What Every Contractor Brags About, That's Actually Proving Their Brand's Working Against Them

**Terri Briggs** (0:00)
When you can arm somebody with something they're proud of, a brand they feel more confident in, suddenly they've got this brand supporting them with great materials to leave behind. They feel proud of the uniform, the truck they're pulling up in. They can perform at their best, and that positivity starts to spread like a spider web throughout the company. Think about all the amazing things that your brand does.
Everything, like your company, what are you proud of? Now forget it, let's look at your truck on the screen together, and now does that tell you any of those things? If it doesn't, you need to address your brand. A great brand isn't a prize for doing well and staying in business and growing, it's the accelerant to get you there. Don't wait, don't wait, you deserve it now.

**Tommy Mello** (0:38)
Welcome back to The Home Service Expert, I got Terri Briggs here, she is the COO and president of KickCharge Creative, who I happened to get my brand done about five years ago?

**Terri Briggs** (0:48)
About five years ago, yeah, almost six now.

**Tommy Mello** (0:50)
We were 30 million, and this year we'll do 400 million. And I think a lot of people are like, Tommy always talks about them, but you guys have done so many case studies to just show, I think about Bueller, and just looking at, it all started with Ken Goodrich. We're going to dive into it, but you're an expert in branding, strategy, operations, culture.
You've been at KickCharge...

**Terri Briggs** (1:20)
Almost 13 years.

**Tommy Mello** (1:21)
Almost 13 years. And there's 55-plus people now on the team.

**Terri Briggs** (1:26)
Yeah, we're 72

**Tommy Mello** (1:28)
72 people.

**Terri Briggs** (1:29)
Which is wild.

**Tommy Mello** (1:30)
And you guys are just kicking ass. I mean, it's crazy to see how many brands you guys... What are you guys, 3,000?

**Terri Briggs** (1:39)
Yeah.

**Tommy Mello** (1:40)
3,000 brands. And so this thesis of this episode is your brand is either helping you grow or quietly holding you back.

**Terri Briggs** (1:47)
Correct.

**Tommy Mello** (1:48)
And most contractors don't know which one it is.
Terri Briggs, president of KickCharge Creative, breaks down why branding isn't a logo. It's the ignition switch that drives conversions, pricing power, hiring and long-term company value. She explains why waiting to invest in the most is the most expensive choice contractors make and what it actually looks like when a brand starts working for you instead of against you.

**Terri Briggs** (2:12)
Yes.

**Tommy Mello** (2:13)
So, what made you leave the, you were in the food market.

**Terri Briggs** (2:19)
I was, I was, I worked with brand managers and consumer package goods. So we did, I did a lot with like the Ferrero company, Nutella and Tic Tac, on the agency side. And I left, it's a silly story, but it's very true. I think people think I made it up.
My son who is graduating high school this year, he was in kindergarten and he was doing, it's like the kindergarten project where you talk about who your community helper hero is. And he picked a policeman and he asked me who I helped. And I was like, no one. I help people eat Nutella. You know, I'm like, I help people get chubby. Like I had no, no good answer for him. And I honestly was like, if I'm going to spend a lot of time away from my family, I want it to be because I'm making change. So I started looking for a new opportunity. And I randomly saw a posting for a job at this little agency in Washington, New Jersey. And I was fortunate enough to get called in for an interview and met Dan Antonelli. And right away we clicked. It was, he talked a lot about wanting to help home service contractors grow. I come from a family of plumbers.
And I was like, oh my gosh, I could make measurable change here. And that was, I literally that day was like, okay, we're going to do this, right? And I left kind of the corporate world behind and started working with Dan.

**Tommy Mello** (3:37)
What was it like in the beginning of when you started there?

**Terri Briggs** (3:41)
It was wild. We were a tiny group of people. We were very scrappy back then. I think a lot of how we operate today being so nimble and able to change quickly is because of our roots.
Dan was exactly who he is today. Not very focused because he's just always been such a creative, such a visionary. And we started to assemble a very passionate team of people. A lot of us are still there, you know, the OGs.