An HVAC company filling the shoulder seasons with memberships

The situation

Imagine an HVAC company with five technicians, two office staff and an owner who came up through the trade. They've been in business about twelve years. Summer heat waves and winter cold snaps bring more calls than they can handle. Then spring and fall arrive, the phone slows down, and the owner spends those weeks worrying about payroll and whether to cut hours.

They technically have a maintenance agreement. It's a printed sheet in the trucks that some techs mention and others never do. Nobody's sure how many customers are on it, renewals happen when someone remembers, and tune-ups get booked whenever the customer calls, which is usually the same week everyone else calls.

The owner wants a real membership program. Tune-ups scheduled in the shoulder seasons, when techs have time. Members who get looked after first when it's 98 degrees. A recurring base he can count and plan around. He has heard it's worth doing but doesn't want to build something complicated that his team won't sell and his customers won't understand.

What's getting in the way

The plan is invisible. It isn't on the website, it isn't on invoices, and customers only hear about it if they happen to get the right tech.
The numbers were never worked out. Nobody knows whether the current price covers the visits and discounts it promises.
No reminders. Members aren't told when a tune-up is due, so visits pile up in peak season or never happen.
Unclear permission to message. The customer list lives in the field software, but nobody recorded who agreed to receive emails or texts.
Techs aren't comfortable offering it. Without a simple script, the offer feels like a sales pitch, so they skip it.
Messy renewals. No clear terms on how and when the plan renews, and no reminder before it does.

The plan

Week 1: Design a plan you can explain in one breath

The owner and Zome design the plan together, keeping it to one tier to start (with a small add-on for homes with a second system if needed). A common structure includes:

A cooling tune-up in spring and a heating tune-up in fall.
Priority scheduling for repairs.
A member discount on repairs, if the numbers support it.
No extra trip charge during normal hours, if that fits the pricing model.

Then the owner works out the price with a simple formula: plan price = (cost of each tune-up visit × visits per year) + (expected cost of the repair discount) + margin. Say a tune-up takes a tech about an hour on site plus drive time; multiply by the loaded hourly cost of that tech and truck, add materials, and you have the cost of one visit. Zome provides the worksheet; the owner fills in his own numbers.

He also decides annual versus monthly billing, how renewals work and how members cancel. Prepaid plans can raise accounting questions about when the money counts as earned, so he checks with his accountant. Some states also have rules about automatic renewals, so he checks those too. Our guide to building a maintenance membership program covers these choices in more depth.

Weeks 2 to 4: Put the plan everywhere customers look

Zome builds a maintenance plan page on the website: what's included, the price, how priority service works, how renewal and cancellation work, and a sign-up button. Every service page gets a short block pointing to it. The plan also appears as a line on invoices and in the job-complete message.

For techs, Zome drafts a short script and a one-page leave-behind: "Your system's running well today. If you want us to handle the spring and fall checkups and put you first in line during a heat wave, here's our plan." The owner rehearses it with the team at a morning meeting.

Online booking goes live for tune-ups, showing only the time windows the owner opens, mostly on spring and fall weekdays. Customers pick a window and add details about their equipment; nothing is confirmed until the office approves it.

Meanwhile, the office cleans up the customer list. Zome helps mark who has clearly agreed to receive emails and texts. Only those customers will get marketing messages.

Months 2 and 3: Remind, spread out and renew

Once there are members, Zome sets up the reminder schedule. Members get a note when their tune-up is due, with a link to book. The office releases time windows by area and week so visits spread across the shoulder season instead of landing all at once.

Zome also runs two seasonal email and text campaigns to past customers who opted in: a spring cooling tune-up offer and, later, a fall heating one. Each mentions the membership as an option, not a requirement. These go out in the slow weeks, when the calendar has room.

Renewal reminders go out ahead of each member's renewal date with a plain summary of what they received this year and what's coming next.

Every month, the owner looks at insights: new members and where they signed up (tech, website or campaign), tune-ups completed, how full spring and fall weeks were, and renewals and cancellations. If most sign-ups come from one tech, that tech teaches the script to the others.

What Zome does and what you do

Task	Zome	You
Plan design	Provides a pricing worksheet and example structures	Choose the benefits, price and renewal terms
Accounting and renewal rules	Flags the questions	Check with your accountant and your state's rules
Plan page and sign-up	Writes and builds it on your site	Approve every benefit and promise
Tech script and leave-behind	Drafts both	Rehearse with the team and use them
Tune-up booking	Sets up booking with the windows you choose	Open windows and confirm requests
Customer list and permission	Helps flag who agreed to hear from you	Confirm consent records are accurate
Reminders and campaigns	Writes, schedules and sends to opted-in customers	Approve messages before they go out
Monthly review	Reports members, visits and renewals	Adjust the plan and coach the team

What to track

Active members. The size of your recurring base and the number to plan staffing around.
New members by source. Shows whether techs, the website or campaigns are doing the work.
Tune-ups completed on time. A plan that promises visits and doesn't deliver them will not renew.
Shoulder-season calendar fill. The whole point: are spring and fall weeks busier than before?
Renewal rate. The clearest signal that members feel the plan is worth it.
Repairs and replacements from member visits. Honest findings on tune-ups often lead to planned work later.
Cancellation reasons. Tells you what to fix in the plan or the service.

Common mistakes to avoid

Promising priority you can't deliver. If every customer is a member, nobody is first. Know your capacity before you promise same-day service.
Discounting too deep. A repair discount that looks generous can quietly erase the plan's margin. Run the numbers.
Turning tune-ups into sales calls. Members notice. Report what you find honestly and let them decide.
Booking every tune-up in the same week. Spread the reminders by area and week so the shoulder season actually fills.
Hiding the renewal terms. Say clearly how renewal and cancellation work, and remind members before they're charged.

Your first step

Get the free AI report to see how your business shows up online today, including whether customers can find and understand a maintenance plan on your site. Or book a demo and we'll work through plan design and pricing with you.