Trust, Tech, and the Consultative Selling Advantage | Tim Musch, Paradigm

0:00 Selling With The Buyer’s Interest
0:50 Show Intro And Host Setup
1:14 Meet Tim Mush And Vendo
2:02 1984 Ad That Sparked A Pivot
3:38 First Mac, First Lines Of Code
5:29 Inventing A Proto‑CRM
6:14 Dealer Meeting And Early Adoption
7:50 From Windows Seller To MarketSharp
9:15 Education As A Growth Strategy
10:31 Consultative Selling Over Scripts
12:15 Talk‑Listen Ratios That Win Trust
13:28 Tech Phases To The AI Moment
15:01 Tech Stacks vs Tech Piles
16:05 Sequencing Tools And AI Coaching
16:52 Work‑Life Balance And Guitars
17:11 Guarding Teams From Overload
18:15 Two Commercials, Two New Paths
19:19 Legends, Cats, And What’s Next
19:51 Closing And Subscribe CTA

Tim Musch: 0:00

When you get in front of a prospect and you're selling them home improvements in this case, if you have their best interest at heart, you're gonna do great. But more common out there is the salesperson just insists on yapping, talking futures, benefits, features, benefits, and all that. Not bad. But rather than really doing proper needs assessments and finding out what does this person really want and need, I can tailor our solution to them. Consultative selling is so important. I think we're at a place right now that in many ways you could feel is similar to when I started when there was virtually no technology in the industry. What these guys are are dealing with right now. Because I'm gonna say I started we kind of want like technology, technology, technology, bang, we get a yellow. And now everybody's like.

John Wheeler: 0:50

Welcome to the Paradigm Industry Insiders podcast, where real people share real stories about what's happening with doors, windows, milwork, and life. I'm John Wheeler, and along with my co-host, we sit down with your peers who are moving our industry forward. These are honest conversations packed with practical insights and lessons you can take and bring value to your team. Here's today's conversation. Welcome to the Paradigm Industry Insiders Podcast, where we tell the stories of the people, the products, and the technology of the window and door industry. Uh today I'm joined with Tim Mush, uh, who's been around for a little bit of time. And uh we're gonna talk a little bit about uh a little bit about your history. Uh so thanks for joining the show. You want to talk about what you do?

Tim Musch: 1:36

Yeah, I am a business development specialist at Paradigm, and I work specifically with a product uh in the Paradigm's repertoire called Vendel. Um, it's in a space that I've been in for a lot of years. The story of how I arrived here is kind of interesting. Maybe we can dive into that a little bit.

John Wheeler: 1:54

Tell me a little bit about that.

Tim Musch: 1:55

How far back should I go, John?

John Wheeler: 1:57

I would say I think I remember something about the year 1984.

Tim Musch: 2:02

All right, we'll start there. 1984. So at that point, I was in the window replacement business on the retail side, selling windows. Uh, business was great, having fun. Things are going along just great. And all of a sudden, it's football season, the end of football season, not the beginning of football season. And it was the Super Bowl in 1984. I believe it was the Raiders and the Redskins, and um watching the game. Of course, everybody's interested in commercials during a Super Bowl. And uh, what many people probably don't know, even if you were around back then and watched a game, is that particular Super Bowl had one of the most iconic TV commercials ever created. Do you have any idea what it is? No, it was uh introduction of the Macintosh computer. And uh for the folks listening to podcast, I would suggest you Google that and watch that commercial because it had quite an effect on me. You know, it really wasn't your typical commercial talking about features, benefits, and all that. Little unusual. And uh, if you would check out the commercial, you'd see what I mean. But anyway, the game went on. I believe the Redskins won the game. Um, window business carried on, but for some reason that commercial stuck in my mind because I thought, I don't know what they just advertised there with that commercial. But whatever it is, it looks like it might change the world. So carrying on in the retail window business, back of my mind, that commercial stayed. And about three years later, I decided I'm gonna get one of these things called computers. I'm gonna go down to the local Apple store, only place you could get them back then, and get myself one of these Macintosh computers. I actually have a picture here, John. That's what it looked like. It was a little nine-inch black and white Macintosh computer. Back then, that thing cost $3,495.

John Wheeler: 4:02

That's crazy. And that's $84, $1984.

Tim Musch: 4:05

Yeah, actually, that was about 1987. All right. Because it took me about three years to have this commercial running around in my head before I decided I'm gonna get one. And uh what I wanted it for is back then all the marketing in the window business was yellow page ads, newspaper ads, and all that. And I thought, you know, I'm gonna get one of those things and have it help me create these ads. So I did. Um, but what I learned is a tutorial that came with the computer, and I had never turned one on before that, um, had a little tutorial that talked about a little programming language that was built in. And I thought, hmm, what's this about? So I went into tutorial and it it said, do this, type in the words on mouse up, which I did. Then it said hit return. I did that, and then it said type the word beep, did that, hit return, third line, and mouse up. I looked at those three lines and I said, geez, I think I know what might happen if I click this mouse. So I clicked the mouse, sure enough, that computer beeped. And I thought, oh my god, is this this easy?

John Wheeler: 5:16

You just yeah.

Tim Musch: 5:17

So I joked with people all the time, and I say, next thing I tried is on mouse up, generate leads, and mouse up, click the mouse. Nothing happened, didn't work. So I thought, okay, I'm gonna have to work at this, I see. So it kind of drew me in. I thought, you know, this, I understand this. It seems like it's easy enough for me to figure out. So I spent the next three, four years creating what we now know as a CRM. Back then, those letters weren't even put together, and I created just to help us in our retail window business. One day a window supplier comes into my office from Minneapolis, trying to sell us their windows. He says, What's that? And I said, Well, that box there is a computer. You know, back then not many people had them. He says, What does it do? So I showed him. He says, I'd never seen anything like that. Remember, there weren't CRMs back then. And he said, Would you mind showing my boss this? So I go, I guess. Up to Minneapolis, I go, I showed his boss this thing, and he says, Man, I got a dealer meeting coming up. Gonna have about a hundred people in this hotel, which is in a place where now it's a parking lot for the Hall of America. And uh, you want to show this to them? So I said, Oh, all right. So there I was in front of this group of 100 people with that nine-inch black and white Macintosh computer in front of the room. No projectors back then.

John Wheeler: 6:41

Is everybody just huddled around you?

Tim Musch: 6:43

No, it was a big room. I mean, they were way back. So I talked to them for about seven hours about this crazy idea I had. And uh at the end of it, most people there thought it was from Mars. But at the end of it, eight of them raised their hand and said, Can I have one of those? And I thought, okay, guess so. So that's what started that business. They stayed in the retail business after that. Kind of interesting. You know, these people knew nothing about computers, and eight of them wanted this thing. They had to buy a laser printer and a computer. They had to invest about $15,000 to $20,000 on this back then. Never forget we got all eight of these in a room. We had to buy all the equipment, put it in the trailer, haul it to the hotel to train them. I'll never forget we we sat down with them, ready to train them. We're all excited, and I knew we're in trouble. And when one guy raised up a mouse and said, What's this? So we played video poker for two hours. Yep. Absolutely. So turned into a business of its own, um, turned into a product. Back then, we made an exclusive arrangement with that company in Minneapolis, and we decided to call this product Windows Seller for it. Until Microsoft got wind that we used the word windows in software.

John Wheeler: 8:09

Yeah.

Tim Musch: 8:09

And they said, You guys might want to change that. And we decided, yeah, we're not gonna, we're not gonna fight this battle. So that product ended up turning into a CRM that you know is well known in the industry called Market Sharp, used by thousands of companies, you know, and it's turned into be, you know, kind of a big thing in the industry. So that kind of got us got us to that point. So in 1984 brought us up to the up to then.

John Wheeler: 8:36

I think it's interesting that you watched a commercial. It took three years to for you to like figure out that this might be something you want to do, and you didn't even intend to do that.

Tim Musch: 8:45

Absolutely.

John Wheeler: 8:46

Yeah, it's crazy. You know, you've you've been around paradigm for a while. Um, you know, I've watched you on other podcasts and shows and uh webinars and things like that. Um, and one of the things, you know, you're you're kind of later in your your career and your your coaching skills are uh I think one of your secret weapons, right? Helping the the folks here, you know, but also whoever you're you're on with at a trade show or things, just educating people. Um talk a little bit a little bit about where that comes from and and why you think it's important.

Tim Musch: 9:18

Yeah, I'm not sure where it came from, but it was just a strategy we used in that market share business from day one. Um, we were like the first, not just in our industry, but in many industries, to do what we now know as a webinar. Back then, there weren't no such things. There were teleconferences back then where you would get people that you know had teleconferences and trained people that way. But then uh a couple companies came out with webinar software. We were a beta tester for one of them, and we started this webinar deal. And uh one ended up what ended up happening there is we found out very early that rather than be really aggressive with our marketing message and so forth, if we will just provide quality education to the industry at large, we will gain people's trust and their ears will open up to other messages that we've we've got. And frankly, that's how we built our business is is through that, through educational marketing. And uh it really worked well. I'm sure in today's day and age it probably works as well or better.

John Wheeler: 10:25

Yeah, I'm thinking I'm thinking of my 12-year-old son that watches YouTube and watches his favorite YouTubers, and they say, Oh, you know, go go check out Prime Energy Drink or whatever, and that's the only thing that he wants to drink because somebody said it, but they give him all this other other fun stuff. I don't know if it's educational, but yeah, the same things there. Uh-huh. Um, you know, you also use consultative selling is a phrase that I got written down here um to describe there's a transition in the industry, and the consultative selling is kind of the phrase you use to describe that. Tell me about that.

Tim Musch: 11:03

Yeah, well, the side of the business that I'm on and our product paradigm vendo is on is on the retail side of the business. So, in other words, what the tool does is it helps people in their presentation when they're in front of homeowners, you know, to give them the information they need to make the best decision for them. And uh over the years, and as mentioned, I've been in a business quite a few years, and it it's still it still exists today. There's been a lot of sales techniques and things such as that that are I don't know how to describe them, you know, probably not centered on the customer as much as they should be. In other words, salespeople are trained to go through you know a scripted methodology to get to a close and then they learn all these closes and all that. And don't misunderstand, I'm not saying that's bad stuff. It's not at all. But I think really what's what's really resonating now is when you get in front of a prospect when you're selling them home improvements in this case, if you have their best interest at heart first, you're gonna do great. You know, and I just I'm thinking, for example, I saw a a bunch of research done recently by an organization that analyzed twenty-five thousand presentations and determined the optimal uh talk-listen ratio between a salesperson and the prospect. And that ratio was fifty-three percent prospect and forty-seven percent salesperson. That's optimum. Is that the way it really is? No. But more common out there is the salesperson just insists on yapping, talking futures, benefits, features, benefits, and all that. Not bad, but rather than really doing proper needs assessments and finding out what does this person really want and need, so I can tailor our solution to them so that we can gain that trust that's so necessary to have them want to do business with us. So consultative selling, so important.

John Wheeler: 13:16

You mentioned you know, that's the way that it's going moving to now. Um and I would imagine that as far as like technology is concerned, there's kind of uh, you know, lots of technology and then it maybe goes away. What have you seen over the years for like the phases that that's that's gone through?

Tim Musch: 13:33

Well, as mentioned earlier, when I gave you the story about training the first aid people, back then technology wasn't even here at all. But then it went through a bunch of phases. Next thing that came up is things like QuickBooks, things such as that, and people dove in, and then of course it's Excel and learning all that. And um, you have early adopters to all this stuff, and then you have people that kind of lag behind. But what's really interesting now is I think we're at a place right now that in many ways you could you could feel is similar to when I started when there was virtually no technology in the industry. Because what we're what these guys are are dealing with right now is all this AI stuff. And that's as foreign to them right now than the computer was back when I got started back in the 80s. Yep. So it's kind of interesting that we kind of went like technology, technology, technology, bang, we get AI, and now everybody's like, ah, you know, everybody's talking about tech stacks and stuff like that. You know, and that's a very interesting concept. I think probably what's more normal out there in many of these companies' business is they have a tech pile. They have all these unrelated pieces of software, and every one of them says, Oh, yeah, we integrate with that one and that one and that one and that one. And yeah, the integrations are not the best in most cases.

John Wheeler: 15:01

I imagine I envision just a bunch of different magazines all over the floor. They all say that's the best, and they all say that do this to be successful, and but the you know, men's health doesn't go into architectural digests, it doesn't go into National Geographic or whatever it is.

Tim Musch: 15:18

Yep. You know, so so people really have got to you know use their heads when it comes to all this AI stuff. And also when they're developing the proper tech stack, sequencing is so important. Sometimes I get that backwards. You know, there's some software out there, pretty popular software. Uh a couple of companies, Rilla Voice and Zero and companies like that. What they'll do is just use your phone and they'll record a salesperson's presentation with a prospect in a home. And then using AI, it's it provides benefits just like a ride-along with a sales manager going with them. It can find things and dig things out of the presentation that they did well, that they didn't do well, and all that kind of stuff. But that's on the back end. It's too late. Right. You know, and I'm not saying that stuff isn't useful because it is, but sequencing your tech in a manner that makes it make sense so you're not overwhelming your staff is so important nowadays. So a lot of thought needs to be put into that.

John Wheeler: 16:20

Yeah, I think not overloading your team and enabling them to do stuff. Um, I think is kind of a theme that you've also talked about. I think we want to end with something, you know, we've talked a lot about personal interests, you know, both like musical stuff. Um, you know, and and I mentioned not calling you old, but I mentioned, you know, that you're in the the sunset of your career. Um talk to me about your work-life balance, right? And how important it is to carve out time for whatever interest it is, um, especially heading into that twilight age.

Tim Musch: 16:52

Yeah, well, work-life balance is obviously a very important thing, and more and more people are figuring it out nowadays. Uh, so so important, you know, and when you and I get on calls, you know, and you got your camera on, I see your wall is loaded with guitars. You know, and I got a little bit of background in that space too. Um, I tell people that's where I learned everything I know about marketing back when I was in a rock band. Because I figured out everything a person should not do to be successful. Because all we did is played the stuff we wanted to play that was some deep album track, and the crowd's going, What is this stuff?

John Wheeler: 17:34

Yeah, you know, so you try to convince them that it's the best thing that they've ever heard. No, that didn't work out so well. I'm right there with you.

Tim Musch: 17:41

Yeah. But anyway, as far as you know, things now, the work-life balance. Another commercial, actually. So I'm gonna bring up another commercial. It was about four years ago watching TV. All of a sudden a chewy cat food commercial comes on TV. And I say to Mary, I say, Mary, look at that cat. It looks like it doesn't have any ears. And she goes, You're right. I've never seen a cat like that. Well, come to find out, that's a breed called a Scottish Fold, meaning their ears are folded over. And uh she got her phone out, started researching them. Next thing I know she says there's a cat show up at the Excel Center in St. Paul. Let's just go. I'd like to see one of these things. Up we go. Next thing I know, one of these Scottish Fold cats is on the way from Romania to your house. So now here we go to pick this cat up. Next thing I know, we get one from Ukraine. We got some from Russia. So the Ukraine cat and the Russian cats, they fight. Oh, yeah. But there's gonna be a peace agreement any day now, so they're gonna get along just fine here shortly. But anyway, that is fun.

John Wheeler: 18:55

Yeah.

Tim Musch: 18:56

So it's kind of interesting that two commercials in my life sent me down these two different paths.

John Wheeler: 19:02

Anyone that has anything you want to sell, just make any sort of a video and show it to Tim.

Tim Musch: 19:07

Yeah, there you go. Good point. But we love this, we breed these cats, we breed two breeds of Scottish Folds and Mean Coons, which are very popular cats as well. And we're just having a blast with that. So, you know, fortunately, a couple years ago, I was lucky enough and fortunate enough to be inducted into what's called the legends of the home improvement industry. It's only about 60 of us, and I joke with people and tell them all you gotta be is old enough and you'll get into that.

John Wheeler: 19:35

You just gotta make it that long.

Tim Musch: 19:36

But now I have a new goal. I want to be a legend in the cat breeding and selling business. So that's next in line for me.

John Wheeler: 19:44

Awesome. Well, good luck with that, and thanks for being on.

Tim Musch: 19:47

You're welcome. It was fun. Thanks for the invite. Cool.

John Wheeler: 19:51

Thanks for joining us on the Paradigm Industry Insiders podcast. If you enjoyed today's conversation, be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast platforms and follow Paradigm on LinkedIn and YouTube to catch more stories, insights, and ideas from your peers across our industry. See y'all.