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I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

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Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#51

Post by linkjuice4all »

deweywsu wrote: post #38

This might be a bit of a gold rush of sorts at first, in that the first people to transition from tech to running a small business, whether tech-enabled or not, will find a bigger piece of the pie waiting for their taking. But as the stream of many others increases over the years, the pie's slices will get smaller as competition for the same market segments increases. Not trying to paint doom and gloom, just that I'd…

In my limited “ai transformation” experience the biggest gains seem to be just forcing down some of the walls between these different systems. Larger, more well run places were probably integrating all of their systems/data/etc so there was none of this low hanging fruit. It seems AI as a forcing function of combining data sources to feed into the AI just had the beneficial side effect of connecting all the crap.

Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#52

Post by dsalzman »

deweywsu wrote: post #47
dsalzman wrote: post #34

Doing something similar. Bought a business in the petroleum equipment service space. Building internal tools for ourselves. Pen and paper still dominates the industry.

Would you recommend buying a business over starting one from scratch when possible?

Depends on the industry and your experience plus your access to capital. Sorry for the non-answer

Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#53

Post by DrewADesign »

gnarcoregrizz wrote: post #48
DrewADesign wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but as a recent white->blue collar convert, (union metalworker,) tech workers are usually far less qualified than your average vocational high school graduate, way less physically capable, and waaaaay less tolerant of the sort of workplace unpleasantries in these types of jobs at the entry level. Your tech experience gets you pretty much zero advantage, and there are lots of very…

yeah. there absolutely are lots of very smart and capable people outside of tech. as someone who has seen the blue collar world "up close" (family businesses), its a different breed... the culture and attitude gap is enormous. shockingly so. most tech workers I know couldn't hang (don't hustle as hard, risk averse, liberal), but some skills may transfer, like problem solving and diagnosis, i.e. debugging.

I mean, brains transfer to any job, and it’s tough to be a developer if you’re genuinely stupid. So in that respect, sure. But I’m definitely not saying that developers aren’t smart enough to do blue collar work.

Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#54

Post by TZubiri »

deweywsu wrote: post #38

This might be a bit of a gold rush of sorts at first, in that the first people to transition from tech to running a small business, whether tech-enabled or not, will find a bigger piece of the pie waiting for their taking. But as the stream of many others increases over the years, the pie's slices will get smaller as competition for the same market segments increases. Not trying to paint doom and gloom, just that I'd…

What's the gold rush in this scenario, just business in general?

Doesn't seem like it can be a tulip if it encompasses all productive endeavors.

Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#55

Post by Aeroi »

I work as a Boat Captain and I've been building Camera Search for 16 months to provide better tools for tradesmen. It's evolved into a larger platform with multiple clients, but the core use case for me was building a video and photo first agent that is grounded in actual manuals and data and provide better diagnostics, parts, and repair info.

My longterm vision is to be the agent platform for traditional industries, bridging the gap between knowledge work and physical work.

Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#56

Post by tezclarke »

linkjuice4all wrote: post #51
deweywsu wrote: post #38

This might be a bit of a gold rush of sorts at first, in that the first people to transition from tech to running a small business, whether tech-enabled or not, will find a bigger piece of the pie waiting for their taking. But as the stream of many others increases over the years, the pie's slices will get smaller as competition for the same market segments increases. Not trying to paint doom and gloom, just that I'd…

In my limited “ai transformation” experience the biggest gains seem to be just forcing down some of the walls between these different systems. Larger, more well run places were probably integrating all of their systems/data/etc so there was none of this low hanging fruit. It seems AI as a forcing function of combining data sources to feed into the AI just had the beneficial side effect of connecting all the crap.

Getting data into the crm without physical input is a good quick win. Techs will often drive and type at the same time. Another good win is scheduling the right technician for a job when the customer call comes in. Lots of companies building these agents at the moment and a challenge for them is how to get into customers at scale.

Re: I wanted to build vertical SaaS for pest control, so I took a technician job

#58

Post by tezclarke »

Aeroi wrote: post #55

I work as a Boat Captain and I've been building Camera Search for 16 months to provide better tools for tradesmen. It's evolved into a larger platform with multiple clients, but the core use case for me was building a video and photo first agent that is grounded in actual manuals and data and provide better diagnostics, parts, and repair info. My longterm vision is to be the agent platform for traditional industries,…

Diagnosis without the professional having to be on site is a good use case.
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