11 - The Hidden Mistakes Hurting Your Sales and Marketing with Lauren Kingsley

SPEAKER_00 0:32

And I'm your host, Alan Langer, with another amazing guest coming up in just a few minutes in Lauren Kingsley. And this is for the marketing people in the world. But also, I want the sales guys to not turn this off because I want you guys to listen to this as well because she's going to have a lot of nuggets for everybody, including marketing and salespeople. Before we get to Lauren, two quick housekeeping notes. The website for the podcast is sellinginthedwelling.com. And when you go there, look to the top right, you're going to see a little button that says Ask Alan. You click on that and you send me a question. If I wind up reading your question in one of the upcoming episodes, you will get a free Selling in the Dwelling feature. And we have one of our best questions coming up later for Lauren. And I can't wait to get to that. The second housekeeping is our title sponsor, it's Paradigm Vendo, the best in-home software you're going to find in the in-home selling industry. It's paradigmvendo.com forward slash dwelling. More on them later on in the podcast. Before we waste any more time, Lauren Kingsley, thank you for joining me on today's podcast. How are you today?

SPEAKER_04 1:35

I'm doing great, Alan. Thanks for having me on.

SPEAKER_00 1:37

I'm assuming quite a few people in the audience probably know who you are, but maybe a lot of people don't. So Lauren Kingsley has her own, I guess, a marketing firm called my Lauren Kingsley Strategy, but it's sort of a little different because she she not only does marketing, she really looks at companies from an operational standpoint. And really, like on her website and in LinkedIn, she has this tagline that says find the leak in the funnel. And I love that because in-home companies, any company, it's not just marketing, it's not just sales, it's not just operations. Everything has to work together. And if there's a kink in that hose somewhere, things will slow down. And that's what Lauren helps people with. Did I kind of describe that right, Lauren? Or you can certainly uh correct me if I missed anything there.

SPEAKER_04 2:20

So, I mean, really, you we want to think about it from just an overall like systems mindset too. Marketing, yes, more marketing efficiency and effectiveness, but more so just evaluating the entire business end-to-end across all of the different journeys. My background prior to home services and home improvement was in telecom, which is it's actually divine timing on that, because uh telecom went through digital transformation about 10, 15 years ago. And so during that time, it was extremely transactional when it first started, kind of like the home services and home improvement industry is right now, where you know it's it's flood the leads in and get get one product in and then move to the next one, and then you know, let's let's scale from there. And the consumers have completely shifted. So if I'm a if I'm a CEO or I'm a founder or an owner operator, one of the biggest challenges that I have in my business is that there's no limit on tools or technology or you know, the new greatest thing to use to help to optimize the business. The problem is that no one is really connecting all of the dots. And that's where we end up losing oversight. And then we're applying this new technology here, but we're not thinking about how it connects over here, and then we're also not aligning our marketing to the end result, which is how much are we trying to grow for the year? What is the overall business net revenue that we're trying to accomplish? And then working backwards from there, which will tie into your team's capacity planning and to your monthly targets, which also leads to how many leads do I need, right? Per market. How are we growing? So all of this stuff we're able to uncover. And in a world where there's no shortage of information, we're providing clarity. And the mission was never to just help businesses. It was more so stewardship. When I first started in home improvement and home services, I saw all of these CEOs and all of these different teams that were just kind of stressed out. They really wanted to win, but they didn't really know what was the path of least resistance, what was the light at the end of the tunnel, what should I focus on? Because there's this thing and that thing, and they're all over the place. And so our mission is to help to steward CEOs and their teams to, you know, I'm a big Bitcoiner. Bitcoin ethos is all about proof of work, proof of trust, uh, you know, um, making sure that we have systems that can help to create a legacy long term. What we want to do is help companies become rooted in truth instead of just vanity metrics, provide clarity, visibility, help them understand their numbers instead of guesswork, making sure that the numbers across systems align to the organizational goals, and then help them to really take ownership of the things that matter, like the customer relationship, instead of just renting them, kind of like we've been doing. Helping these companies really tap into their markets, capture additional market share where there is long-term value instead of chasing short-term wins where you know we end up losing, you know, in the in the long haul.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

And you you're touching on so many things right now that I think are a problem in the in-home service industry. And one of them, this to me is is one of the biggest ones, and you touched on it. There's too much stuff that all the owners are buying. Like they say, oh, we need this, or oh, we need this for our sales reps, and then let's add this, and then a month later we're gonna add something else because all of this stuff and they fall into these cycles of the shiny object, like you said. And all of a sudden you got so many things happening and no one has any clarity of where it's all going. And I love what you have on your website as well, is you create operational clarity. I think we're at a point now where companies need to take a step back and like maybe less is more, but let's just look at the three or four things that are really working instead of buying five or six things and hope they all work together. Because you're right, nobody looks at how is this software going to affect this software plus this other software that the reps have to use in the house? Because the rep is confused in the house. Guess what? So is the customer, and then that's not a sale.

SPEAKER_04 6:30

It's unifying the team. We're actually rolling out it's not live yet. We're we're rolling it out, but it's just an overlay over top of all of the technology. And what it does is it creates a sovereign command center where you're able to really evaluate what's happening across the business, across all of the different technology and pulling it all into one place, which really helps. And then it all works together, right? So now we have one seamless system that, you know, it doesn't matter if you're an HR or if you are an owner operator just doing about a million a year trying to scale and figure things out, or if you're trying to figure out where do we need to prioritize our marketing spend, you'd be surprised how many organizations or companies I walk into where they have the same marketing strategy across every single market and they're not really targeting specific zip codes and they're not evaluating the fact that every market is unique and dynamic and we have to lean into momentum. It's like it's like be water, my friend. Like what is working and what is not working, and is the business at risk because we have overcompensated in one lead source, or are we flooding in all of these leads that are not providing the outcome that we want, like ROI? If you only have a you know call center of 10 people and you're flooding in thousands of leads, well, are you prioritizing those leads? And are you creating the right routing strategy to prioritize your high-intent leads that are going to have the highest opportunity to net sales? So there's so many different nuances that are not considered that when you put it all together and you can see what specifically to do, you can truly generate so many wins, it's ridiculous.

SPEAKER_00 8:12

Yeah, I can imagine. And you're actually, I'm gonna do a little cliffhanger here. What you're talking about is exactly we're gonna approach it with the question that we have later coming on because Deborah from Portland, Oregon sent in the question talking about exactly what you just mentioned. I'll wait till we get to the question. But when you're a sales rep, all you care about are going on leads. You want to get leads, and then the very next thing you care about, and now it should be the for me, it was always equal, is what's the quality of that lead? Is the marketing team just piling up numbers just to fill calendars? So we'll get to that later in the podcast. So I'm so fascinated with what you do because I think there's there's many other consultants out there that are doing what you do, but I'm not sure they're doing it in a way you're looking at everything together as one ecosystem. So many people are like, okay, I'm gonna look at your marketing, I'm gonna look at your sales, I'm gonna look at your operations, I'm gonna look at this. You know it's all connected, and like I said, that the kink in the hose, you know, stops the stops the water flow. So what do you think companies now in the industry are missing when it comes down to their overall strategy in the markets? What is there something specific that you're seeing out there that you can you can comment on?

SPEAKER_04 9:15

That is such a large question.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

You've got a three-hour podcast.

SPEAKER_04 9:19

Right. You know, and I've been asked this question before by by business owners, by CEOs, and I always tell them the same thing. I say, look at your finger. And they're like, What? And I'm like, look at your finger. And they're like, okay, I'm gonna do that.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

What fame? I look at my index finger.

unknown 9:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 9:32

Yeah, look at your finger. So there's there's your fingerprint. Every single person, every single company, every single market is unique. I might look at one company and I notice that they have the same exact target spread across all of their markets and months. That is the exact same. It's not taken into account seasonality. They're not really taking overhead costs into consideration. They're not adding the full PL against their targets. And so then they wonder why they're not doing too well at the end of the year. First and foremost, it would be to zoom out where are we today? And what are what is the company goal? That is the first question. Because if we don't know what our company goal is or how we want to grow our scale, then we should probably figure that out first. You know, a lot of people that I talk to, they they kind of grew up in the industry. They were they were out in the trucks and and they don't really know what is the best way to do that. Starting there, we have to look at what are the risks that we have currently? What are the current challenges within the within the industry? What's changed? So, for example, consumer sentiment has changed. The the the customer basis has shifted, whereas during COVID and prior to that, we had aging in place. Now we have staying in place, where it's the older millennials and they're a lot more tech savvy and they're using AI. And I actually just did a post the other day. The Google search bar is almost completely done for. You know, they're getting an answer when they type into Google before if they're using Google at all. Are there macro shifts that are impacting pricing? Have we looked at the entire PL when we're creating a pricing strategy? So, first and foremost, we gotta, if you don't have a goal to go for, then you're just shooting, you're playing darts blindfolded. So we gotta, we gotta set the right goals and then we gotta work backwards from there. We got to figure out how many sales reps do we have? Who's dialing? Do we have an omnichannel tech stack for the call center, meaning the email SMS dialing? How many people do we have doing that? How much of that is automated? Do we have AI incorporated into that? And then from there, we're gonna look at goodness, I cannot tell you how many times I've gotten into an organization and they're not tracking all of the different pieces of the funnel that they need to track to make the right growth decisions. And so they're wondering why are all my leads canceling out, or how come I'm losing so much between I'm getting all these leads in, but then I don't have enough to fill the slots? Well, first off, do you have performance scorecards in your call center that prioritize next day set?

unknown 11:57

Right?

SPEAKER_04 11:58

What is your next day set percentage, for example? Or where are they canceling? Are they canceling because we're scheduling too far out and seven days, we're not tracking that? You know, what are we tracking specifically? And what are we not tracking first and foremost? And then from there evaluating how are the lead sources performing? What is the channel mix? What is it by market? Do we have a zip code ROI strategy? So there's a lot of different things, and really it is, you know, me and my team, we're getting under the hood. We're we actually we plug their information into our system that we're gonna roll out to the industry because we genuinely believe in operational sovereignty. We start to evaluate what's missing, where are the biggest leak points in in their company, and what are the top three things we need to focus on right now to capture incremental revenue fast. Most of these companies they need to capture that fast to make up for dips from Q1 and Q2 of this year. So it's a loaded question, and I and every company's different.

SPEAKER_00 13:00

I love what you said though about reverse engineering. I I think one of the biggest problems I see in companies and even small entrepreneurs like myself, you forget to reverse engineer something. You think you want to do like, okay, I want to start a podcast. Let's say that you know, I had this this podcast selling in the dwelling. I had it, you know, I wanted to do this for years. So I was always like, I'm gonna start this podcast. But I never really started it until I actually reverse engineered it and say, okay, what do I need to get here? And say, let me just start the podcast and see what happens. That's what I did with my first podcast, which was a lot of fun. But I never, you know, never really did anything. And I'm like, I'm gonna do this the right way. And I did it by reverse engineering. And when you set that goal and say, okay, now let's go backward, I think that's so critical for companies to do that. And you can do that in any part of your uh in your organization, right?

SPEAKER_04 13:48

Well, you you can. And if you're in a a growth stage where you're not thinking about capacity planning, but you don't realize that, hey, we have so many competitors in the market right now that for for sales reps or for installers, and you don't know that, you know, there's a massive deficit in installers right now, and you want to make sure that you have a really good, you know, plan in place to keep your people, you know, love your people and and make them feel valued and create authentic human connection with them, then you're going to continue the same playbook that you've always had, throwing leads at the funnel, and then wonder why people are leaving or going somewhere else, or you just you don't have the bandwidth or the the cash flow to do what you actually need to do later on. And so you have to think about it from an ecosystem because it all plays in together. You don't want to get into the you know end of Q3 and realize that wow, we're gonna really miss our fiscal target because we cannot get the the the headcount that we need. We're we got the lead flow. We just we can't, it takes us forever to to open this up. Or, you know, you're putting leads on the calendar that were scheduled a week ago where you have a a lead that's high intense that was just scheduled for you know today for tomorrow at 10 a.m. and and you're gonna prioritize the one a week ago because you have no visibility into it. So there's just a lot of little things that that you know make a big difference and compound.

SPEAKER_00 15:15

We you mentioned earlier, and I've had this on a couple other podcasts, that the concept of too much tech, tech overload for the reps, whoever you have in your organization. What would you suggest or or what recommendation would you make to a business owner on how to choose to look at software to see if it's the right fit? What could he or she do? Is there is there like a system you say, all right, I'm gonna look at the software, but it has to it has to meet this criteria? Or how how would you suggest people look into when they get approached with these new bells and whistles and newfangled things that come out all the time?

SPEAKER_04 15:47

Well, I think that they have to understand what is the end, like like everything they do should start with the end in mind. What are they hoping that it will solve? And how is that gonna impact the overall goal? Every single like you have to, you know, one of the things too about being a Bitcoiner that I learned is uh your time is valuable and there's high time preference and there's low time preference, and we have to make sure that we're finding the the right time preference for what we're trying to accomplish. Now, if you have to make up revenue quickly to capture, to make sure that we're, you know, paying out our people and and covering the bills and trying to make up losses from from prior quarters, that's a little bit of a different action plan than, you know, how are we going to grow into 2027, you know, forward thinking and should we be greenfielding additional markets and where should we go? So I think that we should you should always evaluate where are we today and what is our overall goal? Every decision that is made across the business should be aligned somehow or another to the end result. And if we're not setting the right metrics and the right KPIs for each functional area or department that would align to that, then what will happen is you're gonna get these silos of lost time where we're not focusing on things that are not gonna really make a big impact to that overall goal or to the overall business. So I say make sure that your KPIs and your metrics are aligned to the end results that you're trying to accomplish and that there is a lot of discussion on that across the business so that we're celebrating wins that we have, you know, and we're making the right decision with with our time ROI. So as far as evaluating, you know, the technology or any decision whatsoever, does it align to the end goal?

SPEAKER_00 17:34

Amazing advice. Yeah, that something gets very excited. I'll give you a great example. Rilla, you know, Rilla and CRO, the recording software for for for reps. I mean, a lot of companies jumped on it because it was so excited. Oh, now we can record the reps and we can listen, but they had no idea on the back end how to train their sales managers how to use it. If reps got mad because they thought Big Brother was watching it, it was just they just dove right into it rather than let's look at this closely and see how we're going. Not only are we gonna buy it, how are we gonna roll it out, how are we gonna convince the rep, all of that stuff. And so many owners don't think about that kind of stuff. That's just an example.

SPEAKER_04 18:07

Well, if the the thing is, is that you talk to any CEO, and I'm sure you do all the time, they're always let's get this done right now. Sometimes you do have to slow down to speed up because you have to think about what is the impact of the decision. That particular technology is great, but you know, I always say, do it do a fishbowl, do f ask why five times. Why is it great? Or what? What what are we using it for? How are we going to use it? And so on. So that way we are ensuring that we are making the right decisions. We know how to communicate it. Do we have a training process for it? Is the company that we're signing up through, are they going to provide any support and training? You know, what questions do I anticipate my leaders might have? How are we going to hold people accountable into utilizing this? Do we have a way of measuring that from an accountability standpoint? So we have to have systems thinking because even if it sounds great to one person, they get all excited and sign up for it. You should always have an execution process and plan in place.

SPEAKER_00 19:10

Great. And by the way, the people, my friends at Rilla and Ciro, you guys are awesome. Everyone should get them, but just don't dive in without a plan in place, as is what Lauren is saying.

SPEAKER_04 19:19

So yeah, exactly. You know, it is it it's fantastic. It's actually uh, you know, you can take take the recording from that and plug it into my system and have coaching and simplify based off of what is the coaching, for example, what is the root cause behavior that's going to make the biggest ROI, the biggest impact to the overall sales rep commission or whatever. And so it's just literally simplify the business across the board.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

Hey dwellers, you know what term is becoming very popular today in the in-home selling world? Well, it is called tech stack overload. Another word for it? Shiny object syndrome by all the business owners out there. They get so overwhelmed, they get a call from a salesperson for selling software and they buy it. Then they next week they buy another software and then they try this ARM. They're trying too many things at once, and they're creating what they're calling tech stack overload to their reps. Well, our title sponsor, Paradigm Vendo, takes care of all that. It is a one-stop shop, one computer, all the software you need in one spot for your rep to give the customer an amazing experience in the home. ParadigmVendo.com forward slash dwelling. Check them out. You will not be sorry that you did. So since this is selling in the dwelling, I'm going to ask you a sales question. Is there anything specifically you're seeing in the sales world in the home services sector that you either work on or that you can see in your years in the business that should be improved? Or what are you seeing out there from a sales standpoint?

SPEAKER_04 20:49

I think that what from an overall sales standpoint, and where I would highly recommend that companies jump on right now and investigate, is because the consumer has shifted, because there's changes in financing in the market, and because there's so much opportunity from you know tapping into the market share, I would suggest first and foremost, having a waterfall financing approach, evaluating an effective bundle strategy. We should be measuring across the board what is our product selling, and then incentivizing sales reps for multi-product sell-in. We we know that nine times out of 10, it's it's the wife that is making the buying decision. So there's so many ways that, you know, creatively to tap into that. You know, it's a mommy makeover for the home, right? Let's bundle it in together. How can can we capture the financing earlier on for a pre approval strategy to where we're able to then make sure that we're doing a top down selling where we're asking the open ended questions, doing an effective discovery, and making the recommendation to them? You'd be surprised nine times out of 10, people they don't know what they want. They don't even know that it's available. So by us uncovering the unit, Known need and packaging that into this beautiful bundle of multiple products, then we're able to truly capture either A on that first install or set something up to where they're able to continue to do that throughout the year. There's many ways to do it, to where we're really able to tap into ongoing revenue, ongoing uh recurring revenue, which is how we really create value long term. You know, I think people forget that when we're doing these installs, it takes a lot for a homeowner to feel confident enough to where they're trusting us in their home. That's their home. That is their safe space, and they're trusting us to come in and do contract work. That is a very valuable relationship. They don't want to go with another contractor. So we have to truly capitalize on that, nurture that relationship and add on. Why are sales reps not going back to the home to get additional product selling? They've already built the relationship and gotten the buy-in and close the deal. So go back, you know, go get capture something else or do a follow-up, have a rep do a follow-up. There's there's so many opportunities that we just leave on the table. Every single product that we do not sell to a homeowner is a missed opportunity. And so, as a business owner, if I owned a home services company, I would evaluate that and and I would hold my reps accountable to it. I would say, hey, great job on getting the bathroom, but this house has five bathrooms, they have X amount of windows, that that's a missed opportunity. So what can we do so that way you're capturing that later on? So that way it's just not one transactional sale.

SPEAKER_00 23:41

100%. I talked to so many companies that sell multiple products, and I'll ask them how big's your database? How many, you know, customer? Oh, I got 10,000 customers. Okay. How many are window customers? Oh, 7,000. Did you ever market to the 7,000 that you also do siding and moving? And it's like, oh, I never thought of that. Or like crazy stuff like that. Like you know, you and I were like, that's we do that in our sleep. But most a lot of business owners don't know what they don't know, and they don't have people telling them what they don't know. So I mean, that's a low-hanging fruit. And if I were a sales, here's the other thing, Lauren, I want to bring this up. I think and I hope that the pendulum is finally changing. I think the in-home service industry got to the point where they just wanted robots going to houses, spewing out sales scripts, doing presentations, and going to the next one. And they started to remove the reps that had high emotional intelligence. The reps that did have a high EQ were the ones that were always at the top of the board because they didn't follow those scripts and they were the ones that followed up. They were the ones that said, yeah, we also do roofing, we also do siding, rather than the robot that goes in there and just tries to sell the windows on the 10-step system and up, they didn't buy, and my closing percentage is 23%. So hopefully, and I'm seeing this because I'm getting asked to do more EQ talks than I've ever been. So I'm thinking, wow, owners are like, we really need high EQ reps rather than high script reps.

SPEAKER_04 25:05

Yeah, I, you know, I there was a study when I was in telecom, which is a completely different world, but it's relevant, especially right now. The companies that I work for, they did sell home security in the home in addition to cell phones and you know, all of the different technologies. And so the top 2% of performers are in the 90th percentile and higher for high emotional intelligence because they're able to pick up on the unsaid cues, which is critical. And they're able to really tune into the frequency of the person that they're speaking with, which is also absolutely critical, and create relatability and have authentic conversations. You know, homeowners are so, you know, especially right now, there is so much information. People are just like, all right, information overload, like just give me something real for once. And that is the unique flair that sales reps have, and and they have to really hone in on it and and nurture it.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

Yeah. And technology and all the information is gonna get you in the house, but the human-centered approach is gonna sell the job. If you just stick with the crap and the and the let me just, you know, ask these 10 questions because they're on my script and not listen to the answer that the customer's giving, you're not you're gonna be a ver mediocre to bad salesperson.

SPEAKER_04 26:22

Well, yeah, and not only that, but you're not relating to the homeowner. You're not personalizing it. And so when you're asking them specific questions about the home, the household, and you know, all of these different things, you have to when they include those specific things that the homeowner said in their pit, it allows them to really, they're artists, they're painting the picture of you know the experience that the homeowner is going to have. That is like the secret sauce right there, is how do you relate to the homeowner in a way that ties into them emotionally, that allows them to capture buy-in and confidence. People buy from people they like. So if you're able to be likable, you're able to really have high energy, and you're able to mirror the homeowner effectively and tap into everything that is important to them, then there's no way that you're gonna miss out on that deal.

SPEAKER_00 27:18

Exactly. And you know, I can't tell you how many times I still do ride-alongs for companies. They would they want me to ride the reps and and see what they're doing. And I can't tell you how many times a rep will ask a pretty good question. And the customer will give them a well-spoken, well-thought-out answer. Beautifully, you know, spoken, like this is my pain. And the rep goes right to the next question in in his or her head without r responding to the actual answer. Like, you're supposed to ask a follow-up question based on the answer the customer gave you, not what's next on your script. And it drives me nuts because I see it all the time.

SPEAKER_04 27:50

Or even just use a transition statement and then like it going right back into the right question. You know, like if they have an objection, you gotta skate across it first so you get everything out and so you capture all the information. Because if we're not leading with a top-down sales approach, then what are we doing? You don't want to start from the bottom up and then try to do add-ons. You know, you gotta do you gotta top down and you know, you gotta know how to use effective transition statements throughout that conversation so that you're in control of the conversation.

SPEAKER_00 28:19

So you know a lot about sales, Lauren. Don't don't say you don't. You should put that more in your in your in your stuff here.

SPEAKER_04 28:25

Oh yeah, I know I most of my career was actually in sales prior to and then uh so tell me before we get to the Ask Alan segment, which is coming up fairly quickly.

SPEAKER_00 28:35

You mentioned this two or three times already today, and I've seen it everywhere on your stuff. What do you mean by operational sovereignty? Tell me what you mean by that.

SPEAKER_04 28:42

So operational sovereignty, what that means is that, you know, or what it means to us, is it's not isolation, it's not self-importance. Um, it is about creating a legacy for you and your people. It means that we're accepting responsibility for what has been entrusted to us. It means that we're thinking independently as well as, you know, collectively as one team, and we're leading with conviction with the right focus areas. So we're building systems that ensure that we're creating freedom across the organization instead of a dependency on one technology or one tool or one person or one process, where we're freeing up our time so that we have more time to focus on the things that matter, like effective coaching conversations or career growth or tapping into the community more. If all of our time is spent on trying to figure out what number do we even focus on, or what technology do we have to integrate, or, you know, is this even, is this dashboard correct or the numbers right? You know, like if we're if all of our time is spent on focus on these things, then we are not getting a lot of ROI in our time. And so operational sovereignty means we have clarity across the business. Everyone is confident because they know what should be focused on, they know how to do it. We're able to create those authentic human connections with everybody across the business. We're we're teaching leaders how to lead effectively. We're we're taking the time to do train the trainers with our teams and upskill, you know, continuous training. Right now, there is so much chaos in a lot of these companies that they don't have the time to do. They sound nice, they sound like a nice to have, but they can't because they're they're bottled down in these chains of like what is going on, you know. And so it is about freeing up your time so you can focus on the things and the people that matter. So that way your company is built and structured, you know, for the long haul and and not just for getting through the next quarter or the next season.

SPEAKER_00 31:00

We can talk for hours, but it is time, and you'll hear the little angels when you hear the edited version sing about the Ask Allen segment. And this is one of the best questions I think I've gotten in a long time. And the universe was at work this morning because as I was looking through the questions I get every week and I knew I was recording with Lauren Lauren today, this question came in literally a few hours ago. So this is from Deborah from Portland, Oregon. And I want the salespeople out there to listen to this because I think this is and also the marketing people, because this is really a question that I think a lot of people are asking themselves but are afraid to ask out loud. So she writes, I am one of the top sales consultants for an exterior remodeling company in the Pacific Northwest. I'm writing for some advice on how to get our marketing people to start thinking about lead quality over lead quantity. Salespeople, I know you've thought about this before. It seems all they care about is just filling calendars rather than booking more qualified leads. And half the time, we sales reps are mar are meeting with people we have no business being in front of. So if you ever have a marketing expert on here, you are Lauren, any advice on how to try and change this mentality and how I can suggest these said changes would be greatly appreciated. Keep up the great work and thank you very much. Terrific question from Deborah. Lauren, teeed up for you. How would you answer that?

SPEAKER_04 32:25

So there's so many ways to approach this. And I just want to first say thank you for sending in such a great question. Secondly, right now, I can assure you every marketer in the industry right now has more pressure on them than they've ever had before. Because of these massive shifts, and they're at the very top of the funnel. They are trying to figure out what is happening. And so, marketers that are listening in right now, this is important for you to know and understand. First and foremost, actually, I just did a post the other day, Angie's list. They actually just did an article not too long ago about how much of their overall revenue they lost because they were sending in all of these leads that were low intent. It's not just about capturing the high-intent lead. She's nailed it right there. Companies that are just prioritizing these low-intent leads where they're competing against other companies to get into the door, you are having a losing battle. You know, we kind of touched on it earlier, but starting with the end of mind, the end in mind is net sales. It's growing your EBITDA. And we have to ensure that our marketing strategy does really not even just by the market, by zip code. We need to have a marketing strategy by zip code, by product. And we need to know fully what lead sources are netting ROI. They're not getting a credit decline because that's got to be so frustrating for a sales rep going out and you're getting a credit decline. And then you have turnover, and we don't want to deal with that. We want to make sure that we're targeting the right homeowners where we're going to be able to close the deal. Part of it is creating a zip code strategy by channel mix. What you're using in one state is not going to work in another state. Every area has its own unique variables and dynamics. So that's first and foremost. Secondly, evaluate your overall channel mix. If you are not diversified in your channel mix, if you don't have field marketing in there, those are high-intent leads, your website. If you don't have fact schema on your website for AI searchability, you're going to struggle, especially into next year. So ensuring that you're leading with high-intent leads now, a lot of companies do have these high intent leads. They are throwing major so much of their capital at marketing spent. But what they're not thinking about is what happens when the lead comes in. So having a right lead routing strategy, which means we should be hitting that lead within 30 seconds from a speed to lead standpoint. And we should be routing them first and foremost to our top call center people. Let's get them closed right then and there. And the call center should be held accountable to leading with next day set, 10 or 2. Use 6 p.m. as a back pocket, depending on the market. If you have a lead on the board, you have no visibility into, you know, whether it is a high intent lead, low-intent lead, or whether it was scheduled 10 days ago, the probability of them actually being there when the rep drives out is slim to none. You lose 80% of your net issued or demo leads after 48 hours. So if you're not effectively measuring next day set and a prioritization strategy when it comes to your lead routing and then your lead assignment strategy, then you're you'll get stuck with the low intent lead on the board because you know you've waited too long for the high intent. And so there are pieces of the funnel that have to be optimized based off of the end result again. And so that means that your dialer, if you if are you manually dialing or are you doing an auto-dialer, all of that has to be optimized based off of dynamic performance, meaning that the market's going to shift? You know, we have to we have to know how the market shifts. We have to also anticipate, like for inbound calls, are we prioritizing them? Are we tagging them by the right lead source? Are we capturing all of that data? So evaluating the taxonomy and naming conventions and making sure that we're mapping those things so that we know what our growth levers are across the organization that we can pull to make sure that we are filling the slots. Every call center manager, director, or leader should have the scheduler up and they should have visibility into what is the goal for tomorrow, meaning how many slots do we need to fill. And that is going to be based off of how many sales reps are on the calendar for tomorrow. How many of them have we filled? And what do we still have to fill for the day? And that should be up and reported out at least hourly. Everybody should have visibility into that because if not, then we're not filling the calendar. And that's aside the fact, but that's also a big issue is making sure that we are measuring for fill rates or schedule utilization, but really making sure that we are prioritizing the right lead source on that schedule with your lead assignment, making sure that you have the right mix. So there's a lot of things that you can do. Like I said, field marketing media, there's a big shift on the marketing side taking place this year. Cost per lead is up. You know, if you're if you're doing a ton of aggregators, you are going to run into a lot of challenges. And so you should be allocating all of your spend into high intent leads and getting the right leads on the board.

SPEAKER_00 37:37

And and what you're saying here, I think is really important for salespeople to hear because I don't think salespeople, I don't not I think. I know salespeople don't think about what goes into getting these leads. Like all that stuff you just said, they're not thinking about that. They're just thinking, why am I in this house? Because I'm in a triple decker rental property and I shouldn't be here because I sell $3,000 windows. So what am I doing here? They're not thinking about all that other stuff that you just said. And that's what frustrates sales represent. How I would uh answer or add to Deborah's question and and and add to your answer, Lauren is I think we did this when I was selling this was done once, and I thought it was one of the best meetings we've ever had. We had marketing and sales together in a room. So they could actually the salespeople say, What are you guys doing? Tell us what's going into this, and uh we'll tell you what we're seeing in the homes. And they actually started working together rather than being in silos, because so many companies have marketing and sales in silos, and marketing people say, We're gonna do this promotion, we're gonna get these leads. Here you go, salespeople, go sell them. And they have no idea why they were done, where they're going, why they're in the house. Get your marketing and salespeople to sit down once a week and have a meeting and talk about what's going on.

SPEAKER_04 38:47

I I had my marketing guy like literally sit into in the department because I wanted him to hear out loud, real time, what was the impact of his decision making.

SPEAKER_00 38:59

Yeah, absolutely. Have the marketing director or at least some of the marketing people be in the sales meeting and vice versa.

SPEAKER_03 39:05

Right.

SPEAKER_00 39:06

Yeah. Yeah. So I would suggest that to Deborah, because it's it's tough for the sales rep to say to the owner, to the marketing people, hey, we don't like the leads, or the because that's just gonna sound like they're complaining. But I think Deborah, if you go in there with like, hey, I just want to understand how what's behind marketing and what's getting us into homes, and maybe we can help from our sales perspective, you know, you you go in with the with the the notion of I want to help sell more and that what help the company rather than complaining about the leads, you don't want to do that because you're just gonna be a you know noisy wheel.

SPEAKER_04 39:37

It sounds like where she's coming from. If she's kind of, you know, I look at it from okay, if she if that is her question that she has, then she's probably experienced quite a bit of these either no-shows, one legs, rental properties and or credit declines. And so to that, I would say, have them call me first off, because I got you there. And then secondly, I mean, to me, that is like that is a softball solution. It's just making sure we're targeting the right thing. I think that a lot of these companies just don't know how to do it. And then when they figure that piece out, what do you do from there? And so it's each piece of the journey. The goal is to create a frictionless experience for internal customers, our people, our employees, and then the homeowner. And so making sure first and foremost that we're getting the right leads on the board is absolute priority. Otherwise, what's the point? You know, so if they're not tracking one legs or cancellations or we're not tracking the appointment resulting, all of those things matter. And if we're not tracking it, then there's no way for us to go back to marketing and have accountability conversations and say, hey, this is what's happening. So I would start there. Are we tracking those things? And then from there, make sure that there's a bit that they would probably have to do if she's if she's that upset. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:59

Well, talking to you, Lauren, is a great segue into we're we're pretty much running out of time here. But if I had a home improvement company, I would be calling you'd be my first call for sure, especially after this conversation. But how do people find you if they want if they need some help or they want to reach out and say hello or find out about your services? Where do they go?

SPEAKER_04 41:15

Yeah, they can go to uh laurenkingsley.now or you can hit me up on LinkedIn, which is just LaurenKingsley Strategy. Happy to help and also refer, you know, other great companies that do other aspects of uh of the process too. So we got you.

SPEAKER_00 41:30

Awesome. And Lauren is L-A-U-R-E-N, Kingsley K-A-N-G-S-L-E-Y. Dot now, you said Lauren Kingsley.now. Okay, that's cool. Now and then she's on LinkedIn, you go find her, follow her, she has some great posts. And uh that's how I found her for this podcast. I'm so glad I did because I think you dropped some really golden nuggets today. So Lauren, I want to thank you for being on Selling in the Dwelling. This has been terrific, and uh I want to thank you, everyone out there, for listening to Selling in the Dwelling. Don't forget, uh, sellinginthedwelling.com is the podcast website. Uh Deborah from Portland, Oregon is getting a t-shirt because she asked a great question. You're next. Send in the question, and hopefully I'll read it on the next episode. And visit paradigmbendo.com forward slash dwelling to take a look at the best software you can find in the in-home selling industry. Lauren, that's it for us. And that's it for everyone out there. We'll see you next time on selling in the dwelling to five.