Home Hero Podcast

Michael Oakes started out coaching basketball and teaching health education in New Jersey. Then he moved west, took a job at a startup called Federal Express when there were six or eight people in the entire Western Division, and spent the next few decades learning business the hard way.

He co-founded a same-day delivery company before most people knew what same-day meant, turned it into a national franchise called 1-800 Courier, scaled it to $40 million in revenue, and discovered that the profit at the bottom was close to nothing.

That last part is the reason this episode is worth your drive time. Michael has been Jason's business coach for almost ten years, going back to the day Jason pulled a Sundance Coaching business card off the wall at an auto shop while spending most of his savings on an unexpected car repair. He had no revenue yet. He hired a coach anyway, which put his business net negative on day one, and he still calls it one of the best investments he has ever made.

In this episode:

• Why $40 million in top line meant almost nothing, and Michael's rule that business is a sport and net profit is how you keep score
• The three filters he puts in front of every decision (time, money, and is it right), plus Coby's confession about the hours he spent designing a logo instead of writing the estimates he owed clients
• Why "busy is a disease" and what Michael makes his clients say instead when he asks how their day is going
• The eight pillars every business owner has to keep an eye on, and why being great with your hands only covers one of them
• Hiring for character and attitude instead of skill, and why a culture problem is almost always an owner skill problem
• Jason's three layers of coaching (one on one accountability, industry-specific group coaching, and leadership coaching), which one to start with, and Coby's honest take on doing it backwards
• Michael Jordan's passing drills, the flu game, and what fundamentals actually look like in a home service business

Whether you have never worked with a coach or you are wondering if the group program you joined is the right fit, this one gives you a clear picture of what real accountability looks like and what it does to a business over ten years.

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros
👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: https://go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: https://go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbooks
👉 Join the Home Hero Business Owner Community: facebook.com/groups/homeherocommunity

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

The conversation delves into the challenges of time management for handyman contractors, highlighting the juggling act of balancing work, business management, and personal life. Strategies for managing time, the impact of pricing on time management, and tools and tricks for effective time management are explored in detail. The key takeaways emphasize the challenges faced by contractors and the critical role of pricing in time management.

Takeaways

• Time management challenges for handyman contractors
• The importance of pricing in time management

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros

👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com/p...
👉 Connect with us:
💻 Website: http://handymanmarketingpros.com
Facebook Group:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/homeherocommunity

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

The conversation explores new variables introduced by AI as a search platform for consumers, focusing on SEO and AI recommendations. It delves into review diversification, organic socials, brand mentions, and the increased value of websites in the context of AI and SEO.

Takeaways

• Review diversification is crucial for AI recommendations and SEO.
• Organic socials and community engagement are valuable for brand mentions and AI recommendations.
• Websites have become significantly more valuable in the context of AI and SEO, emphasizing the importance of helpful, informative content.
• Websites in AI and SEO

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros

👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com/p...
👉 Connect with us:
💻 Website: http://handymanmarketingpros.com
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/homeherocommunity

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

For Taylor and Michael Robair, their story started with a simple problem: one income wasn't covering the bills, and staying home with their kids mattered too much to give up. So Michael started picking up $30 handyman jobs on Angie at night and on weekends, assembling furniture and hanging TVs while the app billed homeowners three times what he took home.

A few years later, they run Triangle Handyman Services in Raleigh, North Carolina with a small team, they did around $200K in the first half of 2026, and they're chasing a $500K to $600K year. This one is the honest version of how a family builds something real from scratch.

Taylor and Michael sit down with Jason and Coby to walk through it.

In this episode:

• How Michael turned cheap Angie jobs into loyal, direct, repeat clients he still serves today
• The Facebook group post that made Taylor realize handyman work is real money
• Going from $50 an hour to $145 to $198, and why they stopped telling clients their hourly rate
• Why they price every single job on the spot instead of emailing a quote later
• The hiring saga: why a Facebook jobs post beat Indeed, and the applicant who checked all 21 skill boxes straight from Waffle House
• Why they share their full profit and loss statement with their technicians
• The 21-day stretch that nearly ran them into the ground, and the 5 o'clock boundary that protects their family time now

If you're grinding through the startup phase or trying to make the jump to full-time, this one is packed with real numbers and honest decisions from a family figuring it out in real time.

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros

👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com/p...
👉 Connect with us:
💻 Website: http://handymanmarketingpros.com
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/homeherocommunity

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

Do you really need a contract for every handyman job? Even a $200 TV mount?

Jason and Coby go back and forth on this one, and they don't fully agree. Coby's stance is simple: you need a signed agreement 100% of the time, before anyone gets on the schedule. Jason pushes on whether that's realistic for smaller jobs, and where the line actually falls.

In this episode:

• Why Coby calls it an "agreement," not a "contract," and why that word choice matters
• The real reason a $200 job carries way more than $200 of liability
• How to tie an agreement to your estimate so clients approve it in one click
• Writing a scope of work so specific it ends the "I thought that was included" argument
• The toilet flange trick that stops repeat callbacks before they start
• Payment terms, draw schedules, and getting paid the day you finish
• The pet monkey story you have to hear to believe
• Why "my clients give me cookies" is not a reason to skip the paperwork

Coby learned this running his own remodeling crew in Michigan. Jason learned it as a homeowner, watching a half-day siding job turn into four days of dry rot repair. Where they both land: clear expectations beat a bulletproof contract every time.

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros

👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com/p...
👉 Connect with us:
Website: http://handymanmarketingpros.com
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/homeherocommunity

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

Here's a free, two-minute Google trick almost no handyman is using yet.

Jason and Coby break down Google "preferred sources," a newer feature where your team, family, friends, and good clients can vote for your website as a trusted source. The more of those votes your site collects, the more authority Google may give it, which can help you rank for searches like "handyman near me" and show up when people ask AI tools like Google, ChatGPT, and Gemini for a handyman recommendation.

How to do it: send people this link, swapping in your own website:
google.com/preferences/source?q=yourwebsite.com

Or head straight to google.com/preferences/source and type your site in. It is about as simple as it gets.

In this episode:

• What a Google "preferred source" actually is, explained in plain English
• Why more votes can add authority to your website and entity over time
• Jason's "feed the beast" rule for anything Google gives you a way to submit
• Why your website matters more than ever now that AI tools pull from it directly
• The note Coby caught live on the Google page that hints at why ongoing content matters

Want to test it on us? You can add Handyman Marketing Pros as a preferred source here: google.com/preferences/source?q=handymanmarketingpros.com

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros

👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: http://go.handymanmarketingpros.com/p...
👉 Connect with us:
💻 Website: http://handymanmarketingpros.com
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/homeherocommunity

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

Jon Sanders took one of the more unusual roads into the trades. He went from full-time firefighter, to church-planting pastor, to running Dakota Small Jobs, a professional handyman business in Sioux Falls, South Dakota that crossed $400,000 in revenue last year and is chasing seven figures in 2026.

What makes his story worth your drive time is that he built it on the least glamorous stuff in business. Show up when you say you will. Answer the phone. Do good work. Treat your team like they matter. As Jon puts it, that alone puts you head and shoulders above most of the trades.

In this episode:

• The "three F's" Jon used to land his first jobs with zero budget, plus the Facebook and Nextdoor move most guys get wrong
• Why he doesn't make his crew clock out for lunch, and how he builds a team that keeps the business running while he's on vacation
• Revenue vs profit, requiring 50% deposits for cash flow, and the Profit First system that changed how he sees his money (with Coby's hard-earned warning about spending money you haven't earned yet)
• When to make your first hire (hint: sooner than you're comfortable) and how to hand off work without becoming the bottleneck
• Turning van wraps, a strong Google Business Profile, and word of mouth into a lead engine you can dial up when you need it

Whether you're booking your first jobs off your personal Facebook page or trying to get off the truck for good, Jon's story is full of practical, do-it-this-week ideas.

Connect with Jon and his Handyman Starters community at handymanstarters.com.

Hosted by Jason Call and Coby McManaman of Handyman Marketing Pros

👉 Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: go.handymanmarketingpros.com
👉 Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbook-form
👉 Connect with us:
💻 Website: handymanmarketingpros.com
✉️ Email: [email protected]

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

Google just started testing something worth paying attention to: it's pulling social media posts straight into Google Business Profiles. Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube can now feed right into the profile homeowners see when they search "handyman near me."

In this episode, Jason and Coby break down what the update means and why it matters more than it might seem at first. The bigger story here is that organic social posting is quietly becoming a ranking signal. Google and AI search tools like ChatGPT are looking for proof that you're a real, active, local business, not just an address with a website. Posting about the work you're doing is one of the clearest ways to show that.

What we cover:

👉 How to set it up: add your social links in the edit info section of your Google Business Profile so you're eligible when the feature rolls out

👉Why authenticity is the keyword, and how being a real local business is your advantage over the big franchises

👉 How social posts may actually get more visibility on Google than they do inside Facebook's own feed

👉 Why "all else equal," the business that posts on social will rank above the one that doesn't

👉 The simplest possible posting habit: one post a week, a photo or quick video of the job you're on, no overthinking required

If you've been telling yourself you'll get around to social media eventually, this is the episode to change that. It takes two or three minutes and it compounds.

👉Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: go.handymanmarketingpros.com

👉Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbook-form

👉Connect with us:
💻Website: handymanmarketingpros.com
✉️Email: [email protected]

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

Everyone in the marketing world is buzzing about ChatGPT rolling out a paid advertising platform, and the usual voices are already telling you to jump on it or get left behind. So should a family-owned handyman or home service business actually care?

In this episode, Jason Call and Coby McManaman break down what's real and what's noise. They cover who these ads are actually built for (hint: it starts at a $50K per month minimum ad spend), what the new ChatGPT ad placements look like, and why Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) is becoming the AI version of SEO. The kicker: one home service operator running $3 million companies tracked thousands of leads last quarter and got exactly one documented lead from ChatGPT. That's less than 1% of total visibility, even though AI dominates 90% of the marketing conversation right now.

The takeaway is simple. Be where people are actually searching, be prudent about chasing hype, and focus on the things moving the needle: Google rankings, a Google Business Profile loaded with reviews, a website that converts, and showing up organically across AI platforms as they grow.

Want marketing built specifically for family-owned handyman businesses?

👉Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: go.handymanmarketingpros.com

👉Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbook-form

👉Connect with us:

💻Website: handymanmarketingpros.com

✉️Email: [email protected]

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

👉Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: go.handymanmarketingpros.com

👉Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbook-form

👉Connect with us:
💻Website: handymanmarketingpros.com
✉️Email: [email protected]

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

Jay Bergrfeld spent years as a handyman before he made the call most people are too nervous to make: he niched all the way down. Today he runs Jay's Door & Trim in Castle Rock, Washington, a rural market where everyone says you have to do a little bit of everything. Jay did the opposite, and it worked.

In this episode, Jay sits down with Jason and Coby to talk about the full journey. He gets honest about the transition from Jay's Handyman Service to a door, trim, and custom carpentry specialist, including the gut-check moment when he had $0.62 in his bank account and decided to keep going anyway.

What we get into:

• Why starting broad as a handyman is the smart way to build relationships before you narrow your focus
• How niching down actually changed his lead flow and the quality of his jobs
• The box truck investment he wishes he'd made sooner
• Why he refuses to hide behind a logo, and how being real on Facebook drives his business
• Staying level-headed and even-keeled as the real common denominator of business owners who last
• The homeless pressure washer who reminded Jason what this work is really about

If you're listening in the van right now and you've been thinking about putting more focus on one service, this one's for you. Jay shows what it looks like to follow your gut, serve people first, and let the work speak.

Connect with Jay on Facebook: Jay's Door & Trim (Jay Bergfeld)

The Home Hero Podcast is brought to you by Handyman Marketing Pros

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👉Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: go.handymanmarketingpros.com

👉Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbook-form

👉Connect with us:

💻Website: handymanmarketingpros.com

✉️Email: [email protected]

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.

👉Schedule a free, no-pressure strategy call: go.handymanmarketingpros.com

👉Grab the free 3-in-1 Handyman Playbook Bundle: go.handymanmarketingpros.com/playbook-form

👉Connect with us:
💻Website: handymanmarketingpros.com
✉️Email: [email protected]

New episodes of the Home Hero Podcast every week. If you got value from this one, subscribe and leave a review. It helps more home service pros find the show.