Michael: Hi, this is Michael Senoff with Michael Senoff’s www.hardtofindseminars.com. Here’s a series of interviews with existing HMA marketing consultants. The number one concern from people interested in becoming a marketing consultant is how do I get my first client. Well, what you’re about to hear in the next series of recordings are interviews with existing HMA consultants that reveal exactly how they got their first client. I hope you find this helpful and I hope it gives you the confidence and the ability to go get your first client, even before you invest in the HMA system. You’ve got all the tools on my website to go out and prospect and interview and get paid upfront for a client for consulting. Enjoy.

Michael: I’m doing an interview with Bob Bly. He’s a great copywriter and I’ve got hundreds of questions that come and you know what the number one question by far is? How do you get your first client? And so, it gave me an idea to put together a little audio recording for people who are interested in the consulting business; stories of some of the HMA students who have signed up and how they got their first client or how they’re getting towards getting their first client because it seems like it’s something that is on everyone’s mind. That’s really the purpose of this call. David, the purpose of this call, what I’m doing, I’m putting together a little promotional audio CD called My First Client. All the people I’ve talked to who are interested in getting into consulting, even though you’ve got a lot of experience, they want to know, how do you get that first client. So, I though what a better thing to do than ask some of the HMA students or people with consulting experience how they got their first client or how the HMA system has made it easier. Just any kind of advice or reality check that someone considering going into the consulting business can gain from your experience. So, why don’t you just start off by telling what your name is, what you do, and how you got into the little consulting business here?

David: Well, my name is David , What I do is business consulting, business development on the website, as well as offline for small to mid size businesses. I do something called Taguchi methodology and that works with other businesses to help them increase their response rate. I was really interested in the HMA system because I saw that as rounding out or giving me further depth or breadth into my background. I am a salesperson, offers to $100 million in sales I’ve already done, but knowing the pieces and parts from the foundational standpoint as far as a system. A USP, going from that to be able to articulate your sales argument, put together the letters, develop the alliances; basically from A to Z was something I did not have. Getting the first client was relatively easy. It was as easy as walking into a business owner and saying how’s business going and him saying no so good and you say well we can make that better and here’s how. And then that one client led to another. Actually I engaged the client for $20,000 to help him with the Web, as well as the offline part of his business. And then I have another client coming right behind that one. If I do this wrong, it will be $20,000 a month and if I do it right, $100,000 a month. And all of that is based on just into the client base, doing the survey that’s talked about on the CDs, find out what the USP really is, find out not what you’re selling but what they’re actually buying, developing the proper alliances both online and offline, and then handling the conversions on the interim. That’s really all I’m doing, which is as easy as asking the question. I was at a conference in Dallas just the other week and a young lady said that she had a ski website and I said well how’s it going? She said, oh it could be doing better. I said maybe I can help you with those conversions. Here’s what I do. And she said let me have your card and subsequently I got a call.

Michael: When you say here’s what I can do, what’s your elevator pitch? What do you say?

David: My elevator pitch is I help you with the conversions on your website or with your business. Anyone can get people either to their website or into their business. That’s the traffic part. But if you don’t convert that traffic because you have a sales message, which is articulated very clearly and concisely and that doesn’t necessarily match the customer’s conversation, but aligns with it so you see a positive future, no profit comes out. So, it is basic formula of traffic plus conversion equals profit. I handle the conversion piece. That’s exactly how I illustrate it to people.

Michael: So, with this particular client, the one with the ski website, did you set up an appointment by phone or was it in person?

David: It was by phone. She was in another state. I met her at a conference. She took my card. She gave me a call. I used go to meetings, so went to her site and saw the obvious things…no headline, no articulated sales argument, no USP, no credibility elements on the site, no capture mechanism for any email address, no communication element; all those things that are standard and customary for a business to have if they’re going to enter into a sales process, she didn’t have. So, I turned around and said look for me to just work on this, this first part, it’s going to cost $1,500, but this may range if we keep on going at this, it may get upwards of $15,000 and she said fine, as long as I can see what each one of the steps are, then we’re good to go. So, the first thing was to start with the USP. What are you doing and why would someone want to buy from you. And then I asked her, I said I’d like to speak to some of your clients also to find out why they bought so we can take those names and put them in the sales argument and move forward from there.

Michael: So, on your pricing, are you charging per step, like Richard recommends, or are you doing any contingency? What’s your philosophy on pricing? And I know you’re an experienced, seasoned sales pro. A lot of the consultants coming in don’t have the experience you have. For instance, we just talked to a gentleman who quoted someone $600 for a USP. And I know and Richard knows and you probably know the difference in what you charge can be two things; who you’re talking to and your level of confidence. And it’s easy to understand you have that confidence in you because of the experience you have behind you. But what would you tell someone, I guess who’s starting out and maybe doesn’t have as much confidence, what would you advise them as far as charging and what’s your philosophy on pricing your services?

David: It does really depend on who you’re dealing with. You can’t squeeze blood out of a rock. I mean if there’s no money in the business, then either you have to make the decision you’re going to reduce your pricing and get it done for them so that they get a result so they can continue to pay you or you just don’t do business with them at all. For me it’s deciding is it worth my time to work with that business. What is the potential? I do, do contingency. It’s really not a contingency. I’ll do a retainer of a minimum of $5,000, plus when I make my promise, I get the rest of it plus I usually cut in the backend on any increases they were able to see. Now, a lot of the work I do is online and I have tools that allow me to track and test to make sure that I’m above their baseline when we started. So, it’s very easy for me to have that contingency backend because I can see what’s going on. In an offline business, especially if there are phone calls going to an office, it’s more difficult. So, in that case, you charge a flat fee, get it done, whatever promise you made as far as increase, I have to listen to the tape, but it’s saying between 25 and 200%. Although with the technology I can use, I can sometimes get it up to 700%. The 25 to 200 makes people very comfortable, but it lowers the threshold at which I have to perform. So, when I get the 200, 300, 400% increase by stacking media or going offline and online, optimizing the website, using advanced testing on any of the pieces of the sales process. It’s just better for me because that backend is tied to that. I’m tracking that all the time.

Michael: Richard, do you have anything for David?

Richard: David, you mentioned right at the beginning it’s as easy as walking into a business and just saying how are things going. Have you done any prospecting for business? Have you done any workshops or anything like that?

David: Well, I’ve been very fortunate. I speak in seminars now and I’m being called to speak at different seminars around the country. I’ve been in Chicago twice. I was in Washington just yesterday speaking on my expertise. And from that business development comes. So, I really haven’t done any prospecting so to speak. I am thinking about going to the local Chamber of Commerce because the businesses that I get on a plane and go see in the other parts of the country are in here Nashville. So, I feel like I need to probably stop and go to the local Chamber of Commerce because now I have an information product, which speaks for me. I’m speaking at seminars. So, I probably will start trying to be home a little because I’m a celebrity outside of my own hometown now. That one situation where I was at the conference, it was just as easy as asking the question what business do you have and how is it going. A business owner, most of the time the guy or gal is not going to say it’s great. It’s always it could be better. And if you can tell them that you can get them 25% more than they had before minimum, what are they going to say, no. As long as their product or service can hold my fee and that’s what I look for too, what are they selling? If they don’t have the volume and the profitability to hold my fee, obviously, it’s not worth it. And I have turned away some clients because they were selling an e-book for $98. That’s not going to do anything. But when you get to the folks who are selling something upwards of $2,500 per unit sale, they can easily hold the fee. I was speaking to a dentist this morning. I told him that my fee -- what he asked me to do is going to be $20,000. He said done. Within 30 seconds with no problem.

Michael: Do you have them pay you all upfront?

David: No. Usually what I do is I do half when I start because I have people I need to pay to get things done and then half upon my promise. The nice thing is with this particular situation -- this is a pilot -- the reason I’m doing this one so cheap is because this one is a pilot and that person has a center of influence of upwards of 2,000 individuals that he would want this work done for. So, I’m in the process now setting up an affiliate that will bring me more business without me having to go out and prospect. It’s got to really be nichey. And that’s people with websites in a particular area, high-ticket items because those folks can pay me. I even have a client now -- a hosting company -- that I’m looking to work with now that has like 78,000 customers. Never surveyed a one of them. Has not communicated at all with any of them. So, that’s a gold mine. He has email addresses, names, addresses, phone numbers, and those people are paying him on a year-to-year basis.

Michael: What’s this HMA system going to mean for you down the road? How has it put things together for you or did you already have a lot of this knowledge before you got it?

David: I knew of Jay Abraham and Dan Kennedy. I’ve been an avid student of both of those. When I was put in my territory I’d use those direct marketing and those points while I was working corporate America. In corporate America, I learned how to be on the sales side. Now, they don’t teach you a system. The HMA system is a system. So, now I have something to weave all the other skills sets, the sales, the marketing, all the different skill sets are now woven into the HMA system. HMA is a great foundation.

Richard: It just gave you a way to package everything.

David: Right. I went through the paperwork first. I kind of spot went through the DVDs. The USP, I think I went through four times. That is the most important part. Everything else after that becomes mechanics. Can you develop the joint venture? Can you get a letter written? Can you get into the mail? My expertise is in the testing part of it, so I don’t ever write a letter and say this is the letter. This is the letter we’re going to try and we can try that letter until we get it right, but now I have a better copywriter, web designer, graphic artist, traffic developers for the online market space, pay for click folks that now when I need these folks in place, I just plug them into a project, as long as the project has enough money to hold them. It’s a great system. It’s great. I need to go through it again to see if I’m missing anything, but so far so good. I mean you could really take just one piece of the HMA system, like just the joint ventures part of it and go to a business and say hi, you’re in business, who else has customers that want what you’re selling. You could make a career just with JV piece of it. You could make a career with the JV piece…

Richard: And you can make a career with just the USP.

David: Oh, absolutely.

Richard: And you could make a career just with database.

David: Oh my gosh, yes. I was at a database conference in Washington. I had no idea that there are companies out there that have more traffic than they know what to do with, more content than they know what do with, and they still can’t figure out how to convert. And I’m sitting there…oh my gosh…they don’t split-test, they don’t do anything, and they’re saying we wish we knew how to convert. Oh my goodness. So, I have a training package now on nothing but testing; how to convert, when to convert, what method to use, what tools to use. I’ve had other tools created. So, now that is my segue into just about any business now. Whatever you’re doing, you could probably be doing better or better yet, let’s just get your baseline. Just getting a businesses baseline is worth a lot money there because they don’t know where they are.

Richard: That’s right.

David: This is great because I’m starting with the testing piece and the HMA just -- now I’m business development as opposed to just testing. So, I can talk to a dentist today and say well what is it you’re trying to do. Well, I’m looking to put something together for the Web and offline, CRM. Well, I can help you with that. Really. Well, how much is that going to cost? Well, that will be upwards of $20,000. Oh, okay. That was the whole conversation. That was it.

Michael: David, I know you’re busy and I really appreciate it. I’m glad I was able to connect. You’re a hard guy to get in touch with. David, thank you very, very much.

David: No problem. I appreciate it. Richard, good to talk to you finally.

Richard: You, too, sir. Thank you.

David: Thank you. Talk to you soon. [END]

Michael: If I could just ask you some questions and you can just share your experience and Richard you can offer any kind of commentary and feedback. So, tell us your name and where you’re from and how you fell into this HMA consulting business?

Peter: My name is Peter. I’m from the greater Detroit area. And I have been pretty much a student of Jay Abraham for probably the last ten years and it’s been just an evolving trail. Started out with Jay’s stuff and then got into the PEQ with Chett Holmes and along the way I’ve been self-employed and had two or three businesses and I sold them out about five years ago. Semi-retired and wanted to do some of the marketing stuff that I had learned. Did some stuff around the Detroit area, moved down to Florida for a couple of years, worked with a couple of companies down there, and really didn’t know how to totally put it all together. The PEQ really helped me as far as organizational and how to structure, things like that, but I was still kind of vague on the marketing end. And then when I was talking to you, you and I went back and forward on some things and HMA came along and I kind of synthesized it all together where it made sense to me. It gave me a template. I really like the outline. In fact, when I go talk to client, I take that with me.

Michael: Now, what outline is this? The Opportunity Analysis?

Peter: The Opportunity Analysis, yes. I just sit right down with it and they watch me fill it out. It helps. It’s a lot more professional because they’re not expecting that. They’re expecting someone to come in there and start schmoozing them or…

Richard: Selling them a product.

Peter: Right. And you start asking them the hard questions and the thing that really has impressed me the most and kind of the light bulb went on. Well, when Chet in the PEQ talked about the stadium pitch, the stadium pitch and the USP are kind of related. The stadium pitch is kind of a longer version of the USP. That’s what I’m finding when I talk to people. They just have no idea what business they’re in. That goes right by them. So, the three clients that I’ve had, that has been the light bulb going on for them when they really stop. It’s hard for people, too. A lot of people don’t have any idea. I’m a carpet cleaner, but why am I cleaning carpets.

Michael: Can you go back and kind of bring us into the involvement of very first client?

Peter: I was in Florida until last October and I came back. The company I was working with had some financial problems. One of our larger clients went Chapter 11 on us and I using the PEQ down there. I had totally organized that company and we were doing really well until this client puked on us. Then I got back here and was fixing the house up. I have a residence up here and I also lease a place down in the Sarasota area. And I had a friend of mine who had three businesses. He had an insulation business. He had a light manufacturing business, commercial lighting. And he was starting a new operation, which was in the training area or the health fitness area. It was called My Training Card. It was a plastic card that workouts were put on it and it was computerized thing, Windows, and it printed out and we’re still working on that. But anyway, we were talking when we were on his boat in October and he’s like what are you doing and at this point I was just getting into the HMA because I knew I was reading material on it and to be honest with you Michael, I’m like everybody else, I’m there trying to read this thing and glean as much as I can without having to buy the darn thing. How much material can I get out of here that’ll help me without having to buy the thing? It was titillating enough that it gave you enough information, but not enough. You needed the analysis worksheets and the videos and stuff. So, that was October. So, he flat out just hired me because I had enough information just from what you put free on the site to actually start it. And I knew the USP was the first thing you had to do and I went into his lighting business and he was kind of all over the place and we developed the USP for that and he was really happy with that. It helped us out. He’s a manufacturer and it was kind of a direct sales situation and we evolved from there into a sales rep regional model. And we are actually going around the country now setting the reps up. The USP has helped us with that because we need to get all the material down for them and they need to get it to those people that are buying.

Richard: Peter, how are you finding these reps?

Peter: The industry is kind of small. In other words, like Lithonia is the huge guy on the block and Cooper Light is the other big manufacturer. And that’s the distribution model for the lighting industry. They’re based on representatives in regions. So, you merely look in the Yellow Pages, who’s the rep, who’s the Lithonia rep and you go to that person. You say I have another line of lights. We don’t compete directly with them. We have an indirect commercial light that is patented by this gentleman that I work with that puts out 25% more light and it saves on installation. It’s indirect lighting, which is a little different than direct lighting. I often build the USP around that.

Richard: So, how many reps will he try to have?

Peter: Right now we have 16 reps mostly covering the Eastern and Southern part of the country. We go as far as Oklahoma right now. Pretty much like Oklahoma, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, New York, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana.

Richard: And these reps just take the product on, on a commission basis?

Peter: Right. Like a representative might be handling 50 lines. You’re just one more line and your job is to get him to sell your line.

Richard: But you had to track those down one at a time through the phonebook?

Peter: Yes, pretty much that’s what you would do. On the Internet you’d click on lighting representative. There are sites that will categorize them for you and give you the rep by state.

Richard: Okay.

Peter: You call them and, of course, they’re happy to take a line on. It’s no skin off their nose, another line. But again, the key is getting them…to educate them to sell your line. That goes back to the USP because you don’t have much time with these people and it’s like you’ve got to impress them right away.

Richard: That’s right.

Michael: How were you able to close the deal with this first client?

Peter: What you do is you start asking questions. Oh, how’s business going? Oh, it’s going all right. Well, are you selling as much as you might? No, no. no. Well, why not? Guys can’t put the finger on it. It’s like I’ve got this great product, but nobody wants to buy it and they don’t understand it’s because they don’t have a USP and they don’t know how to communicate that.

Michael: Did you take him through the Opportunity Analysis?

Peter: Oh, absolutely. Yes, what I did is I go through the Opportunity Analysis part and then he actually hired me on a salary basis to work for him. So, I’m working with him now on a salary on a regular basis and I’m still picking up other clients on the side. And what I do because of the fact that when I retired I really didn’t need this as a source of a first income is I’m really tuned in more to joint ventures and I went through the thing you sent me. It’s one of the bonuses with the 250-page joint venture. And that’s kind of how I approach it. When I go for a client now, I’m really looking at equity stake in their company. I don’t need to waste my time doing a little bit of consulting for them for a couple hundred bucks. I really like to see what I can do. And the thing is, too, it’s almost like cheating because you go in there and you ask them these questions and they’re providing you with all this information. It is very valuable and they have no idea how valuable it is. So, these guys are divulging, yeah I have a customer list of 5,000 or 10,000 customers. What do you do with those? Oh, well nothing. I think we mailed them once. And you’re sitting there going, oh okay and you know that’s revenue just sitting there.

Richard: That’s right.

Michael: What’s the biggest challenge of doing this consulting?

Peter: The biggest challenge I think is getting people first of all to believe you; that what you’re telling them is true because no one’s ever told them that. And the second is to get them out of their comfort zone because some of them are just kind of comfortable doing what they’re doing. They’re making enough and they’re paying their bills and they don’t want to go to that next level. They’ve got kids. They’re busy. They need to find somebody that’s really, really hungry or you need to go into larger companies, which Richard was talking about on the video. But what happens when you get into larger companies, like you say over $10 million, they start getting…you’re butting heads with marketing departments and things like that. The guy I’m working with now, he’s doing about $5.5 million and he was right at that point because he had a couple people that were on the outside. He had a copywriter and he had a graphics person, but he didn’t have anybody internally that was driving the marketing. It was all coming from him. Nobody telling him what he needed to do. So, that’s kind of where I came in. I said here’s what you need to do. You need the USP. You need to integrate it into everything. You need to get all your salesmen on the same page. And then from the PEQ background, which I throw that in for free, it’s like you need to systematize this. You need to train these guys. It’s just a lot of the PEQ stuff kind of comes in over the top of the HMA from a structural standpoint.

Michael: Do you have any challenges that you want to discuss with Richard?

Peter: How many other consultants do a lot -- what you do as far as the meetings like the Chamber of Commerce stuff and things like that?

Richard: Well, for example, I’ve got a client in Fargo, North Dakota. We put on a workshop. He sponsored it. He was with a manufacturing association group and he sponsored it with the local business development center. We had 25 people there representing about 11 businesses and these businesses were across the board in manufacturing, in service, in professional. And we scheduled for that client 10 appointments to follow up and give assessments to those 10 businesses. He’ll either close them on one-on-one consulting or he’ll put them in a group and use the training materials. So, the workshops really, yes Peter, it just depends on where you’re at in your career.

Peter: Some of the people that are doing this are pretty much…this is what they’re doing and they’re geared to it and they want to go right through it. I’m kind of…have been around. I’m 55, been there, done that.

Richard: Well, let me just say this. What he did say was most critical and I will say that and that is you’ve got to go in and just start talking to them about their business and asking a lot of questions -- that is why we have the Opportunity Analysis -- so that the client doesn’t feel like you’re pushing some kind of solution or product, but rather you’re helping him solve his problem. Then the other thing that Peter said that’s critical is the guy’s got to feel and believe he’s got a problem. If he’s not motivated, don’t waste your time. The guy that Peter met was motivated. He was ready to change his situation. And it’s also clear that some of these guys are so comfortable where they’re at, they’re not motivated enough to change. So, to all of the HMA guys out there who are looking for their first client, spare yourself a lot of energy by not going to people who are not motivated. That will only discourage you, you need to just find out and make sure these guys are kind of in a mindset ready to make a change. Is that right, Peter?

Peter: I totally agree. I think like you were talking about in South Dakota, North Dakota, there’s not the opportunity that’s available. I’m in a metropolitan area of 6 or 7 million people. I could go down right now five houses off to my main street right here and go down there and there’s 100 businesses. And I can walk into any one of them I want or I can do mailings to them. That was probably going to be my next move because I’m not that comfortable calling people on the telephone. Just for myself, I like the mailings where you just mail them out.

Richard: Well, I’ll tell you what Peter, send me an email with your mailing and we’ll work on it together.

Peter: Okay.

Richard: I’ll certainly help you with that.

Michael: I remember talking to you about those cards for the gym. Did you get that guy as a client?

Peter: That’s who it is. That’s his third business.

Michael: Oh, that’s his third business.

Peter: That’s Internet based and we’ve been waiting to get it totally squared away on the Internet and just last week our tech guys got that all set. So, we actually have a meeting a week from Thursday with the person that has 40 fitness facilities in the Detroit area and he’s very excited about looking at our products. So, we’re going to go in and do a presentation. I’ll do the presentation, like a Power Point and see if we can sign him up. We went out to Vegas. We took the product up to Vegas to the big ERSA show, which is the International Racquet, Health and Sports Show. Premiered it out there and got a lot of good feedback. We’re doing a lot of follow- ups, but nothing concrete. Everyone wants the Internet version and like I say, that’s just coming out now.

Michael: I like to talk about good stories, but have you done an Opportunity Analysis where it just bombed?

Peter: Actually what I did is I think I told you about this, the gentleman who was the racecar guy, Roy Booth. I mean this guy was just perfect for this. He had a warehouse. Distributed out of his warehouse. He was up to like $4 million three years ago and business just stinks now. He’s down now to about $1.5 million and he ripe for this. He’s got a name recognition he doesn’t use. He’s got mail order he doesn’t use. He’s got a whole database of clients he’s not using.

Michael: So, you got in and did an Opportunity Analysis?

Peter: I did the opportunity for him, Michael, and he was kind of excited and I did the analysis. What I do is I do a whole binder for the person. I fill out the Opportunity Analysis and what’s the other one. There’s the Opportunity Analyses, then there’s the actual implementation where you tell them what you’re going to do.

Michael: The prospectus?

Peter: A prospectus. I fill that out and I type that all out specifically for them, putting their names in the different spots and everything. I had them that in a binder and I couldn’t land the guy.

Michael: What did you price it in?

Peter: I told him I would do the USP for $600 because I wanted to get my foot in the door because I knew that once I got going, I could take a percentage, especially with the Internet stuff because he hasn’t started any Internet stuff. I don’t know if I was too strong and scared him or if he just looked at it and said it looked like too much work.

Michael: It is a numbers game and you’re not going to get everyone.

Peter: I’m going to go back and ask him. I’m going to wait a little bit and go back and say why didn’t you do it.

Richard: That’s a good idea Peter.

Peter: That and also there’s a photographer and his wife. They do commercial photography and sat with them and they were excited about it and they admitted, yes we don’t have a USP, we’re going the wrong direction, things aren’t that great. Did a one-hour free consultation with them. Left them the same thing, material and everything. I sent him a follow-up and he was busy. You know how that goes. And then I saw at a social function three weeks later and he was like I really appreciate everything and we’re really going to get going with this, I’m really going to call you and I haven’t heard anything from him. I’m the kind of guy that if you don’t call me, I’m not calling you.

Michael: I put an interview of me doing an Opportunity Analysis with George, the owner of a tanning spa and I put it up there on my site at www.hardtofindseminars.com on page H. It’s one of the first ones. In the beginning, I stated this is the perfect type of client because it’s clear as I interviewed him, never meeting him, just all by phone, he was such a perfect client. He was so willing. He had studied the Abraham stuff. He had all the materials, but he couldn’t put it together and he wanted an expert to do it for him and that’s why he hired me right over the phone. And this is the type of client that makes doing consulting a pleasure because one someone say yes, you really have a business partner. That’s the way I look at it.

Peter: It goes back to low hanging fruit, too. I mean I could see this was going to be a more difficult one and there are a lot out there that they’re like low hanging fruit. You can just see it. They’re just not doing it right. You could make them more successful quicker and that’s kind of what I’m looking for. I really do appreciate everything you did and you put it together. I mean you put it so that it’s understandable and that people can take it and actually make money with it.

Richard: I appreciate that and that’s exactly all that happened is we just packaged it in a way that you could step by step make some money with this. [END]

Michael: Well, Bill, I’d mentioned to Richard that you’ve been a consultant for some time and you kind of got a little bit active and got de-active, but you had just shared with me that you got your first client, which you’re really excited about. And the reason I’m doing this call is the number one question most people ask me is how do I get my first client. I think it’s on everyone’s mind. I want to get that first client, get my investment back and I thought sharing some of the stories with some of the HMA consultants on how they did that and the feelings and the fears and all that, that went into that would be a help for anyone considering becoming a HMA consultant. And Richard agreed to get on the phone and interact with some of the consultants and so, why don’t you just say who you are, where you’re from, and kind of your story; how you got into the consulting and then lead up to your very first client that you were excited to tell me about and tell me how that evolved.

Bill: I’m Bill Milliken. I’m in Mansfield, Ohio. My career has been over 30 years in consulting with small business owners, but relative to their accounting and business systems like their computer system. And in all of that time, the only people I’ve talked to are people that own their own businesses and their employees. Our business -- in doing computers -- kind of came to the point where we were no long current with how things are done these days. We grew up with mainframes in the 60s and through the 70s to about 2000, we’re working with minicomputers and things that are no longer that big a deal. And what we’ve always done…there is a very difficult to find a market for now, but it occurred to me after we’ve been thinking about what to do instead. And I finally realized that my expertise, along with writing software, has been sitting down and talking with the owner of a small business and finding out what he needs and then filling the need. And so, after studying the HMA system, I finally realized this is right up my alley to do this. It’s just in a different segment of small business. So, last year when I did the HMA course in the winter of 2005, I had a couple of clients I talked to and they have been my clients…one of them a computer client for 30 years and the other for 20 years this year. And I spoke with them about doing an HMA approach with them because they’re businesses are not growing anymore. Both of them, though, kind of blew me out of the water because their response was I’m tired, I’d rather sell it than work on it, which is really disappointing to me because I know all about them, I know all of their like oozing hidden assets. I mean they have all of the assets just sitting there and they could be doing wonderful things, but they don’t want to. That was disappointing and I had sky-high hopes with that. And the one of the two, actually both of them, but the one that’s been a client 30 years even told me exactly what kind of a joint venture would make all the difference to her business, but she didn’t want to do it because she’s rather sell it and she’s tired. So, I was even excited about my very first client then. Even had a joint venture deal and I had the solution to the joint venture with yet another former computer client and I even talked to him and it was all set up. But then it fell through for those reasons. Then I’ve been fussing with doing Internet marketing since then and then a couple months ago, I thought, I really need to get back to this thing that I understand and get going with HMA again. So, I’ve been restudying, re-watched the DVD course. One day at lunch…there’s a little restaurant we go to and I was sitting there and we’ve been kind of friendly with the now owner of this little restaurant for a long time. He was the manager of a different restaurant and we got to know him there. We’re in his restaurant one day a month ago, I asked him what is he doing to ask people to come back to the restaurant and why do people keep coming here. And he said I don’t know, but he’s had the business now for six months. It’s a very old business. It’s been there 15-20 years. It’s a family business in a small town near here. Since he bought it, he and his wife, they haven’t done anything. The way he says it is, I haven’t done anything yet to make money. What he’s been doing is learning exactly what the business is before they start changing it or doing things to increase their profit. And just by being there, they’ve done a little promotion and increased their business by over 50% in the last five months, which is pretty good and they’re happy with that. But he wants to go yet another 10% over that this year, which will end up being close to 100% from where he started. But he was just starting to think about how do we do this and I happened to be there and I started asking questions about it and I suggested a couple of things like since you don’t know who your customers are, you can’t mail to them, you can’t promote them. You can only talk to them while they’re here, but you can’t send them something or whatever. The advertising they have and had success with are the little throw away marketing newspapers. There’s one here call ICBM, which a little 8-page advertising business card size ads of things. And he’s been doing that in three or four publications. But when he doesn’t do it, the people come in anyway and say well I can’t come as many times this month because where was your coupon. And it turns out, it’s a lot of people who are fixed retiree income and they wait for that coupon because it lets them go out to eat. So, we’ve been exploring things like what could we do instead of those coupons so that they know they’re getting maybe a better price because they keep coming in’ maybe a member card, frequent eater card or something. So, then we started talking and I said I’m doing this for a living, helping small businesses increase their sales and profits without spending more money advertising and I think maybe I can help you grow your business. And I’m coming in there…speaking of the fears and stuff…in the case of Earl, I was comfortable talking with him. We had talked already, so he wasn’t a cold call. It was actually several years worth of chatting on and off over time. And, of course, he loved it. And then using your example, Richard, on the DVD training talked about maybe on your first marketing consulting gig, you do a couple of them for no charge because that way you have somebody’s name on a reference. In my entire career since 1973, I believe every client I’ve ever had, including the first one, was word of mouth. It was a referral from someone else, so I’ve never had to do cold calling. And my closing ratio always has been somewhere around 80-85% because when I walked in the door, I’m already a friend. They know they want me. So, I did this with Earl. I said I’m going to do the first two steps of the system, I’m going to do them without charging you. It’s okay if you comp me some meals, but I’m not going to charge you a fee. He thought he could probably comp me for meals. We’re in the process of the USP. At this point, I’ve gotten everything he thinks and I’ve talked and met with his wife Amy and I’ve talked to half of his employee and two customers to find out what they all think. So, I’m at that point now and Wednesday or Thursday of this week is our next appointment when I’ll go back and sit down with him and go over what people have told me. I don’t see a way -- the way their hours and things are broken up -- to do something like a focus group to do brainstorming. But there’s no un-clarity. I mean I’ve talked to one person at a time and they’re all open and friendly and they’re happy. They’re madly in love with their owner and maybe because they make it fun to work there and the old owner wasn’t fun. So, I’m getting a lot of the same kind of feedback from everybody about why it’s a great place to eat and, of course, from the employees also it’s a great place to work. So, that’s where I’m at.

Michael: That’s great, Bill. I appreciate it.

Michael: Tell me your name, where you’re from, and how you got intertwined with this HMA consulting thing and we’ll just roll into the story of how you ended up getting your first client? MATT

Matthew: I’m Matt . I’m in Chicago, Illinois. Probably the last, I would say seven or eight years, even longer, I’ve been intrigued by marketing. It just so happened I was working at an accounting firm when I first came out of school and this guy handed me this tape program. It happened to be Jay Abraham’s, Your Secret Wealth. I listened to that and I was kind of intrigued by it, although all my work experience from that point and even on through the last couple of years was all accounting. But I was intrigued by Jay’s ideas about the three ways to grow a business and all that stuff. So, back in my mind, I wanted to help businesses more than just recording their accounting transactions. So, I started to study a lot of the marketing greats. I studied Joe Vitale and Dan Kennedy’s stuff, his Magnetic Marketing, and got some Jay Abraham stuff and even some Chet Holmes, reading all of this stuff and trying to figure out I could deliver it because a friend that would have a business, I would help them with some tidbit of information I had from one of these guys that I read and studied. They were kind of like, wow, how did you know that. But I really never had a systematic way to help people. So, I was shooting from the hip or recommending this strategy, but nothing really formal. So, in a subconscious way, I was trying to think of how can I get something where I can deliver this in a way that’s systematic or I can know how to charge? So, initially being in tune with the marketing stuff, I came across your information. It may have been something you were selling on Ebay, so I may have been on your list or something because I’ve been getting emails from you for a while. And I must have been on your email list because I remember first reading maybe a couple of years ago about how you got the Jay Abraham cassettes. And then really interested in trying to figure out a way to do marketing consulting because I had all this content of people who were experts in different areas, but I had no way to put it all together and to go prospective client or business to help them because I really wanted to help these small businesses. I always wanted to do small, medium size businesses. So, anyway, at some point, I must have gotten something from you, an email, and I probably read over it a couple of times and then I called you and that was that. So, I ordered it from you. Studied the materials. My first client, it was a company that I patronize. It’s this all-natural eco- manufacturer guy.

Michael: Were they local?

Matthew: Yes, they’re local. I had a business relationship with them via me purchasing products from them. And even back when I was purchasing, I was talking to the guy about marketing. I didn’t have a system two or three years ago, but when I first met him, I was talking to him about marketing more effectively. So, he remembered me from buying stuff, but also just tossing some marketing ideas out to him when I first met him. So, anyway, I just called him up because I’m really interested in the eco-natural stuff. I called him up and set up an appointment using the information that you got. And I’ll say one thing, the system actually gave me not only a formal way to present it, but I think it gave me more confidence in how I would actually approach a company.

Michael: Why is that?

Matthew: Because it was systematized and I didn’t have to figure out…like I was doing _____. I was thinking okay I know USP. I always knew USP was the first thing from the Dan Kennedy stuff. Message, market, and media; that’s what his approach to everything was. So, I always knew the USP, but I felt like something was missing and I didn’t have enough to go to a client. I didn’t know what to charge. So, once I got the HMA System, I had a complete turnkey way to deliver some of the things that I already knew. It gave me a lot of confidence in the knowledge that I already had because it was put altogether for me to go to a customer and they could understand it better this way.

Michael: Have you looked at any other systems or were you shopping other consulting opportunities?

Matthew: I got all the Jay Abraham PEQ stuff. I didn’t buy the program, but I almost bought it. I got Chet Holmes’ program, so I already knew about that. But I hadn’t come upon anything. I actually was getting a lot of stuff in the mail by the Y2K Company all the time. I never responded to it, but I used to get stuff in the mail all the time.

Michael: Do you know how much that program was?

Matthew: No, I never knew how much it cost.

Michael: $35,000 plus you pay a percentage of everything you make.

Matthew: Oh really. Wow. The way they market it, it was kind of an obnoxious way. I used to get these things. They would use cool headlines, which I thought they adapted from some of the old great John Capel stuff on all their postcards. I could see that’s what they were doing. They were saying if you’re not making at least $100,000 right now, then we don’t need to talk to you or something like that. Marketing it like you’ve got to be a super-duper serious person to even talk to us. It was pretty easy with this guy because I had this relationship with him. And I would say one thing; that may be a great route to go. I know you guys talk about getting an endorsement or getting a list from may be some people you already do business with. But some of the people that you actually do business with daily are great prospects. You’ve got a local grocery store. You’ve got a cleaner. You’ve got some places or something you’re already patronizing. Most of those Mom and Pop shops are really looking for somebody to help them their marketing, in which this case this guy was. They’re doing like a million and a half and he’s wearing all the hats trying to be a marketer, a payroll guy, operations. I sat down with him. I did the Opportunity Analysis, word-for-word right off the sheet, and he accepted it and that was my first client. I charged $1,500 for the first project and he paid for it and no problem.

Michael: Very good. Did you get a second project with him?

Matthew: I did get a second project and that was $1,500. And actually we never completed it because the guy’s kind of a scattered type guy, so I did the sales training. I was trying to get the stuff integrated to all his marketing efforts and I just never got back over there. He paid me for it. I didn’t even get to the last step. I was trying to get to do some packages for him.

Michael: That’s going to happen. Some are going to flake out and not go all the way through. What advice would you give anyone considering getting into the consulting business as far as how to get their first client? What would be your worldly advice based just on your experience?

Matthew: Based on my experience, I would read all the information and get familiar with the system itself once they receive it and then I personally would go to businesses that I’m already familiar with. And even almost as practice to get comfortable with it. I would just go get one of those really quick as a client. That is what I would suggest. That gives you a more comfort level. There’s a relationship there already. And then once you get that first client, then you feel more comfortable doing the cold calls and more comfortable with even the endorsed call like a friend of yours knows this business owner, he referred me to you. But I would go directly. That was the easiest for me. I think everyone has a rapport like that with some business. Do you know what I mean? I think that’s the easiest step to go grab one really quickly, boosts your confidence enough where you can get the script down. Even if you screw up, they know you already. I forgot to tell you about this one, Mike. I go on Craig’s List and I type in marketing. And so, there’s this bed and breakfast in Ottawa, Illinois. So, this guy is looking for somebody to help him market, but he really doesn’t have any money because this is already a year old. So, I did an Opportunity Analysis with him over the phone. So, this is going to be a straight barter deal, but I have a $1,500 credit at this bed and breakfast.

Michael: There’s nothing wrong with that. Craig’s List has a whole barter trade section.

Matthew: So, this guy was astonished with some of the things I was saying. I sent him the outline with the four projects.

Michael: There’s nothing wrong with that. You could have him provide you script. Do you know what script is?

Matthew: No.

Michael: When you do barter, what you do is you set your deals up like this. You say look, I’ll take you through the Opportunity Analysis. We’re going to trade for $1,500 worth of services from your bed and breakfast. I want these services in the form of $100 little notes. So, have him make little gift certificates worth $100. You want to make sure it’s transferable…that you could pass it on to someone or sell it to someone. You don’t want any expiration date on it and it’s redeemable just like it is for cash; $100 worth of products or services from their bed and breakfast. Outline the terms of what you want on that. And then you have a currency that you could go and trade someone else. You’ve got something worth $100 at a bed and breakfast that you could trade and negotiate with. You can do this with all your vendors. You do trades for them.

Matthew: I didn’t know that.

Michael: You could make a lot of money just by saving money. I bartered all my server time with my website host provider. That server is $300 a month. I’ve got the next 18 months all paid for through consulting. I do a lot of trade and it’s a great way to keep that money in your pocket.

Matthew: Yes, that’s a cool thing. The place where it’s located is a place where my parents used to take me as a kid.

Michael: You and your wife and your kid can go and have a vacation.

Matthew: Right. Or I was just thinking about maybe using it with another client. After I talk to you, I’m doing an Opportunity Analysis with this guy who has a small bookstore in the neighborhood.

Michael: Good job. Tell me how you got that Opportunity Analysis appointment?’

Matthew: I just walked in. It’s a Black bookstore, so it’s got a lot of Black books in there about African art and I was looking around for some books for my kids. The owner of the store was at the front desk, so I started talking him and I said are you interested in growing the business. He said of course. I said well the reason I asked that is because some business owners that I ask that question to say no. They’re at capacity or they can’t fill…he’s like I can’t believe any business owner would say that. He said who could ever be at capacity. I said you’d be surprised how many blow me off. The conversation kind of followed from there. Established rapport with him really fast and I set up something with him and I confirmed it.

Michael: That’s great. So, it’s really as simple as talking to people?

Matthew: Yes. I find it’s easy because I bought a list from Info USA and it’s cold call stuff. It’s like you said. It’s much harder.

Michael: Oh yes. Besides your two clients that we’ve talked about in previous recordings, the real estate guy with his course and your bean products guy, have you obtained any other clients?

Matthew: I have one client that’s an iridologist.

Michael: Yes, I think you told me a little bit about that.

Matthew: What I did with her is, I actually did the Opportunity Analysis and she’s not really making much money at all. So, essentially I was kind of funding her whole thing for my initial proposal because I’m just popping $1,500 for a project, but when I did that, they were going to do it, but they were trying to get the money together or whatever. So, I said, well if you’ll give me a list of some business owners that you’ll endorse me over to, I’ll do it for $500 a project. I did the first project for $500.

Michael: You did a USP for her?

Matthew: Yes and they really liked the USP. She was totally astonished.

Michael: What was it? I’m just curious.

Matthew: Well, the USP…it kind of was parallel to what the USP for the Marketing Associates. I said well here’s what your USP is. We show people, using a multi-dimensional approach and without the use of harmful and toxic drugs how to improve their health in 14 days or less guaranteed.

Michael: That’s great.

Matthew: Because with her, I did some research when I was doing the USP and with this all natural stuff, it’s kind of becoming clichéish within that little industry to say optimal health. Oh, Mike, we’ll promise you optimal health or holistic or whatever. Well, 20 years ago that might have sounded like a unique thing, but it’s almost a cliché. I know its cliché. And nobody else is going to guarantee for anything. They’ve got a whole write up about it. I can send it to you if you want it.

Michael: Yes, I’d love to see it.

Michael: Tell me who you are and how long you’ve been an HMA consultant and where you’re located.

Jez: I’m Jez Hunt, located in Oxford in the U.K. I’ve been an HMA consultant now…I bought the course eight months ago, but I’ve only really just started pushing that side of things because of my existing job.

Michael: What do you do right now? You’re a graphic artist?

Jez: Yes. Graphic artist/graphic designer…creating brochures and some marketing materials for communications.

Michael: How long have you been doing that?

Jez: This is my eighth year now, running my own business doing that.

Michael: So, you’re self-employed. You’ve been doing this for eight years as an individual business owner.

Jez: That’s right.

Michael: Do you like working from home?

Jez: Oh, definitely. I think I’d find it very hard to go back and work for somebody else now.

Michael: What was your previous job before you started your graphics business?

Jez: I was working actually for an industrial electronics company. I’ve worked for a number of companies, but it was doing a mixture for the technical manual design work and in-house marketing, so sort of a combination of all those sorts of things; sort of technical background with applying marketing and then design techniques to that.

Michael: Do you remember how you first learned about the HMA opportunity?

Jez: Yes. A friend of mine who I got to know through local networking, we were talking about how I could develop my business and how I could take things up a pace and then do something perhaps a little bit different, which was still within the realm of what I’m aware of and what I’m able to do and to take that a step forward. And he suggested that I get in touch with you and have a look at the HMA course. I’m not sure how he found it. He avidly searches the web for marketing materials and things like that that might be of benefit to his business. He has a similar thing to the HMA, but it’s basically a system he set up himself over the years, business growth and business marketing.

Michael: And you had mentioned recently that you now have your first client.

Jez: That’s right.

Michael: Can you tell me how that happened?

Jez: Yes. Because running my own business I haven’t focused particularly on the HMA side of it and the marketing side of it, I’ve been using this time to read up on the manuals and listen to the audio and watch the DVD, etc. And I was talking to a guy that I met again from one of the focus network groups that I go to, he’s an accountant, about the fact that I was now going to be developing and then start doing marketing and business growth stuff. And he said hey there’s a client of mine that’s looking to market his business and then pushed forward with it. So, he introduced us and got us talking. So, I went through and sort of followed the initial process and landed him as a client. It’s actually a garage…I think it’s an auto repair center that is actually my client. The auto repair center was my accountant’s client.

Michael: I see. So, your client was the auto garage repair service.

Jez: That’s right, yes. Roger, my accountant, my accountant gave the client’s name and telephone number and said he was expecting a phone call from me.

Michael: Was your accountant the guy at the networking meeting?

Jez: Yes.

Michael: So, your accountant was at the networking meeting and he introduced you to his auto mechanic.

Jez: That’s right, yes.

Michael: So, that me through the process. So, you had a lead. When you got home you phone the auto mechanic?

Jez: Yes, that’s right. I gave him a call and explained who I was and that Roger, the accountant, had asked me to give him a call. And he was immediately very receptive and oh yes I’m expecting your call and when can you come and see me. So, I didn’t even have to do any selling over the phone at all. There was nothing like that.

Michael: You were already positioned as an expert through the accountant.

Jez: Absolutely. The phone call was about three minutes, just long enough to set an appointment for the following week.

Michael: Did you do anything to prepare for that appointment? Take me through the appointment process when you met with him.

Jez: Yes, I did. I always do a lot of forward planning in my own mind anyway, outcome based thinking, that sort of thing. So, I worked out what I expected or what I wanted to have out of the meeting and what I hoped he wanted out of the meeting, as well. And then, obviously, I just refreshed myself on the Opportunity Analysis process and fact sheet and then basically I went in to see and really just took him through the Opportunity Analysis program.

Michael: Where were you guys sitting, like in an office area?

Jez: Yes. I went to his office area at that stage.

Michael: Were there any interruptions during that?

Jez: No, actually there weren’t. I was a bit wary of that particularly being in an auto repair center. I’m sure if you’ve ever had your car repaired, you know the type places they are, busy, lots of people moving around, lots happening, and all happening quickly. It actually worked, in this instance, quite well, but subsequently with potential clients, I’d like to try to make sure there are no interruptions. But on this particular occasion, I didn’t find that to be a problem.

Michael: So, you had your Opportunity Analysis in front of you. Was it easy to follow along?

Jez: Yes, absolutely. I have actually added some of my own questions in, as well since then. But I find it very easy to take the clients through and surprisingly it doesn’t seem to matter to the client that you’re actually reading from something or you’re referring back to. I mean I wasn’t reading from it, but I was referring to it there. I think in some ways it came across to my client that I was actually more professional because I had a system there. I wasn’t relying on just my memory. Since we spoke last, Michael, I have taken on another client, so I now have two HMA clients.

Michael: Very good. If we have some time, we can talk about that one, too.

Jez: But I actually found that just taking people through the Opportunity Analysis just step-by-step, asking the question and that, they actually felt quite comfortable with me working from a sheet.

Michael: Very good. Well, that’s no different than a good attorney, who always references his notes and his cross-examining and stuff like that.

Jez: That’s right.

Michael: So, as you took him through this Opportunity Analysis, were you finding gold in his business? Were you finding hidden assets as you took him through this questionnaire process?

Jez: Yes. It became very clear quite early on that they certainly hadn’t marketed to past customers. They haven’t tried to revisit past customers and get them to come back. In fact, they hadn’t at that stage even got the database on the computer in a way that we can actually use to market. I think there are about 3,000 past and current clients of whom I would guess probably about 600 were within the last year or so. So, that’s 2,500 people that they’ve done work for in the past that they’ve never revisited. So, yes, I mean that was pretty amazing to find.

Michael: So, after the Opportunity Analysis, did you try and close him and ask for money on that or did you say you wanted to come with a proposal? How did you position yourself there?

Jez: Well, what I did was I kept doing test closes while we were going through. I think if you remember some of the recordings that Richard had done where he’s saying all the way through saying do you see how that can add value, can you see how that can be hidden money in your business; those sorts of phrases. And all the time he was giving me back buying signals saying oh yeah, yeah and quite excited and animated about it. So, in this particular instance, I actually tried to close him there and then at the end of the analysis. So, then I kind of recap and explain all these different areas that we can work on and the first thing to do is come up with a USP for him and take it from there.

Michael: And what was your offer to him?

Jez: Well, to start off with, and again this partly due to his circumstances, which the accountant had warned me of before, but I had started with 500₤ a month, which is about $700 in American…

Michael: So, you asked for a retainer, a monthly fee.

Jez: Yes, that’s right, yes.

Michael: And you promised him that you would work on his business, taking him through the steps of the system.

Jez: That’s, right, yes.

Michael: That’s very good. That’s another way of packaging your services. You have a lot of variety and ways that you can make offers. You could ask for a retainer or you could sell it a project at a time or you could package projects two or three at a time. So, it does give you some choices of ways to package your services.

Jez: Yes, that’s right. I think, from my point of view, I’m looking for ways of balancing out the dips in seasonal work, which in graphic design it’s difficult to put people on retainer. It typically tends to be project- by-project basis. So, by doing this, I’m looking at the retainer scenario. It seems to work well from my point of view because it’s regular cash flow. And the beauty is, as well, I can control the speed of how quickly I do a project anyway because I’ve only got them on 500₤ a month, so I don’t have to do it four weeks. I can, but I don’t have to. It seems to be working and from my client’s point of view, they seem to be happy because it’s not a lump sump they’ve got to come up with straight away and I’ve not had any problems with payment. They’re set up on standing order so it’s regular, straight from their bank to my bank automatically and no problem.

Michael: That’s very good. Tell me about your second client. How did that come about?

Jez: The second client was basically a printer doing printing, brochures and that kind of stuff.

Michael: How was the contact made?

Jez: Well, this was actually Nick Divine again, the guy who put me in touch with you because it was a client that had approached him through some of the marketing he had done. And, unfortunately, _____ circumstances, they were too small a business for him to deal with, with the workload he had at the moment. So, he asked me if I’d like to step up to the challenge and he referred me in.

Michael: So, he referred you and then you called?

Jez: That’s right. He referred me in and again it was the same scenario, really. I rang, they were expecting my call, they immediately wanted to see me as soon as possible, so we arranged an appointment. I went in to see them, sat down and went through the Opportunity Analysis. This time I told them the monthly retainer was 650 a month and I told them that and then they said right, no problem, we’ll go and think about it and get back to you. So, I left the meeting and came away. The following morning I had a phone call saying we want to go ahead.

Michael: That’s great. If you have another potential client, as you have two clients you’re working on and your confidence has gone up a little bit, do you see yourself charging the same or asking for a little more money?

Jez: I set out in my own mind to aim to have three clients around about the 500 to 600₤ mark. And that’s really, again, from my point of view, experience, confidence. And it’s really to get things started. But, no the intension is then that my next client, number four, five, and six, will be maybe 750, eight, nine and ten will be up to 1,000 a month; that sort of level. It depends really what I feel and also the size of the business I’m going into and circumstances like Richard was saying about charging different amounts for the modules. I think you do have to take a bit of a _____ and see when you get there. I mean your gut feel about the business and how it’s doing genuinely. I mean people always want to spend less than they have to, but I think you can get a realistic feel for something by going through the Opportunity Analysis and talking to guys and going on your instincts, as well, to a degree.

Michael: What were some of the hidden assets you found in the printer’s business?

Jez: I’d say the biggest thing is the cross selling and up selling in their case. It became very clear that they hadn’t ever promoted all of their products to all of their clients. And so, for example, if a client was in touch with them and getting them to print stationary, so letterhead, business cards…that kind of thing…they hadn’t then been saying we also do brochures and we also do promotional stuff and we also do this and we also do that. So, none of that was going on at all. And what we’ve just done, literally just done talking about it this week…yesterday, in fact…is set up a matrix of products against clients where we can very quickly track whose been told of what products…told of the printing things that they do and at what level they are, i.e., whether they’ve bought, whether they’re not interested, or whether they haven’t been told…that sort of thing. And what it does is it’s just systemizing that process of telling the clients of what they do. So, they’re looking at doing some mail shots, direct mail pieces is what they particularly want to get involved in to past customers particularly at this stage. They’re also talking about buying lists and also in the longer term. I’ve only had them as a client for three weeks now.

Michael: So, it sounds like both of your clients were very eager to work with you and eager to grow their business. Have you had any challenges in them working with you? Do you feel like you are partners in the business on the same side of the table?

Jez: In both cases, yes. There’s been no resistance to what I said at all. They understand where I’m coming from. They understand the fact that I’m using non-traditional marketing methods in some cases and they understand where I’m coming from with that and I’ve not had any resistance with that. A few people I have done the Opportunity Analysis with that haven’t become clients, I’ve had a few interesting conversations with, but I think there are some people out there that really just don’t get it. They just don’t understand that you’re not doing it traditionally and sticking an ad in the local newspaper every month. If you’re not doing that, you can’t be doing marketing properly and some people just don’t get it, I think.

Michael: How many Opportunity Analysis have you done total?

Jez: Seven now.

Michael: So, out of seven, you’ve got two clients.

Jez: That’s right.

Michael: That’s not too bad.

Jez: No, it’s not too bad and I’m not actually disappointed with it because what I have done is honed the way I do the Opportunity Analysis and also the way I then ask for the close or don’t ask for the close at the end of the meeting. And again, it’s that feel, I think. But I found it a very interesting experience and the point is, as Richard said, again, in the training stuff that we get, the more you do it, the better you get at it. So, I’ve had five Opportunity Analysis meetings that haven’t come to anything, but I’m five steps closer to perfecting my Opportunity Analysis meeting and closing the next one.

Michael: In the five that didn’t go through, why do you think those didn’t result in clients…if you could give your opinion on that? Do you think it had to do with were they qualified or were they more for practice?

Jez: If I’m honest, I think probably the first couple I went in with the mental view that they were for practice and maybe that came across. Not that I was practicing with them, but the fact that I wasn’t hungry for the business. I might be wrong. But maybe something came across that I thought this doesn’t seem right. Then the next one I think he was just looking for free advice. He wasn’t looking for me to actually help him grow his business. He was hoping I would tell him all the things he could do for his business that would make a difference and then he’d say thanks very much and then go.

Michael: How were these set up? Did you do a promotion or something to get leads?

Jez: No, again, just word of mouth and me talking to people saying what I’m doing and people saying I know someone that’s got a business and they keep talking about looking to expand it and looking into marketing and it might be worth talking to them. So, again, that kind of thing. All of them have been introductions. But, I think the two that became clients were different. When I picked up the phone and rang them, they immediately knew who I was and they immediately just wanted me to go and see them. The selling had been done for me. Whereas the other five, I was ringing up and I’m just _____ and your friend _____ has asked me to contact you and it’s _____, yes, okay. You take them through the basics of what it’s all about and they’ve got interest about it and yes come and see me. But I think it wasn’t quite set up the same. Then the last one seemed fired up until I went through and started going through ideas of things that we could start doing and then looking these databases and we’re going to do this and we can go back to ask clients and then I think he just started getting a bit twitchy. This is a catering company and I think he just thought we’ve never done this sort of thing before. I think he was just maybe a bit uncomfortable with it.

Michael: Yes, that’s possible.

Jez: Because it’s not what he’s done in the past, that sort of thing.

Michael: Very good. So, what advice would you give to anyone considering becoming a marketing consultant? Any words of advice that you could give any who is thinking about getting into the business, a realistic expectation of what it’s going to take for them to get some clients?

Jez: The realistic expectation is the first thing I would recommend is that they listen to the audio or they watch the DVDs to get a real feel for what it’s all about. I have more time for audio while I’m walking the dogs or whatever and I listen to my MP3 player. But just to absorb yourself in what Richard’s saying and what the course and the program and the HMA System is all about. Be familiar with that. Look through your Opportunity Analysis and I absolutely recommend you go and find a friend or your wife, your husband, your colleague, your whatever and treat them like a client and explain what you’re doing and just sort of take them through the system just a couple of times to get yourself a little bit more familiar with it. Not because you can’t follow it because, obviously, you take it into the meeting and follow it, but it does help if you know what’s coming next rather than going in completely cold. And then the other thing I would say is not to get too disheartened if something doesn’t happen. So, if you go and do an Opportunity Analysis meeting and it doesn’t result in a client signing up immediately, that’s not a bad thing because every one that you do is you learning, it’s you progressing. And not every client that asks you to do an Opportunity Analysis is going to actually necessarily be a right client anyway. And I think that is one of the main things I would say at this stage.

Michael: All right, Jez. I really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience with the HMA consultants and anyone considering becoming an HMA consultant. It’s been valuable.

Jez: You’re welcome and I hope it helps people out because it’s fun. The other thing is have fun with it. [End]

Michael: Here’s another recording. Now, this gentleman is not an HMA consultant, at least not one yet. He’s a 16-year-old Jewish kid, out of New York, who contacted me a couple of months ago wanting to get into the marketing consulting business and he talks about how he’s gotten his first two clients. Now, he hasn’t ordered the HMA System, but he’s been using the audio recordings and the Opportunity Analysis and the training from my site, www.hardtofindseminars.com. It won’t be too much longer before he gets the HMA System and I’m real proud to introduce to you Simon, a 16- year-old kid out of New York, who has already got two clients just by talking to people. Enjoy this short story. Tell me your name.

Simon: My name is Simon Rosenthal.

Michael: Where do you live?

Simon: I live in Lakewood.

Michael: And your goal here is to try and get some clients before you even purchase the HMA System, correct?

Simon: Before I purchase HMA and I already have one right now and I’m just starting my second one.

Michael: How old are you?

Simon: I’m 16.

Michael: You’re 16 years old. Tell me about how you got your first client, Simon.

Simon: The way I got my first client was in the Synagogue every week I used to go over to all the businessmen just to tell them I’m studying marketing and this guy said come on, let me see what you can do for me. So, he offered me a job and once I went through your CD and realized that if I know this stuff, I should have the same confidence as anybody three times my age. So, I went over to him and proposed to him where he would pay me $500 a week and I would get him more customers. We’d work on his advertising, on doing joint ventures. So, I started working for him and tried changing his ads and he wasn’t very open to that. So, I decided let me do something that will make him money without him having to do a thing.

Michael: What kind of business was he?

Simon: He does fencing. He has a fence company. He puts in residential, commercial, and I went to pool owners and landscaping owners and I proposed to them that my company will give them a small discount to their customers, plus we’ll give them a commission, like a percentage of the whole purchase by a customer, if they start referring us. So far I gave him 13 names and I brought him $15,000 worth of sales in seven to eight weeks. Number two, he has another…at least $75,000 in sales waiting, but it takes two months because pool people give the name to the customer in the beginning when they do the estimate, but it takes two months until the customer gets the pool. So, they’re not going to put a down payment on a fence two months before they get the pool.

Michael: How did you contact these businesses and what was your offer to them? Did you go see them personally or did you do this by phone?

Simon: Everything was over the phone. I pretty much perfected it over a couple of times. I do have a pretty good closing ratio, like one out of five, I could close them even on the phone and then some of them I would call, leave a message, they’d call me back, propose to them, and they would want it without referring us right there. Then I would have my boss call them with the percentage and send the business cards and he also did not meet with most of them. Two of them he met and the two that he met are those that are giving him a lot more business. So, I just propose to them on the phone and told them that I’m willing to give your customers a discount and that could be a benefit for you for working with you that you have a discount on a fence. And number two, the pool people…the only way for them to put in a pool is if they have a permit, then you have a fence around it. So, my client was willing to give their customers the very date that they want for him to put in the fence.

Michael: So, you felt like it was important to get your client initial results that he could see that the efforts you were producing for him was bringing green money in his pocket?

Simon: Right. First of all, I wanted to get him money in his pocket. Then this past week when he paid me, I told him let’s start working on your advertising and he was more open to it because he realized that I was good enough to bring him money in his pocket through joint ventures without him having to do a thing. Also, I explained to him that if you’re really careful about where your money is going to on me, then you should be careful where your ad money is going. If you could throw away your money on just putting out an ad just so people could see your name, it makes much more of an impression on someone if they see your sign on the fence. This is much more effective advertising. So, you should work on having more direct advertising. He has an ad that just says use our company…not exactly use our company, but it was just his name and the names of the different types of fences. It wasn’t direct. So, if he focuses more on direct advertising and then gets more customers and puts his name on the fence, that’s putting his money to a much better use.

Michael: That’s wonderful.

Simon: He’s very open to it right now. In the beginning, he wasn’t really that open to it. But once I brought him money into his bank account, he’s really open to changing his advertising.

Michael: That’s great. Now, tell me about your second client.

Simon: I am very into reading all different books on leadership, on marketing, on management, on sales; a lot of different business books. I read a lot of success stories, too. So, I was in the library taking out like a stack of ten books and I didn’t notice at the time…my client told me after…that he was watching me take out these books. And I started walking home. And this car stops and offered me a ride home. So, I get inside and he asked me…I see you’re into CEOs or leadership. I said yes, I’m into reading this. I’m into marketing. I explained to him that I work for some guy. I really helped him a lot and then I was explaining to him the different pointers about marketing, like three ways to grow your business, but nothing really that big.

Michael: Was he in the library?

Simon: Yes, he was in the library. I didn’t notice at the time. I thought he was just passing by and he didn’t know who I was and he offered me a ride. Once he hired me, he told me that he saw me there and he is into that type of stuff, so he thought maybe he’d give me a ride and see what’s going on. Maybe ask me a couple of questions. So, after that he explained to me what he does. What he does is he has foreclosures. Let’s say a guy owes $150,000 to the bank and their house is worth $250,000. Now, the banker is telling this guy that they’re going to take his house and foreclose. So, this guy goes and the guy that owes the money tries finding someone to give him a mortgage and if his credit rating is not good, he’s not going to get a mortgage. My client has some sort of bank account with investment money. He pays back this guy’s debt.

Michael: So, what did you negotiate with him? Did you ask for money up front?

Simon: No money up front. He wants to pay me $1,000 per client that I get him for these foreclosures and this is negotiable. That means I can make it higher in the future. Number two…he’s going to pay me for other projects that I take on. The people that produce results are ten times more paid and more respected than people that just give ideas.

Michael: Will he put that all in writing for you?

Simon: Yes, we have a contract. Another thing that I’m happy about is I have a teacher that is a lawyer, but does not practice it as a profession. He has another business, but he happens to be a lawyer so I send him my contracts and he looks it over and he would tell me what I should fix and what I shouldn’t.

Michael: Let me ask you this. You’re 16, what would you tell anyone considering getting into the marketing consulting business? What do you think the key is to getting clients?

Simon: You’ve got to be very good speaking to people. And here’s the thing, when you are driven to be successful in these things, you get pulled into a lot of opportunities. Like before this, I was so close minded in business in general that even if I would have gotten into it, I would not have gotten opportunities knocking on my door. When you’re driven to succeed and when you feel your insides turning with excitement, then you’re going to be getting clients knocking on your door. You have to go out, though, and find those people. So, whenever you speak to someone, just tell them that you’re doing marketing. You have to put it into the conversation…not that you’re trying to sell them something…that you have the opportunity. When you go over to speak to someone, don’t try selling them on the fact that you’re doing marketing. Tell them that you’re doing marketing. If he’s in business, give him a tip maybe. Try to give him a little idea about referrals. It doesn’t have to be an idea that will make him so much money because maybe he would be an opportunity to make money for you. But it could be like three ways to grow your business. And another thing is I realize that when you give people ideas, they’re not all going to take it and go create money for themselves. People want someone to do things for them. It’s very nice to give them ideas, but they’re not going to do it. They want a marketing consultant that is going to do what they don’t want to do and they’re willing to pay for it. You’re more valuable if you could do instead of just give ideas. So, my advice is, if you could be someone that does the work, it’s worth it for me to be paying a girl $8 an hour to be doing the calls if I can be paid five times the amount. It’s worth it…ten times worth it.