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00:00:01
Biggest Mistakes Made in Training Sales Reps
50 Plays4 years ago
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the Solarpreneur podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level. My name is Taylor Armstrong and 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 fail. online teach you to avoid the mistakes I made and bringing the top solar dogs, the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro and closing more deals. What is a Solarpreneur you might ask 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.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
What's going on top in the morning to all our Solarpreneurs out there. We are back with another exciting episode and we've got a familiar face on, he's been on a couple episodes previously, and we're going to be starting up sort of a new, um, kind of interview series we're doing so familiar faces James Swiderski. What's up, James. Thanks for coming
Speaker 3 (01:02):
By Taylor. Thank you, Matt. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
My pleasure. My pleasure. And so James we're, we're talking off camera just about this new kind of calm set concept of training we're doing, which is sorta like on the company level issues we see. So you were on kind of introduced this, um, I dunno, series we were talking about kind of what the thinking was behind it.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Yeah, for sure. So the new series we want to do is called train to win. And more specifically, we want to give company owners and I guess more ambitious reps that are looking to really scale their sales, some tools and strategies on how to actually develop out their sales skills. Um, this is not just specific to solar, as far as, um, people struggling with training in general, it's a epidemic in multiple industries. And, um, for those of you who are not familiar, I am the founder and CEO of a trained in global training company called epic. And what we do is we help multi seven figure companies scale past eight figures with their teams, hire reps, develop systems and processes around that. So what I'm going to do is pop on once in a while, do a solo episode about some of my experience with having trips and over a thousand reps with my company as well. So that'll be for you business owners out there, um, train to win tune in, listen to that for some specific tactics on how to train and scale your sales team. So yeah,
Speaker 2 (02:38):
It's a stuff that we should all be talking more about for sure. A hundred percent. And the reason I thought it was a good idea is just because there's such a disconnect in the training, in the industry, on the company and the rep level. Um, I remember starting out, I struggled with it a ton of just getting good, getting and finding good training and then actually implementing it because how companies do you know, James? I'm sure you've seen it, where they bought the card on use. They bought these trading platforms and what do they do? They didn't even hop on it. So that's a huge problem. I mean, I don't come me as a boss, thousands and thousands. Um, I mean my, my previous company I was with, we spent, I know a ton of money to get the card on you and yeah. And on it, and then it didn't increase ourselves.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
So solar either. That's the thing. Uh, um, I would say solar is even a little behind the eight ball on it, but the, the statistic on that actually there's over $1.5 billion a year spent on enterprise training for sales teams. Okay. And this is crazy. This stat was done by e
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Transcript
Introduction to the Solarpreneur Podcast
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.
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 going on top of the morning to all our solopreneurs out there we are back with another exciting episode and we've got a familiar face on he's been on a couple episodes previously and we're going to be starting up sort of a new um kind of interview series we're doing so familiar face is james swiderski what's up james thanks for coming back what's up taylor thank you man thank you
00:01:05
Speaker
My pleasure, my pleasure.
The 'Train to Win' Series by James Swiderski
00:01:07
Speaker
And so James, we're talking off camera just about this new concept of training we're doing, which is sort of like on the company level, issues we see.
00:01:18
Speaker
So do you want to kind of introduce this, I don't know, series we were talking about, kind of what the thinking was behind it?
00:01:29
Speaker
Yeah, for sure.
00:01:30
Speaker
So the new series we want to do is called Train to Win.
00:01:32
Speaker
And more specifically, we want to give company owners and I guess more ambitious reps that are looking to really scale their sales, some tools and strategies on how to actually develop out their sales skills.
00:01:46
Speaker
This is not just specific to solar as far as people struggling with training in general.
00:01:53
Speaker
It's an epidemic in multiple industries.
00:01:55
Speaker
And
00:01:56
Speaker
For those of you who are not familiar, I am the founder and CEO of a training, global training company called Epic.
00:02:05
Speaker
And what we do is we help multi seven figure companies scale past eight figures with their teams, hire reps, develop systems and processes around that.
00:02:13
Speaker
So what I'm going to do is pop on once in a while, do a solo episode about some of my experience with having trained over a thousand people.
00:02:27
Speaker
with my company as well.
00:02:28
Speaker
So that'll be for you business owners out there.
00:02:30
Speaker
Train to win.
00:02:32
Speaker
Tune in, listen to that for some specific tactics on how to train and scale your sales team.
00:02:38
Speaker
Yeah, it's stuff that we should all be talking more about for sure, 100%.
00:02:43
Speaker
And the reason I thought it was a good idea is just because there's such a disconnect in the training in the industry.
00:02:49
Speaker
On the company and the rep level, I remember starting out, I struggled with it a ton, just getting and finding good training.
00:02:57
Speaker
and then actually implementing it.
00:02:58
Speaker
Because how many companies do you know, James?
00:03:00
Speaker
I'm sure you've seen it where they bought the Cardone U's.
00:03:03
Speaker
They bought these training platforms.
00:03:04
Speaker
And what do they do?
00:03:05
Speaker
They don't even hop on it.
00:03:06
Speaker
So it's a huge problem.
00:03:08
Speaker
I mean, I know companies have lost thousands and thousands.
00:03:12
Speaker
I mean, my previous company I was with, we spent, I know, a ton of money to get the Cardone U. Yeah.
00:03:19
Speaker
And on it.
00:03:19
Speaker
And then it didn't increase our sales.
00:03:22
Speaker
It's not just solar either.
00:03:23
Speaker
That's the thing.
00:03:26
Speaker
I would say solar is even a little behind the eight ball on it, but the statistic on that actually, there's over $1.5 billion a year spent on enterprise training for
The Problem with Current Sales Training Methods
00:03:36
Speaker
sales teams.
00:03:36
Speaker
Okay.
00:03:37
Speaker
And this is crazy.
00:03:39
Speaker
The stat was done by EdTech, their conference in 2017, and they found that 87% of sales training that was purchased for their sales team was forgotten within 30 days.
00:03:52
Speaker
So if that's not the equivalent of lighting cash on fire,
00:03:56
Speaker
As a CEO, I don't know what it is, right?
00:04:00
Speaker
So yeah, that's what my company solves.
00:04:02
Speaker
And I want to kind of talk about why that's the case and more specifically what you guys could do about it, solar specifically.
00:04:09
Speaker
Yeah, well, let's jump into it.
00:04:10
Speaker
And so for our listeners, our solopreneurs that don't know, James helped us through his epic platform.
Introducing Sol City: A New Training Platform
00:04:17
Speaker
He helped us build out SoulCity, which we've been talking about here and there on the episodes, which is the new training platform that we just released.
00:04:26
Speaker
And we're already seeing people get results with it in training.
00:04:30
Speaker
We think it's going to revolutionize.
00:04:33
Speaker
the solar training game just because it combines the learning with games you can take with a separate accountability.
00:04:41
Speaker
So we're going to talk kind of the specific things that James is doing to help just sales training in general with that system.
00:04:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:04:49
Speaker
Developed within Epic.
00:04:50
Speaker
But yeah, I guess, why did you decide to start this whole Epic thing?
00:04:55
Speaker
I thought it was Epoch.
00:04:57
Speaker
Epoch.
00:04:59
Speaker
Just for the record, it's spelled E-P-O-C-H.
00:05:01
Speaker
So James gets sick of correcting people.
00:05:05
Speaker
It's not E-Pock, it's Epic.
00:05:07
Speaker
Right, right.
00:05:09
Speaker
Whatever you want to call it.
00:05:10
Speaker
E-Potch, C-H.
00:05:12
Speaker
All right.
00:05:14
Speaker
The biggest thing I trained, if any of you guys know my background, right?
00:05:16
Speaker
So I got into sales consulting and training like after I left my first solar company job, a startup I worked with.
00:05:24
Speaker
And I found out scaling this company up from a couple million upwards of eight figures.
00:05:31
Speaker
with their sales team that sales training was just fundamentally broken altogether.
00:05:38
Speaker
The most common training mistakes we see actually, and I even have a few of them listed here that I discovered through training my own reps was they didn't have a predictable system to do it, right?
00:05:48
Speaker
That's very common.
00:05:49
Speaker
And that's why guys will go by like Cardone University, Jordan Delford, Straight Line Persuasion, stuff like that.
00:05:56
Speaker
All great programs, by the way.
00:05:57
Speaker
I've taken all of these programs.
00:05:59
Speaker
I spent over half a million dollars in my own money on sales training programs.
00:06:03
Speaker
That's how I got good at sales.
Tracking Training Outcomes for Effective ROI
00:06:05
Speaker
And I recommend people do that, right?
00:06:07
Speaker
The problem was this.
00:06:09
Speaker
most companies in solar and my company in particular, we did not have a way to measure training success.
00:06:16
Speaker
Okay.
00:06:17
Speaker
We were spending all this cash on training, but we didn't know if it was actually producing a real ROI.
00:06:24
Speaker
Right.
00:06:24
Speaker
So that was the first problem companies have is they don't measure training outcomes and how to actually get an ROI.
00:06:32
Speaker
If you...
00:06:35
Speaker
are generating leads, buying Facebook ads, anything like that, right?
00:06:38
Speaker
For your business, you need to measure the effectiveness of your campaigns, what's happening on the calls.
00:06:44
Speaker
And if you don't measure these things, we can't improve them.
00:06:47
Speaker
What gets measured gets improved, right?
00:06:49
Speaker
So that's the biggest thing.
00:06:51
Speaker
If you own a company right now and you're looking for a better way to train your reps or you're a rep,
00:06:56
Speaker
looking to improve your skillset, the first thing you should do is establish a baseline with your skills and where you're currently at by tracking everything from activities to what skills you're working on, your current sales pipeline, you need to make sure you're tracking.
00:07:13
Speaker
So I'd say that's the first mistake I've seen working with, I'd say probably a little over 45, 50 different solar companies at this point in my career.
00:07:24
Speaker
Yeah, no, that's good.
00:07:26
Speaker
Yeah, tracking is huge.
00:07:27
Speaker
And like, my question is, how do you know?
00:07:29
Speaker
I don't know, what are some specific things you track?
00:07:33
Speaker
I know you talked about a little bit of just barely, but like, when I've gotten coaching and training, sometimes it's tough to tell with reps, it's like, oh, are they just more motivated to work?
00:07:43
Speaker
Are they like putting in a few more hours or is this like actual information helping them?
00:07:48
Speaker
So what are things that, I don't know, is there anything specific you're seeing?
00:07:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:52
Speaker
It's like you track this thing and that's how you know if the training is actually working or how are you seeing?
00:07:57
Speaker
Exactly.
00:07:58
Speaker
Yeah, so the biggest, before we get to that, I want to kind of give the big idea of this.
00:08:02
Speaker
So the big idea is to adopt what I call conscious skill development.
00:08:06
Speaker
So most reps kind of use the spray and pray method with training and companies.
00:08:12
Speaker
And that method is...
00:08:14
Speaker
the most familiar with anybody and it's proven, right?
00:08:17
Speaker
You will learn that method is to just go out there, do the craft, repeat, put in the work and you'll learn as a byproduct through experience, right?
00:08:27
Speaker
And that is effective to a degree, but you're wasting a lot of time in there.
00:08:32
Speaker
Is what I found working with teams and myself
00:08:39
Speaker
we're able to really cut the learning time by a drastic amount.
00:08:43
Speaker
And I can't give you an exact percentage or anything, but I've been able to learn everything from marketing to sales to recruiting to basically every skill within business.
00:08:54
Speaker
It's kind of a running joke Taylor and I have with things.
00:08:57
Speaker
I just have like a ridiculous set of skills, whether it's from producing sales videos, promo videos, marketing email, whatever it is, right?
00:09:07
Speaker
And it's because I use this process.
00:09:10
Speaker
What was your question again?
00:09:12
Speaker
Mine was just like, are there specific things?
00:09:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:14
Speaker
Are there specific things that you're like, I don't know, companies that you've been working with?
00:09:18
Speaker
It's like, okay, that's how you're going to know if it actually had an ROI or ROI or paid off.
00:09:24
Speaker
Cause yeah, I know that's a big problem is like guys can't see that it's, they don't necessarily know if they improved from this training or maybe your reps were working more hours.
00:09:32
Speaker
So yeah.
00:09:33
Speaker
What are things you're telling them?
00:09:34
Speaker
So here's what we
Core Skills for Success in Solar Sales
00:09:35
Speaker
measure.
00:09:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:36
Speaker
So five key things specifically for solar.
00:09:38
Speaker
One, it's going to be,
00:09:42
Speaker
Most of you guys, it's gonna be knocking doors, right?
00:09:45
Speaker
Second, we have appointment setting for skill sets.
00:09:47
Speaker
We have presenting for number three, closing's number four, and then five is emotional intelligence, EQ, right?
00:09:54
Speaker
These are kind of like the five core skill sets that you need to master to really successfully sell solar.
00:10:01
Speaker
How you measure these is you define a clear outcome for each activity.
00:10:06
Speaker
In other words, like what do we wanna produce when we're prospecting?
00:10:11
Speaker
For most guys, it's we want to get a new lead, right?
00:10:14
Speaker
A new opportunity.
00:10:15
Speaker
So we define what we want to accomplish with each skill.
00:10:20
Speaker
So for prospecting, maybe it's a new lead.
00:10:22
Speaker
Okay.
00:10:23
Speaker
For prospecting,
00:10:25
Speaker
Some door knocking companies, it may be time spent on doors is the most valuable metric.
00:10:32
Speaker
So these metrics will be different company to company.
00:10:35
Speaker
And the way you determine what is the most valuable metric to measure is the one that produces the majority of the hours.
00:10:44
Speaker
outcomes.
00:10:45
Speaker
And you can only do this if you track, right?
00:10:48
Speaker
That's the thing.
00:10:49
Speaker
That's why nobody does this is because their tracking is not in place to begin with.
00:10:53
Speaker
You need to be tracking, not just like leads and appointment set.
00:10:56
Speaker
It's actual activities.
00:10:58
Speaker
So how much time are you spending per rep on the doors, right?
00:11:02
Speaker
How many doors are you knocking to get a conversation, right?
00:11:05
Speaker
These are things that you need to track if you want to have a successful training system.
00:11:09
Speaker
So go through each activity within your sales process.
00:11:13
Speaker
if you're a rep or a company owner and define what you want to accomplish with each particular skillset.
00:11:20
Speaker
So yeah.
00:11:21
Speaker
Does that answer your question?
00:11:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:23
Speaker
That's better.
00:11:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:24
Speaker
And I think a big thing that companies struggle with is just the actual tracking.
00:11:28
Speaker
Um, because I've seen, you know, I've worked for multiple companies now where it's like they're tracking is just, um, you know, whatever's posted in like the group, me, the group chat.
00:11:38
Speaker
It's like, Oh, I got a lead.
00:11:40
Speaker
Okay, we're going to put that up, count it as a lead.
00:11:42
Speaker
But it's like, they don't know, was that lead, was it qualified, was it actually booked with a homeowner?
00:11:48
Speaker
Were they using enough energy to even count as a solar lead?
00:11:51
Speaker
Like all these things.
00:11:52
Speaker
And then they don't even know how to figure this out and track it.
00:11:58
Speaker
Start majoring it good.
00:11:59
Speaker
So what's really cool about what we've been able to do within Solcitee too, is we're helping companies set up just systems for actually tracking this.
00:12:07
Speaker
Because the truth is most people don't know how to set up good systems to track and measure and report all these different KPIs.
00:12:13
Speaker
It's like they're just arbitrary numbers thrown up on a scoreboard on a group chat.
00:12:19
Speaker
And they may or may not be true.
00:12:21
Speaker
I mean, I've worked for lots of companies where reps are just throwing up.
00:12:24
Speaker
I got six leads today where four of them were booked with people that didn't even own the home.
00:12:29
Speaker
And the other two, they just put just to make them make themselves look good.
00:12:33
Speaker
So it's like, come on, you're not going to be able to know.
00:12:36
Speaker
Happens all the time.
00:12:37
Speaker
Like so much.
00:12:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:40
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:41
Speaker
So it's, yeah.
00:12:41
Speaker
Soul Society will have done it.
00:12:43
Speaker
It's done for you tracking.
00:12:44
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:45
Speaker
So I've got to give you a secret sauce right now on kind of how to do this as a rep or a company owner.
00:12:51
Speaker
But basically the first thing we accomplished with our enterprise setup is like we literally will track your reps on over 45 different skillset points that we found in the industry, whether it's from door knocking, specifically tailored to your business.
00:13:05
Speaker
And then we generate reports for your entire team on a weekly basis down to the rep.
00:13:10
Speaker
So you'll know exactly what's going on, what insights you need to make good decisions.
00:13:14
Speaker
So again,
00:13:15
Speaker
That's what we do there, but let's keep moving and give them kind of the get back on track, give them the process on how to actually train and develop your skills.
00:13:27
Speaker
Cool.
00:13:28
Speaker
So yeah.
Strategies for Conscious Skill Development
00:13:29
Speaker
So like we're talking about, I mean, you set up a lot of these processes so you can get into the specifics, but I think the cool thing for me was just seeing
00:13:37
Speaker
The interactive stuff, the quizzes.
00:13:41
Speaker
I don't know about you, but I've gone through tons of video, you know, courses, trainings, things like that, just online courses where it's just a random video and then you're expected to remember all this, to implement it.
00:13:53
Speaker
And half the time you don't even remember what you just watched.
00:13:56
Speaker
So I think a big key in any training course is just actually getting tested on the material, getting quizzed and remembering it.
00:14:04
Speaker
So that's a big key that I thought was super impressive about what we've been able to develop within society.
00:14:10
Speaker
But yeah, what are some other things, James?
00:14:12
Speaker
Do you want to talk about that and just other specific, I guess, training processes that were set up within that?
00:14:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:18
Speaker
Yep.
00:14:18
Speaker
So back to the conscious training thing, the way you combat this and really just accelerate your learning time ridiculously is set a time, a minimum, I would say one hour is what I recommend with clients.
00:14:31
Speaker
Have each rep, or if you're listening as a rep, set aside one hour where you dedicate all of your time, focus, and attention to developing a skill, right?
00:14:42
Speaker
That skill can be anything, door knocking, presenting, whatever it is.
00:14:45
Speaker
Now there are a couple of rules with skill development time I have for myself and our clients when we do this.
00:14:53
Speaker
One, this needs to be private time.
00:14:55
Speaker
Okay.
00:14:56
Speaker
Zero distractions, nothing getting in your way.
00:14:58
Speaker
Like if you want to be really hyper effective here, it's got to be all in laser focus, turn off the Facebook, turn off the notifications, all in skill development time.
00:15:06
Speaker
Second, this is not sales activities.
00:15:09
Speaker
Okay.
00:15:09
Speaker
So let's
00:15:10
Speaker
a knocking doors doesn't count as your skill development time, right?
00:15:13
Speaker
Going on presentations does not count.
00:15:15
Speaker
This is not actually talking to customers.
00:15:18
Speaker
That's where I don't see a lot of guys do this, where they don't actually dedicate time to, think about it this way.
00:15:25
Speaker
If you're talking to a homeowner, right?
00:15:28
Speaker
stuff's changing constantly, right?
00:15:31
Speaker
Something shows up, you gotta build rapport here, you're dynamically shifting.
00:15:34
Speaker
You can't work on your skillset in that case.
00:15:37
Speaker
You need to have a fixed variable.
00:15:39
Speaker
So sales activities don't count.
00:15:41
Speaker
And then third, binge watching courses and videos is not training time.
00:15:46
Speaker
This is what throws a lot of people off.
00:15:49
Speaker
It's basically just entertainment.
00:15:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:15:52
Speaker
Right.
00:15:53
Speaker
Just watching a bunch of videos back to back.
00:15:57
Speaker
And that's why we do things very differently with Soul Society too, where it's just like 20 minute bite sized videos.
00:16:03
Speaker
It's not designed for you to binge watch all the videos in a weekend.
00:16:06
Speaker
It's to just choose one skill based video, watch that, implement it.
00:16:09
Speaker
Right.
00:16:10
Speaker
So that's what you want to do to set yourself up for success.
00:16:14
Speaker
Aaron Shaw, Ph.D.: There's another tool with this I like to use what I call a practice log.
00:16:18
Speaker
Okay, so this could be a digital version.
00:16:21
Speaker
This could be a paper version, whatever you want to do.
00:16:23
Speaker
I've been using this long before solar.
00:16:26
Speaker
It happens to work fantastic in sales.
00:16:28
Speaker
I actually learned this process as a musician growing up as well.
00:16:35
Speaker
So what you do is you document what you're training, your specific outcomes, what you're working on specifically within each skill set on a daily basis during this hour.
00:16:46
Speaker
So you're productive.
00:16:47
Speaker
The way I like to do it is simply just define my skill goal.
00:16:51
Speaker
So let's do it you, Taylor.
00:16:53
Speaker
What's a skill that you'd like to work on and further develop right now with your sales?
00:17:03
Speaker
I would say increasing my closing percentage.
00:17:07
Speaker
Yeah, getting it up probably at about 40% right now.
00:17:10
Speaker
I want to get it up to more like 60, something like that.
00:17:13
Speaker
Okay, cool.
00:17:15
Speaker
So we want to set the clear outcome.
00:17:18
Speaker
We want to increase your close rate by 20%, right?
00:17:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:17:22
Speaker
Perfect.
00:17:23
Speaker
So how do we know if we increase Taylor's close rate by 20%?
00:17:27
Speaker
We need to define that metric.
00:17:30
Speaker
So
00:17:32
Speaker
let's say that you go on 10 appointments, right?
00:17:34
Speaker
We know that you're going to close four of them about right now on average, right?
00:17:39
Speaker
So we know he needs to close two extra appointments, right?
00:17:44
Speaker
Per what?
00:17:46
Speaker
Month, week, month,
00:17:48
Speaker
we define what we want to set, right?
00:17:50
Speaker
If it's month, we say month, right?
00:17:52
Speaker
So you want to write these down.
00:17:53
Speaker
You got to get really granular.
00:17:54
Speaker
Like how will you actually know if he increased it?
00:17:59
Speaker
Make sure you're tracking those numbers, right?
00:18:01
Speaker
Now to the training specifically, right?
00:18:04
Speaker
What makes up a close?
00:18:06
Speaker
Because closing is kind of a broad skill, right?
00:18:10
Speaker
I don't actually think closing is a skill set.
00:18:13
Speaker
Closing is handling rebuttals, handling objections and smoke screens.
00:18:18
Speaker
It's how your presentation works, right?
00:18:22
Speaker
So we need to identify like what is the root cause that's causing Taylor's close rate to be 40% and not 60%.
00:18:30
Speaker
So let me ask you that, Taylor.
00:18:31
Speaker
Do you know or have a suspicion of what that root cause would be?
00:18:37
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I would say just based off of what I know, without tracking it super good, is just getting in front of more qualified people.
00:18:47
Speaker
Because right now, I mean, I'll go to closes sometimes where it's like, there's a good chance they're not even going to qualify.
00:18:56
Speaker
So I guess stuff like that.
00:18:58
Speaker
And also if, you know, if the spouse isn't there,
00:19:04
Speaker
Um, so I don't know, just getting in front of more qualified people because my closing ratio can't increase if I'm not getting in front of
00:19:12
Speaker
You know, like obviously my closing ratio is going to be less if it's just talking to one spouse.
00:19:17
Speaker
It's talking to people that are lower credits.
00:19:20
Speaker
If it's talking to people that have energy bills that are super low, those are all things that decrease it.
00:19:26
Speaker
So I don't know.
00:19:27
Speaker
I think for me, it's like also tracking those things, like how many of these appointments are actually super qualified to even close.
00:19:34
Speaker
But yeah, that's just one thing I would think of.
00:19:37
Speaker
Is that what you're asking?
00:19:39
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:19:39
Speaker
You answered perfectly.
00:19:40
Speaker
So what's interesting here is Taylor thought he had a closing problem.
00:19:45
Speaker
He doesn't have a closing skill problem.
00:19:48
Speaker
This is where reps would make the mistake with this and they'd go start working on like fancy closing lines and stuff like that.
00:19:54
Speaker
He doesn't have a problem with those lines, right?
00:19:56
Speaker
He has an appointment setting skill issue at this point.
00:20:02
Speaker
So now we know, all right.
00:20:04
Speaker
The root causes appointment setting.
00:20:06
Speaker
That's what we need to spend our time on, right?
00:20:08
Speaker
See how that works.
00:20:10
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting.
00:20:11
Speaker
Cool.
00:20:12
Speaker
So we want to work backwards at this point.
00:20:15
Speaker
Okay.
00:20:16
Speaker
I was just going to say, that's probably a lot of, um, a lot of companies once they start actually tracking and getting deep into this data, it's probably like what they'll realize is companies think they have one problem, but really it's another problem.
Effective Structure for Skill Training Sessions
00:20:29
Speaker
Every time prospecting, maybe it's getting more qualified leads.
00:20:32
Speaker
So that is interesting.
00:20:34
Speaker
Like, uh, so I used to own a marketing agency, right?
00:20:37
Speaker
Um,
00:20:39
Speaker
All the time we hear in solar, I have lead problems, right?
00:20:42
Speaker
I need more leads.
00:20:44
Speaker
I could tell you like seven to eight times out of 10, it's not a lead issue.
00:20:49
Speaker
It's a offer issue.
00:20:51
Speaker
It's a branding issue.
00:20:53
Speaker
It's a training issue with their reps.
00:20:55
Speaker
They're not training the reps how to self-generate.
00:20:57
Speaker
Even when they get the leads, they don't actually use them effectively.
00:21:02
Speaker
They won't.
00:21:05
Speaker
waste 90 out of 100 of leads, right?
00:21:08
Speaker
Boiling things down to its first principles is like a fundamental skill here.
00:21:12
Speaker
So how do we actually practice your appointment setting?
00:21:15
Speaker
That's what I want to talk about here.
00:21:16
Speaker
So we've got our practice log.
00:21:19
Speaker
We've set aside an hour to practice.
00:21:21
Speaker
Here's what we're going to do.
00:21:22
Speaker
We're going to divide our 60-minute skill session into three more main parts, okay?
00:21:28
Speaker
The first 20 minutes, we're going to work on what we call fundamental techniques, right?
00:21:33
Speaker
What are the like basic technical mechanics of setting an appointment?
00:21:38
Speaker
So in this case, this would be like how long the call should be when you're setting an appointment, how long you should take on the door to set an appointment, right?
00:21:46
Speaker
What you're saying, the script itself is
00:21:49
Speaker
That's technical.
00:21:50
Speaker
That's fundamental.
00:21:51
Speaker
The objections and FAQs, that's technical and fundamental.
00:21:55
Speaker
So in this first 20 minutes, we're going to practice really just going through all of those processes.
00:22:02
Speaker
So like knowing your FAQs,
00:22:06
Speaker
just right off the bat, right?
00:22:08
Speaker
Somebody says, what if the solar panels get dirty?
00:22:11
Speaker
Boom, you can handle it without even thinking, right?
00:22:14
Speaker
So in this 20 minute period, I'm gonna go through my weak points, my FAQs, my whatever it is, my scripts, and I'm just gonna practice them.
00:22:20
Speaker
I'm gonna say them out loud.
00:22:22
Speaker
I'm gonna...
00:22:23
Speaker
Turn myself on camera, right?
00:22:25
Speaker
I'm going to practice saying it that way.
00:22:26
Speaker
I'm going to record myself.
00:22:27
Speaker
I'm going to get my tonality right.
00:22:29
Speaker
I'm going to break down specifically what parts in there I'm missing, whether it's tone, whether it's script, whether it's FAQs, right?
00:22:37
Speaker
We're getting very nitty gritty details for 20 minutes and just repeating that process.
00:22:43
Speaker
Right.
00:22:43
Speaker
That's huge.
00:22:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:45
Speaker
And this is another huge thing I think companies miss is just their recording aspects, actually seeing what their reps are saying.
00:22:52
Speaker
I just had another Lenny Gray.
00:22:55
Speaker
He was on the episode, I think, I don't know, two episodes ago.
00:22:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:59
Speaker
He wrote the two door-to-door millionaire books.
00:23:02
Speaker
But yeah, it's something he talks about a lot in his training is just actually having your reps record what they're saying on their doors, record their objection handling, and
00:23:10
Speaker
Send it into their managers, send it into the company owners, send it into the VPSLs and all that because then they can actually diagnose and fix the problem.
00:23:18
Speaker
That's something that I think is super powerful.
00:23:20
Speaker
What we're doing within Solciety is we're helping also companies set up these systems and get recordings from their reps, have them actually train effectively because how many people think they're out there following the script, following how they were taught to handle the objections, and then you get out there, you listen to them, and you're like, what the phrase are you saying?
00:23:41
Speaker
That's accountability.
00:23:42
Speaker
Accountability is a big problem with that for sure.
00:23:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:46
Speaker
So after we've worked on our fundamental techniques, right?
00:23:49
Speaker
The technical skills, it's only got to get us so far, right?
00:23:52
Speaker
Next, we want to do modeling and reviewing.
00:23:54
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:55
Speaker
So the next 20 minutes, this is where your rep should be watching what your managers are doing, hopping on a quick call with them, listening to recordings of themselves or managers or other people in
00:24:13
Speaker
best looks like specifically for the skill they're working on.
00:24:16
Speaker
This is where you review the game tape too, right?
00:24:19
Speaker
They'll listen to their recordings.
00:24:21
Speaker
Hey, I don't like how I did this.
00:24:23
Speaker
The next practice session, they're gonna work on that specific skill they identified, right?
00:24:28
Speaker
The last 20 minutes is role play and implementation.
00:24:32
Speaker
So we wanna make sure that we're practicing the new skills that we just learned in modeling, right?
00:24:39
Speaker
And we're role playing with somebody, an accountability partner.
00:24:43
Speaker
Right.
00:24:44
Speaker
So managers, other reps, people online and groups, whoever it is, you got to be role-playing on a daily basis.
00:24:52
Speaker
Like this is another just fundamental everybody misses, right?
00:24:56
Speaker
Sales is a predictability game, a consistency game, right?
00:25:02
Speaker
For every one day, two days you miss selling, right?
00:25:06
Speaker
It's going to take you three to four days to make that skill up.
00:25:10
Speaker
If you go a year with it,
00:25:12
Speaker
without selling, watch what happens, right?
00:25:16
Speaker
I've done the same thing too, where I go like six months, 12 months without like hopping on closing calls regularly.
00:25:21
Speaker
That skillset is almost shot, man.
00:25:23
Speaker
Like it goes down considerably and I have to get back in the ring, right?
00:25:26
Speaker
Role playing, actually going out there in the field more to get that skill place up.
00:25:31
Speaker
So that's kind of my skill session divided up into 60 minutes.
00:25:35
Speaker
Tech technique, 20 minutes, modeling, 20 minutes, role play, 20 minutes.
00:25:41
Speaker
Yeah, that's awesome.
00:25:42
Speaker
It's funny how much it, yeah, me, James and I were both from the music world.
00:25:47
Speaker
So I know you're doing like trumpet and stuff.
00:25:49
Speaker
But yeah, it just reminds me.
00:25:50
Speaker
It's so funny.
00:25:51
Speaker
You know, that's how practice sessions were divided up.
00:25:54
Speaker
It's like 20 minutes of technique, 20 minutes of, I don't know, improv, whatever, 20 minutes of whatever repertoire you're working on.
00:26:02
Speaker
Yeah, it's the same stuff.
00:26:03
Speaker
And people forget about all these things in solar.
00:26:06
Speaker
But I think this is what separates truly the best from the people that are just staying where they're at is they're always working on these things.
00:26:12
Speaker
And you mentioned like, you know, even guys that are experienced getting out and doing taking sales calls, still doing role plays.
00:26:20
Speaker
That reminds me of a story where I had my previous company, I had one of like, he was a VP of sales, he came out with me.
00:26:27
Speaker
to a deal.
00:26:28
Speaker
And I'm thinking, okay, this guy is going to close them like no problem.
00:26:31
Speaker
20 minutes will be in and out of the house.
00:26:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:33
Speaker
Close them.
00:26:34
Speaker
And he hadn't gone to a close for probably, I don't know, maybe at least a couple months at that time.
00:26:40
Speaker
And he came to this close and he just, I mean, it was, it was okay, but he forgot a couple of crucial things.
00:26:47
Speaker
Number one, the husband was in the other room
00:26:49
Speaker
He forgot to even invite the husband into the presentation.
00:26:55
Speaker
And then at the close, you could tell he's just super uncomfortable.
00:26:59
Speaker
So I'm like, man, I thought this was going to be a 20-minute close.
00:27:02
Speaker
And at the time, I was a newer rep.
00:27:03
Speaker
So I'm like, okay, he's probably doing this for a reason.
00:27:05
Speaker
He probably just knows he's so good at closing that he doesn't have to invite the spouse into the room.
00:27:10
Speaker
He's that good, so he doesn't even need to invite them.
00:27:12
Speaker
But sure enough, we get to the end.
00:27:14
Speaker
I'm like, no, I need to talk to my spouse.
00:27:17
Speaker
You get all the same objections.
00:27:18
Speaker
And I'm like, wow, okay.
00:27:20
Speaker
So that's what happens.
00:27:21
Speaker
Even guys that are at the top of their game, if they're not doing these things, there's no staying neutral.
00:27:29
Speaker
You're either getting better or you're getting worse.
00:27:31
Speaker
So that's what's going to happen.
00:27:32
Speaker
Perfectly said.
00:27:34
Speaker
So yeah, I think that's a big thing we're trying to solve.
00:27:36
Speaker
But yeah, James, anything else that we're doing, I don't know, in the epic processes in SolSciety, what
Accountability and Motivation in Sales Teams
00:27:43
Speaker
else are we missing?
00:27:43
Speaker
Anything else we're implementing to help companies and reps improve their craft?
00:27:48
Speaker
So, I mean, I'll talk about a lot more on the specific company stuff, but the biggest benefit in our program we've put together and what my company provides for Taylor as well as a content partner is the tracking, as I talked about.
00:28:02
Speaker
Accountability is second piece that most companies miss.
00:28:06
Speaker
You need to be holding your reps accountable for training, not on a monthly basis or weekly, a daily basis, okay?
00:28:14
Speaker
If you need, if we're asking and showing you right now that training...
00:28:20
Speaker
60 minutes a day, right?
00:28:22
Speaker
You can plainly see on here, whether you take anything, what we're saying for real or with a grain of salt, doesn't matter.
00:28:29
Speaker
You can admit that if your reps were to train specifically on their weak points and their skills for 60 minutes a day following this process, do you think they would get better at selling?
00:28:38
Speaker
It's an obvious answer.
00:28:39
Speaker
Yes.
00:28:39
Speaker
Right.
00:28:40
Speaker
The problem is
00:28:42
Speaker
Most company owners don't believe their reps will actually put in the work with this and they don't want to babysit their reps with that.
00:28:49
Speaker
So that's where we actually come into play in our partnership, me and Taylor here, is we actually hold your reps accountable through what we call a pod check system, where they're actually holding each other accountable with quick five minute check-ins.
00:29:04
Speaker
with each member of their team on a daily consistent basis to make sure they're training and they're reaching their goals.
00:29:10
Speaker
The other part of this is just incentives at the end of the day.
00:29:13
Speaker
What are you actually rewarding and incentivizing as a business owner?
00:29:18
Speaker
And the biggest mistake again that not
00:29:24
Speaker
just anybody right i'm not just picking on solar here but it's for sure in solar that's where i've learned this process we're incentivizing only one outcome most of the time and that's sales right most companies say hey taylor go sell 10 deals we'll buy you a rolex or whatever we'll rent you a tesla for a year right the problem is that only incentivizes who like your top producers that know they're gonna be able to do the action the rest of your team is just like
00:29:51
Speaker
screw it, Taylor's a rock star, I'm not gonna even try, right?
00:29:55
Speaker
This happens like every freaking time a sales contest.
00:30:00
Speaker
And when I was the VP of sales, right?
00:30:03
Speaker
a few years back, I was just like, dude, no matter how awesome the prize is, cash, we did like a 25 grand in cash for like a month competition one time.
00:30:14
Speaker
Guess what?
00:30:15
Speaker
It's the same crap.
00:30:16
Speaker
Three reps out of the lot are actually motivated by it, right?
00:30:21
Speaker
And what I realized...
00:30:24
Speaker
is it's because we're incentivizing only results and results are so overwhelming and big to go and accomplish, right?
00:30:31
Speaker
Our rep sees he's gotta go close 10, 15 deals to go on the company retreat.
00:30:35
Speaker
He's like, dude, I haven't even closed more than three deals.
00:30:38
Speaker
I'm not even gonna, how the freak am I gonna make this happen, right?
00:30:41
Speaker
This is why your numbers are so key because guess what happens when you know your numbers?
00:30:46
Speaker
you can track activities and incentivize activities, not results.
00:30:52
Speaker
If you know for a fact that going on 10 appointments as a rep is gonna yield three, four closes, right?
00:30:59
Speaker
You can now place rewards, right, on appointment set and not those deals.
00:31:05
Speaker
Where companies get scared with this is because they don't know their metrics, they don't have any trust in the system that an appointment is not just gonna get fudged to get a quick reward.
00:31:15
Speaker
If you have accountability with your reps and you know they can't BS you, right?
00:31:20
Speaker
You can incentivize whatever you want to do, right?
00:31:23
Speaker
Make the barrier super low.
00:31:25
Speaker
Yes.
00:31:26
Speaker
So that's the final piece.
00:31:28
Speaker
We do the same thing with SolCiety.
00:31:31
Speaker
We help you craft really unique and specific incentives to your team that will actually motivate them and use action motivations and incentives rather than just results.
00:31:41
Speaker
So.
00:31:41
Speaker
Yeah, so powerful, guys.
00:31:43
Speaker
So this is key.
00:31:45
Speaker
Whether you get on Solciety or not, it's something that every company needs to be thinking about is just how can we better develop these systems?
Challenges and Solutions in Incentive Tracking
00:31:52
Speaker
How can we better develop our reps to get the maximum efficiency out of them?
00:31:56
Speaker
Because if you're not doing these things,
00:31:58
Speaker
It's a big reason you're losing reps.
00:32:00
Speaker
Companies are losing reps.
00:32:01
Speaker
It's like, you know, pouring water into a basket.
00:32:04
Speaker
You have 10 holes in the basket.
00:32:05
Speaker
You don't have these processes and systems set up, set up the water's just leaking out the ends of it.
00:32:10
Speaker
I mean, right now, or matter of fact, our company's doing this exact thing.
00:32:14
Speaker
We have a, uh, Connor McGregor tickets set up for the weekend.
00:32:18
Speaker
Um, we have to close six deals.
00:32:20
Speaker
So that's great.
00:32:21
Speaker
And yeah, it's going to motivate the top guys, but how about the guys that have never closed more than two deals in a week?
00:32:26
Speaker
or that I've only closed one day a week.
00:32:28
Speaker
It's like, you need to have these top incentives, but you also need to be rewarding these little things, these mini habits as guys like Mike O'Donnell, stuff like he's come on and talked about these things.
00:32:38
Speaker
But what are these little actions that you can reward that are going to lead to the big actions?
00:32:43
Speaker
Because not everyone's going to go out and hit six deals in their first
00:32:46
Speaker
first week so how can you also give them incentives how can you motivate them and then how can you track and set all the systems in place because most companies that i've seen just i mean they don't even know how to track their incentives and it happens they're at every company i've been with it's like you could talk to any rep they're they've been oh yeah i won this incentive but i didn't get paid out on it yeah i was keeping track so i personally owed a lot of prizes from back when i was selling full time
00:33:16
Speaker
I know.
00:33:17
Speaker
And I know for reps, that's the worst thing you want to do is have to go, you know, beg your, your manager.
00:33:21
Speaker
Your credibility as a sales leader just tanks, man.
00:33:25
Speaker
Culture just goes down.
00:33:26
Speaker
Like, why would you even want to participate in the next contest?
00:33:29
Speaker
I know.
00:33:30
Speaker
And it's not that they don't want to, but it's just, they don't, yeah, they don't, they probably don't even know who won it.
00:33:35
Speaker
They don't have a system set in a place to track that.
00:33:38
Speaker
And then they just forget.
00:33:39
Speaker
So yeah.
00:33:39
Speaker
It's important to have someone in charge of this.
00:33:41
Speaker
And then if not, I mean, yeah, considering getting on Solcity, that's what we're trying to help companies do is really set up these systems and then track up for them.
00:33:50
Speaker
So you don't have to worry about all this.
00:33:51
Speaker
You don't have to remember it.
00:33:52
Speaker
And then we're going to help you put these systems in place and actually get reps rewarded for these little actions they're taking.
00:33:59
Speaker
So super powerful stuff.
00:34:01
Speaker
Go set it up, figure out a way to do it.
00:34:03
Speaker
And James, I think we covered quite a bit of the details, but anything else that I don't know you wanted to cover that I didn't think of?
00:34:12
Speaker
No, I think I'm looking forward to putting out some solo episodes to really dive deep on some of these concepts.
00:34:20
Speaker
Awesome.
00:34:21
Speaker
Yeah, so we're looking forward to it.
00:34:22
Speaker
Let us know what you thought of this, guys, especially for company owners.
00:34:26
Speaker
Let us know if there's things that you struggle with because that's what James is going to be doing specific episodes on.
00:34:33
Speaker
It's things that companies struggle with and things that we can help them improve as far as systems and processes.
00:34:39
Speaker
So James, thanks for coming on.
00:34:41
Speaker
Guys, we'll be hearing more of you.
00:34:43
Speaker
And we had a few, sorry, we had some Wi-Fi issues.
00:34:46
Speaker
So I apologize if there was some blips in the audio, but we will get that figured out for next time.
00:34:53
Speaker
So set that up.
00:34:54
Speaker
And James, any final words you wanted to share before we talk next time?
00:34:58
Speaker
Yep.
00:35:00
Speaker
All right, guys.
00:35:01
Speaker
Well, we'll see you on the next show.
00:35:03
Speaker
Thanks for tuning in.
00:35:03
Speaker
And then if you are a rep that's listening to this, make sure to send it to your company owners so they can also work on these things.
00:35:10
Speaker
Because I know that's another problem is company owners aren't listening to this podcast.
00:35:13
Speaker
So send it to your company owners.
00:35:15
Speaker
Send it to the guys that do need help setting up these systems.
00:35:19
Speaker
And that's it, guys.
00:35:20
Speaker
So James is going to be talking more, and we'll see you guys on the next one.
00:35:24
Speaker
Hey SolarPrinters, quick question.
00:35:26
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?
00:35:36
Speaker
For the last three years, I've been placed in the fortunate position to interview dozens of elite solar professionals.
00:35:41
Speaker
and learn exactly what they do behind closed doors to build their solar careers to an all-star level.
00:35:47
Speaker
That's why I want to make a truly special announcement about the new solar learning community exclusively for solar professionals to learn, compete, and win with the top performers in the industry.
00:35:59
Speaker
and it's called Sol Society.
00:36:01
Speaker
This learning community was designed from the ground up to level the playing field and give Solar Pros access to proven mentors who want to give back to this community and help you or your team to be held accountable by the industry's brightest minds for, are you ready for it, less than $3.45 a day.
00:36:19
Speaker
Currently Soul Society is closed to the public and membership is by invitation only.
00:36:23
Speaker
But solopreneurs can go to soulciety.co to learn more and have the option to join a waitlist when a membership becomes available in your area.
00:36:33
Speaker
Again, this is exclusively for Solopreneur listeners, so be sure to go to www.solciety.co to join the waitlist and learn more now.
00:36:45
Speaker
Thanks again for listening.
00:36:46
Speaker
We'll catch you again in the next episode.