This is the seven figure agency podcast discover the strategies and techniques to grow a highly successful and profitable digital marketing agency with your host, Josh Nelson.
All right, well, hello, welcome thanks for joining me I’m super excited about today’s session with the man well, whoo suit. Am I saying that right?
Oh, yeah, it was
I apologize. I know you as Manny love up to this point. So
I’m a proud,
super excited. This is part of our agency success, I guess series where we interview highly successful digital marketing agencies on how they’re growing and scaling. And man, he’s had some tremendous growth over the last, I don’t know like six to nine months. I’ll let him tell the story but kind of from you know, as I know it working full time doing internet marketing as a side hustle in his agency, up to now over 30,000 a month in recurring revenue, recently put in the the resignation note, and so I thought man, it would be just tremendous, too. Interview Manny hear his story kind of hear how he’s done this while working full time. So maybe thanks so much for coming on and congratulations on your on your momentum.
Yeah, yeah appreciate it appreciate
so let’s, let’s start off just kind of introduce Introduce yourself your background kind of who you are where you’re from and kind of tell us your backstory a little bit.
Um, so So my name is Emmanuel we do. A lot of you guys can be as many Facebook. So, I don’t know if you a lot of you guys know me acts as an immigrant. So this is my sixth year in the US.
Hello, ah,
yeah, this year, August 31 will be my seventh year in America. So, when I I remember, you know, just six years ago, I remember you know, when I first came doing, you know, working $40 an hour at the night Local mom and pop hotel. I work two jobs while still going online, both school online and an MBA online
by where to find jobs. I was going to school for
an MBA program.
But I did that for probably about 12 months. And then I had a friend call me. So my background is chemical engineering. And I had a friend call me was based in North Dakota High School. So I’m originally from Africa. So he called me and we were just chit chatting. And he was like, Hey, you know, what, what did you go to school for guys like us here? They need a lot of engineers up here. You know, up north, this is when I do all the fracking which was getting very big. So I was like, I don’t know if I want to I want to drive all the way from North Carolina. You know, it’s just fine. You know, by myself who’s like, dude, like it’s gonna change your life. Like I’ll show me how it’s gonna change my life. Show me a paycheck. Tell me a paycheck and I was like, I think I’m gonna quit my job now so I quit my job and I made the drive sometime in 2016 and made a drive all the way from North Carolina up here by myself. I was like a 34 hour driver it took me like three days. immigrations driving all the way I didn’t know I was going I was just relying on GPS you know, but I came here and lo and behold it was true. On the very first day I went out looking for a job I landed a six figure job
that’s amazing. This to my life so
so you know if you know if you know the history of how us into becoming a dominant player. You know, actually perhaps back and forth with opaqueness about now we have so much oil So
now that that was made possible by wind directional drilling
so North Dakota is is is the state that really started that entire that entire episode in this country’s history. So I was part of that whole thing, you know, but anyways, okay, because we were becoming kind of like competitors in the auto industry, okay, kind of, you know, data circle and then the whole thing the whole boom went bust. So back in 2013, I was back to square one. I lost my job. You know, a lot of almost everybody lost their job. My company fought with bankruptcy. So I came back to North Carolina, you know, doing the same thing and go to school again. And then, I think seven months later, I can call my company events. If I had experienced going bad. The industry was on Google. A little bit stable, prompting the industry gastic. So, you know, all the engineers and the scientists got laid off. It was kind of like a floor backwards economy again. And so that’s how I found myself back up here in North Dakota. And so when I started working for my new company, I was like, Man, I’m in a very up and down kind of industry, I need to find something to do on the side in case anything happens. That’s how I stumbled into internet marketing. Because I was looking at affiliate market, you know, Shopify, all these things. And then I was like, Well, I think and in marketing, you know, I knew a little bit about it. I don’t really know much about it. So, I mean, I started my company, small it’s on YouTube guy. I started my company my first year I made like 900 bucks or something like that. You know, made like 900 bucks, but it was proof of concept, right? It was proof of concept and then my second year, I went from nine dollars for like $22,000 you know, as a side as a side income that’s that’s pretty great. Yep. As a slight income. And then my third year I went from 22,000 to almost 85,000 Wow. Yeah. So by then, I mean I had invested in horses learn how to sell and all this stuff. So yeah, and this is my my fourth year doing it and we like i mean it’s it’s six months into the year we were over, over $120,000 Wow.
And so the base recurring somewhere around 3000 a month at this point right
at this point about so this month, I think we’ve added just like 6000 or so about between 30 and 35,000. Okay,
beautiful. That’s awesome man. So migrated here. Started out with nothing. Got a really good job learned internet. Now you on the prep press. Epistle of a $35,000 a month agency that’s well on its way to seven figures and beyond.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, well, yeah. Kudos, man, you’re definitely headed in the in the right direction. So the first thing that everybody wants to know, like when we’re talking about this transition from kind of an on ramp phase to, just to scale significance, how to choose your niche, right? You’ve got a very specific niche that you went into,
like, how did you land on that one? Oh, that was just by chance. Like, really? If I can. I have picked up a client organically that was already in the niche. And they weren’t my highest pain point for the time. So it’s like, well, yeah, I think around that time, that’s that’s the same time I joined your program. And I was like, Well, if they’re my highest paying clients, and a lot of people in that niche probably have a lot of money. So it just makes sense. And I just went into that niche. They were paying like 5100 a month. I was I was literally doing everything for them. And I was also a consultant for them as well. I wasn’t just like an other part, you know, manage your website, do SEO, all that stuff. I was kind of like in like an outsourced marketing consultant, they didn’t make decisions without consulting me. So that’s how the relationship was. And it was a very high level decision. So when they came on board, I realized the professionalism and how easy it is to work with clients that pay high ticket, like versus clients that pay 1000 bucks a month, meaning you do all these things. Give me all the runaround. And so I was like, I think, you know, so I studied the niche a little bit and I liked it. Um, you know, they were doing mold remediation, water damage, fire, that was the whole thing. And then, you know, biohazard cleanups and stuff like that, so I dabble into it a lot. And then a, that’s a lot of science in that industry as well. So it kind of Just resonated with my personality. So I just I just picked it up, and I went with it.
That’s awesome. So I think a good tip for everybody there is you’re trying to find something where you have some some wins already don’t try and scrap from the ground, sometimes you have to scrap from the ground. But ideally, if you can find an industry that you’ve had some success within the past, that’s going to play really nicely to kind of build your focus on right. It’s kind of what your experiences here. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so so the next question everyone wants to know when it comes to this initial phase is alright, so you’ve got this one client in the in the niche. How did you get the next five? Like, what was the approach to kind of get that first five and it sounds like your tickets a little higher. But you know, that first five or so clients,
um, so I’m really so I was I was before I hit, you know, currently at 35 k a month. I think I was doing I was doing maybe 20 I was looking around 25,000 but I didn’t have a lot of clients because I, you know, all my prices are like four or five, you know, between three and $5,000 a month. And so I would sell I and I wasn’t even like actively prospecting, you know, I had organic stuff out there that just brought him inbound email traffic. And so, um, so what happened was when Coronavirus hit, I went from like, and I told you this, I went from like, 25,000 to $14,000 till I was like, man, Kennedy quit my job with a no. So, you know, if you’re doing if you lose almost about 50% of your business in like, instantly, then you’re like, wow, like I you know, then you cannot claim to your job because your job now like this, this pseudo security that your job offers you. You know, so the decision was taught, but anyway, so when that happens And I was I was I was looking really, really hard into my niche and just what was going on to see those and like you were saying, like, I was watching a lot of the videos that you will post about being in the right kind of mindset and all this stuff. And I was really down like I was really down I wasn’t even active in a group and all that. So one day, I’m Mike, my client came to me with a little suggestion and said, Hey, we want to we want to offer rotavirus disinfection, sir. And so I was like, okay, so you know, he was like, Can you guys email Can you set up a landing page and all that stuff and then let’s start driving traffic to and let’s see what happens. So we started that for him and it blew up for him. He like blew up. I knew how to get in clients and all that stuff. And so I was like, now I wonder if I can car service we product around Coronavirus and go to the restoration industry because these guys already have the certifications for it. They have the equipments for it, you know, so it’s gonna be an easy target. But it’s like I didn’t know but I was like, let me try it out. So I built an entire funnel around it set up my Facebook ads, all that stuff, what my niche list uses my list as my custom audience a bit all the techie stuff and turn on my ads. And then the first day I remember turn on my ads at like midnight or something like that. I woke up in the morning, and I had like a book into my calendar. That has never happened to me. That’s a wonderful, that’s a wonderful feeling right? That has never happened to me before. So I was like, holy crap. You know, I’m onto something here. So the first call I had with with that group, that first call that I had I sold him for like, 1500 dollars, the first call, and I was like, Okay, I was like, What the hell is going on? You know? So, anyway, so I had like eight calls that day, you know, nobody but the next the second day, the next call the first person who bought everybody else is like, whoa, I’m gonna call you back all that stuff. And then so I so two in a row in two days for like 1500 a piece. And I was like, I wonder if I can sell this for 2000? More Oh, freaking right? Yeah, girl. I was like, Yeah, so the next person that got on the phone, I was like, Well, you know, yada, yada. It’s gonna be two grand a month. I was like, Hey, you know, just send me an invoice. Okay. You know that I started selling for 15 for 2000 down afterwards. And then if any client wants to sign up and then they’re really really on the fence Now, I know I can do it for 1500 dollars, and then it was cleaned up. So I think Sign up about. I signed up about eight clients in my niche, offering a particular service for them, getting them Coronavirus, disinfecting jobs. using Facebook advertising Oh, I was only doing Facebook ads. I wasn’t doing PPC or anything like that was it was 2000 a month. It was a Facebook ad service. I’m gonna bring you leads, I’m gonna have your phone ringing. And you know if you spent in and then on top of that I was recommending they spend 50 to $100 a day on Facebook. So they were spending between
between three and $4,000 a month with this particular service. So a lot of the clients that will speak with you know, will see my answer like, Oh hey, I saw Coronavirus. I want to get into the business. I really love this design. And so my target customer was somebody who already had manpower you know, we have to stand They have to trudge, they did have I mean, I worked with companies going $50 million a year. Crazy. I never thought you know, I never thought I could snag such a fight. So it’s just been it’s just been amazing. Yeah. So
So it sounds like it mean, you basically have the Nish, you got an idea from one of the clients. I was like, Okay, here’s kind of a cool angle. And they said, Let’s test it. Let’s kind of put it put it out there and see if we can get proof of concept. They got great results with it. They’re like, hey, sweet, let’s see if some other people in this space would be interested. Yeah, we set up some really smart Facebook ads, a great funnel, bringing people right onto your calendar, got the calendar slammed up and just started landing deals.
Yeah, yeah, that’s that’s exactly what it was. Um, so now now that I’ve been doing that for them, a lot of them are coming to me with another service, that I’m kind of still testing out a little bit on tests. See how viable it is to go to market with it? And then when I do, I’m definitely sure I’m going to smack some more some more clients with that. But yeah, that’s, that’s the strategy that I used. I had a client that came to me with an idea. I’m like, when they mentioned they, I guess we asked like, How the hell did it but think about this.
Like, Ah, it’s so dumb, like,
in the room, right?
I know. So. So that was the strategy. I had a client that came to me with an idea that was, you know, that was kind of like a real time idea. And I noticed that, you know, and then we tested it with with the market and then work and then I took that entire concept. I literally went to the broader market with that with that entire process, and it’s working really, really good. I love it. And so
you’re building up more and more success within the niche more and more clout more and more credibility. Talk a little bit about the service offering. I know that for a lot of these guys, it’s been this one specific thing. What like, what are you selling to most your clients at this point? Is it is it that one package for two grand a month or just kind of walk? Walk us through that a little bit?
Yeah, for sure. So, you know, if I snag a job, and right now I, because I’m not like 50 clients, my goal is to hit 50 k a month, and then I will just drop everybody else. And then I will just solely focus on my niche. Um, because I still don’t have a lot of clients in my niche to really, fully fully go in. If I have at least, I think I have between 15 and 20 clients in my niche, and the revenue is all the way up there. And I can I can turn off my other assets. I’m bringing in inbound inbound leads, so I can sell just the other day. We closed two clients. So the reason why we added about $6,000 is we closed a What did they do? I it’s like a, it’s like a gym or something like that we close it for like 30 $500 a month. And then we have another client that sells boats and stuff. We close it for about 20 $500 a month while I still have other things going on. And then you know, so this is what I’m doing now. But then I’m not even like all those guys coming in, I’m not even actively chasing them. So I have assets out there that are bringing me inbound leads, and then let me come. If I feel that’d be having money, then I would spend the time and talk
to them. That’s probably I want to pause you here for a second. I want to speak directly for those of you in on ramp and seven figure agency right now, what he said there is critical. I was actually on my leadership team meeting with Jeff this morning. We were talking about, you know, in the early phase of your agency when like you’d get, let’s say less than five clients in any specific niche. At that phase, you’re in a survival mode. You really need to take anything you can get right yes, you’re going to hyper target whatever Damage Restoration Companies but if something comes in for a poor build company, right, and you’ve got the capability to fulfill that, you take it right when when Dean and I started our agency plumbing h SEO, we were targeting restaurants, like that was our that was our focus, we’re going to do restaurants, but we didn’t, we’re getting traction. Unfortunately, one day I got a plumber, right? The plumber signed out for 1500 bucks a month. And I was like, Hey, cool, that’s great. But we’re gonna still focus on these restaurants. And then nothing happened with restaurants we got two or three other Plumbing Companies, sometimes, you know, the niche is gonna choose you and you have to be flexible. You got to take what you can get you got to pay the bills in the early days. And so I’m really glad that you said that a man because I think it’s a message especially those that on ramp and we want to go tunnel vision in one niche. And yes, that’s the long term vision. But you got to take what you can get at the beginning until you get the momentum until you get five or six or like man, he’s looking for 15 in his niche before he says okay, all the bridges are all the boats are burned. I’m just going to double down on this. So
right right And the thing with my niche is that there are there are several sub niches in the niche. And like when you start getting a lot of like clients and and it’s you would notice it, you will notice a trend. Um, so my niche that that do like water damage, you know, they work with some other, you know, they work like plumbers and stuff like that. And then if you go to motive mediation, they work with some other people, if you do, if you do fire damage, they work with some other people. So there’s a whole lot of interconnected niches within the main niche. And as you start growing in a niche, you would notice all those connections. So I mean, like, though, there wasn’t any way to do it, because if I just had, if I just like, you know, shot everybody else out, and then this focused on damage restoration, you know, it would have took me a long time to, you know, to get to like 10 points, you know, while missing out on all of the extra revenue that I could have picked up. So it definitely makes sense that if you’re focusing only on Right now, in a part a seven figure agency strategy, that if you’re currently in the on ramp, you’re still doing the things that you were doing before you joined on land, you know, you’re you’re, you’re making sure that you have that pipeline full with other activities. And with all these inbound strategies, everything, all the things that you’re doing for your niche focused agency, you have to make sure that you’re doing you know, you want to, you have a target. So for me, it was like 20 grand a month or so. And then when I hit it, I was like, Alright, now I’m not gonna focus a lot on you know, the other niches a big come in, I’ll take them, but I’m not, you know, doing SEO or PPC or Facebook to kind of get over. So now, all the assets are there. I have leads coming in, you know, I mean, to me, instead of me going to that.
I love it. I love it. So can you talk a little bit about some of those inbound strategies that have worked well for you? Um, yeah, just to get to get opportunities in play.
Yeah, for sure. So, so I’m going to give you guys my personal experience. All right. So what I if you were if you were earlier on a call, you know, I kind of talked a little bit about how I stumbled into digital marketing. So I said that my first year in marketing in this business, I made $900, a first year, and in my second year, in May $22,000. Now, a lot of people asked me, What was the difference? Like, how did you go from $900 to 20, almost 22,000. And my job is doing this on the side. So, you know, when I started, I was watching a lot of YouTube videos and all this stuff. And everybody was saying, Well, you know, do this and do this and who is and I
did all that stuff.
I did the Facebook ads, I did the Google ads. I did SEO and I was doing I wasn’t getting any. I really wasn’t getting anything. And then one day, I read an article by a lady I forget her name, and then see the title of the article. I still remember it was like How I made $200,000 in six months, right? That’s an interesting title, right? So it just I read the article. And then this lady talked about this platform called Tom tech. All right, so a lot of you guys have probably heard about thumbtack. So she mentioned thumbtack, and I was my friend. I’ve been doing this for a while, and I haven’t heard about thumbtack at the time, I’ve heard about Upwork. And it’s, it’s flooded with all these people. So I checked thumbtack out. And then I saw these negative reviews like all these pros who were offering marketing service and other service on the platform. Were leaving the flat. So I was like, wow, this is a great opportunity for me because all these people are leaving. Now I’m used to spending a lot of money doing PPC and I’m not getting anything. So I’m going to try channeling those funds into this platform and see what happens. My first month on the platform I’ve made like I made like 40 $500 I sold two website made like 40 $500. And that was the most money I had made on the internet ever. And I was like, holy crap, like, I’m gonna stick with this with this platform. Alright, so you guys go check out the platform if you like. So that’s how I started. I mean, my first month I made like 40 $500. And then every single month, I was making at least, you know, two to $5,000, in addition to my regular job income. So I did that on the side, and I wasn’t even prospecting I just had my profile and the things that I did. And I have inbound leads coming in through the platform.
And then a contact is like a service where you put up your profile and then you pay on a per inquiry basis. Right? I call the plumbers or, you know, the services. It’s a lead gen service for people that have been in the market for website or pay per click or whatever.
Right.
That particular platform for internet marketing usually think of it as I need somebody to come assemble furniture. It’s interesting, you’re able to tap into inbound opportunity there.
Yeah. And it was just by by chance. You know, it was just by chance. And I remember my first month on platform, I literally looked at my wife and I said, I think I think this is it. So I think I think I found the goldmine I think this is what’s what’s gonna make us you know, I guess financially stable or whatever, right? So when I started the whole thing, my my goal was that my family was growing, right? So my goal was to be able to buy an SUV and have this side job paper. That was my goal, you know, and then and then when the money starts coming in, you’re like, Well, I think I can make my goals a little bit bigger. So that’s that’s how I that’s that’s so thumbtack was a was a really big blessing to me in disguise, you know, I’ve made a lot of money on that platform. And I never imagined all my high ticket clients and a lot of my high ticket clients came off that path. I never imagined that I could snag a $60,000 a year job you know, somebody pay me $3,000 a month and all these companies that are making millions of dollars every single year they’re coming through the platform you know, you guys go check it out. And you know, it might it might work for you it might not work for you but it doesn’t hurt to try.
So you get you get that what we’re also the leads coming from it sounds like Facebook ads is a massive play for you where the majority of the inbound opportunities are coming, right?
Yeah, yeah. So I have I have my niche website and I have my general agency website. So I have leads coming from those as well. Nice. So if you if you if you when I set up my niche website, I you know, I did my I did my research and I noticed some of the money keywords. And so I feel it’s my site To kind of, you know, to be centered around those money keywords for my niche. And so now if you go to Google and type in, you know, water damage marketing or something like that my company is number one way up there, I think we’re like number two and number number two, or number one or number three, for that high volume keyword for my mix, and bring that we rent our website for those for that particular keyword in less than three months. So when I get mine, I’m like, Hey, you know, we’re new to this. But guess what, you know, all the companies in our niche, see what we were able to do in less than three months, and then they and then they get impressed. You do? That’s great.
All right. So so we’ve got Facebook ads, we’ve got thumbtack, we’ve got SEO, we’ve got inbound leads, obviously a high degree of confidence in the sales process, like you’re able to command a higher fee because you’ve got the background, you’ve got the confidence you’re willing to ask for that amount of money. Can you talk a little bit about, like kind of the service model at what you do what you charge kind of what’s included?
Right, so, so what I get when I get a general client, um, a lot of times I will do website management, I would redesign their website first and foremost. And then I will, you know, charge for a website management. And I will do social media management, but my social media management, I don’t like post every day and all that stuff. I just do ads. I just do Facebook and Instagram ads. So I do that. And then I do PPC management, and then SEO. I’ve only been doing reputation management. So I do web site management, SEO, PPC, and then Facebook and Instagram advertising. And then you know, call tracking.
And that’s all bundled in, in what they’re what they’re paying for.
Right? Correct. Fantastic.
So another big question and this is what everybody’s like kind of scratching their head about So you work full time, you’re a high paid engineer. But you’ve been able to grow this agency on the side. How in the world do you find the time to do it?
Well, you know, how many kids? I have three kids freaky. Okay. There you go. Gentlemen, this
is the secret mystery that we all need to understand right here.
Oh, God, um, I think I think it’s just, it’s just that immigrant mentality, man. It’s just, I don’t know, it might my wife asked me all the time. You know, she’s American. He was like, you know, how do you like it? I just do what I got to do. You know what I mean? I know where I’m from, I know where I’m going. And the difference between, you know, the promise and the promised land is almost a wilderness, you know, so you have to be willing to go through that wilderness. The Wilderness is not gonna last, you know, forever. It’s gonna come a time. You go through your wilderness and go through all the pain and all the sleepless nights when you get on the other side of the boat unless you’re on your Promised Land. So you have to pay the price, any good thing in life comes with a price tag. You know, for me, I wanted to kind of like a military style High School. So I think that instilled that in me, don’t be best uses. Doesn’t matter if you were born with one leg, like that kind of mentality, right? So it doesn’t matter if I’m working 12 to 15 hours a day at my day job. When I come home, you know, if I have if I have to squeeze an hour into it to work on a client’s SEO or to try to get backlinks for a client or to build a website or to outsource something, or to get my quote my clinic call and tell them how it’s you know how stuff is going. I find the time you know, this was like we all have 24 hours in a day. You know, you have to find the time and it’s hard Hard, like, it’s not easy. Like, there are times that I’m working till like 2:30am. And I’m waking up at like five and I’m checking on act. It’s not It’s not easy. Yeah, it’s really hard. I mean, it’s hard. And it’s really hard. I there’s really no way to put it, it’s hard. But you have to, it depends on how motivated you are. And and, you know, I guess is that immigrant mentality, you know, if you come in as country, you see how, how blessed people are to be in this country and, and you see how like, like, I, my friends tell me all the time I you know, if we’re in America, where you know, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that, you know, and then you come here and then a lot of people have that opportunity. And it’s like, they’re just like, this is like their, you know, like, wow, but if you come from a different I come from a third world country. I don’t even have I didn’t even grow up with internet or anything like that. You know, to drive an air conditioned car is a luxury to have a car home if he loves her. You know what I mean? So, when you come here, you, you realize that a lot of people are taking this stuff that we don’t joke around with, they’re taking it for granted. You know what I mean? So that’s where that’s where that comes from. That’s where that drive comes from. You know, and plus, when really also most motivates me is how my mom passed away. You know, I look at the last promise I made to my mom was looking at her lifeless body. And I’m like, that’s always a motivation as well. You know, because I want I want better for myself, I want better for my kids. I want better for my kids shoulder, you know, to leave a legacy. You know, somebody has to the wealth building has to start from somewhere. And you have to be the one that makes that decision that hey, even if I have to sacrifice my life to make sure that this is a legacy in my family, it has to Start for me, and I’m gonna pay the price for it. So that’s, that’s all it is. It’s not, it’s hard work. So you have to embrace it. That is really no way to make it juicy or anything like that. It’s just hard work.
That’s powerful. I mean, it’s really powerful. Um, so just just so I can kind of wrap my head around it, like what are the our schedules and what time you start? What time do you end what time you work on the agency, because there’s a lot of people doing this full time, and they haven’t had anywhere near the momentum that you’ve had, and what can only be like three or four hours a day, you know, talk me through that.
So, so yeah, I love what I do. I don’t even I don’t even count the hours like, you know, like, I just got on a computer and my wife knows to leave me alone.
It’s good to have a supportive wife because
you know, so I, I just jumped on a computer and then I just I just do it for I don’t even I don’t even realize the time going, you know what I mean? But I do Go to work. I start work, you know, eight o’clock, that I might come home sometimes at five o’clock sometimes at 10pm. But every single day, I have to make sure that I’m putting, you know, I’m taking breaks. You know, I have I had Well, I used to I had 215 minute breaks at my job, and then I hadn’t gotten our food, right. And so every 15 minute, I remember telling my boss I said, Hey, you know, the 15 minutes is not enough. Can I combine both? 15 minutes was 30 minute break, an hour break. So I had two breaks, 130 minute break and one one hour break. So during those two breaks, I will, you know, go in a break room or you know, posted in my car, I’d be calling coins, you know, doing strategy sessions. That’s what I was doing. Yeah, it’s the time is nowhere, like that’s you have to find a time and then sometimes, you know, I would I would just, you know, if we’re not very busy, I would take you know, take half a day off or go to work from like eight to three o’clock. You know, they’re not saying Can I go home? They all knew I was doing something on the side. It wasn’t a secret, you know, cuz they would notice all you know, because my I remember my first day, I sold my first high ticket, I came back in the room shouting and screaming at they’re all like what’s going on? And they knew I hadn’t been doing it, they knew I had been struggling. So I invested it into a sales program to a sales training, I learned how to sell my first high ticket, it’s like 5000 a month or something like that. I never, I never charged anybody above 500 before. My first point is to pay me $300 a month. You know, and I have played, you know, I still to this day, I have clients who pay me $200 a month, you know, and I have plays in Penny $500 a month, you know, but those were the clients that I snagged when I was started, you know, but I was willing to learn the ropes and with those smaller level clients, and then when I learned how to sell, you know, I would even I wouldn’t sell you my entire package for 150 thousand dollars a month, you know, the least I would do is 20 $500 a month because there’s a lot of work involved if I have to make it work, because think about you know, if you have a high ticket job searches, and, you know, if I bring you 10 additional jobs per month, and I’m making you $50,000 it doesn’t make sense that if I get paid for $200 it doesn’t, to me doesn’t make sense. It’s not a fair trade. No, it’s not a fair trade. If If I bring you $50,000 and you pay me $5,000 that is that is still a 10 a 10 to one, right, it a 10 to one, so that’s how can I explain it to the client? And then they’re like, Yeah, that makes sense. So, yeah, I went from like charging 200 bucks a month to you know, I’ve done a deal swap charge, you know, eight $7,000. So it’s, it’s just the blessing that you know, and it’s been a it’s been a journey, you know what I mean? It’s just I’ve learned so much Like I said, you know, four years ago, I had no clue what digital marketing was. And then now, here we are.
That’s I mean, it’s a tremendous story. And I think for those of you that are listening, that are giving us a full time effort, you need to give yourself a little bit of a gut check. Like, are you really are you putting in the effort, right, Manny, obviously is has put in the effort to get where he’s where he’s at. Can you talk a little bit about the the decision to leave the security of a full time job because I know that’s something you struggled with for a long time. He’s talking about how you work through that and kind of what you’re how you’re feeling at this moment knowing that you know, like full time focus is on the horizon for you.
Yeah. It was taught. It was a it was taught, you know, my even when I was doing even when I came for the roadmap program in Miami, I was still at 25 k a month. And I if you remember back to I have just taken I think I had taken like three days off. I had called in sick Just watching the tenant program down
the road map live, right?
No. So I was still at 25 k a month, I was making so much. I was making much more than I was doing in my day job. But I don’t know, it’s just like, the way we are wired as a society to have this pseudo security from a job. You know what I mean? So, every time I had the thought of quitting my day job, I had this other person on this side telling me what if this happened? What if that happens? What if so, and then, you know, now you have kids, why did this happen? So I never I never even thought about it. Like I thought I was all I was gonna do this, like get to $50,000 a month, even if it took me 10 years and then I’ll quit my job, you know, but after getting on the call with you, and then doing you know, going through the mathematics with every day, it just didn’t make sense to us to still be so that’s where So really thank you because you gave me that confidence to really quit my job. Really? I mean, it’s, if I didn’t talk to you, I probably will still be at my job right now. guarantee. Yeah, but you know, when you showed me the map, I never thought about thought of it that way. So when you showed me the map it I just it’s like, I saw it from a different perspective. And then all of a sudden, it just makes sense.
Yeah, because if you’re able to do what you’ve done with a little part time effort, imagine what you’ll accomplish with that with the effort. How much longer are you there? And what are you most excited about looking into the rest of 2020?
Um, so the goal with 2020 is to I mean, we’re, we’re halfway through the year. So my goal is to, you know, get to 50 K, really, my goal is to get to 50 k before before 2021. And it’s very exciting. It’s very exciting. It’s not even above The money it’s just about. It’s just about, you know, I still have family back in Africa, it’s just about the the happened, the potential to be able to help out. You know, when you when you’re needed, you know, just just the other day, my brother was like, hey, my wife went through the surgery, blah, blah, blah. And, you know, he’s like, Hey, can you help? You know, it’s a lot of money for us down here. I’m like, Yeah, for sure. I know. You know what I mean? It’s just that feeling that it gives you that you’re, you’re doing something, you know what I mean? So, I mean, ultimately, when I joined the program, ultimately, my goal was multiple six figures per month but obviously that’s that’s a way you know, ways out, but my goal definitely before 2021 is 5850 k per month. And definitely I’m gonna hit
it. No doubt the exciting stuff. Thank you so much for sharing. This has been awesome. You know, especially though that journey from You know that you’d have less than 20 k that over 30. And now being able to focus on this full time? What would you say kind of as we wrap up to that agency owner, that’s still an on ramp still trying to like land those those next five clients? What would your what would your encouragement be? Or what pieces of insight which you have?
Yeah, so I remember, you know, one of the first things that really caught my eye about the program is you have made a statement about the rule of ones, right, where you had said something about, you know, a lot of the big agencies were study, and they all had these traits about what they had accomplished. And it was the rule of law. So what I took from that whole, you know, that whole thought process about the rule of warrants is if you look at your niche, one of the first things that you need to be determined about your niche is What is that? What is that one thing? All right, we all think that our clients want SEO and websites and all this stuff. But really, even though the client doesn’t really care about all that stuff, but what the client wants is profitable sales leads that can turn into jobs. You know, and the question is, what kind of job does your client really want? You know, that’s the million dollar question, guys. That’s the million dollar question. So if you’re in, in plumbing, or if you’re in roofing, you have to ask yourself, what is that? What is that one thing that plumbers really like to do? It doesn’t really take a lot of time, but it’s a high ticket offer. Right? Whether it’s hot water, I know in a plumbing niche, it’s like hot water something in my niche is different. In your niche. You have to do the you have to ask your product, even if you don’t have place in the niche. Get your industry list and call them up and say hey, you know I’m a student from college or whatever right? Am I This research, can you guys tell me? What is that? What keeps you guys up at night? What is that one thing that if I work with you, you would really want me to bring you more leads, more leads, so that you can sell these these guys and make more money and then they will tell you they will deposit information. So that’s the one thing that I would definitely advise you guys to do. All right to bow to your niche, figure out the one or two things or maybe that one thing that they really want, right? I can’t stress that enough. In my niche, they really want high quality water damage leads, water damage leads or water damage job could be a 50 to 100 to whatever, you know, a quarter million dollar job. You know, that’s what they want. You know, so if I can go to them and say, Hey, I can I can get you guys, you know, five to 10 Water Damage leads every single day. And here is my proof. Everybody will be flocking to you. That is how you start getting people who want to talk to you. And that is how you you control the compensation from your perspective. Because if you go to them, and you’re like, Hey, I can handle your website, I can do social media and all these things, guess what? Everybody else is telling them the same thing. You know what I mean? Everyone is telling them the same thing. So how are you differentiating yourself from everyone else that is, you know, that is emailing them and showing them Facebook ads and all that stuff. You have to tell them that, hey, this is what I can do for you guys. And that’s what piques the interest want to listen to you once you want to have a conversation with you. You know, and then when you jump on that sales call is very, very different. Right? It’s very different because now it looks like you have something that they want, not the other way around. It’s not now they are selling like I have guys get on the phone with me. And they’re like, they’re like, I’m like, Hey, I only work with one thing. Clients criteria. And they’re like, well, can’t you squeeze me in? It’s like, look funny. That comes you squeeze me in there. But all because I have found what the niche ones and now they want. So that’s how you have to approach this thing, guys.
I love it great, great, insane, right figure out that high transaction value, high profit, differentiated service that they want more of and focus on that talk about the thing that will really pique their interest. I think that’s an amazing insight. And and something you’re just really powerful that close on today. So, man, well, thank you so much for your time. Congratulations on your success. What a story from migrating to the United States that now you know, having a really successful agency that I have no question is going to be at seven figures in the next 12 to 24 months. Congratulations. Thanks for sharing. I can’t wait to do the next interview. Or we’re looking back at this and like remember when you were just at 30 k outside that’s where we’re at now. So Awesome. Any last thoughts before we wrap up today?
Um, yeah, I mean to you guys that are, you know, you feel like you’re struggling and you, you feel like you know you’re you’re doing everything that you know everybody say to do and you’re not making headway. Here’s the thing that you need to remember. You know, there’s something called the compounding compound interest. All right, the compound interest effect, everything that you’re learning right now and you’re implementing, you might not see the results right now. But guess what Einstein says compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. What that means is all the efforts that you’re putting in right now, you might not see the effects right away. But guess what? I went from $900 to 22,000 to $22,000 on the side to $85,000 on the side, where this one this year, we’ve crossed over six six figures still on the side. All right, you see the effect of compound interest. It starts small and it starts compounding over time. So you might not see the effects right now. But I guarantee you, you’re gonna definitely see the effects. You know, if you don’t quit, just do not quit. You have to stick with it. Keep doing what you’re doing. Compound Interest is going to work in your favor. Trust me.
I love it. That’s a great, it’s a great tip. Wonderful, wonderful place to stop. Thank you so much for your time. Congratulations. And thank you guys for joining us you’re listening in and we’ll see you on the next episode of the plumbing and on the next episode of the seven figure agency podcast.
Thanks a lot, Manny. I no problem.
