February 12, 2025 • 53 mins
We know...it's not a particularly gripping topic to discuss, but it IS critical to master. What is it? Managing your time. And what is one of the most effective ways to do so? Tracking your time. Todd and Craig discuss the time tracking method to helping you become more efficient, and ultimately more effective in running your real estate media business.
Also, Craig is giving away another book on leadership. This week's book giveaway is "Impact: Releasing the Power of Influence" by Scott Wilson. Be the third person to message us in the Spiro Pink Chat Bubble in your Spiro Interface with a business question you have that you'd like to see talked about on the podcast, and the book is yours! Congrats to Gregory W. in California on winning last week's book by John Maxwell!
Chapter Timestamps:
0:00 Episode Open
02:48 Spiro Updates
05:42 Spiro Summit Discussion
08:54 Answering a Listener Question
16:26 Leadership Book Giveaway
19:03 Time Management & Tracking
50:59 Episode Wrap-up
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Coming up on this episodeof The Spiro podcast.
(00:04):
prioritizing your time
and your focus can just lead
to monumental change in your business.
Welcome to the Spiro Podcast.
Managing your real estate, photographyand videography business
with your hostsTodd Kivimaki and Craig Magrum.
(00:28):
Hi and welcome to the Spiro Podcast.
Managing your real estate, photographyand videography business.
Spiro is a software platform.
It's designed to help youmanage your day to day business.
Whether you're a small boutiquereal estate
photographer or a regional companyserving multiple markets, it's
designed to help you grow and scaleand manage your day to day business.
(00:49):
I'm Craig Magrum, host of the podcast.
Welcome back to those of youthat have watched or listened before.
If you're a first time viewer or listener,we welcome you.
The whole idea of this podcast,just to give you a quick
recap, is to helpyou build a strong business.
Lots of great resources out there.
On the creative side of what we doas real estate media professionals,
(01:10):
but we want to help you really builda strong business as well,
and we invest in you as a businessleader, a business owner.
So that's the gist of it here each weekto, help us dive into those topics,
our owner and founder of Spiroand co-host, Todd Kivimaki.
Welcome back, Todd.
Craig, it's fabulous to be here.
(01:31):
We've got a great week here.
We've got a few topics today,so this will be a round robin,
which will be fun.
And, you know,we had some great feedback from all you.
Thank you.That just means the world to us.
It's so great to hear from you all.
So please don't hesitate if you aresaying, hey, how do I contact you?
You can always leave a message,you know, down below,
(01:52):
if you're watching on YouTube,you can email us hello@spiro.media.
Also,if you are using Spiro for your software
for your business, you can join the SpiroSuper User Facebook group.
Jump in there.
There's a lot of great content,
a nice, rich community in there of peoplehelping people.
(02:14):
Not just about Spiro, but about realestate, business, photography questions.
So again, find us on on any of thosechannels, whatever works for you.
We love to hear from you.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
All right.
Well, we we started a new, featureto the podcast last week.
We are giving awayas long as it lasts in my collection.
(02:34):
Books on leadership and business ownershipand topics like that.
So we had a winner last week.We're going to get to that.
And we're going to announcethis week's book as well.
But before we do, Todd,
we always like to give some updates onwhat's happening with the Spiro software.
So what do we have this week?
Yes.
I'll echo what we gave last week.
(02:55):
We are working on how you can sell betterand more on the order page.
We're giving you a landingpage for your order pages
i.e. residential, commercial,
short term rentals or Airbnbs,whatever you like to call them.
Any other type of productsyou might be doing?
We hear about headshots.
We hear about your luxury video services,whatever you want to sell.
(03:18):
If you have an order page for it,you can advertise it on a landing page.
And that landing page can be the startof the ordering process for your clients
and then reviews.
Really excited about this one, Craig.
So how did you do on the shoot?
Were they happy? Were they not?
If they weren't happy, then we need togive them this type of messaging.
(03:42):
You're probably going to say,hey, call us, we'll fix it.
If they are happy,let's ask them for a Google, Facebook,
whatever reviewyou want to ask them for a review.
It's great. And yeah,try to get you those reviews.
You know,
we look at website traffic, we look athow we look at the top of the funnel.
A lot at Wow video tours, our real estatemedia company, we have a full sales team.
(04:03):
And we look at how we sell.
How do we sell over 12,000 a year and12,000 shoots a year and continue to grow?
Well, it's because we focus on it.
The podcast is going to go into
some of that today,but what you focus on will expand.
And how can you put more peopleinto the top of the funnel?
Well,we have to know what people are thinking
(04:26):
and when they think highly of us,let's get a review
so that they can influence others.
So some exciting things come up here.
We've got a list of other things as well,but those are the highlights.
At least that's what I'm excited about.
And that is comingthe first week of March 2025.
That's fantastic.
Reviews are huge, and,
(04:48):
word of mouth is is huge as well.
Just a quick testimony, Todd.
I picked up a soon to be new clientto us in my market,
and I was at a regional meetingfor this brokerage, and,
she reached out to me afterwards and said,I've just heard so many good things
about you and working withWow from other agents in this brokerage,
(05:10):
and I just wanted to connect.
And I said, great, let's let's do coffee.
I'd love to get to know you andyour business a little bit better. And,
so reviews are great.
Word of mouth is really powerful as well.
I mean, that was anthat was an easier job.
She reached out to me.
Wow. So, yeah, making those connectionsand building
those relationshipsjust pays off in in droves. So.
(05:33):
- All right.- It does.
All right, one more questionfor you, Todd, before we dive
into the book giveaway.
And then our main topic, the Spiro
summit that's been mentioned in a pastepisode or two.
What is the Spyro summitand who can attend?
Yes.
So the Spyro Summit right now
to be transparent with youall was just an idea we have,
(05:54):
and it's so great to hear fromyou all just through this podcast.
I mean, who thought Craig,you started this thing?
We've been doing it for a couple of yearsnow and
It's amazing.
Just the feedback and the responsesthat we get from you all and the love.
Thank you for that.
The thing
is, so right now, the short answer iswe do not have a summit planned.
(06:16):
We want to plan one,but we want to ask a question
before the question, okay.
We want to ask what you need,not just in a summit or a gathering.
there are events coming up.
There's conferences coming up in November.
Eli Jones has this planned.
It's the first or second week in November.
And then PMRE, I believe, is the thirdweek, third or fourth week in November.
(06:40):
And those are fabulous to go to.
You'll see myselfand the team at both of those.
Maybe Craig, this year.
But beyond that,
that's a time for community,for learning, for gathering.
But we understand thatthere might be a gap in what you need
throughout the year.
(07:00):
So what do you want to know
and then what capacity, you know,is it just the podcast?
Is it different topics?
Do you want to be a part of a community,a group?
Do you want individual coaching?Team coaching?
Do you need helpwith getting more clients?
Closing clients?
Do you need helpwith systems and processes?
Do you need SOPs? What's an SOP?
(07:22):
What did you just call me?
Standard operating procedures.
Are you trying to grow?
So all of those things.
What would help usis understanding what you need
and what that would look like.
We'll continue to bring you great content.
I hope that we have this Spiro summit.
The answer is, we'll let anybody attend.
(07:43):
For Spiro users,we might have some bonuses
or maybe a pre day,you know, MVP day at the beginning of it.
But understanding what you guys need
helps us greatlyso that we can go back to the team.
And, and we have a team of people herebetween Spiro and Wow that have a ton
of real estate photography and real estate
(08:06):
industry knowledge.
What that pack, how we package that up
and give it to you and allow you
to come in and get what you needis very interesting to us.
So we have some ideas,we're planning some things,
but we want to know what you want to know.
Email us hello@spiro.mediaor any of those other various ways,
(08:27):
but be open and candidif you don't need another thing.
I just like the podcast. Great.
Just tell usthat we're going to keep doing it.
We're not taking away, we're not goingto put it behind a paywall.
But we do understandthat there is a need for more,
and sometimes it's customand sometimes it's a group.
Yep.
Good stuff.
Okay. Yeah.
Somebody had to ask the question,hey, is that for subscribers only?
(08:48):
So we just wanted to provide somesome clarification there.
So hope for that. Hope that was helpful.
All right.
Awesome.
Well let let us move on to the thenext segment here, the the book giveaway.
So last week here, let me grab this.
Last weekwe gave away, a book from John, John
Maxwell called the 16 Undeniable Lawsof Communication here.
(09:10):
For those of you on YouTube,and we want to say congrats to Gregory W.
Let me let me get this.
Let me try to get this right of,Santa Maria Real Estate photography
in Orcutt, California. Gregory, congrats.
He was our first, first responder.
To the question ofof submitting a question
(09:31):
for us to cover here on on the podcast.
So Gregory asked a great question.
Todd, the, I've done before.
He said, so when you run across bad media,
bad photos on the MLS,is it a good strategy
to basically define leadsthrough the MLS and reach out?
(09:51):
And if so, how do you do that?
Yeah, it's a great question. Yes.
There you have to be a little particularabout your messaging.
Craig, can I send this one back to you
because this is somethingyou do on a daily basis.
Yeah.
So, yes, that's a that's a great strategy.
I have I've utilized that before.
And like Todd said, messaging is, is,
(10:14):
the most critical, important, criticallyimportant part of
realtor your photos are terrible.
Right. So so yesterday.
So I've got a client that he doesn't useus a ton anymore
because he's using an inside
marketing department at his brokerage,but he still uses us once in a while.
I've got a shoot for him coming out.
He he texted me yesterday and said,hey, Craig.
(10:38):
Hey. So.
Okay. There's no other way to say this.
He said, hey,I saw some really bad photos on the MLS.
And in case you're looking to continueto grow your business,
you might want to reach out to this guy.
I don't know who he is,I don't I've never met this realtor, but
I thought of you immediately.
Thank you Scott.
(10:58):
Unfortunately, this realtor is like in ourno man's land of our service area,
and it's not an areawe're looking to to grow in.
But but his his messages,they were really bad photos, Craig.
that guyand my mother does the same thing.
It really?
Yeah.
For those of you that don't know,my mother is a real estate agent.
(11:19):
And if you don't take professional photosand you work at her office,
you will hear about it from her on Tuesdaymorning meeting.
All right. So I love my mother.
She's fabulous.
But yeah, that guy, my mother
giving our clients hard timesthat don't use professional photo, right?
Right.
I mean, it's it's 2025 people. Come on.
Anyway, so.
(11:40):
Yes, utilize the MLS.
The way I've responded to, when I,when I've seen
some bad photos, I'll reach out.
But whether it's a phone call or an email,a lot of times, I'll admit
I start with the email.
If I don't get a response,I might follow up with a phone call.
But, I'll say, hey,
I happen to notice your listingon such and such street.
(12:02):
Congratson, you know, on winning a listing.
You know, in this marketof limited inventory, that's a
you know,that's a start with start with positives.
Congratulate them.
A basic introduction of who you are.
Maybe you mentioned some of the,
other agentsthat you might serve in their brokerage
and say,I just happened to notice these photos.
(12:23):
You know, if if you're looking to expandon the photos that you've provided
on this listing, you know,we'd be happy to help you out with that.
If you want to sit down for coffee,I'd love to,
you know, talk with youabout what your marketing needs are.
You know, how we're helping someof your colleagues and your brokerage?
I absolutely don't.
(12:45):
I honestlydon't say your photos are really bad,
but just kind of walk around around it
and, just see what their goals areas a realtor and can
can we help you grow,you know, in your branding,
your branding as a realtorin trying to win more listings?
That's kind of our specialty.
And if we can help, we would love to.
(13:05):
Craig, do you adjust that messagein a little bit?
If you see that the days of market
the days on market,
excuse me, is is largeras opposed to just listed?
Yeah.
I might mention hey you know happen seethat as it's been listed since this date.
Seasons change.
You might you know, you might be thinkingabout updating the photos for the season.
(13:27):
You know,we could help you with that as well. So.
Yeah,that there's, there's ways to walk around
those, those types of things and,and do it in a positive, uplifting way.
So
I love what you did there, Craig,with giving the congratulations.
Remember, celebratewhen your agents get a listing.
That's a big win for them.
It might be their first listing.
Yeah, those are really.
(13:47):
Those are really fun. Yeah. They are.
Or it might be their first listingat that level.
I know we had plenty of timeswhere we would have a client that's like,
hey, I'm, I'm competing for this listing.
It's my first listingat this level of price
and what should I do for it?
And then it's so exciting to hear themgo in and pitch that media
that we've talked about.
(14:08):
And then you get the call backand you're like, I got the listing.
So remember,that is a huge win for an agent.
It helps your client understand thatyou understand them and so celebrate that.
Plus you don't want to lead themwith the negative right.
And keep just like Craig mentionedkeep that conversation short.
You don't want to don't beat aroundthe bushes.
(14:29):
As at 30 questions, I was readingan article on this year's day.
The 30 questions for the sales processjust doesn't work anymore,
especially over the phone.
So just be quick and to the point.
Congratulate them,
tell them what your intentions areand give them an offer.
And it doesn't. I'm not sayingyou have to give them a discount.
Just just get to the call to action.
What are you asking of them? Right.
(14:51):
You bring up an interesting,interesting point about the 30 questions.
Doesn't work anymore.
I forget where I heard
this, but somebody told meyou can't sell a salesperson.
Yeah, our clients,our sales, our salespeople.
Now, they might balk at that and say,no, I'm a consultant.
Yes, same.
Same for me. I'ma consultant. I'm not a salesperson.
That that further confirmsthat their salespeople right?
(15:15):
Right. No, I'm a consultant. Yeah. Okay.
All right.
We I knowI hope I hope none of those realtors
that I've had that conversation with meare listening to this.
But anyway,
I don't even remember what my pointwas going to be on that.
Yeah.
Meeting or the 30 questions.
Just get to the point.
(15:36):
Yeah. Yeah. Because you can't sell them.
They they know, they know,they know the questions.
just like that, just like the YouTubevideo ain't nobody got time for that.
Yeah.
Justine, canyou put that in the background right now
to make me not sound so dorky?
(15:58):
It's such a good, good video.
Oh, love that one.
- Sweet Brown is awesome- we are showing our age with that one, Craig.
I think a lot of our listeners are well,
that's a really bigoh see, I've never heard of that one.
That one's going to live in infamy anyway.
Okay.
So Gregory,hope that answered your question.
- It was a great question. Yes, Gregory was an early bird man. He.
he was, Johnny on the spot on that one.
(16:19):
Thank you for the question.
And right emailing into us, Gregory.
Yep. So congrats. He picked up that JohnMaxwell book. All right.
This week's book, so we don't dragthis out is by, Pastor Scott Wilson.
Now, this is from a Christian perspective.
He's a pastor of the, lead pastor of OaksChurch in South Dallas.
I believe it is,
(16:39):
the name of the book is called ImpactReleasing the Power of Influence.
Now, great concepts in this book,both as a leader in business development,
because you are going to influence clientsthat you work with.
Whether it's it's helpingguide them into what services
they might needto build their brand or whatever.
(17:01):
So great book on on the impactthat you can have on people.
We're going to give that away.
This week, we're going to do ita little bit different this week.
You're still going to contactus, through the pink chat bubble on Spiro.
If you have a Spiro portal,it's free to to sign up.
So if you don't have one, just go toSpiro.media.
You can sign up for your freeaccount there, and then you can contact us
(17:24):
through the pink chat bubble.
And we are going to take the third person.
So the I'm going back to my radio dayslike caller number seven
third person to write us.
And what was it that we were going to ask?
Oh yeah.
Just your business question that you wouldlike to see addressed on the podcast.
So caller number three
(17:47):
on the on the Spiro Lines.
Yeah.
Just with your, your business question.
If you're, you're if you're, respondernumber 1 or 2, we're still going
to answer your business question,but number three is going to win
this week's book called ImpactReleasing the Power of Influence.
Love it.
love it love it.
(18:07):
Cool. All right.
That takes care of that.
and Craig, thank you for doing that. Yeah.
Yeah, my pleasure.
we mentioned on the first that's fromCraig's personal book collection.
Like he is pulling those off his shelfand we're
and he's sending them out to all of you.
- So thank you for doing that, Craig.- Yeah. No problem.
And I think I mentioned this last week,there might be marks in there, underlines.
I might have notes in there too.
(18:28):
I had a grab one book,
and I'm glad I flipped through it,because I was in a really raw spot
when I was reading a particular bookin my life, and I'm like,
I don't think I want
someone else reading that note right now,
so I'm going to have to I'm goingto have to,
preview all my notes in the insome of these books.
(18:49):
What was Craig thinking?
We all go
we all go through those times in life,you know
we do.
So anyway.
Okay. Yeah.
No problem. I'm. I'm happy to do this.
All right, so Todd in,I believe it was two episodes ago.
We started to, dive a little bitinto the topic of time management.
(19:10):
And you mentioned that you'reworking on an exercise of time tracking.
Yes.
And you wanted to divea little bit more,
into that,get a little bit deeper into that topic.
So I would love for youto kind of set this up
and talk a little bit about timetracking in this new year,
the impact it can have on your business,on your leadership,
(19:31):
and in effective and efficient waysto manage your time as a business leader.
Yeah, Craig, thisis one that I've learned over the years
and I've taken from a lot of differentcoaches and and theories and techniques,
and it all boils back down to the fact
that what you focus on will expand.
So if you focus, if you want more sales,
(19:55):
if you focus on sales,
that focuswill lead to getting more sales.
If you need systems,you can't keep track of anything.
Focus on systems and you'll be organized.
Whatever it is in your business,if you focus on it, it will expand.
However,
life, at least for me,
(20:16):
has a bunch of really sneaky little TimeBandits
that like to tell youthat they are important
and they're not the most important thingin the thing.
You should be focusing on.
Now, I'mnot saying they are not important.
However, prioritizing your time
(20:38):
and your focus can just lead
to monumental change in your business.
And I know that sounds.
I use the word monumental as a sales word,
but when I figured this out
and I don't have it all figured out,but when I focused on this
and got better at it,I actually got things done.
(21:01):
And I got the things donethat moved the business along.
Yeah.
You know,I'll give you a quick example right now.
I posted in the Spiro Super user group.
Just my time tracking.
Here's my time tracking.This is how it's done.
I've done it now for a couple weeks,and I write down what I do
in my workday
(21:21):
and in about 15 minute blocksso I know what I'm doing.
And I had a
person ask me, you know, what do you find
are your Time bandits?
And that's going to be a little bit
different for everyone but a sneaky one.
(21:41):
And I'll give you a greatexample is for Spiro.
We have chat support.
So that little pink bubbleand I have a fabulous team in that pink
bubble that
are here to help,
that are on a lot of hours of the day,and they have a lot of experience
and troubleshooting in the system.
(22:04):
But one thing that I'll do is I'll goI have it up in a tab right now.
I'm looking at itand I will go and look at it,
you know,and some tickets are assigned to me
and that's valuable time.
One I love to help.
I love to talk to all of you.
A lot of my ticketsare really just questions from you all.
(22:24):
Some of them are more in-depthtroubleshooting
and system settings, but I find that
I can spend too much time in that bubble,and I justify it in my brain
that I'm helping the clients,and that's 100% true.
But the thing that I'm sayingno to is the next big update.
(22:46):
And Spiro, what are we going to do,a quarter four of 2025 and beyond?
What is the status for,you know, so many different things?
Are people empowered?
Are they able to do so?
I find
that some of those tasksthat you might be used to.
Here's another one.
Craig, I was asked this questionthis week about photo editing.
(23:11):
You might be doing your photoediting right now saying that.
Yeah, I justI really know what my clients want,
and my editors don't do this onelittle thing that I love to do
and my time, you know, I spend half my dayand night editing photos.
Well, that's just that's a thought.
Er, that's a time bandit.
(23:31):
Another thing is,if you are growing your business
and you're doing a lot of photographing,still,
I, I have these legacy clientsand my VIP clients,
and they're only going to want me totake photos and videos of their property.
I'm telling you, I'm sorry.
I'll be the one to say it.You are aligned yourself.
(23:54):
You're wrong and you are now
wasting money by shooting houses.
Wow. Yes,you are losing money by shooting houses.
And what I mean bythat is if you go and shoot that house
and you could have paid a photographer
for $100 to shoot that house, $70,whatever it may be,
(24:15):
you just exchanged all of your time
to make 25, 30 bucks an hour.
You drove around the city
and you did not focus ongrowing your business.
So when I look back at Wow,when we grew like a,
you know, hockey stick curve, it'swhen I said no to everything else.
It's when I said, no, I can't shoot that.
(24:36):
But I have a fabulousteam that can do that.
And that's when we really grew.
But what I had to do isI had to carve out space for that.
I didn't.
It's weird as as a business owner,because you have to start saying
no to thingsthat you're really used to doing, right.
You're comfortable at doing themand you're really good
at doing them.
(24:59):
So your brain's going to say, hey,you should do these things,
and you like doing these things.
Maybe you like taking all the photography.It's great.
I actually I love troubleshootingand the text and then the window.
I love that, like I enjoy finding it.
Like I don't want to toot my own horn.
I feel like I'm pretty good at it.
I feel like I can get to an answerright away, and I feel like it's good
(25:19):
for me to talk to youall in that pink chat bubble.
But then I go, I let everybody downbecause I didn't document this update
and we have a large development teamnow that we've added to.
And do they have enough pipelineand really the opportunity cost
for not giving you guys insane featurescoming up in one month to month 12 months
(25:39):
is a bigger cost for me
than to talk to you in the bubble,even though, and I have a fabulous team
in there and the team will come to mewhen you need me or when they need me.
So those are some of my examplesof what my Time Bandits are.
I think we shared earlier in a podcasta couple ago, Craig, that
those silly littlefrickin videos on Facebook
(26:02):
I’m not on the instagram right nowbecause I'm older, old, whatever.
I'm just I don't do the Instagram, butI do Facebook as we have groups on there
and I talk to you guys in there and I postin there, but man, those videos scroll.
I don't click them,Craig. I do not click them.
Okay, I
haven't watchedI haven't watched The Gangster guy this year.
(26:23):
Yeah, I haven't watched the gangster guythat goes, hey, you want a slice?
He's so freaking entertainingbecause how can you,
how can you give a straight facein that environment?
It's beyond me,but I'm just not going to worry about it.
Right?
So I'm going way off course here.
But you guys know me by now.
But that is.
That's what my Time Bandits are.
And you need to find those things
(26:43):
where you're like,hey, this is good for my business.
No, it's not good for youto shoot houses anymore.
If you want to scale your business
There's the the key that you just said.
If you want to scale your business
reality.
Some of us like a smaller businessin the boutique type of model.
We like the hands on.
(27:03):
And that's part of whyI'm not leading my own business anymore.
I had my own business.
But I like the hands on.
I like the creative, you know,the creativity, the relationship building.
And so it's worked out now that I'mworking for Wow video tours where
I don't have the burden of the ownershipand the growing of the company,
(27:25):
I get to really focus on pun intended,
did I tell you about?
Did I tell you about
Justine, can we get acan we get a snare drum or something?
Did I tell you about the t shirt?
I get a squirrel moment, the t shirt
that I'm going to have my motherin law make me.
She's got one of those cricket things,
but it says in intend your puns,you cowards.
So. Pun intended.
(27:46):
I like to focus on the creative,the shooting.
But also building thethe base of business in my work.
Cowards. Tend your puns.
Darn it.
my gravestone is going to sayhe was dying to get in here.
I told my wifeI want that on my headstone.
So anyway,you were going to ask something, though.
(28:08):
I was going to say,
can you come up with some sort of punnyt shirt that I can wear in conjunction
with your pun t shirt that we canboth debut at the next family gathering?
I'll think of something absolutely, yes.
So we'll take a picture of it.
and send it to you all
Send it to you all those of you that just are.
You're goingwait. Family gathering you two together.
(28:30):
So our wives are cousins.
Just so you guys know. Yeah.
They're going to.
Oh, our poor wives.
Our poor wives anyway.
Yeah. So,
I don't even remember.
Where was I
I threw us all off.
My apologies. Yeah.
No. Intend your puns, you cowards.
(28:52):
Focus.
Oh, yeah.
The key about expanding your business.
If that's your goal, then yes.
You've got to get your handsoff the day to day shooting.
And I realized that's what my passion is.
My passion is not what Todd's passion is.
And so you have to look at your individualgoals, needs, focuses
and that will shape those time blocksthat you're you're looking at.
(29:16):
Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Thank you for saying that.Yeah. All goes back.
We all have to go back to our goals. Yeah.
That's why we started our business.So thank you for that perspective, Craig.
Sure sure.
So here I have a list here.
And we're going to go through themrelatively quickly
because we've we've given a lot today.
We've given some good stuffand we've given some really bad stuff.
So hopefully I,
I've given some bad stuff.
(29:37):
So here we go.
I want you to ask a questionwhen you look at your calendar, okay.
We're all looking at our calendarsand I want you to look at it
in a two month time period right now.
So over the next two months,
how balanced is your schedule?
(29:57):
You know,maybe maybe you're way too heavy.
You're just trying to cramway too much in.
Well, that's going to lead to burnout.
Maybe you don't have enough rest or marginin your calendar.
You know, I think all of you out therelistening were a little bit
of a different group of individualsbecause you all are overachievers.
(30:20):
Okay? You know, let's be honest.
if you're listening to this podcast,you're an overachiever.
If you're not, you're probably listeningto some book on tape
or you're listening to music,and there's nothing wrong with that.
But if you're spending your time
trying to figure out how to growyour business, you're an overachiever.
And in thatwe sometimes like to lie to ourselves
(30:42):
and feel like we can do everything.
I've tried it, I've done it.
I still try it. I still fail at it.
And that's when the pressure builds up.
I give myself a thumbs up.
If you're on YouTube, that's.
And that's when the pressure builds upand that's when you go,
(31:02):
why did I ever startthis business to begin with?
Would it'd be great if I had a 9 to 5 job.
Well, remember, you had a 9 to 5 jobthat you quit to start this business.
Yeah. And it's like,wait a minute, let's just get back.
Left brain, turn off your left brain.
Let's get back to reality.
Okay? How can we not go down that road?
(31:22):
Well, let's not over cram our schedule.
the next question
I want you to ask yourself is,do I have enough time to achieve my goals?
Being realistic.
Yeah. This is a big one here, Craig.
Because if your calendar is packedand you are doing shoots
after shoot after shoot,shoot quality control after quality
(31:45):
control, answering the phone,who knows what else you're doing.
If you are working in your business,
then don't be.
Don't be surprised
when we get to the end of 2025 and you go,wait a minute, I didn't hit my goals.
logically,how can we expect to hit our goals
if we never put time in our calendarto actually work
(32:06):
towards the goal?
So that's a super important thing, isdo you have enough time?
And just a question
I get asked all the time is, ishow do you make sure you have enough time?
Well, you work it backwards.
So I subscribe to a service wherethey would help you manage your calendar.
I did this for a few monthsand I learned the technique.
(32:27):
It's it's it's a great technique.
It's it's I've taken portions of it.
But when you want to achievea goal, you have to look at
what is the endproduct and then work yourself backwards.
Okay.
So a questionI saw on Facebook this morning.
We have 50 clients right now.
What's the best sales techniqueto scale to 100 clients.
(32:48):
So you want to grow in 50 clientsokay great.
What does it take to grow to 50 clients.
Ask yourself okay, I have to buildrelationships, have to have more people
find out about you.
You know, you know, there's a millionthings need to do more presentations,
attend brokerage,you know, brokerage meetings, MLS.
I need to join the MLS.I need to go to the realtor events.
(33:09):
I need to do office drop ins.
I need to do cold calls, Zillow calls.
Oh, there's a million things.
Yeah, I need to host events.
Okay,so how many of those types of activity
do you need to do to get one client?
Okay, great.
I probably need to call them.
You know,I probably need to call ten clients.
(33:29):
Okay. 10 to 1. Great.
Okay.
So how much time do you need to calland follow up with ten clients?
Well, probably about an hourper client okay.
So I need ten hoursof work to get to one client.
Great.
So if we want to get to 50 clients,just do the math.
(33:50):
So super simple to do.
You need to then time block that.
So say you need that.
My math went went wrong here.
So 10 to 1 I need to get I need to do that
five times 50 hours maybe my mass off.
But it's Fridayand I've got too much coffee in me.
But say, you know, you need 50 hoursand you want to get those clients
(34:11):
in the next two months.
Okay, so you better put those time blocks.
You have 21 working days per month.
If you don't work weekends,you have 41 days.
And you need to spend 50 hoursto make those connections.
No problem.
You need to spend a little over an houra day, every day
(34:32):
doing those activities that you feelthat will lead to you
getting those clients right,so you just need to work it backwards.
It's super simple. On a two month timeperiod.
Just put those on your time blockso your time is blocked out. Yes.
And your calendar.
That's the calendar that syncs to Spyro.
That would actually prevent youfrom taking a job.
(34:55):
Yes, prevent yourself from taking a job,because if you don't,
we're going to get two months from nowand you're going to go,
hey, Todd,I didn't get those extra 50 clients.
Well, no, all you did was shoot.
Yeah, but it's going to be painfulfor those of us
that are used to that productionand filling our calendar
with those shoots,because that's all we're looking at.
(35:17):
It's going to feel painful to block outbecause you don't want
to disappoint a clientby not having availability,
but in the long run that it will paydividends.
You know, if if you live in an areathat's seasonal, you know,
so here in the north were slow between,say, November
and mid-March,
(35:38):
take that time to really invest
in your business developmentto to grow that number of clients.
I mean, you're not shooting anyway,so make the most of it.
If you are shootingduring the busy season.
That's that is what it is.
Unless you've hired photographers,
which would be a good ideaif you're looking to scale.
But yeah, justlook at look at your cycles.
(35:59):
Where can you best use those times?
Okay, that was a fabulouslead into my next question.
And we didn't even discuss this off air.
But what can I anticipateover the next two months?
What can I anticipate?
You know, it's like Craig said,do you anticipate
that the number of jobsis going to go down?
Can you anticipatethe number of jobs going to go up?
(36:19):
Great.
Let's be proactive to it and not reactive.
None of you all should get the middleFebruary, middle March.
You go, hey,I can't believe we're this busy.
Well, I mean, let me just warn you,if you don't know what's coming,
I have the chart heresomewhere on my desk.
For the last 21 years,it's been a bell curve.
Yeah, it's scaled up.
(36:41):
Super, super busy middle.
I always say around
the Super Bowl, time is when everybodystarts to wake up here in our country.
Yep. And it goes until school starts.
It's like thatevery year. It's a bell curve.
That's where you're goingto do 80% of your jobs right.
So what can I anticipate.
(37:02):
The next question.
This is a this is a good one.
And I got this from Austin Chevironwho he coaches realtors.
So I love that
he asked this because it's so important,especially being a business owner.
How much fuel do I have in my tank?
So let's play this scenario, Craig,that you're looking ahead
(37:24):
and we've done that thingwhere we know we needed to devote 50 hours
of uninterrupted, uninterrupted time to
feed people onto the top of our sales funnel.
But you have worked like crazy,
and you have leftno margin in your schedule,
(37:49):
and you're busy.
Your business is growing all
that's a great thing, right?
It's exciting,but if you have no fuel left in your tank,
you mightbe able to power through and do it,
but it's going to turn youinto hating your business.
Yeah,
and please don't hate your business.
(38:11):
Business?
It's not the reason why you started it.
Your business can work for youand you're going great time.
Yeah, you do this like I've been there.
I've been down in the dumps.
I was a I was 4 or 5 years in.
I was shooting almost everything.
We were growing like crazy.
(38:32):
I was working 16, 18 hours a dayand I was doing everything.
I was driving the cities an hourand a half away
because they found out about usand they loved what we had.
It was exciting to have people
from an hour and a half away call like,hey, when can you come and do?
I've got ten propertiesI need you to do, literally.
(38:52):
Like nobody's doing this.
I haven't seen this.
Can you come do photos and video for me?
Okay.
Like, yeah,this is why I started this thing.
I was doing my own invoicing.
I was doing everything.
And my wife told me, she's like, you need.
You need someone to help you.
(39:13):
And you know what I had told her?
This is
nobody can help me.
Nobody knows how to help me.
I nobody's ever going to be able to do itlike me.
Yeah,
I was convinced.
Yeah.
Literally convincedthat nobody could help me.
I had such a big thought.
Air and thinking that only like,I'm special.
(39:35):
I'm not special, y'all.I'm not even that smart.
I really I'm I'm.
I I you would if you really knew me.
I'm just a down to earth guythat I believe I can do a lot of things.
But I was really bullheaded,thinking that nobody could help me.
Like, why are you that special, Todd?
Like, how was sending someonean invoice for $200 difficult and making
sure they pay it
(39:56):
now? Spiro
does thatnow, but that's beside the point.
But what?
And this is going to be tough.
You know, Eli Jonestalks a lot about this to
that your business is not differentthan any other business.
A lot of times we read
What. What
Come on, Todd
we'll read the emailor you'll read
(40:17):
any other type of business bookand you'll go, wait a minute.
But they're notthey don't that industry's not like mine.
Mine's really niche
It's just growing like they don't know.
Like mine's different.
I don't apply to those theories.
Yes. You do apply to those theories.
So moving forward here Craig.
And again I'm being direct todayI, I do want to come at you
(40:41):
with a place of love from my heart.
Just because if you're feeling, if you'relike, oh, this is convicting for me.
I don't mean to be harsh to you,but sometimes somebody just needs to say,
hey, you need to dosomething different,
You know, actually, Todd, that'sa great time.
Back to thethe book that we're giving way impact.
The whole point of thisis leading from the,
(41:04):
the value of love for peoplecaring about people.
So great book right there
So two more.
What do I need to prepare for?
This kind of goes along withwhat can I anticipate?
What what do you need to prepare for?
Do you have a big presentation coming up?
Well, you better start now.
I see a lot of you and I.
(41:24):
And I feel youbecause I work this way, too at times.
I've got this brokerage meetingcoming up tomorrow.
Does anybody have a slide deck? What?
What do you guys recommend?I do what I take him for food.
Well, think of how
hard you work to get that meetingand how excited you were.
Yeah.
Don't plan for the day before
(41:45):
right
I get life.
Sometimes it comes at you really fast.
But when you get that meeting, if it's onemonth from now, two months from now,
just put two one hour timeblocks on your calendar right now.
Plan for brokerage meeting the next week.
Finalize planning for a brokerage meeting.
(42:05):
If you're not done on week two,add another one on week
three. Yep.
Finally, Craig,this is this is a tough one. for,
for me for I think just our.
Our our
just for people in 2025.
(42:27):
Okay.
What needs removed.
I can't afford to remove anythingfrom my life right now.
Todd. It's all critical.
That is a common. Yeah. CraigI tell myself that too.
And the thing that you haveto tell yourself is if you say yes
to everything, you're really saying noto a lot of things.
(42:48):
And it's worse when you say
yes to someone and you let them down
rather than you just tell them, no.
Hey, I'm really sorry.I just don't have I.
Maybe I could do this in two months,but I just can't do this right now.
I'm so sorry.
Maybe I have someone I can refer you to,
but you say yes,
and then you let them down,and then it's that much worse for you.
(43:11):
As opposed to just telling themno to begin with,
it's about setting boundaries.
But to be able to set a boundary,
you have to identify what your valuesand priorities are.
So what are those top of line things
that you don't want to compromise on?
Identify those and then set the boundaryaround that practical example.
(43:32):
Todd.
I got a new client that was a referral,
from someone else in the same brokeragethat,
it's her first big listing.
Might even be her first listing,but it's a it's a big one
and wanted a Sunday shoot. Now,
one of my values isI do not work on Sundays
(43:54):
because that is my time for family,and that's my time for worship,
so I don't make exceptions for that.
That's that's a boundaryI've set because of the value of family
in and worship in my life. And,
I know there's competitorsthat do shoot on Sundays, so I'm running.
I'm runningthe risk that I might lose that business
if somebody absolutelyhas to have it on a Sunday,
(44:16):
you have to be okaywith what you might lose.
But what is it that you're gaining?
And to me,the value of building the relationship
with my family in my faith,my my relationship with God
is more important than one shootthat I might lose on a Sunday.
So identify your
priorities, your values,set your boundaries based on that
and just be okaywith the consequences of that.
(44:41):
Yeah that that's a tough decision thoughright.
It is. It is.
But as it ends up that person said
I suggested I could do it on a Saturday.
I don't like to shoot on Saturdays again.
That's time with my family.
But I make exceptions because I understandwell once in a while
that's all the client can do.
So I offered a Saturday at a particulartime and they said actually, that works.
(45:06):
So I didn't.
I didn't losewhat my my core conviction was on Sundays,
and I still was able tothen earn the business of that client.
Yeah, thatthat's that's a higher level technique.
Craig.
How so?
What do you mean?
Well, what I mean by that,Craig, is the fact that
(45:28):
when we start our business,we start it for goals.
If we write them down or not, you know,there are goals.
Sure.
And sticking to those goals,we sometimes for selves and thinking
that we're going to make an exceptionto the rule because it helps us
get successful in our business, which thenin turn allows you to reach your goals.
(45:51):
But that's a very slippery slope.That's not true.
You all out thereif you have kids yet or not.
Maybe they're maybe you don't have them,
maybe they're grown,but you only have them for so long.
Yeah.
And this if you're not going to have kids,if I mean kids are fabulous,
but if it's with your,you know, your spouse,
if it's with your family,your mom and dad, your
(46:12):
are only going to be on this earthso long.
Your grandparents,if you're still lucky enough
to have them around or young enough.
Yeah,those people are going to be here so long.
And it sounds morbid.
It is, but it's reality.
And if you always choose your business
over those relationships and
(46:33):
the reasons why you start your business,you know, it's just a slippery slope.
I've been there. I've done it.
You turn into your businessand you turn into this monster
and you're like,I, I'm doing this for the good.
Well, you're going to get to retirement
and you're not going to have
any energy left,and you're not going to know your wife.
Yeah. You're not going to knowhow to spend time with your kids.
Your kids. You're be like,why weren't you at my games?
Why weren't you at the band concert?
(46:55):
What did you fold yourself?
And you told yourselfthat you were working every waking moment
right now to get to something that you'renever going to get to
And I can raise my hand to say,I fail at this, too.
So I'm not talking to you.
I'm talking to myself.
You know, I hadI was flying out of the conference
(47:16):
two years ago, and I listen to a podcastand literally made me break down.
It's like when talked about spending timewith his wife and family.
And I was like,I was just so convicted because
I had in my head that I was buildingSpiro right
now, and I had another business,and I was going morning to night,
and I was excitedbecause it was ramping up.
(47:37):
But I just let down my family.
Yeah, I just felt that conviction, like,we haven't
had dinner with my wife, just my wife.
I couldn't remember the last time.
I was starting to get angrythat the kids want to play with me.
If you're a fatherand you get angry when you walk in that
your kids run to,you know you need to reevaluate your life.
(48:00):
Yeah.
Like why would like,
my kids run to me and I'm like,why are they running to me?
Like, don'tthey know what I went through today to.
Oh, those are some tough things, Craig.
And but those are some things that we needto evaluate as business owners.
And if you need someone to talk to you,find someone to talk to.
(48:20):
Yeah.
You know, if it's just youthat's a lonely place.
Find someone that you can confide in.
Yeah.
And the importance ofof surrounding yourself
with people that will speak life intoyour life is critically important.
I had a great, conversation on Facebookwith somebody that's,
you know, so how do you dealwith being hard on yourself?
And so the number onething is surround myself with people
(48:41):
that won't be as hard on me,that they'll speak truth into my life, but
they'll give me more gracethan I give myself sometimes.
So, yeah, surround yourselfwith good people that
that will speak somelife giving things into you.
Yeah, agreed
and correct youwhen you need correcting in a loving way.
Yeah. So yeah, yeah.
(49:02):
Just one last thought.
I have, here foryou guys with what needs renewed.
My last question.
Craig,do you know how many minutes are in a day?
Don't ask me to do math.
1440 minutes,
1440 minutes.
And if you sleep eight hours, six timeseight, 480,
(49:26):
you'vegot about a thousand left thay you’re awake.
Think of how many timesyou let a minute go by.
Look at the activity thing on your phone.
How many minutes did you spend
browsing the internet, social media?
Did you for yourself?
Oh, I was helping clients.What were you really?
Were you watchingthose sneaky little videos?
(49:47):
You got 1440 minutes in a complete day.
You need to sleep. You need to eat.
You need to spend time with your family,
and you need to prioritize your scheduleto have enough of those minutes
that help
you reach your goal, that work on thingsthat are going to guide you and direct
the ship towards what you feelthe success is for your business,
so that you can look back and say, yeah,I started this for a reason.
(50:11):
And you know what?My business worked for me.
Not much to add to that.
It's pretty to the point.
And again,I apologize for being to the point today,
but these are all things
that I work on these things every day,guys, this is stuff that I focus on
because I knowif I don't, I'm going to screw it up.
And we all do.
(50:32):
We all do.
It's good.
Good reminders I this weekespecially I've, I've been focusing on
trying to minimizeyeah the distractions and it's amazing
how much more you get donethe the momentum you build when you
really start being aware of your timeand being, purposeful with your time,
that momentum just buildsand the ball just keeps rolling.
(50:56):
it does.
It makes it a lot easier.
Todd thank you. Great insight this week.
Hey my pleasure.
Thank you all for sticking with us.
Yeah yeah some some rabbit trails
I know some people that it drivesthem up a wall.
But this isthis is just real life, real conversation.
We got to have some funwhile we're talking the seriousness
(51:16):
of business as well.
Because it isit is just real life, you know?
Yeah. A couple of guysfrom the cornfields of northwest Ohio.
It is what it is.
So thank you for indulging us,and watching and listening.
We do appreciate you guys.
All right.
Well,Todd, unless you have anything to add,
I think that's going to wrap things upthis week.
(51:38):
Yeah, that's it for me.Just don't be too hard on yourself.
One little step at a time,
It takes time to break those habitsand to build new ones.
It does.
We'd love to hear what habitsyou're working on.
Building time.
Maybe you want to share some of your time.
Sucks, you know, or what's what'sbeen stealing moments from your day.
And how are you?
How are you addressingthat? Drop us a line.
(51:59):
hello@spiro.media.
You can maybe send us a message,you know, in the in the pink chat bubble, but.
Well, maybe not the pink chat bubble.That's more for help.
Join the Spiro Super Spirosuper Spiros user.
Super Spiroers.
Yeah.
in the Spiro sphere
- Steve came up with that one- I like it I like it.
(52:19):
Isn’t that good. The Spiro sphere.
Yeah. Sorry I'm taking over again.
And, oryou can leave us a comment on YouTube, but
we'd love to hear what are your your TimeBandits and how are you addressing those?
And maybe someone else is going to say,yeah, that's mine too.
That's a great idea on how to address it.
It's community, guys. It's community.
So let's help each other
(52:40):
build some great businessesin the real estate media profession.
So thank you.
If you found value in this,give it a like share it.
You know what?
All those things that YouTubers say,we we just really appreciate that.
Can you tell howrelaxed we are about this?
Anyway, that's all I've got this week.
(53:01):
Make sure you take some time.
Time that maybe you identify on youron your time tracking sheet to be
thankful for the blessings in your lifeand make sure you take a breath this week.
Have a good one.
Thank you for joining usfor the Spiro Podcast,
managing your real estate, photographyand videography business.
This is a production of Spiroand Wow video tours.
(53:21):
You can find out more about Spirois Real Estate Media Business management
software at our website, Spiro Dot media.
Coming up on this episodeof The Spiro podcast.
(00:04):
prioritizing your time
and your focus can just lead
to monumental change in your business.
Welcome to the Spiro Podcast.
Managing your real estate, photographyand videography business
with your hostsTodd Kivimaki and Craig Magrum.
(00:28):
Hi and welcome to the Spiro Podcast.
Managing your real estate, photographyand videography business.
Spiro is a software platform.
It's designed to help youmanage your day to day business.
Whether you're a small boutiquereal estate
photographer or a regional companyserving multiple markets, it's
designed to help you grow and scaleand manage your day to day business.
(00:49):
I'm Craig Magrum, host of the podcast.
Welcome back to those of youthat have watched or listened before.
If you're a first time viewer or listener,we welcome you.
The whole idea of this podcast,just to give you a quick
recap, is to helpyou build a strong business.
Lots of great resources out there.
On the creative side of what we doas real estate media professionals,
(01:10):
but we want to help you really builda strong business as well,
and we invest in you as a businessleader, a business owner.
So that's the gist of it here each weekto, help us dive into those topics,
our owner and founder of Spiroand co-host, Todd Kivimaki.
Welcome back, Todd.
Craig, it's fabulous to be here.
(01:31):
We've got a great week here.
We've got a few topics today,so this will be a round robin,
which will be fun.
And, you know,we had some great feedback from all you.
Thank you.That just means the world to us.
It's so great to hear from you all.
So please don't hesitate if you aresaying, hey, how do I contact you?
You can always leave a message,you know, down below,
(01:52):
if you're watching on YouTube,you can email us hello@spiro.media.
Also,if you are using Spiro for your software
for your business, you can join the SpiroSuper User Facebook group.
Jump in there.
There's a lot of great content,
a nice, rich community in there of peoplehelping people.
(02:14):
Not just about Spiro, but about realestate, business, photography questions.
So again, find us on on any of thosechannels, whatever works for you.
We love to hear from you.
Absolutely. Absolutely.
All right.
Well, we we started a new, featureto the podcast last week.
We are giving awayas long as it lasts in my collection.
(02:34):
Books on leadership and business ownershipand topics like that.
So we had a winner last week.We're going to get to that.
And we're going to announcethis week's book as well.
But before we do, Todd,
we always like to give some updates onwhat's happening with the Spiro software.
So what do we have this week?
Yes.
I'll echo what we gave last week.
(02:55):
We are working on how you can sell betterand more on the order page.
We're giving you a landingpage for your order pages
i.e. residential, commercial,
short term rentals or Airbnbs,whatever you like to call them.
Any other type of productsyou might be doing?
We hear about headshots.
We hear about your luxury video services,whatever you want to sell.
(03:18):
If you have an order page for it,you can advertise it on a landing page.
And that landing page can be the startof the ordering process for your clients
and then reviews.
Really excited about this one, Craig.
So how did you do on the shoot?
Were they happy? Were they not?
If they weren't happy, then we need togive them this type of messaging.
(03:42):
You're probably going to say,hey, call us, we'll fix it.
If they are happy,let's ask them for a Google, Facebook,
whatever reviewyou want to ask them for a review.
It's great. And yeah,try to get you those reviews.
You know,
we look at website traffic, we look athow we look at the top of the funnel.
A lot at Wow video tours, our real estatemedia company, we have a full sales team.
(04:03):
And we look at how we sell.
How do we sell over 12,000 a year and12,000 shoots a year and continue to grow?
Well, it's because we focus on it.
The podcast is going to go into
some of that today,but what you focus on will expand.
And how can you put more peopleinto the top of the funnel?
Well,we have to know what people are thinking
(04:26):
and when they think highly of us,let's get a review
so that they can influence others.
So some exciting things come up here.
We've got a list of other things as well,but those are the highlights.
At least that's what I'm excited about.
And that is comingthe first week of March 2025.
That's fantastic.
Reviews are huge, and,
(04:48):
word of mouth is is huge as well.
Just a quick testimony, Todd.
I picked up a soon to be new clientto us in my market,
and I was at a regional meetingfor this brokerage, and,
she reached out to me afterwards and said,I've just heard so many good things
about you and working withWow from other agents in this brokerage,
(05:10):
and I just wanted to connect.
And I said, great, let's let's do coffee.
I'd love to get to know you andyour business a little bit better. And,
so reviews are great.
Word of mouth is really powerful as well.
I mean, that was anthat was an easier job.
She reached out to me.
Wow. So, yeah, making those connectionsand building
those relationshipsjust pays off in in droves. So.
(05:33):
- All right.- It does.
All right, one more questionfor you, Todd, before we dive
into the book giveaway.
And then our main topic, the Spiro
summit that's been mentioned in a pastepisode or two.
What is the Spyro summitand who can attend?
Yes.
So the Spyro Summit right now
to be transparent with youall was just an idea we have,
(05:54):
and it's so great to hear fromyou all just through this podcast.
I mean, who thought Craig,you started this thing?
We've been doing it for a couple of yearsnow and
It's amazing.
Just the feedback and the responsesthat we get from you all and the love.
Thank you for that.
The thing
is, so right now, the short answer iswe do not have a summit planned.
(06:16):
We want to plan one,but we want to ask a question
before the question, okay.
We want to ask what you need,not just in a summit or a gathering.
there are events coming up.
There's conferences coming up in November.
Eli Jones has this planned.
It's the first or second week in November.
And then PMRE, I believe, is the thirdweek, third or fourth week in November.
(06:40):
And those are fabulous to go to.
You'll see myselfand the team at both of those.
Maybe Craig, this year.
But beyond that,
that's a time for community,for learning, for gathering.
But we understand thatthere might be a gap in what you need
throughout the year.
(07:00):
So what do you want to know
and then what capacity, you know,is it just the podcast?
Is it different topics?
Do you want to be a part of a community,a group?
Do you want individual coaching?Team coaching?
Do you need helpwith getting more clients?
Closing clients?
Do you need helpwith systems and processes?
Do you need SOPs? What's an SOP?
(07:22):
What did you just call me?
Standard operating procedures.
Are you trying to grow?
So all of those things.
What would help usis understanding what you need
and what that would look like.
We'll continue to bring you great content.
I hope that we have this Spiro summit.
The answer is, we'll let anybody attend.
(07:43):
For Spiro users,we might have some bonuses
or maybe a pre day,you know, MVP day at the beginning of it.
But understanding what you guys need
helps us greatlyso that we can go back to the team.
And, and we have a team of people herebetween Spiro and Wow that have a ton
of real estate photography and real estate
(08:06):
industry knowledge.
What that pack, how we package that up
and give it to you and allow you
to come in and get what you needis very interesting to us.
So we have some ideas,we're planning some things,
but we want to know what you want to know.
Email us hello@spiro.mediaor any of those other various ways,
(08:27):
but be open and candidif you don't need another thing.
I just like the podcast. Great.
Just tell usthat we're going to keep doing it.
We're not taking away, we're not goingto put it behind a paywall.
But we do understandthat there is a need for more,
and sometimes it's customand sometimes it's a group.
Yep.
Good stuff.
Okay. Yeah.
Somebody had to ask the question,hey, is that for subscribers only?
(08:48):
So we just wanted to provide somesome clarification there.
So hope for that. Hope that was helpful.
All right.
Awesome.
Well let let us move on to the thenext segment here, the the book giveaway.
So last week here, let me grab this.
Last weekwe gave away, a book from John, John
Maxwell called the 16 Undeniable Lawsof Communication here.
(09:10):
For those of you on YouTube,and we want to say congrats to Gregory W.
Let me let me get this.
Let me try to get this right of,Santa Maria Real Estate photography
in Orcutt, California. Gregory, congrats.
He was our first, first responder.
To the question ofof submitting a question
(09:31):
for us to cover here on on the podcast.
So Gregory asked a great question.
Todd, the, I've done before.
He said, so when you run across bad media,
bad photos on the MLS,is it a good strategy
to basically define leadsthrough the MLS and reach out?
(09:51):
And if so, how do you do that?
Yeah, it's a great question. Yes.
There you have to be a little particularabout your messaging.
Craig, can I send this one back to you
because this is somethingyou do on a daily basis.
Yeah.
So, yes, that's a that's a great strategy.
I have I've utilized that before.
And like Todd said, messaging is, is,
(10:14):
the most critical, important, criticallyimportant part of
realtor your photos are terrible.
Right. So so yesterday.
So I've got a client that he doesn't useus a ton anymore
because he's using an inside
marketing department at his brokerage,but he still uses us once in a while.
I've got a shoot for him coming out.
He he texted me yesterday and said,hey, Craig.
(10:38):
Hey. So.
Okay. There's no other way to say this.
He said, hey,I saw some really bad photos on the MLS.
And in case you're looking to continueto grow your business,
you might want to reach out to this guy.
I don't know who he is,I don't I've never met this realtor, but
I thought of you immediately.
Thank you Scott.
(10:58):
Unfortunately, this realtor is like in ourno man's land of our service area,
and it's not an areawe're looking to to grow in.
But but his his messages,they were really bad photos, Craig.
that guyand my mother does the same thing.
It really?
Yeah.
For those of you that don't know,my mother is a real estate agent.
(11:19):
And if you don't take professional photosand you work at her office,
you will hear about it from her on Tuesdaymorning meeting.
All right. So I love my mother.
She's fabulous.
But yeah, that guy, my mother
giving our clients hard timesthat don't use professional photo, right?
Right.
I mean, it's it's 2025 people. Come on.
Anyway, so.
(11:40):
Yes, utilize the MLS.
The way I've responded to, when I,when I've seen
some bad photos, I'll reach out.
But whether it's a phone call or an email,a lot of times, I'll admit
I start with the email.
If I don't get a response,I might follow up with a phone call.
But, I'll say, hey,
I happen to notice your listingon such and such street.
(12:02):
Congratson, you know, on winning a listing.
You know, in this marketof limited inventory, that's a
you know,that's a start with start with positives.
Congratulate them.
A basic introduction of who you are.
Maybe you mentioned some of the,
other agentsthat you might serve in their brokerage
and say,I just happened to notice these photos.
(12:23):
You know, if if you're looking to expandon the photos that you've provided
on this listing, you know,we'd be happy to help you out with that.
If you want to sit down for coffee,I'd love to,
you know, talk with youabout what your marketing needs are.
You know, how we're helping someof your colleagues and your brokerage?
I absolutely don't.
(12:45):
I honestlydon't say your photos are really bad,
but just kind of walk around around it
and, just see what their goals areas a realtor and can
can we help you grow,you know, in your branding,
your branding as a realtorin trying to win more listings?
That's kind of our specialty.
And if we can help, we would love to.
(13:05):
Craig, do you adjust that messagein a little bit?
If you see that the days of market
the days on market,
excuse me, is is largeras opposed to just listed?
Yeah.
I might mention hey you know happen seethat as it's been listed since this date.
Seasons change.
You might you know, you might be thinkingabout updating the photos for the season.
(13:27):
You know,we could help you with that as well. So.
Yeah,that there's, there's ways to walk around
those, those types of things and,and do it in a positive, uplifting way.
So
I love what you did there, Craig,with giving the congratulations.
Remember, celebratewhen your agents get a listing.
That's a big win for them.
It might be their first listing.
Yeah, those are really.
(13:47):
Those are really fun. Yeah. They are.
Or it might be their first listingat that level.
I know we had plenty of timeswhere we would have a client that's like,
hey, I'm, I'm competing for this listing.
It's my first listingat this level of price
and what should I do for it?
And then it's so exciting to hear themgo in and pitch that media
that we've talked about.
(14:08):
And then you get the call backand you're like, I got the listing.
So remember,that is a huge win for an agent.
It helps your client understand thatyou understand them and so celebrate that.
Plus you don't want to lead themwith the negative right.
And keep just like Craig mentionedkeep that conversation short.
You don't want to don't beat aroundthe bushes.
(14:29):
As at 30 questions, I was readingan article on this year's day.
The 30 questions for the sales processjust doesn't work anymore,
especially over the phone.
So just be quick and to the point.
Congratulate them,
tell them what your intentions areand give them an offer.
And it doesn't. I'm not sayingyou have to give them a discount.
Just just get to the call to action.
What are you asking of them? Right.
(14:51):
You bring up an interesting,interesting point about the 30 questions.
Doesn't work anymore.
I forget where I heard
this, but somebody told meyou can't sell a salesperson.
Yeah, our clients,our sales, our salespeople.
Now, they might balk at that and say,no, I'm a consultant.
Yes, same.
Same for me. I'ma consultant. I'm not a salesperson.
That that further confirmsthat their salespeople right?
(15:15):
Right. No, I'm a consultant. Yeah. Okay.
All right.
We I knowI hope I hope none of those realtors
that I've had that conversation with meare listening to this.
But anyway,
I don't even remember what my pointwas going to be on that.
Yeah.
Meeting or the 30 questions.
Just get to the point.
(15:36):
Yeah. Yeah. Because you can't sell them.
They they know, they know,they know the questions.
just like that, just like the YouTubevideo ain't nobody got time for that.
Yeah.
Justine, canyou put that in the background right now
to make me not sound so dorky?
(15:58):
It's such a good, good video.
Oh, love that one.
- Sweet Brown is awesome- we are showing our age with that one, Craig.
I think a lot of our listeners are well,
that's a really bigoh see, I've never heard of that one.
That one's going to live in infamy anyway.
Okay.
So Gregory,hope that answered your question.
- It was a great question. Yes, Gregory was an early bird man. He.
he was, Johnny on the spot on that one.
(16:19):
Thank you for the question.
And right emailing into us, Gregory.
Yep. So congrats. He picked up that JohnMaxwell book. All right.
This week's book, so we don't dragthis out is by, Pastor Scott Wilson.
Now, this is from a Christian perspective.
He's a pastor of the, lead pastor of OaksChurch in South Dallas.
I believe it is,
(16:39):
the name of the book is called ImpactReleasing the Power of Influence.
Now, great concepts in this book,both as a leader in business development,
because you are going to influence clientsthat you work with.
Whether it's it's helpingguide them into what services
they might needto build their brand or whatever.
(17:01):
So great book on on the impactthat you can have on people.
We're going to give that away.
This week, we're going to do ita little bit different this week.
You're still going to contactus, through the pink chat bubble on Spiro.
If you have a Spiro portal,it's free to to sign up.
So if you don't have one, just go toSpiro.media.
You can sign up for your freeaccount there, and then you can contact us
(17:24):
through the pink chat bubble.
And we are going to take the third person.
So the I'm going back to my radio dayslike caller number seven
third person to write us.
And what was it that we were going to ask?
Oh yeah.
Just your business question that you wouldlike to see addressed on the podcast.
So caller number three
(17:47):
on the on the Spiro Lines.
Yeah.
Just with your, your business question.
If you're, you're if you're, respondernumber 1 or 2, we're still going
to answer your business question,but number three is going to win
this week's book called ImpactReleasing the Power of Influence.
Love it.
love it love it.
(18:07):
Cool. All right.
That takes care of that.
and Craig, thank you for doing that. Yeah.
Yeah, my pleasure.
we mentioned on the first that's fromCraig's personal book collection.
Like he is pulling those off his shelfand we're
and he's sending them out to all of you.
- So thank you for doing that, Craig.- Yeah. No problem.
And I think I mentioned this last week,there might be marks in there, underlines.
I might have notes in there too.
(18:28):
I had a grab one book,
and I'm glad I flipped through it,because I was in a really raw spot
when I was reading a particular bookin my life, and I'm like,
I don't think I want
someone else reading that note right now,
so I'm going to have to I'm goingto have to,
preview all my notes in the insome of these books.
(18:49):
What was Craig thinking?
We all go
we all go through those times in life,you know
we do.
So anyway.
Okay. Yeah.
No problem. I'm. I'm happy to do this.
All right, so Todd in,I believe it was two episodes ago.
We started to, dive a little bitinto the topic of time management.
(19:10):
And you mentioned that you'reworking on an exercise of time tracking.
Yes.
And you wanted to divea little bit more,
into that,get a little bit deeper into that topic.
So I would love for youto kind of set this up
and talk a little bit about timetracking in this new year,
the impact it can have on your business,on your leadership,
(19:31):
and in effective and efficient waysto manage your time as a business leader.
Yeah, Craig, thisis one that I've learned over the years
and I've taken from a lot of differentcoaches and and theories and techniques,
and it all boils back down to the fact
that what you focus on will expand.
So if you focus, if you want more sales,
(19:55):
if you focus on sales,
that focuswill lead to getting more sales.
If you need systems,you can't keep track of anything.
Focus on systems and you'll be organized.
Whatever it is in your business,if you focus on it, it will expand.
However,
life, at least for me,
(20:16):
has a bunch of really sneaky little TimeBandits
that like to tell youthat they are important
and they're not the most important thingin the thing.
You should be focusing on.
Now, I'mnot saying they are not important.
However, prioritizing your time
(20:38):
and your focus can just lead
to monumental change in your business.
And I know that sounds.
I use the word monumental as a sales word,
but when I figured this out
and I don't have it all figured out,but when I focused on this
and got better at it,I actually got things done.
(21:01):
And I got the things donethat moved the business along.
Yeah.
You know,I'll give you a quick example right now.
I posted in the Spiro Super user group.
Just my time tracking.
Here's my time tracking.This is how it's done.
I've done it now for a couple weeks,and I write down what I do
in my workday
(21:21):
and in about 15 minute blocksso I know what I'm doing.
And I had a
person ask me, you know, what do you find
are your Time bandits?
And that's going to be a little bit
different for everyone but a sneaky one.
(21:41):
And I'll give you a greatexample is for Spiro.
We have chat support.
So that little pink bubbleand I have a fabulous team in that pink
bubble that
are here to help,
that are on a lot of hours of the day,and they have a lot of experience
and troubleshooting in the system.
(22:04):
But one thing that I'll do is I'll goI have it up in a tab right now.
I'm looking at itand I will go and look at it,
you know,and some tickets are assigned to me
and that's valuable time.
One I love to help.
I love to talk to all of you.
A lot of my ticketsare really just questions from you all.
(22:24):
Some of them are more in-depthtroubleshooting
and system settings, but I find that
I can spend too much time in that bubble,and I justify it in my brain
that I'm helping the clients,and that's 100% true.
But the thing that I'm sayingno to is the next big update.
(22:46):
And Spiro, what are we going to do,a quarter four of 2025 and beyond?
What is the status for,you know, so many different things?
Are people empowered?
Are they able to do so?
I find
that some of those tasksthat you might be used to.
Here's another one.
Craig, I was asked this questionthis week about photo editing.
(23:11):
You might be doing your photoediting right now saying that.
Yeah, I justI really know what my clients want,
and my editors don't do this onelittle thing that I love to do
and my time, you know, I spend half my dayand night editing photos.
Well, that's just that's a thought.
Er, that's a time bandit.
(23:31):
Another thing is,if you are growing your business
and you're doing a lot of photographing,still,
I, I have these legacy clientsand my VIP clients,
and they're only going to want me totake photos and videos of their property.
I'm telling you, I'm sorry.
I'll be the one to say it.You are aligned yourself.
(23:54):
You're wrong and you are now
wasting money by shooting houses.
Wow. Yes,you are losing money by shooting houses.
And what I mean bythat is if you go and shoot that house
and you could have paid a photographer
for $100 to shoot that house, $70,whatever it may be,
(24:15):
you just exchanged all of your time
to make 25, 30 bucks an hour.
You drove around the city
and you did not focus ongrowing your business.
So when I look back at Wow,when we grew like a,
you know, hockey stick curve, it'swhen I said no to everything else.
It's when I said, no, I can't shoot that.
(24:36):
But I have a fabulousteam that can do that.
And that's when we really grew.
But what I had to do isI had to carve out space for that.
I didn't.
It's weird as as a business owner,because you have to start saying
no to thingsthat you're really used to doing, right.
You're comfortable at doing themand you're really good
at doing them.
(24:59):
So your brain's going to say, hey,you should do these things,
and you like doing these things.
Maybe you like taking all the photography.It's great.
I actually I love troubleshootingand the text and then the window.
I love that, like I enjoy finding it.
Like I don't want to toot my own horn.
I feel like I'm pretty good at it.
I feel like I can get to an answerright away, and I feel like it's good
(25:19):
for me to talk to youall in that pink chat bubble.
But then I go, I let everybody downbecause I didn't document this update
and we have a large development teamnow that we've added to.
And do they have enough pipelineand really the opportunity cost
for not giving you guys insane featurescoming up in one month to month 12 months
(25:39):
is a bigger cost for me
than to talk to you in the bubble,even though, and I have a fabulous team
in there and the team will come to mewhen you need me or when they need me.
So those are some of my examplesof what my Time Bandits are.
I think we shared earlier in a podcasta couple ago, Craig, that
those silly littlefrickin videos on Facebook
(26:02):
I’m not on the instagram right nowbecause I'm older, old, whatever.
I'm just I don't do the Instagram, butI do Facebook as we have groups on there
and I talk to you guys in there and I postin there, but man, those videos scroll.
I don't click them,Craig. I do not click them.
Okay, I
haven't watchedI haven't watched The Gangster guy this year.
(26:23):
Yeah, I haven't watched the gangster guythat goes, hey, you want a slice?
He's so freaking entertainingbecause how can you,
how can you give a straight facein that environment?
It's beyond me,but I'm just not going to worry about it.
Right?
So I'm going way off course here.
But you guys know me by now.
But that is.
That's what my Time Bandits are.
And you need to find those things
(26:43):
where you're like,hey, this is good for my business.
No, it's not good for youto shoot houses anymore.
If you want to scale your business
There's the the key that you just said.
If you want to scale your business
reality.
Some of us like a smaller businessin the boutique type of model.
We like the hands on.
(27:03):
And that's part of whyI'm not leading my own business anymore.
I had my own business.
But I like the hands on.
I like the creative, you know,the creativity, the relationship building.
And so it's worked out now that I'mworking for Wow video tours where
I don't have the burden of the ownershipand the growing of the company,
(27:25):
I get to really focus on pun intended,
did I tell you about?
Did I tell you about
Justine, can we get acan we get a snare drum or something?
Did I tell you about the t shirt?
I get a squirrel moment, the t shirt
that I'm going to have my motherin law make me.
She's got one of those cricket things,
but it says in intend your puns,you cowards.
So. Pun intended.
(27:46):
I like to focus on the creative,the shooting.
But also building thethe base of business in my work.
Cowards. Tend your puns.
Darn it.
my gravestone is going to sayhe was dying to get in here.
I told my wifeI want that on my headstone.
So anyway,you were going to ask something, though.
(28:08):
I was going to say,
can you come up with some sort of punnyt shirt that I can wear in conjunction
with your pun t shirt that we canboth debut at the next family gathering?
I'll think of something absolutely, yes.
So we'll take a picture of it.
and send it to you all
Send it to you all those of you that just are.
You're goingwait. Family gathering you two together.
(28:30):
So our wives are cousins.
Just so you guys know. Yeah.
They're going to.
Oh, our poor wives.
Our poor wives anyway.
Yeah. So,
I don't even remember.
Where was I
I threw us all off.
My apologies. Yeah.
No. Intend your puns, you cowards.
(28:52):
Focus.
Oh, yeah.
The key about expanding your business.
If that's your goal, then yes.
You've got to get your handsoff the day to day shooting.
And I realized that's what my passion is.
My passion is not what Todd's passion is.
And so you have to look at your individualgoals, needs, focuses
and that will shape those time blocksthat you're you're looking at.
(29:16):
Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Thank you for saying that.Yeah. All goes back.
We all have to go back to our goals. Yeah.
That's why we started our business.So thank you for that perspective, Craig.
Sure sure.
So here I have a list here.
And we're going to go through themrelatively quickly
because we've we've given a lot today.
We've given some good stuffand we've given some really bad stuff.
So hopefully I,
I've given some bad stuff.
(29:37):
So here we go.
I want you to ask a questionwhen you look at your calendar, okay.
We're all looking at our calendarsand I want you to look at it
in a two month time period right now.
So over the next two months,
how balanced is your schedule?
(29:57):
You know,maybe maybe you're way too heavy.
You're just trying to cramway too much in.
Well, that's going to lead to burnout.
Maybe you don't have enough rest or marginin your calendar.
You know, I think all of you out therelistening were a little bit
of a different group of individualsbecause you all are overachievers.
(30:20):
Okay? You know, let's be honest.
if you're listening to this podcast,you're an overachiever.
If you're not, you're probably listeningto some book on tape
or you're listening to music,and there's nothing wrong with that.
But if you're spending your time
trying to figure out how to growyour business, you're an overachiever.
And in thatwe sometimes like to lie to ourselves
(30:42):
and feel like we can do everything.
I've tried it, I've done it.
I still try it. I still fail at it.
And that's when the pressure builds up.
I give myself a thumbs up.
If you're on YouTube, that's.
And that's when the pressure builds upand that's when you go,
(31:02):
why did I ever startthis business to begin with?
Would it'd be great if I had a 9 to 5 job.
Well, remember, you had a 9 to 5 jobthat you quit to start this business.
Yeah. And it's like,wait a minute, let's just get back.
Left brain, turn off your left brain.
Let's get back to reality.
Okay? How can we not go down that road?
(31:22):
Well, let's not over cram our schedule.
the next question
I want you to ask yourself is,do I have enough time to achieve my goals?
Being realistic.
Yeah. This is a big one here, Craig.
Because if your calendar is packedand you are doing shoots
after shoot after shoot,shoot quality control after quality
(31:45):
control, answering the phone,who knows what else you're doing.
If you are working in your business,
then don't be.
Don't be surprised
when we get to the end of 2025 and you go,wait a minute, I didn't hit my goals.
logically,how can we expect to hit our goals
if we never put time in our calendarto actually work
(32:06):
towards the goal?
So that's a super important thing, isdo you have enough time?
And just a question
I get asked all the time is, ishow do you make sure you have enough time?
Well, you work it backwards.
So I subscribe to a service wherethey would help you manage your calendar.
I did this for a few monthsand I learned the technique.
(32:27):
It's it's it's a great technique.
It's it's I've taken portions of it.
But when you want to achievea goal, you have to look at
what is the endproduct and then work yourself backwards.
Okay.
So a questionI saw on Facebook this morning.
We have 50 clients right now.
What's the best sales techniqueto scale to 100 clients.
(32:48):
So you want to grow in 50 clientsokay great.
What does it take to grow to 50 clients.
Ask yourself okay, I have to buildrelationships, have to have more people
find out about you.
You know, you know, there's a millionthings need to do more presentations,
attend brokerage,you know, brokerage meetings, MLS.
I need to join the MLS.I need to go to the realtor events.
(33:09):
I need to do office drop ins.
I need to do cold calls, Zillow calls.
Oh, there's a million things.
Yeah, I need to host events.
Okay,so how many of those types of activity
do you need to do to get one client?
Okay, great.
I probably need to call them.
You know,I probably need to call ten clients.
(33:29):
Okay. 10 to 1. Great.
Okay.
So how much time do you need to calland follow up with ten clients?
Well, probably about an hourper client okay.
So I need ten hoursof work to get to one client.
Great.
So if we want to get to 50 clients,just do the math.
(33:50):
So super simple to do.
You need to then time block that.
So say you need that.
My math went went wrong here.
So 10 to 1 I need to get I need to do that
five times 50 hours maybe my mass off.
But it's Fridayand I've got too much coffee in me.
But say, you know, you need 50 hoursand you want to get those clients
(34:11):
in the next two months.
Okay, so you better put those time blocks.
You have 21 working days per month.
If you don't work weekends,you have 41 days.
And you need to spend 50 hoursto make those connections.
No problem.
You need to spend a little over an houra day, every day
(34:32):
doing those activities that you feelthat will lead to you
getting those clients right,so you just need to work it backwards.
It's super simple. On a two month timeperiod.
Just put those on your time blockso your time is blocked out. Yes.
And your calendar.
That's the calendar that syncs to Spyro.
That would actually prevent youfrom taking a job.
(34:55):
Yes, prevent yourself from taking a job,because if you don't,
we're going to get two months from nowand you're going to go,
hey, Todd,I didn't get those extra 50 clients.
Well, no, all you did was shoot.
Yeah, but it's going to be painfulfor those of us
that are used to that productionand filling our calendar
with those shoots,because that's all we're looking at.
(35:17):
It's going to feel painful to block outbecause you don't want
to disappoint a clientby not having availability,
but in the long run that it will paydividends.
You know, if if you live in an areathat's seasonal, you know,
so here in the north were slow between,say, November
and mid-March,
(35:38):
take that time to really invest
in your business developmentto to grow that number of clients.
I mean, you're not shooting anyway,so make the most of it.
If you are shootingduring the busy season.
That's that is what it is.
Unless you've hired photographers,
which would be a good ideaif you're looking to scale.
But yeah, justlook at look at your cycles.
(35:59):
Where can you best use those times?
Okay, that was a fabulouslead into my next question.
And we didn't even discuss this off air.
But what can I anticipateover the next two months?
What can I anticipate?
You know, it's like Craig said,do you anticipate
that the number of jobsis going to go down?
Can you anticipatethe number of jobs going to go up?
(36:19):
Great.
Let's be proactive to it and not reactive.
None of you all should get the middleFebruary, middle March.
You go, hey,I can't believe we're this busy.
Well, I mean, let me just warn you,if you don't know what's coming,
I have the chart heresomewhere on my desk.
For the last 21 years,it's been a bell curve.
Yeah, it's scaled up.
(36:41):
Super, super busy middle.
I always say around
the Super Bowl, time is when everybodystarts to wake up here in our country.
Yep. And it goes until school starts.
It's like thatevery year. It's a bell curve.
That's where you're goingto do 80% of your jobs right.
So what can I anticipate.
(37:02):
The next question.
This is a this is a good one.
And I got this from Austin Chevironwho he coaches realtors.
So I love that
he asked this because it's so important,especially being a business owner.
How much fuel do I have in my tank?
So let's play this scenario, Craig,that you're looking ahead
(37:24):
and we've done that thingwhere we know we needed to devote 50 hours
of uninterrupted, uninterrupted time to
feed people onto the top of our sales funnel.
But you have worked like crazy,
and you have leftno margin in your schedule,
(37:49):
and you're busy.
Your business is growing all
that's a great thing, right?
It's exciting,but if you have no fuel left in your tank,
you mightbe able to power through and do it,
but it's going to turn youinto hating your business.
Yeah,
and please don't hate your business.
(38:11):
Business?
It's not the reason why you started it.
Your business can work for youand you're going great time.
Yeah, you do this like I've been there.
I've been down in the dumps.
I was a I was 4 or 5 years in.
I was shooting almost everything.
We were growing like crazy.
(38:32):
I was working 16, 18 hours a dayand I was doing everything.
I was driving the cities an hourand a half away
because they found out about usand they loved what we had.
It was exciting to have people
from an hour and a half away call like,hey, when can you come and do?
I've got ten propertiesI need you to do, literally.
(38:52):
Like nobody's doing this.
I haven't seen this.
Can you come do photos and video for me?
Okay.
Like, yeah,this is why I started this thing.
I was doing my own invoicing.
I was doing everything.
And my wife told me, she's like, you need.
You need someone to help you.
(39:13):
And you know what I had told her?
This is
nobody can help me.
Nobody knows how to help me.
I nobody's ever going to be able to do itlike me.
Yeah,
I was convinced.
Yeah.
Literally convincedthat nobody could help me.
I had such a big thought.
Air and thinking that only like,I'm special.
(39:35):
I'm not special, y'all.I'm not even that smart.
I really I'm I'm.
I I you would if you really knew me.
I'm just a down to earth guythat I believe I can do a lot of things.
But I was really bullheaded,thinking that nobody could help me.
Like, why are you that special, Todd?
Like, how was sending someonean invoice for $200 difficult and making
sure they pay it
(39:56):
now? Spiro
does thatnow, but that's beside the point.
But what?
And this is going to be tough.
You know, Eli Jonestalks a lot about this to
that your business is not differentthan any other business.
A lot of times we read
What. What
Come on, Todd
we'll read the emailor you'll read
(40:17):
any other type of business bookand you'll go, wait a minute.
But they're notthey don't that industry's not like mine.
Mine's really niche
It's just growing like they don't know.
Like mine's different.
I don't apply to those theories.
Yes. You do apply to those theories.
So moving forward here Craig.
And again I'm being direct todayI, I do want to come at you
(40:41):
with a place of love from my heart.
Just because if you're feeling, if you'relike, oh, this is convicting for me.
I don't mean to be harsh to you,but sometimes somebody just needs to say,
hey, you need to dosomething different,
You know, actually, Todd, that'sa great time.
Back to thethe book that we're giving way impact.
The whole point of thisis leading from the,
(41:04):
the value of love for peoplecaring about people.
So great book right there
So two more.
What do I need to prepare for?
This kind of goes along withwhat can I anticipate?
What what do you need to prepare for?
Do you have a big presentation coming up?
Well, you better start now.
I see a lot of you and I.
(41:24):
And I feel youbecause I work this way, too at times.
I've got this brokerage meetingcoming up tomorrow.
Does anybody have a slide deck? What?
What do you guys recommend?I do what I take him for food.
Well, think of how
hard you work to get that meetingand how excited you were.
Yeah.
Don't plan for the day before
(41:45):
right
I get life.
Sometimes it comes at you really fast.
But when you get that meeting, if it's onemonth from now, two months from now,
just put two one hour timeblocks on your calendar right now.
Plan for brokerage meeting the next week.
Finalize planning for a brokerage meeting.
(42:05):
If you're not done on week two,add another one on week
three. Yep.
Finally, Craig,this is this is a tough one. for,
for me for I think just our.
Our our
just for people in 2025.
(42:27):
Okay.
What needs removed.
I can't afford to remove anythingfrom my life right now.
Todd. It's all critical.
That is a common. Yeah. CraigI tell myself that too.
And the thing that you haveto tell yourself is if you say yes
to everything, you're really saying noto a lot of things.
(42:48):
And it's worse when you say
yes to someone and you let them down
rather than you just tell them, no.
Hey, I'm really sorry.I just don't have I.
Maybe I could do this in two months,but I just can't do this right now.
I'm so sorry.
Maybe I have someone I can refer you to,
but you say yes,
and then you let them down,and then it's that much worse for you.
(43:11):
As opposed to just telling themno to begin with,
it's about setting boundaries.
But to be able to set a boundary,
you have to identify what your valuesand priorities are.
So what are those top of line things
that you don't want to compromise on?
Identify those and then set the boundaryaround that practical example.
(43:32):
Todd.
I got a new client that was a referral,
from someone else in the same brokeragethat,
it's her first big listing.
Might even be her first listing,but it's a it's a big one
and wanted a Sunday shoot. Now,
one of my values isI do not work on Sundays
(43:54):
because that is my time for family,and that's my time for worship,
so I don't make exceptions for that.
That's that's a boundaryI've set because of the value of family
in and worship in my life. And,
I know there's competitorsthat do shoot on Sundays, so I'm running.
I'm runningthe risk that I might lose that business
if somebody absolutelyhas to have it on a Sunday,
(44:16):
you have to be okaywith what you might lose.
But what is it that you're gaining?
And to me,the value of building the relationship
with my family in my faith,my my relationship with God
is more important than one shootthat I might lose on a Sunday.
So identify your
priorities, your values,set your boundaries based on that
and just be okaywith the consequences of that.
(44:41):
Yeah that that's a tough decision thoughright.
It is. It is.
But as it ends up that person said
I suggested I could do it on a Saturday.
I don't like to shoot on Saturdays again.
That's time with my family.
But I make exceptions because I understandwell once in a while
that's all the client can do.
So I offered a Saturday at a particulartime and they said actually, that works.
(45:06):
So I didn't.
I didn't losewhat my my core conviction was on Sundays,
and I still was able tothen earn the business of that client.
Yeah, thatthat's that's a higher level technique.
Craig.
How so?
What do you mean?
Well, what I mean by that,Craig, is the fact that
(45:28):
when we start our business,we start it for goals.
If we write them down or not, you know,there are goals.
Sure.
And sticking to those goals,we sometimes for selves and thinking
that we're going to make an exceptionto the rule because it helps us
get successful in our business, which thenin turn allows you to reach your goals.
(45:51):
But that's a very slippery slope.That's not true.
You all out thereif you have kids yet or not.
Maybe they're maybe you don't have them,
maybe they're grown,but you only have them for so long.
Yeah.
And this if you're not going to have kids,if I mean kids are fabulous,
but if it's with your,you know, your spouse,
if it's with your family,your mom and dad, your
(46:12):
are only going to be on this earthso long.
Your grandparents,if you're still lucky enough
to have them around or young enough.
Yeah,those people are going to be here so long.
And it sounds morbid.
It is, but it's reality.
And if you always choose your business
over those relationships and
(46:33):
the reasons why you start your business,you know, it's just a slippery slope.
I've been there. I've done it.
You turn into your businessand you turn into this monster
and you're like,I, I'm doing this for the good.
Well, you're going to get to retirement
and you're not going to have
any energy left,and you're not going to know your wife.
Yeah. You're not going to knowhow to spend time with your kids.
Your kids. You're be like,why weren't you at my games?
Why weren't you at the band concert?
(46:55):
What did you fold yourself?
And you told yourselfthat you were working every waking moment
right now to get to something that you'renever going to get to
And I can raise my hand to say,I fail at this, too.
So I'm not talking to you.
I'm talking to myself.
You know, I hadI was flying out of the conference
(47:16):
two years ago, and I listen to a podcastand literally made me break down.
It's like when talked about spending timewith his wife and family.
And I was like,I was just so convicted because
I had in my head that I was buildingSpiro right
now, and I had another business,and I was going morning to night,
and I was excitedbecause it was ramping up.
(47:37):
But I just let down my family.
Yeah, I just felt that conviction, like,we haven't
had dinner with my wife, just my wife.
I couldn't remember the last time.
I was starting to get angrythat the kids want to play with me.
If you're a fatherand you get angry when you walk in that
your kids run to,you know you need to reevaluate your life.
(48:00):
Yeah.
Like why would like,
my kids run to me and I'm like,why are they running to me?
Like, don'tthey know what I went through today to.
Oh, those are some tough things, Craig.
And but those are some things that we needto evaluate as business owners.
And if you need someone to talk to you,find someone to talk to.
(48:20):
Yeah.
You know, if it's just youthat's a lonely place.
Find someone that you can confide in.
Yeah.
And the importance ofof surrounding yourself
with people that will speak life intoyour life is critically important.
I had a great, conversation on Facebookwith somebody that's,
you know, so how do you dealwith being hard on yourself?
And so the number onething is surround myself with people
(48:41):
that won't be as hard on me,that they'll speak truth into my life, but
they'll give me more gracethan I give myself sometimes.
So, yeah, surround yourselfwith good people that
that will speak somelife giving things into you.
Yeah, agreed
and correct youwhen you need correcting in a loving way.
Yeah. So yeah, yeah.
(49:02):
Just one last thought.
I have, here foryou guys with what needs renewed.
My last question.
Craig,do you know how many minutes are in a day?
Don't ask me to do math.
1440 minutes,
1440 minutes.
And if you sleep eight hours, six timeseight, 480,
(49:26):
you'vegot about a thousand left thay you’re awake.
Think of how many timesyou let a minute go by.
Look at the activity thing on your phone.
How many minutes did you spend
browsing the internet, social media?
Did you for yourself?
Oh, I was helping clients.What were you really?
Were you watchingthose sneaky little videos?
(49:47):
You got 1440 minutes in a complete day.
You need to sleep. You need to eat.
You need to spend time with your family,
and you need to prioritize your scheduleto have enough of those minutes
that help
you reach your goal, that work on thingsthat are going to guide you and direct
the ship towards what you feelthe success is for your business,
so that you can look back and say, yeah,I started this for a reason.
(50:11):
And you know what?My business worked for me.
Not much to add to that.
It's pretty to the point.
And again,I apologize for being to the point today,
but these are all things
that I work on these things every day,guys, this is stuff that I focus on
because I knowif I don't, I'm going to screw it up.
And we all do.
(50:32):
We all do.
It's good.
Good reminders I this weekespecially I've, I've been focusing on
trying to minimizeyeah the distractions and it's amazing
how much more you get donethe the momentum you build when you
really start being aware of your timeand being, purposeful with your time,
that momentum just buildsand the ball just keeps rolling.
(50:56):
it does.
It makes it a lot easier.
Todd thank you. Great insight this week.
Hey my pleasure.
Thank you all for sticking with us.
Yeah yeah some some rabbit trails
I know some people that it drivesthem up a wall.
But this isthis is just real life, real conversation.
We got to have some funwhile we're talking the seriousness
(51:16):
of business as well.
Because it isit is just real life, you know?
Yeah. A couple of guysfrom the cornfields of northwest Ohio.
It is what it is.
So thank you for indulging us,and watching and listening.
We do appreciate you guys.
All right.
Well,Todd, unless you have anything to add,
I think that's going to wrap things upthis week.
(51:38):
Yeah, that's it for me.Just don't be too hard on yourself.
One little step at a time,
It takes time to break those habitsand to build new ones.
It does.
We'd love to hear what habitsyou're working on.
Building time.
Maybe you want to share some of your time.
Sucks, you know, or what's what'sbeen stealing moments from your day.
And how are you?
How are you addressingthat? Drop us a line.
(51:59):
hello@spiro.media.
You can maybe send us a message,you know, in the in the pink chat bubble, but.
Well, maybe not the pink chat bubble.That's more for help.
Join the Spiro Super Spirosuper Spiros user.
Super Spiroers.
Yeah.
in the Spiro sphere
- Steve came up with that one- I like it I like it.
(52:19):
Isn’t that good. The Spiro sphere.
Yeah. Sorry I'm taking over again.
And, oryou can leave us a comment on YouTube, but
we'd love to hear what are your your TimeBandits and how are you addressing those?
And maybe someone else is going to say,yeah, that's mine too.
That's a great idea on how to address it.
It's community, guys. It's community.
So let's help each other
(52:40):
build some great businessesin the real estate media profession.
So thank you.
If you found value in this,give it a like share it.
You know what?
All those things that YouTubers say,we we just really appreciate that.
Can you tell howrelaxed we are about this?
Anyway, that's all I've got this week.
(53:01):
Make sure you take some time.
Time that maybe you identify on youron your time tracking sheet to be
thankful for the blessings in your lifeand make sure you take a breath this week.
Have a good one.
Thank you for joining usfor the Spiro Podcast,
managing your real estate, photographyand videography business.
This is a production of Spiroand Wow video tours.
(53:21):
You can find out more about Spirois Real Estate Media Business management
software at our website, Spiro Dot media.
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