Latest / Founder Talk with Alex Sheridan / How to Save Six Figures on Taxes with Jim from Revenue Task Force

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How to Save Six Figures on Taxes with Jim from Revenue Task Force · Founder Talk with Alex Sheridan

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The 10 years ago founder from where you're at today, what are
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maybe one or two things that you feel like you've really learned
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and maybe the other founders could kind of learn from too?
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What are some things you've skilled up on that you weren't
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good before on but you've gotten better?
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At well, I would say it's probably the.
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Jim Taylor, founder and CEO of Revenue taskforce.com Why is the
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government not telling us about the savings that we can get as
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business owners? Well, they don't.
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Generate revenue. You've grown your business,
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you're bringing in sales, and then it's like, oh, there it all
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goes. You know, taxes, employees, you
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just got a bunch of different things that end up being a
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pretty big cost. You know, a lot of times they
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just pay for them and put them in and have no clue about the
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incentives. So we're constantly researching
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and new incentives pop up all the time.
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Like we've got one for FICA tax incentive savings.
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So just whatever is available out there for customers, we try
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to find it. Yeah, All this time I've been
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putting proposals in front of people that make total logical
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sense. You know, it's for itself, cost
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this, but then you get this back in an incentive and all that.
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I think what I found is people don't make decisions on logic.
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Yes, almost seems like a Navy Seals for like revenue savings
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and things like that, right. The task force is coming in,
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right? It's kind of cool.
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So I think it's probably fair to say in this episode, talking to
1:12
Jim here, we're going to talk about really how to keep more of
1:16
the money that you make. I watched one of the videos on
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your website and it's like, hey, you worked this hard as a
1:20
founder, as a business owner, you generate revenue, you grow
1:22
in your business, you're bringing in sales.
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And then it's like, often times, I know I feel this way.
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Sometimes it's like, Dang, I had a Goodyear and it's like, oh,
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there it all goes. You know, taxes or whatever
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things you got are employees. You just got a bunch of
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different things that end up being a pretty big cost.
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So I think if you're listening to this right now, it's like,
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hey, our goal here is to unlock a couple things for you.
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Maybe it's just one or two things that you're like, wow, I
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didn't know I could, I could do that.
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I didn't know I could save money that way.
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I didn't know I could payless taxes in that way.
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And I think you get into some really creative things that I
1:51
want to dive into. So I know you brought some
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examples too. I think that'll be cool to go
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through. But maybe first and foremost,
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you want to kind of give a high level overview of just like some
2:00
of the areas that business owners can be saving money right
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now. Some of the kind of aha moments
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that you have with clients when you tell them about things and
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they're like, where has this been the last decade?
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Yeah. Well, our group has been around
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since 85 and we kind of look at different incentives that are
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available for customers to do these upgrades because selfishly
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it makes more sense for them to do it and maybe they'll say yes.
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So different kinds of upgrades like new roof, solar, EV
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chargers, compressed air upgrades have incentives.
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Lighting the EV chargers out here.
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Yeah, I saw that. That's good.
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So. That they're getting, well
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potentially if they know about it, right, but they're probably
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getting the discount or some kind of incentive for it.
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Yeah, there's incentives and you know, a lot of times they just
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pay for them and put them in and have no clue about the
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incentives. So we're constantly researching
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and new incentives pop up all the time.
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Like we've got one for FICA tax and incentive savings.
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So just whatever is available out there for customers, we try
2:59
to find it. Yeah, what is the FICA one?
3:01
Let's dive into some of these. So the FICA one, it's a
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government program. They're trying to encourage
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people to, to actually, you know, take a little more
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proactive approach towards healthcare.
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And so it's not health insurance at all, but it's a program that
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if you can prove your people are doing certain things, taking
3:19
actions to be more healthy, they get a FICA tax reductions
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really. So the employer saves 6 to $800
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per employee per year. And that's every year on the
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money they would have ordinarily sent to FICA, you know, and to
3:36
the government. And the employees end up with a
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2 or 3% take home pay increase and some really nice additional
3:42
benefits that complement whatever they're already doing.
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But by taking advantage of these incentives, the government gets
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a little less money. But it's, it's supposed to take
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some of the heat off the, you know, the medical system because
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everything's so expensive. Yeah.
3:58
So. Well, that makes sense because
4:00
that the medical or the healthcare systems like just got
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all kinds of problems and it's very costly.
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And a lot of times if you can make just everyone a little bit
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healthier, it would probably bring down those overall costs.
4:09
You get that savings back is what you're saying?
4:11
Yep. Wow.
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Not only that, it it actually reduces in some states depending
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on how they charge for workman's comp insurance.
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Sometimes it's a straight percentage of payroll, it'll
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reduce the payroll so you save on your workman's comp premiums.
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So there's it has like a secondary savings part.
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Yeah. Well, I could see it's adding up
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to especially if you have, you know, 20304050, a hundred 200
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employees. I could send me 6 to $800 a year
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times that. And then you've got they're
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getting a little bit increase on their pay.
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So they're happy about it, which they didn't know they're
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getting, right. So do you have to have a certain
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amount of AW2 employees or like is there a certain qualification
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that you would need to have for this?
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Yeah, usually the math works best if they're making they're
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more full full time like over 26,000 per year.
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So that's usually where it, you know, breaks out, but.
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Could anyone possibly be less than that?
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Well, we've got states. Well, it's if they're part time,
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Yeah. But yeah, there's some companies
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we talked to that, you know, 3/4 of their company they have
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insurance for and they're part of a plan and the rest don't.
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Well, there's a way to give them something, you know, a nice
5:20
little program and without costing the company anything.
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So it's it's benefits with no cost.
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So I get a lot of it's too good to be true things and but it's
5:32
true, Yeah. So you check it out.
5:34
Yeah, it's like, wait a second, wasn't there was a big one where
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during COVID there was a big savings like per employee, you
5:41
got like 30,000 or something, you wouldn't even know about it.
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And there was like businesses that started literally because
5:46
of that, they would refer and then get a cut and they were
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making a shit ton of money all because people didn't even know
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this existed. Why is the government not
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telling us about the savings that we can get as business
5:55
owners? Well, they don't.
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You know. It's all in the fine print that
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the FICA savings you read. Page 79 at the very bottom and
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invisible ink, you will actually find it.
6:04
That's like, OK, thanks. Yeah, I mean it was in the fine
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print. Really just don't want us to
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know. I mean, do you think that's just
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like, well, it's there, but like we don't want everyone to take
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advantage of this because it's going to drain our you?
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Know our money well it I think it takes people like regular
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business owners or somebody to dig into this stuff and see, OK,
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what is this benefit really here for and and can we make this
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available to people? And but yeah, it was embedded in
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the the healthcare act from Obama a long time ago.
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And some I don't know how many pages that thing was.
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It was like 20,000 pages. Right.
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No one's reading through that entire.
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Thing and now with AI we're able to help like diagnose people at
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a time. If, if this is what's going on
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with you, maybe you should look at doing this to prevent this
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down the road. So there's a lot of cool things
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that are happening with it now, so.
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Were you guys a part of the one during COVID where there was
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that big savings that? No, I knew about it.
6:55
Yeah, I knew about it. I think it was like 26,000 per
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employee. And it I mean, if you have 15
7:00
employees, like 20 employees, I mean, that's crazy.
7:02
Yep. And and the requirement back
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then was it didn't matter if your business was shut down or
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yeah. So if you're still operating and
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making money, you could still access that money.
7:12
Wow. So But I think because of that,
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companies are starting to realize there's government
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programs out there, and why not take advantage of them?
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Because they're getting taxed at every level, every which way
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they go. So if there's a way to get
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something back, you know, why not look at it?
7:28
Yeah. And maybe part of it's too, like
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the government always there's coming up with new legislation,
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laws regulate things like that. And it's like probably hard to
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get a trillion different messages out to the masses,
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right? It's like, we'd love to be able
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to tell everyone potentially, but it's just hard to get that
7:42
many messages out. Like you're gonna run ads.
7:44
You're gonna like, I mean, how do you get the message out,
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right? So there's probably that
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component too. And there's probably a little
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bit of like, yeah, this is good for the people.
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But maybe if everyone didn't use it all at once, it might not be
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on the worst thing either, you know, It's like, so how do you
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guys, could somebody do this by themselves or do you guys guide
8:00
them to the process to for I want to get into some of the
8:02
other ones to like the solar, the roofing, because there's
8:05
some creative things. I think people just aren't even.
8:07
Thinking of well, yeah, it just depends what they're looking to
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do. But for this fic incentive, we
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set up a discovery call for them and they can have, they usually
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have one of their financial people on there and they usually
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have an HR person to kind of, you know, see it.
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And we do a quick little Zoom call and we go through the
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program, explain what codes we're referencing to make this
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happen. And it is kind of a voluntary
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system for the employee. But who would, who doesn't want
8:36
a pay raise, you know, So it's gives them a little incentive to
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do the things required. So it's, it's basically on an
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app checking in once a month for maybe 10-15 minutes and putting
8:48
some things down about their health, what they've been up to.
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But it will tailor, you know, all sorts of things depending on
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what you have going on. You want to lose some weight,
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It'll come up with a plan for you.
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Plus you have actual doctors and stuff involved in there too.
9:03
And it's, but it's not insurance.
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So it's just a nice compliment on top of whatever, whatever
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they're doing. Yeah.
9:11
And then do you guys is like whatever you find in savings,
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you guys take a percentage of that because I saw there's no
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upfront cost with you guys, right?
9:17
Yeah, with that program, there's there's no out of pocket in
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fact, so the savings start immediately.
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So as soon as the they have to, you know, have everyone say yes
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and do a little bit on boarding. But that first month that
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they're, they start, the employees get the the pay
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savings and they get all the benefits associated with it.
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And the employer saves money from that moment too.
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And so there is a little service.
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So what happens? Is you got to make money,
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obviously you. Know so they, they do pay for
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it, but it's part of the pre tax money that they were already
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sending to the government, right?
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So, and, and basically you're redirecting a portion of that so
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it goes directly to your employee to benefit them versus
10:00
into the abyss. And who knows if Social Security
10:03
is even going to be around. So this way they, them and their
10:07
families. So part of it's free telehealth
10:10
for their whole family. So if they've got 4 kids or
10:14
whatever and it includes the top 1000 prescriptions, no cost, no
10:20
co-pay. So if nothing else, they can
10:23
make a phone call, you get a prescription, no cost, no
10:26
charge. They'll even deliver it a lot of
10:29
times. So, and if somebody's on
10:31
vacation and they forgot their meds, they just pick up the
10:33
phone and, you know, they can have a prescription sent to
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wherever they're at. So that that part's kind of
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neat. Yeah, I can definitely see that.
10:42
And then some of the other ones I saw were like solar EV
10:45
charging. What are some of the the
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benefits there? Like you got to what?
10:48
Replace your whole roof or there's got to be a, well, roof?
10:50
Like what? So a lot of businesses put off
10:54
doing the roof because it's a super expensive thing to do, but
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they don't realize that most of the time that there's huge
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incentives off the cost of that roof if you combine it with
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solar. So I've got a, you know, quite a
11:07
few businesses, they're not really green per SE.
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They're not, you know, they're financial people and, and, but
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if they need a cost of a roof, you know, we show them how much
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of that they actually get back in an incentive.
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So in some cases it's 30. We've even had 50% of the cost
11:26
of the roof, the customer gets back in a tax credit and then
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there's other incentives that go on top of that.
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So that's. And they write off the entire
11:34
purchase of the roof too, as a business.
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It's so a tax credit's a little different.
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So they can, they get that money, they can sell those
11:42
credits, they can exchange them between entities.
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So if you know, if there's people that want to, you know,
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some of those credits, they can get them and they're easily
11:52
transferable. But the other part is it's bonus
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accelerated depreciation. So normally if they put up a
11:59
roof by itself, it would never pay itself back.
12:02
They would never get incentives and they would have to
12:04
depreciate it along with the rest of the building, usually 39
12:08
1/2 years or something like that.
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So this way they get to bonus accelerate depreciate it right
12:13
away, both for the, you know, the federal government and the
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state tax. So there's extra savings there
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that they can realize right away.
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And then in some cases there's power company incentives and
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state incentives. So our group finds all those,
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gives them all the paperwork, fills out the paperwork, does
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all the, you know, full turnkey. So they don't really have to
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know all this stuff. They just we, you know, we give
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them a proposal showing them all the incentives and, and we put
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it all together. So do you.
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Think there's a lot of businesses out there right now
12:47
that just are doing, putting up new roofs, adding this, adding
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that, and just not even realizing that they're missing
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out on like 10s, if not hundreds of thousands.
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Of dollars, yeah, especially on the roof 'cause you know, they
12:58
typically put it off, patch it as long as they can until OK,
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gosh, I guess I got to, I guess I got to do this now, finally.
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And they're saving up for it, need a budget for it and all
13:08
that and then they finally decide to do it.
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And so we work with quite a few different commercial roofers and
13:15
I haven't met 1 yet that has a way to actually fund the
13:18
project. So folks that work with us,
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we've had a relationship with the power company for quite a
13:26
while and you know, businesses don't believe us till they see
13:30
it and do it. But you know, we put together
13:33
the example I have, they needed a new roof, they wanted to do
13:36
solar, they wanted EV chargers and they needed new rooftop
13:40
units. And so there's incentives off
13:43
rooftop units too, but not as much.
13:46
But when you combine the whole thing together, we have power
13:49
company funding that will fund the whole thing.
13:52
So they don't even need a budget.
13:54
And it's kind of off the books, so to speak, because it's not,
13:59
it's not showing up as a line of credit.
14:01
It's a power company agreement. So the way.
14:04
Why are they? Are they just saving a lot of
14:06
money by doing it? Is that why they're?
14:08
No, they, they've been charged. I don't know all the rules
14:11
behind the scenes, but they're supposed to be helping
14:14
businesses be more energy efficient.
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So we've had a working relationship with them for a
14:19
long time and so they'll fund our projects.
14:22
So because we've we make sure it's done right, it's.
14:25
Just fun for free though, like. How?
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Well, it's not entirely free so they have to pay it back.
14:30
So it's kind of a little bit like a shell game.
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They pay tax. Incentive and then they pay,
14:35
yeah. Yeah, the incentives and all
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that come back after they do the project.
14:39
I got it. So, but the way it works, they
14:41
might look at a couple years financials, right, then once
14:44
it's approved, then where they would fund the entire project.
14:48
So the customer doesn't pay a penny, the roof gets done, the
14:52
solar gets done, whatever else they are having done.
14:55
Yeah, rooftop units, the EV chargers, and they don't make a
14:59
payment until it's fully completed.
15:02
So that could be a year from now until it's all done.
15:05
And then that year that it's mostly completed, that's when
15:08
they get the bulk of the incentives.
15:11
So they would get the huge tax incentive on a tax credit plus
15:16
the bonus accelerated depreciation, plus the state
15:19
money. Certain states, Illinois has
15:21
some state incentives. They get money every quarter for
15:25
having a solar array up and they get power company incentives.
15:29
So the first payment, they typically do 60 payments, so
15:33
five years, but you're not making that first payment till
15:37
that probably like a year from now.
15:40
And so they can plan for having to repay these payments.
15:43
But when these incentives come in, it pretty much offsets a lot
15:47
of yeah. Especially if you're going to
15:49
have a new roof put on anyways. Like why would you not look at
15:51
this? Because I imagine is there a
15:53
bunch of, you know, savings probably long term with having
15:55
solar, right, being able to bring down energy costs and
15:58
things like that, right, I would assume.
15:59
Well, we also use bifacial panels and we recommend the
16:03
white TPO surface. So if any light actually hits
16:08
the roof and bounces in the bottom of the panel, that adds
16:11
to the generation of energy. But, but we don't calculate any
16:15
of that in the in the math. And so far we haven't had one
16:21
promise when we we guarantee the production number, whatever that
16:24
is for 30 years. So these it's an American
16:27
company, tier one equipment. Nice.
16:30
You can't say tier one equipment unless it's been proven in
16:33
Bloomberg. So the racking system, the
16:35
inverters, all that they, they check out the company, they
16:39
check out all the equipment to make sure, yeah, that's all good
16:42
before you can say Tier 1. What if it's cloudy?
16:45
How does solar work? It still works.
16:47
It still works. Yeah, you've heard people still
16:49
getting sunburned. Get UAVs, yeah.
16:51
Right. But I mean a certain amount does
16:52
go through and it and it continues to produce so.
16:55
But when it's sunny it probably just really like supercharges
16:58
it. Yeah, yeah.
16:59
So most of the production is in the summer, the summer months.
17:03
It's just stores it. Well, the way it works here is
17:06
they they have what they call net metering.
17:09
So if you make more energy in the summer, that meter measures
17:12
that credit and it goes out into the grid and then they get the
17:16
same credit back at night time or the winner.
17:19
And those credits stay with your account number here until you
17:23
end up using them. And if you don't use them, they
17:26
go over into the next year. So that's kind of interesting
17:29
because I don't think people think about like sharing energy
17:31
like that, right? Like putting it back in the
17:33
grid. We worked with the company a
17:35
while back where they do electric vehicle charging,
17:38
wireless electrical wheel. So we'd.
17:40
Put a pad and you would drive under the pad and it would
17:42
charge a car and then there was talks of like one day building
17:45
into the roads so you could drive your as you're charging
17:48
your car. Wow, that's.
17:49
Cool. And then park it and then
17:51
anything leftover bringing it back in the grid.
17:52
And that's kind of what you're talking about there.
17:54
Yeah. I think people just think like,
17:56
we just turn on a light, we watch TV, we do whatever, we use
17:59
the energy. And that's the cost versus like,
18:02
actually there's energy you're accumulating.
18:03
And then if there's excess, you sell that back to the grid and
18:06
exchange it. And yeah, yeah.
18:07
Wow, that's pretty interesting. Yeah, so far they're not
18:11
actually buying it back, you know, But you get it.
18:13
You. Get a discount though, yeah.
18:15
So you get it back credit for credit.
18:17
Right, right, right. So, yeah, So if you have a ton
18:19
in July, you know, maybe you didn't use half of it, but then
18:22
December it's cloudier. So you're getting some of that
18:24
credit back. Yeah, yeah.
18:26
And then so what's the, how do you feel like EV charging and
18:29
that kind of stuff? I know we we touched on it, but
18:31
like they have two I think ports out here.
18:34
What are they getting for that? Right.
18:35
Is it, do you think they took that in consideration of this is
18:38
going to be a cost benefit, we'll get some kickback for
18:41
this? Yeah, there's some, there's some
18:43
tax credits and things that's things that go along with with
18:46
installing those, but. What about just for buying a EV
18:48
car right now? Is that state by state
18:50
deductions or federal? Like if I go and buy a Tesla
18:53
right now, is that worth it from a tax standpoint or no?
18:55
Well, I'm not an expert on on on the cars, but but from what I
18:59
heard, there was some incredible incentives early on and now not
19:03
so much. Yeah, it's like everyone's
19:04
starting to kind of do it. So it's like, yeah, we're not
19:06
going to give you a break for doing what you should be doing
19:07
anyways. Yeah, yeah.
19:10
People always ask up here in Illinois.
19:12
You know, I could see putting panels down in Arizona, but why
19:16
do it here in Illinois? It just doesn't seem it's cloudy
19:18
all the time. But I mean the difference is we
19:21
might need more panels up here. But once you put it up, if I
19:25
mean we, we did a beer distributor that we were able to
19:29
get 100% of their energy use covered because they have a big
19:32
roof and they have refrigeration and things like that.
19:36
But they're not a manufacturer. Manufacturers are harder to get
19:39
100%, but you know, if that same number of panels, we use 3.8
19:44
hours of sunlight per day in our calculations and we've never had
19:49
one not match, not meet our goal and not one.
19:53
But if you took that same system and put it down in Arizona, they
19:57
probably need less panels to do the same thing.
20:01
They're going to have a bigger number of hours per daylight per
20:04
year. But it pretty much, you know,
20:08
when we do the 3.8 hours, that's taking into account snow and you
20:13
know, all the shorter days in the winter.
20:15
Yeah, it's for the whole, you know, average of the year.
20:18
Yeah. What other savings are there?
20:20
Do we cover most of the like the big ones, the EV charging the
20:24
and I don't know if we fully covered the EV charging one.
20:28
Is there something specific do and what if you work from home,
20:31
is there any breaks for that? Like if I, you know, put one in
20:34
my house or something like that, is there, you know, how does
20:36
that work? Well, the power company, they
20:40
have a lot. They have their own little
20:42
incentives. And so for this year, there's
20:45
supposed to be some extra incentives to put those in from
20:48
the power company directly. And there's also a federal tax
20:51
credit you get on doing those as well.
20:54
But a lot of the ones we end up doing, like on this example,
20:58
they, they like the idea of charging the car with the sun.
21:02
So they, you know, let's put in a few of these things where we
21:05
got a big solar array up there and, and a lot of our
21:08
manufacturing customers, they're not putting in the ones where
21:11
they're making money off of somebody using it.
21:14
It's more like a courtesy, you know, for their guests and maybe
21:18
to show off a little that they're on the cutting edge and
21:20
they've got these things there. So, you know, every business,
21:23
some businesses have a lot of visitors from their customers.
21:26
So they want to show that. And we can even put a monitor in
21:30
the the lobby that shows real time what it's producing up on
21:34
the roof. Wow, that's really cool.
21:37
It feels like everyone will be driving electric before long.
21:39
Don't you kind of get that feeling?
21:41
Yeah, yeah. Or some type of hydrator, right?
21:44
Yeah, I would think so. Yeah, it doesn't seem like the
21:46
next five years, but because we've just got to replace all
21:49
the gas stations and the entire system set up for gas, you know,
21:53
it's like hard to you can't just flip a switch and all the things
21:56
done. You got just a lot of
21:57
infrastructure type things that you'd have to build in place.
22:00
But it seems like it's going that way.
22:02
Yep, I think so too. Lucid, you've got, you know,
22:05
just more even like the, you know, BMGMS and Fords and things
22:10
like that, they're all starting to produce more.
22:12
I think Tesla kind of kicked their ass into gear.
22:14
Yeah, I think so. I guess we probably should get
22:17
on this thing, you know, And I, I have a theory this could, this
22:20
is my theory. It's not a fact.
22:22
I just feel like there's something with the oil companies
22:24
that they were like, hey, don't go too crazy on the electric car
22:28
stuff. I mean you.
22:29
Just there, Just. Has to be.
22:31
Like there has to because this it wasn't like this technology
22:34
wasn't here. It absolutely was here.
22:36
Maybe wasn't as good as Tesla made it, but no one really tried
22:39
that hard. It was like the red headed
22:41
stepchild is like, yeah, here's a, you know, a Prius with, you
22:44
know, a hybrid. It was like it wasn't cool.
22:46
They weren't trying to make it hyper.
22:48
You know, it was just like, no, we use gas and there's a huge
22:51
industry of this and we're probably getting some kickback
22:53
from the companies and just felt like there was a stall and then
22:57
someone had to come and said, I don't care about that industry
22:59
or the kickbacks. We're trailblazing and
23:01
innovating. I think a big thing is, is the
23:04
battery technology they're coming up with and as soon as
23:07
they get the cost down and, and maybe find some new technology
23:12
in the batteries that would bring everything down and
23:15
someone there, someone's first car could be an electric car
23:18
and. I think even getting the ranges
23:20
better but my point is like I don't even think they would
23:23
work. I don't even think it was just
23:25
like a full like it just was. I don't know if I'm Ford,
23:29
Chrysler or something like that. Why am I not just saying here's
23:31
a chunk of money, let's start a side company.
23:33
Try to put us out of business by making the best electric car you
23:37
pot like sexy, high performing get the battery.
23:40
I want you to try to literally put us out of business.
23:42
I mean, why would you? And see what they could do,
23:43
yeah. Just think that that's the way
23:45
to do it. Just I think, you know, I nerd
23:47
out on some of this business stuff, but it's the same thing
23:49
with Walmart and Amazon, like Amazon, you know, and Walmart
23:53
probably could have created easily in Amazon.
23:56
You know, they could have said, let's just create a third party
23:58
entity or company or whatever it is and put some smart people in
24:01
there. And and here's a billion
24:02
dollars, you know, like they have capital, like there's 500
24:04
and whatever it is, try to create an online business that
24:08
would put us out of business. And they just didn't.
24:11
So they waited for someone else to disrupt.
24:13
And then it was like, Oh, I guess we should probably get
24:15
serious about the online thing. And for some companies that put
24:18
them out of business, like they're Sears and things like
24:20
that. There were other reasons, but
24:22
yeah, you got to be able to adjust and evolve, you know,
24:25
that's for sure. Is there any other big savings
24:27
that we didn't cover that's you think is good to touch on?
24:30
A lot of manufacturers use compressed air and there's those
24:36
motors use a ton of energy and and sometimes they never stop
24:39
running. Yeah.
24:40
So, so yeah, there's upgrades on those.
24:42
If somebody wants to upgrade their system, when those things
24:47
leak throughout the factory, no one seems to care because it's
24:51
just air. But when if there's leaks
24:53
everywhere, then the motors starting up and going again.
24:56
So we've got quite a few customers that want to add that
24:59
kind of upgrade. So there's newer technology with
25:02
variable speed and all that to have the motor use less energy
25:06
doing what it does, But then also having all those leaks
25:09
fixed kind of definitely helps. So there that's one area where
25:13
there's some significant savings.
25:16
And if they haven't upgraded their lighting yet, I mean, we
25:19
do that too, but a lot of folks have already done that.
25:22
But there's still incentives out there if you need to, if you've
25:25
been putting that off and now you got to get it done.
25:28
And I don't think they're, I don't think they're making
25:30
fluorescent lights anymore. So at some point you're not
25:33
going to be able to get them. So you've got to upgrade at some
25:36
point. It seems like you would just
25:38
drive through an industrial park and just have a field day there.
25:41
Is that right? I mean I would just like I would
25:42
target all these. Manufacturing companies knocked
25:44
on doors. Yeah, you know, but.
25:46
We gotta get you going on LinkedIn, man.
25:48
Yeah, it's a gold mine for you there for real.
25:50
Because I think especially given what you do, it's like so
25:52
attractive because there's a lot of just upfront savings.
25:55
It's like you got to invest a ton of capital in front
25:57
necessarily. It's like, let me get you some
25:59
savings, do all the work and then, you know, I'll take what
26:01
you would have been sending in anyways.
26:03
Yeah, so. Yeah.
26:05
They, they really don't realize that the power company actually
26:08
fund these projects and they'll do it nationwide.
26:12
So we can go nationwide on different projects, but we like
26:16
them to be a little more sizable.
26:18
Yeah, yeah, definitely. We don't really want to go
26:21
across the country for a 20,000 square foot, you know, right.
26:25
Right, Exactly. So you've been doing this for 10
26:28
years, right, As the founder, is business pretty good for you
26:32
guys right now? Yeah.
26:33
Yeah, yeah. We do have a lot of a lot of
26:36
folks that have had proposals, but kind of waiting it out to
26:39
see what happens. And I don't know if I mentioned
26:43
this to you before, but so there's a company called PJM
26:46
that owns the grid for 13 states.
26:49
So it goes all the way to the East Coast and it covers all the
26:52
way through Illinois. And we've always paid them some
26:57
of our money when on our bill behind the scenes.
27:00
It was a small little portion to deliver the energy here.
27:03
Well, they just made an announcement in Bloomberg was
27:07
actually in July last year. They're raising their little
27:10
charge 833%. So, so right now in Illinois, if
27:16
someone has a negotiated in a rate with a power company like a
27:21
supplier side for maybe six cents, that's going to jump to
27:26
probably, you know, could be another two or three cents.
27:29
So it could go to 9 cents, maybe more for just the delivery side
27:34
or from that to getting it here on the supplier side.
27:37
And then Comed adds a few cents to deliver it to everybody's
27:41
house because they owned the grid here.
27:43
So they're going to go, I mean, if a, you know, if a customer
27:47
was, I don't know, ending up spending, you know, $180,000 a
27:53
year in in energy, if you add up all the months, it's going to
27:56
jump to like 270. So it's, it's sizable.
28:01
So I, I think when people, some of those folks, they're sitting
28:05
on their hands, they might rethink at that, you know, hey,
28:08
call Jim again, let's get some updated numbers because and, and
28:13
a lot of people have numbers that are locked in.
28:15
Oh, I got a locked in rate. Well, I'm pretty sure there's
28:18
fine print in there that says if it costs us more to deliver it,
28:21
we're not going to go out of business.
28:22
We're going to pass that on. So I think some of those folks
28:27
if they're looking for, you know, another three-year, 2
28:31
year, you know, rate lock in right now, they already know
28:34
about it. But if they think they have
28:37
three years left on a deal and they don't have to worry about
28:40
it for three years, there might be surprised when they get their
28:43
June bill, probably, you know, second week in July or something
28:47
like. That so we say the grid to
28:51
explain like what that is like. I didn't know one company owns
28:54
13 states. Well, someone has to put up the
28:57
so there's all these different power companies around.
29:00
Michigan has 1, you know, Ohio's got a different one here in
29:04
Illinois. It's Comed up north and Ameren
29:07
in the South. So they own the infrastructure
29:10
there, but they need, they need a way to get energy across state
29:14
lines to get to their so they can, you know, distribute it to
29:19
their customers. So.
29:20
Is that just like the electrical power that you have?
29:23
Is that what is that? What's part of that?
29:26
So they produce energy, you know, all different places.
29:30
Well, it goes into the system. Yeah, yeah.
29:33
And so they own the big power lines, the transmission lines
29:36
that are going from state to state.
29:39
So when it gets here, you know to Comed takes over and then
29:43
they deliver it to the individuals.
29:46
It makes sense. Like the distributors at a local
29:47
level. Yeah.
29:48
What? What creates the power?
29:50
This might be a stupid question, but I'm actually kind of curious
29:52
about all this stuff. Most of them have switched.
29:55
They've got, most of them have gotten rid of most of the coal.
29:59
So now most of them are actually, yeah, most of them
30:02
switched to natural gas. So they've got big generators
30:05
burning natural gas to create the electricity and that's how
30:09
most of it's done. So does.
30:10
That originate from oil then. Yeah, OK.
30:13
Well, it's above oil. So if oils they find oil in the
30:16
ground, there's natural gas. Oh God, it's actually, it's the
30:19
actual gas. Oh yeah, I got it.
30:21
So they they route that in there, but.
30:23
That's so to me, that whole thing is just so weird and like
30:26
fascinating how we use we found gas in the Earth's like cross,
30:30
you know, not cover the like how did how the hell did that become
30:33
energy and even oil? Like, how does that even become,
30:35
you know, what did it like the gas we think of to fill the cars
30:38
up and like that makes something go.
30:40
Yeah, it's really. Kind of wild, but then again, I
30:42
think like a TV is wild or a phone.
30:44
Like how am I able to communicate with somebody on a
30:47
screen and their face and audio bounces off a satellite and
30:50
space and then comes back down? Like it's just, it's kind of
30:54
wild when you start thinking about everything.
30:56
Like it's really weird. It is strange.
30:58
It is weird. Then you think about space and
31:00
it's like a whole other weird. We're just like floating out in
31:02
space right now and traveling 500,000 mph.
31:05
It's just weird. The whole thing is weird.
31:07
Still the most efficient is the nuclear.
31:10
Is it the the power plants hot so?
31:11
Where does the nuclear power come from?
31:13
Well, they take the uranium and they have a system of capturing
31:17
that heat. It's still heat and they
31:18
generate and then they get turbines and stuff.
31:21
But what is? Uranium.
31:22
Is that just found in the ground?
31:23
Yeah, I'm not a super sciency expert, but yeah, they, they
31:28
have to mine it and, and get it and, and it has to be a certain
31:32
purity level in order to to do that.
31:34
But but yeah, once one of those turns on, it produces it's kind
31:39
of the cleanest way because there's really no, you know, the
31:42
only byproduct is the nuclear waste.
31:44
They have to find something to do with it.
31:46
So like, they get rid of it by, you know, packaging and putting
31:50
in mines, like way down on the ground, old salt mines and
31:54
things like that. But but they are the most
31:57
efficient. And a lot of those that were
31:59
built a long time ago are kind of reaching the end of their
32:02
life cycle. So so yeah, sometimes they shut
32:06
them down and then nothing happens from them.
32:09
But yeah, we'll see what's going to happen in the future.
32:12
I think there's going to be some neat changes.
32:14
You think so? Yeah, wasn't uranium.
32:17
Did you ever see Top Gun like the new one?
32:19
Yeah, wasn't that there was like a uranium plant or something
32:21
they were trying to like blow? Up or something and like when
32:24
you do it, yeah. When you just send the fighter
32:26
pilots in, they'd be like, yeah, we're gonna send a drone in.
32:29
Actually, we're gonna send a missile, right?
32:31
Guided missile, right. I still don't know why they had
32:33
to fly all the planes in there, Do you?
32:35
I mean is that? I think it had to be below the
32:37
radar or something. They didn't shut a missile that
32:39
would like follow that path. I mean with AI and everything
32:41
technology they got now, that would be just wouldn't have been
32:44
as cool. It wouldn't have been the cowboy
32:45
like Tom Cruise. You know, that whole.
32:48
I heard they're gonna make a third one in that, which would
32:50
be cool. I thought the movie was great.
32:52
I did too, it was just. A fun flick, you know, like it
32:54
was fun start to finish. It was a it was a fun show to
32:56
watch. Yeah, they did a good job on
32:58
that one. Yeah, made me think of that
33:00
though. So are you running this
33:02
business? Is it like a sole or a
33:04
solopreneurship type business or you got team or that helps you
33:07
implement like how do you work it?
33:08
Yeah. So I'm, I'm more like the guy
33:10
that goes out and finds the projects.
33:12
And so and part of our group is the engineering procurement, you
33:17
know, construction phase. If it, if it's a, a job that, I
33:21
mean, we have our own crews that do a lot of the work, but you
33:25
know, they might oversee as a general contractor different
33:27
parts of it. So like the compressed air, we'd
33:30
bring in a local compressed air guide and, and we'd oversee it.
33:34
We'd make sure we get all the incentives for it.
33:37
And if, if wanted, we can help with the funding.
33:41
So not everyone uses the funding, but.
33:43
Yeah, well, it's smart. You kind of stand your zone a
33:45
genius. You find the opportunities, work
33:48
through them, and then you have a team that handles the what
33:49
they're good at. Yeah, right.
33:51
Yeah, that's smart. I'm not an engineer.
33:52
Yeah, Yeah, neither am I. Let them let them fill out all
33:56
those paperwork. I mean, you're dealing with the
33:58
government. So yeah, the paperwork to fill
34:00
out for so there's Illinois S rec incentives to fill out what
34:05
we do, they do it all. Yeah.
34:08
Yeah. Anytime I get something from the
34:09
government, I'm like, here we go.
34:11
I just like, all right, man. It's going to be a the process.
34:14
Well, to get the money on this S rec incentive, we have to
34:17
guarantee the production and report it to the state.
34:20
So every month we're reporting it and the customer gets money
34:23
based on that production level. So there's a lot of moving
34:27
parts. Yeah, I'm glad I'm not doing all
34:29
that stuff. Do you?
34:31
Do you? Excuse me?
34:32
Do you? You've been doing this for 10
34:33
years now. I'm sure you probably learned a
34:35
lot over the last decade in terms of just like business
34:37
knowledge. What have been some of the what
34:39
were some of the maybe were you doing the same thing 10 years
34:41
ago roughly or was it a? Little bit different.
34:44
There was a lot yeah. There was a lot more of the
34:46
lighting going on back then cuz it's still a building upgrade
34:50
and people weren't quite sure what to do.
34:53
What's this LED stuff and can I just go buy a bulb like I've
34:56
always bought bulbs and but no. No, Roger, not just no.
35:02
I mean, you can go to Menard's and buy a few, but if you want
35:05
to capture these incentives, you know that.
35:08
And so at that point the lighting like you could
35:11
calculate what is the your energy, you add up the lighting
35:15
that you know, the wattage, the ballast.
35:17
So you could say, well this fixtures, you know, 200 watts,
35:21
you know, we could put an LED replacement fixture in fixture
35:24
in there that might be 30 watts. So what they would do is that
35:28
difference they would give a dollar amount per Watt reduced
35:32
and they give you a check at the end of the project.
35:35
So, so we would figure out that, calculate that, and if it was a
35:40
big project and they didn't have the budget, the power company
35:43
would fund it. So so yeah, 2016 is when they
35:47
signed the law in Illinois to add this extra money for doing
35:51
solar. So it took a little bit to get
35:53
that rolling, right. But but yeah, it's Illinois
35:57
still has one of the best states, the best incentives to
36:00
do this stuff. That's got Illinois founders.
36:02
If you're listening, hit our point, Jim up here.
36:05
Yeah, while it lasts, Yeah, No, who knows?
36:07
We don't know how long that's. True, that's a good point.
36:09
I think it's a scarcity. Elon likes solar and I and I
36:13
think Trump does too. He did say he didn't like.
36:15
Well, we probably will have. I don't really like.
36:19
I don't like where it covers the whole.
36:21
Country's tremendous opportunity, Jim.
36:23
We're going to look into it. Yeah, but yeah, he made a
36:26
comment he didn't like, you know, taking our countryside and
36:30
covering it for miles and miles, 'cause I don't know, some people
36:33
don't really like the look. But but if it's on a commercial
36:36
roof, I mean commercial roof, that's, that's some expensive
36:40
real estate. You know, it costs a lot for the
36:43
building, costs a lot for the roofing material that's up
36:47
there. So why not turn it into a profit
36:49
center? You know, maximize the rooftop
36:51
real estate? Absolutely.
36:52
It's already there. And, and the solar panels
36:54
actually, so, so the UV rays of the sun is what deteriorates the
36:59
roof up there more than more than anything.
37:02
You know, if there's a tornado or hurricane or whatever, that's
37:05
a little different. But sun hurts that material.
37:09
Am I putting solar panels on it? It protects it.
37:12
So you could actually see some roofing, you know, probably last
37:16
40 years with solar on it. Do you, as a founder, the 10
37:20
years ago founder from where you're at today, what are maybe
37:24
one or two things that you feel like you're just, you really
37:26
learned and maybe the other founders could kind of learn
37:28
from too, or some things that you've skilled up on that you
37:31
weren't good before on but you've gotten better at?
37:33
Well, I would say it's probably the, the tax savings because
37:37
taxes, you know, it's such an important part of what you're
37:40
doing. If you're not planning right for
37:41
taxes, it hurts, you know, so. But he like, what am I owe?
37:46
Yeah. But to be able to get some tax
37:49
credits back, and I mean, just looking into it, like in the
37:54
city of Chicago, they have what they call a TIF.
37:57
So it's an incentive for you to increase the value of your
38:01
building and stay here and keep doing business and keep paying
38:04
crazy taxes. But so like some projects.
38:08
So in that case, the customer has to request it because
38:10
they're the taxpayer to the city and they, they ask, hey, we want
38:14
to upgrade our building. We want to stay here.
38:16
We want to have employer employees here.
38:19
We want to be an employer for a long time.
38:21
Can you help us? And sometimes they'll get free
38:24
money given back to them for a particular project.
38:28
And then when you Add all the other incentives, Yeah.
38:30
So because that doesn't change the incentives.
38:33
Well, but what about just you as a business owner is what I'm
38:36
talking about? Like how have you grown over the
38:38
last 10 years? You know, advice to if there's
38:40
another entrepreneur here regardless.
38:41
Of the industry. No, you're OK, You know,
38:44
regardless of industry, just what are some maybe one or two
38:46
things that you feel like you've really, because I look back for
38:48
me and I'm like, I'm, I've only been at this five years.
38:51
It feels like a lifetime. But at the at the same time, it
38:53
also feels like it was just yesterday.
38:55
But I think, man, five years ago, I didn't know anything.
38:58
Like what I know now, whether it's marketing, sales, how to
39:01
hire people, how to develop, you know, just all of this stuff
39:05
that you see here now. I didn't even know how to set
39:07
any of this stuff. I mean, it was just like, man, I
39:09
feel like the learning curve has been huge.
39:10
So I'm sort of a decade in. There's like, wow, you look back
39:13
at like the 10 years ago, Jim, you're like, yeah, you didn't
39:15
know anything. Well, some things I still
39:17
haven't figured out. Yeah, of course.
39:19
So it's. Always a learning process.
39:20
I think the biggest thing, you know, people, you know, all this
39:24
time I've been putting proposals in front of people that make
39:28
total logical sense, you know, pays for itself or does this and
39:32
cost this. But then you get this back in an
39:34
incentive and all that. And I think what I found is
39:37
people don't make decisions on logic.
39:39
And I'm still trying to figure that whole tricky Rd. out, but
39:43
because every single proposal should have gotten a thumbs up
39:47
because illogically, but people have to come around to it.
39:51
And so I joined the Manufacturers Association here
39:55
in Chicago and I go to a bunch of events and I, I, I, I'm a
39:59
sponsor, like in a bronze level, you just pay more money.
40:03
But but I go to events and do those things.
40:06
And part of the reason is for credibility.
40:09
And, and like I'm telling people how great these incentives are.
40:12
Well, I can say, well, don't ask me talk, talk to Linda.
40:15
She just. She did a project two years ago
40:17
or talked to, you know, people in that organization.
40:20
And I think, I think we're getting close maybe with the
40:23
rate going up and stuff. I, I think it's, you know, some
40:27
of these owners that, that take the step first because a lot of
40:31
people don't want to be first. They want to wait till all their
40:34
friends have done it and OK, I'll do it.
40:36
But the beer distributor guy was kind of the first in his area to
40:42
do that. He didn't, you know, none of his
40:44
compadres had done it yet. And so he got asked to speak at
40:49
this big convention for beer distributors.
40:52
So he's like, I did, you know, and then he's he gave the speech
40:56
as kind of like a leader. So it's funny, once they make a
40:59
decision, I'm going to do this, then they're proud of the
41:02
decision, they start telling everybody, Oh yeah, I got solar,
41:05
You don't have solar yet. They're putting mine up there
41:08
tomorrow. So.
41:09
So it hasn't. Been this element to it right?
41:11
Yeah, and it hasn't really become cool yet, but you know, I
41:16
just keep going. And so part of it is
41:18
persistence. You just got to keep on going.
41:21
I, I have a customer that's had a proposal in 2019 roof solar
41:27
and they're just now finalizing the paperwork to sign it.
41:31
So it takes a little while, but I think things are going to
41:34
speed up a little bit, especially with the new
41:36
administration for sure. People have to feel confident
41:39
too, not just, you know, a logical or not logical, They
41:44
have to feel confident about the next few years while I'm making
41:47
these payments back to the power company or can we afford this
41:51
right now? This, you know, new roof and
41:53
solar is not, not cheap. So they have to be in a good
41:57
place for the, the, the near future to take the steps I
42:01
think. But I think we're almost there.
42:03
To what you were speaking to earlier is not just the logical
42:07
piece, but I think one of the biggest things I've learned in
42:09
marketing over the last five years has been you have to
42:13
appeal to the emotional side of things, to how people are
42:17
feeling and how you make them feel when they go through the
42:20
transformation that you take them through and the results
42:22
that you get them. Because oftentimes it's just
42:25
like you were talking about earlier with I feel like I'm the
42:27
one doing this now, I'm the pioneer, I'm the leader.
42:29
Like this feels good, right? Like people are talking about me
42:32
in a positive light, you know, and for us, it's like helping
42:34
people build personal brand and brand for their company and
42:36
create content and all of these types of things.
42:39
And it's like oftentimes it comes down to do you want to
42:41
feel like you're that key person of influence in your space?
42:44
You want to get invited to conferences to speak because
42:47
people are looking up to you Like, wow, you've, you're
42:49
leading the way. You know, sometimes that's more
42:51
important than even saying, well, look at our last five
42:54
clients. They've gained, you know, 6
42:55
figure deals and this and this. Like, yeah, that's cool, but and
42:58
that's good and you do want to show that, but at the same time,
43:01
how did that make them feel? And what was the emotional
43:03
impact and result of that actually created for them?
43:06
Because people typically, as we know by on emotion and then
43:09
justify on logic. So it's even something I always
43:12
try to I'm trying to even get better at leaning into.
43:15
And it's why I've done I've added emotion in my content even
43:18
and done entertainment and these different types of things,
43:20
because I need to get people to feel it.
43:22
I can't just get them to say on paper, this makes a lot of
43:24
sense. Makes sense to get in front of
43:26
your customers and create content and build brands and
43:28
then build trust and credibility.
43:29
Obviously you're going to win business that way.
43:32
But I got to get people to feel it to get them really bought in
43:34
from an emotional standpoint and saying I want to be that guy or
43:37
gal that is that person I want to deal with.
43:40
That's like to be on stage because people know me now and
43:43
I'm the sought after company because I'm out there.
43:45
You know, it's all those types of things.
43:47
That's a good one. That's a really good one.
43:49
I think everyone listening could could get something out of too,
43:52
because you're you're you probably, I mean, deal with that
43:53
more than anyone. You're like on paper.
43:55
Roger, do you not see how this makes sense?
43:57
And they're like, yeah, no, it makes sense and they never sign.
43:59
It's like because they're not thinking about how it's going to
44:02
make them. Wow, I'm gonna yeah, seen a ZAP
44:04
type person. I'm gonna be looked at.
44:05
Is that I'm gonna Yeah, That's how it's gonna make me feel.
44:07
Well, the beer distributor guys, so they have sales people that
44:10
go out to all, you know, all the stores that sell it and then
44:14
they go out and sell the beer and then the next day that it
44:17
gets delivered. And he said he could not believe
44:20
the amount of customers talking about them having solar and
44:24
asking questions. And it's he said, I, I didn't
44:27
think any of them cared, you know, but it became a topic.
44:31
And then. And so the drivers, Oh yeah, we
44:34
only have solar up there. And I don't know, I don't, but
44:37
he came to me and then he explained, explained it.
44:39
So obviously they're talking about the.
44:40
Fact that he talked about it, right.
44:41
So I think that's like in the content and in the customer
44:44
success stories and making sure you're talking about how people
44:47
are feeling after that going to transformation is huge.
44:49
They had the newspaper come out and took us up on a forklift.
44:53
I was there when they saw, when they were doing it, But they had
44:55
a politician there, the newspaper there.
44:57
They were videotaping it. And yeah, that's cool.
44:59
I didn't say anything, but. But it's kind of nice for PR.
45:03
Yeah. And I also do I've got a couple
45:06
more I got to do that we finished up and I didn't get
45:09
there, but I usually do a drone video for them And so so I could
45:13
write off the drone, but go do. Everything I possibly can.
45:18
But I do it for Muse, you know, with little music and whatever.
45:21
And I give them the raw footage so they don't have to do it if
45:24
they, you know, they're busy making their widgets and then
45:27
send them that and you know, they can put it on Facebook or
45:30
whatever, wherever they want to do.
45:32
Or a lot of customers, a lot of customers, believe it or not,
45:36
are getting asked what are you doing by their customers?
45:39
What are you doing for CO2? And, and that ESG thing that was
45:45
happening, I don't know if it's going to happen or not, but
45:48
people want to know. I guess the idea was that on the
45:51
ESG, if you're going to invest into this company, then you want
45:55
to know how green they are or not green they are or whatever,
45:59
if you're going to buy stock in that or whatever.
46:01
And so everyone's saying, oh, well, we're doing this
46:03
sustainability, we're doing that.
46:05
But it's a everyone's, there's no measuring stick.
46:08
So they were trying to get a measuring stick for that.
46:10
But but yeah, I had a customer, I gave him a roof and solar
46:15
proposal. Gosh, I don't know 2019 and he
46:20
still hasn't done it. But he told me then I have to do
46:23
solar because my customers, he's got customers with like Ford and
46:27
General Motors and, and, and so a lot of times those companies,
46:31
they're publicly traded. So they'll say, we're going to
46:33
do this for our own company, but we're also going to push our
46:38
entire supply chain to reduce CO2 by whatever the number is.
46:43
So, so then it becomes, you know, now I got it.
46:47
Now they have to do something because they're part of a supply
46:49
chain that's. Why they won't be compliant with
46:51
that and they can't work. Yeah, wow.
46:53
So like the beer distributors, they're, you know, they have a
46:58
right to that brand, whatever it is.
47:00
Miller Coors for a certain geography.
47:03
If they say we're going to do our, you know, part in our
47:07
production, in our, you know, of making our product, we're going
47:11
to reduce CO2 by 30% by 2030. If they're publicly traded and
47:16
they say that they have to try to do it and then they always
47:20
have a sub line and another 20% through our entire supply chain.
47:24
So, so now the beer distributor is part of that supply chain and
47:28
they're kind of the monkey in the middle because now you got
47:31
now you got places like Walmart and you know, Jewel Osco or all,
47:35
you know, these big grocery chains, Costco saying, well,
47:39
we're going to reduce our CO2 by this much and we're going to
47:42
encourage our entire supply chain to do some.
47:45
So now it's like it's just. Down.
47:47
Yeah. Wow.
47:48
So to get ahead of it, you know the guy, you know the beer
47:51
distributor, He he decided, let me look at the numbers and let's
47:55
see if it makes financial sense to do with these incentives
47:59
because he literally could get kind of forced into doing it
48:03
down the road anyways. Yeah.
48:06
And maybe there's no incentives there.
48:07
Right. That's a good point.
48:08
So now you're doing it because you have to, and you didn't take
48:10
advantage of any incentives versus now you could.
48:12
Yeah. Did you think you'd be doing a
48:15
podcast 10 years ago? No.
48:17
It's kind of wild. Right.
48:18
Yeah, and. You're on another one later
48:19
today. It's like, yeah, how's that been
48:21
like the last cuz you know, I've been this five years and even
48:24
for me, I've seen a wild change. And before that I was still in
48:27
business working for corporate and I was doing sales, knocking
48:29
on doors, cold calls, emails. I would have told you 10 years
48:33
ago I would have been shocked to say I'm hosting a podcast and
48:36
doing all this video content. I'd be like, really?
48:38
I am, you know, it's like, it's just, I'm curious how you've
48:41
seen that change And I know you've got some videos on the
48:44
site and, you know, probably starting to get more active on
48:46
LinkedIn and things like that. Like, what has it been like the
48:48
last 10 years and what a transformation have you seen
48:51
from a content standpoint, social media?
48:53
Well, I think that a good idea for anybody that's been in sales
48:57
is like, you know, you're constantly reaching out to
49:00
people, reaching out, reaching out, reaching out.
49:02
And, you know, if you believe in what you have to offer, that
49:06
it's a good win win. You know, you feel motivated to
49:11
go out and, you know, touch people, send an e-mail, you
49:15
know, call them, do whatever, follow up and all those things.
49:19
But, you know, things have changed.
49:21
You know, people are like to watch videos and they like to,
49:24
you know, learn more, you know, maybe when they're driving
49:27
instead of listening to the music.
49:29
And so, you know, it's this guy that's kind of representing
49:33
these things. It's nice once in a while to get
49:35
somebody to like call you. So it's a whole.
49:39
Come running to you, right? It's a whole different animal
49:42
and they usually are serious and they want to close and.
49:45
Yeah, that's right. It's a totally different setting
49:49
when you have customers coming to you that the the value is so
49:52
much bigger from the prospect standpoint coming into it.
49:55
Because I remember doing B2B sales and I was again, cold
49:58
calling, emailing, knocking on doors in industrial parks
50:01
because I was selling staffing and recruiting services in the
50:03
engineering field. And it was like every meeting I
50:06
took felt like I'm taking your time and like, they're like, all
50:10
right, what do you got? You know, or maybe I got a need,
50:11
maybe I don't. But I'm trying to build rapport.
50:14
I'm trying to get them to trust me.
50:15
I'm trying to, you know, do all the things you're trying to do
50:17
in a natural way as possible. Ask good questions, uncover some
50:20
needs, figure out what the gaps are.
50:22
And then if we can solve them, solve them, great.
50:23
But when you create content and build a brand, your customers
50:27
are coming to you and said, you've not been watching you for
50:29
the past, you know, four months or five months.
50:31
And you keep talking about building your own internal
50:33
content team. And we really should be doing
50:35
that. And I think you're the person
50:36
that can help us do it. And now all of a sudden it's
50:38
like, OK, well, when do you want to start?
50:40
And not that it's always that easy, but just the conversation
50:44
is flipped. It's like you have the leverage
50:46
now and they're coming to you with like, I'd like to talk
50:49
about working with you versus you having to come to them.
50:51
So yeah, it's huge. Do you feel like, you know,
50:55
people say like your first million in the business is the
50:57
hardest, you know, that first kind of just getting, you're
51:00
working your way up. Do you feel like that's true?
51:02
Like it gets easier with time or you get better with time and
51:04
that first kind of money that you make is the toughest.
51:07
Yeah, I think so. Especially 'cause I mean, what
51:10
you're doing is, is knew that when people weren't doing that
51:13
long ago and with what I'm doing, people aren't really
51:16
doing it yet. I mean, maybe in other states,
51:19
but up here in the North a little bit, it's this is still
51:22
really, really new and it hasn't really become cool yet, but I
51:26
think we're almost there. But.
51:28
Which means like to me, if you're doing something new and
51:30
innovative, huge opportunity potentially assuming that the
51:33
world is going that direction, which it is in our cases.
51:36
But it also means a lot of friction and a lot of education
51:39
and a lot of like I didn't know that was a thing or I didn't
51:42
never heard of that before. Like ours is kind of we're not a
51:45
marketing agency. We help companies build their
51:47
own internal content teams to get better results and drive
51:50
business and build brand. That's somewhat of a newer
51:53
concept where people are like they hear marketing and they're
51:54
like, oh, you're a marketing company, you must do all the
51:56
marketing for the company. It's like, no, no, no, we're the
51:58
opposite. So it's like, I got to go on the
52:00
marketplace and educate people on why that matters to them and
52:03
how they're going to feel having their own internal content team
52:05
and what's going to do for their business versus outsourcing all
52:08
their content. Again, huge opportunity because
52:11
I think that's the way the world's going, especially when
52:13
you have a podcast studio in your damn office now, right?
52:16
And you can shoot phones or shoot videos from your phone
52:19
now. It's like, of course build it
52:20
internally, but it's just people are so used to hiring out for
52:23
something like that that it's like it takes an adjustment in
52:26
education and entertainment to get them to say, OK, yeah,
52:29
there's a better way. So yeah, well, you got a lot of
52:32
opportunity ahead of you, so. Yeah, I.
52:35
Appreciate it, man. Where can, where can people find
52:38
you? We'll wrap this up, but where
52:39
can where do you want people to get a hold of you to potentially
52:41
work with you? Probably going to be businesses
52:43
that stumble upon this podcast, listen to it, see some of the
52:46
clips and go I'd like to talk to Jim and see if he can help me,
52:49
you know, save some money. Sure.
52:51
Yeah, just go to revenuetaskforce.com and there's
52:54
a button there to sign up. We do like a 7 minute incentive
52:58
discovery call to find out why. 7 minutes.
53:01
Because it's short and I can I can tell them what incentives
53:04
you know might be for specifically for that property
53:07
because it depending on the location, each location might
53:12
have a different level of that tax credit that biggest.
53:16
So it could be 30% is pretty much everybody, but I can also
53:20
check pretty quickly if it's 40% or maybe more.
53:25
And so I can tell them that right away.
53:27
And then on the FICA savings program, I can tell them a
53:30
little bit if they're interested in that, I can tell them what
53:32
the savings might look like and what the next steps would be.
53:35
But I, if I can't get through that in 7 minutes, then, you
53:39
know, if they have other questions, they want to, yeah, I
53:42
mean, I can't give them a number on what the roof's going to cost
53:46
and solar's going to cost. So.
53:47
But if they're in, if they decide they want to, you know,
53:50
find out, then we send a roofer out.
53:52
And then we need the actual usage, the monthly usage for a
53:56
year because we want to try to get close to his 100% of that
54:00
usage as possible. So I would get that the roofer
54:03
would go do his thing and then by the time week or so, maybe
54:06
depending on how quickly he gets back, we'll have actual numbers
54:10
to sit down and talk with him. I love, that's why I love
54:13
talking to other founders because I get ideas too.
54:15
It's like 7 minutes. Like that's kind of interesting,
54:17
right? Obviously you got to buffer it
54:19
in case it goes longer. Probably a lot of them do,
54:21
right? But I think there's something
54:22
that's interesting about that. It's like low commitment but
54:25
high value potentially, right? And so.
54:28
See if there's an interest. If there's no interest, you
54:29
wasted 7. Minutes.
54:30
Yeah, exactly. Which isn't a big deal versus 30
54:32
minutes. And then it's like, all right,
54:34
we just wasted 30 minutes, which I've done, I've done before, you
54:36
know, So we all have, right? Yeah.
54:38
It's like, maybe I'm thinking about mine.
54:40
Maybe I go to 10 minutes or 15 minutes, right, And just say,
54:42
hey, 15 minutes. Here's what we do.
54:44
I'm ask you a couple questions. See, there's an opportunity.
54:46
Yeah, we take it from there, right?
54:48
It's like. Yeah, I usually go, well, what
54:50
kinds of projects do you are you looking to do?
54:52
Yeah, the biggest incentive like dollar wise is if you need a
54:56
roof and you combine it with solar, that's the biggest
54:58
incentive available right now. Got it.
55:00
But some of those other ones are pretty cool too.
55:03
Yeah, definitely, absolutely worth looking into it, minimum,
55:06
right? So go to your website, book a
55:08
call there, get ahold of you there.
55:11
Matt, I really appreciate you being on the show, Jim.
55:13
This is a fun conversation. We got through all the stuff I
55:15
wanted to talk about. So I appreciate you coming down.
55:18
No problem. Thanks for having me.
55:19
Thanks. That's great.