Broker Deals: A Real Life Story

Coming up on this episode of the Spiro Podcast. You're going to see a lot of them between all of your shoots. So you have an opportunity to build those relationships. And probably if you're an introvert, this is a better platform for you because it's literally like one to one, which is you in the age and you have time to go above me on. You have time to ask them questions. You have time to show your care for them. Welcome to the Spiro Podcast. Managing your real estate photography and videography business. With your hosts, Todd Kiva-Mackie and Craig Madden. Hi and welcome to the Spiro Podcast. Spiro is a software platform that we designed for our company while video tours to manage and grow our business, but now extended to you to help you accomplish the same goals. Glad to be here. I'm Craig Magrum, host of the podcast. Just appreciate your time. Want to introduce Todd Kiva-Mackie, our founder and owner and co-host of the podcast. Welcome back to another week, Todd. Craig, thank you. It's good to be here. You all we have something exciting. This is like a breaking news story and this is like in real life with our business. So one of the cool things about what a perspective that we can bring as a software company, we're also a real estate media company. We own and run a very large media company over 12,000 shoots a year. Millions of dollars are revenue, 30 some photographers and we do this at a very high level. So we can bring the day to day as to what we're doing. We have a sales team. We have marketing. We have operations. We have just a great support team that's been with us for a very long time. And this is kind of like in stride with our business. So Craig accomplished something really awesome. It's probably the question that I get asked the most of how to do this. So this is the answer today and we're going to take you through the progression. So be sure to tune in. Take notes and let's see if we can't get this for your business because we would not be anywhere near the point we're at without these deals. That little hint there deals deals. Yes, yes. So a deal was was hammered out this week that, yeah, it was pretty fun. So before we get to that though, we always like to start the podcast with some Spiro updates. Anything you want to share this week, Todd? Yeah, let's sell them something. Okay, I'm just no. Hey, so we are working on reshoots. That's going to be a great process, a revamped process. And you all just got cubacosis and other things coming out the way that we sink media to the property website. So the team just put in their head back down again. We're listening to you. I did want to take just this quick minute and just say thank you to all of you. The response and seeing all of you coming in is overwhelming. If and I just would ask you, if you're a listener and if you're at a point in the year, many of us in the US are at a point in the year where we're starting to think about our business because we're not so busy with the shoots. If software is a gap, if systems are a gap, if you're tired of sending emails to an editor, tired of sharing Dropbox links, tired of doing tasks, and all day, every day of the same thing. Spiro can automate a lot of that for you. Also, Spiro really flexes his muscles when you start to scale your business, talk about tracking your team, knowing where everybody's at, keeping everybody accountable to the Slack bot. I mean, it's just, I don't pitch you all a lot, but I am asking you that if you're not in a system, if you're in another system and you feel some pain of systems, give us a shot. We do demos, Nick does demos every week on Wednesday at 430 Eastern. You can use, you can email us. Hello at Spiro.media for an invite or hit our chat bot. It's free to sign up, only pay when you use it. And we'd love to guide you through. Also, just a reminder of some ways that, specifically, I want to connect with you every, the first, excuse me, the first and third Thursday of the month, that 430 PM Eastern, I hold a tech talk with Todd and it's on our Spiro Super User's Facebook group. So it was great to see all of you last time. I kind of pleaded with you like, come join me and there was a ton of you in there. So thank you, no, I fear of being lonely, but thank you. Come join me like I'm literally in there. It's unscripted. You have me. It's live, ask me a question about Spiro, ask me a question about real estate media, the business, I'm happy to share with you. This is like a ask me anything session. So and then one more thing quickly. I know I'm way over my minute, but the content later on is so good. The day that it'll be worth it and I'll keep it quick. But I'm doing a task set up, Shannon called it task, but Todd, something tacit, it was a better name than that. But so one of the portions that we see a lot of you get in and you start using Spiro and then you have some questions about task. It's probably the most robust, but complicated portion of the system. We're going to set them up live. I'm going to be there in person. We're going to go through these tasks. So if you don't like following the guide and Spiro, we have a video series. But if you want a live person, I'm going to be on there. I'm going to ask, I'm going to answer any of your questions. We're going to walk through all of it. So that's coming up here in October. I believe this second week of October, you'll see more on all of our social channels about that webinar. Okay. Excellent. And before one more thing before we get into the main subject this week, good, good memory. Well, let's, let's see if it's the same thing that you're thinking of. So last week, we talked about the upcoming rep conference. This week, we want to tell you a little bit more about PMRE. So you want to set that up to? Yes. We were on the same wavelength. Okay. So yes, Vegas is coming up. So let me look over my wall calendar here. There is a, there are two conferences coming up. You should just go to both of them. PMRE is going to be the 13th, 14th and 15th of November. So just search PMRE conference brand and great individual. We've been there. This will be our third year. And it is tons of great speakers, great event, great venue. So PMRE, 13th, 14th, 15th. And then also the rep conference that's Eli Jones is the 15th and the 16th. So they've already sold out the 14th, but that's okay. That was limited. The main conference is the 15th and the 16th of November. I will be there, my team from Spiro will be there. Craig's not joining us this year. So it can get him virtually, yeah. But also my leadership team from wild will be there as well. So Steve muster my director of sales and marketing and then just packs in my, my head of operations. They will both be there with me. So we're excited to meet all of you. Come pick our brains. Come see us. Come say hello. We're going to be there at everything. It's going to be a blast. Yeah, it good time, great information, great way to connect with others in our industry and just exchange ideas. So check it out PMRE and the rep conference, both in November. And we'll put some information in the show notes for you to find out more. Awesome. Alrighty. Let's dive into it, Todd. Yes, Craig. So let me set this up because this is, this is going to be mostly you giving us this content and so I already told you that this has been the biggest impact of how we grew up. Wow. And if you've listened to any of the podcasts or listened to me present, I typically share some of this because it is the most asked question I get. How do you do you scale to doing 12,000 shoots a year of millions of dollars in revenue? And it was through what we call broker deals. Now, a broker deal if you're not familiar is the broker is the managing broker. So the person who's in charge of the real estate company. So that is the individual in charge. And that is where we are going to that individual and we are showing them the value features, benefits of our services. But not only that, but there's a different set of features and benefits to a broker. So the way a broker uses your media and your program is different than a way an agent uses this. And we'll get into that because that is what Craig was so successful on on conveying to this client. So the broker deal, we typically sit with the person in charge and we ask them to put together a media program where they promote only our company and they pay or front some of the money of the media. So they have skin in the game. So that is the deal. These things are incredibly valuable. We have somewhere we shoot 1600 shoots a year, 1000 shoots a year. We have many, many of these Spiro Spiro was built around the idea of handling these deals and it knows everything that a broker wants and everything that an agent wants. So with that being said, Craig successfully signed a broker deal this past week. And we just want to run you through the timeline a little bit to help you understand because you're saying, okay, that's great Todd. How do I? do it. And that's typically the next question that you all ask me when I tell you broker deals are the things that have helped us scale the most. You say, how do I get it? So Craig, do you want to walk us through just that question? How do I get it? Maybe let's we're going to have to go back in the timeline because this isn't something that you just start off with and you go inside. Yeah, there's a lot of history in this one. Man, yeah, how do I keep this brief enough? So this broker that I met with, I started shooting for her a couple of years ago, like not too long after I had started my own business. So for those of you that might not know, I had my own real estate photography business that I had started. And while became kind of my back end engine with various things with the early version of Spiro, I was the first beta tester. So anyway, I built my business with a little bit different model. I didn't really have broker deals. I was more the boutique type of photographer. I got to a certain point of of clients and number of shoots that I was comfortable with and how I wanted my company to be where I just I had a different philosophy than wow. So I didn't really have broker deals so to speak. I had a membership deal that individual agents could do. But I built, you know, a lot of a lot of good relationships. So with this one individual, she was with one of the larger brokerages in my market and she had moved from Detroit down to Toledo. So I'm in the Toledo Highell market. And she had started and I don't remember exactly how we first met or I introduced myself, but eventually started shooting for her. And we just developed a really, really good working relationship. So part of my client's story is she is a female minority single mom whose husband passed away a couple of years ago. And she wouldn't have a problem with me sharing any of it. She's very public about her story because it's a super inspiring story. So she was on her own looking for a new start in a new city. She moved out to Detroit, brought her to smaller, you know, younger kids with her and just has an incredible work ethic, positive attitude. I mean, this woman, you can't help but smile around her. She's just one of those people, you know, Todd found out very quickly we should have a common faith as well. So we just we cut, we just really hit it off on multiple levels, not, you know, not to minimize the fact that she loved our photography and our videography that that I started doing for it. So had shot for her for a little while and towards the end of my business before I transferred things over to wow, she changed brokerages, which happens a lot, you know, you see agents bounce back and forth all over. She changed brokerages and in that transition somehow, somehow we lost a little bit of touch. So some of the momentum I had with her kind of went off the rails a little bit. Nothing bad. She didn't express any dissatisfaction or anything. And then the transition with my business happened. So yeah, how much how much of this? Okay, so when wow took things over, Steve took over a lot of the relationships that I had I had built up here in the in the Toledo market. And he he tried working with her and getting a whole of her as well at this new brokerage that was she was at and just wasn't getting any traction. She's a very busy person. She's got a lot of ears in the fire. And yeah, just just didn't really get to see much traction in in his efforts. No, no fault to Steve at all. She could be hard to track down sometimes. So so I've, you know, then joined the wow team. I've been working on reconnecting with a lot of my old clients and I, you know, some that had strayed. We got back. And so I reached out to Lorraine myself because of that relationship. And I've I've dropped her couple of emails and messages and she's written back a little bit here and there. Never got her on the phone. So I was kind of having the same challenge that Steve was in just trying to try to get a hold of her. Well, I think it was about a month ago, Todd. I sent I checked in again after I think a month and a half or two months and said, Hey Lorraine was just thinking about you still would love to connect if you ever have the time because I really want to hear. Oh, I miss I missed a very important critical point to the story, Todd. Okay. So I would love to know as it was. She had moved brokerages right to a second brokerage. Okay. Well, the beginning of this year, I saw on her social media, she started her own brokerage. Kind of an important point there. Yes. So I definitely wanted to hear what was going on because again, we had a great relationship and I was really happy for her and really excited. So she, you know, part of her distinctive is she's a woman minority-owned brokerage and the only one in my market that I know of. And the local newspaper did a story on her. She's the first woman-owned broker in 38 years in our market. Wow. So I just was super, super excited for her. And so a couple of times this year, I've, you know, tried to get a hold of her. I really want to hear your story. Now, do I want her business? Yes, obviously I do. But I really genuinely want to hear her story because she's gone through a lot as a human being just with the passing of her husband and everything. So about a month ago, I again reached out. I don't pastor, but I try and check in and just, you know, keep touch with people. Well, she responded finally. And it's a crag. I would love Ashley to talk with you. And we sub a time to talk on the phone. I had that phone conversation and she's like, I want to have you come in and present to my new team. And she's very exuberant person, very excited. And I said, I would love to, but I'd love to hear more of your story in detail as well. And I said, actually, before I come to present to your team, I'd like to meet with you individually because there's something specific I think might interest you as now a broker that could help grow your business. And I want to see her succeed. I have this thing, Todd, where I'm kind of a David versus Goliath type of guy. I always root for, and I've told her this. I said, don't take this the wrong way. I don't mean it as an insult, but I root for the underdog. You're a small brokerage. And it's tough in that market to compete against the big dogs. She said, yes, it is. I said, I want to see you succeed. So anything we can do to help you, we want to do. So we set up a time to meet in person before she had become present to her team, because she already sold herself. She said, we need a good photographer that will give us professional marketing, because she's got a couple of agents that do their own cell phone photos. She had one person that the seller provided the photos. Oh, okay. Todd, they weren't good. I saw him yesterday. They weren't good. So all of that led up to the meeting that we had this week in person at a downtown coffee shop. And we just had a fantastic conversation. Craig, I mean, so much in here, Craig. So rich. Let me, I took some notes here. I just want to ask you a couple of questions. So you would start off by saying, and you couldn't quite remember where, but you met her somewhere. The question I have here, did you meet her by sending a message online or an email or were you physically like, was this out human to human interacting and promoting your business, but also just wanting to meet people? Yeah. And I'm trying to remember, like I said, I don't remember exactly, but I think it was a referral, Todd. So I was shooting for other agents at this brokerage. And I got a lot of referral business in my early days. So I think if I remember right, I want to say she actually reached out to me. And we talked on the phone. And that's how, you know, I started shooting for it. Got her, got her pricing information. And you know, we talked about an upcoming listing she had. And so I think it started on the phone. And then we met for the first time in person at the shoot. Okay. Okay. So just, I think this is a confirmation that it is important for you all out there. If you want to grow your business, that you need to be out with your clients. Yeah. And we've talked about this as to where to some of you, it's terrifying to walk into a brokerage. Quietly, I don't love it either. You know, I've done it enough times that it could just walk in and you know what to say. And then, and then it's really not that bad. So you can get over the hump. But some of you are saying, hey, Todd, you don't understand how big of an introvert I am and how terrified I am. And that's okay. But if you are giving yourself that excuse right now, and I say that with love, like I'm not, I'm being hard on you, but I say that with love and my heart to you because like it's true. And some of you need to hear it. Like, hey, don't use that excuse. And I've, I've run plenty. I've had coaches over the years and have coaches now that like, uh, Todd, that is your line yourself. That's a thought air. don't kid yourself, even if you're running that thought air right now, you are still out with your clients at real estate shoots. I understand they're not at every shoot. I've done this a long time. I understand what it means to go shoot real estate, but you're going to see a lot of them at every shoot or you're going to see a lot of them between all of your shoots. So you have an opportunity to build those relationships and probably if you're an introvert, this is a better platform for you because it's literally like one to one. Where it's just you in the age and you have time to go above me on, you have time to ask them questions, you have time to show your care for them. So I think it's so important that if you are only relying on digital, there's nothing wrong with it. Okay, we do it too. There's nothing wrong with it, but don't only rely on it because the relationship is ultimately what matters. It's what's going to take you down the road. Craig said he was actually referred by another. I start remember our largest client at this date. She's been with us now for almost 15 years or over. She she called me. This is an agent that does over a hundred a year, a hundred listings, just on the list side. She can't I can't tell you how much revenue, but just referral. She's brought us. I can't tell you how many times I emailed her. I was young. I was I was I didn't really have a clue. It was going on. I was emailing her and I was trying to give away every shoot. Heck, I think I probably even offered to give her my house. You know, like take this, take this. Oh, by the way, you can have this. Just use me. She never responded once. She was she was referred to me and she called my phone. It little creepy because I had her punched into my cell phone. Like I had her number. I had her punched myself when I didn't call her. It's weird when I saw her name appear. I'm like, holy crap. She's calling me. But I can't tell you how many times this has happened to me over my life where our largest brokerage deal. I did the same thing. I emailed him. I emailed him. I emailed him one day. He contacts me because it's through a referral. I'm like, whoa, holy crap. This guy's this guy's contacting me. So and it still happens to this day. We're working with the we're we're going to very large deal and I can't tell the details right now, but it's it's something we've been working on. And it was a referral to me from one of our other very, very large clients. So some of these things in our heads, we get stuck. And I tell you, I love technology. I love technology just as much as anyone. And I for so many years had the thought air of thinking that I was going to digitize myself into success through online advertising or campaigns. And I was going to grab the next latest and greatest piece of marketing software. And that piece of software was going to grow my business to be a success. And I hate to tell you it's just not going to happen or everybody would subscribe to that 29, 95 a month piece of software. And they would grow their business to success. So sorry, a little bit a little bit of a soap pops there. Go ahead, Craig. I think software does have a role in in the digital presence does does have a role in developing business. But it's a it's a it's a what's the term I want to I want to use an add on or in addition to so I think this is kind of a generational difference that we might have to Todd. I'm I'm Gen X you I believe are millennial. I was right on the first as 83 so it was right. Yeah, so just just I think 80 is like the cut off technically speaking for for your zenial is what I there you go the term I've heard. So we have a lot. We have a lot of millennials grew up in the digital age. Of course, Gen Z totally completely in the digital age. And everything we're we're wired pardon the pun don't pardon the pun. I did that on purpose. We're wired we're wired to think digitally and to think online presence, right? I'm kind of the last of the generation that was more build the relationship in person in the the digital didn't happen until later as I was an adult, you know, in college and beyond. So real estate is all about relationships because it's like it's like this. We're really with any kind of sales people buy from people they know like and trust. Real estate is a very personal transaction. It's it's a seller's biggest investment probably in their life. There's a lot of pressure on the realtor to handle it well and to get that transaction through in a way that the seller's happy with. So they've got a lot of pressure. So any vendor that a realtor has a realtor has they've got to really trust and know that hey this partner of mine is going to take care of my seller and represent me well. You can't do that strictly online. You've got to have some in-person interaction. And so this this broker that I met with this has been a multi-year development. I mean this didn't happen just overnight. As I was meeting with her Todd after she signed the deal she goes because I know you I know you're going to take care of my realtor. There you go. I just I know your track record. So it takes time. You can't expect to necessarily get that broker deal overnight. You might have to build the relationship for a year or two years, three years. For me it's been since I think I started shooting for her in 2018 or 19 somewhere in there. Yeah. But yeah we can't stress enough especially for you that my fellow introverts. When I discovered that I was comfortable one-on-one that's where I've put my effort. So we have a couple of other business development specialists that have very different styles in how they develop their business and their markets. It works great for them. Me I love coffee meetings. That's where I really get to know the realtor and that's where the relationship starts to get built. Yeah yeah that's it's you know all about understanding where you're comfortable and you know where your gifts are at. Where's your strengths? Yeah don't try to be me don't try to be Craig you know Joy for example in one of our markets she holds these fabulous huge events and she is so good at getting a lot of people to come to these events and she networks with vendors and she has food and she has drinks and she has presenters and she presents and it's like that is really cool. Yeah and if that's not you that's okay but that's what Joy is really really good at. She's actually so don't but don't feel the pressure to be any of these things you have to be you have to see where your strengths are at yes exactly. I mean Joy and I are in the same company right we're on the same sales team but different markets and totally different approaches to how we're developing our business. I also have the added role of photographer and videographer so I don't have the time to organize those massive events that Joy does so incredibly well done I'm kind of jealous of to be honest Todd but at the same time I totally would be uncomfortable in in that large group setting and I just I I wouldn't be able to pull it off the same way she does so yeah find your strengths in in how you start it okay good advice. Well another note I wrote down Craig is right time right place and I think I think a misnomer of this and it's a question I get asked a lot is you you might have the perception that you're just going to walk in and sign this because we typically talk about when it happens I mean that's the culmination of getting it right so that's the fun point as humans that's what we look to like that's what we consider this success but this has been a long journey for Craig and I can tell you almost every single one of our broker deals takes this same journey you know Craig said he had been shooting since 2018 for her and it's not like he walked in in 2018 June second the first shoot and it's like hey you want to do a broker deal she wasn't even she wasn't a broker right yeah so right time right place you have to be consistent something that he told us was he would just check in an email and just he would look for little keys okay he understood he saw that she started it opened her own brokers is the first woman in 38 years like he collected all this information this is where technology is fabulous right Craig is not like you have a friend of a friend that told you that she started a brokerage right yeah so this is where tech this is where technology is great scan it every once in a while and then just connect with your with your clients Craig do you have any tips or trick do you just you spend a look what is your your social media is it won't you know once a day do you scroll it is it linked as a Facebook what do you have a technique um it's I have a count I count on LinkedIn on Instagram on Facebook Okay, I would say I actually look at Facebook the most okay, which I know younger generations aren't using Facebook Yeah, we both shin our age there. Yeah, but realtors are on Facebook. They have business pages I friend most of my clients like most of my clients. I think I'm friends with on Facebook So I get to see their personal the personal side of their lives in addition to the business some are more business less personal But you get to know them as a human being a little bit more You know, so I get to see the pictures of her kids going to school that you know, etc But that's also where I learned that she started this brokerage and I was so happy for because I know she's she's overcome a lot of challenges And I love hearing success stories. I love hearing, you know, challenges overcome so Yeah Craig that leads me to my last question and and just gonna ask you now Do you really care about her do you just care about her enough because you want to sell something to her like Like you we've heard it and you like you said I want to see her succeed I could tell you're smiling when you say this you're excited like it's just a sales tactic For some it could be and that's when it's manipulation, but Me as a person Todd my background is Christian ministry. I worked in Christian radio for almost 20 years and What happened to me during that time was I really I cared about people because The I know this isn't going to relate to everybody, but we don't all share the same faith I respect that that's fine. We're not trying to shove anything down your throats But me as a human being I truly believe that the gospel that I've put my faith into Gospel meaning good news To almost 20 years of my life spent speaking words of encouragement to listeners on the air Building them up caring about them as individuals because I'm not wired for business Money has never actually been my primary motivator now money is important I have a family to take care of you know I want to make sure I provide well for my for my wife and my boys But the idea of of amassing as much money as I can just it's just never been my primary primary motivator Relationships with people has been So you know, I now find myself in the business world right but doing something I really enjoy I like the creative aspect. I've always liked media media's Kind of whatever. I just I've always enjoyed it so Being in the business world allows me to take a little bit better care of my family financially I'm just gonna be real ministries hard. It's if if those of you that are listening and have pastors or ministry leaders in your life Just know that's that's not an easy life and they really do most of them really do care about you On a spiritual level on a personal level So yeah, I can honestly say and look someone and I and tell them I do care about you and I do want to see you succeed Now does it help me financially? Yes, what I do it regardless Whether money was on the line or not. Yes Yeah, I don't know that so well said Craig and I I was a little facetious when I asked that question it was it was Because I do want to make the point even if so I'm I'm a I'm different than Craig as to where money is Was the start of why I wanted to do any of the businesses I've done sure and I think I've shared this before Honestly when I think about look at it like I don't really like that But it's through talking with people and understanding and and and I don't covet the money I I I know it's a blessing and I'm just motivated by it, but I use that To be productive not only for myself, but then I look for ways that Our clients my client, you know the person I'm talking to how they can make money in that regard So again, you don't have to have Craig Craig's personality or my personality But I'm just sharing because that's that's a kind of a bit a complete opposite as to where like I'll go to the money first Craig will go to helping the person first I think the point I want to make is if you can figure out a way that your client succeed and grow By using what you provided them Your you will be a success That's no different than any business out there like you say like that's pretty general anything you do if you follow that formula You that business will be a success and then at the end of the day You you can define your clients can define what success and growth is I I strategically use those words because I didn't say if you can make your clients more money I said if you can help them grow and help them be a success Then your business will be a success again everybody can define their own terms there But if you follow that that formula then you will achieve your goals if you help your clients achieve their goals So let me let me add two points that kind of tie in with that First let's talk about money being a motivator so Todd that is one of your motivators But that's not necessarily a bad thing because money is a tool right I have a father-in-law who has been very successful financially high level executive Has done very well but probably I'm going to say the most generous man I know Who has used that money that he's amassed to bless a lot of people Like a lot of people and organizations So the money itself isn't isn't the problem or issue there there's nothing wrong with trying to earn a lot of money It's what's your motivation with With pursuing that is it a love of money for the love of money and power or is it Using it as a tool to really be a blessing to everybody around you And I think that goes a long way we have different gifts Todd has a gift my father-in-law has a gift of I'm asking You know larger money, but they use it as a tool to be a blessing to those around them So if that's how you're gifted hey go for it There's those of us that are more service oriented we we like to serve we you know do that the hands-on work and be A blessing to people at a more um Ground level So whatever your motivation is find that motivation and go for it. So for for this broker Todd so as part of my second point her motivation with starting this brokerage is She she has made it very clear. I'm a woman. I'm a minority and part of her motivation in being a broker Is serving not just minorities, but she really cares about the minority community and helping them get out of a life of Renting where you can't amass any sort of wealth and get them into home ownership where they can start to build generational wealth And pull their families up out of poverty. That's a very strong passion of hers and something I can totally get behind Yeah, so if we can bring her tools to help her realtors Market well and show their professionalism and help homeowners that get out of or I'm sorry help renters get out of renting into Home ownership to start to build generational wealth. Hey, I'm all be I'm all behind that So part of what I wanted to do knowing that that was part of her passion Was that I knew this broker deal was gonna help her financially. She wanted to have me come in and just present And wasn't even thinking she didn't ask about discounts or anything But I knew we had this broker discount program That would help her and I also knew as a broker her goal is to recruit more More agents that will help her business grow. That's just that's just how real estate works So the reason I wanted to talk with her and I told her I said there's a broker discount program that we have that I want to talk with you about Before I come present to your team because I don't want to spring that on you and them in In a situation where you're like wait, yeah, yeah So that's what we sat down at coffee to talk about first we caught up just on a personal level You always want to start with that and genuinely care about the person and then I'm like okay Tell me your story what what led to this, you know, what how is it going? How many realtors do you have now? How many listings of you so I just I had a whole list of questions that I worked up Todd and she started sharing everything with me And I said okay, so you've expressed the need for professional media You've told me the horror stories of some of the photos that your realtors are doing right now And you want to take it to the next level So yes, we want to help you with that, but ultimately they still have the choice you know to hire somebody to do their photos or do it themselves So here's the broker program and I you know, we went through it talked about volume. Hey, do you think you could do this number of listings in the next year She's like, oh, yeah, for sure. Okay, well then we can discount this. We know you're a smaller brokerage every penny Matters so we can discount it based on what you think your volume is and she's like, oh, that's fantastic And she loved it. She's like, yeah, sign me up. I said, okay, well, she I mean she was ready to sign right But again, I had her trust because we built the relationship over multiple years and she knows my work And she knows how I try to take care of people. I said one more thing before we do that. I said let me wait run an idea past you. And this might sound crazy, but I love this part. She looked at our photo only price and already said that's a great price because another competitor in town was a lot more expensive. She said, yeah, I think that's fair. That should work for my agents. I said, let me ask you one more question. Okay. One of your goals is brokerage is to recruit more realtors to your brokerage, right? To grow the business. She's like, oh, yeah, definitely. My goal is, my initial goal is I want to get up to 10 realtors, like fantastic. So I asked her, what are your distinctives that would attract another realtor from another brokerage to your brokerage? So she shared a few things and they were nice things, but I didn't question, I didn't think it was anything that would necessarily really instigate a change in a realtor. I didn't say that, but I wanted her to start thinking, what? That might have been the end of your coffee. But I'm thinking, okay, I'm trying to think like a broker. How am I going to attract, you know, seasoned and new, but seasoned realtors to my brokerage to help me grow. Yeah. So I said, okay, those are, you know, those are great things. A lot of personal coaching, mentoring, you know, building a business plan for that realtor, which I thought, that actually, that was a good idea of building a business plan. I said, what if I said, I don't know if this is going to be in your budget or not, you know, as the broker, but what if is one of your recruiting incentives, you tell your realtors, I will pay for your photos. Love it. Her eyes got super big and she's like, wait, what? I said, what if you paid for your realtors photos, because that you have so much value on the professional marketing that you want them doing that you'll actually cover that for them anything they do beyond that, say the video tours, we talk about the importance of video, drone, et cetera, they cover that part, but you're going to take care of the photos for them. She's like, for those of you that are listening and not watching. Her eyes got wide, her mouth dropped a little bit. She's like, I love it. Yes, let's do it. That's a good price. I can do that. I said, good price plus the discount. She goes, yes, exactly. She said, give me that paper. I told you she's a very exuberant person. She wrote that paper. She signed immediately on the deal. And I'm like, I'm so happy. Thank you for this opportunity to be part of your team and she knows absolutely. And that's when she made the comment. Craig, I know you're going to take care of my team. I just, I know you as a person and I've watched your work and, you know, et cetera. So it seemed like a fast, it was a fast conversation. I mean, she had sold herself, but she hadn't even thought about paying for photos for her Realtors as a recruiting tool. But that's one of her biggest priorities right now is growth and bringing Realtors into her business. Yeah, this is, I just love this. If you're not watching, I have the biggest smile on my face. It's just incredible. It's just, you know, and just one thing I want to want to clarify is Craig said, you know, once he was at that table, it went fast. But I don't want you to forget about all the work he did leading up to that. And that's the important part. Again, I'll say it one more time, but that is why building the relationship is so important. Because it will get you passed and it takes a long time to build. But once you get to that decision point and they see the value in your service and they see how they're going to use you differently. It is super, super quick because they know like and trust you already. Yeah. And knowing what questions to ask to start to get the thing. And for you, for you to learn what what is actually their goal. Yeah, because you might be trying to sell something they don't actually need. Find out what their priorities are and see what you have to offer to help them achieve those priorities. That's where the consulting. It's more a consultant role than it is a sales role. Yes. And that's a great structure to take in any conversation you have. And I do it almost all the time if I'm talking to a realtor about wow, but it's where I'm talking to a real estate photographer about Spiro or anything else. I asked people what their goals are. I can't tell you how many years I used to walk in. And I feel great about my products and services. I knew the features and the benefits. I walked into the room and I'd spew off the features and the benefits or I'd tell the other individual the features and the benefits. And it'd be like crickets. Because I was selling them something I they might not even be concerned about the look of the photo is the price of the photos to turn around time. They have their own goals and their own objections and understanding what those goals are, you can show how your services will get them past those objections so they can reach their goals. So that's one thing that I think is so important that Craig said a couple of minutes ago that he started his conversation off with what are your goals as a broker. And then just and Craig when you say that, I mean, do people talk and tell them to you. Yeah, I've never had anyone refuse to talk about what their ultimate goal is. Yeah, and I think the thing is sometimes we're scared to ask, you know, I think back when I was 20 something just started this. You know, I was a bit terrified when you sit in front of a broker and then if you get in front of a broker, I mean, especially at a large company, you know, you're like this could change my life. And it's like, sorry, go ahead, go ahead. I was going to say, you know, can I ask this broker, like what are your goals? Like that seems so personal. Like, oh my goodness, where if they kick me out of the room. At the realtor level, what I've run into actually more than I expected was when I've asked them, I do ask them, how many, you know, about on average, how many listings do you do a year? I've had people kind of give me a blank stare and like, well, I mean, my total volume is this and they're taking in both the buyer side and the seller side. But they've never actually stopped to think about how many listings they've done and they haven't necessarily set a goal. I was actually kind of shocked. Yeah. So when you ask that question, oh, you know, how many listings do you do? And if they're not sure, you know, said, well, I mean, do you want to win more listings? And it's always yes, because that's where they're going to make more money. Yeah, great question. I haven't actually stopped to think through. Yeah, what is my goal? Because then I can tell them, okay, let's, let's set a number and what can we do on the visual marketing side of things to help you build your brand as a realtor and show potential sellers, what you can do for them, you know, in a competitive situation, maybe your competition is only offering photos, but you're offering photos and video, you know, what, what can we add to you and your business that will help you win more. I mean, who's, who's going to look down on that? Yeah. Oh, no, I don't want to help with that. I want to help with like no one's going to say it's actually a good question and it works with every agent out there. And it's, it's not manipulation because you really do want to see if you're not helping them grow, they're going to drop you. So you have a vested interest as a real estate visual marketing professional in helping them grow. And if you don't, you need to be checking your own motivations because if that's not your goal, you're not going to grow because you're not adding any value. Exactly. Exactly. So Craig, to wrap up here, yeah, because I wanted to enforce the two things and I have, there's a phrase we use that it's called speaking broker and speaking broker means that you basically understand what's important to a broker. And it's a little bit different than what is important to an agent and it was kind of cool to see in Craig's example here, this transition happened because this individual used to be an agent and then transition into being a broker and owner of a company. So the thing that Craig knew coming in there was there was two things. Can I pop in real quick just to clarify? So she actually is still a realtor as well and still selling, but she did make it a point to tell me I want to transition out of that and be more full time broker. So, you know, it's a young small broker. She does still have to sell some, but she has a goal of moving out of that. So, yeah. So, and knowing that, there are some things that she told you, Craig, you knew that there was some agents using cell phones, agents had a seller take their own photos and they were terrible. So, this is the first point of understanding in a term that I use is raise the floor of marketing. So, now that she is going to have agents underneath her that are going to have her company name on their listing, that is her name, her image, her brand on those crappy cell phone photos, I will tell you every broker wants their agents to market their listings better. Yep. Every broker. That is the first part of speaking broker and Craig did a great job by understanding where there were some gaps at he knew some of the media that was being taken and he knew some of these pain points. So, the second thing is that Craig knew that this broker wanted to grow. Well, how does a broker grow? There's just two ways. a broker can grow. It's called market share. I won't go into it now. We did a podcast on it a long time ago, but market share is really one of the only metrics that a broker cares about, and they know what their market share is. You grow your market share by getting more listings and getting more agents that have listings. How do you get more listings with your current agents? Well, you help them market their business better so that they stand out so that they can get more listings. Do we, as real estate photographers, offer anything to agents that help them stand out and help market their business? Of course, right. The second way a broker grows is through getting more agents to come to their company, created a fabulous job here with understanding that and then just asking. It's pretty bold to ask a broker to pay for something. If you just think of a face value, will you pay for this for all your people coming in? They're 10, 9, 9 subcontractors, it's not the norm. Craig, what was, again, what was the feedback on that? I mean, her eyes widened and it's like she had never even thought of that possibility as a tool to help recruit. It is a bold question, but if you set it upright and introduce it correctly, it doesn't come off as bold or brash or presumptuous. Do you have a goal of recruiting more realtors? Well, yeah, of course. Okay, great. What if, and you set it up very soft? What if you did this as an incentive? Actually, I know of one other brokerage in town that does this with a different company, but they're the only ones I know of. Every other brokerage makes their realtors pay for their own photos. Yeah. So it's a distinctive that this brokerage has over pretty much every other company in town. Yeah. And that's, that's the classic way to sell it. And it works because agents are out there, brokers are out there. Everyone who owns and runs their own business and that's agents and brokers, they are looking for a unique advantage on how they can grow. And you can offer that to them. So that is across the board. And then when you grow to have enough broker deals, you begin leveraging one broker deal over another. And you can grow on these. So you know that the sell point at the beginning is like, I don't know if anybody in town that's doing that. Or I think there might be only one other company in town. That broker is going to be like, holy crap, like I could say I'm one of two or I'm the only one that offers this. What a great tool to get agents to come to my company. And then when you have four, five, or six broker deals and you have the largest companies, you begin just going like, Hey, yeah, I do it with this company, that company, that they all do it. And then the broker's like, wow, behind fear missing out who likes FOMO, nobody. Right. And they sign and they sign the deals. But it all ties back to the fact that you understand what their goals are. And those are the goals for every broker. Ask them that, but I can tell you we've done hundreds of these. And that is the goal of every broker. Understand them, sell it at the right time. That's the other thing is Craig met a great point like don't walk me in the first thing you say is hey, do you want to pay for our agents photos? You're probably going to get kicked out. Yeah. Right time, right place. And just keep building those relationships. Yeah. Anything to close, Craig? I mean, not really. You know, we've said it over and over on these episodes, just the importance of relationship and authenticity, you know, integrity in your business. I mean, I can look her in the eye and say, you know, say what I said. And she knows that I'll follow through the importance of integrity in your personal conduct, but also your business conduct is huge. Because again, people buy from people they know like and trust and that trust issue. I mean, it only takes a millisecond to lose trust, but it takes a long time to build it. So make sure that your consistency in your personal morals, ethics, world view, you know, just care about people, take care of people. And you might not win everyone. I don't win everyone. Yeah, you won't win everyone. Right. Right. But it will go a long way to just establishing your your reputation in the market that you serve. Yeah. Be consistent. Yeah. And I guess I should say you won't win everyone now. We've had plenty where we've had the conversations. They said no. And in my head when they say no, I'm just like they're saying no, not right now. Great. Let me keep building a relationship. Let me keep showing the value. Let me keep getting more of their agents. And then let's have the conversation again. Right. So just one one thing that one more point that I'm closing because you're all sitting out there and it's like, okay, great, Craig did it, but Craig's been doing this forever. Todd, you've been doing this forever. You guys have a, you know, over a hundred of these things, like it's easy for you guys. It's not easy. That's the process we take. Literally, we're not holding anything back. But if you're asking like where to start, okay, Todd, where do I start? Let me just give you a couple of easy things to look at. One, do you know the people who run the companies you work for? Do you know the broker of the Coalwell banker, the Keller Williams, a Berkshire Hathaway, the Howard Hanna, the Alan Tate, you know, insert that company name. Do you know the people that are in charge there? Do you know the managers? You can get to know them by one asking your clients, hey, who's the manager of your office? Who's the broker of your company? Okay, get to a close agent, ask them. You can walk into an office and you can ask, hey, is the manager here? I'd love the meat, I'd love to meet them. And you can start building relationships that way. So know who those people are first, because if you don't go to them and you're trying to sell them a broker deal, you're going to have someone looking at your cross, I'd be like, hey, I'm not the broker. Okay, sounds great, but I can't do this. So understand who those people are. And then my other tip there is when you start to get this list and this understanding of who these people are, you might not want to start with the top dogs. It's only natural that you want to start with the largest companies because of us, if you get the deal, they're going to bring you the biggest amount of business. They have the largest potential. But I will tell you that when you walk into the top dogs, they know they're the top dogs. They're sitting there going, hey, what we're doing's work, what we're doing is working. Okay, so they, I'm not going to say they won't listen to you. One, that meaning is going to be a lot harder for you to get. And two, they're going to move a little bit slower because there's a big organization underneath them. And there's a lot that goes into making a change at a large company. So we have found this to be true with agents and brokers that we find the agents that are in the middle and brokers that are in the middle are hungry to move up the ladder if that makes sense. You know, sometimes the newbies, they're just getting going and from a financial standpoint, it might be tough for them or impossible or you have a lot of part-time agents there. And the middle is where we really find the sweet spot because those are the people that want to be the top dogs that are like, what tool can I get that is different so that I can win the listing, I can win the agent to come to my brokerage and not go to the top dog brokerage. And I think, I think Craig's example here show that as she was completely open, like he said, she just started, she was wanting to grow that desire was there and just helping her understand that we had a tool to help her get to that growth is super important. So compile the list. I'm not saying don't contact the top dogs but maybe focus on the middle of the pack because we find that they're more apt to want to listen to you to want to take an advantage so that they can move up to be a top dog. Something, Todd, let me know what you think of this idea. What if I shared some of the questions that I ask brokers or agents in the show notes? Yeah, that'd be fabulous. Yeah, I'll put some of those questions that you can ask in the notes for you guys to if you're stolen from us you've stolen them twice because I learned from I've learned from someone else as well. We want to see you succeed, guys. We want to see you succeed. We do. And this is like I said, this is probably the number one question that I'm asking the number one reason why we've grown to be where we have grown to. So use it, steal it, go do it. All right. It was a fun week. Hopefully you've found value in this and if you get a deal, you know, say you get your first broker deal and they're going to pay for the photos. We want to hear that story. Share that with us because we want to celebrate with you. Drop us a line either at [email protected] or leave a comment on on a social media post that you see. Just let us know because we want to hear about it. Your success is our success. So awesome. Todd, I think that's going to wrap it up. Yeah. And when you get them, let us know we'll help you set them up. We can give you guidance because there is a little a little bit of a different setup. and Spiro because you need to build a company. So we have company pay and agent pay. Like I said, the system was designed around this 'cause it's so integral to our business growth. So once you get them, just send a semester in chat, we'll help you will direct you of how you could set up that deal. So that the company can automatically get build, the agents can automatically get build. You don't wanna be doing all the paperwork for this. It'll be a mess. You'll get behind when they're done that. So just send a semester when you do get these, we'll celebrate with you. And then we'll help you get it set up. There you go, there you go. All right, well that's gonna wrap things up. Something we don't do every episode is ask you to like an episode or just share it, subscribe. But if you're new to the podcast and you have found value, we're gonna ask you, would you give us a like on this? If you find it valuable, share it in the Facebook real estate photography and videography groups. We just really appreciate you helping spread the word about the podcast. And by all means subscribe, so that you can get notifications when the next episode releases. Which is generally every week either Tuesday or Wednesday we publish it. We record on Fridays and we try to stay consistent with this. - Yeah, just don't approach any of the brokers in our markets. - Right. - I'm just kidding, I'm just kidding. Y'all know me. You all email me from our markets. I tell you what to do to gain business in our market. I just have to say it though. Yeah, yeah, it's like do it is just not against us. Let's be real, right? But you know, there's a ton of business out there and let's all go for it and just do our best to serve our clients well and just set them up for success. So, all right. I love your authenticity. - I had to, and that's just me. You guys know me, like I was just me. - Alrighty. Well, hey, make sure that you take some time. Be thankful for the blessings in your life. Share those blessings with others 'cause they love to hear. They might be in a down state right now. Maybe you're dealing with a realtor. This is just having a hard time. You get the unique opportunity to speak into them and just encourage them. Be their partner and do what you can to serve them and help them succeed. All right. So, be thankful for your blessings. Share those blessings with others. Make sure you take a breath this week. Have a good one. Thank you for joining us for the Spiro Podcast, managing your real estate photography and videography business. This is a production of Spiro and Wow Video Tours. You can find out more about Spiro's real estate media business management software at our website, Spiro.media.