Cold Open: Contribution Drives Compensation

Ty Cobb Backer 0:00

Alrighty, episode 342. Where is our industry heading next? We have a kind of a boom system that either we're gonna push you up, we're gonna push you out. I don't want to be around five other people that are pushing themselves to 16. That isn't about taking, but giving value first. Compensation follows contribution always. This is true. That's the truth. Every year this is our story. We share with you our journey, we share with you our scars. Please welcome your host, Ty Cobb Backer. Hey,

Welcome And Guest Intro

Ty Cobb Backer 0:33

what welcome back everybody to Behind the Tool Belt, where we dive into stories, strategies, innovations shaping our trades today. I am your host, Ty Backer, and today's episode is going to be a banger. I've got an amazing guest on the show who has been on the show before, Travis, who is the president and CEO of Roofil. If you haven't heard of Roofle yet, they're changing the way I believe contractors approach sales, pricing, and the entire, I would say, customer experience. And since the last time that he's been on the show, I know there's been a lot that has evolved. And today we're going to try to dig into what's new, what's working, and where the industry he thinks might be heading next. So welcome, Travis Jarbago, to behind the tool belt. How you doing, brother? Hey, good, Ty. How are you doing? Uh good.

Travis Harvego 1:31

Thanks for having me. Good to be on again. It's been a minute. Let me tell you that. It's been a minute for sure. So I was I was fearing the question you're going to ask as far as what has changed since the last time you've been on, because it's been so dang long that it would take us two hours to get through uh, you know, what exactly every single detail that has changed. But glad to be back on and glad to always catch up.

Ty Cobb Backer 1:49

No doubt, no doubt, man. That's it's always a pleasure when we get together. It's always a pleasure having you on the show. And you know, uh we've known each other for for the past couple of years, and I want to say you guys were one of our industry guests to actually do an in-studio live session with with us on Behind the Tool Belt. And it was in the hundreds back then, like it was a hundred and something. 183 when they when you guys drove down, you and Mike drove down here. Back then, Baker Baker was our co-host. He he every now and then makes a surprise cameo. He's still with us, he's still here, he's still rocking. But you guys have since then a lot has changed with with Rufal. And and I know you don't have the time to tell us everything that has changed with it, but I would say over the past six months, what what would you say are some of the maybe the the the biggest changes that that have has happened with Rufal?

Roofle Acquired By SalesRabbit

Travis Harvego 2:54

Well, obviously, I think the biggest change of the last six months is obviously we were acquired, right? So we were acquired by Sales Rabbit. So I think that's the biggest one that was announced in January. It was really kind of the bigger one, that now we're part of kind of a bigger entity, right? And I think that that's everybody's goal and dream when they do a startup when they have an idea, right? And it's like 0.01% of you know entrepreneurs that really make do a startup, right, actually get acquired, right? And I think that that's something that is obviously a big milestone to where it's one of my most amazing accomplishments that have been able to be done, because obviously you can't do it alone, right? Anyone knows that you can't do this alone. You got to build an amazing team, you gotta have an amazing culture, you got to have amazing vision, right? To keep everything aligned to be able to get to a point to where somebody even wants to look at your business and be able to acquire in your business, right? And so, like that was kind of my experience really over the last, you know, 12 months prior to that was basically going through the acquisition process. And if nobody's been through it, let me tell you about it because it will just stress your life out in a lot of different ways. It will test you mentally, emotionally, physically as you go through that process of you know, basically being looked at by multiple different companies as far as digging so deep into your business and deep into you and to your employees. And, you know, it's just it makes your mind go crazy alongside also still running the business. Let's not forget about that, right? As you're going through a process, we have to give all this information, right, and going through all these interviews about your business and your vision and things like that. But you also have to still run the business on the day-to-day to make sure that that's still being healthy because at any point in time the business drops off, then it's not as healthy as it was when they started looking at you, right? So that still has to maintain growth, right? A good percentage of growth rate, right? On top of all of a sudden doing all these other things, you know, on top of it, right? So that's a whole nother experience in itself that, you know, I do talk to a lot of people about that experience if they are looking to go through it, what to expect as you go through it. Like not only that, preparing preparing your family, right, your wife, your employees, like what is going to be happening as you go through this process, you know, because it is going to be a very strenuous process, right? That you're going to endure on top of also running the business. Because in a lot of cases, most people can't step away 100% from the business while going through that process, right? So that's something I've been talking about a lot of, you know, other people about that the last six months, as that's now been over, obviously. And I can share my experience to hopefully pass it on to them so that they can be ready for it whenever happens to them, or if they are going through it, or all the expectations as far as they go through that part of it. But, you know, so that's you know, a big obviously, you know, win and celebration part for myself and my team as far as getting to that point, you know, and have it, and then obviously now we're now into it as far as now obviously being a part of a big redity, right? Which means obviously a lot of things, right? Bigger company, you go from like 36 employees that we're at, or yeah, 36 employees we had a roofful at that time to now, you know, 200, almost 300 employees, right? Come convectively, you know, as a unit, right? So that's a big change, right? You have a lot more people, a lot more hands, a lot more things that are going on, right, at the same time, but you also have more resources, right? Compared to me in a startup, we have limited resources, multiple hats everyone is wearing, you know, compared to wearing now, you rarely wear one hat, you know, that everyone's able to wear and just really kind of really hyper-focused on really what their duties are, you know, as a whole, right? So it allows us now, obviously, in the vision, you know, that that I saw and seen is it allows us to do to build bigger, better things, quicker, faster things, you know, together, right? And you know, it also allows our people to be more focused on one thing, to build those things quicker, better, faster. And also really even making a lot of our employees be kind of a little bit more comfortable with their position rather than just having to do multiple different things and not really knowing what was gonna happen when they showed up to work because they could be shifting 10 different ways. And so now when they show up, they kind of know exactly what they're gonna be doing and they're hyper-focused at being able to do that. And then also giving them a lot of people, you know, an organization got cool promotions or cool new places that they were placed based on their expertise that they never would have been able to get outside of you know joining us as a startup, right? A lot of people joined us, believed in us as a startup, you know, whether they were employee number five or employee number 20, right? They're like, okay, it's a startup, we don't know where it's gonna go, could fail at any moment in time, who knows? Startups are always risky, right? And you know, now being able to give them roles and opportunities that they have now, where it's like, wow, I never would have dreamed of having this role that I have now because I was given more opportunity with a larger company, right? So a lot has been happening, you know, over the last, you know, six months. And I've been learning a ton, obviously, as other leaders in the organization that I'm learning from, you know, that are very smart individuals, you know, that I get to work with, you know, on a daily basis and learning from them and their experiences, uh, you know, as far as you know, taking you know, other companies as startups and you know, taking them to $50 million to $100 million companies, and they've been there, done that multiple times in multiple different areas. And so, you know, I get to learn from them, you know, as well. So a lot is going on, a lot of exciting things, you know, that are that are happening, you know, uh overall, and you know, a bigger part of the industry now as a whole, right? And so that's really what I'm focused on now is they've been able to bring bigger, bigger, better technology right to our industry that I love and care about deeply. You know, I love this industry. I'm truly passionate about this industry, you know, as a whole, because obviously I was a contractor for many years and you know, care about, you know, trying to improve, you know, the the lifestyle of a contractor, but also trying to improve their business at the same time.

Ty Cobb Backer 8:04

So

Leading Through Acquisition Anxiety

Ty Cobb Backer 8:05

right on, right on. You answered a lot of my questions, but the one thing that popped in my head is that I could imagine the the fear that not only you experience, but but your team members walk us through that transition and the doubt. Because I I I would imagine if I went to sell TC Backer today, there would be a lot of fear of like, oh my God, so much is gonna change, and they're gonna be so fixated on like the negative things that might change, and and a lot of people are fearful that they might lose their job, and then the change is gonna become entirely too corporate because essentially it was like you and Mike, you know, were like the the figureheads of it, and you guys are amazing people to work for. I mean, you're just amazing human beings in general, and I can only imagine working for you how amazing that would be. So walk us through that that that first transition because it's been a couple months now. So I'm I'm assuming people were probably settling in, like you had mentioned, that they got new roles, new titles, and and get to work with new people. So let's talk about that that fear and that that change, that transition. How how how was that?

Travis Harvego 9:12

Yeah, that's yeah, that's always a tough one, right? And you want to reassure obviously your employees, right, that you know, this change is obviously gonna be a change, no doubt about it, right? Like it's going to be a change. I'm not gonna hide that from you, right? There are gonna be changes. It's not small startup ran by myself and making all the calls and decisions anymore, right? So there's gonna be changes, right? There's gonna be chain of command, there's gonna be these things that you join a larger company that's now essentially right a corporation, right? Like there is gonna be changes, right? But you know, just assuring them for as far as like what these changes look like and trying to be as transparent as you possibly can be, as much as you can be, keeping them updated about what is gonna happen, where it's gonna go. We assure you that everyone here is going to have a role, right? And that was reassured to everybody, and they saw that, right? As the the process, you know, happened, right? They believed in what I was telling them and how it was gonna look. Like, I don't know 100%, I don't know where all you are gonna be gonna be placed. They're gonna evaluate our talents and say they fit more in this role, and it's where they want to be anyway. So we're gonna move them. So everyone is gonna be evaluated, but as sure that everyone is going to have a place. Now, I think that there's a lot of employees that look at it and say, I don't belong for into a corporation. And that's fair, right? There's a lot of people that say, I want to work for small startups or small mom pops, small business. That's where I fit, that's just where I want to be. And that's fair, right? And that's totally fair. And we were transparent as far as what they could expect. And some of them, you know, a couple of them didn't make the choice to say, you know what, I'm not going to continue into this transaction, or at some point I will exit after the transaction because I just know that I will not be a good fit there. And it's not really what I want to do, right? They were able to make that decision based on the information that we were gate, we were giving them because I wanted to be transparent. Yeah, I didn't want to lose anybody, right? I wanted everybody to come with, right? I want everyone to come into the new venture and the new ride and be part of a bigger, better thing. But, you know, I was very transparent. I think that that's the best thing that you could possibly do so they knew what they were getting into. And so, you know, I think that that's where the transit transition happened. You know, obviously when we went into it, everyone was evaluated as far as like, you know, what they like, you know, what they're doing, you know, what they want to do, what their strong suits are, you know, those types of things. And then, you know, I would say basically three, four months in, people started to get moved. You know, it's probably a three, four months ish process to where we were just operating by ourselves, doing our own thing as it was. But then once people started to really get moved and started to shift around, and that's when those other people said, I don't think I really, this is not for me. They exited and said, That don't move me. Like, I don't want to be on this team. Like, I'm actually gonna exit, you know, here's when I'm gonna leave, whatever it may be. And what they thought that they thought was the case, they had time to evaluate it, right? Because it wasn't just like, hey, this transaction happened and they were just gone, right? They got to evaluate it, they got to see as far as what it was gonna be like, they got to meet their new team members, their new team leaders, they got to see those things, and then you know, they the people that thought they would, they wouldn't fit, which I thought also they wouldn't fit either either. I just know them very deeply and personally and on all these different levels. I just I just knew of them, and but they were open and honest with me about it, which is I appreciated. So I could you know expect that. And so people have been moved, they went on new teams, people again who wanted to be like a sole developer, right? They could never do that before. It was hard to get in, right? Well, they got moved to the developer roles and engineering roles, right? They got to move to all these different places they wanted to go. They got moved to those teams and got to do those jobs, and so I think the trans the transition and the move of people happened as smooth as I possibly could, just because I was as transparent as I possibly could be and reassured them as far as this is what I know, this is what you can expect. And for 98% of the situations, it happened and went down exactly how I explained it and how I thought it was going to be. And so I think that's where they just felt like, okay, I'm comfortable with it and I feel good with it, and this is just how it's gonna go. And again, some people will say that's probably not for me. I understand what this is gonna be, probably not for me, and that's just you know the way it goes. And as a business, right? And the best movement for the business was doing something like this overall for the long term, right? Because I'm looking at this from another 10, 15, 20 years down the road, not just you know, next year or the next six months, right? And so is it best for the business? And unfortunately, that was the the change the business needed overall, and unfortunately, some employees this may not come with a for the ride, so yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure.

Ty Cobb Backer 13:25

You know, and it it I feel like I want to say, but I don't have much experience. I mean, I've heard a lot of horror stories when when companies get acquired, but it it it sounds like it sounds like it was a very smooth transition. And like you said, I believe because of the transparency and the time that you allowed everyone to, you know, your team to evaluate it, and then the time that it took for the the the acquisition, the team that it acquired Ruffle, it took them you know, three, four months to also evaluate. And it sounds like you kind of gave both parties, both parties had enough time to evaluate to see if it was a good fit, if it wasn't gonna be a good fit. But what would you say your biggest pushback was from your teen?

Protecting Culture Inside A Corporation

Travis Harvego 14:14

The biggest pushback is obviously the the culture that we built here. And again, like Ruffle had the most amazing culture, right? We built the most amazing culture like that I've ever seen. Everyone always says your culture there is incredible, right? And again, that's something that you can't mandate in a business and say, I'm making this business, and the culture is gonna be like this. The culture is formed by the people, right? Like the people are the ones that formed the culture, and the way that we were able to basically form these bonds and to almost be like family. And obviously, we were on the road, what 82 events we did last year or something like that, and a lot of those people came with us, and we just we had this bond, right? And then we just kind of naturally developed like this amazing culture where everyone was there for each other, and you know, we were kind of on this send it right mentality to where like I believed in in my employees, right? And I empowered them to make a lot of decisions. And yes, they were gonna make mistakes, but every time they made a mistake, we went through it, we figured out why the mistake was made, and you know, they never really did it again, right? But that's how we I was able to empower them to allow them to say, okay, they ran it by me, and I would say send it, right? That's what you want to do, go ahead and do it. So we had this mentality of how we're able to get so many things done so quickly and so efficiently compared to most companies, just because I empowered so many people to make those decisions, and it wasn't a bottleneck of run it by me or run it by this or run it by this and how to do that. It wasn't like that, right? So I think that was their biggest fear, knowing they were going into a corporation to where there's gonna be a chain of command, right? There's gonna be certain protocols before you can make a decision and before you can deploy certain changes and things like that. I think that was kind of the biggest thing because a lot of those employees came from other companies, right? And had worked other places, and they're like, this company is like no other. Working for Ruffle has been like no other company I've worked for before. It's just like everyone trusts each other, everyone makes the right moves, we make the right decisions, we make amazing things happen, things move quickly, they move fast, so it's always like fast pace, which is always enjoyable that things are moving so quickly and so many changes are happening. And I think that was really their biggest fear is like we're gonna lose this amazing type of culture, right? That we built here. Obviously, we're gonna we're gonna lose that part of it. I think that was like the biggest piece. Aside, and it's kind of crazy because most people you would think like they would be worried about themselves independently. Don't get me wrong, they were. Am I gonna have a job? Am I gonna have a place, right? But aside from that, it was always well, what about the culture, right? What about what we built here, right? And and and how is that gonna look and how is this gonna feel? And how is that how's you know? And so I think that was really kind of one of the biggest concerns that was brought up to me was the culture that was built here.

Ty Cobb Backer 16:42

That makes sense. That's huge. I mean, because I think that's why a lot of people have stuck around here, was because of our culture. You know, and it's not even necessarily about the money and you know how much they make, it's that they like you said, you had in you empowered them, you gave them purpose. And would you say that that that the the cultures have meshed well?

[Ad] Leadership Lessons From The Great Books

Travis Harvego 17:44

You know, obviously, at at first it was like they they they saw us as kind of like a band of misfits, right?

(Cont.) Protecting Culture Inside A Corporation

Travis Harvego 17:52

And which we are fine, yes, that's us. Yeah, we're raising our hands, right? But as they've slowly been able to see over time, right, as far as like that part of it, it has slowly become more and more adopted to where it's become like easily more accepted. Like, I like how they do things, I like how they did things. And more and more of those things have been able to become adopted at first. Obviously, it was very much like, whoa, whoa, you guys are coming off very fast. You're trying to make decisions very fast, right? And you're trying to like make all these moves, and we don't operate like that quite like here. So there's a lot of things that obviously we can't do, right? But there's a lot of things that we can do as far as having the fun that we have, right? And bringing that culture piece into it that we do to be able to bring the fun back in the company. And that's a lot of what we hear as far as Ruffles been able to bring the fun, right, back into this company, right? The interest, the fun of wanting to be here and talk to other employees and have you know more fun on a daily basis. I think we've really been able to bring a lot of those things in, but I can't tell everyone that they can expect that to happen right away, right? To where it's just like they're just gonna naturally accept these things. But from my experience, now there's two different types of acquisition, right? I was fortunate to be able to be a part of a contractor acquisition to see that side of it, and now a software acquisition. So I've kind of seen both sides and they're very different from each other. They're very, very different from each other and how it's done. And I think that again, you know, I think at least in the software space is that uh at least all the companies that we talk to, they've been there done this for many years, many times. It's just maybe it's in a different industry, but it's been repeatedly done, especially in software, to where it's like they have it kind of figured out from what I've kind of seen in the construction world, not necessarily have everything figured out, necessarily as far as like they've been there, they've done this in the space. Here's the blueprint, right? Because like we were presented multiple different blueprints about like what they're gonna do, what the plan is, how this is gonna work, how this is gonna flow, what the execution is gonna be like, to where we necessarily wasn't really like that in contracting. So I would say that the two were kind of very, very different from each other as far as how the acquisition actually went down.

Ty Cobb Backer 19:56

Yeah. Well, I guess have you guys been able to rub off on them at all?

Travis Harvego 20:02

Yeah, I would say, yeah, yeah, for sure. Definitely have been able to. Yeah, I mean, I would imagine you're gonna be able to find your people, right? That kind of like have it in them, right? To like take that stuff in, right, and and feed off of it. But you're always gonna have some people that are like, no, that's not my style. No, I'm not feeding into that. No, that's not how I operate. No, I'm very much I show up to work, I'm focused, focused on my work, and then I get out of here, right? And that's how I want to be is heads down, right? So I think that some people you're never gonna be able to get to kind of open up and in and enjoy some of the day-to-day, I don't want to say shenanigans, right? But some of the things, you know, that we do to keep the interest and the energy and the excitement going, right? Those types of things. But I think that, you know, that's you're just not necessarily, and that's where like when we hired people, right? And we were very fortunate that when we went to hire, most of it was all by referrals, people that wanted to work here. I want to be a part of it, right? We've interviewed them and like that they're gonna be a great fit for our culture, right? And obviously, as you come into a larger organization, they obviously didn't hire that way. So you're gonna have some people this way, some people that way. So I would definitely say that there's a there's a decent sized group, right? That we've been able to kind of rub those pieces into there and to be able to bring that fun back. And we've seen it uh as far as people saying, hey, you know, we want to bring this back. We had this years ago at Sales Rabbit, you know, when we were a startup, we see Rufals doing it. Like, let's bring this back, let's bring this back again, let's do this again. So we've seen things that they've been able to bring back to instill more of kind of like that culture type piece to bring people kind of closer together and also have fun while also getting work done, also.

Ty Cobb Backer 21:31

Yeah, yeah. I found the bigger you get, the the harder it is to keep that that fun type of culture, fun while still getting a lot of stuff done. And and you know, when you walk into a larger corporation like Sales Rabbit, you know, it's it's it's kind of hard, it's not as close knit, it's not as intimate as as Rufal was when Rufel met, you know, sales Rabbit. So I would imagine there was probably a quite a bit of a clash there for a minute and the fear and everything like that. So I guess changing changing gears here a little bit, what what do you where do you see the future of of Rufal?

What’s Next For Roofle Tech

Travis Harvego 22:08

Yeah, so I mean again, the future future here is obviously looking, you know, pretty, pretty bright overall. And obviously now we got Sales Rabbit and obviously RoofLink's a part of it as well, and now obviously Roofall, you know, right? So we got three different companies right coming together, right? So we got three different forces, you know, being able to work together to be able to put it put together some pretty amazing technology. And here in about a couple of months, I'll be able to talk more, you know, about some pretty cool new features, some new releases. But I'll tell you right now, we've been working on some pretty cool stuff with some lot of smart, smart individuals here. Even in the development tech engineering space, you know, that we now have access to, right? And be able to work with alongside with, you know, aside from obviously, you know, building out some cool new things, obviously for Ruffle alone, right? But we want to be able to work together with the other companies, right, that we're a part of, right, to release some really, really cool technology that will help streamline everyone's business, right? And be able to make their business easier, right? And even bringing some new, cool, innovative technology that no one's ever seen before to the industry that people will be like, just like we did, you know, three, four years ago, right? When we came to the industry, as far as it being a new cool concept, we got some pretty cool new things coming as far as like it's a new concept, right, to the industry. And that's always what I've always been about is innovation and bringing cool new things to the industry that you know should be adopted, whether it's now or will be adopted in the near future, right? And always talking to contractors because you're always gonna have these early adopters, right, that think that way as well and say, hey, I can add this piece to my business and can and help be a part of the revenue driver to my business. Yeah, it's not gonna be the full piece of my business, but it's gonna be a portion, right? That I can look at when I look at my PL and look at my weekly sales or monthly sales or marketing or whatever and say, hey, this is a piece of my business, right? So we're gonna have some cool new things. Again, I can't go into detail on them as of yet, but here in the very near future, I'd be able to talk about some really cool new things. And uh, I'm pretty excited about it.

Ty Cobb Backer 23:58

No, that's good, that's great. No, we can leave it at that. I'm sure we'll find out sooner, sooner than later. But you know, you were talking about you know, contractors uh adopting things early, which made me led me to think about like what do you where do you see most contractors making mistakes today in their business?

Travis Harvego 24:17

Yeah, it's still it really comes down to just a lot of contracts, especially now, like them just not really understanding their numbers, right? And

The Contractor Mistake: Not Knowing Numbers

Travis Harvego 24:24

it's still shocking to me that we ask on a regular basis, a daily basis, right? They sign up for technology and they say, what's your pricing per square, right? Like it's a basic price, and they have no idea, they have no clue on what they should be charging a customer per square. It's like, how are you in business if you don't even know what to charge, right? And again, also guys work on insurance proceeds, right? Insurance dictates the price or whatever it may be, but let's even funnel it all the way back, right? To even understanding like their marketing dollars. Like, how much are you spending a month marketing, right? And what is your cost per lead, right? What is your cost per sale, right? And boiling it down to that to even understand they're just throwing 20 to 30 to $50,000 a month at marketing, and they're not even sure what the return is on that. They couldn't even tell you what their cost is on it, right? And it's just like, how can you be able to streamline and predict your business in a situation of like we get into a situation where there's no storms, economy gets terrible, right? All these situations, like, how are you gonna predict your business about like how is it going to perform when you get into those situations, right? And be able to budget accordingly to where all of a sudden we've seen it too many times, like, I'm out of money this month. It's like you didn't know this was coming. No, I'm shocked, right? Like, how are you shocked that you also don't have money to pay payroll, pay this, pay this? It's like they just don't watch and just don't know, right? And it's it's because this industry, and as I know, you can get into it quickly. The beared entry in most cases is very low. You can make a lot of money very, very quickly, and they just watch the watch the cash in their bank account, right, accumulate over time, but it dwindles as fast as it accumulates, right? And if you don't have something in place to be able to say, we're gonna spend this much money per month, if we spend this much money per month, we should generate this many leads. If we run this many leads, we're gonna close this many deals, which equals this much revenue, this much profit, right? It's a mathematical equation in most cases, right? If they're able to dial that in, but say they can predict in most cases what their revenue is gonna be and what their profit's gonna be, right? And there's just so many of them out there that are just like don't have those things figured out, right? But I attribute it to obviously insurance contractors getting in because of the insurance proceeds game, right? And that part of it to where it's like, I don't need to know that information, right? I just go out and sign a bunch of deals, make a bunch of money, we'll do it all over again next year, right? But it's like if you're trying to run a sustainable business, what if it doesn't happen next year? What if there is no storm? What if there is no insurance events, right? What are you gonna do then? Right. And I think in most cases, these businesses need to think about if you're gonna build a business again, it's like, why'd you start a business? In most cases, two reasons, right? To sell it or pass it down to somebody else, right? Like that's aside from I just want to work for myself, right? But in the long-term vision, right? What is the plan? Well, you have to think outside of what if this these things were to happen, how am I gonna make sure I maintain right this business, right? And so that's still which still shocks me to this day that so many contractors don't know what those are.

Ty Cobb Backer 27:14

Yeah, for sure. We we hear that a lot and we see that a lot. It it I guess it's not surprising if you don't have if if you know, if you're working for somebody and you decide to start your own business, I mean that's those aren't the numbers, those aren't the things that that are visible to you as as an employee, someplace like that, to try to figure those things out, unless it's big enough and they're having meetings and everything is fully transparent. So I can I can see why, especially in our industry, how people wouldn't know their numbers. But do you does any of your software help contractors with with any of that? Does you know, would Rufu anything that Sales Rabbit provides or RoofLink will that help facilitate, make things trackable for them?

Travis Harvego 27:57

I mean, yes, sort of, right? And you know, that's obviously again, knowing that, like that's obviously like my long-term right goal and vision, right? Is to basically be able to help contractors like that. Yeah, so this piece is there right now that basically say, like, with this software, you paid this much money a month or this much per the year, right, to have it. Here's what your, you know, your your cost is, you know, to have it. And then also here's what your conversion rate is. Here's how many leads you've been able to get, here's how many you've been able to set, right? So you can kind of figure that out, right? That part of it, right? But I think obviously holistically, right, when we're able to connect all these pieces together, right? We can track it from start to finish, right? You you you you paid this much for it, and then you're able to track how many conversions, how many leads, how many sales, right? Now track how many sales you had. Now, now be able to track the closed job, right? All the way to the end, right? So I think that's an important piece that you know needs to be had for contractors to be able to have those pieces of it. So currently, right now, yes, we have a portion of it, right? But my long-term goal would be to have all of it, right? For contractors, be able to help them right understand what that is so that they can see it, they can forecast it, right? And even try to like help predict their business so that they don't go out of business, right? Because what is it now? Like 80% of contractors go to business in the first two years. Like, why can't we get that number to be 50% at least, right? Or it's like, okay, the numbers are much better to where it's half of them in the last and in the next not 80%. That's a crazy number to think about that. When you start a business, 80% of you are gonna go out of business in the first two years, right?

Ty Cobb Backer 29:26

It's a lot, yeah. For sure. No, we we we talk about that. We have talked about that a lot on this show. My honestly, when I asked you that question, I thought for sure you were gonna say not implementing AI. So I guess it leads me to a different question here. Where where do you see AI playing a big part in in our industry?

Travis Harvego 29:47

I see it playing a huge part in our industry every single

AI In Roofing Software And Ops

Travis Harvego 29:50

day, like a huge part of it. I mean, even even in the software world, right? Where even like you can now use a AI to basically write code and build whether it's websites or software in a matter of days, which would take us a year. You could do it in a day now, right? And so that's where you're able to probably see a lot of software companies in our space be able to do quicker, faster releases, more pieces of technology being released because they're utilizing AI to be able to write this code. Now, there's still some gaps there where you have to make sure to check the code, right? You got to make sure that it was written correctly, right? It's gonna function. There's all these different things, but still that process is so much quicker, right? On a regular basis. But even you start to see now more AI tools, right, specific to our industry and it's specific to our business to be able to utilize within their business. Now, I think you've already seen some and you're gonna see more and more to where more AI is gonna be brought into these softwares, right? To help you manage your business on an AI level rather than having maybe even actual employees, right, overseeing, looking at these jobs, approving jobs, managing production schedules. AI can do that today, to where it can do those types of things that have been able to approve jobs based on certain parameters and then being able to put them on a schedule with certain crews, right? As long as we're able to put that information in into the AI and able to do those things now today, right? So I'm not shocked because our industry is usually two, three, four, five years behind other industries. We're just a little bit more kind of like standoffish, old school, I would say in the roofing industry specifically, to where we kind of like, okay, we see AI, let's let some other people test it and tell us how it's doing for their business first before we start to see a lot of large mass adoption. Because I think their worry is like they adopt this AI and it makes mistakes, right? Because it's not by human. We're so used to humans doing it. So I think that over the next two, three years, you will see that big mass adoption to where everyone is using it. It's it's it's readily available to them at a very cheap cost, affordable cost of being able to use it within their business. So it doesn't shock me as of yet. Yes, I think that more people should be doing it, but it's not shocking in our business as as of yet. But I think over the next two years, we meet again in the next year or two, that we'll see like, oh, it's it's available everywhere, right? Every piece of software has it available in it to where that everyone is just utilizing it, even though they might not know that they're utilizing it, they are utilizing it in their business.

Ty Cobb Backer 32:12

Yeah, I agree. I I completely agree to that. And I think if you're not deliberately trying to use it, I think you're gonna get left behind too if you're if you're still stuck in the Stone Ages. And I agree with you too, that our industry has always been at one point in time, it was at least 10 years behind you know, the HBAC and plumbing industry. But over, I'd say over the probably the past 10, five years, we've really, you know, and because of people like you and you know, Rufel and Joe Huffman and you know, companies like SMA and Rufal have have really, you know, in all the CRMs out there, Rooflink and uh Job Nimbus, like you guys have really brought us out of the stone ages and have brought us into a more professional, I don't know, atmosphere where like we we can track our numbers better. We we know cost per acquisition, we know you know where our leads are coming from, what's working, what's not working, all of these things because of the tools that you guys from the tech side of things have brought into our industry, we have been able to exponentially, and I mean grow our businesses, allow them to run a lot smoother, track our numbers a lot easier. So having said that, like where where do you see our industry in like the next five, three, three to five years, and and how should how should us contractors prepare for this shift?

Travis Harvego 33:42

Yeah, and just like we talked about as far as AI, and I truly see that in the next three to five years, you're gonna basically see all in one

The All In One CRM Future

Travis Harvego 33:49

CRMs, tech stack platforms, right? Because right now, as a contractor, when they start a company or they have a company, they have to go out and build their own tech stack, right? They have to say, okay, I'm getting a CRM, I'm gonna bolt on this, I'm gonna bolt on this, I'm gonna bolt on this, right? They're just got some other boltons that are out there. And as you start to see, especially with like an service tightening and things like that, kind of now coming into our industry, right? Where they're more advanced pieces of software. But I think, you know, in the next two, three years, it's basically gonna be like, this is just what you use, right? You use this platform, they have all the bolt-ons figured out for you. They're all a part of it, they all use it, they utilize AI to be able to communicate the different pieces together where it automatically does all these things for you. And it's like you don't have to worry about paying 10 different bills to different pieces of software you use. You pay one bill, right, to one piece of software that has the full tech stack already there, already built out and done for you. And that's all you have to worry about for a contractor, which is nice for a contractor when you're looking at it from a perspective of like, you know, these different bills that they have. Did they pay this one? Do they have this one? What are all these things for? It's just one bill covers everything. But I think as far as an industry from this standpoint, as far as software, that's where we're gonna be to where it's like a lot of these, you know, bulltons really won't exist or be there. It's gonna be like these CRMs have all these things built into it where it's like this is what you use and it's all built in there. No, they have to think about it from a perspective as like if they're using these other add-ons, now they're gonna have to adjust their business to how that add-on works into that main piece of CRM or whatever, right? So that's what they have to have to adjust to. But it's not gonna be a major CRM migration, right? That a lot of counters fear that they may have to do as far as migrating their entire CRM. It's just adjusting maybe some of what these botons look like, right? And how are they gonna use them? How are they now gonna function within the business? But if it's all built in all in one, well, then it's all talking to each other. It's easily gonna be able to communicate back and forth. Like right now, when you have an integration, it's mostly just pushing. It's not a lot of pulling and pushing, it's all just pushing into one place. When it's all built into one spot, now you're pulling and pushing from this piece of the software, and so it makes everyone's life a lot easier to where they're not just worried about one thing pushing in and funneling into one spot overall.

Ty Cobb Backer 35:53

Right on, right on. Yeah, I I agree 100%, 100%. I know, I know that you have a hard stop here at one o'clock. So we'll we'll try to wrap this up here. So before before we wrap this up, and I I know we talked a lot about you know where you're at, where Rufel's at, and and well, not necessarily where where you where you're at, but on a I guess, hmm, trying to wonder, I'm I'm debating if we should dive into any personal stuff, if unless that might take a little too long, but like where where are you at personally? Like give us give us you know, change gears here completely. Like where what's what's the last greatest thing that that you've done for yourself to to to kind of unplug

Scuba Retreat: How Leaders Unplug

Ty Cobb Backer 36:37

and rejuvenate and refresh yourself in order to maintain at the high level that you're at right now?

Travis Harvego 36:42

Yeah, because going through that process, the last 12, 18 months, right, of going through that of you know running the business and trying to get acquired. And obviously, when that's all over and it's done, right? Like you would think that you'd be able just to kind of relax right after it's completed. That's not the case, right? Once it's completed, it's like now the work really starts, right? Of bringing this stuff together, making sure your employees are comfortable, right? But then it really was kind of like April time frame was like, okay, everything's starting to kind of mesh really well. I can actually take some time off where I never took really any time off as far as a week, maybe a day here or there that I had to, right, over an 18-year period or 18-month period was that like in April I didn't went on this scuba trip, right? It was like the time where I could actually unplug, right? And so Eric Obrump, you know, puts on this great, you know, you know, exhale, you know, scuba trip that I've heard about for many years. Like, Travis, you got to go, you gotta go get it unplugged. Great other business leaders, great other people there, entrepreneurs, right? You can have a conversation and actually unplug, which I was able to do that here, you know, in April, right? And it was like, shoot, I didn't know if I could do it. And then it was two weeks before it's like, I think I can actually do it. I can take this whole week off and actually go do it, right? So I committed two weeks prior to actually doing it. So I had to hurry up and do my bookwork, go get scuba certified, go do the pool work when I had to hire a private person to go and take me to the pool to get it done in time. And then we went, you know, on the trip, I got to do my checkout dives there, you know, on the trip while we were in the Cayman, right? There were six other guys there with us doing the checkout dives. We got to do that. And, you know, overall, it was the most amazing experience I'd ever been a part of as far as being able to not only unplug, obviously, from all the business things that were going on, but being around other great individuals, smart entrepreneurs, great people, just all around, to be able to learn what from them, build relationships that we will have and friendships we'll have for the rest of our lives, right? Based on this trip we're able to experience, right? Because when you're under the water, right, and you know, being able to work together of really kind of survival to make sure everyone that goes down comes back up, right? Whatever that takes to make that happen, you know, we got to make sure we stick together as a group to make sure whenever we go down, we all come back up, you know, together as a group, right? And so it was just an unforgettable, you know, experience to be a part of, and you know, even from the scuba is only so much of the trip, right? You only get to do so much scuba dive in, you know, in a day, but just even to be able to be a part of like, you know, talking to these other great individuals and how they started their businesses and where they're at and kicking uh ideas off of each other about like, you know, what to do in business, and then also just even personally, and then even to have like personal coaches come in, right? About, you know, even to be able to do like meditation, right? And fitness and diet and just all these different things and how they affect your body, right? Overall, not only now, but over the long term, right, of your life, right? And how stress fits apartment. It's just just being able to do those types of things and being able to be in a great location with great people and being able to do that stuff and plenty of stories to be shared. You know, I got in my fair share of shenanigans there of going down a little bit too deep on the dive, and somebody had to come and get me and rescue me back up, and you know, all those different types of things, you know, that happened. But we were able to have a lot of laughs, you know, it was a great time, and I highly suggest that anyone that gets the opportunity to go, they should go because it truly is, and everyone told me it's a life-changing experience, and I was able to experience it this year, and it truly was a life-changing experience. Like after that, being able to be not only refreshed, but also having a very different viewpoint, you know. Obviously, on life, I've been able to unplug and get away with amazing, amazing individuals and experience, you know, just epic things with epic people, right? Saying the people say, right, and that's really what it was all about of being able to do that, that part of it. So that was really kind of the highlight, right? I've been able to be able to do after a long journey, right? And been able to really experience something that I wanted to do the last three years, just never been able to unplug and do so over that period of time of been able to do it, and I was able to this year. So it's pretty incredible.

Ty Cobb Backer 40:24

Yeah, I'm glad you got to experience that because I I got to do a couple years with Eric. And what's cool about Eric's Eric's little retreat, I guess, the exhale retreat, is that it's not just open for anyone. Like Eric takes his time and and handpicks and selects people to to come on this trip. So it's special in that way. But the quality of people, like you had mentioned, the the business owners and entrepreneurs and and visionaries that that are on this trip, you know, yes, the the scuba part of it is definitely life-changing. I mean, it it has changed my perspective on life and the things that I got to experience. I saw sharks, I had like a 300-year-old turtle literally come up and I was able to touch his head and you know, and all these crazy things that go through your mind, what if I run out of air? And it was like all of a sudden, you know, and the trips called exhale, just just breathe. You know, and and all of a sudden, here came this turtle, like it had shit growing on it and moss, and I mean, this thing had to be 200, at least 200 years old. And he came out and he was so colorful, and and you could see the coral growing on him and and these other things. And he looked me right in the eyes, and I was able to, I was able to touch his head, and then he swam away, and then he came back, and I swim like this. Okay, so he came through my legs and came back up. And right at that point in time, I knew I just needed to stop fighting, whatever it was that was fighting down there, you know, because I almost feel like my body and mind just went against everything that what that was happening, and I wasn't necessarily able to relax. And then at that moment, and that might have been like during that time where you're with your trainer, you know, and they're going through all the worst case scenario. Rip your mask off, shut your air off, and all like the worst case scenarios. I I'm still debating, like, I don't know if I like this, I think I hate this. And then that happened, and it was like, okay, I need to chill and take in, I need to take in what's happening here, you know, not in a negative way, but in a positive way. And the trip that was my very first trip I did with those guys. And Tim Brown and I went through this whole experience together. Like we were, we were dive buddies, and he had never dove before. And and so we were both kind of like talking each other off the ledge like the entire time, like, no, we can do this. Yeah, no, I'm not gonna do it. No, we can do that, yeah. I'm not gonna do it, you know, back and forth. And the connection I made with Tim and and some of the other people that were there, and like you had mentioned, like that was special in itself. And then we had a yoga instructor come in. We we had oh shit, Dr. Gary, who talked about like breathing and and and uh just all kinds of stuff that I still apply today from from that very first trip. And it was it was, you know, Mike, Mike was there, Joe was there, Dan, Daniel uh Robowski was, I mean, they're just really great group of men that that were serious about like doing epic shit and and personal development. Like we were all on the same, you know, wavelength, not maybe not at the same levels in business or personal, but we were all there to connect, to rejuvenate, to refresh, to to get something out of it that so we could change and be better human beings when we came back to our normal life. So I I I do too. I I agree that if you ever get the opportunity to be on the XL trip, do it because it's probably a once-in-a-lifetime thing if Eric kind of handpicks, not that he bets people and he he swears he doesn't, but uh we we know he does. But just scuba diving in general, because like you, I had had people tell me Brad Whitlock, our our G A F T M has trying to convince me to probably for 10 years now to go scuba diving with him and his wife because her their whole family's you know avid divers and thought I'm like, no, screw that. I just I'm not down. But he helped encourage me, told me where to go and get our lessons here and stuff in New York, and did did that, almost didn't make it. I called Eric two or three times and told him I wasn't coming. And of course, you know how that went. And I did go and I'm glad I did. So no, it's cool. Good, yeah, all good stuff. So, anyhow, I know I know you got to roll. I know I know you gotta roll. It's been a great conversation today. We need to connect more often. Let's not just do this whole on the podcast every now and again. But if it as always, our it's it's great to to hear from you guys. It's great to hear about the technology and how you guys continue to keep growing and and shaping our industry. I just I just love what you guys do, and more importantly, you know, how how contractors can actually use your tools to to grow smarter, to to serve their customers better. And it's just cool, it's really it's it's amazing what you guys do. So yeah, thank you.

Travis Harvego 45:30

Yeah, it's always exciting. Love it.

Ty Cobb Backer 45:32

Yeah, so thank you for everything that you guys do for our industry. And if anybody wants to reach out to you or Roofle,

Roofle Demo And Closing

Ty Cobb Backer 45:39

what what's the best way they can contact you guys?

Travis Harvego 45:42

Yeah, just roofle.com. Go at roofle.com, you can try the technology for yourself, you can book a demo on there. It's the best way to reach us. Plenty of different, you know, we did a bunch of case studies and things like that with other contractors that you can go on there and read, tons of testimonials. So everything you need for be a resource is just there at roofl.com. So go check it out.

Ty Cobb Backer 45:57

Awesome. I love it. And always, if if you got any value from this episode, share it with somebody in the industry who needs to hear this. And and always thank you for for tuning in to be on the tool belt, and we will catch you on the next one.

Speaker 46:14

Thanks to our sponsors, TC Backer Construction, Hook Roofing Marketing, Roofal, and Project Map It. And thank you for watching. Subscribe to our YouTube channel and follow us on Facebook. We are streaming on all major platforms. See you next week for another episode of Behind the Tool Belt.