REality

Relationship-Driven Real Estate Success

• Gary Scott

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What separates thriving real estate agents from those who struggle? Dawn Allred, an accomplished branch leader, reveals it's not about secret formulas or high-dollar investments—it's about consistency, relationships, and practical strategies that work in any market.

The conversation begins with Dawn outlining five foundational strategies for new agents who are building from the ground up. She emphasizes the critical importance of cultivating your sphere of influence by creating a comprehensive database of 100-200 connections and communicating your real estate services clearly. "Your first few deals as a brand new agent will most likely come from people you already know or people that they know," Dawn explains, highlighting the need for regular, meaningful contact through multiple channels.

Dawn introduces a revolutionary contact management approach called the "52/26 strategy" that ensures no relationship falls through the cracks. By systematically calling contacts organized by alphabet (two letters each week), agents connect with everyone in their database twice yearly. This methodical yet personal approach exemplifies her philosophy that success stems from genuine relationship building rather than transaction chasing.

For both new and experienced agents, Dawn stresses the necessity of establishing a personal brand that complements your brokerage's identity. From professional photography to consistent visual elements across all platforms, this branding creates recognition and connection. "People connect with people," she reminds listeners, encouraging agents to share authentic details about themselves that potential clients might relate to.

The conversation tackles the evolution of social media from optional marketing to essential business tool. Dawn provides practical guidance for agents who feel uncomfortable on camera, suggesting gradual steps toward creating video content that establishes market expertise. She emphasizes that authenticity resonates more than perfection, noting that unplanned, casual videos often generate the most engagement.

As the discussion shifts to experienced agents, Dawn outlines strategies for scaling businesses through deliberate investment, delegation, and systematization. She offers a straightforward monthly action plan including social media posts, newsletters, handwritten notes, and regular video content that creates predictable growth. This consistent, relationship-focused approach, she insists, will inevitably lead to business growth regardless of market conditions.

Ready to transform your real estate business? Listen now to discover how small, consistent actions can create remarkable results, and why Dawn believes that "if you're trying to help people, the dollar will typically come because you're doing it for the right reason."

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Reality Podcast. I'm your host, gary Scott, and I am particularly excited today to introduce our guest Dawn Allred Dawn. Good morning.

Speaker 2:

Good morning.

Speaker 1:

How are you?

Speaker 2:

I'm good. How are you doing?

Speaker 1:

I'm good. I love saying good morning because what you and I know is our listeners may be listening to this at any time is our listeners may be listening to this at any time, but I'm letting everybody know it is the morning of May 30th. We are on the last business day of May 2025. And, as I said earlier, I'm particularly excited to have you on as a guest. We're just talking that branch leaders have not filled up Reality Podcast. I think you are the second branch leader from our company to share your experience and your expertise as we think about the balance of 2025. So how about we get right into it? You ready to roll?

Speaker 2:

I'm ready.

Speaker 1:

Awesome. You know, I think what is important today and I shared it Dawn when we were all together a couple weeks ago is what a great time, whether it's May or June, to reflect and to reset on our business. Take a little, look back in the rearview mirror what I do. Am I where I want to be? Am I not where I want to be? I think I shared that day that it's my belief. A third of the population is doing better than they thought, a third is kind of right where they thought they would be and a third is like man. I can't figure my way out of this thing Right, and what we know is the market has certainly had some headwinds, but the success stories that you and I have a chance to listen to and experience are great.

Speaker 1:

We're going to try to share those today. So I went to Dawn a couple of weeks ago because we've had this podcast on schedule for a while and I've had some, as Dawn shared with me before we got on. This has been like an act of Congress to get Dawn and I together Technical difficulty, not feeling very good, scheduling conflicts, but we're ready to roll. I'm going to start right now with the five most important things that our listeners need to be aware of in growing your business. And I know that you're going to talk a little bit about that brand new agent who may not have past customers or clients, and then you're going to talk about the experienced agent who maybe has a big book of business. So I'm going to be quiet, I'm going to let you roll, because we are here to listen to you.

Speaker 2:

All right. Well, first, I'm very passionate about this. This is exciting for me. This is what I talk a lot to my agents about, because it's important and it's not hard. It's time consuming, it takes planning, it takes a lot of consideration, but if you'll just do it, I think it'll make a huge difference for new agents and experienced agents. So when we start with the new agents, of course we always try to start with not a lot of money. They're just getting rolling. It could be a while before they get that first closing, depending on combination of skill and luck, in my opinion.

Speaker 2:

So the first and most important thing, in my opinion, for a new agent to get started with is the relationships they have to leverage their sphere of influence, and they've got to start building some type of CRM to keep in touch with those people, because your first few deals as a brand new agent will most likely come from people you already know or people that they know. So it's time to make a list of friends, family, former co-workers, anybody in your community that you hang out with, your kids, parents, etc. And aim to try to get 100 to 200 in there as quickly as possible to get started. And then, once you have that list, start reaching out to them. Tell them what you're doing now. I'm a real estate agent. Now I can help you and anybody you know with your real estate needs. Stay in flow with them. So, now that you've got them in a sphere, you've done that initial contact with them. Now it's time to figure out how you're going to stay in touch with them long term. So we need to start sending some monthly newsletters. We need to do things on social media, text messages to keep in contact. Phone calls Don't forget phone calls. We've gotten into a world where I feel like we lean so much into electronic touches and social media that we're learning we're leaving behind the relationship building process with voice to voice and face to face. So we got to work that in as well.

Speaker 2:

So I think that's number one, first and foremost, is your relationships, your sphere of face. So we got to work that in as well. So I think that's number one, first and foremost, is your relationships, your sphere of influence. Second, I would start working on, early in my career, a brand, a personal brand for myself, a logo, a color scheme, something that makes me recognizable as they start to see me more and more in social media, online mailers that I send, emails that I send, etc. This is important, I think, because real estate is a people business and clients choose you, not just the brokerage that you're with. So you've got to identify yourself. So to me, that starts with professional photos, your website, getting those professional photos on your website, creating an authentic bio on your website about you that tells them about you.

Speaker 2:

People connect with people, so work on that website. Make it where, when they go there, they know who they're reading about, they know who they're calling and they make connections. Because if you're a dog person, let them know, because other dog people will be drawn to you. If you have kids, let them know. Those kinds of people will be drawn to you. So you've got to make it real and then use your branded content. Once you get it all done, use it everywhere. It should be branded. Everything should be branded. Your social media graphics should be branded and, by the way, we started this with we're new, so we don't want to spend a lot of money. We started this with we're new, so we don't want to spend a lot of money.

Speaker 2:

Canva has a free version that you can use to do a lot of this content on your own, so you don't have to spend money necessarily up front to do this. And then, once you've got all that branded, then you need to be hyperactive on social media. I know there's a lot of people today that say I'm just not a social media person, and that's okay. There are other ways I get it to build a business. But in today's society and market I think it's becoming almost a must to get out there and it's the best free way to put yourself in front of people in a targeted manner without spending the money. So I would get on Facebook, linkedin, instagram and, if you're really up for it, maybe even TikTok. I haven't gotten good at that part yet. My daughter's a genius at it, but not me. And then, when you're on social media not just graphics start being the market expert. You want to go to empty listings and get permission to do walkthroughs in those listings. Talk about the houses, do open houses and do a video of your open house before it gets started. So you want to do more than just stagnant graphics on social media. I think you need to do some videos, some stories, some reels, those kinds of things. And then use social media to educate your people that are following you. Talk to them about the real estate market. Tell them the three things they need to know before they buy a house. Tell them the things they should do to get ready to sell their house. Talk to them about interest rates. Get together with your mortgage lender and put together a post to talk about where mortgage rates are and show them the benefits of buying now versus waiting, et cetera. And then another one again new agent building content, open houses.

Speaker 2:

I am a firm believer in open houses, but you got to do them right. But that is the easiest way to get in front of people you don't know is to host an open house. Be kind, be courteous, be informational, talk to them, build the relationship, earn their trust while they're there. And in order to do that, as a new agent, you're going to have to lean into your mentors and the other agents in your firm and ask to hold theirs open until you have your own. What else do I have? And then educate daily. So we're doing all these things, but don't that's not hard to do when you're a new agent. I will have to preface that it's easy to educate, because we educate a lot when we're brand new. It's like drinking from a fire hydrant it's just nonstop but become the most knowledgeable person in your market.

Speaker 2:

So I think when I hire new agents, a lot of times all they think about is contracts. How do I write a contract? How do I fill out the paperwork? And I'm like we'll get to that, don't you worry. If you have to learn by fire, you will learn by fire. I need you to learn the market. I need you to build relationships. I need you to check those new listings that hit every day. I need you to follow them and see what they end up closing for and how long it took them to close. So start learning the data and the market, not just the paperwork. I think we get hung up sometimes on the paperwork in the process. Youtube videos like this podcast, for example, take in all the content you can take in. Watch the podcasts, watch the YouTube videos, use AI. You'd be shocked at the questions you type into AI now and the answers that you can get to help you build a business, build relationships, et cetera. I think that covers pretty much what I had written down, at least for new agents.

Speaker 2:

I could go on all day, but.

Speaker 1:

Well, and I'm going to ask some follow-up questions because I think you bring up a couple of many key points. You know, I think, as I wrote down some, a bunch of notes, you know, I think, the sphere of influence in the CRM you know you made a comment, don, that it's not. I always say our business is not hard to understand, our business is hard to execute the plan necessary to be successful. And you know, I think there are a couple of things that you talked about that I think are really important and that is, you know I would add to the CRM, particularly for new people, have a hundred people in it by a certain date. You know, we spent a lot of time a couple of weeks ago on this concept which so many of us have been familiar with, which is smart goals, be specific, be measurable, be attainable, be relevant and be timely. And I think that when and I'm pretty confident that when you and I get to experience successful agents, like that's a common thread, so I'm brand new I go through winner's edge. I graduated yesterday and now I I need to have my a hundred names in by June 3rd, like that's like be that specific.

Speaker 1:

And then the other piece of the CRM which I, I, I focused on and I, I think that I don't believe a lot of people do it, which is add to that list every day, and maybe it's one person Like don't make it so big that you won't do it. Make it smart. I'm going to talk about smart all episode today. So I'm going to have my hundred names and every day I'm going to add somebody. And I know, when I say that in front of a group of agents, you know they, they, they, like I'd be like well, we're like, we can find people every single day, you know, and when we are intentional about it, you know it can be the barista at Starbucks, it can be the checkout line at Harris Teeter. You know people say all the time why do I go grocery shopping when I can do Instacart? I like to go there because I like to meet the people and you know I love going through there and they have their name tag on and you thank Wanda for helping you check out. And then you know I'm wearing my logo and they want to talk about real estate business and so I think you know, don't call your sphere and tell them what you're doing. Like don't? Well, they say. They've said you and I have heard this don't be a secret agent. Like, do not be a secret agent.

Speaker 1:

Um, I want to talk a little bit. I love your personal brand and and I think the only caveat I would add to that is don't dismiss and take over the brand of the company. Oh no, I know you know that, but I want to make sure that our listeners know that your company is investing and has invested for years on their brand, is investing and has invested for years on their brand. Don't minimize the millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars that are being invested each year to build this brand the Hanna brand, the Tate brand, whatever but make the Allred brand be with that brand, make the Scott brand be with that brand. Don't minimize the investment that your firm has made for decades. And so I think it's all about one plus one equals four if we do it right.

Speaker 1:

And then the only other question that I have for you is the video. Let's talk about the video. So I'm a proponent that in today's world. I wrote down here. I think you said it's now mandatory, like this isn't like maybe I should jump into social media, but it's mandatory. So tell us about how you work with an agent who says oh my gosh, don, I am not good on video. Gosh, I am uncomfortable on video. Talk about the importance of the authenticity and that you don't have to be a movie star.

Speaker 2:

Right, I think it's a soft launch too. So the ones who are nervous, I tell them you don't have to be the one talking on video live all the time if you don't want to. So if you're really nervous, just do a video. Let's say you're doing a video of your new listing. It could be as simple as you opening the door, letting them in a video of you, and then it can span to the house and you're talking. So you can start with stuff like that, so that you're not so nervous. And I think the more you do things like that and you start seeing it, you'll get better and better at you being on video for longer periods of time.

Speaker 2:

Now I will say that one of the agents in my office just did. I forget the name of it, but it's little tiny pieces of video. She paid somebody to do this for her, but now it's just these little 10, 15 second clips of her doing some things and then she adds the words behind it and that has been. She's been posting those a lot. So now she has like 20 clips. Some of them are her at the desk writing, some of them are her drinking coffee. Some of them are her walking through a home and then she puts music and or words behind those and that was a nice soft launch for her. Now she's not afraid of video. She'll do it in a heartbeat. But sometimes it's those. We've had agents in our company that said you know what?

Speaker 2:

The ones, the videos I did that I thought would get the least traction? Because I just woke up, it was just off the cuff, hair in a bun, no makeup, house, a mess. Those are the videos that they're like. That's where I got the most views. Why? Because they were real. People connect again, people connect with people. It was authentic, it was real, it wasn't staged and people like that.

Speaker 1:

Yep, I think that you know it's interesting. You know one of the conversations I have from time to time, dawn, is you know, social media is called social media because it's social. And you made a really important point is that if you're going to be doing what we do, you better build into your social media strategy a thought leader, trusted advisor strategy. So it can't just be me picturing of my kids and my grandkids or my dog and all that's super interesting and you get a lot of likes and so on and so forth. But I do think that it's important to you know, take that opportunity to share with buyers and sellers why it's a good time to buy and sell you know, one of our opportunities in our business today, and I shared this many times the last three weeks.

Speaker 1:

I said there's one constant about every market that I've been in Dawn for 39 years, and that constant is the media is not our friend.

Speaker 2:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 1:

I mean that's constant because good news doesn't sell and so the media can't wait to get a hold of an article about a market that's struggling and they present it as if the world real estate market is struggling when the market in High Point or or Asheboro, or Raleigh, or the mountains hyper, hyper local. It's interesting I loved your word here you need to be hyperactive on social media, not just hyperactive. And then the last thing I'll say and you and I both have learned a lot about social media from Tony Jarrett, who you work with and I work with very closely, and the one thing he is passionate about is have a plan and be consistent. Have a plan and be consistent. His Friday focus is expected now, like I get on Friday Dawn, I want to see who he's highlighting. And so don't get intimidated if you're not in social media. Maybe pick one day a week for the first 60 days to do something. Yeah, and move it to two days. Yeah, don't like, the elephant must be eaten one bite at a time. Yeah, don't get intimidated, overwhelmed by what somebody else is doing Right. And and also start today.

Speaker 1:

Like I think many of our listeners know, I grew up in the in the real estate business and my great mentors, my father and my dad, used to say what frustrated him, don, was people that got ready to get ready, to get ready to plan the plan, like they can't wait to get ready but they don't do anything.

Speaker 1:

I would rather you do something every Friday that's imperfect than wait a month or two and try to get be perfect, because guess what, we're never perfect. Yep, and, and you know, good is the enemy of perfect, and I think that's a good, good challenge. So I think, really good stuff. The consistency, tiktok I will mention, having never done TikTok. We have at least one agent who will attribute, I'd say, 50% Dawn of her 10, $12 million of business to TikTok, and this particular agent also has a one-year-old and so in these TikToks are the baby at showings. Again, find out what connects Dawn talked about. You know, if you're a pet lover, like connect with pet lovers, like that's good, but make sure your social media is consistent and you have to sell your services and our industry in your social, in addition to the social part of social.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. I tell a lot of my new agents because you keep talking about consistency, you don't need more money, you need more consistency and creativity. That'll fix it. It doesn't need, because they'll come in here. I think I'm going to buy leads. I think I'm going to no, no, no, no, no. Let's do all the free stuff first. There's a lot of things you can do without spending money that you're not doing, that we can get started.

Speaker 1:

Awesome. So, while this focused five was on new agents, I'm making notes saying I think I'm going to write about this for every agent, but share a couple of things that might be more appropriate. Maybe I think you might have another five, or at least an addition to the five for the experienced agent, because they've already if they're successful and experienced, they've already done much of this. But I also think we have to challenge the experienced agent to reinvent themselves, because the world and our business is changing. It's very fluid and there's a lot of experienced people, dawn, that haven't jumped into social media, and I love your comment. I think it's mandatory now Share the next five.

Speaker 2:

Well. So, along those lines of social media, I think, now that you're an experienced agent, you've got the sphere, you've got the people which you will continue to build. So now it's getting exciting. Right, you've got a following. Now you also have a little more money now, so I think it's time to build what I would call a scalable lead system. What does that mean? Well, you need consistent, predictable leads that don't eat up all of your time, and the way to do that is to start leaning into some social media. Start spending some money on Facebook ads with a strong follow-up system, because if you learn to use Facebook, instagram et cetera, and you use those targeted ads, you can make those ads hit the people you want to hit, and learning that is important and it will generate more business. It's time to start launching real estate email newsletters with personalized drip campaigns. This is all talking about getting into your CRM, because hopefully now, if you're experienced, you've got a few hundred people. You're getting to right, because you mentioned you need to add people every day. Well, as a new agent and growing in your business, if you're doing everything we're telling you to do, if you're doing open houses, you're meeting people to put in your CRM. If you're wearing your name tag everywhere and introducing yourself, you're meeting people to put into your CRM. If you're going to community events and collecting information and getting to know people, these are all creating new people to add to your CRM. So hopefully now you've got this CRM pretty full where you can get into a lot of people.

Speaker 2:

But we also want to create some value driven lead magnets like homebuyer guides. Put a homebuyer guide of some kind out on your website. Post that to social media from your website and start driving traffic to your website. And when we talk about the website now you can double down. You've got some money. Spend some money to really make that website pop. Start putting things on your website where people go to you to find out what to do for the weekend. People go to you to find out where the local farmer's market is, to find out where the half-price wine days are, where the kids eat free. Start using that content. Now that you have people following you, post it on social media to push them back to that and you'd be surprised at how many people are coming to your website to be like oh wait, dawn has that list. We're going to go out for wine tonight? Where is it half price? So starting to do things like that, to build that lead generation system where it's starting to come back to you let's see what else did I have here Strengthen your database and your past clients.

Speaker 2:

So this is where it does get exciting. We just talked about your CRM. Now you've got people that have closed transactions with you. I personally want those people in their own special little group. They trusted me once, they'll trust me again.

Speaker 2:

Now I have to figure out how am I going to stay in touch with them after they close on their first home with me long term. And now I'm talking about sending thank you notes, handwritten birthday cards, handwritten Christmas cards. Do I want to send them a calendar every year at the end of the year for next year? I have an agent in this office that sends out calendars every December. She's been in the business for 30 years and, I kid you not, that phone starts ringing around October because she's been in the business a long time. So a lot of her clients are older and they're like Donnie where is my calendar? I have doctor's appointments that I need to get on that calendar and they are looking for them. I've had them stop in this office to pick them up before, because they needed them. They couldn't wait for her to mail them. So things like that that people will start to anticipate, I think, are important. But they closed with me. I send them a thank you. They're getting an email from me, maybe happy Thanksgiving, happy Easter a few times a year. They're getting a monthly newsletter from me or a neighborhood news telling them what's going on in their neighborhood. They're getting a birthday card from me, handwritten.

Speaker 2:

We have a system, gary, that we use here. We actually learned this from one of our transaction coordinators. So if you've got all these people in your CRM, she told us and created this system and taught us how to pull them out of our CRM that if we break the alphabet, has 26 letters in it. There's 52 weeks in a year. If we take two letters of the alphabet every week and make phone calls to those people phone calls, not emails, text messages, so don't call them we will hit everybody in our CM twice a year.

Speaker 2:

So we have a lot of people who've adopted that process. So now they've got their CRM set up, they've got their mailers set up, they've got their postcards going out. People are seeing them on social media. Now we have figured out a way to not miss the personal phone call twice a year. Now some people that are in your CRM you talk to regularly anyway we're talking about the people that you don't necessarily have a close relationship with that could fall through the cracks. This will keep that from happening. I love the system. I think it's painful.

Speaker 1:

I'm going to ask you to repeat that. I'm making a note here, so say this again there's 52 weeks in a year. There's 26 letters in the alphabet.

Speaker 2:

Right. So you pick two letters. So for example, week one of the year, pick A and Z, and that first week of the year, call all your A's and all your Z's in your CRM. And week two, two more letters. So now we're hitting them twice a year.

Speaker 1:

So I love that. So I'm going to interrupt you in the middle of this. So number five on your to-do is educate daily. It was educate daily and I'm just sitting here going to let the audience know that you've all known I've been doing this a long time in a lot of different places. That strategy that Dawn already just shared is the first time I've heard it. The first time I've heard it. So it doesn't matter how long you've been in the business, it doesn't matter how successful you have been. Like just activate that strategy, just that. Like I'm just saying to myself.

Speaker 1:

Imagining number one you know what they say, don, and I think you and I share this the more we give, the more we get. Not give me more. I'm going to bet a dollar and I'm not a gambler that if anybody listening does this for the next 52 weeks, the joy, the stories, the experiences, the connectivity will bring you more enjoyment and guess what? You will get business. But put business in this bucket. I like to put things in buckets, but this other bucket is going to overflow in a way that you made know, you made a comment. You know we've got to get back to relational. The other thing I want everybody to write down if you don't take anything from you know we've been at this 26 minutes and Dawn has been off the charts, handwritten notes, voice to voice. I loved in your opening voice to voice. We have allowed ourselves to fall into the economy.

Speaker 1:

If I got up this morning and I was just thinking about you and here's what I know, that person in that moment needed that call. You don't know they needed that call, but they needed that call. That's how life works. So again, I I tangential to our business, but I think what we do Dawn is so much more important than the simple transaction Like we become part of these people's lives in such a significant way. You know, one of my favorite comments people make is I love the business because my circle of friends grows. I have more people that I enjoy and I love when a calendar is requested because they're just waiting for it. I want to go to one other tangential moment and try to keep this particular person in the semi witness protection program your agents. I will call her first name Linda and I'll let anybody decide who that is. One day I was in the office and Linda was on the floor going through files, and Linda's been in the business 20 years.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

And she was in her filing cabinet for the year 2020 and 2021. And she was going through every single file, dawn and I. Clearly she was on the floor and I said Linda, what are you?

Speaker 1:

doing, and here's what she said. She said during COVID. Like you have said before, gary, our business became transactional, not as relational, because we had to be. You know and I have not done as good a job keeping in touch with my clients that I closed in 20 and 21 because I was so busy chasing this euphoric market and I just that struck me so many times. If people have not done something every day that goes by that they don't do, it is one more reason that they choose not to do it.

Speaker 1:

Right, how am I going to get back to my customer from 2020 and 2025? My gosh, they're going to wonder where I've been. They're going to be so happy to hear from you. So it goes back to that get ready to get. I was so inspired by Linda that day. Here's an experienced agent, does a ton of business, big community supporter, big company supporter and she was down on the floor understanding that she missed this opportunity with her sphere of influence. And instead of hey, gosh, I'm going to feel bad when I get like she just took it upon herself. And that's another, I think, thing I want everybody to grab hold of today, listening to Dawn and myself, and that is is like it is never too late to start, agreed, okay, so I didn't mean to get tangential, but you got me thinking about your new strategy that I I'm gonna take that strategy, that phone call strategy. I'm gonna give it a name 52, 26, I'm gonna give it a name, uh, and take that on the road. Because the other thing that we talked about in preparation, dawn, was I love the fact that phase two experience.

Speaker 1:

You use the word invest Invest in your website, invest in your news, like invest. But there are also things that aren't money. I always call it time, talent and treasure. Right, you know, treasure is I'm investing Time and talent is I'm doing Like the phone call doesn't cost you anything. You got to manage your time right Now. Obviously, time is money, money is time, etc. So I interrupted you and you were on a roll, but you really inspired me with that new thing. And just no matter how long you have been in this business, every single time that I have an opportunity to interview one of our superstars, there is a nugget in everyone, and I love handwritten notes. I love voice to voice, voice to voice. I love that. Face to face, belly to belly, we have all those. And then the 2652, man that is going to be part of the Gary Scott show over the next 90 days. So because I think every single agent in our company Thank you.

Speaker 2:

Well, I'm. I'm glad you interrupted because when, sometimes, when you get in the flow as a leader, talking to people about helping them grow their business, you get into the checklist. So you stopping me and saying relationships I know I said it, but sometimes I assume it If you're not in this because you care about people, you will not be successful. Making those phone calls just to say don't forget, I'm a realtor, that's not gonna get you the business. The phone calls are to learn about them, not them to learn about you. The social media you can use that to let them learn about you, learn about your knowledge of the market, learn about your skills as a realtor, learn about your tips, tricks and techniques. The phone calls, the in-person, the running into people when you're out in the community, that is your opportunity to learn about them. And I think if you're trying to follow the dollar, it typically doesn't work. But if you're trying to help people, the dollar will typically come because you're doing it for the right reason. So I'm glad you stopped me there, because it does sometimes get more like a checklist. Ultimately, it's all about people, experienced agents. If you are getting to the point where you are closing. It differs per person 25, 35, 40 transactions a year.

Speaker 2:

It might be time to start investing that money, to delegate some of your duties and leverage your time, because ideally, you want to continue to help people, to meet people, to guide people, to advise people. So you will probably hit a point where you either need some kind of administrative assistant to start handling all that paperwork in the background so that you can continue to work with your people. Maybe you need to hire some buyer agents to start taking some of your buyers so that you're not bogged down and you can continue to help people. So I think, getting to a point in your career where you realize it's time for me to pay people to do some of these things so that I have more time to generate business, to help people, to meet people, to talk to people, that becomes and that's hard for them. They get used to it and they're like oh, I don't want to give up any of the money and I'm like well, are you doing your clients a disservice by not giving up some of the money and are you costing yourself money in the end Because there's only so much one person can do money, and are you costing yourself money in the end, because there's only so much one person can do. So I think starting to delegate is a big one, and then leveling up your branding so we talked about as a new agent start small, get your logo, get your colors, start doing some things to like you said in connection with your company branding. But now I think it's time to really and we do a lot of this for our agents, which I think is fantastic but having those presentation tools to give out it just takes you to a such a higher level of presenting something that's a prebound book with your information on it, your picture that tells them all about the buyer process, all about the seller process. Making sure that now, when you send out postcards, they show you and your branding, because now we're experienced, these people typically what you're sending out, they already know you. Now they need to see you over and over and over again.

Speaker 2:

We're all guilty of it. Where we fall off, we're not sending stuff, we get, like you said during COVID, we got all so transactional, we lost track of our people. I have done this since 1995 and I have run into people before that looked at me and panicked because they wanted to tell me oh my gosh. We bought a house last year and as soon as they saw me, you could see the guilt all over them. And you know what I said.

Speaker 2:

That's not your fault, that's my fault If I didn't stay in touch with you to the point that you forgot about me. That's not a you problem, that is a me problem and I hope you are enjoying that house and if there's anything I can do to help you, I've had to eat that crow before. So staying in contact with them. But if you set up this auto flow and you follow the 5226, it's not going to happen. You're going to stay in contact, especially if you're putting all those people that trusted you once in that CRM and you're following through with them. Once they closed with you, those are the people that will trust you again. So just leveling up your branding, staying in touch, investing money to delegate duties and continuing to work your sphere.

Speaker 1:

So I'm going to interrupt you again, because the timing of that last comment is amazing. I was in an office yesterday Dawn having a little coffee chat at one of our smaller offices, not a sales meeting just sat around talking about our business and somebody made a comment about well, if this happens, you know then this situation, I think I'll get my client base stolen, like I'll get my sphere stolen. And I said timeout, I did my football thing. I'm like timeout, you never can get it stolen. And I I said timeout, I did my football thing. I'm like timeout, you never can get it stolen, you can only lose it. You. You said it much more articulately than I did. I was like cause it's like if this happens, then I think you know, you know you're going to steal my customer, they're going to steal my customer.

Speaker 1:

Uh well, I was talking about a. Here's what I was talking about. I was talking about a company generated farming. I said you know, one of our challenges is, you know, we've got a lot of communities in all of our markets that should be geographically farmed, because there's enough transactions. We rely on agents to do that and there are subdivisions that need to be farmed and I think at some point in time that need to be farmed. And I think at some point in time we're going to do it and everybody loved it. And then somebody said well, what if I have a sphere of influence that lives in that farm and then in three years they contact the company and then you steal my client? I said impossible, it's impossible because I'm not calling them. I'm not like like literally they're going to get some geographic farming market update real estate newsletter that's going to be branded to the enterprise in hopes that if there's 15 deals in a subdivision and today we get to, maybe we get five Right and we will refer that business to the people that are the perfect person in that community. Now I think that's a strategy that we need to think about, that mindset of I don't want the company to do that because I have two of my sphere living there and you're going to take my business and I said, if you're doing your job, it's virtually impossible. So thank you for bringing that up. As I said, you said it much more articulately. I'm kind of archaic in my description of this, but it's all about control what you can control. Have a plan, be intentional, be relational, and you got to stay on it consistently. Like.

Speaker 1:

It's interesting, don, I'm writing this thing I started this week. It's called CPR for Leaders, leaders and I'm I'm just writing about cpr for leaders, and you know the cpr is consistency, passion and resilience. That's what leaders need when they're about to gasp for breath in that moment in time. Right, and so it's. You know it's a, it's a, you know, take off of the, the CPR, to keep us alive. But, as you know, as leaders, there are days that we're gasping for breath because of the things happening around us. No different than agents. In that moment, right, and we have that time in our business when it looks like it's going down. Well, it's only going to go down if we're not doing it to maintain the steady nature of it. So really, really great point. Thank you for bringing that up.

Speaker 2:

Well, and you know what, If it was easy, gary, everybody would do it. I tell my agents that all the time I'm like everybody would be a rock star if this was easy. It's not easy. It takes time. So, like you just said, I do have people look at me and go okay, I've got 500 people in my CRM. How do I keep personal relationships with 500 people? That's what the CRM is for. You don't just call them on a hope and a prayer. Talk to them, hang up and call them back in 26 weeks when they hit it again. You take notes. What did they say? What are they?

Speaker 1:

doing? What are their?

Speaker 2:

kids doing? What are their parents doing? How's their work situation going? What are they doing in the house? Take those notes so that when you do call back you have some personal points to touch on. But you got to again. If it was easy, everybody would do it. It's not easy, it takes time and you've got to time. Block that time to get in touch with people. Keep notes on them and remember what they're going through at that time that you spoke to them.

Speaker 1:

And when you're putting your notes in, make sure you put the next contact note. Oh, absolutely. And again, you know there's having a CRM is one thing, leveraging a CRM is a different thing. Expanding the CRM or the database is another thing. Exactly, and you know, when you think about, you know what Dawn has shared today. You know I always say that the goal of our podcast is for everybody to take three things that can make their life easier and more productive. That's who we are on this show. I wrote down, as I said, I've got my third page of notes. One of the things that I'm going to do with this particular podcast and I don't do them with all of them is I'm going to listen to this one again. I typically don't listen to them. I joke, I'm not going to drive down the street and listen to myself. That feels awkward, right. But I think about the takeaways from today. Dawn are not three.

Speaker 1:

I've got nine here that are like really solid, either reminders or introductions and, as you know, in our meeting the other day, our leadership meeting, I said very infrequently does anybody share with you something that you're not familiar with? We're reminded of what we already know and hopefully we become inspired to either do something we're doing better or do some things we're not doing, to either improve my quality of life or improve my productivity, or a combination. Really really excellent today. Thank you so much. Really really excellent today. Thank you so much. Let's see, do you have any other things? I've got a couple of final questions as we put a bow around. Dawn Allred, you've been amazing today. Anything else that you want to add before I follow up with a couple questions that were not on the intro questionnaire that I gave you.

Speaker 2:

Here's what I would say. We just talked about all these things, so let's put a row around it. Let's wrap it up. I want people to just imagine you're building a business, you're in it, you're trying to get to the next level. Imagine a monthly plan where you just 12 to 15 social media posts of some kind in a month, a monthly newsletter to everybody in your sphere, 40 handwritten notes in a month that's just two a day. Stop Facebook for those reasons. Send birthday cards, send anniversary cards and then go to Facebook to see who graduated, who's having a baby, who's getting married, whose daughter just had a dance recital. You can figure all that out on social media. So, 40 a month. Two open houses set an amount to do some targeted Facebook ads and then, once a week, do some kind of video, blog, podcast, et cetera. You cannot tell me that if you don't do that monthly, that you will not see a huge bust in your business. I just think it'll burst open. I really do.

Speaker 1:

I love that. And I go back to the comment about Smarticle. What Dawn just gave you very specific, very measurable. I either do it or I don't do it. I did 34 notes, okay, don't? It's okay, like I always tell you, if you say 40, you do 34. There's next month, like, don't, don't get caught up in it.

Speaker 1:

Ask yourself why, what happened in your world and ask yourself why and Dawn knows this we talk about this all the time. Once you look at a number that already passed, don't spend a whole lot of time on it. Understand why it was what it was and then figure out what you got to do different to move forward. I think sometimes we make this thing called life and business more complicated than it is and very attainable. Again, I want you to just think about I love what Dawn said. Just imagine, like, shut your eyes and imagine 40 notes gosh to a day way different, 15 social media posts, okay. So, as you're thinking about this, let's say you want it to be six. Then make it six attainable, relevant.

Speaker 1:

The relevance is how do I build here's the other thing when you went to I love it Scalable lead system that provides consistency and predictability for my business. That's she shared phase one, which is I'm new and I like to call it how to get rich without going broke. Then phase two is how do I invest to expand my business exponentially? And I've got to invest. I've got to invest time, talent and some treasure.

Speaker 1:

Now you also brought up the other point you got to run it like a business, which is, if I'm going to invest treasure, did I get a return on investment? So you've got to be able to analyze, which is also part of the smart goal strategy. So you know what I think we're going to leave it at that. I want you to imagine and I want everybody listening to commit to me to do three of the things Dawn said and to do it for the next 90 days. Now I'm going to ask you to let Dawn and I know how it goes. I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen. What's most important is let yourself know how it goes. That's the most important, agreed that's the most important, agreed.

Speaker 1:

I can't help but believe that if you do the final summary of Dawn and pieces prior to that, you won't grow your business at a time when there is business to be had, and those who do will get more. Those who don't, I think, are going to get left behind. Don Alred, rock star, thanks so much. Great to see you today. To our listeners, this was a Hall of Fame All-Star edition of Focus, or a reality podcast. Don did a great job and I can't wait for everybody to not only listen to it the first time, but sit down at a table with notes and take some notes. Dawn, have a great day. Appreciate you being with us. Thank you, see ya.

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