Stop Chasing Leads First

I see a lot of lighting business owners doing this backwards.

They want to grow, so what do they do?

More leads.

Facebook ads. Google. SEO. Direct mail. Referral partners. Whatever brings in another opportunity.

And listen—I love marketing.

But marketing is actually the third thing I would fix, not the first.

If I were building a landscape lighting business today, I'd focus on these three things, in this order:

1. Pricing

2. Sales

3. Marketing

Here's why.

1. Get Your Pricing Right

Before you spend another dollar on marketing, make sure your pricing is actually supporting the business you want to build.

And I'm not talking about calculating exactly how much wire you'll use or whether a project needs 17 connectors or 19.

I'm talking about building enough profit into your pricing to create the company you want.

One of the biggest mistakes I made when I had my lighting business was pricing based on what my company looked like today.

I didn't have an office manager.

I didn't have a shop.

I didn't have another crew.

So why would I price those things into my jobs?

Well…

Because eventually I wanted those things.

This is something I wish someone had taught me much earlier:

Price like who you want to be, not like who you are today.

Want an office manager?

A second crew?

Better trucks?

Better installers?

Better customer service?

More training?

More marketing?

Where does the money for all of that come from?

Your pricing.

Here's where it gets interesting.

Let's say your company is currently making a 10% profit. If you can raise your prices by 10% without increasing your expenses, you've just doubled your profit.

Sometimes the math is pretty cool.

2. Improve Your Sales Process

Now let's say you raise your prices and suddenly you're thinking:

"Ryan, I tried it. People aren't buying."

You might not have a pricing problem.

You might have a sales problem.

The good news?

Sales is a skill.

And skills can be developed.

Your clients don't necessarily care what something costs. They care about what it's worth to them.

There's a massive difference.

If you give someone a $15,000 proposal and they only see $8,000 worth of value, you've got a problem.

But if you give them a $15,000 proposal and they see $25,000 worth of value?

That's a completely different conversation.

So instead of immediately assuming your price is too high, ask yourself:

How can I increase the perceived value of what I'm offering?

Get better at communicating the transformation.

Get better at asking questions.

Get better at presenting your proposal.

Get better at overcoming objections.

Role-play.

Practice.

Improve.

Then move on to marketing.

3. Use Marketing to Amplify What's Working

Now you're ready to pour gas on the fire.

Because what happens if your pricing isn't working and your sales process isn't working—and then you spend $10,000 getting more leads?

You just paid $10,000 to discover that your pricing and sales process need work.

Marketing is an amplifier.

Before you amplify something, make sure it's worth amplifying.

Get the pricing right.

Get the sales process right.

Then start investing aggressively in generating more opportunities.

That's how you start building a machine instead of simply creating more work for yourself.

Start Working ON Your Business

Here's the challenge for this week:

Pick ONE area.

Don't try to fix your entire company today.

Block out one hour.

Just one.

Work ON your business instead of constantly working IN it.

Look at your pricing.

Role-play your sales process.

Audit your marketing.

Then do it again next week.

Eventually, that one hour becomes 90 minutes.

Then two hours.

Then maybe half a day.

Eventually, you have an entire day every week where you're not installing lights, putting out fires, or answering your phone.

You're actually being a business owner.

And that's the goal.

Because the whole reason you started this business wasn't to create yourself another job.

Build the machine.

Pricing → Sales → Marketing

In that order.

Even if leads are slow right now, don't wait for them to magically show up. Use the time to get better.

Because when the leads do come, you want to be ready to maximize every single opportunity.

Keep Moving Forward!

— Ryan Lee

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