Why Your Techs Are Losing Sales in 2026 | Justin Riley
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Release Date: 08/19/2026
Why Your Techs Are Losing Sales in 2026 | Justin Riley
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Service Scout (14 day free trial): This is the toughest year to close a sale in home services since 2008. Equipment costs more than ever, credit is tighter, and the customers calling for a replacement are the hardest ones to sell. The problem usually is not your leads. It is what happens when your technician walks in the door. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Josh Crouch sit down with Justin Riley, CEO and founder of UpFrog, for a straight read on the 2026 home services market and how the best companies are still closing jobs hand over fist. Justin breaks...
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Systems That Outlast You: Building a Trades Business for Generations
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most companies do not last. A huge share of the biggest names in the world vanish within a few decades. The Smith & Oby Company has been running since 1898. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Josh Crouch sit down with Jake Wattenbarger, president of Smith & Oby, a Foundral brand, a Cleveland mechanical contractor that has stayed relevant for 125 years by reading the market before it forces the issue, and by building systems and a culture that outlast any one person. Jake spent nearly a decade as an Army logistics officer before the trades, and it shows....
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How to Beat Private Equity Without Selling | Zach Cooper-Vastola
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Private equity is buying up home service companies and quietly gutting the good ones, and most owners think their only options are to sell or get outspent. There is a third one. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Josh Crouch sit down with Zach Cooper-Vastola, co-founder of Hickory, who has bought and built home service companies across the tri-state to roughly 350 people and 80 million dollars in revenue, without ever running them from an ivory tower. Zach breaks down how he keeps technicians from walking out the door after an acquisition, why he...
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How Home Service Pros Hit 20% Net Margin | Profitability Partners
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most home service businesses keep just 5 to 12% net profit, and most owners have no idea that is where they are. The best run HVAC, plumbing, and electrical shops keep 20%, and the gap almost always comes down to a few fixable mistakes. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Josh Crouch sit down with Matthew Mooney and Raymond Gong of Profitability Partners, a fractional CFO firm that spent years on the private equity side of the table and now helps owners find the profit already hiding in their business. They break down the real gross profit benchmarks for every...
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How AI Is Changing HVAC (Without Replacing Techs) | Chris Plunkett
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
AI is not coming for your techs. It is coming for the busywork, the missed calls, and the guesswork that quietly eats your margin. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett sits down with Chris Plunkett, a Tucson HVAC owner who has been in the trade since he was eight years old, to talk about what using AI in an HVAC business actually looks like day to day. They get into how Chris turned home inspections from a loss leader into one of his highest paying jobs, why his AI voice agent books calls so well that customers swear they were talking to a person, and the simple pay...
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Stop Missing Calls: The Real Reason Home Service Leads Disappear
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most home service companies do not have a lead problem. They have a missed-call problem. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Joshua Crouch sit down with Chris Nelson, Senior Manager of Vertical Marketing at CallRail, to talk about why home service leads disappear, how missed calls turn into lost revenue, and what contractors can do to better understand what is happening inside their call flow. This conversation is not just about answering the phone faster. It is about understanding where your leads come from, how they move through your business, and where good...
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How to Grow Your Business with Sales Process and Technique
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most contractors want more leads, more booked calls, and more revenue. But if your sales process is inconsistent, more leads will only expose the problem faster. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Joshua Crouch sit down with Josh Martin, Director of Revenue Strategy at 3Four Labs, to talk about how service businesses can grow by building a stronger sales framework, improving technician coaching, and using AI-powered tools the right way. Josh explains why AI and automation are only useful when your company already knows what “good” looks like. If your...
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The Moneyball for Home Services: How You Can Catch the Jobs You’re Missing
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most contractors think they need more leads. But what if the real problem is that you’re already missing the jobs you paid to generate? In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Joshua Crouch sit down with Shaun Ritchey from Breezy to talk about Moneyball for home services and how contractors can use AI, better data, and smarter systems to uncover the jobs hiding inside their existing business. Just like Moneyball changed baseball by finding overlooked value in the data, this conversation shows how contractors can find overlooked revenue in missed calls, slow follow-up,...
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The Guide to Branding and Networking for Service Business Owners
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most service business owners are chasing the next lead source. Google Ads. Facebook Ads. AI. SEO. Automation. But sometimes the fastest way to grow is still the most old-school strategy in the book: getting out into your community, shaking hands, building trust, and making sure people remember your brand. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Joshua Crouch sit down with Chuck Worley, owner of Worley’s Home Services, to talk about branding, networking, reputation, and the real-world grind behind building a service business people know, trust, and refer. Chuck shares...
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Consistent Branding Can Solve Your Hiring and Growth Headaches
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Most contractors think branding is about logos, colors, and marketing. It's not. The strongest brands in the trades do something much more powerful: they attract great employees, create loyal customers, and make growth easier. In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Joshua Crouch sit down with Levi Torres, founder of High 5 Plumbing, Heating, Cooling & Electric, to discuss how consistent branding became the foundation for one of Colorado's fastest-growing home service companies. What started as a simple idea—a high five at the end of every service call—evolved...
info_outlineService Scout (14 day free trial): https://getservicescout.com/demo.html
This is the toughest year to close a sale in home services since 2008. Equipment costs more than ever, credit is tighter, and the customers calling for a replacement are the hardest ones to sell. The problem usually is not your leads. It is what happens when your technician walks in the door.
In this episode of Service Business Mastery, Tersh Blissett and Josh Crouch sit down with Justin Riley, CEO and founder of UpFrog, for a straight read on the 2026 home services market and how the best companies are still closing jobs hand over fist.
Justin breaks down why likability now beats price, why repair and maintenance calls are the easier win this year, how to lead with the right financing so a customer with tough credit still says yes, and the new tool he built, Service Scout, that briefs your tech on the home, the buyer, and the strategy in 90 seconds before every call.
If close rate is where your money leaks this year, this one is the fix.
This episode is brought to you in partnership with Upfrog, one of our show partners. Fitting, since today's guest is Upfrog's founder. Upfrog turns paid ad spend into booked, sold system replacements instead of wasted leads. Learn more at upfrog.com.
CHAPTERS
0:00 – Raise Your Close Rate by Listening for 90 Seconds
3:01 – From HVAC Apprentice to Founding UpFrog
7:11 – The State of the 2026 Market: Toughest Since 2008
9:04 – Why Close Rate Is the Number One Problem This Year
11:45 – Why Customers Shop for Who They Like, Not Price
13:00 – Why Repair and Maintenance Calls Are the Easier Win
14:03 – The Average Ticket Meat Zone and the Credit Ceiling
17:01 – How Service Scout Was Born
19:12 – Inside a Service Scout Pre Appointment Intelligence Brief
23:30 – The Results: A 5 to 14% Close Rate Lift
24:12 – Leading With the Right Financing to Win Tough Credit
28:02 – Handling the Data Responsibly
31:27 – The Reporting Most Contractors Have Never Seen
33:11 – The Pricing and the ROI Math
36:53 – AI Should Make Your People Super, Not Replace Them
49:30 – The Number One Reason Close Rates Are Down
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- Why 2026 is the hardest year to close a home services sale since 2008, and where the money is actually leaking
- Why likability now beats price, and why the replacement estimate is the hardest call to win
- How a 90 second pre appointment brief can lift your close rate 5 to 14%
- How to lead with the right financing so a customer with tough credit still says yes
- What you can learn about a home before the visit, and how to use it without crossing a line
- Why the real IP of a home service business is your people, not your AI stack
THIS EPISODE IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY
UPFROG
System replacement leads from paid ads, nurtured and booked into sold jobs before your team arrives: upfrog.com
MARKETSTORM
An AI-powered advertising platform. Results vary by market, budget, and campaign configuration: https://marketstorm.ai/
CALLRAIL
CallRail's Voice Assist is a 24/7 AI voice assistant that answers every call, handles customer questions, and books jobs directly onto your calendar, all without you ever having to step away from the current job. Try Voice Assist for free today at voiceassist.com
BREEZY
Capture 25-30% more clients with Breezy AI Agents. Use code 'SBM' to book a demo and get $500 on us: https://bit.ly/4ihjXkx
PHONETAP
Your calls hold the key to growing your business. PhoneTAP gives you instant AI analysis, real customer lifetime value, and tools to coach your team. Learn more: phonetap.ai/demo
COMPANYCAM
Capture work, track job progress, and stay connected from the field to the office with photo documentation and AI tools that keep work moving. Start a free trial at https://companycam.com/
CONNECT WITH OUR HOSTS AND GUEST
Tersh Blissett: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tershblissett/
Josh Crouch: https://www.linkedin.com/in/josh-crouch/
Justin Riley, CEO and Founder of UpFrog: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justintriley/
UpFrog: https://upfrog.com
Service Scout (14 day free trial): https://getservicescout.com/demo.html
ABOUT SERVICE BUSINESS MASTERY
Service Business Mastery helps home service owners run better, more profitable companies. Every week, Tersh Blissett and Josh Crouch break down the operations, technology, and leadership behind growing an HVAC, plumbing, or electrical business, with the operators actually doing the work. More at https://servicebusinessmastery.com/
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