Beyond the Tools: Marc Mason on Mindset, Confidence, and the Real Work of Sales

What does it take to rise from the bottom and build a winning mindset? In this episode, Sam Wakefield sits down with Marc Mason—entrepreneur, speaker, real estate investor, and voice for the next generation of men. Together, they dive into the psychology of sales, the power of personal transformation, and how to stay resilient when life knocks you down.

💥 Whether you're a new rep or seasoned closer, this conversation will reignite your belief in what's possible.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Why confidence is a choice—and how to rebuild it when it breaks
• The mindset shift that took Marc from broke to bold
• Tools for visualization, discipline, and staying in momentum
• How personal responsibility impacts sales results
• What it means to coach the next generation with purpose

🔥 You don’t need perfect circumstances—you need the right mindset.

Connect with Marc Mason on Instagram: @marcmasonofficial

—

📞 Work with Sam / Join the Close It Now Movement:

🌐 Website: https://www.closeitnow.net

🚀 Coaching & Training: https://www.closeitnow.net/coaching

💬 Leave a review: https://g.page/r/CbfnnDqTCwQdEAE/review

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Welcome to Close it now, thepodcast that's revolutionizing the
H Vac and home improvementtrades industries.
Get ready to dive deep intothe world of heating, ventilation
and air conditioning.
We're turning up the heat onindustry standards and cooling down
misconceptions.
And we're not just talkingabout fixing vents and adjusting

(00:21):
thermostats.
It's about the transformativemovement that's reshaping the very
foundation of H Vac and home improvement.
We're the driving force,inspiring top performers who crave
excellence not only in theirprofessional endeavors, but also
in fitness, nutrition,relationships, and personal growth,
proving that we can indeedhave it all.

(00:44):
This is Close it now, whereexcellence meets excitement.
Let's get to work now.
Your host, Sam Wakefield.
Well, all right.
Welcome back.
Close It Now.
I am stoked about this guest today.

(01:04):
We have another brother fromthe Boston area, so he is joining
us today.
This is Mark Mason.
I don't know if you've seenthis, but he just launched an incredible
book that I'm excited to dive into.
It's about being a.
It's the Resilient entrepreneur.
How do we be resilient as an entrepreneur?

(01:25):
Which if you're an.
If you've even sniffed theidea of being an entrepreneur is
a concept you must know.
You have to be resilient.
You have those days, the updays, the down days, and everywhere
that's in between.
And how do we manage that?
How do we handle the mindsetaround that and then navigate through
it and not let those down daysderail you?

(01:48):
And so I'm super excited to introduce.
He's not only an author, he isfounder and CEO of in RCL Mechanical
and also has a propertydevelopment company as well.
If I can get my languagestraight today.
And, man, I'm just excited tohave you on the show.

(02:10):
We've been bouncing aroundeach other and been in each other's
circles on social media foryears now.
And so it's great to finallyget to sit down and have a good conversation.
So thanks for joining us, Mark.
Thanks, Sam.
Appreciate it.
Yeah, like you said, I mean, Ifeel like I've seen you around social
media bouncing around the samefriend circles and, you know, I feel
like this is the new, like,you know, whether anybody likes it

(02:31):
on social media is a new thing.
Right?
Like, like, it's like I almostsee people on social media and have
these friendships andrelationships on social media more
than I see my normal friends.
Right.
No doubt.
So.
And you kind of just like yourexpertise and your.
And your growth is just Exponential.
When you can kind of leverageit over the whole US or world, you
know, if you may, you know, so.

(02:52):
No, I appreciate it, man.
Absolutely.
The book.
Yes, the book just came outthat was that exciting.
Two years in the making.
You know, it's called theresilient opportunity.
Like Mr.
Wakefield just said, it kindof dives into, deep, into that entrepreneurial
journey, the adversities thatwe all kind of dealt with.
So I'm excited for you to takea read.

(03:13):
Yeah, yeah, 100%.
It's going to be, I'm sure itwill be one of the Close it now book
club books.
So for everybody that'slistening, yes, the Close it now
book club is rocking and rolling.
The date of recording.
I'm sure you won't hear thisin time, but the June book we did
go for, no, the Sequel.
And the authors, RichardFenton and Andrea Waltz, actually

(03:36):
sat in on the conversationthat we had about the book in the
book club meeting.
So that's one thing that'sreally exciting.
With Closing now, every, everychance that I get, I'm going to have
the authors actually hang outfor the discussion of the book to
get extra insight, which isreally exciting.
So I'm sure, Mark, your bookwill be one of those.
But let's go back a little bit.

(03:58):
Give us a quick highlight.
Real man.
How in the world did you endup where you're at, what you're doing,
you know?
What gives you the, the streetcred to write a book called the Resilient
Entrepreneur?
Well, I mean, I think I'mdefinitely no better than anybody
else.
I think that I just workextremely hard and I'm just disciplined,

(04:18):
you know, And I think if, Ithink if you have those, those traits,
I feel you can do anythingreally, you know, to rewind it here
a little bit, you know, Ithink that to tie it into the book,
we all have this.
You know, they've always hadadversity in the past.
Right.
You know, we've all lost somebody.
We've all had these tragedies,some higher than others.
Right.
So, you know, as I was growingup through my childhood, I, I crossed

(04:41):
a lot of that, right.
And I, I, throughout mychildhood, elementary, middle school,
I had the opportunity to goleft to right this whole time, you
know, And I feel like whenyou're that age, just, you just don't
know what you don't know right now.
Looking back at it, after Igot through high school and I, and
thankfully I've hung aroundwith the right people, took that
right path, you know, Foundsomething I love because I feel like,

(05:02):
truly like to, to, to beexplosive in life.
I feel like you need to likefind what you, you're passionate
about or you just, you're notgoing to really have a purpose.
Luckily I found that and as Iwas coming up through the success
and as, as I started buildingmy side business doing plumbing at
H vac, I got my plumbinglicense, got into real estate and

(05:23):
I was just that go get it.
You know, I, you know, myfirst house I bought.
I, you know, I did everythingto get that full close house.
I, you know, dumped $60,000 incredit card debt into it, refinanced
it, paid it off, rolled itinto the next one.
While building the plumbingbusiness, working, you know, 12,
14 hours a day is hustlinglike, you know, a lot of you probably
have that listen to this orwant to, right?

(05:45):
And it takes me to like 20,19, 2020 where I started o mechanical
and I started really kind ofgaining that reputation of, you know,
you know, the entrepreneur,the successful business owner from
the real estate, the plumbingand all that good stuff.
And I wanted to, I got into acoaching group and everybody was
writing books.
I'm like, all right, this isdefinitely the right room to be in.
Even though I have no desireto write a book, you know, but all

(06:08):
these guys, like, you know,they're doing it right, they're doing
something right.
You know, they own the onlymulti million dollar companies, seven,
eight figure, nine figure companies.
And it just grew on me.
Kind of like, you know, youare who you hang out with.
I'm sure you, you know, you're all.
About the average of theirfive closest people in your circle.
Absolutely.

(06:28):
It, it just, you know, whathappened was I was like, you know
what?
I'm gonna write a book.
It was a challenge to me notrealizing that that challenge was
like probably going to be oneof the bigger challenges of my life
because it took extreme amountof focus and like dedication, which
you know, I can be.
But like to have it for a longperiod of time to write a book is.
But I definitelyunderestimated that.

(06:50):
So I figured out what I wantedto write the book about because I
feel like I went through thattrauma in adversity and I created
success out of it, right.
And I wanted to say, hey, howdo I get other people to, to, to
inspire, to do this as well?
So that's what the wholebook's about.
It's kind of how to convertadversity into wealth.
Kind of goes through my storyin the first couple Chapters of,

(07:12):
you know, what happened to meand, you know, and how I did it.
Right.
And kind of goes over likebuilding your own personal core values,
trying to figure out who youare, who you want to hang out with.
Kind of like those basics, per se.
Yeah.
And then goes into the basicsof building a business, essentially.
Like, you know, what are thosebasic things you need?
So it's almost like a two part book.

(07:33):
Sure.
You know, to help you maybeget over these, these, these small
transitions in life that like,you may like play victim of, but
if you use it as fuel, likeyou can use it to get you to the
next level.
Yeah.
So, you know, and then it goesinto the basics of business, which
is, you know, your basic, likehow to do a business plan, you know,
what's marketing, how can youget free marketing?

(07:54):
Right.
How do you leverage social media?
And you're huge on the same.
I mean, you're in the salesworld, marketing world.
They tie in, they marry,they're in bed together.
So it's the same.
Yeah.
It's almost the same thing ina way.
Yeah.
So I.
Or two sides of the same coin.
Maybe it would be a better wayto say it.
100, you know, and I thinkthat that's the one thing you need

(08:15):
to know how to leverage asgetting into it.
Right.
Whether you're one guy out ofa truck or you inspire to be a Fortune
500 company, like it's just amatter of like how much money you're
going to spend on it.
Right.
So that's what it was about.
And I'm just one thing Ilearned to.
The whole process was like, Iwas just super.
I had super.

(08:35):
A large amount of gratitude oflike the support I had.
I didn't realize like how muchpeople are watching.
And when I was like tellingpeople with the book, I'm like, you
know, it's funny because Ilove marketing just like you do.
And I'm like, all right, well,it's time to.
My publisher says I have tomock my ass off for two and a half
weeks.
That's the number.
Right?
Two and a half weeks.
You're gonna have to get infront of people.
I'm like, oh my God, I'm gonnaannoy so many people.

(08:55):
But you know, I did it.
The imposter syndrome was real.
I got it in front of a ton of people.
We had a book release party.
Mh.
Truly just an amazingexperience because people read it,
people gave me feedback,people supported me that weren't
even probably going to readthe book.
You Know, and I just found out who.
Who.
Who really, truly loves me.

(09:18):
Who.
You know, who.
Who.
Who needs help, who doesn'tneed help, you know, who.
And everything else inbetween, man, it was.
It was just an amazing,amazing experience.
I love it, man.
Let's go back to somethingthat you start.
I definitely want to talkabout the.
The marketing and the business plan.
And it sounds like part.
Almost a little bit of a howto as well.

(09:39):
Yes, that's exactly how it was.
You know, it's funny becauseit does.
It does.
You know?
You know, it starts from,like, I think one of the chapters
called it was all a dream.
Right.
You know, it starts with that,like, so I try to stop from, like,
that bottom.
Like, you know, when you're intheir bedroom and you got nothing,
like, you just have thisdream, like, I want to be a police
officer.
I want to do this.
It's like.
And it's how to put around thepeople that give you the opportunity

(10:02):
to be able to want a dream.
You know what I mean?
Like, I feel like a lot ofit's opportunity.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, 100%.
Let's go back to something yousaid initially about the identity
and the belief and the mindsetaround it.
Because, you know, I.
We.
We know that if you'reentrepreneur with the limitations
and if you've never heard thisout there in.

(10:23):
For everybody listening, youknow, and I.
If you've listened to verymany of my episodes, I know you've
heard this, but you arelimited by your beliefs, your belief
system, who you believe youare, what you believe you're capable
of.
You know, we start off lifewith none, no limits.
As a kid, we could.
You know, they tell us you canbe anything you want to be, which
is absolutely true.
But then the limits come inthrough life when we maybe got our

(10:46):
teeth kicked in and we're toldyou're not good at this or whatever.
So we start to set our ownlimiting beliefs in ourselves.
But I'd love for you to diveinto that a little bit, especially
around this concept ofentrepreneurship and, you know, taking
that leap and what it takes tomentally be resilient enough to be
able to do that.

(11:07):
Interesting.
You're 100% right about the beliefs.
It's funny because, like,you're right.
The older you get, you setthese limiting beliefs, and it comes
from fear, comes from failuresin your life.
It comes from insecurities,and it's very hard to get over them.
Right.
And if you're.
And if you're around thatPeople that like feed into that,

(11:28):
then it's almost like it'sgoing to hurt you, right?
It's going to suppress your,your, what you really are.
So I mean, one thing that'sreally helped me get to the next
level is working with speed.
Like, I feel like if someonesaid like mark, what is like your
superpower?
I, I work with speed.
Like, I work extremely fast.

(11:49):
It doesn't allow me to thinkabout, you know, double think things,
right.
And I don't use it.
I mean, this certain, at thispoint in my life, I pivoted a little
bit, you know, working fromspeed, you know, years ago, worked
very well.
Now I have to pivot a littlebit because I, you know, I'm in a
different position.

(12:10):
I still work with a massiveamount of speed.
But like I would say that'sprobably like a hack is like you
don't give me enough time tosecond guess it because usually when
you have a plan B, a C, you'regoing to go to that, right?
Because you have that fear andyou're nervous.
I don't get the money.
My wife, you know, like, youknow, where am I going to get a van?
Where am I going to, you know,where am I going to do this?

(12:31):
You know, what about payroll?
You know, so the moment youstart thinking about all those things,
you create these narratives.
So I think that if I'd saythat's one hack, you have to work.
With speed, you know, can yougive us.
I love, I love that, you know,we've, if you've never heard it,
there's a big time expressionin business, especially people who
are wildly successful, thatmoney loves speed, success loves

(12:53):
speed.
Break that down for us alittle bit though.
Can you give us an example ortwo where that's applicable and how.
You know, clearly we getderailed a lot of times by overthinking.
But when we, when you say youwork with speed, what does that really
look like?
So on the spot here, this iswhat we do.

(13:16):
Yeah, no, and I'm gonna, I'mgonna try using a real life example.
So like, you know, speed, I'msuper urgent, which kind of aligns
with speed.
Right.
And for example, since we'reon, you know, we're talking sales
marketing.
Last year, you know, we, we'regetting behind kick with diminished
returns of marketing, youknow, and that required us to work

(13:39):
with an extensive amount of speed.
Like I could have overanalyzedand looked at this.
What is my PPC leads, givingme leads, giving me my Facebook leads,
What's going on.
But the fact of the matter isI'm burning tens of thousands of
dollars on canceled callsevery month.
Yeah, no doubt.
Like, let's work with thewhole industry.
All of home services.

(13:59):
It was like you could almostput a pin on the date.
Mid.
Right at the end of June,start of July 2023, everything fell
off the cliff and hasn'treally come back yet.
And so it's like, yeah, thatthis huge example.
I love that.
Yeah.
And.
And to be honest with you, Icould overanalyze this and give you
this big spreadsheet and.

(14:20):
But I said, you know what, I'mcutting all my marketing in half,
you know.
Yeah, I'm just operating with speed.
I know there's an issue.
Could I cut it in a third or aquarter or cut it or just eliminate
it all at once?
Absolutely.
But I made that fast decisionand it got me aligned.
Right.
It got me in a spot.
Like, okay, my cancel callrate went from like 28 to like 14.

(14:42):
All right.
Like I did something right,you know, I, but I could have analyzed
that over months, you know.
And I think that the peoplethat are kind of coming up that are
starting to grow, I think thatlike that's something that you really
have to have a handle on asyou grow and get that foundation
because that's something thatlike truly you need to get coached
on.
Right.
Because if you learn by trialby fire, it's going to cost you 10x

(15:05):
if someone just has a quicklike 3 to full meetings coaching
session and, and kind ofeducate you on how that all operates.
And I wish I did that in the beginning.
So that's kind of how Icorrelate to speed as an example
recently.
But even if, if I'm going todumb that down even a little bit
more just with emails,everything is urgent in my life.

(15:27):
Like I don't wait on emails.
I don't wait on getting incontact with people hiring and hiring
and recruiting.
Like I am on the phoneimmediately if that comes in, I send
them an email through my, myATS system.
Hey, I'll be calling you, no problem.
I'm coming from a 508 number.
Boom, call answer.

(15:49):
Like people just need, peopleneed these technicians and installers
right away.
Right.
And if you wait 24 hours, 48hours, they might already have another
job.
So like I feel like you can'tlet that opportunity pass.
So that's what I mean withwork with speed.
And I think you can apply thatin so many different areas.
Right.
So I hope that answers yourQuestion, Sam.
It does.
Yeah, absolutely.
I.

(16:09):
For a long time, I've toldpeople my sense of urgency, especially
when a company hires me tocoach them or train them.
I was like, okay, I'm going totell you ahead of time.
My sense of urgency will driveyou nuts because we get it done.
There's no.
We talk about it once we makea decision and we do it.
And that's.
That's like, if we close thatgap, man, so much more incredible

(16:32):
things can happen because thenit just.
It happens instead of, well,okay, well, we'll talk about it in
the next meeting.
We'll table it to the next meeting.
No, let's make a decision anddo it.
If it's the wrong decision, wecan course correct, but until the
car starts moving, you can'tturn around.
So what if you point thewheels in the right direction?
You can't even turn it arounduntil it's moving.
100.
I'm so glad you said that,because I think everybody's first

(16:54):
mindset, if you.
If you have thoseinsecurities, you're like, well,
what happens if I did thewrong thing?
It's like, you course correct, right?
It's not.
Nothing's a life or death situation.
Will it cost you a hundred dollars?
Will it cost you a thousand bucks?
Maybe.
Right?
But at the end of the day,you're gonna.
You're gonna make it so muchfaster, so much quicker.
Not analyzing something, and your.
Your competitor is gonna bestuck behind you, you know, so that's

(17:17):
a great example.
I love it, man.
Well, let's get into a littlebit more into the.
The.
So talk about speed and making decisions.
Let's dive.
Jump over to the mindset sideof things for a minute, because there's
such an entrepreneur'smindset, especially revolving around

(17:38):
this concept of the resilient entrepreneur.
Dive into that because you'vehad huge wins, you've had huge setbacks,
and you have to be able tonavigate both of those to be that
resilient entrepreneur.
So I'd love for you to talkabout that a bit, because that really
is such a crux to be asuccessful entrepreneur.

(18:01):
Yeah, that's a good one.
You know, I.
The first thing when yousaying that, the first thing that
comes to mind is, like, youjust can never give up.
I feel like things can be sohard and, you know, I work around
the clock.
You know, I woke up threetimes last night, sent a couple emails
to myself, like, I'm workingaround the clock because that's how

(18:24):
I'm going to get mycompetitive advantage, right?
And I made a goal that we needto be X amount of profit profitable
this year.
And I'm not going to do thatworking an eight hour day, right?
So that's when we talk about resilience.
And that's why I, resilienceis just, that's why I need to book
that.
Because I feel like it's avery underestimated term and, and
realistically, in order to bewhat you want to be and hit the success

(18:46):
that you want to, like, it'sgoing to legit.
Take that, right?
You're going to get, you'regoing to lose money, you're going
to lose people, you're goingto lose best friends, you're going
to lose family members, you'regoing to, you're not going to see
eye to eye with people.
You're going to get robbed,you're gonna get stolen from, you're
gonna get, you know, and allthat stuff, like imagine, like think

(19:06):
about all that stuff I justsaid right off the rip.
And it, obviously it can growand grow, but like think about all
the, the lanes that come with that.
Like, you know, your bestfriend did this, this person did
this.
This person quit.
This person stole money from you.
This person stole that personfrom you.
This guy got the tools, thisguy crashed the van and left the
next day.
Like, there's so many setbacksand things that cost money and things

(19:29):
that like, will give you the out.
I guess that's what I guessI'm trying to get at.
Like, you have so many outs,you know, and I feel like you have
to be able to just beconfident enough to be like, you
know what?
I'm going to get through this,I'm going to get through this, you
know, and you know, the bookcame out at the perfect time for
me because we got our asskicked in 2024.

(19:50):
You know, we rode this amazingwave from like 2019 to 2023 and boom,
we got hit with that unionpetition, we got hit with a lot of
setbacks and you know,turnover and like every aspect.
I could have walked right, Icould have went left to right.
But you know, I decided tofight through it all, you know, and

(20:11):
obviously as a business owneror someone getting into this, you,
you have your personalsetbacks, you have your professional,
you have like, you have allthese things coming at you and I
feel like the book goes over.
Like you have to take that allas fuel.
You know, God puts you in thatposition to because he knew you can
get out of it.
And you Know, one way or theother, like, you're not gonna fail

(20:31):
unless you give it up.
Like, that's the only way ifyou think about it, right?
You're not gonna fail unlessyou give up.
So you just have to keepmoving forward.
It might look different, right?
I think that you have to.
At some point, you have tolook yourself in the mirror and say,
things may look different, butI'm not going to give up.
Yeah.
You know, and I think that's resilience.
Like, I think that, like, it'spretty simple.

(20:52):
I feel like all these thingsthat we talk about in this entrepreneurial
world is like, they come downto, like, a core, like, handful of
things.
Like, if you do them in theirheart, as.
As you know, right.
Nobody loves waking up in the morning.
It's like, yeah, I'm soexcited to get up at 4 or 5 o' clock
in the morning.
I can't wait, you know, but,like, when you do it, like, you gain

(21:13):
a couple hours a day, thatcouple hours, it compounds, I think
everything compounds.
Like, you know, you beingconfident compounds, you being resilient
compounds, you beingdisciplined compounds.
And I think that that's kindof what the book goes over, you know,
And I think that we've alllost a mother, lost a father, you
know, had these supertragedies, you know, and I have every

(21:35):
angle to just say, you knowwhat, I'm all set.
Like, like, I'm just gonnawork a 9 to 5 or I'm just gonna be
small.
Maybe I'll just have one ortwo guys.
I'm just.
Maybe I just don't want to do anything.
Maybe I just want to be a bum,who knows, right?
Like, I had all those oats.
But, you know, I think that ifyou're listening to the right podcast,
you're around the rightpeople, you're doing what you can

(21:56):
do, and you're like, almostinfiltrating that mind with positivity.
You're going to win.
I love this so much.
Such a good.
Surrounding yourself with thepeople and, you know, I call it staying
close to the campfire.
You know, when you stay closeto the campfire, it keeps your.
Keeps your mindset warm, keepsyou focused on the right things,

(22:17):
the main things to keep themain thing, the main thing, so to
speak.
And when we're doing that, itjust keeps us on track.
Those accountability partners,the people pouring into your life
and not always taking away.
And, man, it's huge.
It's crucial.

(22:37):
So, Mark, one thing, I want tocircle back to here real quick.
Is because I know there's somany companies in areas that are
very union driven.
I was just in Chicago withPerfect Temp and with on the Mark,
and I hear these conversations there.
You know, there's.
And lots, of course, lots ofcompanies in your area, you know,

(22:59):
Akea and.
And green energy and you guys.
And just so many companies allover the areas that constantly having
this conversation around union.
And they're either incompetition with these union shops
that are grossly underbiddingthings or whatever the conversation
is.
But the conversation usuallycomes back to we're building a culture.

(23:23):
So fingers crossed we don'tget all of this craziness, this union
petition, all these things.
So if you're okay with that,I'd love for you to kind of talk
us through that a little bit,especially since you're in the midst
of it.
What are some of the.
Navigating this help us out here?

(23:44):
Because I know there's a lotof guys that they have this hanging
in the back of their mind.
There's this anxiety, thisfear that maybe, God, we hope we
don't ever have to go throughthis or experience it.
Talk to us about it, man.
Yeah, well, I'm big onflipping the mindset, right, like,
because like, they came afterus for a reason.
And it kind of goes back towhat we talked about earlier.
It's like our branding and ourmarketing was so good that realistically

(24:08):
they were nervous, you know,and we have a commercial side of
the business, and we also havea residential side of the business.
And, you know, our commercialside of the business of works.
We work in Boston.
So they saw us around Boston.
We get the Boston top place towork in 2024, 2023.
And, you know, we were ontheir target, you know, and what

(24:32):
happened?
We're taking union jobs.
Yeah, we're taking union jobsand all that.
And I'm in growth mode.
Right.
The biggest thing to me is,like, I'm keeping my people busy.
My main concern is like, howcan I grow this thing as quickly
as possible with the bestpiece, but best people possible and
have fun with doing it.
Right?
And that's what I was doing.
We have to have fun.
And that's what I was doing.

(24:53):
And you know, and then we got,you know, they infiltrated the company.
You know, they call it like,you know, sometimes they send people
into the company and they kindof just.
They disturb it.
In my opinion, that's kind ofprobably what happened.
And, you know, we got hit, youknow, with these union cards, you
know, and I think about 30 ofthe people signed them in the commercial

(25:15):
side.
So started that clock and wehad a certain amount of time, about
30 days to campaign of whyessentially, like why like, you know,
we would like to stay a nonunion open open shop.
And they kind of did what theyhad to do, not realizing how dirty
it actually gets.
Like it was literally dealingwith the mob.

(25:37):
Sam no, I'm not surprised at all.
It was goes back to what JimmyHoffa and all of the things.
It was nasty.
It was the most un Americanthing that I've ever been through
from somebody just doing good,trying to build a culture, trying
to build a company from theground up, you know, that it's not
like I inherited millions ofdollars and said, you know what,

(25:59):
I'm gonna start a company tomorrow.
Like everything was sweat equity.
And these guys came in andjust swept the floor.
You know, I mean they justwanted, they, they wanted what they
wanted and there was no, therewas no out.
And you know, we dealt with itthe whole, we won that, we won the
election.
You know, the big thing wasall the, all the laws changed in

(26:21):
2023 with the Biden administration.
And it was new for we were thefirst company that I was told in
the US to go through it withthe changes of the legislature.
Interesting change.
The 28th of 2023 on December.
We got hit January 11th, soright, right away.

(26:42):
So, you know, and we'veprepared for this, but we also didn't
prepare for the changes andall that good stuff.
So we knew enough to bedangerous and to prepare.
But you know, we, we relied oncouncil to really help us do it.
And we won the election onFebruary 9th.
We were on the election threeto one vote.
I think it was like 34 to likenine or something like that.

(27:05):
And they, they excluded like15, 20 votes just because they wanted
to.
But the big thing was becauseit didn't really work, in my opinion.
It didn't really work.
It just was very one sided.
And the big thing during itwas like, hey, you can't get any
unfailing practice strategiesduring this.
Like you can't tell peopleyou're going to freeze to pay.

(27:27):
You can't tell people to go,don't go union because of this.
And we followed all those guideline.
Even had a HR consultant walkaround with us as we kind of campaigned.
So we make sure we staybetween the lines.
Sure.
We didn't get hit with any.
We won the vote.
A week later we hit with 40.
Now the new law stated likeonce you get Hit with that, like

(27:47):
it forces you to recognize andbargain with the union.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
So we said, yeah, so as aquick aside here or here in a minute,
I'd love for you to give usmaybe a bullet points of what the
changes were that kind offacilitated this extra navigation
that you went through.
Yeah, I don't exactly know allthe changes.

(28:07):
There was a lot to take in,but those were some of the changes.
Like I think that main one waslike, you know, if you get hit with
those ulps, like it doesn'tmatter before or after.
I think under my attorney'simpression it was if you did get
hit with the ulp, during it,you were fine.
But once we get hit after, Ithink that was a change that kind
of got overlooked.

(28:28):
So either way, we were goingto go to bargaining.
We didn't even know it.
Right.
Because like there was no waya judge that was going to overrule
40 charges and you know,because all they needed is one.
So, you know, we fought themall year in, in court.
Once again, we're a four yearat that time, we're a three and a

(28:49):
half, four year old companywith major growth, you know, not
a lot of equity.
And it really put it, itreally puts stress on the company,
you know, and I think they didwhat they wanted to do, Sam.
They wanted to remove us from competition.
Yeah, they wanted to eliminateus or have us join us, but the way
we're structured, it was toughat that time, you know, so, you know,

(29:12):
here we are now.
We, we got the judge's rulinga couple months ago and they said,
you know, you lose, you haveto go bargaining.
So now, now the whole clockstarts again next week.
I start bargaining with themin good faith for a year, which in

(29:33):
my opinion I think they'reprobably going to, you know, not
bargain respectfully.
Like I think they're going tocome at it like differently.
You know, I think their wholething, Sam, is they, they try to
financially drain thesecompanies until they just have to
fold.
Sure, that's just my opinion,but I, I don't wish it upon anybody,
you know, especially someonethat's just, that just started a

(29:56):
new company that, you know,that, you know, I just think there's
different ways to go about it.
And I feel like if people wantto go union, there's an open door
for it.
You know, you don't have toforce a company to go union when
that wasn't in the business plan.
Yeah, you should just go to ashop that's union and join it yeah,
absolutely.
Wow.
What an incredible.
Thanks for sharing too.
What an incredible journey.

(30:17):
So if there was any piece ofadvice you could give to companies
out there in the areas thatare heavily union, that are somewhere
either maybe facing this ortrying to avoid it, what would that
be?
Well, I think that we shouldhave another episode and to dive
deep into the full process andwhat actually happened deeper.

(30:41):
Because I do think that peoplehave to have the picture of exactly
what's going to happen, youknow, because if someone told me
the steps that were going tohappen, I would have been a little
bit ahead of it and I wouldhave been able to navigate things
a little bit better to put my team.
Because everything's about the team.
Like, I'm going to surviveeither way.
Right.
Whether a union, not union,whether the company's there or not
there, I'm going to be okay.
But I'm emotionally tied tothe people that took shot a shot

(31:04):
on the company, took a shot atme, that I told them that they would
have a job.
Right.
That's what, that's what kindof gets me.
But I mean, overall, like, youknow, I think that this is another
one.
I work very fast.
I, I work with speed with this.
You know, did it hurt me?
I don't know.
Right.
But I think we went to aseminar, an open shop merit seminar

(31:31):
against union shops.
We, we are, We Are ABC Contractors.
It's a nationwide networking group.
And like six to 12 monthsprior I went to that and I learned
a lot about the connect.
Like, well, number one, I madethe connections on which attorneys
to hire because there'sspecialized labor attorneys that
deal with this.
Like, like this is not yourtypical, like the guy that sends

(31:54):
out your small claims court.
Like, this is not somethingthat they would handle.
Like these, these are like,when you're dealing with the national
labor Board, like, you need tohave the right fit.
Right.
And I think that although itdidn't turn out how I wanted to,
I think I was represented very well.
And I think that anybody thatthinks they're gonna face this, I
think they should just stayahead of it and just get a labor

(32:16):
attorney in their.
Back pocket, you know, makethe connection.
To make the connection, figureout who they are and, and make the
connections.
Before you 100 and maybe eventalk to them, spend a couple thousand
bucks, have them spend acouple hours with you and just have
them go over how you canprotect yourself.
Yeah.
You know, because I think oneof the reasons, one of the ways to
protect yourself is justobviously you need to get the tools

(32:38):
Right.
And the attorney is a tool.
But they might be able tofigure out ways that like you can
work things.
You know, I think that onething that we could have done if
I had this conversation acouple years ago, I could have split
the company.
Like I have a commercial and aresidential vision which is very.
Not a lot of people like that.
You know, we do commercial spec.

(32:58):
So like if a hundred and fiftythousand square Amazon building comes
up, like we, we bid that planspec and we go do that with commercial
plumbers and then we have yourresidential division where you do
service plumbing and service Hvac and installs.
Right.
So like we're two totallyseparate companies that we probably
should have had those splitthe whole time because it would have
probably made us a little bitdiverse than that.

(33:20):
But that would be my thing is,is it doesn't hurt to stay ahead.
Like we all talk about beingproactive versus reactionary and
I think that that's aproactive situation.
Situation that you can stayahead of if you're a little bit nervous.
I like that.
And my phone number and myInstagram and Facebook are probably
going to be on here after.
So guys, if you need somethinglike shoot me a dm, like I don't

(33:41):
mind getting on the phone withyou guys.
Excellent.
Yeah.
And for everybody, I'll makesure to have all of that in, in the
show notes.
So don't try to write it down.
And you're in Drive TimeUniversity right now.
Yeah, yeah.
Check the show notes if that'ssomething you want to have a deeper
conversation with Mark about.
And I will absolutely take youup on that.
We'll do a whole episode onevery bit of that because it is important

(34:02):
to be able to navigate andthere's so many business which actually
this is a great segue to theother, the next place that I wanted
to go with you because it, youknow, being proactive in business
is so crucial.
Yes.
You have to be able to pivot.
We have to be able to pivotquickly sometimes.
And you know, we react to the market.

(34:24):
But the more proactive we areand the more especially like you
mentioned earlier, bringing inadvisors and counselors and coaches
and those types of things thathave proven results.
Not the quote unquote gurusout there, but people actually know
what the heck they're doingwhen we bring those in.
A lot of times we can forecastthe future based on past experience.

(34:47):
And so we can.
For example, when I work withcompanies, I can take a 15 minute
look at a handful of things inthe company I can see, you know,
the pitfalls and these arejust gaping holes where you could
big gotchas in the company andthen have one conversation with people.
Okay, here's the things youneed to do to patch those holes.

(35:10):
So those types of things,that's what happens when we, you
know, hire coaches and peoplelike yourself that have been through
the experiences.
It's okay to, for everybodylistening, it's okay to spend, you
know, like Mark saying, spenda couple thousand bucks with somebody,
buy some time with them andearn the right to have that conversation
because it will save youmultiple times that in the future.

(35:31):
So along these lines of beingproactive, I love where you went
in the book, the next sectionthat we were talking about about
more of the how to setting upthe business plan, those types of
things.
So I'd love for you to give usa little bit of a breakdown of what's
in there and your thoughtprocess around the requirements for

(35:53):
a company.
Because most people, they get frustrated.
It's the entrepreneurialseizure like Michael Gerber calls
it.
They get pissed off at theboss one day and they want to go
start their own shop.
So they hang out their shingleand they get going and okay, I'm
great at fixing stuff now howdo we get people to buy it now?
Okay, I don't know how toprice it all these things.
So take us into that level of business.

(36:16):
What are the steps?
What things should we have setup first before going to bad?
And clearly you like speed, sothis doesn't mean a million miles
of preparation work, but thereare some things we have to do first.
So through this portion of it.
A little bit.
Yeah.
So I love this because I feellike this is almost my favorite part.

(36:39):
All right, so let's put Sam'sjust quit his full time job, you
know, and he's, you know, hejust bought his 3, 500 van, you know,
and it's like, okay, what do Ido next?
Got the tools, I'm ready to go.
Yeah, you got the tools,you're ready to go.
I feel like you have to figureout the why, like what do you want?

(36:59):
A lot of people don't knowthat, right?
So I think that someone has tofigure out what, what do they want
and it can change.
So I think that everybody hasto put a pin in it.
You know, I didn't want to a80 man shop.
Like that wasn't part of myvision at that time.
I pivoted with the market whenI was growing, right.
And I made the decision that IKnew there's going to be some foundational
cracks.
I knew I was moving with a lotof speed, but I bet on the growth

(37:25):
and the sales and the volume,which came to a complete halt when
I get hit with the union stuff.
So there was a, you know, I, Ipivoted and then obviously I had
a setback, right?
I had, I had some adversity.
You know, we're whererealigned and we're getting through
it.
As you guys can tell, like it sucked.
Sucked big time.
But I got over it, right.
I'm so alive.

(37:45):
The company's still here.
We're, we're moving and grooving.
So I mean, how does thatresonate with you?
Like, I think that you have tofigure out the why.
Don't forget, don't overthink it.
It can always change and youjust got to do it.
You know, I think that a lotof people get caught up in the logo
to get caught up in the.
I need to do an llc.
I got to get, I got to findthat cpa.
I got to do this.
I have that mindset.

(38:06):
Like, get the contract.
Yeah, get the contract.
Figure it out.
Go sell that forty thousanddollar cut in.
Like, go sell that, thatfurniture placement, you know, as
an llc.
The right thing to do.
Absolutely.
But if, if you sell 15, 20, 30of them to get off the ground and
get some money in the bank,it's not going to kill you.
Is there a little liabilitypossibly right at the end of the

(38:27):
day, like, just move,everything's gonna work out.
You know, you can set up thatLLC on the way.
You know, you know, I go into.
And that sounds kind of likethat the beginning stage, right?
You know, you get on socialmedia, you tell your parents, you
tell everybody that you, youdo H Vac.
I truly, I truly didn't knowthe power of referrals and words

(38:48):
and just you and the communityuntil I, I had someone in my area
that was kind of a mentor tome and he's like, Mark, you just
gotta just tell people you do it.
I'm like, yeah, I'm not gonnatell people I do real estate.
That's weird.
Everybody's gonna think I'mwealthy and think I'm rich and guess
what?
Like, it was a limiting belief.
Like, you know, I thoughtpeople were gonna draw this thing

(39:09):
about Mark Mason in the back.
And what did it do?
I started telling people, Istarted posting about it and it truly
spiked my business.
Like, you know, I went fromliterally flipping a house, making
my first flip.
I think I made like three grand.
I mean, we're building 22units right now.

(39:30):
So, like, guys, like, it can happen.
Right?
Like, I, like, that's allwith, you know, I.
I was not a trust fund baby.
I didn't have millions ofdollars in the bank.
Like, sure.
I literally started RCMMechanical with $20,000 in the bank,
and I put no money into itsince I started it, you know, and
where, you know, volume isn'teverything and we can get into that

(39:51):
at some point.
But, like, you know, where weclosed last year at 18, 19 million
bucks and ton of setbacks.
But I kind of.
To draw you back to thebeginning, like, it's just about
doing it.
It's about that speed.
It's about not thinking about it.
Right.
I'm not saying rush throughyour install and don't have quality
control.
There's things that you kindof have to like, all right.

(40:12):
Like, you kind of have to havethat common sense.
But it starts that.
It starts with just getting to work.
Get the contract, get an llcright after that, make sure your
insurance is in place, makesure your license is there, which
is all simple stuff for themost part.
I think if someone's going totry to make that sound like it's
a bigger thing than it is,you're probably talking to the wrong

(40:32):
person.
Yeah.
You know, attorney is notgoing to charge you $5,000 for an
LLC if he does.
Now, please contact anybody onthis podcast or anywhere.
No kidding.
I mean, in Texas, mine were900 bucks.
Yeah.
And you can do them yourself.
Full on, you know, with an attorney.
Full on everything.
Articles, incorporation, withthe stamp included.

(40:55):
Absolutely.
It's not insane.
It's not insane.
And to be honest with you, somany people put the logo in the.
Which all.
That's all the fun stuff.
Right?
So so many people put thatstuff before even getting the job,
and then they never start.
So, like, make sure that youwant to do it right.
Go get that job.
Get that confidence, you know,and then chapter.
You know, let's see.
So chapter six, I go into thatdynamic building, like that.

(41:17):
That business plan, and that'skind of what I just said to you.
That's kind of all that in there.
Like, yeah, I.
The nlc.
I want this logo.
I want to do.
I want to do residential.
Like, I think the whole pointof a business plan, guys, I think
that people get a little bitnervous, right.
Whenever somebody asks me togo into business or wants me to be
a business partner, I'm like,no problem.
Send me a business plan.
And I never get one.
It's kind of funny.

(41:38):
I got that from Sean Whelan.
It's like, he's like, hey, anytime.
Once you get all.
Once you have all thissuccess, everybody wants to partner
with you.
So just ask it for a business plan.
So that's kind of like my little.
That's a great way to weedthem out.
I need to start.
I need to start doing that.
I think that's probably why Ihave like, six different projects
going right now.
Yeah, exactly.
So get that business plan downand all it is, guys.

(41:58):
It's like, where do you wantto work?
What cities and towns?
What kind of work do you want?
What are you envisioning?
How many employees do you wantto have?
How much revenue do you wantto do?
What's your.
What's your profitability?
How much is your net profit?
What do you want your grossmargin to be?
Essentially, it's almost likea bible of, like, your wish list
in business, which is tough todo when you don't know it.

(42:19):
So I think that, like, simplygetting with somebody that's done
it before, you know, like, Ibet you if.
If someone messaged Sam andsaid, hey, I'm starting my business,
I.
I want to do a business plan.
Can you just help me?
An hour your time, just tokind of go over it.
I bet you probably on thepodcast and.
And there'll be a greatpodcast on how to build a business
plan.
Oh, you know what?
I.
In fact, I'll put a challengeout right now.

(42:41):
Anybody that wants to do this,message me.
I'll take applications, of course.
We'll screen this a littlebit, but we'll do an episode, literally,
of sitting here walkingsomeone through what it takes, the
questions I ask, have themanswer it, and we'll do a real time
workshop as an episode of howto put together all the things you

(43:01):
need for a business plan.
So if you're out there andyou're wanting to do that, pop me
a message.
You can email mesamoseitnow.net or go to the Facebook
group.
Find me on Facebook and jointhe Close it now Facebook group and
pop me a message through there.
And yeah, that's a great episode.
Good idea, man.

(43:21):
I love that because that'sreal value, guys.
You know, that's super valuable.
So take them up on that.
Absolutely.
So I go into the business planand Sam's gonna build it for you.
And then we have I.
I touch on sops and operatingbesieges in this book and core values,
because I feel.
Like I'M so glad you do thatbecause nobody has them and everybody

(43:42):
needs them.
Yeah.
And sometimes your personalcore values go into your, your professional
core values, you know, andthen your SOPs.
I literally, it took me yearsto build up my SOPs.
Now there's actually a lot ofpeople that just sell them that you
kind of manipulate them.
And when I started them chat,GBT wasn't a really big thing.
Probably would have saved meso much headache, way more hair.

(44:07):
But I will say it's easier tobuild the SOPs than to hold people
accountable to them.
It is.
Yeah.
I will say that I think thatEverybody talks about SOPs like you're
done once they're done.
Absolutely not.
It takes you years to makeliving, breathing organism.
It really is.
It has to be updated 100.
And I think they're very underestimated.

(44:28):
And I think that it's funny, Ihave a buddy of mine, Mike, he's,
he owns Horizon H Vac in Rhode island.
And he's like, you know, hebounces a lot of things off me and
I kind of mentor him along theways because he's kind of about,
he's like an $800,000 milliondollar shop right now.
And I'm like, you know, yougot to do this.
You should debrief on these jobs.
This is how you collect the money.

(44:49):
And like, I've been throughall those.
I said, hey, put a debriefform in place right now because like,
let me tell you, it's so muchharder to do it when you're at 5
million, you know, so this isthose SOPs.
We can go into that in prettyin depth, but I think that like,
just write down what you doday to day.
That's the easiest way toreplace yourself.

(45:09):
And Dan Martell has a reallygood book called buy back your time.
And that doesn't mean like,like, hey, like, you know, although
he kind of means like he'strying to back you out of the business
as much as possible.
It doesn't mean you don't haveto be in the business.
It means that like, you shouldbe working on different things.
Right.
Yeah, I, I actually, it'sfunny you mentioned, I'm literally

(45:29):
in the middle of that bookright now and I'm doing, I'm going
through the process.
The way that I, the way ithits me is I get the opportunity
to be intentional about what Ispend my time on, knowing the KPIs
around it.
So if I'm doing a lower valueactivity, it's because I chose to

(45:49):
not because I have to.
Which is wildly different thanI think so many people get caught
in the loop of, oh, I have todo all this work, not even knowing,
man, I could hire somebody for$8 an hour a VA that, that would
do this faster and better thanme anyway.
But if I like it and I want todo it, it's a choice.
And I plug it intentionallyinto my schedule.

(46:10):
That's the way it hit.
You're right that it's a verypowerful book, guys.
I'm sure you get a ton out ofit, Sam.
But you're right, it is.
And I'm the king of doingthese admin tasks because I feel
like success from them,weirdly, because I feel like my day,
I feel like sometimes I justend my day and I'm like, what did

(46:31):
I even do?
Like, what did I get done?
Like, this is crazy, you know,but like, checking my emails.
Dan would lose it.
He could jump to the podcastright now.
But like, I check my emailsbecause I feel complete, you know,
I really haven't likegraduated to not check them.
I've tried it multiple times.
I've been weeks, I've been acouple days.
But at the end of the day, Ijust like doing it right.
And that's how I keep a pulseof my business.

(46:52):
So I'll work myself out of that.
You know, I have work to do aslong with, just like everybody else
does.
And then I go into the powerof marketing, right?
And that kind of goes into.
So let's camp out on that fora minute because I think there's
so many people, especiallysince you, I love that you started
and totally bootstrapped thewhole thing.
You know, you started with,what did you say, $20,000.

(47:12):
And every bit of it has beenthrough your growth because of things
like this.
So totally go through whatyou're about to go through.
But I would love to followthat with a question of.
Speak to the guys that arethat small shop right now or the
place where you started, orthey're wanting to.
If you had to do it all overagain, knowing the things you know

(47:34):
now, clearly you've learnedalong the way and can shortcut some.
Some people, they can learnfrom your mistakes.
So how would you do it if youstarted fresh right now with no money,
but build this answer howeveryou want to.
Yeah, so I'm in the back of atruck, just getting going.

(48:00):
I'm inspired to be a 10 man shop.
I drag my wife in or myhusband and I'd say, you know, I
need something from you.
I need you to post five timesa week, you know, on social media
and cover all the platforms.
I don't care what you post.

(48:23):
Don't care what you post.
Just post anything.
Me related, H vac related,plumber related, I don't care.
And put me in and come up.
With anything you think is relevant.
Anything you think is relevant.
And that's how I'd leveragesocial media.
And I think that what goes onwith social media is a lot of people

(48:43):
don't know the why behind itand how it works.
So I think that once I waseducated on that, it made sense.
And I'll kind of give you guysthe breakdown of it.
When post on social media, youget engagement.
And I have to.
How much people look at yourpost, how many impressions you have,
right?
And when Facebook or Instagramknows that you have people looking

(49:03):
at it, they show it in frontof more people.
What does that do that getsyou in front of so much more people
than a yard sign does.
Right.
You know, I mean, only so manypeople drive by yard sign when you're
on social media.
Like, it can be thousands ofpeople in just a small area, right?
Especially if you can reallylearn how to give value to, like,
Facebook groups.
Like, you know, you're gettingaround everybody in that town, right?

(49:24):
I've bought in Facebook groups.
You know, we won't go downthat route yet.
But like, for example, like,you want, like, the reason my growth
was so exponential is becauseI, I created a brand and I believed
in the brand.
And what happened was I, Imade the social media, the social.

(49:45):
If you go on my social mediaright now, it's not about plumbing
and H vac.
It's introducing people.
It's showing people what'sgoing on in the background.
It's taking pictures of things.
It's.
It's not like quick tips.
You probably won't see quicktips on my social media.
You know, we touch on coolvalues a little bit, but like, you
will not see, like, hey, howto change your afl.

(50:06):
You know, Although there's probably.
There's, there's, there'ssome, there's some value in that.
I think it's more in videos, though.
I think that people want towatch that on videos, not like photos
anymore.
But I think that none of thatcosts money.
You don't need Facebook adsfor that.
You don't need to boost it.
Like, get on social media, getin front of people, get in front

(50:27):
of those Facebook groups, tagpeople, engage with people, build
that know, like, and trustfactor That's a.
That's a big one.
Because when anybody goes andlooks you up online, they're going
to look at your Google reviewsand they're going to look at your
social media and they want to see.
They don't want to do businesswith our sale Mechanical.
They want to do business with,like, Mark Mason.

(50:47):
They want to know.
Like, I think it's.
I think a lot of people havethis image in their mind that, like,
it's.
Because I was like that for a while.
Like, I want to do all that.
I was so up on the air.
Do I do my personal.
Do I do.
Do I spend a lot of time on mypersonal brand on Instagram?
Because I had three businessesat one point.
I had a restaurant, I had RCLMechanical, and I have Eastside,
the development company.
I'm like, what do I do?
Like, do I do.

(51:08):
I just post on each businessplatform to post on mine, and I just
doubled down on mine.
And I.
I love that you said thatbecause there's.
That's where a lot of people,I think, miss it.
Because I, you know,personally, I've done a ton of study
into social media.
And yep, the last fivebusinesses I've had have been built
on social media.
And yes, I have a.

(51:29):
The professional page, butwhere I have always gotten the most
traction is on my personal profile.
Because Facebook, if you havea professional page, you can do it,
but it will cost you Personal page.
You can get the same betterattraction at guerrilla marketing.
Free 99, which is my favorite price.

(51:49):
And yeah, you're right.
You.
Sam, you're right.
And we're talking about free marketing.
Yes, absolutely.
And at some point, I took thatleap and I had a professional videography
company that I found that.
That gave me a ton of value.
Their value was they got thebest out of the person they were
interviewing.
Yeah.
Which you don't see that much.
I've hired you over a fewcompanies that, like, stand in front

(52:11):
of you with the camera like,hey, what's up?
Like, what do you do?
And it's like the guys, like,feel awkward, right?
This guy, this media team toldby fire, they.
They just knew how to get theanswers out of people.
I was like, it was.
And we rode that wave.
So we had.
We had them talk aboutthemselves, you know, and.
And you guys can do this on aniPhone, right?

(52:32):
You go to.
Go to your technician.
You've hired your first technician.
Better yet, I'm gonna give youan example.
I love that we're talkingabout this 2020.
My friend Matt Benavides.
I left.
I left Sagamore, my oldcommercial company, and he did.
You know what?
I.
I did the development.
I was doing a flip.
And he's like, I want out of here.

(52:52):
I want out of here.
He was my foreman when I wasan apprentice, and he's like, I want
out of here.
I want out of here.
You know, I'm like, matt,here's a deal.
I'll give you every one of myflips to Plum if you leave.
I will support that 100.
He goes, I'm gonna drop mytruck off tomorrow.
Always, like, Thursday, Whatever.

(53:12):
It was a couple days.
It was like, no joke.
He made that decision.
He was like, I'm out.
He goes, you do that.
I'm dropping my truck off.
He dropped his truck off.
No two week notice.
And he started, right?
And I keep seeing these,these, these.
And you're gonna know who heis once I get into it.
And I start seeing theseInstagram reels and tick tocks.
I'm like, oh, my God, look atall the followers he has.

(53:34):
He's the Boston porn monster.
Have you seen this stuff, huh?
He's the Boston plumbingmonster, guys.
He legit.
He started all those videos onmy projects, and he would just film
what he's doing for the day.
And he's naturally funny, but,I mean, this kid's getting paid.
He's still, to this day, hedoes probably 50, 60 of my real estate

(53:56):
development stuff, and he iskilling it.
He makes thousands of dollarsa month on social media and he has
an iPhone.
He.
The footage is not great, andhe just goes through and it's almost
like how tos, right?
He figured out how to do thehow to's, right?
He may not change a filter,but he's going in, he's fixing a
stack that's cracked orwhatever, and he just lines it up.

(54:18):
He's funny and he's gotTimberland, he's got Milwaukee representing
him.
He's.
He's found his niche, and nowthat's opportunity, guys.
He created that opportunity.
So, like, I feel like there'sjust so many avenues and things that
you can pivot when it's time.
But that brings you guys alittle clarity of, like, where you
can take things.
My social media, if you lookat my social media, I have that professional

(54:41):
page that, like, reallyengages on, like, who my people are.
It's not about me.
It's not about the company.
It's about the people.
He talks about that how to andjust funny.
Day to day loves to get thecomments about being a hack and.
But he just makes it work.
Right?
So you're just gonna pick whatyou enjoy.

(55:01):
It's gonna be, it's gonna beone of them.
You can't do anything thesedays not have social media.
I'll make that 100 clear.
No doubt.
Yeah.
Oh, I love this so much.
Yeah.
So it's huge.
You know him, right?
1.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Oh, 100%.
I'm going to reach out to himand have him on the show too.
We'll have some fun up on here.
Oh, did he.

(55:21):
Is he coming on?
Well, we haven't scheduledanything yet.
I'll bust his chops.
You do it.
Yeah, for sure.
I'll, I'll get reached out.
Just like you and I, we'vebeen bouncing around each other in
social media for a while andhasn't, haven't hadn't quite made
that connection yet, but we will.
But yeah, I mean, heck, socialmedia, I love social media because
it's the leverage point to getin front of so many people.

(55:44):
And one thing that I wouldjust add the yes.
And here super quick foreverybody listening.
Don't be scared of it if youthink that, oh, I don't want to do
that.
Because when you maybe get badreviews, etc.
So what, you're going to getthem anyway.
So just.
It's another platform.
You have to be out there.
The other thing is so manypeople are scared to make videos

(56:06):
of themselves and I don'tknow, I don't like how I look on
camera.
What's how you look in person?
Get over yourself.
If you're going to be anentrepreneur, you have to do hard
things sometimes.
So if you don't want to be theface of it, find somebody in your
company that will, that'll own it.
For example, when I was, youknow, in the field, the last company
I was in, the owner of thecompany, he didn't want to be in

(56:28):
any of the social media.
I said, that's fine, but wehave to have it.
I'll be the face of it.
And so I was the one that tookit over and I ran it and it was awesome.
They had, you know, had hiredsome social media and they did other
things, but all of the realworld stuff, I'm doing dogs of, you
know, air conditioning, theDogs of Austin.

(56:50):
Hashtag Dogs of Austin.
And people would literally buyfrom us strictly because we took
care of their dogs.
It was like, hey, the fanfavorite was this little cool little
pug named Waffles.
And, and so many comments camein about that one dog that I got
a selfie with that day we went.
I had.
I went back to that homeownermonths after the project, say, hey,

(57:12):
can we do some more pictureswith your dog?
And they were like, oh, myGod, that's awesome.
And so it was just hilarious.
You're gonna make the best outof it.
You're 100% right.
Yeah, you're 100% right.
And go back to your comment,Sam, about, like, how you look on
camera, because believe me,like, you probably feel the same
way still.
There's probably secondguessing the second guess on my end.
But, like, it goes back towhat we talked about in the beginning.

(57:34):
It's like, work with speed.
Don't even give yourself timeto think about how you look.
It is what it is.
That's you as a person.
If you don't like, you change it.
Right.
100%.
Well.
And, you know, even the same,I've got.
I don't know how many.
I'm coming up on 250 episodes.
I've.
The first year I got intosocial media was when Facebook Live

(57:55):
started and I did this challenge.
Go live for 30 days in a rowand see what happens.
Well, that 30 days turned into300 days.
Not because I was good at it.
It was strictly because I gotjust in the flow and started doing
it.
And even still, I go back andlisten to episodes all the time and
I'm like, oh, my gosh, I hatethe way I sound.

(58:16):
I don't like my voice whenit's being recorded, all these things,
but do it anyway.
Yeah, somebody does grow.
Yeah, you just grow like that.
It's a natural progression.
And that's what happened withthe book.
The.
The reason the book took solong is because I wrote it and then
I hated it.
And then I wrote it again.
I'm like, I'm not givingmyself enough time to hate it again.
So I'm releasing it, you know?

(58:37):
Yes.
I love that.
Back to the same thing youjust said.
Yeah, and it's so good too.
And, you know, my friend CoreyBarrier, he said, told me something
because I was telling him thesame thing about my book.
It's like, I don't know if Iactually, you know, these concepts
I teach different now.
He's like, so release it.
And then when you write yournext one, say, here's how I've progressed

(58:59):
in my thinking.
And it's like, oh, brilliant.
Duh.
Instead of just rewriting andnever doing, just actually do it.
Yeah.
100% super powerful.
Nailed it.
You Nailed it.
I think that goes about withthis whole episode.
Like I feel like we covered a lot.
I feel like that the speed isone thing that like it keeps coming
back to, you know what I mean,with everything.

(59:20):
It's like, you know.
Do you think the BostonPalomasa had a, had a plan on how
his social media was going toblow up?
Like, you know, I mean he'sgot millions of followers.
It's just like he just did it,he pivoted, he made it happen and
he sent it.
You know, he's, he's gettingfamous off talking about people's
sisters.
Yeah, I love it so much, man.
Dude, this is, this is such agood episode.

(59:42):
I, I wish we could talk for along time.
We'll have to do another oneon, on the union.
Yeah, for sure we can do that.
But for now I'd love to wrapthis up with what are you most excited
about?
What's really getting likelighting your fire right now.
What are you looking forwardto, you.
Know.

(01:00:04):
In personally or business?
Both.
Either one, Whichever one.
However you want to answer this.
You know, I ask open endedhands for a reason.
I, I super, I'm super dialedinto the company and you know, obviously
my, my biggest go now is toget this thing profitable, more profitable
than it is.
But at the same time I want tobe able to have some time for myself
and my family.

(01:00:25):
Like I'm doing it for that,you know, and I'm like, you know,
and it goes back to DanMartel's book about buy back your
time.
It's like I'm not saying Idon't want to work, but I just need
a little bit of breathing roomso fast in the day and I pivot and
like I move faster than youraverage person that you have on the
floor in the company and Ithink I of drive them crazy a little
bit.
You know, you got to know youhave crowd but I feel like I just

(01:00:48):
want to get to the point thatlike things slow a little bit down.
I can be a little bit moredialed and precise with my decisions.
So like I'm excited to justget there.
I'm excited to put pieces inplace to get there and there's a
lot of things that I need todo to get there.
But I would say by, by the endof the year I think we're going to
be in a really good spot.
And I think obviously moneysolves a lot of things but, but it

(01:01:13):
takes time, you know.
And you know, nobody gave methe, the playbook on how to Read
financials of a company that'sthis big.
You know, I mean, you know,and there's a little.
And you have whip reports andyou have all kinds of things and
cash flow reports.
And there's just so manythings that you learn as you grow
as a human being.
And I think that, like, I'm.
I'm armored now.
And I think that I'm excitedto buy back some time and to have

(01:01:36):
a normal work day to like,give back, maybe have some time in
myself and my family.
So that's what excites me, man.
I like it.
I like it.
What excites you?
Give me one.
Give me one minute.
Yeah, yeah.
You know, thanks for asking.
Nobody ever asked me questionsin these episodes before I answer.
That makes me think ofrecently, this last year, year and
a half, I've gone through thismajor transformation and I love that

(01:01:58):
you're going through it.
I learned the differencebetween being a businessman with
a family and being a familyman with a business.
Business.
And the minute that I learnedthat there is a separation there,
I made the choice to be afamily man with a business and it
changed that mindset shift,changed everything in my life because

(01:02:18):
then I prioritized differently.
My calendar looks different,the way I schedule things looks different.
And man, that choice, thesecond that happened, it changed
it all for me.
So there's a little a tip foryou, maybe that will be helpful in
your journey.
Thank you for that.
I'll take that away.
Yeah, that's a big.
That's a big one.

(01:02:40):
But yeah, what's exciting forme right now, you know, I've got
a couple things on the horizon.
One is I'm working with orabout here really, really soon be
working with officially withan editor on my book, which will
be the name of it will be besomeone worth buying from.
And the other thing is I'm.

(01:03:01):
I'm really excited about.
I'm putting together a homeservices mastermind which will be
a really low entry point asfar as cost wise.
I want to keep it superinexpensive to be able to help as
many people as possible, whichis something that there's a lot of
those.

(01:03:22):
I know of several that arelike one trade specific type of things.
But I really want to dosomething on a bigger scale that
impacts all of home servicesto a level that really hasn't been
done before because we're in aplace right now with things changing

(01:03:42):
so fast in our.
I mean, the industrialrevolution took 100 years and there
was a lot of pain goingthrough it right now.
We're in this AI revolution,which is not slowing down.
It's not going backwards.
In fact, it's speeding up.
And the projections are sixmonths to a year for the same type
of transformation thathappened in 100 years of the Industrial

(01:04:03):
Revolution.
So a year from now, not asingle one of our businesses are
going to look the same.
Not even close, or the worldis not going to look the same.
And so I really, really amfocused on putting together one big
group like this Mastermind tohelp, especially home service companies

(01:04:24):
navigate this.
Because there's going to be alot of the talk about robots coming
into the workspace doing themanual labor jobs and tasks.
I mean, right now, for anexample, we're paying our technicians,
you know, six figures.
Six figures plus annually, anda robot costs 30 grand is what the

(01:04:47):
projection's going to be.
2026, they're rolling out amillion of them.
2027, they're projected toroll out 20 million of them.
So companies will be replacinglabor force not because they want
to, but because they have toto fiscally keep up.
So how are we going tonavigate that?

(01:05:07):
And so I'm really working onstaying on the forefront of being
a thought leader in that spaceto really help us navigate and pivot
properly to stay.
Both stay profitable, as wellas how do we help our people retain
incomes, and how do we helpall of us together collectively transition

(01:05:33):
and learn new things andbecome the operators of these tools
instead of getting replaced bythese tools?
So, yeah, that's where myhead's at.
I love that.
I love that.
Let me know when that comes upbecause I would love to be a part
of it.
You know, if there's stillsome open slots, please let me know.
Or if it's a tree of Facebook,whatever, just let me know.
Keep me posted.
You know, 100.

(01:05:53):
I'll be talking about it a lotbecause it's something.
It's going to affect all ofus, like it or not.
And so we.
We've got to just like, how dowe navigate when unions come knocking,
we're going to have tonavigate this because it's.
It's even more widespread than that.
So.
So that.
Those are the two things thatI can talk about right now that I'm
working on that I'm excited about.
Nice.
I look forward to that.

(01:06:13):
Yeah, thanks for asking.
Look forward to it.
Fun times, man.
Well, we need to.
We've got to wrap this up.
Our.
We're.
We're running out of a Runwayhere, man.
I'm so grateful that you're onthe show today.
Yeah, thanks for having me, man.
Yeah, appreciate it.
I hope Everybody got value.
100.
What?
Leave everybody with something.
What's the big word of wisdomor quote or, you know, just.

(01:06:36):
What do you want to say toeverybody before we sign off here?
Actually, I was thinking aboutthis earlier, you know, you know,
to go with marketing, themarketing aspect of this podcast,
like, you know, and to go withhow we talk about social media.

(01:06:58):
You don't make it feel likemarketing, you know, like, you can
be marketing without it beingfeeling like marketing.
Right?
So, like, I'll leave you withthat because I feel like, don't get
too caught up in the detailsof, like, you know, I want to do
this, I want to do that.
Like, make it feel organic.
So just leave with that,because I feel like one takeaway.

(01:07:20):
You guys should kind of leave here.
It's like, hey, let me go andlet me ask my wife to help me with
this.
Or let me.
Let me make a goal to postthree times a week to start.
Like, if you can do that and.
And just keep in the back ofyour mind, just make it feel organic.
Don't make it feel like marketing.
I have a quote in my book thatI use during it.
See if I can find it realquick that it kind of goes back to

(01:07:44):
what I just said.
And it's under the marketing section.
For everybody on YouTube.
You're seeing what's going on.
I love how you know your bookso well.
And I can see that the pagesare like, you've thumbed through
this thing a ton, which isreally, really cool.
Not many authors that I've hadon know their book as well as they

(01:08:06):
know the content, but theydon't know the book itself.
Book itself.
Yeah, yeah, no, that makes sense.
I love it because after you'reready, you're probably like, I want
out of here.
You know?
So look, it says the bestmarketing doesn't feel like marketing.
Essentially what I just said, right?
So, like, guys, like, keep it simple.
Keep it short.
Keep it simple.
Let it.
Let it grow into what it is.
Love it.

(01:08:27):
Well, how do they.
For everybody listening, ifyou want a copy of this book, where
do they get it?
Amazon.
Just type in the resiliententrepreneur Mark Mason.
Marc M A S O N.
You go right on Amazon.
You can go onto my Instagram.
I have it under the link on Instagram.
You can find me on Instagram.
Mark Mason.
Underscore Facebook.

(01:08:48):
Same thing.
Mark Mason.
My company name is RCL Mechanical.
We have both Facebook,Instagram, you know.
And if you want to seeexamples of what great marketing
looks like, go follow Mark'sInstagram and Facebook.
Absolutely, absolutely.
Go in and check it out.
Guys.
I appreciate you all.
Thanks for having me, Sam.

(01:09:10):
I'm sure, I'm sure we'll be in touch.
100%, man.
Well, I appreciate you beingon the show.
For everybody else, thanksfor, thanks for listening today.
This has been a great episode.
We covered a lot of things.
If you got some value fromthis, first of all, we'd love to
love you to start engage inthe conversation and we can keep
it going within the Facebook group.
So again, join, go searchClose it now on Facebook.

(01:09:31):
Join the group and love foryou to drop a big takeaway or two
in the comments in the group.
And also my business growsjust like yours.
So if you got value, love foryou to leave a five star review,
you can review it on review meon Google or Apple podcasts.

(01:09:51):
Drop a review there.
Drop what your big takeawayfrom the show was.
That would be very helpfulbecause all of you may or may not
know this, but when I'mworking to get higher profile people,
not that you're not highprofile, Mark, but when I'm working
to get people on the showthat, you know, are, you know, in
household names and theirbooks are all around the globe in

(01:10:12):
40 languages, when I'mreaching out to those authors and
speakers and those type ofpeople, their gatekeepers, one of
the very first things theylook at is how many reviews does
this show have and what are,what's the rating?
And so the more and betterreviews I can get, I can get better
guests on the show, which isalso, it helps the show grow and

(01:10:32):
bring more value to everybody involved.
And I love reviews just likeyou love reviews.
So review the show.
We'd love that.
And otherwise, man, Iappreciate you being on and for everybody
out there, I hope this broughtyou some massive value today.
I know I learned a ton and Iknow you did too.
So work every single day.
Go be someone worth buying from.

(01:10:55):
You've been listening to theClose it now podcast.
Our passion is to diveheadfirst into the transformative
movement that's reshaping thevery foundation of H Vac and home
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(01:11:16):
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