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How to Pick Good Prospecting Area in 2025
207 Plays4 days ago
A new area is a goldmine for appointments in solar, but how do you know if it's the right one? This episode teaches you the strategies you should use to pick an area for the season: aligned with your time and intrinsic skills helpful to getting more out of your time on the doors.
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Transcript
Taylor's Journey: From $50 to 150 Deals
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level. My name is Taylor Armstrong. went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in the year and cracking the code on why sales reps fail.
00:00:19
Speaker
I teach you avoid the mistakes I made and bring in the top solar dogs of the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro, and closing more deals.
00:00:31
Speaker
What is a solopreneur you might ask? solopreneur is a new breed of solopro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery and you are about to become one.
Planning Sales Territories for 2025
00:00:42
Speaker
Hey, Solorpreneurs. Today, we're going to be talking about how to find the best areas in 2025. If you struggle to find good areas to knock, if you struggle to figure out where you're going the next day, plan out your turf as we like to call it, then this podcast is for you.
00:00:59
Speaker
Welcome to the show. My name is Taylor Armstrong. We're here to help you close more deals, generate more leads and referrals, and have a much better time in the solar industry.
Opportunities in Solar Industry 2025
00:01:06
Speaker
Hope you're doing and awesome. Hope you're taking advantage of the urgency we have in 2025.
00:01:13
Speaker
We're entering towards midway through ah quarter three at the time of this recording. And so much urgency, so much going on with the big, beautiful bill, with things ending, with changes. So if you are not maximizing the opportunity right now, right here, then I don't know what to tell you.
00:01:31
Speaker
Get out there, grinds. But ah today we're going to show you how to be more effective. And this is something that for me, um i believe it's one of the things that's helped myself and our team sell quite a few deals over the past three months.
00:01:46
Speaker
16 deals the past month, 16 deals the previous month. um So it's been pretty consistent over 15 plus deals using some of these strategies. So if you're not at 15 plus deals in a month, then Maybe you should try some of these. Okay.
00:02:03
Speaker
So let's jump into it.
Effective Door-Knocking Strategies
00:02:04
Speaker
The first one is figure out your strategy. Okay. And um what I mean by that is there's a few different ways you can knock doors, right? Some people, if you're just starting out and then you're probably just going to regular neighborhoods, you're probably getting dropped off in a cookie cutter neighborhood, just knocking door after door, after door, after door.
00:02:24
Speaker
But a lot of us that have been in solar for longer now, and that's a great way to learn, by the way, you definitely need to get your reps in just hitting every single door. But ah people that are more experienced, what's your strategy? It's like a couple different things. You can hit people that just moved in recently.
00:02:43
Speaker
You can hit maybe be spread out areas. You can go to smaller towns, hit areas where maybe it's just not like... door after door after door, but they're on bigger properties. Maybe have to drive half a mile, quarter mile to the next one.
00:02:56
Speaker
Okay, you can hit gated neighborhoods. um So there's a few different strategies and you've heard us mention this several times, but the easiest way to target homes like that is with SolarScout. if you're not using SolarScout, makes it so much easier ah We should have a link down in the show notes if you want to book a demo with these guys.
00:03:16
Speaker
um If not, you can also hit me up. I'll connect you with them. and They got a offer special for our listeners, um but makes it so much easier to figure out where you're going, what's your strategy, and that's going to determine the area you pick, whatever your strategy is.
Setting 'Trigger' Appointments
00:03:33
Speaker
um The second thing is strategize your appointments. Okay. And um that's just make sure you are doing couple of things. Number one, setting appointments to start off your day.
00:03:45
Speaker
and This is kind of a hack, a secret. I think I first heard this from my guy, Ashton Buswell, just goats of the industry. I would say Ashton, he taught us this, that if you can schedule an appointment, you first thing when you go out to the neighborhood say you're maybe lacking motivation if you have an appointment scheduled at 9 a.m then you're going to get out to the area at 9 a.m okay and i know this but other people talk about this too but if you can set we think we call it like a keystone appointments or like a trigger appointment it's going to trigger you to get out there and then it's like even if it's maybe not the most solid appointments
00:04:21
Speaker
gave you a reason to get out there. That appointment is not there then you're knocking. You're in hood. You're in area. hey And then um a few other things with the appointments is try not to set those appointments during prime time. If you're knocking, knocking, knocking. So many people I hear all the time where the first option they give the homeowner is, hey, we'll be back tomorrow at 5 p.m. We'll be back tomorrow at 6 p.m. What if you could schedule it after knocking hours?
00:04:46
Speaker
yeah Or maybe you're doing same days. um What if you could schedule those after 8 p.m.? Most people, doesn't make a difference. They're home after 5, they're also home after 8.
00:04:57
Speaker
And, you know, don't risk losing that appointment. If you have them right then, right now, then by all means, do it. I'm a big, big fan of same days is walking, get them right then. But if not...
00:05:08
Speaker
Try to schedule it outside of those prime time hours. And if you do have appointments during those hours, maybe you're waking up ah Friday morning and you've got a stacked schedule in the afternoon and evening, but you got nothing going on in the morning, then that's also going to determine where you knock. hey Because guess what? In the morning, probably not going to be a lot of working class people.
00:05:31
Speaker
So if I were you trying to strategize, plan your areas, you know you got a packed schedule with evening appointments, people that you know yeah have to have to meet at 4, 5, 6 p.m., which is going to happen if you're getting lots of appointments. Then maybe you go out in the morning and you hit like a retirement community.
00:05:51
Speaker
You pick an area where people are more likely to be home. And it's pretty easy to research this. You can search for retirement communities. um And just in general, as you're going in regular neighborhoods, lot of times it's kind of easy.
00:06:04
Speaker
You know, you'll see sometimes like handicap ramps. Sometimes you'll see the handicap stickers on cars. Those ones, if you're not going regular neighborhood, it's prime time. Maybe don't knock that. Maybe you can save that for when it's not prime time because, you know, they're probably always going to be there.
00:06:20
Speaker
So some of you already know that I run my own door to door sales team here in San Diego. And as we are gearing up for the summer, I realized if we do the same thing we always did, we're going to get the same results.
00:06:31
Speaker
But if I want to increase my deal flow, I need to do something different to get an advantage. Then we discovered an app called Solar Scout, but it's not a door knocking app. It's a data platform that shows us who is likely to go solar in our market.
00:06:44
Speaker
It shows us who has previously applied for solar, but later canceled the deal. who has moved in recently, and even how much electricity the homes are using in a given neighborhood. It's been working for a lot of teams across the country, and now I'm on board too.
00:06:59
Speaker
I'm going to be one of the first use SolarScout in San Diego, so I decided to partner up. But I told them, hey, if I'm going to talk about SolarScout on my show, you need give my listeners a great deal. And they did.
00:07:09
Speaker
So go to solar scout dot app forward slash Taylor and book a demo with them and you'll get 10% off your first month when you sign up That's solar scout dot app forward slash Taylor.
00:07:22
Speaker
Okay, back to the show. Hey, so that's another good thing to consider is how are you strategizing your appointments? How are you strategizing your area based on the appointments you have? Something to think about.
00:07:33
Speaker
Okay, and then number three, figure out who you have the most success with. So we got demographics. and This is another thing that SolarScout is fire for.
00:07:43
Speaker
We've been having a ton of success just hitting the Hispanic neighborhoods. yeah I've got my guy, one of our top setters here, Rosenberg. He's a Mexican guy. He comes out and he just absolutely crushes in Spanish.
00:07:56
Speaker
you know I would say 70% of the doors when they're Spanish speakers. So he knows, hey, I can knock any area, but you drop me off in a place where it's mostly Hispanic.
00:08:07
Speaker
mostly Mexican, going have a lot more success. So for you, maybe you can target those areas. um If you're not using a tool like SolarScout, can go to citydata.com. You can pull up the ethnicity. You can pull up the demographics.
00:08:22
Speaker
You pull up income levels. Maybe you know that you do better in a little bit lower income. hey And ah you know don't sleep on higher income too. Even this week, sometimes I like get in my head, oh, higher income, these people don't listen as much. They don't buy from door-to-door salesmen. I think it's sometimes a false belief we can tell ourselves.
00:08:38
Speaker
But I have someone and on on our team this week. He went out in a higher income neighborhood, absolutely crushed five appointments in like two hours. And I think it's because so many other people knocking doors, they're scared of these higher income neighborhoods that people are going to be shorter with them.
00:08:55
Speaker
You do have to have a little bit different approach, but some of these higher income places can be really great areas too. But figure out the demographics, figure out where you have the most most success with, and consider targeting those areas. Okay, and then last
Maximizing Efficiency with Car Groups
00:09:12
Speaker
but not least is, especially if you're closing deals,
00:09:16
Speaker
And I would say even if you're just newer, if you're setting appointments, just try to work as a pack. makes it so much easier when you can go to when you can go to similar areas, be feeding off the energy.
00:09:27
Speaker
um If you have car groups, make sure you're not in forming gigantic car groups. We actually did a blitz. A couple weeks ago, and we went up in northern to Northern California, kind of around San Francisco, and um it was good. Decent blitz, got some deals.
00:09:47
Speaker
But one of the mistakes we made, might have mentioned this in previous podcast, we had one car for five people. And, you know, at first it was like, think, oh, it'll be fine. we can just all go to similar areas, snock.
00:10:01
Speaker
um I can walk to appointments as needed. But it ended up getting tough because the other closer that was there, he needed to go to he had customers already in the area. He had appointments, referrals that were like 20, 30 minutes out in different areas.
00:10:17
Speaker
And then um i ended up having to take Ubers to a bunch of appointments. And, you know, walked, I walk um think I walked like a mile and a half to another one because the Uber was taking too long. and Stuff like that. um so make sure you plan it to where you're not forming car groups of like 20 people.
00:10:35
Speaker
yeah Ideally, you want two or three, I would say, in a car group. And that way you're not having one person just drive all over town, drive all day. Hey, so um those are some tips on how to pick an area.
00:10:46
Speaker
Hey, number one, just to review it, figure out your strategy. For me, I like switching between strategies. And some of these some of these ah strategies, it's like you're not going to be just knocking one area.
00:10:57
Speaker
We call it driving for dollars. It's like where you're driving to maybe new move-ins. You're driving to people with pools. You can go easily on a map. You can target all the people with pools. um A really cool filter in SolarScout. If you want to check that out, you can target people with electric vehicles.
00:11:13
Speaker
So many different ways you can target these people. And especially if you're not in saturated areas, pretty much everyone everywhere in California is like this. Areas that that have been hit hard.
00:11:24
Speaker
Try to filter it like that. Okay, you can go to the homes of pools, you can go to the homes that ah look like they have higher usage. yeah When I'm knocking in an area, I'm listening for the humming of an AC unit, right? Because probably using a more power if you can hear the humming of the AC.
00:11:41
Speaker
Sometimes in San Diego where I'm at, it's kind of kind of rare to be running AC because people just don't have AC out here. So look for clues like that. ah Target your area like that. And then number two is strategize around your appointments.
00:11:54
Speaker
Another thing with that, if you have limited time, right, maybe you have limited time, just an hour between appointments ah might be good to pick a different strategy.
00:12:05
Speaker
if I have a limited time, I'm going to do the thing that gets me appointments the quickest. OK, and we all want quicker appointments. But ah if you have limited time, maybe pick dial down even more. OK, I got an hour.
00:12:17
Speaker
You know, I'm going to hit some new move ins. I'm going to go to this area where I know people are home. ah You need to strategize around the time that you do have in the hours available, depending on the hour of the day. Right.
00:12:32
Speaker
Then number three, figure out who you have the most success with. Know the demographics, know the ethnicities. It can be extremely valuable knowing that. Then number four, get your team in similar areas, especially if you are closing people's deals, running appointments.
00:12:46
Speaker
Helps so much to be in similar areas, not driving all over town. Okay, so just some things to think about. i hope this helps you. hope the help Hope it helps the organization of your team. And remember, if you are new here listening to this, you can't avoid getting your reps in.
00:13:02
Speaker
and Sometimes I see newer reps try to do all these fancy strategies, but it's like, hey, put in the grind, put in the hours, learn to overcome the objections, learn the script, learn the presentation.
00:13:12
Speaker
and that's going to be the biggest keys your success starting out. Then you can add in more strategies. Then you can target more homeowners. Then you can do things a little different.
Engaging the Audience & Future Topics
00:13:21
Speaker
But hope this helped you and your team today.
00:13:23
Speaker
Send me, please, any topics, suggestions you have. We are always looking for guests. um The past month or so, we have had kind of a guest shortage. So you've seen me ah repurposing some previous episodes and partly just because we are slammed, we are grinding here. I haven't had so much time. haven't had as much time to run interviews, but please ah introduce me to any anyone you know that is crushing it in the solar industry right now. Would love to hear from them. Would love to feature them on the podcast and ah happy selling this week. Go would get out there and we'll see you on the next one. What's up, solopreneurs? Hope you enjoyed the episode.
00:14:00
Speaker
Before you run out and start selling more solar yourself, wanted to let you know about an exciting new cheat sheet we created specifically for you in mind.
Top 10 Podcast Episodes Cheat Sheet
00:14:10
Speaker
One of the top questions I get asked on Instagram, on Facebook, by our listeners is, Taylor, where should I start?
00:14:17
Speaker
What episodes should I listen to in the podcast? You got too many podcasts, man, because now we have over 200 episodes. So what we've done, we created the top 10 most downloaded, most listened to, and i would say widely accepted, most useful podcasts that we've done here on Solapreneur.
00:14:38
Speaker
We put them together all in one sheet so you can go, you can hit the ground running, especially if you're new, you do not want to not have this sheet. So go download it right now. It's going to be at top10.solarpreneurs.com. Again, that's top10, the number 10,.solarpreneurs.com. Don't forget the S on solarpreneurs. We will have that in the show notes. Go download it right now.
00:15:03
Speaker
And especially if you have not listened to them, go listen to them and you can re-listen to them. That's going to show you how. So go download it and we'll see you on the other side.