Welcome to the painter marketing mastermind podcast. The show created to help painting company owners build a thriving painting business that does well over 1 million in annual revenue. I'm your host, Brandon Pierpont, founder of painter, marketing pros and creator of the popular PC A educational series. Learn do grow marketing for painters. In each episode, I'll be sharing proven tips, strategies and processes from leading experts in the industry on how they found success in their painting business. We will be interviewing owners of the most successful painting companies in North America and learning from their experiences in this series titled Relationships are Key Candelario Valenzuela A VS pro painting will be sharing how he has grown his painting company to $2 million in annual revenue with a 100% year over year growth rate and the advice he has for an ambitious painting company owners who are looking to follow in his footsteps.

In this episode. Episode one, Candelario will discuss the importance of effective systems to scale. In episode two, Candelario is going to outline how knowing your numbers is critical and which numbers he most focuses on. In episode three, Candelaria will discuss the importance of reinvesting into your business and the decisions he has made as his company has grown. And in the final episode, episode four, Candelario will deep dive into the importance of networking and some actionable insights he has on how to most effectively network for your painting company.

If you want to ask Candelario questions related to anything in this podcast series, you can do so in our exclusive painter marketing master Bride podcast form on Facebook. Just Search for painter marketing mastermind podcast form on Facebook and request to join the group or type in the URL facebook. com/groups/painter marketing mastermind. Again, the URL is facebook. com/groups/painter marketing mastermind. There. You can ask Candela your questions directly by tagging him with your question. So you can see how anything discussed here applies to your particular painting company.

Thanks for joining us Candelario. Hey beard, super excited to have you, brother. No, man. I'm excited. Thank you for having me here. Yeah. So you and I have have known each other for quite a few years at this point. Uh And, and you're a great guy, a thought leader in the industry. I've been privileged enough to, to see uh some of your growth and I'm really excited for you to bring, bring a lot of your insights to bear here on this podcast series. You said this is the first podcast you've ever conducted.

Yeah, this is actually the first podcast. Uh I mean, I've, I've seen many of your podcasts. And I'm like, ok, cool. This is, this is how you do it. So, uh I'm like, I'm excited about it. It's so cool. And then you're speaking later today at a Sherwin event? Yes. So, uh it was about a month ago. I got uh, one of the supervisors from Sharon Williams actually reached out to me and, uh, they're having like a, a Hispanic uh business owners painters um, out in the key two stadium here in Austin.

It's uh uh the soccer stadium here in Austin. And they're gonna have AAA place there where, where they want me to be a guest speaker and just kind of like, encourage and motivate our industry in the Hispanic culture. And that's wonderful. And you'll be given that presentation in Spanish. Yeah. So, um I'm actually, you know, I fluctuate way better in Spanish because I was, I was, you know, my, I guess my primary language is, is in Spanish. But um yeah, definitely, I'm, I'm excited about that one too.

That's actually the first time that I'm gonna be, you know, public speaking about uh the business and all that good stuff. So, yeah, that, that's so neat, man. So you're, you're doing this in English, you're doing that in Spanish? What, what was the uh do you remember when we started working together because you work with painter, marketing pros? What has it been a year over the next 100 years? A little bit over over a year, it's been a year and a couple of weeks um that I've been working with you guys.

OK. So you, I remember when you joined, you were under a million. You're now gonna hit 2 million this year. And one of my biggest goals of when we, when we work with the company, I think I even talked with you about this because we, we only really bring people onto the podcast that we're doing over a million, right? Unless we have some industry partner series or we have a couple of other things, we do. One of my biggest goals is always that we grow you to a point that you become a thought leader.

We pull you on the podcast that kind of goes full circle. So I am super excited Candela that you are honoring us by doing this. Yeah. No. Uh I think uh I met you the first time that I went to the PC A and it was uh about a year and a half ago or two years ago. Um I met you out there and I remember that uh we connected and II I went to one of your uh sessions that you had out there and I was like, man, and this is gonna be the guy and I remember that we started talking about it and then we started going in, in, into more depth on, on marketing and all that good stuff.

And, and for me, it was like, OK, cool. Like after we make the connection and all that good stuff, we were able to uh start working together and since then it's just been a change, man. It's, it's, I was looking, you know, I was definitely looking to scaling and all that good stuff. I didn't think it was gonna be that fast. Uh But man, I'm, I'm so excited to see what's coming. Thank, thanks for the plug. Candelario, I'm not overly self promotional. I probably should honestly even be a little bit more.

But the two takeaways here. Number one work with painter marketing pros that was obviously blatantly self promotional. Uh But number two, the bigger takeaway, the more serious one is be an action taker, right? So Candelario saw someone who he thought would potentially be a good fit for him marketing wise, he knew he wanted to grow his business and he took action and regardless of whether that's hiring an estimator or project manager, hiring a marketing agency, finding it a director of marketing for your business, whatever it is, the most successful entrepreneurs are action takers speed attracts wealth.

So be an action taker. Candela is an action taker. He didn't just hire painter marketing pros. He's done a bunch of other things which have gotten him to where he's at, which we'll be covering in this podcast series. But that's the big takeaway from this. Be an action taker. No, definitely. And then I I remember that. I, I actually got in touch with you way before I even went to the PC A. And I remember you asking me, hey, are you gonna be at the PC? I don't know if you remember that, but you asked me, hey, are you gonna be at the PC A?

And I was like, yeah, I'm actually heading that way and that's when we're finalized or kind of like, uh that we started working together after that because I, I wanted to meet you in person. I wanna see what, you know, what, what you were about. Uh But you make sure I wasn't a hologram. Everything worked out good. We've hung out a bunch of times now too. Been to a lot of uh Jason Phillips events together and some other things. So it's been fun. Um And that's another thing you'll, you'll Yeah.

Well, we'll get into that. I don't want to jump ahead the networking. We'll get into the networking and, and how you, while you do that. That's, that's a big one there. It's a big one. Yeah. All right, cool man. Systems. Systems are kind of boring. Nobody's usually super passionate about them. At least I think us entrepreneurs aren't typically the most passionate about systems, but they are what allow you to scale. Let's get into it. Yeah, definitely, man. So, um I remember back whenever I started, uh it was back in 2017.

Um It was myself and a helper. And it was, it, it first started as a, as a kind of like a side thing, right? It was a side hustle. I was working for like a larger company. Um I was not even in the, in the painting uh industry, I guess I, I had previous background in the painted painting uh industry because I worked three years for a company uh in the painting in the commercial side of things. Um And then I started working for a drywall company.

And then I remember I was, I had a good position there, but I always had in my blood that I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I wanted to, you know, start a business. And I, I was like, OK, cool. Like I know how to paint. I know drywall. What about if I can, you know, start painting and drywall business? So I remember that I, I went out there registered, did everything, you know, insurance, e everything that, that was with the legal part of things. I went ahead and did it.

Um It started all like a side hustle. And when I was about a year into the business, whenever I started seeing that it was giving me uh enough work to handle, you know, my family, be able to support my family. Um And the guy that was working for me, I remember that I was like, OK, it's time for me to just, you know, go all in and whenever I, uh, you know, I went all in, I was like, ok, cool. Like I set myself a goal and I was like, ok, so where do I wanna be in five years?

And I remember that day I was, uh, uh, it was a Friday afternoon and, you know, whenever you're, you're trying to collect all checks and you're trying to pay, uh, your, your, your guys and all that good stuff. And I remember I was in the back of my truck with a whole bunch of paint on my pants and on my um on my shirt, you know, like from, from working hard and all that stuff throughout the week. I remember sitting with my uh with one of my painters and we're talking about it and I was like, hey, you know, uh my going in five years hoping that we could hit our first million.

We had never seen, you know, not even, uh I remember not even in the first year we saw 100,33. So, and, and I was already, you know, kind of like setting myself uh for, for a big uh uh go there, which was a, a million and back then maybe a lot of, a lot of people or, or even me, I was doubting that. Ok, you know, it's a realistic can I can I really meet, you know, can I really make this happen? But I knew I could. So, um I remember then whenever I was already like in the middle of, of my goal, like, you know, 23 years uh uh into the business.

I remember that I started seeing, ok, cool. Like I was already at 5, 500,000. So I was halfway there. So now, but I started seeing that there was a lot of things that, you know, we're going south, right? And it was people, uh it was uh uh uh sometimes overload of work, too many responsibilities. I knew that I started, you know, I need to start uh to figure out some, some type of way that how I scaled, I was able to also maintain like the quality and the communication throughout the whole uh uh different aspects in the business, right?

So from production to sales uh to, to whatever is going on on the business, financials and all that good stuff, marketing. So I was like, OK, so I'm, you know, I'm, I'm trying to get to a million. How can I scale where I could have repeatable systems that can be in place. So that way our, our guys and, and our team can punctuate uh with minimal mistakes. And that's when I came to the PC A. I remember I was, I was at, and this was about, you know, two a year and a half ago or so.

Um I remember coming out there and it was, it was, I sat down there and I was my, my goal my, my thing in my head was like, I need to find someone that's already doing a million that can guide me through. Like, OK, how he did it and how, like, what systems is he using that? It's, you know, making, making him get there or uh with, without, you know, sacrificing the quality and all that stuff. And I remember I met, you know, I, I rub a lot of shoulders with a lot of different people in the industry there and all the sessions that I went to and all that good stuff.

I remember that I kept on asking everyone there. Hey, what are you doing? What do you do for production? What do you do for sales? What do you do for market? What do you do? What, what systems are you using for this and that, and it started opening my mind, right? Um And then I started seeing that a lot of people were using mentors and all that good stuff. And that's when I started reaching out to this different mentors. And, and I remember uh one of my, one of my mentors that helped me out with the systems was with Steve Burnett.

Um And hi to Steve right there. If he's, he's uh watching this or he'll, he'll be able to watch this. Uh But he helped me out a lot with uh uh some of the systems that I could put in place that was gonna kind of like open the doors for me and I started seeing, ok, cool. Like I started uh using a software for uh production because that was one of my main uh main problems that I had was like, ok, um I had delegated the brush already.

I had uh uh after a year, I remember that II, I knew the only way of making money was me actually selling jobs um that I, you know, I could pay someone, you know, my uh uh salary for, as a painter that could take my role and I could focus, you know, on selling 5000 $4000 jobs out there and I was gonna be more profitable. So, um whenever I started doing that, that changed the whole, the whole uh war in my business. So that's when I started seeing that production was, you know, there was, there was a cou a couple of items there that I need to work on.

And I was like, how can I manage production without me actually being there and it can just run itself. And that's when we came up with, with uh uh uh uh production, I guess uh system. Um and we implemented, we brought different Softwares into the system. So, so now I'm able to see like uh our, our production uh a team is, is basically making it happen out there and I can oversee what's going on. So we have uh something that uh a software where whenever I, whenever we sell a job, it goes right into the production software and our production manager is able to pull it out and then see the work order, all the information of the customer.

And then from there, he's able to tag in our crew lead or our subcontractor. And then the subcontractor is able to see the same thing that, that uh we all see and then we can notate, you know, what's going on in that job throughout this software. We're able to, you know, put pictures, notes and things like that. And that helps basically the whole kind of like the production side of things just to handle itself because I'm, I can, you know, I can be uh uh at a PC eight event and I pull up my computer and I'm able to see, OK, cool.

Like where, where we at in each project. So that's, that's been AAA big, big, big impact in the business and has helped us kind of like with the, with the skill side of things without, you know, with minimizing the, the mistakes. Yeah, man, that's awesome. What is the software that you're using? The production? We, we use Monday, monday. com, monday. com and he helped to set all that up. Yes, Steve helped us set up all the Monday. Uh and it, it, it's just like it was a game changer for me, for a lot of people.

I remember, I, I spoke with a couple of people that are there already in the painting industry and they have other systems like, like Google sheets or Google Docs and things like that. Um, and, and whenever we were talking about and so because they asked me about it and I asked them what they were using and I showed them what I was using and they were like, oh my God, that's just a, a game changer. But sometimes it's just far whenever you already have something in place and to change it, it's just sometimes tough.

Uh But for me, I didn't have nothing in place. So whenever I put Monday in there, for me, it was like, oh my God, this is just, it, it changed, it changed all the perspective in, in the, the production side of things because we're able to manage and oversee what's going on every day uh at any time. So if I have a question about a project in there, I'll just go in there and then I'll go directly to the project and send a, send a message to my uh production manager and he's able to, you know, respond back and knowing what job are we talking about or even creating tasks, like with our admin, I'm able to create tasks in there.

We, if we have a special task for her that we need to make sure that she gets done, then we'll go in there and we'll type it out and then she received a notification, we're able to uh also put in the, the deadline basically. And then how, how impactful is it, is it, you know, uh uh uh you know, five stars, one star, like how, uh how important is that uh task to be completed? Yeah, now Monday is uh, is very good for project management. The uh a couple of really important points here was it is easier to do it when you don't have sort of any system, right?

Ideally, you, you kind of build it the right way the first time. That's rarely the case. Uh as you. So astutely pointed out if, if you already have a system, you're using Google Sheets, maybe have a couple of Softwares hacked together or whatever, it will be harder to switch, you'll want to revert back, you want to just use what you're already using because it's working well enough. But the way I always think about systems and we're still working on this summit painter. Marketing pro is, is where we're at right now.

Will it hold at 10 X? And if we won't hold that 10 X, then it's not a good system, right? So I encourage everyone who's listening if you think, well, the Google Sheets, this is working pretty well. It's a little tedious. If you're at 500,43, would it work at 5 million if you're at a million? Would it work at 10 million if it wouldn't, then take the time to go back, redo it, go through a little bit of short term pain to give yourself that future runway. Right. It's, it's, it's really important and it has to be repeatable.

So that, and, and the, the way that I saw it was like, you know, it, and, and how, and, and I, I hear a lot of people kind of like, use this example, but like mcdonald's right. Mcdonald's doesn't have, uh, I guess, you know, the best talent working for them and all that stuff or, and they don't, you know, they do, they've managed to find all the most talented 18 year olds in the country. Um, and it, it's probably not the best burgers out there, but their systems are so like, you know, anybody can learn them like, you know, but some teenagers can learn them like it's, it's as long as you create systems that are repeatable and, and that are coachable and trainable to your people.

I think that, you know, that's, that's a really solid thing to do in your business. So that way you can make sure that you maintain because a lot of people worry about, ok, cool. Like I don't want to get to 5 million because then, then I'm gonna lose the quantity. But what about if you put the right systems in place that you're able to manage and oversee and, and make the, the mistakes be minimal, then, you know, that might be an eye opener for you. And that's a really common refrain, isn't it?

When people are talking about the growth and, and then we hear people at Expo or at other events. And so, you know, I, I really, I've had a bigger company before and it was too much headache or the quality would go down and we, we have these issues with personnel or, or customers. And so I'm much happier now with this smaller company, with it, with just a couple of crews or whatever it is and maybe that's true. Right. Some people might want a smaller company and, and no matter how efficient systematized it is, they might be ok with that.

But I think a fair amount of the time it's that they don't know that you can have a big company and it can still run that way. Right. We, I think we all have different opinions. Right. And, and we're, you know, we're, we're free to think whatever we want to think. Uh, and there's, there's different, I guess, uh, goals for, for, uh, everyone. Right. Uh, my goal might not be the same as another painting company, but at the end of the day, uh, definitely systems are gonna help out with that kind of like that mindset where you're ok.

No, like if I wanna get to five mil, uh I'm gonna lose, you know, I'm, I'm a great painter or I have, you know, great painters and I don't want a bad reputation and all that stuff. Uh, but if you have those systems in place, definitely that's something that it's gonna, it's not gonna take all the, you know, the errors or, or mistakes or all that stuff, but it's gonna minimize, um, a lot of them. So, definitely it's, it's, it's, it's things that, uh, me, whenever, you know, whenever I started seeing, ok, where I wanted to be and, and I thought the same thing. Right.

Oh my God, I wanna be the best painting company in Austin, right? Um But it's, it's kind of like, ok, cool. How do I get there without, you know, having that mentality where, oh, I can't get, you know, to five mil because I'm gonna lose that quality. So, yeah, yeah, they are glass ceilings that we impose upon ourselves. So the, the system needs to be repeatable. It needs to be scalable. One of the big things you've done is you adopted a software monday. com to help with your production management.

And that's been a huge game changer. What other actions have you taken that have helped systematize your business? Um So we have a financial uh dashboard and that definitely, it's uh it's a system that has helped us oversee. Um Basically, uh we can go into, you know, each project and see how profitable we're, you know, like how we gross margins and net profits and that probably that's going into knowing your numbers, but it's a system that we have in place that helps us kind of see where we add on numbers that yes, we're scaling, we're getting to a million but, you know, you can get to a million and then being at, you know, 9% or 5% net profit at the end of the day, you know, like, do you really want to be at a million or you could be a 500,000 making 30% profit and you'll probably be making the same amount, right?

Um So definitely, uh we have a dashboard that, uh we have a profit and loss statement in there. Um We have each job per week, per month, per day. Um We're able to kind of like whene whenever we're done with the project, I'm able to go in our, our financial dashboard and see, you know, what, what the numbers were and on that project. And then if, if something is not right, then we're going to the, to the, uh, um to the board and start, you know, I'll, I'll set up a meeting with, with the production side of things and we're like, hey, what happened here, why it would take longer than this or, or why the numbers in the uh um materials were higher than usually.

So that system there helps me clarify basically what's going on with the numbers. So definitely setting up with having a financial dashboard is definitely for me, a system that has helped me kind of like, see where my numbers are at. And when I started, I mean, I didn't, I didn't know it, you know, it was, it was for, I didn't know nothing about net, net profit, gross, you know, gross profits, none of those numbers. I remember when I, whenever I first I first hired my uh CPA, I remember I had, I had a meeting with him.

I was like, hey, man, you know, treat me like a kindergarten. I wanna know, you know, apples to apples. What's, what's going on here because, and, and I mean, it was, it was, he's, he's been a big help on my end and he has helped me kind of like set up that, that uh dashboard for me. Is that dashboard also in Monday? Uh No, that dashboard is separate, separate than, than, than Monday. It's just, that's, that's a, a software that basically, uh our, our, um, our CPA helped us kind of formulate and all that stuff throughout the whole uh years that we've been working with him and all that stuff.

We're, we're able to kind of like, you know, we started with, with the, the smaller package and now we're like using him 53 7. Ok. So that's, that was part of the offering from your CPA. Was this dashboard? Yes. At the beginning we didn't, we, we just had like meetings like every now and then, right? Uh We'll have a meeting every quarter, go over numbers and all that good stuff. Uh And, you know, three years after our, our financial started growing and we were able to kind of like, you know, grabbing a little bit more from him.

So we were able to kind of like work out and, and, you know, we, we, I, I kind of dictated him what, what I needed in my end because I wanted to be able to oversee the numbers and being able to go in life, basically what's going on, you know, like what happened last week and I'm able to go into my computer and go in there and just check out what's going on with, with the numbers in our end or where are we at in our number?

So that way I can formulate, right. So I know that uh if we're $200,000 in sales right now and we have a, a 29 $110,22 target for this month and, and we're, you know, we're $211,23 short, then I'm able to get with my, my team and be like, hey, you know what we need to hit this because this is, this is where we need to be or ee even tells me how many jobs we need to sell to be able to get to our number. Yeah. So the focus on profitability, not revenue I think is really key.

And then I really like the fact that you're drilling down almost having a mini PNL by project, you know, how profitable is each project? Where are all the expenses going? What are we walking away with right from, from that project. And I think more companies than not don't actually even know their full pno let alone how profitable every individual project is. So I think that is, is insightful. No. And, and I think, I think uh it's just for us, it was a, a little bit tough at the beginning having to kind of like get our production manager involved in this type of things.

Like, for example, getting, getting the system worked out where he's inputting some of the numbers. So that way you can go through accounting and then accounting gets, takes care of, you know, uh um or, you know, seeing what, what's, what, what's getting plugged in, in receipts and all that stuff and then uh a meal me a proving basically the whole thing. So it, it, it has, you have to get your team on the same page. Definitely, you know, some, sometimes your production manager could do certain things, but if you're able to kind of like um show them the vision or why you need, you know, this system in place or certain items to get done.

So that way we all are on the same page and know where we're heading to basically. So, yeah. Have you uh speaking of mcdonalds, have you ever seen the movie, the founder? I have. Yes, I love that movie. It's an amazing movie. Yeah. The, the 24, I mean, a bit bit bit vicious. Right. But business is vicious. But the, uh, the tennis court scene, like mapping every screaming at them as they, as they kind of navigate the tennis court. Super love that. No, it's crazy. And it, it just showed for me, that movie showed me like, you know, sometimes you don't see the potential that you have and someone else might see it.

And it's kind of like, oh my God, what am I doing wrong? Right? Um So it's, it's there, there is, there is a lot of ways you can go on your business and you know, make it successful. Yeah. And I think the one of the things I focus a lot on is is what's the output versus the input, right? So the the output would be maybe some drywall repair, you know, repaint, maybe some sanding, what whatever the things are that are actually being done and then the input kind of what you're having to do to make those outputs occur can sometimes seem ginormous.

It can seem like, oh, you, you repainted the house? Cool. What does the, what does the customer see? They see that their house is nicely repainted? Sweet. What did you have to do? There's like a billion things that you had to do, right? You had to make sure that that the crew was there on time every day, you had to make sure things were cleaned up appropriately. You had to make sure that any drywall repair was taken care of. You. You, you had to make sure that every area was inspected appropriately.

You, you had this whole huge amount of tasks for this one output, right? So the more you can take that, that huge, seemingly insurmountable amount of things that you have to do and, and systematize it, simplify it, almost minimize it to, to more closely match the actual output that you're delivering because you don't get credit for that. And that's where I think people kind of end up running around feeling like their hair is on fire, feeling trapped. You know, Jason Phillips talks a lot about contractor prison, feeling trapped because you're doing so many things.

But none, none of those things matter. What you're doing is you're delivering the painting project. So you have to, you have to work as closely as you can align the inputs of the outputs. And I think efficient systems help those become more apples to apples. Yes. Yes, definitely. II, 103% agree with that. It's just, it just facilitates everything for you. So you have the monday. com, you have your production management. You can be at an event, you can pull it up and you can show the people that you're sitting with everything that's going on with all your projects.

They're like holy cow. Let me look at my Google Sheet, I'll try to try to figure out if I, I know what's happening on our end and then you have this financial dashboard through your CPA, which means that guys figure, be careful about who you work with, right? Like, like make sure that for each department, whether it's uh financial management, CPA, counting um marketing, whether it's coaching, mentorship, find somebody who uh you know, a company that's good at what they do with a proven track record and can actually give you results.

But so you have a CPA who's going above and beyond what a standard CPA would do, or they're gonna file taxes, maybe do bookkeeping for you. Uh They're actually gonna give you, give you like a whole lot more value, right? So you're basically pursuing the best in each category and that's helping you. Um So you can drill into your PNL at any time. You can drill in your P your PNL by every project at any time and you can navigate and, and change strategy accordingly. What other systems do you have that we maybe haven't touched on?

Yeah. So uh another important one will be our um our estimated uh uh software that we use, which is PG. So uh Pain Scout also, I mean, I, I know a lot of people use other different uh I guess it estimated software and things like that, but we, we use Pain Scout and it has helped us whole bunch. Um so we have that integrated with Monday. So whenever we sell a job, that's when it goes right into Monday. Um, and then, you know, from there, our production team takes over, uh, our, our estimated software basically.

And, and I know a lot of people that are in the industry know, you know, their, um, what's your closing rate based on their software that they're using? Uh, but a lot of people, and I've met a lot of people out here in Austin that they don't have a software that they use, they don't even know about, you know, there's a pain scout, there's a trip jobs, there's all these other, you know, uh different Softwares that they, they can be using, um, out there too because I remember back in and whenever I started, I created a template, right?

And I will have to come, like, every time I'll go in and do an estimate, I would just basically have a lot of papers out printed already with, like, the information, have them sign, like physically and all that good stuff. Um But now it's like I'm able to, and that was not like a trackable system because I will h paper all stacked up together. And it was like, whenever I was looking for an estimate that I gave, you know, about a month ago, I'll be on my papers trying to, you know, dig in, into that uh uh estimate.

But now it's like I can go in there and I'm able to see. Ok, cool. The customer costs me, you know, I did a job for them about two months. I'm able to go in and pain scout and, and see what, you know, what it would do. Ok, cool. I'm able to come like, you know, more about it and it's just more self sufficient. I'm able to oversee too with our, um, you know, whenever our sales people are out, you know, setting a job, I'm able to see what's going on out there too.

Ok. You know what they, you know, the customer hasn't even viewed it, what's going on. I'm able to get on the phone, make those phone calls because I, I have, you know, that software that helps me see what's going on, the sales part of things. Yeah. What made you choose? Paint scout? Um, so I, I think, because it was, it was, I, I'm, and I didn't, I didn't, I was, I was using Joyce before that. Um, and Joyce is more kind of like for handyman and all that good stuff.

Um, and whenever I was presented to Pain Scout, p Scout was just a whole different world than that because it was just meant for, for ping companies. And, you know, that, that just, I, I didn't even look farther so I can't really speak on, on other Softwares. But in, whenever I saw Pain Scout and I went over the, uh, I guess one of the presentation, um and I met, I met him at the PC A, they're at the PC A and I remember they're like, oh, yeah, we can, we can teach you how to do an in five minutes.

I'm like, oh, ok. So I looked into it. I was like that, that sounds, that sounds like super fast. So that's something that I might wanna consider. And, yeah, man, it's like once you get the hang of it and, you know, you know, you have your, your sales process in place and, and a good, you know, software to use then, you know, it's, it just things changes. Yeah, so we have the paint scout. So we're gonna conduct your estimate. Your financial dashboard is gonna how you is, how you're gonna keep track of all your finances and how profitable each project is.

And then we have your monday. com right where we're gonna track your production rates, what else? And we have our CRM that we use and that's through you guys, right? Painter. Yep. So that, that one there is the key, right? It's, it, it just has all your customers, um, you know, all the database in there, all the information of what's going on where, where each lead is coming from, right? You're I'm able to see. Ok, cool. You know what, um I have, let's say I have four different uh marketing platforms, right?

I have you guys, I have uh Yelp, have leads or uh I'm doing a door to door campaign or yard signs, we're able to track, you know, where, you know, where, where is that coming from or how many jobs they might see which, which of those platforms are being more profitable for us. And you know, from there also sending, you know, uh uh stay keeping, keeping basically uh marketing back to your past customers. That's a great platform to have, right? CRM. Definitely, if you guys out there don't have AC RM, you guys definitely need to implement AC RM system in place.

So that way you can market back to your past customers because that's, I guess that's the less expensive uh marketing side of things whenever you're able to have AAA big database. I remember back then we only had like we had like uh 210 1045 customers um in our, in our CRM. Now we have over 210 for the. So it's kind of like, ok, cool, like how, you know how so because sometimes whenever low season comes, right? And, and uh you know, normally for us will be like in uh January or so, um we're, we're starting to market like, you know, from today to our past customers, like every month we're trying to send a newsletter or some type of, you know, uh making a touch with the customer just so that we can stay on top of mind.

You're saying from, from like end of June. So, so, so we, so we, we do it every, basically every, so right now we're coordinating with, with our uh um the one that handles all of our account and every month basically we'll send, uh uh we're trying to send a newsletter or some type of uh uh uh e even uh how do you a case study to them? So that way we, we stay on top of our customers. Mind. we're doing that for you guys. Yeah. Awesome, cool.

Like Bianca. I know she's doing a good job. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah, good. So yeah, a couple of super good points there. The Yes, Brandon Lewis is very big on, don't, a lot of painters are stepping over a dollar to pick up a dime, right? This idea that there's a lot of value in your past leads and your past customer list and you need to keep in touch with them and ultimately own that network. Um So we can help you with that. And then the uh another point I want to bring up here is we work with Pan American Pros, works with a lot of companies.

We, we work with well over 100 painting companies right now and the ones that we find are the most successful with our system because we employ CRM and, and this gets back to um actually being holistic with your sales and marketing approach. The ones that are most successful are the ones that engage in use. And so that's one of the things Candela is doing in general with his business. Right. He's taking opportunities. He's taking a CPA who offered him a financial dashboard and he's using it. Right. He's taking Steve Burnett who has tremendous experience, consulting painting companies and in setting up integrations and he's, he's working with him to get his monday.

com set up in a really helpful way. He's hiring painter, marketing pros and then not sitting on his hands, not saying, oh, I'll hire pay market pro. So I don't have to worry about anything anymore. They have automations, they have it all set up, so I'll just be lazy. No, he's actually taking the training that we conducted on, on how to best use our system in the CRM that we've built out and he's doing it and then he's also has other marketing channels, right? He's still entertaining Angie and Yelp, he's, he's projecting out ahead, Peter Murry pros any marketing.

So he doesn't automatically solve, doesn't, doesn't make slow season disappear. So he's already thinking ahead, trying to drum up business and, and working his past leads and leaning into the system. So the takeaways here are used to engage the professionals and, and the resources that are gonna be affected. But then actually use them. The reason Candelario, one of the main reasons he's just a smart and great guy, but he's an action taker. He takes action. That's, that's a huge takeaway here am I missing anything on that?

No, I think you, you hit, you hit right. You know, on the nail. Um, that's, that's sometimes we, you know, we, I guess we listen a lot to what other people are doing but we're not doers. Right. We forget we'll even engage with somebody. Right. We'll even hire a marketing company or we'll hire a coach or we'll hire whoever. Right. And they'll give us the stuff, they'll lay out this road map, they'll, they'll tell us what to do and then we just kind of don't do it.

And then we say, and we start blaming all, all the, you know, all these other people and we don't, you know, blame ourselves for it. Right. And, and it's like, did you really give it your 100% on whatever, you know, system you're using? Right? Whether it's marketing, uh, uh, uh, or, uh, you know, mentor what not like, are you giving it your best? So, that's, that's, that's something that it's, it's like there's no magic into, uh, you know, ok, I wanna, I wanna be a, you know, $2 million company and I want to get there, you know, tomorrow there, there has to be some work to be done by you basically.

Yeah, there are best practices. There are, are best, um, companies that you can work with, but ultimately, you still have to steer it. It's still your business and I think you, your propensity to action and, and um ownership really is what's getting you there and all you're in. Austin. Austin is a competitive market. We, we work with companies all over the place. Austin is one of the most competitive markets we serve. So for people listening, who? That's another big, uh excuse. Right. It's like, well, he probably has a great market.

My market is too small. My market is too competitive every time I go to a job, there are all these other painting companies and they just undercut me. It's not fair. It's not possible to win in this market. Canario probably just has a better market. Do you ever get undercut? You probably never get undercut. Uh I mean, I, I hear, I hear what you're saying all the time like, you know, oh the economy right now is super bad, right? Uh There's no and, and that happens a lot in the Hispanic culture.

I was actually at event the other day uh where uh there was a guest speaker talking about and this was, you know, they were talking to the Hispanic uh painting companies or, or, or uh painting business owners and they were all Hispanic in there and they were like just saying, oh no, when we try our best to uh uh sell the job. But right now the economy is super bad and that's why people are not buying, right? And then you start thinking, OK, are you creating enough value?

You know what, what are you doing to actually sell a job? And it's just, there's, there's different ways we can go on this. But, um, I think overall it's gonna be all in your mindset. Right? Ok. Am I gonna, am I gonna, you know, give it all my 100% and make this happen, whatever I do in the business, you gotta give it your 100%. Yeah. And I think, you know, Jason Perris talks a lot about the Sherwin Williams Store math that he has. Right. I go in, ask him how many, how many gallons of paint they're selling a week and then figure out how many Sherwin's there are in the area and then what percentage of the market does Sherwin take up?

And ultimately how much or do it yourself or how much are, you know, done by painting companies? And you can figure out roughly how many houses are being painted each week right through, through this exercise. And if you do that, you'll figure out that even in the slow economy, houses are being painted, they did not just stop. It's not in your area. Hey, guys, we're gonna hit the brakes. No house is gonna get painted for the next eight months. It might be a slowdown. There might be, there might be a little bit of a slowdown.

That's a real thing. There might be, uh, people taking a little bit longer to make a decision, right. We have a first presidential debate coming up here. People are gonna start to get anxious about next steps for the country. That's a real thing. People start to hold on to their dollars a little tighter. They can hold their breath, seeing what's gonna happen. But winners are still winning. Winners are absolutely still winning. So it's important to remember that. Yeah, you cannot, you cannot just sit in your back and think about, you know, the world is ending and not doing nothing about it.

So it's, it's for me, for me, like we, we call it a hunting season. So whenever, whenever our leads are down and we're not receiving, you know, enough leads from our different, uh, sources that we have, we, we start to go into a hunting season. So what that means is we'll go out there, start door knocking, basically doing God. No, don't do that. That's terrifying. What if, what can, what if they told you no or like get out of here or what if they shut the door in your face?

ID? I, I, I've got that many times and we still, we'll still sell 2 to 23453 job, you know, per day whenever we're out there door to door marketing. Yeah. How many of you listening have ever or maybe currently or are lamenting low leaf flow, but you haven't knocked on one door. He Canario has a $2 million company and he's willing to knock on the door Yeah, we were, we were, we were out there about 23 weeks ago and I remember whenever I first we, we first started implementing that and, and um I, I brought in my production managers like, hey, man, we gotta go into hud season, we gotta go knock some doors, we need it.

We need to fill in your Monday. We need to fill in your cal your calendar. So we went out there. He was, you know, he was kind of like a little bit shy and all that stuff. But right now, man, you'll see that guy. He'll, he'll call me, hey, come, you're available, man. Can we go, can we, can we go door knock, door knocking? I wanna sell a job so bad and we'll go out there and I'll go with him and I'll see him posting jobs and it's just, it, it, for me makes me feel so good because I know that we're not sitting on our backs and we're basically out there whenever we don't have sufficient, you know, leads coming in, we'll go in there and make it happen. Yeah.

11 quote. I like, um, I probably heard it somewhere. I don't know. Otherwise I made it up. We can just, but, but, you know, somewhere probably Google it. I probably just heard it somewhere. But I, I always, uh, tell my wife like, do what others won't. So you'll have what others don't be willing to do the uncomfortable things, you know, get comfortable being uncomfortable, door knocking sucks. It, it does, cold calling sucks. Things like that are just, you have to be a, a special kind of person to enjoy that.

Very few people do. But because it's so hard, it means that very few people are doing it, which means that it's, it's sort of a blue ocean opportunity. Right. So be, to be willing, it's a lot easier to, to just swipe and sit back and ok, we, you know, we did hire a marketing agency. Great. That's a good step if it's a good one, but then the lead comes in but, oh, I'm not gonna call him. I'm not gonna follow all the automations will handle all that.

I'm not gonna, actually, I don't want to get myself on the phone. That would be scary. Like let's just have them book it themselves, lets the more passive you are, the less money you're gonna make, have to be active. Right? Definitely. I li I like that a lot. Uh, you know, uh, I, I fluctuate a lot way better whenever I'm in my uncomfortable position. Like whenever I'm in an uncomfortable position, like let's say we're struggling with sales. I, I gotta, I gotta eat, my family has to eat, our people has to, you know, they have to eat.

So I'm in an uncomfortable position. So that means that I'm, I'm gonna go there and hunt for food. Yeah, hunting season gosh, I love, gosh, I love it. Does, defense is a good offense. All right. So we have the, the Pan American Pro Crm, the sales system. We have, uh, monday. com, we have the financial dashboard and we have paint scout. Am I missing any systems? Um, I think the, the only other thing that we're using, it's gonna be just Google calendars. Uh, that, that's an important one.

Right, because without a calendar then you're, you're not, you know, you're, you have to, we, we stay on track. Basically. I'm able to like our, our, our team is able to share their calendar with me. So I'm able to see where they at like every day, what's happening basically every day on a day to day basis. Like what, what are they doing? You know, like, ok, at 9 a.m. I'm, I'm, you know, I'm stopping by job site, you know, at 1030 I'm sending an invoice or would not, you know, things like that.

Uh Calendars is just for me, it, it also helps a lot with uh facilitating what's going on through the whole day and also organizing yourself, right? Um As, as a business owner, sometimes you're like, uh whenever you're, you're trying to delegate certain responsibilities to people and you're in the position where you're uh more like an owner, less an operator, then you're able to. Ok, cool. Like what do I do with my time time now? Definitely go into your calendar start putting things that are your, are your priority and that's what I do every day.

Um, I'll go into my calendar and then I'll see what's happening and then at the end of the day for tomorrow I'll get ready and I'll put everything in my calendar that needs to get done the next day. So that way I know how to use my time, time management. It's a really, really important thing as a business owner to always know what's going on, what's gonna happen throughout the whole week. Um On a day to day basis, this is just, this is a business master class you're getting right here. Candelario.

Now time management is so many people wake up and it's just all what is, what is going to be imposed on me by the world today. You know what emails am I gonna receive? What angry customer issues am I gonna deal with? What? Let me just wake up and, and let the world dictate my day for me and you are not going to get the 2 million and beyond. If you wake up and you're just, you know, the punching bag of the world, you have to decide the, the concrete actionable high value tasks that you weren't going to engage in each day.

Yes, that, that's definitely something and, and II I, every time that I delegated something it was for me. Now I delegated that I felt like I had nothing to do but whenever you start looking around there's a whole bunch of things in the business that you could be doing to be able to get to your next goal. Yeah. Hm. Yeah. I think some people are afraid of, feel, feeling like they're losing a purpose too. Right. Like, oh, I, I conduct the service. I'm, I'm such a good salesperson.

I wouldn't want to give that up. But if you gave it up then you could start thinking more like a visionary, you could start spending time plotting a master plan for the growth of the company. Right? And 11 of the, one of the, the, uh, I guess, uh the task that I delegated was the sales, um, to one of, one of the sales guy that we had hired and that for me was kind of like, really tough because that's, that's what I love the most is basically going out there and selling jobs.

Um, but, and, and, and once I did it, I, I remember that the first time I did it and, and it was, he was already, you know, on his own. Um, it was like, ok, what do I do now with my time? Because now I'm like, you know, I had, I was having 3 to 4 appointments per day. Um, and that was, that was taking, you know, a lot of my time. So now it's like, now that I have, you know, this six hours available per day. Now, what do I do with that time?

And then that's, that's when you really start to kind of like, OK, put pieces in place and you're like, ok, cool. Like there's this other items in my and, you know, in my business that I could be doing so that way I can grow at a faster pace and get there without getting hurt. Yeah. Yeah. Your business is not magically going to grow to multimillions to 5 million to 10 million. It's not gonna grow like that just because you're working hard and you're staying busy. And so if you are not delegating these things, if you are not the brain, if you're not stepping back and coming up with an action plan of how you're gonna get there, nobody else is doing it and entropy and, and momentum on its own is not gonna get you to 2345 $10 million it just isn't.

So when a anytime you're doing an activity that you think, well, what would I do if I don't do it? Well, who, who's doing the, the thinking, who's doing the leadership of what needs to actually happen, depending on your goals. Again, if you're listening to this, you li you likely have ambitious goals. Right. Right. But, but that's right. That's true. Like we, we all define success in different many ways. Um And you know, my success or your success might not be someone's else. But definitely if people are listening to this is because they wanna grow, they wanna scale, they, they want, you know, always better, their business, which, you know, that, and that's what I do all the time too.

I'm always listening to different uh podcasts or, or people that I can learn, learn from because that's really important. You never, you never stop learning the, the day that you stop learning. I think everything ends there. Uh But I just, I just see life as a learning a lesson every day, I'll learn from someone even, you know, from, from whoever I'll, I'll try to get, you know, and, and I always, I'll go, I'll, I always go based on, on a kind of like a scripture in the Bible that says, you know, uh take everything, this is, this is the Apostle pa.

He always says take, take everything that's good and leave everything that's bad. So I always take, you know, the good from everyone. So and I love that Candelario. This is incredible, man. Is there anything else regarding systems that you want to cover before we wrap up this first episode? I think, I think there's many but probably I missed one or two. But I think this ones are like the main, main uh primary sources for me that have helped me um you know, scale, scale my business. Amazing.

Well, we will be uh this was all about effective systems to scale. We'll be covering critical numbers next time. So super excited to, to figure out more about your dashboard and what you look at. Uh And thank you so much, brother for this business master class. No, man. Thank you for having me there. I'm excited for the next one. 

If you want to learn more about the topics we discussed in this podcast and how you can use them to grow your painting business, visit paintermarketingpros.com/podcast for free training, as well as the ability to schedule a personalized strategy session for your painting company. Again, that URL is paintermarketing pros.com/podcast. 

Hey there, painting company owners. If you enjoyed today's episode, make sure you go ahead and hit that subscribe button. Give us your feedback. Let us know how we did. And also if you're interested in taking your painting business to the next level, make sure you visit the painter marketing pros website at paintermarketingpros.com to learn more about our services.

You can also reach out to me directly by emailing me at Brandon@PainterMarketingPros.com and I can give you personalized advice on growing your painting business.

Until next time. Keep growing.