2164 - How Technology is Shaping the Trade Industry with Powerhouse Consulting Group's Jenny Benbrook

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1:05with us right now it's jenny benbrook jenny you are the founder and ceo at powerhouse consulting group your website is my powerhouse.group jenny it's great to have you so wonderful to be here josh thank you for the opportunity absolutely well listen before we kind of talk about powerhouse consulting group. I'd love to, what have you been into lately? And from a fun perspective, like movies, music, TV shows, hobbies, books, anything like that? Well, funny, you should ask my, my hobby, my only hobby right now is playing Uber driver to my children who are, who are pre-teen age and very active in athletics and after-school curricular.

1:54So outside of work, my entertainment and true joy is watching my children blossom and do the things that they love. But it also means I don't have much of a social life or free time. But then there's the other moms and dads that are out there. What are your kids doing? What do they do? So our daughter, our daughter is a basketball player. She is a select ball. She's quite the athlete. And our son is an aspiring MLB player. And so they are both on select teams, which is quite an honor. Yes. Quite a commitment. And they're incredibly dedicated. And so my husband and I find so much joy in the season of our life.

2:38Although we joke that we have no time and we're Uber drivers. It truly is the best to watching your children do what they love. If you were to stereotype basketball moms or baseball moms, like, are there any common like behavioral or just like things that you observe? Like, yeah, we're all a little dot, dot, dot. I will say I will go on the record saying baseball moms are so much more aggressive than basketball moms. Really? Yes. basketball moms are chill they cheer their kids on baseball moms are getting in fights with the umpires that is something well can i i'll just say as someone who has been through that phase and knows exactly what you're talking about um yes it could especially if they're on select teams and that's sort of that's really really exciting you know and hopefully that leads to some scholarships and so forth.

3:39And that's really cool. Yeah, I know. Fingers crossed, right? Yeah. Well, Jenny, tell us about your work with Powerhouse Group. Again, your website to our friend that's listening is mypowerhouse.group. Yeah. Thank you for asking. So Powerhouse is a software consulting firm with a specialty focus in serving the trades industry. Trades industry being home services, interior services like mechanical, your HVAC contractors, electrical, plumbing, or exterior services. So these are roofing, windows, siding, garage doors, etc. This is a very unique industry for a few different reasons. One, it's predominantly people-driven.

4:27It's a service-based industry. And two, we were a bit later to adopt technology. So when you look at the industry as a whole, leveraging software to operationalize their businesses has really only been a concept for the past 10 years or so. Prior to that, everybody can probably relate to your HVAC technician coming to your house and providing you with a handwritten estimate. It's really only within the past 10 years or so that we're seeing these contractors adopt digital sources to provide a more enhanced customer experience. And what that meant for the industry was a big shift in their operations, their workflows, change management, things that are really difficult for any business to adopt, but especially contractor businesses that are so people-focused.

5:23And so having built my career in the industry, I had a front row seat to the advent of technology and was able to quickly realize a need in the market for proper implementation guidance and support for these software platforms, as well as somebody to provide ongoing management to ensure that the contractors are getting most started these tools. So that's where Powerhouse came from. You know, we are recording this in March and it's Women's History Month. And I would be remiss if I didn't ask, because, you know, more than 50 % of our audience, our listeners, our clients are just amazing female leaders.

6:07You are, point this out, you are in kind of a historically male dominated space. Would you mind sharing to other women who are making their way in maybe a more traditional, you know, kind of male dominated space? Like, what are some lessons that you've learned or maybe just other insights that you might share to other women that are also kind of blazing some trails? Oh, that's such a great question. And we've seen females in our industry really shine as of recent. There are several trade organizations that exist today that did not exist when I started in the industry that really empower women to have a voice, to develop core competencies or key leadership skills that will help them to escalate their careers in this male-dominated space.

7:03For me personally, I've seen quite a change over the years where women were not contractor owners. There were very few women certainly were not at the top of organizations in the trades industry. Whereas today we see a champion behind women and elevating their expertise. You know, women bring a special duality to the work environment, which is operating on intuition and instinct, but also being grounded in knowledge and training. And so it's a really incredible mix that we're able to offer, bringing that emotional intelligence aspect into it. So my advice for women is own that. Be proud of it.

7:56Really lean into your natural strengths because they serve organizations very well. And confidence is the key to success in any industry, but especially in the male-dominated industry. Yeah, yeah. Well, if you could, for those of us who aren't working in the trades space, would you mind sharing just, and you've already pointed out some trends, I'm so grateful you have. But for those of us who are just kind of casual observers of that industry, can you share maybe some high-level observations and general trends that you've seen, particularly over the past six to 12 months, that is kind of a headline?

8:37People should know what's going on. the technology landscape, I think, would be the most relevant in our industry. This is something that we have focused on quite heavily here at Powerhouse, which is scaling beyond primary FSM, which is your field service management software implementation, and really looking at the entire ecosystem that's now available to contractors to operationalize their businesses. So we have their FSM, as I mentioned, that's considered an ERP. It's the all-in-one software that will run a business, everything from your financials to your inventory management to call booking and dispatching.

9:25However, there are new technologies, integration partners that work with these primary FSNs to enhance specific functions or departments. This is where we're starting to see almost an overwhelm in the market with how many options are there and an unintentional plan on how they're adopting, how contractors are adopting and implementing all of these solutions. So what we see is an eagerness to leverage technology to fully run or automate a business, but without a dedicated plan or a vision in place on how all of the tools will work together. And so this is a really big trend that I think we're starting to see and a problem that is starting to have a definition put to it and an opportunity for another solution on what that tech stack planning will look like.

10:24I draw a parallel to the advent of digital marketing in our industry. So about 20 years ago, I started in the trades on the marketing side, and this was before digital marketing was well known. And it certainly hadn't reached small businesses the way it's so prevalent today. So what we saw was a shift in how contractors had to run the marketing for their business. Historically, with traditional marketing, they could place an ad in the yellow pages. Their office manager could do that, or even the owner operator could do that. And it was quite transactional. However, when we saw digital marketing enter the market, in order for a contractor to be competitive, they had to now adopt an SEO strategy.

11:20And so your audience, I'm sure, knows SEO very well. Most small business owners do because it became a necessary evil to keep up with competition in the market and to serve customers where their expectations were. So what that meant for a contractor was there was a new level of expertise that they had to acquire in order to run these marketing campaigns. Typically, that's not something that a owner operator has expertise on or office managers or service managers. And so what happened in the industry was contractors had to seek outside support and resources to implement these complex marketing plans.

12:07So there was the rise of the digital marketing agency. We're seeing that now, let's say 20 years later or so, the same pattern with technology. Technology is incredibly complex. It requires There's a certain level of subject matter expertise to ensure that you know which technology to choose, how to implement it, who will manage it, how to read the data that you get from these platforms. And seldom is that something that contractors or small business owners have the internal resources to manage. And so the shift in the market that we're seeing is for a contractor to be very competitive and to intentionally adopt a tech stack, they are now seeking outside support, outsourcing that subject matter expertise on behalf of their business.

13:06Yeah. Jenny, your website is mypowerhouse.group. And so for a friend that's listening, you know, go ahead and follow along right now. But, you know, very specifically, you know, again, you talked a little bit about consulting that you do. But if there's anything more that you want to make sure that folks understand about the problems that you solve, namely, I'm thinking of someone that might be listening right now. And, you know, if you can kind of point out their pain points and like how you fix that, that would be great. Also, too, you know, what resource like what are their next steps in terms of maybe going to your website resources that you offer or maybe ultimately just grabbing a call?

13:47Yeah, I would be happy to describe the type of services that we provide, both for the trades industry, but also to provide insight to your listeners outside of the trades industry, because technology adoption is necessary for any business. And I'll draw an example. We implemented a new HR software here at Powerhouse last year. We migrated from our old software to a new and essentially went through the same process that our actual clients go through that we provide consulting services on. However, going through it directly as the business owner on our own one-on-one with myself and my partner and the new HR software, we had no intermediary to ensure that we knew the proper questions to ask, that we knew the pain points that we might face or which capabilities this software had that could meet our unique needs.

14:53Ultimately, we didn't know what we didn't know, which is what a lot of contractors tell us when they're adopting their primary FSM. The beauty is we know, we understand that software. We've been through implementation hundreds of times. And so we can not only manage the implementation project, but we can help to educate a contractor on what to expect, which parts of the software will they want to look into that are relevant to their business? What are some of the unknown landmines or roadblocks that they might run into in migrating to this new software? And so speaking from direct experience, it is completely beneficial to have that third party intermediary who can help educate you or bridge the gap between the software company and your business.

15:48Software companies provide a really excellent product. They are SaaS-based business models, and they invest very heavily in R &D and product development. However, customer support, typically on implementation and beyond, is very generic. So they're giving you enough information to get the product implemented, but not really going through custom workflows or nuances in your business that may be relevant. And so that's where bringing in a third-party expert can really help enhance implementation, ensuring that you're set up for success upon go live, and also that you have the proper amount of knowledge and training, not only for yourself as the owner operator, but for your teams who are using the software on a day-to-day basis themselves.

16:43So that's, let's call it customer bucket number one, those that are in implementation phase. So they need to move to this software. They bring us on as an expert to help ensure that they do it correctly. That results in a tremendous amount of increased efficiency, as well as team adoption. So it's that change management piece. Yeah. Jenny Benbrook, founder, CEO, Powerhouse Consulting Group, your website, mypowerhouse.group. Jenny's been a great conversation. Thank you for joining us. Thank you.

17:46empowering one another as thoughtful leaders. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this program, if you're looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, and clients, I have had private conversations with over 2 ,000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from. I've got a free video that you can watch right now with no opt-in or email required where I'm gonna share the exact steps necessary to be 100 % inbound in your industry over the next six to eight months with no spam, no ads, and no sales. What I teach has worked for me for more than 15 years and has helped me create eight figures in revenue for my own companies.

18:28Just head to upmyinfluence.com and watch my free class on how to create endless high-ticket sales appointments. Make sure to hit subscribe so that tomorrow morning, that's right, seven days a week, you are going to be inspired and motivated to succeed. I promise to bring positivity and inspiration to you for around 15 minutes every single day. Thanks for listening. And thank you for being a part of the Thoughtful Entrepreneur Movement.