Ex In-Home Sales Pros Chat About What It Takes To Be The Best - The Sales Bull

What's going on, y'all? Welcome back to the Sales Bro Pod. This is gonna be episode 4 with the Sales Bull. You guys may know him off of Twitter as a B2C, big B2C advocate. Um, Mr. Sales Bull, thank you for coming on to the show.

Hey, no worries, man. Happy to be here.

So I typically like to start things out with, for those of you that don't know who you are and what you do and, you know, specifically what kind of sales you do, do you mind giving us a little bit of a rundown of what you're currently doing?

Yeah, of course, man. So I've been in sales for about 12, 13 years now, and I've flicked back and forth many, many times between B2C and B2B. Always hated B2B, but it sort of felt like that's what you're supposed to do, you know, the old sort of suit and tie jobs working for a tech firm. Do you know what I mean? It's sort of what, what you're supposed to do, whereas B2C has got this impression that it's a bit grubby, there's not enough money. And then what I've found over the past few years is that that's absolute nonsense. And look, I can't speak for the US, but in the UK you can make just as much, if not significantly more money in the B2C game. So that's what I'm doing at the moment. Uh, so I'm selling solar, which I think there's a lot of people, uh, on our side of Twitter doing, and I enjoy interacting with anybody who's in the solar game. And then also, because I'm in Europe and we have poorly built cold houses, uh, an awful lot of home insulation as well, which I think is something that people forget a lot about, and it's almost the other side of solar. Um, whereas solar is generating energy for people, Insulation is saving energy for people. So slightly different pitch, slightly different way of selling it, but a massively underrated product. Uh, yeah, that's what I'm doing at the moment in the commission-only game.

Got it. Yeah, so commission-only. Is this, is this a primarily in-person thing that you're doing?

100% in person. The occasional bit of phone sales. So we do what are called sweeps. A lot of people who've worked from B2C will be familiar with sweeps. So at the end of the month, we'll call back all of the unsuccessful visits that we've done and, you know, try to sell them a dropdown offer. So there's a little bit of phone sales. But yeah, you know, 90% of this is going into someone's house, sitting them down, chatting about what you're there to chat about and aiming to get a deal on the day. So a lot of urgency to be built.

Gotcha.

Yeah.

And so obviously For most of the guys that are listening from the US in this sales space, you guys know that solar is big money, government incentives, all that. But I'm definitely super interested to learn more about how that works in the UK, being that you guys hardly even get sunshine over there. Yeah, man, I guess I'll be— I mean, honestly, I think you might be the only person that I know That's, that's doing solar in the UK. Like, it's massive over here in California, Texas, Florida. Um, but how did you, how did you even get started in that? Like you said, you've been in sales for, you know, a good while now. When did you realize like, hey, there might be some opportunity here?

So about 4 years ago, I was working for Philip Morris. Have you heard of Philip Morris?

No.

You have heard of them because they sell Marlboro.

Marlboro cigarettes.

Oh yeah, I guess so. Yeah, so, uh, yeah, so obviously that's one of the biggest brands in the world. So I was working for Marlboro cigarettes, um, doing a different few different things for them, uh, basically repping for them, earning good money. And I wanted to do something else because, to be honest with you, as sort of I sell myself as this ruthless guy, but flogging tobacco was a little bit too much for my conscience. So I was looking for something else and I ended up literally bumping into this guy, uh, who owned a firm which was selling, uh, like plumbing stuff, and specifically heating. So I ended up selling boilers, and that sort of opened my eyes to, wow, you can actually earn just as much doing, you know, in-home B2C stuff as you can with a— with an air quotes proper job working for a proper firm. So I did that for nearly 2 years. I then had another sort of crisis of, oh, this isn't a proper job, there's no real career here. I don't know what the hell spun my head into that. And then I went to work for a tech firm in a big proper AE position. You know, there's a lot of guys on, again, on Twitter and that who think that is the absolute top of the tree, the place to be if you're in sales. I hated it. I was quite good at it, but I hated it. Didn't even care how much money I was making because it was an awful job. And so I sacked that off. I knew I wanted to work back in the B2C game. I phoned the guy that I'd worked for before, said, have you got any positions open? He said, no, I haven't, but there's a friend of mine, uh, who owns a solar company. You might want to speak to him. So I gave him a ring. It's all, it's all who you know, mate, do you know what I mean?

Yeah.

It's all the connections you make. Uh, a lot— you can find jobs like this on Indeed, but a lot of it is much more word-of-mouth based. So I gave these people a call last year. I was told, you know, we've heard of you, you've got a good reputation, come and work for us whenever you want. So I did. Um, been doing a lot of solar, but obviously over the winter it— as, because as you just said, there's not a lot of sun in the UK, so it's a difficult pitch, um, in the winter when it's literally snowing. But when you're sat in someone's freezing cold damp house, selling them insulation is a much easier game.

Yep.

So that's how I fell into it really. Um, I don't— I talk about a lot of this, um, I talk about this a lot on my Twitter. It's if you're gonna be in, in B2B, the place to be is tech, and that's where the real money is. And there is an awful lot of money in the UK. There is damn decent money in the US. You know, a basic SDR position can be getting you $100,000, you know, flat wage plus, yeah, you know, $50,000, $100,000 OTE. And you get to live in New York and it's really cool and all the rest of it. And it is a great place to go, tech sales. And I encourage anybody who wants to work in sales, who wants a career for, you know, for want of a better word, to go and work in tech sales. I couldn't because my brain is wired differently to a lot of other people and I couldn't play the game.

Yeah.

I could do the sales. I mean, I was booking meetings, I was closing deals, all the rest of it. Absolutely fine. But I couldn't play the game. I couldn't do the, you know, oh, I'll put in an extra half hour. Yes, boss. No, boss. I couldn't do the silly little corporate events that you have to go to. It just wrecked my brain because I'm not built in that yes, boss, no, boss way. And if you can do that, I recommend people go into tech sales over B2C. But if you're like me, and for want of a better term, you're built different, you can't behave. I I'm totally honest about that. If you can't behave, then you can make as much, if not more money in B2C. Yeah.

No, I completely agree. And I acknowledge that, hey man, this is a really good career path, better than most for people. It's just truly like, what do you want? It's apples and oranges, right?

Yeah.

Like they both work. It's just like, which one fits you better? That's, I personally, Yeah.

Sorry, Michael.

Yeah. So I, I personally have not dove deep into that myself. I did come from like the B2C roofing industry and did really good there, like the whole in-home deal. And I loved it, man. Like I had, you know, great potential, all that stuff. Ultimately, it was kind of dangerous because we had to get up on the roofs, had some close calls, got out. But I did also sell a little bit of solar too, obviously. You know, when you're replacing a roof and there's solar on it, like you, you get to, you get to sell both.

Yeah.

You get to subcontract, mark it up, all that stuff. So I'm curious, like, I know there's going to be a lot of solar or people who are interested or who are selling solar. Like, how does solar work in the UK? Like, is it as appealing to homeowners as it is here?

So I'll tell you what I wouldn't necessarily tell somebody that I'm pitching to. which is the, the unobstructive truth of the matter. And that is, if you've got a south-facing roof and £15,000 to £25,000 spare, it is probably the absolute best investment that you can make. There is nowhere better to put your money. You will not find a bank, an ISA, a stock, an ETF, really even a business that will get you as much money back as laying down £15,000 to £25,000 worth of solar on a south-facing roof. Anything other than that, it becomes less of a good deal. And if you are borrowing money to finance the solar, you are throwing money down the pan and you're not going to see any sort of return on your investment. The reason people still go for it, and I don't know if, if your listeners will know this, so in the UK We have essentially the worst deal in the world when it comes to energy. We have a government that is utterly obsessed with self-imposed carbon emission targets to the point where they're looking to be at zero carbon at 2050, which most people agree is completely impossible and impractical. They're also looking to halve our carbon use by 2030, which is only, you know, 7, 8 years away. So they've completely boxed themselves in on this, and as a result of that, uh, we are no longer producing oil to any significant extent in the North Sea. Get a bit technical here, but bear with me. Uh, and we're also not doing shale gas. So you in America, you guys have fracking, which I know can be controversial, but at the end of the day, it does lower energy bills.

Yes.

We are not allowed shale gas extraction in the UK. We also got— get absolutely screwed on nuclear. because we had in the '90s a sort of anti-nuclear phase, which meant that nothing got built. And all of the— and we also have terrible, terrible planning laws in the UK, which make building windmills very, very difficult. Not impossible, but very, very difficult.

Yeah.

And what that means as a result is that we buy all of our electricity. Oh, we also don't like having the actual power plants that burn gas to produce energy. So we end up having to buy energy off France, Germany, and Holland, who, for want of a better term, screw us over. And as a result of that, we have the highest energy bills in the world here in the UK for both heating and for electric. So when you sit down and explain that to somebody and say, look, if you've got this money available, uh, to put these panels on your roof, it means that you're energy dependent— energy independent. And what that means is, you know, because last year when the Ukraine invasion happened, you know, UK energy bills went up depending on what tariff you're on anywhere between 30 to 70%. And so some people, yeah, a lot of people paying sort of £350 a month for energy and they just simply can't afford it. So if you have these, so I'm just pitching you now, mate, sorry, but if you just have these solar panels on your roof, you know, yes, they are expensive, but you know what the price of it is.

Yeah.

Yeah, if you're paying, yeah, if you get a set of solar, that covers your energy usage and you're then paying, you know, whatever, £200 a month to pay the loan back, you know, you've got fixed cost, you know, it's not going to go up. Whether if you're relying on tapped-in energy, as we saw last year, that can just go up whenever they want really, and then you're screwed and there's nothing you can do about it.

Yeah. So I know, um, here in the US, like I mean, dude, I'm not super, super tapped into solar, but from what I know, like, people don't really pay for these things in cash. And you did mention, hey, if you got £15,000, £25,000 in the bank, it's a good investment for you. Do— are a lot of people financing these things in the UK?

A lot of people are financing, yeah. And it's, um, that's a very recent thing. Nobody used to. And that's a thing in the past 12 months as a result of the Ukraine war pushing the price up. Uh, and it's an, it's an easy pitch because, as I just said to you, do you know what I mean? If you do finance it, you've got a fixed cost. If you're relying on the energy coming in through the tap, it can just be anything and it can just shoot up and there's nothing you can do about it.

Mm-hmm. Uh, interesting.

Yeah, so it's an ideal situation, and I do recommend anybody that has that money does put it down on some solar because you need to, because we're in a really crap place when it comes to our energy generation in the UK. It's a really bad— I don't like shitting on my country, but yeah, but yeah, there's not many positive things to say.

Is solar and I guess the combo of the solar and the insulation, is that a pretty big thing over there that just hasn't made its way over to our end of Twitter? Are you pretty, pretty like lucky to have stumbled across what you're doing?

I'm very lucky to have stumbled across insulation. I'd never considered it, uh, until I contacted these about the solar position and, oh yeah, we also do insulation. Um, you know, do you want to sell that over the winter because you won't sell a lot of solar panels? Okay, yeah, fine. I've found it's so much better to sell. I really, you know, without doxxing myself and without sort of, you know, putting up PDFs of my, my invoices, I can't really prove this. I genuinely think I'm the best insulation salesman in the UK, and I have figures to back that up. Yeah, yeah. I mean, and the reason I can do that, and this is what I tell people, like, I do a little bit of training and stuff, like, yeah, I have people that I look after on that. Anyone selling in-home insulation and anyone selling solar panels, really, to a certain extent as well, you need to come across— obviously coming across as a salesman is nearly always bad. So how should you come across? You should come across as tradesman. So some people wear a shirt or even a suit to these visits when they're selling people insulation, and it's— that's just a stupid idea. That's just not going to make it.

Yeah.

Those people don't last very long. I wear— and I do think this is really— it sounds silly talking about what I wear, but I genuinely think it's very important. So I wear sort of plaid shirts, I wear sort of rough trousers, I wear a pair of clean work boots, you know, with a steel toe cap. And my whole pitch is an awful— I spend 45 minutes in that roof. Most people spend about 10 minutes sort of measuring it, okay, done. I spend about 45 minutes in that roof going over the beams. I make them get up the ladder and come and have a look with me. I point out all the bits that, you know, you've got some moisture coming in here, you know, you've got inadequate ventilation there, this is where the cold's coming in. And the reason I do that is— I tweeted something like this the other day— the best salespeople in the world, or some of the best salespeople in the world, are tradesmen. Because if a plumber comes in your house and he looks at your toilet and goes, that toilet's broken, you need a new one, do you haggle with him? Do you argue with him? Do you throw objections at him? No, you don't. You just go, oh, okay. Oh, oh no, I didn't know it was broken. When can you fix it? I think that's the attitude you've got to bring with it. And then that, that definitely is, is the case for insulation. Transferring that to solar, right? And this is— I was talking to somebody about this the other day. So solar, right? People forget, I think, when they're selling solar, and there are better solar salesmen than me, um, just in the company that I work for. I'm very decent at solar, but I'm not the best. What people forget when they're selling solar is that this stuff is going on the roof of someone's house, and you can make the best financial case for it in the world. You can make it affordable for them, you can sell them the finance on it, you can do anything you want, but people forget that this is a construction project. And I think a lot of people that don't— aren't getting the close rate that they should be getting, they're selling the solar fine, They're not setting their expertise on, and they sort of forget that for the people whose house you are in, you're essentially messing around with their house. You're messing around with their roof, you're putting rails on whatever, you're bolting something to their house, you're messing around with their electrics, you know, you've got to change their consumer unit most of the time. You're installing these big scary batteries that are big scary pots of electricity that we don't really understand properly. you've got to give them that expert, you know, or the impression of the expertise that you know what they're doing with the install. And people forget about the install when it comes to solar, and I think that is incredibly important. And if anyone's going to listen to this and take one thing away, it's that don't, don't forget the construction end of it when you're selling solar, because you are selling a construction— you are trying to gain consent for a construction project on the house that someone sleeps in. Just as much as you're selling an investment.

Yeah. Yeah, dude. That was massive, massive for me. And this goes out to anyone who's in just home services, right? Like contractors, like who do, you know, painting, drywall, flooring, cabinets, concrete, whatever you do.

Anything like that. Yeah.

Yeah, bro. You're working on these people's like likely biggest investment they'll ever make.

Yes.

You know, and it's the investment that protects the people that they love the most. So like, sure, you can be A1 top sales guy, but at the end of the day, if they don't trust you to do a good job on the project, like they're going to go with someone who they do trust. I remember similar to you, I would show up with boots, tucked in polo, work pants, and I wouldn't look like a sales guy. I would look like I mean, I was technically an estimator slash salesperson.

Yes.

And when I would, when I would come down from the roof, I would spend like 20 minutes or so up there. I'd go into the, into the truck, I'd make the estimate. I would like take my time. I'd mark up photos, I'd do all that. And then, so when I get to the, get back to the door, we're talking 30, 40 minutes later, they're like, okay, this guy has like really been working. I usually come sweating 'cause I'm in South Texas. And they're like, man, like he really put in the work. And then I sit them down and I blow up the photos on an iPad in front of them. And I'm— it's undeniable that they need what I have, right?

Yeah.

So it's not even so much about selling, like, oh, you need— you should get this and you should get this shingle and this underlayment and it's going to boost energy efficiency. Like, it's not about that. It's about you have a serious problem. Here's what it looks like. Here's what's going to happen.

And if you don't fix it, You know that, mate, that is exactly so. That is so spot on, and you, you clearly get it and you've clearly done it.

Yeah.

And that's something that, you know, the roof thing does my head in because you will get, uh, you'll get reps that will do 10 appointments, not close anything, and then you go, yeah, you'll go with them to shadow an appointment, and then, oh, here comes the roof inspection bit. They'll stick their head up, take a photo, take a measurement, jam in the moisture reader into one beam and then they're back down in 5 minutes. And you're going, how the hell have you built that trust up? And you can— people sell this stuff, solar especially, um, also insulation, but solar especially. They sell it as an investment, like they're pitching a stock.

Yeah.

And they talk about rate of returns and that. And yeah, that is important, that is important, but stuff like that is normally provided by your company, and you can just, you know, reel that out in whatever way that you do that.

Yeah.

Yeah, what you know. Yeah, it's not about the bloody investment. It's about, you know, because, because they know if you're letting somebody into your house, you know what solar is. You probably have done a lot of research on it. Uh, these customers, you know, prospects have probably done a lot of research. They know roughly how much they're going to generate. They've done— they've looked at batteries, all the rest of it. They've read your Google reviews. What they're looking for is a reason to trust you. And if you're just coming across as a salesman You might pick— you might sell them the idea of solar, but to sell them solar from your company today, you need to build that workmanship trust. And the way that you just said, mate, is spot on.

Yeah, yeah. And so I, like, for context, man, my company was the top rated in the city, but we are also the most expensive. Um, and those 2 things go hand in hand, right? Like, we charge more, we work We're better.

Yeah.

And so people, especially in certain parts of town, I mean, I'm, I'm in San Antonio, Texas. It's a really diverse, it's a big city. It's diverse where you go, you know, one side of town you've got, you know, Maserati, Maseratis, the newest Mercedes-Benz and like, you know, $700,000 house neighborhoods like everywhere.

Yeah.

You drive 20 minutes in a different way and it's like, man, these people are struggling to put food on the table. So like, you have to, you have to be able to differentiate between the two. But I think I was curious because here, here in Texas specifically, I mean, Texas, there's a lot of big cities. Roofing and solar is just absolutely massive. Everybody and their dad wants to have a company because of the insurance work that we get here. There's a lot of hailstorms. Every, almost every hail season, like February, March, April, we get something and then the insurance companies are paying out so big. So with you guys, I mean, and, and that being said, then comes the door knockers. I mean, I've gone to a neighborhood, a brand new neighborhood that really got hit. And then within an hour after the storm, there's like 10, 15 other roofers hitting doors. With, with what you do in, in In the UK, are you knocking doors or are you working inbound inquiries or how does that work?

So I don't knock doors personally. I don't knock doors. I have done that job in the past. I don't knock doors at the moment. So we do have a few door knockers. Don't tend to work in my area. They tend to work in the bigger cities. So I'm not going to say the name of my company, but they have door knockers in London, Birmingham, Manchester. They occasionally go down to Bristol, Southampton, Portsmouth, Cardiff. They only door knock in the, in the cities. In the UK, obviously there's a lot more rural areas. It's not really worth sending door knockers out there. So we have very heavy Facebook and Instagram marketing. So the door knockers are the door knockers. They book the appointments. I very rarely attend an appointment booking by a door knocker because I work in a more rural area. So what we do is the way we get appointments, we have Facebook and Instagram marketing, very, very heavy. Um, I'm sure that the marketers on Twitter and that could have a good go at it. It's really good stuff. We work with some really top people in the UK, uh, on the, on the Facebook and Instagram marketing. They click on that, they fill in their details. Uh, we have a team of whatever you want to call them— appointment bookers, marketers, or SDRs. I don't know what you want to call them. They then contact these people by phone and email, ideally by phone. And they say, look, they pitch very quickly, pitch the product, explain what it is, uh, and then they have someone come around to do a survey. The word salesman is banned. If you say the word salesman, you know, twice on a call, you're being shown the door. Um, we'll send the salesman around is the way to not last your first week doing that job. It's the surveyor.

Yeah.

Again, leading to that sort of tradesman sort of vibe to it. Yeah, so it tends to be. And again, this is why I say my job is actually pretty easy, uh, for the insulation especially. We tend to get called out when there's a problem. So when there's a load of damp in the roof, or when the house is utterly freezing, or when there's like chunks of mould on the, on the beams up in the attic. So you just go, and then this is how people go wrong. They go there and try and sell the products. You do have to do more product talking when you're selling solar, but when I'm selling the phone, And I've, um, written about this before. You don't sell the product. I, I don't use the word insulation. I don't really talk about it at all. I walk in— this is my process, you know what, I might as well just tell you. So the process is I walk in the house, I do the warm-up. People go back and forth on warm-up. I had a really good conversation on Twitter, uh, publicly with Rogue Wealth. I don't know if you know him.

No.

Yeah, really good account. I had a good conversation with him about the importance of warm-up. We disagree on it. I think warm-up is incredibly important. If I can take 45 minutes just sitting there chatting about their dog or whatever, I personally will do that. Not everyone does. I do that. I then go up and do the survey up in the loft. Like I said, I make a really big deal of it, show them up there. I'll spend 45 minutes doing that, looking like a tradesman. I then Pass them the video on my iPad, which has a marketing video on it, which is about 6 minutes long, while I fill in the results of this, you know, of the upstairs survey, while I fill in your, uh, your, your inspection form. Obviously I'm just making stupid notes and stuff, it doesn't really matter, but they watch the video. I, I then say to them, does that make sense to you? They normally go yes. If there is a question, I will deal with it. But if they say yes, I understand it, I leave it there. I just completely just get off it. Okay, fine. Well, now that you understand it, you know, I've got your results here. This would actually work for you for the reasons that I was telling you about earlier. Um, look, if this was £2, would you have it done? Oh yes, I would. Okay, fantastic. Right, no worries. It's not £2. Hahaha. Using that rapport we built earlier, right? We produce the invoice, show them the invoice. What do you think of that? Sometimes they'll just say, yes, fantastic fucking deal. Sometimes they'll go, oh, that is a bit much. We then get into— and we do this unashamedly— subsidies, we call them. Really, they're discounts, right? Well, I can start chopping money off this, that's absolutely fine. Okay, um, would you be— and these are all if questions that build up the sort of persuasion. They're just the idea that we've already made a deal and they haven't said yes yet. Right, could we do an install during the day? Yeah, during a weekday rather than on the weekend? Oh yes, we could do that. All right, fantastic, that's, that's £500 gone because that makes it easier for us. No worries at all. Would you mind if we take photos and videos of the install so we've got before and after pictures to put on the website? Oh yes, that'll be okay. Oh fantastic, that's £300 off. Low, literally, we've got about 10 different options, things like that. But the key is you've got to justify them. You have to justify them.

Yeah.

And then you get to the end, and then eventually you find a price that they like, and then you deal on that. Or, and this is something that we can do because we're a big company, the point of this sort of sales is to get a budget off them. And if you get a budget off them, you've got a deal because you can work it out. And I'll be honest with you, this stuff, if we're doing a 50-meter roof, it can cost anywhere between— we can charge and make money anywhere between £1,500 and about £9,000. Yeah, so you just find— you find their budget, you get their budget out of them, you do— they then do the whole theater. I've done a thread about this before, uh, that I'll retweet. You then, uh, you do the whole pantomime theater, whatever you want to call it, of ringing up the manager. It's called pender them sales. So you're going from one end to the other, you're swinging from you talking to the customer to I better talk to my manager, and you go back and forward, and eventually Oh, wouldn't you believe it, we've managed to get it for the price that you've already told me is your budget.

Yeah.

And that's how it works. And that's how it works, mate. And as I say, if people have got a problem with that, if you want to call that a scam, I will laugh at you, but you're entitled to that opinion. You don't— I always think, you know, if you walk into a Walmart, right, and you've seen a, you know, toothpaste on the shelf for $5 Do you think that they're selling that for $5 out of the goodness of their heart, or because they've calculated that nobody would buy it at $6 and they wouldn't make as much money if they sold it for $4? Everyone sells everything for as much as they can get away with. That's how you make money. That's fucking capitalism. That's business.

Yeah.

And so if you've got a problem with that, feel free to, but I'm not going to stop doing it. Nobody else is going to stop doing it. And if you've got an issue with that, do not go into this sort of sales because you're going to get— we always have Every month or so, uh, we'll have somebody join the team, someone who's got an issue with the way that we close, that doesn't like that sort of, uh, pantomime, and we'll show them the door because go and do something else. That's just how it is. I've got, you know, I've got a family to feed.

I think it's— I'm laughing at some of this stuff because, um, dude, I haven't had a conversation like this with somebody who like gets it Since I was in roofing, and so some of this stuff you're saying is like really bringing back the memories of how of how in-home sales works. And you know, I think that's how everything is. Like whether you're online or you're B to B or whatever, like you're gonna you're gonna charge what the market values it at, right? If people are paying, that's what it's worth.

Yeah, absolutely.

I don't know. I feel like maybe people in the UK and Europe might be a little bit more upset. I think people in the US kind of get that that's how it goes.

I would expect people to understand it. But yeah, in the UK, I sent a tweet out about this literally earlier today. In the UK, we have a real anti-success culture. Yeah. Yeah. Like if you earn 30 grand, that's considered to be making it. If you earn 50 grand, then oh bloody hell, you know, that's a bit much, mate. If you earn 100 grand, like, you're a fat cat and you deserve to be taxed into the dirt. And, you know, really true. Yeah, you're taking the piss a bit there, mate. Do you know what I mean? That's a lot of money. Not, you know, are you sure you're— you sure you actually— no one earns that. Do you know what I mean? A nurse works 40 hours a week and they earn £30,000. So who the hell do you think you are with your £100,000, you piece of— and it is endemic in our society and it is bad. It is really bad and it really just sort of crab mentality in the UK is out of control. And I think a lot of Americans especially don't understand that because if you go to London, yeah, if you work for a US firm and you go to London to work in the London branch for a couple of months or something, you won't pick that up because obviously central London is worldwide, worldwide city.

Yeah.

But it is such an endemic crab in the bucket attitude and it is disgraceful. You know, $100 grand is some mythical amount of money that only fat cats earn. Or in the US, it's a manager at a Buc-ee's car wash.

That's so funny. I saw, I saw you tweeting about that. Like, dude, I'm, I'm born and raised in Texas. That's where Buc-ee's is. And like, that's always, that's always been a thing, bro. It's, it's like in the US, like you do have people on both ends of the spectrum. Like, you know, if you're surrounded by the right people, like if you're making less than $100,000, Like, it's like, bro, like, you're fucking up. Like, what are you doing? Um, and I'm sure that's, you know, that's the case in the UK when you have those right people. But also on the flip end of that, there are people who are just really pushing like, government save me. Like, I just want to work my job and clock out and like all that stuff.

Yeah, that's exactly what it is. And the nurse thing, I threw that in there, that is out of control.

Yeah.

Uh, like the, the nerd— like, we've always had a thing in the UK because we have this NHS, right? So we, um, I don't want to get political, but the point is we have an NHS in the UK which has got fully government-owned healthcare. Not government-funded healthcare, government-owned healthcare. They own the buildings, they own the hospital, they own the operating room. You know, Germany, they'll pay for your healthcare, but it's private providers. In the UK, we own it, and apparently it's the best system in the world. Even though no one else copies it and everybody, every other country, I think apart from Italy, doesn't have it and thinks it's stupid, it's the best in the world. And so we have this sort of worship and nurses are at the front end of that. And every single time that you see a salary in the media or something, you will see it compared to nurses. So if you're talking about a soccer player who makes, you know, 150 grand a week and the headline will be That's 4 nurses for a year every week. Who the hell does he think he is? And the nursing is out of control. And you will have people say that to your face. And Joe, like, I don't tell no one. I would never suggest to anybody out— like, what, I'm— yeah, I'm not a bloody millionaire, but I would never tell anyone how much money I make because you will get looked down on.

Yeah.

That's how it is. And yes, unless you make the money in the public sector, in which case it's okay. If you work for a council As a, you know, whatever, um, you know, as a town planner or something. For some reason that's okay because you're working for the government, so therefore you're doing a good thing. It's much more left-wing in this country, sort of classically left-wing in this country, than you're led to believe.

Yeah, man, nurses in, in the US, most of them are, are cleaning up, man. They're—

that's the joke of it.

$100K minimum if you do the whole travel thing, like I don't know if that's a thing in the UK, but yeah, you get, you get sent off to a different city and they're gonna pay you a premium and they're gonna put you in a nice hotel. I mean, man, these guys, these guys are making $20K, $30K, $40K a month. They're working like dogs.

Yeah.

But yeah, I mean, it's, it's a completely different thing. And I think everyone knows about like American healthcare, how—

Oh, that's what we hear about. That's what we hear about. Because, yeah, if you ever criticize our system, it's just the American thing is thrown back at you because, you know, like they're the only 2 options. Do you know what I mean?

Yeah.

As if there's no middle ground whatsoever. But quite frankly, I would rather expensive healthcare that you actually get than free healthcare that you don't get. So again, I don't want to get political, but that's my opinion on that.

For sure. So as far as, as far as the solar Or just like in-home sales, because I like talking about this stuff. Like I said, it's been a while. I mean, obviously, your company that you're working for, pretty big, well-known, I guess you could say. They're doing the paid social media stuff. Like, I know that here in the US, a lot of people are trying to do like the Facebook ads, the Instagram ads, some of them successful. But with the home services, man, like it is just so competitive. Like here in the US, like everybody is just, they're like, they know exactly what it is now. So like, do you feel like, like you guys, you said it's working well for you. Do you feel like that's something that is going to last for a while or is it something where you guys are truly like innovating as far as that goes?

No, we innovate nothing. We're doing a very old system that we know works and it's double glazing. sales from the 1980s. Those are the— and interestingly, I've worked with people in this role who were actually there on the ground when that was kicking off in the late '70s, early 1980s. Um, there's a BBC series called White Gold, which is worth a watch. It's good fun. It's a fun program to watch. And that is about a group of salespeople who were doing the first door knocking to sell double glazing back in the early 1980s. And just, you know, printing money. And they set a blueprint, which is exactly what we follow today, which is, um, obviously there was no social media back then, so that was, uh, advertisements in newspapers, etc. You know, fill in this form, send it in, and we'll be in contact with you. Then you go around, you know, measuring them up for windows, and then, oh, wouldn't you just know it, there's a deal today, you know, but today only. I'll ring my manager, back and forth, penning them sales. The blueprint they set is the, the exact blueprint that we follow today. So there is nothing. Um, to answer your question on the social media advertising, we don't actually do that. We agency it out. And I imagine what that agency does is pretty groundbreaking and pretty cutting edge because we do have a very high response rate.

Cool.

Double—

I'm trying to look it up right now, but like double glazing is not a term that is used At least not one that I've heard here in the US. Have you not?

Well, major opportunity there for anybody listening because it sells like hotcakes here to this day. It's just the window with 2 panes of glass in it. Oh, yeah. And a PVC casing.

Yeah. So wait, wait. I'm sorry. I know about that. I thought this was like some sales method.

No, no, no, no. It's that, the windows.

Um, okay.

Yeah, and the, uh, so double glazing the windows was brand new to the UK, and PVC in general. So PVC gutters, PVC fascias, everything like that was brand new to the UK in the 19— in the early 1980s. And yeah, um, the big sort of big contractors, etc., were not willing to pick it up and take a chance on it because the industry was run by glazes, uh, who didn't want to do it because it was obviously put know, that making it in a factory and shipping it over in standardized sizes was going to put out of business local glazes. So none of the big contractors wanted to take it on, so it ended up being small teams of people going out, putting in newspaper adverts, knocking on doors, and selling it. And that's what— and the pendulum sales technique comes from car sales, and most people that have bought a car, particularly a secondhand car at a dealership, will, will have experienced being put under pendulum sales, which is such a powerful sales method.

Yeah. How do you see like your specific industry progressing as time goes on in the UK? Like, do you see it growing? Do you see more people catching on or what do you think?

So in terms of the companies doing this sort of sales, I imagine it will continue the same. The reason I say that is it is almost impossible to hire good salespeople. Like our dropout rate is insane. insane. Like, we have new people join the team every single month and they don't last. And the reason is very few people in the UK got a pair of balls. Like, straight up. Like, anyone— like, if you're a bad solar salesman in the US, I guarantee you if you come over here— I mean, don't, because it sucks— but if you came over here, you would clean up because nobody has any balls in this country. And you can't find salespeople. And that's why we stay on top, because— the company that I'm with, is really the only company that can really keep together a sales team. And there's a lot of reasons for that that I'll go into another day. Uh, in terms of the solar industry itself, it's going to absolutely explode, uh, within the next 5 years or so. It's going to go insane. Every— uh, so most people don't know this in the UK, but by 2030 it is going to be illegal to sell a house unless it's at least B-rated. So we have an A, B, C, D, E energy efficiency rating system. By 2030, it's going to be illegal to sell your house if it's not B-rated. So yeah, you can just— and the way to get it B-rated is to stick a set of solar panels on it. So every household in the UK— and that's part of the reason why I got into this industry, because I saw that coming— every house in the UK is going to have to have them by 2030. It's that simple.

Yeah.

So it's going to go mad.

I remember like having those almost like, I guess the pitfalls, bro. Like, hey, if you don't do this, you're gonna screw yourself over. Like, you're not gonna be able to do this. For us, it was always, because again, we're working insurance hailstorm stuff. It was always like, hey, if you don't file a claim on this after a year, they're not gonna cover it and you're gonna have to come out of pocket $15,000.

Yeah.

You know, versus, you know, paying your $1,000 deductible or whatever. It's like, we'll walk you through the process. We'll meet the adjuster here. We'll do everything for you. But just a heads up, man, I, I got called out one time to a roof in one of a really nice neighborhood, and they called us because they had like a mold problem.

Okay.

And they were like, dude, we, we had, we had that insulation guy come. We had, you know, people come look in the attic, couldn't find it. I came, I kind of tied it back to the roof, but I got on the roof to check and it was just splattered. Like hail damage bad. Like we're talking 3-inch hits, tons of 'em everywhere. Next thing I know, like the little, you know, a repair that I wouldn't even be able to sell because honestly, like it was just a really strange case, like turned into a $130,000 roof.

Wait.

Um, and like, yeah, the, the reason why was like, dude, if you don't fix this, this is gonna be a really big issue, you know?

Yeah.

And I think that's one thing about home services that, dude, there's so many of them in Texas. Everyone wants to be a contractor and I encourage it, dude. It's a good route to go if you want to own your own thing and work hard. But I do miss that because when you— so I've done since roofing, I've done the B2C route, I've done the B2B. That's what I'm currently doing, the whole remote thing. And it's like, The demand is like, it's a little bit harder to create.

Yeah.

You know?

Yeah.

And I guess you would have that experience as well going from, you know, you were in the tech space for a bit. I don't know, dude. Sometimes I miss it. Sometimes I'm like, man, I really do miss meeting people, providing like serious value, giving them peace of mind and that kind of stuff. But Yeah, it's a different, it's a different way of life.

It's a totally different way of life. I'll tell you quickly the story beyond when I knew that I needed to leave this, this big clever whiz-bang tech job that was supposed to be amazing. Anyway, yeah, the salary is very good, all the rest of it, all the perks were good. So I knew it wasn't for me. So I was given a set, as you do when you're an AE, I was given a set of accounts to look after alongside all the normal prospecting that you need the SDR babysitting that you have to do. I was given some accounts to look after, okay? And one of these was a fairly major law firm, um, you know, like the biggest law firm in town, basically. Everyone would know who it is. So I went down there, uh, with a— because I had an appointment, and I went down there to have a chat with the, the IT director there. And we had a chat, and we got on really well, developed the rapport, had a word with him, and I said, look, look, you must have a list of IT things that you need doing, you know, various different upgrades, whatever. I don't really understand tech, so I'm sort of winging it. I'm saying you must have like, you know, um, your server systems need looking at. You must have a few more like racks of servers that you need doing. You must have some wiring you need doing, some printers, you know. You must have some sort of Azure services that you need doing. Come on, mate, I'm like, you seem like a clever bloke. I know you've got a list somewhere. Oh, I do. I don't know if I want to show— Come on, mate, just show me your list. Fine, go on, get your list out. Fine, great. I'll look through this list. Yeah, we can do that. We can serve you all of that. Fantastic. Um, right, so we've been doing this Azure work for you, and we've also done some, uh, service, you know, wiring work for you. Uh, what did you think of that? Yeah, you did really well. Okay, well, how about, you know, since you sort of trust us, since we're getting on, why don't you, you leave me with this list and we could do all of it, and I can just give you a quote for all of it, and then you're keeping it all one provider, and it's just going to be easier for you. Oh, oh, I don't hate that in principle. You know, that sounds like a good idea. Yeah, of course it does, mate. Yeah, whatever. Move on a little bit. Hit him later. What's your budget for? Yeah, what's your IT budget for the? Oh, we're a bit squeezed this year. Oh, come on, mate. You know, tell tell me what it is. Come on. Found out and it's about forty grand. Fantastic. So I shook his hand and I went off. And then I went to speak to one of our architects or technical people, whatever you're supposed to call them. We call them architects. But yeah, the technical salespeople. And I said, right, this is his budget, this is the list that needs done. Can you have a look at this and just sort of try and work out what if we can do everything for him for his budget? I then got called in for a meeting with my manager and I got a big bollocking because that's not the way we do things. That's too salesy. I don't like you pressing him for his budget. That's not the sort of questions that we're supposed to ask. And I'd, that was on a Tuesday and I'd handed in my notice by Friday.

Yeah, dude, I've sold to a lot of people, UK and Europe and other parts of the world, primarily US. But I've noticed that a lot of people like European people and those in the UK are like the sales tactics and I hate to call them tactics, but the methods that work well here, specifically in the remote space. Like, they're kind of frowned upon in other parts of the world.

See, would that work in the US? If I did that in the US, would I have been in trouble?

To be honest, no, you wouldn't be. Like, these people would probably be like, man, you're so like direct and confident that you can help me. I appreciate it. Like, Obviously, unless you're asking for like some outlandish stuff. But no, dude, just being direct, like, man, especially in Texas, if you were doing that here, like, people would be like, man, you want to like appreciate that? Like, let's drink a beer and we'll go talk to my neighbor too. Like, um, yeah. So yeah, no, no, I, I do know how we do things.

Uh, we approach every, we approach every problem on a case-by-case basis is what I was told. So I was like, right, so, you know, you were asked out there to look at the Azure services. Um, that was, you know, too much too quickly. You should have just only talked about the Azure services and everything else we can bring up, you know, in meetings over the next 6 months. And I'm just sat there like, the fuck are you on about? And I knew it wasn't for me. I knew it wasn't for me at that point. Yeah.

I wanted, I wanted to ask you too, like, being the nature of, hey, most of the people in the UK, they kind of frown upon salespeople. And, you know, if you're making a lot of money, it's like, it's like whatever. But I've worked on a good amount of teams. I've worked with people all over the world. Like, I feel like some of the very best closers that I've worked with were UK-based. Like, time and time again, like, yes, there's great American closers I've worked with. But I'm not too sure why, man. Like, sometimes these, these guys out of the UK are just killers. Like, why, why do you think that is? And I don't know if you've noticed that at all, but why do you think that is?

So I've not worked with enough, um, people from other countries to have noticed that, uh, but I've had other— like myself, but I have had other people tell me that. And I think the reason for that is in the UK, it's so difficult to have a pair of balls on you, and you will get constantly called up for it. If you're the sort of person that will point out bullshit or pick up on bullshit or not go with the flow, you get called out on it immediately. So it's very difficult to be that sort of person, right?

Yeah.

So in, in school, I wasn't— definitely not stupid. I did very well, but I used to get in trouble all the time because I would sort of pick up on bullshit and, you know, sort of put my hand up and say, actually, sir, that— you contradicted yourself there, whatever. And your life gets very, very tough. And a lot, and a lot of people that do that, again, tall poppy syndrome, cow mentality, do get pulled down. So those of us that can rise above it and are willing to stick our heads up above the parapet, even, even with the flak you get, we are going to be pretty hard. Whereas in America, and I gather a few other countries as well, sticking your hand up and, and being that sort of guy is very much encouraged. So you're going to get a higher percentage of people that do that, whereas in the UK it's much more of a gauntlet. And I feel that anybody that makes it through to adulthood and has kept that attitude is going to be fucking battle-hardened. Yeah, because it's not encouraged.

I feel like it's slowly becoming less and less encouraged. Um, I guess, I guess depending on where you are living as well. But for, see, I have a call in about 6 minutes. For the next like couple of minutes, man, I do wanna, I don't know, I just kind of wanna give you the floor to put any of the guys that are like in solar or home services that are considering this, like what are some of the best pieces of advice that you can give them to be successful in this?

Well, my first piece of advice to anyone that's considering this is really don't. And the reason for that is a tough life. And if you have the ability to, to be in B2B and to sort of yes sir, no sir it to a certain extent, I would encourage people to do that because it's a much clearer career path. You get paid more regularly. Um, it's a career rather than a week-to-week job, which is what B2C is. But for— so be bloody sure that you want to do it and try, try B2B first. Go and work for Salesforce or something first. Is my advice. And if you can't— if you've got the sales skills but you can't hack the bullshit, then do it. And really what you need to do is you need to believe in your own product. So there's a product that we sell which is for conservatories that I don't sell. I refuse to take appointments for because I don't personally believe it's a good product. So take your time and don't just go for the first company that offers you a job. Go for the first company that you actually believe in and would sell to your mum. Um, like my mum's got this spray foam in her house that I sell.

Yeah.

Right, and that's really, really important. And the other thing really is, don't— you're not there to sell the product because they're already interested in the product. The type— I would not let someone in my house to try and sell me something. Like, no, I just would not do that. Okay, so the people that you're talking to are highly compliant. If you walk into someone's house, they're already compliant and they already probably know what they want about the product. So your job is not to sell the product. Your job is to do 2 things. Your job is to convince them that your company or you have the expertise to let them, you know, to give that tradesman appearance and let them, you know, dick around with your house basically and bolt things onto your house. You've got to give that. Sell the deal, right? In most of these sort of scenarios, in most B2C in-home sales, you're looking for the deal on the day. Sell the deal and justify the shit out of the deal. And 80% of the words out of your mouth should be to justify the eventual deal that you're going to offer them and give them. And just think of cast-iron reasons why that you, you know.

Yeah.

So if the price— what, you know, how the fuck do you— and I do this every single day— show a price of £9,000 and then we deal on £2,500? How the bloody hell have I just chopped my price off by 80%? They believe it because I justify it. And that's what you're there to do is to sell and justify the deal. You are not there to sell the product.

Yeah, I think that's extremely valuable. I want to— I forgot, we probably should— I should have asked you this earlier, but I know you being in in-home sales, you've seen some crazy shit, man. Tell me, tell me, tell me something that like people wouldn't believe. something that you've seen before?

Seen a lot of weed farms up in the attic. People forget that they've got one, and then you stick your head up and they go, oh shit. I've had that happen 3 or 4 times. Uh, that's a good one. I tweeted the most disgusting photo of an ashtray the other day, which was one of the 7. Did you see that? That was minging. Yeah, yeah, there was 7 of those in there. I wish I could have taken a photo of the entire table. I had to hide my phone. There was 7 of them. That was grim. I've seen a guy who had Snakes who didn't have a, didn't have a cage or whatever you call it, tank for the snake. The snake was just free range.

That's true.

That was a good one. You occasionally see, if you go, I need to see the damp in the ceiling, and they'll take you into a room that they weren't expecting you to show in. So you do occasionally see some X-rated shit left out, sort of handcuffs attached, still attached to the bed or something like that. You see some shit. You also see people with the most disgusting houses, like dog poo on the floor that they haven't cleaned up, um, shit up the walls. Those people, you'll deal. Yep, yep, absolutely.

Yeah, I know that. I know that all too well. Some disgusting-ass houses, bro.

Yeah, and you deal with them, don't you? They've got money, they're just nuts. They don't think they need to clean, but they've got 10 grand, and you've seen it, mate. You've seen it. Right. I enjoyed this. I enjoyed it. Thank you for this platform.

Yeah, absolutely. So I think, I think a lot of people, man, I do have a lot of people following me who are in solar and in home sales. So I think this is going to be super valuable to them. I guess for the last part of this, I mean, where can people find you? Where, where can they work with you? Go ahead and let them know.

So @TheSalesBall1. is my Twitter handle. Um, that's the main place to go. I've got a Substack which I update once a month. I am available for one-on-one coaching calls. Uh, I'm, I'm very good at motivation if you're struggling with motivation or reframing, uh, reframing, uh, reframing your role really. Uh, so contact me for that. I am currently also putting together a B2C sales course, uh, which I'm hoping to launch at the end of March. So if you sign up to my Substack, you will therefore be on the email list And I'll contact you for that. And I'm also, as I said, available for one-on-ones. Cool.

Yeah, if you're in, if you're in in-home sales, get with this guy, even if you, even if you're in the US. Because obviously, I mean, just speaking to you, I can tell you're good at what you do.

So thank you, man.

I appreciate you coming on. It was actually our official first time meeting. Yeah, it is.

Yeah. Yeah.

We'll be in touch again, I'm sure.

Definitely, mate. Definitely. 100%.

All righty, man. Well, I appreciate you.

No worries, man. I appreciate you and everyone listening as well. Thank you, man.