Business | “I Just Wanted to Give a Big Thank You to Clay And Everyone At the Office. It’s Been Really Exciting to Help Get the Processes In Place!” – Kelly Herneson Joins to Celebrate the 37% Growth of His Business with Clay Clark Coaching

Audio Transcription

Hey guys, this is Kelly Harnesson with American Document Shredding. Just wanted to give a big thank you to Marshall and Clay there at the Drive 15 office. Man, just being able to look at a spreadsheet and say, oh yeah, we made $800 off of $50 invested in Google. Where before I would run advertising on the radio and not even be able to tell you how much I made off of it. It’s been really exciting to help me get the processes in place to know where to spend money and also know how much I’ve got left at the end of the month. Being a small business owner, I’ve always just been a great operator and they’re helping me become a business owner and it’s pretty exciting to feel in control of where everything’s going instead of always running every direction all day long and feeling unaccomplished at the end of the day. Now whenever I leave the office at the end of the day I’ve made sure I’ve entered everything into the spreadsheets and the feeling of accomplishment has been fantastic. So again, thank you, Marshall, and everybody there at Thrive 15 office. Have a great day. Well, Thrive Nation, sometimes we find ourselves at a place in space where we have a job that we don’t necessarily like. Or maybe we, if I have a career, we think to ourselves, well, if I keep doing this for 10 more years, where will I be? Sometimes we find ourselves at kind of a proverbial fork in the road where we say, is now a good time for me to start a business? And really, there’s three kinds of entrepreneurial endeavors you can take if you want to become self-employed. One, you can start your own business from scratch, which requires you to invent all the systems, all the processes, and start literally from scratch. The second option you can do is you could buy a franchise. And a franchise is a proven business model that’s been proven to work, and you’re paying for the privilege of using a proven system. And the third option that exists that’s pretty common is to license something. So maybe you pay for the ability to take a product and license it so that you can pay a license fee so that you can sell that product or service with the permission of the company. And on today’s show, we’re joined by a tip-top canine franchise owner by the name of Josh Johnson. He’s done very well as a tip-top canine franchise owner and he’s here to share his story. Josh Johnson, welcome to The Thrive Time Show. How are you, sir? I’m doing great. How are you doing, Clay? Brother, I’m excited to have you. Now, how did you originally hear about the tip-top canine franchise opportunity? Sure, yeah. So I live out here in Utah, as you know, but my brother lives out kind of by you. He’d been working with you for a while and he mentioned to me that there’s a company called Tip Top K9. They work with dogs and they’re looking for more people to franchise out. That’s kind of how I heard about the opportunity. Full disclosure on this, I’ve had the opportunity to work with your brother and his incredible wife, Jared and Jennifer, for years with their company called Platinum Pest, and we’ve helped them grow dramatically, and he’s just a wonderful guy to work with. If you’re in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and you’re looking for a pest control service you can trust, that’s Jared and Jennifer Johnson with Platinum Pest. And so you heard about the opportunity through your brother, and do you remember what your next step was? What was the next step you took? Sure, yeah. So my next step was scheduling a call with you and meeting you for the first time, which is awesome. It was very informative. And if I can, would you like me to tell you kind of what I was doing before TipTalk K9? Yeah, go for it. Perfect. That might help shed a little more light on the context. So before TipTalk K9, I went to college, went to BYU, got a degree in public relations, really awesome degree. At the time, it was like, they had like one of the top five PR programs in the nation. And I got a job working for an energy consulting firm, and it was okay job. The people were great, I loved working with my coworkers, but it was pretty boring work. So what I was doing, I was working with major utilities in the area, so power companies, gas companies, just super boring clients, right? And so I was actually saving up and I was studying to take the GMAT, because I was, and figured if I’m gonna sit at a desk the rest of my life, I might as well get paid more, right? So I was gonna go back and get my MBA, but it was, in fact, while I had my GMAT scheduled, that’s when my brother told me about Tip Top K9. And the more I thought about it, the more it sounded like, you know, work with dogs the rest of my life is a lot better than going back to school just to sit at another desk. Now, do you remember, I know it’s been years now at this point, but do you remember what our first interaction was like, you and I, or the first kind of things we went over? Do you remember that at all? Sure, yeah. You talked with me, you talked to me about like goals that I had in life, things that I want to be able to do with life, where I felt I was at currently with my current job, and you gave me some kind of some ideas about the opportunities that come with purchasing a Tip Top K9 franchise. And that was mostly kind of our discussions about. Now the thing I love about Tip Top K9 is if you buy a Tip Top K9 you’re following a proven system. I’m going to show that system in just a moment. You’re following a proven system. Did that factor into your decision to want to buy a Tip Top K9 knowing that it was like a workflow that you could actually see? Because I’m going to show the workflow to people in just a minute, but for me it helps to see it and go, okay, this is what I need to do on a weekly basis. Was that helpful to see the workflow? Oh, absolutely. So it did take a little bit of convincing for me to actually start up because just looking at my personality, I never saw myself as like a business owner. I never really saw myself as like the head of a company. But the more I learned about the systems, the more I learned about the processes and the support that I had, ultimately made it kind of a no-brainer. It’s been awesome, the support I’ve had through every step of the way, getting books set up, getting the business set up. It’s really helped me plow through a lot of the red tape and headaches that go along with one, starting the business, but two, just continuing to operate so that it’s profitable. Now the thing I’ve discovered too is most people who I speak to who become a Tip Top K9 franchise owner or an Oxyfresh franchise owner, they don’t consider themselves as somebody who could run a business. That’s like a big gap. They go, I don’t know if I could ever do it. And I look at somebody who has high integrity, who is a hard worker, and I go, if you have high integrity and you’re a hard worker, you can do it. But what we like to do with both Oxyfresh and for Tip Top K9s, we schedule a discovery day where you can come out to Tulsa and spend time with Ryan and Rachel who in my opinion, let me get your thoughts on this, I feel like they do a fine job showing you what it’s like to run a tip-top canine, what your schedule is going to be like, what the activity looks like of being a dog trainer. Can you explain your discovery day process with Ryan and Rachel what that was like? Sure, yeah, so I went out to Oklahoma and I got there in the morning and met with Ryan. Ryan, right off the bat, told me about TipDog Canine, kind of where we’re going as a company, kind of the culture there. And then right off the bat, he jumped right into that. Within like 20 minutes, he had me working with dogs. It was very hands-on, it was very thorough, it was definitely a lot of work. It’s kind of a baptism by fire, but it was good, because it really helped set the precedent for what working with dogs is going to be like. Now you decided to buy a Tip Top K9 franchise and now we have a weekly coaching call. Now what Andrew Bloomer does is he hops on the call, or I’ll hop on the call if we need to if there’s like an intervention. But we hop on the call every week and the purpose is to make sure that you’re following following the systems because I want you to bring in $20,000 of gross revenue as soon as possible. And so this workflow, you can look at it, folks, and kind of look at it from a perspective of if this was going to be your new career. Every week, the expectation that I have for you is I’m expecting you as a franchise owner, and you don’t have to do it, but I’m expecting you to get Google reviews and to market to your Dream 100. The Dream 100 would be dog groomers, veterinarians, it’s places that are likely to be visited by your ideal and likely buyers. We’re wanting to make a list of places that your ideal and likely buyers are likely to go to so that they can be referred to you. And then we have to get Google reviews and video reviews every week. Can you explain the importance or what your thoughts are on the weekly accountability of making sure that that happens? Sure. Accountability is really awesome because I mean, I found that first you have to measure your progress. Progress doesn’t improve without being measured, but once you hold that progress accountable, that progress is going to double, if that makes sense. The more you’re held accountable, the more likely you are to actually follow through and make sure you’re doing it. And the systems are designed to make sure that if you follow that, you’re going to grow, you’re going to improve, you’re going to meet goals. And you are in Utah. What city in Utah are you at? So people can verify you’re not a hologram. Yeah, so we live in Salt Lake area. Our first franchise location was in West Jordan. West Jordan. And for everybody out there that doesn’t know, how would you describe the West Jordan situation, the West Jordan community? Is it a big community, small community? How would you describe that? Sure. So, just a little bit about Salt Lake. Salt Lake is just a bunch of kind of small cities all mushed together. West Jordan is awesome. It’s on the kind of the southwest side from Salt Lake City. And it’s a tight-knit little community. It’s growing and the people there are really awesome. But we started off as kind of just a new dog and in the park full of hundreds of other dog trainers. And quickly risen to the top of being the highest reviewed dog trainer. Not only in West Jordan, but also in the entire state of Utah. And again just so we’re clear, the reason why you come up top in the Google search results isn’t because I like you. It’s not because you’re a great guy. You happen to be a great guy and I happen to like you, but it’s because you diligently every week get those Google reviews, we write that content. And now you’re getting referrals, though, from Dream 100 people. You have people that are referring you, and I’m not looking for the specific names, but what kind of professionals are referring you now, or what kind of organizations are referring you at this point? Sure, like you said, it’s mostly veterinarians and dog groomers. There’s also been a couple of pet stores that we’ve branched out to, and just mom-and-pop pet stores in the area that we bring cookies to, develop good relationships with, and we’ve gotten referrals from them as well. Now, the leads come in. So leads come in to the website. People find the website. They go to the website. They go, they’re typing in West Jordan Dog Training, they find it, they fill out the form, and at that point, these items here on this agenda, the local location has their leads called by the corporate call center. So the call center will send them a pre-written text, they’re gonna send them an email, and they’re gonna go ahead and call those leads, and the calls are recorded for quality assurance, and they’re going to book a $1 lesson so that you can demonstrate what you can do. So again, the consumer is only paying a dollar for that first lesson, and that gives you an opportunity to demonstrate what you can do for them. And again, this area here in black, this is all the work that you have to do as a local owner. So again, as it relates to marketing, the expectation is you’re getting Google reviews, you’re doing the Dream 100. The leads come in, leads come in, they get a text, they get a call, we get a booking, boom. And all of a sudden, but you have to do all this work after that, you have to provide the $1 lesson, you gotta sign people up, you’ve gotta sign them up, you gotta sell the packages, you gotta present the options, you’ve gotta do the weekly group interview. Now again, what I find is successful business owners love what I call the CRAP, the core repeatable actionable processes. They love the crap. The successful business owners love doing the core repeatable actionable processes. Why do you have to consistently do a group interview and why do you have to consistently get Google reviews and why do you have to consistently do the Dream 100? Why can’t you stop those things? Sure, well, in our industry, if you’re treading water, you’re actually gonna drown. You’re gonna get passed up super fast. Dog training is very competitive training in Salt Lake. So if we’re stagnant, we’re getting left behind. So if we’re not continually getting Google reviews, we’re gonna be left in dust, because everyone else is. So if we wanna stay on top, we have to make sure we’re continuing those different processes. The group interviews are super important, because we’re only as good as our people. Earlier on, when it wasn’t as consistent with doing group interviews, we were stuck and kind of held hostage a couple times by bad employees. Right now, the employees I have, they are all rock stars. And we’ve got a core, solid team of really good players that I feel like we can grow and continue to just do really awesome with. Now the way a franchise works is theoretically I’m supposed to get a percentage of what you make. So I want you to make a lot of money so that I can make money. I mean, and the theory is that you’re supposed to be making a lot more money than I’m making because that’s what we agreed to on the franchise disclosure document. So it’s very clear. I want to hit on three final areas here, and I want to respect your time. I really do believe that Ryan and Rachel do a phenomenal job training the local franchise owners and supplying the ongoing support at the call center. Can you maybe talk about what that’s like, not having to answer your own phone and having great training that Ryan and Rachel provide on how to actually train dogs? That is such, one, it’s such a huge burden off my shoulders from not having to just live on my phone and answer calls all day. But two, it gives us a leg up on the competition. I can’t tell you how many times where I’ve shown up to a $1 lesson with a potential customer, and they let me know, hey, we’ve called several trainers. Y’all were the very first people that responded back, and it was within minutes of us even filling out the form, or like they were just able to call, we answered right away, they didn’t have to leave a message, and we were able to get scheduled, and that has led to a lot of revenue from us just being the first one to get our foot in the door and meet these people. So now let’s talk about the, if you could share about the importance of the weekly calls with Andrew, having somebody that’s pulling the ad reports every week, having somebody to make sure your ads are on, somebody to harass you every week about getting Google reviews, video reviews, and how important is that? Sure. I mean, like I said, accountability, it’s super important for helping make sure your progress is continuing to grow and grow and grow, that you’re staying true to these processes that have been proven to work and do lead to your success. How would you describe in your mind, what would happen if you didn’t have that weekly touchpoint? One, I would just feel kind of just a lack of support for like if I have like a burning fire that comes up or if I need to change something with, you know, how we’re marketing. No, I just, it would not, I wouldn’t feel very supported in making sure that we’re making the most out of the ad spin that we’re putting forth. But two, if the accountability isn’t quite, you know, weekly it can be a lot easier to just kind of make the changes after the call and then regress into what you’re doing before. And then the call comes back another quarter later, make changes and you’re regressing. So I feel like instead of your progress continually going, increasing, it’s gonna be more like waiving, if that makes sense. How would you describe what the weekly call is like with Andrew? Sure, yeah, so we answer the phone, Andrew asks us how we’re doing, if we have any burning fires we need to discuss. And then we also get to meet with other franchise owners on the phone too. We get to hear about their successes, maybe points or tips that they have, any challenges that they have, we can ask for support, we can ask for help. It’s really just a big support group call to really help motivate us to push forward and also give us the tools that we need to be successful. Now the reason why I like to set it up where you’re on the phone with other locations is so that clearly you can see who’s having success and who’s maybe not having as much success. You can find out who’s doing well and what they’re doing and who’s not doing well and what they’re doing that maybe you shouldn’t be doing. Does it help in your mind, is it helpful to hear other franchise owners in person at the conferences and on the phone on a weekly basis? Oh, absolutely. It absolutely does. It’s fun to hear the numbers and the revenue that other locations are getting. I’m not necessarily a competitive guy, but so I don’t hear those numbers and feel like, oh, I need to do better than them. It’s more like I hear those numbers and I realize, okay, this is what’s possible, this is the potential. What can I do to make sure that I can get to the level of success that they’re getting as well? Final question for you. For anybody out there who’s watching this right now and they’re going, I don’t know if I want to fill out the form or not. You know, I don’t know. I always tell people, when in doubt, just schedule a free consultation so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. But for anybody out there that goes to tiptopcanine.com and they’re thinking about, you know, scheduling a free call with Ryan and Rachel or myself, what would be your advice to anybody who’s thinking about buying a Tip Top K9? Maybe who should buy one, who shouldn’t, or just what advice would you have? Sure. Take the free consultation. It’s free, right? And it’s definitely worth a look, I’ll say that. Like I said, for me, it took me a little bit of convincing because I never saw myself as a business owner, right? All the headaches that go along with it. But the more I understood the support that goes around everything, the more it made it more streamlined for me. It helped support me to help make the best decision I’ve ever made in my entire life. You know, I had my old desk job. It was a good job, but now I’m making over three times as much as I was at that job and I actually have freedom and I can, you know, take trips I wasn’t able to take before. I can have a team I didn’t have before and it’s just been the best decision I’ve ever made. Would you recommend that others buy a Tip Top K9 now that you’re, you know, several years into it? Would you recommend it? Oh, I’d absolutely recommend it. Awesome. Well, I appreciate you very much, brother. Thank you so much. It was great to see you there in Tulsa at the annual conference. And again, folks, if you’re in the Utah area and you’re looking for a dog trainer, Josh Johnson does a phenomenal job. And if you’re in Tulsa and you’re looking for a pest control company, his brother and his wife do a great job. And I’m honored to work with your brother for years and help him grow his company. And I guess my final, final question for you. Your brother’s worked with me for years, and I don’t ever know what he says about the process. All I see is the growth on the tracking sheet. Did he ever talk to you about business coaching and what that’s done for him? No, he’s loved it. So before, he used to rely on me going out and knocking doors every summer out there in Owasso. I’m pretty sure I’ve touched every single door in Owasso trying to sell them pest control. But then he met with you, and he hasn’t had to rely on me to do that anymore, which is great because it’s freed up my time. Okay. I knew there was a story there. I knew there was a story because I heard that the marketing system consisted of you knocking on doors before he met us. So your quality of life has gone up quite a bit. Absolutely. Awesome, Josh. Thank you so much, brother. Have a great day. It was a pleasure. Bye-bye. We’ll see you. The number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. We are Jared and Jennifer Johnson. We own Platinum Pest and Lawn and are located in Owasso, Oklahoma. And we have been working with Thrive for business coaching for almost a year now. Yeah. So what we want to do is we want to share some wins with you guys that we’ve had by working with Thrive. First of all, we’re on the top page of Google now. I just want to let you know what type of accomplishment this is. Our competition, Orkin, Terminex, they’re both $1.3 billion companies. They both have 2,000 to 3,000 pages of content attached to their website. So to basically go from virtually non-existent on Google to up on the top page is really saying something. But it’s come by being diligent to the systems that Thrive has, by being consistent and diligent on doing podcasts and staying on top of those podcasts to really help with getting up on what they’re listing and ranking there with Google. And also we’ve been trying to get Google reviews, you know, asking our customers for reviews, and now we’re the highest rated and most reviewed Pest and Lawn company in the Tulsa area, and that’s really helped with our conversion rate. And the number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. Wait, say that again. How much are we up? 411%. So 411% we’re up with our new customers. Amazing. Right. So not only do we have more customers calling in, we’re able to close those deals at a much higher rate than we were before. Right now our closing rate is about 85%, and that’s largely due to, first of all, like our Google reviews that we’ve gotten. People really see that our customers are happy, but also we have a script that we follow. And so when customers call in, they get all the information that they need. That script has been refined time and time again. It wasn’t a one and done deal. It was a system that we followed with Thrive in the refining process, and that has obviously, the 411% shows that that system works. Yeah, so here’s a big one for you. So last week alone, our booking percentage was 91%. We actually booked more deals, more new customers last year than we did the first five months, or I’m sorry, we booked more deals last week than we did the first five months of last year from before we worked with Thrive. So again, we booked more deals last week than the first five months of last year. It’s incredible, but the reason why we have that success is by implementing the systems that Thrive has taught us and helped us out with. Some of those systems that we’ve implemented are group interviews. That way we’ve really been able to come up with a really great team. We’ve created and implemented checklists. Everything gets done and it gets done right, it creates accountability. We’re able to make sure that everything gets done properly, both out in the field and also in our office. And also doing the podcast like Jared had mentioned, that has really, really contributed to our success. But that, like I said, the diligence and consistency in doing those in that system has really, really been a big blessing in our lives. And also, you know, it’s really shown that we’ve gotten a success from following those systems. So before working with Thrive, we were basically stuck. Really no new growth with our business. And we were in a rut, and we didn’t know. Okay, the last three years, our customer base had pretty much stayed the same. We weren’t shrinking, but we weren’t really growing either. Yeah, and so we didn’t really know where to go, what to do, how to get out of this rut that we’re in. But Thrive helped us with that. They implemented those systems, they taught us those systems, they taught us the knowledge that we needed in order to succeed. Now it’s been a grind, absolutely it’s been a grind this last year. But we’re getting those fruits from that hard work and the diligent effort that we’re able to put into it. So again, we were in a rut, Thrive helped us get out of that rut. And if you’re thinking about working with Thrive, quit thinking about it and just do it. Do the action and you’ll get the results. It will take hard work and discipline, but that’s what it’s gonna take in order to really succeed. So, I just wanna give a big shout out to Thrive, a big thank you out there to Thrive. We wouldn’t be where we’re at now without their help. I’m Rachel with Tip Top K9 and we just wanna give a huge thank you to Clay and Vanessa Clark. Hey guys I’m Ryan with Tip Top K9. Just want to say a big thank you to Thrive 15. Thank you to Make Your Life Epic. We love you guys. We appreciate you and really just appreciate how far you’ve taken us. So this is my old van and our old school marketing and this is our old team and by team I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing and this is our new team. We went from 4 to 14 and I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales, which is awesome, but Ryan is a really great salesman, so we didn’t need that. We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out into systems, into manuals and scripts and actually build a team. So now that we have systems in place, we’ve gone from one to 10 locations in only a year. In October 2016, we grossed 13 grand for the whole month. Right now it’s 2018, the month of October. It’s only the 22nd, we’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month, and we still have time to go. We’re just thankful for you, thankful for Thrive and your mentorship, and we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us. Just thank you, thank you, thank you, times a thousand. So we really just want to thank you Clay and thank you Vanessa for everything you’ve done, everything you’ve helped us with. We love you guys. The Thrive Time Show, two-day interactive business workshops are the highest and most reviewed business workshops on the planet. You can learn the proven 13-point business system that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. When we get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re going to teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re going to teach you how to do a social media marketing campaign that works. How do you raise capital? How do you get small business loan? We teach you everything you need to know here during a two day, 15 hour workshop. It’s all here for you. You work every day in your business, but for two days you can escape and work on your business and build these proven systems so now you can have a successful company that will produce both the time freedom and the financial freedom that you deserve. You’re gonna leave energized, motivated, but you’re also gonna leave empowered. The reason why I built these workshops is because as an entrepreneur, I always wish that I had this. And because there wasn’t anything like this I would go to these motivational seminars, no money down, real estate, Ponzi scheme, get motivated seminars and they would never teach me anything. It was like you went there and you paid for the big chocolate Easter Bunny but inside of it it was a hollow nothingness and I wanted the knowledge. They’re like, oh but we’ll teach you the knowledge after our next workshop. And the great thing is we have nothing to upsell. At every workshop we teach you what you need to know. There’s no one in the back of the room trying to sell you some next big, get rich quick, walk on hot coals product. It’s literally, we teach you the brass tacks, the specific stuff that you need to know to learn how to start and grow a business. I encourage you to not believe what I’m saying, and I want you to Google the Z66 auto auction. I want you to Google elephant in the room. Look at Robert Zellner and Associates. Look them up and say, are they successful because they’re geniuses or are they successful because they have a proven system? When you do that research, you will discover that the same systems that we use in our own business can be used in your business. Come to Tulsa, book a ticket, and I guarantee you it’s going to be the best business workshop ever, and we’ll even give you your money back if you don’t love it. We’ve built this facility for you, and we’re excited to see it.