175 | Ellen Rohr: Brand, Basics, and What Ride-Alongs Really Teach You

**Justin sits down with Ellen Rohr on the beach right after Home Service Hoorah wraps** — Zoom Drain founder, Service Titan brand ambassador lead, and someone who's been humbled by this industry more times than she can count. Ellen walks through her path from founding Zoom Drain to running Service Titan's brand ambassador program, how she discovered Jered Williams (the Wealthy Plumber) on Instagram, and why his Wahoo Plumbing launch, booked solid for weeks off a handful of Facebook ads, is proof that personal brand matters more than ever in an age of rising ad costs and AI-generated noise. From there the conversation turns to the basics: the John Wooden "how you put on your socks" lesson on repetition and training, why SOPs should start with something as simple as "sober, on time, dressed right," and a string of shop-tour stories — from A+ Garage's high-tension springs to Any Hour's maze-like $125 million strip mall to the shop visit that changed how Ellen thought about scale back in 1992. She closes with details on Service Titan's free Titan Creator Summit on November 19th. ⏱️ VIDEO CHAPTERS 0:00 — Hanging Out With Ellen After She Rocked the Hoorah Stage 0:22 — Why We Kept This Year's Event Intimate 1:05 — Ellen's First-Ever Podcast 1:57 — How Wealthy Plumber and Hoorah Joined Forces 2:48 — Ellen's Path From Zoom Drain to Service Titan 3:53 — Building Service Titan's Brand Ambassador Program 5:04 — Discovering Jered Williams on Instagram 5:27 — Practicing What You Preach: The Wahoo Plumbing Ad Story 6:02 — Why Personal Brand Matters More Than Ever 7:18 — Guerrilla Marketing for the Small Guys 7:59 — Chad Peterman's $200M BHAG 8:37 — The 18–24 Month Rebuild After Selling a Business 9:31 — Jered's Take: Why Getting Bigger Reduces Risk 11:12 — John Wooden, Socks, and the Power of Repetition 11:58 — SOPs Start With Sober, On Time, Dressed Right 13:19 — Most of Your Time Is Spent Correcting What You Never Clarified 14:01 — Shop Tours: The Garage Door Ride-Along 15:16 — A+ Garage and a New Respect for Dangerous Equipment 16:12 — The Advantage of Not Knowing the Trade 17:25 — What Am I Doing That's Getting in Your Way? 18:08 — What Really Matters on a Ride-Along 19:27 — Simple Process, Overcomplicated by Owners 20:46 — The Titan Creator Summit, November 19th 22:38 — Half the Room Was at Their First-Ever Conference 23:02 — The $100 Million Shop Tour That Changed Ellen's Mind 24:38 — Tommy Mello's Business Is a Training Business 25:09 — Any Hour: The $125 Million Strip Mall 27:16 — Training Rooms Built Like Real Garages 28:33 — Patrick Lang and the Art of the Long Q&A 29:29 — Texting Kristen From the Panel 30:16 — John Fay's Next Chapter 31:08 — See You Next Year at Hoorah 🎯 IN THIS EPISODE YOU'LL LEARN ✅ Why Ellen believes personal brand matters more than ever in the age of AI and rising ad costs ✅ The John Wooden "how you put on your socks" lesson and what it means for training your team ✅ Why simple SOPs, starting with "sober, on time, dressed right," beat over-engineered systems ✅ Stories from shop tours at A+ Garage, Any Hour, and Mike Diamond's landmark 1992 shop visit ✅ Details on Service Titan's free Titan Creator Summit on November 19th This one's less of a lesson and more of a conversation — two people who've built and sold businesses swapping stories about training, brand, and the mistakes that taught them the most. If you want the behind-the-scenes of Home Service Hoorah straight from one of its guests, this episode is for you. 🎧 Welcome to The Freedom Blueprint Podcast — short, powerful episodes to help home service business owners lead better, grow faster, and keep crushing it. 👉 Subscribe so you don't miss the next episode 👉 Share this with an owner building their brand from the ground up #HomeServiceBusiness #HVACBusiness #PlumbingBusiness #ContractorMarketing #FreedomBlueprint #JustinDeese #EllenRohr #ZoomDrain #ServiceTitan #HomeServiceHoorah