Mike Minutes Mastermind 11/17/2023

All right, folks, if you are rearing and ready to go, you've come to the wrong place. My mic minutes. Mastermind. Let's rock and roll. What are you laughing about over there? We're over here just, like crushing it. All right, let's see what we got.

Questions? Let's get moving. Last day of training here at.

Cool. Why is that not showing up in YouTube? Why did I change this all the time?

Okay, thank you. Copy the link right now. I can put in Facebook. All right, sorry. This takes every single time I have to go live before I can copy these links. Otherwise it doesn't work well. So let's get rolling. There are nine questions today, folks. Me see first if there was anything I needed announce. I don't think there is.

I don't think so. Cool.

Now I gotta go back here and click share to stage. There you go. All right, we're in business. We are in business.

Okay. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yesterday I was scarred, folks. Here's why I found out. Much to my chagrin, there are a lot of owners in the destination, less than the masterminds in the shower. So I'm just very thankful that Streamyard doesn't allow people just to show their faces, because that would be very smart. So that was quite the experience knowing that as I'm talking here, I speak to somebody in the shower. But here we go. Let's rock and roll. As long as you're listening, I'm happy.

There. First question comes from John Garretson. I think this is an inaugural question on the Mike minutes. Mastermind. I hope it's a good one. All right, could you please add a date to the bonus videos in the MBA course? Without one, it is very difficult, if not impossible to remember which is new and not yet seen. Now there are so many. I thought about this. It's a good point. What we're going to do instead is email you when there's new ones added every couple months. So instead of emailing you every few weeks, when we add new ones every couple months, you'll get an email that here are the new ones. You can expect that starting here, right away. So, for example, like the.

Keynotes from conference are going to be trickled out slowly and people will get emails when they're available in their account. So what we found is when we can track when people watch the lectures. And what we found is if we give everyone the information all at once, they don't listen to it. So what we're going to start doing is when new members join the course It'll slowly trickle them out. It'll give them a bunch of lectures, but then the bonus lectures, it'll trickle out to them and then email them. Like it comes out like kind of like a drip so that we find people listen to the content way more. So we're going to be doing that. And so if you have. When CONDA gets added, you will be notified. That being said, I considered doing the dates. The problem is I find when we.

Do dates, people don't go back a.

Couple years and listen to this stuff. They think it's like old. It's like no. Like the principles are exactly the same.

So I've kind of been a little.

Hesitant on doing dates. I know it'd be helpful for the OGs, but for the people that are new, they get in there and like, oh, just watch the new stuff. It's like no, like the stuff. It just cause it's two years old.

Doesn'T mean that like profit and loss.

Statements and balance sheets changed. So I've been a little bit hesitant to the date thing. But I am going to be making. When we add new stuff every couple of months you get an email of what those new things are. Lectures. This is from Anonymous. Is it possible to have an AI AI? Is it possible to have only a. Is it possible to have only Max AI answer the phone then have the recording sent to us?

No, it is not possible.

Is it possible that Mac AI ends the phone, Dan records it? No, it is not possible. Is mostly around security. We have to log in to get all of the recordings and there's no way for us to share that. And so it would be getting outside of the security breach as well as.

Max is good. But we still need 70% of the calls Max can't answer to go to command center. And so it's Max only Max can't answer the phone. You still got to have command center behind it because he can't handle things right now. For things like accepting estimates, changing their billing information, complaining, etc. You really just can handle only inbound leads. The stage two is like how do we make it where he can sell to those inbound leads and get their credit card information? Stage three, probably a good year up for now, is how can he handle those other tasks? So you still need Command center behind it. I have two questions that tie into each other. Oh, this is Kevin from Bloomingdale. One, should I buy a car to commute with instead of driving my work truck? We currently live about 37 miles highway from our shop and I feel like I'm playing a lot of miles in truck and it's costing me a lot more than a small car would. I would usually rather just buy another truck because that's a better use of my money. But I also don't get another truck next. Don't need another truck next year. Which ties into part two. I'll finish this year around 220,000. I'm hoping to do about 300k next year, which I think I can do as my current asset. Two trucks. If from April through June I fill those trucks with two employees each, will I be busy enough to be a working GM for those three months of spring rush? Yes. If you have four employees during spring rush and you basically are doubling your capacity for those few months, you nailed this. For those few months, you'll feel like you need to work on the business. Mostly that's like working GM in terms of like being in the field and doing estimates. Great call. I would be using the car to run estimates, interviews, to keep four employees at all times through stream rush and helping on projects, et cetera. Come July, when things slowed down for a bit, I would hop back in one of the trucks when one of the employees drops out. The other option would be just to have three employees and I would be in one of the trucks. But I just feel like this year I was held back by having an employee in my truck with me during spring rush. It was a lot harder to run estimates, help the crew if they had an issue, et cetera. I imagine I would still spend about 70% of my time in the field with the product hero, but I would just have way more flexibility. Two important factors would be that I'm starting completely fresh on employees next year, and also that I want to be as profitable as possible and not buy more equipment. Hope this makes sense. Thanks, Mike. Great analysis. Let's go. Here's the kicker. You're saying you still are spending 70% of your time in the field with the project crew. For that reason, I think having another truck is actually the better move instead of the car. If you have two trucks and you're going to and you have any inclination that you're going to grow beyond that, I would get another truck. Because if 70% of your time, the truck could be used, for example, yes, you're going to spend more money on gas, et cetera, on the truck. However, the truck, you can throw a weed whacker and a blower and a mower and go finish a few jobs at the end of someone's route instead of going and meeting them with the car, parking the car, jumping in their truck and helping them finish their route. And so as a working gm, most of what you're doing is like helping them finish a job, helping them finish a route. And so in my opinion, having that third truck, I. E. The one that you can kind of be more flexible with, would be worth the extra few hundred dollars per month you're going to spend an extra fuel and the extra cost of that of that truck. So in my opinion, I would get a truck of this size. Especially if you are going to max out your two other trucks. If one of them goes down, you're in a really bad spot. If you have an estimate truck that you could throw in. It just. It's also an insurance policy, in my opinion. So I would hate for you to have four employees, two trucks and a car. And then all of a sudden, in the middle of spring rush, one of your trucks had a problem and now you're down to one truck. You would like stall the whole business and really shoot yourself in the foot for the whole year. Look at this. Somewhat of an insurance policy as well. Kyle Todd Morgan, Oklahoma. I find it quite fascinating how people's lives can change in a few short years. Why do you think people. Why do you think some people end up doing really well financially, material, and others do tend to be stagnant or hardly grow within years? To me, it is not really a mystery. It is a matter of if someone goes to the gym and works out every single day and lists very heavy things, they will probably gain more muscle, they will probably lose weight. It's not really a shocker. So if someone's going to do really well financially, materially, most of the time they are putting in the work on the back end. And unfortunately, most people don't see that the same way that most people don't see someone that is healthy and they don't see like, oh, like they prevented themselves from eating late last night. They did. They, they forego, they foregone, they forewent. I don't know, they avoided the extra slice of pizza and the extra bag of chips and they Woke up at 5am to go work out the gym. Those things are lost. And they, oh, like they're just skinny. Like they're healthy. Like, no, that took some work. So the same thing is true typically for people that are financially well off. Now, obviously they're bad actors and you know, people like Sam Bankman fried, like scammed a bunch of people. But I would say Long term health and long term wealth are typically correlated. In that long term effort is being put in on the back end. And so I would say that's the ingredient. And what in like the same way that someone's body can change relatively quickly if they change their habits and they change their inputs. Like your outputs only correlate based on your inputs. So if your inputs are junk food, no exercise. Oh, my microphone's mess now.

There we go, there we go. So if the inputs are potato chips, pop and pizza every night, you know, the outputs should not be shocking. When someone's overweight, you know, unhealthy, having diabetes, et cetera, it's not really a shocker. Now if someone's inputs are watching what they eat, making sure they're hydrated, they get good exercise, they sleep well, they make sure they have healthy relationships, there's a really good chance they're going to be healthy longer in the, in the long term. So.

Everyone always brings up like the shortcut stuff. So like yes, you could take hormone therapy, yes you could take trt, yes you could, you know, scam people, make money in the short term, but those things in the long term never work out well. So long term wealth and health typically correlate and that inputs are correctly aligned. Nick from Marysville. We should have around 75 clients on winter services. I'm not on Copilot yet and I was wondering if there was a way I could start using the paid version of Copilot in December and the free only allows 50 clients that way. I'm not setting all the winter services up in SA and then redoing copilot shortly after when I switch. If not understand.

If you are have filled out the form and you're on the waiting list, you should be able to get in December. So whenever you are on that list, we're getting through everyone as soon as we possibly can. I know we've gotten everyone from Zooper in and I think we're on track to get everyone in by end of December, early January. But make sure you're on the list. There's a form on the dashboard, fill that out so you're on that. It's first come first serve with this new group that's coming in here. We're going to get them through the next couple weeks. Then my locations are going in and then I know quite a few other bigger locations are starting to go in December. So feel free to sign up for the waiting list just so that you get like kind of first priority. I know that already Is pretty filled a lot of people though. So you will likely be end of December. But fill out that form just to make sure you're on the waiting list. Double O1, this is Thomas Salazar. All right, good afternoon BM. Following up from yesterday's question from home page, I went to Academy tab then forms and cannot locate the new mowing price page form. Can you direct me? Yeah. So from the very front page go to edit your webpage, then put in your email and then go to add new. So it's on your website.

Right.

So cuts are on your website. Do it from edit your webpage which is the button on the top left corner of the dashboard. Right when you log in.

Kyle Turner we plan to officially buy our growth model next week. Just looking at what is the process looks like after we pay for the growth model, what are the next steps? Yep. So as soon as you pay that command center will probably reach out to you and set up what they would typically do for a growth model, which is what other services you need, walking you through other processes, making sure your connect team is set up, et cetera. So I think it'll be like a big eye opener of like oh wow, there's like so much more that they can help me with so I would highly recommend it. It's what you probably lacked last year Kyle, in terms of like the spring rush not having that in terms of like connecting to be able to reach out to them and just like quickly send them voice notes, stuff like that. So as soon as that's paid they get notified they have a Prof. Process for that. They'll probably set up a call, a zoom call with you and walk you through the that entire process.

Kyle Turner Next one. Just curious if there's a ticket system or there'll be a ticket system for copilot that we will know when a bug we submitted is closed or fixed. Yes. When you submit a bug on the form for copilot you're notified when we ever we change that thing on our end, the back end. So you'll see like go to in progress and you'll see when it goes into coderview you'll see when it gets completed and then when it says ready for prod that means it's been deployed but we haven't tested it in production. So like there's all these layers and levels of testing. You get notified of each one if you submit the ticket for the bug.

So yes, if you submitted one and it's still sitting there after a while it is typically meaning that it is not affecting everyone's core loop. So we have to prioritize bugs.

So I think right now there's like 20 that we know of.

And so when they come in, you have to prioritize them. Like, is it affecting everyone? If not, it goes down a little bit. Is it affecting the core loop? If not, it goes down a little bit. If it's affecting everyone and it's part of the core loop, which is like making money, then we prioritize those very.

Quickly and get them done like immediately.

So we get, we just do our best, I'll say that. And we're doing our best to get those down as fast as possible. But yes, if you submit a ticket through atc, this is why like everyone should be submitting anything through ATC Air Traffic Control. Because if you do and they attach your email to that bug, you'll be notified all along the process of getting fixed.

Oh, by the way, by the way, by the way, I have a very special gift for everybody coming up. Hopefully today, if not Monday. I'm going to keep it a surprise, but it's coming in copilot and it was mentioned on this mastermind like a.

Week ago, maybe a week and a half ago.

And we tied it up in a little bow and we threw it up inside a co pilot and we've. It should be through code review, if not today, on Monday. I think you guys like it.

Vlad, you.

If it comes out today, you'll hear it in the 747 update tomorrow and you'll see it right away in your software. But if not, probably Monday, it'll come out.

Vlad from Winter Garden, will you be owning corporate locations in Australia in the near future? Definitely not the near future. I'm not going to say never because I do like to be in different markets to be able to learn firsthand what everyone's facing. But I don't definitely not in the near future do I want to own corporate locations. Because.

Here I'll try to explain this really quickly. Basically it is. Let me delete these. Boom, boom, boom. So the reason I wouldn't is because the way that we currently can get in Canada and Australia.

Very nice.

The reason we can do that really simply is we don't have to start a business inside of those countries in order to operate as a franchise. What we do is we submit legal documentation for an international ftd and so we operate as a foreign entity inside of those countries and they're okay with it. And it's like just no problem. Australia's super Easy compared to Canada and the U.S. in terms of franchise law. So it's been very, very simple comparatively. And so there's a lot of things we've kind of been doing on the back end to make sure it's, it's going to support everyone on the US side. So for example, their day is our night. So as we staff to the end of 2024 for Australia, it's basically going to allow command center to stay open more, more and more hours. It's like we're adding Sundays coming next spring. But beyond that too, I would like it to be more and more hours going forward. So it'll support all of us and make it where it was worth it for us to be able to extend hours at command.

But in terms of me owning corporate locations, if I did that, I would have to then start entities over there. I would have to really like it's a lot difficult. More, more difficult to own a business and not be a citizen.

And way more legal stuff around employment, etc. Whereas like the franchise part, it's all based on licensing and their laws are like super loose. Even the fact that like yesterday I'm able to say like, hey, next year we're selling franchises in Australia. You can't do that in the US and Canada. So like I couldn't mention Canada or the U.S. until we had all our legal docs ready to go. Whereas Australia, we aren't going to be done our legal docs till February likely. But they're okay with you, you know, promoting it as long as you don't sign anyone up.

So.

Wow, getting people saying good morning to me. Let's go.

Thought on a gutter blowout, instant quote door hanger. Not trying to expand services too much, but just an idea for some extra late fall revenue and work to keep you guys. Keep guys with. Yeah, I think it'd be good. Let's say you sell a hundred of them though. At a hundred bucks a pop, that's 10 grand. Like that's okay, right? I just don't know if that's the best bang for your buck, like 10 grand. Or do you try to get people on winter services and let's say you only sell 20 or 30 of those, but, but those people are paying you 150 bucks a month. Then you convert them into mowing and like you got like long term value.

Right.

So I know in the short term it's like let's get more jobs on the schedule, like great, but can we do something that maybe converts half as many people but has long term and long tail effects to the business in the form of recurring revenue. So I think I would think I would focus my attention on if I was doing that on winter services and then if you wanted to just on the on the.

Door hanger change the service and you can change it to gutter blowout totally fine because after you blow it out one time you probably hardly have to do it the rest.

Of winter unless they're like under a tree.

So that would be my recommendation. Like if you're going to spend all this time and energy on getting a customer I'd rather spend twice as much energy or get half the results but have a long term recurring customer versus someone that I just I only have like an hour or two's worth of work from a singular gutter blowout right so all right everyone have a fantastic Friday. Have a fantastic weekend. I love you all and we'll see you on Monday.

Take care.