The Real Deal Podcast
Unlock the door to success in the dynamic world of real estate with your hosts, William Gomez & Alfredo Madrid. Join us as we dive into the inspiring journeys of loan officers and real estate agents, sharing their triumphs, challenges, and invaluable insights. Your key to navigating the ever-evolving landscape of real estate starts here.
The Real Deal Podcast
Harnessing Social Media for Real Estate Success
What if mastering the art of social media could transform your business landscape? Stephen Hester, The 918 Agent, joins us to highlight how YouTube's "shelf life" offers lasting impact and how content consistency can drive business growth, particularly in the real estate market.
Despite not having a massive following, Stephen's strategic content has helped over 70 families relocate to Tulsa. By balancing personal and professional content, he illustrates the power of authenticity and niche content, such as burger reviews, in capturing audience attention and generating real estate leads.
Get ready to reimagine your approach with engaging content creation strategies that enhance client relationships. From creatively capturing home tours to sharing valuable inspection insights, learn how to add value to the home-buying process. Whether you're a seasoned content creator or just starting, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you thrive in the digital age.
The funny thing about editing videos is when you get better at editing, it actually takes you longer. Now, one tip that I would say my recommendation is to try everything. You just need to find the thing that you're most comfortable with.
Speaker 2:I always tell people like truly, what you see in the stories is like 2% of my day. If you have had a reel that has gone 100 views, 1,000 views or a million views after about a week or so, that's tapped out Harris versus.
Speaker 1:Trump 2024. Who do you guys got, yeah, who are you voting for? Well, I got $20 on.
Speaker 2:Steven Hester dude, welcome to the Real Deal Podcast. I've lost track on how many times you've been on mine. I think it's been three. Two times by yourself, and then once with May, and that was your first duo one, wasn't it? Yeah, and I've only done a couple of those. And then this is your first time on here on the Real Deal Podcast. Yeah, man, pleasure Dude, I feel like Alfredo is going to be talking to you most of the time, because I feel like I talk to you all the time.
Speaker 1:And you know me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so, but I wanted you to come on because one I think you and I have helped each other a lot in our areas of expertise. So a lot of people look at you, look at me, and they're like, oh, these two people are using social media for their business, but you're really good at YouTube. I'm not, I'm not, you're, I'm really, I, I, I. I'm saying I'm really good at Instagram. You're not, but now you're, you're definitely good at Instagram. You've killed it from help from you.
Speaker 2:And then and so, uh, that's how you built your business. Um, and actually to get it started, I was going to post a story that yesterday I posted a almost a two minute video it's a minute and 40 seconds and I almost didn't post it. And then the realtor that I posted it with texted me today and said hey, dude, I got a buyer from that, from that uh video that we did together that you posted yesterday. So I'm just like man, you're just one deal away, or one. You're essentially one video away from potentially earning more business, right?
Speaker 1:But you just never know.
Speaker 2:Right. So, um, but yeah, I think it'll be interesting, Alfredo, because this is I just had a podcast right before this with uh Arturo, and uh, we brought you up at the very end and I was telling him how, um, whenever I came on board over here, um, that you were big on like, um, that you were big on like we've got to do video, we're going to do marketing, and I was just not about it. I was like, well, I like one, it's like everybody right now I wanted to do it, but I like hated being on camera and then to see kind of where we're at now. It's kind of crazy. So I'm kind of I'm I'm kind of interested to hear your side of kind of have you?
Speaker 3:I think that people make a huge mistake and overthink it too many times. Instead of just getting started, I want to get to the part because I really like your story in this area of when it really took off for you. But before I ask about that, I kind of want to hear what your business looked like pre social media takeoff and what does it look like now? So what did it look like before? Just so there's an understanding of like, hey, what has the transformation been like?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So it's actually real interesting. So I'm going to give you the backstory and then I'm going to speed up just a little bit. So COVID happened. I wasn't in the fit oh, I wasn't in the real estate industry. So I was in the fitness industry, and when COVID happened, I got laid off from my job and so I was door dashing trying to figure out what my next move was going to be. Also, I got into rehab because I'm an alcoholic.
Speaker 1:And so that put a little bit of space in between of what my next move was going to be. But once I got out of rehab, my father-in-law sat me down and said hey, Steven, what's your next move is going to be? I mean, you're getting out of rehab, You're just door dashing now what move's going to be? I mean, you're getting out of rehab, You're just door dashing now, Like what are you going to do? And I'm like I honestly don't know yet. And he was like you should do real estate. And I was like, man, I don't want to do the a hundred percent commission thing, Like I'm not about that. He's like you'll be great, Like you'll be successful, Trust me. And he's like, no, trust me, Uh, you'll do great. Uh, my father-in-law is the broker of uh, managing broker of the office I'm at.
Speaker 1:So, that's the reason why he told me to get in real estate. So when I got into real estate, I thought, before I actually, you know, I was getting through the academy you know about to take my test I was already thinking about how I was going to market my business because I realized from running so many gyms that real estate's like probably 80, 90% lead generation. How are you going to get your next deal? So, uh, I always want to start a YouTube channel.
Speaker 1:That's kind of selfishly, you know, and I I did some research on it before I got, you know, passed my test for real estate that other realtors were using YouTube in their market. There was one guy in Tulsa that was kind of doing it, but not really very consistent, and actually there's two people that weren't very consistent with it and weren't very strategized of how they did it. Um, so I based it off of all them, off of different markets not them locally, but off of different markets, kind of put something together. And then December or December 1st was no sorry, november 1st was the first time I posted a YouTube video and I got my license uh 2020.
Speaker 3:And so I got my license.
Speaker 1:Of what year? 2020. And so I got licensed October 1st of 2020. I posted my first video November 1st of 2020, and I closed my first deal from YouTube in December. Wow, what was the video? So my first video was the pros and cons of living in Tulsa, oklahoma.
Speaker 3:Wow, just self-recorded on your phone, yep.
Speaker 1:I recorded it. I recorded, recorded off the camera at my church, because my church I'm very involved with my church the Refuge of Owasso shout out, and so I was able to borrow some of their equipment and also, luckily, I had a MacBook Air that had iMovie on it so I was able to edit that on my laptop so. I didn't spend any money because I didn't have any money, so I tried to use everything that was around me For future reference in this podcast.
Speaker 3:How long did it take you to record that video? How many takes did you do? What was that process like? Because we've all been there, right, we've all been in that very first video. We were like start over, I mean, I've, I've, I've used my cell phone before and I go look at the. You know how you look at the when your kid takes your phone and takes 5,000 video pictures of themselves. Well, I had like 5, video editing. No background in making videos.
Speaker 1:I didn't even do social media before I got in real estate.
Speaker 1:Like, if you go back and look at my Instagram, you can go back to my very first post that I ever did on Instagram and then you know, two years later, then you start seeing me do more and more content.
Speaker 1:So I didn't have any background in social media zero. And so with my first video I had about 45 minutes combined of footage that I was going to make this video on. I had probably about two hours of research before and making that video of like figuring out what I was going to talk about. And the funny thing about that 45 minutes of footage is it was all sporadic because I would start and stop, start and stop because I didn't really have an idea of how I was going to do this, and so I had about 45 minutes of footage. I spent probably about six hours of editing that footage down to about 12 minutes and then posted it Like it was like after my first video refreshing views, refreshing views, refreshing, oh and I got like maybe, maybe, 10 views in a matter of a month how many views does it have?
Speaker 2:right now that one has over 30 000. So that is what I of, why I've been, and, alfredo, you and I were just at a conference and, uh, it's, it's real estate, mostly loan officers, but there was real estate agents there and they just talked about um, social media, newsletters, like all these different things, right, so I wanted to implement three different things, um, one of them was that I I wanted to jump on a zoom call with somebody that I've met that is doing a lot of deals, the guy that sat at our table, sterling, he he closed 30 deals last month and so I have a zoom call with him next week. Uh, the other thing was I want to do a webinar once a month. Uh, had my first webinar yesterday. We had about 36 people show up, um, and then my other one, which I called you yesterday about, was to do two YouTube videos that were at least 10 minutes long, and I was like, bro, I'm about to shoot these videos. I'm like, pump me up because, like, I hate, I don't want to do this and it's just so much different.
Speaker 2:But part of the biggest difference of why I want to do this is because a short, even those shorts that go 2 million, like. You cap out at that. Like if you have had a reel that has gone 100 views, 1,000 views or a million views, after about a week or so that's tapped out there. You refreshed it and you had 10 views. Now that video has over 30,000 views and you're probably still getting business from that one video.
Speaker 2:So right now, people that are listening to this might think that, dude, I don't have time for that, like I don't have time to spend two hours researching, which now you don't really have to do that there's so many different things that you're able to accelerate the process and you don't have to edit it. You know, like I don't have to edit my stuff, so it makes it so much easier. But those are the things that if you put into place right now, they can service you later down the road with with deals on that, something that I didn't talk about that I want you to tell me and I don't think I'll I think I've shared these numbers with Alfredo, but share your numbers from the first year, um, and where they came from and stuff.
Speaker 1:Right, right, and I'll get to that. I'm gonna back up just a little bit. But uh, you said it perfectly about short form videos. I like to call it shelf life. So those videos have a certain shelf life. With the YouTube videos it's not necessarily evergreen content, but it's content that's going to obviously last a lot longer than a couple of weeks with short form content. So that's the beautiful thing about making YouTube videos. Also, the other thing to really think about is that video, like I said, in the first month, only had 10 views. I got a deal from that. Wow, like I, I closed a deal.
Speaker 3:Like somebody made a comment and you responded and then stayed in contact with someone.
Speaker 1:So it's. It's interesting how it works, Uh, over time is uh, most of the time, people will call me or email me, but then other time, what they'll do is they'll actually go to my social media pages. So they'll go to my Instagram, Facebook and then start following me on there and then they'll DM me. So that's the one bad thing about YouTube that I don't necessarily like is there's no way to message people through YouTube. There's no like inboxes. People will have to go through another.
Speaker 3:You have to funnel them somewhere else, right?
Speaker 1:You have to funnel them somewhere else. So that's why, with me making the short form content, now, it's actually kind of helped, you know, basically keep get those people engaged. So it's like they, they found me on YouTube, they then go to Instagram, they follow my content and then, a couple of months later, they'll, you know, contact me. But going back to your question, uh, my first year. So, like I said I started, uh, my first video was posted November 1st of 2020. I got my first deal in December. I didn't get my next deal from YouTube until June.
Speaker 3:Wow.
Speaker 1:So I, from January 1st to about end of June, I did just uh, I did just over a million dollars in production. Um, I think I closed like three or four deals, uh, one of which was from YouTube. The other two came from my COI, the one that I did in December, I don't count that this in the story. Uh, from July 1st to the end of the year, I did, oh gosh, like 16 or 18, 19 other transactions, um, and I finished the year at 5.9 million. Wow, and uh, my total number of deals for 2021 was 24 deals. So, or 20, 24 or 25 deals I forgot the numbers on that but, um, I won rookie of the year for my, uh, for my brokerage, coldwell banker, and we have offices in Oklahoma city, tulsa, broken Arrow, wasso, all everywhere. So I was the rookie of the year and literally that I mean four. I think four deals were from my COI and the rest of them were from YouTube, so that was like 20 or 21 deals.
Speaker 3:In the first six months there. I mean, were there ever times where you're like I told you, father-in-law, like this isn't for me, like this isn't working?
Speaker 1:No, I was really like, honestly, I was very, very lucky because I always had some sort of deal going on. I mean, it might've been just one, but I was working on something. So, um, and also I tell people, me and my wife were really good at being poor, like we were really good at being poor, so we definitely live within our means. Uh, you know, we didn't spend a lot of extra money. I didn't have an editor, I didn't really have a lot of overhead like I do now. Um, so, like I edited my own videos, I recorded off a DSLR camera, I got from my church, I got the lights from my church, I had a green screen for my church, I edited on iMovie, so I didn't really spend too much money extra. Um, so I was able to kind of space out. Like you know, I closed my first big deal Cause let me go back. So my first deal for my YouTube was only $6,000. That wasn't my commission that back. So my first deal for my YouTube was only $6,000.
Speaker 2:That wasn't my commission.
Speaker 1:That was the actual deal. It was a piece of land, no, it was a house that was abandoned, that should have been torn down, and the value was just in the land. But this guy from Washington was like you got both sides.
Speaker 1:No, I made I made $124 and I think 26 cents. It's so funny. So my wife, when I told her I was going to get leads from YouTube, she was like Stephen, no, you are going to be delivering pizzas for the rest of your life. You cannot do that. You need to go do open houses. You need to go farm neighborhoods. You need to do cult calling. And I'm like, no, trust me, I got this.
Speaker 2:YouTube. She sounds like her dad was a broker. Growing up she was like I know what you got.
Speaker 3:I know the blueprint, I know you got to do these things.
Speaker 1:I'm like, no, no, no, social media is it? And she's like, oh my gosh, we're going to be homeless. And so, after I closed that first deal, uh, I came home she had a cake saying congratulations, my wife's a sweetheart. She had a cake saying congratulations, my wife's a sweetheart. She had a cake said awesome, you know, even though it was only $124.26. In commission, yeah, she had the cake. And then she had a framed picture of my YouTube thumbnail, a picture of me in front of the house.
Speaker 3:Oh, wow, and then that check, that's cool.
Speaker 1:In a frame and it's in my office, so it reminds me that this works all the time, and so that's why that's the reason why I was so consistent, even though I didn't get my next deal until June. And also, by the way, I don't know if she ever cashed that check.
Speaker 3:It might be good.
Speaker 1:You know I might need to go break that.
Speaker 3:What so? When you say the rest of them, like you, you know closed about 20 transactions that year you say the rest of them came from YouTube. How do you know they came from YouTube? Oh, I ask, like you're just like hey well, they just call you randomly or they sent you a message. How are you tracking this?
Speaker 1:It's really easy to figure out which ones are from YouTube, because they're coming from California, like so I get an area code from California, I get an area code from New Mexico and I can push, put it together pretty quickly. And then also it's really cool because when they call you they'll tell you like most of the time I didn't have to ask. They're like oh my gosh, I can't believe you answered Like I'm talking to the nine, one, eight agent.
Speaker 2:That's what. That's what Caleb said.
Speaker 3:Well, did you have a ton of followers at this point.
Speaker 1:No, and they're still saying I'm tough.
Speaker 3:And they're still saying stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, they think I'm like some big celebrity. And so when I'm showing them houses around town, or if we're going to the gathering place or the coffee house, they're like, oh dude, you not know this guy? He's the 918 agent. And then people look at him like I don't know who the heck, this guy is.
Speaker 2:By the way, people don't know your name. My wife knows you your name. Really, your name is 918 agent. Like she forgets it, she'll remember it, but she's like I always forget his name. I just know him as the 918 h oh that's hilarious, but that's exactly what we had caleb right, who's big on tiktok, yeah, um. And. And he said the same exact thing. Do you like do?
Speaker 3:you try to get granular in identifying which videos are working more than others by asking well, which video did you watch? Yeah, and then you start, and then you organize that and you know, so that you can start. I mean, tell me a little bit about that, it's so funny.
Speaker 1:I've never asked you that, by the way. That's a great question. I'm glad you asked it. I'm glad you guys asked me what my first video was. All of them say the pros and cons.
Speaker 2:Really that first video.
Speaker 1:So they said the first video they watch is the pros and cons. And then I have videos you know so many other videos but they always say that was the first video they watched. And then they started watching. Yeah, like still people Wow, still to this day, but then they get to you know through all the other stuff.
Speaker 1:So right, but, that's how, that's what hooked them. Yeah, and people ask me all the time like, are you afraid of other people coming in? You know doing YouTube and things like that. I'm like no dude, because what happens is I might not hit a certain keyword phrase. I mean because I geeked out on YouTube after I got really good at it. I geeked out on it, did a bunch of research.
Speaker 1:You're the Mr Beast of Tulsa, oklahoma, right yeah that's what I like, to think that I like to think that, but what I realized is that so, let's say, another agent comes in and starts making a YouTube channel and they maybe hit a niche that didn't hit. My video is going to be the next video that they that they watch. So the day the person might watch their video, but the next video that's going to be recommended is mine, and so now they're going to start watching mine and I have so many more videos than all these other agents that they're going to get to watching me.
Speaker 3:How long is your average video right now? Still 10 to 12 minutes.
Speaker 1:Uh, yeah, I mean I'm I'm venturing out and trying some new stuff right now, uh, just because doing sit down videos for as long as I have, like I got bored of it and then I just quit kind of posting on a regular basis. So I kind of changed my strategy up just a little bit. Um, I'm still doing the sit down videos which cause that's my bread and butter, that's what people really want to see. But I kind of got feedback from my clients, uh, that I moved here and they're like, man, I really wish like you actually showed like the place that you were talking about in the video. And I'm like, okay, I can do that. So I started doing more blog styles, style videos. Um, still working through that. I'm very early stages of that, Um, so we'll see how it works out, but I always like trying new things. Uh, even though I'm not super artistic, I like to think I am and I like to kind of be creative.
Speaker 3:How many videos do you have right now on your channel?
Speaker 1:Uh, oh, it's so funny, so I actually. So there was a big conference in Oklahoma city a couple, a couple of weeks ago for real estate agents, and so I didn't go to it. But the reason why I know about it is I got this random call from Atlanta, georgia, and I thought it was a client calling me for my YouTube channel. So I answered it. I said hey, this is Steven, how can I help you? And he goes oh, wow, you answered hey, steven, I'm so-and-so speaking at this big event convention over in Oklahoma city to realtors. Uh, I want everybody to cheer for you. And then everyone cheered in the background and I'm like what? Like, am I really like on state? He's like yeah, yeah, I'm talking to all these people. I go around and talk to agents about YouTube and things like that, and I just wanted to show them your channel. So we're actually looking at your channel right now and it is awesome what you're doing. Like, can you talk about it? So I was like giving like a, like a, a lesson on.
Speaker 1:YouTube through, uh, through through this phone call. But anyway, he asked me the question how many YouTube video videos have you made? And I was like I don't know, probably like 60 or 80. I don't know. And so after I got off the phone with them, I went and looked I made 127.
Speaker 2:Wow yeah 127 videos.
Speaker 3:So over how, over how much time?
Speaker 1:Uh, four years, almost four years. Yeah, november 1st would be four years.
Speaker 3:So you're just, you're doing like a couple of months.
Speaker 2:Yep, how many families have you moved to Tulsa, oklahoma? Uh, over 70, now Over 70.
Speaker 3:Yep, I just hit 71. So the majority of your business is people moving into 90% of it yeah.
Speaker 1:Wow, which kind of sucks. Honestly, I got really good at it right. I have a niche. I know how to work with people from outside of can. I can confidently say I'm the best person in Oklahoma with moving people from out of state. I'm not saying that cocky, I just. I just have so many experience.
Speaker 1:Right, I have so many, like I started with working with remote people that during this time they weren't able to get here. So I had a FaceTime and show houses and over time I'm like dude, this is not good because it's fuzzy. Like the husband couldn't get on this FaceTime. Like, what am I going to do next? So I started recording these videos and then, after I started recording the videos instead of doing FaceTime because then I can go at any time I didn't have to wait till they got off work to do this FaceTime.
Speaker 1:They asked questions. They're like steven, how big was that room? Like, could I fit a couch in it? Or hey, what was the? What was the serial number on the ac unit? Or what did this look like. So I got all this feedback from people like showing houses that I now know everything. So when people like say, hey, steven, can you go look at this house because we're interested in it, we can't make it because we live in nevada, um, I go and I I do a video. I sent it to him. They said, steven, like this is more information than we got when we bought our house here in nevada.
Speaker 3:Like, wow, like we didn't like you're giving them measurements of rooms. You're giving them appliances brands you're giving them. Is there a?
Speaker 1:checklist that you have or no. I need to make one I just I've done it, so I mean I can actually show you I can actually show you because I actually have a private playlist on my phone. Give me a second. I have a private playlist on my phone. That's just for private showings and I can tell you how many I've done.
Speaker 2:Let me just go to it real quick and it's crazy that you're telling us all this because, like, I'm not an agent, but I wouldn't have even thought of hey, if I can go to that house right now, I can film it better quality, and I don't have to. What does that number say? 466. Oh, so you do it on YouTube, but it's set as private. Yeah, so people can see it.
Speaker 1:And here's the really, really cool thing man, I'm giving out too many secrets. I need to get paid. Send something to my Venmo.
Speaker 3:Let's double what we were going to pay.
Speaker 1:So so this is the, this is the cool thing. So and once again, this is just for me learning right. So when I first did my recording right, I recorded like this, the whole entire house right, and then I went to go send it through a message.
Speaker 3:The file was too, yeah, so I'm like oh crap.
Speaker 1:So I had to start cutting it in pieces and I'm like, man, there's gotta be an easier way. So then I was like you know what, I'm going to turn it this way. So I turned it this way, did it in 0.1, whatever, recorded it, and then I was like, all right, I'm just going to send it to them via email.
Speaker 1:and so I tried to do that a couple times I was like man, that didn't work. So I was like all right, I'm gonna upload to a google drive and then I'm gonna send it to them. And then they had troubles opening it and downloading it. And I'm like oh gosh, what am I gonna do? And I'm like steven, you're an idiot, you're on youtube. Yeah, why do you just upload it to youtube?
Speaker 1:you just set it as a private, and so that's what I did. And then the next cool thing is, like I I sent it to. I sent it is so funny Cause I remember it is a. It was this it was a first time home buyer from Arizona and I sent them the video. And I looked at the video the next day Cause I can see how many views on it.
Speaker 1:It had like 40 views, so I'm like oh crap, I don't have it as as private, cause I don't want that to go out to everybody, cause we know we talk about stuff and I give them advice or whatever. And so I looked at I'm like what is private is unlisted. So I called him. I said, hey, like have you guys watched this video 44 times? And they're like no, we sent it to my mom, we sent it to my friends, we sent it to my mom, we sent it to my friends, we sent it to everybody, like they are all having an input on this house and so we just, and so funny. They're like yeah, we just like my parents come over sometimes, like if you make a video for us and we'll like pour wine and you know, and we get popcorn and we just watch it. It's like entertainment to us. Uh, because they think I'm funny, because I'll do stupid stuff and that's the.
Speaker 2:Uh, really you, you actually don't have a personality at all. So it's funny that, uh, you're saying that because, um, as an agent, a lot of the times you're in that awkward. And I say this like I've done it before I've just heard stories that you're in an awkward situation where you're showing the house and then the mom and dad show up and then it just makes it awkward because they're the experts, right. Oh, you're just like, ah, so it's better to just do the video and then anybody can watch it, but you're not having to be there to endure oh, I bet the amount of people talk behind my back is insane.
Speaker 2:So a couple things real quick. I really wanted you to come on because, as you've gotten to and you've known, known Steven, but like I feel like you're really getting to know him and how his business is working but I always remember your name yeah.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Destiny is, um, that he's very, very like, he knows his stuff as far as like, he remembers, like when he posted his first video, when he um, when he closed his first deal, how long he went without and and then, and then he's very honest too, because it's easy as just to start off in credibility and just say I've closed x amount of deals that came from youtube and you leave everything else out. That's not relatable for people. It's relatable when you said it's it's, it's intriguing when you said I post, I posted one video and then, within a month, I got a, a deal. That deal was $6,000. And then. So at that point people can relate more. And then two this podcast is mainly for realtors and loan officers, I believe Whoa.
Speaker 2:I didn't know that. I just gave all these realtors my secrets.
Speaker 2:Well, I will say this is that there's no way for us to track it, but I do think that most people that listen to this are loan officers and loan officers from our company and stuff. To where, if you're listening, I'm big on adding value. Adding value. The reason why our relationship is the way it is is because I didn't call you and say, stephen, do you want to go for a cup of coffee?
Speaker 2:You came to a social media class of mine and we started working together on how can I help you take your social media to the next level, to where, if you're listening and you're especially if you're in a different state and you're a loan officer he just gave you so much that you can call agents in your local area to add value to them and say, hey, have you ever thought about just doing you know a YouTube, a private YouTube video for, even if that's not their niche, just doing one of those that's gonna go the extra mile that might get you an extra referral later down the road. So I just wanted to point that out because it's easy to listen to a podcast and then you just get done listening to it and then you go to the next thing, but they're listening it for a reason and you just added so many things that I can think of. If I am in Texas or Michigan or DC area. I'm calling them like hey, this is what I just learned. You could teach a class on that.
Speaker 1:No, yeah, and here's just something else that you can do. Let's say your client's not even a remote right. Let's say your client's here. What I do for all my clients now but just because I do it all these private showings is when I go to an inspection and my client can't make it, or my client is even there, I'll record the summary, Cause you know how inspectors will go in and then they'll give a summary to the client after.
Speaker 1:So I record the whole thing, so I'll remember what they say, all that good stuff. And then you know they'll have that to go back to them because you know they're they're getting all this information from the inspector, right. And so they're like oh, I don't remember what he said about the ac, was that a big deal? I don't remember if he said that was a big deal. And then if I get the permission from the buyer that bought it he, they, you know, and they're asking for all these repairs and they're only asking for or they got all these repairs, only asking for some of them I ask him, I say, hey, you want me to send that to the listing agent so they can actually hear it coming out of the word of the inspector's mouth. And most of the time they say absolutely, send that over. So then it's not coming from just an agent or just the buyers, it's actually coming from a professional inspector. So it gives a little bit more power to the word or to that whatever the inspector said.
Speaker 1:And then also I do that with staging, that uh, whatever the inspector said. And then also I do that with uh staging. So if I have a listing, I have a stager come in, uh, that recommends where stuff goes, like just basically uses their stuff to stage the house of, like hey, moving the blender off the counter, or hey, fold the towel like this and putting on the rack, or you know, move all the kids toys to this area and do all this stuff, just basically making the house look presentable for pictures and showings and all that good stuff. I record that whole thing. So I bring the stager in record, the whole thing and then I send it to my client. Because there I noticed it when my very first one I did of my listings, I had my stager come in um that my client was just writing all these notes, like not really focusing on her and like, you know, engaging, just writing all these notes, and I was like man do that.
Speaker 3:You remember all that? Yeah, you can even record it. You can even throw it to like a fathom or something in AI and it'll summarize all the bullet points. Oh yeah, and that's awesome.
Speaker 1:And that's what I do now too. Um, I'll take transcripts, uh like, if you go to YouTube and go down to the description and go to the very bottom, you down to the description and go to the very bottom, you can see transcripts. I'll copy all those transcripts, put it into a um, put it into chat, gpt, summarize and then just summarize it and then I send.
Speaker 2:I have an even better one for you. You can download glasp. If you download that to your it's oh, what is this? It's, it's glasp, it's that's what it's called. Yeah, and then you download it into your computer and then there's just a little button at the top where it just summarizes the entire video for you.
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 2:And it gives you the five bullet points that you need to see.
Speaker 3:G-L-A-P. Like grasp except glasp.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:G-L-A-S-P.
Speaker 1:Yeah, glasp. Okay, I'm going to check that out. I haven't heard of that one.
Speaker 3:So, looking back at your first video and how much time you spent on it, and like you're like six hours here, two hours, I mean, it was an entire day just to get that. Um and then you can touch a little bit on what you ended up. What ended up helping your actual short form take off, which was the whole burger thing, right, what are some other areas that you felt like you really overthought? Like you overthought it back then and it was just a lot easier than what you thought it would be.
Speaker 1:Uh now looking back on that thing, so I'm going to go back to cause you. You said something really cool that I just thought of is that you know I spent six hours on on uh. I spent I had 45 minutes of raw footage, so let's say, round up to an hour. I spent about two hours of of uh researching and then I spent about four to five hours on, you know, editing. So I spent, let's just say, a total of like eight hours right On this video. The average open house is what? Two hours right. So I basically did four open houses for a video that's still giving me leads today.
Speaker 2:So, and one thing that I want to say earlier, that I forgot was and I'm not, I'm not, I'm, I'm not condoning this- I'm not saying people should do this, but you still don't do any open houses, you don't do any farming, you don't make any cold calls. All he does is YouTube. I'm not saying people should do this.
Speaker 1:No, I'm not saying people should do that either.
Speaker 2:Because I'm a big. There's so many agents that aren't even doing that, that want to do social media, and then they're like's all I'm gonna do. You're like the exception, but but that, that's all he's doing.
Speaker 1:He's not doing any of of his greatness tracker is just another video videos. Yeah, I yeah. I don't recommend doing that at all. Like no, that's like, that's like I. Yeah, I should do some other things, but I just don't want to.
Speaker 1:The only time I I've done four open houses in my career and the only reason why I did I did one as a favor for another agent because no one else would hold it open, and she had two houses and she's like, stephen, please have this open house. And I was like, okay, so I went and helped her out and then the other three were for I've done probably five. And then the other three were for I've done probably five. And then the other four or five were listings of mine that my client was like hey, I want you to have an open house. I said, yes, absolutely, I'll do whatever you want. If you want an open house, I'll do an open house.
Speaker 3:I guess what I'm saying is that exact same video right now would probably take you an hour.
Speaker 1:You would think, when you get well, yeah, probably now.
Speaker 2:That's what I'm saying, because I have an editor now.
Speaker 1:But the funny thing about editing videos is, when you get better at editing, it actually takes you longer, because you start pointing out different things. Oh wow, because you know more tricks, you know more trades. So, like I got faster at editing and then, once I got better at editing, it got back up to taking a long time. Um, but you, you asked a question earlier.
Speaker 3:Well, my question is like what are some things that you overthink? Like when, when, when even myself or anybody else or most people that I encounter that are thinking about getting into social media, making videos, making short form or long-term content, they're like man, this, this has to be gold, like I got to get all these bullet points and it's got to be perfect and it's got to be valuable, and so they never end up doing, whereas if they just would have got out there and started doing it, they probably would have had some of the results you've had to some degree. And so, like what are some areas that it's more? Like, just do it, cause even your story about you were trying to have all this information about real estate on your short form on your Instagram. Uh, and all of a sudden you're like I'm just going to review burgers.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And next thing you know that's when you took off there what are some areas that people just overthink, that they just need to get out there and do it Right and you said it, the biggest thing is just getting out and just getting started.
Speaker 1:So I honestly, my best videos are ones that I'm just being myself. I'm not trying to be perfect. I'll mispronounce words on accident. By the way, people think I do it on purpose. I grew up with a really bad stutter and all the way up to middle school and also I was dyslexic. Dyslexic so where I had to take like hook on phonics classes and go to a speech therapist and all that other stuff. So, um, like I can't say words right, like a lot of times, um, but you know, I just I'm just, I'm just myself, um, and if I waited to make the perfect video, like I would not. I I still don't make the perfect video. My videos still, I stutter through them. I might not say the correct thing, but I just, I just record and I just do it.
Speaker 1:Now, one tip that I would say if you're doing like a sit down video in front of the camera is don't stop. Don't stop the camera. Like, if you look at the camera, say your piece, if you mess up, just start back over and then go as long as you can, and if you mess up, take a pause, start back from that last sentence of the point you're going to make and then, after you get through that whole entire video, edit from back to forward. So your last sentence is going to be the last sentence you say in the video is going to be obviously your best sentence, right? So if you edit that, you know all that stuff before it that you're trying to say was going to be bad. You can edit that out and delete it out and then you know all right, I'm starting the next section. You know that last section you said was good. So you know that part is going to be good. So you know it's easier to edit. That's a trick that I learned from a YouTube editor on YouTube, like I was watching YouTube editing videos, and that was the device he gave me. So I was like oh yeah, so my first video, right, I stopped start, stop, start and then also on my short form video will does a really good job of doing sit down in front of the camera and give advice and expertise, right?
Speaker 1:I don't do well in those types of videos. I tried them with will. It just wasn't my cup of tea. I like doing more, like the voiceovers, because I can get the footage I need while I'm there, if I'm looking at a house or if I'm doing a burger review, and then I can go back later and do a voiceover video. Um, so my recommendation is to try everything. So, first, nothing's going to be perfect. Second, try everything when it comes to social media. Do carousels, do videos, do sit down videos, do vlog style videos, do home tours. There's so many ways to be successful in social media. You just need to find the thing that you're most comfortable with or maybe not the most comfortable with, but maybe not something you like to do because you're going to be doing a lot of it. So I really enjoy doing voiceover videos, and so that's what I do.
Speaker 3:So even on your burger reviews they're voiceovers. Oh yeah, you're not there reviewing it right there. Yep, you're just recording the burger, recording the restaurant. Later back, you come back and give you a review.
Speaker 1:And the funny and the reason why I did it that way is I was very self-conscious about filming in public so I wanted to do quick takes of stuff so people wouldn't know like I'm like talking to my phone, like out in public. I just think I'm just kind of weird about that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean I'm doing more of the same yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm doing more of it now, but when I first started I was very weird about it. So I was just like I'm just going to get quick, quick, quick clips and then you know, and then do the voiceover later, you know type of deal.
Speaker 2:One of the questions that um people ask all the time is like how are you okay with sharing so much of like your life, right? Um, especially like with my stories, like I'm pretty active in my stories but I always tell people like, truly, what you see in the stories is is like 2% of my day.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Not even that. So I thought that I I was, you know, in front of the camera a lot every single day and it it sounds like you blow me out of the water because you are shooting content for your youtube videos. You're filming for your clients, for open, for not open houses, but home tours and stuff like that. You have a podcast now to where you're having conversations and that's being filmed and everything. How much of your of your life do you think you're sharing with people right now?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, maybe like two, 3%, kind of like you, I mean, and the funny thing is is like stuff that you see online happened weeks, weeks ago. Yeah, like like I, I rarely post anything that happened the same day because I'm busy, you know. I'm talking to clients, I'm recording videos, I'm doing real estate stuff, I'm working transactions, like so what I do it's it's another great tip here. Uh, you know, another little gold nugget is every evening after I put the kids down. That's when I do all my editing. So that's why I do my reels, all that stuff.
Speaker 1:Also, I edit my stories. So I do a lot of editing in my stories, which you don't really have to. I do a lot of editing, um, so I do all my editing on my stories and then the next day I have them ready to go. So throughout the day I'll post them throughout the day. So most of the time when you see one of my stories, it's probably happened either the day before or a couple of days prior. Also, I might put in stuff that happened on two separate days. So, like in my stories, you'll see something and then my next story might happen like the day before, the day after. So I kind of piece it together Um so.
Speaker 3:I hope that didn't ruin it. Do you have like a rule of thumb for content and where you're posting, like are you keeping certain um things to just business? Are you keeping certain things just personal, like, are there any rules that you stick to in part two of the question? Do you have like a scheduled rhythm in which you do things like meaning like I'm going to post on Tuesdays and Thursdays or I'm good, or is it just kind of you're just feeling it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's, and this is really bad to say. I need to get better with my scheduling. That's something that I really lack on is like my calendar, my social media calendar of when I post and how I post and all that other stuff. Also, with me growing my audience so big on Instagram comparatively to, like you know, just like other agents, like I have a big audience for you know the type of content I do, um, I get a lot of brand deals now and things like that that I have to post and things like that, cause I do make money off the social media now not not as much as real estate, but you know I do make a little bit of money, um, from my social media. So I have deals, that kind of pop up. But if I was to do it perfectly in my mind, right On my post, I would do 75-25. 75% of what my niche is and then 25% of what I'm trying to get out of.
Speaker 1:So 75% burgers, 25% real estate Right restaurant reviews, going places, showing off Tulsa, and then 25% talking about real estate. And then in my stories I really, really tried to do the opposite. So 75% talking about behind the scenes real estate, and then 25% of what's going on in my life. And you know cause? What's going on in my life is mostly real estate, right?
Speaker 3:so I'm showing houses going to closings, you know you know, doing all that stuff, you try to keep your personal life out of it most of the time, like personal, personal or no.
Speaker 1:No, I'm pretty personal, like I'll show you know, let's go into the movies and got it. You know us at the house, us watching pickleball, love pickleball uh I still have never played pickleball.
Speaker 2:You never played pickleball, I just I just played my first full game a couple of Sundays ago and I kind of got big into it, dude I, I bet you're legit, I bet you're pretty good. I almost called you to be like, to be like hey, you want to come over and play?
Speaker 1:I just, it's just, yeah, it was just two last minute.
Speaker 2:But, dude, I appreciate you for coming on, and I mean he gave a lot of info that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that was a lot. I mean this might be. I mean this Might make cassette tapes and sell this one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want a 25% royalty fees.
Speaker 2:That's what I should have done with your when you started doing videos is I should have put a royalty deal, because this dude wasn't even getting free food.
Speaker 3:No, I wasn't. So what do you say? You get brand deals Like what are you getting Like?
Speaker 1:people are like hey, can you promote our restaurant? Yeah, yeah, so I'll get some of that.
Speaker 3:You're like the what's the El Presidente, or something? Yeah, yeah, el Presidente.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's funny. So that's actually how I started with my food reviews. So my first food review was a cookie spot in Oklahoma City called Eileen's and it wasn't a voiceover. City called Eileen's and it wasn't a voiceover. So I actually did kind of the Dave Portnoy walked outside right in front of the shop, you know, had tried to make up some cool little taglines that would go viral. Totally sucked, like it was. It was. It's still up today, I think I just posted. I reposted like 13 views?
Speaker 2:now, yeah, it probably has 13 views.
Speaker 1:And so that was. That was how I started the food reviews. I did a cookie review day portman style and it did horrible, so I quit doing them one bite.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I said, I said one bite.
Speaker 2:Everybody knows the rules yeah now you have your french fry thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the break test the break test. Yeah, the break test, so it doesn't mean anything like I actually try to keep it out of like the pressure you have when you're breaking a fry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the pressure of how it breaks all that good stuff. And honestly, I did a brake test on one where it had a horrible brake test but I really liked the flavor and the taste of it so I still gave it a high score. So I was like, oh, the brake test is stupid, I'm not going to do it anymore. And I didn't do it in that video. And someone asked where's the break test? And then I didn't do it in another video and my comments discussed where's the break test? Where's the break test? And I'm like, oh crap, I guess I got to bring back the break test, dude if I ever have a TV like a game show TV, how do you say it TV game show.
Speaker 1:Yeah, TV game show.
Speaker 2:I think you, you as the host, oh dude, I would totally do it. My last question is we didn't really get fully into it. But my last question is some people which I'm sure if they go look you up they're going to kind of see your content, and a lot of agents. Actually last night I had an agent text me and say they just said they said May West, that's all they said. And I said what?
Speaker 1:about her. There she kills it.
Speaker 2:And then this agent goes. I just literally see her everywhere and I've never met her and I go. That's what social media will do. It'll get you into rooms that you'll never get into and people will get to know you, like you and trust you before they ever even meet you. And then she goes. I need to do social media, um, before they ever even meet you. And then she goes. I need to do social media, but she's like I hate being on camera and I don't like when people watch me on video.
Speaker 1:And I said it'd be tough to get your show and also I hate the sound of my voice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Everything Right and I, I almost I'm to the point where I'm just like well, maybe social media isn't for you Like and then so. But anyways, I have a lot of people that are like I just like, you like, you're like I don't feel like I can do the videos that Will does or Steven does or whatever. But a lot of people are thinking like how is he doing burger videos and how is that helping your business? Can you just answer that? Connect those dots, yeah.
Speaker 1:So basically, what I look at is like it's a big cast net, right? So I throw out this big cast net of burger reviews. So I throw out this big cast net of burger reviews and will is the one that kind of taught me this of like doubling down on what's really performing. Because when I first started doing the burger reviews, I just did every now and then, like occasionally, but me and him sat down and look at the analytics and those were by far my best performing videos. But I told him I was like dude, I don't want to be known as the burger guy. And he was like well, I mean, if you, if you want to grow your social media and trust me, Steven, it's going to work for you, because I rather them know me as the burger guy than not knowing me as all at all. And I was like, okay, that makes sense. Well, so what I do is I throw out a big cast net and that's the burger, right.
Speaker 1:And then you know some of the people that aren't really serious about real estate or aren't really wanting to work with me. We'll kind of get out of the cast net or whatever. But as I'm starting to draw it up, people are going to start following me, right, People are going to start looking at my other view, other videos. Then they're going to start following me and then they're like oh man, dude, Steven has a story up, I'm going to go watch a story. Then they're going to watch my story and they're like, oh, the burger guy's a real estate agent, that makes sense, the nine one, eight agent. And then they start watching it, Right, and then over time they'll reach out to me and be like hey, you know what? I'm about to buy a house.
Speaker 1:I want to use that burger guy Cause I know he's a realtor. Perfect example. I just got a call and I'm actually showing this guy houses. Um, this weekend he moved from Dallas, didn't watch my YouTube this, this is really cool Didn't watch my YouTube channel, but was moving from Dallas to Tulsa and he's like an HVAC sales guy. He sells like to HVAC companies or something. And so when he moved to Tulsa he was like man, I'm kind of hungry, I'm going to kind of go look at some spots, and you know, the algorithm picks up. And so he watches some of my, my food reviews. So he's like oh, dude this guy's awesome.
Speaker 1:So he's looking at my food reviews and he's like, oh dude, this is, this is great. And so then he found out that I was a real estate agent, right. And so he's like, oh dude, yeah, man, this is awesome. So he went on a sales call and he was watching one of my videos in the lobby and the guy that he was meeting with came out and heard it and he's like hey, are you watching the nine one eight agent? He's like, yeah, I'm watching Nelson Buffeteria. He goes dude, I love that guy, we should go check that place out together.
Speaker 1:He made a sale on that just because he had a relationship with him. So a couple months later, when he was ready to buy a house, which he's ready to buy now, he calls me up and says hey, I need to use you because you helped me close a sale. That's awesome. And so that's how it kind of worked, is? He originally started watching because of my restaurant reviews, liked my stuff, followed me, started understanding that I'm actually a real estate agent that's why I do full time. And he's like dude, I want to use that guy because I want to be his friend that's great.
Speaker 2:So that's great. You couldn't have explained it better, and I think that that's the mentality that people in our business is to get out. It's like I'm going to shoot a video and I'm just going to get a bunch of leads and it doesn't really work like that, alfredo.
Speaker 3:Anything else, no, that's all I got. This is steven hester, and he's the real deal yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2:There you go.