YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – For Gutter Clear owner Scott Seitz, accreditation from the Better Business Bureau of the Mahoning Valley demonstrates to customers that his company operates at a higher standard.
“You’re there to make sure that the customers are comfortable with you, and it provides them a little bit more peace of mind,” Seitz says.
Accreditation also boosts sales for his McDonald-based company, he adds. Customers want to feel comfortable and secure with any company they pay for a service.
“I always recommend getting three estimates and I think that all of your estimates should come from an accredited business – somebody who has put forth the effort to follow through on things – and I think that’s a good place to start,” he says. “So, it’s really created a lot of sales for us, and as a small business, sales are of the utmost importance.”
The BBB offers other services to companies including inviting them to seminars and helping to protect them from scams, he says.
Changing Customer Habits
Chris Haus, owner of Haus Auto Group in Canfield, says accreditation is particularly important, as the way customers shop has changed.
“In the last five, 10 years in my industry, a lot of people shop online,” he explains. “I never even get a chance to meet them.”
Many customers use reviews and the BBB rating in deciding where to buy a car. They select or eliminate a business from consideration based on that information. “It’s very important to have that in your mobile or online storefront,” Haus says.
It helps people connect to the business and feel comfortable doing business with you, he explains.
“And, you know, sometimes they get on and they look at all that, and that’s what makes them call,” Haus says.
Online presence, reviews and BBB accreditation become a company’s sales pitch, he says.
Standards of Trust
Melissa Ames, president of BBB of the Mahoning Valley, says accreditation is a designation that a business is following the BBB Standards for Trust.
“I call them the Golden Rule,” she says. “No matter what industry you’re in – you could be a manufacturer and producer, you could be a mom and pop shop – but things like operating with integrity, honoring your promises, safeguarding privacy…” are followed by the business.
Building trust, advertising honestly, telling the truth, honoring promises and being responsive round out the BBB’s Standards for Trust. They represent that a company follows good business practices.
One of the standards of BBB accreditation is that if a company has a website, a privacy policy must be posted there, demonstrating transparency about how customer information is used. Earning accreditation requires a process of review, ensuring a company has the required licensure, evaluating its history and assessing customer satisfaction.
But the BBB provides other resources for small businesses too.
“Our mission is to help bring awareness between the customer and the business, and we want to start at the very beginning with that relationship,” Ames explains. “When the consumer is in their shopping experience, customers of all different shapes and sizes will turn to the BBB to find out more about a business.”
Complaints
Still, dealing with customers means dealing with customer complaints, and the BBB fields them.
“So first of all, with the complaint, we always ask the user, have you contacted the business first?” Ames says. “Let’s be fair here and give them an opportunity to resolve the issue.”
If it can’t be resolved, the process proceeds with a written form. The BBB will contact the business, offering it the opportunity to respond.
“A majority of our businesses do respond to complaints, which is what we want to see,” Ames says. “And a mark of distinction for accredited businesses is that they, through their accreditation, are obligated to respond to complaints. They get an opportunity to make it right.”
Even many businesses that aren’t accredited understand the importance of working to resolve customer complaints.
“They understand the value of that,” Ames says. “And so again, each complaint is different, so each resolution is different. What you might want to see is maybe different than what your neighbor wants to see. And so, it’s a very individualized process, but at the end of the day, we want to make sure that we are working with both parties to see that resolution come through…”
BBB doesn’t allow anonymous complaints, but its process differs from reviews on other platforms in its transparency as well.
“Anything that the consumer sends us, we send to the business and vice versa,” Ames points out. “But the business always has an opportunity to respond, and you don’t see that in other platforms. You don’t see that anywhere else. Businesses are voluntarily going through this process because they believe that they are a good business, and they want people to know that they can be trusted.”
Companies’ Histories
Haus Auto Group earned BBB accreditation in 2013 and Haus, who bought the business from his father about 16 years ago, has maintained it. That’s important to Haus.
“We’re not a franchise so we don’t have a Chevy logo or a GMC logo,” Haus says. “So really, our name is our franchise. So the accreditation and the reviews and all that mean the world. I mean, that’s our franchise.”
He does right by his customers, so complaints are few. When the business gets one though, he tries to resolve it.
Seitz, owner of Gutter Clear, started his business more than 31 years ago and it became a limited liability company in 2017. His son, Matt, handles estimates for the business and plans to take it over when his dad retires. A younger son, CJ, handles the company’s payroll.
Matt says it’s an honor to work with his father and he plans to maintain the same standards when his dad retires.
The BBB emblem on the sides of company trucks shows Gutter Clear’s commitment to trust, Seitz says. Many of the company’s customers are older, some widowed and on fixed incomes. Most customers live in the Mahoning Valley, but Gutter Clear serves a roughly 70-mile radius.
Gutter Clear became BBB accredited in 2020. That’s about the time that Matt returned from college and started working at the company.
“I had about 2,500 customers,” Scott Seitz says. “We got the accreditation about the same time that [Matt] came home from college. He took us from there to about 3,500 customers. We had about 60 condo associations (and) he took us to over 100.”
It’s a combination of credentials and knowledge, he adds. And you have to run a tight ship.
“I felt very good about what I was doing out there,” he explains. “I thought this was a good step for us to go to get an accreditation.”
If there’s a complaint filed with the BBB regarding the company, Seitz gets notified and tries to address it. He won’t accept payment until the customer is happy, but it rarely comes to that.
Keeping customers happy is something important to Seitz. He’s involved in his community, having served on council and coaching youth sports. It’s about integrity, he says. “It matters.”
Pictured at top: Scott Seitz, right, owner of Gutter Clear in McDonald, Ohio, and his son, Matt, hold a plaque showing the company accreditation from the BBB of the Mahoning Valley.