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3 Important Sales Lessons From The Movie Moneyball
54 Plays4 years ago
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Transcript
Taylor's Journey & Sales Challenges
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level.
00:00:08
Speaker
My name is Taylor Armstrong.
00:00:10
Speaker
I went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fell.
00:00:19
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.
Defining a Solarpreneur
00:00:31
Speaker
What is a Solarpreneur you might ask?
00:00:33
Speaker
A Solarpreneur is a new breed of Solar Pro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery and you are about to become one.
00:00:41
Speaker
What's up, solopreneurs?
00:00:43
Speaker
Taylor Armstrong back with another episode.
00:00:45
Speaker
And as usual, here to make your life easier as a solar sales professional by closing more deals, generating more leads and referrals, and hopefully having a much better time in the solar industry.
00:00:59
Speaker
Thanks for making us the first listen of your day.
00:01:03
Speaker
And today we're going to be doing a little unique episode.
Announcing SolarCon & Offers
00:01:07
Speaker
Before we jump into the podcast topic of the day, though, I have a quick announcement.
00:01:13
Speaker
If you are looking to come to SolarCon, which is the event, the first ever solar conference event created for solar pros like yourself and solopreneurs alike, it's going to be in April.
00:01:27
Speaker
So I'm going to put the link to it in the show notes.
00:01:30
Speaker
If you wanted to come hang out with yours truly there, I'm going to be speaking.
00:01:34
Speaker
I'm going to be hanging out.
00:01:35
Speaker
I'm going to be jamming with all of you.
00:01:37
Speaker
So if you do want to come, I've got a discount exclusive for solopreneur listeners.
00:01:43
Speaker
So go head on to the show notes.
00:01:46
Speaker
If you don't know how to get to that, all you do is click on wherever you're listening to the podcast and there should be a little show more tab.
00:01:53
Speaker
You're going to be able to see the show notes.
00:01:55
Speaker
We're going to put the discount code there.
00:01:57
Speaker
We're going to put the website and exactly how you can do it.
00:02:00
Speaker
So the discount code is solarpreneur at 25, 25% off for our listeners.
00:02:06
Speaker
And along with that, I wanted to throw in a little something extra just because I love you guys.
00:02:11
Speaker
I appreciate you.
00:02:12
Speaker
Appreciate you supporting the show.
00:02:15
Speaker
So anyone that does want to take advantage of that offer, please.
00:02:19
Speaker
I'm going to throw in free access to a Soul Society, which you should probably know by now.
00:02:25
Speaker
That is our solar training platform where we get the greatest coaches, trainers, and get all their content, put it in one place so you can learn from the best in the business.
00:02:36
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And not only that, you can get feedback from the best in the business.
00:02:41
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We have a partnership with Ciro, which is the app that lets you record your presentations and get direct feedback from coaches.
00:02:50
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So if you want to take advantage of that, we're going to give anyone that goes and purchases with the exclusive Solrepreneur code, Solar Conference, SolarCon, we're going to hook you up with a month free access to that, which usually costs $100.
00:03:06
Speaker
So hope to get an email.
00:03:09
Speaker
All you got to do is go purchase your ticket and then send an email of a screenshot of the receipt.
00:03:17
Speaker
and you're, well, we'll have your email, but yeah, just email us a screenshot of your receipt.
00:03:23
Speaker
Say, Taylor, I bought it with your coupon code.
00:03:27
Speaker
Then we will verify that and we will hook you up with access.
00:03:30
Speaker
Okay, so my email is taylor at solarpreneurs.com.
00:03:34
Speaker
You can also email support at solarpreneurs.com with your receipt.
00:03:41
Speaker
So now for today's episode, we're going to
00:03:43
Speaker
We're going to be talking about something kind of unique.
Sales Lessons from Moneyball
00:03:46
Speaker
I don't know if I'm crazy or hopefully everyone's like this, but sometimes I'll be watching movies and I'll think, huh, there's actually a lot of sales lessons, sales principles in this movie.
00:04:02
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And of course, I'm always thinking about content topics, about stuff we can jam on in the podcast, and
00:04:09
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So last weekend, I watched the movie Moneyball.
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And this thing, I was just having sales principles click off my head.
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So if you haven't seen Moneyball, it's on Netflix right now at the time of this recording.
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So go watch it if you haven't seen it.
00:04:27
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Great movie.
00:04:28
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But for those that haven't seen it, just the summary of it, I'm not going to spoil anything, but summary is it's about the Oakland A's, the baseball team, right?
00:04:37
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MLB.
00:04:38
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It's about their manager, which is their general manager is Billy Bean.
00:04:44
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And the big problem they have in their club is their budget is millions of dollars less than the bigger players, like the Yankees, like the bigger markets.
00:04:55
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And they have to compete with these guys with, you know, a quarter of the budget.
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Actually, I think it was in the movie.
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It was like $30 million compared to like $200 million or something that the Yankees had.
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And so obviously a huge problem.
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How do you attract big time players when you have a smaller budget?
00:05:15
Speaker
And by the way, before I go into these principles, I did this with another movie.
00:05:20
Speaker
I think it was six months ago or something when I watched Cars.
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Got the kid.
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He's getting into the kid movies.
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And I took some sales principles from that as well.
00:05:30
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So if you want to go see that, that was about six months ago.
00:05:33
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But anyways,
00:05:35
Speaker
Moneyball, though, great movie on cells.
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And I'm going to get into why I think it applies to what we're doing right now, specifically solar cells.
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So many lessons we can learn from it.
00:05:46
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And the gist of the movie is that Billy Bean has to figure out how to take what he's given and recruit players and compete with the bigger guys.
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And it talks about exactly how he does it in the movie.
00:06:00
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So go watch it.
00:06:01
Speaker
Again, it's on Netflix.
00:06:03
Speaker
Okay, so three principles with it.
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I'm going to get into the first one.
00:06:07
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And if you watch the movie, it's going to make a little bit more sense.
00:06:13
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So maybe pause it, go watch the movie if you want to.
00:06:16
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But the first principle I took from it is that culture matters.
00:06:20
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Okay, so in Moneyball, culture is such a huge part of what they do.
00:06:27
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There's one point in the movie where they have some bigger name players, some guys that are, you know, better than the others.
00:06:36
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But what happens is they go on a long losing streak.
00:06:40
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I think they lose 15 games in a row or something in baseball.
00:06:44
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And Billy being the general manager, he walks into their, I don't know what you call it, their clubhouse or their locker room, I guess.
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I don't know if it's called, I'm used to basketball.
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but a locker room, right?
00:07:00
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So he walks in there and some of the best players are up there like messing around.
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They just lost their 15th game in a row.
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They're up there like dancing.
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They got music going.
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They're fooling around in there.
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And so he shuts them down immediately.
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And he says, that's what losing sounds like.
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It makes them all listen.
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So I thought this was super powerful.
00:07:24
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How many of us are messing around when we're losing?
00:07:28
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How many of us are having a good time partying on the weekends when we just pulled a bagel for the week?
00:07:36
Speaker
How many of us quit early that day and are satisfied?
00:07:40
Speaker
Well, I guess it's one thing if you put in a solid effort, but how many of us didn't put in a solid effort who didn't hit the amount of doors we said we're going to hit, who didn't do enough presentations that day?
00:07:53
Speaker
How many of us are doing that and are still happier, still celebrating?
00:07:58
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And so if you have something like this going on at your company, if guys are happy, if they're satisfied,
00:08:05
Speaker
with getting one, I don't know, one appointment on the day, one close on the week.
00:08:11
Speaker
I've been there.
00:08:13
Speaker
But if you are part of an organization like that, then you need to do two things.
00:08:16
Speaker
You need to help that company or help whatever organization you're in improve the culture or you need to look into switching companies, right?
00:08:26
Speaker
Cause I, I've been with multiple offices where we didn't have a great culture and
00:08:33
Speaker
And I didn't do anything about it.
00:08:34
Speaker
And I know I lost out on hundreds of thousands of dollars because I was satisfied.
00:08:40
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I was hanging around the wrong people.
00:08:42
Speaker
I wasn't selling up to my potential.
00:08:45
Speaker
I've told the story before, but in my first couple years of selling, I was hanging out with guys who would go out and who would watch Game of Thrones, who would hang out in the car, who would want to chat.
00:08:59
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And instead of changing it, I got sucked into all that.
00:09:03
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And I still do.
00:09:03
Speaker
I'm not perfect.
00:09:05
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I still go knock sometimes with people who drag me down.
00:09:10
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But it's something you need to be conscious of.
00:09:12
Speaker
And so in the movie, Brad Pitt, well, Brad Pitt plays Billy Bean, who is the general manager.
00:09:20
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Even though these players that are fooling around, they were actually some of the better players on the team.
00:09:26
Speaker
He trades them the next day.
00:09:29
Speaker
And just taking that little step, that made a huge difference on the team improving.
00:09:35
Speaker
So that is principle number one.
00:09:37
Speaker
Make sure you get your culture right.
00:09:40
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Make sure you are contributing to a hustle culture in your office or in your company.
00:09:47
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And if you are a manager, if you are a leader, if you are a company owner, lead from the front.
00:09:53
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Some of the best companies, the company owners are going out and selling with the reps.
00:09:59
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Even if you have hundreds of reps.
00:10:02
Speaker
I think I said it in a podcast before, but I saw that Sunrun CEO, I think her name is Mary Smith or something.
00:10:10
Speaker
She came and did a training for the teams down here in San Diego.
00:10:14
Speaker
Then she goes out and knocks Doors, the CEO of Sunrun, which is the biggest solar company.
00:10:22
Speaker
So that is principle number one.
00:10:24
Speaker
Make sure you're contributing to your culture.
00:10:27
Speaker
And then number two.
00:10:29
Speaker
is make sure you're celebrating the little wins.
00:10:33
Speaker
Okay, so not to be confused with being satisfied, but in the movie, what happens after this, they sell or they trade the players that are messing around, right?
00:10:45
Speaker
Billy Bean does.
00:10:47
Speaker
And then he ends up recruiting guys that aren't, they're not big name players.
00:10:53
Speaker
They're not heavy hitters.
00:10:54
Speaker
They're not home run hitters.
00:10:57
Speaker
But what are they?
00:10:59
Speaker
They're guys that can go get on a base.
00:11:02
Speaker
They're guys that can go walk, right?
00:11:05
Speaker
They're guys that can chip away runs one by one.
00:11:07
Speaker
I'm going to talk more about this in the next principle.
00:11:13
Speaker
But I think the big point with this is sometimes you don't need to be hitting a home run, especially when you're out there knocking on doors when you're trying to close deals.
00:11:24
Speaker
Maybe in that deal, you got clear up to running someone's credit.
00:11:28
Speaker
Maybe you couldn't get them to sign the documents, but you got them to run credit.
00:11:32
Speaker
So celebrate that.
00:11:33
Speaker
Okay.
00:11:34
Speaker
You just got more further along in the process than a lot of guys get, right?
00:11:40
Speaker
A lot of guys don't even get to the point of running credit and it's frustrating.
00:11:44
Speaker
We always try to focus on what we couldn't do.
00:11:46
Speaker
We couldn't fully close the deal, but you just ran their credit.
00:11:51
Speaker
Or maybe you just got in the home and booked a solid appointment with a homeowner.
00:11:56
Speaker
Maybe you're doing a virtual seller on the phones and you just got further than you had in the process than the last three days.
00:12:05
Speaker
So make sure you're celebrating these little things and keeping track of it too, right?
00:12:11
Speaker
We need to focus more on the inputs of what we're doing than what actually happens from it, than the output of the input you put forth.
00:12:22
Speaker
So if you're out knocking on doors, focus on the amount of conversations you had that day.
00:12:26
Speaker
Focus on what you can control, right?
00:12:31
Speaker
So that is principle number two.
00:12:33
Speaker
Make sure you are focusing on the bunts on those little successes and celebrating them.
00:12:40
Speaker
But don't
00:12:42
Speaker
You know, at the same time, make sure you're not letting it get you lazy.
00:12:47
Speaker
Celebrate the little wins, though.
00:12:49
Speaker
And then the last principle from the movie is, and this is the main one here, is make sure you always know your stats.
Effective Recruitment & Metrics
00:12:58
Speaker
Use analytics.
00:13:00
Speaker
In the movie, this is actually, I guess, kind of the main thing that happens in the movie.
00:13:06
Speaker
Not to spoil it too much.
00:13:08
Speaker
Maybe I am.
00:13:09
Speaker
But Billy Bean, he recruits some math whiz, some stats whiz from Stanford.
00:13:16
Speaker
And he gets him to come basically tell him the best players to try to recruit to the team based on the stats.
00:13:26
Speaker
And they find out that they don't necessarily need the guys that are slamming home runs.
00:13:32
Speaker
Because they base it off of the analytics, which at that time people weren't doing.
00:13:36
Speaker
They were just going off eyeball tests, off guys that could hit home runs, grand slams, all that.
00:13:44
Speaker
So the movie, the stats guy, his name's Peter Brand, he tells Billy Bean, hey, why don't we just focus on the guys?
00:13:54
Speaker
They're not big names, but they're going to go out and go and get us the bunts.
00:13:59
Speaker
They're going to go out and get us on base.
00:14:02
Speaker
And this entire premise, by focusing on these stats, they don't need to go out and get the big name players.
00:14:09
Speaker
So this is how once they start focusing on that, they go on a huge winning streak because all of a sudden they're focusing on what matters most.
00:14:18
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They're focusing on those numbers that are actually helping them win.
00:14:24
Speaker
So for you and yourselves, make sure you're keeping track.
00:14:28
Speaker
Make sure you're keeping your stats like a madman.
00:14:33
Speaker
And by the way, I forgot to mention that this is how they were able to beat the big name teams because they didn't go spend a bunch of money on the bigger players.
00:14:44
Speaker
So for you and your team, make sure you have your key performance indicators.
00:14:50
Speaker
Of course, we should all be keeping track of our appointments booked, of our appointments kept, of our closed deals, of our installs.
00:14:58
Speaker
Those are all key.
00:14:59
Speaker
But are you also keeping track?
00:15:01
Speaker
If you're knocking doors, your door is knocked, your conversations had.
00:15:05
Speaker
And then are you really putting those in a spreadsheet and analyzing them?
00:15:12
Speaker
Whatever you're doing, make sure you're tracking them.
00:15:15
Speaker
Make sure you are improving those on a weekly basis.
00:15:18
Speaker
This is another thing that I think Sunrun has, right?
00:15:24
Speaker
I recently went and I have quite a few friends selling with Sunrun.
00:15:28
Speaker
I went and checked out one of their meetings and I was actually surprised that they weren't near as focused on the actual results for the week.
00:15:39
Speaker
But the main thing they incentivized their team, the main numbers they focus on was the conversations they had for the week.
00:15:47
Speaker
So this is one of the big goals that they put for everyone on their team is how many conversations did you have?
00:15:53
Speaker
What's your goal for conversations this week?
00:15:55
Speaker
Because they know that if they can go out and incentivize their team to get in front of enough people,
00:16:01
Speaker
then the results are going to come, right?
00:16:04
Speaker
So it's the same thing that you do if you're in the weight room, if you're training sports, if you're swimming, whatever, if you focus on the things you're doing every day, do them consistently, track them, you're going to make improvements.
00:16:18
Speaker
So those are the lessons from the movie.
00:16:20
Speaker
Okay, just to recap again.
00:16:23
Speaker
Number one, culture matters.
00:16:26
Speaker
Number two, focus on the little successes on the bunts, on the walks.
00:16:30
Speaker
Number three, make sure you are really getting good data to analyze.
00:16:35
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Make sure you're keeping track of it.
00:16:37
Speaker
The times I perform best is when I put all my numbers in a spreadsheet for a week, how many conversations I had, how many doors I knocked, how many hours I put in,
00:16:49
Speaker
how many appointments I booked, how many appointments sat out of those, and then how many closes and installs I got.
00:16:56
Speaker
And that's how you can start to make little incremental improvements.
00:17:00
Speaker
So I hope that helps.
Episode Wrap-Up & Future Plans
00:17:02
Speaker
Go watch the movie if you haven't.
00:17:05
Speaker
And just every time you're watching stuff, maybe look for sales principles too and let me know.
00:17:13
Speaker
Maybe we can do a podcast about another movie in the future.
00:17:16
Speaker
So send me your suggestions.
00:17:20
Speaker
So that's a wrap for today's podcast.
00:17:22
Speaker
Hope you guys enjoyed it a little bit different.
00:17:26
Speaker
And don't forget to tune in next Friday.
00:17:28
Speaker
We're going to be previewing the next guest that's coming up on the podcast.
00:17:32
Speaker
We got a lot of exciting folks coming on.
00:17:35
Speaker
Send this to someone that could benefit.
00:17:38
Speaker
And guys, please leave me a review if you haven't, either on iTunes or on Spotify.
00:17:43
Speaker
Would be much appreciated.
00:17:45
Speaker
And thanks to our sponsors, Pi Syndicate.
00:17:47
Speaker
If you need help with your finances, hit them up and we'll see you guys all on the next episode.
00:17:54
Speaker
Hey, solopreneurs, quick question.
00:17:56
Speaker
What if you could surround yourself with the industry's top performing sales pros, marketers, and CEOs and learn from their experience and wisdom in less than 20 minutes a day.
00:18:06
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For the last three years, I've been placed in the fortunate position to interview dozens of elite level solar professionals and learn exactly what they do behind closed doors to build their solar careers to an all-star level.
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Speaker
That's why I want to make a truly special announcement about the new learning community exclusively for solar professionals to learn, compete, and win with top performers in the industry.
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Currently, Soul Society is open, launched, and ready to be enrolled.
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So go to soulcidey.co to learn more.
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and join the learning experience now.
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We'll see you on the inside.