Exterior siding business tips for the off-season

The seasonality of exterior siding brings challenges for contractors. A whirlwind of siding projects in the spring and autumn gives way to a dearth of activity in the winter season, which can sometimes lead to cash flow issues or problems with employee retention.

Experienced contractors know that the off-season also provides an opportunity for end-of-year reflection and planning for the new year ahead. Analyzing financial data, developing marketing plans, and refining business processes are all strategies that can help ensure your team handles the spring rush like a well-oiled machine.

We asked two expert contractors how they maintain business momentum during the off-season. In this guide, we’ll cover their strategic planning tips for streamlining operations, acquiring more siding jobs, and boosting your revenue once the spring siding season kicks off.

Assess your finances and build your annual budget

To get your spring preparation started, check up on the health of your business finances by analyzing sales and revenue, expenses, and net profit for the year. Get an understanding of where the money is going, particularly your variable costs, and look for ways to trim your expenses. “Make sure you’re not spending on things you don’t need to be spending on,” says Addison Kaasa, Owner at Wright at Home Roofing and Exteriors.

Jamie Breneman, Partner and VP of Sales/Marketing for Chattanooga Exteriors, says it’s helpful to classify the different types of jobs your business does and look at their profit margins. He suggests asking questions like, “Which jobs are more profitable? Which jobs are harder and less profitable? How much revenue are projects creating per day?” With those metrics in mind, you can decide if you want to pull back on certain jobs or charge more for them, and you can focus your efforts on maximizing profit.

Once you understand how to create additional profit for your business, you can then build a realistic annual budget for the coming year. Creating a budget can help you control cash flow — from where to spend marketing dollars to managing during the slow season. Digital accounting tools can save time and provide you with more meaningful data. “I use QuickBooks,” says Kaasa. “I think having a solid bookkeeper or accounting system set up is key, so you have the metrics to pull from.”

But when it comes to analyzing that data, you may need additional support. “I joined an industry group called Breakthrough Academy that does a lot of strategic planning.” says Kaasa. This helps him compare his net profit and business expenses with other siding contractors. “Understanding where your industry peers lie in terms of other numbers is really important.”

Analyze data to form a strategic plan

“In the off-season, to keep the ball moving forward, I’m trying to do a lot of strategic planning and high-level thinking,” says Kaasa. Siding businesses can use the extra free time in the winter season to make data-informed decisions about what they’ll do differently in the coming year.

Breneman says he starts with a revenue goal. “Know what you want to make in a year and how you’re going to get there by backing it into it,” he suggests. Breneman calculates the minimum number of jobs required to achieve their goal and then determines what they’ll need to get the work done based on past performance. For example, he might decide, “We need to go find another crew that can do 10 decks, or we need to make our crews more efficient to do 100 more.”

If you’re not sure what to focus on, reach out to your James Hardie rep. They can support you by providing actionable objectives that will help you grow your business. “I especially value my relationship with James Hardie,” says Kaasa. “They’ve been instrumental in getting us to grow from basically zero James Hardie jobs to 20 something this year.”

“Anytime I need him, I shoot him a text,” Breneman says, referring to his own James Hardie rep. “We work on long-term strategic goals, moving in unison to figure out results or how we’re going to get a problem solved.”

Conduct a Business Operations Efficiency audit

Regularly checking the efficiency of your business processes, from the technology you use to optimize workflow to the protocols that allow your employees to work independently, can help your business grow. Even if your existing systems have worked well in the past, changes in market conditions, product options, customer demand, marketing trends, and other factors may require your business to innovate.

Rather than putting out fires as you go, design processes that proactively reduce errors. Then, you’ll have the time to focus on higher-level improvements. “Make sure you have processes in place so you’re not micromanaging the business, and so you can really focus on growing the business,” suggests Breneman.

One way he does this is by regularly seeking new technology. Digital tools for customer relationship management, accounting, project management, workflow analysis, and marketing analytics not only save time, but also provide more readily digestible data that will help you identify areas for improvement.

Breneman mentions a new tool his crews use as an example of an expensive upgrade that can pay off. A job that would normally take two days to complete, they can complete in one with the aid of the more expensive tool. The time and money saved, Breneman says, can be put towards hiring another crew or investing in another instrument that’s going to make them more efficient. “If they need a $5,000 tool that’s going to make us $50,000, or a slightly more expensive screw that can save two days of work, yeah, let’s do that.”

If you’re a member of the James Hardie Contractor Alliance® Program (CAP), you can access time-saving solutions for in-home selling, digital tools to help you provide more accurate estimates, and marketing resources to help you get leads. “We utilize Hover®,” says Breneman, a tool that’s brought to you by James Hardie and discounted for James Hardie Contractor® Alliance program members. “We’re part of their Transform program. That has eliminated some paperwork for us and has made the office end faster. Instead of back-and-forth, ‘hey, this person didn’t to do their job and now this person can't do anything until that person gets them the information,’ and so on, with Hover® Transform, it sends out the information to everybody, and everybody can get going right away.”

Develop a marketing plan

Your marketing activities during the off-season may involve less direct contact with customers, but you shouldn’t forget about marketing entirely. “It’s hard to generate siding leads in the middle of winter in Minnesota because people just aren’t focused on that,” says Kaasa, “But having a solid plan for when the snow does melt and the temperatures warm up is key,” he says. Kaasa says his winter meetings with his James Hardie rep often focus on marketing.

You might start by identifying leads from the previous season who decided not to move forward at the time, Kaasa suggests. “It could have been for budgetary reasons or a variety of different things,” he says. “We try to track those things and then, come spring, we’ll do a rehash campaign engaging with the people we talked to but didn’t close.”

Keeping track of where leads come from will also help you game-plan for the future. “I have a software that tracks where the leads are from,” Breneman says. “Then we look at how many set appointments, how many closed. The software is key, but also, when that phone rings, we have to ask them ‘Where did you hear about us?’ and make sure to put that down.”

Then, at the end of the year, Breneman says he’s able to see which areas, such as TV or pay-per-click, returned the most or most profitable leads, and can adjust accordingly for the next year.

It can be tough to prioritize social media or website content when your business has a lot of active siding projects, especially if you don’t have a dedicated marketing professional on your team. But you can make use of free time in the off-season to engage with customers online and create a schedule of content to post throughout the year.

If you haven’t already joined the Contractor Alliance® Program, now would be a good time to establish membership and begin exploring the resources available to you. Becoming a CAP contractor grants access to dedicated sales training and marketing tools including social media and web content, as well as lead generation support and placement on the James Hardie Contractor Locator. “Being part of the program gets you access to leads,” says Kaasa. “In general, the leads that come from the Contractor Alliance® Program Portal are of high quality and high intention.”

Engage with workers through ongoing training

Kaasa says he tries to provide training opportunities for workers during the winter. His team can access training materials on the CAP portal, making it cost-effective and flexible for installers to brush up on their techniques and salespeople to familiarize themselves with Hardie® products. “They have a pretty extensive video library,” he notes. He also gets help with in-person training sessions from James Hardie.

Ongoing training keeps employees and contractors engaged with your business while providing them with income. “I try to do at least two days a week where I’m doing training and development, having my sales team come in and my production team come in and work on skills,” says Kaasa.

Be ready for the spring season

These off-season business planning strategies will ensure your team is ready to deliver when the weather warms up and local homeowners decide it’s time for a siding replacement. Your workers’ skills will be polished, your processes refreshed, and your data put to strategic use. There will always be roadblocks, even with careful planning — but your James Hardie rep will be there to help.

To get even more support with everything from marketing to training, along with other perks and rewards opportunities, join the Contractor Alliance® Program today.