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No Place Like Home Services Author Interview
Episode 4110th May 2024 • Connect & Convert: The Sales Accelerator Podcast • Sales RX and Wizard of Ads Employee Optimization
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In this episode of Connect & Convert, hosts Dennis Collins and Leah Bumphrey sit down with Ray Seggern and Monica Ballard, co-authors of "No Place Like Home Services," to uncover the secrets behind explosive growth in the home services industry. Join us as we dive into the Holy Trinity of business growth and learn how to dominate your market.

Key Takeaways:

  • Discover the power of story, culture, and experience in driving business growth
  • Learn how to develop a compelling message that resonates with your target audience
  • Understand the importance of recruiting and retaining top talent in the home services industry
  • Gain insights on allocating marketing resources for maximum impact

Resources and Links:

  • Get a copy of "No Place Like Home Services" on Amazon

Timestamps:

00:00:00 - Introduction and guest introductions

00:03:26 - The inspiration behind "No Place Like Home Services"

00:09:10 - The transformation readers can expect from the book

00:14:19 - Applying the book's concepts to businesses outside the home services industry

00:21:15 - The heart and passion behind the book's creation

Guest Bios:

Ray Seggern is a Wizard of Ads partner and head of the Brand Guys. With over 20 years of experience in the advertising industry, Ray specializes in helping business owners quickly identify their growth issues and prescribe effective solutions.

Monica Ballard is a Wizard of Ads partner, author, and consummate storyteller. With a passion for words, Monica has authored books, written plays, and helped countless businesses craft compelling messages that resonate with their target audience.

Connect with the Hosts:

Transcripts

Dennis Collins:

Greetings, everyone.

Dennis Collins:

Welcome back to Connect & Convert.

Dennis Collins:

The Sales Accelerator podcast, where we share small business

Dennis Collins:

owner insider secrets.

Dennis Collins:

To grow your sales faster than ever.

Dennis Collins:

I'm Dennis Collins, and I'm joined by my partner today.

Dennis Collins:

Hey, Leah, how are you today?

Leah Bumphrey:

Hey, doing good.

Leah Bumphrey:

I'm very excited about this, uh, about this session, Dennis.

Leah Bumphrey:

This is gonna be fun.

Dennis Collins:

Well, I agree.

Dennis Collins:

We love to have guests.

Dennis Collins:

And today we have some very, very special guests who are near and dear to us.

Dennis Collins:

And they have just co authored a book, which I think our

Dennis Collins:

viewers and our listeners are going to find very interesting.

Dennis Collins:

No Place Like Home Services.

Dennis Collins:

No place like home services.

Dennis Collins:

How a wizard of ads and his crack cracker deck copywriter helped

Dennis Collins:

America's best companies sell 2 billion.

Dennis Collins:

Our first guest today is, is Ray Segrin.

Dennis Collins:

I think I met Ray about 20 years ago when he was starting his company.

Dennis Collins:

Brand guy, right?

Dennis Collins:

Team heads up.

Dennis Collins:

God, it's been a long time, Ray.

Dennis Collins:

Uh, but your superpower.

Dennis Collins:

I love your superpower.

Dennis Collins:

Your superpower is getting to know a business owner quickly and

Dennis Collins:

getting to know their issues very quickly so that you can prescribe.

Dennis Collins:

Correctly, a methodology for their, for their growth and for their dominance.

Dennis Collins:

I love the word dominance.

Dennis Collins:

That's your superpower.

Dennis Collins:

That's your superpower.

Dennis Collins:

Well, thanks man.

Dennis Collins:

I appreciate you saying that.

Dennis Collins:

We want to know more about that.

Dennis Collins:

I'm sure the book details that.

Dennis Collins:

Can I also introduce the co author who is here with us today?

Dennis Collins:

She is Monica Ballard.

Dennis Collins:

Hi, Monica.

Dennis Collins:

Hey, Monica.

Dennis Collins:

Uh, I have not known Monica as, I have not known her as long as I've known Mr.

Dennis Collins:

Ray, but I do know something that Monica is the consummate storyteller.

Dennis Collins:

She, in fact, one description of her I read said if words are

Dennis Collins:

involved, Monica is involved.

Dennis Collins:

All different kinds of words are involved.

Dennis Collins:

Words, be it a song, be it content, be it a speech, uh, I think you're a

Dennis Collins:

playwright, you're an author, you've authored books, you've co authored books.

Dennis Collins:

Words are pretty much your life.

Dennis Collins:

You have, as they say, a way with words.

Dennis Collins:

So it's a wordsmith.

Dennis Collins:

So, we're glad to have both of you on today.

Dennis Collins:

As I said, the book is called No Place Like Home Services, so I

Dennis Collins:

like to kind of get an idea of what's inside an author's head.

Dennis Collins:

And since we have co authors, we'll probably have maybe two different ideas.

Dennis Collins:

What was the inspiration for this book?

Dennis Collins:

What was Ha!

Dennis Collins:

Ha!

Dennis Collins:

What was the inspiration?

Dennis Collins:

What was the reason?

Dennis Collins:

What, what, what, what said?

Dennis Collins:

Yeah, we got to do this book.

Dennis Collins:

What, what was that?

Dennis Collins:

Right.

Ray Seggern:

Sure.

Ray Seggern:

I'll, I'll jump in on that, Dennis, for starters.

Ray Seggern:

Thanks, Dennis.

Ray Seggern:

Thanks Leah for having us today.

Ray Seggern:

We're gonna have a lot of fun.

Ray Seggern:

I'm sure.

Ray Seggern:

So the idea for no place like home services came from our considerable

Ray Seggern:

experience inside the home services vertical, um, going all the way back to.

Ray Seggern:

It is 20 years ago and changed, and just a little bit of change.

Ray Seggern:

It was Good Friday 2004 when I went into the, into the wacky world of The

Ray Seggern:

Wizard of Ads when Roy Williams, founder, hired me to be one of his writers.

Ray Seggern:

And, uh, there's, when I went to work for him, he said, there's this partner network

Ray Seggern:

that I'm building, and I'm not going to pay you probably what you're going

Ray Seggern:

to discover your worth, but I've got a, I've already planned your exit strategy.

Ray Seggern:

Even when I was writing for Roy back at the home office,

Ray Seggern:

uh, home services was a thing.

Ray Seggern:

And I can share that with you.

Ray Seggern:

Like, but the book generally came from Monica and I hitched our wagons

Ray Seggern:

together back in 2012 when I had the opportunity to bring a lot of

Ray Seggern:

clients in, in one fell swoop from a particular trade organization.

Ray Seggern:

10 years, Monica and I collaborated.

Ray Seggern:

On an article for their, their publication, right?

Ray Seggern:

In addition to that, we're, we're working on dozens of clients, uh, uh, week after

Ray Seggern:

week, month after month, year after year.

Ray Seggern:

So the sum total, everything we learned across that decade, um, is, uh, what's

Ray Seggern:

featured in No Place Like Home Services.

Ray Seggern:

It really just became a, uh, uh, at some point it was great.

Ray Seggern:

You know, we've got so many articles we've written.

Ray Seggern:

We could take that idea and write a chapter on it.

Ray Seggern:

And we've got this client, boy, that was a great success story there.

Ray Seggern:

Uh, so it was just with so much material that, uh, it was actually, uh, born of the

Ray Seggern:

pandemic, uh, but took us a little while to get, so that's kind of when we decided

Ray Seggern:

we were going to start, uh, compiling and it took us a minute to sculpt it

Ray Seggern:

into what you've got in your hands today.

Dennis Collins:

That's great.

Dennis Collins:

Monica, you being a writer in so many different disciplines,

Dennis Collins:

I'd love to think of a book as something that's transformative.

Dennis Collins:

For instance, there is a before state and there's an after state.

Dennis Collins:

Okay, so the proposed reader, our reader, Is in a before state that we're

Dennis Collins:

requires them to get to an after state.

Dennis Collins:

How do you see that transformation in this current book in no

Dennis Collins:

place like home services?

Dennis Collins:

How do you see that transformation?

Dennis Collins:

Where can you be transformed from before to after by using?

Monica Ballard:

Yeah, we, um, uh, like, like Ray says, we started out with

Monica Ballard:

these disparate articles, and so we had to kind of go through them and decide

Monica Ballard:

which articles do we want to include?

Monica Ballard:

Which ones did.

Monica Ballard:

Because of the word count, we really didn't say enough, and we can expand and

Monica Ballard:

expound on, uh, and increase the word count there to, to say what it was we

Monica Ballard:

really meant to say in the first place.

Monica Ballard:

But, uh, because of the amount of column space, just didn't have the

Monica Ballard:

opportunity to say, and then, um.

Monica Ballard:

How do we want to couch all of this, package it in, in a way that is sort

Monica Ballard:

of a theme and the Wizard of Oz theme came about because we're wizards of ads.

Monica Ballard:

And, uh, so the whole point is that a lot of business owners have the

Monica Ballard:

brains, the heart, and the soul.

Monica Ballard:

And the courage that they already have, they, they just need a map, essentially,

Monica Ballard:

they need a yellow brick road to follow to get from point A to point B to

Monica Ballard:

follow that, uh, that that dream to get those answers that when they get

Monica Ballard:

there, they find out they already had.

Monica Ballard:

What it was that they needed all along, so we found that thematically,

Monica Ballard:

um, it sort of matched the goal that we wanted them to have.

Ray Seggern:

No place like home services.

Ray Seggern:

You know what?

Ray Seggern:

I had Eureka moment on that.

Ray Seggern:

It's kind of cool.

Ray Seggern:

Yeah.

Ray Seggern:

And then, you know, the more we talked about it, it was just there was so

Ray Seggern:

much to explore there that it was.

Ray Seggern:

It was just a fun, a fun thing to sort of leave everything through.

Dennis Collins:

Well, it worked for me.

Dennis Collins:

I've pretty much devoured it and enjoyed it.

Dennis Collins:

But I want to highlight one particular chapter, chapter 7.

Dennis Collins:

Okay, uh, story, culture and experience story, culture and

Dennis Collins:

experience that rings my chime.

Dennis Collins:

You know, a lot of the stuff that the practice that Leah and I are in basically

Dennis Collins:

is about that is about storytelling and what's your, your culture.

Dennis Collins:

Determines the level of flight, how high are you going to fly this airplane?

Dennis Collins:

Your culture has a lot to do with it and certainly your customer experience.

Dennis Collins:

But there's one part, I think towards the end of the chapter that I'm going to cite

Dennis Collins:

that I really kind of, kind of hit me.

Dennis Collins:

I think it's an actual quote from one of your clients.

Dennis Collins:

I, uh, I don't know if I want to use his name, but it was one of your clients,

Dennis Collins:

I think called service champions.

Dennis Collins:

Yeah, that's Kevin Comerford.

Dennis Collins:

He says

Dennis Collins:

Kevin Comerford.

Dennis Collins:

Yeah.

Dennis Collins:

He says.

Dennis Collins:

Run the play.

Dennis Collins:

Okay.

Dennis Collins:

Did you come to work with the right mindset?

Dennis Collins:

Did you run the play?

Dennis Collins:

Those are powerful words.

Dennis Collins:

What does Kevin mean by that and why did you include that in the book?

Ray Seggern:

Yeah, Kevin has been a great guy to work with through the

Ray Seggern:

years, and it really, um, you know, it really highlights for me, guys, the

Ray Seggern:

degree to which you stumble across a every now and then who it's super clear

Ray Seggern:

that, uh, uh, that we're, uh, bringing something to the table to help them.

Ray Seggern:

But certainly we're learning a lot from that.

Ray Seggern:

We're always learning all our, the only reason we're any good in these

Ray Seggern:

industries is because the clients taught us about the business.

Ray Seggern:

And then we brought value with what we learned, uh, about ad.

Ray Seggern:

Who is a good combination, right?

Ray Seggern:

But yeah, run the play is something that was so powerful.

Ray Seggern:

That's out of Kevin's book, which is called champion mindset.

Ray Seggern:

And, uh, the idea that the experience component of story, culture, and

Ray Seggern:

experience, uh, uh, we think about how do we deliver an experience?

Ray Seggern:

I can go on and on about this, by the way, my whole next book that I'm writing is

Ray Seggern:

called story and culture and experience.

Ray Seggern:

So, um, The, the idea of running the play means if we think of it like

Ray Seggern:

we're Vince Lombardi or Tom Landry and the play says this is how you score a

Ray Seggern:

touchdown and you, and you diagram it on a chalkboard and everybody knows

Ray Seggern:

what their role in the play is to, to achieve success, then, uh, uh, that's

Ray Seggern:

what the metaphor works on there.

Ray Seggern:

And yeah, Dennis, like you, I like it a lot.

Leah Bumphrey:

Yeah, I was very impressed with.

Leah Bumphrey:

the amount of questions you give to the reader to take some time.

Leah Bumphrey:

I mean, this is not a tome.

Leah Bumphrey:

This isn't going to take you, you know, a few months to go through,

Leah Bumphrey:

but every chapter you ask some very reflective questions that any of

Leah Bumphrey:

my clients, I would want them to sit and be thinking about that.

Leah Bumphrey:

Now that comes from both of you guys and is.

Leah Bumphrey:

I would imagine that's what you do with your clients.

Leah Bumphrey:

Delve into those questions to make sure that that story comes out.

Monica Ballard:

Yeah.

Monica Ballard:

And I think one of the things that, that, um, that we excel at as consultants is

Monica Ballard:

in those monthly meetings to ask for some good news, always at the top, give us

Monica Ballard:

some good news, what good news happened.

Monica Ballard:

And that puts them certainly in the right mindset.

Monica Ballard:

Uh, in, in order to, if they came into the meeting ready to, to kind of, or

Monica Ballard:

something like that, when we ask for good news, it's kind of like, oh, it's,

Monica Ballard:

it's really a transformation for them, uh, to, to kind of flip things and,

Monica Ballard:

and, uh, and look for those good stories to tell us and then, uh, What we try

Monica Ballard:

to help them with is look, we're here.

Monica Ballard:

We're here in the foxhole with you.

Monica Ballard:

All right.

Monica Ballard:

We're here to help you along with your advertising and your business.

Monica Ballard:

We don't have all the answers.

Monica Ballard:

There's no silver bullets or certainly one, one thing, one, one

Monica Ballard:

cure all, but as far as advertising is concerned, let's help you.

Monica Ballard:

Tell that story.

Monica Ballard:

Let's help you with your culture and improve your experience.

Monica Ballard:

Because the stories that we tell in their advertising have to ring

Monica Ballard:

true by the time the experience comes along and the technician

Monica Ballard:

is in their home doing whatever.

Leah Bumphrey:

Home services, that's the theme.

Leah Bumphrey:

And I know that you guys do tons of business with home services.

Leah Bumphrey:

But when I was reading this, I mean, there's a lot of, a lot of wisdom

Leah Bumphrey:

that can be pulled out for us.

Leah Bumphrey:

Other businesses, the way I'm looking at it, what are your thoughts?

Ray Seggern:

Yeah.

Ray Seggern:

So, I mean, if you look in the second section, the great things come

Ray Seggern:

in threes, which obviously Monica referenced earlier, you know, we we've

Ray Seggern:

connected that to, uh, uh, you know, the, the three tag alongs in, in wizard

Ray Seggern:

of Oz, right, but really the first.

Ray Seggern:

You know, Golden Trinity was strategy, message and budget

Ray Seggern:

because Monica and I just developed a very, uh, organic shorthand for

Ray Seggern:

describing what is it y'all do?

Ray Seggern:

Well, we help you with strategy.

Ray Seggern:

We help you with messaging and we have to do with budget, right?

Ray Seggern:

And then along the way, um, I came up with this idea of air, land and

Ray Seggern:

sea, which is air is the airwaves and sea is where the surfing happens.

Ray Seggern:

And then land is boots on the ground.

Ray Seggern:

And a lot of the A lot of the contractor types can tap into

Ray Seggern:

the military analogy there.

Ray Seggern:

And then we've already talked about experience.

Ray Seggern:

So all, but all of that applies whether you're in home services or not.

Ray Seggern:

Right.

Ray Seggern:

I mean, the fact that you have a strategy that informs message is.

Ray Seggern:

And that we always want to get the highest and best use of that

Ray Seggern:

marketing, precious marketing resource through budget planning.

Ray Seggern:

Now, you know, we're not reconciling invoices and keeping a spreadsheet week

Ray Seggern:

to week, but what we do is once a year, we help our clients plan their budget, right?

Ray Seggern:

How much should go to this?

Ray Seggern:

How much should go to that?

Ray Seggern:

And the other.

Ray Seggern:

So, yeah, all of those are universal, Leah.

Ray Seggern:

And I think that, Whether you're a jeweler, a furniture store, a car

Ray Seggern:

dealer, cosmetic dentist, whatever that those same principles would apply.

Leah Bumphrey:

Monica How about what for you?

Leah Bumphrey:

I mean when I was reading this book thinking of both of you as authors I

Leah Bumphrey:

know you're not trying to stop being consultants But somebody could use this as

Leah Bumphrey:

a template for developing their own their own strategy their own marketing You guys

Leah Bumphrey:

bring something a little bit more to it.

Monica Ballard:

Absolutely.

Monica Ballard:

And, uh, as the message developer, and that is certainly, I went from being a

Monica Ballard:

copywriter for a massive amount of radio stations, too many, to being a message

Monica Ballard:

developer for Roy in Roy's home shop.

Monica Ballard:

And I learned the difference between uh, Writing copy banging out copy as I used

Monica Ballard:

to do, um, to being a message developer and messaging is different than copy in

Monica Ballard:

that, uh, you, you help the, the client develop the message, which is the story

Monica Ballard:

of their company and it's more about.

Monica Ballard:

bonding than it is What the sale of a week is or something like that So that's

Monica Ballard:

the difference between message and copy and that's what I try to to stress in the

Monica Ballard:

book as well Is um that you need sort of a long story arc to take people From here

Monica Ballard:

to there you got to pull people in and take them along on this journey uh through

Monica Ballard:

through messaging rather than just copy

Dennis Collins:

I I I think that's That's great that you guys are messaging experts.

Dennis Collins:

I don't think there's any question, uh, if it has to do with a message, you

Dennis Collins:

will find the message, but I want to turn my attention and your attention

Dennis Collins:

now to chapter 11, which is recruiting.

Dennis Collins:

And retain.

Ray Seggern:

Yeah, I think the trades have it really hard right now in terms

Ray Seggern:

of attracting, uh, technicians, but it's really something that I learned,

Ray Seggern:

uh, very early on that the only way any business owner can grow is to attract,

Ray Seggern:

train, motivate, and retain team members.

Ray Seggern:

And it goes back to in the Holy Trinity of story, culture, and

Ray Seggern:

experience is that culture.

Ray Seggern:

Any organization that is.

Ray Seggern:

Subject to high turnover is going to have a hard time maintaining culture.

Ray Seggern:

So in the relationship of story and culture and experience, you could

Ray Seggern:

see how a deficiency in culture undermines your ability to deliver the

Ray Seggern:

experience ultimately and translate everything to happy customers, right?

Ray Seggern:

So, yeah, really, uh, uh, uh, you're right to hone in on that, Dennis.

Ray Seggern:

It's a, it's an important part of the equation, and we knew it needed to be in

Ray Seggern:

the book, uh, for that particular reason.

Ray Seggern:

And I think it's a really good chapter.

Ray Seggern:

Um, it, I think it highlights.

Ray Seggern:

It's, um, uh, Monica and I's, uh, our, uh, um, our working relationship

Ray Seggern:

because while I get credit for a lot of, uh, The Big Rise, this is

Ray Seggern:

a chapter really that, uh, is a lot of Monica in this chapter for sure.

Leah Bumphrey:

This chapter talks about finding the organization's rhythm

Leah Bumphrey:

and that did make me think of Monica.

Monica Ballard:

Interesting.

Monica Ballard:

Uh, yeah, this, um, I won't say that this was an easy chapter, right?

Monica Ballard:

Uh, but, uh, it was, it was lessons that we learned from a lot of feedback

Monica Ballard:

from our clients about what they do to, I mean, a lot of them were, were just

Monica Ballard:

like, Oh, we just can't keep people.

Monica Ballard:

And, and so we asked them a lot of hard questions about their

Monica Ballard:

culture and how they were.

Monica Ballard:

Rewarding and attracting new talent and what that new talent had to

Monica Ballard:

say about where they came from and why they left the previous company.

Monica Ballard:

And so we were, we were taking all those nuggets and helping our clients with a

Monica Ballard:

plan in order to retain the good talent that they had weed out the bad talent.

Monica Ballard:

And, and how to look for those guys and, uh, reward them, you know, not everybody

Monica Ballard:

is all that excited about free pizza Fridays or, uh, they, they prefer time

Monica Ballard:

off or they prefer a monetary reward.

Monica Ballard:

Or everybody is, is sort of wired a little bit differently.

Monica Ballard:

And I, I think through the years we've helped clients.

Monica Ballard:

See that so that they can retain the best talent that they have and, uh,

Monica Ballard:

have them really be true to the company and, and the people who employ them.

Monica Ballard:

And we've talked to a number of homeowners, not, not homeowners,

Monica Ballard:

but, um, business owners, particularly when the pandemic hit.

Monica Ballard:

And it was amazing how many of them were like, I got to look after these guys.

Monica Ballard:

You know, these guys and their families and their mortgage payments.

Monica Ballard:

And it was really, it was really heartening to know how much

Monica Ballard:

they were invested in their employees and their lives.

Monica Ballard:

They didn't just look at them as a number on the bottom line.

Monica Ballard:

And so that was, that was a relational aspect of our consulting business that I

Monica Ballard:

think was, was really brought to light.

Monica Ballard:

Particularly during the pandemic.

Ray Seggern:

One of the things that, uh, um, that that we've realized along

Ray Seggern:

the way is the tables have turned.

Ray Seggern:

We don't live in the world of the 80s where the business owners have

Ray Seggern:

the good jobs, the precious jobs that, uh, everybody fights for.

Ray Seggern:

Therefore, do it my way or the highway more and more.

Ray Seggern:

You're interviewing employees so they can interview you.

Ray Seggern:

You to decide if they're going to hire you to be their next

Ray Seggern:

boss, because great resignation.

Ray Seggern:

There's so many side hustles and entrepreneurial opportunities.

Ray Seggern:

It's just a very interesting reflection of the time that we live.

Leah Bumphrey:

I was really struck with both of you, the heart that you guys

Leah Bumphrey:

put in, especially in the beginning, when you're talking about the why,

Leah Bumphrey:

why you got into this Ray, your story of literally, you know, going to the

Leah Bumphrey:

little stores when you were a kid and how that impacted you and small town.

Leah Bumphrey:

That's, that's huge.

Leah Bumphrey:

Because I think we all heart.

Leah Bumphrey:

And that's that difference between working with local businesses.

Leah Bumphrey:

I don't care how big they are, but the local business that you're trying to

Leah Bumphrey:

help and kind of getting to the nut.

Leah Bumphrey:

I think it showed both of your parts.

Ray Seggern:

Yeah, I'm glad you enjoyed that, that part of the book, Leah.

Ray Seggern:

Um, it was fun for me to write.

Ray Seggern:

Um, because it took me back sort of in the Sherman and Peabody way

Ray Seggern:

back machine to, I got to revisit time with my granddad when I was in

Ray Seggern:

third and fourth grade going around.

Ray Seggern:

He was a CPA in a small town here in central Texas.

Ray Seggern:

And, uh, um, we'd actually, my mom had relocated our family

Ray Seggern:

there when my grandma died.

Ray Seggern:

So, but then my mom's going to work, dad going to work, they

Ray Seggern:

were doing their own things.

Ray Seggern:

I spent a lot of time with granddad.

Ray Seggern:

So, so, yeah, running around.

Ray Seggern:

To all those businesses along Main Street and 2nd Street in Taylor,

Ray Seggern:

Texas of the 1970s, it was special for me to be able to share that.

Ray Seggern:

And I think we've all all of us, you know, have however we got here.

Ray Seggern:

You know, that's that was our yellow brick road.

Ray Seggern:

Right?

Ray Seggern:

And that was certainly a big part of it for me.

Ray Seggern:

And, you know, my dad.

Ray Seggern:

Dump truck driver who's, you know, his professional trajectory was to go from

Ray Seggern:

one dump truck to six and to own a plot of land that the business was staged on.

Ray Seggern:

Uh, my granddad was a CPA, so I got to experience how he was with his clients.

Ray Seggern:

And then my mom was an English teacher.

Ray Seggern:

So, you know, she, uh, she has a role to play in all of this.

Ray Seggern:

I'll often say, um, Monica's heard me say a few times through the

Ray Seggern:

years that my English teacher mom may be rolling over in her grave.

Ray Seggern:

Would be sometimes we'll go in and we'll see the competitor ads, right?

Ray Seggern:

The abominations of the English language.

Ray Seggern:

And then also, but really, it's just by extension, you know, so.

Ray Seggern:

Just the fact that so many ads don't really do anything compelling in them,

Ray Seggern:

you know, um, that really the baseline still still Dennis Leah, how is it?

Ray Seggern:

We're this deep into the human experience and there can still

Ray Seggern:

be that bad of cliche ads on my TV for car dealers every morning.

Ray Seggern:

I just don't understand.

Dennis Collins:

Uh, lucky for, that, that's, that's where you come in.

Dennis Collins:

You are the anti cliché.

Dennis Collins:

You are the ones we go to for the new ideas.

Dennis Collins:

So, you know, I can't help Ray, you were just telling a story.

Dennis Collins:

I also enjoyed your, kind of your origin story that, that you shared.

Dennis Collins:

Thanks.

Dennis Collins:

Here's a question that I struggle with.

Dennis Collins:

Lea, Lea and I both Hand, uh, work with some HVAC, uh, companies.

Dennis Collins:

Okay.

Dennis Collins:

Yeah.

Dennis Collins:

And we, and I, as you and Monica, both believe in

Dennis Collins:

stories, but here's the problem.

Dennis Collins:

I have a devil of a time getting some of the outside people,

Dennis Collins:

the techs, the salespeople.

Dennis Collins:

I have a heck of a time.

Dennis Collins:

Getting them to remember stories, to bring us stories, to give

Dennis Collins:

us stories that can work.

Dennis Collins:

Have you had that?

Dennis Collins:

And if so, have you been able to tackle that?

Ray Seggern:

Yeah, it's a good question.

Ray Seggern:

Um, and what we're talking about here is something that I, um, um, I write

Ray Seggern:

about a lot in the book I'm working on.

Ray Seggern:

I've really honed in on this idea.

Ray Seggern:

That story in the continuum of story culture and experience story as we

Ray Seggern:

as we like to tell it and weave it into the marketing pieces, right?

Ray Seggern:

Um, it's either a mirror or it's a fairy tale, meaning we either are holding a

Ray Seggern:

mirror up to something that's good in.

Ray Seggern:

an organization.

Ray Seggern:

Maybe it's their culture.

Ray Seggern:

Maybe it's how they deliver the experience, right?

Ray Seggern:

Maybe it's the core values of the owner, whatever it is.

Ray Seggern:

But specifics trump generalities.

Ray Seggern:

We know, right?

Ray Seggern:

So any time you can get specific stories, um, where, uh, you know, this

Ray Seggern:

is a challenge that the team faced.

Ray Seggern:

And here's how we solved it.

Ray Seggern:

Or here's an example of us going above and beyond or anything like that.

Ray Seggern:

You know, um, uh, we love to weave that into the ads.

Ray Seggern:

So how do you do it?

Ray Seggern:

Man, I don't know that I have any, any magic beans in my pocket because

Ray Seggern:

that would be the Beanstalk book.

Ray Seggern:

And this isn't the Beanstalk book.

Ray Seggern:

This is the Yellow Brick Road book.

Ray Seggern:

But, uh, the only way to improve something is through train,

Ray Seggern:

measure, and reward, right?

Ray Seggern:

So, Ben Franklin coming out unannounced at a staff meeting is very powerful.

Ray Seggern:

So I've often counseled our clients, Hey, If somebody brings you a

Ray Seggern:

good story, let everybody else on the team see them get 100 bill.

Ray Seggern:

It's not a silent bonus on the paycheck that we tell them about.

Ray Seggern:

It is a hundred dollar bill coming out of your wallet that you hand

Ray Seggern:

them in front of the rest of the team that gets everybody's attention.

Ray Seggern:

Maybe I should come back and bring some stories.

Ray Seggern:

Maybe I'll get a hundred dollars.

Ray Seggern:

So if you train, measure and reward, they have to know what to do.

Ray Seggern:

They have to know you're watching and then they have to know that there's

Ray Seggern:

something in it that they're incentivized to do the thing you want them to do.

Leah Bumphrey:

Monica, what's the one thing you had to leave out of the book

Leah Bumphrey:

when you were writing that killed you?

Leah Bumphrey:

Because I know you, you always have stories, you always have these things,

Leah Bumphrey:

and as you're editing Or that you had to make smaller than what you wanted to.

Monica Ballard:

Oh boy, I'm, this was, this book was so much about

Monica Ballard:

expanding, expanding, expanding.

Monica Ballard:

That, um, I, that I don't, I don't think I was tasked with, uh, carving

Monica Ballard:

something out and leaving it behind.

Monica Ballard:

If anything, I would, I would constantly come back and post, post the new version.

Monica Ballard:

And Ray would come back and say, no, no, no, it needs to be

Monica Ballard:

bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger.

Monica Ballard:

So any, we had 504 words on that and so, uh, beautiful.

Monica Ballard:

Yeah.

Monica Ballard:

Yeah, it was, uh, and I think I, in writing the afterward, um, that was

Monica Ballard:

something I was really, really proud of.

Monica Ballard:

You know, Ray got the origin story in the forward and so I kind of, uh, arm

Monica Ballard:

wrestled to get the afterward and, um.

Monica Ballard:

It was, it was really just a story that went back to when I started

Monica Ballard:

at, uh, at Roy's shop and we had someone who wanted to come in

Monica Ballard:

and, and teach an academy class.

Monica Ballard:

And one of the questions that he asked was, why does

Monica Ballard:

someone want to own a business?

Monica Ballard:

And.

Monica Ballard:

All of us being the consultants that we were had all of these.

Monica Ballard:

Oh, well, you know, it's to fill fulfill your dream of entrepreneurship and

Monica Ballard:

to right a wrong in the marketplace.

Monica Ballard:

And we had all of these lofty ideals.

Monica Ballard:

Right?

Monica Ballard:

And he was like, no, it's to.

Monica Ballard:

It's to sell it and make a lot of money.

Monica Ballard:

And that seems so foreign to all of us that we knew we did not

Monica Ballard:

want him teaching at the academy.

Monica Ballard:

It was kind of like, okay, this is the wrong fit.

Monica Ballard:

We don't want him near our tribe.

Monica Ballard:

We don't want him near our people.

Monica Ballard:

And we, we pretty much sent him packing.

Monica Ballard:

And that I feel like was an important story to tell was we know why

Monica Ballard:

you wanted to go into business.

Monica Ballard:

It was to do this and that.

Monica Ballard:

It wasn't just to make a lot of money so you could sell it and make a

Monica Ballard:

profit and go and do something else.

Monica Ballard:

This, this book is for the relational business owners who feel

Monica Ballard:

passionate about their businesses.

Monica Ballard:

And that is who we wanted to talk to no matter what industry.

Monica Ballard:

They're in.

Dennis Collins:

Well that, that, that in itself is a great story

Dennis Collins:

that really defines your book.

Dennis Collins:

It also defines, uh, our, uh, the Wizard Academy, you know, we all

Dennis Collins:

are devotees, uh, frequent flyers.

Dennis Collins:

We, uh, still revere what the Wizard Academy stands stands for.

Dennis Collins:

And, uh, and that's what it stands for.

Dennis Collins:

Something different.

Dennis Collins:

Not, uh, the, the, you know, grab the money and run.

Dennis Collins:

And I think that's a, that's a great way to emphasize that.

Dennis Collins:

What, what questions have we not asked that we should have asked?

Ray Seggern:

Yeah.

Ray Seggern:

You, you, you know, um, what separates the clients that achieve

Ray Seggern:

success from those that don't.

Ray Seggern:

That's the first thing that's popping into my head.

Ray Seggern:

Um, one of the side jokes.

Ray Seggern:

That everybody in my shop has heard plenty of times.

Ray Seggern:

It's not.

Ray Seggern:

Everybody's gonna be an astronaut when they grow up.

Ray Seggern:

Um, and, uh, I would just say that if you talk about brains, heart and

Ray Seggern:

courage, right, they imply for me, what is the knowledge that we need?

Ray Seggern:

Heart says We, there's a difference between platitudes and genuinely

Ray Seggern:

investing in how to care for not just customers, but for one another, right?

Ray Seggern:

And then courage says, will you take the little bit of leap of face?

Ray Seggern:

Uh, and not chicken out before the miracle happens.

Ray Seggern:

So if we come back to those three things, you know, it's one thing to put the

Ray Seggern:

ideas of here's how we did it in a book.

Ray Seggern:

The, the thing that, uh, That's couldn't be clearer to me right now.

Ray Seggern:

And it's super important to me when I choose clients to work with,

Ray Seggern:

we're both blessed to be in a place in our professional careers where

Ray Seggern:

we don't need the next client.

Ray Seggern:

So I think we, we, because there have been plenty of times in the 20 years I've been

Ray Seggern:

doing this, Dennis, where, you know, our founding partner, Roy Williams told me

Ray Seggern:

early on, he said, whatever puts food on the table with honor and dignity, right?

Ray Seggern:

So great.

Ray Seggern:

So, but sometimes that's being, Hey, you know what?

Ray Seggern:

I did it for the money, you know, I saw, I was skeptical that this person was maybe

Ray Seggern:

not going to be an astronaut when they, when they, when they will discover this

Ray Seggern:

along the way, but I like them enough and, you know, they've got employees and.

Ray Seggern:

Those employees have families.

Ray Seggern:

There's a lot of dreams tied up in a business owner, even if they're

Ray Seggern:

not made of the right stuff, right?

Ray Seggern:

Or all the best stuff, right?

Ray Seggern:

Cover books has helped America's best companies, right?

Ray Seggern:

But we helped America's.

Ray Seggern:

good, better, kind of okay, and best companies along the way.

Ray Seggern:

And, um, you know, it makes it very easy for me.

Ray Seggern:

And I'll be honest with you straight up.

Ray Seggern:

Uh, I did a gut check on some clients that I've been working with for a long

Ray Seggern:

time that maybe haven't grown as much as I thought they would or they wanted to.

Ray Seggern:

I look at it and my side of the street feels pretty clean to me.

Ray Seggern:

And so I make a choice.

Ray Seggern:

Do I cut them loose because they're not growing and making me enough money?

Ray Seggern:

Well, maybe, but there's just as many where I've said, you know what I, you

Ray Seggern:

know, I did everything short of spitting in my hand and taking a blood oath that I

Ray Seggern:

will help you get to where you want to go.

Ray Seggern:

So it doesn't feel good.

Ray Seggern:

To walk away from them just because we haven't multiplied their income

Ray Seggern:

enough to where they're one of my more desirable clients financially.

Dennis Collins:

Sure.

Dennis Collins:

What, Monica, how, how about you?

Dennis Collins:

What, what, um, uh, what questions have we not asked?

Dennis Collins:

That was, Ray, was, uh, quite a heartfelt answer.

Dennis Collins:

Yeah.

Monica Ballard:

You didn't ask when the movie is coming out.

Leah Bumphrey:

I want to star as Monica.

Leah Bumphrey:

I want to be Monica.

Monica Ballard:

We've done a gut check on this and we really feel that with the

Monica Ballard:

Wiz Reappearing on Broadway right now and Wicked coming out in theaters, uh,

Monica Ballard:

that there's really, this is going to be overshadowed and, and so we, we, we

Monica Ballard:

really feel like, uh, we would be letting people down if, if we went ahead and,

Monica Ballard:

uh, with the, with the movie project.

Monica Ballard:

Uh, plus Ray, Ray doesn't want to be a movie producer.

Leah Bumphrey:

Okay, but I, this, this brings up something

Leah Bumphrey:

for me that I wasn't going to be critical of, but now I have to.

Leah Bumphrey:

And Ray, I don't really blame you, but Monica, I, I have a

Leah Bumphrey:

little bone to pick with you.

Leah Bumphrey:

Reading through the book, I'm thrilled.

Leah Bumphrey:

I love The Wizard of Ads.

Leah Bumphrey:

I love what you've done thematically.

Leah Bumphrey:

And then you got to talking about the slippers and you called them ruby

Leah Bumphrey:

red slippers and we all know if we've read that book They were not ruby red.

Leah Bumphrey:

They were silver.

Leah Bumphrey:

So that was a little heartbreaking for me So if and when that movie comes

Leah Bumphrey:

out i'm gonna introduce But only if we stick with the silver slippers.

Leah Bumphrey:

None of this ruby crap.

Monica Ballard:

You, so you're, you're a, you're a purist, you're an orator.

Monica Ballard:

I am a purist.

Leah Bumphrey:

Oh, and you know that, we've roomed together, you know that.

Leah Bumphrey:

We need to direct our listeners and our viewers, Amazon, anywhere Fine Books are

Leah Bumphrey:

sold, this is what they want to be, uh, ordering, this is what they need to know.

Leah Bumphrey:

Yeah, you gotta put it the right way up.

Leah Bumphrey:

Yes, this is that.

Leah Bumphrey:

This is a template.

Leah Bumphrey:

This is a template.

Leah Bumphrey:

Absolutely.

Leah Bumphrey:

There it is.

Leah Bumphrey:

Am I doing this right?

Leah Bumphrey:

Not quite.

Leah Bumphrey:

It's falling out of the shoes.

Ray Seggern:

Yeah, so, you know, we have we have soft launched this so so far.

Ray Seggern:

Um, we're, uh, six weeks from now.

Ray Seggern:

Everybody's gonna be annoyed that, uh, they can't get So we really just want

Ray Seggern:

to thank you guys for having us on and sharing the book with your audience.

Ray Seggern:

Uh, it is available on Amazon for sure.

Ray Seggern:

And, uh, and obviously, uh, you know, a big part of this is, uh, um, you

Ray Seggern:

know, to, to mix my metaphors here.

Ray Seggern:

You know, uh, the road goes on forever, but the party never ends.

Ray Seggern:

Right.

Ray Seggern:

So we're, we're on this journey.

Ray Seggern:

And really the book exists for us.

Ray Seggern:

Hopefully that people will read the book.

Ray Seggern:

Um, and, and the value for, for me, and I think I speak for Monica here,

Ray Seggern:

is not that we become gazillionaires as bestselling authors, although, Not

Ray Seggern:

opposed to it, but really, it's that if somebody, if the book speaks to you,

Ray Seggern:

if the book really, if the concepts in there resonate with the business

Ray Seggern:

owner, that's the right kind of business owner that we would want to work with.

Ray Seggern:

So hopefully they would read the book and go, yeah, these guys get it.

Ray Seggern:

They're my kind of crazy.

Ray Seggern:

Sign me up.

Ray Seggern:

Where, where do I?

Leah Bumphrey:

Perfect.

Leah Bumphrey:

Perfect.

Leah Bumphrey:

Well, thank you guys.

Leah Bumphrey:

Thank you so much, and we're looking forward to the next book,

Leah Bumphrey:

but we'll let you get this one solidly in everyone's hands first.

Dennis Collins:

Yeah, our, our guests today have been Monica Ballard,

Dennis Collins:

Wizard of Oz partner and author, and Ray Segrin, Wizard of Oz partner

Dennis Collins:

and author, head of the Brand Guys.

Dennis Collins:

No place like home services.

Dennis Collins:

Do yourself a favor and And get your copy today.

Dennis Collins:

Okay, that's all for this episode of Connect & Convert.

Dennis Collins:

Leah and I will be back next week.

Dennis Collins:

Stay tuned.

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