Efficiency First

Efficiency First’s Best Practice Working Groups

What our nine Best Practice working groups have been working on:

Business Models

• Want to know how to scale up your business? Going from General Contractor to your own crews? Do you have one crew and you dream of five? To answer these questions, contractors from around the country have teamed up to develop recommendations for your business. Welcome to Business Models 101 – 401 to be released in the spring.
• Start-up tools: what do you need for your business on day 1 and to for the second stage.

Finance and Incentives

• Financing tools that exist in the industry today.
• Planning long-term how to engage more national lenders in the industry.

Labor and Industry

• Defining a series of terms & definitions for the industry.

Manufacturers Council

• Marketing toolkit: supplying contractors with templates of marketing materials.
• Marketing & Sales training: Where applicable industry experts will work to educate contractors about sales and marketing techniques: How to drive demand. Several sales representatives of manufacturer members of Efficiency First will arrange for presentation and education sessions at local Efficiency First Chapter meetings.

Low-Income Weatherization

• The group is working to identify a course of action for itself over the next several months, including what the post-ARRA funded industry looks like.

Marketing

• Building out more marketing template tools for contractors. See the “What is Home Performance” Marketing Brochure for EF-member company use (member log-in required).
• Third-party products used to drive consumer demand, market the “whole house system,” and increase your sales.
• After releasing a “whole house” tri-fold last in December , the committee is following up on developing:

1. • A web page, one you can insert into your web site – better explaining the “whole house” approach and outlining stages of work.
   • Speaking in the community? A PowerPoint you can make your own? A little help from people around the country, giving you a tool to speak at local home owners associations, community groups like Rotary or Sierra, etc. all in the name of driving your own customer base.
   • Reach the top of Google. What do you need to know about Search Engine Optimization. The marketing committee will give you a guide.
   • Get in the press. Drum up business. Join the marketing group for an upcoming Webinar as they help you develop a local media strategy.
   • Demonstrate your success! Spread that word of mouth on a job well done. The marketing group is going to give you instructions on how.

Multi-Family Homes

• White paper & recommendations for program managers developing multi-family home programs and incentives (to be delivered in April).
• Case studies: What to learn on existing multi-family home programs.

Real Estate

• Labeling, a tool to increase retrofits — a white paper (April).
• The appraisal process: engage real estate brokers in your community; increase the value of homes through the Listing Services (MLS).

Software and Technology

• Software position paper.
• FAQ – what do contractors need to know before purchasing software.

Workforce Development

• Thinking about hiring? The Workforce Development Working Group is developing a toolkit outlining the most successful hiring processes in the industry.

We are continually working hard to develop a thriving Home Performance industry.  if you would like to join any of the nine working groups that we support, we’d love to have you on board.

For more information on Efficiency First’s Best Practice working groups, check out http://www.efficiencyfirst.org/take-action/best-practices/.

If you’d like to contribute in one of our working groups, send an e-mail to internpolicy@efficiencyfirst.org.