Lead Generation for Video Business

Perry:            Hi, Perry Lawrence here, Mr. Video from AskMrVideo, with another in-depth interview with an industry professional. I've got my good friend Thomas Roberts here. We're clandestinely hidden away in a lakefront undisclosed location shooting some amazing films with another bunch of folks. We've just been having a great time.

                       One thing I noticed right off the bat from speaking with Thomas and learning more about his business is that he loves film and love video. He loves what he's doing but even more importantly, he's got a great business head about him. He knows how to generate leads and clients for his business.

                       I don't care whether you're somebody who is using video as a profession, whether you're using video in your marketing, or whether video is a small or large part of your business, Thomas is really going to talk to us today about what I feel a lot of creative types (I'm raising my hand...) miss and that is a solid business sales funnel approach to your business.                  Thomas, welcome to the show.

Thomas:            Hey, Perry. Thanks for having me. This is an outstanding location. I have to tell that you picked an incredible place for us to do the shoot this weekend.

Perry:            We had fun. It's just pretty much Mayberry R.F.D., isn't it?

Thomas:            It is...with some great food, some great steaks, and some outstanding wine.

Perry:            There you go. Some amazing talent we got to shoot as well.

Thomas:            Absolutely.

Perry:            Would that be a fair assessment what I just laid out? Creative types love video and gear and they love what they do but they have no clue when it comes to actually running a business. Would that be correct? Or let me put it this way...somebody says: Hey, can you shoot a video for me? They say: Hey, yeah. They do it and then that's hit or miss.

Thomas:            Absolutely. I have a business partner and I'll tell you about what we do. We meet once, twice, or three times a week and we review a sales funnel. We know what's coming into place. We know who we've talked to, and we know what sort of strategies we need to implement for the next 30-60 days because our goal is to close business and have a regular monthly income from our video business.

                       Now my experience is I've been doing medical sales since 1992 right out of college. I worked for a couple of fantastic companies. In 2005 I got the proverbial pink check with an 'atta boy, we're moving your business group to another part of the world.'

                       With that in mind, we just felt very inspired to do the entrepreneurial thing and with our sales experience (there is a big difference between sales and marketing), we started our business.

                       My business partner and I will get together 3 times a week and sit down and discuss our prospects, our leads, and our strategies to close business. I'll share with you a little bit about that today.

Perry:            It sounds like a whole lot of work. You're talking to a bunch of creative types...videographers...and you're talking about sales leads, sales funnels, and that sounds a little bit like business for us. While you have a lot of great background in this, it does sound like you've put together a system. Do you think you could make that system palatable for us creative types who break out in hives when it comes time to write a check?

Thomas:            Look, I'm a creative type, too. I just discovered that if you don't have a process in place, if you don't have serious methodology, you're not going to get paid on a regular basis. I think everybody wants to get paid. I always tell people that I have a beautiful wife to clothe and two kids to feed, so that's my motivation.

Perry:            Awesome...and the more kids you have, the more motivated you get, right?

Thomas:            Yeah, we're done...totally done.

Perry:            It does sound like you have a system in place that you follow? Share a little bit about that with maybe setting us up with some fundamental sales principles. Take us into your sales funnel and if you don't mind, I'd really love for you to share some of your scripts that you have when you do some calling on new clients and how you generate some new business. That's good stuff no matter what you sell.

                       That's just really great stuff...identifying your market and who the contact is in that market or that industry...in other words, who is the keeper of the keys, then who signs the checks. Talk a little bit about how you do things.

Thomas:            Sure. Let me give you a couple of scenarios. I've done some recent videos last year with a couple of local airports. What I did was create some great content. We produced some web video. I went to the airports and found out who the key decision makers were and that's important.

                       You need to identify the person who really has the money to play with. Depending on your sector, depending on if you're working with a small business, you want to find out simply if you want to do business with me, we need to have some video made. How soon do you need to have this done? Secondly, how will I get paid?

                       You can answer those questions very quickly by asking them a very simple question: Are you budgeted this year to do a project? By simply answering that, you can pretty much weed out 50-75% of the people you talk to. Gee, I just wanted to get some pricing. Maybe you could do it for us for free? How many times have you heard that?

Perry:            Man, I am super guilty of doing a few too many favors. But no, seriously, there's a lot of work down the road. You do this one for free and you'll be on fat city! It never ever pans out that way.

Thomas:            Absolutely...100% never pans out. I had a call just a couple of weeks ago from a great organization...a great couple of guys...and they wanted me to come and spend a half day with them and bring a lot of business cards and  I was sure to get a lot of deals.

                       I emailed them back and said: Look guys, here's my half day rate. You have to keep the favors and the business...once people identify you as a serious business person, plus on the creative side you're going to really make progress with your business.

Perry:            Wait, back up. That's a key thing that you said right there. You're saying that by presenting yourself as a solid business man that has boundaries and has some day rates and some no favor policy, your business will improve?

Thomas:            Absolutely....200%. It just takes a few daily keys. I'm not saying going out and spending 12 hours every day to do sales. You just need to set aside time every day 6 days a week. Why do I say 6 days a week? If you do this methodology 6 days a week for the next 30-45 days, you will have a sales funnel. You will have sales coming in and people begging to do business with you.

Perry:            Awesome. It still sounds a little bit like work, but if you can make this push button, step by step easy...Again, I don't mind work but sometimes as creative types we get overwhelmed with the details of the work. If it's a paint by numbers approach, we can...Hey, we've all sat down at an edit suite or cranked out videos all day or done whatever it is that we love to do because we know the process, we know the routine.

                       If you can share with us a routine, Thomas, we would forever be in your debt.

Thomas:            Sure. Let's start out with a basic simple approach. You have to have your business card call. You have to be able to say: This is what I do. I'm Thomas Roberts. I'm a web film maker and this is what I do. You have to reduce that to 30 seconds.

                       From that you're going to start to elevate that to the more elaborate sales pitch. Let's call it your elevator pitch. If you're meeting with a decision maker in an elevator and you want to tell them all about you, you've got to be able to narrow that down to 30 seconds.

                       What I tell people is you can cold call. We'll talk about that. What is it? What's the sales funnel? How do I determine if that sales is legitimate or not?

                       Let's talk about the first thing...the sales funnel. It's not as complicated as it sounds. You want to make X amount of dollars. Let's say we want to make $500 a week. We need to figure out how many deals we need to talk to to get to that sales goal. This is called the proverbial numbers game.

                       When I was doing professional sales prior to my business - and I consider that part of what I do now- we had to have X amount of contacts that we would talk to. From those contacts we would be able to say: You know what? I'm able to identify some warm leads...meaning people who are interested in doing business with us.

                       What you're doing is filtering down the large number systems to a narrow group of people who want to do business with you. You're going to ask a couple of very simple questions. I mentioned earlier #1: Do you have a budget? #2: What do you need? How can we help you?

                       From there I would highly suggest that the initial consultation you do and I really suggest you present yourself as the business consultant or a film or media consultant. Hey look, guys, this is what I do. I'm a web video specialist.

                       From there set up the parameters. Set up what you're going to do in the initial discussions with your clients. That way they're thinking you're going to produce Star Wars for them and you're just going to produce a simple YouTube video. You can see the disparity. It happens very simple.

                       You have to be able to have a good reel. You have to have some great business skills. When I say great business skills...you need to follow up. A lot of great creative people don't follow up. I'll tell you when you get emails from clients, a simple 'thanks' or 'thank you' will pay dividends in the end.

Perry:            Alright, so we've talked about identifying who you need to talk to. You need to be savvy about that. You need to present yourself as a business man. I love what you said. A lot of us- me included- I'm a video specialist or I'm a videographer or I shoot video.

                       That can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people but you actually said something that was interesting...a media consultant. That just rings a whole lot better and probably translates to whatever business you're approaching a whole lot better because now it's a little bit wider brush that they can paint the picture with.

Thomas:            What I suggest you guys do is your research. Go on their website and find out who their competition is and sort of establish that everybody in different levels of corporate America has a title. You want to resonate your title even though we're all video guys...we hold cameras, shoot, edit, and deliver. That's fundamentally what we do.

                       You want to present yourself as some sort of consultant. You've got some special abilities and matrix that to what they're doing. Fit an ABC to what they're doing.

                       I'm client #1. I need a video. #2: I need it done in 30 days. #3: This is what my budget is.

                       I'm telling you this is very simple. If you spend the time with each client to determine what their needs are and what you can deliver and establish some good pricing, you'll close more business.

Perry:            About the numbers game. I'm fairly familiar with that. You talk to 100 people and 10 are interested. You qualify 2 out of that. Is that pretty much it?

Thomas:            Correct. It will vary where you are.

Perry:            The industry you're in...the product you're selling? Exactly.

Thomas:            What I have is an inside sales person.

Perry:            What does that mean? We've all heard inside/outside. What is the distinction there?

Thomas:            Because she's so beautiful I keep her inside. No, I'm kidding. That's a term that's used in the field I was in. It's someone who basically does telemarketing but at a more sophisticated level. What you need to do is prep that person to call and ask for very specific questions about your company and what you do and what you're able to offer.

Perry:            As a business man I can do that myself. I could dedicate a certain amount of time. For example, it will take me ...make 10 calls a day. I'll hit my 100 in 10 days. Out of those I'll have 2 great leads that will be paying me $5,000 plus each.

Thomas:            Correct. It's that simple.

Perry:            Really?

Thomas:            Really. What you need to do is you need to sort of be aggressive with it and determine initially if people are really serious or if they're just kicking the tires. You'll get a lot of that. That's just the nature of the game but if you ask some pretty simple and straightforward questions, you'll be able to determine not only is this my decision maker, I now know who the person is who's going to sign my check.

Perry:            So now that little bit of work sounds like it's worth it, doesn't it? It's all about return on investment. Talking to 100 people sounds outrageous but if you chunk it to 10 a day and in 2 weeks you're going to have 10 grand? I think we can all get behind that idea.

Thomas:            That's very doable. It might sound crazy but it's very doable. Let me give you a very simple golden tip. Everybody has a kitchen timer in your house. If you don't have one, go out and buy one and set it for 60 minutes. You're going to allot 60 a day to start out.

                       I'm going to include getting on the phone, calling, and then you're going to get a lot of rejections. Don't make this personal. It's not about you. It's not about your ability. People are busy.

                       You need to be able to distinguish when they're ready to talk to you. My previous manager from my previous industry would always say: People are ready to buy when they're ready to buy. You just have to hit them at that sweet spot.

                       The more calls you make, the percentages of people you're going to contact will be greater.

Perry:            Now the more calls I make I'm guessing I'll get smoother and my close rate will go higher.

Thomas:            Correct. What I teach my people is a very simple script. Introduce yourself.

Perry:            Let's do a little bit of role playing.

Thomas:            Sure.

Perry:            Let's say you're trying to drum up new business. I'm in a particular industry. You give me a call and we'll do a little role playing here.  Ring...Hello.

Thomas:            Hi. Is this Perry Lawrence?

Perry:            It is.

Thomas:            Hey, Perry, this is Thomas with TR Imaging. How are you?

Perry:            I'm really good. How are you, Thomas?

Thomas:            I know you're busy but 2 quick questions. Are you able to set up a quick meeting with me? I'm a video professional here in the area and I understand you have a couple conferences coming up that we'd like to talk to you about our services. Could we set up something?

Perry:            Yeah, I'm pretty busy. I do have a couple of conferences coming up. I'm not sure we're going to be using video with that.

Thomas:            Let me tell you what. Can I get your email and shoot you a couple of links to follow up with you so I can at least show you about our business and what we can offer as far as a quick live demo?

Perry:            That would be fantastic.

Thomas:            Great. Could I get your email address and a cell phone? Here's what I'm going to do, Perry. I'll call you back in about a week, okay? So next Thursday I'll give you a call?

Perry:            That would be great.

Thomas:            Thanks, man. Have a great day.

                       Okay, 3 things I've got. I've got his email. I've told him I'm going to follow up with him. That's key, guys. That is critical key. That's the money right there. There are so many people who call who don't follow up.

                       Here's my little golden tip: Not only are you going to follow up, you're actually going to take the initiative because you've already done some research about this company as I mentioned before. You're going to make the effort to go out to that company and stop by and drop off a business card just so this guy knows you're serious.

                       Everybody gets email. It's easy to ignore email so 2 things...You're going to send the link with a quick email saying: This is Thomas from TR Imaging. I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to talk to me. Here's a quick link to our videos. I understand you have some need for web videos or video later on this year. I'd like to talk to you about those. We do have a special coming up that you might want to consider.

Perry:            Wow. That's awesome....throwing the special in there for a little bit of scarcity. I like that a lot. That was a nice little role play.

                       Let's say you call me back a week from now. Let's do that one.

Thomas:            Sure. What I do is try to set up the link so I can monitor with analytics when they see it, how many times they viewed it, and then I know he's looked at and I've given him a dedicated password for that.

                       That week not only did I follow up with him which is critical because that's your money, I've also stopped by his office. I know who his secretary is. I might know some additional people in his office.

Perry:            Okay, now when we set this up I was a fairly warm lead but you might have called 10 people before you got to a guy like me.

Thomas:            Absolutely...or 15 people. All it takes is one call to move you forward. One thing...when I started out I used to take this personally: Oh, man. They don't like me. It has nothing to do with liking you. They're busy. You're calling at the wrong time.

                       Be persistent. One of the things I can tell you is to call at least 5-7 times. One of the things we learned professionally is to call until they tell you no.

Perry:            Excellent. In other words, I've got video marketing. No, I'm not interested. Don't call them again.

Thomas:            Right. Don't call them again just put them on hold and follow up with them a year from now or 6 months from now. It becomes a dead list or a list you're going to create to call - I called this guy in January. I'll see where they're at in June. Things change. Businesses change. Look at our economy. Things change all the time.

Perry:            That's the numbers game...calling enough people, having a great script, and we'll transcribe that script and make it available to people so they can take a look.

                       On the second follow up would you set up a live meeting?

Thomas:            That's the game. You want to get in front of that person. You want to meet with them and greet with them. You want to get them to like you. There's 10 video guys in your area that are all doing the same thing. What differentiates you from the other guys is you now have a live person.

                       You've going to contact and connect with that person and you're going to have your presentation. You'll have maybe a link to a web video...additional stuff and then offer some pricing and talk about your package.

                       Then you want to stop and listen. You want to figure out...Okay, I understand you have some need for video for your website..blah, blah, blah. You want to identify what the need is. You want to create the need and listen for what their need is.

                       Secondly, you want to ask: Are you budgeted for this? That's the golden question. That's pretty much the calling card that will let you know if these guys have a budget and dollars set aside to do something whether this year or next year.

Perry:            So you ask them if they have a budget to do video? Just straightforward as that?

Thomas:            Yeah, straightforward.

Perry:            Yes, I have a budget.

Thomas:            Great. What kind of a dollar amount are you looking at to spend this year?

Perry:            Total? $20,000.

Thomas:            Great. So now you have some numbers to play with if you want to look for repeatable business. Guys, you need to look at your customers not as a one-time deal but as multiple deals. That way you can upsell them.

                       You can come back and say: Okay, we did this video for you back in 2008, and now because the market has changed and we have different things going on politically, your business dynamic has changed. Let's put together another video for you.

Perry:            So now you've got me. You've been in front of me. I said it looks great but we're not quite ready to pull the trigger on this yet.   

Thomas:            Okay, great. When?

Perry:            Well, we've got our convention coming up in about 6 weeks and we're just now starting to think about that.

Thomas:            Here's what I think you should do as a consultant. I've found that in most cases working with video we need to develop a story line. You'll see that there is a great return on investment with video using for the web or using it....Guys, you get the idea.

                       You need to determine what your calling card is. For me I play on scarcity and on pricing and sometimes...I was talking to Perry in the car today...I've turned customers down simply because they aren't within our budget.

                       The client needs to be in our budget, too. You're not going to do a $20,000 project for somebody who only wants to spend $395. I know we've all done that whether it's on weekends for couples or other things like that.

Perry:            Talk about that a little bit more...elaborate on the scarcity and on the other thing you mentioned as far as how you position that. You sound like you're using some of the influence points we were talking about.

Thomas:            Sure. We want to create scarcity on pricing...Look, I've got a special coming up. I've got some Summer pricing that's gone away but I might be able to talk to my business partner and extend that out for you. You want to create that: Thomas' company has a deal that I could fit in. Then you work with their budget which you've already identified what it is. It could be a single deal or multiple deals.

                       You want to make sure 'if we do this project' to create your terms. If they're asking a lot of questions or saying 'no, no', it's because they're not understanding. You need to explain to them your value...create your value.

Perry:            So, yes, Thomas, I want you to do our video for our show booth.

Thomas:            Great. Let's put together a proposal. I'll get that over to you in the next couple of days and we can sit down and review that.  Once we get that agreement from him you do a couple of emails and figure out what they need for their project and we put together some very realistic numbers.

Perry:            It sounds like a pretty easy system. I call enough people to identify the ones that are interested. Take the interested ones to the next step and then live meetings. Tell me, we've all heard the term close....as a sales person how do you close a deal like this?

Thomas:            You have to keep asking for the sale. If you don't ask for the sales like: Okay, we'd like to do some business with you. What do you think? Something as simple as that is very non-toxic and very...you're in a business setting.

                       These guys we're working with are either business people who buy business products so they're being sold to all the time. You just have to present yourself as a professional, as a consultant and someone who is very good at what you do.

Perry:            Let me ask you a random question. Do I show up in my traditional jeans and white shirt untucked?

Thomas:            That's how we're dressed right now. We're creative types. I'm in my Kelly green shirt and shorts. When I go and meet people I'm dressed as a business professional. I'm dressed in my very best two-piece suit. Sometimes I wear a tie and sometimes I don't wear a tie. I kind of figure out the dynamics of the office before I go.

Perry:            Coat at the very least.

Thomas:            People judge you on the first two minutes when they meet you. Fundamentally, when they see you for the first 2 minutes, that's your power presentation. Do you want to look professional? I think everything about you...

Perry:            That's tough for some of the audience out there who are college types or just out of college and love the craft of video but don't necessarily love the business of video. You've found that that makes a big difference?

Thomas:            A huge difference. I'm able to sit in some pretty big companies because of that. I go to some of these massive trade shows and if I were dressed as the creative type...there are some guys that get away with it but they are at the very high level and have their brands already established. When you're at that point, great. Do it. But most of us aren't at that brand level.

Perry:            If you can get away with it being the La Font Terrible, then go for it but up until that point, you have to play the corporate game.

Thomas:            Yeah, and also, it speaks very well of you in a community.  There is a lot of business in most communities and those business guys are in their 40s and above. They're the ones who sign the checks. They're the ones who will like or dislike you.

                       Funny thing, I had one of my guys come with me at a meeting and everybody has their iPhone and they use them for their watches. The guy with me didn't have a watch and one of my clients observed that. He said: Some of your guys aren't aware of time, huh? I thought that was interesting.

Perry:            Interesting. They don't miss a trick.

Thomas:            Very traditional. It's almost like the whole button-down thing.

Perry:            Let's back up a little bit. Explain the clientele that you're going for and why.

Thomas:            I have 3 different types of businesses we're looking at this year. We had a lot of small businesses, a lot of mid-size businesses, and then our large corporate which we do a lot of trade shows for the industry that I've been working with as a sales person and the industry that I do video for. Within those 3, within the peer-to-peer businesses when I do the networking groups then I dress up in a nice pair of pants and no tie. That's the decorum.

Perry:            What kind of business are you going for? We've talked about doing business with entrepreneurs and we've talked about doing business with corporations. Which do you prefer?

Thomas:            For me because of my ability to meet with people and I like people who have marketing budgets...

Perry:            In other words, somebody who's got some money...

Thomas:            There you go. You can define that with any...If it's your next door neighbor who needs a biography video done, you could tell them right off the bat: What is your budget for this? What do you think it's worth? From there they understand that you're a professional and you're not going to do this as a favor.

                       One of the guys in my team is a fantastic guy but he loves to do a lot of free favors. I told him: Look. Create some value on what you do. This is ideally what you want to do so create some experience and get paid for it. It's no sin.

Perry:            But people that are afraid especially this particular age group, they're afraid if they charge they won't have the business. they'd rather do it for free and get the business than charge and not get the business.

Thomas:            We're got lawyers and doctors and psychiatrists. We have all shades of professionals. We need to start behaving as professionals. If you look at the amount of money our profession generates, we're a big part of the economy. The entertainment, news event...it's a huge part of the industry.

Perry:            So give us a little bit more. You've taken us down your sales process quite deep and now we're actually doing the work. What are some of the next steps that you need to insure new business?

Thomas:            We break it down monthly and quarterly so we know at the end of the year we're going to have a great 2010. We've got some projections out. We basically know that there are customers coming in. We just need to figure out when we're going to get paid.

                       It's simply asking: Hey, look. We're under terms and conditions. One of the things I learned working for a company that's a very powerful statement: A contract is a contract. When I heard that I thought: Naw, that's ridiculous. But it's something very simple.

                       You can protect yourself and your clientele knows that you're a professional and it enables you to commit to what you've committed to doing. It benefits everyone.

Perry:            So after you close your client, get their business, contracts are signed, and now we're into the delivery phase.

Thomas:            Now we're into the delivery phase. That's the fun part. Now we can get in there and do the project.

Perry:            Now we can be creative.

Thomas:            Right. That's the key. I love doing the creative stuff. It's great. I love being involved with shoots, but I think getting there to that process a lot of guys miss that. We've been in business for 5 years. Had I not had the sales and marketing thing...

                       Let's talk about the difference between sales and marketing. You're a marketing genius. You know how to go out and get the messaging out but without sales, without you doing your due diligence, identifying- Here's what I do and here's what I'm about- and then being able to tell that to the masses and being able to figure out who your audience is...

                       My audience changed. I started doing something completely different when I started the business. My father had passed away in 2000, and I was really big in biography videos. I thought: That's a great segment. I realize some people don't want to pay what I needed to clothe my wife and feed my kids.

Perry:            Really, that will set up what kind of a numbers game you're playing. I think that's why a lot of 'professional' video folks feel like they're on a hamster wheel because they're doing a lot of work but not getting a lot of money.

Thomas:            Right. I think that you've touched on something right there. One of the things I like to do is as my projects get bigger, I bring in really good help to make it happen. I have 6-8 virtual guys that based on what I know they can deliver- their specialties- I get them involved in different phases.

                       One of the things I'm doing right now is I have Project 1 Editor, Project 2 Editor, and Project 3 Editor, and we'll come in with that. I can be working on three projects concurrently. These guys are doing their creative thing and we're moving on to the next project. So that creates the ability to get paid on a regular, consistent basis.

Perry:            So in other words, you have regular business coming in and you have the ability to service up to 3 projects concurrently. You're figuring out what your monthly gross income is and how you can keep it consistent.

Thomas:            Here's the kick in the pants. I meet with my business partner three times a week and we sit down at a great coffee shop with the green lettering and she sits down there and kicks my butt. What's happening with Client #1? What have we talked about? Client #2...what's happening with it?

                       I'm accountable to someone on a weekly basis. You have to have a mentor or somebody that you're accountable to or it's easy to...Oh, yeah. I'll get to that. You've got to every week or daily...Hey, I'm going to talk to Customer XYZ. I'm going to follow up with Customer XYZ...and again, the weekly or tri-weekly meetings attribute to our success. I'm accountable to someone.

Perry:            Awesome. You don't have a problem with that?

Thomas:            No. She's beautiful.

Perry:            So now we're into the creative aspect of the project. We're working on our deliverables. Now we've got a situation where we're delivering some of the deliverables and the client isn't happy.

Thomas:            Your name brand is everything you have. I would go back to your initial setting of expectations. If you don't set expectations, they're expecting Star Wars and you're talking about a YouTube video. You guys didn't discuss it early on.

                       It's really about us educating, informing, and letting them know based on prospect work or a demo clip...just so they're involved in every single phase that will never happen.

Perry:            Typically that doesn't happen where they're completely dissatisfied but what about the scenario where they want....Can we throw in this? Can we throw in this? How do you handle a situation like that?

Thomas:            On my initial quote and initial budget proposal I always include a few line items that are going to be billed out at an hourly rate. Once we have everything done if we need XYZ, this is what it's going to cost.

                       Again, it goes back to the old adage leave nothing on the table. You don't work for free. Again, other professionals...you can see your physician for X amount of times and you get X amount of times. Again, it's us thinking that we're professionals.

Perry:            Yeah, it's mindset. I'm a dentist...

Thomas:            Think in terms of billable hours. I meet regularly with our accountant. She says the same thing. We really need to look at this in terms of your billable hours as a sales professional as a production. Once you start to track this, let me tell you this...for the last year I've had a little flip book where I document throughout the course of the day every day what I do and how I spend my time. I'm editing for 6 hours. I'm doing sales calls. It's not religious. I do get some breaks in there but it really helps us focus in on where I'm spending my time so as I get these projects I know that editing for a project should take 22 hours-ish and when I bring in people I sort of have a framework based upon what I do.

Perry:            So you know what to tell them. You know what kind of budget if you're going to start hiring out some of your virtual assistants. You know what you did it for and what you accomplished so they should be able to do the same?

Thomas:            Right. It sort of gives you a sense of accountability as far as how you're spending your time.

Perry:            How do you handle the situation where somebody wants a little bit more? You touched on it but for some reason a lot of us have a hard time billing for more.

Thomas:            That's a real interesting question because what we've been able to do in the last year and a half is...It's going to cost you this. This is what the fee is for that. Again, it's being very direct and open with the client.

Perry:            Why do creative types have such a hard time asking for money?

Thomas:            Because you really need to understand that you're creating value for other people. You've taking away the pain. That's really what we're doing. We're taking the pain away for other people by providing our services.

                       They don't want to do it. They don't have the ability to do it and here we are serving everything on this beautiful silver platter that's going to be worth X amount of dollars.

                       Again, you go to your dentist or doctor and it's like: What should I charge? No, they have everything in place. We should, too.

Perry:            Are you advocating pretty much having a product line or a list of services that ...Here's what this cost if you want this...or if you want anything out of the site of this scope it's X amount per hour...that type of thing?

Thomas:            It depends. I scale our pricing based on the industry I'm working in and I meet with a mentor in my hometown once every other month and she said something very powerful to us. Why don't we try the same product and price it out four different ways for four different places and see how it works? It's been product/price testing. The market will bear.

Perry:            Yeah, the market will bear. I think the interesting thing about what you do is you have a great process and great system in place for identifying and just really getting out there and hustling. It really comes down to hustling but when you have the words in place, you know the script and the languaging to use, and you know how to present yourself as a professional, let's talk about that for a second. You don't actually pitch yourself as a videographer. You pitch yourself a little bit differently, don't you?

Thomas:            Yes. I pitch myself...my title on my business card is Sales and New Business Development. Even though I'm a video production guy, I'm a filmmaker, it doesn't resonate with people.

                       How many times have you been to the couple on the weekend that are getting married and you're just the video guy? You're sitting in the room in the back. You're not even eating with the people. You're treated as a third class citizen. Welcome to another...

Perry:            Ouch. Why is that?

Thomas:            Like I said, when I meet with people on my email it says Sales and New Business Development. It's a term that ...the industry that I was working with for a number of years...resonates with that because they understand what that is.

Perry:            You're continuing to sell in that industry...

Thomas:            Yes. What I would suggest that you guys do is...I'm a videographer. I'm a filmmaker. Don't get me wrong. That's my passion. That's what I love to do but in order to resonate with the people you work with, here's an example.

                       I work with a group of fantastic Italian restaurants in Chicago. We've cut some deals with them and we've talked about what kinds of deals you can do....We have some very creative pricing with them.

                       When I say that I mean I'm doing it for next to nothing but I'm getting something out of it. I'm getting some phenomenal experience in a couple of things that I don't know yet with doing social media...Facebook and Twitter. They're giving me the play land. In exchange for that they're giving me some creative space to play in. We've bartered with some other stuff, too.

                       Think about how you can grow your business creatively and still get paid.

Perry:            Absolutely. Don't give it away but make some bargain deals that it's a win/win for everybody.

Thomas:            Right. It could be time. It could be editing. It could be a lot of different things.

Perry:            So now that we've delivered and everybody is happy, what's the next step?

Thomas:            It starts over again.

Perry:            With that same client?

Thomas:            Well, let's talk about that. I talked about identifying the budget. If they only want to spend $5,000 out of that $20,000, and you know they have $15,000 left for other work so you need to figure out who you are, what you do, and what you can offer them. Are there other services you can refer and is there a photography business they need? You can refer in and get a commission on that if they don't need anymore video work.

                       Be creative and think about it. Look at it dynamically on different levels.

Perry:            So it's really taking a lot about what we talk about online marketing and applying that to the offline world. A lot of us are familiar with online world and follow up and upsells and downsells but you're pretty much doing that in a brick and mortar world.

Thomas:            Correct. Face to face.

Perry:            So what do you mean by it all starts over again?

Thomas:            We talked about the timer and the sales funnel. My sales funnel is my 40-50 clients I'm working with for the fourth quarter. We need to review every 2 days who I've contacted whether it's an email or phone call....and how I need to follow up.

                       I have a list with names of the customers and potential customers, their email addresses, and how to reach them. Then I have a list with the last contact and what we talked about. There's a lot of sales tools that are available out there that you can buy.

                       The last company I worked with my manager said: Get an Excel spreadsheet and be prepared to get a call when I need to talk to you about it. I would be off the major Interstate, pulled over, got my cell phone right there, and we could talk about it. That's what we do in our business when we meet 2 days.

                       I was with you here this weekend on this fantastic shoot and I got a couple of emails to follow up on some things for when I get back.\

Perry:            So you do your whole sales on an Excel spreadsheet? Awesome. Maybe you could share that template with us and that would be awesome.

Thomas:            Sure. I won't give you the list but I'll give you the template.

Perry:            For those of you in Chicago you might want to help him out... So, Thomas, really appreciate all of this creative advice and the system that you have. It really does make it seem like (A) it's not hard.

Thomas:            No, it's not. You just have to commit to doing it. That's why I said to get the timer and break it out into two 30 minute blocks..one in the morning and one in the afternoon. You have to commit to doing it on a regular basis so it becomes part of what you do.

Perry:            Awesome. So if you continue to follow up and continue to present yourself as a professional, you'll have those 2% convert and have a nice little paycheck per month.

Thomas:            It could be higher than that depending on your ability and how you sell.

Perry:            Sure. Your jobs have been anywhere from $5,000 to $40,000.

Thomas:            Let me close with this golden tip. When you guys are finished with your client ask them for a referral. It sounds cheesy but it's not. They do it in their industry, too. Everybody does this.

                       By the way, I know you're happy with the video we produced for you. Do you know anybody else in your industry that I might be able to talk to based upon your positive experience with us? Could I get a name? Better yet, could you call them and ask them?

                       I tell you...if you ask them to call right then, they'll do it. Golden...

Perry:            Excellent tip. Before we close out...you shared one tip with me that I thought was brilliant as far as your invoicing and getting paid. This is another golden tip. Share that with us before we close out. 

Thomas:            Sure. My accountant was looking at our monthly receivables and expenses and she came up with something very brilliant because she's a CPA. When we send out our invoices follow up with statements. Accountants when they see statements...30 days, 60 days past due, 90 days past due, 120 days past due...They follow up on it because they don't like loose ends.

                       So once you send out your statement...if you treat yourself as a non-professional, a creative type, they're going to think you're in it just as a hobby. They're going to pay you like you're in a hobby and they'll get to it when they get to it.

                       In the last year we've been sending out our initial invoices and 30 days later we send a follow up statement and 9 times our of 10 we get paid. On one occasion we even paid in full in advance because the accountant wanted to go ahead and clear it up and take care of it.

Perry:            So instead of just leaving it hanging out there or just invoicing them you sent out basically an aging statement: Here's where you are and the money you owe us. Because of the accountants being the type that they are, they do not like loose ends so they'll jump on that sooner than they would say a straight invoice.

Thomas:            Control your money. If you deliver a great product then treat your money as it is what they owe you.

Perry:            Thomas, this has been fantastic. We've had a great time hanging out. I had a great time in Southern Virginia.

Thomas:            And we're not in a suit. I'm in shorts and a Kelly green tee shirt.

Perry:            We're just having a great time hanging out and really talking a lot of great biz. We've had a lot of great business sessions up here and I've been learning a ton. I hope Thomas has gleaned a little bit off the folks up here and we've just had some great times. Shooting at a plantation today was off the hook and playing with all kinds of crazy gear.

                       The reality is you can have all the crazy gear in the world and make some of the best films in the world but unless you're able to market and sell what you do, you're going to die a penniless pauper. Am I right?

Thomas:            Yeah. Die a penniless fool...

Perry:            So thanks for listening. I hope you enjoyed this. For more great stuff we're at AskMrVideo.com.