner who’s not, you know, not reading a lot of books, who’s going around and pointing out what people are doing wrong or who thinks holding people accountable is yelling at people or writing them up, are missing the opportunity to build a place where people feel safe to try to experiment, to, to fail and, and have their employer, whoever’s above them, their boss, the manager, embrace that. And, and it sounds to me like part of yours is even that you innovate and experiment and thrust stuff out there and say, we don’t know if, you know, I’m taking some chances all the time. Yeah. And, and in some ways that’s probably good because people would love to see that you, you tried something that they told you wouldn’t work and it didn’t work.

Dana Robinson:
And, and in some cases they probably are just as happy when you find a tool that does work because it’s usually solving a problem that they experience themselves.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah. One, one of the things that I’m learning is it’s not, you know, having one conversation of, yeah, let’s be innovative and let’s have a space. It’s something that you really need to embody. That’s why, like, I’m creating my own things and I’m bringing up and I’m sharing with people. Some of them are great, some of them are stupid, some of them are just even funny just to kind of get the conversation going and get some juices going. Right. It’s really embodying it. That’s where I see a big difference.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. There’s some people friend that I know that will talk about culture and then they go and do something completely different.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. Yeah, let’s be open space. And I mean open communication and create a safe space. And then somebody says something that they don’t like and yeah, done. Right. I’m like, oh, okay, this disconnect is, is a terrible thing because now there is what you’re saying and what you’re doing is not matching. So yeah, I think it’s important to really embody something that really sits well with you, that you really want to see your company or your life unfold in a certain way. Right.

Idan Shpizear:
So yeah, that’s something big that I see a lot of. I mean, the same thing. It’s like you really need to embody it. You need to walk the walk. Right. I mean, I know we’re not saying anything new, but it’s important to do these things.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah, that’s the, the, you can, you can probably listen to anybody who’s been through the cycle of business the way you have and find that you’re all saying a lot of the same things. But if you’re not hearing this or, or saying it a lot at your company, you’re, you’re missing the opportunity. There, there isn’t, there’s no, there’s no magic. And, and you know, I don’t want to, don’t want to slam on a program that I don’t understand. But I, I took over business once where the guy had been to a bunch of 10x, you know, seminars, and, and the 10x is run by a pretty well, pretty well known fellow, you know, who, who’s very successful for a lot of reasons.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah.

Dana Robinson:
But the, you know, no matter how many of those this guy went to, and he had a lot of lanyards hanging in his office, you know, he never even 2x’d his company because the, he wasn’t just doing the basic things that you gotta do every day. And, and like you, I think accountability came into your, your pot piece of the podcast at like four different times in the last 30 minutes. You know, like you account you being accountable to your job as the boss, you know, others being accountable, the, you know, being held accountable to your brand, to your culture, to the, the message, to your customers, to delivering that to your customers. There’s no real magic. And that, that in some ways I think is maybe the missed opportunity for a lot of small businesses. They want an easy button and, and they would like it to be magic. But the easy button is just do the basic stuff well every day and, and keep, keep saying it to yourself and keep saying it to others because it does work.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah. Yeah. You know, it’s funny you’re saying it. I, I met with a good friends and he’s starting his own business and he’s sitting there and says like Dan, I want to build the things, I want to get clients. I want to make to the point that I’m making ten thousand dollar a month small business.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
And I’m, and I’m sitting and I’m thinking about it. I’m thinking about it. I took a small piece of paper, I said, okay, how much are you going to charge each client a thousand dollar? Okay. How many clients do you need to talk to to get one one of them to buy? So I speak with 10, one buy. I said okay. Here you go. So how many clients do you need to talk to? Okay. About 100.

Idan Shpizear:
I said okay. Can you identify who is your clients? Yes, I can identify their 1, 2, 3, 4. Can you can create a list of X amount of clients? Yes, I can. I said that’s it. Now you call them, you meet with them, you bring them in and you provide great service. That’s it. Can you just do it every day? Yeah, no, no, it’s not only that. I promise you if you only do this, you’re gonna get your $10,000 a month.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, that’s it. Yeah. So it’s really going down to the basic and producing is the part of producing that I think a lot of people are not. Look, I mean when we build it and again I still have a lot to, to learn it. When we built it, well like we, we were sitting there at night, it was with the facts was, you know, long time ago. We just wrote up on a, on a blank piece of paper with a pen. We can help you with water, mold, fire and other services that you need. We took the apartment management book that they gave in each store and we, the entire night we sat by a fax machine and that’s what we did.

Idan Shpizear:
Dial the numbers, send it in, dial the number, set it in. I said I’m gonna do it enough times.

Dana Robinson:
Yeah.

Idan Shpizear:
People will call me. And it’s the simple thing of just produce. Like make the actions, just get out there and do it and it’s, that’s how it’s gonna work.

Dana Robinson:
Yes. I love it. And yeah, the, the e myth is boils down to generate a lead, convertally deliver the product. You know, the, the, the business flywheel is that simple and it’s a, it’s right there under most of our noses now. All right, so the, the, the, the 62nd success story. We, you know, I, I said what I, I just teased that you’re at the head of this 91 1. Uh.

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, I, Look, I, I think we’re still, we have a lot of. Right. I mean we’re still writing our success, right. Working with franchisees, seeing people really achieving their success. If I looked at my success, I think just developing a good level of awareness. Right. So I see success really of achieving the sense of fulfillment and peacefulness and joy regardless of my external achievement. That’s for me the biggest game Changer.

Idan Shpizear:
And that’s really what helped me keep building and getting involved with other businesses and other things that I do is really get to this point. That’s what I’m seeing almost with everybody is that they’re waiting for some level of external achievement to find some level of fulfillment and peacefulness. And we know the story that this is not really how it works. You know, how many times, you know, we see people that reaching the top of the mountain and getting there, like something is missing. Like, yeah, what they do all this time, like I still feel very empty and feel I still didn’t find this inner quiet. And I thought that once I’m going to be able to do 1, 2, 3, 4, I’m gonna find it. So for me, the biggest thing that kind of I’m seeing as success is finding that and sitting in that place. And my hope and a lot of the work that we’re putting out there for our franchisees, and this is a big part of our discussion is for finding financial success and inner fulfillment.

Idan Shpizear:
Right. So try to bring both of them together.

Dana Robinson:
I love that.

Idan Shpizear:
Doesn’t really have an end to it. Right. It’s just a certain.

Dana Robinson:
Yes. That the, the person who said to you that they wanted to make 10,000amonth, they’re going to get there. And then two years later they’ll say, boy, I wish I could make 20 and they’re going to get there. That, that goal setting and accomplishment is certainly a, it’s a good delivery mechanism for keeping us, you know, accomplishing things. That does feel good. But I think you’re right as someone, you know, as for, for you, for someone who’s built a hundred million dollar franchise business that you, if you haven’t taken on investment, you know, you could liquidate and never work a day in your life, you know, that every day is just another set of problems to solve and that it doesn’t matter what, what the zeros are, it doesn’t matter what’s, you know, what, what the economics are. You’re either going to be a happy person or not happy person. And it’s.

Dana Robinson:
None of that’ll get solved by all your problems going away. Right. None of it’ll get solved by, by having more, more money. Is it more, more money, more problems?

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah, look, I’m all about, you know, go get your biggest goal. And yeah, look, every day I’m doing it, but I’m, I’m saying it’s a go for both. Yeah, you can get both and you can get both and you can, if you get the inner fulfillment, you’re going to see that the financial success will come even faster because then you’re not chasing anymore. You’re not coming to things from a place of luck. Coming from place with the really taking, really using your innate abilities, really being in a certain flow and alignment now it’s hard to speak with somebody about it when he’s having a hard time to pay rent. I get it right now, go work, make the phone calls, pay rent because you’re in a survival. But as soon as you get out of it. Yeah, I think really putting more attention to it of really doing a lot more of the inner game as you’re building your business because then you’re going to really build the momentum around your innate abilities and develop them into skills.

Idan Shpizear:
You’re going to be able to build more, add more value. Momentum is a big thing. Right. So when you do what you’re supposed to do and you feel at the place of alignment, you know how a lot of us are asking the question, what is my purpose and what I’m here and what’s going on and here and there. Once you’re at the place of alignment, these questions falls away and you’re just acting from a place of, you know, you do what you’re supposed to do. You’re giving your gifts again and again and again and people just say, wow, you know what? I’m not sure exactly. I’m not sure I understand exactly what is it that you do, but I want to be a part of it because there’s something in you that I want. Right.

Idan Shpizear:
So that is my hope for kind of bringing out there for especially our franchisees and people that I work with.

Dana Robinson:
I love that. That’s much better than telling us how to. How great it feels to, to be rich down. So thank, thank you for. Thanks for that perspective. I love it and don’t get it often enough. So I appreciate that. If people want to connect with you, what’s your.

Dana Robinson:
What’s your platform or form of choice?

Idan Shpizear:
Yeah. So if you want to know more about the franchise is 911restorationfranchise.com beside it on LinkedIn. So my name is Idan Schpizear. Unique enough so it just.

Dana Robinson:
Yes. Yeah. If you’re, if you’re watching this or you’re on ExitPlan us, it will. When the episode’s up, it will show Idan’s name and the spelling and a link to your. To his LinkedIn. Idan, I appreciate you coming on today and look forward to getting to know you better over the years ahead.

Idan Shpizear:
Awesome. Thank you very much. This was great.

Dana Robinson:
Thanks for joining me on this episode of the Exit Plan Podcast. I’d love to hear from you. Feel free to hit me up with questions or comments by emailing me at hello@danarobinson.com or leave comments and questions by calling 858-252-7785, call 858-252-7785 and leave a message.