Why Everyone Should Know Sales | Josh Barta, Access Pro #030

Hi everyone. I'm Karissa Dunham, host of Shining Light on Minnesota. We have an amazing guest here today, Josh Barta. Welcome Josh. Thanks for having me, Karissa. You bet. So, let's kick it off a little bit and tell all our listeners about Access Pros and how you kind of got into that and what it is. Yeah, so um I got into Access Pro. It's been a long journey to be honest. It's uh it's been a I'd say about a 15-year journey. um always being in direct sales uh running different organizations and uh at one point I decided hey it's about time I just start doing my own thing and so in 2023 ventured out on my own and uh started Access Pro um with just one contract working directly with Amazon and then from there we've grown to um multiple other contracts and got into more stuff. So amazing. So what for our listeners that don't know what is Access Pros? So, Access Pros is a gotom market specialist. Uh, and what that means is really if you have a if you run a company, you have a product, you want to get it out to the market, uh, but you don't really want to invest in having your own sales force or something like that on site, you just come to Access Pro. We'd go ahead and take that, run with it, um, build an organization around it and really kind of mimic who you are, um, from our side of things. So, awesome. So, you talk about a long 15- year journey. Are you from the area and where did you get started? Uh not from the area. So I grew up in Montana, a small town in Montana called Laurel. And I lived in Big Fork for quite a while. So I'm very familiar with Laurel. Yeah. So right outside of Billings. Nice. Um so yeah, small town. And uh I went to college in Black at Black Hill State. So in Spearfish, South Dakota. Yep. Played basketball there for a couple years. And then um yeah, at that point I met my wife. Ended up uh at during college actually I I got a job from a company called Dish One. It was a a Dish Network Direct TV retailer. And so I was uh they said, "Hey, you want to go to Indianapolis for this summer and go sell doortodoor, right?" I was like, "I don't sure, why not?" Um so I jumped on it, went to Indianapolis. After that summer, I was actually able to manage my own office and they said, "Where do you want to go?" I didn't know anything else. So I asked my wife and she said, "I love Minneapolis." Uh I was like, "Never heard of it. Boy, heard of it. Never been." Right. And uh yeah, so then landed in Minneapolis and honestly we haven't looked back. So tell our viewers who don't know Montana what the drive and the commute is like going from beautiful mountain clear blue water Montana to Minnesota. Uh so I always say I swapped my mountains for my lakes. Uh because at the end of the day like yeah I miss the mountains. Every time I'm in any state whether it's Utah or Virginia or something like that and I'm around mountains I feel like I'm at home, right? Yeah. Uh the lakes are good, but it's something about the mountains. It really brings you home. Absolutely. Um driving wise, yeah. I mean, it's you hit the Dotas and it's flat land and then it's like, okay, what happened to my hills and my rolling mountains? And Exactly. Yeah. So, like my wife's from Watertown, South Dakota. So, it's on the uh what is it? Eastern side of South Dakota. And when I went to college in Spearfish, I really wanted to go to school there because we're in the Black Hills, Lake Mountains still. Um good school. And yeah, going home to go see the in-laws, it was like, man, you like cut you hit the river and it's just you could fall asleep and just you wouldn't fall off the road. It's just straight flat. So, I know when I came back from Montana, I had a U-Haul. I had my three little kids and my dog in there and I'm like, I'm not making the right decision. I got past the Dakotas and I'm like, all right, it's just flat dead land now, but then once you get to Minnesota, it's home for sure. Yes. Yeah. So, when you got started doing Access Pros, you've grown the business now. It's well established. You're getting out there. How do people and how do businesses get a hold of you? Uh, for the most part, they go through Margot, who's my brand manager. Uh, she actually is the one that kind of plugs and plays everything to see if it's the right fit. Uh, outside of that, obviously, they can just reach out to us, uh, you know, via phone. A lot of our connections have really come at this point just from people we've known, right? Um, I've worked for multiple different companies. a lot of those uh sales reps that I worked with or owner business owners at the time, they've kind of done their own things and they've kind of shifted. And so, uh sometimes it's just that that referral that we're really looking for, right? Um that's that's really the big piece of it. Uh and outside of that, just working with these other businesses, I know some of the connections that they've worked with. Y and so I've just, you know, I reach out to them and see if there's something we can do to help build their business. what is your driving force and what's your why and why why and you do everything individually and on your own. Uh so I mean ultimately my why is my family. Yeah, that's that's the the driving force and everything. Um but outside of just my family it's I think it's just I have this like knack for always wanting to succeed, always wanting to do better and uh in order for I don't know when that stops to be honest. I don't think it does. I think it's it's been ingrained in my mind uh ever since I was, you know, in high school playing sports or even in middle school playing sports. I just, you know, I always had that kind of it factor. I want it more. Um, and so that's going to been the driving force. But outside of that, it's now it's it's turned to being like actually building something that's generational or something lot longer than just I'm going to solve this problem today, right? And that's it. I want to actually solve a problem that is going to be here for a long time um and continue to grow it. So in the sales world today versus let's say a couple years ago, how has it changed and what have you seen? Well, I am pretty biased about it because I've always been in the direct sales. So the the people-to-people communication like I I always want to be in front of that client. I don't I Zoom calls is what it is. Uh but it's not real. It doesn't feel real. They could be distracted on the other end. Um, so what I think that's changed the most is just people have gotten away from that human interaction and I that's what we really try to drive a little bit more on our side is, you know, we're going to have that face tof face interaction with your clients to to get that product to the market as fast as possible. Do you see that with the generational changes obviously from like the the millennials to the Gen Z's to everything like that with technology the way it's going that it's getting harder and harder for those kids to understand how important it is and that they're adapting more to let's just get on and send a quick text or quick snap or anything like that? 100%. Yes. Uh yeah. I mean I have my son's 18. He does everything from his phone, right? He can text call. uh you know AI is a big thing now and so a lot of this stuff is kind of it's getting pushed away from that human interaction but I think at the end of the day if you really want to move the needle in anything you you need to use those to get your name or anything out there but at the end of the day like you want to have that interaction to to have that conversation people still want that like especially since after co everything like that they want to get out there they want to meet face to face they want to go to lunch they want to seal the deal and close or do what they need to knowing that they're actually dealing with a person. I think Yes. Y do you think that with with technology the way it's going with with the younger generation, everything like that, it's going to be an easy process to kind of maybe change the gap and put like the old technology with the new technology together, you know? I mean, this AI stuff's pretty wild. So, and kids growing up nowadays, it's going to be the norm, right? Um, I mean for me the norm was, you know, growing up with dialup internet and then, you know, Facebook came out and all of a sudden, you know, there was little things like that, but that's, you know, standard now. It's it's out there everywhere. So, all this new technology that's coming in, it could change the landscape, but at the end of the day, I I think business is dealt in person. Yep. And that's when your deals are actually going to get closed. um you know for what they're going to use they're still going to need to be involved in it somehow. I don't know. I'm a little scared person behind it. Yes. Yeah. Right. Little scared for that generation but you know they you know techn is always advancing. It's just the way you use it and if you can you know benefit from it to get you in front of more people by all means. Yes. Got to work smarter not harder sometimes. But at the same time, like we said, the old ways going door to door, just stopping by a business, doing all the old school stuff definitely leaves a mark a lot more than just here's a video message. Yeah. Cuz you don't know like a lot of times who you're talking to, um, with technology, even if it's a real person, if it's a robot, you could hear my voice, record me, and guess what? That's going to be my message every time I go somewhere. So, you just don't know, right? But with the younger kids, having them not be afraid to use their voice to communicate communicate effectively and get the job done, I think is important. Yeah. I think I mean going off of, you know, some of the technology and the AI stuff, if you actually can articulate the message yourself with people, then your whatever your systems that you're building are going to work better, too. So if you actually have the mindset of how would I like this conversation to go, you can build that into whatever new technology comes out. But if you're just letting the computer do the thinking, it's unfortunate. You're going to run into some problems. It's going to get hacked. Something is going to happen and it's going to be a complete nightmare. But yes. Yes. And I mean, that's trial and error for everything we do. I mean, even just going to meet with somebody in person, thinking you're going to meet one person and it's somebody else and it's it's it's interesting. Or I mean, I do a lot of networking. I know you guys do networking too, but you get to places, you start pushing yourself a little thin and someone comes up and they're like, "Hi, Karissa." I'm like, I don't remember your name because I've seen so many people through the day. So, being more intentional with it, too. Yeah. What avenues have you guys seen or what do you think you'll see for growth coming up in the future? Um, I mean, there's there's a lot of changing there's a lot of cool products that are coming out. Uh, and you know, outside of just the tech side of the company, uh, or and what's coming out from like a sales standpoint, it's there's a lot of new technology coming out everywhere right now. And so, uh, I mean, we're working with a medical device company that is, you know, they're they're the going to be the first of their kind to be doing any of this remote patient monitoring without actually putting a watch on. Um, so that's really cool stuff. you know, we have a solar company that is going to be reaching out or we've been in communications with that they're changing the landscape of just solar in general and making it more accessible to everybody. Um, so yeah, I mean I I see those are two big paths going down the road. Obviously, our our main contract that we have is with Amazon, so they're improving something every single I mean, we can't even barely keep up with them. But, uh, so I see a lot of that stuff coming down the road. And and as a business owner, I really want to stay within that realm. That's that's the realm that I like. I love technology. I love how it works. And so if we can bring that to more businesses or to more clients, customers, we want to do that. For the regular, let's say, small business or regular homeowner that wants to stay on top of technology and stay on top of sales and grow themselves, what's what do you see is best for them or how to stay on top of it? Uh, well, you got to read. You got to do the research and Google. Yeah, chat GBT will tell you a lot of things, right? Um, but ultimately reading, I mean, from a sales standpoint, if you want to get good at sales, follow people on, you know, social media, watch podcasts with Joe Rogan. Um, you know, Tony Robbins is he I during my career, I it was like four years into it. I was good at it. I was a top sales rep in the company. Yeah. But I wasn't I didn't feel like I was hitting the peak. And I went to the company actually invested in in their top sales reps, which was awesome. and we went to a Tony Robbins event for three days. Came out of there, I walked on Kohl's barefoot, you know, just just a a mind over matter kind of feeling. Um, and since then, I've really honestly never looked back. So, I'd say you got to invest in yourself. Yes. And you you know, if the company's not going to invest in you, invest in yourself to be better. Uh, you know, and that's that comes from a lot of time and effort into personal development. Um, yeah. other than that from like from the from the client side of things if they're going to do the research and figure that out. Uh I you got to stay in with the end technology. So I mean if if you're seeing people around you or other companies around you are evolving and they're starting to apply these certain technologies, think about why they're doing it and do the research and figure out why you're not doing it because in the end of the day you might become a dinosaur if you don't. You have to stay on top of your game. I think it's important too for businesses small or large to never stop learning, never stop investing. But the big thing is is to look outside the box because a lot of times they stay in their lane. They're really focused on the one thing that they do when they could be missing out on a whole another sector. Adding service, adding tenant improvements, adding, you know, marketing, whatever it may be in house. There's just so many different end games that you've got to keep going and keep moving forward. Otherwise, you're going to miss that whole generational gap. Yes. Yes. Exactly. I see a lot of businesses out there, um, large and small, that are wanting to grow, that are getting into sales, that have certain ways to do sales. Do you guys have a certain way that you inhouse, um, I know Tony Tony Robbins has his own way, Grant Cardone teaches you different ways. There's different processes and scripts to follow. Do you guys do that or do you let them be a little more personal and figure it out on their own? We definitely give them a structure to start with. Um, but majority of it is it's built, you know, we we give them almost like bullet points. Yeah. Hit on this, hit on this, talk about this. Make sure you build the rapport. Um, but outside of that, it's I tell everybody, I'm like, you got to be yourself. If you're if you're going off of a script that you're that we're telling you to do, you're Yeah. you're going to feel awkward. You're not going to be able to have the conversation that you truly want, right? and you know that sale might go one way or it's probably going to go the wrong way because you didn't feel comfortable. So, um we definitely stay away from a lot of the scripts. We do talk about you know how to follow up and when you should be reaching out, right? Um how to climb the ladder leader the the ladder um within the corporations the right way. Yep. Um, but you know, it's it's it is pretty crazy though if you're there on if you're there in person with a lot of these businesses. Like you find the right people faster than if you're sitting behind a computer. It's just you can't get to the right people. So, I mean, cold calling is kind of the same way. Yes, you can pick up the phone, you can talk to the gatekeeper, you can keep staying on them. No doesn't mean no forever. It just means no, not for now. But if you actually go in there and just like drop in, here's some cookies. Here's pizza. just wanted to say hello. Here's our service flyers or not be afraid to get out there and do events and be in front of people and be omniresent. I think that's another side of it too because you never know who you're going to run into and you've got to keep planting those seeds. Yes. Do you guys do a lot of associations or do you do any networking outside or what areas do you cover? So, we haven't honestly got into too many associations. Um, that's a plan of ours. I mean, we had a good book of business kind of coming into this from a property management standpoint. we built off of that. Um, but yeah, I mean, we need to get more involved in associations. That's that's a big play. And uh, that's the way that we do our business is a little different because we're usually just kind of mimicking the other business. So, we're kind of just a an extension of them. Y um, so a lot of times that's on our consultant side of things is we go back to them and say, "Hey, you guys should be involved in this association, this association. This is what works. This is what works." and we're happy to do that for you, but really it's the we're kind of becoming the face of your company, but wouldn't you rather be there? It makes more sense for the owner to be there on site. They can have the conversations, create the relation center, here's the gatekeeper instead of here's the actual person meeting you. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. So, we've invested into a few um you know on the from a Amazon standpoint. They have a uh big into like universities and we've kind of cracked the code for them for that um to allow delivery drivers into the university. So, everything's delivered to one central spot which is nice opposed to going all across the whole campus and they got delivery drivers everywhere. So, we we kind of cracked the code with them on that one. Uh and we got into a handful of uh associations that were just around mail rooms specific to that. And so we've sponsored some of those and and now, you know, they're just sponsoring most of them. Now, do you see in the future more companies like Amazon or do you have any ways to kind of keep growing into the bigger conglomerate or are you going to stay more smaller business focused or kind of whatever comes in? We love the small business. Yeah. Uh just because it's it's you kind of get that family atmosphere. Um, a lot of our fiber optic companies that we partner up with, they're all I wouldn't say they're small like mom and pop shop, but they're small in the grand scheme of an Amazon, right? And so, uh, those are great because a lot of times they don't have the they haven't invested anything into the technology really other outside the just the fiber and operating the the actual fiber line. Um, so when we come in, we're able to give them a lot more analytics of the sales and the market penetrations and that kind of stuff. And that's fun because it's we're we're really adding value outside of just the sales side of thing. Um ultimately I would like to have our own product inhouse um that we're actually offering. And so that's that's something um we're we're developing software right now that uh it could solve a lot a lot of problems for a lot of companies because of you know they just don't have that infrastructure. So kind of a plug-and-play system. you jump right in and you can start using it. Do you think it's important for businesses to know the different personas that they're trying to sell to, the different markets, things like that, or do you think that that obviously can be ever changing, but I think that they need to find that specific group that they're looking for to find it? Yeah. Um, I mean, that's part of the market penetration is, you know, if if the penetration is this amount because it's that specific of a product, uh, your your entire outlook of your product kind of dwindles. It's not dwindles, but it it it's smaller, right? It's very Yeah. Um, and you know, that's what we a lot of times find out with some of these companies that come in, you know, we get it to the market, we're like, I don't know, this is going to be a very small amount of the market. Like, how do we make this thing a much more vast? How does this apply to more see the bigger picture? Yeah. Yep. Um, but for the most part, they are uh pretty open to most of the markets. Uh but yeah, there's there's a few and and what we do to help them is yeah, we just kind of paint a picture like right here's all the cont here's the people we've reached out to. This is what the feedback is and usually that feedback paints a very big picture of it just doesn't make a lot of sense for these companies but these ones it does. So now how many of those are there? How do you deal with a customer when they come to you and say hey you know I want to grow but I don't want to grow too large too fast. Usually I ask him what would have like what's holding you back from growing too fast, you know, and what what do you think that would look like if you grew too fast? Um I think about it on my side. Well, right. Everybody does, right? Yeah. But uh yeah, I mean from their side of things, I that's how I would ask them is like what what would it look like if you grew too fast? Okay, well let's you know throttle it back maybe and find that right that happy medium. Yeah. But ultimately you want to continue to grow. So, what's the biggest obst obstacle that you guys face kind of day in day out that it's it's a hurdle, it's a learning experience always, but maybe one that just keeps coming back? Um, the biggest probably one of the bigger ones is just we're representing these other companies and so the one of the big obstacles we run into is just we can't solve everything, right, from an access pro standpoint. like we can solve the sales side, but sometimes the how we're integrated within these other companies is semi uh there's blocking like we're blockers on certain things. And so, you know, if we do an installation, sometimes we might not control that piece of it, right? And then it comes back on us. It's it's our fault for not doing it right. Um sometimes that is ours and it's a sales world. it is what it is with a lot of contractors and yeah at times there's you know bad actors and you know they don't last long but um when there is yeah they kind of comes back on us but that's I'd say the biggest problem that we run into is just not having that full integration where where we could actually do the customer support right and we have to leave that customer support to somebody else because they come to us y customers are going to come straight back to us because we created that communication and if they're if we're not able to solve it we kind of feel handcuffed What do you do when customers for the companies that you have kind of get slipped in between the cracks or they get missed out on things like that? How do you respond to the companies that you're the face of or rephrase that? If there's Yeah, sorry. If there's a customer that's trying to reach out to the company and you're kind of the the middleman and they keep slipping in between the cracks or they keep missing certain people and they come at you like how do we reach these customers that keep saying they're trying to get a hold of us and they want they want to work with us. Yeah. So, uh I mean we track a lot of that. Um the the biggest I I guess if we were going to try to catch that these customers slipping through the cracks, that's usually what like our inside sales team would be doing. Y um they're finding the gaps and trying to plug those gaps and figure out what's happening. Uh if there's not if there's an issue on one of our uh partner sides, then you know we reach out to them and we might have them reach out directly so that they can kind of connect the dots or say hey yeah you should work with Access Pros. They're our you know preferred vendor. Let's go ahead and like connect the dots that way. What do you see in the future coming up for Access Pros? Are you guys going to try to grow into a bigger market segment or are you gonna kind of stay more local or do you stay in Minnesota or what do you think the homebased? Um, so we're in 50 we're we cover all 50 states when it comes to the Amazon campaign. Uh, medical devices, that's something that can go to 50 states. We're testing it locally um just here in Minnesota. And then from a fiber footprint, you know, we're heavy in the Northwest. Um, actually, we don't even have a presence of fiber here in uh in Minnesota. So, right. Um, you know, from a Exactly. So, from a fiber standpoint, there's a lot of growth that needs to happen there. Um, it's obviously, you know, there's a lot of funding in it and that's not going to stop. Like, I mean, they're going to continue to build out better networks. Um, so yeah, I I would say we definitely we want to be in all 50 states. We have sales reps in all 50 states for one product. Why not have them for, you know, duplicate the process everywhere? What do you see for the economy the way it's going right now in quarter one rolling into quarter two in Minnesota? Uh, I mean, from an economy standpoint, to be honest with you, I stay a lot I stay outside of it. Um, I don't I don't dig too deep into it. What I do know is that sales makes this world go around. And so if we can solve a problem from a sales standpoint, the economy could do whatever it wants to do and we're going to continue to thrive. Um and companies are going to continue to thrive. Now does that mean that products are going to be a little bit harder to uh find or you know maybe companies are kind of you know slowing down, stepping back from this. They don't want to grow too fast because maybe there's some limitations there. um that's possible, but at the end of the day, like if we're able to, you know, get the product to the market and it's successful, that shouldn't ever go away. No, there is enough work to go around. There always has been. I mean, I we deal a lot with the different economies and different places. And I think it's important for people to start working more together as a team and collaborate than always just going headtohead. I know that people are getting hungrier and wanting more work and wanting more jobs and wanting more sales to drop and they're all starting to go against each other. But if we work together, I think it's going to in the end help everybody out. Yeah. I would say from like an economy standpoint, our business model today, which was probably going to change is these are all entrepreneurs and they're they're, you know, 1099 contractors. And so if the economy does take a a major change in one direction, it could increase the amount of so-called gig workers that are going to be out there. Um, and that could, you know, make us even better or it could go the other direction where people feel like they need a more stable income. They don't need, you know, they're not willing to risk as much, right? Um, not going to say it's a risk because I've been 10 and nine my entire life, but yeah. Uh, yes. I mean, there's definitely a growth in the entrepreneur world versus corporate America. You see that every day, especially through the last couple years. Everybody kind of wants to be their own boss, do their own thing, and make a name for themselves, but at the same time, you have to hold yourself accountable then. That's a lot more poignant. Like, you have to be the first one there. You have to be the last one to leave and want to put in the time to make it work. Exactly. Does your family, like your wife, your kids, are they used to that now with you being being business owner? Yeah. Um, yeah, I'm going to say yes. They're they're used to it. Uh, it's been a transition from what I was doing to actually owning my own business and, you know, starting that in 2023. So, uh, I'm home more often, which is a huge plus. It's just I might not be as home, right? Because you're busy at home. Oh, it's now I'm busy at home where, you know, when before when I was just on the sales side and and running and gunning, I was gone for, you know, weeks at a time or a week, then I'd be home when you're shut it off. Exactly. I was able to shut it off and, you know, just deal with customers during business hours really. Um, now, yeah, I mean, covering all states, too. The time zones change. So, um, you know, depending on where our contract's out of, like y you know, they might live in Vegas and reaching out to us and so I might need to be available in after hours. Well, what a lot of people I think that aren't in sales or in any other world don't realize is that with technology the way it is, your phone's always on. You could get an email at 4 a.m. You could get a text at two. You don't know where they're calling from, where they're texting from, what time it is there, and so on. So yeah, the accessibility point is is a lot more difficult to maintain to shut off at a certain hour, I think. For sure. Yeah. How often do you I mean you guys have done some traveling. Tell our listeners a little bit about some of the places you guys have traveled to. So I took my wife to Ireland. It was kind of a dream of ours on our 5year anniversary. Um that was I mean I love Ireland. It's my favorite place. If I have a choice, I'm going to be we'll build a little cottage up in the hills in Ireland. And that's We are too, so we're good. We'll be right there. Um, and then last year, it was supposed to be for our 10 tenure and ended up being our 11th year. Uh, we went to Ireland again and uh it kind of took a different route around. Um, so I absolutely love that area. Um, the people are great. The beer's good. Yep. The atmosphere, the weather, there's no bugs, there's no snakes. you know, you could go on and on. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's absolutely amazing. Um, outside of that, I mean, being in sales, I've gone we've gone on sales incentives every single year, um, since 2013. Uh, so we've been, you know, Dominican, uh, Costa Rica, a lot of the ocean, like a lot of the the beach vacations. Yeah. Um, and then one year I was actually able to go to South Africa. Very cool. Um it was awesome. Safari and golf every day. Uh it was tough life, right? It was a lot of fun. So yeah. Um but yeah, I mean we do love to travel and we actually I tell my I tell all my kids um I brought my oldest on a few. Our youngest has gone on a couple of them when he was really really young. Um but I tell everybody that you know education is great but traveling it teaches you so much more. You you have so much more um understanding of what else is happening in the world. Well, and it's important too when you do some of those beach trips to get off the beaten track path. Go explore. See what it's out there. Like if you're going to go to the Bahamas, go see the castles. Like, who would know they're there? You always think beaches are just a beach, but there's there's a lot more to the culture. Get into the the mom and pops places, go to the restaurants that are probably run down, but have the best food that you can get at, and just see the culture. Yeah. Yeah. What do you think as far as your incentives go and your team growing? Where are you guys going to go next? Are you going to keep growing or do you want to kind of keep it the way it is? We're I mean we're not I don't even I feel like we haven't even truly started um to where we can go. Uh so yeah, 100% we we're continuing to grow. Um we're going to continue to add more contracts. Whether maybe my executive team says no, I'm probably going to say I'll I'll step back and say all right, I'll take a little breather. I'll say yes now. We'll figure it out, guys. But we'll figure it out. Um, ultimately what we want to do is we want we want to streamline this as as we want to make it as easy as possible for our our clients, our contracts, um, any of those to to work. They just plugandplay system, right? And so that's my that's where my vision is going is if it's a plug-andplay, sales reps are going to be in a much better position because they're going to have more opportunities. Why take those away from them if they're, you know, motivated? They've been with us for a long time. We want to keep filling their pockets and making them excited to to go to work every day. Yeah. Um and so I don't see that stopping by any means. Um and the more we bring on, the more we want to throw back to our sales reps and make sure that they're, you know, profitable and they have a goal in mind to go achieve. So, um I don't want this to be just a kind of like not a dead-end career, but I want it to be an opportunity that's they're going to walk away at some point and maybe never have to work again. It's a culture. It's it's a lifestyle. People don't understand that when you go to work, you're at work more than you're at home. It's your life. It's your livelihood. It's it's your why. You kind of do what you do, but you have to love what you do. Yeah. And at the end of the day, if you're bringing that home with you and you don't enjoy what you're doing, it gets to be a lot more stressful, a lot more just not fun. So, yeah. And it becomes stagnant. Yeah. And you just get bored in what you're doing. And so, um, I know I know in the sales world a lot of people, even if you're selling well, like if you're making good money and you're you're you closing a lot of deals, you could still get bored. Yeah. And you can think the grass is greener somewhere else. And um, not that that we want to hold anybody, you know, in the company and you can't leave or do anything else, but we want to create it as it's an ecosystem there that you could be as profitable as you want it to be, right? The sky's is the limit. I think there's a lot to be said too in the sales world with burnout and people going on full force and not taking a break and just getting run down. Um, I was just at a meeting a couple days ago and one of the ladies there, she's like, "I' I own my own business. I'm starting to cut myself too thin." She's like, "But I heard one of my mentors tell me." And she's like, "I've always got to remember is just to stay present in the present moment and be present no matter where you are. Take a minute, stop everything, and just be there." So, she's like, "That's what gets me through my day." just like I don't care how busy I am just to be in that moment. Yeah. Which is kind of important. It's it's definitely important and I think if you're in the moment you don't feel I actually had a situation last year um where we were bringing on a few more uh contacts and or contracts and it was getting a little busy and I was kind of getting this like oh there's a lot of things a lot of moving parts are happening. Yeah. And at one point I actually stepped away from that and I kind of just let it run its course. Yep. Um and then I focused heavily on another part of the project and then after things kind of I guess settled down um I was able to just kind of look back on it and go, "Oh wait, I should actually be more involved in that because it means something." And so instead of that's you know the world is falling it was more like I could clearly look at it and see figure out okay we were just missing this piece this piece we just got to step back it's it's easier to see the big picture. I think with a lot of business owners too it's important for them to understand that it's great to wear a lot of hats but at the same time you have to do what you're good at and hire those experts on the things that you're not good at. As long as you know what you're doing and you know how it needs to run and you learn it, don't let somebody else who actually knows that and it strives for that a little bit more, too. Yeah. Yeah. I uh that's that's spot on because when I first started it was uh I was wearing every hat. I was I was doing payroll. I was doing a little bit. Uh I mean it was everything. So, I mean, those hours were so long and I felt like I was getting away from what I truly was good at, which was being in front of the sales team and making sure that they know and you stop enjoying what you're doing because you're so focused on all the other little stuff just to get it done that it's like, wait, what now? I still catch myself at times doing that. Um, but it's it's a lot less amount because now I have a team that I can I can focus on and I can actually they're supporting me. They're good at that role. Great. just take on that role and just you get your process, you get your lane, you just do it. Yeah. I mean, big business, large business, small business, that's important for people to stay in their lane. It's it's great to know how to do everything. Obviously, you need to. It's your business. It's your baby, but at the same time, if you don't enjoy that, hire somebody that does because that's what they love. You can see it in their face and they get excited about it. Yep. What roles do you see coming on that'll be new or changing in the next year for you guys? Um, well, I mean, we just brought on an operations manager that's going to be overseeing kind of the the backend operations, so that'll be a huge plus. Um, and that's a new role. There's going to that that role, I've already talked to him. I said, just get ready. Get ready because what I tell you today might not be like this tomorrow um or next week. That's every role though, really. That's what we want it to be. We want it to be fun and exciting. Like, you never really know what's going on. Um, if you're if you're happy with this exact role and you want it to be that role, it might not be a great opportunity here because this thing is ever ever flowing. Um, I see, you know, as as we kind of get growing and and doing more uh of the software side of stuff, we're going to end up having to bring in a lot more developers um backend and front end and uh just get a little bit more tech heavy on that side of things. And so that's ultimately where I see that going. Um, this last year we did bring on a VP of sales which kind of took a huge load off of me. That was huge. Uh, and it gave me the ability to like, all right, now I can go and work with other companies rather than managing what's already here. So, uh, that's been a huge help. And so, I could see as we get more and more uh, contracts and more companies coming on board with us, we'll definitely start building that part that that director role in. Yeah. I mean, ideally, you want the role to be, okay, I don't have to be here. It's good that I'm here, but I don't want everybody dependent on me being here every single day because you have to do things for the business that are outside of normal working hours or whatever it may be or working on other clients elsewhere. And if the world ends every time you leave, that can survive. Right. Right. I've actually joked around a few times where I'm like, I'm just going to leave for a week. Like, I'll just be at home, but I'm not going to tell anybody. is my phone will be off and we'll just see. We'll find it. Yeah. I I feel like it's kind of interesting to say, but like a lot of the generation, they have the access to their own answers. They just want somebody to do it for them and they want to talk about it and they want to have you do it. So, they're going to come in and sit down and just be like, "Hey, show me how to do this again or can you do this for me or can you help me out?" And I'm like, "Okay, let's pull up Google. Let's find your answer." So, I mean, even in the sales world, if they want us to put them in connection with somebody else, you're going to do the same thing I am. Let's get on Google and see who's in the area. Right. Right. Yeah. So, it's fun to see people excited about what they do. You guys are changing as a company and growing, ever changing. I can't wait to have you back on after that week. You take off, right? Yeah. See See how everybody's doing. Maybe we'll have you on. Hey, absolutely. Let's do it. Yeah, might as well. It helps out. I think any way that you can grow as a business and try to reach more people, but you generally have to have a why. And if it's helping out, if it's giving back, obviously it's always family first, but giving back and just being out there and not afraid to try new things. Make mistakes. Yeah, that's a big part of it, too. Yeah. I mean, I've made I've made thousands of mistakes. I mean, we we we make a mistake every day, I feel like. Um and that's usually what that I mean, a mistake just shows me that there's opportunity to still be fixed. If you're not making mistakes, you're not growing. Mhm. Yeah, exactly. As long as the same mistake's not made over and over and over again, right? Yeah. It's like you can you can do it a couple times and learn from it, but after the third try, it's it's it's an interesting battle. Then, what do you see with your kids that are growing up these days? You said you have an 18-year-old and you have a younger one, too, I believe. I'm Yeah, he's 11. What What do you think's in store for them in the future? Um, well, I already said it. I'm a little worried about the the younger generation uh just because, you know, growing up I I was forced to do a lot of things. Um you know, in order to get a cell phone, which was like the newest branded thing. Um I had to go and clean bathrooms or whatever. Like I had to do something to get a reward. I feel like everything nowadays is so instant gratification. You want it now. Um and you know, it's just built that way. there's nothing wrong with it, but that you can't assume that because you can order on Amazon and you can have it here tomorrow doesn't mean that if you want something, you're just going to get it tomorrow, too, right? Um, and so I think the that the work ethic and and that is going to need to get adjusted. Um, but you know, that's what we have to do as parents is to try to instill that in, which is interesting because I I mean I grew up, my dad was a sergeant in the army. I had two older brothers, played a lot of basketball, a lot of softball, a lot of golf, a lot of everything. But the one thing that was instilled in me is you have to get out there and try and you have to do something. Like, you have to work. You have to go at it. If you want to play basketball, you're going to be there all the time practicing. You've got to do it. And kids these days will go to the gym once and try out for the team, not hit the gym, not do anything. Or if they want to play golf, they just want to play a round of golf and not put in the time. And that's the hardest part. It's like your gratification. You're not going to be good if you don't practice. Right. Right. Right. I uh I mean this might be a little off the topic, but I mean so my son's getting towards the end of you he's going to graduate this year and I can tell he's getting like that senioritis not wanting to get some homework done, not wanting to do that. Um so we're, you know, obviously on him like, hey, you know, you got to graduate, right? So let's get your homework done. Um, but I'm finding out that I don't know if this is something that societyy's allowing or not, but we were never able to not turn in an assignment and then turn it in at a later time and get the same grade. Uh, we were never multiple times it, right? We were never able to Yeah. take it. Yeah. Retake a test, right? Um, and you know, so I I don't know if that's I mean, obviously there's nothing that we can change if that's what it is. But I that I in my mind just gives the opportunity that that's what the world looks like, too. When you leave high school, you can turn things in. So I was joking with him. I said, I'm going to talk to your boss, who's a good buddy of mine, and I said, I'll uh when you get your paycheck, I'll just tell the payroll to just, you know, submit it like two weeks late. Yep. No problem. We'll see if you you care about it then, right? And obviously you're definitely going to care about it at that point. So um so yeah I mean they're going to be everything's at their fingertips right now. So they can be the younger generation will I'll learn so much from them at some point but not everything they're seeing on technology is accurate either. And that's a hard lesson that a lot of them are going to have to learn. Like I'm going to look up my answer but yeah two. You remember when you remember when you googled something and you knew like oh that's a real thing. Yeah. Now there's, you know, all this fake stuff that you Google fake news and real news and like Dr. Google really, right? Right. Yeah. Um, so yeah, that's that's gonna be that's gonna be a challenge. Um, I mean my youngest, he so my youngest, he's 11 and he's on the spectrum. Y and uh you know, that's something that has challenged me and my wife more than anything. Um, and the outlook for him is, you know, he's not going to use the technology really. you know, I mean, there might be some technology that could help him be uh better, but I mean, he's, you know, he's verbal and everything like that, but uh you know, I that that kid has taught me so much more in life about just what life really means in itself. Yes. Um than than anything else. And so, um where his outlook looks like, I mean, I don't know what that's going to do, but um technology is not going to affect that. But I know that he's a he loves people and so communication and people are always going to be his number one thing. He's going to want to be around everybody. So, and everybody's gifted in their own way and you just don't know every child no matter where they're at in life are completely different. I mean, we have a blended family of seven kids and every single like even with my three kids night to day difference, boy, girl, first, second, third. It's it's a learning process every everyone you go through for sure. Yes. Yep. Yeah, it's exciting to see, you know, all the technology that's out there. It is scary. Yes, it's exciting to see growth. It's kind of one of those like you want to keep moving forward. You stay positive. You keep growing. You keep at the grind every day. But then there's a part of you that's like, okay, I've got to take a minute and take a step back. Thousand%. Yeah. So, I I feel like I could work 15 out of the 20 hours every day if I had a choice. Yep. Um, and yeah, and I probably, you know, get close to 12, um, or more. But at some point, I mean, I've had to throttle myself back a little bit, too. I was like, okay, you know, before you jump into this next role, this next step, uh, there's probably other systems that need to be in place so that when we're there, it's actually efficient and it's not just, um, you know, you're going to get blindsided by a lot of things. And so, um, I I know right now from a growth standpoint, we want to grow. We want to everybody should want to grow. If they don't then I don't know what you're doing in business. N um so we definitely want to grow but I have throttled back in the last you know probably six months to say hey let's make sure we have the structure and the system inside of the company is strong enough to handle this next load right because if that's not there that's just going to take a toll on me which then takes a toll on my family which takes a toll on the other businesses. So it's a full circle thing. Um and so I mean there's that limitation. Yeah. But I I really look at it as more it's not really a limitation. It's more of just I'm forward thinking making sure that when we do roll into that next program it's it's the right fit because like for the businesses coming into you guys too you've got to have the processes in place to grow. Yes, you can always say yes and we'll figure out a way and we'll figure out how down the road. But if you don't have the core of the business flowing then how do you expect to have everything else coming in work? Yes. Yes. Yeah. I know a lot of companies out there don't have processes. What's the easiest way for you to you guys to help have them or get them established in getting the core processes set in place, things like that, too? Um, I mean, the one thing that I see most often is all these businesses, they they work from an Excel. They work just from an Excel document and that's about it. Y um so one thing that we always do is we'll take that Excel, we bring it into our own system which is called the hub and it it kind of it's more of like a smart sheet but then you get the analytics behind it and you can gather more information than just an Excel sheet. And so um that's the big piece that we do. I mean a lot of times they don't even know what you know if they don't have a sales channel right they don't know what kind of metrics or what things that we we would need. So we're also consulting on that side of hey it would be nice to know I need this data point this data point and this data point and then we'll bring it in house and we'll figure out what those data points mean and how it correlates to the sales volume we're doing the conversion rate you know the completion rate that kind of stuff for the older small businesses that are out there that don't understand all the analytics and the data and everything like that what's the easiest way for them to understand what they need to succeed I'm a dashboard person. Like I need a dash. I'm a visual person. I need to see it. Um I looking at an Excel sheet, yeah, I can see some things maybe, but for the most part, if I see it on a on an, you know, it's broken down in a dashboard, I know exactly where the problems are and where we could get better at. And that's that's the quickest way that we we've been able to show them is, you know, give me what you have from a reporting standpoint and let me give you back what I think we're missing. And then when we're able to paint that picture to them, um I mean this is crazy, but like Amazon is, you know, this huge tech company. Yep. They've seen our systems and they're like, I wish we just had those. It's just simplified because it's simplified. It's not so complex and, you know, multiple moving targets. It's here's the target. Y and here's where we're at and you know, here's where we need to go to get there. This is how we got to tweak it. Yeah, I think a lot of times people when they when they are bigger companies, Amazon, Targets, whatever they may be, there's just so many processes and so many things that are on so many different softwares and balances that they can't put them all together. And that's I mean it's it's easy once you get them all there and right in front of you and you can just visually see it all happen. Yeah. Yeah. It it it goes a long ways. Um I mean seeing is believing so Right. And we we try to show that to the whole sales team as well. I mean, everybody should see all of those, you know, we we we make it a competitive atmosphere, too. So, u, you know, they can climb a leaderboard, they can earn, you know, company trips and all kinds of stuff that goes into it. But it's that same seeing and believing that I had when I was in on the sales side, what I wanted to see, what I felt like if I knew this, this, or this, I would be more efficient at my job. Yep. And that's what we're trying to roll back to our own sales force, which in turn helps them, but it also helps our clients, you know, need to know more. When you win, we all win. It's kind of one of those deals. How do you see for your salespeople and or like your other staff out there that are closers and or hunters or gatherers or whatever they are in their roles? Do they finish from start to finish? Do they What roles do they have? So that has been um I mean they they go start to finish as of right now. We we want to take that piece away a little bit. Not take the whole thing away, but the sales cycle and at times can be really long. Yeah. Um and there's some people that are really good at just creating that initial interaction. They can create the rapport fast, but then they might not have the so-called backbone to get the deal done or maybe the negotiating power to do something. Um and that if we just supported them a little bit along the way, it would that would go a long ways. And so as of right now, yeah, they start to finish. They learn the product from the very beginning to the close. And then ultimately, we just want to make their job simpler. Y and so we figure out who are actually the closers, who's not and you know, put the people in the right places, but tweak it around if you need a little help. There's always people to follow up and help you out. The nice thing is though, if they go start to finish, they know the whole product cycle. They know the whole cycle. they can, you know, they inside and out no matter what, right? Yeah. What do you think for the ones that are the closers? I mean, do they have do you let other people like if you're starting a customer from start to finish? They're struggling with a customer. Can you handle it or do you hand it off to other people depending on their their closing cycle? We definitely hand it off. Yeah. Um and this is going to sound bad, but some people want to work with a woman versus a man, right? Um it's kind of interesting, but uh or they are able to make the decisions faster. I don't know why. Um and we've seen that at times. And so sometimes it gets to this last piece and it's just not closing like I don't this doesn't make any sense. And so sometimes I'll call them or you know our director Katie will call her or call them. Um and sometimes that last little touch point y goes that it always sometimes just takes a different voice. Like you're dealing with a person from start to finish. They're just not connecting. There's so many different ways to communicate and so many different communication styles that unless you know the actual person you're speaking to and how they communicate, you might just be at a barrier there. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. We actually just ran into it last week where I mean there was like 12 deals that we closed last week that they would have never been closed by the person that actually got them initially and they were just in this holding pattern of nothing and you know was flip by someone else. Yep. One other person called them and they said, "Yeah, I've actually been waiting to get this done." I'm like, "Hm, interesting." Okay. I can see the 12 follow-ups with them here and the texts and the emails and everything else and the calls and the stopbys, but it's not working. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and it's fun to see. I mean, some of those the quick closes. It's like, okay, what what were you waiting for then? Were you just waiting for me to call a different voice? Male, female, who knows? Yeah. It's interesting. It's fun to see all the growth, all the sales finally closing. What have been some of the biggest successes that you guys have had as a company? Um, the biggest success we have we've had so far is I mean I keep going back to it, but Amazon is our baby at this point. Um, they're the ones we we always joke they keep the lights on for now. Um, but they our biggest, you know, we we jumped into the Amazon world and selling uh it's called the key access program and it was just going back to current customers and getting a getting them set up with a portal. Y and that was kind of a leap of faith in the very beginning of just trying to test the waters with these guys and see how it goes. Y and uh we caught them up to goal in three months. Uh we got him all the way up to goal for 2023. So that was awesome and then it rolled right into then it's an easy goal forward. So then going forward we started offering more products for them. Um and now we're pretty much offering all of their suite of their their Amazon key products. And so that was like a big stepping stone. Um 2024 we were their largest uh channel partner uh in the country. We expanded into Canada. It was a big win for sure. Um it's a bit of a challenge in Canada. Uh the borders and everything else just that whole, you know, the the way that business is run there is a little bit different than how it's run here. So it's similar but different. And I don't know, that's just it's more similar to Montana because you have a lot of Canadians in Montana. You start to understand it a little more. It is a bit slower though. That's just that's the the one issue we run into. Um and then outside of that from a fiber standpoint, you know, we we've brought on a few new contracts. Uh, and that was that was those were cool because they were actually reached out to us where they're like, "We know what you guys do." Um, and so that was ultimately like the, you know, a feel-good moment for me to know like, hey, somebody else knows what we're doing out there and it's working. Um, the other really big win we had was we brought all of our um, internal data and everything into one thing called the hub. And that was um, that took a lot of time. It's still an ongoing process. It's never really stops working, but it's now in house and you can say it's all there together. Yes. Yep. So, everybody can come right in. No matter what product they sell, they plug right in. They see all their customers. They see their metrics. They see everything there. So, that's exciting. Yeah. So, if people want to get a hold of you, how can they find you? What's the best way for them to find you? Uh, I mean, the best way is just to go on our website, access-pros.net. Got it. It's as simple as that. Um there's a couple options in there whether you're looking to become a you know new client of ours or if you're just uh looking to actually be what we call a pro uh which is actually on the sales side. So everybody wants to be a pro, right? That's right. If you don't, you're not in the right role. Yep. Uh can they find you on social media at all? Access pros or anything? Yeah, we have uh Instagram. This be a better question for Margot, but uh what do we got? Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook. Yep. you can find us in any of those. Um, we're always trying to add more. So, and what does Margot have interest in coming up in the marketing world for you guys, you know, and that's I don't know. Uh, she's always surprising us. I know we uh uh a month ago, this is actually off-the-wall kind of story, but we were in Jamaica on our company trip. We took our top top sellers to Jamaica this last year in January. And I'm at the swim up bar hanging around in the pool and uh this guy walks up to me and he says, "Hey, do you do any are you into NASCAR?" And I was like, "I've been to a few NASCAR races." Yes. But um we we kind of Anyways, long story short, I ended up facetiming the one of the drivers uh that was at the Daytona 500. And so we sponsored a piece of his car. That's cool. Just a fun little thing. So I mean, we want to get our name out there for sure. Um I know we we plan on um opening up kind of a nonprofit in regards to my son um on the anything with special needs. Yes. On that side. And so those are some new things that are coming out. But um yeah, I just did the Polar Plunge. There's Special Olympics Minnesota. There's a lot of things out there. Um there's a gentleman who actually golfs his uh Charlie's golfing club. He's on the Spectrum and he goes around raising money for Special Olympics Minnesota. I mean it's it's fun. He's been in here to our simulator. It's It's always fun to give back and to see other people striving and being gifted in their own ways. It's It's invigorating to me. I just love it. Yes, it really is. Yeah, it it's a lot of fun. So, yeah, that's that's a big passion of mine. So, I know that, you know, as that comes up, we'll we'll be obviously announcing all of that, too. Well, let us know how we can get involved when you do. For sure. Yeah. Well, we appreciate having you on today and can't wait to see where you guys are going in the future and look forward to the growth. Amazing. Yeah. Thanks for having me on. Thank you. Yep.