Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level.
Speaker: My name is Taylor Armstrong and I went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fell.
Speaker: I teach you how to avoid the mistakes I made and bring in the top solar dogs of the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro and closing more deals.
Speaker: What is a solopreneur, you might ask?
Speaker: A solopreneur is a new breed of solopro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery, and you are about to become one.
Speaker: All right, what's going on, everybody?
Speaker: I am stoked for this podcast.
Speaker: We've got a full setup here in the studio, and this guy, he's been doing solopreneur probably, like, I don't know, almost more than anyone I've ever had on the podcast.
Speaker: How long have you been in solopreneur?
Speaker: Almost 11.
Speaker: Almost 11 years.
Speaker: 11 years, man.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So in solar years, that's like a century, isn't it?
Speaker: Like forever.
Speaker: I'm definitely an old dog.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I'm excited to hear his journey.
Speaker: We've got Jeremy Rose in the house with us.
Speaker: And yeah, this guy has just been through a lot.
Speaker: He's doing some commercial solar now.
Speaker: He's been in multiple companies, help them grow and just blow up.
Speaker: And I know you're consulting a lot of companies, so we're going to talk about all that and a whole lot more.
Speaker: I'm excited for the episode.
Speaker: So, yeah, man, do you want to just give us, like, I don't know, the background?
Speaker: I know you got a pretty crazy story getting into solar and all that.
Speaker: Yeah, no, I mean, first of all, thanks for letting me be on with you.
Speaker: I've followed you for a while.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: It's super cool.
Speaker: I love your stories and your reels and, like,
Speaker: You give people a feel of what door-to-door is like.
Speaker: Yeah, try to keep it real.
Speaker: What the bathrooms are like.
Speaker: And if you've got cat allergies, be careful.
Speaker: You know, those kinds of things.
Speaker: So I love seeing your little reels and stuff you post.
Speaker: And you do a great job with your podcast.
Speaker: So I appreciate you having me be on with you.
Speaker: Now, my story getting into solar goes back a ways.
Speaker: Like you said, I'm in this 10.
Speaker: I'm in my 11th year.
Speaker: And I just wanted to get into this industry.
Speaker: I think that there's a special thing in solar right now, which is I think we're kind of called into this industry.
Speaker: I think there's a lot of money in it because
Speaker: the creator of all things is like, we needed to help the earth a little bit.
Speaker: And so let's incentivize the humans to get to work on it.
Speaker: I think there's some of that going on, but early on, I actually helped another company that was doing energy conservation, not energy creation.
Speaker: And when I saw the numbers and how much it helped just conserving energy, it was kind of mind blowing to me.
Speaker: And then I started putting my mind to work and I was like, what if we could create energy?
Speaker: What would that look like using my skillset from door to door?
Speaker: How can we get involved?
Speaker: And there was a couple of companies just kind of starting to play around with it, with solar a little bit, but nothing that you could just go do.
Speaker: It wasn't really there.
Speaker: And so this is no joke, man.
Speaker: My story getting into solar, like I wanted in, I was trying to find a way in, but
Speaker: I was helping other companies at the time, kind of like how I do now with solar, just with sales in general.
Speaker: And I remember we got pregnant and it was my first kids.
Speaker: And we found out we were having twins.
Speaker: And what that did was change everything.
Speaker: Like now, as you know, we travel a lot.
Speaker: Like door-to-door guys, we travel all over the place.
Speaker: We train people.
Speaker: We help people.
Speaker: We're all over.
Speaker: And so then when I found out we were having twins, I figured out we couldn't travel anymore.
Speaker: So I had to fix something.
Speaker: And I'm like, man, what do I do here?
Speaker: Luckily, I just kind of was able to settle down for a couple months.
Speaker: I was scared of bed rest and all the things that come with twins.
Speaker: And I kid you not, we had a crazy delivery.
Speaker: It all happened.
Speaker: My wife was just beat.
Speaker: It took a whole day, 24 hours.
Speaker: And I was sitting in the...
Speaker: in the recovery room with her finally catching a breath just from a crazy, crazy time, just catching her breath.
Speaker: And I decided to check my phone and I see a message from a good buddy of mine.
Speaker: And I was like, okay, he, it was an incoming message.
Speaker: And I had talked to him a little bit about solar and possibly working in it.
Speaker: And if there was any possibility out there, but nothing substantial.
Speaker: So I get this random message and he says, Hey, I got a guy I want you to talk to, you know, can you set up a call?
Speaker: I'm like, sure.
Speaker: Long story short, I take the call.
Speaker: That was Lyndon Rive.
Speaker: Some of the solar people know who that was.
Speaker: He was the CEO of SolarCity at the time.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And they were exploring the possibility of doing direct-to-market, like, door-to-door type sales.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so, you know, we did a deal.
Speaker: I moved out to California, and we have been here ever since.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And been in this solar journey the whole time.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's been...
Speaker: We've had to make a lot of things happen that maybe weren't ready for us.
Speaker: And so what it's done is now you have companies you can just find, we call them EPCs, right?
Speaker: Hey, I've got deals.
Speaker: I'm going to go match up an EPC.
Speaker: That didn't exist back then.
Speaker: We had to really figure it out.
Speaker: But I've loved the industry.
Speaker: It's opened huge doors for me, not only in residential solar, but commercial, even utility scale overseas.
Speaker: Like it's become a...
Speaker: major part of my life.
Speaker: So that's kind of how I got into it.
Speaker: I would say I, I, I claim divine intervention on it because I was looking for a way in and it just,
Speaker: It came right up.
Speaker: Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker: Yeah, especially with twins, man.
Speaker: I can't even imagine.
Speaker: I got the four-year-old and the two-year-old, and I can't even deal with them.
Speaker: So listen, man, we moved – I was given the blessing and opportunity to be able to, like, search all the markets.
Speaker: Where do I want to go start this?
Speaker: And I remember thinking I'm going to go somewhere so I don't have to travel, so I don't have to move around.
Speaker: And yeah, we're right now we're in Southern California and this is where I've been almost 11 years now.
Speaker: Just, and trust me, people have come and gone, come and gone.
Speaker: I've seen a hundred gazillion solar companies start and end and leave.
Speaker: And, and it's been great the whole time.
Speaker: It didn't ever stop.
Speaker: Well, yeah, it's good to hear people say that because as you know, like especially now we've gone through NEM 3.0 here and all the changes.
Speaker: And I know you've been with a lot of companies that some of, you know, like aren't here anymore.
Speaker: Some have gone through some crazy things.
Speaker: So for, I don't know, like for a guy like you, how do you go through all these different changes?
Speaker: And I don't know if you struggle to like stay positive.
Speaker: It seems like, like you just keep going and you got the family, you got the roots dug in here, but so many people have left.
Speaker: So many people quit.
Speaker: I mean, back in the day, it kind of was tempting like to jump.
Speaker: Oh, that market's better.
Speaker: That look at these dudes are all going and selling super easy in this other market.
Speaker: They don't even know solar and you would be tempted by that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I think it just comes down to a baseline, the way you work.
Speaker: And changes don't just surprise you in solar.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I remember NEM 2, when it went from NEM 1 to NEM 2 in California.
Speaker: Yeah, that's fair.
Speaker: And then it went to NEM 3.
Speaker: So when it went from net metering 1 to net metering 2, everyone freaked out.
Speaker: And they're like, you don't get money at the end of the year anymore.
Speaker: This is BS.
Speaker: And a lot of people thought that was it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Now, knowing what you know, looking back at Netmetering 2, it just wasn't a very bad deal.
Speaker: So that's what I saw.
Speaker: I'm like, it's still good.
Speaker: And I would just learn what was coming, like pay attention to the CPUC and what's coming and create a formula around it.
Speaker: So when NEM3 was being flirted with, my initial thought wasn't, I got to bounce out of here.
Speaker: My initial thought was,
Speaker: Well, I think they've been doing this in Hawaii already for a long time.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I started calling battery companies and inverter companies.
Speaker: And I'm like, how are you guys going to handle this?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it was actually pretty easy.
Speaker: They already knew.
Speaker: If you want to know how to handle NAMM3, call an inverter company.
Speaker: Call a battery company.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Like they...
Speaker: They'll just tell you, they did a lot of high-level research before it ever hit.
Speaker: So I was able to look at all that and make a game plan and say, oh, look, it's actually still good.
Speaker: And I watched everyone leave.
Speaker: And I tried telling them, guys, it's fine.
Speaker: And they all came back.
Speaker: So that's how that went.
Speaker: Well, yeah, it's going to be, you know, it separates the pretenders from the contenders.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, I think it's just like anything.
Speaker: If you look for all the reasons it's going to work, you're probably going to find proof that it'll work.
Speaker: You know what's funny?
Speaker: You kind of always are going to find what you're looking for, right?
Speaker: I think in general.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I'm looking for ways to stick around and not make my family move all the time.
Speaker: And truthfully, I've probably paid some financial price for that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But that was the goal, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, yeah.
Speaker: This industry has been a very solid place for me.
Speaker: Not always is it easy, but it really can be as solid as we want to make it.
Speaker: It's a tumultuous new industry, so it can get crazy.
Speaker: I've had my days where I thought money was coming.
Speaker: My receivables were huge and the money didn't come.
Speaker: I've had those days.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Live through it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, well, no.
Speaker: I always say you haven't sold solar for a long time if you haven't not been paid.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: And I've been dealing with a lot of new sales reps lately, too.
Speaker: And I'm like, look, and it's funny because they'll come to me and they say, I think my mental health is struggling.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I'm like, you're probably right.
Speaker: But if you haven't sat on a curb and cried yet, you haven't done it yet.
Speaker: I know we need to create like a checklist of all the things that you have to go through to be like a professional solar salesperson.
Speaker: I think cry on the curb, have a gun pulled on.
Speaker: Yeah, there's a lot of crazy stories, but I can tell you the blessings of being a part of it have far outweighed that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I've had the opportunity to understand the inner workings of quite a few companies.
Speaker: I've had my own for a while.
Speaker: And it's been a great blessing and opportunity, just this whole thing.
Speaker: And it's still a baby.
Speaker: I'm in California.
Speaker: Hawaii maybe has had it a little bit longer.
Speaker: But it's a baby.
Speaker: We're opening markets that don't understand this stuff still today.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: There's a big future here.
Speaker: Yeah, it's like even San Diego, you know, where I sell mostly and people say it's the most saturated market.
Speaker: Like, you know, I got three deals last week and two of them was like the first time they ever looked into solar.
Speaker: I mean, granted, they did have lower bills.
Speaker: They didn't really see a need, I guess, before now their bills have gone up.
Speaker: But there's like so many people, even saturated markets where they just like didn't think solar made sense, never looked into it.
Speaker: So, yeah, I mean, everyone can stay out of California and go do your thing, but we'll still find people here.
Speaker: Listen, and I'm noticing this.
Speaker: I've opened about 30 markets throughout the country in the last 10 years or so.
Speaker: And what I've learned is that it's not a matter of if, but when.
Speaker: Like eventually that price point is going to
Speaker: Just the natural inflation is doing it.
Speaker: So it's like once it crosses a certain threshold, this whole market just comes available.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And that's happening a lot.
Speaker: And we know what markets are close.
Speaker: We're like, okay, two more years in that market and they're going to kind of cross the line and it's going to work.
Speaker: So we got our eyes on that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I would say to solar people, pay attention, man.
Speaker: Learn about community solar.
Speaker: Learn about commercial.
Speaker: Learn about this stuff.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: residential is always going to be that good, fast, stable thing, but they'll learn these things.
Speaker: And, and there's a lot of opportunity in this space.
Speaker: Not a little it's, it's, it's massive.
Speaker: We're very lucky.
Speaker: We're in it this early.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No doubt.
Speaker: And yeah, if anyone's listening to like, maybe, maybe you've been in solar for the first year or something, you're here in this podcast.
Speaker: Don't worry.
Speaker: It's not all like terrible.
Speaker: Like, yeah, there's a little worried about that.
Speaker: Look, how many millionaires do you think have been created?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: In, let's say, the last 10 years in solar?
Speaker: I don't know, hundreds, if probably more.
Speaker: We need to research that.
Speaker: I bet you it's a big number.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What other industry...
Speaker: do you think has created that much wealth in under 10 years?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Other than like some like really lucky crypto stuff.
Speaker: Other than that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What do you think?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Yeah, probably not.
Speaker: Cause yeah, you hear like, you know, Grant Cardone, Andy Elliott, a lot of these sales guys.
Speaker: And now they talk all the time about sores being like one of the best things to go into.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's like, I don't know.
Speaker: The opportunity is insane.
Speaker: So yeah, if anyone's new listening to this,
Speaker: Dig your heels in because this is, I mean, it's happening now, but our future depends on this going well is the way I see it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it has to.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So find your way, find, find your, your lane and solar and get involved for sure.
Speaker: I think as I say that it brings up some thoughts of like a lot of people are nervous about solar right now.
Speaker: We just came off a pretty rough year.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like it got a little nuts, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So a lot of people worked really hard and didn't get rewarded.
Speaker: And I'm of the belief that if you work hard and you're consistent, it's always rewarded.
Speaker: Sometimes I would look back in my past and look at some of those times where maybe I didn't get financially rewarded, but I learned financially.
Speaker: very important lessons that I won't duplicate.
Speaker: So next time that won't happen, right?
Speaker: So we call it tuition.
Speaker: A lot of tuition in solar.
Speaker: But I have learned like, if you're new and you're looking for a place to land, find a good solid company.
Speaker: And believe it or not, this is hard.
Speaker: A lot of people are like, how do I find that?
Speaker: How do I know that the company I'm with is actually solid?
Speaker: Because
Speaker: How many people were driving Lambos three months ago?
Speaker: And now they're just gone.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What happened?
Speaker: So people have a hard time identifying.
Speaker: Because if you look on social media, Instagram, everyone just looks like they're loaded in solar.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And that's not necessarily the case.
Speaker: And so what I found is if you can find companies that hold certain attributes,
Speaker: It's going to do a lot of homework for you.
Speaker: You don't have to do the homework.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, that's a good point because, like, I know you've been with some companies that things haven't gone ideal.
Speaker: I've been with, like, me and you, we've both been in the industry forever.
Speaker: And, like, I think both of us have made the mistake of maybe being with companies that, like, maybe we didn't know at the time, but things went south and didn't go great.
Speaker: I think a lot of these companies are actually good, trustworthy situations, but...
Speaker: Hey, solopreneurs, how would you like to close an extra 20, 30, 40, or even 50 deals this year without knocking a single door?
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Speaker: One more time, that's bootcamp.solarpreneurs.com, and you can grab your tickets today.
Speaker: Hope to see you there soon.
Speaker: The way the financial climate hit, it put them in situations where they had to make really hard decisions that, you know, there's collateral damage from all of it.
Speaker: And it's unfortunate.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I would say what I found in searching is, one, if you can find a company that has revenue from another source and they're actually willing to use it –
Speaker: then that causes like a safety blanket.
Speaker: If something happens with a finance company or a load of jobs don't get
Speaker: funded or something, if they're willing to tap into that safety blanket, the sales reps don't even know that that glitch happened.
Speaker: And there's companies like that, right?
Speaker: I would say that's a part of the criteria.
Speaker: I would say another part is if they have institutional partnerships, institutional money.
Speaker: And I think it's important to know not debt, but like money, institutional money.
Speaker: And I also think it's important to know that it's at a minority share.
Speaker: Mm-mm.
Speaker: Like if you notice, a lot of times institutional money comes in, they want what percent of the company usually?
Speaker: 51%.
Speaker: 51%.
Speaker: So what that tells me is they want to call the shots when tough decisions have to be made.
Speaker: So if they can come in at a minority share and still bring partnership style money –
Speaker: That tells me they're trusting that group or they already maybe know that company to make good decisions.
Speaker: And I'm never going to be able to do the type of homework they did.
Speaker: And so I get, I piggyback on them and I say, okay, that's probably safe.
Speaker: I can roll with that.
Speaker: And a company in those situations would not even be allowed to.
Speaker: be put in the position to make hard, bad decisions.
Speaker: It's going to go fine.
Speaker: So at their expense, and they're willing to do it.
Speaker: So if you find that, I think there's a handful of them.
Speaker: I think there's a handful of them that probably fall under that criteria.
Speaker: But I would say if you're looking for safety, I've learned that that's kind of – Then you don't have to be like, I really trust this guy.
Speaker: Of course, I do trust the people I'm around right now, but I don't have to.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: There was a really harder barrier of entry other than whatever I could research by far.
Speaker: So any new people out there, that might be really high level talk, but look for that.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So you're telling me just don't go join the company with the lowest red line.
Speaker: I should have just said that.
Speaker: I could have just said that.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So, yeah, hopefully that's a lesson.
Speaker: And yeah, and this is coming from two guys that have been with companies who I think, you know, haven't paid out.
Speaker: I've had the best red lines in the whole industry several times.
Speaker: It's the most expensive thing I've ever done.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All of a sudden you're red line when you don't get paid on five deals.
Speaker: It doesn't matter that much, does it?
Speaker: It just went a while higher.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: But no, those are good questions to ask.
Speaker: Maybe when you are checking out a company or considering maybe getting into solar, like I wish I would have known to ask those things and look at some of that before I just jumped in with every company or any dealer because…
Speaker: It's the opportunity for growth is what attracts us.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So we'll find us a group that's maybe smaller and we'll help grow them up.
Speaker: And I think that's big.
Speaker: But I also think that we there's no way to know how shaky those foundations were.
Speaker: And I think that some of the best guys are doing that.
Speaker: But.
Speaker: The foundation is what it is.
Speaker: No one's trying to put a bad rap on the solar industry.
Speaker: We love it.
Speaker: I think something to pay attention to is there's real efforts to try to fix it.
Speaker: The government's going to come in and regulate this.
Speaker: And that could...
Speaker: That could be bad because they might not understand our industry.
Speaker: So you may have – I'm going to plug this.
Speaker: There's a group called the RSA, Residential Solar Association.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: Anyone on this or looking at this should pay attention to that.
Speaker: That's a group of high-level leaders coming together, no competition among them to try to put good –
Speaker: best practices in place that we use as an industry.
Speaker: And then the government hopefully will look at that group and say, Oh, here's how we can regulate the industry in a safe way.
Speaker: So I'm always going to plug those guys.
Speaker: I, I just, my hats off to what they're doing.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: I joined with that group a little while ago, and I would encourage anyone in solar to look at that.
Speaker: And they'll want to use your hands.
Speaker: They'll say, hey, we have a thing in California you can help with.
Speaker: We have a thing in Texas you can help with.
Speaker: Go spend an hour on this.
Speaker: And I would love to point people that way.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: No, that's awesome.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We'll, uh, we'll drop some links for sure.
Speaker: How do they get involved with that?
Speaker: Or is there like that website or I would just go to like, if you go to Facebook or, or Instagram and just look, look up residential solar association or RSA, you'll, you'll see it.
Speaker: Um, a lot of these guys are posting it.
Speaker: Uh, there's a guy named Mark bench.
Speaker: If you know him, he's, he's kind of running the show right now.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Um, so follow those guys.
Speaker: I don't know the, uh,
Speaker: Maybe you can put a link up or something.
Speaker: I don't know what it is, but RSA, Residential Solar Association, get involved with that if you can.
Speaker: It's pay your own way.
Speaker: Nobody's making money there.
Speaker: It's for the good of the industry.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Now we'll post that for sure.
Speaker: Well, so last couple things I want to touch on before.
Speaker: I know we've got a time deadline, so just make sure we can get to a couple things here, Jeremy.
Speaker: But something that's really impressed me that I've seen you do is you've got just a ton of connections with – I know you've been in it forever, but you've got a lot of connections with people.
Speaker: And, you know, off-camera we're talking about just some of, like, celebrities and boxers and all that.
Speaker: You know, like –
Speaker: you know, rub shoulders with and everything.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So like, yeah.
Speaker: Can you tell us, like, how do you build all these connections?
Speaker: And I know you had, like, you've gotten some cool things you've done with like Evander.
Speaker: What is it?
Speaker: Holy, Holy, Holy, Holy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So how do you, how do you make all this stuff happen?
Speaker: Listen, guys,
Speaker: solar is a big industry let's call it renewable energy yeah it's a big industry yeah and i've taken the initiative to learn it on every level yeah residential commercial um community solar utility scale you start getting involved with utility scale and you start getting it in in with some of these people but yeah i uh
Speaker: I learned how to do that.
Speaker: Not easy, by the way.
Speaker: It took a lot of effort, a lot of failed deals in Panama, in Zambia, Africa, and some of these places.
Speaker: But through that experience, I was able to attract people that want to be involved in those.
Speaker: And I ended up doing some deals, one with the WBC itself.
Speaker: And then kind of offshoot from that, yeah, Evander Holyfield was actually a sales rep for me for about two weeks.
Speaker: And then his lawyer called me and he was like, bro.
Speaker: He doesn't – because I had him on commission.
Speaker: And then his lawyer called me and he was like – well, we were doing countries, right?
Speaker: It wasn't like a house.
Speaker: But his lawyer called and he was like, he's not making these phone calls unless you pay him X amount.
Speaker: And it was a lot.
Speaker: And I was like, okay, well –
Speaker: Thanks.
Speaker: That was fun.
Speaker: But he was super gracious.
Speaker: He came to my little town that I live in in California.
Speaker: We did a golf tournament with him and a bunch of other boxers and stuff.
Speaker: And it was really cool.
Speaker: So this industry has opened amazing doors.
Speaker: I think everyone involved has these kind of possible things in front of them.
Speaker: Be resilient.
Speaker: Those things take a lot of resilience.
Speaker: They take your money.
Speaker: They take your energy.
Speaker: They take all that.
Speaker: They take dedication.
Speaker: You got to leave the country sometimes.
Speaker: And when I was in the middle of deciding on some of those things,
Speaker: Full disclosure, I haven't made a dime in that part of the industry yet.
Speaker: Well, yeah, that's still cool.
Speaker: But I remember thinking like, look, if I'm ever going to learn this, I just got to go do it.
Speaker: Just like knocking a door.
Speaker: If I don't go knock my first door, how am I going to learn it?
Speaker: So I knew the cost.
Speaker: I knew what was at stake.
Speaker: And that served me very well.
Speaker: And now the cool thing is I can do those type of projects here in the United States.
Speaker: It's starting to be a thing.
Speaker: So that's cool.
Speaker: That's pretty crazy.
Speaker: I would say for your podcast, though, like-
Speaker: the door to door stuff, the door to door skills, going out, making yourself knock doors when you don't want to going into these houses.
Speaker: Uh, there some are nice, some are crazy.
Speaker: You're good and all kinds of stuff like that prepares you to handle yourself in these other kinds of situations.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It, you know, it's true.
Speaker: I was sitting at a government table.
Speaker: It felt like a kitchen table, you know?
Speaker: And so be resilient, learn, you know,
Speaker: Give yourself time to learn.
Speaker: Like I would stay up all night and just...
Speaker: I put myself on the hook.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right?
Speaker: I think I listened to a thing with Grant Cardone.
Speaker: And he was like, look, make a commitment.
Speaker: And then better make sure you live up to the commitment.
Speaker: And I made some big ones.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so I would stay up all night.
Speaker: Like, I better be a professional of this by tomorrow.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I would grind.
Speaker: And so that's the open door to everyone.
Speaker: That's free, guys.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So let's find it.
Speaker: That's what it takes.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: And, yeah, you talk about, I know something you train on all the time with your teams and everything is just like,
Speaker: separating the sales rep or like the closer from the professional.
Speaker: So would you say that's like a big aspect of that is just like the dedication?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, I don't know.
Speaker: I'm glad you brought that up.
Speaker: So in my mind to separate, and I'm usually have a door to door audience on this to separate a closer from a professional because closers in solar,
Speaker: Have made millions.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: They've done very good.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I think the difference between just a closer and like a full professional is knowing what you have access to and being willing to use all the tools.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Knowing when to use them and not to use them.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I think a lot of closers find the easiest path and they crank on that, and that's good.
Speaker: That's been very profitable.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I think a professional can actually...
Speaker: run not as fast and actually get more result because I'll give you an example.
Speaker: Southern California.
Speaker: If you're in Southern California and you don't understand Pace products, you're missing like a bunch of jobs.
Speaker: Yeah, true.
Speaker: And everyone kind of says, well, that's a crappy thing because of this.
Speaker: That's bad.
Speaker: Well, I think the real reason they say it's bad is they don't want to take the time to
Speaker: Deal with it.
Speaker: Take a little bit more process.
Speaker: And so I think knowing what you have access to, um,
Speaker: In fact, I might be doing an interview with a person that shows us all the different incentives that are available to us.
Speaker: We don't even know about all of them.
Speaker: There's tons available.
Speaker: So that's the difference.
Speaker: Be a professional.
Speaker: Find out if there's, like I learned that if you're a minority-owned business, you get more tax benefits than not.
Speaker: So there's all these things out there that are wind in our sails.
Speaker: We just got to pay attention, go find them, be resilient, be resourceful.
Speaker: And dude, there's guys like you out there.
Speaker: Listen to Taylor.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You've got trainings.
Speaker: Aren't you doing some coaching?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Get me up.
Speaker: Applications open.
Speaker: Everything I just said doesn't matter.
Speaker: Like call you and just, you'll tell them what to do.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's easier.
Speaker: Do that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, now I'm still learning about a lot of this stuff on the flip side, though, because I'm sure you've seen this.
Speaker: Like sometimes there's reps that they learn all this.
Speaker: Oh, commercial deals.
Speaker: Oh, paste products.
Speaker: Oh, this, that.
Speaker: That sometimes they get distracted and just like they could be out knocking doors, just making a bunch of money.
Speaker: But they're like, oh, I'm going to try and figure out this thing, this product, whatever.
Speaker: So what's like how do you coach guys on that?
Speaker: Disclaimer, disclaimer, because I probably just set everyone up to do a bunch of that dumb stuff.
Speaker: The whole time I've learned all this stuff, I've had to keep residential sales moving.
Speaker: I could never go away from it because I paid my bills, man.
Speaker: Bread and butter.
Speaker: If I didn't have that, I couldn't afford to do that other stuff.
Speaker: Not at all.
Speaker: And I want to say one more thing.
Speaker: A lot of people say, oh, I want to go get this big thing and I'm going to level up.
Speaker: There's a difference between leveling up and leveling over.
Speaker: I don't know if you are into all the subconscious stuff and the
Speaker: And I'm into some of this study of the subconscious and how it works.
Speaker: But, you know, when you level up, your brain tries to bring you back to normal.
Speaker: Like your subconscious is like, this is weird.
Speaker: Bring you back to normal.
Speaker: It's the same thing when you go below your comfort level.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All of a sudden it's like, oh, yeah, I remember how to make money.
Speaker: Hurry and do that.
Speaker: And you get back.
Speaker: It works both ways.
Speaker: Your subconscious doesn't know the difference.
Speaker: So careful about leveling over.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And what I mean by that is a lot of people think, well, now I've got –
Speaker: A lot of residential sales and I've even got a team.
Speaker: Now I should focus on maybe growing my team and I should focus on commercial and I should do.
Speaker: You can't because the stuff that got you there will die.
Speaker: Leveling up means continuing to do that at the same level and adding this thing.
Speaker: You can't let that go.
Speaker: That lifts you up.
Speaker: Trading one for the next.
Speaker: drops you every time.
Speaker: So I'm very glad you brought that up.
Speaker: I don't want people running around thinking they're going to go sell a deal to Argentina tomorrow.
Speaker: Like it's going to, it won't work.
Speaker: But
Speaker: Get so good at what you do that you can do it along with this and not let go of it at the same rate.
Speaker: If you're selling 10 a month, you got to be able to sell 10 a month and add this one thing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's so good.
Speaker: I'm very glad you brought that up.
Speaker: It can't go away.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, it's important because I'm just thinking, you know, like first year rep to listen to this and they're like, oh, sweet.
Speaker: I'm going to go do commercial.
Speaker: I'm going to go do this.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's like, yeah, you need to like master, you know, one thing at a time, like get master your bread and butter, then start adding other things.
Speaker: And I think another point to that I've been doing door to door for more than 20 years.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That tells you a little bit.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And also with that, it's just like knowing building these connections too.
Speaker: Cause like I was just texting you about a deal last week that failed credit.
Speaker: And so I know I don't have to necessarily know every single detail about this.
Speaker: I've done some pay deals out in California, which is put on like, you know, the property tax for, I guess, people out of California.
Speaker: But yeah, you'll train them.
Speaker: You'll train your students about that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Another, another topic.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like if you know people that are doing this, then it's like, I don't have to know everything.
Speaker: I can just text Jeremy now and say, Hey, can you like, like, what are the qualifications?
Speaker: What I need?
Speaker: There's so much opportunity.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: for people to help each other out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So if you don't want to learn that stuff, don't just let the deal not get done.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Call Taylor and be like, Hey, what do I do with this?
Speaker: It fell to credit.
Speaker: Taylor will work the deal.
Speaker: You finish it.
Speaker: Nothing wrong with the commission split on something you were going to leave in the garbage at all.
Speaker: So work that out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I was going to build an entire business right around that.
Speaker: That's a whole different discussion, but like work that out.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: There's a lot of opportunity there.
Speaker: If you're in Florida or California specifically, Texas, there's some.
Speaker: There are things available for no credit customers.
Speaker: Don't leave them on the table.
Speaker: Find someone that knows how to do them.
Speaker: And if nothing else, split it with them or learn how to do it on your own.
Speaker: But be able to run fast.
Speaker: Yeah, definitely.
Speaker: Well, yeah, so a lot of different –
Speaker: A lot of other things we could talk about, Jeremy, but I think we'll have to do another podcast and jam more on like commercial solar and all that because I know you're getting into a lot of that.
Speaker: Yeah, we'll do another.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: When I learn how to do it, when I learn how to use Instagram, I'll have you.
Speaker: Yeah, we'll teach you that.
Speaker: But yes, in case people want to connect more with you and maybe ask you more about getting into commercial deals or know more about some of these like pace options in California, what's the best way?
Speaker: I know you're not like huge on Instagram.
Speaker: I really should get in there.
Speaker: So I think my handle is just my name, Jeremy Rose, J-E-R-A-M-I-E Rose.
Speaker: You'll find me on there.
Speaker: I have a solid like eight pictures.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Maybe 12 posts.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: It's pretty solid.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But no, you can find me there on Instagram.
Speaker: Just look or on Facebook.
Speaker: Same thing.
Speaker: Just put my name up.
Speaker: If that doesn't work, look up as MySpace.
Speaker: Might be on MySpace.
Speaker: Dude, my MySpace page is fire.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Let's go.
Speaker: I appreciate you, man.
Speaker: Well, hey, it was fun.
Speaker: And guys, so go connect with Jeremy.
Speaker: Let him know you appreciated him coming on the show.
Speaker: And yeah, we'll have to have you back soon.
Speaker: And I'll jam some more.
Speaker: But I know you got your kids waiting in school and everything.
Speaker: So, hey, man.
Speaker: We'll do it again.
Speaker: That's what happens when you got twins, huh?
Speaker: Taylor, you're freaking the man, dude.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: It's been fun.
Speaker: See ya.
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