Agency owners + local service owners: am I overbuilding this or is there a real offer here?
I’ve spent the last 10 years running door-to-door sales teams. A little over a year ago, I stopped knocking personally and started testing phone sales for digital services aimed at local businesses.
Now some of my D2D reps are asking me to help them transition into selling over the phone.
Here’s what I’m trying to sanity check:
Right now, the business I target is very niche-specific, and my reps don’t really understand that vertical yet. So I’m debating between two paths:
Option A: Train them deeply on my current niche and keep the offer focused.
Option B: Build a broader system for local service businesses — plumbers, detailers, contractors, cleaners, roofers, etc. — helping them clean up the basics most are missing: better online presence, custom website, Google Business Profile, reviews, missed-call response, CRM, booking, and lead follow-up.
The reason I’m considering Option B is because I keep seeing the same problems across a lot of local service businesses: outdated websites, weak Google profiles, no review system, no CRM, slow response times, missed calls, and leads slipping through the cracks.
A lot of these businesses don’t seem to be losing jobs because their work is bad. They’re losing jobs because their online systems and follow-up are weak.
My concern is whether this is a real business opportunity or if I’d just be overbuilding a solution that sounds good to agency people but local business owners don’t actually care enough to pay for.
For local service business owners:
Would fixing these problems actually be valuable to you?
What would matter most: website, Google visibility, reviews, faster follow-up, missed-call recovery, booking, CRM, or something else?
Would you prefer someone specialized in your exact industry, or would a strong local-business growth system be enough?
For agency owners or people running sales teams:
Would you train reps into one specific vertical, or give them a broader local service offer?
Have you found it easier to sell niche-specific solutions or general “local business growth” systems?
Is this type of offer too broad, or does it make sense if the fulfillment system is tight?
What would you avoid building before getting paying clients?
How would you validate this before hiring/training reps around it?
Not selling anything here. Just trying to sanity check the direction before I build too much around it.