Andy's Inbound/Sales Braindump

[Andy Black]

This thread has some seriously GOLD networking advice in it.

Thank you very much Andy! Word of mouth guys like @Andy Black have some of the most impressive lead gen models. It is also an extremely solid foundation to build a business on which I am ALWAYS in favor of.

Thanks @Kak

I find it interesting that I’m known as an “AdWords Guy”, and some people think I should therefore use AdWords to grow my business.

AdWords is a way to get found by people who don’t already know you. I consider it the purest form of cold traffic because they’re searching when they find you.

It still doesn’t beat warm leads and word of mouth referrals though.

I think the trick is to master warm, then go to the cold channels. If you can’t sell to someone who’s been referred to you, then how can you sell to someone who has never heard of you?

What really tickles me is how we’ve sold over 40 landing pages without having a landing page to sell them from. And that I still don’t have a website to speak of, just a holding page for my business, and a personal branded domain that redirects to my LinkedIn profile - and I’m in the digital marketing space!

 

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[Andy Black]

What really tickles me is how we’ve sold over 40 landing pages without having a landing page to sell them from. And that I still don’t have a website to speak of, just a holding page for my business, and a personal branded domain that redirects to my LinkedIn profile - and I’m in the digital marketing space!

This reminds me of this thread:

• You don't need a website, you need sales

 

[Andy Black]

A website designer I'm chatting to found this highly amusing. This is my business website. It's a holding page - a polite "bugger off if you don't already know me".

It's been like this for years. I'll make it a bit prettier this week, but I'm not adding any more copy to it.

Why have I never got round to it? Because I've found the best lead generation strategy for my own business is to spend all my time generating leads for my client businesses. AKA I focus on building relationships, doing good work, and word-of-mouth referrals.

Not advising that this is the only way to do things of course. Just showing you that you don't "need" as much as you think to get clients.

 

[The Abundant Man]

 

[Andy Black]

A GOOD USE OF YOUR LUNCH BREAK

A few of you are in jobs trying to get traction with your side hustle. Here’s what worked for me when I had a couple of Google Ads jobs:

I’d let people meet me to pick my brains about Google Ads. They’d ask if I could meet them and I’d say I’m working but could meet for lunch.

They’d offer to come to a pub near me for that lunch (which gave them more time with me than me traveling to meet them).

Invariably they bought lunch, which I always thought was a nice touch.

Once time the CEO of a company came along accompanied by the marketing director, finance director, and an IT person. So it was me sat with four suits, each of them with a pad and pen taking notes. They had a coffee and I had a big pub lunch. Ha... that must have been quite a sight.

Anyway, how it works is that you give 100% of the best advice you can in that hour. There’s no pitch. There’s no product or service for sale. Don’t even give them your website or email address unless they ask for it.

See it as practice at being a consultant. See how you can solve their problems in one hour, and by finding the single one thing that would make the most difference.

Guaranteed you’ll learn more than them if you’re listening to their problems and can figure out a process for them to find a solution.

Keep doing this and you’ll get slicker talking to folks.

People will start contacting you with messages like “Bob said you’re good at Google Ads. I’m wondering if we could meet up for a quick chat?”

I’ve since heard this called “diesel and coffee”. Meet folks for a coffee. Somewhere neutral, and for about an hour.

Talk shop. Shoot the breeze. Do NOT make it a sales call.

Enjoy it.

Good things will happen.

...

I still do this. More often it’s a Skype call for an hour. I have the mindset of helping folks the best I can, and then moving on. I don’t try to close. I don’t follow up. I create an imbalance in the universe and let it try to right itself.

 

[Andy Black]

STOP TRYING TO BE A SALESMAN

How would you say hello to someone at the coffee break when you’re attending a business course with other business owners?

Do that.

Stop with all this awkward throat clearing and value vomiting.

Stop trying so hard to be a “good salesman”.

Just be natural and build relationships like you’ve done all your life.

 

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[Andy Black]

FOR THOSE INTIMIDATED SPEAKING TO BUSINESS OWNERS

Go book yourself into a local business course. Make it something you want to know about, and where you’ll meet loads of other business owners who are also trying to learn social media, email marketing, whatever.

You’ll learn stuff.

You’ll have a day out.

You’ll meet some great people.

You’ll also see those fellow business owners are people just like you and me.

You may even get some prospects out of it, but that’s NOT the point.

Better would be to start getting known locally as The Web Guy/Gal (or whatever your thing is).

Best is that you walk away realising business is all about chatting to folks and building relationships,

... and that YOU CAN ALREADY DO IT.

 

[Andy Black]

ALWAYS BE CLOSING?

If someone asks “Why should we work with you?” then they’ve just pissed me off. They’re running through their nice little questionnaire and will be comparing me to other apples.

So I’ll throw the kitchen sink at them and let them figure the f*ck out what to do with it. But they’re too late, I’ve already mentally shut that door and moved on.

Send in a Request For Proposal (RFP)? See ya.

Sales is a screening process. They’ve just told me they don’t know why they want to work with me. I’d much rather spend my time helping the people in motion.

“Our job is to find the people who see the value in what we do, not the cost.” (Blaise Brosnan)

While you’re trying to close someone who’s not that interested, there’s someone else up the road who’ll bite your hand off to work with you.

Always Be Closing?

I read that as “Keep moving till someone bites your hand off.”

(Your mileage may vary. I’m not selling high-ticket initial sales. I’m building long-term relationships with clients. Over the years it ends up high-ticket.)

 

[Andy Black]

A SALES TIP FOR TECHIES

I’ve been meaning to write about this for years and it recently came to a head when someone asked me to review some cold emails they were sending out. It’s a bit long and rambling but I hope it helps.

Anyway, here goes...



A friend was made redundant after three decades as a pharmaceutical sales rep. It hit him hard, and left him with no desire to work for another company.

I suggested he work with me for three months and see if he could bring me clients. We spent hours going over stories how I’ve helped businesses and how I’ve signed them up.

He arranged a meeting for me with a prospect and listened while I chatted to her for an hour.

After that meeting my friend told me “You’re not a salesman Andy.” He explained how much more there was to learn about sales, and how big his library of sales books was. I smiled and nodded.

To help sign up a local car dealership, my friend went round with his laptop so I could have a Skype call with them.

I spotted instantly the business owners were a couple of regular guys hustling hard to build their business, and that they’d appreciate straight talking.

I did my thing on the call, the client signed up, and we’re into our third month helping them.

Last week my salesman friend told me he wanted to get me on calls with prospects more often, explaining that I bring a lot of value to those calls.

So why did he say that after he initially proclaimed that I’m not a salesman, and how can it help you?

What my friend didn’t realise back then is that I try damn hard to NOT be a salesman.

I’ve since explained to him that when I pop into my local garage with a weird rattle in my engine then I prefer talking to the guys in the oily overalls to the guys in the suits.

That when I ring up Google with a problem then I’d much rather speak to a technical specialist who can tell me exactly what’s up with my account, even if they’re not as smooth on the phone as an “account strategist”.

And that I know I’m a techie, a regular guy, and that I play to that deliberately.

On sales calls I talk too much. I get way too excited. I often speak first to fill in the awkward silence (a big no-no to the sales folks amongst us). I wave my hands in the air, interrupt myself, and go off at tangents. I propose solutions there and then, get carried away, and give away too much.

In short, I act like a techie who loves what he does rather than a salesman trying to close a sale. I do all the things a salesman accompanying me would want me to stop doing.

Except I know this works. I’ve been doing it for years.

I’ve had big agencies in Dublin wheel me into meetings to answer questions from the marketing team in a big corporate they’re pitching to. Apparently one marketing director was sold the moment I bounced over to the flip chart and started doodling to answer his questions.

I “allow” myself to get super passionate and excited about what I do. I don’t try and put a lid on it, or act how I may think a good salesman or good businessman would. If anything I ham it up!

I try to be that guy with oily overalls that loves cars and wants to chat about them all day long.

If you’re a techie then consider playing to it, rather than trying to dampen it down and become more of what you think a professional salesman or businessman would be.

Learn about sales by all means, but just consider acting more how a techie would than how you believe a professional salesman or businessman would.

Chances are you’ll do better at sales by not trying to make sales.

 

[James Fake]

I create an imbalance in the universe and let it try to right itself.

x 1000

 

[Andy Black]

Why do you have a simple website? Just curious. I am possibly going to do the same style.

My personal brandname website redirects to my LinkedIn profile. It’s for when I email someone from andy@andyblack.net. I know some will check out andyblack.net, and I figure they’ll learn what they need from my LinkedIn profile, and that they’re more likely to believe what they read there.

My business website is a pretty holding page. It has a link to a Contact Us form. I think of it like a velvet rope outside an unassuming door down an dark alley. Only people in the know will find it, and only people in the know will contact me through the form. I’ve been meaning to change the copy to “We’re currently not taking on any more clients. Fill in the form if you want a quick chat though.”


Some stories:

1) I worked in a business that spent €120k/day buying Google Ads. All those visitors went to their online properties, none went to their business site, which was pretty sparse. The deals the business owners made were done via diesel and coffee (they went to meet people and had long chats with them).

2) A salesman friend was learning what I do. I was helping him get setup as a self-employed salesman for websites and digital marketing. He started creating a Facebook page for his services. I told him not to bother, and to put all that effort into making sure his client websites worked well. I explained that the best sales strategy was to get unasked for referrals from happy clients, and for visitors to their websites to wonder who built them.

3) I went round in circles for years trying to figure out what to put on andyblack.net and my business website. As soon as I blew them away it freed up my mental energy to just go chat to people. My business has done way better recently just by building relationships and getting referrals. Not one single person in the past 10 years who’s been referred to me has asked why my websites are so simple.


Building your own website is a very inward looking activity. I prefer looking outwards and to focus on helping other people.

 

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[Andy Black]

Other reasons I much prefer to start minimal with websites and landing pages:

1) It's quicker to get out of the blocks. Engineers and programmers in particular can get caught up rearranging pixels instead of launching and learning. Copywriters will agonise over every word, sentence, and piece of punctuation. F*ck that. Launch and learn. Put up a strawman and fire some pot shots at it. Add hotjar and observe what visitors do when they hit the page.

2) As a media buyer, the first question I'll ask is "How do the campaigns perform *without* all those fancy distractions on the page?". I'll ask to have them removed so I can get a baseline, then ask to get them added back in to see if they improve performance. So if I'm going to ask to have them removed, we might as well start without them right? ... which leads us back to 1).

3) You're less likely to talk yourself out of the sale when you're visitors want what you're selling and you stfu and let them buy it. I focus on getting the right people to the page initially.



We're doing this for clients, and I'm about to do this for my course.

We setup a simple mobile landing page that has:

• Company name/logo plus company tagline.
• One sentence statement.
• Call to action button to signup to an email series.
• Links in the footer to Privacy | Terms | Disclaimer | Contact Us (optional)

We call these info-seeker campaigns/pages/funnels. We focus on getting people who want information to the page, and see if anyone signs up. We don't have any auto-responder series setup before we go live. Why bother until someone signs up? If someone does signup to my own email series then I'll be all over them with a manual email. I'll apologise that we've not got the 7 day email series done yet. I'll try to get into a conversation. I'll send them info that will help them based on what they ask.

After we've gone live (not before!) we'll install Hotjar. If we get visitors and no-one signs up then we'll observe what folks are doing on the page. We'll come up with theories and test them by adding more content to the page and observing how folks interact with that content.

 

[Andy Black]

Blimey... something I wrote on LinkedIn over a year ago that popped up on my radar when someone liked it today.

.....

Why does an Google Ads consultant NOT use Google Ads to generate more business for himself?

You may already know I love Google paid search.

It's the purest form of cold traffic because (done right) each visitor not only wants what you're selling but is already actively searching for it.

But paid search is the purest form of COLD traffic - the visitors to your website typically don't know you (unless it was a branded search).

People usually need to know, like, and trust you before they do business with you.

Whenever I have to get more clients quickly, I start with the network of people I've *already* done business with. People who already know, like and trust me, and who've already bought from me.

When I can afford to take my time I plant seeds so new people get to know, like, and trust me.

One day soon I'll use cold traffic to start generating leads for myself, but this comes after years of generating inbound leads by going TO the market and engaging them hand-to-hand.

TL: DR?

Consider the following plan:

1) Use your existing network first.

2) Add to your existing network by doing such a good job that clients refer you on, and by being seen to help folks.

3) Use cold traffic *after* you've worked out how to sell to people who already know, like, and trust you.

 

[Andy Black]

PERSONAL BRANDED SITE, OR BUSINESS SITE?

Create both. I have andyblack.net redirect straight to my LinkedIn profile. My actual business website is a holding page. I don't even want people to know it exists. I'll create specific sites for offerings I want to sell - when I get round to it.

E.g. If I was to focus on blacksmiths, then I might create blacksmithsonline.com and create an "agency" service to get blacksmiths online, starting by putting them on the blacksmithsonline.com directory.

 

[mdivljina]

Can I just pop in and say thank you haha. Like I'm starting my cold calling today trying to sell my Adwords services to local business owners in Croatia and I'm definitely going to implement what you said and just offer them an hour of everything I know without a sales pitch. That's gonna be grand!

Thanks again and cheers!

 

[maverick]

Great value Andy. Repped+++

I'd like to add one thing that supports your line of thinking. The aim of your website and marketing activities should be to load up the 'diesel and coffee' funnel.

Position yourself as an expert in digital growth. You will use Paid Search to scale their business however you will also provide them with (free) tips on implementing tag manager, search console and setting up google analytics.

Build their funnel, create a dashboard with their main KPIs and show them what the baseline is (i.e. what is their conversion rate now? CTR? CPC?). Make them aware of these KPIs. Use them as your motivator. It's your role to now improve all of these metrics. Provide tips on increasing page speed, SEO, CRO and analyse the competition.

Grow with your customer.

 

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[Andy Black]

Great value Andy. Repped+++

I'd like to add one thing that supports your line of thinking. The aim of your website and marketing activities should be to load up the 'diesel and coffee' funnel.

Position yourself as an expert in digital growth. You will use Paid Search to scale their business however you will also provide them with (free) tips on implementing tag manager, search console and setting up google analytics.

Build their funnel, create a dashboard with their main KPIs and show them what the baseline is (i.e. what is their conversion rate now? CTR? CPC?). Make them aware of these KPIs. Use them as your motivator. It's your role to now improve all of these metrics. Provide tips on increasing page speed, SEO, CRO and analyse the competition.

Grow with your customer.

Thanks. I think I'm moving away from educating and towards "It's already built. Do you want it?"

“Grow with our customer” is super advice!

 

[Andy Black]

I AM NOT A SALESMAN

In my mind I'm not an agency or a freelancer, I'm a business owner. I think of myself as "building a marketing technology company".

When I speak to another business owner I do so as a peer. I'm not a salesman for my agency, and I'm not a freelancer trying to sell my services to them.

"Hey Jason. How's business going?"

^^^ That's me... NOT being a salesman. I'm curious what you're up to, and if I can help you in any way. I'm literally not interested in whether you buy anything from me or not.

The other thing about being a peer is that I'm on the same level as you. I'm not desperate, timid, worrried about how I come across, or anything that tangles people up. I've earned my stripes. I've had "the cheque is in the post" done to me. I know about the feast and famine of lead pipelines. I know about the struggle to detach my time from my revenue. I remember starting out. I remember the first sale. I remember the pita clients, the crap courses, and the wasted time fiddling with Facebook pages and trying to write About Us pages.

Also... because I'm building a marketing technology company, my focus is NOT to get more clients. I can attend a business course and explain what I'm doing, and people in the room won't think I'm there to get clients. But they'll still approach me if they need help with Google Ads for instance.

 

[Andy Black]

WHAT WOULD RICHARD BRANSON DO?

What would a business owner do as opposed to a salesman?

I don’t “follow up”. I don’t try to close. That would be killing the golden goose. The relationship is more important to me than a few extra €.

We started with a “chat”. I then continue the conversation by email. I’ll send a Thank you email and maybe point to resources that might help them. I do this because its plain old good manners.

I’m also a techie so I might chatter excitedly about the technology and things I’ve done, am doing, and hope to do. I might interrupt the person I’m talking to with some ideas or stories that pop into my head.

My salesman friend was aghast. “You’re not a salesman Andy” he told me. Yep, it’s deliberate. I don’t spend all my time listening like the sales book tell us we should. It’s probably 50/50, or sometimes I do most of the chattering.

If it starts where the other person thinks it’s a sales call then I’ll break out of that as soon as I can. It’s not the questions I ask, the tonality, or the body language. It comes from a place of me not trying to make a sale, and it not being a sales call. It comes from a place of one business owner chatting to another business owner. Actually, it comes from a place of one person chatting to another, with a goal of seeing how we can help each other.

I’m not saying I couldn’t do better as a salesman, just that I’ve no intention of being a salesman. I’m good at sales because I don’t come across as a salesman. I think that’s important. By all means, read, study, and immerse yourself in sales. Then throw the rule books away and find the style that suits you.

 

[Dianne Cohen]

I was asked this a while ago:

If you were to start your business from scratch, how would you approach prospecting? Given that you don't cold call. And you don't know many people in the business world to "spend your money on diesel and coffee" with. And you've already reached out to your friends and family and done some work for them.

I've been trying to gather up and arrange my thoughts. It's a bit messy but I'll keep coming back to add to this.

Feel free to add your comments and twists. Ask questions too. This is what's worked for me to date, and I welcome tweaks that can improve it.

Hi Andy, How do you handle all of the leads that you get every day? There is no way you have time to call everyone.

 

[Andy Black]

Hi Andy, How do you handle all of the leads that you get every day? There is no way you have time to call everyone.

I maybe get an enquiry every couple of days? I don’t really track it. That feels busy enough.

I’ll have a quick email back and forth, and if a call is the next logical step then I send them a link to my calendar (via Calendly).

The calendar thing is reasonably new and it was to save the email ping-pong trying to find a time that suits, and it’s also to slow everything down (because there’s a limited number of slots a week).

I was getting a bit frazzled so had to slow things down a bit.

Today I decided to tell people that I’m too busy for the next few weeks onboarding all the new clients, and trying to dial in their campaigns. I was kinda surprised when a couple of folks emailed back saying “no problem, I’ll get back to you in a few weeks”.

(There’s more details in the inside in my 2019 progress thread.)

 

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[Andy Black]

STOP BEING SO SALESY

Someone recently asked this (I have their permission to repeat it and my replies):

Hello guys, so, I found a prospect online & I invested 30 min in finding things about their website & made notes about it so that i can share it with them & then today I sent them this message:-

Me: I really like your work! your work is beautiful (which I really felt)
Prospect: thanks, very kind of you to say those words!

Me: is this the owner I am talking to?
Prospect: yes

Me: Hey, I know it's kind of random but I have some feedback that I wanted to share with you!
Prospect: Sorry, not buying

I am a bit sensitive, so, I am feeling hurt

Can you guys share your fail attempts & a few of the bad responses you got, this will help me ease my pain & my perspective of the typical "I think I am really unlucky, this is only happening with me" kind of thoughts, that I am having!

Thanks a lot!
​

Here were my replies:

Your second two messages told him you’re selling something. Why does it matter if you’re speaking to the owner? Why tell him you have feedback? Those two messages now invalidate the first message, which suddenly looks like a standard copy/paste opener (aka spam).

Here’s what I did recently: We’re looking to get someone to clear some junk from our garden. My wife sends me a link to a website where she spoke to the guy. I check it and then click the link to his Facebook page. It’s broke. I find their page on Facebook. I Facebook message him and introduce myself saying my wife already spoke. I also tell him his Facebook link is broken.

That’s it. I’m a potential client telling him his link is broken. I didn’t ask if he’s the owner. I didn’t even ask his name. I didn’t tell him I had some advice. I just said one thing.

Later on, after sending photos of the garden, and a bit more conversation back and forth, I then suggested that if he’s always this responsive then he should put a Facebook messenger button on his website.

No attempt to close. No mention that I’m in the digital marketing space. Just a helpful suggestion.

You’re clearing your throat too much (saying things before you get to your point), and you’re trying to value-bomb. People don’t want 10 bullet points of things they could improve. Give them one tip and keep moving on (to the next message or the next lead)?

Don’t use this as a tactic... because you’ve missed my point, but there’s a reason business owners carry phones and have ways they can be contacted. It’s because they want leads, NOT because they want to be sold to.

Don’t pretend to be a lead because that’s disingenuous. Instead, try not to be so salesy.

...

Another thing... why are you investing 30 minutes reviewing his site? Find one thing that could be improved and you're good to go. With that landscaping / gardening site my initial thought was: "Do you do residential? It looks commercial only from your website?" I could have mentioned that if I'd rung the number. Instead I wanted to Facebook message him because I was busy, and it was more painful than it should have been to do so.

...

And you should be grateful to him because he politely stopped you dead and stopped you wasting any more of your own time. That’s a typical business owner. They’re direct because they’re busy and don’t have time to beat around the bush. He also helped you realise you come across as selling. That has allowed you to improve.

...

Have an abundance mindset. There’s millions of potential clients out there. You don’t have to close the one in front of you.

Relax. Keep doing the right thing and the results will follow.

Enjoy it too. Build relationships. Have a laugh. Chat to folks, don’t have “sales calls” or “discovery seasions”.​

 

[Andy Black]

Changed the name of the thread from "Andy's Inbound Braindump" to "Andy's Inbound/Sales Braindump".

Maybe one day it will just be "Andy's Sales Braindump"?

 

[The-J]

Changed the name of the thread from "Andy's Inbound Braindump" to "Andy's Inbound/Sales Braindump".

Maybe one day it will just be "Andy's Sales Braindump"?

How to sell like Andy Black

1) Don't
2) See #1

 

[100ToOne]

I love your thread because it's the real deal sales techniques that I've personally seen live and works best.

My uncle is 55 years old and never read a sales book before. He sells products here locally worth around 1 million Dollars a year. I went with him to some "business meetings" before and what you say in this thread is exactly accurate.

He goes there for 2 hours, and usually just drinks coffee, talks about life, listens to other business owners issues (issues that have nothing to do with business), offers them solutions and offers help (again nothing to do with business issues), then walks out selling $20K worth of products to this guy without the other guy negotiating anything. He truly cares about other people and their problems and that was such an eye opener. He would call them later to ask about their kids/parents/life even if the business between them is over. It's as you say the more you honestly help people from your heart not wanting anything in return, the more unexpected return that comes back to you.

 

[Andy Black]

How to sell like Andy Black

1) Don't
2) See #1

I spat my tea out. Ha... that’s funny. I hope I’m not laboring the point too much. Life’s short. Enjoy it and enjoy chatting with all the interesting people around you.

 

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[Andy Black]

I love your thread because it's the real deal sales techniques that I've personally seen live and works best.

My uncle is 55 years old and never read a sales book before. He sells products here locally worth around 1 million Dollars a year. I went with him to some "business meetings" before and what you say in this thread is exactly accurate.

He goes there for 2 hours, and usually just drinks coffee, talks about life, listens to other business owners issues (issues that have nothing to do with business), offers them solutions and offers help (again nothing to do with business issues), then walks out selling $20K worth of products to this guy without the other guy negotiating anything. He truly cares about other people and their problems and that was such an eye opener. He would call them later to ask about their kids/parents/life even if the business between them is over. It's as you say the more you honestly help people from your heart not wanting anything in return, the more unexpected return that comes back to you.

Great story. I love watching people like that do their thing. IMO... not only does it work better to not be in “sales mode”, but it’s also a whole lot less stressful and a whole lot more fun.

 

[Andy Black]

Amen.

 

[Andy Black]

DO YOU GUARANTEE RESULTS?

Here’s my reply when someone asked “Should I make ‘30 sales in 30 days or your money back’ my USP”:

...

I don’t guarantee results. I even state it when I speak to people interested in hiring me: “We don’t guarantee results, just that we follow a process, and our process is this: blah blah blah.”

Even when we can’t get results for a new client and they have to disengage, they understand the process we went through and often still refer people to us in the future.

Maybe it goes against all the sales and marketing books, but I sell the process that should get results, not the results. I speak at length about the process. Prospects can visualise what we’ll do for them.

If they engage and we start the process then they will “see” the process in action and “get” it. Even if they don’t get results, understanding this process is extremely valuable for them because they can use it for any other business idea they have.

.

I’m not saying my process is my USP.

Again, contrary to sales books I don’t believe we need USPs. I believe we just need to get the right offer in front of the right person at the right time.

I’ve been on local courses for business owners - as an attendee. At the start folks are asked to introduce themselves and what they do.

“My name is Andy. I do them little ads on Google.”

Ta-da. That’s enough for anyone looking for help with Google Ads to make a note and come speak to me at the coffee break.

What was my USP? Did I even say I was good at it?

Nothing... I was just in the same room as them.


30 clients in 30 days or money back

 

[Andy Black]

PHRASES I USE A LOT

“We’ll buy data on a whiff of spend first. Then we’ll decide whether the project has legs or needs a swift bullet.”

“We try to get you profitable as soon as possible.”

“Our goal is to get to the point where your new customers/clients pay for the ads and our fee.”

“We can’t promise results, just that we follow a process, and that process is this ...”

“Your competition aren’t doing X, Y, or Z. You’ve a good chance if you do X, Y, and Z.”

“I’m happy to leave money on the table to build a long term win-win relationship.”

“We did this when we build 120m keywords and ads for a startup in Dublin.”

“When I was in a team of 35 Google Ads specialists spending €120k/day on ads we did <insert relevant story>.”

“Our goal is to grow *with* you.”

“You’re not tied into a contract. You can cancel anytime. We have to make this profitable for you each month.”

“We dig one layer below everyone else.”

“We do things the competition doesn’t think to do, doesn’t want to do, or doesn’t know how to do.”

“I’m a geek. I love this stuff.”

“I grow my business through customers recommending us to other business owners.”

“Even if this doesn’t work out you’ll have learned the process we use to see if something will work, or fail fast and cheaply.”

“I’m not trying to grow a consultancy or an agency. I have other plans... but just can’t help myself.”

“I do this for fun!”

“You’re getting my consulting brain for SaaS fees.”

“We’ll eventually not take on clients. We’re just doing this while we figure out the products we’ll create and sell at scale.”

“There’s two learning curves here. We learn about your business and market, and you learn what we do and why. When those two learning curves meet in the middle it pushes us up higher than your competitors.”

“I’ve had clients paying €5k/mth but don’t want big clients like that anymore. I prefer to help with smaller businesses where I work with the business owner.”

“If this works well then maybe you could rent this system to businesses in other locations?”

“I started in AdWords back in 2009 and it never gets old!”

“I don’t look at all that crap. When we were buying a million clicks a day we just used spreadsheets to figure out our CPCs and EPCs. All those other KPIs are just that... *indicators*. All we cared about was whether we made €150k/day for our €120k/day spend.”

“We got our butts kicked if the margin was too low. We also got our butts kicked if the margin was too high, because that meant we could push bids and get more volume.”

“I’m a business owner too.”

“What marketing have you done to date, and how has it worked out?”

“How’s business going?”

“It wrecks my head when people talk about ‘traffic’.”

“People keep talking about landing page conversion rates. Argh... landing pages don’t fecking convert. People do.”

“People overcomplicate it. Launch and learn.”

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I’m sure there’s more. I feel like I’m just getting started brain dumping these.

One thing I’ve noticed about all those statements is that they’re all unique to me and the way I work. They’re all “authoritative” too. They’re mostly statements.