Dallin Huso - Building a Multi-Million Dollar Pool Cleaning Company

summary

Dallin Huso, owner of Flamingo Pools, shares his journey of starting a successful pool maintenance and repair business. He discusses how he transitioned from college to entrepreneurship and the importance of finding a niche with high demand. Dallin emphasizes the value of creativity in marketing and branding, using his company's unique logo and color scheme to stand out in a saturated market. He also shares his marketing strategies, including door-to-door sales, social media content, and networking. Dallin provides insights on building a team and establishing a company culture based on core values. In this conversation, Dallin and Branden discuss the importance of hiring and building a team to scale a business. They emphasize the need to find team members who share the same core values and understand the company's vision. They also highlight the significance of documenting core values, mission, and processes to provide clarity and direction for new hires. Dallin shares the importance of having a growth mindset and being willing to take risks in order to grow the business. They also discuss the value of networking, education, and seeking advice from experienced entrepreneurs.

keywords

entrepreneurship, pool maintenance, branding, marketing, door-to-door sales, social media, networking, team building, company culture, hiring, building a team, core values, company vision, documenting processes, growth mindset, taking risks, networking, education, advice

takeaways

• College isn't the only path to success; entrepreneurship can be a viable option.
• Creativity and uniqueness in branding and marketing can help a business stand out in a competitive market.
• Utilize various marketing channels, such as social media, networking, and door-to-door sales, to reach potential customers.
• Establish a company culture and hire based on core values to ensure a cohesive and successful team.
• Focus on providing value and education to customers through marketing efforts. Hiring team members who share the same core values and understand the company's vision is crucial for building a successful business.
• Documenting core values, mission, and processes provides clarity and direction for new hires.
• Having a growth mindset and being willing to take risks are essential for business growth.
• Networking, seeking advice, and continuous education are valuable for personal and professional development as an entrepreneur.

Get More Reviews w/ NiceJob 
NiceJob Automates Your Review Requests!

Grow Your Business with Jobber
Sign up for a 14-day free trial or get a special discount when you sign up! 

Grow Your Business with Jobber
Sign up for a 14-day free trial or get a special discount when you sign up!

Get More Reviews w/ NiceJob
NiceJob Automates Your Review Requests!

The Perfect Payroll Solution
Gusto is a powerful and user friendly payroll provider. With Gusto you can integrate with Jobber and

Maximize Marketing Dollars w/ CallRail
Attach call tracking numbers to all your marketing campaigns and track their success!

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

Transcript

Branden Sewell (00:00)
Hi everybody, I am Brandon Sewell. I'm the owner of Seal Pro Painting, located in central Florida. I'm also the host of the Off the Ladder podcast, and we exist to help home service business owners learn so that they can lead well and ultimately live life off of the ladder. Today's guest is Dallin Huso. He is the owner of Flamingo Pools. Welcome to the show, Dallin.

Dallin (00:26)
Hey, Brandon, thanks for having me. Excited to be here.

Branden Sewell (00:28)
Yeah, for sure. So we had the opportunity to work on another project together with Nice Job, which was fun. So that's how we got introduced. you know, I've got introduced to your business and, I've seen like, you know, just your social media and stuff. And it looks like you've got a pretty awesome thing going. And you're in Arizona, right? Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. So I was,

Dallin (00:52)
Yep, yeah, Gilbert, Arizona.

Branden Sewell (00:56)
excited to get you on here and kind of dive into your business. Could you give a quick introduction about yourself and your business to the audience?

Dallin (01:06)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. And as well, it's been awesome getting connected with you over the last few months ever since, like you said, run that podcast together and then just following each other and just kind of seeing what you're doing with your business and with this podcast. It's super cool how you're helping people get off the ladder and succeed in scaling their business. But yeah, a little bit about me. Flamingo Pools, we do swimming pool maintenance and repairs. We started about six years ago. Told this story so many times, so I try not to get too repetitive with it.

but I was going to college for my first semester and it just wasn't for me. I was failing a lot of my classes, was just disinterested and was also hopping around from job to job at the same time. And I was just not a very good employee either. And yeah, I was just trying to figure out what to do with my life. And someone recommended that I read the book, Rich Dad Poor Dad.

And that completely changed my mindset of what I could do with my life and what I should be doing with my life. And at that point, that's when I knew I wanted to start a business. Didn't really know what at the time, but I just knew that was the path I wanted to take. And yeah, being in Arizona, it's really hot here and it feels like almost everyone has a pool. So I just knew that that was an industry that had a lot of demand. So started working for a company for a couple of months just so could understand the industry a little bit more. And then, yeah, once I felt comfortable

enough to clean other people's pools. I bought a pole and a brush and started knocking doors to get clients. So that's how I got started.

Branden Sewell (02:37)
That's awesome. you know, there's two common themes that I've heard from, you know, guests recently, and that is, you know, just feeling like college wasn't for them. And I know that's my story.

And I too, like I was just like, I don't feel like this is for me. And the other thing I was wrestling with is like, I didn't want to have a mountain of student loan debt. So I was like, I, cause I was going to school and it was more so because of like pressure from other people, not because I really felt like it was like something I was passionate about or felt like I even needed to do. And so I was like, man, if I'm already like a semester and a half in and I'm like,

Dallin (03:06)
Right.

Branden Sewell (03:26)
hating this and don't want to do it like you know three and half more years of this is gonna be like torture and I'm probably not gonna like it's not gonna benefit me long term so you know I know there's certain people in the world who would probably be like

Dallin (03:29)
Right.

Branden Sewell (03:42)
looking down on people who drop out of college, but when I hear it, I get excited. I'm like, way to be. So it's really cool. And it's just a testament that you don't have to go to college to be successful.

Dallin (03:47)
Right? Yeah.

Yeah, and it's funny, like you said, I didn't even know that I had the option to not go to college just like growing up, going to high school, like all they talk about, okay, what are you going to do next? Like, what's your degree going to be? So I didn't even know there was an option to like, you know, be successful in life without going to college. So until I read that book, like that's all, even though I didn't really enjoy it, I was just like, well, this is, you know, kind of what you have to do.

Branden Sewell (04:16)
Yeah, I was watching this video this morning on Instagram and it was this guy and he was saying he's like most of the time

your students who are like straight A students, really good test takers, you know, love studying and love that whole like school environment. He was like most of the time in their life after college, they end up being like very mediocre. And he's like, and then you have like your, your B level, like kids who like go to school and they like get B's and like, you know, they get by. He's like, usually those

Dallin (04:38)
Mm

Branden Sewell (04:57)
like seem to end up being like in management or something, you know, they do a little better. He's like, and then the kids who like start businesses, become CEOs and like run the world are like those C students. And so he's like, and then all the A students and the B students work for the C students because, you know, the C students, like they're very independent. They don't like to be told like, hey, this is what you have to do.

Dallin (05:16)
Mm

Branden Sewell (05:26)
they like to be like kind of free thinkers and like create and build and have that freedom. And that's why they excel at being entrepreneurs, CEOs, business owners. Whereas the others, they're more of like, they just like fall in line, do what's expected of them, you know, and just, so it's, it's funny. Like I feel like that's, that holds pretty true to like most people I meet who are business owners. So many business

that I know are like either high school or college dropouts, you know, didn't really do well in school, but they thrive as a business owner. And it's not, I don't think that, you know, like there's not a correlation between grades and intelligence in my opinion. You know, it's like me, I hate learning about things that I'm not interested in. So like if you have me sit down and try to

Dallin (06:16)
Right.

Right.

Branden Sewell (06:26)
I think being a lifelong learner

Dallin (06:35)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (06:52)
and a student of life is more important than whether you have a four -year degree or not.

Dallin (06:58)
Sure, yeah, and I think that creativity aspect, like you said, is a big reason why a lot of people that end up being business owners struggle in school, just because I don't, me and a lot of people that do have that, it's hard to be in this closed classroom environment where you're forced to just memorize things, and like you said, a lot of times it's things that you're not really interested in. So growing up, I thought that I just hated education, but it turns out I just wasn't interested in the things that I was being forced to learn about. But now that I'm out of that world and I

Branden Sewell (07:20)
Yeah

Dallin (07:28)
can learn about whatever I want. I love educating myself and learning about new things, whether it's business or sports or cooking. I've got all these different hobbies and passions now that I love to learn about. It's just the things that I choose to learn about. And it's in a more creative mindset and setting versus that classroom setting and being forced to learn a particular thing that you know that isn't going to benefit you at all down the road.

Branden Sewell (07:52)
Yeah, for sure. Well, you know, one thing that I can say that I noticed right away with your business and even like I jumped on your social media and I was like, man, this guy's like got some pretty good ideas. You know, it's clear to me that you're creative. You really understand how to be like kind of

disruptive when it comes to your marketing and have like, you know, there's this guy that I really have started to look up to. I'm not sure if you've heard of him, but Dan Antonelli wrote a book called Branded Not Blended. And there's a phrase that he uses quite often is like making your brand sticky, you know, so like where it like sticks in people's minds.

Dallin (08:26)
or the Namia.

Branden Sewell (08:42)
And I think that you're definitely accomplishing that. Like I look at your shirt and I'm like, all I'm gonna think about after this is gonna be like, Dallin's pink, bright pink shirt. it's, yeah. I mean, and it's funny how it's like just those little things, you know, that can...

Dallin (08:56)
That's the goal.

Branden Sewell (09:05)
make or break your business in the sense of like grabbing people's attention. So I wanted you to kind of just dive into that. What are some of your thoughts about marketing and branding? Where did your inspiration for like starting your company and even like the brand and the logo? Where'd you, you know, come up with all that? If you could, like if somebody was listening to you talk about starting your business and they were trying to think like, how do I even come up with a logo? How do I come up with like,

concept, kind of walk through like why you made some of the decisions that you did with your brand.

Dallin (09:41)
Yeah, so it's funny because the more I learn about branding and marketing, I learn all these fancy terms and find out, that's what I was doing. But at the time, didn't know what I was doing exactly. I guess I was on the right track. I just didn't know what track that was. I like the word that you mentioned, sticky. So I was very intentional about picking a logo that I wanted to be something that people saw in their everyday life and that it would create these triggers and remind them of our brand. So when I was thinking of the

the business name and the logo, I started to do some research on number one, other pool companies. And just noticed there was a lot of similarities in a lot of their names and a lot of their logos and their color schemes. It was all like navy blue and light blue. The logo had something to do with water and a splash. And so it's hard to kind of differentiate yourself when you look like that. And so number one, I knew I wanted to stand out. And then number two, I just kind of started looking at pools and seeing what is there around a pool or something that people see commonly in their ev

everyday life that could possibly remind them of us and associate their pool and their pool party with us and our brand. And I just started looking at different popular floats. And one of the most popular ones is those flamingo floats that a lot of people have in their pool. So number one, that would help us stick out with our color scheme because we wouldn't just be your standard.

your standard blue colors. So we have the pink and the teal coloring. And it's something that a lot of people have in their pool. So the idea is, know, when people are going out and they see their sparkling clean pool, if they're going to have a pool party and they have these flamingo floats, they see that. And then that reminds them of us and our company. And there's just like this mental association, even if they don't totally realize it, they are in some some capacity associating, you know, having a good time and enjoying their pool with our brand. So that was, you know, the thought behind the name and the logo. And I knew that down the road

we would start to wrap vehicles. And I knew that a pink vehicle is definitely going to stand out versus maybe a navy blue truck, which a lot of people have, or just a black truck with a logo on it. So I wanted to make sure that when our truck is driving down the road, that it's something that sticks in your head the rest of the day that maybe just out of curiosity, you look it up on Google or on Instagram later. So we're just trying to do as many different things as possible to kind of stick out and be a little more unique than your average pool company when it comes to our marketing.

Branden Sewell (12:00)
Yeah, it's so funny. think some people just like intrinsically have some of the thought process and I can relate. I, once I read Dan's book, which is, I think I mentioned this already is called Branded Not Blended. I was like, wow, I didn't even know I was doing these like.

what would you call them, like tactics or whatever, methods of marketing and branding. It just made sense to me. Like when I was coming up with Seal Pro, I did the same thing that you did. I was thinking, I was like, let me look at all these different painting companies and all of them are like somebody's name or like the...

Dallin (12:27)
Right.

Right. Yeah.

Branden Sewell (12:49)
name of the company was tied to like a location or like a service area. And I started thinking about it. was like, well, if I do my name, well then, you know, it's just not very unique. It's, it's going to be too tied to me. And like, what if I decide to like sell it one day, you know, who's going to want to buy something that has my name?

Dallin (13:11)
Exactly.

Right.

Branden Sewell (13:15)
So I thought about it from that standpoint. I thought about these people who name it after a specific area. was like, what if I want to take my company to multiple locations? Who knows? What are the possibilities? And I was like, well, if I name it after my service area, it's going to be harder for me to take this and put it somewhere else. So was like, that eliminates that idea. And then I thought through, you have a lot of people who do these

Dallin (13:29)
Mm.

Branden Sewell (13:45)
common names like excellent painting, precise painting, A rated painting, all -star painting. I was like, okay, I'm not doing any of that either. And so then I started thinking, I was like, what are brands that stick in my brain in the service industry? And I was like,

You know, like one is like Massey. I don't know if you know like Massey the or like Truly Nolan or I'm trying to think of other ones.

Dallin (14:18)
-huh. Yep.

Branden Sewell (14:24)
Anyway, they typically they'll have like a mascot or like a logo that has nothing to do with The service that they offer directly, you know It's not like a paintbrush or like a person holding a paintbrush or a roller. It's like something totally random and Like Massey's I think there's is a frog And they do I mean in a sense, I guess it's somewhat related. It's like associated but

Dallin (14:40)
Right. Yeah.

Branden Sewell (14:54)
because they do like lawn care and I think pest control. Truly Nolan, having them house that makes sense. anyway, I guess what I'm just trying to say is like there's I was tied to like or drawn towards making a mascot and then

kind of like you said, finding an association. like for us, they call our industry waterproofing and sealing. So I was like, a seal, like, and then I'll put a paintbrush in its mouth. It's like, and, I can't tell you how many times people like stop me and they're like, what's the seal about? And so it sticks in their brain. I've had people like, I was, I think I told this story on the podcast I was on with you, or maybe it

was on another podcast I was on, but I grew up surfing. So I was surfing one time and I came in and this guy was like really intrigued by me surfing. So he like stopped me and wanted to talk to me. So I was talking to him and I asked him where he was from. was from New York and he had a pizza business that he sold and he moved down here. And then he asked me what I did and I was like, I own a painting company. He goes, Seal Pro? And I was like, yeah. I was like, how do you know that?

well I saw your truck and the logo just like stuck in my head he's like I couldn't stop thinking about this seal and what it had to do with painting so you know for me that was like that was like validation it was you know and that happens a lot like it's a good idea so anyway I hope like for whoever's listening to this if you're like

Dallin (16:18)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (16:39)
you know, looking to start a business or maybe you've started your business and maybe by listening to us, you're like, man, my name is awful. You can always rebrand. I changed the name of my business in 2020. So that's always a possibility.

Dallin (16:52)
really? How long had you been in business? How long had you been in business at that point?

Branden Sewell (16:56)
I started my company in 2017, about three years, just over three years.

Yeah, so I went from, I was actually in a partnership and we were called Perfect Painters and more. And then I got out of that and I started my own thing and that's when I really started to look at what's a better name. So anyway, I love that you went through that whole thought process and came up with what you did. It obviously stands out. Could you go a little bit into some of the things that you do for marketing?

I think that I was looking at your Instagram and I saw some like pretty interesting like ideas for posts and and things like that that were kind of like interesting ideas in my opinion but can you dive into like some of the things you do from a marketing standpoint?

Dallin (17:57)
Yeah, yeah, a couple things I can touch on. One more point about what we were just talking about is I think it's just so important, whether it's your colors or your name or your logo or your trucks or just something to when people see it that they stop and think for a second, like how you're mentioning that people do that when they see your logo. And it's like, why is that the name? Or like, why is it a flamingo? Why do they have pink trucks? And if you can just get them to think for one second, we have so many things that we're seeing every day and we're conditioned to ignore it. But if we can make someone actually stop for a second and think about it, I think that's

huge for branding. And that kind of ties into one thing that we're doing for advertising that's been really beneficial for us is when we're running ads, particularly Facebook ads. And people, again, people are coming across so many ads throughout the day. And so let's say, you know, someone's being targeted by five or six different pool companies. If they see four or five of those and all of the branding is pretty similar, all the messaging is pretty similar. And then they come across ours and it's this bright pink truck with this flamingo.

We're most likely going to be the ones that stand out and so because of that we've gotten a little better ROI when it comes to a lot of our our marketing that we do so that's another you know great reason to have a logo and A name that kind of stands out a bit and it's a little bit unique But yeah, so in terms of marketing I have been really intentional to try to have as many different You know arms of marketing as possible a lot of people ask like what do do for marketing? What how do you get all like all your customers and there's not just

one particular answer. have so many different things that we're doing at the same time. And that's because there's not just, I don't think there's just one surefire way to get customers. If there was, then everyone would just do that thing and everyone would have this huge business. But there's so many different things that work at different times and different seasons, depending on your business and your audience. And so we just try to be in as many places at once. So we definitely do some paid advertising. We do Google and Facebook ads. We do a little bit of lead generation with Yelp and Thumbtack.

Branden Sewell (19:37)
Right.

Dallin (19:57)
My favorite thing that we do is social media because it's free, it's organic, you can have a lot more fun with it too. We're pretty heavy right now on just on.

on pushing value when it comes to our social media content. So just trying to educate our customers and educate really anyone that watches our videos. So that way, they come across a video, even if they're not a current customer of ours, maybe they even clean their own pool. And they see that, and they see the value in what we're sharing, the tips that we're giving people. And so they decide to follow us and continue to watch our videos. And maybe one day, if their pump breaks down, they need to call someone we hope to be the person that they call. We do a little bit of paper marketing as well. We're in a local magazine.

We've flyers, we've done some signs out on the road. So yeah, we just like to do as much as we can. Another big thing that we do is networking groups. I've been pushing that a lot recently. Not only do I go to some, but I've got some employees that all go to a couple groups. I've got our newest hire, actually. One of his main roles is just to go to different marketing groups and different networking groups and just connect with other business owners, kind of like a brand ambassador, if you will.

Branden Sewell (20:47)
Mm

Dallin (21:07)
we have all these different arms, like I like to think of it like an octopus, just being in as many places we can at once. So that way, if one dries up or slows down for a little bit, that doesn't totally affect the business because we've got all these different ways that we're getting marketing coming through. One cool thing that we've been doing lately, and again, marketing is my favorite part of the business because we get to be unique, we get to be creative, stand out a little bit. But we recently put together this packet, this pool packet. We called it Pool Care for Dummies and Smarties.

And we're offering that for free to people that come across the link or come across the ad on Facebook. And it's basically just like a step -by -step guide of how you can take care of your pool on your own. There's no like, we're not trying to force people to come and be our clients. We're not gonna spam them with emails. We just wanna provide the education with them. And obviously if down the road, they're out of town, they need a one -time service or their pump breaks down, they need someone to help them out. They need the question. We hope that we're the ones that they call. And so there is that marketing tactic there, but it's really just like a branding plan.

trying to show us as professionals in the industry. And so that's been a fun thing we're doing lately. But yeah, I just love to sit down and put my creative cap on and think of what we can do again to kind of stand out and be unique when it comes to marketing. Sorry, I know that was kind of a lot, but just some of the things that we're doing right now.

Branden Sewell (22:22)
No, no, that's really good. So.

So there's a couple of things I want to ask.

One, the first thing I wanted to ask is like, okay, let's say you've got somebody who is listening to this and they're early on. Like obviously, you know, like I'm trying to help guys who are so far from where you're at and they might be thinking to themselves, how in the world do I get there?

Dallin (22:56)
Right.

Branden Sewell (22:57)
And so there's two things I want you to kind of talk about and walk the listener through is like one, like what did it look like going from just getting started? What kind of like things did you have to do that maybe competitors weren't doing or like others aren't willing to do? How did you have to get out of your comfort zone to like grow? And then secondly, I want you to kind of talk about how you like rally a team around

these concepts, these creative concepts of growing your business and how do you rally them around that and get everybody to like move in this like same direction and vision and keep everything together? Does that make sense?

Dallin (23:43)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So to answer your first question, yeah, to start off, had no paid marketing. I had no money to start up my business. Like I said, I could barely afford the pole and the net and the brush as that was. And so yeah, I could not afford Google Ads or Facebook Ads or any sort of lead generation. So I had to figure out how to be creative and how to do stuff for free. So I think there's probably three main things that I did starting off when I had no other way to get customers. First thing was just knocking doors.

Branden Sewell (23:57)
Mm

Dallin (24:13)
So if I had when I had three or four clients after I'd clean that pool I would just knock the entire street and just share my story just say that hey I just started this brand new business Looking for clients. I know a lot of people get annoyed by salespeople But I think when you share that story that you're just out there hustling you just started a business People are a little more open to that is what I found Doing that verse, you know I have done some some door -to -door sales in the past and I got a lot better Reaction when I was the actual owner of the business people had a lot of respect for that. So I did a

I did pick up a couple clients that way. Another thing I did early, yeah.

Branden Sewell (24:46)
Really quick, before you go too much further off of the door to door, I want to jump in here. So before I started my own business, I did door to door. And one of the things that I notice is like, it just makes a huge difference on how you show up. Like show up, be professional, like don't like

Dallin (24:51)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (25:11)
Be intentional about how you're going to approach door to door. So like for me, if I'm gonna go door to door, I'm gonna make sure like I'm going presentable, right? So making sure I don't look like I haven't shaved in five days. Make sure I brush my teeth, my hair looks okay. You know, I'm dressed in a somewhat professional way. I'm not saying you have to like wear a, you know, shirt and tie, but you know, like I'll wear a polo and some nice slacks and nice shoes

Dallin (25:41)
Right.

Branden Sewell (25:41)
Just being professional in that and then I would say I found the most success in not being like a pushy salesperson but kind of taking a path of like empathy and understanding that I just like disrupted this person's whole day by knocking on their door unwanted or ringing their doorbell and and so I would always take like a position of empathy of like hey look I know you don't want me here and look it's really uncomfortable for me too but look I

Do you have like I'll even take like a few steps back to like that was one of my strategies like I'd knock and then like when they came out I would back away from them almost to say like hey look I respect your space and like I'm gonna move back away from you and then I would always have something to hand them because then if they were willing I'd ask like hey do you mind if I just hand this to you and then that that's them inviting me closer to them right so now I

and

a strategy, you can kind of make that effort more effective, if that makes sense.

Dallin (27:17)
Yeah, yeah, no, those are some good tactics.

Another thing I did was just starting to post organically on social. I know I mentioned that earlier, but that's like there's no reason that you shouldn't be posting on social, especially if you're out being the technician. You can just pull your phone out and take 30 seconds and explain what you just did or what you're about to do. And you don't have to do any sort of fancy editing. You can just post that as a real, give a good caption. Instagram and TikTok will both like auto populate captions for what you're saying to make it easy for people to watch. And that's just a free

way to get organic content. And it's even better now than when I started, because we didn't have reels when I first started. TikTok wasn't a thing either. So the opportunities now are even better than they were then. So like I said, it's completely free to post that. Obviously, now we do a bit more editing to our videos. And we've got someone like a nicer camera. We've got a guy that goes out and films our technicians. So there's obviously cost to that now. But when you're first getting started, it's completely free to just pull out your phone for 30 seconds, talk about what you're doing, post that to Instagram and Facebook and TikTok. And you might get a couple hundred.

which still isn't a bad thing. That's 100 people that didn't know about your business that now know about it for free. I feel like we're so used to wanting to go viral that we think 100, 200, 300 views is bad. When really it's like we just got 300 people to see our company for free when that would normally cost maybe a couple hundred bucks depending on what platform.

Branden Sewell (28:24)
Yeah.

Dallin (28:41)
You're using so definitely tap into that definitely use that and when you're the only person you can really be personable talk about how you're the owner to share your story. about how you learned what you're doing just share tips be educational and yeah there's so much that can come from that. And then networking was the other big thing I did starting off I've talked to so many people that think they're too busy to go to any sort of like networking event and you know and meet other people but like it's just something that you can't afford not to do so just.

Branden Sewell (28:42)
Yeah, that's good.

Dallin (29:11)
It's only an hour out of your entire week, find a local group that you can network with. outside of groups, you can network with other business owners that can potentially give business to you. I always say, try to provide value to someone else first. See how you can be of assistance to them. Don't just be a taker. See how you can give. But by doing that, it's just going to come back tenfold. And so when I started off, I reached out to a lot of people, like real estate agents and

landscape companies were the two biggest for me. Just people that I thought, okay, who knows my customer? Who has a need for a pool guy and would benefit by having a good pool guy in their back pocket that they can refer. So I met up with a lot of landscape companies, just told them my story, told them who I was, and like I said, try to be a giver, try to push value. said, hey, I'd love to offer a free month of service to your clients. You can let them know, hey, I've got a really good pool guy. He can help you out for free and you can see how you like him.

you know that customer is going to see even more value in their landscaper and so a lot of people like that and so I started getting people sending me referrals and I didn't have to pay anything for that so that's another great opportunity to get free business just by you know thinking who knows my customer and who needs my assistance right now and then those networking groups as well as kind of that other aspect of networking you're just getting to know other business owners that learn to know you and like you and trust you and by doing that they have all these

in their everyday life and they might need a pool guy or a painter. And so it just provides all these extra opportunities for people to give referrals to you for free. And so those are just a couple things that I did starting off that there's no cost to do. It really doesn't take that much time to do either. It's not like you're spending hours going to this group every week and it's taking away from the other things that you should be doing. So you can spend an hour at a networking group, do a couple lunches a week with other business owners, and take 30 seconds while you're doing your work to post something.

on social media and then knock a couple doors after each client and by spending a couple hours a week doing that, that's a huge way to build growth at the beginning when you don't really have any sort of marketing budget. That was your first question. Remind me what the second question was.

Branden Sewell (31:27)
So I said, obviously the challenge is that somebody who's just starting or is just like that one guy in a truck, one of the things they're gonna challenge with is the mindset that it takes to go from...

you know, like where you're at now and then to grow, like add team members, to hire your first person and then rallying that team around this common vision and really helping everybody to stay like cohesive and move forward together. like, for example, I've got like, I'm thinking of this buddy of mine, he just started his own pool company and you know, he's working by himself and

I'm just trying to think what kind of things would you share with somebody like that to give them value of like, okay, this is the mindset you have to have to hire your first guy like What questions did you have like if you could go back and think like when you were by yourself on that truck what were some of the hurdles that you were facing and How did you overcome them? How did you hire that first person? How did you what are the lessons or mistakes?

she made and like you know just try to help that person as much as you could he's still on the truck by himself.

Dallin (32:52)
Yeah, so I would say first off, establish a company culture, which sounds kind of weird when it's just you, but kind of envision what you want your company to look like and what sort of life you want to have. And establish some core values. And hire based off of those core values. Because if you don't, you're going to let your employees dictate your culture and dictate your core values. And as you hire multiple people, and they're pulling it in different directions, and most of those directions are not placed

that you want your company culture to be, that's just gonna be an absolute pain and you're gonna have to clean house one day and it's gonna cost you a lot more in the long run. So start with that culture and that vision and those core values and hire based off of that. I know it's hard and even today like I wanna hire people with experience and sometimes we do, but it's a lot easier to train someone how to do a job than it is to train someone.

on some core values that they don't currently possess. Obviously, people can learn and grow and improve on those core values, but if they have this red flag that goes completely against one of your values, even if they're the greatest technician in the world, that's just something that I don't want to deal with, and it's something that I have dealt with in the past, and it's hurt our company quite a bit. Obviously, we've been able to recover, luckily, but I'm very confident that I would be a lot further along than I currently am if I had received that advice earlier.

on because I was mostly just looking for people that had experience and I just thought that I could teach them the values that I had in mind for our company later on and it just didn't work out that way. And so yeah, as we've hired four of those core values that kind of answer the second part of your question, it's getting a team to rally around you. When they don't really understand your company vision and the mission that you have in mind, it's hard to get them to rally around that.

And so early on, part of this was my fault because I didn't always believe in myself and my ability to share that vision. I always had the vision, I didn't, I wasn't confident enough at times to share that with the team and hey, this is what we're doing, this is where we're going. And so they didn't always care when I did bring that up because I had the wrong people. And so now that I have people that share the same core values and understand where we're trying to go, they're totally behind the things that we do, whether it's marketing or sales or just scaling and growth and

in and they understand why we're doing the things that we're doing. So it's so much easier to get a team to rally around you when they're all on the same page when it comes to those core values.

Branden Sewell (35:31)
Yeah, that's really good advice and I tell people that all the time. Like one of the best things you can do is early on in your business is be clear about who you are. Like write down, so like if you're listening to this.

and you want to get off the truck, off the ladder, you want to start hiring people. One of the best things you can do is document your core values, document your mission as a company and what your vision is, and even document some of the steps that you want to take to get there, right out where you are now and where you want to be in a year, three years, five years.

to start to see what that might look like. And then.

The other thing that I would say that is pretty key, I'm sure you would agree with this, Dalin, is documenting your system and process of how you do things. So when you hire somebody for a position, being able to hand them something that says, hey, this is how you do your job, and this is what success looks like in that position. And kind of have it outlined. And be very detailed, like, hey, success looks

like you know we show up in with you know groomed like make sure like I have an employee policy manual and so it goes over just like expectations from like taking care of yourself hygiene you know uniform what we look like how we dress how we show up how we greet our customers you know how we communicate with our customers step by step just from like

start to finish on a job what it looks like and what that success looks like so I think those are some really key things that you can do to set yourself up to be successful when you start to hire do you guys go ahead yeah sure

Dallin (37:37)
Yeah, I'll touch on one more.

Yeah, no, I touch on what you're talking about systems and processes and that's another thing I wish I would have done, you know from the beginning I do it now But I mean for a technician. It's a little easier to be like, okay. I know how to hire a technician I know like what their tasks are gonna be but anything outside of that It can be tricky if you don't have systems and processes to know who you need to hire and what tasks they need to do I remember when I was getting so busy with like all of the admin and office stuff and before I really understood like what What positions existed within a small business?

I was like, I know I need someone, but I don't know what I need them to do. And so it took me a while to figure that out and really envision that role. And so I got some advice later on that I wish I would have known right at first. And they said to do a time audit. And so take your day, break it up into 15, 20 minute segments, and just write down everything you're doing that day. And then just kind of label that and figure out, put it into one of four quadrants. You have high value things that you would pay a lot for. And then you have high energy.

Branden Sewell (38:15)
Yeah.

Dallin (38:40)
things that you really enjoy doing and that you're passionate about. And then you have the flip of that. And so what you want to hire first is the things that are low value, things that are very cheap to hire out, and things that you don't enjoy. And so for me, that was obviously cleaning the pools. And then also, my first hire outside of a technician was a receptionist, because I hated just dealing with the random calls from customers all day. I didn't want to be as involved in that. And so that's obviously something that you don't have to pay

you know $200 an hour for right so as I found that to be something that I could hire someone for relatively cheap being on a budget as a new business and then it's also something that you know I didn't love to do and so that's a great way to find out what your first hire should be and what tasks they should be doing because you don't have to have like this official role because when you're starting off you're wearing a lot of hats and your first two hires are probably wearing multiple hats as well so hiring someone and making them you know a receptionist or a secretary or an assistant and just kind of giving them a couple

different jobs that you don't enjoy doing and that are cheaper labor tasks is a great way to kind make that first hire outside of a technician.

Branden Sewell (39:50)
Yeah, that's really good. Some people might be listening to this and asking like, man, how in the world do I afford to hire somebody? Like, how do I know if I'm ready? How do I know if I can make that leap? And I know that answer much better now. I would say that I didn't really know the answer to that when I made my first hire, which mine was an administrative person

Dallin (40:18)
Right.

Branden Sewell (40:20)
well. But I knew I needed to. so like kind of like, and I don't know if you would agree with this, but my, what I decided in my head, I was like, well, this person is going to free me up. like, worst case scenario,

I don't like, this is literally the way I thought about it. was like, worst case scenario, maybe I don't get paid. You know, or, and then I was like, best case scenario, we end up growing as a result of hiring this person. make more money and like the extra money that we're making covers paying them. And of course that's what happened. But, I'm just curious, did you have more of like a methodical way of thinking of that first hire or was it like, I'd know

Dallin (40:59)
Right.

Branden Sewell (41:13)
I need to do this and I'm just going to take the leap and take the risk.

Dallin (41:17)
Yeah, just have to, I think you just have to have a growth mindset and understand, like you said, yeah, I'm scared. I don't know if I can afford it, but when I can have the time to work on growing the business more, I'm just going to be able to grow that much more. And so it really is a limited mindset that I think keeps people from, keeps people in that fear of hiring that first person. I think there is like some math behind it. And everyone I talked to, like we realize now that there's these equations you can do to figure out, okay, I'm making this amount and you know, this is how many leads I have coming in.

I can afford to hire someone but most of us we didn't have that and we were still able to do it So I think if you can just you know Don't be stupid and do it before you have any sort of leads coming in But as long as you're busy as a technician and you know, you're confident that you can now spend your time Either doing bigger jobs or growing the business and focusing on marketing and sales then you just got to take that leap and go for it I'm a huge sports fan and I love relating sports to to the business world and something

Branden Sewell (41:57)
Yeah.

Dallin (42:17)
that I see like over and over again in sports, especially I'm a big basketball fan. So in the playoffs, when a team is down in a playoff series and their backs are against the wall, they always just have this edge to them that you just can't replicate if you're up in the series. And you see so many series turn because that team that was down 2 -1 or down 3 -1 just has this edge because their backs are against the wall and they're able to just perform with this little bit of extra something that you can't replicate any other way. I think we perform.

the same as business owners. So think one of the best things to do to grow is to hire someone, get them in a truck, and now you are now forced to create and to make sure that you have enough business to keep that person busy. And where otherwise there might be a day where you're super tired in the morning, you wake up, you don't feel like knocking doors or doing whatever marketing you had planned for that day. And when it's just you, maybe you can afford to do that. But when you know that you've got a mouth to feed out there and a vehicle payment to make and that person's relying on you

to do that, like you're going to do everything necessary to make sure that you keep that person busy and you keep growing the business. that's another thing that I found is when I put myself in those pressured situations, and obviously don't be stupid about it, but to a certain extent, putting your back against the wall and giving yourself a little bit of pressure is really good for growing the business.

Branden Sewell (43:36)
Yeah, I mean, I think no matter what, there's risk associated. and yeah, like putting your back against the wall is a good way to like, push yourself into that uncomfortable realm where you've got to just perform. It's like sink or swim. And yeah, 100 % I feel like whenever I do that to myself, it's like, you really find out what you're made of. And I think really, too, like you find out you're capable of much more than you ever thought.

Dallin (44:00)
Exactly.

Branden Sewell (44:06)
I know like for myself just in this journey of being a business owner, I'm like, wow, like if you would have asked me if I could do this, you know, seven years ago, eight years ago, I'd have like looked at you and been like, there's no way I can do that. I'm just not capable. But like you said, like when you put yourself out there, it's like, well, it's like, no other choice, you know? And the other thing that I think of with business is,

Dallin (44:06)
Yeah.

Right.

Branden Sewell (44:36)
I like to a lot of times like when I'm questioning a decision or I'm questioning whether something's going to work, I like to look at a company that's doing it already. Because for what that does for me, it's like it proves that.

there's something there that's obviously working, right? If you look at a, someone who does, they're like on the truck right now, they're cleaning pools by themselves and they're looking at your business.

They would be foolish to say like, I don't need an admin and I don't need anybody else. I can do this all by myself, right? Because it's just, you you get to a point where it's not, you can't grow past your own capacity, right? So if you wanna continue to grow, if you wanna continue to scale, you have to increase your capacity. And the only way you can do that is if you bring more people, you duplicate yourself.

Dallin (45:27)
Right.

Branden Sewell (45:40)
and get other, and even people that are better at things than you are, right? So there are people out there, I've had employees who are much better at answering the phones and like talking to customers on the phone than I am. You know, my painters, they're better painters than I am.

You know, so I'm not trying to be the best at everything. I just want to be the best at what I'm good at, which is for me, that's marketing and sales and like creating that vision and direction for the company.

Dallin (46:19)
Yeah, I think that's huge. I think that's a big struggle for a lot of people that I talk to as well. They think that nobody can do it as good as them. And for certain people, that might be true for certain aspects of the job. you really do have to be humble if you want to grow and scale a business and understand that there's people that specialize in these particular roles. And there's no way that you are actually the best technician and the best manager and the best sales guy and the best marketing guy and the best receptionist and the best customer service person. There's people that are very specialized.

those particular roles. And so like I knew very early on that I wasn't the best at any of those things. So I was trying as much as possible to hire those people that were specialized in that particular role. And at first I was like scared to admit like to my service manager. I didn't want him to know that he was smarter when it came to pools than I was, that he had more experience and knew more than me. But now I'm totally okay with empowering my team and letting them know like, hey, obviously I want some input here and there on these certain things. But I hired you because I know you're great at this particular

role and I want you to take your talents and take your experience and just you know you do what you see best you know reach out to me if you have thoughts or questions and we can collaborate together but like I want to empower you to be the best at this position because you know that's what you were made to do.

Branden Sewell (47:33)
Yeah, that's so good. I find myself a lot of times, like I just mentioned, looking at companies that are bigger than mine for inspiration on leadership and delegation. It's impossible to look at a large, successful company and...

for the owner to be the one who's doing everything or to be the expert at everything, right? So if you're the owner of your business, you can't try to be like the best at everything. You've got to put your ego aside and realize like, hey, I'm not going to be the best salesperson. I'm not going to be the best at managing our production and our team. I'm not going to be the best at marketing and just down the line.

the things that I'm passionate and great at, I may not be the best. And so the best thing that I can do as a business owner is like put my ego aside, humble myself, and then really look for others who are better than me at things and put those people in those places of, you know, leadership or in those roles. And then really what I want to try to do is be like a champion of

Dallin (48:31)
Right.

Branden Sewell (48:56)
their success, right? And like encourage them, like talk them up like, wow, you're amazing at what you do. You're an expert. Like, you know, you're great at this and really talk them up and make them feel like they have a place to...

Dallin (49:04)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (49:16)
to work and live out what they're great at, right? And feel purpose and passion for it, if that makes sense. So yeah, think there's so many, like you look at like like Jeff Bezos, you know, it's like, he probably doesn't walk into a room of engineers for Blue Origin, which I'm not sure if you're familiar with Blue Origin, but they're like right across the river here where I live.

But he probably doesn't walk into a room of engineers or like physicists or chemists and like tell them how to do their job, you know? But he's still like, like one of the, or is he still the richest person in the world or like one of the richest? And yeah, he's one of the top. think he's like, it probably bounces between him and Elon or something. But either way, it's like you have this billionaire who,

Dallin (49:55)
Right.

Yeah, he's up there.

Branden Sewell (50:14)
you know, walks into a room and he's, he's not trying to be the...

expert chemist, the expert, you know, engineer, whatever, he's, but he's the visionary, right? And he empowers these people. So it's, and I think we can take that example, and even though that's a very large scale, and we can apply it to our small business and say like, hey, I don't have to be the best person at cleaning a pool. I don't have to have all the best ideas. I can, you know, empower others to have great ideas too.

Dallin (50:28)
Right. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I think people think that if they're not the best technician, that they can't grow a successful business. But I think the opposite is true. It's kind of easier to grow if you know that you're not the best. And that way, that's the sooner you can start hiring people and grow and focus on the things you love and the things that you're successful at and that you're really good at. And that's the best way to grow the business, I think.

Branden Sewell (50:59)
Yeah.

Yeah, and I think another thing that hinders people is probably like a scarcity mindset. You know, like thinking like, well, if I don't do it, I'm going to be giving that money away to somebody else.

And you know, because I've heard people say that all the time, you know, like it might be like a painter or something or whatever other trade it is. And they're like, well, if I hire somebody, well, then I'm not going to keep that money for myself. I'm going to have to pay them. It's like, yeah, you're going to pay them. But now you can scale and you can you can make more money. Would you rather have the piece like a piece of the pie of like, you know, a five million dollar company or would you rather have all of like

hundred thousand dollar company you know it's

Dallin (51:56)
Yeah, no, I was just about to share that example because I've talked to some people like, my profit margins are so good since I'm doing all the work. It's like, OK, would you rather have a 6 % profit of this really small company, $100 ,000 company, or you can take 20 % profit of a multimillion dollar company and you're not out in the field working all day and being miserable and you can do the things that you love, you're still making the same amount or more money. It's just, like you said, it's that limited mindset that stops people from seeing the bigger picture.

Branden Sewell (52:16)
Yeah.

Yeah, and I think sometimes too, it's like, it takes time to get there, right? Like you might sacrifice, I mean, this is at least my story. I don't know if it's yours, so I'll let you share if you would, if this resonates with you, but like I've chosen to grow my personal income slowly because I've obviously focused on growing and like hiring people. And so obviously that's like big chunks of money that go to other people, but

My personal income from the business has grown over time as the business has grown. But I had to sacrifice. If I would have done all the work myself all this time, I could have made a lot more money for myself in the here and now. But because I chose to live a certain lifestyle and chose to be reserved early on in my business, I'm setting myself up for down the

I'm going to make considerably more. So it's just having that long -term mindset and like a different perspective.

Dallin (53:31)
Yeah.

Yeah, no, I can definitely relate to that. think a lot of people just want that instant gratification and it doesn't help that, you know, everyone on social media kind of glorifies entrepreneurship and how much money you can make. So they think that you're going to start this business and you take home all this money right away. But yeah, it's definitely not the case or it shouldn't be the case. You should spend a couple of years growing and putting as much back into the business as possible. So, yeah, I'm still I think I'm still there, honestly, like I could be taking home a lot more than I currently am, but I'm just continuing to reinvest as much as I can back into the business.

because I know in the long run, I'll end up being a lot more successful and the business will grow a lot faster than it otherwise would have if I would have taken all those extra marketing dollars and just kept it for myself. yeah, there's definitely something to be said about just being patient, letting the business continue to grow, not having that instant gratification and just putting as much as you can. Obviously, it's different for different people. Like my wife was working for a couple of years, so I was able to just literally put every dollar back into the business. I didn't pay myself.

Once we started having kids and she was staying at home, I started taking out what's necessary. It's what I'm still doing and it's funny because I'm probably making less this year even though it's like our best year ever than I have in previous years and that's because we're also growing the most we've ever had. just put a lot of money and invested a lot into scale and into marketing this year. Again, one day it'll pay off I know but for now my focus is just on continuing to grow the business.

Branden Sewell (54:58)
Yeah, and I mean the other thing to think about too is like, so you've been in business for seven years, Or six years, so like, just to put this in perspective,

for those who are listening. say, you know, because I think what you're really ultimately doing is you're building a business that you could sell, right? Because there's, you're not, it doesn't depend on you. You have, it's, getting bigger than just you, right? So let's say if it, if you kept it just as you, and let's say your take home pay capped out, like in those six years at like a hundred thousand just for a round number. And let's say you were paying yourself a hundred thousand dollars for six years.

Okay, well you made $600 ,000 Now you have a business that like let's say it's worth like, you know 50 to a hundred thousand dollars because you haven't You know built something that's sellable. It doesn't have much value beyond you. So now your your total earning potential for that business over six years is anywhere between like 650 ,000 to

700 ,000 and that's before taxes, you know, so then you take and figure in taxes you're making even less than that. Now, let's say you pay yourself less. Let's say you pay yourself like 50 to 60 ,000, you know, and you're making that over the course of, you know, six, seven years. So you've made that income, but you've grown this business to sell one day and then you make like a seven figure exit or something out of your business in 10 or 15 years, like

which one are you gonna choose? You know, for me, it's gonna be that big exit. And I might have had to sacrifice on the like front end, but ultimately in 10 or 15 years, if I do things right, if I build a sellable business and have that as like a mindset, well, I can exit and I can make up, I can make 10, 15 year income in like...

you know, however, like in that sales process, you know. So it's just a different perspective.

Dallin (57:13)
Yeah, right. And that's why I think it's super important to have long term goals and kind know what you want in the end. Because it's hard if you're just thinking about today to do that and to take less. It's like, well, for what? But if you know long term, hey, I can grow this to sell it or have it kind of run on its own while I do other things, then it makes more sense to take less upfront if you're remembering those long term goals and that long term vision in the back of your head.

Branden Sewell (57:40)
Yeah, and you know, I think some people don't, I'm hoping that people listening to this get opened up to that possibility, right? That it like changes their perspective. They don't look at their business and being a business owner is like owning a job, but they're like, wow, this could really be an asset for me. you know, change the way that you think about it because, you know, the reality is the sky is the limit, you know, and there's goodness, I

Dallin (57:49)
Right.

Branden Sewell (58:10)
Sometimes I'm like man if I could just There's certain things that if I could just make the right decisions take the right risk and all this stuff There's there's no end to like the possibilities what I could do with this business the biggest limiting factor is gonna be like myself and you know my ability to get uncomfortable take risks and you know do those things so anyway I'm gonna bring this to a close, but I want to open it up here at the end

Dallin (58:32)
Right?

Branden Sewell (58:41)
Is there anything that like we didn't cover or that you would want to You know talk about really quick before we wrap this up that would you know bring some value to the listeners something that maybe you're passionate about and a little bit of value you'd like to bring

Dallin (58:58)
Yeah, I think education is huge. It's a great opportunity, especially if you're a technician out in the field, to invest in a set of AirPods or whatever it is to listen to some podcasts and audio books. That's what I did. And just a couple of books that kind of came to mind while we were talking that I think are super helpful for kind of getting off the ladder, getting out of the truck, and just starting those initial phases of growing is the E -Myth Simplified. And it just talks

about how so many of us like we want to start a business, have this, you know, this passion, this idea, but then we end up really just, you know, creating this bigger job for ourselves. And it talks about, you know, going from feeling like you're stuck and having to do everything and just helps you to make those first steps to grow. So I would definitely look into that. And then Traction is another book that really lays out the growth of an organization and how you can kind of initially set up those core values for yourself, set up an organizational structure, even though it's usually just

in every part of the organization and just starting to grow and scale from there. So those are two books that have kind of been coming to mind as we've been talking that really helped me early on that I wish I would have had even earlier. And I think just like just reach out to people. I think you'd be surprised how many people are willing and open to talk about, you know, things that they did early on because I know that I could have grown so much faster and been a lot more successful than, you know, I currently am if I would have had someone that walked me through it. And yeah, on one hand,

you can do what you said and just kind of see what other people are doing. But if you can see how to provide value to someone, maybe take them out to lunch, do anything you can to help them out and just learn from them and figure out what mistakes they made earlier on, if you can avoid some of those things, it can just fast track your path to success. And so I'm sure you feel the same way, but I'm more than happy to have a conversation with anyone. If anyone wants to DM me on Instagram, we can set up a time for a quick call and I'm more than happy to share.

a lot of the things because it's great to listen to these these sorts of podcasts and educational content but there's some times where you have more specific issues that you're going through and a lot of us went through those same things so there's just so many people out there I think that are willing to help and if you can you know provide any sort of value to them they're more than happy to share what they've learned and help someone else out that's that's going through what what we used to go through because you you and me know more than anyone what it's like to be in their shoes and and we want to help those people yeah get out of that situation so more

I'm to have a conversation with anyone who's looking to grow like that.

Branden Sewell (1:01:31)
Yeah, for sure. mean, that's the whole reason why I do this podcast is like, I'm just willing to like help and share. I was gonna ask you, so you're in Arizona. Do you know Tommy Mello, A1 Garage Stores? Is it like the Freedom?

Dallin (1:01:46)
Yes, yep, yep, he's got an event coming up. Freedom, yeah.

Branden Sewell (1:01:53)
Yeah. So I, I listened to his podcast and obviously he's like one of like the biggest influences on me as a business owner. I've been listening to him for years and

Dallin (1:01:56)
cool.

Branden Sewell (1:02:05)
You know, a couple things that I really love that he says, he says all the time on his podcast, like, why do you, people ask him, why do you give away all of this like content for free? And he'll usually say like, well, because I can't pay most people to do it. Like I could tell them, like, hey, I'll pay you to do this. I'll pay you to implement this and they won't do it. And so I've always challenged myself that if Tommy talks about something, it's like my,

My goal is to implement, right? So I think even if you're listening to this podcast, there's probably been things that, you know, Dallin's talked about or I've said, and you're like, kind of like on the fence of, of listening or taking action. And I think the, the best way to close the gap or the distance between like where you want to be and where you are now is your ability to listen and then to take action.

there's something that you heard and you feel like man that was really valuable I've been thinking about doing that but I just haven't do it like just take the risk take the chance and I can't promise you that you won't fall down I can't promise you that you won't have a failure or that it won't go well for you but what I can tell you is that if the more that you try the more that you take action the more you fall down the more you make mistakes and

get back up the better you're gonna get and you're just gonna continue to like fall forward and you'll find yourself you know like for me I like like man I can't believe some of the stuff I got through as a business owner and so anyway I hope that encourage you and yeah if I were you down and I'd be like finding wherever Tommy is and trying to like show up at his doorstep and be like hey dude I'll I'll buy you

dinner I'll give you what you know can I pay you 500 bucks for 10 minutes of your time you know because that guy's is

Dallin (1:04:12)
Right. Yeah, I'll.

I'll say one thing real quick just on, I've talked a little bit about trying to build value for people. I have a friend who is now really close with Tommy Mello because he met him at a networking group actually. it was a while ago. Tommy's business wasn't as big as it was now, but it was growing. And my friend saw where Tommy was going and where he was going to take it. And so he offered to provide lunch at Tommy's next team meeting.

Branden Sewell (1:04:24)
Mm

Dallin (1:04:44)
And so my friend made lunch and spent all this money investing and just bought lunch for the entire team. And he's done that a couple times since then. And he was just on Tommy's stage for his last event and now is a close friend of Tommy. So just like I said, find ways that you can provide value to people and you can build those connections. And he now has all these connections and referrals because of that relationship that he started to grow a couple years ago.

Branden Sewell (1:04:58)
Wow.

Mm

Yeah, that's amazing. know, and it's just, you know, it's one of those things like, you know, you talked about this earlier. And when you're talking about networking, and I don't know if you go to BNI, or if that's the networking group you're talking about, but I go to BNI. And obviously, you know, like the whole, what do they call it, the,

Dallin (1:05:30)
That's one of them. Yeah, that's one of them.

Branden Sewell (1:05:40)
the core value of BNI is givers gain. So give to others and it'll come back to you. So I think when you add value to other people's lives, that value is gonna come and come back to you and seek you out. I've, even with this podcast, adding value to people's life with this podcast, I've seen it come back to me already. I started this back in November and

Dallin (1:06:05)
That's awesome.

Branden Sewell (1:06:10)
I didn't really know.

what the possibilities were going to be, but it's opened up so many opportunities already and has brought so much value just from giving away so much free value. it's good, man. So anyway, Dallin, I appreciate you coming on here and sharing your journey as an entrepreneur. I think it would be really cool to get you back on here at some point to follow up on some of these topics and bring some more value, because I think there's so much that we could

Dallin (1:06:16)
Wow.

Branden Sewell (1:06:41)
jump into. One thing that I think would be really fun to jump in with you, topic would be like social media and talking about really like key strategies that you have there and get really kind of dialed in on that. So we'll have to talk offline and maybe set that up for another time. But yeah, I appreciate it man.

Dallin (1:06:42)
Right.

Yeah, no, thank you so much for having me on. Love having these sorts of conversations. So really appreciate the time.

Branden Sewell (1:07:08)
Absolutely. Well, if you're listening to this podcast and you've gotten some value out of it, if you're watching on YouTube, please like this video, comment, share your feedback, please subscribe to the channel, turn on the notifications so you can get other content in the future and listen to future episodes. And if you're listening on Apple or Spotify or any other major podcast platform, please rate and review the

show that will help us reach more people. I also want to let you know that if you are a fan of Off the Ladder and these conversations that we're having, you can also, I've got a couple different groups that you could join, like on my Instagram I've got a group that you can join, it's called Off the Ladder Strategies, and I'd like to talk to you or just us as Home Service Business owners bounce ideas off of one another. I've also got a

Facebook group called Off the Ladder Contractors, really the whole mission and goal is to help people get off the ladder so that you can experience that freedom that you've always wanted as a business owner. So anyway, thank you so much for tuning in and I'll see you next time on the next episode of the Off the Ladder Podcast.