Ten Reasons You Must Attend The New Orleans Roundtable

The second national meeting of the Service Roundtable will be the New Orleans Roundtable.  Why New Orleans?  It's simple.  The city's largely rebuilt (at least, the French Quarter's largely rebuilt), the food's great, the jazz is great, it's easy to get to from nearly anywhere in the country, and it's a fun place to gather. 

Yeah, but what about the meeting?  Time is short.  Money is tight.  Why should I take off April 11-13 to attend another industry meeting?  In short, because this isn't like any other industry meeting.  It's completely focused on taking your business to the next level. 

Look, I'm all for efficiency and frugality.  Few companies are more efficient and frugal than the Service Roundtable.  Yet, the truth is you will not save your way to prosperity.  There are times you must invest... invest in the growth of your business, in the growth of your people, and in yourself.  The New Orleans Roundtable represents a great investment.  The tuition is very affordable.  The ideas and knowledge you'll gain are worth thousands.  The motivation and inspiration is priceless.  If you don't come to another event this year, come to the New Orleans Roundtable.  Here are the Top Ten Reasons You Must Attend...

#10 The Meeting Emcee is Ron Smith
Hanging around with Ron Smith is a seminar by itself. The guy casually drops gems of wisdom whenever he engages in a conversation. How can you miss the opportunity to spend time with the contractor who invented the service agreement, who came up with the idea of residential retail salespeople, who started the HVAC industry’s very first private contractor group and was the first person to franchise the HVAC industry, who spotted and recruited Tom McCart, Charlie Greer, Al Roach, Ruth King, and other superstars into the service trades?

Ron’s going to be emceeing the events, signing books, getting his picture taken with contractors, and generally hanging out.

Click Here to Register

#9 The Ideation Roundtables
Contractors from around the country will be bringing their best ideas to share during the Ideation Roundtables. What is an “Ideation Roundtable?” It’s like business idea storm, where you can pick up proven new ideas ways to make money and cut costs from other contractors. Look, some contractors simply do not post to the HVAC Roundtable, Plumbers Roundtable, and Electrical Roundtable. But they still have great ideas. They’re just more comfortable sharing them in person than over the Internet.

Click Here to Register

#8 Bar Talk
The best part of any industry meeting is the interaction that’s not on the agenda. It may sadden the people who bust their tails assembling a first class event, but the conversation over a beer at the end of the day is often better than event. This is especially true when you can meet the faces behind the email signatures and the staff of the Service Roundtable. If bar talk’s important, few places are better for it than the New Orleans French Quarter.

Click Here to Register

#7 Charlie Greer’s Lagniappe

A lagniappe (lan-yap) is defined by Dictionary.com as “a small gift given with a purchase to a customer, by way of compliment or for good measure; bonus.” Charlie “Tec Daddy” Greer will be delivering the New Orleans Roundtable’s lagniappe in the form of a free-for-all question and answer session at the close of each day. Bring your questions for one of the top consultants in the service trades and fire away as long as you want.

Click Here to Register

#6 The Haunted Hotel Monteleone
Okay, no one goes to a conference because it’s held in a cool hotel, but it doesn’t hurt either. Located in the middle of the French Quarter, the historic Hotel Monteleone has been a hangout and inspiration for numerous literary greats, such as Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams, William Faulkner, featured on everything from E! to the Food Network to A&E, CNN, and the major Truman Capote, Eudora Welty, Rebecca Wells, Anne Rice, Stephen Ambrose, John Grisham, and more. It’s been the site for a bunch of movies. It’s been featured on the major networks. The Travel Channel’s featured the hotel many times, including a show about “the best place to pop the question” and a show about haunted destinations. Haunted? Yup. It’s considered “one of the premier haunted hotels in North America.” Don’t worry. Staying on the haunted floor is purely optional. Look, this has got to be one of the coolest places ever for a meeting.

Click Here to Register

#5 Your Own Personal Board of Directors
Want help with a problem? We’re creating mini Roundtable Boards of non-competitive contractors to address each others’ business problems. Bring your most perplexing issues, whether it’s sales compensation, marketing issues, human resources problems, succession planning, figuring out a tactful way to get the mother-in-law to retire, truck policies, or anything else that affects your company. Get input, suggestions, and advice from contractors who have been there, done it, and have a closet full of t-shirts.

Click Here to Register

#4 Bob Viering’s Secret of Successful Email Marketing

Email marketing is one of the more powerful marketing tools at your disposal. Service Roundtable Content Manager, Bob Viering will show you an incredibly easy way to create an email marketing program to reduce the cost to build relationships and promote your company. Done right, email marketing is the lowest cost method for pushing communication to your customers. It’s the fastest marketing method around – what’s sent today is opened today. Customers who opt-in to receive your email communication and promotional offers are surprisingly likely to open the mail and respond. If you’re tired of expensive, hit or miss marketing, you must attend this session.

Click Here to Register

#3 Joe Cunningham’s Menu For Success
Popular sales trainer and consultant, Joe Cunningham promises he’ll show you how to take your business zero to profitability in 60 seconds. By adopting Joe’s simple, proven processes and plugging them into a “menu for success” implementation calendar that you’ll build, even the smallest contractors can leap forward, regardless of the economy.

Click Here to Register

#2 Brandon Jacob’s Exit Strategy
Every so often a window opens where buyers, ranging from consolidators to utilities to independent business people, look for contracting companies to buy. When the time is right, your company must be ready. Brandon Jacob, the service trades’ go-to-guy for acquisitions, will identify the steps you need to take to prepare your company maximum attractiveness and value. Even if you never want to sell, following Brandon’s guidelines will help your company more easily secure lines of credit and other loans, as well as generally improve your financial performance. If you ever want to sell your company or borrow money for less, you should pay attention to Brandon.

Click Here to Register


#1 Ken Goodrich’s Wild Ride
Ken Goodrich is a contractor like no other. The guy’s put together a team of all-stars who built and sold six companies. When he sold his last business to a consolidator, management hired him and told him to keep doing what he was doing. With his team, he grew the company and expanded to $100 million in 10 markets with 250 trucks. Incredibly, most of the growth was organic, not the result of acquisitions. With double digit net profit, Ken doubled the size of his operations in 2009.

Ken is a contractor with an amazing, inspirational story. He shows you what is possible in our industries. Even if your goal is to grow to $10 million or $1 million instead of $100 million, you can learn lessons from Ken Goodrich. Because he’s a contractor, growing like crazy, it’s rare for Ken to speak in public. This isn’t the type of presentation or speaker you’ll hear anywhere else. Do not miss this change to change your perspective on your business and industry.

To register for the New Orleans Roundtable, call Janet Thomasson at 877.262.3341 or click here to send her an email.  Or, you can click here for more information and the registration form.

Bonus:  Maintenance Agreement Seminar
Stay an extra day and join me to attend the Profit Strategies "Build Lasting Value With Maintenance Agreements" seminar.  You're already in New Orleans.  Stay one more day and get that much more value out of your travel dollar.

Click Here to Register For the Profit Strategies Maintenance Agreement Seminar