Business Cycle for a Local Service Company

The business cycle is a way to represent the processes in your HVAC, plumbing or roofing business.  The individual parts can be thought of as steps.  The steps are linked in a circle so the cycle is connected and never-ending.

I believe there are 7 steps to a typical business cycle.  The steps are:

• Marketing – Marketing is the process of explaining your products and services to a potential audience. This is first step mainly because this is typically where you start the process to reach out to potential customers.  But, since the cycle is connected, you could start at any step first.
• Leads – Leads are the outcome of marketing and represent people that are interested in your products or services.
• Sales – Sales are the next part of the cycle where a lead is converted to a sale. This process may involve a sales funnel and a sales process that could be its own cycle.
• Operations – Operations are the business processes where a product or service is manufactured and shipped or a service performed. The key is the process results in what the customer purchased by the sale.
• Customer Service – Customer service is the business processes after the customer receives the product or service.
• Reputation – Reputation is the step in the business cycle where the customer forms an opinion of the product and service and shares it with others.

The final step of reputation connects back to the first step of marketing and shows how the steps build on each other.  But, they also restart the cycle since reputation is one form of marketing for your HVAC, plumbing or roofing business.

The business cycle is composed of 7 steps that form a linked flow through which a potential customer is made aware of your product or service and moves through the sales process to receiving their purchase.