End of Year Business Review: Lessons From 4 Years of B2B Sales

0:00Zach Thompson. I said your name. what about that wow trench tips in person can you believe it it's the end of the year i know another year it smells like christmas it does doesn't it and you were just saying it felt like the first year went much slower yeah and was colder no you said it was colder and i said it felt slower that first year in business was like and then this is year four that is mental yeah i know what's that percentage like percentage of business that fail in year one But you can make it over three years. And then it goes to five years. We've got one more year to make sure we don't fuck it up.

0:37Fingers crossed. And we could do a direct camera because we're in person. Yeah. You could say things like happy holidays. Yeah. And holidays will put their Instagram handle in the comments. Happy Hanukkah, if you're one of my lot. It's great to see you. Yeah. What a year it's been. We've said this off camera. We've been blessed this year. How much time have we spent together? So much. I mean, we've really doubled down on the pod. The podcast. The book. The book. Public speaking. Public speaking. Content. Me coming down to your office for a week, you coming up to my office for three days. Yeah.

1:12It doesn't compare. Sorry about that. I think it'd be good. Let's start with the problems from last year and what we put in place to solve them. Nice. Okay. Biggest problem would probably be, I think for the business, it was the amount of time we had to get a client working was just not enough. Okay. What were we on? Three months? Three months. So, I mean, when we started, I remember doing a day. Yeah. So I did a day's worth of dialing, 250, 250 pounds, that's what I charge. Telecoms, didn't make it work, and that was it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Obviously, in a day, there's just not enough time. Three months, it's like an uphill trajectory.

1:54Month one is teething, getting the messaging, the data right, making sure it's... Month two, you're starting to see those seeds happen. Three, yeah, you're getting there. Month four, but we were having clients going, it's probably not been where we want it to be. So many people confuse outbound to be this tap that you can just switch on. And if you could just switch it on automatically, well, everyone would be a millionaire. So how did you see the problem? How did you analyze that? I thought there was a big piece on expectation. Yeah. Like we always say to all sorts of people, like what's obvious to you probably isn't as obvious to other people.

2:31So actually being, someone's seeing maybe a post from you on LinkedIn and going, oh, wow, they got a million meetings in a day. I better work with them and then not getting a million meetings in a day. Oh, this is just totally underwhelming. So really understanding that expectation piece of if we do our bit, what does your bit look like? And then if those boxes are ticked, surely we should just work together indefinitely. Forever. but then it allows us to then be able to put kind of skin in the game on both sides so saying all right well let's say we do get you x amount of meetings what's going to happen if you can't close any oh well then we'd get you in for a bit of training we'd help with that and i think that's been a big thing like you i'm sure you wouldn't mind being mentioned but um solvy digital yeah yeah working with them for a long time the difference between a client that you've also trained on the discovery and the closing with someone then booking meetings what's been the difference oh they've just been because they i always call them the dream client because they actually care about like the problem and the problem being solved and having more like leads is part of that that's part of what we do but also like working with us and coming to those catch-ups and not being like where are my meetings what's going on being like right i had this cold this is stalled what can i do to make the most of it and like we can be that sounding board as we've got the consultancy as well but like actually if we're communicating every single week bring those challenges because if you're closing the deals that we're booking for you it's win-win like everyone's winning to how do we work together to get those end results so i think like managing expectations one of the things like in discovery now is just setting that expectation of you'll probably see 50 of results then 75 for month two and then we should be steady by month three and then you're rolling into the six months by doing that when we've actually hit 75 100 150 in month one because it does happen doesn't always happen but it does happen then people are like oh this is amazing because we've managed those expectations um what are the problems did you spot in 2024 that we solved in 2025 probably also the bringing a bit of creativity into solving the top of funnel problem for clients so not just obviously like i think a lot of outbound agencies and we've been guilty of as well is just pull a list concepts everyone on the list and then stop scratching in your head when you get into call four or five six and like what do we do now yeah actually going back to the client and being able to say look give me a list of all the discovery calls that never went anywhere over the last year give me a list of your um best current customers and will pull a list of their closest lookalike and try and win them um anyone that you've emailed any webinar attendees accounts that you're in but you want to work in all departments so being able to actually attack things from all angles makes it much easier for someone to turn off yeah because it's like there's a million different branches of a tree here rather than just going like well if we cut off this one it doesn't really doesn't really change anything we changed we changed the packages as well so we changed the packages so we we used to work on like the legacy was days how many days do you want whereas actually we we analyzed the data from the last three years to say we know that if we have the right clients, and we won't take on the wrong client, but if we take the right clients on, we put the right amount of time in, if we nail the data, we nail the input, and we've got the skill from the team, we should get these results.

5:56So using that data, we've said, okay, based on 8 to 10 dialing days, we can get 4 to 6 meetings a month. By having those different packages, we've started to see clients go, how do I jump to the next package rather than just how do I get more days? It's made it very easy to upgrade and say like, well this is what we're doing on this we should be doing an events campaign or a direct mail campaign and then pushing them through which has been great for the business to say like you always want to be doing more with the clients you've got rather than that feast and famine mode yeah i agree and then i wouldn't normally mention this because i think it's really boring but um all the comments will be like what dialer what data like what are you using what you see in work dialer air call air call salesforce air call in salesforce so we can track all the metrics it's got some cool like ai coaching and stuff like that in there nooks nooks for anything where it's lower connection rates bang bang bang you want a bit of bang bang bang and then data our friends cognizant and zoom info together you don't need to get these guys to fight they've both got their friends together have them both and also new addition to the team clay clay now what are we able to do with clay that we weren't previously able to do cognizant and zoom info are great for like building a list and like tailoring it so like i want it to be this sick code this sick code we'll put the sick code in the uh the comments uh but but the the the sick code or like getting the injury but we were finding like but what if we want them to have an internal recruiter and they've also gone through funding and the ceo has rehired rehired someone in the last four months that's so specific you can't do that on cognitively more zoom info actually you can build anything you want on clay yeah so you build it and then you enrich it with all these different partners cognizant zoom info full enrich whatever they are but then you you build it we have all of a sudden you've got a shit hot list of these are the people that are hiring now ring those people exactly we've got a client who they've got a tool that helps with when people are getting nasty comments on their brands which we get a lot which we get a lot and pop your nasty comment in the comment.

8:08Just below. But they were looking for people who were running like 20 plus ads, were a global facing brand, but also had some either negative reviews or nasty comments about their service or offering. That is just not something that Cognizant or Zoom Info can do. But what you can do is go through Clay to get that, then put it back through Cognizant or Zoom Info. Total game changer. We also, I think Mrs. Cook is going to be pretty shocked to hear this. Mrs Cook you have Mrs Cook in high school or not? no I didn't oh she was an English teacher I was like was that your food tech teacher? no she was but I wasn't top set English so there you were what did you get in English?

8:47a B I got a B do you know where I also got a B? honey making we'll put honey in the in the comments below so we became authors we became authors which is we're not just authors can we say it? I'm not going to say it because I'm modest best selling authors best selling authors wow And the book has been how long in the making? I think since we started the business, we always said that we wanted to release a book. We actually chucked some out. We wrote a book. I've still got the Google Drive with all the different chapters in, and we started it, and we was like, let's scrap that. Because this is not good.

9:23That's not good enough. Wrote the book, and then all of a sudden we got the – do you remember we got the proof copy of the book, and the book was like that. I've got it. Yeah. It was like that, and we went through it, and you were like, this needs a bit more this is missing loads of the tricks frameworks like breaking it down now it's like that that's your thumbnail there you go um one of the things right if you're a fan of someone like daniel priestly he's big on being a key person of influence right that's his thing and he was saying one of the ways to do that is to have some sort of intellectual property and probably the best easiest quickest way to do that is to get all your thoughts down in a book and there's other things that he does but that was that was one of the things and actually in growing the business and working in multiple campaigns and clients as much as there are your global tiktok influencer types who like here's how to open a call we're actually getting calls with people that become deals and meetings across all industries and sectors so we're trying to put that in a book that's very there's no real ask for people is that there's just like a if if i was starting my sales job there's a lot of naff advice out there that's kind of the book i wish i'd had some i saw a comment the other day that somebody said this has been the most actionable book i've read since how to teach kids to ride a bike at a seminar which i was like that is the i mean that's that is the foundation so that's where it started so that was that was lovely and then off the back of that i've i've been doing you've been doing a bit more training based around it it's not the bread and butter of the business being honest do we want to be out on the road three days a week training companies no we want to be in the business on the business um but it's very nice to get that call and be like i've read your book and i want you to now come and teach that in person and and showcase those tools i think by having that like ip that that framework it's made training a lot easier because i'm like oh i'll just take all these and here's the the games or the techniques or the the tools to use yeah i've totally when i think back about the way i used to train as well it would be presentation powerpoint and i did a training session in uh dublin maybe about six months ago and i just was like i'm actually not doing any presentation i'm just gonna ask if you got a big whiteboard and actually not do it i didn't even write much down it was just like straight away because i hate that feeling when you look into the room and you've got the the hostages the people who just like i don't really want to be here and learn this but my boss has made me yeah straight away they're getting picked on and i'm just getting everyone involved straight away but having the book as a fallback of this works yeah i don't know what it is the maybe people just take it a bit more seriously when you're like it's in the book yeah or you get intro'd as like the author of the psychology behind it because the reality is we're only best because of your mom yeah thank you thank you thanks we'll put your instagram handles in the comment the rebrand it feels it feels like so much has happened this year and it feels like we probably did the the work in 2025 that we'll see in 2026 planted the seeds yeah and now you're gonna do what water and baby wow the rebrand why i remember we we sat in the room me you and ben the third jonas brother um in london where we where we do our kickoff for the financial year and I guess why did we decide to completely rebrand?

12:45I mean, if you've ever seen our brand before, scroll through some old YouTube videos. I mean, that is a new logo. That is a new color. That's teal for anybody at home. Knock, knock. Who's there? We have a meeting. Very good. Thank you. Why did we decide to rebrand? Well, do you know what I always remember is we had a wonderful, and we still work with him from time to time, Sean Ball, the great marketing mind. But we had a really good chat with him once where he said, I think it was like some form of at some point, this will probably have to be a bit more grown up because at some point a big company is going to come on the website and go, not really sure, don't quite like that, can't really figure this out myself, and maybe I don't quite like the branding.

13:32I couldn't put this in front of my board. So that was the first thing. But then also just being able to answer all the questions that people want to ask. The top things that we get in discovery calls are, well, can I listen to a call? Yeah. Yeah, you can. You can listen to a call from every single person on the team if you want. I hate the idea of proposals, right? That's another podcast episode anyway. What's that one? What episode? Episode 497. We'll do that in two years. Put the Instagram handle in there. Thank you. But the idea of proposals is just like, here's the website. The pricing's on there.

14:06The case studies are on there. The testimonials are on there. Listen to calls. the book the podcast everything it's the shop front whereas on the i remember being like you post something on linkedin then you're like where do i send them oh go go here to get the book listen the podcast go to the website you'll find everything it's your shop front the website is sainsbury's your posts are a lot more useful than they want to as well aren't they i don't know if i want to go down this rabbit hole with you but come on no i don't i don't post on linkedin anyway Jack keeps saying to me do you still post on LinkedIn and I post every day the algorithm so the rebrand we did the rebrand we had some brilliant people on board to do that and I got a message a few weeks ago I told you but someone said I don't have any budget but I was thinking about using you guys six months ago and my business partner is an ex-KPMG and I wouldn't have felt confident showing them the website.

15:04Oh, wow. Whereas now, I definitely would. And stuff like that. And you know what? I did a post for tomorrow. Our website inquiries have gone down. Yeah? Have you noticed that? But the amount of time wasters that it's got rid of, because everything's there. We're very, very hard on disqualification. People should be like, well, don't you just want hundreds and hundreds of meetings? No. I want five of the right meetings. Everything closes much faster. Yeah, so much faster. I mean, you've actually been closing deals, haven't you, recently? People have started calling me the closing king. They have.

15:36I'm actually really proud of you. The other thing, and I think this has actually been a bit of an unsung hero from like a new biz strategy. Obviously, we're here doing a podcast, but we've doubled down a lot on getting kind of high-profile guests over the last few years. I think probably starting with Daniel Preece, Rory Sutherland, just had Rory Sutherland on again, but really doubling down on the podcast and seeing growth through that. And I think of it as like a net. You know, people, you see people getting in these arguments on LinkedIn. Is it email or cold calling or LinkedIn DM or personal brand or whatever?

16:14All these different things, like they're picking one. The answer is, why should you do all of them? Do absolutely everything. Because I had someone, and I forwarded it on to you, didn't I? This lady booked a meeting with me. I just thought you'd be interested to hear the customer journey. i saw a stupid post you did on linkedin looked at your profile to see if you're a real person then went oh maybe you are a real person and then i watched a youtube video of you then i was like oh they have a podcast walk my dog listen to the podcast came back clicked on your profile again and thought i need to book a meeting with these guys there you go that was the customer journey that i went on but if those bits of the net weren't available you wouldn't have caught you wouldn't have caught do everything can be everywhere that's the thing and i think we probably should praise we should off camera off camera off camera we've got someone in the business now Mel who's been looking after all things podcast and I think the difference has been from me uploading shorts on a Sunday morning in my kitchen and it's a nice kitchen like I'm not slugging the kitchen off it is nice it's so nice man so nice it's just a breath of breath we've gone from maybe a 3 or 4 in quality to a 10 and I'm very excited we've got some big episodes for 2026 Big episodes.

17:24And the growth on things that like, oh, Instagram's really stagnant. Yeah, yeah. Instagram's just absolutely tripled in the last week or so, TikTok. So if you're thinking about, should I invest? The answer is? Always. Always. Always invest. Any other life lessons, life learnings from 2025? Do you know one that I always, like, it's a hard thing to do, but I, and maybe you've got stories like this as well. I've done this a few times I'd noticed someone in my team a few weeks ago um Meg and I was just like you know you're just drawn to you don't seem happy anymore she's been here for two years and she's like I just don't really I wasn't really seeing the bit anymore because she came in and was like yeah firecracker like learn all the stuff to release it anyway so I pulled her aside and just said i might have been paranoid but i don't think you're very happier anymore oh and it's like a relief like shoulders drop like oh yeah what is it that clear did it uh i'm not being but i'm sure i'll get out of it i just don't want to let you down i think what would probably let me down is if you you stayed here and you were really unhappy and i was wasting your years where you wanted to maybe go and do something else yeah you're young yeah she's 21 she's been with us for two years And it was so lovely because she said, oh, my parents have talked about what a difference this job's given me in confidence.

18:51I really look up to you. I've loved this as first job. It was so lovely. And then we agreed the door's always open, but let's not draw out something that's probably inevitable. And I think it goes back to that thing that I remember you saying really early on of the business is a bit like the campfire. if you're going to come and sit down and cook some food with us and share some stories and stuff, just try and leave us better than you found us, and we'll do the same with you. Don't leave a mess. Don't leave loads of rubbish. And it doesn't always end like that, does it? But when something does end like that, like I remember that with Meg.

19:25I used to have a guy called Gert who was team leader. I had a few this year in my office, yeah. Same sort of thing. When it ends like that, you think, oh, it can end nicely. And you can go on and still have like one of our first employees that moved on a few years ago to Pastures New is now like helping me find my new office in his new role so that's like quite rewarding like to be anywhere he goes oh i was doing some cold calling this week i'm like that's so nice to see like you will i remember you've got i got my dream job i wouldn't be able to do it without you i know i mean he sends me some crazy voice silly times in the morning but it's just amazing to see like now we're on the other end of our life where we're not these young 20 year olds and looking up to the bosses.

20:06Like, I know we've had some amazing bosses and some awful bosses, but then we look back and hopefully you make that little imprint where they go, in 10 years they remember you and stuff like that. So, no, it's been a real learning year. I feel like a lot of the, I say the foundations, but I feel like we've been setting foundations for years. Mate, it's been a pleasure. It's been actually really nice, isn't it? We've spent a lot of time and you didn't think you were going to like it, did you? I didn't think I'd like it as much, but hey, maybe we'll spend some more time together in 2026 what about last bit what about we had a no show for the podcast in london and we went out on the streets of london's try and find a replacement guest and we found someone who just launched a drinks brand yeah in holland and barrett yeah and last minute they were like oh i can't i've got to go and pick up can we reschedule um so yeah being able to put yourself out so maybe maybe we need to be on the streets a bit more let's get on the streets bro i'll see you on the streets.

21:02Do we do a task? One task. Here's a Christmas task. Have you ever got one? Yeah, I've got one. It's got to be Christmas here. Yeah, right. Voice note me. The sound of a wood pigeon in the voice notes on LinkedIn. The most accurate sounding wood pigeon I'll give a grand. There you go. Merry Christmas. That pays for you too, okay? Thanks guys. We'll see you in the new year. Cheers.