August 27, 2024 • 27 mins
Welcome to the latest episode of the Profit 911 Podcast, hosted by Justin Miller. In this episode, we delve into the crucial aspect of follow-up after events and presentations. Justin shares his experience speaking at a virtual summit and the importance of staying engaged with potential leads long after the initial contact.
Discover the strategies for maximizing your post-event follow-up, including the use of physical mailers, email campaigns, and the right mix of personal outreach. Learn how to turn casual interest into committed clients and why persistence is key to business growth.
Whether you're a seasoned entrepreneur or just starting, this episode offers valuable insights into making the most of your marketing efforts and ensuring that no lead is left behind.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Marketing entrepreneurship and all things
small business you're listening
to the profit 9-1-1 podcast now here's
your host justin miller hey we're back again look at that just like we were
never die never die uh we're gonna have to get like a new intro and call it
(00:23):
like i was just thinking that i'm like we need to upgrade that intro we're about
ready to full forward with the Jurassic Marketing stuff.
But for today, it's the Profit 911 Podcast.
We're talking about the fortune being in the follow-up.
So not that I needed reminded of it, but my buddy Michael Rosbrook sent me an
email and all it said is the fortune's in the follow-up.
(00:46):
Because last week, you and I were chatting, I was in Charleston for his big annual summit,
virtual event broadcast out of studios down there, which is interesting,
by the way, I had to just as an aside to, you know, fly somewhere in the country
just to do a remote broadcast.
That's interesting. That's true. When you showed me pictures,
you were texting me. I'm like, where's he at? And then when you told me,
(01:06):
I'm like, why would it be located there?
And I'm like, you know, not in LA or New York or whatever, but it looked like
a really well put together place. Yeah, the company was Sage Studios and they
knew what they were doing for sure.
And at a pretty fancy studio with the giant Zoom wall.
There's other fancier software, I'm sure, actually running. But for lack of
(01:27):
a better term, the giant Zoom wall with 400 faces on it that you present in
front of. So kind of cool.
But of course, a little behind the scenes baseball in that particular one.
So that event I am not a paid speaker at.
And I am not able to sell during my session.
So it was 45 minutes of real educational content, which is not always the case.
(01:48):
Those that know the speaking for a living gigs.
There's usually one or the other. Either you're a paid speaker or you're selling
something. And there's rarely any in between.
This is one of the rare exceptions of an in between where all I'm able to do
is speak and passively, of course, give examples of ways that we can help people
(02:09):
with direct mail marketing,
which puts a huge sales burden on following up afterwards with anyone we can identify.
So no magical leads, although I will say there were a fair amount of people
that found their way to our website during the broadcast, which I didn't share the website.
(02:29):
They had to actually use that wonderful thing called Google.
And they ended up on our campaign manager's calendar.
However, that event had hundreds and hundreds of attendees. And of course,
I was not there just to see my friends. I love them.
But travel days and everything like that, we have to make some money.
So we're talking a little bit about what happens now.
(02:51):
So if in your business, you have the opportunity to be in front of a large group
of potential buyers, that's amazing, first off.
But most of the money is in what happens after that occurs.
So if I just dropped it right now, and we took the, I don't know,
handful of leads that came in and closed a few deals, I mean,
(03:11):
I guess technically we would make money.
As a company overall, Overall, you know, we'd go bankrupt doing that all the
time, unless I wanted to be on the road twice a week doing that,
which I guess would be something you could do.
For me, it doesn't fit. You know, I'd end up divorced really quick.
Yeah, with a family and children, that's a lot harder to do.
(03:32):
If you're a single 32-year-old who's built a business, that's maybe you love
the travel. I like to travel too, but there's at some point I'm like, I just want to get home.
Not even talking about travel issues, just like being on the road and being
away from And as you know, we don't live by a major airport.
We got a decent sized regional airport, but a 45 minute presentation quickly becomes three days.
(03:54):
Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's true. The equation matters a lot.
And in the previous business I had, like the event business,
we did a lot of wedding shows. This is another situation.
So an expo would be another situation
where you're in front of a lot of potential buyers of your service.
And yeah, I was always somewhat amused because you could look around the show
(04:16):
and you could see the vendors there, the ones that were just writing business
there, you know, which sounds like the dream.
And then, you know, they didn't do anything after that. So they lived on whatever
they got there and it was on to the next show.
Which they probably made money, which is fine. I would prefer to do both,
though, follow up after that, because I can tell you in that business,
(04:37):
we probably did four times as much business after the show as we did during it.
I don't know if that was your experience or if that's changed over the years.
Probably two or three times, yeah.
I mean, there's always a few who may already know you or are looking and are
ready to do business right now, but I'd say two or three times afterwards.
Yeah, and it's no secret that we sponsor events, too, And we have boosted events
(04:59):
with the Jurassic marketing stuff and the inflatable dinosaurs everyone loves,
which I did bring an inflatable dinosaur to Charleston with me on stage.
And the AV guys loved it, by the way. They had a dinosaur running across the
LED wall behind me. I'd like to have seen that.
And then it took me a while to realize that my walk-off music was the Jurassic
Park theme. They did that for me. Oh, sure. Okay.
(05:21):
So here's an unrelated question then. You're used to being able to speak on
stage in front of people, big or small. Yeah.
Was that different, just having that wall of video monitors and having to look at the camera?
Yeah, so I would say that for sure it would be a skill set. And this was the
first time I had done that setting.
Of course, I've done Zoom presentations and webinars and stuff.
(05:45):
It was very clear that with more rehearsal and at bats, you could do a very
interactive segment that way that you couldn't do any other way.
Now, I didn't have time to have a lot of interaction.
You know, I had a 45 minute slot. It's not a lot of time. Yeah.
There were, let's see, there were 10 monitors displaying the webcam feeds.
(06:05):
Okay. With like 50-ish heads, whatever the maximum number of heads you can get on one is.
And then there were two very large scrolling monitors with different chat feeds.
Okay. Yeah. And it is quite difficult, even being used to being on stage,
catching anything in the chat off in the wings. It's different.
It's almost like being a weatherman and having to look off camera,
(06:26):
you know. Yeah, with someone else controlling what's on the map.
Yeah, that weather map behind you is not, that's not a real map.
That's why they look, they're always facing to the side because they're looking
at that, you know, that sidewall. But yeah, I think that would be a skill.
And you see, I mean, the Tony Robbins and other people, I mean,
a lot of them are doing this now.
It's the thing. I would think it would be weird not
to have human beings like 10 feet that interaction
(06:48):
facial expressions even when you have a monitor that's got
50 people on it I and I mean I
didn't have my glasses on or I mean you have to have caught well I can see where
you start you I bet if you watched your performance back you would see places
where maybe you're like you could tell that you're focusing you're like watching
the chats you know feed or yeah for the most part the presentation I gave was
(07:09):
pretty much monologue I tried.
A few times to just catch some chat comments to let people know that I was paying
attention to them so they didn't drift off, call out a name or two.
But if you did a lot of that, you know, he had hundreds of attendees,
like I said, so the chat would actually scroll faster than you could read.
Oh, geez. I mean, you had like a three foot tall monitor, but it's scrolling
(07:30):
up as fast as it could go there.
I will say the other thing is they didn't have on any of the displays the actual live broadcast feed.
Okay. So there were two primary monitors that I
had behind one of the cameras I was watching and they were you
know my current slide and my slide
notes okay and I guess I was looking down to
(07:52):
see my time or two quite a bit yeah if you're not familiar with speaking on
stage just countdown timer for you you don't want that thing to go red and start
counting up if you like the host anyway so that's primarily where I was focused
that was on those but yeah AV crew is completely in charge of what the live
out is I didn't have have control over that.
So I have my slides, but whether or not that slide's being displayed is kind
(08:15):
of by them as an unbiased producer.
Does this add value right here or not? They're making that judgment call the
whole time. So I don't actually know what the display outlook like.
But I tried that I could have in my mind enough that I'm like,
all right, I'm going to skip through five of these transitions because it's probably not up here.
Yep. And that whole concept fascinates me because I think it's I mean,
(08:35):
obviously for for Michael, it's it's worth it to do that versus throwing a full on site scale event.
Yeah. So this this particular event, they moved virtual in 2020,
I think, whenever the first bout of COVID was.
This was this was a quick pivot to online.
(08:55):
Which many people had to. And they actually did really well online and have
continued growing that and it's done well. Yes, I like face-to-face events still.
They're both expensive to produce. So obviously face-to-face,
you got a lot of logistics with attendees and stuff.
But to do the virtual event right, you do as well.
And they put a ton of work into it. They check in people one by one to make
(09:20):
sure they can run the cameras.
And it's a webcam on event, like 90 plus you're
supposed to have it on and they do so they do all that they
send out event boxes beforehand they do everything right
so it probably still is close in cost to produce yeah well i mean and the av
crew costs just as much well that's i mean that's why he's going to charleston
(09:40):
because they obviously have figured out a way to do that right yeah i mean he
has a studio in his office for smaller ones but this this is the big thing it
has to be right there's There was a crew of,
I'd say there were eight to 10 actual members of the event staff there, plus his team.
Wow. So behind the scenes, there's a dozen plus people working long days.
(10:02):
But yeah, it was fun. It was a unique skill set. Obviously, some better than others.
I would give myself an average grade on that particular performance.
If you did it seven more times, that score would get higher.
I mean, you'd get more used to it. Well, and the entertainment background like
makes up for some. I mean, it's true.
We politely say if you suck at presenting, this would like spiral that down.
(10:26):
I think, OK, let's say it amplifies it. I'd say if you're a good speaker already,
this tool can be used to amplify it. If you suck, it's going to be really bad.
But yeah, so what happens now afterwards? You know, we need a bunch of money.
The minute the cameras go off, you're like, all right, how do I reach these
people? I mean, we were doing that beforehand.
And there were some tech things that we fixed beforehand that I happened to
(10:47):
catch. But yeah, so what happens now besides the five?
So there is a thing behind the scenes that we were able to do a little form
submission during my presentation, which if they filled it out,
then I get their contact info and I can follow up with them.
And we will of course but that's it so i had to push people there and as soon
(11:08):
as i'm off stage that's gone that form's not up there anymore so i had to get
within 40 minutes and we had,
a couple hundred people do that so about half the audience okay that's not bad
or is it i don't know it's 50 is that good i'd say that's pretty good for 45
minute presentation with only casual pushes to it sure because you're not really
yeah you're not selling selling you can mention it but you're You're not like, no,
(11:30):
I didn't even say what you were going to get. I said, I was going to send you a gift, which I am.
So we have follow-up boxes that are in production here right now.
Could we have produced them last week? Probably. But you know,
our own stuff always comes last.
So we have follow-up kits going out that are intended to open the door for a
(11:52):
sales rep or whatever you want to call them here.
They're campaign managers, but something that physically gets in people's hands
before we We make a phone call so that we can say, hey, we sent you blah,
blah, blah. Did you get it? Yeah.
So we'll be sending boxes. They'll have a Jurassic marketing swag item in them.
Nice. They will have an educational piece. Now, everyone already got my book before the event.
(12:13):
So we have a smaller report going in there. I think we have a postcard going in there.
We have some sort of edible snack going in there. Naturally.
I was going to say, is there brownies in there?
There's not brownies, but there'll be something to eat in there.
That's good. That's on brand.
And then there is some pricing information in there. Dinosaur eggs I can eat or what?
(12:35):
When you say on brand, I think, well, what possibly could that be?
Can I give away everything on here?
So the current one is Jurassic Park fruit snacks or Jurassic World fruit snacks. I like that.
However, we end up emptying the shelves at all the supermarkets.
So the two Walmart deliveries that were supposed to come today,
(12:55):
they gave us a fourth of what we ordered.
Of course. And now someone's going to go run around the rest of the grocery stores.
How many Walmarts are there in the Quad Cities? Like four or five? You should hit them all.
Yeah, now they're going to have to hit the Jewel Oscos and the Hy-Vees and all
the Midwest chains here. Everywhere. Road trip.
I wonder if then the store is like restocks. Like, man, these things are hot.
It makes you wonder. They order too many now. Yeah, then they'll be sitting there.
(13:19):
So that will go out. Of course, we will email.
Of course. And then we'll begin phone calls. And we can also do text messaging if need be.
How many of those people do you think will preemptively
call you before you get a chance to connect with them oh maybe
10 i would say okay so maybe 10 of the list will be proactive on their own get
(13:41):
going beat the line do those people in do you find that those more proactive
people do they end up spending more do they last longer do they stay longer
or is it just they're they it's top of mind and they do it i don't know about
that it's an easier sale because they're They're clearly interested.
Like they proactively went out of their way.
It's one of those situations where now the job is to not screw up the sale rather
(14:02):
than create the sale, which is a valid job.
And you certainly can screw up sales.
But no, so maybe 10% reach out, do that on their own.
We'll probably get to speak to half the list.
And by speak, I mean like they'll answer the phone at some point,
but not like an in-depth conversation.
So half of it's gone. on so i mean our
(14:24):
follow-up kit's probably going to cost 10 20
bucks each so i mean that's
got a couple grand going out yeah maybe three grand and just to talk to 100
people of that you know maybe maybe half will get pushed to a real conversation
be it a zoom session which would be the preferred or they'll just you know force
(14:47):
us to go back and forth with a lot of questions via email which is not preferred.
Also, this is kind of when we're in post-event follow-up, it's the time of year
where the sales staff gets to play favorites a little bit.
So those that follow the rules and do what they're supposed to get dealt with more quickly.
If you become a pain in the ass, you're going to get followed up with,
(15:08):
but it's going to be last. Makes sense.
So we don't always have that liberty, but this time of year we do.
And yeah, we will continue to follow up forever. There's a lot of spots in the
business that follow-up needs to be in place.
And let's take a quick break. I'm going to drink some of my pumpkin cream cold
(15:30):
brew from Starbucks. Super extra large.
You're like, just give me the big one. So when you redeem the Starbucks points,
the stars, every size costs the same amount of stars.
Well, then give me the big one. Oh, this is your marketing words of wisdom.
But if you're redeeming your Starbucks points, get the big one.
That's right. Also, the add-ons don't cost anything. So just load that up with more sugar. Great.
(15:54):
Two o'clock comes, you're sleeping in your office. Yes. Anyhow,
we'll take a quick break. We'll be back. And let's talk about what happens after the appointment.
So the ones that followed through did what they were supposed to and then didn't
give us a credit card. What do we do then? We'll be back.
And now, back to the Profit911 Podcast with your host, Justin Miller.
(16:20):
Okay, we're back. We're talking event follow-up or actually just lead follow-up in general.
And I talked about how we get them to talk with us. So how we get to the consult.
But then what happens if they don't buy?
As much as I would love everyone to just give us money the first time they talk
to us, it just doesn't happen.
(16:43):
I actually made a comment, I think, at the very end of my presentation last
time that, of course, we want you to succeed, but we want you to have lofty
enough goals that when you have that success, then you spend more to hit the next goal.
And therefore, we make more money. You make more money.
And the line's all kind of in the delivery because otherwise I sound like I
(17:04):
just want to take your money. Yeah.
But I do want to take your money while providing more value as we do it. Well, sure. Yeah.
But yeah, people don't always willingly give out their credit cards.
So if they have met with you or whatever your first contact point is,
and they don't take the next step, which I don't know if I have the percentage
(17:24):
here off the top of my head.
I could tell you in the last business or in a couple specific situations,
how many that is. and it depends how many obstacles to meeting with you there is.
So if you put a bunch of like hurdles before they can meet with you,
you know, your close rate will be higher, but your volume will be less.
If you make it easier to meet with you, such as the case of a larger company
with the sales team, you'd really want to have those conversations to move people forward.
(17:47):
You know, the close ratio tends to go down a little bit and all of a sudden
we're back in a chasing mode again.
And it's funny, we get like the emails that are like, yes, I do want to move
forward. word, I'll let you know when I'm ready.
Like in my world, those two statements are contradictory. Yeah.
That's a no. That was a literal email that came in yesterday.
(18:09):
And hopefully if you're listening, I don't offend you, but those are not the same thing.
There's a clear next step and you didn't take it, but no. So then what happens?
Oh, well, you fall down the list of favorites again.
And if we don't have enough time, you know, you, you go by the wayside for a
while You are put into automatic follow-up, so you're going to get our newsletters forever.
(18:34):
You're going to get any mass emails we do until you unsubscribe.
And I say those as an aside, but those actually are very important parts of
warming that lead back up again.
A lot of times it's a waiting game till something changes, a need changes.
I tell these tax resolution people that they help people with IRS debt.
(18:55):
And I'm like, hey, they didn't get the IRS debt overnight.
You know, the IRS is hounding them. It's probably been years.
Like it was probably an error or a problem three years ago.
Like it doesn't mean they want to solve it right now. Now, I realize you want
to solve this problem for them, but it may not be an important problem to them right now.
Or the pressure from the IRS isn't significant enough that they're ready to
(19:18):
deal with it. That's, I suppose.
Yeah. So something has to change to where all of a sudden it's important to resolve this issue.
Something could be like a spouse getting pissed off.
Yeah. It could be being denied for something else they want.
Oh, shit. I can't get a car loan or a mortgage.
It could be something like that. Or it could be just finally they're fed up
(19:41):
and ready to deal with it.
All of those are outside of our control.
Like we didn't cause that to happen by marketing to them.
True. But we do want to be there when they make that decision.
So this is why appointment no sale follow up, as it's called, is important.
So they had an interest or an inquiry.
We've identified them as a real lead. For some reason, the timing's off.
(20:06):
Now, in part of your world, the wedding world, there's a very real deadline.
Yeah, I mean, the ones I don't sell, I just move on at this point because my
close rate is so high if I get them in the right, if I get the right client potential.
I mean, if I try to close you and you, oh, I'll get back to you,
those people never get back to you.
Yeah, well, and they have an added deadline. They have an actual date where
(20:29):
this expires and you have set inventory. inventory, you know,
there's a lot of things stacked in your favor for closing that.
Yeah. It makes me realize how much backend work I'm not having to do because
of the business that I'm in, or at least that business. But yeah.
Yeah. For a lot of other businesses, the equivalent would be like,
hey, we're thinking of getting married sometime. Yeah. Yeah.
We'll let you know when. Oh, okay. Is that a lead? You might establish,
(20:53):
yeah, they look like they'll probably get married someday.
So they are a lead. You know, how much follow-up could we invest in this?
And okay yeah maybe the emails are justified maybe the newsletters are justified
how many phone calls are justified beyond that or like real attention that varies
and a lot of times we'll have to,
do a mass event like a webinar or something we'll likely do a follow-up webinar now which will be,
(21:18):
a 70 80 overlap with the content they just heard but maybe get them excited
again yeah and and push them over the edge or something to where it's not a
one-on-one type sales environment,
so yeah if you're not excited about getting married i can't get you more excited
i mean if you're getting married and you're not excited i can't help you.
So we need people excited about growing their businesses, which not everyone
(21:41):
is. So this actually floored me.
We started a division, what, like three years ago that was kind of aimed at
the traditional CPA and tax prep community.
And I flew around to a half dozen trade shows and exhibited to have conversations
with people and see what the needs were.
And I was amazed how many times people were like, yeah, we got our book of business. We're good.
(22:04):
Like, we're just gonna ride this out till retirement we're gonna
serve the current clients and because it's consistent we don't want any new
ones like this this floored me kevin like yeah
that would be well yeah your personality my personality i i'm
we're always looking for like where can we expand where can we grow but that's
a very comfortable level i guess i'd be bored as shit though like yeah i'm an
entrepreneur i want growth i want change i i'd be bored too if i ran numbers
(22:28):
all day long but that that's i mean i know accountants i think my accountant
loves this job because it's It's just, it's what he loves. But I'm like.
I mean, I don't want to say it was the minority, but the ones that were actively
invested in growth. That is interesting. You would think. Yeah. Yeah. That's.
They're not even interested in discussing it or like even thinking about it.
And it wasn't that I was going to sell anything.
(22:48):
I could have casual conversations outside of the booth and try and get to really what's going on.
And they're just happy kind of doing what they do.
You know, that to us is not a good lead. That's. Like we've identified that
there's an area we can help them, but they don't see a need. Yeah.
This is critical though, because this is the difference for me speaking to groups
(23:12):
of business owners or groups of marketing minded business owners.
I just, I need one hurdle further.
So we have an event we're sponsoring in October that is real estate agents,
which is an audience we serve. It's not a major portion of our business.
And part of the reason is because, you know, it's so fragmented and there's
(23:34):
so many people just serving their friends and family in the industry.
And a lot of them are getting wiped out right now because the industry is getting tougher.
But I was introduced to the producer of the event. And really quick,
I'm trying to feel out, okay, are these just real estate agents coming to hang out?
Or are they actively invested in growth?
(23:55):
What's the other content? What's the connection? Yes. And I never quite know
because event producers, for the most part, they're selling you too.
Sure. Well, I mean, how many times did you go to a convention in Vegas?
And it's like, that's why they're in Vegas and not in Cleveland,
because it's a vacation on top of, you know.
Well, in special event world, you know, your world, a lot of them are just coming to check out gear.
(24:19):
Unfortunately, yeah. Which is the fun stuff. It is fun. I mean, it's all, yeah.
But you're right. If you're not looking to specifically grow,
you can still have some time away and maybe buy some stuff.
But yeah, you're right. Which is not a good spot for me to exhibit.
No, that doesn't help you at all. Like if I'm selling like widgets and toys, that's great.
(24:39):
If I'm selling, let's help grow your business. Not so much.
So yeah, everyone has to make that decision, kind of qualify, leads a little bit.
It's also the difference in my world between who you're marketing to.
Are we marketing to people buying your service or are we marketing to referral
sources? We do a ton of referral marketing, as you know.
I actually don't like in-consumer marketing. We do it because we're a marketing agency.
(25:04):
But I would much rather get referral sources because it's a different conversation.
But anyhow, we follow up, follow up forever. It happens to do with resources.
We're actually hiring in another
account manager right now to help deal with some of this follow up.
Otherwise, we end up with a situation where our reps are busy enough and cherry
(25:25):
picking and there's still more money out there. Yeah.
And yes, we have capacity in our production department to serve.
And when we don't have capacity, I will grow further so we have capacity.
So I practice what I preach as far as that goes. goes
makes sense anything we missed
in follow-up here i mean essentially you know
(25:45):
the the blunt way to put it and i mean i
heard it from dan kennedy i'm sure he heard it from somewhere else is you know
as far as follow-up and when you stop it's buy or die yeah yeah buy die or unsubscribe
by the way if you unsubscribe from email that to me just tells you you don't
want email i'm still gonna mail you unless you let me know that's totally i
would never thought about
(26:05):
that you're right you're only asking me to not connect with
you one way that's true yeah well i said it
as an aside but i guess we could briefly i mean that makes sense
a lot of business owners would take that person say well he doesn't he she doesn't
want to talk to me at all so i'm to stop all forms of communication
yeah no i unsubscribe from a lot of email lists where i still have a relationship
with the company i just don't want the email you're sending or what you're sending
(26:27):
is not a value to me if you send me a piece in the mail i'll still glance at
it i might recycle it But it doesn't mean the relationship's dead just because
I don't want you calling my cell phone.
Yeah. Just because I unsubscribe to text messages.
Now, as a marketer, yeah, don't take that personal. Use every media to your
advantage. Don't, you know, make sure you're playing by the rules.
(26:49):
But elimination of one media is not elimination of relationship.
And if you're reliant on one and only one media, you should be scared for just that reason.
That's the problem. Yeah, that's true. If I'm just sending broadcast emails
and someone unsubscribes and they're completely out of my world now,
the cheapest thing to do was retain that client and you're out there chasing the next one.
So that's it for follow-up. We'll follow up with another episode soon enough.
(27:12):
And hell, maybe it'll be a Jurassic Marketing intro. Oh, maybe.
Probably not. At some point. At some point.
Thanks for listening to the Profit 911 Podcast. Be sure to subscribe and leave
your comments. For more information on how Profit 911 Consulting can help grow
your service business, visit Profit911.biz.
Marketing entrepreneurship and all things
small business you're listening
to the profit 9-1-1 podcast now here's
your host justin miller hey we're back again look at that just like we were
never die never die uh we're gonna have to get like a new intro and call it
(00:23):
like i was just thinking that i'm like we need to upgrade that intro we're about
ready to full forward with the Jurassic Marketing stuff.
But for today, it's the Profit 911 Podcast.
We're talking about the fortune being in the follow-up.
So not that I needed reminded of it, but my buddy Michael Rosbrook sent me an
email and all it said is the fortune's in the follow-up.
(00:46):
Because last week, you and I were chatting, I was in Charleston for his big annual summit,
virtual event broadcast out of studios down there, which is interesting,
by the way, I had to just as an aside to, you know, fly somewhere in the country
just to do a remote broadcast.
That's interesting. That's true. When you showed me pictures,
you were texting me. I'm like, where's he at? And then when you told me,
(01:06):
I'm like, why would it be located there?
And I'm like, you know, not in LA or New York or whatever, but it looked like
a really well put together place. Yeah, the company was Sage Studios and they
knew what they were doing for sure.
And at a pretty fancy studio with the giant Zoom wall.
There's other fancier software, I'm sure, actually running. But for lack of
(01:27):
a better term, the giant Zoom wall with 400 faces on it that you present in
front of. So kind of cool.
But of course, a little behind the scenes baseball in that particular one.
So that event I am not a paid speaker at.
And I am not able to sell during my session.
So it was 45 minutes of real educational content, which is not always the case.
(01:48):
Those that know the speaking for a living gigs.
There's usually one or the other. Either you're a paid speaker or you're selling
something. And there's rarely any in between.
This is one of the rare exceptions of an in between where all I'm able to do
is speak and passively, of course, give examples of ways that we can help people
(02:09):
with direct mail marketing,
which puts a huge sales burden on following up afterwards with anyone we can identify.
So no magical leads, although I will say there were a fair amount of people
that found their way to our website during the broadcast, which I didn't share the website.
(02:29):
They had to actually use that wonderful thing called Google.
And they ended up on our campaign manager's calendar.
However, that event had hundreds and hundreds of attendees. And of course,
I was not there just to see my friends. I love them.
But travel days and everything like that, we have to make some money.
So we're talking a little bit about what happens now.
(02:51):
So if in your business, you have the opportunity to be in front of a large group
of potential buyers, that's amazing, first off.
But most of the money is in what happens after that occurs.
So if I just dropped it right now, and we took the, I don't know,
handful of leads that came in and closed a few deals, I mean,
(03:11):
I guess technically we would make money.
As a company overall, Overall, you know, we'd go bankrupt doing that all the
time, unless I wanted to be on the road twice a week doing that,
which I guess would be something you could do.
For me, it doesn't fit. You know, I'd end up divorced really quick.
Yeah, with a family and children, that's a lot harder to do.
(03:32):
If you're a single 32-year-old who's built a business, that's maybe you love
the travel. I like to travel too, but there's at some point I'm like, I just want to get home.
Not even talking about travel issues, just like being on the road and being
away from And as you know, we don't live by a major airport.
We got a decent sized regional airport, but a 45 minute presentation quickly becomes three days.
(03:54):
Yeah, yeah, that's true. That's true. The equation matters a lot.
And in the previous business I had, like the event business,
we did a lot of wedding shows. This is another situation.
So an expo would be another situation
where you're in front of a lot of potential buyers of your service.
And yeah, I was always somewhat amused because you could look around the show
(04:16):
and you could see the vendors there, the ones that were just writing business
there, you know, which sounds like the dream.
And then, you know, they didn't do anything after that. So they lived on whatever
they got there and it was on to the next show.
Which they probably made money, which is fine. I would prefer to do both,
though, follow up after that, because I can tell you in that business,
(04:37):
we probably did four times as much business after the show as we did during it.
I don't know if that was your experience or if that's changed over the years.
Probably two or three times, yeah.
I mean, there's always a few who may already know you or are looking and are
ready to do business right now, but I'd say two or three times afterwards.
Yeah, and it's no secret that we sponsor events, too, And we have boosted events
(04:59):
with the Jurassic marketing stuff and the inflatable dinosaurs everyone loves,
which I did bring an inflatable dinosaur to Charleston with me on stage.
And the AV guys loved it, by the way. They had a dinosaur running across the
LED wall behind me. I'd like to have seen that.
And then it took me a while to realize that my walk-off music was the Jurassic
Park theme. They did that for me. Oh, sure. Okay.
(05:21):
So here's an unrelated question then. You're used to being able to speak on
stage in front of people, big or small. Yeah.
Was that different, just having that wall of video monitors and having to look at the camera?
Yeah, so I would say that for sure it would be a skill set. And this was the
first time I had done that setting.
Of course, I've done Zoom presentations and webinars and stuff.
(05:45):
It was very clear that with more rehearsal and at bats, you could do a very
interactive segment that way that you couldn't do any other way.
Now, I didn't have time to have a lot of interaction.
You know, I had a 45 minute slot. It's not a lot of time. Yeah.
There were, let's see, there were 10 monitors displaying the webcam feeds.
(06:05):
Okay. With like 50-ish heads, whatever the maximum number of heads you can get on one is.
And then there were two very large scrolling monitors with different chat feeds.
Okay. Yeah. And it is quite difficult, even being used to being on stage,
catching anything in the chat off in the wings. It's different.
It's almost like being a weatherman and having to look off camera,
(06:26):
you know. Yeah, with someone else controlling what's on the map.
Yeah, that weather map behind you is not, that's not a real map.
That's why they look, they're always facing to the side because they're looking
at that, you know, that sidewall. But yeah, I think that would be a skill.
And you see, I mean, the Tony Robbins and other people, I mean,
a lot of them are doing this now.
It's the thing. I would think it would be weird not
to have human beings like 10 feet that interaction
(06:48):
facial expressions even when you have a monitor that's got
50 people on it I and I mean I
didn't have my glasses on or I mean you have to have caught well I can see where
you start you I bet if you watched your performance back you would see places
where maybe you're like you could tell that you're focusing you're like watching
the chats you know feed or yeah for the most part the presentation I gave was
(07:09):
pretty much monologue I tried.
A few times to just catch some chat comments to let people know that I was paying
attention to them so they didn't drift off, call out a name or two.
But if you did a lot of that, you know, he had hundreds of attendees,
like I said, so the chat would actually scroll faster than you could read.
Oh, geez. I mean, you had like a three foot tall monitor, but it's scrolling
(07:30):
up as fast as it could go there.
I will say the other thing is they didn't have on any of the displays the actual live broadcast feed.
Okay. So there were two primary monitors that I
had behind one of the cameras I was watching and they were you
know my current slide and my slide
notes okay and I guess I was looking down to
(07:52):
see my time or two quite a bit yeah if you're not familiar with speaking on
stage just countdown timer for you you don't want that thing to go red and start
counting up if you like the host anyway so that's primarily where I was focused
that was on those but yeah AV crew is completely in charge of what the live
out is I didn't have have control over that.
So I have my slides, but whether or not that slide's being displayed is kind
(08:15):
of by them as an unbiased producer.
Does this add value right here or not? They're making that judgment call the
whole time. So I don't actually know what the display outlook like.
But I tried that I could have in my mind enough that I'm like,
all right, I'm going to skip through five of these transitions because it's probably not up here.
Yep. And that whole concept fascinates me because I think it's I mean,
(08:35):
obviously for for Michael, it's it's worth it to do that versus throwing a full on site scale event.
Yeah. So this this particular event, they moved virtual in 2020,
I think, whenever the first bout of COVID was.
This was this was a quick pivot to online.
(08:55):
Which many people had to. And they actually did really well online and have
continued growing that and it's done well. Yes, I like face-to-face events still.
They're both expensive to produce. So obviously face-to-face,
you got a lot of logistics with attendees and stuff.
But to do the virtual event right, you do as well.
And they put a ton of work into it. They check in people one by one to make
(09:20):
sure they can run the cameras.
And it's a webcam on event, like 90 plus you're
supposed to have it on and they do so they do all that they
send out event boxes beforehand they do everything right
so it probably still is close in cost to produce yeah well i mean and the av
crew costs just as much well that's i mean that's why he's going to charleston
(09:40):
because they obviously have figured out a way to do that right yeah i mean he
has a studio in his office for smaller ones but this this is the big thing it
has to be right there's There was a crew of,
I'd say there were eight to 10 actual members of the event staff there, plus his team.
Wow. So behind the scenes, there's a dozen plus people working long days.
(10:02):
But yeah, it was fun. It was a unique skill set. Obviously, some better than others.
I would give myself an average grade on that particular performance.
If you did it seven more times, that score would get higher.
I mean, you'd get more used to it. Well, and the entertainment background like
makes up for some. I mean, it's true.
We politely say if you suck at presenting, this would like spiral that down.
(10:26):
I think, OK, let's say it amplifies it. I'd say if you're a good speaker already,
this tool can be used to amplify it. If you suck, it's going to be really bad.
But yeah, so what happens now afterwards? You know, we need a bunch of money.
The minute the cameras go off, you're like, all right, how do I reach these
people? I mean, we were doing that beforehand.
And there were some tech things that we fixed beforehand that I happened to
(10:47):
catch. But yeah, so what happens now besides the five?
So there is a thing behind the scenes that we were able to do a little form
submission during my presentation, which if they filled it out,
then I get their contact info and I can follow up with them.
And we will of course but that's it so i had to push people there and as soon
(11:08):
as i'm off stage that's gone that form's not up there anymore so i had to get
within 40 minutes and we had,
a couple hundred people do that so about half the audience okay that's not bad
or is it i don't know it's 50 is that good i'd say that's pretty good for 45
minute presentation with only casual pushes to it sure because you're not really
yeah you're not selling selling you can mention it but you're You're not like, no,
(11:30):
I didn't even say what you were going to get. I said, I was going to send you a gift, which I am.
So we have follow-up boxes that are in production here right now.
Could we have produced them last week? Probably. But you know,
our own stuff always comes last.
So we have follow-up kits going out that are intended to open the door for a
(11:52):
sales rep or whatever you want to call them here.
They're campaign managers, but something that physically gets in people's hands
before we We make a phone call so that we can say, hey, we sent you blah,
blah, blah. Did you get it? Yeah.
So we'll be sending boxes. They'll have a Jurassic marketing swag item in them.
Nice. They will have an educational piece. Now, everyone already got my book before the event.
(12:13):
So we have a smaller report going in there. I think we have a postcard going in there.
We have some sort of edible snack going in there. Naturally.
I was going to say, is there brownies in there?
There's not brownies, but there'll be something to eat in there.
That's good. That's on brand.
And then there is some pricing information in there. Dinosaur eggs I can eat or what?
(12:35):
When you say on brand, I think, well, what possibly could that be?
Can I give away everything on here?
So the current one is Jurassic Park fruit snacks or Jurassic World fruit snacks. I like that.
However, we end up emptying the shelves at all the supermarkets.
So the two Walmart deliveries that were supposed to come today,
(12:55):
they gave us a fourth of what we ordered.
Of course. And now someone's going to go run around the rest of the grocery stores.
How many Walmarts are there in the Quad Cities? Like four or five? You should hit them all.
Yeah, now they're going to have to hit the Jewel Oscos and the Hy-Vees and all
the Midwest chains here. Everywhere. Road trip.
I wonder if then the store is like restocks. Like, man, these things are hot.
It makes you wonder. They order too many now. Yeah, then they'll be sitting there.
(13:19):
So that will go out. Of course, we will email.
Of course. And then we'll begin phone calls. And we can also do text messaging if need be.
How many of those people do you think will preemptively
call you before you get a chance to connect with them oh maybe
10 i would say okay so maybe 10 of the list will be proactive on their own get
(13:41):
going beat the line do those people in do you find that those more proactive
people do they end up spending more do they last longer do they stay longer
or is it just they're they it's top of mind and they do it i don't know about
that it's an easier sale because they're They're clearly interested.
Like they proactively went out of their way.
It's one of those situations where now the job is to not screw up the sale rather
(14:02):
than create the sale, which is a valid job.
And you certainly can screw up sales.
But no, so maybe 10% reach out, do that on their own.
We'll probably get to speak to half the list.
And by speak, I mean like they'll answer the phone at some point,
but not like an in-depth conversation.
So half of it's gone. on so i mean our
(14:24):
follow-up kit's probably going to cost 10 20
bucks each so i mean that's
got a couple grand going out yeah maybe three grand and just to talk to 100
people of that you know maybe maybe half will get pushed to a real conversation
be it a zoom session which would be the preferred or they'll just you know force
(14:47):
us to go back and forth with a lot of questions via email which is not preferred.
Also, this is kind of when we're in post-event follow-up, it's the time of year
where the sales staff gets to play favorites a little bit.
So those that follow the rules and do what they're supposed to get dealt with more quickly.
If you become a pain in the ass, you're going to get followed up with,
(15:08):
but it's going to be last. Makes sense.
So we don't always have that liberty, but this time of year we do.
And yeah, we will continue to follow up forever. There's a lot of spots in the
business that follow-up needs to be in place.
And let's take a quick break. I'm going to drink some of my pumpkin cream cold
(15:30):
brew from Starbucks. Super extra large.
You're like, just give me the big one. So when you redeem the Starbucks points,
the stars, every size costs the same amount of stars.
Well, then give me the big one. Oh, this is your marketing words of wisdom.
But if you're redeeming your Starbucks points, get the big one.
That's right. Also, the add-ons don't cost anything. So just load that up with more sugar. Great.
(15:54):
Two o'clock comes, you're sleeping in your office. Yes. Anyhow,
we'll take a quick break. We'll be back. And let's talk about what happens after the appointment.
So the ones that followed through did what they were supposed to and then didn't
give us a credit card. What do we do then? We'll be back.
And now, back to the Profit911 Podcast with your host, Justin Miller.
(16:20):
Okay, we're back. We're talking event follow-up or actually just lead follow-up in general.
And I talked about how we get them to talk with us. So how we get to the consult.
But then what happens if they don't buy?
As much as I would love everyone to just give us money the first time they talk
to us, it just doesn't happen.
(16:43):
I actually made a comment, I think, at the very end of my presentation last
time that, of course, we want you to succeed, but we want you to have lofty
enough goals that when you have that success, then you spend more to hit the next goal.
And therefore, we make more money. You make more money.
And the line's all kind of in the delivery because otherwise I sound like I
(17:04):
just want to take your money. Yeah.
But I do want to take your money while providing more value as we do it. Well, sure. Yeah.
But yeah, people don't always willingly give out their credit cards.
So if they have met with you or whatever your first contact point is,
and they don't take the next step, which I don't know if I have the percentage
(17:24):
here off the top of my head.
I could tell you in the last business or in a couple specific situations,
how many that is. and it depends how many obstacles to meeting with you there is.
So if you put a bunch of like hurdles before they can meet with you,
you know, your close rate will be higher, but your volume will be less.
If you make it easier to meet with you, such as the case of a larger company
with the sales team, you'd really want to have those conversations to move people forward.
(17:47):
You know, the close ratio tends to go down a little bit and all of a sudden
we're back in a chasing mode again.
And it's funny, we get like the emails that are like, yes, I do want to move
forward. word, I'll let you know when I'm ready.
Like in my world, those two statements are contradictory. Yeah.
That's a no. That was a literal email that came in yesterday.
(18:09):
And hopefully if you're listening, I don't offend you, but those are not the same thing.
There's a clear next step and you didn't take it, but no. So then what happens?
Oh, well, you fall down the list of favorites again.
And if we don't have enough time, you know, you, you go by the wayside for a
while You are put into automatic follow-up, so you're going to get our newsletters forever.
(18:34):
You're going to get any mass emails we do until you unsubscribe.
And I say those as an aside, but those actually are very important parts of
warming that lead back up again.
A lot of times it's a waiting game till something changes, a need changes.
I tell these tax resolution people that they help people with IRS debt.
(18:55):
And I'm like, hey, they didn't get the IRS debt overnight.
You know, the IRS is hounding them. It's probably been years.
Like it was probably an error or a problem three years ago.
Like it doesn't mean they want to solve it right now. Now, I realize you want
to solve this problem for them, but it may not be an important problem to them right now.
Or the pressure from the IRS isn't significant enough that they're ready to
(19:18):
deal with it. That's, I suppose.
Yeah. So something has to change to where all of a sudden it's important to resolve this issue.
Something could be like a spouse getting pissed off.
Yeah. It could be being denied for something else they want.
Oh, shit. I can't get a car loan or a mortgage.
It could be something like that. Or it could be just finally they're fed up
(19:41):
and ready to deal with it.
All of those are outside of our control.
Like we didn't cause that to happen by marketing to them.
True. But we do want to be there when they make that decision.
So this is why appointment no sale follow up, as it's called, is important.
So they had an interest or an inquiry.
We've identified them as a real lead. For some reason, the timing's off.
(20:06):
Now, in part of your world, the wedding world, there's a very real deadline.
Yeah, I mean, the ones I don't sell, I just move on at this point because my
close rate is so high if I get them in the right, if I get the right client potential.
I mean, if I try to close you and you, oh, I'll get back to you,
those people never get back to you.
Yeah, well, and they have an added deadline. They have an actual date where
(20:29):
this expires and you have set inventory. inventory, you know,
there's a lot of things stacked in your favor for closing that.
Yeah. It makes me realize how much backend work I'm not having to do because
of the business that I'm in, or at least that business. But yeah.
Yeah. For a lot of other businesses, the equivalent would be like,
hey, we're thinking of getting married sometime. Yeah. Yeah.
We'll let you know when. Oh, okay. Is that a lead? You might establish,
(20:53):
yeah, they look like they'll probably get married someday.
So they are a lead. You know, how much follow-up could we invest in this?
And okay yeah maybe the emails are justified maybe the newsletters are justified
how many phone calls are justified beyond that or like real attention that varies
and a lot of times we'll have to,
do a mass event like a webinar or something we'll likely do a follow-up webinar now which will be,
(21:18):
a 70 80 overlap with the content they just heard but maybe get them excited
again yeah and and push them over the edge or something to where it's not a
one-on-one type sales environment,
so yeah if you're not excited about getting married i can't get you more excited
i mean if you're getting married and you're not excited i can't help you.
So we need people excited about growing their businesses, which not everyone
(21:41):
is. So this actually floored me.
We started a division, what, like three years ago that was kind of aimed at
the traditional CPA and tax prep community.
And I flew around to a half dozen trade shows and exhibited to have conversations
with people and see what the needs were.
And I was amazed how many times people were like, yeah, we got our book of business. We're good.
(22:04):
Like, we're just gonna ride this out till retirement we're gonna
serve the current clients and because it's consistent we don't want any new
ones like this this floored me kevin like yeah
that would be well yeah your personality my personality i i'm
we're always looking for like where can we expand where can we grow but that's
a very comfortable level i guess i'd be bored as shit though like yeah i'm an
entrepreneur i want growth i want change i i'd be bored too if i ran numbers
(22:28):
all day long but that that's i mean i know accountants i think my accountant
loves this job because it's It's just, it's what he loves. But I'm like.
I mean, I don't want to say it was the minority, but the ones that were actively
invested in growth. That is interesting. You would think. Yeah. Yeah. That's.
They're not even interested in discussing it or like even thinking about it.
And it wasn't that I was going to sell anything.
(22:48):
I could have casual conversations outside of the booth and try and get to really what's going on.
And they're just happy kind of doing what they do.
You know, that to us is not a good lead. That's. Like we've identified that
there's an area we can help them, but they don't see a need. Yeah.
This is critical though, because this is the difference for me speaking to groups
(23:12):
of business owners or groups of marketing minded business owners.
I just, I need one hurdle further.
So we have an event we're sponsoring in October that is real estate agents,
which is an audience we serve. It's not a major portion of our business.
And part of the reason is because, you know, it's so fragmented and there's
(23:34):
so many people just serving their friends and family in the industry.
And a lot of them are getting wiped out right now because the industry is getting tougher.
But I was introduced to the producer of the event. And really quick,
I'm trying to feel out, okay, are these just real estate agents coming to hang out?
Or are they actively invested in growth?
(23:55):
What's the other content? What's the connection? Yes. And I never quite know
because event producers, for the most part, they're selling you too.
Sure. Well, I mean, how many times did you go to a convention in Vegas?
And it's like, that's why they're in Vegas and not in Cleveland,
because it's a vacation on top of, you know.
Well, in special event world, you know, your world, a lot of them are just coming to check out gear.
(24:19):
Unfortunately, yeah. Which is the fun stuff. It is fun. I mean, it's all, yeah.
But you're right. If you're not looking to specifically grow,
you can still have some time away and maybe buy some stuff.
But yeah, you're right. Which is not a good spot for me to exhibit.
No, that doesn't help you at all. Like if I'm selling like widgets and toys, that's great.
(24:39):
If I'm selling, let's help grow your business. Not so much.
So yeah, everyone has to make that decision, kind of qualify, leads a little bit.
It's also the difference in my world between who you're marketing to.
Are we marketing to people buying your service or are we marketing to referral
sources? We do a ton of referral marketing, as you know.
I actually don't like in-consumer marketing. We do it because we're a marketing agency.
(25:04):
But I would much rather get referral sources because it's a different conversation.
But anyhow, we follow up, follow up forever. It happens to do with resources.
We're actually hiring in another
account manager right now to help deal with some of this follow up.
Otherwise, we end up with a situation where our reps are busy enough and cherry
(25:25):
picking and there's still more money out there. Yeah.
And yes, we have capacity in our production department to serve.
And when we don't have capacity, I will grow further so we have capacity.
So I practice what I preach as far as that goes. goes
makes sense anything we missed
in follow-up here i mean essentially you know
(25:45):
the the blunt way to put it and i mean i
heard it from dan kennedy i'm sure he heard it from somewhere else is you know
as far as follow-up and when you stop it's buy or die yeah yeah buy die or unsubscribe
by the way if you unsubscribe from email that to me just tells you you don't
want email i'm still gonna mail you unless you let me know that's totally i
would never thought about
(26:05):
that you're right you're only asking me to not connect with
you one way that's true yeah well i said it
as an aside but i guess we could briefly i mean that makes sense
a lot of business owners would take that person say well he doesn't he she doesn't
want to talk to me at all so i'm to stop all forms of communication
yeah no i unsubscribe from a lot of email lists where i still have a relationship
with the company i just don't want the email you're sending or what you're sending
(26:27):
is not a value to me if you send me a piece in the mail i'll still glance at
it i might recycle it But it doesn't mean the relationship's dead just because
I don't want you calling my cell phone.
Yeah. Just because I unsubscribe to text messages.
Now, as a marketer, yeah, don't take that personal. Use every media to your
advantage. Don't, you know, make sure you're playing by the rules.
(26:49):
But elimination of one media is not elimination of relationship.
And if you're reliant on one and only one media, you should be scared for just that reason.
That's the problem. Yeah, that's true. If I'm just sending broadcast emails
and someone unsubscribes and they're completely out of my world now,
the cheapest thing to do was retain that client and you're out there chasing the next one.
So that's it for follow-up. We'll follow up with another episode soon enough.
(27:12):
And hell, maybe it'll be a Jurassic Marketing intro. Oh, maybe.
Probably not. At some point. At some point.
Thanks for listening to the Profit 911 Podcast. Be sure to subscribe and leave
your comments. For more information on how Profit 911 Consulting can help grow
your service business, visit Profit911.biz.
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Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!