Today on the Listing Agent Lifestyle podcast, we're talking with my good friend and long, long, long time client Nanci Garnand.
Nanci is in Colorado, and she has a business that's almost exclusively based on her relationships with her clients, so we talked a lot about the equity of an after unit relationship in generating referrals and building relationships.
It was great to catch up with Nanci, and this is a really great episode to look into the depths of your after unit, and what that can mean for you in terms of where business comes from.
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Transcript: Listing Agent Lifestyle Ep117
Dean: Hello?
Nanci: Hello.
Dean: Nanci?
Nanci: It is, Dean. How are you?
Dean: Wow. I'm so good. I'm happy that you're here.
Nanci: I'm so sorry I'm late. Well, I had technical difficulties. So I had to reboot my phone.
Dean: No problem. That always happens, doesn't it? Right when you need it the most.
Nanci: I know, and I hate it. I may have to buy a new phone.
Dean: That's funny. So, where are you quarantining?
Nanci: Where am I what?
Dean: Where are you quarantining? Are you in Colorado? You have to quarantine. You actually had corona, didn't you?
Nanci: I actually had corona.
Dean: And survived.
Nanci: Oh yeah. Yeah. It was a miserable week.
Dean: I bet.
Nanci: But I was very lucky, because I had it when the rest of the area was quarantined. So I could work on the phone and the computer from home, and nobody knew the difference.
Dean: Wow. Really?
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: It's a serious thing.
Nanci: Very serious. Very serious.
Dean: Yeah. Have you ever been this sick?
Nanci: No.
Dean: No.
Nanci: No. And so when it comes to paying attention to it, I take it very seriously in protecting my buyers and sellers.
Dean: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Nanci: And I honor people's concerns. I have some friends who are still [inaudible 00:02:32] physically, and I have some that I now get hugs from.
Dean: Wow. There you go.
Nanci: They think I'm one of the safest people.
Dean: Yeah, right. You're the safest people. That's right. And you're a hugger. That works out. That's what got you in trouble in the first place, probably.
Nanci: Well, maybe. Maybe not. I don't know if it was traveling or the hockey game, or social event or what it was.
Dean: Wow. Well, there you go. Well, I'm happy that you are on this side of it. But that's not why you showed up today, to talk about your COVID experience.
Nanci: No.
Dean: You've got another agenda, don't you?
Nanci: I do. I want to say thank you to you for getting us going with those instant open house videos years ago.
Dean: Oh, good. Well, tell me what's been happening?
Nanci: Well, the state actually does not allow open houses, and so we've brought back instant open house, calling it an online showing. We've changed a few things to try to make it more safe for the sellers, and videos and all this other stuff is changed out. So we have our front page with a... And I love Zoom. So, the first recording inviting people into the home is with a Zoom using a background picture of the house that we're promoting. So, that was pretty exciting. Yeah, yeah. And that one is just a short little video inviting people in. We have a little bit of information along the bottom. The CRM works beautifully to present it too, by the way. And then we invite people in, and then the back page of what they see right there is the video. Now, then we email them and we start to drip emails.
But what happened to us on a specific one is I listed the house, and then the people had the carpets cleaned after we had listed it. So no showings that day. Well, of course, that's when an agent wants to show it. So I'm on phone with the agent, and I said, "We can get you into the house with a video. A real, true walking you through video so they can see the house." She said, "Well, I don't want to give you their name and email address." I said, "Don't worry about it. Put in your name, your email address, and we'll let you in. Then we'll send you the email with the video, and you can share that with them."
Dean: Okay. That's perfect.
Nanci: Yeah. So they watched the video, and then they set up a showing for later the next day when they could, so we'd already had their offer.
Dean: Wow.
Nanci: So, it was really nice to have them see the house knowing that we already had the offer, and how we were going to progress.
Dean: Right. I just think wow, that's such an amazing thing when now you can... I think this is going to fundamentally change the way that we show homes and stuff. I think that this is going to be a normal, now that people are going to be willing to gather virtually to go and look at homes. That you're sharing your screen kind of thing. Let's go look at this one and do these virtual walkthroughs to narrow it now. And then really, only go and look at the ones that are on the absolute final list, that you really need to go out and just see it in person.
Nanci: Absolutely.
Dean: It's pretty amazing, actually. Think of the time efficiency of that for everybody.
Nanci: Exactly.
Dean: Yeah.
Nanci: What makes me laugh is how leading edge you are. Because doing this 10 years ago or whenever you brought it up, people would watch it. But I really didn't know that they were watching it over and over and over again.
Dean: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Isn't that something?
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: I think that's the thing now, when you really think about this is making it so that... Because it's really just saving people the most. Imagine how many homes you could go and look at in a 30 minute virtual showing appointment, where you could meet with them and then go through. If everybody, it becomes the norm that because of this everybody's doing these walkthrough tours, it's going to be an amazing outcome.
Nanci: Right now, they're calling the virtual tours just the photos stitched together.
Dean: Right, exactly. No, that's not the same.
Nanci: It's a waste of time.
Dean: Right, right, right.
Nanci: No. They actually need to do the videos and as they're showing the house to a buyer. So, it's actually framing real estate agents to say, "Here's this. Here's that." Help people visualize things we should be doing with them anyway, when we're physically showing a house.
Dean: Yes. I think that's awesome. That way then, with all the things that somebody could, all that time saved. I think it's exciting.
Nanci: It is.
Dean: Yeah. Virtual for you don't want to go out. It just seems so inefficient to now drive all that distance in between the homes when they could eliminate something before even going to look at it.
Nanci: Well, but the other part is they need to know their neighborhoods that they want to be in, too.
Dean: Right. Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Nanci: So there's a lot of value in people doing their own research, because people want to do their own research and checking out the neighborhoods or watching the video and then driving through the neighborhood, talking to neighbors if they can find any. You can tell that we approach things a little differently.
Dean: When you think about the progression that a buyer goes through. I had this realization when I first put together my guide to Halton Hills, which was giving people the lay of the land of what you get in Halton Hills for your money because that's what people need to know first. But I think if you look at the narrowing of the decision, they start with the city or the town. Where are we going to be? And then go down through the neighborhoods, and then to the type of homes that are available in that neighborhood, and then the street and the exterior of the house. All of that stuff has to be right, before even the inside matters. When you really look at it, if the inside is great, if it's not on the right street or on the right neighborhood, or on the right area, that's going to be a non-starter. So it's exciting if you can naturally go the way that people start, especially if you're in an area where I think that Colorado's going to win in this, in terms of the net moving into Colorado as opposed to moving out of Colorado, probably.
Nanci: I think you're right.
Dean: I don't know that to be true, but I think it's like Florida is poised right now, it's going to grow by six million people over the '20s here. We're growing by a city the size of Orlando every year. That's pretty interesting, when you think about it.
Nanci: Well, and COVID probably helps if it really doesn't do as well in heated areas and warmer climates.
Dean: I hope that's true. I hope that's true.
Nanci: I know you do.
Dean: Yeah. Well, good. So tell me what's on your mind today for what we can focus on?
Nanci: Man. So, I'm going back to what you've always said Dean, is taking a look at what's going to stay the same. And I was on a phone call earlier today where I was corrected, not harshly, but refocused on saying it's not social distancing. It's physical distancing.
Dean: Yeah, yeah. Right.
Nanci: We need the social. It's how do we physically distance, and stay safe?
Dean: Yes, exactly.
Nanci: I think this experience, it's repeated every 100 years, but I think this one's going to stay with us a little bit longer.
Dean: Well, I saw a restaurant or a bar somewhere that was... You know how toddlers have those little bouncy things that support them? But they're on wheels, and it's a round thing that they can move around. Almost like, imagine a six foot picnic table with a hole in the center of it that has wheels that you can wheel around, but it keeps you in a six foot radius. Well, this bar had those for things so that you could get in this and then you can't get closer than six feet to somebody because it's a six foot radius all around you. Almost like a bumper car situation. That's pretty innovative, pretty funny.
Nanci: Yeah. Yeah. I'm just visualizing that. I went to a swimming pool where you have the outdoor bar area, but the six foot thing is a whole new way to think.
Dean: Yeah, it's a pretty interesting thing. It'd be like wearing one of those at the swimming pool, the rescue rings that they throw out to people. The floaty thing. Imagine a six foot diameter one that you just are constantly in the center of, so that you have a bumper barrier around you that nobody can get closer than that three feet or six feet or whatever.
Nanci: I'm already trying to break that. How can I get so I can get touch?
Dean: That's funny. Well, you'll have your immunization certification.
Nanci: Yeah. I haven't checked even on getting my antibody test yet, which I need to put on my list to do.
Dean: Yeah.
Nanci: Yeah. Yeah. What else is going to? We get people into the system. Those videos, those YouTube videos are actually not open for anyone to look. They have to have the link. We're not making...
Dean: You can make them unlisted. Yeah.
Nanci: Unlisted, yeah. I always forget if it's unlisted or private.
Dean: Yeah. Unlisted, so that they can't search them, and you can make it so that anybody with the link and watch the video. That way, you can embed them in the page, and I think creating that page around it, just like we have, so that you can position it there. I think that's really, certainly fits in with our listing multipliers, of ways to multiply your listings. You're still able to do that. What's working for you right now, overall? How is your, if we were to go through the elements, the Listing Aging Lifestyle elements, how is your getting listings through right now, where are you on that stage right now?
Nanci: The getting listings, for me, basically just the referral aspect.
Dean: Okay, so that's your primary focus, is getting referrals?
Nanci: Through my client base.
Dean: Yes, perfect.
Nanci: We're doing some farming in the areas, and I'm dropping the ball, because we're getting the letters. Great, I'm sending out the mailings, but I don't reach out of call and do that nurturing that I need to do, if that makes sense. So, that's where I'm working on getting help with new agents, and training them so they get to learn the seven steps directly, as we're working through those.
Dean: Have you got, how much of your focus right now is on your personal business, versus your theme? Are you running a brokerage now, or what's the situation?
Nanci: So, I did make a change of real estate companies, and I'm with a new company that's been in existence. Started in San Diego. They actually started another real estate company, and that real estate company got greedy, so they left that and then they started this one, and it's called Sentury, with an S, Residential. They're military folks, and they focus on servicing people who have served, and service people, military. It's wonderful. They have a heart.
Dean: But they've been in Fort Collins, right?
Nanci: Well, it's throughout Colorado, and then we have our veteran's hospital is actually in Wyoming, but they're going to put a 14 acre campus in Loveland. Our veterans have been underserved, and we give a lot of lip service to servicing them, but we don't necessarily fully do what we need to do to give back to the commitment, and the contributions they've made to us. That same service that we've been trained to do for our clients in general needs to be given to our service people in particular.
Dean: Yeah. So what are you doing about that, then? How is that? How are you making that happen?
Nanci: Well, the first thing that I have done, which is interesting, is interview my dad, who is still alive. He served in World War II. He was in Germany, and he said it was miserable. It was cold, you had those wool Army blankets, you didn't have enough. You were always cold and hungry. He was going to be sent to the Philippines, and then to Japan, and they dropped the atom bomb. Now the atom bomb, of course is a horrible thing to have happened, but the key with it is, it saved lives, millions of lives. And so, we hope we never have to use anything. We hope we never go through anything like that again.
Dean: No, exactly.
Nanci: But learning about his being an Army grunt, because I've never heard of those terms before, in the Blackhawk division, and then the other military people. It's being, when you are involved with something, it makes you more aware. It's like an advertising thing. You can hear it seven times, 10 times, whatever, but you don't pay attention until you finally have a reason.
Dean: Yeah, that's true, because we're all going through our own, filtering everything through our own lens. Yep.
Nanci: Yeah. So, Sylvan Dale Ranch in Loveland has started the Heart-J Learning Center, and they have a thing for veterans to get together and work through the PS, I don't say this right, but the PT...
Dean: SD?
Nanci: SD, thank you.
Dean: Posttraumatic stress disorder, right?
Nanci: Posttraumatic, exactly. And they did a songwriters for veterans, and I was a sponsor of that.
Dean: Wow.
Nanci: And one couple was amazing, Dean. Oh my gosh. They're both military, and they had to sleep on opposite sides of their house because of night terrors.
Dean: Oh my goodness.
Nanci: And it just gives me chills even just to still think about this, that it was that devastating. They both were there. They ended up working with the same songwriter, and he did his song first, and then the songwriter was working with her, and he said, "What do you want to work on?" And she goes, "Well, our songs are going to be similar." He says, "Well, how do you know that?" "Well, you've been married for 50 years." The next year, when I saw them, they were able to sleep in the same room.
Dean: Wow, amazing.
Nanci: So, that's the kind of work that's going on to help people adjust, and deal with some other stuff. The Housing Authority has some housing that are designated for veterans, and so all of these little things are starting to happen, but there's not a huge focus on it that there needs to be.
Dean: And that's, you're saying that a lot of the things you're describing, you are just being of service, and you're helping.
Nanci: Correct.
Dean: In people, in that your business is growing just as a byproduct of that. That kind of work.
Nanci: It is.
Dean: Through that, you're meeting people. Do you remember Glenn McQueenie? We helped him do a book called The McQueenie Method, and The McQueenie Method is about being you, doing what you do.
Nanci: Absolutely.
Dean: And being of service and in communication with people, and that's going to yield a business for you, as well. More than even sometimes just going out to seek out a business.
Nanci: Absolutely.
Dean: Do you measure your return on relationship? Do you ever go that far, or do you just serve when people come, and not really measure it, or do things like that?
Nanci: I don't quantify it.
Dean: Right.
Nanci: But here, for me, what I find is that I have to create events to bring people together, because I'm wealthy with friendships and relationships, and people that care about me, and people that I care about. I'm going to change just a tad. My sister and I taught quite a bit, and one of the things she asked me around the holidays is, when am I going to retire? I was heartbroken, absolutely heartbroken. Why would she want me to retire from the thing I love doing?
Dean: Right, exactly.
Nanci: But then I understood, yes, she was talking about a job.
Dean: Yes, exactly. Isn't that funny? Dan Sullivan and I talk about that all the time. Dan now is 76 years old, but he's still, now he's in a new, 25 year plan. But he's at the very top of his game right now, at 75. He's more engaged than ever. We've been doing the Joy of Procrastination podcast for three years, which we're now going to switch to refocusing it on a podcast called Welcome to Cloudlandia.
Nanci: Oh, sweet.
Dean: Where we focus on all of the migration into Cloudlandia, of big things that are going to shape the next 25 years. Cloudlandia is where it's all happening.
Nanci: It is, yeah.
Dean: Yeah. I think you're absolutely right. When you're doing what you love, when you're doing something that's natural, why would anybody ever think of retiring? You're right.
Nanci: Right, and you're absolutely correct, is there is abundance.
Dean: Yes.
Nanci: And so the question of what you do with that abundance talks about how you're taking care of people. So, with the abundance, that's one of the reasons I have those estate agents to help train, who can actually show a house if I'm not available, and it becomes about my client, not about me. They can get what they want, when they need it.
Dean: Yes. So now, tell me about the agents, or the structure of what you're building there. You're building the traditional brokerage, or a team, or what does that look like?
Nanci: Thank you, Dean. I appreciate talking about this. It's all about helping people grow into their unique abilities. So, I have a support team. I have a transaction coordinator, and she also helps with training and going through the contracts. I have a marketing person who actually helps us with our newsletters, our marketing lead generation, we're always learning something new. We're learning when we got something, and then reviewing it, and go back in and checking to maybe, now is the time to bring it back. And then we have myself, and I have three agents that are working with me, but they're their own agencies. They're not underneath my license.
Dean: I got you, okay.
Nanci: They have my license, that we are a team.
Dean: I got you. So, you're just sharing or providing the support services for it.
Nanci: Right, and the training.
Dean: And they're running their own business kind of thing, right?
Nanci: Yep, and we're helping push each other, because to me, a team is when you're together as a team, can do more than anyone can do as an individual.
Dean: Do you know what helps push people?
Nanci: No.
Dean: Metrics, a scorecard.
Nanci: Okay.
Dean: That if you're looking at it, that part of this thing, and I know that either when I look at it, this is what when we look at the listing agent lifestyle elements, all of them come with a metric attached to it, really. We look at, you're very after unit focused, right? And so, getting referrals is a primary focus of your business. When you look at it, the way that we measure that, so that everybody can be on the same page is with your return on relationship. If we look at how many people, and we talk about your top 150, have the benchmark of this, how many people are you in communication with as your -. Are you back?
Nanci: I'm back.
Dean: Okay.
Nanci: Thank you.
Dean: Where did you lose me?
Nanci: Return on relationship.
Dean: Okay, so in your return on relationship, the metric you start with your top 150, and we say our gold standard is to manage that relationship portfolio for a 20% annual yield, which means that you should be able to generate 30 repeat or referral transactions from that group of 150. Now, you may have more people than 150. How many people do you have in your relationship portfolio there, that you're managing in your after unit?
Nanci: I do about 500.
Dean: Okay. So, out of those 500, there's, I know that you don't have a relationship with those 500 people. If we were to go out...
Nanci: That's correct.
Dean: Yeah. If we were to look at a printout of them, and highlight the ones that, if you saw them at the grocery store, you'd recognize them by name, and have a conversation with them, it would probably be closer to 150, right? That's what we're capable of managing. You can know, you can recognize more than 150 people. If we showed you their picture and your name, you can say, "Oh yeah, I know them." And you can recall them, but you may not have a relationship with them, if you ran in them in the street.
Nanci: Dean, when I turned 60, which was just five years ago, I had 160 friends, everybody that I knew at my birthday party.
Dean: Perfect. That's great. That's what we're talking about, those are the group.
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: But anyway, let's say you've got those 500. Now, because you've been in business a long time, there's a lot of relationships, a lot of people that you helped, and a lot of people that have come across your tasks, so you've collected 500 of them. Then how many transactions, as a result of those 500 people? Meaning-.
Nanci: Well, you're exactly right. A lot of those transactions were a one-time deal.
Dean: Yeah, but I'm saying in the last 12 months. If we look at just your after unit, one of the things of having that common metric is that we measure it against 150, no matter what.
Nanci: Yes.
Dean: Whether you've got 100, or whether you've got 500, the measurement we use is against 150.
Nanci: Absolutely.
Dean: To get the percentage, right?
Nanci: Absolutely.
Dean: So, do you have a sense of what your return on relationship is? Metric-wise.
Nanci: No, and selfishly, the reason I don't count it is because I just enjoy it.
Dean: Yes. I get it. But part of the thing of being a leader, and communicating and helping your team and stuff is to have some sort of guideline for people, right?
Nanci: You start to see it, absolutely.
Dean: It's like you're just running around the soccer field, playing soccer just for fun, and not keeping score kind of thing, you know?
Nanci: Exactly.
Dean: Right. And so, that often can lead to a team, or an environment where that's what other people do. They run around the field, but they might not understand that the method or the way that you are running around the field. You're actually scoring, you're just not keeping score.
Nanci: Exactly.
Dean: Yeah. And so, that, because it can look effortless, what you're doing, and it can look like, "Oh, she's not really doing anything." But being able to help people in the best way, what did you do? If I'm in your top 500, what's my experience of that? What experience do I have of being in your top 500?
Nanci: So, that's changing. That's one of the reasons I moved to the TPC Golf Course in Colorado. I'm revising - look forward to is they never know what I'm going to do next, because we had an opera with an open house before, a perception before that. I've done different things, even a hockey game, and people, it always surprises me when I do something different, that people come out differently. Some people I haven't seen for a long time, but yet we're looking.
Dean: Hello?
Nanci: Hello. So, one of the disadvantages of moving to a rural area is that you don't always have good phone service or good wifi calling.
Dean: I can see that, yeah, but you have a fabulous golf course to fall back on.
Nanci: Fabulous golf, yes. Beautiful views of the Colorado Rockies, water. Yep.
Dean: You were talking about, we lost you. You were talking about your move to TPC. - were changing, you said.
Nanci: Thank you, yes. One of the things that I'm doing with moving out here is, I want to share it with people. So, you do get a discount to play golf with me here.
Dean: Wow. Noted.
Nanci: And what I'm also wanting to do is maybe treat someone, people who use my services to a round of golf, and referrals. I have to figure out how to make that right and fair, put in a consistent plan, because I don't want to do it and not make it right by people. But then I was also thinking that because...
Dean: Well that's one of the things. You talk about, part of this thing of, one of the things that I would do, because I love to play golf, too. The thing that I would do was, I would invite, if I knew that one of my clients was a golfer, when we were looking for homes, or selling our home or whatever, and keeping up with the relationship part of it, after the transaction, I would invite them to go play golf and let them, I would invite someone, and they could invite someone. I got to meet their friends, as well. It was a good way for us to, so I could either bring another client, or I could bring them with their client, and it was a nice, real, fun thing to do. I got to play golf, and I got to expand and meet people.
That was a cool way of being me, to grow my business. Sounds like that's a neat opportunity for you, as well.
Nanci: Well, this is helping me because this is giving me a framework to go, "Oh yeah, we need to include more people so that more people can have bragging rights, and share."
Dean: Yeah.
Nanci: Because when the course was restricted, I got people onto the course. We got to watch, but they only had to pay $75, and they bragged about it.
Dean: Right.
Nanci: That's exactly it. You want to have that word of mouth from people that you want to connect with.
Dean: Yes, and that's the kind of thing. Any time, this has been something I've been saying to people now about. It's really not so much about refer a friend, because bring a friend is so much more natural and exciting than refer a friend. And so, it's much easier to get someone to bring a friend to go play golf with you, at TPC, than it is to refer a friend to you. Right?
Nanci: Absolutely.
Dean: But they're the same thing.
Nanci: But you're getting to know the individual, and it's taking that fear out of, it's like the introduction and the referral.
Dean: Yeah.
Nanci: The referral has so much more commitment to it.
Dean: Yes, that's right. It's kind of an interesting thing. If I had, one of the things that thinking about things that you like to do, or doing it, because I know that you do like the social elements of things, right? Is to think through opportunities like that, like bringing, like everybody that closes with you this month is invited to come do something with you next month. It's almost like doing client events, but doing them smaller, and more consistently throughout the year kind of thing. You bring in some long-time clients. I'm more, I like doing things in smaller groups kind of thing than smaller groups.
Nanci: Well, you get to spend more time with people.
Dean: Right. I think I would enjoy more a dinner for six than a party for 600, you know?
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: Because that's where you can bond a little bit. If you started thinking about it that way, that you had some fun things that you could do, with mixing your friends with your new clients thing, or allowing them to bring a friend. It's an interesting way to think about it, you know?
Nanci: Well, it is. This is actually, your timing on this is wonderfully perfect. We have the golf, we have the dinner for the small groups. I can see people either to the clubhouse, or do something at my house and different things. I was thinking of Sunday brunches and birthdays.
Dean: That's nice, right? But if that's the thing, what if that was the thing, if you had a birthday brunch, a monthly, you start to think about that. You have a monthly birthday brunch, and all of your clients that have birthdays that month, you invite them to come to your house to do a birthday brunch.
Nanci: Exactly. Now, social distance physically is distancing.
Dean: No, I get it now.
Nanci: Changes that a little bit, so the other thing that I did is, if you look at my Facebook page, I have a fire pit in the backyard. I call it the Rocky Mountain Fire Pit, and we put chairs out, and we had six or seven sitting around that last night with a fire going. It's just flames, and you have the Colorado view, and it was just a pleasant evening that I can't wait to repeat.
Dean: Yeah, nice. I like that. That's the kind of thing, so you start to build some framework around these things, right? That you start to think, how can I?
Nanci: They need experiences.
Dean: Right, but then I think it's going to be important for you to add the element of keeping score. That's a good way, just for everybody.
Nanci: Please.
Dean: Well the reality is you don't need to. Part of it is, it's all there. You're just not acknowledging it, or counting it. It's there. You know all of your trade record sheets from the last 12 months, all the transactions that you've done are all on a matter of record. It's just looking and seeing, where did they come from customer because part of it is, that's going to start the process of acknowledging where it came from too, right?
Nanci: Exactly, yeah. Two-thirds of my business, I just took a look, is repeat and referral clients.
Dean: There you go. But that two-thirds, this is the problem with a number like two-thirds, is that it doesn't tell anybody how they're doing compared to you. In a way, not like, that doesn't tell me that this is, these things that you're doing are working better. That's where, if the standardizing of a metric, meaning that the number of transactions divided by your 150 people is a standardized way of getting a percentage of that, to know that it's 20% return on relationship. That way, somebody who is not just about the number of transactions, or the percentage relative to all the transactions that you've done. It's about the potential from that group of 150 people.
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: You know?
Nanci: So, looking at this year so far, only one client came to me through a phone call through postcards and doing listings. Of the 11 closings that I had, and I had eight while we were closed down through COVID, and all the changes and stuff. So, I feel very, very blessed. Only one of those, and most of those were double-sided.
Dean: Yeah.
Nanci: And so, that was even more special for me. But only one of those was a phone call, that came out much better by having reached out to me than if they had moved in the course they were moving.
Dean: That's great. I think that kind of thing, where all of these things that you're looking at, what kind of outbound communication would I get as being one of your top 500? Are you sending anything in the mail? Are you spending emails? Are you, birthday cards? What would be the editorial calendar, or the communication calendar that I would experience as one of your 500?
Nanci: Well, one of the things that's interesting for me is, birthdays were not part of my love language. So, I never collected them.
Dean: Perfect. Want to know a fun way to get everybody's birthday?
Nanci: Go ahead.
Dean: We can do it right while you're on the call even, is get your 500 together in your client touch, and send an email that says happy birthday.
Nanci: And when they send it back saying, "It's not my birthday, here's the date."
Dean: Exactly. Then you can play around with it, though. They say, "It's not my birthday." Then you go, "Are you sure?" That's the fun thing, to make them think that they might be wrong. Play along with it and say, "Are you sure it's not your birthday?" And they go, "No silly, my birthday is May 10th."
Nanci: Exactly.
Dean: And you say, "Okay, I'll tell you what. Tell your boss I said it's okay to take the rest of the day off, and get yourself a cake." Then you joke it off, that it becomes a fun kind of communication. That way, that's the funnest, easiest way to get people's birthdays, if you don't want to look them up on Facebook. It's a fun thing.
Nanci: And it is actually all about birthdays. It's all about recognizing people. We are so starving for someone to actually see us.
Dean: Yeah. I think that's funny. I'm going to actually do that, pick a group and send a little happy birthday email. It's fun though, to see what will happen, but I guarantee you that's exactly what happens. People go, "Thank you, but it's not my birthday."
Nanci: I'm actually doing a pretty good job of collecting birthdays, so I would probably tweak it just a little bit and say, "Happy birthday," but what you said was make it fun. Whatever you're doing, make it fun for them so that they want to engage with you.
Dean: Yes, that's the thing. Happy birthday.
Nanci: If it's not fun, why are you doing it?
Dean: Right. That's exactly right.
Nanci: Why don't you go get a job?
Dean: That's the fun thing, to reply with, "Are you sure?"
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: Are you sure that's your birthday? Yeah, that's funny.
Nanci: And I have actually got your birthday, Dean, so you should have had an email from me last month.
Dean: Wow. Very exciting. Happy birthday email.
Nanci: So, when are you going to be here, so you can be here for the birthday brunch?
Dean: Exactly. See, that would be, we've missed that. But those kind of things, when you looked at it. Would you look at that? There it is. Dean, happy birthday. I got my happy birthday email from you.
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: Very good.
Nanci: And I always set music in there. This one, it's not quite as obvious, but video, anytime you can put video in, or link, people, it gives them a little bit more. I always give them more.
Dean: Yes. All right, that's so true. Anyway, that whole thing of sending out and lock into place things that can be a system that would make it effortless for you to just enjoy. Wouldn't it be nice if your assistant, your support that you put in the system where you say, "Listen, I want to have a birthday brunch, but I don't want to do any more work than I would if I was a guest at this birthday brunch. I want to put on a birthday brunch like I'm a guest at a birthday brunch." That would be a really neat thing to just have that on your calendar, on the first or the middle Saturday of the month kind of thing, that you have a birthday brunch as the thing, and the list is all made up, and everybody in knows what to happen, how to invite people.
Nanci: Yeah.
Dean: Then the RSVPs happen, and you to show up, and there it is. The brunch is all laid out for you, and you just get to be the hostest with the mostest.
Nanci: I just get to enjoy everybody, and get to see them again.
Dean: Yeah. How great is that?
Nanci: It's awesome.
Dean: But that would be a wonderful thing to have happen. You know?
Nanci: Yes.
Dean: I love that idea.
Nanci: Me too.
Dean: Yeah. That's a cool thing, right? When you look at that, that way you celebrate once a month, that's a fun thing.
Nanci: It could be a dessert. It doesn't have to be a brunch. You personalize it, but you have to have the system in place.
Dean: Yes. I think that's a fun thing.
Nanci: You'll laugh at this. I'm actually already looking forward to wintertime, and having the fire pit outside in the backyard, during the winter on the ground. Now, that's not you.
Dean: Not for me. I'm 20 years into a snow-free millennium, so I'm hoping that continues.
Nanci: Exactly. So you can be here this summer for a little bit of golf.
Dean: I don't need any of that.
Nanci: No, you need the golf during the summer.
Dean: I think yeah, that's absolutely true. But I love all of the ideas that we're coming up with here, but what's your summary here? How's this help? Is there any last thing that you want to talk about before we wrap up?
Nanci: I think the key thing is for, especially we're real estate agents, is don't focus on, you have to have income coming in to meet your expenses in some way, but when you really give, and give from your heart to others, and do it correctly, it's the best care and advice you can have. You're going to be taken care of.
Dean: Agreed. And that's the fun thing. Yeah, and you've proven that. How long have you been in doing real estate this way now? How many years have you been in?
Nanci: 25 years.
Dean: 25 years, and we started working together, when?
Nanci: About 20 years ago.
Dean: I was going to say, 2000, right? Right at the beginning.
Nanci: Well, because I started with Joe Stearns in '95, '96.
Dean: Right, because that would've been when we met, right.
Nanci: That's when we met, and then you started your marketing programs and things, and I just followed you.
Dean: That's great. It's been a good ride.
Nanci: It's been a good ride.
Dean: I'm looking forward. I'd love to see these whole, I've found, I have journals. I started journaling in 1996, April of 1996. Right at the very first journal that I have is April of 1996, but I was looking through, as I often do, my old journals. One of the pages I found from 1998, looking at it, I'm going to read exactly what I said on there. I approached journaling with a question, usually. So, in August of 1998, August 24th, 1998, the question on my mind was, "What are you going to do about the Internet?" I'm not sure. It's becoming to the point where I really feel the need to get in there and get going. What stands out as opportunities, one was stopyourdivorce.com, which I just started because I had just written the book with Homer, and livinginwinterhaven.com was the next thing. Those two were the things that I dove into the Internet with, and they both worked out pretty well.
Nanci: Yes, they have.
Dean: Yeah, and now I think this is, the whole thing is I feel like that with Dan Sullivan, this whole focus of, I think now it's time to dive into Cloudlandia, because that's where everything is migrated, you know? That's definitely where we're headed. It's fun.
Nanci: It is, absolutely.
Dean: I always love talking with you, Nanci. It's always fun. I love hugging, but we can't hug.
Nanci: So, here's the phone hug.
Dean: That's exactly it. The long-distance phone hug.
Nanci: It's always a pleasure when I see you, I do believe we'll be able to see each other in February.
Dean: Yes, I believe so too. Absolutely, I'm counting on it. That was funny, because that was the last public gathering that we did, was our Double Agent Academy. Hopefully we will be back on track in February. Love it.
Nanci: Yeah. I do, too. What's interesting is that this has been very helpful, and it's actually helped giving me a lot of focus as I move forward into my new steps of joy and sharing.
Dean: I love it. Thank you, have a great day.
Nanci: I will, you too. Thank you.
Dean: And happy birthday.
Nanci: Thank you, appreciate it. Talk to you later.
Dean: Bye.
Nanci: Bye-bye.
Dean: And there we have it. Another great episode, and if you'd like to continue the conversation, you can go to listingagentlifestyle.com. You can download a copy of the Listing Aging Lifestyle book, the manifesto that shares everything that we're talking about here, and you can be a guest on the show if you'd like to talk about how we can build a Listing Aging Lifestyle plan for your business. Just click on the "be a guest" link at listingagentlifestyle.com, and if you'd like to join our community of people who are applying all of the things we talk about in the Listing Aging Lifestyle, come on over to gogoagent.com. It's where we've got all the programs, all the tools, everything you need to get listings, to multiply your listings, to get referrals, convert leads, and to find buyers. You can get a free, truly free, no credit card required trial for 30 days at gogoagent.com. So, come on over, and I will see you there.