7 Key Systems To Go From The Freelancer Trap To A 7-Figure Autopilot Agency With Alex Schlinsky

If we want to grow our agency beyond ourselves, we need to get out of the freelancer trap where we have this mindset of having to do everything ourselves. But often people don't know exactly how to grow their business. So in today's episode I'm going to be talking to Alex Swinsky about the seven key systems to go from the freelancer trap to building a seven figure agency that can run on autopilot. So I'm really excited to dive in.

So.

So come with me and let's get going. I'm Rob Da Costa and this is the Agency Accelerator Podcast. As someone who has stood in your shoes, having started, grown and sold my own agency, I know just how it feels in the ups and downs of agency life. So this podcast aims to ease your journey just a little by sharing mine and my guests experiences and advice as you navigate your way to growing a profitable, sustainable and enjoyable business. Hey everybody and welcome to this week's episode of the Agency Accelerator Podcast. I'm really excited to be joined today by Alex Schlinsky who's joining me on the podcast to discuss the seven key systems that you need in place to go from being a freelancer to running a seven figure agency on autopilot. Now Alex has sold over $15 million worth of products and he's worked over 700 clients in 50 different markets. He's authored multiple books and today he runs Prospecting on demand that helps impact driven entrepreneurs achieve time and financial freedom, which is music to my ears. So welcome to the podcast, Alex.

Rob, thanks so much for having me. Excited to be here.

Excellent. Now before we jump in to talk about the seven key systems, can you just talk us through what you see is the typical entrepreneurial journey from having that spark to starting your own business to working as a freelancer initially, then thinking about hiring staff and maybe share some of the pitfalls that you see along the way?

Yeah, absolutely. I think the standard entrepreneurial journey is the initial spark, right? I think the initial spark usually in today's day and age either comes from your parents or loved ones, relatives that have been able to achieve some sort of opportunity through entrepreneurship themselves and thus you want to replicate that or now because, you know, social media is so pro, you know, proficient everywhere, it's likely that some people have seen biz op either from like originally Tai Lopez back in the day or seeing, you know, current gurus if you will, running ads, making promises that probably aren't true but ultimately will capture someone's attention to start, you know, maybe I don't Want to go this traditional route. Maybe I don't want to go back to school, maybe I don't want to get a job. Maybe I want to try to make it myself. And, and so it starts with the biz op, then from there usually it starts with the local market, the people that, you know, a religious community. Sometimes, you know, if you're like a really like aggressive person, maybe some door knocking and then you just slowly but surely, probably over a year or so start building out and recognizing. Are you really cut out for this or not? I think a lot of people in the beginning will start with this mindset of, oh, this is easy. Nothing is easy ever. I don't want to have anyone listen to this podcast and think that any of this is easy. It's definitely not. But there is, you know, specific systems in place that you can make that will make it easier. Easier doesn't make it easy. I think once after a year or so most people will either flame out and go back to a regular job or they'll push forward after about probably two years and building out some business. They recognize that they're kind of this freelancer where everything relies on them. They're saying yes to anyone with a dollar. They're not understanding opportunity, cost or how to automate or delegate things. They're thinking very short term, usually like on a month to month plan, plan. Like if they lost money or broke even one month, it's like the end of the world. Even though, you know, the next three months, if they invested appropriately, would be unbelievable profits. And then I start thinking at that point, probably mentorship is where most people would start considering around the 20 to 24 month mark. Like, hey, I really need someone that's been there before can help me accelerate that. Whether it's Rob or myself or other people in the space. And then from there you go, you start building out systems, operations, hiring team, and hopefully you can build yourself out of the business with willingness. I think that piece is so key, a lot of people forget the willingness factor of hiring. I like using these four steps for hiring that might help some people in their freelance mindset right now. Number one, you do the job yourself. Number two, you build a system to have someone else do the job. Number three, you hire someone to do the system to do the job. And then lastly, number four, you let them fail. I think a lot of people struggle with the idea that oh, they're never gonna be as good as me or anything like that. You don't need someone to be as good as you you just need them to be roughly 70 or 80% as effective with your system so you can scale and grow beyond yourself. And I think that's kind of the main plan, the main process of, like, an entrepreneurial journey.

Yeah. There's a couple of things that are worth picking up there. That mindset becomes such a huge part of growing an agency because the entrepreneur, by definition, is the person that's got loads of ideas. And they're pretty. They probably started their agency because they want control. They're pretty sure that they don't want to let go. I was saying that a lot of owners started their agency because they want control, and so they find it very difficult to let go. And as you said, they ask the wrong question. The question should never be, will they do it as well as me? It should always be, will they do it well enough? But I really like your four systems. And the other thing I wanted to just kind of agree with you on is the fact that we are surrounded by supposed gurus who are standing in front of a yacht that probably isn't theirs, telling you how to get rich quickly. And I think what you teach and what I teach there. There is no magic formula to getting rich quickly. There's just doing the right things and putting the right systems in place and surrounding yourself with the right people. Right.

Related to that mindset comment that I think is key. The other mindset needed is longevity. Like, really understanding what you're doing this for. If you're doing it to get rich quick, you're probably thinking of this more like some sort of crypto opportunity where, like, maybe you can make a lot of money or lose a lot of money. It's really not like that. It takes time and effort and responsibility. But over time, what I like to tell people is that less and less things become new, which makes it easier. Like, your first client that's frustrated is a huge deal. And then the first chargeback you get. Huge deal, first sale, huge deal. But over time, all of these things become the same and you learn how to handle them over time. And I think one of the other elements related to mindset is I think most people start the business with this roses and daisies or roses and rainbows mindset where nothing will go wrong. The reality is things will go wrong. You can't win at 100% of clip. It's not possible. You will have bad clients, you will have bad experiences, bad hires, and most people don't sign up for that. But that's what it takes long term. And I just Want you to know, like, if you're listening to this, it will get better as long as you're comfortable in the uncomfortable and recognize the stakes are pretty low. I mentioned this to you before we started the pod, Rob, but I did have open heart surgery. My brother is a ER doctor. Um, I feel like the agency owners have this weird tendency to make the stakes massive. Like if they have a $5,000 client that pays them for three months and the results don't go well, it's like, oh my God, life is over. It's like now, you know, it's marketing, you know, it doesn't go amazing every single time. And that's not to diminish the value or impact that we make. It's just to hopefully make your mindset a little bit easier. So you're not going to bed literally thinking like you're ruining someone's life. Which I actually have clients that think that way. And I feel bad, you know, I feel bad about that because it's totally an inappropriate mindset. It's not like, oh, I care too much. You're putting the onus on caring and what you are doing too heavily. And I think it's a really unhealthy thing. So just a couple things on. Buy in of what's necessary to grow.

Yeah, it's good shout. It's interesting, I was saying, I had my group coaching call this morning and one of the questions that one of the members posed was the fact that she's just had two senior people resign totally unconnectedly, but within a week of each other. And we were talking about, you know, what that means. And one thing I said to her, which is what you're saying, Alex, is that you have to see this as business as usual. This isn't some catastrophe that's happening, it's just bad luck. But it's business as usual. Most things that happen to us on a day to day basis are business as usual, even if we don't feel in the moment like they are. Because it feels like a catastrophe that's about to happen.

Oh, absolutely. And I love using this mindset, Rob. That helps me a lot. I kind of am a catastrophizer. I try not to be, but it's just human nature of who I am. Like I'm a bleeding heart. I wear my emotions on my sleeve. I'm very excitable, I'm very depressive at some times I try not to be that way, but it's just who I am. One of the things that I like to Remember is that usually if you're watching this on YouTube, I'm making a small, like a, like a big circle with my hand, right? This is the problem you think it is, and this is really what it is, and it's just a very small circle. And when you look back in the past and do some reflection, some problem you had in, you know, October 2020, as an example, you thought was the biggest deal on the entire planet, you know, here we are, you know, roughly two years later, everything's fine. So I think it's just a good reminder to remember you're never going to wake up and everything's perfect. You're never going to wake up and everything is done. You're never going to wake up and nothing is to work on. There's always things to do. Always. We're tinkerers. That's what we do. But ultimately, if you really believe in the process long term, and you build a foundational process with the appropriate seven systems, you will be able to grow and hit the goals that you have, and I'll happily share them with you today.

Yeah, well, that's a great segue, isn't it? A great segue into the seven key systems that you need to put in place if you want to move from a freelancer or a smaller agency into a bigger one. So let me hand that over to you to tell us what.

Yeah, absolutely. So let's start first with just the three core tenants of the business before we dive into seven systems, because I want to make sure it's really easy for everyone to understand and very simple to execute on. When we talk about the three core tenants, it's going to be prospecting, lead generation, sales, converting those leads into clients. Right. And then fulfillment delivering on those services. Is there a lot more to that? Of course. That's a very gross oversimplification. We can even make it more gross in terms of oversimplification if we want, which would be client acquisition and fulfillment. I don't think that's a good idea. It's just an easy way to encapsulate kind of where my mindset is and where my frames are for when I share these seven systems. Because some of the systems you might think are a little bit unique in comparison to what you probably expect. So if you're listening to this, this, this podcast right now, if you pause and write down the seven systems you believe I'm going to share, I think you'll probably get a few. Right. But I don't think you'll get all of Them. Right. So what I'll do to start is I'll share all seven of them just off the bat, and then we can dive into any of them that you want to right away. Okay. The first and most important one to me is the 8020 principle, the Pareto principle. We're going to come back to this, but this is your operating system as an entrepreneur, and frankly, this is my operating system as a human being. Um, it's really, really important to me. My wife and I work on this every single week for our personal professional life. It's very important. The next one is going to be the A team. It is kind of like a play on the old show, but you know, obviously having a quality team. We just go with the a team. Your KPIs, the monthly numbers that you're tracking, sales, obviously. Long term retention. I like to use the word long term retention versus just retention, because I think the average in the agency space right now is like, I don't know, three months maybe. It's very, very bad. I want all of my clients and every agency owner to have a minimum expectation of six months. Meaning if you're churning your clients roughly twice a year, it's certainly a lot better than four times or six times a year, which is pretty common. Obviously I'd like you to have it longer, but I'm not going to sit here and be like, hey, you know, you currently retain your clients for 60 days. Let's magically make that a year. Now, I like to take things in chunks and be reasonable. I think 6 months is a very healthy expected KPI for long term retention. The next piece is going to be auto fulfillment, automated fulfillment, or delegated fulfillment. I'll explain that in just a bit. And then inbound ads. We'll talk about inbound ads related to prospecting. But ultimately, just a quick note into it, everyone wants to talk about all the, you know, sexy, exciting ways to generate prospects. There's only one effective long term, scalable way, just one, and that's ads. And if you are an advertising agency, a marketing agency, asking your clients to invest into ads and you are not doing it yourself, not only are you hypocritical, but you are not serious about growing. And you are probably very scared of the same exact thing that your prospects are scared of, which is, what if it doesn't work? So those are the seven systems. I'm happy to dive into any of them, but I wanted to share that first with you, Rob.

Yeah, that's so interesting. I've got to Admit if I had paused the video and written down my seven systems, I would have had a team. KPIs, sales and retention, those were the four. I would have not had the other three. So talk us through. I mean, hopefully everybody understands what the 8020 Pareto principle is, but talk us through how this applies to running, running a business.

Yeah. So I think that to me, first and foremost, before we can even talk about the 8020 principle, is understanding the purpose of it. Right? The 8020 principle, of course, is what 20% of effort is generating 80% of the results. And the key here is, in terms of results, only you, listener, can identify what results matter to you. Rob, nor myself, nor anyone else, Your parents or your mentors can tell you what life you want to live and what success means to you. Success is different to every single human being on this planet. Everyone wants to make more money. That is just a baseline. Anytime I do coaching and I start with a training of like, who wants to make more money? Every single person in the audience raises their hand. You probably right now, Mr. Pro, Mr. Podcast Listener, or Mrs. Are thinking immediately, yes, of course I want to make more money. But then when you're asked why and if you pause this and you're like, why? You probably have no idea other than it's just capitalist mindset and entrepreneurial hustle mindset. And that's the way you think you are supposed to feel because you've never even taken the time to really journal and clarify why you want to make more money. And the crazy thing about this is most people who want to consistently make more money are sacrificing their own mental health, their well being, their time with their family right now for a money goal that's not clear or purposeful or intentional. And then they'll never really hit it anyways. Because when you make more money, what do you want? More money. So it never works.

Can I just give you a hallelujah? Yes, please, Mark to that. Because it's so true, isn't it? I think we're driven. We're driven by peer pressure. We're driven by what we think success looks like or what we think, how other people will judge our success. But surely success is about being in control of your own destiny and knowing what that direction is.

Let me be really blunt about this for a second, okay? At 29 years old, okay, I was told that I had to have open heart surgery. I don't want to have open heart surgery. I don't recommend open heart surgery to anyone. I had to have surgery 10 months later because Covid delayed it, which was by far the worst part of the surgery was the delay because, you know, if I had to do it in two weeks, I would have a lot less time to think about it. But 10 months was terrible. In the midst of those 10 months, my wife got pregnant with our first child, which more than anything in the world, we can talk about this in another podcast, but I wanted to be a dad more than anything in the whole planet. And now I am. By the way, to a almost 2 year old, he's the greatest thing in the entire world. But in general, right, like having this opportunity in front of you where life is about to provide you with the thing you've wanted more than anything, with your amazing wife and with the business you've built, only to say, hey, here's a potential finish line that you didn't expect and anticipate. With one mistake by a doctor, you could be dead. Essentially, you really change your mindset about what success is. I was really bought into hustle culture. I was very invested into the idea of more and more and more, never because of a reason. There was no reason. It was just more that was easier to do. It's always easier to say more than put the reason together. So I just let that be. As soon as, as the doctor tells you, hey, you need to make sure you have a living will, you need to make sure you have these things organized just in case. Even though it's unlikely you're going to die, you start recognizing what really matters. And what I like telling people is, Look, I'm only 31. I get the opportunity to tell you this versus maybe your 70 year old parent or your 85 year old grandparents. I feel like hopefully you'd listen to me because I'm a lot younger than most people in this scenario and I'm super grateful to be alive. Two years ago, October 15, 2020, I had my surgery and I'm alive and well. It's. It's incredible. You know, it's an amazing, amazing thing. And I think what most people just need to hear is you can only 8020 if you know what your actual goal is. You can't run a marathon if you don't know the finish line. It's impossible. Or a race. Technically, a marathon's the same amount of miles or kilometers every time, but you get the point, right? The idea behind the 8020 principle simply comes down to where are you finding the most satisfaction, enjoyment and financial new wherewithal, like growth in your business? It's not just money, in my opinion. I think the purpose of running a business is to also have satisfaction and fulfillment. Otherwise, you're probably listening to the Rod podcast, I would guess. But to me, the problem and the baseline of this is if you're doing too much in the business and you're not making enough money, or you're not making like having enough joy, satisfaction, fulfillment, it all comes down to simply 8020 in your life. 8020 ing your business because it should be your operating system, right? What we end up seeing is people do this wrong at the beginning and later in their journey. You attempt to be like a full service agency and then you end up getting spread too thin, which really cripples your growth at the start and then stifles you as you try to surpass 100k a month because of this desire of offering more. You want to offer more to everyone because you know you can make more money. But then without 8020ing it, things become way more complex, more convoluted, more more challenging. The team is not able to execute. You have to get inside. It's weird how it ends up working on both ends of the spectrum for beginners and for experts. But what we identify is if you exercise your ability to choose and define your North Star, you clarify exactly what you want, then what you'll be able to do is very simply 80 20, and it just comes down to three steps. It's very easy, Rob. You define you design and you do define design. Do is the method that I believe in more than any other in agency or life. All you have to do is just define what you want, design the path, the milestones to get there, and then take action on it every single day. The craziest thing is how many people skip define design and they just do. Imagine going to a gym, okay? Never defining what you want as the success of the gym, never designing a path to achieving it, and just go to the gym always. How could you ever feel like you've made any progress? You're just doing stuff. It never works. That's 82.

That's fantastic. I love that. I always talk about the vision and the plan for your agency. Like a car journey. I mean, imagine going on a car journey, but you've got no idea where the destination is. Or even worse, imagine having your team all jumping in their own cars and saying go. Or even if you do have a destination, but you have no way of getting there, so you have no plan of how you're going to get there. So I always liken the you know, vision and strategy and plan as a. Planning a car journey. Because it's. It would be stupid. Everyone knows that, like you just. The way you just decide. It's a shame. I mean, you know, it's a shame that sometimes we have to have things like that happen in our lives, like awfully happened to you to make us open our eyes. And, you know, I mean, hopefully to a lesser extent, the pandemic has sort of helped everybody focus on what they want because suddenly we weren't able to do what we wanted. So I always talk about, I help my clients build a profitable, sustainable and enjoyable agency. And the enjoyable part is super important.

My goal of any speech or podcast that I do is trying to use my, you know, personal experience, my health skill scare as a opportunity for someone to recognize, like, you don't have to have this opportunity happen to you. You can just learn from me because I did go through it and I obviously didn't want to go through it, but I'm on the other side now. Two years later, full bill of health, amazing two year old son. I get to enjoy the fruits of my labor. I still work pretty hard. I would say that's the truth. But I have an incredible business and I have incredible community and I done a lot of amazing work. But much more importantly than my business or my community is my life and my family. And I'm very grateful for that opportunity. And I want you to have that opportunity too, Mr. Or Mrs. Listener. But you got to define it, you got to design it. You can't just keep doing it. And if you are doing it, it just takes some journaling time to write it out and identify what you want. Don't be afraid that you will never be able to hit your goals. And don't be afraid of not knowing what goals you have. Just put together a plan based on what you think will make you satisfied and happy and then you can optimize over time. We're not in any sort of race. You're not competing against anyone. There's enough fish in the sea for all of us to be very successful. And I think that's ultimately the key to how to be able to be successful long term. Yeah.

And I just add to that those words of wisdom that keeping it simple is a really smart approach to all of this because we overcomplicate it. You know, banks give us complicated templates for business plans and we try to follow those and then they get, you know, put on a shelf and gather dust. So we, you know, keep it simple like Like Alex says, journal just I use a very simple three page template to help people do this because I want to keep it as simple as possible. Because if we keep it simple, it's more likely to get done and it's more likely to remain a living dynamic document. I want to dig into two more of the seven points that you mentioned because I think people hopefully will understand the idea behind hiring a team. Or we can dig in more into that. They'll understand the importance of measuring KPIs, of having sales and putting retention strategies in place. But I wanted to talk in about six and seven and I wanted about six first of all, which is auto fulfillment. So just talk to us a little bit more about what that means.

Yeah, so I think one of the main problems that we see from agencies consistently is that they are very often the ones doing the work themselves. There's this funny mindset related to, you know, like people prospects telling someone like, oh, I know enough to be dangerous, right? Like, I'm sure you guys have heard that on pro, on prospecting calls, which is very frustrating because you're like, look, if you know enough to be dangerous, what you're really telling me is that you're gonna get in my way of work and you're not gonna let me do my job and you're gonna bitch about everything and you're gonna be very irritating to work with. And I think that the great irony is that's what most agency owners are dangerous enough to do some damage, right? And, and what it ends up being is they refuse to remove themself from fulfillment altogether. And if you don't remove yourself from fulfillment, you, you're going to end up being stuck in that really forever. And what it comes down to in terms of success for building an auto fulfillment process is really understanding like what type of business you're trying to run. I think a lot of people want to throw shade at white label marketing companies, but to me, if that's the business model you want to run, I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with it. There's certainly some danger that if the white label company gets acquired and they change their numbers, that you don't own it. But like, so what? At the end of the day, you're smart enough to likely figure out a different solution thereon. To me, it's really focusing on what your strengths are. For me, as an example, when I was running my PI agency, the idea of me trying to learn how to run Google Ads was a joke. Like just, I don't know anything about this kind of stuff and wasting my time on it was so silly. I spent $1,000 on a course in like 2015 on how to run ads on on Google. And as soon as I started the course, I was like, this is stupid. This is just dumb. Like, there's no way that I'm going to become even mediocre enough to be able to get results at the level that I can sell. Because my sales skill is so clearly far and beyond my ability to understand data, numbers, strategy. I don't even think I'm a good marketer still. And I'm okay with that because I don't need to be, because my team is. And the people that I pay is. You have to identify what your strengths are. And in order to make sure that you delegate fulfillment, it really comes down to two pieces. One, if you are the expert, you need to make sure you have documented processes to hire someone else to to do them for you. Or if you're not the expert, you need to hire someone internally that's the expert or a white label team to do it. And I think those elements are often missed by most people. They refuse to accept that because they're so dedicated to ensuring that they deliver results over and over, which I appreciate and respect. I only want people selling with integrity. But if you're doing that based off of I need to learn everything myself, you're never going to get there. Right. It has to ultimately be the opportunity to get out of the fulfillment black hole. Right. Want to do it all yourself in the beginning, you don't want to make sure that you're the one handling all of the results for every single person. And what I like to tell people is, as the leader of your agency, your job is not to get things done. It's to get things done through other people. And when you get too deep into the fulfillment, you get stuck in the business, you get trapped, and you never allow yourself to get out. So you just need to create clarity on the exact roles and people. You need to deliver amazing results to get your clients the results that they want without your direct involvement so that you can grow. Otherwise, you will never be able to get out of it. This is why it's a standalone system outside of the A team, because some people will be like, well, isn't this just part of the A team? The A team is the whole business. It's not just fulfillment. If you do not separate the fulfillment. We're misunderstanding the key, most important characteristic, which is retaining your clients. You cannot build A business if you're consistently turning them, which is why I've separated them into this format.

Such wise words. Again, I think that need for control that a lot of agency owners have is part of what keeps them. I talk about being stuck on the. Excuse me, being stuck on the client service hamster wheel of doom. And I think a lot of agency owners, because they tell themselves this story that no one will do it as well as me, they find it very difficult to let go. And then, of course, they quickly become the bottleneck because there's only one of them. And then they get stressed and they wonder why on earth they're doing what they're doing.

And I want to add one quick thing to this, particularly for people that aren't just like a little dangerous, but are actually like expert marketers, because it's a totally different thing. Like people that are expert marketers that now want to build a business where they're not involved. First and foremost, I think Rob and I will both agree. We know that is extremely challenging. We understand that right. When we're talking about in the last five minutes is for the people that really don't know what they're doing, and you just got to let it go for the people that are amazing. The problem is it's like asking sometimes Picasso to put down the, you know, the. The. What's it called? The brush, right? And to hire someone else to do the painting. And it seems like sacrilege almost. Let me clarify, though, right? You have to identify if you want to be a freelance artist, right? A freelance marketer, or if you want to build a business. And here's what I tell people that are the Picasso of marketing, right? Probably inflating their ego a little bit. But in general, what I would tell you is build the simple system, right? That you can create revenue from. That creates freedom for you to do what you want in freelance marketing. So if you've built a business that's generating you $50,000 recurring revenue per month, $20,000 take home. Now you want to take on a project that's by yourself, $10,000, $6,000 a month, where you get to, you know, pick up your brush and do enjoyable marketing work and build out these crazy funnels and proposals, by all means, you get to choose to do that. Rob nor myself get to tell you if that's right or wrong, you get to choose that. But doing that as a choice consistently and then telling yourself that you're frustrated about how much work you're doing and you don't have A build business, that's your choice also. So I like to tell those specifically to people that are really artists. But let's be frank here. The amount of people that are that level of artistry is less than 5%, probably of this market. 95% of this market are salespeople who don't know anything about marketing, that don't know how to run ads. The 5% that are exceptional at it, just build the business and then come back to it maybe six, ten months down the line and then you can go back to where your skills lie.

Yeah, you definitely can't have it both ways, can you? And I think a lot of people get frustrated, but they behave like the freelancer, but they don't want to be it. I think one nugget that you said that is a certainly lesson I've learned is that you need to document your processes. If you. You need to get some of the stuff that's in your head out onto paper so that other people can follow. So that not only can you let go, but also it means that your customer is going to get a consistent experience, no matter who they're working with. Let me just dig into number seven now before we wrap this up. And this was interesting. You talked about the importance of running inbound ads as the only scalable thing. Now that is interesting because I always talk to people about the importance of building their email list and how they need to nurture their list to get those inbound inquiries. So. But you talked about ads being the number one thing. So let's just sort of try to square those two different approaches.

And let me clarify, right. I don't think it's mutually exclusive. I do think building an email list is extremely valuable over time. I just think in terms of the fastest way to consistently grow, predictably, it's always going to be ads, right? It's the most consistent way to book interested leads on your calendar. There's such a different approach than when you email someone, when you direct mail someone, when you prospect someone. We go in person. You are the party that's saying are you interested? Versus an ad. Essentially a billboard online that says here's an offer and someone clicks on it because they are interested. The intent is so drastically different that it will make a massive difference in your sales long term. Ultimately, outbound is great when you use it at the right times, when you're just starting or you don't run ads yet or your ads aren't working. But to have another channel on top of ads to trickle in leads is still valuable. But in my opinion, all outbound is a means to inbound, all of it. Because the idea comes down to the more that you invest into ads, the more opportunities you have. The more opportunities you have, the more at bats you get to test your offers and sales processes. The more at bats and testing of your offers, the more opportunity you have to sell. The more opportunity you have to sell, the more money you make, and so on and so forth. It's just the simplest, most effective way. Is it also the riskiest? Of course it's the riskiest because you're going to have to spend money to do it, right? This is why most people do the other prospecting solutions. But I would tell you, if you really just want a head start, here's the absolute reality, right? And this is going to scare a lot of people. But I know an agency, okay, in the real estate marketplace, very saturated niche, okay, that started in the beginning of this year. They started and within three months they had 10 clients. I know it's not a lot. All of those were people that they know from outbound, right? They used every single cent of profit to put into ads. They started putting in $10,000 a month into ads, got some results, but they were negative for two months. A lot of people would have a heart attack at that point. But then here's what happened. They got a loan for their business because they recognized that they're getting a lot of calls, and if they just made a little bit more sales, they'd be not only profitable, but significantly profitable. They started putting in $40,000 a month into ads. They now run an agency that does over $350,000 per month with a profit margin of roughly 35%. They're not good at retention, bluntly. They're not great at results, bluntly, they're kind of just focused on agency sales, which I don't really like. But that's not the purpose of today's, you know, conversation. But it's just proof of what's capable. There have been agencies in the real estate space working for five years still stuck at like $35,000 a month. You know why? Because they spend $1,000 on ads a month or nothing. At the end of the day, it's a simple math equation. If you're worried about cost per lead and total ad spend, you're misunderstanding. It's the cost per acquisition and then the lifetime value. If you have a lifetime value, that's pretty significant, meaning your clients are retaining with you a long time. You could spend up to 20% of that lifetime value to acquire that client. Because we're playing a long term game, right? So if your average client pays you $10,000 over three months, you can pay up to 2K 2K to acquire them. And 2K is a lot of money to acquire a new client. But when they're paying you the 10th or 15th or 20th or 30th time, you won't care that you spent that amount of money, even if you lost money in the first month. So it's just math. And look, I'm not the biggest math fan by any means, but it's just simple math. And, and, and really what it comes down to more than anything, Rob, I think, is fear. A lot of people fear making investments into their business, which, look, I completely respect and understand, but that's what it takes long term.

And do you think, listen, this is a whole rabbit hole. We could go down for another podcast. But do you think that strategy works as well for B2B businesses? I'm just asking you that because most of my clients are in the B2B space. They're not in the direct to consumer sort of space.

So most of my clients are B2B. So I think it works in every industry. Um, the difference is the sales process. Some sales processes, you are able to speak directly to the person that's going to buy, and other sales processes, like, for example, attorneys or doctors or nonprofit organizations or political organizations. The reality that you're going to get on a call with someone right away and sell them is unlikely. You're probably going to get on with Mary, who then has to convince David, who then has to convince Charlie, and then Charlie will make the investment. Is it a little bit longer? Yes. Will that extend your investment time? Absolutely. Your sales process might be three or six weeks instead of a day, in which case, you know, you have to have the longevity of the financing, but you have to be serious about what you're growing here. 100% works B2B. But I also, again, understand my positioning of saying this is a lot easier than people having the audacity to do it. I'm not the one spending 50 grand, you are. So that has to be your call and your choice. My recommendation, at minimum is 10% of your recurring revenue. But if you're at 20k a month and you're spending two grand on ads, you're going to grow, grow slowly. That is just the truth. That is the truth. So hopefully this helps some people get out of their fear of investing. But 100%, it works. B2B as well as B2C.

Yeah. And I guess you need to find a good partner to help you run those ads. I think you need to have your eyes open that your initial investment is research to find the right message and the right audience and all that stuff.

I can give a quick tip on this, Rob. Very simply and very quickly, all you have to do to start is just run Facebook lead ads. It's the low cost type of ad to run because you don't have to get them off of Facebook and into like a whole funnel. Plus then you don't have to like build the whole funnel and take all that time just running an extremely direct offer. The most blunt offer you can do. Let's say you work with chiropractors, for example. It's like, hey, chiropractor, do you want 10 new patients every single month, guaranteed? Click on this ad. The most blunt ad you can possibly run. Obviously need someone good with targeting. That's not me. And then just see what the results are. Call speed to lead as fast as possible. If you have someone that's on your team, that appointment sets. If they, if they book an appointment, call them right away. Hey, this is the result that we're promising you. Do you want this? They don't care about the delivery mechanism or how it works. They just want the result. Confirm that they want this. The prospect quality will certainly be lower than on a funnel process, but the costs will be lower and you'll be able to see what's working so that you can then build a funnel. This is a very low barrier of entry. Anyone listening to this podcast can literally run this ad in less than 30 minutes. Now, Facebook has to approve it, which will probably take like a day, but in general, it will take you less than 30 minutes to set it up. And it works. It does, yeah.

So interesting. Like I said, a whole other. Whole other topic, I think, for another podcast. Really, really interesting. I hope people have written down those seven systems. I hope they have thought about what they need to do to implement in them in your. In their agency. So a couple of things, really. Let me first of all ask you the question that I ask all of my guests, which is if you can go back in time and give your younger self just starting out in business one piece of advice, what would it be?

Yeah, it's kind of a shocking one, but it's. Go slower. I'll tell you this really quickly, but when I was 18 years old is when I found out that I was born with a congenital heart defect. I was born with what's called a bicuspid aortic valve. Aortic valve is supposed to open up with three leaflets. It looks like a Mercedes Benz sign or a peace sign. Mine opened up in a semicircle because that third leaflet was attached to. To the second. And so blood leak back into the heart. And just like any muscle that overworks, eventually that muscle grows in size. And in terms of your heart, there's a point of no return where if it grows in size, it has to be transplanted out, which is a significantly more dangerous surgery than aortic valve replacement. Medicine is incredible, by the way. 99% of aortic valve replacements are survived, Especially people of my age. I mean, it's just amazing. It's crazy to think about it. If you look it up and see what the surgery is, very not safe for work warning. But if you look, it's just crazy, like what medicine can be, what medicine can do. But in general, you know, when you're 18 years old and you find that out, I think when you're that young, you anticipate hopefully having a long life. But my thought process was, maybe now I'm capped to like, 60 or 70 years old because they said I would probably have the surgery when I'm 50 or 60, but 100% guaranteed I would have to have this surgery. So what I did from 18 to 29, basically, when I found out I had to have it 30 years before they told me I was supposed to have it, I burned the midnight oil. Always. I rev the engine into the red every day. Always. High anxiety, high stress, high emotions, like nothing was good enough. I'm always having to work more. I'm not doing good enough consistently. And then you get told by a doctor 10 years later that what is the results of this overworking and revving the engine? Well, you accelerated your heart problem, essentially, and now you have to have surgery, and it is possible you die. Unlikely, but it's possible. And then everything you worked for in the. In the first place is gone. So to me, it's. Go slower, be more intentional. I'm a very intentional person. I journal every single day about what I want from that day. I'm trying to have satisfaction and excitement. And I'll leave you all with this. And it's really important to me. And I tell this to every client I work with. Do a journal every day about the main emotion that you had about this business. And most people, when they hear this, this journal prompt, they get very nervous because over the last 365 days. They would estimate that more than half of them they'll put stressed, lack of fulfillment, anxious, frustrated, annoyed, irritated. And when you look at that and you recognize life is so precious, time is the most valuable resource we have. You're spending the majority of your time frustrated, anxious, annoyed, irritated, lack of fulfillment, something's really wrong. Right. And the crazy thing is you have agency, not a marketing agency. Agency as in choice. Right. And the choice that you are choosing to make is these feelings leading you instead of identifying intentionally what you really want. And that's why I'm such a big believer of the define, design and do process. And that to me is the lesson I would tell my younger self.

Wow. So that's so powerful and such good advice. And also, well, just really thought provoking the fact that like you say, most people's emotion would not be a positive one and that's what's making up the majority of their day. So thank you for sharing that.

Of course. And I want to just say, by the way, for me, I'm not in the in the mindset of every day is perfect. Still, even after surgery, habits don't get broken, you know, in two years. It takes time and I'm committed to that. I'm sharing with you because I know you need to hear it as much as I need to hear it too. I'm not sitting on a high horse saying I'm happy, perfect, fulfilled every single day. I'm always working towards getting better.

Fantastic. Yeah. Thank you. And if people wanted to find out more about you, Alex, where would the best place for them to go?

Yeah, easiest place is prospectingondemand.com probably a lot easier than trying to spell my name. But hey, I mean, if you're listening to this and want to guess how to spell my name, you know, I'd be impressed. Schlinsky, what do you think? It's S C, H, L, I, N, S K Y. But I bet you got that wrong. But if you want to try to find me online, you can. Prospectingondemand.com's the easiest place though.

I will share that link in the show notes. I just want to say a huge thank you for joining us today. That was so insightful. And I'm pretty sure everyone would have got a bunch of key learnings that they probably didn't expect they would get from the title of this episode. So I really want to say thank you again for joining us today.

Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it.