How Ryan Add $250K in 3 Months & Hired First Sales Team Member - Master Filmmaker Review

What's going on, guys? I'm here with one of our clients, Ryan, who actually closed, I think it was a quarter million dollars in the past three months, and hired his first salesperson. Ryan, what's going on, man? How are you?

Hey. Hey, Eric. I'm doing well. How are you doing?

I'm doing well, man. I guess maybe for anybody who doesn't know you, do you mind just giving us a little bit of brief background? I know we've had a couple of these client interviews, but a little bit of background on you and kind of what you do.

Yeah, so we're a video marketing agency. We focus specifically on the manufacturing sector with it. With the kind of the western United States, particularly Utah. But we're kind of branching out now. And yeah, our niche is really in the manufacturing area. So if our clients make something from health and wellness protein powders to. To, you know, medical devices or furniture and everything in between, we. We. We help them tell their story.

I love it. And I know this was. We helped you. Obviously, you've been with us for a little bit, but we've helped you a little bit with the, um, like, actually structuring the ads, the. The inbound system, and now hiring the salesperson. I guess talk a little bit about kind of what that experience has been like, hiring a salesperson. Because this is your first time hiring somebody, right?

Yeah, yeah. Actually, interestingly enough, he was our first hire. You know, I'd outsourced crew positions, you know, did that all the time editing. I outsourced a lot, but. But a real, you know, meat and potatoes kind of role within the company. This is our first time. And it was a little bit of a revelation. I remember sending you a message, like, after the first time, he. He kind of advanced a client call forward. I was on an airplane going to Chicago. I didn't have time to get this lead that had just come in. You know, we're all about close those leads really quickly, get in. Get in front of the customer really quickly because they're expensive and you want to move fast. And. And he told me, he's like, ryan, I've got it. You go do your thing in Chicago, and when you get back, we'll have the squared away. And when I landed, he's like, yeah, here's the call. He sent me the meeting notes, and I listened to it while I was taxing and getting my Uber to my hotel. And I was just smiling the whole way, like, I didn't have to do that. I didn't have to be the one to do that. And I felt like, okay, for the first time in my business's history, I was working on my business, not in my business. And that was a revelation for me.

Isn't that such a weird. I remember my first time having a client, having someone actually close a deal, and I wasn't there. I was like, what in the world is happening? I don't have to be on these calls. And it's a very weird, like, humbling experience, I think, because it's like, you start to realize, like, you are necessary in the business, but you're not as necessary as you think you need.

Yeah.

Which is kind of like a freeing and weird feeling at the same time. Which is. Which is always fun. And then all of these have been from, like, obviously, you're. You're scaling ads right now. You're scaling the inbound system. He's taking those appointments. I guess, like, to kind of jump back to when you first started with us. Like, what was kind of that first problem you came to us with? And, like, how has that evolved over the past year or so?

Yeah, so I think the first set of issues that we were dealing with is I was doing everything, and we weren't running any ads. We weren't doing really any. We didn't have any sales process. We didn't have a system. I was literally taking business based on referral and knocking doors and anyone I could talk to, you know, I try and drum up something. And so we had hit a plateau in revenue. And so my whole objective with the program was, okay, let's see if we can actually hit another level of revenue. And. And, you know, we've so far surpassed that level. I mean, we're like 3x the revenue now.

Wow, that's crazy.

Yeah, so it's. I mean, it's brought new problems. Like, I'm having to be more of a people leader now. And so, like, it's putting more pressure on my leadership skills that I'm grateful to be able to develop. But those are, like, new problems that we're now having to tackle as we. As we lead people instead of. Instead of just focusing on the shoot or whatever. Now it's like, okay, well, what are the processes behind the shoot? And how do we get people engaged and thinking aligned and have a shared vision for the direction of the company as a group? Yeah.

Yeah. It's interesting because, like, you start by doing everything yourself, and then you have other people now. You have to develop different skills, which are leadership. Leadership skills, obviously, to bring those people to Bring those people together and have them do it for you. Because you physically can't do all the work that, you know, a million dollar a year business requires, which is the interesting part. And it's really, there's a lot of. And we'll talk about that obviously offline a little bit more on like different ways to lead and different ways to get people to do things. But yeah, I mean, and the other thing that I think is interesting for a lot of people maybe watching this too, is like, you target manufacturing companies with an inbound system and I think a lot of people have this limiting belief where it's like, oh, I can't target that person with ads. And I think you're a great example of somebody who can. You're targeting a very B2B sector with an inbound system, which I think is awesome.

Yeah, it's so true. We had a client discovery call and they said, so how do we know that this will work for us? And I said, well, how did I find you? You know, and it's, it's like people are humid at the end of the day, you know, even though they, they may be blue collar or white collar in a B2B sector, if they go home and they're going to go on Instagram or they're going to go on a TikTok and we're going to find them. And so far that's provided fruit. You know, it's, it may be the cost per lead is a little higher than it is in other sectors, but my.

When you're closing $90,000 deals, and that's the thing is the lead cost is higher maybe, but you also have way higher, like ceilings for deals. So it's the same anyways.

Yeah, Yep, Precisely.

I love it. Has there been anything that's been like, particularly helpful working with us so far? Like, I know it keeps changing a little bit of like different things that we're working on. But like, has there any been, has there been anything that's been particularly helpful to you?

I would say it's probably twofold. There are probably two different ways to say the same thing. I think that master filmmaker, first the community is, is helpful. There's a lot of ideation and, you know, throwing things back and forth within just the community, not even your team or you yourself. And that's been helpful. Making new contacts, getting on calls, you know, kind of problem solving with others and realizing that we're not competitive with each other, we're more supportive and that's been helpful. And then I think the other aspect is that your team and you specifically, I count kind of as a trusted advisor. Right. So we re upped our subscription with you for another year in part because as we were scaling the business through this next section with adding sales professionals and media buyers and everything, I wanted to make sure that from a process perspective, from a people leadership perspective, you guys have that experience. I don't, I, I can trust that you'll give me, you'll shoot me straight and give me the right advice. And, and so I kind of view your team as an extension of my team in terms of leadership. And I, and I'm forthcoming with my, with my employees and I say, look, master filmmaker, we're gonna, we're gonna pass some ideas along with them and they're gonna kind of sign off on this and, and, and they're all aware that you're helping us scale and that's, it's been a really cool relationship in that regard.

I love it. Well, dude, I can't wait to see us. Obviously we're gunning for a million this year. We'll keep upping that to 2, 3, 4, 5. And just keep pushing the envelope from there, I guess. Last question. If anybody is maybe on the fence about booking a call and speaking with us, I guess what advice would you give them, kind of knowing what you know now?

You know, I've been monitoring and you and I chatted about AI a while ago, but I've been monitoring the changes and the shifts in the industry and I think that if you are, if you were like me, like a one man band kind of guy, and you're thinking that the way you're doing it is going to cut it in 10 years. You've got to realize you've got to shift or you're going to be snuffed out. And change is coming, Change is so dynamic. And I feel like the best way forward is to build these processes, these systems, relationships and methodologies to acquire new business. And I would say that your business needs it. You owe yourself the time to give it a serious consideration because it's more than just some kind of group that we're going to hang out and copy paste and do your thing. It's a substantial philosophical and methodical change to your business. And so I. Listen up, listen up, implement it. And I think you'll find yourself in a very good place 10 years from now.

Ryan, I appreciate your time, man. Can't wait to help you scale this even further.

Awesome. Thanks, buddy.