In this enlightening episode of the Close It Now podcast, we dive deep into the world of branding with the renowned Dan Antonelli, founder of Kickcharge Creative. Dan unveils the secrets behind his latest book, 'Branded, Not Blanded,' and explores how effective branding can be the missing piece that transforms your business.

Discover why a compelling brand is essential in today's competitive landscape and how it can set your business apart. Dan shares real-world examples of businesses that have experienced remarkable growth through strategic branding.

We also delve into the core principles of effective branding, from creating a memorable logo to crafting a brand story that resonates with your audience. Dan's wealth of experience in branding shines through as he provides actionable insights that you can apply to your business immediately.

Join us for an episode that will change the way you think about branding and equip you with the tools to take your business to the next level. Tune in now and get ready to revolutionize your approach to branding!

Welcome to Close it now, an H Vac sales training podcast with Sam Wakefield.

Here we'll build your reputation in residential H Vac sales to be the expert influencer in your market.

You'll get insight into the top minds in the industry as they share their skills and hacks to help you on your journey.

This podcast isn't just about selling more, it's about understanding your customers needs and building efficiencies behind the scenes so you can sell more by but work less while being top of mind when people think H Vac.

Now let's get started with your host of the Close it now podcast.

This is Sam Wakefield.

Well, all right.

Welcome back to the Close it now podcast.

Sam Wakefield here I am sitting here with a gentleman that if you don't know him yet, you will.

He's somebody that I've looked up for a while in the industry and you have seen his work even if you don't realize that you've seen his work.

So I've been reading his book, which I'm going to tell you the name here in a minute.

But I came across this one chapter and my daughter who is 10, I've been teaching her about marketing and branding and business, she sees this section called Purple Cow and she's like oh my gosh.

And she instantly says I know what a purple cow is.

And it was the coolest thing because so we had a moment to talk about that lesson from this book and how to stand out in the crowd.

And every now, every time we're driving around town, every single time she says she sees something that stands out, if it's a service truck, if it's a sign, anything that's unusual, she says, hey dad, is that a purple cow?

That's absolutely it is my dear.

So that 10 year old is going to be a business genius by the time she I hand to hand to the heavens, both of my daughters, I 100% know that they're going to have six figure plus income by the time they make high school, I'm sure.

But I am so excited about our guest today.

He is the author of Branded, not Blanded.

He's the owner of Kick Charger.

Kick Charge is the name of his company.

They are a branding and just they do a lot of stuff.

So we'll go through everything they do today.

But I want to start this podcast off with this quote.

It's the very last page of the book but I think it's a great place to start.

When we begin with the end in sight, we know exactly where we're headed.

And this quote says at the end of the day, you really have two choices.

To fit in or to stand out.

To be bland or to brand.

Choose wisely.

So I'm so excited to welcome to the podcast today Mr. Dan Antonelli.

Thank you for joining us today, sir.

Thank you, brother.

That was like an epic introduction, man.

I love the story of your daughter knowing and understanding what disruption means at such an, such an early age.

I mean, it's, it's a great lesson for her to really understand and I love the fact that she's picking it out as, as you guys are driving and looking at things.

It's, it's.

That's aw, that's really cool.

It's fun.

It's cool when you, you know, when you have a fan, when you're entrepreneurial minded, you and you share, everyone around you has no choice but to, you know, rise to the same level.

Right.

So, yeah, so tell us a little bit about, about yourself.

We always like to start this with the highlight reel.

Give everybody your, you know, kind of short history of how you ended up with Kick Charge.

You've gone through reading in the book, you've gone through a rebranding yourself.

So you know what it's like to go through that.

But give us that, that journey and kind of some philosophies for us.

Yeah, well, I mean, I really actually started when I was very young hand lettering things, mainly trucks.

So I was working with entrepreneurs.

The first truck I did, I was about 15 years old.

And you know, it was for a home service company, it was for a plumber.

So it's kind of ironic that, you know, 35 years later or so, I'm still actually doing that.

So I just really love the idea of working with entrepreneurs.

And I loved lettering.

I love topography, I love seeing the work on a vehicle.

And also I love the idea that that work that we were doing even at that early age was really significant for the people that were hiring us to do it.

Right.

So the ability to recognize I think very early on that it was more than just cool lettering, cool, you know, art.

It was actually helping this business to grow and, and in effect change their lives.

And so I really wanted to be a sign painter when I was 15 and my parents gently encouraged me to, to go to college instead.

And I still did lettering while I was in college and, and I honestly, I studied advertising while I was in college, so it was actually a really good thing.

They sort of pushed me to do that.

But then when I got out I worked as a graphic designer in Manhattan for a number of years and started the business like so many others, like, on the side.

So it was like my side hustle.

And I was working nights and weekends, and I was doing a lot of lettering and logos and brochures and websites at the time and things like that.

And I just love the idea that that logo became so central to everything that that business was.

Was putting out.

And I thought it wouldn't be cool if there was a place you could go where they could do everything for that small business that really kind of laid the foundation for what we became today.

And, you know, today we have about.

I think we have 22 people that work here right now, and we are primarily a home service branding agency.

So we'll design the brands for probably over 200 home service companies this year.

Throughout my career, I think we've probably surpassed over 2,000 home service brands.

So I don't know if there's a way to say this unequivocally, but I'm pretty confident that no one's created more home service brands than us in the world.

I'm pretty confident of that.

But regardless, the cool thing is that even 25, 35 years later, we still are changing lives with our work.

And so that's what gets the team excited.

A lot of the team actually came from bigger agency backgrounds where they felt like their work actually didn't make a difference, like if it helped Verizon sell more phones or phone service, so what.

Like, I wasn't.

They weren't changing lives.

And they get to really experience firsthand the results that we're able to achieve and how that impacts that.

That business owner, his family, his employees, their culture.

Like, there's so many really cool things and.

And, you know, that's our.

Why.

That's.

That's why we do what we do.

And what still, to me so many years later, is the best part of my.

My job of what we get to do is we get to change lives.

We get to do really fun, creative things.

And, you know, still as passionate today as I was, you know, 25, 30 years ago about it.

It's pretty cool.

I love it.

It's.

It's definitely.

I mean, I. I worked in the company and tiny Texas town years and years ago when I was getting my.

Starting my career, and we went through a rebrand.

We went from the basic, you know, let's buy vinyl stickers from the Walmart into, okay, we hired the guy down the street that just did vinyl stickers.

But they were bigger and then finally moved into.

The owner hired a branding company and we developed a, you know, logo and, you know, a character that became kind of the face of the organization.

This was before, you know, this is years ago.

Before, you know, you were nearly as known, I guess.

But yeah, it was really cool.

It was to see the, the response of, you know, homeowners when I'm walking into the house, like, hey, we like your little guy on your truck.

You know, and it's just such a warmer reception.

If nothing else, it's like, wow, it gives it instantly something to talk about.

So I've been through that experience and it was fun.

But let's dive in a little bit because you're talking about, you know, really changing lives and creating affecting culture.

Culture is huge.

It's one of the things that we talk a lot about in this podcast.

And I know that there's several.

Well, plenty of listeners.

I could think of two people I actually corresponded with recently.

I'd have put up a post the other day that I was reading your, reading your book and I had a couple people comment.

One guy was like, man, this book's been riding around in the truck with me for two weeks.

And it's like, thanks for this post.

I'm going to pick it up and actually start reading today.

And another gentleman, he is starting his company.

I was like, man, make sure to start on the right foot so you don't have to, you don't have to hit pause and cost later.

Yeah.

So tell us a little bit about.

Let's talk a little bit about culture, but kind of from both perspectives.

One, if you start with the right branding, and two, what it's like to rebrand down the road, because those are, you know, kind of two very different pivotal points in the, in a business.

And it's funny because the book, the books for both of those people.

But ideally, if you're starting a business next month, six months from now, whatever the case may be, if you read the book and understand as much as you possibly can about the do's and the don'ts, like naming, you know, whether or not you should use a mascot, how to research color, like, it's just going to help you so much more than doing it later on.

Right.

And.

And so I really felt like, you know, when I looked at so many of these common mistakes that keep happening when, when people start their business because they're not branding people, you know, like, you know, most home service contractors got pissed off at who they were working for one day and said, I'm starting my own company.

Well, what am I going to.

After myself, I'm going to name it after my kids initials.

Like all these things that sound like really good ideas at the time turn out to be not so good later on.

So I said, let me, let me hopefully get this book and as many new entrepreneurs as I possibly can.

And then for the people that have been doing it for a while, help them to understand why, why maybe they're spending so much money on LSA and PPC and understanding the relationship between the branding that's out on the street and how that affects their overall marketing strategy and how to make the most of their marketing budget and spend the least amount of money.

I mean, I think that's the sort of the weird thing that most, I feel like a lot of, a lot of agencies don't necessarily want you to spend the least amount of money on marketing.

And I'm like, well, we want you to spend like as little as possible on marketing and just maximize the roi.

And as it relates to culture, culture becomes the thing that changes post rebrand, okay?

So it infuses that new energy and infuses that new confidence.

It's really crazy to me sometimes the confidence that the owner gets after the rebrand, they get so energized and proud to put on the shirt, they're really pumped up.

And that kind of, you know, distills among all the employees that energy.

And it also signals to them that you're serious about what you want to do with this company, that you're evolving, that you're not status quo and that complacency affects so many owners because they, they get to this point and they think that everything that they've done up until that point is the reason why they should never actually pivot and change.

And, you know, sort of like to say that, you know, again, you know, the old axiom like what got you here isn't going to get you there or it can, it's just going to cost you a whole ton more money in doing it.

So it never makes sense to me sometimes why, why not fix the deficiencies as early as you possibly can and realize the rewards of that transition later on?

So there's some pain.

Listen, rebranding for companies, I don't want anyone to go through under the illusion that it's easy, that it's not going to be painful.

But I will say this, I mean, honestly, I can't think of a single company that we've ever rebranded and renamed that has lost Revenue post rebranding.

Like, I just honestly don't know of a single company that we've ever rebranded that has lost revenue.

It's always been that inflection point, that trajectory change, you know, and they're, they're, they're gradual.

The gradual, gradual everything steady, steady, steady.

And then suddenly that is what sort of catapults them into that next level.

And we have so many examples of, of companies.

And I think the other thing too, Sam, is like, you're never too big to endeavor to do this.

You know, we, we had several companies this year that were 30 to $50 million in revenue that we rebranded.

Right.

You know, so, so you.

Some.

I think a lot of owners get to the point where they think they're too big to rebrand and that, again.

That established people know us too well.

And it's, and it's, you know, I feel like some people may know you, and I would hope if you're at 10 million, there's a decent amount of people that know you.

But just recognizing that someone says, I see your trucks, it's more about what does the truck say about your company?

Is.

Is the larger question.

Like, seeing the trucks is only part one of the equation.

But if they didn't, if they just moved to the area and they saw your trucks, what's the takeaway?

What do they feel?

How do they connect with it?

Like you mentioned earlier, like, making that connection, causing that empathy between you and the homeowner.

And so, you know, it's interesting because there's some really, really large companies, especially on the Northeast, with awful brands, right.

And, and, and I just look at that as opportunity, you know, because you know that they're complacent whether they're PE owned or not.

A lot of them are PE on now.

And, and the PE guys are generally not the guys that are really enthusiastic about rebranding, right.

Because they got money from the bottom line that could be exact shareholders.

And so they, you know, the returns are steady.

Why rock the boat?

And that whole mindset, which is fine for them.

And I sort of like having some of those behemoths in the market because I know they're complacent, and I know I could come in and do something that's more disruptive.

I know I could do something that people will react more favorably to and not need to spend as much money.

Those are the guys that.

Actually, the irony of it is those are the guys that are usually at that 10 range more that they're spending on marketing, not really even understanding that they could probably half their marketing budget if they actually just fixed what's wrong with their branding.

Oh, 100 agree.

I was, it's funny, I was having a conversation, well, two, two quick things that I have a coaching client up in two in Tacoma, Washington and he was asking me, he was like, hey, do most companies out there, do they provide vehicles for their sales guys or it's like because we're driving our own.

And I'm like, man, you know what, it's all over the board in the industry.

But I tell you what, they're missing a massive opportunity to have a rolling billboard.

And that's what we experienced at our company here in Austin was everywhere we went, people were like, oh my gosh, we see your vehicles everywhere.

Well, we weren't that big of a company, but people, it's memorable.

So it feels like we're seeing vehicles everywhere.

Exactly.

That whole concept of being sticky and that's how you can compete.

You know, Maybe they've got 50 trucks in the market after a while.

Again, if they're not done right, they do tend to blend in.

But you know, we've had so much success with the smaller guy that does something that's disruptive, that does something that's memorable, unique, you know, uses different colors, you know, gets away from doing the red and blue arrows or the sun and snowflakes.

You know, those types of things are generally not causing Mrs. Jones to look at your truck wrap and say, oh my God, that's so creative.

I'm going to remember that when I need service.

So, you know, that whole, the whole concept, that purple cow concept obviously plays, plays into a huge role, especially with the vehicle.

And to your point earlier, when you just said about the salesman taking home the, the, the trucks or the sales trucks, like they're driving that truck back to their home like in their own community.

So that local proximity factors in decision making process for that homeowner as well.

Oh, I've seen those in my neighborhood, I've seen their trucks there.

My neighbor uses them, you know what I mean?

So that else that also helps instill that confidence.

So again, the idea of, hey, if I could just remember their name and Google their name instead of heating repair near me, right Then I'm winning, right?

Because I'm going to rank high for my brand keyword searches versus an unbranded keyword search.

Right.

So as much as you can get in their minds, that's obviously better.

So you mentioned something that is very near and dear to me.

You know, When I, When I established my coaching company years ago, I did.

I spent time first designing my brand.

And it's very simple, but people remember it.

You know, I've looked across the other coaching companies, like, they're either super bland or really hard to decipher what it was saying.

I was like, okay, now let's make it simple.

Close it now.

Sales training, that's.

This is what we're doing.

We're closing sales.

Right.

And so.

But talk to us a little bit about.

You use the word sticky.

That is something that I think a lot of times we can talk about really quickly, but dive into that a little bit.

But especially for the listeners, there's so many people that don't quite get marketing concepts and stuff, and this is a really, really crucial one.

Yeah.

So, I mean, naming has become a really, really big part of what we do for a lot of companies.

So they'll, they'll come to us with, asking us to rebrand them.

And their biggest obstacle for that idea of becoming sticky is that they have a name that no one else, no one would care to remember.

And it's really hard to get them to remember.

And of course, with enough ad spend, you can get people to remember stuff.

But I always look at it like my clients don't have a million dollars to spend on radio and TV to get them to remember a poor name.

Can it be done?

Yeah, it's done all the time.

But what if we just fix it and we create a name that as soon as you say the name, first of all, you have a visual of what it even looks like.

Right.

So that's one thing.

Like, we just named the company Happy Hippo Heating and Cooling.

It looks so cool.

Yeah.

Like, but.

But if you hadn't seen it, I bet you knew what it should look like.

Roughly.

Like, you probably had a vision of what that probably looked at.

So if you can create a name that as soon as you say the name, you immediately think of a visual that maybe goes with it, and then you plaster that visual large on the side of that truck and the repetition of that, again, becomes easier for people to remember because the visual.

People remember visuals quicker than they remember words.

Right.

So.

So if I can get them to associate those two, then it becomes a lot easier for them to remember when they need service.

And people forget, too.

They think that the truck wraps are meant for people to suddenly call them right away when they see the truck.

And, hey, oh my God, I'm driving behind this van and I need H Vac service.

Sometimes that happens, but the reality is it's mostly something that happens later on, right?

Because they may not need that right at that very moment.

But even think about the branding that we did for Amanda, and I talk about that in the book Amanda Triolo from Grasshopper.

Her, her name was PMI Mechanical.

Now would you ever remember PMI Mechanical or would you remember Grasshopper with a big grasshopper on the side of the, the van?

It's, it sounds so painfully obvious, right?

Like, oh my God, of course you'd remember Grasshopper.

Right?

And so, you know, I mean, her business is just exploding since, since we renamed her and she was doing, I think at the time, less than a hundred thousand dollars in residential revenue, residential sales, and now she's doing almost 20 million two and a half years later.

Well, how did that happen?

I mean, Amanda's just a complete rock star.

I, I, she's just amazing at what she's been able to accomplish.

But I don't think she gets there with PMI Mechanical.

I just don't think it, because it was more than just the name.

It was also the idea of Grasshoppers only move forward.

So you talk about culture in the brand and the idea that we as a company will move our people forward, we will help our clients move forward.

And so it really became foundational to the overall vibe and the culture of that organization.

So, so naming, like, that's probably the biggest chapter in the book, I think, is naming.

And a lot of people just, to me, it's like they're beating their head against the wall with a bad name and they keep trying to hammer it and keep hoping it's going to get sticky and, and it just, it's so hard to have happen.

Yeah, it's so hard.

Yeah, absolutely.

And you know, one of the things being, since the podcast is so much about personal growth, we talk a lot about letting your ego is not your amigo and your ego getting in the way of your sales of all these different things.

And for everybody listening, I mean, don't get confused.

I mean, rebranding and doing having great branding is not a magic bullet or cure all to fix other parts of your business that are broken.

Don't think that also, however, it is definitely an integral component.

It's one of the pieces, one of the ingredients in the cake, right?

It's, it's just as integral as flour, sugar, you know, flour, sugar, milk, eggs, butter, those five things make a cake.

It's one of those components to your business.

Most people leave it out and wonder why their Cake never rises, and it's just that important.

And so, yeah, I love this conversation so much, but don't let people get in the way when it comes to naming.

It's.

It's a really big obstacle for a lot of people.

You know, the reality is you could look at, at a hundred home service brands and probably 85 to 90% of them really.

Right.

It could use work Now.

Now, the reality is, out of the 85 to 90%, if I were to tell that owner, here's the deficiencies in your brand, here's why it actually doesn't work, here's why your truck wraps aren't working, whether there's legibility issues, whether there's contrast issues, whether there's blanding going on in there.

How many of those, you know, 85 to 90 of people would actually listen to me and, and, and accept that?

Or it would be, oh, you know, you're full of it.

Like, I, I know what I'm doing.

Like, you know, people say they see my trucks, so, like, that's the mechanism that they use to justify continuing down that, that path.

I don't have any skin in the game.

You can hire me or don't hire me.

Like, if you really want my feedback on it, I'll be happy to give it to you.

But the reality is, is most people aren't even having those conversations with the owner.

Like, the digital marketing agency is not going to have the conversation with you and tell you, hey, dude, your logo sucks, and I can't build a really effective website that's going to convert for you until you change it.

No, they're not.

They're not having that conversation, right?

No, they're saying, hey, pay us more and we'll just put more into ads.

Yeah, yeah, it's like, okay, send me your logo.

O, yeah, all right.

I guess I'll work with this.

Or the truck wrap guy, is he going to tell you, oh, my God, your logo is awful?

Probably not.

You know, so there's a lot of people that have probably been saying yes to, to the owners a really long time.

Even the employees.

Like, that's the funniest thing sometimes is after we rebrand, then the employees feel free to speak about how poorly they thought the, the previous brand was, but during the time they were using it, no one's having a conversation with the owner.

Hey, hey, hey, boss man.

You know what our logo, like, no, it's having that conversation.

I get it.

Like, why would you have that conversation?

It's like, I, I feel like it's like telling somebody they have bo like you want to know, but it's like you don't want to know.

Yeah, I think that a lot of it too is, you know, it's awareness.

When rebrand, going through a really good branding and taking the time, effort and expense it takes to do it, is that like, okay, we're ready to make forward momentum, but until that moment happens, I think so many people, well, that creates a company and a culture that is, you know, focused on not just reacting but being responsive.

You know, really choosing where they're going instead of just, you know, putting out fires all day.

I think a lot of it is everybody's so just bogged down in the day to day of okay, it's, it's summer, it's hot.

Okay, it's winter, it's slow.

That they just don't know what they don't know at some point too.

It's like.

And that's, they might mention it, but.

They don't even know it sucks.

Yeah, they don't know.

And they also don't realize the impact that it has on all the other channels.

Right.

So, so when they say sometimes, you know, the, the obstacle from the sales perspective is it's very expensive to rebrand.

And I always say, well, how much is it costing you not to rebrand?

What's the cost of not rebranding?

Well, your recruitment cost is greater because it doesn't look like a place people want to work.

Your marketing costs are more expensive because it's not working properly and we need to spend more money than getting our name in front of more people.

Our average tickets are lower because it's harder for us to charge more because we don't look like a company that should be charging more.

So you add all these things up over time and it's like rebranding is like, is the least expensive thing for you to be considering because it will save you so much money down, down the road.

Even the impact of what happens online, like we mentioned earlier about just people typing in your name, you know, we, we had a client, I mean we had a company that we do some digital marketing with and they compared, they have built the brands the wet.

So I built the websites for 25 kick charge clients and they compared the kick charge clients that they've built the websites to with non kick charge clients.

Right.

And the amount of branded searches on a kick charge client in comparison to a non kick charge client.

This is an average of 25.

So it's not like we picked one or two and we cherry picked it.

Right, right.

Not just out there.

And it was, it was 450 or so average branded keyword searches for people that had our brands versus about 45 for a non kick charge brand.

Wow.

So 10x.

So it's basically like a 10x.

Now they also then I said, okay, well what about conversion rates?

Right?

So we, we got this inbound traffic, what's the conversion rates on.

On these sites?

And kick charge branded companies were experiencing a 12% conversion rate, which is great.

Like anything over 10 is considered to be very high.

And the non kick charge was 6%.

So out of the 44 that were coming in, only 6% were converting versus 12% of the 400 something that we're converting.

So you extrapolate that out.

There's a difference of like 50 leads a month that were coming in organically because of a better brand.

Well, you know, I feel stupid saying this because you see all these ads, like, what would it be worth to get 50 more leads a month for your business?

Like, you know those things, right?

This is like legit.

Yeah, this is legit.

Like we're getting you 50 more leads a month on average.

Like of them were really even so much higher than that because people were also not just doing the obvious things like the truck wraps.

They were also attending trade shows.

They were also commu.

Attending community events.

They got their mascots made into a physical mascot.

They were handing out chachkis to, to parents.

Like, so they were doing a lot more to even get their name to be stickier in the, in that community.

So.

So you know, when people say, oh my God, branding's, you know, so expensive, I'm like, well, it's a lot more expensive.

Not branding is just going to keep costing you more and more over time.

Absolutely.

That white band syndrome is, it's, it's a real thing.

And so, and I'm gonna tell this quick story and I want to take.

You'd mentioned earlier talking about the difference in average tickets.

And I can every.

Ollie, listen, I can absolutely attest to that.

You know, when we were in Austin here with the precision heating and air before the, the original owner sold it, man, our branding was spot on.

And I can tell everybody listening.

There were so many times I walked into a house and the homeowner said, oh, we saw your trucks everywhere.

And so we read some reviews and this does.

You have to have great reviews and provide the service.

If you're going to be a premium company, be a premium company.

But so many times I walked in the house, they said, yeah, we read all the reviews of the companies in town.

We see your trucks everywhere.

You guys are professional.

We didn't call anyone else.

We're here to make a decision today.

And they're telling me that the minute I walk in the doors, the, as the consultant and what a different conversation.

So then we're walking out with, you know, 20, 30, $35,000 project and they didn't even shop and it was such a great experience.

So tell us a little bit about what changes with average tickets when rebranding happens.

Exactly what you described is exactly how it's supposed to work.

And people misunderstands the role that branding plays in the perception for the home home consumer and the psychology behind it.

So, so the idea that I can help control what Mrs. Jones believes about your company before you actually get to deliver any service.

That's, that's the win, right?

That's, that's the ultimate goal.

Right.

So she's seen the vans, she hit the website, she saw some reviews.

Like you said, she's already establishing every one of those touch points is contributing to an impression that she has about your company.

All I'm trying to do is control what she feels ultimately.

Right.

That's, that's the end game.

Does she feel you're professional, trustworthy, honest, reputable, going to be in business next year?

All those things are factors into how much she feels she should be paying for this service as well.

Right?

Because, because the homeowner will pay more for the service as long as they feel there's value, as long as they feel like there's a reason behind it.

So I don't want the cheapest guy to put a ten thousand dollar system in my home because judging by his truck, I'm not sure he's going to be in business next year.

Right.

And then I'm screwed.

Right?

So yeah, so all those things again, every single touch point that integrates that brand is telling a story about who that company is.

The more you can control those impressions, the higher the likelihood that you have of closing the sale and closing the sale at a higher average ticket.

So absolutely, before that doorbell is rung, you know, the way the CSR answers the phone, you know, the, the communications to them before you arrive, the trucks that they've seen in the neighborhood, all those things are playing into her mind.

And, and again too, the idea too, and we talk about, in the book about consumer psychology and recognizing the fact that women are making up like 70 to 80% of the home, home purchasing Decisions.

So having brands that speak to her is critically important.

Brands that don't scare the hell out of her is also pretty important.

Right.

Which is like, again, like, we're the angry Rhino company.

Like, what you feel like, again, is like painfully obvious information.

But, but you'd be surprised, like, how many, you know, owners have really, really aggressive mascots and muscled mascots.

And, and she's already scared to have someone to her home.

I mean, at the end of the day, she's letting somebody in her home.

Right?

So, so why lead in with something that already makes her apprehensive?

Why not lead in something with a warm and fuzzy that makes her feel comfortable with who's coming to her home?

So remembering your audience.

And I think that that's another ego thing where the owner who, you know, in, in this industry obviously is more male owners.

Right.

So they want the brand to be something about them.

Like, oh, well, like, you know, I'm really into this and I really, you know, I'm very tough and, you know, we work out and, you know, all this other stuff.

And I'm just like, listen, it's not about you.

Don't make it about you.

Make it about who you're selling to first.

And I guarantee you, once they love your brand, you're going to love your brand when you see the revenue that comes from it.

Right?

Absolutely.

You know, and you mentioned that I'm looking, looking through the book and everyone out there, if you don't have the book branded, not blended, you have to get it.

It is a must read.

I instantly put it on the top five highest recommended books.

I get asked a lot of times because we're all about personal growth.

What's, what's my book recommendation list?

This is instantly in the list.

So from, from henceforth, this will be the, the one and, and unless or until you come out with a newer or different one.

But as I'm looking through this, it's like, just like you mentioned, there's so many visuals in here and so many of them are, you know, these warm, fuzzy.

Either animals or it's like the turtle one.

Everything's totally awesome.

All.

Every single thing is so, like, I just want to be friends with the character on the side of the van and it's a fictional character.

Right.

And, and I mean, think about it.

Yeah, I mean, think about, like, totally awesome.

They're not coming to my house to screw me.

No, like, that's not happening, you know, But BDS services, I don't know what they're doing.

Like, you know what I mean?

But that's, but that's the way guys brand themselves, you know, so, so why not brand with a name that immediately establishes a positive expectation of service rather than needing to invest all this money to even establish what that initial based brand even stands for and what that actually means for me as the home consumer.

So, you know, names, again, going back to the name, just any name that is going to conjure up positive expectation is, is inherently superior to a last name based brand or an initial base brand.

Like, I hate to say it like that because it feels so painfully obvious to me, but you know, that's the reality when you think about naming.

That's why I spent so much time in the book on naming, because I think that that's the root of so many problems for many home service companies is they start off on the wrong foot with the naming.

Right?

100% agree.

So everybody listen.

I mean, it's just like we talk about in sales.

You have to divorce yourself from the outcome and marry the process.

Divorce yourself from the numbers.

And that is not what matters.

What matters is helping people and serving them and listening.

It's the same thing here.

You got to divorce yourself from, you know, having to have your own name in there.

It's your company is its company.

It's like your kid.

You're not, I mean, unless you're, you know, a third in a, you know, Thurston Hal, the third.

Right.

But it, you've got to divorce yourself from that.

It's about what the homeowner wants to hear.

It's the benefit lens we talk about.

They have to, we have to be great communicators to show the homeowner what are the benefits.

Everything else comes later.

And so, so something this podcast is known for, Dan, is having basically every episode we give the listeners something that's actionable that they could implement immediately.

And so when, when we're in this conversation, you know, if they're either an owner or even just somebody who is working maybe for, with a company that might not have the best.

What are some things that they can do right away?

You know, on the path to, of course, getting in touch with you and getting rebranded, but some, some immediate changes that they can look at that might make a difference for them.

So I mean, there's a couple things, there's a couple of simple things that I, I think people can do even just to judge the effectiveness of their brand on their vehicle.

Right.

And one of the simplest things that you can do is take a photo of your truck wrap and then put it in your phone and then make it grayscale or black and white.

And if you can read it when it's black and white, then you have at least sufficient contrast.

You'd be surprised how many truck wraps can't even pass that basic test because they don't have enough contrast in the actual branding.

So that's one simple thing or actionable thing you can actually do is like, if you're not sure if your logo has challenges or if your truck wrap is working properly, simply take a picture of it, convert it to black and white, and you'll be able to see right away.

Because you have to remember, too, without sufficient contrast, your legibility is impaired.

So it's a medium that relies on distance legibility.

So it's so critical to have that proper contrast.

And then another thing too, like, again, too, like, if.

If you were describing your company and you were on an elevator and you imagine you're.

You're handing out your card, and if you handed out your card or if you've experienced this before, where you hand out your card or you say the name of your company, and the next question you hear from that person that you just said the name of your company is, what do you do?

That's another problem, right?

So you see a lot of brand names that are.

That are generic in their sense, and you don't know, and then you rely on other things to say it.

So, like, if your company name was Absolute Services, that would be my next question.

What.

What do you do?

Oh, I work services.

Yeah.

Well, what do you mean?

Or, you know, so.

So thinking about talking to a stranger, telling them the name of your company, and having them understand from.

From that point, what you actually do is another simple, like, judge of whether or not there may be some brand deficiencies and just the naming itself.

Oh, I love it.

That is.

That's great.

We actually just had a guest recently that just wrote a book on how to properly have this conversation in, like, a business networking setting.

So, like a BNI group or some of the chamber of commerce or those types of.

So it's a very similar message.

He was saying the exact same thing.

So everybody, success leaves clues.

If we have a common denominator here in the conversation, clearly this is something to pay attention to.

So.

But it's the same thing.

If they don't know what from your five seconds of what you told them, then it's not sticky at all like we talked about.

Yeah.

Sam, honestly, listen, you know, people can hit me up it's not a sales pitch.

Like, my, my goal is to help as many people as possible.

Whether they become clients or not is irrelevant.

Okay?

I, I didn't write the book certainly to get rich, because I'll barely ever break even on writing a book.

But I just knew that there's so many mistakes that keep happening.

And so I said, this can, this can help so many people.

But if you have people listening and they're not sure or, or maybe they're about to get their truck wrapped and they just got the design back.

Like, a lot of times people send me that stuff and I can just mark it up and tell them what to fix before they invest all this money in it and say, hey, you know what?

You don't have good contrast here.

Make this a little bit bigger.

Delete this.

You shouldn't say that.

You know, I can give that feedback very quickly.

I'm like an open book.

Like, just hit me up on, you know, on Facebook or send me, send me an email, like, and I'll give you feedback.

And I promise you I won't try to sell you a thing.

It's just not how I work.

But I hate to see, I hate to see guys investing in things that weren't.

Won't deliver an roi, you know, and sometimes it's simple, like, sometimes it's easy, like, just take this off or make this bigger, move this over here, like, and I can art direct very quickly.

Like my whole life, you know, that's the curse.

I look at everything and I, and I want to fix it, right?

So, like, I'm okay with giving feedback.

You don't have to be a client or a customer.

Like, I'm not, I'm not like that.

Like, I just want to try to get as many people winning as possible.

And if I can help them in that journey, that's.

That would be awesome.

Awesome.

Well, that is.

So that, that's definitely gracious of you.

Definitely appreciate that.

Because I know there's a lot of people I've talked to recently that are kind of in that phase.

They're considering it.

Should I, Should I not?

And what.

First of all, everybody, you should.

It's not.

Should you or should you not?

You should, yes, do it, but do it right.

Don't waste, like Dan's saying, don't waste money with something that's just, you know, half assed along the way.

Actually take the time.

If you're gonna spend time and money, make, do it once and do it right.

And this is one of those cool things.

Though once you've done it, you don't ever really have to do it again.

Yeah, you shouldn't have to redo it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's something that's gonna carry on with you.

So it's a, it's a.

But it pays in residual dividends.

Yeah.

So somebody that does want to contact you for service.

What.

Tell us a little bit about Kickcharge.

What all does the company do?

I know we've talked generically about branding and strictly truck wraps, but give us the full run of what the services you guys provide and then give us a, you know, direct how they can get a hold of the company directly to start that conversation.

Yeah, absolutely.

So obviously we create logos and brands.

We do taglines, we do naming, we do brand story elements, we do traditional collateral, so brochures, billboards, those types of things.

We also manage the social media for a number of clients.

So we actually do their.

The voice of the brand and then communicate that on social media channels.

And 95 of our client base is.

Is home service companies, so.

And of course, the truck wraps too.

So, you know, a lot of people start out as wanting a better truck wrap.

A lot of times they come to us with a brand that I can't, I can't ever get to be effective on a truck wrap.

And that'll be the conversation that we'll have.

Because at the end of the day, if you're insisting on using that brand that I know will never function properly on the truck, I completely respect that decision of yours, but I can't be a part of that journey because I'm not going to take money for something that I know won't deliver an ROI for you.

I'm not, I'm not the right person for that endeavor.

So, you know, so we get a lot of people, you know, certainly they ask us to, they love our truck wraps and then they send me their logo and I'm like, you'll never get to that from here.

Right.

So we can fix this and we can absolutely get you there.

But if you want to keep it, I understand, but I can't add value at that point to this process.

And so, yeah, if they wanted to contact us, kickcharge.com they can reach me there or dan@kickcharge.com and then if they wanted to get the book, you can obviously get the book on Amazon.

They have it on the Kindle.

Or you could get it from our website also.

Just kickcharge.com books.

Awesome.

Well, thank you so much.

Yeah, I 100% agree with.

Not everyone is the ideal client if they're not willing to make the change.

To get changes, you have to make changes.

And I'm looking at, for everybody that's listening, I'm looking at the wall right behind Dan and he has this really kick ass poster of all these different truck reps lined up.

And I can't imagine this lemon right in the center of there being like, okay, these were all great, except this guy didn't want to change anything.

So it's just, okay, you know, that's not how you function.

Right.

So, so when you, when you reach out to Dan, you know, be open minded, you know, remember that your mind's like a parachute.

It only works if it's open.

So don't, don't be so married to what you currently have if you're wanting to see change and growth that you're not at least open to the conversation to redo some things, maybe rebrand, maybe rename.

You never know.

Because I clearly the track record, you know, just proves that, you know, the, the numbers don't lie.

At the end of the day, you know, there's, I can't tell you how many examples in this book.

And as you read through the book, everybody, you're gonna see just like a crazy number after number after number.

Would it be okay if you shared me then with the listeners, the numbers that you were reading to me right before we hopped on the, on the podcast from, from your client that send it to you on the average ticket?

Right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, so one of the companies that's mentioned in the book was a company, it was previously called Air Source America.

And the revenue of that company was about 2.2 million.

It had taken them about 10 years to get to 2.2 million.

And the owner's name was Jason Bueller.

And this is one of those very rare examples where a last name brand actually can work very, very well.

And he said, you know, Dan, I've been doing this for a long time and no one can remember the name of my company.

Like I'd be finished with the job and they're writing the check and they would say, who do I make the check out to?

Because the name was Air Source America, which just kind of sounds like an oxygen supply company, not necessarily an H Vac company.

So we, we.

But they always remembered my name from the movie, right?

So, so I said we should name the company Bueller Air.

We should do this fun brand and create this fun mascot.

Which we, which we did.

And the tagline is stay cooler with Bueller.

Right.

So it's, it helps become sticky when you have the rhyme there.

And we were looking at his average tickets, so we looked at his average tickets from prior to rebranding and post rebranding and we've been updating it every year.

He's five years into it, so he's gone from 2.2 million to 20 million in five years.

Okay, so really nice growth.

He's done it at a less than 5% ad spend, which is also the beauty of, of, of, you know, having a very sticky and disruptive brand.

But his average tickets have grown from $6,100 in five years ago, in 20, 20, 18 to now it's over 13,000.

Okay, so imagine, you know, doubling more than double and of course there's inflation.

So I, I completely understand that.

Obviously the prices from five years ago aren't what they should be today, but I don't think everything has gone from six, you know, to, to doubling like that.

So, so on average, you know, getting another $6,500 per job I think is just a great testament to the power of the brand and why people feel like, hey, there's a reason why it's okay for me to spend more money with this particular company because again, I trust them.

They'll be in business next year.

I've read the reviews.

They're clean, they're neat.

The trucks look, you know, polished.

All the, all those things are factoring into those decision making.

So I love it.

What a cool testimony.

And for everybody listening, that's not the only one.

That's just the, the most recent one.

Dan was just saying, he just sent over the new numbers.

But as you go through the book, you're going to see example after example and after example of, you know, not just.

We're not just talking about, you know, 2x5x10x.

We're talking about hundreds of percent difference in all the different types of numbers.

Everything from close rates to average tickets to massive reduction in the need for ad spend and still growth.

Traditionally before this was a part of the conversation, I mean, I've been in the industry 17 years.

I remember taking classes with, you know, Barry from BDR 12, 13, 14 years ago and he's talking about, yeah, for companies to stay stagnant, they're going to spend 5 to 7% in their marketing budget.

In order for a company to grow, it needs to be 10, 12, 14, 15% marketing budget.

This is, that's a 15 year old conversation.

However, clearly this has changed the game with all of the different, you know, things becoming sticky, one of the things you talked about in the book that just made so much sense to me is if you took your company and your logo and your brand and you put it on the shelf at the grocery store alongside all of the other, you know, we'll just pick toothpaste or anything, would it stand out and would anybody want to grab it?

And of course, for most people, the answer is absolutely not.

That's going to be the bottom shelf.

Kick back to the back of the shelf, because nobody wants it, because it doesn't say anything to them.

So if all of these companies that are retail companies spend so much to get their brand right, the most recognizable brands in the world, why shouldn't we spend a little bit?

Because in the grand scheme of things, it's such a small investment to dive into branding at the time.

But both small amount of time and money, man, it just changes everything.

It changes everything.

So love it.

Love it, man.

Well, thanks for being on with us today.

It's about time to land this plane.

I so appreciate the the and grateful for the time that you've given us.

Everyone listening.

Here's the big announcement.

This podcast will launch before that.

I will make sure of it.

So if you want to have the chance to meet Dan in person, ask him, ask him some questions.

I'm sure there'll be opportunity for that, that he's going to be one of the presenters there.

So get to the event.

You can go to the Close It Now Facebook group.

I have a pinned post in there with a link to buy tickets.

So make sure that you go there or go follow Dan on Facebook as well.

And I saw he has a discount code.

When you put his code in to get a discount on your ticket as well.

Saw that you can get a couple hundred bucks off.

Yeah, so I did.

Also, if you're open to this idea, if you want to join the.

The Close It Now Facebook group, I sent you an invite that all of the speakers along the series have been pretty cool with that.

So it's a great place.

Everybody can come to the Close It Now Facebook group.

It'd be a good place to be able to reach out and get a hold of Dan if you want to get contact through there as well.

And, yeah, so I love our industry.

I love what we're doing.

This is the moment of there's so much changing.

There's so many things that are, you know, looking at the market and looking at what's happening, everything is leaning out.

We've got all of these big PE groups that are buying up places.

I was just in Kansas City and 70% of the heating and air companies in Kansas City are owned by corporate.

Wow.

Talk about an opportunity for explosive growth.

So it is just amazing what's happening in our industry.

So absolutely any last words or insights, nuggets you want to drop on everybody before we do the the sign off here?

I mean, listen, I just want to say thank you to you for giving me the opportunity to speak on this subject.

I'm so passionate about this and so grateful for the opportunity that we have to work with so many home service companies.

It's been just an amazing journey for, for me and I just feel so much gratitude for what we've been able to do and, and you know, I get to practice my craft and, and work with so many amazing owners and I just can't think of anything, anything other that I'd rather be doing.

And it's just a really cool industry that we're a part of, you know.

So I feel really blessed to be in it.

Love it.

Well, thank you so much for the insight again everybody.

I can't say this enough.

Go grab yourself a copy of Branded not Blended to kick charge your home service brand.

It is a number one bestseller and you will not regret it.

Even if you just go through and read the high look at the pictures, eat the read the highlights and eat the covers off the book, you're going to get more value than most branding books will you if you read the whole book.

So 100 agree with that.

Thanks Dan for being on everybody.

Come see us at the Profit Rocket Growth Summit.

I'm going to be on the sales panel.

Dan's going to be on the marketing panel and it's just going to be a great time to up level your everything that you do in your organization and up level yourself.

There's going to be even the so if you've been listening to the series Shawn Michael Crane, we've got Zach Williams coming up.

So many great people.

Even fitness mindset working out, you know all the things all the key the complete components to be a person.

You know we say work to become a person worth buying from.

That's all the different elements of your of yourself same with your business work to have a business worth buying from and branding it definitely one of those components.

So.

Well thanks for joining us today.

Thanks for listening everybody.

Until next time, go out there, save the world.

One heat stroke at a time.

Thanks for listening to Close it now with Sam Wakefield.

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