In this episode, Wayne and Andy tackle a brutally honest topic most tradesmen don’t want to hear:

👉 If you’re still answering your own phone… you’re holding your business back.
Full stop. End of.

This week’s conversation dives deep into why taking calls yourself destroys productivity, kills your pricing confidence, and keeps you trapped as the “local guy who does everything” instead of a real business owner.

Inside this episode:

• 📵 Why answering your own phone instantly caps your growth

• 💁‍♀️ Why women outperform men in admin, customer service & call handling (stats don’t lie)

• 🧠 The emotional bias that makes YOU terrible at quoting — and why office staff fix it

• 💼 How a female voice on the phone elevates your brand, reputation, and perceived value

• 🔧 The difference between a tradesman mindset and a business owner mindset

• 🕒 How many hours you’re wasting every week flicking between jobs and admin

• 🤯 The hidden lost revenue when you miss calls or call customers back “later”

• 📈 Why outsourcing your calls isn’t a cost — it’s one of the best investments you can make

• 🧩 Why you MUST have a job management system before getting admin support

• 🔥 The real reason customers won’t pay your new prices… and how admin staff fix it

• ☎️ How missed calls sabotage every pound you spend on marketing (listen to last week’s episode!)

This is a big wake-up call for tradesmen who:

• want to charge more 💷

• want to appear more professional 🧑‍💼

• want to scale a real business 🚀

• want more time back with their family ❤️

• want to stop being chained to the phone like a 24/7 emergency hotline ☎️🔥

If you want less stress, higher profits, and a business that grows without you doing everything…

Get off the phone.
Get someone in the office.
Grow like a real business.

💬 Got questions about hiring, systems, or call handling?
Drop Wayne or Andy a message or jump into the Off The Tools community on Facebook. 🦁🔥

If you’re still saying “I’ve never advertised and I’m doing fine” — this episode is for you. 🔥

Wayne and Andy rip into one of the biggest myths in the trade game: that word of mouth alone is enough to grow a modern business, charge properly, and stay ahead of the competition. Spoiler: it isn’t. ❌

They break down the difference between primitive marketing (cards, mags, leaflets, vans, local presence) and new age marketing (Google Ads, Checkatrade, platforms, SEO, CRMs) — and why the smartest businesses are doing BOTH. 🧠🚀

Inside this episode:

• 🧯 Why “I don’t need to market” usually means you’re too cheap

• 📉 The brutal truth about relying on word of mouth in 2025

• 🪓 Primitive marketing vs new age marketing — and where each one wins

• 📬 How to use leaflets, A6 cards, local mags & sponsorships properly

• 🔌 Why most trades switch off marketing at the worst possible time

• ⏳ Marketing for the future, not just for “when it’s quiet”

• 🌐 How Checkatrade and lead gen sites actually work (once you stop expecting 60% conversion)

• 🥶 Why cold leads are different – and what’s a realistic win rate

• 💷 How marketing and pricing are linked (more leads = more confidence = higher prices)

• ⚠️ Why chasing turnover without foundations is a fast road to burnout

• 📈 The slow, boring, compounding marketing most lads are too impatient to do

If you want to:

• stop depending on luck and “hoping the phone rings” ☎️

• attract better customers 🤝

• raise your prices without shitting yourself 💰

• and build a business that grows every year instead of yo-yoing 📊…

…then you need to get serious about marketing. Properly. Consistently. Long-term. 💪

💬 Got a question about your marketing or want us to break down your current setup on a future episode?
Drop Wayne or Andy a message or join the free Off The Tools community on Facebook and get involved. 🦁🔥

AI isn’t coming.
It’s already here.
And the trades who ignore it are going to get smoked by the ones who adopt it.

In this episode, Wayne & Andy dive into the truth about AI in the plumbing, heating, and electrical world — stripping out the sci-fi nonsense and showing exactly how real tradesmen can use AI TODAY to save time, win more work, and look more professional than 90% of their competitors.

Inside this unfiltered episode:

🔥 How Wayne went from “AI’s a novelty” → to fully embedding it in two businesses
🔥 Why AI won’t replace tradesmen — but WILL replace slow, old-school businesses
🔥 The biggest game-changer: AI phone answering (live demo included)
🔥 How AI can answer calls, book jobs, send links, collect customer info & upsell… all while you’re under a boiler
🔥 The shocking increase in online bookings once AI handles your first contact
🔥 Why customers prefer AI speed over human small talk
🔥 How AI helps single-man bands COMPETE with companies that have full offices
🔥 Why the older generation actually prefer AI more than you think
🔥 How AI + automations can reduce your office workload by 50–80%
🔥 Why manual call handling is losing you customers every single day
🔥 The one mindset shift that stops tradesmen sabotaging their own growth
🔥 How AI protects your business from “giving away the diagnosis” over the phone
🔥 Using AI for website chat, content creation, customer service & more
🔥 Why “not answering the phone” is the #1 reason customers leave their old tradesman
🔥 The harsh reality: customers want SPEED, not excuses

PLUS:
Real examples from inside Wayne’s business — including a live walk-through of his AI call handler and chat bot, how it collects data, how it routes calls, and how it pushed online bookings up by 50%+ almost overnight.

If you’re a one-man band, small team, or even a growing company with office staff — you NEED to hear this.

AI isn’t a threat.
It’s a tool.
And the ones who pick it up will dominate the next decade of the trades.

Want us to build your AI call handler or chatbot?
Email Wayne or Andy — links in the description.