From Agency to Training Company (How IMPACT Made The Shift) w/ Bob Ruffolo

Speaker A: Foreign. Welcome back to Agency Builders. I'm your host for today's episode, Logan Lyles. I'm joined today by Bob Ruffalo, the CEO of Impact, a, uh, sales and marketing training company. Bob, welcome to the show, man.

Speaker B: Logan, thanks for having me on, man. Good to see you.

Speaker A: Yeah, good to see you again. You and I got to be on the mic on a previous show that I hosted, Agency Life. That one was really good. We got to talk about kind of the evolution of the business model of Impact as you guys have evolved, changed, and grown quite a bit over the years. I'm excited to share more of that. I'm sure we'll touch on your new book, Endless Customers, that you guys have, uh, come out with here recently. We're fans of that already, and I wanted to kick things off with actually what I said at the open A, uh, sales and marketing training company. You guys no longer describe yourself, at least in kind of that first line as an agency. Tell us a little bit about how that came about and why that shift happened for you guys.

Speaker B: Yeah, well, I mean, like, probably many of your audience, you know, we. We were figuring this out as we were going. So I started as just a freelancer, uh, doing website redesigns. In 2011, we hooked up with HubSpot, became a HubSpot partner, and, uh, we're doing typical HubSpot inbound marketing retainers like a lot of agencies were during that period. We were lucky. We caught that wave early, and we were a top tier HubSpot partner for a lot of years. Um, but I think I just realized, like, we had a good brand, we had a good culture, we had a good team, but still something was missing. Uh, we look at the work we were doing for our clients. Some clients were happy, some were not. Um, and we just knew we needed to do something better. We didn't have a framework, we didn't have an ip. We didn't have a unique way of doing things. And we, again, just not having a ton of successful clients. We're like, we need. We need to figure this out. And, uh, I decided to take a shortcut. So what I did was I looked around the HubSpot community. I'm like, who is really doing this well? Who's got a model that's proven and has incredible success stories? Um, and that's when I crossed paths with Marcus Sheridan. And that was in 2018, maybe a little bit. We crossed paths before that, but in 2018 is the, uh, moment we merged our companies together. Um, and what he was really doing Differently. So, uh, for starters, he had the book. They ask, you answer. Um, if anyone's. I'm sure a lot of your audience has read it, you're nodding. I know you guys have read the book, they asked, you answer. Yeah, it's such a simple concept of just answering the questions your buyers are asking. Right. Um, but certainly he knew that there was a very particular way you had to create that content. Um, and then even early in his journey of having an agency and working with clients, um, he just never really wanted to do the work for the clients. So his idea was always like, listen, I'll teach you how to do it, but you're going to do it yourself. Um, and that was, you know, it sounds so simple, but it was so brilliant at the time. If you're, you know, if you're a client that's not going to take this seriously, you're not going to dedicate the right resources, you're not going to willing to learn this. Um, you know, he knows that for great marketing to work, you got to be willing to do things that others not willing to do. You got to talk about things that buyers want but most businesses avoid. And, uh, you know, there's a culture shift there. Um, and he just had the best success stories, whether it be Yale appliance and half ass they blew up and black, um, images and so many incredible success stories. So I convinced them to merge the companies in 2018. Uh, originally we thought, okay, we're going to have an agency side of the business and do it for you, and then we're going to have this coaching and training side of the business. Um, but didn't take very long for us to realize, like now if we really want to serve our customers well, we really want to have a big change in the industry. Um, the best way to go is to go all in on the coaching and training model.

Speaker A: Yeah. Interesting, man. Uh, because you were saying as m like, that was Marcus's approach from back in the day when he went out on his own and he made the shift into marketing. It was, I'm going to teach you how to do it. I might coach you through it, but I'm not going to, you know, write articles for you or turnkey, quote, unquote, done for you solution even at that point. Right. Because that was kind of in his. In his ethos even before you guys merge. Is that right?

Speaker B: That's exactly right. I mean, he was, he was a pool guy before he did all this. Right. He learned how to do digital marketing. Ah, necessity to Save his business and to, you know, ultimately do something special. But he also realized the power came from his expertise, his words, the relationship he was building with his audience and his community, um, who then trusted him and want to do business with him and no one else but him. It was authentic. He had real empathy with the audience. Um, and that's just something that an agency, very hard to replicate. Um, and we think about how agencies are typically structured. You know, obviously we have to take half the margin, make sure we're feeding the machine, and then, you know, we're working with 10 to 15 or 20 clients per person and a lot of context switching. And you can only know so much about your client's business because they're only paying so much.

Speaker A: You gotta be an expert in digital ads and Facebook and LinkedIn and webinars and every, you know, new marketing tactic all at the same time. Just to add to that list that you already had growing there, right?

Speaker B: And agency staff, I mean, they learn a lot going through that. Um, they learn a lot about different businesses. They learn a lot of different skills, but they're also under a lot of pressure from clients saying, where are my leads? Where's m. My business? Why is my traffic not going up? And Marcus, uh, didn't want to be that guy. He said, listen, you're gonna own all this. I'll just teach you what to do, and you just go do it on your own. Um, and our model is, you know, if our clients are not gonna staff people in marketing to do the things that they need to be able to do, they're not gonna be our client. But when they do hire that person, um, usually young, full of energy, excited, and they read the book, they come to our conference, they learn the ip, they start applying these principles, they start getting themselves better. They take that company to that brand, that website, the social media, and they make it their baby. And they say, I'm gonna put all my energy into this. I'm gonna prove myself here at this company. I'm gonna learn all the players in this company. I'm getting them all involved. Um, and we just seen that model just work significantly better. It's not for everybody, but for us, we feel strongly about it. Yeah.

Speaker A: What were some of the risks early on for that model? Cause I imagine you had to tell a lot of clients no, because they were like, no, we. This is great. How much does it cost for you to do this? And they're probably even like, just, you know, what that number is going to be? That's still going to be acceptable to them because you've dug in enough with that client. Yeah, I imagine that could be tough to say no to. Right.

Speaker B: Yeah. I think, um, enough of our clients at the time did have an internal marketing team.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: We definitely lost some clients, uh, because they just wanted to outsource their marketing, and that wasn't going to be where we were going in the future. Um, I think it was actually much harder to convert the team that we had at Impact because it was tougher than the clients. Impact at the time had about 30 employees, and Marcus's company had about four employees. Um, so converting the clients because Marcus had so much influence and he had the book, and people could read the book and it made sense to them, getting them to buy into it was, I would say, a little bit easier. But there's a big difference between being a typical agency employee who often is there to serve and. And take orders from the client and things to the client, and hope the client likes it and accepts it, doesn't want too many revisions, and it's in this, like, very servant role that typical agency person would be. Yeah.

Speaker A: Even as you're saying that, you're kind of leaning into the camera, like, we've all been there, right, in those conversations. Man. I can just read it.

Speaker B: Fifth revision. Sixth revision. Please just accept this.

Speaker A: Final.

Speaker B: Final.

Speaker A: Final. V1 Final. V2 Final. V2 Final.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: We've all made overscope names.

Speaker B: Yeah. And, uh, but taking. Taking what they're so used to and being in that role. And how do you flip that to them being in a position of authority where they are seen as a coach, as a guide? Um, instead of being the one that is doing the work and hoping the person likes it, being the other side of the table, we're like, no, you're going to do the work, and you show me if it's not right, you're going to do it again. Right. It's. It was a big shift, and a lot of our staff couldn't make the change. Uh, I think that was probably what made our transition from being a typical agency to a consulting business, uh, extremely hard. It probably took us two or three years to really understand the Persona that we need in every one of those seats.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And some people are leaving. Trying to recruit people. That was the hardest part of it.

Speaker A: Yeah, that makes sense. And maybe this is a stretch, but it reminds me of what Marco Barish, speaking of HubSpot folks, said in the sales acceleration formula he talked a lot about in that book. One thing that stood out to Me, maybe it was a small part of the book, but it's always stuck with me, is that this idea of matching the buyer Persona with the salesperson Persona. Right. Like, uh, when I moved into selling for an agency the first time and I was selling to B2B marketers, primarily in SaaS that were a little bit more forward thinking, they weren't maybe as buttoned up as other industries I had sold to. I was just like, man, this is, like, this feels like it's working, right? Not a whole lot of friction. And the same sort of thing, I think, for our agency as we think about who's our client. Right. At Impact, you guys had already, um, started to shift, or at least you were focusing on that point of companies who had a sizable marketing team or at least some semblance of a marketing team. So there was a good fit there. But then you had to do the same thing. Just like Robert talks about the buyer Persona and the sales Persona, you guys needed the agency employee Persona to match the client Persona with all of this motion to work. Is that fair? Is that a bit of a stretch?

Speaker B: No, that's. That's spot on. That's spot on. Um, again, it's just a very different being a typical, early in your career marketing account manager for an agency versus being a coach and somebody that a CEO or a head of marketing would see almost as a peer, as a leader, somebody they could look up to. Big, big difference.

Speaker A: Yeah, I want to get into some of the things, uh, from the book, especially the four pillars of being known and trusted before we get there though, because I think this ties into all of it. I wanted to talk a little bit about how the model shifted for you guys and what you guys have learned in building a community. Right. The last time you and I spoke on the mic and the other podcast we mentioned earlier, we talked about this shift from like, hey, here are clients and we deliver for them to, uh, okay, we get people into a community free slash paid. We get people into maybe cohorts or training, and then we have people in maybe higher tier consulting or some, some mixture of consulting and execution and kind of moved into that kind of those three buckets. Tell me a little bit about that shift and what you guys did. Well, where the community became a feeder system for the other services.

Speaker B: Yeah, I would still say we're certainly working through a lot of that still. Um, you know, we don't look at ourselves as like, how can we be the best service company, um, like where a lot of agencies will be, you know, what's the next service we can add on and how can we, um, get into these different areas? And, uh, a lot of agencies will then try to create products, uh, whether it be add ons to the HubSpot Marketplace or AI tools now, um, which is. It's all good. And it's just a typical way a lot of people would think. Um, my mindset is trying to say, how can we do less but do more of the same thing over and over again. The company I'm probably most inspired by is Eos, uh, the entrepreneurial operating system, Gino Wickman's, uh, creation there, the book Traction. Um, so I would say everything I'm doing is really trying to just model myself in our business after Eos. We like to say that we're the EOS for sales and marketing. So if you're already doing Eos, now you're like, all right, great. We're operating a great business.

Speaker A: Nice.

Speaker B: How do I get more, more customers? Well, that's, that's where we want to play. Um, so when I think about our community, it's just like if you think about the EOS community, there's a lot of companies are very passionate about Eos. They refer, they recommend it by name.

Speaker A: Right?

Speaker B: It's like you have to read the book Traction. You have to do EOS in your business. Um, so I've always wanted to be that. I want our book to be that way. I want our services to be that way. When I think about, um, when people sign up for, to work with us, they're not scoping out a project of like a retainer and this many things and that. And is this conclude or not? It's like, no, we have a program and you're signing up for our program, and this is how much our program costs. Just like if you're signing up with an EOS implementer, um, then from a community standpoint, again, you think EOS has this amazing conference and all these raving fans that are excited when they get to meet Geno and other people doing EOS in their industry, outside their industry. They want to go to sessions, they want to learn how to do EOS better. Well, we have the same thing. We have our online community loaded with courses on how to do Endless Customers. Now, used to be they ask answer, but the new book is, uh, they, uh, ask answer 3.0 endless customers. Yeah, but you know, that's got to get built out more. That's something we're working on. That's our biggest objective between now and the end of the year. We have our conference, um, where you can go and you can learn Endless Customers. If you've never heard or say, you just read the book, you want to dive deeper into it or you just want to be around a bunch of other companies are already doing, and some of them doing it really, really well. And we're sharing their stories from the stage. So it's really just narrowing in where we don't want people coming to us, where they're like, yeah, we need to figure out this digital marketing thing. If they're like that, it's like, oh, you should go read the book. Um, if not, uh, we want people to come and say, hey, we read the book. We should be doing Endless Customers are in a business. Everyone on our leadership team, we all agree we're making this a priority to do Endless Customers like people say we need to do eos. Yeah. And that's, that's the people we want to work with.

Speaker A: Yeah. You're so right about the passion around a, uh, framework or a system. Right. I've even seen it on Slack in our agency builders community. By the way, if you're listening to this podcast and you're not yet plugged into the 400 plus other agency owners and leaders that are asking questions in there every day, go to agencybuilders.com and sign up for free and you can join the community. Um, and we in those threads though, Bob, it's exactly like what you said. Someone's like, ask a question about how you run an L10 meeting and people are like, very passionate of, like, you have to stick to EOS pure. Right. Or no, you don't. You don't have to in this part really kind of drags us down. And we did this. Oh, yeah, we did too. There's, there's a lot of power in connecting people, um, who already have some exposure to, especially if they are now rabid fans of a certain framework. Right. I think like you said, to kind of unpack the journey a little bit. Okay. We didn't have any ip. We didn't have a framework that we owned that we could go to market with. Right. Well, once you have that, you can kind of put that out there. But then you need to, like, there's more fuel to the fire when you can connect those people and get them talking about it.

Speaker B: That's right.

Speaker A: Especially in kind of these niche communities. I also like what you said there. I think there's something to it, um, for agencies, you know, in addition to Eos, they ask, you answer one of the other frameworks at Business Builders that we love is the story brand framework. And it's so powerful for a lot of our clients, especially those that are service based, because, you know, the parts of that framework, there's a hero who meets a guy or, uh, has a problem, who meets a guide who gives them a plan. And I think especially for service based businesses, that's where it gets m. Murky. Right. What is the plan? What is the entry point to working with us? And as much as we help our clients work through that, and I know a lot of agency members in our community are story brand certified as well. It's like we need to apply that to our own business. And look at is the plan murky when working with us? Well, we could start with a workshop or we could jump onto an SEO retainer to start, or we could, you know, run this campaign. Um, there's something so powerful about saying, this is the plan, this is the process. Let's start here and then you'll go here, and then you'll go here and kind of communicates. We've done that before, which I think kind of sets up. Yeah. What are you holding up on screen?

Speaker B: Yeah, this is ours. This is the, uh, the path to Endless Customers. So this is the plan and, uh, connects right to the journey. That's why I would go through. If they're implementing customers.

Speaker A: Well, let's. I mean, great segue there. I love that you got a visual prop for us just to jump right into it, man. Um, tell us a little bit about what was the, um, impetus for the new book? What is the problem or the shift that's happening where you guys were like, okay, it's not just, um, they ask, you answer with kind of an updated version. This is the Endless Customers framework.

Speaker B: Yeah, well, you know, um, the first edition of the Ask Answer came out in 2017, I believe that was before Marcus and I joined our companies. Talked a lot about the content you should be creating. Talked about it a lot in written form. The second edition went into video. Marcus, um, was really on the, uh, cutting edge of knowing how important video would be. Um, and when most companies, most brands weren't doing it, many brands are still not doing video, not to the level they should be. So, uh, that's really where it left off. And I think, you know, that book, 20, uh, 19, 20, 20. Even then we knew that there were some things that probably should have been added to it as we were working with our clients. But a lot happened in the last five years. Yeah, exactly. Um, There was a pandemic, um, uh, that changed a lot of the way buyers buy, the way, um, businesses do business. AI, you know, that was kind of a big deal. Um, and I think that changed a lot of the way, um, buyers behave. I think we're a lot less patient today. You know, uh, the rise of short form video has uh, dramatically shifted the way, um, buyers discover brands and products and how they engage with media online. And that's a massive shift. Um, you know, I don't think. I think there's a much larger trust, uh, deficit in the world. Um, I think if you were going to go back and do inbound marketing in 2015, you could land down a blog article and get a conversion with an email address and do the whole traditional inbound marketing funnel. But today I think buyers are just smarter and more skeptical and they land on a blog and it's like, yeah, I know what this person is trying to do. And they hit the back button, right? There's a faceless company that just has written words, even if the words are good. I mean, we don't have the patience to even read the article anymore. And even if we do, we're doing that, we're so skeptical. Um, and I think we just demand more instant gratification than ever. So all these shifts, um, really impacted not the principles of the Ask youk Answer really at all. Um, I think that's one of the things I've been most fascinating on being on this journey with Marcus over the last few years is the same principles that were in the first edition of they Ask youk Answer were actually true 100 years ago and they'll probably be true 100 years from now. Um, because principles don't change. But I think the tactics and the way you bring those to life dramatically has to change here in 2025. And then we realized we had to get into a cadence of updating this book every two years now, um, because just the world's moving so fast. And uh, so this new edition of uh, they Ask, they Ask Me Answer now called Endless Customers, um, has a much bigger focus on self service, has a much bigger focus on video and especially short form video. Uh, the importance of YouTube, um, it provides a lot of recommendations for AI and should we be using AI avatars and how does that, uh, go along with buyer trust? Um, but things like the Big Five are still true now we have to address that more in video. Um, and for those of you that don't know what the Big Five are, the five topics that, um, buyers care about the most. But both businesses avoid wanting to talk about on their website and online, like pricing and problems, uh, their competitors and alternatives. So, uh, those things still reign true. But now how do we actually bring that to life in YouTube videos and short form videos and, um, other interactive website tools like, uh, pricing calculators or assessments. Um, none of that was really addressed. If it was, we just scratched the surface on it. But it's even more important today.

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. We just did a webinar, um, for our own agency over at business Builders a week or so ago, and we were talking all about, um, five website mistakes that a lot of brands make. And it was pulled from a ton of great data from do what works, who analyzes the results of different A B tests. And we were talking about social proof and how the logo farm or the logo scroll, whatever it is that we all put on our websites now, um, has become just kind of noise that people scroll right by. Right. And I think that has to do with the trust that we talked about here. And we actually highlighted a really cool instance where clay, um, which is an AI powered tool especially for B2B marketers on their website. If you look at their little logo scroll, some of the logos, not every one of them, but a lot of them have case studies and it's just like, okay, uh, typically testimonials and case studies kind of live over here. But we have the logo farm right under the header. Right. To create some trust and credibility. Like, what if we connect those. Because we know that people, you know, you see state farm and it's like, well, did you serve state farm corporate or like, you know, one agent in middle of nowhere North Dakota? Um, in some small town. Right. People are skeptical. They're asking those sorts of questions.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.

Speaker A: Well, let's dive into the four pillars of being a known and trusted brand. Um, tell me if I get these right, and then we can dive into each one. So number one, say what others aren't willing to say. Number two, show what others aren't willing to show. Three is selling ways others aren't willing to sell. I'm interested to dig into that one with you. And then number four, be more human than others are willing to be first. Did I get them right? Is that.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yes, Don.

Speaker A: Cool. We got all four pillars.

Speaker B: All right.

Speaker A: Say what others aren't willing to say. And I think, like, the context I want to ask you in with these, Bob, is you mentioned, like, the principles of they ask, you answer haven't really changed, but the execution does so that's right. Like, tell me a little bit about, say, what others aren't willing to say. What does that execution need to look like today? Going off of that comment you made a few minutes ago.

Speaker B: Yeah. Well, um, you've probably already noticed the book is basically in two sections. It starts off the first two thirds of the book are the four pillars, and then the back half of the book, or the back third of the book is, uh, around the five components. And that really is how we put all this together. Um, so we're talking about the principles of the book. And when we talk about saying what others aren't willing to say, um, it's as simple as these are the things buyers want to know, but most businesses are avoiding. And we've all had those brands that we've experienced with as buyers, and it's like the finally, the breath of fresh air. Somebody's finally giving me what I want. And when you finally, as a buyer, feel someone's giving you what you want, immediately you feel something about that brand. You have more of a relationship, more of a trust. You're willing to invest more time in with them because they're willing to give you what you want. Um, and really the core theme that carried over in that section is the big five. It's just addressing the things that buyers want the most. Um, but it also goes beyond that, too. It's like one of the hidden things in the industry where companies often burn their buyers. And, you know, there are so many good businesses out there that do things the right way and they take care of their clients. They may be more expensive, but they do things the right way. Are they telling that story online on their website? Are they educating the buyer? Or are we letting the buyers, we get the leads in and then the competitors get the leads and they can't tell the difference between us. So the only thing they can make a decision on is price. Yet could we have had a better opportunity to, uh, to better educate them before they get into that sales conversation? Of course. We talked about this. And they ask, you answer. And again, reigns true. The far majority of the buying process happens before the buyer ever reaches out to the company. We're talking 80% of that process. Um, this is when they're doing the research, people. Again, we have less time than we've ever had before. We're not going to waste our time going to talk to salesperson and salesperson and salesperson and salesperson. Not when we have all the information right at our fingertips. So we're doing all this research online, watching videos, scouring the web, trying to get our answers. And the person that answers our questions best will most likely get the first phone call and we'll get the business.

Speaker A: Yeah. Uh, and just to kind of give people something tactical there of what you were saying of like, we often say both of our agencies and the way that we market when we're doing marketing for our clients. Oh, we do things the right way. We care about clients. And I'll never forget this one time I was in a sales training and it was like, go around, give me, you know, 32nd intro, 62nd intro to your sales conversation. And everybody stood up and said like, well, we've been around for so long and we really care about you and our customer service is great. And it didn't take but like four iterations of that. And we still went around the room to like all 25 where it was like, oh, gosh, we all sound exactly the same. Like, we all believe it and we all have stories to back that up. But if that's all you're saying in your sales conversations or in your marketing messaging, if you're not backing that up, like, people want to see the receipts, they want to see the examples, because one, everybody's saying that, and two, they know that a lot of people saying that can't, uh, you know, they don't have anything more. And so you might still say that, but you might give a for instance, like, and that's where maybe that kind of leads into number two, showing what others aren't willing to show. How does that relate to the first one? Or lean into video? What's going on with pillar number two, Bob?

Speaker B: Well, you know, when you're thinking about your strategy, you're never saying, well, are we doing this pillar on this one? Are we doing this pillar on that one? You're really doing all four pillars all the time. Ah. So, okay, first we have to say what others not willing to say, like, what are the things that buyers need to understand? But there's a lot more proof in video. And when you actually are willing to show it, there's a great video that we talk about. In the book, the company is called Service Threads. One of my favorite videos, um, we call it claims we make video because it's basically the company, uh, going through all their claims that they make. Um, and the things that they're saying in the video are the same things everyone says in their websites. Um, we try really hard. We have a great facility, our people, or we have good people, um, ethical, whatever.

Speaker A: It is.

Speaker B: It's all the same stuff everyone says. The beauty of this video is that you watch it, they validate all those claims because you can see it and you believe it because you see it. Um, you see this big factory that's beautiful and clean and organized and you can see like the way they're operating in the background. It's like this is such a well run company. The people, they've got personality, they've got smiles and they're telling you the things that you want to hear, but you believe them because it's come from real people that look like they really care about their jobs.

Speaker A: They're actually putting their own people on camera instead of saying, we have the greatest people with a stock photo of five people that have never been maybe in the same state as this company.

Speaker B: So show what others are not willing to show really means you can go and put on your homepage all the reasons why you're the best home builder and so and so or why you're the best agency so so. But in the digital marketing world, we know this when we create a YouTube video and we're educating on a principle or a point or tool, whatever it is, and we're doing that in a way that makes the viewer really like us and trust us and want to do business with us. It doesn't matter if we can go there on YouTube and be like we're the best agency because so and so, like we all tune that out. But when we actually show them like the thing and show us who we are and how we work, um, the audience just believes that agencies, I think a lot of agencies probably do that. Um, a lot of people in digital space too. But far majority of businesses still have not figured out this video thing. Um, and they're just not doing any video, anything on Instagram, anything on YouTube and then they're wondering why they're not getting leads is because that's where we go as buyers to go learn about products and services. Now if you're not there, the person that does show up is going to win the business.

Speaker A: Yeah, there's shopping happening on ChatGPT just in the last couple of weeks with new updates and things happening there.

Speaker B: Uh, awesome.

Speaker A: M. All right, number three is sell in ways others aren't willing to sell. Give us an intro to this one, Bob.

Speaker B: Yeah, and here we often talk about self service. Um, and this is really, um, the one, the principles of the book is like we'll just wait until we're into a sales conversation to have that, that that talk with them about the thing. So it's. You know, many businesses will say that, like, we can't put that on our website, or, you know, we're gonna talk about these things. We're gonna wait till they're in a conversation. But the reality is, if you don't have that online or you don't have that functionality, whatever it is, uh, you're never gonna have that sales conversation. Right. Cause you never gonna get there.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So, um, the idea that we'd rather, um, assess ourselves, gives ourselves a score of how we could be doing things better, or calculate our own price or configure our own thing, um, pick the salesperson we want to work with, um, building that experience onto your website, um, where now you're going to be doing probably 99% of the sale in a touchless way, um, before the prospect ever reaches out to the buyer.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So we're doing a lot more for

Speaker A: you guys at Impact like, that other agencies specifically might be able to learn from. Because I think we could be. And you and I are probably thinking about, you know, different SaaS brands and different sorts of companies in different industries, how they could apply it. Curious, since a lot of our audience here are also agencies. What does that look like for you guys at Impact and something that others might be able to implement similarly.

Speaker B: Yeah, well, we're working on an assessment right now. Um, we're hoping to roll that out next week. Um, the idea here is, like, we fully understand we're not the best fit for everybody. Um, for starters, if you're a business that's less than $3 million, you know, spending money with Impact is not the right thing for you. And we're the first to admit that, uh, if you're too big, we're not the right fit for you. There's a whole bunch of things, but m. There's also, uh, looking at the type of business you are. So by building an assessment and educating along the way and helping the buyer really understand. Help me understand what the right marketing plan or program is for me, because we'll create this assessment at the end. Many of the leads that go through it, the people that take that assessment, we're gonna recommend they do something else other than endless customers.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Because it really is not gonna be for them. So, uh, that would be the challenge, I would say, for the agency folks here is, um, you know, first off, understand who you are a good fit for and who you're not. Because I think too many agency people are like, listen, I have to get Business from wherever I can. So I'm gonna take whatever jobs I can. I hope I win everything. And that's no way to grow a business because you really aren't known for anything. And you know what? They do this, that, and if you ever read the book Built a Cell, um, you'll realize why that whole model is just so broken to try to be, you know, a job shot that does everything to everybody, for everybody. But if you really nail down like this is our ideal customer and help them understand like, what the right solution is for them, uh, by building some kind of self service assessment.

Speaker A: I like that. Yeah. Awesome. All right, number four, as we rounded out and then we're going to get into our rapid fire round, uh, as we wrap it up today, Bob, um, be more human than others are willing to be. A lot of this I think has to do and agencies are set up really well. To do this is to show the people doing, doing the work. Right. Um, we, we had some fun recently where we did a kind of AI competition at Business Builders where everybody had to, um, do an AI generated image or multiple that we could use for our own agency or for a client. Just kind of test the limits, get people tinkering with stuff. And um, one team member put together, like took our, our team page and made it to where when you hover over each team member, um, it turned them into a little cartoon with kind of builder, like construction, um, attire and stuff like that to go with our personality. So as one way to try and be more human and fun. But give, give me maybe some examples or what's the principle here that you want people to learn?

Speaker B: There's, there's a whole, um, bunch of things that we have in this section of the book. Um, one, um, of the things that, that I really like is, um, every organization should have a, uh, perspective, a worldview. Um, yeah. What's their point? Yeah, take a side. Um, on certain issues. I'm not saying like social issues, but just like philosophy is the way business should be done. Um, there should be a soul to the business, should be a personality and a tone to the business. So once we really understand that that should come to life in everything that we do. Um, you're absolutely right. People do business with people and they need to see the people behind the curtain a little bit. So the fact that you have a podcast, you know, people are building a relationship with you, Logan, through this. And over time, more and more people are going to want to do business with you because they're going to get to know you. So in our world, that might mean, all right, how do we get our salespeople in front of the camera? Um, they are talking to prospects all day. They know the answers to the questions buyers ask all the time. How can we give them a little on camera performance training so they come off well in front of the camera and they could be in our YouTube videos. Another story that we tell in Endless Customers, which I love, is, um, this girl Ellie, who worked for La Z Boy. She was a new salesperson that worked there. And, uh, when she was hired, they were already doing the asking answer. And they told her, if you're going to work here, you're going to have to be in front of the camera and be on YouTube, which she got all nervous about. Um, but what happened was, um, you know, a little bit of training. She just has this great personality in front of a camera, and she started producing videos, and her videos started doing incredibly, incredibly well. Um, and so well that almost every day somebody would walk into that Lazy Boy store and not say, um, you know, can I talk to a salesperson? Or, I'm just browsing. They'd walk and say, is Ellie here? I want to work with Ellie. I want her style. I want her design expertise. Ah, so she had all the leads coming to her because she was willing to embrace this. They felt like they had a relationship with Ellie and they only wanted to work with her.

Speaker A: Ah.

Speaker B: Um, so how can we do that inside of our businesses?

Speaker A: Man, it happens so much and it carries over from position to position and even company to company. Like, I had someone recently who was looking at, um, coming on board with our agency at Business Builders for one of our workshops and then possibly doing some ongoing work with. And she sent me a Slack message and was just like, I've listened to you on multiple podcasts over a number of years. Again, I didn't even realize this, and I don't even think we were connected on LinkedIn until somewhat recently. And I was just like, oh, wow, what sort of trust, affinity and credibility has that long game of being in front of the camera or on the mic done, that's going to accelerate that sales process, those sorts of things. It reminds me of another great agency owner I know, Ali Schwanke at Simple, Ah, Strat. They do a fantastic job of this, of putting their employees on camera with their HubSpot hacks channel. Um, and when they bring on new team members, like, it's not just Ali as the agency founder who's even always on video. It's A team effort. Um, and I think that goes a long way. Like, she's literally told me, you know, walks around, uh, at Inbound, has. You know, you and I both have. And people are like, where do I know you from? And she's like, YouTube. Yeah. Okay. Uh, so I think she's a great example of, you know, someone else in the agency space who's doing that really well. Awesome. Well, um, Bob, I want to hit, uh, you with our rapid fire round of questions. So we got five here. You ready to go as we wrap it up?

Speaker B: Let's go.

Speaker A: All right, number one, what's one book you often recommend to other agency leaders?

Speaker B: Attraction by. Uh.

Speaker A: I knew you were going to go there.

Speaker B: We already talked about it. Yeah.

Speaker A: Uh, it's a fan favorite in our community. If you have not read Traction, what are you doing? Just stop, hit pause. Don't even finish this episode. Go buy it on Audible or somewhere. All right, um, Bob, number two, what's the next challenge you and your team are focused on? Face, uh, tackling this next quarter.

Speaker B: Yeah, I would say in a very EOS business model, but also, as they advise in the book, it's just consistency at scale. How can we be very consistent with the way we deliver our services? Um, whether one coach is delivering for one client, we have another coach working with another client. How can we make sure everyone's delivering at the right way, the best way, consistently over time? Because what if one day we have a hundred coaches, um, and just like an EOS implementer, um, so how we do that at scale.

Speaker A: Love it. Number three is always one of my favorite because I'm a bit of a tech head. Um, what's one tool you've been recommending to friends and peers lately?

Speaker B: I'm gonna go super lame and say chatgpt. I'm obsessed with the.

Speaker A: But I'm telling you, there's one application, though. Like, you gotta.

Speaker B: The application. The application is the, uh, little microphone.

Speaker A: Yep. Ah.

Speaker B: Oh, my God. How much time do I save writing emails or just anything getting my thoughts out of my head and help me, like, structure my thoughts constantly on my phone. I just hit the little microphone. I'm just talking to it, and I'll just ramble, ramble, ramble, ramble, and what comes out is just absolute gold. I can't tell you how much time I've saved.

Speaker A: Yeah. And to be clear, I think we're on the same page, but I want to make sure people get this tip because it really is a good one. You're not talking about Necessarily voice mode.

Speaker B: Not voice.

Speaker A: Talking about.

Speaker B: Not the conversation.

Speaker A: Right, not the conversation. Because sometimes that can feel, like, very slow and, you know, it's somewhat limiting. And then if you want to switch to text, you can't go back. But just the dictation, right, so that you can just talk into it. Um, you know, like you would with Siri. But obviously Chat GPT is m. Way, uh, way more than what Siri can do when I just talking to it and, um, you know, dictating. Um, so I think that is absolutely a hack. Seems small, but I think a lot of people are still like, oh, if I'm gonna use Chat GPT, I gotta type into it. That's gonna be slower. Um, so. Good one there. All right. You went from, yeah, lame answer to a really good answer.

Speaker B: I did have my notes on the side here. I knew I was gonna talk about the microphone.

Speaker A: Um, number four, if you could ask one question of everyone, uh, in the agency Builders community, fellow agency CEOs, um, what would you use that question on? M. Bob?

Speaker B: It would probably be something around. Um. The world has been so much of a roller coaster, and I would just be so interested in how businesses are navigating that, um, you know, are there things they've done to counteract some of this. This craziness that's going on? Because I think we're all feeling it. So how are we. How are we protecting ourselves? That's probably. I'd be interested.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think that's a great question. All right, to round it out, who's one person you want to thank or mention that's impacted your own journey, uh, in building your agency? Excuse me, sales and marketing training company. Let me get that right. But, you know.

Speaker B: Yeah, um, you know, it takes. It takes a village, and it takes, um, a lot of people caring about you to be successful. Um, there's way too many people to name. I'm, um, going to pick one, but it's not because anyone else I'm not naming is not important, but I'm going to go with Katie, um, on, uh, my team. Katie Coelho. She's my integrator. Uh, she started with me 14 years ago, um, and grew through the ranks and became essentially the president of the company. Um, she's just absolutely incredible, and I'm so lucky to have her on my team. She makes me, uh, so much better at what I do.

Speaker A: I love it, man. Um, well, one more bonus question before we wrap it up.

Speaker B: I just prepared for this.

Speaker A: Um, yeah, you didn't prepare for it. I Mean, this isn't anything too crazy, but we talked about kind of the community building, the shift you guys have made in the agency. If you guys were going back and kind of starting that shift over and restarting the community that you started building, what do you think is maybe one thing you do different that you learned? Um, a few years into it now,

Speaker B: um, one thing I would do differently. Um, I would, uh, I would probably free up as much time as I possibly can to get to know all the members at the deepest level and make sure whatever we're doing is solving for them. Yeah, um, I know it's easier said than done. Sometimes it sounds like such a blanket thing. And there's, I think, um, Gary Vaynerchuk had a quote once in a while. He asked me, like, you know, CEOs, like, didn't really know his customers. And Gary's like, how many customers do you have? He goes, 40. He's like, what do you mean you don't know all your customers? Right. And I think we're, you know, I'm often guilty of that, too. It's like, it's not like we have a million members. I can't know them. Um, and some of them are spending a lot of money. So we do a lot of things to try to really have great conversations with them and take account care of them. But I think that real personal connection is what keeps a community thriving. Yeah, you've got to bring the members together and have them feel, you know, just be the community. But I think you have to also go and be the leaders of the community and show up the way you want all your members to show up.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think that that's a solid answer, because I remember someone saying this to me recently about, you know, if you are. Whether you're doing a free community that people are investing time in or a paid community, is that people are less and less willing to pay for content, but they are more willing to pay for access. And sometimes that can mean access to other people who are their peers or who are their peers, but a little bit further along or to, um, someone like yourself, if you are a leader in the community, um, who can give them insights they can't get elsewhere. And so I think for two reasons, your answer there is important. One, you're leaning into what people are valuing in when they sign up for a free or paid community is access. And number two, it gives you insights into. Make that into the ways you can make that community better. So that's solid. Thanks for putting up with my sixth question on our rapid fire round of five. Well, Bob, for anybody who's not as well connected with you as I am fortunate to be, what's the best way they can, um, reach out, stay connected, or maybe find the book and list customers that we talked about a good bit today, man.

Speaker B: Yeah, obviously, uh, you can buy the book. Endless customers. Wherever books are sold, we definitely appreciate, um, picking up a copy. And then for me, LinkedIn is probably the easiest place to find me.

Speaker A: Awesome. All right, Bob, well, this has been fantastic. Thanks for being our guest today.

Speaker B: Awesome, Logan, thank you so much.