Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level.
Speaker: My name is Taylor Armstrong.
Speaker: I went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fell.
Speaker: I teach you how to 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.
Speaker: What is a solopreneur, you might ask?
Speaker: A 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.
Speaker: Hey, what's up, solopreneurs?
Speaker: Today, we're going to be talking about the data you need
Speaker: to help you when you're knocking doors or when you're prospecting.
Speaker: And make sure you stay tuned till the end because we've got a tool that's an absolute game changer you need to be using.
Speaker: So we're going to be talking about that and much more.
Speaker: Thank you for tuning in to the podcast.
Speaker: My name is Taylor Armstrong.
Speaker: We're here to help you close more deals, generate more leads and referrals, and hopefully have a much better time in the solar industry.
Speaker: Thank you for tuning into the podcast.
Speaker: We're coming at you free and available every Tuesday and Friday.
Speaker: on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, you name it, wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Speaker: So thank you so much for tuning in.
Speaker: And hopefully you are picking up some nuggets that can help you close some more deals this week or help you grow in your solar business.
Speaker: And speaking of growing, the best...
Speaker: And most helpful way that you can help us grow the podcast is by sharing it and leaving a review.
Speaker: So wanted to thank our most recent reviews.
Speaker: We had two recent ones coming on.
Speaker: Been a minute since we've highlighted some reviews.
Speaker: So wanted to say thank you so much to these two people and these two reviews.
Speaker: So first one we had from Polly Connor.
Speaker: Let's left us a review says great podcast.
Speaker: I've been in the solar business for almost three years now.
Speaker: And I've learned so many nice nuggets from Taylor's podcast.
Speaker: I listen to it every day.
Speaker: Thank you, Polly.
Speaker: Love to hear it.
Speaker: And then we had one from Max Long.
Speaker: He says great value.
Speaker: Five stars.
Speaker: I've been listening to this podcast for about a month now.
Speaker: It has helped me tremendously.
Speaker: I recommend this to anyone that is in solar cells.
Speaker: Always good to learn from the killers in the industry.
Speaker: 100% agree with that, Max.
Speaker: And that's a big reason why I do the podcast is because I want to learn from the killers in the industry myself.
Speaker: So important to always be learning.
Speaker: If you are not growing in this business, you're shrinking.
Speaker: There's no middle ground.
Speaker: So we constantly need to be up leveling ourselves and figuring out how we can grow.
Speaker: And one of the best ways to do that is by surrounding yourself with greatness and hearing what the top people are doing.
Speaker: That's what we aim to do here on the show.
Speaker: So let's get into the topic.
Speaker: We're going to be talking about a few different pieces of data you should be using when you're knocking doors.
Speaker: And the previous podcast, we talked a little bit about AI, how you can start to use ChatGPT AI in your solar business.
Speaker: So this podcast, we're going to be talking about some data you should be using and some tools that you can use and utilize to have that data in front of you.
Speaker: And some of these are paid tools.
Speaker: Some of these things, pieces of data you can get for free.
Speaker: Obviously, it's going to take a little bit more work if you go the free route.
Speaker: But there's ways to do it.
Speaker: And so I'm going to tell you about some of the pieces of data I use specifically when I'm prospecting and really the four pieces of data that I think are super crucial to be using.
Speaker: So let's jump into the first one.
Speaker: is you should be figuring out who is the person on title of the home.
Speaker: And this is, I think, is the most basic piece of data.
Speaker: It's something that anyone should have when you're knocking doors.
Speaker: And I've talked about this in the show before, but one of my best ways, one of the most effective ways, I think, to break the preoccupation is
Speaker: when you're knocking a door or maybe maybe you're even calling people doing cold calls if you can have the name of the person on the title of the home then it gives you a reason to be there right it's separating yourself from a lot of other people that knock the door they say hey i'm taylor i'm with xyz company are you the homeowner
Speaker: You say something like that, people are triggered instantly.
Speaker: Okay, salesperson, he's asking if I'm the homeowner, probably selling something.
Speaker: Instead, what if you had the homeowner's name, you're acting a little confused at the door.
Speaker: You're saying, hey, I'm just making sure I'm in the right place.
Speaker: Is this still the Rodriguez's?
Speaker: Is that you guys?
Speaker: Okay, and then what are they thinking?
Speaker: they're probably thinking instead of sales guy, they're thinking, oh, is this guy here to drop off a package?
Speaker: What is this guy doing?
Speaker: It's creating curiosity in their mind, right?
Speaker: So it's so powerful to have just the name of the person on the title.
Speaker: And it's also saving you time because if it's not that person, like on the next door.
Speaker: So, so powerful, I would definitely figure out a way to find out who's on the title of the home.
Speaker: And the there's several door knocking apps, you can use most of the best door knocking apps, they have this data, who's on the title of the home.
Speaker: But you can even use there's tools like on X, it's like a hunting app.
Speaker: That shows my buddies use it for hunting.
Speaker: You can see by area who's on the title.
Speaker: There's yeah, I'm drawing a blank, but there's a few different ones like that.
Speaker: And then pretty much all your knocking apps should have that again, stay till the end because we're going to be dropping a super powerful tool that has all this and much more.
Speaker: Hey, but then the second one is new move ins.
Speaker: This is something I've talked to.
Speaker: I've also talked a lot about on the show, but if you can figure out, hey, who just moved in here, who might not have been hit a million times with solar, especially for people that are knocking in saturated areas, you guys know.
Speaker: I'm in San Diego, California, an area that is super saturated.
Speaker: It's the mecca of solar.
Speaker: And so if we can have access to this data, we're probably not battling as much.
Speaker: These people probably haven't been talked to a billion times about solar.
Speaker: So this is something myself and the guys on my team use.
Speaker: If you're in San Diego, don't use these strategies.
Speaker: Don't come into my territory using these strategies.
Speaker: Just kidding.
Speaker: Hit me up.
Speaker: We can knock together.
Speaker: But anywhere else, free game.
Speaker: But new move-ins, so powerful.
Speaker: It's just roll up.
Speaker: And what I love about this strategy is it gives you a different approach.
Speaker: You can say, hey, this is a program.
Speaker: We're supposed to talk to all the people that just moved in the home.
Speaker: You guys just moved in, what, six months ago?
Speaker: But it also gives you a point of reference.
Speaker: So as you're knocking around these people,
Speaker: As you're approaching them, then if you go hit the neighbors around it, which I do and I would recommend, you can reference them.
Speaker: Hey, we just came from your neighbor, so-and-so.
Speaker: They just moved in.
Speaker: Have you met them yet?
Speaker: No, a super nice family.
Speaker: Hey, and all of a sudden, it's breaking the preoccupation with the neighbor you talk to.
Speaker: It's making it seem like you're familiar with that neighborhood, like you're the mayor of that hood.
Speaker: And just way more effective.
Speaker: I love this strategy.
Speaker: So that's in this data you can get just for free on Redfin, Zillow.
Speaker: Great strategy right here.
Speaker: Number three, a three and four here.
Speaker: And these are ones that I haven't looked at as much, but still really good information to know.
Speaker: The third number three is just their estimated credit score.
Speaker: Okay, most of us are selling programs where they need to have usually 650 minimum credit score.
Speaker: I know there's some options for lower than that, but generally it's like 650.
Speaker: People should be having that credit score.
Speaker: And so you get on a lot of the door knocking apps, it'll show you what their estimated credit credit score is.
Speaker: So if you see someone below 600, you might want to
Speaker: Think about skipping that one.
Speaker: And keep in mind, not all this data is correct 100% of the time.
Speaker: So if you roll up to a house, it's like really nice.
Speaker: Yard is kept up with and it's shown below a 600 credit score.
Speaker: Still probably going to knock that one.
Speaker: But if you roll up to a house where there's like 10 cars in the drive or on the lawn, junk everywhere, and it's showing that it's below 600, I might be skipping that one.
Speaker: So just something to keep in mind.
Speaker: You want to save yourself as much time as possible.
Speaker: Speed is the name of the game.
Speaker: So if you can save yourself time and get in front of those people that are more qualified, that's how you're going to be having a lot more success.
Speaker: And then number four is age.
Speaker: Hey, I like this one for a couple reasons.
Speaker: The first is if you know that specifically if you know they're above like 65, you're knocking in the afternoon.
Speaker: Guess who's more likely to be there in the afternoons?
Speaker: Probably the people that are retired that are seniors.
Speaker: So a good strategy is you can pull up your knocking app, your sales rabbit, your rep card.
Speaker: If you can have this data in front of you.
Speaker: And there's also tools online.
Speaker: There's tools where you can look up, I think it's called like city data.
Speaker: You can look up like ethnicity.
Speaker: I believe it shows you the general like age of the areas you're looking at.
Speaker: But you can look this up.
Speaker: And then in the afternoons, when it's one, two o'clock, when most people are going to be working, guess who you can target for those hours.
Speaker: You can target your seniors because they're more likely to be home.
Speaker: And they're more likely to go to bed early.
Speaker: So maybe you want to hit them anyways during the afternoon hours.
Speaker: And if you are not knocking in the evening, you see senior citizens, maybe you put a pin on those and save them until the next day when you're not re-knocking in the afternoon.
Speaker: Then you hit them because you know they're probably going to be home in the afternoons.
Speaker: So great, great piece of data to know is the age.
Speaker: And then the second piece of that is if you know, okay, they're above 65, right?
Speaker: then you can turn your knocking into a senior citizen program, right?
Speaker: And it's not, you're not lying to them, right?
Speaker: We can all offer different bonuses, discounts.
Speaker: We can adjust our program for seniors.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So if you say you're doing a senior program, then you probably are pricing it a little bit different or you're presenting it a little bit different.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: But personally, I'm
Speaker: When I knock into someone that is a senior, all of a sudden it's the senior solar program that I'm doing.
Speaker: And this sounds different.
Speaker: Again, if you're in saturated areas, you've got to be different.
Speaker: You can't be like the 20 other people that have stopped by.
Speaker: And especially if it's a senior person, they want to know these people love when things are geared towards them, targeted towards them.
Speaker: They're asking about senior discounts at the movie theater.
Speaker: This is going to grab their attention a lot of times.
Speaker: I've seen it work really effectively.
Speaker: So these are some great pieces of data.
Speaker: Again, that's the person on the title.
Speaker: That's new move-ins.
Speaker: That's estimated credit score.
Speaker: That is the age, how old they are.
Speaker: And there's a whole lot of other useful pieces of data we could go into.
Speaker: But just to kind of demonstrate some things you should be thinking about.
Speaker: The last thing I wanted to really drop and announce is that we have a new sponsor of the podcast.
Speaker: I'm super excited to announce that we have, they're called SolarScout.
Speaker: And this tool is absolutely insane.
Speaker: The pieces of data it has.
Speaker: I mean, I just talked about four pieces of data.
Speaker: But what if you could have all this plus like,
Speaker: 10, 20 other pieces all in one single application.
Speaker: Well, if you think that's cool, then you need to be checking out SolarScout.
Speaker: They are the newest sponsors of the podcast.
Speaker: And disclaimer, I'm just starting to use them.
Speaker: I actually just got it onboarded today.
Speaker: So I'm really excited to be able to check it out, share some results coming up soon.
Speaker: But many of you know, I run my own door-to-door team here in San Diego.
Speaker: And as we're gearing up for summer, I realized if we do the same thing we always do, then we're going to get the same results we always get.
Speaker: But if I want to increase my deal flow, I need to do something different to get an advantage.
Speaker: So that's why I'm stoked to start using this app called SolarScout.
Speaker: It's not a door knocking app, though.
Speaker: I already mentioned you can use other apps.
Speaker: You know, there's the rep cards, there's the sales rabbit, there's Canvas, which I use as a door knocking app right now.
Speaker: But this is really a data platform that just takes it to another level.
Speaker: All the things I was just talking about, it shows you the new move ins.
Speaker: It shows you how much energy they're estimated to be using in the house or actually in some areas it can show you their exact usage.
Speaker: I know in Texas it does that.
Speaker: It shows you who just got their energy bill.
Speaker: So you can target those homes right after they get their bill and the pain is high.
Speaker: And then my personal favorite and what I'm going to be just implementing right off the bat here, it actually shows you who had applied for a permit to get solar in the past, but then later canceled.
Speaker: So you can like literally go back to people that were super interested in solar, that's maybe they bought solar, but for whatever reason, the company screwed something up.
Speaker: I don't know what the rep was.
Speaker: maybe said something dishonest, you can go back and hit those people up and get these people that are way more likely to be interested.
Speaker: And it's, you know, it's not poaching the deal.
Speaker: You're not like permit poaching or anything, but you're getting people that had at one point been at the stage where they had a permit and then for whatever reason had to cancel.
Speaker: Hey, and then, yeah, I mean, I'm going to do future episodes on this and share with you a lot of my results.
Speaker: But a couple other things.
Speaker: Yeah, it shows you the new move ins all in one app.
Speaker: No more going to Zillow.
Speaker: No more going to these other.
Speaker: real estate apps.
Speaker: So just super, super cool.
Speaker: So I'm going to be one of the first to use SolarScout here in San Diego.
Speaker: I decided to partner up.
Speaker: I told them though, hey, if I'm using it, then I got to hook up my peeps.
Speaker: I got to hook up my listeners of the podcast with a killer deal.
Speaker: And they did.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So get this.
Speaker: If you go to solarscout.app forward slash Taylor,
Speaker: That's one more time.
Speaker: Solarscout.app forward slash Taylor and book a demo with them.
Speaker: You're going to get not 10, not 20, but 30% off your first month when you sign up.
Speaker: Okay, so go check it out, guys.
Speaker: And I don't like I don't take it lightly.
Speaker: I don't you guys know I don't run ads in the podcast very rarely.
Speaker: So unless I'm really excited about something, that's the only time I'm going to recommend them to y'all listen.
Speaker: So go check them out.
Speaker: And I'll let you know how things are going as I start to use this here with my team in San Diego.
Speaker: Go check them out, guys, and appreciate them for the support of the podcast.
Speaker: And with that being said, make sure you tune in to next episode.
Speaker: because we have a guest.
Speaker: This guy, he has been through so many ups and downs.
Speaker: I mean, he's the definition of solar coaster.
Speaker: We're going to have Luke Toon.
Speaker: He is the CSO of Legacy Power.
Speaker: And you're going to hear about how this dude broke his back and then lost like half his company while he was in the hospital with a broken back.
Speaker: Crazy, crazy story.
Speaker: Make sure you tune in.
Speaker: to hear all about that on the next episode.
Speaker: And thanks for thanks for jumping on today.
Speaker: Let me know if you want an opportunity to come sell with the best the best here in San Diego with me and my team.
Speaker: And then let me know if you have any suggestions for the podcast future guests you want on the show.
Speaker: Always looking for killers to come on and share their knowledge.
Speaker: So thanks again, and we'll see you all on the next episode.
Speaker: What's up, Solopreneurs?
Speaker: Hope you enjoyed the episode.
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.
Speaker: One of the top questions I get asked on Instagram, on Facebook, by our listeners is, Taylor, where should I start?
Speaker: What episodes should I listen to in the podcast?
Speaker: You got too many podcasts, man, because now we have over 200 episodes.
Speaker: 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 Solopreneur.
Speaker: We put them together all in one sheet.
Speaker: So you can go, you can hit the ground running, especially if you're new, you do not want to not have this sheet.
Speaker: So go download it right now.
Speaker: It's going to be at top10.solarpreneurs.com.
Speaker: Again, that's top 10, the number 10.
Speaker: dot solarpreneurs.com.
Speaker: Don't forget the S on solarpreneurs.
Speaker: We will have that in the show notes.
Speaker: Go download it right now.
Speaker: And especially if you have not listened to them, go listen to them and you can re-listen to them.
Speaker: That's going to show you how.
Speaker: So go download it and we'll see you on the other side.
