Selling enhancement work isn’t a way to nickel-and-dime your client base; rather, it can serve as a core growth engine that strengthens your customer relationships when approached as a proactive partnership. Tyner Tew, vice president of sales for Bland Landscaping Company, based in Apex, North Carolina, says they’ve sold enhancements since the start of the business 50 years ago, but over the last 10 years, it’s become more of a focus for them.
“It helps with growth from a revenue standpoint, and then it also helps us with providing more opportunities for our team to grow within our company as well,” Tew says.
Why You Shouldn’t Ignore Enhancements
Brook Haygood, national director of sales for Visterra Landscape Group, based in Rosemont, Illinois, says one major advantage of enhancement work is that it tends to have higher margins than maintenance contracts.
“It also is a great way for us to give our field employees more hours because we’re doing higher margin work, but we can pay them on overtime because of that higher margin work,” Haygood says.
Clare Munie, a national account manager with Munie Greencare Professionals, based in Caseyville, Illinois, says by providing solutions to clients via enhancements, they are able to build a portfolio of interesting projects, proven solutions, and happy customers.
“We are the experts on grounds – that’s why they hire us,” Munie says. “So, when we can be proactive in solutions, provide solutions to large pain points, or to enhance their property, we are building trust. Our goal is to make our property managers look good. We understand what the little details mean to their brand. An erosion problem that is causing safety and visual eyesores for the customer could turn into a beautiful, tiered retaining wall with an eye-catching assortment of shrubs and perennials.”
Montana Barrow, an account manager with Pacific Landscape Management, based in Hillsboro, Oregon, says enhancement work makes up a huge share of their business and they rely on it for growth. She says additionally, by solving problems for their customers, they are able to add another layer of trust to the relationship.
“It can also be about beautifying the property, making it look better, which makes them look better as well,” Barrow says. “So I definitely think it adds value there to the relationship.”
Haygood agrees that selling enhancement work is one of the biggest relationship builders for their customer base. He says project managers particularly appreciate being notified proactively of issues that need to be addressed on the property.
“The last thing you want to do is when they’re doing a walkthrough with an owner, and then they discover those issues,” Haygood says.
Tew says occasionally, when they take on new business, one complaint they hear is how their previous landscape provider never communicated any recommendations to improve their site.
Standardizing Selling Enhancements
To ensure enhancements aren’t random one-offs, you need to determine which clients you want to focus on, when to propose enhancements, and who is responsible for selling them.
Haygood says it’s best to propose enhancements to every client, especially safety-related issues.
“I’ve had just as much penetration rate on C properties as I’ve had on A properties,” Haygood says. “It depends on the relationship of the property manager. And are you really providing a solution if you’re just constantly just saying, ‘Hey, let’s do this, let’s do that,’ and there’s really no solution behind it or no problem to begin with? It’s really a waste of everyone’s time.”
Munie agrees that every customer is a target for enhancement opportunities; it’s just the size of their goal that will vary based on their understanding of each customer.
Pacific Landscape Management makes a point to create a budget for every property, but Barrow says she knows which will invest in enhancements and which will not, based on previous years.
“The smaller the property, I would say it’s going to be harder,” Barrow says. “I know HOAs are harder to sell things to just because it’s their money. Their emotions are involved in that purchasing process. The larger properties that are more commercial and are professionally managed tend to be easier sales. Most of that is because they’re looking to reduce their liability. They want to make sure things are safe, so where a lot of these projects tend to focus on is like safety and liability.”
Tew says they opt to respond and react to different customer groups and customer types based on what they’re trying to do from a value standpoint with their assets, but will present enhancement opportunities to everyone.
What matters the most is timing proposals, so they align with your client’s renewal season.
“What we try to do is present enhancement budgets for the upcoming year to these property managers, so that gives them an opportunity to budget it,” Haygood says.
Haygood says by being proactive, they can ensure they have spring work front-loaded for operations by presenting enhancement budgets during the August-September timeframe.
Munie has found the summer months are a good time to get in some billable work, especially if clients still have money left over for the year and the spring rush has come to a close.
“We have our budgetary goals for enhancements, but we won’t sell a project just because it hits a quota if it’s not what fits for the property,” Munie says. “Our account management team performs audits and site walks, identifying areas of enhancement potential, not to meet a quota, but to improve property function and beauty.”
Hilary Moody, design/estimating team leader for Bland Landscaping Company, says there is always some type of enhancement that can be done on site each month of the year, so they try to look 60 to 90 days out. For instance, with hard pruning shrubs to improve sightlines, this is work that is best done in January or February, so they’ll pitch this offering to clients in November, so they have time to propose the work, the client can review and approve it.
Barrow says she starts building budgets from March through September, where she conducts site visits to identify and document problems and build out an estimated budget for properties.
“After that is submitted to the customer, as we get into the new year, I have different lists that I refer to for each month that have what was budgeted for each month, and then I’ll dive through that list and send out those proposals to customers on that monthly cadence,” Barrow says.
Because about 25-30 percent of enhancement work comes directly from customer requests, it’s best to have a single point of contact for your client base.
Moody says they prefer their account managers to be the single point of contact as they meet with clients most often.
“They discuss opportunities with the client,” Moody says. “They take requests from the client. If the clients have specific needs, they then will capture photos, measurements, and information of that sort. Some enhancements are so small, they can easily take care of them themselves. If it needs more design work and it’s a larger-size project, they’ll take all that information and submit it to the design team. From there, we have dedicated enhancement designers and estimators who will pull that together with a design, with renderings, estimating, and a full proposal that the account manager can then submit back to the client.”
Haygood says selling enhancements is one of the three key functions of their account managers.
At Visterra, they hold account managers accountable through the KPI of how many monthly site inspections (MSI) they’ve conducted that month. Haygood says aside from property managers requesting enhancements, the rest of their enhancement work is fueled by their MSIs.
“It’s a big relationship builder,” Haygood says. “When we’re proactive, they wake up in the morning to get their MSI report, and it’s here all the things that I saw this morning during our morning inspection. Would you like us to fix them?”
The Hooks That Lead to Yes
If you want more clients to sign off on your enhancement proposals, three main pressure points resonate with property managers.
The easier enhancements to sell are often related to tree work, drainage, erosion control, plant replacements, and the renovation of high-profile areas that get a lot of use. As Barrow and Haygood mentioned earlier, safety is a major selling point for many property owners.
“The safety issues always need to be highlighted, even if they know,” Haygood says. “So at least we gave them a heads up and gave them an opportunity to fix it before anyone gets hurt.”
Barrow says liability is particularly a concern for older properties with large mature trees.
Offering enhancements that boost ROI, increase operational efficiency or reduce costs is another angle that can lead to a property manager saying yes. Haygood says beyond safety issues, account managers should be on the lookout for ways they can lower their clients’ maintenance contract value.
An example would be replacing mulch with rock. Haygood says while there is a bigger upfront investment, over a few years, the client has paid for that, and they are no longer paying for mulch in their contracts.
“It’s taking mulch out of those contracts, but the reality is you’re deepening relationships,” Haygood says. “You’re making properties better. It’s almost karma at this point that property is just going to continue to give you more because you take care of them at the end of the day. It’s just better to improve the property. It’s the right thing to do.”
Moody says they’ve seen a lot of interest in replacing old irrigation controllers with smart controllers as buildings pursue LEED certification.
“Water conservation is huge with property managers, especially in this day and age,” Barrow says. “The tenants are usually the ones who are paying for the water bill, and so they will sometimes put pressure on the property manager, like ‘How can we save water?’ A great place to start is with the landscape.”
Lastly, improving overall aesthetics and amenities can’t be overlooked. Many commercial properties value curb appeal and amenities as it helps with their leasing and branding. Moody says the best combination is where an enhancement will save a client money while providing environmental benefits, like adding a pollinator meadow.
“When they’re trying to lease and somebody drives up in the summer, and there’s just this beautiful meadow all out the back of all of the units on that particular area where they’re going to walk their dog, that feels good,” Moody says. “It feels good to them because they know they’re doing something good for the environment, and then they’re also saving money.”
The hardest enhancements to get approval for tend to be for big infrastructure changes, hardscaping or changes where the client is unable to see the value.
“If we’re providing enhancement proposals for things that they do not see themselves that they’re coming to you for, those generally take an extra conversation or two, or a walk on property to actually point things out and talk through,” Tew says.
The Power of Boots on the Ground
Your field staff can also play a powerful role in the equation of growing the enhancement side of the business.
First off, your crew members are the ones who are visiting properties on a regular or even daily basis, making them even more likely to spot opportunities to upsell if you’ve trained them to look for certain indicators.
“It’s part of the expectation of their work that they are the eyes and the ears of the site, so they’re there to bring problems up for our attention so we can stay ahead of it before the customer finds out, and then it’s a reactionary thing at that point,” Barrow says.
Moody says their crews take pride in the properties they care for and will share with the team if there is something that is affecting their ability to work efficiently or detracting from the overall beauty of the site.
Haygood says they have an incentive program where if a crew member identifies an enhancement opportunity that is then sold, that individual is rewarded with a piece of the account manager’s commission.
“Even if business development people are out looking at new sites, but see old sites, we’ll even allow them to sell enhancements, especially if I see that the account manager hasn’t been there in 30 or 60 days,” Haygood says. “We have honey in the pot for everyone to sell enhancements.”
Additionally, how you go about executing the work will greatly determine the likelihood of the same clients saying yes to future upgrades.
“We want them to be enthusiastic buyers, and I think the way to do that is by giving them a good product and a good outcome of what they’re buying,” Barrow says. “I take it on myself to come up with the scope, but if there is a part where I can involve them and get their opinion, that tends to also help the outcome, because they had some say in it. Overall, I try to make their life easier and figure out the best things to recommend to them because I am the professional.”
It is best to have a dedicated enhancement team in place, as they will be able to execute these jobs with consistency and speed.
“These enhancement folks, they understand the challenges that come with working on these existing sites and existing properties versus a brand new construction site,” Moody says. “We also have built very strong internal relationships with these enhancement crews and the design estimating team because I want them to be able to call right away if they have a question or any kind of concern about what they’re installing.”
Munie says after they deliver a quality enhancement project, their clients are more likely to trust that their sales aren’t for the sake of sales; they are solutions.
“Once a property manager sees the process, it was painless, we did what we were going to do, we did it at the time we said we were going to do it, pending weather that conversation becomes easier and easier,” Haygood says.
This article was published in the March/April/May issue of the magazine. To read more stories from The Edge magazine, click here to subscribe to the digital edition.
