I’m Matt Manero and I am here with Judge Graham.

Here in the studio. I want to thank everybody for their support of the Scale With Speed Podcast each week, it continues to grow and the stats go up every single week. So thank you guys for the support. We must be busy with the new parish. Look at this, look at that. If you’re watching it on YouTube, go to burn the ships on YouTube, check out the podcast there. You’ll see the studio as it continues to grow with our chotchkies. I love that the Judge loves the chat.

I saw the pirate ship and I was just like, Holy shit. That’s awesome.

Look, scale means revenue and speed means profit. You have to understand that when it comes to your business scale means revenue. You need more revenue. It solves a ton of problems and you need speed. Condense time. Like we talked about in one of our very first episodes so that you can squeeze the margin, the profit out of the damn business, a hundred percent. We just take too long to do shit in our businesses. We spin these cycles. We think it’s going to get better, man. Time is not. Your friend in the business is your freaking enemy at all. But today’s topic. My man is what I think is the Holy grail of business for the next three years. This is the greatest single opportunity anyone in business has to dominate. And it’s what we call mining your acres of diamonds. And let’s start with this simple question for you listening.

Have you bought anything during COVID let’s say material-wise and let’s say it’s a decent size? I don’t even know what the dollar figure is, right? I don’t, maybe it was a car. Maybe it was a house. Maybe it was something big. Maybe it was small. It doesn’t matter, but it could be a $500 piece of furniture. You, you, you wrote a check to someone with which you ended up with a relationship, right? You had to communicate with someone a few different times. I’m not talking about purchasing on Amazon, right? Right. There was some communication with someone on the other side of the phone or in-person Amazon. Well, I, by the way, think of Amazon for as many amazing things as they do, just on a side note, did you know? I’m, I’m buying a bunch of shit. You got me in the Trotsky game, right? Like I’m starting to buy shit memorabilia shit. And the difference between purchasing on Amazon and purchasing on eBay, it’s like an Apple and an onion. Yeah.

Yeah. It’s the worst buying experience compared to them,

Amazon. Totally. Like you never worry about the seller’s credibility on Amazon ever. And on E-bay you’re always like, man, is this guy, is this guy going to ship his stuff? Right? Yeah. It’s so unbelievable. How Amazon is freaking dominated. That it’s incredible. Well, let me get back to the initial question, judge. If you have bought something during COVID again, not sure what the dollar amount is that becomes material for you as the listener, but you had a relationship with someone through communication before you purchased. Great. The second question is, did they ever reach out to you again and say, thank you. How are you doing? Want to buy another one? What else can I do for you? Leave me a review and leave me a review. How’d I done it?

Do you have any other people like you that are interested in what I offered and sold you?

So let’s get real on it. You know, the answer is no, right. And you and I bought some shit during COVID and I can tell you flat out, not one time has any of the salespeople ever reached out to me to see how my purchase was? How am I doing? What else can they do for me? Do I know anybody? Exactly what you just said?

Yeah. Let’s give the stats. Cause I’m always a data guy, right? I mean, this is a real stat. I think it’s a Gallup or Forbes, um, uh, stat, but it’s, it costs, um, five X to get a new customer, five X more to get that new customer than it does to sell to an existing one. And then I think the stat also is the existing customer on average, right? You gotta have a good company and service is 31% more likely to buy again than the new customer and to spend more money.

Totally. So now let’s ask the audience the real tough question. If you’re listening to this, you’re a business owner. And now we’re going to ask you the real question that matters. When was the last time you followed up with a customer that bought from you and it’s probably going to be pretty damn similar to the same answer that you just gave about the guy or gal that you purchased from who hasn’t followed up with you? And that is the purpose of today’s podcast called mining, your acres of diamonds

Take away, not even bought prospects.

Okay.

So, so if you, you know, we, we could do, um, which I know we’ll get into your business because you do an amazing job at this, but take anybody, whether you have a low ticket or a high ticket item, right? Whether you’re selling a service or a product you exist because you’re selling to customers or you’re attempting to, okay. So whether that’s somebody that filled out a, um, you know, a lead, whether it’s somebody that you gave a proposal one time to, whether it’s somebody that put their information in an online shopping cart and left, those are all prospects, right? Do you have a strategy that you’re going back and you’re retouching those prospects to buy?

No, you don’t. Right? Nobody sucks at it. And that’s why we believe over the next three-year period of time. It is the single greatest opportunity for you to dominate your niche. It’s the lowest cost to its lowest cost with the greatest return. So the real-life example is, at the commercial fleet this year, the first quarter we spent we’d lost $107,000 on our social media marketing efforts. That was the first-quarter loss of our marketing department. Last month, we made a hundred thousand dollars in our marketing department after marketing expenses and ad buy and payroll, that sort of stuff was paid out. We made a hundred grand. And the reason is that we pivoted in Q2 and Q3 to exclusively mining our acres of diamonds, going back into our CRM, extracting data, creating campaigns and messages into them that we pushed out via text and email and cold calling.

So let’s talk about one thing. We always talk about mat timing and circumstance. Okay. A previous customer or previous prospect maybe didn’t purchase or wasn’t ready to purchase again because the timing was bad, right? We’re selling burn the ship tickets all the time to four people that said, Hey, that date isn’t good for me. Or we just invested in this. They didn’t say no. They said it was timing or a circumstance. And most people just go, Oh, they’re not interested anymore. Dude, you got to go back and hit them.

So we all know the stats, seven to 12 times seven to 12 follow-ups before the customer typically buys. And we also know the counter to that that most people make one phone call and they never return. We’re moving our CRM here at a commercial fleet judge. And we bid it out and we have selected the company that we’re going with. And in fact, we signed the contract with these guys this week. Just this morning, I got a shitty, crappy little rinky-dink email from the salesperson. And one of the other companies that we bid it to, Hey, it’s been three weeks since we talked. I thought I would just give you a follow-up, see how you guys are doing okay. Appreciate you. Let me tell you how we’re doing buddy. We had about eight meetings, ran the contracts with your competitor through legal, came back to an executive committee, signed off on it. We have a war room that we scoped the project and we’ve signed the contract with your competitor. That’s how it went

Three weeks. Yeah, because where were you?

What happened to you, dude? You don’t need to be asking me what I’m doing. We already made our moves. You’re the one who missed out. So how do we get people to understand this amazing low hanging fruit called mining your acres of diamonds and help them build out a strategy that they can start to put a program together and enjoy the benefit of it is changing this company at commercial fleet because we have it? So dialed in that.

So I think the first thing Matt is, is everybody needs to understand the importance of your first-party data, right? That’s your data, your, your data that you’re collecting that is your customers and prospects. If people aren’t valuing that like you’re calling it the term acres of diamonds. If people in an organization, if you’re in business right now and you don’t value your customer data and prospect data like it’s a freaking pile of diamonds. That’s, that’s the step one that the issue goes. Okay. So you have to set your organization of whether it’s a, you know, an entry-level CRM, but how are you collecting that data? Segmenting it storing. It would be step one insecurely go in. This is a huge asset right before we’re going to make all this marketing spin. We’re going to do all these calls. We’re going to reach out to these prospects. Dude, we’re going to collect that data. That’s step one.

Or we’re going to go out and buy expensive lists and then start to put something together. Great. What are we doing with that? Right.

Yeah. And as soon as they interact, they become a prospect. As soon as they buy, they become a customer. And that data shifts from cold data to prospect and customer data.

So, you know, uh, we do business with, uh, truck dealers, right? Not a lot because we’re an end-user based company. So, Bubba, the trucker is our client rather than the dealer typically that sells to Bubba. But we, I, I have been into countless dealerships and their sales offices, dude. These are guys that have floor plans, tens of millions of dollars worth of equipment sitting out on their lot. And their sales guys have no common CRM. They are taking notes on yellow pads. They’re flipping through their Yelp. But what was that guy’s name? Hold on, man. I think I taught him that God, what was it? Oh yeah. Harry is, yeah. Let me go. Now what happens in the big organization when you put some scale to that, it doesn’t scale well, and what happens when that salesperson leaves, you know what he does, he takes this little yellow note, he’s got eight of these and he puts them in his brain off. He goes, and you lost the two years’ worth of work because you didn’t put the time to do what the judge is saying, which is this first line data collection. So when we’re talking about, we’re talking about freaking CRM,

Let’s take it a step further. Even people that do that map where you’re going to win in this kind of post COVID era is this idea of being customer-centric in, in, in understanding the customer experience. And what I mean by that is let’s use like auto dealerships. Okay. They think they have this dialed in, okay. Hey, this customer bought in, uh, you know, uh, in two years when that leases up, we’re going to send them an email. This customer bought it. And, and you know, we know on average people don’t buy cars every six years or whatever. So in six years, we’ll send them an email dude. No, no, no. You need to understand that the customer level takes a guy like me. I trade cars pretty frequently, right? In that CRM, they should be setting up triggers. He likes these kinds of vehicles.

When those come in stock, I should be notified. And I should be alerted that judges had a vehicle now for over six months, here are four things that match inventory that he would like, boom, that, that is mining acres of diamonds, not, you know, set it, forget it. And then you get an email that’s not even relevant. I get an email from a vehicle I own four years ago. I’ve traded a car now probably eight times, 12 times, right. That they’re there they’re texting me saying, Hey, you’re, you’re 20 a year, 2014 range Rover. Um, would you like to trade it? And I’m going, I don’t even remember that car. And so what does that do? That’s an awful customer experience now. Right? They think they got it dialed in and it’s wrong.

So the judge sent me an email about 60 days ago. I guess I re you know, it was like nine in the morning. You should go, you go, this is your next car, right. It’s a, a Raptor with the, uh, Kev LAR covering and all that sort of stuff. It’s green and Black’s perfect. Like an army, colors remind me of Johnny boy, all that sort of stuff. W I think by 10 o’clock we bought it. Right. And, um, there was timing and circumstance there because I had a range Rover that was getting close. I think it was, I think it was like, I don’t remember. I think it was 38,000 miles or something, or maybe it was 44. I don’t remember. But there was that next turning cycle of mileage. Right. And, uh, we struck the deal and off we went, that was the 70, some odd thousand dollar vehicle. I have never heard from the guy that we bought that ranch.

It’s telling you an extended warranty or, Hey, I’ve got a tire program. I’ve got a freaking car wash program. We’ve got an oil program. Like I got it. I got a new ranger or a Raptor that came in.

What if he said, do you have any children? I said, yeah, I have three boys. In fact, yeah. My son’s about to turn 16 and I’ll be buying him a truck, which I did. And didn’t even think about that guy.

So ask yourself, we can

All talk about these nightmare services or lack of service stories and the purchases that you’re making. But that’s not the purpose of the podcast. It’s to reverse engineer your mind to say, what are you doing in your organization to mine, these acres,

The one keeping them too, right? I mean, if you, if you own a gym or you own an AC company and you have maintenance contracts or whatever, what’s your frequency of keeping that customer happy and relevant, right? Because if you just set it and forget it, and you’re not providing value, somebody else is going to come along and steal that customer. Right? You’ve got to mine, the acre of diamonds, you’ve got to keep the customers happy and you got to go back and touch those prospects. So the first step, these what we refer to on

The podcast as Monday moments, as you have to establish some form of a CRM now, whatever that is, again, if it’s something out of the box if it’s something,

Once there’s free, one sugar, CRM is free,

Cool. Or, or you could spend, you know, tons and tons and tons of money to build it. Like we did, which, by the way, we’ve now after 11 years of having our CRM, we have finally said, we’re going to go, you know, somebody else, um, go to Salesforce, whatever. There are millions of ways to do it. Now, the big problem judge, everybody says, yeah, but my sales guys won’t put in the information. I can’t get anybody to use the CRM to make the data. The data is always dirty. So we can’t trust them.

That’s a cultural thing. Mandated has to happen. You’re going to work here and this is the program.

But does that mean that the manager has to then go in and review the notes section in the CRM?

No, you’ve got to, you’ve got to set it up. I mean, you know, I know you’re, you’re, you’re a softball on this question to be, but it’d be, you, you have to create it around the culture and what you’re trying to achieve. And then you have to show the value through that commission. Right? I mean, your guys understand how the freaking value of acres of diamonds. So they’re taking the proper steps to do that. So you get a new sales guy and you go, Hey, I want to tell you, this is what people are making from prospecting. But over a year, being here, if you collect your data, this is a guy what he’s making year three, and here’s the cut of what he’s making off of past customers and prospects versus new. So do you think to map that CRM is important? Yeah, it’s important,

Which is one of the things that you and I, uh, teach at burn the ships, which is this buyer persona piece, um, which was, which was an ad that you put in, um, to, I don’t know, maybe in our fourth Bootcamp in the last one for sure. And the perfect example of that is I just had some work done to Jackie boy’s truck. Um, it blew an injector. Um, but by the way, I had the extended warranty, the guy at the dealership, so many extended warranties, cause he said, this diesel is gonna blow an injector sooner or later, you’re going to engender assured blows in the jacket. Right? So, um, the guy at the, at the dealership that he kept calling me like relentlessly, like clearing all these little chicken shit charges, like a $30 charge. And I just want me to shortcut it. And then finally I’m like, dude, listen, it’s, I’m okay with

All of it. When do

I get the vehicle back? Right. And so it’s really important as we’re talking about this, I’m digressing a little bit, but did you have to sell and communicate to clients differently based on their persona. But if you’ve never taken the time to learn about buyer personas, I would teach you how to burn the ships. You don’t understand, we’re talking about dude, you don’t sell to me the same way you sell to that person. Who’s who is concerned about the $30 did time. And circumstance is not the same for me as it is with him. I don’t give a shit about, I appreciate the service, but I don’t need you to call me check clear on me on $30 freaking charges, get me the, to the new version

Of customer data, right? There should be something in there that triggers your persona. So when you’re, how many touches does Matt get? What’s the offer is much different than the individual that doesn’t, you know, act the way you

All right. So now another big question that we end up having, um, when we teach acres of diamonds that burned the ships for the third element, the first is the CRM. The second is culturally being relentless about the information going in. So it’s not garbage in garbage out. The third piece is I really can’t afford to put in the right acres of diamonds program.

Yeah, no, you’ve got to put it in and then you have to, you know, uh, activate it, which I think is the, probably the last step, right? So what are you doing now that you have the data to properly activate it? What’s the frequency, what’s the offer based on the personas who’s getting what right. And if you can’t do that internally, you need to hire a company that can get that set up and automated because there’s, you know, depending on the size of your company, it could be thousands, millions, hundreds of millions of dollars. You’re just leaving on the table.

So, here’s your Monday moment on how you create this process. You create an email drip campaign. Well, yeah, I’ve heard this a thousand times. Yeah, but I don’t read my email drips that come in from people and all that sort of stuff. No, you don’t. Because at that moment you don’t need it, but the moment you do need it and the subject line is timing and circumstances and it becomes valuable to us. You would be amazed you wouldn’t because you know it, most people would be amazed. Do we get the click-through rate that we get in our email drips now for our mining or acres of diamonds, most of the time, there is no click for five, six, seven, eight, nine emails?

But that 10th, then 10th, they click it

Because time and circumstances kicked in, they just had a truck break down. They had a new driver, they got a new contract, they got an insurance deal, whatever. And now they’re in the market to buy, but you fucking stopped at the sixth email. So what do you have to do to get to emails? You sit down and write shit that you think your customers would care about, right? It doesn’t listen, go grab an RSS feed from our industry trade magazine, and start grabbing articles from them. Put it in. Guess what? You have a Monday newsletter that goes out to one of your customers every single Monday, or you add value, providing freaking value in the form of information. Give me something. So this cost, I can’t do it. It’s bologna. You can do it. You can get the content, whether you’re doing RSS feeds and customizing it. I challenge everyone. Don’t plagiarize. Don’t rewrite the articles as if they were yours. Gift frigging credit. I don’t give a shit. Whether you wrote the article judge or you cite the Gallup poll, I’m interested in the topic.

this guy. Oh my God. Maybe. So go get those acres of diamonds. What else we got this, this, I just, I want to leave everybody with this man. You don’t think it’s worth the time. It is the greatest lowest cost. It is the greatest, lowest cost, biggest ROI component that you should do. You should stop right now and build-out, uh, acres of diamonds, mining strategy for your organization, and start implementing on Monday. If you want to go deeper on this, come to the freakin ‘ burn the ship’s Bootcamp, where we teach you structurally exactly how to do it. And by the way, we are sold out for it

Or Tobar Bootcamp. So December would we decide 10th

And 11th. I believe that’s a Thursday or Friday.

So December 10th and 11th, we’ll update the site, but burn the ships.com hit on Bootcamp and you don’t make it happen. Make it happen.

We’ll see you down the road and do not take this episode lightly. This is the single greatest differentiator that you can put into play right now to turn everything around and make the most money. We’ll see all down the road.