Building a Winning Sales Strategy with Ryan Groth

Good morning, everybody. Jim Johnson here, the head coach at Contractor Coach Pro. And I couldn't be more excited about the guest that we have today because it holds kind of a special place in my heart is kind of how everything got started. Started for me was sales and learning the skills, learning some of the art that goes along with sales. And this guy that we have today, Ryan Groth with Sales Transformation Group, has been a student of the game himself, not only in sales, but in baseball as well. Former baseball player, played for the Angels in their system. So that's super cool. We have a lot in common because of those things and, and we're super happy to have him on board with us. Welcome today, Ryan Groth.

Hey, thank you, Jim. And it's an honor to be here and I just want to say a couple things. You know, you're, you know, it is an honor to share some time with you and be invited in your environment, your world, you know, and I think you're like, you're like Uncle Jim, you know, to me, like everything's so similar, just our background and just how you go about helping the industry at large. And yeah, it's just an honor to hang out with you and watch you work from afar and come a little closer and build a relationship and learn from you and how you're helping others. And to be able to do that side by side in many ways is really cool and just shows what you're all about. And yeah, it's a blessing and honor to spend some time with you and chat. So thanks again for having me. You're doing great things.

Thank you. First off, honored that you look at me that way. I'm very thankful that you don't look at me as like Grandpa Jim. That would be awful.

It was close. I wasn't sure what I can go with.

Uncle. I'm a close in age uncle, so let's try that one out. So, you know, this whole sales thing, I'm fascinated by it because I think it's a opportunity that presents itself to be a limitless type opportunity. I mean, if you look at the highest income earners on the planet on an annual basis, excluding business owners, you know, large business owners, but as far as an employee type position or even a subcontractor type position, they are the highest earners per capita of any job title that you can have. And I think that's what fascinated me the most about sales was this opportunity to like not put a cap on myself and be able to just go out there and do something amazing and not be limited by anybody. So you got into sales. What got you into it in the first place? And how did you get into this sales mastery world that you're in?

Yeah, it's really interesting, you know, sales for me, because, you know, my parents were not really professional business and sales folks. I mean, my mom and stepdad, when they married, they started a. A remodeling company in south the summers, you know, work with the superintendent and, you know, do the tap cons and, you know, code compliance in Florida. And they were just very small, mom and pop. And then my dad was. It was an engineer. So he was, you know, kind of a, you know, a geek in that sense, where he wasn't great with people and he was a little awkward socially. And so, however, when I was done playing pro ball and I was looking for that next thing that would help me see that, you know, big league achievement, because my goal was to make it to the big leagues. Didn't happen. But I'm like, hey, I've tasted, I've seen, I know the professionalism, the growth, the potential, the impact you can make, and I'm going to find that somewhere. And as I started my family, you know, and you know, eight years ago, kind of a first mention was that I'm going to provide well for us. I just didn't know exactly how. And so as I was spending some time with some different friends and mentors, one of which currently lives in Michigan now, but he was down in here, and he's a really successful entrepreneur. And he's like, ryan, why don't you get into sales? He's like, you're a competitor, you're a communicator. Great communicator. He's like, you know, if you were in a one of my other companies, I'd hire you in a heartbeat. And I was just like, whoa. Like, I never felt permission, so to speak. Not that we need it, but, you know, we need mentorship, we need guidance. We need someone to help us see what we don't see. And he was like, I could see you doing that. And I remember selling chocolate at the school and I wanted to be the best. And I, like, sold a bunch of world's finest chocolate. And I just always wanted to be the best, very competitive. I think that's important. And so when I saw that, I was like, oh, really? And so I started looking at jobs. I ended up meeting a commercial roofing contractor who started building a sales organization a few years prior. And we could talk more about that in a minute, but when he performed an analysis on me, and he was like, you know, you have the makings of a hunter. You're. You're a killer. You're somebody who. And I was like, something in me just, like, woke up. It was like this lion in the. In my heart that just said, I'm gonna go kill stuff. And that's okay. Like, I'm allowed to do that in business. I don't have to go on a sports field to do that. I mean, because I was navigating what I wanted to do because I love my wife so much, and I thought I wanted to. I'll go into nursing because we didn't know I have any other way to make good money. But whenever I got into. But I'm like, I'm not going to be immersed, you know, nothing wrong with male nurses, but it just wasn't me. Like, I'm a. I'm a. I'm a warrior, man. And we all know, like, salespeople know if they got that in them, like, they're a warrior. They're out there to go make stuff happen, you know? And I just felt this permission by a couple mentors in a very fast set, sequential way. And then once I started to go out there and realize that I can create and design and gather information and then like, kind of create progress for myself and my family, I was hooked. And I started. I just fell in love with it. And, you know, there's a lot more to the story. But, yeah, I love selling. I love more than just, like, talking about it. It's the mindset and the whole DNA that comes along with, you know, the role of a salesperson.

Awesome. Awesome. That's. Man, it's so crazy, like, the similarities between you and I across the board. I grew up also with parents that had zero interest in sales. Like, that was not the thing. It was.

It was bad. It was like, those are bad people, right?

They're bad guys. You need to. You need to get a real job. You need to start at the bottom, work your way up. Either go in the military or go to college, that type of thing. And very against this whole sales thing. But I got real lucky. I had a neighbor across the road that noticed that I was fairly competitive with sports. Basketball, baseball, and all the stuff I had done with that, as well as, like, selling stuff, like you said, all the little contests you have at school, fundraisers and things like that. I can remember this will tell everybody how old I am. There was a tv, and that TV was about this big, by this big With a little tiny screen on it, had like this little 5 inch screen, black and white screen on it. That was a top prize if you sold the most in this fundraiser. And I was adamant I was going to win that. And sure enough, I did. Like, I just, I mean, I kept going, kept going, kept going. And it's that competitive drive. I think that's what it really is. It wasn't about could I sell the most. It was more about could I win? Like, I wanted to win. And that's been always my attitude as a salesperson, like, how many times can I win? Now as I've gotten older, I've seen some other things that go along with that where I want it to be a win win, not just for me, but for my client as well. So, yeah, man, a lot of interesting similarities. So, Ryan, there's always a question that I ask early in one of these conversations. And so I'm going to go ahead and ask you now, what's your biggest achievement to date that does not involve family? No. Getting married, having kids, any of that kind of stuff. We all know those are our biggest achievements. But besides that, what would it be for you?

I would say it's kind of a. I'm going to blanket it in a subject and then give maybe an example or two. I would say it's my ability to have assembled mentors in my life. My dad did pass right after I got married with the drug overdose. There was a lot of challenges with my own upbringing. So for me, I always felt a little orphan y, you know, like always kind of looking for some approval. The coaches, when they said I was good, I was like, oh, I'm doing good, you know, because I lacked it, you know, a little bit early on because my dad was broken and challenged in his own regards. So I think my greatest achievement that is creating so much abundance, success, confidence is my ability to first identify and assemble a series. I have three specific predominant mentors that have helped in different phases. Actually, now I've got like five. They're all kind of sequential, like stepping stones. But it's my ability to submit my life, my mind, my heart, my actions to them and actually listen and honor them when I didn't agree or that chapter was turning well. And so I think that that's my greatest achievement, assembling mentors, that skill. And then one of those was my pastor for 10 years. Now the next one was a gentleman who told me I'd be great in sales. He's like, you know, he's 40, I'm 33, so. And he's 40, 41. Incredibly, incredibly impactful for the way I view the world. Business, my family, myself, you know, both of us reconciled with our fathers. I mean, so many things. And then, and then Greg Wallach of Best Roofing, who wrote the CRM as your ACCU Links founder, wrote for his company and turned it into a business. He and I, I submitted my business, even my personal self. We're hanging out this Saturday. I can't wait. Like, he's a friend, but he, he created, he was a mentor in a father like way and in the business world, which can get hairy, but we navigated it incredibly well. And he changed my life so much. In fact, he gave me all of his relationships, all of his knowledge, all of his expertise, all of his mistakes he shared with me for five years. And there's no way some baseball player who had no idea anything about business, who had an inkling of desire to do something special, could become something and make an impact in an industry and have a wonderful family and provide well and have options and freedom without mentors. So it's my ability to assemble mentors and submit and listen as a student and think of it as like, my life. Like, this is, this is like the goal, this is the manna, you know, straight from above that's going to feed me for generations. All my children and children's children are going to benefit from who I listen to today. And so whenever I open my heart and my mind to mentors and navigated it without some like, oh, you know, you've seen people get coached and something, they get challenged and then they bounce, right, they leave, they check out. They're like, screw that guy. But for me to not say, screw that guy as much as I, my wife and I were having those conversations, we almost said it hundreds of times, but got back in, opened up, changed it, set me up. And for that, I'm internally grateful. And every single time I see him, it's a thank you, thank you, thank you. So that's my answer.

Ryan. That is extremely impactful. If the people are attending today and watching this video in the future, listening to podcasts, as we put that out, if they could just take that one nugget, say, hey, I'm going to search out mentors, I'm going to search out people that are smarter than me and submit myself to learning and listening, it'd be shocking the amount of difference that it would make in their lives as they grow and learn. Very similar again, like a broken family. So I grew up with a stepdad. Did not know my real dad, so I was always kind of looking for that approval, too. Those. Those coaches, you know, every time they said, hey, good job, great shot, whatever it was, that was awesome for me because I didn't quite have that. So there's a lot of similarities between the two of us. All right, so let's get to talking strategy. We got these guys on. That's what they're here for today. So let's just start high level. Like, if you were just to look at it from like 50,000 foot view, what would you say your overall strategy from a sales leadership perspective? Like you're leading a sales team or what does that look like? What is that strategy that you try to help your clients transform their sales teams with?

Well, great question. I think when I answer this, you're going to be amening me because of how similar we are. But I would say you are, if you're looking at. My strategy as a sales designer is to look at it like a professional sports organization. Like an absolute. Like, are we. What are we the Bad News Bears? Are we? Okay, here we go.

Oh, wow.

Are we the Washington Nationals? Which one are we? So we got to decide, you know, kind of organization we're going to be. If you guys know what's going on here, then I'd love to see your comments in the chat. No. So. What we got here, Jim? Yikes. Hey, you got any video cameras under that sombrero? Okay. All right, I'm taking this off. That was rough.

Oh, man, that was. Ryan, that was harsh, man.

I'm sorry, man. I had to do it. I had to do it, so. No, but to bring. Bring it back, whether it's, you know, any organization, you got to look at what they're doing. And what I see is a very. So many similarities, right? And when you have a company with the sales leader is like, I'm the offensive coordinator or the head coach of this specific set of talent, whether they're from former guys off the field. Like, I've seen technicians from the field transform an amazing salespeople A, because their product knowledge is great, they're disarming with their appearance, and people trust them, but then they learn the skills. And when you look at your organization like a professional sports organization, that's what I know, right? I got this shirt, it says pro sales athlete because I believe that we're athletes out there. We're competing. We either win or we lose. You either win or you lose. Either when. And then what head coaches do is they're able to say, we're going to win this championship or we're going to lose this championship. In sports, what I love about our ability in business is we're able to design what our championship looks like and create a culture around that. Because when a sports team loses, it's because they knew they were going to win or lose. They had a goal from the onset. In sports, as a leader in the strategy, you want to create a team, not a bunch of individuals that just play for themselves, but are actually supporting each other, playing together. I could tell you if you and I were on the same sales team and I make a sale, you should be happy, because I'm bringing in money that's feeding us with marketing, with product, with delivery of materials, with. I mean, all the stuff that makes you have the ability to be successful. So to create this sense of we have a bunch of superstars on a team working together toward a common goal is really actually super complex. It's not that simple. So to be able to, though, think of it like, take a complex situation, like when we build a sports team for a sales team, it helps us anchor the learning. Like, hey, anybody who's played even high school football or high school, anything with a team knows that the spirit, the camaraderie that comes with that. And then you're probably looking, depending on how. How developed your organization is. You look at the Orlando Magic, when they started their franchise, they didn't have anybody that great until. Until somebody named Shaquille o' Neal came on and it changed the game, right? And so you're not going to get your Shaquille o'. Neal. Maybe right away, you're probably the owner and you're doing everything, and then the sales leader comes and he gets. So over time, as your organization develops and there's. There's a. There's a rich heritage of high performers based on the standards you create. People will rise to that, and not everybody's going to make it. You know, the players who were there in the beginning didn't last, you know, their entire career there because everything's getting upgraded to a championship caliber. And I could promise you that. You know, I'm down in South Florida, so the Dolphins, right? I guarantee you, if Tom Brady came to the Dolphins, everybody on the Dolphins would get better right now. Everybody. Because it's because of who he is and the general he is on the field. So to really put it super simply, without getting into detail, think of your sales organization like a professional offensive unit who's going out to win or lose against in your market, to be the best. And there are different variables of what you would consider were the best. But I know in sports, you win the championship, you're the best in the market. It could be a couple of other things that you say we're the best at. Maybe it's top line, bottom line, customer experience, results, number of reviews on Google, you name it. Bottom line is look at and say, I want to be the best. And we have to determine what that looks like. And look at sports as our guide, because look at analytics, numbers, tracking. You know, you look at process, playbook. You look at how many times they look at film, you look at how many times they coach. You look at taking the best and applying the fundamentals with every athlete, but not changing everything to be exactly the same, because then they become robotic. Right? You have all these variables. So that right there, point blank, makes.

It simple to understand that, again, awesome. Well said. And you're right. I agree with you. I believe that this is. This is a competitive sport, this whole sales thing. And you do, you either win or you lose. And you can win the right way or the wrong way. As we can see, based on your example that you just gave us and kind of zinged me with, there's a right way to go about doing it and wrong way to go about doing it. And that example, like the Astro, super disappointing. I mean, my own son said, man, I'm considering getting rid of all my Astro. Stuff like that one failure, that one thing that your actions didn't align with your values and who you seem to be versus who you really are can make such a difference. We were talking before we hopped on this morning about this idea of brand and everybody thinking brand has to do with the logo on your hat or the slogan that you use. But it's not really. It's your reputation. That's what your brand is. And up until about three weeks ago, I was like, man, I couldn't be prouder to be an Astros fan. Their culture is great, their egos are in check, their fundamentals are solid. They all work together to achieve the same end goal of winning a World Series. And one thing can take all that away. I think it's a great example to all of us, you know, making one bad decision in our sales strategy of, hey, we're willing to do this just to get that particular sale can cost us pretty tremendously. You mentioned a couple of things in there I thought were interesting. It's not just that championship. There's steps on the way back from there, you know, know it's winning a playoff game, it's winning your division, it's crossing, you know, winning a game, it's crossing a goal and scoring a touchdown. It's getting a first down or it's baseball and you're getting to first base. You're, you're scoring a run, you're winning a game, you're winning a playoff series, you're winning a championship, whichever way you want to look at that competitively. It's all of those things that build off of each other that get you to that championship level. And we believe strongly in that same type of strategy is you got to know what the end is. You mentioned a bunch of different possible endings or championships, right? These things that you might be after as a contractor or sales leader in your organization. And once you know what the end is in mind and you get buy in from everybody that that's what we're trying to accomplish, the egos usually will come into check because everybody's, as they say at University of Minnesota, rowing the boat in the same direction, right. We're all trying to get to the same place together. So I thought that was really cool. Well said, Ryan. So that's, I guess from a high level strategy thing, like how are you approaching this as a leader? One of the other things that we talk about with strategy and I would love to get your opinion on this, I'm a big reader. Okay. So I like to read about sales, learn about sales, learn about leadership, learn about management skills and those type of things. And there was a study done about successful businesses, like what was the one most important factor for those businesses? Success. And it came down to really one factor, their sales leader. Whoever that person was that was driving and pushing and directing their overall sales strategy and their ability and capacity to handle more was the determining factor of their success. And so I'd like to get your opinion on that. What do you think about that? Like, I've seen several cases like there's these consulting type companies that will come in and help you with your business, right? They come in, they walk in and they say, okay, we're going to take over and help you with your business. And several of them, the comment they make, they always fire the leader. Whoever the leader is, like, they just fire them. There's no if, ands or buts about it. And so you ask them why they fire the leader. Well, that person obviously wasn't doing what they needed to do. So we need a new leader. I don't know if I necessarily believe in that. I believe in that either that person needs to go or I need to get better, or whoever I have leading needs to get better, needs to grow in their skill set and their abilities as well as their capacity. So your viewpoint on it, like, does it come down to the sales leader, this one person that's the champion for what you're going to do for your strategy?

Absolutely. I would say the sales leader, especially with the companies I work with and I would say Most, isn't Josh McDaniels. Right. The Patriots. It's not Josh McDaniels. It's Tom Brady. Like, that's typically the sales leader. It's the guy in the game. Call him a player, coach, right. So he's in the game. He's still contributing on a large level, directing, guiding, coaching. But what happens is, what I love about that image is that the sales leader is actually demonstrating the standard. Not just talking about the standard, but demonstrating and living out the standard in which he holds the team accountable to. So I think that there's a few major factors that come into great sales leadership. Does the sales leader believe that they are respected, have a great relationship with those in which report to them, and do those salespeople actually respect them and have a great relationship with them and listen to them and want to be around them? And I find that whenever I analyze sales organizations, I found some sales leaders, although their whole team respects them, feels they have a great relationship with them, they don't believe that those salespeople respect them and have a relationship with them. So you got one group of guys are like, yeah, we love this guy. We love this guy. We listen to them. And then the sales leaders like, ah, so what happens when they're not sure that their folks respect him and like him? They're hesitant. They're kind of walking on eggshells. Like, I don't want to. I don't want to piss that guy off or, sorry, that language. I don't want to frustrate him or I don't want to. I don't want to make. I don't want him to leave me, whatever, you know? And so. But when those, when there's a full alignment, when the coach is like, no, they love me, they respect me. Then, like, then their mouthpiece opens up and they start becoming themselves and they start really leading with boldness. And then they start getting passionate and fired up about the results, about their focus, about their future, about. About holding somebody accountable and say, bro, you're way better than that. Or, hey, you know, I watched that. Can I put my coaching hat on? And can we discuss that for a moment? Hey, let's do drills. It's time to work on some drills right now on asking the right questions and getting to compelling reasons to buy. Rather than jump into the presentation right away. Let's talk about how we do that. Let's work on that right now. And good coaches. Well, you have a lot of people who love you, Jim, and I'm sure that when they're done with you, they're like, man, thanks for that. Thanks for saying that. That was a great session. And they come back again. That's because they liked getting coaching from you. And so if you know you're a good sales coach, a good sales leader, which is a coach, 60% of their job is coaching. The other parts are motivating, holding accountable, and recruiting, which is basically a constant draft scenario of thinking about how to bring in talent to upgrade your sales force and make your top performer say, oh, dang, that guy looks like a stud. I better keep moving because he's going to challenge me versus the big fish and small pond kind of environment. You got to always be upgrading. But the sales leaders, when they have that set of tools where someone's like, dude, can we come back? Can we do that again? Can we role play again next week? Or can you ride along with me again next week? I learned so much. That's how you know you're a good sales leader when people actually want your coaching. And there's a lot of variables that make that actually a good environment. But I can tell you right now, the sales leader doesn't have confidence. He won't hold him accountable. He won't coach, he won't recruit. You know, he's satisfied. He doesn't. He's not driven, not motivated, doesn't know how everyone else is motivated. There's so many variables that make a really good sales leader, great sales leader. But, yeah, it to me, initially, you're Tom Brady. You're not Josh McDaniels. You're on the field, dude. You're out there. And if you're maybe a residential and the sales managers coaching them, but then they're starting to close the commercial jobs and open that side of the game up right. Of the business. So there's a lot of variables, but I could tell you that that's my thoughts on sales leadership. And, you know, I see a lot of owners have to wear that hat initially, right? Until they. Until they're able to hire that sales leader. But that Sales leader needs to have authority, needs to be a stud or stud at, you know, whatever it is. And they got to be committed and they get out there ready to win and they got to put their self themselves on the line to do that, to gain the respect and adoration of the team.

I agree 100%. So you touched on a few things there that I thought were actually pretty insightful. Like your sales leader, if you're looking at it as an aspect of your team, that guy is usually like the quarterback or your shortstop. You know that guy that's the star athlete, but he's the guy that's also pushing coaching and teaching internally while you're on the field. And in playing the game, you always hear, you know, coach on the field or coach on the court type of situations when it comes to sports that that person can take what the coach has taught fundamental wise and what the goal is and translate that on the field. And I can't agree more that that person is extremely important. Whenever I'm not getting what I want from my sales team, I might have one of those superstars, but he's not the coach on the field. He's more about him than he is the team. I have to look more at myself at that point as that sales leader or sales driver in our business, the head coach, whatever you want to call that person for your team. That I have to look internally is my skill set. Where it needs to be, is my coaching, where it needs to be, is my leadership where it needs to be. And as that person, you know, that person leading the overall aspect of sales for your business. I really think there's three things that as far as strategy goes that they should focus on. They should focus on recruiting, training, coaching, recruiting, training, coaching, recruiting, training, coaching over and over and over again. If you really want to break it down to like a sports team, think about being the coach in high school, right? You are the varsity. Let's use basketball as our example. We've used baseball and football. Let's use basketball. I'm the varsity basketball coach now. I've got the varsity team, I got the JV team and I got the freshman team. And so that would be my sales team, right? I got the top players, mid players and then the bottom players. And so as the head coach, I spend the majority of my time with my varsity team. They're the ones that have proven that they're ready to play the game, ready to help us win, help us to accomplish that championship. The B team, the junior varsity team, we're Scrimmaging against you guys all the time and seeing, hey, who's getting good enough that they can come up to that varsity team now, that freshman team or that C level team, Those guys I'm not scrimmaging against, I'm saying, hey, you got to work just to get to the JV team. You got to work hard just to get to there. And we treat that. And that's a lot of the strategy that we teach behind our sales leadership is this. You've got different levels of sales guys. Where should you really focus your time? Really, that A and B team probably is where you should focus most of your time. But how do you feel about that, Ryan? Is that something that you would coach as well?

I really like that. I don't know if I've ever seen it from that angle. So thanks for sharing that. Yeah, you know, typically you have coaches for those levels, but you know, if you're. But at the end of the day, it's the varsity coach's decision as to wherever this person's going to go. And you know, it's funny, like at freshman level you're just kind of testing their commitment level, aren't you? You're even saying, are they going to show up to practice today? Are they going to get their grades done? You know, are they going to get their, you know, be able to pass this year? You know, who's that? How are their character? What else are they playing? Five other sports? Are they're showing commitment? Are they trying to ask to leave every day? Like that's kind of what you're doing with a 14 year old, you know, and in business you have a, have somebody coming out of college, you know, they maybe dabbled in waiting tables or doing this or that, and now they want a job, they really start ready to start making some money. You want to test their commitment level, especially if you have a group of producers. So I think, you know, some companies I deal with don't even have a freshman team because they're just assimilating, you know, their varsity team is a JV team and they're trying to get it to where they're competitive. But if you have an established team of players who contribute, sales guys who are hitting their numbers quarter over quarter, you know, they're setting the bar high, they're breaking records, you know, they're, they're bringing confidence to the whole team, the whole system, the whole program, the whole organization gains that confidence. And the younger ones of the newer ones are the ones who are on the fence and they're saying, man, this is cool. I could see myself being like, Jim, who's killing it this month or this quarter, he's been doing it for a year. He got the award. We even have awards, you know that. I know our prayer program. I know how much he's making. You know, I can think of myself making that kind of money. But right, so all these ideas, all these, you know, if you're a freshman kid, you're like, hey, that kid got drafted. Hey, that gets going D1 or hey, this is our. You know what I mean? Like that success output is occurring because. Only because, only because your top producers are doing well. And that's the only reason why. I mean, why else. Why did you go to the college you went to? Or why did I pick the school I went to? Because they produce pro athletes, they produce draft picks. I could have went to Liberty University, but I chose to go to Oral Roberts University because Oral Roberts was ranked top 30 the year I was being recruited. And Liberty wasn't even close. But I wanted to go to that type of school. So I chose ORU for sure. And nine guys got picked up that year out of my class. We had a sick team. We hit 350 as a team. It was insane. So that's all, that's all kind of language that folds into that. I agree.

So a couple comments. There was Ben Van Curren. He says alignment is important. The system and the culture has to be built well. And yes, you have your overall business strategy and then a part of that strategy is your sales strategy and how does it align with your business and your culture and what you're after as a team? Because it may not all be just totally sales focused. And then Brooks says, losing me a little on the sports analogies. Not a sports person. And so as a comment to that, I completely get it. We work with all kinds of companies and in each one that we coach, it's up to us to kind of figure out who they are, are they really competitive and sports oriented and those type of things. Your strategy may revolve around that. On the other hand, you may have a very professional organization looking for like C level executives, very corporate. It's still competition. If you look at any business structure that's out there, it's still competition. There's competition between Apple and Google, there's competition between Amazon and Google and Netflix and all the different things that they compete on. There's competition between Amazon and Walmart. It's all competition. It's all winning and losing. Is really what it comes down to for each one of those businesses. It's not the end all and be all though. Okay, so I want to be really clear about that. Your version of winning could be completely different from somebody else's version of winning. Just because Amazon and I believe. No, he just changed. He's the second richest guy in the world. You got Bill Gates, the richest guy in the world, Microsoft and Amazon, Just because you see those things that may not be necessarily their definition of winning. I know that's not Bill Gates definition of winning. Bill Gates definition of winning is impacting the world in a, in a much grander way than just how much money can he make? And so it's defining what that goal is for you. This, hey, what do we want to accomplish as a sales team? Do we want to be this really competitive thing? Do we want to be more friends and family? Do we want to be very relationship oriented? How do we want to use that top line strategy to build the tactics that we need to be a part of it so we can track it, measure it, make sure that we're constantly improving, getting better every day. So, Brooke, did that help A little bit? I hope it does. And how we kind of explain that. Ah, cool. Good. That really helped. Great, Good. So, Ryan, we've been talking about leadership and that kind of stuff and I know I've only got you for a short period of time here, so I want to make sure that I touch on this when it comes to present, I'm sales guy now. I got somebody across the desk or across the table, depending on what it is that you sell. What does your top line strategy look like there? What are you trying to accomplish in this face to face conversation that you're having with somebody in order to obtain their business?

Great question. And I have strong opinions about this, of course, I'm sure as all of us who are sales trainers and, and proclaimed guides to others, I know that people want to be understood, they want to be heard, they want their opinion to be valued, they want to feel helped. So what I am trying to accomplish, first of all is setting really good expectations as to what is going to occur. Timeline, questions, answers, presenting things of that nature. I'm really good on that, Big on that. Because I don't want anybody stopping early, taking a phone call. I don't want any, you know, I don't want there to be distractions because certain milestones have to happen if they're gonna buy from you. And I think presenting to me, my language of presenting is here's what I think you need. Here's, here's a solution, here's the details of the product or the service, here is the timeline of that, here is the cost of that and then the close for that. I actually am so much more of a fanatic about doing things before that. You know, that makes that a formality, makes that easy, makes that like a non issue. And because people buy, because, you know, I like to say the intellect shops, but emotion buys. So when you're going straight to presentation, you know what I call going from first to third because I use a baseball diamond, you skip going to second and then skip going to third before you try to run home. A lot of people have an appointment which is on first and then they're on third. They think it's qualified because they have a leaky roof. And then they try to present and close. They don't really do anything on the front end. Before they talk about themselves, their company and fixing something. What happens is they end up saying, hey, thank you, we got to look a couple other bids or we got to think this over. And then they kind of try to close them and force them and then they don't. And then you have crickets and a lot of think it overs in your pipeline, whether it's commercial, residential, whatever. It happens like that. And that's reason why is because we haven't taken enough time on the front end to ask the right questions. And so to me, salespeople who just show up and present are order takers. It's like going to a restaurant. They're like, yeah, here's our specials today. And then they just collect the order, right? But when we're selling 15, 30, 50, 100 million, $2 million, custom tailored solutions, that's just not how it works. You need to put your consultant hat on. You need to put your, I am your partner. In fact, I'm probably going to differ in what you're thinking. I'm going to push back when it's time to push back and it becomes equal. You have equal business stature. So to do that you have to take on this mindset of I am a partner. In fact, not everyone's going to really like me. I don't need them to love me. I just need them to take some time to hear me because I'm going to ask them some tough questions. And what we want to accomplish is find their emotion to even buying. Yeah, they want a roof, but why do they need a roof and why does it matter? How does it impact them? How does it affect them? All this sounds like, yeah, I know we teach that, but your people, are you actually doing it? Are you masters at it? Because when you can slowly conversation down, ask questions, not just get all excited and jump to the presentation because it was a referral and you thought it was a slam dunk, you end up getting to their why they end up opening up. You find consequences, impact what else they tried to do, why it didn't work. And now you have so much leverage in the environment of your presentation. It's basically a non negotiable no brainer for them to work with you because of what was expressed on the front end. And even at that point it supports getting to the decision maker, them sharing more information because they're basically like, holy moly, what are you going to do to help me fix this thing in which I'm expressing to you? And when there, that creates urgency and makes it a no brainer. That is the core material of what I teach. Getting people to be incredible at it takes work, it takes practice, coaching, training, reinforcement, standards, demonstrating reps, just like hitting a ball, the opposite field with authority takes reps. It takes reps. But to do that, it changes the game. And now presenting is a formality. And it's not all about, oh, I need to have the perfect folder and the perfect GAF or OC deals and I got to have all my reference lists and I got to have all that stuff is like, if you do it right on the front end and ask the right questions, have a good sales process that supports those types of milestones, they're gonna be like, what do we do from here? It's not gonna be, well, let me think it over. This is great, you know, and they ask you to cut your price or you're too expensive or whatever. And so I, I think face to face meeting is the thing. It's like what I call being on first base, but if you just skip questions, it's uncomfortable. Oh, they're gonna, they're not gonna like me. If I ask them like what they try to do to fix it, why didn't it work and the cost of it and how much money this is costing them to not solve it, things of that nature, how it's affecting their home or they're building, they're afraid to ask those questions, they go right to presentation and if they have a good brand, if they have great reviews, they'll close pretty good. But if you don't and you're starting or you're smaller or you're In a new territory of your market, a whole nother level of client, like commercial or something's more complex, you better believe, you better get to compelling reasons and qualify it before you just start spouting out the great things you do and how awesome you are. Because as soon as you drop the price, dude, everything's over. Like the not drop the price when as soon as you share the price, the conversations over it, the decision will be, will be put off as a think it over or will be made and then you don't have any leverage anymore. You can't have that conversation. You can't take steps back anymore. So that's my philosophy on Face to Face. Doesn't have to be a three and a half hour in home presentation. I'm not saying it does, but it's certainly not a hey, let me get up on your roof. Hey, let me get, let me measure it. Hey, let me come down. Let me tell you how great it is. We're Master Elite or we're OC Platinum. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then they just say, do you want to buy? And then they try to force them into buying and manipulate them. Now we want partnerships. We want people to walk away saying, man, I wasn't sold to, they helped me buy. I feel really understood. They're really helping me. They're a little bit more expensive, but I trust that they're gonna do what I want. That's the culture that can be created with a consultative approach and not a show up and throw up close at all costs approach.

I love the show up and throw up. We actually have levels of sales guys that we talk about and that's one of them. The show up and throw up guy. I completely agree with you on the front end side of things. If we look at ourselves as like detectives, that's really kind of what we are. A lot of people in sales will call them inquiry questions. I'm asking lots of questions because if I could teach a salesperson one thing like, you need to learn this one skill and it will make the most dramatic difference in your ability to obtain clients. That skill would be to ask questions and listen in a way to help that client, client achieve their ultimate goal. The ultimate goal isn't necessarily to put a roof on their house or to paint it this color or to put this type of siding on. That's not the ultimate goal. In most cases. The ultimate goal is a combination of factors where if you ask the right questions, you're going to, you're going to hear them and you're going to be able to say back to that customer. So based on everything that you're telling me, what you're looking for, you know, is a stress free experience, something that's going to last a long time from a contractor that you can trust and feel. Do I have that correct? And they give you confirmation that you're hearing them and listening what their ultimate goal is. And that ultimate goal is different for everybody. Some people, it could be a price conscious ultimate goal because they just don't have it in their budget. They're trying to keep as cheap as it can because it's a rental property and that may or may not be your customer. And then the ultimate goal could be, hey, I'm trying to put as much value into this place I possibly can because at some point I'm going to sell it. I want to sell it for as much as I possibly can. So you've got to ask those questions to kind of build that knowledge. Because those tools that you have, you know, the presentations, your credibility, your credentials, your warranties and all that stuff, those things are great, but they're not necessary if it doesn't achieve that person's ultimate goal. So to have the tool is great, but to know where to go with that tool is all based on those questions and determining what that ultimate goal is for somebody. Now before we move on, I know we're on time limit here and I don't want to miss some things that people have said here from our, from our comments. And so let me just make sure so to do one of the ones I thought was really good. If you build a sales team around, didn't want anybody to get confused here. That's why I want to bring this one up. If you build a sales team around the personality, the qb, your sales leader, right, Instead of a system, are you building from scratch every time that person leaves? And so a couple of things on that. First off, if you have the right culture and you're all after the same thing, the same championship, that person doesn't want to leave. I can tell you right now, Tom Brady does not want to leave the Patriots. Aaron Rodgers doesn't want to leave the Packers. They want to be a part of that culture. They want to be a part of that thing until the time that they go, hey, I'm done, I'm going to hang it up. So that's kind of thing one that to realize the culture part of it is extremely important to retaining those folks. Now with that said, that culture is something that should be equally bought into from the team itself and that sales leader as well as the coach of that team that those two things are aligned together. So that way when that person does retire or move on or go to the next place, the next person with the talent and the skill can step into that position and continue to drive that team forward. You saw it with the packers as a great example. One of my teams saw him go from Brett Favre to Aaron Rodgers and nothing changed. They continued to move down the path to going and winning championships. And I, I believe that systematically your culture is important, but having that sales leader to grow and learn from is also important. But it doesn't have to be the same person. It just has to be a person. So how do you feel about that, Ryan? Do you agree with that? Do you have any more comments you want to add to Ben's point there?

Yeah, I would just agree and say, gosh, like you know, a sales leader won't want to leave because they're probably helping to shape so much of the vision along with the head coach and create, create the systems because they want everybody else to be successful. But one, there's momentum and you know, they're quote unquote, you know, replaced. It's probably because you know, they just outgrew the scenario if they're really good and hopefully the head coach can keep them excited enough and grow them and pay them and help them realize their dreams to within the organization to do that. Obviously in the NFL they can, they can get a huge contract and they can win championships. Right. Business, it's a little less, you know, cut and dry, but it's the head coaches commitment level to building something bigger than just a lifestyle business.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more with that. There's a couple more comments on here. Matt Varnell says I just made that a rule. Must have been something we were talking about like Coach O. I don't care if they succeeded or failed. So Ogeron LSU coach is who he's talking about. I know he from Louisiana. They're going to be critiqued until they do everything perfectly. 100% perfection is the goal. And I would agree that that's a goal. I also believe that it's not an achievable goal. There's only one person ever walked this planet that was perfect. But on our way to perfection we can achieve mastery. And so if we can master it, you look at anybody that you think of that's ever mastered anything. The greatest salesperson, the greatest artist, the greatest musical talent that you've ever seen, they can always point out to you where the little mistakes were and whatever it is that they did and accomplished as their greater achievements. And so realize that perfection is truly not attainable, but mastery is. And that's what we're striving for. Striving for perfection is as important as achieving it. Go ahead, Ryan.

I just want to comment and say, yes, yes, yes. Those who are top performers, what makes them the best in the world of what they do is the fact that they never think they've actually. They're. They actually are. And they're not good enough. They're like, they're not good enough here or something needs to work. So like, like Kobe Bryant watched his games losing. Like Tom Brady watched his games losing. Like Beyonce Knowles, soon as she does a performance, she goes, not even goes to sleep, looks at the recording and says, how can we get better on our performance right away? And she's killing it. So it's about the journey of insatiable hunger for flaws as a feedback mechanism so that we can improve. And I've been, you know, I'm constantly improving. I feel like my game gets better and better as a coach and as a salesperson because I'm coaching and teaching it and I'm just like, well, it's because of reps and because of feedback and because of the environment. So shape it. You can either have a really slow, poor feedback environment or a really great feedback environment. It's up to you. If you obviously need help with that, we're good at helping with that type of stuff. But, yeah, my point is those who hundred percent is a beautiful thing to say. And I think. But you're always thinking, I could have done that better. And it's the humility, that insecurity that we all have, at least the best people have, they have a little insecurity. It's like, man, I didn't do something else. What drives them to keep changing? What drives them to keep growing? So anyway, that's my comment there.

Yeah, that's awesome. I couldn't agree more. Like, I never feel like I got it figured out. I'm not perfect. I'm not going to ever be perfect. And that's what keeps driving me because I would like to get there. I would absolutely love to achieve perfection, but there's a problem with that. The second you think you're perfect, you've achieved everything you can achieve, you quit, you can become complacent, and everybody else comes and gets you. So, yeah, I think that drive for perfection and knowing that along the way we'll achieve. Mastery can be very important to your success as a salesperson. Andrew asked a very good question. I want to see what your comment is here. This is a, this is a good one. Is there a go to question that you teach and if so, could you give a couple.

For sure. I'll tell you later. I'm just kidding. A couple questions I would say is one of those is, are you willing to pay a little bit more to get this done right the first time as a qualifier before you present, hopefully it's because it's within a context and supported by some sort of horror story that they are sharing that you're just eating popcorn and listening to because of your good questions, which is, yeah, I tried this other roof before. It didn't work. You know, he was cheaper. Right. So you have this polarity that's been created by a bad experience, which is like our strongest piece of leverage. We don't even know the company's name or any of that. We just know that they have frustration about something other than you. So when you have polarity and that's described, it's a, it's put on a, it's put, put in the TV film room that's flashing through your eyes and their eyes in the meeting, then you can say, well, are you willing to pay a little bit more to do this right the first time this time or do this right this time? And when they say, yeah, for sure, because they know the cost of the frustration of the alternative. So that's one of the questions I ask that is supportive of value. So yeah, that's the only one that many. But that comes to mind considering our timeline to support as a qualifier to make sure they're willing to pay more so that they're not going to give you the year too high objection. Because most everybody's like, yeah, as long as it's within reason. But now you've justified why you're a couple grand more on your proposal than somebody else who came in. And they don't want to feel that horror story again. They don't want to have the sequel occur on their home. Right. I call it the sequel. Do you want part two of this or do you want a difference script here? Right. So those are kind of things, mentally that we need to be thinking about because, you know, people don't really know.

Yeah, Andrew, I could probably help you out with that question a little bit too. This is a pretty easy exercise to go through. Sit down, you know, with you by yourself. If that's all you got, or if you've got a team of guys. And identify everywhere where a prospective client struggles with making this choice, the type of materials that they choose, the contractor, and those experiences with contractors like home protection, cleanliness, safety, installation. Make a list of all those things that you think that a client struggles with and then for all of those things, develop a question that you can ask to that client to get their answer about that thing. For example, Ryan mentioned one, you know, a situation of, you know, early on the process, one of the things I might ask them is, you know, have you ever worked with a contractor before? And most people have that own a home, they've had something that they've had done. And then I will ask them, well, you know, what was that experience like for you? And they'll usually focus on the bad. And so they'll tell you all the bad, they weren't clean on time. And all that other good stuff, you're just shoving those in your pocket like, okay, I know where to talk about that and what it is I'm going to accomplish with this homeowner. But then I'll think a lot of contractors, they hear all that and that's where they stop. But they don't ask a second follow up question. What was the greatest experiences you've ever had?