Commercial Electrical Business Growth: From Solo Operator to Multi-Crew Empire

Electrical business owners looking to grow their business can come across a lot of conflicting advice online. To help electrical business owners find useful strategies to grow their businesses and increase their bottom line, we spoke to a range of highly successful home service industry experts and users of our electrical service management software.

From these conversations, we have assembled this collection of strategies and tactics for growing an electrical business, whether you're a startup or an established small business.

In this guide to growing your electrical business and creating an electrical contracting business plan, we help you position your electrical company to survive any disruptions and be prepared to grow and adapt to the changes and fluctuations of the home service industry in the future.

Create an Electrical Business Plan Based on the Electrical Business You Want to Be in the Future

• Find a mentor who’s doing what you want to do.
• Shadow your mentor on the job; ask for electrical business ideas.
• Go find 10 more mentors, and do it all over again.
• Listen to electrician podcasts for tips and inspiration.
• Read books on how to grow your electrical contractor business.

Tommy Mello, The Home Service Expert, says he wished he’d found a mentor before starting his own garage-door business 15 years ago. He could have emulated their best business practices, instead of figuring things out on his own.

“You’ve got to act like the business you want to become, and I didn’t know that back then,” says Mello, owner of A1 Garage Door Service, which topped £24 million in revenue last year.

“If I would have listened to a mentor tell me, ‘This is why you shouldn’t do this,’ or ‘This is why you should,’ it would have definitely fast-forwarded the business.”

Find a role model who’s doing what you want to do and is willing to share everything you need to know. Shadow them on the job. Ask tons of questions. Then go find 10 more mentors, Mello advises, and do it all over again.

He also suggests reading or listening to books to grow your business, such as The E-Myth by Michael Gerber, The 7-Power Contractor by Al Levi, The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes, Essentialism by Gary Keller, or his own book, Home Service Millionaire.

“Reading has been a big part of my success, and hanging out with successful people,” Mello says.

Mario Campirano, owner of Express Electrical Services, gives thanks to Service Sales Coach Joe Crisara for pointing him in the right direction when he decided to switch from commercial electrical work to residential in the midst of the last recession.

Large-scale electrical project management with SOV tracking, change orders, submittals, and AIA billing.

“He took me under his wing and taught me how to not take no for an answer,” says Campirano, who now runs a £6.4 million electrical company in London.

With lessons learned and high ambitions, Campirano started knocking on homeowners’ doors. He says it even got to the point where he visited local DIY stores to find potential customers.

“Now I didn't have a sign like, ‘Will work for food,’ but you have to get smart,” Campirano says. “You go into B&Q or Screwfix and you start looking at the people buying an electrical item, you start hitting them up, ‘Hey, you've got an electrician to do that?’ And then you start just going, going, going.”

“You’ve got to be hungry for it, at the end of the day. If you're not hungry for it, if you can't go knock on somebody's door, I don't know what to tell you, but that changed my life. That gave me a reality wake-up call.”

Grow Your Electrical Contractor Business by Investing in Recruiting and Training a Qualified Workforce

• Build a strong company foundation.
• Outline a fully developed organisational chart.
• Always be recruiting, and establish a thorough interviewing process.
• Provide extensive training for every employee.
• Offer performance pay as an incentive to grow.

Remember that pesky trade worker shortage? That problem didn’t disappear overnight.

Electrical contracting business owners, like others in the skilled trades, struggle to find qualified employees in a climate rife with high demand. They also worry about investing time and money in training, only to see those electricians leave to go off on their own or work for another company.

“Focus instead on building a strong company foundation in the first place, with a fully developed organisational chart,” Mello says. That means creating clear job descriptions and expectations for every position, providing extensive training to set up every employee for success, and using performance pay as an incentive to help employees grow.

“Some people say, ‘always be closing.’ I say, ‘always be recruiting,’” says Mello, who gives employees £1,200 for referring a new hire.

“I think a lot of us just don’t start the business right,” he adds. “Give it such a strong foundation, there’s nowhere to grow but up.”

A UK-based electrical firm, for instance, built a strong company foundation using mobile software for electricians. The company services about 70% commercial customers and 30% residential customers in the greater Manchester area.

The Director of Operations says the software helped the business streamline and operate more efficiently. Six months after he joined in 2021, he says the software helped him generate more revenue, manage money better, build a £32,000 home office, and still end the year with a profit.

In 2023, the firm offered private health insurance to its employees for the first time. The move, the director says, positions the company for growth.

The firm also focused its efforts on growing the home services side of the business and training electrical techs to understand that business model.

“The commercial side is paying the bills and helping us grow,” he says. “The residential side is going to put us in a whole other department.”

Need Better Electrical Branding? Start by Building a Great Company Culture

• Value your company’s number 1 asset: Your employees.
• Invest as much time in recruiting and training as you do on electrical service sales.
• Increase electrical branding and engage potential applicants by sharing insight into your company’s culture.

Share your team’s success stories regularly to motivate and inspire everyone. Happy employees typically mean more productive employees, no matter the industry. Give your electrical staff more than just a steady paycheck by building a company culture that really shows them how much you value their work. They can help spread the word to potential new applicants.

AI-powered bid management with takeoff assistance, labor estimation, and win/loss analytics.

Trades consultant Ben Stark advises keeping techs and other employees involved in the process, and making sure they know their role in growing your electrical contracting business. Let them own a piece of it, and you’ll likely get complete buy-in and increased cash flow. “Employees are your number 1 asset,” Stark says.

When crises or setbacks occur in the home services industry, don’t stop hiring for your company or marketing to expand your customer base.

“Resist the reactionary,” Stark advises. “I’ve gone through a recession, a crisis...we put on the accelerator (for marketing and hiring), and we have always come out on the positive side.”

Express Electric’s Campirano says he tries to keep his employees motivated by leading with a cup-half-full mentality. Showing fear just leads to more of the same.

Instead, Campirano tells his employees they’re heroes. He pumps up his employees and makes them feel valued with a specific message: “Let's go out there and be humans. Let’s help other humans in need. We can do this together — as a team.”

“Employees who feel valued also work harder,” says Tom Howard, a VP at ServiceTitan and owner of multiple home service businesses. He thinks electrical companies need to spend as much time attracting and retaining employees as they do trying to sell electrical services to new or existing customers.

How Software Can Improve Communication and Company Culture

After implementing a field service management platform across its business in 2022, a Bristol-based electrical services company found communication between team members much easier. This improved the overall company culture of focusing on keeping both employees and customers happy.

The platform gave the company's techs and office staff access to job information, call history, and customer communication details in a single interface, available anywhere.

“We’re able to be more productive as a company because everything is all in one system,” says the company's customer service representative. “With a platform like Sterling, it’s all at our fingertips, no matter where we are.”

Following the switch, the company grew by an estimated 50%, now employs 14 team members, and expects to generate £2.4 million in revenue in 2025. The representative attributes that success to the new software system. “It’s allowing us to focus more on training and the future,” she says.

“All the information is in one programme where everybody can access it,” she says. “It’s very convenient. It’s made so many things a lot easier.”

Build Your Electrical Contracting Business Using Systems, Checks, and Balances

• Establish clear, documented procedures for every task.
• Ensure compliance with UK regulations, including BS 7671 (IET Wiring Regulations) and HSE (Health and Safety Executive) guidelines.
• Use software to standardise quoting, invoicing, and job management.
• Implement quality control checks and regular safety audits.

To scale your business, you need robust systems. This means creating and documenting standardised processes for everything from how phones are answered to how technicians complete a job. This ensures consistency and quality, regardless of which team member is performing the task.

In the UK, adherence to regulations is paramount. Your processes must incorporate compliance with BS 7671, and all work should be carried out by qualified electricians who are part of a Competent Person Scheme like the one offered by NICEIC or NAPIT. This not only ensures safety and quality but also builds trust with your customers.

Using a field service management platform like Sterling can be instrumental here. It allows you to build templates for different job types, ensuring all necessary safety checks and compliance steps are followed. Digital forms can be used to confirm that technicians have completed risk assessments and adhered to all required procedures, with data stored centrally for easy access and auditing.

Regularly review and refine your processes. What works for a two-person operation will need to evolve as you grow to a 20-person team. Getting feedback from your staff on the ground is crucial for making practical improvements.

Automated AIA G702/G703 billing with schedule of values, retainage tracking, and certified payroll integration.

Electrical Contracting Business Marketing Focused on the Right Audience

• Identify your ideal customer (e.g., commercial, industrial, high-end residential).
• Tailor your marketing messages to their specific needs and pain points.
• Use a mix of online and offline marketing channels.
• Track your marketing ROI to focus on what works.

Once your operations are solid, it's time to ramp up your marketing. The key is to focus your efforts on attracting the right type of customer for your business. Are you targeting large-scale commercial projects in central London, or residential rewiring jobs in the suburbs of Birmingham?

Your marketing message should speak directly to your target audience. For commercial clients, this might mean highlighting your team's certifications, your adherence to HSE regulations, and your ability to deliver projects on time and on budget. For residential customers, the focus might be more on reliability, transparent pricing, and the peace of mind that comes from using a NICEIC or NAPIT registered electrician.

Digital marketing is essential for reaching a wide audience. A professional website that showcases your work and customer testimonials is a must. Invest in local SEO to ensure you appear in search results when potential customers in your area are looking for an electrician. Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising on platforms like Google Ads can also be effective, allowing you to target specific keywords and demographics.

Don't neglect offline marketing. Building relationships with builders, estate agents, and property managers can be a great source of referrals. Networking at local business events and joining trade associations can also help to raise your profile.

Using a platform like Sterling can help you manage and track your marketing efforts. You can see which channels are generating the most leads and which campaigns are providing the best return on investment, allowing you to focus your marketing budget where it will have the biggest impact.

Grow Your Electrical Business with the Best Field Service Management Software

As your business grows, managing all the moving parts becomes more complex. That's where a comprehensive field service management software like Sterling comes in. It provides the tools you need to streamline your operations, improve communication, and make data-driven decisions.

From scheduling and dispatching to invoicing and reporting, Sterling brings everything together in one platform. Your technicians can access job information, update their status, and create invoices from the field, while your office staff has a real-time view of what's happening. This level of visibility and control is essential for managing a growing team and maintaining high standards of customer service.

Ready to take your commercial electrical business to the next level? See how Sterling can help you grow.

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