Connect for Life: Network Your Personal Brand and WIN
John Humphrey's book outlining his proven system for building meaningful business relationships that drive long-term revenue.
Available on Amazon

Connect for Life
A client acquisition and coaching firm founded by John Humphrey, focused on helping service-based businesses win with intentional networking.
Visit Connect for Life

CoPoint Data
John’s AI and data consultancy helping companies reimagine growth through strategic analytics and automation.
Explore CoPoint Data

ConnectPoints
A software platform developed to help individuals and teams nurture high-value relationships across large networks.
Learn about ConnectPoints

Podcast Appearance: The How of Business – Episode 385
John shares insights on how to build a connected business development strategy using his Connect for Life approach.
Listen to the episode

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Chapter 1: Intro

While most MSPs are out there hunting endlessly for new clients, the smart ones know their richest opportunities lie in the fields they already own. My name's James Steel, and this is Harvest, where MSPs and industry experts share proven ways to grow profitable revenue from your current customer base. No theory, no fluff, just field-tested strategies that work. Let's grow.

When I start the year, do I have 65 to 75% of my target revenue in the bag? And in the bag means I've got existing contracts that are multi-quarter, multi-year. What are the tools of the trade? The tools are time and relationships. The tools are being prepared for meetings. The tools are having strategies inside the account. And the tools are content.

What I realized is what I needed to do was isolate their message so that I could turn my yellows to greens and have my greens elevate their voices in the organization so that they were heard by the decision makers. So you say, before we have this discovery meeting on this new idea I've got, on this hunch I have, I want you to be prepared so that we can talk about it intelligently.

Hello, welcome back to Harvest. Today I'm joined by John Humphrey, a man who's genuinely been there and done that in the MSP world, and he's now leading AI innovation with CoPoint data. From building an MSP from scratch to 50 million, to now helping businesses reimagine AI-driven growth, John's experience is the real deal. In this episode, we're going to dive deep into how MSPs just like you can truly unlock hidden revenue in your existing client base using a sharp tactical method he calls heat maps and hunches. Let's get stuck in. As always, get your notepad ready.

Chapter 2: Heat Maps and Hunches

Hi everyone. Today I'm joined by a very special guest. Out straight out of Texas, I'm with John Humphrey. Now John has, in the nicest possible way, been around the block. I mean, he's got some serious experience. Published author, has run an MSP, taken it from zero to 50 million, is now deeply embedded in the AI space and with a business focused on that. So I'm absolutely thrilled to have John on board because also his specialty, would you believe, is talking about how you can generate more business from within your existing customer base. And he has a very particular methodology around that, which we're going to dive into.

But first of all, hello John, how are you?

James, I'm great. Great to be with you. I'm excited about our conversation.

We always start this show with a misconception. What do people get wrong about you when they first meet you?

You know, I think they think I'm an extrovert and a sales leader. So they think I'm this really outgoing and gregarious person when in fact, I'm a very introverted person. I've just learned that to get close to the money, you got to get out of your comfort zone. So I have, I guess, an act that I've been using for 30 years. It seems to work.

I think this is such a great overlooked point. It's so easy to think that extroversion equals success, especially when it comes to sales. But John's point, I think, really hits home because real growth often starts by just pushing yourself outside of that comfortable bubble. If you're naturally introverted, as many of us in the MSP space are, that's not actually a disadvantage. But the important thing is that you're actually training that outreach muscle intentionally.

So my advice to you this week, pick one customer that you don't always engage with outside project work and simply set up a casual check-in. So even if that feels a bit odd, just go ahead and do it. Love it. That's your first nugget, people. Get out of your comfort zone.

Chapter 3: The Sales Reality and Account Planning

So listen, you've done so much in your long career, as I alluded to before. You're now deep embedded in the AI space. What I'm really interested to know, though, is why do you also kind of share the opinion around the theme of this podcast, which is it's better to go after existing customers and nurture those than it is to chase net new logos? What's driven you down that path?

Well, I think if you just sort of take a pyramid of what it takes to find a new client outside, like once you've tapped your personal network, if you don't have a huge one, it takes an inordinate amount of work. Probably it's going to take you 12 to 18 months. If you're really good, you'll get a few clients in the first six to nine months. Then of course, there's not a CEO or an owner on the planet that thinks that's acceptable.

It takes time for the trust to transfer in your relationships. And so all things being equal, you have these relationships where you've already delivered value. You're probably doing in a very narrow slice of the organization. And so it's just much easier to develop a relationship in a new division than find a completely net new client to go after.

Chapter 4: Empowering the Delivery Team

I was with a gentleman in Minneapolis, and I watched him pouring over this big spreadsheet with lines and colors. And I'm like, what are you doing? He says, I wake up every morning, and the first thing I do with my coffee is I look at my org chart. And he said, I call it my heat map chart for my account.

And he tried to figure out who was on his team, who supported him, who was neutral, he wasn't sure, and who was an enemy, not supportive of him and his technology. And then he built strategies on penetrating the champions and isolating the naysayers and using this idea of a hunch, like where should I make my next investment at this account?

Chapter 5: AI Readiness and Competitive Advantage

The great secret that we're all learning is generative AI. And it doesn't matter whether you're chasing a publicly traded company. That seems obvious, the gen AI, you drop a 10K in a collage and you say, I'm meeting the CEO this afternoon. What are the five most important things to him? But you'd be amazed at how much publicly available information is out there on privately held companies.

You're not going to lose your job to AI, you're going to lose your job to somebody who's effectively using it. That's what I would tell most people.

Chapter 6: Cultural Shifts and Future of MSPs

As a leader, in between it, you almost have to relish both roles and keep them from getting personal or angry, agree with them both. At the end of the day, our goal is 100% client satisfaction, and we back that up with a money-back guarantee. We're involved in every relationship, and we get to choose a lot of our clients and choose to leave ones that are abusive and nasty and mean.

Listen, what a segue. Talking of crapping all over on things, our next segment is called Industry Manure. This is your opportunity to tell me. Now, you move in slightly different circles to some of the MSPs that perhaps we normally talk to, maybe the larger companies. But in terms of the gurus out there, the advice that's thrown around, can you single out one thing that really gets on your nerves as being just echo chamber stuff that doesn't ring true in your experience?

Yeah, I listen to a lot of financial market news. I listen to lots of podcasts. I've always been kind of a closet investor. This is blasphemy in most circles, but Nvidia is just a chip company, and AI, the hardware, is just the technology. It's how we use and implement that technology that creates value for customers.

The fact that everybody's talking about the chips, the compute, the data centers, the power, I want to know how that's going to make a difference for a customer. What am I going to be able to do with that compute and with that technology to make more revenue, lower cost of goods sold, lower SG&A, or manage risk? Those are the only four things that a CEO and a CFO care about.

What am I going to do to reinvent myself? What is enterprise transformation? How are these tools going to manifest themselves in my enterprise to create the kind of value that I just described?

This is a common theme, less on the shiny thing syndrome and more about how you actually utilize properly. What's there? What brilliant advice.

Listen, our next segment, let's lead into this one, is called Pass the Pitchfork. This is where our last guest puts a question to you. Now, we've already talked extensively about AI, and it was about AI, so it does make it a little bit tricky. I'm going to tweak it slightly because I think what we need to do is, the question was, how will AI change MSP operations and internal organizations? I think we've covered that a little bit.

Let's wind it forward into the future. If we're talking five years away, and that's an impossibly long time in the space of AI, where do you think AI is going to impact MSPs most? How are MSPs going to look in terms of their adoption, bearing in mind where their core business comes from now?

You say five years. I stick a pitchfork in that. I think three is a reasonable horizon to have a clue. We haven't crossed the chasm yet. We're over here in the innovator, early adopter phase. I think there's a bubble out there somewhere in this world, so that's going to be a gap. I think they're going to be able to do more with less. I would be looking at my IT budget and figuring out how to kill it.

I think that's a great opportunity for MSPs that have developed a toolset. You should be thinking about every single service you provide and how AI can accelerate it, add value to it.

There's a great thing I learned years ago. I don't remember whether I read it or I heard it, but I heard a speaker once say, "Eat your own lunch before somebody else does." I think that's a really good reminder that creative destruction is how capitalism works. If you're not destroying yourself and trying to get better, you're probably going to get destroyed by somebody else.

I don't know if that really answers your question, but that's how I see the next three years. Some kind of a bust. Everybody's going to get distracted like it was just a thing. Then the people that really are embracing it to make the relevant changes are going to... I think AI is going to be the thing that once you start up the learning curve, you will leave your competition exponentially in the dust and it will be very hard to catch up.

I think that's great. It does answer the question. I particularly like your point about the risk there of companies looking at how they can kill their IT budget through the use of AI because that's obviously where the MSP's bread and butter comes from. That's a big part of the MSP.

I think you have to push the envelope to make sure that you're adding value and you're always looking about breaking something to fix it.

I totally agree. They are absolutely worlds apart and bringing them together is probably where the magic is.

Do you have a question for our next guest? It's your chance to ask. This could be... It'll either be a medium-sized MSP or it will be a MSP expert.

I would say it's always on the hiring of your sales team. Do you have a secret sauce? For a long time in sales, it was like, "Hand somebody a pen and say, 'Sell this to me.'" Is there something as an old dog that I've missed in hiring the current crop of salespeople and what advice would you give me if I'm now talking to the 25 to 35 range of young people?

That's a great question. I love that one, John. Your chance to give a yell from the barns. You've given us loads of value there. Thank you so much for your time. Give us a shout out. Let us know what Copoint is all about, how we can get in touch with you and learn more about what you're up to.

Copoint Data, all we do is AI and data. We're based in Dallas, Texas in the Energy Square in the Metals Building, which is just north of downtown. We also have an office in Girigau, India. As we like to say, born global. We do blended teams at fixed rates and we solve the Stone Age problems that people have with AI and data.

Do you want to hear from MSPs that are wondering how they can do more with AI? Is that something you can help with? Do you partner with MSPs?

Yeah, you can find me, John, at Copoint Data. If you search on John Humphrey and Connect for Life, you'll also find me at John at Connect for Life. You'll find both those things on LinkedIn. I'm out on LinkedIn all the time. If somebody mentions your show, James, and they want to connect with me, happy to do that. I'm very free with my time and ideas.

Yeah, and that's been my experience so far. It's been a pleasure getting to know you, to talk to you. I recommend anyone reach out to John. He lives by his word. He's putting out loads of good content on LinkedIn as well, so go and check that out as a steady flow.

John, thank you so much for your time. Catch you soon.

A lot of fun. Have a great day.

That was good, wasn't it? I really enjoy talking to people who've got loads of experience, but from outside the industry or certainly on the peripheral about how we can generate more value from existing customers.

Hanukkah's challenging MSPs just like you to shift from being reactive tech providers to proactive business partners by doing things like creating custom AI research tools, setting up contact change alerts to be more in tune, abandoning PowerPoint for deeper conversations, bridging tech advancement gaps, and proactively identifying improvements continuously.

It'll mean you'll differentiate yourself in what is a crowded market, so it's so important. You go from being that necessary evil into having a genuine partnership that the clients truly value.

Okay, that is it for this episode of Harvest. If you found this useful, all the links we mentioned are in the show notes. Of course, if you enjoyed it, please do leave us a review and share it with a friend or even better, someone else in the industry who you know would get value from it.

Until next time, happy harvesting.

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