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100: Lies I've Told in Sales.. 😵
31 Plays5 years ago
Let’s bring honor to solar sales!! Unfortunately I’ve said some things that I’ve regretted while selling. While most were not a big deal, a few brought terrible reviews to my company. One even could’ve caused a lawsuit.. Hear what happened to me and PLEASE be honest 100% in your sales
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/taylor.armstrong.330
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/taylor-armstrong-3ba975139/
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Anchor: https://anchor.fm/solarpreneur/
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Transcript
Introduction to Solopreneurs
00:00:00
Speaker
What do you call an underground group of solar professionals on a mission to create a more sustainable world?
00:00:05
Speaker
We call ourselves solopreneurs.
00:00:08
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.
00:00:17
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.
00:00:30
Speaker
We are Solopreneurs, and this is our story.
Apologies and Listener Appreciation
00:00:34
Speaker
What's going on, Solopreneurs?
00:00:36
Speaker
We are back with another episode.
00:00:38
Speaker
This time, it's just me in the house.
00:00:40
Speaker
I apologize for missing last week.
00:00:42
Speaker
We're actually in Lake Powell.
00:00:44
Speaker
If any of you guys haven't been to Lake Powell in Utah, Arizona, you need to get down there.
00:00:49
Speaker
It's a blast.
00:00:51
Speaker
No excuses to not have an episode, but I am closing my own deals every week.
00:00:56
Speaker
Things do get a little busy, but I'm going to do the best to get you quality content every Friday coming your way straight to the podcast app or wherever you find your podcasts.
00:01:07
Speaker
So I wanted to get going.
00:01:09
Speaker
I wanted to revisit a couple reviews.
00:01:12
Speaker
We haven't checked them out for a while here, but just to thank the people who have given me a shout out.
00:01:17
Speaker
This is honestly what keeps me going.
00:01:19
Speaker
There's been several times where I've gotten super busy and just thought, you know,
00:01:25
Speaker
I'm not making money off this.
00:01:27
Speaker
Why not just stop the podcast?
00:01:29
Speaker
I'm making money off my solar deals.
00:01:30
Speaker
So let's focus my time there.
00:01:32
Speaker
But every time I see these reviews come in, this is honestly what has kept the show going.
00:01:37
Speaker
So I wanted to give a couple shout outs.
00:01:40
Speaker
First, we got one by Ian Chams.
00:01:43
Speaker
Says this podcast provides so much value in every episode.
00:01:46
Speaker
It's incredible skills that are not only imperative in solar, but in life.
00:01:51
Speaker
This podcast has completely changed my view of the industry by providing top quality content that you won't find anywhere else.
00:01:59
Speaker
Thank you, Ian.
00:02:00
Speaker
Makes my day.
00:02:01
Speaker
Loved it.
00:02:03
Speaker
Then we got another one by at Cleedog.
00:02:05
Speaker
He said, Great cells nuggets for solar earth nuggets.
00:02:09
Speaker
Listen to two episodes and going to go for more.
00:02:11
Speaker
If you want to be in the top 1% of solar cells pros, probably a good idea to check this pod out.
00:02:16
Speaker
Appreciate that.
00:02:18
Speaker
Then we got one here, and I'm not necessarily just picking the best ones.
00:02:23
Speaker
Luckily, we've had mostly good reviews.
00:02:26
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But I don't care what you think.
00:02:28
Speaker
Just leave your review.
00:02:30
Speaker
This is what gets people listening.
00:02:32
Speaker
So I appreciate the honest reviews too.
00:02:35
Speaker
We got one from Green Gorgeously here.
00:02:39
Speaker
This is a four-star review.
00:02:40
Speaker
She says, lots of good info, but I'd love for the hosts and guests to try to be more inclusive with their wording regarding sales reps.
00:02:47
Speaker
I'm a woman's sales rep, so when you discuss girlfriend or wife at home or the guys, that doesn't apply to us.
00:02:53
Speaker
It makes us feel out of place and excluded.
00:02:55
Speaker
We are here, and we are kicking butt selling solar as well.
00:02:58
Speaker
Please recognize this.
00:03:00
Speaker
Green Gorgeously, want to give you a shout-out for leaving an honest review.
00:03:05
Speaker
Really appreciate it.
00:03:07
Speaker
Telling what's on your mind, and especially in the social stuff we got going on in the country now.
00:03:12
Speaker
Obviously, U.S., if you're listening to this, can definitely appreciate that comment.
00:03:19
Speaker
And let me tell you, we definitely are going to try to improve that.
00:03:24
Speaker
I know I've been guilty of it, as I'm saying.
00:03:26
Speaker
Guys only referring to the wife at home, things like that.
00:03:31
Speaker
So I definitely appreciate commenting.
00:03:33
Speaker
comment like this being honest and giving us that reminder we are getting some powerhouse girl reps in the house we have that on the books we're going to get a few of them in here so I think it's important to get people of all different situations get the ladies here there's ladies that are closing deals galore and we are going to get them on the show so thanks for pointing that out thanks for being honest in the review
00:04:02
Speaker
Hey, solarpreneurs, real quick.
Recruiting and Celebrations
00:04:04
Speaker
If you've been in the solar industry any amount of time, you know that in order to take it to the next level, you need to always be recruiting.
00:04:10
Speaker
What is it, ABR?
00:04:12
Speaker
Always be recruiting.
00:04:14
Speaker
So if you need help with recruiting, I wanted to share with you something that helped me take my recruiting skills to the next level.
00:04:21
Speaker
We literally went from an office of less than 10 reps to 25 to 30 reps in less than three months.
00:04:30
Speaker
And we did this with reps that continue to sell with us.
00:04:35
Speaker
Two or three of them went on to become managers.
00:04:37
Speaker
Several of them were top producers in our office.
00:04:41
Speaker
And there are multiple reps that are still with us to this day, more than a year later.
00:04:48
Speaker
So what is it that helped me?
00:04:50
Speaker
I took up the services of Ryan Holman with Sells Recruiting University.
00:04:56
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He helped me develop a system to take my recruiting game to the next level.
00:05:01
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And he really helped me follow up with the recruits, schedule group interviews with them, get a huge pool of applicants coming in day after day.
00:05:11
Speaker
I wanted to share with you guys his link.
00:05:13
Speaker
If you are looking to take your recruiting skills to the next level, go to Calendly.com slash sru forward slash solarpreneur.
00:05:24
Speaker
Once again, that's Calendly.com slash sru slash solarpreneur.
00:05:33
Speaker
SRU is Sales Recruiting University.
00:05:35
Speaker
Ryan will help you take it to the next level.
00:05:44
Speaker
With that said, if you haven't left a review, please go leave us one.
00:05:48
Speaker
And you have some extra incentive to do that because guess what?
00:05:53
Speaker
This episode is actually the 100th Solarepreneur Podcast episode.
00:06:00
Speaker
Oh my gosh.
00:06:01
Speaker
Crazy.
00:06:03
Speaker
So what we're doing, we are doing a giveaway.
00:06:06
Speaker
And if you have a friend of me on Facebook, go hit me up, Taylor Armstrong.
00:06:10
Speaker
Also, go join the Solapreneur Facebook group if you're not already part of it because that is where the details will be posted.
00:06:17
Speaker
But what we're doing is giving away 48 boom boom sticks.
00:06:23
Speaker
If you don't know what that is, go see it.
00:06:25
Speaker
Go visit the group and you'll find out what it is.
00:06:28
Speaker
But basically, it's something...
00:06:30
Speaker
It is an essential oil stick that you can sniff.
00:06:34
Speaker
I know it sounds kind of crazy.
00:06:36
Speaker
And it gives you a burst of this essential oils in your nose.
00:06:40
Speaker
And I use these things anytime I'm about to go into the deal.
00:06:43
Speaker
Because I'm anchoring it to all the good thoughts, all the deals I've closed in the past.
00:06:48
Speaker
And it gets my brain alert and attentive.
00:06:50
Speaker
It's not drugs or anything.
00:06:52
Speaker
I know Wolf of Wall Street, other guys probably do drugs before deals.
00:06:56
Speaker
But I'm all about it.
00:06:58
Speaker
keeping it clean, doing stuff all natural.
00:07:02
Speaker
So if you want to get one of these, then go visit, again, the Facebook group, Solarpreneur Facebook group.
00:07:07
Speaker
All the details will be posted there.
00:07:10
Speaker
And all you'll need to do to get in on it is leave a review and then invite a few people into the group.
00:07:17
Speaker
So do that.
00:07:17
Speaker
And I want to send you something for free for our 100th episode.
00:07:21
Speaker
And thanks again for being a loyal listener and supporting us in this journey.
Sales Strategies Amidst COVID-19
00:07:28
Speaker
Cool, so just to get transitioned, get into the topic today, before I do that, I wanted to also mention just a little update on my personal sales.
00:07:40
Speaker
We're getting into the summer, which is awesome.
00:07:43
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Obviously, we're dealing still with the coronavirus challenge.
00:07:48
Speaker
And luckily, I've been on a knock.
00:07:49
Speaker
I'm here in San Diego.
00:07:51
Speaker
I'm knocking every day, usually without a mask.
00:07:54
Speaker
And a little tip on that, depending where you are at or how the kind of COVID climate is, my thoughts on it are I'm just going to be cautious.
00:08:04
Speaker
I'm not shaking people's hands.
00:08:06
Speaker
I'm giving them elbow bumps, fist bumps.
00:08:08
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That's what I'm doing.
00:08:09
Speaker
Personally, I'm choosing not to wear a mask while working.
00:08:13
Speaker
Okay, and here's my thoughts on it.
00:08:16
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The reason I'm not wearing one is because in my opinion, it makes it tougher to get inside the home.
00:08:24
Speaker
It makes it tougher.
00:08:25
Speaker
It's reminding people of, you know, how serious the situation is.
00:08:30
Speaker
I know it is serious, and I know people might bash on me, might disagree with me on this, but it's my personal view is when people see the mask,
00:08:38
Speaker
It's getting them in their head.
00:08:40
Speaker
It's making them more worried.
00:08:42
Speaker
It's making it a bigger deal.
00:08:44
Speaker
And I think we all need to keep our cool.
00:08:45
Speaker
Obviously be cautious out there.
00:08:48
Speaker
But I think it's something if we're cautious, if we're not trying to keep our distance for the most part,
00:08:54
Speaker
then people are really going to see you as a human being.
00:08:56
Speaker
They're not going to see you around as a walking virus.
00:08:59
Speaker
And I think, honestly, that's partly what the masks do is gets people nervous again.
00:09:04
Speaker
It's like, oh, yeah, I should be worried about the virus.
00:09:07
Speaker
What are you doing at my door?
00:09:09
Speaker
I'm definitely not letting you in the house.
00:09:11
Speaker
So that's what I think about it.
00:09:13
Speaker
I personally don't knock with a mask.
00:09:15
Speaker
I do.
00:09:16
Speaker
And I'm starting to carry one in my pocket.
00:09:19
Speaker
So if people bring it up, yeah, I can bring it out.
00:09:21
Speaker
And if I have to, I'll wear one.
00:09:23
Speaker
But that's my suggestion is just have it on hand, but I don't think it's necessarily necessary to wear one at all times when you're in the neighborhood.
00:09:34
Speaker
And again, it might be different, different areas.
00:09:36
Speaker
San Diego, obviously all California, it is pretty intense with the COVID situation here.
00:09:42
Speaker
So I would doubt that there's too many other states that are, that have more restrictions than California.
00:09:48
Speaker
I mean, out here, we can't even go into a store without a mask.
00:09:52
Speaker
My gym just opened up and I go in there the other day.
00:09:55
Speaker
I'm working out.
00:09:57
Speaker
All of a sudden I get one of their managers saying, hey, we had two people say that they don't like you working out without a mask.
00:10:04
Speaker
So I'm going to ask you to put on a mask or else leave the gym.
00:10:09
Speaker
Like, are you serious?
00:10:10
Speaker
I'm like, I'm going to pass out.
00:10:11
Speaker
I'm doing squats here.
00:10:12
Speaker
How am I supposed to do a workout with a mask on?
00:10:15
Speaker
So even my own gym is requiring masks, which is pretty crazy.
00:10:19
Speaker
So anytime I'm doing sets, I slip it down.
00:10:23
Speaker
And because I do think I would pass out if I'm working out the whole time with a mask.
00:10:29
Speaker
But it's pretty crazy here.
00:10:30
Speaker
So I'm hoping, obviously, I'm praying every day that things get better.
00:10:35
Speaker
And shout out to any of you who have caught the virus.
00:10:38
Speaker
I hope you guys make a speedy recovery.
00:10:40
Speaker
And I hope you're still able to close deals in this whole situation.
00:10:44
Speaker
But last thing on this, and then we'll get into the topic.
Lead Source Diversification
00:10:48
Speaker
Another thing that happens is my Facebook ads got shut down.
00:10:54
Speaker
And it sucks because I was getting quite a few leads over Facebook.
00:10:58
Speaker
But then, like I've talked about in...
00:11:01
Speaker
A couple other episodes, Mark Zuckerberg decides to snap his fingers.
00:11:05
Speaker
Same thing that Thanos does in Avengers, and we get shut down just like that.
00:11:11
Speaker
So guess what?
00:11:11
Speaker
I got no online leads coming in through that platform right now.
00:11:15
Speaker
So just to emphasize with that, if you are not getting leads from multiple sources, then this is very likely going to happen to you.
00:11:24
Speaker
Most of you that have been running Facebook ads, it probably has happened to you at some point.
00:11:29
Speaker
So I just want to emphasize the importance.
00:11:32
Speaker
Put your eggs in multiple baskets.
00:11:35
Speaker
That's why people should be knowing how to knock.
00:11:37
Speaker
That's why you should be able to get leads from multiple platforms, not just Facebook.
00:11:41
Speaker
You should be looking into YouTube ads.
00:11:45
Speaker
You should be looking on multiple platforms because if not, then something like this will happen to you and it's going to shut down your whole business.
00:11:55
Speaker
So get your eggs in multiple baskets.
00:11:57
Speaker
And that's just
Ethics and Honesty in Sales
00:11:59
Speaker
a reminder.
00:11:59
Speaker
I wanted to give people on that.
00:12:02
Speaker
Okay, so the topic today of the show is lies I've told while selling.
00:12:10
Speaker
Boom, boom, boom.
00:12:12
Speaker
Taylor Armstrong has told lies.
00:12:14
Speaker
Okay, so this is something, there's a couple of things I'm going to share on here that I am not proud of.
00:12:20
Speaker
A, I've tried my best to repent and turn away from some lies.
00:12:26
Speaker
Some are...
00:12:29
Speaker
Some lies were not intentional at all, and some were things that I just stretched the truth.
00:12:35
Speaker
So I'm sharing these things because I consider myself a really honest person.
00:12:40
Speaker
I go to church.
00:12:41
Speaker
Well, right now it's shut down, but I go to church, did a two-year mission for my church.
00:12:47
Speaker
I always strive to be as honest as I can, but unfortunately it gets to all of us, and I know hopefully I didn't speak to more people
00:12:57
Speaker
for more than just me that we get excited about selling.
00:13:01
Speaker
Sometimes we stretch the truth a little bit to get that sell.
00:13:04
Speaker
We're all commission based.
00:13:06
Speaker
So I'm going to tell several stories here and then just kind of illustrate
00:13:11
Speaker
what went down with it, and then hopefully you guys can learn from some of the lies I've told, whether they've been intentional or unintentional.
00:13:19
Speaker
And then just give a reminder to people to never lie, because I think in every one of these stories I'm going to tell, it's come back to haunt me.
00:13:29
Speaker
It's caused negative reviews.
00:13:31
Speaker
It has, yeah, just made things generally more difficult.
00:13:36
Speaker
So I want you guys to learn from mistakes that I have made.
00:13:40
Speaker
So before I get into some of these stories, just a couple of things I want to just review.
00:13:47
Speaker
Why do we need to be honest?
00:13:50
Speaker
There have been some pretty shady sales reps that I have heard about.
00:13:54
Speaker
Some even have gotten fired from companies I've worked for.
00:13:59
Speaker
But with that, I mean, first thing is it's just good karma.
00:14:05
Speaker
think anyone most people believe that as you put good things into the universe good things will come back to you if you're not being completely honest then trust me 100% of the time even if customers don't find out I believe it's karma is gonna come back for you something's going to happen even if the customer never finds out it will hurt you in one way or another if you're not being 100% honest
00:14:31
Speaker
And then there's some obvious things with it.
00:14:34
Speaker
It can cause lawsuits.
00:14:37
Speaker
Being honest, it can increase referrals.
00:14:40
Speaker
It can increase confidence.
00:14:41
Speaker
It's going to avoid bad reviews.
00:14:44
Speaker
And here's the thing.
00:14:45
Speaker
If you are caught on even a small lie, your credibility is gone completely.
00:14:51
Speaker
Nada.
00:14:51
Speaker
You have zero credibility.
00:14:54
Speaker
And the first story I want to tell with this is actually a good example of that.
00:14:59
Speaker
I think it's a story I may have told in previous episodes, but there was a time when this was probably about a year into me selling solar, and I was trying to improve as much as I could.
00:15:12
Speaker
I think I was listening to a lot of Grant Cardone at the time, and some of his suggestions are record yourself and then always listen to your recordings, listen to what you can do better.
00:15:25
Speaker
But here's the thing with that recording thing.
00:15:29
Speaker
cells recording other people without their permission here in California is illegal.
00:15:34
Speaker
You can't do that.
00:15:36
Speaker
I actually found out that in some states it's not illegal.
00:15:41
Speaker
As a matter of fact, some of our managers, some of our owners of our company went to Nevada for weekends to actually record videos of door approaches because apparently it's legal there to record without people's permission.
00:15:57
Speaker
But in California, it definitely is illegal, okay?
00:15:59
Speaker
So maybe you can check the laws in wherever you're at.
00:16:03
Speaker
But what happened is I went to a appointment and I started recording.
00:16:09
Speaker
I'm like, okay, I'm gonna get some great feedback on this.
00:16:14
Speaker
I'm gonna be able to listen in to what I'm saying, to maybe what I'm not saying, to the things I'm doing wrong.
00:16:21
Speaker
It's gonna be awesome.
00:16:22
Speaker
I go on there, it's this Hawaiian guy.
00:16:26
Speaker
and we start going through the deals, go through all the details of the deal, talk about solar.
00:16:31
Speaker
This is about 15-20 minutes into it, I get out a notepad to start writing on and when I do that, I bump my phone a little bit.
00:16:41
Speaker
It's actually on this table and if any of you have an iPhone, you know that when you press the record on voice memos, it shows a red bar at the top for recording.
00:16:51
Speaker
I bumped my phone.
00:16:53
Speaker
This guy, he sees the red bar.
00:16:55
Speaker
He's like, hey, is that recording?
00:16:59
Speaker
And I'm like, what?
00:17:00
Speaker
And I'm like a deer in the headlights.
00:17:02
Speaker
I'm just caught there.
00:17:04
Speaker
I'm like, what are you talking about?
00:17:05
Speaker
He's like, can you show me, can you tap your phone one more time?
00:17:09
Speaker
And I'm like, uh, and then I kind of like tap it again.
00:17:13
Speaker
And there's the red bar again.
00:17:15
Speaker
He's like, dude, are you serious?
00:17:18
Speaker
You're recording me?
00:17:20
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, yeah, I guess we're just doing some training stuff.
00:17:25
Speaker
He's like, you know what?
00:17:27
Speaker
I didn't give you permission to record.
00:17:30
Speaker
We're done here.
00:17:30
Speaker
We're done.
00:17:32
Speaker
And this guy flips out and I'm going to leave out some choice words.
00:17:36
Speaker
He started kind of yelling and freaked out and basically just kicked me out of his home.
00:17:42
Speaker
He caught me red-handed recording and told me to delete it.
00:17:47
Speaker
This guy was not happy.
00:17:49
Speaker
I can't remember if he did leave a negative review.
00:17:53
Speaker
Hopefully not.
00:17:54
Speaker
But honestly, this is something that's in California could probably cause like a lawsuit or someone suing the company.
00:18:02
Speaker
Some people take these things very seriously.
00:18:05
Speaker
And that's something that I forget is that to me, most stuff isn't a big deal.
00:18:10
Speaker
But sometimes we do things and it is a big deal to other people.
00:18:15
Speaker
That's the first story, that's the first example, and my credibility was gone off the table, had no chance in this deal anymore.
00:18:25
Speaker
He did, he was being pretty short on me, so it probably was kind of a long shot that it would have closed, but the second he saw that recording going, just all trust was lost.
00:18:37
Speaker
I was doing something without his permission, and he freaked out.
00:18:42
Speaker
So there's story number one, don't do that.
00:18:45
Speaker
And if you are going to record people, I would suggest asking their permission.
00:18:50
Speaker
This would have avoided a lot of pain for me.
00:18:54
Speaker
If I would ask them, hey, just for training purposes, our company just does it for training, do you mind if I record this?
00:19:00
Speaker
And they're just going to make sure that I'm explaining everything correctly, something like that.
00:19:04
Speaker
And I would bet that most people, if you bring it up like that,
00:19:09
Speaker
then you're probably gonna have a good chance at them not even caring.
00:19:14
Speaker
So bring it up, figure out the laws in your state.
00:19:18
Speaker
But don't do that, you're gonna lose credibility.
00:19:22
Speaker
And then I'll get into a few other stories, but another question to ask yourself is why are we tempted to lie?
00:19:31
Speaker
People, well in commission sales, we all know that we're not gonna make any money unless we close that deal.
00:19:39
Speaker
So I think that's the big thing.
00:19:40
Speaker
We're always tempted to get that next commission.
00:19:43
Speaker
Maybe it's a huge deal.
00:19:44
Speaker
Maybe we want to stretch the truth a little bit.
00:19:48
Speaker
I went to Door2DoorCon, which I've talked about in previous episodes.
00:19:54
Speaker
That was in February.
00:19:56
Speaker
And one of the guys that talked on solar, his name was Tyler McAllister,
00:20:01
Speaker
And I get this question all the time, but he brought up this question that he gets asked a lot by homeowners.
00:20:08
Speaker
And if you've been selling, you pretty much guarantee that you've been asked this.
00:20:12
Speaker
But the question is, what happens if we don't like the solar and want to take it off next year, later down the road?
00:20:20
Speaker
And what I thought was cool was Tyler McAllister.
00:20:24
Speaker
instead of kind of beating around the bush with it, he just goes straight for the kill.
00:20:30
Speaker
He says, oh, yeah, no, we don't take it off.
00:20:33
Speaker
You won't be able to take it off later.
00:20:36
Speaker
And that's why we make sure it's going to benefit you and that it will be a good thing.
00:20:40
Speaker
Okay, this is something that I appreciated is because I think most cells are absent.
00:20:46
Speaker
Well, especially me.
00:20:48
Speaker
Whenever I get asked this, in the past, I would kind of beat around the bush, be like, oh, um,
00:20:53
Speaker
Yeah, well, you wouldn't want to take it off and then just kind of like avoid the question.
00:21:00
Speaker
But I think people appreciate the honesty.
00:21:01
Speaker
And the other thing is if you don't know something, you don't need to pretend.
00:21:10
Speaker
You don't need to make stuff up.
00:21:13
Speaker
And that's something that's gotten me in trouble as well, which I'll share a story about.
00:21:18
Speaker
Don't make stuff up.
00:21:19
Speaker
Admit that you don't know things.
00:21:23
Speaker
And that's going to help you.
00:21:24
Speaker
It's going to help you build trust.
00:21:25
Speaker
If anything, it'll help the sell.
00:21:27
Speaker
It'll help you get more referrals.
00:21:29
Speaker
Because people will know that you, even the hard truths, even questions you ask them, or that they ask you, they know that they're getting the honest answer.
00:21:39
Speaker
And they can appreciate you saying things that maybe aren't the easiest truths to tell.
00:21:46
Speaker
So I really like that.
00:21:47
Speaker
So even if it's a tough question, don't bend the truth.
00:21:50
Speaker
Don't stretch things.
00:21:53
Speaker
and make sure you're being 100% honest.
00:21:57
Speaker
Another thing, here's a story that happened with that.
00:22:02
Speaker
I had a customer, this was about six months ago, that needed a main panel upgrade in order to get the solar up.
00:22:14
Speaker
They were super excited about the solar, but one of their important questions that they wanted to ask in order to go solar is, hey, will you guys pay for
00:22:23
Speaker
the panel upgrade, because it's probably going to be needed.
00:22:27
Speaker
And the way it worked, our company, they did panel upgrades, but only if it was needed.
00:22:33
Speaker
And obviously, we're just betting on most people not needing it, so we don't have to do it.
00:22:38
Speaker
But the customers that do need it, then, yeah, we just take the hit on it.
00:22:43
Speaker
So the lie I told, well, I should say the truth that I bended for this, and I would say it was a little bit unintentional, but I should have been watching what I was saying back then, is I said, oh, yeah, if it's needed, they'll do it.
00:23:00
Speaker
And the customer responded, okay, well, this home is like 80 years old, so it's a super old panel.
00:23:10
Speaker
And my response was, oh yeah, you guys will definitely get one then.
00:23:12
Speaker
You'll for sure get one.
00:23:14
Speaker
Don't worry about that.
00:23:16
Speaker
And then guess what?
00:23:18
Speaker
Our guys went and did the site survey, the inspection, after I closed the deal.
00:23:24
Speaker
And sure enough, the customer didn't need a main panel upgrade, which was surprising to me.
00:23:31
Speaker
He didn't need one.
00:23:32
Speaker
And I was like, oh, shoot.
00:23:35
Speaker
And then what happens next?
00:23:36
Speaker
I get a call from the wife.
00:23:38
Speaker
She is just...
00:23:39
Speaker
Super pissed.
00:23:40
Speaker
She's super mad.
00:23:42
Speaker
Saying, you promised us that we'd get the panel upgrade.
00:23:47
Speaker
Now you guys are saying we're not going to get one.
00:23:49
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, well.
00:23:52
Speaker
And at that point, I had nothing to say.
00:23:55
Speaker
I tried to defend myself.
00:23:57
Speaker
Honestly, I couldn't remember really what I said.
00:23:59
Speaker
But she reminded me that I told them they would need one.
00:24:04
Speaker
This got me in a lot of trouble.
00:24:06
Speaker
Unfortunately, had to basically take from my commission.
00:24:10
Speaker
to help them get the panel upgrade.
00:24:14
Speaker
Otherwise they were going to freak out.
00:24:16
Speaker
But yeah, this caused me a huge headache.
00:24:18
Speaker
I did several calls with them, basically just listening to them, cussed me out, listening to them super furious on the phone.
00:24:26
Speaker
And then they also called our owners.
00:24:30
Speaker
Yeah, they just caused a whole fiasco.
00:24:34
Speaker
So there's another example of a reason you shouldn't bend the truth.
00:24:41
Speaker
And then last story I'll tell.
00:24:45
Speaker
Let me see how many other stories we got.
00:24:49
Speaker
Okay.
00:24:49
Speaker
And then another thing that I've done in the past going on with the admitting to things you don't know.
00:24:57
Speaker
It's another problem I see, especially with newer reps.
00:25:01
Speaker
And here's a story of when I was super new.
00:25:04
Speaker
This was about two months into me selling solar.
00:25:08
Speaker
It was one of the, I think it was maybe the fourth or fifth deal that I had closed.
00:25:16
Speaker
I was just starting to go to deals myself without taking another closer to the deal.
00:25:23
Speaker
And at the time, I thought I knew all the details that I needed to share with the customers.
00:25:28
Speaker
I thought I knew how to answer all the questions.
00:25:32
Speaker
And this was an unintentional lie I told.
00:25:35
Speaker
But the question I got in this appointment was, hey, if the power goes off, will we still have electricity?
00:25:44
Speaker
And guess what?
00:25:45
Speaker
I told them, oh yeah, you'll still have electricity.
00:25:47
Speaker
You're powered by the sun.
00:25:49
Speaker
Sounds logical, right?
00:25:50
Speaker
They got solar.
00:25:51
Speaker
If it's during the daytime, then they should have power.
00:25:54
Speaker
but in California and I would assume most other places if the power goes off the panels don't work I mean the electricity goes off too and I did not know that at the time and I told him with a hundred percent confidence yeah you guys will have electricity you'll be good and then sure enough
00:26:17
Speaker
About four months down the road, there was a power outage, and I heard it from these people.
00:26:23
Speaker
They called, they were so mad, their power was off, they thought they were gonna be the one person on the street that had electricity still.
00:26:33
Speaker
They were mad.
00:26:34
Speaker
They emailed our owner, they emailed all our upper management, and I was in pretty big trouble.
00:26:43
Speaker
And then the other lie I told with the same person,
00:26:47
Speaker
which was a mistake, I told them that the loan would be transferable.
00:26:51
Speaker
And this is another thing that came back to haunt me.
00:26:54
Speaker
About three months ago, I got a call from them saying that they were moving and then that they wanted to transfer their loan.
00:27:04
Speaker
This solar loan, it was done by Green Sky at the time.
00:27:07
Speaker
And I think for a while, their loans were transferable, but they changed it pretty soon that the loans were not transferable.
00:27:16
Speaker
to the homeowner coming in.
00:27:18
Speaker
And then this again caused me a huge headache.
00:27:22
Speaker
I had to, and I wasn't even sure to this day that Green Sky had changed it.
00:27:29
Speaker
But once we figured that out, I had to admit to them that their loan wasn't transferable.
00:27:34
Speaker
I was on the phone with their realtor, probably several hours of just pain, just listening to them angry, upset, and then back and forth with
00:27:48
Speaker
with our upper management it just caused a lot of unnecessarily screaming and upset customers.
00:27:59
Speaker
So that's the thing with that.
00:28:01
Speaker
If you don't know something just admit it.
00:28:03
Speaker
If you're not 100% on something
00:28:06
Speaker
then don't even say anything.
00:28:09
Speaker
Just make sure you figure out.
00:28:11
Speaker
I would definitely suggest reading your company's contracts, whatever finance companies you're working with.
00:28:16
Speaker
Read their contracts.
00:28:17
Speaker
Know the facts.
00:28:18
Speaker
There's going to be people that ask very specific questions, that ask tough things.
00:28:22
Speaker
If you don't know the answer, then just don't say anything because trust me, it will cause bad reviews.
00:28:29
Speaker
If it turns out that one of those things you said was a lie, it will cause bad reviews.
00:28:35
Speaker
definitely some problems down their own.
00:28:37
Speaker
So don't be like that.
00:28:42
Speaker
Cool, so last story I wanted to tell, and this is the one that tops all of their stories.
00:28:47
Speaker
This is the thing I have the most forget about that probably cost me more than any other live told.
00:28:58
Speaker
intentional that I did and I might get called out for this but this is me just sharing a mistake I made hopefully others can learn from it hopefully no one will do anything like this and I have a ton of regrets for what I did with this last story I'm going to tell but this definitely tops anything so here's what happens our company this was about two years ago maybe three
00:29:28
Speaker
We started running people's credit on the door, and it was just a soft check.
00:29:35
Speaker
So we didn't do hard checks, but we started doing soft checks.
00:29:37
Speaker
We're working with Dividend Finance, which many of you have probably worked with them.
00:29:43
Speaker
But to my knowledge, they still have a soft check that they do for their customers as you're running credit for them.
00:29:53
Speaker
So what we did, our company thought, okay, well, we might as well start
00:29:57
Speaker
running people's credit, we might as well do this soft check while we're booking appointments on the doors.
00:30:03
Speaker
And then we can just be able to know for sure what they're qualified for.
00:30:09
Speaker
That way it's going to reduce the number of failed credits when we get in the home.
00:30:12
Speaker
We already know if they're qualified or not.
00:30:15
Speaker
And if they didn't pass credit, then we know the PACE options.
00:30:18
Speaker
We know other options to be able to present them once we go to the appointment.
00:30:23
Speaker
So what happened with it was I was
00:30:26
Speaker
Before they didn't require that, so it did make it a little, well I would say much more difficult for us to set appointments.
00:30:33
Speaker
Because now instead of just getting like the electric usage, name, email, phone number, now we're doing a soft check on their credit.
00:30:42
Speaker
They had to sign a form.
00:30:44
Speaker
They had to get lost for the social and it made it a lot tougher to set an appointment.
00:30:52
Speaker
But it also made the appointments more solid.
00:30:56
Speaker
we got back if they went through that whole process there's a much higher chance of closing
00:31:02
Speaker
It lessened the number of appointments we booked, though.
00:31:05
Speaker
So what happened was we had just started doing this for a month or two, and then we entered in our summer competition.
00:31:12
Speaker
It's called Ironman, which I've talked about.
00:31:14
Speaker
It's like a tournament style.
00:31:15
Speaker
We go through, and it's kind of March Madness single elimination for sweet prizes, trips, stuff like that.
00:31:23
Speaker
Obviously, during their time, under that time, we're...
00:31:28
Speaker
We have a lot more pressure to sell more.
00:31:30
Speaker
We want to win.
00:31:31
Speaker
We're pushing hard.
00:31:32
Speaker
We're grinding.
00:31:33
Speaker
We're working more hours.
00:31:36
Speaker
And so unfortunately, what I decided to do, and this wasn't my idea.
00:31:40
Speaker
I actually heard it from another rep.
00:31:42
Speaker
So...
00:31:44
Speaker
It wasn't just me, but I thought it wasn't a big deal.
00:31:47
Speaker
What this rep told me is he says, hey, man, I found a way around this.
00:31:52
Speaker
If customers don't want to give you the last four of their social, then there's another way to get it.
00:31:57
Speaker
They said, oh, really?
00:31:59
Speaker
How do you mean?
00:32:00
Speaker
And he's like, yeah, so when you call in to the SDG&E, that's the utility coming to you down here,
00:32:07
Speaker
to get their electric usage, they have to give the last four of their social to confirm the account, to confirm it's them.
00:32:15
Speaker
So you can just get it straight from that and plug it right in.
00:32:18
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, well, what if they decided they didn't?
00:32:22
Speaker
What if they see you typing it in there and get mad with that?
00:32:27
Speaker
And he goes, dude, I figured I'd wait around it.
00:32:30
Speaker
Just take the months.
00:32:31
Speaker
What happens is on our call cards, on our usage cards, we had every month, January through December.
00:32:39
Speaker
And we're supposed to write the usage for the last 12 months that they, as far as kill watts, that they use in their home.
00:32:45
Speaker
So he's like, yeah, I created a little code.
00:32:49
Speaker
All you do is just put a number next to the month that matches the last four of their social.
00:32:56
Speaker
So if their last four is three, seven, two, one, then you put a one next to March, a two next to July, a three next to February, and then a four next to January.
00:33:08
Speaker
And then you can just get it later.
00:33:10
Speaker
And it's just a soft check.
00:33:12
Speaker
It's not like it's affecting them.
00:33:14
Speaker
So it's not a big deal.
00:33:16
Speaker
So I took this bait and I'm like, oh, wow.
00:33:19
Speaker
That's actually going to help me book a lot more appointments during Ironman, during this competition.
00:33:25
Speaker
And that was a huge mistake.
00:33:29
Speaker
So you can see where I went wrong already.
00:33:32
Speaker
You can see that this was just a disaster waiting to happen.
00:33:36
Speaker
I did this.
00:33:36
Speaker
I did book more appointments because now I was booking the people that were hesitant to give out the last four of their social.
00:33:41
Speaker
I was booking it still.
00:33:44
Speaker
And I started booking a lot more appointments, just like my buddy who had told me this.
00:33:50
Speaker
We're both in the wrong, and he didn't get caught with it.
00:33:55
Speaker
But guess who did?
00:33:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:33:58
Speaker
So here's the story with it.
00:34:01
Speaker
Maybe two months after we started doing this, I had a customer or an appointment I booked.
00:34:09
Speaker
It actually didn't end up sitting down.
00:34:12
Speaker
And we kind of scheduled this for a follow-up appointment.
00:34:16
Speaker
And I left our usage cards with them.
00:34:18
Speaker
And on that card, I had done what I just talked about.
00:34:22
Speaker
I'd put that little code on the back to get the last four of their social to do the soft check on their credit.
00:34:29
Speaker
And I thought nothing of it.
00:34:30
Speaker
I mean, no way anyone's going to discover that little secret code, right?
00:34:35
Speaker
But what happened two weeks later, out of the blue, this customer, he hadn't even showed up for his appointments.
00:34:42
Speaker
But this guy, he had kept that qual card.
00:34:45
Speaker
I had left it at his house.
00:34:47
Speaker
And I don't know if he's just picking it up to throw it away.
00:34:50
Speaker
But he looked on the back of it.
00:34:52
Speaker
He put two and two together.
00:34:54
Speaker
And he found out my dirty little secret.
00:34:58
Speaker
He found out what I was doing.
00:35:00
Speaker
So he called me immediately.
00:35:02
Speaker
He just calls me out on it.
00:35:04
Speaker
He says, hey, I know that you have the last four of my social.
00:35:11
Speaker
Um...
00:35:11
Speaker
what's going on here, what's being done, and I just, kind of like in the story before, I was just a deer in the headlights, had no idea what to say, he caught me in a huge lie, pretty serious, could get me in a ton of trouble, and I just pretty much said, oh, sorry if I did that, yeah, I honestly don't, I just, I don't remember, I just didn't know what to say, I was just kind of fumbling around,
00:35:38
Speaker
And he's just like, whatever, man, I'm calling your company.
00:35:41
Speaker
This is some pretty serious stuff.
00:35:43
Speaker
This could be like identity fraud.
00:35:45
Speaker
I'm not happy at all.
00:35:47
Speaker
And said some choice words, was super upset.
00:35:51
Speaker
He called into our office, ended up talking to the owner.
00:35:56
Speaker
And also he left like,
00:35:59
Speaker
one star review was just super mad so now everyone that looked at our Yelp page they saw this review that I had done the shady thing and it was just a disaster so this was something that could have probably got us in a ton of trouble legally it's definitely not legal to take the last word someone social and even if it's just a soft check that's not something that anyone should be doing
00:36:28
Speaker
Okay, so I have a ton of regret with this.
00:36:30
Speaker
What happened is our company, they had to, luckily we did get them to remove this review and basically we had to, it didn't go to anything legally, but we had to kind of settle with them in a way.
00:36:44
Speaker
And I know our company, which is super grateful to them for being patient with me and not firing me because honestly that's something that probably most companies wouldn't fire her up for.
00:36:58
Speaker
But they ended up paying this customer out, bought him a whole new fancy security system, I think paid him out some just so that he would not make a bigger deal of it and then know that he was secure.
00:37:14
Speaker
So guys, don't tell lies.
00:37:17
Speaker
Now I've gone through a lot of stories here.
00:37:19
Speaker
Don't want to ramble on.
00:37:20
Speaker
But just don't tell lies.
Improving Sales Reputation
00:37:22
Speaker
Learn from mistakes that I've made.
00:37:23
Speaker
And I've heard definitely bigger lies too.
00:37:27
Speaker
So if you know that reps are lying in your company, just make sure they knock it off.
00:37:32
Speaker
It's going to hurt your company.
00:37:34
Speaker
It's going to cause negative reviews.
00:37:36
Speaker
It's going to hurt the industry altogether because, let's be honest, the reason why people are so skeptical of door-to-door people is because of things like this, because of that story I just told.
00:37:47
Speaker
I did something shady because of other reps that have done shady things.
00:37:51
Speaker
So if we're all honest as an industry, it's going to help people trust just the industry in general more.
00:37:57
Speaker
It's going to help us all get more sales.
00:38:01
Speaker
So don't lie and...
00:38:04
Speaker
I have again I have repented of this lie okay try to be as honest as I can now and try to definitely not stretch any more truths but learn from my mistakes don't stoop down to the level that I went to and that's the show today guys so let me know what you thought about it okay if you want you can bash on me for
00:38:29
Speaker
That's a lie I told.
00:38:31
Speaker
I've learned from it.
00:38:32
Speaker
So learn from mistakes you've made.
00:38:34
Speaker
That's the most important thing.
00:38:36
Speaker
Don't tell lies, and let's crush it as an industry.
00:38:39
Speaker
So I hope you guys enjoyed the episode today.
00:38:42
Speaker
Again, go and get in on our giveaway.
00:38:46
Speaker
I want to send you something free, and I want you guys to continue getting value from this show.
00:38:52
Speaker
Let me know if you have guests that you want on specifically.
00:38:55
Speaker
and we'll continue to strive to drop the best contents in the solar industry, help you guys close more deals every week, and take it to another level.
00:39:05
Speaker
Thanks, guys.
00:39:06
Speaker
Wow, what another value-packed episode of The Solarpreneur.
00:39:10
Speaker
Guys, if you couldn't tell, we spend a lot of time and energy to put these episodes out to hopefully give you just one strategy, one golden nugget that's going to launch your solar career to the next level.
00:39:21
Speaker
And we do it all for free.
00:39:22
Speaker
And if you found any value in this episode or it's helped you in any way, all I ask in return is that you just take 30 seconds of your time and leave us a review on iTunes.
00:39:32
Speaker
so that we can help more solopreneurs like you to change the world.
00:39:35
Speaker
And as a gift for leaving us a review, we have a special training package exclusive for solopreneur listeners over at solopreneurs.com.
00:39:44
Speaker
Remember, you need to leave us a review on iTunes to qualify for the training package.
00:39:49
Speaker
So take care of that now, and we'll see you on the next episode.