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Actionable growth hacks to help architects improve their sales, marketing, and social media skills.
Alexander: getting that eight hours
of business development every week
will be challenging, of course.
Tyler: That is Alexander Buckridge
who just launched his own architecture
firm, Studio Bucky, a few weeks ago.
In this episode, we dive into the
nitty gritty of running a solo
architecture practice, including
how to manage a sales pipeline,
Alexander: I need to start
building up because, next few
months here, I want to be getting
moving.
Tyler: plus how to scale and
delegate workload effectively.
Alexander: And I think it's just
interesting as you start to go through the
steps, where is it necessary to bring that
in for that bit of like focused support
Tyler: Then we end on a strategy
for overcoming client hesitations
with a low cost, high value offer.
Alexander: I think it's just
more figuring out how to.
how adapt my services
to different situations?
Tyler: Let's talk about building pipeline.
Yes.
Alexander: falls.
Let's say next week, dad decides not to
do this or many variables that always
happen in, in, in business and whatnot.
And perhaps, just not the
right fit, whatever it's back.
No, it's not back to the drawing board.
ultimately this was a seven day
exercise, but, again, I need to
start building up because, next few
months here, I want to be getting
moving.
Tyler: So let's think about this.
I think generally at a certain point,
you actually at the very beginning you
want some version of a CRM, Customer
Relationship Management Platform, right?
Now at the very beginning at your stage
like that might just be a spreadsheet
And I think you've already shown me one
like you already have one of people Yeah,
or Notion is a perfect example, right?
It can work in Notion too.
HubSpot, I think you know In terms
of all the CRMs that I've worked
with, I think HubSpot is probably the
easiest, simplest, easy to plug in.
It's a little bit more user friendly.
Alexander: Did you put that in
your most one of your more recent
Tyler: I did.
no, I did.
I did mention it, as a
good CRM to start with.
And so I think that's a good one to begin
with, but yeah, notion, anything, what
it is, the important thing with that
is that you have a database to go into
and see the stage of each relationship.
And there's two different pipelines
that you want to be focused on.
There is.
A lead pipeline, right?
And then there's your sales pipeline.
And the difference between them
is your lead pipeline are people
that might have projects for you.
These are relationships that you
want to continue to nurture, or they
might have, a way into a project at
some point, and so you're continuing
to nurture those relationships.
At the moment that it becomes evident
that there is an opportunity, that
there is an actual project being done.
That's when it then moves
over to the sales pipeline.
And it's like almost the sales cycle.
It's there's the discovery process,
there's the proposal process, there's
the negotiation stage, and then there's,
did you win it or did you lose it?
And those are generally the stages,
but those are the two different, like
they really are two different pipelines
that you have to manage and there's
conversion rates to all of them.
It's almost how, what percentage
of people in your lead pipeline
eventually turn into an opportunity.
And then once you start an
opportunity, what percentage of,
Projects that get to the proposal
phase, do you end up winning, right?
That might be like
25 percent or something.
And so you begin to get yourself in a
position where you can forecast, literally
from your lead pipeline, you can begin to
understand, okay, I literally need, I need
100 people in my lead pipeline at once
because I know that 5 percent of those are
going to transition into an opportunity.
And out of those opportunity
out of those opportunities, 25
percent of them are going to win.
And my average contract value
is, 50, 000 or 100, 000,
Alexander: yeah, you can forecast roughly
Tyler: yeah, you can get a revenue
forecast and that's all it is right now.
but it is a way to plan.
And it's almost, I think if I would
guess that if most like solo architects.
Did this at this point?
They'd be a little terrified, right?
They realize they don't have much revenue
forecast much revenue pipeline So I
think that's why just like putting it out
and realizing, there's a decent amount
like There's definitely a quantity play
here where you need to Be nurturing
a certain amount of relationships and
for those leads for the lead pipeline
that might just be checking in once a
month or, I think we've talked about
this before, but like probably 20, you
probably want 20 percent of your time
after projects get going, you probably
want to devote 20 percent of your
time to business development still.
especially until you I shouldn't
actually, I take that back.
I was going to say until you.
Find yourself with, the three projects
and you're full, but you actually
probably shouldn't stop then either,
because that's how you make the
mistake that most architects make
where finish your projects and then you
actually don't have a warm pipeline.
you don't have a full pipeline
and you've got to restart again.
So always be devoting about 20 percent
of your time, at the beginning,
until you have more opportunities,
you're probably spending more of your
time on that lead pipeline, right?
So you're checking in maybe
once a month, you're going in.
You know once a week and you're saying
here's the ten people I'm going to reach
out to this week I'm gonna focus on these
people I'm going to try to get like I want
a real answer like do they have a project
do they not have a project Do they know
someone that has a project or do they not
know someone that has a project, right?
I'm gonna really focus on those
relationships this week And so yeah,
just having a way to manage it having
a way to see it I think is the most
important thing but like those are the
things you want to lean into and then
obviously You The second you hear about
a project that kind of becomes your
priority as a solo architect, right?
And if you hear about an opportunity,
you want to be leaning into those.
Now, at the same time, you've
definitely like the higher priority
always is going to be anything
that's in your sales pipeline, right?
So the distillery project, the developer
project, those are higher priorities
than anything that's happening in your
leads right now, because those are the
closest to the money, so to say, right?
Like those are like, there's.
There's scope to be had there.
There's revenue to be made.
on your part, there's
problems to be solved.
there's an actual project.
And so it's easy.
I think when they're in that sales
pipeline and the project isn't moving
forward, it's easy to forget about them.
But those are really like,
those are your warmest ones.
And I think your goal with any of
those is always going to be to get
to a decision as soon as possible.
You want to keep that sales cycle I
don't want to say as short as possible,
but you want it to be healthy, right?
Like you don't want your sales cycle
to be 90 days for you as a solo art.
that's just too long from the time that
you have your first discussion and you
learn that there's a project at the time
where they on average signed the contract.
Like for you, I'm assuming you
probably want to be closer to 30.
you want this process to
happen within a month, right?
And so
your goal is probably always be
to shorten that in a sense, right?
and, keep the project moving
forward and understand what their
timeline is and at least get,
you want to get a decision made.
So I think that's your goal
with the distillery and the
development project too.
Like you, you don't want to be
hopeful for something that's
not going to fall into place.
you want to be able to plan for
something that is going to happen.
so
Alexander: No, that's great.
it's helpful to put a
bit more timelines on it.
Cause I feel like previously you could
just put an endless, yeah, time on it.
and sometimes it's just
people just not being direct.
It's just having a direct
conversation and saying, look.
Is there something here tangible
to do, to a certain degree
and for me to help you with?
and if not, that's okay.
Let's, let's maybe this is not the
right opportunity and let's move on
it's the mental, it's the everything.
It's the emotional, it's the mental.
It's you're, there's a lot going
on there that you're keeping this
in the back of your head as someone
that you need to connect with,
that you're someone you could
potentially go and do something with.
And, as we all know,
we've got a lot going on.
So I guess that's all part of
the sales management process.
Tyler: It is part of it.
And I think the thing that you have every,
I think every solo architect kind of has
this in their, every firm, really, I don't
think they play into it enough, but you
have the scarcity play, which is great.
scarcity is such a powerful, cognitive
bias that you have at your disposal
because, you have a threshold in
terms of how, like you, everyone
has a threshold in terms of the time
that they can devote to projects.
And so for you, figure out what
that is, however many hours
you're willing to work a week.
If that is 40, then you want to
make sure that, you basically have
32 hours a week to devote to work
because you want to leave eight
hours for business development.
Alexander: Yeah, that's
Tyler: Right.
And so make sure you're taking
that into account when you do it.
But, you have that scarcity play when
you're having these conversations
to be like, I really only have
space for one more project.
So I'm just trying to understand if
this is something that makes sense
right now, or if it's something that
we should revisit, next year instead.
Alexander: Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, that's even better when you're
trying to get to that tail end of
those pipeline discussions is look,
as we were saying with some followups,
I think one or two more meetings
is fine, but I think eventually it
could be more towards that of look,
I think, I can only take on so much.
And yeah, three to four is I
think where I'm at max right now.
We're keeping that eight hours
for business development.
That long we're happy.
Thought about the marketing side of
things where I have made a big push
on that obviously recently But I also
want to keep certain things moving, and
keep awareness and engagement active
Tyler: Yeah, absolutely.
And it's tough.
You've got to wear so many hats right
You've got to wear, you've got
to wear all the hats right now.
And
Alexander: Listen, and listen, once I
can start getting some cash flow in,
I've already thought about, building
remote teams and all that stuff.
And That's a whole conversation
for us to have, potentially is not
a, entire thing about that because
I've already had reached out.
It's an interesting subject.
Tyler: the remote workforce is,
the world has obviously gone
global in terms of everything.
all of the products that we get
are from all over the world.
And, there's definitely, I think, it's
a bit more of a taboo subject here in
the U S in terms of going global with
your workforce or going remote, the
fact is that there's talent all over the
world you shouldn't, limit yourself to.
just one, one location, really.
the goal should always be to find the
best fit for your company and for your
services, and that will provide the most
value to your team and your clients.
Really.
So
Alexander: That's it.
And so
as things start to, progress for
myself, with a couple of these
projects coming in and me wanting
to, Put myself on more value work.
And then that is meeting, getting
people in, building the pipeline,
all that stuff, it's about,
delegating that out to potentially,
remote teams and stuff like that.
So that, cause I, right now, as
you're a startup, you need to
keep lean and, you want to keep
the expenses as low as possible.
And so, you know, there's a lot of play
there, but I feel like that's the way you
can get from, you can grow the business
seeing it with a few friends of mine that
are a few steps ahead, you know, let's
say three projects come on and I'm, doing
all of them, some help with a contractor
or something, freelance, whatnot, you
just get caught up in this cycle for
about, a year of getting through the
work and the paperwork's just building.
And at the same time, it's Is you're,
then you come out the other end.
So I'm just trying to preempt this
kind of journey that's, I'm going to go
on and how to start to have something
in it, some team that's working that
works for me, that understands, a bit
about my process and, can be there
and I feel is like effective, right?
Tyler: Yeah.
this is 1000 percent one of the
largest mistakes that I made when
I was running, my design studio.
Is that I was doing everything and I never
delegated, I never brought on extra help.
And that was a mistake
because I hate doing CDs.
I hate doing CD sets.
Like just, I don't, that is not
something that brings me joy.
And I just, pushed myself through it.
And I think that for sure
led to the burnout for me.
It was doing all aspects
of the project when.
in reality, that just wasn't
like, the technical part is
not something that I love.
that's not an aspect of architecture
that I ever found that appealing.
and so it was always a trudge
for me to get through that.
And when it comes to delegation, I forget
there, there's a few different models
for it, but there was one that I recently
heard about, when I was in a group,
like cohort call and it was essentially,
it was like four quadrants, right?
But there's things that you're good at.
There's, the dichotomy is like,
things that you're good at and things
that you're not good at, right?
And then there's things that you like to
do and things that you don't like to do.
things that you're good at and
things that you like to do, best
case, that is the best quadrant,
you want to maintain those things.
But the first things that you want
to start to delegate are the things
that you're not good at and the
things that you don't like to do.
So if you have that quadrant
set up for all of the work
that you do, and you have those
four
quadrants, things I like to do, things
I'm good at, things I like to do, but I'm
not good at things I don't like to do, but
I'm good at and things I don't like to do.
And I'm bad at that bottom quadrant,
that's the first one you want to tackle.
Delegate that out immediately.
And so for me, like I'm now able
to do that now, because for me
immediately I'm running my own business.
Bookkeeping and accounting.
Alexander: to
Tyler: at it.
Don't like to do it.
See you later.
that was the first thing I delegated.
yeah, so that framework has been
really helpful for me to think through.
And I, so I think that's a really
good one to think about as you begin
to scale, I think it's easy to get.
It's probably the hardest
thing when you start to scale.
Like when do I hire?
What do I hire for?
What should I do?
I think if you lean on yourself,
especially since you're small,
like you should be leaning on
your mental capacity a little bit.
So don't feel so bogged down by
the common titles of architecture.
That's like, do I need a designer?
Do I need a project manager?
Do I need this?
So no, don't think about that.
Think about think about that quadrant.
What are the things that I need to get
off of my plate that I don't enjoy doing?
Alexander: 100 percent drafting technical
person straight in through the sets.
know, it's very time consuming.
Very time consuming.
Tyler: And you, know, for you, I
can already tell you definitely,
you enjoy the chase, right?
You enjoy building the relationships
and you obviously enjoy the conceptual
design, or you wouldn't have worked at
Snarkitecture for so many years, right?
and running, their studio.
So I think, those are the things that
you want to maintain and you want to
start delegating out those other things.
sustainable for you to do so?
Alexander: yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think that's just an interesting
part of what I'm thinking about as
pre planning potentially if something
did come on in the next two weeks,
look, I have the tools, I have the
tools to execute the entire thing
with, sacrifice around other things.
Of course.
all hands on deck for the project.
It will be, getting that eight hours
of business development every week
will be challenging, of course.
But
at the same time, you know, if I do
need, of course, like anything, we've.
Work with different people.
There's always people you can
call upon and all that stuff.
And I think it's just interesting as
you start to go through the steps,
where is it necessary to bring that in
for that bit of like focused support,
or selective, and I can carry the
certain amounts of it and everything.
So it's just something I'm definitely
considering and having some conversations
around at the moment around what that
looks like and getting ahead of it
and not like last minute panicking
to try and get someone in, Yeah.
Yeah.
Tyler: let's back up really quick
and go back to the pipeline building
just for a moment, because I was
just thinking about something.
I realized, yes, I had just written
about HubSpot, because I was
writing about sequencing, Sequences,
which is something I think we've
lightly discussed, but, yeah.
So it was around sequencing.
And so those warm emails that
you sent, You already got a
great reply, right on the.
90 or so emails that you sent.
So you said you got 10 or 15, I don't know
what happened with those other replies.
It sounds like one turned into an
opportunity, but those other ones, I
don't know if those are conversations
that are continuing or if it was
just more like a support, like, Hey,
great to hear, glad you're excited.
there's still 70 other people
that maybe didn't respond.
Alexander: There's two other
calls that I have today.
get, one is about an apartment in London
Tyler: Okay.
Alexander: and the other one
is, I'm not sure what that is.
but, I definitely want to just pick your
brain at the end about this London thing.
Tyler: Oh, cool.
Okay.
Yeah.
Let's do that in a second,
but I would just say, yeah.
Bounce back to those.
Sequencing, just for a quick run, is
you need more than one message, right?
On average, it actually takes
eight touchpoints before you
can get that initial meeting
with someone, based on studies.
So touchpoints can be an email, it can
be a LinkedIn message, it can be a phone
call, it can be these different things.
And this is specifically, if you're
working backwards from cold outreach
for you, for warm outreach, it should
probably just a little bit shorter.
but you should consider that kind
of sequencing with your warm email.
One email going to be enough as we found
out for 75 percent of people, right?
So a quick followup, that's just
something like, Hey, any thoughts or,
Hey, just want to make sure you saw this.
Just a one sentence email.
And maybe that's, 10 of them
that you're sending a day.
Hey, curious if you have any thoughts,
right now could be good and you'll
probably get another, trickle in there.
You'll get more responses for
sure, but you'll get, maybe there's
one or two other opportunities
that are hiding in plain sight.
You just want to make sure that you're
following up and warming those up for you.
let's talk about London.
Yeah.
Alexander: Yeah.
So someone reached out, cause a
lot of stuff I've been sharing
recently and everything.
And I will get more into.
Moving on to kind of design and
projects and stuff, in terms of
what visually I'm sharing, but, they
reached out about, do I work there?
Blah, blah, blah.
And I said, can, and yes.
And so I'm getting on a call, discovery
call around an apartment that they
bought and that they're renovating.
I think it's just more
figuring out how to.
how adapt my services to
situate different situations?
I, obviously it's just going
to be a discovery call.
It's going to be figuring out what it
is and it's early days, but I think
for certain people, I've started
to think about, is there a lighter
engagement services that you can offer
that hey, maybe this person only has.
The ability to do a week's of
work, you know, like maybe I can
only do a week with this person
or put together a smaller package.
I'm just thinking of if there's smaller
ways of engaging people in, or maybe that
work is not worthwhile going after it.
It's a separate thing now, but anyway,
I don't know what this is, where this
is leading, but it just got me thinking
about offering, my service offerings.
And can they, do a day with me or
can you do, lighter engagements.
Tyler: Yes, all of this, you have to
be careful with yourself right now
being right.
So I think you do have to define,
this is you figuring it out right now.
you have to be careful about
the high quantity, low, revenue.
things that you're
doing, I think, because I think
that's like a quick way to burn
out, but I actually call these,
low cost, high value offers.
And they're like foot in the door
packages that you can put together if
you find yourself You know, I wouldn't
do it unless you get a clear indication
from your market But this is now the
second this is now the second kind of
residential project in europe that's come
your way and in the last month or so and
so I do think you know having an ear out
for what those issues are and it'll be
important to be mindful of What it is
that people are looking for because maybe
there is kind a low cost high value offer
and the point of a low cost high value
offer isn't A one and done situation.
It's just a foot in the door, right?
It's to overcome that initial hesitancy
that for example, residential clients
will usually have, because they're
less used to, how this process
works And so they might be more
hesitant to make a large investment
up front or something like that.
So low cost, high value offer is just.
It's a way for you to do what is, a
relatively simple and easy process for
you, but it offers them a lot of value.
So that's like a concept
design package for example.
It could be something like that.
that they pay for, 5, 000 or something.
And that includes you flying out, or
maybe it probably had to be higher
than that, 10, 000 or something
that includes you flying out.
And then you put together a concept
with a certain amount of renderings
and these different things.
And if they want to move forward,
then they even get a discount,
you know, if they do choose
to move forward with the rest
of the project or something like
that, And so I think, that's
generally the way I would treat it.
I think you want to avoid setting
yourself up for one off things where
it's like, Oh, I'm just trying to get.
I'm trying to get 10, 10
people to pay me 10, 000.
because that's a, lot of, that's
a lot of, management for you.
But whatever that number is I think you
have to decide like what's the minimum
amount that you can accept right now to
take your attention away from all the
other things that you're working on.
And my guess is that probably
is somewhere around 10 right.
for a
Alexander: think, I think
the 10 is about you.
were to add in like a couple of weeks of a
concept, and then the back and forth, and
then going potentially over as part of the
Tyler: you want to give some
padding on those things.
And I think, that's
something to think about.
Again, I wouldn't do it necessarily yet.
but just start being mindful of
that off or giving them a foot in
the door, for residential projects.
Just something smaller that makes
it easier for them to say yes to
Alexander: that's helpful.
It's just something I'm thinking about
as other things come in lighter requests
and having just a solution to Hey, look
for X, I can do this and, we can meet up
and go through this and you have this.
So I think that's just helpful.
Tyler: yeah, you have the entire
Growth Detect community rooting you on
we're here recording whatever episode
Alexander: appreciate that.
hopefully there's a positive outcome
in the next episode or two around
this, I think that's the, it's
the best thing we can get here.