Your Culture is Your Brand
0:01
Branding and Culture
13:57
Leadership and Friction in Business
28:51
Evolving Business Strategies for Success
42:56
Building Authentic Business Culture
47:42
Creating Customer Delight Through Authenticity
Unlock the secrets of compelling branding and business culture with our special guest, Ryan Chute from Wizard of Ads. This episode promises to transform how you view branding, as Ryan shares insights likening a brand to a book, where the logo serves only as the cover while the story unfolds within. Through engaging stories and a rebranding case study, discover how authentic storytelling and visual alignment can create meaningful connections with customers, and why being too attached to initial branding elements might hold you back.
Explore the intricate dance of leadership and business dynamics, where freedom and responsibility often collide. We'll discuss how core values shape both personal and corporate culture, drawing parallels to historical groups grounded in strong principles. Learn how a lack of self-awareness in leaders can inadvertently generate friction that stifles growth, and why personal development is key to resolving such conflicts. Through real-world examples, we illuminate how understanding emotional reactions can be the linchpin in fostering business success.
Embark on a journey of business transformation and customer delight, inspired by a client who revamped their strategies for success. By simplifying product offerings and improving website functionality, they dramatically increased conversion rates, akin to the seamless experience of New Zealand's great walks. We'll share the secret sauce behind creating authentic business culture, emphasizing integrity and trust over profit-driven motives. Finally, experience the magic of delightful customer interactions, where unexpected gestures lead to stronger bonds and unsolicited referrals, driven by the potent power of authenticity and employee satisfaction.
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Speaker 1: 0:01
What's up, lemonheads? Welcome to another episode of From the Yellow Chair. I am Crystal and I am joined virtually today in our lemonade stand with one of my absolute favorite brand marketers idea, creative, collaboration, style people. You know that's our jam here at Lemon Seed. I'm super excited to be talking to Ryan Shute from Wizard of Ads.
Speaker 1: 0:24
We're going to get down into talking culture. We're going to be talking branding, brand building, storytelling, all the things you're not going to want to miss it. Let's sip some lemonade, all right? Well, guys, I don't know about you, guys, we're recording this on a Friday afternoon and there is no way more to keep me motivated to record, as when we get to talk about branding, you know I love it, I live for it, and Ron is one of my absolute favorite people to talk to about that. So, ron, just in case, we have some listeners that are like who is this dude? I don't know how that might be, but just in case, just tell everybody a little bit about who you are, kind of what you do, because I think it's super interesting.
Speaker 2: 1:07
Well, I'm a real deal, actual wizard of ads wizard. I am a I'm a strategist at wizard of ads and I help build teams and put teams together to help small businesses become household names. I run an eight-figure agency within the organization and we have 70 or 80 or so within my purview that I look after to help build their brands up and grow past where they are today.
Speaker 1: 1:38
Yeah, all through which. I made a post the other day that said, marketing is a long game. Branding is, for sure, the long game and so many contractors, so many people listening are just they're ready for leads right now. So I can really get on my soapbox about that. But I wanted to first like run through this culture being a part of your brand. So you know your brand goes way deeper than a good logo, a good bandwagon, don't get me wrong. That's super important, it's a great piece of the puzzle, but it's definitely not the whole puzzle. There has to come a level of implementation and execution, and so as we talk through this, like I know right now, I just see contractors that really are like, ok, check, I have a logo, check, I have a bandwagon, check, well, that's my brand. And I'm like no, no, no, no, no, right, I know you feel the same way.
Speaker 2: 2:27
Well, you know, it's, I imagine, I, I think about a logo and a truck wrap, like I think about a book. When we, when we think that we're, you know, we're going to title a book, we're going to write ourselves a book, and we have a title for the book Boom, it, boom, it's there we go, that's the name of our business, and then we get a truck wrap and the truck wrap is pretty spiffy looking thing and it's uh, it's uh, it looks really nice and that's the cover of our book. But we haven't written the book yet. So, uh, we, we have this story to tell, and and and and we, we then start telling our story, uh, either in just real life, with real customers doing the thing, uh, delivering the solution, or we have, we had it kind of documented out and we actually follow a path and figure it out with writers like us and who really kind of figure out the depth of the brand story, and then we tell the story.
Speaker 2: 3:18
Well, almost every case, a person will change the title and the picture on the front of their book by the time they finish writing their story, because the story's changed, it's more defined, it's more clear, it's more poignant. There's that thing that really happened. That deserves to be on the front cover and ultimately, it's a really important thing to start, but it's also a really important thing to not be married to, because ultimately, ultimately, the title of your book might change.
Speaker 1: 3:46
Yes, Because you know it's an ever evolving thing. Well, I remember you and I were just visiting one day at some show in some city, in some state and some year, but we were talking and we, we brought, or you actually brought up. One time you had a client that had this really cool brand but had no connection to the brand.
Speaker 1: 4:05
Like no connection I think it was a mascot or something. He had no connection to it. And we run into that all the time at limited seed, like we'll have contractors that reach out and say, hey, I've got, uh, this is my brand. I feel like my brand is great. And I'll say, oh, why did you choose that name or that mascot or that color or whatever? And they're like, uh, because my designer told me to yeah, I'm like, well, now we've got to like, now we've got to curate a story. And a curated story just doesn't quite have the same impact and passion behind it as a true story. And everyone, every contractor, has a story, something we can build off of.
Speaker 2: 4:39
Well, I agree that most, most contractors have a story, and we have run into situations where their story may not be the most interesting story that we can tell, but we can do a based on a true story story that accentuates the brand a little bit more. The brand that we talk about is that we were talking about is a brand that we renamed to Captain Cool. They were originally Anchor Air. Most of the shore towns around America have an Anchor Air, and rightfully so. It's a good name, but this brand had a toucan for a mascot. I said are toucans native to the area? They said no, we've never seen a toucan in real life. And, of course course, it had an anchor. So that's, I mean, that's that like it fit the thing like it's, and it was pretty right. It was look, at the end of the day, it was a lovely little idea, but at the end of the day, it didn't matter. It had nothing to do with anything and there was no good story that was going to come out of that. Well, the client was, um, comfortable enough to, uh, to trust us to step into it.
Speaker 2: 5:47
Well, as we started to really leverage in the concepts and figure out who these guys were. These were guys who literally wore flip-flops to their company, to their individual jobs. Yeah, they wore specifically sunglasses. They were kind of on island time. Yeah, they wore specifically sunglasses. Yeah, they're very, very island vibe. Yeah, they got the whole Caribbean vibe and they wore specific type of shorts. They wore a specific type of shirt. They did all of the things that you would expect them to do to live up to this Captain Cool vibe, this whole idea where we're going to go and be the cool guy that just keeps you cool.
Speaker 2: 6:29
And then we have this whole narrative. Well, we went a little bit, you know, we got carried away as we do and had some absolutely extraordinary fun with it, and they authorized us to change the name to Captain Cool. We changed the mascot to a guy that was kind of like Kurt Russell in Captain Braun. He had that whole vibe but he was also wearing the flip-flops and he was leaning on an anchor still. But now we're not worried about any kind of trademark infringements if we take over half the southeastern quadrant of the states and we have this whole vibe. And what we turned the campaign into was every single radio ad is a new and unique sea shanty and it's hilarious. It is absolutely extraordinary because now we're telling stories and we're creating an environment where the customers and the prospects are leaning in and listening and going. What in the world are they going to say this time?
Speaker 1: 7:32
Yes, well, I'm telling you like I see it every day, literally 99% of contractors have no real vibe, no real story. Percent of contractors have no real vibe, no real story. There's that one percent across the country that really have. Heck. Honestly, that's probably most companies outside of national companies. That's probably most companies. They just don't have the vibe and they haven't embraced it. They haven't really started telling the story about who they are and a lot of times the brand is about the people and, like you said, the vibe which does kind of lead me into like one of the things I've heard you say before is like man, when you talk about people in your business like and how they can help determine or damage your business like, people are definitely the wild card right. They can make or break you sometimes.
Speaker 2: 8:21
Isn't? Isn't that the truth? You know and look and look. You're literally risking it all, crystal. These people with these amazing intentions, these astoundingly hardworking people who really understand how to care for people at an exceptional level. They hire people to represent their brand and we all know that it takes 10, 20, 30 years to build a heck of a reputation and one day, to ruin it all. So at the end of the day, we need to figure out what we can do to actually drive that opportunity to, to protect our, our, our intention from the moment that we start, right, right. So when we're out there and hiring people, we have to recognize because people are the wild card, both as customers and employees we have to do everything in our power to protect our reputation because, it's so easy to lose, and that's where culture comes in right.
Speaker 2: 9:22
Our culture is our brand.
Speaker 1: 9:24
Yeah, don't sleep on on that. Your culture is your brand. That's exactly right, you know. Just, I look back and even like I even had, like when I first started Lemon Seed, I had several clients that started out a million bucks, you know, a million dollars in revenue to me. And after a couple of years not just with Lemon Seed, but they were great operators as well. So the combination they were able to sell their companies right in the height of private equity world, slamming into this and they were really bought.
Speaker 1: 9:52
Well then, I just gradually, slowly but surely, if you will, started seeing, like man, what made them so cool was their vibe and their culture and their team and what they were doing. And you had some PE companies come in there and they just got so focused on that bottom line that they were like, uh, no more of this. No, this is not important. This is not important. And I wanted to be like. I wish I could like run across the country with like stop signs, like everybody, stop, freeze with what you're doing. Because that's what happens when you take the culture out of the brand is it just starts, it just starts separating out, um, and you lose your identity.
Speaker 1: 10:29
I mean literally, it's like an identity crisis and you know, again, we've got to look for people that we need to hire for attitude over aptitude sometimes, um, talk to any contractor, which I'm sure you'll echo talk to any contractor and they'll tell you, man, I don't necessarily want this super educated, long-term HVAC technician to come into my business, because they have to unlearn a lot of times so many bad behaviors that I would just take someone that's kind of new, that knows the basics but it's ready to learn, because then you have to cultivate them as well into, like the culture, like how you speak, where you park, how you dress, how your van looks, and I mean it's. It's a challenge, man, it's really a challenge, but definitely hiring for attitude over aptitude would definitely help drive that culture, which in turn would drive the brand.
Speaker 2: 11:21
Well, you know, and I'm and I'm of two minds there, because, yes, there are some broken individuals out there who have had enough and built those walls and that scar tissue that they're just not going to comply anymore because they've lived an entire life of compliance. The people who aren't looking those really amazing technicians that you really, really would love to have they're happy because they're in a good culture, right, and only you know we love private equity, coming in and disrupting the market. We've hired some of the best hires we've ever had because they've gone ahead and thrown away absolutely astounding talent with their absolutely tragic disposition towards the human condition. When you're a soulless entity that puts everyone to a spreadsheet and if they don't show up in a spreadsheet they don't exist and then treat them as if they were quite literally indentured servants, you're going to get exactly what you deserve out of that group of people. And, yes, you can churn through people all day long, but go ahead, spend your money, waste your time, ruin the customer experience.
Speaker 2: 12:41
I believe that there is truly the most amount of value with people who take care of people, with leaders that truly do protect and defend a happy, healthy, wealthy culture, and when you suck all of that value out of the company, you're sucking out all of the goodwill, you're sucking out all of everything that your brand holds value in. You know, it comes down to this fascinating notion that I was talking with Roy and one of our other partners, manley Miller, about Manley's a minister in New Orleans and also a partner of ours, an absolutely brilliant writer, and he said, brian, one night, as we're going to dinner, brian, you know, your beliefs are worthless. And I go well, this is an interesting way to start things. All right, so let's get out of here, man.
Speaker 1: 13:36
I feel so at ease.
Speaker 2: 13:38
That's right, and you know, and I go, let's talk. And he goes well, the reason why they're worthless is because there's no consequence to them and they're easily interchangeable. And I said, okay, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but it kind of makes sense. But tell me more. He goes. Well, think about it. Let's think about freedom and responsibility. And you can have freedom, and we all agree that freedom is a really important thing that we all need to have, right. And he says you can have responsibility, and we all believe that responsibility is equally as much something that's important that we should all have Right.
Speaker 2: 14:19
Very often, the opposite of a profound truth is an equally profound truth, even though it's the opposite of it. Just like freedom and responsibility, they're paired opposites. So what does that? What does that mean? That means that if they're both true and they can't live inside each other, you can't have ultimate, unadulterated freedom and full responsibility. And you can't have full, uh, be fully responsible and live a completely free life. And because you're putting limitations on yourself, right, if that responsibility is, I'm going to uh, hold myself to a standard and I'm going to inflict consequence upon myself when I don't do the thing I say I'm going to do for my clients, for my customers, for my. I don't do the thing I say I'm going to do for my clients, for my customers, for my uh, for my employees, my coworkers, my family, right, my, my greater community as a whole. So when you start to look at it that way, I go, wow, that's, that's, that's really a big deal, and it makes me think that there's a difference between beliefs and values. So I go down the rabbit hole and, of course, there's a fundamental difference in in beliefs and values. Values are the thing that you hold yourself to, the standard, the hill you die on, the things you stand for, the things you stand against, and these all reflect back.
Speaker 2: 15:42
We're still talking about culture here. Culture, yeah Right, this is, this is all culture, because the culture is your brand, because the culture is going to be a set of rules that you're going to live by or not live by, just like the samurai did, the Navy SEALs do, the Knights of Templar, the rules of the West, every culture that we've ever reflected upon and revered in the past, the Spartans they all had things that they would and would not do and they would die for that. And that's a big deal, because that means that they stand for something and that we can stand with them, because let's all agree that no one wants to follow somebody who isn't going anywhere. And that's what this all really boils down to is, if you are an empty vessel, as most private equity companies do, as they empty the company of all of its true goodwill, then what you're left with is features, not the benefits, not the advantages.
Speaker 1: 16:42
Yeah, and I can see a lot of times again, branding it's deep, man, like branding and culture it's so deep. And I think so many times we're just like, uh, we just follow like the flashy object, like, oh, I use, you know this, this graphic designer, and like, and I'm like, yes, great, and it's beautiful. It's just there's this this doesn't tell me, like what you stand for and who you are. And a lot of people are like, ah gosh, that's so corny, that's so, that's too emotional for me. And I'm like, well, that's fine. Um, I just pray I can get a competitor in your market so we can just like plow over you. You know, um, and it's a little aggressive, right, like, it's a little aggressive on my part, but at the end I like I will talk to contractors and literally sometimes I'm like I wish I could just open a location right there in your backyard, because it's such a gaping hole to those of us that see when branding is missing, like it is a huge gaping hole there. Well, you know you also I've heard you talk a few times about like how sometimes, like, leaders can unintentionally create friction that stops their companies from growing or from customers being satisfied.
Speaker 1: 17:54
One thing that I remember is we had this client one time and he got a bad review, so he missed his call. So we checked in. We're like, hey, we missed you. And he's like, well, I had to drive to that person's house. They're not going to leave a review like that for me. And I was like hang on, sir, like this is not MMA, like we're not going to get in a ring and box it out, you know. And so I was like this was just a high level, it was just a moment in in his journey. You know, you've met those contractors. They can, they're right at the cusp of being uber successful, but they're still mid-range. So they were just really in this beautiful place but so emotionally draining and I think man it just inadvertently he was causing chaos and destruction amongst his team because he was so aggressive and so reactionary.
Speaker 2: 18:44
And so I've heard you talk about that. Before you know, I've identified 12 major areas of friction within a business. Roy and I are in the midst of writing a book exactly about this exact issue. Friction happens at all points, be it in the marketing point, be it in the sales funnel, be it in your operations of your business. It starts actually with your leadership. It starts with the internal self. The more friction you have in the business, the more friction you have in yourself. And I'll tell you, an awful lot of incredibly well-intentioned, ambitious, smart men and women that I have met have an absolute chaos going on in their hearts and minds and they just haven't reconciled what's going on in the attic and the basement and they really need to start figuring out something about themselves. They need to do the work to get past itself, and I'm the first one to put my hand up and say I need to do the work, get past itself. And I'm the first one to put my hand up and say I need to do the work right.
Speaker 2: 19:46
I came from a place of friction. I lived a life of friction. I lived with bad bosses, toxic workplaces, weaponized fear, shame, guilt. I created friction in my business unknowingly because I was mimicking bad bosses that mimic their bad bosses, that mimic their bad bosses and have been for the last 200 years as the industrial revolution took over our, our western hemisphere. At the end of the day, we're a product of our environments, from the past, from our childhood, from all of these things, and that's the first place we look at where this friction comes from.
Speaker 2: 20:21
We believe things because they satisfy our, our uh return on investment, whatever that might be the emotional, the mental, the math, the mathematical, you know the, the pay, the energy, right. But we also sit there wondering why, god's name, is everything so hard all the time? It's so transactional. Why is it? Why do I think I'm surrounded by imbeciles every day and that I have to hold the hands of these Muppets doing the thing? They're not the Muppet, they're not the Muppet, they just haven't been treated right and they themselves have have uh challenges that they're working through and they're on a journey in life where they're just not in the same spot as you.
Speaker 2: 21:09
And when we start to to, to, to see it from a 10,000 foot view and give everyone just a little bit more forgiveness, humility and grace, uh, including ourselves, and first ourselves inside our subconscious selves. Then we can start to be kind to our conscious self, and then our conscious self can be kind to the people that are most beloved in our environment, be it our family, our friends, our parents, our co-workers, our direct reporters, but then further into the tribes that we're a part of, our churches, our communities, our kids' school, the company you work for. Leadership isn't about you being the boss. Leadership is about you doing something that people will follow.
Speaker 1: 21:58
Yeah, and you know, again, again, this all is. It's so much deeper. You know I keep honing in on that, but you I met. I have another great client on the lemon seed team Fantastic, wonderful family. But honestly, like his nerves, his anxiety sits at the top of his mind every single day. So, like I spend a lot of time like I have identified that I need to be his encourager Because I definitely think that there's a lot of things that just weigh on him because he's striving so hard to be the leader and a lot. One time I actually said you know what you need to give yourself grace. You need to give yourself some grace here. You need to give yourself some. There's got to be some level of understanding. Like you're one human right and right now you are wearing 20 hats. We might wear your marketing hat, but you're still the service manager, you're the sales manager, you're the install manager. You know you're handling payroll problems and CRN problems and and I remember thinking like man, he needs a leader to lead him while he's leading others.
Speaker 1: 23:00
Cause I had a really good friend, you know, trey, my brother. He tells me he told me one time you should always have a coach for something. So there needs to always be something in your business or in your personal life that you're getting coached through and coached on Danielle Putman from New Flat Rate. You know she'll share that with me as well, because she'll say you know, I'm a part of this six-week mastermind because I've got to get out of my own mind and start moving around. And so I think when we invest in ourselves as leaders of companies, naturally we're able to invest better and more authentic self to our team and we tend to be more patient, more kind, more loving and it just, it just ripples on down all the way to our customer, you know, and so it's a. It's a powerful thing. I'll laugh at this other thing too. I had this client before I met with him, you know, and so it's a. It's a powerful thing. Um, I'll laugh at this other thing too.
Speaker 1: 23:47
I had this client and I before I met with him. You know, I do a little pre-work before our client. So it's like this edgy brand, it's green and black and lightning bolts and I'm like I'm about to open this phone call and this guy's going to be tatted up earrings, absolutely not. I'll open that up to my accountant. That's what he looked like and I was like okay, but when he started talking he was very forward thinking, very edgy. Now he didn't look it but it really made me kind of step back and say you know, this brand kind of matches his vibe. But yeah, you're, you're definitely like hitting the nail on the head there. So like how do you think we can start identifying, reducing those friction points? Like is there a practical way? You know, and I know you've kind of leaned into some of this, but you know one little piece of advice if someone really identified with that portion of what we just talked about, what are just like maybe a little quick takeaway from that.
Speaker 2: 24:37
Yeah, absolutely. You know, and, and, and. To that point, we'll have a book out the next six months that speaks exactly about all 12 of these friction points and how you can identify them and reduce friction in your business. But the very first question that you're going to ask yourself is a simple one what rubs people the wrong way? Right, because friction is a rub point. Friction is the rust on the flywheel. Friction is the thing that's slowing and grinding things down. It's brakes that are almost out of brake pad. They're the thing that allow us to go. If that makes them angry or if that gives them angst. Or compensation plans is a perfect example.
Speaker 2: 25:19
People in 90% of cases do compensation astoundingly wrong, and it's all based off of completely sound principles. If you employ people in a factory, right, this stuff makes sense for the industrial revolution. It does not make sense for the more complex task driven things that you need to do. So there's all kinds of source material that I could chase you down on. Ultimately, I'm going to consolidate that into a single spot.
Speaker 2: 25:49
But what rubs you the wrong way? What doesn't sit right with you? What is giving your, your client that you spoke of, angst? What is the one thing? Just and and and. Here's a trick. Here's a trick Don't think of a story, don't think of a, don't think of a whole thing that happened in the past. Think of an incident, think of an incident that caused the angst, the angst for the customer, the CSR, the reason why the customer didn't buy. Right, we have to think about it. Read, listen, hear, listen to those calls, go out and listen to our technicians talking and find out what's kicking back at us. Why are they quiet, quitting? Why are they? Why are they sullen? Why are they despondent? Why are they disengaging when you need them to engage? Well, don't think of it as a holistic, big old, monstrous thing. Think of one incident where they would have flipped a switch. And when we start to identify those, we've started the process of identifying the rub points, and then it's just about getting your sandpaper out and get rid of that rust.
Speaker 1: 26:55
Yeah, I love that analogy. Just, you know, some people start thinking, well, I'm not, I am who I am and I get it, I really do. But there is always a point of refinement, sanding down those rough edges. That's what makes us good leaders, that's what we should always I use this, I usually say always be branding like just as a fun little tagline. But you know, we should always be refining who we are, just as business owners and leaders, and I absolutely adore, adore that.
Speaker 1: 27:23
But you leaned into something there that I really enjoy talking about too is you know what about the buying experience? A buying experience you know, I was. So I was talking to you and this, this blew my mind company like a $13 million company, multi-service, that you could not book online. They didn't answer the phone but like very basic hours and they were like man, we just haven't grown in like five years. And I was like, well, because so much of the buying journey has transitioned to not dialing someone on a telephone that they were just missing the mark and like it literally just never clicked with them, that this gaping hole again of the customer experience.
Speaker 1: 28:04
They have a great brand, they have a great team, great leaders, but just the customer experience had become so antiquated that I think it bled over onto their brand. It's like, yeah, that's just an old school company. And I'm like man $13 million is nothing to shake a stick at in Texas, as I say, but it is when you're frustrated that you can't grow. I'm like man once you hit 13, there's no reason you shouldn't be at 25. You're past that, let's hit the gas. So I think that better buying experience comes into things, but I also think that's another area to layer in, like how your team acts and how they are interacting with people, and so I know you probably have a lot to say on that too.
Speaker 2: 28:44
Well, there's two big things that I take away from that. One is the four great walks, and we'll talk about that in a moment. From that One is the four great walks, and we'll talk about that in a moment. But first let's talk about a very large client of ours just about to touch a billion dollars in revenue, and they really did struggle with this in the early days when they were about $250 million in revenue. They were looking at the data from their website and their website said looking at the data from their website and their website said well, the website sucks and it's it has a terrible job of calling. So we need to get the website to get people to call us because we're killers in the call room. We can, we can crush anything in the call room, just just get them to call us. So let's fix that website to get them to call us. And what the data actually was telling them when we did a deeper dive and then analyzed it is that their website was just terrible and if they fix the website, we would convert more of the website. Now the hard charge from a quarter of a billion to a billion. They fix that website and over 70% of their appointments get booked on their website today. 70% of their appointments get booked on their website today. Now, ultimately, when we're talking the scale of big numbers here, you can get an incredible amount of efficiency if you invest your money in the right things.
Speaker 2: 30:04
Very often, the data is telling us something and we're interpreting it as something else, and that in itself is a friction point, right? Not understanding or knowing the data, not having that experience there's no reason in the world they should have that experience. They've never been there before. We had in various different scenarios across different industries, let alone their specific situation in their call center. So, because they were a highly extroverted company, we knew that the extroversion was the thing that was driving their need to get people to call, when what we do know from Myers-Briggs and the library patterns that exist in America today that tell us that half of the planet wants to make the appointment online and never talk to a human being in the history of human beings, covid actually shifted that. So we actually have a little bit more introversion as, one, online real-time booking functions have improved dramatically and, two, they know that when they do the thing, it does the thing. Now it's more reassuring than previous technology had been, as improvements continue to get made. So that's the first thing. Yes, we're not always looking at the right thing, and when we're looking at the right thing, we're not always drawing the right conclusion. And that's why you need to have people in the room who understand the situation, so that you can go from a quarter billion to a billion, or a quarter million to a million, or a million to 12 million or whatever the case might be, because we're all on a journey together and let's follow the old man in the woods on the high road and skip over the potholes in the roadblocks. So to that end, we've also got the four great walks.
Speaker 2: 31:55
The number one reason why salespeople have a hard time selling is because we, as leaders, have not supplied them or curated our inventory, our prices, our protections, our payments and our prices to be elegant and easy to buy right. So when you make it easier for buyers to buy, you instantly make it easier for sellers to sell. I have seen anywhere from 30 to 50% to 100% increases in dramatic cases where things were really bad in conversion rates and consistent conversion rates when we did a few things. First we looked at the price books and said 90% of this is, um, distracting and confusing for anybody, and if it's confusing for the technician, it's confusing for the customer. And if it's confusing for the customer, uh, confusion causes knows, we're not going to get the thing that we need. Confusion causes no's, we're not going to get the thing that we need. So let's get purposeful in how we curate our product first, but then let's look at how we align that product to a journey for the customer. I have about a 45-minute video that's called Price to Sell that I'm happy to share with anyone who's in the home service space and wants to see a wide range of this in both replacement and in service repairs, as well as maintenance upgrades, and it's designed specifically. It's free. We're not looking for money.
Speaker 2: 33:26
What we're looking to do is help people understand that a great way to reduce or eliminate friction is to create an environment where there is no friction, where you've made it so easy for a person to walk from the bottom to the top. Now, this was inspired by the nine great walks of New Zealand. I lived in New Zealand for three months and spent about eight months there in total over the over a couple of years period, and they have these beautiful nine walks varying in length and challenge, and you start off at a base camp and everything in New Zealand is beautiful, so it starts beautifully. You go up up to the vistas, along the way of the vista, you're seeing all this beautiful scenery and seeing all of these unique, fascinating things, and then you're getting up to this gorgeous pinnacle moment this thing, this volcano, this cave, this something and then you're taking that all in, you're drinking it all in and then you're making your way back to the base camp.
Speaker 2: 34:26
Well, this is not unlike what we need to be doing for our employees, right, our culture, our employee experience. Because when we can curate a beautiful visit of the Louvre or we create this wonderful art exhibit at an art gallery or this beautiful like Baird Jackson is this weekend here in Scottsdale, this array of gorgeous vehicles that people get to drink in and enjoy Now, some of these cars are many millions of dollars. Ain't nobody buying those except the mega rich. But we can look right.
Speaker 1: 35:03
Yeah.
Speaker 2: 35:04
But there's going to be an awful lot of cars there where you go up to it and you think, well, that's not something I can afford. And you hear it up on the auction block and go by God, I can actually afford that car. And you put your paddle up right and that's no different than our customers. What if we were to take a customer first on the product and the protection and curate a message and story and strategy for them to walk from the smallest solution to the biggest solution, not the Band-Aid solution, the standard solution that would be as proud to sell at the base level as we would at the Lamborghini level? Right, but take them on that walk and allow them to walk up to say, the fifth option, the option that they're most likely not going to buy but they deserve to know. They deserve to know that that exists and it's an option for them, respectfully.
Speaker 2: 35:50
Now, what that does is we've now just anchored that up at the high point. We started low, we went high, right. We now reverse and we go backwards in our price and our and our payment, including our club price and payment, and we walk them from the high back down to the low. So we finished looking at our beautiful Vista, we reconcile what this thing means in the meaning of life and we start walking back to base camp and we finish low.
Speaker 2: 36:17
Now there's all kinds of gurus out there and people that are saying, well, you got to start high because you got to like, condition them and do the thing and like, just you got to do a thing that make them feel like so that you could stay in control and stuff. Yeah, all kinds of All kinds of nonsense that I don't subscribe to, because the real psychology of it tells us that people want to see your empathy first and empathetically you're going to show them your most modest solution, but you're also going to respectfully show them your best solution and then walk them back down to your modest solution and then let them choose and help them navigate.
Speaker 1: 36:53
Yeah. So a lot of times contractors will tell me that like, well, you know, we don't, we don't really want to sell this or we don't really want to do that. And I'm like man, the people want people. Like you mentioned earlier, nobody is excited to be dealing with home service companies. Their roof is blown off or it's leaking, their toilets or hot water heater is leaking, their HVAC is not working, their lawn system is broken, they've got pests everywhere. There is something that is not enjoyable. And so they want your empathy first. Empathy takes you a long ways because you just identify, you relate to them and then I tell this is I say this all the time like you've got to get your team out of their bank accounts, of the customer's bank account. Your job is to provide options. The homeowner can make their decision. You provide choices and options. And again that becomes where you're not known as the pushy or the overzealous contractor, you're known as the like. They came out and presented all of these options Like there's a lot of power in that.
Speaker 2: 37:51
Right, well, and this gets deep Crystal really really fast.
Speaker 1: 37:56
But let's, let's not you, I know.
Speaker 2: 37:59
Yeah, very uncharacteristic of Ryan to go deep like a fire hose on a teacup here. It's a let's switch over to service repair. Right In service repair. I've identified three significant categories of service repair. There is the priority repair that brings the product to manufacturer specification right and full stop. That's priority. Then there is the second, which is what I call the necessary repair.
Speaker 2: 38:26
These are the scheduled preventative maintenance solutions that we should be doing on a consistent basis, along with some peripheral things like tune-up type solutions that we can create, like real tune-ups, not fake tune-ups that most people talk about. And and right. These are the things that a client needs to have their system last 50 to 100 percent longer, because, golly, we we want our customers to to sell um replace their equipment every 10 years. But there's an awful lot of people who have 25 and 30-year-old systems, even in the hottest or worst places of the country, that are hard on equipment. So this narrative that we like to tell ourselves to satisfy the belief that we're actually serving our clients at the highest level is a false flag. It's a red herring and it's frankly not what the customer is subscribing to. Last but not least, there's the discretionary purchases. Now we like to think that everything is necessary and priority. But let's face it, all those things that aren't necessary and aren't actually priority are fully discretionary. If it is an improvement or upgrade to the solution are fully discretionary. If it is an improvement or upgrade to the solution, then that is the. That is a completely different scenario than than a priority. Something that gets it back to manufacturer specification. Or two, something that maintains it, scheduled maintenance, just like a car has to get their spark plugs or timing belt changed. So now we see the landscape and most people like to do these options where it's like.
Speaker 2: 39:57
Option one is this band-aid nonsense that only a handyman would be proud of. And then there's option two, which is the thing that we need to sell you. Then option three is this, plus a whole bunch of nonsense that they don't need, and option four and five are just more nonsense that's piled onto it to pretend like that actually matters, so that we anchor in option two or three as the sale and then we hope to get our bigger sale and that's all just malarkey, right? All of that is just smoke and mirrors and customers, quite frankly, are sick of it because they're not idiots. But you know who else is sick of it, our employees, our employees, who feel so disingenuous and self-betrayed when they have to present this garbage and nonsense that they know is garbage and nonsense for the situation at hand. So what if? What if we were to be so bold, so brazen, so cheeky as to actually have five options that sound something like this.
Speaker 2: 40:51
Option number one Mrs Jones, you can do nothing. Right, there's no like you can do nothing. That is an option that's like well, it's all. Stack hands that you could just ride this out, right, put some flex tape on it and hope for the best right. Option number two you could get some handyman to do some bandaid thing.
Speaker 2: 41:12
We're not going to do that. We're not handymen. You hired us. You called a skilled technician to come to your house. Why in the world are you asking me for handyman solutions? Right, if you want a handyman to do that, there is a hundred people down the street that are doing this for beer and pizza money. So talk to them, get your husband to do it, hope for the best and hope that your whole system doesn't go into catastrophic failure as a result. That's the consequence that you risk, but it's also.
Speaker 2: 41:41
It may work for another 18 years, we don't know, but at the end of the day, I'm pretty confident that this solution is going to solve your problem, cause the only thing I'm trying to sell you is option three retail price of the priority service. If there is no priority service, the necessary service. If there is no priority service, the necessary service. If there is no necessary service, the discretionary service. Discretionarily, everything in moderation, including moderation. We don't need to jam something down their throat every time we show up. That in itself is unnecessary and too much for customers.
Speaker 2: 42:15
Option number four is the club price, which should be a built-in sort of uh controlled manufacture, uh manager, controlled uh discount. A lot of people will disagree with me that they should be not doing discounts. I'm going to have about a half a day uh session on why exactly you do this, due to the psychology of human beings, and then I'm going to do option number five, and option five is going to be the club payment. But wait, there's more right. I have 5.5 options. I don't have six options. I don't have five options. I have five and a half options. Well, what's the half option? Well, if you don't actually want to go ahead and get that thing fixed, no, no problem. We really think that we could just get this fixed and save you thousands and thousands of dollars. But you do have the outside option of getting it replaced. But why not just get it fixed? Because, yeah, all of a sudden.
Speaker 1: 43:08
Yeah well, all of a sudden, the ball is really in their court.
Speaker 1: 43:10
They really feel in control of the decision making process and not bamboozled, you know, and not not bait and switched, you know, just very uh, I think they feel very protected in a sense, and you know that I think there's a lot of power in being genuinely invested in, in making it and not just driving to the bottom line. And you know, I I watch people, um, you know, in these neighborhood groups and things like that say you know, don't use so-and-so company, because they're always pushing for replacement. Odds are that's probably true, because they're so numbers driven, they are pushing on replacement when really, a lot of times if you just laid the facts out in front of these, in front of these homeowners odds are the educated ones and the ones that can truly afford it they're going to lean that direction anyway ones, and the ones that can truly afford it they're going to lean that direction anyway. And so it is a very it's a very sincere approach that takes a lot of the pressure off being so salesy.
Speaker 2: 44:03
Well, and frankly I'm going to say you're right. The educated and or experienced customers very well could, but the more experienced and intelligent they are, of course, the more affronted they are when they feel like they are being put through the grinder. Equally as much, we have a duty of care to people who aren't as savvy and we have to care for them at a very high level Because, again, it comes back to that thing that we were talking about. You started a business as a business owner, with your name on the line, with your reputation and your good intentions, at, at, at, at risk, and it takes 20 years to build that reputation and one stupid idea of greed that comes out. Now. I just heard about a company, um, that is getting ready to get set to sell to private equity, and private equity has come in to say here, here's the things you're going to do. Now the guys who are setting it up for sale, they're saying all right, guys, now we're going to start condemning units on all of these things so that we can start getting more unit sales out on things that don't actually need condemning. We're just going to start creating situational problems and then elevating the risk factors on these things and I, I, I, my visceral response was to drive to the place that that was happening and literally just start punching people in the throat.
Speaker 2: 45:30
I was, I was so appalled that this is a thing that happens as you suck the soul out of your business and do anything you can to make a buck. There is a good, positive, real, authentic way that you can serve people in this community, in this industry, in your communities. These are your neighbors, these are your family members. If you're not proud enough to have your grandma be exposed to that at any given time, you shouldn't be in business and shame on you for not having a business that you could put comfortably and safely in front of your own grandma.
Speaker 2: 46:06
Right, have some standards, because people will follow people who have standards. People will follow and stand with people who stand for something, who care for the less sophisticated and the sophisticated who create ahead of time the solution that is going to best serve the technician, to be able to present it with confidence and a belief that they're not betraying themselves and their honesty and their own integrity as human beings. For what we're doing. When we build a better culture, we build a better buying experience. Our culture and our buying experiences are our brand and those are the stories that we tell in the advertising that we tell. So again, we've been talking about culture this whole time. You want to have absolutely gobsmacking, astounding ads.
Speaker 1: 47:00
Stand for something. Yeah, I'm telling you like it really is a game changer when you realize like it's like a button, a click, some a light bulb will go off and you're like I've been doing this wrong the whole time, um, and so it's very impactful. So I know that really good stories build really great brands.
Speaker 1: 47:19
Um and so I know, you know, I think a lot of times we can get um, you know, just down in the weeds, but, like, great experiences really are what helped define um impactful brand stories Right, so, um, why do you what? What is your advice for capturing and maybe sharing some of those stories that contractors, that really resonates with contractors. You know, I remember one of our, one of our technicians, accidentally ran over um a dog. It was a terrible situation, um, but he helped, I mean, he picked the dog up, he kept, you know, notified the homeowner. I mean it was a terrible situation but at the end of the day he did everything he possibly could to say we go above and beyond, you know, and you know rolling down trash cans and changing out light bulbs, things like that, but you know what are, what is some and I know this is the last little part here but what is your advice for just capturing those things?
Speaker 2: 48:13
Well, you know, I've really reflected on that a lot, crystal, when my family was running a furniture store and I was thinking, how do we deliver delight in our company? What thing extra can we do when we do the thing? And I really struggled with that. So, fast forward to today, with the home service industry, I have spent so much time figuring out the things that we can do that are operationally built in as a surprise to our customers. For example, you do a duct cleaning. Right, we clean ducts. We don't try to sell it top of funnel because we actually want to make money at it. We sell it mid-funnel as a maintenance, a necessary purchase, not a discretionary or a priority purchase, but something that helps your equipment last twice as long. And we sell it for a really good price. But we add 0% financing in there. We throw in a dryer vent cleaning and we uh and we do uh like a one price for everything kind of scenario and every system additional is just a half the price when we do it at the same time. Well, it makes it awfully easy for them to sell it. Right, we're selling it about 30% and a lot of our clients who've gone whole hog it's certainly in our organization that fix it, frankie. What the that we've started ourselves and what we've, what we've seen is when we did that. It's fantastic.
Speaker 2: 49:35
Here's the secret delight. Now I'm telling this to the inside scoop. Don't go there and tell all the customers what you're doing. You have to keep that a surprise. The whole point of it is that it has to be a surprise, and I'm going to tell you why in a moment. But the thing we do is we go to their bathrooms and you know those nasty, scraggly vents that are in the bathroom that have all those cobwebs and grossness all over the nothing to do with your HVAC system whatsoever, right, yeah. But we go and we we clean that thing, right, we pop it back in and it's all nice and clean and tidy and it looks nice and it's just like that's the delight factor, that's. That's no different than five guys throwing in those extra bit of french fries at the bottom of their bag, on all of their bags of burgers and fries. Why do they do that?
Speaker 2: 50:18
Because delight surprise activates a different chemical than promising something and then delivering on it. What you're delivering when you say I'm going to do all of these things is satisfaction. You satisfy your customer unless you fail to do one of the things that you promised within your stack and then you disappoint them, right, then they're not getting their money's worth because you promised something and they didn't get it. But if they just get what they want, you've, you've created the chemical dopamine. Right Now, dopamine isn't the happy drug, it's not the satisfaction drug that the chemical, the molecule in your system, blood system, that says, ah, that's satisfactory.
Speaker 2: 51:02
Dopamine actually comes from anticipation of the thing being done. The pure, pure as deepest significant doses of dopamine come from anticipation, not from resolution, right? So don't promise everything that you're going to promise in the whole wide world. Promise everything that you're going to do consistently, every time, without fail, and then deliver on those things that you can deliver on, cause not everyone has that nasty old air vent in their bathroom. You do it when you can, right, but those ones who do you deliver that, and when you deliver that, what you're getting now is oxytocin.
Speaker 2: 51:39
Now, oxytocin is the chemical that comes into the blood system. When you have a bonding moment, a moment of loyalty, a moment of surprise and delight create oxytocin. So does looking at the sincerity of faces, children's faces, authentic faces, faces that you trust, right Faces that have done something for you, in humility and in gratitude. Those are the things that are activated. Oxytocin is what's activated when they receive these things. Now what does that matter? It matters because that's where loyalty lives, that's where unsolicited referrals live, that's where five-star reviews and gushing customers. That's why you don't need to have a referral paid program, because they don't work. It is a fact that referral-based programs are dopamine driven.
Speaker 2: 52:34
We want to create oxytocin driven referral programs, programs that have people insisting that their friends use your guy. Right, you have to be their guy. So that's what we try to manufacture. That's what we look for. Those are the opportunities we're looking for to develop a solution where the customer goes oh yeah, no, those are my boys. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no, no, stop using those people. Use these people. These people are my people, they are my tribe. I will die for these people, and when we do that with our customers, we win. But we also win when we do that with our employees.
Speaker 1: 53:13
Absolutely.
Speaker 2: 53:15
When we start figuring out these things, my goodness, do we ever have a chance to really shift the way that our culture feels? And when our culture feels right and everything is congruent with the employee they're delivering? We're talking about ordinary people, crystal, ordinary people delivering extraordinary buying experiences, and it's not the story and branding that matters, it's the stories we create that we can tell in branding, because they're authentic, true stories to our brand. So the experience, the experiences of the employee and the customer are what come first. Those are the things that are easily told um in our branding, that show the people right, not tell them. Not so often.
Speaker 2: 54:02
This is probably one of the most powerful things I ever learned is we often are trapped in telling the story of our story. Right, our ads are stories about stories. What if? What if we just took those stories instead of telling the story of the stories? What if we were just the story? What if we just played out the story and and and did it a little bit like acting right, so we can do that? That's exactly what wizard of ads do is not tell the story of the story, but actually be the story, and that's where your game changing advertising takes place. That's what draws people in, but it has to be authentic to the employee and customer experience. That's where the big wins come, because anything else falls a little flat, just like you said earlier.
Speaker 1: 54:53
Absolutely. You know there's again. I said this earlier, I'll say it again this is deeper. This is so much deeper and I just want to encourage anyone that's listening.
Speaker 1: 55:02
It doesn't matter what industry you're in. This technically applies to all brands, all industries, all cultures, all work environments. This is not just solely for home service. This is how you can elevate any business that you're in. My grandmother used to tell me if you focus on the pennies, the dollars will save themselves. It's the same thing. If you focus on your people, the company will grow. If you focus on how you can build yourself up as a leader, your culture, your brand, overall, just everything is lifted, everything is elevated and explored, even your customer experience. I mean everything.
Speaker 1: 55:39
And so many contractors are just rushing to the bottom of a pile of leads. So they're down there in a dog fight for their life and I just want to shake them and be like hey, if you want to step out of the ring, if you come over here and you can hold on for a little bit not train for a marathon you will get yourself out of that hamster wheel that most people are running on and you will be like looking down there like man. I spent way too much time down there. And I'm not saying it's easy and I'm not saying it's cheap. You and I both know it's not cheap or easy, but it is such an investment in yourself, in your team and in your company, like Jennifer Bagley from CI Web Group.
Speaker 1: 56:17
The other day she and I were talking at a Dyken event and she said you know, I just want to tell these people you're not just a contractor, you're an entrepreneur Like you are building something, you're an investor. And I'm like man. That is so true. Just you know, I encourage everyone listening, like listen to what Ryan's saying. There's so much depth to that conversation that if you were to take a step back and remove yourself from the hustle and bustle that everybody's grinding on, your hustle becomes a little different.
Speaker 2: 56:45
It just becomes a little different when you can shift yeah.
Speaker 1: 56:50
You're shifting your focus.
Speaker 2: 56:54
Very often we're focused on the nuts and bolts of business, when what you said earlier, a lot of the time I'm just trying to give them hope and encouragement. So do your employees right. Yes, we recognize that our business owners need it because they're lonely at the top, and that's natural, because they're putting themselves in a bit of a silo. But they can also recognize that in their employees.
Speaker 2: 57:19
What I'm discovering is I've gone down this rabbit hole.
Speaker 2: 57:22
You know it started with these are the true principles of marketing, and marketing in the grander, greater sense of the thing, that there are laws of the universe when it comes to communication, that we understand and can follow the natural laws of pattern.
Speaker 2: 57:37
But it's equally true in sales, which is equally true in how we structure our businesses out, be it the org charts or our comp plans or the way that we create the environment. That sends a message to our people our level, our duty of care, what we stand for, what we stand against people, our level, our duty of care, what we stand for, what we stand against. But then, as I'm writing this book, I'm realizing, my goodness, this matters with me and my wife and son, and this matters with my church, and this matters with the basketball team that my son is playing on, and it plays out at every level, but it starts inside you, at the subconscious and conscious level. You know the only person that you're going to get to do this right and point in the right direction. And, trust me, you're going to fail along the way and you're causing friction and within yourself not not not to mention your loved ones, but you got to keep pushing through and working through it. When you take care of yourself, you can take care of others.
Speaker 1: 58:39
That's right. That's right. Well, as y'all can tell, we could talk for hours about all of these things. We could really get on our soapbox. We did get on our soapbox. It felt really good. I think you know I love listening to you.
Speaker 2: 58:52
It is just very.
Speaker 1: 58:52
You know I love listening to you. It is just very. It always brings me back to the psychological and the impactful side of branding, because even I can get caught up in the showy, the fancy, the pretty, the all of that. It really does bring me back to really understanding the psychological pieces that go behind who you are as a company and I just loved it. So, to summarize today's discussion, guys, I feel like Ryan really showed us how a strong culture is essential to your brand's success. By aligning those values, who you hire, reduce the friction, create some positive experiences, your company culture can actually be one of your most powerful storytelling tools. So I know our quick little call to action for you listeners, is we encourage you to take a really good look at your culture this week. Identify one area where you might could, in the words of Ryan, reduce that friction, build a stronger, more cohesive team and really start making moves in your company. So any final words, ryan.
Speaker 2: 59:53
Absolutely, liz. If you'd like to get a copy of the video, I can send that link out to you. You can either message me on any of the socials you can find me at WizardRyanChute, pretty much anywhere or you can email me at RyanChute, at wizardofadscom, and more than happy to send that out, more than happy to have a discussion and, frankly, I'm more than happy to really just talk to you about some of the transformation work that I'm working on and the self-reflection and some of those other friction points, just so that you can start reconciling it on your own businesses. Right, look, we believe in two prices full price and free. So when you need me and you're ready to implement these big things, we'll be there for you and we'll be extraordinary partners for you, for those people that we have a good fit with. Otherwise, it's free. We're here to care for the industry at the highest level. We know and we believe.
Speaker 2: 1:00:48
I made the conscious decision that home services is going to be my home and I, and I did that because I just love the attitude, I love the gumption, I love the, the, the, the authenticity of the, of the hands-on frontline worker who's doing the real thing every day, serving and caring people at the highest level. I'm there for you to win and and and I know, certainly know the crystal is and these are the people I want to surround myself with and serve at the highest level, whether we're officially in the mix or if we're just on the sidelines cheering you on to see you win.
Speaker 1: 1:01:26
Absolutely Well. Thank you so much. Well, all right, guys. Thank you for listening to another episode of From the Yellow Chair. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider writing us a review, giving us a follow, letting us know what you think. But, guys, thanks for sipping some lemonade with us. We'll see you next time.
Speaker 2: 1:01:44
Cheers.
