How to Go from $5k/Month to $15k/Month (with Nick Njuguna)

this year is all about me thinking about who do I know that's better than me at a certain skill set. So as soon as I identify just a trait, like, and it can be something in sales or marketing or anything, business, um, or life, then I'm just like, I would love to learn what that person, like, what makes them tick, what they learned and worked on in order to get good at that specific area of sales and where they want to go. So that's my intention. Cool, cool, sweet.

Let's run it.

Let's do it, dude. Who, uh, tell me your story from wherever you want to start, whether it's college, birth, or before.

Um, I think maybe a good place to start is like my entrepreneurial journey. Um, I'll try to be as concise as I can, but I came across this whole online space a couple years ago. It was like 2019 is when I first came across it, and it was through dropshipping like everyone else. And I did that for like 2 years, and I learned a lot of skills about just marketing in general. Um, I never really— I thought I'd be like the Dropshipping Millionaire, but I wasn't. But through the skills that I learned there originally— what was that?

Who'd you learn from originally in dropshipping?

Dude, I used to watch all the OGs on YouTube, like Hayden Bowles and fucking like all the OGs.

Yeah, it was a time in that era of just everyone teaching it. What, uh, what worked and what didn't? Just for people listening to this, we don't have usually biz op dropshippers anymore at this point, but certain types of dropshipping get a lot of hate, but some do work. So I'm curious, like, what you would glean from that even.

So this was like Shopify to, you know, a Facebook ad to a Shopify store. Like, this is like, oh, this is before like TikTok dropshipping got big and like high-ticket dropshipping. This was like bare bones.

Yeah, this is like learn every side source from AliExpress, sell it. Yeah, cross the middle. Yeah, tough, tough, tough, tough thing to be, uh, your first entrepreneurial endeavor.

Yeah, bro. And like, my main thing was like, I just wanted— I was washing dishes at the time and I was in college and I was just like, I just want to get— I want to not be in college, but if I'm not going to go to college, that means that I can't be financially dependent on my parents. So that was like the main thing. And in hindsight, like, dropshipping was not going to get me there. But with the skills that I learned, so there was a bunch of different things. It was Facebook marketing, you know, email marketing, design, like copywriting, a bunch of different stuff. And I came across a gentleman on Twitter named Code Email Wizard, and he was talking about like selling services, right? So I was like, hmm, there's a bunch of things I learned here. I think I could sell the service and make like 4 or 5 grand a month. That's what I thought I needed to live, which was like so wrong, right? If I could do that, um, that'd be great. So I did, and email marketing was what I chose, and I was sending a bunch of cold emails. And then I was like driving home one day from a dinner with my family, and I saw a billboard that said hiring. It was a marketing agency that said they're hiring, and I was like, I know more marketing than these people, right? Can I curse? Is that okay? Yeah, you can.

Yeah, you can do anything.

Like, I know more marketing than these fuckers, right? That's how I thought it. So that gave me the epiphany that maybe rather than trying to chase clients down, a quicker way to get out of my parents' house is maybe getting a marketing agency job. So I scraped up through the skills that I learned with cold email, I scraped up a bunch of marketing agency CEOs, and then I recorded like a custom video and blasted them. And then I ended up getting hired. Um, we're gonna say something.

No, I was about to say something because I had the exact same story of how I got into this industry. So it was weird, but I'll let you continue.

Oh, that's sick. That's sick. You just assaulted a bunch of cold emails to CEOs.

Maybe that's why I like you. Like that part different. You're probably better at cold email. I'd love for you to look at some of my approaches. I take like absolutely, I'm just some A/B, a human A/B test. But as far as that, like getting in for the first time, I basically said, hey, I would love to apply as director of marketing at Clever Investor. They said, hey kid, that's great, but you're 24 years old and we had 30 people more experienced. So I just ran Facebook ads at the CEO for until he gave me a shot at interviewing. And then I told them I was going to be in Phoenix, flew down there, got the job, just hustled my way in. So I just don't take rejection very well, which has helped me in business. And it's a cease and desist at the worst, but at best you get what you want. So like if you do it respectfully. So cold email, I struggle sometimes with because I have strong first touches and I have very like vanilla first touches and everything in between. And it can be hard. So I would love to hear some game on that.

I mean, I'm by no, by no means a cold email expert, right? This was probably like 4 years ago, but the thing, it was like, very direct, right? So I put in the subject line because I recorded a custom video. And so the— everything about the video was custom except for the first— I mean, everything about the video was the same except for the first like 3 seconds. I'd say their name and their company. Cool.

Be like, that's a great ad.

Yeah. So I'd be like, for example, so the person who ended up hiring me, um, was Andrew— I know what's his name— Eric Huberman from Hawk Media. He's the one who hired me. Great dude.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's good, dude.

There's a CEO is who sent it to their hiring team. And so the subject line would say, uh, it said, Eric, comma, here's a video I made for you. How do you not open that?

I agree. That is, I'm going to steal that right now, Nick. What was the exact, uh, phrasing you used, Nick?

Here. So I sent it to Tony actually, his, his, his, uh, COO, but it said Tony. Here's a video I made for you. Yeah. Here's a video I made for you.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So simple. Sometimes I overthink it too. That's a great one. My, I'll give you one in advance. Like this one is the only one that's repeatedly worked for me over 10 times, 10 different brands. Hey, first name, do you still live in state? If you have state personalization, you just have to, you have to know how to navigate what happens after that, but it's open rate king for me.

That's good. Yeah, that's fire. I like it.

I'm actually like, it feels good to actually say that. I've never said that one publicly because I don't want anyone to like abuse it too much, but it's pretty good. If, but if someone's watching this and can think of something better, I've tested a lot of things. I've tried city, I've tried zip, I've tried a lot of different personalization, but name and company is, makes sense why that would work so well. Yeah.

Yeah, that was good. When I was sending emails to like to business owners when I was trying to like sell the service. This is some crazy shit, but I printed out a picture of their face, right? And I would hold the face because I did the video thing. So I would hold the picture of their face in the video in the first few seconds of the video. And the subject line would say, name, here's a video. The first line would be like, you're probably wondering why I'm holding up a picture of your face. Like, how do you not open that?

That's phenomenal, dude. That's really good. Uh, did you have a printer? How many prints would you do? Like, and was there a process? You just sit there and print out all of them? Because that to me is— I'm like, I'll do that for maybe like my people I really want to get connected with, but that would be a crazy workflow if you're doing it at scale too.

These were 8-figure entrepreneurs, so maybe like 30.

Yeah. Yeah, that would, that would work on me for sure. I would feel special. Yeah, bro.

The dude Daniel Fazio, Code Email Wizard, he taught me a lot about just like, you know, fancy ways. Like something else he said is if someone's been ghosting you and it's a pretty high profile client to send them a brick, like a literal brick that says, I can't wait. I can't wait to build something great with you.

I love lump, like lumpy mail. Um, it's like, that's That, that implies that I have the money to send you freaking like FedEx ground insured, whatever the next up level of that is on weight. That's not a cheap package.

Shit was like $30, bro.

We gotta up the ante now. Now I gotta think about what I'm gonna send people. Yeah, that's better than that. Bar gold, that'd be, that'd be a bit spendy. But dang, like, mad respect to people who really want to get in touch. That's cool. Yeah.

Yeah.

So what did, what did that do for you? Like those types of, of tactics, did that in any way inform like the next part of where you were taking me there on your journey?

So that changed everything for me because I instantly start hearing back from like almost everyone, bro. I was getting interviews from almost everyone. So I had interviews with like big fashion companies. I had interviews with, you know, Hawk, like I said, another pretty big agency. And through there, that's, that was like the next season of my life was now from dishwasher who's in college, who's, um, just ultimately not enjoying his life to now I have like real income, right? Now I'm making like $60 grand a year. And so very shortly after, maybe 3 or 4 months after, I was able to move out of my parents' house. I was able to moved to Houston. I got like a pretty cool high-rise apartment in Houston, and for the next 2 years, that was my life. And then I, I eventually got like a senior role too. At that point, I was like 22, and that was pretty cool because telling people 10 years older than me what to do, which was like new.

Yeah.

Um, but I did that for a little bit, 2 years. After being a senior, I had clients that were paying us like $100 grand a month, bro, like billion-dollar companies, like It was, it was pretty fun and it was a lot of cool experiences, but I, even though I was working from home and I'm making like that point, like 90 grand a year, it just, something was just like missing. Right. I was, first of all, I was working a ton. Yeah.

Last time I come in contact with them was on the Bilzerian project and it wasn't you, unfortunately. Otherwise it probably, I would have like really loved our team. It was on web design too. So different service like that. That's where they got to eventually a bunch of different services. But I'm guessing like you were in a different place in the area of performance media for them, right?

I was in email marketing.

Yeah. Email marketing.

So performance. Yeah.

Yeah. So like where, not to cut you off there, but I'm curious, like what did you learn there from working those long hours? Because I get being disoriented. They, they got a good reputation from, you know, a lot of people for a reason of just being on. Um, and the reps obviously like can take you into burnout or make you better. So I'm, I'm curious what was gleaned from it too.

So it was cool. So I worked there and then another agency, right? And it was like very different because there I really liked the team that I worked with. Like everybody was on the same page and it was just a really fun culture to be around. The clients, there were a lot of smaller businesses though. And so the $100K a month retainers I'm talking about, that was the second agency. The clients at Hawk were a lot smaller, so they came with different headaches. And like, I didn't really enjoy working with the clients. That was the thing. But I learned a lot about just like corporate structure, right? I learned about like how to put together an executive summary, how to cool down an angry client. I learned a lot of the things that I use in my business.

You were, you were basically forced into an account management seat at that point.

Yeah, pretty much, man. Pretty much like we had account managers, but I'm the person that they're talking to all the time. So there would be crazy fuck-ups, man. There were, I don't think I did anything crazy, but there'd be times like people from other teams would like send the wrong email for a different client on the account of this client.

I've never done that. That's actually pretty hard. I have sent broken links like a couple of times in my career and got chewed out though.

Broken links.

Broken links are a huge sin. Anyone watching this, like, I've never been so scared that I was going to get fired early in my career. It was the first time I sent a broken link email to 200,000 people or whatever, whatever it was.

Yeah. Or no link.

Yeah. I don't know. Like no links. Well, no link is sometimes more defendable, like, cause you're going to be like, oh no, it wasn't like a CTA post or whatever. Uh, but yeah, if you say click the link below and there's no link below, for sure you're screwed. Yeah. Uh-huh. Needless to say, people who are at an agency working hard, I always have mad respect for. That's, uh, that's cool. So you went from— this is, this is maybe the most uncommon journey into maybe the kind of content that you do that I've, I've heard you've sat in. Normally people who are email marketing, typically not always, but are just a bit more reserved. Um, they like to stay there. They don't actually move forward into sales. It's much more common. I see. Go from sales to marketing type content, right? Next thing, what was, what was that for you, like going through this agency?

So what I learned about just email marketing in general is like, it's largely, at least what the clients care about is largely like design and feel versus like data and results. And I care more about data and results. So I'm coming on these calls hyped to talk about, you know, We increased the close rate, I mean the show rate by this much, or the open rate. Sorry, I'm a sales guy now. We increased the open rate by this much, the month over month revenues by this much, but they don't care about that shit. They're like, I don't like how the design looks, but like, why is the CTA there instead of there? Yeah, I was beating my head against the wall for so long with these clients that I realized I started looking around at the people I'm working with and I'm like, they get excited about design. Like they like talking about this stuff. I'm not in the right place.

Yep. Yep. Other realization was that you're handling objections that aren't, aren't sales objections. They're—

yeah, exactly. It's like, what am I doing here, right? Another thing I realized with that is, so the, the people around me actually liked design and they were less analytical. And so it's like, it makes sense why these people are here Why am I here though? And I noticed that what I really enjoyed the most was like not necessarily getting the job, but like selling myself to get the job because I'm 21 with no experience, 22, 21, 22, no experience. I was dishwashing and then I was able to sell these C-suite executives to hire me. I was like, dude, that's the funnest part. So after doing a lot of brainstorming, I was like, and I came across Luke Alexander on Twitter a couple of times. I was like, dude, I think sales is where I need to be. So I did both. So I'd be 9 to 5 and then at the agency, and then 6 to 10, 11, I'm taking sales calls. And I like completely burned out. I was cooked. I was exhausted after doing that for a few months. And I had like a whole breakdown, bro. I was, I was crashing out. And that's when I decided that I'm going to walk away from this comfortable $85,000, $90,000 a year, and I'm going to go all in on this high-ticket sales thing. And that's kind of what, what brought me here. That's what started the high ticket sales journey.

Interesting. We don't have to get too dark and too deep, but when you said like, is that an extended, um, crash out for you or is there like a low point that you remember? Cause some people remember like certain moments where it's like they snapped out of it. Um, because they fell below like some crazy standard and it was too much. Other people just kind of like are in that zone and then gradually get out? What was it like for you?

So the moment I realized that I needed to go was— so this is at the second agency, right? This client is paying us— they're a big app for barbers, and they're paying us like $100 grand a month, right? It was like $30 to $40 grand a month just for email in addition to the other services. And the guy had some feedback. It was honestly pretty fair feedback, but I think it was our second or third round of revisions. So I like blow up in Slack. Like, I blow up in Slack. And then the account manager hits me right after and he's like, you can't talk to clients like that. And I looked at it and I'm like, this is so out of character. Like, I'm such a reserved, chill guy. Like, this shit is getting me way out of character. Burned out. Something needs to go. And that's how I made the decision that marketing needed to go.

Okay, cool. Dude, also, yeah, agency life made me neurotic too. We had an agency for the first to cash flow the brands we were building early on. Similar experiences, not that same one too, but needless to say, expectation setting was the number one lesson I learned year one of agency running my own. And I, I knew that was important, but then it became really important because of stuff like that of just like design revision. What are we going to make our mind here? So yeah, clients will be clients. And re-anchoring expectations. Regardless, like, I don't know anyone who's missed the, um, whatever their version of that is. Um, so, right. So take me to like now, like where you're at and actually where you want to go really fast. But I like to stay in the present typically, but I do want to hear your vision. Like, do you have clarity now of where you're headed forward or just in the near term?

I think I have more clarity now. Sales coaching is the thing, right? Like, I left my full-time role to go all in on this, and I'm kind of toying with like, okay, well, where am I taking sales coaching? My rough idea is 100 people hitting their first $15K month, and we've got— I got a couple of them under, under the belt already. I think $10K is very like, you know, that's like, it's not that hard and like everyone talks about it. But $15K, at least for me, $15K was like when my life really started to change.

So What, what industry are you specifically kind of referring to? B2B, B2C sales, like high ticket?

Yeah, high ticket B2C.

High ticket, $15K a month is rare. It's reserved for usually people that both have top performers and good offers, good volume, because you need consistent lead flow. You're usually not set closing yourself at that point. Usually, not always. There's some exceptions. So to that threshold, and like you said, most people promise 10, what is it about a $15K a month closer that is different than a $10K a month closer in your— as far as habits go or the things they do?

I think there isn't much variable between those two numbers. I think they're pretty similar. Like, for some, it could literally just be the offer. Like, a $10K a month guy could go to a better offer and be a $15K a month guy. Yeah. Um, I think if we, if we made it a little bigger, the difference between like a $5K and a $15K is pretty big in my opinion.

Let's do that then. If that's the gap, where's the gap?

Yeah, I think the difference between those two is, for one, understanding language is pretty important, right? Understanding— I think that you can get there without even being the best at objection handling if you can understand the right language early on in the call. So that you know what you're dealing with and like what kind of person you're dealing with right there.

That's super cool. So like what, what period are you talking about? Pre-call or like during the first initial running of the script?

Like this, I'd say the first like 6 minutes, 6 to 10 minutes of the call, you can know what type of person you're dealing with. And it's just based on the type of language that they use.

Got you. Cool. So you didn't even have to see my daughter was in here to know that I was a parent, uh, probably coming into this, but yeah. Typically, typically anyone watching this, you would be like, hey, are you, um, are you in a good place to take a call right now? If I saw a distraction, right, or in the car or anything else. So what visual cues are you picking up on and what kind of auditory and other things are you looking for?

Yeah, so I'd say visual cues is like their environment, right? Like if we were on a sales call right now, I don't think she's being super distracting. She just like wants to be with her dad, which is okay.

Right, it's my girl.

But if they're like, if, if they're like pacing around the, the house, right, or if they're driving— driving is like an instant no for me. But if you're pacing around the house, just like a podcast driving, yeah, I'll instantly put a brake to slow down, slow down. Looks like you're a little occupied there, like, is everything good? Yeah, get themselves together. That's a visual one. I'd say auditory, like what I'm listening for as far as their language is, is this someone who's taking ownership for their situation or are they externalizing? I'd say that's the biggest one, um, and the, the best way to find that is once you find their problem, asking them what they've done to solve their problem.

Mhm.

And that tells you everything. Like, I didn't have time— that means this person has a poor relationship with time. Yeah, that's what I need to reframe. I didn't have the money to have a poor relationship with money. That's what we need to reframe. And you're able to find that pretty early on.

And I did a little bit of both right at the beginning of the call. I internalized and externalized and then wrapped, try to, and then took accountability. So I was processing.

So you're a good prospect, man. Thank you.

Uh, I buy like I sell, which is well, and that is extremely rare that someone would even articulate it just like you did. Um, and that's— great marketers think the same too. Is it like internal, external? But I don't even process like that. I typically think when I come into a call, either beginner's mind if that's the goal for me, which is the case for this, or what's my objective and what do I want from it? It's like more transactional too. So I'm always fascinated by it because everyone is so different on that, like, initial approach, and that is just super cool. So where does that come in in the second or third part of the sales call? Like, if it's a typical high-ticket trajectory, like, when you notice that, where are you inserting it or preempting it?

So they'll tell you that pretty early, but that doesn't mean that you challenge them early on it, right? So first, the— like, my way I go about sales calls is I'll get their logical problems And then I'll get their emotional problems. And that's full context, logical and emotional. And then once I have that, then I'll ask them what they've done to solve it. And then I'll challenge them on not doing enough. Something I internalize is everything is the prospect's fault. They either haven't done anything to solve their problem or they haven't done enough. So once I have those two things, then I'm going to challenge them on not doing enough to solve the logical problem so that they can then solve their emotional problem. And that's where the language like, I didn't have time comes into play, or I didn't have the money comes into play. But if I challenge them too early, I don't have enough context. And that's what I see a lot of reps doing is they hear it and they're like, oh yeah, let me fight this person. Like, bro, really?

Yeah, I love those reps, but yeah, they lose a lot. They're efficient because they get more. But if you don't have enough leads to backfill calendar, then you're sitting there burning through.

Mm-hmm.

Dude, very, very cool approach. So. Makes sense why I appreciated your videos. So I didn't know, you never know when you're clipping just like what the deal is or what the situation is. Yeah. But even if it's role plays that happen to me and I've seen now, I don't think they were doing this on your videos, whether or not you had like real prospects or like, let's call it acting. To me, I'm like acting comes out of just real call like situation. So it's just like recreating a situation. To me, there's so many different scenarios. Reps like yourself get thrown into every day. Like new objections are just like, yeah, this is— imagine, you know, have you ever seen someone not like who signed up for the call, take the call and they just pop in instead and take the call?

Um, what do you mean? Like someone who likes to—

like imagine my daughter just sitting here doing the podcast instead. Like it's not them.

Oh no, no, that's— I think that's more of a B2B thing.

That's one of the weirdest things that's happened to me for sure. It's just like, yeah, they sent me and I don't know what the situation is. And I was like, whoa, okay.

It sounds like they do that a lot in B2B though, right? They'll have like—

B2B is more common that, but it's, um, yeah, it can be, it can be preset as an expectation, like 7 minutes before of like, hey, I'm running late. I'm sending someone, which is to me fine. But if it's just done as a misdirect right at the time of call, it's weird for sure.

How do you handle that? Do you still take it? I'm curious.

I'll tell you how I did the first one, which is. Hey, okay. I, I said, okay, then let me hit the group text real fast because I, I was just want to make sure we're all on the same page and tried to, you know, not steal frame, but essentially just let everyone know because I was unsure of what the actual situation was. It was genuine confusion. I was like, is this a setter or am I like— because I knew the person who did it.

Yeah.

So I was just trying to feel it out of just like, it's fine if it is, just tell me. So I, I didn't know, but that's the only time it's ever happened to me in that situation.

That's pretty funny. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's— I haven't sold B2B, so it's, it's tough for me to say, but if I'm expecting to talk to this person and then they put their assistant on, I don't think it makes sense to sit here because what's the idea?

They were, uh, they were framed as, I want to say, like the, the COO or something like that. It was a partner, partner-level framing. Of the, of the person.

So then I'd get context. I'd be like, okay, depending on whatever problem you're there to solve, I'd be like, okay, what parts of the business does he handle versus you? And if they're— if they're— you're there to talk about the part of the business he handles, then I'd continue. But if it's the part that the other dude handles, then there's no point in us having this conversation.

Yeah, business partner basically, um, objection sequence. That would have been smarter. I was just thrown off by it. But yeah, certainly, like you said, getting to the objection handling stage is never my aim or intent. If you do a good job, um, straight line sales still exists. At least I— have you seen the same, like one call close?

Yeah, yeah, majority of my calls are one call. And like, I think the— what I've seen, at least the misconception is like people think that you just prevent all objections or you prehandle objections. And how I like to look at it is the discovery is meant to eliminate as much of them as you can, but they're still going to come up because it's still a human who has concerns. So I want to have as much ammo as possible when that objection comes up. So like the way we're talking about challenging them on their relationship with time, if they tell me at the end that they don't have time, I already have the ammo because we had this conversation sooner about why your relationship with time isn't serving you. I'm, I'm ready for it. I'm embracing it rather than running away from it, you know.

100%. So walk me, walk me through this one then. As far as money versus time, do you separate those? And then internal, external, you separate those? Those are kind of the two lenses that you're filtering through, or do you look at it even more multi-dimensional than that?

Yeah, typically those are going to be the two. From what I've seen, those are going to be the two reasons that someone hasn't done what they need to do to solve the problem. And they'll package it in different ways though, right?

Yeah, slicing through. So more tactically, is there anything that you adamantly kind of are different on than the— let's just call it quote unquote the 80% of people who teach high ticket sales, whether it's Seth Klosz, you're like, yo, no 35-minute like discovery slots only with zero buffer. Anything like that doesn't have to be slots, but ramping up. No, reps can ramp up on day 1. They don't have to be— or no, I keep them till day 90. They're not touching the phones. What is unique that you found about your approach now having done so many reps?

So I have a document, it's called the Avatar Sheet, that they have to fill out like before we even meet. They have to fill it out and it's very detailed. It has What's— and they obviously have the context to be able to do it, right? But like, who do you sell to? What are the different archetypes? What are their problems? How do they say their problems? How do they tell you their problems? And what's the limiting belief behind this? Okay, so what kinds of— well, firstly, when it comes to the problem, what kinds of questions can we ask in the discovery to get those problems? And they're doing it with every single avatar type.

Interesting. How many avatar types is too many or too little, or do you just start with one?

There's typically like 3, like 1 to 3. Yeah. So that's cool. Yeah. Like one of the, one of the offers is a career coaching offer. So they have the person who's like pretty comfortable in their career financially, right? That's one avatar, but they're not growing. And then they have another type who is— they were laid off, so they have nothing, right? And they have another type who they're making good money, like a couple hundred grand a year, but they're actually check to check and they need to add another 100, 200 grand a year. So each of these people are going to present their problem differently to you.

Interesting. This came up earlier today for me and my team. I was asked basically a question of that's relevant to a whole sales floor in itself, which is, hey, what do I do to ramp a setter I just hired? First, first setter ever they hired. And I was like, okay, cool. I have just observed the different people— when this is from a book that I just put in chat, but basically 5 different ways to accelerate sales. I'm like, yeah, I can't really think of like without getting, you know, without saying like, you know, external events, there's— that's pretty good. Like talent, ramping people faster, standardizing process, better systems. You might think of something else too. That's a gap in there. Where do you feel like you really overskew and help people or like to lean in at?

Yeah. So similar to what I said before, like most people literally just don't know their avatar. Which is like so basic and it's not very shiny, but like, I love it. Why would someone buy this? Like, most people don't know why they would even buy this. Like, at a deep level, it's not just because they want to make a couple extra grand a month, right? They want to make a couple extra grand a month without working as much so they could spend more time with their kids, so they could be able to do XYZ financially, right? So they could be able to give back to their wife. Like, truly understanding why they would buy for setters and closers. Because when we understand that, we are able to work backwards with the questions. Otherwise, they're just fucking cherry-picking questions out of there.

Yes. So you said that you primarily handle that by getting on the call and just assessing it through, let's call it, just your, your razor to cut through and get directionally correct. Is there anything that you're doing additional outside of the calls to get to avatar besides like those worksheets? Like, how do you even know it's time to develop an avatar when you've just talked to a few people?

So, so they'll go through the avatar doc, right? And so what happens, and this is what makes it fun, is they go through it themselves. And then I— because again, they don't— most people don't know who they're selling to, right? So they'll go through it themselves. And then on our first call, we'll go through it together and we'll unpack, we'll get more layers of depth. So they may just say, oh, this person wants to make more money. We'll get more layers of depth around everything, and then I'll pull up a call, and then we'll together look at, okay, this is what he said right here, but then we moved on. Where do you think we could have gone deeper? Or what kind of questions would you have asked there?

Hmm.

So we're kind of doing it together. Yeah.

Sweet. So it's iterative, and you start them, you chunk it down so they get to something. That, you know, so what is, um, what's maybe the game theory optimal? What's, what's too far? Like, are you taking them to 7 whys and getting them like crying on the phone? Is your style more like emotional collapse? Is it just get them enough to know 2 or 3 layers deep after, like, it's a money thing? Where, where do you like to sit?

You're talking about what, the prospect now, like on call?

Back now.

So there's— I got this from Matt Ryder, like the buying pocket. Right? If we think about the buying pocket, this is too confident, this is not confident enough, this is perfect right here. And so I kind of gauge based on how they're speaking where they are. If they're on the too confident side, meaning they don't think that they need any help, then I'm killing their confidence a little bit and I'm bringing them back. But if they're not confident enough and they don't think anything's going to work and they just want to kill themselves and they're going to have to call, right? So I'm bringing them closer to here.

Yeah, Ryder's so good at that. Um, yeah, he's done it to me too. And, and just in such a nice, nice way. So, so it's just by doing more reps, I get that part of it then. So then last, like, tactical, um, thing about just how much discovery is too discovery. Where do you, where do you orient then as far as someone comes into your community? And by the way, like, how can they find, before we move on, that like sheet and that training? You mentioned the program.

Yeah, if you DM me Avatar Sheet, I'll just send it to you. It's, it's typically for private clients, but I got you, I'll send it. Whoever DMs me.

Well, I appreciate that. So if you guys are interested in getting access to that, hop on a call and see if it's right for you. But if it sounds like you're right in that cusp of helping people who are making $5K on the phones get to that $15K mark, or whatever it is, just more than that typical average mark, I think that is the threshold that is not just offer dependent for sure. And Yeah. What's, what's the biggest swing actually that you've seen between any floor, like lowest performer to highest performer? Because there is, there's this concept of like, okay, there's developers that are 100x better than an average developer, but that multiple doesn't exist in sales. I've seen on my own floors maybe 2 to 3 times like top performer than the worst performer. What's the biggest gap that you typically see, whether it's average to lowest or average to highest?

So this was a month before I got on the team. Uh, the top performer had paid like $48,000 and the bottom performer had made like $3,000.

And I was like, with the same level, like round robin, like kind of style, or was it preference, some priority but still like not excusable?

Yeah, so he definitely had priority. He definitely had priority. But the thing is, they got— they had a They had a structure where if you hit a certain amount of cash, your commission doubles.

Oh, double.

He hit that and the other person was like well below it, which is why that gap is so big.

That's a crazy gap.

Yeah, that's a huge gap. Yeah.

Sweet. Well, yeah, and that's— I don't know if you ever looked into it, but to me, I'm always trying to figure out why did someone ramp faster than than other reps? Why did someone gradually become better? Um, and my conclusion's pretty, pretty basic. I imagine you'll, you'll see it a little bit differently, is like they get better over the long term cuz they were just more disciplined and they built discipline over time and showed up consistently. The person that ramps faster usually isn't jaded, um, and has skill and like, let's call it skill slash a little bit of experience, but not jadedness where they don't come in and and they still are a student of the game. Is there any other kind of like, because I imagine, is it fair to say that you primarily are helping people like get there for the first time or back on their like back on their $15K type shit?

Yeah, so most of them it's the first time. I think it's interesting. I slightly disagree there because from what I've seen, like people who came in just swinging, making a lot of money quick, Like, I know guys who came in and made their second month like $10,000, $12,000, $15,000. Second, third month ever. Uh-huh. The people who don't have to deal with as much adversity before hitting those kinds of numbers, when they hit the slumps, those slumps hit way harder.

I'm in agreement with you there. I— yes, I've seen the same pattern.

And then they're in a slump for months now. Um, that's what I've seen, and it sucks. I'd rather be the guy who slowly ramps up than knowing what it feels like, and then it's just like I just can't get back.

So you're right. Like you're, you're challenging me and like what I see more so than what I actually believe, because you're right. Why do I care about if they ramp faster? Because of cash cycles and short-term sighted. So like, do I really care about that or do I care about going a little bit slower? So what is, in your opinion, the perfect speed to ramp a sales rep, let's say, or what do you do in the first month if someone comes on new?

So. From, from experience, I think them being at— I think it's like 50% their first 2 weeks being at 50% of KPI, and then the second 2, so week 2 to 4 being at like 70% of KPI, and eventually 80 to 90% by like their 6th week. By the end of the second month, they should be hitting KPI. And some may say that that's a little generous to give them that long, but I mean, if you're, if let's say KPI is 30% and you're closing at 15% the first 2 weeks, there's some kind of hope there. Like we can make this work. Yeah.

Right. Like, and I, and I've also seen at least anecdotally, I guess it is just, yeah, it is everyone's style, but anecdotally I've seen people get better after the month mark and I've seen them get better after 2 months, but I've never seen like a bad performer for 4 months go like green and go Super Saiyan. Kind of thing.

Yeah, it's tough, man. I think there's a lot of things that kind of— I don't mean to externalize, but like work against some people. And like, one thing is like just baseline intelligence too, for sure. I think there's a certain level of intelligence, like you definitely— you don't want to be too smart because there's diminishing returns of being like too, too smart. But if you're not smart enough, it's just like really hard to grasp these things. Like you have to kind of be in the middle. I agree.

So, dude, let's— because I'm at time here and I'm going to try not to make this a perpetual problem of being late, guys. And by the way, if you didn't catch it, Nick and Nick here, and this Nick was late to this one. So I want to catch up a lot. I like your sales style, like the methodology. And if you have people looking for those opportunities and people looking to earn more, we have those sales floors. So I'd love to see if there's synergy there too. And the way I look at it is if we— if I can help you, you know, provide more places for ups to land, that's the gift I usually give people is like, hey, it's not just our floors, but look at all these opportunities that I can introduce you to. I'd be happy to do that for your community and even just pop in.

Yeah, of course, man. Of course. Yeah, there's definitely a couple people who need a new home that are in the process of finding, so—

yep, sweet. Or, or even if they're not, just coming in and doing whatever I can. And likewise Dude, if you, um, if you are ever looking for whatever the next step is for that sales, like, training program and want to do a part 2 with me, I would love to just explore what it looks like for you and just catch up.

Hell yeah. Appreciate it, man.

Truly.

Sweet.

And my daughter says goodbye too, and hello.

Bye, Stevie.

Bye, Stevie. Wow, you remembered her name, man.

Good, good, dude.

All right, cheers.

Yeah, this was fun, man. Appreciate you, bro. Peace.

Appreciate you too. Cheers. Have a good one.