You could say that Marni Center is an animal person.

She moved from Deerfield, Illinois to Denver to study ecology and evolutionary biology. She's owned beautiful dogs and had so much fun training them that she completed The Animal Behavior College’s Dog Training program after she graduated. Since then, she’s made dog training her career, and she’s trained dogs all over the Denver area.

As Marni became more involved with the world of dog training, she began to find problems with some of the training methods her peers were using. That’s because many of them were using a method called Aversion Training.

Marni working on training with a client's dog

Aversion Training is a very common strategy for training dogs in the US and aims to expel unwanted behavior by utilizing things that are unpleasant to the dog such as shock collars, loud noises, and spray bottles. While this method often seems like it is working in...

Jerry Schill

Schill Grounds Management, Ohio 

Jerry Schill is the owner of Schill Landscape Management a full-service Landscape Maintenance and Snow and Ice removal contractor providing services to Commercial, Industrial, Apartment, Retail, and HOA across Northern Ohio.

Company Expansion & Growth Without Pains 

He’s a mover & shaker in the Green Industry and this winter, Jerry’s top priority is successfully moving into his new location. They have 2 big branches and 2 satellite locations. The new office will be the largest branch for the team.

He laughingly admits he “over-did it” as he told me about how the ½ acre building is jam packed with a huge formal meeting room, a training center addition, full kitchen, and a robust fenced-in parking lot.

They found, purchased and closed on the property all within 30 days. Like you, I was wondering how he’s keeping his head on straight.

“We’re blessed to have our...

Spring time in the landscape industry is our biggest opportunity for sales. Many of our clients and prospective clients see the ads from Lowes about all the latest and greatest gardening ideas and they want it all now!
 
This week I led our weekly sales meeting with a chat about our conversations. The amount of people that our sales team talks to can be overwhelming in the spring and it’s really important that we find a balance between ‘building a relationship’ (shooting the breeze) with capturing unique insight that will help us land the sale.

So what are the best conversation starters that help you quickly jump into the content of the conversation without making the prospect feel rushed? Here’s what we came up with:

• What’s your story, how did you get to this point?
• What’s a day in the life of [name] look like?
• What’s your favorite part of what you do every day?
• What are your biggest goals and dreams for [your landscaping]?
• ...