Ray Ruecker leads Connect 5000, a Kansas City-based lead generation and inside sales training and consulting firm. Listen to our interview with Ray for sales wisdom, a cold-calling hall of fame opener and entrepreneurial advice! In today’s tip, we suggest applying for that award.
Transcript:
Welcome to the Small Business Miracles podcast, I’m Jeff Randolph.
This small business podcast is brought to you by EAG Advertising and Marketing.
We’re gonna talk about marketing, we’re also here to celebrate entrepreneurs.
We have marketing news and advice that business owners can use to keep moving forward.
This week we’re talking with Ray Rucker.
He’s the managing director and chief connector at Connect
But first, we’ve got another small business marketing tip to talk about.
Today’s small business marketing tip is to go ahead and apply for that award.
There are a lot of awards available out there, from major national prestigious awards for
customer service excellence to the local media award for employee health programs in the
city.
Are any of those worth your time?
Well, let’s paint a picture of when these come in handy.
Imagine you’re in a tight labor market and you’re trying to attract top talent.
Having a best places to work or a coolest office award or recognition for the charitable
work that you do can really sway top talent your way.
And if you’re an agency with a lot of creative awards, well, you get it.
Success is attractive.
But the process itself can be valuable to the company.
If you’re filling out a form to enter for an award that recognizes what you do for employee
health or diversity programs, or for work-life balance, even the process of filling out the
award entry can teach you something about where your program may be falling short.
And that helps your company get better.
Yeah, some of these are basically an advertising program to raise money for the awarding entity.
But whether that award is being given by a media outlet or a local chapter of a professional
association, there’s real value in the process and bragging rights.
So congratulations on winning that award.
You’ve earned it.
Hey, we’re here with our featured guest.
It’s Ray Rucker.
He’s the managing director and chief connector at Connect
Ray, welcome to the show.
Thanks for having me, Jeff.
I mean, we’re just, it’s, it’s, we’ve talked about breakfast already.
We’re, we’re up.
We’re, we’re ready to get to it.
Yes we are.
Well, let’s, let’s start out with Connect
Tell us about Connect and what you do.
What is it you’d say you do here?
So I am the CEO of Connect and in a nutshell, we provide fractional business development
reps to software tech and SaaS companies nationwide.
So if you need business development reps to fill the top of the funnel, full time, part
time, short term, long term, we are there to provide help to set up demos, sales conversations
and discovery calls.
So, so really you’re, you’re setting all kinds of appointments, making sure that everybody
gets their, their inbox full, their calendar full, everybody’s ready to go.
Correct.
Because sales reps love to sell.
They just hate to prospect.
Any, any particular industry that you’re in or is this like every industry you’re, you’re
across the board?
Mainly software, technology and SaaS firms.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Okay.
That’s, that’s, that covers, that covers plenty of people, I would say.
Yes.
We will never run out of people to reach out to.
That’s, wow.
And, and you reach out to people for a living.
Yes.
I’m also an author, I’m, I’m holding in my hand your, your book, How to Score from First
Base in Sales.
And it’s a step by step guide to shorten sales cycles and multiply revenue.
I’m holding my autographed copy, which makes me cooler than most other people out there.
So I mean, that’s, that’s not bad.
Tell us, tell us about the book.
What, what, what, what is this that I’m holding in my hands here?
Sure.
Well, first of all, your copy is probably worth an extra cents a dollar on the open
market since I autographed it.
Oh yeah, it’s signed.
So, um, back in the day, um, actually this has an EAG group story back, I knew Paul Weber
back in the day and he actually did the second version of our website and he encouraged me
to blog.
This is back when blogging was the rage.
So years later, I had about blog posts and videos and it’s always been on my bucket
list to write a book.
So I tried it many, many times, ran into my friend Stacey, who I’ve known since she was
I said, I have a friend who can write this for you.
She’s a stay at home mom, former English teacher, and you should talk to her.
And I was very hesitant.
So I decided, let me give it one more shot.
And then I gave up.
So I reached out to her.
This is pre pandemic.
And I said, here’s blog posts.
Here’s my videos.
I need you to put it together and make it flow, but keep it in my own voice.
And so Sarah, who’s a copywriter did a lot of it for me.
And during the pandemic ish towards the end, finally finished it up because there was nothing
else to do and we couldn’t go anywhere.
So got it done.
And it’s been a nice calling card for me to drop off to prospects, friends, business owners,
and such.
Yeah, it’s a solid gift with lots of great advice in it.
There’s the shortening sales cycles and multiplying revenue, something everyone can get behind.
But you’ve got templates in here.
You have all kinds of sample emails, sample call scripts, sample voicemails to leave.
There’s a lot going on in here.
Oh, thanks.
Well, I’ve read it.
Let’s be fair.
I have read this book.
You’re like the fourth person who’s actually read it.
Noah is more of a step by step guide for business prospecting because a lot of people know how
to sell.
But half the battle, I think, is getting in the door and then half is closing the deal.
And it’s a numbers game.
But to kind of provide a step by step guidance that they can take what they like and discard
what they don’t to help them set up their own prospecting to go after targeted clients.
Okay.
And so let’s shift back to the business for a second and talk about your ideal client
because you are making calls for, we’ve talked about the industries you’re in, but is there
a particular client that is like, hey, I know if I’m talking to this kind of a client, it’s
a cakewalk.
I’m going to, we know we’re going to knock it out of the park for them.
Is that, I don’t know if that’s a certain client mindset or a certain client size or
their product or service that they do is this kind of thing that fits.
Tell me, what is that secret sauce?
So I would say to answer your original question, our best clients are technology clients who
have emerging technologies.
They have a established client base and they simply need to go after more.
I’ve had clients who have had folks reach out to me who are pre-revenue who have an
idea but they’ve never sold it to a single person yet, which is not the best for us today.
But I would say that our target market is the sales and marketing executives who have
a team of sales reps who maybe don’t want to prospect.
They don’t have the time or the desire, but they need someone to follow up on MQLs, SQLs,
do pure code outreach and or a combination of both.
But I think if you have at least or more clients, you have an ideal customer profile
and you know, how do we go get the next the next and the next whatever that match
those.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yes.
I see.
So if someone’s paying them already and they don’t have the bandwidth to go after more,
that’s where we step in.
And so I have a team of plus reps scattered across the country who do this on behalf of
the clients.
Just a force multiplier for companies where they you’re stacking onto the existing Salesforce
and getting people right in the either the top or middle or even bottom of that funnel,
it sounds like.
Correct.
And so we have a client that’s a publicly traded firm.
We have small to mid-sized companies.
So it’s all over the board.
But at the end of the day, everyone needs help in this arena.
And thinking about that kind of a client, I’m imagining that it’s difficult to get their
attention a lot of times.
You’ve done a lot of work to get to those hard to reach prospects.
And in the book, you know, I’m seeing everything from buying a cup of coffee for them in advance
and saying, hey, you know, here’s a cup of coffee.
It’s on me.
Now can we have a conversation?
What are some of the ways that you’ve tried to break through the clutter to get that prospect’s
attention, especially someone busy and important, a decision maker?
So I think part of it is a pure numbers game.
You know, the more number of people you reach out to, the better your chances.
I also think it’s a luck and timing game.
But I would say, you know, was probably a change when you could, you know, like clockwork,
you know, reach out to folks.
% of them would say or % went to voicemail, talked to folks and set up four to five
meetings.
Those days are over unless you have some phenomenal marketing that I’m missing out on.
What I would say is there in the pandemic helped accelerate email where everyone and
their brother used email almost exclusively because people were working remote and you
didn’t have phone numbers.
But I think it goes back to the tried and true of, you know, the basics of the phone
works when even when it doesn’t email works, LinkedIn outreach works, but doing multiple
touch points rather than just relying on one point of entry.
Yeah, specta.
It’s it’s the it really is numbers.
It’s making sure that you’ve got the right right message, but in a way that gets attention.
Yes.
I mean, obviously we like referrals and we like networking and that is very effective.
But I’ve always told folks is when your marketing department leads dry up or they’re not coming
in fast enough, when your referrals networking aren’t getting what you need, you can either
sit by your inbox or sit by your phone and wait for the phone ring or you can go make
things happen.
Oh, yeah.
The solid, solid advice all the way across the board.
Let me let’s you ready for the lightning round.
Let’s take you to the lightning round.
I’m ready.
You have no way to know what we could be talking about in this lightning round.
Oh, I practiced last night.
Did you just random people asking you questions that are, you know, crazy, weird questions
like what’s your favorite kind of ice cream or whatever the Jeopardy round?
Perfect.
Well, you are set then.
Let’s let’s start with this one.
As somebody who has that professional call center, what are the worst calls that you’ve
received from an outbound calling service?
Like do you mess with them?
Do you are you are you know, do you ever answer that phone?
I think the worst are my direct competitors who didn’t do any research, but I will typically
it’s gotten sneaky.
Now, if it says spam risk, I won’t answer it.
But sometimes you just it looks like a phone number.
Like I think I should answer that.
But because I’m in the business, I try and be polite and professional and take the call
and tell them no thanks.
But they have a tough job.
So there’s no need to pour gasoline on the fire.
Right.
So what’s the most brilliant cold opening cold call sales line that you’ve heard or
used?
One that would be deserving of a cold call Hall of Fame?
There is a gal on LinkedIn.
Her name is Sarah Plowman.
She just started her own firm.
But I don’t typically use it myself.
But one of her lines is you don’t expect a cold call on a Monday.
Can I have seconds and explain why I’m calling?
And it’s short, sweet to the point.
It’s direct.
And I don’t know if it works for her.
She posts a lot of videos on TikTok, but she seems to use that line effectively.
And I would like to steal it.
And I sent it to my reps the other day.
I think you know, you being on on the podcast now and saying it, I’m pretty sure it’s yours
now.
You’ve put your own spin on it.
You can use it.
I’m going to trademark it this afternoon.
Perfect.
Let’s see.
When you are we all have conversations when we’re on the phone and whatever distracts
us or things didn’t go our way.
And you’re bombing a conversation.
So percent you’re bombing this conversation.
It could be business.
It could be social.
What’s the fail proof phrase or question that you use to kind of course correct that conversation
and get out of that bad spot?
I try and use the old political thing to just stall and answer with a non-answer.
But I’ll try and not change the subject quickly, but kind of redirect it back to them.
Maybe it’s a control thing.
Maybe it’s a manipulation thing.
But if things are falling apart badly, my go to is, hey, let’s restart this from the
start, from the beginning and get back to the basics of the core reason for you taking
my call.
Oh, nice.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That’s a good course, correct?
That’s a good way to move things back where it should be.
Start right over.
I try.
So you’re an entrepreneur.
You’re a business owner.
What’s the best thing about being an entrepreneur?
I would say I would call it the F’s of life.
And so the three F’s that I think are highly critical for me is freedom, flexibility, and
fulfillment.
So freedom in the sense of you plan your day.
I mean, obviously there’s things that are unavoidable, but freedom to plan your day,
how you see fit.
Flexibility, you can literally work anywhere, whether it’s a coffee shop, home, or office.
In fact, we used to have office space years ago.
I have a -year-old daughter and -year-old son.
And so I try to plan my life around their events so I can be part of their life.
And then fulfillment is I actually like what I do.
I mean, yes, it’s work, but at times it’s more like problem solving than it is work.
So and then the other things I think outside of it, the other three F’s, you know, faith,
family, and friends.
Oh, you have just doubled down on all the F words.
The six F words.
It’s a different, it’s a whole, you didn’t even use the obvious one, but well done.
Well done.
And now if those are the best things about being an entrepreneur, what’s the hardest
thing?
I would say the hardest thing, I think it’s a great responsibility to be responsible for
to persons’ livelihood.
Obviously you want to show up and do your best, but sometimes there’s things beyond
your control that can affect their livelihood.
And it might be the economy, it might be a pandemic, and it might be, you know, things
beyond your control where an executive leaves.
I think that’s the unpredictability part can be the toughest because it’s not anyone’s
fault, but it affects your folks on staff.
Yeah, %.
I’m going to ask you to kind of look retrospectively at your career at this point.
And you know, you’ve been doing this for a long time.
You’ve got it down.
You know all the F words that are all of the benefits of being an entrepreneur.
If you were to look back and time travel back to the first year in business and look back
at you running first year, what kind of advice would you give to first year you?
The first year me would be to level set expectations.
I think that everyone has probably unrealistic expectations on what to expect in the first
year, but everything takes time.
And most things in life, unless you have an Instagram story of months, most things
take longer to build and grow than you expect.
And it’s kind of like having the happy balance of keep your feet on the ground, but your
head in the sky.
But also I think it’s also important, I don’t know if I’m answering your question, is to
have a nice healthy cash cushion of savings just because you know, you don’t know what
you don’t know.
And there’s a lot of ups and downs and a lot of roller coasters in the first year.
So that’s what I tell myself.
That’s, I mean, that’s solid advice.
Would having that cash, I mean, having that cash reserve would have helped quite a bit
is that would you have would you have said, hey, don’t don’t start this until you have
that?
I don’t know I would start it I would say is have a ideal in a perfect world have three
to six months of cash in the bank, expect to work hard and long.
And it’s kind of like a pregnancy in the sense of a lot of activities going on, you may not
see any fruit anytime soon, but also one day a baby pops out.
Because I think to myself, when I started this company, my goal was to get to five wraps
and it seemed it took forever to get there.
And now we’re at to
But also, it’s the the year overnight success story that you hear over and over from folks
who you know, they finally found their groove kind of thing.
And maybe Malcolm Gladwell’s hour rule.
Yeah, where you become an expert after hours of doing that same thing over and over
again and you you yes, you can then look at something and go, yeah, that’s not right.
Or yes, this is right.
Let’s keep moving forward.
Right.
But there’s also it’s a tired worn out cliche.
But also, you know, sometimes the journey is more important than the actual destination.
Did you feel as though you enjoyed that journey?
Or are there parts of it you would just leave behind in a heartbeat?
I think it’s just natural growing pains of just starting something.
And you know, there’s certain things that can’t be, you know, instant gratification
overnight.
I mean, we live in a world of Netflix, Amazon and Uber, where you can just get something
overnight.
But I think that, you know, certain things, relationships, work ethic, building something,
it just takes time.
And it’s hard at times when everything can be grabbed upon demand.
Yeah, give yourself some grace.
Know that it takes some time.
You’ll get there.
Just keep grinding it out.
Know that it’s going to be a lot of hard work.
But also be ruthlessly clear of what you’re of what you’re in the business of doing and
where you’re going.
I remember years ago, I had a business coach we met every Friday on for an hour.
And I think one of his first things he ever said to me, he did to me was he handed me
he wadded up his piece of paper and said, throw it at the target.
And I thought, I don’t know what the target is.
He goes, exactly.
And that sticks with me years later.
So I think clarity happens.
Sometimes it happens overnight.
But sometimes it’s just a long process.
And Ray Ricker, you’re hitting the target.
I’m going to take you out of the lightning round.
Well done.
Well, it was as simple as that.
There’s nothing to it.
All right, easy.
Tell hey, tell people where they can find you if they want to know more about Connect
if they want to find you, where do they go?
What do they do?
Sure.
If you want to find us, please visit www.connectcom.
And unfortunately, connect is not spelled any way other than how it sounds of C-O-N-N-E-C-T,
the number com or find Connect or me Ray Rucker on LinkedIn.
And I think I’m the only Ray Rucker there, but it’s R-U-E-C-K-E-R.
Perfect.
Right.
And that’s our show, Ray Rucker, CEO of Connect
Thanks for being here.
Thanks for having me, Jeff.
We’ll get it to your business.
And that is our show.
Thanks so much to our guest, Ray Rucker, and thank you for listening to the Small Business
Miracles podcast.
Remember to subscribe, leave us a five star rating and review.
Drop us a line on the website at E-A-G-A-D-V dot com if you have any thoughts.
Until then, we’ll be out here helping entrepreneurs with another small business miracle.