Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level.
Speaker: My name is Taylor Armstrong.
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.
Speaker: I teach you how to avoid the mistakes I made and bring in the top solar dogs of the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro, and closing more deals.
Speaker: What is a solopreneur you might ask?
Speaker: A solopreneur is a new breed of solopro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery and you are about to become one.
Speaker: Hey, what's up, solopreneurs?
Speaker: Today, we're going to be jamming on a little recap of SolarCon 2024.
Speaker: Hopefully, you were able to make it to the event.
Speaker: But if you're not, we got all the action, all the highlights, all the recap coming up on this podcast to fill you in on what you missed out on and hopefully get you there for next year.
Speaker: So let's jump into it.
Speaker: My name is Taylor Armstrong.
Speaker: We're here to help you close more deals, generate more leads and referrals, and hopefully have a much better time in the solar industry.
Speaker: And if you were at SolarCon and also at our little referral bootcamp we did,
Speaker: then you know those are great ways to boost your motivation, to get inspired, to see what's possible.
Speaker: Big fan of going to events, and hopefully you were able to make it.
Speaker: But if not, hey, we got more events coming up.
Speaker: But yeah, I'm going to share just some highlights, some things that stuck out to me and fill you in on what you missed from the event.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: And then first of all, if you have not been able to leave us a review or share the podcast,
Speaker: That would be much appreciated.
Speaker: That's how we get this show out to more people and hopefully inspire more guys to get in the industry.
Speaker: Please, please, please, if you have not shared the podcast or left a review, that would be very much appreciated.
Speaker: Thank you in advance.
Speaker: That's really how we spread the show to more people.
Speaker: But jumping into it.
Speaker: So last episode, you heard our recap, our lessons that I learned from doing my first live event.
Speaker: And we did our referral boot camp.
Speaker: And then right after the boot camp, starting on Thursday, we went straight into SolarCon.
Speaker: And it didn't leave me a ton of time to recover because I actually had to do a panel the first day.
Speaker: I went and moderated the recruiting panel, actually.
Speaker: Had a good time doing that.
Speaker: So I'll talk a little bit about that.
Speaker: And then just some things I noticed from the event.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm not going to go super deep into it.
Speaker: Sometimes I feel like I can ramble on with the event and recap.
Speaker: And so I'm just going to give you some little takeaways and a brief recap.
Speaker: If you do want a full breakdown,
Speaker: And a full recap of all the main stage speakers and highlights.
Speaker: We are actually making a book, a little e-book of the top SolarCon takeaways, a little implementation guide.
Speaker: And that was actually one of the bonuses we gave out of people that took advantage of our SolarCon offer.
Speaker: So those that took advantage of that, we are working on that.
Speaker: It's going to be coming in your inbox real soon, hopefully the next week or so.
Speaker: If you are not at SolarCon and would like to snag that, then you shoot me an email.
Speaker: we may have a way that you can also get your hands on that.
Speaker: But yeah, again, those that took advantage, you are going to have it come into your inbox.
Speaker: Okay, so jumping into it.
Speaker: Thursday was day one, started on the 18th.
Speaker: And so we checked in and I'll be honest, the first day, the morning, there weren't a ton of
Speaker: speakers, a ton of things that I was like rushing to get into.
Speaker: And I was, you know, I was just wrapped up my event the day before.
Speaker: So I'm like, yeah, you know, I need a little bit of recovery before I get on stage and speak.
Speaker: So I'm like, you know, I'm sleeping in, I'm gonna do some rest or recovery, hit the gym.
Speaker: And so I didn't actually get to SolarCon until I think around lunchtime that day.
Speaker: And speaking of lunchtime, if you didn't, they had VIP tickets.
Speaker: They have lunch included every day, which I actually thought was a great idea because sometimes you go to these events and it's like all this time is spent leaving the events.
Speaker: Coming back, you don't know what you're trying to get back to and, you know, lots of wasted time walking back and forth, figuring out where you're trying to go for lunch, who you're going to meet up with, etc.
Speaker: So I really like the idea of just going backstage.
Speaker: She had all her lunch there and you had all the VIP ticket people and just hanging out with people, you know, are committed in solar.
Speaker: So for next year, you might want to consider getting a VIP tickets because for me, it was definitely worth it.
Speaker: Just being able to stay at the event center the whole time at the Salt Palace.
Speaker: Not have to worry about where I'm going, who I'm meeting up with.
Speaker: Just have it all right there.
Speaker: And the food was good too.
Speaker: But then that afternoon is where it really picked up.
Speaker: Thursday afternoon, they started with these breakout sessions.
Speaker: And I was on the panel starting at 2.50 that day.
Speaker: There were some few other panels before then.
Speaker: But we did the recruiting panel.
Speaker: and had a great time moderating it.
Speaker: It's funny because we were going backstage, the green room.
Speaker: We thought there was this, you know, green room backstage set up.
Speaker: And I go back there and it was just a couple chairs sitting in like a, you know, with the staff from the event.
Speaker: So I thought that was funny.
Speaker: We just laid out some chairs and hung out.
Speaker: But yeah, we got ready for it.
Speaker: And then I had the opportunity to be on the stage with Christian DeLuca, Jonathan Brunazzo, Abby Buckmiller, and Will Ellermitz.
Speaker: These guys dropped some bombs and just so many things that I'm going to start applying from just the things I heard in this recruiting panel.
Speaker: But I think the main takeaways from that, in case you missed it, is we just need to be setting up systems around recruiting.
Speaker: We need to get organized.
Speaker: We need to inspire a team.
Speaker: We need to build good culture.
Speaker: Part of what we talked about is you cannot recruit people into a terrible culture, into a not a good company environment.
Speaker: Because if you're doing that, it's just like dumping water in a bucket with holes into it.
Speaker: You got to focus on the culture.
Speaker: You got to have systems set up.
Speaker: You got to get organized.
Speaker: And that's how you do it.
Speaker: So a lot of takeaways I had from that.
Speaker: We're actually having Christian DeLuca.
Speaker: I thought some of his stuff was so good.
Speaker: So we did a podcast right after the recruiting panel and it's going to be dropping next Tuesday.
Speaker: So make sure you tune into that.
Speaker: He's actually going to be sharing a bunch of things and even expounding.
Speaker: Further on the stuff he talked about in this panel.
Speaker: So make sure you don't miss out on this next episode.
Speaker: But he's just incredible.
Speaker: Christian, this dude, if you haven't heard of him, he's 25 years old.
Speaker: He started Ohm Solar up in Northern California.
Speaker: He's grown it to over 100 reps in like a year and a half, I think.
Speaker: It's how long he's been doing it.
Speaker: So absolutely incredible.
Speaker: I'm like, man, if I knew half the stuff when I was that age, it's like insanity to see how much he's been able to grow it.
Speaker: So yeah, he's got a whole recruiting strategy.
Speaker: He recruits off his warm contacts and just has reps really just kind of the network marketing strategy.
Speaker: Just taking the people that his reps already know and then
Speaker: Colin Lowell's leads.
Speaker: And that's how he's built his entire company and recruited so many guys.
Speaker: So definitely make sure you tune in for next episode to hear more about that.
Speaker: Hey, but moving on, I did do quite a few podcasts.
Speaker: I was able to crank out like six, seven podcasts at SolarCon.
Speaker: So I'll be honest, I didn't like go to a ton of these, you know, breakout sessions, main stage.
Speaker: A lot of it was just...
Speaker: making sure I take care of y'all that are listening to the show, making sure I have fresh content.
Speaker: And that's how I like to do it because it's like so many quality people are already at this event.
Speaker: So I know I can get some really good podcasting to read there and not have to sit and, you know, chase people down after.
Speaker: So I did definitely take advantage that way.
Speaker: But yeah, and then just to highlight the next couple of days here, some good speakers, presentations I saw.
Speaker: The next day we had the door-to-door panel.
Speaker: It was what's trending this year from door-to-door trailblazers.
Speaker: And so these were like the top guys in door-to-door.
Speaker: You had Sam Taggart was moderating it.
Speaker: Then we had Jaddy Leo, actually not sure.
Speaker: I haven't met him.
Speaker: But then Jack Pastrana, who I work with down here in San Diego, Melissa Romiza, Johnny Graham, all freaking studs.
Speaker: So yeah, with them, it was just cool hearing really what it takes to be a top producer in door-to-door and had a pretty wide range of topics.
Speaker: But they talked about same days, work ethic,
Speaker: how much time they put into their craft, what they do, their routines, their schedules.
Speaker: I thought that was some really good, really interesting stuff.
Speaker: Caught part of that one.
Speaker: And let's see, other highlights of that day.
Speaker: Just a side note, they had all these, I thought the exhibit hall was rocking.
Speaker: They had all the vendors that were out there.
Speaker: And so, so many good things just in that.
Speaker: They had some VR guys that had these VR classes.
Speaker: They had this like bow and arrow shooting game where you're like battling with people.
Speaker: You know, you have like four people you're up against and you're trying to like shoot each other with arrows.
Speaker: You're in like a, you know, castle.
Speaker: Um, so we wasted some time playing that hanging out.
Speaker: So it's a little bit of fun and games at these events too, right?
Speaker: You're hanging out with your peeps, had some good conversations.
Speaker: Um, but I will say I did probably gain like six, seven pounds over the weekend.
Speaker: I need to take it easy when I get to these events.
Speaker: They had a chip cookies.
Speaker: Um, that's one of the cookie shops out in Utah.
Speaker: They had a booth there.
Speaker: And I would just walk by it every time I would grab like a couple handful of cookies every time they had like fresh cookies right out of the oven, just sitting there boxes and boxes and boxes.
Speaker: And I'm like, man, how do you resist that?
Speaker: So my willpower is obviously not the greatest.
Speaker: So I grabbed some way too many of these cookies.
Speaker: Now I'm paying the price this week.
Speaker: Definitely feel a bit heavier.
Speaker: Gonna have to get my diet and game a little bit under control a little bit rather.
Speaker: But a side note, right?
Speaker: Make sure you have self-control when you go to these events and there's all this food sitting out for you to munch on because that's how it is with these exhibitors.
Speaker: They're rolling in with food, with cookies, with treats, with candy, all this stuff.
Speaker: So yeah, sometimes I got to watch out for that.
Speaker: But side notes, that's a lot of what we're doing is afternoon, just walking around, talking to some of the vendors, doing more podcasts.
Speaker: Another one we headline speaker was Jeremy Miner.
Speaker: And I was able to catch most of that one.
Speaker: If you guys aren't following Jeremy Miner, this guy, he just has some bombs that he drops.
Speaker: I would definitely recommend checking out Jeremy Miner's podcast.
Speaker: I think it's called closers are losers, if I'm not mistaken, but you can join.
Speaker: He has a Facebook group.
Speaker: And what's cool about him is he just teaches people.
Speaker: It's called his NEPQ method, neuroemotional programming questions, I believe.
Speaker: Could be butchering that.
Speaker: But yeah, I've learned a lot from listening to him.
Speaker: And it's just he teaches how to basically bypass people's programmed responses.
Speaker: And just the way he approaches it is just like the tonality you need to be speaking in.
Speaker: The words you need to say, how you can get around people thinking, oh, this is just some dumb sales guy coming to the door.
Speaker: Like, how do we need to act?
Speaker: What do we need to say?
Speaker: And that's what he talked about.
Speaker: You know, some of that stuff we go over in Solar Printer podcast too, but it's just like...
Speaker: How do you approach yourself when you're knocking a door or doing a phone call, whatever?
Speaker: Like, what's the tonality you need to have?
Speaker: And so a lot of those things Jeremy Miner, he shared with us when he's speaking from this age.
Speaker: So super cool stuff.
Speaker: But yeah, he was the headline speaker for that day on Friday.
Speaker: And I did ask him if you want to do a podcast.
Speaker: Hopefully that'll be coming in the future.
Speaker: He sent me to his team.
Speaker: So I'm waiting on a response if we can get a podcast dialed up with him.
Speaker: So hopefully you will agree.
Speaker: If you know Jeremy Miner, shoot me a good word.
Speaker: Shoot me a recommendation because hopefully we can get him here on the show here pretty soon.
Speaker: Yeah, but he crushed it.
Speaker: Jeremy Miner stood.
Speaker: And then day three, last but not least, this day, I actually, I went and that morning, I got invited to go do some jujitsu with my buddy, Alan Bullen, which he did a podcast with us a couple weeks back.
Speaker: Alan Bullen, he runs the company over there, Amp Titanium, the alarms.
Speaker: And then, yeah, also Titanium Solar.
Speaker: I'm doing some incredible things with that organization.
Speaker: So go check out that podcast if you haven't already, but was able to go do some jujitsu with him in the morning.
Speaker: So I missed out on some of the morning speakers, but really the highlight of Saturday is
Speaker: is just we had Gary Vee come.
Speaker: Everyone knows Gary Vee.
Speaker: And just like it was crazy him walking through.
Speaker: Everyone was just like standing up like wondering what's going on.
Speaker: Jerry, he's a big he's a big deal.
Speaker: I did talk to the guys at SolarCon, which I think
Speaker: Jay Kess, he also mentioned this in a little pre-SolarCon episode, but they dropped, it was like 275 grand, something like that for Gary Vee to come speak.
Speaker: So just insane.
Speaker: It's like, when you think about it, if you can command that much for two hours of your time, get paid over a hundred thousand per hour, it's like, man, that's the goal, right?
Speaker: That's the, that's, that's the life we all want.
Speaker: That's the level we all want to hit someday, making over a hundred grand per hour.
Speaker: But yeah, just really cool seeing him and, you know, hearing some ways he applies social media, how he would do it if he were in solar.
Speaker: Really eye opening to see like how much he just thinks that it's important that we all need to be on social media.
Speaker: And so it really inspired me.
Speaker: I'm just like, OK, this train isn't going anywhere.
Speaker: You got to hop on the social media.
Speaker: And something interesting he shared is that social media, it might only be good for another 10 years or so.
Speaker: We don't really know the way things are headed.
Speaker: We're getting all this AI stuff, virtual reality, augmented reality.
Speaker: And so in Gary V's opinion, he was just sharing that, hey, you need to jump on this train now.
Speaker: You need to ride it while it's high.
Speaker: And he just talked about how he has millions and millions of followers.
Speaker: He's been doing this 15 years now.
Speaker: But like what's crazy is that someone can go produce content tomorrow and they can literally get more views than them tomorrow.
Speaker: They can go viral.
Speaker: They can get more views.
Speaker: They can get more outreach than him.
Speaker: And he's been doing it 15 years.
Speaker: So he said that's the incredible thing about social media is we can use this to our advantage.
Speaker: Like we should be using social media to build up our teams, to build awareness.
Speaker: It's like our virtual business card, right?
Speaker: We should be building our brand on there.
Speaker: So yeah, just really got me thinking, okay.
Speaker: As much as I hate social media sometimes, as much as I tell myself that I'm not the greatest at it, like I need to make sure I am making it a priority in business.
Speaker: Okay, not like skipping out on knocking doors, not putting it over everything else.
Speaker: But I think it's important for us all to
Speaker: to think about social media and to use it to our advantage because, yeah, so much money.
Speaker: It's more of a long term play, right?
Speaker: But we can be building up our teams with it.
Speaker: It can help us in recruiting.
Speaker: It can help us get more leads.
Speaker: It can help us close more deals.
Speaker: So definitely something that we want to be thinking about and applying.
Speaker: So Gary Vee crushed it and was awesome being all to hear from him.
Speaker: So those are just a few highlights.
Speaker: Not to get super in the weeds here.
Speaker: Didn't want to go through every single one I saw.
Speaker: But yeah, we're going to be dropping a lot of podcasts with speakers that actually spoke at SolarCon.
Speaker: So even if you weren't there, we got several dudes that several guys and gals that were able to come on the podcast and share the secrets.
Speaker: So make sure you're tuning into the upcoming podcasts.
Speaker: I'm so excited to drop them.
Speaker: And I know they're going to be very beneficial to anyone that's listening.
Speaker: So make sure you tune into the next episode.
Speaker: Again, we have Christian DeLuca.
Speaker: He was on the recruiting panel with me and just incredible how he's been able to build his company and just take off with more than 100 reps in not much more than a year of business of being his own installer and company up there in Northern California.
Speaker: So tune into that one.
Speaker: If you weren't at SolarCon,
Speaker: Hopefully you can join us there next year.
Speaker: And then last thing, if you are looking for an opportunity in solar, we are bringing on a few people here in San Diego to come hang out with your boy, the solarpreneur, and crush some deals.
Speaker: Our team is building the same momentum right now.
Speaker: So hit me up if you are looking for an opportunity.
Speaker: Taylor at solarpreneur.com is the email, or you can also shoot me a DM on social media, Instagram, Facebook.
Speaker: I'll be sure to reply.
Speaker: So thanks for tuning in the episode.
Speaker: We'll see you guys on the next one.
Speaker: Go close some deals this week.
Speaker: Happy selling.
Speaker: See you next time.
Speaker: Hey, Solar Pruners, quick question.
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?
Speaker: For the last three years, I've been placed in the fortunate position to interview dozens of elite level solar professionals and learn exactly what they do behind closed doors to build their solar careers to an all-star level.
Speaker: That's why I want to make a truly special announcement about the new learning community exclusively for solar professionals
Speaker: to learn, compete, and win with top performers in the industry.
Speaker: And it's called Solcite.
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.
Speaker: Currently, SoulCity is open, launched, and ready to be enrolled.
Speaker: So go to SoulCity.co to learn more and join the learning experience now.
Speaker: This is exclusively for solopreneur listeners, so be sure to go to SoulCity.co and join.
Speaker: We'll see you on the inside.
