I had about 270 to 300 customers when I sent that LinkedIn message to a lawn care company in my market. We weren’t competing. They didn’t do pest control. I didn’t do lawn care. It seemed like the perfect partnership.
They responded. We set up a meeting. We agreed to partner up and send business back and forth.
Then I learned they had 4,100 customers. And I had 300.
I was so excited that I made a massive mistake. I sent out text messages to all their customers within the first week. All of them. At once.
And then my phone exploded.
So many people responded wanting pest control. Way more than I expected. We couldn’t get back to people fast enough. We couldn’t service people in that amount of time. I didn’t have enough trucks. I didn’t have enough techs. I didn’t have enough anything.
It was a really, really bad scenario. I had to scramble to hire people. I had to get a loan for trucks. We went through some serious crap trying to figure out how to service all those people.
Luckily, we figured it out. And that strategic partnership ended up being one of the best things I ever did for my business.
But I learned a valuable lesson. Strategic partnerships are like a cheat code for growth. But if you’re not ready for them, they can destroy your business.
Let me show you how to do strategic partnerships the right way so you can add hundreds of customers in 90 days without nearly going out of business like I did.
Why Strategic Partnerships Are So Important
Strategic partnerships are important for three main reasons.
Reason One: Fast Exposure
You get a lot of exposure very, very quickly. Way faster than building up SEO or running ads or knocking doors for months.
With a good strategic partnership, you can tap into thousands of potential customers overnight.
Reason Two: Profitability Without Heavy Marketing Spend
You can be very, very profitable quickly because you don’t have to do all these marketing channels instantaneously. All the stuff we teach in Pest Control Millionaires, like Google ads and Facebook and SEO, that’s going to take a little bit of time to ramp up.
Strategic partnerships are fast. If you do it properly and you know what you’re doing, you can start getting customers immediately.
Reason Three: Win Win for Everyone
It’s a win win for both you and the strategic partner. They’re sending you pest control leads. You’re sending them lawn care leads or moving leads or whatever service they offer. Everyone makes more money.
That’s why I love strategic partnerships. And honestly, it’s the first thing I do when I go into a brand new market.
I ask, “Who can I partner with? What company is already serving my target demographic that we can send business back and forth with and win together?”
When Should You Start Looking for Strategic Partners?
Here’s an important question. When should you partner? Day one when you first start up a business, or should you wait until you have some clients and know what you’re doing?
If you’re brand new to business ownership or brand new to being a pest control owner specifically, I would definitely get a few clients first. Get your systems down. Get your processes down.
The reason I say that is because strategic partnerships can bring you so much business that it can put you in a hole. Like what happened to me.
If you’re brand new and you don’t have any systems, don’t have any processes, don’t make the stupid mistake I made. Make sure you have things set up in place before you do this.
But if you feel like you’re ready for it and you have a good strategic partnership in town that you can build and you do it the right way, it’s like a cheat code. You can add hundreds of accounts within 90 days. It’s that good.
What Local Businesses Make the Best Referral Partners?
First, you’ve got to make sure you find someone reputable in town. Do not partner with people who have bad reviews or a sketchy reputation.
Think of this like an interview process. Don’t just partner with anyone. Make sure they’re reputable. They have good reviews. Preferably they’ve been around for a few years.
Another thing you want to look out for is someone who is willing to sign an agreement that you won’t take each other’s customers later on. I actually have a legal agreement with my strategic partnerships.
Everything is transparent. If we’re going to send business back and forth to each other or we’re going to share each other’s customer lists, which is a very, very sensitive piece of information, you have to have a legal agreement there.
If they’re not willing to sign anything, that’s a red flag. Don’t partner with them.
The Best Industries for Pest Control Partnerships
If you’re a pest control company, here are the best strategic partnerships.
Lawn care companies that don’t do pest control. This is the obvious one. They’re already servicing the same homes you want to service. Perfect fit.
Moving companies. These are actually fantastic. People say, “Yeah, I’m moving out of town. We need to cancel service.” Boom. You send them to a moving company and you get a nice referral. You help build that moving company.
Property managers. They manage tons of properties and need reliable pest control.
Real estate agents. They’re constantly dealing with buyers and sellers who need pest control.
HVAC companies. They’re in homes all the time.
Plumbing companies. Same thing.
Roofing companies. They’re servicing homeowners constantly.
Pretty much any service based business that is going to homes just like you are is going to be a great strategic partner.
But I will say, the best ones I’ve seen for me personally are moving companies, lawn care companies, and pool cleaning companies. Those have been the absolute best for us.
And it makes sense. It’s the same target demographic. Same buyer profile. Same type of homeowner.
Should You Offer Commission or Just Trade Exposure?
I would definitely offer commission. Here’s why.
A lot of strategic partners will just be like, “Hey Jake, I’m going to give you business” and you’re like, “Hey John, I’m going to give you business.” It’s like a handshake agreement.
I wouldn’t do that because you’re not going to get as much as you can out of that partnership.
What we actually do a little different than what most people do in strategic partnerships is we put it into a software called Go High Level.
Let me explain how this works.
How We Structure Strategic Partnerships With Go High Level
Let’s say I have a pest control company and I partner with a lawn care company. We’ll call them ABC Lawn Care.
We put ABC Lawn Care’s customer list into the CRM. Then we text their customers on their behalf.
Here’s what the text looks like:
“Hey, my name is John. I’m with ABC Lawn Care. We just partnered with Green Day Pest Control. If you’re interested in pest control, here’s a coupon or discount code we’re offering.”
The reason this is so important is because there’s transparency. Both you and the strategic partnership have access to the communication in the CRM. So they can’t screw you. You can’t screw them.
And it goes both ways. You’re sending texts to their customers, and they’re sending texts to your customers.
That’s the win win.
How to Pitch a Strategic Partnership When You're Small
Now, here’s the tricky part. In the beginning, you might be where I was. You’ve got 300 clients. They’ve got 4,000.
It’s not going to be as advantageous for them. So you must sell them on the dream.
It’s almost like pitching a door knocking wrapper or someone that you’re growing a company with.
Here’s what I literally said:
“Hey, I own a pest control company here. I’m looking to partner with someone in town. I’m going to grow by thousands of accounts here in the next few years. I’m looking for a reputable company that can partner with me that I can send my leads to. I don’t plan on doing lawn care. I want to focus on pest control. And I want somewhere I can send those clients. I’m looking for that partnership. Are you willing to send your business to me if I send my business to you?”
I had a lot of people say no. But you don’t need everyone to say yes. You just need one good one in town to say yes.
How to Track and Follow Up on Partner Referrals
This is critical. You need transparency in the pipeline.
Your strategic partner is going to have a login to the CRM. You’re going to have a login. You send everyone a text or an email. I suggest a text because response rates are way higher.
Both of you are going to be able to see the text messages going through. And when you call or they call that client, those calls need to be recorded as well so you can see if they closed them or not.
That way nobody’s screwing each other.
Email Lists Versus Phone Numbers
Is it worth getting a strategic partner’s email list?
Email lists are okay. They’re not going to be as good as getting their texting list. People are way more responsive to texts. You’re going to get a lot more leads and a lot more sales with phone numbers.
If emails are the best they can do, emails are still fine. You’ll still get sales from that if their email list is large enough.
But I would definitely stick to text messages if you want to get the optimal results.
What If They Don’t Have a CRM?
This actually happens. We just ran into this today with a potential partner.
If they don’t have a CRM, sell them on getting one. Or just get a list in a spreadsheet, download it to a CSV, and upload it into Go High Level yourself.
You can make it work.
Red Flags That Indicate a Partnership Isn't Worth Pursuing
There are two big red flags.
Red Flag One: Bad Reputation. If they don’t have at least four and a half stars on Google with a decent number of reviews, don’t partner with them. Their bad reputation will reflect on you.
If they only have like ten clients total, you may want to find a bigger company. You need someone with a substantial customer base to make it worth your time.
Red Flag Two: They Won’t Sign an Agreement. If they’re not willing to sign a legal agreement protecting both parties, walk away. That’s a huge red flag.
Success Stories That Will Blow Your Mind
I’ve seen some pretty crazy success stories with strategic partnerships. A lot bigger than even what Jonas and I have done.
We had one person in our Pest Control Millionaires class that ended up getting a list of 12,000 customers. Twelve thousand.
I haven’t followed up with them in a few months, but I know that they sent out a text to that 12,000 customer list. Even if just 1% converted, that’s 120 customers.
At the time, this company probably had around 800 to 1,000 customers. So they potentially added 10% to 15% to their customer base in one move. That’s insane.
And the cool thing is, pretty much everyone that’s gone through our Pest Control Millionaires class ends up getting a strategic partnership. It works that well.
Create Your Own Mastermind Group in Your Town
Here’s a pro move. If you get four strategic partnerships with a pool cleaning company, an HVAC company, a lawn care company, and a moving company, you’ve basically created your own mastermind group in your town.
It’s like your own referral networking group, but without the 8 AM meetings. You’re all sending business back and forth to each other. You can go on vacations together. You become friends.
It’s powerful.
The Most Common Mistakes People Make
Besides my massive mistake of sending 4,000 texts at once and nearly destroying my business, here are the most common mistakes I see.
Mistake One: No Transparency
You need a software that has transparency and that both parties can see. You need to trust each other, but verify.
Mistake Two: Handshake Agreements
People are just doing handshake agreements. “I’ll send you business if you send me business.”
Then you both send like one or two referrals back and forth, maybe even 20 over a year. You’re exchanging business cards.
That’s not a real strategic partnership. That’s just a casual referral relationship.
To make this really go fast and be effective, you need to send out text messages to their customers and they need to send out texts to your customers.
Mistake Three: Being Afraid to Text Customers
People are like, “Well, I don’t want to bother my customers. I don’t want that text to go out to them.”
I promise it’s worth it. Jonas and I contact our customers all the time. People do not care as much as you think.
If the text is valuable and offers them something they need, they appreciate it. They don’t see it as spam.
Start Building Your Strategic Partnerships Today
Look, strategic partnerships are one of the fastest ways to grow a pest control company. Period.
You can add hundreds of customers in 90 days without spending a fortune on ads or knocking thousands of doors.
But you have to do it right. Get your systems in place first. Find reputable partners. Sign legal agreements. Use a CRM for transparency. Send out texts to their customer list and let them send texts to yours.
Do it right, and you’ll create a growth engine that prints customers for years to come.
If you want to learn more strategies for building a million dollar pest control business, join our free Facebook group, Pest Control Millionaires. We’ve got over 2,000 active members sharing what’s working every day. And if you want the complete playbook, grab a copy of our book, Zip Code Kings.
Now go find your first strategic partner and start growing.
