0:01
Welcome to the Sales Lead Dog podcast hosted by CRM technology and sales process expert Christopher Smith.
0:09
Talking with sales leaders that have separated themselves from the rest of the pack.
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Listen to find out how the best of the best achieved success with their team and CRM technology.
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And remember, unless you were the lead dog, the view never changes.
0:27
Welcome to sales lead dog.
0:29
On today’s episode, I have joining me Kevin Costiner, Chief Commercial Officer of Climify.
0:35
Kevin, welcome to sales lead dog.
0:37
Hey, Chris, pleasure to be here.
0:39
Thanks for having me.
0:40
Awesome.
0:40
Tell me a bit about Climify.
0:43
Sure.
0:44
So Climify is a start up and we deliver unparalleled financially optimized, resilient and reliable energy solutions.
0:53
And it’s around microgrid technologies, which I’m sure we’ll get into a little bit, delivering strategic energy management and what’s called arbitrage and to help companies with sustainable practices for them to have a very solid energy infrastructure future, which is becoming very critical in today’s current electricity grid world.
1:19
Oh yeah.
1:19
With, with all the the changes in terms of how utilities are charging for electricity, there’s people, you know, if if you run a business, you that’s an area you just don’t want to be surprised in, right.
1:31
You’ve got every so much other stuff to worry about.
1:33
Do you really need another?
1:35
Yeah, it’s, it’s that’s part of it.
1:38
And then the critical nature is what’s been going on with just the resiliency and the the the grid instability.
1:48
That’s huge, especially like this time of year.
1:52
Oh, yeah.
1:52
You start having brownouts, the rolling blackouts, those kinds of things.
1:56
Yeah.
1:56
I mean, and then you have, you know, climate issues that related to storms.
2:00
We just had another hurricane out of the blue turn into something you didn’t expect.
2:04
And Houston’s without power for how many days now?
2:07
So you have, you know, you can’t run businesses, you can’t, you can’t operate and function if you don’t have confidence in the electricity that’s going to run your business.
2:14
And that’s where Climify comes in, to bring that reliability, bring that confidence, and to do it also in a unique financial way.
2:22
Yeah, that’s awesome.
2:24
And it’s just that problem’s only going to escalate.
2:26
It’s only going to get worse as as things keep going right, that’s much worse.
2:31
People have no idea how bad it’s going to get because the utilities can’t fix it on their own.
2:36
They just can’t.
2:36
They don’t have the money, they don’t have the time.
2:39
It’s just it.
2:40
You have to do it yourself.
2:41
You have to become proactive and take steps to what we call armor, your infrastructure yourself.
2:46
Because if you don’t, you’re going to be those with the lights off when you, those that have taken the proactive steps will be the ones with the lights on.
2:52
No, no, that’s crazy.
2:55
Kevin, when you look back over your career, how would you summarize the three things that have really driven you and LED to your success?
3:07
Well, one thing is just the ability to focus.
3:11
I find that if you can focus, if you can put on your air pods and just just dive into whatever it is you’re doing and not be distracted, that’s that’s number one is you just, you just got to be able to do that.
3:23
Whatever your way of doing it is, you got to find that way.
3:27
If you get distracted easily, if you can’t stay on one task for very long, you’re going to have issues.
3:32
So it’s, it’s critically important to be able to focus #2 is to have hopefully a sense of what interests you.
3:42
You know, it kind of sucks if you keep doing things you absolutely hate day in and day out.
3:46
It’s a miserable way to live a life.
3:48
So find what gives you a level of, it doesn’t have to be that, you know, gives you this euphoric form of passion.
3:54
I think that’s kind of just ridiculous.
3:56
I mean, that’s like the the Fantasyland Ted talk, right?
4:00
That’s you don’t have to, it doesn’t have to be the best in the world.
4:03
Just has something, you know?
4:04
Yeah, I really like that.
4:05
And I want to, I want to pursue that.
4:07
And, and then #3 is the ability to see it through too many people, you know, if it’s not going right immediately or they’re not closing sales fast enough or the companies and they don’t feel the companies are responsive enough right now, they tend to check out and want to go somewhere else and they start bouncing around.
4:26
It used to be not too many years ago, we’re on a resume.
4:29
If you were interviewing somebody and their resume showed constant job hopping, that was a huge negative.
4:34
Now with the, you know, tech industry, it’s almost like if you’ve been there too long, you know, there’s something wrong with you.
4:40
But I think there’s a balance somewhere.
4:41
And if you bounce around too much, it is not a positive thing.
4:44
You can’t gain the benefits of doing whatever you’re doing for whoever you’re doing it with if you aren’t there long enough to to kind of get that stuff.
4:53
So, you know, that that’s the third most important aspect as far as I see it.
4:58
Yeah.
4:59
It it’s funny how that’s changed.
5:02
I think it’s so unusual these days to come across and it’s happened a few times and I’ve had some people on the podcast where I’ve invited them because they’ve been at one company their whole career.
5:11
And that’s so unusual.
5:13
Like I want to hear that story, you know, because it’s just, it’s by far the exception these days.
5:19
And 20 years ago that was not the case, not at all.
5:22
I mean, I’ve, I mean, I’ve got a lot of people I’m connected with, people follow me on LinkedIn and I sometimes, you know, we’ll see someone’s profile and I’m like, wait, they’ve been there for 27.
5:33
What?
5:34
And I, somebody I actually just seen, I, I work out at lifetime here in Henderson, NV and I’ve seen him around the, the, the, the gym there.
5:42
And I saw him in an airplane sitting next to me and we started chatting.
5:45
I said, well, what do you do?
5:46
And he, he said he’d been with this one company for 27 years.
5:51
And I was like going, just looked at him and went, I probably even said what because I was so surprised by that, right.
5:57
In the current environment that and, and you know, it, it was just he probably started there.
6:02
He was 20 some years old, you know, and there he, he built a career there And, and you know, it’s give it gave him the ability to branch out and do other things as well to achieve other goals he had.
6:12
So it’s definitely kind of eye opening.
6:14
No, that’s crazy.
6:17
When you look back in, you know, the time when you’re getting started in sales, is there a particular event or experience that has carried you through the rest of your career?
6:33
It it’s funny, I, I want to sit here and give you some the, and people that watch your podcast and listen to your podcast like this incredible kernel of knowledge.
6:42
But you know, when I look back on it, I just stumbled into it.
6:46
I mean, I, you know, I love people that say I have this life plan and I curated my goals and objectives perfectly as every book I’ve read and every, you know, every one of those talks I went to said I should do and I followed that plan to the letter.
7:01
And I’m not one of them.
7:03
I didn’t.
7:03
In fact, I think it’s it the idea of setting down excessive goals and objectives all, all the time, we’re a bit over overblown and a bit ridiculous.
7:11
I, I mean, you need to be nimble and just kind of sometimes, you know, see how the universe aligns things for you and pay attention to that.
7:17
So I think it’s more about maybe paying attention to certain directions that just, I ended up in without any conscious effort on my part.
7:26
But that doesn’t mean there was an unconscious things going on.
7:30
And, you know, I just kind of went with it and those things, I mean, I hindsight, right?
7:35
I look back on some of some of that direction and it was painful.
7:41
And, you know, there’s some serious negatives and some of it as I look back.
7:44
But then I see the connections it made for me.
7:47
And then I have to say to myself, well, you know, either I did it myself or there was a guiding hand, whatever you want to say, that kind of put me down a path.
7:55
And that path is not always going to be, you know, nice paved path.
7:59
It could be a rutted dirt Rd.
8:00
in the middle of nowhere.
8:01
And you’re going, why the heck am I on this road in the middle of the night?
8:05
And you don’t know.
8:06
And then, you know, you get to the end of that and all of a sudden the answer’s there and you go, oh, so to me, that’s that was more from my journey.
8:14
Then again, just somehow I was brilliant, you know, a bunch of years ago and wrote it all down and followed it to the letter.
8:21
I didn’t.
8:22
Yeah, I had a similar experience here.
8:24
I, I think anyone who says the what you described, like the stuff you read in the books, you see in Ted talks, and they’re like, I don’t know anybody who lives their life like that.
8:33
You know, it’s like, come on, like that’s not just not normal, at least my experience.
8:39
And I’m a big believer in serendipity.
8:42
You know, that it’s like you have to be open to the opportunities that are in front of you and you have to be willing to take some rest, you know, make a leap of faith.
8:50
That’s why they call it a leap, right?
8:52
And you know that and just embrace the experience and take from it what you can.
8:59
And I mean, that’s kind of the theme that thread through my life anyway.
9:04
You know, I, I think you bring up something too.
9:06
I was saying that I, I, there’s really a fourth component to answer your first question.
9:10
I just, and I, I actually think I probably should have said this one first.
9:14
And that’s confidence that things that you’re taking the right step.
9:17
And if it doesn’t work out, you’ll figure something out.
9:20
And confidence, I think, is something that is highly overlooked and in short supply.
9:28
I mean, I’m not going to sit here and say it, you know, I’ve always been the, oh, I’m, you know, the most confident person in the world.
9:33
I’ve doubted a huge bunch of times.
9:35
Most people hide it, right?
9:37
When you’re talking to people, especially in a business setting, you’re at a social event, networking event, after trade show, whatever it is.
9:43
Everyone seems so like polished and on point, but they’re not that, you know, And to be rather specific, why are they all drinking so heavily?
9:54
Cause the booze is free.
9:56
If they’re all so comfortable, They’re not, they’re creating artificial confidence.
10:01
And I’m not a drinker.
10:02
I just choose not to drink.
10:04
So I noticed this stuff and you know, I’ve discovered something when you confidence is also knowing it’s OK to not be confident and to not feel comfortable.
10:12
And that’s part of the journey as well, because if you’re always trying to fake it till you make it, you know, I like the idea that we can act and play roles.
10:21
And I think it’s exciting to do that.
10:23
But if you’re always faking to make it, you’re going to be constantly faking it instead of just being who you are.
10:29
And that, you know, being just admitting it is confidence.
10:33
And that is a driving force to just, you know, experience things and realize it’s OK to just take a different path.
10:41
Mom and dad didn’t want you to do that.
10:43
Your friends didn’t want your family didn’t want you to do it.
10:45
Your girlfriend, your boyfriend, your husband, whatever, didn’t want you to do it.
10:48
But you know what?
10:50
If it’s something you have passion and you just feel it’s the direction I need to go, go do it.
10:54
Now, granted, if you have three kids and you know, there’s a heavy financial risk here, you do have to have a little bit of a deeper dive on it.
11:02
But I think back when you’re starting in whatever path you’re going on, if it’s just you, you know, you’ve moved out of the house.
11:09
You live in an apartment with some buddies, or maybe you bought your first home.
11:11
It’s just you renting a couple rooms out with the friends, whatever the model is.
11:15
And someone offers you a job to go, you know, be a international sales Rep and you get to travel around the world on the company’s expense, meeting and selling and talking to people around the world.
11:26
And you like traveling, Take the darn job.
11:29
You know, even if you’re gonna miss being at home and all that other stuff, there’s just opportunities that are there for you.
11:34
You gotta seize them.
11:36
And, and not over overthinking is the worst thing we can do because the universe is setting things up.
11:43
You gotta be there to just respond to them.
11:45
And you know, someone dangles a carrot in front of you.
11:48
The carrot isn’t always attached to a stick.
11:51
It’s attached to a lot of beautiful things.
11:53
So just take the care, take a bite and give it a shot, ’cause you can always change your mind.
11:57
You’re not.
11:58
You’re not forced to stay on that path if you’re not happy.
12:01
Oh, yeah, that that you reminded me two things.
12:04
One was my daughter when she graduated college, Life is staring her right in the face, right?
12:10
It’s like two months away from graduation and she kind of has this crap.
12:15
Real life is coming at me and I have no plan.
12:18
I have no idea what’s going to happen and heard things like that.
12:20
What if I do this?
12:21
Her thing was, should I go to grad school or not?
12:23
It’s like, what if I go to grad school and I don’t like it?
12:27
Do something else right?
12:29
And like message like there’s nothing carved in stone in your life.
12:32
There is no plan that’s just guaranteed to work.
12:36
You’ve got to move forward, figure out if it’s working or not, and then adjust.
12:40
You know, that’s life in, you know that.
12:44
And then the other part was, you know, I’ve been an entrepreneur most of my career.
12:47
I started my first company.
12:48
I was 23, Drew.
12:51
It worked my tail off and just thought I was like, I had this vision of what it was to be an entrepreneur.
12:57
And then I started getting involved in entrepreneur networks here in Colorado.
13:01
And you go these functions and you’re meeting people and when you’re early in, you always want to have this era of super confidence and everything in your life is great.
13:09
You’re just crushing it.
13:11
So people are like, Chris, how’s it going early on?
13:13
I’m like, Oh, it’s great.
13:14
You know, things are going really well, even though it could have been a total **** show.
13:18
You don’t want to expose that, right?
13:20
Because you’re thinking like all these people are think I’m a loser or whatever.
13:24
And but I’ve learned over the years that the people that I really respect when you say, how’s the, how’s your business going?
13:31
How are things going?
13:32
The ones are saying, oh, I am struggling right now.
13:35
You know, we’re growing really fast, but we’re strapped for cash.
13:38
We’re struggling to figure out our cash options and cash issues or whatever, or my staffing having major HR problems.
13:46
I’m trying to figure out those are the people I want to talk to you now because they’re being vulnerable, they’re being open, they’re being real, you know, and, and it, it gave me a different kind of confidence, you know, to say, hey, you know, if I’m really going to get what I need out of this experience, I need to be just as open and honest.
14:05
That’s when I’m really going to get some value out of this.
14:08
It’s hard to do that for most people to be vulnerable.
14:12
Being vulnerable can kind of suck ’cause you just don’t know, especially when you’re, you know, growing up or something and you show vulnerability and people that dumped on you or whatever because of it.
14:21
And you kind of grow up with this like fear of showing it.
14:24
So I think it’s hard and justifiably so to be vulnerable, especially in a business setting where you’re bringing maybe the personal aspects of what you experience from a personal side into a business setting.
14:36
But I found, you know, clearly, I’m sure that people are listening or watching.
14:40
They probably have 10 times more horror stories, I would think.
14:44
But the reality is, I think most people in the business said you’re not looking to take advantage of your vulnerability if they’re looking to listen and provide appropriate guidance if you’re asking for it.
14:52
Other times it’s just just basically shut up and listen to what this person’s saying because they’re just trying to kind of just let go of some things to make their life a little bit easier.
15:02
And you might be the ear that’s there at that moment.
15:05
You know, I, I kind of think that that’s the important, important thing.
15:12
You know, if we can close the lips and just keep our ears open, sometimes that’s all that is really needed.
15:19
And then they might say, hey, what would you do?
15:21
I mean, I really would appreciate your thoughts on it ’cause I know you’ve done whatever you work for and, you know, experience those things and now you can provide some guidance and support because it’s incredibly important to not what is it called wallowing your misery by yourself.
15:35
Oh, totally.
15:36
You know, it, it sucks, it sucks, it totally sucks.
15:39
It’s you feel so alone, so isolated.
15:41
And then if you find out you have those, you’re willing to take that leap and make yourself vulnerable.
15:46
Often times those people like, oh, I was in the exact same place two years ago and here’s what I did, you know, and it’s like, it’s it a lot of times it helps just to know, Hey, I’m not the only one.
15:56
Yeah, but you’re not, you know, you made me think as you were talking about that and you talked about your daughter, You know, it’s I think as parents, I have two sons and a daughter, an older son, middle daughter, younger son.
16:10
And as parents, I mean, my dad, I mean, it’s, it’s hard, you know, depending on generations, right, Is how much they kind of push and say you have to do this and this has to be your life.
16:24
And I know growing up it was like, you know, no one ever went to college.
16:27
You got to go to college.
16:28
You have to, have to, have to have to, and you have to do this.
16:31
And it’s interesting with my kids, my oldest son, he was in his first year of college here in in the Las Vegas area and his first year of college, admittedly, he will say he completely, shall we say, messed it up pretty bad and he was miserable.
16:50
He didn’t like where he was going to school.
16:52
He did not like the school, the program or anything.
16:55
So he can’t.
16:55
And but the school was basically free.
16:57
Living in state is really financially amazing.
17:01
And he came to me and said he don’t want to do that.
17:02
He don’t want to do that anymore.
17:03
Second year, he wants to do online through Western governors University and but which was going to cost us money.
17:10
And I looked at him and thought I could have said, no, you’re going back to the school.
17:15
It’s free tough.
17:16
But I said, OK, what do you want to do?
17:19
And he said he they have a cybersecurity program and he wants to do online and he wants to get it done, you know, whatever quick because you can do that online.
17:29
And I said, OK, I’ll pay for it.
17:32
And he went off and started it.
17:34
And the summer was approaching.
17:36
This is 2015 summer was approaching and he on his own decided to apply for some internships in cybersecurity.
17:43
Long story short, he was selected for one with the Department of Homeland Security in DC.
17:47
Unpaid got go there pay.
17:50
I have to pay for him to stay some place for the summer.
17:52
So it’s one of those like, oh, you’ve, gosh, you got to be kidding me, right?
17:56
So, so I said fine, we went.
17:59
He, we set him up at, at Georgia Washington University and one of the dorms there paid for it.
18:04
He, but the one in this process, since he was 16, he had a LinkedIn profile.
18:09
And your audience member, everyone listening if, if none of, if you’re early in your career, you do not have a LinkedIn profile, you need to stop what you’re doing right now.
18:17
Put everything down, go create one, use chat or whatever you need to do to create a really good one for who you are and whatever you’re doing and get it up there right now ’cause you have to have it.
18:26
Forget about Facebook and I’m TikTok.
18:28
I don’t care about other social media.
18:29
If you’re going in business, starting a business, you’re on LinkedIn.
18:32
He did that when he was 16.
18:34
So when he got the internship, he updated that on LinkedIn.
18:37
Almost immediately he started being recruited by a cybersecurity company.
18:41
Now I said I had no experience in cybersecurity 0 and he got selected for the internship because another important aspect that people need to be is he was good on the phone.
18:51
He could talk to people.
18:53
So another thing is if you’re people cannot, you cannot communicate like we’re doing right now, whether over a, a, you know, a zoom or Google meets call or face to face eye contact, the normal social aspects.
19:04
You need to learn that because that’s what got him that internship and he ends up getting hired by the cybersecurity company before he was even done with the internship.
19:13
And he never came home from decent.
19:15
He went to Florida for five weeks of training and that launched his cybersecurity career.
19:21
So and now he’s nine years into that career doing phenomenally well.
19:27
His younger brother’s following in his footsteps and he’s taking his path into cybersecurity.
19:32
So it’s really important to sometimes if you’re a guiding light in someone’s life is to get out of your way to let not be in their way.
19:41
And that cannot be easy.
19:42
But people will come to you, whether it’s children or friends or people that work for you and ask you, you know, to help them do something or what your opinion is.
19:51
And we got to put aside our own like, you know, the stuff we’re programmed with, whether it’s through just the way we were brought up or, or, or work beliefs or whatever, and say and, and think, OK.
20:02
A different direction for them is right.
20:04
Whether I agree with him or not, I need to help that person figure that out.
20:07
Because if I had told my son no, I don’t know where his life would end up.
20:10
I have absolutely no idea.
20:11
But I don’t think it would have been where he is today.
20:13
And you know, the beautiful things that that path that took him has created for himself and now his fiance and his and our family.
20:22
So it’s it’s awe inspiring.
20:24
Really.
20:24
That’s a beautiful story.
20:25
I love that story.
20:26
It’s like goosebumps listening to that because that is, let’s take a pivotal life moment for him where you definitely could have gone two totally different paths.
20:36
And thank God you picked the one which allowed him to be where he’s at.
20:39
Now.
20:39
I’m getting the sense that that is probably a common theme.
20:42
And in terms of how you are as a leader within your organizations that you’ve been involved with, is that an accurate assessment?
20:50
Yeah, I totally believe in in.
20:52
First of all, I absolutely detest micromanagement.
20:57
I’ve been involved in someone recently with micromanaging and things of that nature, and my personality literally rebels against it.
21:03
I can’t stand it.
21:04
I think it’s the worst form of management.
21:06
If anybody has managers that manage that way, they need to fire them.
21:10
I’m very blunt about that because they’re ruining your organization, they’re scaring away good people, and they’re impacting yourselves in a horrible way.
21:18
So, yeah, I believe in supporting people again, trying to work with them to figure out their motivations, their passions, their challenges and where they want to go.
21:26
I mean it, you know, it’s kind of a trite thing where managers should know what the goals of all their people are.
21:30
It’s not goals, it’s more about their passions.
21:33
Goals are such a cold, sterile term.
21:35
We need to get away from using that.
21:37
Oh, set your goals down.
21:39
Want to be rich by the time I’m ex?
21:40
Oh, cool.
21:41
Well, how are you going to do that, right?
21:43
It’s passion, right?
21:44
Passion gets you to where you want to go, not goals.
21:47
So you need to learn your the goals of the people that work with you and for you and see, you know, in your role, the role you play, how you can help them achieve those passions.
21:58
And some of it might be work directly related to work.
22:01
I want to become, I want to move from this group to that group and, and learn these things.
22:07
Awesome.
22:07
But it also might be something that’s not business related.
22:10
You know, they want to be able to, you know, they want to be able to have a better work life balance.
22:16
They want to spend more time with their children.
22:18
They don’t want to travel so much.
22:19
They want to travel more, whatever it is.
22:22
And we, we need to work with those things.
22:24
You know, I, I think, I think back about this is one of three years ago when all of a sudden people were sent home to work.
22:33
And I remember talking to people on the phone.
22:35
You know, I was just, I was still doing the outreach and stuff.
22:37
And I get people on the phone and they go, yeah, I just started working from home.
22:41
We don’t know why he’s working from home.
22:43
And I just don’t know what to do.
22:45
And I said, well, if you want, if I can give you some advice, said this is going to be real simple.
22:51
My advice, enjoy the hell out of it.
22:54
Don’t dress up to sit at your computer at home.
22:57
Wear whatever you damn well want.
23:00
And you know what?
23:00
The people on the other end of the camera aren’t going to give two hoots if you’re in a suit and tie or AT shirt that says Grateful Dead on it.
23:07
It doesn’t make a difference because they’re doing the same thing and they’re worried about the same stuff.
23:12
Be you.
23:13
The best thing about that whole thing was people got to go home and all of a sudden experience being themselves in a work environment instead of always going to the office with the whatever the the business casual on or the sport coats or this nonsense and pretending to be something they weren’t.
23:30
And being something you’re not in a business setting is not a recipe for success or happiness.
23:36
So it was just the greatest thing to be able to kind of give people some simple advice since I’ve been working virtual from my home for a very long time.
23:44
And you know, I learned just through my own efforts initially, I was that person.
23:49
Oh my gosh, their kids are in the background.
23:51
The dog’s barking.
23:52
Oh, that’s going to be they’re going to that’s not going to go well.
23:55
I literally felt that way.
23:56
I remember it.
23:57
I remember my son when these little coming in my office, I’m on a phone call and I’m getting upset with him.
24:01
In hindsight, I didn’t feel bad about that.
24:03
I should have said, come here.
24:04
I want to introduce you to somebody.
24:07
This is, you know, whoever I’m on the phone with, but I didn’t because I was so worried back then.
24:12
And you know, now it’s literally like we, I was on the call this morning, my internal call and, and folks I work with are coming to Vegas next week so we can meet and spend some time together.
24:23
And my CEO said, you know, just seeing it’s like it’s been very hot here, incredibly, ridiculously hot.
24:30
The weather broke, but this week it’s only going to be a high of like 108, only 100.
24:34
And he said I’m just wearing shorts.
24:37
I just want to let you know.
24:38
And I said cool cuz makes guess what?
24:41
I don’t care if if you literally show up in flip shops and AT shirt, it doesn’t make a difference.
24:45
We are not here to impress each other with our clothes.
24:48
We’re here to to help this company grow and what we wear has zero impact on that.
24:52
That’s right.
24:53
And anyone that thinks that what you wear has an impact on how you grow your company is slightly demented and they need to reassess their viewpoint and what’s important in helping achieve success for themselves and their business and their company.
25:08
Yeah, I can’t tell you how many times the culture.
25:10
So I’ve been, we’ve been virtual.
25:12
My firm Impeller has been virtual since 2007.
25:16
We, I started the company.
25:18
I think seeing that, hey, this is a strategic advantage for me.
25:21
I can recruit the best people wherever they are and say, hey, you don’t have to worry about traffic anymore.
25:26
You can work from home.
25:27
You could wear whatever you want.
25:28
I don’t care.
25:29
Be happy, make your life simple.
25:33
And it was a huge advantage for me for years.
25:36
Well, then COVID came and now everybody’s virtual.
25:38
But I’d love it now because I’ve met my employees, their their children, I know who their dogs are, you know, the names of their dogs, all of that.
25:50
You know, because it’s it’s so much more casual.
25:52
And you get you get to know people better when you see where they live, you know, and you get a sense of really who they are and what they like about.
25:59
Oh, you love the Grateful Dead.
26:01
That’s awesome.
26:01
I saw the best concert.
26:03
You know, you could start relating on a totally different level that you would never be able to in the sterile environment of an office where everybody’s dressed the same.
26:13
Yeah, it’s so true.
26:15
I mean, it’s personal.
26:17
Expressing your personality is a great bonding for people in business.
26:22
You’re doing you wanted, I mean, there’s a great adage, right?
26:24
You’re doing business with people.
26:25
You’re not doing business, right.
26:27
So if I like you and you like me, then we’re going to try to find a way to do business together.
26:31
Maybe it won’t be today, but we’re going to do it at some point.
26:33
But if I’m always plastic and artificial, you’re going to pick up on that.
26:37
There’s going to be something about, if that’s something about that person that you just can’t, I can’t believe it’s right.
26:43
I can’t put my finger on wide, but I don’t feel comfortable or I don’t like that.
26:47
It’s because they’re not being genuine.
26:49
And it, it’s, it, it’s like when you are giving a talk or a speech, like, I mean, I sometimes watch the Ted talks on LinkedIn and you know, I, some of the subjects they talk about, I mean, are pretty, are pretty cool.
27:01
I mean, oh, that’s a pretty good subject.
27:02
And I know they have teleprompters and I know they rehearse it, but the best ones are the ones where they are genuine.
27:08
They’re just having a conversation with the audience and the, I mean, the greatest speakers are that way.
27:13
And sometimes if they don’t even memorize, they just, they have the notes and they’ll just talk from their notes.
27:19
And I found I, I would shoot videos for a YouTube channel.
27:23
I started a bunch of years ago, a few years back.
27:25
And I felt I had to, I had to script everything.
27:28
So what I’d do is I, I’d write these scripts to each segment and I’d film them and I’d memorize, memorize, memorize.
27:34
And I remember I would do like 20-30 takes at a time because I didn’t want to make and I wanted the whole thing to be perfect.
27:41
Then I’d go back and watch and I posted these and they were pretty lengthy and they were, they’re the topic was interesting.
27:47
And now I’m looking at myself.
27:48
So I’m being very critical.
27:50
I would watch these and I still sometimes watch them today and I cringe because I see how tense I am.
27:56
I’m not flowing and I realized that once I threw out the script ideas and just went with my idea.
28:02
So everything I post on LinkedIn now, all the videos are just extemporaneous.
28:05
I don’t, I don’t have any.
28:07
I just have an idea in my head.
28:08
I’m motivated by this idea and I go out and shoot a video and I now flow.
28:12
I feel relaxed, I feel comfortable.
28:14
I like the content.
28:15
So a lot of it is again, being genuine.
28:18
And we, we’re not perfect.
28:20
We say, we say, you know, and they’ll, they’ll, people say, oh, you can’t do that.
28:25
Yes, you can.
28:27
Being human, if I’m on a business call, if I’m in, if, if I’m talking to the CEO, the CCO, the CIOCRO of a major company, we’re having a meeting about climifies, you know, solutions.
28:41
We’re having a conversation.
28:43
And I’m not going to sit here and worry if I say umm or ah a few times because I know they’re going to do the same thing and they’re going to appreciate that.
28:50
I’m not going to rehearse.
28:52
I’m not going to sit down for three days before and rehearse the meeting.
28:54
I’m going to make sure I have my tools.
28:56
If I want to use PowerPoint, it’s going to be there.
28:58
But the bottom line is you want to be relatable.
29:01
Be yourself.
29:02
Don’t be afraid of being yourself.
29:03
Now, granted you’re working virtual.
29:05
Some people like blurred backgrounds, like you have a white background.
29:08
I prefer just I’ve set that up so it’s nice looking what’s behind me.
29:12
You don’t want your bedroom room with the you bet on made your background like you know, certain nuances you should pay attention to.
29:19
But beyond that, just be yourself and enjoy the process.
29:23
And you know, it’s really funny you mentioned my background.
29:26
Some sit in my office and the sad thing about my background it’s boring.
29:30
There’s really doesn’t tell you anything about me versus your background.
29:34
I’ve been intrigued about the picture hanging on the wall behind you since you first came on camera.
29:40
Now, you have no idea that right to my left on the wall here is an autographed Doctor J, you know, Philadelphia 76ers jersey.
29:49
Now, if you saw that in the camera shot, you’re like, oh, Chris loves basketball.
29:51
He loves Doctor J We’d have something to talk about, right?
29:55
And you know, I can ask him, like, tell me what’s the story behind that, that painting on the wall?
29:59
You know, why is that important to you?
30:01
You lose that like my I’m the exact opposite of what it probably should be.
30:06
You’re the case for what it should be.
30:10
I, I chose it.
30:11
It’s interesting when I set, I moved into the house, I mean, about five years ago and this I knew this would be my office cause a lot of natural light.
30:18
I mean, off to my off to stage.
30:20
What is it called stage, right?
30:21
You’re right in my life, there’s a huge French door and a deck looking on in a Greenbelt.
30:25
I have another window over here.
30:27
So there’s a lot of just beautiful natural light and I’m a light person.
30:30
So but I knew I wanted behind me to be something engaging visually and I knew on the wall could I wanted, I like art and I wanted a nice piece of art that could start a conversation.
30:40
And it’s also visually appealing, colorful and nice and and and you know, I, I, I think about like when you’re talking about Doctor J.
30:49
I’m not a huge I don’t watch ESPN, but it’s just on sometimes and stuff.
30:53
And the one thing I’ve always, you know, I visually gravitated towards is when they’re doing their whatever the shows are and they have they’re interviewing somebody, you know, from their virtual spot.
31:04
And they have many of them have bookcases behind them with all these cool things on the shelves, you know, footballs and this.
31:10
And I always engage in what’s behind them.
31:13
I’m looking at those shelves going to school because this is like, I don’t know, some great basketball player and behinds them like a basketball or, you know, autographed this and books.
31:22
And it’s just so visually engaging.
31:25
It represents, like you said, a little bit about you.
31:28
It starts conversations and even if we may not have that, we’ve got 30 minutes booked and we really don’t have a lot of time to talk about, you know, non, you know, business stuff.
31:38
At the same time, we’re visually learning something about that person.
31:42
And again, the humanness of this person that this person has interest outside of, you know, my selling you micro grid technologies.
31:48
Are you selling beyond, you know, joining a podcast?
31:51
It’s just who we are and people need to not be afraid to do that.
31:54
I mean, curate what’s behind you.
31:56
It just seems like everyone blurs their backgrounds and I’m just like, I’m looking at the blurred and I’m looking beyond the blur and I’m going that’s and I’ll even ask them what what is behind you looks engaging.
32:09
And especially some people live in, you know, a high rise apartment or something and they have a beautiful skyline.
32:15
You know, other people just have like, you know, just kind of engaging decor right behind them, maybe their their offices in their living room.
32:23
And I just think it’s OK.
32:24
You should show that, you know, looks you’re ashamed of it.
32:27
You know, you don’t you don’t have something right.
32:29
It’s so important.
32:31
Again, it’s the humanness.
32:32
It’s connecting with people.
32:34
Sales is if you can connect with people quickly, it relaxes the whole tenure of the call and just kind of gets it flowing better.
32:44
And you know, it’s just you may end up literally going to, you know, you and I may go to a basketball game together because I saw Doctor J.
32:52
No, exactly, totally.
32:54
It’s like you never know because I use that all the time.
32:56
I’m constantly looking to see what’s behind people because then I’m like, right, I want to make sure I ask that question about them, get them telling a story I want.
33:03
I want to hear a story that maybe I can pivot off of and we can build a relationship.
33:10
Shifting gears a little bit here, CRM, do you love it or do you hate it?
33:13
I don’t know.
33:16
CRM love it or hate it.
33:17
I don’t hate it.
33:19
It’s really dependent upon the CRM.
33:21
I do believe strongly that we need a means to effectively record, track, monitor the data of of the efforts we put forth.
33:34
It’s critically important.
33:35
And I remember back the company I was with before for five years in the EB charging space, it was really, we didn’t have a really good solid means to do that.
33:44
And there’s a lot of like spreadsheet stuff going on.
33:48
It works for a while, but it becomes hugely inefficient, very manual.
33:53
And I am one that hates manual processes.
33:55
If they can be automated, it’s a huge waste of time.
33:58
Time is valuable.
33:58
And if I’m wasting it doing a bunch of red tape nonsense because we don’t have the, we haven’t implemented the right tools, then we’re making a huge mistake.
34:05
So serums are important.
34:06
You just have to pick the right one for your business.
34:09
You know, It doesn’t mean you have to go for the one everyone else uses.
34:12
You know, you don’t have, you know, Oh, John, what are you using?
34:14
Oh, I’ll just go with that one.
34:15
No, you have to look into it.
34:17
You got to understand your business and look at the pros and cons.
34:19
Certainly cost is a big issue.
34:21
If you’re an early stage startup with minimal funding, you don’t want to be paying huge amounts of money to ACRM provider.
34:27
So you look at some of the newer players.
34:29
There’s a lot of newer players in the market, a lot of start-ups in the market.
34:32
There’s there’s there’s just smaller players that have some really good products.
34:35
So know your product, pick it carefully, and then you use the tools it gives you.
34:40
You know, again, where I was before they kept having these manual processes, which drove me nuts and I argued against it.
34:47
So this is stupid.
34:48
Let’s automate and they wouldn’t do it.
34:50
It it comes down to if you have tools, use all of them that apply to you and get of as many manual processes as you can, because it will save you time.
35:01
And it’s a right saying, but time is money.
35:03
Not just the, you know, the, the stuff that goes in your bank account, but it’s your, it’s your, it’s your money of, of, of time to produce and to work and, and thrive and move forward and develop and create.
35:15
So it’s necessary.
35:17
Just know the right one for your business and then implement it and use it.
35:22
I cannot have said it better myself.
35:23
I get asked that all the time and I’ve seen so many people like, oh, we use this because we used it at my last company.
35:29
It’s what I’m comfortable with, but it’s like crazy expensive for what you know, that size company doesn’t fit right.
35:36
You said it perfectly.
35:37
I’m not going to pare it back.
35:38
Just real.
35:39
If you didn’t catch it, rewind.
35:40
Listen to what Kevin said.
35:41
He nailed it It.
35:44
It is exactly the right approach.
35:46
There’s no one-size-fits-all.
35:48
There are over 2000 CRMS in the market, which is a really overwhelming number.
35:53
Just spend the time to find one that’s right sized for you.
35:56
And also not just for now, but you know, where do you expect to be three years from now, five years from now.
36:01
Make sure you you have that in consideration as well.
36:05
Kevin, we went a bit long earlier, which is OK.
36:09
So we’re up at our time here on Sales Lead Dog.
36:12
It’s been a great conversation.
36:13
I really enjoyed talking with you.
36:15
If people want to reach out, connect with you, learn more about you or Climify, what’s the best way for them to do that?
36:22
They can e-mail me at [email protected], that’s CLIM afi.com or on my phone number, 702-533-5886.
36:32
Of course, they can also text me as well.
36:34
Yeah, that’s, and if you didn’t catch that, no worries.
36:36
Check it out in the show notes.
36:38
You’ll get those at impellercrm.com/sales.
36:41
Lead Dog.
36:42
We’ll get not only this episode, but all of our hundred plus episodes of Sales Lead Dog.
36:47
So be sure to check that out.
36:48
Subscribe so you get all our future episodes.
36:50
Kevin, thank you so much for coming on.
36:52
It’s been great conversation.
36:54
And welcome to the Sales Lead Dog Pack.
36:56
Thank you, Chris.
36:57
Loved it, appreciate it.
36:58
And you know, hope your audience enjoys it as much as I had and having this conversation with you.
37:04
Yeah, it was great.
37:07
As we end this discussion on Sales Lead Dog, be sure to subscribe to catch all our episodes on social media.
37:15
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37:28
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