Topic: Business Talk

7 Easy Steps for Signing up your Techs at the Master Samurai Tech Academy

Posted on February 24, 2015 by - Academy Talk, Business Talk

7 seven birthday anniversary celebrationWhen enrolling technicians in an MST Academy appliance repair training course, most business owners will do the registration/enrollment process themselves so that they will have the username and password for each tech, and can therefore log in as desired to check on a tech’s progress. Here’s how to do that:

1. Make sure you are NOT logged in (check the upper right hand corner of the site).

2. Go to the Enroll page.

3. Select the course or bundle you want from the pull-down menu box.

4. Now enter your coupon code, if you have one.

5. Create your tech’s profile – First and Last name, email address, username, password. (See notes below.)

6. Click “Add Billing Method” at the bottom of the Billing Method section of the enrollment form and enter your credit card information.

7. Click the red “Submit Form” button.

That’s it! The tech is ready to log in and start his Journey of Total Appliance Enlightenment! If you have more techs to enroll, simply go back to Step 1.

Notes –

1. Once you create a profile, the username cannot be changed. All of the other items can be changed, if needed.

2. Each email address must be unique, in other words, one per student.

3. If the tech’s email address has already been registered at the site (for example, to take the Sample Course), then you can’t do a new registration with that email. You can either use his existing registration (get his username and password, log in to the site with them, then enroll in a course) or contact us and we can delete his old account and you can start fresh.

4. If a tech has a company email address, then some business owners set their email client to forward messages from the Academy to them so they will see the progress notifications. (Emails are automatically sent out when a tech completes a lesson and successfully passes a quiz.)

5. Taking our courses is a very personalized experience for each student, so each technician needs his or her own enrollment in each course. For online training to be effective, students need to work at their own pace and be encouraged to repeat lessons and videos as needed. The goal is mastery of the material, after all! And each tech comes to their training with their own unique mix of strengths, weaknesses, and experience.

If you have any questions at all, please contact us!

How Much Does Appliance Tech Training Cost?

Posted on January 28, 2015 by - Business Talk, Career Talk

Costs and Benefits of Appliance Tech TrainingMany of you may be asking yourselves: how much does training cost? Well the truth is good training doesn’t cost anything because it pays for itself. Whatever money you spend on the training that you need to become a good tech you’ll quickly earn back when you’re out in the field kicking appliance butt.

In fact, the better question to ask is: how much does it cost you not to get training? Profitablity and customer satisfaction rely on a high first call complete (FCC) rate. A high FCC rate comes primarily from successful pre-diagnostic work and sharp troubleshooting skills, which happen to be two key areas of instruction in the Fundamentals of Appliance Repair training course.

 

If you are either a novice or a working tech without a thorough background in electricity, schematics, and modern motor/circuit board configurations, then it is imperative for your bottom line that you divert some of your budget away from advertising and towards training. There’s no sense getting a bunch of calls if you can’t fix most of them on the first trip.

If you’ve been working as an appliance tech for awhile and still have a low FCC (below 80%), then you should definitely invest in some training.

After you’ve completed your training in appliance repair, then you can kick up the spending on advertising with confidence. You can also tout your new certification!

Make the right choice, get the training you need to succeed. Or, as we say at the Samurai Tech Academy, “Learn More. Earn More!”

If you’d like to get more of a look and feel for how the courses work and receive a discount coupon, please try out our FREE Sample Course!

 

Will the demand for Appliance Repair Techs increase in the near future?

Posted on November 4, 2014 by - Business Talk, Career Talk, Tech Talk

PCB_Testing_400The short answer is “yes!” according to the Bureau of Labor. We discussed their projection that the demand for appliance repair technicians will grow by 21% over the next decade in an earlier Blog Post.

It’s an important question for anyone looking to invest time and money in training. You want to make sure there’s a good chance of getting a job or running your own business once you’ve geared up.

Besides the overall growth trend that the BoL is predicting, we also think there will be another important shift in the trade due to the changes in appliances happening right now.

Due to a number of factors, especially the government Energy Star requirements, appliances are becoming increasingly “electronified.”

We think the increasing computerization and complexity of appliances will only create more opportunities for skilled technicians to have a steady work flow with lots of interesting and profitable work. This will weed out the people who don’t want to learn new technologies and change with the times from the people who do keep up with technology and continue to learn and hone their skills. That second group of techs will find that they have plenty of work.

It was recognizing this trend, along with noting the lack of convenient training available in these critical skills, that inspired us to create the Samurai Tech Academy.

The Fundamentals of Appliance Repair course at the Samurai Tech Academy provides an excellent technical foundation giving you the basic skills you need to build on and understand the present and future technologies coming out in appliances, and how to profit from that knowledge.

 

Then take the Advanced Schematic Analysis and Troubleshooting training course to get advanced instruction on troubleshooting appliances with multiple electronic control boards.

 

For Business Owners: Where Can I Find a Good Tech to Hire?

Posted on October 22, 2014 by - Business Talk

One of the biggest inspirations for creating the Samurai Tech Academy came from conversations we had with business owners at the Appliance Service Training Institute (ASTI) this past winter. “Where can I find good techs to hire?” was the almost universal question being asked. Some companies were turning potential customers away because they simply didn’t have the manpower to handle them.

Here’s an interesting statistic about the appliance repair trade: the average multi-tech service company goes through 4 to 5 new hires before they find one that has the qualities needed. After all, the technician is the one right on the front lines. If he doesn’t have the personal and technical skills to do the job, then you would have been better off turning the customer away than sending an inadequate tech.

Many companies are coming to the realization that they may have to stop looking for a good tech to hire, and instead make a good tech out of a promising candidate. The question then becomes how to train that person. What you need is an easy, effective, cost-efficient way to train techs.

This is the mission of Master Samurai Tech and our newest, most powerful resource: The Samurai Tech Academy. The STA is an online school that trains techs in everything from basics of electricity, gas, and troubleshooting to refrigerator repair and customer relations. Finally, here’s a cost-effective way to increase the skill level of your existing techs and to get new hires trained as quickly as possible.

And because it’s online, it’s much more efficient than the old-fashioned way of training techs, such as sending them to a training facility or hiring trainers to come to yours. Novice techs can spend part of their day studying, then part of their day running service calls with experienced techs so they can immediately begin applying what they are learning and thus get up-to-speed more quickly. You, as the employer, can log in and check on their progress whenever you want.

Having well-trained, professional techs is critical for a repair business to thrive: you need techs that you can rely on to get the job done right and be good representatives of your company to the customer.

The Internet has become a great venue for education and now the Samurai Tech Academy has brought appliance repair training into the modern age. With courses already out – Fundamentals of Appliance Repair, Customer Relations, and Refrigeration Troubleshooting and Repair – and more coming in the near future, the STA is a trove of knowledge for your techs and a lifesaver for your company.