Your Role Before the Paramedics Get There!

by | Sep 24, 2019 | Safety | 0 comments

Your Role Before the Paramedics Get There!

The accident happens, the victim is rescued and down from the tree. Now, you are waiting for the ambulance to arrive; you have already gone to the truck to get the First Aid kit. Upon opening the First Aid kit you discover there is nothing in there to help your victim.

We, as an industry, need to re-think how the First Aid kit is stocked. This article is meant to help guide you when setting up your First Aid kit to ensure you have the right pieces to save a life before the paramedics get to the scene.

In addition to the traditional bandages, gauze and medical tape, your First Aid kit should also contain:

At least two tourniquets
Israeli Bandages
Compressed Bandages
Nasal Trumpet (nasopharyngeal airway)
SAM Splint

All First Aid kits on the truck should have these materials, however, it is also a good idea for a climber and a ground person to carry a small personal First Aid pouch with them whether in the tree or on the ground. The climber can carry it attached to his climbing harness with a carabiner and the ground person can carry one hooked to his belt with a Velcro strap.

The aforementioned tourniquet can be used with one hand for the climber to apply. It will take practice, but when you sever an artery, you will be glad you learned how to use it. With a severed artery, you have less than four minutes to survive. You know it is going to take longer for a rescuer to climb up the tree to retrieve you and descend with you than four minutes. Carrying a tourniquet as a climber could possibly save your life!

For the ground person, saving a crew member, having the tourniquet on your person rather than running back to the truck to retrieve the first aid kit saves time and possibly a life.

The Israeli Bandage and compression bandages are another great item to have in your First Aid kit on the ground person’s kit. They can be used as a tourniquet or compressed bandages for the head, chest, arms and legs. Compressed bandages can be used to help stop bleeding for gaping wounds.

The nasal trumpet can be used to create ease of breathing. All you must do is cut the tube of the nasal trumpet to the person’s nose length and then firmly insert.

The SAM splint is used to treat broken bones and possibly create a neck brace to lessen mobility so the rescuer can bring the victim down.

Personalizing your own First Aid kit to include anything that you think might be an advantage for saving your crew member’s life is an important part of taking safety seriously. Remember you are the first responder and if you are well prepared it might save your or your crew member’s life.

Because training is required for most of these life-saving methods, we would encourage you to contact our ArboRisk Thrive Consultants, Dawn Thierbach or Margaret Spencer, to sign up for one of their upcoming Trauma Classes.

Written by: Dawn Thierbach

How to Get Your Tree Service Found on Google

by | Sep 10, 2019 | Marketing | 0 comments

How to Get Your Tree Service Found On Google

I often find myself questioning how people knew where to eat or the answer to obscure questions before Google was created. Google has simplified the lives of individuals in more ways than one, but if you were to ask a digital marketer what they think about the platform, their answer might shock you.

In today’s digital marketing world, Google is king, and conquering it is no easy task. With ever changing algorithms, showing up is not a one and done project that can be finished in an afternoon. Tackling your search appearance is a process that takes time and specific knowledge.

So, how do you get your tree service to show up when a prospective customer is searching? Here are three steps to help your business be found on Google:

Tell Google your website exists: Did you know Google has a host of free marketing programs that help with your search appearance? One of them being Google Search Console. This program gives you detailed information to help optimize your website to ensure that you are showing up. Before you can gather and analyze that information, you need to say “hey Google, my business has a website”. Without submitting your website, the elusive Google Search bots would eventually crawl there, but by giving Google a heads up that your site exists, it speeds up the process dramatically. To do this, send a site map over on Google Search Console. If you’re like many, you’re probably sitting thinking, “What in the world is a site map?. Head over to this blog here to learn how to pull a site-map from your website and submit for indexing.

Discover what keywords you want for your business: Picture your ideal client surfing the web for a tree care company, what services do you want your business to show up for when searched? The 3-5 word phrase that came to mind is a keyword. Good keywords are vital because there’s a correspondence between what words are being typed in the search field and the words you’ve written on your website. So being an insurance agency for the tree care industry, we want to be seen when tree services are in the market for insurance. The keywords we incorporate into our website are, “tree service insurance”. Based on these keywords we create specific content around that phrase so we are likely to appear when that is searched.

PRO TIP 1: Do a search in an incognito Google Chrome browser with your desired keyword and see what type of content is coming up. Google evaluates a website’s content and displays what they believe is related to that search. This way, you can add content to your website based on what Google believe is relevant to your desired keywords.

Rule the local search: If you run a tree service in Southeastern Wisconsin, you don’t want to show up on Google when someone is searching for a tree service in Washington state. The answer to this is local search. Most people take to Google when searching for local businesses, instead of driving through their hometown. In order to ensure your website is being found in your desired location, you have to prove that you are local. Google My Business is an online directory of local businesses. This allows you to be found in your local area more easily because it’s just another hint to Google that your business is relevant to what users are searching. To get started, claim your business on Google My Business and create your profile. List all relevant business information such as address, website and contact information.

PRO TIP 2: Create a review generation campaign for customers to leave reviews on your Google My Business profile. This helps further solidify the legitimacy of your business in Google’s eyes. Added bonus if they include the type of job that was done and in what geographical area.

The key to being found on Google is to be on Google! By utilizing the marketing platforms they’ve created, you can analyze and submit data to help improve your search rank. Becoming the #1 business on Google doesn’t happen overnight, but using these three steps can help your business begin to show up more!

Written by: Amanda Eicher

4 “Knows” to a Yes!

by | Sep 3, 2019 | Business Strategy | 0 comments

4 “Knows” To a Yes!

“Sales Training? Ha! We don’t have time for that, we just do on-the-job sales training.”

Have you caught yourself saying that before? If not, I’m sure you’ve heard other tree care companies say that. Whether you use an outside sales training program or not, this article will give you four simple points to discuss with your team to help close more sales.

We all know the most common mistake that every sales person makes is that they talk too much and don’t spend enough time listening to the prospective customer. So at ArboRisk, we’ve come up with the 4 “Knows” to a Yes, which is a series of questions designed to help us understand our prospects better and close more sales. I personally believe, these should be taught to everyone of your team members, not only the sales people to maximize the impact on your organization.

Here are the 4 Knows that should be part of your sales training:

Know the Why – Why did the prospective customer call? Not what did they call about, but WHY. You have to dig deeper to learn the reason they want the tree work done. This can be accomplished by simply asking them “what is your vision for your yard?”. If you uncover the underlying reason for the call, your sale has just become immensely easier. Here is a full article that I wrote on this topic (The Most Important Question to Ask Your Customer).

Know your prospective customer – Was it the decision maker that called or is there another one you need to know about (spouse, business partner, village board)? Have they had professional tree work done in the past? Knowing who the prospective customer is as well as learning if they can afford your services goes a long way in determining whether or not they are a good fit for your company. Each decision maker may have a little different reason for wanting the work done, so understanding how the decision will be made is also important part of this process.

Know how you can help this customer – Knowing the strengths of your company is vital for all employees in your company to understand. When anyone from your team communicates with a prospective customer, they have the chance to continue to move the buyer along the customer journey towards a sale. They don’t have to know all of the scientific reasons and exact methods that could be used on the tree, but they should know of past examples of how your company has helped similar situations before.

Know how to say “no” – If you’ve figured out the first 3 Knows, this one should be easy. Being able to politely and professionally walk away from a job that isn’t within your scope is a skill that needs to be practiced and taught, but once mastered this skill helps eliminate wasteful bids and unprofitable or perhaps unsafe jobs. Having a few referral partners within your area that will gladly accept work that is outside your specialty is necessary for a successful walk away. I recently wrote an entire article on walking away from a job that you can read here (The Power of Walking Away).

At your next sales meeting talk about these four “Knows” and how each of your team members can begin incorporating these into their daily conversations with prospective customers. If you need additional help with your sales training, check out ArboRisk’s Sales and Marketing Package! We can help you get more of the right jobs with your ideal client immediately!

I’m Too Busy to Manage My Time

by | Aug 27, 2019 | Business Strategy | 0 comments

Effective Time Management Skills

All too often we hear people say “sorry for the delay” or “today was crazy”. I’ll start by saying I’m no time management guru myself. I had been using the first one almost every day because let’s face it, it’s much easier to fall into a reactive lifestyle rather than a proactive one. I recently started reading a book called Atomic Habits by James Clear and was encouraged to grab the bull by its horns and make some changes in both my personal and work life. In the book, Clear discusses the power of habits a.k.a. systems and how important they are for success in everyday life. I strongly recommend giving it a read.

Knowing I need to improve, I attended an eight hour class which focused solely on time management and organization skills. Coincidentally, the overarching theme of the class also focused on systems. Whether it be keeping your desk clean, your email inbox empty, or managing projects, we all need these systems to stay proactive.

One of the key systems I took away from this class is called Time Blocking. Time Blocking is the idea of breaking down your day into different levels of activities to help prioritize what gets done and when. Below are the three different levels of time blocking:

Level 1 Activities – These are going to be activities that are most important for you to move closer to your definition of success. The more level 1 activities you complete in a day, the more efficient you are. If you own a tree service, this might be something like creating a safety program for you employees to follow so they can stay safe day in and day out. Maybe you want to grow your sales from $750,000 to $1 million and you need to create a marketing strategy to do so. Consider your goals and think big picture when you create your level 1 activities.

Level 2 Activities – Level 2 activities are things you HAVE to get done, but don’t necessarily help you move forward. These could be things like dealing with customer complaints, handling employee altercations, etc. These activities typically still need to be done by you, and can’t be passed on to others. With level 2’s, make sure you don’t underestimate the time it takes to complete and try to focus on 2 or 3 per day. If you overwhelm yourself, you’ll likely disregard the time blocking system as a whole.
Level 3 Activities – Level 3 activities are day to day work, such as answering phones, cleaning the shop, etc. Activities in level 3 can be easily delegated allowing you to focus on the larger goal. As the owner of a tree service, the less time spent doing level 3 activities, the better.

The idea behind this system is that time blocking becomes a habit. For example, Eric has blocked off time every Tuesday morning to write the weekly tip for ArboRisk. After doing it for a little over a year, it is ingrained in his mind that he needs to complete an article each week, even if something pops up on Tuesday.

Monitor your daily activities and get a feel for how you allocate your time. Then map out your ideal day and leave time to address each level. Some will suggest mapping out one week at a time but I’ll leave that up to you. I personally have found it helps to address one day at a time to account for things that come up unexpectedly. Feel free to reach out if you have questions regarding this system and how it translates to your everyday life. I’ve dropped another blog post below that I found helpful while writing this article and check out Atomic Habits if you have time!

Written by: Malcolm Jeffris, CTSP

Succession Planning – Managing Risk

by | Aug 13, 2019 | Business Strategy | 0 comments

Succession Planning – Managing the Risk

Succession planning is the process of identifying and developing new leaders. New leaders may be needed to replace an employee who is retiring, one that has been promoted, to fill a vacancy caused by turn over and or to fill a new leadership role created to expand the company. It’s a risk management strategy that increases the availability of prepared and qualified people as the business grows, adds new employees, new services and or loses a key employee. It’s also one of the best ways to retain, inspire and reward employees.

No matter the size of your company, this activity starts at the top. The leader is responsible for the people who are responsible for the customers. Leadership is a learned skilled, preparing your people to lead is one of your most important duties.

Here are a series of steps to consider at least once a year to help you include succession planning as a risk management strategy in your annual business plan.

Identify critical positions in the company which require highly capable employees.
Identify the most competent person for each specific critical position and what the consequence would be if that person were to leave, be promoted, and or become temporarily out of service.
Identify people in the organization that are likely candidates to advance into those critical positions when the time comes. These transitions can be planned in the case of a promotion, or in the case of an emergency the company is prepared to minimize the impact.
Identify success profiles for all critical positions. If you are on top of this there should be job descriptions to review for this information. If not, that is a good first step to developing a success profile.
Create development plans for successors to ensure they are ready to assume future roles.
Develop a complete employee development plans to address the gaps. Budget time and resources for leadership training.

Begin by getting your key players involved to help with identifying critical positions and highly capable people. At first people can be threatened with this type discussion, as it may appear you are getting ready to replace them. Communication needs to be handled well and if it is, you will find it is something that is welcomed. The process allows people to see benefits and opportunities that they might not have seen before, for themselves, others and the company.

Written by: Jim Skiera