Search results for: “conversion”

  • Video Marketing for Real Estate: A Step-by-Step Guide

    Video Marketing for Real Estate: A Step-by-Step Guide

    Videos are often seen as a way to build brand awareness and establish a presence in the industry. However, many real estate professionals are missing out on the full potential of video marketing for real estate.

    This unique article will debunk the myth that real estate videos are only for branding.

    We’ll show you how to use videos to generate motivated seller and buyer leads using data and creative use cases you may not have considered before. So, if you’re ready to take your real estate business to the next level, keep reading to learn how to unlock the full potential of video marketing.

    With the right strategies and techniques, you can use video marketing to create targeted campaigns that drive conversions and help you stand out in a competitive market. So, let’s dive into how you can use video marketing to generate quality leads for your real estate business.

    By the time you’re done reading, you’ll know how to take advantage of one of the best forms of marketing we have at our disposal.

    [The Data] Benefits of Video Marketing For Real Estate

    If you aren’t convinced you need to implement video marketing into your business, here’s some data to back up how quickly this sector is growing.

    Carrot members drove 2,741 leads via YouTube.

    Carrot members generated 2,741 leads through YouTube, which is evidence that YouTube can effectively serve as a channel for lead generation.

    Leads from YouTube convert 2x higher than other channels.

    There are a ton of different ways to generate leads online. Regarding lead quality, though, it’s hard to beat the conversion rate from leads that come through video platforms like YouTube.

    Based on our internal data across more than 7,000 members, we’re seeing leads convert from video viewer to prospect at a rate of 8.43% — more than double the rate of other lead sources.

    37% of investors and agents ARE using video in their marketing.

    And whether or not you consider yourself a marketer right now, a recent study from the National Association of REALTORS Research Group has shown that more than 37% of investors and agents ARE using video in their marketing. With an additional 35% responding that they intend to implement it. The remaining 28% stated that they do not want to use video in the future.

    73% of homeowners are likelier to list with an agent who uses video.

    When it comes to selecting a realtor, homeowners and buyers take it seriously. Even if they don’t know what’s on the line by choosing the wrong one, they know this decision can be one of the biggest decisions they make in their lives.

    That’s why more than 73% reported that they are likelier to list with an agent who uses video in their marketing. (Source: Realtor Magazine)

    403% more inquiries are driven by video listings.

    In the same study, NAR found that 403% more inquiries are being driven by video listings, especially 360-degree tours, than with photos only. Videos are not only a fantastic way to get extra attention on your properties but also a great way to keep them engaged with your business.

    51% of homebuyers use YouTube in their searches.

    One of the biggest reasons you should use video in your marketing is because YouTube is the primary destination for homebuyers. After Google, YouTube is the biggest, most widely used search engine available. (Source: Animoto)

    70% of homebuyers want a virtual tour of the home.

    With the pandemic, virtual tour requests skyrocketed. In a Digital In The Round study, 70% of buyers wanted to virtually tour the home they were considering BEFORE physically visiting the property.

    On top of that, they reported that buyers in the 18-34 group spent 10x more time looking at listings and were 130% more likely to become a lead if they saw a virtual tour of the property before they had to contact you.

    How To Get Started With Video Marketing

    Since getting started and creating that first video can be the hardest part of implementing this strategy into your marketing, here are some quick tips to help you.

    Tip #1: Keep it simple.

    You don’t have to be a professional videographer or editor to make incredibly effective videos.

    Keeping it simple, especially initially, will help you more than spending thousands of dollars hiring a professional or paying an editor.

    All you need is an iPhone or Android with a decent camera, a good lapel or Bluetooth microphone, and a handheld gimbal if you have problems keeping your hands steady.

    Initially, focus on ensuring your audio is good and the video quality is at least 1080p HD. From there, the rest of your effectiveness comes down to the content in the video.

    Tip #2: Everybody starts in the same place.

    One of the best things you can do, especially in the beginning, is to accept that your videos will probably be bad. You may even cringe when you look back on them a year from now.

    Everybody starts at the same place, and unless you were born a video marketing savant, it’s OK to be bad at this for a bit. Keep showing up and improving, and your videos will improve, too!

    The people watching your videos care more about you as a human and the property you’re showing them than they do the editing tricks you used to get their attention.

    Tip #3: Stay focused on your goals.

    Are you trying to become an influencer in your market or space? Or are you trying to generate buyer leads so you can sell more properties?

    People often try doing both, which creates washed-down, ineffective marketing. Instead of falling victim to the ‘do it all’ marketing strategy, focus on one specific goal. 

    Tip #4: Be patient. It takes time.

    The traction you get with your video marketing efforts won’t happen overnight, either. 

    But don’t let it discourage you if your first few videos don’t take off how you thought they would. As with any marketing strategy, it takes time to build that momentum up.

    But once you’ve built it? It’s easier for your newer videos to gain traction because you stayed consistent and kept creating your first videos without giving up.

    Tip #5: Don’t forget the humans.

    Many investors and agents using video make one major mistake: they ONLY showcase the property and not themselves. 

    So, with that in mind, ensure you’re showing up in the video and giving them a chance to get to know, like, and trust you without taking the focus off the property. 

    Humans buy from humans, so give them a chance to buy from YOU.

    While you’re keeping humans as the focus, make sure to include the humans around the property you’re selling — they’re buying into the lifestyle, the location, and the property’s features. Show them what they’re getting! 

    Tip #6: Keep your videos to the point.

    On average, around 37% of your viewers will stick around to the end of the video. 

    So if you want to increase that rate, keeping them short and to the point will ensure the videos are engaging and that you keep people watching.

    Not every property needs a 30-minute documentary. A shorter 3-5 minute video can be more effective if it targets the property’s key features.

    Tip #7: Promote your videos.

    Don’t sit around thinking, “if I build it, they will come.” Proactively sharing the videos you’ve created will significantly reduce your time to gain real traction in your area.

    Make sure you’re devoting energy to helping get the word out. You can even partner with a digital marketing agency to complement your in-house efforts and reach your target audience more efficiently.

    All it takes is the right person to see the video to be effective, so do what you can to share it where you think that person might be.

    Top Video Marketing Topics For Seller Leads

    When looking for people willing to sell their homes fast for cash, video is one of the best marketing strategies you can use.

    To help you get started, here are some of the topics you’ll want to cover:

    Top Real Estate Video Ideas & Topics For Motivated House Seller Leads

    Seller Testimonials

    When you’ve just finalized a deal with a prospect, emotions will never be higher than they are at that moment. That means it’s time to turn on the camera and capture those emotions on video. If it’s finalized during an online call, make sure you ask your prospect for their consent before turning on the recording on your enterprise call center software.

    We’ve recorded a podcast focusing solely on capturing the perfect seller testimonial. You can watch/listen to it by clicking here.

    And to show you how quick & straightforward these videos can be, here’s a 15-second seller testimonial we found from a Chicago-based agent and his seller.

    When you get it right, these videos are some of the most effective content you’ll ever create for engaging with potential prospects, starting the relationship on the right foot, building trust, and getting them to move forward with you.

    About Me Video

    Sometimes, investors and agents struggle to create an “About Me” video. Whether that’s because they’re uncomfortable talking about themselves or because they can talk about themselves for way too long, we’ve noticed a trend.

    Creating these around precisely what your client wants/needs to see and hear from you doesn’t have to be a struggle. We’ve compiled a 10-minute video that breaks down our process and how we create “about me” videos, introductions, and more.

    You can watch it below!

    Other topics to make sure you cover:

    Seller testimonials and a video about who you are, are must-haves, but you’ll also want to ensure you’re giving the search engines what they want. 

    To help with that, here are some of the most common keywords your sellers are going to be using on Google and YouTube:

    • How to sell your house fast for cash [city, state]
    • We buy houses in [city, state]
    • Home buyers in [city, state]
    • How to stop foreclosure in [city, state]
    • First-time home seller in  [city, state]
    • Real estate Investor vs. agent in [city, state] (pros & cons)
    • Top 5 mistakes when selling your [city, state] house
    • Top 5 neighborhoods in [city, state]

    When creating videos around these keywords, keep your content focused on what you know they will be searching for.

    Some keywords are self-explanatory, while others will let you dive deeper. 

    For instance, the “top 5 mistakes when selling your home in [city, state]” can be tailored to the specifics of your area and include things like neighborhoods to avoid, best school zones, worst areas for traffic, etc. 

    These will help your prospects visualize their life in the area and know they’re avoiding the mistakes you point out.

    And don’t forget to cover the questions that you keep getting asked over and over again. 

    Not only will you be giving your prospects what they’re looking for, but these questions will often help you show up higher in the search results on Google and YouTube.

    And you’ll save time by sending prospects the video you’ve already recorded when those questions inevitably come up.

    How to Script & Outline Your Videos

    When creating your videos, you can use impromptu sessions where you hop on and talk about something you know your buyers and sellers could help with.

    But, for the most part, you’ll want to ensure you stick to some scripting. In our case, it’s always best to keep it as simple as possible. 

    Here’s a quick 3-step script you can use:

    • Step 1: Introduce the property yourself. People connect with people, so don’t be afraid to show your face on camera. 
    • Step 2: Give a quick tour of the property, including 3-5 key features. For this section, focus on the property — you don’t have to be on camera.
    • Step 3: Record yourself making final points and giving a call to action. Make sure your face is on camera for this step, too.

    Don’t let it be any more challenging than this. 

    Practice before you go live and, if you have to, write down what you want to cover in bullet point format and keep it in front of you. It helps to stay focused and make your videos more concise.

    As you get experience and become comfortable with the process, you can develop your style and hire creative editors to make your videos flashier. Until then, though, keep it simple!

    7 Creative Hacks & Tools For Video For Real Estate

    You will naturally want to make even more videos as you gain momentum. That’s when it’s time to start looking at tools and efficiency hacks you can use to get more done in less time.

    Here are some of the best hacks and tools you can use to save more time:

    #1 – Convert Your Videos Into Blog Posts

    Sitting down and creating long blog posts isn’t something anyone looks forward to. 

    With VideoPost, you can upload your videos and instantly receive a transcription that you can review and turn into a blog post. Once approved, you can hit publish on your blog.

    Here’s a link that shows you how to use VideoPost to create real estate content in less than 10 minutes.

    Then, when you’re ready to start increasing your customer engagement, converting more visitors into leads and leads into deals, and optimizing for YouTube and Google SEO, watch this quick 15-minute tutorial.

    #2 – Automate Engagement, Replies, And Testimonials

    Personalizing your interactions with your audience can be time-consuming if you try to do it manually every time you get a question or testimonial.

    With VideoAsk, you can add the human element to your funnel and convert more leads. This tool makes it super easy for you to be conversational (and authentic) in your marketing and collect testimonials once the deal is done.

    Once you start using it, you will abandon the manual way forever. It’s that powerful.

    #3 – Perform Advanced YouTube Keyword Research

    Even though YouTube and Google SEO are based on similar algorithms, what ranks on YouTube and the keywords people use to search on the platform can differ from those used on Google.

    With a tool like TubeBuddy or VIDIQ, you can see the keywords people use on YouTube and then cater your content and video titles to those keywords.

    Advanced keyword research helps you find high-performing video topics faster, too.

    #4 – Increase Email Clickthrough & Conversion Rates

    Tools like BombBomb help take your email campaigns to the next level by making your follow-up campaigns more personal and personable.

    Whether converting leads into deals, following up for birthdays and anniversaries, letting them know what to expect next, or just answering questions, BombBomb enables you to put video responses directly into your emails to make them more personal & powerful.

    This results in increased responses and stronger relationships and helps keep your prospects and contacts engaged throughout the process. On top of that, recording a video and plugging it into your email is FAR faster than typing it out manually — and gives you room to add context and clarity to the conversation.

    #5 – Train Your Team Faster & Easier

    Loom lets you quickly record your screen or desktop and automatically upload it to their platform. Then you can share a link to the video so your team or prospects can watch without having to log in.

    This saves a ton of time, helps eliminate lengthy Zoom meetings that could have been summed up in a quick five or 10-minute video, and enables you to keep the conversation moving forward.

    You can access the tool for free, and it plugs into your web browser, so you don’t have to download anything. You can also use it on your phone to record Looms even if you’re on the go.

    #6 – Offer 360 Degree Virtual Tours

    3D virtual tours are becoming necessary to stand out while highlighting the key features your prospects want to see.

    Whether you want to help them experience walking through the home before they become a lead, or you’re looking for a way to make your listings stand out, tools like Matterport make it easy.

    With it, you can use your phone to record the tours, add notes and comments, create accurate measurements, and even pull 4K photos from the video. You can also upload directly to your social media profiles, Google Street View, VRBO, and Realtor.com, and embed the tours on your website.

    You can do it without hiring a video editor or buying expensive cameras.

    #7 – Create Before & After Flip Videos

    Most investors make the mistake of only focusing on the result. This is understandable because they’ve poured so much time, love, money, and energy into the project that it only makes sense to showcase how great it turned out.

    But if you want to stand out and engage your prospects deeper, show them what the project started as. Spend some time filming it before you start and what it turns into once you put all that hard work into it. When you use an animation maker, you can creatively illustrate this transformation, making your project even more captivating

    Most of the time, prospects don’t notice the small details that take the most effort. If you point those details out, though, they become selling points without having to do any selling, and you’ll hear prospects talking about them when it’s time to sit down and close the deal.

    Video Marketing for Real Estate Simplified

    Once you understand how powerful (and profitable) using videos in your real estate business can be, creating them becomes much more enjoyable.

    In the beginning, remember to keep things simple and stay focused on what your people want to see from you. Keep your videos short and concise, and ensure you share them wherever possible.

    If you keep the tips and hacks from this guide in mind as you create, you’ll experience why video marketing for real estate is so effective.

    We’re here to help. You don’t have to get overwhelmed, find new topics, and fumble through video content. Not only have we done a lot of the work for you in this post, but we’ll guide you along the way, step-by-step, so you can be on your way to doing what you do best — closing deals.

    If you have any questions…

    And as always, if you feel Carrot may be a fit for your real estate websites and want better results online, we’d love to have you in the Carrot community, and be sure to learn more about video marketing

    Check out our plans and hit us up with questions anytime!

  • How To Build a High-Converting PPC Landing Page For Real Estate PPC Campaigns (7 Elements With The BIGGEST Impact)

    How To Build a High-Converting PPC Landing Page For Real Estate PPC Campaigns (7 Elements With The BIGGEST Impact)

    You’re spending a hard-earned marketing budget on your PPC campaigns…

    Every penny counts. More importantly, every click counts.

    The worst thing that can happen is a lot of people click on your PPC ad (costing you money), but none of those people become a lead or turn into cold, hard cash for your business. That would make your PPC campaign a waste of time and money.

    This is why where you send people (i.e., the landing page) when they click on your ad is so critical.

    If you send prospects (even motivated sellers) to a low-converting landing page, you might still get some leads, but you won’t get as many as you could (how hard is it to hit the back button and click on your competitor’s website instead?).

    Sadly, one lost deal could be between $10,000 and $50,000 down the drain, depending on your business model…

    And that’s not money you’re willing to lose.

    At Carrot, we’ve generated millions of online leads for real estate investors and agents. During that time, we’ve learned a thing or two about building a high-converting landing page.

    Let’s talk.

    What is a landing page for real estate PPC?

    A landing page is just marketing terminology for the page you send people to in a marketing campaign.

    In the case of Google Ads, it’s the page people go to when they click on your ad. For example, if I click on this result…

    Google Ads search results for sell my house in boston

    The reason that optimizing your landing page is so essential is because it helps determine the effectiveness of your ad campaign. If the page people go to after clicking on your ad is irrelevant, unpersuasive, or even takes too long to load, they won’t stick around and will not become a lead.

    Here’s a table summarizing the key differences of full webpages vs PPC landing pages:

    FeatureWebpagePPC Landing Page
    PurposeInformational, brand awarenessLead generation, conversion-focused
    Target AudienceBroader audience interested in real estateHighly targeted audience, e.g., motivated sellers
    ContentDiverse content: bio, services, blog postsFocused on a single offer or call to action (CTA)
    NavigationExtensive navigation to other website pagesLimited or no navigation to avoid distractions
    Call to Action (CTA)May have various CTAsStrong, clear CTA to capture leads

    Now that you know what a landing page is and why it’s important, let’s talk about 7 elements of every landing page that impact conversion.

    7 Elements You MUST Have for High-Converting PPC Landing Pages to Maximize Lead Generation

    Element #1: Simple Opt-In Form

    Every real estate website (agent or investor) at Carrot needs a high-quality, easy-to-fill-out opt-in form.

    And we don’t just believe that for no reason: it’s science. We’ve run hundreds of A/B tests on our member’s websites to determine whether opt-in forms perform better than a “Call Now” CTA (they do) and what types of forms perform the best.

    From one test we ran, we found that our member’s sites had almost a 30% conversion rate!

    Here’s the heatmap from the test…

    Rent To Own Homes In NC Heatmap

    And here’s the data…

    rent-to-own-house-website-test1

    If you want a high-converting landing page right out of the box, our Carrot sites already have all the elements mentioned in this article baked right in. Or, if you want to build one yourself (no biggie!), here’s what you’ll want for your opt-in form…

    • Keep it simple and only have 3-4 fields for people to enter their information.
    • Set up text message notifications for when a lead opts in so you can follow up fast (Carrot does this automatically!)
    • Ensure that the form you use is above the fold — meaning when people land on your website, it’s the first thing they see.
    • Have a big, clear button that’s a different color than everything else on your website.

    High-Converting Element #2: Clear & Actionable Content

    When it comes to capturing motivated sellers, clarity and action are key. Your landing page copy should be clear, concise, and laser-focused on the benefits you offer.

    Why is clear content important for seller-focused landing pages?

    • Motivated sellers are in a time-sensitive situation. They need to understand your value proposition quickly and easily. Dense text blocks or overly technical jargon will only deter them.
    • Focus on Benefits, Not Features. Don’t just list your services; explain how you solve seller pain points. Highlight the benefits of selling to you, like a fast cash offer, a hassle-free process, or the ability to avoid costly repairs.
    • Action-Oriented Language: Motivate sellers to take the next step. Use strong verbs and clear calls to action throughout your landing page copy.

    Best Practices for Persuasive Landing Page Content:

    • Keep it Short & Sweet: Stick to short paragraphs and bullet points for easy readability on any device.
    • Local Market Data: Showcase your knowledge of the area. Highlight relevant local market data, like average sales times or cash buyer trends, to demonstrate your expertise and ability to deliver a quick and smooth sale.
    • Focus on Seller Benefits: Use clear language to explain how you address their specific needs and challenges. For example, “We understand the stress of inherited property – get a fair cash offer and avoid costly repairs.”
    • Testimonials & Social Proof: Integrate positive testimonials from satisfied sellers to build trust and credibility.

    Remember: Your landing page copy should be a conversation starter, not a novel. Focus on clear communication, highlight the advantages of working with you, and guide sellers towards taking action (e.g., requesting a cash offer).

    High-Converting Element #3: Compelling Headline

    Your headline is like the golden sign outside your investor open house. It needs to grab attention, pique interest, and clearly communicate the value you offer. Real estate investors are busy, so a strong headline is crucial for making them stop scrolling and engage with your landing page.

    Here are some key ingredients for crafting compelling headlines for real estate PPC landing pages:

    • Clarity: Keep it clear and concise. Investors should instantly understand what your offer is.
    • Relevance: Ensure the headline aligns with your target audience and the specific investor segment you’re targeting (e.g., flippers vs. buy-and-hold investors).
    • Benefit-Driven: Focus on the benefits your offer provides. What problem do you solve for investors? How can you help them achieve their goals?
    • Location-Specific (for Real Estate): Highlight your local expertise and cater to the specific market you serve. This personalizes the message and resonates with investors familiar with the area.

    Example:

    Let’s say you specialize in helping investors buy rental properties in a specific city. Here’s an example headline that incorporates these elements:

    • “Tired of Making Repairs? Get a Fair Cash Offer Today (Sell Your Rental Property Fast!)”

    This headline is clear, relevant to buy-and-hold investors facing repair hassles, emphasizes the benefit of a quick cash offer, and targets investors specifically in your city.

    High-Converting Element #4: Equally Compelling CTA

    Your call to action (CTA) is the moment of truth on your real estate PPC landing page. It’s where you convert curious visitors into qualified leads by prompting them to take a specific action.

    A strong CTA is essential for maximizing your lead generation efforts. Here’s what makes an effective CTA for real estate investors:

    • Clear Action Verbs: Tell investors exactly what you want them to do. Use strong verbs like “Download,” “Schedule,” or “Get Started.”
    • Prominent Placement: Make your CTA button stand out visually. Use contrasting colors and place it above the fold (visible without scrolling).
    • Relevant to Investor Goals: Your CTA should align with the value proposition you’ve presented and address the investor’s specific goals. Don’t ask them to “Learn More” if they’re ready to “Schedule a Consultation.”

    Examples:

    Consider these CTA examples tailored to different investor goals:

    • “Download Your How to Stop Foreclosure Guide” (Clear action verb, relevant to distressed property investors facing foreclosure)
    • “Schedule a Free Consultation to Find Your Perfect Investment Property” (Prominent placement, addresses buy-and-hold investor goals)
    • “Get a Fair Cash Offer Today!” (Strong verb, urgent tone for investors seeking a quick sale)

    Remember: A/B testing different CTAs can help you determine which ones resonate best with your target audience.

    From one test we ran at Carrot, we found that “Get My Fair Cash Offer” converted 49.55% better than “Click here to continue.”

    split test motivated house seller website

    Here are the exact percentages…

    house seller website test

    Giving people what they already want isn’t just less work for you; it converts better, too.

    High-Converting Element #5: Trust Signals & Social Proof

    Securing motivated sellers hinges on establishing trust. This is where trust signals and social proof come into play.

    • Trust Signals: These are visual cues that demonstrate your legitimacy and expertise as a real estate professional. They act as a digital handshake, assuring house sellers you’re a reliable and trustworthy partner to help them achieve their goals.
    • Social Proof: This leverages the power of “herd mentality.” By showcasing positive experiences from past clients (especially sellers in your local market), you demonstrate the effectiveness of your approach and encourage others to take action.

    Why are these important for real estate investor landing pages targeting sellers?

    House sellers are entrusting you with a significant financial decision – selling their property quickly and efficiently. By incorporating trust signals and social proof, you significantly increase the likelihood of converting website visitors into qualified leads.

    Examples of Trust Signals:

    • Security Badges: Display logos indicating secure transactions and data protection.
    • Professional Licenses & Affiliations: Showcase your real estate licenses and relevant professional memberships.
    • Awards & Recognition: Highlight any industry awards or recognitions you’ve received.

    Social Proof in Action for Real Estate Investors:

    • Seller Testimonials: Feature quotes and success stories from satisfied sellers, particularly those in your local market.
    • Case Studies: Showcase real-world examples of how you’ve helped sellers achieve their goals (e.g., “Sold John’s house in X days above asking price”).
    • Logos of Trusted Partners: Display logos of reputable companies you work with, like title companies or closing attorneys.

    Remember: Social proof should be authentic and verifiable. Encourage seller reviews on trusted platforms like Google My Business or industry-specific sites.

    By strategically integrating trust signals and social proof on your real estate investor landing pages, you build trust with potential sellers and establish yourself as a proven resource to help them achieve a smooth and successful sale.

    High-Converting Element #6: Image That Paints Desire

    Real estate is a visual business, and the same applies to your landing pages targeting motivated sellers. High-quality visuals are crucial for capturing attention, conveying information effectively, and ultimately, convincing sellers to choose you over other options.

    Why are visuals important for seller-focused landing pages?

    • Attention Grabbing: Compelling visuals instantly capture attention and make your landing page stand out. In a sea of competing offers, strong visuals are the first impression that can convince sellers you’re the right buyer for their property.
    • Emotional Connection: The right visuals can evoke emotions and build trust with your audience. Use high-quality photos of beautiful homes you’ve helped sell or inspiring visuals of happy sellers receiving a fast cash offer. This creates an emotional connection and positions you as a solution to their situation.
    • Transparency & Trust: High-quality visuals demonstrate professionalism and transparency. Showcase problem-free solutions: for example, pictures of smooth walkthroughs or happy sellers signing paperwork. This builds trust and reassures sellers you’re a reliable partner in their sale.

    Examples of Effective Visuals for Motivated Sellers:

    • High-Resolution Property Photos: Showcase attractive, professional photos of the types of properties you buy (e.g., single-family homes in need of repairs, inherited properties).
    • “Before & After” Photos: If you specialize in renovations, highlight your expertise with “before & after” photos showcasing the transformation potential of properties.
    • Fast Closing Videos: Short testimonial videos featuring sellers who received a quick cash offer can be incredibly powerful. These visuals demonstrate your ability to deliver a smooth and efficient sale process.
    • Data & Charts: Use data visualizations (e.g., charts showing average closing times) to communicate your commitment to a fast and hassle-free experience for sellers.

    Remember: Don’t underestimate the power of visuals. Invest in high-quality photos or consider using high-resolution stock imagery that resonates with motivated sellers and showcases the types of properties you typically buy.

    High-Converting Element #7: Quick Load Speed

    In today’s mobile-driven world, ensuring your real estate investor PPC landing page is mobile-friendly is no longer optional – it’s essential. Here’s why:

    • Mobile Dominates Real Estate Searches: A significant portion of motivated sellers initiate their search for solutions (like cash buyers) from their smartphones. If your landing page isn’t optimized for mobile viewing, you’re missing out on a huge pool of potential leads.
    • Seamless User Experience: Mobile users expect a smooth and intuitive experience. A mobile-friendly landing page ensures clear navigation, easy-to-read text, and properly sized buttons for seamless interaction on any device. Frustrated sellers on clunky mobile pages are more likely to bounce and seek alternative solutions.
    • Faster Lead Generation: A responsive landing page loads quickly and functions flawlessly on mobile devices. This translates to faster form submissions and quicker lead capture when motivated sellers are ready to take action.
    page speed loading time

    (Image Source)

    Benefits for Real Estate Investors:

    By prioritizing mobile-friendliness, you unlock several advantages in the competitive real estate market:

    • Increased Lead Generation: Capture leads from a wider audience of sellers who are searching and making decisions on their phones.
    • Improved Conversion Rates: A user-friendly mobile experience keeps sellers engaged and more likely to convert on your call to action (e.g., requesting a cash offer).
    • Enhanced Brand Image: A mobile-optimized landing page demonstrates professionalism and a commitment to providing a convenient experience for sellers, potentially positioning you as the go-to buyer for their needs.

    Remember: Don’t just assume your landing page is mobile-friendly. Use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool or other resources to check responsiveness and ensure a smooth experience for sellers on any device.

    At Carrot, we’ve optimized all our member’s websites to be fast. Here are the results of one being run through a speed test.

    Carrot member pages speed results

    This helps with SEO rankings, and, more importantly, helps with the conversion rate. When your website loads quickly, people stay longer and are more willing to work with you than if they have a clunky and difficult experience.

    It’s not the most important element in the world, but it does make a difference…

    And how much would it cost you if a motivated seller, could-be-a-deal, left your website because it moved too slowly? $10,000? $50,000?

    Yeah… it’s not worth it.

    Bonus Section: Common Real Estate PPC Landing Page Mistakes to Avoid for Sellers

    While crafting compelling landing pages to capture motivated sellers, here are some common mistakes to steer clear of:

    • Generic Landing Pages: Don’t use a one-size-fits-all approach. Tailor your landing page specifically to the needs of motivated sellers (e.g., facing foreclosure, inheriting a property) rather than a broad real estate audience.
    • Weak Value Proposition: A vague or unclear value proposition won’t resonate with time-sensitive sellers. Clearly state how you solve their problems and the benefits of working with you (e.g., “Sell your house fast for cash and avoid costly repairs”).
    • Confusing Navigation: A cluttered landing page with complex navigation will frustrate sellers. Keep it simple and focus on a single call to action (e.g., “Get a Cash Offer Now”).
    • Lack of Trust Signals: Sellers are entrusting you with a significant financial decision. Omit trust signals like security badges, professional licenses, or testimonials, and you risk losing credibility.
    • Excessively Lengthy Forms: Don’t overwhelm sellers with lengthy forms. Request only essential information needed to get started (e.g., property address, contact details).
    • Unrealistic Promises: Avoid making exaggerated claims about closing timelines or cash offer amounts. Focus on transparency and realistic expectations to build trust with sellers.
    • Not Tracking & Testing: Don’t set your landing page and forget it. Regularly track key metrics (e.g., conversion rates, bounce rates) and A/B test different elements (e.g., headlines, CTAs) to optimize your landing page performance for maximum lead generation.

    By avoiding these common pitfalls and focusing on the best practices outlined above, you can create high-converting real estate investor PPC landing pages that effectively capture motivated sellers and propel your investment business forward.pen_sparktunesharemore_vert

    How Do You Get Results?

    PPC takes work but is essential for real estate professionals seeking more qualified leads. Real estate businesses can ensure high conversion rates by optimizing their landing page for conversion. This is especially important when targeting hyper-competitive markets such as Dallas, Miami, or Denver, where it’s even more critical for a business to have all conversion principles in place.

    Doing so can increase lead generation by up to 2-3x or more compared to businesses without conversion optimization. With the right approach and strategy, you can use PPC to increase lead generation and build brand loyalty among your target markets.

    If you’re already a member, here are some resources to help you learn more about PPC:

    Other free PPC resources:

  • EP 428: Multifamily Development Opportunities for 2023 w/ Daniil Kleyman | Market Harvest 3/23

    EP 428: Multifamily Development Opportunities for 2023 w/ Daniil Kleyman | Market Harvest 3/23


    If you’re a wholesaler or flipper wanting to get into multifamily developments, this episode is for you. Daniil Kleyman talks about the important steps he took to GC & raise capital for duplexes and, later on larger commercial properties. We talk about the ROI of building spec homes vs commercial properties and what opportunities Daniil sees in his market. Enjoy!

    Mentioned in this Episode:

    Connect with Daniil: RehabValuator.com

    In-depth content on developing: RehabValuator YouTube Channel

    Catch more episodes at CarrotCast.com


    Episode Transcript (This is an automated transcript by robot carrots – please mind the typos 😉)

    00:00:00:01 – 00:00:27:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    The rental side. What I focus on is really class-A product these days in order to build ground up. Given what things cost you almost have no choice but to focus on class-A product because that’s the only kind of product that will give you the rents that can support the cost of construction. But even before construction costs got out of hand, I very quickly realized that a lot of the suffers is a management headache.

    00:00:27:12 – 00:00:44:14

    Daniil Kleyman

    And my focus for a long time has been on the classic product. We build really nice stuff that attracts really nice tenants that commence really high rents and in turn it allows me to build a scalable portfolio.

    00:00:48:27 – 00:01:11:23

    Brady Winder

    Friends, welcome back to the Kurt Cass podcast. I’m your host, Brady Winder, and this is a podcast where we help you dial in your online marketing so you could build a business of freedom and impact. The second Tuesday of every month is our market harvest, where we’re bringing you data from behind the scenes at Carat, the real estate industry data, and we bring in an expert to talk about something that we don’t traditionally talk about during the podcast.

    00:01:11:23 – 00:01:26:03

    Brady Winder

    So a little bit of a step away from online marketing to talk about what’s going on, different relevant real estate industry topics. So I’ll spend a couple minutes going over our data, but first I want to kick it off and introduce you to our guest, Dana CLAMAN. Welcome on, man.

    00:01:26:05 – 00:01:28:01

    Daniil Kleyman

    How are you? Thank you. Happy to be here.

    00:01:28:14 – 00:01:49:22

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, absolutely. Well, I’m going to go through our data real quick here and then I’ll toss it over to you to give an intro. And then we’re going to be talking about multifamily today. So multifamily trends and opportunities for 2023 and what I’ll see in his market, it’s going to be a fun conversation. So real quick, behind the scenes at Carat, it’s been a couple months since we did this.

    00:01:49:22 – 00:02:12:10

    Brady Winder

    We skipped last month and as a side know, I’m probably not going to be on the next one or two of these. I’m having a kid at any time now in the next two weeks. Thank you. And so Trevor is going to be coming back on, so you’ll get to hear from Trevor. He’s been away from the podcast for a little bit and he’s going to dive really deep, much deeper into the data with you guys and hopefully Tyler for my co-host will be joining us soon as well.

    00:02:13:20 – 00:02:53:07

    Brady Winder

    Anyway, so visitors, what we’re seeing behind the scenes at CARAS in terms of visitors, motivated sellers coming to care sites has been has declined steadily, not a huge drop off but a little bit taper down over the last nine months or so, 9 to 12 months, four two reasons one being the Google may update in 2022 and you know, some rankings being impacted by that and that’s not a I want to make it very clear this is not a care issue we’re seeing, but this is Internet wide and, you know, multiple industries and this is primarily businesses, websites that didn’t have their profile set up well.

    00:02:53:07 – 00:03:16:28

    Brady Winder

    So that’s their expertise, authority and trust. They were the most effective. Basically, this is just a long the way of saying that people who weren’t putting out quality, unique, relevant content, their rankings were impacted with some of the Google updates from last year. It’s kind of a double whammy, though. Those contacted by the interest rates, you know, coming up, obviously through last year, sellers are more sitting on the sidelines.

    00:03:16:28 – 00:03:36:18

    Brady Winder

    So visitors have gone down. The good news is the leads we’re seeing have gone up, you know, 5.9% this month over last month. So it’s good because it shows what we were anticipating that we’re coming out of the winter slump and heading up into that sort of boost we typically see in the spring. So that’s what we’re seeing with leads.

    00:03:37:06 – 00:04:18:12

    Brady Winder

    It’s encouraging and we’re predicting to see, you know, usually it takes people a few months to kind of the freeze when big shifts happen in the market. But we’re seeing more seller interest. And so we do purchases predict to see more seller interest as the year goes by and should be seeing more leads. But as far as visitors and leads where they come in from, you know, social media or are they searching organic, organic and direct, direct meaning people go in right to someone’s account members, a website, direct an organic search, continue to be the bread and butter for current members far and above paid search, social media things like that.

    00:04:18:18 – 00:04:48:16

    Brady Winder

    And so people are still bringing in leads. And then as far as what’s converting what’s converting leads at the higher rate, same thing. Organic search is continuing to convert at the highest rate above things like paid social, direct mail, email, that sort of thing. And yeah, that’s about it. The only other thing I’ll touch on, see if it’s in here, only other thing I’ll touch on and if you have any thoughts on this, is inventory.

    00:04:48:28 – 00:05:04:19

    Brady Winder

    You know, we’re for January 20, 23 of this year. We get 625,000 active homes on the market. It’s not exactly double, but close double what it was January last year. Any thoughts on that man and how much has dramatically changed?

    00:05:04:29 – 00:05:41:04

    Daniil Kleyman

    You know, it’s it’s changed dramatically, but it’s off of a very low baseline. Very low baseline. I mean, we had no inventory a year ago. Yeah. And I you know, honestly, I don’t watch this national data carefully. I barely watch it for my own market. And we sell houses. But I know locally we do not still not have enough inventory and everything that’s that’s being put in the market unless it’s unreasonable or in terrible shape, it’s selling.

    00:05:41:24 – 00:05:50:27

    Daniil Kleyman

    So, you know, we still have a housing shortage in this country and it’s not getting any better because of interest rates, because homebuilders went back. So, yeah.

    00:05:51:18 – 00:06:09:23

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, it’s interesting. We did an episode, I think our last market harvest was two months ago. We did an episode just about that. Like what is it going to take for, you know, for this gap to go away, the housing shortage. And yeah, there’s quite a big gap to fill there. But anyways, yeah, tell us a little bit about what you do.

    00:06:09:23 – 00:06:16:29

    Brady Winder

    You’ve been in carrot’s ecosystem for a long time and a friend of Trevor’s for a long time. What’s your deal, man?

    00:06:16:29 – 00:06:21:09

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah, well, first of all, congrats on the kid. That’s fantastic. So your first.

    00:06:21:18 – 00:06:27:08

    Brady Winder

    Second, we have an eight year old son, and so it’s a big gap. Intentional gap. But yeah, brother.

    00:06:27:08 – 00:06:35:13

    Daniil Kleyman

    No, that’s awesome. My brother and I are nine years apart and we hated each other for the first probably 20 years of his life. And then we became really good friends.

    00:06:35:21 – 00:06:36:22

    Brady Winder

    Sounds about right. Yeah.

    00:06:36:27 – 00:07:06:07

    Daniil Kleyman

    So that’s awesome. Congrats. I’ve got, I’ve got three myself and they’re all very close in age, which creates its own craziness on a on a daily basis. But so I live in Richmond, Virginia. That’s where my real estate business is located. I my business right now primarily is focused on ground of development. So we have a homebuilding division where we build and sell spec houses.

    00:07:06:07 – 00:07:27:18

    Daniil Kleyman

    But that’s a small part of my business. We probably do anywhere between 12 and 20 houses a year. Most of my focus is on building long term assets for my rental portfolio. So I develop multifamily and they develop mixed use projects. They develop projects where it’s it’s mostly apartments and then we will have a retail component either on the ground floor or on the corner of the building.

    00:07:28:13 – 00:07:56:03

    Daniil Kleyman

    So my tenants include restaurants, juice bars, yoga studios, cocktail lounges, co-working spaces. We have a restaurant that’s actually having a soft opening tomorrow, another restaurant. So I’m very passionate about those kinds of projects because the mixed use development in general allows us to create walkable neighborhoods. It allows us to create amenities inside our buildings and then serve our tenants.

    00:07:56:12 – 00:08:11:03

    Daniil Kleyman

    So that’s that that part of my business I’m very passionate about. But my my focus is on building long term assets. And, you know, I do everything from building duplexes to right now we’re working on a 130 unit apartment complex and everything in between.

    00:08:12:00 – 00:08:18:01

    Brady Winder

    Is I’m curious for context, here is Richmond a pretty trending? Is it growing pretty fast?

    00:08:19:11 – 00:08:57:23

    Daniil Kleyman

    We’ve been we’ve been growing even before COVID and during COVID, we were a big sort of beneficiary of people moving south. Right. People moving. Everybody’s moving to Florida. But some people get tired of driving all the way down to Florida and then they just stop and move into Virginia. No, all jokes aside, we’ve had we’ve had a solid influx of people from Northern Virginia, from D.C., from Baltimore, people that are able to work remotely now or people that are tired of the high cost of living up.

    00:08:57:23 – 00:09:19:06

    Daniil Kleyman

    There are people that are tired of the traffic and where I where I do business. We have a great quality of life, everything. Housing is still relatively affordable. So people moving from the south, people moving south from up there are hitting much cheaper price points than what they’re used to while actually driving our market up.

    00:09:19:26 – 00:09:40:06

    Brady Winder

    So, Dana, with you doing being on the residential and commercial side of mixed use and new in spec homes, how are you determining where to put your investments in, like whether you want to go more into residential versus commercial? And then I don’t know if the supplies you at all, but are you considering like different, you know, ABCD classes or markets?

    00:09:41:26 – 00:10:05:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s a great question. So on on the rental side, what I focus on is really Class A product. Now it’s funny because these days in order to build ground up, given what things cost, you almost have no choice but to focus on class product because that’s the only kind of product that will give you the rent that can support the cost of construction.

    00:10:06:12 – 00:10:30:27

    Daniil Kleyman

    But even before construction costs got out of hand, my preference and we have an in-house property management company that manages all of our assets so we’re vertically integrated. But my, my, you know, when I started 15 years ago, I had some student housing, I had some Section eight rentals, and I very quickly realized that a lot of the suffers is a management headache and can be a nightmare.

    00:10:30:27 – 00:10:55:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    So my focus for a long time has been on the classic product. We built really nice stuff that attracts really nice tenants who commence really high rents and in turn it allows me to build a scalable portfolio because we release these properties quickly. Our rent comes in on the first of the month, they stay rented, they have very low turnover.

    00:10:55:26 – 00:11:22:18

    Daniil Kleyman

    We have tenants that treat their properties really well and you know, I haven’t had to evict somebody in over ten years. I haven’t had to even threaten eviction to a tenant in probably the same amount of time. We’re 100% leased were 100% rent collected usually within the first week of the month. Inevitably, there is always some somebody that’s having a little bit of difficulty and needs a few days to catch up.

    00:11:22:18 – 00:11:44:17

    Daniil Kleyman

    But I mean, I’m, you know, it’s it’s a the kind of portfolio that I actually want to scale and then we don’t mind managing and my property management staff that sits in my office, they’re proud of the product that we put out in the market. They’re proud to walk potential tenants through those units. They’re proud of the kind of buildings that we put out.

    00:11:44:17 – 00:12:07:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    So so my focus is on class-A. And again, ironically, I mean, these days you really have no choice if you’re going to build ground up. There is a reason why everything nationally that’s that’s coming up, that’s multifamily ground up. It’s old class-A stuff. Unless you’re getting low income housing tax credits and you’re getting subsidies from the government, in which case you can afford to build on quite affordable.

    00:12:07:20 – 00:12:34:10

    Daniil Kleyman

    But otherwise, if you’re doing you know, if you’re not getting subsidies, you’re building clay, you have no choice. You’re putting out class-A product that must command class-A rents. And that’s that’s that’s almost the entire construction pipeline right now in the country. So so that answers your question about the rental product. How how much spec product we’re putting out, how many houses we’re building to sell the.

    00:12:34:29 – 00:13:04:06

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah, we pay attention to the market. We pay attention to interest rates, we pay attention to buyer demands. I was spooked for a while because probably the biggest pipeline we’ve ever had has been over the last four months of what we have under construction and given what interest rates were doing and people yelling gloom and doom, I you know, there was a period of a few months where I, I was a little bit freaked out because we were building more houses than ever.

    00:13:04:06 – 00:13:42:00

    Daniil Kleyman

    Last November, December, buyer demand plummeted, right? It was just dead. But things rebounded in January. Everything that we’ve put out on the market so far and they’ve had three closings in the last 30 days has sold. It’s sold quickly. I can’t speak for every part of the country. I can’t speak for other markets. But what we’re seeing locally is that if you build a good product in a relatively good location because there are less buyers now and buyers are more picky about what they’re buying, if you put out a good product in a relatively good location and if you don’t try to push the market right.

    00:13:42:00 – 00:14:02:16

    Daniil Kleyman

    What we did the year ago was we put product out in the market and we said, Hey, I think it’s worth for 50. Let’s see if we can get for 85 and a half the time you’d have multiple bids and you’d get for 85, right? You can’t do that anymore. You can’t price things unrealistically because they will set you.

    00:14:02:16 – 00:14:23:14

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. So if you’re putting out good product, if you’re putting out good product in a relatively good location that doesn’t have any major red flags. And if you’re listing things at reasonable prices, what we’re seeing is that everything is still selling. Now, again, there are there are overheated markets around the country and that’s and that’s no longer the case.

    00:14:23:19 – 00:14:51:16

    Daniil Kleyman

    But, you know, the beauty of the market phenomenon is it’s always been fairly even even keel, Right. It didn’t go crazy during the housing boom. It didn’t go crazy on the way down during the recession of oh eight. It’s been it’s been a fairly stable market compared to places like Phenix. That goes nuts or Austin, right? Yup. That just goes through and then goes, you know, and cools off really rapidly.

    00:14:51:16 – 00:15:01:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    And I like that about the market because it, it, it makes sense on a regular basis. Whereas there are some other markets around the country that are very temperamental.

    00:15:01:19 – 00:15:11:03

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Tyler Ford, our co-host, he was on the last one I did is in Tucson and he’s experienced that the crazy highs and lows. It’s wild the swings.

    00:15:11:03 – 00:15:12:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    There it is. Yeah.

    00:15:13:08 – 00:15:30:25

    Brady Winder

    So, you know, I’m curious about the multifamily, but more so the mix used to. I love walking through towns like you’re talking about where it’s really walkable. There’s just so much going on. What kind of opportunities are you guys seen in Richmond for multifamily mixed use coming up this next year?

    00:15:30:25 – 00:15:52:10

    Daniil Kleyman

    So I’ve got, you know, I’ve got a bunch of projects in the pipeline with, with the other mixed use and what I what I am realizing is that again, if you just listen to the news, if you pay attention to all the, you know, talking heads over last five, seven years, you know, retailers that retail that it’s it’s not true.

    00:15:52:16 – 00:16:14:24

    Daniil Kleyman

    Right. People will always want to go to restaurants people will always want to go to, you know, local neighborhood amenity spots. Now, location makes a great difference. So there are places where I’m building apartments where I won’t do mixed use because it just doesn’t make sense to put a business there. There’s not enough foot traffic, there’s not enough car traffic.

    00:16:15:10 – 00:16:45:09

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s a great place for multifamily, terrible place for mixed use. So when we build an excuse, we’re a lot more selective about locations than even we would be with the regular multifamily product. But there are still ample opportunities, I believe, throughout the country to build mixed use projects in the right locations because people more than ever probably want that walkability.

    00:16:45:20 – 00:17:08:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    Mm hmm. Everything. Everything is moving towards density, right? Like, we’re we’re not I truly believe we’re not going to come back from the age of suburbs and cul de sacs where everybody wants that, right? There’s a huge part of this country that wants to live in the magnetized, walkable neighborhoods. And there are lots of cities around the country that lack that have you.

    00:17:09:09 – 00:17:09:18

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah.

    00:17:10:00 – 00:17:25:06

    Brady Winder

    Oh, sorry. I was going to ask if you’ve seen that trend come up since the pandemic, has that been pretty dramatic going from everybody being completely isolated, stay inside quarantine to now, hey, we want to be out and about in a walk or neighborhood is a benefit to do.

    00:17:25:22 – 00:17:49:18

    Daniil Kleyman

    You know, I was in the middle of a 20,000 square foot mixed use project right when the pandemic was actually 25,000 square foot mixed use project, right when the pandemic happened. And we we never saw that fall off. So we opened up a little of phase one of that project in May of 2020, like when lockdowns were hardcore.

    00:17:50:06 – 00:18:20:05

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. And and one of the businesses in my building that opened up was a juice bar. And it was a perfect business for the pandemic because it was mostly was a small space. It was mostly carryout right. And he opened they opened up during during a perfect time for that and we never saw. So I personally guess what I’m trying to tell you is I never in our in the neighborhoods we were active.

    00:18:20:05 – 00:18:38:24

    Daniil Kleyman

    We never really saw that demand go down. Even during the pandemic, people wanted to people want to walk places. It’s just what they were doing changed because maybe they weren’t sitting down in big restaurants around a lot of people, but they still wanted to go and grab a cup of coffee. They still wanted to go grab a juice or a smoothie.

    00:18:38:24 – 00:19:01:28

    Daniil Kleyman

    They wanted to go and pick up a meal. So most most of the retail development that we do, they’re small spaces, right? I don’t do these. If you go into a suburban shopping mall, they have these restaurants that are five, six, 7000 square feet. Right? But we don’t do that stuff. What I love doing is taking making small bets.

    00:19:02:15 – 00:19:31:21

    Daniil Kleyman

    So our average retail space is 1000 to 1200 square feet. And so right now we just we just finished phase two of that project that has another 5000 square feet of commercial space and there’s six tenants in there. Wow. Yeah. Which, which means that these tenants have smaller overhead. They’re making more revenue per square foot than they would in a really big building.

    00:19:31:21 – 00:19:59:17

    Daniil Kleyman

    Right. Big space. And also, if one of them doesn’t work out, we’re not sitting with 5000 square feet empty. So the project that we just finished that’s got an ice cream parlor with a full production kitchen, it’s got an office, it’s got a 1000 square foot coworking space that fits 22 desks and the don’t ask me how, but, you know, it’s got a they’re getting ready to open up a rama noodle shop that’s going to be mostly takeout.

    00:20:00:17 – 00:20:23:23

    Daniil Kleyman

    And then there’s like a 1200 square foot cocktail lounge in there. And that’s and that’s one of the things that I really love about this business is because we get to curate tenants. I have an apartment building and it’s got a bunch of commercial tenants downstairs and I get to really curate who goes in there and make sure that those businesses are not just somebody that can breathe and pay a rent check.

    00:20:23:23 – 00:20:53:22

    Daniil Kleyman

    I want to make sure that those businesses are and the many to my tenants are in the memory to my neighborhood and they become a draw and help me lease sub the apartments in that building because we have 21 apartments in that building as well. So that’s that’s one of my favorite parts about this business is being able to put together a tenant makes this very complementary, but just massively enhances that block in the neighborhood.

    00:20:53:22 – 00:21:09:00

    Daniil Kleyman

    And you drive past that building now, and especially when it gets warmer in the summer and you just see activity on the street, people on the sidewalk, people, people at tables in the sidewalk benches, eating ice cream. And it’s it’s cool because it’s you. You can see the difference.

    00:21:10:15 – 00:21:23:05

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I love that. I love the way you describe that. I love how you talk about making, you know, making small bets versus, you know, one tenant at 5000 square feet that tenants out like, you know, you’re kind of screwed.

    00:21:23:05 – 00:21:43:26

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah, you’re just yeah, you’re, you’re and the downside is that the downside to retail and when I say retail, you know most people when they think of retail, they think like stores. When we say retail, we I can mean restaurants and cafes that can mean office to me, all of that I kind of throw into that retail bucket let’s call it commercial.

    00:21:44:12 – 00:22:08:06

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. The downside to commercial is, you know, when things are good, things are good. When when those tenants are there, they’re there for many years. Right? I’ve had the restaurant, my first ever commercial tenant, they’re probably coming up on ten, 11 years now and they’re doing great. Nice. So when that’s good, that’s good. Those tenants are in there for a very long time.

    00:22:08:06 – 00:22:31:00

    Daniil Kleyman

    They pay their rent. It’s usually triple net leases, which means that those tenants are responsible for their own maintenance. They pay their share of real estate taxes and insurance has very little management on their part. So when things are good, they’re great. The problem is when these tenants leave and inevitably all of them at some point, well, I hope it’s not for a very long time.

    00:22:31:00 – 00:22:48:16

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s not as easy for me to fill as an apartment. If somebody if you move out of one of my apartments, I can advertise it. I may have to do some painting, but I can have somebody in there potentially tomorrow moving in. Commercial spaces are much harder to fill because, you know, you have to find the right tenant.

    00:22:49:03 – 00:23:10:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    You have to qualify the tenant. Then you have to make sure that that space is right for the tenant. And if that space is not right for the tenant, then you’re renovating that space again and you’re contributing what’s called tie allowance for that tenant, which is standing room and allowance. So replacing these tenants is much more complicated and it will inevitably cost money.

    00:23:11:12 – 00:23:32:01

    Daniil Kleyman

    So it’s a double edged sword, right? When things are good, things are wonderful and inevitably there is going to be a time when things are going to be not so wonderful. But you put money away for that, you put reserves away for that, so that when that happens you’re not, you’re prepared. Mm.

    00:23:32:12 – 00:23:44:03

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. And you’re also not making, you’re not building and designing super niched properties that are very specific, you’re keeping them open to retail so that you know.

    00:23:44:25 – 00:24:07:15

    Daniil Kleyman

    For the most part, I mean we just finished again, we’re finishing this, this, this building where one of our tenants is putting into 2000 square feet. They’re putting a really, really high end cocktail lounge and the ramen noodles shop with the shared kitchen. Yeah. They build that space out from the ground up, meaning it was just gravel floor, gravel, gravel on the floor and four walls.

    00:24:07:15 – 00:24:27:26

    Daniil Kleyman

    So that entire build out is very specific to their exact needs and designs. It would be challenging to get somebody to come in and simply take over their space. Yeah, but at the same time, they have so much skin in the game of their own that, you know, and, and they’re, they’re very good operators. They’re going to be successful for a long time.

    00:24:27:26 – 00:24:45:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    And when the time comes for them to go, we will have depreciated the building so much and we will have made so much money from it that will, we’ll cut the check and bite whatever cost, you know, requires to, to replace them with somebody else. That’s going to be awesome.

    00:24:46:10 – 00:24:46:17

    Brady Winder

    Yeah.

    00:24:46:17 – 00:24:47:26

    Daniil Kleyman

    Just that’s just the nature of the game.

    00:24:48:17 – 00:24:55:11

    Brady Winder

    I want to be there and I would love to be at a ramen ramen shop and cocktail lounge right now. That’s like, that’s my city.

    00:24:55:11 – 00:25:08:03

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s a great it’s a great combo. You know, you go in, there you are. You have to wait to get to get ramen. You go next door, grab a drink, and vice versa. It’s they’re going to do really well.

    00:25:08:21 – 00:25:40:28

    Brady Winder

    That’s awesome. So one other thing I wanted to ask you about before we wrap up, just for the we like to give the show short for the sake of time. And I want to ask you more about your transition into multi-family. I mean, we could go for hours about that, but let me boil it down into two areas and I want to ask you about is there you know, you’re transitioning into, you know, getting into more commercial properties, Mars mix, use, specialty, higher level investing versus your, you know, people who are doing fix flips and wholesales.

    00:25:41:10 – 00:25:56:23

    Brady Winder

    When you started taking on some of these larger transactions, what were the two most helpful things you did or most helpful thing you did in the area of relationships? So what did networking look like? And then in the areas of finance, like was it reserves or what were the two things you did to kind of make that transition?

    00:25:57:18 – 00:26:27:00

    Daniil Kleyman

    So I, I would say the most helpful thing to me was going out it slowly, meaning I, I was renovating single family houses and I didn’t all of a sudden wake up one day and said, I want to build 131 apartment building. Can you. I suppose you can. You can go and raise a bunch of outside capital and find some good contractors and engineers and, and, but you’re kind of learning with other people’s money.

    00:26:27:09 – 00:26:44:11

    Daniil Kleyman

    So one of the most helpful things to me was I evolved very slowly. I was renovating single family houses and then they decided to to build a single family house. And they built a duplex, They built a bunch of duplexes and they and they and they see them myself so that they truly knew what I was doing. Then.

    00:26:44:11 – 00:27:04:29

    Daniil Kleyman

    Then they built a four unit building and a six unit building. Then we built a 14 unit building. So I, I made the point I wanted to do it slowly and grow organically. And that allowed me to build my knowledge base and my confidence and to to address your, your actual question. That also gave me plenty of time to build up credibility with my local lenders.

    00:27:04:29 – 00:27:27:01

    Daniil Kleyman

    We do a lot of business with local community banks. They didn’t just come out of nowhere and help one of these banks. It was like, I need $20 million, you know, I established long term track records with these bankers by borrowing small amounts of money, paying it back, or, you know, that’s properties I’m keeping that making my my loan payments every month.

    00:27:28:12 – 00:27:53:23

    Daniil Kleyman

    And it’s allowed me to build good long term relationships with subcontractors as well. You know, they’re there guys that have been working in their projects for for many years and we know and trust each other. So so as far as relationships, capital is incredibly important. It’s easy to do residential deals with private money lenders or just with your own a little bit of cash.

    00:27:54:07 – 00:28:23:19

    Daniil Kleyman

    When you get into larger scale development, you will need institutional money, you’re going to need banks, you’re going to need you’re going to need bank or bank like lenders. So the relationships I’ve built over time have been by performing on a number of deals and gradually ramping them up. So. So you asked me about finances and you asked me about about relationships.

    00:28:23:19 – 00:28:50:26

    Daniil Kleyman

    So, so so those are interrelated, right? You’re due to do larger scale development. You you need two things. It’s very simple people over complicated to do any kind of large real estate deals. So you need equity and you need that right? There is no such thing as 100% financing. When you’re doing a large scale development, right, you’re going to need skin in the game and that can be skin in the game that you bring from your own money.

    00:28:50:26 – 00:29:15:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    Or you can bring in limited partners that contribute equity to your deal, right? So for me, I don’t like to raise a lot of outside capital. So for me, it’s also been helpful to kind of slowly ramp up my own finances so that I’m able to execute larger deals without going out there and raising money from 50,000 people.

    00:29:15:20 – 00:29:16:00

    Brady Winder

    Yeah.

    00:29:16:26 – 00:29:39:28

    Daniil Kleyman

    But again, that’s a personal preference, right? There are other investors that very successfully syndicate deals and they go out and they raise all of their money from outside investors and then they bring a bank lender to contribute the remaining portion of it, you know, whatever, it’s 70% of the deal and they can execute deals that way. Um, they just, it just depends on what your preferences.

    00:29:40:13 – 00:29:45:09

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. And what, you know, how much bandwidth you have, how much stress you want to take on, you know.

    00:29:45:27 – 00:30:09:26

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. And you know what I always tell people because we meant there, we meant there are a lot of people and we meant there people trying to get into, into development. There are larger scale deals. Having an operating business that’s separate from your long term investment or development business is helpful. So there is a reason why we, for example, build spec houses to sell.

    00:30:10:07 – 00:30:34:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s not my primary focus. It’s not where my passion lies, right? I’m very passionate about building the long term portfolio, but being able to build 12, 15, 20 houses a year and sell them and generate a healthy amount of profit, then creates a piggybank for me and generates my own equity internally that can roll over into long term projects.

    00:30:35:13 – 00:31:01:28

    Daniil Kleyman

    So the more of those deals I do, the less money I have to raise from partners or from outside investors. So if you can have an operating business of some sort that generates operating cash and profits and use that to fund your long term investments, that’s always helpful. And banks like to see that as well, Right? So many investors and so many developers, they don’t have two pennies to scrape together.

    00:31:01:28 – 00:31:26:26

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s all coming from outside sources. Yeah. If you can show your lender that, look, I’ve got a separate business that has a history of generating profits, you’re going to be much more likely. It’s going to be a lot easier for you to secure financing because banks, when they finance deals, whether they be small or large, they don’t just look at what you have.

    00:31:27:21 – 00:31:48:18

    Daniil Kleyman

    They look at what are you able to get if things don’t go according to plan, if things if, if brought out, if your project goes over budget, if if unforeseen things happen, you know. A Yes. What do you have now? Do you have reserves, you have liquidity, but it also helps them to show that I’m able to generate more cash.

    00:31:49:04 – 00:31:56:19

    Daniil Kleyman

    I’m able I’m able to create more money to tackle situations that may arise, that may sink the deal. Does that make sense?

    00:31:56:29 – 00:32:15:15

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and I appreciate the the context in your journey there and really the patience, because I think a lot of, you know, I see a lot of investors look like, oh, I love to get into multifamily or I love to get into commercial. And to them it’s it’s what you describe. The other scenario of like you go from flipping a house to building 130 unit complex.

    00:32:15:15 – 00:32:35:00

    Brady Winder

    And so, you know, like how you kind of break that down and start to build trust with people. And you can answer my two questions with one response of like go slowly, you know, you build those relationships, you’re not taking big bets, you’re making smaller ones and building those relationships with the banks and the the subcontractors as well.

    00:32:35:00 – 00:32:55:19

    Daniil Kleyman

    You’re also just you know, you’re I mean, if you’re going to play with other people’s money, you need to fake it till you make a thing is fine if you’re playing with your own dough, right? Yeah. But there’s so many people out there that are faking till they make it with other people’s money. And that’s the responsible. Yeah, right.

    00:32:55:19 – 00:33:14:18

    Daniil Kleyman

    I mean, there is. And there is a lot of people that are jumping into, you know, syndications and they’re buying apartment buildings and they don’t know what they’re doing. But it’s it’s not hard to raise money these days. I just had this conversation with a friend of mine the other day. It’s very easy to raise capital from people who don’t know what they’re doing.

    00:33:14:18 – 00:33:26:25

    Daniil Kleyman

    There’s so much gullible money out there that if you are unethical and unscrupulous, you can go out there and raise a ton of cash. But you need to be a steward, a responsible steward of that money.

    00:33:27:08 – 00:33:52:22

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. So my last question and we’ll wrap it up here, man, you mentioned subcontractors. You you go to your first few developments and so you truly have a good understanding of what goes in. You know, you know, I’m assuming, you know, a good skilled labor looks like in how to get the best bang for your buck. Contractors. You know, from my own experience, building from talking to everyone else’s building is like contractors.

    00:33:52:22 – 00:34:16:24

    Brady Winder

    It’s there’s a shortage. We know that. And it’s different. It’s become more and more difficult to find quality skilled labor. Meanwhile, material is going up like everything’s just gotten more difficult for construction sites. Besides those long term relationships and you having the experience of seeing, are you doing anything specific to like, you know, find and retain quality subs?

    00:34:16:24 – 00:34:55:09

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah, So absolutely. I am always having conversations. I’m always having conversations with what subs and and suppliers to you know that’s, that’s other thing that I some of the people that we mentor, you know they’re doing projects and they’re still buying everything from Lowe’s and Home Depot, right. I mean there’s a lot of suppliers locally that we get to compete with each other on lumber siding doors, just the amount of money that you can save there for any given project by simply shopping around there’s three or four people is incredible.

    00:34:55:09 – 00:35:21:21

    Daniil Kleyman

    But we’re there’s two parts to that game, right? I mean A maintaining existing relationships with your subs. And what I mean by that is I guess it helps to give them consistent work so they know where their bread is buttered, right? Yeah. Paying them quickly, that goes a long way. And like our subs never have the chases for money and we don’t nickel and dime them and don’t show them.

    00:35:21:21 – 00:35:38:00

    Daniil Kleyman

    Like if we agree to a certain number, there is no situation in which I call them when they get that bill and say, but you didn’t, you didn’t do this or you took an extra three days to do it and I’m going to chip away some money from you. So taking care of your people goes a long way, right?

    00:35:38:00 – 00:36:03:20

    Daniil Kleyman

    If they know that you’re going to give them consistent work and if they know that they’re going to get paid quickly without any kind of bullshit, that goes a long way. So we take care of our existing subs. But that being said, we are very careful about keeping our existing subs honest. And what they mean by that is, you know, when, when he know like when you’re illustration knows he’s your only guy, he’s your go to guy, those prices are going to start creeping up.

    00:36:03:20 – 00:36:25:17

    Daniil Kleyman

    Right. So we’re constantly checking them like like you’re my guy, but I’m going to make sure that you’re staying competitive from project to project. And in order to do that, we’re constantly having conversations with you subcontractors and a lot of this coming from from our network. You know, I talk to other builders, they talk to other developers, and they say, Hey, who are you using for electrical these days?

    00:36:25:17 – 00:36:57:16

    Daniil Kleyman

    Like, who is there anybody that you’re happy with that you don’t mind referring? It’s not hard to to form new relationships, but it’s it’s a constant game. You’re constantly updating your list of contractors because even your go to guys eventually fade out. Right? They just maybe they self-sabotage or get burned out or so I mean, you need to constantly keep your old decks of of of backups of contractors.

    00:36:57:26 – 00:37:25:24

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. And, you know, being disciplined is really important. What what with I have become more disciplined about over the last couple years is again when I even when they have go to subcontractors we get two or three bids for everything always you know there’s never a situation where or I’m sure there’s been situations, but the goal is to never have a situation where I’m just getting a price from one guy and blindly signing off on that.

    00:37:25:24 – 00:37:49:05

    Daniil Kleyman

    So I mean, we’re getting multiple bids on on everything and and keeping people honest and keeping people competitive without just beating the living shit out of somebody rightly, there is a difference. And I see people taking that too far, right? I’m not advocating like beating the crap out of your subcontractors so they’re not making any money. Yeah, but keeping people competitive and getting them to, you know, even now, right.

    00:37:49:12 – 00:38:10:15

    Daniil Kleyman

    Subcontractor shortage, we’re still able to to do that to a degree with our relationships because they want to work for us. So, hey, listen, like I want, I want to give you this job. But you know, you got to improve a little bit. What can you do here for me? And you do that enough and you’re saving a lot of money on your projects.

    00:38:11:06 – 00:38:29:21

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I like that. I appreciate that. It is. Checks and balances. You know, it’s like what you said about Keeping Them Honest, You know, minimum 2 to 3 bids, aim for 2 to 3 bids, every project. Yeah. So you always have context. You understand what rates because I mean, you know, I feel like rates for contractors are changing just as fast as interest rates.

    00:38:29:21 – 00:38:30:15

    Brady Winder

    It’s crazy.

    00:38:32:07 – 00:39:00:03

    Daniil Kleyman

    Materials have gotten crazier than labor over the last couple of years. You know, materials have just been completely out of control. What I found is that most of our subcontractors have been reasonable. They’ve not they’ve not taken advantage and jacked up their prices. Yeah, excessively, right? For us, the biggest struggle has been has been materials.

    00:39:00:20 – 00:39:00:29

    Brady Winder

    Yeah.

    00:39:01:12 – 00:39:26:21

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. Over the last probably three years that’s been, that’s been and not just pricing but but lead times. And you know, right before I started this podcast, I got off the phone with my electrical contractor and you know, we’re starting the 16 unit apartment building in gear is taking six months like the the meter stack for the for the electrical meters is taking six months to arrive.

    00:39:28:21 – 00:39:38:28

    Daniil Kleyman

    So yeah. So you have to order it. I mean you have to order it just weighing the advance. Otherwise you get to a certain point in your project and then you’re you’re just standing still.

    00:39:38:28 – 00:39:55:06

    Brady Winder

    You know, hearing you say that and going through my own build myself. I think maybe, maybe if anyone finds this interesting, let me know or email me. But. Brady at Care.com. But maybe we’ll do an episode on supply chain issues because I think we all thought but at least a lot of people thought it was going to go in a couple of years, that it would sort itself out.

    00:39:55:06 – 00:40:01:15

    Brady Winder

    Clearly, that has not happened. So I want to know more about when is going to start to normalize. Will it normalize? You know.

    00:40:02:02 – 00:40:21:27

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s it’s it’s improved in a lot of areas, but there’s still areas like electrical gear that and there’s a few others. You know, our lead times in appliances has improved. We we have major trouble with appliances for a while. So some things have improved and some things are still very difficult.

    00:40:22:17 – 00:40:28:20

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, it’s pretty wild. Drywall went up recently. I was like, Wow, this is crazy. I didn’t see that one coming.

    00:40:28:29 – 00:40:50:03

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s, you know, there is there was a period where we saw price increases every three days. Yeah. I mean, we we just got an email from, from our suppliers every days about the price increase and it was insane. I mean, just for context, you know, I built a lot of duplexes. I ran the math. I have kind of a typical duplex that I’d like to build.

    00:40:50:03 – 00:41:21:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    It’s about 2500 square feet of apartment on top, apartment in the bottom in 2016, I could build the duplex $475,000 at at the peak of lumber. Right. It it costs me double that cost me 300, 350 grand to build the same exact duplex. So that was probably a year ago. Now, lumber has come down since then, so I’m probably now oh, for that same duplex that cost me 175 grand to build in 2016.

    00:41:22:09 – 00:41:26:01

    Daniil Kleyman

    I can probably get that done for about 325 to 330 right now.

    00:41:26:01 – 00:41:27:09

    Brady Winder

    Is that materials are all in.

    00:41:28:12 – 00:41:47:12

    Daniil Kleyman

    All in not including land. Well right so just just hard costs. Yeah so I mean almost double you know and people are wondering why housing is so expensive. Yeah. It costs twice as much to build as it did seven, seven years ago.

    00:41:47:23 – 00:42:07:07

    Brady Winder

    Hmm. Okay. Well, we might have our next episode. We might. We might dive into that. That’s a that’s an interesting one. It’s affecting all of us. Well, we’re out of time, man. I appreciate you hopping on. Thanks for sharing your journey. Sure. Yeah. Super insightful. Happy to have you on again Someday, man. And yeah, where can people find you?

    00:42:07:07 – 00:42:15:03

    Brady Winder

    You mentioned you have students you’re mentoring, you know, Adam and Amanda. Neil Yeah, they’re campers. Yeah. Yeah.

    00:42:15:03 – 00:42:41:25

    Daniil Kleyman

    Well, so we so, I mean, I, I met Trevor ages ago and we got into sort of the mentoring business through our software business. So I have a real estate analysis, marketing, fundraising and project management software called the rehab validator that we’ve, we came out with ten plus years ago. And we have, you know, a very large number of clients.

    00:42:41:25 – 00:43:04:19

    Daniil Kleyman

    And there is a free version of the software that people can sign up for, and we use it in our own business. I use it for my ground up developments, for everything from deal analysis to creating funding presentations for all of our banks to actually running it. There’s a construction management suite inside the software, so if people go the rehab valued adcom, there’s a free version there that they can sign up for.

    00:43:04:19 – 00:43:07:16

    Brady Winder

    And all of that made by investors. For investors.

    00:43:08:17 – 00:43:29:02

    Daniil Kleyman

    Yeah. I mean, I built this firm really for myself originally for for my own business. And it’s kind of evolved since then in in line with the needs of, of my business. And it just so happens that it works for a lot of other people. But that’s, that’s usually a great way to get a hold of me because then you’ll start getting emails from me and you can just reply to them.

    00:43:29:02 – 00:43:33:21

    Daniil Kleyman

    And I typically respond to everybody unless it’s total nonsense, in which case it gets ignored.

    00:43:33:21 – 00:43:51:12

    Brady Winder

    So yeah, absolutely. All right. Rehab valuated. Com Put a link in the show notes. All right. Well, thanks again, Daniel, for joining me and everybody watch and listen and thanks for tuning in. If you have any questions, hit me up. BRADY At Care.com, if you have any feedback on the episode, there’s something I want to hear about. Let us know.

    00:43:51:24 – 00:44:16:19

    Brady Winder

    But Trevor will be on for the next market harvest. And until then, we will see you next time.

    Josh Culler

    There’s been a lot of interesting changes over the last few years, and even I would say like some changes since the last time I was on the Caracas. Like some really big changes in terms of like video traffic. And I feel like when I was on that first episode with Trevor, we were talking about like why you should take advantage of it.

    00:00:18:03 – 00:00:35:00

    Josh Culler

    The time has passed if you’re not doing video now, this is not going to be a very comfortable episode for you. Like it’s it is definitely something where it is the standard, it is the thing that you have to be doing and 2023 and it’s not a case of like, should I or should I not? It’s a yes, automatically.

    00:00:35:07 – 00:00:38:07

    Josh Culler

    It was a yes two years ago.

    00:00:43:21 – 00:01:06:16

    Brady Winder

    Hey, friends, welcome back to the current cast podcast. I’m your host Brady Winder, and this is the podcast where we help investors build businesses of freedom and impact by dialing in your online marketing. So this month is video month at Video Marketing Month. And so this is probably one of my favorite topics and it’s very relevant right now.

    00:01:06:16 – 00:01:29:09

    Brady Winder

    I know any time you’ve heard us talk about video marketing in the past two years, we’re always saying, Oh, it’s more relevant, but that’s because it actually is. It’s increasingly becoming more and more relevant to things that happened this last year that matters As far as video marketing. One of them, it has become a lot more almost necessary in order to rank high in Google.

    00:01:29:09 – 00:01:47:20

    Brady Winder

    So pages that are putting videos on their blog posts and on their pages are much more likely to rank. We don’t have an exact percentage, but anywhere between ten and 100% more likely to rank, depending on the topic, the types of posts. Anyways, the SEO benefits just within the last year with the updates of Google made have come up a lot.

    00:01:47:20 – 00:02:15:06

    Brady Winder

    And the other thing is I ran a survey every few months, every six months to a year within our audience on how they like to consume content, what topics they’re interested in. Far and away. 80% of our audience this time around wants to consume content through video. And so we’re seeing the same thing for our members customers. For sellers, video content is just more of a standard right now and less and less.

    00:02:15:06 – 00:02:32:00

    Brady Winder

    Hey, this thing you need to take advantage of. So it’s becoming more and more important. I can’t drive that any further. So we’re going to have a conversation today on video marketing one on one. So getting started what some of the tactical things, what do I need to do? What do I need to be thinking about? How do I strategize?

    00:02:32:00 – 00:02:52:27

    Brady Winder

    How do I outline what kind of topics, what do I talk about? How do I actually get this video done? And then a whole lot of really good technical tips on little things you can do or software you can use to make the best of this video to really attract more leads and convert those leads into deals. We’re going to cover a lot of stuff.

    00:02:53:04 – 00:03:16:23

    Brady Winder

    I’m not worried about how long this podcast goes. Fair warning. Anyways, that’s what we’re talking about today. And so that brings me to a writer. My guess on Josh Cutler. His is his second second time on the podcast and Josh Color is a friend of care. He’s been at care camp. He’s been on our care summit which if you’re wondering if CARE Awesome is happening this year it is don’t worry is the summer.

    00:03:16:23 – 00:03:25:13

    Brady Winder

    We’ll be announcing it very, very shortly if we haven’t already. Anyways. Josh color of Aria video. Did I say that right? Sorry.

    00:03:25:17 – 00:03:26:15

    Josh Culler

    Yep. Yep.

    00:03:27:00 – 00:03:39:09

    Brady Winder

    Mario video. Josh Color. I was going to introduce you. Tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do, because I feel like you’ll do a better job of it. I people you. Yeah. Why you wish we listened to you on this podcast.

    00:03:39:13 – 00:04:01:13

    Josh Culler

    Yeah. No, that’s good. Thanks for having me back, man. I was the last dash, actually. The first time that I was on the Carrie cast was in the studio. So that was a lot of fun with Trevor. Yeah, over there hanging out with you guys. So I appreciate you having me back. Yeah. So just in a nutshell, I’ll keep it very short and sweet because I hate when I’m hosting a podcast and people spend 20 minutes on introducing themselves and I’m like, Oh, well, we’re almost done now.

    00:04:02:07 – 00:04:22:07

    Josh Culler

    So yeah, I’ve been in the real estate investing space for over 11 years now. So I was a marketing director for a large wholesaling organization out here in the Midwest, doing anywhere from 4 to 500 deals a year. And I was the marketing director for that organization, and that got me grounded into the real estate investing space. And now I’m speeding up the time.

    00:04:22:07 – 00:04:48:21

    Josh Culler

    I now focus all of my services and business on real estate investors and influencers as well educators, people that are really taking what they have done in real estate and then teaching it out to other people as well. Maybe they have masterminds, coaching programs, courses, stuff like that. And so what we primarily focus on now is social media for for social media management, YouTube management, podcast management.

    00:04:49:06 – 00:05:06:26

    Josh Culler

    But you know, specifically working in the real estate investing space. So there’s been a lot of interesting changes over the last few years. And even I would say like some changes since the last time I was on the Caracas, like some really big changes in terms of like video traffic and how much I think you said it right.

    00:05:06:26 – 00:05:32:02

    Josh Culler

    I was actually going to like kind of capitalize on your statement, that video is not like I feel like when I was on that first episode with Trevor, we were talking about like why you should take advantage of it, why, you know, now is the time, the time has passed. Like if you’re not doing video now, I don’t like this is this is not going to be a very, very comfortable comfortable episode for you.

    00:05:32:03 – 00:05:47:28

    Josh Culler

    Like it’s it is definitely something where it is the standard. It is the thing that you have to be doing. And 2023 and it’s not a case of like, should I or should I not? It’s a yes, automatically. It was a yes two years ago. So that we’re going to have some good questions. I’m excited about this.

    00:05:48:11 – 00:06:03:08

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I like that the people who are doing it are the ones who are winning. Yeah, well, thanks for summarize in that. Yeah, I’ll have people reach out to me from time to time like, Hey, Brady, you need time to, you know, help me out with this podcast on the site. I do from time to time. But when people get serious about it, Mike, I don’t have the time.

    00:06:03:08 – 00:06:21:05

    Brady Winder

    I’m all on accurate. I’ll send them to Josh So if you’re really are serious about a YouTube channel podcast social and you want to go all in and content, consider go with Josh and his team. They’re really good at what they do in their their industry specific to not just real estate but to investors, wholesalers flippers they know you guys inside and out.

    00:06:21:21 – 00:06:43:06

    Brady Winder

    And so two more quick things before we dive in this conversation. Just just to further impress them. The importance of video. I was doing some research before we started the podcast today. Around 25% of searches feature a video snippet at the top of the page. Whenever you’re Googling how to, you know, how to make chicken pot pie, how to sell my house fast.

    00:06:43:06 – 00:07:08:19

    Brady Winder

    Louisville, Kentucky. A lot of times there’ll be a video up there and then sometimes even a video with the snippets pulled out or little chapters of the video that is becoming more and more common. I’m sure you guys see this every day and stuff you search. Another interesting tidbit we’ve seen in our own data from over 8000 members is a YouTube leads from YouTube convert from visitors into leads at 8.43%.

    00:07:08:19 – 00:07:31:18

    Brady Winder

    So that’s actually double the conversion of any other lead source. And so it’s the highest converting lead source we have accurate, which is just it’s crazy. You know, people who are watching YouTube videos, they are they are motivated. Yeah. So anyways, let’s dive in. I want to talk about first how to how to get started in video marketing.

    00:07:31:18 – 00:07:51:00

    Brady Winder

    So we’re going to talk about the mindset and the gear. I think one thing we just need to get out of the way just real quick. You probably experience this all the time as everybody. Everybody has to start somewhere. People like like the biggest objections, like, I don’t I don’t want to be on camera. I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.

    00:07:52:03 – 00:08:04:24

    Brady Winder

    To me, it’s simple. It’s like you got to be willing to be bad at something and care more about the person on the other end of the screen or care more about getting the lead. You got to think about something else besides how you’re looking on camera. What do you think about that?

    00:08:05:06 – 00:08:26:21

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, at this point in time, I when somebody asked me that question, the only response that I have is if you’re not going to do it, your competition is going to do it. So suck it up. Like there’s a lot of things in business and you know, like as a business, there’s there’s so many things that I have not wanted to do or I knew was going to suck.

    00:08:26:21 – 00:08:44:00

    Josh Culler

    I knew it was going to be a grind and it was going to be something I was uncomfortable with, But as a responsibility, I had to do it because it’s just part of business. Well, video content is part of marketing. You have to do it. And of course, I think and even, you know, and it comes to my personality.

    00:08:44:00 – 00:09:02:25

    Josh Culler

    Brady I mean, there are some people out there that have never been on video, but they’re super confident in themselves and they can just hop on a camera and just talk away. And there are some people that it’s the complete opposite where if even if there’s nobody on the other side of the camera, like there’s literally nobody in my room right now and they’re looking at a camera, it scares them to death.

    00:09:04:05 – 00:09:20:29

    Josh Culler

    You it’s just like anything else. Practice will make perfect. You keep getting it out there and you will get better over time. If you look at anybody, anybody’s videos, I mean, like the biggest YouTuber on the planet right now is Mr. B and or maybe it’s PewDiePie, but like if you look at it, he’s probably the most well known YouTuber.

    00:09:20:29 – 00:09:42:09

    Josh Culler

    If you go back and actually look at his first video he ever posted, it was ridiculous. He look, he looked so he looks so dumb like it is video and it was all pixelated low. I like, but he started somewhere. Everybody that has that you follow that has been an influencer in any way shape or form started at ground zero.

    00:09:42:09 – 00:10:02:24

    Josh Culler

    Everybody started at zero. So you if you’re going to do anything with video, you’ve just got to turn the camera on, start practicing. I think a really good thing to do that actually is kind of funny is coincidentally, I just had an onboarding call with a new client that we’re bringing on, and he’s one of those guys that he’s a little bit, you know, he doesn’t like speaking on stage.

    00:10:02:24 – 00:10:22:01

    Josh Culler

    He’s kind of shy on camera, stuff like that. He even said he’s his own biggest critic, so if he records a video he doesn’t like, he’ll just delete it, he will edit it or anything like that. And, you know, basically what I told him was like, dude, one of the best things that you could do for yourself if you’re that type of person is just to don’t script out your video.

    00:10:22:01 – 00:10:47:21

    Josh Culler

    It’s create the topic, create some bullet points, and then just get it out. If you mess up, if you screw up, you say something you don’t want to say or you need to repeat yourself. Just pause for a second and carry back on. That’s what post-production video editing is for. You can clip all that out. So there’s just some mechanisms, I think, Brady, that people can, if they really pull back the curtain, they look at like what video has become nowadays, it’s not live TV.

    00:10:47:21 – 00:11:06:27

    Josh Culler

    You’re not a news anchor that you have to be perfect on every single word that comes out of your mouth. You’re articulate, clearly, can’t stutter, can’t trip over your words. That’s not the case. Like, there’s there’s ways to get to happiness and yeah, again, the number one thing I would say is just suck it up, because if you’re not going to do it, your competition’s going to be right.

    00:11:06:28 – 00:11:21:15

    Brady Winder

    Absolutely. I’m so glad you said that thing about scripts, too. That was one of the things this is going to talk about as far as aligning videos is for me. I mean, there’s a time and a place for scripts, but more often than not, bullet points can be what’s most helpful? Tell me, what does this look like for you?

    00:11:21:15 – 00:11:38:02

    Brady Winder

    So if I’d say, Josh, we’re going to record it, say I’m going to record a video of you, and the video’s about like teaching people how to sell their house fast and Louisville, Kentucky, or working with like working with a real estate investor in Louisville, Kentucky. How many bullet points are you doing? What does that look like to keep you?

    00:11:38:02 – 00:11:39:09

    Brady Winder

    What do you need to stay on track?

    00:11:39:17 – 00:12:13:11

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, that’s a great question. And there’s two answers I’m going to give actually, and a couple of variables to this. If you’re doing like an ad video, say, for instance, you’re actually using the video to be a Facebook ad, I would recommend scripting it. And the only reason why is because you want to get out what, like you’re paying for X amount of time to be to have your ad out or, you know, just script it, make sure is very well articulated and I would practice it and record it several times because the problem that I’ve always had Brady with people that script videos and put them on a teleprompter or maybe they just try

    00:12:13:11 – 00:12:43:25

    Josh Culler

    to memorize it, it’s very unnatural for us to read something off and remain human while doing it. We like to turn our robotic voices on and not move, not show any animation or any emotions at all. And that’s what ultimately connects. That’s that’s one of the biggest reasons why video is so powerful is because it connects emotionally, intellectually, and it’s just it’s far more connective than putting a copy out there for somebody to read or any other form of content.

    00:12:44:17 – 00:13:17:29

    Josh Culler

    And it’s very hard to read off a script. I can’t even do it. I have out of the couple hundred people over the years that I’ve recorded videos with, there’s only one person that I have allowed to use a teleprompter because they were really good at it and they’ve had it passed with reading teleprompter scripted videos. So just what I would say is if you’re going to do a short form piece of content, if you really feel like you need to script it out and it’s got to get to the point, you know, like I said, if it’s for an ad or something like that, then or a TV commercial, of course, scripted out, just

    00:13:17:29 – 00:13:44:19

    Josh Culler

    practice it a handful of times and stay focused on trying to keep the human element. The alternative, of course, is my recommendation is not scripting videos into a bullet points. I would say for every every minute that you’re going to go and talk about something, maybe create two basic bullet points. The thing that I don’t want to do, it’s almost like going back into the school days where you don’t want to literally write and Terry paragraph for your bullet point.

    00:13:44:19 – 00:14:03:18

    Josh Culler

    You want to just treat it like a headline. So here’s the headline of my bullet point number one headline of bullet point number two. And then you talk about those things. And the key the key to is rate is something that’s a little off topic with us that I always like to mention is you shouldn’t be talking about things that you don’t know inside it out anyway.

    00:14:04:03 – 00:14:05:26

    Josh Culler

    So. Yeah, yeah.

    00:14:05:26 – 00:14:06:14

    Brady Winder

    Good point.

    00:14:06:22 – 00:14:26:20

    Josh Culler

    If you can’t talk about it on a podcast like this comfortably and get all the information out, regardless of if you’re comfortable on camera or not, you shouldn’t be doing it anyway. So if you can’t riff for 20 to 30 seconds on a bullet point, then you know, go away from that topic. So I think that with bullet points, just treat them like headlines.

    00:14:26:25 – 00:14:44:22

    Josh Culler

    Do one or two bullet points for every minute that you plan on talk, It’s a five minute video, maybe not ten bullet points, but somewhere in the neighborhood of like six two 6 to 9 bullet points would be a good idea, but make them as informational to you as possible. And the important thing is just you getting the content out.

    00:14:44:22 – 00:14:53:27

    Brady Winder

    I like that one. You know, one or two for every minute or so, because that’s about it’s like about how long your brain can go remembering what you’re talking about. You know.

    00:14:54:01 – 00:15:11:21

    Josh Culler

    In regards to mush, I do one per minute, but that’s what works for me, right? So that person could also riff for 5 minutes. If you just give me one thing to talk about. But I didn’t start off that way either, by the way. And I’m sure Brady, like you’re you’re pretty fluent on camera as well. And I’m sure you didn’t start off that way.

    00:15:11:21 – 00:15:20:07

    Josh Culler

    I’m sure Trevor didn’t start out that way, right? It takes practice and time to evolve that over time, to be comfortable on camera and allow yourself to get information out.

    00:15:21:02 – 00:15:44:19

    Brady Winder

    Oh, it’s it’s crunchy. In the beginning. It’s crunchy. I’m not going to link up some of our old content so you’re can click it in the show notes. I’m going to find it hard to. Yeah. Good chat this yeah is crunchy. Don’t judge the light lighting or audio either everybody starts. So another thing to keep in mind is knowing your goals.

    00:15:44:19 – 00:16:11:03

    Brady Winder

    So I feel like, you know, you talk about video, it can be really vague like, oh, video marketing and people might think of ticktalk. I mean, I think of Instagram social and they might think of TV. I don’t know. But for the sake of this conversation, we’re talking about generating leads. And so I think one of those I’m sure you see this is one of the mistakes I see people do is they haven’t really thought or they haven’t decided exactly what they want their video to be for.

    00:16:11:03 – 00:16:42:28

    Brady Winder

    So they say, well, I want to generate leads with it, but I also want to be an influencer and I also want to share with other people how to do X, Y, or Z. And so videos that maybe sometimes are good, but they don’t have a clear purpose. And so they kind of just they don’t really hit when you’re watching them, you know, video someone walking through, hey, we’re flipping a house is what we’re doing is I’m not saying don’t shoot that contact because it can be helpful, but know why you’re doing it as this is this for like a social media outlet or your website where you’re educating people on what it’s like, work

    00:16:42:29 – 00:16:51:28

    Brady Winder

    with a wholesaler or an investor, or are you trying to get coaching students so you can teach people how to flip houses? It’s usually two different things.

    00:16:51:28 – 00:17:16:08

    Josh Culler

    Do I? So when I travel to speak, I’m going to be traveling to a large area in Pennsylvania next week, and I got asked to to speak on a similar topic. But I’m like, you know what? Let me frame it a little bit differently and the type of presentation, I call it a North Star. So the North Star is obviously, you know, the story of, you know, Jesus being born and the three wise men.

    00:17:16:08 – 00:17:49:16

    Josh Culler

    We’re finally following the North Star to, you know, get to their destination. Basically, it’s just a waypoint. Is really what it is. And if you look at what you are, you can also call it your goal, your objective, whatever you want to call it, the North Star, though, it’s basically you’re on a path somewhere. And in your marketing, if you don’t have a very specific point in which you’re trying to reach, whether it’s the end of a funnel that you have built now or it’s step one would be like click the link in my bio, fill out this landing page, fill X, Y and Z, go do this, go do that.

    00:17:50:00 – 00:18:10:09

    Josh Culler

    You have a sentence for that. But at the end of the day, if they’re not reaching your North Star, then your marketing could be pointing to multiple different things that can really confuse the fact of what you do. So if you create what your North Star is for some people, you know, if you’re if you’re, say, a realtor listening and your North Star is it, it could be more than one thing.

    00:18:10:09 – 00:18:35:07

    Josh Culler

    But I unless you have multiple businesses, it should not be more than 3 to 5 things, period. Like unless you own multiple businesses and you have different products that you’re working with, with within. But say, for instance, you’re a realtor, maybe you’re a North star is to get more listings and to sell more deals. Right? So it could be, you know, one of those two things or whatever it is, it could be one of those you know, it could be one or two more, whatever it looks like.

    00:18:35:07 – 00:19:00:24

    Josh Culler

    But you have to be very specific on what that is. And in every bit of content that you work within is literally just pointed out that that’s the objective. Because again, like you said, the you know, there’s some people out there I run into this all the time where, you know, somebody will contact me and they’ll say, you know, I attended this mastermind and, you know, like I got up to speak and like five people in the room were like, you’re a really good speaker.

    00:19:00:24 – 00:19:17:08

    Josh Culler

    You should do social media stuff. And then I responded like, I don’t really like social media. I just want to buy real estate, sell it, You know, maybe I’m a wholesaler or whatever it is, and then they get pressured into doing it. Now they’re shooting videos on random topics that they have no idea why they’re shooting up. That’s a waste of time.

    00:19:17:23 – 00:19:19:15

    Josh Culler

    We call that garbage.

    00:19:19:15 – 00:19:22:14

    Brady Winder

    So if you have a specific.

    00:19:23:08 – 00:19:45:19

    Josh Culler

    You know, goal North Star that you’re trying to achieve everything that you do, content wise, not just video content, but primarily video content should be centered around that. And I boil that also down to demographics, and that goes down into platforms. Brady So like when I’m hopping on a onboarding call with a new client, we go through the process of who your demographic is.

    00:19:45:19 – 00:20:04:11

    Josh Culler

    It’s marketing 1 to 1. You’re your target demographic, your avatar, whatever it is, the ideal person you want to work with. And if they’re not, believe it or not, not everybody consumes tick tock. Believe it or not, not everybody’s on podcast and listen to podcasts. So if your demographic is not there, then why would you put content there?

    00:20:04:11 – 00:20:21:28

    Josh Culler

    Why would you be building something that’s not there? But the other the other kind of rebuttal to that I get radio is you build it and it will come. Or like, you know, there are there are scenarios. There are rare, very rare scenario. Yeah. Where you could start putting something out and then your demographic will flock to it.

    00:20:22:06 – 00:20:45:14

    Josh Culler

    But you got to remember, the more sophisticated your demographic is, the less likely they are to budge off of what they’re currently using. So there’s so many variables that that comes to this. And you know this too, if you’re saying that everybody is your target demographic, that nobody is right, You got to get very specific with it, figure out where they hang out, what they consume, what type of content they consume, what they’re looking for.

    00:20:45:14 – 00:20:48:15

    Josh Culler

    And that’s what you got to put videos out about.

    00:20:48:15 – 00:20:58:24

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I really appreciate how you didn’t gloss over and just call it for what it is you say. That’s garbage. I call it noise, but it’s it’s anything outside of the focus people consume.

    00:20:58:24 – 00:21:00:19

    Josh Culler

    It just makes noise. Just remember.

    00:21:00:19 – 00:21:15:00

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Yeah. You know, it reminds you of essentialism. I’m going to be cautious. But in Essentialism, Greg McKeown talks about how you need to have know what the finish line is, know what the end goal is. Otherwise you’re just going to be creating indefinitely, forever.

    00:21:15:06 – 00:21:42:12

    Josh Culler

    You’re never going to know when you reach that finish line. You’re never going to know when you get to the destination. And obviously the destination repeats itself, you know, based on conversions, you know, you want more conversions, but you know, my proper rule of thumb, Duda is like whatever you have to offer. A simple quote that I like to say is content slash social media slash video marketing is literally just explaining to your target demographic about what you do, who you are and your industry.

    00:21:42:22 – 00:21:58:13

    Josh Culler

    If you answer those questions, that’s literally how you can frame your topics around and the type of content you put out. That’s that’s going to solve all your problems and asking questions of like, I don’t know what topics to write or do to do videos about or I don’t know what platforms to post on. That’s what you do.

    00:21:58:20 – 00:22:20:16

    Josh Culler

    Because also, you know, this to me is that like if you’re say for instance, if you have if you’re a real estate investor, you’re a wholesaler, or as much as we like to say referrals are a really good source of getting more deals, it’s not realistic. You might get one or two, you know, on a periodic basis, but for the most part you’re doing you’re doing repetitive actions to get deals.

    00:22:21:00 – 00:22:47:18

    Josh Culler

    So putting out daily social media videos or let’s just say, for instance, you started a podcast to bring you more deals. You’re not going to have a thousand motivated sellers lined up to listen to your podcast every week. And the transactional service is really what it is. That being said, maybe the alternative is I know I have a couple of friends of mine that do Brian Snyder down in Indianapolis.

    00:22:47:18 – 00:23:12:25

    Josh Culler

    He does a podcast that’s specifically built to educate other Indianapolis wholesalers and real estate busters to bring him deals. So he teaches how to bring them because they don’t wanna do their own marketing. So they have all their wholesalers bring it deals and it brings them deals all the time. So that’s the alternative. But if your objective is depending on going directly to the motivated seller, that could dictate the platform that you’re on and the frequency, because once again, you’re not going to have 100,000.

    00:23:12:25 – 00:23:20:19

    Josh Culler

    So, you know, Instagram followers that are all motivated sellers watching your your daily videos, it’s just not works. So there’s yeah, variables.

    00:23:21:03 – 00:23:41:04

    Brady Winder

    Or maybe you could even go, you know talk on like a community podcast about, you know, how you are the local investor in your community, why you’re different from an agent and what you offer, or maybe sponsor a podcast episode. There’s yeah. One thing I want to hit on a real quick gear. We’re not going to we’re not going to spend time talking about gear.

    00:23:41:04 – 00:23:45:05

    Brady Winder

    Y’all can Google this. Y’all can look at blog posts for getting started with video marketing.

    00:23:45:09 – 00:24:18:24

    Josh Culler

    I was going to say, I’ll just give one high level expert tip here. You have an iPhone that is, I would say, newer. So I even have that. I’m a content creator, but I just have the iPhone 12 pro max, whatever the top one is. And if you have this or newer, you’re good to go record content out there on Amazon, you can buy Nikes that plug into your lightning port and then it’s wirelessly propelled to you to get good audio, get good video feed record content.

    00:24:18:24 – 00:24:36:25

    Josh Culler

    That way it works. As long as you got good lighting, as long as you frame yourself correctly, it’ll work. You know, you don’t have to have like Brady set up looks insanely incredible. Mine looks pretty solid, but they’re stages to it. Everybody thinks that they can buy $10,000 worth of camera gear, jump right into it, but that’s not where it starts again.

    00:24:37:06 – 00:24:44:29

    Josh Culler

    Everybody starts from ground zero. And what better to create content with something that you already have? So that’s my expert on gear. That’s my expert opinion.

    00:24:45:19 – 00:25:06:15

    Brady Winder

    I’m glad you said that. I was going to say iPhone 3G s that works. In all seriousness, though, it’s like it depends a lot on the audience do so like for motivated seller specifically there you know if this is an ad or thing on social media, it needs to kind of blend in with the fee to blend in and I think stand out at the same time.

    00:25:06:27 – 00:25:17:28

    Brady Winder

    But by blending, I mean like if it looks overly polished, overly commercialized and professional, they might gloss over depending on what they’re looking for. So just food for thought.

    00:25:18:15 – 00:25:44:28

    Josh Culler

    I think a really good way to go about recording content in the context of what you just said too, is environment is very important too. So if you are shooting a video specifically to motivated seller leads, be at a property maybe that you have under contract or if you don’t have anything. We were just getting started. Go to your parents house or go to your house and go in the front yard and, you know, shoot a video in front of a house that you would be that would be in your buy box.

    00:25:45:25 – 00:26:03:13

    Josh Culler

    You know, if you don’t buy D class in D class neighborhoods, don’t go to a D class neighborhood and, you know, in a war zone and record videos, but be in the same environment. I think that’s really important and underrated as well when recording. So don’t be afraid. Don’t don’t shy away from just getting out of your office and, you know, recording video still.

    00:26:03:27 – 00:26:23:24

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. Yeah. Well said. Keep a simple start with an iPhone. Let’s talk about topics. This is this is a big one. Nobody knows what to talk about. I think, you know, we already covered you covered one of the most important things, which is if you don’t know what to talk about, the best tip we can give you is ask.

    00:26:23:24 – 00:26:51:05

    Brady Winder

    Find out what questions people are asking. So find out what questions sellers are asking and just answer their questions. That’s like the definition. That’s like content marketing. One on one is answer the questions that people are asking and give them the best value you can. Something something that’s disrupting the Internet as we know it right now. I JPT It’s like everyday conversation.

    00:26:51:05 – 00:27:11:14

    Brady Winder

    Like what is it doing? What is it doing? It’s it’s maybe it’s a bunch of buzz right now and it’s actually not as powerful as we think it is. Maybe not Maybe things maybe the landscape of Google in being really does completely change in a couple of years. We’re staying on top of that anyways. The reason I bring it up is because there’s a there’s a place for it.

    00:27:11:14 – 00:27:35:16

    Brady Winder

    So my job as a podcast host and content strategist, I’m constantly coming up with ideas and what to talk about, what we should be talking about, and we can talk about anything, how to format that. I found a really helpful I don’t know if you’ve said all Josh, but I found it helpful as not not to do the bulk of my thinking, but as a helper, as an assistant for when I get stuff.

    00:27:35:21 – 00:28:00:26

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, and so, I mean, you could do it to us so you could use chat to get you to like, you know, 50% of a blog posts like give me the outline, give me some to talk about. I like to use it for outlines like help me summarize this idea. Or let’s say I have an idea and I’m thinking of another way to say, Hey, reword this phrase or conclusions.

    00:28:00:26 – 00:28:14:28

    Brady Winder

    So concluding a video or blog post can be difficult because a lot of people get stuck at the very end. It’s like, okay, write me a conclusion to this. It could be helpful for that. Any thoughts on GP JPT and are we all going to be replaced tomorrow? Josh And now?

    00:28:15:05 – 00:28:33:09

    Josh Culler

    So I think it’s one of those things and I’m not I will say this first, I’m not an expert in it, but you know, like I mentioned earlier, I’m one of my full time jobs as a CEO of my organization is research and development. So I spend a lot of time digging into stuff like this. I think, you know, anytime something new comes to the forefront like this, it does get hyped.

    00:28:33:09 – 00:28:52:12

    Josh Culler

    You know, for instance, I have my my VR headset over here that we play games on and stuff like that. And I remember when VR first came to the forefront, when Samsung was kind of the biggest one to launch it, you would have to take your phone and set it inside of the headset and then you would do that and your phone would burn up after like 10 minutes and stuff like that.

    00:28:52:21 – 00:29:15:18

    Josh Culler

    And it became hype and then it kind of like dialed back a little bit and then met out, really brought it back up. And, you know, Oculus has been around since since that time period. And it was really under Samsung’s watch and it moved over to Facebook slash matter. I think it has the feeling of that. So I think it’s something that is a I think people are looking at it like it could be like this huge thing.

    00:29:16:06 – 00:29:32:15

    Josh Culler

    But I think right now it’s just a tool that can help with a lot of things that you talk about. You presented it in a really good way. I think it’s just a tool to kind of either spark it, get you started, help you finish up, give you ideas, create sparks, whatever it is. But I think that, you know, for instance, I tested a handful of things I love.

    00:29:32:15 – 00:30:09:18

    Josh Culler

    Asking questions is how I learned I was terrible in school. And so asking questions is like how I learned everything. And it got me really excited. You know, I even went as far as to we were looking for a new copywriter for our team and I had Chad GPT write me a job posting for a social media copywriter and it did a pretty bang up job like it did a really good it got it got about 85% accurate on what I would type out and I just had to go through an editor a couple of things and something that would have taken me close to an hour to type out it literally.

    00:30:09:25 – 00:30:39:09

    Josh Culler

    I finished it like 8 minutes after I edited what it already presented. But I think a really good leverage point. You know, I tested this the other day as well. You know, people in order for to use stuff like this and technology like this, you have to be good at asking the right question. But understanding what the other side of it is, For example, what I asked Chad GTP to do for me was I I’m going to try to like were to exactly how I word it.

    00:30:39:09 – 00:31:01:29

    Josh Culler

    I said create me 50 topics for video content that business owners are asking about, and it literally lists it out 50 topics of the most asked questions on the Internet of what people are asking about video content. And I was like, okay, those are my topics that I’m going to be shooting videos on for the next couple of months.

    00:31:02:13 – 00:31:30:18

    Josh Culler

    And it did a really good job on that. So if you got specific, I can’t imagine I didn’t test this. Yeah, but I can’t imagine that if you look at Chat GTP and you say, create me 25 topics that are for sale by owner, you know, motivated sellers are asking about you know, it might be able to spit out a handful of really good topics but you know I do I do like the idea you know I have been reading up that Google is planning on coming out with a competitor within the next few days to that.

    00:31:30:18 – 00:31:53:21

    Josh Culler

    That is no shock. And surprise to me because normally Google is not the first one to do things. It is like the second or third, but because of it being Google, they do it the best and then they squash whatever the first one was. And Apple and Google have that reputation to do it. Apple’s ever the first to anything either, but they will crush at that, you know even after their second or third to it.

    00:31:54:03 – 00:32:13:03

    Josh Culler

    Then I’m excited about this type of technology. I think people need to just be leveraging it as a tool right now and just be focused on asking the right question to the to the program. But yeah, I don’t I don’t see it being a everyday useful tool for somebody for another, like probably two or three years as some development to go under.

    00:32:13:03 – 00:32:17:28

    Josh Culler

    But it’s, it’s pretty it’s pretty impressive at the given moment.

    00:32:18:19 – 00:32:31:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, it’s interesting It’s a it’s a good help right now for sure And you still, you know, kind of like you’re alluding to, you still need a a human element to at a minimum QC it to make sure it is the right.

    00:32:31:14 – 00:32:53:25

    Josh Culler

    I even gave it to my as soon as I heard about it I signed it over to my lead, my my department lead for my quality control and writing department. And I’m like, Hey, take a look at this and see if this is something that you could use in your department, because they I mean, they quality control. I mean, we, we at it and publish close to about 5000 pieces of content on a weekly basis.

    00:32:53:25 – 00:33:11:17

    Josh Culler

    So my quality control team has to have eyeballs on every single one of those every single week. So I’m like, go through and see if this is something that will help you guys, you know, in efficiency. And she was able to discover like one or two things that it might help with, mostly with like descriptions and show notes creation.

    00:33:11:17 – 00:33:20:08

    Josh Culler

    But I think like it’s just underdeveloped right now because it just started. But it’s it’s been I’ll keep an eye on it. It’s going to it’s going to be pretty cool.

    00:33:20:21 – 00:33:39:06

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. We’ll check back in on a year from now. Maybe we’ll have another conversation, right? Yes, change of course. So topics I’ve got a I’ve got a list of topics here for generating seller leads. We pulled this from our video marketing playbook. I don’t know if I said this at the beginning. The podcast is video Marketing Month Guru Care.com Search Video.

    00:33:39:12 – 00:33:57:03

    Brady Winder

    We’ve got this playbook. Josh actually helped us come up with a view on this a while back and we revamped it in the last year, but basically How to get Started Video a list of 52 ideas as one idea per week and just all the essential information, you know, to get going on the video marketing in one nice little PDF.

    00:33:57:03 – 00:34:12:18

    Brady Winder

    So anyways, I pulled this most of it from that list of 52. I’m going to run through them and just and talk about in real quick. Josh, feel free to interrupt me or if you have any you want to add, just go for it. But I’m just going to give you guys these so you know what to talk about.

    00:34:13:15 – 00:34:27:18

    Brady Winder

    Seller testimonials probably hands on the most important thing you can do if you haven’t done a deal yet. Get character testimonials from other people you know about you, you as a person, your character. But seller testimonials get them on Vimeo plus to them more.

    00:34:27:18 – 00:34:38:13

    Josh Culler

    Chime in here real quick. Yeah, something super cool. So like I don’t know if I’m hoping you haven’t discovered this yet because it would be really cool if you did it that I found something that that you didn’t find out.

    00:34:38:17 – 00:34:39:17

    Brady Winder

    I’m excited now.

    00:34:39:17 – 00:35:01:15

    Josh Culler

    About value too. So one of the number one is seller testimonials and the reason why I wanted to bring this up in the first place, because that is normally what people revert to for video content is getting very you know, you’re at closing table, you want to get your cell phone out, record a quick video. What I see happen, though, and it’s been acceptable up until this point because now you have the tool to be able to help.

    00:35:01:15 – 00:35:21:15

    Josh Culler

    This is, you know, let’s say, for instance, your closing table is like three feet across. Well, you’re sitting on the other side with your phone recording it. Where’s the microphone? It’s next to you. So it’s across the table. And so maybe you’re in a bigger room. So it sounds hollow. The person that’s on the other side of camera more than likely is not good at speaking on camera because that’s not what they do.

    00:35:21:23 – 00:35:46:15

    Josh Culler

    So they’re just going to give it their best bang up shot. You’re going to have fuzz. You might have some like office sounds in the background, the fax machines going, the the copiers, printers, phones ring and stuff like that. So my lead video editor discovered a tool called It’s an Adobe Tool and it’s called Adobe Podcast. But what it does is it has a a speech enhancer tool to it.

    00:35:46:21 – 00:35:55:25

    Josh Culler

    It’s in beta mode right now. I think you have to have an Adobe account to use this. Basically what you do and Brady after we’re done, maybe I’ll show you an example because you won’t believe me if you haven’t tried this yet.

    00:35:56:06 – 00:36:02:13

    Brady Winder

    Sorry. Are you doing it? You all Honestly, I’m getting distracted. Like I have to know about this right now. The podcast guy is.

    00:36:03:04 – 00:36:23:25

    Josh Culler

    Normally normally when I discover stuff like this, I’m kind of like, Oh, that’s kind of cool in my help. But this is this right here is something I require all of my videos to go through at this point. So it will literally take any audio like I’ve I’ve done it with testimonial videos where it was that there was fires in the background.

    00:36:23:25 – 00:36:45:16

    Josh Culler

    They were they were just super hollow. They were quiet because they were like four or five feet away from the camera type thing. And it was with a cell phone. You got to just strip the audio, put it into this software. It takes like maybe 2 minutes tops. It’ll spit it back out. I’m telling you, it will sound like they have a podcast microphone right next to their mouth.

    00:36:45:27 – 00:37:11:29

    Josh Culler

    Really? And it will make it sound immaculate. You got to test it. Brady is mind blowing, but that alone, we’re going into a phase where content is becoming unacceptable. To have high quality standards, you have to have high quality standards to get what you’re trying to get to because people are just sick and tired of watching cruddy Zoom videos and cell phone recordings.

    00:37:11:29 – 00:37:23:21

    Josh Culler

    You have to make it as high as possible. Audio is one of those ways to do it. This right here testing solid testimonials. It will ultimately ten x the quality of video by just doing that.

    00:37:24:06 – 00:37:41:27

    Brady Winder

    I, I thank you for mentioning that. I’m so glad you did because we were just I was recording a podcast last week at the you know if you listen to this in March it just came out a couple weeks ago but it’s all about testimonials. Keith and Bo and I, we dive really deep into this, and Keith had mentioned how he had thrown out a testimonial.

    00:37:41:27 – 00:37:55:00

    Brady Winder

    It was like one of his best testimonials, you know, throw it out because the phone was so far away, didn’t think about it. And it’s like, I can just hear that that conference room sound in my head where it’s 15 feet away and you didn’t get what you needed to get.

    00:37:55:09 – 00:38:12:22

    Josh Culler

    Dude, and takes all of that out. It cleans it up. It is the most mindblowing software for editing like media at all that I’ve seen. And it’s all it’s all automatic, so you don’t have to make any adjustments or anything. It’ll do it for you. It just knows what to to take out to add and stuff like that.

    00:38:12:22 – 00:38:38:02

    Josh Culler

    And, and a lot of times, you know, for me, like I speak at a higher tone so I don’t have much of a low voice so it’ll equalize my, my my tone as well and it just sounds when you put headphones on after you run it through it, it just sounds so good. So, I mean, to interrupt you with that, but I know testimonials is a number one thing with topics and that’s the biggest barrier is, you know, you don’t you don’t normally have a DSLR camera with a lapel mike at your closing table.

    00:38:38:28 – 00:38:43:14

    Josh Culler

    So I still want you to capture video if your concern is audio, run it through that. You’ll be good to go.

    00:38:44:03 – 00:38:51:17

    Brady Winder

    Okay. Yeah, I love that. I had not heard of it. You got me all excited. I’m glad I hadn’t heard of it. I’m going to be. I know what I’m doing for the rest of today will be tested.

    00:38:51:17 – 00:38:52:15

    Josh Culler

    I know you’ll be stuck.

    00:38:53:10 – 00:39:20:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Get the mic close to the person. You’re recording it. The phone call. It’s the closer you are, the less room noise and all y’all are close in your deals in a big empty conference room that’s echoey as all get out So the mike close second about me video this is huge. This is the thing that converts your visitors into leads and leads into deals as people getting to know you like you trust you and they can see that you’re a real human in your market.

    00:39:20:14 – 00:39:46:15

    Brady Winder

    Doing about me video doing by yourself to get started. And then I would even recommend once you’ve got a better feel for you know, how you position your service and your your overall messaging, maybe even bring in a videographer to do a legitimate like professional about me. A video that is a time and a place to do professional video so you can show that you’re not above the competition because most people are not going to do that.

    00:39:47:02 – 00:40:10:21

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, yeah. About me video and then some of the more general topics how to sell your these are more obvious and a lot of them are aligned with Google keywords. What sellers are searching for, they’re not always the same as YouTube. So if you go to YouTube, do keyword research there, there’s a lot of times some variance. But how to sell your house fast for cash in Pensacola, Florida, whatever, city state.

    00:40:10:27 – 00:40:36:15

    Brady Winder

    So maybe talk about the steps you would need to do or did you know that you can sell your house this fast? Did you know you can close this fast? So talk about some of the things people might not know, the questions they have. We buy houses in the city state. So talk about where you buy houses, what types of houses you buy home buyers in city state, Roseburg, Oregon, where home buyers in Roseburg, Oregon.

    00:40:36:15 – 00:40:50:13

    Brady Winder

    How are we different from agent investor or how are we different from agents? How to Stop Foreclosure in Roseburg, Oregon, If you’re about to be foreclosed on, here’s the five steps you can take to not get foreclosed or here’s what you might want to prepare for how to deal with that.

    00:40:50:13 – 00:41:07:17

    Josh Culler

    I like I like that one because not that the other ones are bad, but I like that one because the context of it is you’re delivering some value to the person watching the video. You’re giving them tips on what to do if they’re going through something. And then giving yourself as a solution is a really good way to frame it up.

    00:41:07:17 – 00:41:20:15

    Josh Culler

    So the other ones are great as well, but I like that one, the concept of that one because yeah, it’s value leading and then you give call to action at the backside of it saying if you need help with this, I have solution for you. Here’s what that is.

    00:41:20:15 – 00:41:51:27

    Brady Winder

    So yeah, while I actually like the you said that because you know the reason that one stands out versus the others is one of the most important things I learned about copywriting awhile back from Trevor actually is is opening a loop in the person’s mind. You could do this like almost borderline unethical. Like with click bait, you know, you open up the Google app and here’s like 100 articles that are just pure clickbait and but they’re all opening a loop like, you won’t believe what these people did to their child when they’re going through the airport security line.

    00:41:51:27 – 00:42:18:12

    Brady Winder

    That was literally one I saw yesterday. Come on anyways. But it’s how to stop foreclosure. So they know that they’re going to get the value out of it, like five steps to stop foreclosure in 60 or three ways. Working with an investor is different from an agent would be a better way to spice up the topic. Real Estate Investor versus Agent Pros and Cons Top five Mistakes When Selling Your Roseburg, Oregon Home.

    00:42:19:01 – 00:42:19:25

    Brady Winder

    That’s a good one.

    00:42:20:06 – 00:42:21:09

    Josh Culler

    MM Yeah.

    00:42:22:10 – 00:42:40:15

    Brady Winder

    Top five neighborhoods. This one is a little bit more geared towards buyer leads, but I put it in here because I think it’s still I don’t see investors do it enough and it can still really position you as an authority. This is a concern that agents are making all day, every day, you know, top five neighborhoods in Portland, Oregon.

    00:42:40:25 – 00:42:53:03

    Brady Winder

    But if you know someone if a motivated seller goes to your website and they’re looking to sell their house fast and they see, oh, this guy actually knows all my neighbors and know he’s a local guy, I think that adds a great deal of credibility to you.

    00:42:53:14 – 00:42:55:23

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, I think so.

    00:42:55:23 – 00:43:10:04

    Brady Winder

    And then tip, we already cover this, but what questions are you getting from your prospect’s ask them or either one, whatever. Any any thoughts on topics? Josh That’s my short list from the video marketing playbook.

    00:43:10:15 – 00:43:41:23

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, that’s, that’s, those are really good places to start and don’t be afraid to overlap any of those topics because generally speaking, a lot of those topics will overlay with each other. I think another good kind of contextual topic silo would be processes. So like the process of working with you, keep it in general, the process of working a wholesaler, or if you’re a realtor, the process of selling your house with a realtor because there’s a lot of questions that people have.

    00:43:41:23 – 00:43:58:23

    Josh Culler

    I, I had never even, even though I’ve been in this real estate investing space for a long time, I’ve actually never listed a house with a real estate agent before. And last March. It’s been a year since we moved into the house that we’re currently in, and last year in February was the first time I’d ever dealt with a realtor and did.

    00:43:58:23 – 00:44:16:18

    Josh Culler

    I had so many questions. There were so many things. I had no idea what to expect with it. And I think just realtors. Not that my realtor didn’t do a good job of this because he is answering all my question. He’s a close personal friend of mine, but I think a lot of people, when they’re going to list their house or they’re going to buy a house like they have so many questions.

    00:44:16:22 – 00:44:39:20

    Josh Culler

    So any of those questions that you can answer by opening up processes is a good idea. Also, like if you’re a real estate investor, like what’s the closing process? If you’re a realtor, what’s the closing process? If I’m buying a house and selling mine and or whatever it is, if you can list out those processes, people want to know step one through whatever in order to get to the destination that they’re trying to achieve.

    00:44:39:20 – 00:45:07:26

    Josh Culler

    And if you can answer those questions, then you’re creating clarity in their mind. You automatically have built credibility with yourself with that person. So process is another thing that I really like to do. I mean, honestly, it’s common practice in the education world. If you go to open your phone right now to any real estate influencer and click on their first video on Instagram reels, it’s it’s guaranteed to be some sort of a process, whether it’s like, here’s the five things that you’ve got to do to close more deals.

    00:45:08:01 – 00:45:30:05

    Josh Culler

    And then they’re walking you through those five things. The process of what it looks like to close more deals or here’s how you can sleep better, like they’re going to walk you through step one, through four of how to sleep. There’s just the process of working through things with, you know, your demographic is very, very important and I think it’s very underrated.

    00:45:30:05 – 00:45:43:02

    Josh Culler

    And I think it’s something that a lot of people don’t do. They want to go straight to the About Me videos, which of course you should do, but that’s not where the buck stops. You’ve got to keep going and providing value is very key when it comes to especially video content.

    00:45:43:18 – 00:46:10:07

    Brady Winder

    Oh yeah. And I mean, the things that you and I are both talking about can be useful for, you know, are useful for Legion and, and awareness and, and warming up those leads for sort of the middle of the funnel. But I would be so excited as a investor or an agent right now because the tools that are available to us to create content like you’re talking about are so powerful.

    00:46:10:07 – 00:46:29:21

    Brady Winder

    But also so underutilized. And so I’m not a real estate agent, but I can’t imagine how many techs a real estate agent gets because I know what I text my real estate agent, you know, as 8 p.m. on a Sunday night. Hey, I got a question for you, dude. I can’t imagine how much they get on. And then it’s like the opportunity to answer.

    00:46:29:21 – 00:46:37:25

    Brady Winder

    So many of those things with really sweet, short form video content. It’s like, Oh my gosh, there’s so many this many ways to do this.

    00:46:38:03 – 00:46:50:02

    Josh Culler

    I was like, I was just about to look it up. Like, I go back into my text thread with my realtor from last year and probably pull out like 45 to 50 topics just from the questions I asked.

    00:46:50:02 – 00:46:50:23

    Brady Winder

    Oh my gosh.

    00:46:51:01 – 00:47:19:15

    Josh Culler

    I like it. Yeah, there’s so many questions out there. So I think that people don’t have an excuse to create topics. It’s literally just answering the questions that your target demographic about what you do, your industry, you know, and the process of working with you and you know what it is that you do like literally what I would do is if you’re struggling with this this document for one day document every single task that you do and then create spinoff topics about those tasks that you do and then deliver that on video.

    00:47:20:19 – 00:47:42:03

    Brady Winder

    Absolutely. I love that. And if you know and if if you find yourself like saying the same things or if you’re an agent, like texting people back or you’re investing in your training, your team telling them the same things all the time, like, Yeah, I empathize with you. It sounds exhausting. It’s a lot. I know and I know it’s work to create the process or to create the video, but at the same time, like you can be proactive about it.

    00:47:42:10 – 00:48:03:19

    Brady Winder

    You can educate people with videos on your website. You can say, Hey, you know, we’ve started working together. Here’s three short little videos on what you can expect from working with me. Here’s how the process is going to go. I mean, I like to say like nothing beats a personal touch, but in so like offer a personal touch, share when you can but is it scalable and yeah, I don’t know.

    00:48:03:25 – 00:48:25:18

    Josh Culler

    I couldn’t write it but I could method that I think is a good idea for that is like for instance on my team, if somebody asks a question about something specific, what I do is I have like a 1 to 2 minute short video that I have like a massive unlisted playlists on my YouTube channel for all this stuff, for video training, for internal team.

    00:48:25:29 – 00:48:53:07

    Josh Culler

    But I recommend this for external marketing as well is that you shoot a one or two minute video that explains it at a high level and then maybe you shot another video that’s like a 5 to 10 minute video that goes deeper. And at the end of your two minute video, you could say if this didn’t explain it and you need more details, I have a link down below to the next video that explains everything in the detail, because now you’re given the option for them to get the short quick answer or everything into every nitty gritty detail you can have to offer.

    00:48:53:13 – 00:48:59:15

    Josh Culler

    It’s a lot of work, but if you go above and beyond that way, you will see results with that. Like it’s a nine day difference.

    00:48:59:15 – 00:49:05:06

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I like that. It’s like the reddit. TLDR Too lazy to complain. Is that too lazy? Didn’t want to watch.

    00:49:05:06 – 00:49:06:27

    Josh Culler

    That’s exactly what it is. Yes.

    00:49:06:27 – 00:49:28:07

    Brady Winder

    Okay, quick side. No. Anybody listen to podcasts, right? You know, we’re true audience people who are tuning in every week. If you’d be interested in it. It was a deal to lazy didn’t listen. If anyone out there is interested in like condensed podcast episodes like Hey, you don’t feel like listening to the hour and ten minute long podcast with Brady and Josh, Where’s the five minute version?

    00:49:28:07 – 00:49:31:15

    Brady Winder

    Let me know. Brady at Care.com. Email me. I’m genuinely curious.

    00:49:31:15 – 00:49:32:09

    Josh Culler

    Cliff Notes.

    00:49:33:00 – 00:49:53:11

    Brady Winder

    Yes, the Cliff notes. I’m curious. Maybe we put at the beginning I don’t know if nobody emails me. Don’t expect it. You have to listen all hour in 10 minutes. Okay. So we talked about topics. We covered a lot there. I think the last thing I want to talk about and maybe one of the most valuable is a few tools and really creative use cases for video for real estate.

    00:49:53:11 – 00:50:14:09

    Brady Winder

    And so I want to go through this list and and then we will wrap it up because we could talk all day on this stuff. But anyways, as we go through this list at this point in the podcast, you might be feeling overwhelmed. You might have a million ideas. If you’re anything like me, I give you full permission and just hit pause.

    00:50:14:21 – 00:50:29:13

    Brady Winder

    Don’t even finish the episode. Go shoot the video. If you’re feeling motivated, just go to the About Me video. Go start getting testimonials and then come back and hit play. When you have started making this videos and, find some tools to help speed things up some differently.

    00:50:29:17 – 00:50:51:18

    Josh Culler

    I could give I could give a helpful solution to what typically what I may step one through whatever type person like I don’t like to, I’ll think ahead. But if I if I haven’t gotten past up to that, I can’t go to step five. So I think a really good like step one is create your topics of what you do before you’ve done that.

    00:50:51:18 – 00:51:13:14

    Josh Culler

    If you have not yet, which if you’re in business, you should have already done this, is create your target demographic, your avatar. A really good, easy way to do this is just to go to either the one page marketing book, just Google that and that’ll help you nail down all of those details. So it’s like demographics, age, you know, occupations and geographical locations, stuff like that.

    00:51:13:27 – 00:51:34:15

    Josh Culler

    And that. Or you could do the Donna miller Story brand kind of exercise there. So either one of those will work that will establish demographics. Step one. Step two, start creating your topics. I would create you know, you have 52 topics here at your disposal. So that’s not an excuse there to create another like 25 or 30 topics for yourself.

    00:51:34:15 – 00:51:56:15

    Josh Culler

    Sounds like a lot. Once you get past five, you will be riffing through those. I promise you it will be much easier going through writing those topics down. Then as you do that schedule something you know your own capacity. So block out whether it’s once a week, once every other week or once a month and just what we call batch your video recordings.

    00:51:56:21 – 00:52:12:08

    Josh Culler

    So if you’re going to choose once a month and you’re doing, say, three videos a week that you’re publishing, that’s 12 videos a month that you record. So the first Monday of the month, that’s when you recorded 12 videos and then you don’t have to worry about it over for the rest of the month until the next month.

    00:52:12:19 – 00:52:29:28

    Josh Culler

    Likewise, for if you’re going to do once a week or once every other week or whatever that is, batch your videos, record them and then you can move on to getting them out into the public. So you start with those three stops. You have no excuses at this point. You got to just go execute that. Don’t don’t get overwhelmed with everything else.

    00:52:31:04 – 00:52:31:18

    Josh Culler

    Brady.

    00:52:32:05 – 00:52:46:09

    Brady Winder

    Please. Thanks for doing that. Yeah. No, that’s perfect. Yeah, I see. I’m a I’m a step one through ten guy. I love following them. Terrible at creating them. I’m not naturally geared towards processes and.

    00:52:46:09 – 00:52:51:13

    Josh Culler

    Place train all my team and I have to train clients too. So it’s repetitive.

    00:52:52:10 – 00:53:15:13

    Brady Winder

    No, that’s good stuff. That’s good, man. Okay, so top seven. Well, it’s going to be nine by the time we’re done with this podcast. It’s up creative uses for video for Real Estate. One Shameless plug Video post curates video post tool within our own software. So if you’re recording videos and you have a care site and you’re not already using this, I don’t know what to tell you.

    00:53:15:13 – 00:53:43:19

    Brady Winder

    You’re missing out. You probably could be ranking higher if you do this, right. So what is this is you record a video How to Sell My House Fast. Roseburg, Oregon. You put it into our video post tool automatically transcribes it, puts it in your blog post, spend 1520 minutes adding your h one edge to tags as your titles, your headings, and rework the wording so that it sounds a little bit more natural or you could say This is a transcript from the video.

    00:53:43:19 – 00:54:02:00

    Brady Winder

    We do the same thing with our podcast since we put the transcript and the blog post helps tremendously for SEO. SEO alone. But also if you forget about SEO, if somebody wants an alternative to watching the video, then there you go, they can read through it if that’s their preferred way to learn because of videos. Not for everybody.

    00:54:02:04 – 00:54:29:12

    Brady Winder

    It is for most, but not for everybody. And they can scan through to see what it’s about. Just like Google can. So use video post and a quick use case for this. So, you know, I’m not just talking theory. We shot a video, a link it up the show notes, but Trevor and I a few years back shot a video about how to use video posts and in I’m getting really meta here but in that video we shot a video on a cell phone of like co-working spaces in Roseburg, Oregon.

    00:54:29:12 – 00:54:46:15

    Brady Winder

    Hey, if you’re looking for a cool workspace, check out the loft Jurors for Oregon. We did that upload. It’s ranked number, I believe, at the time of recording. This is still ranked number one for co workspace for Roseburg, Oregon. It’s not a competitive term. That’s not the point. The point is how easy it was and how effective it is at getting things to rank.

    00:54:46:15 – 00:55:06:09

    Brady Winder

    So did the video transcribe get up there? I also did this with if you go Google now, someone’s going to try to outrank me. If I say this video, husky, video, husky reviews, go look it up. And there’s a video that I shot. I scripted and recorded, put it in the Kurt’s video post. I’ve been ranked number one above video Huskies own website for like two years now.

    00:55:06:09 – 00:55:28:15

    Brady Winder

    I’m out ranking there on website, which is just crazy, super powerful. So video post second one, I just threw this in there because I just remember that video ask we had a have you ever heard of that Josh video ask this is really interesting it’s we had a Kerry camper share this tool with us and they’re using it to basically screen and qualify tenants for their rentals.

    00:55:28:15 – 00:55:51:16

    Brady Winder

    But there’s a million use cases. You could use it for getting testimonials too. Like we’re we’re probably going to experiment with it. I care if for getting testimonials from our members, but basically it’s just a simple little piece of software and mobile app. You send them a link and it will the the app will prompt the person. So it’ll say, you know, tell me about your experience with this, and then it’ll give them 30 seconds to record.

    00:55:51:16 – 00:56:15:05

    Brady Winder

    They record a video response. So that’s the basics of it. But you can do like a if this than that. So if they answer this then ask this prompt instead. So really intuitive, powerful tool for getting video from other people. So you don’t even necessarily have to be there. Yeah, a lot of creative ways to use that, like getting screening tenants for your rentals.

    00:56:15:18 – 00:56:36:08

    Brady Winder

    Anyways, Adobe podcast, I just threw that in the list so I wouldn’t forget about it. We already talked about that. That was a nice surprise. Another one is a number for YouTube keywords. I know you’re thinking on YouTube. That’s not a creative use case, like everybody knows to put their videos on YouTube, but a lot of people don’t think about doing cured research.

    00:56:36:08 – 00:56:54:00

    Brady Winder

    And so it like for YouTube, they just think, Oh, I’m just going to put a video and put a video up on this topic and hope that it works out. You spend like 5 minutes doing keyword research. I do before every podcast when I’m coming up on my titles. What is ranking in YouTube? Where’s the low hanging fruit?

    00:56:54:01 – 00:57:17:12

    Brady Winder

    So if you go get Tube buddy, just Google tube buddy or video IQ, Video IQ, they both do about the same thing. You can do your keyword research with them, find the low hanging fruit so it’ll tell you like the competition for that keyword and what people are searching for, what the intent is, or if it’s actually the video you to be shooting.

    00:57:17:12 – 00:57:39:27

    Brady Winder

    So anyways, not overcomplicate it, but if you have been doing videos for some time, then take some time to do some basic keyword research and optimize the videos that you’re shooting. Because why not? Number three? No, that was a number for my ordering is we’ve added so many in here, my ordering is all off Bom bom, bom, bom.

    00:57:39:27 – 00:57:58:16

    Brady Winder

    This is specifically for agents. I don’t know. I’m a user myself, so I’d imagine investor could use it. I don’t see why not. But for follow up, so little videos that go into emails for follow up agents are using this for like, Hey, here’s what to expect next. Or as a thank you video, thanks for working with me.

    00:57:59:00 – 00:58:02:09

    Brady Winder

    Josh, you have any plans to do like follow up videos or anything like that?

    00:58:02:10 – 00:58:18:18

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, of course. Yeah. And campaigns like if they especially like text or email campaigns, they will leverage that stuff like Bambam videos in there. Bambam is kind of like phased out just a little bit. I think there’s a couple other tools that people use, but it is still useful.

    00:58:19:06 – 00:58:29:13

    Brady Winder

    That’s funny because Chad Beatty Like set of words. Shaggy Beatty I want to Chad repeated before we hit record just to see if there was any was missing in the first one. I was like, Oh, bom bom.

    00:58:29:16 – 00:58:29:26

    Josh Culler

    Yeah.

    00:58:30:21 – 00:58:59:21

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Another one real quick. Liam videos. Josh and I were talking about process. I love Liam videos. I will die by them because you can just hit record. I intentionally so what is Liam is just a quick little Google Chrome plug in goes on your browser you click it and it screen. Of course you use your camera and your screen and you can just send somebody a URL to that video so you don’t have to do any editing download upload to YouTube.

    00:58:59:28 – 00:59:16:25

    Brady Winder

    Send them the YouTube link. You don’t have to do any of that for it. So for internal videos like super Quick and Dirty Liam videos is a great way to explain things. And a lot of software is like billing this and now like Slack in your table, it’s already built in. But Protip don’t upgrade your account. Stick with the free version.

    00:59:16:25 – 00:59:26:10

    Brady Winder

    It’s a five minute limit because it will make you be concise. I never record over five minute videos on Liam. It’d be dangerous for me to upgrade.

    00:59:26:20 – 00:59:34:14

    Josh Culler

    Dude, it’s a habit. I do the same thing I like. I have not upgraded it. I use I use Liam four or five times a day. I still haven’t upgraded because I’m like, I got to keep it short.

    00:59:35:01 – 00:59:35:27

    Brady Winder

    That’s then you’re like.

    00:59:35:27 – 00:59:39:07

    Josh Culler

    If it requires more than 5 minutes, I’m getting on a Zoom call with you. So.

    00:59:39:08 – 01:00:07:28

    Brady Winder

    Right, exactly, exactly. For else, another one 360 virtual tours. This is not news to any of you, but we’re on a podcast. A while back, one of our members mentioned how they were using Matterport like an agent word. This was an investor and they’re doing 360 virtual tours for their buyers list. So as soon as they would get the house under contract, say, Hey, we’re coming to take photos, put the Matterport up and send that out to those buyers lists.

    01:00:07:28 – 01:00:29:10

    Brady Winder

    It says they the buyers have so much more confidence when they’re able to you virtually tour the home and they can get it get the contract sign so much quicker. So if you’re an investor, consider Matterport before after flip videos on your site. So a lot of people do this on Instagram. Little IG stories. Hey, here’s this house we’re working on.

    01:00:30:04 – 01:00:54:25

    Brady Winder

    I think that also could lend a lot of credibility if you are flipping houses and you’re doing it well. I think of home buying guys in Dallas. They’re members of ours. They really take pride in how they flip their homes. They care about them and they are doing the community a service. So if you’re doing that type of flip where you’re really improving the property, put on your website and people love to see that as incentive to work with you versus someone else.

    01:00:56:02 – 01:01:22:22

    Brady Winder

    And then the last one, social media repurposing, I figured that would be a good note for Josh to end on. I mean, we could talk about this all day. We won’t, but social media repurposing. So just like, you know, if if I’m if I’m an investor, I’m making these videos that we’re talking about what’s what’s like the easiest low hanging fruit like ways I can repurpose these videos because it’d be it’d be bad not to do any repurposing.

    01:01:22:25 – 01:01:25:28

    Brady Winder

    But you also don’t want to go ham and try to be the next TikTok influencer.

    01:01:26:05 – 01:01:50:17

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, I’m going to give an answer that probably most people will not like, but you have to do this or you’re not going to stay consistent because consistency is the number one factor to any success within content. It’s hire it out and you can leverage tools like or platforms like Fiverr or Upwork. A lot of people have like especially marketers, they have a bad taste in your mouth with fiber.

    01:01:50:21 – 01:02:15:29

    Josh Culler

    I use fiber pretty often on some smaller projects that need done. You can also go to Upwork and find video editors that will help you chop up the content, repurpose it and possibly even post it for you. The reality is, is that if you’re a business owner, you don’t necessarily most of the time and this is why this is where like we come in and people hire us because they don’t have the time or the ability or the want to to keep up with this kind of stuff.

    01:02:16:11 – 01:02:35:22

    Josh Culler

    So I have my clients focus on recording content. I want them doing nothing else. I don’t allow them to check the content. I don’t allow them to post it. Obviously that’s a little bit of a higher level. Service is going to cost you more, but you if you’re just getting started, allocate a couple hundred bucks a month to just getting videos edited.

    01:02:35:22 – 01:02:57:00

    Josh Culler

    You can send them off to a good editor on Fiverr or hire somebody, a freelancer on Upwork to edit videos for you, have them edit it, maybe you can post it or have an assistant post it for you and just get them out that way. Because the reality is, is what happens is that people shoot videos and then they get stuck at the editing portion because they spend so much time on it and they just don’t do it later on, like they they’ll they’ll be fired up about it for a month.

    01:02:57:00 – 01:03:19:11

    Josh Culler

    And then if a phase is out now, you literally wasted a month of doing literally nothing. That’s my short answer. If you are the type of person that you want to do it yourself, there’s very simple tools that you can use to edit videos. Of course, like from a professional standpoint, from your pro is great and it actually has gotten to a point where it’s pretty easy to use like it’s very user friendly.

    01:03:19:11 – 01:03:41:09

    Josh Culler

    It’s not. It still has all the technical aspects of it, but it’s not as complex as it used to be. Of course, if you have a mac device, I movies are really easy to use platform to edit your videos on, but outside of that headliner, dot app is really good as well. And there’s there’s tons of other platforms.

    01:03:41:09 – 01:03:54:00

    Brady Winder

    We’ve news using. I forgot about that we’ve been using headliner for. I mean I’ve been using it for years for podcasts because they were the first ones to say, okay, drag in your audio or video, add captions automatically adjust snippets. Yeah, yeah. Audio Grahams.

    01:03:54:00 – 01:04:08:26

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, yeah. So that’s what I would use by I’m just going to lean back into hire it out likes stop being a cheap H-E-B, be willing to spend some money on some of your marketing and hire somebody for 200 bucks a month to edit your videos and get them back to you. That’s what I would say.

    01:04:09:12 – 01:04:28:02

    Brady Winder

    I think that’s a great answer and I want to I want to dive deeper real quick and then I swear we’ll wrap it up. But so I think it’s a good answer that you say hired out, not because you’re the guy with an agency who does this really well, but because there are there’s diminishing returns, too, with anything.

    01:04:28:15 – 01:04:53:03

    Brady Winder

    And the diminishing returns correct me if I’m wrong, but here’s you know, Brett and I were just having a conversation in the office about this the other day. The returns of social media are high, meaning people might ask us, like, why don’t you post to social media more often? My take on it is we post enough to stay relevant to make sure that when someone comes across our Instagram feed that there’s things on there.

    01:04:53:03 – 01:05:17:03

    Brady Winder

    It’s somewhat current, it’s interesting, there’s there’s stuff there consume, but we’re not posting a thousand times a day. That’s why when I hear you say, hire it out, I’m like, it’s it’s more scalable that way. If you’re if social media is a strategy, I feel it. Maybe I’m being long one of this with this, but I feel like there’s this big gap between like you post, you know, once a week and it’s effective.

    01:05:17:17 – 01:05:22:24

    Brady Winder

    You post, you know, ten times a week and it’s marginally more effective. Is that the case?

    01:05:23:06 – 01:05:44:11

    Josh Culler

    No. Well, it depends. There’s platforms. There’s platforms specific. Like what I what I tend to do is take what the platform wants and, and go all in on that. Like, for instance, if you’re not posting at least a video a day on Instagram, you’re obsolete just period. Especially if you especially if you’re just starting to content, you will be obsolete if you’re posting less than one video a day.

    01:05:44:19 – 01:06:15:00

    Josh Culler

    It’s just the reality of it. It’s how the platforms work on YouTube. If you’re not posting at least 2 to 3 videos weekly are for videos, you’re going to be obsolete or or it’s going to be really hard for you to get traction at all. But with these platforms, you really have to like volume is a key. You have to put into what they want and generally speaking with reels, Tik Tok videos, YouTube shorts, velocity is the name of the game because these are shorter videos, you’ve got to feed more into it.

    01:06:15:06 – 01:06:43:23

    Josh Culler

    But even if you look at it one video a day on Instagram, let’s just say it’s seven videos that are minute long, the 7 minutes worth of recording, right? I mean, that’s that’s really not as much as you might think it is. So that’s a week’s worth of content. So volume does matter what my formula today is, Volume plus quality is really what and it’s the right volume, the right volume, the right time quality, the right efforts combined is what’s going to get you the success out there that you you need.

    01:06:44:15 – 01:06:57:13

    Josh Culler

    So in a way it does matter. But do you need to be posting ten times a day? Probably not. And that being said, I don’t know if it would hurt you. We have a client that we post five times a day for and they kill it.

    01:06:57:13 – 01:07:14:21

    Brady Winder

    So no bigger. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And content. Thank you for that context man. That’s that’s I appreciate the insight there that’s specifically more geared towards influencers if looking to get motivated seller leads like these answered Posner Instagram TikTok In terms of do.

    01:07:14:22 – 01:07:27:18

    Josh Culler

    Yeah you got to consider your demographic. If they’re not following you on Instagram, then you only need be creating the content that they’re going to consume, which for the most part, if it’s transactional, it’s just going to be informational content about what it is you do and that kind of thing.

    01:07:27:18 – 01:07:49:20

    Brady Winder

    So yeah, awesome. In well, this has been value packed. This is the longest podcasts I’ve recorded in a while. I have no shame about it, but hopefully everybody listening you have found this if we missed anything, if there’s a tool that you’re using or a tip that somebody gave you, let us know. Send me an email. Brady At Care.com, or if you’re on YouTube, drop in the comments below.

    01:07:50:03 – 01:07:53:12

    Brady Winder

    And thanks for listening. And Josh, thanks so much for joining me. Man.

    01:07:53:15 – 01:07:55:16

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, man, this is a lot of fun and hope to be back soon.

    01:07:56:00 – 01:08:16:10

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. All right. We’ll catch up later.

  • EP 426: Real Estate Video Marketing: 9 Creative Use Cases, 12+ Topics & 15 Pro Tips to Attract & Convert Leads w/ Josh Culler

    EP 426: Real Estate Video Marketing: 9 Creative Use Cases, 12+ Topics & 15 Pro Tips to Attract & Convert Leads w/ Josh Culler


    This one is jam-packed! In this podcast all about video marketing for real estate investors, you’ll learn:

    • Creative ways to integrate video into your marketing & follow-up that you likely haven’t tried (with specific apps & tools)
    • The most effective topics for getting motivated seller & buyer leads + how to outline a video fast
    • What gear you don’t need, how to create a video strategy, why audience & demographic matters, and the truth about being comfortable on camera
    • The most common video marketing mistakes made by investors & influencers
    • and a whole lot more.

    You might want to take notes and listen to this in two parts! Head to Carrot.com/video to get the full playbook & our other resources.

    Mentioned in this episode:


    Episode Transcript (This is an automated transcript by robot carrots – please mind the typos 😉)

    00:00:00:01 – 00:00:18:00

    Josh Culler

    There’s been a lot of interesting changes over the last few years, and even I would say like some changes since the last time I was on the Caracas. Like some really big changes in terms of like video traffic. And I feel like when I was on that first episode with Trevor, we were talking about like why you should take advantage of it.

    00:00:18:03 – 00:00:35:00

    Josh Culler

    The time has passed if you’re not doing video now, this is not going to be a very comfortable episode for you. Like it’s it is definitely something where it is the standard, it is the thing that you have to be doing and 2023 and it’s not a case of like, should I or should I not? It’s a yes, automatically.

    00:00:35:07 – 00:00:38:07

    Josh Culler

    It was a yes two years ago.

    00:00:43:21 – 00:01:06:16

    Brady Winder

    Hey, friends, welcome back to the current cast podcast. I’m your host Brady Winder, and this is the podcast where we help investors build businesses of freedom and impact by dialing in your online marketing. So this month is video month at Video Marketing Month. And so this is probably one of my favorite topics and it’s very relevant right now.

    00:01:06:16 – 00:01:29:09

    Brady Winder

    I know any time you’ve heard us talk about video marketing in the past two years, we’re always saying, Oh, it’s more relevant, but that’s because it actually is. It’s increasingly becoming more and more relevant to things that happened this last year that matters As far as video marketing. One of them, it has become a lot more almost necessary in order to rank high in Google.

    00:01:29:09 – 00:01:47:20

    Brady Winder

    So pages that are putting videos on their blog posts and on their pages are much more likely to rank. We don’t have an exact percentage, but anywhere between ten and 100% more likely to rank, depending on the topic, the types of posts. Anyways, the SEO benefits just within the last year with the updates of Google made have come up a lot.

    00:01:47:20 – 00:02:15:06

    Brady Winder

    And the other thing is I ran a survey every few months, every six months to a year within our audience on how they like to consume content, what topics they’re interested in. Far and away. 80% of our audience this time around wants to consume content through video. And so we’re seeing the same thing for our members customers. For sellers, video content is just more of a standard right now and less and less.

    00:02:15:06 – 00:02:32:00

    Brady Winder

    Hey, this thing you need to take advantage of. So it’s becoming more and more important. I can’t drive that any further. So we’re going to have a conversation today on video marketing one on one. So getting started what some of the tactical things, what do I need to do? What do I need to be thinking about? How do I strategize?

    00:02:32:00 – 00:02:52:27

    Brady Winder

    How do I outline what kind of topics, what do I talk about? How do I actually get this video done? And then a whole lot of really good technical tips on little things you can do or software you can use to make the best of this video to really attract more leads and convert those leads into deals. We’re going to cover a lot of stuff.

    00:02:53:04 – 00:03:16:23

    Brady Winder

    I’m not worried about how long this podcast goes. Fair warning. Anyways, that’s what we’re talking about today. And so that brings me to a writer. My guess on Josh Cutler. His is his second second time on the podcast and Josh Color is a friend of care. He’s been at care camp. He’s been on our care summit which if you’re wondering if CARE Awesome is happening this year it is don’t worry is the summer.

    00:03:16:23 – 00:03:25:13

    Brady Winder

    We’ll be announcing it very, very shortly if we haven’t already. Anyways. Josh color of Aria video. Did I say that right? Sorry.

    00:03:25:17 – 00:03:26:15

    Josh Culler

    Yep. Yep.

    00:03:27:00 – 00:03:39:09

    Brady Winder

    Mario video. Josh Color. I was going to introduce you. Tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do, because I feel like you’ll do a better job of it. I people you. Yeah. Why you wish we listened to you on this podcast.

    00:03:39:13 – 00:04:01:13

    Josh Culler

    Yeah. No, that’s good. Thanks for having me back, man. I was the last dash, actually. The first time that I was on the Carrie cast was in the studio. So that was a lot of fun with Trevor. Yeah, over there hanging out with you guys. So I appreciate you having me back. Yeah. So just in a nutshell, I’ll keep it very short and sweet because I hate when I’m hosting a podcast and people spend 20 minutes on introducing themselves and I’m like, Oh, well, we’re almost done now.

    00:04:02:07 – 00:04:22:07

    Josh Culler

    So yeah, I’ve been in the real estate investing space for over 11 years now. So I was a marketing director for a large wholesaling organization out here in the Midwest, doing anywhere from 4 to 500 deals a year. And I was the marketing director for that organization, and that got me grounded into the real estate investing space. And now I’m speeding up the time.

    00:04:22:07 – 00:04:48:21

    Josh Culler

    I now focus all of my services and business on real estate investors and influencers as well educators, people that are really taking what they have done in real estate and then teaching it out to other people as well. Maybe they have masterminds, coaching programs, courses, stuff like that. And so what we primarily focus on now is social media for for social media management, YouTube management, podcast management.

    00:04:49:06 – 00:05:06:26

    Josh Culler

    But you know, specifically working in the real estate investing space. So there’s been a lot of interesting changes over the last few years. And even I would say like some changes since the last time I was on the Caracas, like some really big changes in terms of like video traffic and how much I think you said it right.

    00:05:06:26 – 00:05:32:02

    Josh Culler

    I was actually going to like kind of capitalize on your statement, that video is not like I feel like when I was on that first episode with Trevor, we were talking about like why you should take advantage of it, why, you know, now is the time, the time has passed. Like if you’re not doing video now, I don’t like this is this is not going to be a very, very comfortable comfortable episode for you.

    00:05:32:03 – 00:05:47:28

    Josh Culler

    Like it’s it is definitely something where it is the standard. It is the thing that you have to be doing. And 2023 and it’s not a case of like, should I or should I not? It’s a yes, automatically. It was a yes two years ago. So that we’re going to have some good questions. I’m excited about this.

    00:05:48:11 – 00:06:03:08

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I like that the people who are doing it are the ones who are winning. Yeah, well, thanks for summarize in that. Yeah, I’ll have people reach out to me from time to time like, Hey, Brady, you need time to, you know, help me out with this podcast on the site. I do from time to time. But when people get serious about it, Mike, I don’t have the time.

    00:06:03:08 – 00:06:21:05

    Brady Winder

    I’m all on accurate. I’ll send them to Josh So if you’re really are serious about a YouTube channel podcast social and you want to go all in and content, consider go with Josh and his team. They’re really good at what they do in their their industry specific to not just real estate but to investors, wholesalers flippers they know you guys inside and out.

    00:06:21:21 – 00:06:43:06

    Brady Winder

    And so two more quick things before we dive in this conversation. Just just to further impress them. The importance of video. I was doing some research before we started the podcast today. Around 25% of searches feature a video snippet at the top of the page. Whenever you’re Googling how to, you know, how to make chicken pot pie, how to sell my house fast.

    00:06:43:06 – 00:07:08:19

    Brady Winder

    Louisville, Kentucky. A lot of times there’ll be a video up there and then sometimes even a video with the snippets pulled out or little chapters of the video that is becoming more and more common. I’m sure you guys see this every day and stuff you search. Another interesting tidbit we’ve seen in our own data from over 8000 members is a YouTube leads from YouTube convert from visitors into leads at 8.43%.

    00:07:08:19 – 00:07:31:18

    Brady Winder

    So that’s actually double the conversion of any other lead source. And so it’s the highest converting lead source we have accurate, which is just it’s crazy. You know, people who are watching YouTube videos, they are they are motivated. Yeah. So anyways, let’s dive in. I want to talk about first how to how to get started in video marketing.

    00:07:31:18 – 00:07:51:00

    Brady Winder

    So we’re going to talk about the mindset and the gear. I think one thing we just need to get out of the way just real quick. You probably experience this all the time as everybody. Everybody has to start somewhere. People like like the biggest objections, like, I don’t I don’t want to be on camera. I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.

    00:07:52:03 – 00:08:04:24

    Brady Winder

    To me, it’s simple. It’s like you got to be willing to be bad at something and care more about the person on the other end of the screen or care more about getting the lead. You got to think about something else besides how you’re looking on camera. What do you think about that?

    00:08:05:06 – 00:08:26:21

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, at this point in time, I when somebody asked me that question, the only response that I have is if you’re not going to do it, your competition is going to do it. So suck it up. Like there’s a lot of things in business and you know, like as a business, there’s there’s so many things that I have not wanted to do or I knew was going to suck.

    00:08:26:21 – 00:08:44:00

    Josh Culler

    I knew it was going to be a grind and it was going to be something I was uncomfortable with, But as a responsibility, I had to do it because it’s just part of business. Well, video content is part of marketing. You have to do it. And of course, I think and even, you know, and it comes to my personality.

    00:08:44:00 – 00:09:02:25

    Josh Culler

    Brady I mean, there are some people out there that have never been on video, but they’re super confident in themselves and they can just hop on a camera and just talk away. And there are some people that it’s the complete opposite where if even if there’s nobody on the other side of the camera, like there’s literally nobody in my room right now and they’re looking at a camera, it scares them to death.

    00:09:04:05 – 00:09:20:29

    Josh Culler

    You it’s just like anything else. Practice will make perfect. You keep getting it out there and you will get better over time. If you look at anybody, anybody’s videos, I mean, like the biggest YouTuber on the planet right now is Mr. B and or maybe it’s PewDiePie, but like if you look at it, he’s probably the most well known YouTuber.

    00:09:20:29 – 00:09:42:09

    Josh Culler

    If you go back and actually look at his first video he ever posted, it was ridiculous. He look, he looked so he looks so dumb like it is video and it was all pixelated low. I like, but he started somewhere. Everybody that has that you follow that has been an influencer in any way shape or form started at ground zero.

    00:09:42:09 – 00:10:02:24

    Josh Culler

    Everybody started at zero. So you if you’re going to do anything with video, you’ve just got to turn the camera on, start practicing. I think a really good thing to do that actually is kind of funny is coincidentally, I just had an onboarding call with a new client that we’re bringing on, and he’s one of those guys that he’s a little bit, you know, he doesn’t like speaking on stage.

    00:10:02:24 – 00:10:22:01

    Josh Culler

    He’s kind of shy on camera, stuff like that. He even said he’s his own biggest critic, so if he records a video he doesn’t like, he’ll just delete it, he will edit it or anything like that. And, you know, basically what I told him was like, dude, one of the best things that you could do for yourself if you’re that type of person is just to don’t script out your video.

    00:10:22:01 – 00:10:47:21

    Josh Culler

    It’s create the topic, create some bullet points, and then just get it out. If you mess up, if you screw up, you say something you don’t want to say or you need to repeat yourself. Just pause for a second and carry back on. That’s what post-production video editing is for. You can clip all that out. So there’s just some mechanisms, I think, Brady, that people can, if they really pull back the curtain, they look at like what video has become nowadays, it’s not live TV.

    00:10:47:21 – 00:11:06:27

    Josh Culler

    You’re not a news anchor that you have to be perfect on every single word that comes out of your mouth. You’re articulate, clearly, can’t stutter, can’t trip over your words. That’s not the case. Like, there’s there’s ways to get to happiness and yeah, again, the number one thing I would say is just suck it up, because if you’re not going to do it, your competition’s going to be right.

    00:11:06:28 – 00:11:21:15

    Brady Winder

    Absolutely. I’m so glad you said that thing about scripts, too. That was one of the things this is going to talk about as far as aligning videos is for me. I mean, there’s a time and a place for scripts, but more often than not, bullet points can be what’s most helpful? Tell me, what does this look like for you?

    00:11:21:15 – 00:11:38:02

    Brady Winder

    So if I’d say, Josh, we’re going to record it, say I’m going to record a video of you, and the video’s about like teaching people how to sell their house fast and Louisville, Kentucky, or working with like working with a real estate investor in Louisville, Kentucky. How many bullet points are you doing? What does that look like to keep you?

    00:11:38:02 – 00:11:39:09

    Brady Winder

    What do you need to stay on track?

    00:11:39:17 – 00:12:13:11

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, that’s a great question. And there’s two answers I’m going to give actually, and a couple of variables to this. If you’re doing like an ad video, say, for instance, you’re actually using the video to be a Facebook ad, I would recommend scripting it. And the only reason why is because you want to get out what, like you’re paying for X amount of time to be to have your ad out or, you know, just script it, make sure is very well articulated and I would practice it and record it several times because the problem that I’ve always had Brady with people that script videos and put them on a teleprompter or maybe they just try

    00:12:13:11 – 00:12:43:25

    Josh Culler

    to memorize it, it’s very unnatural for us to read something off and remain human while doing it. We like to turn our robotic voices on and not move, not show any animation or any emotions at all. And that’s what ultimately connects. That’s that’s one of the biggest reasons why video is so powerful is because it connects emotionally, intellectually, and it’s just it’s far more connective than putting a copy out there for somebody to read or any other form of content.

    00:12:44:17 – 00:13:17:29

    Josh Culler

    And it’s very hard to read off a script. I can’t even do it. I have out of the couple hundred people over the years that I’ve recorded videos with, there’s only one person that I have allowed to use a teleprompter because they were really good at it and they’ve had it passed with reading teleprompter scripted videos. So just what I would say is if you’re going to do a short form piece of content, if you really feel like you need to script it out and it’s got to get to the point, you know, like I said, if it’s for an ad or something like that, then or a TV commercial, of course, scripted out, just

    00:13:17:29 – 00:13:44:19

    Josh Culler

    practice it a handful of times and stay focused on trying to keep the human element. The alternative, of course, is my recommendation is not scripting videos into a bullet points. I would say for every every minute that you’re going to go and talk about something, maybe create two basic bullet points. The thing that I don’t want to do, it’s almost like going back into the school days where you don’t want to literally write and Terry paragraph for your bullet point.

    00:13:44:19 – 00:14:03:18

    Josh Culler

    You want to just treat it like a headline. So here’s the headline of my bullet point number one headline of bullet point number two. And then you talk about those things. And the key the key to is rate is something that’s a little off topic with us that I always like to mention is you shouldn’t be talking about things that you don’t know inside it out anyway.

    00:14:04:03 – 00:14:05:26

    Josh Culler

    So. Yeah, yeah.

    00:14:05:26 – 00:14:06:14

    Brady Winder

    Good point.

    00:14:06:22 – 00:14:26:20

    Josh Culler

    If you can’t talk about it on a podcast like this comfortably and get all the information out, regardless of if you’re comfortable on camera or not, you shouldn’t be doing it anyway. So if you can’t riff for 20 to 30 seconds on a bullet point, then you know, go away from that topic. So I think that with bullet points, just treat them like headlines.

    00:14:26:25 – 00:14:44:22

    Josh Culler

    Do one or two bullet points for every minute that you plan on talk, It’s a five minute video, maybe not ten bullet points, but somewhere in the neighborhood of like six two 6 to 9 bullet points would be a good idea, but make them as informational to you as possible. And the important thing is just you getting the content out.

    00:14:44:22 – 00:14:53:27

    Brady Winder

    I like that one. You know, one or two for every minute or so, because that’s about it’s like about how long your brain can go remembering what you’re talking about. You know.

    00:14:54:01 – 00:15:11:21

    Josh Culler

    In regards to mush, I do one per minute, but that’s what works for me, right? So that person could also riff for 5 minutes. If you just give me one thing to talk about. But I didn’t start off that way either, by the way. And I’m sure Brady, like you’re you’re pretty fluent on camera as well. And I’m sure you didn’t start off that way.

    00:15:11:21 – 00:15:20:07

    Josh Culler

    I’m sure Trevor didn’t start out that way, right? It takes practice and time to evolve that over time, to be comfortable on camera and allow yourself to get information out.

    00:15:21:02 – 00:15:44:19

    Brady Winder

    Oh, it’s it’s crunchy. In the beginning. It’s crunchy. I’m not going to link up some of our old content so you’re can click it in the show notes. I’m going to find it hard to. Yeah. Good chat this yeah is crunchy. Don’t judge the light lighting or audio either everybody starts. So another thing to keep in mind is knowing your goals.

    00:15:44:19 – 00:16:11:03

    Brady Winder

    So I feel like, you know, you talk about video, it can be really vague like, oh, video marketing and people might think of ticktalk. I mean, I think of Instagram social and they might think of TV. I don’t know. But for the sake of this conversation, we’re talking about generating leads. And so I think one of those I’m sure you see this is one of the mistakes I see people do is they haven’t really thought or they haven’t decided exactly what they want their video to be for.

    00:16:11:03 – 00:16:42:28

    Brady Winder

    So they say, well, I want to generate leads with it, but I also want to be an influencer and I also want to share with other people how to do X, Y, or Z. And so videos that maybe sometimes are good, but they don’t have a clear purpose. And so they kind of just they don’t really hit when you’re watching them, you know, video someone walking through, hey, we’re flipping a house is what we’re doing is I’m not saying don’t shoot that contact because it can be helpful, but know why you’re doing it as this is this for like a social media outlet or your website where you’re educating people on what it’s like, work

    00:16:42:29 – 00:16:51:28

    Brady Winder

    with a wholesaler or an investor, or are you trying to get coaching students so you can teach people how to flip houses? It’s usually two different things.

    00:16:51:28 – 00:17:16:08

    Josh Culler

    Do I? So when I travel to speak, I’m going to be traveling to a large area in Pennsylvania next week, and I got asked to to speak on a similar topic. But I’m like, you know what? Let me frame it a little bit differently and the type of presentation, I call it a North Star. So the North Star is obviously, you know, the story of, you know, Jesus being born and the three wise men.

    00:17:16:08 – 00:17:49:16

    Josh Culler

    We’re finally following the North Star to, you know, get to their destination. Basically, it’s just a waypoint. Is really what it is. And if you look at what you are, you can also call it your goal, your objective, whatever you want to call it, the North Star, though, it’s basically you’re on a path somewhere. And in your marketing, if you don’t have a very specific point in which you’re trying to reach, whether it’s the end of a funnel that you have built now or it’s step one would be like click the link in my bio, fill out this landing page, fill X, Y and Z, go do this, go do that.

    00:17:50:00 – 00:18:10:09

    Josh Culler

    You have a sentence for that. But at the end of the day, if they’re not reaching your North Star, then your marketing could be pointing to multiple different things that can really confuse the fact of what you do. So if you create what your North Star is for some people, you know, if you’re if you’re, say, a realtor listening and your North Star is it, it could be more than one thing.

    00:18:10:09 – 00:18:35:07

    Josh Culler

    But I unless you have multiple businesses, it should not be more than 3 to 5 things, period. Like unless you own multiple businesses and you have different products that you’re working with, with within. But say, for instance, you’re a realtor, maybe you’re a North star is to get more listings and to sell more deals. Right? So it could be, you know, one of those two things or whatever it is, it could be one of those you know, it could be one or two more, whatever it looks like.

    00:18:35:07 – 00:19:00:24

    Josh Culler

    But you have to be very specific on what that is. And in every bit of content that you work within is literally just pointed out that that’s the objective. Because again, like you said, the you know, there’s some people out there I run into this all the time where, you know, somebody will contact me and they’ll say, you know, I attended this mastermind and, you know, like I got up to speak and like five people in the room were like, you’re a really good speaker.

    00:19:00:24 – 00:19:17:08

    Josh Culler

    You should do social media stuff. And then I responded like, I don’t really like social media. I just want to buy real estate, sell it, You know, maybe I’m a wholesaler or whatever it is, and then they get pressured into doing it. Now they’re shooting videos on random topics that they have no idea why they’re shooting up. That’s a waste of time.

    00:19:17:23 – 00:19:19:15

    Josh Culler

    We call that garbage.

    00:19:19:15 – 00:19:22:14

    Brady Winder

    So if you have a specific.

    00:19:23:08 – 00:19:45:19

    Josh Culler

    You know, goal North Star that you’re trying to achieve everything that you do, content wise, not just video content, but primarily video content should be centered around that. And I boil that also down to demographics, and that goes down into platforms. Brady So like when I’m hopping on a onboarding call with a new client, we go through the process of who your demographic is.

    00:19:45:19 – 00:20:04:11

    Josh Culler

    It’s marketing 1 to 1. You’re your target demographic, your avatar, whatever it is, the ideal person you want to work with. And if they’re not, believe it or not, not everybody consumes tick tock. Believe it or not, not everybody’s on podcast and listen to podcasts. So if your demographic is not there, then why would you put content there?

    00:20:04:11 – 00:20:21:28

    Josh Culler

    Why would you be building something that’s not there? But the other the other kind of rebuttal to that I get radio is you build it and it will come. Or like, you know, there are there are scenarios. There are rare, very rare scenario. Yeah. Where you could start putting something out and then your demographic will flock to it.

    00:20:22:06 – 00:20:45:14

    Josh Culler

    But you got to remember, the more sophisticated your demographic is, the less likely they are to budge off of what they’re currently using. So there’s so many variables that that comes to this. And you know this too, if you’re saying that everybody is your target demographic, that nobody is right, You got to get very specific with it, figure out where they hang out, what they consume, what type of content they consume, what they’re looking for.

    00:20:45:14 – 00:20:48:15

    Josh Culler

    And that’s what you got to put videos out about.

    00:20:48:15 – 00:20:58:24

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I really appreciate how you didn’t gloss over and just call it for what it is you say. That’s garbage. I call it noise, but it’s it’s anything outside of the focus people consume.

    00:20:58:24 – 00:21:00:19

    Josh Culler

    It just makes noise. Just remember.

    00:21:00:19 – 00:21:15:00

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Yeah. You know, it reminds you of essentialism. I’m going to be cautious. But in Essentialism, Greg McKeown talks about how you need to have know what the finish line is, know what the end goal is. Otherwise you’re just going to be creating indefinitely, forever.

    00:21:15:06 – 00:21:42:12

    Josh Culler

    You’re never going to know when you reach that finish line. You’re never going to know when you get to the destination. And obviously the destination repeats itself, you know, based on conversions, you know, you want more conversions, but you know, my proper rule of thumb, Duda is like whatever you have to offer. A simple quote that I like to say is content slash social media slash video marketing is literally just explaining to your target demographic about what you do, who you are and your industry.

    00:21:42:22 – 00:21:58:13

    Josh Culler

    If you answer those questions, that’s literally how you can frame your topics around and the type of content you put out. That’s that’s going to solve all your problems and asking questions of like, I don’t know what topics to write or do to do videos about or I don’t know what platforms to post on. That’s what you do.

    00:21:58:20 – 00:22:20:16

    Josh Culler

    Because also, you know, this to me is that like if you’re say for instance, if you have if you’re a real estate investor, you’re a wholesaler, or as much as we like to say referrals are a really good source of getting more deals, it’s not realistic. You might get one or two, you know, on a periodic basis, but for the most part you’re doing you’re doing repetitive actions to get deals.

    00:22:21:00 – 00:22:47:18

    Josh Culler

    So putting out daily social media videos or let’s just say, for instance, you started a podcast to bring you more deals. You’re not going to have a thousand motivated sellers lined up to listen to your podcast every week. And the transactional service is really what it is. That being said, maybe the alternative is I know I have a couple of friends of mine that do Brian Snyder down in Indianapolis.

    00:22:47:18 – 00:23:12:25

    Josh Culler

    He does a podcast that’s specifically built to educate other Indianapolis wholesalers and real estate busters to bring him deals. So he teaches how to bring them because they don’t wanna do their own marketing. So they have all their wholesalers bring it deals and it brings them deals all the time. So that’s the alternative. But if your objective is depending on going directly to the motivated seller, that could dictate the platform that you’re on and the frequency, because once again, you’re not going to have 100,000.

    00:23:12:25 – 00:23:20:19

    Josh Culler

    So, you know, Instagram followers that are all motivated sellers watching your your daily videos, it’s just not works. So there’s yeah, variables.

    00:23:21:03 – 00:23:41:04

    Brady Winder

    Or maybe you could even go, you know talk on like a community podcast about, you know, how you are the local investor in your community, why you’re different from an agent and what you offer, or maybe sponsor a podcast episode. There’s yeah. One thing I want to hit on a real quick gear. We’re not going to we’re not going to spend time talking about gear.

    00:23:41:04 – 00:23:45:05

    Brady Winder

    Y’all can Google this. Y’all can look at blog posts for getting started with video marketing.

    00:23:45:09 – 00:24:18:24

    Josh Culler

    I was going to say, I’ll just give one high level expert tip here. You have an iPhone that is, I would say, newer. So I even have that. I’m a content creator, but I just have the iPhone 12 pro max, whatever the top one is. And if you have this or newer, you’re good to go record content out there on Amazon, you can buy Nikes that plug into your lightning port and then it’s wirelessly propelled to you to get good audio, get good video feed record content.

    00:24:18:24 – 00:24:36:25

    Josh Culler

    That way it works. As long as you got good lighting, as long as you frame yourself correctly, it’ll work. You know, you don’t have to have like Brady set up looks insanely incredible. Mine looks pretty solid, but they’re stages to it. Everybody thinks that they can buy $10,000 worth of camera gear, jump right into it, but that’s not where it starts again.

    00:24:37:06 – 00:24:44:29

    Josh Culler

    Everybody starts from ground zero. And what better to create content with something that you already have? So that’s my expert on gear. That’s my expert opinion.

    00:24:45:19 – 00:25:06:15

    Brady Winder

    I’m glad you said that. I was going to say iPhone 3G s that works. In all seriousness, though, it’s like it depends a lot on the audience do so like for motivated seller specifically there you know if this is an ad or thing on social media, it needs to kind of blend in with the fee to blend in and I think stand out at the same time.

    00:25:06:27 – 00:25:17:28

    Brady Winder

    But by blending, I mean like if it looks overly polished, overly commercialized and professional, they might gloss over depending on what they’re looking for. So just food for thought.

    00:25:18:15 – 00:25:44:28

    Josh Culler

    I think a really good way to go about recording content in the context of what you just said too, is environment is very important too. So if you are shooting a video specifically to motivated seller leads, be at a property maybe that you have under contract or if you don’t have anything. We were just getting started. Go to your parents house or go to your house and go in the front yard and, you know, shoot a video in front of a house that you would be that would be in your buy box.

    00:25:45:25 – 00:26:03:13

    Josh Culler

    You know, if you don’t buy D class in D class neighborhoods, don’t go to a D class neighborhood and, you know, in a war zone and record videos, but be in the same environment. I think that’s really important and underrated as well when recording. So don’t be afraid. Don’t don’t shy away from just getting out of your office and, you know, recording video still.

    00:26:03:27 – 00:26:23:24

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, that’s good. That’s good. Yeah. Well said. Keep a simple start with an iPhone. Let’s talk about topics. This is this is a big one. Nobody knows what to talk about. I think, you know, we already covered you covered one of the most important things, which is if you don’t know what to talk about, the best tip we can give you is ask.

    00:26:23:24 – 00:26:51:05

    Brady Winder

    Find out what questions people are asking. So find out what questions sellers are asking and just answer their questions. That’s like the definition. That’s like content marketing. One on one is answer the questions that people are asking and give them the best value you can. Something something that’s disrupting the Internet as we know it right now. I JPT It’s like everyday conversation.

    00:26:51:05 – 00:27:11:14

    Brady Winder

    Like what is it doing? What is it doing? It’s it’s maybe it’s a bunch of buzz right now and it’s actually not as powerful as we think it is. Maybe not Maybe things maybe the landscape of Google in being really does completely change in a couple of years. We’re staying on top of that anyways. The reason I bring it up is because there’s a there’s a place for it.

    00:27:11:14 – 00:27:35:16

    Brady Winder

    So my job as a podcast host and content strategist, I’m constantly coming up with ideas and what to talk about, what we should be talking about, and we can talk about anything, how to format that. I found a really helpful I don’t know if you’ve said all Josh, but I found it helpful as not not to do the bulk of my thinking, but as a helper, as an assistant for when I get stuff.

    00:27:35:21 – 00:28:00:26

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, and so, I mean, you could do it to us so you could use chat to get you to like, you know, 50% of a blog posts like give me the outline, give me some to talk about. I like to use it for outlines like help me summarize this idea. Or let’s say I have an idea and I’m thinking of another way to say, Hey, reword this phrase or conclusions.

    00:28:00:26 – 00:28:14:28

    Brady Winder

    So concluding a video or blog post can be difficult because a lot of people get stuck at the very end. It’s like, okay, write me a conclusion to this. It could be helpful for that. Any thoughts on GP JPT and are we all going to be replaced tomorrow? Josh And now?

    00:28:15:05 – 00:28:33:09

    Josh Culler

    So I think it’s one of those things and I’m not I will say this first, I’m not an expert in it, but you know, like I mentioned earlier, I’m one of my full time jobs as a CEO of my organization is research and development. So I spend a lot of time digging into stuff like this. I think, you know, anytime something new comes to the forefront like this, it does get hyped.

    00:28:33:09 – 00:28:52:12

    Josh Culler

    You know, for instance, I have my my VR headset over here that we play games on and stuff like that. And I remember when VR first came to the forefront, when Samsung was kind of the biggest one to launch it, you would have to take your phone and set it inside of the headset and then you would do that and your phone would burn up after like 10 minutes and stuff like that.

    00:28:52:21 – 00:29:15:18

    Josh Culler

    And it became hype and then it kind of like dialed back a little bit and then met out, really brought it back up. And, you know, Oculus has been around since since that time period. And it was really under Samsung’s watch and it moved over to Facebook slash matter. I think it has the feeling of that. So I think it’s something that is a I think people are looking at it like it could be like this huge thing.

    00:29:16:06 – 00:29:32:15

    Josh Culler

    But I think right now it’s just a tool that can help with a lot of things that you talk about. You presented it in a really good way. I think it’s just a tool to kind of either spark it, get you started, help you finish up, give you ideas, create sparks, whatever it is. But I think that, you know, for instance, I tested a handful of things I love.

    00:29:32:15 – 00:30:09:18

    Josh Culler

    Asking questions is how I learned I was terrible in school. And so asking questions is like how I learned everything. And it got me really excited. You know, I even went as far as to we were looking for a new copywriter for our team and I had Chad GPT write me a job posting for a social media copywriter and it did a pretty bang up job like it did a really good it got it got about 85% accurate on what I would type out and I just had to go through an editor a couple of things and something that would have taken me close to an hour to type out it literally.

    00:30:09:25 – 00:30:39:09

    Josh Culler

    I finished it like 8 minutes after I edited what it already presented. But I think a really good leverage point. You know, I tested this the other day as well. You know, people in order for to use stuff like this and technology like this, you have to be good at asking the right question. But understanding what the other side of it is, For example, what I asked Chad GTP to do for me was I I’m going to try to like were to exactly how I word it.

    00:30:39:09 – 00:31:01:29

    Josh Culler

    I said create me 50 topics for video content that business owners are asking about, and it literally lists it out 50 topics of the most asked questions on the Internet of what people are asking about video content. And I was like, okay, those are my topics that I’m going to be shooting videos on for the next couple of months.

    00:31:02:13 – 00:31:30:18

    Josh Culler

    And it did a really good job on that. So if you got specific, I can’t imagine I didn’t test this. Yeah, but I can’t imagine that if you look at Chat GTP and you say, create me 25 topics that are for sale by owner, you know, motivated sellers are asking about you know, it might be able to spit out a handful of really good topics but you know I do I do like the idea you know I have been reading up that Google is planning on coming out with a competitor within the next few days to that.

    00:31:30:18 – 00:31:53:21

    Josh Culler

    That is no shock. And surprise to me because normally Google is not the first one to do things. It is like the second or third, but because of it being Google, they do it the best and then they squash whatever the first one was. And Apple and Google have that reputation to do it. Apple’s ever the first to anything either, but they will crush at that, you know even after their second or third to it.

    00:31:54:03 – 00:32:13:03

    Josh Culler

    Then I’m excited about this type of technology. I think people need to just be leveraging it as a tool right now and just be focused on asking the right question to the to the program. But yeah, I don’t I don’t see it being a everyday useful tool for somebody for another, like probably two or three years as some development to go under.

    00:32:13:03 – 00:32:17:28

    Josh Culler

    But it’s, it’s pretty it’s pretty impressive at the given moment.

    00:32:18:19 – 00:32:31:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, it’s interesting It’s a it’s a good help right now for sure And you still, you know, kind of like you’re alluding to, you still need a a human element to at a minimum QC it to make sure it is the right.

    00:32:31:14 – 00:32:53:25

    Josh Culler

    I even gave it to my as soon as I heard about it I signed it over to my lead, my my department lead for my quality control and writing department. And I’m like, Hey, take a look at this and see if this is something that you could use in your department, because they I mean, they quality control. I mean, we, we at it and publish close to about 5000 pieces of content on a weekly basis.

    00:32:53:25 – 00:33:11:17

    Josh Culler

    So my quality control team has to have eyeballs on every single one of those every single week. So I’m like, go through and see if this is something that will help you guys, you know, in efficiency. And she was able to discover like one or two things that it might help with, mostly with like descriptions and show notes creation.

    00:33:11:17 – 00:33:20:08

    Josh Culler

    But I think like it’s just underdeveloped right now because it just started. But it’s it’s been I’ll keep an eye on it. It’s going to it’s going to be pretty cool.

    00:33:20:21 – 00:33:39:06

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. We’ll check back in on a year from now. Maybe we’ll have another conversation, right? Yes, change of course. So topics I’ve got a I’ve got a list of topics here for generating seller leads. We pulled this from our video marketing playbook. I don’t know if I said this at the beginning. The podcast is video Marketing Month Guru Care.com Search Video.

    00:33:39:12 – 00:33:57:03

    Brady Winder

    We’ve got this playbook. Josh actually helped us come up with a view on this a while back and we revamped it in the last year, but basically How to get Started Video a list of 52 ideas as one idea per week and just all the essential information, you know, to get going on the video marketing in one nice little PDF.

    00:33:57:03 – 00:34:12:18

    Brady Winder

    So anyways, I pulled this most of it from that list of 52. I’m going to run through them and just and talk about in real quick. Josh, feel free to interrupt me or if you have any you want to add, just go for it. But I’m just going to give you guys these so you know what to talk about.

    00:34:13:15 – 00:34:27:18

    Brady Winder

    Seller testimonials probably hands on the most important thing you can do if you haven’t done a deal yet. Get character testimonials from other people you know about you, you as a person, your character. But seller testimonials get them on Vimeo plus to them more.

    00:34:27:18 – 00:34:38:13

    Josh Culler

    Chime in here real quick. Yeah, something super cool. So like I don’t know if I’m hoping you haven’t discovered this yet because it would be really cool if you did it that I found something that that you didn’t find out.

    00:34:38:17 – 00:34:39:17

    Brady Winder

    I’m excited now.

    00:34:39:17 – 00:35:01:15

    Josh Culler

    About value too. So one of the number one is seller testimonials and the reason why I wanted to bring this up in the first place, because that is normally what people revert to for video content is getting very you know, you’re at closing table, you want to get your cell phone out, record a quick video. What I see happen, though, and it’s been acceptable up until this point because now you have the tool to be able to help.

    00:35:01:15 – 00:35:21:15

    Josh Culler

    This is, you know, let’s say, for instance, your closing table is like three feet across. Well, you’re sitting on the other side with your phone recording it. Where’s the microphone? It’s next to you. So it’s across the table. And so maybe you’re in a bigger room. So it sounds hollow. The person that’s on the other side of camera more than likely is not good at speaking on camera because that’s not what they do.

    00:35:21:23 – 00:35:46:15

    Josh Culler

    So they’re just going to give it their best bang up shot. You’re going to have fuzz. You might have some like office sounds in the background, the fax machines going, the the copiers, printers, phones ring and stuff like that. So my lead video editor discovered a tool called It’s an Adobe Tool and it’s called Adobe Podcast. But what it does is it has a a speech enhancer tool to it.

    00:35:46:21 – 00:35:55:25

    Josh Culler

    It’s in beta mode right now. I think you have to have an Adobe account to use this. Basically what you do and Brady after we’re done, maybe I’ll show you an example because you won’t believe me if you haven’t tried this yet.

    00:35:56:06 – 00:36:02:13

    Brady Winder

    Sorry. Are you doing it? You all Honestly, I’m getting distracted. Like I have to know about this right now. The podcast guy is.

    00:36:03:04 – 00:36:23:25

    Josh Culler

    Normally normally when I discover stuff like this, I’m kind of like, Oh, that’s kind of cool in my help. But this is this right here is something I require all of my videos to go through at this point. So it will literally take any audio like I’ve I’ve done it with testimonial videos where it was that there was fires in the background.

    00:36:23:25 – 00:36:45:16

    Josh Culler

    They were they were just super hollow. They were quiet because they were like four or five feet away from the camera type thing. And it was with a cell phone. You got to just strip the audio, put it into this software. It takes like maybe 2 minutes tops. It’ll spit it back out. I’m telling you, it will sound like they have a podcast microphone right next to their mouth.

    00:36:45:27 – 00:37:11:29

    Josh Culler

    Really? And it will make it sound immaculate. You got to test it. Brady is mind blowing, but that alone, we’re going into a phase where content is becoming unacceptable. To have high quality standards, you have to have high quality standards to get what you’re trying to get to because people are just sick and tired of watching cruddy Zoom videos and cell phone recordings.

    00:37:11:29 – 00:37:23:21

    Josh Culler

    You have to make it as high as possible. Audio is one of those ways to do it. This right here testing solid testimonials. It will ultimately ten x the quality of video by just doing that.

    00:37:24:06 – 00:37:41:27

    Brady Winder

    I, I thank you for mentioning that. I’m so glad you did because we were just I was recording a podcast last week at the you know if you listen to this in March it just came out a couple weeks ago but it’s all about testimonials. Keith and Bo and I, we dive really deep into this, and Keith had mentioned how he had thrown out a testimonial.

    00:37:41:27 – 00:37:55:00

    Brady Winder

    It was like one of his best testimonials, you know, throw it out because the phone was so far away, didn’t think about it. And it’s like, I can just hear that that conference room sound in my head where it’s 15 feet away and you didn’t get what you needed to get.

    00:37:55:09 – 00:38:12:22

    Josh Culler

    Dude, and takes all of that out. It cleans it up. It is the most mindblowing software for editing like media at all that I’ve seen. And it’s all it’s all automatic, so you don’t have to make any adjustments or anything. It’ll do it for you. It just knows what to to take out to add and stuff like that.

    00:38:12:22 – 00:38:38:02

    Josh Culler

    And, and a lot of times, you know, for me, like I speak at a higher tone so I don’t have much of a low voice so it’ll equalize my, my my tone as well and it just sounds when you put headphones on after you run it through it, it just sounds so good. So, I mean, to interrupt you with that, but I know testimonials is a number one thing with topics and that’s the biggest barrier is, you know, you don’t you don’t normally have a DSLR camera with a lapel mike at your closing table.

    00:38:38:28 – 00:38:43:14

    Josh Culler

    So I still want you to capture video if your concern is audio, run it through that. You’ll be good to go.

    00:38:44:03 – 00:38:51:17

    Brady Winder

    Okay. Yeah, I love that. I had not heard of it. You got me all excited. I’m glad I hadn’t heard of it. I’m going to be. I know what I’m doing for the rest of today will be tested.

    00:38:51:17 – 00:38:52:15

    Josh Culler

    I know you’ll be stuck.

    00:38:53:10 – 00:39:20:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Get the mic close to the person. You’re recording it. The phone call. It’s the closer you are, the less room noise and all y’all are close in your deals in a big empty conference room that’s echoey as all get out So the mike close second about me video this is huge. This is the thing that converts your visitors into leads and leads into deals as people getting to know you like you trust you and they can see that you’re a real human in your market.

    00:39:20:14 – 00:39:46:15

    Brady Winder

    Doing about me video doing by yourself to get started. And then I would even recommend once you’ve got a better feel for you know, how you position your service and your your overall messaging, maybe even bring in a videographer to do a legitimate like professional about me. A video that is a time and a place to do professional video so you can show that you’re not above the competition because most people are not going to do that.

    00:39:47:02 – 00:40:10:21

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, yeah. About me video and then some of the more general topics how to sell your these are more obvious and a lot of them are aligned with Google keywords. What sellers are searching for, they’re not always the same as YouTube. So if you go to YouTube, do keyword research there, there’s a lot of times some variance. But how to sell your house fast for cash in Pensacola, Florida, whatever, city state.

    00:40:10:27 – 00:40:36:15

    Brady Winder

    So maybe talk about the steps you would need to do or did you know that you can sell your house this fast? Did you know you can close this fast? So talk about some of the things people might not know, the questions they have. We buy houses in the city state. So talk about where you buy houses, what types of houses you buy home buyers in city state, Roseburg, Oregon, where home buyers in Roseburg, Oregon.

    00:40:36:15 – 00:40:50:13

    Brady Winder

    How are we different from agent investor or how are we different from agents? How to Stop Foreclosure in Roseburg, Oregon, If you’re about to be foreclosed on, here’s the five steps you can take to not get foreclosed or here’s what you might want to prepare for how to deal with that.

    00:40:50:13 – 00:41:07:17

    Josh Culler

    I like I like that one because not that the other ones are bad, but I like that one because the context of it is you’re delivering some value to the person watching the video. You’re giving them tips on what to do if they’re going through something. And then giving yourself as a solution is a really good way to frame it up.

    00:41:07:17 – 00:41:20:15

    Josh Culler

    So the other ones are great as well, but I like that one, the concept of that one because yeah, it’s value leading and then you give call to action at the backside of it saying if you need help with this, I have solution for you. Here’s what that is.

    00:41:20:15 – 00:41:51:27

    Brady Winder

    So yeah, while I actually like the you said that because you know the reason that one stands out versus the others is one of the most important things I learned about copywriting awhile back from Trevor actually is is opening a loop in the person’s mind. You could do this like almost borderline unethical. Like with click bait, you know, you open up the Google app and here’s like 100 articles that are just pure clickbait and but they’re all opening a loop like, you won’t believe what these people did to their child when they’re going through the airport security line.

    00:41:51:27 – 00:42:18:12

    Brady Winder

    That was literally one I saw yesterday. Come on anyways. But it’s how to stop foreclosure. So they know that they’re going to get the value out of it, like five steps to stop foreclosure in 60 or three ways. Working with an investor is different from an agent would be a better way to spice up the topic. Real Estate Investor versus Agent Pros and Cons Top five Mistakes When Selling Your Roseburg, Oregon Home.

    00:42:19:01 – 00:42:19:25

    Brady Winder

    That’s a good one.

    00:42:20:06 – 00:42:21:09

    Josh Culler

    MM Yeah.

    00:42:22:10 – 00:42:40:15

    Brady Winder

    Top five neighborhoods. This one is a little bit more geared towards buyer leads, but I put it in here because I think it’s still I don’t see investors do it enough and it can still really position you as an authority. This is a concern that agents are making all day, every day, you know, top five neighborhoods in Portland, Oregon.

    00:42:40:25 – 00:42:53:03

    Brady Winder

    But if you know someone if a motivated seller goes to your website and they’re looking to sell their house fast and they see, oh, this guy actually knows all my neighbors and know he’s a local guy, I think that adds a great deal of credibility to you.

    00:42:53:14 – 00:42:55:23

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, I think so.

    00:42:55:23 – 00:43:10:04

    Brady Winder

    And then tip, we already cover this, but what questions are you getting from your prospect’s ask them or either one, whatever. Any any thoughts on topics? Josh That’s my short list from the video marketing playbook.

    00:43:10:15 – 00:43:41:23

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, that’s, that’s, those are really good places to start and don’t be afraid to overlap any of those topics because generally speaking, a lot of those topics will overlay with each other. I think another good kind of contextual topic silo would be processes. So like the process of working with you, keep it in general, the process of working a wholesaler, or if you’re a realtor, the process of selling your house with a realtor because there’s a lot of questions that people have.

    00:43:41:23 – 00:43:58:23

    Josh Culler

    I, I had never even, even though I’ve been in this real estate investing space for a long time, I’ve actually never listed a house with a real estate agent before. And last March. It’s been a year since we moved into the house that we’re currently in, and last year in February was the first time I’d ever dealt with a realtor and did.

    00:43:58:23 – 00:44:16:18

    Josh Culler

    I had so many questions. There were so many things. I had no idea what to expect with it. And I think just realtors. Not that my realtor didn’t do a good job of this because he is answering all my question. He’s a close personal friend of mine, but I think a lot of people, when they’re going to list their house or they’re going to buy a house like they have so many questions.

    00:44:16:22 – 00:44:39:20

    Josh Culler

    So any of those questions that you can answer by opening up processes is a good idea. Also, like if you’re a real estate investor, like what’s the closing process? If you’re a realtor, what’s the closing process? If I’m buying a house and selling mine and or whatever it is, if you can list out those processes, people want to know step one through whatever in order to get to the destination that they’re trying to achieve.

    00:44:39:20 – 00:45:07:26

    Josh Culler

    And if you can answer those questions, then you’re creating clarity in their mind. You automatically have built credibility with yourself with that person. So process is another thing that I really like to do. I mean, honestly, it’s common practice in the education world. If you go to open your phone right now to any real estate influencer and click on their first video on Instagram reels, it’s it’s guaranteed to be some sort of a process, whether it’s like, here’s the five things that you’ve got to do to close more deals.

    00:45:08:01 – 00:45:30:05

    Josh Culler

    And then they’re walking you through those five things. The process of what it looks like to close more deals or here’s how you can sleep better, like they’re going to walk you through step one, through four of how to sleep. There’s just the process of working through things with, you know, your demographic is very, very important and I think it’s very underrated.

    00:45:30:05 – 00:45:43:02

    Josh Culler

    And I think it’s something that a lot of people don’t do. They want to go straight to the About Me videos, which of course you should do, but that’s not where the buck stops. You’ve got to keep going and providing value is very key when it comes to especially video content.

    00:45:43:18 – 00:46:10:07

    Brady Winder

    Oh yeah. And I mean, the things that you and I are both talking about can be useful for, you know, are useful for Legion and, and awareness and, and warming up those leads for sort of the middle of the funnel. But I would be so excited as a investor or an agent right now because the tools that are available to us to create content like you’re talking about are so powerful.

    00:46:10:07 – 00:46:29:21

    Brady Winder

    But also so underutilized. And so I’m not a real estate agent, but I can’t imagine how many techs a real estate agent gets because I know what I text my real estate agent, you know, as 8 p.m. on a Sunday night. Hey, I got a question for you, dude. I can’t imagine how much they get on. And then it’s like the opportunity to answer.

    00:46:29:21 – 00:46:37:25

    Brady Winder

    So many of those things with really sweet, short form video content. It’s like, Oh my gosh, there’s so many this many ways to do this.

    00:46:38:03 – 00:46:50:02

    Josh Culler

    I was like, I was just about to look it up. Like, I go back into my text thread with my realtor from last year and probably pull out like 45 to 50 topics just from the questions I asked.

    00:46:50:02 – 00:46:50:23

    Brady Winder

    Oh my gosh.

    00:46:51:01 – 00:47:19:15

    Josh Culler

    I like it. Yeah, there’s so many questions out there. So I think that people don’t have an excuse to create topics. It’s literally just answering the questions that your target demographic about what you do, your industry, you know, and the process of working with you and you know what it is that you do like literally what I would do is if you’re struggling with this this document for one day document every single task that you do and then create spinoff topics about those tasks that you do and then deliver that on video.

    00:47:20:19 – 00:47:42:03

    Brady Winder

    Absolutely. I love that. And if you know and if if you find yourself like saying the same things or if you’re an agent, like texting people back or you’re investing in your training, your team telling them the same things all the time, like, Yeah, I empathize with you. It sounds exhausting. It’s a lot. I know and I know it’s work to create the process or to create the video, but at the same time, like you can be proactive about it.

    00:47:42:10 – 00:48:03:19

    Brady Winder

    You can educate people with videos on your website. You can say, Hey, you know, we’ve started working together. Here’s three short little videos on what you can expect from working with me. Here’s how the process is going to go. I mean, I like to say like nothing beats a personal touch, but in so like offer a personal touch, share when you can but is it scalable and yeah, I don’t know.

    00:48:03:25 – 00:48:25:18

    Josh Culler

    I couldn’t write it but I could method that I think is a good idea for that is like for instance on my team, if somebody asks a question about something specific, what I do is I have like a 1 to 2 minute short video that I have like a massive unlisted playlists on my YouTube channel for all this stuff, for video training, for internal team.

    00:48:25:29 – 00:48:53:07

    Josh Culler

    But I recommend this for external marketing as well is that you shoot a one or two minute video that explains it at a high level and then maybe you shot another video that’s like a 5 to 10 minute video that goes deeper. And at the end of your two minute video, you could say if this didn’t explain it and you need more details, I have a link down below to the next video that explains everything in the detail, because now you’re given the option for them to get the short quick answer or everything into every nitty gritty detail you can have to offer.

    00:48:53:13 – 00:48:59:15

    Josh Culler

    It’s a lot of work, but if you go above and beyond that way, you will see results with that. Like it’s a nine day difference.

    00:48:59:15 – 00:49:05:06

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, I like that. It’s like the reddit. TLDR Too lazy to complain. Is that too lazy? Didn’t want to watch.

    00:49:05:06 – 00:49:06:27

    Josh Culler

    That’s exactly what it is. Yes.

    00:49:06:27 – 00:49:28:07

    Brady Winder

    Okay, quick side. No. Anybody listen to podcasts, right? You know, we’re true audience people who are tuning in every week. If you’d be interested in it. It was a deal to lazy didn’t listen. If anyone out there is interested in like condensed podcast episodes like Hey, you don’t feel like listening to the hour and ten minute long podcast with Brady and Josh, Where’s the five minute version?

    00:49:28:07 – 00:49:31:15

    Brady Winder

    Let me know. Brady at Care.com. Email me. I’m genuinely curious.

    00:49:31:15 – 00:49:32:09

    Josh Culler

    Cliff Notes.

    00:49:33:00 – 00:49:53:11

    Brady Winder

    Yes, the Cliff notes. I’m curious. Maybe we put at the beginning I don’t know if nobody emails me. Don’t expect it. You have to listen all hour in 10 minutes. Okay. So we talked about topics. We covered a lot there. I think the last thing I want to talk about and maybe one of the most valuable is a few tools and really creative use cases for video for real estate.

    00:49:53:11 – 00:50:14:09

    Brady Winder

    And so I want to go through this list and and then we will wrap it up because we could talk all day on this stuff. But anyways, as we go through this list at this point in the podcast, you might be feeling overwhelmed. You might have a million ideas. If you’re anything like me, I give you full permission and just hit pause.

    00:50:14:21 – 00:50:29:13

    Brady Winder

    Don’t even finish the episode. Go shoot the video. If you’re feeling motivated, just go to the About Me video. Go start getting testimonials and then come back and hit play. When you have started making this videos and, find some tools to help speed things up some differently.

    00:50:29:17 – 00:50:51:18

    Josh Culler

    I could give I could give a helpful solution to what typically what I may step one through whatever type person like I don’t like to, I’ll think ahead. But if I if I haven’t gotten past up to that, I can’t go to step five. So I think a really good like step one is create your topics of what you do before you’ve done that.

    00:50:51:18 – 00:51:13:14

    Josh Culler

    If you have not yet, which if you’re in business, you should have already done this, is create your target demographic, your avatar. A really good, easy way to do this is just to go to either the one page marketing book, just Google that and that’ll help you nail down all of those details. So it’s like demographics, age, you know, occupations and geographical locations, stuff like that.

    00:51:13:27 – 00:51:34:15

    Josh Culler

    And that. Or you could do the Donna miller Story brand kind of exercise there. So either one of those will work that will establish demographics. Step one. Step two, start creating your topics. I would create you know, you have 52 topics here at your disposal. So that’s not an excuse there to create another like 25 or 30 topics for yourself.

    00:51:34:15 – 00:51:56:15

    Josh Culler

    Sounds like a lot. Once you get past five, you will be riffing through those. I promise you it will be much easier going through writing those topics down. Then as you do that schedule something you know your own capacity. So block out whether it’s once a week, once every other week or once a month and just what we call batch your video recordings.

    00:51:56:21 – 00:52:12:08

    Josh Culler

    So if you’re going to choose once a month and you’re doing, say, three videos a week that you’re publishing, that’s 12 videos a month that you record. So the first Monday of the month, that’s when you recorded 12 videos and then you don’t have to worry about it over for the rest of the month until the next month.

    00:52:12:19 – 00:52:29:28

    Josh Culler

    Likewise, for if you’re going to do once a week or once every other week or whatever that is, batch your videos, record them and then you can move on to getting them out into the public. So you start with those three stops. You have no excuses at this point. You got to just go execute that. Don’t don’t get overwhelmed with everything else.

    00:52:31:04 – 00:52:31:18

    Josh Culler

    Brady.

    00:52:32:05 – 00:52:46:09

    Brady Winder

    Please. Thanks for doing that. Yeah. No, that’s perfect. Yeah, I see. I’m a I’m a step one through ten guy. I love following them. Terrible at creating them. I’m not naturally geared towards processes and.

    00:52:46:09 – 00:52:51:13

    Josh Culler

    Place train all my team and I have to train clients too. So it’s repetitive.

    00:52:52:10 – 00:53:15:13

    Brady Winder

    No, that’s good stuff. That’s good, man. Okay, so top seven. Well, it’s going to be nine by the time we’re done with this podcast. It’s up creative uses for video for Real Estate. One Shameless plug Video post curates video post tool within our own software. So if you’re recording videos and you have a care site and you’re not already using this, I don’t know what to tell you.

    00:53:15:13 – 00:53:43:19

    Brady Winder

    You’re missing out. You probably could be ranking higher if you do this, right. So what is this is you record a video How to Sell My House Fast. Roseburg, Oregon. You put it into our video post tool automatically transcribes it, puts it in your blog post, spend 1520 minutes adding your h one edge to tags as your titles, your headings, and rework the wording so that it sounds a little bit more natural or you could say This is a transcript from the video.

    00:53:43:19 – 00:54:02:00

    Brady Winder

    We do the same thing with our podcast since we put the transcript and the blog post helps tremendously for SEO. SEO alone. But also if you forget about SEO, if somebody wants an alternative to watching the video, then there you go, they can read through it if that’s their preferred way to learn because of videos. Not for everybody.

    00:54:02:04 – 00:54:29:12

    Brady Winder

    It is for most, but not for everybody. And they can scan through to see what it’s about. Just like Google can. So use video post and a quick use case for this. So, you know, I’m not just talking theory. We shot a video, a link it up the show notes, but Trevor and I a few years back shot a video about how to use video posts and in I’m getting really meta here but in that video we shot a video on a cell phone of like co-working spaces in Roseburg, Oregon.

    00:54:29:12 – 00:54:46:15

    Brady Winder

    Hey, if you’re looking for a cool workspace, check out the loft Jurors for Oregon. We did that upload. It’s ranked number, I believe, at the time of recording. This is still ranked number one for co workspace for Roseburg, Oregon. It’s not a competitive term. That’s not the point. The point is how easy it was and how effective it is at getting things to rank.

    00:54:46:15 – 00:55:06:09

    Brady Winder

    So did the video transcribe get up there? I also did this with if you go Google now, someone’s going to try to outrank me. If I say this video, husky, video, husky reviews, go look it up. And there’s a video that I shot. I scripted and recorded, put it in the Kurt’s video post. I’ve been ranked number one above video Huskies own website for like two years now.

    00:55:06:09 – 00:55:28:15

    Brady Winder

    I’m out ranking there on website, which is just crazy, super powerful. So video post second one, I just threw this in there because I just remember that video ask we had a have you ever heard of that Josh video ask this is really interesting it’s we had a Kerry camper share this tool with us and they’re using it to basically screen and qualify tenants for their rentals.

    00:55:28:15 – 00:55:51:16

    Brady Winder

    But there’s a million use cases. You could use it for getting testimonials too. Like we’re we’re probably going to experiment with it. I care if for getting testimonials from our members, but basically it’s just a simple little piece of software and mobile app. You send them a link and it will the the app will prompt the person. So it’ll say, you know, tell me about your experience with this, and then it’ll give them 30 seconds to record.

    00:55:51:16 – 00:56:15:05

    Brady Winder

    They record a video response. So that’s the basics of it. But you can do like a if this than that. So if they answer this then ask this prompt instead. So really intuitive, powerful tool for getting video from other people. So you don’t even necessarily have to be there. Yeah, a lot of creative ways to use that, like getting screening tenants for your rentals.

    00:56:15:18 – 00:56:36:08

    Brady Winder

    Anyways, Adobe podcast, I just threw that in the list so I wouldn’t forget about it. We already talked about that. That was a nice surprise. Another one is a number for YouTube keywords. I know you’re thinking on YouTube. That’s not a creative use case, like everybody knows to put their videos on YouTube, but a lot of people don’t think about doing cured research.

    00:56:36:08 – 00:56:54:00

    Brady Winder

    And so it like for YouTube, they just think, Oh, I’m just going to put a video and put a video up on this topic and hope that it works out. You spend like 5 minutes doing keyword research. I do before every podcast when I’m coming up on my titles. What is ranking in YouTube? Where’s the low hanging fruit?

    00:56:54:01 – 00:57:17:12

    Brady Winder

    So if you go get Tube buddy, just Google tube buddy or video IQ, Video IQ, they both do about the same thing. You can do your keyword research with them, find the low hanging fruit so it’ll tell you like the competition for that keyword and what people are searching for, what the intent is, or if it’s actually the video you to be shooting.

    00:57:17:12 – 00:57:39:27

    Brady Winder

    So anyways, not overcomplicate it, but if you have been doing videos for some time, then take some time to do some basic keyword research and optimize the videos that you’re shooting. Because why not? Number three? No, that was a number for my ordering is we’ve added so many in here, my ordering is all off Bom bom, bom, bom.

    00:57:39:27 – 00:57:58:16

    Brady Winder

    This is specifically for agents. I don’t know. I’m a user myself, so I’d imagine investor could use it. I don’t see why not. But for follow up, so little videos that go into emails for follow up agents are using this for like, Hey, here’s what to expect next. Or as a thank you video, thanks for working with me.

    00:57:59:00 – 00:58:02:09

    Brady Winder

    Josh, you have any plans to do like follow up videos or anything like that?

    00:58:02:10 – 00:58:18:18

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, of course. Yeah. And campaigns like if they especially like text or email campaigns, they will leverage that stuff like Bambam videos in there. Bambam is kind of like phased out just a little bit. I think there’s a couple other tools that people use, but it is still useful.

    00:58:19:06 – 00:58:29:13

    Brady Winder

    That’s funny because Chad Beatty Like set of words. Shaggy Beatty I want to Chad repeated before we hit record just to see if there was any was missing in the first one. I was like, Oh, bom bom.

    00:58:29:16 – 00:58:29:26

    Josh Culler

    Yeah.

    00:58:30:21 – 00:58:59:21

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Another one real quick. Liam videos. Josh and I were talking about process. I love Liam videos. I will die by them because you can just hit record. I intentionally so what is Liam is just a quick little Google Chrome plug in goes on your browser you click it and it screen. Of course you use your camera and your screen and you can just send somebody a URL to that video so you don’t have to do any editing download upload to YouTube.

    00:58:59:28 – 00:59:16:25

    Brady Winder

    Send them the YouTube link. You don’t have to do any of that for it. So for internal videos like super Quick and Dirty Liam videos is a great way to explain things. And a lot of software is like billing this and now like Slack in your table, it’s already built in. But Protip don’t upgrade your account. Stick with the free version.

    00:59:16:25 – 00:59:26:10

    Brady Winder

    It’s a five minute limit because it will make you be concise. I never record over five minute videos on Liam. It’d be dangerous for me to upgrade.

    00:59:26:20 – 00:59:34:14

    Josh Culler

    Dude, it’s a habit. I do the same thing I like. I have not upgraded it. I use I use Liam four or five times a day. I still haven’t upgraded because I’m like, I got to keep it short.

    00:59:35:01 – 00:59:35:27

    Brady Winder

    That’s then you’re like.

    00:59:35:27 – 00:59:39:07

    Josh Culler

    If it requires more than 5 minutes, I’m getting on a Zoom call with you. So.

    00:59:39:08 – 01:00:07:28

    Brady Winder

    Right, exactly, exactly. For else, another one 360 virtual tours. This is not news to any of you, but we’re on a podcast. A while back, one of our members mentioned how they were using Matterport like an agent word. This was an investor and they’re doing 360 virtual tours for their buyers list. So as soon as they would get the house under contract, say, Hey, we’re coming to take photos, put the Matterport up and send that out to those buyers lists.

    01:00:07:28 – 01:00:29:10

    Brady Winder

    It says they the buyers have so much more confidence when they’re able to you virtually tour the home and they can get it get the contract sign so much quicker. So if you’re an investor, consider Matterport before after flip videos on your site. So a lot of people do this on Instagram. Little IG stories. Hey, here’s this house we’re working on.

    01:00:30:04 – 01:00:54:25

    Brady Winder

    I think that also could lend a lot of credibility if you are flipping houses and you’re doing it well. I think of home buying guys in Dallas. They’re members of ours. They really take pride in how they flip their homes. They care about them and they are doing the community a service. So if you’re doing that type of flip where you’re really improving the property, put on your website and people love to see that as incentive to work with you versus someone else.

    01:00:56:02 – 01:01:22:22

    Brady Winder

    And then the last one, social media repurposing, I figured that would be a good note for Josh to end on. I mean, we could talk about this all day. We won’t, but social media repurposing. So just like, you know, if if I’m if I’m an investor, I’m making these videos that we’re talking about what’s what’s like the easiest low hanging fruit like ways I can repurpose these videos because it’d be it’d be bad not to do any repurposing.

    01:01:22:25 – 01:01:25:28

    Brady Winder

    But you also don’t want to go ham and try to be the next TikTok influencer.

    01:01:26:05 – 01:01:50:17

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, I’m going to give an answer that probably most people will not like, but you have to do this or you’re not going to stay consistent because consistency is the number one factor to any success within content. It’s hire it out and you can leverage tools like or platforms like Fiverr or Upwork. A lot of people have like especially marketers, they have a bad taste in your mouth with fiber.

    01:01:50:21 – 01:02:15:29

    Josh Culler

    I use fiber pretty often on some smaller projects that need done. You can also go to Upwork and find video editors that will help you chop up the content, repurpose it and possibly even post it for you. The reality is, is that if you’re a business owner, you don’t necessarily most of the time and this is why this is where like we come in and people hire us because they don’t have the time or the ability or the want to to keep up with this kind of stuff.

    01:02:16:11 – 01:02:35:22

    Josh Culler

    So I have my clients focus on recording content. I want them doing nothing else. I don’t allow them to check the content. I don’t allow them to post it. Obviously that’s a little bit of a higher level. Service is going to cost you more, but you if you’re just getting started, allocate a couple hundred bucks a month to just getting videos edited.

    01:02:35:22 – 01:02:57:00

    Josh Culler

    You can send them off to a good editor on Fiverr or hire somebody, a freelancer on Upwork to edit videos for you, have them edit it, maybe you can post it or have an assistant post it for you and just get them out that way. Because the reality is, is what happens is that people shoot videos and then they get stuck at the editing portion because they spend so much time on it and they just don’t do it later on, like they they’ll they’ll be fired up about it for a month.

    01:02:57:00 – 01:03:19:11

    Josh Culler

    And then if a phase is out now, you literally wasted a month of doing literally nothing. That’s my short answer. If you are the type of person that you want to do it yourself, there’s very simple tools that you can use to edit videos. Of course, like from a professional standpoint, from your pro is great and it actually has gotten to a point where it’s pretty easy to use like it’s very user friendly.

    01:03:19:11 – 01:03:41:09

    Josh Culler

    It’s not. It still has all the technical aspects of it, but it’s not as complex as it used to be. Of course, if you have a mac device, I movies are really easy to use platform to edit your videos on, but outside of that headliner, dot app is really good as well. And there’s there’s tons of other platforms.

    01:03:41:09 – 01:03:54:00

    Brady Winder

    We’ve news using. I forgot about that we’ve been using headliner for. I mean I’ve been using it for years for podcasts because they were the first ones to say, okay, drag in your audio or video, add captions automatically adjust snippets. Yeah, yeah. Audio Grahams.

    01:03:54:00 – 01:04:08:26

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, yeah. So that’s what I would use by I’m just going to lean back into hire it out likes stop being a cheap H-E-B, be willing to spend some money on some of your marketing and hire somebody for 200 bucks a month to edit your videos and get them back to you. That’s what I would say.

    01:04:09:12 – 01:04:28:02

    Brady Winder

    I think that’s a great answer and I want to I want to dive deeper real quick and then I swear we’ll wrap it up. But so I think it’s a good answer that you say hired out, not because you’re the guy with an agency who does this really well, but because there are there’s diminishing returns, too, with anything.

    01:04:28:15 – 01:04:53:03

    Brady Winder

    And the diminishing returns correct me if I’m wrong, but here’s you know, Brett and I were just having a conversation in the office about this the other day. The returns of social media are high, meaning people might ask us, like, why don’t you post to social media more often? My take on it is we post enough to stay relevant to make sure that when someone comes across our Instagram feed that there’s things on there.

    01:04:53:03 – 01:05:17:03

    Brady Winder

    It’s somewhat current, it’s interesting, there’s there’s stuff there consume, but we’re not posting a thousand times a day. That’s why when I hear you say, hire it out, I’m like, it’s it’s more scalable that way. If you’re if social media is a strategy, I feel it. Maybe I’m being long one of this with this, but I feel like there’s this big gap between like you post, you know, once a week and it’s effective.

    01:05:17:17 – 01:05:22:24

    Brady Winder

    You post, you know, ten times a week and it’s marginally more effective. Is that the case?

    01:05:23:06 – 01:05:44:11

    Josh Culler

    No. Well, it depends. There’s platforms. There’s platforms specific. Like what I what I tend to do is take what the platform wants and, and go all in on that. Like, for instance, if you’re not posting at least a video a day on Instagram, you’re obsolete just period. Especially if you especially if you’re just starting to content, you will be obsolete if you’re posting less than one video a day.

    01:05:44:19 – 01:06:15:00

    Josh Culler

    It’s just the reality of it. It’s how the platforms work on YouTube. If you’re not posting at least 2 to 3 videos weekly are for videos, you’re going to be obsolete or or it’s going to be really hard for you to get traction at all. But with these platforms, you really have to like volume is a key. You have to put into what they want and generally speaking with reels, Tik Tok videos, YouTube shorts, velocity is the name of the game because these are shorter videos, you’ve got to feed more into it.

    01:06:15:06 – 01:06:43:23

    Josh Culler

    But even if you look at it one video a day on Instagram, let’s just say it’s seven videos that are minute long, the 7 minutes worth of recording, right? I mean, that’s that’s really not as much as you might think it is. So that’s a week’s worth of content. So volume does matter what my formula today is, Volume plus quality is really what and it’s the right volume, the right volume, the right time quality, the right efforts combined is what’s going to get you the success out there that you you need.

    01:06:44:15 – 01:06:57:13

    Josh Culler

    So in a way it does matter. But do you need to be posting ten times a day? Probably not. And that being said, I don’t know if it would hurt you. We have a client that we post five times a day for and they kill it.

    01:06:57:13 – 01:07:14:21

    Brady Winder

    So no bigger. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And content. Thank you for that context man. That’s that’s I appreciate the insight there that’s specifically more geared towards influencers if looking to get motivated seller leads like these answered Posner Instagram TikTok In terms of do.

    01:07:14:22 – 01:07:27:18

    Josh Culler

    Yeah you got to consider your demographic. If they’re not following you on Instagram, then you only need be creating the content that they’re going to consume, which for the most part, if it’s transactional, it’s just going to be informational content about what it is you do and that kind of thing.

    01:07:27:18 – 01:07:49:20

    Brady Winder

    So yeah, awesome. In well, this has been value packed. This is the longest podcasts I’ve recorded in a while. I have no shame about it, but hopefully everybody listening you have found this if we missed anything, if there’s a tool that you’re using or a tip that somebody gave you, let us know. Send me an email. Brady At Care.com, or if you’re on YouTube, drop in the comments below.

    01:07:50:03 – 01:07:53:12

    Brady Winder

    And thanks for listening. And Josh, thanks so much for joining me. Man.

    01:07:53:15 – 01:07:55:16

    Josh Culler

    Yeah, man, this is a lot of fun and hope to be back soon.

    01:07:56:00 – 01:08:16:10

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. All right. We’ll catch up later.

  • EP 424: AirBnB Subleasing: How Jorge Makes Six Figures Automating Short Term Rentals w/ Jorge Contreras

    EP 424: AirBnB Subleasing: How Jorge Makes Six Figures Automating Short Term Rentals w/ Jorge Contreras


    Want to make your AirBnBs more profitable? Want to automate your Airbnb management process? Want to start investing in AirBnbs without owning the property (AirBnB Arbitrage).

    Well, good news. That’s all Jorge focuses on.

    He’s THE AirBnB guy, and he’ll share with you his short & medium-term rental strategy netting him nearly double the profits compared to his days as a traditional landlord.

    Plus, he has a WILD and inspiring story of going from dealing drugs and failing through high school to finding his purpose & building a business of impact.

    If you’re ready to diversify your portfolio and master AirBnbBs, listen in.

    Mentioned in this episode:

    George on Instagram

    Work with George

    About Jorge Contreras:

    Jorge Contreras, a Real Estate Investor & Airbnb Coach, is passionate about helping people create time, financial and location freedom with Airbnb and Real Estate Investing. He retired at age 29, became a millionaire by 30, and now earns 7 Figures with his Airbnb Business.


    Episode Transcript (This is an automated transcript by robot carrots – please mind the typos 😉)

    00:00:00:00 – 00:00:19:00

    Jorge Contreras

    Most people need like 2 to 4 Airbnbs to replace 95, and most people don’t have money to go and buy 2 to 4 properties right now. But with the same amount of money that you could buy one, you could sublease like four or five properties and replace your 9 to 5. So again, number one, you know, verify the regulation.

    00:00:19:00 – 00:00:37:06

    Jorge Contreras

    Just you don’t want to you don’t want your property or business to be short lived. So make sure you can get a permit. Run the comps on the rent advisor, pitch it as corporate housing and get permission in writing. And I say that because I’ve had a lot of people do me on Instagram and they’re like, Hey, the landlord just found out I’m getting evicted now.

    00:00:37:06 – 00:00:54:23

    Jorge Contreras

    I got to shut down my business and like that sucks is like, Hey, you should have been upfront with the owner and just get permission in writing. So those are the three like most important things. When somebody wants to go into arbitration.

    00:00:55:18 – 00:01:12:01

    Brady Winder

    Hey friends, welcome back to the Care CAS podcast. I’m your host, Brady Winder. This is the podcast where we help investors and agents build businesses of freedom and impact by dialing in your online marketing. And today I have with me Mr. Jorge Contreras. Welcome to the podcast where Hey, how are you?

    00:01:12:01 – 00:01:16:21

    Jorge Contreras

    Mr. Brady I’m doing great. Truly an honor and a pleasure to be here. Thank you for the opportunity.

    00:01:17:21 – 00:01:37:11

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, absolutely. MAN Everybody, this is going to be a really fun, good episode. So we’re going to be talking about Airbnbs, short term rentals today, and not just Airbnb’s, but a lot of you know here, a lot of investors just kind of go into Airbnbs without a lot of knowledge or insight that just we’re going to do this.

    00:01:37:11 – 00:02:04:06

    Brady Winder

    We’re going to see if it works. And sometimes it doesn’t work. And it could have been prevented. It could have been done better. So I’m bringing George out of the podcast because he has been doing this more efficiently and effectively than anyone I’ve heard of in our industry. As far as arbitrage in Airbnb biz and automating them as far as systems and process, how to find your Airbnbs, how to make sure they’re profitable, how to find the right ones, and how to get into them with no money.

    00:02:04:06 – 00:02:19:14

    Brady Winder

    So this is going to be a perfect episode if you’re just starting out a real estate or if you’re just wanting to start out an Airbnb is how to do it with lower risk than just buying a property and lessons use of the house hacking. So it’s going to be so yeah, it’s going to be a good conversation.

    00:02:19:14 – 00:02:49:05

    Brady Winder

    Or is the Airbnb expert. And so yeah, we’re going to talk about it. But first before we get into it real quick, housekeeping. It’s SEO month at CARA. This episode has nothing to do with SEO, but we’ve put out a lot of great SEO content this month, so go to Care.com slash SEO to check that out. And then next month we’re going to be doing website design and conversion months or all about conversion of your website to make sure that you’re making the most of the leads that you’re generating and that you’re actually turning those leads into deals.

    00:02:50:06 – 00:03:09:21

    Brady Winder

    But anyways, hooray. He runs a six figure Airbnb business focused on arbitrage and automation, like I said. But what I want to talk about first here is I got an email from you. You are getting mail from your system about coming on the podcast, went over your website and it was a video about your story and managed to pull it all of my heartstrings.

    00:03:09:21 – 00:03:22:08

    Brady Winder

    It was it was so good for the people that haven’t watched the video or that don’t know you. Would you mind just giving us a glimpse into the upbringing of RJ and kind of what drives you like how you got to why you’re doing this thing today?

    00:03:22:08 – 00:03:51:11

    Jorge Contreras

    Absolutely. So a lot of challenges in my upbringing, and I think it’s great to talk about this because often you see people on social media just showing like the result or the success, everything above the surface and you don’t get to hear a lot of the struggles, challenges and obstacles, which is how people can actually actually relate. And I think this will connect for anybody that is going through a chapter in their life where they’re experiencing challenges and they feel like they don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, but definitely experience a lot of challenges.

    00:03:51:11 – 00:04:12:08

    Jorge Contreras

    Growing up, I attended my Half Brothers funeral when I was five years old. He got he was murdered due to like gang related, you know, stuff. And when I was seven, I was selling drugs with my dad. When I was ten, we were smuggling people into this country. And also when I was seven, my dad was an alcoholic his entire life.

    00:04:12:08 – 00:04:29:11

    Jorge Contreras

    And the doctor told him that if he wanted to see his youngest son or he to grow up, you needed to stop drinking alcohol. And he did. But the damage was too far and too much. So when I was 12, he passed away from alcohol, and then when I was 13, my mother abandoned me and I’m pretty much the youngest one.

    00:04:29:11 – 00:04:55:22

    Jorge Contreras

    Out of all my brothers and sisters, everybody after me, even though they were only like 14 and 16, they were like pregnant. I already had kids. I’m the only one who graduated high school and I graduated with like four S and one D dropped out of college. I did seventh grade twice. So and then a lot of the friends that I grew up with, like in junior high and early high school, they ended up like in debt, like dead in jail or just really messed up from like drugs and alcohol.

    00:04:57:07 – 00:05:18:07

    Brady Winder

    See, that is that is a, well, one, I commend you on your storytelling ability because that’s a lot to back into about 60 seconds to I commend you and you like that you are resilient, man. It’s crazy to see where you are now. Yeah. Especially out of all your siblings and your families and friends. What would you what would you attribute, you know, to your success?

    00:05:18:07 – 00:05:22:07

    Brady Winder

    Like, what was what was the one thing that kept you going through that crazy upbringing?

    00:05:22:18 – 00:05:40:11

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah. So I would say what kept me going is I didn’t have anything to fall back on. So even when I was like when I was 16, I was completely living on my own. After my mom abandoned me, her friend took me and she said, Hey, as long as you go to school, she said, I’ll feed you clothed you, and put a roof over your head.

    00:05:40:11 – 00:05:59:10

    Jorge Contreras

    And that was the deal. And then when I was 16, she said, Hey, I’ve helped you enough. Now you got to look after yourself. I got my first job making minimum wage. I was paying $300 a month renting a room. And I just remember if I wanted to take a girl out on a date or just do anything, go out to a restaurant, like there was nobody there that I could go and ask for money.

    00:05:59:10 – 00:06:18:03

    Jorge Contreras

    So just there was no safety net. There was no Plan B, I was like, this is going to work because it’s going to work. Like it just put me in survival. Like I didn’t have an option. So that that was a blessing in disguise. But what really helped me is that I had to change the meaning that I had to give in to my story.

    00:06:18:03 – 00:06:35:03

    Jorge Contreras

    But because up until I was like 16, I always was a victim to my story. I’m like, I’m never going to be successful. I’m never going to amount to anything because that’s what all my teachers told me, because I always had bad grades. I wasn’t I didn’t have great attended to in school. And so I just believe what they were what they were telling me.

    00:06:35:15 – 00:06:57:10

    Jorge Contreras

    And I just didn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. And I thought that life was just happening to me rather than for me. And so of course, as I started getting older, I started going through going to a lot of self-development trainings, a lot of did a lot of mindset work, a lot of therapy. And then I realized that all of these things actually happened for me and not to me.

    00:06:57:10 – 00:07:13:23

    Jorge Contreras

    So as I saw that at a young age, you know, being at my brother’s funeral and then being in like gangs, it was like, okay, well, I don’t I don’t surround myself with other gang members. And then growing up, my dad was like in and out of jail for doing illegal businesses. It was like, okay, well, don’t do anything illegal.

    00:07:13:23 – 00:07:33:06

    Jorge Contreras

    Just do what’s right. And then like, he would like, cheat on my mom. And that was normal. And that we saw how much that impacted our life as kids, just everything that she went through. So that taught me the value in, you know, being loyal and just focusing on. So everything that I experienced, it was like, don’t do that, don’t do that, don’t do that.

    00:07:33:06 – 00:07:52:02

    Jorge Contreras

    So even today, I’m 35, like, I don’t smoke, I don’t drink, I don’t cheat on my wife, I don’t do anything illegal. And so it just pointed me in the direction of do the opposite of what your dad did. And they became like the biggest blessing to just change the meaning that I that I had previously given to all those stories.

    00:07:52:02 – 00:08:08:12

    Jorge Contreras

    I think that people everyone that’s been to be there challenges, obstacles, tribulations. If we change the meaning of our story and and of our past and realize that all of that happened for us and not to us, it’s a game changer. It takes you from being a victim to your story to feeling empowered.

    00:08:09:12 – 00:08:26:03

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, absolutely. I’m a you know, I’m a firm believer in that, too. Like, the things happen for you instead of you, because otherwise you wouldn’t have the opportunity to share your story with other people and encourage them and help them as well. You wouldn’t be here on this podcast talking about that. Oh, one more question and we’ll dive into the stuff people tune into the podcast for in the first place.

    00:08:26:03 – 00:08:34:13

    Brady Winder

    But I love talking to others. Did did some of that change or some of that motivation drive, did that intensify when you had kids because you have at least one kid?

    00:08:34:13 – 00:08:37:12

    Jorge Contreras

    I have to I have a three year old daughter and a six month old daughter.

    00:08:38:07 – 00:08:47:06

    Brady Winder

    Oh, wow. That’s awesome. Did that. You know, so growing up, your dad was not the dad that you wanted to be. Did that really light a fire?

    00:08:47:06 – 00:09:12:16

    Jorge Contreras

    Oh, yeah, totally. And that’s exactly what I always said is my goal is to be the father that I didn’t get to have, you know, So for sure, Like, then I think about it, you know, when I travel to, like, conferences or if I’m not here for three days from time to time, I think about that. And it’s always a reminder of my dad was in prison, like he was present for us partially, but he had kids with two other women and he was never present for them.

    00:09:12:16 – 00:09:35:01

    Jorge Contreras

    Like when he died. I think he owed over $200,000 in child support. And this is like the nineties. So it’s probably like close to a million with inflation adjusted and they like, never got to see my dad. And so I still to this day right they’re all in their forties and I still see to this day how much their lives continue to be impacted by not having the father figure.

    00:09:36:01 – 00:09:44:20

    Jorge Contreras

    So it’s just crazy how much your life can be impacted by not having a father figure. But even more important, the meaning that you give it.

    00:09:46:02 – 00:10:05:21

    Brady Winder

    That’s awesome. That’s really cool, man. Thanks for sharing. I can relate to, you know, my son, he is eight and like that, that drive, that motivation that comes from that, it’s a blessing for sure. Anyways, we’ll get into the Airbnb side. Thanks for, you know, thanks for having that conversation. It’s really important. Like Carrot’s mission is to build is to help our members build businesses of freedom and impact.

    00:10:06:04 – 00:10:26:09

    Brady Winder

    And so, you know, as we’re I feel like it’s 100% applicable to the conversation around Airbnb is is courses like this can help you buy back some time freedom you know so that you can have a bigger impact and you can spend more time with your family. You know, that freedom and impact. And so you’re going to live and breathe in the example of how you’ve done this and bought more time back in your business.

    00:10:26:19 – 00:10:40:14

    Brady Winder

    So anyways, getting into so you run Airbnb, you’re the Airbnb guy. I’m curious, what is your what’s your business model look like now versus when you started out? Get into Airbnb.

    00:10:40:14 – 00:11:02:10

    Jorge Contreras

    It’s so when I started investing, that was back in 2012, actually just posted Thursdays and I like to post throwback Thursday all my stories and have a picture with my best friend who today is actually my property manager. His name’s Ron and it’s his birthday. So I found a picture where it’s like me and him standing in front of my very first house that I closed on May 23rd of 2012.

    00:11:02:10 – 00:11:22:18

    Jorge Contreras

    So could I ask you that? That’s sweet. So when I started back then, I was doing like house hacking and I wanted to just not have to pay the money out of pocket. So I got this house back then. 2012, four bedroom I lived in, the master, rented the other three rooms, which paid not only the principal and just taxes and insurance, but also the utilities.

    00:11:23:01 – 00:11:46:08

    Jorge Contreras

    But I always saved those 1800 dollars a month that I didn’t have to pay. And two years later, at $43,200 from saving those 1800 a month. And I took that. And rather than buying a mercedes or a nice car or going on vacation, I did my first new construction project in the back yard in 2014, and then that started to rent to a long term tenant for a thousand a month.

    00:11:46:08 – 00:11:52:19

    Jorge Contreras

    So here I am 2014 living mortgage payment free and making $1,000 a month in the back unit.

    00:11:53:05 – 00:11:56:22

    Brady Winder

    And if you build 80 you that you put in the back of that, you’re okay.

    00:11:57:02 – 00:12:17:03

    Jorge Contreras

    So it was actually a recreational room back then. The 80 you law in California didn’t pass until January of 2017. So in 2014, even though my property was zoned for to have two units to be a duplex, I didn’t have the lot requirement. So they said, Hey, you cannot have a second unit with the kitchen. And I’m like, Well, what can I do?

    00:12:17:03 – 00:12:33:05

    Jorge Contreras

    Because I’ve always been a big believer in do what you can with what you have where you are. They said, Well, you can do a rec room. I’m like, What’s a rec room? They’re like, Well, it’s like a room that you could use as a recreational room. You could use it for an office or an extra room, but you can have a kitchen or a shower.

    00:12:33:05 – 00:12:54:17

    Jorge Contreras

    You could have a toilet. So I’m like, Oh, okay. So I talked to my contractor. I said, Hey, we’re going to turn this into an 80, you or just another unit? Yeah, I don’t think I knew what the term was back then. And so he did that. We designed it in a way where after all the inspections and everything, fine inspection pass, we added a shower, we added a kitchen and boom, I started renting it for a thousand.

    00:12:54:23 – 00:13:18:08

    Jorge Contreras

    Perfect. Yeah, powerful things. So the lesson there is that growing up and I’m sure you heard this growing up, people always told me that money didn’t grow on trees and I had this belief that money was hard to make. It was hard to come by because of that, you know, hearing that growing up. But I realized in that moment because after I rented a unit for a thousand a month, it was like a 40% ROI.

    00:13:18:08 – 00:13:44:21

    Jorge Contreras

    So in two and a half years later, after building it and renting it out, I got my $30,000 back and so now I got my money back. I’m still making a thousand from the back now in net profit and I’m still living mortgage payment free. And I realize that money does grow on trees. If you learn how to plant money, seeds and I learned at that point that everyone who told me that money didn’t grow on trees were simply projecting their limiting beliefs and lack of result on me.

    00:13:46:00 – 00:13:56:05

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, that’s cool. That’s awesome, man. So you got that first property you built the, you know, in the back. And so now so when you got into Airbnbs, what did that like?

    00:13:56:05 – 00:14:16:21

    Jorge Contreras

    Sure. So my first business that I used to be a professional dancer and at the time had a choreography company and one of my dancers who was a performer in 2016, she owned two duplexes in Fresno, California. Her name is Nicole, and she mentioned to me that she was making three and a half times on Airbnb compared to what she was making with like fair market rents.

    00:14:17:06 – 00:14:36:02

    Jorge Contreras

    And I thought that was crazy. I’m like, I got to look into this. So there was very little information back then online, like in 2016 about short term rentals. I tried to consume everything I possibly could. I had a few leases in 2017. I at that point, I had I had three houses for a total of like six units, right?

    00:14:36:08 – 00:15:00:20

    Jorge Contreras

    So like I lived in one, my mom lived in one, I bought her a house and then I had four units that were all long term. So I put all four of those units on Airbnb in March of 2017. So it’s going to be six years pretty soon. And I went from making 1500 in gross rent per unit to 3500 in gross rents from six K to 14 K, And I was like, What is going on here?

    00:15:01:12 – 00:15:07:19

    Brady Winder

    It’s so and how, how many? No, I don’t want to throw you off. I’m just curious for context, how many days out of the month were they booked?

    00:15:08:12 – 00:15:29:09

    Jorge Contreras

    I would say probably about 22 days. Like about like just under 70% occupancy in all of these units at the time were like two bedrooms and one bath. And I was hosting like about six people on average. And I think on one of them I pushed it up to eight. But I told them in the description, Hey, I know it’s a lot of people, but if you want to save some money, it’s a great place.

    00:15:29:09 – 00:15:50:19

    Jorge Contreras

    And if you guys can power in one restroom, you guys can make it work. It’ll be great. Yeah. So, yeah, that’s what I did. And you know, these properties were all in Southern California. So, you know, we have they were in somewhat proximity to like universal Studios, Disneyland near downtown L.A. for a two of the units. So they were in great locations and, and they did really well.

    00:15:51:03 – 00:16:10:15

    Jorge Contreras

    And then I and then my next goal was I wanted to scale faster because at the time in 2018, I wanted to replace my my wife’s 95. She was a law enforcement officer. We wanted to start building a family, but in her government job say her shift was going to be done in 15 minutes. They would say, Hey, Lucia, you have to stay for another 8 hours.

    00:16:10:15 – 00:16:24:03

    Jorge Contreras

    And there was nothing she could do. And so we knew that that was not going to work out. I would always joke that I would be with our kids at Disneyland where she would have to work. And I’m like, I got to do something about this. So my goal be get more cash flow and replace her 9 to 5.

    00:16:24:11 – 00:16:49:02

    Jorge Contreras

    And I didn’t have the capital to keep buying more properties like every few months. And so I came across this arbitrage strategy and I’m like, okay, so I can rent properties from owners, get permission in writing in the lease agreements, because in our lease agreements it says no subleasing. But I was like, Well, what if I talk to them and actually get the permission and I just let them know, hey, I got strong financial, strong credits, you know, I’m going to be responsible.

    00:16:49:02 – 00:17:07:17

    Jorge Contreras

    I’ll set up the property and autopay if there’s any repairs or damages, I’ll put in the lease and I’m going to be responsible. And so in in early 2019, my business partner Jaime, and I went and we launched like seven subleases and that was I was able to replace her 9 to 5 and even it was strictly a cash flow play, right?

    00:17:07:17 – 00:17:31:16

    Jorge Contreras

    We didn’t have the equity or the appreciation. Couldn’t do bonus depreciation with cost segregation from owning the real estate. But at the time that was not important to me. I’m like, I need cash flow to replace my wife’s 9 to 5 and that’s what did it. And then what’s cool is only having all those subleases actually helped me, you know, compound, compound my savings and grow my savings so I can then go and buy a ton of real estate.

    00:17:31:16 – 00:17:37:08

    Jorge Contreras

    And now I have a portfolio of like close to $8 million in like single family homes that are all on there.

    00:17:37:19 – 00:17:55:02

    Brady Winder

    So that’s crazy. So the first objection that pops up in my head, as he said, I heard this arbitrage model. We did seven of them. The first thing that pops up for me is most landlords wouldn’t have a reason to say yes, right? How many out of the ones you ask are saying yes and how do you get in house?

    00:17:55:06 – 00:18:17:01

    Jorge Contreras

    That’s a great question. It’s going to be a numbers game. So we get about 25 to 30% of landlords that say yes, and I’ve never done I’ve never done flips or wholesale myself, but I have some, you know, some really close friends that do and they shoot out like a ton of offers and they’re like, Yeah, man, we look at 100 properties and from there we submitted so from 100 properties that they look at, they say they closed on like one, right?

    00:18:17:01 – 00:18:36:12

    Jorge Contreras

    So it’s a numbers game, whether you’re flipping wholesaling, even if you’re a loan officer or real estate agent. Like it’s, it’s always going to be a numbers game, right? And so with our Airbnb arbitrage, about 25 to 30% of landlords say yes, and you get everything in between from people that are completely open to it, to people that hang up on you and say, Don’t ever call me.

    00:18:36:12 – 00:18:57:01

    Jorge Contreras

    And then everything in between. But one of the things that really helps us and I think this will help the audience is we don’t say, Hey, we want to rate your property and do Airbnb because the landlord is going to think that it’s going to be a party house. Right. We’ve all heard heard on the news once or twice about this crazy party that took place.

    00:18:57:12 – 00:19:24:10

    Jorge Contreras

    And fortunately, these landlords probably came across one of those videos and now they think that’s what you want to do in their property. So we always pitch it as corporate housing because we want we want them to understand that we truly only work with professionals that are coming to the property. That could be a family, it could be a legitimate company, it could be nurses traveling for work, relocation companies, government bookings or or air works or nurses traveling for work.

    00:19:24:10 – 00:19:32:00

    Jorge Contreras

    But we don’t allow any parties or any events. Even if somebody wants to do like, you know, just anything.

    00:19:32:14 – 00:19:32:18

    Brady Winder

    And.

    00:19:33:01 – 00:19:45:16

    Jorge Contreras

    Just nothing with music. And we don’t allow people other than those on the reservation. So we really only do work with professionals. So when we pitch it as corporate housing, they’re a lot more receptive to the idea.

    00:19:46:20 – 00:20:08:00

    Brady Winder

    Interesting. That’s, you know, honestly, you know, I’m familiar with the numbers in regards to wholesaling. And so those are much better numbers than I would have thought, like 25%. That’s admirable. And I love how you, you know, you pitch it as that, not only pictures of that, but that’s what the business model is. It’s an and, you know, I was going to ask about lowering risk and it sounds like that’s one of the ways you do lower risk is having those strict standards on your Airbnb.

    00:20:08:00 – 00:20:11:06

    Brady Winder

    Right. As opposed to, hey, we got an Airbnb. Come on. Come on.

    00:20:11:07 – 00:20:12:06

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah, exactly.

    00:20:13:13 – 00:20:17:14

    Brady Winder

    So what are the you know, what are the splits like between you and the landlord?

    00:20:17:16 – 00:20:48:00

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah. So typically what we do is we pay them the fair market rent. So if, if their property is being advertised for, say, 3000 a month on Zillow, that’s exactly what we pay personally, I’ve never paid more than what they’re asking for, only because in real estate we always want to have multiple exit strategies. And so when I first started, I used to launch Airbnbs in a lot of gray areas where Airbnb is where they weren’t they weren’t issuing permits, but they also like weren’t illegal.

    00:20:48:00 – 00:21:17:13

    Jorge Contreras

    And I got caught with my pants down one time where I launched an Airbnb and again it was a gray area and six months into the lease they implemented a regulation that no longer allowed me to operate like one day to the next. And so what I did is I put it as a long term rental on Zillow and I got a tenant for 12 months who was paying $500 more than what I got the lease for, and mainly because I had furnished it, right.

    00:21:17:13 – 00:21:39:01

    Jorge Contreras

    So we put like 15 grand in like furniture. And the crazy part that that was at the beginning of the pandemic. So we’re coming up on almost, almost three years of making $500 a month from a long term tenant. So that so when I got to experience that, it was like and again, that’s another example of, hey, things don’t happen to me.

    00:21:39:01 – 00:22:07:08

    Jorge Contreras

    They happen for me, right? Who wouldn’t like make $500 a month in that cash flow from a property you don’t own without doing Airbnb rights? And so for that reason I only and ever I was only want to pay fair market ran because I need to have that as like a backup strategy in case anything ever happened. So I always pay from fair market rents if I’m paying them 3000 a month and then I’m making say 6000 a month, of course after I pay for utilities, cleanings replenish bills.

    00:22:07:16 – 00:22:28:02

    Jorge Contreras

    My goal is to make about 2000 a month in that cash flow per property. That said, we only go for properties in primary locations that are near theme parks to beach downtown. All of my properties have pools, Jacuzzis and the game room and we host 8 to 12 people, which allows us to charge a higher nightly rate and have a higher profit margin.

    00:22:29:02 – 00:22:51:12

    Brady Winder

    MM So you’re only going after those larger groups that make sense. Yeah. Okay. So you’re paying the landlord around 3000 and then you said the 2000. That’s your, that’s your net net cash flow. Okay. Gotcha. Okay. So that makes sense. I’m curious about some of the automation. So how many Airbnbs do you personally have right now?

    00:22:51:12 – 00:22:56:16

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah, we have 18, So we own eight, sublease seven and manage three.

    00:22:56:16 – 00:23:01:12

    Brady Winder

    Okay, So what are you doing to streamline the process and kind of buy back some of your time?

    00:23:01:12 – 00:23:21:08

    Jorge Contreras

    Absolutely. That’s a great question. The Street, there’s three operations in a short term rental business, right? Two of them, you need somebody in person and the third one is virtual. So the two in person is, of course, somebody to clean and someone to do maintenance. And I recommend to build an in-house team, which we’ll talk about in a second.

    00:23:21:16 – 00:23:44:18

    Jorge Contreras

    But as far as the automation, I got the cleaner, the maintenance person, and then I got a virtual, you know, a virtual assistant in Mexico, only because I used to have Vas in the Philippines, but they were 15 hours ahead of Pacific Time and it was a challenge with the time zones. So by having somebody in Mexico, South America, Central America, the time zones are going to be very similar to like Pacific and Eastern and whatnot.

    00:23:45:09 – 00:24:09:05

    Jorge Contreras

    And what I did is I created a Slack channel. So you got the workplace right, like the company name. And then each channel is a property. So we have 18 channels. And if I go in channel number one, people know that anything that we talk about pertains to that property. So I have the cleaner, the maintenance, the VA myself and the property manager and we are in all 18 channels and this way everybody communicates with each other.

    00:24:09:05 – 00:24:29:08

    Jorge Contreras

    So the VA will come in here and be like, Hey, Claudia, somebody is asking if they can check in early, if they could check if they could drop off the luggage and they all just communicate with each other. And then, of course, whenever something more important needs to be done, that’s when my manager steps in and my manager’s like a really strong operator integrator.

    00:24:30:04 – 00:24:47:06

    Jorge Contreras

    I can honestly delete the Airbnb app off of my phone like I am not involved. We don’t have weekly meetings. Like he just he’s just a doer and he’s he’s really good with that stuff. So that’s how I’ve systemize it. And this allows me again, to like work on the business and not be so involved in the business.

    00:24:47:06 – 00:25:06:10

    Jorge Contreras

    And like right now I’m working on a couple developments and going into the multifamily value add stuff. And if I was like 18 properties is a lot of freaking work. If you’re doing it yourself and you know, I want to continue to grow my portfolio and go after bigger deals and not being involved here allows me to go and do other stuff.

    00:25:07:13 – 00:25:22:18

    Brady Winder

    Absolutely. It’s scalable and I love just, you know, it’s funny. I mean, it’s like in and out of it every day. And I would have thought to, you know, do that with your properties like that, having a one slack channel per property. And that way you don’t have to worry about which which email thread was that was it this for that one reply.

    00:25:22:18 – 00:25:24:13

    Brady Winder

    Like where is that conversation. Yeah.

    00:25:24:23 – 00:25:41:04

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah. Because in the beginning, in the beginning we were using WhatsApp but it was the same team for like three or four properties. And then that it’s exactly what you just said. They’re like, Oh, with property as is for if you just switch to Slack and now each property has its own channel and it’s all in there. One workplace.

    00:25:41:04 – 00:25:44:19

    Jorge Contreras

    So it makes it super easy to, to handle communications there.

    00:25:45:16 – 00:25:55:12

    Brady Winder

    Absolutely. So just clarify real quick for me, what is the VA doing or what’s the difference between what your VA is doing and then what your property manager? So I had.

    00:25:55:12 – 00:26:16:04

    Jorge Contreras

    My VA focus on like those lower income, lower income activities that are tedious but necessary. So like, I don’t need a manager to answer, Hey, can we check in early? Can we check out Lee? Hey, can we get more time? So a lot of that tedious stuff. I have the VA. Do you know she will send in the check in procedures, check out procedure.

    00:26:16:04 – 00:26:39:01

    Jorge Contreras

    She’ll remind them of the check out time. Just anything before, during and after. As far as communications. Now, let’s just say there’s an issue. Actually, just yesterday I was talking to my property manager and he was telling me that he found like a mice in one of the are like a rat in one of the units. So when it’s something like that, you know, like which is super rare.

    00:26:39:01 – 00:26:54:18

    Jorge Contreras

    Right. But he goes in there, he steps in and he actually went to the property because he set up some traps. You know, when the guest checked out before the next guest checked their number, normally he would have called the professional, but he’s like, dude, they’re checking in like the same day and I want to catch this thing.

    00:26:54:18 – 00:26:55:10

    Jorge Contreras

    So like, he just.

    00:26:55:18 – 00:26:57:13

    Brady Winder

    Like, I don’t mind me and just getting the rats.

    00:26:57:15 – 00:27:19:07

    Jorge Contreras

    And he went over there and just handled it right. And yeah, anything that requires someone in person, he’s very hands on because again, my VA is in Mexico. So that’s kind of how we split some of those roles and responsibilities. And together they work really well. And this way we also protect his time because if he was doing all the communications, I think he wouldn’t be able to handle the whole portfolio.

    00:27:19:07 – 00:27:20:09

    Jorge Contreras

    It would just be a lot of work.

    00:27:21:10 – 00:27:39:02

    Brady Winder

    Oh, yeah, absolutely not. It sounds like you’ve got, you know, those roles and responsibilities now then and separate as well. What do you what are you doing? So we talked a little bit about buying criteria. I mean, we could talk about that a little more. But you mentioned, you know, larger parties. They have to have a pool or hot tub.

    00:27:39:02 – 00:27:41:17

    Brady Winder

    How are you finding these properties? Yeah, so.

    00:27:41:17 – 00:28:03:13

    Jorge Contreras

    We find the properties in Zillow for for everything just makes it easier. Obviously, all the inventory is there. The only thing I don’t like about it is that the filters don’t work when you’re looking for properties with like pools or even the description. So that’s why a lot of times I’ll actually use like other platforms like Redfin, super easy, the filters work.

    00:28:03:13 – 00:28:22:08

    Jorge Contreras

    There are 100% accurate. So I’ll go in there and I’ll type a city and I’ll put, Hey, three bedrooms, two baths, minimum 1100 square feet. It must have like a pool. And then and that’s about it. And then I start looking for everything and I focus on the acquisition. So I’ll look for it myself. I’ll find the property I like.

    00:28:22:08 – 00:28:40:23

    Jorge Contreras

    I’ll talk to the landlord myself. Once we signed the lease, everything else is done by my team. So my team will put together a furniture list, so order the furniture, coordinate that everything goes in from. Once Amazon delivers, they’ll assemble the do the decor, be there with the photographer, they’ll create the listing for me. So they have the, you know, my log in and password.

    00:28:41:07 – 00:28:52:20

    Jorge Contreras

    They’ll create the welcome books and they’re like, Here you go, here’s a listing. And then my manager obviously takes over management. So again, I can focus just on those high levels, which for me is acquisitions.

    00:28:54:02 – 00:29:04:00

    Brady Winder

    In it sounds like I’m guessing you’ve got your systems and process your playbooks dialed in as far as this. You’re not you’re not just winging it and hoping that they can figure it out, but you’ve created systems for.

    00:29:04:00 – 00:29:21:03

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah, exactly. Like I have the same team that’s been launching all the, you know, for the last three years for me. So when we get a new property typically and one of like the same area, so it’s the same cleaners, the same maintenance people, the same, it just we just plug and play to the same system so it works Good.

    00:29:21:05 – 00:29:28:17

    Brady Winder

    That’s awesome. That’s crazy. Efficient. Yeah. Anything else As far as buying criteria, you know, that we didn’t mention.

    00:29:28:22 – 00:29:51:21

    Jorge Contreras

    As far as purchasing criteria, like purchasing the real estate. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I guess for somebody that’s just getting started, like I’ve done this a couple of times where similar to when I bought my first property five years later, after that one in January of 2017, me and my wife won our first property together. And at the time, you know, we weren’t married yet, but we were engaged and we didn’t have kids.

    00:29:52:06 – 00:30:13:12

    Jorge Contreras

    And we also wanted I wanted us to leverage the mortgage payments so it didn’t have to come out of our pockets. So same thing. We got a four bedroom property with two bathrooms and we did a split home. 80 you right? So we were able to close a hallway, open a door where there was no door. We converted one of the bedrooms into a kitchen.

    00:30:13:12 – 00:30:44:22

    Jorge Contreras

    That’s living room. And so we kept the main living area, dining kitchen, the master bedroom, backyard, all that. And now we we got two rooms and the middle room was the kitchenette slash living room. And then it had the bathroom, but it was completely separate. It was like a duplex. And we started renting that out on Airbnb and we were able to set up to the bedrooms were fairly big, so we were able to fit in two queen beds in each bedroom and we were hosting up to eight people.

    00:30:44:22 – 00:30:59:02

    Jorge Contreras

    I’m like, I know if I host more people, I can make more money. And again, most of the time it was like 4 to 6 people and sometimes people were like, Yeah, we want to save money. And they would be seven or eight people. They would always park in the street. I was like, Don’t park in a driveway.

    00:30:59:08 – 00:31:23:19

    Jorge Contreras

    But for three and a half years of having that Airbnb there, we saved 3000 a month. So we saved over $100,000 in mortgage payments over the course of three years. And and again, I mentioned in this because if somebody out there wants to go on and buy a property with three and a half percent down, FHA or 5% conventional, do some house hacking, turn one unit into A or E live in the rest of the house.

    00:31:24:14 – 00:31:48:03

    Jorge Contreras

    I know everyone’s largest monthly expenses where they live so you can get rid of a $3,000 mortgage payment. Man, that’s like a huge, huge, huge win, right? And then there’s 100,000. We rolled it over and then acquired more properties. Right? So that that could be one strategy for anyone. That’s looking to to buy and to buy with less money, to have more money to then buy more deals.

    00:31:49:02 – 00:32:05:20

    Brady Winder

    Oh heck yeah, man. I’m a big proponent of instead of first looking at it is like, how much more money can I make? It’s like, how can I reduce my monthly expenses? First, How can I really get efficient every month, everything from cars to house to, you know, get rid of all the fluff and how can I make more money and that kind of thing?

    00:32:06:20 – 00:32:22:22

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Let’s talk about risk, if you don’t mind. So I know you know, people think about doing Airbnb and B, they’re like, Oh, well, especially where I’m at and more of a rural market, it’s a little different. But they’re like, Well, what if I can’t rent it all the time? How do I keep it full? And what I even make that much money?

    00:32:23:17 – 00:32:44:14

    Brady Winder

    But there’s also risk of like seasonality, you know, depending on the market here. And there’s also a risk of like what laws and regulations are going to come down the pipeline, like you mentioned, you know, in the previous story. So what kind of risks do you face and what are you doing to kind of, you know, be ready to pivot those regulations?

    00:32:44:23 – 00:33:06:13

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah, one of the risks is regulation, right? I would stay away. And again, when I first started, I would again, there wasn’t as much regulation as there is today, but I see it as a blessing because today I only launch in areas where I can get a permit because in the past. Right. I learned from that experience where at six months into the lease they changed the regulation and then I couldn’t operate.

    00:33:06:13 – 00:33:26:10

    Jorge Contreras

    And then it was like, okay, I don’t want to keep building businesses, investing time, money and resources to something that is going to be short lived. So a risk is launching in areas where it’s a gray area or launching in areas where you shouldn’t be launching in the first place. So really the way to avoid that is, again, only launch in cities where you can get a permit.

    00:33:27:06 – 00:34:04:02

    Jorge Contreras

    That for sure is like a big risk. And the good thing is once areas have regulation in place and you can get a permit, whenever they do make adjustments, they tend to be very minor. The changes are major when there is no regulation and they implement one and they could likely not be in your favor. The other thing is as far as the actual numbers, just like when you use the, you know, the MLS or different resources to get the comps to figure out the RV on a wholesale or on a flip, we look at two softwares to get the numbers to extract the data, and that is match visor, which works everywhere in the

    00:34:04:02 – 00:34:26:21

    Jorge Contreras

    U.S. except Puerto Rico. And then air DNA works worldwide. And so with air DNA, they have a an area on the rent a laser, and you can plug in an address and it’ll tell you what the projected revenue is for the next 12 months based on similar properties and bedroom count, bathroom square footage, location and the lease and all that stuff.

    00:34:27:10 – 00:34:49:03

    Jorge Contreras

    So that’s what makes it really cool. So if you’re going into an area like Big Bear, California, or Poconos, like New York, they’re going to they’re going to be those are those are going to be like like seasonal areas where they’re like in Big Bear from November to May, you can make a ton of money, but on the other months, like, it’s going to be a really slow.

    00:34:49:03 – 00:35:09:16

    Jorge Contreras

    But if you’re looking at what those properties did over the last 12 months that you just and it says, hey, this property’s projected to make $80,000 over the next 12 months and you’re going to have, you know, $40,000 in a ranch, then, you know, it’s it’s a no brainer. So that’s why I like using those softwares, because it helps mitigate some of the risk.

    00:35:09:16 – 00:35:23:05

    Jorge Contreras

    And our goal is to be able to generate double whatever we’re going to pay in rents. If I’m going to rent a property for 5000, I want to see that there’s already properties making ten from rent. If I’m going to rent something for 2000, I want to see other properties are already making 4000.

    00:35:24:05 – 00:35:43:04

    Brady Winder

    That’s awesome. That’s a really good tip. Thanks for sharing that. Are you? Yeah, especially for places like Big Bear. I mean, there’s a ton of places like that, you know, where we are in Oregon or down in Nevada are these little ski resort towns, you know. Have you found that to be pretty reliable or are you still trying to couple that with like talking to locals?

    00:35:43:23 – 00:36:05:15

    Jorge Contreras

    You know, I would say it is it is very reliable, especially because these are like paid softwares. I think if they were free, I would be like, but they’re pretty expensive. Like the softwares are pretty expensive, like mass fighters like 800 a year. And with air DNA, I mean, we have the worldwide subscription, but you could buy just per city and it could be like 20 or $100.

    00:36:05:15 – 00:36:45:06

    Jorge Contreras

    But with the annual worldwide subscription, it’s like 7000 a year. Wow. That said, the numbers that you’re getting right now from DNA based on the last 12 months performance. Right. The last 12 months is very different than these next 12 months. So I’m telling my students to subtract like 30%. So if I said that properties projected to make 100, you should only account for like 70 because people are spending way less money right now and we’re having to bring down our prices right now in order in order to be competitive because people are just not spending as much as they were six or 12 months ago.

    00:36:45:06 – 00:36:50:22

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, people are tightening their belts, you know, and, you know, postponing vacations that they were going to take because it’s it’s getting more expensive.

    00:36:50:23 – 00:36:51:13

    Jorge Contreras

    Exactly.

    00:36:51:17 – 00:37:05:23

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. One of my questions was how do you, you know, I guess would be for your students because it sounds like most of your Airbnbs are local to Orange County. How are you forecasting future demand for other markets?

    00:37:06:06 – 00:37:25:16

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah, it’s a great question. So there’s two things that we do. The very first thing is to look into the regulation and then the numbers. So what we do is we just have them go on Google and look up the building department in that city. So if somebody wants to launch in Dallas, California, they’re going to Google and type building department and the city of Dallas, and then the phone number will come up.

    00:37:26:01 – 00:37:40:18

    Jorge Contreras

    And then that’s where you asked, hey, what’s the regulation? Can I get a permit? Are you still issuing permits? What’s the process? How long does it take? How much does it cost? And then if you know you can get a permit, then the next thing is you go on. The rent advisor on air did a look at the projected revenue.

    00:37:40:18 – 00:37:50:09

    Jorge Contreras

    Subtract 30% just right now for the recession. And then after that, if the numbers still make sense, then you can pretty much replicate that in any market.

    00:37:50:09 – 00:38:12:09

    Brady Winder

    Okay. I gotcha. That makes sense in asking for a friend. These gray markets you mentioned, what’s the is this just counties or cities built in departments who haven’t decided their stance on Airbnbs? Like if you can’t pull a permit, but it’s not black and white that it’s illegal, do you get a slap on the hand? Do they are they even looking for those?

    00:38:12:12 – 00:38:12:17

    Brady Winder

    Look.

    00:38:13:00 – 00:38:31:20

    Jorge Contreras

    That’s super interesting because it’s funny because when you call the building department, they’ll say, Well, we’re not giving it you know, we’re not issuing permits, but it’s not allowed. And we’re like, okay, can you point me in the area on your website where it says that short term rentals are banned and they’re like, well, they’re not really banned, but they’re not allowed.

    00:38:31:20 – 00:38:34:08

    Jorge Contreras

    And that’s how, you know, it’s like a gray area, right? Yeah.

    00:38:34:21 – 00:38:35:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, yeah.

    00:38:36:05 – 00:38:51:19

    Jorge Contreras

    And so, again, it depends like I I’ll give you an example. Like if you’re living in an area right now and it’s a gray area and you’re going to move out of that property and like you already own it and it’s like, dude, it’s already furnished, I’m going to buy furniture for the new house that I’m going to move into.

    00:38:52:12 – 00:39:14:17

    Jorge Contreras

    We’ll give it a shot, an Airbnb. It’s like, cool, just ride the wave, right? Because you have nothing to lose. Everything to gain. And in most places they won’t issue you fines unless it’s actually banned because you’re like violating a regulation, right. Like in the city of New York, although it is changing and in New York and same thing, it’s they’re also changing it right now.

    00:39:14:22 – 00:39:35:02

    Jorge Contreras

    They’re banned so they can give you fines, I think 500 to $1000 per day right now in those areas. But they are changing both of those regulations to start allowing short term rentals, which is good. But if it’s in a gray area and it’s not banned, they can really fine you for something that they don’t have a ban for.

    00:39:35:18 – 00:39:54:15

    Jorge Contreras

    So it’s kind of things where depending that situation, you could just ride the wave for as long as possible like I did that the house that I mentioned earlier that me and my wife bought five years ago or six years ago, it’s still on Airbnb and it’s still a gray area. There’s no you you can’t get a permit, but it’s also not banned.

    00:39:55:01 – 00:40:13:02

    Jorge Contreras

    So we’re just writing that way for as long as possible. And honestly, I don’t think they’re going to they’re going to like do anything. So some cities, I think they’re just going to stay that way. It’s just not really a priority because it’s also not taken up like there’s not a lot of Airbnbs in some of these cities.

    00:40:13:02 – 00:40:30:03

    Jorge Contreras

    I think if it gets to the point where, hey, 20% of the inventory or 10% of the inventory is taken by short term rentals and they’re taking away from affordable housing and they’re creating a supply and demand issue and it’s getting more expensive, then I can see something happening. But until that happens, it’ll just be on a city by city basis.

    00:40:30:21 – 00:40:43:12

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, absolutely. I mean, so I guess my last question would be as far as looking at the future, any things you see coming down the pipeline for Airbnb’s or it’s going to be more demand for it in the future or less? What do you think?

    00:40:43:14 – 00:41:02:19

    Jorge Contreras

    Yeah, that’s a good question. You know, one of the things that I always look at and I like to go in to the Airbnb app and kind of look at who is booking our properties. And one of the things that I noticed frequently is that a lot of people who are staying at our Airbnb sites are staying at an Airbnb for their first time.

    00:41:03:03 – 00:41:27:00

    Jorge Contreras

    And I know because it tells you when their account was created. So I’ll be like, Hey, this person created an account in January of 2023, like they don’t even have a profile picture. There’s no reviews. And you’re like, Oh, it’s like it’s a new person who maybe just discovered Airbnb. And I think that’s a great sign because people are realizing that this is an alternative way to have a have an experience of a vacation other than a hotel.

    00:41:27:07 – 00:41:39:15

    Jorge Contreras

    And so I think like and of course, even when I just meet people all the time, they’re like, I’ve never stayed at an Airbnb. So I think as long as we have a lot of that demand, which I believe we will, I don’t I don’t think there’s going to be an issue.

    00:41:40:11 – 00:41:56:15

    Brady Winder

    Interesting. That’s good to hear. That’s really insightful because to me I’ve stayed in them and I think I envy me like that’s our norm. I like, say, an Airbnb versus a hotel, even if I’m not even saving money because I just like the experience more. But I forget there’s still masses of people who just never say to want is mysterious to them.

    00:41:56:19 – 00:41:57:18

    Jorge Contreras

    Right? Exactly.

    00:41:59:05 – 00:42:02:23

    Brady Winder

    Anything you would want to add. People should know about Airbnb. Yeah. Yeah.

    00:42:02:23 – 00:42:23:04

    Jorge Contreras

    I would say like there’s really three main things. If somebody wants to get into Airbnb arbitrage. And again, just to kind of preface this, my goal for everybody here listening is to own as much real estate because there’s no doubt that’s where you want to be. That’s where you’re going to create long term wealth, have that equity, that depreciation and you know, that’s how you create long term wealth.

    00:42:23:15 – 00:42:44:12

    Jorge Contreras

    That said, most people I know are not in the position to go and buy like most people need like 2 to 4 Airbnbs to replace in 95. And most people don’t have money to go and buy two or three for 2 to 4 properties right now, but with the same amount of money that you could buy one, you could sublease like four or five properties and replace your 9 to 5.

    00:42:44:21 – 00:43:06:04

    Jorge Contreras

    So again, number one, you know, verify the regulation. Just you don’t want to you don’t want your property or business to be short lived. So make sure you can get a permit, run the cons and the rental loser, pitch it as corporate housing and get permission in writing. And I say that because I’ve had a lot of people do me on Instagram and they’re like, Hey, the landlord just found out I’m getting evicted now.

    00:43:06:04 – 00:43:16:18

    Jorge Contreras

    I got to shut down my business and like, that sucks is like, Hey, you should have been upfront with the owner and just get permission in writing. So those are the three like most important things when somebody wants to go into arbitrage.

    00:43:17:10 – 00:43:32:11

    Brady Winder

    Hmm. I appreciate you sharing that. I think that that demystifies a lot of what could be a very mysterious and, you know, a lot of unknown. Yeah, that’s awesome, man. So you teach this, you coach students through this. You’re the guy to learn from. Where can people find you?

    00:43:32:14 – 00:43:43:12

    Jorge Contreras

    They can find me on Instagram. My handle. Is that like THG and then cortijo. CONTRERAS So they’re working. CONTRERAS And make sure there’s no underscores or any of that stuff. It’s just name.

    00:43:44:09 – 00:44:02:14

    Brady Winder

    Awesome. Well, thank you, man. I appreciate you sharing that. Everybody listen in habia value out of this. I enjoyed that conversation. All right. Thank you for. Sharing your story. I appreciate that. You know, those impactful for our audience. So anyways, everybody listen. And if this is a valuable share with a friend and we will see you next week.

    00:44:02:19 – 00:44:23:14

    Jorge Contreras

    Thank you, guys. Have a good one.

  • EP 416: The ROI of SEO: How to Measure & Scale Your Marketing For More Deals w/Mike Otranto

    EP 416: The ROI of SEO: How to Measure & Scale Your Marketing For More Deals w/Mike Otranto


    If your definition of a marketing budget is “spend money until I get a deal,” this episode is for you. Mike Otranto consistently brings in high-quality motivated seller leads from SEO, PPC, and direct mail, while keeping his business profitable and predictable.

    We break down how to understand the effectiveness of each marketing channel, the specific ROI of each of Mike’s marketing channels, how to outsource your SEO wisely, and mistakes to avoid when managing SEO & other marketing channels.


    Mentioned in this Episode:

    Mike on Instagram

    Mike’s Carrot Site

    Spin Selling by Neil Rackham

    Never split the difference by Chriss Voss


    Episode Transcript (This is an automated transcript by robot carrots – please mind the typos 😉)

    00:00:00:00 – 00:00:22:02

    Mike Otranto

    I started to realize is that my highest margin deals were coming from ACL. So that’s the other thing that you have to say, okay, well, if this is the most efficient way to get me in front of my target audience, well, how do I get more more leads? And how do you scale it? Yeah. And that’s that’s one of the challenges with SEO is it’s kind of mystical and it’s it’s will I hire somebody to do ACL?

    00:00:22:02 – 00:00:26:13

    Mike Otranto

    But, you know, if I’m not getting results, well, what’s the problem?

    00:00:31:17 – 00:00:48:08

    Brady Winder

    Hey, friends, you’re listening to the Access podcast, where we help investors and agents like yourself deal businesses of freedom and impact. I’m your host, Brady Winder. And today I have with me longtime Care.com customer and care camp alumni, Mr. Mike Otranto. Welcome to the podcast, Mike.

    00:00:48:17 – 00:00:50:04

    Mike Otranto

    What’s up, Brady? Great to be here.

    00:00:50:22 – 00:01:09:14

    Brady Winder

    Doing good, man. Thanks for joining us. So so we’re talking Madeleine online marketing. It’s SEO month at Carat. First month of the year. And we want to help you get your SEO dialed in because this is a long game. So we’ve had a couple of other SEO topics during the month. Today we’re talking about the ROI of SEO.

    00:01:10:03 – 00:01:24:15

    Brady Winder

    And the reason why I brought Mike out of the podcast is because he looks at his marketing in a very analytical way where a lot of investors, they just, you know, they get some money from a deal. They say, Oh, I got five grand, ten grand to play with, I’m going to throw it at PPC, I’m going to throw it at TV.

    00:01:24:15 – 00:01:41:02

    Brady Winder

    I’m going to see if it works and are not always as good with the follow up and evaluating that to see, okay, did it work, Why did it work? Why did not work? What was my close ratio on that? And so Mike’s really organized in that way and I like the way that he looks at the math behind marketing.

    00:01:41:02 – 00:01:59:08

    Brady Winder

    So that’s what we’re going to talk about is is really math over emotion when it comes to spending your marketing dollars wisely and specifically with SEO and what he’s done with SEO to be effective and why it makes sense versus other marketing channels and a few other things. So it’s going to be a good conversation. Hope you guys enjoy.

    00:01:59:08 – 00:02:08:23

    Brady Winder

    But yeah, Mike, give us a little bit of background. Like how do you, how did you get to where you are? What’s your your real estate origin story, if you will?

    00:02:10:03 – 00:02:35:21

    Mike Otranto

    My real estate origin story is it really started in around 2000, 2001 when I read Rich Dad, Poor Dad. I already knew that I hated working for large companies. So, you know, I just started, you know, buying more books and then trying to get into it. I think I bought a couple of courses and eventually I hooked up with a guy that I knew from where I grew up and started out in New York, and I started to call him and he kept telling me, you know, come down to North Carolina, it’s so much easier.

    00:02:35:21 – 00:03:04:05

    Mike Otranto

    Raleigh is a great market, you know, And eventually I followed them down. I started doing buy and hold real estate and general brokerage. And, you know, by the time I got up to about 40 units and these were, you know, for Plex’s six plex multifamily, unfortunately around 2009, a lot of stuff was losing money. So I had to basically come up with an alternative strategy and figure out a better way to invest it.

    00:03:04:05 – 00:03:34:00

    Mike Otranto

    In addition, I had to get a job and join corporate America. So I started to rebuild on the side. I started to do some wholesaling just to get started. And, you know, the more I got into social media, digital aspects of marketing and how emerging they were and how effective they could be, that’s where I kind of started on my journey throughout the teens to say, All right, well, let me skip the MLS and let me skip the brokers and the realtors and let me go direct to consumer and try and buy houses that way.

    00:03:34:00 – 00:03:55:07

    Mike Otranto

    So, you know, I joined Carrot in 2016, and almost immediately I started to see more converted leads come to me through the carrot website and then I said, Well, how do I get more leads? Well, you know, now let’s let’s start the SEO conversation, the paid search conversation and all that stuff. But once I started to figure it out, I worked full time in the late teens, 2018.

    00:03:55:07 – 00:04:01:02

    Mike Otranto

    And then, you know, I’ve been a full time investor ever since. So I do fix and flip, buy and hold and a little bit of wholesaling.

    00:04:01:20 – 00:04:09:17

    Brady Winder

    Okay, nice. Would you consider yourself like what’s the scale as far as tech savvy?

    00:04:09:17 – 00:04:28:03

    Mike Otranto

    The funny thing about tech savviness is that, you know, there are a lot of people, especially in real estate, that are not tech savvy at all. They’re very traditional in their mindset. I think they’re they’re very well behind the tech curve, so I’m well ahead of them. But then there are some people that are very high on the tech curve that know a lot more than me.

    00:04:28:03 – 00:04:41:23

    Mike Otranto

    So I guess some I’m an advanced I’m advanced on the tech curve, but I have to stay humble because there’s always new things that I don’t know about and new types of software and just new trends that I might not be aware of. So yeah.

    00:04:42:11 – 00:05:06:06

    Brady Winder

    Things are always changing. You know, the algorithm is always making little improvements and changes and something we’ve got to be aware of. Oh, cool. I mean, what’s the I want to ask you one question before we go. Sort of what’s what’s the best thing you’ve like? What’s the best hack you’ve ever done to generate leads? A urban One thing, we’re like, Holy crap, man, this this really works for me, like a strategy or a thing you started doing over the past six years.

    00:05:06:06 – 00:05:08:02

    Brady Winder

    We’re like, This is killing it. For me.

    00:05:08:12 – 00:05:30:06

    Mike Otranto

    I would say the website and I would say a carrot website. You know, I’ve been a it’s rare for me to find a brand that I believe in so much that I would stay with it for. I mean, Carrot is what, eight years now? Seven years. And the thing is, is that with the carrot website, it’s designed for real estate investors to convert leads.

    00:05:30:06 – 00:05:52:17

    Mike Otranto

    That’s what it’s for. A lot of other agents that will, you know, once I start talking to them and they visit my website, they’re like, Oh, is this your website? I don’t I don’t know about. Then the funny thing is they don’t like it. But the thing is, is that they’re designed to work subordinate to these big franchise names and their websites don’t get them any business because that’s not what it’s for.

    00:05:52:17 – 00:06:19:04

    Mike Otranto

    It’s there to build the franchise brand. My business is designed to get me in front of my customers directly and buy houses directly from them. That’s its purpose. That’s what it’s for. So I’m not interested in subjectivity of I want green here, read here what converts, what builds authority in my local market, what allows me to provide tangible evidence that I’m a trustworthy business person and will allow me to buy houses directly from my customers.

    00:06:19:04 – 00:06:23:02

    Mike Otranto

    And that’s that’s its purpose. And it does it does the that one thing very well.

    00:06:23:19 – 00:06:42:11

    Brady Winder

    Hmm interesting I premise I genuinely wasn’t team that up to say let me get you to say something good about carrot but I appreciate it that’s you know thank you for that. I’m sure you know it’s interesting you know, especially looking at agent websites, it’s like I never thought about that. It’s building a commercial brand versus your local brand.

    00:06:43:02 – 00:06:44:20

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah. So there’s a difference. There’s a big difference.

    00:06:45:09 – 00:07:00:20

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Well, let’s talk about let’s talk about our way of marketing. So tell me about kind of just first holistically your approach to marketing and how you how do you decide which channels to go with? Like how do you measure the effectiveness of your marketing and hopefully not lose tons of money?

    00:07:02:14 – 00:07:20:15

    Mike Otranto

    Since I do have a background in corporate sales, you know, I did learn that they they want to look at their salespeople, see how productive they are and say, all right, well, how many leads did you get or how many calls did you make? How many? Now there’s an intermediary there. How many opportunities did you have? And out of those opportunities, how many of those did you convert?

    00:07:20:15 – 00:07:38:20

    Mike Otranto

    So you have kind of three pieces of data using addition and division to come up with some percentages. But I started measuring things like even my bandit signs in the early teens. I would say, All right, well, how many signs that I put out this month that I put out 100 signs. Okay. Well, how many calls I get?

    00:07:38:20 – 00:07:55:16

    Mike Otranto

    Well, I got 30 calls. All right. Well, out of all those calls, how many of them were actual leads? And then you start coming up with numbers like five and six or seven and then add up all those leads, how many deals that I get. And then you would get like one or two. And it was every other month.

    00:07:55:16 – 00:08:16:11

    Mike Otranto

    It wasn’t quite as consistent. And what I started to learn is that when I have when the bulk of the calls that I’m getting are people complaining about the signs, I have to conclude that that is not the most effective way to get in front of my target market. So when you start doing things like direct mail, I would say, Right, well how many pieces that I send out, how many calls that I get?

    00:08:16:11 – 00:08:43:16

    Mike Otranto

    And I would notice this real volatility in the amount of calls that I would get versus it’s because a lot of people would call up to complain about the fact that I sent them a letter and I’m like, This is not who I want to talk to, but sometimes I would get deals from it. So what I started to notice with people that found my website organically, especially in the beginning when I was doing my SEO and it was starting to gain momentum in the late teens, I started to notice that I didn’t have to do a lot of selling and a lot of negotiating.

    00:08:43:16 – 00:09:11:17

    Mike Otranto

    They wanted someone that they knew and they trusted. Money was not the most important thing for them. They just wanted a very smooth, easy transaction and that allowed me to provide service in exchange for a discount where everyone was happy. I got my profit, they got their smooth, easy transaction and I was just easier. Yeah. So, you know, at the end of the you know, at the end of, let’s say a year, I’ll say, well how many leads that I get for the year.

    00:09:11:17 – 00:09:34:17

    Mike Otranto

    Well all those leads did come to me from my website. But how did they come to my website, Did they get a postcard for me? Did they come via paid search or did they come by your S.O.? Now, in the last couple of years, I started tracking the source. You’ll see either Google search, you’ll see sometimes Bing or DuckDuckGo.

    00:09:35:04 – 00:09:55:22

    Mike Otranto

    You also see paid search campaigns. So that allows me to delineate how or delete by channel is a paid search for. I use the category organic because whether or not they came via Bing, Google or DuckDuckGo, I’m not as concerned with that. I’m more concerned with SEO or paid search because how do I most efficiently allocate my marketing dollars based on channel?

    00:09:56:12 – 00:10:25:07

    Brady Winder

    Hmm. Exactly. It’s more than just online. Yeah. Well, and I like how you mentioned it’s not just the how many deals did I close from this channel, but it’s like, how much time did that take me? Like where there’s this underlying sense of like, where’s my energy and my time go and don’t even if I am closing a bunch of deals from you, just, for example, direct mail or cold call inside, do I really want to spend if it’s working that much time, addressing the people that want my sign out of their yard or business, you know?

    00:10:25:17 – 00:10:42:14

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah. And the way I look at it is, well, you take your total spend for the period, which is usually a year, but I’ll also do it by quarter. Then take how many leads you got and then got how many deals are closed. So you know, take it to expand, divide it by the amount of leads and that I’ll give you a cost per lead.

    00:10:42:14 – 00:10:59:18

    Mike Otranto

    And also you want to get well what is my cost per lead really need to be to be efficient. I also look at the amount of deals I closed. So how many leads do I need to close? One deal. So that’s really a conversion rate is really what that is. Right. And then I’ll measure something else called a cost per deal.

    00:10:59:18 – 00:11:21:04

    Mike Otranto

    What did it cost me to close this deal? Now at the best of the best from SEO, I think it was about 1000 to 1500 dollars cost per deal. And when I compare that alongside paid search page, search has always been higher, you know, anywhere from 2500 to 7000, just depending. I mean, there’s a lot of variables there.

    00:11:21:04 – 00:11:31:23

    Mike Otranto

    But what what really dawned on me as well, what’s my so I will buy houses from wholesalers. I will do that. Yeah. With my average assignment fee you’re looking at least.

    00:11:32:00 – 00:11:34:17

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. Thousand. So what’s your. Yeah. Your average far for deal.

    00:11:35:08 – 00:11:48:16

    Mike Otranto

    So I mean even if paid search it costs me 6600. I mean I have to say to myself well how many wholesalers out there are satisfied with 60 $600. Therefore my direct marketing endeavors are more efficient.

    00:11:49:20 – 00:12:09:23

    Brady Winder

    So what’s your you know, like in our marketing for care, we’re usually looking to get a 4 to 5 LTV, the lifetime value of the customer in a customer acquisition cost. Anyways, don’t get too deep here, but it’s a it’s a 4 to 1 return on your outspend. Yeah. Or, or more at the end of the minimum. So you’re looking at like 2 to 1, two to 4 to 1 at least that seems to be a range.

    00:12:09:23 – 00:12:25:21

    Brady Winder

    Like 2 to 1 is acceptable, but 4 to 1 you can usually predictably pull out for sale. It’s for talking like maybe 2500 bucks or so, 15, 20, 500, put it into the SEO efforts and then, you know, a $10,000 assignment fee. Is that about right?

    00:12:26:08 – 00:12:50:06

    Mike Otranto

    Well, the way I’ll do it is, you know, I’m familiar with the 2 to 1 or the 4 to 1 ratio. When I really started to compile the data and I started to see things how SEO always year after year would beat out the other channels based on, let’s say, conversion rate. So last year I was converted one out of 7.25 leads.

    00:12:50:06 – 00:13:16:03

    Mike Otranto

    So it’s a very high conversion rate. And when I look at my cost per lead, it’s always been under $300 in the SEO world. The other thing is the cost per deal was a B about, you know, a thousand 1500 dollars depending on the vendor that you use, it could be upwards of $2,000. But the other thing that really stood out to me was my highest margin deals.

    00:13:17:08 – 00:13:39:10

    Mike Otranto

    For example, this year I closed out a flip where at closing I got $272,000 back and Trevor was nice enough to jump on the carrot cast. Not think this is the carrot cash, but the the the annual summit, the carrot summit run on the end. And because what happened was when I got the I sent him something via Instagram and said, Hey, check this out.

    00:13:39:10 – 00:13:40:05

    Mike Otranto

    This was an SEO.

    00:13:40:21 – 00:13:43:08

    Brady Winder

    Oh, it’s coming back to me now. I’m remembering.

    00:13:44:04 – 00:14:10:19

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah, yeah, come on, tell us about it. And I told him about it and it’s like this great deal. She was happy with the $275,000 purchase price. I put 150 into it, and my net was about 150. And since I funded the repairs, I got about $272,000 back at closing because I sold it at 651. Now, the person I bought it from, she knew they sold it for $650,000 because I let her tour the property once I was done with it and she was perfectly happy.

    00:14:10:19 – 00:14:27:15

    Mike Otranto

    So the other thing that I started to realize is that my highest margin deals were coming from ACL. So that’s the other thing that you have to say, okay, well, if this is the most efficient way to get me in front of my target audience, well, how do I get more, more leads, right? And how do you scale it?

    00:14:27:15 – 00:14:37:16

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah. And that’s that’s one of the challenges with SEO is it’s kind of mystical and it’s it’s will I hire someone to do SEO? But, you know, if I’m not getting results, well, what’s the problem?

    00:14:38:08 – 00:14:52:23

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. So I want to touch on that in a second. Yeah, we’ll talk about outsourcing. One thing I want to touch on those. Before the podcast we were talking about what’s your spend like per marketing channel? Would you mind sharing what you know, the breakdown 2021, where your money was going, You don’t get it.

    00:14:52:23 – 00:15:17:09

    Mike Otranto

    Context 2021 I was doing about $1,000 a month in SEO toward the end of the year. I did bump it to 1500 with paid search. I was doing about 3000 a month, 2500, $3,000 a month in spend. Now the interesting thing, in early 2021, the results were they weren’t that great. And I was trying to figure out why.

    00:15:18:14 – 00:15:40:16

    Mike Otranto

    And part of it was, you know, we had record low inventory. I mean, there was almost no houses on the market. But what I was able to determine by looking at some KPIs was is that I needed new I needed new people, I needed a new SEO company and I needed a new paid search guy. And that’s what I needed to get better results.

    00:15:40:16 – 00:15:46:20

    Mike Otranto

    So, you know, these very simple costs per lead cost per deal and conversion ratio was really what I used.

    00:15:47:19 – 00:15:57:06

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. And you would have known that had you not been tracking what was, what were your close ratios like on SEO versus PPC versus direct mail. Do you know that.

    00:15:58:01 – 00:16:26:08

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah. My clothes ratio was one in seven and a quarter on SEO and then it was one in 12 on paid search. I think direct mail was like, you know, I spent I spent like ten grand and I got one deal. So I mean, I didn’t make that much sense. And, you know, there’s a concept that is used on the carrot carrot website about evergreen marketing versus hamster wheel.

    00:16:26:19 – 00:16:43:14

    Mike Otranto

    The reason why I like hamster the hamster wheel analogy is because to think about direct mail, you’re constantly pulling lists, you’re constantly going through data, there’s skip tracing. You know, you actually have to select the type of piece that you’re going to send out. You have to pay for it. But it’s this ongoing thing that I have to be involved in.

    00:16:43:14 – 00:16:55:02

    Mike Otranto

    And I, you know, the I am notorious for starting things and not finishing. So, yeah, you can say anything you want about direct mail, but it’s not the best fit for me because I just don’t want to be involved in churning that hamster wheel every month.

    00:16:55:11 – 00:16:56:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, exactly.

    00:16:56:14 – 00:16:58:00

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah, I want to be buying houses.

    00:16:58:19 – 00:17:18:05

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. And so. So two things I want to kind of dig into before we move on is one, before we recorded the podcast you were talking about like SEO is your bread and butter for sure. It’s it’s predictable, it’s consistent. You’re, you’re getting your best leads from there. But it’s also important to realize you don’t want to build your business on a three legged stool.

    00:17:18:05 – 00:17:30:22

    Brady Winder

    And by that we mean fully relying on one marketing method. Putting all your eggs in one basket can be a little bit scary. And so you’ve got SEO, you’ve got your paperclip going and you’ve got are you still doing some direct mail? Right.

    00:17:31:09 – 00:17:46:20

    Mike Otranto

    I’m still doing some direct mail. I experimented with some Facebook advertising. You know, I’ll buy some some stuff from wholesalers sometimes on the MLS. So you have kind of these alternative strategies as well. But yeah, I do like to have multiple sources to find deals, not just one.

    00:17:47:18 – 00:18:07:16

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. So with our and so you mentioned set one and what it’s seven and a half, seven in a quarter, one in seven and a quarter SEO leads that you’re closing, That’s very respectable, that’s some of the best. So we see about let’s say on average about one in ten for SEO leads to a deal, PPC 1 to 10, 1 to 20.

    00:18:07:16 – 00:18:27:22

    Brady Winder

    Somewhere in that range you a cluster of 20 direct mail cold calling. You start getting up into the forties and above. That’s a lot of leads to sift through. So with without turning this into a sales negotiation podcast, you had mentioned that your, your view on sales is a little bit different. Is there anything different that you’re doing because these are SEO leads, Are you handling them differently?

    00:18:27:23 – 00:18:28:15

    Brady Winder

    Like what’s that like?

    00:18:28:22 – 00:18:58:08

    Mike Otranto

    The way I handle my sales is I have to basically I have experience, hands on experience in corporate selling in two different types of selling. One is something called ESR, which is inside sales and really inside sales. As you never meet your prospect, you’re always on the phone meeting and about, yeah, B2B. The other thing about inside sales, this is involving outbound cold calling which it’s very aggressive, it’s very tactical in nature and it’s very pushy.

    00:18:59:04 – 00:19:32:08

    Mike Otranto

    Now you have very low conversion rates. That’s where a lot of your your tactical questioning comes from. Like if I were to pay cash and close Friday, what’s the least you’ll take things like that. Now, when I went into another type of selling, which was enterprise sales, this was where our minimum contract was about $100,000. We I worked for a microsoft partner and what we did was we configured an existing project, Microsoft project, because it was so large and complex and the organizations were so large, the first call was, All right, we don’t know what we need.

    00:19:32:08 – 00:19:53:19

    Mike Otranto

    What do you think we need? And there would be usually about a six month to a year sales cycle. And there was a lot of talk around, well, what is it that we need and what’s it going to cost? Now in enterprise sales, there was a total absence of this tactical selling style. So what I did with these SEO leads is I found that people were more relationship oriented.

    00:19:53:19 – 00:20:08:19

    Mike Otranto

    They weren’t concerned with price, they really wanted service and trust. And I dispensed with a lot of selling tactics and just talk to them like human beings. I whittled down my sales process to keep it very, very simple, and I found that it worked. Hmm.

    00:20:09:17 – 00:20:27:16

    Brady Winder

    That’s that’s really interesting. I had never thought about I asked that question not knowing or expecting. Does your sales strategy or your technique change based on the type of marketing that you’re doing? But from what you’re saying, it does and it sounds like the opposite would be true too, where if you took that strategy and applied it to cold calling, I would imagine that it would fail.

    00:20:28:08 – 00:20:38:03

    Brady Winder

    And would it be if it was treating it relationship based and a little bit more relaxed, less tactical, would you agree or no?

    00:20:38:03 – 00:21:06:09

    Mike Otranto

    I would have a reservation. I would say it depends. The thing about outbound cold calling, it’s a different style. When I was in inside sales and I was actually working for a Google partner and it was actually I was selling paid search to auto dealers. So that’s one of the reasons why I’m so comfortable with paid searches. I kind of have an idea of if it’s not working, it’s usually something the manager you have the campaign, there’s usually something else that’s going on that’s cause it’s not.

    00:21:06:13 – 00:21:07:00

    Brady Winder

    It’s not the.

    00:21:07:00 – 00:21:35:19

    Mike Otranto

    Platform platform itself. But what I learned is you had people with two different styles. You had your real aggressive outbound cold callers talk very fast or very pushy, and then you had some laid back people that were a little more relationship oriented. They took their time. I think that’s this more of a laid back approach. I think in the long run it’s more effective and you will see that that style in someone like Chris Voss and never split the difference.

    00:21:35:19 – 00:22:02:14

    Mike Otranto

    He was a hostage negotiator. He I think selling has it’s evolved over time and the theories behind it are starting to change. I do think that there are different types of products that are sold. For example, one of my favorite books is spin selling and one of their their basic premises was you had features and benefits selling for things like coffee and watches and trinkets and stuff under 100 bucks.

    00:22:03:04 – 00:22:24:16

    Mike Otranto

    Then you had these six figure plus type sales where they’re more complex, there’s less features and benefits, almost no features and benefits. And what they did in the book is you see two things. You see an ad for Digital Watch, which is all features and the benefits, and then you see an ad for a Rolex, which is no features and benefits because it’s a different product for a different market.

    00:22:24:16 – 00:22:57:18

    Mike Otranto

    I think that real estate is more toward the enterprise space where it’s a more complex transaction. You’re dealing with high dollar amounts. There’s plenty of room for the transaction to fall apart. So I think it does lend itself to a little bit more enterprise style, relationship style selling. That’s my opinion. And based on my experience and one thing I noticed is that when I was doing cold calling, my no show rate for appointments was over 90% because people it didn’t matter what you told them, they weren’t listening because they get hammered with, with these types of yeah, these types of calls all the time.

    00:22:57:18 – 00:23:11:06

    Mike Otranto

    But with anything inbound when they’re coming to me, especially when they’re coming to me via SEO, they’re much more serious about what they want to do. And I think that a lot of that has to do with the higher conversion rate and the the style of selling.

    00:23:11:15 – 00:23:31:05

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, that makes sense. That’s helpful context. And really all things aside, it’s like trust still trumps tactic at the end of the day, regardless of which marketing channel the trust and relationship always comes before the tactic, regardless of what type of selling you’re doing. Before we hit record, you mentioned you spent 11 grand on Facebook ads and didn’t get a deal.

    00:23:31:10 – 00:23:33:12

    Brady Winder

    What did you learn from that?

    00:23:33:12 – 00:23:51:12

    Mike Otranto

    What I learned from that is that I got a lot of leads. So I think I got about 53 or 50 leads or something like that. I got two contracts, but both of the contracts had title problems. So that’s what really stopped me from buying the houses. Now, once I saw $11,000 and I saw there were no deals, I paused.

    00:23:51:12 – 00:24:13:10

    Mike Otranto

    The campaign because even if I closed one of those contracts, that would have put my cost per deal at $11,000, which is too high. What attracted me to Facebook is that the cost to generate a lead is under $100. It could be 40 or $50. So I saw it as a more cost effective way to advertise my business.

    00:24:15:06 – 00:24:36:11

    Mike Otranto

    What I learned is that people from Facebook are very top of the funnel. So if you’re going to do Facebook and you’re a self-employed person and you’re just, you know, you’re running the show, it’s going to be a lot of more, more work and follow up. And it’s much more long range. The way I am in my business.

    00:24:36:11 – 00:24:43:22

    Mike Otranto

    I don’t have that kind of time anymore. So I do have some plans on maybe doing some more Facebook this year, but the follow up is going to be handled by someone else.

    00:24:44:07 – 00:24:49:19

    Brady Winder

    And you’re talking about follow up with the leads, not even just managing the campaign, not the Facebook campaign. Oh, yeah.

    00:24:49:19 – 00:24:53:08

    Mike Otranto

    I don’t manage any campaigns, any marketing campaigns. I manage the manager.

    00:24:54:00 – 00:25:12:09

    Brady Winder

    So so so let’s talk about that. Yeah. So S-so a lot of people, you know, some people are going to listen to podcast and say, yeah, I’m going to dive into it myself. And awesome. I think, you know, there’s not a right or wrong either way, but a lot of people are going to listen to this and say, okay, I want to outsource my echo, and that’s okay too.

    00:25:12:17 – 00:25:35:06

    Brady Winder

    But the the most important thing is to understand the marketing channel, the marketing platform enough to know how to manage the manager before you start spending money. So I say that. What’s your experience been like outsourcing SEO and for for context, like what was your you didn’t have a lot of SEO knowledge coming in. You sort of learned it.

    00:25:35:11 – 00:25:39:09

    Brady Winder

    What’s what did the outsourcing journey look like for you?

    00:25:39:09 – 00:25:59:05

    Mike Otranto

    I started out in your early teens with a VA that was doing a lot of spammy stuff and that was not very effective. Then I would say later on, once I joined Carrot, there were plenty of coaching calls where Adrian at the time he would discuss SEO strategy and that’s I kind of learned a lot of it from him.

    00:26:00:19 – 00:26:22:05

    Mike Otranto

    And I noticed that, you know, trying to learn about SEO from books really wasn’t effective because it was just too general. I was like, Well, how do you create great content to get people to link to? And I remember I talked to Adrian about this and he said, Well, when you start out with a We Buy Houses website, a lot of people don’t want to link to you because their impression is that you’re the lowball or that’s going to rip people off so they don’t want to link to you.

    00:26:23:04 – 00:26:44:12

    Mike Otranto

    And that’s one of the problems. So you had to kind of build your own foundation by creating your own content that you create and link back to your own website, sort of build that out. Sometimes they call it tier at link building or link pyramids and use that in conjunction with some more organic natural, some guest posting and some other strategies to get a real good strategy going.

    00:26:45:22 – 00:27:14:14

    Mike Otranto

    I would say that to manage the manager, you need to find someone that specializes in not just real estate SEO, but real estate SEO for real estate investors, the problem is, since our industry is very traditionally minded and wants to do networking and postcards and motor mouth and all that stuff, our industry is not spending money on SEO, so there’s not a lot of incentive for an SEO to focus on on industry.

    00:27:14:14 – 00:27:33:14

    Mike Otranto

    The people that are spending the money on SEO are e-commerce websites. So a lot of the companies out there are their main focus is ecommerce. So you had someone like Adrian who was a wholesaler and had some buy and hold properties and he had he did it all his own SEO and then gradually developing SEO company on the site.

    00:27:33:17 – 00:27:37:22

    Mike Otranto

    Generally speaking, those are the people that you need, but they are very difficult to find. There’s a unicorns.

    00:27:38:07 – 00:27:51:03

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, a So you mentioned that you hired a VA and they were doing some spammy stuff. Did you know it was spammy at the time or was it like, then you learn something from it and you’re like, Oh, that stuff wasn’t working.

    00:27:52:07 – 00:28:15:14

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah, it wasn’t working at the time. And I think I had talked to someone else that was in the CEO world. And when he started to look at the reports, he said, Yeah, you know, this is spammy. And the other thing is he was using a lot of the tactics that were used in the 2000s when you could kind of stuff keywords and just like buy a domain and then point it back to your domain kind of thing and then you re spin content.

    00:28:15:14 – 00:28:19:23

    Mike Otranto

    And it was just the craftsmanship wasn’t very good.

    00:28:19:23 – 00:28:40:02

    Brady Winder

    Yeah, we talked about that on a podcast earlier this month with Brian where it’s like Google over the years thankfully, has made it harder to gamify it. Yeah, it’s harder to give a fiasco and it’s becoming more human, more natural. So you had mentioned that you were spending you were spending about a thousand on ASO and then you’d bumped it up to 1500.

    00:28:40:11 – 00:28:47:05

    Brady Winder

    What said, What does that mean? Like, what are you getting for that money? What’s what’s the work involved? How does that change?

    00:28:47:20 – 00:29:06:13

    Mike Otranto

    You’re building links. So really what you’re doing is, well, there’s two things with SEO is on page and then there’s off page. A lot of SEO companies will not touch on page and on pages are going to be the copy. And what keyword density you have on your page is relevant to what the person is typing it.

    00:29:06:23 – 00:29:13:00

    Brady Winder

    Interesting you said a lot of SEO companies won’t touch your on page, correct? They just want to do backlink building.

    00:29:13:10 – 00:29:29:18

    Mike Otranto

    Mm hmm. And it might be a liability thing. Like, you know, once you start touching someone’s website, is it going to break? And you’d be surprised how many SEO is that did do on page. They said, oh, you work with Karen. Well who owns the website. Well they own it. What happens if they go out of business? What happens if this whatever?

    00:29:30:06 – 00:29:39:16

    Mike Otranto

    And I’m like, Dude, just do it. What’s the problem? I’m like, I already had a website. Then I’m the one that’s responsible for the plug ins. And when things break and I don’t want to be responsible.

    00:29:39:16 – 00:29:48:01

    Brady Winder

    For that, that’s a bigger risk then. Yeah, right. That’s a bigger risk than wondering about what if carrot, you know, is what if I. Yeah, it’s a lot to manage.

    00:29:48:13 – 00:30:06:07

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah. That’s why a lot of investors throw their hands up because they’re like, Hey, I’m not an SEO guy. What’s the problem? Get it done. And then there are five grand, ten grand in the whole and they have nothing to show for it. I kind of understand it. So one of the reasons why, due to the many algorithm updates that we’ve seen over the last couple of years, I’ve always stuck with SEO because the results were always there.

    00:30:06:07 – 00:30:26:00

    Mike Otranto

    I could always look back and say, What are my best deals? As they came to my website, the ratio, the the highest margins, the best conversion rates. Therefore this is a good channel. How do we get the best results possible at the lowest cost possible? But you would ask me a question. I think I digress a little bit off page.

    00:30:26:00 – 00:30:47:12

    Mike Otranto

    Okay, so with link building, really what it what it’s doing is someone’s writing an article and they’re there have a link and they’re pointing to your website. So the way it was described to me is like picture link building, like a soccer game where there’s a bunch of players passing around a ball and every time a player gets a pass to them, that’s like a link.

    00:30:47:16 – 00:31:12:01

    Mike Otranto

    It’s a pointer saying This guy knows what he’s doing with Google. The way it was explained. And you know, there’s been a lot of changes. Is it used to be, well, the person that’s the most authoritative is the person that gets the most passes. And it used to be in the early days of the search engines in the late nineties, you know, when you typed in something and you got a bunch of search results, you had to scroll back to page two and three to figure out what you were looking for.

    00:31:12:01 – 00:31:30:02

    Mike Otranto

    The search results were garbage. So one of the things about page rank, as it is explained to me is that Google started to look, well, let’s not concentrate on who’s getting the most passes, who not only who is getting the most passes, but who are they passing the ball to. So who are the blessed best player passing the ball to?

    00:31:30:09 – 00:31:54:08

    Mike Otranto

    And then you started to look at things in a little bit different light. So to bring that back, I mean, to get a backlink from like a local news website or university, those have a lot of authority. Those are very valuable. They’re also very difficult to get. And that that, that in lines, that’s where the art form comes in is how do you get the most, the most valuable backlinks.

    00:31:54:08 – 00:31:55:05

    Brady Winder

    Nice value.

    00:31:55:15 – 00:32:08:02

    Mike Otranto

    And because the thing is you could either buy it outright or you could hire somebody to go and ask for a backlink. But either way, it costs money. So the question is, how do you do this without spending $10,000 a month?

    00:32:08:19 – 00:32:10:14

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. So yeah.

    00:32:11:11 – 00:32:29:03

    Mike Otranto

    Some of the problem you have to hire someone that knows what they’re doing can do it affordably and knows how to do it for our industry. Specifically, things like how do you hire the best real estate agent? Well, tens of thousands of them all over the country. I mean, you have to whittle it down and maybe go through four or five and until you find the right one.

    00:32:29:18 – 00:32:32:11

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah, for the most part, that’s kind of how it is.

    00:32:33:07 – 00:32:49:21

    Brady Winder

    That makes sense. So for context, for people listening, you’ve already got your on page. Now then your website has been dialed in for a while, so most of the money you’re spending is going to backlink building to further increase your Holger SEO rankings. Who’s doing it? Who’s handling your SEO right now?

    00:32:51:03 – 00:32:56:16

    Mike Otranto

    The guys that I met at Carrot Camp, so SEO meets real estate investing.

    00:32:57:08 – 00:33:02:16

    Brady Winder

    So yeah, yeah. Facebook group. Go to Facebook search, SEO meets real estate investing.

    00:33:03:03 – 00:33:03:06

    Mike Otranto

    Yeah.

    00:33:03:15 – 00:33:05:01

    Brady Winder

    We’ll link it up in the show notes. Yeah.

    00:33:05:08 – 00:33:10:05

    Mike Otranto

    That’s Keith Sansone and Andy Ecology. So they handle both on and off page for me.

    00:33:10:23 – 00:33:29:14

    Brady Winder

    Okay, awesome. I’m glad to hear they’re working for an awesome dudes really know their stuff. You can. I believe you could find Andy’s backlink building service in the current marketplace. So if you guys are a care member marketplace dot Care.com and these backlink service in there or you can look at the Facebook group and learn from Keith and Andy, we’re going to wrap this up here.

    00:33:29:14 – 00:33:45:21

    Brady Winder

    Anybody listening? If you want to dive deeper into SEO or if you missed our episodes earlier in the month where we talk about the strategy of SEO and why you might want to get into it. And we’ve got like a ton of resources, all of our resources on SEO at Care.com slash SEO, and so you can go check it out there.

    00:33:45:21 – 00:34:03:01

    Brady Winder

    Just dive down the rabbit hole with us if you have any questions, any comments, anything you’d like to hear on the podcast or if you have a question for myself or Mike, hit me up. Brady at Care.com, I love to hear from you and we’ll talk about it on our next podcast. Mike, anything else you want to address before we wrap it up here?

    00:34:03:02 – 00:34:04:06

    Brady Winder

    Any last final words?

    00:34:04:11 – 00:34:11:06

    Mike Otranto

    Sure. If anybody has any questions for me, you can reach me on my Instagram at Mike underscore otranto. I’d be happy to answer any questions.

    00:34:11:19 – 00:34:14:19

    Brady Winder

    Yes, and I’m sorry I forgot to ask. Yeah. Yes.

    00:34:15:19 – 00:34:18:03

    Mike Otranto

    Actually buying houses by what I post on my Instagram.

    00:34:18:21 – 00:34:49:08

    Brady Winder

    Yeah. And give Mike a backlink. So thank you for listening this episode. All right. Well, thank you, Mike. Appreciate the conversation. It’s been good. Everybody. Thank you for watching. Thank you for listening. And we’ll see you next week.

  • Study Shows Carrot Websites Dominate Rankings For “Sell My House Fast”…

    Study Shows Carrot Websites Dominate Rankings For “Sell My House Fast”…

    Do you know… SEO has 2x-3x higher conversion over other online marketing channels?

    If you’re in the market for the most motivated leads, look no further than SEO. Search engine optimization is a powerful tool that helps real estate agents and investors improve their online visibility and ranking in search engine results.

    The question is, who’s ranking/winning?

    We recently surveyed the top 225 markets in the United States to see which companies rank on the first page of Google for one of the most competitive search terms… “sell my house fast [insert city].”

    In fact, according to Google’s keyword planner, “sell my house fast [insert city]” was searched 12,100 times per month in the United States in 2022. That’s also a 50% increase over 2021.

    It’s no secret that ranking on the first page of Google is crucial for businesses that want to attract qualified leads and drive conversions. With so many companies vying for a top spot, we wanted to see which successfully achieved page-one rankings for this highly competitive search term.

    The results of our study were fascinating, and we’re excited to share them with you. Keep reading to discover which companies, including Carrot, came out on top and how they achieved such impressive results.

    The Results

    Carrot websites rank #1 for “sell my house fast” in 132 out of 225 cities

    Carrot websites ranked in the top 3 positions 382 times within the 225 markets

    That’s 98% more times than the nearest competitor

    See the full results of the study here.

    Top Two Performers… Carrot vs. Custom WordPress

    Carrot and custom WordPress sites are popular for building and hosting a website, but they offer different features, advanced tools, and pricing plans. Carrot is known for its user-friendly interface, performance, and affordable pricing, while WordPress offers a broader range of theme options for building a website.

    Both providers offer options to choose from and include basic SEO tools. Carrot is an excellent choice for a more hands-off and cost-effective solution. At the same time, custom WordPress sites are more suited for businesses with more time and budget to learn how to create and manage a website.

    Quick Comparison Chart…

    And Pricing Comparison Chart…

    Also… Carrot template’s mobile performance scores are 60.01% higher than custom WordPress sites we tested.

    Learn more about Carrot’s performance and how our members report a 7x higher lead-to-deal conversion and an increase of $13,932 profit per deal while gaining consistency and predictability in their online leads.

    Keith Sant… how he got to the top ranking in Seattle

    “That 3 leads per day training paid off! Yesterday was my first 5 organic lead day! 2 SEO leads 1 Google My business lead, and 1 buyer lead. I’m so pumped and not slowing down.”

    Keith Sant, Seattle, Kind House Buyers

    Here’s how it looks… Google search “sell my house fast Seattle”… Carrot website ranking #1…

    Motivated seller lands on Kind House Buyers Carrot website…

    Organic SEO Leads grow…

    The importance of ranking first in search engine results and how it can benefit your business

    For several reasons, ranking first in search engine results can greatly benefit your real estate business. In a recent study, Backlinko reported the #1 result in Google has a CTR (click-through-rate) of 27.6%.

    CTR per Google Ranking 1-10

    Ranking first in search results can lead to an increase in traffic to a website. When users search for a particular keyword or phrase, the top-ranked results are typically the ones they click on first. As a result, a top-ranking can significantly increase the number of visitors to your website.

    Ranking #1 is significantly more valuable than any other position. The #1 result in Google has a 10x higher CTR than the #10 result.

    A #1 ranking can improve your website’s credibility and perceived authority. When a website ranks highly in search results, it can give the impression to users that your website is a reliable and trustworthy source of information. This can lead to an increase in the credibility of your website and the services you offer.

    Finally, ranking in the top 3 in search results can increase your business’s revenue. If your website can attract more qualified visitors as a result of its top ranking, it may be able to convert more of those visitors into deals. This can lead to a significant increase in revenue.

    Overall, ranking 1-3 in search results can significantly benefit your business, leading to increased traffic, improved credibility, and higher revenue.

    Ready to Learn More About SEO for Real Estate?

    Download our comprehensive keyword bible now and optimize your online presence for maximum visibility and success!

    SEO keyword Bible Cover

    The current state of competition

    The level of competition for top rankings in search engines can vary significantly depending on the market and the targeted keywords. In general, however, there is often high competition for top rankings in search results as investors and agents strive to attract as much traffic as possible from search engines, especially Google.

    There are a few factors that can influence the level of competition for top rankings in search engines:

    Market: Some markets are naturally more competitive in search engine rankings due to the higher demand for buyers or sellers. The real estate industry tends to be highly competitive regarding search engine rankings.

    Keyword difficulty: The difficulty of ranking for a particular keyword can also affect the level of competition. Keywords that are highly specific and have low search volume are usually less competitive, while more general and high-volume keywords are often more competitive.

    The number of competitors: The number of competitors targeting the same keywords can also impact the level of competition. If there are a large number of websites competing for the same keywords, it can be more challenging to achieve top rankings.

    Overall, the level of competition for top rankings in search engines can vary greatly depending on the market and keywords being targeted. It is important for businesses to carefully research their competition to determine the best strategies for achieving top rankings.

    Strategies for increasing number one rankings

    Several strategies can be used to increase the chances of ranking first in search results:

    On-page optimization: On-page optimization refers to optimizing individual pages to rank higher and earn more relevant traffic in search engines. This includes optimizing the content and HTML source code of a page. On-page optimization can include techniques such as using header tags, optimizing title tags and meta descriptions, and using internal linking.

    Off-page optimization: Off-page optimization refers to activities performed outside of a website to improve its search engine rankings. This can include building high-quality backlinks from other websites and promoting the website on social media and other online platforms.

    Content marketing: Creating and promoting high-quality, relevant content on a website can help to improve its search engine rankings. This can include blog posts, articles, videos, and other content relevant to the target audience.

    Link building: Building high-quality backlinks from other websites is another important factor in search engine rankings. These links act as “votes” of confidence in a website’s quality and can help improve its rankings.

    Technical SEO: Ensuring a website is technically optimized can also help to improve its search engine rankings. This can include optimizing the website’s loading speed, mobile responsiveness, and security.

    Overall, a combination of these strategies can help to improve the chances of ranking first in search results. To stay ahead of your competition, continually monitor and optimize a website’s search engine rankings.

    Ready to Learn More About SEO for Real Estate?

    Download our comprehensive keyword bible now and optimize your online presence for maximum visibility and success!

    SEO keyword Bible Cover

    The role of keyword research

    Keyword research is essential to ranking first in search results, as it helps determine which keywords and phrases are most likely to drive traffic to a website.

    There are a few key factors to consider when conducting keyword research:

    Relevance: Choosing keywords relevant to a website’s content is important. This will help ensure that the website attracts qualified, motivated visitors interested in your services.

    Search volume: Choosing keywords with a high search volume can help to increase the chances of ranking first in search results. Keywords with a high search volume are typically more competitive, but they can also drive more traffic to your website.

    Competition: The level of competition for a particular keyword can also be an important factor to consider. If a keyword has a high level of competition, it may be more difficult to achieve top rankings for that keyword.

    Several tools available can help with keyword research, such as Google’s Keyword Planner. These tools can provide data on the search volume and level of competition for different keywords, which can help determine which keywords to target.

    Overall, keyword research is an important step in ranking first in search results, as it helps identify the keywords most likely to drive traffic to your website.

    How Do You Get These Results?

    SEO takes work but is essential for real estate professionals looking to generate more qualified leads. By optimizing website content, real estate businesses can ensure they appear in the top search engine results. This is especially important when targeting hyper-competitive terms such as “sell my house fast [insert city],” where it’s even more critical for a business to be visible on the first page of search results.

    Doing so can increase lead generation by up to 2-3x or more compared to businesses without SEO optimization. With the right approach and strategy, you can use SEO to increase lead generation and build brand loyalty among your target markets.

    If you’re already a member, here are some resources to help you learn more about SEO:

    Other free SEO resources:

    If you’re not a Carrot member, join today!

  • EP 380: Fyre Fest & Adult Ent. Marketer Breaks Down Top Real Estate Marketing Channels w/ Martin & Lyne

    EP 380: Fyre Fest & Adult Ent. Marketer Breaks Down Top Real Estate Marketing Channels w/ Martin & Lyne


    About this episode:

    Do you want guerilla marketing ideas from one of the most creative real estate marketers? How about the 7 marketing channels crushing it for this wholesaling duo?

    Today, you get both. Martin & Lyn are among the top real estate investors in eastern Canada.

    We talk about how to market & stand out more creatively, for less money, from free marketing to TV ads, billboards, and more.

    If you missed part 1, make sure to listen to episode 378. What’d you think of this episode?

    Let me know at brady@carrot.com.

    Mentioned in this Episode: 

    Part 1: EP 378: Buyers List Hacks & JV Strategies for $650k in Profits

    Martin’s Instagram

    Lyne’s Instagram

    Meily Property Solutions Instagram

    Proofly.io for higher conversion

    Matterport for 3d photos of houses

    Mailchimp.com for cheap email automation

    About Martin & Lyn: Martin and Lyne are two Canadians that left their lives behind in Montreal to invest in New Brunswick full-time in March 2021 after witnessing the significant cash flow potential there.

    With an integrated marketing strategy to source leads, they have done over 40 off-market property acquisitions in just over a year, focusing on wholesaling, BRRRRs, and JVs.

    Now expanded to a team of 16 and has become one of the top producers of off-market opportunities on the east coast, they are working on building a 7-figure wholesale business. They are also working on leveling up their 40+ door portfolio to multi-family and commercial assets.


  • EP 378: Buyers List Hacks & JV Strategies for $650k in Profits w/ Wholesaling Duo Martin & Lyne

    EP 378: Buyers List Hacks & JV Strategies for $650k in Profits w/ Wholesaling Duo Martin & Lyne


    About this episode:

    This creative powerhouse of a couple is crushing it when building a sustainable investing business. Through their unconventional & creative methods, they’re very efficiently closing multiple deals a month. If you’re looking for better, faster ways to find serious buyers & joint venture partners that trust you, this episode is for you. I found their approach to the business refreshing. I hope you do too.

    What’d you think of this episode? Let me know at brady@carrot.com.

    Mentioned in this Episode:

    Martin’s Instagram: @ItsMartinMei

    Lyne’s Instagram: @LyneSaighi

    Meily Property Solutions Instagram: @MeilyPropertySolutions

    Proofly.io for higher conversion

    Matterport for 3d photos of houses

    Martin & Lyne’s Carrot website

    About Martin & Lyne: Martin and Lyne are two Canadians that left their lives behind in Montreal to invest in New Brunswick full-time in March 2021 after witnessing the significant cash flow potential there.

    With an integrated marketing strategy to source leads, they have done over 40 off-market property acquisitions in just over a year, focusing on wholesaling, BRRRRs, and JVs.

    Now expanded to a team of 16 and has become one of the top producers of off-market opportunities on the east coast, they are working on building a 7-figure wholesale business.

    They are also working on leveling up their 40+ door portfolio to multi-family and commercial assets.