2156 - Sustainable Sales Mastery with The Diamond Group's Theresa Bassett

0:05Hey there, thoughtful listener. Are you looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, influencers, influencers, and clients? Well, I've had private conversations with over 2 ,000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from. I've got a free video you can watch with no opt-in required where I'll share the exact steps necessary to be 100 % inbound in your industry over the next six to eight months with no spam, no ads, and no sales. What I teach has worked for me for over 15 years and has helped me create eight figures in revenue for my own companies. Just head to upmyinfluence.com and watch my free class on how to create endless high ticket sales appointments.

0:51Also, don't forget, the thoughtful entrepreneur is always looking for great guests. Go to upmyinfluence.com and click on podcast. I'd love to have you.

1:05With us right now, it is Teresa Bassett. Teresa, you are the CEO and co-founder of the Diamond Group. You're found on the web at diamond-group.co. Teresa, thank you so much for being here. Oh my gosh, Josh. Thank you so much for having me. You're amazing. Thank you. So are you. That's why you're here. Teresa, before we get going, I'd love to hear maybe some fun things that you're into lately. What are you geeking out on? And maybe it's TV shows, movies, books, whatever. Yeah, I am always geeking out on books. So if you're ever looking for a book or a podcast recommendation, I'm all in on that.

1:43So 10x is easier than 2x is in my reading repertoire right now. Practicing the Way is another one that I'm reading, which is really all about slowing down to speed up. You know, slowing down to the speed of joy is another one that I'm reading. I'm really trying to learn, you know, the art of doing more with less, but using my token better, using my energy better, being a good steward of the things right in front of me so that I can get maximum impact from, from what I'm doing. And then at the end of the day, I really like to just like kind of chill out and watch Netflix once in a while. Right now I'm watching Zero Day and Robert De Niro is just like, he's one of my heroes.

2:29He just makes it look seamless and easy. Right. And it's just like, you can't, you're not even remotely aware that he's acting and that's the sign of a master. Right. Exactly. You know, you are the second person in the, I just had someone about eight episodes ago, also recommend zero day. It is going on the list already on the list. I need to like my wife and I have been binge watching hell on wheels right now. It's an older Western show, but, um, and the books, um, have you, um, have you, are you into, have you ever heard of like Ryan holiday or stoicism? And yeah, yeah. Yeah. I was going to say like, if you're into like this, you know, it's kind of slowing down to speed up an intentionality and recognizing what we can control and what we can't control and kind of letting go of the things that outsider.

3:19Like, I know that like, I'm really getting into that and Buddhism right now, just like topics about something, you know, things are a little bit more accessible for me at this stage, but thank you for those book recommendations. You said practicing the way, slowing down to speed up, but that may have been more of a concept. Slowing down to the speed of joy. To the speed of joy. Thank you. Yeah. And that was a recommendation given to me. I actually haven't even cracked it open yet, but I have it sitting on my table waiting for me. And 10X is easier than 2X is also written by Sullivan and Hardy.

3:56Dan Sullivan, yeah. Right, exactly. And they also wrote Who, Not How. And that actually was the book that led me to that book. And that has probably been the number one most significant shift I've been making in my business in the last year is asking a totally different question is helping me get to a totally different answer. wow i love it those are going to the top of my queue right now i have so many books you know i i i love audio books too so like i you know i if i can you know listen at like 1.5x speed or whatever i'm getting going to my goal is to get through a book every you know two to three days at this point you know a lot of walking the dog and that's already anyway theresa we got to do an interview here theresa tell me about the work that you do with the diamond group please yeah well you know So people have a hard time getting over the seven-figure hump in small business.

4:48And I really feel like my passion, my mission is really to equip and encourage business leaders and help them get over that seven-figure hump. It is so hard. Only 9 % of small businesses, research shows, in America get to seven figures and beyond. And the reason being is that they don't have sustainable sales and marketing systems where the business can really stand up without the owner's chutzpah, charisma, sales ability, right? And they need a sustainable sales and marketing system that doesn't rely on them. And what's possible beyond that threshold, honestly, for me, Josh, that's what gets me up in the morning.

5:29You know, I love, I love helping entrepreneurs get the time, money, freedom, the peace of mind that comes from predictable profitability, right? From really knowing that a system is working for them and with them 24 seven, and it doesn't all just require grit and determination. I think, you know, that's what leads to burnout, bored out, you know, just it's very hard to be on the 365 24-7 treadmill. And so our goal at the Diamond Group, we understand businesses are created under pressure like their owners. However, we'd like to alleviate some of that pressure, create the shiniest, brightest version of those brands and businesses by really giving them sustainable sales and marketing systems.

6:15All right. Well, how do we get there? So let's say that we're talking to someone that's been, you know, they've been hovering between six and eight hundred thousand dollars a year. Maybe this is like their third year, fourth year at that level. And they're like, come on. And so what are they missing? Because I think to your point, I'll just presuppose this, that they're probably, I'm guessing, might be relying upon the owner a bit too much. And there's only so much that the owner can do if the owner is involved or maybe, you know, the owner is not able to step away. The systems aren't quite there.

6:49There's my thesis, but I would love it from your perspective, Teresa. No, I think you're spot on. I think there's, you know, obviously as owners, we only have 24 hours in a day. There's only so much you can do. I think what happens to a lot of founders is because of those limitations, you rely on word of mouth and referrals. And so you have an excellent reputation in the industry that you're in. And so those word of mouth and referrals, that kind of feeds the business. And, you know, we run into businesses who have been at it for 25, 30 years. They have an excellent reputation. But word of mouth and referrals, it's unpredictable, right?

7:26It spits and spurts. Oh, yeah. It's seasonal. You can't. You have zero control over it. So it's really not a system. No. And that's maddening for business owners too, because they look at the ups and downs and, oh, we had a good month this month and this month's not good. And then they stress out and they think, oh no, there's something wrong with me. I hear this story, I mean, day in, day out. Yeah. Or they just take the seasonality of the business as a given. Oh, well, we're always just down in the summer and this is just the reality of what we do. Or, you know, we always have a terrible, you know, spring.

8:02And this is just, and I think that that becomes, that's really a limiting belief in the business. And what you're really saying is what I've been doing has gotten me here. But, you know, I'm not willing to do something different in order to get something different. And I think that it starts with just a self-awareness of, oh, well, maybe there is something different available to me. What if I had a system that worked on my behalf and it didn't all rely on me? What if my company could actually be team led or what if I had a system that worked with me and for me instead of, you know, it all resting on my shoulders?

8:41I think too many business owners are stressing the payroll cycle. Yeah, yeah. You know, I think I bump into a lot of small consultancy owners, you know, maybe small agencies. Okay, so let's talk about what are those systems that might drive consistency and growth today that you see? Yeah, absolutely. That's an excellent question. So I, it's both inbound and outbound working together. So for the businesses I'm talking about, a lot of times the businesses we work with are service-based businesses. These are direct to consumer or they're B2B, a mix of B2C and B2B. And so they need inbound marketing where people find them, right?

9:19Their brand is a magnet and they have a digital doorstep, a website, a series of lead pages, a funnel campaign that leads people to them. But they also need outbound, right? They also need sales effort. And so they need a consistent documented process for converting those leads, for guiding people on a path and working with them. So what I find is that a lot of times they just don't have this inbound, outbound, both sides of the equation working together. And in this day and age, I mean, you were talking about being along for the ride in this internet age for eons. And, you know, we have to all be publishing content all the time for that inbound system to really work because the Google gods own the search game at this point.

10:10So they want, you know, the Google gods want to be fed content. Yeah, well, and now, you know, AI is going to basically rely upon whatever your digital reputation has been as to what it directs. I didn't get that. Could you try again? My Siri is talking. Oh, my goodness. I must have said something. Yeah. Okay. Whatever I said, I won't say that, because our listeners' device just went off as well. So, Teresa, so what's working well with Outbound right now, particularly B2B, which I, again, kind of in my world, I work with a lot of B2B folks. Yeah, absolutely. Education marketing, event-based marketing is the number one tactic.

10:57So having a great webinar, a masterclass, something where people have an opportunity to really get to know you, like you, and trust you, right? Right. You know, having an opportunity to really get to to enter it, interact with your content before they make a buying decision that helps a ton. And that's really the number one thing is just making making yourself available across social media and across content platforms so that people see you as a thought leader and an expert in your space and giving them an opportunity to interface with some of that knowledge, making it value driven for them. So they're really getting something of value in the interaction with you before they make any commitment.

11:38Yeah. What about, I mean, the concern that there's just so much content out there. So if I spend all this time, you know, creating this content, it's just like a thimble of water poured into a sea of content. And, you know, again, you know, when we look at patterns of behavior, you know, how well attended are webinars today versus, you know, is there a lot more movement to people just working with AI to get that kind of information? Yeah, well, that's why I think it's not a one size fits all answer. I mean, it really is a strategic plan that has multiple parts and pieces. So to your point, there is so much content out there.

12:20So you really can't rely on one tactic being enough. I mean, it used to be that seven touches of a marketing message and people would take an action. And nowadays it's over 21 touches. So they need to see you through multiple, you know, an omni-channel approach. They might need to even follow you for months and months before they ever take an action to really getting to know you. So I think it is really important to be super specific about who you're talking to, as well as use an omni-channel approach to reaching those people. You're not just publishing stuff to everyone. You're publishing the right content to the right people across multiple channels that they're really tuning into.

13:08What about paid advertising right now? What's going on in that world? Yeah, well, the world of paid, of course, is changing a lot. Of course, anybody who relies on a single social media platform for their paid advertising, a lot of times they end up just getting in trouble, right? If your entire brand is built on Facebook and then meta changes their algorithms, all of a sudden you're up a creek with no battle, right? So again, kind of back to that diversification. But what's working really well in the pay-per-click space is a layered approach. If you think about your digital strategy as an onion, and an onion has a lot of different layers, Google loves it when you're publishing blogs, you're playing in the pay-to-play space across pay-per-click, and even the paid service ad space, and you're updating your website.

14:04You're adding content to your website so that the breadth of content is being added to regularly. So we use that growth-driven design type of strategy across multiple onion layers to really drive a lot of traffic. Yeah. And in terms of like platforms that are, you know, obviously Facebook's one, Google's another one, YouTube, like, are you seeing any gaining or losing favor? Yeah, well, definitely the rise of LinkedIn in the B2B space that you're talking about. People are really, you know, a lot of people are getting a little bit disenfranchised with Meta's various algorithm changes. They're really looking at LinkedIn as a safe space in the B2B world.

14:50Yes, I've heard that multiple times. Yeah, kind of really carve out a space in the business owner and influencer sphere. And I think that's really smart. LinkedIn has done a great job. They've created some new campaign-focused tools for people who want to launch campaigns. And for as little as$1 ,000 a month, you can get a significant traction in LinkedIn space. Well, tell me more about, Because my impression of any kind of paid work on LinkedIn was exceptionally expensive. And to the point where I think I remember someone saying, yeah, your cost per CPL is going to be hundreds of dollars in most sectors in the B2B space.

15:34Is that your view or are there other options now? Well, we always recommend starting out small and then split testing the creative, split testing the campaigns, and then growing the budget. rather than throwing a bunch of money at it. And then trying to pay, you know, you pay dumb tax, but at a premium, you're going to pay the dumb tax no matter what. So start out small and grow those campaigns. I think that LinkedIn has created some easier inroads so that you can start at lower budget points. And I'm not saying$1 ,000 is enough for everybody. I'm saying that's kind of the minimum play. But it used to be, to your point, that people needed to have$5 ,000 or$10 ,000 minimum to really get traction in the LinkedIn space.

16:20And that's really not the case. Well, that's great. Yeah, it is. Because, yeah, again, I haven't looked at LinkedIn in terms of paid advertising in quite some time, but that's great to hear you. Teresa, tell me how you work with your clients. What does that engagement typically look like? Yeah, no, that's a fantastic question. So we have an in-house system called Momentum. And we walk small business owners through a tried and true framework we've been using, really tested and improved over time. But it's a multiple phase process. And in the first phase, we really plan the work. In the second phase, we work the plan.

16:57And so we give our clients a multidisciplinary power team that essentially becomes their marketing team down the hall. And so we're giving them a strategic account manager, a marketing coordinator, a digital you know, creative, social person that really works on behalf of their brand. And so working with us is, well, honestly, I mean, our, you know, part of our secret sauce is getting into motion and keeping our clients in motion, right? I mean, so much of marketing and sales is just getting going and then keeping the gap small between inspired action steps, right? And if you have a multidisciplinary team that you can hand stuff off to and they get it and they've built a strategic framework for you and then they're keeping the ball bouncing, well, a lot can get done really fast if you have a team of experts working on your behalf to work with you.

17:52Yeah. Oh my gosh. Many, many hands make light work. And to the founder owner who's looking to eclipse that next level, surround yourself with a great, an A-lister team and you can get there. Stop doing everything. Exactly. That's back to that who, not how, right? Not how do we get it? I'm being over simplistic. Yes. Absolutely. And we, you know, I talk to business owners every week who, you know, Josh, they go to the mountaintop on the weekend, right? It's like Friday afternoon, Saturday, they're investigating how to launch that new, you know, meta campaign or how to set up their, do their SEO, how to DIY it.

18:30And all this Band-Aid fixing and spaghetti up against a wall approach to sales and marketing, that's why only 9 % get across that seven-figure threshold. Teresa, after a conversation here, someone wants to engage with you. Either maybe they're not quite ready for a conversation. I don't know if you have any resources you'd recommend. And also, if you could talk about, know if someone is ready and they would like to have a conversation, what that looks like, what they should do. Oh, yeah. Thank you so much. So our website, we can be found at diamond-group.co, and you can sign up for a free strategy call with one of my growth specialists.

19:06We also, if you go to the resources tab, there are many free resources from buyer persona workbooks. There's an ROI calculator in there. There's a website auditing tool that you can get access to. I also have some books and a free jumpstart challenge that I host twice a year. There's a lot of opportunities to work with my team and really get some sales and marketing traction. So all kinds of resources there for business owners. Yes. Teresa Bassett, CEO and co-founder of the Diamond Group, the website diamond-group.co. Teresa, thank you so much for joining us. Yeah, thank you so much, Josh. You're amazing.

19:45And all these business owners that you serve, just keep up the good work, man, because that encouragement, that knowledge is just so needed in the space. You're very kind. Thanks, Teresa.

20:03Thanks for listening to the Thoughtful Entrepreneur Show. If you are a thoughtful business owner or professional who would like to be on this daily program, please visit upmyinfluence.com and click on podcast. We believe that every person has a message that can positively impact the world. We love our community who listens and shares our program every day. Together, we are empowering one another as thoughtful leaders. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this program, if you're looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, and clients, I have had private conversations with over 2 ,000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from.

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