The Grow Show: Business Growth Stories from the Frontlines

Build A Badass Advisory Board

March 23, 2023 Scott Scully, Jeff Winters, Eric Watkins Season 2 Episode 15
The Grow Show: Business Growth Stories from the Frontlines
Build A Badass Advisory Board
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

You need to treat your banker, lawyer, accountant, and insurance broker like a part of your extended team. They will act as an expanded advisory board that can help you in a pinch.  It's tempting to partner with the banker you know or the IT provider with the best Google reviews or the lawyer with the lowest initial investment, but don't risk it. Shop around, meet them in person, ask them questions, and talk to their clients. Find the best advisors for your business. You never know when you'll need them. 

Thanks for listening!

Scott Scully:

Welcome back to The Grove show. I'm with my partners in crime, Eric Watkins and Jeff winters. Hello, gentlemen.

Eric Watkins:

Good day to you. Good day to you Good day to you

Jeff Winters:

honestly feels like we never left. I feel like I have been here this whole time. That's how comfortable I feel like you're living

Scott Scully:

in the studio. Yeah. First of all, by the way, if you're just joining us, what is the gross show? The gross show is tactical advice,

Eric Watkins:

not theory things

Scott Scully:

thinks that. Yeah, no theory, no textbooks. This is all Convo about things that we've actually implemented, we are using and it is working, whether we're doing it or whether our close vendors or people in, in business relationships are using these tactics. These are inaction they're working. And they are causing consistent year over year growth. And we wanted to put a show together to make it just a little easier for people out there in their journey. Because we just know how tough it is. I wish I would have had this 28 years ago,

Eric Watkins:

I wish I would have had what I talked about today, six months ago. Yeah. Like we're, we're, we're if we learn it, and we're doing it, we're bringing it out here. If

Scott Scully:

you're not growing, you're dying. So I just want to make a couple of shout outs before we get into or swing it over to our LinkedIn sheriff. I wanted to shout out our customers, we have a growing number of customers that are interacting with us on the growth show, I know that you're out there listening, and this is on behalf of all of us, we appreciate you. We would not exist abstract would not exist if you were not so loyal, and kind. And we appreciate you. And we just want to be part of your journey and help you in growth. Thank you very much. Thanks for listening, spread the word to our team members 550. And growing, we wanted to put this together for you. So that we could make it just a little bit easier to understand why it is that we do what we do. And we felt that if we were working through some of these really important topics through a podcast, it'd be an easy way to talk to you. And we could help in your growth and you becoming even better consultants for our partners and even more impactful in, in your jobs and in your lives. Hope this causes growth for you, for our prospects, if we have interacted with you at some point, and we're not currently doing business. This is part of us staying in touch with you. And we hope we build confidence in the things that we're doing over time. And whenever you're ready, we're ready for that powerful partnership. And if we don't have any business affiliation with you, whatsoever, that's fine. That's why we wanted to do this. We wanted to make sure that we put good content out into the world, we just want it to be a smooth ride towards growth. It is not

Eric Watkins:

smooth it out as much as policies are the

Scott Scully:

shocks, if you will through business growth.

Unknown:

What about the people that are just here for the laughs?

Scott Scully:

There are two of those. And thank we welcome

Unknown:

all of you with open arms.

Scott Scully:

Yes. All right. So one of your favorite sections, you loyal listeners, keep calling out your favorite section. Jeff, the sheriff work in the Lincoln LinkedIn pastures. What do we have this week?

Jeff Winters:

They do talk about it? They do. I'm getting the people and I said this a few episodes ago, we're getting the people who are the truth tellers. They like that I always do when the LinkedIn post about the show, we say hey, these are some truths in that I think. I think it's not a blue checkmark of credibility. But I certainly think you're getting close. It adds a little credibility to the people where I, you know, talk about the truth. I don't know. No data to support that, but certainly something I think is true. Speaking of today, Bob Marsh, he's a CRO keynote speaker on sales and leadership and founder. And now he can add to that truth teller, because he says Bob says probably my number one tip for any manager or leader of people always be recruiting. If you have an open position and this is key, or even if you don't make sure you're always building a talent pipeline. This is really good. I think it is so easy to not have that bullpen of people to come in when you need them. You don't know what somebody's gonna resign. You don't know what something's gonna happen like, you just don't know as a leader, your number one job. Have the best players You can't do that if everything is just in time recruiting.

Scott Scully:

I find it amazing that so many people are fascinated with professional sports. Um, you've got your diehard fans that have completely converted half of their house to get up on a Sunday. And live NFL football. They know the league, and they know that there are scouts out there, combing us trying to find the best talent to put in every position. Like people know this, they live by this. But then we don't do it in business. How does that happen? Like, we know that professional sports teams, you are elite, if you've joined an NFL team, an NBA team, an NHL team, and you're also not safe. Just because you've made the team doesn't mean you're always going to play that position. Right? Why does that not happen in business? I love this post couldn't agree more. You need the best players in all of your positions all the time. And you always have to be looking and people should continue to improve or not hold that position.

Eric Watkins:

Yeah, I feel like this is 100% truth. And I think the root of why we don't do it as leaders is because we're so focused on the day to day and we're not stepping out. So some sort of regular cadence of how are you going to evaluate the characteristics of your team? And what are you comparing them against? And what's the litmus test? And the, you know, the bar raiser mentality that Amazon uses every new person we're going to put into a position? Are they raising the bar? Or are they just adequate? In the role? I think this is great. And I think it's often overlooked. the busier you are, the worse you are at this.

Jeff Winters:

Yeah, and a lot of this is networking. It sounds simple. But we had a situation just yesterday, where we had an opening. And we were able to go through the internal Rolodex and call someone and get them hired that day. I mean, that's, that's what you need as a business. That's what you should set yourself up for. So this is really good sage advice. Others other search advice, a universal truth. From Len Lisowski. Len says, I lost the deal based upon price. Unless you sell a commodity, no, you didn't lose based on price, you didn't show them value, you didn't align with the business goal or strategic imperative. You didn't have true executive sponsorship, you didn't sell broadly enough across the organization, you didn't prove how your solution could solve the client's business problems I could go on. But you did not lose based on price price is the easiest reason a client can provide. But rarely, the true reason you lost. Price is the easiest reason a client can provide by why they didn't go with you. And they don't want to tell you why. But in today's world, where people are so in tune with the difference between a low quality or high quality solution, how that can impact their business. You're not losing deals based on price. You're just not. You're losing deals for a variety of other reasons. And you shouldn't as a sales leader, except this excuse truth.

Eric Watkins:

Yeah, cheers. I agree with that. It's the easiest excuse for a sales rep to use. It's the easiest excuse because you can't argue with it. Oh, is price. Right? But you know, the and I think that's why a lot of people lean on that. But you're right, there's so much everybody would buy something. If you know the circuit like no one's pricing their products so far out of the realm of affordability.

Scott Scully:

You know how in sales processes, there's ways to log reasons to lose deals, contract price, doing business with a competitor, not the right size? And maybe this should be a call out to take price off the list? Yes. That's a good idea. If people say it, yeah, all sales managers when somebody says price say no. Go find the other reasons. Yeah, good idea.

Eric Watkins:

And don't let a prospect tell you price. Yeah, will hurt my feelings. It's not price. Yeah, it's not price.

Scott Scully:

There's a deeper part to this too, because so many people discount because they think that somebody's just gonna make the decision based on 250 or $500 a month less. And if they built another enough value, they wouldn't have had to come off the price point period.

Jeff Winters:

Now you may have sparked a different debate. But let us move on to the other side of this coin a darker side of the coin. I wonder if I'm gonna get universal agreement on this slide. We don't need universal agreement on the show folks. I'm not a yes man. Happy to have the discussion. But this is a lie that I think is a lie. unpopular opinion. Leaders should not pursue friendships with the team they lead. Before you get upset with me hear me out. Leaders are responsible to build relationships with the people they lead. They are responsible to foster unity within those teams, but building friendships with the team creates confusion and unhealthy power dynamics. I think that's bullshit. I don't think that's right. I am friends with many people that I lead. And I'm also friends. I think Scott, with my boss, they're not unhealthy, we're good. Like, then I think I'll use our like, I know, like, I know what it is, I know what it's not like, if I'm not doing a good job at work, you'll even say, alright, on a personal level, you won't come over, like, but like, I'm still doing a shitty job at work. So you don't hold back. You can, the way you do it is can be tricky. But that's ridiculous. You can be friends with people, that's outrageous.

Scott Scully:

I feel like, it's pretty hard to avoid, when you're in the trenches with people all day, every day, and you really enjoy those people and respect them. You can't help but to establish some friendships, I think where there'd be some truth in this is, you know, a couple layers. Underneath where, you know, if you are a manager, and you're all out on a Friday night, and you know, you're in a situation where maybe there's a lot of drinking, and there's some things that start to go on that maybe you didn't want to see. And now all of a sudden you have to do something about it. I think there are situations with certain people on your team that it just makes. It could make it awkward if you put yourself in certain environments or situations with with people at work.

Eric Watkins:

Sure. I think it's a lie at face value. I think a leaders intent should not be to become their team members, friends, first, you should start with the mission vision of the team. And then inevitably, if you can do both great do both, but don't let one get in the way of the other. That would be my response.

Jeff Winters:

People say they don't gotta like you. They just gotta respect you. You know what, fuck it helps if they like you, though. Like, it really does. It helps if they don't dislike you, but I understand your point.

Eric Watkins:

Yeah, but no, you're 100%. Right. Everything comes at a cost. Yeah,

Jeff Winters:

it helps that I like Scott, you don't like I'll do what he says anyway, because he's my boss. But like, I also like him and trust him like those are important things,

Eric Watkins:

right? Well, any what's super important, I feel like, ultimately, is feedback. And if you don't have that relationship, a lot of times people withhold information. And they don't give you that feedback. And if you don't have all the information on the table, you can't make the best decisions.

Scott Scully:

If you're going to, if you're going to do this, like I could see why this post was made. And by the way, we're for everybody out there, we're partners, right? So we're friends, but we also own shares in a business together. So that might be different than a couple levels underneath where maybe somebody's running a sales team. And all of a sudden, they're really good friends with two out of 10 sales on the sales team. And then one of those people happens to get promoted, maybe even because they're the person that should be promoted. But everybody knows that. You're you have good friendships with those two people. Now favoritism comes into play. Or you're the sales manager, yep. 10 people and want to your salespeople does something frickin stupid on a Saturday night and you see it, you got to do something about it. And then you feel you feel like you don't want to do something about it. Maybe nobody knows. And this is my friend, it can get pretty tricky if you're not ready, willing and able to separate business and personal. And I'm more worried about what people see. Like if you're friends with some and not friends with other others, and you're a leader that can really sure lead off that you're favoring some and not equal to others. That's a difficult one.

Jeff Winters:

It's a hard one. But life is so long, and you work at a company five years, 10 years. I'm not going to sacrifice my potential friendships with people just because they work for me. You know, I'm not down for that. Yeah, it's bullshit. But it's also clear that you know, Scott and I are best friends. And that's what I took away from that. And she took away from that. I don't know if other people hurt. I have got

Eric Watkins:

you're a better friend than an employee for sure. Definitely. give you that. I

Scott Scully:

mean, I don't have I don't have Jeff up on my frigerator

Eric Watkins:

I'm out there though. Right.

Jeff Winters:

You did my Christmas card. You did? Yeah, you did. What's up All

Scott Scully:

the rest of your family is better looking than you are. All right, Jeff, you did a pretty damn good job out on Lincoln Warren good work holding people accountable. And I know our listeners are proud of you. Thank you. So thank you for that. Thank you. All right, we're heading into the 5450. Again, just as a recap, the 50 for 50 is the 50 things that we would put in place no matter what if we were going to start a business from scratch, we would put these 50 things into place, there the law, they're our golden rules. These things have all been used, time tested. I don't care who you are, what kind of business you're in, we think that you should take these things into consideration. And, you know, put them into play. So I love today's and when I say it, you're gonna say well, duh, or that's, that's not new. But I'm gonna say it anyway. Build your advisory team, talking about banker, lawyer, accountant, insurer, insurance person, I'm going to go with just those four for now. Now, I would tell you, there's a very important fifth one in there. That's your outsourced sales pipeline provider. Abstract marketing. Number five, baby are two snuck in a little.

Eric Watkins:

Number five, maybe number one can't sell if you don't mark, it depends who you ask.

Scott Scully:

And I know that there's more people that are fitting into this category as technology advances, I know outsourced IT partners are certainly start to get on this list and, and, you know, Employee Benefit benefits providers, you just have to have the right Advisory Team. Today, I'm going to focus on bankers, lawyers, accountants, and insurance people. And all of your sand Scott, I've heard this before. Well, you've also heard don't eat brownies every day, and you still do it. Like, it's like, if you can tell me that you think that you have a world class, banker, lawyer, accountant, and insurance person that know your business inside and out, have been with you for at least three years, and are proactively helping you steer the business forward? Then don't listen to the rest of this. If you're like the 95% that don't, please do listen. Take these things into consideration. First of all, what are your goals? You know, am I going to need capital? Am I going to operate in multiple states? Are my employees remote? Or, you know what, what are? What are you shooting for that is going to that is going to make a difference when selecting the appropriate partners. Network in your industry. You know, if you're in the construction industry, network in your peer groups, because there are lawyers or bankers or trusted advisors that understand your industry that would be better to use. So ask your buddies do not save money on this. Do not say, Well, this accountant can do it for less, do not say, Well, I just saw that lawyer on the park bench and called them and he can do it for half the price. Don't do it. You need the best advisors period. If you're going to grow year over year and have just a predictably healthy business, do this. Now. Think Forward at least three years. Think about who you want to be who you are becoming and make sure that you have the right relationships early. Maybe someone just starts a business. And they can't go out and get the top law firm in town or a top accounting firm in town like I get that. But as soon as possible, as soon as you can afford the very best move to the very best. And when I say look forward three years, I'd get a little uncomfortable. I'd saved money elsewhere, so that you can have these people in place, thinking about where you're growing and helping you get there. You do not want to find these people. When you have the problem. You don't you have a problem with a contract. And all of a sudden someone's suing you. You don't go to a lawyer with a contract that they didn't write and get the same representation. You need to go make these relationships right now so that they understand your business so they can effectively back you up if things happen.

Eric Watkins:

Why do you think people do this? You think it's just saving money up front?

Scott Scully:

I think that there aren't as many problems when you first started so they're like, Hey, I gotta check in business. checking accounts, I've got my accountant I play golf with, you know, they're gonna do my taxes, things are pretty simple, I'm fine. But what they're not, you remember in the episode when we said go set up your accountability network, like they're not considering these people as really part of their board or their executive team. They're not considering that, if these people really understand me where I'm going in my business, they could like, they could help me with relationships, they could proactively help steer me towards success, like, let me use, like some of the exact examples like a bank, right, the bank is going to have different financial products for you. And when you first start, you may need like I said, the business checking account or, as they go forward, you may need capital to build a building, you may need, you know, a loan to buy a business or invest in equipment. And it's not very often that you can walk in blind to a bank and ask for a couple million bucks. My dad was in this business, it was amazing, all the stories that he would have of people to just walk right off the street and say, Alright, I have this business problem. Now I need your help, right. But if you are with a bank early, as your deposits go up, you're more of an attractive customer. If they have, if you have loans with them, they want your business to go well, so you can pay the loans back. But the more you deposit, the more that they can lend. That's the name of the game from a banking perspective. And talk about a network like this, this banker wants you to do well. And they also have relationships with other business owners around town, a lot of them and vet so they're going to help you with vendors, they're going to help you with new clients. They're going to push your business as much as they can so that you can pay the loans back or so that you have more deposits so that they can learn more. A bank, a good bank will make you better because they're better if you're better. And accountant, tax advice, payroll advice, just making sure that you're fiscally fiscally responsible, you know, pointing forward, you know, you guys know, Kyle, we got Kyle involved. Another entrepreneur, but happens to be a CPA, brilliant financial mind, we got him involved at the very beginning. Because we wanted to make sure when it mattered, we were being responsible. Right, we put the right amount of money away, we budgeted we just we planned ahead, we we thought about financial decisions in the right way. And I truly believe that's one of the biggest reasons why we're here today. And we happen to be going now in the last couple of years to a new accounting firm, because we need big ticket advice, not only as an organization, but as individuals as well. So we're making that move probably before we need to, but thinking about becoming $100 million. Organization, we need $100 million. Plus, we need a $500 million accountant. Legal, couldn't be more important contracts, policies, intellectual property, whatever it may be, I mentioned it earlier. If they write your contract, they can defend your contract. If they're part of your employee policies, they can defend your employee policies. And, you know, from an insurance perspective, this is a big one, if you have the right insurance, you can protect your business going forward. That's, that's the name of the game. If you don't have insurance, or you have the wrong insurance policy, you could be out of business. And I just think that it is so important to make this team right now. One of your most important action items, you got to evaluate who you're using, you need to go out and do this right now thinking about who you want to be three years down the road. I will end this little section with my story. I've told it before, but it's a story of being saved by my advisors, and a vendor. And that was in the business prior to this. When things were going south in the auto industry. We had a lot of business with Chrysler and some larger dealerships and things were going down fast Chrysler extended people out so we did not get paid a couple million dollars for like six months. And then we had a couple of big dealer groups that were in the same situation. So we had several million dollars out. We had a million dollar line of credit at the bank. fool tapped. And somehow we got a million dollars on American Express cards. I'm not sure how we did that. They weren't sure how we did that when they called us. But fact the matter is, in the same week, American Express called, we want our money, and the bank called, we want our money. And two things happened. And in the two weeks following that, one went and sat down with the bank. And because we had a relationship with with them, not only did they extend it, they gave us a little bit more couldn't believe it, from calling, from calling it to extending the amount of time that we had to give them some money and, and actually extending the alignment line of credit, was a difference maker. And then we had a really good vendor relationship, where we owed them money and took a little trip down to Florida and offered them 20% of our business and for x. And he said, Well laughed and said, How'd you come up with x? And I said, because it's exactly what we owe you. And you have margin in it. So it's not really that amount. And he wrote us a check that week. And business was saved. But it was because of partnerships, not not only a good vendor, partnership, but because of having the right banking relationships. So do this, you're going to need it and do it now. Way, way way, go set up a line of credit right now, while you don't need it. I didn't listen to people. And for some reason, one day I did, and thank God, thank God, I've had long lasting, the longest lasting relationship we have is with our bank, they've been through three companies with us. And they've been a big part of our success. I know this dissection was longer than the normal, but I think it's really important advice. And advice. This one I wouldn't wait on,

Jeff Winters:

I had a very similar banking story during COVID, our line of credit was 500,000. And I called the bank and we you know, and people said, Go get a line of credit when things are good. And bankers want to talk, they're not paid by the hour, like bankers go out to lunch, they'll talk to you, they'll hang out with you that like bankers are great free advisors. And I called them and I said, we need that line of credit to 1,000,005. And they go, you're gonna pull the whole thing down, meaning we're gonna take the whole line of credit and show in our bank account. Probably knowing full well, the answer was absolutely. And they said, okay, and they did it that day, that day, it can happen, but it doesn't happen. If I go, Hi, my name is Jeff, I run a business, it's nice to meet you. I need 1,000,005 like in an hour. That's not how it works. It's similar thing. And then again, when you think about being really small, you don't have that many people to turn to that know the business that are vested in the business. Yeah, people that don't, you don't pay by the hour you can talk to and they will talk to you. And I'll give you a couple others just as bonuses, your real estate broker, your real estate broker knows the business can introduce you to people vested not paid by the hour. You know, for me, I had, I had my doctor because I'm a hypochondriac, I needed that and then also I professors. And now Scott, you're right, this is a huge thing, set up this network to give you trends give you a business give you relationships help you out when you need it.

Eric Watkins:

I just wanted to give context on that not starting my own business, just being on the outside of it, and hearing you go through this, this would be something if I were to start my business tomorrow, if I didn't hear this, I wouldn't think about at all. Like this would not be something that is just great advice. I'd be thinking about the problem I'm solving and how to take it to market and how to hire the best people. And then all of a sudden, you've run into an opportunity where you need a little bit more money than you have. And well, there goes my business because I didn't have the relationship in advance. And by

Jeff Winters:

the way, everybody has, how many business owners you talked to that don't have I almost didn't make payroll story.

Scott Scully:

And I think that everybody that's listening probably has a relationship and each one of these categories. But what's the relationship look like? And, and more importantly, how, how well do they understand your business? How often do you get together with them? Do they understand exactly where you want to grow? And what part are they playing in that? Not just, I'm a bank and thanks for the deposits. Like I'm a bank, I'm part of your growth. I know where you're heading. I know the money that you need to do that. I'm invested in helping you find other customers and important vendors to make your business successful. Put these people at a table once a quarter, share your ideas, share your financials and get four or five more people to help put their heads together to make you successful. All right. I beat that to death. But it's important We are now going to head over to mining, for growth, gold

Eric Watkins:

mining for growth gold. So you got your business setup for growth, you have your sales team that Jeff's gonna get to and how to close the deals. But the missing link is how do you get more leads into your business, you've been growing organically through referrals through word of mouth, you've maybe tried a couple of things here and there, we're going through our business, what we do for ourselves what we do for our partners, what is the best way to drive leads for your business? Today, we're going to talk about email deliverability. So email has got to be a core function of any lead generation strategy, you got to have email, the cost to do it relative to everything else, the amount of messages you can get out the reach you can have, it just absolutely has to be a part of your strategy. So when I talked a couple episodes ago, about a talked about the sense in sending out one email or the throttles and how you send out these emails. And we look at we try to do at least three minutes in between each email because the goal here is you want to look human, it is so important, the name of the game is getting eyes on your emails, that is the hardest thing here, the hardest thing, you can write good content, you can have the targeting. But first, in this day and age, you just have to get eyes on emails. So the most effective way to do this is to actually look at reply rate. So the common misconception here is let's just look at bounce rate, because those will tell me all of my emails that just didn't get delivered. But now, that's just table stakes. Making it past the bounce rate is just table stakes. And from there, you have to beat the ever changing technology of the spam filters that are on every single inbox, in addition to Outlook and Gmail constantly changing these settings. So you have to beat the spam. And then in addition, you may get all the way through the spam into the inbox, and then you show up as an unverified sender. And I don't know about you, but I'm never clicking on somebody who sent an email to me and they're an unverified sender. The question that a lot of people have is well, okay, if I'm not looking at, if I'm not looking at bounce rate, then I should look at open rate and open rates. Great, and you should absolutely look at it. But unfortunately, in this day and age, a lot of these spam detection technologies, actually open the emails. So it gives you this false sense of security of Oh, I'm getting all these emails open up? Well, no, you're really not. Because you really need to look at reply rate. And does reply rate have a lot to do with the content targeting? Absolutely. But looking at the reply rate will give you the best indicator, if you're actually getting eyes on your emails. So that's the name of the game. We want to increase our eyes on the emails, how do we do this diversification? Diversification is the word here. So we will use we will you it's not going to be a perfect science, you're always finagling, this you have to think about the whole system is working against you, they don't want a person to be able to send out 1000s of emails over the course of a month. So they're constantly trying to keep us out of inboxes. So here's what would do, let's say you go you're going after a tam total addressable market of about 30,000 prospects, what we would recommend is using two separate platforms. So for example, in this case, we'll use Outlook. And then we'll use Gmail. Underneath each platform, we are going to set up for total domains, so two domains for each platform. And then at those domains, we're going to be setting up to senders per domain. So overall, we're going to have four domains. And we're gonna have eight total senders, and it's going to be across two platforms. So why two platforms? Outlook. So for example, back in November, we had an event where our email deliverability fell off a cliff in just one day. And then it slowly came back over time. But that's not just one company that were emailing, changing their settings that was a mass move from Outlook or Gmail, whichever, whichever one company would be the case in this scenario, because they are they have this dial switch behind the scenes. No, they don't say they do. But they do. Like everybody knows that they're doing things to decrease the likelihood of you getting these emails through. So if you are, if you have all your email set up on one platform, and they move that dial, you're screwed, you're not getting any emails out. So being able to be diversified across email platforms is huge. And then from there, having the four different domains gives you the flexibility to not only evaluate the performance between them, but also know also able to leverage if one domains working better than the other. Or if one domains get one domain gets shut down. You can transition your sense over to the other ones and not mess up your flow of emails and keep your consistency going out. So overall, as a lot of nerdiness around email marketing. But if you're just using one platform, you're setting up one domain, and you're blasting out 1000s of emails, you're not getting email, you're not getting eyes on your email. So you have to set this up. And you have to diversify up front, because it's a complex environment. And it gives you the ability to pivot as we go through this.

Jeff Winters:

If you're doing email prospecting, if you're an SDR, you need to rewind this, you need to listen to that at three quarter speed. Because in two years, this is what everyone's going to be doing. Because we were doing two years ago, what everyone's doing now, with the domain, and inbox setup diversification. This is the next evolution of that, get ahead of the game, do what Eric is saying. And by the way, Gmail, Outlook Zoho mail, he's even suggested AOL, AOL, I would love to know your screen name from back in the day. I bet I bet I know what it was. football player, cool guy. 1212 12. Do it. Do it. Do it,

Scott Scully:

do it. Two things. First of all, the whole time you were talking, Jeff was looking over at you like a proud dad, like, look, look who's become the email expert over there. He's saying it better than you know, everybody listening, I think is used to hearing how Google is constantly changing their algorithms to make it even more difficult to raise keyword rank. And so that's why so many people use an out sourced provider to write content and work on local SEO and make adjustments to websites. And, you know, because it's just all the time the business rules change. And if you're not on top of them, then your your rank is going to decrease. I bet most people that are out there don't realize it's the same thing with email marketing. I bet they buy a tool by a list, send email, it bombs, and they said doesn't work. Yeah. And what they don't realize is it's just frickin hard. And if it wasn't, there wouldn't be the big email companies that actually use other companies to help their customers set set up, set their tools up the right way. Right,

Eric Watkins:

exactly. And you could even argue it's harder, because Google will at least publish the update that they did. These aren't This is behind the scenes, they're trying to keep you out. And you have to have smart people that can look at situations and try to find the roots of problems and put these solutions together. So take our word for it, we've done it, we've made the mistakes. Like I said, I wish I would have known this six months ago. This is new, this is fresh off the presses. But diversification up front and domains in send and senders and in diversification up front, and not only platforms, but also domains. And also senders is critical.

Scott Scully:

How's good stuffer. So Eric now has sent beautiful emails that actually land causing an amazing amount of leads. That sales team is now sitting on top of what are you going to suggest to do to just make it a little easier to sell over here and Tales from sales. Today, it's

Jeff Winters:

a suggestion of what not to do, what not to do what not to do. I've heard this more often than I'd like over the last couple of months, and I want to bring it to our loyal listeners. As salespeople, it is hard enough to sell. Selling is hard selling today may even be a skirt harder than it's ever been. Don't make it harder. And the advice that I would give is don't create problems on the sales call that don't exist. Don't create problems that don't exist. And I'll give you why this happens. First, let me define it. salesperson is on a call. And the prospect asks a question. And the salesperson answers that question and then goes on a long diatribe. Not answering the question, but just continuing to talk. And whatever it is, they say, creates a problem now that the prospect wants to talk about. So let's go back to the bank example. Let's say I'm a banker. Eric says Jeff, the banker, tell me what's my interest rate on a loan? You go? Well, Eric, you know, it's interesting, yes, the interest rate on the loan is, you know, five or 6%. And I also wanted to tell you that we have a lot of people who are in danger of potentially not paying back their loans, and it's putting the bank in kind of a weird financial position. We're a little nervous about it. So obviously, but to answer your question is 6% What now

Eric Watkins:

what why are they

Jeff Winters:

paying their loans? And does that mean that my deposit like this is the kind of stuff you want to avoid? And we laugh at that silly example. But it's happening all the time. With your salespeople in less flagrant and obvious examples. So here's what you need to do, sometimes, as a salesperson just answer the question, like there's no price for giving a long answer. Hey, Jeff, you guys secure sales meetings for your prospects, right? Yes, we do. That's just the fucking answer. Just let it be. What's the interest rate? 6%? And secondly, even when you're giving a longer answer, just end it. And like, and make sure before you do you clarify, Eric, just so I can understand exactly what you're asking. You just want to know the interest rate of the loan. Right? That's all you're looking for. Yes. Boom. So what you want to avoid here is giving a the wrong answer because you don't know the questions really being asked, or be over talking. Because you run yourself into a problem. Don't create problems that don't exist.

Scott Scully:

I love this. And it's really simple advice, but hard. Like I trained hundreds of salespeople early on, and this was my biggest pet peeve. Like, everyone does it, especially when they're getting into sales. They just keep talking. For whatever reason they think like a short answers, not being a good salesperson. Like just answer the question, move on, answer the question, move on. And I took a lot of training. This is if you have new salespeople, this is going to be one of your biggest hurdles to jump over. Because for whatever reason, as a rookie salesperson, this is one of the biggest mistakes people make.

Eric Watkins:

I love this. And I would say the number one way to combat this if you're a new sales rep, listen back to your calls. Go back, watch the tape, listen to your calls, and go through one call and say what are all the words I said that didn't need to be set at all. And I bet the list is long, and you'll just get a little bit better each time. Good tip. Good tip tales from sales. Were their were their baby.

Scott Scully:

Everybody's favorite. To do or not to do. Eric, the boys got some good ones. Yeah,

Eric Watkins:

that's a good one today. So So Jeff and I have been doing this 75 hard, which is just good for results. Terrible for your mind. It's not not ideal. Not loving it. But you know, we've gone through it and Scott's kind of joined in, halfway through. Doing this little 35 Easy 35 Easy. Yeah. But long story short, we've been on this diet and these exercise routines, you can look it up 75 hard if you want to do it, and I've been dreaming about fast food. Like I'm having dreams about burgers and fries and tacos. I can't wait for that 76 day, you know, I'm gonna I don't know what I'm gonna eat, but it's gonna be a lot. It's gonna be a lot of things. My question for today is and I'm talking fast food. I'm not talking Chipotle. I'm not talking Macalester I'm talking heart attack in a bag. Fast food. You can only eat at one place for the rest of your life. When you go to fast food. Do you pick McDonald's? Or do you pick Taco Bell? We're not doing like the where you get to eat every day forever. But you can only if you are going to eat fast food you you got one option?

Scott Scully:

Oh, I thought you meant I had to eat there every single day for the rest

Eric Watkins:

that documentary that did where the guy like died. But McDonald's McDonald's.

Jeff Winters:

First of all that the the two cheeseburger meal is my appetizer. I mean, that's a joke.

Scott Scully:

You ate two Big Macs.

Jeff Winters:

I don't mind McDonald's order. Two double cheeseburgers no pick a large fry 20 Nuggets and a make chicken. Oh fuck nothing to it. My wife knows not to just rip it right off. By the way. What do you start with one tooth with the tooth? You start with a cheeseburger?

Scott Scully:

I know what you don't order it you're out. Start with I know. I know. I know what you don't order it the

Jeff Winters:

fries down immediately rip through the fries just like they weren't even there.

Eric Watkins:

The fries should not make it home. He doesn't it shouldn't make it home. No,

Scott Scully:

he doesn't order a shake because their machine doesn't.

Jeff Winters:

Yeah, wait two hours from machine and then Taco Bell. Also easy three cheesy gordita crunches and three hard tacos

Scott Scully:

are can eat a lot. I'd go with like six Doritos. Locos Tacos.

Eric Watkins:

Yes, a pre yes Doritos. locos. See,

Jeff Winters:

like a happy meal. Come on, man. You gotta eat.

Eric Watkins:

Well, it sounds like you're a big fan of both. So if you had to pick

Jeff Winters:

I'm gonna talk about Taco Bell. Yeah, the cheesy gordita crunch is the single best fast food item in the history of mankind.

Scott Scully:

For those of you that are in a market that has a taco Johnson there are not many of you. Shout out to the potato lace top. guys haven't eaten it at a Mexican fast food restaurant said I was There's one in Iowa

Eric Watkins:

today of loose meat tacos. Yeah.

Scott Scully:

By the way, yes. In Iowa they had the smoky bar and the loose meat sandwiches.

Jeff Winters:

I bet they did. Yeah, talk about the treat. That's a treat. I get burgers wherever, like you can't get a cheesy gordita crunch anywhere but talk about one on one.

Eric Watkins:

I love to lupus. I'd love to lupus, but not as much as I love a Big Mac. A big mac a MC chicken a double cheeseburger. Unlike Jeff, I don't get them all at the same time. I'll mix it up. In some. You gotta get the large fry and you got to eat the fries that didn't that made it to the bottom of the bag first. And then you go to the ones that are that are sitting in the container.

Scott Scully:

Big Mac flip. Donald's 100 French fries, Coke six shakes. What?

Eric Watkins:

McDonald's all DAC and

Scott Scully:

apple pie. What was it? I

Unknown:

don't think you got any of those items. Right?

Eric Watkins:

You're hungry now.

Scott Scully:

This was a good this was a good episode. And now you're hungry. So tell us where you went. Get you you get back to us. Tell us what your McDonald's order was or your or your Taco Bell order was we'd love to hear

Jeff Winters:

you think can I say I tried to go knock down my order. Like go see if that yeah, the FDA warning. What do I I don't want anybody to like keel over. If

Eric Watkins:

you can't, if you cannot eat that whole thing out. Please.

Scott Scully:

Get in one of our social posts. Let's include this whole the poll. I'd like to know what people pay

Eric Watkins:

McDonald's or Taco Bell.

Scott Scully:

And what would you order? keep chatting with us keep subscribing, sharing, spreading the word interacting. We love you. We're here because of you. As always, let's grow

Eric Watkins:

let's grow let's grow. It brochure show is sponsored by inbound SDR digital search that works

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