Builder Funnel Radio
Stepping into the new home builder adjacent industry of home remodelers, I joined Spencer Powell, Founder and CEO of Builder Funnel, for Episode 8 of Builder Funnel Radio.
This podcasts hits a lot of topics: how to build a lead generation machine, getting into the mindset of your customer, the brief industry distraction of Pokémon Go, how to avoid becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy, and Static vs Noise metrics.
Transcript
Spencer Powell: Welcome to Builder Funnel Radio. My name is Spencer Powell, the Inbound Marketing Director at Builder Funnel, and each week we bring you marketing and sales strategies for your home building or remodeling business. Thanks for joining me today. Let's get started! Welcome to Builder Funnel Radio. This is Marketing and Sales Strategies in between job sites. I'm your host, Spencer Powell. Here at Builder Funnel, we help home builders, remodelers, and contractors generate more leads from their websites and close more sales. With me today, I have Will Duderstadt. Will is currently the Marketing and Development Manager of Web Platforms at MI Homes. overseeing electronic marketing efforts, lead generation, search marketing, social media, and content development for 15 divisions in 11 states. So Will, you're a busy guy, but thanks for joining me today.
Will Duderstadt: Well, Spencer, my pleasure.
Spencer Powell: I'm really excited to get into some lead generation topics today, but before we get into that, I really want to learn a little bit more about your story. So how did you end up in the homebuilding world?
Will Duderstadt: This is like my origin story, like I'm a superhero, right?
Spencer Powell: Exactly.
Will Duderstadt: I like to say that home building is in my blood. Back in Pittsburgh in the late 1940s, my great-grandfather was working with Ed Ryan, Ed Ryan eventually, of Ryan Homes. And they both went on to start their own home building companies in the early 50s. My great-grandfather was really focused more on custom home building to the point where the street I grew up with was named after my grandmother, Shirley, and it intersected with a street named after my great-grandmother, Hedwig. My childhood home itself was built by my grandfather. So my entire mother's side of my family has been in home building for a really long time. Wow. Yeah, it's pretty wild to think about how much time and energy has been spent before I was even around. And now I get to do that same thing, obviously, in a much different era.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, that's super cool. Well, then it is a true origin story here.
Will Duderstadt: Right. And then, you know, my true superpower comes in because my father is a recently retired wood shop teacher. So he is a true craftsman and spent his entire career working with his hands and teaching other people how to work with wood. In fact, a dining room table he made probably 30 years ago recently went viral on Facebook when it got posted to like a woodworkers group. Oh, that's awesome.
Spencer Powell: That's pretty neat. That's very cool. Yeah, well, I feel like we've got a little bit of crossover because my family has been in the home building business. I think it's 108 years now in the Seattle area. It was like my great, great grandfather, or something like that. So it's interesting that lineage has carried forward for both of us in some way or another now.
Will Duderstadt: Yeah, absolutely. But sort of like a copy of a copy, I definitely inherited the itch to build, but I don't think I got much of A talent. So rather than pick up a hammer or try to actually build a house, I picked up computers. Making or building web pages was really my first step. And then eventually identifying traffic sources and methods to influence conversion come after that, right? Once you build something like a website, you want to get people to it, you want to get them to see it. So a lot of that learning really was born out of, I think, this innate desire to just make things that I thank my ancestors for.
Spencer Powell: That's cool. That's awesome. Yeah, that's really fun to hear the background. I think everybody always comes into the industry from a different angle. So it's fun to get that background. And then I saw you worked at Apple for a while, but you also ran a print magazine. Is that right? So tell me a little bit more about those roles and how that kind of played into your role as a lead generator in the construction industry.
Will Duderstadt: Like you said, we all come to the building industry in different ways, and I took a roundabout way of getting there. My time at Apple was absolutely awesome and amazing. I had grown up admiring that brand in like a really big way. I think a lot of people do now, but back in the mid-90s or even late 90s, they were still the underdog, so people were worried that they were going to be going out of business. And I still saw something very admirable in the way they positioned their products, the way they sold their products, and then obviously, what you could do with their products. It was a complete lifestyle, really. My time there was spent doing a lot of education. So I was teaching small courses, short sessions, how to use Pro apps like Final Cut Pro, and then some consumer-focused stuff as well. But it was an absolute joy to be able to spend five years with such an amazing company.
Spencer Powell: That's cool. Yeah, I bet you learned a lot of things about working in a large organization and then being a part of a lot of that growth, you know, that's occurred with Apple.
Will Duderstadt: A bit, yeah, you're right. Because a big part I think that I keep with me is this idea of building processes and scaling. And if you think of Apple today, they're going to come out with a new iPhone or invent a new widget that we all need. But they immediately have to think and understand how can we manufacture 1 million of these things every month for the next two years, right? That is the epitome of scale. So I like to put that hat on quite a bit and really talk through and develop processes so that we can take advantage of things like that.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, that's super cool. And then tell me a little bit more about the print magazine as well.
Will Duderstadt: That's funny to think about a digital guy working on a print magazine, right? Yeah, you gotta keep in mind, this was, we started this back in 2007, and I think we ran through 2010 or 2011, but it was a small group of us that really built out a company around a print magazine that covered collegiate club lacrosse. So it's the non-NCAA lacrosse.
Spencer Powell: Gotcha.
Will Duderstadt: This is pretty big schools though, like Arizona State and BYU. And they have tremendous talent playing on these teams. It was just not getting a lot of media coverage. So the fellows that I partnered with had grown up playing in that particular league. And again, I just like building stuff. So It was a bit more technical at the time, and I built the front-end website, the back-end content management system to actually collect all the articles and collateral for the magazine, and then built the subscription system as well, which is really similar to lead generation. Trying to convert a website visitor to a subscriber of a magazine is really what got me pumped up about this idea of conversion and lead generation. Since then, I've kind of discovered that it's harder than e-commerce, right? You're not just selling a cool t-shirt or a little item. You're signing someone on for something more meaningful. In the case of the magazine, it's an annual commitment. In the case of lead Gen. they know the onslaught that is about to begin when they convert to a lead. So while it's harder, I do think it's much more rewarding. And I'm grateful for my time being involved in a startup like that to really give me the hunger to want to continue to attack lead Gen.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, that's super cool. And it sounds like you've picked up and kind of developed a lot of those skill sets that you use in lead Gen. whether it's building websites or figuring out some of those backend systems and how those work. I guess when you're thinking about generating leads, where do you begin? I'd imagine most of our listeners, if not all of them, probably want more leads. So where do you start when you start thinking about this topic?
Will Duderstadt: I really bust through four major questions that I have to ask myself. And the first that anyone thinking about lead generation needs to sit down and take a hard look at is, where are your customers? That's where are they in a couple different ways, right? What is their demographic? What age group, what income level? Where are they spending their time online? And oftentimes, those two things are related. It's a little different, B2C and B2B, but you're going to find that certain demographics might skew towards Facebook and others towards maybe Snapchat. Some are more or less likely to interact with paid ads on Google or Bing. So you really have to get in the mindset of your customer and understand where they spend their time online. My other three items that I kind of have on my checklist, why would that potential customer choose to convert? There has to be a compelling reason that we give them. but hopefully we're solving a problem for them or fulfilling a need. So really trying to get into their mind as to why they would take that step is going to be critical to being able to attract it. I mentioned earlier, like we all know the onslaught after you convert to become a lead. So I try and put myself in their shoes and think about what's going to happen after they become a lead. Do I have a process in place to be able to handle that lead, to have an appropriate conversation with them, and to fulfill whatever need really prompted the conversion in the 1st place? I would say if you don't have a good answer at this point, you kind of got to start over completely and build out that back end of what's going to happen with these leads before you start to try and generate them. And then I happen to have a pretty awesome online sales team already in place. And I like to put myself in their shoes and think about how are they going to react to these leads. There's a lot of different quality of leads that can come through. There's different amounts of information that can come with a lead. And how that sales team reacts or how they're positioned to react is really going to make a big difference if it's going to be deemed a successful source in the long term.
Spencer Powell: Gotcha. Yeah. So you tackle those four questions or kind of you run through your checklist of where are your customers Why would the customer, potential customer, want to convert? What happens after they convert? And then how is the sales team positioned to react or tackle that lead? Did I get that right? Okay.
Will Duderstadt: Those are the four, man. That's where you got to start.
Spencer Powell: The big four, yeah. So there's a lot in there. Let's try to unpack a little bit of this for our listeners. So let's start with the first one, which is, you know, where are your customers and where are they hanging out online? what are the first couple steps? Because I hear that from a lot of people. you got to know your customer and you got to know where they spend their time. How do you know if they're on Facebook or Snapchat, like you said?
Will Duderstadt: The first... really place that you have to start is building out, if not a persona that encompasses your customer, at least being in touch with your existing customers. So understanding the age, not just that you're targeting, but that are actually consuming and buying your product will start kind of scoping out what that persona looks like. It takes a special skill and a special talent to be able to build out a really rock solid persona. So the shortcut is to just get in front of your customers and talk to them. Whether it's a point of sale for builders at time of close or maybe even afterwards, get to know them. Ask them how they found you. Ask what their impression of you really is when they are browsing online for whatever it is that you sell. So that's going to drive you, I think, to certain channels more than others.
Spencer Powell: Gotcha. Yeah, that makes sense. I'm glad you said that because I feel like a lot of times when we think about generating leads and attracting people, we kind of want to skip over that step, which is really nailing down who is it we're trying to attract. And it seems like if you do a good job up front, it kind of makes everything else easier because then you have some direction in what content to write or what might be a good conversion point for those types of people. I'd imagine that's what kind of flows you into those next steps too.
Will Duderstadt: Well, really, if you have this in place as well, you make life easier for yourself in the future because you won't be blindsided by the next new thing, so to speak, right? About a year ago, pokémon Go pops up on a lot of marketers' radar. And the question was, you know, should home builders be using this in some way? Should we be incorporating whatever they called the places or the checkpoints? If you know who your customers are and where they're spending time, you're going to be able to answer that question of, should I be using pokémon Go to generate leads a lot quicker? And you probably don't even need to test it. You can just be confident that your customers aren't using that particular platform and get back and focus on the one that's performing for you.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, that's a great example because the answer will be very clear to you, right?
Will Duderstadt: Yes, indeed.
Spencer Powell: So are there any... channels online that, I know you have to study your persona and you have to know where they hang out online, but have you seen in your experience that there are certain channels that just tend to be very effective in this space?
Will Duderstadt: Well, that's a loaded question, because it is slightly different for every builder, but also, suppliers or remodelers or vendors. I would say, hands down, The best channel is a well-optimized, strategically planned and monitored channel. If you're just doing it to check the box, like if you're just on Facebook because everybody tells you you're on Facebook, that's never going to be the best channel for you. So where you spend your time, how much effort you put behind making sure that it's optimized and working correctly will probably turn into your best channel.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, I love that. Yeah, you can't just say, oh, I'm just going to be on all these social networks because we need to have all these profiles set up. And everyone, I go to every conference and they say, I got to be on Instagram or Snapchat or Pinterest. And so I'm just going to do it. And then, yeah, you end up putting in 1/4, an eighth of the effort that you really need to. And then. Then none of it works. Right.
Will Duderstadt: And don't mistake that advice for not registering usernames on new social media sites or protecting your brand on sites. It's really about are you going to spend time on that particular channel? Are you going to make it appear like you have a presence? And are you going to expect something back out of it?
Spencer Powell: That's a great point. Yeah.
Will Duderstadt: We're talking a lot about social, but I have to give a nod to a few of my favorite channels, 'cause once you get that disclaimer out of the way, yeah, exactly.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, let's hear 'em.
Will Duderstadt: There are some pretty awesome ones. Currently, I think Zillow Group is doing a fantastic job for builders with lead generation, especially if you're a builder that carries any inventory at all. It is an... amazing opportunity to really compete directly with resale, which is a challenge a lot of home builders have. So this gets your spec inventory product right in front of people that probably had not considered new. They might even convert and fall in love with a home from a home builder without knowing that it's new. And that's just awesome, right? As A marketer, that's an amazing opportunity.
Spencer Powell: Super cool.
Will Duderstadt: A big fan of the work they're doing.
Spencer Powell: Cool. So you throw Zillow group at the top there. That's great. Now, there's a big misconception out there that online leads are junk. I hear that a lot. How would you respond to that?
Will Duderstadt: I think to a certain degree, there's some truth in it, that there are certainly sources that can be junk, but it's thrown around a little too strongly at times. In a lot of cases, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. People get the idea that a particular source or maybe even all online leads are junk, and then they treat them like junk. They don't respond quickly. They aren't nice. And ultimately, if you do that, they're going to be junk. They're not going to reward you. But if you take the time to build real relationships, act quickly every time you get a lead that comes in with an inquiry, you're going to find that they've blossomed. Truly, the The single fact that battles the misconception is that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of home builders that are logging millions of dollars of sales from their online leads. And if you're not one of them, you might have to look inward first to really diagnose the problem.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, I think that's a well-stated and probably some tweetable quotes in there. But I like what you said about it really becoming kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy because you never know, you get one e-mail address and that's all. If that's all you have, you don't know if that person is ready to, you know, buy tomorrow because their situation is dire and, you know, for whatever reason, they need something fast or they're 12 months out, but they're still a good lead, they're just, they need to be in the database for the future. And if you don't handle them professionally and respond quickly, like you said, then you'll never have that opportunity or know what those leads could turn into. That's right.
Will Duderstadt: And you know what, I can hit an example head on. New Home Source, which is another site that I'm a fan of, generates both direct leads for builders, but also recommended leads for builders. which is basically when a consumer goes to the site and finds a particular plan or community that they like, there's a checkbox that allows New Home Source to send that lead to similar builders. And I talked to a lot of builders that think that those leads are junk, almost a direct quote of yours, right? Junk, throw them away.
Spencer Powell: Yeah.
Will Duderstadt: But there's tremendous value in even that lead because that's an opportunity to really talk to a customer that wasn't going to reach out to you, but is still in the market for something that you offer, because they're filling out a form for your competitor. So if you treat it like junk, it's going to be junk, and your competitor is going to be happy that you never tried to sneak in and have a conversation. But if you realize that there's some similarities in what that lead needs, and you're able to quickly get that information in front of them, you might find that you're a better fit for that particular lead and it's going to turn into a sale for you. So I have a hard time saying anything is absolute junk. Everything is worth some amount of effort. And really, again, kind of hearkening back to an earlier comment, building out some sort of process so you aren't necessarily burdened by junk or what you perceive as junk. You have a method to deal with it so it's efficient.
Spencer Powell: Yeah. That's a fantastic example. And I kind of want to dig into this a little bit further because I feel like it spurs a couple more questions for me. But when we're thinking about online leads being junk, I feel like part of that perception is somebody that walks into a model home and has a conversation with you always feels like a better lead than somebody coming online. But I feel like part of it too is we have the ability to generate so many more leads online than necessarily the number of people that walk through a model. So I feel like part of the perception there is just because you're dealing with the sheer volume of leads oftentimes. And so what are some of those processes that you've kind of mentioned that can help people effectively, quote unquote, weed through these leads or process these leads in a way that doesn't discard them as junk, but you're also maybe not wasting tons of time on leads that aren't going to pan out.
Will Duderstadt: Right, I think the most important thing, it goes back to my 4 questions. What are you doing once you generate leads? If these aren't going to a dedicated online salesperson to be able to work, you're setting yourself up for maybe a little bit more junk than you would like. I see a lot of examples where leads are going to the owner's email box or the owner's mobile phone. That's just not going to fly in so many situations. The owner of a building company has a lot to do, and responding to leads is probably not one of them. So getting a dedicated professional in place is really step number one. And when I say dedicated, I mean that is job number one. They can certainly do some other functions around the office, especially as it relates to sales and marketing, but they need to be able to drop everything when that phone rings. That dedicated person really needs to log in every day with the focus being on having as many quality interactions and conversations as possible. So a headset, a dedicated computer, a nice quiet space, that's really going to set the tone for being as efficient as possible. If someone's trying to work from a shared cube set up, maybe in the middle of a busy office, this is just going to deteriorate and you're going to get that feeling of too many leads a little too quickly. So if you get all that in place and somebody has the organizational right away and all the technology that they need to be successful, it's really about scaling up. A lot of these lead interactions start with the same basic couple questions. What part of town are you looking at? What's your price range? You converted on this particular home. What is of interest to you about it? Or kind of the pinnacle, do you want to set up an appointment? Sure. You know, those are quick little lines to say, but if you're typing that same thing every day for hundreds of leads, you're really starting to chew up minutes and hours. So look to technology, not to replace you, but to give you some of those shortcuts to make your life easier. The iPhone and I'm on an iMac, they have built-in kind of shortcut things where you just, you type a couple characters and it auto-completes an entire sentence for you. And that can make all the difference in the world when you're trying to respond to 10 or 20 people within 5 minutes. Temporary automation like that, I think is A-OK. It also might be a mail merge to do an outbound email to a group of five or 10 people. Obviously, you want to do it correctly and follow can-span regulations and all that, right? But sending an email once rather than 10 times saves you time.
Spencer Powell: Absolutely.
Will Duderstadt: Yeah, look for those bulk tasks and spend a little bit of time to save time for yourself.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, those are good points. I mean, surely you can use technology in a lot of these instances to automate it, but to your point, I mean, you could just have a Word document that has, three or four common templates that you end up sending, and it could just be, here's the four questions I always ask, and then you can copy paste, you know, at the very basic level. So yeah, those are good points.
Will Duderstadt: Here's the beauty of having more leads than more walk-in traffic. You might create that shortcut script for yourself. But over just the course of a month, you're going to be able to utilize that script far more frequently than an on-site salesperson could, which means you're getting feedback much quicker than an on-site salesperson could. And you can refine that script and really hone it to the point where you know it's as effective as possible, whereas that on-site person might still be going at, you know, three or six months before they realize, oh, maybe I should be changing part of my presentation.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, another excellent point. And I'm curious too, because this dedicated person is tackling so many leads and interacting with so many people, how important is it to take those findings and those learnings and pass it back to the lead gen team?
Will Duderstadt: it's absolutely huge. And I think we're delving into like 102 level lead generation stuff, right? The first metric that so many marketers look at are, things like impressions or a cost per impression. Savvy marketers are looking at cost per lead or cost per conversion. But the really good marketers are looking at the cost per sale. Are they doing efforts that are, yes, generating leads at a reasonable rate or not, but are they going all the way through to sale? If you have a target of, let's say $100 per lead, but none of them ever go to sale, that's a pretty terrible metric. Someone that's selling 3 or $400,000 homes might be willing to pay $200 per lead if 100% of them go all the way to sale. So that communication from the top of the funnel all the way down to the bottom is crucial if you really want to optimize every channel.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, marketers, we tend to love all the numbers. There's impressions, there's likes, there's comments, there's all these. I mean, there tends to be a lot of vanity metrics. And to your point, really the end goal is let's track it down to the sale. And sure, there's branding and there's some other intangible elements of marketing, but as a lead generator, yeah, you really want to get down to what's producing sales and can I do more of that? Can I just scale that up and cut away stuff that's not working? Or, you know, what do I need to change about my strategy?
Will Duderstadt: Spot on. And the last time I checked, the bank does not accept likes or comments when I try and get my mortgage.
Spencer Powell: We got to change that.
Will Duderstadt: Those metrics make us feel great. And they are good indicators of a lot of other things, right? But if you're going to optimize for a true business metric, you got to kind of set those aside, relegate those to the top of funnel, and focus in on the things that are going to actually drive sales.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, I love it. So Will says you can't take likes and comments to the bank. Yeah. So let's shift gears here and still talking about leads, but maybe leads that aren't ready to buy today. So you, maybe you have that template set up, you're getting the online lead through your online sales counselor is sending out that template and somebody goes, oh, I'm just, I'm looking to buy in six months or nine months. What's a good, you know, general process or what should you do with those leads? Because they're still potentially customers, but obviously not looking to set an appointment, this weekend.
Will Duderstadt: Well, I got to say, I love that you phrased this question with, they're not ready today, because so many marketers or sales professionals like to lump all of these unqualified leads into one big bucket, and then they're just done. They're unqualified. Being qualified or unqualified is not binary. Being unqualified is really just a point in time. and they will probably be qualified at some point in the future. You really have to develop individual campaigns to address whatever the deficiency might be. These could be electronic campaigns or they could just be truly offline campaigns. So if you're engaged with a lead who maybe has credit problems or haven't saved enough yet for a down payment, you might have an auto drip email campaign over the course of the next six months. It gives them some assistance or tips on how to build savings, how to repair their credit, and the things they should be doing if they're thinking about building a home in six months. Because ultimately, if you give someone that assistance and that advice, there will be a certain amount of loyalty when it does, when they do become qualified again. And hopefully they'll pick up the phone and you'll be the home builder they choose. I mean, if somebody's premature and they're still in the dream phase, You can deliver content to them via email, via social, that really establishes yourself as an aspirational brand, right? Give them amazing photography of your models or of your exteriors so they have something to start to put on their Pinterest board and they can envision themselves in the home that you're selling. Again, when they're qualified in six months, you've built some loyalty. They're already picturing themselves in one of your homes.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, that's awesome advice, Will. And for everybody listening, I mean, this is a perfect example of how to nurture leads that, are potentially good customers, but down the road. And you broke it out into some really good scenarios. You know, somebody that maybe needs to build savings. And so that could be a campaign where you're providing advice around that. And I love the example on repairing credit and giving tips there. And so you can kind of It's thinking back to that persona, but then it's like, what stage are they in this process of buying a home? And what can you do to help them get to the finish line? You know, they're going to get there at some point and they're going to buy from somebody. And like you said, you can build a lot of trust and credibility through these automated campaigns that you kind of, you know, you build once and they work for you in the background. That's right.
Will Duderstadt: you will get into situations where your leads will not buy from you. That doesn't mean the conversation should stop, especially if you build a good relationship with somebody. Pick up the phone and give them a call. Ask them why they did not choose you. Ask them why they went with the competitor. Not 100% of people are going to give you answers. Probably 100% won't take your call. But anytime you get that gem back as to what you could have done differently, what you could have done better, or maybe where you didn't fulfill a certain need that they had is an opportunity for you to build out one of these campaigns.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, well said. Now let's shift gears to technology. So what tools or technology do you feel like builders need as a part of their lead generation strategy in today's environment?
Will Duderstadt: Well, man, tools and technology, that is a wide, wide net you're cast. I will say I rely on Google Analytics in a big way for lead gen. That is really the Bible or the authority on how I'm doing. You can work with a lot of different channels, Zillow, New Home Source, Social, and they're all going to give you their independent dashboards. But Google Analytics, if set up correctly, is the great unifier. And it will be able to give you a cross-section of your entire electronic business. So I can't stress enough how important it is to become a Google Analytics certified marketing professional to really live and breathe inside that app and know where everything is and really understand what's driving all of those metrics. Additional technology, I think it's a given that a builder needs a great CRM. They'd need a mobile website and a desktop website, either responsive or adaptive, but something that's going to be able to really deliver content to people at the right time and the right place. Hopefully, optimized landing pages are a part of that website. If they aren't, looking at some tools that can build those for you is certainly a high need. then I think an outbound email provider is a really necessary technology. Part of keeping people engaged with a lot of these campaigns and getting your content out there is not always about attracting new or speaking to a new audience. It's about continuing to re-engage with your existing audience. So a strong email practice is pretty darn critical. And it's not really a tool or a technology. But you need a geek to be the conductor of all of these things. not the stereotypical geek, a modern day, a 2018 geek, but somebody who understands how to use all of these tools. They don't have to be an expert of each individual one. They need to be able to bring it all together as a marketer.
Spencer Powell: I like it. Yeah, you kind of need a hybrid person that can span across these different tools because yeah, I mean, You said it. I asked a kind of a very wide sweeping question there and there's a lot out there. But let's dive just a little bit deeper and what do you think are your favorite two or three tools that you use? And it doesn't necessarily have to be a big broad sweep. It could be a very small tool, just something you like, whether it's a social media tool or something for your website. What's on your favorite list these days?
Will Duderstadt: Well, Your audience might find my answers relatively boring. Well, at least my first answer. I think Excel is probably the greatest application or tool ever made. I play in Excel like it's a video game.
Spencer Powell: All right.
Will Duderstadt: And it is, I mean, it is the root of just unlocking so much information, past, present, and future about your business. You really, you have to be a ninja inside of Excel. So that is absolutely Number one on my list of any technology or tool. Cool. A little bit more specific or actionable for your audience, there's a great service offered by O'Neill Interactive called Follow, which does something pretty cool. It merges the builder feed that a lot of builders have with their communities and their plans and their inventory, merges that feed with Facebook ads, which for a builder of our size, it's a godsend to have. because it can build thousands of ads almost immediately based on all the different things that I currently have for sale, my communities, my plans, and my inventory. And then the follow part is that it really is remarketing on steroids. It's going to attach or show that ad to people that have interacted with those pages or similar pages on my site. So it's not an interruptive piece of marketing or add on social, it's really emotional and it's drawing somebody back to that thing that they've already interacted with.
Spencer Powell: Very cool. Yeah, those are, those are some, you gave us one of each, right? You gave us something, I guess, in the quote unquote boring category with Excel. But yeah, it's amazing how versatile Excel is. But we're getting towards the end of the show here. What are maybe a few super actionable tips that our listeners can take away and basically start improving their lead gen efforts in the next couple of weeks?
Will Duderstadt: super actionable, count everything. Literally everything. Every lead counts. Your reporting needs to reflect every source that these leads are coming from, the conversion rates, both website to lead, lead to sale, telephone capture rates, anything that could possibly influence quality or downstream conversion, get on a report, get into GA, make sure you're logging it. You really can't improve anything until you start counting it. So I think the other big item that I recommend is marketers need to focus on getting individual channels as close to autopilot as possible. or at least a baseline foundational kind of autopilot. Get that process in place, make something rock solid, move that base foundation stuff into a maintenance mode where you're not going to tinker with it anymore. You're just going to keep it running, and then you build upon it with little improvements at a time. You know, they say the easiest way to eat an elephant, one bite at a time, that's how you're going to tackle a lot of these big sources like organic search or paid search or social media. So experiment, but do it with rigor and specificity, and don't cannibalize something that you know is strong and performing well for you.
Spencer Powell: Yeah, that's great advice. And I have one last question for you today, Will, but first, you know, how can people get in touch with you? Where can they find you online and connect?
Will Duderstadt: sure. I have a website, willduder.com. Occasional musings of the things that are going on around me, like my garden. I'm most active on Twitter. So I'd love if anyone listening has additional questions or just wants to say, hey, you know, drop me a note on Twitter and I'll be sure to respond. And then you can find me everywhere else, right? Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram. I'm doing them all.
Spencer Powell: Cool. That's awesome. And we'll make sure to link those up in the show notes to make it easy for everyone to find you there. And yeah, as we wrap today, what would just be one piece of advice that you'd like to leave everyone with for today?
Will Duderstadt: You know, that one piece of advice, lead generation is hard, but it's really, it's a game that only the best can play. So if you're doing it, know that you're already among the elite. If you're doing it well, you're in that top tier. And if you want to be better, work towards becoming an equal parts marketer, technology developer, and storyteller, and all the pieces are going to fall into place for you.
Spencer Powell: Awesome. That's great advice. And Will, thank you so much for joining me on today's show. I think this was awesome.
Will Duderstadt: It's been a blast, man. Thank you so much for inviting me.
Spencer Powell: Absolutely. Thanks, Will. Thanks for joining us today on Builder Funnel Radio. Don't forget to visit www..builderfunnel.com for tons of free marketing and sales resources. And if you ever need hands-on help implementing your marketing and sales system, just send a quick note to radio at builderfunnel.com. And as we close for today, remember, never stop learning. See you next time.
