Ep #259 - Patrick Martinez - Close More. Sell Better.

- Welcome to Lighting for Profits. - All right, all right, all right. - Powered by Emory Allen. - Here is your host, Ryan Lee. - Let's go, welcome, welcome, welcome to the number one landscape lighting show in Thousand Oaks, California. I'm your host, Ryan Lee, looking forward to hanging out. - Guys, if you're looking to start or grow a landscape lighting business, you're definitely in the right place. And I will say today, I've been going to other industries because I know some of you guys don't want to hear this, but sometimes other industries are way more advanced than the outdoor lighting industry. And so it's been really, really cool 'cause I've been able to tap into a completely new network and I've met some amazing people and on my K help us, like help us get to where you guys are. And so today's one of those days, so technically, even if you're not looking to grow your outdoor lighting business, you could be looking to grow a lot of different types of businesses. But if you're an artist, you're going to want to listen to this episode because we're going to talk about how to help you grow your business. We've got Patrick Martinez, the founder of Five Stone Solutions. And we're going to be nerding out on some business. We're going to be talking about some ways to really streamline your sales process and really use leverage in your business to help you grow. So it's not always by working harder. I can tell you that 'cause I learned the hard way. (laughs) I thought that was the definition of being an entrepreneur, just outwork the next guy. But that's not really the case. So looking forward to having Patrick Martinez with Five Stone Solutions on the show in just a couple of minutes. And before we have him on, just a couple of things. Number one, we are about to start promoting the heck out of Light It Up Expo. We're going to have limited spots for vendors, actually limited number of tickets for attendees as well. So you're going to want to take advantage of that. But for now, just mark it out on your account, and we'll pencil it in lightitupexpo.com. March one through four in Las Vegas. It's going to be an awesome show. We've got so many cool things planned and I just kind of want to plant that seed for you guys. Also big shout out to lights for decorators, owner Jimmy Tompkins, his entire team. You guys know what? We're entering in the holiday lighting season. There's going to be a lot of Christmas light sales, a lot of permanent lighting. They're an incredible resource. Obviously, I have great products, but one of the things I like about them is they're always trying to help you grow your business. So we had Jimmy come speak to us at Secret Summit last week, or two weeks ago now, I guess. But he just knows his stuff. He just knows how to run a tight ship, knows how to run a business, and knows his numbers, which is really important. So if you want to win in your market, go to lightsfordecorators.com, get in touch with him, get in touch with his team, and get on the latest training schedule. And again, guys, in just a few minutes, we're going to have Patrick Martinez, the founder of Five Stone Solutions, and really looking forward to our conversation with him. I don't know why, but just the last few days I was thinking about the lighting industry, and I was thinking like, what separates those that are just like, absolutely killing it, and then those that are still kind of struggling, those that still just haven't figured out how to get traction in their business. And one thing that's kind of true in anybody's business in the outdoor lighting industry, is most lighting business owners spend their time designing beautiful lighting systems. And it's honestly, it's one of the coolest things about our industry. It's like, I don't know how passionate I would be about selling roofs. I mean, I'm sure you can tap into some passion somewhere, but lighting design is pretty cool, and like being able to create something and transform a space, and then the way just to see and feel how the homeowners react to that, it's a pretty cool experience, right? And so I think a lot of us have felt that we know that. And so it's easy to kind of like lean in to the design side, and really because we're able to like tap into that artistry, and that's pretty unique. Like you don't get that in a lot of industries. And so what I want to talk about is like the difference between the lighting artist and the business architect, and really kind of like when you need to tap into each one. Because in my opinion, there are businesses out there that are just so heavy on the lighting artistry that they're not really ever getting traction in business, and sometimes they go out of business because they never put on the business architect hat. And then there's other people that are like so heavy on the business architect side that they kind of forgot about the lighting artistry. So how do we blend those? How do we merge those and which one do you need to focus on at which phase, right? And so especially in this industry, most people got into it because they're artistic talent. Like it's pretty special. Like I said, compared to other industries, that you're able to like check that box and you're able to like exercise artistic side and your creativity, like it's really fun, right? But you know, that artistic talent that got you into business won't necessarily keep you in business, okay? And so like being the best lighting designer in the world doesn't automatically create the best business. And I see a lot of people falling in love with design, which again, I can appreciate, but they spend so much time on that that they forget that they're actually running a business not a charity and the numbers, the expenses, everything piles up and there's nothing to show at the end of the season. And you see this in and pretty much every industry not just outdoor lighting, but the market usually rewards the company that communicates its value best. Not necessarily the company with the most technical or the most design skill, right? And if I'm an artist, like that's super frustrating 'cause it's like, do you know who I am? Like do you know my creativity? Like I'm so much better, but if you're not able to communicate that value, like you're just gonna get left behind, okay? And I don't know. There's just this paradox between the two. And for whatever reason, I've always appreciated both. Like I love the fact that I can go create something and then like tonight the lights turn on and those customers are like, wow. Like this is the coolest experience I've ever had. Would you build a pool for us? I'm like, what? What do you want me to build a pool for you? I just did your lighting and they're like, well, because that's the coolest experience I've ever had, right? So it's awesome for a couple of reasons. One, because we're actually giving someone something that they want, not necessarily something they need, which is interesting. People want to go on badass trips to Europe and spend $60,000 a day on a yacht. Like they want to do that and they feel good doing it. They don't necessarily want to go spend $60,000 on a roof. You know what I mean? They will because they need to. But lighting is like that. It's like we're giving someone something that they want and it doesn't just end in a week, like these cool vacations. Like it continues to give back every single night for like the next 10 or 15 years, right? So it's pretty dang cool what we're able to do. But I've always been drawn to the business side because I'm like, I didn't get into business to like, what did I see the other day? Someone said they left their nine to five so that they could work five to nine, right? Like most of us get into business thinking, I want freedom. Like I'm sick of working for this asshole boss. I'm sick of like doing all these things for someone else. I'll just do it for myself and then I can go to my kids' games and I can go on vacation when I want and then all of a sudden what happens? Like we become trapped by the very thing that was supposed to give us the freedom. And so I want you to think about this in a different way. What if you could still use your artistic side, but not just into this lighting design phase? Like what if you could use your artistic side to build your dream business? It's like an architect, okay? An architect is an artist like they create different blueprints. And so an architect creates a blueprint that other people can follow. And when you're designing your business, not just designing lighting, you're doing the same thing. You're designing a business that other people can follow. And I've really thought about this a lot because what I'm doing now, I think can be misconstrued a little bit. People that know me well from in-person events and friends and stuff like that, they know who I am. Like you can't hide from who you are. But online social media, I'm not posting all this stuff. Like if I have one cool thing that looks awesome, I've probably already tried 10 things that failed. I just didn't talk about those because that's not what you do in social media, right? And so some of the stuff I'm doing can get misconstrued, but it's like just because I'm so passionate and focused on the business and helping you guys make money, doesn't mean I'm anti-design. In fact, the way I design events, the way I design experiences is me exercising that creativity and that artistic side of my brain. I just happen to believe that you can do both. If you're an artist, it doesn't mean you have to be a starving artist. (laughs) Like that just frustrates the crap out of me 'cause there's so many talented people that are doing good work and no one knows about 'em. In fact, I went to, you know, I was in the industry, I started my lighting business in 2007. And I had heard about Ili, the international landscape lighting. institute, I had heard about them, but never gave, I mean, why would I go to some event that's thousands of dollars and it's going to take a week, already know how to put lights in the ground, like why would I go to that? I never understood the value. So in 2019, I sold my business, I think I went to my first Ili in 2020 or 2021. I wanted to see what was out there. You know, people were going to be coming and asking me, should I do this, should I do that? I don't want to tell them, no, I didn't do it. I want to go experience it myself and then have a real opinion. So I go to this Ili International Landscape Lodding Institute and it was an incredible experience. I mean, after being in the industry over 12 years, I learned a ton about design. It changed the way I thought, it changed my perspective. And one of the first things I said to Jan Moyer, who started Ili and to the president of Ili, Jesse, I said, you guys suck at marketing. I was like, oh my gosh, you guys suck at marketing because you guys have an awesome product. You have an awesome experience and no one even knows about it. Right? And that's what I mean is like you can do both. Like you can be passionate and good at that, but like you need to get good at business. If you want to stick around, if you want to scale and these things matter, these conversations need to happen because people ask me all the time, if they're getting new into business, like what light should I use for this or what whose product should I buy or who should I hire for this and when should I hire this person. And the answer always is the same. The answer is it depends. Because if you're going to, if you're trying to grow a lighting business that's heavy on the artistic side and that means you don't trust people because no one can design as good as you. No one can install as good as you. You're an artist. How could someone be as good as you? You're this unique artist. Well, then you're going to grow your business differently than I grew mine. Okay? Because I want to exercise that art aside, but it's not just in one field. It's not just in lighting design. It's in the design of the entire business. Okay? And again, if I'm going to be in business and I'm going to work five to nine, five a.m. to nine p.m. and later in the lighting industry, I better make a shit ton of money and people feel guilty for making money. Like why? This is how this is. When I talk about overdeliver, like, you know, overdeliver on your client experience, you can't do that if you're not making any money. But if you're making a lot of money, you can afford to overdeliver. You can afford to overpay your people. You can afford to recruit higher caliber. So instead of hiring bees and seas, you can hire an A player who's actually going to be disciplined, who's actually going to show up, who's actually going to put in the work and overdeliver for your customer. That can only happen if you're a profitable business. Okay? So I guess what I want to leave you with is just to encourage you, like, in my mind, you can have both. You can be an amazing artist, a great designer, and a business professional and a business architect. Okay? And I think the ultimate outdoor lighting business does both. I don't think you pick one. I do think that, you know, creative minds tend to, we tend to do the thing that's more natural for us or more comfortable for us. And so this is another way to kind of gauge like, Hey, are you, if you're comfortable right now, you probably need to do something else. Right? If you want growth, if you're happy and you're fine and, you know, and great, like, live your life, the way I look at it is like, I need redundancy. If I get hurt today, what's going to happen to my income? Is someone else going to be replacing me? And most of the time, this is why the term starving artist exists because that person gets so infatuated on what they do. They're unwilling to hire other people because they're not as good as them. And they don't share the same standards because they don't have a standard. Right? But if you will become a business architect and design your business accordingly, I promise you, you can do both. You're going to have to make some sacrifices. What are you willing to say no to is going to come up a lot. And you're going to have to say, notice some things. You might not be able to go and choose from 27 different suppliers to create that masterpiece. But maybe you can. Maybe you can do just one or two masterpieces a year. And everything else, trust me, is still way better than what most people are putting out, but you now have a scalable business. So just remember that your customers need your artistry. Like, that's fine. That's good. Right? But your employees, your team members, they need your architecture. You're going to have to figure out when to put on the different hat. And remember that your family, your circle, they need both. They need you to do both. So make sure you're designated time to be the artist and designated time to be the architecture. That's all I got for you guys. Oh, let's see. You guys want to know how to get more jobs? Whether you're an artist or not. One of the ways is to just differentiate yourself. So one of the easiest ways to do that is just use better product. Don't let a bad lamp ruin your client experience. Emory Allen, they make the premium LED lamps for lighting professionals that demand the best. So don't settle for less. Just reach out to them today. It was kind of funny. We were at Secret Summit and I was introducing Tom and Jackson. They were there. And they were like, Oh, is that Jackson L at Emory Allen.com. If you guys want to reach out to them, do email Jackson. His last name is starts with L. So Jackson L at Emory Allen.com. But the cool thing is they do offer discounted contract repricing. All you need to do is mention that you heard about him here on lighting for profits. And they will hook you up. So again, it's Jackson L at Emory Allen.com. Alright guys, let's say we got Patrick coming on the show. I say it's time to get into it. So if you guys are ready, I'm ready. Let's not need to drink. Let's do it. Welcome. Welcome Mr. Patrick Martinez. What's up Patrick? What is going on? What is going on? Man, thanks for coming on the show today. I appreciate it. I'm looking forward to talking all things business with you. Yeah, this will be fun. This will be super fun. I listened to the show a bunch. So this will be super cool. I like the energy you bring to this. And I like the intro. I have comments on the intro to you. But I'll let you do your thing. Let's start there. Well, before the comments, because I do want that, the reason I do that, by the way, is because I believe that this show is so valuable, because I can bring on so many different perspectives, you know, and we're going to hear your perspective today. But I am kind of selfish. And I'm like, I want to get my like energy out. I'm like up a dog. It's got to go for a run in the morning. And then then we can focus on you. So yeah, after after you introduce yourself, you can pick up a thing apart, give me ideas, whatever that's great, because the rest of the shows got you. Yeah, that was cool. That was cool. Um, yeah. So my name is Patrick. No, I'm with five stone solutions. I've been in the specialty contracting space for over 30 years. So audio video, lighting, shading, technology, networks, all that good stuff. And we run a company called Five Stone Solutions. There's four of us here that we're here. And we do one-on-one coaching. We do sales playbooks. We do how to help you find your next sales superstar. But the thing we're most excited about for your audience, I think, is our is our weekly sales training program. We meet every Friday morning. Today's Friday. We had a session this morning, and we meet every Friday morning talking about sales, sales strategy, and all like it's stuff for specialty contractors. So that's kind of our, what we do around here all week. Very cool. So what, uh, and how long has Five Stone Solutions been around? How long have you had this business? Yeah, about 12 years, full time for 12 years, it's just been growing steadily. Um, and, you know, been in, like I said, it was in the contracting space, high end construction, and all that kind of stuff for decades and decades. And were you an integrator? What type of business it would? Yeah, I was a very, I was a full service integrator back in the day before there was, there was that common. Um, so I started my first integration company in 96, probably before some of your listeners were born. And then over the years, you know, grew that business, sold that business, merged with other businesses, did other world ups, did all kinds of stuff. So, uh, did that. And then 12 years ago, went full time, uh, consulting and coaching for specialty contractors and also manufacturing companies. So, so you mentioned like Emory Allen. Like those types of companies are also about half our businesses made up of like manufacturing companies than about half our businesses made up of contractors of various types. So we, nice. Our specialty is subject matter expert sales people. So I've been turning nerds into salespeople for 30 years. And I was my first customer. So that's what we did. That's cool. Well, obviously you had a lot of like experience, you know, helping people growing your business because you're hiring salespeople, training them, stuff like that. Yeah. What prompted you 12 years ago to go, you know what, maybe maybe there's something else here we could actually start a company around education. Yeah, yeah. It was similar. You said it's kind of a diversification thing. It started out like part time. And then I was like, Oh, well, this is kind of cool because I get, I get bored, you know, you might relate to that. So if I can have a part in building lots of businesses, it's more exciting to me than just building one business that I'm working on. So, you know, I build my business with the night to help others built there. businesses. And the building is what excites me. The day-to-day running, not always so much. I think a lot of entrepreneurs can relate to that. But the building is exciting. So that's why I just kind of diversified into that and helped these other companies. That's cool. Yeah, I felt like I'm always chasing my next adrenaline hit. So I remember when I sold my first $10,000 job and then the first $20,000 and the $50,000. And those were like amazing moments. I thought, oh my gosh, it's going to change my life. And now like I tell people, I'm like, I could go to knock doors and sell like $2,000,000 jobs right now in the next like five hours. And it just wouldn't do nothing. It's just like, I need to, I need to have your drug. The heavier drug is someone new comes in. They follow my script. And they have a way to go. Dude, I just closed this $8,000 deal. They gave me $4,000. I'm like, let's go. Yeah, it's like the best thing ever. Exactly. I had one of those on a one-on-one call this week. He sold his first design package before doing all the work. I know we'll talk about that later, but he had sold his first design package where he got paid to do the design before he did it before he lifted the pencil. And that's how he started as one-on-one call. He was so stoked about that. That's sweet mindset change. Yeah. Well, let's talk about the real quick. Where are your thoughts on the lighting artist versus the business architect? Yeah, I love it. I think that's a really good point. And I think it taps into this broader thing of the visionary versus the integrator, which is part of the EOS business model. Not to get too dirty. But, you know, you have some some people who are natural visionary artists who are then for the excitement of the thing. And then you have like the blocking and tackling integrator business folks. And in smaller businesses, it's hard to have both that yin and yang. But as soon as your business grows big enough where you can get some support, it's really critical to kind of support. If you're the visionary artist, you got to get some people to do the blocking and tackling that you don't want to do so that you stay in business. But until you get that point, what you said is 100% true is just you got to like adapt and be able to do both sides good enough until you can grow enough. And then if you're hard business hard numbers and you don't have that creativity or passion for the business, it's hard to make sales and make money because you people don't you know people don't buy from companies people buy from people. And if you're not super passionate about landscape lighting or you know permanent lighting or all the different things that you guys do, it's hard to make those sales. So, so I think the yin and yang is really is really critical. And and the other thing I encouraged all my contractors they work with is don't forget why you got into this business. So many guys get into the business and like you're you're monologue about like the grind and working five and nine all that like it's so true. And they fast forward 10 years, they got eight guys working for them, they got four trucks, they got a mortgage like and they forget why they got in the business because they haven't been to a finished project in a year. They haven't been to a trade show to see anything fun and exciting in three years. They haven't walked the client through the final install and too long because there's somebody else doing that and they lose that kind of passion and excitement. So I just encourage you guys get out you know and remember why you did this go look at big gnarly projects go experience what it is you do so you don't forget and get your office folks out too you know you can't just lock people in office and not let them see what you guys do. Everybody needs to be passionate about about what you guys at work on. Yeah well said. Well what would you say to someone who's I feel like the most most of the people not everybody of course but most of the people they're listening are kind of that like visionary artist. They they're probably listening going like okay I know I'm supposed to do that but like how you know I'm like I know I'm supposed to hire an integrator. I need someone to help me build these systems because yeah they're not they're not gonna do that like it's just like you're asking you know them to do something that's not really possible in their mind. How do you do that like how do you get to that spot where you go okay I'm not just an operator anymore but business owner and I'm putting these people in these seats. Yeah well one of it's part of its money not you're gonna have some money not a lot but it's some money in a process to get more money. Everything is I really encourage people like your program super great like get into a program of some sort get a coach of some sort get a mentor of some sort like get some other people that are kind of dripping into your life on a regular not just can't just go to like an annual conference and get all rah rah rah and expect to deliver for the next 364 days. So you got to get things you know where you're getting regularly dripped on like your program you know our program meets weekly we have a weekly scorecard that sales people have to fill out before they come to the session you know there's like some accountability is really key and just regular touches on that stuff and then through that you'll start to figure out your plan of what's next because you have these people are gonna have you read books these groups are gonna have you do things and like that starts to help formulate what your next what your next steps are yeah very cool yeah falls in line with like we just finished our our secret summits our members only thing and this year we did um the theme was intentional success and I was I was like you know we you and I we see like behind the scenes of all these companies and and I would just realize I'm like man no one's actually like I say like I want to fly private jet I want to want to fly a private jet like not really because I've never really put the plan in place to do that it's just go to like fantasize about it or whatever and there's there's no successful business person out there they just got lucky they just like woke up and they had this business that runs without them and everything else and it really is just like getting intentional and then how bad do you really want it because some people like me saying I want to fly private like it's cool to say but like it's just it's just not gonna happen until I like actually put the plan in place and reverse it for sure a big part of our program is just goal setting like we we do like annual we do a big annual goal setting session or two sessions actually it's pretty fun over that I'll be coming up in a couple of months here because we're getting into it but um you know kind of studying those goals but then you can't just set the goal and like let them run like you have to check in you have to hold yourself accountable you have to score things and so we we do these regular check-ins on reflecting on your day and your goals and all that stuff and you but you write it has to be intentional I love the title of that it's just so great because you do you're not gonna accidentally you're not gonna accidentally get successful you're not gonna accidentally get in shape um you know you're not gonna accidentally get rich this sucks this podcast sucks exactly exactly yeah it's got to be a same brand it says it's got to be that gazelle intensity right like you they're gonna get in shape or get rich or get your business tidy um while also here's the really hard part too while also not losing that passion because you don't want the business to just be a bunch of check boxes and goals like you guys are in a very creative business and we need to be still fostering that creativity yeah yeah I think that that passion for for these guys is easy because they're just like so addicted to it it's just natural like you know I've got friends that are like it's natural for them to like love working out I'm still freaking hate working out I hate it makes me like literally nauseous and so I'm like I would love I wish I had a great yeah so they're they're wired to be passionate which is cool yeah um they're definitely not wired to do the other stuff yeah and for so for me I I'm bummed that I don't naturally love to work out so in place of that and this is where it kind of corresponds with what you were talking about in the monologue in place of that I have a system so I have a checklist of how many times a week I'm supposed to lift weights how many times a week I'm supposed to do cardio um I have like I have some hand issues so I have like a list of times I'm supposed to do my stupid my stupid hand exercises you know and I have like my metrics that I hit for the week that I track and my little tracker and in place of that passion I have the accountability of that and that's what helps me like get it done so very cool yeah that's awesome well you just mentioned that you got a new um or one of your members just came to you with his first like win for design or getting paid for design work uh we should talk about that because when I first came when I sold my lighting business in 19 I started getting active on social media all that and then I see in a lot of the outdoor lighting groups who were like hey um do you charge for quotes do you charge for designs do you know all this and I'm like well like I think one we got to understand what the definition of a design is because like I was going to someone's house and within 30 minutes telling him like hey we could be like 30 lights and it's 12 grand to me that didn't feel like a design it felt like a quote I'm like right didn't charge for that because I just told them that and they gave me a deposit but to me a design is like putting a design together I mean we're talking like like fixture placement what types the wiring diagram the voltage drop all the stuff um but talk a little bit about that because I do think there is a need for it uh but what what are the deliverables and walk us through your process on that yeah good question so we we try to get you to charge for design services as often as possible we don't necessarily want to create a bunch of friction in the buying process so if somebody calls you for a quote it's like, hey, I need to just like, like you said, like 12 lights are what you call in the indoor space, like four cans in a fan, right? There's not a lot of design work there. But, you know, we're looking at like more complex projects like you're talking about. And what we're trying to do is get to a point where about half of the value of the design service is deliverables. And about a half of it is your intellectual property. So everybody who's in the space or these specialty contracting spaces, you have decades of information in your brain that has value. And so it needs to be positioned as such that you're not going to just tell them all what to do so they can go get it all from someone else, right? And so, well, we're trying to talk about, you know, for your space, deliverables, like you said, plans, load schedules, some light electrical engineering, right? Like to make sure we're going to have enough, you know, there's not too much voltage drop and all that stuff. But really the layout of where things are going and the types of fixtures. And if I'm going to come out to your house and rope up some stuff, so you can keep it over the weekend and take a look at it, like all of that kind of stuff should be part of your design services package if you're in landscape lighting space. And so, you know, I work with a lot of integrators, I like with a lot of interior lighting designers and shade contractors and all kind any kind of specialty contractor, they all have a certain element of design. So, I'm going to look at what your deliverable package could be and then not forget that the real value is in your intellectual property and you shepherding them through the process to help them figure out what it is that they really need and want. And what's possible? Yeah, I like that. So, how would you approach it? Someone just calls in a homeowner calls my lighting company today. Am I charging to go out on that first visit or I'm going out there to like, introduce this whole concept? Yeah, yeah. So, it's great, great, great point. Here's the thing. And this is the challenge, you know, this is the challenging podcast. I could change the name of it to the challenging podcast. Anything you say after high my name is Ryan, this is how we work, diminishes the value of the design service offering. And if it gets you out to the house, you're a problem solver, you want to prove how smart you are, you want to show them all the cool stuff and you start talking and offering ideas and you start solve, you don't realize it, but you start solving problems right then. It gets harder and harder to sell that design service because you have, you're already giving away the milk. So, in an ideal world, yes, you would re-qualify it into being more than just a quick holiday project, you know, some small project. You'd pre-qualify a deal of phone and then you'd explain how your design service works and then you'd get some sort of verbal affirmation, some of my clients take a credit card over the phone and then you're off to the races. Mostly, I want some sort of verbal confirmation and then you'll go out and see them and you'll have like, you know, your design contract or your single page or whatever it is kind of pre-filled out so that you can get it approved. But really, the purpose of that visit is not a discovery visit like it used to be. It's a get my paper sign, get money visit and that's what the mindset changes for a lot of people that's really hard. That mindset changed because we want to solve problems and this is why for a lot of my clients, the big shift happens when the non-technical people start selling design services. We don't let anybody who knows anything go out to the house until we have a contract and a check. So, you build that physical barrier where you have somebody who's excited about the technology, who works for your company that knows kind of, oh, we could do this. Oh, that's kind of cool or whatever. But really what you want to do is you want to talk to Ryan and before you can talk to Ryan, you got to sign my paper and give me some money and so that's like the big picture model that we're trying to get to. Yeah, yeah, I can see that. That's cool. It makes sense. I mean, I'm guilty of the like, oh, I'm just doing discovery and I'm like, oh, I just gave you all of our stuff because I don't know what I paid for. I'm like, I don't know what you would pay for. I think I just gave you most of it. Exactly, exactly. The other thing that's kind of like kissing cousin to that is getting our clients away from line item pricing. A lot of our clients are still in the line item pricing game. So, you know, we try to get you in professional, we're trying to take you from a technician doing a technical sale to a professional sale, which is you're getting paid for your expertise. You're providing a proposal and a design with drawings and support. You're not giving them a shopping list and you're not answering all their questions for free. Okay, very cool. So, how do you guide someone to come up with their first price for design with drawings and all that stuff? Is it based on hourly? Is it a package? Like, how are they? How are they? Because I've had people ask me that. They're like, well, like, yeah, even if I know my hourly, like, I don't know how long it will take until I like get to know them and everything else, right? Exactly. That is a tricky question. It's all, I'm going to, I'm going to non-answer your question and then I'll try to answer your question. The non-answer to your question is that it doesn't matter because anything one dollar or more is one dollar or more than you would have gotten yesterday when you didn't do this. So, you see even you just at least need like a commitment to go out there. It's giving a commitment. It's removing the tire kickers from the process. It's creating a little bit of a gateway for them to get through to be really committed to you and then it helps you get paid. But I don't, again, a lot of our people are engineers, right? They hyper-focus on how much should I charge and I just try to tell them right up the bat it doesn't matter. And then once you realize it doesn't matter, now let's try to come up with a pricing model that makes sense. Sometimes it's based on square footage. It might be based on number of loads. It might be based on areas that you want to light. It might be based on how long you think it's going to take. Like, all of that stuff becomes much less important when you realize you're still at least one dollar ahead than you were yesterday. I love it. Yeah. I mean, that's a better way of phrasing what I think I told someone I was like, if you don't know, you don't know. So, like, let's just say you charge 500 bucks and you get out there and like, damn, I should have charged $2,500. Well, now you know for next time. But at least you made the 500 bucks because you weren't going to get that before. That's a great point is it doesn't have to be permanent. This is not, you know, setting some stone tablet with your pricing model in it. And a lot of guys get, again, we work with the subject matter experts, engineers, nerds, all this stuff. Like, that's who I am. That's who we are. You know, I was on a track to become a structural engineer before I found out that this is funner. So the, you know, knowing that the numbers don't matter and then it's not permanent is really a key that just kind of loosen up the grip on things and just try to see what's going to work for your company. I know. I don't know where that like somewhere that gets implanted into people's mind. Like, and for some reason, my mind never got that same like commandment because I'm like, you just raise your price. And then if you need to lower it like right now, then you can, you know, I mean, like, there's no one like, there's no principle watching over you. Like, you own your business. You actually create all the rules. My business. I just make them up as I go. Yeah, I'm not surprised by that. Yeah. So it's just giving it a try and trying something new is really key. And knowing that we have clients that are charging, you know, you said 500 or 2500, we have clients charging 5, 10, 20, $50,000 for design work. Nobody's dying. And they're just getting paid. So just keep in mind that nobody's going to die from this stuff. Just give it a shot and see what you come up with. And having, you know, but having the tools. So on that note, on the tools, I'll give you a little plug if that's okay. We're doing actually a workshop on this whole topic in at the end of September, September 30th. So we're going to do a three hour block sit down with a group of people and you're going to build your entire process. If you've never done design sales where you've done a little bit or you've done some of what I call the halfway where you like charged a little deposit and then you give them money back or we're going to fix all that stuff in this three hour workshop coming up in week and a half. That's it's very cool. And I think we're going to do we're going to do an offer for listeners. Is that right? We'll do an offer. Yeah, we're sorry. We're going to do. So the workshop is 500 bucks for three hours. 500 bucks covers three people from your company. If you need more than three people, we have a discount to add more people. And then for listeners of this show, we have a coupon code, if you will, called 100 off. And that'll work to get you 100 bucks off the workshop. So the workshop will be $400 for you and three or for three people from your company. Okay, sweet. So we'll put a link. We'll put a link. Yeah, we'll link a little kind of like webpage that talks about everything. We're going to cover in the workshop and then you'll be able to put that code in 100 bucks off. Okay, awesome. Yeah, and the promo code is 100 like the number 1 0 0. Well, very cool. So I want to ask you on that though, like, have you found that when people say, okay, fine, I believe you I went to the workshop. I'm doing this. Is it all in or all out or does it depend on it? Like you said, like the pre-qualification and be like, oh, this is just like a $6,000 job. They're clearly not a design fee person. Or is there a way to still do the design fee without losing that opportunity? Great point. Yeah. So pre-qualification is really key. Part of that pre-qualification is how they found you and if they can be trusted, right? Okay, cool. They have found you through some Google search and they're searching everybody and talking to everybody. You can't really trust them, you don't really know them. If they referred to you by like your architect or your, you know, landscape, landscape architect who all the COIs for you guys are, but like, landscape architects or whatever, then you kind of have a little bit more of a confidence in the project. So you may be able to either skip the design services altogether or give them some sort of discount or tell them what you're doing or whatever, but it kind of depends a lot through that pre-qualification. And then there's some projects that you just need to go get done. You know, we used to call them and when I was younger, we used to call them the "Do". Like we're just gonna give you a number and we're just gonna get it done. "Do". And so those are not probably those design projects. The model is if it's something that is simple and fast, we want you to be as fast as possible, which means I want you to quote the job as fast as possible. I want you to start the job as fast as possible and get lights in the ground like you guys say, which I love that phrase. So if it's complex or involved, I want you to get paid. And that's one of the big differentiators there. So many times I see you guys do either way. It's complicated and they do it all for free. It's super simple and they wait two weeks to get the client a number or the prospect a number. I've seen both too. Yeah. So if it's simple, do it fast. If it's complicated, get paid for your work. I like that. That's good. Yeah. People should write that down because I think that's why like I feel like I've flipped depending on the week on how I feel about this topic. And I think it's because it depends on who I've talked to. And I'm like, you just spent 80 hours and you didn't even get the job like what? Yeah. No, no, don't ever charge for design because whatever. You know, it's like, I don't know. So I think that's interesting. So what about, what was I going to ask on that? Oh, I guess what I was going to say, that's why I love geeking out on business with you. Anytime someone gets a job where they're like, yeah, I've got this opportunity coming up. I Oh, literally, like, probably 90% of the time, like, oh, what was the lead source? And because it matters. You know what? And they're like, I don't know. I'm like, no, you, you have to know because we don't live in a vacuum like every cells present, even though your process could be the same, the actual script, the actual like wording and and like choreography is going to be a little bit different based on who they are. And like you said, like if they trust you, you trust them. Yeah, I the term we use is lead attribution. So where did this lead come from? Where can you attribute this lead? And every sales person that I work with, they did, they could beat into their brain that the very first thing they're going to start to go down that road is where did this thing come from. And we don't really accept like the internet. So if somebody says, oh, I found you on the internet, or I found you on Google, our sales people that we coach are required to continue asking questions. Was this actually on Google? Was it chat GPT? Was it some other thing? Did you see us any of our reviews? Did you like, how did you what would you searching for? Type in. Yeah. Yeah. What did you type it? Like trying to get a little more information on that what that actual attribution is because you'd be so surprised. I mean, you see people, where did you find us? Oh, the internet. Okay, cool. Was it like a Google search or was it like an AI searchable? Was it? Oh, actually, my contractor told you to call, told me to call you. What? We're just so default to say internet because probably what they did, the contractor told me call and they went and Googled you and did some research. And then that's what's locked into their brain. But the reality was the contractor told me call. Man, I could go on like a three hour tangent right now, but I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. Stay focused. I can do hard things. So what about? So okay, so we charge for the design, or we don't, whatever, you know, we pre-qualify. When we get out there, I see people on both sides of the spectrum talking about closing rate. Landscape lighting, let's say an average ticket is 10 to 15k. Should I be bragging to my buddies that I'm at 90% or should I be bragging to my buddies that I'm at 50 or bragging that I'm at 30? Yeah, super great, super great question. Statistically, if you do not charge for design services in the specialty contractor space, so that covers a lot of areas, right? You're going to get, you're going to, you're going to close about 35 to 35, but 35% of what you price. So if you price 100k this month, you're going to get like 35k. If you don't charge for design services, if you do charge for design services, of the stuff you actually price that closing ratio goes up to 80 to 90%. Wow, because you're only pricing the stuff that people are invested in, they're serious, and they want to be a partner, and they want to participate in the process. So that's my first answer. If you're not charging for design services, and you're closing more than 50%, you said like 50 or 90, then you're not charging enough money, because you should be losing some of that work to get closer to that statistic. So a high close ratio is not always a quote-unquote good thing. I love this conversation, because even just what you like inserted there, this is why like every question that someone asks me now, I'm like, "I depends." Did you charge for design service or not? Like if you are, then yeah, you're going to expect a higher close rate, and what is your pricing, and did you pre-qualify? Like some people don't pre-qualify, and they're closing rates lower. Some people pre-qualify heavy, heavy, heavy, and they're going to be higher. So yeah, I just, I want people to think differently. A lot of people just go to Facebook groups now and like, "Oh, I have a question. I'm not going to think about what my real question is," and like just going to like ask like, "What should I charge?" I'm like, "Well, it depends." You know, like, we need more information to help you, and the problem is people don't ask those good follow-up questions, so then they get advice, and 90% of it is bad advice based on someone who's not running their same business model. Not running their same business model, not in the same market, not doing the same type level of work. You know, we talked about this morning, on the fact that like, you know, we have this macro niche of, you know, high-end residential clients, right? That's my target audience. It's high-end residential clients. I want more of those. How do I get more high-end? But you got to realize that within that high-end residential clients, there's like four tiers of people. Some are coming to you with a bunch of problems and a bunch of broken crap. Some are trying to just do like some basic troubleshooting and fixing. And then the top tier, the top tier were like planning and building and really doing something great. And so, you know, within that hierarchy, you might be really good at the break-fix, tune-up stuff. You might be really great at the high-end planning. But knowing where in the four tiers, you need to be focused your efforts. That's really key. It's not just high-end homework. So when I hear people like, offer that type of advice, or when I hear people like, "Oh, I went to chat GPT and asked this question," it's like, "Yeah, but you need the context." In the context, where do you want to be? So that's where like when you were talking about the beginning, that's where like a good coach or a good mentor manage because they can ask those contextual questions and they get to know you. So they know like what you're looking for. Like when I'm in my group with our with our Friday members and somebody asked the question, I'm like, "Yeah, here's how I would answer this question for everybody, Bob." But for you, this is this. And that's what's really key about having people to kind of pour into you in your business. That's huge. Man, that's huge. Okay, so we're going to pause real quick. I forgot to tell you this, but we started this new segment called "You Make the Call." And so I'm just going to ask you if it's just a few questions. No pressure, no pressure. Yeah. Everyone's going to judge you and decide. This is this is how they're going to decide the fate of the rest of your life and your success. So this is like I said, it's called "You Make the Call." We brought on a new partner called Call Source. And these guys are awesome. They have an outbound call center. So we found a lot of people are going out. They're small. They don't have time to follow up. Even if they have an admin, their admin's not following up. So they'll literally like install a dedicated person to do all the follow-ups for you, all outbound stuff. No inbound because most people are already answering their phone. But this is all outbound stuff. So if you guys want to try Call Source, they have a link called try.callsource.com/lfp for lighting for profits, try.callsource.com/lfp. And they're going to hook you up with 50% off your first month just to try them out. So we're going to play along. Are you ready to play along? Oh yeah, let's do it. Good. We're going to start out easy. Dream Vacation, Mountain Cabin or Beach House. We're going to beach house. That's a quick one. How do we do like our mounts? Do we do mounts? I mean, I'm in Southern California, so we got it all the same as, you know, where you're going to have a lot of beaches. But you know, we have lake beaches. The lake beaches. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So where, what about, where would you, what would you favorite beach vacation be? Our local spot is we have like a, I'm just near Malibu, so we have Zima and then we go up to like Ventura Santa Barbara, so that kind of cold coast right there is our, this our hotspot beaches. So that's where we like to go. Okay, very cool. And then mountains for us is kind of outside the Sequoias and Central California area. There's some good mountain spots out there. Okay, sweet. Or a little spot in there. Yeah, give up coffee forever or give up dessert forever. That's a real easy one because I don't drink coffee and I'm addicted to refined sugar, so that's an easy one. Give up coffee forever. Yeah, done. What's your favorite dessert? Uh, I, I like chocolate of any sort, but I also like gelatos and ice cream, so like, you know, chocolate gelato. a lot is probably going to be the pinnacle of chocolate and ice cream meat so. Very cool. Yeah. All right. You read or listen to books? I am a reader and not only that, I'm a tabber. So I have like, I'll put like hundreds of tabs in books that I'm reading and I have a whole system and I'm kind of a nut job. But yeah, definitely paper book guy. And will you go back and reference those tabs or they're just there? Yeah. So you're a little insight into my no CD neuroses. Yeah. Cause I can go back and I can kind of essentially read a book from tab to tab and just get to the stuff that I really cared about at the time and kind of be reminded of what we were doing. So. Okay, very cool. See, this is why we do this. Like you, I learned all sorts of crazy stuff. No idea. I was gonna learn today. Yeah, no, this is cool. It's a cool. All right. So you can make an extra 500k per year, but you have to work an extra 25 hours per week or just stay where you're at. How long do I have to work that? 25 hours. Oh, that's a tough one. You got to do a 25 hours per week for two or a month. Yeah, yeah. I probably I'd probably do the 25 hour. I'm an addict. Although, I don't know where I would put the 25 hours. So yeah, I like working that like I like the thrill of the thing. So yeah, I'm probably in on the 25 hours. I know. See, that's my my problem is I'm addicted to business. So it's like, oh, you just need me to go work on my business. Yeah. And then what? Oh, and then you're going to pay me more money. Sounds great. So working out, eating better. Yeah, there's some other. Yeah. All right. You are a sales trainer. You can only train one one skill the rest of your career asking better questions or handling objections. Asking better questions, I think is especially in the technical space is an area that's really overlooked. We have as technical people, we have a tendency to show up and throw it. And we know all the answers and we think we're the smartest guy in the room. And so a lot of times we struggle in that area. So asking better questions is where it's very cool. Actually, we just did this exercise. We did an improv to start off our secret summit. And we got mixed reviews. Some people were like, I hate that, which is to be expected a bunch of introverts in a room. But we talked about asking better questions. And what we did exercise, we did was like, I would ask you a question. And then whatever you say, I have to repeat it back before I say the next thing. And it's very difficult to do. Like you said, we show up and throw up. I'm just thinking about instead of like, Oh, what Patrick just said, I'm thinking about what I want to say because I'm the expert. And then you wonder why you suck at sales. Yeah. So we do a very great, we do a variation on that where you have to say just the last word. So they have to have waited to the last word, repeat the last word. And then, and then they could ask a question. Another improv skip will do is called questions only. So we'll have contests where you ask people going at it. And they're only allowed to respond in questions. And then somebody would never go make a statement. And then they're out. And then another salesperson jumps in and you kind of do round robin like that. And that works as a technical salesperson. That really works your brain hard because we're so used to making statements and, you know, technical statements at that. So. All right. Your best salesperson refuses to use the CRM. I know this has never happened. But keeps producing and force the standard or make an exception. Oh, man. That is. Okay. I, and this happens every single day. What I do in this situation, as I said, a target revenue goal where I can hire them an assistant. So they have to use a CRM until they make enough money to hire an assistant. And then they can have an assistant to put the CRM. That's cool. So. But it's got it, you know, it's a target that they have to hit. And then they can, and then they're off the hook. That's cool. Until then they got to listen to me, bitch. I don't every week. So. Okay. Last one, build the company quickly and accept some chaos or grow more slowly with strong systems. Yeah, I'm naturally a systems guy. But I realize that's not always the way to go. So I support chaos in my client companies and my own company. I'm a little harder to support chaos. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Cool. Well, thanks for playing. And, yeah, that's kind of fun. New segment, just to get our get to know our guests on a different way. So yeah, thank you, source. Appreciate you guys. Yeah. That's awesome. All right. So we got just a little bit more time. I want to wrap up because there's a couple more things I wanted to ask you specifically about like the sales process and stuff like that. Yeah. There's no secret. I've told people this before I'm doing the show to gain more intelligence myself. I'm like, why am I taking the most notes on my own show? You guys, come on. I hope somebody else is paying attention here. Really good stuff so far. Thank you so much. Okay. So this is what can happen, especially in landscape lighting. You know, these are successful people that are buying lights, their attorneys, CEOs, business owners. They're fluent. So how does one establish authority with one of these like affluent customers without sounding arrogant? Yeah. So it's back to what we're just talking about it about asking good questions. If you ask, so we have question buckets. We talk about figurative question bucket. There might be some report questions. There might be some qualifying questions. There might be some technical questions. And good sales people go into those different buckets and pull questions out. And if you ask good thoughtful questions and you take notes on a pen with a pen and paper as they're talking, then you immediately gain their trust. And I say the pen and paper thing in the old days wasn't a big deal. But now with all these AI note takers and stuff, I am a strong advocate for still taking notes with pen and paper. You can have the AI note taker writing shotgun. Sure. And you're not, you might not even be taking notes for you. You're taking notes for them. And the analogy I give everybody every time is what happens when you have a waiter comes and takes your order to restaurant and doesn't write it down. It pisses me off. Do you feel great about that? Are you impressed? No. No, because I already like I know there's a good chance that they're going to forget that I said no sour cream. Exactly. Mine is no one. So thank you. I'm going to get I'm going to get sour cream. You're going to get onions. And I'm like, dude, I would have been fine with onions. Like why did I get right there? I'm not impressed. Because here's the thing. For the waiter, the minimum acceptable standard is my order 100% correct. That's what matters. That's the minimum. Yeah. So I want you guys taking notes. I want you write in pen and paper. I want you asking thoughtful questions. We have a whole like we call it meeting 101, which is like all this stuff that we take you through on how to run an effective discovery meeting. And that's the way you get you gain authority is through good questions because your questions will reveal how smart you are. You don't have to tell anybody how smart you are. Your questions will reveal how smart you are. Wow. So good. I mean, I know you got a whole program around this. So I don't I don't even know where you would start, but could you throw out a one or two questions that you think are effective that most cells people tend to overlook? Maybe. Yeah. Sure. Good. Good open-ended questions. I like a lot about what I do with luxury homeowners. A lot about how tell me how you use this space. Tell me what your thoughts are for this. Tell me what you've seen here. Tell me what you've heard about that. You know, so open-ended, but getting them to open up and share their emotional connection. Again, people don't buy from companies. People buy from people. And most of what we do in the specialty contractor space is luxury. And most of it is emotion. Like there's a lot of emotional connection to this stuff. So I want to get them talking about this. Tell me, explain to me your vision for this area. Or are you guys going to do any expansion over here? Or I see this yard isn't as developed here. Do you have a plan for this? Are you like, you know, just getting them opened up and you know, getting them to explore that kind of stuff? That's cool. And it's so true. Like it's awesome because you're talking about like what we do even though have you ever sold or designed or installed landscape lighting? At my own house. Okay. Yeah. And I just actually just bought eight more lights because I was like, oh, I can do something over here now. So it's kind of a dick. I mean, as your listeners know, it's a little bit of dicking because you can start doing really cool stuff. And I haven't even introduced any color yet. And that's another thing where I'm thinking about like, ooh, that would be probably the next step is a little bit of color. All right. Cool. It is addictive. I mean, that's why it's like, if you can just get your foot in the door, even if it's like phase one of the front yard, you're going to get the whole project if you can over deliver and be the business architect and all these other things, right? So yeah. Now it's so good. I guess I still, you still got a couple more minutes. Yeah. I'm good. Okay. Because I got a couple more than three hours. I have a three hour drive to my son's football game facing me in the square in the face. So I ain't three hours. Yeah. We got a, we got a game on the other side of Los Angeles. And anytime you have to try to get through Los Angeles on a Friday afternoon is never. Oh, so it's probably like, yeah, 20 miles away. That makes sense. No, I think it's 80 miles away, but yeah. Forgot LA. Yeah. Talk to, talk to us about the, your approach on the close. Yeah. You know, I, I realize it's landscape lighting. It's different than what, you know, all you do but in a way like Like you said, it's high end homeowners. Is it multiple options? Is it just the best solution that the person thinks because they're the expert? Like, how do you go about that? - So good, such a good question. First of all, are you charging for design services, right? Did you charge for design services? If you did or did not, it doesn't really change my answer, but I just want to bring that to your point. - Yeah. - Like, that's part of the deal. We have, we like to do budget pricing, not line-in and pricing. And we have what we call the benefit budget builder, which is three benefits of this thing we're going to do. Two features, like real specific features, you might even mention a brand name in there, you might mention some numbers, like really technical, and then one price. So, if you're doing some pool lighting, benefits might be a show off the architecture of the pool at night or whatever, and then some feature might be like 23 in-ground lights and made by someone, so whatever, and then one price. So, benefits, features, price. So, that's that. I always, always, always want something for them to say no to. - I don't want you, it's funny that you said that. I specifically teach, do not be the expert that comes to you with the perfect solution. - All right. - If you come to you with the perfect solution, they're going to assert their control one way or another. So, if you have, given them the perfect solution, and they start making cuts, now they're cutting into your core perfect solution. Create the perfect solution, give them some options that float around the edges, and let them cut into some of the accession. - Cut out for a second there. You were saying let them cut out something. - Yeah, let them, you have some options, and let them cut out like some of those options without cutting into the meat of the steak that's in the middle of the plate. So, give them some options to say no to. It's really a key. Never the perfect solution. - This is so good, man, it's just so good. I mean, like you said, it's an emotional cell. When you think about it logically, like I'm like, okay, if you just went to someone and you're like, hey, do you want to buy some lights for $60,000? - All right. - What? You think I'm an idiot? It's not even like, it's, no. Like it's, it's definitely emotional. When you do charge for the design, the renderings, the drawings, like all this stuff, like that's starting to tap into that emotional experience. How are you gonna use this space? Allowing them to say no to something. I mean, I feel like we accomplished a lot. So thank you for kind of walking us through. And I know there's a lot more to it, obviously, but that was really, really good stuff. As maybe my last one, you've been doing cells. I mean, your own business, teaching, helping, coaching, all these things for 30 years, I guess now. What's something about cells that you understand today that you wish you would have understood, say, 20 years ago, maybe even just 10 years ago? - Yeah, I think as a technical sales person, it's definitely the show up and throw up. I learned that from one of my mentors, Jack Daly, and that was really a key thing. So show up and throw up and then watching out for my ego and my need to be right in the sales process. Like pushing my, what my vision is too hard and letting my ego get in the way and my need to be correct and right on something technical, there's just no upside to it. So how do we avoid all that? Again, it sounds like a broken record today. This, I don't usually talk about asking good questions this much in one conversation, but we're back to asking good questions. So that's something I wish I would have learned earlier is just asking better questions. - That's so good. Yeah, I love it, man. Well, again, you guys have the workshop coming up, announce the dates again. - Yeah, yeah. - If you know the link, you could say that. I don't know what the link is, but we'll put it in the show notes. - It's kind of like a little sublink. So well, you can find us at fivestoneacademy.com. We'll take you to one of our pages and then you, there's a big giant banner right now because the workshop is coming up. So workshop is September 30th, 10 a.m. Pacific time. That's our magic time. Every time we do something, it's 10 a.m. Pacific time. So it's three hours long. It's a working session. It's not a webinar of me talking. You're gonna get a trail guide. Those are things that we send out in advance. Where you're gonna have a trail guide and we're gonna work through it. We're gonna build your design services program. Everything from the emotional stuff about like how to message it to the deliverables of like, what can you actually execute and complete with your current resources? Like we're not gonna give you, you know, we're gonna treat every company the same. There's some companies can do more than other companies in terms of what they can provide for deliverables. So soup to nuts. It's for everybody in the specialty contractor space. Even if you think you're an expert at charging for design services, I guarantee you're gonna learn something because we've been doing it a long time and you're gonna get some insights. We're also gonna do, so in addition to building all the tools, so it's not theory, we're building tools. I'm also having a live guest that's gonna come in and we're gonna do a live role practice where I'm gonna be a homeowner. He's gonna sell me design services and I'm gonna ask him questions. I'm gonna have complaints. I'm gonna have objections and he's gonna actually overcome those with me live on the call. So you actually get to see somebody messaging it who's really good at it, message it well and it's gonna be just tons and tons of value. And then you're gonna leave with your program built, including how do I get my salespeople to sell this? How do I incentivize them? All kinds of stuff, there's so much good stuff that's gonna come out of this. And it's 500 bucks for three people. It's the total bargain. We're gonna do this one and then we'll see how it goes. So yeah. - Awesome, man. Well, thanks again, Patrick. I really appreciate it. Congrats to you on all your success and just everything you're doing. It's just amazing. So it's great. - I love watching your journey too, man. It's just been so great, so it's really cool. - Thanks, I'm living the dream. Live in the dream as they say. Not every day is the dream, but we're going the right way. We're going the right trajectory, so that feels good. All right, so guys, check out Five Stone Academy. Highly recommend the workshop. Sounds like an incredible deal. If you are listening to this, watching this, you can use the promo code 100 off to save 100 bucks. So what are you waiting for? It's coming up. And it sounds like that trail guide's cool too. So I'm sure you can probably register the day before, but you're probably not going to get the trail guide in time. So, yeah. - Exactly. - Let me scramble a little bit, yeah. - Yeah, get it now. Yeah, thanks, Patrick. I appreciate you coming on the show today. That's the one to you. - Thanks for having me on. Awesome, see you. - All right, guys, take it easy. Now I just go implement everything. 'Cause, you know, Patrick said it's easy. (laughing) One thing at a time, guys, you got this. I'm in your corner. Keep moving forward.