Tom Milham: On Marketing a One-Man Business Without Big Budgets
dissident creative agency
44 views
In this episode of The Build Up Podcast —Tom Milham of TCM Air Conditioning Services opens the books on how a one-engineer business actually finds work. He started his apprenticeship at 16 and went out on his own six years ago; today roughly 70% of what he does is subcontracted, and he is not afraid to say so. There is a stigma about it in the trade, and his answer is simple: he is feeding his family, the money is coming in and the customer gets a good service. What he and Dan pull at all episode is how you market your way out of that dependency when the budgets everyone talks about online are numbers a small business will never have.
Tom is refreshingly straight about what has not worked. Eighteen months paying a lead generation service produced nothing usable — the one enquiry he remembers was somebody wanting a hole drilled through a wall for a portable unit’s hose. Dan matches him with the £12k dissident put into Google ads that came back with nothing, and an agency who mentioned afterwards that it takes about twelve months to kick in. A couple of hundred quid boosting a Facebook post was just as wishy-washy. What has worked is the unglamorous stuff: Screwfix Live and the Installer Show, cards handed over and passed on, and Instagram — where at least 80% of his subcontracting work comes from.
The idea at the centre of it comes from his tattooist, who fills a feed with black and white work and then wonders why nobody books colour: only show what you want to do. Tom is caught in exactly that trap, because a feed built on his own face on the tools is why contractors ring him and homeowners do not. Along the way he and Dan map what each channel should actually be doing — LinkedIn for facilities management, Facebook for domestic, Instagram for the trade, TikTok for apprentices — and get into the £2k-to-£15k website gap with nothing in the middle, the mismatched logos on the van, why construction’s one-up mentality will get you thrown to the wolves over a detail in the corner of a photo, and the free marketing nobody is doing, starting with the sign-written van most tradespeople are still sleeping on. Plus the two things he would tell anyone starting out: charge what you are worth, and get used to other people making their problems yours.
FOLLOW TCM AIR CONDITIONING SERVICES
Website: https://tcmairconditioning.co.uk/
Tom Milham (LinkedIn): LinkedIn: tcmairconditionigservices
Instagram: Instagram: tcmairconditioningservices
Facebook: Facebook: tcmairconditioningservices
Stay connected with dissident creative agency: https://linktr.ee/dissidentagency
Subscribe now and don’t miss future episodes of The Build Up Podcast!
CHAPTERS
00:00 “Two months down the line, I could be gone”
00:49 Series two, a new studio, and meet TCM
03:51 Cash flow, deposits, and paying the supplier first
06:15 “I’m not afraid to say that” — 70% subcontracted
07:50 Cards through doors, and a first quote way too big
09:37 Instagram first, website late
13:41 The £2k to £15k website gap with nothing in between
16:40 Trade shows, business cards and word of mouth
17:37 Eighteen months of paid leads and one bogus enquiry
19:15 £12k on Google ads — “we gave it a go, it didn’t work”
22:44 Copy-paste DMs, AI slop, and £200 on a boosted post
27:08 “Only show what you want to do” — the tattooist lesson
29:50 Construction’s one-up mentality and getting thrown to the wolves
34:11 The channel map: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn
36:01 Being the face of it — “that is my branding”
40:07 One logo everywhere: van, email and website
46:01 The quick wins: trade shows and a LinkedIn target list
49:52 “Charge what you’re worth” and market yourself like it
50:53 “People like to make their problems your problem”
53:23 Marketing when the budget is zero
54:59 The sign-written van: the most slept-on billboard going
57:20 Local paper ads, directories, and who to actually ring
Tom Milham: On Marketing a One-Man Business Without Big Budgets
dissident creative agency
44 views
In this episode of The Build Up Podcast —Tom Milham of TCM Air Conditioning Services opens the books on how a one-engineer business actually finds work. He started his apprenticeship at 16 and went out on his own six years ago; today roughly 70% of what he does is subcontracted, and he is not afraid to say so. There is a stigma about it in the trade, and his answer is simple: he is feeding his family, the money is coming in and the customer gets a good service. What he and Dan pull at all episode is how you market your way out of that dependency when the budgets everyone talks about online are numbers a small business will never have.
Tom is refreshingly straight about what has not worked. Eighteen months paying a lead generation service produced nothing usable — the one enquiry he remembers was somebody wanting a hole drilled through a wall for a portable unit’s hose. Dan matches him with the £12k dissident put into Google ads that came back with nothing, and an agency who mentioned afterwards that it takes about twelve months to kick in. A couple of hundred quid boosting a Facebook post was just as wishy-washy. What has worked is the unglamorous stuff: Screwfix Live and the Installer Show, cards handed over and passed on, and Instagram — where at least 80% of his subcontracting work comes from.
The idea at the centre of it comes from his tattooist, who fills a feed with black and white work and then wonders why nobody books colour: only show what you want to do. Tom is caught in exactly that trap, because a feed built on his own face on the tools is why contractors ring him and homeowners do not. Along the way he and Dan map what each channel should actually be doing — LinkedIn for facilities management, Facebook for domestic, Instagram for the trade, TikTok for apprentices — and get into the £2k-to-£15k website gap with nothing in the middle, the mismatched logos on the van, why construction’s one-up mentality will get you thrown to the wolves over a detail in the corner of a photo, and the free marketing nobody is doing, starting with the sign-written van most tradespeople are still sleeping on. Plus the two things he would tell anyone starting out: charge what you are worth, and get used to other people making their problems yours.
FOLLOW TCM AIR CONDITIONING SERVICES
Website: https://tcmairconditioning.co.uk/
Tom Milham (LinkedIn): LinkedIn: tcmairconditionigservices
Instagram: Instagram: tcmairconditioningservices
Facebook: Facebook: tcmairconditioningservices
Stay connected with dissident creative agency: https://linktr.ee/dissidentagency
Subscribe now and don’t miss future episodes of The Build Up Podcast!
CHAPTERS
00:00 “Two months down the line, I could be gone”
00:49 Series two, a new studio, and meet TCM
03:51 Cash flow, deposits, and paying the supplier first
06:15 “I’m not afraid to say that” — 70% subcontracted
07:50 Cards through doors, and a first quote way too big
09:37 Instagram first, website late
13:41 The £2k to £15k website gap with nothing in between
16:40 Trade shows, business cards and word of mouth
17:37 Eighteen months of paid leads and one bogus enquiry
19:15 £12k on Google ads — “we gave it a go, it didn’t work”
22:44 Copy-paste DMs, AI slop, and £200 on a boosted post
27:08 “Only show what you want to do” — the tattooist lesson
29:50 Construction’s one-up mentality and getting thrown to the wolves
34:11 The channel map: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn
36:01 Being the face of it — “that is my branding”
40:07 One logo everywhere: van, email and website
46:01 The quick wins: trade shows and a LinkedIn target list
49:52 “Charge what you’re worth” and market yourself like it
50:53 “People like to make their problems your problem”
53:23 Marketing when the budget is zero
54:59 The sign-written van: the most slept-on billboard going
57:20 Local paper ads, directories, and who to actually ring