I pay with my time, but I got to meet 14, 15 new contacts.

Now they all know me and I stay in touch with them.

And it didn't cost me the same time.

I would have put into cold leads or cold calls.

But I am the world's biggest super fan.

You're like a super fan.

Welcome to the Business Superfans podcast.

We will discuss how establishing business superfans from customers, employees and business partners can elevate your success exponentially.

Learn why these advocates are a key factor to achieving excellence in the world of commerce.

This is the Business Super Fans podcast with your host, Freddy D. Freddy.

Freddy.

Hey super fans.

Freddy D. Here.

In this episode 197, we're joined by Billy Sammons, a former teacher turned realtor turned marketer who helps service based business owners solve a challenge so many face.

How to grow without cold calls, expensive ads, or constantly chasing the wrong leads.

Through his live local warm marketing approach, Billy shows entrepreneurs how to create real one on one opportunities, build strategic local partnerships, and turn community connections into consistent business growth.

After building his own business this way for more than 15 years, Billy brings a practical, proven path for replacing cold outreach with authentic relationships that grow your business faster.

Welcome, Billy to the Business Superfan Service Provider's Edge.

Great conversation that we had before we started recording.

Ironically, you're on the east coast around Washington D.C. and it's warm by you and I'm in Arizona and and I'm wearing a thick shirt because of the fact that it is chilly here.

It's like 50 degrees right now and this morning it was in the 40s.

So welcome to the show.

We'll send some warm weather your way.

Don't worry about it.

I'll send some warm weather your way.

It's on the way, don't worry.

Any day now.

Perfect.

Appreciate it.

So you've got an interesting background as we talked, you know, before we started recording.

So let's kind of share the backstory.

And then how did you.

I know you've got a book and you've got also a unique approach with warm marketing.

And so how did this all come about?

Oh my superhero origin story.

Alright, so the superhero origin story is way back, 16 years ago.

I got into real estate and as you know, you can't walk through a grocery store without bumping into 20 real estate agents.

They're everywhere, they're all over the place.

And so I wanted to do something that was different.

I came from a background of a teacher and I was a coach and I did all the stuff.

So I Wanted to do something that was more community driven.

And at the same time, there was a brewery opening up nearby and we stopped by a few times.

It was very family friendly, like kids games, you bring your dogs.

And it was really cool space.

And so we're there a few times and I'm like, hey, I want everybody in my audience to know you're here.

I want you to succeed, I want you to do well.

Because if you do well, you know, it's nice to having a brewery around.

It's kind of neat.

They have food trucks, they have the whole thing.

So I did a commercial for them and when I did a commercial for, I'm like, hey, that was really fun.

So we did the commercial and I got it out to my audience and I'm like, I want to do another one.

So I went to the sweet shop, the cupcake place, I did another one and then that one led to another one and another one, another one.

And so I had a whole bunch.

And at one point I stopped and I'm like, I should stop worrying about my audience and I should start focusing on the business owners.

They're the ones that have all the people, they're the ones that are sending me referrals, they're the ones that I'm collaborating with.

And so I made that quick pivot from.

I didn't worry about how much audience was watching it.

I was trying to meet as many business owners as I could and start adding value and, and started collaborating with them.

And it became a lot of fun.

And my business grew like four times the size from just doing all these local business videos people.

So it was a lot of fun.

It was a great way to do

it, and great story.

But at the same time, you're really providing a lot of value for the business because you're getting them exposure to their markets.

That was the value add.

And so now I'm out there preaching to people like, it's great to add value, it's great to give, but unless you give with some kind of intention, if you give something, if you give just for the sake of giving, you're not going to get anywhere.

You do it if you want to, that's great, it's fine.

There's the good feelings you have about it.

But if you're giving to somebody else with intention, like helping them grow their business, you're going to see the benefits much more clearly and for the both of you, for them and for you.

And so giving with intention has been kind of my theme as I go out and Talk to people.

Sure.

Because what you're doing is you're really helping them get to where they need to go because of the fact of you're helping them gain their visibility, engage with their existing audience, AKA customers.

At the same time, it circles back because you give out to the universe, it comes back tenfold.

And so what you're really doing is really, there's no downside to it because everybody gets a benefit out of the whole aspect of what you're doing.

Yep.

It's a lot of fun.

Yeah.

And it's just rewarding.

So when I'm out and about meeting people and I'm like, hey, I do warm marketing, the first question is always, like, what does that mean?

Like, and that's what we just talked about.

Warm marketing means you're out there meeting people and you're becoming collaborators, your referral partners.

You're doing stuff to help each other out.

I'm not making cold calls.

I'm not wasting my money on cold leads.

I'm not buying ads.

I'm not doing any of that stuff.

All my businesses run off of warm referrals now.

And I've done it through intention and through giving and just.

And it's way more fun because I'm out in the community.

And now they'll be like, oh, that's Billy.

You need to meet him.

He's the community guy.

You walk into restaurants, they know you there.

It's just so much more fun doing it that way than giving Zillow or Google all your money and hoping that somebody calls you back.

You know, it's just better.

You bring up a great point, because I want to emphasize that because I was in the BNI's for a while and in a multitude of networking groups, and I had.

I've ran my own networking groups when I was in Chicago for a while.

And the biggest thing that really perplexed me was that people would go to a networking event and never follow up with the people that they met.

It just makes no sense.

And the thing is that if you don't take the time to meet with that person that you met, even though you will never do business with one another because it just.

It's not there.

But you also never know who they know.

You got zero chance of knowing the 250 potential people in their network, and they have zero chance of learning your 250 people in your network.

And at the end of the day, you'll never know what opportunities you squandered because you didn't take the time to Meet with somebody, especially in today's world via virtual, you know, zoom meeting for 30 minutes, which you don't cost you nothing.

Back in the old days, we had to go drive and meet somebody in the coffee shop and all that stuff, right?

But you can do FaceTime to get an Apple phone or whatever.

You can do poof, FaceTime and meet with somebody.

Just so there's no excuse, but it's just mind boggling because at the end of the day I think doing that, you waste each other's time.

You talked about technology.

Let's take that and run with it.

So when I teach people how to do this, when I first got started, you needed the camera and needed the whole bit because this was 16 years ago.

But now, honestly, you just need your phone.

I have a $9 lapel mic and I have a $9 tripod.

So for under 25 bucks you can go in there and interview a local business owner and then you can put it on Facebook and X Instagram, all that stuff put on YouTube.

You spent 25 bucks for the whole thing.

You can give Google all your money if you want to.

I already spent my 25 bucks.

I got the equipment.

I'm just going to meet people, I'm going to start.

Because warm leads are going to stick around with you.

They're dedicated to you, whereas cold leads, they don't have no attachment to you.

They clicked on a button on Facebook, like that doesn't do anything for them.

And there's so many bots and there's so much AI now that there's so much saturation, that low level of, low amount of money, a little bit of technology.

And just like you said, following up, that's all you need for on a business right now.

That's it.

Yeah.

And the other part of it is you really got to transform what I call your whole ecosystem into what I call business super fans.

And it's really how do you treat the team?

You empower people.

A couple years ago I worked with a language services company.

I was working with them initially as a CRO and then moved into as a COO chief operating officer.

Because I put in systems and implemented stuff.

The goal was they were going to retire as a husband and wife team that ran the company for 30 years.

They were 901.2 million.

1 million for.

That's where they were at.

And I took it over because the goal was like I said they were going to retire, but then he unfortunately had a heart attack and passed away.

So I took it over earlier than Planned.

But we grew that company in one year, about a million dollars.

And it's documented.

And one of the ways that we did it is we completely changed the mindset within the company to everybody was important.

All the customers that we dealt with, I sent birthday cards to old school via the mail.

Same thing with our interpreters.

They were contractors.

The mindset was, well, these are contractors.

They should be grateful.

We're giving them work.

And we're like, no, they're the guys going to the court.

They're telling them they're the front line.

You want them to be super excited.

But when you transform those super into super fans, I used a funny analogy of Chicago Cubs, okay, took them 100 years to win the World Series, but they had super fans that were die hard Cobbs fans.

Every year, every year for a hundred years, wearing the gear, promoting their team, defending their team and everything else, you transform your employees, your suppliers, your customers, everybody into what I call super fan.

That's promoting your business.

You can only do one thing and at scale without spending a ton of money.

Just like you're talking earlier, the system works, right?

So if I go out there and I do a video and I help the brewery, the brewery's got an audience.

They got people to go and check it out all the time.

So when I'm supporting them, they see me doing that, being part of the community again, that trust.

Because if I'm out there in the community doing things to help the community and then I start getting fans and I get started getting audience just by association.

And so my database grew very quickly just because you started doing those and you started attracting me, started tagging these businesses like, hey, I just met the owners of so and so.

You need to meet them too.

They're really great owners.

And that's the key too.

You have to meet like the owners because.

Because that changes.

That makes this separation from the owners of the cupcake place versus Hostess Cupcakes.

Who knows who owns that?

Nobody.

There's no relationship if you meet the owners in your.

None.

So if you meet the owners of the bakery and you go in there, you're gonna go to that bakery more often, right?

Because the owner's there, you just are because you're supporting.

And when I do things to help them, I gain that trust and I start gaining their audience too.

So like I accidentally did super fans.

Like you do it on purpose.

I kind of did it by accident.

That was my success in the tech space was, you know, I would go into companies and I would basically neutralize the fact right off the bat that, okay, there's four or five software products in this space.

So let's get that out of the way.

Okay?

They all do the job, otherwise they wouldn't be in business.

So, boom.

Yeah, that conversation's gone.

Billy, what's the biggest challenge?

What's cost you the most money in your business?

We started talking about that conversation.

Oh, we're a mold shop and scrapping metal is a problem.

Well, what's a piece of metal cost?

30,000 bucks.

Okay.

Because if you gouge, the milling machine gouges the metal, you can't use it.

So what do you do with the metal?

It sits there because we can't repurpose it until we get someone other project that wants that specific metal.

Well, how many times a year does that happen?

10, 12 times.

So if I could save you three pieces, is that worth a conversation?

Yes.

And then so all of a sudden we started talking, and then we started talking about the business strategy.

And then the big thing that I would do is we would have everybody come in to do a presentation of how our technology would help minimize the scrapping of the metal.

And the guys from the shop floor would come in so they would take a look and watch it.

I made sure I got everybody's name.

And then when we left, everybody got a thank you for participating in the meeting.

Then the subtle close was we were excited to work with you to get the system implemented into your facility.

So I assumed the deal was done by the way I worded it.

And we would win the sale.

And I would ask, why did we win the sale?

What was the reasoning?

And the reasoning was they said that they felt after the sale we would provide the best support.

And the reason was, I'll pick on you.

Billy, who's running the milling machine, got a letter in the shop floor that never gets recognized for anything.

That's cool.

How would you feel?

You get a letter and then all of a sudden everybody's going, who sent you the stuff?

The other shop people.

So all of a sudden you've got the attention on you.

And that changed the whole mental dynamics of everybody.

And I found out that the IT guy was looking to run because they were expanding.

They started as a 40 man company, and they went to about 140 people over a period of four years that I worked with them.

But the IT guy, I knew what his business aspirations was, and so I worked with him to help him get where he wanted to go in business.

And he became one of my biggest super fans.

And I've shared it before that the fastest sale that I've ever done was 30 minutes for a $60,000 computer system with software.

And the time was putting in the order, configuring the order, getting its stuff set up, making sure the guy reads it, signs it, and then used his fax machine to send it.

So let's take that example, and let's say we don't work in the manufacturing business, right?

So not everybody's doing machine stuff and so forth.

Let's make it a little more practical.

Let's do the.

I worked with the coffee shop owner, right?

And so one of their big pain points.

You made pain points.

That was your main point, which is brilliant, is the little holders on the cups.

You're spending a ton of money on those little, like, cardboard things.

I happen to know a lender who is looking to promote himself and get himself out there.

So for, like, 8 cents, he bought them all these cup holders with his logo and name on it.

What are those?

Customers?

Every time they grab the coffee, what are they gonna see his name on it?

Over, over and over again.

And so I made the connection with them.

Same idea.

I didn't spend any money.

I connected two people up and ended up, like, every time they needed something, they reached out to me.

They sent me referrals.

They did all the stuff.

Because you made that connection, you helped their business with a pain point, and you helped another business with their marketing.

So, yeah, there's opportunities everywhere.

You're absolutely right.

It's fun because you look back, and it's, like, really changes the dynamics and the relationships that you have.

And it got to the point where I was one of the top sales guys in the company, if not the top at.

Sometimes we flipped me and a buddy of mine, one year, he was a top dog.

I was a second.

Second guy.

And the next year we flipped.

But it got to the point where I had such an attitude that I had a daytimer with all my customers in there, and I carried a smartphone.

But it wasn't like this.

It was a brick back then.

And I would turn around and says, all right, Billy, please look at the presentation of our software here.

Here's a list of all of our customers.

And I'd flip the daytimer over, and here they were all printed in there.

And I'd say, here's my phone.

Bam.

On the conference room table.

Pick any one of them and call.

I just shut up.

That is awesome.

Nice.

That's a good move.

They would flip through the pages, and they'd say, oh, John is using your stuff.

Yeah.

Yes.

And then flip it over and he says, oh, Mike is using your stuff.

They go, okay, I'm good.

I don't need anything else.

What do I got to do to get this system?

And that was it.

Because that social proof and the reason I bring it up, that was social proof.

Yep.

You can't beat it.

It's the most powerful sales engine that

you can have, and it costs you what?

Nothing.

Nothing.

You put a piece of paper together, nothing.

I mean, I go and do these videos with local businesses.

It cost me half an hour.

That's it.

And the trust is there.

Like I paid for trust.

25 bucks and a half an hour of my time.

All the trust of.

There are 300 people in their audience.

Yep.

It's just.

It's so.

Makes so much sense.

It's such a common sense that I don't know why everybody doesn't do that.

I think we've gotten caught up all the technology and all the DMS and all that stuff.

I was having a conversation yesterday with some people and they were poo pooing directors, mail marketing.

I'm going, like, wait a minute.

Direct mail marketing is one of the most powerful marketing mechanisms today.

You get something in the mail, you're gonna go, oh, wow, what's this?

Versus a text message or an email that you never read?

If you even do the old school postcard marketing still works because at least you get 40 seconds.

People read it, they may throw it away, but you got across.

Still works with doing it the right way.

I just sent out new Happy New Year stuff to a bunch of my people just to stay in touch with them and so forth.

And it didn't say anything more than a, hey, hope your 2026 is a great year, Billy.

So, yeah, it works.

Yeah.

That you don't have to do a lot.

And I think your warm marketing is really the catalyst that people are overlooking that the growth of their business is really in their backyard.

Was it a book?

Fields of Diamonds.

Right.

Ever read that one where the synopsis of the book is basically the farmer and he knows there's.

He thinks there's diamonds in his field and he goes out there and digs and digs and digs and doesn't find anything.

He's got.

There's nothing here.

So he goes move someplace fancy and he sells the farm to somebody for nickels.

And then the next day comes in, he works a little bit harder and he finds all the diamonds just because he put a little more effort into it.

But the thing is though that a lot of people are busy pursuing cold leads, spending tons of money on cold marketing, trying to attract new business and everything else and they forget about the backlog of customers that they're satisfied with.

You've been in real estate.

So I'm going to share a story of I got divorced years ago and I had two realtors from a Coldwell banker and they were both ladies and it worked out because my ex wife didn't like one of them.

It worked out and we got the transaction done.

I moved into an apartment temporarily until everything got settled because I couldn't buy her out, she was forced to sell the house and blah blah blah and a year later I was ready to.

Okay, everything is all done, everything settled.

I'm looking to buy a house.

I lost their information in the move and everything else.

Never heard back from them, either one of them.

I ended up going with the realtor that was in my BNI group and then I ended up buying a house for myself and I ended up buying an investment property and they completely squandered it because they never stayed in contact with an existing customer.

So that's the objection I often get.

So when I'm like, hey, I do war marketing, like that's too much work for me really?

Because I just seen you on the phone for two hours getting hung up on and getting yelled at by all the prospects you paid for.

So not only did you pay for somebody to yell at you, but you still put the same twice as much work in as I did.

I did a half an hour video and chatted it up and got a free donut from the donut shop lady and you're on here getting yelled at on the phone like which system is better?

I going to get three or four referrals from her.

What about your cold lead?

What are you going to get out of that?

You're going to get yelled at a couple of times and maybe one out of 50 are actually going to do anything.

Like who?

This is mind boggling.

Doesn't make any sense to me.

Honestly, I don't know.

I don't get it.

We're on the same page.

Exactly.

Because your warm market is really your sales team and it's not more complicated than that.

Your warm market can be your sales team.

You just got to ignite them to become your sales team.

They've got to know that you want them to promote you.

You got to give them some assets so that they can promote you.

All of a sudden it Starts taking off.

I don't have it in here right now, but I send gifts to people.

It's got my Superfans logo on it.

However, this is where it changes the equation.

The Superfans logo is about who?

Superfans.

It's about you because you're marketing your business.

Right.

They don't care.

It's a reminder.

Yeah, you're right.

Nobody cares.

You get a Nike shirt, it's a Nike shirt.

Who cares?

Now I add your name to it, it's your shirt.

Yes, good point.

Exactly.

It's the same thing as if I send you a Business Superfans coffee cup, and now it has Billy on it.

It's Billy's cup.

Don't touch my cup.

But that's how you start creating super fans is those little things I like to say is really the big things.

Because that's a little switch in the marketing, because everybody gives away swag left and right.

Most of the time, it gets tossed away, but now if you put their name on it, it's personalized.

The number of times I've done listing appointments, and I've walked past, like, the calendars on the refrigerators.

Like, I don't even know why realtors buy that stuff anymore.

You walk by the calendars all the time.

It doesn't mean anything.

Because what I would have done was I'm going to send them a gift card, a $5 gift card to the coffee shop.

I'm like, hey, this coffee shop is great.

Here's a video I did with them.

Here's the owners tell them I said, hello.

If you walk in there, and they go in there and they see the owner's like, oh, Billy sent me here.

And then maybe the owner will give them a little extra or a little something extra.

You know what I mean?

Which one's the Lasting impression calendar on the wall, like you said, the thing with your logo on it, or a little gift card where they go in and meet the owner and become a part of the community.

Right.

There's such a big difference.

Huge difference.

And it cost me less.

5 bucks is less than that stupid magnet that goes on refrigerators.

Correct.

And I help the local business at the same time.

It's a trifecta win.

Everybody wins, but he's winning.

And it's more fun, right?

Way more fun.

So Billy, share a story of how that you kind of really helped transform somebody with the warm marketing approach.

I'm gonna shift gears because we've been talking mostly, like, me helping the businesses and bringing people my way I'm gonna shift gears and I'm gonna have another business owner.

She has a little boutique down about half an hour south.

And I did a little video with her to help her with her boutique.

And she's like, this was so much fun.

I love this.

It was great.

I was nervous at first.

You made it nice and easy.

And what she did is she went to the other business owners on the same street that your boutique was on, and she did the same thing with all of them.

So now she knows all the owners on her street.

So if anybody needs something, because she has, like, dog toys there and clothes and knickknacks and stuff like that, if somebody's in one of their shops or the restaurants or whatever and they need something, they send it down to her.

So she's getting referrals now, and she's getting people sent her way, like, oh, you need to go down and check the boutique out.

Or if somebody's like, oh, I really.

I'm visiting, and this place is great.

Oh, you need to go check the boutique out.

Because now she knows all the owners, and they're sending people her way.

And she had a blast doing it.

Now she knows all her neighbors, she knows all the people on the same street.

So it doesn't necessarily just have to be an entrepreneur trying to get more leads.

It can be a business owner who's also trying to grow their business and create more relationships on their own street, their own block, their own street, their own neighborhood.

Like, it works both ways.

And again, it's just fun.

I keep saying that over and over again.

If I'm marketing and there's days you just don't feel like doing it, and I just, oh, I gotta post again.

But if you're like, I am helping my community, there's somebody out there that needs my help.

It motivates you.

You lose those days where you don't feel like doing it because you know that if you don't, there'll be four more people that go through the coffee shop.

There's 10 more people that won't go to the brewery.

There's eight people that don't know anything about the principal at the high school or whatever your videos are.

So it's on you to take part, active, part of your community.

And it really motivates you.

Because I don't have very many days where I'm like, yeah, I just don't want to do it because I know there's people relying on me to get the content out there to help them out.

It's just another layer to it.

Whereas cold markets, you're like, oh, I gotta get more leads or how to call more people.

I gotta get yelled at some more.

It's a different feel, it's a different approach.

It's more fun, it's more engaging.

There's no very few downsides to it, to be honest with you.

That was what propelled my success in a SaaS space.

When I was setting up resellers around the world and I met with different people.

One of the reasons I grew a product from 0 to 3 million, the SaaS based was subscription based, was we shipped physical software and all that stuff.

A lot of people would recognize the agency.

So you got an agency in Australia or Japan, so they would recognize the agency.

Thank you so much for your contribution to help grow our business, blah, blah, blah.

I did something different.

I recognize the agency, but I actually recognized the sales team that sold the most of my product.

And that's when I would go to trade shows.

I'd hang around with the owners and they'd take me out to dinner.

But all day during the the day in the booth, I was hanging out with the people that are selling my stuff and having lunch with them and etc.

Etc.

To the point where they invited me in some places I get invited into their houses, they fed me and everything else and that was cool.

But I still have friends.

And this is back in the late 90s.

I still have friends that I communicate with still today because we're no longer in the industry.

We've gone on doing other things, but we've built lifetime friendships because of those things.

It's wild.

That's just amazing.

Like, I probably have more friends now that are business owners in the community than I do.

Like friends.

Friends Sounds crazy, but you're like all the people I know.

Like if I were to bring everybody over for a picnic, it all be business owners just because we made such great relationships.

And when you start giving and taking and collaborating and working together and trying to help each other because your business is your livelihood, it's your life.

It's what's paying the bills.

It's what's keeping your family moving.

It's sponsors, the baseball, the T ball teams, it's community.

So the business owners have become the friends, they're the people.

I know it's been interesting in the same vein.

I didn't think of that until you just said it, but it's definitely true.

Yeah.

And Sir Richard Branson says it the best.

There's no difference between personal Life and business life.

It's called life.

So we're living it.

Whether we're in the office, at the home office, or out on the street in a restaurant, Whatever it is, it's basically life.

What's fun about what the two of us are doing is we're really kind of helping other people kind of recognize that there's more to marketing business in a way that is much more engaging, much more fun.

Fun, at the end of the day, really doesn't cost you a lot of money.

Next.

Next to none, next to nothing.

You got to put the time in anyway.

Like, if you're making cold calls, you're buying cold leads.

You still have to put the time in.

So you might as well do it, making a big impact on your community.

Because one of the other things that you can do is, and I'm sure you've done it, is once you build that relationship, you can both market in each other's warm community.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

All the time.

And they're endorsing you into their community.

You're endorsing them into your community.

You split the marketing expense.

And so you've got a W from both aspects.

It's nominal money because it's to a warm market on top of it.

So the odds of generating some revenue out of it is exceptionally high.

Even adding a third or a fourth.

Right.

So we just did a.

Every year, we do a vendor event for Christmas.

We do donate all the money to a local homeless shelter.

But, I mean, it's going to be us, and it's going to be the church that we're working with, and it's going to be vendors, and it's going to be the children's theater singing songs.

It's going to be the food truck bringing, like, there's five or six different businesses plus all the vendors we get to meet for this event.

It all goes to charity, and you end up becoming, like, the centerpiece.

And it didn't cost me anything.

Time, of course, organization, getting the vendors lined up, like, that's what I pay with.

I pay with my time.

But I got to meet 14, 15 new contacts.

Now they all know me, and I stay in touch with them.

And it didn't cost me the same time.

I would have put into cold leads or cold calls.

Right.

But now I'm donating all this money.

We were somewhere around $1,500 to the homeless shelter for Christmas, which is exactly when they need it the most.

Sure.

I don't know why I would ever do cold calls.

I'm not a cold caller.

That's just not me.

But you get me into front of the room and they got no chance.

It's perfect.

It's a different approach.

Back in the day, this was using direct mail, but this is going to be emphasizing the importance of direct mail.

And it's a sales approach that I think is overlooked today.

That's very powerful.

And that is back when we got started in the computer aided design and computer aided manufacturing space.

It was brand new.

And so we were marketing.

And so what I created was a lunch and learn of how technology is changing the manufacturing space.

I cheated a little bit, but we mailed direct mails to the president, the vice president of engineering and VP of manufacturing.

And then we were in executive suite.

So I hired the gals to contact the guys in a manufacturing world to invite them to a lunch.

So the guys would take the phone

call because I'm just leveraging marketing.

Marketing.

It's marketing.

It's marketing.

And they would come into the luncheon, okay, and we had food and everything else.

And what we would do is we would demonstrate our software, but we weren't talking about how wonderful it was.

We were talking about how it's changing the impact of the engineering and manufacturing space.

So what was happening is they were understanding and saying, wow, okay.

They had never seen it before, didn't know about it and everything we were demonstrating drafting boards, computer design on the computer screen, 2D drawing, 3D.

And so what would happen is they would say, okay, would you be willing to come to our shop and take a look at our stuff and tell us how this would potentially impact my business?

Thank you so much for inviting me into your company.

I prospected, but in a clever way.

And then once you invited me into the companies, like inviting the fox into a hen house.

Because you're the one that invited me.

It's not cold, though.

Yeah, it's not really cold.

Prospecting cold.

I always picture cold as, like, you get a list of people and you start calling them.

But we mailed them because they were cold because I bought a directory back then.

I used to buy a directory and sic code is 3544.

It's burned into my brain for infinity.

Well, even that's lukewarm, I would think, because they have to actually physically get up and come to you for that lunch and learn.

I would consider that lukewarm.

Okay.

I wouldn't even consider that cold because, yeah, they actually have to take the action and get up and do that.

I mean, cold call like you're just calling somebody on their phone.

Fair point.

So I'll give you Luke.

How about that?

Lukewarm.

There you go.

Because if they came, they're interested and at least learning.

Exactly.

Exactly.

I would say the same for workshops.

You do virtual workshops now?

That's the big thing.

That's what everybody likes to do, is workshops.

And you can educate the same concept but on zooms and stuff.

But it's the same.

Like if somebody shows up to a zoom, they put the time they blocked off their schedule.

They're doing it with intention.

I think that would still be a lukewarm lead.

Sure.

Really?

A cold lead?

Cold lead would be I knock on somebody's door when they didn't invite me or I call them when they're on their way or they're taking their kid to daycare.

Like those are cold when you're interrupting their life and they didn't expect it or didn't invite you.

I know some people selling solar, especially in Arizona, and that's what they're doing.

They're knocking on doors.

Yep.

Knocking on doors.

That's cold.

It's fine.

It works.

I guess.

It's just not for me.

You and I aren't cold people.

Like, I'm with you.

Hey, put me in a room with people.

I'll go in there and chit chat and I'll figure it out.

But I think I've done three cold calls in my life and each one I felt dirtier than the last one.

I just.

Not my thing.

Yep.

Yeah.

I've knocked on two doors my whole life and abandoned three cold calls.

And that's the max in 16 years.

Wow.

So Billy, how do you actually work with somebody?

What's the approach?

So we have different levels.

My background before even 16, 18 years ago, was high school teacher, adjunct professor and basketball coach.

So I have those bones in my body of teaching.

It's just kind of.

I can't get rid of it.

My whole family's teacher, my grandmother taught in a one room schoolhouse back in the 1990, so it's just ingrained in me.

And so what you can do is I have the whole course that teaches you how to day one.

I have no idea what I'm doing with warm marketing all the way.

Take the whole course.

It's a ten step process.

If you go through step by step, at the end you'll have all the skills you need.

There's video courses teaching you how to do it.

There's handouts, there's guides, there's scripts.

There's everything you want to do because I know there's different levels of learners.

I also have the book.

If you're like, I want to do this myself.

I'm self pacing.

I don't want to take a course or pay the money.

A book is like seven bucks because I want access for anybody and everybody.

Or if you're like, I kind of get it and I sort of don't want it.

There's a membership Too that's of kind 37amonth.

And you go in there and it has all the guides and the handouts and it's got some stuff in there where you can interact with others.

I give you resources and I have a weekly schedule where you log in and every Monday morning all the actions you should take so that way you don't have to do any thinking.

You go in there, your week of marketing is there, and you just have to just log in.

Here's my actions.

I'm too busy to do marketing, but it guides everybody.

And so there's different levels depending on your level.

Learning depends on how active or interactive you want to be.

So I have options on the website and that's the best place to go.

We'll make sure that that's into the show notes.

And as we kind of wrap up

here to give you that website, should I give it to you too?

Yeah, I was going to say I described it.

You're taking my words out because my next part was how can people find you?

But go ahead.

It's www.livelocal.

warm marketing.

So there you go.

I'm really good at this.

I'm the whole thing.

Yeah, I'm with you, though.

Like, by the time you get to people, they ask you for this stuff.

Like, I don't do a lot of pitches.

I don't do a lot of that stuff.

We give and they ask you a lot of the time.

So I'm not great at the pitch or the sale.

No, that's fine.

That's why I was.

I position it to ask.

But we'll make sure that that's in the show notes and great conversation.

You and I could talk about this for definitely at least a couple days.

Yeah, well, I'm going to have you on my podcast so people will be able to catch your version of it.

I think I did a lot of talking.

I want you to do talking too.

We'll book that and we'll get that set up too, so great.

Billy, thank you so much for your time.

Appreciate it.

And definitely, like I said, have you on the show down the road again.

Oh, thanks for having me today.

It was great.

Billy showed us growth comes from warm relationships, not cold outreach.

That matters because service based businesses win on trust.

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