734 Effective Marketing Strategies for MSPs

[Uncle Marv]
Hello friends, Uncle Marv here with another episode of the IT Business Podcast. We are here with our usual Wednesday live show.

It is the matinee hour, 4 p.m. Eastern, and you can always catch the show whenever we do stuff here. There will be an exception next week. I will be in Orlando for IT Nation.

This will be about the time we are judging and watching the Pitch It competition with the three finalists there. So that's where I'll be next week. Orlando is about as far south as Dawn Sizer will go.

We'll see if she makes it or not and see how that is. I do have a guest coming up a little bit later here, Jennifer Blean. We're going to talk about marketing and sales and recap the previous two audio shows that I did with her.

You're free to engage in the chat, ask questions, comments, all of that good stuff. Let me give you a quick rundown of what else has been going on. Of course, I was in Miami.

Yes, I ventured south to North Cuba to visit Kaseya at DattoCon. And of course, they had some big old announcements. You guys have seen it.

I'm not going to go over too much of them. But of course, in addition to the Kaseya 365 group, they've added a new user license, which is going to allow them to do SaaS backup, Dark Web ID, Bullfish security awareness training, graphics, email security, and of course, SaaS alerts that they acquired and announced that yesterday at DattoCon. And it's going to be a whole bunch of stuff there.

So of course, there's comments. And I will give my full opinion of DattoCon a little bit later. I did go down and record a couple of interviews, got a couple of Kaseya brass that I did interviews with.

And then of course, I walked the vendor floor and did the thing, got my obligatory hot sauce from CyberQP. Jen actually tried to woo me with some other swag, and we'll see how that goes. Brooke from ScalePad also tried to sway me with some swag.

We'll see how they do. I'm going to evaluate those probably tomorrow and give my update over the weekend. So we'll see who did very well with swag this weekend.

And let's see, I've got some customer stories that I'm going to do later. But today's show is all about sales and marketing. So folks, the guest I'm bringing up now is a renowned author, Amazon famous, Jennifer Blean.

You saw her book there. And we're going to chat about things. So Jennifer, welcome to the show.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Thank you so much. I'm so excited to talk to you today.

[Uncle Marv]
So let me ask this. It looks like you're wearing the same shirt from the picture that I had. Is that true?

[Jennifer Bleam]
I don't know. I didn't even notice that. You would have to go back to the same shirt.

I don't know. I have a lot of red and orange shirts because I love that power color. But I don't think I wore it to that photo shoot.

But who knows? Who knows?

[Uncle Marv]
So let me ask, before we get too far into things, how are things with you? How's it going?

[Jennifer Bleam]
Things are good. Things are so good. I've got some partnerships in the works.

I've got rave reviews from the new offer that I released that is serving MSPs that are like 250k in annual revenue up to 500-600k. Things are good. Podcast, another book in the works for next year, next, next, late next year.

Yeah, so it's good. Lots of good things.

[Uncle Marv]
Another book. Is it kind of a continuation or is it a completely different theme?

[Jennifer Bleam]
It's a completely different theme and that's all you're getting out of me. You're the first to hear that.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay, well, you got to try to ask, right?

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yep, that's all you're getting.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay, all right. So for those of you that always complain about the number of podcasts I put out, you know, I try to keep them out on the regular. And Jennifer and I did a two-part series just a couple of weeks ago and they're actually episodes number 727 and 728.

Actually, it's just over a week ago. And why every MSP needs to focus on nurturing leads and marketing commandments every MSP needs to know. So I know they've been out for a week.

I actually got a couple of responses that I will ask if we don't have any other questions from the chat. But Jen, I know I asked you before if you had gotten any feedback but have you also kind of went back and thought, hmm, maybe I should have said this or explain this a little differently. Any thoughts along those lines?

[Jennifer Bleam]
I do. I have one thing that I wish we would have dug into a little bit from a little different angle. So we talked about kind of the marketing funnel, if you will.

We presented it a little bit of a different way than it's typically presented. But I want to stress that as business owners, we all want leads, like we all want that bottom of funnel. And of course, that's what we want.

That is the metric that has a really strong line towards revenue, maybe slightly dotted depending on your process, but leads to revenue. Maybe three leads equals one close sale, whatever your close rate is. So it's really common to say, I'm doing all this marketing, but I'm not getting leads.

So I just want to remind everybody that every strategy, every tactic is not designed to create leads. So there are top of funnel tactics. They are literally there to create knowledge that you exist, eyeballs, visibility, engagement.

And so that isn't a lead, but you can't have a lead other than referrals. Let's just table referrals for a second. We're talking about true marketing.

We can't have a lead if we don't have those other things in place. So people don't just typically buy your journeys and people can break the rules, but typically the average is 65%, 68% of people go through your entire funnel. So they may go through quickly, they may go through agonizingly slowly, but they don't usually just slide into the bottom without you having heard of them.

So while we want leads, we have to have the other pieces of the puzzle in place as well.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. Very good. So just so you know, I jotted down a couple of highlights that I actually went back and tried to figure out, okay, what would be my takeaways from our shows?

And I know one emphasis was on that marketing pendulum that you described, that MSPs should avoid swinging from one extreme to the other. And it's funny because I don't think any of us have ever thought about it as a pendulum. And especially as we compare ourselves to the vendors, that we don't want to do marketing the way that some of the vendors market to us, or we do want to do marketing because we see what it works for them.

So that was a big takeaway.

[Jennifer Bleam]
It's interesting because I just had a bit of a rant on LinkedIn about the bad extreme of the pendulum marketing where not someone from the industry was just a general accountant, or I think it was an accountant in my geographic area connected to me, I accepted the friend request or the connection request on LinkedIn, that was my mistake. That was nine or 10 days ago. And I have gotten four or five messages from him in those 10 days, two of which said, this will be my last message to you.

So he completely eroded trust, because he lied to me. And then, my goodness, I didn't respond to a single message. Why are you peppering me to death?

And so that's kind of the one extreme. And so we can shrink away from that. And because we don't want to do the pestering marketing, we swing to the opposite extreme, where like, therefore, I will do no marketing.

Because I said, no, no, no, that's bad marketing. Let's move away from that pendulum. We don't want to do bad marketing, let's do good marketing.

So yeah, that's an awesome takeaway.

[Uncle Marv]
All right, so we're already going to go off course here, because I want to ask about that. So I know that people are pushing LinkedIn as like the new marketing green area. Like it's, you know, it's all of a sudden, LinkedIn is open for business, and everybody should be marketing on LinkedIn.

But just like you, I actually don't always accept connection requests. And part of that comes from the standpoint of, one, I don't know you. And so I do kind of look at how many friends do we have in common?

And what types of friends do we have in common? Like there's, I actually do qualify based on, okay, this group of friends, I know they're going to be okay. This group of friends, I know it's going to be marketing.

Yes. But I know that we're being told that's what we should do. But at the same time, I get frustrated when people connect.

And literally, seconds after we connect, they're already pitching me. And it's, I mean, that I don't think is what it was intended to be.

[Jennifer Bleam]
I don't think it was intended to be that way. And I can't speak for the coaches that are saying, hey, go, go do LinkedIn. LinkedIn is, you know, greenfield.

But don't throw LinkedIn out necessarily don't throw that baby out with the bathwater. There is bad LinkedIn, which is arguably the majority of it, probably 80%. That's not statistically accurate.

But that's my experience, maybe even higher. But there is good LinkedIn and good LinkedIn will mimic good email content. And so it should be engaging, it should be adding value to your world.

Because what if a vendor or let's say a local accountant reached out to you and led with, hey, I don't have anything to sell you shock, like I would literally be like shocker. Because that's my I'm a little cheeky with my marketing. That's my brand voice.

But I wanted to share a white paper, please don't make it a sales letter, but like a white paper on how businesses that are under a million dollars a year are making five common mistakes with their taxes, and why November is the best month to get that fixed. And it happens to be November, right? So that's valuable.

It's also a pattern interrupt. So like, I would probably be like, oh, this guy, this gal actually is doing something different from the vomit inducing fodder that we usually get inside of LinkedIn. And so you, you if you're the salesperson, and you're marketing to me in that way, you've stood out.

So you've created No, I might like you or I might be completely turned off. That's okay. But if I like you, I probably also trust you because I'm like, oh, we didn't connect.

And 27 seconds later, I got a pitch. Instead, you connected. And then a day or two later, you dropped some value in my lap.

What a novel concept. That's what marketing should be.

[Uncle Marv]
Alright, so you actually answered a question I had, I did get three questions. And it was kind of falling in this direction. Because the question is, how often should we be reaching out to prospects during the nurturing phase without being perceived as pushy?

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes. Okay. So if we look at nurturing, picture like nurturing in a circle, and then from there, we've got like little, tiny circles off of it.

So we have nurturing, we can nurture them on social media, we can nurture them in email, there's a bunch of different ways we can nurture them, you could set up a text nurture, if you have had them opt in. But let's just go to social and email. I like weekly emails, if they're valuable and pertinent.

And I like social media kind of depends on the platform, Facebook, roughly daily, LinkedIn, roughly three times a week. And so the reason the reason so you're literally connecting with your list just about daily. So if Facebook is five days a week, LinkedIn, maybe Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and emails go out every Thursday, you know, something like that, you're always marketing.

And so I let's say I'm your prospect for managed services, I may not see your Facebook post, because the algorithm may not serve it to me, I may not be on LinkedIn that particular week, but maybe I read your email. And so by consistent that I think part of the goal is consistency, like consistently sending that weekly email, until it's a habit, then you can add something else, then you can add something else. It's a concept called habit stacking.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. The, the other part of that question that I'm going to add is, sometimes I'll get people that are just kind of like a ping me message where they'll be like, hey, and that's it. Or how was your weekend?

And I know that some of them are probably listening. They sit in my in my messages thing. And I'm like, you know what, I'm not going to respond to that.

So how can we do stuff that is personable, engaging, without being so cheesy, I guess, is the best word I can think of, because it's going to be, you know, it's one of those things where, hey, I know, we don't know each other. You know, is there some time we can chat just to say, Hello, I'd rather get something like that. Then one of these little, how's it going?

[Jennifer Bleam]
It's so it's interesting. Last week, I was on Facebook. And I think I was in on the main Facebook page on the app.

And there was a little message at the top. And it said 218 of your friends are online right now. And I've never seen that message before.

So Facebook's always testing meta is always testing things. And I went, Oh, I hope that is not intended for a salesperson to be like, Oh, Jennifer's online right now. Let me pounce on her because that's horrendous.

Don't do that. So your question is, how do we create genuine connection with our with our followers, our connector, you know, people on our list, etc.? Well, that's, that's like saying, how do I create genuine connection when I go out on a date with my spouse or a date with a possible significant other, you're going to have real conversations, you're going to ask about them, you're going to maybe you get a little bit more analytical, I love the book, they ask you answer.

So for every MSP out there, vendors that are listening, there should be 10 or 15 different topics that you hope your audience cares about. So if I'm an MSP, maybe it's data security, maybe it is cyber security insurance renewals. So that could be like, hey, just reaching out to see if it's time for you to renew your cyber liability insurance.

We've got a checklist if that would help. But that's, that's somewhat personable. It's, it's not super intrusive, it's easy to ignore.

And if they don't answer, you could maybe remind them in a week, and then go away for a month or so in that medium inside of the LinkedIn medium. And then you can potentially swipe that same content for use inside of your email nurture sequence.

[Uncle Marv]
All right, I was looking at the book that you mentioned they asked you answer. Yes, by Marcus Sheridan, Marcus Sheridan.

[Jennifer Bleam]
And then there is a free website called answer the public. I don't know if it's calm, but Neil Patel has set up that website, the concept is they aggregate all of the search terms. So you could type in, let's say, cybersecurity, small business or small business cybersecurity.

So you type that into his website, as if it's a search term. And it takes a minute or two, because it's essentially aggregating all of the searches that have happened for the past, I think it's 90 days. And then it organizes them into who, what, when, where, why, how, and so it might be who needs to worry about cyber, cybersecurity for small businesses, who in my company should be in charge of cybersecurity for small businesses, who regulates cybersecurity for small businesses.

So my point is that you can put in a broad topic, get back maybe 15 to 25 questions that real people are asking. And all 25 of those are not going to be valid questions or blogs or topics or video content. But inside of every search you do, you'll find one, two, maybe three really good content angles for you.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. So it is AnswerThePublic.com.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Perfect.

[Uncle Marv]
And I'm going to come back to this later, because I'll tell you what I did and tell you what it took. So part of what I hear you saying is the analogy I'm going to use is the same way that you are trying to network on Facebook or LinkedIn is really the same way you should do it in public. If you're at an event and you're networking, you're not just going to basically walk by somebody and be like, hey, and then keep on walking and expect a response.

Whether it's networking or dating, I mean, they both work the same.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yeah. And you're not going to walk up to someone and go, Hi, it's nice to meet you. I have a blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, that saves time.

And it's a game changer, smiley face. And you're like, what, what, like, it doesn't, that's not how people converse. That's not how people connect to each other.

So I use the words human centric a lot. And your example is perfect. Like we would never conduct ourselves in real life the way some of these people do inside of an inbox.

[Uncle Marv]
Right. Nice. Another point that I wanted to bring up that was a highlight in my estimation, my view, the importance of qualification.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes.

[Uncle Marv]
Properly qualifying and disqualifying leads is crucial to avoid wasting time on prospects who are unlikely to convert.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes. And it feels so contrary to what we want, because we want to take that lead prospect of that bottom of funnel and convert it to revenue. Of course, that's, that's what we all want.

And so when I say we're disqualifying a prospect, it feels like, but I'm giving up revenue. You're really not if you're doing it correctly, you're simply giving up the opportunity to waste a whole lot of time on a prospect that was never going to buy, either because they weren't the decision maker, they didn't have a budget, they were outside of your geography, they were using you as a shopping list. Like, oh, what if Mark can give me a better price?

Oh, you're not cheaper, then I'll stay with the incumbent. And so if you know the reason that you lose sales calls through no fault of your own, then those are probably areas where you should be disqualifying and not spending the time with them and have a polite way to extricate yourself from the conversation. Don't just, you know, scream at them and hang up.

But perhaps you refer them to another competitor, the one that you like the least, or refer them to Best Buy, or simply say, you know, based on what you're saying, we tend to be a white glove provider, and you're really looking for the lowest budget and like, no worries, that's just not us. Or you flip it, hey, it looks like you're looking for the white glove provider. And that's not really what we do.

We are really, our passion, our mission is to serve the up and coming organizations, and we know that they're on a bit of a shoestring budget. And so that's where we focus. And I just don't think we're a fit.

I picked budget, but you could pick any of those and just have a way to extricate yourself from the conversation.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. All right. Let me ask you a question that I got that wasn't technically related to this, but I want to do a little break here.

Who dubbed you the cybersecurity Sherpa?

[Jennifer Bleam]
I did.

[Uncle Marv]
You did?

[Jennifer Bleam]
I did. Branding at its best.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yeah.

[Uncle Marv]
Why Sherpa? The term Sherpa?

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yeah. So it's, I think we talked a couple weeks ago about pivots that my business has been through. And so when I first started my company, I was doing one-on-one coaching and consulting for anywhere from six weeks to 90 days.

And literally I was helping people figure out their stack. Like what is my cybersecurity offer going to be? And how do I sell it to my existing clients and my new clients?

So they were very, very limited engagements. And I had a conversation with someone that said, it just felt like they were plodding uphill, trying to figure this out. And it literally took them 18 months.

And they actually reached out to me because they were skeptical. They're like, you said that you can help people build their cybersecurity stack and figure out how to sell it in anywhere from 90 days to six months or whatever I was able to do. It kind of morphed over time.

And he's like, I'm pretty skeptical. Like I don't need your services. Please don't try to sell me.

And I'm like, we're good. He's like, but I'd like to understand your methodology. And I'm like, sure, let's get on a phone.

And so we got on a Zoom call and I explained how I work through it. And he said, it took us 18 months of really hard, dedicated work. And then he said, I felt like I was slogging my way uphill without a guide.

And I kind of took that and latched onto that and went with cybersecurity Sherpa. Now I am now calling myself the sales Sherpa because my offerings and my passion has shifted just a little bit. But that's why everybody needs a guide.

And it's kind of reminiscent. My kids are all taller than me and older now. But when they were little, like walking through the snow was hard unless mom had gone through first and made the footprints and then they could walk through deep snow.

I know you don't understand because you're in Florida, but I'm sure you can imagine.

[Uncle Marv]
Use your imagination. Actually, I've seen snow before.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Good. Congratulations.

[Uncle Marv]
Well, that is a good analogy though. So, all right, let's see. Where are we with time?

Let me see. What other point should I go back and I'm watching. We've got a couple of people on the LinkedIn, but nobody, if anybody has a question, go ahead and throw it in there.

Let's see. Holistic approach. Holistic marketing.

We were dubbing it there. We should view marketing and sales as a part of a holistic business strategy. Understanding that closing a sale is just the beginning of the client relationship.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes. Okay. So I was just doing some study last week on the onboarding process and how crucial the onboarding process is.

And I can't imagine that that is news to any of your listeners. That onboarding process though is really not the start of the relationship. The relationship started during the marketing and during the sales.

So as much as you focus on the onboarding process, rightfully so, you also have to focus on your marketing messaging and your sales process because you can alienate people during those two processes. So then you never get to the onboarding opportunity. So the marketing is a process, sales is a process, and then onboarding and service delivery is also a process.

And so each of those should be looked at holistically. And whether you think left to right for marketing, and then that leads to sales, or you say top of funnel, bottom of funnel, and then that's an opportunity which will lead to Either way, think of it like a conveyor belt or like a factory where every piece has to fit in. So then at the end, you have your widget.

If you're not getting what you want at the end, it's a system. So there is a piece of your system that is broken or not optimized. And so that's when I say holistic, we have to kind of look top down first, like look at the entire system.

But then at some point, we do have to get in a little bit more deep and say, okay, why is this one piece of the system broken?

[Uncle Marv]
Right. We talked about the lifetime value of a client, which I have done, but I used it in a different way. I used it when people would ask me about being a boutique MSP.

And I can tell them I've had clients that have stayed with me 15 years. I actually have one that we're coming up on 25 years. He'll be retiring soon.

And that's kind of where that came up. But I looked at the fact that I keep my clients a long time. And so when I look at the lifetime value, it can add up over that.

Do you ever have people, and I don't know why I'm asking it this way, but when they approach a prospect and you're doing that evaluation, you're doing that qualification and disqualification, do you have people look at the value of a potential client with the idea that, okay, if this is the potential value, this will also gauge how much time you're willing to invest in trying to qualify them, get them as a client or whatever?

If it's a small monthly commit, you may not want to work as hard, but if there's a potential for thousands of dollars per month, maybe I'll spend a little extra time going after that.

[Jennifer Bleam]
So I don't think it is necessarily documented and even a conscious decision, but I do think there's that subconscious decision. So I have a client I'm working with right now and they're waiting on an agreement from a, it's a not-for-profit, I believe it's 140 seats. So it's not a small deal.

And it's been months in the making and we've reviewed the sales calls. I don't think he did anything wrong. I think literally the not-for-profit is probably, it's probably going to come down to my client and one other.

And he wasn't able to push the deal along. It wasn't that he, like they are waiting for funding. And so, so that's, that is, that's the reality.

And I don't think he could have disqualified it either because they were shopping right now when he went on the sales call. So he didn't do anything wrong, but because that is a large deal for this client, he is very much making sure that he is following up. And he, so he's layering bulk options that he just does to everybody that's in his, his funnel and in his world.

But then he's layering over top of that some more individual reach outs because it is a bigger client. Whereas if it was at the smaller end, I don't know that there, I'm pretty sure there would not be anywhere near as much follow up. Maybe they would simply get the automated ways of following up.

And so that's a way to look at it. MSPs like to think about automation versus manual and nothing wrong with that. That's a good frame to evaluate things from.

Maybe you have a floor below which they only get automated follow up. They're not, they're not, can we say they're not worth our time? But it's the reality that is our most precious resource.

We cannot recreate it. It is finite. And so, so below this automated only above this, they still get the automated stuff, but we can do some more personal things.

Maybe it's a, send them a, you know, box of cookies and like, it'll be sweet when we're working together or a coffee mug. I was just staying up at night, say, you know, dreaming of how amazing it's going to be when we get your network working quickly. Like there's caffeine.

I mean, that's, that's horrible messaging, but you know, whatever.

[Uncle Marv]
I'm not sending cookies like that.

[Jennifer Bleam]
They'll send cookies like that, but you could, you could say, so I've had people again, it's a little cheeky, but I've had people to try to resuscitate dead leaves in their pipe. They will send a pizza and they'll pay someone, like pay a delivery person to deliver the pizza. And they're like, but I need, like, I'm going to, I'll tip you handsomely, but I need you to grab a Sharpie marker and right inside the lid, we're the missing piece of your cybersecurity stack, or we're the missing piece of your network, something like that.

And then I need you to eat a piece of pizza. So the MSP literally delivers a box of pizza with a slice missing. And there's a marketing message on the lid.

Sometimes it works to jar the prospect loose and they're like, okay, this was clever.

[Uncle Marv]
Right.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Sorry. And they re-engage. And sometimes you burn 50 bucks for a pizza and a delivery person for a lead that was dead anyway.

So why not have fun? Like have fun with it.

[Uncle Marv]
All right.

[Jennifer Bleam]
And then, okay. Sounds a little weird. It's weird for some people, but it totally works for others.

Like I would totally do it. Your, your marketing personality might be like, I would never do that. That's really creepy.

That's okay. Different strokes, different folks, but I do want to stress, you should not have a bunch of deals in your pipeline stalled. So I don't want anybody reaching out to me tomorrow and say, oh, I just heard you on Uncle Marv's podcast.

And it sounds like you advocate for stalled deals. No, best practices, ideally no stalled deals, a firm next step, always be pushing things forward, but sometimes they do happen.

[Uncle Marv]
So always, I don't know if I would, I don't know if I would say stalled deals because I've had a couple of clients that I just simply thought I wasn't going to get who circled back around for whatever reason. So it's almost if you just, I don't know if there's a little bucket you can put them in where it's like, you know, almost dead, but not quite.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yeah. I would add it back to your nurture sequence.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Because you never know, maybe they went with someone else and they get poor service. Maybe they told you no, but they're having not lack of buyer's remorse. I don't know what you call that, but hey, maybe I should have bought, maybe I shouldn't.

I don't know. He was a little more than I was, but I mean, he said a lot of the right things, but no, let's just stick with the incumbent. But you just said enough things that the seeds are there and gradually they're going to germinate.

So, but I, when I say stalled deals, I mean more of like, I need to think about it and get back with you. And then you're like, cool. And you're thinking that is a third of a closed deal.

If you have a 30% close rate and you have three deals in your pipeline that have all said, I might want to do business with you. It is natural to get our hopes up. I don't want those deals in the pipeline at all.

I would ideally like a no or a yes. So I don't like stalled deals.

[Uncle Marv]
Those are deals that should move over to the right lane and in the slow lane, you could still be in the express lane doing other stuff with other clients, but they're just in the slow lane. You're still doing stuff. You're still moving forward, still checking in.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yep. Okay.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. Let's do this. We are midway through.

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All right, Jen, I already asked you one of the questions that I got, and I've got a couple of others, and I tried to rephrase them because I just didn't. They sounded kind of goofy when I got them. But one of them is, how do you recommend structuring our sales process to naturally lead to closing, as Jennifer mentioned?

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay, got it. Okay, so when we spoke last, the concept was the rest of your sales call or the whole part of your sales call should naturally lead into the close. So that's what he's asking about or she is asking about.

So in your sales call, in the discovery, you should be, in my book, I talk about revealing the gap. So we're over here, we want to move the prospect over here. And so you're finding out and you're asking questions in such a way that the prospect is finding out where that gap is.

And is that gap acceptable? And what would it mean to them if we don't close the gap? And so is it okay with you if this risk or that impact on your business?

What would it look like to you if you couldn't access your payroll, if you couldn't respond to RFPs, if you couldn't process your time, create your widget, like whatever it is. So these need to be very personable, very customized to the organization that you're talking to. And then what would it look like and help them paint a picture in their mind.

And this is all during discovery. So we're still leading to the sale, to the close. And would that be okay with you?

So okay, you wouldn't be able to pay your team, you couldn't pay your bills, you couldn't answer your phone because your phone is not accessible because of ransomware, like I'm making this up because I'm not on the sales call. Is that an acceptable level of risk? And they say no.

Okay, well, why not? When you get them talking and well, why not? Well, we rely on our phones.

I mean, like, we need to be able to pay our team, they might give me a couple of days grace, but not two weeks. And we pay all our bills, you know, just in time. And you know, if we don't pay our bills, they're going to cut us off, like whatever, let's get them talking.

Okay, got it. Then you do a quick recap statement. And you're like, so right now, you haven't invested in any kind of cybersecurity, your networking infrastructure is decent, needs a little bit of sprucing up, but it's not horrible.

But the cybersecurity, woefully inadequate, you said you were surprised that your existing person hadn't talked about it. I get that. And that that's not okay with you.

Are we on the same page? And you're like, yeah, perfect. And then you keep moving.

And so what we're doing is we're stacking, you're here, oh, but you want to be here, you're here, and it's unacceptable to you that you're here. And eventually, you're going to have that same similar conversation, three, four, five times inside of the same discovery call. Now we're near the end.

Hopefully, you've talked about budget, maybe in your disqualifying call, maybe in you know, at the beginning of your sales call. But now you're like, okay, let me do a quick recap. And by now they're like, yeah, I know what's coming, because you've done it a couple of times already.

You told me this was unacceptable. You told me this was unacceptable. You told me this was a shock.

You had no idea. You told me this is keeping you up at night. I appreciate you being honest with me that that you know, you were a little vulnerable when you share that.

I appreciate that. And you explained that these things aren't okay, because you couldn't deal with this amount of downtime. If you don't hit your quota, you're not going to be able to hire your sales, you know, your rock star salesperson in three quarters, you're a little concerned about your job, totally understand where you're coming from.

The great news is, we can help with all of that. So I just need to know where you want to go from here. Right?

You kind of hand the reins back to them. And they're probably going to say something like, well, can you solve all those problems? What does it look like to work together?

I love everything you've told me. No one's ever said it that way before. What's the investment look like?

And so you can either go into the investment, or you can say, well, we can talk about the investment, of course, that needs to make sense. But do you have any questions about how we do business or the proven method? Or do you care what compliance frameworks we align to?

If they care about those things, hand handle those answer those questions. If they're like, no, everything you said is perfect. Marv.

I like I just need to know the investment and we're good. And you're like, okay, cool. So as long as we're like, in that range, we're going to partner together.

They say yes, then you're like, awesome, because you know, you already know that they're in range, because you asked that last week or an hour ago. And now you're just like, yeah, perfect. It's 1750 a month.

And we require a one month commitment, or one year commitment, or you're like, it's 3700 a month, and we require a 36 month commitment. And you can either let that sit, or you can ask a question. How's that sound?

Or you can say, it's 3700 a month, we require a one year commitment. And we have onboarding slots open next week, Tuesday or Thursday, I just need to get you in which is the better day. So we're just assuming Well, I mean, you said you liked everything I said, we already talked about budget.

I mean, you now know exactly what it is. But you already told me that was in range. So now I'm like, when do you want to onboard, and they just happen to now be a client because you only onboard clients.

And so that's what I mean. Obviously, that's, that's abbreviated. And that's, that's the idea is that you're naturally stacking so many reasons that they don't want to stay where they are, that of course, they need to move.

That's, that's what sales is.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. So you just gave a very detailed answer to that question. And the next question I had, I'm actually not going to ask because it seems as though the questions are always like, Can you give me a nugget for free?

And I know that you do a lot of speaking, you've, of course, got the book. How often do you get questions that way that you can tell that they're weaseling for a free answer?

[Jennifer Bleam]
I don't, I guess I look at it a little bit differently. I don't mind giving away free advice. If I for the longest time, my book was $5 on Amazon.

So I don't, I don't like I didn't, I might have earned enough for a Chipotle dinner from like, four months’ worth of book sales. So I don't I don't mind giving away free advice. Because there's nuance.

And there's the right advice, but the right advice in the right situation is different. And so giving general advice is great. But what I do in my coaching program is give the right advice at the right time.

Because there's nuance, every situation is a little bit different.

[Uncle Marv]
Right?

[Jennifer Bleam]
So I I'm, I'm generally okay, giving out free advice. The only time it does feel a little bit like people are just looking to take is if I'm working, let's say I'm working a trade show booth, and I'm signing copies of my book. And it's now the sixth time that they've come by with one more question.

And it's like, okay, if you have this many questions about sales and marketing, can we just talk about working together? Because, like, I do get paid to answer these questions all day long. That's, that's what keeps the lights on.

So six questions is probably beyond the threshold, one or two is all good.

[Uncle Marv]
How do they get back in line?

[Jennifer Bleam]
Because if you've already, if you've already signed the book, they shouldn't be in line again, they circle the trade show booth, because I'll usually be there for, you know, a whole day. And so they'll circle the trade show. These are the same ones that grab swag two and three and four times from the same.

[Uncle Marv]
No, we're not. We're not. We're not the same.

Don't put me in that category.

[Jennifer Bleam]
You gather the same swag from the same vendor.

[Uncle Marv]
So the short answer is yes, but there's a reason.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay.

[Uncle Marv]
I don't do it on the same. I don't do it on the same visit.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay, that's not, that's not what I'm saying.

[Uncle Marv]
I may do it at a different conference.

[Jennifer Bleam]
No, I'm saying someone's at DattoCon and they come by and grab the ChapStick and then they come by two hours later and they grab a ChapStick and they come by an hour later and they grab a ChapStick. Like, I don't care who you are. Your lips are not that chapped.

Like, what are you just collecting it? Like, that's what I mean.

[Uncle Marv]
So that's different because I would, so I would just grab two if I wanted something like the mints or shirts. Now shirts, so I'll, I'll, this little secret. I do grab two shirts because one shirt is going to be hung in the rafters or wherever and I do that and I take a second shirt that I might wear and that's the only reason I would take two, but I can't see I mean someone who circles the same show and it's like, oh, here comes Ronnie again.

[Jennifer Bleam]
I don't know anybody in the industry named Ronnie, so I just, that's why I picked that name, but oh, here comes Ronnie again. I bet he's going to have another question and grab some swag. I'll get like, how many more?

Yeah, at the same show, at the same show.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. All right, so I have seen that. I usually, that's, I usually like for those people to be there so I can swing in and grab the swag without being scanned.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay, that's all good.

[Uncle Marv]
But I get your point. Yeah, there are people that'll, that'll sit at a booth and they'll ask every question they can in lieu of setting up an appointment or doing a demo, you know, it's like, well, I don't want to do the demo, but let me ask you this and it's like, you know what? No.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yeah.

[Uncle Marv]
Well, I get it. All right, uh, let's see. We're up.

We are on time. Anything, uh, anything else that popped in your head during all of that? I know it took us off base a couple of times.

[Jennifer Bleam]
So the only thing that popped in my head was just now I was shocked that we are on time because you and I can chase rabbits and, uh, like with the best of them. So I'm, I'm amazed that we stayed. Maybe it's because we're on camera.

It's keeping us on our best behavior.

[Uncle Marv]
Well, I'm, I'm watching. I've got, you know, I've got the screens up. I'm watching.

I'm looking at people in LinkedIn, but they're not asking questions. Usually I'm getting a couple of jabs. Uh, and then actually I have a, I get text messages.

[Jennifer Bleam]
That's how ridiculous it is. You only have like 14 minutes or 13 minutes left. Throw some jabs at us.

It makes it more fun.

[Uncle Marv]
They sent me text messages like, ask this. And I'm like, no, I'm not asking that.

[Jennifer Bleam]
After we're off screen, y'all have to tell me what some of those are.

[Uncle Marv]
We'll talk about it. Yes.

[Jennifer Bleam]
We'll talk about it later.

[Uncle Marv]
Uh, but I will have a link for your book of the simplified cybersecurity sales for MSPs. Yes, it is not free on the Amazon. Uh, and you actually, you have paperback, Kindle and audio book versions.

So very nice. And I actually will put a link to this other book you recommended. They ask you answer by Marcus Sheridan and where'd it go?

Did I, did I close it? AnswerThePublic.com.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes.

[Uncle Marv]
So of course I decided, let me type in Florida, man.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay.

[Uncle Marv]
So of course what it did was it did a thing. And, uh, first of all, the pop-up says sign up or log in to explore 3,417 results for Florida, man. So that's a lot.

So the search volume 90,500, 39 questions for Florida, man. Uh, so I will do that and let's, uh, let me go ahead and do this because let's go ahead and get into our Florida man segment that people are so happy to hear about. So Jennifer, this is the time where you can present a story from your area that would challenge a Florida man's story that I will pick, or you can answer a random question.

[Jennifer Bleam]
So do you pick it before I give my story or not? Cause I know Florida man goes last, but so you haven't picked it yet.

[Uncle Marv]
Oh, I've picked this one.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes. Okay. Okay.

Perfect. No, that's fine.

[Uncle Marv]
Sometimes I have multiples, but it's a crazy week.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Got it. Okay. So this is not super recent, but it was one of the best I could find.

It was one that I had actually heard of. So it was very newsworthy. So Charles County, man.

So that's a, that's a County I live in, in Maryland. So Maryland man, um, is found in home dead, surrounded by 100 snakes. So literally he has pet had, he passed away, um, had pet snakes include, and they were venomous and non-venomous, including cobras, rattlesnakes, pythons.

And one of them was a 14 foot Burmese Python. And guess what he died of? A snake bite.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. I was going to say, because surrounded by could mean that they were still in their cages, but this, in this case, they were out.

[Jennifer Bleam]
They, they were. So all, I read like four news reports in the last couple of days, they, every one of them said snakes in cages. And I'm like, so did he put the snake back?

He get bit. He put the snake back and then collapsed on it. Like, I don't, I don't know, maybe.

And apparently the reason the cops went is that a neighbor saw him lying on the, the floor and set the police to do a wellness check and he had passed away.

[Uncle Marv]
Oh, wow. Wow. Wow.

Yeah. Okay.

[Jennifer Bleam]
All right. What's your Florida man story?

[Uncle Marv]
So the Florida man story, and I had to weed through a couple of stuff because first of all, it's getting close to the election and Florida man is just crazy anyway, ever since the hanging shad. So I'll just briefly mentioned that. Yes, there was a Florida man arrested for brandishing a machete at a polling place there for Oliver voting.

So that did happen. I'm not going to talk about that story. That's out there.

And then there was a Florida man who tried to kill his wife twice because he didn't want her to be alone after he left. So those are the stories I'm not reading.

[Jennifer Bleam]
No, that, that, that beats mine. Those both be mine. I, I, I acquiesced to the greatness of Florida.

[Uncle Marv]
And these are all, these were from yesterday.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Oh my goodness.

[Uncle Marv]
So from the weekend, here is the story I chose. This disturbing incident actually occurred on a United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Washington, DC. So he was headed your way.

Great. But it was a Florida man, 44 year old Everett, Chad Nelson.

[Jennifer Bleam]
That's never good when they give him a middle name.

[Uncle Marv]
Allegedly attacked a sleeping passenger on the flight for no reason at all. He had gotten up to go to the bathroom and on his way back to his seat, he saw the victim sleeping and began pummeling him. And it was described as a beating, suggesting that it was prolonged or severe.

Blood was reportedly splattered in the surrounding area.

[Jennifer Bleam]
What in the world?

[Uncle Marv]
So again, no reason is given. It wasn't like the guy was snoring and he was tired of it or anything. It was just what it is.

So of course now, because it was in flight, federal authorities have become involved. And you asked why? So there were going to be federal charges.

Basically it falls under the category of assault on an aircraft. He could face federal charges for interfering with flight crew members in attendance, which carries a penalty of up to 20 years in prison. He could also face a civil suit for the guy he pummeled.

You think? There are federal aviation regulations that allow for civil penalties up to $35,000. He could be placed on the no-fly list.

And apparently, because he was flying to DC, there could also be additional charges there.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Oh my word. Yeah, that takes the cake.

[Uncle Marv]
The reason I chose that story was just to let people know, we don't have to be in Florida to cause a commotion. A Florida man can be anywhere.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes. And by the way, not to turn this completely serious again, but what you do on your podcast with having the whole Florida man piece, snippet, whatever you want to call it, is branding. People talk about like, well, I don't know if people want to listen to me.

You probably were like, I don't care. This is funny to me and we're going to do it on every podcast. I think it's fantastic.

It's creative. It's different. Again, it's a pattern interrupt.

Jennifer gets to crash and burn. I don't lose a whole lot, but I lost today. I can't beat that story.

That's fantastic. And it's fun. So if you're going to market, you may as well have fun doing it.

[Uncle Marv]
It's something that I reluctantly fell into and accepted because everybody loves a Florida man story. And I even had, and I'll call his name out. He's on vacations, I think.

Tim Golden was like, the time I had him on the show, I forget. Oh, it was right after the hurricane. And he thought, well, it might be a little insensitive to do the Florida man.

And I'm like, oh no, people would probably go berserk if I didn't do Florida man after a hurricane, because the stories, all the news outlets, everybody is doing Florida man. And apparently I don't, I mean, yeah, there's probably some insensitivity there, but Florida man is crazy.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Laughter is good for the soul. So I wouldn't even worry about it.

[Uncle Marv]
I'm not because it's the most clicked link on my show.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Laughter.

[Uncle Marv]
I even got emails. There were times where I mentioned the Florida man story and by the next morning, people are like, you didn't put the link. You didn't put the link.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Oh, too funny. Yeah. So you you're known for that.

You can't stop now.

[Uncle Marv]
Got to do it. Got to do it.

[Jennifer Bleam]
That's awesome.

[Uncle Marv]
But hopefully they'll be clicking on your link to your book. Again, I will have that folks, the Simplified Cybersecurity Sales for MSPs, a book by Jennifer Bleem and a precursor to another book coming your way in 2025.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Late, late 2025.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. So you haven't started it yet.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Oh no, it started. It's started. It's coming along very nicely, but I, yeah, it'll be, it's on my roadmap for December.

We'll see if it gets released any earlier than that. There's a lot, there's a lot I have to decide about, but it's certainly not done. And it does take a bit of time, but it's coming along very nicely.

[Uncle Marv]
I'm going to make a note here that we'll circle back. Maybe we can have a book launch party.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yes, that would be a lot of fun. And I'll be honest, this is super, this particular book topic is really outside of my comfort zone. So by saying it out loud on a podcast, it kind of convinced me to make it happen.

So there we go. It's out there in the world.

[Uncle Marv]
We'll be looking for it now and seeing how far outside it is. Because that makes it sound like, okay, could it be outside of marketing? Could it be outside of sales?

Could it be outside of security? Is it a cartoon? You know, Gary Vee's doing his little thing with some character.

He's trying to do cartoons.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Oh, fun. I haven't seen that. I'll have to go look.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. That's what I heard anyway. He mentions it on the podcast.

I don't know what it is, but.

[Jennifer Bleam]
I'll have to go poke around. I'll let you know if I find out. Did you like how I dodged your question?

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah, I gotcha. I'm moving along. All right, folks.

As I mentioned, there are going to be a lot of podcast episodes come out. I was at ASCII Cup, the last ASCII event of the year last year. So I got a few episodes out for that.

There's a bunch of talk about IT Nation, Tony Hawk's Skateboard is going to be up for grabs there. Of course, the IT Nation Pitch It, I will be there covering that. There's a couple of episodes.

Let's see. What did we talk about? There's a new group that has joined ASCII, the Apple Security something group.

If you need Apple resources, they are now a part of ASCII and can share. There's a whole Back to the Future thing that ASCII did. So those will come out.

And then, of course, I do have episodes coming out from DattoCon that I was there. I think I now remember why there may not have been a lot. People are at DattoCon today.

Today is still DattoCon. The block party is tonight. I will not be going to that, obviously, because I'm here.

[Jennifer Bleam]
But you're right. There's a lot of people there. Yeah.

[Uncle Marv]
And then, of course, IT Nation, which I will be at on Wednesday. So there will not be a live show next week, but there will be podcasts that come out. I have to go shop for steak knives.

[Jennifer Bleam]
For steak knives?

[Uncle Marv]
Yes. You probably don't know. So IT Nation gives prizes for the top two of the winners.

So they give $70,000 for first place, $30,000 for second place, and third place got nothing. And I said, come on. You got to give them something.

So last year, Sean Lardo agreed that I could present them with a set of steak knives.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Oh, very nice.

[Uncle Marv]
And people have already asked, are they going to be good steak knives? So I haven't got them yet, but I'll get them this weekend.

[Jennifer Bleam]
You can't get Cutco knives this late, can you?

[Uncle Marv]
It's got to be from a dollar store. Oh, why? Something we made up.

A dollar store set of steak knives.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay. All right. Well, good luck.

[Uncle Marv]
They're not a dollar, just so that you know. If you haven't been to a dollar store lately, not everything's a dollar anymore.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Okay. Got it. That's funny.

Good for you, though. They all work awfully hard. I like that everybody is getting something.

[Uncle Marv]
All right, folks, that is going to do it for our episode today. I want to say thank you to Jennifer Bleem for coming on and hanging out. And listen, Jennifer, I mentioned before, thank you for doing a part two because we went so long the first time.

But then again, thank you for being here on the live show and for participating in Florida Man or Random Question.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Truly a pleasure. It was amazing.

[Uncle Marv]
You'll be able to get over to her site, MSP Sales Revolution, get her book, and we'll be out and about. Do you go to IT Nation? I am not this year.

[Jennifer Bleam]
I usually do, but I'm not this year.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. We'll see you somewhere down the road.

[Jennifer Bleam]
Yeah, I'll be around.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. That's going to do it, folks. Thanks so much for hanging out.

We'll see you next time. And until then, holla.