Reed Hastings Never Installed a Furnace – But He Understood Your HVAC Customers Better 

So, if your customers aren’t shopping for HVAC equipment, what do they want? 
 
Consider what Reed Hastings, co-founder of Netflix, deduced when solving a similar problem in his industry over twenty years ago.  
 
Hastings never sold movies. Yet, he’s become one of the most successful businessmen in the entire home entertainment industry. That’s because Hastings understood what companies like Blockbuster Video didn’t: homeowners may act like they care about the product, but what they really care about is convenience. They want to be taken care of. They want to experience a feeling of certainty and comfort when sitting on their sofas, scrolling through all their viewing options after a long day.  
 
Blockbuster misunderstood the customer completely – they focused on optimizing everything about the same old transactional model. Hastings positioned Netflix to focus on solving customer friction points related to that model – and his vision won out. 
 
As a residential contractor, that’s where your focus needs to be, as well. And maybe it already is. But can you honestly say that minimizing friction by putting your customers’ feelings first is your primary focus?  

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Netflix, Apple, and Their Blueprint for the HVAC Industry 

When a company’s focus shifts to the customer’s experience, everything about the operation changes. Hastings took something tried and true – brick-and-mortar video rentals – and optimized the process by looking toward the future with an eye on customer convenience: mail-in rental services to start, then at-home streaming options a few years later. He changed an entire industry by removing a pain point in the homeowner’s weekend movie-watching experience, providing them with the solution to a problem they never knew they needed to solve.  
 
Steve Jobs and Apple did something similar with the iPhone in 2007, when they combined cell phone and iPod technologies into a single, handheld device. No need for a Walkman, a portable CD player, or an iPod Shuffle. No more bulky flip phones, either. Just one device for all your on-the-go technology needs.  
 
But that’s not all Jobs was selling. More than anything, owning an iPhone was – and still is – centered around the feeling of owning something (which, keep in mind, customers don’t actually own) that makes people feel special. The iPhone brought forth a single device to connect people with the world so that anything seems possible. 
 
Convenience. A solution. That special feeling. Sound familiar? Hastings would say so. 
 
For Apple, it starts with the unboxing process, an elevated experience that leaves the customer hesitant to throw out the wrappings when, in truth, they’re just trash. 
 
This is one of the reasons why an Apple customer is almost always a customer for life. Sure, there are logistical reasons why people choose not to switch from Apple to Android devices, but it all begins with that initial feeling. Once someone opens their first iPhone, there’s no more comparing prices or spec shopping with competitor brands. The customer doesn’t want to switch; they’ll even consider an upgrade if they don’t like the look of the latest model. That’s a special kind of loyalty you can’t earn by simply having the best product. Instead, it’s won by giving people an experience they never knew they wanted. 
 
Steve Jobs and Reed Hastings both knew the value of operating with this mindset. It’s time you considered the benefits, as well. 

The Pros and Cons of Competing on Price 

For years – unlike Apple and Netflix – your focus has likely been fixed on pricing.  
 
It makes sense: if your products or services are too expensive, customers might seek out cheaper options. If you’re too cheap, you’ll go out of business. It’s a constant (and exhausting) push-pull that leaves you on an endless marketing and homeowner-haggling treadmill.  
 
Are there pros to conducting business this way? You may think there are.  
 
Your employees seem happy 
Business seems solid 
Customers don’t write you bad reviews 
 
These are wins in the short term but consider whether this was what Hastings and Jobs focused on when building their empires. The question you need to be asking is whether prioritizing the price is moving your company forward.  
 
Here’s the truth: it’s keeping you afloat, not pushing you ahead.  

Homeowners, Trust, and the HVAC Contractor’s Duty 

Reed Hastings saw a gap and filled it. Steve Jobs saw an opportunity and ran with it. Their companies shifted focus to the customer’s experience. They won the buyer’s loyalty by putting their needs first – and part of that meant taking the issue of “price” out of the equation. For Apple, free upgrades with a trade in. For Netflix, no more late fees.  

Think about it: When Peacock puts out a show Netflix subscribers want to watch, people don’t cancel their Netflix subscriptions. When a homeowner is sitting in 100-degree heat with a broken air conditioning unit, what do they care about? Getting the comfort they need now – and ensuring it stays that way for the rest of summer. They couldn’t care less about which HVAC unit model might work best as a replacement. They just want something that’ll get the job done, and they want it installed by someone they can trust.  

Instead of waiting for a call from someone price shopping in your area, wouldn’t it be nice to have loyal customers who feel connected with you? Who trust that you’ll empathize with their situations and get things fixed? 

That’s what HVAC, plumbing, and electrical companies are struggling to work through today. Equipment has always felt like the destination, but it’s only the vehicle. Comfort and peace of mind are what your customers really care about.  

That’s what you’re actually selling – or, rather, what you should be selling.  

Reed Hastings understood this better than anyone in the home entertainment industry, and look where Netflix is now. Steve Jobs built an empire on similar grounds. How high can you climb if you choose to act and pivot like them?