During each episode Brian Margolis helps entrepreneurs, sales pros and other professionals create a simple weekly strategy using The Pillar System. A system that's helped multiple individuals become 7-figure earners and is licensed by some of the largest companies in the world to help their teams grow through simplification. Some episodes have a 2nd part where Brian helps guests review and refine their initial pillars and solidify the CAP strategies they can use to turn pillar execution into a habit.
Apologies for the sound quality on my end
Jack is a software sales rep who changed companies 4 months ago. He was already using the Pillar System based on his participation in my program a few years back. The goal of this call was to review/refine his pillars for the new role. His updated pillars are:
To hear other episodes go to
https://productivitygiant.com/simplify-your-strategy-magnify-your-results-podcast
During each episode Brian Margolis helps entrepreneurs, sales pros and other professionals create a simple weekly strategy using The Pillar System. A system that's helped multiple individuals become 7-figure earners and is licensed by some of the largest companies in the world to help their teams grow through simplification. Some episodes have a 2nd part where Brian helps guests review and refine their initial pillars and solidify the CAP strategies they can use to turn pillar execution into a habit.
Apologies for the sound quality on my end
Jack is a software sales rep who changed companies 4 months ago. He was already using the Pillar System based on his participation in my program a few years back. The goal of this call was to review/refine his pillars for the new role. His updated pillars are:
To hear other episodes go to
https://productivitygiant.com/simplify-your-strategy-magnify-your-results-podcast
This is Brian Margolis and welcome to the simplify, your strategy, magnify your results podcast, where on each episode I use the pillar system to help a sales pro entrepreneur or other results based professional, create a weekly strategy to run a simple, more lucrative business strategy. So simple. It can fit on an index card, but powerful it's actually helped create multiple seven figure earners and is now licensed by some of the largest companies in the world to create strategies for their teams. If you'd like a free copy of my book on exactly how to do this, or want to be considered as a guest on a future episode, head on over to productivity, giant.com, enjoy the episode Cloud. All right, so let's do it Jack. Um, awesome. Thanks, Brian. I, I will, I will give the quick background because this one's an easy one to sum up you're in software sales. Um, we've I guess we've we met about two years ago, ish, when you joined one of my group programs. And so, you know, the pillar system, you, you know, the game here, but not an uncommon situation, you started a, a new job. It's a little different than the previous job. And so you've kind of put together your pillars in a way, right? This is almost more like a pillar review call all, and let's kind of sharpen these things up. Right. So, correct. Tell me if, if my summary is right, um, in the new job, you and it is software, right? Or is it correct? Okay. Yeah. So this is for companies that need to hire people in other countries where they don't have locations or legal entities, and that can be a mess. So they come to you and, you know, if they use your software or your platform, they basically can say, Hey, I need to hire someone in, you know, Paraguay or whatever, if that's even, did I even say that right? Is that country? Yeah. Is it nailed it?<laugh> is it para, is it your, yeah. Okay. So, so the, you know, that you are able to make it legal and do all the compliance stuff for'em by setting up an entity, take all that headache off their place, and now they can get that superstar from, uh, from Honduras or wherever. Okay, perfect. So my first question to you then, just so I understand even more is who is your tar? Who, who do you call on personally?
Jack:So that's the interesting thing about this role, I think is, uh, right now we don't have territory set up. It's more of just a round Robin set up mm-hmm<affirmative> where companies will come into the site, they'll sign up for a demo and then they'll get a sign to sale. Okay. So we don't have necessarily a territory, but I think ideal company that we're going after isn't too large, because most larger companies have entity set up in most countries just cuz they're more developed. Right. So it's probably a 20 to 200 person startup who is growing super fast looking to hire internationally and doesn't have these entities in, in a lot of countries. So just fast growing, I would say tech companies are usually target I C P.
Brian Margolis:Got it. Okay. And then do you, um, who's the person you target in these companies or, or are they such small companies that it's usually founder or not very far removed from the founder?
Jack:Yeah, it depends. If it's a small company, 10 people are less usually talking with the CEO, who's saying, Hey, we need to bring on developers or the salesperson in this country. If it's a, if it's a larger company, you're usually talking with the head of people or head of recruitment or someone in, in the people team.
Brian Margolis:Got it. And that's something and that's something you guys find out. Okay. So up until, and you've only been doing this now for about four months, correct. And you said there's a shift happening quickly where you went, you, you just told me briefly before we started recording that you went from inbound to having to do more hunting. So explain that shift real quick. And then we'll kind of jump into your, your
Jack:Pillars. Yeah, I think, uh, just with the, with the company growing and more reps getting hired and things like that and just to, uh, be safe and, and try to close as many sales and as many deals as possible, it's gonna be beneficial to do more outbound prospecting, have that as a part of my pillars.
Brian Margolis:Okay. So inbound was keeping you busy, but now you're kind of trying get a step ahead by starting to prime the pump. So you have inbound, but when those dry up or the company has too many sales reps to, for that to be consistent. Okay. I got you. You wanna go into hunting
Jack:Mode? Exactly. Yeah. He obviously hoping the inbound keep coming in, but good to have kind of a mix of both.
Brian Margolis:Okay. So here's what, so why don't we do this? This is more like a, a pillar review call almost. Um, here are some of the, the, I'm just gonna go down the list. You explain'em to me what we'll talk about'em so you text and texted these, you put'em in the chat for me activity pillar one hour identifying prospects, right? So you're gonna an hour a week identifying prospects. What does that entail using LinkedIn using?
Jack:Yeah. So I think my thinking on this one is since we don't, since we're not to the level yet where all these companies are, where the reps don't have territories, so it's not like Jack, your territories are California, Oregon, and Washington right now. It's pretty much a, a free for all you, you can go after any company you want. And then obviously if you get assigned to a company who comes inbound, that's your company. So I think I need to spend time on primarily LinkedIn or the company's websites, finding these companies who have openings in different countries. Mm-hmm<affirmative> and saying, Hey, these are the, the 15 or 20 companies that I found this week, who I wanna reach out to and say, Hey, are you having any of these issues that, that
Brian Margolis:We, okay. So you're, you're kind of, and backwards. You're looking for people who are posting jobs in those countries, correct? Yeah. Not for, not for people who aren't doing it cuz they don't think they can. You're kind of saying no they're already doing it. We can make their life easier.
Jack:I think that's probably the best way to go about it. Cause otherwise you're just guessing
Brian Margolis:A hundred percent I'm with you. Okay. So one hour a week of doing that and I, I guess filling up your database, right. With, with, with those people, um, 15 personalized LinkedIn connection requests.
Jack:Yeah. So once, once I have that list of, and maybe down the line, I changes the first pillar from an hour of identifying prospects to identify X and amount of companies that week who are a good fit. And I can kind of adjust these numbers as I go. But yeah, 15 personalized, LinkedIn connection requests to either the CEO, if it's a smaller company or someone on the people team, if it's, you know, 50 plus saying, Hey, checking out your career site saw that you're hiring in, in Italy, but your headquarters are in France. Do you actually have an entity there or do you do whatever the messaging is?
Brian Margolis:And, and do you put that right in the right, in the initial request?
Jack:Depends. Uh
Brian Margolis:That's that's an interesting game where it's like, do you, do you kind of get awfully like, oh, okay. I just said yes to some guy. I don't even know who he is. And then you pounce on him right away. Or do you kind of let him know like, this is why I'm reaching out to you. You can kind of reject me as not even taking my request.
Jack:Yeah. There's, there's two ways to do it. Like you said, you can either put it out there front, which kind of gives him an idea of why you're reaching out, which I think is a little bit more train inch parent, or you just send a connection request. Most people on LinkedIn nowadays just accept them. Right. And then<laugh>, I've had that happen to me a lot. You accept somebody's your connecter request. And they send huge, huge paragraph, which is terrible, which is huge turnoff. So, uh,
Brian Margolis:Here's, here's, what's interesting about that though. And I know we're not going into the marketing world, but I of this stuff, it is terrible, but in a weird way, and you'll hear people like post crap, like, ah, someone did that to me. I'd never, you know, they go on their high horse like, ah, can you believe this guy called me? And um, but I'll tell you what, if it was a problem that I really needed solved, I'd be a little more open to it. Right? It's like nobody wants anyone knocking on their doors and soliciting'em, but freaking, Hey man, if my like gut's hanging off and I've been meeting to get around to it and some guy comes out with a ladder and he is like, Hey, I do gutters. I, you, I like get up there. Um, right.
Jack:No, I, I totally agree. And I think there's a good way to do it. Like I think if it's, it's semi personalized, that first reach out, it's totally fine. Like, Hey, either I am reaching out because of your role or I'm reaching out because of your company. I've got no issue with that. What bothers me is when you get just a copy paste stuff. Oh, connection, boom. Like this has nothing to do with you, but it's just automated. So
Brian Margolis:Then, okay. Three, three personalized videos make and send. Now are those videos you make to prospects and you send the video email, correct?
Jack:That's something I've had success with that past companies that I haven't tried with this new company. So, uh, you can use things like VI yard or loom and then just attach to an email or attached to a LinkedIn message or lots of different ways to send it. I haven't tried it at this company. I think it'd be good to, to give a shot.
Brian Margolis:And, and you could almost just shorten that up to send three video emails. Cause obviously to, to send them, you gotta make'em cuz they're personalized,
Jack:Right? Yeah, no, that's true. I'll change that.
Brian Margolis:All right. Email X email times call bundle. Oh, I see what you're saying. Send'em an email call.'em the same day. Leave a voicemail that this sounds familiar something.
Jack:Yeah, this is what, this is something I learned from you.<laugh> okay.
Brian Margolis:Leave a voicemail that pushes them to the email five, seven days later. Send that sec, send that forward email. Okay. So it sounds like basically you're doing the bundle of 25, 25 20. These are prospects I'm assuming, right?
Jack:Yeah. This would be all prospects. The only tricky thing with this that I see being an issue is it's hard to find people's direct dial and, and I haven't had a lot of success calling their company line mm-hmm<affirmative> just with COVID it's I feel like it's really tough to get through to people. So got it. Uh, the voicemails might not be a possibility for most people, but the emails and the forwarding emails definitely are.
Brian Margolis:Right. But the spirit of it is that you're gonna, you're gonna try to call 25, no full, well you won't okay. Yeah. Let, let me just explain for people who don't know right now, they're listening, going, what the hell are they talking about? So it, it, it's just that prospecting. It's just a, a system of prospecting, obviously what you say and who you say it too, is what determines whether they respond, but you send 25 emails. You know, you, you email the person, you don't have to send'em all on the same day, the same day, you email them, you call them and on the voicemail, which is what you usually get. You refer back to the email, meaning, you know, Hey John, it's, you know, Jack from wherever I sent you an email a couple of hours ago, and then you fill in the benefit on a service that can help you with the job posting, blah, blah, blah. If that's something of interest, take a look at that email. A a and the idea is that people don't like to call back, but they'll more so they'll, they'll check out an email more often at least than they'll call you back. Certainly. And then the classic, you know, the next week, if you don't hear a response from that email, you hit forward on it and you put the little sticky note above, Hey, thought this could be valuable dot, dot, dot, okay. Or something like that. All right. So that's your prospecting? 25, 25, 25 3 coffee chats per week.
Jack:Yeah. So that's something that we do at the company since everyone is, uh, since no one's gone into an office. I wanted to set that up with other colleagues who maybe aren't in the sales department just to get to know more people at the company and kind of understand what they're working on and see if, if there's ways I can help them. Uh, just make more
Brian Margolis:Connections. How many employees at this company?
Jack:It's about seven 50 right
Brian Margolis:Now. Okay. Is, is three seems excessive.
Jack:I think maybe one or two.
Brian Margolis:I mean I'm, I'm, I'm asking it's okay. So there's 750 people sales or whatever I'm going. Do you really wanna be spent how long's a coffee chat? I imagine 15 minutes.
Jack:Okay.
Brian Margolis:Quick. And it's easy to get off and on. I mean, some people just talk, talk, I mean like you and I were talking before I hit record and you were asking me about this one thing you saw I did. And I was about to tell you about the scuba diving vacation. I just took a couple weeks ago and I was like, all right, well, hold off. We gotta do so, um, all right, so, okay. Three coffee chats break. Now, obviously you don't control whether you have'em, but you're saying you wanna schedule three for the future, whether that's for tomorrow or for, okay. So schedule three coffee chats,
Jack:Try to get that, uh, feeling that you get in the office when you're, you know, going to the kitchen and you meet somebody from product who you probably wouldn't have crossed paths with if, if you hadn't reached out
Brian Margolis:Well. And, and I guess the goal here is you get information or insight, ways of saying things that maybe you didn't even understand or think about, or, you know, got passed over in the training. Um, three reach outs per week to friends and family. Okay. So those that's a personal pillar, correct? Three friends and family reach out, which you had that my brain tells me a couple years ago. You had that.
Jack:Yeah. I just kept it in there. Okay.
Brian Margolis:Just, you know, this would be an question I don't usually get to ask on these cuz a lot of times the first time I meet someone. But, um, it is that when you were doing it, was it working?
Jack:Yeah, I think it's just good to stay in touch with people and, uh, nice to have it as a pillar cuz it reminds you to do it. And sometimes something that could get, uh, a overlooked, I guess.
Brian Margolis:Got it. Okay. Um, you have more friends than I have three a week. I I three a week. I'd be out. I'd be out next week or I shouldn't say that people that are willing to return. Okay. Follow up pillar. So update and review your pipeline twice a week, Monday to Friday, go through the full list, touch base with all current. Okay. Explain this follow up. Pillar to me there's a lot written down here.
Jack:Yeah. So this is just going through the, the current pipeline that you have ideally twice per week, probably beginning and end of the week, making sure that you have reached out to all your current ops and making sure that you're, you're getting done what needs to get done for that deal to close, uh, which is obviously good for you to, to close the deal. But also these look good for management that you have an accurate pipeline with correct close dates and correct, uh, sales stage and the correct amount that, that you're forecasting, that deal to be. Okay.
Brian Margolis:So, okay. So this is similar to, um, yeah. Th this is that idea that you, you have in your software, some kind of, whether you keep an Excel doc or you use it, I'm guessing with a company, a tech company, they make you do it all in the, so software, whatever
Jack:HubSpot or Salesforce. Yeah. You
Brian Margolis:Got that, right? You, you have some kind of access to a report that says these are all the things I've identified in the pipeline twice a week. You're gonna go down that name by name and decide, do they need that next email, whatever, right.
Jack:Yeah. Or, Hey, this company has gone dark. They haven't gone back to me in a month since we first chatted, I'm probably gonna close this opportunity and then got it. Months of ones that are, are more high priority. Okay.
Brian Margolis:Right. And that's the kind of the update thing, the update and review your opportunity list twice a week. And hopefully there's a lot going on. It takes you a long time to do that,
Jack:But yeah, ideally it would be great. Yeah. I
Brian Margolis:Mean that, that's the money pillar. Exactly. Um, it's been the money pillar in my business forever. So my Excel follow pillar. All right. Learning pillar one hour per week on messaging inputs, webinars and reading output crafting the pitch 30, 30 studying customer stories. Okay. Are those two different pillars?
Jack:Yeah, I think I need to, to update this one a little bit, but it's basically spending an hour just improving your messaging, going through, seeing what's working on LinkedIn, seeing what's working via email, fine tuning things, testing different to see how you can get a better response and ultimately drive more meetings
Brian Margolis:And you have input and output on here. So input, meaning reading books, listening to podcasts, whatever on effective messaging output being, actually taking what you're learning and crafting the pitch, making the email, whatever. Um,
Jack:And then the customer stories part was just being able to tell good stories of customers that you're working with or colleagues are working with when you're talking with prospects or customers about, you know, potential things that they could do.
Brian Margolis:Right. So are you, is that why you thought about combining'em or are you kept those separately?
Jack:Uh, I just, I could probably separate'em I just put'em together because like crafting the pitch with the customer stories involved there. I thought they were kind of combined, but well it's fine. Could be separate. Yeah. No,
Brian Margolis:No, that, I mean, I think that's, I think that's fine. I think just maybe bump it to 90 minutes then.
Jack:Okay. Yeah. That's probably a good idea.
Brian Margolis:Like 90, so nine now, do you tend to lean toward input versus output or vice versa? Like you'd rather read about it or listen to a podcast on effective messaging or whatever versus actually doing your job.
Jack:I, yeah. I mean with the messaging, I'd probably lean more towards the, the input than the output. Yeah.
Brian Margolis:Right. Okay. So we should, like you said, we should probably put a number on this where, you know, how, how much do you need to do each week? Minimum of actually crafting? I mean, is this a 45 minimum?
Jack:I mean, it'll probably go down every week. Like now it's gonna be higher because I don't have a ton of good stuff that I've been standing out and need to create some new stuff. But once, you know, February comes around, March comes around. I'm probably gonna have a more fine tuned message and I'll probably have to spend less time every week. Okay. Changing things.
Brian Margolis:Right. You'll just be more trying new things. Yeah. Fine tuning. Okay. So I would say, um, make this 90 minutes and at least 45 has to be output. Okay. Right. So 45 slash 90 messaging, you know, of the 90 minutes, it'll it can all be output, but at least 45 of it has to be you actually.
Jack:Yeah. I like that
Brian Margolis:Again. It's gonna force you cause yeah. I can listen to podcasts all day, but if all I do ever do is listen and read about stuff and don't actually do it, not getting anywhere. Um, one hour sharpen in the ax sales and market.
Jack:So that's reading books, that's going to the webinars that are going on. Just always, uh, always trying to get a little bit better.
Brian Margolis:Okay. You know, you have about 40,000 pillars here, right? We're gonna be,<laugh> trimming these down. Okay. It's a lot. Yeah. One hour sharper in the, a sales and marketing, then you have one hour per week learning the product.
Jack:I can probably knock that down to 30 minutes. That's just staying up to date with what the, the product team is doing. Any announcements that we have so that you can better address customer questions on.
Brian Margolis:Well, let, let's talk about that one, because you said like right now, you know, the product at some level, right. At a good level, then you said, but then sometimes they announce things or they, whatever. Do you tend to, when they make those announcements, do you tend to read those things or do you tend to ignore'em?
Jack:Uh, it depends like we have, we use slack and we have probably 25, 30 different channels. Mm-hmm<affirmative> so you, you try to stay updated with it, but I don't usually go into that product channel and read super thorough. I try to, but that's kind of where this one would come in. It's given me time to actually go through there and say, this is exact what they did with this feature. And, and just small things like that
Brian Margolis:One hour per week, learning about the space.
Jack:So that's just learning about, uh, strategies that companies are employing in the space. Uh, maybe competitor research, seeing what competitors are doing, just trying to stay up to date, maybe going through the company, website, reading any new blog posts that we have out, things like that. Just so you can be more of a, uh, considered, I guess, an expert in the space and have more knowledge about it.
Brian Margolis:And then two hours of gone calls per week.
Jack:Yeah. So we use gong and it records all of our sales calls, which is great. So you can go back in and, and listen to any calls that you've had and find questions that you've asked or, Hey, I forgot what this prospect said here, which is super helpful. But for this pillar, I was thinking of actually listening to colleagues, calls to say, what are they doing differently? What I like, what I don't like, what could I include in my calls? What can I include in my pitch? Things like that.
Brian Margolis:Okay. Got calls. Listening. Okay. All right. I mean, look, software sales, pretty straightforward industry. Um, I, you know, pillars look good to me as a group. I guess my first question is you have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 pillars. Right. Which is definitely on the higher end. I'm not saying it's not possible, but it's definitely on the higher end. So, you know, when I look at these, I go, okay, 2, 3, 4, 4, and a half six. Um, you know, just, just your learning pillars and stuff are like six hours a week. Right. And your messaging and all that stuff, that six hours right off the top, the three friends and family reach out. That's a personal pillar. So that doesn't really, you know, and it takes two sec, you know, it doesn't take long. Anyway. Um, the coffee chats, 25 through video emails, one hour of IDN, prospects, 50 personalized, they all see legit, right? They're all things. And this is the game now, right? These are all things that will help your business. Mm-hmm<affirmative> um, but obviously you need time to do, you know, to respond to whatever, if you had to eliminate one of these pillars and I'm just asking of these 12 pillars, which one would you eliminate or reduce?
Jack:Probably the coffee chats is the one I would,<affirmative> something I haven't been doing and wanted to start doing, but is it gonna make a huge difference to the bottom line? Probably not.
Brian Margolis:Well, my, my, my fear, my fear with the coffee chats. Okay. Is that it doesn't seem like a lot saying three times a week, 15 minutes. Mm. But again, sometimes it's hard. If it's a good conversation, sometimes it's hard to cut someone off after 15 minutes cuz it is kind of, even though it's a work call, it's kind of a personal call. Yeah. Cause you're kind of getting to know someone you're, you're kind of whatever. Um, and then again, to schedule three, you probably have to go back and forth with more than three people. Right. So there's probably some, some going back and forth. Um, so that's a possible one we can reduce or change. Let's just put that to the side. Um, okay. The two hours of gone calls. Right. So, so to me again, this is the only people I'd wanna be listening to are people that you determine ahead of time are really good. Yeah. Right. Like I wouldn't wanna be randomly listening to these rec I, I have a hard time calling'em gun calls these record. Right. I have a, but to just randomly listen to two hours of recorded calls, you know, again, maybe you already know who some of the good guys are and good ladies are and all that kind of stuff.
Jack:I think. No, I think that's a good point. I think we could probably reduce it to an hour, which would be about two calls per week that I listen to because most calls are about 30 minutes and yes, I, I have, you know, in my mind too, I think the, the top reps are so it'd be listening specifically
Brian Margolis:To, to that. But the other, the other thing with those calls is I have a feeling 10 weeks from now, 12 weeks from now, certainly three months from now, if there's a few top reps, you're gonna kind have heard most of it. Mm-hmm<affirmative> right. Not all of it, but most of it, here's what I'm thinking. And again, you don't have to go for this. You can have as many pillars as you want, as long as you think you'll hit'em um, I almost feel like that can be part of sharpening the ax. Okay. Yeah. Right. I, I, I almost feel like you can make it to decision just for the sake of time you can make a decision each week. Right. Should I, what's the best thing I can do right now to sharpen the act. Should I be listening to these recorded calls? Should I be reading a certain book? Should I be, you know, you can kind of make a decision. I would put that under sharpen in the ax. I like
Jack:That. Um, yeah. Would you increase the time? Would you put it to like two hours sharpen the acts a week? Or would you just leave it at?
Brian Margolis:No, I would put, look, remember these are minimums, right? Yeah. So if you have a week where you don't have a lot going on or there's a space and it's like, yeah, I wanna, you know, listen to the, some gone calls and you know, the idea of this is to be consistent that in and week out you're getting better. Right. Um, the it's the same thing with the space, the space learning and the product learning. I, I think those well learning, you already have 30 minutes. I almost feel like, and, and again, I could be wrong, but the space learning, right? Yeah. I let's say it this way. I would get, get rid of for, by the way, just cuz something's not a pillar doesn't mean you can't do it. Yeah, exactly. But I would get rid of coffee chats. Okay. I would roll gun calls into sharpen in the acts. Okay. Right. Because I, I just wanna make sure you have enough time to look. I Dean prospects takes a long time. Yeah. I know it does. Creating three video emails takes time. Right? The prospecting, the other thing I'd consider doing with the prospecting is, well, you don't have to really worry about it. Cause obviously, almost like eliminate some of the calls, but they kind of naturally eliminate anyway. Um, so, so you can leave'em on there knowing you're not.
Jack:Yeah. I feel like most of those calls won't even happen. Cuz you go on their LinkedIn site, you don't see the number. We don't have a ton of tools that show the number. Hopefully those will come. But even then it's, it's tough to get people's direct dials nowadays,
Brian Margolis:Tough to get their direct dials. But is it tough to get'em to pick up or?
Jack:Oh, both. I mean, even if you have someone's cell phones, the, the chance of them picking up and then taking the, I dunno
Brian Margolis:If you call an office line, if they tend to pick up cuz it's an office line,
Jack:I haven't had much success with it, but yeah, it's, it's something that you can also try.
Brian Margolis:Um, tell me about the space learning again,
Jack:The, as just staying up to date with what competitors are doing, what's on our blog. What, uh, what, what the general space is looking like. And
Brian Margolis:I think I would combine that with product. Okay. I think you need to make an executive decision each week. Hey look, cuz this is gonna affect your messaging too, obviously. Right. But yep. I think you should make an executive decision each week and say, look, I got at least an hour, where's the best place to spend it in the product or space kinda
Jack:Combine. Yeah. If needed. Yeah. I
Brian Margolis:Like that. Like that one hour a week, especially if that's a minimum, if all you do is the minimum. Think you're gonna realize that adds up quickly. An hour's a long time. If, if I said reading a book, no listening to a podcast<affirmative> but 10 weeks from now to have 10 hours of learning the competition, learning the space, learning the product. I think you're gonna find that that's a lot. Okay. And again, if there's something specific you need go get it. Right. Mm-hmm<affirmative> like, these are just minimums. Um, but yeah, I, I would combine product and space learning. Okay. And you decide, and you can have reference documents for these. Remember those like different ideas, different sources, all that stuff. But yeah, you can decide, um, what the best yeah. What the best use of that hour is. Right. Cause I think in the real world, I mean, you, you've tried to hit pillars before, you know, in the real world that, you know, it looks like you have a blank canvas, but time as a way. Okay. Yeah,
Jack:No, I like that. I think shortening these down, getting to like seven or eight instead of the 12 or 13 or whatever it was would would be helpful.
Brian Margolis:Yeah. And again, it's not the total number I care about. It's the time. Yeah. Right. Like I look at the three friends and family reach out. Okay. That doesn't, you know, that's not gonna take you much time. You probably won't even be working when you do that. You'll probably be texting with someone or, or whatever. Right. So something like that doesn't necessarily take a ton of time. Um, so again, to me it's not the number, it's the, it's the time. So, so here, here's what I have left. I have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. I have nine left, nine pillars, which again is on the high end, but it's fine. Mm-hmm<affirmative> right. It's fine. It's it's, you know, like every business is the business change. This will change. Um, we have, so here's what I have. You ready? One hour of identifying prospects. Okay. 15 personalized LinkedIn connects. Mm-hmm<affirmative> let me ask you something. When you're identifying prospects, when you're doing that, are you kind of, is that when you're connecting on LinkedIn, you're like, oh, I just found someone, are they, they kinda separate. Cause,
Jack:Cause to find the, the companies you're usually using LinkedIn and putting in different search criteria and then once you find them, you could either set that company aside to go through later or<affirmative> and say, Hey, let me check the career site. Now let me check who's in the people department. Let me see who the CEO is. Right. Just at that same time and then send out the, the connection request while you're
Brian Margolis:Going through it. Well, let me ask you something. So, and just, just humor me for a second. If I said you need to, if you need to send out 15 personalized, LinkedIn connects a week, wouldn't you kind of be forced to do the research probably if, if, if, well, I mean maybe we need to put criteria around what counts as those 15, like 15 per personalized LinkedIn prospect
Jack:Connects. Yeah, exactly. If as long as it's like a net new company,
Brian Margolis:Right. Well, yeah. And you can define it how you want, right? Like yeah. If you're already dealing with a company and all of a sudden it says, you may know the guy who works in the cubicle next to yeah. Go ahead and hit it. But that's not what we're talking about here. Right. I almost think, and again, you can, it's your brain, how your brain works. Right. But I almost think they're kind of one in the same, the one hour of IDM prospects and the 15. Um, and I have a feeling, it, it, it takes you more than an hour. Probably I could be wrong.
Jack:Yeah. You, I almost want to just get rid of the personalized LinkedIn connection one because it's gonna come.
Brian Margolis:Well, I see, I was go, I, my brain was going the opposite way. Really. My brain was going, cuz I don't wanna punish you for efficiency. Right. Or finding a, sometimes you, you hit a vein, right? You're like, oh there's these companies that do this and this is the, you know, you kind of hit a vein if you know what I mean. And to me, the idea is the results. If every week you sent 15 of those mm-hmm<affirmative> or 10 or whatever the number was in this case, you say 15, you're kind of gonna be in a pretty good position. Right. Cause that means you're identifying them and you're reaching out to them. Yeah. Right.
Jack:Or you could get rid of both of them and just have it be like identify X amount of companies who fit the ICP. And then once, I mean, once I've identified those, I'm obviously gonna go through these steps that week. I,
Brian Margolis:Well, I mean you, however you wanna do it. Cause it seems like the last step is sending the LinkedIn request. Yeah. Right. And so it's kind like, to me, that's kind of when I would cross it off.
Jack:Okay. That makes sense. Yeah.
Brian Margolis:But, but again, if your brain works the other way, let's go with your brain. Cuz you're the one that has to do this, but I'm thinking, okay. 15 also seems like a lot, but I could be wrong, um, with all your inbound stuff. But basically if you send 15 personalized LinkedIn prospect connects a week, you know, you're gonna be in a good position. Cause to get to that point where you can send it, you've gotta find the companies you've gotta learn. You know, you have to set aside time. I just don't wanna penalize you for, you know, finding a vein, finding better ways of doing it, finding leverage. Right. I don't know if you have like an internal or anything like that or whatever, but you never know you find a database. You like why penalize yourself for that? Yeah.
Jack:No, I like that. I see what you're saying. Yeah. I think I can just keep the, the LinkedIn one and then the 15. Yeah. The, the identifying the prospects every week will just come with it.
Brian Margolis:Yes. Well, yeah. That's basically what you're doing. Um, okay. So includes the gun. All right. So here's what I got 15 personalized LinkedIn prospect connects everything's per week, obviously 15 personalized, LinkedIn and prospect connects or invites. However you thinking about it. Yep. Send three video emails. You're prospecting 25, 25, 25 system. Mm-hmm<affirmative> reach out to three friends and family. Yep. Update and review your opportunity sheet twice a week, spend 90 minutes of messaging. At least five has to be on output mm-hmm<affirmative> one hour sharpening the ax of sales and marketing that can include gone include anything. Right. Mm-hmm<affirmative> and one hour on product and space learning.
Jack:I like it.
Brian Margolis:Yeah. Cause I'm a big fan of learning pillars and effect, but sometimes good enough is good enough. And you know, I don't want you to be doing so much learning that you're not actually out there learning, which is not something I usually have to tell people it's usually the opposite. I gotta tell'em to do, do more learning and effectiveness. So, um, yeah, I feel pretty good with these, uh,
Jack:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 8 or nine. Yeah. Around
Brian Margolis:Nine. No, I think they're and I can, I, I can type'em out as I have'em and send'em to you. You're too
Jack:Good. Yeah. Thank you so
Brian Margolis:Much. That'd be great. Yeah. To, well, I have to write'em out for the notes for the show anyway, but um, yeah, I think, I think we're good.
Jack:Cool. No, that was super helpful. I think, uh, I think I got a solid base here now, and that was really great at the end, you know, combining 12 or 13 down to, to eight and just keeping it more simplified cuz otherwise it's, it turns out to be a lot. Those first two first few weeks are pretty easy to get'em done and then it's all about consistency. So
Brian Margolis:Thanks for listening to another episode of simplify your strategy, magnify your results. If you know someone you think could benefit from this episode, be their hero and share it with'em. If you'd like a free copy of my book or you wanna be considered as a guest on a future episode, head on over to productivity, giant.com have a great day and thanks again.