Matt Clark
The Virtual Edge
@0:00 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Shades of Entrepreneurship. This is your host, Mr.
Gabriel Flores. Today I'm here with Matt Clark. Matt, how are we doing?
@0:18 - Matt Clark
Doing amazing, brother.
@0:19 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Thank you having me on today. Yes, I'm excited because you know, what you do is really help other entrepreneurs.
And so we're going to kind of talk about that. But first, give us a little background.
@0:30 - Matt Clark
Who is Matt Clark? Where do you want me to start? That is the loaded question. OK, how far back do we want to go?
@0:39 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Let's start at the beginning. Let's start at the beginning of Matt's entrepreneurial journey.
@0:44 - Matt Clark
What were you doing? So, you know, I kind of I'm not I'm not one of these people who when they grow up, they know exactly what they want to do life and go and get it.
You know, I was always kind of like, I don't know what I to be when I grow up. I don't know where I'm going.
don't know what to. going to happen but you know I'm curious so let's go figure it out and that's kind of what I've taken through with me through my entire journey so you know when I finished school I was like the first thing is well what the hell am I going to do now let's be a waiter started with that figured out okay well I'm really good with people and then my dad was like well you know you're going to be the first one in the family to go to university and I was like yeah I think you're barking up the wrong tree here buddy I hated school I just got out of school I'm not going back for another four years it's just not going to happen so instead what I did was I went over to the UK and I got a job there with one of the family friends and it was supposed to be installing Sky TV like satellite TV and that lasted about a week I looked at this five in the morning till 10 pm at night and the freezing cold and I'm like nah this is not exciting so that's just the next best thing which was door to door salesman
Well, everyone loves a door-to-door salesman. So there was kind of the basis for everything that that I've done. And then, you know, I actually really excelled at it.
I loved it. We did really, really well. did that for a year. Then I went back to South Africa and then I was working for one of my dad's friends selling corporate clothing and gifts.
Like that was not something I enjoyed in the slide. And then one of my, the guy who used to be the manager in the door-to-door sales company phoned me out.
He phoned me on a Tuesday and he's like, Matt, I got this thing I've just started. We're selling telephone systems to businesses door-to-door.
Easiest thing I've ever done. You've got to come and do it. I was like, I think the Lord, because I need to get out of what I'm doing right now.
So he phoned me on the Tuesday. quit on the Wednesday. was in Cape Town on the Thursday, made up in this little garage inside of a warehouse inside an industrial area in Cape Town.
And I'm looking at this, we're sitting on these white plastic chairs.
@2:58 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
I'm like, where is this thing going?
@3:00 - Matt Clark
Oh, it turns out we blew this thing up and we opened up offices all around the country and then I ended up starting my own business with two partners.
We took that to six million a year within four years and I sold my shares in that business and then I started in the online world.
I was looking for something that could give me freedom, you know, something that could give me more fulfillment, something where I wasn't earning South African Rans, but I could start earning dollars and pounds and euros, know, currency that actually makes some sense in the world.
And so I started off as an impugence of certified partner that was like the first entry into it because I looked at, you know, what it does.
I'm like, are you kidding me? We can take a sales process that I used to do manually door to door, put it all online and automate most of it.
mean, this is like, every business needs this. And so as we started diving into that helping businesses do that, we realize
I said, okay, you could automate the process, but now you've got to feed the beast, right? Where everyone needs leads now.
And I don't know, I couldn't figure out Facebook advertising. I couldn't figure out YouTube. And so one of my friends was doing LinkedIn and she was like, you got to check this thing out, man.
That's amazing. And I realized for me, it was like virtually knocking doors. I could do it from anywhere in the world.
I could skip the gatekeeper, skip the red tape, speak directly to the decision maker. And as long as everything is positioned properly and I could get them on a call and sign them up.
And so we started helping a couple of our clients do that, created a course on that. We sold almost 500 courses.
And then we just started going deeper and deeper and deeper. now we've kind of built a whole, we've almost circled back where it's like, we built these three areas, which is how do we generate leads, number one, then how do we convert those leads in an automated area, which is in the sales process.
And then how do we scale that, you know, through running webinars and events, getting on stage speaking live and then finding joint venture partners, people that can promote you to their audiences or speak on their stages or whatever it is, and then running ads.
And so, you know, now with the event of AI being in there as well, it's just like shortening the cycle even further to everything.
So we've dive deeper into that. And, you know, over the last eight years, we've helped over 1,800 clients in 26 countries, and we're just having a lot of fun.
And, you know, our mission is we want our people to have massive impact, exciting growth that they love, a lifestyle that lights them up.
@5:40 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
You know, folks, I got to tell you what Matt is essentially talking about very organically. He just essentially defined a sales funnel for you, right, and he's saying, Hey, I that's my awareness state, right, I'm just getting people aware of the product and I'm trying to convert them.
And then once they convert them. Now I have the contact information, all that information. Now I send them to the webinar.
Now I'm trying to make them a loyal consumer of the product. Because at the end of the day, what you want as a brand, as a company, as an owner, you want a loyal consumer that's so loyal, that's actually going to share your information on social media and other platforms because they found such a value.
Now, it's interesting, you talked about, you kind of did a lot of different things before the entrepreneurship world. You kind of thought about the corporate world, you thought about working, what was that kind of moment, that that transitionary period that made you feel like, you know what, I can't work for somebody else, I got to do this myself.
@6:42 - Matt Clark
You know, I've actually never, I've never had a salary before until I own my own business, right? I've only ever worked on commission only.
So no basic, no petrol allowance, we had a petrol allowance, but no basic, no benefits, no nothing. that everyone expects these days only ever worked on commission and for me that was amazing because I've literally got a blank check that I can write every single month and for me it kind of just felt like the next natural step I needed something more you know I'm always into personal development and you know when I said to you like I kind of don't know and I saw to some degree I'm like I still don't know where this is going but I'm curious and so it's just kind of like pulling at the threads and following where it takes me into see where it goes that you know I've done a lot of work internally you know personal development spiritual development health fitness like all of it like it's all you can't just have one piece of the puzzle like you need all the pieces to be successful and so you know I think when you start going down that journey of having that curiosity just that question of like well what else is there leads you down a path and and that's kind of what it took me and I was looking at what I was doing and I'm like asking myself the question I kept
Am I truly loving this? Am I feeling fulfilled by this? Yes, I'm making lot of money, but you I love what I'm doing.
The answer was no. In fact, it was quite the opposite.
@8:10 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
I felt like it was sucking my soul.
@8:12 - Matt Clark
And so, yeah, it's like golden handcuffs, you know, making tons of money, but I couldn't travel. And traveling is one of my highest values.
I mean, I've been to, I think we worked out there, they're like 52 countries now. And my wife and I've been traveling for the past two and a half years, we're in Vietnam at the moment.
And we've been to 27 countries in two and a half years. I couldn't do that before. I had sales, massive sales teams and offices and staff and all this stuff.
So you kind of get the golden handcuffs and there's no fulfillment or no reward other than make money and then find the fulfillment somewhere else.
And I was like, well, want to bring these two together. So I went looking and, you know, here we are today.
@8:56 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
It's evolving and still asking what else I know and I got I feel like I'm in the exact same situation, got the golden handcuffs, know, a lot of people know I work with my full-time careers in the healthcare industry, I do have pension, right?
And so now, as I begin to look at entrepreneurial endeavors and what I want to do, I got about eight years left in my healthcare career, I'm always thinking, well, I got that pension, but then I'm also thinking, well, what is the true lifetime value of that pension?
And so then I'm starting to think like, okay, well, I just, I know this, I'm saying I just have to make honest folks, this is in fact, yes, a lot of money.
But at same time, I think when you think of a business perspective and where I'm trying to go, I don't think this is very much.
And so when I think of my lifetime value of my per suspension, it's $4.5 million. So I essentially now have to go out and figure out a way, how can I find or earn in a different career path that much funny?
Because that's what that was, that will be the shortfall I need. to cover. What Matt is also trying to say, and I truly believe this is as well as I love my job, I love it makes money, I make great money.
But I've been trying to find passion in other areas. This podcast is one, the nonprofit Latino founders, we started the newsletters, right?
Networking with people. That's my passion. Connecting and building and helping coach entrepreneurs to success has been my passion. so now I'm starting to feel this tear between here's this, the corporate world that's paying the bills versus the passion that could possibly expand into something else.
Now, how did you, you know, because I think entrepreneurs, you have to have a bit of a risk tolerance.
How did you finally decide to say, you know what, this is, this is, this is the journey I'm supposed to be on.
And what ultimately made you decide that?
@10:58 - Matt Clark
You know, I think it comes back down to never having owned a salary before. So, you know, what's the risk?
I don't sell, I don't eat. What's the difference? So, it's just like, okay, there's a bit more responsibility in terms of now you've got to think differently because, you know, if you want to be successful as a business owner, you know, you've got more responsibility than just yourself.
You want to build a team. want to build a business that runs without you. You want to think about things a lot differently.
So, the risk isn't different in at least for me anyways. The risk wasn't different. was, you know, more rather.
It wasn't more. It was just different. And so, what I needed to do was understand, well, who do I need to become in order to make this thing a reality?
You know, you just start asking different questions of that. So, you know, we work with a lot of people who actually come from corporate and they want to get into coaching or consulting or whatever it is, and they're looking at...
at you know the first goal is while I'm making 20 grand a month here and this pays for a nice lifestyle but I work my butt off you know 20 to 30 grand a month I work my butt off how do I do that in how do I now go and build a business that can replace that income as the first goal is the first milestone how do I get making money first then how do we get it to replace the income and then how do we build a business out of that and so it's just a bit of a journey and I think that you know if someone is like you asking these kind of questions inside of a corporate environment thinking well I'm not going to get rid of this thing that's that's working for me right now and gives me the lifestyle and I can take care of my family and I got that security if you're used to that it is a big shift for you I wasn't used to that I was always like you don't sell you don't eat but if it's somebody that's got security looking to go into the entrepreneurship world it's always a case of you know go and start something on the side in your in your
spare time, go and build that up, go and make a bit of extra cash. when you get that to a stage of 50% of what you're earning right now, then you can stop doing what you're doing, because if you're doing 50% of what you're doing right now in terms of revenue, and you're working on it a third of the time, well, now if you've got three times more time, you can get that revenue up there and have a lot faster.
@13:23 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Yes, that is very true. I like that concept of waiting until you have 50% of that your current salary before you take that transition, having a runways is so important.
transition is very important. When you started to build up your entrepreneurial journey, did you work with any mentors that you tagged on to or have you just learned it as you went?
@13:51 - Matt Clark
There have been tons, so many along the way. you know, there's, I think that you learned just as much from people of what not to do.
And it's also from people, I mean, we've invested probably over $300,000 in our own education and over the years.
And some of the investments that we made were there's this big promise of what you're going to get and we asked specifically, are we getting this and the line items?
And they're like, yes. Okay, cool. Pay the money. Very excited. Get in, something completely different. And, you know, we get in and we start working and it's like, ah, it's not quite what we got.
But then we learned the valuable lesson we got out there was what not to do and how to make our staff 10 times better to solve the problems of those.
And then very often what would happen is that the people that we had engaged within that group would then come and work with us because we've solved those problems.
So I'm always a big believer and in turn the obstacles or the failings or the wrong choices or whatever it is into opportunities.
And there's always opportunities around.
@15:00 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Yes, you know, that's like, I think, I think that's the best way to define an entrepreneur's mind is they don't see a problem as a problem.
@15:09 - Matt Clark
They see it as a business opportunity, right?
@15:12 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
there's business opportunities everywhere. In fact, there's old saying, you know, there's blood on the street by real estate, right?
essentially what they're meaning is when there's conflict and there's there's the pandemic is a great example. The amount of individuals that started small businesses or side hustles during the pandemic is astronomical.
I mean, it's to the point where we're actually seeing a limited amount of professionals in other industries because so many people have been starting their own entrepreneurial endeavors.
@15:48 - Matt Clark
And so it's interesting because you see people that have the motivation to do it and they're kind of going up there and doing it.
@15:54 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Now, let's, and one of the things you kind of do is really help these people through that process. let's talk about your
A current job, a current business, virtual edge. Tell us a little about it and what does it do?
@16:06 - Matt Clark
So we work with B2B service providers and we help them to generate their ideal clients to close more of them and to scale it.
As part of that, we help them get really clear on who is the ideal client that they should be targeting based on their skillset, what they've got to be able to bring to the market.
We help them get real clarity around the message, the positioning that they've put into the market and how to actually attract these people in.
And then validate it, which is the most important piece of the puzzle, actually so many people get these wonderful ideas, they go and build this thing, put it out in the marketplace and no one wants it.
We're very big on let's validate it first and then you can start going out and getting it wider and then building whatever course program, process, service, whatever it is.
And how you validate it is by going in and interviewing people and figuring it out. And we built a whole AI tool that does what we call an ARK interview, and we built a whole AI tool that does like a virtual ARK interview, taken through, you know, thousands of responses around the internet.
And so this helps get a lot of clarity, so that clarity is really the first step. The second piece is getting the offer defined.
So what are you going to sell? How are you going to deliver it? Right, then it's creating what we call a signature solution.
So a visual roadmap of how you get your client from point A to point B makes your sales easier, determines your delivery model, and makes your marketing just a breeze.
It's wonderful.
@17:42 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
the signature solution is the game changer for our clients.
@17:45 - Matt Clark
And then now we turn the lead flow on, right, because we've got now an validated, validated offer message positioning.
We've got a couple of clients on board. Now you turn the leads on, right. And then once the leads start coming.
How do we convert those leads into conversations, into sales, and then how do we scale it through either running your own webinars and driving traffic to those webinars, or if you want to start talking on stages live, then you can invite people to that, then finding partners that have your ideal clients as part of your network to deliver that and to get you in front of their network, and then running LinkedIn ads.
So depending on what stage people come to us, if they're starting out there and then that validating stage, they need to get clarity, and they need to get validation.
That's the most important step, clarity validation and an offer. Those are the most important steps before you even get leads, because the funny thing is, is as you're doing that validation and the clarity, you're going to generate leads any way, it's because you're going to be talking to people.
So if somebody's already got their message dialed in, they've got case studies of clients that have got results, they've got an offer that they know works, then generally what we need to do is turn up the leads and then dial in their sales process.
And then if they've got that dialed in and they've got a team and they've got their foundational elements of lead systems and sales systems dialed in and they want to scale it, then we showed them how to drive traffic to webinars, how to better utilize their team, so turn their sales people from order takers into deal makers, right, so they go out and actually find it.
mean, one of our clients gave us 10 of his sales people and I went and spent a couple of days with them and trained them up and literally the week after I was there, they tripled their sales.
It was nuts. So that's how far you can move, depends what level of business that you're at, you know, and how hungry you are is going to depend on how fast you move.
@19:58 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
You know, this is really good. quite incredible because essentially what you've created was a digital service to kind of get you to the stage gate process of product development, but whether it's an idea or a product.
@20:09 - Matt Clark
So essentially, what Matt's saying, you get your minimal viable product out there, right? He's talking about the one thing, what's your thought or idea?
@20:17 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
And then discovery stage, go out, talk to interview people, does it makes do I have a market, does do I have a product market fit for my minimal Bible product?
Okay. And then as Matt was saying, if people are willing, they have one, first and foremost, they have to trust you and they have to believe that you're providing value to them in order for them to actually reach in their back pocket and open up that pocketbook.
And so, but then once you start to get a few people that are interested as Matt's saying, that's really when the magic starts to happen because that's when you start going to the trade shows, the Saturday markets, the conference is talking about your product, speaking about it because you are
You know a subject matter expert in this field because you are the one creating it And so folks that is exactly how you should be thinking about when any business that you're thinking about What is your mental problem product get out there ask people if they like it or not?
That's your discovery stage and if you get people enough they like it that are willing to pay for it now You have product market fit But it's also important when you're going through that discovery stage and I highlight this as well Understanding who your target audience is and really getting down to The age group if they work in the corporate side of the more industrial people are their farmers Are they do the world individuals?
Are they you know metro individuals? know getting down to that will also know the riches are the niches and so being able to narrow down their market So you're you're doing a little bit better or focusing specifically on the individuals that again will Purchase your product is very important, but more importantly when you're asking folks
Don't just ask mom, don't just ask your friends, you know, make sure you ask people that are going to give you true advice because the last thing we want to see is an entrepreneur spinning their wheels on an idea that doesn't have an actual product market fit.
But they believe it does because family and friends can kind of continue to encourage that. So how do you kind of get, you know, you probably work with entrepreneurs and sometimes maybe they don't have that product market fit.
What are some of the areas that entrepreneurs should be thinking about to get to that realization either, yes, I do have this product market fit or I don't.
@22:38 - Matt Clark
Yeah, 100% great question. And you know, this is something we deal with all the time and we get it in a, it shows up in a couple of different ways.
One of the ways is I don't have anything I'm looking to get started. Right, another way is I'm starting a new business in a new niche and I don't quite know the target audience just.
yet and I don't know how to position this thing. Right. Another way is I'm completely switching what I'm doing.
Right. And all of them kind of fall under the same area because essentially you're taking a new direction. So instead of saying I'm starting a new business or, you know, getting into business for the first time or whatever, is you're taking a new direction for what you're doing.
And if it is different to what you're doing, if there's a different target audience is, you know, even if it's a new product to a different audience under the same banner, the first step is to do that market research.
Right. Figure out what are the pain points. So if you take a look at what are the skill sets that you can do and figure out, well, if I had to go and who am I targeting first?
Because if we have to target a, let's say, I don't know, a nurse, right, as an example. And we have to target a CEO.
Those are going to be two very different messages with very different pain points. we want to understand what are their pains?
What are their pains? fears, are their goals, what are their desires, right? We call this the 4P framework, so pain, panic, pleasure, and purpose.
Understanding that, and then your entire message is going to be, how do we get you from pain to the pleasure?
How do we get you from panic to purpose, right? And that's where your message lives somewhere in there. And your offer is entirely based around, can you get them there?
You know, there's only three ways to do it, right? Can you make it better than what they're doing, less expensive, or make their lives better, right?
So can your offer fit within that? If it fits within that, great. Then you know you've got a starting point.
Now you go and create your first version of that offer, right? And even if you're thinking of selling, so what we do with a lot of our clients is they'll come in and they'll say, cool, I've got this thing that I've put together.
I want to charge $5,000 for a whatever it is. Okay, cool. Have you got any clients yet? Any proof of any proof of concept?
Anyone that's paid you for it? No. Okay, so step number one is get someone to pay you for it.
Doesn't matter how much they pay you, right? That's irrelevant. What matters is that they pay you. And so here's a little strategy that is really good for validation, also really good for getting clients to come in.
And we call this creating your beta offer. So as an example, if you are wanting to sell this thing for $5,000, you're going to go and do some interviews with people, or you're going find some people that are potentially good fits for your audience.
You're going to show them what problem that you solve. Make sure that it's a measurable metric, that's measurable in a fixed time frame.
And you say to them, look, I'm charging, I'm going to be charging $5,000 for this. I'm looking for five people in my beta group.
I'll be giving it at a thousand bucks, right? So 70% off or 60% off whatever the number is, and my brain's not working at the moment.
It's 1am here for me. So the math is not mapping right now but you get the picture and so sell it for a thousand bucks.
Get those five people in and it needs to come with some conditions and the conditions are as one is that they realize that this is a beta group and that you will be asking them for constant feedback on how it's going and where you can make improvements that you can make better.
Number two is that they will give you a video testimonial when they get results. Okay and they'll talk about it extensively.
And number three, they will give you three referrals of people that they think this would be a good trick for as well.
So now you've turned your beta offer where you've gone from zero to five thousand dollars with five clients. You've now turned that into fifteen more referrals where even if you bring in fifty percent of those so now the seven clients and you charge them two thousand dollars.
Now you've turned zero into five. 5 into 14, you've made $19,000 and you've got 12 new clients that you can now make a further upsell offer to.
And that's when you start just building momentum and you make your product better so that as you're working your way up to selling it at 5,000, you know that when you make it off of 5,000, you've got something that's going to look a little bit results that you're expecting it to do.
@27:25 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
And I really love the beta testing idea because what happens with that cohort of beta testers, they kind of feel like they're also part of the game, right?
@27:37 - Matt Clark
Because it's down to sweat and thoughts, right, that helped define or construct this software app or whatever it might be.
@27:44 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
And so they become the champions, know, they, they're thinking of that sales funnel again, folks, they're the lowest point on the funnel because they're the loyalist, right?
They're the ones that share and talk about the product. And this is what it's about and this is how the coders written and this is how we do it and this is why it's about.
playable because they also see the value. fact, that's one of the things you mentioned. Talk about the importance of an entrepreneur to creating value or essentially highlighting value for their product or service for the client.
@28:15 - Matt Clark
How important is that? It's the most important thing and we always talk about, especially in your front-end message to the first thing that people see.
Let's talk about the outcomes that they can experience. Choose one outcome. So we call this the power of one.
Solve one big problem for one ideal client. Talk about the outcome that they're going to get. Make it measurable.
An interesting thing is we work with a lot of business coaches, consultants, and some of the stuff that they do, people come to me sometimes with things that are very difficult to measure.
It's an intangible thing that they help with, leadership. As an example, work with a lot of leadership executives that are leadership coaches or executive coaches.
mindset coaches and it's like well how do you make that tangible right because it's not like leaves or sails where you can track the numbers and you can say okay call this as a direct result of these activities so the trick is to make the intangible tangible right if you can do that that's where the magic happens now the question is how so what we do is and and it's actually pretty simple most people just don't do it don't even think to do it and especially in like the coaching industry where they do these intangible things they never ask this one question what was the impact that this had on your business or your life depending on what are you focusing on always the impact that this had as a result of this what improvements did you see and by how much and that starts taking what you're doing these intangible things and making it really tangible
@30:01 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
I really like that.
@30:02 - Matt Clark
That's what you dinged in itself, tangible outcomes.
@30:06 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
That's a piece I think a lot of people miss, the measurable objectives, measurable goals, because you hit its spot on, Matt, and like, how do you define a successful leadership?
What measure are you using? Is it the number of people you talked to? Is it the number of phone calls you have?
it the number of people you hired or fired, right? How do you define a success? And then to your point, also creating a sense of, so for example, folks, you don't have to use an example in your industry to get your point across about your problem and solution.
A great example of this is the AT&T commercial that most recently have. They're on the airlines. They're sitting on the airplane.
They're talking about all these hidden fees, like, oh, you have to charge an extra dollar for water on the
the airplane and, well, if you want food, well, you can get food, but it's an extra $10, has nothing to do with the telephone, right?
But what the common thing that AT&T is doing in that marketing is they say, you know what, we're not like airlines, we don't have hidden fees.
Everybody knows, everybody's had a flight, everybody sees the hidden fees. And so essentially they're like, oh, that's relatable, right?
@31:22 - Matt Clark
The fees are measurable and relatable, right? that's the value, right?
@31:27 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
We're going to treat you better. You're not going to have to worry about that. That's the value of working with our company.
so looking outside of your industry, for examples, to amplify your solution to the problem that you're helping to identify or solve is also really good because, again, it makes it relatable.
I always tell, I work in healthcare, I tell my folks, hey, if you're going to do a case study and talking about measurable goals, right, it's very difficult to measure success on an educational lecture.
Go out, need a lecture. Okay, well, how do I measure that six? Yes. Well, for me, one, how many individuals attend?
Two, I'll give an evaluation at the end. How did we do? Am I clearly or did we go off topic?
Was there some bias in it? Let us know how we do and give us some recommendations how we can improve.
But lastly, the most tangible way I can actually see if these lectures are paying off is the quality of care improvement in the communities that we did the education in.
If you're starting to see a decrease in melanoma cases because we did a melanoma lecture in a coastal region, high melanoma rate, then you're starting to see it be successful.
@32:37 - Matt Clark
It's very important to identify different different measurables because they're out there. You just got to find them. 100%. Most people just don't take the time to go in and cover them.
They go in and they're like, I've done my job, check the box onto the next one, whereas if you go and actually uncover those measurables and you uncover the impact,
of the work that you've done not only would you have bragging rights to say this is what we do but your clients are also going to see the value of what you do and are going to work with you for longer right so you create lifetime value for yourself you make more money from the same client the client has more value that's created for them so they have more of the result that they want or in other areas or whatever it is and then together you make a bigger impact in the world yeah what you know one of the things if you work with lot of clients you you're really focused on helping individuals what would you say is one of the most common problem that founders either come to you with or tend to run into yeah it's interesting everyone comes to us because they say i want more leads okay i want to get more of the ideal clients on calls so lead flow lead quality lead flow and lead quality
That's what they come to. when we dive into it, we uncover the reason of why you don't have the lead flow and the lead quality.
And it comes down to exactly what we're discussing. That front-end message is not clear. not solving a measurable problem in a fixed time frame.
And that is the most common thing that people come to meet with. even companies, we work with heaven and eight-figure businesses too.
And they come in and they're like, well, we just take on anyone and anyone with a PELSA and a wallet is our ideal audience.
And then when we start diving deep into it, it gets them so far. And then they start hitting a plateau.
And anyone know how do we take this to the next level? And then when we show them, or are they doing a lot of activity, which is generating results, but the amount of activity to the amount of results is not weighing up.
So they're looking for other options on how to maximize that. And then when we start showing them how to be like,
laser-targeted and how to bridge that gap between the message and the ideal clients and showing them how to get what they want, then like the example that I gave you, they tripled their sales in a week, right?
It flies. We're working with one of our clients right now, who is, they came to us, mean, they're a seven-figure business.
We work at the management team and some of their salespeople and they're doing really well, but they're on this revenue rollercoaster.
They've got this offer that is like they piecemealing this offer together and the reason that they're doing it is because they don't have a way to start conversations with their ideal clients because everything comes in word of mouth and they've tried tons of stuff before, none of its work.
Only word of mouth has worked for them. They've invested lot of money, they were gun shy and I was like, just come in, let's do this, we'll do a fun deal, make it first.
We've helped them. of their signature solution, which get them clarity, and then structured their offer in a way that they could make a front-end offer that's an easy yes, and they have a repeatable model for the back-end process.
Now what's happening is their sales cycles have gone from six to 12 months down to two to four weeks.
Not only that, but we're creating a repeatable process that the owners don't have to be the ones doing the sales all the time.
So it's creating freedom for them now with an increase in income, repeatable process, and a repeatable delivery process, because now they've got a step-by-step approach on how they help the guys get results.
It's very difficult to do if you've got ten different industries that you're working with or ten vastly different clients that you're working with.
It's essentially like trying to build ten different businesses.
@36:49 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
You know folks, to tell you, operation, don't get me wrong, making the first sales key, making sure that, like we mentioned, we have a product market fit, but operations
That is so important because, you know, as an entrepreneur, when you're first starting your business, your jack-of-all-trades master of none, you're the accountant, the marketing, the CEO of you're all of it, right?
Now, once you create operational structure around what you're doing, and for now, for example, Greg's example is my podcast.
When I'm after the show, I will email Matt, send him a template, email and say, this is when your show is coming out before here, here the lecture, or here the questions I'm going to be asking, maybe before that, here's the link to schedule the show, so all of these are processes that I put in place to help me be an operationally efficient, so I don't have to kind of recreate the will all the time, because if you're constantly having to focus on operations and building and building and building, then you're not scaling.
You're actually just kind of running in a circle chasing your tail, and at the end of the day, your goal is to scale and sell that business.
you see that comes in and looks at your operations and if they're all over the place, don't get me wrong, the entrepreneur is the one that's going to get the interview but the operations that will get the sale.
@38:10 - Matt Clark
you know, it's actually a listening to you there, there's a there's a piece in here that I want to kind of bring to the table and this happens a lot with people that come from corporates and then go and start their own businesses, looking at this and you know, they identify real problems out there and they they now like, okay, well, I want to go start a business to go and solve these problems and they think that because I did it in in my corporate job that it's going to be easy to do it as an entrepreneur and they forget that the reason that they one of the reasons that they were so effective in their corporate job was because they already had a team in place, they already had systems and processes in place and when you got into it and you're by yourself, you got none of that support, right?
And that's why that transition phase that we spoke about in the beginning is you don't just stop one and start another transition over into it.
It is the best way it's safe, right? one, but obviously you're going to take some risks anyway. It's safer, let's put it that way.
Number two, it helps you to build your business in a more sustainable way. Like I would rather somebody have slow sustainable growth than a spike and a crash and a spike and a crash.
I'd rather that slow upward curve than these crazy ups and downs.
@39:32 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Yes, yes, very true. Much rather have the hockey stick trajectory than anything else.
@39:37 - Matt Clark
Exactly.
@39:38 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Now you've been talking about transitions and trajectories. What does virtual edge look like? What is the five-year trajectory for you, for Matt and your current business?
@39:51 - Matt Clark
Yeah, so for us we love helping entrepreneurs grow. And you know, our mission is we are helping. we want to get this out to as many people as possible, we are specifically doing how we're doing that is by building everything into automation, into AI, making it readily available to thousands of people around the world.
The big goal, we use the money that we make into investments and we've got a couple of other really exciting projects that we're working on as well, but for us it's about creating freedom, creating lifestyle, and we want to help our clients to create their freedom and lifestyle as well.
We've got some personal goals, we've got some business goals, but it's just growth at the maximum, really for us.
@40:40 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
And now who is your ideal client? So if I have folks listening right now, they're like, you know what, need help generating leads.
@40:47 - Matt Clark
Who is your ideal client? B2B service providers, business coaches and consultants we spoke about some of them before, so anyone that's got a high ticket offer, so
three mediums, I think it's probably at 3000 and above. Some of our clients charge up to $500,000 a year for their services and they've got a very specific audience that they're looking for and their clients are on LinkedIn.
They're looking for to do professional business with professional people. That is our ideal client. So either they're in the validating stage where they're trying to figure it out and they need some clarity or they're in the growing stage where they need to get more leads and close more sales or they're in the scaling stage where they've got a team, things are rocking and they want to blow their business up and they're looking for a new channel to do that.
So those that's our ideal client.
@41:43 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
I feel like lot of people I know don't tend to use LinkedIn very often and I got to tell you, most of my from the podcast perspective, most of my leads have come from LinkedIn.
I think it's really important. We talked about about product market fit and know in your customer, but you also have to know where your consumer wants to gain information and what that information is actually for example Instagram.
If you're going to use Instagram, they want reels. They want videos. They want content of that nature.
@42:17 - Matt Clark
And Facebook?
@42:18 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Yeah, they want entertainment. is more groups. you want to build a group and talk about value propositions in that group, they don't really want to be posted all over their wall thing.
But LinkedIn is true. Like let's network.
@42:31 - Matt Clark
Let's let's what do you what is your networking?
@42:34 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Yeah, you know, it's I feel it's extremely beneficial, valuable writing newsletters. I put blogs on every once in a while and it has allowed me to grow professionally and take on, you know, professional speaking opportunities.
I'm going be speaking national conference next month in Palm Springs, you know, continuing to grow this granular, you know, this organic brand, which is again, folks, if you're listening, you are
are the brand, just want to make sure you know that. Everything you do, your perception, the way you wear, the way you act, the way everything you do is your brand.
so just remember that when you're meeting with people and you're building your presence online, that is in fact your brand.
Underpromise, overdeliver always, but also figure out way to create value, right? what is value? Value is education, value is networking, mentorship, right?
All of these things are valuable. What Matt is doing, helping create leads, that is valuable, right? And people will be willing to pay if they find that what you're doing is valuable enough to actually impact them in their lives.
They will be, again, I mentioned, they'll reach back to that back pocket and open up that pocketbook and pay for that because of the value.
@43:54 - Matt Clark
A hundred percent.
@43:57 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Now, Matt, we've talked about LinkedIn. What is the- best way for individuals to get in contact with you.
@44:04 - Matt Clark
So best way for people to get in contact with me is obviously I'm LinkedIn. That is one place we're very active.
So it's mat clock rainmaker. And then you can do the email me directly mat at the virtual edge.com. And Facebook's the same mat clock rainmaker.
So we're pretty simple and straightforward to get hold of love connecting with people love having people reach love starting conversations, you know, for us, it's all about relationships.
And if I can help you, I will. If I can't help you, I'll point you in the right direction.
Because you just never know, right? It's always under the, you know, we've got a bit of a saying, it's like you just one relationship away.
And I can't tell you how many times I've connected with people, like I just got off a call now with a buddy that I haven't spoken to in a while.
And, you know, I've been quite active on on some of the platforms, like on Facebook, we reconnected and he doesn't need my services, but the people he's connecting me to are amazing.
I love just connecting with people and seeing where there's opportunities. If there's not, cool. You meet someone. If there is, great.
Let's see what you can do. waste that opportunity. Even curious all the time.
@45:24 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Yes, there's never a harm in meeting somebody else learning from their experiences, because again, in traveling. I was encouraged people to travel because the more you travel or you are going to grow individually, you know?
@45:36 - Matt Clark
Exactly.
@45:37 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
So you to.
@45:39 - Matt Clark
You have to. You have to.
@45:41 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Clark, thank you so much again for again, folks, is virtual edge. This will be on the newsletter, great time to plug the newsletter.
So visit the shades of e.com to subscribe to the newsletter. We will have Matt's information on the newsletter the week before the episode airs, the week the episode airs, and the week after.
You can also follow us on the social channels, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok at the shades of E. But most importantly, I would say just sign up for the newsletter because that is the best way to kind of connect with his entrepreneurs.
lastly, if you feel so to do so, Patreon page, it's $5 a month to be one of our patrons, that helps support the podcast and really brings on international guests like Matt onto the show and allows me to continue to do this.
Because again, networking is key. Matt, is there any last words you have to say to the guests before leave?
@46:34 - Matt Clark
Yeah, I would just say, no matter where you are in your journey, just stay curious, you know, and if something interests you, go for it.
There's always going to be a risk in everything for you, right? There's risk in staying at home and sitting on the couch and watching TV, right?
So you can get fat and get your heart disease or whatever it is, you know? There's risk in going outside and walking across the street.
if you could get by a car or whatever, right? There's risk and absolutely everything that you do. And the only thing I would say is go and take action.
If you're curious about it, go and do it. Go and take action. Go and invest the money. Go and play because, you know, you can always make more money, which you'll never get back time.
@47:20 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
Very, very true. And folks, again, I encourage you, be creative, be innovative, color outside the lines. The masterpiece is not in the wall.
It's actually within side of all of us. We just have to bring it out and showcase it to the world.
Matt, thank you again so much for the to interview. I really appreciate it. Go get some rest in Vietnam.
@47:40 - Matt Clark
Relax and enjoy the time.
@47:42 - Gabriel Flores (The Shades of Entrepreneurship)
For those who vote at home, again, subscribe to the newsletter at theshadesofe.com. Thank you and having a great night.