How Ryan Went From $0 to $40,000 by Running Two Agencies (while still in college)

In the last month or two, like, we were, we were closing anywhere from kind of 30 to 40%, which is pretty, pretty solid. And yeah, I think, you know, going to his calls and, you know, getting feedback on calls that, that I'd have myself was just. Was just huge. And getting some tough criticism from him at times, which was. Which is very needed, I think was great. But yeah, definitely sales was a big thing that, you know, I wouldn't say I had the skill of when I came in, and now I'd say it's probably one of my stronger attributes as a founder for sure.

What's going on, guys? Andre Hagel Jr. Here from client Ascension, here with one of our most successful and impressive students who's also a college student, funny enough, at the same time that he's scaling multiple businesses that you're about to hear more about in this interview. So, Ryan, welcome to the show, bro.

Thank you for having me, Andre. Pleasure to be here, man.

Yeah, of course, dude. I'm pumped to just hear like and learn about all the success that you've been having in the program because I'm not tracking things every single day. And I know you're scaling really fast and you're doing a whole lot and it's just an awesome story. So let's just start from the very beginning just to give the audience a quick recap. What you're going to hear about in today's interview is how Ryan joined the program with one or two clients right around $1,000 a month. So he was just getting started with his agency and has now scaled that agency to around 15 to 17k a month. At the same time, he started a new agency that's also at 20 to 25k a month. And at the same time, he's working at our other software company called Liskit part time, doing some amazing work for hundreds of clients that we work with over there. And at the same time, he's a college student. So, dude, I don't know how you do it. I think this might even be a masterclass in regards to time management. But let's just start from the beginning. Where were you at when you first joined Client Ascension? How'd you learn about the program? Why'd you join? Fill us in on that.

100%, man. So it was pretty funny. I think, like a lot of people that end up in ca. I believe it was Daniel somewhere on Twitter. And so I was really early in the whole online business space and I actually, my first kind of introduction in it was coming to the Tampa event last year in October. And so I think I had started the agency probably about a month or two before, like didn't really know much at all and then went to the event, met a bunch of people there, met you and the rest of the founders there and I think that was really big for me. Just kind of seeing that everything is real and just kind of getting a sense of some of the people there and then learning from a few of those speakers was definitely big for me. Came back home and a few months after that joined the program there and then kind of got started learning from everyone there.

That's so awesome, bro. Yeah, I remember you were in the liskit school community when we first launched and we did some giveaways. So I'll have to run that back because we have again our event in Tampa this October on October 26th. And if you guys are listening in, it's probably still before the event at the time this is posted. And so go to client AscensionIO Tampa Dash 2024, 2024 and you'll be able to see more information about that event. Ryan just hit on and tickets and the whole agenda. We have some really cool speakers coming in and just all the people that will be in attendance, like Ryan, I think you're going to be there.

Of course. Of course.

So awesome. So if you want to meet me, Ryan and the rest of the founders and all other agency owners incline Ascension and that are just really focused on growth, that's definitely the place to be on October 26th in Tampa, but awesome, dude. So you went to the event, got exposed to kind of what everyone else is doing and that this is possible for someone like yourself. And then a few months later you joined the program. So how did you go from where you were at when you first joined the program to where you're at now? Just talk us through like the growth stages of being at like you said, 1k a month or whatever it was to now 17k. Obviously there was a lot that happened in between but like what were some of the main milestones along the way?

100%. I think it was funny when I first joined, I DM'd a bunch of people in Slack, like some guys that I knew from the program that I met in cinema that were, you know, super successful with they were doing. And I asked and I was like, what's some main things that I can do to really try and grow as fast as I can? And common answer from a lot of them was show up to every call that you can. And so I think there was a span, probably a month or two span where I think I went to every single call. And so learning from all of the different coaches that are in there and picking up a whole bunch of different skills, I improved my sales game. I was writing better copy my social media content and things were better that way. And so I think, you know, obviously it takes a few months for you to really see the effects of a few of those things, but I think a few months in, you know, the growth was there pretty quick and myself as a business owner and kind of getting a team built out under me as well was really important and all just learned from the coaches in there and showing up to literally every single call and then yeah, I think that really just kind of built me a good foundation and then just kind of went from there.

That's awesome, bro. Yeah. I mean, the two things that stand out that you did that I recommend every single student that's in the program or will be joining the program, Client ascension or any coaching program that is there any online community of other business owners is one. Like, reach out and connect with as many other community members as possible and don't be the guy that reaches out and is like, hey, my name's Ryan, I sell this. Are you interested more. So be like, hey, I saw you're in the program. I saw you're doing great. You're in the Winds channel. You've been in here for a while. I even saw you as a case study on Andre's YouTube video. Like, what have you done to get the most value out of this program? Like, how do you extract the most value? And so that is a great strategy, dude. And then that led you to then obviously attending the coaching calls, which we have like dozens of live coaching calls every single week across all the different topics that you need to know about and master to be, you know, efficient agency owner. And that obviously proves successful for you as well because you got answers and insights on things to work on. I wanted to kind of do like a crash course real quick because if you break down an agency business, really all it comes down to is lead gen sales and fulfillment. So if we could just go one by one and maybe you share some insights on. Let's just start with lead generation. How do you start generating more leads for your cold email agency again from before and after? Because obviously like leads is where it all starts. If you don't have leads, you don't have anyone to close. And if you don't have anyone to close, you don't have anyone to fulfill. So how do you solve that problem first? What were some lead generation methods or strategies that worked then and even still now?

100%. I think right away one of the few things that I did was I would just talk to Christian and Niall, who are two coaches inside of CA a lot. I would go to their calls pretty much every Monday, I think it was, and I'd get my scripts reviewed by them and we'd go over a bunch of stuff that way. And I think just testing, you know, especially in cold email, which is the channel that I've relied on the most, the very, very start, you know, a lot of tests, a lot of different scripts that I'd write and really just kind of seeing what was working there. And then one thing I did kind of on the more organic side is, you know, as we were starting to generate results, as there was insight and things that I kind of, I'd pick up on along the ways, you know, posting on Twitter. I got a few clients from the Twitter side of things and really just kind of sharing expertise and things that you would learn from, you know, doing this all day, every day. I think that definitely helped on the social media side as well, for sure.

Yeah. And there was some interesting thing that happened obviously in our space a couple months back where cold email is essentially proclaimed to be dead and that it doesn't work anymore. And obviously we're sitting here, both you and I, scaling cold email offers, using cold email to grow our own business still successfully. So what was it like being inside of a program like client attention that teaches cold email during times like that? Cause I know you've showed up to some coaching calls and put some messages in the group saying, hey, like, how are you guys navigating this? How did being part of a community like client ascension, not even like the content that we're putting out about the situation, but just being around other people that were talking about it and looking for solutions around the issue. Like, how did that help and impact, you know, you being able to stick it out and make it out on the other end as a better cold emailer and as a better business owner and just with more revenue and now clients to serve.

Totally. I think I couldn't imagine not having a community like this while that was going on. I mean, that was a pretty scary time for a lot of us, I think. But being able to just, you know, bounce ideas off one another or hearing from a lot of the really talented people inside of there, of, hey, this is working great for me now or hey, this isn't working anymore. And you know, having people who are experts at this stuff to kind of turn to for questions and to get answers right away was definitely a huge relief for the business and for myself and being a founder. Right. Because it was some pretty scary times. So I think just having that network of people to bounce ideas off of, kind of seeing what was working and what wasn't during that time was really, really big. To get kind of the first step on new developments that were coming out or whatnot.

Yeah, I mean, like you said, it's not just learning the actual skill sets and new strategies, but also navigating the times as a owner. Like, the stress levels were definitely increased, the fear was definitely increased. And that's not a great feeling. And so just being surrounded by other people that can empathize with that and also relate to that is in itself already so beneficial. And so that's great that you pointed that out because I see the value in that as well. Like, I think as business owners, we have to stick together and band together and support each other because there are some dark days. And it's our responsibility to stay in business so we can continue to serve our end clients at a really high level for a really long time. So, okay, lead generation, we talked about that. How about sales? Right. So you mentioned you're still doing founder led sales, which I love. I think you should do founder led sales for as long as you can until there's too many sales calls on calendar for you to take, which is also a great problem to have in a place to be in business. But what is it like doing founder led sales and how did your sales process, techniques, strategies improve through being in the program 100%.

With that, I have one very easy answer, and that is my man, David Jacob. I went to his call for months on end. I think naturally I'm a extroverted person, but in terms of sales structure wasn't really something that I was just kind of naturally comfortable with. So going to his calls and really learning, you know, psychology and like frames and tactics and things like that and just how to ask good questions I think was huge for my sales. Like in the last month or two, like we were, we were closing anywhere from kind of 30 to 40%, which is pretty, pretty solid. And yeah, I think, you know, going to his calls and you know, getting feedback on calls that, that I'd have myself was just, was just huge. And getting some tough criticism from him at times, which was, which is very needed, I think was great. But yeah, definitely. Sales was a big thing that, you know, I wouldn't say I had the skill of when I came in and now I'd say it's probably one of my stronger attributes as a founder for sure.

That's awesome, dude. And it's such an important skillset. Not just with the business you're running now, but I'm sure it also applied to what you're doing with your other agency and just other aspects of life. And yeah, David's great because David's the type of guy that is not afraid to tell you what you need to hear.

Right.

I feel like I'm more like I want everyone to, to like me and I want to tell them what they want to hear and give them advice that makes them happy. But David, especially when it comes to sales, he'll tell it to you straight and he doesn't really care if your feelings are hurt. He just cares that you're getting better, you hear what you need to hear and you're improving. And it's up to you at the end of the day on how you hear that feedback and coaching. Right. A lot of people might take offense to it or be butt hurt by it and decide that no, like he's wrong, like I'm just going to keep doing it this way. But try it and see and watch how your sales close rate increases and how your sales conversations just go better. And it's not for sales at least it's not just a, a metric of what's your close rate. It's also like how does it carry over into fulfillment? Because if you're selling and you have a great close rate but you're selling them false promises or you're not properly aligning them with the expectations on what's going to happen with fulfillment, you're just going to create problems for yourself in this next category which is fulfillment. And so obviously sales has a lot to do with that. But also fulfillment is no joke. It's not like this thing that just kind of happens automatically as I'm sure you know, especially with cold email. You gotta write scripts, build leads, list, set up sending tools, manage technology, handle bugs with different softwares that you don't own or have control over. And so it's a lot. Manage clients expectations, answer emails, do one on one calls, report stats, hire team members, manage those team members, review type forms, have one on one meetings, fire people. It's a lot of. And so how have you improved? Obviously when you joined the program you didn't have a team because you're just getting started and you didn't have a whole ton of clients to fulfill. So how did the program help you with building out processes and systems and even hiring some people to help with your growth?

100%. I think if I was to say the number one skill that I probably got from Client ascension, it would be how to manage operations and become a better, I guess, CEO to say like I came in, you know, basically like a freelancer. Right. It was just me running everything, I was handling all the back end, I was doing everything. And now we're up to a team of four and just the offside feels so much more structured and dialed in. And so, you know, a lot of that was to do with, you know, course content that I watched through and would check out pretty hard and then coming to your calls too.

Right.

We're definitely helpful in the hiring process and making sure that we're getting the right people on board. But yeah, I think ops is an area that I guess agency owners don't always focus on as much as they should because everybody wants to just sell, sell, sell. But super, super important and probably the biggest skill that I've learned being in the program so far, I would say.

Oh wow, dude, that's awesome. That's awesome to hear. I did not expect that because obviously in client ascension our big focus as well as helping people with marketing because you need marketing and sales to even have to begin to worry about fulfillment. But yeah, fulfillment is definitely that next issue that a lot of people get stuck at and also affects sales and marketing too because if you don't do a good job, it's really going to slow down sales and marketing because you have to spend all your time on fulfillment rather than doing sales and marketing. But that's awesome to hear and I love what you said about going from being a freelancer to a business owner and like you said, like an actual CEO. And that's kind of like what our entire fulfillment and operations content and coaching is based around is like taking you from being like just like a teenager, online business owner, guru, money Twitter guy, college student that doesn't really know what they're doing, just kind of figuring things out. To a professional CEO business owner that has operations dialed, team managed and clients getting results. And so that's awesome to hear, dude. And I'm sure that is reflecting in your churn rate being super low referrals probably you're getting from clients, case studies, you're getting from your clients and so on and team members as well that it sounds like you've already, you know, made some key hires. So.

Really?

That's awesome to hear, man. That's really awesome to hear. How about this other agency that you briefly mentioned at the start? So it sounds like this is something that I just heard about, like a day ago, so it was really cool to hear about. So another huge benefit of being in a program like client ascension is you're surrounded by tons of other business owners. And what that does is it presents opportunities, especially if you have a skill set that you sharpened or learned about or just improved upon in the program that can apply to other people's businesses or potential opportunities or ventures. And so explain to us what happened, basically, going from your agency that's currently growing to adding on this other agency and how you found your business partner, how that relationship, that partnership works, and how you guys have had so much success in such a short period of time.

100%. So the partner that I'm working with is somebody that I met at the Tampa event last year. It was funny because we didn't really connect after that for the longest time, like, we had, we followed each other and, like, kind of stayed in touch, but not anything too, too close. And then kind of mid summer or so, he kind of came to me with an idea that was really in the wheelhouse of, you know, the cold email skills and running outbound and go to market for companies. And it just seemed like a home run, this skill set that he has and what I do. And so we've been teaming up for the last three months or so, kind of targeting a bit of a different space than a lot of the typical marketing agencies, I guess, kind of position themselves in. But no, it's been great. I think having a business partner, especially with a background of, you know, being someone who's been in client ascension before, I think we both just have a really strong foundation and so kind of bouncing off each other. Like, it's cool seeing different things that we both picked up from the program that we're now applying to this, which has been a pretty good success so far, and hopefully we can continue to scale this for the next little while.

That's awesome, bro. Yeah, I know. Your business partner is awesome. I had no idea you guys first met and connected at the event. And it's cool too, because partnerships happen at the event all the time. Like last year, even, like Dylan and Alex from Stacks Accounting, they're crushing it now. They actually just joined our new mastermind offer called Olympia. They were both running independent companies before the event. At the time of the event. And at the event they basically just realized, what are we doing here? Why not partner and team up on this and scale this thing to the moon together? And they did. And there's so many more examples of partnerships that happen at our previous events and I'm sure will continue to happen at these upcoming events. But yeah, dude, that's awesome to hear. And it's cool too that like the opportunity fit right into your wheelhouse of what you are really good at and I'm sure like running that business. I don't know because we've not talked about it yet, but is that business like fun for you to run because you just get to focus on what you're really good at and enjoy doing?

Totally. Yeah. I'd say it's, you know, fun being a founder and it's fun kind of wearing all the hats in the business. But there's some kind of joy that I think you get when you have a project that's just, you know, right in your wheelhouse of what your skill set aligns with. And so that's kind of what I've been able to to do with what we're running in this kind of different agency. And so it's been nice to like just focus on that. And I mean like we have I think five or six case studies and testimonials. We've only been around as a company for three months or so. So it's been nice to just really be able to focus on client work and kind of drive home results that way. So yeah, been a blast so far. It's been good.

Dude, that's so awesome. And then this last opportunity we'll talk about just because there's so much going on, dude, which I'm pumped for you because you're a young guy. How old are you again, by the way? I know you're in school, but how old are you?

Yeah, I'm 21.

21? Yeah. It's crazy, dude. Like you're gonna be like an absolute mogul in this space. Yeah, dude, I'm really excited for you. But anyways, going into this next opportunity that basically came up as a part of you being in the program. How did the opportunity to work with Liskit. So we have Liskit, which is my software company. It's based around cold email. Obviously it's a way to get leads for your cold email campaigns and we're scaling an offer that requires really talented people in the cold email space. Even if it's a part time opportunity, which is the One that we'll get more into. How do you find that opportunity, hear about it, and land the opportunity to now work with the same guys, Christian and Niall, that you're joining their coaching calls pretty much all the time when you first joined the program?

100%, yeah, I think it was just a message that you guys put in slack there. And I think seeing the growth of Blisskit so far, it's been just really cool to see how you guys have handled things and being completely bootstrapped. I think it's something really cool as well. And so when I saw that role and I mean, I write a lot of scripts so I would think that I'd be a pretty good fit for it. And then, you know, doing that, but then also being able to, just to learn from you guys even more. Again, talking about the op side and the fulfillment side and really how to have a team so dialed in was something that I wanted to learn from, from you and the rest of the team as well. So, you know, being able to kind of team up with people that I've been learning from this whole time, that I've been able to get to where I'm at now, like it was pretty much a no brainer for me to, you know, join up and help out.

Yeah, it's so cool, man. It's so cool. And I guess being a part of that team, right, because that team at Liskit is onboarding hundreds of clients every single month, which is obviously a lot how, I guess what are some things you've learned not just from the work that you do as a part of that team, but just from being a part of the team. Being in meetings, being in the slack, maybe even some things you saw that we were doing that you're like, hey, let me apply that to my agency as well. Yeah.

I think the environment that you guys curate, like I know Dan, who handles the sales side of things, like the way that I'll see him motivate different reps and just getting people like super bought in was something that I found really, really cool. Like, I mean, my team is still quite small right now, but just that same kind of level of intensity and of, you know, thoroughness that the entire team has, I thought was something really commendable. And that every business owner, every, you know, person that's managing other people should try to get instilled in your employees and your team. It's so important to have everyone on the same page with the same like, beliefs. And so I think the way that you guys do that is something that I picked up on in just like the first few weeks that was really impressive and something that, you know, I'm definitely trying to implement with my team for sure.

So awesome, bro. I love it. Awesome, dude. Yeah. I mean, I'm pumped for you. Just seeing everything you've been able to accomplish since we met. I remember meeting for the first time at the event last year because you were one of the guys I specifically picked. I always said I closed my eyes to randomly pick community, but I really didn't. I remember it was you and Zach Schieffer, who's doing really well. He's been in client's engine for a while now too. But I picked you guys from the Lizkit community mostly just because I saw how much passion you guys had towards learning cold email and starting your own agencies and doing your own thing. And so it's just really cool to see since last year's event how much you've accomplished since then. Just, you gotta be proud of yourself for how far you've come. And I'm sure, just like everyone else in this space, it's never satisfied, right? It's always like, all right, how can I keep growing? How can I get better? How can I hit the next goal? But take some time this weekend, bro, to just remember, like, just appreciate how far you've come, because it really is impressive. And I can only imagine in a couple of years when you're my age, 24, you got three years, dude. Like, man, I'll be learning from you. So keep crushing it, bro. If you can, just let the audience know where they can find you. I always say, outside of like your social medias and stuff like that, if you're in client ascension, shoot Ryan a DM the same way he shot a ton of students DMs when he first joined and probably still now. And also if you're going to be at the event in Tampa in October, you'll obviously get a chance to meet myself and Ryan and so many other people there. But outside of those places, Ryan, where can our audience connect with you?

Yeah, for sure. I think I had the same handle on pretty much every platform. It's just Ryan Bryden with two ends on Brighton, so should should be able to find me there. I'd say I'm probably most active on Twitter, so happy to engage with anyone that wants to there.

Love it. Awesome, dude. Well, this has been awesome. Just to catch up. I know we're both so busy and even though we even do some work together at List Kit, it's just like, we're on team meetings, and then we're off. So just having the opportunity to hear more about your success and your journey up to this point has just really been a highlight of the day so far. So I'm excited for people to hear this and listen to this and hopefully be inspired to take action. Join Client Ascension. Show up to our event in October. There's still tickets left at client ascension.IO-/tampa. 2024. We'll just link it up. Yeah, it's somewhere there. You'll find it. If not, just reach out to myself or Ryan, and we'll. We'll put you to the right place. But, dude, keep crushing it. Thanks for coming on. And thanks, everyone, for listening in.

Thanks, guys.