Lighting for Profits - Episode 254

I'll be going into detail on the Landscape Lighting Secret formula that has helped members of LLS generate over $74M in sales.

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Episode Transcript

Welcome to Lighting for Profits. All light. Here is your host, Ryan Lee

Welcome to Lighting for Profits. All light. All light. All Light, powered by EmeryAllen. Here is your host, Ryan Lee. All light. All light. All light.

Today's show is Lighting for Profits, powered by EmeryAllen

Welcome, welcome, welcome to the number one landscape lighting show in Lehigh, Utah. It's Lighting for Profits, powered by EmeryAllen. I'm your host, Ryan Lee. It's gonna be a great show. It's gonna be a great day. Anytime we get to nerd out on business, and specifically business in the outdoor lighting industry, I mean, doesn't get much better than that. So excited for today's show, guys. Um, today, uh, I'm going to be talking about. I'm really going to go into detail, into the. The top secret, okay, the landscape lighting secret formula that has helped our members inside Landscape Lighting secrets generate over $74 million in new cells. Okay. Uh, and that's just in a short period of time. So really, really cool stuff. Um, if you're looking to start or grow a landscape lighting business, I'm pretty sure this is the place you want to be. Um, and by the way, I was thinking about this earlier. Um, there's kind of two different types of people that listen to Lighting for Profits or watch it on YouTube, Facebook, whatever. It's typically, um, When I first started it, I was just trying to, like, get my message out there. And so it was really more of a recruiting machine. Uh, but what I've learned over the years is it's not just, um, about getting, like, new eyeballs, it's about, um, strengthening the existing relationships that we have. Some of those people are already in Landscape Lighting Secrets. And, uh, so some people are clients of mine, the members of our community, uh, Luminati. And, uh, some are not. Some, some people like to kind of stay along around the fringes and not really comment or whatever. And that's cool, too. Um, so they're kind of two different people. Like people that are, uh, trying to get value, um, and not quite members of our community yet. And then there's people that are already members. So, um, this podcast is actually going to benefit both, uh, because we're going to talk about some things that if you're already in Landscape Lighting Secrets, you might go, I already knew that. But it's kind of like when you, uh, read a book, you know, read the Bible. Um, if you read the Bible once, you're not an expert, it's not like, okay, cool, I know what to do. Like, I'm not going to sin anymore. Um, you're still gonna do some bad things. And so you read it again, you're like, oh, that's what he was talking about. Um, that's kind of, uh, what it's gonna be like for, for people that have heard some of these messages. You're gonna get some new nuggets. Because when you learn something, and the Bible, any type of book, whatever, any type of concept that you learn, you learn it with a certain perspective. And then when you learn that concept and you apply it, you now have a different perspective because you now you have experience. And sometimes that good experience is good, sometimes it's bad, but it doesn't really matter. You just have experience. And so now you have a different perspective. Okay. And so we're going to be talking about some of the things that, um, you might have heard before, but I promise you, you're going to have a different perspective and I'm going to freaking blow your mind today. Okay? So, got some really, really cool stuff.

Landscape lighting secrets is hosting its annual members only event in September

Uh, before I dive into it, do want to remind you if you are, uh, in landscape lighting secrets September 9th and 10th, it's coming up in just uh, about a month here in Park City, Utah. And I love Park City in September, which is why we're doing it in Park City in September. So this is our annual members only event, Secrets Summit. You do have to be a member and this is our once a year gathering. So if you're um, in the program, you know, we have like 13 calls a month that you have access to, but we don't have time to like network and get to know each other. This is that event. Um, but we're gonna have speakers, breakouts, $10,000 ideas, like so many cool things, raffles, giveaways, a bunch of different stuff. You're definitely going to want to be there. So if you're on the fence, like, I don't know, should I go? Yes, you should go. And if you're uh, even considering joining Landscape Lighting Secrets, I think you've got like, we're coming up close to the deadline because we do have a deadline for people to register and stuff like that. So if you are thinking about joining, like, don't wait till January, just join now because there's gonna be a lot of value next month here in Park City, Utah. Always. Um, want to thank you guys seriously for your support. It's so cool, um, doing this show. We have so many amazing guests, as you guys know, if you, if you're a fan of the show. Um, thank you guys so much for your reviews. We're up to like 113, I think on Apple and um, 60 something on Spotify. So thank you guys. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Um, the more you give, the more you get. And so just remember that like, if you give me a review, you're probably going to get a review yourself. Someone's going to be motivated to, uh, hook you up as well. So thank you guys so much as, you know, it's freaking awesome getting five star reviews. So thank you, thank you so much.

Emory Allen's line of premium LED lamps deliver performance and longevity

Um, again, like in just a few minutes, guys, I'm going to really kind of just go into detail on the exact landscape lighting secret formula that has helped, um, members of our, of our community generate over 74 million. Um, I thought it was like 64 million or something like that, but Darcy told me today that it's actually over $74 million now in trackable, uh, new revenue after joining our program. So that's really, really cool. We have different awards that we give out to be able to track that. And so I'm literally going to give you guys the exact framework that I discovered that helped me build my multimillion dollar lighting business and in the past six years has really helped hundreds of other lighting companies double and even triple, uh, their results. So, um, I'm excited to kind of just give you guys, like, just lay it out there for you. Uh, got to thank Emory Allen. These guys have been around supporting us almost since day one. Uh, absolutely love Emory Allen. And honestly, I haven't met anyone that's used them that doesn't love them as well. Um, they even give you Jolly Ranchers with every order. So, you know, you need to stop settling for those cheap, unreliable lamps that ruin your projects and your reputation. Um, Emory Allen's line of premium LED lamps, uh, they deliver performance, longevity and color consistency that your clients expect. I mean, we're doing high end LED outdoor lighting, right? Um, we're going after that market that desires. They're, they're doing it because they want it, not because they have to get it right. So they really want the best. Um, and so don't settle for less. Upgrade your designs and installations today with Emory Allen. All you need to do, if you're not using them, you are truly missing out. Just email Jackson Lry Allen. com Jackson the letter L Jackson Lry Allen. com and make sure to mention that you heard about him here on Lighting for Profits and he will hook you up with that discounted contractor pricing.

Jackson Lryallen talks about the landscape lighting secret formula

Just email jacksonlryallen. com all right, so, um, man, I, I'm really excited about today's show. Um, the format's going to be a Little bit different because I normally have a guest on here and I normally start with like, you know, like a 10 minute monologue or something like that. Something that's on my mind, a recent experience that I had and I've been wanting to do this for actually some time now. And so I decided, all right, today's the day we actually were going to have a guest on and, uh, didn't work out. And so I was like, no problem. I mean, sometimes you're in panic mode. Like, crap, there's no guests, what are we going to do? But I was like, already prepared because I've been wanting to do this episode for a while. And so I'm really going to just talk about this formula, the landscape lighting secret formula that we use and teach inside of our community that can literally help anyone. If you, if you have a lighting business and you, and you've been stuck for a while or maybe you like, you know, lived through the COVID bump and everyone's like, oh my gosh, like, this industry is awesome. And it's so easy to get leads and close deals and raise your price. And then now you're starting to second guess your business ownership skills. Um, don't worry, a lot of people are doing that too. I remember being in the situation of the, um, 08 crash going, crap, what am I going to do? And so, um, we, we want to help you get unstuck, get further along, get massive results. I mean, and business should be fun. Like, you should be growing, you should be experiencing new things and sometimes when you try new things, you experience growing pains. And um, I want to make sure that you guys don't retreat when you experience those growing pains because I promise you, you can push through. Um, your future self will. Thank you.

So right now we're at 74 million, which means we're almost 10%

So before I kind of give you the actual like, you know, the formula, I want to kind of set the stage here because, um, you know, when I started my business, um, yeah, you probably are due for a new, uh, award. We should check the numbers because that could boost the numbers, you know. Here's what's cool, guys, about our award system. So we give away 100k awards. We give away LMC, which is lighting Millionaire Club. We do penta, uh, million, which is 5 million. And then actually Greg Matthews is our, so far, our only LMC X. And we actually made him this really cool custom award with his logo and stuff like that. And so what's cool though is like, there's a lot of people that are getting close to the lmc. There's a lot of people that are getting close to the penta. There's people that are close to getting to the lmcx. So, like, these numbers are about to explode. And my mission, my goal is to help basically contribute. You know, I mean, you guys have to do the hard work. Like, I definitely give you the credit, but I want to contribute to a billion dollars worth of impact. And so right now we're at 74 million, which means we're almost 10%. We're 7.4% to our goal, so we got a long ways to go. But, um, this. This is starting to snowball. So, um, really, really cool to see people taking action and getting over their fears and doing the hard thing, because, to be honest, it's just easier in. In the short term to just like, not hire anyone and not get out of your comfort zone and stay comfortable. Like, let's just. We're human beings. Like, we were designed to live in a cave. If we didn't survive the caveman era, we wouldn't be allowed to be entrepreneurs. You know, God didn't. He literally did not design us to be entrepreneurs, like, to take massive risk and do crazy stuff and be business owners, because we would have died, uh, a long time ago, ah, risking our lives, leaving the cave. So, um, it's normal to think like a human, right? Um, that's normal. But I've. I want to help you guys unlock this freedom that, you know, you're capable of. You know, it's possible you've seen other people do it. You know what I mean? And, um. And I'm like, dude, if I can do it, you can do it. Like, truly, this is not rocket science. Um, and so I want to walk you guys through that exact process.

God delivered entrepreneurship in a vision, and I didn't pray for it

Um, but before I do, again, I want to kind of set the stage here, because this. This formula, this framework wasn't something that just, like, fell into my head. I didn't pray for it. And, like, God delivered it in a vision. And it wasn't anything crazy like that. It was something that wasn't really blatant or obvious, you know, something that, um. It wasn't something that, like, I just read in a book, and I was like, oh, this is it. Right? Um, in fact, I didn't. I didn't come from an entrepreneurial family. Um, I wanted to be my goal. Okay. Like, just out of high school, um, I wanted to be the first one in my family to, uh, get a degree, get a college degree. I know. Ah, especially college now versus, like, what it used to be. It's Like. Like, do you really need that? Right? And, uh, I don't want to make that argument or whatever, but I just wanted to be the one Ed Mylett talks about the one. And I wanted to be the one in my family to change the trajectory. I mean, we've got a history of, um, alcoholics, drug abuse, like, felons, like, all sorts of crazy stuff. So I'm like, oh, no, I don't want to be that. I want to break the curse. And so I was like, I'll be the first one to get a degree. So that's what I did. I got a marketing degree. And, um, and that was it. And then I was going to, like, land this sweet job, like, in my mind at the time, I was like, man, you get a degree, and then you probably get, like, a sweet, sweet job where you get a cell phone and you get a car and you get a bonus and $100,000 a year. Like, that was what this fantasy that was in my head. And so I get my marketing degree, and I get my first job, and it paid $30,000 a year. I was like, what the heck, dude? $30,000. This is sweet. That was more money than I had ever made in my life. So I was a little bit disappointed, but also, I didn't have any kids. Uh, yeah, I was. Was I married? Yeah, I was married, but Lindsey worked, too, and she probably made 30 grand a year. So 60 grand. Like, we're going to be rich. But after, like, six months, you're like, okay, this is not what I want out of my life. And so I remembered that, um, right before we were getting married, we actually. Lindsay and I, we went and knocked doors. I was living in my mom's basement, and my mom's basement was unfinished. Uh, my brother and I lived in the basement together. We had a plastic sheet because it was just framed. Like, there was framed walls, but really no walls. So there's a plastic sheet separating our rooms. And then my mom had an old couch that I brought out into, like, our living room. And so I would sit in the couch sometimes and then sometimes sleep in the bed like that. That was it. So we would knock doors, and Lindsay and I. And then we would land jobs. And then we would clean the windows, like, same day. And, like, I wouldn't call it a business, but that was, like, my first glimpse, uh, of entrepreneurship. And I. And I loved it. I was like, this is cool. Like, we. We were making good money, and, like, we made enough money to get married and everything. But again, I didn't know. I didn't have guidance. I didn't have a mentor. I didn't have a program to teach me how to do this right. So I went to school, got my degree, and, uh, I went and got my mba. I went two more years, got my master's, uh, in business. And throughout that experience, they were talking about all sorts of different things, and I was had in my mind. I'm like, hey, I'm gonna. I'm gonna create, uh, this window, uh, cleaning business. I'm gonna build this empire and everything. My brother had moved from Utah. He also left the basement. He moved from Utah to Texas, and he had started a window cleaning down there, and he was doing pretty good. I mean, he was making good money. But it was definitely like a, um, solo entrepreneur. I mean, it was him and one other guy. Um, it wasn't a business yet. It was definitely still a job. But I was like, hey, I've got all this, like, knowledge that I didn't have before we could scale that thing and really blow it up. So we literally, Lindsey and I fly down there, and, um, she's pregnant with our first daughter at the time, and we fly down to Texas, and we're like, let's find a place to live. And, like, let's. Let's make this a reality. And so we look at homes, and this is in 2007, guys. I'm telling you, like, it was crazy. We were. We were looking at homes that were like 150 to $300,000. Brand new homes, brick homes in Texas. Um, I couldn't believe it, right? And so, you know, we made. We were making, um, not crazy good money, but enough money to buy a house. We bought a house for $200,000. Brand new house. Um, I was. It felt like a kingdom. I was like, oh, my gosh, I can't believe we get to do this, right? So we make an offer on the house, we get it, and we go to my brother's house.

Let's talk about lighting, too. And so we're talking about that

We're celebrating in the hot tub, and we're like, oh, my gosh, this is gonna be so cool. Like, this is a new start and everything you got, you know, when you're excited, when you start something new. And so we're talking about that. And my brother's like, yeah, man, it's gonna be great to get. Have. Have you guys come down here when you get down here. Let's talk about lighting, too. And I was like, what is lighting too? And he, uh, goes, yeah, I started doing Christmas lights on the side, and then I Also just did these two landscape lighting jobs and you know, it was kind of crazy. They were $4,000 each. And I was like what? Like hold on. If someone's willing to give you $4,000 to put lights on a house, like that just seemed crazy to me because I grew up like not like with a dirt floor pour but like we just didn't have extra money. So I'm like why would someone put lights on their house and give you $4,000 for that? It was just like, it's just the dumbest thing ever. But I was like if what you are telling me is true, I'd much rather sell a four thousand dollar ah, lighting job, whatever that means than a 250 window cleaning job. Right? And it's just like, well if we can make more money in the same amount of time, why would we not do that? That was my mentality. We go in, we. So we go on to GoDaddy in his, we go into his office, we go onto the computer that night and we bought the Domain Majestic outdoor lighting dot com. And so it's kind of a cool story because we know this, we know that every good story starts in a hot tub, right? So um, it's just kind of crazy to reminisce about like where it all started and how I got into this. And like guys, I was not smart enough to think, oh, I'll just start a uh, lighting business and then sell it and then I'll teach others how to do that and start a coaching business. Like no, that wasn't even what I'm doing now. Wasn't even a uh, thought. I mean I had, there was. That was not on the vision board. Okay. All I was trying to do was provide for my family. I was not thinking about ah, freedom. I m. Was not thinking about impact and how we could grow a community and elevate the industry. Like heck no. I just needed money. Okay, and so we start that business. Well yeah, we moved down you know, a few months later, whatever, start that business. Right after that was when the 08 um, housing, the mortgage crisis and all that stuff. And so we started out pretty hot. Like we were knocking doors and, and doing stuff and it wasn't like super easy but we were getting jobs. I mean I, I sold a $25,000 job like pretty quick. You know, I'm like holy cow, this is even better than I thought. Um, sold some 12ks and then all of a sudden that the housing uh, crisis happened and those same people, well one, we got less leads and then um, when we did get leads, those same people that normally would have spent like 12 now only wanted to spend like 4 or 5. Or if they normally would have spent 25, now they're thinking like 10 or 12. So we had to make some adjustments, and the adjustment at the time was just work harder. I was like, okay, I'll just work later. Get up earlier. You know, I didn't really have a plan or a strategy at that point. And so we went through all those phases. The first two, three years. I mean, it was a freaking grind. I mean, working crazy hours, demos, uh, till freaking midnight, getting bit by mosquitoes and the 100% humidity, all this stuff. But I didn't even care. I was like, this is freaking awesome. I was like, dude, I'm working for myself. You know, um, this is the American dream. And that truly is like the honeymoon phase of your business, because you're just like, you just don't care. Like, this is awesome. Um, and that honeymoon phase can, can get you through a lot. You know, it can really help you grind. And, and there's a benefit to that. But then I remember getting past that, going, okay, like, now what? Like, I mean, we, we worked through some stuff. We, you know, hired some installers, but I'm answering all the phones, I'm, I'm doing all the sales. Uh, still a really hard job. And then the thought of, like, well, man, we're only booked out till tomorrow. What are we gonna do about the next day? You know? And so you start kind of second guessing everything. And then I remember getting an email because I was. LinkedIn was already around. I was, I was on LinkedIn. Now we get emails from, um, recruiters. And now I know it's just like marketing and stuff like that. But at the time, I didn't, I was like, oh, cool. They want me to be like their chief marketing officer or they want me to be their director of marketing or marketing executive. I mean, all these things, right? And I was like, huh, huh. I click on it and I'm like, I mean, 60 grand a year. Get 60 grand a year and be home by five benefits, maybe I should apply. I mean, I literally started thinking that. And then as soon as I have those thoughts, I'm like, you know, like, smack myself in the face like, no, no, like, that's not what we're doing. You're an entrepreneur. You're living the American dream, remember? And so you grind some more and everything else.

For about five years, my life was super chaotic

Basically, for about five years, my life was super chaotic. Um, one, we were, we had the baby factory going, I mean, we were pumping out kids. So we have four kids. And these last two weeks, I mean, today is August 11th, so, um, have been wild because somehow. And I've yet to meet anyone that has been better at me than this. This is like the one thing that I'm better than, than anyone I've ever met. Most things, I'm really not better than most people. But this one, I pretty much. I got you, like, unless someone proved me wrong. But I've placed four kids, four kids within a 14 day window. Okay? All four of the kids were born within 14 days of each other. You know, different years. And three of them, three of them were born within seven days, all within a week. So imagine that. I mean, I got chaotic business, don't know what I'm doing. Not, uh, not good. Not doing the things I'm about to share with you. This like, magical framework, right? Super chaotic. Um, pumping out kids. It was wild, you know, and that's when I'm just like, dude, I don't know, is this worth it? And so this is a time where Lindsay starts to go, hey, what, um, are we moving back to Utah? When are we moving back? Right? And I was like, moving back to Utah? How would we do that? Like, our life is crazy. There's not even possible. We don't have a business that we could sell and it's not set up enough to just run remotely. You know what I mean? And so, um, but that was kind of like that, like implanted in here. And then, um, it start. She started to talk more about like, hey, not when are we going? But like, hey, I'm going. And you're welcome to join if you want to. It started to become like this more reality. Like, listen, like, you suck as a husband. You might be like, you know, providing financially for us, but you are not here for us. Like that, that was the message that was starting to go through my ears. Even though she'd probably been telling me that for a long time. And then I remember one day, okay, this, this was a huge moment, A huge defining moment. Um, a friend of mine, we went to church together. He knocks on my door and he gives me this book. And the book is called Traction. Okay? And I've given this book to a lot of different people. I've recommended it to hundreds. Um, and it's a great book. It's basically like the operating system and the blueprint, how to like, you know, build a, build a business. And now that I look back at the time, I was like, hey, thanks, man. Like, I didn't think much of it, but now I know. He saw, dude, my, My life, like, sucked. He saw how chaotic it was. He saw, like, my business was not awesome, my life was not awesome. And so he's like, you need to read this book. And that, that was like my light bulb moment. That was it. That was like, okay, because I do like reading. I do like learning. And so you give me a book, I'm going to read it. I read it and it was insane. I knew that if I kept doing what I was doing, I was going to get the same result. And then, like, what's the why? Like, again, I would rather just get a job and continue the misery that I was putting us all through. And so I knew that I, uh, something had to be different. Well, when I read that book, I knew what had to change. I knew we didn't have systems. I knew we didn't have, uh, a plan. You know, Um, I knew my brother and I were two visionaries trying to lead the company. So if, like, if he wants to go left and like, go to the lake and wake surf, which we did a lot of wake surfing, like, life, life didn't suck, it was just hard, right? So wake surfing to the left or right? I want to build this empire and like, build this multimillion dollar lighting business. Well, neither of us were happy. Uh, he didn't want to go right and I didn't want to go left, which means you go right down the middle doing what you're doing. And that's like the definition of insanity. So neither of us were really happy. So I knew reading that book that our partnership wasn't going to work long term. And it was really like, um, eye opening moment. But it was really sad, you know, because I was like, hey, you know, I like my brother. Like, he's my brother and like, he's my partner and all these things, you know. But I just knew, like, something was going to change. And I knew that, um, even in the book, the book talks about this. Like, you know, what got you here will not get you there. You're going to have to leave behind key employees that were there at the beginning. You're going to have to leave behind, um, friends. Friends are going to try to, like, hold you back. You might have to lose partners, like, all this stuff. So I'm like, dang it, that's going to be me. No. But I knew it had to be done. And so we really started to build this business. And I was like, okay, what has to be true for me to be able to build a business that would allow me to move back to Utah.

Don't build your business and then just sell it because it's awesome

And that was my driving. That was like, all decisions, like, filtered through that. Okay. And so we finally built that business up, um, started to hire my replacement, you know, and built that business up to where we had finally two salespeople. And I was still doing some sales as well, but we had two full time sales guys. And I would just do, like, the big projects. People would call in, like, hey, I want to meet with Ryan. And they go, oh, he doesn't. He doesn't do those jobs anymore. And they would have to, like, beg, basically, like, hey, but do you know who I am? Like, okay, then we can make an appointment with you. But two salespeople had, um, two install teams, had a maintenance team, m and then a couple, uh, ladies in the office. So we had redundancy. Um, we had a business. It finally was not a job anymore. It was an actual business. And this is why it was so hard to actually sell. Because I had sacrificed so much for those 12 years building this, that it's like, dude, you're an idiot. Why are you selling this? Now? This is the time you get to enjoy it. Like, I'm just telling you, like, don't build your business and then just sell it. Like, build it like you're gonna sell it, but then don't sell it because it's an awesome business. At that point, I had some reasons why, again, like, my brother and I didn't see eye to eye on different things. And it was like, he buy me out or I buy him out. And he's not a business guy. He's like MacGyver. He can figure anything out. He can build a bomb out of a, you know, toothpick or whatever. Um, I can't do those things. He's got his strengths and I have mine, but he's not the business guy. And so it just made sense for him to buy me out. We moved back to Utah and so did that in 2019, sold the business. Um, and it did feel good to, like, you know, obviously we made some money. It's not like I made $100 million or anything, but we did have some. Some money to put, um, into some things. You know, So I bought some land, I bought our house. Like, just stuff like that. Um, so it wasn't like, terrible selling, but it also was just not the plan. You know, I. If I could have drawn it up, it would have been a little bit different. I would have sold. I would have bought him out. I would have hired a general manager, moved back to Utah, started up in several other locations in Texas, and sell the private equity when we get to $5 million EBITDA. Like, that's. That's what I wanted to do, right? So, um, that's why I'm like, I'm disappointed, but I'm not. I'm still. It was still. It was still a good thing. And so sell the business, move back to Utah. Here, um, I'm doing digital marketing. Websites, online reviews, Facebook ads for people, Google Ads for people. And these are people who are just friends of mine. They own businesses in Texas. They knew what. They knew my success and my history. They know I'm good at marketing. So these people just hired me, and I kind of had a business, but I was doing a lot of the work again, you know, so it was like a job. Okay, Um, I go to this event in February, uh, 2020, called funnel hacking Live. There's a bunch of people there. It's a big marketing event. A lot of people were like, um, they had businesses that helped other people, Information businesses, coaching. I'd never even, like, heard of these things, right? And they kept asking the same question, what are you an expert at? And I'm like, an expert. I don't know. They're like, what are you better at than anybody else? I'm like, uh, oh, again, I'm not making babies. Uh, but there's people that make more babies than me, so I don't know. Um, I'm like. I like doing things like fishing, riding my dirt bike, snowboarding, skiing, hiking. I wouldn't say I'm better than people, you know? And so I really struggled with that. And then I had this epiphany that I go, you know what? Um, it's not that I'm better than everybody, but I am further along than some people. That was big for me because I don't have this ego of, like, let me tell you guys how this is. And, like, this is the. It's my way or the highway. Like, there's lots of ways to win, and there's so many people that are way smarter and wealthier and more successful than me. So I'm like, who am I to, like, try to teach someone? But the epiphany was like, hey, um, I'm one chapter ahead, you know? And if I could go back five years in time, 10 years in time, what would I tell that person? And so that really unlocked a lot for me to be able to be like, okay, maybe I Can help people and not feel like a douche. Because I felt like a douche before. Just like, let me tell you how to grow your business, you know? And so, um, I started talking, and some of you guys I've known since this moment because I started doing Facebook lives. And my Facebook lives were not about lighting. It was about home services and like, hey, here's how to, you know, sell jobs and here's how to raise your price. And it was very generic not. Not lighting advice. And, um, I had gone down this road of like, okay, maybe I could do this. I probably couldn't do landscape lighting, because who's going to hire someone to help them with landscape lighting? There's probably only two people in the world that would actually want to hire a landscape lighting business coach. I just didn't know what was what.

I joined my first coaching program ever. It was a lot of money. And so I didn't tell Lindsey that I was joining

I didn't know. And so, and so, um, I decided at some point. I remember seeing all these. All these people that I had met at this Funnel Hacking Live event. Um, the majority of the most successful people had all hired the same coach. And I, uh, reached out, got in their funnel, get on a call. It was a lot of money. And I knew that I. Even before I knew the price, I knew I was gonna say yes just because I was like, I don't know what to do. Like, I've never done this type of business. And so I didn't tell Lindsey that I was even doing the call, and I didn't tell her that I joined and that I paid money, a lot of money to join my first coaching program ever. And I was. I was scared. I was terrified, because I'm like, dude, if this doesn't work, I eventually have to tell her. Um, but I was like, my plan was like, once it works, then I'll tell her, you know? And so, um, we. We. I join it. And it was so awesome, guys, because he. The program just laid everything out. Step one, do this. Step two, do this, do this. And all of a sudden, I started to get traction. And it was like, you know, who are you going to. Who are you going to be able to help? And at the time, I was thinking home services. So, um, I'm like, oh, if I could sell landscape lighting, I could probably sell fencing, pest control, roofing. I could sell anything, right? But the truth is, all my examples, when I was putting together, like, my case studies and my teachings and everything else, all my examples were landscape lighting. So could I sell pest control? Could I sell roofing? Painting, maybe? But, like, my experience was landscape lighting. And so my Coach calls me out and he goes, hey, why. Why not just be the landscape lighting guy? And I'm like, well, because that would be stupid. Like, who's going to be the landscape lighting guy? That's not even an industry. This, like, no one even knows what it is, and there's probably not that many people. And, like, I just feel like it would just be a waste of time because I'm just going to end up switching to general home services anyway. And he just again, called me. I was like, dude, you. You don't know that. Like, you have no idea. All your stuff, you're so. You light up when you talk about lighting, when you talk about roofing, I can tell you don't care about it, but. And I can tell you don't know anything about roofing, but with lighting, you know your stuff, like, you are the guy, you know? And so I go, all right, well, I'm gonna. Again, I invested in this company and I. I'm paying them for their advice. Like, I might as well follow it. So I go, all right, I'm gonna do it almost to, like, prove him wrong, right? So we get into it and, um, before you know it, we start getting people's interest. Right? Um, and so that's how we ended up starting Landscape lighting Secrets. Um, I spent weeks literally writing ideas, writing down all the things I wish I would have done different in my business. And I came up with this simple framework, okay? And this simple framework wasn't again, something that, like, I invented, you know, mid, uh, business. What it was was a bunch of a series of events. And it was like, I talked to this mentor, and some of my mentors were just my clients. I mean, you guys know this. Most of our clients are very successful business owners, executives, doctors, attorneys, whatever. Like, they're smart people. And so, um, you should be asking them for advice. Like, that's all I would do, is like, hey, if you were me, what would you do here? You know? And so, um, I got a lot of advice, but it was like me packaging it together and me trying something and, and trying it five times and realizing, okay, uh, maybe that's not going to work the way I'm doing it because it doesn't work. Okay? So there's a lot of different things, but the framework that I'm going to go over right now was actually opposite from what most people had been teaching and opposite from some of the things I had read in books and. And things like that. And so I realized that it's pretty easy to be average you just have to do what the average person is doing. And the average person is doing the opposite of what we're teaching in landscape Lighting Secrets. They're doing that. They're doing what everybody else is doing. And so when you do what everybody else is doing, you're going to get the same result.

M getting me out of operating my business to owning my business has changed many lives

Okay, so I'm going to share with you now this pretty simple, uh, framework. I'm going to go into some like, details of it. Uh, but this is what really became the foundation for really what had changed my life. Okay. M getting me out of operating my business to owning my business and now has changed many, many other lighting business owners lives as well. And many are in the, in the process. Because it's not a, even though it's a framework, it's a shortcut, it's not a flip of a switch. It still takes like real grit and it takes the ability to take risk and ability to fail and keep moving forward. Okay? So most people, when they learn about business or when they are wanting to grow their business, the number one thing people ask for and when, even when we get on strategy sessions with people, they're like, man, I'm like, what's your biggest challenge? I need more leads. I need more clients, right? And especially now, I mean we're, end of the summer getting ready to go back to school, uh, people finishing vacations. Historically this is kind of like the lowest point of the year for the average lighting business owner. And so it's normal for you to want more leads. We don't start with leads, we don't start with marketing, we don't start with getting you more leads. Because the, the reason is because if we help you get more leads into your broken system, that's not good at converting, okay? It's not converting mean you're not good at converting those leads to customers, then why focus on getting more leads? Because you have a broken system. And so what we do is we actually reverse the traditional average way of doing it and start and solve the main problems first so that when we solve your broken system now, we can build your marketing machine and run those leads through your now better system. I don't, I want to say perfect because there is no perfect. Um, but the better system that now converts at a higher rate and now your profitability goes through the roof and now you can afford to put more money back into your marketing. Okay?

Pricing is the number one killer of outdoor lighting businesses

So, um, step one of this framework actually starts with pricing. Okay, why, why would we start with pricing of all things? It's like, dude, you could teach Anyone anything about how to grow their business. Why pricing? Well, I'll tell you why pricing. Because this is the number one killer of outdoor lighting businesses. Okay? Hm. There's people that are very, very talented with design. Really, really good installers, pretty decent at sales, and they're getting enough leads to like kind of keep the thing going. But the one thing that if they could actually understand how much money they need to make in their business and price accordingly, they would have a thriving business. It's the one thing it's so important, it is literally like the linchpin. This is the thing that's breaking so many businesses. Okay? And so the average person at this point, if, um, I'm, if I'm having like a one on one with you is like, yeah, but I can't raise my pricing. I just can't do it. It's my market. Or if, you know, I, I can't even get enough deals at the prices I'm charging right now. People already think I'm too high and I'm like, well listen, if you're, if you're not able to sell people at 250 a light, then there's not a difference between not selling someone at 450 a light. Okay? You're still not selling. It doesn't matter because you're still not selling. Right? Uh, so if you have a pricing problem, it means one of a few things. Number one, you could be in front of the wrong person. Okay? If you haven't really analyzed and identified who you're ideal client avatar is, then you're probably wasting money on marketing. You're probably wasting money trying to grow this thing because you don't even know who you're talking to. And so if you meet with someone who lives in a house that thinks that $10,000 is insane and who in their crazy right mind would spend $10,000 for lights, um, you're probably meeting with the wrong person because there's other people that would go ten grand. That's it? That's it. Are you sure? Like our last lighting project was 20,000. Like, wouldn't you rather be in front of that person? Okay. And so if you have a pricing problem, it's either because you're in front of the wrong person, your marketing is not getting you in front of the right person, or you have a broken sales process. Most of us, if we own a business, when I say most, not everybody, but most of us think we're good at sales. I mean, most people, like, oh yeah, I don't need help with sales? I'm good. Well, what does that mean exactly? And some people go, sales is sales. I don't know about that. Because I'll tell you this, if you're selling Christmas lights, okay, you could literally, in November, walk down a street that has a sign that just says, I sell Christmas lights. And you're going to be pretty good at selling Christmas lights because there is a built in deadline, there's built in urgency and scarcity, okay? Like they know that they got to get that thing done otherwise their neighbors are going to judge them. Right? That's how they feel. Okay? Landscape lighting doesn't have the built in urgency and scarcity. So you might go, well, why would I do landscape lighting? I'll just do holiday lighting. Because you're not average. The average person would say no to landscape lighting because, oh, uh, it's, it's harder to do. That's exactly why I love it. Because there's a little bit higher barrier to entry. Okay? And so when you can admit that, okay, maybe even if you think you're the best at sales, what if you could be best, er, what if, what if you could just get like 10% better, you know, close one extra deal a week at an average ticket of 10 grand. That's $500,000 at a profit margin of 20%. You're talking extra a hundred thousand dollars if you're just willing to admit that maybe someone could help you become a little bit better at sales. Right? And so pricing is the key, you guys. And you can make excuses and you can say, I can't do that in my area and I can't do that with my clients and all that you can make, that's totally fine. And if you do that, and if you can't solve pricing, you should honestly give up. Like, I don't want to. Like, you guys know me, I'm super optimistic. I'm the guy that like, wants to lead by example and I want everyone to win. And, and I, and I just like to be happy. I like to choose my attitude every day and life could be falling apart. I'm like, smile, I'm happy today. Right? Um, but I'm just telling you, like, this is one area you should give up if you're not willing to do this. Why, why run a business? Because this is. You're going to set yourself up for failure if you don't get your pricing right. You're setting yourself up for failure for the next 10 years because then you're gonna end up failing anyway. So just Fail now and go get a job. Like, come work for me. I'll pay you a lot of money. There's other good employers that will pay you a lot of money, give you benefits, and you'll live an awesome life. You don't have to own a business to experience freedom. Do you know what I mean? Like, a lot of people work for other people and still love their life. In fact, they probably love their life more because we think we start a business for freedom, and. And then it becomes the thing that traps us, and we're like, this sucks. Where's the LinkedIn email? Uh, for the Director of Operations, 60K. Yep. I need to apply now, right? Just get that over with now. Just quit. And again, I'm not saying that to be negative. I'm just saying that to be realistic. It's like, dude, just own the situation here, okay? Pricing is the coolest thing ever, by the way, guys. Pricing will allow you to use. You can use leverage.

You can double your income by just doing a 10% price increase

Okay, so get this. Um, a lot of people, when I. When I first started reaching out to people, okay, I had no podcast, I had no Facebook group, I had no, like, no one knew who I was. And I would send people this message, and it was like, hey, do you need help, um, growing your lighting business? Like, I'll help you double your profits or something like that. You know, I've got the script somewhere. But people would be like, you can't double my profits. And I was like, what? And I started to think, can I? Is that true? Um, maybe. Maybe I can't double their profits. And I'm like, no, wait, it's just math. Like, look, I'm right. If you. Most of you guys, if you. Does anyone know, like, do you know exactly how much money you make every single month or every single year? Like, to the. To the percentage? Do you know what your profit margin is? Like, net profit? Um, most people think it's higher than it actually is, but it doesn't matter. Like, if you just take, like, an average home service business, they make 20%. Like, that's the goal. Some make 25, some make 30, some make 10, some make 5, whatever. But let's just say 20%. Okay? So, uh, if you're making 20% net and you raise your price, the only thing you do, you don't even go to. I've got two more steps to my framework, by the way. But if the only thing you do is just raise your price by 10% and you're making 20%, remember, 20%, you raise it by 10%. So let's just say you're at, uh, $300 a light right now. If the only thing you take away from today's episode, this podcast, is you raise your price from 300 to 330, 10% price increase, your bottom line, your profit for the entire year is going to increase by 50% because you were making 20 and now you just increase 10. So 50% of 20 is 10, right? So you're going to go up now you're going to be making 30 points. So what does that, what does that mean? That means a, uh, 10 price increase is a 50% increase to your bottom line. That is the definition of leverage. Okay? Small input change, bigger, um, output change that you want to look for ways to leverage, use leverage in your business. Pricing is the easiest one. Okay? And So a, uh, 10% price increase could yield 50%. Now, if you guys are making, um, less than that, let's say you're only making 10% at the end of the year or less, that 10% price increase will. It's going to double your take home. It just doubled it because you were making 10, now you're making 20. You just doubled it. You can double your income this year by just doing a 10% price increase. It doesn't even make sense. But it does because it's math. But math doesn't make sense. Remember, we all hate math. So pricing is the first step of the framework. You've got to get crystal clear on how much it costs you to run your business. And not only that, but I wish someone would have told me this, like, a long time ago. Price like who you want to be, not like, who you are today. Okay, so what that means is, like, when I got started, I was like, oh, I'll just charge like 200 bucks a light. Cause at that I can pay myself, my brother, our, uh, two installers. And so guess what? We did that and we sold jobs and we thought that's what you. It's working. Why change it? Well, after a while, I'm like, dude, we can't afford to hire an office manager. Because if we hire an office manager, we'd have to get a shop, and we can't afford a shop. And so you talk yourself out of growth, you talk yourself out of good decisions because you can't afford it. And why have a business if you can't afford it? It's just, like, so dumb. Looking back, like, why did I do this? So all I would have had to do was price. Like, I already had the office manager. Like, I already had the shop, like, I already had the second crew. And all of a sudden everything unlocks. When I raised my price and I charged like a multi million dollar lighting business and the overhead that would come with that, suddenly I didn't. I never had that excuse of like, well, I can't afford it because I, uh, of course I could afford it. I was charging accordingly. So it's not that you can't afford it. You can't afford not to do these things, guys. That's the bottom line. Step one, pricing. Step two is sales. Okay? So you get your pricing down and then you're like, okay, well, I listened to this rando on lighting for profits. He told me to raise my price. Well, now I'm not closing deals. That sucks. Bad advice. Look, lower your price. Uh, well, you're not closing sales not because you raised your price. You're not closing sales because you suck at sales. That's just. I'm sorry, I still love you, but you just suck at sales. Um, but the good news is you can get better. And when you, when this, this was a big epiphany for me, I learned that then. You hear people say it all the time, oh, don't sell with your wallet. You're not your customer. To me, that I just.

The key to sales is you have to provide more value than you're pricing

That goes in one ear and out the other. Um, I had to learn this. Like, I had to be in this moment. Um, our clientele, okay, the people that live in a 2, 3, 5, 10, $20 million house, they honestly do not care what something cost. They don't care what something costs. In fact, the size of their house, the price of their car, the meals that they eat, the vacations that go on is all evidence that they don't care what something cost. Because if they cared what something cost, they wouldn't spend $5 million on a house. They wouldn't spend a half a million dollars on a car and buy six of them. They don't care what something cost. You need to get that through your head. They don't care what something cost. They only care what it is worth. They only care what it is worth. Okay? So there is a difference between cost and worth. So if you have a, uh, some of you guys are watching this, some of you are listening, but if you're, if you had, if you were to compare and you had like some scales, okay, um, and you were to say, okay, you have a, you have a pricing or the cost of something and then the value of something, okay? And if they're the same, you're going to get A lot of people saying, hey, I want to think about it. Because the cost is the exact value of what the thing is worth. Right. And so you're like, I don't know, it's like, it seems like, whatever, like, maybe we'll think about it. And if your price, your cost is higher than the value that they see, then they're rarely going to go with it. It's like, ah, uh, it's too expensive. Let's, let's go with someone else. Let's get other quotes. So if you're getting those objections, then your cost is higher than the value proposition that you're detailing. And then they'll say, uh, oh, we'll do it next month, we'll do it next year, get some other bids, whatever. And then the other option is if your value exceeds your cost, your price that you're declaring and showing, that's when you get the lay down cells. That's when they're like, okay, yeah, well, when can you get started? They, they just saw that the value was worth more than the money they're spending. Because wealthy people don't care what something costs. They only care what it's worth. And so if it's worth more than the money that's coming out of their pocket, then they're going to do it all day long. That's why they buy a half a million dollar car. A, uh, $500,000 car is not worth it, you guys. You can get another car right now for $20,000 that has four wheels and a steering wheel and it has a motor and it actually drives. Yeah. It'll get you to the exact same destination that the $500,000 car will go. Might not be as fast. Right. Might not be as fun, but it, it doesn't matter what it costs. Okay? So this is the key to sales. The key to sales is you have to just provide more value than you're pricing it for. So if you're pricing it at 500 a light, then you sure as hell better give more value than $500 a light. Okay. By the way, I've said this before, but there's still a lot of people that screw this up. This might be a huge thing for some of you. You can't ever talk price per light with a homeowner. That is just like the dumbest thing you can do. Um, they're just not, I mean, yeah, they're, they're successful, they're wealthy, but they are not emotionally intelligent enough to handle this conversation. Because no one wants to buy a $500 light fixture. No one, they're just like, what, that 500 bucks times how many? We need 60 of those. Okay? No one wants to buy a $500 light. Someone will gladly spend 10, 20, $30,000 to like light up their yard and to give them an experience and to give them a sanctuary that at the end of the night they can come home stressed out to, out of, uh, from coming home from work and then have a place to hang out with their kids. Have a place where their kids can, I mean, my kids, these last two weeks, we've had these four birthdays, right? Every single night. And last night till freaking 2:30am we had the music going, the lights, like the pool, all the stuff, right? That's worth spending the money, right? But I don't want to buy 500 lights either. You know what I mean? And so we cannot talk price per light. You and I can like, we can have this mature adult conversation. Clients that their homeowners are not prepared for that. So don't talk about that. But you need to add more value than your price. And I promise you, your, your sales are going to go through the roof. There's a lot of other, um, I call them techniques, but we're not really convincing someone to do something that they don't want to do. Um, unless you just like knock doors and held people at gunpoint and was like, hey, you guys should do lighting. Like that doesn't happen, right? People called you, they're interested in this. They don't know enough information to make an educated decision unless you provide that valuable information. And so if you coach them and you show them, hey, uh, would it be okay if I showed you some possibilities here, you know, that aren't really limited on pricing and you get their buy in and all of a sudden they might have gone from thinking they were going to spend $8,000 to now spending $38,000 because now they know it's possible. And again, pricing won't matter. In fact, most, most wealthy people understand the value of paying more because they get more value. That's why they'll buy the nice cars, the nice houses. To them, it's more valuable. Okay? They could save money on cars, vacations, houses. They choose not to because they value experience. And we need to show them what your lighting transformation and how that is going to affect their experience. Okay?

Once you get your pricing and sales dialed, then you get into marketing

So number one, pricing. Once you get your pricing dialed, then you need to get your sales process dialed. Once your sales process is dialed now, and finally now we can turn on the marketing machine. Because if we turned it on too early and your sales process is weak, then what's going to happen? You're going to get leads and you're going to go, ah, this marketing sucks. I'm going to fire this marketing company. Or, yeah, the marketing company's decent, but I just, they just weren't quality people. So now we're going to cut that off. Now you're cutting off the blood supply to your business. You need customers, you need leads to create customers. And a lot of people make the wrong decision and say, oh, I'm going to cut off this marketing. All because they had a pricing problem or a sales problem. Which is why we've reverse engineered this whole thing and teach this in this method. It's crucial that you follow it accordingly. But now that you got pricing and sales dialed, that's when you get into marketing.

From a marketing standpoint, you gotta ask a couple questions. Okay, Number one, what does your branding look like

Okay? And like I said, right now, heat of the summer, traditionally marketing, um, is slow. I remember growing my business and, um, same thing would happen to me. I would, I was super consistent with marketing, by the way. But, um, like, I wouldn't turn it off in July and August just because it got slow. But you see it happen. You see these, you know, like in September, it's about to get there. You're gonna sell a lot of lighting in the fall. Starts to get dark earlier, starts to cool down. September, October, November, December, big months for landscape lighting. Okay, March, April, May, big months for landscape lighting. So you get like the up and the down. So from a marketing standpoint, you gotta ask a couple questions. Okay, Number one, what does your branding look like? Because a lot of people, they turn on marketing, they'll start doing Google Ads or they'll do social media, or they'll do text marketing or direct mail. And a lot of times they'll see someone else in the industry getting success with a certain vertical. And so they go, oh, it's working for him. So I'm going to turn on the thing and do the thing. Well, all marketing is not created equal. If your brand is weak, you're not going to get the same result as someone else who's doing the exact same thing with a better brand. And then you're going to question everything. Oh, man, why didn't it work for me? Um, I'll just fire the marketing company and I'll turn that off. And now you're just turning off so much opportunity to your business, all because you have a weak brand. So everyone needs to do an analysis. You honestly do. You need to, uh, do an audit of your Brand. And don't ask your family and friends. Like, you need to ask someone like me who will just tell you the truth. Some of my clients, I'm pretty sure hate me. They're like, why did I pay this guy? Because I'm not here to, like, make friends. Yes, I want to be friendly, whatever, but, like, I'm here to help you grow your business. And if it means, like, being like, dude, that your brand sucks, like, I'm not trying to offend you. I'm just trying to be honest with you. And if you listen and take the feedback, you're going to be more successful, right? So you need to talk to someone who's actually going to, like, give you the truth. Um, because you got to get this right, okay? Once your branding is right, then you got to decide, okay, what am I willing to do here? You know, typically in life, we have more time or more money. And I know some of you are like, dude, right now, I don't got any money or time, exhausted. I'm out of time. I'm trying to figure out this stuff, I'm broke, all that. Um, but typically, you have more time or more money. So if you have less money, more time, you're going to do certain things, like knock doors, right? If you have more money, you can invest in different things. But again, this is why pricing and sales matter so much. Because if you can convert just one extra deal a month, one extra deal a week, and raise your price, this is, like, crazy. This is crazy leverage. You're just going to make more money. You make more sales. Like, everything becomes way easier. And this is how you create an unfair advantage. So then you go, okay, well, I'm going to start investing in marketing. This is where a lot of people screw this up, too. They go, well, um, what percentage of revenue should I invest in marketing? And you ask that in a Facebook group, people are going to be like, well, this is what I do. This is what I do. Well, if. Are you getting advice from someone who you'd switch places with? Because sometimes we get advice from people that just. They're nice people, but we just shouldn't be listening to their advice. Okay? And so in my experience, if you want to scale, if you want to grow your business, you need to be investing at minimum, 10% of revenue, but in most cases, 15. And if you're crazy like I am, I'll even spend up to 20%. Not forever, but 20% to get things going. Okay? And the reason I'll do that is because I'm not Gonna have time to get into it today. But if you're really, really good at owning the client journey after the sale and converting that same client into a client again, and converting that client into referring to one of their friends or family so that your lifetime value of that client is more, in most cases, double or triple from what the original sell is. Now you can afford to spend 20%. Like, that's not a problem. You can't afford to do 20% if you're only spending that and getting the one client. And that's it. And that's what 99.9% of lighting business owners do. They get the one client. That's it. And so then that's why they go, well, I can't do 20%. I'll go down to 10, I'll go down to five. And they're cutting their own legs off. It's just, like, ridiculous. Like, you can't grow a business without investing into the business. Okay? And you can't get successful marketing if you have a weak brand and you can't close or, uh, you're not going to, you know, grow your business if you're not closing those deals that it's getting you marketing. And you're not going to grow it if you're not pricing those deals that you are closing accordingly. Like, all these things stack up on each other. So it's really, really crucial that you decide how much you're going to spend on marketing. And then you have to. Or you put your plan in place and you have to stick to it. Um, marketing isn't always a flip of a switch. Some lead sources are faster than others. Some take a little bit time to develop. But, uh, you have to have the ability to, like, stay in the game long enough. Most people will throw five grand a month at something for three months and go, I just wasted 15 grand. And if that's the case, you probably did waste 15 grand. I'm willing to stay in it for the long game and say, okay, that five grand is for 12 months. So I'm not gonna stop at 15.

Pricing and sales matter so much when growing your business

I'm gonna go to 60. Because sometimes it's that next month where all of a sudden you spend another five grand, you're 20 in, and you get a deal, and it's worth 30 grand. Now, you're still upside down, but that deal results in a referral, and that referral results in repeat work. And that repeat work gets you a referral partner. And that referral partner is a landscape architect who gets you eight jobs this year. Uh, all because you were willing to stay in the game long enough. And then of course, you need to measure all these things because if you, if you go that the next month and all of a sudden you get two more clients and they're each worth eight grand. Now all of a sudden, hey, this thing's starting to turn. People saw that postcard the first time and didn't do anything. The second time they saw it and was gonna call you, but then they heard their kid saying, oh, yeah, we gotta go to soccer practice. The third time, they actually put it on their fridge. And then the fourth time they finally called you. All right, so you. This isn't, this is. You got to have a strong stomach. I mean, you gotta, you gotta be willing to risk some stuff here, okay? It's easier to play with house money. You know, like if you go and bet in Vegas, which you should not ever gamble. That's terrible advice. Don't ever do it. But let's just say you did and you placed a hundred dollar bet and you won a hundred dollars and you put the $100 of yours back in your pocket. You now have house money. And so it's easier to play with money that didn't exist before. Which is why pricing and sales matter so much. Because this will help you create new income that now you can play a little bit more, you can gamble a little bit more. Okay? It's not gambling because it's honestly, it's strategic. You're not going to just throw money at random things. Um, but it can feel like that because there's no guarantee, right? Um, okay, so, um, the other thing I'll tell you, just like my pricing, where I said, hey, price, like who you want to be, not like who you are today. If you really want to scale, this isn't for everybody. But if you are looking to actually grow, you have to invest that 15% or 10 or 20, whatever your number is, like who you want to be. So if you're stuck at 500k and you're like, I don't know why I do all the things, but I just can't get to a million, I just don't get it. And you're spending 10%, you're spending 50 grand a year on marketing. That's why. Well, it's one of the reasons why you probably need help with sales and you probably need help with your pricing too. But if the only thing you did was doubled your marketing budget, what are the odds that you could get more deals, right? And so you start acting like a Million dollar business who's willing to spend a hundred, one hundred fifty, two hundred grand to get there. Things are going to be different, right? And this is hard. This is probably the difference between, I see the people that are succeeding in the outdoor lighting industry right now. These people have made up in their mind, they've made the decision. They're acting like the person they want to be. They're not making decisions from the, the scary fearful place, uh, where they're at now. Like, wow, what if it doesn't work? They're acting like they already have the million dollar business. They're acting like they already have the 3 million dollar business and they're making decisions from that person's standpoint. It's like, well, if you were making $3 million, how much would you be spending on marketing? Oh, I'd be doing 10%. Okay, so 300 grand. Okay, so spend 300 grand now and see what happens. Okay, so that is the framework, you guys. Um, that is the framework. Pricing, sales, marketing, in that order. Don't screw this up because most people have it backwards. And if you turn on the marketing too early and you're missing out just on those like, like those fringe deals, you know, you're missing out on the, the one deal a month, the one deal a week. That's a problem because that one extra deal could fund your next marketing campaign. It could allow you to hire your marketing person, it could allow you to hire your admin, it could allow you to hire an installer, another salesperson. All those things, all these things add up big time.

Call Source can help you grow your lighting business by helping you negotiate prices

Hey, I also forgot you guys, I wanted to, uh, mention, uh, call Source. They're a new partner of ours and um, they're seriously awesome. I only partner with people that I. And when I say partner, I don't have equity or anything like that, but I like to bring, um, valuable partners into the lighting community that I think could help you grow your business. You guys have probably heard the phrase fortune is in the follow up. Okay, we know that. We know we should be following up. Just because someone reached out from Facebook and then we never got a hold of them doesn't mean they're not interested. It's just they're busy, they're on vacation, they're getting their kids back to school. So who's going to follow up with them? And we know we should, but we just don't. And so that's what one of the things that Call Source does. Um, they actually have a us based, uh, ah, outbound call center. So you can give them access to your um, CRM. They have us based CSR experts that will call on behalf of your company. You'll, they'll learn your systems and stuff like that. They'll follow up with like old leads, um, old, um, sales that are still ongoing, um, and recover revenue. Like literally they, they'll go out and get you more deals than you're currently getting. So make sure you guys check out callsource. com. they're a new partner of ours and we're doing, we're going to do some fun stuff with them on the podcast. But um, I want to make sure to give them the love. Um, but um, I guess to basically sum this up, you guys, when you, when you go through this uh, formula, pricing, sales and then marketing, it is just, it's transformational. And what's cool about this is it's not just a one time deal. Um, like I, like I said at the beginning, like, we have people that are in landscape, lighting, secrets, listening to the podcast. We have people that are not in the community yet trying to learn and trying to get what they can. But even if you've heard some, some of this message before, you're in a different perspective now. So go through it again and go, okay, well, yeah, I was at 300 a light. I raised it to 330. I wonder if I could do, I wonder if I could charge 350. I wonder if I could charge 360. And something that you have to realize as a business owner is you have so much freedom and flexibility. You have the ability to change your price on the fly. Like you change it right now. Okay? And it's called supply and demand pricing. If you raise your price today to 500 bucks a light and you go out and quote a job for 30 lights and it's $15,000, the worst thing, the worst case scenario is they could go, well, that's just more than we thought it was going to be or we're going to get quotes or we got to think about it, whatever. Or no, that's higher than we thought. Right? So then you just have to overcome the objection. And I'm not saying you should lower your price right off the bat, but you now know if you were charging 300 bucks a lie and now you're at 500, you have some negotiating wiggle room in there, right? You were charging for 30 lights. If you were, that was 9,000, now you're at 15. So you got $6,000 to negotiate. It's supply and demand. If you quote someone a price at $15,000 and they say, cool, where do I sign? How much do you need for a deposit? Then that is exactly the price you should have charged. And a lot of people feel guilty about charging a premium price. They feel guilty about charging more and go, well, I don't know, is that fair? Is that right? I'm sorry, it's, it's unfair if you're giving them a deal. If you're charging lower than 400 bucks a light, I think that's unfair because you can't afford to over deliver. You can't afford to hire top quality talent. You can't afford to train this top quality talent continually every week. You can't afford to answer their call and get back to them in 24 hours. We see when you're charging the right price, you can, you can afford to over deliver for your client. And, and I think it's unethical if you don't. So you got to just rewire your brain, get out of your own way and realize that like, it's not, it's not a, unethical thing to charge, charge people more. I think it's unethical to undercharge. I think you need to, um, realize that it's just like the housing market. Like there is no set price for a house. Like people pay exactly the top dollar that someone's willing to pay. So it's like it's a million dollar house. If someone's willing to pay a million, if they'll pay 1,100,000, it's worth 1,100,000. If they'll only pay 900, that's the price, that's how our businesses should be too. And so if you are, um, slow right now, you might need to lower your price. Okay, Yeah, I talk about raising your price, but like, it's not a fixed thing. Okay, Raise your price and work on your sales process. But if you're still, if your sales process is like dynamite and it's still just slow, you don't have as many leads coming in. You, you start high and negotiate supply and demand. You don't need to feel guilty for this, okay? Because your competitors that are listening and that are raising their price are going to be able to afford higher, higher quality talent people that will over deliver, people that will do the training and they're going to just be better. You know, you can afford to answer the phone call and get back to your, there's a light out, you can get it done within 24 hours. I mean, that's, that's A better promise than, like, yeah, we'll get back to you as fast as we can. Okay, so just know that when we go over this stuff, it's not fixed. Okay? Like, you can negotiate. Um, I've got a whole thing on negotiating. I won't go over today. Um, because you don't. Negotiating doesn't just mean. Okay, 15.

Follow this framework to build a multi million dollar lighting business

All right, well, how about nine? Like, that's not negotiating. Negotiating for me starts with like, well, what else could I give them? Remember I talked about this relationship between value and price. If my value and my price are about the same, and they're like, I don't know, it's just higher than we thought. Or maybe my price is higher than the value, what am I going to do to increase the value? So that's when I'm like, hey, let me sell them more lights. I know that sounds crazy, but, like, maybe you do some more things to show them more value. You know, you could. You can include a maintenance plan, an annual maintenance contract that's, you know, worth, uh, a thousand bucks. But that doesn't cost you a thousand dollars, does it? But to them, it's worth a thousand. Might cost you 2, 300 bucks to deliver. Okay, so maybe you throw that in for free. So, yeah, it cost you two or three hundred bucks, but it gave them thousand dollars worth of value. That's how I negotiate. Start giving more value. And then if you try value after value after value, and then you have to come down, sure it's okay. Don't. Don't drop from 15 to 9. That's weird, right? Make them earn it. Make them earn it again. I got a whole, whole nother thing on, like, negotiating, whatever. But I really wanted to give this to you guys. Uh, let me know what you think. Let me know in the comments, um, if you are on Facebook or YouTube or LinkedIn or something like that. I know most people actually just listen to this after, but, um, let me know what you think of this. I mean, I really want to share my story. I wanted you guys to know that, like, if I can do this, so can you. And it's not as hard as you think. I guess it's not as complicated. It's simple. Um, but it does take work, you know, it's just some of you guys are working so hard in the wrong areas. If you would focus and get intentional on what you're actually doing and, like, show up with that same enthusiasm and, like, passion, but just in a different area. You're. You should not be stuck for longer than, like, two Weeks. Some of you guys have been stuck for years. And honestly, it doesn't take that long to build a multi million dollar lighting business. Um, you've told yourself it's okay. Your friends, your family told you it's okay. You don't need to work that hard. Like, because that's you trying to be comfortable and it's them trying to be comfortable too. Because when your circle of influence, when you elevate yourself and you start to get outside that, they don't want you to leave either. They would rather pull you down and be like, hey, where are you going? Don't leave us. Right? Because if you elevate yourself, what does that say about them? Okay, so just know that guys that, uh, like, you have to get intentional. You have to like, ask yourself, where's your focus? If you're scrolling on Facebook, like, look at your screen time, see where your time is going if you'll focus. And if you're constantly saying, I just don't have time. You do have time. You just have to create it. You just have to, you just have to devote it to the right areas. Instead of spending all this time putting out fires, let's prevent them from even happening. Follow this framework. I promise it works. There's more. There's more to business, obviously, but this is the catalyst. This is how you fund all the other problems in your business. Pricing, sales, and then marketing, in that order. I promise you, you'll have extra money in your bank account that makes it easier to make those riskier decisions, makes it easier to hire higher quality talent. So now you have, you don't have as many problems of people not showing up on time. And you know what I'm talking about. There's the problem children. And it unlocks so much because you have money to do things the right way instead of just constantly putting band aids on things. So that's my message for you guys today. Um, I don't know. I love this industry. Seriously, if you guys knew, I want everyone to win, um, I know it's possible. You just have to get intentional. So pick one area and I hope it's pricing and then it's sales and then it's marketing. But pick one area that you are going to improve and then dedicate time every single week to getting better. And you have to dedicate time. You have to time block and say, okay, I'm going to spend an even. If you, if you're just like, I don't have time, then you have an hour. You can find an hour every single week, one day to do it, and then after that make it 90 minutes and then 2 hours and then 3 hours and then 4 hours. Eventually you have a whole day that's dedicated to you just being a business owner, working on pricing, then sales, then marketing. Once you have that system built, you have a money machine that money machine can fund. Like I said, the recruiting and the training and the, the, the. The hiring, your replacement problem and stuff like that, that's all I got for you guys. Really appreciate it.

September is going to be huge for your sales, so start now

Thank you to EmeryAllen. Thank you to call source. Thank you guys. I hope everyone has an awesome week. Get through these last couple weeks of summer. I promise you guys, September is going to be huge. But don't wait. Start these systems now. Even if you don't have more leads right now. Get better at your pricing, get better at your sales, role play, practice. Get ready so that when the leads do come in, you're maximizing every single opportunity. Thanks you guys. Hope you have a great week.