Helping Real Business Owners Get More Customers Live | Ep 961

0:00It will take you less time to get 10 paying customers by getting 10 free customers first and then and flipping some of them to paid and then using their testimonials to get 10 more than to start from scratch and try to get 10.

0:14Let's go, Steve. Let's go pistols. QP's. Steve, rock and roll. You're on Hermosi Hotline. What's cooking? All right, thanks. Nice to meet you. I was actually at your workshop in February. Badass. 2024. All right, was it good? It was fantastic since then. We've almost made$900 ,000 in total revenue. So it worked out great. And this is not a claim. Everybody, his results are unique and yours will vary, but not bad for a$5 ,000 ticket or$6 ,000 ticket, whatever it was then. No, it was fantastic. Okay, I'll run you through these numbers real quick. Yeah, let's do it. All right. For this year, 2025, our total revenue is right at$423 ,000.

0:59Okay. Profit is$275 ,000. industry, mortgage broker, what we sell is we are hyper-niched into, I'm an airline pilot and military pilot, so we help airline pilots and military pilots buy homes with their VA loan. Okay. And the problem we're trying to solve is I think we have so many different kind of marketing strategies right now, it's tough to kind of pick which to put the more on. That's why we get started, then we stop, then we start, then we stop. Word. Okay, well, what are the different ways you're getting customers right now, and what's LTVCAC on each channel? Okay, so this is fantastic.

1:43So organic, that's where we get LTV is$11 ,107. Our CAC is$3 ,200, and we have 46 deals we closed this year, so 18 came from there. from realtor referral networks our ltv is 7800 okay like just real yeah um cac still the same right 32 across the board on the cac and then oh really okay really by channel it's that or you just took all your marketing spend and divided it i just did a a gross like a fully loaded cac across the board i didn't break it out okay per group there i'll actually be able to figure that in a second how many people did you get from the realtor thing we only got 14 ok so 18 then 14 ok got it and then what was the third channel just past clients 14 coming back for more loans ok got it just repeat business and then how many did you have there 14 on repeat business ok and then what was LTV on them LTV on them was 77.56 ok and so organic for you right now is content?

2:58Yeah, it's pushing out content. We were sending messages out about 25 a day to people. However, it wasn't converting. They're just reaching out to us when they're ready. They're super warm. They ask us for an application and no friction. It's almost one for one. It's kind of crazy. We solved the problem of underwriting for airline pilots. It's super complicated and we know exactly how to solve it. That's what we're going on. I love that you're niched on this, by the way. I think it's really good. So I like the model. There's also a ton of pilots. So like, love all, like all of it, all right? Okay, so you've been making content.

3:35Let's put a pin in that for a second. So the affiliates, so the realtor networks that you have access to, how do you recruit the realtors? Well, I was thinking last year, we recruited very heavily, but we realized the LTV was so, like it was lower, almost 30 % lower. We kind of quit messing with them. So we really don't mess with realtors anymore. We're looking to get back into realtors, kind of seeing I really need the affiliate to keep the money model going. So we really haven't done much with realtors this year. It's just these are some leftover ones from last year. So let me ask you a question.

4:07How much did you do outbound? Is that what you did for the realtors? Yeah, it's just calling them up, look them up in the local area, just calling them up and meeting with them. And then they refer business to us. Got it. So how much would you say of your time last year was allocated towards doing that? Almost 80 % of our time was doing that last year. No way. Really? And what we kind of realized was like this year we've had 42 qualified leads come from them, but only 14 of them we closed, and only one of them was our ideal client of an airline pilot using a VA loan. Kind of just generic. They just think you just like people.

4:50Yeah, they're sending generic people, and it creates more return in the system, more work, more credit pool, everything. Yeah, yeah, heard. Okay, so given the fact that you're in a niche, going after generic realtors is going to be tough because the likelihood that they sell a pilot is going to be super low statistically, right? So I think that your best bet is probably going to be an organic plus ads rather than organic plus affiliates unless there was, like, actually, you know, said differently, this actually makes way more sense. So instead of going after realtors, I think your outbound strategy is the right idea, but I'd be going after group owners or community owners who have pilot-related businesses or like pilot-related merchandise.

5:29Because actually, it's so funny, because I want to say two years ago, I had a call like this with a guy who did pilot merch. So all it was was just like merch for pilots. And he had a community owner of pilots, and he ran, it was an e-commerce business. And so he was running ads. So I don't think it's, one, and I don't think it's very hard to find these pilots. I would also recommend starting a school community for all the customers because they're all the same. I actually think that'd just be cool. It's just like a cool benefit that you have that other people can't normally do in your space. And I think you'll be able to generate a shitload of referrals from that.

6:07That's kind of what we were kind of thinking. We do have a finance course that we built out that we just haven't really been able to use because I kind of get stuck in this, hey, I need to go back to doing more. but like we've built out courses just for pilots, just for the veteran, exactly how to fix your problem. Here's what I'd do. Here's what I'd do. So you're going to take your course, right? And you're going to make that as a lead magnet for your organic. And I would drive them into a group because to your point of like, some of them aren't ready. That's fine. They can join a group in the meantime.

6:36That will spin up the wheel. That will then get you leads and then it'll also get you referrals because you can tell them, hey, send your friends to this group. They're all welcome as long as they're pilots. Pilots only. Okay. So they get this lead magnet when they join the group for free. Thing one. Second thing is I would start experimenting with Facebook ads, and I would use the lead magnet yet again. And then what I would do is I would include, because I would send them to the group and give them an onboarding call for free so they get the lead magnet plus an onboarding call. And then you can talk to them.

7:15You can gauge where they're at in the life cycle. And that group can basically act as your long-term nurture in the meantime. But I think the referrals from the community are going to be big. And I think paid ads in today's day and age can get super targeted for this type of avatar. And that's what we identified. On social media, it's almost 75 % are our exact client. Yeah, dude, the algorithm's already done. Like the algorithm's finished. They know what's inside. AI gets it. AI knows who the pilots are and they just send that. It's interest media, not social media anymore. If you want to get pilots, you have to make pilot stuff, which you've already figured out, right?

7:51So it's like, number one, I think by and large, for sure, this strategy is a more strategy because what I want you to do is make way more pilot content, number one. I would also experiment with like pilot-related humor and memes because I think those will probably do really well and they'll still bring people in because that's fine. Normally, I'm not pro-meme, but I think for stuff like this, like inside jokes for pilots, I think would be a great content type. Not every day, but a few of those a week I think would do well. Just top of funnel awareness. But what's cool about that is that I want you to pump way more content so that when you take the winners of that content, take the content and then slap on a CTA at the end, run that as the ad.

8:28And then the offer is going to be the lead magnet you already made. They can facilitate the course or they get the onboarding call for free. We can score where they're out in the lifecycle. and then you can follow up with them accordingly. Okay. That's what I would do. Well, cool. That was really the decision was go after realtors and just keep going after our clients. No, dude. I don't think, no. I don't think realtors is the play. I don't think realtors is the play because if you want to stay in this niche, I don't think that's the play. Okay. Perfect. Thank you. Rock and roll, dude. Appreciate you.

8:56All right. Thanks, man. All right. That's it. Okay. The training gyms. I have personal training. Oh, gosh. I don't know anything about gyms. Can someone else take this one? So UK-based, money model is pretty good, but can't get my salespeople to sell supplements. Cool. It might be that they aren't really confident in their general supplements. Yeah. So having sold a lot of supplements in my life, let me just give you the solution rather than, you know, ask going back and forth on it. So what you want to do is you want to give every single one of them kind of like the ultimate package and tell them to go through a 30-day challenge where they'll follow your meal plan and they'll take the supplements and you want them to take before pictures and after pictures.

9:33So you say, hey, guys, and you kind of like whisper-teach out this. So right as all the trainers take their before pictures, have them all be like, something big is coming. You know, kind of like, dun-dun-dun. And so have them posting a ton during this 30-day period of their workouts and their food and all this stuff. It's like, hey, we've got something sick that's dropping. And then at the end of the 30 days, you'll post all the after pictures, right? And with the after pictures, you'll then announce a 28-day transformation or something like that. And you can email your entire list, and you can even post to your socials, whatever, and run it for free.

10:05Hear me out. You'll run it for free so any members can also bring somebody or as many friends as they want to do the 28-day transformation. Here's how it works. When they come in, it is free, but the first meeting you're going to do is going to be a nutrition orientation. At the nutrition orientation, you're going to say, hey, we've got your food covered. We've got your workouts covered. These are the supplements you're going to want to take for the 28 days. And you'll sell them all$300 to$500,$600 package of supplements. And when you give the trainers commissions, And one, if they can't sell anything but the supplements and they just went through the experience, they will like it a lot.

10:38Now, lucky for you, Mr. Training Gyms, let me tell you how to sell them. So menu upsells, which is page 77 inside the Money Models book, literally outlines exactly how I sell supplements. Four steps. Unsell what they don't need, prescribe what they do need, which is basically tell them exactly how they're going to take each product. So let me explain that. Actually, I'm going to go a little deeper on this one because I think you guys, you guys cool with that? Everyone good with that? All right, we'll go a little deeper on this one. So the way to sell supplements, I've sold a lot of supplements in my life.

11:09Person comes in. As soon as they sit down, what you're going to say is, hey, I'm going to give you this meal plan. Everyone always wants to know what supplements they're going to buy. I get to that, I promise. But I really want you to focus on the food because the food is the most important part. All right? What have I just said right with the beginning? One is I made everybody know that everyone wants to know which supplements they're going to buy. So I've already seeded that. Number two, I've also told the truth, which is that I want them to focus on the food because the food is the most important part.

11:33So you already accomplished two things right up front and you do so ethically. Now, after you go through it, you're gonna go through the nutrition plan, go through the grocery plan, whatever. You say, okay, finally, we're gonna get to everyone's favorite part. Then you flip back to the plan. Now, I integrated supplements into my meal plan so that they were one and the same, so that it wasn't like, oh, I've got supplements here and meals here, because then it makes it seem like this is an addition. I want it to be integrated. All right, now, the next thing you're gonna do is on your meal plans, You should have little dashes next to each of the products that you have on site.

12:05And I prefer to, step one, unsell. So you say, hey, Dorothy, I'm guessing you're not trying to get any chest hair. And they're like, oh, God, no. And you're like, great. So let's just cross out this testosterone boost. You probably don't need that. The next thing is you're not trying to gain weight, are you? No? Okay, cool. Let's just cross out this weight gainer. I don't need you on that. And so I go through first two things they don't need. I'll be like, now this one. I then give away the supplements that are low margin. So I say, listen, we've got a fish oil or an Omega Complex. There's one down the road.

12:32I'll write down the brand name for you. It's probably half the price of what we sell it for. It's not as good. I was like, but it'll get you 80 % out of the way there. All right, so let's just like, I'll write it down. Boom. Next thing, this one, this is generic. You can probably get another one probably for half the price down the road. I'll write that one down. Great. Boom. So the next thing is like, okay, now we've done our seeding. We've told people that everyone's going to buy. then we've unsold the products that I don't want them to buy or aren't right for them then we go to prescription okay step two we say all right so I want you to write a one next to this which is going to be your protein I want you to write a two next to this I want you to three next to this whatever you're going to go down the list and so with each one of them you say all right so your pre-workout uh do you want to drive the same car every day they're going to say yes and you say awesome so I want you to take your pre-workout I want you to put it in the car with you because it's always going to be with you next thing is your uh post-workout you're always going to be using this car.

13:25I want you to keep that in the car too. Next one is your PM. Okay. So this stuff I want you to take at night. What's the last thing you do before you go to bed? You know, I put my retainer in. Cool. I want you to put it right next to your retainer or right next to your toothbrush. That way you don't forget it. What's the first thing you do in the morning? I drink coffee. Great. So I want you to put your AM stuff right next to the coffee. I'm going to take this tape, put it on top, write a tube, take tape, put it on top, write a three, tape on top, write a two. That way you know how many pills they're going to take in each of those specific sessions.

13:50They have to think about it. So I don't want this big stack of stuff that's going to sit in your closet. I want it already integrated into your life. That's prescriptive. Notice, I didn't ask them. I told them. I told them exactly how to take it. Then I say, great. For the protein, do you want chocolate or vanilla? Great. You want chocolate? I like chocolate. Fantastic. For the pre-workout, do you like strawberry or kiwi? Most people like strawberry. Strawberry, great. All right. Awesome. You're almost ready to go. Put it in front of them and say, great. Do you want to use the card you have on file?

14:16Awesome. Done. Close everyone. You'll close 90 % power works. That's how you do self and sell. Next caller, Corey, what's up, man? You're on Hermosi Hotline. Hey, man, what's going on? I'm cruising and bruising. Hell yeah, that's what I'm talking about. All right, talk to me. What's the business? What do you sell? How much you make? All that good stuff. Yeah, so we're an HVAC cleaning business. So we're doing currently on track right now for this year for 1.8. All right, 1.8 top line, got it. What's bottom line? Bottom line right now is roughly 450 to 500. Nice, solid, good, okay. What is, you must have been consuming my stuff for a while.

15:05Okay. Good math, huh? Good inspiration. No, I love it. Okay, so what's the thing that's holding you back? Is it not enough technicians or is it not enough leads? Now it still leads a little bit. we're always looking for more because we're we're currently always hiring uh so we are now putting on a technician probably one every three to four months okay got it so what's the constraint of business right now what's holding you back from doing twice as much right so right now is definitely leads uh so okay for our cash cow event that we had with you the one thing that we really dissected was our third-party marketing.

15:50Corey, I didn't realize that this was that Corey. All right, rock and roll, Corey. Yeah, I remember everything. I didn't know. I had Corey. That's all I had. Corey and HVAC. No, no. But you're in duct cleaning, which is a little unique. All right, all right, all right. I remember. All right, so what's holding it back? Yeah, so right now, we just got rid of our old marketing company, so we went with a new third-party now. They're great. A lot of track record. It's kind of a higher echelon of what is in our market. So we actually have our CMO that worked with them previously and her past company.

16:23She took them from$2 million a month to, I'm sorry,$2 million a year to$2 million a month. So now we reunited them. So they are super excited to all work together again. But, yeah, I mean, right now is we're trying to just lock in on leads again. We are redoing the website. We're redoing a lot of our ads and kind of reconfiguring things. And just like we've talked about in our cash cow is, you know, I mean, I'll spend unlimited ad spend as long as it makes sense and makes money, right? Yeah. So what's holding you back? Or this stuff just needs to pan out? Yeah, so we're working on leads right now.

17:02And then finding the real constraint is finding enough technicians that fit our feed and what we do. So a big part of what we do is education. And all of our employees right now, there's none of them that have a HVAC background at all. So it's been really interesting to kind of train people up from the ground zero, which has also been great. Yeah, but you get way better margins. They learn it your way. So there's advantages. Yeah. Right. Right. Exactly. Okay. So do you need more leads or do you need more technicians? Definitely more leads first. So technicians are good right now. Definitely more leads.

17:41Well, if you're already redesigning all your funnels and your offers and you're about to turn on a bunch of ads, I don't know if the first thing I want to do is just say, let's stop all that. I think you need to do that. And so I think you need to let the dust settle from that change. One of the big things that Layla says a lot, which I really appreciate, is you never want to solve the same problem twice. And so sometimes it's like if we have a three-month solution to a problem, if we're one month in and the problem isn't solved, it makes sense, though, because we're still working on it. It's a three-month solution.

18:07It's going to take us 90 days. And so sometimes we want to solve the same thing like multiple ways when really the first thing was the right thing. It's just going to take 90 days. Right. Exactly. So if these guys were able to scale the other business, you know, from$2 million a year to$2 million a month, it sounds like they already have, you know, whatever their playbook is on the lead side. So I'm going to just assume just for the sake of our conversation, because it's going to get too granular that I can do over the phone without seeing what I'd be looking at, like super tactical headlines and moving, you know, all that kind of stuff, transitioning over to the supply side.

18:34Because assuming that works, you're going to be quickly supply constrained. Right? Right. Okay. So what is your lead gen funnel for the technicians? So right now, we are currently going on Facebook groups and stuff of that nature. And we're also kind of, we're almost recruiting and like reaching out to other companies. So when we see posts or things from other technicians or when my technicians are out in the field and they see other companies, those guys are coming out to us of like, hey, I've never heard of you guys. what do you guys do and they see what we're doing they want to be involved so they're just not happy where they are and they're looking for us but we have to be careful with that too yeah well all right so we have a couple like you need to increase like you're going to need to dream you need to go from you know one what do you say one every three or four months is what you said right so if you're gonna if you're gonna 12x you're gonna have to go one every three or four months to like almost, I mean, it's 12 times that.

19:35So if you did one a month, it would still be only three times that. So it's going to be closer to one a week to sustain the volume. So we need to build that machine like soon. And so we have to think about a more scalable way of acquiring them. And so I think part of it is, do you have the economics around how much an HVAC technician makes you? Yes. So an average technician around us thinks I'm going to be between 50 and 70. They make that much money. That's their pay. right is that what you're saying yeah okay so their salary is i'm gonna say 60k okay got it how much gross profit does the technician bring in for you take out cost of like you know the materials right so take out material costs how much does it make and then i'll subtract out their salary about i'll just call it the i mean 180 to 200 all right the 200k all right well it's already 30%, which is already kind of high.

20:31Cause I was like, is there a way that we can, what commission are you giving to, uh, to bring them in? Uh, well, right now we've actually had to outsource for, for, from different states. So we're offering like relocation, um, you know, packages in order to get them here. Uh, because we live in a lot of retirement communities and stuff like that. So the people that we're looking for is kind of hard sometimes. So, um, I mean, We offer up to$10 ,000 of relocation. And then, like I said, we try to get them rocking and rolling. Yeah. So I think we just have to be a little bit more violent. I think you have the right strategy.

21:06I think it's just a volume thing. You're reaching out. It's like, how many recruiters do we have? How many we ask them for? Can we get them to get us more? Thing one. Thing two, you're going in communities, but how many? How often? like do are they on like where's the where's the best pool because they all hang out somewhere right so where do they hang out that's a good question I gotta I gotta deep dive into that well you solve that and you make like 50 million dollars they're all typically working that's the way it's like especially with us no but they hang out online dude everybody hangs out online entrepreneurs are always working okay but they hang out online so that like don't like there's there's somewhere they hang out groups forums associations associations discords school communities like they're somewhere so i'd be looking at the trades like trades uh groups in general like look broader because you train these guys from scratch anyways right and do you like i mean you train them from scratch because like do you need them to be existing techs can you just get anyone to do it i hire for personality more than anything well dude i mean then why i mean like you don't need to be looking cross-state i mean like this, this to me sounds like a, an ad thing.

22:19So I would be running like Indeed, uh, and like Facebook marketplace or whatever ads. And then I'd be running them to a group interview because that'll make it efficient for you. Just group interviews, just do, you know, one group interview, two group interviews a week, 10 people on assume only 30 % are going to show. So it's like get 30 people booked for each of the times. So it's like 60, you know, 60-ish leads confirming, which will probably take you five times that or more. So 300 leads a week. We're coming in off of Indeed Ads. Do a much, you know, do a 50-mile radius around your location.

22:58And I would be group interviewing. And then off the group interview, we're talking like one or two minute, just them, just you catch a vibe pretty quick, right? And then you do a one-on-one with them after that. And that'll allow you to triage through a shitload of applications. This is a low-skilled role. This is a low-skilled role. I wouldn't be recruited from out of state for this. Just low-skilled role. You need to be spending like a ton of money on, I mean, a ton is relative, right? Like if you're willing to spend 10 ,000, which I think is the right way to think about this, dude, if you spend 10 ,000 a month, you're going to get way more than one technician on ads.

23:29Way more. Right. So I don't even think you need to do much. Like, I mean, it's good that you're doing that, but I think I would just, you have to build the recruiting process for this business because if the girl and the reuniting with the agency or whatever, they worked together before, they already know how the sales motion and the acquisition works. So you're going to have to 12x your acquisition of talent. So this is another machine. Yeah. Cool? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that's very helpful. I mean, like I said, it's the biggest thing that we're trying to do is just kind of grow our team. And like I said, just making sure that the right people on our team, because especially with our industry as a whole, it's very important that we do the right kind of work.

24:13No, you're good. And if you're catching for attitude, right, which is what you're looking for, just cast the net broad. Talk to as many people as you can. That's all we're doing here. Talk to as many people as you can. You catch a vibe real quick, move them in. Yeah, absolutely. It's very helpful. All right. Rock and roll, Corey. Appreciate you. All right, brother. Yeah. All right. Talk soon. All right. Renato, I've ran ads for my biz for two years and 8x their business. Oh, for a biz, not your biz. 8x their business. I learned everything about the business, but I'm not sure if it's enough proof to talk about and get new clients on the niche.

24:49I mean, some proof is better than no proof for sure. But I would say like, can you work for more customers for free or at a discount? I'm telling you, everybody, you will shortcut your path to success by getting 10 testimonials more than just about anything else. Because that's like, if you look at a conversion page, you look at a VSL, you look at a sales process, if you show 10 testimonials, it's about all you really need. Because once you have 500 or 5 ,000, like I do, there's actually not a lot of incremental benefit. There's not a ton. If the offers book is 27 ,000 five stars, at 1 ,000 five stars, people are like, this book is probably good.