Roofer MBA — 128 plays for the business side of a roofing company. Free to read, no account, nothing for sale. What this is →
Run the Same Visit Every Time
Module 9 · Sales & Leads · Play 2 of 14
The problem in one breath
Two homeowners call the same shop in the same week. One gets a man who walks the roof, mumbles something about flashing and drives off. The other gets ninety minutes of pressure at the kitchen table. Neither one knows what happens next, and both of them call somebody else.
Why it happens
The owner has run a thousand of these and does it well without thinking, so it never got written down. Then a second man starts running inspections and there is nothing to hand him but a ride-along and a shrug. He invents his own visit. So does the third one. Now the shop's front door is three different experiences, none of them repeatable, and when one of them stops closing nobody can say what changed — because nobody can say what it was supposed to be.
The play
- Book it into a window and say the window out loud. Morning or afternoon, not "sometime Tuesday." A homeowner who has taken time off work remembers exactly what you told them, and the visit is being graded before anyone gets on a ladder.
- Call before you leave the shop, with the ETA and their own words. Read back what they said when they booked — the stain over the back bedroom, the shingles in the yard after the wind. It takes fifteen seconds and it tells them a person read the notes instead of a name landing on a route.
- At the door, say what is about to happen before you do it. How long you will be up there, whether you are walking the roof or flying it, that you will come back down and tell them what you found, and when the written price will reach them. Say plainly that you are not selling anything today. The pressure they are braced for is the reason half of them are short with you at the door.
- Ask what they are trying to do with the house before you climb. How long they plan to stay. Whether they are fixing it to sell. What has been done to it before, and what somebody else has already told them. A man selling in eighteen months and a man who just buried his last mortgage payment need two different recommendations off the identical roof.
- Come back to the door and give them the verdict. What you found, what you would do about it, what you would leave alone, and what happens next. No price out of your mouth, no start date promised — the schedule owns start dates and the weather owns the schedule (Module 14, Play 5, "Sell a Start Date You Can Actually Hit"). If they push for a number, that is its own conversation (Play 5, "What to Say When They Ask What It'll Cost").
- Leave without asking for the job. The written estimate does the selling, the same day if you can manage it (Play 4, "One Price, Sent Today"). You do not need both spouses home, you do not need a signature at the table, and you do not need to wait them out. You need them to know exactly what you saw and exactly when the number lands.
Do this this week
Ride along on one inspection you did not run and time it against these six. Wherever your man went his own way, that is not a discipline problem — it is a line missing off the card.
The tool
The inspection visit card — one page, on the visor, in the order the visit happens.
THE INSPECTION VISIT
BEFORE YOU GO
Call with an ETA. Read back what they told us when they booked.
AT THE DOOR
How long I'll be up there. What I'm going to do.
I'll come down and tell you what I found.
Your written price reaches you [when]. I'm not selling you anything today.
BEFORE YOU CLIMB
How long do you plan to be in the house?
Fixing it up to sell, or staying put?
What's been done to this roof before?
What has anyone else told you about it?
BEFORE YOU LEAVE
What I found. What I'd do. What I'd leave alone.
What happens next, and when.
No price. No start date. No asking for the job.
If your crew is 1099
The inspection is not sub work and it never gets handed to the crew that installs. A sub who quotes at the door is pricing your job with his numbers and your name on it, and every promise he makes is one you have to keep. Your man runs the visit; the sub crew shows up after the deposit clears (Module 12, Play 1, "Your Crew Or His, Priced On One Real Job").
M9-02 · Run the Same Visit Every Time — Roofer MBA, https://roofermba.com/plays/sales-leads/run-the-same-visit-every-time
Take it with you
One email unlocks this and every other sheet and card on the site. The plays stay free.
Same fire
The phone rings but the jobs don't close
- M9-02the same visit every time — you’re here
- M9-03show them the roof
- M9-04one price, sent today
- M9-06the three things they push back on
Fixed this?
A visit that goes well and then goes quiet is not a closing problem — it is a follow-up problem, and it has its own play.
The fire right behind it is usually You sent the price and never heard back.