Shed Geek Podcast

The Future of Shed Sales Is Just a Click Away

• Shed Geek Podcast • Season 5 • Episode 42

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What happens when two shed industry innovators join forces? A digital revolution that's reshaping how Americans shop for outdoor buildings.

In this revealing conversation, ShedHub founder Jeff shares the platform's impressive growth – now reaching 1.6 million Google search impressions monthly and welcoming a new visitor approximately every 90 seconds. These aren't casual browsers; they're serious shed shoppers actively searching for their next building.

Shannon announces his new role as part-owner of ShedHub, creating a powerful partnership between Shed Geek and the leading online shed marketplace. This collaboration aims to bridge the gap between traditional shed dealers and the growing population of digital-first shoppers who begin their buying journey online.

The discussion tackles common objections head-on, explaining why ShedHub complements rather than competes with platforms like Facebook Marketplace. At roughly $40 per location monthly, the investment pays for itself with just one or two additional sales per year while delivering targeted visibility far beyond a dealer's typical geographic range.

Looking toward the future, Shannon and Jeff explore how the shed industry's digital landscape continues evolving. They emphasize that embracing online marketplaces doesn't diminish the importance of physical lots but rather extends a dealer's reach to customers who might never discover them otherwise. As younger generations increasingly shop online first, having a strong digital presence becomes not just an advantage but a necessity.

Ready to get your sheds in front of thousands of serious buyers? Contact Shannon today to learn how this powerful partnership can transform your shed business's online presence and connect you with customers you're currently missing.

For more information or to know more about the Shed Geek Podcast visit us at our website.

Follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube at the handle @shedgeekpodcast.

To be a guest on the Shed Geek Podcast visit our website and fill out the "Contact Us" form.

To suggest show topics or ask questions you want answered email us at info@shedgeek.com.

This episodes Sponsors:
Studio Sponsor: Union Grove Lumber

LuxGuard
Making Sales Simple
Digital Shed Builder
Ifab
NewFound Solutions

Shed Geek:

Okay, welcome back to another episode of the Shed Geek podcast. Nerves on high today for everybody around our area because it is April 2nd, we are in Metropolis, we're actually in our new office and while it's not completely finished out we've got a long way to go We've at least moved in here and out of our house into an old church. So, yeah, pretty significant and maybe unusual for a business, maybe unusual for a business.

Shed Geek:

But everybody's nerves are on high today because we've got some pretty significant severe weather coming through Catastrophic storms and tornadoes and followed up by biblical flooding. So that's life today. But we know who's in control. So, um, we will either endure here longer or we will be with him sooner. One of the two, that's the way it goes around my mind, uh. But I'm here with a, a friend, a colleague, um, gosh, maybe a lot of adjectives I can use for you, all positive for the podcast. Jeff, um, just someone that I've gotten to know for a long time and very early guest of the podcast.

Shed Geek:

You would have traveled to Metropolis four years ago yeah and done a podcast about shed hub, uh, four years ago. So, who knew just what all the you know things would experience? You know, like the yeah, it's just, it's. It's kind of uh, fiction is stranger than the truth, they say, or whatever, and I feel like that's kind of been the case for some of mine in your journey, getting to know each other and work with each other throughout the industry. But, um, you are the founder and the idea man behind ShedHub. Yes, uh, which has been. I've been four years. Now we we're on year five going into the podcast. You guys are. I don't even know when did ShedHub begin?

Jeff Huxmann:

ShedHub started. Well, shedhub. com started right around the time COVID was hitting the United States. So winter of 2020, spring of 2020 is sort of when we went live, but we weren't really advertising ourselves a whole lot at that point. We were just brand new. We didn't have a huge following on the website, but that's when we launched, and so, as a website that's designed to promote sheds, everybody was selling sheds, just fine, without Shed Hub.

Shed Geek:

What a time During the COVID era.

Jeff Huxmann:

You know people really didn't need to advertise or anything like that. So, we sort of laid low, didn't do a whole lot in that first year or so.

Shed Geek:

Yeah, I definitely remember you telling us about it and then coming down and doing the interview with me and Kyle, um and um, it was an interesting thought. We went out to eat, uh, and and I just remember it being a very interesting thing Um, we were working more in rent to own at that time, so we had kind of like moved away from shed sales. Like imagine that we decide to quit selling sheds the year that COVID happens, when sheds flew off the shelf, rent-to-own at that time. So we had kind of like moved away from shed sales, like imagine that we decide to quit selling sheds the year that covid happens, when sheds flew off the shelf with not much effort whatsoever. And then, of course, you must be an equal uh glutton for punishment because you start a shed sales right, pipeline, right, basically a lead generation tool right, right in the middle of a time where people are saying I don't need help selling sheds, I need help building sheds. Okay, do you have a shed hub builder?

Shed Geek:

right, exactly um so yeah, it was. I mean, um, it was definitely. I feel like it's one of those things that the industry didn't get the opportunity to embrace, much like today, where you hear the opposite story of we're buckling down, we're increasing marketing, we're increasing other efforts to be able to get sheds in front of people. And I think about the specific nature of the fact that it's tech. It's getting sheds in front of people who are shopping on a tech perspective and it's also using tech from an industry facing perspective. So, it's just kind of interesting the two-sided marketplace. So what? What probably the shed industry doesn't realize, is some of the success that you have had in one side of the marketplace, which has been getting in front of people yeah, yeah.

Jeff Huxmann:

So, for instance, um, this is the beginning of April and both February and March um of 2025, we got over 1.6 million impressions on google search. That's the number of times that google delivers us as an option to click on. We get a new visitor roughly every 80 90 seconds or so to shed hub.

Shed Geek:

So, there's a lot of serious shed shoppers going to the shed hub platform looking for their next building, for sure so, uh, I always mean you like to joke, laugh and talk about these different things because we kind of so involved in the shed industry, that like it's, it's. It's a different language, but when you try to reach somebody to say like, how does that help me? What does that mean? 1.6 million, I think, probably for comparison, shed, uh, Shed Geek gets you know, like 20 000 impressions. You get 1.6 million.

Shed Geek:

I'm not trying to reach the public, right, I'm trying to reach the industry, right? You know, like we talk to the industry about industry things, um, you try to do both. You try to explain to the industry. This is a tool you can use, but a bigger part that overshadows that is that you get in front of the public, which is anybody who's done marketing, if they've done any kind of ads or SEO, realizes probably from the professionals that are telling them what that takes or what kind of budget that takes. That's accomplished. That's getting even better, but it's there. So that $1.6 million is like what does?

Shed Geek:

that mean, Does that help me sell a

Jeff Huxmann:

In certain ways, it's creating brand recognition out in the general public for ShedHub, so people are more and more likely to use ShedHub as a resource. Think about when you're out looking for a new home and you type in homes near whatever city you're about to move into. And you type in homes near whatever city you're about to move into. You're probably going to get Realtor. com or Zillow, one of those marketplaces that comes up and it's aggregating all the real estate in that neighborhood in that city into one website. So, might be 20 real estate brokers serving one city, but Zillow or Realtor is going to have all those properties in one spot, so you're not necessarily going to 20 different websites to look for your next house.

Jeff Huxmann:

You're going to one, and it just makes it a nicer shopping experience for those who are looking for a home in this case. So that's sort of the similar idea with Shed Hub is people who are looking for their next accessory building can come to Shed Hub, look at everything that's available out there and learn about you, whereas they might not have never heard about you before.

Shed Geek:

Let's address some of the you know the obstacles Obstacle is the way right. You know the obstacle is the way right. You know the obstacle is the way. So embrace the obstacles.

Shed Geek:

You know, um, I put my building on shed hub. It's out there with a bunch of other buildings on shed hub. I have a response. A couple responses that come to mind for me are if it's good enough to work in the real estate world and it's good enough to work in the car world, I think that we would be miss a miss if we said can't work in the shed world? Uh, you know, of course it can. It's worked in these industries and it's worked well with auto trader. It's worked well with, you know, Zillow.

Shed Geek:

You know, um, there comes a point where the auto industry, from what I've, you know, been told in any of this research I mean we've interviewed some guys like John Grossman, you know, wrote the amazon way. He was part of Jeff Bezos team when they started amazon. Even you know what I mean, uh, and he talks about these different things and he's and you know he said it's. It's difficult in the beginning but even the car guys that didn't want to be on it saw so much value that why shouldn't you be on it? You know, unless you're going to create your own system, and then, if you do, you've got to generate that SEO. That shed hub's already done for you, and so that that's. One pushback that I would give is if it's good enough for the homes that sell every day and the cars that sell every day, it's good enough for the sheds every day.

ADVERTISMENT:

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ADVERTISMENT:

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Shed Geek:

and two.

Shed Geek:

You can't, in my opinion, like eliminate enough competition to be successful. I'll use government as an example. You can't save enough money to be wealthy. You can't save enough money to be wealthy, right? You only make a certain amount of much money. So saving is always responsible and you should do that and I encourage that. But you can't save yourself into prosperity.

Shed Geek:

You still have to earn yourself into prosperity, which is why I'm a probably a big yeah I'm not, not, I don't want to go down that road, but uh, you know, so like to me. I guess what I'm saying is like the, the point I'm trying to draw, the conclusion I'm trying to draw there is like you have competition today that you have to beat. Who puts a shed lot out, who advertises on Facebook, google? They have SEO, they have marketplace. So, you have all those things you already have to overcome. Would you treat Facebook the same way and say, ah, these guys can't put sheds on marketplace. I'm putting sheds on marketplace.

Shed Geek:

Your product and your process is what helps you win business, not the fact that you can put it on here and no one else can Right, that's my take and that's maybe too strong of an opinion, but I don't think that eliminating people off of a platform is the answer, and you having the only platform. I think it actually generates more eyeballs onto your products too.

Jeff Huxmann:

Right, Right, yeah, and you're going to get eyeballs from people who are not necessarily right in your area. Like, if you have a Google listing a good Google listing you're probably going to get decent clicks from local search within that 30 mile radius around where you are. I think where ShedHub shines is sort of going out beyond that 30 miles, going to the 80-mile radius, say, and you're going to get people finding your products that maybe live a little bit further away from you coming in and looking at your products and buying them.

Shed Geek:

So, I'm trying to think of more accolades, because we've done a couple interviews with you people, like we know what Shed Hub is maybe. I don't know, some people do. Maybe some people are still finding it. Maybe there's an awareness, um that I'm not just focusing on. Uh, you know that people are still.

Shed Geek:

I talked to someone today that was like you know, yeah, I think I have heard of that you know what is that you know and I was talking about our partnership, which we'll get into a little bit deeper as you guys continue to listen to the podcast. But, um, um, you know, what other accolades would you focus on? That has made shed hub really good. I know I make you nervous whenever I say this, but I was one thing that, when you started advertising, that I thought was very neat in comparison and in comparison to any other lead generation tool that was out there. If there's a shed listed on shed hub within like 50 miles roughly, uh, something along those lines.

Shed Geek:

Like I have people call me all the time and they and they say, uh, I can't figure out the SEO, what on earth has he done? And I'm like, well, if he told you that then he'd have no company. He's not selling that, he's selling you the product, not the cure. And the product is hey, we can get your sheds in front of people. I want to talk about the negative things and the things to overcome here in a bit, but I still want to spend a little bit of time flossing it up making it look good showing everybody why you should be on shed.

Shed Geek:

Let's talk about the good. We can talk about the bad later. Okay, what? What are other things that come to mind for you that you're just proud of, things that have worked, good things that you're excited about?

Jeff Huxmann:

well, the seo, as you mentioned. Um, we work every day on SEO and making sure that your products show up on ShedHub when people are searching.

Jeff Huxmann:

If you're near the town that someone's searching in. They type in Sheds near, whatever the town name is. We want you to get benefit out of ShedHub and that means showing up on page one on Google Search and getting your products out there. And I think we've done a good job of that and that's a never ending job to make sure that your products can show up on page one of search. So, yeah, that's something we never quit thinking about.

Shed Geek:

We're always thinking about how can we improve this and make it better for the people who are paying money to be on our platform I think it's important to point out too that this is not, we say, it's a new technology, and that's, that's fair. But the dot-com boom started in the 90s under the Clinton administration. But here we are, 35 years later. Essentially, you know, the dot, the dot-com boom's here to stay right, like you know, barring the idea that all humanity ceased to exist. It seems as though we're moving into a retail world that is embracing and I'm not saying that industry is embracing, just to be clear. I'm saying the world, the population of the world and the way they choose to shop, seems to be gearing up in more of a digital, sure, storefront not saying that that eliminates a correct brick and mortar storefront by any means whatsoever, not even suggesting that you can't do well with just a brick-and-mortar storefront.

Shed Geek:

You can do very well. I think growth and scalability is maybe a bit more difficult without sort of embracing some of the new technologies that allow you to get in front of people. Social media is a perfect example. We talked about the early bird not getting the worm. Myspace didn't get it, Facebook got it, you know. Tiktok seems to be, you know, really infiltrating that space.

Shed Geek:

Currently X just sold, you know, to its own parent company right but still an ai generated company that's going to incorporate that into social media. It's, I think, people get frustrated when they don't understand these things right, because it should be simple. You know and I think a lot of times it's just recognizing your place in history that it will be probably a little bit easier explained in 10 years or 20 years or 30 years, but the people who are on the forefront of building the rocket ship are already doing it. We'll learn about it later, right, right.

Shed Geek:

So, my mindset is ShedHub is not a new technology, it's a website. I know there's more than that, but I'm trying to convince people like this is not necessarily a new technology. It is a website that is optimized to get in front of a bunch of people. Right. And get your sheds in front of a bunch of people. That's really the mystery.

Jeff Huxmann:

It's really no different than Zillow or Autotrader or any of these other marketplaces. They're optimized to serve one particular niche product category out there and they do a really good job of it.

Shed Geek:

So, anything else before I start grilling you or we start doing the hard questions?

Jeff Huxmann:

I'm ready for whatever.

Shed Geek:

Okay, all right.

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Shed Geek:

So, I'm trying to think of, like, um, questions that people would ask, and maybe I should have just put something out before this episode. Uh, but we didn't know we were going to do this necessarily until last week. So, uh, I guess. I guess what I'm thinking is what are the concerns that you have to overcome from a sales perspective on ShedHub? Yeah, that you have heard, and maybe I can bring up some that I've heard and then like just address them head on, because I think the humility in that is appreciated. Sure, you know what, what. What are things that have you feel like have uh stagnated at any of its success at a higher level?

Jeff Huxmann:

I think, um, you know there's Facebook Marketplace out there and you can list buildings for no cost and that's great. It's a tool that people should use. And so, people might say, oh well, I'm already listing on Marketplace for no cost, why should I use ShedHub? That costs a little bit, and I guess think about all the different advertising that you pay for. You know you might get print ads, you might do Facebook, uh, paid ads, you might do google paid ads. You know there's still advertising dollars being spent and Facebook marketplace is great. You should use it, um, but you know this is a paid advertising channel, if you want to call it that, and we try to be very reasonable in cost. It's, you know, roughly 40 per location per month it's, you know, roughly 40 per location per month.

Shed Geek:

So, one sale, I mean one sale annually, at a cost of six thousand dollars per average on. You know sheds, you know, uh even as a, as a dealer who's a 10, you know commission structure, you know, uh, 600 bucks. So, you sold one shed off of it.

Jeff Huxmann:

You've broke even right for the year you, you know two sheds and you've made money.

Jeff Huxmann:

Right, exactly, and just think about how much you spend on Google or meta ads during the course of a year or a month. It could easily exceed that. Um, so you know, I don't encourage people to not use other channels. I just think this is another avenue to get leads. You're getting people who are serious about buying a shed. These people visiting Shed Hub are serious about buying a shed, and so there's some value in that, and so you know, and it takes money to run a company. Yeah, so you can't do it for free.

Shed Geek:

Well, I would even add people on marketplace.

Shed Geek:

You know it's tax time, so a lot of times tax dollars are out there and it's like they're just scrolling through Facebook marketplace and they see a shed and they're like we really need one, but there's a new motorcycle or there's a four-wheeler or whatever the distractions the distractions you don't have that because they're staying on a shed specific site.

Shed Geek:

So, if they are impulsive or looking to spend, you know, a tax return or save money or whatever it is, uh, they're, they're more inclined and more likely to stay in the area of which you want them to be, which is on your website, on the sheds. And then there's tons of data that you gather as well from you know, just them being on the website, where they go, what they're looking for, what they do, what they're interested in. Um, you know, all, all any major marketing outlets are going to be able to utilize and clone and, and, and you know, like, understand that data and use that data for the purpose of, uh, you know, uh, making for a better shopping experience for the customer overall. But, um, you know, I've never imagined telling someone don't use something that will work right for them to sell sheds.

Shed Geek:

It's a wild kind of like thought in the shed industry. I think that there's some territorial things that exist, uh, in the shed industry, based off of the way that it has just been established as a industry over the years, and I think part of that comes with a mentality that's like uh, I have to, you have to fail for me to succeed. We couldn't possibly both succeed together. You know, I don't know why that exists. It's probably more of a just like business acumen to you have to fail for me to succeed. We couldn't possibly both succeed together. I don't know why that exists. It's probably more of a business acumen mentality in general. But, yeah, it's one of those things where use it. But Facebook has made it clear that for businesses, they want you to spend money. You can use marketplace for free, but the algorithm is manipulated right, even on your personal page it's manipulated, um, and they admit that that's not something that they like hide from. They're like yes, if you create a uh business page right.

Shed Geek:

We are going to suppress the algorithm because we want you using the Facebook ads manager. We want you spending money and then working those leads inside of that. If you want to test that out, any of you who have created a personal page and watched your growth and friend suggestions or things like that versus creating a business page, it kind of falls flat. You just don't see as much interaction without spending dollars. Now if you were to go create a private Facebook group, the algorithm is pretty open, right? You know they make suggestions to people all the time. That's how many of you find Shed Sales Professionals or Shed Haulers page or whatever it is that's out there. So, to me, Facebook has already made it clear we're a business and if you're a business, we want you to spend money to be profitable on here. You can be successful on Marketplace, but it is limited in terms of your total potential.

Jeff Huxmann:

Sure. Also, one perhaps advantage of ShedHub is your listings automatically renew and your marketplace listings you have to go in and click buttons to get them to pop up again. I forget the time period, but every so many days you have to go in and renew your listings there, so there's some time savings there too yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I get it.

Shed Geek:

Uh, other things that you've just kind of heard uh, reasons for why ShedH ub may not be for me, or people who have even already tried it and said, oh, maybe that wasn't for me.

Jeff Huxmann:

I think if you know buying into the platform takes time too. You have to upload your inventory and take the time to do it. You're not going to get leads if you don't have inventory in there. And the people who are currently using it I would encourage them to add new products every couple of days, because our algorithm within ShedHub is going to favor new content and new things. So, if someone's out there shopping over the course of a week and they come back to ShedHub several times during the week, they're going to see what was newly posted, they're going to see something different, and so but you just got to use the platform.

Jeff Huxmann:

It's one thing to just spend a little bit of money, but you actually have to put in the time. We also have integrations, however. So, if you're using, say, Shed Suite or you're using RTO Nationals DMS, we've also created custom integrations with other proprietary inventory systems. We can bring that data from those systems into ShedHub so that your dealers don't have to re-upload everything into ShedHub, which is a huge time saving. So, twice a day, we'll ping your inventory system and look for a new inventory and bring it into shed hub automatically, and that's a huge time savings you do see you know, tech's always improving, apple's making improvements.

Shed Geek:

I have to update my phone regularly, even with a new phone. Um, I'm sure it's the same for shed hub. I know it is in fact, and occasionally something will break. Happens with apple, happens all the way down the line. Um, I guess my question to you is what encourages you when something breaks?

Jeff Huxmann:

if something breaks and you get five different phone calls. It says shed hub is down, or shed hub's not working, or this is that's to me. Uh, I want to fix it right away first of all. But it also tells me people use it and need it for sales. Um, so you, you never want technology to go down, but when it does and you start getting a flood of calls, you know, oh, okay, this, this is important to people to have it up and running. So that's encouraging to me. When I hear people saying, yeah, I, I couldn't access it 10 minutes ago, I said, okay, yeah, we're on it, it'll be up in five minutes, or something like that. You know, I don't mind getting those calls. It means people are paying attention.

Shed Geek:

Yeah, really good.

ADVERTISMENT:

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Shed Geek:

Time's flying by, so I want to segue. We've talked all about the good, the bad, or, and we welcome, to be clear, any, any calls, any emails, any concerns. Um, even if, if it's something you've used or you've used another program before and you say, well, it didn't work, I gave it my shot, it didn't happen, I moved on. These are programs that, if Shed Hub's not it, in five years someone else is going to create a different program that's going to be very similar to e-commerce, that's going to offer these same solutions anyway. So, like these are things that are not going away in the digital storefront, that's not to say you know, might as well use it, or else. You know I'm not trying to paint that picture.

Shed Geek:

What I am saying is, like those who embrace different things, or that's what's going to set them apart in the in the business world, and I do think that if Shed Hub fell flat on its face today and wrote up shop and left town, someone else is going to create something. So, it's like you know you want to keep going till you get it right in every situation and you learn right, you learn um. But what I want to talk about now for the second half of the podcast, with the time that we've got left, is a I don't even know what word, but a joint effort on behalf of Shed Hub and Shed Geek to make for a better user experience, both in the shed industry, which we have done a pretty fair job of reaching, and then also in the public-facing space, which you guys have done a really good job of connecting with. I'm going to let you take it, I'm going to let you have the microphone and tell you know, like the industry, your thoughts on sort of, and then I'll come in and correct you All right.

Jeff Huxmann:

Well, we're really excited to announce that shed geek is a you know a partner within shed hub and um. Shed Geek will be um, tasked with making our industry-facing presence more powerful, empowering what we do for the next foreseeable future. And then ShedHub will keep servicing the general shopping consumer. Keep doing what we're doing there. Shannon, you're going to come on as project manager. Yes, doing there. Shannon, you're going to come on as project manager. Yes, and um, you'll be working with the industry side of things a lot more and helping us out a lot. So, we're really excited for this new joint effort, this partnership, to move forward, and it'll take the shed industry to the next level, I think and this will include ownership to a degree that is being kept private for our purposes.

Shed Geek:

There's just no reason to let everybody know the details of what it is that we're working on. But you can feel comfortable knowing that we're embracing shed hub. We've advertised for them for quite some time and found some success in that, uh, using shed geek specific codes and things of that nature. But we just wanted to take that to a new, a new level where you know me buying in as owner. Ownership would sort of um synergize that. Did I just use that word?

Jeff Huxmann:

You can use that word, okay.

Shed Geek:

Synergize the effort that we're trying to create for the industry, hoping that you know, you guys see that I embrace this effort, regardless of how long it takes to make it successful, because we are now, you know, doing finance and finance and rent, own and marketing. We're pretty heavily involved. I mean, there's not a whole lot of areas left in the industry, right, uh, in a tech world outside of e-commerce. You know, um, we, we partner with many um 3d configurators, pos, crp's and guys like and guys like that, and we support them all and we think they should all do good. We are having a change of title sponsor That'll be coming up in May, so keep an eye out for that, because that is a tech space that is choosing to take that on. And, look, we encourage them, just as we've been a faithful steward to union grove lumber for three years, for their dedication and effort to what they've been doing.

Shed Geek:

Um, uh, to help sponsor the podcast. Uh, we want to make sure to offer the same, you know to the new, to the new partner who's deciding to take that space. Uh, and the tech world's tricky because not everybody does the same thing. You know, um, some of our, our partners, overlap even uh from time to time. I mean you, you, you do the occasional one-off. I got websites and different things.

Shed Geek:

So, like, you know, how can we partner with you and we offer this marketing services right as a, as a, as a um, you know uh, to the industry, um, and but we can, because I think that certain people are willing to partner, who realize that, um, it's, it's better to work collaboratively, yeah, for the benefit of not only your business but also the shed businesses you serve right, as opposed to creating a hard line and saying we're unwilling to work with this person or that person because of that situation. And it's a. I've had people tell me before it's a tightrope. You know you walk a tightrope, Shannon, and I do. I do walk a tightrope. I'll admit that. Um, I want to see everyone win. I'm also realistic enough to know not everyone will win. You know, um, we would like to win business all the time. We're also realistic enough to know that we won't always win business, uh, but we don't take that as a failure for us If we don't win business.

Shed Geek:

Uh, we've been very successful in this marketing uh agency role. Uh, in the last 18 months, uh, creating over 50, you know uh, accounts and gosh, it just makes sense to do this with shed hub because you are a lead generation tool, mm, and guess what? Marketing is trying to create lead generation and it's like why should we not be managing partners, if you will, uh, to kind of oversee this, especially as it relates to the industry itself? You get me out there in in in the world of retail that you guys do on shed hub, on the two-sided marketplace, and you tell somebody you know we partnered with shed geek. They're going to say who's that?

Shed Geek:

don't care right. You know they don't listen to my podcast every day. We don't try to get those podcast listeners. You know we go for quantity. Uh, quality over quantity we don't need 50 million people.

Shed Geek:

Who's going to listen in on a podcast to find out about shed industry and the inner workings of it? But we do try to make it entertaining and talk about life and people's business and not just try to sell somebody something all the time. Albeit, we're trying to sell you something today, aren't we? We're trying to sell you a shed hub. I believe in it because I understand the tech well enough to see how profound 1.6 million impressions is, and for anyone who does understand it, they would get that too. But as a project manager, there's just a few things that we wanted to start to do to sort of like build and instill the confidence in the industry. If there's any that's been lost, we want to regain it. If there's any that hasn't been found, we want to break, make awareness of it, and the one thing that that I noticed almost immediately in connecting with you is your SEO is working amazing. The problem is sometimes people don't know when they're getting leads from ShedHub. Sure, would

Jeff Huxmann:

mean we post your website address, we post your phone number, we post links to your 3D configurator. So unless you have a really, really good way to track that on your own, those clicks and things like that, it might be hard to know that ShedHub was one of the many touch points that people use to find your products and you know if you have a ring to number that you can put into ShedHub to track calls coming in that might benefit you.

Jeff Huxmann:

But if it's the same number that you're posting everywhere, you might not know where they found your phone number originally, and so we have lead generation forms on the website. We'll know exactly who found you how through ShedHub. But a lot of times I get calls all the time that say, yeah, jeff, I just sold a shed off of ShedHub and I didn't see the lead come in.

Jeff Huxmann:

There's no record in our database. So, to me that says okay, someone found your number and called you and that's good, that's what we want to. There's not always a direct connect back to shed hub unless you get those anecdotal uh statements from different sellers. So, we know it's, it's working, um, and people are getting visibility on their products you know, 90 of the population's using a smartphone now.

Shed Geek:

You see the phone number and you click on it. The salesperson's not going to take the time to be like. You know. Even if they do, they're not going to grill them. And the truth is, the customer may be unaware, they're just shopping. They don't even know what website they've landed on. They've clicked a page because google suggested it. Google is suggesting ai is even suggesting correct shed hub now as a uh, primary outlet of places to find sheds. Correct. The whole purpose of google is to be an information source. That's why it says you know 1.7896, 37 million. You know options in 3.2 seconds, you know, or whatever it is like. You know based off what you search. I need water. Well, they, they're going to find the, the best suggested water source near you, times whatever. And you're going to go through all these different pages. Well, we all know everybody stops after the first page. I mean, sometimes you go to second or third, maybe, if you just really are, you know, desperate for water or whatever it is you're looking for, uh, but with sheds they don't. They don't spend a whole lot of time. And then the sales people don't spend a whole lot of time saying where'd you find this lead? Where'd it? We need to measure our ROI. No, it's a barrier to entry for the customer to get a shed. They're just like, hey, how can I help you? So, they're not really worried about how it came in.

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Shed Geek:

What we're going to attempt to do with our connection, you know, uh and our tools at shed geek marketing as part of this process is tie in some of those analytics to be able to show people the value of ShedHub and just exactly not only how useful it is already, but how much more useful it can become. And here's the beauty of it. You know Maya Angelou, yes, said that right. She says creativity is a funny thing the more of it you use, the more of it you have, well, ShedHub's kind of similar. So, the more you guys post, the more things get seen. So, it's actually beneficial as you guys embrace it and you say you know, um, well, I was on it, but I didn't get a lead. It's like, well, actually, the more you use it, the more leads you'll get, and the more other people use it, the more leads it'll get. So, I guess what I'm saying is it only has growth potential to go up, because you're already seeing natural growth from an impression side, with or without those listings. So, with those listings, it will only increase the SEO value to the point to where I mean I already know that ShedHub's SEO is outperforming many, many websites.

Shed Geek:

Uh, most let's be honest, most websites, because we get those calls and we're in marketing enough to know that we sell SEO packages to people and they're like you know, how do you get us there?

Shed Geek:

And we're like, yeah well, you know, Jeff and ShedHub sure have the secret figured out, because they're everywhere right. And it's like yeah, well, that's what we want to do with you, which, in turn, limits the amount of spending you have to do on google ads and Facebook ads. So, whenever you say things like I don't want to spend more money, it's like cool, increase your SEO value. And you won't have to, because you'll start getting organic traffic based off search results. ShedHub's already doing that, with or without sheds. The thing is we need subscriptions, and there's a couple other things that we're going to create. I don't know that we want to talk about them too much today, but I'll mention them in this way. I'll mention them in this way. There will be a yeah it's okay.

Shed Geek:

There will be a model that will exist outside of the subscription model that we aim to create. And, from a industry perspective, why on earth would I not pull on your SEO value while I'm already selling advertising? So, for those of you who are advertising with us, hey, let's talk. Maybe we can get you onto ShedHub and create this other entire stream of you to get in front of people. And obviously it's probably best for products and services that are aftermarket, to be honest with you, but that doesn't mean that you can't help by getting in front of people. We get in front of people now. ShedHub's just going to get in front of more people. The hard part's going to be the branding. ShedHub's already branded and it's branded to not just the industry, whether that brand name is excellent or whether it's just okay. Brand name is excellent or whether it's just okay, um, but from an SEO perspective, it's excellent whenever it comes to the public facing uh.

Shed Geek:

So we're going to have to be creative on on this, this co-branding effort as far as shed hub and and shed geek collaboration. What are your thoughts? I'm babbling.

Jeff Huxmann:

Oh, you're fine, I'm excited for it. I think this will be a new chapter for us, a new chapter for the shed industry. So many people come to the internet first to start their shopping journey and they're going to learn about you online and then come out and visit the lot and make a purchasing decision, and so it's just important that the shed industry embrace the Internet and go where people are looking for sheds, which is online. I think a majority of people start their auto shopping journey online.

Jeff Huxmann:

Um uh, and so it's just a trend that's going to keep growing and growing as this younger generation grows up and becomes shed buyers and accessory building buyers. Everything's headed towards digital age.

Shed Geek:

No, I agree. Uh, we're. We're just in that weird place in history where we're, we're the middle children of what seems like both of these things in many ways, like they both still work. Uh, are there models that work brick and mortar only absolutely. Are there models that work digital? Only absolutely. Who's doing it best? Probably those who are able to do both and then scale it. You can figure out how to scale that, uh, and there are some that that are, and I think a lot of that comes back to branding and conversations we've had on branding uh I don't care to share my thoughts even deeper on that.

Shed Geek:

Um, for anybody who wants to know, we've got thoughts and opinions on it. For those who call in and seek to work with us, something I want to do, uh, deemed project manager, hate the title, ceo or whatever you want to call it, but as project manager, one of the things that that interests me first is making it, making it easy, make it simple to sign up for someone who says, okay, I'll give it a whirl, you know? Hey, uh, you know we're month to month, we're month to month, but you know, for, for, for $39 a month, for 480 bucks or less. You know, give it 12 months give it a shot.

Shed Geek:

You sell one shed. You broke even. Obviously, you don't want to just break even, but you sell two. You've actually made money. So, it's actually really low risk in comparison to the many alternatives, sure you know, to getting your sheds in front of people online. Um, so I want to make it simple. So for those who are like I tried to sign up in the past or there was complicated, just know, call me directly, we'll do whatever. We'll get the people on the phone to get you signed up, get you onboarded, get it figured out or whatever. But just know that we're working on a process to just make it simple, make it easy, clutter-free.

Shed Geek:

You understand the website well. We're kind of going back through that a little bit to make it just more user-friendly. We want the program to be user friendly as a whole. It already works is the beauty of it. It's just a matter of tying in some of these different things, like the analytics, to show, hey, this person actually clicked on your phone number and that was a lead you got from here if you ended up selling that shed. We don't. It's not that we need credit, we need the subscription. You pay for the subscription. We consider us even. We're not trying to get more of the sale right, yeah, there's no commission.

Shed Geek:

There's no commission on it. So, it's like, man, this is really really really simple. Um, the beauty is, if you're an independent 1099 contractor, you can sign up and list your inventory on this today. Yeah, uh, you know, like I can't imagine I have seen this where you know there's more company influence that says, you know, don't use this program, do use that program, and it's. It's just kind of an interesting thought to me. Sometimes it's hard for me to digest and get through all of it. But, dude, I've said from the beginning I love your. You know, I've always enjoyed it. We've stayed friends through a lot of different things that the industry will probably never know about, and I've always enjoyed your tech brain. Thank you.

Shed Geek:

To be able to come on and my tech brain may be lacking where your sales initiative may be lacking, and we've somehow figured out how to right orient those together correct, and it's worked out really, really, really well

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Shed Geek:

Yeah, thoughts or questions for me, or thoughts or questions, just anything for the industry that you would want to put out there. This is a first adventure. This, this podcast, it's April 2nd, I don't know, it might not even come out till May. We've got some other partners in this that we may bring in on a podcast eventually, correct? Uh, that we want to, you know, talk about help build the, the stability of just the user friendliness of it and the overall effectiveness of shed hub um via shed geek. However, you want to say that we still got some of some language there to figure out um, but I am an owner now yes, congratulations so yeah, we're gonna make it work.

Jeff Huxmann:

We gotta make it work, right, yes, but just thoughts, thoughts that you have just for people, or questions for me, or anything I guess a question for you would be where do you think the digital is going for the shed industry over the next two, three years?

Shed Geek:

You know, um, good, good question. Um, obviously it's as you said. Younger generations are going to continue to embrace things more and further. Um, obviously, social media is a big thing. You know a lot of people don't realize, like Instagram and other areas is almost used as a search engine. Tiktok is almost used as a search engine. So, whenever you start thinking about you know youtube is the second largest search engine. You know essentially, so what what's on the surface may not be.

Shed Geek:

There's just so many changes. You know intuit, buying things, oracle buying things. You know google uh, essentially getting out of the URL game, selling that to squarespace, which is a pos kind of an interesting thought when you just watch all of these things happen. There's obviously things that are happening at this higher level, uh, with people who have way more money than me, who are making way bigger decisions for our future in tech. So, the only thing we can do is operate within what we have control of. We can't really operate outside of that. But seeing social media being used more like a search engine, if somebody wants to find where to go find an ice cream shop and they're teenagers and they find it through TikTok, they don't necessarily Google ice cream shop near me. That's interesting, you know.

Shed Geek:

So, when you say digital, I would say you know, younger generations are choosing to rent more than buy, you know. So that's an interesting trend because, guess what? We rent buildings. That works out perfect, right? You know so, if you don't want ownership and the beauty is, you can have ownership at some point Maybe there's a rent-to-rent market happening at some point instead of a rent-to-own market, I don't know. Maybe they don't want to be responsible for the repair you know, I don't know or the upkeep, or something like that. Who knows what business opportunities it's going to spawn for people who are creative, dedicated and just want to make it happen, kind of personality. Um, I do believe the digital world's just going to get bigger.

Shed Geek:

Probably my biggest thing is like how are you branding to some of these big companies? You know I don't like to give all of our information away or whatever, but you know, I just can't imagine they would continue to open up, shed lots and then try to rebrand two to three different brands. That's pretty wild, because that's really limiting their SEO value, their ad budget, and we've kind of signed on a role as a bit of a consultation partner in some ways, we actually do some consultation for a few different companies. More so not because we had an organized consultative company, but more so because they just begin to ask and it was like, hey, you're getting into the point to where we got to charge you for information. So, we got to create something here, like we're friendly but we need to make a living too, right? So, um, I just think you know it's.

Shed Geek:

It's interesting to watch the digital storefront play out at a bigger level. Graphic design is getting way more robust. It's really impressive at like what these websites are starting to see. You'll see a new shed geek marketing site here coming out soon. So, we're going to start to separate the sites because the business opportunities are getting big enough now to where we need to be able to work cohesively but also autonomously. Um, and the graphics are going to be just dynamic on the website. It's going to be awesome. So, look forward to that, and that's what we're trying to create for you guys too. Whenever you call in um, it's here to stay. I mean, it's here to stay. You said it yourself.

Shed Geek:

People start their car buying journey there and that might not look like the same for everybody. That might not look like, let me it might be. Where is this BMW? Is there one of these located closest to me? Or it also might be? What's the average cost of that? That's still starting, and sometimes that's what people come to shed up for is to find out. Well, what is the average price of a shed? Is this guy totally gigging me over here on this? You know, 10 by 12? Or is it in line with most? 10 by 12s, right? And then people might get on there and they might be like man, this one's $3,000 more. But my goodness, look at the stuff on it.

Jeff Huxmann:

There's no Kelly Blue Book on a it. There's no Kelly blue book on a shed. There's no Kelly blue book.

Shed Geek:

Yeah, we need to create a shed geek blue book. There's no, yeah, there's no. They just you know when, when, when lumber prices spike, during COVID, you know one of my favorite people in the industry told me.

Shed Geek:

he said you know, our salespeople were so worried about this increase because that increase ultimately gets passed on to the consumer. Let's be honest, you know, and he said the thing is, though, that lumber for them to build sheds costs the same for me. So, if our sheds $5,000, it's not going to be $2,000 down the road it's going to be 49, 95 or 5,100 or something.

Jeff Huxmann:

You know what I mean.

Shed Geek:

Like it's, we're going to be close, right, it's really just at that point. It's about execution. You know, how soon can we get it? What's our process is like how simple can we make it? Are we good salespeople? Can we close all these different things? Do we have what they want? Can we build what they want? Can we use a 3d builder builder to show them what they want? It's all these start.

Shed Geek:

Things start to come into into play, but he's like the reality is, though, my shed is going to cost about the same as their shed down the road, so we don't have to overcome the prices as a company. We have to overcome it as an industry, and we're probably going to start seeing some of that with tariffs and different things and think about how it affects steel. And you know carports, and you know I keep thinking to myself like how big does this thing get right? Because, like, I know guys that are doing like well, we do 90 metal sheds, and I'm like why don't you have a roll former? I'm like, oh my gosh, do I need to start going to the roll forming shows? Do I need to get involved in that very deep so that I'm educated enough on it to be able to explain and then suggest a row former maybe, or a cost or something. It just for me there's no shortage.

Shed Geek:

Whenever people say the shed industry small, I'm like well, it's as. It's as small as you want it to be based off of your ambition, and it's as big as you want it to be based off your ambition. So good, good question, and I like to ramble. So more questions, more thoughts. We're 55 minutes in. I got a few minutes.

Jeff Huxmann:

If you're just something you really want to share or no, I'm good we go home and get in a bunker so that we don't get blown away right yeah, uh, no, I what, what's?

Shed Geek:

what's your thoughts? I mean, what do you? What do you? Where do you see the industry going the most? What are the things that stick out to you the most?

Jeff Huxmann:

I think people just need to pay more and more attention to leads coming in from all sources, not just Shed Hub, but, you know, being responsive to leads that come in using a CRM. If you've got a team making sure that someone's on top of your salespeople, make sure they're using it, because a lot of people shopping online are going to want quick response times. If you can respond within five minutes, that's super, super important. And so don't just think of yourselves. Nobody should really think of themselves as a brick and mortar only. I mean, there's always going to be this digital aspect to bring those customers into you, and it's just going to become more and more important. And you were mentioning search and how some of these social media channels are big on search, and you mentioned YouTube. I think Instagram is a big search engine now too, as well. So, there's all these different areas where you just sort of need to have a presence and your marketing team needs to start thinking about those sorts of things.

Shed Geek:

What's really amazing to me is like and I know it's it's kind of like we could maybe because it's been proven, but the, the I've seen some of the company numbers and like what they'll drop on a new shed lot, like that blink of an eye want to think about it.

Shed Geek:

Yep, let's go spend that money big dollars, big dollars, and it's like half of that in a digital presence would, would, would net you way more. And it's like because it's not proven or they don't trust it or don't understand it or whatever the reason. It's kind of like, man, it's not the spending of the money that is the issue, it's the confidence of where to spend it, isn't it? And it's like if you would just really drop that on a digital storefront and then, and then of course, there's like you know this, this wholesomeness to the industry. That's like a dedication to a dedication to their dealer network.

Shed Geek:

And I admire that.

Shed Geek:

And I love that and I'm like well, that's completely true. Isn't there also a dedication to the vendor who's bringing you free sheds to sell with essentially no accountability if you don't, and if you don't sell for them, do they not have the right to figure out how to sell? And with the digital storefront being able to offer so much like? The truth is, I know I know some, some companies that have, like, endured a lot in keeping certain dealers, you know, and it's like wow, you probably don't see that in most other industries. It's much more cutthroat and I'm glad that we're not that at the same time, I couldn't do this and you couldn't do what you do, and none of the listeners could do what they do without making money. It's about where is your heart on making that money? We have to make money, everyone has to make money, and I think any reasonable business person understands that. I think that those who don't occasionally message me and they're like man, you shouldn't have got into this, nah, you shouldn't be doing that, you know, and I'm like, oh my gosh, you know, like I'm sorry that it's, it's worked out, but we, we, we encourage you to do things too Like you know, we don't want to limit you in any way, shape or form and we'd ask that you don't limit us. You know Got to make money. The more that we're given, the more that we can give away. You know I hope I always maintain that mindset. So, it's not just about living some, some high life or something. So, we're thankful for the opportunity that God's given us. And look, this podcast is his, this endeavor is his. If it doesn't work out, then you know, so be it. If it does work out, then he gets all the credit. So, I'm excited that we're finally working together and I can call myself an owner of Shed Hub. So, for those of you who want to talk to an owner, give me a holler and we'll try to get you through it and know that we have your best interest in mind in every one of our meetings. We meet every week more than every week. We have a big phone call every Monday and then we meet several times throughout the week to steady this process. Hope that you guys will embrace it. If you've ever in any way, shape or form, thought about helping yourselves, it's 39 a month. If you thought about helping me, it's 39 a month. Thought about helping your customers 39 a month to get on shed hub. So, uh, give us a holler. We'll try to continue to build and instill more confidence in this uh collaboration and this partnership.

Shed Geek:

I'm super excited about it and really excited about being able to put it out on the air. Um, nothing else, I'm good. I'm going to say a prayer because of all the anxiety that exists today for the bad weather that is coming into our area, including terrible rains afterwards. Me and you have some really awesome meetings tomorrow we'd like to be able to attend and get to if the weather is cooperative. Uh and uh, I just, you know I feel the anxiety something that we did recently.

Shed Geek:

Uh, we actually purchased a what's called a safe shed. For those of you who want to go look it up, it's located in Salem, Illinois. Um, no disrespect to those people, but they know nothing about the shed industry, because they build a concrete bunker basically for as a storm shelter, and we purchased one, so we're probably going to go get in it here soon. Uh and uh, I encourage people to take a look at if they travel all across the United States. I'm not a paid spokesman. I don't make a dime off of this. I just thought it was a really cool thing and if it's a way to provide safety and security for you, as it will be about 11 people here for us in the next couple hours um, go take a look at it, tell them shed geek sent you and I'll say who's that? I have no idea who it is, uh, so, um, I'll just, I'll just pray over the industry and safety, if that's okay.

Shed Geek:

Uh, lord, thank you for this day.

Shed Geek:

Um, I'll be at a weary and dreary day. Uh, full of anxiety and worry about weather and tornadoes and just all the unrest and rain and flooding and things of that nature. Ask that you would just calm the storm and ask that you would be with us through it, guide us, protect us and see us through it, help us to help our neighbors, help us to help others, as you've helped us, protect us all, and tonight and the next few days of severe weather. Those across the country that experience these same things, um, ask that you would continue to bless our industry, keeping you in the mix of all that we do and not letting us forget that, in the name of chasing a dollar or um, just seeking riches, it's um, it's your money, it's your business, it's your industry, after all, and, uh, something you'd continue to, let us be vessels of doing good with it. So we thank you, we thank you for your son that you sent to die for our sins, and, uh, I give you all the honor and glory in Jesus' name Amen.