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Speaker 1 (00:03):

Welcome to the Solarpreneur podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level. My name is Taylor Armstrong and went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fail. online teach you to avoid the mistakes I made and bringing the top solar dogs, the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro and closing more deals. What is a Solarpreneur you might ask a Solarpreneur is a new breed of solar pro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery. And you are about to become one what's up Solarpreneurs.

Speaker 2 (00:43):

Back. We're gearing up for the summer. We are today. Memorial day is when I'm recording this episode. You'll probably hear it later, but we are ready for an awesome summer to close enormous amounts of deals and take advantage of these hot temperatures that we're being given right now. So I'm excited. I'm ready to start crushing some summer deals. I hope you are in whether you are a summer sales rep or you're doing it year after year after year, like myself, take advantage of this summer, coming up and use it to really jumpstart your deals. So I'm excited for an episode. And first, before we jump into anything, I need to give a huge thank you to you. My listeners, um, I just, we just got our hundredth review over on iTunes and I am super appreciative. So if you are a long-time listener or you're just hearing these episodes, give yourself a pat on the back right now.

Speaker 2 (01:44):

I love you guys and appreciate the support that you've given us over the years of we'd done this. Um, it's been a long time. If you look back, we've been doing this podcast since 2018 now, and as I've said before, there's no way I would have kept this going. If it weren't for people sending me comments, leaving reviews, uh, let me know that it's helped them. And then on top of that, just me being a little benefit as well. I'd tell a lot of people that even if guys don't listen to the show, it's helped me learn more. And it's helping me connect with guys who are really doing some awesome things in the industry. So thank you again. Thank you for helping us get to a hundred reviews and yeah, I hope you are taking some good stuff. That's helping you in your cells from the Solarpreneur podcast.

Speaker 2 (02:34):

So that being said, let's jump into it. Um, I did a little presentation two or three weeks ago. We had an event here in San Diego, which we're actually going to be having more. So I'd love for you to come out to our next one, if you want to find out more, um, yeah, shoot me a message. We actually have, I think a list we can put you on that would notify you for any future events. Um, but it was a good event and we had myself, we had Earl Kapule here in San Diego. Who's been on the show, uh, Brent Attaway our marketing guy. Um, and Jay Pez, another big guy that does events with the soar academy here in San Diego. We all spoke at it. We had a good turnout, probably around 30 people there, um, which we didn't promote it a ton, but it's just good to kind of, um, you know, connect with others network and then hear from some of the top minds in solar.

Speaker 2 (03:32):

So what I want to talk about today is just, um, what I presented on at this event. And we had some pretty cool slides that we went over and obviously I'm not going to do the whole presentation. It was like an hour, hour and a half presentation that I gave out this event. So I'm not gonna, um, do an hour and a half podcast right now. But if you want the slides that we did, um, hit me up and definitely send you those. But the title of the presentation I did at this event was called how to separate yourself from the competition, actually being as how to stand out from the competition. And the reason they did this is because here in San Diego, there's there are so many solar companies. I went to church this last Sunday and someone in at my church came up and said, actually, I already hooked them up with solar, where they came up and said, Taylor, since you hooked us up with our soar and got the process started, we've had like four or five guys come to our house.

Speaker 2 (04:30):

And this is in the past month. So I don't know what it's like in other markets, maybe areas are getting hit up that hard, but four to five people in a month, it's like one floor guy knocking on the door a week, right? So that was pretty saturated here. Guys get hit up a lot. And if, especially if you're in a saturated market like San Diego, if you're not progressing, if you are not hustling, then it's going to be really tough to have success. And so that's what I, that's why I did my presentation on that is just because in saturated markets, you need to stand out. You need to think of ways to be different. And even if you're not in a saturated market, if you can do these things, it's going to get you even more cells. Okay. If you're in a market that hasn't been touched much at all, it's going to be easier sells, but really implementing strategies that I'm going to talk a bit here about in this episode, they're going to help you have even more success, even if you're not in a saturated market.

Speaker 2 (05:27):

Hey, so let's talk about a few of them. Okay. And so, first of all, I have a story that happened a few weeks back that illustrates a couple of these points. I was down in Arkin around two of Vista here. That's just kind of the suburb of San Diego and actually got a referral from a deal that I was working with. And funny about this deal. I had gone to him. He had already signed with another company and I thought we could get them like switched over. I, you know, built some value. I showed them what's different about our products, what we had to offer him. And he's like, Taylor, that's sweet. Yeah. Helped me get switched over. And what happened was he ended up being basically a really far along in the process. He was going to get hit with a huge cancellation fee.

Speaker 2 (06:17):

Actually, he didn't even know how to fully cancel it. So by the time I was helping him get the process started with us. He calls me, um, like early in the next week and said, Taylor, actually, I can't cancel they're on my roof right now. Sorry, am I doing it? Then you get to them fast enough. So I got beat to it. But what happened with this deal? He actually gave me a referral. He got installed by a different silver company, but Yami referral, uh, which was his son. So this was the other deal I went to. And that's what I want to talk about. So I show up to his son's house. Um, it's the referral and never had a referral like that really where they sign with another company. And, um, you know, gave me the referral, even though they got installed by someone else.

Speaker 2 (07:06):

Um, but I'm talking to a son I'm saying, Hey. Yeah. Um, unfortunately we were able to get your dad installed, but he did like our program way better. There are some good benefits we're able to offer to him. So I think you're going to love it. Okay. And so I made some crucial mistakes with this, um, appointments that I'm going to bring up here. Um, but as I'm going in the appointment, it's going pretty well. He's telling me what he wants. I'm going through the fact finding saying, Hey, what's your experience? What do you want out of solar? Um, what are you looking to do? Which everyone should be doing, you know, taking out your notepad, writing down what his experience has been with solar written down, what he wants written now, what questions he has. And then as I'm figuring out these things, he tells me, oh, you have two or so I do actually want to get AC and a new roof included in with my solar deal.

Speaker 2 (07:58):

So at this point it kind of throws me for a curve ball. I'm like, okay. Um, yeah, let's look into that. And um, yeah, so he wanted to make it a huge project. He wanted to add in all these extra things, which some people do this, but I prefer to just hopefully keep it as simple as possible. I personally don't love adding all these things in, even though it can be super powerful if you were adding in different products and different home improvements into the project. But of course I'm like, okay, no worries. We're going to get you this. Yeah, we can do that. No problem. So we're going through in the deal. And, um, it became pretty obvious. I went on to, I wasn't ready to necessarily add these different home improvement products in with the deal I was telling him we could get them for him.

Speaker 2 (08:44):

But truth is I had no idea how much those things were going to cost. Um, I had no idea, um, you know, how to get those things started right. Then I just thought, okay, I'm gonna sell his deal. Hi, I'm going to add in, you know, 10, 15 grand on the total cost of the project. And that should cover it. Um, actually it was more than that cause he wanted a roof too. So I think I added in like 20 grand for a new roof in AC, so a pretty big project. Um, and then we're going, he's like, and everything about it. And we're talking with him and his wife and we got them approved for credit. Everything's good. Then we go to sign the dotted line. The wife comes out sweeps out of nowhere and says, Taylor, yeah, I just don't feel comfortable. I know you're saying you didn't get us the AC ans um, the new roof, but it's not detailed anywhere in the contract.

Speaker 2 (09:37):

And yeah, it seems like you're not prepared with that yet. So we're going to have to hold off. Um, and then we can get back to you. So my big mistake was I wasn't prepared to have these things added in and these homeowners, they could sense it. They knew that I didn't know what needed to be added and exactly they knew I wasn't ready to fully close this deal. And so it killed me, the wife, since that. And then ever since this time, I haven't been able to get back in touch with them, unfortunately. And they were comparing me with another company too. It was funny actually the same company installed their dad. They gave him the referral. He gave them the referral originally first, but then he gave me them after he gave it to me after and said, Hey, um, get my son to switch.

Speaker 2 (10:25):

Cause I think he's going to sign with this company too. So I still trying to get in touch with them, but a couple of points from this deal I want to talk about. Okay. Is number one, um, know your competition. Okay. And the big mistake I made with this referral and his dad is, I didn't know the competition. I didn't know who they were going with. I didn't know anything about them really. So I wasn't prepared to show them the differences. Okay. I said what I thought based on what they told me, but I didn't truly know what they were being offered. They told me the company and there's so many here in San Diego. It's tough to know them all. Um, but what I should have done in hindsight is figured out all these details. Okay. And uh, even better if I could have had a contract saved, maybe from this other company, maybe what they're offering would have helped out a ton.

Speaker 2 (11:23):

I was on a Instagram the other day. Um, yeah, someone I follow her. Name's Kiarra. She's going to be on the show here. She does. A lot of virtual sells. Virtual closing has a team and she demoed her a sells portal that she uses with her team. And I thought this was a great idea. Something that you could implement yourself or with your team. She saves an entire folder of dozens, of different contracts from other companies. Just these she's collected over the time, over time. And as someone says, they're comparing, she has multiple contracts. And what, most of the time she has contracts from the exact companies that people are comparing. That's something you can do. As you're meeting with people, as they're comparing your product CP, you can get their contract and then save that bad boy. You can have those contracts saved. Gene that have that animal stored up.

Speaker 2 (12:21):

It's going to be so powerful. If you can be like Mr. Customer, oh, here with you with XYZ company. Oh yeah. Actually one of your neighbors, they were thinking of going with them. Matter of fact, here's, here's their agreements that they had, but I'm just going to point out a few things that they didn't like, and this is coming straight from their agreement. Let me show you here real quick. Boom. You pull up the contract, you show them those things. Do, you can have stuff like that. Saved. If you can know your competition, like the back of your hand, it's going to be so powerful. You can help these people switch. Hey, and then in another this something we did actually back when I was doing pest control, we knew all the companies, our wholesales manual, it had, um, a bunch of different competitors listed out exactly what they're offering and it, um, it really helps you be perceived as the expert.

Speaker 2 (13:10):

If you can tell your customer, oh yeah, we've dealt with them. This is exactly what they're doing. And pest control is, oh, they don't have the, uh, they don't have their agricultural license. So they actually can't spray the yard. We have our agriculture license. We can cover the yard. We can cover these different types of pests. And I would get destroyed by people sound passenger right now. It's been a long time since I've been out on the doors, sling and pest control. But the point is, if you can know all these things, if you know what's being offered, you're perceived as expert in, is going to make you that much more powerful in your closes. Hey, and so I wasn't prepared. I didn't have, um, you know, contract saved from the other company. And I wasn't prepared in the fact that I didn't have these things factored in.

Speaker 2 (14:00):

Did he wanted, he told me he wanted AC factory and he told me he wanted a new roof. So if you can know these things beforehand, it's going to help you be prepared as possible. Hey, and I've been tell you I've lost a lot of deals over time, just because of the simple fact that I haven't been prepared and little things, little delays, um, things like the home is in the trust. If a homeowner has a home in a trust, you need to know those things because most finance companies that you deal with, they're going to need copies of those trust documents, right? So things like that. And the way to be prepared is try to do a mini backfire in your, um, as you set the appointment, right? And sometimes it's not always possible. Maybe you're doing a same day appointment, but if you're sending your appointment, ask these things.

Speaker 2 (14:51):

If they're older homeowners, Mr. Customer has a home in a trust. Um, if the roof isn't looking great, Mr. Customer, how old is your roof up there? If they, uh, have an older electric panel, Mr. Customer, do you know how many amps their electric panel was? No. Well, let me take a look, let me grab a picture of it then. You know, uh, things like if they're going to need an electric panel upgrade, so gather as much information as you can be prepared, figure out what they want, figure out why they haven't, hadn't gone solar and that's going to help you have all your ammo ready, locked, and loaded so you can close any deal. So you can be ready for any scenario that you come across. Okay. So that's just a couple points that I talked about in the presentation a few weeks back again, if you want the slides from this, hit me up, happy to send them.

Speaker 2 (15:42):

I went over, um, you know, way more details, had a lot more specific things in it, but just thought, I'd give you guys a recap. And those are a few things you can do to set yourself apart from the competition, save contracts from other companies, know your competitors, and then be prepared, be prepared to throw an extra, a home improvements projects, um, be prepared with prices, be prepared with everything you need. And then that's going to help you just lock down the deal the first time and not opt to have it been in this. Follow-up like I'm going through right now. And so if this helped you share with someone, thanks again for helping us get to a hundred reviews, you guys are awesome. And this is how we're going to change the industry is by knowing our competitors and being experts. So go out and do those things and keep crushing.

Speaker 3 (16:33):

Hey Solarpreneurs. Quick question. What if you could surround yourself with the industry's top performing sales pros, marketers, and CEOs, and learn from their experience and wisdom in less than 20 minutes a day. For the last three years, I've been placed in the fortunate position to interview dozens of elite solar professionals and learn exactly what they do behind closed doors to build their solar careers to an all-star level. That's why I want to make a truly special announcement about the new solar learning community, exclusively for solar professionals to learn, compete, and win with the top performers in the industry. And it's called Solciety. This learning community was designed from the ground up to level the playing field and give solar pros access to proven mentors who want to give back to this community and to help you or your team to be held accountable by the industry's brightest minds. For, are you ready for it? Less than $3 and 45 cents a day currently society's closed the public and membership is by invitation only, but Solarpreneurs can go to society.co to learn more and have the option to join a wait list. When a membership becomes available in your area. Again, this is exclusively for Solarpreneur listeners. So be sure to go to www.solciety.co to join the waitlist and learn more now. Thanks again for listening. We'll catch you again in the next episode.

The SOLARPRENEUR podcast is here to help you close more deals in the solar industry, generate more leads and referrals, and hopefully, have a much better time and situation.