The Top 5 Posts of 2015

The blog experienced explosive growth in 2015.  55,910 of you visited the site, and read 165,988 blog posts.  First of all, Thank You for Reading and Sharing!  You are the reason we are here writing, vlogging, and training each week.

Much of this growth is attributed to the maturity of the blog.  We have been blogging weekly for the last 3 years.  I can say that the blog is out of it’s infancy, and well past the toddler stage.

There was also a massive spike in growth once we started focusing on the readers of the blog, and delivering content they wanted to read.

In this post, I’m going to share with you the Top 5 Posts of 2015, and the lessons learned from each post.

Killing the Service Tech

Killing the Service Tech was our first “viral” post.  Within 2 days the post had over 1,000 shares on social media.  It now has close to 7,000 shares.  Hundreds of comments flooded the internet.  And, it was completely unexpected.

I wrote this post in about 30 minutes, and just covered what was on my heart.

The Learning Lesson

“Techs are suffering from the negative consequences of a poor lifestyle, and they want our industry to change.”

3 Reasons Why You Should Do Side Jobs

This post was my first attempt at using sarcasm in a blog post.  I wasn’t sure if my meaning would be clear, so I even posted the following warning:

This piece incorporates the use of sarcasm, irony, satire, truth, and fiction. In case it is not clear, Todd Liles and Service Excellence Training DO NOT condone side jobs in any fashion.

The audience loved this post, and it grew to our 2nd most popular blog of 2015.

The Learning Lesson

“Humor works.”

The True Cost of Running an HVAC Business

Chris Loudermilk wrote this post about the perception of business owners.  Chris wanted to bust the myth that the average business owner is a rich person that stingily hands out the technician’s pay.

This lesson was very polarizing.  It created clarity that the vast majority of service technicians don’t understand the cost of business.  It also showed that too few owners are taking the time to educate their techs about the cost of running a business.

The Learning Lesson

“There needs to be more open communication between techs and owners.  Without communication, myths arise and thrive.”

4 Keys to Winning the “I need to talk to my spouse” Sales Objection

In 2015, I wrote a blog post to address each of to the 5 major objections received by techs and salespeople in the field.  Of the 5, this one became the most read and shared.

The Learning Lesson

“Solid skills are wanted, needed, and sought after.  Techs struggle with the smokescreen objections.”

8 Warning Signs a Tech is About to Quit

This post was written in 2014, and still holds a Top Spot after 2 years.

It serves as a warning to Techs and to Owners.  I believe it is so popular because both techs and owners have experienced the 8 reasons listed in the post.

The Learning Lesson

“Retention is of great importance to Techs and Owners.”

I want to sincerely thank you for being a loyal fan of ServExTra!  We are a big fan of you as well!  2015 has been a great year, and we are working hard to make 2016 even better!