In this actionable episode, Daniel Strohli, Founder of Profitsx.com, shares how to build scalable lead systems for contractors and service businesses. If you struggle with inconsistent pipelines and payroll pressures, you won't want to miss it.

You will discover:

- How to create client-centric websites that generate high-quality leads

- Why consistent, focused work outperforms talent in marketing

- What simple automations boost visibility and conversions fast

This episode is ideal for for Founders, Owners, and CEOs in stage 3 of The Founder's Evolution. Not sure which stage you're in? Find out for free in less than 10 minutes at https://www.scalearchitects.com/founders/quiz

Daniel Strohli is the founder of ProfitsX, a company dedicated to helping contractors and service-based businesses grow by building trust, credibility, and visibility online. Since 2018, he has guided business owners in creating client-centric websites, lead capture systems, and simple automations that consistently generate high-quality leads. With a background in real estate and business development, Daniel understands firsthand the challenges entrepreneurs face in competitive markets. His systems and strategies have helped clients increase revenue by an average of 38% in just 6 months.

Want to learn more about Daniel Strohli's work at Profitsx.com? Check out his website at https://profitsx.com/

Check out his free resources at https://profitsx.com/resources

Mentioned in this episode:

Take the Founder's Evolution Quiz Today

If you’re a Founder, business owner, or CEO who feels overworked by the business you lead and underwhelmed by the results, you’re doing it wrong. Succeeding as a founder all comes down to doing the right one or two things right now. Take the quiz today at foundersquiz.com, and in just ten questions, you can figure out what stage you are in, so you can focus on what is going to work and say goodbye to everything else.

Founder's Quiz

Hello, hello and welcome. Welcome once again

to the start, scale and succeed. Podcast, the only podcast that

grows with you through all seven stages of your journey as a

founder, I'm your host, Scott Ritzheimer, and today I want to

talk to the founder listening out there, just the one I know.

I know who you are. No just kidding, who grew the business,

built the team, and now lies awake at night, wondering where

the next project is going to come from, not because you can't

do the work, but because you've got people counting on you. And

you know that your pipeline may not keep up with your payroll.

You've hired because it was more work than you can handle. But

now, on the other side of all that hiring, you're realizing

that you've got to you've got to scale, not just the way you do

the work, but the way you get the work. Your website sits

there silent, and it just seems like everything you do there's

all this headwind against you. It's a hidden crisis that so

many founders face, especially those who are in the stage that

we all know is the reluctant manager stage. And here's the

thing that makes this so painful is that the very success that

allowed you to build a team has now become a trap. You Can't you

feel like you can't go backwards because they're depending on

you, and you haven't built the lead generation revenue system

for a company of anything more than you. And so every slow week

isn't just worrying a little bit about cash flow, it's looking

your team in the eye knowing you may not have enough work to keep

them employed. Well, it doesn't have to be that way, and our

guest today has spent years solving this exact problem,

especially for contractors and service based business owners.

Daniel Strohli is the founder of profits X, a company dedicated

to helping contractors and service based businesses grow by

building trust, credibility and visibility online. Since 2018

he's guided business owners in creating client centric

websites, lead capture systems and simple automations that

consistently generate high quality leads. With a background

in real estate and business development, Daniel understands

firsthand the challenges that entrepreneurs face in

competitive markets, his systems and strategies have helped

clients increase revenue by an average of 38% in just six

months. He's here with us today. Daniel, welcome to the show. So

excited to have you here. I've been looking forward to this

conversation, and I want to start off with it's out of the

gate with a with this question, why Is it that that this pattern

happens? Why is it that we suddenly feel like this approach

falls apart? What's the gap between lead generation that

works for a solo operator and what's needed to sustain a

growing team?

Pleasure to be here, and I'm honored by being

able to be on the show. I think you guys do amazing work. I do

appreciate all the questions that you asked for this specific

question. I want to point out that people tend to want to hire

sooner than necessary, because they just like the idea of being

a boss. So they'll immediately want to hire the first couple

people that they can. Some people will mistakenly hire

family and friends just because the closest people to them

without obviously having a hiring process, but someone

who's a little bit further out in business. Let's say you hired

the right people. You have everything going the correct way

in your eyes. You have the right culture in place, things like

that. And you're looking to generate leads consistently for

your business, you need to make sure that it's obviously keyword

being consistent. So that way, when you have the people on the

team, they have the product or capability to produce the

product on a consistent basis. Now the question that you ask is

specific to lead generation, and when I work with companies, we

usually work in the real estate niche, financial niche,

construction niche to be specific, but it still applies

for all businesses, because business fundamentally is the

same. Now it can be tweaked for the business type, the category,

the niche, but fundamentally, how you generate leads, how you

capture leads, how you nurture the leads, stay the same. Now,

when people are looking to grow and to scale, they think that if

they just hire people without looking at the marketing side of

the business, it's just going to take care of itself. And the way

I like to explain to people is very simple. There's a marketing

side of the business and there's a business and there's a product

slash innovation side of the business. So what you sell and

how often you get to sell it and how many times people buy it,

that's where marketing comes in. It's not a bad word. I'm making

it very general, so people understand it's a part of

business that being said when you're doing it yourself. You

usually understand what you need on a weekly basis, whether it be

booked, calls sales, whatever it is when you hire someone else in

a lot of times, the mistakes that they make, even before they

even get to the lead generation process, is they don't actually

document their systems well enough they don't demonstrate it

to the new hire, and they're not effectively able to duplicate

it. So what they effectively do is they end up getting

themselves two separate jobs. They're doing the new person's

job. They're doing their job. If they want it done right, they do

it themselves. And then the lead generation issue just becomes

another issue on top. Because, like, Yeah, I knew how to do it

right on my own, but the second I bring an additional person

onto the team, I now have to worry about his workload. I want

to make sure I'm getting my investments worth so on and so.

Forth that this happens at a small level and it happens at

bigger levels the same way. It doesn't really change. Just the

longer you play the game, the more you understand how to do

the documentation, how to generate leads more

consistently. That makes sense.

Yeah, no, it's so good. So one of the things

that I hear a lot is, I have to get more leads. I have to get

more leads. Very rarely do I hear someone say, I need to

build more credibility online. Why is it that you focus on

credibility? And what's this relationship with lead

generation?

Someone who's starting in business, you always

want to make more money. You get into business saying, I want to

make money. That's why I'm in business. Most people tell you

you're in business to make money. I noticed obviously it's

not about how much money you make, it's how much money you

make, it's how much money you take, the profit and the lead

generation is what happens to get you to that profit stage.

And my goal was to simplify it as best as I can, for myself,

let alone anyone else that happened to have served clients

for years to come, but for myself, I needed to understand

very simple things, which was, how many people do I speak to?

Or how many people know about me? I should say, how many

people actually want to have a conversation with me? And then

how many people actually end up converting to become a client?

That being said, if your goal is to generate as many leads as

possible, which a lot of people here may be listening to and

saying, hey, yeah, that would be nice. I would love to have

consistent leads coming in. I would ask you to even define

what the lead is. What is the definition of a lead? A lot of

people think of it as clients or potential clients, which, in

that case, anyone with a name and a phone number and a pulse

is a lead. But the reality is, especially as you grow,

qualifying the leads, speaking to the right people, having the

right clients come through the door, is the difference maker.

And a lot of times that comes down to pricing, credibility,

brand, economies of scale. There's a lot of things that

come into that portion where people don't want to take into

account. They just look at it from big picture. Hey, I need

leads to make sales. And what happens is, you hire the wrong

person, you bring in the wrong lead to become a client, you end

up doing 10 times the amount of work with that one lead, and it

causes you to go in a downward spiral, instead of building the

business that you want, and you look back six months, 12 months

a year, two years backwards, and you connect the dots going, I'm

not sure what's going on. And that's if you're lucky, you get

to connect the dots. Sometimes you really need someone to help

you to connect those dots. But if you're unlucky, you just keep

making the mistakes for years and years and years to come,

instead of being able to diagnose and self assess those

patterns and pretty much understand, okay, great. I need

leads, but I need the right leads, and making sure that you

position yourself as the right person for them will help in

that relationship. Similar to dating, it's not, oh, I need a

spouse. It's like, who am I? Am I the right person for this

spouse that I'm looking for so you guys can connect and be the

correct match for each other.

Yeah, one of the things that I I have found

is that folks at this stage, they're not brand new. They've

been doing it for a time or two. They have enough success to have

a team around them. Let's assume that they've hired and the right

timing. You make a great point there earlier, but one of the

things that I think they fail to miss is how much more

credibility they have at this stage than they did when they

were first starting out. And so a lot of folks when they're

first starting out, especially if they've switched industries

or there's something about this business that's new, oftentimes,

credibility has to be a little bit more creative, right for

this brand new business, but by this point, there's some wins

under your belt, right? There's some success in your wake. And I

feel like a lot of folks don't recognize how much that changes,

how quickly. How do you help folks to understand what their

current credibility level is and how to take advantage of the

credibility that they actually.

Go into the next stage of businesses, which are

the people who are well, evolving in their process, and

regarding how we can help them be more credible or present how

credible they are and showcase their wins to the marketplace,

is what we'll dive deeper into. So that being said, I tell my

team all the time is proof over promise. We don't want to go

around promising people things all day long, because they don't

really believe you, and nor should they like the only people

they believe is themselves, so or other people, like the

masses. So what you say about you is not as effective as what

other people say about you. And since you've been in business

for more than a few years, a lot of times you can turn many

different directions. But we'll use the simplest one. Let's say

like Google reviews, the company that has 10 Google reviews

versus the company that has 1000 is dramatically different, even

though you guys have been in business for the same amount of

time. And I feel like a lot of companies that have been around,

I don't care if it's been 20 years, 30 years, 40 years,

that's their credibility booster. I've been in business

for 20 years. And side note, I'm not the oldest guy in the game,

and I'm not trying to date myself on this, but a lot of

times, people that have been in business for 2030 years, they

have the same year repeated over and over time. Doesn't make you

have 30. Years of experience. That means you have one year of

experience repeated 30 times. I'm not saying that. What I'm

saying is that at the end of the day, the customer, the client

that you're looking to work with, wants to know, very

simple, can I trust you? Can I trust the company? Can I trust

the product? Will the product work? Will the product work for

me? Because I'm a special person, and I have my own

issues, and I have my unique flaws and challenges. How do I

know what you have is good for me? So by you telling them I've

been in business for 20 years and I know what I'm talking

about is not as effective as someone else saying, hey, this

company has been around for three years or five years or

seven years, but they've solved this problem consistently for

me, every time I call them on time, every time, and then

having 1000 people saying that. So just pure proof over promise

is one of the simplest ways to show credibility. Don't tell a

wise man once told me you rather show someone versus tell them,

because what you do speak so loud, no one actually hears what

you're saying. And I think a lot of people hide behind you know

what? I'm shy. I've been in business. I don't want people to

know about me. Whatever it is they try to hide behind their

work, and they may or may not even be open to sharing their

work, but at the very least being able to say, Hey, I'm

proud of what we do. This is the work that we've done. This is

what our clients have to say about us. Here's our letters of

recommendation. Here's all the different problems that we've

been able to solve. Here's the different ways that you can look

at the problem that we've been able to solve. You can break it

down into really interesting facts and figures, to display it

to people in a very simple manner, so they can say, hey,

this is who these people are. This is what they're about. This

is how credible they are. It's not, are you credible? Are you

not credible? It's how credible Are you? And you're going to

want to go work with the person who's done 10,000 brain

surgeries over the person who's doing his first or his 10th. But

also you need the person that did 10,000 brain surgeries, to

at least tell you, Hey, I've done 10,000 brain surgeries.

Here's my happy, healthy, alive clients that made it through.

These are some of the things that tend to be very helpful for

businesses that of all stages.

Yeah, I think what what's also interesting

about this stage in particular is a lot of especially service

based businesses are coming out of the realm where a little bit

of word of mouth is enough, right? You know, they sell to

their friends, they sell to their friends, friends, and then

they start getting a couple degrees removed. And I think a

lot of founders fail to they underestimate how little

credibility they have three degrees removed from them,

right? The Friends of their friends or their friends don't

have any experience with them. They don't know them. And so I

think this becomes a much bigger issue at this stage. What have

you found, just in practical senses, right? So credibility is

important. We need it now more than ever. It's one of the keys

to building a consistent lead generation platform. What are

some of the quickest wins that a company can think of? What are

some things we'll answer the question,

but think of it when you meet a stranger,

because that's effectively what we're doing. Yes, when we start

off in business, your mom, your grandmother, your cousin, your

neighbor, your old boss, everyone will buy from you that

knows you, likes you and trusts you. But effectively, once you

go outside of that ring of people and individuals, you get

stuck with the rest of the world, people that don't know

you, like you and trust you. So your goal is to build trust and

credibility with them as soon as possible. And yes, time is a

huge player in that game. If you've been in business for an

extended period of time, it will be one of the factors that will

build trust more than something else, possibly. But the question

is, what is the most effective force multiplier that, when

implemented, gives you the most amount of trust with the colder

audience? And to that, I would answer like I mentioned, taking

that step back is looking at it. If you met a stranger on the

street and you tell him, I've been in business for 20 years

come where years, come work with me. You're still a stranger. I

don't care who you are. Being able to differentiate yourself

from the crowd is really coming down to one thing, which, again,

from a stranger perspective, is risk reversal, if you're able to

remove the risk from the equation. Now there's a reason

for me to trust you, meaning you can say 100% money back

guarantee, or you could say, put your wallet away. You don't even

have to spend money here. I'm going to take on all the risk

you just sit back and enjoy, and I give you wins that you would

have normally paid for, which makes it, by itself, something

of value that I am taking the risk on that cost you nothing.

And when people see that, it doesn't make a difference what

it is or how big of a gesture it is, if anything, the bigger the

gesture is usually not such a great sign, but anything even

small, something that says I took the time to understand who

you are, what you're about, I can tell you from my own

experience when I started out, you don't have all the social

proof to go out into the marketplace with, but what you

do have is an in depth understanding of the audience

that you serve, and when you use the vernacular that they

particularly use. You say the words and the verbiages and the

lingo and you speak to them the way they speak to their friends,

the way they speak to their spouse, the way they speak to a

bartender, the way they speak to themselves when no one's

watching that internal voice that's going on inside their

mind, when you can verbalize those words back to them, they

instantly will trust you more, because people like to do

business. With people who are like them, how they would like

to be, things like that. So if you're more like them, they like

you. If you show them, hey, I'm like you. I've done things like

you. I understand you. I've been in your shoes. They're more open

to understanding what you're about. Because if you're showing

them, I understand you, they're saying, Okay, let me, let me

hear a little bit about you.

Yeah. So true. So true. Daniel, I have this

question that I ask all my guests. I'm interested to see

what you have to say. And the question is this, what is the

biggest secret you wish wasn't a secret at all? What's that one

thing you wish everybody watching or listening today

knew?

I believe it's something that many people say

but don't actually do, which is the actual doing of the work, I

think, and I had a meeting specifically about this today,

which is why I'm exceptionally passionate about it. But it's

not something that's new to me, and it's not a conversation that

I've had and had plenty of times in the past, but in a very

simple phrase, it's the people who do more win, and the more

you do, the better you get. And I think very few people actually

truly understand that, I think that people wish they had more

in life, or they wish they would do better, or they want more.

All these things are good. They're great things to have.

It's a great attitude. But what I truly believe, in my heart of

hearts, is what you put in is what you get out, and that at

the end of the day you work in the business, you go to the gym,

you may not get the results today, tomorrow, this week, this

month, whatever it is for you, because each person is a little

bit unique. But at the end of the day, the work that you put

in counts, and the people who do that work consistently focused,

disciplined, and are 110% committed to the process,

obviously to the outcome, meaning you're not doing it for

no reason. You obviously want to hit a goal. You obviously want

to hit a goal. You obviously want to go the right direction,

and you're that you're facing but the process itself, which I

know sounds cliche, the people you travel with, these things

are all important, but the work that you do when no one else is

watching the work, the work, the work, that's it, the work.

There's work that you have on your desk. There's work that I

have on my desk that we know that we should be doing. And the

question is, who's going to do it and who's going to do it and

who's going to do it first? Who's going to do it more? Who's

going to do it harder? Consistent work, repeating over

time is my message to the world that beats everything,

especially talent and anything in between.

Yeah, so good, so good. Daniel, there's some

folks listening who it's just the right word at the right

moment. It's exactly where they are, exactly where they are,

exactly what they're trying to accomplish. How can they reach

out and find more about you do.

Tractors, we help a lot of real estate

investors closer into the city, but the thing I always tell

people is, go to profit x.com grab a free resource. Look at

the work I put in. Go check out the resources that we have put

together. And guess what? It's 100% free. Doesn't cost you

anything. Check it out. See if the thing is as good as what I

what I make it seem. Don't take my word for it. Look at the work

I put in. Look at the past. See if it's something you have any

interest in. And from there, I'm not that hard to get a hold of.

You can DM someone on my team say you want to set something

up. We can always go from there to have a chat about how we

would be able to help your business. But for now, I would

implore every person to go there find the resource that's right

for them and see if they can use that to already start making

money and fixing certain leaks that they may have going on for

their business.

Very good, very good. Daniel, thanks for

being on the show. It's a privilege and honor having you

here today. Really appreciate you coming and sharing with us.

For those of you watching and listening, you know your time

and attention mean the world to us, I hope you got as much out

of this conversation as I know I did, and I cannot wait to see

you next time. Take care.