When success comes in business, it’s natural to become overconfident. Roofers who understand the dangers of overconfidence are less likely to make critical mistakes that will reverse the progress of their business. Roofing Webmasters is a digital marketing agency for roofers, and we’ve helped hundreds of roofing contractors achieve business success. While most can capitalize off of this progress and continue its upwards trajectory, there are occasions where contractors get too big for their britches. They overestimate their financial security after a few big roofing jobs and start making poor financial decisions. We’ve even heard of roofers taking entire years off because of financial security. Once the cushion is gone, it’s challenging to re-establish yourself in the marketplace.
Roofers are far from the only business owners to engage in this kind of behavior. Every successful business has beneficiaries, but maintaining success can be just as difficult as achieving it in the first place. There are common threads between business owners who become reckless in their decision-making. And no, that doesn’t mean putting your life at risk (although we could tell you some stories about that too), but it means putting your business at risk. Marketing, in particular, is not something to suspend after starting a roofing business. It’s an ongoing process and must be executed year-round. That goes for up seasons and the highly discouraging down seasons for roofers. Even those who make great money (many are our clients) must continue to market their business to maintain that level of success. Check out these pitfalls of overconfidence:
Taking a Year Off
Commercial roofers will get big-paying jobs and feel like a million bucks, and there’s nothing wrong with celebrating your successes. We can help you get into commercial roofing if you’re currently in residential exclusively. But you must maintain a realistic perspective to ensure that success does not reverse course quickly. There have been confirmed cases of commercial roofers taking entire years off, thinking their business will be there for them when they get back. Not so fast. As you were taking an extended vacation and enjoying the fruits of your labor, another company in your service area was gaining ground and closing the gap on an industry you once dominated within your zip code. Taking a year off is a terrible idea for roofers who hope to continue their business in the future.
Buying Expensive Property
The first thing most newly rich roofers go for is a boat. They want to see a tangible representation of their success, and what better way to see it than on the water? Boats are a great way to celebrate your success. But don’t buy a yacht. Buy something within your price range, and that fits into the trajectory of your business growth. Again, you don’t want to be taking away from your roofing company as its ascending. You can halt its growth and distract you from the end goal of your business, which is to live a fabulous lifestyle over time, not just in spurts.
The other primary item roofing contractors go for is an expensive pickup truck. They want the biggest and fastest, and who can blame them? If you can afford it, go for it. But like with the boat example, don’t become consumed by your latest job. As a commercial roofer, you might have just finished a massive paying job because of great marketing and a lot of hard work. Just be mindful that a single job is not a signal for the new normal of your business and that to sustain success, you must keep after it over the long term.
Suspending Marketing Efforts Indefinitely
There’s a misnomer among some businesses, including roofing companies, that once you establish your company as a mainstay in its market, you can tamper down the processes that got you there. Cliche sayings talk about remembering where you came from, but it holds in the world of digital marketing. If you can remember a time when you had very few leads, no website, no social media, no phone calls, then you should make sure you are never in that position again. A suspension of your marketing endeavors will not allow you to Cadillac your way through roofing season. Instead, the status you worked for will begin to deteriorate and even reverse if you forgo marketing altogether.
Pricing Yourself Out of The Market
One high-paying job is not enough to keep you in that payment bracket for good. Sometimes commercial roofers will work on massive properties and decide that they will only work for that kind of money from now on. Limiting yourself is a dangerous way to do business. While big jobs come around their fair share of the time, resistance to more typical jobs can make the bigger ones less likely and less frequent. There is a tendency not to accept anything less than a job that was so valuable to you as a roofer, but that’s not the way the commercial roofing industry works. It’s not always ego that drives this attitude, but sometimes it is. The bottom line is this; to sustain success over time, you can’t become overconfident and stop accepting roofing jobs that don’t match your highest profit tier.
Good Problems To Have?
If some of these conflicts seem like good problems to have as a roofer, don’t hesitate to get in contact with Roofing Webmasters. As you’ve read and heard, the contractors making these decisions are making them based on success. Suppose you cannot even think about boats or trucks right now because of low call volume, lack of roofing leads, etc. We can turn that around for you. We are a top roofing authority in the SEO world and create custom websites for contractors and companies throughout the United States. The profits achieved from our services are meant to be enjoyed, but it’s also important to keep perspective on your roofing business so that you can continue to maintain that level of success.
