Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / How to Build a Business (and Life) that is Full of Abundance, with Stephen Christopher | Staffing Series

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How to Build a Business (and Life) that is Full of Abundance, with Stephen Christopher | Staffing Series · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of Inspired Stories, where leaders
0:07
share their experiences so we can learn from their successes
0:10
how they've overcome adversity and explore current challenges
0:13
they're facing. Welcome to another edition of
0:18
the Inspired Stories podcast where leaders share their
0:22
experiences so we can learn from their successes how they've
0:25
overcome adversity and explore current challenges they're
0:28
facing. My name is Anthony Cotispoti and
0:31
today's guest is Steven Christopher.
0:34
He is the founder of Witt Digital, a multi $1,000,000
0:37
marketing agency that serves home services companies.
0:41
One of their clients said they went from 5 trucks to 12 trucks
0:45
after working with them and the phone just won't stop ringing.
0:48
They've recently started an outbound calling service for the
0:51
home services industry, and aside from helping home service
0:54
companies grow their business through property digital
0:57
marketing strategies, he's also a conscious maverick and we'll
1:01
learn what that means to him. He uses intuitive coaching to
1:05
inspire leaders to learn that they can choose the life they
1:07
want by harnessing the power of creation.
1:11
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benefitsagency.com. Now back to our guest today, the
1:50
founder of WIT Digital, Steven Christopher.
1:53
Steven, I appreciate you making the time to Share your story
1:55
today. Absolutely, man.
1:57
Great to be here, Anthony. Steven, tell me in plain
2:01
English, what does Wit Digital do and how did you get started
2:05
with it? So plain English, we do digital
2:08
marketing for large home service companies which home services
2:12
generally like plumbing, HVAC, electrical stuff like that.
2:17
We do search engine optimization, paid
2:19
advertisement, web design, conversion optimization for
2:24
those. We like to keep it really simple
2:26
because our job is to make their phone rings and get a more
2:29
leads. How did I get started in this?
2:33
So I owned a mortgage company until 2008 when at which point
2:39
in time it crashed and burned. So I learned, I learned how to
2:42
fail in business relatively early on and out of that I kind
2:46
of said OK, cool, what, what skills did I learn that I could
2:50
potentially take into another business?
2:52
And it was like the early days of SEO, search engine
2:56
optimization and I had kind of learned how to do that.
2:59
We ranked first for a lot of these big keywords in the
3:02
mortgage space and and I was like cool, I learned SEO.
3:06
And so on the heels of that I went and took a job making like
3:09
20,000 a year and I started building my next company with a
3:13
friend and we built a digital marketing agency.
3:16
And then in 2014 just the partnership wasn't a good
3:21
partnership and so I ended up selling my half to him and
3:26
started with the next day and that was in 2014.
3:30
So coming up on 10 years. Tell me a little bit more about
3:34
the mortgage business. How long were you in that?
3:37
Yeah. So that was about 2 1/2 to three
3:40
years. And it it, it was, it was cool.
3:44
It was, it was very great. Meaning, like, I don't know how
3:48
many people remember what was going on with the mortgage
3:50
industry, but it was like, you know, it was crazy, right?
3:51
It was wildfire. And you kind of like Wolf.
3:54
Interest rates were low. People were buying houses,
3:57
flipping them. And you had all these crazy
4:00
loans like no income, no asset verification, which you know,
4:03
ultimately was kind of the thing that broke the broke the camel's
4:07
back. But yeah, it was, it was a lot
4:11
of fun. And I also realized how little I
4:13
knew about business. But it was one of those things
4:17
like, I just went all in. I was like, cool, let's just do
4:20
this thing and see what happens. And probably a couple of my best
4:25
lessons out of it was pick resilient industries.
4:29
Hence why we do marketing for plumbing a track and electrical.
4:32
Like, you know, even in the biggest recession, if your air
4:35
conditioning goes out in the middle of the summer, it's 100°,
4:38
you're probably going to get it fixed.
4:39
If your toilet goes out, you're probably going to get it fixed
4:42
or at least prioritize it over a lot of other things.
4:45
So I learned. I learned to get better
4:48
perspective, to actually pay attention to what was going
4:51
outside on outside of my little business and what was going on
4:56
in the rest of the world and certain things that could have
4:59
an impact on what I was doing for business.
5:01
Because at the time, I just didn't really even think of
5:03
that. And it sounds silly now, but I
5:07
don't know. It's just one of those lessons
5:08
that I learned. So tell me more about that
5:12
experience of having this business that you built up over
5:14
the course of two or three years suddenly just collapse.
5:19
I mean, that had to just be crushing.
5:22
It was, you know, it was kind of interesting because there was,
5:28
yeah, like it was, it sucked. Like it was super annoying.
5:31
And, you know, I had put a lot of time and energy into it.
5:34
But honestly, at the same time there was like almost like a
5:37
relaxing piece of it, right? Like, you know, I was always so
5:41
worried like, man is, is this really real?
5:43
Is it ever going to go away? Like, man, am I really creating
5:45
a business. And so there was this relaxing
5:49
piece to like, cool. Like, all the pressure is gone.
5:52
And even though I was dead broke and like, couldn't pay my rent
5:54
to my buddy whose house I was living in and couldn't pay my
5:57
car payment, I don't know. It just wasn't that big of a
6:02
deal for some reason. And I think that probably that
6:06
was also the thing that started me down the the journey of like
6:09
mindfulness and, you know, whatever you want to call it,
6:12
kind of the spiritual side of growth to like, cool man, like
6:17
the business crumbled. Can I learn something from it?
6:19
And like, what's next? So did you have that mindset at
6:24
the time when it was happening? I mean, I'm hearing you use
6:27
words like cool, like, hey, no big deal, whatever, right?
6:31
Like it's and it almost like relaxing that it it failed.
6:35
But I'm also hearing you say flat broke.
6:38
I'm sleeping on my buddy's couch.
6:40
I don't have any money. I can't pay him rent.
6:43
Like, how are those two things? Sort of jiving together.
6:47
It just kind of, so let's see, I mean to kind of answer the
6:52
specific question, right. So yes, there was times in that
6:56
where it was actually stressful, right?
6:58
Where I was like, jeez, I was like, you know, I got no money.
7:01
I can't do anything. You know, I, I, I can't travel.
7:04
I can't, you know, I wanted to take somebody on a date.
7:07
It was like, all right, cool, like, what's kind of a feasible
7:10
place that kind of looks nice that won't cost anything.
7:15
But I'd say more than anything, there was just like kind of this
7:20
relaxation and peace around it. And maybe it was for the right
7:24
reasons, maybe it wasn't like maybe it was more for like cool,
7:27
like now I can't fail any further.
7:30
You know, you always hear these stories about people hitting
7:32
rock bottom, right? And then coming back out and
7:34
there's something just really peaceful about, you know, I I
7:39
was by no means at at a rock bottom, but it was as close as
7:43
I've ever been. And there's just something
7:45
peaceful in that. And there's something to where
7:47
it's like you don't have to stress anymore and now all your
7:52
time and energy can go into what you want to put it into.
7:57
It was almost as if you had this fear like you were describing
8:00
that Oh my gosh, is this real? Is this going to go away?
8:03
Like am I building a real business?
8:05
And that fear then was in some sense realized like and and it
8:10
was taken away very quickly. And so you were able to tell me
8:14
if I'm wrong, but you were able to face this fear and realize,
8:17
oh, this isn't so bad. Yeah, this isn't.
8:21
But I had it built up in my mind to be.
8:24
Yeah, I would say that that is that is an accurate statement
8:28
and you know, depending on how deep you want to get on this, if
8:33
we're all creating our own realities all the time, like I
8:36
probably somewhat created that reality because that's what I
8:40
was focused on. OK, so this kind of opens the
8:44
door to what I'm seeing here on your LinkedIn profile.
8:48
Not only are you the founder of Wit Digital, but you are a
8:51
conscious maverick. And so I'm hearing you talk
8:54
about sort of creating your own reality.
8:58
Let's dive into this a little bit more.
8:59
Tell me more about this kind of thinking and and how you found
9:05
it. How it found you.
9:09
So I would say it, found it. You know, I I think it's there
9:12
for everybody. It's this underlying pull,
9:16
right? Like when you're at the job that
9:19
you hate and you go every day and you have a headache and
9:22
you're miserable and you know that there's something more, but
9:24
you don't do anything about it when you're in a relationship
9:28
and you know that it's time to exit that relationship.
9:31
Like we're all being pulled toward a life of more happiness,
9:37
more fulfillment, more joy, you know, truthfully, more abundance
9:41
in every way. You know, financial time,
9:43
experience, all of that. You know, we're all being pulled
9:46
to that. Because I think that that's just
9:48
our natural state. And I think we, I think so much
9:52
of the world has covered that up for us from an early age that we
9:57
just, we just start to believe it.
9:59
We just start to believe that life has to be hard, life has to
10:02
be stressful. Life has to be, you know,
10:05
frustrating. There's never enough time,
10:07
There's never enough money. Like, but come to find out, I
10:12
just don't really think that that's actually true.
10:15
And so I think for me, it was just this deeper pull.
10:22
And when I got to the place where things were so stressful
10:26
and they just didn't seem to work, and I kind of just
10:29
decided, cool, there's got to be something more.
10:32
And that's when I started reading, like personal
10:34
development books. And then you know, I was all in
10:36
on like man, if I'm going to, I'm going to set my, you know,
10:39
my, my revenue goal for the year and my personal growth goal and
10:42
I'm going to create a vision board of my house and you know,
10:45
all that kind of stuff. And that was, that was all fine
10:49
and good. But what I think a lot of people
10:52
miss with that is the truth is, is that for most of us when we
10:56
do that, it doesn't actually feel good, right.
11:00
We look at our vision board and half the time we feel like crap
11:05
because we don't have the things that we say that we want.
11:10
And I did that for several years and I would look back at my
11:15
journals and I was like, dude, I'm setting the same freaking
11:18
goals every year and I'm never quite getting them.
11:20
And I just feel like shit when I don't.
11:23
And so phase three, there's got to be something more than I
11:27
started going down more of a spiritual path and not religious
11:30
or anything. Just like cool, man, you know,
11:32
like hippie stuff. Like, you know, why are we here?
11:34
Like, let's, you know, let's go deep, Let's get into, you know,
11:36
meditation. I mean, some of the stuff that
11:38
you know, that you've done with me, Anthony, and then really
11:42
started to just kind of see what else was possible.
11:46
And so I think that the, the suffering kind of led me down a
11:52
path of there's more and the ability to listen to that pole.
11:57
And even when I was doing the things that I thought that most
12:01
people told me I should be doing right, get your vision board,
12:04
set your goals. Like, do all this.
12:06
I was like, this doesn't feel any better than when I was,
12:09
like, completely miserable and broke.
12:12
But it's just this weird trick of like, yeah, man, I'm going
12:15
to, I'm going to do it. I'm going to get it.
12:16
I'm going to, I'm a manifester. But it didn't feel good.
12:20
And I was just like, cool. There's got to be more.
12:22
And I think the, you know, I think a lot of people stop in
12:24
that and then they just end up perpetually creating more of
12:28
what they don't want. But I'll kind of digress here
12:31
for a minute. But yeah, it was like, if you
12:36
don't actually feel good, then I'm kind of missing the point of
12:40
life. And so I just said, cool.
12:43
I'm going to find things that make me feel good.
12:44
And then when I started feeling better and I started having more
12:48
fun and I started letting go of, like, these old beliefs of how
12:52
things should be. And you know what most of us
12:55
might consider facts? Like?
12:57
I just started letting him go, like magic started happening.
13:00
And then I finally started realizing, oh shit, like we do
13:02
live in a universe where kind of our minds and our thoughts and
13:06
our energy create stuff. I just didn't realize that I was
13:09
aiming in the wrong direction for quite some time.
13:12
So would you say it was the release of the attachment to
13:15
these things that was kind of like a flip of a switch for you?
13:21
I would say that that was a was a big part of it and then
13:26
probably the bigger part was down the journey of like
13:30
self-awareness, right? Like truly being honest with
13:33
myself, like OK, what am I actually thinking about all day?
13:38
And I did this weird exercise I forgot if I heard it somewhere
13:43
or not. But I basically took a tape
13:45
recorder and for three days in a in a little notepad and for
13:47
three days I I voice recorded or wrote down every thought I I had
13:54
at least that I could capture, right.
13:56
And I mean this would go on for like 20 hours a day.
13:59
And yeah, it's a very interesting experience.
14:02
Like I wouldn't recommend it to a lot of people.
14:04
But if you're kind of a glutton for punishment and you really
14:08
want to figure out what you think about all day, do this.
14:11
It will make you feel kind of crappy.
14:14
But then you can realize what what the truth is, right?
14:18
Like, we all, we all tend to go around thinking we're like these
14:20
positive people. And like, yeah, man, I'm
14:22
thinking about what I want. Like the truth is most of us are
14:24
not doing that. Like we're thinking about crappy
14:27
stuff all day and we're we're poisoning ourselves.
14:30
And so anyway, point being is that the the, the journey of
14:34
kind of self-awareness and just being honest with myself about
14:38
yeah, like dude, I I think a lot of non ideal thoughts and like
14:44
how can I change that. And so, you know, you go into
14:47
like Buddhism and some other religions like that.
14:49
Like they talk about discipline. And I used to think discipline
14:52
was like against the flow of the universe and you know life and
14:56
God and whatever. But it kind of dawned on me like
15:00
if I'm going to be disciplined about anything, be disciplined
15:03
about like what thoughts I'm allowing to get wings and legs
15:07
in my mind. And the ones that I don't want
15:10
be disciplined about letting those go and then shining a
15:14
light on the the good ones, shining a light on like the
15:16
things that are going well and the potentials that I really do
15:20
want, even if I don't know exactly how to get them.
15:24
But yeah, I would say that's. And so is what you're describing
15:28
is it sort of the the power of positive thought is just when
15:33
I'm thinking better thoughts, when I'm thinking happier
15:36
things, I'm putting myself into a better mindset.
15:39
And so I'm just going to be happier about what comes my way.
15:44
Or are you describing something that's a little bit more
15:46
metaphysical that you believe takes place where?
15:49
Kind of like, what was that that book in the movie a while back,
15:53
The Secret where you're actually.
15:55
Attracting it to you, Yeah. I mean, here's the basics of it,
15:58
right? Like everything is energy,
16:01
right? Like, you know, where, you know,
16:03
we, we think that the desk is solid and blah, blah, blah.
16:05
And really it's just made-up by a bunch of energy and vibrating
16:08
molecules and stuff. And so like attracts like.
16:12
So whatever whatever vibration we are vibrating at, we're going
16:16
to attract and create more of that.
16:19
And so, you know, I don't necessarily know that I would
16:23
follow exactly what the secret says.
16:25
I think there's some pieces missing in there.
16:27
But the simple part of it is like when you feel good, the
16:32
universe and God and whatever reflects back more things to
16:36
feel good about. So whether that's the new car,
16:39
whether that's more money, whether that's more travel,
16:41
whether that's a better relationship, whether it's
16:43
whatever it is, right? So it's not necessarily about
16:47
like force positive thinking, because I think that that was a
16:50
trend that that also created a lot of issues, kind of like the
16:53
whole vision board thing, right. Because, you know, people get up
16:55
in the morning, they feel like shit, but yet they're over here
16:58
reading this mantra about like, you know, what's the old Stuart
17:01
Smalley when he looks in the mirror?
17:02
Like you know, I'm, I'm good looking whenever.
17:07
Yeah, I'm good enough. I'm smart enough.
17:09
I got it people. Like, I got it.
17:10
People like me. And so I think the I think the
17:14
most important thing, and this is like even how we teach our
17:16
staff about this stuff, is when you say something, does it feel
17:20
good or not? And if it doesn't feel good,
17:22
then you need to find a better entry point to it.
17:26
So if you're like, I'm a millionaire, I'm a millionaire
17:28
and and deep down you're like, you know, I can't even figure
17:31
out how to make $1000 a month like cool.
17:34
You should probably not try to force yourself to think the
17:36
thoughts of I'm a millionaire. Like what if you could just
17:39
think a thought and feel a positive emotion around, you
17:42
know, I I can be abundant. I just haven't quite figured out
17:47
how to do it yet. You know, like Kit, what's
17:50
something that you can actually hold on to and feel good about?
17:53
And then as you feel good about that thing you will get the
17:57
opportunities that lay out in front of you to move you down
18:01
that path. And you know that's just where I
18:04
don't know, man. The the whole, like you know
18:06
social media right. Like they just you got a bunch
18:10
of people trying to tell other people what to do that haven't
18:13
even done the thing that they're teaching trying to make money or
18:18
trying to like fake it till you make it.
18:20
And I don't think that they're I'll intentioned.
18:22
I think that they are just not there yet to be able to be a
18:27
teacher. But you have so many people that
18:29
are kind of been like a crappy place where there's like Oh my
18:32
gosh, like I'll listen to anybody if they can help me.
18:36
And so it's this big issue about like be careful about who you're
18:41
taking advice from. Like is the person that you're
18:43
taking advice from a life that you would want to actually live.
18:47
And you know, most of the time it's no, but I don't know, man.
18:51
Like we put so much pressure on ourselves to do all these things
18:56
and be all these things. But in reality, it is a
19:01
disconnect. And we are, we are literally
19:03
pulling the opposite direction of what we say we want.
19:08
And that's why you have so many people that aren't getting what
19:11
they want. You have people that are
19:12
extremely unhappy, that live in this constant state of stress.
19:16
And that's why they're like, see, I told you, like, I told
19:19
you it wasn't going to work. I told you that the relationship
19:22
wasn't going to work. The business wasn't going to
19:24
work. The money wasn't going to come.
19:25
Like, well, yeah, of course it's not going to come because you
19:27
didn't actually expect it to. So, do you have any resources
19:32
that you recommend for people, whether they're particular
19:34
instructors to follow? Maybe books or websites that you
19:38
have found helpful on your path. Yeah, So this is an interesting
19:44
question, right? I used to always have a ton of
19:46
books. I I have some bigger books like,
19:50
you know, Eckhart, Tolle, a New Earth, one of my favorite books.
19:53
They're very kind of woo, woo, high out, spiritual and and not
19:57
everybody is going to be ready for those.
19:59
I mean I read some Eckhart Tolle 10 years ago and I was like,
20:01
what the hell? I was like this guy is
20:03
ridiculous and he talks so slow like how can I ever listen to
20:06
this? And now I go back and listen to
20:07
it. I'm like, Oh yeah, I totally get
20:10
it now. So I'll say this, I think that
20:15
it's really important for people to be cautious about what they
20:21
are seeking. Because you can spend so much
20:24
time reading the next book, following the next guru, and we
20:29
think we get it mentally and so we move on to the next thing,
20:33
but it doesn't actually sink in. And So what I would tell people
20:37
to do is, you know, I love some authors like Eckhart Tolle,
20:41
Wayne Dyer, Joe Dispenza. You know, I think you could just
20:44
pick any of those and just listen to something and see
20:49
where it ends up taking you see what next book recommendation,
20:52
see what next YouTube recommendation.
20:54
But be really cautious about just taking in information over
20:59
and over and over and over and learn to actually get to know
21:03
yourself a little bit. Like, you know, for people
21:06
listening, like, when's the last time you just sat in a dark room
21:09
and closed your eyes for 10 minutes and, like, breathe
21:14
consciously, like deep into your belly and see what shows up?
21:19
Like, we're always looking for these answers outside of us,
21:22
right? But very few people take the
21:23
time to come and get to know, know yourself.
21:27
And we have this amazing intuitive guidance system
21:30
called, you know, feelings and emotions.
21:32
And we just, you know, we were never taught as kids to get in
21:35
touch with those. And so we lose out on this
21:38
whole, you know, Sixth Sense or whatever you want to call it.
21:41
So before you go down paths of just like following teachers,
21:45
right, Like, also make sure that you're learning to get in touch
21:48
with yourself at the same time. Then you canmore consciously
21:52
choose who those teachers are that you should be listening to
21:54
right now. Because there's teachers that I
21:56
had 10 years ago that were perfect for me at the time
22:00
because they opened the door to something else.
22:03
But now I look back and I'm like, haha, yeah, like I would
22:06
never listen to anything you're saying because you just, you
22:09
know, you never actually evolved.
22:11
But thank you for opening that door for me at that point in
22:15
time. Is there something that's a
22:17
little bit more entry level for people who maybe aren't ready
22:20
for kind of the woo woo that you put it?
22:25
You know, Wayne Dyer has some really good stuff.
22:27
That is what I would consider to be like entry level because it
22:31
bridges that gap between kind of you know, big picture
22:35
spirituality but also like manifestation.
22:39
And so I think he's a really good kind of intro person.
22:43
If you're finally ready to lean into this like you know the
22:48
universe is all energy and you know manifestation and like and
22:53
stuff like that. So I would say he's a good one
22:56
to kind of start that stuff with.
22:57
I mean, Joe Dispenza is great because Joe Dispenza does a ton
23:00
with science. So people that need something to
23:03
grasp onto that's kind of factual or scientific.
23:07
There's there's plenty of proof in a lot of his books to like,
23:12
hey, like meditation can can completely heal you.
23:15
And here's 17 examples of how how it happened with X-rays and,
23:20
you know, all of that kind of stuff.
23:22
And so how does this type of conscious, conscious maverick
23:26
thinking show up in your business, for your employees,
23:31
for your clients? So we talked about this stuff
23:36
with them. I mean, I have a one-on-one with
23:37
every employee in the company every other month and my whole
23:42
kind of my structure for my one on ones is very much towards
23:47
mindset, right. So bring me the things that are
23:50
stressing you out. Bring me the things that you
23:52
know that you're, that you can't quite work through in your mind.
23:54
Bring me the things that are making you, you know making you
23:58
unhappy and I'll kind of work through that And then my
24:01
business partner focuses more on the structure of the business
24:04
during his one on ones. But I don't know like I'm just a
24:08
believer that this stuff works because I've seen it work over
24:13
and over again and like I just I use it all the time.
24:16
And so we don't force any of this kind of stuff on our
24:20
employees, but we make it available.
24:22
And we talk about things like, I mean we do, we do meditations to
24:27
sometimes open up our all team meetings.
24:29
And you know, at first, like with new employees, they're
24:31
like, Oh my gosh, this is weird. Like, did I join a cult or
24:34
whatever? And we'll do like a 10 minute
24:36
meditation and I'm like, cool. Do you feel better now than you
24:40
did before? And they're all like, well,
24:42
yeah, I feel great. I'm like perfect.
24:44
You can do this at any point in your day, right.
24:47
And so we're giving them these tools that are that are leaving
24:51
cracks indoors and then they can choose to walk through ones that
24:54
they're ready for that they want to.
24:57
But I believe in business that you know business is really the
25:02
number one place that we have to impact adults, right.
25:07
So kids, you have school and whatever your opinion is on
25:11
that. But with adults, right?
25:13
Like, business is the place where they spend the most time.
25:18
And it's where most people are going to get almost all of their
25:21
education from, right? Because other than that, they go
25:24
home, they hang out with their spouse, they hang out with their
25:26
family, they go to, you know, football games and whatever, and
25:28
you hear chatter on the sidelines.
25:30
But I mean, there's nowhere else to actually educate adults that
25:35
aren't seeking it besides business.
25:37
And so I I believe that as a business owner, like I have some
25:42
sort of a duty to like help people grow if they want to.
25:48
It's not forced, right? Like, I don't care if you
25:51
meditate or you don't meditate, but I encourage you to like try
25:55
things on and see does it feel better than what you had been
26:00
doing before. So we make it a point to to make
26:04
this stuff available to our employees.
26:06
I coach, I mean a handful of our clients on this type of stuff.
26:10
Like when our clients are having bad days, they they call me and
26:15
like, how cool is that? You know, like we're not just a
26:18
marketing agency. Like we're the resource that
26:20
they call when they're having a bad day or they're struggling Or
26:23
like, you know, they they know that they're trying to create
26:26
something, but it keeps not happening.
26:28
And like, we'll work through that stuff with them.
26:31
I'm curious. How those those kinds of
26:32
conversations come up for the first time with a client?
26:37
So it's kind of weird. But besides, people that might
26:42
know or have heard me talk about this stuff because I'll talk
26:45
about it occasionally, like through our social media and
26:47
stuff like that. But this is the weird part.
26:51
We'll just get clients that call and and they'll even just say
26:54
they're like, dude, I don't know why I'm calling you.
26:57
I just your name popped into my head and I thought maybe you
27:00
could help and I'm like, yes, perfect.
27:02
That makes perfect sense, right? Like it's just you can't, You
27:07
can't. You can't deny the amount of you
27:10
know coincidences in the world. Like if you are open to helping
27:17
somebody, the people that need help with your skills will just
27:21
show up. So who is your ideal client?
27:24
Like why would somebody hire you guys versus one of your
27:27
competitors? Yeah.
27:28
So ideal client, you know the specifics about it is a home
27:32
service company that does you know probably 3-4 million on the
27:35
low side up to about 40 million on the high side.
27:38
And they desire a marketing agency that will actually create
27:43
a partnership with them. And I know all agencies say this
27:47
and all agencies say they have you know the secret sauce and
27:50
how to get results and blah blah blah.
27:52
But we've actually just done it and we actually partner with
27:58
them. We you know we go in and we
28:00
listen to hundreds of their phone calls during a given month
28:04
to try to figure out where is the revenue going.
28:07
Is there an issue, is there a lead generation issue?
28:09
Are your just are your CSRS not doing a good job answering the
28:12
phone Kind of whatever it takes to truly help them identify
28:19
issues and solve them whether it's within the set of sort or
28:24
set of things that they're paying us for or not.
28:27
And honestly as simple as it sounds that's why people partner
28:32
with us because we are there all the time.
28:35
We send them weekly updates. Whereas most marketing agencies
28:38
don't talk to these people for, you know, sometimes months on
28:41
end unless the client reaches out to them like they're just,
28:46
they're just a number to a lot of agencies.
28:48
And we train our staff, the importance of like, hey, what we
28:52
do for them is very, very important.
28:54
What we do is drive leads and that drives revenue.
28:57
And if we're not driving enough leads, they're having to send
29:00
technicians home and their technicians don't get paid if
29:03
they're not working. And that impacts the family and
29:05
then that impacts that family and then that family takes that
29:08
out to their community. That has a negative impact.
29:11
So when we talk about what we're really doing here and and our
29:14
staff enjoy that, like they take it personally that they are
29:19
impacting a lot of other people down the chain.
29:23
And I think that's what makes this different.
29:25
I mean I'd love to say that we have some sort of secret sauce
29:28
for, you know, for SEO and pay per click.
29:31
I mean we are very, very good at it and we get excellent results.
29:35
But you know, it's not rocket science to do really good SEO.
29:39
Most agencies are just too lazy to do it.
29:42
You know, they don't give their staff enough time to do it and
29:45
so they don't have good results, but we get really good results
29:51
and we just, you know, our team laughs internally, right?
29:54
I don't know if I can say this, but they laugh internally and
29:57
that The thing is, is like we give a shit the most.
30:00
And that's their theme that they talk about all the time.
30:02
And they tell clients that and clients will call me and they
30:05
say like, dude, they they said this to me and I thought it was
30:09
BS. But now three months later,
30:11
they're like, you guys are awesome.
30:13
Like you actually do care. That's great.
30:16
You described going through the call recordings to see what's
30:21
going on or the customer service reps doing the right thing, not
30:24
doing the right thing, following the script etcetera.
30:27
Are you guys, I'm guessing the the the advent of a lot of these
30:32
AI tools is probably making that a lot more feasible, a lot more
30:37
efficient to do that kind of scrubbing.
30:40
It's getting there. It's not as far along as we'd
30:42
like to see it and it's not as far along as most agencies will
30:46
tell you, at least not that we found, you know, we're we don't
30:50
know everything and so maybe there is something out there.
30:52
But surprisingly like there's still some work to be done
30:58
within AI to really go to the level of detail that that our
31:02
team goes to. Like, I mean, we'll do reports
31:04
and it'll say cool. You know, it took, you know, how
31:07
many rings did it take to answer What was the tone in the
31:11
emotional impact that the CSR had on the person?
31:16
Did they know the software? Did they not know the software?
31:19
You know, how many times did they hesitate?
31:21
How many times did they say, did they use any words that could be
31:24
potentially offensive to somebody?
31:26
Like, we had a client with this really sweet older woman and she
31:30
called everybody Hun. And what we found out is that a
31:34
lot of people actually didn't like that.
31:37
And so there's a lot of things that, you know, we haven't found
31:40
ways to compile using AI to actually do the depth of which
31:44
we're listening. But I mean, you know, hey, give
31:47
it six months and it'll probably be there.
31:49
Right. Yeah.
31:50
I was checking out your blog. One of your entries you talked
31:53
about something called Melissa Data Reports.
31:57
What are these and how are they valuable to your customers?
32:00
Yeah. So Melissa Data is, is this big
32:02
data company and what they do is it, it's not much, it's a few
32:07
100 bucks. We'll basically take our clients
32:09
entire database, right, all of their existing clients, any past
32:13
clients and just anybody that they've talked to or gone to
32:16
their home or done estimate for received a phone call.
32:20
And we'll upload all of that data and they will spit out this
32:24
really detailed report that shows cool your, you know your
32:30
average client is a 40 to 65 year old female that has 1 1/2
32:36
kids, has a household income of over 100,000, you know, drives a
32:40
Lexus, whatever, whatever they can aggregate on those people's
32:45
information. And then that way now from a
32:49
marketing perspective, we can talk to that ideal client more
32:53
intelligently. So if it if it tends to skew an
32:57
older demographic, great, we're probably going to make the
32:59
website a little more simple, little larger font.
33:02
If it skews younger, we're going to make it make the website look
33:06
a little bit more like a social media feed because you know you
33:10
get a 35 year old, what are they used to, They're used to sitting
33:12
on Instagram all day. So we're going to make the
33:14
website look a little bit more like that.
33:16
So it's just information, you know, our clients already have
33:19
all of this information on their customers.
33:21
It's just this is a really cool way to kind of aggregate it and
33:27
spit out some reports that that can really help us identify who
33:31
are we talking to as a true ideal client.
33:35
That way our messaging is on point, you know, things like
33:38
font, things like color schemes and all of that.
33:41
We can be a little bit more intentional with that to speak
33:44
to their primary ideal client. Tell me more about the new call
33:48
center solution that you guys are offering.
33:53
Yeah. So in the home service industry,
33:56
there's there's a thing called outbounding and essentially you
34:00
know, you have people that take the calls, right?
34:02
You know, so that's inbound phone calls that come from leads
34:04
or existing clients and that's an important piece.
34:08
But when home service companies are a little bit slow or if
34:12
they're just doing a really good job of keeping their brand up,
34:16
one of the things that they can do is called outpounding.
34:18
Meaning like you know, an average home service company
34:21
might have, I don't know, 10,000 people in their database that
34:25
they've worked for over the years or have called in for
34:28
estimates and stuff like that. So we will call those people out
34:33
of their CRM and either just check in on them, see if they
34:37
need anything, see how they're doing, thank them for utilizing
34:41
our client or do things like call on like open estimates,
34:46
right. So you think about an HVAC
34:48
person, they go out to a bunch of homes every day, they see
34:52
people, they're writing an estimate or a proposal for work
34:55
to be done. And unfortunately a lot of home
34:59
service companies, you know, they write the estimate and then
35:02
that's kind of the end of it. And if the customer calls back
35:04
and books, cool, like we got the job.
35:07
If they don't, a lot of times nobody ever follows up on that,
35:11
on that, that lead or that open estimate.
35:14
And so this is kind of a way to solve that problem for them
35:18
because inbound call takers, like like a customer service Rep
35:23
is 1 type of kind of skill set, right?
35:27
Like it takes the type of person to do that, But to actually call
35:30
out and start a dialogue and create trust and show show
35:35
somebody, hey, I'm not here to sell you anything.
35:37
I'm just, I'm going to ask you some questions.
35:39
I'm going to see how you're doing because none of our stuff
35:42
is is hard sell. It just takes a very different
35:45
type of person. And so in the industry very few
35:48
companies have that kind of outbound department built or
35:52
have figured out a really good way to do it.
35:54
So we just saw a a need in the industry and so we started, we
35:58
started building a a solution for it.
36:01
So you've got some folks that have sort of this skill and
36:04
obviously some training as well and how to do it.
36:07
There's got to be some kind of a tie in to the client software.
36:10
Is that sort of a difficult integration to manage there?
36:14
No, no, they just they log in directly to the client CRM.
36:18
They, you know, we have, we have it sorted to where they know,
36:21
cool, here's the people that you can call, they can put notes
36:24
directly in the client CRM and then when we book something now
36:27
we have data directly from the client CRM to say, hey you know,
36:31
you guys spent whatever it is, you know $3000 with us this
36:35
month and we made you you know $35,000 based on follow-ups and
36:39
things like that. So everything we do is out of
36:41
the client CRM. Now that would be powerful if
36:44
you've got those reports to be able to tell them, hey, you paid
36:47
us whatever it is, you know, 1000 dollars, $2000 this month
36:52
for this service and we turn that into $35,000 in revenue.
36:56
Makes it pretty easy to get them to renew at that point, yeah.
36:59
Exactly. And that's how you know even
37:01
from the marketing agency side, everything we do is all based on
37:04
ROI. So like our our reporting is we
37:08
make sure our tracking is all set up in your CRM and then we
37:12
pull your ROI data from there every month.
37:16
So you spend $5000 in SEO that month.
37:19
Cool. We made you 95,000.
37:23
Seems like a pretty good, pretty good investment.
37:27
You know, pay per click, it's you spent this, you made that.
37:30
Whereas most marketing agencies are just afraid to do that
37:33
because, I mean, it sucks, right?
37:36
Like you're being held accountable to a number that you
37:39
don't have complete control over.
37:42
Whereas we just said, you know, we're just going to be held
37:44
accountable to what the most important thing is.
37:48
And then we're going to go in and do things like listen to
37:49
phone calls. So we can say, hey, we're doing
37:52
our job, we're sending you hundreds of leads every month.
37:55
But you know, you have 4 phone, 4/4 to 8 phone calls a day that
37:59
are going to voicemail Your CSR, you know, poor Sarah is just,
38:03
you know, her booking percentage is like 5%.
38:06
She's losing all these calls. Like come on, be a good partner
38:09
with us. We'll we'll take ownership if
38:11
we're not doing a good job. And you need to kind of take
38:14
ownership in those areas that that you're not doing a good
38:18
job. They're holding your client
38:19
accountable to do their part of it.
38:21
Yeah, yeah, let's be a partner. Like, let's let's, let's all do,
38:26
let's all do our part and let's, let's have a real relationship
38:30
to where you can say, hey, you guys suck this month and we can
38:33
say, you know, jeez, shit, sorry, we do, we'll fix it, you
38:38
know what I mean? But we need to be able to point
38:41
out things to you and we're not trying to get rid of the blame
38:45
or anything. It's just like, you know, guys,
38:46
these are businesses like you got to answer the phone, you've
38:49
got to book the call. We can't just keep getting you
38:53
more and more leads so that you can squander, you know, 70% of
38:57
them. Whether you're choosing an
39:00
employee, a vendor, a business partner, maybe even a client,
39:04
what qualities are most important to you?
39:08
Openness, right, like somebody that actually is open to the
39:12
fact that they don't know everything.
39:14
So during the sales process. So we've been through a couple
39:18
different sales people and business development people and
39:20
stuff like that. And those people were good, but
39:23
what we found is that they want to do their job, they want to
39:28
close business, right. And so we would get clients that
39:31
just weren't a good fit, that thought they knew everything and
39:35
just simply didn't and that would stress our team out, that
39:38
would take away from other clients.
39:40
And so meet myself and Andrew, my business partner.
39:44
We one of us talked to every single new client before they
39:49
come on board because we have to know that they are open to being
39:53
in a real partnership. And you know, whatever that ends
39:57
up meaning down the road, but they have to be open to like,
40:00
hey, I don't know everything and we'll say that we don't know
40:04
everything. So let's just do a really good
40:07
job of forming an actual relationship.
40:10
And if if we're kind of stuck in one month, great, we're on it,
40:14
we're going to fix it. And if you're kind of stuck in
40:16
one month, like be open to hearing our feedback and just
40:19
fix it. We're not mad at you.
40:21
We're not. We're not trying to point out
40:23
anything like you're a failure. It's just.
40:26
Let's be in this thing together. And so, I mean, we kind of have
40:30
a rule. No, no jackasses as clients
40:33
like. It's just life is too short.
40:36
You ever fire a client? Yeah, often, I guess.
40:41
I wouldn't say often, but we always fire clients as soon as
40:45
they are no longer a good fit and we do not mess around with
40:49
it. What's that conversation sound
40:53
like? You're no longer a fit period.
40:57
Goodbye. And and we do so just like
41:02
internally with staff, this is the way we deal with that.
41:05
If if we can go to sleep at night and say we gave this
41:10
person every opportunity to succeed and they continue to not
41:16
or not be open to grow if they're willing to grow, then
41:21
that's the end of that relationship.
41:25
Steven, I just have one more question for you.
41:26
But before I ask it, I want to point people to your website so
41:29
they know how to get in touch with you.
41:31
It's WIT delivers WIT delivers.com.
41:36
Is that the best place for people to get in touch with you?
41:38
Yep. Right.
41:39
OK. So last question, how do you see
41:42
your industry evolving in the next 5 to 10 years?
41:46
That's a great question. So do you mean the home service
41:49
industry or the digital marketing industry?
41:51
Which one feels more specific to you?
41:54
So I'll touch on both of them. So digital marketing, to be
41:58
really honest with you, I have no idea and I don't think
42:01
anybody does, right. Like even the biggest companies,
42:04
the hundred $200 million companies that are building
42:06
their own AI and all this kind of stuff, like you know, I've
42:09
seen a lot of it and it's cool, but as soon as as soon as the
42:15
rest of the world changes and evolves, it almost becomes
42:19
obsolete. Like it's it's happening so
42:22
quick that the people that are trying to be out on that little
42:26
razor's edge and be this like silver bullet or magic bullet or
42:30
whatever it is, like they're getting some incremental
42:33
changes, but there are some incremental changes in result,
42:37
but everything else changes so quick that it kind of shrinks it
42:41
back to almost nothing. And so a lot of those
42:43
unfortunately are selling based on claims of like, oh, we have
42:48
our own you know, AI that's smarter than anybody else.
42:51
And I'm like cool, Well then how come every one of your clients
42:55
in, in markets where we have clients we're winning because we
42:58
don't have, you know, we don't have a multi $1,000,000 AI tool.
43:01
Like we're just doing things right based on how Google wants
43:05
to see them. So I I don't know how the
43:08
digital marketing industry is going to change, but it's always
43:12
going to change slower than we think it is, right?
43:14
Like, you know, marketers ruin everything.
43:17
Like how many emails a day do you get?
43:20
Like, Oh my gosh, Anthony, I've got to tell you about this new
43:23
AI software that my company created that we can book you 14
43:26
to 22, you know, new appointments every single day.
43:29
And we don't, we don't, we don't get paid unless you book.
43:33
It's all too good to be true. It's all BS, right?
43:38
And and so it's going to change slower than we think it is and
43:41
we will have time to to catch up and things like that.
43:44
And then as far as the home service industry goes, you know
43:48
the home service industry is still like 5-6 years behind most
43:52
other industries. They just had a ton of new like
43:55
digital marketing come in that are promising over promising
43:59
under delivering and they kind of got burnt on it.
44:01
So I think they're going back to like, jeez, I'm just, I just
44:04
want to deal with people that are good people, that care, that
44:07
do a good job and that I can actually talk to.
44:11
And I mean, from a standpoint of like AI and stuff like that, I
44:17
can't imagine in the next 10 years that robots are going to
44:21
be replacing hot water heaters at homes.
44:23
There's just too many variables. You know, maybe I'm wrong, maybe
44:27
it's five years, maybe it's seven.
44:28
But, you know, it's hard to believe that in the next 10
44:31
years these workers are going to be replaced by some sort of
44:37
robot or AI like call centers and stuff, Maybe online booking.
44:41
Sure, but I mean, to replace a hot water heater in a home
44:45
requires just so many different factors that I just don't see it
44:51
happening. So it.
44:53
Probably takes somebody longer to get the robot set up inside
44:56
the home than it would for the. Guy.
44:58
Yeah, I mean, come. In and do the skill itself.
45:00
Yeah, I mean, you know, how does a robot know how to, like, walk
45:03
down a flight of stairs? And you know, it's a house that
45:05
was built 40 years ago. And so the blueprints say this,
45:08
but they've had seven different you know, they had three
45:10
different bathrooms put in and you know this guy wired this and
45:13
this guy plumbed this like you just, you know, it's it's hard
45:17
to figure that out. So I don't know.
45:22
I don't know, man. Your guess is as good as mine.
45:24
And I think it, you know, outside of the very, really,
45:28
really smart people which, you know you and I have some of
45:30
those in our little group, I mean, outside of those elite
45:33
few, you know, anybody else online, they're just making it
45:36
up. They have no freaking clue
45:37
what's going to happen in the industry and what's not like
45:40
they're just trying to sell you something.
45:42
But there are some really cool people that probably could
45:45
answer that question. And hey, maybe they say, oh
45:47
dude, hot water heaters, we're we're in on that in like 5
45:51
years. Watch.
45:53
Well, it'll be fun to watch. See what?
45:55
Happens. I mean, yeah.
45:56
And and that's the other thing, like going back to the beginning
46:00
of the conversation, like, don't stress out about what could be
46:04
coming in the future. Like, pay attention to it.
46:06
Like the lesson I learned from the mortgage company.
46:08
But dude, when you're just having fun doing what you're
46:10
doing and and like you're helping people and you're
46:13
feeling good, the next thing will naturally evolve for you.
46:17
Like you'll never You can't be left behind if that's the
46:21
mindset that you have and you're open to the change and you're
46:24
open to seeing what comes next. Like, just have fun with it.
46:28
Like, we'll all be fine. Thank you, Steven.
46:33
Thank you. That's a wrap on another episode
46:35
of the Inspired Stories Podcast. Thanks for learning with me
46:38
today.