Dirk de Jager’s success story coming from a small town in South Africa to becoming a lucrative business owner was not an easy feat. While he managed to complete a Masters Degree in Structural Engineering which created a great foundation for growth, Dirk’s achievements came from a completely different skill set. After having built and scaled not one, not two, but 3 multi-million dollar businesses, it’s safe to say Dirk’s success was not luck. We had the opportunity to learn about his journey as a business owner, and his advice for those looking to take their business to the next level.
Dirk’s first venture into the business world began with door-to-door sales, where he started a subscription model e-commerce business. After hustling on his feet for 18 months, Dirk went on to sell that business and start an SAAS (Software as a Service) company. To his surprise, the SAAS business would require a tremendous amount of startup capital. To get the cash flow needed for this venture, Dirk started a digital marketing agency, taking more of his time and focus. A short hiatus working on super yachts helped the young entrepreneur reset and realize he did not want to work for someone else, and there was more out there to accomplish himself. This journey led Dirk to High-Ticket Virtual Closing full-time, putting in long 14-18 hours a day back in South Africa. Within his first 5 months as a Virtual Closer, he was earning above $40,000 a month in net commissions and became known as one of the best Virtual Closers in the high-ticket industry. He moved his way up to close on a $50,000 high-ticket offer and made $121,000 in net commissions on his best month. After that, Dirk decided to train other individuals on how to become top 1% Virtual Closers and Virtual Appointment Setters, leading him to launch the Virtual Sales Academy which helps people to create a full-time income while working completely remote.
Never Quit: Don’t Let Adversity Get The Best Of You
At the start of his journey, Dirk was living in a third world country, with a degree he no longer felt passionate about. Multiple attempts at starting a business were struggling to remain profitable and he felt completely lost, despite finding some success and being able to sell one of his businesses. Ending up back in South Africa, enduring long days of work often without electricity for hours at a time was daunting to say the least. On top of that, he was warned entering an already saturated market would be extremely competitive and likely to fail. Despite these hardships, Dirk kept his head up, and kept pushing forward. His number 1 advice for individuals looking for success is: where there’s a will, there’s a way. Success does not happen overnight and if you don’t quit, it’s impossible to fail.
Analyze Success And Multiply It
After learning what he could be successful doing, Dirk then applied that concept in multiples. First, he focused on becoming a Virtual Closer increasing his virtual closing commissions until the concept proved itself to be lucrative enough that Dirk was convinced it could help others too. Taking the expertise he learned along the way, he created a program to help others do the same – Virtual Sales Academy. Diving deeper into the business model, Dirk saw that businesses across countless industries could use help in getting qualified appointments and closed leads. This led to the creation of Client 2 Calendar, a B2B model offering a solution to generate booked appointments through the use of an organic outbound approach with Appointment Setters. They set up funnels and place Virtual Appointment Setters in businesses to drive traffic towards these funnels organically. They also place certified Virtual Closers with them to take their sales calls and completely remove them from the sales process. Dirk’s third business, Scale With Insta is more structured towards B2C business owners with mass market offers helping them to generate more appointments through the use of Instagram Shoutouts and Appointment Setters. Each of these businesses utilizes the skills and proven success of the former to find new success for others.
Stay Focused on the Business
It’s easy to get distracted when you are making money, especially when you are clearing six or seven figures in a month. Despite accomplishing this revenue consistently, Dirk stayed focused and made smart decisions with his capital. Instead of splurging on shiny things or designer clothes, he kept investing back into mentors which in turn helped guide him to launch and scale the businesses he owns today.
Today, Dirk continues to build and scale his businesses while helping others do the same. His plan is to launch more companies with systems to help people and business owners
in different aspects. Following along on his journey at @thejager_
