Running a service business, written in numbers

Cleaning, landscaping, plumbing, pest control, pool, moving, detailing. The operating side of the business — what an hour costs, what a deposit protects, which customer to fire.

Risk

Licensing and insurance: the gap between covered and insured

What general liability really excludes, why an uninsured subcontractor becomes your claim, how unlicensed work voids coverage and the right to be paid, and what a full program costs.

August 28, 2026 · 14 min
Customers

The customers worth keeping, and the ones costing you

What a bad account really costs across five hidden lines, how to sort your book in an afternoon, fixing before firing, and a book that shrank 3% while profit rose 11%.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Hiring

Hiring your first employee

The real cost of a $26 wage, when you can genuinely afford a hire, why classification is not a choice you and the worker make, who to hire first, and the first ninety days.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Operations

The calls you are missing

What a missed call really costs, measuring answer rate by hour, why a trained booker converts 72% where a technician converts 50%, and $24,480 more revenue from the same spend.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Recurring revenue

Service plans: starting the month above zero

Pricing a plan from your own loaded cost, the four things that make it a product rather than a discount, where plans actually get sold, and $71,400 of repair work found on visits already paid for.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Pricing

Raising your rates without losing the book

Raise 8%, lose 10% of customers, earn 28% more — the arithmetic worked out. Who actually leaves, how much and how often, the announcement, and the three answers to pushback.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Demand

Keeping the calendar full in the slow season

What an empty week really costs, mapping the shape of your year, converting one-off customers to recurring plans, and a January that swung $30,300 without buying new advertising.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Local search

The map pack: getting found when someone needs you now

The three factors Google ranks local businesses on, the category field that moves more than anything else, review velocity built into the job, and 38 calls a month turning into 121.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Cash flow

Deposits, terms and the customer who does not pay

Why a $1,400 write-off really costs $4,960, deposit structures by job size, the escalation ladder day by day, and $49,500 pulled out of receivables without a single new customer.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min
Pricing

What your hour actually costs

Labor burden, the utilization rate nobody measures, overhead per billable hour, and why adding 20% gives you 16.7%. The one number every price should be built on.

August 28, 2026 · 13 min

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