Transcript
Speaker: What's up guys, hope you're enjoying your quarantine if you're listening to this during the coronavirus pandemic or if not, I hope you're crushing it in yourselves.
Speaker: Either way, we're going to drop some serious value bombs today in an episode with my friend Bennett Maxwell.
Speaker: He's been dominating and doing some interesting stuff, which is why I wanted to bring him on the show.
Speaker: He built a team up of virtual assistants.
Speaker: He's built a deal around it and doing some really cool stuff with follow-up, like sending packages, getting tons of referrals, taking drone videos, stuff like that.
Speaker: So hop on the show.
Speaker: Let us know what you think.
Speaker: And with that said, let's jump into the intro.
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 is going on, solopreneurs?
Speaker: I'm excited for another episode today.
Speaker: We have the one and the only Bennett Maxwell, and I was excited to get him here this morning because he's actually on his way to a cookie kitchen.
Speaker: He's got another side business going on, baking cookies.
Speaker: So you're starting, we're here in San Diego, and are you starting a cookie shop here in San Diego, Bennett?
Speaker: Yeah, it's one of those...
Speaker: It was warm cookie deliveries.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: We have them going in Arizona and Phoenix area and starting another one out here as well as in Virginia.
Speaker: Expanding that on the side.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So for all your solar and cookie needs anywhere in those locations, hit Bennett up.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Put his contact info in after this.
Speaker: But in all seriousness, Bennett, he's been here a short time actually in San Diego.
Speaker: And we connected a little bit on social media and he showed me some of his results and he's been crushing it for the, what, three, four months or something you've been here in San Diego?
Speaker: October, so three months.
Speaker: Okay, and then before that he was up in, was it?
Speaker: Sacramento.
Speaker: Yeah, Sacramento area.
Speaker: Dominating up there, and he's got some awesome ideas that he's excited to share with us today.
Speaker: We're going to go through some of that stuff, but Bennett, let's hear how did you get in the solar industry?
Speaker: Another alarm guy here.
Speaker: So we'll hear about why he decided to switch from alarms, because I know he dominated in that too.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I actually started in pest control like you, Taylor.
Speaker: Started in pest control, did that for a little bit.
Speaker: It was great.
Speaker: Opened my eyes and then I did satellite for a little bit and then Vivint stole me over.
Speaker: From satellite, did Vivint.
Speaker: Super, super fun time.
Speaker: did that for a year and a half and then at the beginning of this summer I was ready to go out to the summer and then I found out about a buddy that said, hey I do a solar program and I've always been interested in solar but I'm like a Utah dude and I'm like I don't want to move out.
Speaker: Got my family here, got some kids, I don't want to do a year round thing, I want free babysitting with my family here in Utah with me.
Speaker: Anyway, so he said,
Speaker: Well, you can do solar industry in the summer, come give a shot, because now we're installing in a month.
Speaker: So I went and did that, and it turned out really well.
Speaker: So the plan was, if it goes well, then, yeah, we'll move.
Speaker: And my wife said, yep, we can move as long as it's to San Diego.
Speaker: San Diego, yeah.
Speaker: So the plan was, go test it out in Sacramento.
Speaker: And yeah, if it goes if it goes good, let's do it year round and let's get a place in San Diego.
Speaker: So here I am.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: So it wasn't necessarily that the cells are better.
Speaker: You just the wife is the one that brought you down to San Diego.
Speaker: Well, no, the cells are also better.
Speaker: OK, if you I ran all my my.
Speaker: But yeah, I would have been down here regardless because of the wife.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But it's really nice because if you sell the exact same deal, and if you're looking at sun hours, because I'm mainly selling retired people that aren't, I do online advertising to people that do not want to buy a system.
Speaker: Um, so it's kind of, you know, we're targeting that specific market.
Speaker: So most people, most of my deals aren't loans.
Speaker: However, I still do them, um, and some cash, but most, most of them are, are PPAs or prepaid PPAs.
Speaker: And, um, it's all calculated off of sun hours.
Speaker: So if you sell the exact same job here and in Sacramento, this job is just going to pay out more, even though the customer is paying the exact same, because you, the, the, with the same amount of solar panels, you're going to get more energy.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And that's what's awesome about San Diego.
Speaker: Well, the rates, I think I'd have to go and look at the numbers again, but definitely top five in the country, I think.
Speaker: Super high rates.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That means you can sell the systems at a higher price.
Speaker: Customers are still going to save a ton.
Speaker: I came from selling up north a little bit.
Speaker: It's a different utility.
Speaker: and we would when i sold loans we would break even basically with what the customer is paying for electricity down here we're selling at the same price and customers are saving 30 40 50 percent yeah most of the time so definitely awesome yeah i mean there's competition so anyone listening to this stay out of san diego these deals are ours but if you want more info then definitely listen to the podcast
Speaker: But yeah, PPAs are awesome too down here because we were talking about this before the show.
Speaker: It's nice that you can help people who are retired, maybe don't have the taxable income.
Speaker: They can still get all these awesome benefits of saving and they don't have to worry about getting the tax credit back.
Speaker: So yeah, I know there are a lot of benefits to owning it that are awesome, increase the value.
Speaker: But I think PPAs are awesome because there's a huge margin on them.
Speaker: You can make great money.
Speaker: And then you're going to help a lot of people like Bennett said, people that are retired or people in different circumstances that couldn't probably benefit as much doing a loan.
Speaker: I mean, we're in San Diego, which is the number one solar market, the most competitive solar market.
Speaker: Everybody's been pitched on solar and they've been pitched on a loan.
Speaker: That's what they've been pitched on.
Speaker: And they decided against it for one reason or another.
Speaker: For people, brand new move ins that are gonna be in the home for seven plus years, you know, they're not retired, then yeah, a loan is gonna be a PPA every time.
Speaker: But for retired people that don't want to take out a loan or they can't do, I mean, a lot of these people don't have the tax credit, you know, PPAs,
Speaker: PPA is a good option.
Speaker: I bought solar in Utah before coming here.
Speaker: I did a cash purchase through Vivint because I was working through Vivint Alarms.
Speaker: So I got some good pricing out there.
Speaker: That was before I got on the solar game.
Speaker: So now I'm looking at my roof and I got more south facing roof that they didn't install it on.
Speaker: Every time I drive by my house, I'm like those, those poop heads.
Speaker: Why didn't they fill up my south side of the roof?
Speaker: I didn't know.
Speaker: They just threw them on there east facing a little bit on the south.
Speaker: Anyways, within a few months,
Speaker: I looked at my app to see my production and I had three months that I didn't produce anything.
Speaker: I'm like, crap.
Speaker: Call up Vivint.
Speaker: They did a great job.
Speaker: They came out and fixed it within a week or so.
Speaker: But those three months, I must have paid like 400 bucks to Rocky Mountain Power, my utility company.
Speaker: And I'm like, well, this is warrantied.
Speaker: I literally didn't understand how it worked.
Speaker: I was like, well, this is a 25-year warranty.
Speaker: Are you guys going to refund me?
Speaker: And the answer was no, you should have called us.
Speaker: You need to monitor your system.
Speaker: And I'm like, oh, I'm never, ever going to be checking my app every month.
Speaker: Like that's just not something I want to worry about.
Speaker: Anyway, so I have a cash deal.
Speaker: I don't pay anything at all for energy.
Speaker: But at the same time, I have to, now I'm like, oh, crap, I have to freaking,
Speaker: I have to monitor this sucker.
Speaker: Hopefully, I never have any problems.
Speaker: Solar systems are super, super low maintenance.
Speaker: But I had that unique scenario that happened to me personally within a year of getting solar.
Speaker: So it's kind of like if I went back and I was able to save a similar amount of money, but I don't have to monitor it, then yeah, I'll choose that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We do have some Vivint people that listen to this podcast, I think.
Speaker: So I'm sure Bennett would have said some different choice words.
Speaker: But no, I know Vivint does a good job too.
Speaker: But that's awesome.
Speaker: And what I think is really cool about Bennett, he's set up some awesome processes with his team down here already in San Diego.
Speaker: He already has a team going.
Speaker: He works with virtual assistants.
Speaker: So he's really taken what I think is like the solopreneur idea, becoming an entrepreneur in the solar industry,
Speaker: And it's been awesome to hear his ideas on that.
Speaker: So Bennett, you have some people working with you and I know you have some VAs.
Speaker: How many people do you have kind of on your team?
Speaker: So I started door knocking in Sacramento with a company up there in light.
Speaker: Super, super good guys.
Speaker: Great company.
Speaker: It's just door knocking though.
Speaker: And it was good.
Speaker: I'm good at door knocking.
Speaker: And within those first, I just knocked for two months and it was going really good.
Speaker: I had a few sales my first week.
Speaker: Within the first two months that I was actually knocking, resulted in 18 installs or 17, 17 or 18 installs.
Speaker: And it was like, this is going really well.
Speaker: Not that they all installed, but I contacted them all and sold most of them.
Speaker: I have a brother, an older brother that is a marketing genius and all online sells.
Speaker: And anyways, we chat all the time.
Speaker: And he's like, well, why are you still knocking doors?
Speaker: Like, you know, asking numbers and how long do I have to knock to get somebody and how enjoyable it is.
Speaker: And he's like, well, why don't we just do it online?
Speaker: So I talked to the company and they're like, oh, we tried that.
Speaker: You know, it doesn't typically you're getting scammed and it doesn't work.
Speaker: You're paying a lot of money.
Speaker: It's a wild goose chase.
Speaker: But my brother's like, well, let's try it.
Speaker: So he came in, changed my whole mindset on, well, let's do online leads rather than.
Speaker: door knocking and so we teamed up and started you know an online lead gen company that that was the focus now before that i learned some really good skills from in light so this is not solar obviously it's not pest control or alarms you talk to your customer one time you knock on their door you've never met him before and you never see him again when you're knocking doors you set the lead you come back
Speaker: You close it and then you typically come back again in this company.
Speaker: They encourage you to go back again and review like the final design, the final CAD designs before moving forward.
Speaker: So it's more of a handhold teleinstall, and there's typically more fall-off.
Speaker: I think with Vivint, I did the last year that I did it with them, I did 250 accounts and had one go unfunded.
Speaker: That was late payments.
Speaker: People don't cancel.
Speaker: They get installed right then.
Speaker: You leave the home, and you're high-fiving the tech on the way out.
Speaker: You're like, sweet, let's go.
Speaker: Solar's not that way.
Speaker: You have to kind of handhold them.
Speaker: So the...
Speaker: The owner of InLight was telling me, Sanjeev, he was saying, well, you know, when you go back to review the final design, bring them pizza.
Speaker: You know, take their order when you close them and say, hey, it's on the company.
Speaker: Let's review all the results over dinner.
Speaker: So I'm like, sweet.
Speaker: So start doing that.
Speaker: And then one of the other owners of InLight, Josh Bowling, he said, well, what he does is he brings cookies.
Speaker: There's a cookie place up there.
Speaker: And he just brings him over some cookies like I did a day or two after he closes them.
Speaker: So I'm like, well, I want to do both.
Speaker: You know, I want to bring him cookies.
Speaker: So what I would do is bring him cookies to the actual sell.
Speaker: So I'll set the lead, bring cookies when I show up to sell them.
Speaker: And then...
Speaker: assuming that it was a closed deal, I'd come back and bring him dinner.
Speaker: So I was already starting this and my brother's like, well, let's expand this.
Speaker: And do you have to be there for the dinner?
Speaker: You know, that takes time.
Speaker: Do you have to be there for the cookies?
Speaker: You know, that takes time.
Speaker: So I hired a local girl and she was the one that would drop off the cookies.
Speaker: And then we switched to cupcakes.
Speaker: And then we started just ordering the dinner to the house.
Speaker: And then we started giving a few other things.
Speaker: So what we did is we looked at the solar cells process.
Speaker: and we identified all the fallout periods.
Speaker: So you set the lead, whether it's online or knocking, to the actual appointment, there's a waiting period, and they can fall off, so we're gonna send them a gift right then, before we have ever met with them.
Speaker: So I'll close another one.
Speaker: I think I'm already at five closes this week, and all of them, it's Wednesday, or it's Thursday,
Speaker: All of them, I show up and I say, hey, did you get our gift?
Speaker: That's where we're starting our conversation.
Speaker: They're like, oh yeah, thanks.
Speaker: It's light bulbs.
Speaker: It's nothing big.
Speaker: It cost me 10 bucks.
Speaker: Amazon Prime, so it's here in San Diego.
Speaker: It usually gets there the next day.
Speaker: So as soon as they set the appointment, we text them, hey, a gift's coming.
Speaker: It's going to save you over $1,000 over the lifetime in energy savings, and it does.
Speaker: because electricity and it has like a little card and it shows the math on there on how it's going to save them so much money.
Speaker: So we kind of say, hey, something's coming.
Speaker: You know, it has them, it commits them a little bit more.
Speaker: We have actually honestly very few fallout or few falloff between setting the appointment and actually
Speaker: showing up to the appointment because we're literally sending them something, they know it's coming.
Speaker: And then you close them and then they have to wait a day or two for the site survey.
Speaker: Because that's when the next thing goes out, we send them a giant thank you card through send out cards and then some cookies or some brownies or something.
Speaker: And so that's the next thing.
Speaker: And then after that, let's see, and then you have the site survey
Speaker: Then they have to wait for that CAD design or that final design that takes a few more days a week.
Speaker: So we send them another package.
Speaker: Again, this is all my brother.
Speaker: He designed one of those plastic sleeve envelope things you'd get from Amazon, like the bubble wrap type deal.
Speaker: And it says you're not only saving money, you're saving the world.
Speaker: It has silhouettes.
Speaker: It's yellow.
Speaker: It looks cool.
Speaker: It has silhouettes of all the invidgers.
Speaker: And then we literally include an Avengers action figure inside of the package.
Speaker: And people love it, especially if they have kids.
Speaker: And then we include a magnet in there that says, four by four, a little magnet, ready to share solar.
Speaker: And it says different prizes from TVs to $1,000 vacation, depending on the referrals, Apple Watches, AirPods.
Speaker: And it's just a nice little reminder that they can stick on their fridge.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: Now, after the final design, then they have to wait for permits.
Speaker: And that's usually another week or so.
Speaker: So we order them dinner to their home.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And we have, you know, you mentioned the VAs.
Speaker: We have some people out of the Philippines.
Speaker: We have four full-time employees.
Speaker: And they, I mean, it's less than a thousand bucks a month per employee.
Speaker: And they do a great job.
Speaker: It's all a matter of training them and just making sure your processes that as long as everything's written out exactly what they do, when to do it, and all the software's in place and automation, because most of this is automated.
Speaker: Again, that's what my brother does.
Speaker: You can really hire anybody to do it.
Speaker: Instead of starting a business, it's, well, I don't need to start a business or anything.
Speaker: I just need to follow instructions.
Speaker: As long as instructions are clear.
Speaker: So they get the dinner, the next thing they get is once the install is scheduled, then it's usually a week out to actually get the install here and we send them something else, it's a bonsai tree.
Speaker: It's actually called a bonsai money tree.
Speaker: So we send them that off of Amazon and all of these things again, we're not only sending them to them, but we send a text message to, hey, your next thing's coming.
Speaker: And then a text message when it arrives to make sure it arrives.
Speaker: So there's a conversation going.
Speaker: So instead of going back to the house several times, you can have the same benefit of the interaction with the salesman, even though it's not even me, it's my team texting them.
Speaker: They think it's me because we're texting from the same number.
Speaker: They're like, oh, thank you so much.
Speaker: Or they'll take a picture of their kid with the Hulk action figure or send us pictures of whatever, you know.
Speaker: People have a really fun time with that.
Speaker: And then after it's all said and done and it's all installed, we hire a drone guy, does a drone video.
Speaker: We upload it to our Facebook page.
Speaker: It's switched to solar.
Speaker: And then we just share the link with them and say, hey, if you share this, we'll shoot you over Amazon gift card today.
Speaker: So that's kind of that.
Speaker: And all they have to do is they don't have to upload anything.
Speaker: They just click on the link and then hit on the top right, share, and that's it.
Speaker: So those are kind of the different things that we're giving them.
Speaker: And so now it's online leads.
Speaker: I show up 80%, 90% of them are closed in the first time, and I never have to see them again.
Speaker: And they think that there's a lot of interaction with me, but it doesn't take my time because I've hired that out.
Speaker: Yeah, I know.
Speaker: And so Bennett's pretty much living the dream life.
Speaker: I think that's what most guys dream of is just having a team that does all this stuff you don't want to do and then you show up and close.
Speaker: There's so much money in solar, but it's such a process.
Speaker: It's like I went from being just a salesman to like, okay, now I'm a salesman and I'm an install manager.
Speaker: You know, I have to manage the install team to make sure permits are submitted on time and I'm a customer.
Speaker: You know, I have to follow up with the customer and
Speaker: and then make sure they're satisfied and then ask them for referrals and all this.
Speaker: I'm like, I frankly am not good at that.
Speaker: I'm just not.
Speaker: I'm good at sales and I'm good at closing.
Speaker: So if I could just spend my time on that and hire out the rest, especially if it's costing next to nothing, then why not?
Speaker: Let closers close.
Speaker: Let setters set.
Speaker: Let people who follow up, follow up.
Speaker: And fortunately, you can hire that out at a great cost.
Speaker: Yeah, it's awesome.
Speaker: And what's really cool is doing all this, I think you're telling me some of your results up in Sacramento.
Speaker: You were getting mountains of referrals too, weren't you?
Speaker: Yeah, and same down here.
Speaker: I mean, we've still installing here and there up in... In fact, on my way here, we just got another... The drone guy that we have up there, he's like, hey, your drone video is done from an install that we had last week.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So yeah, it's, I mean, you think of solar, it's a big decision, you know, whether they're purchasing it or doing a power purchase agreement, cash, loan, whatever.
Speaker: It's a big decision.
Speaker: It's not quite as big as a house or, you know, and sometimes cars cost more, but I can guarantee they've never gone through this experience with buying anything else.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's like a red carpet treatment.
Speaker: So I actually use it in my cell.
Speaker: I have kind of a pitch deck or slide deck that I'm kind of going through.
Speaker: Here's our agenda.
Speaker: This is what we're after.
Speaker: And one of them, it says, talks about our customer concierge service.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Hey, did you get the light bulbs?
Speaker: If I haven't brought it up, I bring it up there.
Speaker: And then I'm talking about the process of going solar.
Speaker: So, hey, we're going to get our final design.
Speaker: 95% of the time, nothing changes other than maybe a panel, you know, goes two feet over to the left instead of the right.
Speaker: But we do, we'll jump on the phone and we'll order you dinner, you know?
Speaker: And they're like, oh, really?
Speaker: And you're like, what would you order?
Speaker: Pizza or wings, unless you want something else, you know?
Speaker: We'll do DoorDash, you know?
Speaker: Some person's like, sometimes...
Speaker: Like one of the customers, he's like, I just had pizza.
Speaker: And I was like, okay, well, what do you want?
Speaker: He's like, how about hamburger?
Speaker: So again, this is all done.
Speaker: I don't have to deal with this.
Speaker: One of her VA is Jamil.
Speaker: She's awesome.
Speaker: She just texted him.
Speaker: She's like, well, anyway, she sent him a menu of Red Robin.
Speaker: She said, what do you want?
Speaker: He's like, well, it's me and my daughter.
Speaker: So they just took their order and we door dashed.
Speaker: It costs like 30, 40 bucks.
Speaker: I mean, yeah, I'm spending 150 bucks per customer.
Speaker: And yes, I'm sending light bulbs out, you know, spending $10 to people that don't close or that, that don't show up.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: But,
Speaker: You know, invest in your customers.
Speaker: Yeah, it's not a big deal at all.
Speaker: I think it's around 150, maybe even 200 bucks by the time we pay for the Jerome video editing.
Speaker: But still not that.
Speaker: I mean, the commissions are down here crazy.
Speaker: Invest in your customers and it pays off.
Speaker: And honestly, since I've been down here, I think because we were just going over the numbers a few times, I got another one yesterday.
Speaker: So I think I'm at 22 sales or closes and one of them is on hold for another roof and another one filled credit.
Speaker: I'm still trying to find a low credit finance option for them.
Speaker: I've had no cancels, though.
Speaker: I mean, the guy who needs a re-roof, he's on hold.
Speaker: He wants to do it himself.
Speaker: He wants to do the work.
Speaker: I'm like, dude, we'll just pay for this for you.
Speaker: So there's a chance he cancels.
Speaker: But I mean, why cancel when you're getting treated like this?
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: So not only are they getting all of these gifts and at least two text messages or emails, updates each time that something's sent out and received, but we also work really well with the installers to make sure that
Speaker: any new stage, like, hey, your permits are being submitted, congratulations.
Speaker: Hey, your permits are approved.
Speaker: It's just like a one or two liner.
Speaker: Hey, your install is scheduled, remember this.
Speaker: Hey, your site survey was complete.
Speaker: Do you have any questions?
Speaker: Here are your next steps.
Speaker: So just really quick, but they're getting,
Speaker: they're staying up to date you know it's not like hey you're sold today we'll get you installed in 21 days you know it's we'll let you know just with a quick text or email exactly what's going on every single second so if they do have a concern hopefully they're going to bring it up during as soon as they have it because they're getting a text every other day rather than letting it stew for a week and then calling up and canceling you know trying to cancel so luckily i haven't experienced that yet um
Speaker: And I think it's a little bit because of sending them stuff and also just really good follow up and making sure the communication is there.
Speaker: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker: I think that's the number one reason people cancel is just because they're not communicated within the process.
Speaker: I know some guys that sold for Vivint in the early stages when they weren't putting installs through and people were getting put on hold.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I just heard horror stories of everyone canceling and it's just because they weren't followed up but they didn't know the process they didn't know why things were taking a long time.
Speaker: So even if things are taking longer I think if they are being told why and being communicated with then obviously a way lower chance that they're going to cancel.
Speaker: I really think that's the truth.
Speaker: Nobody really cares that something takes longer than expected.
Speaker: People care about is they don't know what's going on.
Speaker: Like sometimes permits take three, four weeks.
Speaker: Just got a permit back yesterday, scheduled an install, and it was just over a month that it was in permits.
Speaker: But as long as we're keeping up at least with the team, is at least they get one message a week just to give them an update, then we're typically good.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: in any industry whether it's pest control satellite alarms or solar there's going to be hiccups and there's going to be mistakes as far as the the operation side technician side and it's all fine you know if a tech shows up late nobody really cares that a technician shows up late if they get a text message saying hey we're running an hour late nobody nobody really cares but it's just like if they don't know that's when that's when they don't have good feelings towards you yeah
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And so for our solar pruners listening, if you don't have a process like this, you're probably not going to get it quite as dialed as Bennett has it here right off the bat.
Speaker: But you can start to do the little things like he sends them light bulbs.
Speaker: So you book an appointment, then they get light bulbs sent the day after, right?
Speaker: Yeah, so we booked the appointment here in California.
Speaker: We have the California Consumer Protection Guide.
Speaker: We send them that to the email.
Speaker: We send them a link to it.
Speaker: We send them that beforehand.
Speaker: We say review this because we want you to be educated by the time we get there.
Speaker: because we are asking them to make a decision.
Speaker: So we want to make sure that they have everything they have time to review.
Speaker: And then we also just let them know, hey, we're going to send you a gift.
Speaker: We don't tell them what it is.
Speaker: We just say it can save you $1,000 over the next 10 years.
Speaker: So 100 bucks a year, just a free gift.
Speaker: okay keep them on the edge and yeah here in california for our out-of-state listeners we have to sign the homeowners have a guide the california california protection for the consumer consumer protection guide yes i'm like that yeah um but it basically asks them if they've looked into solar before it has all these like warning signs they should look for because i guess there's been a lot of scans i mean it's a really good document it
Speaker: um, gives you the pros and cons of cash versus a loan versus a lease versus a power purchase agreement versus a pace loan.
Speaker: You know, it outlines it all.
Speaker: It says the difference between a solar installer, um, the sales, the salesman, um, the finance company, the lenders, you know, it's, it's 23 pages.
Speaker: It's kind of lengthy, but I've read through it all and it's, it's great.
Speaker: It tells them exactly how they're going to be built by San Diego gas and electric and exactly how they're going to be built by us.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: It's really information.
Speaker: If you use that to sell, it builds a lot of credibility.
Speaker: And especially when we're giving them that beforehand, it's nothing to hide.
Speaker: It's like, hey, this protects you.
Speaker: Let's use it to protect you.
Speaker: Yeah, definitely.
Speaker: It can be a pro or a con if you don't know how to use it.
Speaker: And then after, so you go to the appointments, you hopefully close the deal.
Speaker: And then the day, the couple days after that, that's when the dinner and the pizza and all that come.
Speaker: So the day that they close, they get something sent out.
Speaker: So in our software, we usually just are just giving a check mark, notifies the team to order the cookies.
Speaker: And then once the site survey is complete, we get updated that in the software with the installer.
Speaker: and that triggers the next thing to get sent out, which is like the impact report.
Speaker: So it's a report of what their carbon offset's gonna be.
Speaker: And that's why we say they're heroes.
Speaker: Here's a superhero and here's a magnet.
Speaker: The other idea of giving them these gifts is, hey, if there's a superhero sitting on the counter, the kid's playing with it, there's a plant outside that they have to water every now and then, there's a magnet on the refrigerator,
Speaker: You know, there's daily reminders that they went solar and who they went with solar with and they should give referrals.
Speaker: So it's something inside their home that they can see to remind them.
Speaker: And again, it's not
Speaker: It's not me.
Speaker: This is all coming from Brent, my older brother.
Speaker: He's the one.
Speaker: Before that, I was just a salesman.
Speaker: And people are always like, oh, you know, you do pretty good at sales.
Speaker: You're decent.
Speaker: Why don't you start a company?
Speaker: I'm like, no, I don't want to deal with the headache.
Speaker: But he's really good at processes and software and automation.
Speaker: So a lot of this is all automated.
Speaker: As soon as something gets sent out, they automatically get the text message and the email and the next steps.
Speaker: And it's, yeah, it works pretty good.
Speaker: Yeah, it's genius.
Speaker: And what do you guys use to text?
Speaker: What is your team using that?
Speaker: Right now we're using an app called Haymarket.
Speaker: I mean, there's a handful of apps, but you can do all the templates in there and you can do a lot of automations.
Speaker: So if a lead comes in, if they don't respond, they get pre-recorded voicemails, text messages and emails for 90 days.
Speaker: It's all, it's just, and we don't have to touch anything.
Speaker: They just comes in if they don't respond and once they respond, then, you know, a person comes in.
Speaker: But if they don't respond, it just keeps going.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: And what's cool is like you were saying, you don't have to touch any of this.
Speaker: You have your team, your VA is doing.
Speaker: like basically all of this.
Speaker: And for people listening, I think that's important too, because you don't want to be the one spending all the time, like solar cells guys, we should focus on just the closing and making money.
Speaker: And so for those that are interested in getting like VAs, where do you guys find your VAs?
Speaker: And I went, I went through a company called magic.
Speaker: It was get magic.
Speaker: Um, we ended up going, we're actually just went straight with the people.
Speaker: They do take a big chunk, um,
Speaker: Like 30 or 40%.
Speaker: But even then, you can hire somebody for $1,000 a month.
Speaker: If you go outside of that, there's other.
Speaker: Upwork, I think, is one of them.
Speaker: I mean, you can get a full-time employee for $500 to $1,000.
Speaker: And if you want more of a quality person, maybe $1,000 to $1,200 a month.
Speaker: And I mean, you can like full-time and...
Speaker: Yeah, full time.
Speaker: They do everything.
Speaker: They're awesome.
Speaker: They really are awesome.
Speaker: They work the hours that they're working in the middle of the night.
Speaker: We have weekly meetings at 1 o'clock and I hear roosters in the background all the time.
Speaker: You know, it's like 4 a.m.
Speaker: there.
Speaker: But yeah, they do a really good job on everything.
Speaker: And that's like five bucks an hour or something.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: These are people that are, I mean, probably most of them have degrees.
Speaker: These are like high class people.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like I just hired another one just personally for me, nothing to do with the solar business, but just because I'm in a few different endeavors.
Speaker: And I mean, she's a she's a law student.
Speaker: Super, super bright girl.
Speaker: Really good at just random tasks like, hey, pay this medical bill.
Speaker: Hey, pay this.
Speaker: Hey, book this flight.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: A lot of things that you just get too busy to do.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That needed that needed it done.
Speaker: Yeah, they're super helpful and really cheap too.
Speaker: Philippines, that's good money for them.
Speaker: I mean, you don't pay someone here five bucks an hour.
Speaker: Probably that's kind of a slap in the face out there.
Speaker: That's a pretty good paying job for them.
Speaker: I use, for my VA, I found one, virtualstafffinder.com is the service I used.
Speaker: and they do all the vetting for you.
Speaker: So I'll post a link to that too here in the show notes for anyone that's interested.
Speaker: But yeah, if you can start to get someone to help you, that's when you become, I think, more of an entrepreneur in this because then you can start to implement these processes.
Speaker: And like Bennett's doing, you can take yourself out of so much follow-up, out of all these things that people can do for a lot cheaper because your time is worth a lot more.
Speaker: If you're making, if you're closing a deal, you should be making
Speaker: you know, 500, 1,000 an hour probably.
Speaker: At least, yeah.
Speaker: A lot of times, yeah, about that or a lot of times more.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Depending on what your close ratio is and what your install ratio is.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So working that way, if you can make that much, you shouldn't be doing these things that you can pay someone $5 an hour to do.
Speaker: And for me, I enjoy closing more than follow-up.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I don't want to put out fires.
Speaker: We do a lot of re-roofs.
Speaker: I mean, I'm the mentality of,
Speaker: You know, whatever it takes to get this sell type of till, you know, like trying to pay for your first five months of monitoring.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's like need a roof.
Speaker: Yeah, let's do that.
Speaker: Do I want to coordinate a roof with the customer and get the quote?
Speaker: No, I don't want to do that.
Speaker: So we have.
Speaker: So Jamil is the one who runs the customer follow-up program, the GIFs.
Speaker: And then we have Kent.
Speaker: He runs just the communication with contractors and the installer.
Speaker: So he does all my communication.
Speaker: Installer, we've worked with a lot of great installers.
Speaker: But there's always times that...
Speaker: Installers are busy and a job gets stuck in permits forever or it doesn't even get submitted to permits or the permits are received and this job wasn't scheduled.
Speaker: So his job is just basically here.
Speaker: Here are your timelines.
Speaker: If this many days have passed and we don't and XYZ hasn't been met, call the installer and do that communication for the sales rep.
Speaker: So he's full time just just doing that and doing work with contractors, setting up re-roofs and tree trimming,
Speaker: A guy needs to move a shed.
Speaker: I just saw that in one of the text messages just because I'm going through our text messages to be able to have a main panel upgrade.
Speaker: It's like I don't have to text the customer and let them know.
Speaker: Kent's going to do all that for me.
Speaker: And then we have two full-time that they do leads and proposals.
Speaker: I'm setting all the appointments.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Making sure we got the bills and everything.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I think especially if you're running like a dealer type thing like you are, you got to be in communication with the, you know, installer and all that.
Speaker: So that's where it gets really important being in communication and then bugging them if things aren't.
Speaker: If it's not moving forward.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Moving forward.
Speaker: So genius stuff.
Speaker: And yeah, man, we might have to get your brother on the show too to go with this good stuff.
Speaker: He'll give you a lot more info on it.
Speaker: on how everything works.
Speaker: To me, it's magic.
Speaker: That's crazy.
Speaker: When I heard all this, I'm like, holy cow, I've never heard a process.
Speaker: I'm sure there's other people out there, but you guys got a pretty dial.
Speaker: It's a lot of software, and that's not my thing.
Speaker: Since I've been in college a few years ago, I didn't have a computer.
Speaker: I just had my phone.
Speaker: I just got a computer this summer.
Speaker: Don't be joking.
Speaker: I just got a laptop.
Speaker: Figuring out the software.
Speaker: I like it.
Speaker: Yeah, and so yeah, thanks for sharing kind of your process with us, Bennett.
Speaker: I know we got to wrap up pretty quick here.
Speaker: I was going to ask you, you guys do, working with multiple installers and everything.
Speaker: You were telling me something cool before we started recording here.
Speaker: When you're closing the deals, you guys do kind of like a price match thing.
Speaker: Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Speaker: Yeah, so what...
Speaker: I mean, there's literally 100 solar companies in San Diego, right?
Speaker: It's the most competitive market, and they can go get exactly what I'm offering somewhere else.
Speaker: So I want to make it unique, but I also want to let them know, hey, so again, I try to keep my pitch the same every single time, so I have that slide deck.
Speaker: One of them shows here's, you know, I talked to them about they're going to be getting these gifts.
Speaker: So I use that to help them close and say it's a fun process for you.
Speaker: We're going to send you dinner.
Speaker: We're going to send you an action figure.
Speaker: I'm not going to give the rest away, you know, kind of keep them on the edge, but it's fun there.
Speaker: Then I also say we have 100% satisfaction guarantee, meaning up until install, if you want to
Speaker: move products around.
Speaker: If you want to go from a cash deal to a prepaid PPA, if you want to go from a PPA to a loan, we will match or beat anything.
Speaker: So let's say we're on a loan and you go find that somebody else is giving a better deal on the panels.
Speaker: With the same panel, or you want a different inverter,
Speaker: There's no need, we'll match or beat anything out there.
Speaker: If Costco's given a Visa gift card, we're gonna give a Visa gift card if everything's the same.
Speaker: So I let customers know that and I relate it to Expedia.
Speaker: I would just say, if you have to book a flight, are you getting on American Airlines, Southwest, JetBlue, Delta, and checking all the flights, or do you use a flight booking service like Expedia or Google Flights?
Speaker: The only difference with our service is
Speaker: Not only can I get you kind of whatever you want to get, if you want the cheapest cash price possible, we can get you that.
Speaker: If you want a premium panel with the best equipment, we can get you that.
Speaker: If you want a zero, a lease that never, the pricing never changed or PPA, we can get you that.
Speaker: It's like...
Speaker: Whatever you need, we can get you.
Speaker: So at any time before install, we can transition them without basically them having to sit down with another five companies and deciding.
Speaker: But just keep your eye out.
Speaker: If you notice anything, let me know and
Speaker: I mean, we'll transition for you.
Speaker: We're not locking you into anything.
Speaker: If we have to switch from Sunrun over to Sunnova or to Vivint, if you want Vivint because your neighbor has Vivint, let's do it.
Speaker: So it kind of just puts them at ease.
Speaker: And then what happens is when I was selling in Sacramento, the councils that I did get, it was usually because we were selling.
Speaker: I mean, all we were trained to sell is power purchase agreements.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And they're like, oh, I want a loan.
Speaker: And it's like, oh, wait, we can kind of offer loans.
Speaker: I don't know how to sell them at the time, but we can kind of offer it.
Speaker: And then I'm kind of backpedaling of like, oh, we can do it.
Speaker: Well, if I tell them up front, hey, if you want to do a loan, let's do a loan.
Speaker: If you want to go down the line and transition to loan, do it with me.
Speaker: Go get pricing, but we already have a good relationship.
Speaker: You like me.
Speaker: I like you.
Speaker: I just bought you dinner.
Speaker: Just let me match.
Speaker: Let me throw my hat in the ring again and match or beat the price.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It's worked.
Speaker: I haven't had anybody cancel at all, but especially not to go with another company because that was the frustrating thing.
Speaker: When you knock a door, when I was knocking doors in Sacramento, and somebody just is, it was like a hard sell and like even a hard appointment.
Speaker: It's like, no, I've looked in a seller.
Speaker: No, no, I hate this.
Speaker: No, I don't want to buy anything.
Speaker: And you get the appointment.
Speaker: You completely change their mind.
Speaker: And then you even sell them and close them.
Speaker: You're investing in them.
Speaker: And then all of a sudden they're like,
Speaker: Oh, I want to do a loan.
Speaker: And you're like, oh, I don't really know how to sell a loan.
Speaker: So I can't really help you anymore.
Speaker: But there's no way in heck that you would have ever, ever gotten solar if I had a knock on your door.
Speaker: At least not for the next year or two.
Speaker: So it's like, I don't want to lose those.
Speaker: You know, those are, I stem that.
Speaker: So I want to be able to offer them.
Speaker: truly exactly what they need and whatever price that they want, I don't care what they buy.
Speaker: No matter what, it's going to be a win-win.
Speaker: Solar is such a good deal here.
Speaker: And we're talking, for people on the podcast that don't know, the rates down here, this is going to get everybody to read here.
Speaker: Tier 1 in the winter starts at $0.26 and Tier 1 in the summer starts at $0.29.
Speaker: And then I carry around a Utah bill of Rocky Mountain Power.
Speaker: Oh, smart.
Speaker: I just say, here's my rates on my home in Utah.
Speaker: We start at $0.08, then moves up to $0.11.50, then it caps out at $0.14.
Speaker: Here, you guys are starting, you know, a grandma in a condo, a widow is starting out in the summer at $0.29, tier one.
Speaker: Double what the mansions in Park City are ever paying for electricity.
Speaker: So it's just crazy.
Speaker: You can always save people money, and you can always make a good money.
Speaker: you know, good commission check for the salesman as well.
Speaker: It's just a good, good industry.
Speaker: It's an excellent thing to sell and solar's awesome.
Speaker: Solar is 100% the best thing ever.
Speaker: We deserve to get paid a lot.
Speaker: It is super expensive in San Diego too, so I'll take as high as commission as I can get out here.
Speaker: Got to pay high rent and everything.
Speaker: But yeah, I think that's genius too, especially people that are working kind of more the dealer thing where you do have that ability to be more competitive on prices
Speaker: Obviously, you don't want to sell for dirt cheap, but just if the customer can know that, that they have this ability to... I'm sure 99% of people don't go out and like... Oh, no.
Speaker: When you say that.
Speaker: I've had one that I'm thinking of right now that he did, and he's like, I want to go do this with this other company.
Speaker: And I'm just... He's like, this is my option.
Speaker: And again, it wasn't... I never lost the sale.
Speaker: But even if you're... You don't want to drive...
Speaker: 45 minutes to appointment and then not close them or close them and then they go to somewhere.
Speaker: Even if you're only gonna make a few hundred bucks a kilowatt, if I don't have to go back there, why not just drop the price, match it, and I don't have to go back.
Speaker: It's not another visit.
Speaker: It literally takes me just sending out a DocuSign and then signing it.
Speaker: Relationships are already there, they already trust me.
Speaker: So it takes me an extra 30 minutes.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm not, you know, you're making, a lot of times you're making a lot less if you have to get really competitive.
Speaker: Even if you're making a hundred bucks per kilowatt,
Speaker: On a five kilowatt system, if all I have to do is send a docusign, I mean, why wouldn't you do that?
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: I mean, that's all it comes to.
Speaker: As long as you've established that prior and you're not trying, you know, it's like, okay, here's your price.
Speaker: Let's do that.
Speaker: And by the way, I've never had to do that.
Speaker: I don't think I've ever sold for less than like about a grand here.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: kilowatt even even when even with that that guy he's like okay well i do want a ppa because he's planning on moving um zero escalator at like 15 cents so well that's still it was still like 900 a thousand bucks a kilowatt here which is great sun hours great roof um so yeah that's yeah that's about as bad as it gets thousand a kilowatt yeah poor poor guy
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Well, I know we got to wrap up here, Bennett, but thanks for sharing some of your secrets.
Speaker: And so if people want to connect with you a little bit, now that you have a computer, you can find me at Word of Computer and all that.
Speaker: You on Facebook and all that.
Speaker: I know you're pretty active on the solar groups, right?
Speaker: Yeah, those groups, that's where I've learned everything.
Speaker: Those are awesome.
Speaker: Yeah, just Bennett Maxwell.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: So yeah, definitely connect with Bennett.
Speaker: Tell him, give him a shout out.
Speaker: Let him know you appreciated his words of wisdom on the podcast here.
Speaker: Go and join the Solrepreneur group if you haven't already.
Speaker: That's the number one Facebook group for solar professionals.
Speaker: There's a couple other good ones, but that's the best.
Speaker: So go join that.
Speaker: Let us know what you thought of the podcast.
Speaker: And Bennett, any other final words of wisdom before we say goodbye here?
Speaker: No, I appreciate getting this over with, I should say.
Speaker: Every time I talk to Taylor.
Speaker: Anyways, we're hanging out out here in San Diego since I've been out here.
Speaker: And every time...
Speaker: He's always sucking me into the podcast, and I'm always saying, no, give me more time.
Speaker: I want more data.
Speaker: I'm a numbers guy.
Speaker: I want to see, you know, after, I guess, I mean, I have over 20 closed deals.
Speaker: So now it's like, okay, I guess I got some numbers.
Speaker: But thanks for trapping me in this morning.
Speaker: We were going to talk about something completely different this morning.
Speaker: He was like, nope, we're going to do the podcast.
Speaker: We've got 30 minutes.
Speaker: Let's go.
Speaker: Trapped him into it.
Speaker: Thanks for being willing.
Speaker: It's a good bait and switch, man.
Speaker: Yeah, that's how we do it.
Speaker: I tried to say I got to go, and I'm like, oh, I have an appointment this morning too.
Speaker: And put the tables on them.
Speaker: Great salesman, Taylor.
Speaker: You got me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, we appreciate you coming on the show, though.
Speaker: Well, thanks again here, Bennett.
Speaker: And I'm sure we'll have you again on the future, possibly, when you've made a couple million by then.
Speaker: And people connect with you.
Speaker: But thanks for coming on the show today, Bennett.
Speaker: Appreciate it.
Speaker: Yo, hope you enjoyed the episode.
Speaker: Go add Bennett on Facebook or wherever you're at on social media.
Speaker: Let him know you appreciated his knowledge and wisdom and go out and build your team.
Speaker: Follow up like he's doing for next week's episode.
Speaker: We're going to do actually something that I've been talking a little bit about a little bit about in the sort of news group.
Speaker: If you're a member of that group, go join it.
Speaker: If not,
Speaker: But I'm going to be sharing my thoughts on virtual selling and why I think you shouldn't use Zoom in solar cells.
Speaker: I know, I said it.
Speaker: So tune in next week for that episode.
Speaker: Wow, what another value-packed episode of The Solarpreneur.
Speaker: Guys, if you couldn't tell, we spent 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 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
Speaker: the next episode.
