Brooks Van Norman  0:04 

Hey everybody Brooks Van Norman here, and today I'm joined by one of my clients, David syas. From zaurus. David, thanks for joining me on this video interview today.

David Saias  0:38  

Hey, thanks for inviting me, Brooks.

Brooks Van Norman  0:40  

So David has a great story. We've been working together only for a few months now. And David has seen positive ROI on his investment in our system. And we've got some great stuff to talk about in terms of what zaurus is up to and how you're progressing with working together. So I'm not going to steal your thunder. Let's get right to it. David, maybe you can tell us a little bit about zaurus your business and and who you guys help?

David Saias  1:08  

Sure. So zaurus is a cybersecurity startup. We provide Endpoint Protection, and employee monitoring. And we sell it's strictly through the it channel of MSP managed service providers in the IT channel. Okay, and we've been around for about two and a half years right now.

Brooks Van Norman  1:30  

And you guys are focused predominantly in North America in the United States, right.

David Saias  1:34  

Currently in North America. We're planning to expand internationally, but currently in North America, yes.

Brooks Van Norman  1:39  

Okay. Okay, great. And you've been in the space for quite a while yourself.

David Saias  1:44  

I've been in and out of the channel. I've been in technology. For many years, I've had a couple of stints with a company called register calm and some other channel related businesses. But yeah, I've been in this business for a while. constantly moving, constantly changing.

Brooks Van Norman  2:01  

Right on? Well, let's let's start from the beginning, it would be great to learn, you know, what you were doing to generate leads and sales with your existing process before we started working together? And, you know, really what some of your frustrations were with the way that you were doing things before?

David Saias  2:18  

Sure. So you know, we have various ways of creating leads for the business. A lot of work and trade shows and conferences, collecting collecting names. We dabbled in outsourced appointment setting. And also sales reps just grinding through lists and scraping email addresses and phone numbers. So um, it's really been time consuming, in some cases, very expensive, with various levels of results. So it was really interesting that we we came together on this as well.

Brooks Van Norman  2:55  

Mm hmm. Let's go back to the real beginning. How did you initially hear about us? And what was the deciding reason to really do business with us?

David Saias  3:07  

Sure. That's actually a great question for you, for us, because you actually reached out through LinkedIn, one of your processes to our CEO, who thought it was a really unique way to attract leads. And he immediately responded to you had a conversation was impressed, and asked me to investigate this a bit further. And yeah, so that's how we got through the same process that you trained us to use? Cool.

Brooks Van Norman  3:35  

That's great. So how would you describe what it's been like working together so far?

David Saias  3:43  

I think it's a in general, it's been great.

David Saias  3:47  

You have great ideas on messaging, how to reach out to clients. Your support is super responsive. I'm really impressed with the way you respond to any questions that I have any time of day, mostly through video chats, which are great, because I can go back and reference them anytime I want to. So working with you is really been a really positive experience.

Brooks Van Norman  4:11  

Let's talk about messaging a little bit, because I know that was one of the areas where we spent some time and as you and I have talked, we're in such a busy market in b2b. And one of the challenges so many organizations have is just getting a really sharp point on their messaging. So they stand out in their market and differentiate themselves. What would you say have been some of the insights or, you know, the benefits that you think you've gained in terms of just working together on the messaging?

David Saias  4:47  

So, when we first started, you asked me to take a first crack at recreating my LinkedIn profile. And by the way, I do have to say that, you know, one of the things that really attracted me to Brookfield I was I absolutely agree with the fact that LinkedIn is not utilized as a, as a real good marketing tool, I'd say or more importantly, not used correctly as a marketing tool for lead generation. And your ideal LinkedIn profile is really wasted real estate. As a digital resume, if you're not looking for a job, it really is. So why not turn it into a landing page for your business and market off of that. So that that really resonated with me. And then when we got together, and you asked me to take a first crack at creating sort of a landing page portion of my LinkedIn profile, you have some interesting comments on it. But the bottom line is, back and forth over a couple of sessions, we were really able to hone in on great messaging that resonates to our target market. And that was a great experience working through that, in addition to that, the messaging that we do through LinkedIn emails, and then follow on email campaigns are really crisp and to the point. And our business is really dependent upon demonstrations, online demonstrations. So we measure our business on how many demonstrations we can generate week over week. And attracting our target market is kind of hard to manage service business. Most of the main players in them are business owners that their time is really taken up. So it's really hard to attract them. And we currently do two different ways to reach out to them one through this LinkedIn process that we worked out with, with you Brooks. And then another one was more formal sequencing through HubSpot, through our CRM, with probably more detailed messaging and included videos and stuff, and we're measuring them against both, we're getting pretty good results on both.

David Saias  6:58  

But the fact that we have both we can compare them

David Saias  7:02  

pretty equal right now. But the main difference is that this is a longer play, that I see it to generate leads, because we're really building relationships over time, and building a relationship well enough that we can actually have

David Saias  7:20  

sales discussions and not jump into them immediately.

David Saias  7:25  

The fact that the first message that goes out to the clients that I'm targeting is that this is not a sales pitch really resonates. I gotten a few emails back saying You had me that this is not a sales pitch. And they actually LinkedIn to me, we've had great conversations and built up relationships over that. And over time, I mean, we've created, you know, some pipeline of demos out of this, some pipeline of referrals, because even some of the contacts that we've reached out to warrant the exact target market that we wanted to, but I've actually gotten referrals from some of the people I've developed relationships with so long way of saying that's in general, how we've been working, and it's been working really well so far.

Brooks Van Norman  8:12  

Yeah, and you've landed a customer out of the process as small as right.

David Saias  8:16  

landed a customer so far out of it. And we've waited quite a few demonstrations as well. Nice. We have a big one coming up into this week. Good, good.

Brooks Van Norman  8:25  

So we've got some positive ROI there. That's terrific. Yeah, that that messaging is something that we've worked on a lot to really make sure that we're not connecting and pitching, which is what 80% of people using LinkedIn seem to be doing these days. And also not on the other end of the spectrum, which is disingenuously trying to add value or, hey, you know, here's an article or all like your post, if you like my post, it's really in the middle of it, aligning with human nature. And, as you said, getting that profile optimized so that when people see your, your profile, and when David shows up in their inbox, they realize that you understand them, you get their world, your messaging speaks to the outcome that they typically would want for their business. And all of those things influence the, the process. So that's, that's really awesome, the way you described that. Thank you for sharing that face. So why why do you think somebody should take action using LinkedIn and direct outreach now, instead of waiting?

David Saias  9:38  

You know, these are interesting times. And a lot of the business owners that I speak to, are taking my calls or scheduling calls with me, specifically because they're in the same situation. You know, they're grinding it out during these uncertain times. And I had a call yesterday with somebody who was in a similar area. industry but wasn't fine tuned to. They weren't an MSP. So they weren't the exact target market for us. But we talked about what he's doing for reach outs. And what I'm doing. And he appreciated the fact that I was trying to grind it out. And he wanted to have someone to talk it through with. And during the conversation, we created, I think, a pretty good relationship. And he actually gave me two really good leads, one of which was an MSP that he uses for his business, and another MSP that he knows just from, from a friendship. So it's a tough time to market right now, because people are so distracted, we happen to be in a business that is actually gaining because of what's going on right now. We have a product that helps provide security and employee monitoring from remote locations like working from home. So that part of the business is, I guess the timing worked out with COVID. Unfortunately, or fortunately for us, but we're one of the businesses, the types of industries that really haven't been negatively affected so far. Yeah. But it's using different types of reach outs. And I think LinkedIn is something that's not utilized effectively enough, is resonating and is resonating with, you know, 18 to 20% of the people that we're reaching out to, because they are connecting with me, the next step is to actually get a conversation going.

Brooks Van Norman  11:31  

Let's talk briefly about those conversations. When you get on the phone with these prospects. How is the conversation? Do they reference your profile? I know you talked about the messaging, but how do you think the lead up to the conversation or the demo is different now than in the past or what you've done previously, using LinkedIn?

David Saias  11:54  

It's interesting, because we are not starting off a conversation trying to sell or trying to create a relationship. And even I mean, utilizing you is one of those ways of doing it. Because I, I say, look, we're we're in different times right now, we're trying different ways to reach out and create market share. And one way of doing it is going through a marketing campaign through LinkedIn. And I'd say many times that resonates with who I'm speaking to, because typically, they're business owners, and then come back and say, you know, what, we've been trying and testing out different ways as well, we haven't had success. So we have had success with LinkedIn. So we start the conversation off that way. And then we talk about our businesses independently. And then there's some synergy, then we can get into, Hey, does it make sense at some point over the next couple of weeks to get your technology guys involved, and provide a demonstration, or maybe a follow up email that I do, because it's not appropriate to bring up at that time. But the fact that we're not, I'm not trying to overtly sell on the first reach out. I think it's taken really well by the people that we actually connect with. So versus our other email campaigns that we have going on through our CRM, which is, you know, we're praying and trying to show value, but we are overtly trying to sell and the market that we're selling to, some of them want to be blasted directly. And in want to know about new technology right away, and some of them don't. I even had one of our partners posted on LinkedIn, three or four page paragraph posting, talking about the fact that he appreciates people who are marketing through LinkedIn, but if you're going to try and sell me through that first, reach out to me, don't bother, because that's not that's not what I'm into. If you want to create a relationship and, and maybe do find out different areas of synergy, that's perfect. But don't try and sell me up front, because I'm not going to respond to that.

Brooks Van Norman  13:59  

Yeah, you've really got to develop some rapport and some trust and really go through that two step sales process you and I've talked about where you get on that initial call, connect. We're all humans behind these profiles. And if we forget that the process doesn't work, and also assess for suitability. And then if those things are in alignment, as you've said, move to the next call, where we have that demo and see how we can create value with the platform. What have you seen in terms of just efficiency and time savings using my system?

David Saias  14:36  

I think using the sequencing for LinkedIn and then passing over to two emails after that process is, is pretty easy because you just you let you let it go. And it runs on its own. I think the hardest part, the hardest part for me because we really sell into a unique target market is getting the list. That we input into LinkedIn. Right on, I think early on the filtering that I did wasn't sufficient. And we got a lot of I think over 50% of people we initially got weren't the right target, then I spent a lot more time filtering down to make sure that those are actually managed service providers were marketing to, that's starting to pay off, because we're getting a higher percentage of connections now than I did earlier on when we didn't have really a good, a good hit rate. So that part is still time consuming for us. And we're trying to figure out ways of, of making the input of the actual LinkedIn profiles that we're marketing to work targeted. But once it's in there, the process is really easy. Someone links in, we see exactly where we are. And in the email campaigns or the LinkedIn campaigns that we sell out, we send out to, we compare that to the CRM that that Brookfield provides. It's all connected to online scheduler, so everything is really connected very, very efficient from that flow perspective. You know, early on, I think the biggest part, the biggest input I've had, is making people who have actually connected with me that weren't qualified to make them disqualified in the CRM. So that that was the most manual process in the back end. But it was caused by me not being efficient in the front end of having the right target market.

Brooks Van Norman  16:30  

Yeah, it's a good point. You know, as we've discussed, LinkedIn is a great data source for finding people that you can help. And it's the point of the platform is to network and create value for each other. But unfortunately, as we've discussed, also LinkedIn, as storage and indexing is pretty bad. And so the more unique your market, like you and zaurus have, the more we have to invest time upfront to really make sure that the people we're reaching out to are good fit. And that makes a big difference on the back end. But there's also I think, a competitive advantage for you there too, because most people don't take the time to do that. They just scrape a list or create a list and then start blasting and it doesn't work because half of the people aren't a good fit. You get people who are upset because they're being pitched something that doesn't even resonate with them. So it's, it's garbage in, garbage out. Yep. Yep. That's great. Well, I really appreciate this. David, if somebody watching this interview wants to learn more about you and what you're doing with zaurus where can they find you and you guys,

David Saias  17:49  

you can reach out to us on our website. Zorustech.com Zio R Us te ch comm or reach out to me directly. I'm on LinkedIn. David Saias there's not many David Saias out there.

Brooks Van Norman  18:06  

Right. Well, David, I really appreciate this again, thanks. It's been great chatting with you once again. And thank you for joining me on this video interview.

David Saias  18:14  

Thanks, Brooks. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks for your support. Also, it's been a pleasure working with you.

Brooks Van Norman  18:19  

back at you. I've really enjoyed it and look forward to continuing your relationship.