This week's episode of Automation Unplugged we’re celebrating a big milestone—our 300th episode. To mark the occasion, I’m sitting down with returning guest, Lee Travis, Owner of Wipliance.”

About this episode:

Lee founded Wipliance in 2006, but his experience in the integration industry goes back more than 30 years. Headquartered in Bellevue, WA, Wipliance expanded to Scottsdale, AZ, in 2016, and in 2022, they grew again with the acquisition of Huppin’s Hifi, bringing their expertise to Spokane and Northern Idaho.

Over the years, Wipliance has built a strong reputation not just in audio/video and home automation but also in lighting and shading solutions—key areas driving their success. They’ve earned recognition as Integrator of the Year by the Consumer Technology Association and CES and are three-time Lutron Excellence Award winners.

For this milestone episode, Lee and I covered some great topics, including:

• How Wipliance has grown into multiple markets and the impact of lighting and shading on their success.
• How Wipliance uses video content to educate clients and strengthen industry relationships.
• Their work on the historic Taliesin West Frank Lloyd Wright home, in partnership with Lutron.

SEE ALSO: AU #299: Hiring Success in 2025: Smart Strategies to Attract Top Talent with Sam Hodz

Transcript

Ron:

Hello. Hello there. Ron Callis with another episode of Automation Unplugged and today's a big show. It's a big deal. Now, normally you don't see me here right at the beginning of the show telling you what show number, because I don't always know what show number to be completely honest, as you all know, since the summer of 2024 we've been pre-recording these shows and therefore my team, when they're doing their post production and all the magic that they do behind the scenes, they're ultimately, you know, organizing the shows to land every Wednesday. But we're now putting out interviews with integrators and industry professionals, marketing subject matter where I'm interviewing members of our team, or we're talking about marketing and, or we're repurposing different educational content. And so the team moves things around and an interview I have on a Friday could drop that next week, or maybe it drops two months later. This show is a special show because this is episode 300. So this is our centurion show, three times 100, show 300. And if you are a regular listener and follower of Automation Unplugged, keep in mind we've been doing this since April of 2017. It's one of the keys in life and business, people. It's called consistency. And we've been consistently putting this show out for all of you since April of 2017. And if you've been listening, you know who our guest was on show 100. And you know who our guest was on show 200. And if you are gonna extrapolate, you're gonna now know who our show guest for show 300 is and that is correct. That is the one and only Lee Travis of Wipliance. Let's go ahead and bring him in, drumroll please, Lee's always having fun growing his business and always loves to share with all of you. So let's check in with Lee now and see how he's doing. Lee, how was that for a buildup?

Lee:

Hey, that was a great buildup. And while I was listening to you waiting in the green room. I was like, do I take special? Like I'm special or centurion. That means I've been around for a long time. That's like black card status.

Ron:

That's like, you know, it's extra special.

Lee:

They haven't offered me that one yet, but I think probably after the show, three times centurion, I think they're going to say this guy needs a centurion card.

Ron:

I think word's going to get out and like, you're going to be walking through Costco and people are going to go: were you just on Automation Unplugged on show 300? And you're going to go, that was me. They might ask for autographs, but at least they might offer you, I don't know, a centurion Costco card, maybe a black card.

Lee:

Maybe a free hot dog.

Ron:

Maybe a free hot dog. All right. So for those that don't know you, Lee, give us a quick, maybe just quick explanation. What is Wipliance, where are you coming to us from right now? And maybe, and just a little bit of a picture of the business, cause you are a multi location business. You are growing. Help everyone understand a little bit about you and the business.

Lee:

So the location I'm in right now is in our Bellevue showroom. We have three locations, Bellevue, Scottsdale, and Spokane. So for those that don't know, Spokane is on the border of Washington and Idaho, right across that. There's a lot of growth happening in North Idaho, Coeur d'Alene and those areas. And then Scottsdale is obviously a booming market and very sunny in the winter time. So there's a lot of Northwest Midwest and Canadians that have second homes down here. There's a lot of people that have primary homes down there now. It's like the fifth largest city in the U S. So those are our three locations. My background is I started by appliance in 2006. So we're working our way towards 20 years. So definitely not a centurion in that category. I just went to my 38th consecutive consumer electronic show. So though that means I've been around for a long time, I'm not quite a centurion.

Ron:

In the age category, you have a long way to go to make it to this centurion category there.

Lee:

But I have been in the industry and related industries for a long time. I started my first company at 18 years old in 1986 after graduating high school and built the largest single store car audio operation in the U.S. and then from there I got into home stuff in the beginning of surround sound DVD and all that in the early to mid nineties and you know, from home, we expanded into all the categories that we're in today, in networking and audio, video and security and everything else. And most recently lighting fixtures. And then we have a separate electrical company here in Seattle called Obot Electric. I do not have that in the other two markets and we're having great success working with other electrical contractors, both here in Bellevue and in those other two markets. So that is not currently on my radar to expand the electrical business.

Ron:

So we recorded our first interview on show 100 back on February 6, 2020, that was, you had already had COVID, right? You got COVID back in December of 19.

Lee:

I did, December of ‘19. I had it through Christmas and New Year’s. I remember going to the doctor with like, you know, mask on and all that stuff. And they couldn't figure out what it was. And I remember seeing you at the ProSource event in Vegas in March, when it kind of all came out that, you know, COVID at least, you know, had come through, you know, Seattle is one of the first destinations and so who knows where I pick it up, but we went through lots of different antibiotics. They couldn't figure it out. And in the end, obviously, you know, everything changed in March of 2020 when people, you know, figured out that COVID was traveling around and all that. And that was a very, that was a very difficult time. I think for all of us on a personal basis, on a business basis, you know, there's just a lot of new shark infested waters to navigate.

Ron:

Yeah. I, I remember it being, you know, we talk about business or as entrepreneurs, business is terrifying and exciting.

Lee:

That was almost entirely just terrifying because it was just completely unknown. Like you just didn't know what she was going to drop the next day. People didn't know, you know, whether they could and should leave their homes. We had like it here in Washington, they shut us down. So we couldn't go, you know, work in homes and that kind of stuff. And so it was, you know, a scary time for our employees, but, you know. Is there going to be a company where we're going to be able to go back to work? There's a lot of, you know, there was a lot of fear and trepidation, as you know, as a successful business owner, those difficult times make you stronger. So you don't, you don't pray for more of those, but when you're on the back end of that and you realize that you've become, you know, wiser, faster, stronger, you know, it prepares you for whatever the next challenge is, which we may not know what that is.

Ron:

If you last long enough in business, it's generally because you've been hardened. And you've survived, you haven't always been the best. You haven't always been the fastest. You haven't always been the smartest, but you, if you survive, I think that we often are empowered just through experience to, to make more informed decisions as we continue forward. And that's just from what I call my team. And I call many purchased lessons under our belt.

Lee:

Well, they're not, they're usually not free. It is the, it's the wise man that can learn from someone else's mistake and therefore not cost him or her, anything it usually we have to pay them with our own, with our own flesh. Speaking of flesh, how's your shoulder doing?

Ron:

Man, it is a, so we're recording this here in Q1 2025. This show will, it'll be released a little bit later. So hopefully if people are starting to see me at the shows. And we One Firefly are going to be at all the shows this spring. Hopefully I'm in better working order, but as of right now, I'm just, I'm without the sling for about a week and I'm a week into physical therapy for those that don't know. I injured my shoulder, had to have pretty major surgery. A couple of, you know, do we do that on camera? Do we want to do that for posterity? All right. Yes, we're doing, I know that. There you go. All right. There we go. There we go. Look at that. That's a good one. Right.

Lee:

Oh, I, so I feel terrible because when I saw you at Lightapalooza, obviously you and I are close friends and everything else. And so, you know, I saw the sling on the lower part of your arm. So when I gave you, you know, around the shoulder hug, you know, and you grimaced. I felt terrible because then I realized it was actually, you know, in your shoulder.

Ron:

Maybe when the show goes out, you know, I'll be able to actually throw my right hand back out and give people a handshake. But right now I'm very protective of my right arm. You're getting left armed fist bumps and, or pats on the back, you know. This arm is still very sensitive and delicate, but the doctor tells me six to nine months, I'll be back to a hundred percent. So I'm learning the process of patience and persistence in my physical therapy and just the whole process of dealing with a major injury. I feel blessed that this is like one of the major injuries in my life. So it could always be worse. But it is humbling to lose, to lose a major appendage for extended period of time. It's very humbling.

Lee:

Can I ask, were you trying to bench press with Brad Larkin of Argenta?

Ron:

It's funny. I was talking to Brad several weeks ago, and then he shared his story, although he was doing something cooler. Because Brad's a gymnast. So Brad, you know, was on the rings seven feet up in the air doing dips. I don't think I could do one ring dip. And he was probably on his 800th rep or something. And he ripped his same injury, the pec. And I was not doing that. I was bench pressing and I was, you know, I'm happy to say, this is like my ego speaking, it was more than 200 pounds, 210 pounds. And it was my last rep, my one rep, like last push. And then my body said, nope, not going to happen. And it was just full. I saw stars. I blacked out. Thank God, my workout buddy, I was doing that sort of weight with a good partner and he rewrote the rate for weight for me, or it would have been a much more serious injury. If that had fallen on me and I had ice on it within the first 60 seconds, I mean, he, thankfully, he took great care of me in that time of need, but nonetheless, it's very humbling. My wife has been amazing. My son's been amazing. My team's been amazing. I managed, you know, one week post surgery to make it to Lightapalooza, which my doctor thought I was a little nuts, but I was like, I gotta go. Got to see my people. Got to see my friends in the industry. And you're a champion. Yeah, it was good.

Lee:

Back to that point earlier about longevity and outlasting, that's something that Alex Ramosi talks a lot about is that many times it's a game of outlasting, you know, downturns, outlasting competitors. And so it really is a game of longevity.

Ron:

Hey, amen. I couldn't agree more. We got together again, then in February of 2022. So it was sort of like post the fear and anxiety of COVID. And we talked again and business at that point was doing much better. I guess the initial fear of that early 2020 period had subsided and then the money started flowing. It felt like it was raining jobs.

Lee:

Do you recall that time period record breaking quarter after record breaking quarter. So now I think there's a lesson in that, that one of the things that when I'm talking to our sales team and everybody else, and you know this from making purchases and everything else, when, when people don't have the information to make a decision, they don't make a decision. And so they either kick the can down the road or they don't proceed. So when you can make it. easy and straightforward and people have good information, they can make a decision to move forward. So obviously we had went from our worst quarter when there was fear and unknown and all that stuff. And then once people were like, all right, we're going to spend a bunch more time in our homes, you know, we got to ride this out, whatever we want to invest money in our homes. And people had that confidence. So I think, you know, both confidence and people having enough information to make a decision. Otherwise they go back to the well, and they're like, I got to do a whole bunch more research. And they either go in a different direction or it slows the thing down. And so that's, that's one of the things that I try to teach our team is when people have good information in front of them, they can proceed to a decision.

Ron:

I completely agree. This is a little random, Katie, you work with Katie here at One Firefly.

Lee:

I love Katie.

Ron:

And Katie wanted me to ask you on air. Oh, to tell us about your Mario Kart experience in Japan.

Lee:

OK.

Ron:

So I don't know anything about this Mario Kart experience. I don't know exactly when you were in Japan. So what is that about?

Lee:

So I'm going to answer that in a second. But about Katie. As your team has had success and grown, we have grown with you all the way along. So as we've added locations and you guys have taken care of our, our marketing and our websites and all that other stuff. And so you get really attached to a certain person, right? So like Jordan was our guy. And when you were like, hey, I've, you know, we're growing and I've got this role I'm moving him up to. And I've got this person, Katie. You know, once again, fear of unknown, you know, I, and Melissa and my team were like, no, no, no, no, and then, and then, you know, once we got a chance to meet her and get to know her, and we're like, holy cow, this gal is like sharp and on it and organized and focused like Melissa on my team is, and so they gel super well together. But it's also great because like I just had a meeting with, you know, where Jordan was there as well. And so he's still tied to, you know, some of the other parts of our accounts. So we still have SEO stuff.

Ron:

So Katie's your AM, the role Jordan used to have, but Jordan then is running the SEO crew and they, they then collaborate still on driving your marketing forward.

Lee:

Yeah. And part of our culture is building people, right? It's to delight clients, to build people, and to give back. And, and, you know, we, we were through going through EOS and Traction, you know, we were forced to sit down and say, what's important to us, and what are we about, and what are all these things? I know you guys do Traction and EOS as well. I know those things are really important to you. And growing your people internally, to me, that's one of the real rewarding aspects of building these companies and people like, well, why do you add locations and do those things? You know, why is it I'll do that because you have to grow the company to grow your people. Otherwise, there's nowhere for them to grow to. And if they have the capability to want to grow, they're going to have to go somewhere else.

Ron:

They move on.

Lee:

And so we have people that have been with us for, you know. Melissa, my team, I just referenced that, you know, a decade, we've got lots of people in the 20 to 23 year category that followed me from another, you know, three state company that I built. And so, you know, they'll stay with you if you'll provide a career path and a plan for them to grow into, and people want to grow at different levels, like not every technician or salesperson or, you know, admin and marketing, they don't all want to, or have the ability to grow at 50 percent a year or 20 percent a year. Some of them are going to be on a slow trajectory. And so a good leader like yourself figures that out. Figures out, you know, what's the right seat on the bus, what's their role? And I just, I think that's, even though we were afraid to, to make that transition, it just shows now we're even in a better place because now we have Katie who's incredible at what she does, but we still have Jordan hyper focused on the stuff he is as opposed to one person trying to do all of that.

Ron:

I appreciate that. And I appreciate those kind words about both Katie and Jordan. And I know they'll listen to this and they'll, I'm sure they'll glow when they hear the praise and the, and they would, they would put that back on you, but more importantly, they would put it on Melissa. Cause Melissa is a great member of your team that represents your business well, and is a great liaison for all things marketing and your business. And that when that communication, I'll just say with any partner, you know, let's say that you're, you're going to, you could have a prewire partner in a marketplace as an integrator that you're maybe collaborating with their security partner that you're collaborating with, or in our case of marketing, you know, we're a marketing agency. The only thing that one of the keys to that successful relationship is communication. The bilateral nature of that communication, like we need to be great at communicating, but then you also have a job where you got to communicate back to us and tell us what's working and not working. And that is not always understood and it's not always practiced. But I think the nature of the relationship between your team and our team, you know, we've had our ups and downs. We've had our bumps. Everything is not smooth sailing, but what makes it possible is great communication. And I just want to give Melissa a shout out and of course, Lee, you're a great communicator, but Melissa is your, I know she's probably there around you somewhere in the office and she's just, she makes that thing really, really sing. I did want to give you an example. I was talking this week, I won't mention names. I was talking to an integrator, two and a half million dollar a year integrator has been at it for 20 years and never been able to grow past 2 million, two and a half million dollars in revenue. That's their peak in revenue ever. And when he was telling me about his, and he was giving me an explanation, he's going to become a 20 million business revenue business, that's the goal. And he's going to be in six states. And I was like, awesome. Awesome. So talk to me about who’s on your team, your leadership team. Who do you collaborate with? Who do you lean on to run different departments? And the quick answer there is, he was devoid of answers. He's like, well, what do you mean? I know this and I know that. And I immediately identified a good person, but some dysfunction in the operational management of that business. At least that was my observation. That business I felt would be capped in their ability to grow if they couldn't bring on people and properly delegate. You have successfully grown the company. Could you maybe just take us through a little bit of that journey of growth and how you think about people enabling you, your ability to do that?

Lee:

Absolutely. And then I haven't forgotten about Katie. I'm gonna come back and tell the Mario Kart story.

Ron:

Alright, we're gonna get the Mario Kart story.

Lee:

So, Melissa is a fantastic part of our team. Like I said, you know, has grown within the company over the decade and so her and other team members are the people that allow us to grow. Like you have to scale leadership. We just got back from our first official two day leadership offsite. We wish it had been three because we had so much to get through, an incredible schedule offsite. We all stayed in the hotel, and that's just kind of, part of we're always trying to figure out, how do we grow and just having that two days together to talk about, you know, where we've been and where we're going and, you know, push on things. And sometimes there's boxing gloves out, and sometimes there's tears, and sometimes there's no boxing gloves at all. Does it, you know, if you're gonna grow, you gotta get transparent. And, you know, as you know, Traction and EOS is about, you know, identifying the people, and are they in the right seat on the bus, and what would be the right seat. You know, it's not for, you know, the same seats aren't for everybody. Even as the company grows in size. People might have to change seats or roles.

Ron:

Or sometimes you have the right people, but you don't have a seat on the bus for those right people. And that's a hard, I mean, that's just, there's lots of scenarios there, but I love that you're, you guys are practicing Traction. That music to my ears. That's amazing.

Lee:

But the other part is accountability. And so when you're holding, you know, we've got six people on our leadership team, and when you're holding those other leaders accountable. You know, and if everybody is going to be open and honest, which you need to be to grow in any relationship or business, I think it was really powerful. Melissa is fantastic and, you know, wears multiple hats in our organization, including being on the leadership team. And is behind a lot of our marketing efforts and that kind of stuff. And I have a feeling she's not too far away.

Ron:

She might, she might be over there somewhere.

Lee:

Yeah. She's, cause you know, she makes all this stuff happen. And so having those great people on your team is how you're going to grow. It's one thing to talk about. Hey, we want to get to X. All right. What's your plan? And you're not going to be able to do everything in a 20 person organization, 50 person organization, a hundred person, or, you know, who else is going to take on those roles that you can no longer be an owner doing everything. Back when we were two and a half billion, I could touch every client, every transaction. It's part of it when you're at grow and scale beyond that, you can't touch everything. Now you need your leaders building other leaders and you need to scale that leadership in your organization.

Ron:

How did you like, just for you, how did you get past what for many is that ceiling? Of being okay with delegating others that probably wouldn't do it as good as you or wouldn't do it the way you would do it? That's a very hard, humbling process. I would say it was for me and it's, maybe it still is. In some circumstances I've gotten better at it, but it's very hard. How was that for you?

Lee:

It was very difficult and we've had many ceilings and I think they were, I think they were a million. I think they were two and a half million. I think it was four million. I think it was seven and a half or something like that. I think it was at 10 so there's not a ceiling and it's like someone's personal development. You're going to break through multiple ceilings. And as we're coaching our team and they're pushed outside of their comfort zone, which is the only place that growth happens, they're uncomfortable out there. But that discomfort becomes the new comfort over your whole life. You've done things you're uncomfortable to do. And then after a period of time, that was now within your comfort range. So then you have to push outside the comfort range and bring that in. And so for me, learning to let go, because that's always your answer, right? No one's going to close as many sales as I am. No one's going to close as much, you know, the same, you know, high closing rate, it's not going to happen. And, and you're right. It's not going to happen. You're going to have people on your team that are going to close 50 or 60%. They're not going to be you, the owner, who has all their money on the line that has all the experience that can close 80 or 90 percent of the customers, you know, so you just have to come to grips with that. And this is all before the movie Frozen came out where, you know, we sing along and we learn how to let go, right? This is all before that. I love having a daughter. I've seen all those, I've seen all those movies, but it's, and they're not going to do it as good as you are. And you're going to find mistakes and that's the reality of it. And you basically just try to find, and they're never going to care about it as much as you are because they don't own it. Yeah. And so you have to find the best people you can that care as much like they have a stake in it as you do. You obviously have to compensate them properly. You have to reward them properly. You have to treat them properly and you have to find a path for them to grow. And as long as they can grow and flourish in the industry and in income, and, and it's a combination of trying to find like, one of the things that I always teach is you kind of have these three things. Like, what are you good at? What do you want to do? And what pays? And if you're sitting at a restaurant, you had brown coasters, your goal would be to get those coasters to overlap as much as possible. Cause you'd want to do as much as, as much as you can, that you want to do. Right? But I mean, I love watching football, but I mean, they're not inviting me down in the field to play. And there's a lot of money there, but, like, I'm not qualified, that's never gonna happen for me. So it doesn't matter how much I like it or how much money's there, if I'm not good at it, it's not gonna work. And so you just try to find the strength of your people, you try to find their right seat on the bus. And sometimes I go back to Melissa, when she was being hired, you know, Tanya, who 23 years, she was like, H that person that you want know, window treatments, you know, I think you. So I came into an interview and I'm like, hey, I know you're applying for this job, but what do you think about this other job? She turned me down. She said no. Now today, she will tell you that she moved all across the country to come up here to Seattle and she wanted to work within a job that she was comfortable in. And so she would tell you that she learned more about our organization being in an admin position. How does the billing work? How does the scheduling work? How do all these things work? And, you know, she was showing some of the marketing stuff that she could do. So she would start to kind of do some projects. And it took me, you know, a couple of years of like, you ready yet? You ready yet? You ready yet? And then finally she made that cause she'd already had a whole bunch of change going on in her life. And so. Today, even though I make fun of her for that, for turning me down for a job, she accepted the other job and she did learn all those aspects and those make her better in her job today. And so these people that you hire, their seat on the bus could change as their skills and talents. And there were many times that I pushed her out of her comfort zone. It still happens a decade later. And as she grows, that becomes the new comfort zone.

Ron:

Love it. Mario Kart.

Lee:

Mario Kart for Katie. Sony invited me back to Japan. It's been on my top list for a long time. It was a three day set of business meetings. I'm like, I'm not going to go to someone who's been the top of my bucket list and only go for three days. So turn it into a 10 day trip, Osaka, Kyoto. And then obviously, you know, Tokyo for the largest part of it, both with our meetings with Sony. So they have these Go Karts that you can drive through the streets. You have to get an international driver's license, which you can go to AAA offices to get these things. It's about 30 bucks. They take your picture. It's like a passport. And you need these to drive in certain countries that don't allow you to use a U.S. driver's license.

Ron:

In Japan, do you drive on the right side of the road? Like in the U.S.?

Lee:

Yes.

Ron:

So that at least made it a little easier?

Lee:

It made it a little bit easier, but you're in a Go Kart, and so when you hit a pothole in a Go Kart, or you have cars in front of, behind you that are full size, and you're in a Go Kart.

Ron:

All right. So let's just back up. So how did you land in a Go Kart? Like you went from getting a driver's license to I'm driving in a Go Kart.

Lee:

Like so we had set up to go do this go karting. One of the requirements is you have to get one of these international driver's licenses.

Ron:

Okay.

Lee:

Got that before we left the States. Got over there. So you have to, you know, show them that documentation that you have a license to drive on the roads in Japan. And you would need this for India and lots of other countries. In Europe, you can drive with a U.S. driver's license, no problem. So that's part of it. When you go to these Go Karts and you, you sign your release that like, you know, if you die on the road, that's all on you or something happens. Once you've got past that, they run you through a little bit of training of, you know, the gas, the brakes, how it works, we're all going to drive in a straight line where I'm going to signal when we're going to turn, we are going to take stop and take some photos of you at stoplights, the people that are in the front of the pack are going to rotate to the back of the pack, so everybody has a chance to be in the front, the middle, and the back, and oh, by the way, if you'd like to wear a costume, hence the Mario Kart part, we have this entire wardrobe selection where you can wear Mario Kart costumes, Star Wars costumes, any number of costumes. It can't obviously block your vision, but you know, full hats, full costumes, there was even like now.

Ron:

Who did you pick? Were you Mario?

Lee:

I was a Star Wars figure,but there were some, these are like big onesies that you're wearing. So you're getting inside these things and they, you know, they spray disinfectant in them and all that kind of stuff. And then obviously, because you're wrapped up in all this over your clothes, you're sweating a little bit more than you normally would.

Ron:

It sounds like a sweaty mess. But the pictures are awesome.

Lee:

When people, cars see you on the road, they honk, it's hilarious. And so, you know, they have a, you know, you basically go out for, you know, an hour driving in the streets, seeing a bunch of sites you're driving right through the middle of, right through the middle of Tokyo, you got cars and stuff all around you, but when you're sitting, you know, 10 inches off the ground and you're next to a vehicle, even though a lot of vehicles are smaller, you kind of feel like an ant in that scenario, but you're out on the streets and you're seeing all these things and, and you know, you're, people are looking and pointing at you. And so it was, I would 100 percent recommend it. And I would 100 percent recommend the costumes because like, like that's half the fun of it.

Ron:

That's how, and this is, you were there for Sony. So was this a bunch of other, you know, integrator types or retailers that were out there doing this?

Lee:

No, we did that on our own. Sony did some great bonding events. As you know, you do those with your team. That's really good. So to get the integrators and the Sony people together, we went to the, we went to the, the fish market, right? Where you're, you know, the tuna market where they basically bring the tuna in and they auction them off. It's an incredible experience where people have had, you know, these tuna licenses for years. So the fishermen have them, the people that can auction and buy the fish. And then literally you can watch as, I mean, some of that stays in Japan, but literally it's getting cut up and packed and ready to ship to countries all over the world that same day, that stuff being loaded up on jets. So when you have, you know, fresh tuna from Japan all over the world, It's, you know, it was probably, you know, caught two days before it was probably packaged up a day before it came in on a plane yesterday. And it goes to some of the best sushi restaurants all over the world.

Ron:

At Sony, were you seeing a preview? What was the timing? Were you seeing previews of 2025 stuff?

Lee:

Yes. And, and farther out than that.

Ron:

Anything you're allowed to say, anything that was particularly cool. Were you under NDA?

Lee:

Yeah.

Ron:

Boo. Are you excited?

Lee:

I'm very excited. And when you realize, well, so back to the events, we did this whole drum lessons. We, you know, we went to a bunch of shrines, so that was a great event. I mean, we had kind of like most of these events. We have a couple of days of you know, serious business meetings and we weren't just seeing their stuff, but they want input from integrators like, you know, what's your feedback on this? What should we be building? And so you go through a lot of that stuff and then they open up the kimono would be the proper term in Japan and let you see not only what's in our category, but you got to remember they have movie picture studios, they have gaming divisions. And some of the crossover between these things, because Sony story is lens to living room. They're showing us the video cameras that record the stuff that then gets produced in there and other studios that then gets, you know, transmitted that we watch on Sony TVs. That's the whole lens, the living room thing, but with their gaming and movie divisions, but things I realized, Sony, Sony is a huge financial services company. That's a bigger part of their business.

Ron:

In what way? How does that work?

Lee:

You know, investments, insurance, all these kinds of other, like, I would never think of Sony as that, you know, as that's like a part of their business. So many of these companies own all these other things. But the products and getting to see like the product history walls that go back, you know, it's kind of like going to the museum history at CES where you can see the first, you know, the, the products of the year and feature products all the way back to the, you know, the current stuff that's getting technology awards. So it's, it's incredible the stuff that they're doing. I mean, there's some really, really neat stuff coming.

Ron:

All right. I want to pull a couple more threads here in our time together. Lee, I'm going to share the screen so the audience can see what I am seeing. And if you are listening to the podcast, we'll try to use good visual descriptions, but I'm on the Wipliance website. And that is, W I P L I A N C E. com. And I'm gonna go over to galleries in the main menu. I'm gonna go down to case studies and I'm gonna click on Taliesin West. And this is just a really cool project. You have it featured on your website and case study format. There's a video here as well. Tell us, Lee, about this. I know you're proud of it. I know you and Melissa and team worked hard on this. Lutron collaborated with you on this. And probably other manufacturers as well. Tell us what this is.

Lee:

Excuse me. So Taliesin West is a Frank Lloyd Wright's property in Arizona. It's one of 25 UNESCO world heritage sites. So that tells you how important it is. On the list of other world heritage sites are Mount Rushmore, the Statue of Liberty. The Empire State building to give you an example of what company this keeps when he built out his winter home in Arizona, it was a space that they brought in architects to not only design it, but literally with their hands build it out. And so, along with Lutron, we all, you know, came into this project and they wanted to update the lighting in this. Some of these fixtures were handcrafted fixtures, originally built. You'll see some of those that got in that next slide you're getting to. So we had to be very careful, very delicate. Everything has to stay as it was. You can't retrofit any wires or anything. Even if you could, the walls are two and three feet thick made out of stone, which basically keep the property cool in the summer and keep it and his use of natural light. Frank in the U.S. worldwide, he's in the top five usually. And so that shows you his impact on,you know, on our history of architecture, but natural lighting and the use of lighting was so important to him. And so if anyone goes and watches these videos, any other dealers that are Lutron or Ketra dealers should definitely share these. We have taken architects and designers there, so has Lutron. Any builder, architect, interior designer is going to know what this property is, who Frank Lloyd Wright is, and so we basically retrofit human centric lighting and shades without running a single wire and did all that wireless communication through those two and three feet thick walls, which anyone who deals with wireless knows that is not an easy task. So it's basically all Ketra lighting, all Palladium shades, and the video talks about, and has people from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, the work that we did in there, how careful we had to be, the precision of it. You're vetted very tightly to, you know, not anyone can put their hands on a project like that.

Ron:

There's gotta be people that are tuned in. They're leaning forward and they're going, how in the world did Lee secure this project? Like what, like this doesn't just happen.

Lee:

So there were some common relationships between us and Lutron and they wanted to update the lighting. Lutron obviously doesn't have installation teams, whatever, that's all done through dealers. And so basically these common points came together. And many times you'll find that in a job. Like if you know, the architect and the builder and interior designer, and they have a client and they all kind of point towards you, they're like, oh, these are the guys that we should use. That's really where you want to sit in the marketplace. So, you know, when it came to this project, you know, it, you know, three fingers all kind of pointed in the same direction and they're like, hey, would you like to do this? This project, it's very unique. It's very delicate. I think that they knew that we would, you know, understand the marketing benefit of being associated with such a high quality project. And that's how we got involved in it.

Ron:

I'm curious as securing a project like this, I mean, and obviously the PR and publicity tied to this as this helped fortify your relationship with, you know, architects and designers and help spin up more opportunities for you guys.

Lee:

I mean, certainly it's an attention getter, it's a flex, but it's not just for us. Other friends of mine and other dealers are able to use this. You know, we have our own videos of it. Lutron has their own videos of it. You know, we're hosting events and stuff there. So certainly. The fact that we have done it, but I think it says a lot for Lutron and Ketra, you know, Frank Lloyd Wright could work with whoever they want. It's such a prestigious project to be part of, right. And Lutron was 100 percent the right solution for it. Lutron is a great partner vendor of ours , you know, you used to work there, you know how good of company that they are. And I think, you know, our team is, you know, is very good at doing stuff like this. It's just a very, very delicate project.

Ron:

I'm curious, is the home configured such that like the tunable aspect of the light is dialed in. So the, the white is the white of the sun based on the time of day.

Lee:

Correct. And that's one of many things that you can do. That's obviously the easiest one to use. Lutron calls that natural show where you can basically just have the inside lighting. Follow the sun circadian rhythm and with as many windows as there are on the outside, and just like in today's newer homes where you have more, more glazing, more glass on the, on the property, you can really tell the difference between the inside light and the outside light. And so it basically makes the light that's on the inside, even there, as you can see, you know, the shades going up and that kind of stuff, that the light is now matching what's outside, whatever time of day, but you can also make it whatever color you want at whatever time of day. So if it's in someone's home and they work a graveyard shift and they want to wake up as we're all going to bed and they want to relax as we're all waking up. That's beautiful. And in our video, you know, we show what its color capabilities are, and that can be fun for they host a lot of charity events. There are a lot of corporate events there. So you could, you can theme it out for whatever those events are. But sometimes people are like, hh, that's a sin to have colored lighting in Taliesin West to get the perfect white, like an artist mixing paints. You have to mix color to get the range that Lutron Ketra provides from, you know, 1400 Kelvin to 10,000 gallon. And so the color is just kind of an added benefit that you get when they're hosting a charity event or corporate event. You can have some corporate colors from pops wherever they want it. It's just an extra benefit.

Ron:

Love it. I'm going to switch gears now too. And I'm jumping over to YouTube. You have almost 2,500 people following your YouTube channel, which is probably one of the more liked or followed YouTube channels in the custom integration space. And you are, you guys are regularly putting out new video content. And it's really is impressive if you're watching or listening. I'm just complimenting Wipliance. Their videos are beautiful. Maybe I'll put one of the videos up here at least for sharing. And if you maybe could speak to us. Just about your opinion, like where are you with video production? How do you think about it? Since I met you many years ago, it was top of mind for you. Then it has through consistency, and practice you, you and Melissa and team have continued to put out. I think some of the more beautiful marketing videos, educational videos in our industry. How do you think about it today here in 2025?

Lee:

If we look at the history, we go back to the beginning. If you go on our YouTube channel and you were to go back to our earliest videos, all you would see, which was cool at the time is you'll see, you know, pans of cool audio, video, and other stuff mixed to music. Right. I think that was like the entry point. And we thought we were being cool and with that. And then we were like, well, we need to do better storytelling. And the way to do that is to get on camera and Lee, we want you to be on camera, you know, as the front man to do that. And so that's like one of those lessons of getting out of your comfort zone because when I see myself on film, probably like other people, when they hear their voice on your show, or you see yourself on camera or film, you're like.

Ron:

Don't make me listen to that.

Lee:

Yeah. There's too many ums or ahs, or, you know, we realized that, you, and I'm being intent on something and Melissa was the one that pointed this out that I have resting bitch face. And so it was basically like it was, it was a constant change in evolution of me having to get outside my comfort zone to, you know, how do we do this better? And so we wanted to be. You know, the saying that, you know, a picture is worth, you know, 100 words, then video’s worth thousands of words or millions of words, because it's the best way that you can tell stories is through video. And now that we're on screen telling stories with each video that we do, we're like, what's the angle here? What are people interested in? What do people want to learn? How do they want to be? There's, you know, there's a, in some of these videos, there's like a running dad joke. Like we always end up with one here in the company. I call them boss jokes. That's just the boss version of a dad joke. Like, you know, whenever someone says they have time off, I'm always like, who approved that? And it's like the oldest dad joke in our company. So, you know, there's some of the, we always make sure, you know, when we're filming, we're like, all right, what's the dad joke going to be? And it just, it ends up happening at some point along the way, it's never staged. And we're like, that's the one. And so, you know, we're constantly trying to evolve in terms of, you know, cameras in, microphones in, you know, how we do the storytelling and what the background and B roll is. How do we edit these things better? And how do we, you know, how do we be good storytellers and make content that our clients want to see that builders, architects, interior designers want to see? And how do we improve that? So we constantly, you know, sit down and when we, you know, where do we want to go film this year, you know, what's unique about this project, what's the storytelling angle, you know, how, how are we going to do that? That's kind of how all of that evolves. I get asked a lot of this at shows like, hey, tell me about your videos. What does that go? You know, what's that like? And when I tell them, oh, last year we spent about four weeks filming, you know, and then you obviously have editing time and you have all these things. I just see integrators glaze over and they're like, not only do I not want to be on camera, but that's, that's more time than I vacation in a year. It sounds like a lot of work. That sounds like a lot of work. It sounds like a lot of expense. And the short answer is it is, it's no different than physical fitness or anything else. There is no shortcut. There is no, there is no magic pill. You have to, you know, do these projects. You got to get signed up for video releases. You know, this from the videos that you guys do, you have to, you know, figure out when you can get in there, film the project to reduce your costs. You're going to try to film multiple projects in the same city at the same time so that we can, you know, reduce the cost per video, so to speak, and the editing and all those things we can do, you know, remotely, and we work on that throughout the year, just like how you're recording this episode 300 and going to release it in the near future. You used to, you know, do these things live and then you're like, all right, we need to, you know, record these and then kind of link them out. And that's how a lot of podcasters do that. They don't, you know, they're not recording, you know, 12 months out of 12. They do it in waves where they can get set up in the studio, they can have it all ready to go and they can, you know, stack these things back and release this content. For us to scale our video production, we kind of have to do the same thing

Ron:

In this video. This is for those that are jumping onto your YouTube channel and they're checking it out up where we're looking at, on video here, the phase X DMF video that you produced. I'm seeing a showroom. Is this the DMF showroom? Is this, I see the DMF logo. So I'm assuming that's yes, but I also saw just a moment ago. I'll click back. A Wipliance logo on the wall. What, what showrooms are we seeing here in case people go, man, those places are beautiful.

Lee:

So the one that's on your screen now is our brand new Spokane showroom. It's a 9,000 square foot space. It's, you know, got an outdoor area, that kitchen, that family room you're seeing. It's got listening rooms and theaters that are, that are coming. All of our operations, our lab. You know, our Ketra certified showroom is there. And then you'll see video in here where that we filmed in California at DMF headquarters. And so all of this is filmed at those two locations. Actually there's a little bit of content from our show home in Arizona, that's mixed in. And you'll see that kind of in other videos, but once again, to scale this, when DMF asked us to, you know, be involved with them for this product release, kind of like being the centurion on your show. They asked us to do the video for their IX video release, when they released that, that product. And so now this is a product and they've asked us to kind of come in and, and do the storytelling from an integrator's perspective. They have content that they have that's, you know, consumer focused and such. And so like right now, what you're seeing is a bunch of their awards at their headquarters. You know, Rushi, who's their VP of engineering. And so we're just trying to interview different people and tell the best story we can about, in this case, a product or in other cases, projects. And we'd had that product, you know, under NDA and, and had it set up in our Spokane showroom and tested it for a couple of months before we filmed the video and stuff of it. So for some of these vendors, we're a little bit of a beta house and some of these vendors are, you know, see the video content that we're producing and we're doing, you know, multiple states and multiple shoots. So when we're flying down to California, if we can hit a couple different vendors and help, you know, reduce what those costs are, same thing as we do. You know, if we film in Arizona, we're going to try to film it in two or three or four locations.

Ron:

I love it. Lee, we're shooting this show 300. What do you want for it to be true for you personally? And for clients, when we shoot show 400?

Lee:

That is a great question. After just coming out fresh out of our leadership offsite that we just had, I think to, you know, we have obviously revenue targets, you know, that we planned out and that's, you know, kind of what any company does, but we spent a lot of time talking about who the future leaders are in our organization, how to build the people in our organizations. What does that training map look like? And so obviously. From a capitalist or business owner perspective, your goal is to grow revenue and grow profit. That to me, that just seems like, you know, the obvious part of that, but to continue to not only get out of my comfort zone as a leader and in these meetings, I'm vulnerable. Like they can tell me anything they want to tell me. And they do when you give your people permission at first. They're not sure how much to use their, so they kind of test the water. Can I say this kind of stuff to him or not? And then, you know, you know, that's how you become better is, you need coaches. And when you're the visionary and you're the company owner, many times people feel like they can't give you feedback. It all goes downstream. And I want to hear that. I want to hear, you know, what I can do better and, and areas that we can improve. And sometimes it's painful to peel that bandaid off and see what that looks like underneath there. But that's the only way you're really going to address it. So, obviously we have some great, you know, revenue and target growths. We, you know, in the marketing front, we have some great, you know, video and marketing things, both that we're doing with you and the filming content and stuff that we're doing. We're, we're trying to look and see, you know, how is AI going to affect our business. I mean, it's going to affect our business, but how is it going to affect our business? And, you know, though I'm not a centurion in years, I've been around long enough to see different technologies come and go. This one's not going to go. And so, it's to me, it's both exciting and scary at the same time, which is usually how most new things are. And so how do we, how do we capitalize on it, but not lose our human elements. And then how do we make sure that we don't put ourselves at risk at the same time? And I know it's something you study a lot about. I mean, for those that don't know Ron and I are friends and many times we'll have casual meetings there on a Friday evening or something much later for Ron on the East coast. It is for me on the West coast, have a glass of wine and we'll talk crypto or AI or all these things. And you are someone who's very learned in all, you know, you digest a lot of content, whether that be books or podcasts, whatever. And so I love intellectual conversation. I love intellectual stimulation. So talking to other people that are passionate about things that have to me. That's something. Push back dementia and Alzheimer's and all these other things. I heard this analogy that that growing old is the constant pursuit of comfort.

Ron:

Yes,

Lee:

Well, I think that's where people get in a trap. So I'm in constant, you know, constantly going after discomfort.

Ron:

I'm curious. Did you ever buy a Bitcoin? Did you ever? Did you ever buy any of that stuff? We've been talking for probably close to I don't know, six, seven years on that stuff. Did you ever buy anything?

Lee:

Probably since your first episode. I have not because I don't feel like I've gone and learned enough to be knowledgeable. And then when I see it going through the roof, I feel like, oh, I'm going to be buying it at the high time. So I'm going to kind of wait for it to go a little bit lower. And it just, it needs a bunch of other research. And I think within my comfort zone is stocks and indexes and stuff that I buy, because I think I understand the businesses and the finances. It's better than I do the cryptocurrency and how that fits into our future. I know, you know, you're not, I know you're all in it on it mentally, but I know there's only, you know, we've talked about.

Ron:

I'm conservative. I mean, my conservatism has done me well, but, I'm not, you know, one of those mortgage my house and go all in. No way. Yeah. Sometimes even conservative can be fun. I actually would close out on this question. In 2022, when we did that interview, you predicted for those that want to listen to that, it's again, up on our website, or you can, you know, listen to it on the podcast app on your phone or in your favorite platform, but you predicted that lighting would become the biggest growth opportunity for the CI channel. How has that played out? We're three years later, you made that bold prediction. Is that come true for you? And has it come true for the industry? What's your version, you know, on take on that now?

Lee:

Yes. To both of those. Yes. To both us and the industry. If you, in that video you saw of our Spokane showroom, you can see, we went all in on lighting. And so it is every bit as much a lighting showroom as it is audio, video, and all the other categories of business that we're in. I'm on the ProSource lighting and shading committee. And so we are driving those initiatives forward, you know, for the entire ProSource group. And you know, what I will tell you is that. Like we talked about with changing it up. So your comfort zone for all of our team, because they don't come from lighting, it's uncomfortable. And there are mistakes that happen that you're going to make, and there's going to be learning along the way. And that can be painful. But I remember when we went through that 20 years ago or whatever it was in shades, I remember throwing shades in the garbage can because they were mismeasured, something wasn't right. I mean, it was, you, you make some learning mistakes that we don't make today. So it is the largest growing category in all three of our locations. It is the largest growing category in a ProSource. Like, you know, there's things like audio and stuff where some, some vendors are up, but most of them are down as a whole. And so we also find that being involved in lighting gets us earlier into the conversation with the builder and architect and we're, it's very sticky. So, because we're involved now in the lighting and the audio and all that stuff, it's going to be very hard to displace us off the project. And many contractors want, you know, one throat to choke or one person to point at or whatever. You know, term you want to use that we, you know, we're going to own all that and make sure that the lighting and the lighting controls and all the dimming is 100 percent compatible. If they provide the lighting, we can't guarantee that. And so a lot of it is education with builders, architects, interior designers. Our vendors are very helpful and supportive in helping us grow in those spaces. And at Lightapalooza, you can see how much that show has grown in the last few years. I mean, it went from a couple of hundred people to 700 people to 1,200, 1,500.

Ron:

Yeah. It went from like, I don't know the initial number, call it two to 400 to 700 to 1,200 to 1,500.

Lee:

Yeah. I thought 1,600 in this one. I know the original one was 200 and something, so that's massive, massive growth and exponential growth in four years. And it's all those integrator channel focused.

Ron:

For those that are, they want to meet you. They want to get in touch with you. They want to follow you where, where can we send people to learn more about Wipliance and, or get in touch with you directly?

Lee:

So wipliance.com, W I P L I A N C E. com. You can find us on Instagram and Facebook. There as well. You can find me on Instagram or Facebook as Lee Travis. I have not, due to the distraction factor, I have not done the TikTok or that kind of stuff yet. So we have a TikTok as a company, but you won't find me there yet. Cause I'm already distracted.

Ron:

I'm not there yet either. I'm waiting to figure out what this China band thing's going to happen. And then I'll figure it out. But yeah.

Lee:

To me, I'm just more, there's distraction. You know, doom scrolling and all that stuff. And because I'm so into video and everything else we're doing, like, I love to see all that content and I love all, like all the workout content. So I'm like, next thing, you know, I've spent an hour in there and I'm like, I can't, and I've heard TikTok’s even more addicting. So I've just. I've kept the pause button on that. I've got a question for you. As you look down the road, by the time we do episode 400, I know you and I all the time talk about marketing and trends and all these things. What are you excited about? What would you predict that we can talk about? In episode 400, should you invite us back? That, you know, that we could look back and say, you know, what has come to pass?

Ron:

I think because AI has caused a lot of instability or chaos in the world of search, I think it's harder to get found in search. So for those that are doubling down and doing it right. I think there'll be the winners, but I think a lot of people will be losers. And I think the importance of getting your business and brand to show up in generative search will have proven over the next 24 months, incredibly important as people are using these LLMs and AI to do research. Like let's say for their, whether it's, for the technologies to put in their home or the vendors, even to do that work, I just think more and more research will happen in the world of AI. I think what's really interesting is, you know, I go back to the beginning of when One Firefly social media was the fad, it was all new and then, you know, 2016, maybe with Cambridge Analytica and all the chaos that erupted with that presidential election, social media started to become less popular or at least unfavorable for certain reasons. I think with this change in marketing, social media is actually going to be back on the rise. In terms of its importance and relevance to business and people that are online to learn about businesses. I didn't see that coming, but I can say now through a lot of the information I've gathered, that that seems directionally true, at least at the moment. And I think, the importance of unique and original content, whether through imagery and video, I think in this world of just copy and paste AI garbage, that is everywhere. AI is amazing. And it also produces garbage. And so therefore, if you have original content, that's truly unique to your brand identity, I think that's really going to be necessary, not only for the consumer, the people that are researching you, but also for all the bots and robots and crawlers that are trying to distinguish you and do that research because it's, we're not. It's not too far in the future that it may not be just humans that are crawling sites. It may not just be Google spiders that are crawling sites, but you're going to have AI agents crawling sites and the AI agents are going to be crawling your site, doing the research. And if your content on your website is me too, or copy paste, you won't be differentiated. I just don't think it'll bode well for you. But if the content on your entirety of your brand is unique, And true to your identity and differentiated. I think those businesses that, that focus on that, understand that they're going to rise to the surface. And they'll rise to the top and they'll be the, the bigger winners in the coming years.

Lee:

Well, and I like, you know, with you guys doing our marketing, I like that you're, you know, as much as you're digesting, you know, I sat through your AI symposium, which I, you know, took a bunch of notes and learned from. And I'm, you know, trying to learn it out. Obviously there's a lot of, you know, leaders and people in my organization that are, you know, deeper down that trail than I am. And so. I think like any other trend, it's both exciting and scary at the same time.

Ron:

Oh, it's terrifying. I'm drinking from a fire hose, the AI, the technology revolution that's happening. It's one of the bigger technology revolutions in the human, you know, in human history. And it's for someone like me that totally like I'm growth minded. I love to learn. I listen to podcasts every day. I am that nerd. It's fantastically overwhelming. And so I've started, we talked earlier about delegating. I've started to bring on and enlist more members of my team. We just brought on a director of product innovation, you know technology as a whole, automation as a whole, and I'm thinking like technology automation process flow automation within companies. I mean, we're not a big company, but we're bigger. We now have 85 people on staff. So there's just a lot of moving parts. And then, you know, AI is like a sliver of that. It's probably going to continue to grow in terms of its role and function in our lives. It's just, it can't be run like I love it and I'm in it, but it's got to be the organizational, the, you know, the institutional knowledge, the, the methods and the way that the company thinks about problems and solves problems. You know, I've told my team, I want to be a contributor. Please invite me to the conversation. Let me contribute. Let me weigh in. But it can't be that I have the answers because it's just, it, that's it. That goes back. That's a dysfunctional business.

Lee:

You can't scale it. It can't scale it. You asked me about lighting. What do you see? I got a couple of questions for you. What, what do you see? Has the, what either are, or do you predict are the fastest growing parts of your business?

Ron:

Oh my goodness, the fastest growing parts. I can tell you the fastest growing part of my business over the last year has been our SEO business. We built out a true proper search engine optimization business unit that I put against any of the best SEOs in North America. I mean, we truly, although we've been in business 17 years. The capability we now have to help a business dominate page one of search. So not just the ad position, but the organic positioning, the zero click positioning, the generative search positioning and AI. We're more robust and powerful than we've ever been. And we continue, I mean, , I'll just say we're in Q1 of Jan of 2025. We're hitting our best recurring, meaning you, my audience signing up for recurring services with us, best rate of recurring services in company history. And so it's, we know we've struck lightning. We're we're doing, if you do things that are valuable, then people will tell their friends and ultimately they'll stay. We're in the business of keeping our clients for a long time, not in any sort of quick win. So I think that business continues to grow in a robust manner. You're also going to see, from One Firefly in the years ahead, some products that we put out to the industry are going to have more elements of modern technology and AI that a leverage is some of the amazing capabilities of AI to help businesses with repetitive tasks or give really precise, effective answers to customers, and we're on the verge of rolling some of those technologies out to the space. So I'm being very vague, but let's just say we're very excited about what we've been in development of. We've doubled down. You know, I'll just go back to my beginning at Lutron, 25, 26 years ago. I just remember executives in that company talking about, with pride, a lot of company revenue would come annually from products or services that had been invented in the previous 18 months. And it was just, it was ingrained in me. It made sense. Like it's, you need to be taking your profits in your business and inventing in the future version of your business.

Lee:

I mean, they invest a lot in r and d and they're engineering heavy. And so they, you know, the products that they're building are, you know, three, five, how many ever years out, invest in those dollars today. But they won't see any return until, you know, way down the road.

Ron:

And we are doing that at One Firefly. We're investing in software tech stack, people, process consultants. Just, I mean, we're not looking a month ahead. We're looking years ahead. And how do we continue to be positioned to be the leader to help our customer base grow their business? And how do we remain highly valuable? Not just in the next quarter, but over the next years ahead. And that takes investment. It takes faith that those dollars spent today will deliver a return years into the future. That's hard and scary sometimes, particularly if you see sales waffle, or if you see churn waffle, it's like, whoa, do we pull back on that development costs? No, we don't pull back. You, you press ahead. And I'm proud of our leadership team following that philosophy. And I think it bodes well for our business for sure. But also for the industry and then the last piece of that answer, and then, then we'll wrap up. We'll do a part two with more Q and a, is our Amplify People business at One Firefly. We launched that business a year and a half ago, Amplify People, recruiting and just the people side talent solutions. We call it of our industry at large. It's a pain point for many and or most people in this industry, how to find people, how to retain people, how to grow people, nurture people within your organization. I think we do, we've learned a lot at One Firefly. We've engineered that into a business where we can help the industry do that and Amplify People, that business is growing at a very rapid pace. And I think it's, it's already nicely substantial and that, you know, that'll be an exponential growth for years to come. As long as we continue to deliver high levels of value to the industry, meaning we deliver a lot, you know, based on what ultimately needs to be invested to gain that benefit. And that business has me very excited.

Lee:

Well, you guys have done a great job with that, and that's a good segue. I get asked a lot at these events because people see us, you know, in a marketing light and they're like, you know, hey, what, what should I be doing marketing wise in my business? And obviously I send them all in your direction. But earlier when we talked about, you know, people don't have clear information to make a decision. If let's say they get overwhelmed, they're like, oh, Lee, all that video you do. And every week we could never do all that. It's just too much. And they don't, then they don't take any action. Right. So with, with obviously both the companies that you represent and also the ones you see out there that you don't, what do you feel are like the beginning steps that everyone should be doing from a marketing standpoint, part two, what do you see are some of the mistakes that people are making? You know, how do they get started on this path to good marketing?

Ron:

I think that those are, those are two softball pitches. Those are very, I'd say straightforward questions. One is in order to start, you always have to start with the end in mind. That's whether you're building a puzzle or you're building that Lego project. Melissa's over there with her husband, building a Lego project. Or whether you're trying to accomplish big things in business, you need to get really good and clear about what you define success to be and within what time period. So it's always about an objective and a timeframe. And if you get really good and clear about that, then you can back solve what needs to be true to make that to improve probabilities of achieving that. And that's where marketing fits in. Marketing's job is to align with a business and help them accomplish their business plan. So a marketing plan helps a business achieve a business plan and levels of investment. So for example, I'll just, again, I have conversations every day with people all over the country. So I'll just use a random recent example. Someone admitted that they have, you know, I'll just say they wanted to spend 50,000 on the year for marketing and they wanted to grow the business by next year, they wanted to three X the business. Those two numbers are like, they don't, they're not in the same solar system. They make no sense. And not all business owners know that, right? So then you get a good counselor in our case, you know, I'll dialogue and help somebody understand what, at least from our experience, is possible. Now, marketing does not solve all problems, solves some, but you also have to have salespeople and biz dev and, not, you definitely have to have salespeople and biz dev. They actually make the magic. They do the conversions. They make the sales and build the relationships. And so it's really calibrating how much do you want to grow or what new business vertical do you want to get in? Or what new market do you want to enter into? And in what timeframe are you okay with achieving that success? And then what marketing spend to make sense. And then within that spend, how do you divide that into tactics that have a high probability of helping that be true? So when you pick a marketing hire, or an agency in your market or a vertical specialist like One Firefly, you want them to bring ideally experience to the table that helped. They can say, well, when we did this for other people, these types of strategies, these types of spends, these tactics are our recommendation and give us the highest probability to help you achieve your goals. And then marketing, nothing's guaranteed. You then had to look at the data. Cause it, you know, we live in a dynamic marketplace with a lot of things out of our control. So that's the answer to the first question. Start with the end in mind. The biggest mistake is that people, I mean, this is easy. 95 percent of the industry underspends in marketing. They spend a little time, money or energy thinking about it. For the most part, I'm going to say it's not their fault. They don't understand. They don't know what they don't know. So they don't understand that if you are easily found online or well understood by your target demographic as a player or someone they should consider. Or when someone, a target, you know what I'll call a you know, an ideal customer is doing research online. And if they keep seeing you everywhere, and then when they finally call your office and they talk to a salesperson, that salesperson has had a lot of friction reduced. There's already been a lot of pre qualification that has already occurred. Like you, Lee, you have all these case studies on your website. I promise you people are going to those case studies that are considering you, researching, reading those case studies. And so ultimately they're engaging with you or Melissa. They're like, great, I'd love to talk about Lutron shades and a Ketra lighting system in my new home. I'm at this stage of construction, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. How much would that cost? They're jumping right into, I already know I want you to be my partner in this. How can we work through those details? That pre work was done by marketing when it's done well. And so I'll just close on when marketing's done well, marketing and branding, you close jobs faster, you close jobs for higher dollar values and you close jobs with less friction. And now your salespeople is where I get to pick on salespeople because I'm a salesperson. Salespeople think it's all them. So salespeople give no credit to all that investment, that business owner operator made in their branding and marketing. And the fact that they've actually been building their brand equity for eight years or 10 years or 20 years, the salesperson, God bless their heart, they think they are simply amazing on that day. They took that call or had that meeting. And that it was them and they do get some of the credit they do, but it is easier for them when the business does some of the hefty lifting by really building that brand presence in a marketplace in advance.

Lee:

It's, I mean, marketing step one is they just have to find you. Finding you would be the easiest part of that. Like all the things that we do with you guys and the case studies and everything else, hopefully it's helping to educate the customer and get them warmed up. Like what you said before they get in here and the salesperson could stink that thing up or get it to the finish line. But I agree with you. We've already built the foundation. We've already built all these parts of the home. So you're not starting to dig a hole. We're already way down there and their confidence in us because the marketing we've done with you guys and how that's all laid out is so much higher. So finding us as job one, hopefully by the time they see all of our marketing, they've said, we're going to do business with these guys. We just got to figure out how much, and then our sales and design is they're working through that and budget and scope, those parts get figured out, but we just want to be their choice. Period. And the more we can grease those skids. So they're like, these guys are far and away the people that we want to partner with. Now we just got to figure out how much, how soon, you know, the details.

Ron:

Yeah. I mean, word of advice to anybody in sales out there, and you're looking for that place to build a career. You want to find a business like why clients, a business that. Truly. And there, there are why clients, you're not the only one that spends on your brand and marketing. There are some other leaders out there, but when you find a business that does that, and I'll give One Firefly credit, we spend time, money, and budget on our brand and marketing. You just like, that's a really fun place for a salesperson to build a career. Yeah. Because now they have all this backing, you know, they have this wind in their sales to ultimately help reinforce that they are the right company to go with. And it, and it does enable those sales to happen with a little bit less friction and in many cases, higher dollar values, which the business wins, the customer wins, and the salesperson wins. So Lee, you're a rock star. Thank you for being on show 300, sir. And I can't wait to see it the next show. And I know we'll talk to you soon. Thank you for joining me on Automation Unplugged.

Lee:

Thank you for having us. Thank you for making us the centurion. I'll look forward to both watching this. Once you guys get it done and edit and release it as well as, hopefully we've done well enough, we'll get invited to 400.

Ron:

Let's go. All right, buddy.

Lee:

Be well, have a good weekend.

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Ron Callis is the CEO of One Firefly, LLC, a digital marketing agency based out of South Florida and creator of Automation Unplugged. Founded in 2007, One Firefly has quickly became the leading marketing firm specializing in the integrated technology and security space. The One Firefly team work hard to create innovative solutions to help Integrators boost their online presence, such as the elite website solution, Mercury Pro.

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Resources and links from the interview:

• Wipliance LinkedIn Profile
• Wipliance Website
• Lee Travis LinkedIn Profile

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