May 14, 2025 • 38 mins
We have a GREAT topic, and had (yes, had) two great guests lined up to share with you what Realtors look for in a real estate media partner. Pam Swiercz and Janelle Pfeiffer of Berkshire Hathaway - KEE Realty in Southeast Michigan were on the schedule to join us to share their valuable insight, but, technical issues got the best of us! So, Todd & Craig share their thoughts and experiences of what they've learned from Realtors in what they're looking for. But never fear, we WILL get Pam & Janelle on the podcast to share their professional insights and thoughts on what makes a valuable photography/videography partner in a Realtor's business.
Chapter Timestamps:
0:00 Episode Open
02:47 Spiro Updates
04:31 What Realtors Look for in a Media Partner
05:55 Realtor & Photographer Mindsets
37:08 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):
You should not be spending your timedoing $10 an hour jobs.
You should be spending your timedoing 100 hour $100 per hour jobs.
(00:26):
Hi and welcome to the Spiro Podcast,
managing your real estate, photographyand videography business.
Spiro is, it's a software platform.
It's designed to help you manage,but really also help you scale
your day to day real estate mediamarketing type of business.
I'm Craig Magrum, host of the podcast.
Glad to have you back this week. And,
(00:48):
it's it'sbeen an interesting start to this podcast.
We we had two very fun, realtor
guests lined up to be on this episode,
to share with us, the topic this week,
which is what realtors are looking forin media partner.
Todd Kivimaki.
(01:08):
our our our, co-hostthis week.
Todd. Welcome back.
What a morning
Craig,we're going to get through this one.
This is,
but, you know, this is this is life.
This is business.
This is, the way things go sometimes.Yeah.
So we we had a podcast last week.
We missed the week beforebecause busy season has hit.
(01:29):
But we didn't want to miss another weekthis week because potentially next week
we are going to miss.
We're both out of the office next week,so we still wanted to have an episode
for you guys.
So the topic stands.
We're going to still talk about whatrealtors look for from what we know of,
in a media partner and, and helpyou get into the mindset of a realtor
(01:51):
a little bit in, in how they thinka little bit differently than we do
is, is media professionals.
Now, that being said,the guests that we had for you, Pam Suarez
and Janelle Pfeiffer of Berkshire HathawayKey Realty,
in the Detroit metro area, they'rein between Detroit and Monroe, Michigan.
Two of my favorite people to work with.
(02:11):
They're their clients of ours.
VIPs in our our clientele.
And just a fantastic duo of ladies,true real estate professionals.
They do a lot of business.
And, we were going to pick their brain,so we're still going to try.
What what had happenedwas just some technical issues.
We're going to try and get
(02:32):
that worked out with themso that we can still have them on.
So you can hear directly from realtorson what it is that they're looking for.
So with all that set up, Todd,we're not going to dive right in.
Let's hit the Spiro updates first.
What's going on with the software.
Yes. Craig.
Hey, 60 seconds here.
We'll get this thingfinally launched off the ground.
I know all of you going like, hey,
(02:53):
it seems normal, but to usit's been a wacky, a wacky recording.
Spiro updates.
Monday, May.
What month is it? May 20th.
Tuesday, May 20th.
Excuse me, you will get cycle 11.
We've talked about this a lot,
so I'll be brief,but it's a brand new marketing content.
It's going to be beautiful.
It's going to be everything you all wanted
(03:13):
and then property analytics and many othergood things.
But we are excited about this.
The lookand the feel of many of these things.
These are going to be reasonsthat you can reach out to your clients.
So not only are these great updatesand things that you'll like
and they'll like, but
this is going to be thingsyou're going to put in your newsletter.
This is going to be reasons
to reach out to VIPs, explain the greatnew templates, how they can use them,
(03:37):
the reels in the templates,explain property analytics.
What are analytics?What's a referring page?
So we want to give you notonly new features, but then the content
and the ideas of howyou need to be telling those
to your agents to get more bangfor your buck, if you will.
So that's really whatwe're trying to connect with.
The whole Spiro.
(03:58):
Spiro sphere.What do we call that? Craig?
It was Shannon. I can't say it.
I don't remember. the Spiro sphere.
Spiro sphere.
Yeah, I like that. Don't know that.
But that's the idea of like not only
is it a platform,but how can it power your business
and how can it allow youto grow your business?
It's why we do the podcast.
It's why you guys catch meon, tech talks with Todd.
Why we do Spiro 101 201 and 301.
(04:21):
So we are here for you. We are you.
We understand what you do, and,we appreciate all of you.
Yeah. For sure.
I don't even know how to get this
episoderolling in light of everything, Ted,
it has been one of those mornings,like we said. But,
it's a topicthat that you are our listeners
(04:43):
and viewers have requested a couple times,and that is what is it
that realtors are Realtorsare looking for in a media partner?
And, you know, Wow has been around,what, 20 years this year?
So we've learned 22 this year. 22.
Yes getting old getting old.
(05:05):
We've learned a few things over the years.
And just in talking with realtors
and talking businessand picking their brains on things.
So ideally, yes,we wanted to talk with Pamela, Janelle,
and we will at some point
we're going to get this worked out becauseI think you'll really enjoy listening.
To them and hearing from them,they're just
(05:25):
a fantastic, group of ladies that,
I just, I,
I laugh every time I'm shooting for thembecause they're just that fun.
But they have some really goodprofessional insight on things as well
that, thatwe know you're going to benefit from.
So that being said, Todd,let's dive into this.
I'm not even sure
exactly how to enter thiswithout having Pam and Janelle, but yeah,
(05:47):
you've learned a few things over the yearsabout what realtors are looking for.
So I guess let's maybe start just with,
what's what's like a realtor mindset?
Well, we'll ask the overallarching question what is the difference
between a realtor mindsetand a real estate
photographer mindset?
(06:07):
Oh, that's a good question.
That,
honestly, it is very, very close.
I think the biggest thing about it is just
the translationbetween the two industries.
Okay. And what I'm. Yeah.
What I mean by that, Craig, is
(06:29):
let'sthink about the structure of business.
So you all out there at some point got
the idea was introduced, saw media online.
You previously were probablya creative person or enjoyed,
you know, creating things
and it somehow got you into the idea
(06:51):
of is this something that I could do
that could I make money off this?
Could I support my family?
Could I quit my job?Could I reach my goals?
Okay, now let's take that same
step.
Let's take that same timelinewith a real estate agent.
Many real estate agentsprobably went through buying prior
(07:12):
to being a real estate agent. Excuse me?
Drive around, see signs in the yard.
Probably bought or sold a home and go,hey, this is kind of a cool process.
I like interior design.
I like looking at houses.I like helping people.
Meet anotheragent, hear about agent success
stories,how agents are providing for their family.
(07:33):
How an agent stop doing their previous joband transition into real estate
now are working for themselves
and to reach their goals,to feed their family,
to build a team, to help people.
Pretty similar, right, Craig?
Very. The makeups the same.
You all are employed.
We're all employed by ourselves.
(07:56):
They, might have people on their team.
They might have 1099.They might have w-2s.
We know they have VA is becausetheir VA is call us and they place orders.
Right?
Okay.
They have a team of people around them.
So the mindset is so close.
I think the biggest thing isand just understanding
(08:17):
a real estate agent is,is just what they go through day to day.
And I think sometimes we feel
and we
see and I see this online iswhy are they so cheap?
Why do they not upgrade?
Why do they, you know,why are houses never ready?
Why do they reschedule?
Why do they not want to pay a trip fee?
(08:39):
Why do they not want to pay a weekend fee?
Right?
I mean, these are all things that
that that's what is in their brain though.
So that'swhat I'm talking about. The translation.
Like I could go down every one of those.
The reason
they don't want to pay a trip feeis because they drive all over the world,
and it's part of their standard levelservice.
(09:00):
Now, I'mnot saying you should charge a fee,
but that's whythey don't want to pay trip fee.
Why do they think you should worknights and weekends?
Because they work nights and weekends.
You know,all of these things are very similar,
you know, on that one specifically,I've only ever had one realtor
out andout, say I work nights and weekends.
(09:23):
You should too,because you're serving our industry.
But I think it's unsaid from a lotbecause we'll get text messages
at 10:00 at nightand it's like, I'm going to bed.
What are you contacting me for? Yes, but.
So even if it's not outright said.
Yeah, and.
Yeah, that's a good one.
(09:43):
Yeah.
Let's talk about client acquisitiona little bit.
I think, I think this is probably wherereally the connections the biggest.
But let's understandwhat everybody's doing.
So for you and your business clientacquisition as a real estate photographer,
how many of you by show a hands.
(10:05):
And if you're driving,don't put your hands up.
Just cannot wait to go make cold calls.
Really have to even preface like nobody.
Like if you're driving,don't put your hands up because nobody
enjoys cold calls,
even extroverts.
No, I don't,I don't think sell a cold call.
(10:29):
I don't know, I think you canI think you can
develop the,
I think you can develop the knack.
And I think it can be driven by the,
the output that comes from cold calling.
And you can get past the no’s.
But it’s never actually somethingthat you enjoy doing.
Yeah.
(10:49):
You know, I think of,I think of the team at Wow, Craig.
Like, you know,
probably Chris
like, would just pound through cold callsbecause
to, you know, it just go through it like
but I still don'tI think even though we asked him,
you won't be like,yeah, give me a list of a thousand people.
I'm looking forward to calling themand getting rejected 95% of the time.
(11:10):
Right.
So that is
that's the way we workas real estate photographers.
So we have this yin and yang of business.
So we have no businessas a real estate photographer.
When you started out, what did you do?
You did the Instagram method.
(11:30):
You emailed clients.
Then you realized that maybe emailingclients isn't work.
So you show up to open houses,you called, you
text, you emailed, you drop by offices,you did marketing campaigns.
Okay, there's a million differentforms of client acquisition,
but when you didn't have jobs,you did client acquisition.
Then what happens?
The phone rings.
(11:52):
Can you do a shoot?
It's like, Holy cow,this is going to work like Craig,
do you remember when your phone firststarted ringing the first time?
Yeah, it was exciting.
Yeah, it was really exciting.
It was like this high of a lifetime.
Yeah.
And it and and then you're like,okay, great.
What do we do now?
You know, I
(12:12):
remember the first agent that asked methis is four years in, the first agent
that ordered a video from me and said,hey, by the way, can you do photos?
I said, Bob, yeah, I can do photos.
I'd never done a photo in my lifeof a real estate property.
I hang up the phone he ordered four videosand photos from me next week.
I'm like, why did I?
I got to figure out how to do photos now.
(12:35):
So the I know you guysall went through that and it's a fun time.
So you you get your camera gear,you get the photos,
you figure out how to schedule it.
You get Spiro set up, you you make sureyour editor's or autoHDR is online.
And then you go and you do the work, okay?
And you're busy.
You're building relationshipswith clients, you know, in the house,
you're talking to homeowners,
(12:56):
you're vacuumin the floor,you're moving pet cages, you're
you're making lunchfor people in their house.
I’m glad I wasn’t taking a drink
off camera guys.
Todd made a comment.
I was right in the middle of a drink,
and I've got all of thiselectronic equipment in front of me.
I about spewed it all over. So
(13:17):
glad I wasn't taking a drink on that one.
Go ahead. Sorry. Yeah. So.
So you get busy doing the work.
All right.
You're tracking how many miles you drive.You're like, yeah.
How many drives are you? Drive. Yeah,I drove 40,000 last year.
Hey, I stayed up till 2 a.m..
You're doing all these things.
What are you not doing?
You're not doing client acquisition
(13:40):
because you're doing the work.
Okay?
The same thing happens with real estateagents.
Now, the the best.
They have a very consistent flow.
Okay.
And I would say that'ssome of the product of our success at Wow.
Is we consistentlyalways do client acquisition.
(14:02):
I don't think you can have a successful
growing business without being focusedon client acquisition.
That that optimized workflow.
Todd, where you get to the point
where you are consistentin doing client acquisition and outreach.
That's somethingyou have to grow into, correct?
Like you can't just do thatas a solopreneur
(14:23):
by yourself.
At least I felt I couldn't
because I was busy working in the businessinstead of on the business.
But as you grew,then you start investing in somebody
that can help you consistentlydo the yeah, the client acquisition.
Yeah, yeah.
And unless you've come in and your goaland your goal was never to shoot,
like if you launchedwith having a photographer
(14:47):
like I don't think there's many of usout there.
Maybe I'm just not awareI haven't talked to you.
But if you've done that, great.
Like if you're like, hey,I'm just going to be the business owner,
I'm never going to do the shoot.I'm never going to do anything about it.
That typically takes some moneyto start with or an investment.
And a lot of times I think many of you,all of you that I talk to out there,
like we all bootstrapped this, right?
Like Craig, you bootstrapped yours,I bootstrapped mine, it's not like,
(15:09):
hey, let's see if we can get 50 grandto hire two people.
And and
so, yeah,no, I think that's pretty similar.
And for theand for the realtor as well, they,
they started with just themselvesbut then eventually grew a team.
Exactly.
And I think the parallels like thatCraig will continue on and on
and on again because thethe realtors do the same thing.
(15:32):
The Realtors work really hard to doclient acquisition.
Their phone begins to ring.
Now. They're showing people houses.
They're doing listing presentationsor writing offers.
They're negotiating.They're going through inspections.
Appraisals are doing all these thingswell, what are they not doing?
They're not doing client acquisition.
Okay. So then they get everything sold.
(15:53):
They get to the closing tableand they go, hey, I got nothing,
nothing in the pipeline. Yeah.
So I think we're all very, very similar.
Right.
Business is business that it is.
You might we might have a nichein real estate photography but
it's still business.
And the processes are the same.
(16:15):
So okay shiftingthen from say client acquisition
that that they're eventuallygoing to hire that out
or have somebody on their teamthat is kind of keeping that funnel full
so that when deals close,they have new deals to work.
Same thing for for their mediaand for their marketing, right?
They started outprobably doing it themselves.
We started out doing our own media,producing our own media.
(16:39):
But eventually, you know,we have Tesa on our team
that does our marketing piecesand does an amazing job.
But originally we were doing thatourselves.
Same thing. Correct?
Correct. Yes. Yeah.
And this is go ahead. Sorry.
No I was just going to lead thatinto the question then.
Okay.
Then that leads intohow does a realtor start to invest in
(17:02):
outside marketingand and visuals for their listings.
Yeah.
So they do that because they beginto value their time more.
And all of you do that.
All of you should be doing that.
So I talk a lot about a time trackingactivity where you track your time
and then you categorizeyour time in three categories
(17:25):
an admin, a nurse and a doctor.
And think aboutwhen you go into a doctor's office.
When you walk in the front door, isthe doctor sitting there checking you in,
you know, is the nursesitting there checking you in?
Know an admin is checking you in. Okay.
Then you go back, you get call back.
The admin walks you back,or another admin walks you back.
(17:48):
Doctor's not like,hey, let's go do this thing.
You get in the room.
Who takes vitals?
Nurse a nurse comes in and takes five.
Okay, so a higher level job.
And then the nurse, they do their thingand then you get to the point
to where the doctor comes infor your problem or for your checkup.
(18:10):
How long is the doctor in the room?
Four minutes.
You know who's been to the dentist lately?
You know that's the same thing.
Yeah, right.
Yeah. Doctor,everything looks good. Okay, great.
Okay, look, smile.
Bite down. Look. Okay, good. Sounds good.
You got a feeling you got any.You got cavity there? Need a filling.
Okay. See you later.
It's like he walks out and I'm like,did he even walk in?
(18:34):
Right.
Okay, so but he values his time.
He's in there three minutes.
But he's he's he'snot spending his time doing your cleaning.
He's not spending his timechecking you in, checking you out.
There's people to do that.
And the same happens with the realtor.
The same happens with any businessas you might find it valuable right now
(18:55):
that you're qualitycontroling your photos, you should not be.
That's an admin job.
That's a $10 an hour job.
Okay, but let's say it admins
ten a nurse nurses50 a doctor's 100 just for
separation.
You should not be spending your timedoing $10 an hour jobs.
(19:16):
You should be spending your timedoing 100 hour $100 per hour jobs.
And then the cool thing about this, Craig,is this continues
as you build a businessthat $100 an hour job,
you are on to 500 or $1000 an hour jobs,
and you bring up peoplethat used to do the $10 an hour jobs.
(19:38):
That's how you grow a company.
That's how people get excitedabout being at a company.
That's how people see growth and fulfillthe fulfillment at a company.
But it takes you saying no
to the $10 an hour job.
You know, it's a funny thingI'll say on the way into the office.
I think I say this a lot,but I listen to an individual called
(20:00):
Darren Hardyand it's called the Darren Daily.
And he talked this morning about.
As business owners,
we typically look at the top levelpeople in the industry.
And he used the idea of like an Olympianlike think if you're an athlete,
if you want to get to the Olympics like,you know, say it's in
(20:25):
basketball, you know, you want to getto the Olympics, NBA, whatever.
Maybe we play a lot of basketball.
So I'll stick with that analogy.
You're always looking like,hey what what is Steph Curry doing.
What LeBrondo what Michael Jordan do Kobe do.
What are they doing.
What are they doing.
And he arguedthat it's not what they're doing.
It's what they're saying no to.
(20:48):
They're saying no
to some things in their diet.
They're saying no to staying up becausethey know they have to get up early.
They're saying no to $10 an hour jobs.
They're saying no to a $1,000 an hour jobsbecause they're doing
that million dollar per hour jobs.
And I think that's the biggest thing.
(21:08):
As a business ownerwill you say no to the $10 an hour job
so that you can focus on what's going toget you along the furthest?
So let's
translate this back to the realtorsmindset.
And for a new agent that maybe hasn't
grown into that type of mindset yet,where they
(21:30):
they're not seeing the valueof investing in
outsourcing some of these things,how do we, as photographers,
help them grow into that mindsetand show them the value
of not doing the $10 an houror worth more than $10 people?
We understand that, buthelping them understand that their time is
better spentnot doing their own photography and video.
(21:51):
Yeah, I, I think that there is also it's
always through educationand building relationships.
So you're going to show themthe difference.
Maybe you're just showing themhow they could use that,
or how you could use a videoto get more reach on social media,
(22:12):
how they could link the unbranded siteto the on unbranded property
website to the MLS,how they can use their tracking code
to try to retargetthe on branded page traffic.
You know,
like all these high level things,I can't tell you how many times
I've walked into an office.
And I'm sure you have Craig two at a,just a Tuesday morning company meeting.
And I always try to given those meetings,I try to talk about something
(22:36):
that is not selling them photos or videobecause I want them to
I want I want to walk outand they go, hey, how did he know that?
Like, I, I think I need to do that.
I think I saw the top agent doing that
and he just told me how to do it,but I don't really get it.
So I think I'm just going to call him.
(22:57):
You know, another thing we talk aboutis photos.
Don't be a commodity.
There is.
You do not want to sell a commodityor you just don't because
it's a race to the bottom because somebodyis going to do it for $3 an hour.
But it's just no fun that everybody'sgoing to try to cut it out.
You don't want to be a commodity.
(23:17):
You need to sell on value.
And that's a hard thing.
That's a hard thingfor real estate photographers.
But that's a hard thing for real estateagents.
Many of them go, oh yeah, I'll do it.
The best agent ten, they,they get a 3% split each side.
Like I'll do it for two.
And they feel like they need to walk inand do it for two to beat
(23:37):
the agent that does it for three.
That doesn't work.
Because honestly, the best agents,they do it for four,
three and a half or fourand they sell on value.
And that's the same thing we can dois we sell them value.
And your valueis going to be a little bit different
from when you start towhen you build a team.
So what we the value we sell at Wow doing
(23:59):
13,000 is 13,500 this year
13,500 jobs this year.
The value we sell is consistentconsistency.
A team aroundyou support when you need it.
Dedicate to train photographers that gothrough continuing ed that have continued
education and feedback.
(24:20):
We support you.
We support your events.
You like all these things.This is what we sell.
We sell our size. We sell the people.
You have somebody.
If you need something, you go to support,if you need scheduling and you go to scheduling.
And we have
we have highly trained individuals in eachaspect that can help you do something,
okay.
If you're single, if you'reif you are a solo preneur
(24:43):
right now, you're not selling that, okay?
What you're selling isI get to know your business.
I the love for creatingand how I can make your listing
look that if you need something,you call me.
I will take care of it.
I care about you so much that I'm goingto take care of these things.
(25:03):
You have my cell phone.
Probably don't do that.
We all do it,I did it. It's a terrible idea.
As you grow, you want to get rid of that.
But we can help you get out of that idea.
What the what to say then.
But it's just aa different feature and benefit
as you go alongand building your business.
Yeah.
And people will value professionalismand knowing that they can trust you
(25:27):
to represent them.
Well, I a couple weeks ago,we talked about that record
listing that I had thatI was just over the top excited about,
you know, I walked in, it's aalmost $3 million property
and what struck me immediatelywas how down to earth the seller was.
And he just immediatelysaid, you're the professional.
(25:47):
I'm going to get out of the way.
You do your thing at that level.
I was talking with Jess our operationsdirector.
I went from that shoot. Todd no joke.
Back to back to I $150,000 Listing,
where the seller felt that they neededto tell me every shot I needed to take.
Oh, yeah. This is a.
(26:08):
And Ijust I kind of chuckle, I didn't judge,
I'm never going to make a seller feel,
like they're a botherbecause my mindset is I'm
part of that Realtorsteam and I need to represent them well.
So even if I have to bite my tongueas a professional, I'm
going to do thatto to represent the realtor well.
(26:31):
But the mindset differencethat just pointed out to me and I thought
was really good was somebodythat is at a $3 million house level,
has a different mindset in that they knowthe person that they're hiring to sell
their houseis going to bring in professionals,
and they really don't have to worryabout the nickels and dimes
and pennies of a job.
Now, yes, they dobecause they're financially successful,
(26:54):
but they trust somebodyin a lower financial state
has to worry about every penny.
And so they they have a sense ofI have to have some control over this
to get every penny I can out of this.
And just understanding thosedifferent mindsets as a professional,
I think, just goes to really helping usserve our realtor as well.
(27:16):
And in walking in with thatprofessionalism and and understanding
the mindset of the seller,it goes beyond just photography.
So that'sthat's a value that you can bring
to your seller or to your,your real estate realtor clients.
Spit it out Craig?
I don't know exactly whereI was going with that, but that just
that's something I've been chewingon the last week or two here.
(27:36):
Oh that isI hadn't heard that situation, Craig,
but that is fabulous because I thinkthe $3 million owner, he valued his time
so much, he already spent the timehe needed and his time was valuable.
He was doing the 10,000 or thethe 100,000 per hour jobs for.
He walked back into his home officeand was going back to work.
(28:00):
He didn't have time to walk throughhis house and show me every little thing.
Yeah, yeah,they hired us to take care of that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He did his due diligence at the beginningof the process that was vetting
the agent and understanding,and he trusted in them.
And that agent probably setproper expectations.
Your best agents will say, hey, the photoand video guys are going to come in
(28:22):
and I've used them for X amount of time.
They are fabulous.They're going to do their thing.
Please just stay out of their way.
Yes, that's what they're going to say.
I love working with those agents.
It makes my job so much easier.
Yeah. And and that homeowner,he went sure.
Yeah.
Like, honestly, you couldn't
even pay me to get in your waybecause I'm not doing that job.
(28:45):
I have bigger jobs to do.
And I've just done my job by hiring you.
That's the time I needed to spend.
So I trust that everything
proceeding is going to be to the levelthat we've set.
By communicating through expectationsin this conversation,
I think you can almost look at it
(29:05):
from like a cost benefit analysistype of situation.
Okay, so say thethe owner of the $3 million house,
he's making buku money, right?
What is the lost opportunity that he has
and what he can make of doing his job,his million dollar job
versus walking throughto make sure that I'm doing my job.
(29:27):
He's it's cost him something to do that.
So it's the same thing with that.
We can walk that through with our realtorsthat maybe aren't quite there
to that mindset of whatwhat's the the opportunity
you're losing by shooting your own photosand having to maybe edit those.
It's costing you money.
You're leaving money on the table,
and we want to help younot leave money on the table.
(29:49):
We want to get you to the 200, 300and $400,000 house level
as a newer agentand help you grow your business.
It's all about the business.
Yeah.And when you have those conversations,
I know we've had many over the years,Craig.
Those agents go,oh, like I never thought of that.
Like that is the thing I get.
I can think of a story from from Steve.
(30:10):
And this was of aof a local agent here in Lima.
We had an agentshow up the office one day and
I mean the office.
We're out in the middle of,of of a cornfield.
I we truly are the office.
Like, we're literally in the middleof a cornfield, like my neighbor.
Like we have neighbors,but they're farther away.
Oh, my in-laws live next door.
So they'll tell you, listen, about Ohio,
(30:32):
I was, oh, hi.
And so we actually walk.
I have a West Virginia story about Ohioand how they pronounce our state name.
I'll save that forI'll save that for a different podcast.
Go ahead. I'm sorry.
No, no, it's it's it's good.
So we hear the door chime go offand we have a chime that goes off
(30:54):
and some comes in and you that'salways like it's probably someone here.
This was like an off day when not manypeople are in the office like who's here?
Typically it's it's the post, you know,the, the, the male lady showing up
and she's got something.But it wasn't around that time.
And like some people typically walkand we have a we have a big building.
And so people wander aroundlike it's fun to see.
(31:15):
It's terrible.
But like people walk in
and we have a kitchen in a boardroomand then we have like an entryway
and you might not see anybodyfor 50ft of the office.
You're like, snaking your way back in.
And typically people are like, hello.
And so that hello comes like,okay, somebody in here that clearly
we don't know who they are
and they're looking for usor they're looking for wow, internet.
(31:37):
Craig,I can't say how many people you guys know.
Do you have wow internet in your area?
We had a guy come and he's like,you guys sell the interweb like
Well, we don't have the interweb here.
This is not the you have the Google,the Google, the Google.
Sorry. Yeah.
So, sorry, I'mjust taking forever on this story, y'all.
(31:57):
But it has a point.
Realtor shows up.
He's like 19 years old, brand new realtorat one of our local companies,
and he's just got, like, this gusto.
And he's like, hey, I'm calling like,expired listings.
I'm calling for sale by ownerslike he's got like, he is there
ready to make his business happen.
(32:20):
And he comes in, he's like, hey,I'm trying to get this one on the lake.
The lake's about 45 minutesaway from here,
and it's a millionplus our listing and kind of thing.
Like, okay, you've had no listings,you haven't sold a house,
but let's just pick up.
Let's sell the million dollarplus house on the lake.
Why not?It sounds like a great place to start.
I mean, you got to admire the tenacityand the confidence.
(32:41):
Oh, I love it. It's fabulous.
Like, why?I'm. I'm not going to sell the tour.
Give me the million dollar house.
That's like a 5X.
And so Steve was like like, all right.
Yeah. Like this is great.
Like one.
We're honored that you walked in and askedus, like,
how can you be differentin this listing presentation?
Because he doesn't look like he'sever done it before.
(33:01):
He hasn't done it before.I mean, he's a nice looking kid.
He speaks well,but he's he's 19 years old.
And so Steve gives him some prints offsome of our brochures,
give some of our information,
sends him some video links of some thingsthat we've done in the past for that
the company he's at and and has himall prepped to go get this listing.
(33:21):
And so he went inand he gave this spiel, sold the media
and like, they, they took him up on it,which was incredible.
Like us crazy.
So so when youwhen you can become a source of knowledge
to your realtors and that was a referral,by the way, I just want to point that out
(33:42):
like the broker at his company said, oh,why don't you go see Steve over it?
Wow. Like, hey,they're just like, go buy the building.
And he's like, sure, I'll do it.He walks in.
So when you build those relationships,your clients will refer you.
And if you are the source of knowledge,
who's not looking for more knowledge,right?
Right.
That's why you guys are on this podcast.
(34:03):
Because we're not that entertaining.
The jokes aren't great.
Like, you're trying to look for the wayswe've screwed up over the years so
you don't do it.
We're all looking for knowledge.
So when you can put that to useand when you understand what to say no to
and when you can be that
source of knowledge for your agents,
(34:26):
then they will think, hey,you need to talk to Craig.
Craig knows this thing about social media.
I don't know what it is,but he was talking about it.
It seemed like it was really cool.
You should call himand have that done for you.
Do listing.
Yeah. I mean, what a what a story.
And it's again, it's all about mindset andunderstanding of the realtor's mindset.
There's so much morewe could go into, Todd, but honestly,
we want to save a lot of this contentfor when we can actually get
(34:48):
Pam and Janelle back on. Right.
And then pick their their brains on this.
So we don't want it to,you know, to steal all the content.
Because we really want you to hear it from
a realtor's, mouth and experience.
So with that, I think that that'sa good starting point for this topic.
And, and we'll do a part two on this
as soon as we can get that, that timescheduled with, with, Pam and Janelle.
(35:12):
But let that be a starting point for you.
If I, I love working with new clientslike new realtors, Todd,
because I want to see them growand succeed because I feel good about what
I'm doing then in my role in that, I'mtruly serving somebody
and helping them, get some wins.
And for me, that's a win.
(35:33):
You know, it's not about all the money,because if I'm shooting, say,
a $70,000 house,you know, they're going to start small.
Their, theirtheir invoice is not going to be that big.
I'm not making a ton of money on that,but the satisfaction of seeing them,
be wowed.
And that's
part of why we're called Wow video toursby the media that we're giving them,
(35:54):
that they can deliver to their seller,and the seller is wowed.
It makes them feel good.They want to get the next listing.
They can use that, you know, that shootto show their next potential,
seller and client and see themgrow and succeed and be a part of that.
And that's justpart of what I love to do in this.
And I'm sure it's the same for our,our listeners.
(36:15):
But going in with that attitudewhen you're working with a new client,
a new realtor, and really communicatinghow much you love what you do,
that that actually gets a lot of traction.
Because people want to work with peoplethat love what they do.
So just let that shine throughand understand that your mindset
(36:38):
is actually very similar to the realtorsmindset in terms of business.
If you can understand it is, you know,
business partners,
it's going to do nothingbut good things for you.
So I think that's a good placeto wrap up, Todd.
Yeah, a lot of good stuff in here.
Just try to take one nugget away from it,understand your client a little bit more,
(37:00):
connect with them and, you'll be surprisedhow similar they are to you.
Like Craig said. Yeah.
Good deal.
All right. Well,we are going to be off next week.
But we will get back to this ASAP.
We know it's busy seasonfor many of you as well, so,
thank you so much for the time that you dotake out.
As we've said countless times,we appreciate that.
(37:21):
We know you're busy, you're an owner,you've got a lot on your plate.
But the fact that you take the time toto listen or watch is not lost on us.
And we appreciate your timebecause we know it's valuable.
So yeah.
Craig, if you sorry, before you wrap up,if you're looking for content in the off
week, we had an incredible techtalk with with me with Todd yesterday.
That would have been May 8th on Spirosuper user Facebook group.
(37:45):
We covered some really great topics.
There are some questions.
We had a nice group in there,
a nice size of a groupand went over a lot of business items.
So if you're looking for some content,
go backand see if you can't play that again.
There was some really good, businessbuilding conversations in that.
Awesome. I might have to watch that.
(38:06):
All right, well, you guys, thank you againso much.
Make sure you take some time to bethankful for the blessings in your life.
And be sure to take a breath,have a great week.
Coming up on this episodeof The Spiro podcast.
(00:04):
You should not be spending your timedoing $10 an hour jobs.
You should be spending your timedoing 100 hour $100 per hour jobs.
(00:26):
Hi and welcome to the Spiro Podcast,
managing your real estate, photographyand videography business.
Spiro is, it's a software platform.
It's designed to help you manage,but really also help you scale
your day to day real estate mediamarketing type of business.
I'm Craig Magrum, host of the podcast.
Glad to have you back this week. And,
(00:48):
it's it'sbeen an interesting start to this podcast.
We we had two very fun, realtor
guests lined up to be on this episode,
to share with us, the topic this week,
which is what realtors are looking forin media partner.
Todd Kivimaki.
(01:08):
our our our, co-hostthis week.
Todd. Welcome back.
What a morning
Craig,we're going to get through this one.
This is,
but, you know, this is this is life.
This is business.
This is, the way things go sometimes.Yeah.
So we we had a podcast last week.
We missed the week beforebecause busy season has hit.
(01:29):
But we didn't want to miss another weekthis week because potentially next week
we are going to miss.
We're both out of the office next week,so we still wanted to have an episode
for you guys.
So the topic stands.
We're going to still talk about whatrealtors look for from what we know of,
in a media partner and, and helpyou get into the mindset of a realtor
(01:51):
a little bit in, in how they thinka little bit differently than we do
is, is media professionals.
Now, that being said,the guests that we had for you, Pam Suarez
and Janelle Pfeiffer of Berkshire HathawayKey Realty,
in the Detroit metro area, they'rein between Detroit and Monroe, Michigan.
Two of my favorite people to work with.
(02:11):
They're their clients of ours.
VIPs in our our clientele.
And just a fantastic duo of ladies,true real estate professionals.
They do a lot of business.
And, we were going to pick their brain,so we're still going to try.
What what had happenedwas just some technical issues.
We're going to try and get
(02:32):
that worked out with themso that we can still have them on.
So you can hear directly from realtorson what it is that they're looking for.
So with all that set up, Todd,we're not going to dive right in.
Let's hit the Spiro updates first.
What's going on with the software.
Yes. Craig.
Hey, 60 seconds here.
We'll get this thingfinally launched off the ground.
I know all of you going like, hey,
(02:53):
it seems normal, but to usit's been a wacky, a wacky recording.
Spiro updates.
Monday, May.
What month is it? May 20th.
Tuesday, May 20th.
Excuse me, you will get cycle 11.
We've talked about this a lot,
so I'll be brief,but it's a brand new marketing content.
It's going to be beautiful.
It's going to be everything you all wanted
(03:13):
and then property analytics and many othergood things.
But we are excited about this.
The lookand the feel of many of these things.
These are going to be reasonsthat you can reach out to your clients.
So not only are these great updatesand things that you'll like
and they'll like, but
this is going to be thingsyou're going to put in your newsletter.
This is going to be reasons
to reach out to VIPs, explain the greatnew templates, how they can use them,
(03:37):
the reels in the templates,explain property analytics.
What are analytics?What's a referring page?
So we want to give you notonly new features, but then the content
and the ideas of howyou need to be telling those
to your agents to get more bangfor your buck, if you will.
So that's really whatwe're trying to connect with.
The whole Spiro.
(03:58):
Spiro sphere.What do we call that? Craig?
It was Shannon. I can't say it.
I don't remember. the Spiro sphere.
Spiro sphere.
Yeah, I like that. Don't know that.
But that's the idea of like not only
is it a platform,but how can it power your business
and how can it allow youto grow your business?
It's why we do the podcast.
It's why you guys catch meon, tech talks with Todd.
Why we do Spiro 101 201 and 301.
(04:21):
So we are here for you. We are you.
We understand what you do, and,we appreciate all of you.
Yeah. For sure.
I don't even know how to get this
episoderolling in light of everything, Ted,
it has been one of those mornings,like we said. But,
it's a topicthat that you are our listeners
(04:43):
and viewers have requested a couple times,and that is what is it
that realtors are Realtorsare looking for in a media partner?
And, you know, Wow has been around,what, 20 years this year?
So we've learned 22 this year. 22.
Yes getting old getting old.
(05:05):
We've learned a few things over the years.
And just in talking with realtors
and talking businessand picking their brains on things.
So ideally, yes,we wanted to talk with Pamela, Janelle,
and we will at some point
we're going to get this worked out becauseI think you'll really enjoy listening.
To them and hearing from them,they're just
(05:25):
a fantastic, group of ladies that,
I just, I,
I laugh every time I'm shooting for thembecause they're just that fun.
But they have some really goodprofessional insight on things as well
that, thatwe know you're going to benefit from.
So that being said, Todd,let's dive into this.
I'm not even sure
exactly how to enter thiswithout having Pam and Janelle, but yeah,
(05:47):
you've learned a few things over the yearsabout what realtors are looking for.
So I guess let's maybe start just with,
what's what's like a realtor mindset?
Well, we'll ask the overallarching question what is the difference
between a realtor mindsetand a real estate
photographer mindset?
(06:07):
Oh, that's a good question.
That,
honestly, it is very, very close.
I think the biggest thing about it is just
the translationbetween the two industries.
Okay. And what I'm. Yeah.
What I mean by that, Craig, is
(06:29):
let'sthink about the structure of business.
So you all out there at some point got
the idea was introduced, saw media online.
You previously were probablya creative person or enjoyed,
you know, creating things
and it somehow got you into the idea
(06:51):
of is this something that I could do
that could I make money off this?
Could I support my family?
Could I quit my job?Could I reach my goals?
Okay, now let's take that same
step.
Let's take that same timelinewith a real estate agent.
Many real estate agentsprobably went through buying prior
(07:12):
to being a real estate agent. Excuse me?
Drive around, see signs in the yard.
Probably bought or sold a home and go,hey, this is kind of a cool process.
I like interior design.
I like looking at houses.I like helping people.
Meet anotheragent, hear about agent success
stories,how agents are providing for their family.
(07:33):
How an agent stop doing their previous joband transition into real estate
now are working for themselves
and to reach their goals,to feed their family,
to build a team, to help people.
Pretty similar, right, Craig?
Very. The makeups the same.
You all are employed.
We're all employed by ourselves.
(07:56):
They, might have people on their team.
They might have 1099.They might have w-2s.
We know they have VA is becausetheir VA is call us and they place orders.
Right?
Okay.
They have a team of people around them.
So the mindset is so close.
I think the biggest thing isand just understanding
(08:17):
a real estate agent is,is just what they go through day to day.
And I think sometimes we feel
and we
see and I see this online iswhy are they so cheap?
Why do they not upgrade?
Why do they, you know,why are houses never ready?
Why do they reschedule?
Why do they not want to pay a trip fee?
(08:39):
Why do they not want to pay a weekend fee?
Right?
I mean, these are all things that
that that's what is in their brain though.
So that'swhat I'm talking about. The translation.
Like I could go down every one of those.
The reason
they don't want to pay a trip feeis because they drive all over the world,
and it's part of their standard levelservice.
(09:00):
Now, I'mnot saying you should charge a fee,
but that's whythey don't want to pay trip fee.
Why do they think you should worknights and weekends?
Because they work nights and weekends.
You know,all of these things are very similar,
you know, on that one specifically,I've only ever had one realtor
out andout, say I work nights and weekends.
(09:23):
You should too,because you're serving our industry.
But I think it's unsaid from a lotbecause we'll get text messages
at 10:00 at nightand it's like, I'm going to bed.
What are you contacting me for? Yes, but.
So even if it's not outright said.
Yeah, and.
Yeah, that's a good one.
(09:43):
Yeah.
Let's talk about client acquisitiona little bit.
I think, I think this is probably wherereally the connections the biggest.
But let's understandwhat everybody's doing.
So for you and your business clientacquisition as a real estate photographer,
how many of you by show a hands.
(10:05):
And if you're driving,don't put your hands up.
Just cannot wait to go make cold calls.
Really have to even preface like nobody.
Like if you're driving,don't put your hands up because nobody
enjoys cold calls,
even extroverts.
No, I don't,I don't think sell a cold call.
(10:29):
I don't know, I think you canI think you can
develop the,
I think you can develop the knack.
And I think it can be driven by the,
the output that comes from cold calling.
And you can get past the no’s.
But it’s never actually somethingthat you enjoy doing.
Yeah.
(10:49):
You know, I think of,I think of the team at Wow, Craig.
Like, you know,
probably Chris
like, would just pound through cold callsbecause
to, you know, it just go through it like
but I still don'tI think even though we asked him,
you won't be like,yeah, give me a list of a thousand people.
I'm looking forward to calling themand getting rejected 95% of the time.
(11:10):
Right.
So that is
that's the way we workas real estate photographers.
So we have this yin and yang of business.
So we have no businessas a real estate photographer.
When you started out, what did you do?
You did the Instagram method.
(11:30):
You emailed clients.
Then you realized that maybe emailingclients isn't work.
So you show up to open houses,you called, you
text, you emailed, you drop by offices,you did marketing campaigns.
Okay, there's a million differentforms of client acquisition,
but when you didn't have jobs,you did client acquisition.
Then what happens?
The phone rings.
(11:52):
Can you do a shoot?
It's like, Holy cow,this is going to work like Craig,
do you remember when your phone firststarted ringing the first time?
Yeah, it was exciting.
Yeah, it was really exciting.
It was like this high of a lifetime.
Yeah.
And it and and then you're like,okay, great.
What do we do now?
You know, I
(12:12):
remember the first agent that asked methis is four years in, the first agent
that ordered a video from me and said,hey, by the way, can you do photos?
I said, Bob, yeah, I can do photos.
I'd never done a photo in my lifeof a real estate property.
I hang up the phone he ordered four videosand photos from me next week.
I'm like, why did I?
I got to figure out how to do photos now.
(12:35):
So the I know you guysall went through that and it's a fun time.
So you you get your camera gear,you get the photos,
you figure out how to schedule it.
You get Spiro set up, you you make sureyour editor's or autoHDR is online.
And then you go and you do the work, okay?
And you're busy.
You're building relationshipswith clients, you know, in the house,
you're talking to homeowners,
(12:56):
you're vacuumin the floor,you're moving pet cages, you're
you're making lunchfor people in their house.
I’m glad I wasn’t taking a drink
off camera guys.
Todd made a comment.
I was right in the middle of a drink,
and I've got all of thiselectronic equipment in front of me.
I about spewed it all over. So
(13:17):
glad I wasn't taking a drink on that one.
Go ahead. Sorry. Yeah. So.
So you get busy doing the work.
All right.
You're tracking how many miles you drive.You're like, yeah.
How many drives are you? Drive. Yeah,I drove 40,000 last year.
Hey, I stayed up till 2 a.m..
You're doing all these things.
What are you not doing?
You're not doing client acquisition
(13:40):
because you're doing the work.
Okay?
The same thing happens with real estateagents.
Now, the the best.
They have a very consistent flow.
Okay.
And I would say that'ssome of the product of our success at Wow.
Is we consistentlyalways do client acquisition.
(14:02):
I don't think you can have a successful
growing business without being focusedon client acquisition.
That that optimized workflow.
Todd, where you get to the point
where you are consistentin doing client acquisition and outreach.
That's somethingyou have to grow into, correct?
Like you can't just do thatas a solopreneur
(14:23):
by yourself.
At least I felt I couldn't
because I was busy working in the businessinstead of on the business.
But as you grew,then you start investing in somebody
that can help you consistentlydo the yeah, the client acquisition.
Yeah, yeah.
And unless you've come in and your goaland your goal was never to shoot,
like if you launchedwith having a photographer
(14:47):
like I don't think there's many of usout there.
Maybe I'm just not awareI haven't talked to you.
But if you've done that, great.
Like if you're like, hey,I'm just going to be the business owner,
I'm never going to do the shoot.I'm never going to do anything about it.
That typically takes some moneyto start with or an investment.
And a lot of times I think many of you,all of you that I talk to out there,
like we all bootstrapped this, right?
Like Craig, you bootstrapped yours,I bootstrapped mine, it's not like,
(15:09):
hey, let's see if we can get 50 grandto hire two people.
And and
so, yeah,no, I think that's pretty similar.
And for theand for the realtor as well, they,
they started with just themselvesbut then eventually grew a team.
Exactly.
And I think the parallels like thatCraig will continue on and on
and on again because thethe realtors do the same thing.
(15:32):
The Realtors work really hard to doclient acquisition.
Their phone begins to ring.
Now. They're showing people houses.
They're doing listing presentationsor writing offers.
They're negotiating.They're going through inspections.
Appraisals are doing all these thingswell, what are they not doing?
They're not doing client acquisition.
Okay. So then they get everything sold.
(15:53):
They get to the closing tableand they go, hey, I got nothing,
nothing in the pipeline. Yeah.
So I think we're all very, very similar.
Right.
Business is business that it is.
You might we might have a nichein real estate photography but
it's still business.
And the processes are the same.
(16:15):
So okay shiftingthen from say client acquisition
that that they're eventuallygoing to hire that out
or have somebody on their teamthat is kind of keeping that funnel full
so that when deals close,they have new deals to work.
Same thing for for their mediaand for their marketing, right?
They started outprobably doing it themselves.
We started out doing our own media,producing our own media.
(16:39):
But eventually, you know,we have Tesa on our team
that does our marketing piecesand does an amazing job.
But originally we were doing thatourselves.
Same thing. Correct?
Correct. Yes. Yeah.
And this is go ahead. Sorry.
No I was just going to lead thatinto the question then.
Okay.
Then that leads intohow does a realtor start to invest in
(17:02):
outside marketingand and visuals for their listings.
Yeah.
So they do that because they beginto value their time more.
And all of you do that.
All of you should be doing that.
So I talk a lot about a time trackingactivity where you track your time
and then you categorizeyour time in three categories
(17:25):
an admin, a nurse and a doctor.
And think aboutwhen you go into a doctor's office.
When you walk in the front door, isthe doctor sitting there checking you in,
you know, is the nursesitting there checking you in?
Know an admin is checking you in. Okay.
Then you go back, you get call back.
The admin walks you back,or another admin walks you back.
(17:48):
Doctor's not like,hey, let's go do this thing.
You get in the room.
Who takes vitals?
Nurse a nurse comes in and takes five.
Okay, so a higher level job.
And then the nurse, they do their thingand then you get to the point
to where the doctor comes infor your problem or for your checkup.
(18:10):
How long is the doctor in the room?
Four minutes.
You know who's been to the dentist lately?
You know that's the same thing.
Yeah, right.
Yeah. Doctor,everything looks good. Okay, great.
Okay, look, smile.
Bite down. Look. Okay, good. Sounds good.
You got a feeling you got any.You got cavity there? Need a filling.
Okay. See you later.
It's like he walks out and I'm like,did he even walk in?
(18:34):
Right.
Okay, so but he values his time.
He's in there three minutes.
But he's he's he'snot spending his time doing your cleaning.
He's not spending his timechecking you in, checking you out.
There's people to do that.
And the same happens with the realtor.
The same happens with any businessas you might find it valuable right now
(18:55):
that you're qualitycontroling your photos, you should not be.
That's an admin job.
That's a $10 an hour job.
Okay, but let's say it admins
ten a nurse nurses50 a doctor's 100 just for
separation.
You should not be spending your timedoing $10 an hour jobs.
(19:16):
You should be spending your timedoing 100 hour $100 per hour jobs.
And then the cool thing about this, Craig,is this continues
as you build a businessthat $100 an hour job,
you are on to 500 or $1000 an hour jobs,
and you bring up peoplethat used to do the $10 an hour jobs.
(19:38):
That's how you grow a company.
That's how people get excitedabout being at a company.
That's how people see growth and fulfillthe fulfillment at a company.
But it takes you saying no
to the $10 an hour job.
You know, it's a funny thingI'll say on the way into the office.
I think I say this a lot,but I listen to an individual called
(20:00):
Darren Hardyand it's called the Darren Daily.
And he talked this morning about.
As business owners,
we typically look at the top levelpeople in the industry.
And he used the idea of like an Olympianlike think if you're an athlete,
if you want to get to the Olympics like,you know, say it's in
(20:25):
basketball, you know, you want to getto the Olympics, NBA, whatever.
Maybe we play a lot of basketball.
So I'll stick with that analogy.
You're always looking like,hey what what is Steph Curry doing.
What LeBrondo what Michael Jordan do Kobe do.
What are they doing.
What are they doing.
And he arguedthat it's not what they're doing.
It's what they're saying no to.
(20:48):
They're saying no
to some things in their diet.
They're saying no to staying up becausethey know they have to get up early.
They're saying no to $10 an hour jobs.
They're saying no to a $1,000 an hour jobsbecause they're doing
that million dollar per hour jobs.
And I think that's the biggest thing.
(21:08):
As a business ownerwill you say no to the $10 an hour job
so that you can focus on what's going toget you along the furthest?
So let's
translate this back to the realtorsmindset.
And for a new agent that maybe hasn't
grown into that type of mindset yet,where they
(21:30):
they're not seeing the valueof investing in
outsourcing some of these things,how do we, as photographers,
help them grow into that mindsetand show them the value
of not doing the $10 an houror worth more than $10 people?
We understand that, buthelping them understand that their time is
better spentnot doing their own photography and video.
(21:51):
Yeah, I, I think that there is also it's
always through educationand building relationships.
So you're going to show themthe difference.
Maybe you're just showing themhow they could use that,
or how you could use a videoto get more reach on social media,
(22:12):
how they could link the unbranded siteto the on unbranded property
website to the MLS,how they can use their tracking code
to try to retargetthe on branded page traffic.
You know,
like all these high level things,I can't tell you how many times
I've walked into an office.
And I'm sure you have Craig two at a,just a Tuesday morning company meeting.
And I always try to given those meetings,I try to talk about something
(22:36):
that is not selling them photos or videobecause I want them to
I want I want to walk outand they go, hey, how did he know that?
Like, I, I think I need to do that.
I think I saw the top agent doing that
and he just told me how to do it,but I don't really get it.
So I think I'm just going to call him.
(22:57):
You know, another thing we talk aboutis photos.
Don't be a commodity.
There is.
You do not want to sell a commodityor you just don't because
it's a race to the bottom because somebodyis going to do it for $3 an hour.
But it's just no fun that everybody'sgoing to try to cut it out.
You don't want to be a commodity.
(23:17):
You need to sell on value.
And that's a hard thing.
That's a hard thingfor real estate photographers.
But that's a hard thing for real estateagents.
Many of them go, oh yeah, I'll do it.
The best agent ten, they,they get a 3% split each side.
Like I'll do it for two.
And they feel like they need to walk inand do it for two to beat
(23:37):
the agent that does it for three.
That doesn't work.
Because honestly, the best agents,they do it for four,
three and a half or fourand they sell on value.
And that's the same thing we can dois we sell them value.
And your valueis going to be a little bit different
from when you start towhen you build a team.
So what we the value we sell at Wow doing
(23:59):
13,000 is 13,500 this year
13,500 jobs this year.
The value we sell is consistentconsistency.
A team aroundyou support when you need it.
Dedicate to train photographers that gothrough continuing ed that have continued
education and feedback.
(24:20):
We support you.
We support your events.
You like all these things.This is what we sell.
We sell our size. We sell the people.
You have somebody.
If you need something, you go to support,if you need scheduling and you go to scheduling.
And we have
we have highly trained individuals in eachaspect that can help you do something,
okay.
If you're single, if you'reif you are a solo preneur
(24:43):
right now, you're not selling that, okay?
What you're selling isI get to know your business.
I the love for creatingand how I can make your listing
look that if you need something,you call me.
I will take care of it.
I care about you so much that I'm goingto take care of these things.
(25:03):
You have my cell phone.
Probably don't do that.
We all do it,I did it. It's a terrible idea.
As you grow, you want to get rid of that.
But we can help you get out of that idea.
What the what to say then.
But it's just aa different feature and benefit
as you go alongand building your business.
Yeah.
And people will value professionalismand knowing that they can trust you
(25:27):
to represent them.
Well, I a couple weeks ago,we talked about that record
listing that I had thatI was just over the top excited about,
you know, I walked in, it's aalmost $3 million property
and what struck me immediatelywas how down to earth the seller was.
And he just immediatelysaid, you're the professional.
(25:47):
I'm going to get out of the way.
You do your thing at that level.
I was talking with Jess our operationsdirector.
I went from that shoot. Todd no joke.
Back to back to I $150,000 Listing,
where the seller felt that they neededto tell me every shot I needed to take.
Oh, yeah. This is a.
(26:08):
And Ijust I kind of chuckle, I didn't judge,
I'm never going to make a seller feel,
like they're a botherbecause my mindset is I'm
part of that Realtorsteam and I need to represent them well.
So even if I have to bite my tongueas a professional, I'm
going to do thatto to represent the realtor well.
(26:31):
But the mindset differencethat just pointed out to me and I thought
was really good was somebodythat is at a $3 million house level,
has a different mindset in that they knowthe person that they're hiring to sell
their houseis going to bring in professionals,
and they really don't have to worryabout the nickels and dimes
and pennies of a job.
Now, yes, they dobecause they're financially successful,
(26:54):
but they trust somebodyin a lower financial state
has to worry about every penny.
And so they they have a sense ofI have to have some control over this
to get every penny I can out of this.
And just understanding thosedifferent mindsets as a professional,
I think, just goes to really helping usserve our realtor as well.
(27:16):
And in walking in with thatprofessionalism and and understanding
the mindset of the seller,it goes beyond just photography.
So that'sthat's a value that you can bring
to your seller or to your,your real estate realtor clients.
Spit it out Craig?
I don't know exactly whereI was going with that, but that just
that's something I've been chewingon the last week or two here.
(27:36):
Oh that isI hadn't heard that situation, Craig,
but that is fabulous because I thinkthe $3 million owner, he valued his time
so much, he already spent the timehe needed and his time was valuable.
He was doing the 10,000 or thethe 100,000 per hour jobs for.
He walked back into his home officeand was going back to work.
(28:00):
He didn't have time to walk throughhis house and show me every little thing.
Yeah, yeah,they hired us to take care of that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He did his due diligence at the beginningof the process that was vetting
the agent and understanding,and he trusted in them.
And that agent probably setproper expectations.
Your best agents will say, hey, the photoand video guys are going to come in
(28:22):
and I've used them for X amount of time.
They are fabulous.They're going to do their thing.
Please just stay out of their way.
Yes, that's what they're going to say.
I love working with those agents.
It makes my job so much easier.
Yeah. And and that homeowner,he went sure.
Yeah.
Like, honestly, you couldn't
even pay me to get in your waybecause I'm not doing that job.
(28:45):
I have bigger jobs to do.
And I've just done my job by hiring you.
That's the time I needed to spend.
So I trust that everything
proceeding is going to be to the levelthat we've set.
By communicating through expectationsin this conversation,
I think you can almost look at it
(29:05):
from like a cost benefit analysistype of situation.
Okay, so say thethe owner of the $3 million house,
he's making buku money, right?
What is the lost opportunity that he has
and what he can make of doing his job,his million dollar job
versus walking throughto make sure that I'm doing my job.
(29:27):
He's it's cost him something to do that.
So it's the same thing with that.
We can walk that through with our realtorsthat maybe aren't quite there
to that mindset of whatwhat's the the opportunity
you're losing by shooting your own photosand having to maybe edit those.
It's costing you money.
You're leaving money on the table,
and we want to help younot leave money on the table.
(29:49):
We want to get you to the 200, 300and $400,000 house level
as a newer agentand help you grow your business.
It's all about the business.
Yeah.And when you have those conversations,
I know we've had many over the years,Craig.
Those agents go,oh, like I never thought of that.
Like that is the thing I get.
I can think of a story from from Steve.
(30:10):
And this was of aof a local agent here in Lima.
We had an agentshow up the office one day and
I mean the office.
We're out in the middle of,of of a cornfield.
I we truly are the office.
Like, we're literally in the middleof a cornfield, like my neighbor.
Like we have neighbors,but they're farther away.
Oh, my in-laws live next door.
So they'll tell you, listen, about Ohio,
(30:32):
I was, oh, hi.
And so we actually walk.
I have a West Virginia story about Ohioand how they pronounce our state name.
I'll save that forI'll save that for a different podcast.
Go ahead. I'm sorry.
No, no, it's it's it's good.
So we hear the door chime go offand we have a chime that goes off
(30:54):
and some comes in and you that'salways like it's probably someone here.
This was like an off day when not manypeople are in the office like who's here?
Typically it's it's the post, you know,the, the, the male lady showing up
and she's got something.But it wasn't around that time.
And like some people typically walkand we have a we have a big building.
And so people wander aroundlike it's fun to see.
(31:15):
It's terrible.
But like people walk in
and we have a kitchen in a boardroomand then we have like an entryway
and you might not see anybodyfor 50ft of the office.
You're like, snaking your way back in.
And typically people are like, hello.
And so that hello comes like,okay, somebody in here that clearly
we don't know who they are
and they're looking for usor they're looking for wow, internet.
(31:37):
Craig,I can't say how many people you guys know.
Do you have wow internet in your area?
We had a guy come and he's like,you guys sell the interweb like
Well, we don't have the interweb here.
This is not the you have the Google,the Google, the Google.
Sorry. Yeah.
So, sorry, I'mjust taking forever on this story, y'all.
(31:57):
But it has a point.
Realtor shows up.
He's like 19 years old, brand new realtorat one of our local companies,
and he's just got, like, this gusto.
And he's like, hey, I'm calling like,expired listings.
I'm calling for sale by ownerslike he's got like, he is there
ready to make his business happen.
(32:20):
And he comes in, he's like, hey,I'm trying to get this one on the lake.
The lake's about 45 minutesaway from here,
and it's a millionplus our listing and kind of thing.
Like, okay, you've had no listings,you haven't sold a house,
but let's just pick up.
Let's sell the million dollarplus house on the lake.
Why not?It sounds like a great place to start.
I mean, you got to admire the tenacityand the confidence.
(32:41):
Oh, I love it. It's fabulous.
Like, why?I'm. I'm not going to sell the tour.
Give me the million dollar house.
That's like a 5X.
And so Steve was like like, all right.
Yeah. Like this is great.
Like one.
We're honored that you walked in and askedus, like,
how can you be differentin this listing presentation?
Because he doesn't look like he'sever done it before.
(33:01):
He hasn't done it before.I mean, he's a nice looking kid.
He speaks well,but he's he's 19 years old.
And so Steve gives him some prints offsome of our brochures,
give some of our information,
sends him some video links of some thingsthat we've done in the past for that
the company he's at and and has himall prepped to go get this listing.
(33:21):
And so he went inand he gave this spiel, sold the media
and like, they, they took him up on it,which was incredible.
Like us crazy.
So so when youwhen you can become a source of knowledge
to your realtors and that was a referral,by the way, I just want to point that out
(33:42):
like the broker at his company said, oh,why don't you go see Steve over it?
Wow. Like, hey,they're just like, go buy the building.
And he's like, sure, I'll do it.He walks in.
So when you build those relationships,your clients will refer you.
And if you are the source of knowledge,
who's not looking for more knowledge,right?
Right.
That's why you guys are on this podcast.
(34:03):
Because we're not that entertaining.
The jokes aren't great.
Like, you're trying to look for the wayswe've screwed up over the years so
you don't do it.
We're all looking for knowledge.
So when you can put that to useand when you understand what to say no to
and when you can be that
source of knowledge for your agents,
(34:26):
then they will think, hey,you need to talk to Craig.
Craig knows this thing about social media.
I don't know what it is,but he was talking about it.
It seemed like it was really cool.
You should call himand have that done for you.
Do listing.
Yeah. I mean, what a what a story.
And it's again, it's all about mindset andunderstanding of the realtor's mindset.
There's so much morewe could go into, Todd, but honestly,
we want to save a lot of this contentfor when we can actually get
(34:48):
Pam and Janelle back on. Right.
And then pick their their brains on this.
So we don't want it to,you know, to steal all the content.
Because we really want you to hear it from
a realtor's, mouth and experience.
So with that, I think that that'sa good starting point for this topic.
And, and we'll do a part two on this
as soon as we can get that, that timescheduled with, with, Pam and Janelle.
(35:12):
But let that be a starting point for you.
If I, I love working with new clientslike new realtors, Todd,
because I want to see them growand succeed because I feel good about what
I'm doing then in my role in that, I'mtruly serving somebody
and helping them, get some wins.
And for me, that's a win.
(35:33):
You know, it's not about all the money,because if I'm shooting, say,
a $70,000 house,you know, they're going to start small.
Their, theirtheir invoice is not going to be that big.
I'm not making a ton of money on that,but the satisfaction of seeing them,
be wowed.
And that's
part of why we're called Wow video toursby the media that we're giving them,
(35:54):
that they can deliver to their seller,and the seller is wowed.
It makes them feel good.They want to get the next listing.
They can use that, you know, that shootto show their next potential,
seller and client and see themgrow and succeed and be a part of that.
And that's justpart of what I love to do in this.
And I'm sure it's the same for our,our listeners.
(36:15):
But going in with that attitudewhen you're working with a new client,
a new realtor, and really communicatinghow much you love what you do,
that that actually gets a lot of traction.
Because people want to work with peoplethat love what they do.
So just let that shine throughand understand that your mindset
(36:38):
is actually very similar to the realtorsmindset in terms of business.
If you can understand it is, you know,
business partners,
it's going to do nothingbut good things for you.
So I think that's a good placeto wrap up, Todd.
Yeah, a lot of good stuff in here.
Just try to take one nugget away from it,understand your client a little bit more,
(37:00):
connect with them and, you'll be surprisedhow similar they are to you.
Like Craig said. Yeah.
Good deal.
All right. Well,we are going to be off next week.
But we will get back to this ASAP.
We know it's busy seasonfor many of you as well, so,
thank you so much for the time that you dotake out.
As we've said countless times,we appreciate that.
(37:21):
We know you're busy, you're an owner,you've got a lot on your plate.
But the fact that you take the time toto listen or watch is not lost on us.
And we appreciate your timebecause we know it's valuable.
So yeah.
Craig, if you sorry, before you wrap up,if you're looking for content in the off
week, we had an incredible techtalk with with me with Todd yesterday.
That would have been May 8th on Spirosuper user Facebook group.
(37:45):
We covered some really great topics.
There are some questions.
We had a nice group in there,
a nice size of a groupand went over a lot of business items.
So if you're looking for some content,
go backand see if you can't play that again.
There was some really good, businessbuilding conversations in that.
Awesome. I might have to watch that.
(38:06):
All right, well, you guys, thank you againso much.
Make sure you take some time to bethankful for the blessings in your life.
And be sure to take a breath,have a great week.
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