Shed Geek Podcast
The Shed Geek Podcast offers an in depth analysis of the ever growing and robust Shed Industry. Listeners will experience a variety of guests who identify or specialize in particular niche areas of the Shed Industry. You will be engaged as you hear amateur and professional personalities discuss topics such as: Shed hauling, sales, marketing, Rent to Own, shed history, shed faith, and much more. Host Shannon Latham is a self proclaimed "Shed Geek" who attempts to take you through discussions that are as exciting as the industry itself. Listeners of this podcast include those who play a role directly or indirectly with the Shed Industry itself.
Shed Geek Podcast
Beyond the Boom: Redefining Value in the Post-Pandemic Shed Industry PART 2
What separates truly successful shed dealers from those who merely survive? The Steel Kings podcast answers this question as host Jared Ledford welcomes Sheds Direct's JW Rucker and Marc Church for a motivational deep dive into winning strategies for 2025 in the portable building industry.
The conversation kicks off with a powerful framework for success that goes beyond wishful thinking. Marc emphasizes that winning in today's market requires three essential elements: defining what success means specifically for you, creating detailed action steps to reach those goals, and consistent daily execution. JW builds on this by sharing how implementing daily targets transformed his business approach – posting a specific number of marketplace ads daily, making follow-up calls to a set number of leads, and maintaining consistent social media presence.
Perhaps the most eye-opening segment reveals startling statistics about customer follow-up. While 80% of sales require five or more follow-up contacts, nearly half of salespeople never make even a single follow-up attempt. The experts share their proven approach to nurturing leads through relationship-based follow-ups rather than high-pressure tactics. "It's not about asking if they're ready to buy today," Jared explains. "It's about remembering their kid's baseball game and genuinely connecting."
The conversation shifts to a candid discussion about product focus versus diversification. Using real-world examples from their experience, the team explains why many shed dealers waste valuable resources on low-volume specialty products when focusing on core offerings would yield substantially better returns. As JW puts it, "You're going to sell ten barns for every chicken coop," making the case for mastering your primary revenue generators.
Whether you're struggling with sales performance, considering new product lines, or searching for the right manufacturing partner, this episode delivers actionable insights to transform your approach. The passionate conversation culminates with JW's powerful reminder: "I can't want it more than you" – a challenge to bring your fullest commitment to your business every single day.
Want to connect with industry leaders who understand your challenges? Reach out to Marc (marc@shedsdirectinc.com) or JW (jw@shedsdirectinc.com) to explore partnership opportunities or simply make a new connection in the shed community.
For more information or to know more about the Shed Geek Podcast visit us at our website.
Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube at the handle @shedgeekpodcast.
To be a guest on the Shed Geek Podcast visit our website and fill out the "Contact Us" form.
To suggest show topics or ask questions you want answered email us at info@shedgeek.com.
This episodes Sponsors:
Studio Sponsor: J Money LLC
Shed Geek Marketing
Hey guys, what's up? It's Jared with the Steel Kings podcast and we are back for another episode with you guys. We are going to continue our conversation with the guys over at Sheds Direct and I'm going to bring them back in the studio here in a minute. I am back this week again for another episode. Eric is still with the pole barn team because we are just continuing the same conversation that we just had.
Jared:But I wanted to touch base with you guys and give a quick shout out to our guys over at J Money. Joel, katie and the whole team can help you out with anything financing related for home improvement projects. If you're a contractor, if you are a metal building dealer, a shed dealer, if you're a manufacturer, give these guys a call. They can help you out. If you are struggling with customers on payment plans, if you are dabbling in RTO, if you want some traditional, unsecured, straightforward financing, these are the guys. They've got plans starting with no upfront costs. Give them a call. They can help you finance these buildings, help you finance those projects and get you on the right track to success. Also want to give a shout out to our podfather, the guys over at Shed Geek Podcast. Shannon is absolutely killing it. We're all over the place right now the guys over at Shed Geek, the guys here at Steel Kings I can tell you super excited about what we've got, looking forward for the rest of the year, but right now it is the busy season. So if you are sitting back and you are struggling, give us a listen. Check out Shannon on Wednesdays and looking forward to seeing you there.
Jared:The guys over at Shed Geek Marketing as well. Check out Dylan and his team. If you are and I say struggling right. But if you want to take the next step, right, let's say you're a little bit more successful. Let's say you've had a really good start to your year. You want to ramp up your Facebook, ramp up your Google, ramp up your online presence? These guys do it all, from SEO to Google to Facebook, to anything you want to do in the marketing space. You need graphics, you need a logo. Check out the guys over at shed geek marketing, without further ado.
Jared:You guys saw him last week. You're gonna see him again this week. We had such a good conversation. We talked about industry trends. We talked about the price quality, price quality, service triangle. We talked about the race to the bottom. We're going to be a little bit more upbeat this week. We're going to talk about all kinds of stuff. We're going to get into it. We're going to motivate you guys to have the best 2025 you've ever had. Well, I guess you've never had a 2025, right, but the best year you've ever had yet. So I'm going to bring these guys back in. JW and Marc, the guys from Shed Direct, are still here with us. What's up, fellas? How's it going?
Marc:What's up, Jared? How are you?
Jared:today, buddy, I'm good. I'm just as good as when we were recording a little bit ago, but I always like to peek behind. I always like to peek behind the curtain because these guys will hear this episode a week later from our first episode. So, you guys, we were coming off the easter, we talked about good Friday, we talked about being good stewards in your community. I've got these guys back for another half an hour or 35 minutes of time. I want to jump right into it. I don't want to waste any time.
Jared:Yeah, we picked up and we left off at the race to the bottom. We were kind of coming down a little bit talking about some of the things that are the industry struggling with. I want to talk about how we win in 2025. Right, how do we win as a collaborative community? And I know you guys are here to say you know Sheds Direct is a great product, it's a great company and we know that. We rep that. But how do we win in 2025, right, how does Sheds Direct do that? Because I'm sure there's Sheds Direct dealers listening how do we do that as a whole? Right, what do you guys got?
Marc:Well, JW, I'll jump in here. So, number one listen. If there's any time to be excited about the shed industry, it is 2025. But this is not going to be like COVID, right? I tell people all the time if I knew how easy it was to make money during COVID, I would have slept till 10 o'clock every day and fished every afternoon by two. Right, that's what I would have done.
Marc:But in 2025, I would be super excited about the shed industry, but there is going to be some things that you're going to need to to really focus on. Number one you need to wake up every day ready to go. Listen, this is like my third cup today. Right, this is my third cup and it won't be my last, bro. It won't be my last, like I will be. You know pots of coffee all day long. Now, I'm a huge coffee drinker, coffee connoisseur.
Marc:But, number one, you need to be excited about what lies ahead and the ability to financially, you know, make a tremendous amount of money in 2025, going into 2026, number one. Number two you need to be, you need to have a game plan. So what we do with all of our dealers is, number one we set that goal. What do you want to be, what do you want to sell? For you to be happy, for your family to be happy, for you guys, for you to be excited. What is that goal? What does that look like? Okay, number one, so you need to set the bar. Where are you going to be at Right? Number two how am I going to get there? And then you need to create action steps on how I'm going to get there. How many posts am I going to make a day? Okay, how many posts am I going to make a day? Okay, how many? How? When am I going to follow up with all my leads? And when I follow up with my leads, how many points of contact am I going to follow up with them on Right, and so you know. I think that there is number one what is success for me? Some of the dealers on this call it might be hey, I'm only going to sell 400 grand worth of sheds. Or 500 grand worth of sheds, hey, that's fine. Some of the dealers on this call might say I need to sell 2 million. What is success to you? Number one? Number two how are you going to get there? Action steps. And number three implementation.
Marc:Every day I tell people all the time that man listen. I talk to people about sheds. I want to meet shed friends every day. I'll buy you lunch, I'll buy you breakfast. I'll have a cup of coffee with you. The stronger and blacker the coffee is, the better I like it. So if you got any know any coffee shops that will light your fire, man, call me up. I'll meet you there. We'll talk sheds and make a cup of coffee right, but really those are the three steps. What makes me successful, action points on how I'm going to get there and man I'm going to execute every day to be successful and hit my goal. Those are the things that SDI is doing every day and really talking to our dealers about supporting them and helping them be the best dealer they can be. That's really our focus every day.
JW:Yeah, let me piggyback on that really quick. I think one of the biggest things that I started implementing in my life in 2024 that really changed my life both personally, both at ministry and then also professionally at SDI was really focusing on a daily goal. You hear some of the best. You hear the Andy Elliotts and some of these guys talk about setting daily goals. I've heard that for years, but I didn't actually start doing it until last summer and I just want to encourage anybody listening if you have a sales goal, right, you need to, as Marc said, break that down and how do you get to that sales goal, but then make sure you're doing it daily.
JW:So, is it? I'm posting 10 marketplace posts today, is it? I'm posting one post on my business Facebook page every day, is it? I'm creating an ad campaign or a boosted post every day, is it? I'm adding a page to my website every day, right, is it? I'm calling 10 old leads every day?
JW:Right, like, set the daily goals, because the daily goals are what's going to change. If you hit your daily goal seven days in a row and then you hit that for five weeks in a row, I promise you you're going to be selling buildings and you're going to be reaching. Whatever your, your annual or your monthly goals are, you will 100%. And if you're not, then you know that's probably just because maybe you, you know, from a sales perspective, maybe you need to work on your sales pitch or something like that. So then set another daily goal of listen to a sales podcast or go to a sales training class. Right, figure out wherever your gaps are and fill them with not annual goals, not monthly goals. Fill them with daily goals. Like, if you want to do a hundred grand this month in sheds, you can't just put that on a whiteboard and expect to do it. What are you going to do every day, five or six or seven days a week, to get to that hundred grand?
Marc:So I just 100% that Aim small, miss small is what we say, right? So if we're shooting our target, we're aiming super small. If I miss, I'm probably going to miss small. If I have those daily goals every day and I break them down daily. Okay, If my daily goal is to sell one building a day, or let's say, or maybe I'm going to post 10 Facebook posts a day and I only get to eight, hey, that's still eight Facebook posts, right? The issue is we say I'm going to make 50 Facebook posts a week and we only do 10. That gap becomes really big. So we got to hit those daily targets. Aim small, miss small.
Jared:I think, from a personal perspective, right to jump on what you guys are saying manage your time or your time will manage. Perspective, right To jump on what you guys are saying manage your time or your time will manage you, right. So, like for me and Dub and I used to talk about this all the time and for me, managing even down to the hours that you work each day. So I think a lot of people in this industry, specifically you might be an independent contractor working on a small lot with 15, you know, 15 wood sheds and a couple of metal buildings or whatever, and you find yourself getting into these bad habits and I talk to other dealers all the time like I'm working so hard, I'm doing all this work and I'm not you know, I'm not getting the benefits of the sales. How many hours did you put in yesterday? Well, I was at the lot for five hours. Okay, put in an eight hour day like.
Jared:Start with the most basic concepts of what works for you, right? So let's start off with we're in a very unique industry. A lot of people are self-motivated, they're maybe independent owners, they do their own thing. Let's start off with the very first thing. What do you have to do to be successful. You have to show up. If you don't show up, I can't help you from there. Now, if you're spending 10, 12 hours a day at your shed lot and you're still struggling, that's when we can start breaking down individual hours that you're there.
Jared:Okay, you 9 am. What'd you do at 9 am? Did you go outside and make sure your lot was put together? Did you go outside and make sure you weren't missing anything? Did you come back inside and start calling old leads? Did you come back inside and start posting on marketplace? Did you put together an ad campaign? What did you do?
Jared:And I look at that from my perspective. I, you know I have a crew of people in here that sell metal buildings. They take leads as much as I can present them with leads. But a lot of times I get posed the question of you know I didn't get enough leads today or haven't gotten enough leads, or you know I'm not selling enough buildings. And then the first thing I always look at is your time sheet. You know I run a very, very laid back kind of sales environment here. I've been a sales manager for the last gosh between GameStop and Honda and everything I've done. Probably the last 15 years I've been managing folks and what I can tell you is from a personnel perspective I've never had more success than when I have been loose on the reins.
Jared:But a lot of the times, if you're a player's coach, you can't get the most out of your players and every once in a while you got to be a little bit harder on them. You guys know that because you're. You know Marc's a baseball guy, he's a baseball coach. JW is a football guy. He's a football coach guy, he's a football coach. They both played. I played too, and more often than not I get more out of that strong assertive.
Jared:The Gordon Ramsey right. I always look at Gordon Ramsey as like the guy I want to try to be like more often than not. I know that sounds crazy, because Gordon Ramsey is a little bit crazy, but Gordon Ramsey can go behind the scenes and build somebody up and be really soothing, and but when he's in the kitchen man, he's up front. At that, at that pass, he is absolutely laser focused on what's going on and he is not going to accept anything less than the absolute best all the time. And you have to set that expectation for yourself and that's what I really like about working with the two of you is I don't have to struggle with my teammates. You have to run with people who want to run at the same speed that you run at.
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Jared:If you are running faster than your manufacturer or faster than your partner, you're struggling. I can tell you right now you are absolutely struggling because if you are full speed ahead all the time, like Marc or JW, and you're running with guys that are slower than you, you don't want to have to pick them up and stop what you're doing to get behind and go back and pick them up. You want to keep doing exactly what it is that's making you successful, and you two guys probably are two of the most motivated people I know Period. I know you guys run hard all the time and I can't keep up with you, frankly. I mean, you know Dub and I were talking about it yesterday Actually, we were getting ready for the call and he stopped by for a bit and you know I've been struggling. Right, I'm going to be honest with you. I've got a lot going on. I've got podcasts, we're doing pole barns, we're doing metal buildings, we're doing wood sheds. I've got a team full of people that need me. I've got, you know, kids all over the place and I can tell you right now I'm busy, busier than a one-armed man in a wallpaper factory. If you are sitting back and you're thinking like me, drop me an email. I need somebody to talk to, to be honest with you. But I can tell you I needed to hear what he had to say yesterday because it made me feel good. We haven't been selling where we need to sell. Now we're successful, don't get me wrong, but I have a payroll to meet. I've got the stress and burdens of a business to run right and at this point I needed that friend to step up and say, hey, this is what you should do, man, this is what's working for SDI right now. Advertise this way, and it was good to hear that feedback. And what I'm telling you is lean on the friends, lean on the shoulders of your business partners, whoever that might be, and take that next step, because what Marc said is absolutely right Managing your time, setting that goal, action items all the time. You know, JW is the very best I've ever seen. He keeps this meticulous, color, color, coded planner with him all the there. You go all the time and it's constantly with action items and if it's not done that day, it's moved over to the next day and it'll be that way every day until it's done. And I can tell you if we can learn one thing today set those action items.
Jared:I want to talk to you guys a little bit about products. Right, this industry is overrun with products. So, obviously, from my perspective as a dealer, we primarily sell metal buildings. Woodshed is our second, we're starting to get into pole barns, we're starting to get into other avenues, but right now for us it's metal buildings and it's wood sheds 1a, 1b, depending on the day, and but I want to talk to you guys about there's guys out there selling play sets. There's guys out there selling hunting blinds. There's guys out there selling custom made gazebos and all these, whatever it is. I mean, you've seen them, you've seen these lots that look like a circus, and I'm not saying that that can't work. I'm just saying you might want to find something that works and really jump in hard with what works. Right, think about how many times you sold a play set last year. Think about how many times you sold a hunting blind. All right, if you're a shed lot, focus on sheds, but talk to me about what you guys do. Just tell me a little bit about it.
Marc:Yeah, man, and hey, going back to that last statement about time, I'll say this this morning. So we as a sales team at SDI, we have this group chat right and we're constantly texting each other hey, where are you at today? How much have you sold? You know, JW had a record day on Tuesday, so I'm like dude, that's awesome. Like you know, let's get crazy anyway. And so this morning it was like 54545 and I was kind of, I was, I was awake and I was about to get up on, my phone goes off and it was JW and he had a text thread with me you and Jared and I was like oh, JW is not going to be the first one that texts me this morning, so I think I text back. I didn't even need to text back, but I think I text back. I got it, or something like that, because I wanted JW to know. Oh, I got it, or something like that, cause I wanted JW to know oh, I'm up too, buddy, it might be 545, but I'm up too.
Jared:You know what I'm saying? I was not up. I was not up. Just to clear that right up, I was not up.
Marc:All right, I was up late last night and I was not up, so Listen max effort, positive attitude that's that's what we we we talk about two things. We can control Max effort, positive attitude that's what we talk about. Two things we can control my accept or positive attitude.
Marc:But no, when it comes to product systems.
Marc:If you like, in the Sheds Direct world, the history of SDI, we've had some crazy thoughts. Like we've had crazy thoughts. Like I remember, man, I'd only been in the business like four months and I was driving my wife's families from Raleigh, we were coming back, it was around Thanksgiving and man, my founder, calls me at like 1145 at night. I just happened to be on the road driving Right, and he's like I've got a crazy idea. I want to run this by you. And I'm like, like it's 1145, like on the Saturday of Thanksgiving, Like what you know what I'm saying. And so we've had some crazy ideas. And, man, listen, we've had. I mean I can't even get into all the craziness we've had and the crazy things we've done that we thought would be successful. Here's an example A few years ago we said you know what? We're going to take our value line and we're going to start encompassing some metal into that value line Right, and we'll have the Eagle Series wood and metal. And so one of the things we did was we had the shop, it was already, it was already slamming Eagle Barns, Eagle Sheds on the value line and we tried to encompass metal into that. And we quickly realized wait a minute, our shop's not set up to build wood and metal, right, it's taken us twice as long. It's costing us twice the amount of money. We need to take a step back and do what we do best.
Marc:When I first came on board, SDIS sold play sets and I've got a whole book it's right here of all the play sets and I've got a whole book it's right here of all the play sets that we used. And so I was a huge advocate of play sets in the beginning. Man, we got to sell play sets and at the end of the first year I said, man, let me have some data. I need to know all these massive amounts of play sets we sold, and it was like 25, 20, 15 throughout the entire dealer network. I'm like, wait a minute, timeout, that's so much more money I could tie up in wood builds. We've, you know, play sets blunt and blinds.
Marc:You know, when it comes to even options, you know we get a lot of requests for crazy options, whether it's, you know, some type of crazy looking porch, crazy looking dormers, transoms, whatever it may be. It's like the Hardy Board. Look, I get phone calls once a month. We need to start offering Hardy Board. We want to offer Hardy Board. Do you know how many people Hardy Board's crazy expensive? Very few people are going to look at an LP shed and look at a hardy board shed and say I will spend the additional funds on this hardy board just because I want to. And so we are trying.
Marc:Really we see a lot of builders, man, that they are trying to get in this mindset of, hey, we're going to dabble here, we're going to dabble there and we're going to dabble over here, and really they never perfect the quality of the shed, they never perfect the price point, they never perfect the technology that goes into servicing the dealer and the customer. And so it becomes this I can't remember what is the statement. I can't remember what is the statement. Something of many, master of none. I can't remember that statement there.
Marc:But what we're trying to do with SDI is we're trying to build the best building in the industry and really set ourselves apart and really focus on what we do best. And so, at the end of the day, when you pull your data on how many hunting bonds you sold probably not that many. When you pull your data on how many play sets you sold probably not that many. When you pull your data on how many hardy board buildings you sold man, probably not that many. Really focus from not just a dealer standpoint, also from a manufacturing standpoint. Focus on what's going to make you the most money, what you love the most, and be the best at it. I think I'll piggyback off that.
JW:I think even outside of we're talking about some things that are maybe out of a shed manufacturing realm. We pride ourselves at SDI on having a wide product offering. We offer various specialty units and things like that. But it's to the right extent because, as Marc said, think about it from the base level of a production aspect. It's going to take a team of guys that can pump out five 10-by-16 All-American barns in one day. It's going to take that team of guys a lot longer to pump out five playhouses or five dog kennels or five chicken coops, even if they're smaller. Why? Because they're used to building barns. Why are they used to building barns? Because we sell more barns.
JW:Think about it from a dealer perspective. If I stocked a dealer lot with 10 all-American barns and one chicken coop and one dog kennel and one playhouse, they're probably going to sell a lot of barns and they're going to sell a couple chicken coops playhouses. If I stock them with one barn and 10 chicken coops, their sales are probably going to suffer. They might sell some chicken coops I'm sure they would but it's not going to be at the rate that they would sell barns. So really it's give and take and I think the biggest thing is whether it's a product all within the shed, the same umbrella, or whether it's trampolines, basketball hoops, play sets, that kind of stuff. You really have to weigh the cost. Dealers today think, well, it's a consignment model, it's free for me, let me get them on my lot and I'll do it. But what they're not taking into account is there's an opportunity cost to everything that you do, right, and if I'm going to put five trampolines on my lot and I'm going to spend time learning the product, learning how to sell the product, advertising the product and heaven forbid spending money to advertise the product, I probably and I'm not saying this for every there might be a dealer on here that sells trampolines, I'm not sure, but you're probably with all that same effort. If you threw that to sheds or metal buildings or whatever, if you put all that same effort and those same resources to selling one product, you would probably make a lot more money. And I think that's where it's.
JW:A fine line is. I'm all for having variety. We do it at SDI. I'm all for selling metal buildings and sheds. Because they pair so well together. You're going to sell both to the same customer. Sometimes I did that at least six or seven times Sold one of each to a customer when I was a dealer and those pair together. But you always have to weigh the opportunity costs of if I'm going to push this product. Is it going to make me enough money? If the answer is it's more profitable than the other product, that's great. But also can I sell the same quantity? Right? If it's more profitable per item, that doesn't necessarily mean I need to dump all my resources into it, because I might be able to sell 10 of these for every one of these. You know you're going to sell 10 barns for every chicken coop you sell. You, for every chicken coop you sell, you're going to sell 10 barns for every trampoline you sell. You know what I mean. So I just wanted to lend that feedback.
Jared:I think one thing that we didn't talk about. This is a very good opportunity. So the phrase you were looking for, marc, is jack of all trades, master of none. That's it. Mastery of something comes with disciplined effort over time. Yeah, learning every day something else and I talk about it a lot. I want to learn something new every day that I can apply and be better with tomorrow. Right, we've talked about that on the podcast a lot.
Jared:I think that the only logical option for a shed dealer is metal buildings. Period the end, I don't think hunting blinds, trampolines, play sets, whatever it is. There's one thing you have to look at when you're running a business, in my opinion. That's selling portable buildings, things like that margins. You have to understand it from top to bottom. You have to understand what you make. You have to understand what you make on every single thing that you sell. That way you can laser focus, like Marc was telling you guys a little bit about the Eagle series, which is a value line of sheds that sheds direct sells.
Jared:Well, yeah, I advertise that my sheds start at $29.99 or I think it's just over $3,000. That's our starting point. I advertise that all the time, but I am definitely not trying to sell a $3,000 shed, I'm trying to sell a $7,500 shed. I want to get them in the door and then I want to talk to them about 16 inch wall stud spacing. I want to talk to them about 16 inch rafter spacing. I want to talk about OSB sheeting in the roof. I want to talk about all of the benefits that come along with buying the Cadillac right, because I sold the Kia. I know, because I'm a master at what I do. I can talk about that from a point of immense authority. JW and I used to talk about this all the time.
Jared:Speaking from a place of authority will qualify you with a customer. That's the best way to qualify yourself. If you know to which you speak, customer will buy from you all the time. We get it all the time. I'm going to use this as the opportunity, the call to action. I get more customers come to me and buy a building or somebody on my team from somebody else that didn't pick the phone up, somebody that didn't answer their Facebook messenger. We get that all the time. I am so desperate for your help. I have called five other people and now you're the only one who's answered. We do that all the time. If you're not answering your phone and answering your Facebook messenger, my, my best advice is find something else to do. That's my, that's the truth of it. Don't waste. Waste anyone's time, especially your customers. That is the absolute truth.
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Marc:Yeah, I would say this there's two things I'm very bad at. Really, let me take that back. There's one thing I'm really bad at If you want me to fix a vehicle, do anything about mechanic work. Listen, I'll be the guy that takes it out and puts it back and there'll be like half the parts still on the ground and I'm like what just happened? Right, I know nothing about mechanicing. Okay, I know nothing about any of that. I had a diesel truck one time that actually filled up gasoline the entire tank full of gasoline in Ohio on work time. That's a whole other crazy shed story we could get into later on, but here's what I would say about that. I know a guy that is an expert mechanic, right, he's a master mechanic, and he is what I consider a trusted advisor. Okay, listen, my wife had a question for me about a vehicle yesterday. She said hey, this is, this is going on with the vehicle. She's going to be traveling next week. What do you think I should do? Hey, what'd I tell her? Call him, call, call Todd, call Todd, call Todd, right, and so you know, with that being said, in the shed pit, in the shed industry, customers are looking for a trusted advisor, someone that knows what the quality product is, someone that can communicate when they come on the lot and say, hey, my son is coming home from college and I need to store his valuable product in a very safe place.
Marc:Well, Mr. Customer, your son coming home from college is kind of a major transition. I wouldn't suggest the cheapest building we have. We want to put a quality product in play that is going to make sure that your stuff is taken care of and that brings value to your home. Mr. Customer, they're looking for a trusted advisor. They want you to talk to them about two by sixes in the floor, 16 inch on center hurricane ties 16 inches in the roof, or maybe your product is 24 inches in the roof, whatever it is. They want you to talk about 50 year floor. They want you to talk about all the LP and the product in general, the building. They are looking for a trusted advisor.
Marc:I tell people all the time man listen. When I come on a competitive shed lot, first thing I want to know is that dealer coming out of that office? Right, is that dealer coming out of that office? Now they don't have to come up to my car and talk to me, but are they coming out of that office to create a presence? But yeah, customers are looking for a trusted advisor when it comes to purchasing that quality shed. They're looking for.
Jared:I want to give some stats real quick. This is from a company called Peak Sales Recruiting and I just do general research. I saved this to talk about. I'm glad you brought this up. There's a couple of things and this is specifically related to follow-ups so I want to talk about we're transitioning more to really educating our customers, really taking the next level as a dealer, because the manufacturer is motivating me too, because the team at Sheds Direct is good. It makes me want to strive to be at their level. I can't run as fast as you, but I can sure try that kind of a thing.
Jared:That's where I'm at only 3% of your market's actively buying at any given time, and this is across the board. 3% of customers are in active buying mode. Okay, that's just a statistic across the board in any market. So the market for customers is an endless blue ocean. If you think you're busy right now, you haven't even struck it yet. 48% of salespeople never even make a single follow-up attempt after a cold call 48. So if you've got a lead and you've got a call, you 48 of you so almost half say nope, one call was good enough, they didn't answer the phone, I'm done with it. 44 of sales people give up after only one follow-up call. So now you're taking this 52 and 52, 44 of that percent is now given up after the second follow-up call. Right, so two calls was enough. 60 of customers say no four times before they say yes, yeah, wow, this is all relevant to what we're doing.
Jared:Eight percent of sales people have more than five follow-up touches 8%. I have an 8%-er in my office. He's right over here and he's my top salesperson, without a doubt. Every month period, the end, and I'm trying to get everybody in here to be an 8% person 80% of sales. Let me give you this stat 80% of sales require five follow-up calls, 80% of all sales. And this is just general. This isn't sheds, this is across the board. And the last one I want to give to you because I have a guy and he's gotten a lot better I have to tell you One call, one close. I get one call, I close the building that day. Two percent, one, two, two percent of all sales that happen happen on first contact.
Marc:Yeah, we. So listen, I'll say this there is nothing that when I speak to our dealers, when I'm doing podcasts or when I'm with a competitive dealer and I'm sharing data or just talking sheds, everything that I have communicated or will communicate is because of firsthand knowledge. Okay, so let me give you an example. 2019, we purchased a training platform for our dealers and one of the items that this individual communicated was points of contact right Follow up call, email, text, mail, a postcard, whatever it is, but points of contact. And he stated the average customer buys between four and seven points of contact. And I said you know what? This guy, there's no way I'm a better sales guy than that. You're telling me that I'm not doing my job. I'm a better sales guy than that. You're telling me that I'm not doing my job. I'm a better sales guy than that.
Marc:And so I actually, at that time, I went to a we actually SDI had a inside sales team. We no longer have that, but at that time we had an inside sales team. And I said I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to put the headsets on and I'm going to start calling customers. I the headsets on and I'm going to start calling customers. I'm going to start calling customers and so I did it and one of the things that I noticed was I had a couple of hot leads. Customers like I'm super interested in buying. Let me talk to my wife. Whatever you know, try to overcome objections. Call me back tomorrow. I called him back tomorrow. They didn't answer and I thought you know what I thought this guy was going to buy. So the next day I shoot him a text. They don't answer. The fourth point of contact. I call him back up. Hey, they don't answer. Then the next day I said okay, I'm going to give it one more time. This guy says five to seven points of contact. I'm going to work it through. Send them an email. They come right back. Mr Church, yes, we are ready to buy. I apologize.
Marc:My daughter got sick, my son had a baseball game, we had something come up at the school, whatever it is. And over and over again I have multiple examples of life just gets in the way, right? Hey, I'm the same way. I want to buy something Next thing. I know I got a sick kid. Hey, I'm the same way. I want to buy something Next thing. I know I got a sick kid, I got a ball game. Something pops up. But in many cases points of contact following up with the sale every dealer that I know that's highly, highly successful. That is a common trait they have. That breeds success.
Jared:Yeah, I can't stress enough what you just said. Spot on man. I cannot stress that enough. I want to say one thing on what you just said because it ties into something else I have pulled up to share how buyers feel about those sales follow-ups real quickly 75% of online buyers. So we care about online sales. We look at online sales and I give these stats 75% of online buyers want to receive two to four phone calls Period. They don't want to buy on the first call. They want to feel comfortable with who they're buying from. 12% of online buyers would like a company to call until they get a hold of them, often leaving voicemails. They want to know that we care about them.
Jared:Think about how you want to be treated if you were buying something. You want to be courted. We're not selling $5 cheeseburgers. We're selling $7,500 major purchases. That might be a once-in-a-lifetime type of purchase.
Jared:42% of people want to be encouraged to buy it at an appointed time. Always set the appointment. Always set the next task time. Always set the appointment. Always set the next task. We are getting very good about that around here in this office space of what's the next task item. If the customer says, hey, follow up with me in a couple of weeks. I say by the end of the week. You follow up with them. You never know when they want to be contacted. If they're giving you an endless end date, call them back, let them tell you they're not ready yet and then call them again period. And then, lastly, 57% of people and that's over half the customers appreciate low pressure follow-ups and these are not.
Jared:Hey, are you feeling about buying? How are you feeling about buying today? Hey, you were telling me about your kid's baseball game this weekend. I just wanted to check in and see how. That was Joel. So I'm going to give a quick shout out to Joel at J Money. I have learned so much from that guy. You guys can learn a lot about your financing needs, but I can tell you Joel Oney is the absolute best at creating a follow-up conversation, because that guy remembers everything.
Jared:I was in the car with him one time and I heard him close Like I don't even know. It was a lot of money, let's just say that, a big deal. And he started it off with hey, you know I was checking in with you guys. Um, you know, you told me your kid had a wrestling meet. And I'm thinking to myself. I'm driving, we're on, we're actually on our way to North Carolina and I'm thinking what in the heck is Joel talking about with this guy? And, like not even joking, two hours later, on the same phone call, he's closing a deal. That's a massive deal, and I mean a lot of money. So I want to stress to you guys what Marc just said, and I want to back that up from a dealer perspective.
Jared:You cannot do enough for your customer. It is your job, it is your responsibility, is what you're doing as a salesperson. It is your job to take care of your customer. They expect it and when they don't get it, they will buy from somebody else who's not you. Let me tell you that right now. Every time you will lose that sale and there's nothing worse in the world than picking up the phone. Hey, checking in with you guys. We were talking about the shed. I already bought from somebody else. Those are the words that hurt me. That hurt me to the core of my existence. I can't stand. It Makes me sick. JW, you were going to share something, brother.
JW:Yeah, I was going to share and I think this will kind of transition to our last topic of partnerships and what dealers are looking for and then what manufacturers are looking for In the breadth of follow-ups and attitude and effort, as Marc shared and as you've talked about, Jared and I used to work with a gentleman, ironically, that had a saying that he would use all the time and I really liked it. It was a mistake of the mind versus a mistake of the heart and Jared and I have talked about this at times I like that he's chuckling there. But a mistake is when you drop the ball on something right. You you, as marc said earlier, you wanted to post 10 marketplace posts and you only posted eight because you got busy, you know, or you forgot something Right. These are all mistakes of the mind. A mistake of the heart is like where you just kind of folded or you're consistently folding in the sense of your efforts not there, your attitudes not there, you're not committed and I think the biggest thing that we see in the shed world Jared mentioned that sometimes all it takes to close a deal in this industry is answering the phone because the customer says four other people did it. Those four people that did it. Those are examples of mistakes of the heart Right, and what that means is is they're not committed, they're not invested and they don't want it.
JW:I've shared this with Marc. I share this. I'm a very high energy guy, as Marc is. I like to go go, go, run, run run. I'm a sales guy, I'm a relationship guy and I like to see people be successful. But I've told several of my dealers and I will continue to say this for as long as I'm in the industry or in any industry in life is I can't want it more than you. I can't If I want it more than you, right, I can't. If I want it more than you, this partnership and, more importantly, your business or whatever you're trying to do, that I want more than you. You'll never be successful at it. If JW Rucker wants it more than you, you have to want it more than anybody. And what that looks like is that looks like following up, that looks like posting, that looks like making sure that you're touching the customers. Does that mean that you can't be forgetful at times and things fall into the rug? No, we're all humans. We all make mistakes. Life gets hectic with families, you know relationships or even medical issues. We understand all of that, but you have to want it more than anybody else wants it, and if you don't, you're going to have a hard time ever reaching the goals and the levels that you're set out for. But I think that's the biggest thing and I mean that's the number one thing and I think I can speak for Marc too.
JW:When we go and meet with potential dealers and new dealers or new dealers come and meet with us, obviously we want to know about their physical location. We want to know the car count. We want to know if they're hustlers. We want to know how well-versed they are online advertising. We want to know all of that. We want to know their previous shed experience. But the number one thing I want to know is do you want it? How bad do you want it?
JW:Because one of my best dealers, marc Open, before I came to Sheds Direct. His lot is in the middle of a cornfield guys. His lot is in the middle of a cornfield guys From July to September in Southern Ohio. You can't even see the sheds until you can touch them. You can't even see them. He is in the middle of nowhere. But I'm going to tell you he's one of my best dealers. Why Marc ever opened him, I have no idea. His lot is in the middle of nowhere, but Marc saw that he was a hustler and that he wanted it. And that dude, I can't go a day without calling him. And he's like, yeah, I was just out on the lot with a customer and I'm like how are these customers finding you, man? How are they finding you? You're in a cornfield. The car counts like 700 cars a day and I mean at least five of them are going to his lot every day. It's absolutely ridiculous. So I mean I just want to encourage the dealers.
JW:Like, if you don't want it, you're in the wrong industry, right? Eric Thomas is one of my favorite motivational speakers. He says if you won't do what you're doing for free for a period of time, you don't want it. You know and I don't say that to discourage anybody but it's whether you're a mechanic, like Marc said, and you don't love working a mechanic job and you don't love getting up early and doing it, you need to not be a mechanic anymore. If you're a shed dealer and you don't love getting up and selling sheds, if a follow-up call is a burden to you. You're probably not doing the right thing, and that's where you just really need to sit back and evaluate. If I want to be here, I've got to want it like here. Right, Jared, I'll go ahead and talk to the dealer, that's the number one thing I look for in a dealer.
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Jared:Yeah, we talked about that last time. Right, if you're not doing it the way it should be done, maybe get out of the way and let somebody else do it. If your time is coming past, maybe it's time to look for something else on the horizon line. I can tell you that is a between what you said, marc, and what you said, JW. That motivates me for a call to action. Right, and I can tell you from a firsthand perspective. I am no different than anybody else on this phone call. I have my good days and my mad days. I have excellent sales months. I have really crappy sales months. We struggle with wood sales sometimes. We struggle with metal sales sometimes. I can tell you, the number one thing that I have found out over the last few years of doing this is having the right partners at the right time is crucial. And if you can't hear from these two guys the motivation in their voices to sell sheds, to help you sling sheds if that's something you might be interested in, that's my call to action for you guys is I got lucky that marc stepped foot through my door.
Jared:Quite honestly, I was not expecting it and I needed it. Quite honestly, I needed it right now because I was looking and I was nervous about the next steps for me because I was being complete and honestly this is just me being raw and emotional right now I was being very complacent and trying to be a good friend to our current supplier at that time who had done me really well, and Marc could attest to this. I did not want to change. I really appreciated and honestly loved working with the previous supplier that we had and it just came down to what was right for my business. Said direct, fit me like a glove. The way that they do business is the way that we do business and it wasn't a situation of hard feelings and burden. Once I realized what it was like, I opened the door and it was the wizard of oz moment, right where you're black and white and you're in this tornado ridden house and you walk out to the world of Oz and it's like, oh, this is what it should be like doing what I'm doing. It made my job so much easier. It made me love what I do so much more. Because they took the burden of all the extra, because that's what they do, and there's other manufacturers out there.
Jared:I'm not here to tell you that if you're a manufacturer, you're not doing a great job. I don't know them all there's a bunch of them, right? I can tell you from my personal perspective we use and we love working with sheds direct. We have not had any issues on any level that couldn't have been handled in 30 seconds, and they always come to bat when I need them. And I can tell you from a personnel perspective, a me to you, if I, if you're listening to me, and you are struggling with your current supplier, it might be time to make a change. And this is where I advertise and I and I I'm just giving you my heart right now on a sleeve I can tell you I was there. I was sitting there struggling. It was literally five o'clock on a middle of the week day and I was literally on the phone with Eric, and Eric can tell you this story. Sometime. I was on the phone with him and Marc walked in the door and everything got easier from that exact moment. He knew exactly what I needed and we worked together to make it happen and I'm so happy that we did.
Jared:Tell me how the Sheds Direct dealer partnership works. Tell me how, tell our friends how they can get in contact with you guys If there is a need there. If you were in the mid Atlantic market, if you were in the Midwest, these guys can help you out. I'll let them give you guys the coverage areas. I'm going to give them the floor to give us a five-minute sales pitch on why, the why behind it. Tell us why Sheds Direct.
Marc:First off, I'll say this right here. Number one we won't shed people. If you look at from the 2018, all the way to now, there's a lot of people that call us up and say I want to sell sheds, and they would jump in the shed business one day and six months later they're selling something else right there, that ship is sailed. So, number one if you're a shed person, if you're a shed slinger, and at the end of the day, if you just want to meet another shed friend, listen, I'll break bread with you, I'll buy you lunch, breakfast, whatever, dinner. We'll have a cup of coffee, like I mentioned earlier, because our goal and our focus is to connect shed people and bring them under the umbrella of SDI, for three different reasons. Number one due to our technology, as Jared talked about earlier. We know a lot of dealers. I know a lot of competitive dealers that they don't just have to worry about selling the building. They have to worry about the inventory. They've got to worry about the RTO. They've got to worry about scheduling the delivery. They've got to worry about follow-up customer service. They've got to worry about scheduling the delivery. They've got to worry about follow-up customer service. They've got to worry about the work order. Maybe something happens, the driver dings it, somebody's got to get it fixed. They've got to worry about the financing. They've got to worry about everything, not just selling the building. Sdi takes that all away. We are looking to mesh our product line and our service and our technology with Shed Slingers and that is our focus moving forward into 2025. When you look at technology, when you look at sales focus, I had a gentleman the other day I actually met with yesterday. I was in Virginia. It was a great meeting. This guy's been in the Shed business for a while. He brought his wife and small baby. We were meeting and we were talking and he said you know, once I sell the barn, you know, usually then I'll follow up with the delivery team. I said, hold on, let's take a step back. I said, when you sell the barn, I need you to follow up with the next customer and sell them the barn as well, and then you follow up the next lead and sell them the barn. I need your pipeline to be overflowing. Okay, and so you know we're heavy sales focus when it comes to promotions, when it comes to, you know, creating that sales environment, when it comes to following up points of contact, sales training, rto sales training, rto financing, price point, service quality options all that stuff. We're heavy, heavy sales focused. And then, of course, the third piece is a diverse product line. When you look at vinyl LP, all the options you can possibly imagine and our goal is to take what we do best right. Our goal is to take a great product, the first product line, a sales focus, mentality, technology that eliminates all the service work that you've had to deal with, all the customer issues you've had to deal with, and you mesh that with Shed Slingers, man, we will move mountains to bridge that gap. We will move mountains to kind of mold that and bring that together. That is our focus, moving forward into the future. I tell people all the time 2018, if your grandmother wanted to put a shed on her front yard to sell, I probably would have given it to her to see how good a shed seller she would be. We've totally changed the model and the mindset. Our focus is to bring in lifelong shed people, people in the industry, under the umbrella and mesh those two together between a shed selling mindset and really our focus initiatives every day. So that's really how it works.
Marc:If you want to get in touch with Sheds Direct. It's very, very easy, man, listen. You want to get in touch with Sheds Direct? It's very, very easy, man, listen. Jared has all my contact information. My email is marc marc with a C at shedsdirectinc. com. Shedsdirectinc. com. I'll let JW talk a little bit here and close us out. But listen, you call the corporate office. Ask for Marc Church man, they know I'm a phone call and email away. I stay on the road a lot. I like to be out and about meeting people and so, man, we would love to talk. Listen, I tell people at the end of the day you're going to meet a shed friend and I'm going to have a new shed friend, okay, and so you know, please reach out, get in touch with me and, like Jared said, I love the cold call. I'll knock on your door at eight o'clock in the morning or eight o'clock at night just to have a conversation about selling sheds. That's how much I enjoy the industry. JW, I'll turn it over to you.
JW:Man, that's a hard act to follow. I mean just echo and marc. Man, we are looking for the right people. We're looking for shed people that love what they do, that want to be successful in this space. And that's really our main qualification, man. We just want you to want it, we want you to be a good person, we want you to like what you do and we like to have fun with what we do. Man, if you're not enjoying what you do, it's a lot harder. So we have fun.
JW:Marc mentioned our group chat earlier. Man, I text my dealers every day for the most part the majority of them and I mean man, I want us to have fun doing what we're doing making a living, providing for families and so on and so forth. So I mean it's a blessing. As Marc said, my email is very similar. It's JW, the two letters at shedsdirectinc. com or reach out to our corporate office. Our corporate office phone number is is 828-212-1378. That's 828-212-1378. Ask for Marc or ask for JW. Either of us would be happy to speak with you guys. As Marc said, just make a friend talk about the industry, learn something or even potentially explore a partnership together.
Jared:So we would be joyful to have that opportunity 100%, I can tell you as we close out for today, don't hesitate to contact these guys. Okay, it's not going to be a hard sales pitch. Marc did show up at my doorstep. It was late, but he didn't overstay his welcome. As a matter of fact, I think I wanted him to stay longer than he wanted to that night. I can tell you we left that conversation as mutual friends and mutual respect for one another. It's not that he wanted to sign me up that day either. He was just stopping by to say hi, and that's the truth of it. I can tell you from my perspective, it is going to be an easy transition. If you need to make one, If you're not selling wood sheds, let me give you that call to action as we close out this week.
Jared:If you're selling metal buildings and you're not selling wood sheds, you're making a grave mistake. Wood sheds are easy to sell. They're fun to sell. The customers are ready to buy if you're ready to sell it to them, that goes back to what we talked about earlier. Be motivated for your customers. Remember it's your job to sell buildings. If you're a dealer, that's what you're going to get up and do every day. If you don't like doing it. Maybe think about doing something else. Find something that you're passionate about and get out of the way. For those of us who are, I can tell you we love this business. We love slinging sheds in metal buildings. We love you guys too.
Jared:Thank you for listening to this episode of the Steel Kings podcast. Check out our friends over at J Money. Joel and Katie will help you out with your metal buildings, your wood sheds. If you're manufacturing them, if you're selling them, if you're in home improvement and construction, hit those guys up. Zero cost to you on most deals that can be competitive. You can get customers on a monthly payment. Everybody loves a monthly payment. The team over at J Money will help you take care of that. Check out Shannon's podcast on Wednesday. Check out Dylan and his team over at Shed Geek. Marketing For JW, for Marc. I'm Jared. This has been the Steel Kings podcast and we'll talk to you guys next week.
JW:Peace out.