From Home Inspectors to Pest Control: Building Mastermind Communities

Mark started Inspector Empire Builder about six years ago. The original idea was simple: get people together to talk business, mastermind style, and cut the trial and error out of growing, scaling, and refining home inspection businesses.

A traditional mastermind group is usually 10 or 20 people max. That's considered large. You dive deep and help each other in your businesses. But the home inspection group exploded beyond that.

Today, Inspector Empire Builder has 250 company owners in membership. They're all doing business coaching, coming to quarterly conferences, and cutting the trial and error out of their growth journey. That's a massive community.

The success on the inspection side led to people asking Mark to start a group for pest control owners. Many people run both a pest company and a home inspection business. They wanted the same kind of coaching and community for their pest operations.

Mark tested it out with about 20 companies for a year. It worked fantastically. They proved the model and decided to launch Pest Empire Builder as its own full mastermind group, running it with Lenny Gray.

How to Build a Community from Zero to 250 Members

I asked Mark how he built such a massive community because I think a lot of people want to do this but have no idea where to start.

His answer was both simpler and harder than it sounds. Once you get very specific about who and how you want to help, you start finding people that align with that. For Inspector Empire Builder, they looked for home inspectors who wanted to become the person who could grow a really great business.

But more specifically, they looked for people building a life, not just running a business. That became the DNA of the group. That focus on culture is what led to organic growth.

Of course, to get to 250 members, there has to be a marketing machine in place. You need reach and brand awareness. But what Mark found is they grew quickly because of trust building and providing something really valuable with a very specific niche.

His advice for anyone wanting to build a community: surround yourself with people just like you, build trust, and pull more people toward you. It becomes attractive naturally when you're providing real value to a specific type of person.

This resonates with me because I've seen this with Pest Control SEO. When you niche down and become known for serving one specific industry exceptionally well, growth happens faster. People trust specialists more than generalists.

What the Mastermind Actually Looks Like Inside

Both Pest Empire Builder and Inspector Empire Builder follow the same model. When someone's curious about joining, they connect and have a conversation. What Mark's really looking for is people that fit the culture of the group.

If you're overly negative and everything's happening to you and nothing's ever good enough, you're probably not going to get a lot out of the group. But if you're the kind of person who wants to build something special and has a vision so big that no problem will slow you down, that's the DNA they're looking for.

Mark made an important distinction: a lot of people have trouble with that because they know they want to build something but don't know what it is yet. They need clarity. Either way, if someone's future-focused with an abundant mindset and really wants to both give and get from a group, they're a culture fit.

They won't let anyone in who's going to take away from that culture. This is critical for any community builder. One toxic person can destroy the vibe for everyone else.

The groups are run by industry experts. Mark takes a holistic approach to coaching, helping people become the person who can do the things they want to do. All the other coaches are from the industries they serve.

On the inspection side, they're all inspectors who have grown enterprise-level companies. These are the largest companies in the country. They've been at every business stage there is.

On the pest side, the coaches are industry experts who've bought, sold, and built multiple companies. They've been through it all. What Mark sees is people are really hungry for learning how to build high-performing teams. The coaches focus on recruiting, selecting candidates, training them effectively and quickly, managing them, and keeping them motivated.

Members jump on group coaching calls with these industry experts. The coaches teach systems, processes, and frameworks. Then they spend time masterminding with the group, hearing what's going on in their businesses and helping them solve problems live on the calls. That's where the trial and error gets cut out.

Why Most Business Owners Stay Stuck at the Technician Level

One of the most insightful parts of our conversation was about business structure and the transition from technician to business owner. This is something I see all the time in pest control.

The typical story: someone worked for Orkin or a big company, maybe their parent's business. They were a great technician. They decided to start their own company. They were solo, started hiring, got more leads coming in. Now they have this somewhat random collection of moving parts that doesn't quite make sense. Maybe an agency that isn't really doing anything.

What they're missing? Proper systems to scale.

Mark breaks businesses into three divisions: service, operations, and growth. When you're starting out, you're wearing all three hats. You're the technician doing the work, you're handling operations, and you're trying to grow.

What typically happens? "You'll excel at one or two of those while the other or the you know the other one or two are miserable failures or maybe at the at the least they are lagging behind and not supporting each other," Mark said.

Once someone has that basic structure, it's about shifting thinking from running the company like a technician to running it like a CEO. A lot of business owners believe they're doing well with this, but it's actually not that common.

The evidence? If you're clearing your plate and doing less over time rather than doing more, you're operating at the highest level of leadership. Most business owners get stuck doing more, more, more, or getting trapped in one lane of their business.

There's nothing wrong with being a solopreneur. If you want to wear all the hats and stay small, there's a business structure for that too. But most people have a vision where they don't want to be the technician forever. They want to build something bigger.

That's when they hire a team and beat their head against the wall with attrition, poor service standards, wasted time and energy on leadership. They get pulled into one lane, get stuck, then all of a sudden they're not doing growth work. Or they go focus on growth and service falls apart. This pattern plays out over and over.

How to Actually Make the Transition to CEO

I asked Mark what it takes to transition from technician mentality to business owner. Can you flip a switch or does it take years?

It really depends on the person. Mark's seen people make the flip overnight after being exposed to people who thought differently. They just adopted it and ran with it. He's also seen people take years to finally decide to make the change.

As a business coach, Mark always asks: what's the evidence of how you're thinking? Your business tells you if you're running it like a technician or like a real business leader.

One powerful question: if somebody was to think about your business, who pops into their mind? Is it just you, or is it the brand? For people thinking like a technician, they've got themselves stuck believing they are the value. Do business with me because I'm awesome. Versus do business with my company because the company is awesome.

Another indicator: are you pulling systems and processes to yourself? Trying to get good at everything and be technically sound in every single lane? That's not efficient. That's technician thinking.

If you're pulling everything to yourself instead of delegating properly or building a path for someone else to own tasks, you're running your business like a technician. Like it's all about you. If you don't do well, nobody will do well.

The highest performing businesses have leaders who are really good at delegating. Those people end up being better than the leader at those specific things. That's how you scale.

What Mark Learned from Coaching High-Level Entrepreneurs

Mark coaches everyone from people just starting out to nine-figure business owners. I asked what lessons he's learned from these top players.

The most powerful lesson? "We're all human." Whether you're a 10-figure business or just starting out, you typically experience the same pain points with different masks.

Every business, huge or small, rises or falls at its level of leadership capability. Mark sees this sometimes in the same day. Someone just starting their business and someone with a multi-million dollar business struggling with the same thing: the company is slowing down, it's inefficient, we don't have the right people.

The answer is always the same: what type of leader does your business need right now?

We're human. We experience the same things regardless of business stage. Sometimes we're way up on the peak performing really well. Sometimes we're way down in the valley not wanting to do it anymore.

With high-level leaders, you can almost be tricked into thinking they have it all together. Then when you dive in and they show vulnerability or authenticity, you start to see the cracks. Oh yeah, that's right. They're human just like me.

That's when Mark addresses their personal operating system and how they keep themselves moving forward. It's an interesting conversation because different types of leaders organize themselves differently.

The Personal Operating System Every Leader Needs

I asked Mark how leaders organize themselves and what they should be doing.

At the highest levels of leadership, the first question is always: what do their routines look like?

One of the biggest red flags for Mark as a coach? Someone who gets up in the morning and immediately starts working. Another red flag? Someone who works until they go to sleep.

There's a lot to the human experience beyond just work. If you're doing nothing but working, you're playing a small game. This may not be true for everybody, but most people build a business believing the business is everything in their life.

Because of that, they sacrifice pieces of their life. Before you know it, you lose focus, lose clarity, lose excitement for the business because you're sacrificing so much.

Mark evaluates leaders by looking at their routines and asking about their health, spiritual life, personal growth, and all these different buckets. Typically what he sees: they have a mindset that they're focusing everything on the business so they can excel in those other areas later.

That's not how it works. "The the reality is that all of those other areas have to be in check so that you can excel in business for a long time," Mark said.

There's a reason most businesses don't make it past three to five years. A lot of times it's skill and leadership issues. But most of the time it's because the person is working so hard and sacrificing so much they just give up.

This resonates deeply with me. I've experienced this myself. When I work all day every day for a week straight, the work becomes boring. I lose sleep. I've gotten out of my health routine. The work quality suffers.

Now I understand that taking a walk actually makes the work way better. Eating a good meal gives me more energy for better work. Health isn't separate from business success. It's foundational to it.

The Two Traits That Define Great Leaders

I asked Mark what makes a good leader. What does great leadership look like?

He gave me two critical traits.

First: self-awareness. Self-awareness is the foundation for any type of growth. Think about any accomplishment you've ever had. It all came from some form of self-awareness that led to growth.

If a leader isn't self-aware, they probably can't read people very well. They probably don't have emotional intelligence that allows them to put together a strong team and keep them together. Self-awareness causes them to see where their strengths are that they can leverage and where their gaps are that they can address.

Mark's a fan of leveraging strengths and just being aware of gaps, not necessarily pouring all your time into fixing gaps.

Second: curiosity. The two go hand in hand. If someone's really self-aware, they'll typically be more curious too.

Great leaders have almost a coaching perspective on leadership. They go deep with people. They understand what business problems they're having. They understand what it takes to strategically uncover gaps. That's all curiosity. Asking really powerful questions.

Just those two things, self-awareness and curiosity, can cause someone to be an exceptional leader. That leads to all the other skills like communication and inspiring people.

Why Entrepreneurs Get Paid for Risk, Not Hard Work

Mark had a fascinating perspective on what entrepreneurs actually get paid for that completely reframed how I think about my own business.

He tries to create systems around everything so other people can do the actual work. His team does the SEO work. He helps here and there when needed. But he focuses on things only he can do: talking to people, partnerships, risking things for the business.

"Like that's like weirdly your job as like chief risk officer like go risk some more today you know that's really why we get paid at the end of the day," Mark said.

Think about it. If Mark stopped working for six months, he'd still get paid pretty well. Why? Because of all the risk he's taken over the years. He's no longer paid for his hard work or billable time. He's paid for years of accumulated risk.

This reframed everything for me. I'm not just doing SEO work. I'm taking on risk. I'm betting on the future. I'm making decisions that could succeed or fail. That's what entrepreneurs get paid for.

Most business owners think they're paid for working hard. That's employee thinking. Entrepreneurs are paid for the risk they take and the decisions they make.

The Books and Frameworks That Changed Everything

Mark mentioned two books that have been transformational for building businesses: E-Myth Revisited and Traction.

E-Myth teaches you to create a franchise model like McDonald's from the very beginning. Create systems that you could plug and play people into. Even smart people need systems. Without them, everything depends on individual talent and you can't scale.

One practical tactic from E-Myth: create one-page job descriptions for each role you're going to need in your business, then sign them yourself. You are all those things initially. Then you can pass those roles off one by one as you hire.

Mark still does this today. Right now he's the partnerships manager and marketing director. He has a marketing specialist but he's still the director. He'd love to pass those roles off eventually.

Traction, also known as EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System), provided a framework for running the business. It's a light framework, not heavy. You don't want something that messes up all your time.

They implemented Traction themselves for years before getting a professional implementer two years ago. One of the biggest wins? The implementer told them to decrease their leadership team from seven people to four. That created massive clarity.

Too many cooks in the kitchen slows everything down.

The Mastermind Advantage: Learning from Others' Mistakes

One result Mark hears constantly from members: "It's just nice to know that you're not the only one going through something."

When you jump into a group and suddenly have a tribe of people doing the same thing you're doing, you get more excited about business and more clear about how you're doing it.

The other major benefit? People are growing faster with less friction. They're layering on principles for winning through their team and trying different growth strategies without having to figure everything out themselves.

Some people love door-to-door. Mark's group does education around door-to-door sales. Some people don't like door-to-door, so they talk about SEO and other digital campaigns.

The zoomed-out result of being in the group: people are beginning to win through a systems and process-driven business where you replicate success by doing the right things over and over until you can hand those things off to someone else. Then your team is doing the right things over and over. Rinse and repeat.

This is exactly what I need for Pest Control SEO. I don't want to be the one doing all the SEO work forever. I want systems where my team can replicate success without me being involved in every decision.

My Main Takeaway

The biggest thing I learned from Mark is that your business rises or falls based on your leadership capability, not your technical skills. The transition from technician to CEO isn't optional if you want to scale. You have to become a different type of leader at each stage of growth.

The second takeaway is that entrepreneurs get paid for risk, not hard work. Once you build systems and hire people, your job becomes taking strategic risks that could grow the business. That's what you're really getting paid for.

The third thing is the importance of personal routines and health. If you're working from the moment you wake up until you go to sleep, you're playing a small game that will burn you out. All areas of life need to be in check for you to excel in business long-term.

The fourth lesson is that community and masterminds cut out years of trial and error. When you surround yourself with people solving the same problems you're facing, you learn from their mistakes instead of making them yourself.

If you want to learn more from Mark, check out Pest Empire Builder at pestempirebuilder.com. You can also connect with him on LinkedIn and Facebook under Mark Hummel (not the harmonica player). Or email him directly at mark@pestempirebuilder.com.

Why Following Models Beats Reinventing the Wheel

Mark had a powerful insight about entrepreneurs and creativity that I need to share. A lot of entrepreneurs believe they're super creative and can develop anything they put their mind to. Maybe that's true. But there are already tons of proven models out there that work.

What typically happens? Business owners jump into running a business or reach a new level of leadership they've never experienced before. They start attacking problems from a creative perspective. Let's go to the whiteboard. Let's figure this out. Let's develop something and see if it works.

That leads to trial and error. Trial and error. Trial and error. You iterate and reiterate. Eventually you might find your way. A lot of business owners don't. They crash and burn.

The conclusion for most entrepreneurs? They eventually figure out they need to follow someone else's model. That's when they start reading books, listening to podcasts, jumping into coaching groups. But they've already been through all this pain.

The better mindset? Start with a model. If you've got something you're working on, go find a model or a person that can help you. Follow the model until you've mastered it. Then bring your creativity in.

That's a winning play. But it's so hard for entrepreneurs. We like to be creative. We're a little egotistical. We think we can do everything on our own. We want to have our own cool strategy.

But if someone's been in the space for 20 years with a proven model, what are you doing wasting your time trying to figure it out on your own? Adopt the model. Get it working. Then adapt and modify it from there.

There's nothing wrong with following a model. You can put your ego aside. You don't have to be the one to come up with everything. And it's not a weakness to ask for help.

The Top Five Principle with a Hack

Most people are familiar with the principle of surrounding yourself with five amazing people. You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with. This has been researched extensively and found to be true across almost all walks of life.

If Mark and I are hanging out with three other people, we're both going to be the average of the five of us in income, beliefs about politics or religion, family life, everything.

If you really want to level up, focus on who you're spending time with.

Here's the hack Mark shared: they don't have to know you exist.

For people who don't have access to a circle of folks further ahead or don't have access to a mentor, get purposeful with your personal growth. Find two or three people you want to learn from and just listen to them all the time. They won't even know you exist, but they'll be influencing you and helping you level up.

That's why we read books and listen to podcasts. We allow people to influence us. But you can take it deeper by following one specific person and implementing the principles they're teaching. They may never know you exist, but they're one of your five.

I'm a huge advocate for this. I binge YouTube videos constantly. Two days ago I watched four Tommy Mello podcasts in a row, just trying to learn as much as possible from someone running a $100 million garage door company.

If I want to understand what it takes to run a company at that level, who else would I learn from? Even though Tommy doesn't know I exist, he's influencing how I think about business and what's possible.

There's so much free content available online now. Anyone who's truly ambitious and willing to take opportunities can learn from the best. You can watch podcasts, join masterminds, network with incredible people. It's really fantastic, and I think anyone who wants to make it can nowadays.