How I Removed Myself as the Bottleneck in My 7-Figure Agency (Alex Zinni​​​​​​​)
 

[00:00:00:02 - 00:00:17:11]
Alex Zinni
Even though it's only been like four months, like over 90 days that I've been working with you, that's about it. That quarter of business has been so transformative in how I approach using AI and the core parts of my business that it's hard to imagine even was like before. Like I was telling my wife, I'm like, I can't believe there was a before this before Jesse and an after Jesse.

[00:00:22:22 - 00:00:40:17]
Jesse Gilmore
Hello and welcome. This is Jesse B. Gilmore and welcome to the Leverage for Growth podcast. I'm super excited because I have Alex Zinni here, founder of Alpha Key Digital. And for the last decade, outbound has been a big challenge for him. And just recently he had some big wins. So, Alex, what was that big win for you?

[00:00:40:17 - 00:02:58:20]
Alex Zinni
Hey, Jesse. Good to be here. Glad to be on the podcast. Just diving right into it. You know, there's been so many wins since our four months working together. But with this outbound system that you've helped me create, it's truly fantastic to get to my ICP to speak directly to their pain points. To their problems, to have an AI funnel and a workflow that's really helping me prepare what I'm going to say on these looms, the format that we're using via LinkedIn. And to really feel confident going into, you know, this process that I'm going to get a reaction. If I can get the video watched, I'm going to get a reaction. That's what I've learned in a short time. Now, just kind of zooming back a little bit, my ICP plastic surgeons, cosmetic surgeons, medspas, extremely busy people, extremely crowded in terms of the amount of people trying to get their attention. And so for me, I've always struggled with this 10 year journey, like you mentioned, to get in front of that ICP, to make an impression that's going to then lead to a booked call. It was something that I struggled with for many years and didn't see any success until we started implementing what I learned with your program. So, I mean, it's amazing. Forty looms out. Four calls booked. Like 10 percent. It's fantastic. And I can't wait to keep sending looms out. I get excited about sending looms out and I get excited about outbound, which was a piece to my agency puzzle that never had any traction, any growth, any systems. So this is like such a huge breath of fresh air. Don't need to rely on referrals the same way I potentially used to in the past and building a system to where, you know, other people can run it in the future as well. It could become a manager of looms. If we go into other verticals, different ICPs, the growth potential is huge. And that system came from you and I sitting down, having a conversation and then developing the plan. And you're the mastermind behind it. So I didn't couldn't see where it would lead. But when I finally got there, you know, I blindly trusted you throughout this process. And I just real quick, I won't forget where I was in the gym, sent out my first batch of looms to all these doctors. It was five looms sent out. And half hour later, I'm in the gym doing what I'm not supposed to checking my email, but in between sets, checking my email and boom, booked call with a surgeon in New York City. So that was amazing.

[00:03:00:20 - 00:03:14:14]
Jesse Gilmore
I remember that moment because he talked about it being a big aha moment where you're like, you get like this dopamine hit, you know, where you're like, holy cow, they watched it. And then like five minutes later and like, boom, booked call, like, holy crap, this is actually working.

[00:03:14:14 - 00:03:15:17]
Alex Zinni
Yeah, that was amazing.

[00:03:15:17 - 00:03:25:23]
Jesse Gilmore
What has it done to your actual like certainty with the business and growing the business and being able to lean more into that visionary kind of side as opposed to constantly getting rejected all the time?

[00:03:25:23 - 00:05:34:12]
Alex Zinni
And a lot for my confidence, but it's done a lot for quite a few other parts of my business, too. Like, you know, when it comes to addressing the ideal customer profile or the ideal type of client that we're serving, I'm also learning through these looms, through this research, through this outbound, exactly what it is the market wants. I don't I think many of us business owners, we fall in love with our own ideas and we don't necessarily know what the market is demanding. What's good about, you know, this outbound process, these conversations, who's slamming the door in my face? I did get blocked once. I had one person block me, but that's OK. But what I'm learning is that I'm slowly but surely figuring out what speaks to this ICP and what they need. Right. With real time data, real conversations, real interactions. So that is totally invaluable. And it's something that, you know, as I'm growing the business to have because I've just relied on referrals for years, Jesse, waiting for that next referral to come through, that next word of mouth, you know, clients come through. And that worked and built a steady business for many years. But at this growth phase where we're at now, simply want to have a system to start creating conversations and get them down that discovery, proposal, delivery route. So to have now a method to do that, that I can say, here's what I do. A, here's B, here's C, here's D. And to start to go down that religiously is what I'm noticing is super helpful to my confidence as an agency owner. And it's it's also helped me in other areas, more confident in hiring, more confident in expenses and advertising and marketing to do remarketing to those who have visited our website potentially from some of these looms. And it's also just become an important part of the strategy downstream of operations or upstream of operations, I should say. So, you know, it's it's really just like the gift that keeps on giving. And for anybody listening, like start looming, reach out to Jesse, get get on his process because it's it's been helpful.

[00:05:34:12 - 00:06:11:18]
Jesse Gilmore
I think a lot of times when people think about AI workflows, so about three minutes ago or so you're talking about we sat down and we worked on AI workflows. A lot of times when people think about AI workflows, they're thinking, OK, how can I personalize outreach that's inauthentic and thousands of people a day? Right. So any time they're thinking about that, they do this. Like spray and pray model. But it's obviously very different than what we did. So without getting into like so much of the details, what is that AI workflow and and maybe like how has that saved you their time, energy or money from implementing?

[00:06:11:18 - 00:07:12:21]
Alex Zinni
So when it comes to you and I both have a mutual love for Anthropic, we use Claude and Claude skills in particular was one of those things that I really wasn't using before we started working together. When I saw the power of the skills that you created and helped me implement, I think dozens, maybe hundreds of hours have been saved on my end from an operational standpoint, because what these skills are doing is really that mid to lower level work that's super important. Takes a lot of time, but isn't necessarily what's going to ultimately push the ball forward. So, for instance, like screening applicants, we get hundreds of I probably got 500 applications to three open jobs in the last month and was able to reduce that with your Claude skills down to a shortlist of 10 people. And from those 10 people, we've onboarded three employees since then. And it's been the most successful start to

[00:07:14:00 - 00:07:24:20]
Alex Zinni
that having employees, these employees, it's been a very successful start. So the AI has its hands on everything, but it's not AI slop. It's not AI that is

[00:07:25:22 - 00:07:48:02]
Alex Zinni
hallucinating constantly. It is very pointed, very data driven and very integrated into the exact framework that we're using for hiring, for SDR, for sales, for sales research, for screening prospects, screening applicants, screening my thoughts, screening everything.

[00:07:49:02 - 00:08:33:22]
Alex Zinni
And it's great to have a system like that, not to completely outsource my brain, not to completely rely on AI for everything, but to make me more productive, to approach it and make me 10 times more productive. That's what I've gotten out of the AI workflows that we've developed. So I can't even though it's only been like four months, like over 90 days that I've been working with you, that's about it. That quarter of business has been so transformative in how I approach using AI and the core parts of my business that it's hard to imagine even it was like before, like I was telling my wife, I'm like, I can't believe there was a before this. There's a before Jesse and an after Jesse, you know, so it's it's been great and I love it.

[00:08:33:22 - 00:09:35:11]
Jesse Gilmore
One of our core values in Niche in Control is that we're transformation first in transaction, like transformation over transaction. And to be able to have it where there's a before Jesse and after Jesse, and I'm not like God or something, but the ability of creating transformation is one of the big things. And you talked about the the outbound side as being something that was really challenging for about a decade and not really able to crack the code, reaching out to your ICP and generating some type of message resonance or signal for them to respond to. And then you also talked a bit about the hiring side where you you now use a different system, which we call the hiring funnel and be able to have large amounts of top talent and filter through and be able to find those shortlist of people in a very short period of time. And just this week you onboarded two of those those new people. How has the first week been going?

[00:09:35:11 - 00:11:25:14]
Alex Zinni
The first week's going great because I have a development guide and I have a development plan for each person. I have a VA setting the cadences and keeping everybody on on tech and on track. And, you know, it's just been one of those things where it just feels very different. It's very different from where I was before. And even though it's new territory and it feels really good and a part of me is like, oh, my God, when's the other shoe going to drop? You know, I have to remind myself that I have systems in place now that weren't there before. So even if, you know, something doesn't work out with somebody, I have a method to put someone else in that place and pick up right where we where we are. So that wasn't the case before. Like my hiring journey involved, hey, you have a cousin who's in marketing? Like, come join Alpha Key. Oh, I know you. I've seen you a few times, you know, around a Chamber of Commerce events like, hey, why don't you join my team? And then 90 days later, when, you know, everything goes completely sideways, I'd sit there wondering and scratching my head. I mean, I'm an accidental agency owner. I started this. This grew itself right out of college, basically. And I have no corporate experience. I have not been involved in any training programs. I have not been, you know, involved in a corporate ladder in any way, shape or form. So I really need to know the basics. I'm great at sales. I'm great at marketing. I'm good at vision. I'm great at understanding, you know, getting the work done and doing it at a strategic level. There is so many opportunities to be able to implement like that hiring funnel. You could use it. I have clients who I've sat there and thought, you know, that hiring funnel would probably really help them get a nurse practitioner or an injector or, you know, a front of desk office. You know, if you do the same thing that I did, you would have these applications. So I haven't done that because I know you'd tell me that'd be a distraction. But I thought that.

[00:11:25:14 - 00:12:08:13]
Jesse Gilmore
And what you're talking about is assets. I mean, because you realize like if the shoe is going to drop or something's going to go wrong, you can't actually fall back too far because the systems are in place. It's more predictable. You know what you need to do with it. And those types of assets are what we would consider the step towards founder independence, where you're starting to build things that do the thing that you would normally would put a founder in. And the goal behind it all is to move the founder from the person who does the work to be an effective trainer, to be an effective manager, eventually leading the business and then becoming a visionary.

[00:12:09:16 - 00:12:15:21]
Jesse Gilmore
And a lot of times people think that seven-figure agency owners have it all figured out, right?

[00:12:16:22 - 00:12:45:09]
Jesse Gilmore
People associate a certain dollar amount with like success, right? And I find that very interesting. It's like one of the things that keeps me very curious about people's reactions to things and what they view as goals. And did you find that like because you built the business to seven figure within 10 years, beautiful, without having all these things, but now you're starting to understand the need for these assets.

[00:12:47:00 - 00:13:01:11]
Jesse Gilmore
How did you find I guess my question is, how did you find that that was the thing that was missing? Was it kind of accidental that we just stumbled upon it? Or did you understand that you needed to remove yourself as being the bottleneck or kind of talking through that a little bit?

[00:13:01:11 - 00:15:05:15]
Alex Zinni
Well, I hit a ceiling basically about four years in a row of the same revenue ceiling, clients churning, but then new ones coming in, but it all baselining around the same place. And, you know, some people think, oh, when I'm doing 75K a month in MRR, I'll be good. Or if I'm doing whatever the number is, I'll be doing good. And then you get there and you're like, oh, my gosh, I have no time. I'm working Saturdays. I'm working Sundays. I'm working seven-hour days. I got clients blowing me up. They're texting me. They're calling me. This is a true story and it's a sad one. But last summer I was getting married, right? And which is beautiful. That's that was amazing. But I told my clients, I said, the week of my marriage, I'm going to be unavailable. Right. Now, I didn't have systems in place. I didn't have a VA. I didn't have a lot of stuff. Right. And I was getting calls and texts and emails and it was all like urgent, but none of it really was urgent. Right. So I just kind of came and we had a beautiful wedding weekend. It was an amazing time. We had such a great day. And I realized after that, I'm like, I don't care if I lose 30, 40 percent of this damn revenue. I need to figure out how stuff like this can't happen to me anymore. There's no reason for it to happen. And obviously, seven figures is a great milestone. But I'll tell you, I didn't even realize that milestone until I was doing my taxes. And I was like, oh, OK, didn't feel great. Right. So I see a lot of different opportunities and people online where, you know, Tony Robbins is a great example. You know, I'll get his business mastery solicitations and it's like remove yourself from your business, be an owner, not an operator. And that had been in the back of my mind for quite a few years. And basically, I was just sick and tired of being sick and tired. I didn't want to have to constantly be doing account management and fulfillment and, you know, acquire new customers and sales and everything. And I needed the operational systems and processes in place. It was a slow realization that hit me really hard this year, going into this new year after my wedding, going into 26. I said, enough is enough. I'm not doing this anymore. You know, come hell or high water, I'm going to figure this out.

[00:15:05:15 - 00:15:55:17]
Jesse Gilmore
First off, I'm really glad that you figured it out. It's necessary. And what's really interesting to me is that when we thought about founder dependence and like a lot of people don't really associate that as being the root cause, but when you drill deep enough, it always becomes clear, is that one of the triggers that gets people to even think in the way that you're thinking is a life event. You're getting married, you have kids, you have a death in the family, something happens that kind of gets people to look at their relationship to the business a little bit differently. And I think that a lot of times people get really complacent about the way things are, they might be, you know, the fourth year in of the same revenue and they're like, okay, I guess this is as good as it gets, right? That whole like complacency and comfort. And I think it takes a certain

[00:15:56:21 - 00:16:24:15]
Jesse Gilmore
either life event or some type of trigger that gets people to think about their business in a different way. And if you can remember back, one of the first things that we did in the first month of working together, now we work together one on one, you're part of our Advantage program, we're working on a weekly basis. And do you remember what was some of the first things, maybe in the first couple weeks or so that we worked on that kind of set this foundation to build from?

[00:16:24:15 - 00:18:37:22]
Alex Zinni
You know, it was just radical clarity in the system that you, or I'll just say the process you brought me through, which was basically interviewing me to learn about the business and creating that go to market document. Very specific around ICP, very specific around services, very much capturing the vision I have and putting it a document in a way that I had never been able to before. So that was one thing that was huge. The other thing is we did some very personal introspective work, you know, we did the Kolbe, which I've never done before. The StrengthsFinder assessment. I've never done that one before. You know, Myers-Briggs, I've done a million times, but you know, that was good to incorporate into that as well. And then the way that you used AI and the way that I was using AI on my own to take these reports, combine it with the goals, the vision, the go to market document to really show like in my face, I just remember sitting there looking, I'm like, I can see the problem. And that was that was an amazing first month because that problem was I am the bottleneck, like you were just saying, and I'm just for better or for worse, I'm not a complacent person. I think the life event just kind of tipped me over the edge, but by nature, I just I just like to keep striving, you know, but to really have that first month with you where I was like, oh my gosh, like my problem is I do 80% of the work and I lack follow through. I need someone in my business, a mechanism that's going to trigger that follow through no matter what, what would that do for my business if I had that? And since then hiring, you know, an executive assistant who going through that process of the hiring funnel and that hiring funnel knew what I needed. And it was able to vet and find that person just going on week, you know, six with them now, like, I can see that happening. I can see the follow through happening and I'm not doing it. Right. So that that clarity from that first month was was so crucial. And I have a feeling that I'll be needing to do that again next year because there'll be different problems or, you know, in 18 months or whatever. It's an it's a journey that keeps evolving. But I had been stuck for quite a while. And that helped me get unstuck because I saw the problem clearly, but not just saw the problem, I saw the solution.

[00:18:40:09 - 00:19:09:12]
Jesse Gilmore
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[00:19:12:05 - 00:19:26:10]
Jesse Gilmore
I go to market and gave clarity the goals associated with your strengths and getting to understand your unique ability and how that relates to it made it very clear on what needs to change. Do you remember the time log?

[00:19:27:19 - 00:19:29:02]
Alex Zinni
Yes, I saw yes, the time log.

[00:19:30:22 - 00:19:32:07]
Alex Zinni
Yes, I do remember the time.

[00:19:32:07 - 00:19:34:05]
Jesse Gilmore
Was it effective?

[00:19:34:05 - 00:20:44:07]
Alex Zinni
It was. I've done the time log in the past, but the way that yours was in 15 minute increments, whereas the past was just simply tasks done in the day. So breaking it down to 15 minute increments, but then running it through your, I'm going to go back to the AI, you know, that we're using the skills and everything, you know, for very clearly to show me like this is the stuff. Because this is where it gets so tailored that I love that you did is it knows my unique ability. It knows my personality. It saw the assessment. It knows my goals. And after doing that time log and it all ran through all that data, it was like, okay, so this is why this is draining you. It's because it's not aligned with what your zone of genius is, your zone of excellence. This is really happy and you should be doing more of this, but you only did it for 10 minutes this week. Maybe try doing it for more time next week, you know. And then just seeing all of that was like an aha moment. I'm like, oh, I need to hire people to do these things. And I need to be focused on these things. And I've been pretty much doing that since then. And, you know, I'm seeing the fruits of that effort, you know, as the weeks go by now, because I'm spending more time like doing this podcast with you. That's part of what I like to do. I have a

[00:20:45:09 - 00:20:58:17]
Alex Zinni
desire as a part of my profile to do more public facing things, more public speaking, more content, you know, that kind of stuff. So this is the stuff that makes me excited. And it came from that initial process.

[00:20:58:17 - 00:21:04:10]
Jesse Gilmore
You know, it's so cool. And so this is a recap for anybody that just tuned in towards the middle of this thing.

[00:21:05:11 - 00:22:03:10]
Jesse Gilmore
You know, if you think about it, saving hundreds of hours when it comes to implementing either AI workflows or things like that. There's a reposition of your role within the business aligned more towards your unique ability. So as the business grows, it feels more fulfilling as opposed to more draining. And then there's the go to market strategy along with the outbound, which gives you confidence in the growth of the business. And then also the hiring and hiring based around the gaps within your either personality or like things that just need to be kind of balanced up a little bit, all leads towards what you're working on right now, which was systems. So aside from AI workflows and empowering people and using them for certain things, you started diving into systems that would actually fully remove you as a bottleneck towards growth. And you had a couple different aha moments going through some of the trainings. Can you kind of

[00:22:04:14 - 00:22:07:09]
Jesse Gilmore
outline or like, what were those ahas for you?

[00:22:07:09 - 00:22:47:05]
Alex Zinni
One of the biggest ahas was the idea of linear thinking versus systems thinking. So in the past, I've always been, I've tried to build systems and it's not that I haven't tried, right? I would sit down and I had a soft generator and I had a, you know, a sweet, was it sweet process or some software or something. But every time I sat down and approached it, I was always doing linear thinking activity. All these linear activities. And what I realized is that a system is a circle and they should all feed into each other. So SEO, PPC, account management, web dev, reporting, all of these things need to be

[00:22:48:18 - 00:25:20:18]
Alex Zinni
systematically linked to one another. So when I was able to kind of like, okay, peel back and I put my whole business into three buckets, you know, a build phase, an execute phase, and then a maintenance, you know, slash strategy for the next horizon phase. And by having those three buckets, not only did we transform our project management tool to reflect those three buckets, but I'm also now starting to build processes and workflows that coincide with each one of those buckets and they all connect, you know. It's one of those things that was just like mind blown, right? This is what systems is, this is what processes is. And now what I'm currently doing is just doing some very basic things. I'll give you an example real quick. I don't want to be contacted anymore by clients on my personal phone. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to be, and I did this the other day, and I don't, this is another big one, I don't want to chase people anymore for accounts receivable. Those are two things I don't want to do anymore. So I decided systematically that I'm going to get rid of this phone number that I've had since I was like 10 years old and not give that phone number out to any clients again in my new cell phone. And every client is going to be made known that if you want to be responded to, [email protected] is the place to go. And that's going to eliminate this distraction here, which goes off way too much, way too much. So that's good. That's one thing. Another thing is the accounts receivable. I'm sending a message to clients to get on our ACH pull credit card, the 15th of each month non-negotiable. If they don't like it, then they'll have to find another provider and that's non-negotiable. Those are two small things that took up a huge amount of brainpower of mine, and also harm the business, accounts receivable is going unpaid for six months at a time, we have client like that, you know, that's just unacceptable. So that's a very small example of now a system. The system is that if they don't pay on the 15th, I get alerted, my VA reaches out to them. If they're not paid by the 30th, then we're not, the work stops. Right? So that's a small system that's a part of a greater process. And, you know, our onboarding is dialed in. And, you know, our onboarding playbook is getting written, our guidebook. And just this morning, I did a few process flowcharts for PPC delivery, SEO delivery, and we're working on that too. So, you know, it's it's a huge change from where we were this time a year ago, it's like unrecognizable. And I just look back on it and I'm like, holy crap, I should have done this a lot sooner, but I wasn't ready.

[00:25:22:08 - 00:25:23:02]
Jesse Gilmore
But you're ready now.

[00:25:23:02 - 00:25:24:05]
Alex Zinni
I'm ready. Now I'm ready.

[00:25:24:05 - 00:25:28:16]
Jesse Gilmore
This is so cool. And Alex,

[00:25:29:16 - 00:25:52:06]
Jesse Gilmore
I think that in four months has been very transformative. And when I think about when when you think about where you started four months ago to where you are today, all within a four month time period. It kind of gets you to start thinking about what the future is. So what are you excited about for the next 12 months or so with Alpha Key Digital and the work that you're doing right now?

[00:25:52:06 - 00:27:05:17]
Alex Zinni
What I'm most excited about is truly getting myself out of fulfillment and client services. And we're making our way towards that goal. What comes next is a client success manager, somebody truly who is the liaison between the fulfillment team and the client. That's going to help me really get myself out of there. What am I doing with that new time? Going to conferences, working on working on our ICP and the delivery and evolving the business being that true visionary, keeping the systems and the processes growing, maybe getting to a point where we do finally hire a true integrator who can audit process and refine process and keep things even getting better and better and really go out there and do what I love most, which is sell, sell, sell and meet people and network and create content and do all of these things. So those type of goals that I've had for years can actually get the focus. I've wanted to write a book since 2018, since I read Tim Ferriss's The 4-Hour Workweek. Like how long ago is that? I can actually sit down and have the time to do that with certain things taken apart. So that's the stepping stones. It's like way out there. Hopefully by month 12 from now, that's actually come to fruition and I'm actually sitting down and doing those things full time.

[00:27:05:17 - 00:27:07:00]
Jesse Gilmore
You know, it's gonna be cool.

[00:27:08:05 - 00:27:08:16]
Alex Zinni
What's that?

[00:27:08:16 - 00:27:16:20]
Jesse Gilmore
We're gonna have another, have you on the podcast again when you've achieved that and my goal is to have it way less than 12 months.

[00:27:18:18 - 00:27:21:07]
Jesse Gilmore
Let's go. I'm down. Does that sound good for you?

[00:27:21:07 - 00:27:23:17]
Alex Zinni
That sounds great to me. Let's make it happen.

[00:27:23:17 - 00:27:30:05]
Jesse Gilmore
Awesome, man. Well, Alex, thank you so much for sharing your journey on the Leverage for Growth podcast and I'm looking forward to you.

[00:27:38:17 - 00:27:44:15]
Alex Zinni
Jesse, likewise, pleasure getting to know you, work with you, grow with you, and I can't wait to see where these next months take us.

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