Client Verticals - Tygart Media

Category: Client Verticals

Industry-specific marketing strategies beyond restoration. Cold storage, lending, comedy, training, and more.

  • Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment

    Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment

    Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment

    $29

    Delivered by email after checkout.

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    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Score yourself across five areas. Total the checks. Write your top 3 things to delegate first. Buy Now is the packaged Notion page you duplicate, so you are not rebuilding the 25-statement score from a blank doc.

    Tool #2 of the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. Find out where your company still depends on you. An owner bottleneck exists when growth, decision speed, and consistency are limited by your personal involvement in day-to-day decisions. You become both the most important and the most constraining person in the business.

    Check the box for each statement that is true of your business today. Count the checks in each section, then total them at the bottom. Be honest. The value is in the truth.

    How to run it

    1. Work the five sections. Check only what is true today, not what used to be true or what you plan to fix.
    2. Total the checks (range is 0-25). Read your band.
    3. Write your top 3 to delegate first. Those become Weeks 1-2 of a 90-day doer-to-leader plan.
    4. For one full week after you score, log every interrupt for a decision. Sort into Delegate now / Delegate after training / Keep (truly owner-only).
    5. Re-run it at the end of 90 days and compare to Week 1. The number matters less than the trend.

    1. Decisions only you make

    • Estimate / pricing approvals over a set dollar amount run through me
    • Hiring and firing decisions are all mine
    • Vendor and supplier choices need my sign-off
    • Which jobs we take is my call alone
    • Refunds, credits, and customer concessions require me

    If this section is heavy, your next move is a Decision-Rights list: 10-15 recurring decisions, a dollar or scope threshold people can decide under without asking you, and who owns it when you are not in the room. Walk the team through it: “Under this line, you do not need me. Decide and tell me after.” Hand off one decision completely this month and do not take it back.

    Starter rows if you need them: approve a job estimate over $25k; authorize overtime / call-in crew; issue a refund or credit; hire or fire; approve a vendor / sub payment; take an out-of-area or unusual job; sign a contract or insurance scope; pull a crew off one job for another; spend on new equipment; set or discount a price.

    2. Interruptions by department

    • Production calls me daily with questions
    • Office / admin pulls me into billing or scheduling
    • Sales / estimating checks pricing with me before quoting
    • Technicians call me from job sites
    • I get pulled into customer complaints personally

    Tally the interrupts for one week. The department with the most checks is this quarter’s target. Install 1-3-1 there first: one issue, three options with pros/cons/cost, one recommendation, and a default if they do not hear back by a deadline. When someone brings a raw problem, ask: “What are your three options, and which do you recommend?” Then wait.

    3. Recurring questions that come back to you

    • The same operational questions reach me every week
    • People wait for me to decide instead of deciding themselves
    • “Ask the owner” is the default answer here
    • I re-explain the same processes over and over
    • Things stall when I am unavailable

    Recurring questions are undocumented decisions. Write the answer once. Put it where the question gets asked (truck, office, group chat). If you re-explain the same process, that process needs an SOP or a named owner, not another explanation from you.

    4. Tasks that should be delegated

    • I still write estimates I could hand off
    • I handle scheduling / dispatch
    • I chase collections / AR myself
    • I order equipment and supplies
    • I personally produce things others could

    These are doer tasks wearing an owner badge. Pick one. Hand the outcome, not the task. “You own scheduling this month. I will sit in the first week. After that, bring me 1-3-1s, not the board.” Name the 1-2 skills they most need and how you will help (ride-along, training, a stretch job). Set a weekly 30-minute 1-on-1 and protect it.

    5. Areas with no backup

    • No one else can run production if I am out
    • Only I hold the key carrier / adjuster relationships
    • Only I can see the full financial picture
    • There are no written SOPs for the things I do
    • If I am gone a week, something breaks

    A checked box here is a single point of failure. Name the backup, or name the blank. A blank candidate is itself a finding. Put each exposed function on a bench list: current owner, future-leader candidate, backup depth (None / Thin / Solid), the skill gap, one observable 90-day action, a weekly or biweekly check-in.

    This section is the short version of the Owner Dependency Audit (nine areas, Low/Med/High, what breaks if you vanish 30 days) and the 5 Ds Disease / Departure boxes (vacation test, backup estimator, relationships not owned by one person).

    Your score

    Total checks: ___ / 25

    • 0-6 Mild. You have delegated well. Tighten the few remaining gaps.
    • 7-13 Moderate. You are the bottleneck in one or two areas. Fix the worst one first.
    • 14-19 Heavy. The business runs through you. Start delegating now, deliberately.
    • 20-25 Severe. You ARE the business. This is the #1 risk to your growth and your exit.

    Write your top 3 to delegate first. Take the worst section into a 90-day doer-to-leader plan. Run the Owner Dependency Audit for the full picture (nine areas, Decision-Rights Map, 30-day disappear test).

    Tell the team the shift is coming: “I am working a 90-day plan to push decisions down. Expect me to hand more back to you.” Then do it. Re-score at Week 12. Take a planned half-day fully off and note what broke. That is the next bottleneck.

    If you want the packaged assessment

    You can run the 25 statements on a legal pad. Buy Now is the Notion page delivered by email after checkout. Duplicate it (··· → Duplicate) so the original stays clean for next quarter. The five sections, the score table, and the top-3 lines are already laid out. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Pairs with the Owner Dependency Audit (deeper diagnostic) and the 90-Day Doer-to-Leader Transition Plan (Weeks 1-2). Matching Claude skill: owner-bottleneck-assessment. Coaching and operational tool only. Not legal or HR advice.

    Related: Restoration Leadership Toolkit — Claude Edition. Also 1-3-1 Delegation Worksheet.

  • Operations Kit — AI Edition

    Operations Kit — AI Edition

    Operations Kit — AI Edition

    $397

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Talk to your own Claude. Interview your own shop. Write your own SOPs and claims drafts. Buy Now is the packaged zip: eight skills, the plugin files, and the install so you do not have to wire it from scratch.

    This is the AI companion to the Complete Restoration Operations Kit. A restoration owner attaches it to their own Claude. It interviews them, writes a company profile, and then the other skills speak that business.

    What it is

    An 8-skill Claude plugin. Install it into Claude Code, the Claude Desktop app, or Cowork. A setup skill runs a five-minute interview, writes a company-profile.md, and every other skill reads it. SOPs, KPI targets, claims drafts, and onboarding plans come out in your voice, not a generic restoration voice.

    You need any Claude that supports Skills / Plugins. If you can chat with Claude and run a /command, you are good.

    The 8 skills

    1. restoration-setup. Say “Set up the kit.” Guided interview that customizes the whole kit. First run. The concierge.
    2. job-intake-assistant. Say “We just got a water call.” New-loss intake, water Cat/Class classification, scope plus safety, a paste-ready job summary.
    3. equipment-advisor. Say “How many air movers for this room?” Air-mover and dehu sizing, placement, and a monitoring plan.
    4. sop-generator. Say “Write an SOP for mold containment.” A tailored SOP in your company’s voice. Any of the 17 core SOPs, or a new one.
    5. claims-assistant. Say “Draft a follow-up to the adjuster.” Adjuster emails, supplement justifications, an aging-claims chase plan.
    6. kpi-coach. Say “Here are my numbers this month.” Your 12 KPIs computed and trended. The biggest profit leak named, with fixes.
    7. crew-onboarding-builder. Say “Onboard a new tech.” Role-based Week-1 / 30 / 60 / 90 plan plus an IICRC certification roadmap.
    8. iicrc-protocol-lookup. Say “What does S500 say about Cat 3 water?” Plain-English pointer to S500 / S520 / S700 / S540 plus PPE. It is a lookup assistant, not a substitute for the published standard. Defer to current IICRC text, local codes, and your certified judgment.

    How to install it yourself

    Option A: plugin (recommended)

    1. Save the restoration-kit folder anywhere on your computer.
    2. In Claude, run: 
      /plugin marketplace add /path/to/restoration-kit
/plugin install restoration-kit@profit-detective

      Replace the path with wherever you saved the folder. On Desktop and Cowork, type the same /plugin commands in the chat.

    3. Start setup: 
      /restoration-kit:restoration-setup

    Option B: personal skills (simplest, no plugin)

    Copy each folder inside skills/ into your personal skills folder at ~/.claude/skills/. On Windows that is C:\Users\<you>\.claude\skills\. Then tell Claude: “run restoration setup.”

    First run

    Run restoration-setup first. It asks about your company for about five minutes. It saves a company-profile.md. Then it offers to customize each skill: generate your first SOPs, set KPI targets, draft a sample adjuster email.

    Keep that company-profile.md in the folder you work in. Every skill reads it so the answers sound like your shop.

    Using it day to day

    You do not need to memorize skill names. Just talk.

    • “We just got a fire call on Oak St” → intake
    • “Size the equipment for a 15×20 Class 3” → equipment
    • “Write our FNOL intake SOP” → SOP
    • “My gross margin slipped to 41%. What’s going on?” → KPI coach
    • “Draft a supplement justification for the Alvarez claim” → claims
    • “Build an onboarding plan for a new crew chief” → onboarding
    • “What PPE for Condition 3 mold?” → IICRC lookup

    Optional: put it on a routine. Ask Claude, “Schedule a weekly KPI review every Monday at 8am.” It walks you through a recurring run of the KPI coach.

    What the 12 KPIs are

    When you feed the KPI coach real numbers, these are the twelve the kit is built around:

    • Revenue, Gross Margin %, Net Profit %, Days Sales Outstanding, Average Job Size
    • Lead-to-Job Conversion %, Jobs Sold
    • Average Days to Dry
    • Labor Efficiency %, Equipment Utilization %
    • Rework / Callback %, Customer Satisfaction (NPS)

    Starting targets in the kit: gross margin ≥ 45%, net ≥ 12%, DSO ≤ 45 days, conversion ≥ 35%, days to dry ≤ 3.5, labor efficiency ≥ 70%, equipment utilization ≥ 60%, callbacks ≤ 3%, NPS ≥ 70. Use them as a case file, then set yours.

    What the zip actually contains

    • .claude-plugin/plugin.json and marketplace.json
    • skills/ (the 8 skills)
    • README.md with the full install

    Outputs from each skill are formatted to paste into the matching Notion template in the Complete Restoration Operations Kit. The Notion side is the system of record (jobs, equipment, claims, KPIs). These skills help you fill and act on them.

    This is an operational assistant only. Not legal, insurance, or licensing advice.

    If you want the packaged install

    You can rebuild this from the outline above. Buy Now is the zip delivered by email after checkout: plugin files, the eight skills, and the README so you drop it in and run setup. Same Square button at the top of this page.

  • Middle Manager Evaluation Scorecard

    Middle Manager Evaluation Scorecard

    Middle Manager Evaluation Scorecard

    $59

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Name the person and the seat. Score nine traits 1-5 from recent examples. Total them. Read the band. Buy Now is the packaged Notion table you duplicate, so you are not rebuilding the scorecard from a blank spreadsheet.

    Tool #6 of the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. Help owners assess whether someone is ready to manage people, not just perform tasks. Your best tech is not automatically your best lead. The skills that make a great doer (speed, craft, hustle) are different from the skills that make a great manager (getting work done through others). Use this before you promote the wrong person.

    How to run it

    1. Name the person and the seat. Lead, crew chief, PM, estimator, office manager. The bar shifts with the seat. A crew chief lives or dies on conflict and training. A PM lives or dies on judgment and communication.
    2. Walk the nine traits in order. For each, ask for a recent, specific example: “Tell me about the last time they hit a problem on a job. What did they do?” Then give a 1-5 and confirm it. Anchor every score in observed behavior, not gut feel or potential.
    3. Flag the unknowns. If you have never seen a trait (they have never had to handle real conflict or train anyone), record it as a known gap. Do not guess a high score. Untested is itself a finding.
    4. Total the nine (max 45). Read the shape of the scores, not just the total.
    5. Name the lowest 2-3 traits as the gaps to close. One concrete development action each. A re-evaluation date, typically 60-90 days.

    One person = one row. Duplicate a row or a page for the next person. Do not overwrite last quarter’s scores.

    The nine traits

    1. Ownership. 1-5. Takes responsibility for outcomes, no blame-shifting.
    2. Communication. 1-5. Clear, timely, two-way communication. Closes the loop.
    3. Judgment. 1-5. Makes sound decisions without being told every step.
    4. Emotional maturity. 1-5. Stays steady under pressure, regulates reactions.
    5. Coachability. 1-5. Seeks and applies feedback, not defensive.
    6. Follow-through. 1-5. Closes the loop, does what they said by when they said.
    7. Trains others. 1-5. Can teach a task and bring others up to standard.
    8. Handles conflict. 1-5. Addresses tension directly and fairly, does not avoid it or blow it up.
    9. Values alignment. 1-5. Models company values when no one is watching.

    Also write: Name, Role (current title), Notes (evidence, specific gaps to close, target re-eval date), Total (auto-sum of the nine, max 45), Recommendation (Promote / Develop first / Not yet).

    The 1-5 anchors

    • 1. Not yet / recurring problem.
    • 2. Inconsistent, needs heavy supervision.
    • 3. Developing. Does it when reminded.
    • 4. Solid. Does it on their own most of the time.
    • 5. Consistently strong. Others learn from how they do it.

    The recommendation bands

    • Promote. About 37-45. Ready to lead now. Strong and even across traits.
    • Develop first. About 27-36. Real potential with named gaps. Give a development plan and a date. Do not promote yet.
    • Not yet. 26 or below. Performs tasks but is not ready to lead people. Revisit later, or keep growing them as an individual contributor.

    Override rule. Any single trait scored 1-2 on Ownership, Emotional maturity, or Values alignment caps the recommendation at Develop first, regardless of total. Those are the floors for putting someone over people. Call it out when it triggers.

    The bands are guides, not hard cutoffs. The owner decides. The score is an input, not a verdict. Never treat the number as a must-promote or must-pass.

    How to fill it without lying to yourself

    Score behavior, not the person. Tie every number to something you actually saw. Never score personality, background, age, accent, health, family situation, or “culture fit” as a stand-in for a protected characteristic. If that is the reason in your head, redirect to what they actually did.

    Watch three biases. Halo: great tech, so you assume great leader. Recency: one good or bad week coloring everything. Similarity: rating people like you higher. Name it if you see it.

    If several traits are untested, say so out loud. Lower your confidence. Put a trial of responsibility in front of the decision: run a job, train a hire, own a file end-to-end. Then re-score.

    After a Develop-first result, the next move is usually an accountability conversation: here is what is between you and the seat, here is the 30-day or 90-day target. After a Promote, hand them one area end-to-end and put them on the 90-day doer-to-leader spine (Weeks 7-8: develop one manager). Put every scored name on a bench list so you are not keeping five people “on your radar” and developing none.

    If you want the packaged scorecard

    You can run the nine traits on a legal pad. Buy Now is the Notion table delivered by email after checkout. Duplicate it so the master stays clean. The nine scores, the Total, the Recommendation, and the Notes field are already laid out. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Pairs with the Leadership Readiness Checklist (lighter yes/no read on the same person), the Restoration Leadership Bench Builder (develop the Develop-first group), the Accountability Conversation Planner (the “here is what is between you and the promotion” talk), and the 90-Day Doer-to-Leader Transition Plan. Matching Claude skill: middle-manager-scorecard. Decision support only. Not legal or HR advice. Not a hiring, firing, promotion, compensation, or disciplinary determination.

  • Leadership Toolkit — AI Edition

    Leadership Toolkit — AI Edition

    Leadership Toolkit — AI Edition

    $297

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Talk to your own Claude. Interview your own shop. Score your own bench. Write your own 90-day plan to get out of the truck. Buy Now is the packaged zip: ten skill folders, the plugin files, and the install so you do not have to wire the coaching loop from a blank chat.

    This is the AI Edition of the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. A restoration owner attaches it to their own Claude. Setup interviews them. Then nine leadership skills coach from doer to leader, using their team, their roles, and their pain points. The Notion worksheets are the fill-in half. These skills run them conversationally.

    What it is

    A 9-skill Claude plugin plus a shared setup skill. Install into Claude Code, the Claude Desktop app, or Cowork. Setup writes a company-profile.md. Every leadership skill reads it. If you already ran setup from the Operations Kit, it reuses the same profile. One profile powers both.

    You need any Claude that supports Skills / Plugins. If you can chat with Claude and run a /command, you are good.

    The 10 skills

    1. restoration-setup. Say “Set up the kit.” Guided interview. First run. The concierge. Shared with the Ops kit.
    2. delegation-1-3-1. Say “Help me delegate this.” Convert an escalated question into one issue, three options, one recommendation. That is the handoff.
    3. owner-bottleneck-assessment. Say “Where am I the bottleneck?” A scored self-assessment. Names the top places the company still depends on you.
    4. succession-5ds-checklist. Say “Am I exposed if something happens to me?” Death, Divorce, Disease, Drugs, Departure. Your exposure, plus what to shore up.
    5. accountability-planner. Say “I have a hard conversation to plan.” The issue, the change, the expectation, the consequence. Outputs a script plus a 30-day follow-up.
    6. leadership-readiness-checklist. Say “Is my team ready to lead?” Assess the current bench. Flag single points of failure.
    7. middle-manager-scorecard. Say “Should I promote this person?” Score a person on 9 traits. Recommendation: promote, develop first, or not yet.
    8. owner-dependency-audit. Say “What breaks if I disappear for 30 days?” Dependency across functions plus a decision-rights map.
    9. leadership-bench-builder. Say “Build my leadership bench.” Candidates, skill gaps, a 90-day development plan per person.
    10. doer-to-leader-90-day. Say “Give me a 90-day plan to step back.” A personalized 12-week transition plan, week by week.

    How to install it yourself

    Option A: plugin (recommended)

    1. Save the leadership-kit folder anywhere on your computer.
    2. In Claude, run: 
      /plugin marketplace add /path/to/leadership-kit
/plugin install leadership-kit@profit-detective

      Replace the path with wherever you saved the folder. On Desktop and Cowork, type the same /plugin commands in the chat.

    3. Start setup: 
      /leadership-kit:restoration-setup

    Option B: personal skills (simplest, no plugin)

    Copy each folder inside skills/ into your personal skills folder at ~/.claude/skills/. On Windows that is C:\\Users\\<you>\\.claude\\skills\\. Then tell Claude: “run restoration setup.”

    First run

    Run restoration-setup first. About five minutes on your company and team. Company name, markets, services (water, fire, mold, contents, reconstruction), size, key roles, who answers the phone, carriers, how you run a job, and the biggest pain points. It saves company-profile.md. Then every tool is tailored to your people and how you run jobs.

    Keep that file in the folder you work in. You can re-run setup anytime to update it. Nothing leaves your computer.

    Using it day to day

    You do not need to memorize skill names. Just talk.

    • “My ops manager keeps escalating everything to me. Help me delegate it.” → delegation-1-3-1
    • “Where am I still the bottleneck?” → owner-bottleneck-assessment
    • “Score my lead tech for a crew-chief promotion.” → middle-manager-scorecard
    • “Is my team ready to lead?” → leadership-readiness-checklist
    • “I have a hard conversation to plan with my PM.” → accountability-planner
    • “What breaks if I take two weeks off?” → owner-dependency-audit
    • “Am I exposed if something happens to me?” → succession-5ds-checklist
    • “Build my leadership bench.” → leadership-bench-builder
    • “Build me a 90-day plan to get out of the truck.” → doer-to-leader-90-day

    Run the skills in this order

    Same spine as the 90-day plan. Do not skip ahead.

    1. Setup, then the bottleneck assessment and the dependency audit. Name the top 3 places the company still runs through you.
    2. delegation-1-3-1 on the next five escalations. One issue, three options, one recommendation, a default if you do not answer by a deadline.
    3. Readiness checklist. Six sections. Red / yellow / green. Name the next-leader candidates.
    4. Scorecard on the one person you are betting on. Nine traits, 1-5. Promote about 37-45. Develop first about 27-36. Not yet 26 or below.
    5. Bench builder. One row per function. Go deep on that one person. One observable 90-day action.
    6. Accountability planner for the one hard talk this phase. Script plus a 30-day follow-up.
    7. doer-to-leader-90-day to date the six two-week phases. Then 5 Ds as the what-if-tomorrow check.

    The 1-3-1 handoff, in plain terms

    Someone brings you a problem. You do not solve it in the hallway. You send them back to write one issue (the actual decision, not the whole week), three options they can live with, and one recommendation with why. You decide. They own the work. That is how you stop being the bottleneck without abandoning the job.

    What the zip actually contains

    • .claude-plugin/plugin.json and marketplace.json
    • skills/ (10 folders: setup plus the nine leadership skills)
    • README.md with the full install

    Outputs from each skill are formatted to paste into the matching Notion template in the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. The Notion side is the system of record. These skills help you fill and act on them.

    This is a coaching and operational assistant only. Not legal or HR advice.

    If you want the packaged install

    You can rebuild this from the outline above. Buy Now is the zip delivered by email after checkout: plugin files, the ten skills, and the README so you drop it in and run setup. Same Square button at the top of this page.

  • Leadership Readiness Kit

    Leadership Readiness Kit

    Leadership Readiness Kit

    $197

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Walk the bench. Score the person you want to promote. Plan the hard talk. Install 1-3-1 so the next problem comes back as a recommendation. Buy Now is the packaged bundle: four Notion tools plus the matching Claude skills, so you are not assembling the readiness read from blank pages.

    This is the flagship of the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. Everything an owner needs to see whether their team can actually lead, and who to develop next. For growth-stage restoration owners who sense they are the ceiling on their own business.

    What’s in the kit

    1. Leadership Readiness Checklist
    2. Middle Manager Evaluation Scorecard
    3. Accountability Conversation Planner
    4. 1-3-1 Delegation Worksheet

    The matching skills from the Leadership AI plugin: leadership-readiness-checklist, middle-manager-scorecard, accountability-planner, delegation-1-3-1.

    Run them in this order. The checklist is the scan. The scorecard is the person. The planner is the talk. 1-3-1 is the habit that keeps the next problem from landing back on you.

    1. Leadership Readiness Checklist

    Can your team actually lead, or does everything still run through you? Work six sections. Check only what is truly true today. A box you wish were true is a box left unchecked. Rate each section red / yellow / green. Duplicate the page each quarter so you can watch the bench get stronger.

    1. Current leadership bench. Who leads field production, estimating, project files, sales, office / AR, marketing, finance, hiring. If a function has no owner besides you, that is a finding. Check: every core function has a named owner who is not you; each owner knows they own it; someone besides you can speak for the company to a customer or adjuster; you have at least one true second-in-command, not just a senior doer. Red = it is all me. Yellow = one or two real leaders. Green = a functioning leadership team.

    2. Decision-making. The test of a leader is whether they can make the call when you are not reachable. Clear dollar threshold. Someone can authorize a job, a crew move, or an equipment purchase if you are out a day. When a lead brings a problem, they bring options and a recommendation. You have not reversed a reasonable decision in front of their team in the last 30 days. Red = everything routes to you. Yellow = small stuff yes, real calls no. Green = they own their lane.

    3. Accountability habits. A leader who will not hold the line is a doer with a title. Do leads address underperformance, or do they route it to you? Written standards. Feedback that is not just a task list. Consequences when standards are missed. You are not the only person who delivers hard feedback. Red = you are the only enforcer. Yellow = leads avoid the hard ones. Green = leads own their team’s standards.

    4. Communication rhythm. Leadership runs on cadence, not heroics. Weekly or biweekly leadership / ops meeting that actually happens. Daily or start-of-job huddle. Recurring 1:1s. A known way job status is communicated (not you texting everyone). Meetings produce decisions and owners. Bad news reaches you early. Red = ad hoc / by text. Yellow = some of it, inconsistently. Green = reliable cadence.

    5. Single points of failure. You. The one estimator. The one person who holds carrier relationships. The one person who knows payroll. The one dispatcher. Passwords in one head. No SOP for the things “only so-and-so knows.” For each checked box, name the person, what breaks, and whether a backup exists. Red = several critical SPOFs. Yellow = one or two. Green = cross-covered.

    6. Next leader candidates. Name real people. Rate ready now / 1-2 areas to grow / raw potential. Write the one thing each most needs. Have you actually told your top candidate you see leadership in them?

    Tally last. Mostly green: deepen the bench and formalize succession. Mostly yellow: push decision authority and accountability down a level. Mostly red: you are still the company. The priority is not more hiring. It is building one true second-in-command and removing the biggest single point of failure (usually you). Write three lines: biggest SPOF right now; the one leader to develop next; the first move in the next 30 days.

    2. Middle Manager Evaluation Scorecard

    Great doers do not automatically become great leaders. Score the person you named in section 6 before you promote them. One person, one row. Nine traits, 1-5 each. Total is /45.

    1. Ownership. Takes responsibility for outcomes, no blame-shifting.
    2. Communication. Clear, timely, two-way.
    3. Judgment. Makes sound decisions without being told every step.
    4. Emotional maturity. Stays steady under pressure.
    5. Coachability. Seeks and applies feedback, not defensive.
    6. Follow-through. Closes the loop, does what they said by when they said.
    7. Trains others. Can teach a task and bring others up to standard.
    8. Handles conflict. Addresses tension directly and fairly, does not avoid.
    9. Values alignment. Models company values when no one is watching.

    Anchor every score in a recent, specific example. Untested is itself a finding. Do not guess a high score on a trait you have never seen. Bands: Promote about 37-45. Develop first about 27-36. Not yet 26 or below. Override: a 1 or 2 on Ownership, Emotional maturity, or Values alignment caps the recommendation at Develop first, regardless of total. Those are the floors for putting someone over people.

    Name the lowest 2-3 traits. One concrete development action each. A re-eval date, typically 60-90 days. The owner decides. The score is an input, not a verdict.

    3. Accountability Conversation Planner

    Use this when someone keeps missing the mark and you have been avoiding the talk. Ten minutes of prep. Six prompts, then a five-beat script.

    1. What is the actual issue? The pattern, not a single bad day. Business impact.
    2. What specific behavior needs to change? Observable. “Calls in after the crew is already on site,” not “doesn’t care.”
    3. What have I already allowed or tolerated? Where you let it slide or finished their file yourself.
    4. What expectation needs to be clarified? State the standard the way you would want it repeated back.
    5. What consequence or support is needed? Both sides.
    6. What does success look like in 30 days? Concrete. “Zero late starts for four weeks.”

    Script beats: open and set the tone; name the issue and the behavior; own your part; state the expectation and the support; confirm the 30-day target and listen. Private, not on the job site, not by text. This is a planning doc, not a personnel record.

    4. 1-3-1 Delegation Worksheet

    The old way: “The dehu on Maple St died. What do you want me to do?” You just took back the problem, the thinking, and the decision.

    The 1-3-1 way: one issue (the fork in the road, one or two sentences); three real options with pros, cons, and rough cost (“do nothing” can be one when it is honest); one recommendation and why in one line; a default if they do not hear back by a deadline. Explain it once. Pin it where decisions get made. When someone brings a raw problem, ask: “What are your three options, and which do you recommend?” Then wait. Run at least five real conversations. Approve the recommendation whenever it is reasonable. Phase done when at least one person brings 1-3-1s without being reminded.

    If the Readiness Checklist “options and a recommendation” box is empty, install 1-3-1 before you hire another lead.

    If you want the packaged kit

    You can run the four tools from the outline above. Buy Now is the bundle delivered by email after checkout: the four Notion pages (duplicate each so the master stays clean), plus the matching skills if you want the interviews walked. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Coaching and operational tools only. Not legal or HR advice. The planner is a planning doc, not a personnel record. The scorecard is decision support, not a hiring, firing, or promotion determination.

  • Leadership Readiness Checklist

    Leadership Readiness Checklist

    Leadership Readiness Checklist

    $49

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Walk six sections. Check only what is truly true today. Rate each section red / yellow / green. Buy Now is the packaged Notion checklist you duplicate each quarter, so you are not rebuilding the bench read from a blank doc.

    Tool #5 of the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. Can your team actually lead, or does everything still run through you? This is an honest, section-by-section read on your current leadership bench: who leads what, who can decide without you, whether your leads hold their people accountable, your communication rhythm, your single points of failure, and who your next leaders could be.

    Be honest, not optimistic. A box you wish were true is a box left unchecked. Where you see a rating, pick the one that is true today. Where you see a name line, write the actual person. Empty checkboxes are your to-do list. When you are done, the gaps and the single points of failure are your leadership development plan. Duplicate the page for each review. Quarterly is a good cadence.

    1. Current leadership bench. Who leads what today

    List the people who currently carry real leadership responsibility, and what they own. If a function has no clear owner besides you, that is a finding. Note it.

    For each function write four lines: who leads it today; whether you still do this; notes.

    • Field production / crews
    • Estimating / scope
    • Project management / job files
    • Sales / lead intake
    • Office / admin / AR
    • Marketing / referral relationships
    • Finance / numbers
    • Hiring / people

    Then check what is actually true:

    • Every core function above has a named owner who is not me
    • Each owner knows they own it (it is explicit, not assumed)
    • At least one person besides me can speak for the company to a customer or adjuster
    • I have at least one true second-in-command (not just a senior doer)

    Bench depth. Pick one: red = it is all me. Yellow = one or two real leaders. Green = a functioning leadership team.

    2. Decision-making capability. Who can decide without you

    The test of a leader is not effort. It is whether they can make the call when you are not reachable.

    • My leads make routine operational decisions without checking with me
    • There is a clear dollar threshold under which leads can spend / approve without my sign-off
    • Someone can authorize a job, a crew move, or an equipment purchase if I am unreachable for a day
    • My team knows which decisions are theirs vs which truly need me
    • When a lead brings me a problem, they bring options and a recommendation, not just the problem
    • I can be out of contact for a full workday and jobs still move forward correctly
    • I have not reversed a lead’s reasonable decision in front of their team in the last 30 days

    Write today’s decision threshold: leads can independently approve up to $______.

    Decision autonomy. Pick one: red = everything routes to me. Yellow = small stuff yes, real calls no. Green = they own their lane.

    The 1-3-1 rule is the habit behind the “options and a recommendation” box. If that box is empty, install 1-3-1 before you hire another lead.

    3. Accountability habits. Do leads hold their people accountable

    A leader who will not hold the line is a doer with a title. This section is about whether accountability lives below you.

    • My leads address underperformance directly. They do not route it to me to fix
    • We have clear, written expectations / standards people are measured against
    • Leads give real feedback (good and corrective), not just task assignments
    • There are understood consequences when standards are repeatedly missed
    • Accountability conversations stay about the behavior/standard, not personal
    • I am not the only person in the company who delivers hard feedback
    • Wins and good work get recognized, not just problems

    Accountability ownership. Pick one: red = I am the only enforcer. Yellow = leads avoid the hard ones. Green = leads own their team’s standards.

    If this section is red or yellow, use the Accountability Conversation Planner for the next hard talk: issue, behavior, what you have already allowed, the expectation, the consequence or support, what success looks like in 30 days.

    4. Communication rhythm. The cadence that keeps it running

    Leadership runs on rhythm, not heroics. Check what actually happens on a schedule, not what you mean to do.

    • We hold a regular leadership / ops meeting (weekly or biweekly) that actually happens
    • Crews get a consistent daily or start-of-job huddle
    • I have recurring 1:1s with my direct leaders
    • There is a known way job status is communicated (not me texting everyone individually)
    • The team knows the company’s priorities for the quarter / season
    • Meetings have a predictable format and produce decisions/owners, not just talk
    • Bad news reaches me early, because people are not afraid to raise it

    Cadence in place (check all that run reliably): daily crew huddle; weekly leadership/ops meeting; recurring 1:1s with leads; monthly numbers / KPI review; quarterly priorities reset.

    Communication rhythm. Pick one: red = ad hoc / by text. Yellow = some of it, inconsistently. Green = reliable cadence.

    Weeks 9-10 of the 90-day plan is this huddle: 15 minutes, fixed agenda, 3-5 numbers someone other than you owns.

    5. Risk areas. Single points of failure

    Where is the business one person, one password, or one bad week away from a problem? Check every box that is a real exposure right now.

    • I am a single point of failure. Key things only I can do or decide
    • Only one person can run estimating / Xactimate
    • Only one person holds key carrier / adjuster / referral relationships
    • Only one person knows the financials, banking, or payroll
    • Only one person can dispatch / schedule crews
    • Critical logins, accounts, or vendor passwords live in one person’s head
    • If my best lead quit tomorrow, a major part of the business would stall
    • There is no written SOP for the things that “only so-and-so knows”
    • No one is cross-trained on my second-in-command’s role

    For each box checked, name the person, what breaks if they are gone, and whether a backup exists.

    Concentration risk. Pick one: red = several critical single points of failure. Yellow = one or two. Green = cross-covered.

    This section pairs with the 5 Ds (Death, Divorce, Disease, Drugs/dependency, Departure/Disaster). A checked box here is usually a blank box on the 5 Ds.

    6. Next leader candidates. Names plus readiness

    Who is next? Name real people, rate how ready they are, and write the one thing each most needs to grow into more leadership.

    For each candidate: name; the role they could grow into; readiness (green = ready now / soon; yellow = 1-2 areas to grow; red = raw potential, long runway); the one thing they most need.

    • I have at least one green ready-now candidate identified
    • Each candidate has a clear next step or development conversation scheduled
    • I have actually told my top candidate I see leadership in them
    • My second-in-command has a developing backup

    Then put those names on a bench list and go deep on one person. A single real manager beats five people you are keeping an eye on.

    Readiness summary

    Tally your six section ratings last.

    • Mostly green. You have a real leadership team. Focus on deepening the bench and formalizing succession.
    • Mostly yellow. Leaders exist but lean on you for the hard calls and the hard conversations. Push decision authority and accountability down a level.
    • Mostly red. You are still the company. The priority is not more hiring. It is building one true second-in-command and removing the biggest single point of failure (usually you).

    Write three lines: my biggest single point of failure right now; the one leader I most need to develop next; the first move I will make in the next 30 days.

    If you want the packaged checklist

    You can run the six sections on a legal pad. Buy Now is the Notion page delivered by email after checkout. Duplicate it (··· → Duplicate) so the original stays clean for next quarter. The function table, the six section ratings, and the summary are already laid out. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Pairs with the Restoration Leadership Bench Builder (develop the names you just wrote) and the 90-Day Doer-to-Leader Transition Plan. Matching Claude skill: leadership-readiness-checklist. A leadership self-assessment, not legal or HR advice.

    Related: Restoration Leadership Toolkit — Claude Edition. Also Restoration Leadership Bench Builder.

  • Leadership Operating System (Notion + AI)

    Leadership Operating System (Notion + AI)

    Leadership Operating System (Notion + AI)

    $397

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Hang the nine Notion tools. Run the 12-week spine. Talk your own Claude through 1-3-1, the bench, and the 5 Ds. Buy Now is the packaged flagship: the Notion workspace you duplicate, plus the 10-skill plugin zip, so you are not wiring the worksheets and the AI from a blank page.

    This is the Notion + AI operating system for a restoration owner who is still the bottleneck. Notion is the fill-in system of record. The plugin is the coach you talk to. Outputs from each skill are formatted to paste into the matching Notion tool. One company-profile.md powers both this kit and the Operations Kit if you already ran setup there.

    What it is

    Two halves that are meant to run together.

    Notion half. Nine plug-and-play tools. Duplicate them into one workspace page named something like Leadership. One sidebar section, the whole doer-to-leader system.

    AI half. A 9-skill Claude plugin plus a shared setup skill. A setup interview writes company-profile.md. Every leadership skill reads it, so the coaching speaks your team, your roles, and your pain points.

    You need a free Notion account and any Claude that supports Skills / Plugins. If you can chat with Claude and run a /command, you are good.

    The 9 Notion tools

    1. 1-3-1 Delegation Worksheet ($19). Teach the team to bring one issue, three options, one recommendation. Not just the problem.
    2. Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment ($29). 25 statements across five areas. Find where the company still depends on you.
    3. 5 Ds Succession Risk Checklist ($29). Death, Divorce, Disease, Drugs/dependency, Departure/Disaster. A what-if-tomorrow check, not a retirement plan.
    4. Accountability Conversation Planner ($39). Plan a hard conversation so it stays about the work, not the person.
    5. Leadership Readiness Checklist ($49). Six sections. Can your team actually lead, or does everything still run through you?
    6. Middle Manager Evaluation Scorecard ($59). Score someone on nine traits before you promote them. Promote / Develop first / Not yet.
    7. Owner Dependency Audit ($99). What breaks if you disappear for 30 days? Nine areas, Low / Med / High, plus a Decision-Rights Map.
    8. Restoration Leadership Bench Builder ($149). One row per key function. Candidates, gaps, one observable 90-day action.
    9. 90-Day Doer-to-Leader Transition Plan ($199). Six two-week phases. The spine. The other eight feed it.

    The three smaller bundles sit inside this system. Conference Starter Pack is tools 1-3. Leadership Readiness Kit is tools 1, 4, 5, 6. Owner Freedom Kit is tools 1, 3, 7, 8, 9. This flagship is all nine, plus the AI half.

    How to hang the Notion half

    Work the 90-day plan top to bottom. Do not skip ahead. Each phase sets up the next.

    Before Week 1, write three lines: your #1 reason to step back; the one person you are betting on as your first real manager; start date / target Week-12 date. Block 30-45 minutes every Friday.

    1. Weeks 1-2. Bottlenecks. Run the Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment (0-25) and the Owner Dependency Audit (nine areas, Low = 1, Med = 2, High = 3, total 9-27). For one full week, log every interrupt for a decision. Sort into Delegate now / Delegate after training / Keep (truly owner-only). Circle the top 3. Tell the team: “I am working a 90-day plan to push decisions down. Expect me to hand more back to you.”
    2. Weeks 3-4. Install 1-3-1. One issue. Three real options with pros, cons, and rough cost. One recommendation. A default if they do not hear back by a deadline. When someone brings a raw problem, ask: “What are your three options, and which do you recommend?” Then wait. Run at least five real conversations. Phase done when at least one person brings 1-3-1s without being reminded.
    3. Weeks 5-6. Decision rights. List 10-15 recurring decisions (refunds, equipment, scheduling, scope changes, hiring, pricing exceptions). A dollar or scope threshold people can decide under without asking you, and who owns it when you are not in the room. Hand off one decision completely. Do not take it back.
    4. Weeks 7-8. One manager. Open the Bench Builder. One row per function. Use the Scorecard if you are torn on who. Have the conversation: “I want to grow you into running X.” Hand them one area end-to-end. Set a weekly 30-minute 1-on-1 and protect it.
    5. Weeks 9-10. Accountability rhythm. Weekly 15-minute huddle: numbers, jobs at risk, who needs what. 3-5 numbers someone other than you owns. Hold one real accountability conversation with the Planner (issue, behavior, what you have already allowed, the expectation, the consequence or support, what success looks like in 30 days).
    6. Weeks 11-12. Review and repeat. Re-score the bottleneck and the audit. Take a planned half-day fully off and note what broke. Raise one decision-rights threshold. Duplicate the 90-day page and start the next cycle.

    While you are in it, run the Readiness Checklist (six sections, red / yellow / green) and the 5 Ds. Check a 5 Ds box only if it is true and current today. Count the blanks. Pick the three that would hurt most if the D hit tomorrow.

    The 10 AI skills

    1. restoration-setup. “Set up the kit.” Shared with the Ops kit. Writes company-profile.md.
    2. delegation-1-3-1. “Help me delegate this.” Convert an escalated question into one issue / three options / one recommendation.
    3. owner-bottleneck-assessment. “Where am I the bottleneck?” Scored self-assessment. Top places you are still the constraint.
    4. succession-5ds-checklist. “Am I exposed if something happens to me?” Exposure plus what to shore up.
    5. accountability-planner. “I have a hard conversation to plan.” Script plus a 30-day follow-up.
    6. leadership-readiness-checklist. “Is my team ready to lead?” Bench, single points of failure, next leaders.
    7. middle-manager-scorecard. “Should I promote this person?” Nine traits. Promote / Develop first / Not yet.
    8. owner-dependency-audit. “What breaks if I disappear for 30 days?” Functions plus a decision-rights map.
    9. leadership-bench-builder. “Build my leadership bench.” Candidates, gaps, a 90-day development plan per person.
    10. doer-to-leader-90-day. “Give me a 90-day plan to step back.” A personalized 12-week plan.

    Install the plugin yourself

    Option A (recommended). Save the leadership-kit folder. In Claude run:

    /plugin marketplace add /path/to/leadership-kit
/plugin install leadership-kit@profit-detective
/leadership-kit:restoration-setup

    Option B. Copy each folder inside skills/ into ~/.claude/skills/. On Windows that is C:\\Users\\<you>\\.claude\\skills\\. Then say “run restoration setup.”

    Keep company-profile.md in the folder you work in. Every skill reads it. If you already ran setup from another Profit Detective kit, it reuses the same profile.

    If you want the packaged system

    You can rebuild this from the outline above. Buy Now is the flagship delivered by email after checkout: Notion duplicate links for the nine tools, the plugin zip (ten skill folders and the README), and the setup sequence so you drop it in and run. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Coaching and operational system only. Not legal or HR advice.

  • Job-Costing Gap-Finder

    Job-Costing Gap-Finder

    Job-Costing Gap-Finder

    $39

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Pull last 10 closed jobs. Enter estimate vs actual. Tag the leak bucket. Sort the losers. Buy Now is the packaged Notion table with the columns and formulas already built, so you are not making the spreadsheet from a blank grid.

    This is the $39 utility on the profit-leak spine. Compare estimate (or Xactimate) vs actual cost on a sample of recent jobs. Surface margin leak by line category. Natural next step when the Profit Leak Scorecard says Zone 2 (job costing & margin) is your worst zone.

    Why the lag kills you

    By the time most owners know a job lost money, they have already done six more like it. Cash in the bank is timing. Gross margin per job is the only number that tells the truth, and most $1M-$15M shops cannot name it until the bookkeeper closes the month three or four weeks later.

    You do not lose money on one weird job. You lose it on a type of job you keep taking. The playbook’s example: a 30% water-mit job that needed 45%, run forty of them on $600K of revenue, and you gave away $90,000 of gross profit. A bad pattern, not a bad month. Fast costing exposes the pattern.

    The table to build

    One row per job. These columns:

    • Job (name or file number)
    • Loss Type: Water, Fire/Smoke, Mold, Storm, Contents, Reconstruction, Other
    • Invoiced $
    • Estimated Cost $
    • Actual Cost $
    • Labor Over/Under $
    • Equipment Over/Under $
    • Materials Over/Under $
    • Subs Over/Under $
    • Cost Variance $: estimated cost minus actual cost (formula)
    • Gross Margin %: (Invoiced – Actual Cost) ÷ Invoiced (formula)
    • Biggest Leak: Labor, Equipment, Materials, Subs, Scope/Estimate, or None
    • Notes: who estimated, which crew, anything that explains the gap

    Do not clean the numbers up. Enter what actually happened.

    The four cost buckets

    Labor is the #1 leak, three ways. Hours running over estimate. Unbilled drive and idle time (truck leaves at 7, tarp goes down at 9:15). Crews stretching a “full day” on T&M. None of it shows unless you cost labor against the estimate, job by job.

    Equipment is the silent under-track. Units sitting on a job that closed days ago, still not picked up, never billed for the extra dry days. You own 40 air movers; on any given week some are “lost” on completed jobs, off-rent, earning nothing.

    Materials is smaller but real. Over-ordering, the partial pallet that walks off, the antimicrobial you used and forgot to line-item. A 5-8% materials slippage on a materials-heavy reconstruction job adds up across a year.

    Subs is margin compression you agreed to. Sub invoice higher than what you billed the carrier. Verbal scopes. Change orders not documented. A 10% markup when the job needed 20%.

    How to run ten jobs

    1. Pull invoices, labor hours, equipment logs, and sub invoices for your last 10 closed jobs.
    2. Enter one row each. Invoiced, estimated cost, actual cost, and the four over/under columns.
    3. Let Gross Margin % and Cost Variance $ calculate. Sort low margin to high. The jobs at the top are the money-losers. Name them.
    4. Cross-check labor. Flag every job where actual hours beat estimate by more than 10%. Look for the pattern: same job type, same crew, same estimator.
    5. Tag Biggest Leak on each row. Be honest. If the work was performed and never priced, that is Scope/Estimate, not Labor.
    6. Pick the one money-loser with the biggest gap. Write a single sentence: what leaked, and in which bucket. That sentence is your first plug.

    Catch the loser at 50%, not at month-end

    On every significant job, run a mid-job margin check at the halfway point. Pull actual labor hours and equipment days to date. Compare them against where they should be for percent complete. If a $40K job is 50% done and you have already spent 70% of the labor budget, you have a right-now problem: tighten the crew, escalate the scope with the adjuster, or stop the bleed.

    Close-out cost within 3-5 days of the final visit. Every job. No exceptions. While the crew remembers, while the equipment log is fresh, while you can still bill the carrier for that supplement. That turns job costing from a rear-view report into a steering wheel.

    If Scope/Estimate keeps winning

    Filter Biggest Leak = Scope/Estimate. Sort by Cost Variance. Group by Loss Type and by estimator (use Notes). You are hunting the repeating miss: detach & reset, PPE, monitoring labor, containment, equipment days, after-hours, content manipulation. Name the estimator-plus-job-type combination with the biggest consistent negative variance. That is this week’s coaching conversation.

    What good looks like

    • Gross margin ≥ 45% on a blended basis, and you know it by number, not by feel.
    • Job margin known within days of close, not weeks.
    • No surprise losers. Every significant job gets a mid-job check.
    • Labor costed against estimate on every job. Equipment never sits off-rent on a closed file.

    Log this batch’s blended margin as your baseline. Update it monthly so margin is a trend line you watch.

    If you want the packaged table

    You can build the columns in any spreadsheet. Buy Now is the Notion database delivered by email after checkout: the fields, the Loss Type and Biggest Leak selects, and the Gross Margin % and Cost Variance formulas already in. Duplicate it and enter the ten jobs. Same Square button at the top of this page.

  • Google Ads Analysis

    Google Ads Analysis

    Google Ads Analysis

    $250

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

    Secure checkout via Square — all major cards accepted

    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Split campaigns by service. Load negatives before you spend another week. Match every landing page to its ad group. Compute fully-loaded cost per acquired job, not just CPC. Buy Now is the packaged analysis delivered by email after checkout, so you are not assembling the read from a blank spreadsheet.

    Restoration PPC is an engineering problem, not a set-it-and-forget-it expense. Emergency water-damage keywords have been reported as high as $250 per click in competitive metros. Average emergency restoration keywords more commonly land in the $40-$150 range depending on geography. At those CPCs, structure and landing pages decide whether the phone pays you or you subsidize the auction.

    How to run the analysis

    1. Open the account. List every campaign, ad group, and the landing URL each ad actually hits.
    2. Mark the single-campaign trap if you see it: one campaign, one ad group, water / mold / fire / flood keywords fighting each other, every ad pointing at the homepage.
    3. Pull Search Terms for the last 30-60 days. Tag wasted queries (jobs, DIY, training, equipment rental).
    4. Check bidding against conversion volume. Under 30 conversions a month in a campaign is a different tool than 30+.
    5. Open each landing page on a phone. Does the H1 match the ad? Is click-to-call above the fold?
    6. Write fully-loaded cost per acquired job by channel: spend ÷ booked jobs from that channel, then layer close rate. CPC from the dashboard is not that number.

    1. Kill the single-campaign trap

    The most common setup: one campaign, one ad group, a mix of water damage, mold removal, fire restoration, and flood cleanup keywords all fighting each other. Every click gets the same generic ad. Every ad points to the homepage.

    Quality Score is built on expected click-through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. When you stuff water damage and fire restoration into the same ad group, ad relevance tanks for both. A Quality Score of 9 can outrank a competitor bidding twice as much at a 5. Poor structure can inflate CPC by 30% or more while delivering fewer qualified leads.

    Split by service. Each ad group 10-20 tightly related keywords. Every keyword in the group has to fit the same ad and the same landing page. If they do not, split them.

    • Campaign 1. Emergency water damage. Ad groups for emergency water extraction, burst pipe, basement flooding, sewage backup. Separate ad copy. Landing page that opens with emergency water damage, not the homepage.
    • Campaign 2. Fire and smoke restoration. Fire damage, smoke damage, soot removal. Different call to action. Fire jobs are longer projects, a different sales conversation.
    • Campaign 3. Mold remediation. Mold testing, black mold removal, mold inspection. Often a separate buyer with a different timeline.

    Give Performance Max its own campaign and its own budget if you run it. PMax black-box reporting will otherwise hide whether Search is working.

    2. Negative keywords: the bill you are not seeing

    Most restoration PPC campaigns have a weak or nonexistent negative list. Every day without one, you pay for job seekers (“water damage restoration jobs near me”), DIY researchers (“how to do water damage restoration yourself”), students looking for training, and equipment renters who are not calling you for service.

    Campaigns that actively manage negatives see a reported 10-20% lower wasted spend and a 5-15% conversion-rate lift. On a $10,000/month budget, that is $1,000-$2,000 a month currently going to irrelevant clicks.

    Build a seed negative list before the campaign launches. Pull Search Terms weekly for the first 60 days. Add exact-match negatives first. Only go broader if the data supports it. Over-blocking with broad-match negatives will starve volume you actually want.

    3. Bidding: stop fighting the machine

    A large share of Google Ads spend now runs through Smart Bidding (Target CPA, Target ROAS, Maximize Conversions). Advertisers using AI bidding have been reported at roughly 22% lower cost per conversion versus manual CPC on average. For restoration, the right tool depends on data:

    • Under 30 conversions per month in a campaign. Maximize Clicks with a CPC cap while you accumulate signal. Smart Bidding starved of conversions produces garbage.
    • 30+ conversions per month. Move to Target CPA. Set the target from actual job margins, not aspirational ones. If a water job averages $12,000 and you close 25% of qualified leads, a $300 CPL target can still profit. If you close under 15%, fix sales before you fix bidding.
    • Large campaigns with consistent job data. Target ROAS becomes viable only if revenue tracking is actually wired into Google Ads. Most restoration accounts do not have that configured.

    The problem is rarely the channel. It is losing track of where the leads went after the phone call.

    4. The landing page has to match the ad

    If the ad says “Emergency Basement Flooding, 24/7 Response” and the landing page is the homepage with a hero of a happy family and a form below the fold, you are burning the click you just paid for.

    A restoration PPC landing page needs: the emergency service name in the H1 above the fold; a click-to-call number prominent on mobile; a response-time claim only if you can back it up; one short form (name, phone, zip, issue); proof (reviews, IICRC, insurance logos).

    Do not send PPC traffic to the homepage. Do not build one landing page for all services. Match the ad to the page, the page to the ad group, the ad group to the keyword cluster. That chain is where Quality Score lives.

    5. Channel mix and the number that actually matters

    Three channels do the heavy lifting. LSA (pay per qualified call; reported restoration CPL roughly $80-$200 depending on the write-up) is the highest-ROI paid lever for most residential operators, with a catch: Google ended credits for “job type not serviced” and “geo not serviced” in 2025, so junk leads come out of your pocket. Search Ads (reported CPL $150-$400+ structured, $400-$700+ not) buy control LSA does not have: commercial work, specific service lines, overflow when LSA hits a daily cap, brand defense. If you are spending more than $5,000 a month on Search and you do not have LSAs set up, that is the first fix. SEO is the compounding asset. Restoration SEO in competitive metros typically takes 12-18 months. Treat reported ranges as ranges, not promises.

    Cost-per-lead is the number every vendor reports. The number that matters is fully-loaded cost per acquired job: CPL divided by channel-specific close rate, plus CSR labor on the call, plus processing, minus franchise or TPA fee if it applies. Most shops have CPL from the platform and revenue from the job software, and the two systems have never talked. Fix that before you change a single bid.

    Budget ballparks (Search only, reported)

    • Mid-size market (pop. 200K-500K): $3,000-$6,000/month to generate 15-30 leads
    • Major metro (pop. 1M+): $8,000-$15,000/month to maintain consistent visibility
    • Specific suburb or tight service area: $1,500-$3,000/month if geo is tight and Quality Score is managed

    These are Search figures. They are ballparks from the published method, not a quote for your market.

    Done when

    You can show separate service campaigns, a negative list with at least 50 entries, a dedicated landing page for each major service, and a fully-loaded acquired-job cost by channel. If your current agency cannot show those four, the account is not being run as an engineering problem.

    If you want the packaged analysis

    You can run the six steps from the outline above on your own login. Buy Now is the analysis delivered by email after checkout. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Marketing and operational read only. Not a media-buy, legal, or insurance engagement. Reported CPC and CPL ranges move by metro and by month. Use your own numbers.

  • Conference Starter Pack

    Conference Starter Pack

    $97

    Delivered by email after checkout.

    Buy Now →

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    You can copy this method and do it yourself. Score where you are still the bottleneck. Install 1-3-1 so the next problem comes back as a recommendation. Walk the 5 Ds as a what-if-tomorrow check. Buy Now is the packaged bundle: three Notion tools plus the matching Claude skills, so you are not assembling the starter pack from blank pages.

    The grab-and-go pack from the Restoration Leadership Toolkit. Three of the most-used tools, bundled. For restoration owners who just heard the doer-to-leader message and want something they can run this week, not a 12-week program on day one.

    What’s in the pack

    1. 1-3-1 Delegation Worksheet
    2. Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment
    3. 5 Ds Succession Risk Checklist

    The matching skills from the Leadership AI plugin: delegation-1-3-1, owner-bottleneck-assessment, succession-5ds-checklist.

    Run them in this order. The bottleneck names the constraint. 1-3-1 is the first habit. The 5 Ds is the exposure you do not want to discover the hard way.

    1. Owner Bottleneck Self-Assessment

    Find out where your company still depends on you. An owner bottleneck exists when growth, decision speed, and consistency are limited by your personal involvement in day-to-day decisions. You become both the most important and the most constraining person in the business.

    Check the box for each statement that is true today. Count the checks in each section, then total them. Range is 0-25. Be honest. The value is in the truth.

    1. Decisions only you make. Estimate / pricing approvals over a set dollar amount. Hiring and firing. Vendor choices. Which jobs you take. Refunds, credits, concessions.
    2. Interruptions by department. Production calls daily. Office pulls you into billing or scheduling. Sales checks pricing before quoting. Techs call from job sites. Customer complaints land on you.
    3. Recurring questions. The same operational questions every week. People wait for you. “Ask the owner” is the default. You re-explain the same processes. Things stall when you are unavailable.
    4. Tasks that should be delegated. Estimates you could hand off. Scheduling / dispatch. Collections / AR. Ordering equipment. Work others could produce.
    5. Areas with no backup. No one else can run production. Only you hold key carrier relationships. Only you see the full financial picture. No written SOPs for the things you do. If you are gone a week, something breaks.

    Bands: 0-6 Mild (tighten the remaining gaps). 7-13 Moderate (you are the bottleneck in one or two areas; fix the worst one first). 14-19 Heavy (the business runs through you; start delegating now, deliberately). 20-25 Severe (you ARE the business; this is the #1 risk to growth and to an exit).

    Write your top 3 to delegate first. For one full week after you score, log every interrupt for a decision. Sort into Delegate now / Delegate after training / Keep (truly owner-only). The department with the most checks is this quarter’s target. Install 1-3-1 there first.

    2. 1-3-1 Delegation Worksheet

    The old way (escalation): “Hey boss, the dehu on the Maple St job died. What do you want me to do?” You just took back the problem, the thinking, and the decision. That is three jobs.

    The 1-3-1 way (delegation): “The dehu on Maple St died. Here are three options I looked at, here is the cost of each, and here is what I would do. Just need your yes.” You own one job: the decision.

    • 1. One issue. The decision that is actually needed, in one or two sentences. Not the whole story. The fork in the road.
    • 3. Three real options. Each with pros, cons, and a rough cost or effort. “Do nothing” can be one when it is honest. Stuck at two? Push for a third. Even “do nothing and revisit Friday” or “escalate to the carrier.”
    • 1. One recommendation. The option they would pick if it were their call, and why in one line.
    • A default. What they will do if they do not hear back by a deadline, so the job does not stall waiting on you.

    Explain the rule once, out loud. Pin the format where decisions get made (truck, office, group chat). When someone brings a raw problem, ask: “What are your three options, and which do you recommend?” Then wait. Run at least five real conversations. Approve the recommendation whenever it is reasonable. Resist solving it yourself, even when you are faster. Note who takes to it quickly. That is a signal for a future-manager pick.

    The first few 1-3-1s will be lopsided. Three fake options, or a recommendation with no reasoning. Coach it. Do not grade it. Phase done when at least one person is bringing 1-3-1s without being reminded.

    Worksheet fields if you are copying it: prepared by, date, job / account, urgency (Today / This week / No rush); the issue; three options (what it is, two pros, two cons, rough cost); the recommendation and what they need from you; the default deadline; owner sign-off (Approved as recommended / Approved with changes / Chose a different option / Let’s talk).

    Owner gut-check before you sign: could this person have made this call without me? If yes, tell them so, and next time push it all the way down.

    3. 5 Ds Succession Risk Checklist

    Succession is not a retirement problem. It is a what-if-tomorrow problem. Check a box only if it is true and current today. Not “mostly.” Not “we talked about it once.” A box you want to be true is still a blank box. Half-true protections fail exactly when the D hits.

    1. Death. Current signed will that names the business. Funded buy-sell if there are partners. Key-person life payable to the company. A second check-signer on file at the bank. Someone who can legally bind the company. Passwords in a recoverable place. A named person who can run production 30+ days. Spouse / heirs know who to call.
    2. Divorce. Separate vs marital property actually confirmed, not guessed. Prenup, postnup, or buy-sell provision. Books not commingled. A valuation method in writing. Operating cash structured so a personal dispute cannot freeze payroll.
    3. Disease. Someone has actually run production on a vacation test. Backup estimator. Payroll / AP / AR without your hands. Carrier relationships that will not collapse if you are unreachable. Disability and business-overhead coverage. A one-page interim chain-of-command with dollar thresholds.
    4. Drugs / dependency. Dual approval over a dollar threshold. A second set of eyes on the books. No single point of failure, including you. A trusted advisor allowed to tell you the truth. Key roles documented and cross-covered.
    5. Departure / disaster. Tribal knowledge written down. Relationships not owned by one person. Off-site backups you have test-restored. A continuity plan for your own shop. Backup vendor / equipment list.

    Count the blanks. Published bands on the scored sheet: 0-6 resilient; 7-15 moderate; 16-27 high; 28+ you are the company. Pick the three blank boxes that would hurt most if the D hit tomorrow. Name an owner and a date. Re-run it every year, and after any life or business change. This is an awareness tool, not legal, financial, or insurance advice. Use it to walk into the attorney, agent, and CPA prepared.

    What to do after the three

    Take the top-3 bottleneck list into a 90-day doer-to-leader plan (Weeks 1-2 are this assessment). After 1-3-1 sticks, write decision rights so people stop defaulting to you out of habit. The 5 Ds blanks that are also “no backup” boxes on the bottleneck assessment are the same exposure. Name them once.

    If you want the next layer after this pack: Leadership Readiness Kit (checklist, scorecard, planner, 1-3-1) or Owner Freedom Kit (audit, bench, 90-day, 5 Ds, 1-3-1).

    If you want the packaged pack

    You can run the three tools from the outline above. Buy Now is the bundle delivered by email after checkout: the three Notion pages (duplicate each so the master stays clean), plus the matching skills if you want the interviews walked. Same Square button at the top of this page.

    Coaching and operational tools only. Not legal, financial, insurance, or HR advice.