#009 / 2 – The voices of our clients – Philippe Vanschoubroek - (OkDo)
OkDo: multi-technical B2B maintenance, field quality & efficient prospecting with PHCom
Leave a voice message for Philippe Vanschoubroek or Camille De Meeûs!
Multi-technical B2B maintenance, quality on site… and the prospecting that follows
In this episode of Performance, Harmonie & Commercial, PHCom welcomes Philippe Vanschoubroek, co-founder of OkDo, a company specialised in multi-technical maintenance for B2B.
OkDo manages an impressive volume of interventions, with office teams and technicians out on the road, and a simple promise: only offer what they deliver themselves. They focus on specialisation (electrical work, plumbing, finishing, roofing…) rather than relying on large-scale subcontracting.
As the conversation unfolds, you understand what builds loyalty in a job where urgent requests are common: a well-executed intervention, of course… but also clear reporting and proper follow-up, especially for clients who aren’t always on site and sometimes manage networks of hundreds of locations.
Philippe also shares very practical insights: compliance, fire safety, and the value of preventive maintenance to avoid damage, stress and endless back-and-forth.
Prospecting: when experience meets a method
Even with 30 years of sales experience, Philippe says it plainly: prospecting takes time, consistency, and it’s not “the most fun part”. That’s where the collaboration with PHCom comes in: more meetings in less time, more breathing room, and an approach built on listening, asking the right questions… and honesty (selling only when there’s a real need).
[00:00:13] Stéphane Depaepe: Hello and welcome to this new episode of the podcast "Performance, Harmony & Sales" produced by PHCom in the "transforma bxl" studio in Brussels, with technical assistance from "The Podcast Factory Org".?? [00:00:23] Nadia Ben Jelloun: The "Performance, Harmony & Sales" Podcast is intended for marketing and sales managers as well as company executives taking on sales roles. [00:00:32] Stéphane Depaepe: Every month, we share with you successful experiences regarding finding new clients for companies active in business-to-business. [00:00:38] Nadia Ben Jelloun: You can find every episode on the site PHCom dot be, P.H.C.O.M, and also on all major podcast platforms. [00:00:48] Stéphane Depaepe: You can support this podcast and boost its visibility by sharing it with as many people as possible via a like, a comment, or a share. [00:00:55] Nadia Ben Jelloun: The voicemail is always active so you can leave us a message; we will answer it with great pleasure. [00:01:00] Stéphane Depaepe: You can also book an appointment directly with Nadia or Stéphane by going to phcom dot be. [00:01:06] Nadia Ben Jelloun: See you soon. [00:01:07] Camille de Meeûs: Hello Philippe. [00:01:07] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Hello Camille. [00:01:09] Camille de Meeûs: We are super happy to have you today in this new episode of PHCom. Let's start with your business. What, specifically, is "OKDO"? [00:01:17] Philippe Vanschoubroek: So, "OKDO" is a company specialized in multi-technical maintenance, exclusively for B2B clients. So we work mainly for clients who own stores, nursing homes, or for property managers who manage buildings. [00:01:30] Camille de Meeûs: But specifically, what does a workday look like within "OKDO"? [00:01:32] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Well, a workday at "OKDO" is mostly about handling all client requests. That is to say, today we have ten people in the office and 30 technicians on the road; we do more or less 20,000 interventions per year. What does that mean? It means that requests come in. For example, a store that has a problem with lights because they are too bright, or not working; it means the client sends an email or calls the office and asks for a technician to stop by as quickly as possible. [00:01:57] Camille de Meeûs: Is there a lot of competition in your sector? If so, what differentiates you from the competition? [00:02:03] Philippe Vanschoubroek: It all depends on what you call competition. There are very big firms that do many, many things, but ultimately—and this isn't a criticism—ultimately they don't do much themselves; they do a lot via subcontracting. So they promise to handle every possible technical aspect, but behind the scenes, there is obviously an organization creating schedules for a bunch of subcontractors. We work differently; we decided to offer only the work that we carry out ourselves. So that means: we have people on our payroll who are today truly specialized mainly in electricity, plumbing, interior finishing, roofing, and exterior works. And Handymen, as we call them, so, jacks-of-all-trades. [00:02:42] Camille de Meeûs: What advice would you give to people today who would like to get started in the same business sector as you? [00:02:46] Philippe Vanschoubroek: I think there is actually a lot of advice to give. At the same time, we managed to get there in less than ten years simply because we saw there was a market, actually; there was real demand. And we did it little by little, meaning without clients and without initial technicians. The advice: well, firstly, you have to find the clients, obviously; you have to get the client interested. It has to be solid too, meaning that when a technician comes on site, he must do his job, and do it cleanly. The client also expects reporting, which means you don't just need a technician; you also need a system in the background that allows the client to verify if everything went well, because they aren't always on site. We work for certain networks that have more than 200 or 300, sometimes 500 stores, so the manager or the person requesting the work isn't on site, so they need to be able to verify afterwards if everything went well. [00:03:35] Camille de Meeûs: Speaking of that, you mentioned the whole client aspect. How do things work at "OKDO" to ensure you retain your clients? How do you keep these clients in your database? [00:03:45] Philippe Vanschoubroek: We are fortunate to have, I would say, very good technicians. Of course, there is inevitably a little turnover sometimes, but we focused very quickly on quality. Not the cheapest price—that doesn't mean we are the most expensive, but we are in the mid-range. But if clients are paying a certain price, it means they are also entitled to quality. We really focused very early on finding specialized people. I was speaking earlier about handymen—it's a bit of a pejorative term—and we have some, guys who can do a bit of everything. But we understood very quickly that when clients have an electrical problem, they want an electrician to come by, not a handyman doing a small odd job. So you have to see the intervention through to the end, and for that, you need specialized people. [00:04:24] Camille de Meeûs: A handyman is someone versatile, it's about versatility (Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yes), someone who can do several things (Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yes); they aren't a specialist. [00:04:31] Philippe Vanschoubroek: He isn't a specialist in a specific field, so indeed he is a generalist. A handyman is a technician who, for example, comes into a store and does a bunch of little things that others don't want to do. That means: replacing a tile, changing a trap, changing a light bulb, and oiling a squeaky door—that's a handyman. But indeed, he isn't a specialist in everything; if there is really a more serious problem, or more substantial work to be done, it's better to have a specialist. [00:04:58] Camille de Meeûs: But what are the other specialties your technicians offer? [00:05:02] Philippe Vanschoubroek: You have to understand that the handyman aspect is a small part of what we offer. Naturally, it is absolutely necessary and useful, but as I've already explained, the most important thing is working with specialized people. So we propose our services, and these services are performed by our technicians who are on our payroll; it's important indeed that we can see the service through to completion. That means: today we have electricians, we have plumbers, we have finishers—so that means walls, floors, ceilings. We have roofers, and a small portion can indeed do a bit of everything as a handyman. 85% of the interventions we do are done by specialists, but we don't just do small interventions. So I have technicians who do three or four interventions a day. Alongside that, we also do—I won't call them construction sites—but more significant works. More significant works could be: renovating rooms or bathrooms in a nursing home, it could be repainting an entire hall of a building, it's redoing major plumbing over a week with two or three men. So we also do that type of work. [00:06:02] Camille de Meeûs: We have the whole aesthetic side of the work, but what about the work that is mandatory? [00:06:06] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Well, it's true that regulations are evolving more and more as well, and in that context, we go even further and can bring electricity up to code, including single-line diagrams, etc. single-line schematics. For example also: fire protection. Within "OKDO Building Maintenance" we have an entity called "Secu-Fire" which specializes in fire protection. That means we install and inspect extinguishers, hose reels, fire doors, etc. And so that legislation is also changing more and more lately. [00:06:40] Camille de Meeûs: What are the recurring observations you make in your line of work? [00:06:43] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Well, generally speaking, we notice that, starting with fire safety, I won't say we're rarely up to code, but it depends on the buildings. Many residential buildings today, meaning apartment buildings, are rarely 100% compliant, whether in terms of electricity, but especially regarding fire safety. What does fire safety mean? It's not enough to just have fire extinguishers; you also have to check if there are fire doors that work, emergency lighting blocks—very important because, in the end, it's not really the fire that kills people, it's simply that they can't see anything anymore because there is too much smoke. And if the emergency lights aren't working, well, people just don't know how to get out of the building; that's the first thing. Next, more so for buildings like, I'd say, industrial sites or offices, it's preventive maintenance. That is to say, prevention is better than cure; it means maintaining your roofs, maintaining the grounds, etc. It's better than waiting for water to leak from the roof because everything is clogged and because the roof was poorly maintained. That means we end up with more damage later, we're in an emergency situation, etc. Preventive maintenance is the best way, simply to keep things running. It doesn't cost more, but it prevents a huge amount of damage and is necessarily easier to manage in terms of costs and scheduling. [00:07:55] Camille de Meeûs: It clearly limits the damage. [00:07:56] Philippe Vanschoubroek: It clearly limits the damage, or even avoids it. That means fewer arguments with insurance companies, with residents, or with the people occupying the offices. Yes, preventive plans exist, I would say they are quite simple, you know; again, it's a question of cost, it's simply a question of organization. [00:08:11] Camille de Meeûs: Someone who starts with you as a sales rep, a salesperson... do you have sales reps, salespeople within "OKDO" to sell your services? [00:08:17] Philippe Vanschoubroek: No. [00:08:17] Camille de Meeûs: No, there are no Sales reps. But then how do you manage to find these clients? The follow-up, the quality of your technicians, etc. (Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yeah). But before those people go out into the field, you have to find them clients, so how does that work at that level? [00:08:27] Philippe Vanschoubroek: At that level, I was lucky to have actually started "OKDO Building Maintenance" with partners. We divided the commercial side in two, meaning there are two of the four partners who mostly did the canvassing for clientele. We naturally split it up: Jerry does more of the property management side and I do more of the retail side and also the Dutch-speaking clients since we have quite a lot of them. And then we started like that, quite simply. Yes, there was some canvassing at the start, and then afterwards, quite a few clients brought in other clients. There is also sometimes a certain turnover among facility managers, so that means one leaves a network for another and then proposes us again in this new network. And then we also, as I was saying earlier, really paid very, very close attention to quality, to client follow-up. We have very loyal clients going back several years and major clients. [00:09:18] Camille de Meeûs: So you actually have a certain reputation now? [00:09:20] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yes, I think so; in any case, I realized it when I had meetings with prospects, people I had never met before. Indeed, I think we have a pretty good reputation in the facility management market. [00:09:32] Camille de Meeûs: What are the main difficulties one might encounter on the commercial side in your sector? [00:09:36] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Difficulties, well I'd say the primary difficulty in our trade is not having enough time. Meaning that as a partner, we don't exactly have only that to do. We grew quickly in a short time, which obviously also demands a lot of work regarding technician follow-up, regarding the follow-up of internal staff. To sometimes rethink, or restructure the company because it's growing. I would say honestly the commercial part has, I won't say become secondary, but we were following up with our clients, yet for a certain time, we didn't prospect enough. [00:10:09] Camille de Meeûs: Very good connection. So, now we're going to talk about the collaboration with PHCom. Tell me a little bit about the history with PHCom, since when and why this collaboration? [00:10:18] Philippe Vanschoubroek: We got in touch with PHCom via a client who told us about PHCom around April-May, and we were actually in the middle of reorganizing a little bit and telling ourselves that we really needed to start prospecting again. So, we got in touch very quickly, and the contact went well. It's true that at the beginning you're always a bit skeptical, because you tell yourself, "Well, we know how to do it better, so why them and not us?" But there you go, we realized that, well, firstly, it is a profession in itself. Even for me, having been in sales for 30 years, you have to be honest, it's not the most fun part. It's making calls, trying to get appointments, and calling, calling again until you actually get the appointment. That honestly helped us a lot. [00:10:59] Camille de Meeûs: Can we say that the collaboration with PHCom allowed you to be more productive, to save more time? [00:11:04] Philippe Vanschoubroek: It certainly saved us time, since we could never have had so many appointments in such a short time. We had more or less thirty appointments in three months; if someone had told me that at the start, well, I wouldn't have believed it. Yes, it saved us time in any case, and it has already won us some clients. [00:11:20] Camille de Meeûs: Philippe, do you have an anecdote to share with us regarding the collaboration with PHCom? [00:11:24] Philippe Vanschoubroek: It's more of a coincidence. Following the prospecting, an appointment was set for me with a prospect. Well, it's true that we receive a lot of emails, appointments, etc. so I didn't pay attention to it right away but... The day before the appointment, I said to myself, "Hey, who do I have an appointment with tomorrow? Where have I been booked for an appointment?", and essentially, it was at a friend of mine's place. But it was a company involved in property development; I didn't have the appointment with that friend, I would say fortunately, in a way. I met two people during that appointment, but I thought to myself, "Well, they aren't aware that we know each other," so I did my presentation, etc. And it was only after an hour and a half that one of the two people said to me, "Yes, but you do know our CEO, right?" And so there I said, "Yes, it's true," but they asked me the question, "Why are you only making contact now? And why didn't you go through that person?" I said, "Quite simply because I didn't think of it, for one. And then secondly, I think it's actually better not to go through someone, quote-unquote, perhaps more privileged. It might have placed more of a sense of obligation on people. So I actually prefer to meet the people in the field. And afterwards let it be confirmed that, well, we are someone trustworthy." [00:12:31] Camille de Meeûs: In the various appointments that PHCom's prospectors booked for you, for "OKDO", did you have any good surprises? [00:12:38] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yes, I had several. Among the surprises, that is to say, actually you don't realize the number of networks that exist. By network, I mean, some clients are companies that manage a lot of buildings; I'm thinking for example of a client I met, who manages over 700 buildings in Belgium, which is really huge. So what I mean by that is, it's not a retail chain, it's not a brand; it means it's a company managing 700 buildings. These buildings belong to them, but actually, it's not something one could find on one's own. I mean by that, at that point you have to go through a company, for example like PHCom, that knows this hidden world, this sub-world, I would say unknown, since it is not a known brand. You really have to know the companies managing these buildings and the people working in that company to finally get to the right appointment. [00:13:24] Camille de Meeûs: In your opinion, what are the sales skills that are essential today? [00:13:27] Philippe Vanschoubroek: I'm not going to teach you anything new. I've been in sales for 30 years myself. At the beginning, I thought you had to talk a lot, but in the end, that's not true. I learned over time that it's better to ask a few questions and listen, rather than trying to sell your product or service at all costs. So there you go, it's about letting the other person speak first before presenting your product or service. Because ultimately, it's the client who gives us the key, or gives us the answer as to whether it could be of interest to them or not. And then afterwards, you also have to be honest; you can only sell when there is a real need. So sometimes a meeting might simply end with us saying, "Let's stop here; I can't do anything for you," or "You don't have any needs that I can meet." [00:14:08] Camille de Meeûs: Listening is paramount. [00:14:09] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Listening is paramount, and asking the right questions is too. [00:14:13] Camille de Meeûs: And to ask the right questions, you also have to take an interest in the person in front of you (Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yeah) and the person on the other end of the line. [00:14:18] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Of course, of course. It's also experience that dictates it's not necessarily about asking questions just for the sake of it, but simply because we are genuinely interested in the client's problem. We know the issues generally, but then again, a network of buildings, or buildings themselves, aren't always the same thing so... [00:14:32] Camille de Meeûs: Every case is different. [00:14:33] Philippe Vanschoubroek: The client is looking for technical solutions, yes, but then, there are different ways to get there and to interest the client as well. That is to say, not just the technical intervention, but also the administrative part. Meaning, as I said at the beginning, the client wants good reporting; they want to know where they stand and they also want to reach good conclusions, so we have to go further than just the technical work. We also have to help them manage these buildings and be able to create added value on that level. [00:15:01] Camille de Meeûs: What is your next ambition, or personal commercial goal? [00:15:04] Philippe Vanschoubroek: The goals are always, I would say, twofold. On one hand, we have the goals for the company. Naturally, when you start a company from scratch and today you have 30 employees and workers, you have a certain responsibility. So, that means we have to feed them, so to speak, and we have to be certain that we can keep them so we can continue working with them, and for them, so that's my first objective. The second, I would say, is perhaps more personal on a commercial level: it's to land some big brands at some point—more big brands, perhaps better-known brands—since that always serves as a reference for future clients or future meetings. We already have some; it's easy, you know, to say, "We work for so-and-so or so-and-so." Somehow, the prospect feels more at ease. Personally, I have a few targets that would make me happy. [00:15:52] Camille de Meeûs: Is it important to have references like that, from companies you've collaborated with for years? [00:15:56] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Yes, yes, certainly. It obviously counts for prospects because it reassures them that we are already in this market, that we are already active, that we know how it works, right? Again, it's not just a technical question; it's also a question of client follow-up, IT systems, or a platform that allows us to do exactly that. I think everyone likes to buy from a store where they aren't the only one buying, and where hundreds of people have already passed through before and are satisfied. It naturally reassures them in the purchase. [00:16:24] Camille de Meeûs: If you had to define your collaboration with PHCom in three words, what would you say? [00:16:28] Philippe Vanschoubroek: I would say, in any case: speed, efficiency, and professionalism. [00:16:34] Camille de Meeûs: Thank you Philippe, and all the best for the future. [00:16:36] Philippe Vanschoubroek: Thank you very much.Podcast Timeline:
Podcast transcript:
Intro — PHCom at the transforma bxl studio
What is OkDo: multi-technical B2B maintenance
A typical day: requests, planning, interventions
Standing out: doing it in-house, not promising “everything”
Getting started: finding clients, quality, reporting
Building loyalty: specialists vs “handyman”
Trades & types of work OkDo delivers
Obligations & compliance: fire safety, electrical, plans
Field observations: standards, emergency lighting, prevention
Without a sales team: how OkDo grows its clients
Key challenge: time, and prospecting slowing things down
Why PHCom: context, scepticism, turning point
Results: more meetings, time saved, clients
Anecdote: prospecting… and a “network” surprise
Positive surprises: hidden networks, reaching the right contact
Sales skills: listening, questioning, staying honest
Goals: team responsibility + references & brands
PHCom in 3 words: speed, efficiency, professionalism
Outro
