How Automation Transforms Small Business: Systems, Sales, & Marketing | Clate Mask

Ever felt overwhelmed by the chaos of entrepreneurship and wondered if there's a way to reclaim your freedom and time? You're not alone. Join us as we sit down with Clayte Mask, CEO and Co-Founder of Keap, an expert in helping small businesses automate their processes. With over two decades of experience and insights from his book "Conquer the Chaos: The Six Keys to Success for Entrepreneurs," Clate sheds light on the dark side of entrepreneurship and shares practical strategies to tackle the twin monsters of time scarcity and insufficient systems that plague many business owners.

Experience the fascinating journey from traditional business models to cutting-edge SaaS solutions. Clate shares his personal story of co-founding a software company that revolutionizes small business operations through automation. Discover how transitioning from hourly services to subscription-based models can be a game-changer. We also address the myths surrounding automation, illustrating how the right combination of software, strategy, and services can stop your resources from slipping through the cracks, ultimately leading to more efficient business processes.

Unlock the secret to maximizing sales with effective marketing automation. Learn how tools like Keap and strategic follow-ups can transform your customer journey and significantly boost sales — sometimes even doubling or tripling them. Clate reveals why consistent follow-up is the often-overlooked key to growth, and how you can "buy back" your time by automating repetitive tasks. Get ready to transform potential leads into loyal customers and experience substantial business growth with strategic time management and systems that work for you.

Clate Mask: CEO and Co-Founder of Keap

Website(s):
https://keap.com/
https://keap.page/rhl950/a-guide-to-entrepreneurs.html

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clatemask/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@Keapgrowing

#SmallBusinessAutomation #SmallBusinessGrowth #EntrepreneurLife #BoostSales #BusinessSystems #FollowUpAutomation #ConquerTheChaos #SAAS #Sales #Marketing #SmallBusinessOwners #BusinessGrowth #SalesAutomation #KeapCRM #MarketingAutomation #TimeManagement #BusinessStrategy #ClateMask #BusinessSuccess #Entrepreneurship #SmallBusinessOwners #BusinessPodcast #PodcastEpisode #BusinessTransformation #SmallBusinessPivots #Success #BusinessOwners #MichaelDMorrison #OklahomaCity #BOSS #EntrepreneurAdvice 

Chapters

• 0:00 Entrepreneurial Strategies for Small Business
• 5:25 Maximizing Small Business Efficiency Through Automation
• 15:57 Maximizing Sales Through Marketing Automation
• 29:48 Increasing Sales Through Follow-Up Automation

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

All right, welcome to another Small Business Pivots. We have another special guest from around the world and, as I always say, no one can introduce themselves or their business like the business owner.

Speaker 2: 0:09

So tell us a little bit about yourself, where you're at and your business software for businesses generally, that are, you know, between 100,000 and 3 million in that range, where they're just trying to get more hours in the day, and we know that automation is the great game changer. And that's what we do is we help them automate so they can grow their business and get the growth, profit and freedom they want Fantastic.

Speaker 1: 0:41

Well, I know a lot about you, but our listeners don't. So how are we going to help our listeners today?

Speaker 2: 0:46

Yeah. So you know I've been doing this for over 20 years. We've been, you know I've been so fortunate to work with just you know hundreds of thousands of small businesses and see what works and what doesn't work. I wrote a book called Conquer the Chaos the Six Keys to Success for Entrepreneurs, and so we'll talk a little bit about those six keys that I've seen as being crucial in the success and pretty evident when businesses fail that they weren't practicing those keys. We'll talk briefly about those keys and maybe dig into one or two that'll help people to find the success they want.

Speaker 1: 1:19

All right, listeners buckle up, but first we need to introduce the show. We'll be right back. Welcome to Small Business Pivots, a podcast designed for small business owners. I'm your host, michael Morrison, a small business coach and founder of BOSS, where we make business ownership simplified for success, so that you can own a business that runs without you. To learn more, go to businessownershipsimplifiedcom. All right, welcome back to Small Business Pivots. Where would you like to start with?

Speaker 2: 1:55

Clay, because I know you've got a lot to share. Yeah, you bet. Well, michael, thanks for talking with me here. It's been fun just to talk shop a little bit and recognize how time-starved entrepreneurs are and business owners are, as they're trying to get the business really going. And so I, you know, I want to just talk a little bit about that. And you know, in the book Conquer the Chaos, I talk about the dark side of entrepreneurship, which is where the business begins to really envelop the business owner, starts to consume them. It takes way more of the time, energy, creativity that the business owner starts to consume them. It takes way more of the time, energy, creativity that the business owner expected.

Speaker 2: 2:29

You know, business owners usually start their business wanting freedom and they think, hey, this is what we're going to go get. You know, no cap on my income potential, more time, more flexibility, more impact, the control of what I want to do. You know this freedom. And yet what we get is chaos. And so that problem of chaos instead of freedom comes really because of two things.

Speaker 2: 2:51

Number one, when it comes to running a small business, the straight, honest truth is there are not enough hours in the day, and as long as we don't. Just if we don't embrace that reality that there are not enough hours in the day, it can really do a number on us mentally, emotionally, psychologically. So we just need to embrace that, we need to recognize there is chaos in small business because there aren't enough hours in the day. That's the first reason. The second reason we can do, we can really do something about. Yet in most small businesses, the processes and systems are lacking and they're insufficient to create the smooth growth and scaling of a business. And so, when you get right down to it, why do we have chaos and not freedom? Well, there aren't enough hours in the day for small businesses and we don't have adequate systems and processes. So we should probably talk a little bit about that adequate systems and processes.

Speaker 1: 3:45

So we should probably talk a little bit about that. Wow, isn't that amazing how there are too many hours in the day when we have a job, but as a business owner, there's not enough hours in the day, but we have a job yes, right Instead of that freedom that you were talking about?

Speaker 2: 4:00

Yeah, You're dead on, Isn't that? Isn't that the truth? Well said, and when you start doing, you know, then you start to get a little frustrated because you realize how many hours you're working and do the math on the dollars per hour and you think, well crap.

Speaker 1: 4:15

I should have stayed in my job. Well, let me back up just a second, because I know when I'm listening to podcasts I kind of like to know a little bit about someone's background. So how did you get into entrepreneurship?

Speaker 2: 4:28

Yeah, you bet, you know I always had growing up dad was a teacher, mom, stay-at-home mom with six kids and we were always kind of struggling to make things work financially. And when I looked around at friends, neighbors, it seemed like people that were running their own business had something figured out and and they were. You know, I was, I grew up in a pretty affluent area, but we were always kind of the poor kids on the block and and I I looked around at people that were running their own businesses and I was like I want to do something like that. So I kind of early on I kind of had this a little bit of fire in me and then just always had a desire to find ways to earn money. And my parents, you know, are amazing. They kind of taught me that, look, if you want something in this world, go to work and figure out how to, how to buy it, figure out how to make the money and then go buy it and and so I that was kind of my upbringing and then I got into software. When I was in graduate school I went through a lot of schooling and I knew I didn't really love school but I felt like I should do that. And then I started to get into software. And then that began to lead me back down the path of entrepreneurship.

Speaker 2: 5:39

And in the early days of starting this business, you know, sharice, my wife would say, why did we go to all that college and you're doing something that you didn't even need a high school diploma for? You could just do this. And I said I don't know, it's just kind of the way it worked out. But she was right. Long story short, I joined up with her two brothers.

Speaker 2: 5:57

The three of us started building a software company that helped small businesses do what we were trying to do, which was do sales and marketing and automation in a way that could free us up some. And we started to invent kind of a brand of CRM software customer relationship management software that would automate a lot of the workflows and processes. And so that's how we got into what we do. I could go much deeper down the rabbit hole of the days where we felt like it was time to quit and we pushed through it, and the days when we started using our software and shouted Eureka and the days where we started to recognize that this automation thing was pretty darn cool. But that's the quick background. You know, today we've got hundreds of employees. You know we've served hundreds of thousands of small businesses. You know we've I've raised capital which you know that we could go down that path that we wanted to talk about, but probably most people are probably like heck, no, let's do it on our own.

Speaker 1: 6:58

Because that's a beast in itself.

Speaker 2: 7:00

It is. It is. That's a podcast episode for a different day.

Speaker 1: 7:06

Well, the show is called Small Business Pivots. Were there any significant pivots that you could share that maybe small business owners could relate to and maybe take some of your insights?

Speaker 2: 7:14

Yeah, to having a product that we could resell and then, a little bit later, to having a web-based you know, an online product where we could charge a subscription for. Those are two pivots that created real efficiency for us, where we went from fundamentally exchanging hours for dollars to now having a product that we could resell, to then having a product that we could not only resell but recharge for it each month, you know, turning it into a utility. And that's obviously what SaaS you know software as a service is. But in every business you could make, you could do a version of that. Attorneys can go from trading hours for dollars to having packaged services, to having an online subscription that their you know subscription that their members can access. Accountants can do something similar. Even mechanics could do something similar. So, going from trading hours for dollars to productizing, to charging subscription, I think that journey is one that every service-based small business should be racking their brains on how to navigate.

Speaker 1: 8:25

Absolutely. And for those of you that think you may have heard, Keep before you have it's in your Google searches from time to time. So, we're talking to a master here, the goat if you will of small business, automation and things. So let's talk about the automation, because a lot of business owners they think, oh, that's just one more thing to learn. I can barely keep up with my own industry.

Speaker 2: 8:55

So can you share a little bit about the automation process? Yeah, and let me start with a little spoiler alert and this might sound odd coming from a software company CEO it's not about the software. There's lots of automation platforms out there and there's lots of ways to do automation. And you're exactly right, most small business owners don't have the time to go figure that out or even, a lot of times, don't have a team member that can go figure it out. So we say all the time look, it's about.

Speaker 2: 9:21

The success in automating comes from software strategy and services. And when you get a software platform, you've got to make sure that you're getting a strategy that goes along with it of how you implement it. And you have to be participative, in that you got to be a participant. You can't just say, oh, I bought this piece of software, go do this Well. You know that's like saying I hired a robot, go do this Well, do what. Like how do you want it to do what? What do you want done? And so the strategy is really important and it really the key that brings it all together is having services that can help you, as a small business, understand what you're trying to do, how you want to do it and then get that done. So software plus strategy plus services. Let me just kind of put people's minds at rest if they're like I got to go figure this out. No, you don't. You just got to work with somebody who can bring the package together and create a solution of software, strategy and service that will deliver the success. So, having said that, if you stop and think about the problem, it's really as simple as this. You know, I said I said insufficient products and processes and systems. I'm going to make it really simple.

Speaker 2: 10:31

Most small businesses and I mean this with all the love and admiration and and support that I could possibly lend Most small businesses are a leaky bucket and there's money and time that's just draining out of the bucket every day, and it happens in the form of broken systems and processes. And so stop and think about it. You spend some money on advertising to drive leads and some of those leads go to your website and some get captured and some fall by the wayside. And some fill out a form and some don't ever do that, and some who fill out the form show up on the discovery call or whatever that next step is. But at each step from the process of spending money to generate a lead and turn it into a customer.

Speaker 2: 11:18

There are leaks in the system and that's just in the marketing system. Then you go through in sales and you go through in service post-sale, and then you go through the business operations and what you find over and over in small businesses and again, I love them, like my children they have leaks in them and unfortunately it's really hard to grow a business when you've got a leaky bucket and the inclination is just to pour more money in the top. All the while the business owner knows, a it's coming out of their pocket and, b they're not getting the return on the investment that they want. And so if you just simplify down the whole point of automation, it's to look at that leaky bucket and plug automations into those holes.

Speaker 1: 12:04

Very well said. Yeah, because I do see a lot of business owners. I almost said spending time, but it's more wasting time trying to find that perfect automation which one can do all these things. And then it does so many things.

Speaker 2: 12:20

they buy it and then they don't do anything with it Cause there's too much to learn Like it doesn Like it doesn't just work like what you said Right, right, and that's why you know you need a little guidance that goes along with it. You need a little service, you need to get clear on the strategy because otherwise you're kind of reaching for something. But you know you've got leaks and you know that automations can plug it. But you need a map, you need a guide on how to do that. And what we do with our customers is we help them kind of map out the process to identify well, where are the leaks? Ok, where are the big ones? We start with the biggest ones and most of the time not always, but most of the time the most painful, obvious, biggest leaks are in marketing, because you're spending money there. It's not getting the yield that you want.

Speaker 2: 13:08

But then you, you know you plug those leaks and then all of a sudden they start. You know it starts leaking out on the sales side because you're not handling the leads effectively, they're not converting the right way, you know, and business owners will dig in and they're just aghast, you know they're just like how are we wasting this? What are we doing? You know how much money we spent on this to get these and now you're just cherry picking the best ones and throwing away the ones that don't. You know that kind of thing happens and then you close them and you realize, oh my gosh, if we would onboard and serve and fulfill on this on you know what we've sold more effectively.

Speaker 2: 13:42

Then the reviews, the referrals, the repeat business can happen very naturally. I always call those the three R's of profit. People say there's one R in profit and there's three reviews, referrals, repeat business. That's where all the profit is in small business and if you don't onboard and serve your customers effectively, you miss on all that profit, those reviews and referrals and repeat business. And then you do that and you go okay, well, internally we've got internal workflows and processes that are breaking down and handoffs are being missed between employees and stuff's getting dropped and customers are slipping through the cracks and deadlines are falling by the wayside.

Speaker 2: 14:17

You realize, oh well, we've got to plug that. Mapping out the business is the most unsexy, least exciting thing for business owners to do and it's actually where you identify the holes and the leaks in the system so that you can plug them. And because most people will put that off and put that off and put that off, it's really good to work with someone who can say let's get this clear for you, let's get the strategy right, let's lay out your business map or business process, map it out, identify where the holes are and then plug automations. And you know the awesome thing about automations is you just keep doing more and more and more. Like my co-founder says, once you get hooked on automation, you can't stop. It's amazing, amen.

Speaker 1: 15:01

Amen. You're listening to Small Business Pivots. This episode is proudly brought to you by BOSS, where business ownership is simplified for success. At BOSS, we help business owners create their businesses to run smoothly without them being there 24-7. Our seasoned business coaches who have walked the path themselves, provide invaluable guidance and support. Thank you. Discover how small business success begins with boss at businessownershipsimplifiedcom.

Speaker 1: 15:47

If you're enjoying the podcast, make sure to stay connected by hitting that subscribe button, giving us a thumbs up or leaving a positive review. Your support keeps us going. Now let's get back to our incredible guest. Well, for those business owners that's wondering do I fall in that bucket? I will say this because I'm a business coach, so I work with a lot. Those business owners that's wondering do I fall in that bucket? I will say this because I'm a business coach, so I work with a lot of business owners. For those that keep pouring more money into sales if you have a stack of business cards from networking events that you've gone to and you haven't done anything with those, we're talking to you because you might have sales in front of you but you haven't set up any kind of system to capture possible sales and I see that with business owners.

Speaker 1: 16:27

They just keep pouring more money, more time into all these 10 X. Increase your sales in 90 days, but you have sales in front of you everywhere. I promise business owners on your desk, in your drawers, in your car, in your glove compartment, wherever. So what would someone start with with Heap? How would you help them discover that?

Speaker 2: 16:49

Yeah, what we do is we take them through a process and we give them a growth playbook which, in essence, is about identifying these leaks in the bucket. You know, identifies the leaks in the bucket and starts with the top three most important ones to address. And and they can, by the way, they can get this, this playbook, um for free and they can do it, um, get a session to kind of help guide them through it, and then they can implement it themselves. They can go find somebody else to do that with or they can work with us to do it. But they can go to keepcom slash playbook, k-e-a-pcom slash playbook, and you can kind of see the process there and sign up to get a session and get your playbook. And the great thing, once you have your playbook, is you can do it over time. You can do it yourself, you can go get a different automation platform to help you do it.

Speaker 2: 17:43

I would just say, whatever you do, don't just get the software thinking you're going to do it yourself. Get the software, a little bit of strategy to go along with it and some services so that you can get it implemented. Because when you implement it properly, like with that combination, the ROI is through the roof. When you just buy a piece of software, the stats are alarmingly unpleasant for how often it doesn't work. And again people will naturally say, well, it's the software's fault. No, if anything, it's the software company and software industry's fault for not helping people understand. You need more than just a piece of software to throw at the problem. You've got to have the software, the strategy and the services to get to success.

Speaker 1: 18:28

So, on the sales and marketing automation, let's start there. What does the process look like with a software like Keep? Because I know a lot of them are either intimidated, they don't have time, they just, or I'll back up a little. They just don't understand it because they've never used automation before. So can you explain how that works and how?

Speaker 2: 18:48

beneficial it is, you bet Super common scenario is you are collecting a lead and you need to effectively follow up with that lead and nurture it to convert it in the next step of the sales process. And nurture it to convert it in the next step of the sales process. So how do you do that? Well, you use software like ours to put a form on your website that, when someone and the whole point is to have a lead magnet that attracts your ideal prospect and will, and that ideal prospect will give you their contact information in exchange for the value that you're giving. So what's that lead magnet? That lead magnet could be a white paper. It could be a, you know, a buyer's guide. It could be you know what to avoid when you're doing this. It could be a webinar, it could be a free one-on-one consult, you know. It can be any number of free samples, or whatever it is, but you're, you're using that to attract the people that you're, you know, are your ideal customers. And so now you use, so you use software like ours to create a form that, when filled out, delivers the thing that, the thing that the prospect wanted, also stores all of the prospect's information in the software and tracks everything that that person does, whether they click or open or all their behavior, so that you now know, okay, this person filled out this form, they have this interest, they want to move forward with us or not, and there's automated follow-ups that are happening by text or email or phone calls that you can intersperse in there, and all of it is designed to move the prospect from point A to point B and point B is not, you know, done, deal, close, the customer moved on. You know it's a dating process, as we all know, and most people on this call didn't ask their spouse to marry them after the first date. There's a nurturing process, there's a dating process, and so you're moving them from point A to point B and in most small businesses there's really usually one or two checkpoints in between a new lead and that person signing up for the product or service.

Speaker 2: 21:03

So we design that get really clear on that customer journey, as it's often called, and we say, okay, well, now let's automate that so that you don't have a prospect that's waiting for something on your side, because that's where the leaks happen, when there's something we have to do on the small business side but we're busy taking care of clients or, you know, putting out a fire, or showing up at our child's soccer game that we promised, or whatever that is.

Speaker 2: 21:31

We need the prospect to keep going through an automated journey, and so the way I like to visualize and create a visual for people is, if you've ever been in an airport and gone to, you know seen the moving sidewalks that you know the moving. Well, you want to put your prospect on that move, that moving conveyor belt that just keeps them going while you're running your business and taking care of other things. And that's what automation will do for you is it'll move them from step to step to step, and at certain points there's human intervention, but, but. But your automation system is notifying you of when it's time to engage, as you know as a human, and it's taking care of all. You know. It's essentially the moving sidewalk in the background.

Speaker 1: 22:10

Being very well educated in this space. What would you say, cause I know there's a lot of options out there for a CRM. What? What would you say is something that a business owner should be looking for to start with, since there are so many options.

Speaker 2: 22:25

First one we are one we already covered which is software or the strategy of the service, kind of a click down on that. With the strategy you want to start. You want to work with a platform that has a starting point for you, some templates, some pre-built things, so that you're not recreating the wheel and you know doing everything from scratch. As much as we all like to believe, our business is special, unique and different. It's pretty darn similar to some others that are out there that have already, you know, gone down this path, and so we want to learn from them. We want to just do what other successful people have been doing and use automations that are proven to plug the holes in a business. So that's the second thing. First one software strategy service. The second one is proven automations that you can start with where you're not building it from scratch. The third thing I would say is really finding a vendor, an automation platform that is right-sized for your business, and this one is really difficult for people to identify because, unfortunately, a lot of software vendors will say we do this for everybody. Oh, we do it for small businesses and medium-sized businesses and enterprises, and then they'll say oh, we do it for small businesses and you find out what they really mean is 50-person companies, not five-person companies, or what they really mean is 20-person companies, not one-person companies. So you got to be pretty clear about the vendor and who you're working with.

Speaker 2: 23:55

And we serve small businesses. Our customers are generally two to 25 employees. If they're a solopreneur, they're not a good fit unless they're just about to break out. You know they've passed the six figure mark there. They really have got like they got a job that's really starting to stretch them and push them and they're ready to move to go to the next level. Then that solopreneur can work with can can work with us. But 90 percent of the of the small business market, as you know, is solopreneurs and we're very clear we're not for the newbie, we're not for the beginner and you know we want them to be successful.

Speaker 2: 24:31

By the way, we tried to go down that path. Didn't work well for us and we said you know what? That's just not who we are. Our automation platform is for small businesses, that they've got a lot going on and things are starting to slip through the cracks and that's where we really shine is that two to 25 employees. When they start with us, they can grow with us up to 100. But unfortunately a lot of CRM vendors and automation vendors out there. They'll say that we can serve anybody and when you get into it you realize, oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. Salesforce is not for us. Hubspot is not for this kind of small business. It's a much bigger small business and, um, you know, if you're, if you don't do that, the cost and complexity get out of control really fast.

Speaker 1: 25:17

Absolutely. And for business owners, a lot of those softwares. Well, you didn't mention them, but they charge per module or per whatever you want. And I had a business owner, solopreneur, wanting to grow, spending almost 400 bucks a month on a CRM Because they thought the more they invested in those modules, the more it could do. But what they found out was I don't need all that. But they didn't realize that until they brought it to my attention, brought their financials to me, and I said whoa, what do you? You only make X annual revenue and you're spending this much. Is it increasing sales? No, I can't even figure it out. So it's OK to call it quits and go find something that's more comparable to your. So I'm glad you brought that up, because that's something a lot of us don't think about.

Speaker 2: 26:05

Yeah, and I see it all the time and I hate it because the definition of small business is so broad that people think, oh, it's small business and it's like, well, hold on. I talk a lot about the stages of small business success and how they change on the ones and threes of revenue. You know $100,000 to $300,000 to 300,000 to a million to 3 million to 10 million to 30 million. It's an amazing thing. I've studied this for years and years and years and the people process. Products need to get adjusted at each stage change. If they don't, you get plateaued at one of these stages. And yet in small business a lot of times it's just all talked about as the same thing. So I'll give people a good rule of thumb.

Speaker 2: 26:48

Generally speaking, your CRM automation platform is about one to 2% of your total annual revenues and you know I've looked at it six ways a Sunday. It's just the way it is. I you know sometimes you're on the higher end because you're really starting to grow and so it looks more like 2%. Sometimes you might only be 0.75% because you've really maxed out your systems and you're getting really good yield on it and there's an upgrade that needs to be done pretty soon. It's just that kind of thing and people don't like to think of it that way. But if you stop and think about in a retail space to transact your sales with a credit card, you're spending a couple percent. It's just kind of the cost of sales and it's a part of doing business that if people will kind of use that as a rule of thumb they won't get too far off the field one way or the other.

Speaker 1: 27:40

I know for a lot of business owners they're stuck because they can't think of how they're going to get ahead, if that makes sense. So they're kind of stuck in that roller coaster of I don't have time to do one more thing. Take yourself back to when you were there, when you were trying to develop this software, move forward. What were some of the things that you found time other than just creating systems and processes, Because there's also a mindset involved with that. Can you explain or give some insight on that?

Speaker 2: 28:10

Yeah, you bet I'll share two principles that I think will get people in the right mindset to really start to attack this, and it's really fun once you start doing it. The first principle is what is manual and repetitive can be automated. So what you want to do is notice okay, well, where are we doing things over and over and over? And one of the easiest ways is to go look at your sent mail and just see what messages you're sending that are almost the exact same thing going to different people and you're writing this thing over and over Well, that can be automated. Any process you're writing this thing over and over and over Well, that can be automated. Any process where you're doing it over and over and over or your people are doing it over and over and over well, if it's manual and repetitive, it can be automated. That's the first principle.

Speaker 2: 28:56

The second principle is that automation is to your time what compound interest is to your money. So what that means is if we can just get a little bit of automation working for us now that starts to produce something that we've got more capacity to do more and more and more. So, just like the math of compound interest enables you to pay down debt in smart ways, if you use that principle, or to build up savings in smart ways, if you use that principle or to build up savings in smart ways, if you use that principle, well, automation is the same thing with our time. So what we want to do is just like a smart investor would free up a little cash and then go well, let me put this into an investment where I can apply the law of compound interest and it'll start growing. For me, you want to do the same thing.

Speaker 2: 29:48

When you free up a little bit of time, you identify a manual, repetitive task that you can put into a system or automate it. And now that frees up a little bit of time. Now, what do you do with that time? Well, you don't go spend it and throw it away. You reinvest it into some more automation so that it creates more and more time. And each time you do that, you can start, you know, you start doing little processes and it's like, oh wow, this process takes, you know, seven minutes, but we do it six times a day, and now we automate that. We just saved 42 minutes, you know. And then, well, this one, we just saved an hour this way, and it's really fun. This is where I said you start to get addicted to it, because you can start to just put, you can buy back your time, you can start to create hours in the day, and that is the most precious commodity for small businesses.

Speaker 1: 30:39

Absolutely, and every time I think that everyone has heard of a calendar scheduler I meet a business owner that hasn't. So if you're not using anything at all, what you're talking about, go find a calendar scheduler. Calendly is what we've used in the past. That's all it does. But to get that momentum going, I remember the first time that I found automation exactly what you said I was like let's go find some more Like that is really cool, right? So you're spot on. I think that let's go find some more Like that is really cool. So that you're, you're spot on. I think that's a great way to look at it.

Speaker 2: 31:19

Well, great, yep, there's all all sorts of ways to look at the repetitive manual things that we do and we just get stuck doing them and we don't realize, oh my gosh, there's a, there's a better way to do this.

Speaker 1: 31:24

Absolutely so. What is the best way for people to follow? You find you.

Speaker 2: 31:30

Yeah, you bet you know they can follow me at ClaytonMaskcom. They can follow me just kind of on social Clayton Mask, but probably the best way is to go to Keepcom and really Keepcom slash playbook if they want to learn more about what we do. That's where we really help people through this process of going through the leaky bucket, plugging the holes and buying back their time so that they can get the kind of growth, profit and freedom they want.

Speaker 1: 31:59

Fantastic. Well, I always end with a question of if you were in a room of small business owners of all levels of business, what's something applicable that you could tell all of them? That would be relatable.

Speaker 2: 32:11

Yes, I would say every small business could increase their sales by two to three X with proper follow-up. What I just said was really the simple way of saying what our software does. It's an automated follow-up system, and what happens in most businesses is there's not enough time, the systems aren't there, and so follow-up breaks down. And it's the most simple and basic thing in the world that when you send more follow-up, you make more sales. And so if you just even if it's bad follow-up by the way, and so if you just even if it's bad follow-up by the way just more follow-up makes more sales, it is because, newsflash, they didn't get your first message and you've got to keep sending, you got to keep sharing the message, and so most people are dramatically underestimating the amount of follow-up that's needed. And they can.

Speaker 2: 33:13

You know, we've watched it over and over and over and over with our customers. There's not a small business on the planet that cannot double or triple their sales with proper follow-up. I know it's a provocative thing to say, but I've done this for over two decades. I've watched it over and over and over and I stand by it. I say all the time you know when I die and you know people look at my tombstone. I wanted to say you know, clayton Mass, great husband, great father, follow-up works.

Speaker 1: 33:36

That's awesome. I want to enhance that because we just had a client I don't know if it's a, I'll take it as a compliment review. I asked them and they made a very large purchase and I said what made you consider using Boss for this particular product? And they said you were the only one that called me back. Perfect example. And they reached out to six different vendors and we were the only one that called them back. So that's powerful, right there.

Speaker 2: 34:05

And if people don't do any plugging of the holes, that's powerful right there. And if people don't do any plugging of the holes, except for automating their follow-up in the lead conversion process and the post-purchase process, if they just do those two things, they will grow their business substantially. It will propel the business forward while the business owner's doing all the things they got to do to manage the issues. But unfortunately what happens is everybody knows they should be following up, they should be doing these things, and there aren't enough hours in the day and the systems are inadequate and the follow-up doesn't happen and the business struggles to grow.

Speaker 1: 34:41

Solid advice. Well, Clayton, you've been a blessing to many and a wealth of knowledge today. Thank you so much for your time.

Speaker 2: 34:47

Thanks, michael, great to be with you. Love what you guys do at Boston. Glad to be on the episode today, my pleasure.

Speaker 1: 34:54

Thank you for listening to Small Business Pivots. Please don't forget to subscribe and share this podcast. If your business is stuck, you need help creating a business that can run without you, or you need a fast business loan or line of credit, go to our website businessownershipsimplifiedcom and schedule a free consultation to learn why small business success starts with Boss. If you want to talk anything small business related, email me at michael at michaeldmorrisoncom. We'll see you next time on Small Business Pivots.