Transcript
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: Hey, what's up solopreneurs?
Speaker: Taylor here.
Speaker: How are ya?
Speaker: Hope you are having a fabulous day.
Speaker: And if you are listening to this in March of 2020, I hope you're surviving the pandemic, the coronavirus.
Speaker: We're all gonna die.
Speaker: Just kidding, I don't think so.
Speaker: But I do sincerely hope that you're not letting it affect yourselves.
Speaker: Because while people are freaking out, guess what?
Speaker: This is a chance for us to go make more money, get in more homes, and dominate the market while everyone else is losing their minds.
Speaker: So take it as an opportunity to go out and make money while the rest of the people are not working.
Speaker: More people should be home getting those homes.
Speaker: Don't let it be an excuse.
Speaker: But anyways...
Speaker: Today I wanted to do a unique show about incentives.
Speaker: Something I've been thinking about a lot here in my company.
Speaker: We are in our annual sales competition.
Speaker: Actually we have two a year.
Speaker: And let me tell you, it's just nice to see the excitement, the comradery,
Speaker: the extra income extra sales generated during these competitions and if you are not utilizing incentives and competitions in your solar business you're missing out so whether you're a manager whether you're a solar company owner or just a rep think about what incentives can you do in your company and how can you use them to boost your cells
Speaker: Okay, so today I want to talk about number one, why do incentives?
Speaker: Why is it even important?
Speaker: And number two, we got five dope and fresh incentive ideas that you probably haven't heard before that I'm going to give you that you can utilize in your company, in your business.
Speaker: So here we go.
Speaker: Why should we even do incentives?
Speaker: Hopefully it's a given that in any sales environment you should have some type of incentive.
Speaker: But I'm going to tell you why I think it's important and a little bit of research I've done too.
Speaker: So why is it important?
Speaker: Well, if you've been in the industry for a while, you know any salesperson should be competitive.
Speaker: I think that's a key trait in any sales business, especially in solar.
Speaker: And let's be honest, if you're not competitive, then you're probably missing out.
Speaker: So if you don't feel like you're a competitive salesperson, maybe start thinking about that.
Speaker: Because I think any successful salesperson, the top guys, I think they thrive on this competition.
Speaker: I remember when I got into sales, back when I did pest control, I did it in Dallas, Texas.
Speaker: And one of our best dudes there, this guy named Devin, he was a cross country runner for UVU.
Speaker: We were both first year reps and I did okay, hit 100, 150 for the summer.
Speaker: Any of you that have been in pest control, you know that's just okay.
Speaker: But like that commercial says, if any of you have watched it, just okay is not okay.
Speaker: Wanna dominate.
Speaker: But this kid, Devin, he got in, he was a college athlete.
Speaker: And this guy, he would go out and run five to 10 miles every morning.
Speaker: And then every day, we're knocking eight to 10 hours a day in pest control.
Speaker: He'd literally be running door to door.
Speaker: And he would win almost every competition.
Speaker: I think he ended the summer with.
Speaker: 350 account 300 to I don't know around 400 accounts anyone that's in pest control if you're a first year rep that's smoking that's doing awesome hey what's up solar previewers Taylor here
Speaker: I got to thinking the other day, wouldn't it be nice if we had a compilation of all the greatest tips from the people we've had on the show?
Speaker: So my team and I, we took the liberty of preparing a little closing guide because it's all about closing more deals.
Speaker: That's how the money is made.
Speaker: We prepared a closing guide from some of the greatest closers in the industry and people we've had on the show here.
Speaker: So I wanted to give that guide to you for free.
Speaker: So if you want to check out the guide head on over to closer.solarpreneurs.com and we will give you a copy 100% free delivered straight to your email.
Speaker: See you on the other side.
Speaker: So why was he so successful?
Speaker: I honestly think it's just his competitiveness, his drive to be the best.
Speaker: And if you're recruiting in solar, you need to recognize this too.
Speaker: Any competitive person, it's a good chance they're gonna thrive in this industry.
Speaker: So that's why it's important to have the incentives, because it's gonna bring out the best of these competitive people.
Speaker: Even if they're not as competitive, everyone wants to win.
Speaker: Everyone wants to be the best.
Speaker: And going along with that,
Speaker: When you do incentives, it drives collaboration.
Speaker: One of the best ways to get this collaboration camaraderie that I've seen is you need to have a good, clear leaderboard.
Speaker: So in your company, what are your key performance indicators, your KPIs?
Speaker: And can people recognize those and see those?
Speaker: So if you don't have some sort of leaderboard, something where reps can go on and see how they're stacking up against the competition for the week, for the month, for the year, you're definitely missing out on helping reps perform to the best of their abilities.
Speaker: Our company, we have a custom one that's designed in our software.
Speaker: It's okay, but there are some awesome leaderboard apps out there.
Speaker: you go Google just sells leaderboard apps you're gonna have a bunch pop out of you but go and look for some way to major these things and have a leaderboard that people can go on at any time and see how they're stacking up against the competition but that's the other reason for incentives can drive that collaboration and the other two big things here are incentives creates focus
Speaker: Then it adds energy and excitement.
Speaker: Like I mentioned, our company, we're in our twice a year, they call it Ironman competition.
Speaker: And it's crazy to see how motivated people get.
Speaker: Just how stoked they are to go out and get the sales, create the focus.
Speaker: And along with these twice a year competitions we do, we do them kind of tournament style.
Speaker: We have a regular season similar to like a basketball season or football.
Speaker: We have a regular season where people go out and get wins.
Speaker: The last month and a half or so.
Speaker: And then we have a playoff period where people are seated.
Speaker: And it's March Madness style.
Speaker: Which, not good to bring up right now because unfortunately March Madness got cancelled.
Speaker: But...
Speaker: We have a tournament set up like that where it's regular season, then playoffs, and then it's elimination from there.
Speaker: And the winner gets a sweet trip and obviously prizes along the way.
Speaker: But that's the other reason for the incentive.
Speaker: It's going to create that focus.
Speaker: It's going to add energy and excitement.
Speaker: Another thing we've been doing that's been super successful lately is Saturday sells incentives.
Speaker: And it's where...
Speaker: Every Saturday we have a specific incentive and in our company it's anyone that gets three appointments booked.
Speaker: So for us an appointment is just a new lead generated that's energy usage for the lead.
Speaker: It's obviously name, address, phone number, email and a solid appointment time.
Speaker: So anyone that gets three of those in a day they're gonna get
Speaker: a cool incentive for that day.
Speaker: And it's been awesome because I've been out here doing this, what, three years, three, four years about now.
Speaker: When you've been knocking that long, I don't know about everyone else, but you need something to get that focus for you.
Speaker: So when I'm going out on Saturdays knocking, I just had a kid, so a lot of times it's tough for me to be thinking about, oh, what's my kid doing?
Speaker: My wife's at the beach right now, I'm out here grinding on doors.
Speaker: When you have something like that to focus on and incentive for the day, it doesn't become work anymore.
Speaker: becomes what can I do to get that awesome incentive gotta get two more important two more appointments then I get the prize that's the key here make the incentive something their reps can focus on instead of work so just a couple things that's why you should do incentives definitely you know utilize them and before I get into some dope and fresh incentive ideas
Speaker: just another key thing I wanted to mention make sure you're delivering your incentives instantly if possible or give up something that they can have right when they get it so I've noticed over the years sometimes companies I've been with they've been good and some not so good with this is just delivering on the incentives
Speaker: And for two reasons, number one, if you don't deliver an incentive right away, a lot of times you're gonna forget to even give it.
Speaker: So if you're a sales manager, just do your reps a favor, get them the incentive right away.
Speaker: Don't make them beg you for it.
Speaker: Because the truth is if they have to beg you for it, that's almost counteracting the incentive.
Speaker: It becomes something where they feel bad.
Speaker: There's some reps that will feel too bad to even ask.
Speaker: they win something and then they feel bad I have a friend you know he knows who he is but he probably has like 10 incentives that he just hasn't gotten because he feels bad asking for the incentives so some reps are gonna feel bad about it won't even get incentive and then it's counteractive it's demotivating then they don't even want to go get the next incentive because they know there's a good chance they won't get it or
Speaker: or someone will forget to give it to them.
Speaker: That's something super important, deliver on your incentives.
Speaker: If it's something big, I don't know, give them an email, something tangible that they can have to just know that they got rewarded right away.
Speaker: Because the more time they have to wait, the less motivating it's going to be.
Speaker: Okay, with that being said, let's jump over to five awesome incentives here.
Speaker: And some of these were super new for me.
Speaker: Maybe some people have heard of these things.
Speaker: Let's roll with it.
Speaker: And let me know.
Speaker: Give us a comment in the Facebook group or send me a DM.
Speaker: Let me know if you have any other sweet incentive ideas.
Speaker: And we'll be sure to let people know.
Speaker: But here we go.
Speaker: Number one.
Speaker: First incentive idea is a Segway Mini.
Speaker: So if you haven't heard of this, Segway minis are just, like it sounds, a mini Segway.
Speaker: And the reason it's so cool is because you can take these things door to door.
Speaker: Especially if you are a rep that knocks doors.
Speaker: If you're going door to door at all.
Speaker: I think this is one of the coolest incentives.
Speaker: It was a game changer for me when I won this.
Speaker: We had it as an incentive a year or two back.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: It's awesome these things.
Speaker: I mean they're like 500 bucks, so it's not a cheap incentive either you can get cheaper models of it But you can hop on these things and just fly door-to-door they go like 12 miles an hour on a single charge the last year most of the day Depending on how far you're going, but the other cool thing is here in San Diego we go up a lot of homes have hills and
Speaker: San Diego is pretty hilly.
Speaker: So these homes that have longer driveways, hills, it's so nice that you can just fly up the driveway, get to the door.
Speaker: So it changed my knocking game.
Speaker: I thought it was awesome because here's the thing, a lot of incentives that you get or give, for me, they weren't necessarily something that I was going to go out and buy.
Speaker: I mean, I probably, for me, I don't know if I would go out and spend 500 bucks on a Segway Mini, but if I win something,
Speaker: then especially if it's kind of a novel thing that I wouldn't necessarily buy with my own money out of pocket that's what makes it even cooler so that's number one Segway Mini and you can use that to fly between doors number two and this is something that blew my mind got it pretty recently but number two is a gold belly gift card
Speaker: Okay, so Gold Belly, if you haven't heard of it, it's a service where you can buy food from almost any restaurant.
Speaker: Well, any iconic restaurant that you think of.
Speaker: Like you got Philly Cheese Steaks, Philadelphia, Chicago Deep Dish Pizza, New York Bagels, New York Cheesecake, all these iconic foods that you would only get if you were in that place.
Speaker: or only get the best version of it.
Speaker: What Gold Belly is, it's a website where they literally deliver these foods to your home, sort of like Uber Eats, but from the best restaurants, most iconic restaurants in the world.
Speaker: This blew my mind, I'm a big foodie, maybe this isn't super motivating to everyone, but I was in New York last summer, I had some of the best pizza I'd ever had,
Speaker: got some super good cheesecake stuff like that so when I heard about this I thought it was awesome so last week actually a couple days ago at the time of this recording a box showed up to my door open it up I have two Chicago deep dish pizzas I had a New York cheesecake sitting in there
Speaker: I had this delicious banana pudding from Bagnolias Bakery which is the best bakery I think in New York City.
Speaker: That's awesome because they deliver it right to your door and you can just pig out.
Speaker: I'm a big foodie so I love this.
Speaker: Again this is something, it's not cheap so they were doing $200 gift cards and if that gets you, I don't know.
Speaker: three four things maybe each thing on there is like 60 60 to 100 bucks or so that's not cheap but again if you're doing an incentive it's something that it's like cool probably wouldn't spend 70 bucks to get a cheesecake door to my door but it's an incentive heck yeah that's number two go check it out gold belly gift card google gold belly and it'll take your right to have the website number three
Speaker: This gets a little geeky here for our sales fanatics.
Speaker: But number three is tickets to any sales conference or coaching
Speaker: Okay, a lot of guys, if you're in sales, that's another thing.
Speaker: You should be interested in personal development.
Speaker: You should be interested in self-improvement.
Speaker: And for me, I love going to self-improvement conferences.
Speaker: I love going to sales conventions, anything where I know I'm developing and improving myself.
Speaker: But here's the thing.
Speaker: They do get a little bit pricey.
Speaker: Okay, so that's another thing.
Speaker: is you can just to give you an example i mean grant cardone has this 10x 10x con we've talked about door-to-door con on the podcast uh grant cardone does this sells boot camps there's all sorts of personal developments and motivational seminars so stuff like that so if you're
Speaker: If you're in your sales organization, suggest it to your leadership or consider doing something where it's like a team incentive to you.
Speaker: Where you can send just not one guy but a whole team of people to these things.
Speaker: When our company did one of these, we went to Grant Cardone's 10X Con and it was awesome just knowing that we all hit a goal together.
Speaker: All were rewarded.
Speaker: And then also we did different levels to it.
Speaker: It was like whoever got, I don't know, I think it was at the time maybe six cells for the month, got a ticket, but then going up it was tiers of things.
Speaker: So eight cells got you, maybe your hotel room, 10 cells got you gambling money since it was in Vegas that year.
Speaker: So think about that too, make it in levels and think about doing a team incentive.
Speaker: Along with that, number four is online courses.
Speaker: Another thing for our sales junkies, for our self-improvement nerds.
Speaker: For me, I have a bookmarked folder of probably 30 courses or so, and I haven't gone through a lot of them, so don't be like me.
Speaker: If you're going to get a course, go through it, take what you can from it.
Speaker: But these online courses can be super valuable.
Speaker: Again, they can get pricey.
Speaker: The only thing you want to be careful about with this is the level of commitment.
Speaker: That's the thing about going to seminars or online courses.
Speaker: If you pay the money, you're that much more committed to implement what you're learning in the courses.
Speaker: Implement whatever actionable steps you receive from them.
Speaker: Be careful with them.
Speaker: Make sure you set the standard high and make sure people want it.
Speaker: Think about making it custom for each person too.
Speaker: Maybe I care a ton about going to Grant Cardone's 10XCon.
Speaker: But maybe Jimmy, maybe he doesn't.
Speaker: And if you give him a ticket, maybe he's not going to be motivated.
Speaker: So think about how you can customize it.
Speaker: But some online courses specifically for sales.
Speaker: You got Cardone U. That's been a good one for us.
Speaker: You got Door-to-Door U.
Speaker: Sam Taggart's course.
Speaker: I know Jordan Belfort, he has his Wolf of Wall Street Cells course.
Speaker: Haven't actually done that one, but read his book, heard good things about it.
Speaker: So let me know if you've hopped on that one.
Speaker: And then pretty soon, we've got the Solar Cells Mastery course coming out.
Speaker: Little self-promo there.
Speaker: But if you want access to that course,
Speaker: Send me a message.
Speaker: I'm actually looking for five people to beta the course right now.
Speaker: Getting the beta testing at a super discounted rate.
Speaker: That's gonna be custom to solar cells pros.
Speaker: Teach you how to take your game to the next level.
Speaker: If that is in the works right now, send me a message if you wanna be in the beta or depending on when you're listening to this, maybe it's already out.
Speaker: Send me a message.
Speaker: It's Taylor Armstrong or Taylor J Armstrong on Instagram.
Speaker: Okay, that's number four though.
Speaker: Online courses, reward them with that.
Speaker: And the last one, last but not least, is a trip.
Speaker: And I know this is kind of cliche, I mean everyone knows that trips make greats, great incentives.
Speaker: But anything that's experience, that's an experience,
Speaker: gonna be memorable I think those are a lot of times way more motivating people something that's gonna be memorable something that people are gonna appreciate hey I've won a trip to Hawaii that was super cool we did that and even if you are a low budget there's actually services out there that will let you send trip vouchers for free okay so if you're I mean if you're a sales manager if you're looking for
Speaker: to not spend a ton of money you can send trip vouchers you can get trip vouchers okay and disclaimer I haven't used I've checked out a couple of these services I haven't actually tried them myself I've heard mixed reviews about them but if you want to find out more hit me a message and get your info on that but it's websites that will let you send most of them are monthly subscriptions and they let you send trip vouchers
Speaker: and they're free trip vouchers you obviously pay like the flights but their places let you stay for free and they try and fill up just when they have kind of down times or extra rooms so that's kind of how it works i know it sounds to you to be true so do your homework but consider trip vouchers um i mean you can go on groupon there's always good deals for trips
Speaker: But you guys, don't be cheap either.
Speaker: I mean, the last thing reps want is knowing that you nickel and dimed them on an incentive, made it sound all sweet, and then it wasn't that sweet in reality.
Speaker: So make sure people know what they're getting.
Speaker: We had one time where, again, he knows who he is, but one time...
Speaker: one of our leadership he did an incentive for these sweet Ray-Bans sunglasses and it was kind of a low requirement to be able to get it.
Speaker: Ray-Bans?
Speaker: Wow, those are like $100 glasses.
Speaker: And I think you only had to book one appointment or something.
Speaker: Not a super high standard, so like sweet.
Speaker: So a ton of people got it.
Speaker: And then when we get these Ray-Bans we see them and they're made in China.
Speaker: They're these
Speaker: fake Ray-Bans basically so I mean it's a good thought but if you're gonna do incentives maybe tell people that I mean your reps don't want to know that they're getting the short end of the stick that they're not getting what they thought it was so especially when you're doing vacations when you're doing experiences make it be something awesome and I mean you don't necessarily want to tell people you're giving them a free trip but make sure they know what they're getting over deliver and
Speaker: and make sure again you deliver right away so reps know they're getting what they asked for so there you have it let me know what you think if you haven't already left us a review please go on let us know what you think
Speaker: Give us five stars, give us one star, I don't care.
Speaker: I just want to know what people think.
Speaker: We're trying to deliver weekly content.
Speaker: I'm out here trying to dominate.
Speaker: So I apologize for being off on a couple weeks.
Speaker: But we're going to strive to give you weekly content.
Speaker: The greatest material for solar cells professionals to help you dominate your industry.
Speaker: So go out and crush it.
Speaker: Hit your goals and don't get infected by the coronavirus.
Speaker: Alright, peace out guys.
