Are You Positioned to Scale in 2021?
As we head into a new year, we’re also very likely heading into a different market. If we’re planning on scaling our businesses, we need to position ourselves for this market.
The investors who are going to win when the market shifts are the ones who have a solid foundation of marketing and follow up. They are the ones using this time to line up capital so they are ready to hit the ground running next year.
What market indicators do we need to be paying attention to? How do we avoid getting caught in a market implosion? In this episode, I talk about the strategies that will set you up for success in 2021.
The people who have continued to market in 2020 are more poised to scale in 2021 because they’ve owned mind space.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- If you want to have a lead flow, you need to be marketing consistently. You need to put the messaging out there that you buy houses, and that you sell to wholesalers.
- If you have access to money, you’re better situated for what’s coming in 2021.
- Avoid any deals that expose you to the risk of market implosion. Focus on building a stockpile of cash quickly.
Selling During the Holidays
The holiday season is a time when a lot of people dial back on revenue-generating opportunities because they don’t think there’ll be any business, but there are actually more investing opportunities now than at any other time in the year.
While everyone else has already settled in for the holiday break, we still have a lot of time left to work on our business goals.
What are some of the things we need to do during this time to maximize our opportunities? Why do many investors have their best month of business in December? In this episode, I talk about why we shouldn’t halt our business just because it’s the holidays.
This is the time to position yourself to come out strong in 2021.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- In December, a lot of people get busier with holiday activities, including our competition. Instead of dialing back, if we keep doing revenue-generating activities, we’ll actually capture more market share.
- To keep yourself motivated during the holiday season, focus on your vision for next year. What do you want to have accomplished by this time next year?
- A lot of people stop following up because they think they’d be bothering people by reaching out. Sellers still want to sell, and buyers are still looking for homes. People are going to do business with the people who stay in front of them and follow up.
You Deserve to Delegate
For many business owners, it’s difficult to replace ourselves in certain tasks in our businesses, but having too many things on our plates holds us back and keeps us from getting to the next level.
Delegating isn’t a luxury afforded only to a few leaders. It’s critical to our effectiveness and ability to keep growing our business.
As the owner of the company, you deserve to build the systems around you that take the pressure off. You deserve to have time and space to replenish and refresh your energy.
What are the benefits of delegating? How do we determine which tasks to delegate? In this clip, I talk about why delegation is something we should implement in all our businesses.
As the owner of a company, you’re worth more than doing the lowest value activities in your business.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- If a task is repetitive and mundane, we can document and delegate it. If it’s too difficult, time consuming and hard to document, we should try to eliminate it.
- We deserve the time and space that allows us to be creative and reflect on what will get our businesses to the next level. If we don’t delegate, we’ll never have the time and space to come up with these ideas.
- Instead of thinking about how to do something, change your mindset to finding who can do it. Think of how someone else can do a task more effectively than you can.
Why You Need to Join a Challenge
Achieving our goals comes down to saying yes to the things that matter, and no to anything that takes us off that path. That’s why we should actively seek structured challenges that focus our effort and attention. They help us implement the consistent action that makes our goals attainable.
Whether we want to improve our health or fine tune the things that matter in our businesses, challenges create accountability, structure and ultimately, momentum.
In our real estate investing business, follow-up most directly impacts our ability to close more deals. Committing to our follow up within a challenge can be just the thing our business needs to multiply our results.
How can we combine the power of challenges with the results we get from follow-up? What are the psychological benefits of challenges?
In this episode, I share why challenges are so necessary for entrepreneurs and The One Follow-Up Away Challenge.
Challenges have the unique ability to help us apply structured focus and energy to one thing.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- We don’t fail at your year-long goals in December. We fail right at the beginning of the year when we don’t commit to the daily actions and activities that make up that goal.
- The biggest thing we’re going to get from a challenge is the result that’s promised by following the steps, but there are always additional benefits to a challenge. Challenges
can improve our mindset, our health and our habits. - Consistent follow-up multiplies our ability to close more deals. The One Follow-Up Away Challenge will help you build an automated machine that ensures every lead you
pump into it is being touched until they are ready to do a deal.
One Thing Keeping Investors From Closing More Deals
When investors are so focused on the deal and the transaction, they skip a critical step, and create a barrier to closing the deal. They frequently miss the critical part in the process that will turn a seller lead into a transaction.
The conversation and the relationship aspect is the part we simply can’t skip. It’s the part that turns leads into deals and dollars.
How we approach and talk to the seller is the crucial part we must master. Sellers don’t want to be sold to or at, they want to be listened to and understood. They want investors to solve their pain points and genuinely care about them and their lives. That’s why being empathetic is one of the most powerful skills we can have in sales.
How do we find out what sellers really want so we can step in and help them? Why is listening the key to converting leads?
In this episode, I share 3 effective ways to communicate with and listen to the seller, and why that’s one of the most crucial parts of converting leads
If you listen to sellers, they will tell you exactly how to buy their house.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- The more we allow someone to talk about themselves and their situation, the more they get to know, like and trust you. That’s where the sale occurs.
- Develop and nurture the skill of listening to sellers. The more a seller talks, the more you’ll learn about them, the problem they have and how to step in and solve it by buying their home.
- Sellers will talk about the problem they want to solve if we ask them simple questions and leave room for them to open up. Ask simple questions, listen and that will allow them to open up and go deeper.
Team Spotlight – Pushkar Sharma
With over 15 years of experience in List Management, Analytics, Scoring Algorithms, and Database design, Pushkar brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to our team. He’s been a key contributor to our direct marketing engine which has mailed over 65 million pieces of direct mail with a continuous track record of 99.7% error free campaigns.
As part of our Member Services team, Pushkar’s primary role is working with members in a support capacity from getting their accounts set up to utilizing RealEstateInvestor.com’s technical services. With over 15 years of experience in List Management, Analytics, Scoring Algorithms, and Database design, Pushkar bridges the RealEstateInvestor.com system to our user members.
Pushkar, who has been with RealEstateInvestor.com since its inception in 2013, has been a key contributor to our direct marketing engine which has mailed over 65 million pieces of direct mail and has powered thousands of real estate entrepreneurs’ direct marketing. And with a continuous track record of 99.7% error free campaigns, it’s no wonder why RealEstateInvestor.com members rely on us to send their campaigns on time and within budget.
But there’s more to Pushkar than being a technical guru, and we were fortunate enough to have sat down with him one-on-one to learn more about who Pushkar is and what he does.
A Typical Day Behind The Scenes With Pushkar
Pushkar, who lives in New Delhi, India, works the night shift. With a time difference of over nine hours to the eastern coast of the US, Pushkar is ending his shift when most people are just starting their day.
His workday consists of fielding 50-60 tickets, or projects, which could vary from managing mailing lists to configuring marketing campaigns for members.
One of the best parts about working at RealEstateInvestor.com is the people. My coworkers and the leadership team, they all genuinely care about what they do. – Pushkar Sharma
Pushkar goes on to openly tell us how much he loves his job, noting that everyone has strong technical skills which has taught him many things over his 7 year tenure with us.
Working at RealEstateInvestor.com has really been fantastic. I work with very proficient people. They know how to handle things, how to resolve issues. And their technical skills are really strong. – Pushkar shares.
On Life Outside Of Work
Having a busy work week, Pushkar likes to keep his schedule open and not overly planned on his days off. He enjoys playing cricket, a popular sport in India, but since the Covid pandemic hit, games have been canceled and they’re unsure of when they might start back up. This has led Pushkar to pick up a new hobby that seems to be quite popular worldwide, especially during this pandemic— watching more television.
Pushkar, who lives with his wife, two daughters and a pet dog, has enjoyed watching international television, like movies in English, or more recently, a Russian web series. He tells us his family has also enjoyed the Food Channel, although neither he nor his wife have tried any of the new recipes, they certainly love imagining what it would taste like.
Besides sports or television shows, Pushkar considers himself a real history buff. He is fascinated by geography and how countries have changed over the years. He has studied various countries including the United States, Japan, and Germany. He also enjoys documentaries and biographies, seeing video as a tool for learning more about other cultures, traditions, and current events.
On Becoming A SuperHero
It’s not everyday that someone gets to become a SuperHero. Well, that is unless you’re teammates with an author who is writing a Science Fiction series.
Pushkar’s teammate Dave DuBois of RealEstateInvestor.com was inspired by the real life Pushkar and even added a character with his name in the Sci-Fi Series that he’s writing.
SuperHero Pushkar will debut in the sequel to Escape From Earth 1 that’s currently published on Amazon. In Escape From Earth 2, Pushkar will have the superpower of invisibility, a trait that the real Pushkar connects with since he often plays the silent hero behind the scenes saving our member’s days by making sure everything runs smoothly and without a hitch.
“I was creating a character for my second book that works behind the scenes. The character doesn’t like to draw attention to himself, but has a good attitude and gets a wide variety of jobs done and is really good at his work. It reminded me of Pushkar, so I named the character after him. (The fact that the character is also an assassin is where their similarities stop.) I’ve really enjoyed working with Pushkar for the last two years and I appreciate his commitment to our members.” Dave DuBois shares about why he was inspired to write his coworker into his fiction series.
We couldn’t agree with Dave more!
Where will Pushkar be in 5-10 years?
According to Pushkar his future career sights include continuing to advance in his role with us at RealEstateInvestor.com. That is, unless he decides to take up being a SuperHero full time. He also hopes to get the opportunity to travel again with his family, and maybe even make a few of those delicious dishes he sees on his favorite cooking shows!
A Giant Thank You To The Not So Invisible Pushkar!
Even though Pushkar’s behind-the-scenes role may be invisible to the outside world, it is very much visible and appreciated by all of us in the RealEstateInvestor.com family. We’re grateful to have such an incredible team member like Pushkar as a tenured part of our global family.
Thank you Pushkar for allowing us to put you in the spotlight today!
Jay Berkeley & Wayne Hershberger
Meet our RealEstateInvestor.com members Jay and Wayne who are finding great success in real estate despite the fact that they’ve only known each other for a year. With a massive age gap and completely different entrepreneurial styles, this unlikely duo knows the secret ingredients behind building a successful partnership. Find out what those ingredients are and how they plan to leverage our Done-For-You services and what they’re learning in our REInvent Coaching Program to help them hit their impressive goal of $1 Million in revenue by March of 2021.
Jay Berkeley and Wayne Hershberger met about a year ago when Jay was teaching an EOS Traction Meetup that Wayne happened to attend. While Jay joked that Wayne didn’t necessarily like his style of teaching that first day, the two still had a mutual respect for one another and quickly became friends.
When Jay stumbled upon a property for sale earlier this year, he reached out to Wayne and their journey of wholesale real estate investing began.
After closing a few deals and realizing the potential in their partnership, Jay and Wayne were ready to take the next steps in building a successful and sustainable business together. And following the EOS Traction model, they understood the next steps included getting those $10 per hour jobs off their plate. This meant they needed the right software and services in their corner, which led them to RealEstateInvestor.com.
Jay who considers himself the Integrator in the EOS Traction model, tells us their business grew exponentially after becoming members with us at RealEstateInvestor.com. While getting started with our Services Done-For-You was an investment, it no doubt paid off since they were able to close eight deals in just 60-days after their first direct mail campaign with us.
“RealEstateInvestor.com does a good job. Everyone is super helpful. Every investor should do this.” Jay Berkeley shares.
We’re All In The Relationship Business
Wayne, who grew up in an Amish community until he was twelve, tells us it’s all about consistency and focus. He admits that when he first began investing in real estate, he struggled with both. But this 24-year-old investor who bought his first property at the young age of 20, says he’s improved his consistency and focus, and finds satisfaction in helping people by solving their problems.
We couldn’t agree with Wayne more. Focus and consistency are important, but helping people is even more important for all real estate entrepreneurs, as well as for our team here at RealEstateInvestor.com.
Real estate investing is a relationship business. For Wayne, running his real estate business has allowed him to meet some great people and serve his community. In turn, Wayne feels he has improved himself, too.
“Improving ourselves every day so we can help the people we want to serve is our goal. We are putting a value out there in society and solving problems. We are doing that and we’re making money at it. We’re having fun, so it doesn’t seem like work.” – Wayne Hershberger
Wayne embodies the spirit of an entrepreneur who loves what he’s doing. We love being able to witness our members out there having fun and learning while simultaneously running solid businesses.
Let’s Talk About REInvent Coaching…
Both Jay and Wayne are members of our REInvent Coaching Program here at RealEstateInvestor.com. This program is designed to provide real estate entrepreneurs all the resources, tools and support to take their business to an entirely new level. Nothing like this coaching program exists in the real estate investment industry.
While this program has been gaining in popularity over the past several months, we’ve been working on an all new relaunch to help more entrepreneurs learn about REInvent. So when we saw Jay give multiple shout outs to our REInvent Coaches on social media over the past few months, we knew we wanted to ask him about his experience in the program.
Jay has a family legacy of EOS Traction Coaches, and he himself has taught many EOS courses himself. So hearing from him about our coaching program was extra special. Jay told us that hiring the coaches that could fast track his and Wayne’s business has paid off ten fold. Here’s some of the advice he shared for other members on the fence about joining our coaching program.
“If you invest in RealEstateInvestor.com for 3 months, invest $3,000 per month, and hire a coach for one quarter, I guarantee you’ll be wildly successful. But you need to do what they tell you to do.” Jay Berkeley says.
Sound advice from Jay here. If you’re willing to put in the time and effort, and follow the proven strategies you learn from our team and our coaches, there’s really not a lot of room for error when it comes to reaching your real estate goals. Jay and Wayne are proof of this.
The Importance Of Humility
Jay also wanted to add about one of the harder emotions entrepreneurs have to get over in order to benefit from coaching— Pride. Here’s what he shared on this common stumbling block:
“If you’re hungry for knowledge, that’s the key. You need to be humble enough to say I always need to be learning and growing. Hard work pays off.”
The Importance Of Mindset.
We also asked Jay and Wayne about any hurdles in entering the coaching program and one of the common hurdles mentioned was cost. Coaching does have a cost to it, but looking at it as an investment that fast tracks your business and can save you time and money in the long run is the way to go. But if you find yourself in a place where you have little to no money to start your business, Wayne suggests that sometimes you simply need to be creative.
Wayne, who mentioned that he’s made mistakes like most entrepreneurs early on in his investing career and admits he was broke at one point, tells us it’s all about your mindset when it comes to your current situation and your future. Instead of focusing on your failures, learn from them. Invest in yourself—read, listen to webinars, and attend seminars when they open back up. Do what you’ve got to do to show up for yourself and make your goals into realities.
“If you’re not winning, you’re learning. If you’re flat out broke, you should focus on investing in yourself.” – Wayne Hershberger shares when talking about mindset and investing in your dreams and your training.
We couldn’t agree more Wayne!
The Importance Of Setting Goals That Make You Stretch
Constant learning and growing are important to both Jay and Wayne who believe that hard work pays off. It’s one of the reasons this duo set a lofty goal of hitting that $1 million revenue mark in the next six months. Some could say this is too high of a goal, but Wayne begs to differ…
When Jay mentioned in passing that he has a friend who has a goal of becoming a millionaire by age 30, Wayne upped that challenge, setting the goal to achieve $1 million before his 25th birthday next spring.
Is this goal even achievable?
Of course! If they work really hard and go after it just as hard. Something that Jay and Wayne are ready to do.
Wayne even has a visual motivator—a board with all his offers on display. With an average of 5-10 offers made each day, we can see how the duo has been able to close so many deals regularly and how this could snowball into that 7-figure mark easily.
The Keys and The Map To Success
Jay, who spent decades training entrepreneurs, feels there are four keys to achieving these lofty goals. These keys include setting up the right Visionary (Wayne), the right Integrator (Jay), the right coaching strategy (EOS Traction and REInvent Coaching Program), and of course, the RealEstateInvestor.com system. With the right map, Jay says it’s impossible to fail.
“Coach Wilts (from the REInvent Coaching Program) has all the rocks there. That’s the map to success. You cannot fail if you follow it.” – Jay Berkeley
Putting people in the right seats and scaling their business with technology, is why Jay and Wayne have seen the success they have in such a short time. And if this is only the beginning of that success, imagine where they’ll be in a year or five years from now…
Speaking of…
What Does The Future Hold?
For now, this successful team enjoys what they are doing and Jay and Wayne have found the wholesale business to not only be rewarding but also fulfilling.
Does that mean they will limit themselves to only wholesale?
Of course not.
While Wayne has owned rental units in the past, being a landlord isn’t always easy—or perhaps a good fit for him. But if the right opportunity arises, they will consider it. They enjoy chasing after challenges and achieving lofty goals. So at this point, anything’s game for their future.
The Personal Side Of This Duo
Real estate investing allows Jay and Wayne to live the lives they always wanted.
For Wayne, who loves the outdoors, this means he can take adventurous trips to Colorado like he has planned this summer.
Jay, who married his high school sweetheart, enjoys quiet evenings at home or relaxing on a beach. But most importantly, as a Christian, he wants to be of service to his community.
“Our reward is on the other side. Everything else falls in line.” Jay Berkeley shaes.
A Huge Thank You To Jay and Wayne!
Real estate has been a vessel that’s allowing both Jay and Wayne to do what they love doing, enjoy the hobbies that make them happy, all while making sure they both remain challenged and allowing them to be of service to others.
We’re grateful to have Jay and Wayne as Members here at RealEstateInvestor.com. We can’t wait to check back in with them in March of next year to write a follow up spotlight about how they met their goal head on!
75 Hard and Setting Short Term Goals
The biggest reason we fail to achieve our goals is a disconnect between our long-term vision and the small actions that will get us there. We’re often so focused on the future that we overlook what we need to do in the present.
If we don’t have a plan that governs what we do daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly, it’s hard to create any meaningful momentum. The short-term is what sets the pace and accumulates the results that will get us to our super long-term goals.
75 hard is a system that can catapult us in the moment and create the path to our long-term future. It allows us to focus on the smaller sprints that will help us run the entire marathon.
What is the first step we need to take if we want to achieve our goals? How do we determine the smaller things we need to do consistently if we want to create long-term momentum? In this episode, I share a method we can use to govern our goal setting and priorities in order to achieve our bigger goals.
Most people fail at their short-term goals because they are so focused on the long-term goal. They forget about the little boring details they have to do every day.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- Your big goal should be something that stretches your ability and makes you a bit uncomfortable. It should go beyond the abilities you have now, and require you to improve yourself to get there.
- Don’t set a long term goal that’s really a disguised short term goal. Define your big goal and then set short-term milestones that fit into the bigger vision. This approach builds the foundational momentum.
- Honestly evaluate where you are right now, so that you are clear on what your big vision is and the smaller benchmarks you need to achieve to get there.
Resources Mentioned
The One Thing
12-Week Year
90-Day Year
Understand the New Google Ads Policy Update Before It Impacts Your Real Estate Campaign
Last month, Google announced a planned update to their Personalized Advertising Policies specific to Housing, Employment, and Credit ads, effective October 19th, 2020.
Google’s new policies will affect real estate entrepreneurs that target their ad campaigns using demographics that may be interpreted as biased. While Google’s official announcement doesn’t detail all limitations, their notification suggests the elimination of exclusions for gender, age, and marital or parental status, as well as zip code.
According to Google, these changes are intended to improve inclusivity for users affected by societal biases.
“In an effort to improve inclusivity for users disproportionately affected by societal biases; housing, employment, and credit products or services can no longer be targeted to audiences based on gender, age, parental status, marital status, or ZIP code.” – Google Support’s update to Personalized Advertising Policies posted August, 2020.
Google pointed out examples which included housing listing sites, individual houses for sale or rent, and real estate services, as sectors expected to be impacted by their upcoming changes.
Expected Changes Include:
- Targeting specific zip codes will no longer be available
- Excluding specific zip codes will no longer be available
- Excluding specific demographics will no longer be available
Following the October 19th, 2020 update, advertisers will be required to comply with Google’s new policies.
Real estate entrepreneurs that used zip codes, among other filters to target their advertising campaigns must agree to comply with Google’s new update before creating any new ads. Additionally, existing campaigns using the newly restricted targeted criteria must be modified before advertisers can place ads.
What Should You Do Next?
Since this is a fairly new policy, advertisers using the selected criteria may consider making these changes as quickly as possible to modify their existing campaigns to be in compliance with Google’s new rules.
Since criteria used in the past may no longer be available, advertisers should look at alternatives when targeting their audience.
Instead of using specific zip codes or excluding them, marketers suggest considering regions such as state, county, town or city. To further filter your targeted audience, consider other criteria that represent your demographics but are not societal biased.
Marketers suggest updating ad copy to include negative keywords that would limit your ads to desired groups. They also suggest utilizing ad extensions to better communicate your product or service. Images or niche copy may help.
While it isn’t clear if some criteria, such as income levels, will be excluded, creatively revising your campaigns would help minimize the impact of this new policy and target your desired audience.
Now’s the time to develop a strategic plan so your ad campaigns don’t skip a beat.
Need Help With Your Campaign?
If you need help finding more leads, ask us how we can help you drum up more business. We have a suite of solutions that are made to solve everyday problems real estate entrepreneurs like you might have. Learn more about our solutions at RealEstateInvestor.com.
If You Do Nothing Else in Your Follow Up, Do This
As with any form of sales, follow up is absolutely the most critical element. While it’s important to have variety in our follow up methods – there’s one that stands above the rest, and is also the most effective at connecting with people.
We must use the phone in our follow up, especially texting.
Texting is the most effective, efficient, and scalable follow up method; and it’s most likely to elicit a response from people. This is a part of the follow-up system that we simply can’t skip.
What makes texting such a powerful follow up tool? How can we build it into our marketing and outreach operations? In this episode, I share the one thing you should be doing in your follow up process.
The whole purpose of follow up is being there when they are ready. Until they know, like and trust you, they may not do business with you.
Robert Syfert
Watch the Full Episode Here:
Three Things We Learned
- Most deals are not done on the first contact. There should be multiple touch points included in our follow up sequence, including email, traditional mail, voicemail drops and text messages.
- Texting is a simple way to gauge where someone is and if they’re ready to sell. By contacting them regularly, they get to know, like and trust us.
- If we’re going to use text messages in our follow up, there has to be a consistent pattern of contact. Block out time in your schedule to make sure you’re always doing phone calls or voicemail drops. We can also hire someone to text for us.
