Here are a few courses that I have heard about and have taken (landscape Ontario).  Please list any continuing education courses you have taken or can refer for others.

Rutgers Landscape and Grounds Maintenance Courses

Rutgers has a FREE Pest identification webinar coming up that you can register for here.  Course date is December 20, 2011 1:30pm – 2:30pm EST.

http://www.cpe.rutgers.edu/programs/landscape.html (New Jersey)

Ryerson University Landscape Design

The Certificate in Landscape Design is a widely recognized and unique program located in the heart of Toronto, one of Canada’s premier cities. The program delivers fundamental courses in landscape design with emphasis on design, design process, plant materials, horticulture, graphics as a language, construction, landscape ecology, history, and more. Courses are delivered through interactive lectures and enhanced with valuable local field trips.

http://ce-online.ryerson.ca/ce/default.aspx?id=2593 (ON, Canada)

Landscape Ontario Seminars

There are plenty of career opportunities in the field of horticulture. Landscape Ontario has worked closely with the Ontario Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities (MTCU), to provide education at the high school, college and university levels that give individuals the skills they need for a successful career in the industry.

http://www.horttrades.com/seminars/ (ON, Canada) (ON, Canada)

Garden Design School

Garden Design School was founded in the UK in 2002, and is recognized there as one of the top training schools in landscape design. In 2009, Garden Design School opened its doors at Boylston, MA to bring its highly successful landscape design career training program to the USA

http://www.gardendesignschool.com/

With winter on the doorstep these above seasonal temperatures in Southern Ontario have extended the season for property maintenance professionals. I know we have been able to get in a few extra jobs here at Murphy Property Maintenance. Waking up this morning to temperatures above 12C and yesterday topping at 14C really gives the feeling of spring rather than being a few weeks away from ‘winter’. By all means we are not complaining…it is nice not to have to bundle up everyday; dress like a Canadian

Mother nature is just late with the snow and it will soon be here. Our snow removal equipment is looking excited to get out and start working.

I know the weather is seasonally above average in Winnipeg as well. How is the weather where you are? Have you noticed above seasonal temperatures? How is it affecting your business?

By Dave Kollasch, Owner of Lawn Lizards and Greenerbilling.com

Having owned a landscaping business for over 10 years has taught me some valuable lessons about business.  Most importantly, how could I speed up the daily billing and payments process? Managing client invoicing and payments was a challenge for years because there were no Web based invoice systems that focused mainly on billing and getting paid. So a few years into the business, I created www.Greenerbilling.com to simplify sending customer bills, estimates, and receiving and tracking payments. I knew that if I created something that worked well for my lawn company, then it made sense that fellow lawn care pros would benefit as well.

The most unique feature of Greenerbilling is the consumption-based pricing plan (a.k.a. the Dirt Plan) which allows the flexibility to “Spend only for what you Send”. During the off-season when lawn work is slower, this service allows you to pay only when you need to send each invoice, rather than paying for more than you may need in a given month. When Spring-time arrives and business ramps up, you can upgrade from the consumption-based plan to one of the flat rate pricing plans (50 or 300 invoice sends per month) and remain there throughout the busy season. Then as business slows for the off-season, it’s no problem to simply switch back to the Dirt plan. All business data remains the same and there is no fee to jump back and forth between plans as often as needed. You are in complete control of managing your Greenerbilling subscription plan based on your monthly invoicing volume. That’s flexibility!

In the world’s uncertain economic environment, green industry professionals are seeking the most cost-effective ways to run our business. Managing client billing online, from anywhere, and only paying for a service as needed, definitely maximizes efficiency for a landscape professional who is constantly on the go and away from the office.

For those interested, I am personally offering you 60 days free to test-drive Greenerbilling for your business. I still actively own and operate my lawn care company and can directly relate to your billing needs. I also invite your ideas to help make Greenerbilling even better for the landscape professional.

To receive your free 60 days, visit https://www.greenerbilling.com/signup?plan_id=Dirt and sign up for our free trial (no credit card required). Once you activate your account via your confirmation email, contact me at dave@greenerbilling.com with the code FREE60 and I will upgrade your account. It’s that simple!

As many of our readers know, we own and operate a Landscape Maintenance company called Murphy Property Maintenance.  We are constantly struggling with software and how to track our hours, services, create reports.  We have been using Quickbooks for 5 years now but being a constant slave to the program and the extreme learning curve…well, its almost impossible to run the business as well as track it.

I received an email from a gentleman called Sam Pillar he is the Co-Founder and President of the company that makes Jobber.   He boasted that their software was “the best online business management software for on-site service companies.”   Sam had me intrigued!   I check out the website and browsed through the features and benefits that his software offered and decided to sign up for a trail account.

I was pleasantly surprised on how the software looked and felt streamlined.  So many other software / cloud computing out there is hard to navigate and find the information in an easy fashion.  As I evaluated the program the “Quick Start Guide” lead me on my way to setup my company and enter in my employees and first clients.  The scheduling window is a breeze to use and I love the notifications on the ‘Dashboard’ for pending jobs.  This program is looking better every minute I use it.

Woah!  Automatic Geo-Tagging is sweet for client properties…yes I can reviewing this program as I write this, need to be fresh in the mind ya know

Under the user settings you can create custom fields such as – property hazards, property size (sqft.), gate locked, dogs, etc.  Very nice option.  Another option is to have embedded forms for your website that sends quote info straight into Jobber…how sweet is that!

Jobber even has an API key so for all you programmers out there that would like to extend the program even further…have at er.

All in all this program is definitely worth the while to check out for any service based company.  I am going to continue to try it out and post more comments as I come across more neat features that can help me save time and money.  Look for edits and comments on this post very soon.  Oh, I forgot to mention Quickbooks integration and mobile capabilities…Just check it out already.

EDIT* Sam from Jobber just gave our readers a discount code for 15% OFF the first 3 months of subscription.  The code is “lawnblog_15″ .   Sweet Deal!  Thanks Sam.

EDIT* November 27, 2011

Other cool features.  You can upload client property photos and files (like contracts and job orders) and add notes.  So now every time someone calls you can make a quick note of the call under that client.

GetJobber.com

This is an article from one of my favorite websites http://www.greenindustrypros.com/

Having an eye toward sustained and successful growth requires you to also have an eye toward an efficient and effective organizational structure. Without the right people on your team doing the right things, your dream of building a bigger and more profitable company rarely amounts to anything more than just that, a dream.

Your company’s organizational structure allows you, as a business owner, the ability to magnify yourself by leveraging employees. Thus, developing this structure properly will offer your organization opportunities for growth while maintaining your quality and profitability as you manage more work.

Keep this in mind: The current business environment lends itself well to an inspired entrepreneur who is committed to improving his staff. The best-run landscape companies are starting to grow again. You can join this elite group when you put your focus in the right place.

Step 1: Identify how you plan to grow

Strategically evaluate your organization to determine exactly what your present emphasis is and what service lines you intend to offer and/or expand. Does this offer the sales opportunity you are striving for?

For example:

What services do you currently offer your clients?

• Landscape management
• Enhancement services
• Irrigation services
• Tree care

What services could you expand into?

• Landscape construction
• Water management
• Parking lot sweeping

Or, can you continue with fewer service types and expand into different types of projects?

• Residential or commercial services
• Estate work or resort properties
• Government work or municipal projects

To answer these questions, you have to know your market and recognize where your passion is—and how that passion can help you grow your business.

Step 2: Identify who you’ll need to grow

Once you’ve outlined the manner in which you can grow your business, evaluate your current staffing and determine what positions are necessary to adequately service these projects. This will be your organizational chart.

Each primary segment should have a manager with appropriate support staffing. You may find that from a practical standpoint, individuals will wear multiple hats until you have enough volume to adequately support a full-time commitment.

Here’s an example:

• Landscape Maintenance Director – additional project managers may be included under this position
• Landscape Construction Director – additional project managers may be included under this position
• Office Manager (you must have office support when you want to grow) – human resources and accounting positions may be included under this position
• Sales Manager – estimators may be included under this position

There are additional staffing needs you’ll also develop as your company grows, such as mechanics and IT support. These positions are typically covered by outsourcing; only the really big, multi million-dollar firms have these types of support staff on the payroll, in most cases.

Step 3: Putting the team together

Write a detailed job description for each position you identify—all the way down to your field staff. Going through this exercise will help you better understand your hiring needs—and how to advertise and interview for these positions. Job descriptions should include responsibilities, reporting relationships, specific tasks, salary range and commitment.

Remember, it is an excellent market for hiring right now. Use this to your advantage by starting with a good plan and a thorough job description. With this in place, identify the best employment sources in your area to get the word out on the positions you have available. Set specific times during the day during a given week to schedule one-hour interviews. Choose a time when you can offer uninterrupted attention to candidates. Use your job descriptions as talking points during those interviews.

Take your time through this process and choose employees who can buy into your plan and vision for your business. Remember, you are hiring them to help you grow. And when you grow, they have an opportunity to grow as well. This is a win/win arrangement your prospective employees need to be made aware of.

Get employees excited about your business and what it offers. Most importantly, get them focused on providing excellent services. Good businesses stay focused and keep their eye on the ball.

Finally, you must ask yourself: Where do I fit in as an owner? Ideally you want to sit as a manager on top of these new positions you’ve created and oversee activities. If this is not your forte, you must hire someone to do it. Think about what you are best at and enjoy the most.

source http://www.greenindustrypros.com/article/10338914/the-first-step-to-growing-your-company

I am a little late but I said I would share.

COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) – One Midlands family says they have lost the keys to their livelihood after thieves stole thousands of dollars worth of lawn care equipment overnight.

The Samuel family says a truck and trailer full of that equipment were taken from their home on Cora Drive between midnight and 3:00am Wednesday.

Vernon Samuel says he uses the lawn care equipment for his business, Top Notch Lawn Care and Maintenance.

He says that any money he makes is used to support his wife, Lafabia, who was diagnosed with breast cancer this summer and is undergoing chemotherapy. Lafabia says whoever took the equipment also stole her husband’s livelihood.

“Just the idea of knowing now that our source of income has been taken away from us because I’m unable to work is heart-wrenching,” said Lafabia.

The Samuels have also done their part in looking for the stolen merchandise. “We also took it into our hands to ride around in the neighborhood to see if we locate our property,” said Lafabia. “However, we have not had any success with doing so.”

The stolen truck is described as a 1990 white Chevy that had a black trailer attached to it. The trailer has the words “Bowhunter by choice” on the back of it and “Bentley Builders” written on the side.

“It would have to be somebody that was probably watching and saw the opportunity and they took it,” said Lafabia.

The Richland County Sheriff’s Department is investigating the incident. Meanwhile, the Samuel family also says they did not have insurance for the lawn care equipment.

If you want to help the Samuel family, dial 803-665-2882.

lawn care South Carolina

]]> http://www.thelawnblog.com/2011/11/14/family-looks-for-return-of-stolen-lawn-care-business-equipment/feed/ 0 http://www.thelawnblog.com/2011/11/14/back-in-business/ http://www.thelawnblog.com/2011/11/14/back-in-business/#comments Tue, 15 Nov 2011 00:16:55 +0000 Richard Murphy http://www.thelawnblog.com/?p=587

The Lawn Blog is back in business.  After being driven to the edge with comment spam and hacking attempts…we have fought back.  Over 58,000 spam comments were sent to us over a 2 month period as we ran our Landscape Maintenance business www.murphyslawns.com .   Only to find on our return that we were inundated with comments that shut down our database with our host.  We were -47Megs and weren’t able to post, comment, do edits, nothing.  Well after hours on the phone with our hosting company and reading books on how to optimize mysql tables via ssh, we are back and alive.  Please stay tuned as we have a lot to add.

And thank you to everyone who has contacted us asking The Lawn Blog to continue…without your support we wouldn’t be where we are.  We have new products to update, guest articles to process and new original articles by myself Richard Murphy.

Thanks again,

Richard Murphy

This will be a multi-post all about Social Media and how it can help you improve your business. I would also like to hear your responses to this post. Have you used social media to your advantage? Has it worked? Has it failed? Enjoy!

So you decided to take the technological leap into social media, but are you doing it effectively? This article will be a great primer for anyone that has not taken their company to the next level online, as well as people who do leave an online footprint but just want a bigger one… Size matter for this one folks.

I know some of you reading this are skeptical on how social media can help your green industry business. Hopefully after you read this you’ll have a good idea on how to use it to your full advantage.

So let’s start with the basics.

What is Social Media?

Simply stated social media is any kind of online platform that interacts with its audience with the benefit of sharing information.

A two way street if you will. Magazines are a great way to get information but you cannot interact with it. Well, I guess you could but then you’ll be a crazy as my uncle Bob. Don’t worry I won’t tell anyone.

Now there are many different types of social media;

Social Networking – facebook.com, myspace.com, hi5.com, twitter.com

Social Bookmarking – delicious.com, propeller.com, stumbleupon.com, digg.com

Blogging and forums – thelawnblog.com, thelawnblog.com/forum

So now you should have a good example of what social media is. Let’s move on.

I am going to touch on the most popular programs and sites as you should already know what they are.

Facebook.com

Facebook is a massive social networking website. I am sure most of you have an account already and waste the majority of your time on there playing those highly addictive games… Guilty! But there are more than games and keeping in touch with grandma facebook has to offer. You can (and I recommend) you create a facebook page for your business. I have made one for our landscape maintenance company. You can visit it here,

Murphy Property Maintenance Fan Page

If you like you can become a fan. Your support is appreciated.

A quick rundown shows that you can share photos, updates, hours of operation, articles and discussions. Fans can even chime in and comment on your work. If you already have a website you can add your link back to your website. Doing this adds to your online footprint making you a stronger competitor.

For more detailed instructions on how to create a facebook page visit their FAQ page here.

Twitter.com

to be continued…

In the beginning of my green industry career a wise man told me that “Landscape Maintenance is all about minutes”. I had a hard time fully understanding what that meant as I was young and still green (sorry for the pun) in the industry and life. He went on to explain that every minute matters in this business… if you don’t jump on opportunities, somebody else will… if you don’t track your time, you will be lost… if you cannot be efficient, you’ll never survive. As he explained I started to understand but it would take me years and the startup of my own company to fully get the picture.

Opportunity knocks more than once… But only a few times.

Take the opportunities that come your way. Quote everything (within your scope) that passes over your desk. Follow all leads and return all calls quickly. There is something to say about that old adage “The early bird gets the worm”. Generally speaking, if you are the first contractor to provide a call back and quote, your chances of getting that job increase dramatically. And if you start turning down quotes, you may not get another chance.

Potential clients don’t like shopping around for shotty expertise so make sure to give them what they want from the start.

Do your timesheets!

Make sure to do a timesheet everyday to track your work. This is a very big part of tracking your business. Here are a couple of good examples of timesheets you can use.

Blank Timesheet (MS Excel file)

Blank Timesheet – Snow Removal (MS Excel File)

Remember to keep them simple yet detailed… Simply Detailed if you will (I believe we have an oxymoron in our midst). As you can see in the example sheet the columns you need are;

- Client/Property
- Description of Work Done
- Time IN / Time OUT
- Staff and Times
- Total times

***TIP:  To make entries quicker you can abbreviate, such as ‘Cut, Trim and Blow’ to CTB.

By doing daily timesheets it helps you with;

- Invoicing
- Tracking employee hours
- Apply hours to job costing

By knowing these numbers you can really see where your business is losing and gaining.

Know your route.

Use your timesheets and a detailed map to tighten up your route. Minutes are lost during drive time and is one of the biggest profit losses in the business.  You would be surprised on how much time is lost while your butt is in the seat.  Take this into consideration:

Service 30 Clients each day with 5 minutes of drive time between each one = 2.33hrs of driving per day or just under 12 hours per week.  That’s a whole days work for one person lost in the truck.  This equation doesn’t even include time it takes to get to your first client or the drive back to the shop… what about paid breaks?  You could be creeping up to 18 hours lost by the end of the week.  Now lets say that your hourly rate is $45.00 per hour, at the end of the mowing season (which is 26 weeks here in Ontario Canada) you could be sitting on a $21,060.000 loss of revenue.  How does your butt feel now?

Now there will always be drive time, but what can you do to tighten it up and lower your loss?  Here are some examples that I have found worked for me.

Bridge the gaps.

Knowing your point A to point B try to get clients in between by marketing.  This will cut down on drive time between each client and increase ‘Productivity’ narrowing the gap of the dreaded ‘Loss’.

Stay in one place.

Find communities where you can drive to and stay awhile.  Condos, gated communities large commercial properties are all great examples of zero drive time.  By doing this your productivity will go thru the roof.  I have one such gated community where I have 14 properties.  We park and are there for 3.25hrs or 6.5 man hrs.  Without the drive time we can Mow Trim and Blow 14 properties in just over 3hrs… solid productivity.

Reverse your route.

This may sound like a odd thing to do.  However try reversing your route and see how the times differ.  You may be surprised on what you find.  By reversing your route you may find a lot of different outcomes, such as;

-  You are at properties at different times of day.  This allows you to make yourself visible to potential clients that have never saw you before.

-  Avoiding traffic when the volume may be higher. There is nothing worse than sitting in traffic as break-lights turn into dwindling profits.

-  Finding shortcuts to tighten you route. Going the opposite way leads to new discoveries.

Paper Bag it and Pack your lunch

This one may sound a bit grade school, but not only does it save you time it also saves you money from your wallet.

I use to be a huge Convenience Store junkie. But by buying my lunches and water when we do our weekly groceries saved me about $75.00 per week and a lot of unnecessary stops for snacks, food and drinks.

Now of course there are many other ways to save minutes like ‘How to mow efficiently’ but I’ll be doing an article on that soon.  The point of this article was to get across the understanding that ‘Time’ really does equal ‘Profit’ in this industry.  So how are you tracking it?  What are you doing to become more efficient?  I would love to hear your tips and tricks.  Please comment below and if you like this article use the tweet button at the top and spread the word.

Cheers,

Richard Murphy
The Lawn Blog