Todd Miller:

I'm Todd Miller of Isaiah Industries, manufacturer

Todd Miller:

of specialty metal roofing and other building materials.

Todd Miller:

Welcome to Construction Disruption, the show that explores what's new,

Todd Miller:

what's happening, what's next?

Todd Miller:

What's working in the construction and remodeling words worlds.

Todd Miller:

Uh, today I am joined by my co-host, our creative director, Ryan Bell.

Todd Miller:

Uh, what's the scoop, Ryan.

Ryan Bell:

Hey Todd, I've got a joke for you

Todd Miller:

Oh, cool.

Todd Miller:

I wasn't expecting that.

Ryan Bell:

Maybe, maybe more of a riddle.

Ryan Bell:

Uh, what is lighter?

Ryan Bell:

A gallon of water or a gallon of butane?

Ryan Bell:

You should probably be able to get it.

Todd Miller:

Well, but butane is a lighter fluid.

Ryan Bell:

you go.

Ryan Bell:

There you go.

Todd Miller:

Oh, that's a good one.

Todd Miller:

That's a

Todd Miller:

good

Ryan Bell:

made me laugh.

Todd Miller:

So, as we remind our audience today, once again, we are doing our

Todd Miller:

challenge words where each of us here on the show have been, uh, accepted a word

Todd Miller:

that we are challenged to work into the conversation as seamlessly as possible.

Todd Miller:

So you, the listening audience can be listening for strange things.

Todd Miller:

We may.

Todd Miller:

We always say a few strange things, but listen for those strange things and at the

Todd Miller:

end of the show we will tell you whether or not that was our challenge word.

Todd Miller:

So today we're thrilled to welcome Samantha McGuinness to the show.

Todd Miller:

Samantha is founder of Enabled Consulting, a company that is

Todd Miller:

helping home remodelers drive.

Todd Miller:

Positive results by building and optimizing face-to-face

Todd Miller:

lead generation departments.

Todd Miller:

Her work is rooted in systematized efficiency and performance with

Todd Miller:

a focus on home shows, retail locations, events, and RSVP campaigns.

Todd Miller:

A 12 year veteran of the home improvement industry, Samantha equips her contractor

Todd Miller:

clients with proven frameworks to reduce lead generation costs, increase

Todd Miller:

issued appointments, and drive results.

Todd Miller:

Samantha is trusted by many top brands featured on national stages and

Todd Miller:

leader of the face-to-face marketing network, a results-driven membership

Todd Miller:

community for forward-thinking home improvement companies.

Todd Miller:

Samantha, welcome to Construction Disruption.

Todd Miller:

Truly honored to have you here with us today so we can dig into some great

Todd Miller:

topics for the benefit of our audience.

Todd Miller:

Samantha McGuinness: Thank you so much, Todd.

Todd Miller:

I'm really excited to be here.

Todd Miller:

This is such an important conversation right now.

Todd Miller:

As everybody knows, lead generation has.

Todd Miller:

Changed a lot and face-to-face marketing really continues to deliver the most

Todd Miller:

qualified, lowest cost in our industry.

Todd Miller:

And not enough contractors are leveraging this lead source.

Todd Miller:

So I'm really excited to discuss it with you today.

Todd Miller:

I think it's a great topic also because I hear that so often that

Todd Miller:

everyone, you know, you ask them, well, how, what's your lead gen look like?

Todd Miller:

And it's all about digital strategy and things.

Todd Miller:

And so many people have forgotten about the things that perhaps

Todd Miller:

grew their businesses, got them to where they are, and now they have.

Todd Miller:

Tried to switch direction and they're finding it isn't working.

Todd Miller:

So I'm really looking forward to our discussion.

Todd Miller:

Um, I know that you personally in your career have some history,

Todd Miller:

um, with some very recognized brands in home improvement.

Todd Miller:

Tell us a little bit about how you did get started in this industry.

Samantha McGuinness:

Thank you.

Samantha McGuinness:

Yeah, I, um, I've been in this industry forever.

Samantha McGuinness:

I built a landscape construction company back in Toronto.

Samantha McGuinness:

A very long time ago in our, you know, we came from really humble beginnings.

Samantha McGuinness:

We didn't have a lot of money to put on SEO or you know, pay

Samantha McGuinness:

per click and things like that.

Samantha McGuinness:

So we did a lot of what's now deemed old school things that worked

Samantha McGuinness:

really well, and they still do.

Samantha McGuinness:

So we had to get really creative.

Samantha McGuinness:

When you don't have a lot of resources and you need results, you have to tap into

Samantha McGuinness:

what's up here to produce those results.

Samantha McGuinness:

So, driving to different.

Samantha McGuinness:

Businesses on commercial accounts and asking them to submit a proposal.

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, it was all face-to-face marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

I didn't really know that's what I was doing at the time, but this was when I was

Samantha McGuinness:

in college and um, so that's how I pretty much got into the home remodeling space.

Samantha McGuinness:

I also built the renewal by Anderson of Greater Toronto's events, home show,

Samantha McGuinness:

retail store program from the ground up.

Samantha McGuinness:

So when I began working with Renewal by Anderson, there were.

Samantha McGuinness:

There was no revenue.

Samantha McGuinness:

There were no walls in our office.

Samantha McGuinness:

We didn't have anything going on, and they brought me on to build the

Samantha McGuinness:

face-to-face marketing department, and within the first three years we had

Samantha McGuinness:

generated $10 million in revenue annually.

Samantha McGuinness:

At a cost of marketing of sub 9%.

Samantha McGuinness:

So it, you know, a lot of what I was able to do was based on the fact that

Samantha McGuinness:

we had a really strong network of companies to support me in, um, different

Samantha McGuinness:

locations I could visit to learn from.

Samantha McGuinness:

And then I got to essentially go back to Canada and build everything how,

Samantha McGuinness:

you know, take little bits of what was working from different locations

Samantha McGuinness:

and build it how I wanted to build it.

Samantha McGuinness:

And.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that's sort of my claim to fame in, in the industry, but now I get to

Samantha McGuinness:

teach those companies everything that I built based off tons of mistakes and

Samantha McGuinness:

lessons and systems that I, I built as an infrastructure around these departments.

Todd Miller:

Well, I think that's really interesting and especially

Todd Miller:

coming out of RBA and having been part of, uh, what developed that.

Todd Miller:

Um.

Todd Miller:

I think it's a fantastic story.

Todd Miller:

So I'm kind of curious, I mean we're, we're hearing a lot the last

Todd Miller:

several months about the difficulty of lead generation here recently.

Todd Miller:

Um, and I'm kind of curious, you know, what are some of the trends

Todd Miller:

or things that you're hearing about out there that are really kind

Todd Miller:

of upping the ante in terms of.

Todd Miller:

The need for contractors to stay on top of their marketing, to stay

Todd Miller:

on top of their numbers, to look at face-to-face opportunities.

Todd Miller:

What are, what's just some of the scuttlebutt you're hearing out there.

Samantha McGuinness:

Scuttle, but my friend is that people are paying

Samantha McGuinness:

way too much for leads right now.

Samantha McGuinness:

Companies need leads and they need to produce leads at a lower cost.

Samantha McGuinness:

And right now there's a lot of, I, I don't like calling this a trend,

Samantha McGuinness:

but right now a lot of companies are racing to the bottom when it comes to

Samantha McGuinness:

being involved in a bidding war, so to say, for leads, for digital leads.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I think a lot of companies are outsourcing their own success by only.

Samantha McGuinness:

Outsourcing to third party vendors to provide them with leads.

Samantha McGuinness:

And you know, I believe in having a really strong marketing mix.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that companies should do, they should be everywhere that they can be.

Samantha McGuinness:

With the exception of maybe a billboard because you can't track it.

Samantha McGuinness:

However, you know, your digital marketing and your TV or your radio will

Samantha McGuinness:

support your face-to-face marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

And the really great thing about your face-to-face marketing is a homeowner

Samantha McGuinness:

is met with an incredible human being who is there to help you, who

Samantha McGuinness:

is empathetic and is going to put.

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, get you set up with an appointment on the spot as opposed to

Samantha McGuinness:

just throwing something out there and hoping that you get a return from it.

Samantha McGuinness:

Face-to-face marketing allows you to ensure of that when you

Samantha McGuinness:

use the right systems to do it.

Samantha McGuinness:

And so, um, you know, obviously I'm gonna be speaking a lot about face-to-face

Samantha McGuinness:

marketing today, but a lot of companies are just under utilizing this lead source.

Todd Miller:

I love how you said that you talk about face to face.

Todd Miller:

Someone's there with this incredible human being and I think that is such a

Todd Miller:

great reminder to all of us of, you know, what happens when people interact that.

Todd Miller:

Can't happen in other ways.

Todd Miller:

Um, well, what are some of the, let's say the key parameters, benchmarks,

Todd Miller:

metrics, um, as people develop their marketing mix, what are some of those

Todd Miller:

key metrics they should be really watching and paying attention to?

Samantha McGuinness:

A really great question because at Enabled we track

Samantha McGuinness:

everything you can think of when it comes to specifically marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

We wanna track cost of marketing track, uh, we wanna track

Samantha McGuinness:

cost per lead issue, and then.

Samantha McGuinness:

We go down deeper as well.

Samantha McGuinness:

We track a KPI called days to issued.

Samantha McGuinness:

So it's the day from when an appointment is set on to the day

Samantha McGuinness:

when the appointment results and it actually issues, whether it, demos,

Samantha McGuinness:

it sells, whatever happens to that appointment, whatever the resulting is.

Samantha McGuinness:

But that metric is really important, the days to issued metric, because

Samantha McGuinness:

what it does is it gives you.

Samantha McGuinness:

An idea as to whether or not you need to hire more sales reps, and

Samantha McGuinness:

so marketing and sales need to work closely together in that regard.

Samantha McGuinness:

We need to make sure that we have enough sales reps. That are doing

Samantha McGuinness:

a really great job with the leads that we are providing them with and

Samantha McGuinness:

treating the customers really well and giving them a great experience.

Samantha McGuinness:

But we also need to make sure that, um, we are managing our capacity properly

Samantha McGuinness:

and so we market to produce the most results, but we need to make sure we have

Samantha McGuinness:

the sales team who's going to produce revenue from our marketing as well.

Samantha McGuinness:

So days to issued is another.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's a really important KPI we, we track.

Todd Miller:

Talking about days two issued.

Todd Miller:

Um, what do you think is a good number for that, that someone should be shooting for?

Todd Miller:

And I'll just give a quick example.

Todd Miller:

Um, I know a company that, a retail company, it's a one salesperson operation.

Todd Miller:

They're complaining about hurting for leads, but yet I ask them their

Todd Miller:

day and people are waiting a week and a half, two weeks to, to get an

Todd Miller:

appointment with this one salesperson.

Todd Miller:

And I'm just thinking, that's just too long.

Todd Miller:

What are your thoughts on that?

Samantha McGuinness:

My thoughts are that people don't have a lot of time right now.

Samantha McGuinness:

The attention span on a person is below eight seconds and it's probably

Samantha McGuinness:

only going to get lower, and so.

Samantha McGuinness:

If you aren't available for an appointment, they're probably going

Samantha McGuinness:

to call somebody else, and we need to make sure that we have capacity

Samantha McGuinness:

to book opportunity and to help the people that need our services.

Samantha McGuinness:

My theory is that if a company has a really great product and is doing a

Samantha McGuinness:

really great job, their prospects deserve to meet with them and to buy from them.

Samantha McGuinness:

If you're not doing a great job, no problem, but we need to connect

Samantha McGuinness:

with the people who need us.

Samantha McGuinness:

And you know, a, to answer your question, I think a, a good days to issue it

Samantha McGuinness:

is, one, I don't think that it's necessarily always possible, but you

Samantha McGuinness:

know, below three is what we aim for.

Todd Miller:

Gotcha.

Todd Miller:

Very good.

Todd Miller:

Well, when your clients first come to you and start working with you, what

Todd Miller:

are some of their common frustrations and you know, what's heavy on their

Todd Miller:

minds when they first come to you?

Samantha McGuinness:

The biggest contributing factor to a company

Samantha McGuinness:

working with us is that they need leads.

Samantha McGuinness:

Obviously they need leads.

Samantha McGuinness:

They're paying too much for the leads that they have or they are doing home shows.

Samantha McGuinness:

Here's a a really common situation.

Samantha McGuinness:

Companies will be doing home shows, but they're not getting return on it.

Samantha McGuinness:

They know that it's possible to get a return, but they don't know how and.

Samantha McGuinness:

It just really goes in line with some of the biggest mistakes that I see

Samantha McGuinness:

companies makes when they, when they do events and shows, and it's not having

Samantha McGuinness:

the right systems to set and qualify an appointment on the spot, as well as just

Samantha McGuinness:

who is going to work their shows for them.

Samantha McGuinness:

A lot of the time companies take sales reps or call center people and put them

Samantha McGuinness:

out into the field, and they're not necessarily trained for what we want

Samantha McGuinness:

them to produce in terms of a result.

Todd Miller:

know that you talk about the four pillars and they're all P

Todd Miller:

words, um, that kind of guide your approach to how you work with clients.

Todd Miller:

Positioning, precision, performance, and profit.

Todd Miller:

Um, can you kind of reflect on a bit if on each of those or maybe how they

Todd Miller:

work together or how you approach that?

Samantha McGuinness:

Absolutely.

Samantha McGuinness:

So the four Ps at enabled are sort of the filters that we utilize to

Samantha McGuinness:

ensure that each of our clients is getting the most elite experience

Samantha McGuinness:

in working with us and the.

Samantha McGuinness:

First one is positioning.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's that we meet prospects where they are through face-to-face connections.

Samantha McGuinness:

So whether that's a grocery store, a farmer's market, so many

Samantha McGuinness:

food things involved with this.

Samantha McGuinness:

Um, chili dogs at the food festivals, um, you know, Costco stores.

Samantha McGuinness:

A lot of my clients, we help them build up their Costco program.

Samantha McGuinness:

So positioning is all about.

Samantha McGuinness:

Being in front of your customer, positioning your company in front of

Samantha McGuinness:

your customer through face to face.

Samantha McGuinness:

Then the second B is precision.

Samantha McGuinness:

That one is geared around executing with accuracy, using data-driven

Samantha McGuinness:

award-winning systems, which we deploy into home remodeling companies.

Samantha McGuinness:

The fourth is performance, so we deliver unmatched ROI with cost

Samantha McGuinness:

effective marketing strategies.

Samantha McGuinness:

So we're really not doing events and shows for brand awareness.

Samantha McGuinness:

Brand awareness is an extra on top of revenue.

Samantha McGuinness:

So if you do an event or a show, using our methodology, you will be producing

Samantha McGuinness:

revenue in the week after an event.

Samantha McGuinness:

Okay?

Samantha McGuinness:

And then profit, you know, it's empowering teams to again achieve the

Samantha McGuinness:

peak results, which is through results oriented systems that produce profit.

Todd Miller:

You know, one of the things, when I think about lead gen. Um, I always

Todd Miller:

think about creativity and, you know, how do you come up with creative ideas to

Todd Miller:

generate leads, to work in face-to-face situations, whatever that might be.

Todd Miller:

And um, a lot of times I, I feel that we kind of can ignore those creative

Todd Miller:

moments 'cause we start to think about everything just as numbers and processing.

Todd Miller:

And I'll hear so many people say, oh, it's just a numbers game.

Todd Miller:

Um.

Todd Miller:

Kind of curious, how do you help your clients with that creative process

Todd Miller:

when it comes to lead gen? Um, do you find that every company kind of

Todd Miller:

has to match their own culture, their own ethos, or whatever it might be?

Todd Miller:

Uh.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that a lot.

Samantha McGuinness:

Of companies, when they start to do face-to-face marketing, they

Samantha McGuinness:

go heavy on gimmicks and they think that that's being creative.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that sometimes we use gimmicks, gimmicks as a cop out,

Samantha McGuinness:

and what I mean by that is the, the.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's creative that you are at a farmer's market as a window and

Samantha McGuinness:

door company, and it's creative that you're curating your own events and

Samantha McGuinness:

connecting with the community and, and doing the face-to-face marketing Now.

Samantha McGuinness:

A lot of companies think that because they set up a booth and it looks

Samantha McGuinness:

really great, and they use creativity in terms of a design that their work

Samantha McGuinness:

is done and that's not the case.

Samantha McGuinness:

So in fact, when we work with a company, we actually have to undo some

Samantha McGuinness:

of this creativity and some of that looks like we don't need to always

Samantha McGuinness:

tailor our approach to the show.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's tough to scale that if you're doing, I did 300 events a year

Samantha McGuinness:

when I was at RBA and it's tough to, if you always need to rely on.

Samantha McGuinness:

This thing that you have to bring, if it's a dunk tank, if it's a,

Samantha McGuinness:

you know, or whatever it is that you're doing, if it's balloons,

Samantha McGuinness:

whatever it is that you're doing.

Samantha McGuinness:

If you have to rely on that, your team is going to think that.

Samantha McGuinness:

They always need that to set appointments.

Samantha McGuinness:

And so when a company starts working with us, we actually remove, we

Samantha McGuinness:

ask them to remove phone numbers, websites, QR codes from their branding.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I, I would consider that creative.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's completely.

Samantha McGuinness:

The opposite of what a company or a person's nature is gonna tell

Samantha McGuinness:

them to do, you think, put my phone number here, put my website here.

Samantha McGuinness:

I want people to contact me later.

Samantha McGuinness:

I don't want them to contact you later.

Samantha McGuinness:

I want the amazing team who you have spent a lot of time hiring and training

Samantha McGuinness:

to set and qualify appointments on the spot because the likelihood of being

Samantha McGuinness:

able to get a in a hold of people after the fact, it's very very slim.

Samantha McGuinness:

So.

Samantha McGuinness:

We, we have certainly leveraged some creative approaches when we need to

Samantha McGuinness:

in order to get into a certain show.

Samantha McGuinness:

However, the creativity is in your people.

Todd Miller:

I love it.

Todd Miller:

So if I'm a contractor in Ohio.

Todd Miller:

I'm working the wine and cheese show some weekend.

Todd Miller:

I don't necessarily have to have everyone in my booth dressed up

Todd Miller:

as Brutus Buckeye or anything.

Todd Miller:

I take it don't, don't have to do that, apparently.

Todd Miller:

Well, I'm kind of curious, what does it look like when you first bring on a

Todd Miller:

new client and start working with them?

Todd Miller:

How you, you talked earlier a little bit about that positioning and things,

Todd Miller:

but how do you get to know them?

Todd Miller:

How do you connect with them and learn their business?

Samantha McGuinness:

It's a really great question.

Samantha McGuinness:

We always start with an audit.

Samantha McGuinness:

We need to know who our, the company is, what are their core values as a business?

Samantha McGuinness:

Are they doing anything?

Samantha McGuinness:

When it comes to charity, we believe in paying it forward.

Samantha McGuinness:

At my company, we have different org.

Samantha McGuinness:

Organizations we work with like the Humane Society of Broward

Samantha McGuinness:

County, and we like working with a company who does contribute to the

Samantha McGuinness:

communities that they're working in.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think it's really important.

Samantha McGuinness:

People like their homeowner, prospects like that as well.

Samantha McGuinness:

We also do an audit just in terms of finding out where they

Samantha McGuinness:

are with regards to their KPIs.

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, their cost per lead, their close rate based issued.

Samantha McGuinness:

Again, there are about 15 KPIs that we analyze because each one

Samantha McGuinness:

of our clients and the members of our face-to-face marketing network,

Samantha McGuinness:

we do an A one, I do a one-on-one or quarterly KPI review with them.

Samantha McGuinness:

So we set benchmarks with where we wanna be every single quarter, and

Samantha McGuinness:

then we check in every single quarter and we go through all of those KPIs.

Samantha McGuinness:

So those KPIs play a really important part in how we coach.

Samantha McGuinness:

What we're focused on.

Samantha McGuinness:

And then we work with them on optimizing their scheduling, budgeting.

Samantha McGuinness:

We roll out our methodology to actually qualify and set appointments on the spot.

Samantha McGuinness:

And depending on where they are, it's going to kind of

Samantha McGuinness:

guide how we will guide them.

Samantha McGuinness:

But we pretty much help them with everything when it comes to compensation.

Samantha McGuinness:

How do they train?

Samantha McGuinness:

How do they retain their team?

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, the, the biggest cost when it comes to face-to-face

Samantha McGuinness:

marketing is actually your payroll.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's not going to be your booth cost.

Samantha McGuinness:

And so we really wanna make sure that we are enhancing a culture by creation.

Samantha McGuinness:

We need to do things to make sure that the culture is top tier.

Samantha McGuinness:

Otherwise, you will spin your wheels with high turnover.

Todd Miller:

Makes a lot of sense.

Todd Miller:

Um, I'm kind of curious, is your typical client doing most everything in-house

Todd Miller:

or are they using a lot of outside consultants already for, to help 'em

Todd Miller:

with lead gen and, and marketing?

Todd Miller:

Um, or is it kind of a mixed bag amongst your clients?

Samantha McGuinness:

It's definitely a more of a mixed bag.

Samantha McGuinness:

So a lot of our clients are doing all types of different marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

We have, we actually have a client who doesn't do any, uh, aggregators

Samantha McGuinness:

or anything like that, which is rare.

Samantha McGuinness:

Most, most companies are, I, you know, five years ago this wasn't the case

Samantha McGuinness:

though, so it's really interesting how things have changed so much.

Samantha McGuinness:

But there, it's pretty much a, a mixed bag I would say.

Samantha McGuinness:

Most of our clients are at least on doing social media marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

They are doing TV or radio or both.

Samantha McGuinness:

And then of course, all of the digital marketing as well.

Todd Miller:

Speaking of your clients, can you tell us one memorable success

Todd Miller:

story where you've really helped a remodeling company grow and expand?

Samantha McGuinness:

All of my clients are my favorite clients.

Samantha McGuinness:

One of my favorite clients, they're called, they're called

Samantha McGuinness:

Lifestyle Home Solutions.

Samantha McGuinness:

They're actually a jacuzzi dealer out of Canada, and they are an incredible

Samantha McGuinness:

company with incredible people.

Samantha McGuinness:

They hired me.

Samantha McGuinness:

Some years ago and um, because they had a Costco partnership and they originally

Samantha McGuinness:

had outsourced the onsite staff at the Costco stores to a third party company.

Samantha McGuinness:

And when they began working with me, they were doing 15 Costco road shows a year.

Samantha McGuinness:

And now they're doing, we help them scale to over 30 roadshows per month.

Samantha McGuinness:

So they, they've since expanded into several other markets and now they're

Samantha McGuinness:

able to control their field marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

Which has played a huge role in that.

Samantha McGuinness:

One of the biggest compliments that I get when I work with a company is

Samantha McGuinness:

that our systems that enabled, that are strictly focused on events, home

Samantha McGuinness:

shows, retail stores are benefiting their company in all areas and helping

Samantha McGuinness:

their company scale in all areas.

Samantha McGuinness:

So they'll take.

Samantha McGuinness:

Our budgeting tools or our interview questions or you know, our SOPs and

Samantha McGuinness:

all these things, and they'll deploy them into other departments like the

Samantha McGuinness:

sales team, the call center team, and even, you know, install and operations.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I consider that a huge blessing to be able to bless them in this way

Samantha McGuinness:

beyond what they've even hired us to do.

Todd Miller:

Any fun trends you're seeing out there in terms

Todd Miller:

of face-to-face marketing today?

Todd Miller:

Something that someone might say, gee.

Todd Miller:

Was, I never thought of that or never heard of that before.

Samantha McGuinness:

Post 2020, people want human connection

Samantha McGuinness:

and some people go to events just to take content to go and post on

Samantha McGuinness:

their social media, and I think that that really grit gives the.

Samantha McGuinness:

Vendors at events, home shows and retail stores a cool opportunity to

Samantha McGuinness:

be noticed in different ways without having to go, Hey, I'm on social media,

Samantha McGuinness:

or, you know, they can just be at the event in a show and they're in the, the

Samantha McGuinness:

crossfire, so to say, and so you might end up being promoted just by fluke.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that that's, that's really cool.

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, another interesting thing is that being authentic

Samantha McGuinness:

is coming back in style and.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that people want more of that, more than they ever have being, you

Samantha McGuinness:

know, 20 20, 20 21, even into 2022.

Samantha McGuinness:

People were really isolated and some still are.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I think that, you know, just craving that human connection

Samantha McGuinness:

and an authentic experience.

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, with, when we're discussing things like ai, there's deep fake that,

Samantha McGuinness:

you know, I know Gary V was saying in X amount of years, you're not even

Samantha McGuinness:

gonna be able to tell if it's a human you're speaking to online or not.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I think that something that's really cool to, it's weird that it's a trend,

Samantha McGuinness:

but just authenticity in general is.

Samantha McGuinness:

Is coming back in style and I think that's awesome.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I think that the value of human connection is only going to skyrocket.

Samantha McGuinness:

So I'm bullish on, on real human connection, and I think that

Samantha McGuinness:

homeowners want that as well.

Ryan Bell:

I promise.

Ryan Bell:

I was just gonna ask you how important you thought authenticity was in, in

Ryan Bell:

coming out in this creative stuff.

Ryan Bell:

And I feel the same way about ai, and I think as humans,

Ryan Bell:

we're gonna get tired of it.

Ryan Bell:

It's gonna be so obvious and we're gonna be so, uh.

Ryan Bell:

Tired of it, and we're just drawn to connection with each other.

Ryan Bell:

So you read my mind and I didn't even get to ask the the question,

Todd Miller:

Isn't that crazy though, to imagine that here we are

Todd Miller:

thinking we may have to prove to someone that we're real in order to

Todd Miller:

be authentic.

Todd Miller:

Uh, it's just crazy.

Todd Miller:

Well, I'm kind of curious, um, why do you see the home improvement industry as

Todd Miller:

being something that's, you know, really a good opportunity for entrepreneurs?

Todd Miller:

You've been in the industry a long time, and I'm just kind of curious, what,

Todd Miller:

what do you like about this industry?

Samantha McGuinness:

The home improvement industry, to me, it gives people a

Samantha McGuinness:

direct line between effort and outcome.

Samantha McGuinness:

And my favorite part about this industry is that it's transparent.

Samantha McGuinness:

So if you are really great, people will know.

Samantha McGuinness:

And if you are not good at all, people will know that.

Samantha McGuinness:

And.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think that that's just, it's extremely important.

Samantha McGuinness:

There's a lot of industries where you can kind of fake the funk and

Samantha McGuinness:

home remodeling isn't one of them.

Samantha McGuinness:

Not to mention the valuation element.

Samantha McGuinness:

So there's a lot of revenue to be made in home remodeling.

Samantha McGuinness:

Um, I read that I think by 2037, the remodeling space is supposed to

Samantha McGuinness:

generate over $7 billion in revenue.

Samantha McGuinness:

And so.

Samantha McGuinness:

You know, the other thing is just there's many things that we can leverage tech from

Samantha McGuinness:

and you know, we can u utilize AI for, but as of right now, installing windows

Samantha McGuinness:

in a roof and a bathroom remodel and these sort of things we need people for.

Samantha McGuinness:

And so I'm super bullish on the home remodeling industry for that reason.

Todd Miller:

I love it.

Todd Miller:

And the impact I always tell people, you know, you're not

Todd Miller:

just changing someone's home.

Todd Miller:

You're changing.

Todd Miller:

Their life in a lot of situations.

Todd Miller:

And I know my wife and myself, you know, we measure those times.

Todd Miller:

We did major projects to our home.

Todd Miller:

Those have become the benchmarks that we consider everything else, uh, you know,

Todd Miller:

along the timeline of our life together.

Todd Miller:

So big impact for sure.

Todd Miller:

Well, Samantha, it's been a real privilege to have you, uh, with us here today.

Todd Miller:

Thank you so much.

Todd Miller:

Is there anything we haven't covered, uh, today that you definitely

Todd Miller:

wanted to share with our audience here on Construction Disruption?

Samantha McGuinness:

Absolutely just that.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think in general, face-to-face is not old school.

Samantha McGuinness:

Yes, it worked 20 years ago and it works now, and it's the

Samantha McGuinness:

future proof channel again.

Samantha McGuinness:

The, uh.

Samantha McGuinness:

Authentic connection with human beings, it really matters.

Samantha McGuinness:

And the value of that is only going to increase, not in just building

Samantha McGuinness:

up your brand, your company's reputation, but doing the right thing

Samantha McGuinness:

by people and producing revenue.

Samantha McGuinness:

So it's a win-win for everybody.

Samantha McGuinness:

And I'd also just like to add too, that if companies.

Samantha McGuinness:

Aren't controlling their leads, then they're not able

Samantha McGuinness:

to control their business.

Samantha McGuinness:

And being able to create your own opportunities is

Samantha McGuinness:

a, an incredible blessing.

Samantha McGuinness:

And doing it the right way will benefit your prospects and your company as well.

Samantha McGuinness:

So if companies need our services, we're certainly happy to help to do that.

Todd Miller:

It's been a great time together and we're gonna get your contact

Todd Miller:

information here in just a moment.

Todd Miller:

We'll put it in the show notes as well.

Todd Miller:

But before we close out, I have to ask if you're willing to participate in

Todd Miller:

something we call rapid fire questions.

Todd Miller:

So these are just five kind of random questions we're gonna throw

Todd Miller:

at you and you can just give your response you up to the challenge.

Samantha McGuinness:

I'm up for it.

Samantha McGuinness:

Let's do it.

Todd Miller:

Awesome.

Todd Miller:

Ryan, you wanna ask the first one?

Ryan Bell:

I would love to.

Ryan Bell:

Question number one, what's a product or service you've

Ryan Bell:

acquired uh, recently that's kind of been a game changer for you?

Samantha McGuinness:

My Alexa, this is old school.

Samantha McGuinness:

I should have done this a long time ago.

Samantha McGuinness:

And the reason why is I read a book recently on the hidden messages of water.

Samantha McGuinness:

I don't know if you guys have read it, but this man did a study on water and he spoke

Samantha McGuinness:

kind words to the water, froze it and analyzed it under a microscope, and he.

Samantha McGuinness:

Shows pictures of the water that was spoken, kind words to that had negative

Samantha McGuinness:

words, even pictured on the water.

Samantha McGuinness:

So he would write something not nice, and he, uh, taped it

Samantha McGuinness:

to a water, the water glass.

Samantha McGuinness:

And he took pictures and studied this water over time, and he studied

Samantha McGuinness:

how water responded to, you know.

Samantha McGuinness:

Really harsh, like heavy metal music or classical music like Beethoven

Samantha McGuinness:

and Mozart and things like that.

Samantha McGuinness:

And the water that had the kind words and the beautiful

Samantha McGuinness:

classical music is beautiful.

Samantha McGuinness:

Like the, it was like gorgeous, almost snowflake by design.

Samantha McGuinness:

Whereas the water who didn't have nice words, who had really harsh

Samantha McGuinness:

sounds, um, was looking kind of scary.

Samantha McGuinness:

And so in my home now, we have classical music constantly, and I just feel

Samantha McGuinness:

like I'm vibrating at another level.

Todd Miller:

That is amazing.

Ryan Bell:

I've heard of that with like plants before, but not water.

Todd Miller:

I need to know more about that.

Todd Miller:

So, second question, maybe it's what you just talked about.

Todd Miller:

What's a must read book that you recommend to business leaders?

Samantha McGuinness:

Oh my gosh.

Samantha McGuinness:

I read, I probably finish four books a month.

Samantha McGuinness:

I read a lot, and at a certain point, all of the books merge into one.

Samantha McGuinness:

I understand.

Samantha McGuinness:

A book that's really important to me.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's called Outwitting the Devil.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think it's Napoleon Hill, if I'm not mistaken.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's a really great book because you know, in our minds we can control a lot.

Samantha McGuinness:

We can control if we're in heaven or hell in our minds.

Samantha McGuinness:

And to me that book was really impactful in that way because I

Samantha McGuinness:

think you can be your worst critic and you can change your life in a,

Samantha McGuinness:

in a negative way or a positive way.

Samantha McGuinness:

And that book is a really, a really great testament to that.

Ryan Bell:

I just added that one to my list.

Todd Miller:

Very neat.

Todd Miller:

I need to check that out too.

Ryan Bell:

Question number three, are you a dog or cat person?

Samantha McGuinness:

Oh my gosh.

Samantha McGuinness:

I am such a dog.

Samantha McGuinness:

I have two dogs and I love them.

Samantha McGuinness:

Their names are Oliver and Olivia and they're brother and sister and they're

Samantha McGuinness:

the most amazing part of my day.

Samantha McGuinness:

I know I sound like a freak.

Samantha McGuinness:

I love them so much.

Samantha McGuinness:

We actually, um.

Samantha McGuinness:

When I moved to Miami, I began going to the Humane Society just

Samantha McGuinness:

to volunteer and do certain things.

Samantha McGuinness:

And, um, I realized there's so many dogs there that they're all

Samantha McGuinness:

perfect and they have no home.

Samantha McGuinness:

And it's like, and when you go and you see them, they all

Samantha McGuinness:

just perfect, amazing animals.

Samantha McGuinness:

So now at our face-to-face marketing network, every time a

Samantha McGuinness:

new company joins us, we actually sponsor a dog in their honor.

Samantha McGuinness:

So we have a partnership with the Broward County Humane Society, but now we have

Samantha McGuinness:

decided that any, whichever county our client's in, we will form a partnership

Samantha McGuinness:

with that Humane Society and sponsor a dog in their market because the Humane Society

Samantha McGuinness:

is really great at marketing as well.

Samantha McGuinness:

So we like to to do little things like that because I'm definitely a dog person.

Samantha McGuinness:

To answer your question clearly,

Ryan Bell:

I have to ask a follow up question.

Ryan Bell:

What kind of dogs are they?

Samantha McGuinness:

cockapoos.

Ryan Bell:

Cockapoos?

Ryan Bell:

Oh my, my parents used to have a cockapoo.

Samantha McGuinness:

Ugh.

Samantha McGuinness:

Best ever.

Todd Miller:

Very neat.

Todd Miller:

Okay, next to last question, what is your favorite meal?

Samantha McGuinness:

I ha I love food too much to answer this question.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's, it's going to be, um, really ripe mango or crab legs.

Samantha McGuinness:

Clam linguini.

Samantha McGuinness:

Oh my gosh.

Samantha McGuinness:

I love food, guys.

Samantha McGuinness:

This is just, yeah, I love food.

Samantha McGuinness:

I think, I think I would say a really ripe mango or crab legs.

Samantha McGuinness:

There is a tie there.

Todd Miller:

Uh, very cool.

Todd Miller:

Good answer.

Ryan Bell:

Okay.

Ryan Bell:

Last question here at the.

Ryan Bell:

End of your days, what do you hope to be remembered for?

Samantha McGuinness:

Oh my gosh, this is a very important question.

Samantha McGuinness:

Um, I think just somebody who lived for God and not for the world.

Ryan Bell:

Amen.

Ryan Bell:

Yep.

Todd Miller:

Great answer.

Todd Miller:

Good answer.

Samantha McGuinness:

Thank you.

Todd Miller:

Well, you're, well, you're, you're well on your path to that.

Todd Miller:

Um, Samantha Tate, thank you so much for, uh, making a difference

Todd Miller:

out there in our industry and making a difference in the world.

Todd Miller:

Um, thanks for what you're doing to help build a lot of remodeling

Todd Miller:

companies to thrive and go grow prosperously into the future.

Todd Miller:

Um, if folks wanna learn more about you or about enabled consulting, uh, what

Todd Miller:

are the best ways for them to do that?

Samantha McGuinness:

The best ways are to visit our membership page, which

Samantha McGuinness:

is face-to-face marketing network.com.

Samantha McGuinness:

That's a very long domain name.

Samantha McGuinness:

I know we also have an in-person intensive on October 9th in Miami

Samantha McGuinness:

where I will be coaching all day long.

Samantha McGuinness:

We have a couple other companies who will be there as well, but it's all geared

Samantha McGuinness:

towards coaching, helping companies either refine or roll out their home

Samantha McGuinness:

show events, retail store program.

Samantha McGuinness:

We're giving you the sauce on that day to.

Samantha McGuinness:

Sign up for that, you'll go to ftf training.com and it'll be a game

Samantha McGuinness:

changing day in Miami together.

Todd Miller:

And what was the URL for?

Todd Miller:

The face?

Todd Miller:

It was, you said there were a couple hyphens in there.

Todd Miller:

Face-to-face marketing.

Samantha McGuinness:

There are no hyphens, okay, so it's just

Samantha McGuinness:

face-to-face marketing network.com.

Todd Miller:

Okay.

Samantha McGuinness:

And that's our membership.

Samantha McGuinness:

So with that membership, we have a network of companies.

Samantha McGuinness:

We coach them twice a month at minimum.

Samantha McGuinness:

We have three tiers to that.

Samantha McGuinness:

Some have one-on-one coaching, but it's a network of companies

Samantha McGuinness:

to just deploy our systems.

Samantha McGuinness:

There's an online learning system.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's extremely valuable to help support managers who are in these positions.

Todd Miller:

Very cool.

Todd Miller:

Well, we have a URL for roofing for homeowners associations.com.

Todd Miller:

Now I'm gonna have to count letters to see whose is longer, 'cause

Todd Miller:

they gotta be pretty similar there.

Todd Miller:

Good stuff.

Todd Miller:

Well.

Todd Miller:

Thank you again so much, uh, for being with us today, Samantha.

Todd Miller:

This has been great.

Samantha McGuinness:

Thank you so much for having me.

Samantha McGuinness:

It's been awesome.

Todd Miller:

I'm pleased to say we were all successful at

Todd Miller:

working in our challenge words.

Todd Miller:

Samantha, you got yours in first and your word was,

Samantha McGuinness:

My word was corn dog, and I made sure I got it in first

Samantha McGuinness:

because I was gonna forget otherwise.

Todd Miller:

or maybe chili dog.

Todd Miller:

Corn dog would be good.

Todd Miller:

Well, I think we've done corn dog

Todd Miller:

before, haven't we?

Todd Miller:

Ryan?

Todd Miller:

We have.

Samantha McGuinness:

Did I take a corn dog or you had chili?

Samantha McGuinness:

Chili dog?

Todd Miller:

you you did it right?

Todd Miller:

You had Chili dog.

Todd Miller:

Perfect.

Todd Miller:

And, uh, Ryan, your word was,

Ryan Bell:

Authenticity.

Todd Miller:

which, uh, got said numerous times during this episode,

Todd Miller:

and my word was Buckeye, which I figured out a way to work in.

Todd Miller:

I didn't even have to make it plural, so

Ryan Bell:

What was the other word you said?

Ryan Bell:

Scuttlebutt.

Todd Miller:

scuttle.

Todd Miller:

But I think everyone

Todd Miller:

probably thought that was the word, didn't

Ryan Bell:

sure.

Ryan Bell:

Yeah.

Ryan Bell:

I had to, I had to think like, wait, that wasn't one of the words, was it?

Ryan Bell:

Because it caught me off guard.

Todd Miller:

That's just the way, the weird way Miller talks.

Todd Miller:

That's all I could say.

Samantha McGuinness:

Yeah, I've never used that word before until today,

Samantha McGuinness:

so thank you for that experience.

Todd Miller:

Thank you to our audience for tuning into this very special episode

Todd Miller:

of Construction Disruption with Samantha McGuinness of Enabled Consulting.

Todd Miller:

Please watch for future episodes of our show.

Todd Miller:

We always have great guests just like Samantha.

Todd Miller:

Please leave a review or give us a. Thumbs up, whatever works best.

Todd Miller:

But until the next time we're together, keep on disrupting, keep on challenging,

Todd Miller:

uh, keep on looking for better ways of doing things, and don't forget to have a

Todd Miller:

positive impact on everyone you encounter.

Todd Miller:

Make them smile, encourage them.

Todd Miller:

Powerful, yet simple things we can do to change the world.

Todd Miller:

So God bless and take care.

Todd Miller:

This is Isaiah Industries signing off until the next episode

Todd Miller:

of Construction Disruption.