Transcript
Speaker: What's going on ladies and gentlemen, solar pros around the world.
Speaker: Taylor here, wanted to give a quick intro to this episode.
Speaker: If you haven't heard already, Michael O'Donnell, he is probably the top solar closer in the industry.
Speaker: Closes consistently over two megawatts a year in the industry.
Speaker: So I don't think anyone's beating him.
Speaker: Let me know if you know of someone that is doing better than that.
Speaker: We had him on the show last year
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: for those who weren't able to hop on the live stream or if you already listened to it re-listened to it i mean he dropped some serious value bombs so it's not going to hurt you listening to it twice let us know what you think with that we'll hop into the episode
Speaker: What do you call an underground group of solar professionals on a mission to create a more sustainable world?
Speaker: We call ourselves solopreneurs.
Speaker: And while some might call us crazy, foolish, and dissatisfied with the status quo, we're the ones taking action to create a better future for ourselves and the world.
Speaker: Solopreneur is dedicated to give you, the solar professional, the tools, skills, technology, and mentorship to take the industry by storm and sell more solar with less effort.
Speaker: We are solopreneurs and this is our story.
Speaker: What's going on solopreneurs?
Speaker: I'm stoked to be here.
Speaker: We're at Door-to-Door Con Live.
Speaker: We got an audience here.
Speaker: Everyone say what's up.
Speaker: We got our door-to-door peeps.
Speaker: They're at the vendors.
Speaker: We're having a rocking time.
Speaker: If you're not here, you're missing out, but hopefully it'll get you motivated for next year.
Speaker: But we are more excited because we're here with our friend Mike O'Donnell.
Speaker: Okay, get this situated here.
Speaker: So Mike, what do you think of the event so far?
Speaker: Taylor, I just gotta tell you, I am seriously stoked to be at Door to Door for the third year in a row.
Speaker: It's always exciting.
Speaker: I always leave just completely fired up.
Speaker: This year I'm particularly excited.
Speaker: We've got 22 people from our team, Sun Solar Solutions that are here, including our leadership.
Speaker: I've been the, I have, there's three partners in the company.
Speaker: Val Baraket and Troy Dubinkowitz, in previous years they haven't been here, but I've talked so much about this.
Speaker: I've gotten so much from D2D.
Speaker: They've seen so much from me after coming from this.
Speaker: We're all here, the whole leadership of the companies here.
Speaker: We were in the mastermind last night as a leadership team.
Speaker: All our sales directors were all there.
Speaker: And then I've got 12 people from my little team of abundant power here.
Speaker: We've been here three years in a row and that team's getting bigger and stronger every year.
Speaker: And I attribute just a massive amount of that cohesiveness and excitement about the team and about our industry and about what we do to D2D.
Speaker: So I couldn't be more stoked to be here.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, it's great.
Speaker: You got to build the culture.
Speaker: You got to connect with awesome people.
Speaker: We're playing ping pong foosball.
Speaker: We're having a good time.
Speaker: It's all happening.
Speaker: They got pull-up contests going on.
Speaker: I think, didn't you win the pull-up contest over there, Mike?
Speaker: I did not win the pull-up contest.
Speaker: Second place, maybe.
Speaker: Maybe 19th place on the pull-up contest.
Speaker: I got one whole pull-up in, maybe.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Well, pull-up contest, maybe no, but solar cells contest.
Speaker: I mean, this guy will outdo them all.
Speaker: I mean, basically, they're creating a new award just for you, Mike, because it's become too easy at this point, I think.
Speaker: I mean, he does.
Speaker: He's done over two megawatts.
Speaker: I think, what, three years in a row now?
Speaker: I got to tell you, this year was was tough.
Speaker: I learned the value of a goal.
Speaker: So the first year I came, I had busted through a net metering deadline in Arizona.
Speaker: And I landed on the other side of that deadline with two and a half megawatts.
Speaker: of solar sold and cruise through to the end of the year.
Speaker: That was in like September, October.
Speaker: And I was already there.
Speaker: Last year, we had another big net metering deadline in Tucson.
Speaker: I spent the whole year in Tucson, crashed through the other side of that deadline with over two megawatts of solar sold, almost three megawatts of solar sold.
Speaker: This year, we didn't have that deadline.
Speaker: I crashed through that same south cycle with a
Speaker: A deadline we tried to hype as a deadline wasn't quite there.
Speaker: And I landed on the other side of that with about 1.5 megawatts of solar sold.
Speaker: And I got two months and I'm a half a megawatt short.
Speaker: And I'm going to tell you the value of a goal.
Speaker: We come to this thing.
Speaker: We go to these, pay these speakers to come and tell us about driving towards goals and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker: I got a half a megawatt to do it, only a half a megawatt to do it in.
Speaker: And I'm in the part of the year where I normally coast.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm in the part of the year where I usually kind of kick it into cruise control and kind of run it into the end of the year.
Speaker: And I've got a half a megawatt of solar to sell with no deadline.
Speaker: Other than this year, we also did have the 30% tax credit.
Speaker: Turned that into a deadline.
Speaker: But I got to tell you, man, the idea of coming to D2D the last two years and having a double golden door and picking up two of those trophies and being here this year and getting one was just like, that's not happening.
Speaker: It's just, it's not going to happen.
Speaker: I have got to figure out a way.
Speaker: And it was like,
Speaker: It was not crashing through a deadline.
Speaker: It was make the donuts.
Speaker: It was get up every day, get out of bed and start doing the things, you know, that are going to put one or two or three sales a day up onto the board.
Speaker: And just literally, I didn't make it until December 30th.
Speaker: So I worked Christmas Eve.
Speaker: I worked the day after Christmas.
Speaker: I didn't take any time off.
Speaker: Oh, my gosh.
Speaker: The guy in the one of the speakers today said, you know, sometimes you look at people who are doing well and they work like they're broke.
Speaker: So after a megawatt of megawatt and a half of sales at the end of October, you know,
Speaker: I don't need to work hard to pay the mortgage.
Speaker: I don't need to go out and just work to get that.
Speaker: I had that goal of having those two megawatts and another double golden door.
Speaker: And I'm working like I'm broke.
Speaker: Yeah, I am working like I'm broke.
Speaker: I'm working through Christmas.
Speaker: I'm no time off in the New Year's.
Speaker: And I really learned the value of a goal.
Speaker: I had another thing spurring me on this year.
Speaker: My partner, Troy Dvinkowitz, and I had, we're top sales back and forth every year.
Speaker: He actually beat me this year in number of sales.
Speaker: But we had a bet.
Speaker: We had a bet this year.
Speaker: Whoever had the top sales in kilowatts, whoever had the top sales in kilowatts was going to get bought into the World Series of Poker main event by the other one.
Speaker: Bucket list item for me.
Speaker: My hobbies, Texas Hold'em.
Speaker: Playing in the main event on ESPN.
Speaker: That's a bucket list goal for me.
Speaker: That goal, those two goals just drove me and drove me all year.
Speaker: And I would not have had either one of those goals in place without D2D.
Speaker: So just a massive contribution to my
Speaker: psyche.
Speaker: So, awesome.
Speaker: Well, that's awesome.
Speaker: You're using it to your advantage and crazy you're working holidays.
Speaker: I mean, I don't think I wasn't working the holidays, that's for sure.
Speaker: But one of the first questions I had, Mike, is around the holidays, I personally, I had a lot of people say, oh, it's Christmas.
Speaker: We're not scheduling appointments.
Speaker: We're not doing this till next year.
Speaker: So what did you do to overcome that?
Speaker: I mean, you're trying to hit a goal.
Speaker: I imagine you probably got people saying the same thing.
Speaker: Well, let's face it.
Speaker: The tax credit deadlines are real deadlines, right?
Speaker: So,
Speaker: When we're knocking on a door and talking to somebody in December, they're about to miss out on the full credit of the tax.
Speaker: So start thinking about that for this November and December.
Speaker: You should have the watershed part of your year this year in November and December because people are going to be facing the prospect.
Speaker: of having a 26% tax credit melt away into 22%.
Speaker: So I was bringing that information with me into a proposal, bringing that information with me into a meeting saying, look, if we sit here and go solar, you're getting this tax credit.
Speaker: If we don't, you're basically just throwing away $2,000.
Speaker: So that's effective.
Speaker: That's super effective.
Speaker: Smart, super smart.
Speaker: So that's great you hit it.
Speaker: And I mean, Golden Door Award, that's for anyone who does over 100...
Speaker: 100 deals in a year or over one megawatt.
Speaker: So Mike, he's gotten two now multiple times.
Speaker: And I had a couple people ask him before, how many deals did you do to hit that award?
Speaker: Yeah, so I've sold between 200 and 300 systems per year for the last three years.
Speaker: And that's been between two and three megawatts a year.
Speaker: That's my personal sales.
Speaker: I have a team of closers that are on my team.
Speaker: And that volume is in addition to that.
Speaker: And then, of course, I'm one of the three owners of Sun Solar Solutions.
Speaker: And that's a 12 megawatt, 12 to 15 megawatt company.
Speaker: So that's all on top of being a part of that.
Speaker: You know, guys, there's just such a temptation to get drawn into becoming an owner or the runner of a team or a sales manager.
Speaker: Let me just tell you something.
Speaker: There is nothing in the world that pays like being a solar salesman.
Speaker: And if you're smart, you're going to resist all temptations, all opportunities, quote unquote opportunities, all offers to do things that are not selling solar.
Speaker: If you're smart, you're going to do what pays the best and what generates the most income excitement.
Speaker: And that's actually yourself selling solar.
Speaker: So I would say, you know, it's been I've spent 30 years in sales and I have succumbed.
Speaker: to the temptation to become a sales manager over and over again.
Speaker: I have succumbed to the temptation to become a director of sales.
Speaker: I have been the vice president of sales for large technology companies.
Speaker: I've been the regional vice president with P&L responsibility.
Speaker: That was the stupidest thing I ever did was to get promoted out of sales in the general P&L management because it doesn't pay well.
Speaker: It's a pain in the ass.
Speaker: You're hurting cats.
Speaker: You're out there doing what you're not great at.
Speaker: I found myself doing what I was not great at
Speaker: You know, 99% of the time I was doing stuff that was not selling.
Speaker: And you know what?
Speaker: I'm a great salesman.
Speaker: I'm not great at a lot of other stuff.
Speaker: So for me to spend time doing stuff that's not selling, all I'm doing is cutting my own income.
Speaker: I'm cutting my own throat.
Speaker: But each and every one of us succumbs to that temptation.
Speaker: We think, oh, I'm going to grow a team.
Speaker: Oh, I'm going to start a company.
Speaker: Oh, you know what?
Speaker: If you can get a good commission and go sell solar, you don't want a great commission.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You want to know why you don't want a great commission?
Speaker: Because you don't want to work for a company that doesn't do anything for you.
Speaker: You want to work for a company that pays a good commission and then does everything for you.
Speaker: Because the only thing you want to be spending your time at if you're in solar sales is selling solar.
Speaker: You want to be knocking doors and closing deals.
Speaker: You don't want to be calling the customer the next day.
Speaker: to get their utility paperwork submitted or this or that or whatever.
Speaker: You need to be with a company that's going to get all that done for you.
Speaker: So I don't do anything at all for my company.
Speaker: I'm not an employee of my company.
Speaker: I'm a 1099 salesman for my company.
Speaker: And that means anything they want me to do or anything I think I should be doing, I don't get paid for that.
Speaker: I get paid for selling solar, and that's what I stick to.
Speaker: Yeah, it's so true.
Speaker: I think so many people focus on things that aren't important.
Speaker: And just at the event today, we heard from Mark Eaton.
Speaker: He was NBA All-Star, played with John Stockton, Carl Malone, all those guys.
Speaker: Here in Utah.
Speaker: Yeah, he talked about the same thing.
Speaker: At first, he was focusing on chasing around little guys and everything.
Speaker: Wasn't doing his job.
Speaker: But when he learned to do what he was good at, he's 7'4", so he shouldn't be shooting three-pointers.
Speaker: Well, at least back then he shouldn't be.
Speaker: He shouldn't be chasing down the little guys.
Speaker: He should be posted up by the baskets doing his job and swatting shots.
Speaker: So it's the same thing in solar cells.
Speaker: The more time we focus on just closing knocking doors, that's how we're going to be successful at it.
Speaker: And I think it's helped you a ton.
Speaker: So things like hiring assistants.
Speaker: If your company doesn't have the process figured out, go hire an assistant.
Speaker: I pay someone 300 bucks a month from the Philippines, and she does all my paperwork for me.
Speaker: Perfect.
Speaker: You don't got to.
Speaker: My wife is a nurse.
Speaker: My wife was working full time as a nurse my first year and a half into solar.
Speaker: And we had to look at ourselves and say, you're putting in this much time and bringing home this much money.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I'm pulling my hair out, working this much time, bringing home this much money.
Speaker: Maybe.
Speaker: we should be doing something else with your time.
Speaker: So she actually is now, she runs abundant power, which is my little group.
Speaker: So my email is her.
Speaker: I don't get my email.
Speaker: She gets my email.
Speaker: So talking about an assistant, when you email me, you're not emailing me, you're emailing her.
Speaker: You know what, if you're emailing me, I'm probably not emailing you back.
Speaker: Yeah, on a timely basis, because I'm in three appointments every single day.
Speaker: What am I going to do?
Speaker: Emails.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So she is my email.
Speaker: Find someone, pay them, you know, five cents to pay them, you know, to be there or work for a company that has the resources that does that.
Speaker: You don't want to do anything but knocking on doors, making appointments and be in those appointments and closing.
Speaker: If you can.
Speaker: Get your focus down.
Speaker: Mark Eaton was what a great example.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, him talking about the fact that he hated basketball because he wasn't good at it until someone said, you know, there are things a big man could do on the court.
Speaker: He said the problem was I didn't know what those were.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And either did my coaches.
Speaker: My coaches didn't know what to do with a guy who was seven foot four.
Speaker: If you're a seven foot four guy in the sales world, you need to be, you know, find a coach, find yourself.
Speaker: You need to discover what you're good at and make sure that's what you're spending your time doing.
Speaker: Yeah, so true.
Speaker: So we got a couple people on live.
Speaker: Brady, thanks for being on.
Speaker: Luis, Zach, Earl.
Speaker: And Luke asks, why are we looking from under the table?
Speaker: Well, we forgot to try a pod, Luke.
Speaker: So sorry about the view.
Speaker: How the rafters look.
Speaker: The rafters in this place are awesome, huh?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And Brady asks...
Speaker: Did you sell 250 to 300 last year personally?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So at least one closed.
Speaker: I sold 312 last year.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: Incredible.
Speaker: And then how many, so that's one closed deal per day basically.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: About one a day.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: How many in person?
Speaker: How many on the phone?
Speaker: All in person, not on the phone.
Speaker: Maybe one on the phone.
Speaker: I think I did one from, uh, from Phoenix to Tucson cause I couldn't get synced up, but all over all in person.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I don't have the on the phone model.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Curious to learn how people do that.
Speaker: That's incredible.
Speaker: And where are you doing?
Speaker: I know Brady asked before, did you do commercial deals or just residential?
Speaker: This year I had two or three commercial deals and those were customers that own businesses that asked me to sell them commercial.
Speaker: Although I'm getting more and more interested in commercial.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: There's an interesting aspect of commercial where they not only get the state tax credits, federal tax credits, but there's also depreciation, accelerated depreciation.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We just bought a building.
Speaker: Uh,
Speaker: for Sun Solar Solutions, and we put solar on that building, it was going to cost us money at our cost for solar with the tax credits, with the state tax credits, with the depreciation.
Speaker: It would have cost us money to not go solar.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: It's a good time to go solar.
Speaker: You're trying to reconnect, by the way.
Speaker: Oh, trying to reconnect.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Well, we're just going to keep going.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: And hopefully it reconnects.
Speaker: I'm going to turn on the backup recording, though, just in case.
Speaker: Little technical difficulties guys are Wireless connection is struggling too many people watching the YouTube videos here when they should be in the workshops
Speaker: So what I want to talk about, Mike, I know in our last podcast, we focused a lot just on like the little habits you do.
Speaker: You bring people on the doors and you're staying, you have half your family basically working in your company because you paid them to come on the doors with you.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Which is pretty cool.
Speaker: And so any other new secrets you've thought about since last year, what's been going on since we last did the podcast?
Speaker: You know, there is absolutely no secrets.
Speaker: out there to making a million dollars a year selling solar.
Speaker: If you can somehow motivate yourself to be out selling appointments three or four hours a day, you're going to get two or three appointments every day.
Speaker: If you suck at closing, you're going to close one of those a day.
Speaker: If you close one of them a day, you're going to kick my ass.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So it's really just a matter of can you motivate yourself?
Speaker: Can you get yourself to do it?
Speaker: And what I'm always talking about is the habits and the hacks.
Speaker: What are the habits?
Speaker: What are the hacks that are going to get you from where you are now, which is not on a door to being on a door?
Speaker: And the thought of getting onto a door when you're not on a door is overwhelming.
Speaker: The idea of going up on some door that you don't know and knocking on the door.
Speaker: Somehow our brain sort of just.
Speaker: Finds that to be some sort of catastrophic event.
Speaker: Our brain is broken because you're not going to door ask them if they want solar and they say no and you walk away Nothing catastrophic has happened.
Speaker: Yeah, but I don't know why I experience that it will be every single time I try to start Getting myself to do that.
Speaker: And so the trick is in starting once you're in motion The idea of going to the next door is nothing getting yourself in motion is almost impossible What you're trying to overcome is inertia.
Speaker: Hmm
Speaker: Once you overcome inertia and you're on a door and another door and another door, what you have going for you is momentum.
Speaker: It's an entirely different set of forces.
Speaker: If you can harness momentum, you're going to go a long way.
Speaker: You're going to be out there.
Speaker: You're going to get one more appointment.
Speaker: You're going to knock on five more doors.
Speaker: You're going to do what you need to do to get one more appointment.
Speaker: If you're not on a door, the odds that you will be in 30 minutes are almost zero.
Speaker: So you've got to come up with what is the hack?
Speaker: You know, what are you going to do that's going to interrupt your brain and get you to stop doing what you're doing now and get you out onto a door?
Speaker: So one of the things that I'm doing, I'm constantly doing the way I build a team.
Speaker: I'm never out recruiting.
Speaker: People come to me that want to make money.
Speaker: Someone comes to me, they want to learn solely.
Speaker: They want to learn how to do it.
Speaker: I'm always happy to show people you have to get in the truck.
Speaker: Go with me.
Speaker: We're going to go knock on doors.
Speaker: When I'm out knocking on doors, you want to come with me?
Speaker: If we get an appointment and it sells, I'm going to pay you for the appointment.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I do that all the time.
Speaker: So bring somebody with you.
Speaker: Make an appointment to meet somebody tomorrow at three thirty at Starbucks.
Speaker: And it doesn't matter.
Speaker: Invite the homeless guy.
Speaker: Invite the guy you think is a loser.
Speaker: It doesn't matter.
Speaker: Just have him come with you and then you'll be on a door and you'll make an appointment.
Speaker: That's a hack.
Speaker: The habit is scheduling people to meet you at Starbucks several times a week to show somebody how to do it.
Speaker: So you got to create the habit, use the hack to get yourself to go from not being on a door to being on a door.
Speaker: After that, the rest of it all flows downhill from there.
Speaker: Another one of my hacks is every single solitary time I walk out of a house, I make myself leave that house and go to at least one door and get at least one no.
Speaker: Why am I trying to get one no?
Speaker: I'm trying to get one no because if I tell myself I'm trying to get a yes, I probably won't go.
Speaker: I'm going to think about it.
Speaker: I'm going to be overwhelmed.
Speaker: It's going to sound like, oh, they're probably going to say no.
Speaker: I'm going to get rejected.
Speaker: I don't want to feel like that.
Speaker: I'm not going to go.
Speaker: There's no secrets to that.
Speaker: There's nothing new to it.
Speaker: I guess the thing that I'm dealing with this year, now that I have a more substantial team, now that I have more people working with me,
Speaker: is kind of transitioning from being a leader.
Speaker: It's funny, they talk about in the sessions we've been in and some of the sessions I was in last night in the mastermind, the D2D mastermind, talking about stop being a manager and start being a leader.
Speaker: Well, I'm always trying to be a leader.
Speaker: I'm always trying to inspire people.
Speaker: And then I turn around and nobody's working as hard as I am, right?
Speaker: And I'm like, well, why not?
Speaker: Why aren't they inspired by how much money that you can make making solar?
Speaker: Why aren't they just...
Speaker: You know, jumping through their hat to get out and get on to the next door.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The reason that that's not happening is because it's they're just they're not motivated the way you're motivated.
Speaker: So the transition that I'm making this year is really to kind of go backwards, less leadership and more being a boss.
Speaker: My my thing for this year is sell solar like a boss.
Speaker: So you need to be the boss of you.
Speaker: You need to be setting up a schedule for you.
Speaker: Why do these summer programs work so good for the pest control companies and the security companies?
Speaker: Because those guys that are on the doors, they get recruited and they go to Cincinnati, Ohio, and they work all summer selling pest control.
Speaker: They have a boss.
Speaker: One of the problems you have and that I have is we don't really have a boss.
Speaker: No one's in charge of our time.
Speaker: No one's saying, I'm going to pick you up at the Red Roof Inn at 9 a.m.
Speaker: And then I'm going to buy you lunch and dinner and I'm not bringing you back to the Red Roof Inn until 10 o'clock at night.
Speaker: We don't have that boss.
Speaker: And so we have to decide that we're going to get out of the house by nine o'clock in the morning.
Speaker: We're going to get out there.
Speaker: We're going to knock those doors.
Speaker: Well, most of us have a crappy boss.
Speaker: Yeah, we're a crappy boss of ourselves.
Speaker: So a lot of what I'm really working on this year is how to be a boss of myself and sell solar like a boss.
Speaker: And how do I help the people on my team sell solar?
Speaker: because they have a boss.
Speaker: So that's a different transition for me.
Speaker: That's a personal thing that I'm working on.
Speaker: I want to inspire people.
Speaker: I'm kind of done inspiring people.
Speaker: I'm now kind of getting to the point where I wanted to say, guys, this is a job.
Speaker: You got to show up.
Speaker: You got to do the job or you're not part of the team.
Speaker: That's why car dealerships have guys that show up every day because if they don't show up, they get fired.
Speaker: If they're not there from noon till 10 o'clock at night,
Speaker: You miss work two days in a row, they fire you, right?
Speaker: In the solar industry, we don't really have the luxury of having a real boss.
Speaker: And so if you don't have that, invent it.
Speaker: Have it for yourself.
Speaker: Somehow become accountable for your own time.
Speaker: Somehow work with a coach.
Speaker: Somehow work with someone, your wife, your spouse, your business partner.
Speaker: Who are you going to be accountable to make sure that you do the things like Mark Dayton would say?
Speaker: Do the, do the things you say you're going to do, do what you're told and then do the things you're going to, you say you're going to do.
Speaker: If you do those things in today's world of millennials and the whole nine thing, you're going to be exceeding expectations.
Speaker: If you just show up and just work the hours and just do the things you say you're going to do.
Speaker: And in this world with so, you know, it's so lucrative per deal.
Speaker: If you actually do that, you're just going to make an obscene amount of money.
Speaker: So you really shouldn't need motivation to do that.
Speaker: But some reasons we do.
Speaker: And you know, for that reason, figure out what that is for yourself, make it happen.
Speaker: Yeah, super smart.
Speaker: Let me try reconnecting this one more time.
Speaker: See if we exit out.
Speaker: You're fired.
Speaker: I'll go Trump on your ass.
Speaker: You're fired.
Speaker: Let's try restarting this one more time.
Speaker: See if it works better.
Speaker: Did you lose the peeps?
Speaker: We'll see if anyone's still there.
Speaker: Maybe it won't work.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Anyways, so yeah, it's super important to lead from the front.
Speaker: And I know we talked about last time, if you break it down how much you're making per hour, I don't know if a lot of guys have done that, but you talked about last time, it's more than like brain surgeons make a lot of time.
Speaker: If you break it down per hour, if you go on to do is break it down per.
Speaker: No, you want to figure out how much you're getting paid to knock on one door.
Speaker: I talk about this all the time.
Speaker: You know, you've heard me talk about it before.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: If I'm holding a hundred dollar bill and you and I are in the car and I say, go knock on that door and ask that guy if he wants a solar club.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And when he says no, yes or no, I'm going to give you a hundred dollars.
Speaker: When I do the math for how many doors that I knock on, so I knock on about seven doors or when I say knock on seven doors, I mean, get into seven conversations, right?
Speaker: I find seven people to ask them, do you want a solar quote?
Speaker: So when I find seven people and see if they do want a solar quote and I get one yes out of that, that means I got six no's.
Speaker: I'm making a lot more than a hundred dollars per no.
Speaker: So if I can figure out what that number is and pay myself $100 every time someone tells me no, how am I going to keep myself from going to the next door?
Speaker: The problem is that we're not experiencing...
Speaker: earning $100 and getting a note.
Speaker: Yeah, I think we're getting the money when somebody says yes.
Speaker: That's just not true.
Speaker: No one's going to pay you 1000 2000 $3,000 for spending an hour and a half of somebody that that is just not what the money's for.
Speaker: That's not why you're getting paid that much money.
Speaker: You're getting paid that money to talk to seven people 12 people 20 people and asking if they want a solar quote just to get one appointment.
Speaker: That's actually what the money's for.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So do you track like how many no's?
Speaker: Do you just like pen and paper how many no's you're getting?
Speaker: Well, this year I'm doing more of that.
Speaker: So every member of my team, including myself, is reporting in on Slack with exactly how many doors they've knocked, how many pins they've dropped, and exactly how many conversations they had, appointments, sales, and kilowatts, every single solitary day.
Speaker: And if it's zero...
Speaker: Let's see some zeros.
Speaker: Get the numbers on there.
Speaker: Be accountable.
Speaker: Today, I knocked on zero doors.
Speaker: Put it down.
Speaker: Write it down.
Speaker: So I not only track it, I report it.
Speaker: So my group reporting to itself, that's the boss.
Speaker: And I have to do it.
Speaker: Anybody on my team has to do it.
Speaker: And if my numbers are zero today, that's okay.
Speaker: I might have taken the day off.
Speaker: But I got to get on there and post the zeros.
Speaker: Yeah, okay.
Speaker: Yeah, super important to not only track it, but report it, keep people accountable.
Speaker: So something we didn't go into much last time, Mike, was I know we talked about the goals, the mini habits, all those things.
Speaker: But I think a lot of people here want to hear exactly like what you're doing in the clothes.
Speaker: How are you overcoming objections?
Speaker: How are you getting people to not think about it?
Speaker: And so I want to hear some stuff about your clothes, Mike.
Speaker: One of the reasons that D2D has been such a, I would say, almost overwhelming experience for me this year is that I have dozens and dozens of people coming out to me that I've never met before and have never been to a D2D before.
Speaker: And it's because Sam Taggart came to my house and we spent a couple hours at my house on my patio and he recorded a 12-segment video.
Speaker: Well, OK.
Speaker: On my pitch and close, right down to overcoming each objection, right down to presenting my kind of famous graph that I do.
Speaker: I call it famous.
Speaker: People come and talk to me about it, about this graph that I do.
Speaker: All those elements of the pitch and the close are all captured on D2D University.
Speaker: So I've had literally dozens and dozens of people come up to me this weekend and tell me, wow, I've watched that every day.
Speaker: I'm like, you watch it every day?
Speaker: That's just weird, man.
Speaker: Don't tell me you watch me every day.
Speaker: You're going to freak me out.
Speaker: But they've watched those segments over and over and over again, learning how to pitch and to close.
Speaker: You really don't need to sell solar because solar sells itself.
Speaker: When I show you that it costs nothing, absolutely nothing to put it on your house, the government's going to give you $8,000 to $12,000 and that your electric bill is going to go away.
Speaker: And that over the course of the next 20 years, you're going to end up $50,000, $80,000, $100,000 ahead, not by spending more money, but by spending less money.
Speaker: I don't have to sell that to you.
Speaker: You're going to look at it and you're going to be sold.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And so on the D to D university, and I recommend if you're not on D to D university, get on it.
Speaker: There's mountains and mountains of content.
Speaker: One of our big, big, uh, steps forward this year as a company is we launched Sun Solar University.
Speaker: which is a white label.
Speaker: We have our own portal for training people.
Speaker: My partners and I used to get together every time we had a batch of another five or 10, 15 people coming on board.
Speaker: And we'd have to spend two days in meetings trying to say this one to one and one to 15.
Speaker: We've now put all of that on D2D University.
Speaker: All that content is stored.
Speaker: Most of that's private for our company.
Speaker: But Sam and I actually recorded a 12 video segment of me and him going through every single part of a pitch and a close.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: to sit and kind of get the actual A, Bs and Cs.
Speaker: That's what you want to get on to D to D, get access to D to D university, get on there.
Speaker: But the one thing that I'll tell you that, you know, can't really be expressed enough.
Speaker: It's so it's a consciousness thing and it's really hard to understand.
Speaker: It's something you have to, you have to embrace and you have to eat this for breakfast and you have to bring it with you into the, into the, into the presentation.
Speaker: And that's this fact.
Speaker: You are the one in the room.
Speaker: You are the one in the meeting that needs to understand this is the last meeting that we're going to have.
Speaker: I am not coming back.
Speaker: Smart.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: And I'm not going to tell somebody I'm not coming back because I'm going to be a jerk.
Speaker: If they call me tomorrow and say, get my butt over here and sign it up, I will come.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: But I'm going to tell them that I'm not coming back because I know I'm not coming back.
Speaker: They're not calling me tomorrow.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: If I don't close this thing tonight, it's just not happening.
Speaker: Maybe one out of 10, maybe one out of 20.
Speaker: Someone's going to call and say, I've had a couple of
Speaker: A couple of customers actually text me, I've decided to go with it.
Speaker: Most of them were already signed up, by the way.
Speaker: So when somebody tells me that they want to think about it, I say, that's fantastic.
Speaker: Let's just do the paperwork and we'll have lots of time to think about it.
Speaker: Why?
Speaker: Because I know this is the last meeting we're going to have.
Speaker: And if you're the closer, you're there to sell or be sold.
Speaker: And if you're the closer, you better be there to be sold.
Speaker: If a customer tells you they think this is awesome, this is amazing, I just want to sign the paperwork on Friday, that's an objection.
Speaker: If you buy that objection, it's going to kill you.
Speaker: Because you're not going to be there on Friday, that deal's not going to get done.
Speaker: And you're the one that needs to know that.
Speaker: Every salesman, when they hear the customer think that, thinks two things.
Speaker: One, damn.
Speaker: When that customer is getting all fired up and he's like, he can just, he's starting to drool and you can see it.
Speaker: And he thinks, oh wow, the guy sees me drooling.
Speaker: And then he says, you're gonna email this to me, Taylor.
Speaker: I'm gonna have this, right?
Speaker: You're gonna send this to me.
Speaker: I'm gonna have this information that I'm excited about.
Speaker: And we all know what that means, right?
Speaker: I really wanna go solar, but I don't wanna sign up today.
Speaker: Right?
Speaker: It's like the worst thing there.
Speaker: And I'm gonna say, of course, absolutely.
Speaker: We're gonna send this to you, right?
Speaker: But at the same time, I have to know, I was sent there to do a job and it wasn't to sell solar.
Speaker: Solar sells itself.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I was there to help that person make a decision.
Speaker: And guess what?
Speaker: We're about to make a decision, right?
Speaker: That's going to happen right now.
Speaker: You can decide to think about it, but you can't decide to not make a decision.
Speaker: My job was to come here and help you make a decision.
Speaker: And right now we're about to make a decision.
Speaker: Yeah, well, it's true.
Speaker: I can count on the one hand how many deals they haven't signed that day and signed up later.
Speaker: That never happens.
Speaker: Not enough to care.
Speaker: They can promise you.
Speaker: Never happens.
Speaker: And so, Woody, are you actually telling them I don't come back to deals?
Speaker: I tell them that my job.
Speaker: is to come out to three or four people a day.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And my job is to sit for them, help them explain solar and then get the process started.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So you're telling them that before, like before you get in the day.
Speaker: My job is to come here, explain solar, answer your questions and help you get the process started.
Speaker: If you want this other process where you interact with people for weeks and months, I'm not a part of that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's not my job.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: If you want that, we're going to get a salesman involved.
Speaker: Salesmen are expensive.
Speaker: It's going to cost more.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So the deal that we're about to talk about today that I'm about to show you today, that deal is available now because I'm here and you're here.
Speaker: If I got to go away and send a salesman, it's just I don't even know what that deal is.
Speaker: Can you get the deal I'm showing you on another day?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: That's not my job.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm not part of that crew that comes back and visits with you five more times.
Speaker: I'm the guy that comes here, shows your shoulder, explains how it's going to go, and I'm going to help you get the process started.
Speaker: You need time to think about it?
Speaker: We can deal with that.
Speaker: You want to talk about pricing?
Speaker: We can deal with that.
Speaker: You want to think, is there a better deal out there?
Speaker: I'm here.
Speaker: You're here.
Speaker: We can deal with that right now while I'm here.
Speaker: What we can't do is have me go away and help you think about it.
Speaker: Once I leave, I can help you think about it.
Speaker: And guess what?
Speaker: You don't need me here to think about it.
Speaker: Genius.
Speaker: It's just, yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm worthless to you in terms of helping you think about it.
Speaker: I'm here to get the process started and then we're going to give you all the time in the world to think about it.
Speaker: Is that fair enough?
Speaker: Yeah, that's fair.
Speaker: Fair enough.
Speaker: Boom, there you have it.
Speaker: I think that's super important, though, just setting that intention beforehand.
Speaker: I know that's been one of the biggest secrets, I think, is just telling them what your intention is.
Speaker: Because if you tell them that at the end, they're going to be surprised by it.
Speaker: Like, oh, I thought this was just to get information.
Speaker: You say, look, this is what we're doing.
Speaker: and then get them to have that little commitment beforehand.
Speaker: I think that.
Speaker: Think of yourself as a lawyer and the customer is the jury and that as you begin your presentation, you have opening statements, right?
Speaker: You're going to talk a little bit about the company, this and that, but it's also the time to set the expectations and tell them what your job is.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And if all this makes sense to the point where it's hurting you, I'm going to ask you to get the process started.
Speaker: Is that fair?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Hey, Solarpreneurs, real quick.
Speaker: If you've been in the solar industry any amount of time, you know that in order to take it to the next level, you need to always be recruiting.
Speaker: What is it?
Speaker: ABR, always be recruiting.
Speaker: So if you need help with recruiting, I wanted to share with you something that helped me take my recruiting skills to the next level.
Speaker: We literally went from an office of less than 10 reps to 25 to 30 reps in less than three months.
Speaker: And we did this with reps that continue to sell with us.
Speaker: Two or three of them went on to become managers.
Speaker: Several of them were top producers in our office.
Speaker: And there are multiple reps that are still with us to this day, more than a year later.
Speaker: So what is it that helped me?
Speaker: I took up the services of Ryan Holman with Sales Recruiting University.
Speaker: He helped me develop a system to take my recruiting game to the next level.
Speaker: And he really helped me follow up with the recruits, schedule group interviews with them,
Speaker: get a huge pool of applicants coming in day after day.
Speaker: I wanted to share with you guys his link.
Speaker: If you are looking to take your recruiting skills to the next level, go to calendly.com slash sru forward slash solarpreneur.
Speaker: Once again, that's calendly.com slash sru slash solarpreneur.
Speaker: SRU is Sales Recruiting University.
Speaker: Ryan will help you take it to the next level.
Speaker: Sounds fair.
Speaker: So what's your response, Mike, if they say, oh, well, I'm going to need to go get a couple other quotes, though.
Speaker: So you're concerned that this isn't the best price.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And this is a lot of money, isn't it?
Speaker: Yeah, it is.
Speaker: And if I were you, I would also be concerned that it isn't the best price.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Now, I'm here and you're here.
Speaker: Let's deal with price.
Speaker: Let me tell you where my pricing is.
Speaker: Let me tell you where the market is.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Is there a better price out there?
Speaker: Possibly.
Speaker: Of course, if you and I are going to do business today, I'm going to make you an offer right now that has a slightly better price.
Speaker: And that's going to bring me from, you know, here's the market and I'm going to tell you where I am.
Speaker: I'm right here.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And if you find out later, I'm going to give you lots of time to deal with this and evaluate the proposal.
Speaker: If you decide you're not wanting to move forward, you can call me up.
Speaker: It's possible to stop this.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: If you decide that's about price and you you find out there's a price thing going out there, you and I are going to sit down and deal with that price.
Speaker: But let me tell you where I'm at with pricing.
Speaker: The market's here to here.
Speaker: I'm right here.
Speaker: And the guy that's here, you don't want that guy on your roof.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So I make a lot of money selling solar, but I don't make a lot of money selling one person solar.
Speaker: I make a lot of money by selling lots of people solar, and I can't do that by having a high price.
Speaker: My price is designed so that I'm going to come here, show it to you.
Speaker: You're going to shop my prices later, and you're going to decide you got a great deal.
Speaker: I'm going to assure you this is a great deal.
Speaker: If you find out it's not a great deal, you call me.
Speaker: I'll be back here.
Speaker: You and I will sit and deal with price.
Speaker: I'm going to tell you that's not going to happen.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The funny thing is the percentage of people that actually go out and research price after they don't do it.
Speaker: If they've already signed the documents, very rarely are they going to go get other quotes.
Speaker: And I learned that from Sunrun.
Speaker: You know, the state of Arizona, of course, makes every contractor tell the customer they're going to have three days to think about it, check references.
Speaker: I never encourage somebody to shop, but if that's somebody's thing, let's get it out.
Speaker: You know, so you say you need to think about it.
Speaker: How much time do you need to think about it?
Speaker: Are we talking weeks and months?
Speaker: Oh, no, no, no.
Speaker: Mike, you did a great job.
Speaker: I'm a day or two away from, I'm going to know by Monday.
Speaker: You're going to know by Monday.
Speaker: So you're telling me you just need a little bit of time to actually think about it, right?
Speaker: And that's what we're going to talk about.
Speaker: Listen, there's a way to deal with that, right?
Speaker: We can get the process started, which is my job.
Speaker: And then you have all the time in the world to make sure everything that I've said is true, validated.
Speaker: Make sure that it's a good price.
Speaker: You have all the time in the world to do that.
Speaker: It is not a good reason to not get the process started.
Speaker: For one thing, then I've got to get a salesman involved, send him back here.
Speaker: It's going to be a more expensive deal.
Speaker: We're probably not going to end up doing business together.
Speaker: And that's OK, but let's make that decision.
Speaker: You know, I'm here to help you make a decision.
Speaker: Let's decide we're not doing business.
Speaker: I love a no.
Speaker: Help me get the no.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Let's do that now.
Speaker: By the way, you say you're going to be thinking about it between now and then, Mr. Johnson, Mrs. Johnson, as you're thinking about it between now and Friday, what's the one thing that's sticking in your mind?
Speaker: Hmm.
Speaker: That's going to get you to vote for maybe no or holding off on going solar between now and Friday.
Speaker: What is that, Mrs. Johnson?
Speaker: I think we're going to move someday.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Mr. Johnson, what's the one thing that you're thinking?
Speaker: And he says, you know, we've been working hard on our credit score and I just don't want my credit score to go down.
Speaker: And I don't want to take that debt to income onto my credit score.
Speaker: Now.
Speaker: Now I have the objections.
Speaker: Now as a salesperson, I can go to work.
Speaker: So I'm going to use, I know they're going to tell me they want to think about it.
Speaker: I'm going to use that as an opportunity.
Speaker: Anytime someone wants to think about it, agree with them.
Speaker: You do need to think about it.
Speaker: You're going to need lots of time.
Speaker: How about we give you all the time in the world?
Speaker: to think about it.
Speaker: I am going to email you this proposal.
Speaker: In fact, let's do that now.
Speaker: I'm going to email you the proposal right now.
Speaker: What's the best?
Speaker: Boom, you got the proposal.
Speaker: That price is good for 30 days.
Speaker: Is that enough time for you to think about?
Speaker: Oh, well, we don't need 30 days.
Speaker: We're not going to wait 30 days.
Speaker: So you guys sound to me like you're pro solar.
Speaker: Let me ask you a question between now and Friday when you guys are thinking about it and talking about it, what's the one thing that's going to hold you back?
Speaker: So let's get the objections out now.
Speaker: Now I can deal with them and now I can move forward
Speaker: with an offer they can't refuse.
Speaker: I love that, love that, so true.
Speaker: And let me ask you this, Mike, how much of your time, obviously you gotta have a certain level of trust for them to believe you when you're saying this is our price, this is the markets.
Speaker: Because I've been in deals where I don't have that trust and I'm saying, oh yeah, we're priced a little more than average, but you're getting this, you're getting all the maintenance with it.
Speaker: And then I can just see that they don't believe me, they don't buy what I'm saying.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So how much you're how do you generate that trust with homeowners?
Speaker: Is that like rapport you're building with them in the beginning?
Speaker: Well, first of all, you want to work for a great company and a great company is going to have lots of credibility points.
Speaker: We want to cover that up front.
Speaker: Most homeowners don't need to jump inside your business.
Speaker: They just need a checkmark.
Speaker: next to oh good i'm dealing with a great company i love to open up my my uh spotio and show them you know we've got thousands and thousands of installations in your area i like to talk about how our you know our uh our facebook reviews and our our google reviews and we're you know we're very very high reviews right with many many sales we're very very high rating so i'm going to do the things consumers just need really a check mark next to okay i've got a good company
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Then if you sell them solar, by the way, if this is a door knock, you are the one that created the idea that they should.
Speaker: They're not in the middle of shopping, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's shoppers that want to check out prices, right?
Speaker: So you want to take leads from your company that came in through Facebook or this marketing or that marketing.
Speaker: Know that you're going out to talk to shoppers.
Speaker: I don't take those leads because I don't have time to deal with shoppers.
Speaker: I want to knock on a door and bring the idea into their head that two minutes ago you weren't thinking you should go solar.
Speaker: And now you're thinking maybe I should look at a quote, right?
Speaker: Now when I'm back at the table, I just invented how cool solar is.
Speaker: And I'm the one who did that.
Speaker: There's not trust.
Speaker: There's excitement.
Speaker: There's like, holy cow, this is too good to be true.
Speaker: How do I get involved with this?
Speaker: It's all easy.
Speaker: Zero done.
Speaker: Nothing out of your pocket.
Speaker: We're going to get the process started.
Speaker: This is going to happen.
Speaker: There's nothing for you to do.
Speaker: There's not a trust thing going on there.
Speaker: I came to you because I am the solar guy in this area, right?
Speaker: That's why I'm here at your door.
Speaker: You know, we did your neighbors.
Speaker: We did this guy.
Speaker: We did that.
Speaker: So as a good salesperson, you're going to do the things to bring out the credibility check marks.
Speaker: And all you're looking for is that customer to go check.
Speaker: It's not a big part of your presentation.
Speaker: It's a, it's a few minutes so they could go, okay, we got one of the good guys.
Speaker: We got one of the good companies.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: And something that I know you're really good at is having customers stick.
Speaker: Once you've signed them up, that was one of my biggest problems last year.
Speaker: I signed people up like crazy, but my cancellation rate was too high.
Speaker: had people call me and it's that dreaded call.
Speaker: Oh, Taylor, we thought about it.
Speaker: We don't want to go through with this.
Speaker: So what do you do when people call you up and give you that?
Speaker: We thought about it.
Speaker: First of all, nine tenths of having them not cancel is be working for a great company because I have zero cancellations after the first day or so of the buyer remorse people.
Speaker: And if somebody's going to cancel, that's part of the numbers.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But the company that I work for does such a good job of wrapping those people up into a warm hug after they sign up.
Speaker: I don't lose anybody after the 24, 48 hour buyer's remorse period.
Speaker: But the numbers between that are literally a single digit percentage.
Speaker: So what do I do exactly that makes that single digit percentage happen?
Speaker: It's hard to say, but those people are sold.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And so.
Speaker: they're excited about going solar they're not thinking about canceling the the few times that i've had people really come back and go mike i'm really not sure if i should do this or not and they had an actual legitimate concern that i could understand and not necessarily agree with but i could understand why they might consider not going forward was when they said you know i really don't want to take on this kind of debt i'm a dave ramsey guy i'm currently debt free i don't have any car payments all i have is my house payment
Speaker: And what I say to those people, first of all, there are products out there that don't really show up as debt, whether it's a lease or installment contracts or what have you.
Speaker: I can put you into a vehicle that's not going to show up as debt on your credit report, number one.
Speaker: But number two, even Dave Ramsey agrees you should not wait.
Speaker: and save up for 20 years and buy a house.
Speaker: That's a really stupid idea.
Speaker: Why?
Speaker: Because 20 years later, that house is going to cost twice as much stuff doubles every 15 years in price.
Speaker: And if you're like saving your money to buy this $200,000 house and you come back with $200,000 in 20 years, Hey, your kids grew up in an apartment, right?
Speaker: Cause you didn't buy a house 20 years ago and B that house now costs $400,000.
Speaker: And if you would have borrowed the money,
Speaker: and got long-term financing to acquire an asset, which is the same as solar.
Speaker: We're using long-term, low-interest financing to acquire an asset.
Speaker: If you do that, that's a fantastic strategy.
Speaker: Use other people's money to acquire an asset
Speaker: And over time, use money you were going to spend anyway on an expense, just like a homeowner or a renter of a home paying rent every month.
Speaker: They're going to pay that rent every single month, no matter what.
Speaker: Should they rent a home for 20 years and then buy a house?
Speaker: That's a really bad, bad idea.
Speaker: So a lot of people are concerned primarily with taking on the debt.
Speaker: So if you really approach that person and say you're not taking on debt, what we're doing is we're employing a different strategy.
Speaker: You're spending $3,000 a year renting your power equipment from the utility company.
Speaker: When we could take that same money, I'm sorry, it's not the same money.
Speaker: I need to tell you the truth.
Speaker: It's less.
Speaker: It's $2,600 or $2,400 a year.
Speaker: It's going to be less to take that money and put it into an ownership strategy.
Speaker: What's happening in an ownership strategy?
Speaker: Every month I take that payment and I'm now buying down a loan.
Speaker: What's that called?
Speaker: It's called equity.
Speaker: And what am I doing?
Speaker: I'm buying a power plant.
Speaker: How much does that power cost now?
Speaker: 16 cents in Arizona, 40 cents or something crazy like that in California, right?
Speaker: The value of the asset is
Speaker: for capital equipment is the value of the product it produces.
Speaker: In Arizona, that's 16 cents.
Speaker: In 15 years, the value of that product is gonna be 32 cents.
Speaker: It's gonna double in 15 years.
Speaker: If they acquire this asset and the output of this product goes from 16 cents to 32 cents, they're gonna experience the other thing, it's called appreciation.
Speaker: When you own a home and you pay it down, you get equity, and then you also experience the increase in price, that's appreciation.
Speaker: You didn't go into debt to buy into a home, you used other people's capital
Speaker: to acquire an asset, which was going to acquire equity over time and appreciate over time, that's a genius thing to do.
Speaker: It's a must do because the strategy you're on now is an out and out disaster.
Speaker: You're renting from the utility.
Speaker: The price is going to double in 15 years.
Speaker: And at the end of 15 years, you're going to have absolutely nothing to show for it.
Speaker: Why wouldn't you take that same money?
Speaker: I'm sorry, not saying less money.
Speaker: and use that exact same money to become an owner, to become an owner of capital equipment.
Speaker: And every single time you make a payment, your balance goes down.
Speaker: Why?
Speaker: Because it gets applied to the principal, right?
Speaker: So that's what's happening over time.
Speaker: You want to stay, you think you're making a good decision by staying with this other model where you're literally flushing money down the toilet?
Speaker: every single month and at the end of 10 years you've spent $30,000 and you not only have nothing to show for it, the price has gone up and you got another 10 years to pay.
Speaker: Why wouldn't we take that same $30,000 and pay for a solar system and then never have an electric bill for the rest of your life?
Speaker: Why doesn't that make more sense?
Speaker: And Dave Ramsey would agree by the way.
Speaker: Yeah, there you go.
Speaker: Learns how to handle the Dave Ramsey people.
Speaker: And so yeah, I think it's super important like you're saying, just getting them to realize whether it's cheaper or not.
Speaker: Even if they have to take the same money or even a little bit more, just like buying versus renting.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I mean, Dave Ramsey.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They do not have a decision to not spend the money.
Speaker: They have to spend the money.
Speaker: Solar's awesome for that reason.
Speaker: We're never talking anybody into spending more money.
Speaker: We're always talking people into spending less money.
Speaker: True true so true always a good idea so true nuggets nuggets as Sam Tarrant would say it's a golden nugget right there So I think it's important to get them realize that use stories I don't know about you Mike, but I love using stories specific homeowners that said the same thing and Had that objection overcomes because when they hear it not just from your mouth But that Joe down the street if you can show them on the map and
Speaker: The Joe Tudor down had that same concern and you showed him that.
Speaker: I know exactly how you feel.
Speaker: In fact, I agree with how you feel.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: In fact, I've had many customers.
Speaker: In fact, Mr. Jones across the street felt the same way.
Speaker: Let me tell you what he found out.
Speaker: That's super powerful found.
Speaker: It'll come overcome just about any of pretty much anything.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Super valuable stuff.
Speaker: And I know to get the in depth, like Mike said, go to go subscribe to DDD universe.
Speaker: How do people get on that?
Speaker: Is it just, yeah, just get with your D to D guy, uh, get with the, you know, get on the website, subscribe to D to do.
Speaker: You'll have to get with those guys.
Speaker: There's different packages and stuff.
Speaker: I can just tell you it's invaluable.
Speaker: I was spending a lot of my time training people how to do it.
Speaker: Now all I do is I film myself and my partners that,
Speaker: cover different aspects of training how to sell solar.
Speaker: That's all on our D2D University, which we call Sun Solar University.
Speaker: And then not only is all of our content out there, which is this then at this point, right?
Speaker: We literally just launched it this year.
Speaker: So our content is this then.
Speaker: All of D2D University is all under it.
Speaker: That means Jordan Belfort speaking last year.
Speaker: That means me talking at, you know, in a breakout last year or whatever.
Speaker: All the different breakouts, every one of them is available as D2D University.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: On there, Sam and I spent a long time put together A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, how to pitch, how to close, handle objections, come in with the next close, come into the next close.
Speaker: You know, we're talking about closing, honestly, guys,
Speaker: The best clothes in the world is the one that hasn't been invented yet because that guy needs something from you to help him go solar.
Speaker: This is one of the few products in the world where you absolutely stone cold know if you get that guy's signature on a piece of paper today.
Speaker: He is so much better off than if he doesn't do it.
Speaker: right so it is actually on you if he meets with you and decides to think about it and doesn't go solar he's probably never going solar until they make him go solar by the way everybody's going to get made to go solar it's called a green new deal right you're just going to tax your utility bill 100 bucks a month like they tax cigarettes yeah and you're going to quit smoking right right because we're going to tax it so bad you can't afford to do it anymore that's going to happen with utility bills
Speaker: that's not a question that's going to happen right now they can do it with incentives with tax credits or they can that's the carrot right yeah or they can wait and what's coming is the stick it's not a question of if they're going to go solar go green we're not going to let them burn crap out of the ground forever to cool their house that's over it's all but over it's in the dying last gaps
Speaker: of not being over, but it's soon to be over.
Speaker: And the sooner and faster they get with the program, get green, start investing in their own green technology, their own power plant, the more they're going to have the government help them do that.
Speaker: It's 26 now.
Speaker: In about 11 and a half months, it's going to be 22%.
Speaker: and a year from next january 1st it's going to be zero they need to get with that program now they're going to miss out and then what's coming is the stick they're going to go solar because the green new deal is going to add 100 bucks a month for burning crap out of the ground to cool their homes so true terrible idea 100 so true and so if we've got people listening that haven't fully committed themselves to solar the time to do is now like mike's saying you got these expiring credits you got things going that are disappearing
Speaker: So people need to push now, take advantage of those things.
Speaker: Because, I mean, that's how you got so many.
Speaker: That's how you hit 2.8 megawatts.
Speaker: That's where the urgency comes from.
Speaker: You know, the enemy of solar is, no, the enemy of solar is I got to think about it.
Speaker: You've got to use what's actually true and what's real to create urgency to get the process started today.
Speaker: And it's just real.
Speaker: They have to.
Speaker: If they see the back of my head walking down their driveway and they don't have solar, they're probably not going to make it.
Speaker: And you know what?
Speaker: You know who that's on?
Speaker: That's on me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I was sent there to help them make a decision.
Speaker: And if I come back home and I tell my wife, I think they're going to go Friday.
Speaker: She's instructed to make me sleep on the couch because I was sent there to do a man's job.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I went there instead of selling, I got sold.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: That wasn't my job to sell that.
Speaker: These people really need to wait till Friday.
Speaker: That's ridiculous.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: Absolutely ridiculous.
Speaker: So true.
Speaker: So do it now because I can tell you the worst feeling in the world.
Speaker: I don't think it's happened to Mike, but to me is driving past appointments that I went to a year ago.
Speaker: And there's a solar system.
Speaker: And seeing solar on their house.
Speaker: That is the worst.
Speaker: Yeah, and guess who got them thinking about solar?
Speaker: It was me.
Speaker: And I can think of 20 of those before I can think of 20 ones that I sold.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: That I drive by and look at them.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: That's the worst feeling in the world.
Speaker: So, Mike, I know we got to get back to door-to-door con here.
Speaker: We got Tim Grover coming up soon.
Speaker: One more thing about D2D, and this is something brand new, guys.
Speaker: And if you guys are – the guys who aren't at D2D won't know about this.
Speaker: but it's something super, super important.
Speaker: Sam has started D2D Association.
Speaker: I don't know if the camera's working, but I've got my founding member D2D Association.
Speaker: It's absolutely stone cold real guys that we deal with stigma.
Speaker: I know guys who'd be awesome at solar from my B2B career.
Speaker: I go to those guys and I say, man, dude, I'm making a seven figure income.
Speaker: You should do this.
Speaker: How do you get your appointments?
Speaker: I knock on doors.
Speaker: I'm not doing that.
Speaker: I don't want to be a used car salesman and I don't want to be a door to door peddler.
Speaker: There's an absolute stigma associated that there's a whole pain in the next side of it, of the legal side and associations that are blocking people out, small communities, cities that are trying to say, oh, you can't do this anymore.
Speaker: But I would tell you even this.
Speaker: So this is something everybody needs to look at.
Speaker: Everybody needs to get involved with it.
Speaker: It's an existential issue.
Speaker: You hear politicians on TV say, oh, this is an existential threat.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Us not having an association, setting our own criteria, setting our own benchmarks, education, registering, certifying people to be a professional door-to-door executive, a professional door-to-door salesperson.
Speaker: Us not doing that, we're going to end up going the way of the telemarketing industry.
Speaker: Let me tell you what's happening with telemarketing.
Speaker: I started selling solar appointments in 1984, and I did it door to door in a Kohl's directory on the phone.
Speaker: I let my fingers do the walking.
Speaker: I was calling people up trying to set an appointment, set an appointment, set an appointment.
Speaker: I was setting appointments over the phone.
Speaker: Telemarketing is dead.
Speaker: The reason telemarketing is dead is because...
Speaker: They didn't police themselves and they allowed themselves to say, Hey, it's a numbers game.
Speaker: Who cares if we create more and more obnoxious ways of getting bigger and bigger and bigger numbers, as long as we generate the sales at the other end of the pipeline, who cares if we slash and burn this whole industry with auto dialers calling a hundred people from India, whatever, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: And so now what's happening is the, uh, uh,
Speaker: What's happening now is they're passing laws.
Speaker: State-led air zones got a law.
Speaker: You can't call a mobile phone without someone opting in.
Speaker: The telemarketing industry is dead and it's their own fault.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So this is an existential threat.
Speaker: If we don't get to a point where people see people going up and down the street with a clipboard and a lanyard and go, hey, there's a guy earning a living.
Speaker: paying his way through school, providing for a family with a professional, honorable job, one of the oldest professions in the world, and perhaps maybe part of the oldest profession in the world.
Speaker: And consider that to be an honorable profession that we can then go and recruit actual people that
Speaker: have a different opinion and sway them that this is an honorable professional opinion.
Speaker: We're going to go the way of telemarketers, which is people absolutely abhor, abhor telemarketers.
Speaker: We don't want that to happen to us.
Speaker: So find out what this is about.
Speaker: My company just became a founding member of D2D Association, but every single person selling solar out there
Speaker: can go out and sign up on the website, D2D Association.
Speaker: It costs like 50 bucks or 100 bucks, and you're a member.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Now, if somebody asks you, what are you doing?
Speaker: You'll have your little, I'm a registered door-to-door professional.
Speaker: Just part of building credibility, part of building what you do.
Speaker: That's brand new.
Speaker: That just got launched last night.
Speaker: So that's news coming to you here live from D2D.
Speaker: Love it, love it.
Speaker: So if you haven't, well, yeah, obviously if you're not here, you haven't heard that yet.
Speaker: So go check that out.
Speaker: And I think it's super important for, like you said, bringing honor to the industry, getting people to not call the cops on us and have to sit in cop cars and all that.
Speaker: So that's where we want it to head.
Speaker: We don't want the industry to die.
Speaker: It's just like telemarketing.
Speaker: So go and support that.
Speaker: We're going to post a link to that in the show notes for this.
Speaker: And Mike, I told you before the show, but it's between you and Sam Taggart for the top episode.
Speaker: I'm happy to be in that company.
Speaker: Just thrilled to be in that company.
Speaker: You're still at number one, though.
Speaker: Number one.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: That's why we have you back.
Speaker: That's my favorite spot, by the way.
Speaker: If I'm on a list, I'm usually trying to be number one on that list.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So he loves being number one.
Speaker: So go and support Mike, let them know you appreciate the podcast.
Speaker: You haven't subscribed, go join the Facebook group and apologize for the technical difficulties.
Speaker: It's the last time I met you, I actually created a professional Facebook page so you can find me and follow me at at Michael O'Donnell sales on Facebook.
Speaker: And of course, you know what?
Speaker: I still get, I get about one call a month.
Speaker: Do you think a lot of people, I get about one call a month or one text a month from somebody
Speaker: Who hears me on solar?
Speaker: I gave myself one out.
Speaker: I'll do it again.
Speaker: It's 602-818-1355.
Speaker: Anybody who calls me, I spend, you know, 15, 20 minutes.
Speaker: That's crazy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Love to hear from people.
Speaker: Every time I do it, I get jazzed up.
Speaker: It gets me to the next door.
Speaker: And guys, seriously, if this guy has time to talk to people, he's closing the deal a day.
Speaker: We have no excuse to not be closing deals too.
Speaker: He's giving this personal number out.
Speaker: So go and follow his advice.
Speaker: Thanks again for being on the show, Mike.
Speaker: And to those in our live audience, thanks for joining us.
Speaker: Sorry the mic wasn't too good.
Speaker: Thanks for hanging out.
Speaker: Fun talking to you guys.
Speaker: We'll wrap up.
Speaker: Thanks, Mike.
Speaker: Thanks, Dale.
Speaker: Go solarpreneur!
Speaker: Wow, what another value-packed episode of The Solarpreneur.
Speaker: Guys, if you couldn't tell, we spend a lot of time and energy to put these episodes out to hopefully give you just one strategy, one golden nugget that's going to launch your solar career to the next level.
Speaker: And we do it all for free.
Speaker: And if you found any value in this episode or it's helped you in any way, all I ask in return is that you just take 30 seconds of your time and leave us a review on iTunes.
Speaker: so that we can help more solopreneurs like you to change the world.
Speaker: And as a gift for leaving us a review, we have a special training package exclusive for solopreneur listeners over at solopreneurs.com.
Speaker: Remember, you need to leave us a review on iTunes to qualify for the training package.
Speaker: So take care of that now, and we'll see you on the next episode.
