Bryant Gillespie: All right, guys.
Welcome to the next edition of the better sign shop podcast.
I've got Peter Kourounis with me and Mike Riley, still searching for his nickname.
What's new with you guys.
Peter Kourounis: I'm on vacation.
I'm enjoying a couple of days off.
It's been a wonderful, week so far.
I got two more days before I gotta get back into the grind, but being
able to take some time away from the sign shop and from all the other
things I've done is a blessing.
And I've been enjoying it very much.
I even got a nice tan going.
Michael Riley: It's nice.
Where are you?
Peter?
Peter Kourounis: I am doing a staycation.
I did not leave my house.
I had some
plans to travel.
COVID derailed those plans a little bit, but, it's been nice.
I got to take my son for his first haircut today.
I got to take him out for pizza and ice cream.
The other day we went and be doing some pool days and we
went to the beach yesterday.
So it's been nice.
I'm not, I think I wanna do some stays a little bit more often, to be honest, it's
been really nice and doesn't really cost nearly as much as going on a vacation,
but eh, I've got to coup I got to meet a couple of the local business owners.
I'm shopping for a car.
Huh?
It's been nice.
Not having
to worry about work.
Bryant Gillespie: I can't.
Yeah.
I don't think the shopping for a car thing is you.
I think you're lying there, man.
You're not being
Peter Kourounis: no.
I just went on a major Twitter rent earlier this morning against
Tesla, and I'm a huge Tesla fan.
I have a Tesla model three, and man, they really got you because I'm
not allowed to buy out the lease.
I'm not allowed to make the money off the car.
It's their car.
I've just been like renting the car for three years from Tesla.
And now not my lease is over.
I'm like, yeah, what are you gonna do to keep me as a customer with Tesla?
And they basically said, you
gotta give us like five or $6,000 to get you into another lease.
And, you'll pay all the fees and all the stuff to transfer you into this lease.
And I'm like, all right, I'm going back to Jeep.
See you later.
So now I'm looking at that electric, Jeep Wrangler four by E.
but yeah, so I don't know.
I enjoy, shopping for cars.
Said nobody ever
Michael Riley: That's the worst experience ever.
Peter Kourounis: What about you?
I'm sure you guys aren't on vacation.
So how's your week been?
Bryant Gillespie: Go ahead.
Michael Riley: my week's been a nightmare.
Bryant Gillespie: Sign burrito.
Michael Riley: a wild week.
I, my, my wife and I, had tickets to a concert on the other side of the state.
And, we totally didn't realize that it was on a Tuesday night until Tuesday morning.
Peter Kourounis: Hey, was that nineties concert?
Michael Riley: yeah.
That's where we were.
And it was awesome.
It was,
Peter Kourounis: how was that?
Michael Riley: in garbage.
I was amazing.
It was so good.
Yeah.
It was an amazing concert.
It was actually, I'm a concert junkie.
Like I go to concerts all the time.
I made up in the hundreds of concert in my life and in Alan S.
Morris, this is the second time I've seen her.
And it's she stands like where she rises above everybody else I've ever seen.
it's an amazing performance.
I'm only like a huge fan of her music, but just it's crazy.
And this was the.
The rowdiest crowd I've ever seen at a concert too, which is saying
something like there were so many drunk women reliving their nineties
youth I felt really intimidated.
I was a little outta place, but, yeah, it was a lot of fun.
It was great, but it was just, it was stressful because we were like,
oh shit, we've middle of the day.
Like we have to drive four or five hours to get through this
concert on a Tuesday night.
So we get a little poor planning on our part.
So my week's been in
Peter Kourounis: what would you say was Alen Moore?
Set's like biggest nineties hit and,
Michael Riley: Oh, you oughta know that's her biggest song by far.
Peter Kourounis: You ought to
know.
I've always been a handed, my pocket kind of fan.
I love that song
Michael Riley: good
soccer.
Peter Kourounis: for whatever reason that's been my favorite.
But, at your concert, which one was like where the crowd erupted, the one
that they enjoyed the most was it.
You ought to know.
Michael Riley: You ought know.
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
And actually, Bryan, I forgot, I got a video of that for your wife.
Cuz you
Bryant Gillespie: Oh, yeah.
Yeah, no, definitely.
My wife would be the one, like she would be in the middle of that, like tearing
off the brawl and throwing it on stage.
Like
Peter Kourounis: What
Michael Riley: it
was like, it was
Bryant Gillespie: smore set fan man.
Huge fan.
Michael Riley: yeah, it was a really very energetic, wild show.
it was a good time.
I recommend to anybody listening, even if you can't stand Alanis, morrisette it's
just, it's an incredible performance.
It's something to see.
it's worth going to I, that, I don't know how she can sing the way she does.
Like it's she's got a voice that's wild and so good times.
What about you, Brent?
What are you up to.
Bryant Gillespie: It's the same old same all, man.
I'm just trying to keep up with these three girls.
We had the babysitter out last week, so we had the girls at home all week.
Absolutely drove my wife and I crazy.
And, I still was just trying to catch up on work from that.
So we've been heads down this week.
other than that, not, not much has changed
Michael Riley: You need a vacation
Bryant Gillespie: the staycation, listening to Peter talk.
I'm gonna go shop for cars.
I've got some of my old friends from high school that do that.
So that could be like a reunion session while they tried to reach in my pockets.
Michael Riley: isn't it sad.
This is what COVID has reduced us to like now, instead of looking forward
to going to Hawaii or something, we're like, yes, I'm gonna stay home for
a week and shop for a car like this.
this is my vacation.
that's where we're at.
As a society what's happened to us.
It's sad.
Peter Kourounis: Hey,
Bryant Gillespie: I think that's an age and P.
Age thing, kids thing, man.
Michael Riley: Maybe that's what it, maybe we've just grown
Bryant Gillespie: when you have a, when you have three girls and the
youngest is a total Demonn seed, she was supposed to be the chill
one, but she is a total Demonn man.
Like she gets in her feelings and then she will hit you, kick you
and totally tear your house down.
She's like the big, bad Wolf in a, like two foot high package.
that's my youngest
Michael Riley: So the idea of going on vacation is just
Bryant Gillespie: or taking her even to a restaurant is an adventure.
I, I took the kids to CVS to pick up some medication the other day.
And everybody in CVS was just looking at me and laughing.
And some of them were also like, what the fuck, man?
Like, why is your kid running all the aisles?
this was at seven 30, their bedtime is seven 30 or eight.
So she ran the aisles in CVS pharmacy made me chase her.
At one point, I actually asked the cashier, if that was the only exit I
was like, Hey, is that the only exit?
Because she was just all over the place.
So
Michael Riley: Yeah,
Bryant Gillespie: that's what I'm dealing with.
Michael Riley: that's unfortunate.
Bryant Gillespie: never dull.
We'll say that.
Michael Riley: I'm glad I don't have kids.
It's
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, no, it's nice when you can give them back.
Now, I say all these things, but I love my kids for anybody
listening, just so you know,
Michael Riley: he does.
I've witnessed it.
he's a great father.
Despite
Bryant Gillespie: Don't call
Michael Riley: drugstore chasing, just ignore what they have to say.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah.
All right.
let's get into the topic today, guys.
What I feel like maybe Peter or my, you guys should bring the topic today.
I'm the guy that's always doing the topic.
You guys introduce this.
Michael Riley: Yeah.
so this week, instead of picking on one topic, we're gonna actually
just answer a few questions that we've received from, our listeners.
So we appreciate you guys sending questions in and, if
anybody listening has any other questions hit us up, let us know.
And, we're gonna try and do a few more of these kind of listener
Q and a, podcast episodes.
So instead of, like I said, picking on just one topic, we'll try and cover
three or four and answer some questions.
So
Bryant Gillespie: Give him the email address.
He doesn't know it's.
if you have questions.
You would like us to answer on the air or, I guess this is recorded.
On the podcast, if you want us to answer your questions, hit us up.
Hey, H E Y.
I had to think about that for a minute.
Hey, at better sign, shop.com.
Super simple.
Send us your questions.
We'll answer them.
Michael Riley: I'm gonna write that down.
So I don't forget it,
Peter Kourounis: it would be a really cool idea if we, if in the
platform that we're building, if we can make like a Q like a submit your
question for the podcast, little form.
Bryant Gillespie: yeah.
Peter Kourounis: I'm pretty neat.
Michael Riley: Yeah,
Bryant Gillespie: Little plug for the platform there as well.
Peter Kourounis: Hey,
Michael Riley: that'd be cool.
Good idea.
Bryant Gillespie: All
Michael Riley: Peter,
take it away.
What's our first question.
Peter Kourounis: All right.
All right.
So we got our first question here.
I'm gonna read this out here.
I would love to hear an episode that addresses minimum orders and how
to handle the walk-ins requesting $50 for lettering and or sign jobs.
Also how minimums might apply to large accounts that frequently request small
orders of two to three small PVC signs in between larger orders, for example.
there's a couple of questions there.
It MI mixed in between one major question and that's about minimum orders.
So how do we handle minimum
orders for walk-in customers that are requesting $50 jobs?
I have a lot.
I have a lot, I could say about this, but I'll let you guys,
I'll let you guys go first.
Brian, why don't you, why don't you
Bryant Gillespie: Let's go with mayor MC cheese.
Just trying that on.
Do you like that one said, but I couldn't get that costume though.
Really?
Michael Riley: one will pop up on the, it's almost Halloween.
One of those Halloween stores that show up in a closed down retail store will
definitely have a mayor MC cheese outfit.
And when it does, I will be wearing
Bryant Gillespie: I think he's the forgotten McDonald's character.
Michael Riley: was the best too.
Peter Kourounis: All right.
Okay.
So Mike, let's come back to you.
Let's start with you here for those walk-in customers.
For those shop owners that get a lot of walk-in customers that are
requesting $50 sign jobs, lettering, jobs, boat, lettering, car lettering,
whatever it is, do you handle that?
let's just take it one step at a time.
how do you go about addressing those customers right now?
When it comes to minimum orders?
Michael Riley: I think first and foremost, you need to decide what kind
of customer you want to service and what type of work that you want to do, and
then set your minimum order accordingly.
So if you don't really want to do boat numbers and boat names, and
those little sticker jobs for the random guy walking off the street,
then set your minimum order is something that they just can't afford.
So they're just gonna naturally go someplace else.
I've talked about this before too, but I also like, to have some place
that I can refer those people to.
So I'm not just sending 'em out on the street, saying, Hey, I can't do this,
but XYZ sign, shop down the street.
I won't say the name can handle this little job for you.
I think is, is a, is an important thing to have.
if you're getting a lot of people walking in the door for those types
of orders, then you just don't wanna do, 'em just raise your minimum order
and say, we don't do the type of work.
I I it's, there's nothing wrong with saying, I'm sorry,
we don't work for individuals.
We only work for businesses or we don't do race car and boat graphics or whatever.
So I think it's, stepping back from the immediate question and just determining
the market and that you wanna serve and the type of work that you wanna
do, has to drive that decision.
and like I said, then set your minimum order accordingly.
it's, it is a slippery slope because you know the question.
Clearly says, like how do you apply minimum orders to larger accounts?
And that's tough because, say you're working for a commercial realtor
and normally they're doing big four by eight site signs or bigger ones.
And they're a thousand dollars plus tickets every time.
But then every once in a while, they're gonna have a, Hey, we need to change
a single digit on one of these signs.
I just need to cover up DEC out to change a phone number on one of these signs that
would always fall under your minimum.
You can't really get away with saying to your biggest customer, sorry.
I gotta charge you my $150 minimum for that job that should be, $15 or whatever.
So I think you, you have to recognize where you have to make exceptions to that
as well, and be willing to accommodate.
Clients small requests, in pursuit of the bigger picture there, which is keeping
them happy and keeping them buying those thousand dollars jobs from you as well.
but it is a slippery slope and it's really easy to fall off track with that
and let customers walk all over you too.
So you, part of, it's just, you gotta have a spine and stand
up with people and say, no,
But you
gotta know when to do that.
Bryant Gillespie: I think this problem comes like the root of this is when
you first start out, those are the type of jobs that you cut your teeth on.
especially if you started your own shop.
Like those jobs are like the average small, tiny vinyl job.
You do a lot of those.
And, when it's just you in a garage or it's small retail space, those are,
those are still profitable, certainly.
but as you grow, obviously those are not profitable and you have
to figure out the way out of it.
So I think you've given some good tactics there as far as, have somebody
to refer those people to just actually.
Have a spine and say, no, Hey, we're not gonna do this type of work.
I'm going to say something, from our friend, Dylan Martin, the sales manager
of security signs that we had on our, one of our recent AMAs within the
Facebook group is qualify, qualify.
so when that person comes in, you'll qualify them.
They take them through the process, and a very quickly, if it's just an individual,
you should be able to qualify them out.
but if it is, let's say it's just, somebody who's the could be like a
vice president of some corporation, but maybe he does want boat letters,
have a conversation with that person, suss that out and figure out if that
warrant's doing that particular job.
I really like what you said about having a guideline instead of a hard and fast.
you gotta have some flexibility there because certainly those
large clients do come in or call in and need just like a tiny job.
So you gotta have a firm grasp of your customer base and understand who your
best clients are and make sure you educate your team on that as well.
If I've got person at the front counter who doesn't know that, John's
electrical service is, one of our best customers, then that's a problem
because they're going to, treat them the same way that they would, any random
person that walks in off the street.
one of the other ways that I really like to handle walk-ins is just lock
the doors and go appointment only.
I've talked to a lot of shops that were forced to go appointment only because of
COVID and it worked out better for them.
So they just stuck with that.
So I really like that approach as well.
Peter, you've got a book on this one,
Peter Kourounis: I do.
Bryant Gillespie: out
Peter Kourounis: Yeah, no, not,
no, I don't have a book on this, but I have a lot to say about this
and I'm just gonna cut right to it.
I'm gonna give you the short and sweet.
You shouldn't be selling anything in your shop nowadays for $50.
if you are a shop that's selling this for $50.
I question.
The level of that you have in your, as a business owner, you wanna make a quick 50
bucks, but I don't, I'm begged to question how much profit you're actually making off
of that to interrupt your operations, to interrupt what you're doing to handle a
walk-in customer, to comes into your shop, to buy something for $50 is, much time are
you preparing to put that order together?
the end?
How much time are you putting together to do the estimate, to
do the order to take the money?
I understand that you don't wanna say no to a customer that walked in a door,
but that's why shops across the country.
Shops in our mastermind shops in our Facebook group, they've
all raised their prices.
So you have to, and they've raised their prices for a reason.
Inflation gas is damn near still $5 a gallon.
there's no way you're making money on $50 anymore.
even if it's a quick throw black vinyl into your plotter, cut some
letters out, weed them, mask them.
I be, I bet you, you made like five bucks on that job, Yeah.
I get it.
The shop owner right now is like, Ooh, a square foot of black vinyl
is like pennies per square foot.
It costs me pennies.
But on the surface you still have an overhead expenses.
You have your shop rate, you have labor, insurance, all of these other things
that are gonna go into each and every order that you have to take into account.
So walk-in customers that want something for $50.
They get shown the door.
I think that's the quickest and easiest way.
I could say that they get shown the door.
They walk in, they walk out, I'll put a giant sign in my lobby that
says 200, $200 minimum order.
Now I have talked to some shop owners that don't believe in putting a
minimum order that high, that they would normally sell a job for $50.
But if it is $50 and let's just for arguments sake, say it's some D O
T numbers for a truck, they would immediately double their price.
So I normally charge 50.
I would charge them a hundred and I've been okay with that strategy from a few
different perspectives, but then I wonder.
those shop owners that are saying a hundred dollars, isn't worth their time.
I guess that depends on the size of your shop.
If you have 30 people working under your guidance there, a hundred
dollars, doesn't push the needle.
If you're a two or three man shop and you can take that a hundred dollars and then
go buy lunch for your team, alright, you can, and you have some time available
then maybe your plotter is not running.
I can see that working for different size shops, but you
have to double your normal price.
And, in my shop for D O T letters, I didn't sell it for less than $150.
one color cut vinyl, 150 bucks.
I would interrupt my operations for that.
But now I've raised that price as well.
So for smaller shops, you could certainly do that strategy as well.
If you didn't want to put in a minimum order amount.
Now, the second question
here from the same person is how does this apply with larger accounts
that frequently request to three orders, in, in a short frequency.
I think this is the wrench.
this is the wrench in that equation there, Mike.
So let's kind of circle back to you first.
we talked about minimums and I stand that, $50 is not something,
but if you have a, an account.
First of all.
I question how my, in my opinion, how large of an account are they, if
they are buying $50 items from you, I wouldn't consider that a large
account, but I'd like to hear from you guys first, what you would do here.
If they're ordering in more frequency, do, are you a little
bit more lenient on those minimums?
Michael Riley: before I answer that, I want to back up and also
talk about the idea of a minimum, a quote, unquote minimum order, just
from more like an abstract level.
I don't really like using the term minimum order.
And if a client says, Hey, I need this.
And you say, okay, well that's under our minimum, so I've gotta charge you this
$200 or whatever it is that immediately puts kind of a negative feeling in that
customer's mind, oh, I'm not big enough for them, or they're gonna charge me
a lot more than this really should be.
Just because they feel like it's too big of a convenient, like
there's some negative feelings that are gonna be attached to that
from the customer's, standpoint.
So I'm on the fence on how I feel about even saying, Hey, we have
this minimum charge and it's this.
And putting that out there and hanging up a sign that says our minimum order
is X dollars and telling customers, Hey, you're under our minimum.
It just makes them feel small and insignificant.
And really if you really wanna get down to it, The, I, you don't need
a minimum if you're pricing things correctly anyway, because no matter
what the size of that job is, even if it's really small, if you're really
pricing it the way you should be pricing it and doing your math and making
sure you're covering your overhead.
And like you said, Peter, the time to sit there and talk to the customer and design
it and write up the invoice and collect the check and take the check to the bank.
I there's time in that.
And if you're doing estimating and pricing correctly, you're accounting for all that.
And just by, by accounting for all that, by default, you're charging what
your minimum should be for that job.
Anyway, you just gotta think about it a little bit and do the math correctly.
And I, so I think it, I think a lot of shops could benefit from taking
that approach by just saying, instead of you're under a minimum ceremony
charge 200 bucks, but just saying.
This job costs this much period, and you don't really, there's not really a need to
explain why it costs that much, or whether it's under minimum or anything like that.
Just tell em, this is what it's gonna cost you.
I think there's a little psychological warfare there with this that I think
you can overcome by just charging what you gotta charge for it, regardless
of what the job is and that which is gonna make your minimum fluctuate,
depending on what the job is.
If it's a, it's a vinyl decal or something like that, it's probably
gonna be less of a minimum than a, a real estate sign or something.
But I think you can go a long way towards making the customer
feel better about using you.
If you don't immediately step onto this negative, you're under
our minimum because your job is so insignificant kind of stance.
Bryant Gillespie: Mayor MCee with the, the killer answer there.
I like that a lot, man.
Michael Riley: It's not something that I did in my shop and, you know, having
sold my shop and look back, I think like it's kind of shitty of me in a
way to like, you know, tell customers like, nah, you're just not important.
So I gotta charge you a arm and a leg to make time for you.
that's kind of how it comes across.
and I've really started thinking about that now that I've dealt with other
businesses and companies a lot more.
and I've been the customer being told that that doesn't really feel
that good from a customer standpoint.
But if the price was the same, if I went to a garage and I, needed some
work done on my vehicle and they said, ah, you're under a minimum.
So I gotta charge you this versus I've gotta charge you this.
Or this is the price.
I would've thought a lot better if they just said, this is what it's gonna cost
you versus you're under our minimum.
So I've gotta charge you this.
Peter Kourounis: So let me push back on that just a minute.
Cuz I am a shop that uses the term order, minimum order a lot, but
it often precedent before the next statement, which is, is there anything
else that you can get or that you would want to get to that minimum?
we use it as a upselling opportunity, right?
we are pricing correctly.
Our formulas are pretty concrete, but we have a $200 minimum.
So if there's, if that A-frame sign is not what they're, I'm
sorry, let me use another one.
if that real estate sign for $80 is not hitting that minimum, then I might
use that for maybe let's get two or three and let's maybe get you some
business cards or some other things.
Do you want it installed?
I'll use that as a way to get there, right?
Maybe it actually end up with a price that's over $200 in most cases, because I
use it as an opportunity to present value.
So what do you, what would you say to the shops that are doing it that way in
terms of the terminology of minimum order?
Michael Riley: That's the way I approached it at my shop too, was Hey,
I got charge you $200 for this, but for that $200, instead of giving you
one sticker, I'm gonna give you 15.
And that, that usually helped put the customer's mind at ease a little bit.
at least I'm getting more than one for that money, but I don't know.
I still feel a little bit differently about it now than I did back then.
just being on the other side of the equation a little bit
more, And it's a tough one.
I don't really know if there's a good answer to that because a
lot of it's gonna depend on the exact, the type of sign it is.
it's gonna change a lot depending on what it is, but I guess I would ask,
like, why is your two, your minimum $200?
Like where is that?
and I'm not questioning that's a bad idea.
I'm just curious how you came up with the number $200 or what justifies it to you.
And then secondly, let's say your $80 real estate sign example, right?
if you, minimum is $200, but you can manufacture this product for $80,
one of those is the real number.
Peter Kourounis: I think the reason why your minimums are probably
elevated or your minimum order has now been installed is because of
what's going on in the industry.
our suppliers there's supply chain issues.
There are people asking more money for payroll.
I've brought in a salesperson which elevated my shop rate per hour.
So when you really look at my 75 $80 an hour shop rate, and then you
look at the materials and then the profit margins that you wish to make
in order to be in this business.
You're in that $200 threshold.
That's what's gonna push the needle for us in my shop.
It may not be your shop for the listeners out there.
Not advising you to take $200, but I have a six or seven person shop.
And my overhead, my shop rate is a little about 80 bucks.
Now it used to be 45 when I first started.
I'm in that area of I'm in that area of, having to pay a lot more money for
good labor, have to pay for materials that are elevated in by the suppliers.
And I'm not in this to make 10 bucks on a job.
I don't that
doesn't push the needle.
Michael Riley: so you're basically, you're in a roundabout way.
You're saying there's an economy of scale there manufacturing.
So it costs you a lot more to manufacture one of those real estate signs.
And it does manufacture for five of 'em because you're, you're compounding
the labor to make it's the same labor to make one is it doesn't make five.
Which goes back to what I'm saying is if somebody comes in and says they
want a one, single real estate sign is $80, really like the cost of that, or
shouldn't that really be priced on a sliding scale based on the quantity and
manufacturing efficiencies, included in that if you want one of these,
things being equal, this really is going to CU it's going, I gotta charge you $200.
Not cause that's a minimum.
It's just what it takes me to manufacture it and I'll make my margin on it.
Peter Kourounis: there was once a day as a science job owner, where if a
real estate agent came in and said, I needed one estate sign for my, for sale
sign to put in a lawn, it would be $80.
There was once a day where that was the case, but a little bit of education, a
little bit of learning what it takes to be a successful business in this market.
If that real estate agent came in and said, listen, I'm a new agent.
I want, I need to get some signs.
I'd tell 'em.
how many listings do you have or how many listings do you want?
Now that I'm talking to them about their business, providing the value and saying,
you're gonna need open house signs.
You're gonna need, if you're gonna have at least three listings, you're gonna
need at least three, four sale signs.
You're gonna need some business cards, some listing brochures and flyers.
So I'm now getting them over that minimum.
Where, okay.
Yeah, there is the quantity scale or the volume scale of how much those signs
should be, because I know now we're talking a little bit, I'm not talking to
a customer that wants to buy for $200, talking to a customer that wants to buy
maybe even $2,000 worth of signage to get their business going again, maybe.
And that goes
back to the very first thing that you said is what type of customer do you want?
And that's the type of customer I, I work with.
I don't work with agents that come in and say, I need one open house sign
and tell 'em it's $200 or it, or, and, or there's the door, because it's
gotta be that way.
Doesn't push the needle for me in my shop to do an $80 job.
Michael Riley: So what we're, so essentially we're saying the same
thing, we're just presenting it to the customer two different ways.
You're just saying my minimum's 200 bucks and that sign is under that minimum.
So you've gotta buy a few to justify the cost of that.
And I'm saying, instead of saying it's under the minimum, I'm just
saying, why not present it as, Hey one costs $200, two costs, a hundred
dollars, a piece, three costs.
$80 a piece.
And so in that way, they're, you're empowering that customer to, make
the decision, to spend more money versus like trying to backdoor
them in to spending more money.
and I'm not saying that's a bad, I'm not trying to knock you
when I say that, Peter, I hope you don't take offense of that.
I'm just, I'm saying that's the perception from the customer sometimes I think,
and I've felt that when I've been told, Hey, that's under the minimum,
but if I were given, the choice of spending $200 on one or $250 on three,
and a price breakdown accordingly, I feel like, Hey, I made a good decision
Peter Kourounis: I hear what you're saying.
I think the approach is just how you phrase it.
I think you've been
Michael Riley: That's what I'm saying.
Peter Kourounis: been, you haven't been a big fan of saying my minimum order is,
but if you're phrasing this in a way where one is 200, Two is $100, whatever it is.
And you're giving the customer the connotation of being a positive
customer experience, still allowing them to make a decision then yes,
that's that consultative approach that I'm very much in love with, but
let's get back to that question here.
What if it's a big client, how are you handling the customer
from a per perspective of $50 items being proposed there?
Michael Riley: no good
answer for that.
Bryant Gillespie: it's like Nike, baby, you just do
Michael Riley: You just do it
Bryant Gillespie: on you gotta qualify the account, obviously like a large
account for shop a, maybe $25,000 a year, whereas, a large account for
somebody else, maybe a hundred thousand dollars a year, $300,000 a year.
So you obviously gotta qualify the account.
and we don't have any hard numbers here in the question of what's a
large account, but if it's a good account and they spend a lot of money
with me, I'm gonna take care of them because that's that's business, baby.
Michael Riley: You have to, you can't give those guys a reason to go
someplace else for the cheap stuff, because that place is gonna try
to get the rest of their work too.
And if that place is willing to sell the cheap stuff, they're probably gonna
undercut you in price everywhere else.
So it's one of those situations where they've got you between a rock and a
hard place, and you sorta, you gotta play ball with them a little bit, like
you said, I it, you can't completely shoot yourself in the foot and, lose
money,
Bryant Gillespie: have to make.
Yeah.
I still have to make money on the job
Michael Riley: you've
gotta treat them.
You've gotta treat them fairly and yourself fairly, I think.
and a lot of times that means not, letting them under your minimum or,
I talked about this on a previous episode, two about the idea of.
having a way to fast track jobs through your shop, whether it's setting up
a assigned shop with an assigned shop, if you're larger and you've
got a, a dedicated small production department with one person that's just
there for rush jobs and, or running those small types of jobs through.
I if you're bigger and you can justify doing that's a way to squeeze those
jobs through for the good customers in a more efficient manner without
completely losing money on the job.
If you were to just, you don't have to insert that into your typical
or your regular daily workflow.
Not everybody can justify doing that, but if you can, it's a way to
ease the pain on this and be able to service those clients better.
but.
But unfortunately the reality is if wanna keep those big customers happy and coming
back to you, sometimes that means you've gotta break your own rules and essentially
do them some favors here and there.
and a smart shop owner is gonna figure out, what their needs are gonna be, and
try to predict that as much as possible, and maybe have these things ready to
go on the shelf, or maybe you work out a way if they're just buying, the same
things over and over again, but they just need 'em on a as needed basis.
Maybe maybe you inventory them for them and just pull 'em off a shelf.
and that way you can take advantage of that, quantity,
volume, manufacturing, efficiency.
Bryant Gillespie: I like that.
It goes back to Peter's consultative approach, Hey, why are they buying
these two to three small PVC signs?
is it like, are they doing that regularly?
Or, yeah, maybe you could, like you said, sell them more warehouse 'em for
them, provide some value somewhere else.
So like they come in they're on the
Michael Riley: Or even if it's a different phone number every time,
maybe it's just a, you have the blanks precut and PREPA for them ready to go.
And
Peter Kourounis: that's a good, that's a good strategy.
If this is something that they're ordering a lot of, you might wanna prepare some
inventory to make it easier to produce.
That's interesting.
I have a small take on this, just a small take.
I agree with everything.
Brian said, you just gotta go ahead and do it.
you signed up that account.
There in my eyes, there is a difference between a customer and an account.
I don't know how you guys feel about this, but in my shop, whenever I've
trained some sign shop owners, they've always talked about getting the customer
and nurturing them to become an account.
The sign shop owners that make 10 to 12, 15 million out there, work
their accounts and all, and get 80% of their business from their current
accounts that they are working with.
So nurturing people from an customer to an account is, is part of that strategy.
Now, what is the difference in, what are the benefits of either when
somebody becomes an account, maybe your it's your shop policy to install no
minimums because they are in account.
This is a value add to become an account with your customer or
with your, with your business.
if you're treating your.
if this was phrased as a, how do I handle those everyday large customers?
I would say, first you have to turn those customers into
accounts and then nurture them.
But if you are handling, if you're, there are no minimums with accounts,
whatever they want is what you're going to give them because they are an account.
Now, some shirt, some shops will still have their order minimums, and those
accounts will know those minimums.
But for tho for us everyday shops that are small, medium size.
If you wanna take a customer and turn them into an account where they're
gonna order from you all the time, and you're gonna enforce, volume discounts
and maybe, some eCommerce way of buying products from you for ease of customer
experience, take the minimums out.
That's my advice.
Take the minimums out because that's a value add to become an
account, working with your shop.
Bryant Gillespie: I'm gonna go on record here and say that I
don't like the term large account.
I like good account or great account instead of large, because to me, and
especially at this stage of my career, I wanna work with people that I trust.
I like doing business with.
so I would qualify that as a good account, if it's a good account, that
means there's mutual trust and respect.
And these guys aren't gonna be taking advantage of you all the time.
if they are, that could be a bad account.
if they're constantly hoing me for Hey, let's say they spend $25,000 a year with
me, but every week I've got rush jobs.
And there are these tiny little PVC signs that we're talking about.
To me, that's a, not a great account, because there's not
that mutual respect there.
I wanna work with people that are good accounts that like, Hey, shit happens.
like the customers are gonna no different than in a, in our shop.
The customers are gonna have some shit come up and they
need somebody to help 'em out.
And that's why we're here.
So if it's a good relationship, there's naturally some give and take there.
Peter Kourounis: Good point.
Good point.
Very good point.
I like that a lot.
All right, let's go to our second question here.
that's a great, that was a great first topic or good question.
I enjoyed that one.
I hope our listeners did here too.
How much should you be paying yourself as the owner of a sign shop?
Bam, right in your face hits you with the most frequently asked question that
I get with all my sign shop clients.
How much should I be buying myself?
If I'm a first time sign shop owner.
If I'm a, if I've been in this business for five years, am I paying myself enough?
I love this question.
I think.
on the mind of any sign shop owner.
I see.
Brian's raising his hand.
Brian, what would you like to say here first?
Bryant Gillespie: $1 million,
Peter Kourounis: you should be paying yourself what Bryan.
Bryant Gillespie: $1 million.
Peter Kourounis: Yeah, I don't know about that, but, maybe if
you had like a larger operation, you could be doing that, but no.
How do, how do we tackle this here, Mike?
how do we go about factoring in how much somebody should be paying themselves?
where do we even start with that question?
Michael Riley: it's, that is the million dollar question.
the advice that I'm, I have been given time and time again, is to pay yourself
a reasonable, small salary, whatever that may be something that's in line
with, upper management at your business, whatever that looks like to your business,
and then, take owner draws periodically.
but don't think you should go into it trying to pay yourself
some humongous and, exorbitant paycheck cuz they're, you're just.
too much in taxes.
so yeah, small base salary plus draws as needed outta the profit.
I obviously a lot of that's gonna depend on what, how much money your business
makes and how healthy it is financially.
And that's only, only, you know that, but, it should be at the end
of the day or at the end of the year, it should be more than you would,
make working for somebody else.
That's for sure.
so I'll say that, there's a lot of perks owning a business
that, that become, de facto pay.
I used to Bartter and trade everything that I could, and that's a great way to
save tax money and still get a lot of stuff that you'd otherwise pay cash for.
And that becomes income as well.
but I don't know, beyond that.
Peter Kourounis: All right, Brian, I'll come
to you.
Bryant Gillespie: first and foremost, it definitely depends on
the stage that you're at, right?
If you're a one man operation, you're doing a hundred thousand dollars in
sales, that's totally different than if you've got $2 million in revenue and
you've got 20 people working for you.
So it is very difficult for us to say, Hey, the number is 50,000 or 75,000 as a
salary or a hundred thousand or 200,000, it's not gonna be possible for us to
throw out a number that's gonna work here.
but I'm in favor of what Mike says that you gotta pay
yourself a reasonable salary.
And all too often, I talk to owners and they forget this, that and especially
if you're not just an owner, If you're involved in the day to day operations,
you've gotta pay pay yourself, a salary there, but as an owner, you should
be able to make profit on that as
Peter Kourounis: that's the answer I was looking for.
Yes.
I, 100% agree with that while we can't tell you how much you should be paying,
you have to factor in the first question.
Are you a key employee for your operation?
If you are, if you do all the design work for your business, because
you might be a graphic designer, if you do all the installs for your
wraps, because you were certified as your wrap shops, wrap installer.
If you do all the installs for your sign shop, because you enjoy being in
the bucket and installing those big exterior signs, you have to consider
yourself a paid employee for those tasks.
you have to, you can't do that work for free and just live off
the profits of your business.
You have to pay yourself a salary for the, what that role is that could be, you can
reduce your salary if you'd like to be, to make a little bit more on the profit side,
but you have to be, it has to be fair.
and just as the words that I would use in terms of that, now, if you
are an owner and that's all you do is own the business and you layered in a
general manager to run the operations.
That's a different conversation because as an owner, You can make just the profits,
the returns on the business each year and consider the owner discretionary,
the owner, discretionary expenses of the benefits of being a business owner.
And I think Mike was alluding to some of that with the bartering and
things of that nature, but you can expense almost anything you want for
personal expenses through the business.
you, your gas and being one of them.
You'll if your car payment, if you use your car for your business,
you can expense that as well.
All of those pieces are the owner benefits to.
To your business.
And I think that's something to be going into this as well, is that you
could take into all the benefits of business ownership when accounting for
what that salary should be coming in.
If you're age, if you're a passive owner, semi passive like myself,
I don't take a salary, in my shop.
I don't because I live, I'm happy just making the return on the investment, the
return to net profits and distributing that between me and my business partner.
I don't find it to be anything more because I'm not a key employee.
I'm not sitting in the shop every day.
I'm not in the shop doing installs or design work every day, putting
in 50, 40 hours a week, any longer.
That was what I was doing before.
So if you're like me, if you're a sign shop owner like myself, listening
to this, that might be your answer.
But if you are a qualified employee, Doing anything in the
shop that makes your shop run.
You have to consider yourself an employee as well and pay yourself a
fair and just, wage for that role.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah.
O otherwise, when you go to sell or exit the business, you
just shoot yourself in the foot.
Because if you try to sell to somebody who's gonna be a passive owner or, or
a semi passive owner, as you mentioned, they've gotta find somebody to replace
you, presumably, unless you're gonna continue to work in the business.
Peter Kourounis: Yeah.
And think about that.
How many shop owners do we talk to every week that are in very
infused in their operation?
If you took them out, their business doesn't exist.
So you have to be paying yourself because if you ever wanted to talk about an exit
strategy, selling your business or selling it to your partner or whatever the case
is, When you look at your profit and loss, if there's a zero next to your labor.
I, one of my first questions is how much are you paying?
How much are you getting?
And if that number is not reflected well, then your business numbers
are a little skewed and that might make it a little bit more of a
challenge to, to exit your business.
So you definitely want to include what you're paying
yourself on your books as well.
That's just a little helpful tip, little factoid there as
part of that second question.
Bryant Gillespie: I'm gonna give the, I'm gonna give the end all be all on this one.
Peter Kourounis: ahead.
Bryant Gillespie: get an expert accountant and potentially a financial advisor and
work with them to go over your numbers and
Michael Riley: Yeah.
I a hundred percent agree with that.
Do not try to figure this out for yourself.
if you own a business act like it hire a financial planner.
you just, you need to do that.
You, any business owner, who's more than minimum wage working in their business.
They've got assets that they need to protect and take care of.
And they've got tax burdens that they need to minimize and
you can't do that on your own.
I don't care how smart you think you are.
You're not a, you're not a financial expert signed guys.
So don't try to be one, hire a financial planner, hire, a good CPA
and pay them well to do what they do, cuz they're gonna make you money.
And they're gonna make sure you don't get audited.
Bryant Gillespie: we're gonna get flamed on the Facebook groups now, because you
said you can't be a financial expert and
Michael Riley: yeah.
I'm I'm sure we'll get somebody who disagrees with, but.
Good.
Good luck.
Bryant Gillespie: Okay.
All right.
I'm gonna do the intro on this next question.
This is from one of the Facebook groups, the sign shop
talk, or sign industry groups.
How can I get new leads for my sign company?
I feel like this is a huge one.
We could probably do a whole episode on this one.
the second question is what has worked well for you all.
so this is one of those ones that just man, people throw this out there
and you see like people just blasting the shotgun approach on this one.
So I'm curious to hear your guys' take
Peter Kourounis: Hey, man, I gotta tell you, these are these three questions.
These are amazing questions.
I think that they are very heavily talked about and
discussed topics in this industry.
So we recently did an episode about marketing and we talked a
little bit about how do you get your leads and things like that.
So we definitely encourage you to watch that episode.
on our marketing efforts, but what's worked well for me being that I'm a sign
shop owner and these other guys are not, one of those really interesting things is
that I really enjoy creating a strategy around the product that I want to sell.
so that includes like landing pages, press releases, articles, testimonials
from customers where we'll talk, like if I wanted to do something on,
I don't know, let's just call it.
let's see.
let me think of one.
I've done recently.
Sign service.
Okay.
Sign service.
you're fixing broken signs.
Okay.
That is a profitable service for my business.
I got a couple of bucket trucks.
I got a couple of tech missions.
I need to fix the signs that are looking decrepit in my local market.
You like that word?
Decrepit?
I like that word.
anyway.
So I created a whole strategy around.
This particular case, so to attract new business, so that included Facebook ads,
directing them to my landing page for them to fill out a form, to upload the picture
of their sign for instant quotes, paper, click ads, also, competition ads as well.
Like I'd like to piggyback off the keywords of what my competitors are
doing in this space, but it's all directing them into the funnel for which.
New leads are coming in for people that are saying, Hey, my sign's
broken and I need to get it fixed.
And how much is it to get fixed?
that's the question that you have to answer on those landing pages, but
I'm directing now in influx of new customers based off of sign service.
So I'm showing pictures of like really funny looking signs when letters are out.
I'm, I'll post up a couple in the Facebook group here.
So you could see a couple of funny ones that really make those ads
engaging, but that's been working for me to get new leads in the company.
and you could do that with almost any service, if you want to, if
you wanna specialize in real estate signs, make real estate landing pages.
If you wanna specialize in, color conversions on cars or paint correction,
or, Paint protection, whatever it is that you wanna do, you can do those as well.
Channel letters, monument signs, way finding signage, you could do
all sorts of really creative ad strategies based around directing that
to specific built out landing pages and a nice funnel into your system.
At least that's my advice on what's worked well for me lately.
Bryant Gillespie: the key for me and what you said there, Peter is you narrowed
down your focus on signed service in this instance, too many people don't qualify
that Hey, I just wanna grow my shop.
I want more customers.
And my first question is always, what kind of customers do you want?
And they're like the kind that pay the kind that have money.
I value money.
That was one of the responses.
The other day.
Other Facebook group was I value money.
I was like, well, me too.
And I want more customers.
But, when you narrow that focus down, it becomes way easier to give you something.
Action.
So just like you said, Hey, I wanna promote sign service, but
we haven't done enough of that.
Or, Hey, that's actual really profitable for us because we, make connections
with other customers that, that may have not purchased the sign from us before.
so once you narrow down that focus, it becomes really a lot easier.
So you could do that based on the service that you're trying to pitch or sell like
service or channel letters or exterior signs or, vehicle wraps, whatever that is.
You could also do that based on customers as well.
Hey, I want to work with commercial real estate agents, or I wanna work with
developers that are building condos.
I wanted to work with marketing managers at larger corporations.
and once you do that, getting those SI those leads that you want, that's the
first step, it becomes a lot easier when you know what it is you're trying to
sell or who you're trying to sell it to.
because then you can do some more research, find out you where
those marketing managers hang out, what they do, how they, how did
they go about purchasing signs?
what is that purchasing process like for that particular type of customer?
and Hey, that really informs your marketing efforts.
So then you could go after that group of people specifically, like either in
Facebook ads, as you mentioned, cold emailing, some of those people with, just
like a quick little email about, Hey, here's what we could help you guys with.
Here's some other company that we helped with.
so yeah, I think that's the first step in, in this process is narrow your focus
on what clients you wanna serve or, or what you're actually, what type of leads
Michael Riley: Yeah, that's really good advice.
Bryant.
Peter Kourounis: Yeah, let me ask you this, Brian, since you're like the
marketing guru out of the three of us, I consider you more of a marketing
expert than myself.
Maybe.
I don't know how Mike feels, but wanna make sure I give you the accolades there
Bryant Gillespie: tell my wife that I'm a guru?
I feel like she would be very
Peter Kourounis: Oh yeah.
Bryant Gillespie: to a guru.
Peter Kourounis: let me ask you this because I get the sense that we have a
ton of sign shop owners, both small and large that are doing paper, click ads.
Google ads and bunching up all their services into one ad.
Like we're a sign shop for signs.
We do interior exterior trade show, real estate.
We do car wraps, vehicle wraps, awnings channel letters, monuments,
and everything else in between.
How do you think that strategy works?
Bryant Gillespie: I, I think on some levels it probably does.
Or people wouldn't do it.
yeah.
something is better.
Something is better than nothing.
I'll start with that.
I think if you're, if you haven't, if you're not running any ads, as we talked
about, and one of the first episodes that we did, you gotta keep the faucet running.
if you're not running ads now and you start running ads, that's
better than not running ads.
Assuming you've got the budget for it.
but, I certainly think there's better approaches where, like we
just talked about that you, you should be just blanketing, Hey,
we're the most amazing sign shop.
Hey, we do everything.
we I'm of the mindset that when you, this might have been a quote from,
maybe Seth Goden or something like that.
And maybe I'm still in this from Mike, I'm not sure, but like when you
speak to everyone, you're talking to no one, that's the that's like the,
my take on marketing in a nutshell is if you're saying everybody is our,
you're gonna have a really hard time versus the shop that has narrowed down
and said, okay, we serve developers.
We make the process of selling your condo or your apartment building
twice as easy as the next guy.
and that's huge.
and then, certainly you could run ads on that you could do specific
targeting on Facebook is really good for that type of targeting.
if you are doing Google ads, you could set up those ads around those keywords.
It goes back to what your customer is actually searching for.
But, yeah, I think that's the way to approach it instead of just shotgun
blasting, random ads for we do everything,
Michael Riley: And let's not forget too, like the value of just like human face to
face networking as well, which I think is ignored a lot with, the rise of internet
marketing and click per pay or pay per click ads and everything like that.
But.
just go interface with people that are, are your market.
And I'm, I have mixed emotions about most networking groups, like BNI type
groups and stuff like that, where you've got, 15 people sitting around a
table in the morning and one of 'em is a dentist and one of 'em is a realtor.
And one of they're gonna generate some leads for you, but they're
not gonna be very targeted leads.
And like Brian said, I it's you're putting yourself in those groups and
telling 'em that you're everything to everybody all the time, which really
just makes you nothing and nobody.
but there are much more targeted ways to network with people that you can really
get in the door with the industries and clients that you wanna serve.
if you do a lot of say hospital signage and ADA sign packages for large
commercial buildings or office buildings, things like that, like there are.
There are groups specifically for building owners and, property managers and
building managers and things like that.
And if you cultivate relationships in groups like that, you, that becomes a
really great referral network for you for the type of work that you wanna do.
it takes a long time though.
I think that's the problem with a lot of that face to face type networking is it's,
there's not a, not an immediate return on it, cuz you're building a relationship
with somebody you need to prove to these people that they can trust you and that
you can live up to, their expectations.
and when you've proven yourself, then they become an amazing source of leads.
They become a lead generator for you.
They're happy client is a better salesperson than, your own salesperson,
a hundred percent of the time.
approaching your clients like that and your networking efforts like that?
I think really goes a long way towards, creating a built in lead
generator without having to do a whole lot of work outside of be present.
Bryant Gillespie: Oh, sorry.
I missed what
Michael Riley: look like a deer in headlights.
Bryant Gillespie: Oh yeah.
My wife came in.
Peter Kourounis: heard that we called you a guru and was like, who are these idiots?
Bryant Gillespie: I think something else that Mike said
there is really key as well.
Is there whether you're running ads or, doing face to face networking,
making cold calls, cold, whatever.
there are no shortcuts to doing, to being successful at generating new leads.
there's some things have a quicker return than others, but to do it well
and be successful with it, it takes time.
don't go into any of these strategies thinking you're gonna turn around
and get a hundred leads by spending a hundred dollars on Facebook ads
or that you're gonna go to one networking event and come away with a
hundred thousand dollars in business.
it's just not how it works.
Peter Kourounis: Yeah, you gotta keep at it.
You have to keep pushing.
It's gotta be part of your everyday routine.
It's gotta be part of your monthly strategy bus, hiring a business
development managers and other opportunity that's worked really
well for us is somebody that's being the face of your business.
And.
Going out and introducing some introducing yourself to some
companies and things of that nature.
But one thing that's actually really well done well with us with that
service angle is that it really does get you in front of business owners
with a, in a warm lead kind of way.
Like their sign is broken.
They know it is and where they're, we're coming there to help them fix it.
And then that often leads to conversations about new signage or valuing the
repair versus getting something new.
And also the other services that we can then, sell this customer.
So if you're not doing service, I find it to be very lucrative.
If that's something that also, you guys want to jump into there, this was
Bryant Gillespie: don't wanna jump into science service.
Peter Kourounis: I don't wanna jump into, I didn't wanna jump into it either
until I found out how profitable it was.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah.
one tactic that I've got for that.
Now, maybe I've said this on one of the other episodes.
I'm not sure where I picked this up, but if you wanna do service.
and you're looking for more leads, find somebody's kid that's 16 that
just got a license offer to pay them X amount per lead that they generate.
They drive around, go find signs that are broken.
Take a picture of it.
Note the address, try to get contact info, set them up like a simple
job form or something like that.
Peter Kourounis: Yeah, we call those people night Watchers and,
and we pay them and we pay them a dollar, a photo, a dollar of
Bryant Gillespie: a dollar of photo.
Peter Kourounis: of submiss submission.
They can, if they go around often enough, believe it or.
The people that are also doing night watch for me are also Uber
drivers, Uber, each drivers, or Uber
Bryant Gillespie: Ah,
yeah, there you go.
Peter Kourounis: so we, some of them, I pay them $2 if they're not doing them
as frequently, but if they drove five miles, they might find 20 signs that
are broken and get paid $20 or $40.
It's really great little, side hustle that we've created with our night watch team.
And yes, they're often very young, new drivers, just looking
to make a good, whatever.
However many they submit is how much they make.
then we call them in the morning we schedule appointments and we're
out doing service the next day.
Little great tip there.
Bryant Gillespie: Love it.
Love it.
I like this format guys.
I think it was a great episode.
Great questions.
Peter Kourounis: me too.
Keep those questions coming.
Bryant Gillespie: If you have questions for us, you'd like them to
be answered on the podcast by a guru.
everybody wants to be a guru.
Honestly, I don't call me a guru.
I don't.
I take that back.
You could tell my wife I'm a guru though.
that looks good for me.
Uh, but, uh, if, if you've got questions, you'd like the three of
us to answer on the podcast, email us at Hey, better sign, shop.com again.
That's Hey, better sign.
shop.com.
Shall we get into, rapid takeaways?
Peter Kourounis: There's three questions.
There's three of us.
We'll take one of us for each takeaway for each question.
Okay.
How's that sound?
Bryant Gillespie: Mayor MC cheese
Michael Riley: minimums.
Think about how you present your minimums to your customer and consider just
charging what you should for a sign.
Instead of telling a customer you've gotta charge 'em a minimum and see if it.
Presents an opportunity to make a happy customer and sell more signs.
All
right.
how much should you be paying yourself as the owner of a sign shop?
Peter.
Peter Kourounis: 1 million?
Michael Riley: That's why I chose
Peter Kourounis: No, no, no, no.
Michael Riley: you.
Did it
Peter Kourounis: I had to do it.
I had to throw it in there.
Give him my, give him my, give him my impression, how
much you be charging yourself.
Listen, you guys gotta look at what you're doing in your jobs and make a just and
fair assessment of what that is valued at as your business take into account.
Some of the other pieces, how much you're able to expense.
And some of the other benefits of being an owner like Mike said, consider the
draw a low salary, a draw each week as a really great opportunity there.
But also like we all said here consult with a CPA, a financial advisor,
financial planner on having you help or helping you make those, those
final decisions there Bryant the
marketing guy.
I didn't call you a
guru.
The marketing guy,
Bryant Gillespie: I appreciate that.
How can I get new leads for my signed company?
Narrow down your focus, narrow down your focus, pick the customers you
wanna serve that will inform how you go about getting those new leads.
It is as simple as that.
Peter Kourounis: Very good.
Bryant Gillespie: If you like the podcast, definitely check out our mastermind group.
You could find that on the website, better sign, shop.com, poke around.
You'll find it.
we've also got a Facebook group for shop owners.
It's exclusively for shop owners.
we've gotta answer some questions before we let you in.
We do AMAs there with experts.
We've got a group chat with all the owners.
There, there are no topics that are off limits pricing is allowed.
and there's some other deep discussions that we go into that
obviously I cannot talk about here.
It's all top secret stuff.
Check us out.