Episodes

Grant Winstead, a sales mindset and performance coach with over 40 years in the home improvement industry, believes the biggest obstacle to closing more sales isn't the homeowner, the product, or even your sales process. It's what's going on inside your own head. After visiting more than 20,000 homes and generating over $100 million in lifetime sales, Grant has seen talented salespeople struggle despite having all the right training. So what's separating the top performers from everyone else? ...

Nate Fischer, Chief Technical Officer at Local Optics, says your competitors may not be beating you because they’re better at what they do. They may simply be easier to find. Nate and Allan break down what actually determines whether your business shows up when a homeowner searches for a local contractor, including Google Business Profiles, reviews, your website, local SEO, and the technical pieces working behind the scenes. But homeowners aren’t just Googling you anymore. They’re asking AI abo...

Chris Masterson of Cardinal Heating & Air Conditioning went from 16 years in law enforcement to leading a rapidly growing sales team, and some of the skills that made him a good police officer turned out to be exactly what salespeople need. Reading body language, paying attention to what isn’t being said, and actually listening to learn instead of thinking about your next question can completely change what happens in the home. Chris and Allan also get into why sales meetings shouldn’t replace...

Adriane Brooks of Renewal by Andersen of Central Virginia has coached hundreds of salespeople, and one lesson keeps showing up: the objections you hear from homeowners may be telling you more about yourself than the customer. Sales can act like a mirror, exposing what you believe about money, success, your own value, and even the profession itself. Adriane didn’t get into in-home sales because she dreamed of selling windows. She wanted to make the most amount of money she could, and she didn’t p...

Marcus Sheridan of Question First Group has a message for sales professionals: stop practicing sales on your customers! If your weekly “sales training” is really just reviewing pipelines, celebrating top producers, and talking numbers, Marcus says you’re not actually training. He and Allan dig into why real role plays, recording sales calls, and getting comfortable failing in front of your team can dramatically change the way reps communicate and perform. But better selling isn’t just about pr...

THREE seconds of Negativity Could Cost You 21 Hours of Performance. Let that sink in for a second. Three seconds. That's all it takes. One negative comment in a sales meeting, one toxic rep poisoning the well before appointments are run, one "this lead is garbage" attitude walking out the door, and according to studies, your entire team's performance can be compromised for the next 21 hours. Now multiply that by 3 or 4 reps doing it every single day. That's not a sales problem. That's a...

Dan Antonelli of KickCharge® Creative has a message contractors may not want to hear: you could be doing incredible work, but does your brand actually look like you deserve to charge what you’re charging? Dan and Allan dig into the psychology behind branding and how the way your company looks can shape what homeowners believe about your quality, professionalism, and even your price before a salesperson ever rings the doorbell. And Dan has the numbers to show just how much that perception can ...

Senja Spelman of Sisu Synergy has a question for contractors who say they need more leads: Do you really? What if the bigger problem is what happens after the lead comes in? Senja and Allan get into the disconnect between marketing and sales, why throwing more money at lead generation may be masking a much bigger issue, and what companies should examine before spending another dollar. Senja even makes the bold argument that the lead may be the least important part of the equation, and expl...

Tony Hoty of Tony Hoty Training and Consulting has spent more than three decades mastering person-to-person marketing, lead generation, canvassing, and sales. Tony joins Allan to break down how pattern interrupts can lower a homeowner’s guard and create an opening for a real conversation. From his philosophy of “before you can charm them, you must first disarm them” to using questions instead of statements, Tony shares practical ways contractors can stop sounding like every other salesperson at...

Stefanie Couch of Grit Blueprint knows that being great at what you do isn't enough if nobody knows WHY you're different. With roots in the building industry and a lifelong love of sales, Stefanie helps contractors uncover what truly sets them apart and communicate it in a way customers actually care about. She and Allan dig into why so many contractor websites and marketing messages look exactly the same, why your work doesn't simply "speak for itself," and how photos, video, per...

Samantha McGuinness of Enabled Remodeler believes the best marketing doesn't happen behind a screen, it happens face to face. Drawing from years of building successful field marketing programs, Samantha shares why home shows, community events, and retail partnerships continue to outperform many digital marketing channels when done with the right strategy. She explains how qualifying homeowners through authentic conversations, rather than gimmicks or giveaways, leads to higher-qual...

Brigham Dickinson, founder of Power Selling Pros, believes most home service companies don't have a lead problem, they have a conversion problem. After experiencing the failure of his own business, Brigham discovered that success isn't about generating more phone calls; it's about creating trust from the very first conversation. He shares how customer service representatives, technicians, and sales professionals can transform ordinary interactions into lasting customer relationships by ...

What would you do if your top-selling rep was blowing everyone else out of the water, but something felt off? Most owners look the other way. The numbers are good. Why rock the boat? My guest on this week's Selling in the Dwelling did the hard thing. He dug deeper, found out his star performer was running unethical sales, and fired him. What happened next? Six record-breaking months in a row. Al Levi grew up in a family plumbing, heating, and cooling business on Long Island and spent decades...