Weldon Long
speaker
182 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Mar 2025
last heard Mar 2025
Weldon Long’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
Take the mechanics.
Yeah. When I started my first company in 2004, there was this guy in town that was literally, this was back in early 2000s, would do a basic 80s furnace in a 13-serie condition. It might have been 10-serie back in those days. I can't remember. But he would do the whole system for like $4,500.
And I was just opening my first company and I was starting to crunch the numbers and put some budgets together and all those things you just listed. I'm like, how the hell can you do it? How do you do that? You know? So I happened to see his truck one day at a Waffle House. And I pulled in there. And I went and introduced myself. And I said, do you mind if I ask you a few questions?
He goes, knock yourself out. And so I sit down. He gets me a cup of coffee. Nicest guy. And I said, how do you do systems for $4,500? And he says, well, do you know anything about the business side? I said, well, I'm starting to learn the business side. I've been a comfort advisor, but I'm opening my own business and trying to do a budget, and I'm finding out what things cost.
And he says, well, how much is the equipment on that system? I said, probably $3,000. This was a long time ago, 20 years ago. This was $3,000 for the furnace, the transition, the air conditioner, whatever. He goes, yeah, about $3,000. So at $4,500, how much money do I make? I'm like, you mean your gross profit? He goes, well, what do you call what you want? How much do I make?
I said, well, you've got $1,500 gross profit there if you're not paying any sales commission, any labor, because all you mentioned was the equipment, not to mention burden and these other issues. He goes, I don't have to deal with that. I work out of my house. He goes, I make $1,500 in two days. He goes, I make Dr. Surgeon money. And I'm like, how can you ever reason with that guy?
That's what he believes, that he was making $1,500. That's the stupidity that we're dealing with. with our competition. What I tell our guys is that, hey, because they'll come back, hey, man, that guy was $3,000 less than ours. I'm like, oh, did he show you the letter from the IRS where he's two years behind on his taxes?
Did he show you the letter from his mortgage company where he's fixing to go into foreclosure? Did you see the part where his wife had to go back to work because he couldn't support the family? Did they have all that on the kitchen table or just his cheap price? They don't see the whole picture, man.
The best time to sell somebody something is right after they bought something. Right. Once you get to make that psychological and it clicks, I'm doing this. We all have the experience. You go to the car dealership, very stressful. When you make the decision, it's like. You're all in. You're buying everything. Then they send you to finance.
You may have had him on your podcast before. Cialdini?
He's a good buddy of mine. Yeah, he's here in town, right?
Yeah, so I was watching a video of his years ago. And he goes, yeah, everybody knows people buy from people they like. He said, what you may not have thought about is people also buy from people who like them. Yep. And so what I teach is I teach our people to ask the advice about something from your homeowner. Ask their advice. Who do you ask advice from? Your friends.
Somebody you like and you trust. So you send a very strong message. We spend so much time getting people to like us, and that's important. Like you say, that's the number one thing.
No, no, no. If they've got an RV. Hey, Mr. Homeowner, I see that RV out there. I've been thinking for years about getting in the RV life. How do you go about doing that? What's that like? Just find something I'm interested in. Ask my advice. Yeah, and I'm in your garage.
Hey, I used to go to golf clubs. I've been thinking for years I should learn how to play golf. Ask him anything. Dude, I'm an old guy. You come to my house and you ask me about my cars or my RV, and we're going to talk for an hour, and I'm going to tell you about them. Right? And it's like, listen, it's almost like what's that old saying?
I think Zig Ziglar used to say, the sweetest sound you'll ever hear is the sound of your own name. Yeah. Right? Getting people, making them feel like a freaking rock star, letting them know you like them by ask their opinion on stuff. Ask their advice. It's important that they like you, but they've got to know that you like them. And you touched on it just a minute ago.
The number one need we have as humans is to be heard, to be understood. And we don't get much of that. Think back when you were a kid and you're trying to explain to a teacher or your mom and dad, like, no, no, no, that's not what happened. I don't want to hear it. I don't want to hear it. I know what happened. And how frustrating was that as a kid when people wouldn't listen to you?
Dude, I remember when I was in fourth grade. I was 10 years old, fourth grade, and they had a baking a cake contest. I can't remember what it was for, some fundraiser. And all the kids had to go bake a cake. Well, as it turned out, that our neighbor was a professional cake baker. She made wedding cakes, birthday cakes. And so I went over there with my mom and I said, hey, I got to bake a cake.
Can I use some of your molds? And she gave me this Mickey Mouse mold. I made the entire cake from that point. I just used her mold and she told me how to do it. I baked the cake. I used the little thing to put the eyes on. Beautiful freaking cake. We go to the contest. My mom and dad are with me. We're in the auditorium, the gymnasium of the school.
And they disqualify my cake because they said there's no way a 10-year-old made that cake. And, dude, I was like, no, no, no, I promise you. We don't want to hear it, young man. This is very dishonest. And I'm like, no, no, I made the kick up. I didn't want to hear it. Dude, I wanted to freaking strangle somebody. It's so frustrating when people won't listen to you.
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