Episode 70: $60K in Debt: When the “Proven Strategy” Fails (And What Actually Works Instead)

What happens when you follow the “proven strategy”… and it completely fails?

In this episode Jennifer sits down with Sarah Hubbard, founder of The Intentional Network for a powerful conversation about networking, resilience, and building a business rooted in real relationships.

Sarah shares the moment she found herself $60,000 in debt after following her company’s one and only growth strategy, direct mail, only to realize it wasn’t working. That experience became a turning point, leading her to rethink everything about how business is built.

This episode is a must-listen for entrepreneurs who are tired of transactional marketing and ready to grow through meaningful connection.

• Why “proven strategies” don’t always work — and how failure can lead to better alignment
• Why trust is eroding online and why connection matters more than ever (especially in the AI era)
• How introverts can actually become some of the most effective networkers
• The difference between busy networking and intentional networking

Sarah’s mission is simple: help entrepreneurs stop feeling like “just another salesperson” and start building relationships that actually lead to revenue, referrals, and long-term growth.

Meet Our Guest:
Sarah Hubbard is the founder of The Intentional Network and author of The Intentional Networker. She created the MAPP Framework to help business owners network with clarity, confidence, and purpose — without being pushy or salesy. LinkedIn Facebook:
Resources Mentioned:
The Intentional Networker — Sarah Hubbard
AI Networking Prompts: https://sarahhubbard.myflodesk.com/aipromptsitn

Meet Your Host:
Jennifer Kok is a Profit & Growth Advisor and founder of Next Wave.

Meet Your Host:

Jennifer Kok, Profit and Growth advisor for service-based women entrepreneurs. Women Entrepreneurs hire me to scale and grow their businesses profitably without burnout. I bring financial clarity, strategic focus and structure to the decision-making process. 

Because the truth is, business owners make decisions all day long, but the ones that really matter are often the hardest ones. Should I hire? Raise my prices? Invest in marketing? Let go of a draining client? Expand, or simplify?

My clients, on average, see anywhere between $1k-$4k increase in net income each month without hustle, overwhelm, and burnout.
Learn More about my Programs.

Get your copy of Make Waves: How Women Entrepreneurs Stop Reacting. Start Profiting and Build a Business That Lasts. 

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Transcript

Sarah Hubbard (00:00.503)

Jennifer Kok (00:01.112)

Hi, Sarah, welcome to the show today. I'm so excited to talk with you.

Sarah Hubbard (00:05.331)

Jennifer, I'm so honored to be here. Thank you so much for having me.

Jennifer Kok (00:08.878)

So Sarah, you have a very fun, interesting background. And of course, I always like to ask the question, you know, how did you get started doing what you're doing and tell us a little bit about what you're doing?

Sarah Hubbard (00:19.629)

Yeah, so my journey of how I ended up here in the residential mortgage financing space is probably how most people come into the mortgage financing space. It was not anything that we anticipated we would do, but I was an athlete all the way through college and thought I was gonna be a physical therapist. This is what I wanted to do. They helped me so much through my journey. And when I went to go apply for a doctorate program, my 3.9 GPA was not high enough at that point in time. And I was like, gosh, what am I supposed to do here?

Jennifer Kok (00:46.142)

my.

Sarah Hubbard (00:49.419)

I came out to Colorado for my cousin's high school graduation, met my now owners of my company and they were like, you should come work for our mortgage company. And I just laughed in their faces. I'm like, I don't know anything about mortgages. Are you people what? They're like, you're here, you're on vacation, interview, let's just go for it. And so I did. They hired me pretty much on the spot. And I was at this point in life where I was like, I might go back to New Jersey where I'm from. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do. And so I just jumped in both feet.

and learned everything that I could. I moved out to Colorado, didn't know a whole lot of people except for my aunt and uncle that lived here and just went all in on the mortgage business. And so I did the backend, what we call as loan processing for five years. Then the ownership team came to me and said, hey Sarah, we think you should do sales. And I was like, why? I'm making great money. Why do I want to serve that? They're like, you could make even more money. We think you'd just be really great at it. So I did. And that was a huge learning.

I am the only female originator at my company. And so I watched all of these guys basically send direct mailers only to get leads in. It's the only thing I knew at that point in time. And so I went along with it. And four months in and $60,000 on credit cards later, I had no business to show for it and I was drowning. Emotionally and physically, it was terrible.

Jennifer Kok (02:09.482)

my gosh, okay, so, wow. Yeah, I am just like, first of all, physical therapy to mortgages. I'm just like, okay, is that right brain, left brain? I guess they're both still the left brain. I don't know, but what an incredible pivot. And you just.

Sarah Hubbard (02:20.963)

you

Jennifer Kok (02:26.262)

Like most people, I've known people that have applied to PA school three, four times. I've known people that have applied to different kinds of things three, four times. They just keep going because they can't give themselves permission to say, you know what, maybe this isn't the way I'm supposed to go. And that's really, was courageous of you or were you just kind of like, okay, whatever, I'll just try it. Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (02:48.867)

No, it took courage for sure. I left, know, New Jersey is where I was raised. I grew up on the beach. My entire family, most of them are on the East coast. Some of them are out here in Colorado now. My friends were all out there. And when I first brought it up to my family, they were like, oh, we could see it. And my friends were like, we think you should go for it. Like there's not a whole lot here. Like they were all very supportive. Yeah, right.

Jennifer Kok (03:11.02)

Wow. Can I hang out with your people? Because I feel like most parents' reaction would be like, wait, what? You need to keep trying this physical therapy. You've worked so hard for it.

Sarah Hubbard (03:18.659)

it

Sarah Hubbard (03:22.947)

And I did, I had volunteered like 120 hours outside of working in the field full of time. It was kind of a, it was a kick to the ego for sure, but it was also like, what am I supposed to do here? Like I'm in my mid 20s, I want to be able to be doing stuff for myself and this may be the opportunity. And if it didn't work, I could always go back home. It's really the mentality that I was telling myself at that time. But yeah, that's, it's...

It's different form. It's funny, I ask myself that all the time because I love helping people. And this mortgage financing side is a form of helping people in a very different way. But I bring a lot of what I like compassion and caring and more than just what's your name? What's your credit score? What's this? What's that? It's like, tell me more about why we want to do this. Let's make sure that this actually works. And I probably talk myself out of more business than most because sometimes it's just not the right fit.

Jennifer Kok (04:00.919)

Sure.

Sarah Hubbard (04:20.065)

and I want to make sure that they're making the right decision.

Jennifer Kok (04:22.733)

Wow. OK, so you jump in, you learn a lot, you are given this opportunity to grow your career, and you followed the typical path of, you the blueprint of this is what we do to grow a mortgage business, which sounds like it was a ton of direct mail, just a lot of ads.

Sarah Hubbard (04:38.939)

it was only direct mail only, granted picking areas that we would go in for certain area median income limits and appreciation values. So it's not just like a spray and pray and hope for the best. But a lot of the gentlemen that I work with had been doing this for 15 plus years. And so they had very established databases on top of this consistent flow of sending flyers.

but it's all refinance based and it's all interest rates based. And so when people were calling me, they're like, what's the rate? And I'm like, what's your name? Who are you? I don't know what the rate is. The rate could be a lot of things if you would like it to be. And I just, you know, on top of not functioning super well under debt, I was just doing what they told me to do. You got to spend money to make money. Well, I did that. And it was horrific for me as a person.

Jennifer Kok (05:09.357)

Yeah

Jennifer Kok (05:15.521)

Ha ha ha.

Jennifer Kok (05:26.621)

Absolutely right and you know what I think what's important to remember here and remind people is that as mortgage lenders you guys are kind of like your own entrepreneur you're just under an umbrella of a company so it is up to you there's nobody paying this for you this is you pouring into your own business so you find yourself on your own in a state that you don't know a lot of people just grinding out this business and you're sixty thousand dollars in debt

That was probably a key moment for you to kind of think, okay, what can I do differently?

Sarah Hubbard (05:58.508)

Yeah, I had gone to a conference that everybody in my office had like, poo-pooed on. They were like, they're all the same. They're just going to try to sell you something. And I'm like, well, I got to do something different. And so I went to this conference alone and they do a lot of selling of coaching. There was definitely some empowerment things of predictions and different things like that. But I remember going up to a very seasoned loan officer who was selling a coaching program. And I just said to her, I kind of explained a little bit of what I just shared with you guys. And I was like, what is

What is the key to success here? And she's like, it's really simple. Do what you say you're going to do. And I was like, what? No, no way. Yeah. I was like, no. And so I came home after that conference and I had a lot of time, but not a huge budget. And so I was like, I'm going to lean into what I like, which is people. And I'm going to try this networking thing. Cause while I was there, I had talked to a lot of other mortgage professionals.

Jennifer Kok (06:33.825)

That's it. How much you charging for that advice? Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (06:56.899)

And they were like, what do mean you don't have referral partners? What do you mean you don't have a network? We've never even heard of this. This is wild. I can't believe this isn't part of your thing. So I had no idea. And I just kind of went in and I was met with a ton of resistance when I first started networking. had joined my local chamber of commerce here. It was like 450 bucks for the year, which was right on point to what I needed for budget wise. I had a lot of my time. And as soon as I introduced myself and said, I do residential mortgage financing, they automatically would put you in a bucket of

You're selfish, you're just like every other lender. You're not special or unique. You're already in this bucket with real estate agents and this and there's hundreds of you out here. You're really, really selfish and you're not here to learn about anybody else. And it was like, and they told me I looked like I was 20. I'm 41 today. But I mean, so that automatically made me inexperienced, even though at the time I had been doing loans for six years. So it was just this weird.

like another like, my gosh, I didn't think it would be this hard to like get to know people. And I did a lot of watching and I did a lot of like pseudo mentorship with people that I saw were getting business from their efforts, or it looked like they were getting business from their efforts. So I would take them to coffee, take them to breakfast, pick their brains. How do you say this? How do you do this? And now we're almost 15 years into my mortgage career and 90 % of my business comes from my network and referral partners.

And yes, I do have some traditional referral partners in my mortgage space, like real estate agents, but I also have a ton of attorneys, CPAs, people that aren't like your typical go-to that you would think. And it has been beautiful. But for me, that's exactly how I wanted to grow my business. Once that started happening and taking life and fruition, I was like, I am way happier doing this.

Jennifer Kok (08:48.683)

You know, there's a big kind of pivot back to this type of business to business, you know, because we got away from it during probably COVID, I guess, pandemic, where we were all stuck at home and we were all stuck doing Zooms and we just got used to staying in our yogas all day and not leaving our homes. And then we really leaned heavy into digital marketing and Google ads and Facebook ads.

Well, 2025 was an interesting period for businesses because they started seeing those efforts not working anymore. And it's because of AI. Nobody trusts what they see anymore. It was so funny just the other night, my husband and I were talking about that, how he sees something that looks like a little bit of news on Facebook or Twitter or whatever he's on. And then he goes and Googles it because he doesn't know what to trust anymore to see if it's real.

Sarah Hubbard (09:38.955)

And yep.

Jennifer Kok (09:39.925)

And half the time, it doesn't show up on Google because it's fabricated in our social platforms. So I'm hearing more and more, especially as we start 26, you when this airs, we're kind of through first quarter, that we have got to get back to the roots of relationships, people, having conversations, meeting for coffee, you know, getting out of our pajamas and going actually and meeting people because that's the only thing anyone's going to trust.

Sarah Hubbard (10:09.557)

It is true and I have realized through this networking journey that there's a lot of people, whether you identify extrovert, introvert, ambivert, whatever your personality style is. If you are in the sales, entrepreneur space, whatever it is, you have to bring the human back to what we do because we are in information overload. can't tell you how many times I talked to a first time home buyer or even a seasoned somebody home buyer that's bought multiple homes and they're like,

Well, I read this thing on Instagram or on TikTok and you're like, well, let me tell you what this really means. This one little thing that this person decided to do excellent marketing on and now everybody thinks it's applicable to them. It's hard. a lot of people are like, AI is going to phase us out. I think it's a beautiful tool. I interweave it into the book that I just wrote as certain prompts to help you prepare to network better.

Jennifer Kok (10:46.05)

Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (11:07.299)

So if you can use it in a variety of ways, but it is also bringing back that personalization like you just said.

Jennifer Kok (11:14.197)

Right, it is a tool. OK, so 90 % of your business comes from referrals. And that was not by accident. That was being intentional. And you talk about being the intentional networker. And you just mentioned a lot of people who are service-based entrepreneurs or solo entrepreneurs can be a little bit on the introverted side.

Sarah Hubbard (11:21.41)

Mm-mm.

Jennifer Kok (11:33.717)

And I think we've got this stereotype of the experience that you experienced where you walk into a room and everyone's just looking to swap business cards and it's just all about, it's very transactional. And that was the old way of networking. I mean, I used to be a part of hard leads groups where you were the only one in your category represented in that group. And every week you had to show up with five leads. And what I found was I was just chasing really crappy leads because people were just bringing their plumber, their neighbor, you know,

anybody they could just to check the box. So take us through a little bit of how do we start to cultivate intentional networking, especially if the idea of walking in that room just, you know, we break out in hives thinking about it.

Sarah Hubbard (12:04.15)

Mm-hmm.

Sarah Hubbard (12:18.647)

Yeah, I will first say that while a lot of introverts, takes them a lot more effort to push their limits here. interviewed quite a few introverted fellow friends and business owners that I know in the area for my book. And they actually are some of the best networkers because their active listening skills are imperative. They're not necessarily super comfortable about talking about themselves.

But if you can go into a situation and give yourself a time limit of, don't know, I'm gonna be here for 45 minutes or an hour, that's a lot better of a chunk than thinking you have to be somewhere for two or three, a little bit more palatable to swallow. And you can go in and have curiosity questions that make somebody talk about themselves first. It takes that pressure off of the introvert entirely. And they are great listeners and

A lot of times know a fair amount of people and are willing to open up their network to help solve a problem for that other person. The downside that I find with introverts is because it is a little bit more of a hurdle for them to be interactive in that conversation or the pattern I saw a lot of, and I didn't dig into this scientifically, was at some point in time, somebody told an introvert that they were terrible at talking, that they had to be perfect, somewhere in their

school, college, whatever, and that has somehow stuck in their brain and they need to think that they have to be like, they can't say, they can't say, you know, hold on, I don't have an answer for that. Or you must maintain eye contact. There has been some sort of event that has stuck with an introvert that has made them feel like they are not good at this. And I want to encourage everybody to say, you can be good at this, but you also need to do it within your limits of what you feel comfortable with as a person.

I could go work a room in two hours and leave and be ready for drinks and dinner like it's going out of style, no problem. The other person, again, time limit. The safe place is my car and I get to go home after this and I get to go recharge. I also encourage a lot of my introverts, don't schedule a whole lot on the day that you know you have an event, a conference, a networking event, but let that day be a little bit lighter so that you can show up a little bit better on the introverted side.

Sarah Hubbard (14:40.771)

as I go off on this tangent on introverts, but in regards to like the 90%, it has taken time. I will tell you that this didn't happen in six months. This happened, the magic happened for me at about year two, two and a half of consistent efforts of me being curious about people, me trying to give people the benefit of the doubt, me getting a lot of crappy leads before I finally started getting some good ones. But a lot of that also came with evolution of me as a business owner as well.

I learned a lot that will go into my framework of how to actually talk about what I wanted and not just make it sound like everybody else. I needed to figure out how to say what I do, attract what I want, and not be afraid to show up as yourself. I think that there's a lot of people out there today that think they need to be a certain way or they should be a certain way as a business owner. And I completely push back on that. And I'm like, the same person that would be attracted to me.

is not going to be attracted to you Jennifer. Maybe. I mean think we have very similar personalities but that's the magic of it though. You want that to shine through. You want to attract the people you want because if you kept attracting the people that are on the opposite side and just drain you, you're going to burn out faster than you know what to do within your business. There's a ton of people out there that want to work with people that are just like themselves and that they trust and you don't have to be anybody else but yourself.

Jennifer Kok (15:45.173)

Right.

Jennifer Kok (16:04.415)

That's such good advice. I think also for an introvert, sometimes when we go into these type of events, they feel salesy. So we put that pressure on ourselves that we have to be these salesy experts. But you said earlier, they often are better because of curiosity questions. Give me a few examples of a curiosity question you could ask somebody at a networking event if you're feeling a little uncomfortable and just want to be an active listener.

Sarah Hubbard (16:31.523)

Great, great job. Great question. Also at the end, I do have some AI prompts to help you give you guys work through some of these questions as well. But I'm a little sensitive to make sure I don't ask somebody and assume that they have a family or anything like that because I have a fertility journey. So I'm a little sensitive to that. And there was a lot of people that like, well, why aren't you married yet? Why don't you have kids yet? And I'm like, whoa. So I always ask about, me if we're like, you know, on the beginning part of the week,

Jennifer Kok (16:39.283)

Awesome.

Sarah Hubbard (17:01.293)

How was your weekend? And let them just tell you about what they did that weekend. I took my kid to the park. I read a book all weekend, whatever it is. And then we'll jump a little bit into the business side. And I'll say, this will air end of Q1. What exciting things do you have planned for this year in your business? And let them share it. And sometimes they have it figured out. Sometimes they don't. But you'll get to the point of what is actually exciting them on their business, or maybe some pain points.

you're struggling with. And a question I always just say, tell me more about that. Like if they, that is gets people to keep continuing or that's super interesting. I'd love to learn more about that. They will continue to talk because people love to talk about themselves, but you need to just get them to share a little bit about. And if we're halfway through the year and it's not appropriate to ask them what you're excited about in 2026, you know, I asked about people that I know a little bit better.

How's it going goal wise? Are you hitting your goals? Are we pivoting a little bit? I'm not afraid to tell you that I pivoted the last three years in the mortgage business because I shot super high, wasn't there, so I had to pivot down. Just anything that you can learn about them, you'll be surprised that most entrepreneurs don't have a lot of hobbies. When I ask people about, you know, what do you do for fun? I've run this exercise in a lot of networking groups that I run and I ask, you know,

tell without introducing yourself and you can't say what you do professionally and you can only say your first name. Tell me something else that you do. And there's people that look at me like, what do you mean? What do I do? I'm a personal injury attorney and I'm like, anything else. Like, do you like to cook? Do you enjoy food? How about beverages, books, like anything? can't, a lot of people just become so hyper-focused on the business aspect of it, which is a really important thing. But

Jennifer Kok (18:37.93)

Ha ha.

Jennifer Kok (18:43.263)

Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (18:56.513)

We are also people outside of this. So if you can find ways to get them to talk a little personal, a little professional about what did you do this weekend? How is everything flowing this quarter for you? Are you hitting your goals? Is there something exciting that you are about to embark in? Who and I are both wanting to speak more this year, right? So that's super exciting. Tell me more. Who do you want to speak for? I have this connection to this event planner over here, this association that could really use help on.

Jennifer Kok (18:58.529)

Right?

Sarah Hubbard (19:23.733)

networking or whatever it is that we're talking about. That all just opens up a conversation to be a little bit less salesy and a little bit more about you professionally and personally.

Jennifer Kok (19:35.626)

You know, that's really creative and I really like that. And how do you handle, well, what do you do? You know, do you coach on having the elevator pitch, you know, the quick I help with get results?

Sarah Hubbard (19:47.812)

I want people to have their elevator pitch as part of my framework. It's the first P, it's called precise messaging. I want you to have that very dialed in. I think the best disruptors is a little humor and a little something that's a little like, I don't want to say off color, but like something that like you wouldn't expect to hear. Like I'll sometimes answer that question. I hustle mortgages for people. People are like, what? And I'm like, I do residential mortgage financing.

but it feels like a lot of hustle all the time, right? And it just, that's my personality though. I'm a little sarcastic and a little humorous, so I don't want you to try to do something that doesn't feel right. Do I think you should just go for your 30 second if somebody asks you what you do? No, but do you need to have it kind of dialed in into the point that's a little bit of a disruptor? Absolutely.

Jennifer Kok (20:19.275)

Right.

Jennifer Kok (20:38.314)

OK, disruptor, I like that. So tell us about your framework. You mentioned you have, it's called the MAP framework, and it's to help people kind of find their intentional networking, correct?

Sarah Hubbard (20:45.037)

Mm-hmm.

Sarah Hubbard (20:50.027)

in touch with networking and actually get ROI from their efforts. It's the thing I hear most about where I know I should be doing this or I have been doing this and I haven't seen anything come from it, right? You mentioned leads groups. I have been a part of them, run them, done all the variety of different networking. And I think there is for certain business times and different cycles of your business in the beginning, middle, know, seasoned, do those types of leads group work later on?

Jennifer Kok (20:53.863)

Sarah Hubbard (21:19.551)

Maybe not, because for me, the referral I give out has so much value in it. I don't want to have to be forced to give a referral to somebody because I'm sitting in the same room with them week after week. I want to make sure that that person that's getting that referral is actually quality and will handle that person exactly like I would handle that person if they were to come to me for my service. So not knocking them. They serve a real purpose in a lot of businesses. But the MAT framework is something that when I was

talking about networking to people, I realized that there was steps that I was following. So I had been working with ChatGPT and Claude, and Claude was like, you do realize you have an acronym here. And I was like, no, I didn't, but thank you so much. So I'm like, I'll take it. So math framework, the first is mindset and intention. A is authenticity. I would also, if I could add curiosity here, I would, if it made sense in the framework.

Jennifer Kok (22:01.612)

Because we all love a good acronym.

Sarah Hubbard (22:18.723)

P is precise messaging, and the last P is where everybody really, really struggles where the money is to be made, but it's purposeful follow through. So the M, mindset and intention. These are all words that we hear all the time on all of our socials. So they're not like these ultra creative words, but when you talk about mindset and intention, you need to be dialed into where you are as a professional that day at that season of life.

and be okay with it, whether it's great, you were just late coming to this meeting, so you're coming in like your hair's on fire, whatever it is, you have to honor where your mindset is, and you also have to go in with a goal. There's so many people that just show up, and they're like, well, I'm here, I made it. Even if it's to a coffee, I don't know what we're doing here, but we're here. You need to have a little preparation before you walk into the door. So the mindset is, where are you, what's going on? Take a few minutes in your car, take a beat just to make sure you can honor where that is.

And the intention piece of it is a little twofold. So if you're going to a larger networking event or you're going to a conference or something that's gonna have a lot of people, if there's a way for you to get your hot little hands on a like a headshot list or vendors or all of that, the prompt that I have in my book and that I will put in the show notes after this, you can throw that in and it'll tell you the top 15, five people that you should connect with based off of.

Jennifer Kok (23:44.246)

Wow.

Sarah Hubbard (23:45.816)

what you prompt AI of what you're looking for in your business. So this brings a lot more intentionality and maybe will help some of those introverts not feel like I have to work an entire room to find the two or three gold nuggets that I'm looking for. it's, AI has presented to me people that I wouldn't have necessarily thought were a huge referral partner, but I've now met a person that owns a virtual assistant company down in San Antonio and I have sent him a ton of business because

Jennifer Kok (23:49.654)

Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (24:15.253)

I'm around entrepreneurs all the time that are trying to do it alone and we actually need help in order to work in our zone of genius. And AI told me I should talk to Mark. Mark actually found me at an event and I wanted to talk with him and now here we are. We've got a year later relationship together of sending back and forth. So if you can go in with a little bit of an intention of who you want to talk to because you know what you're wanting to get out of that event. Sometimes it's you need a bookkeeper, an IT person.

Maybe it's you do need sales or a new top referral partner. Or sometimes all of that is looking really beautiful in your business and you just need to meet three new people in your community that you just are expanding out there. Those are all really good goals, but you are the one that has to establish that. And then it also gives you a really great ask for when you are there talking with people. They wanna help, they wanna serve. And so if you can say, hey, I'm looking to connect with so and so, because you may not know them.

that person can bring you over to them if they're in the room or if not, they're not here today, but I'd be happy to make that email introduction for you, right? So it just gives you a little direction of when you're in a room.

Jennifer Kok (25:22.251)

Right. That's really smart and something that I don't hear many people talk about as far as setting a networking goal because I thought it was interesting when we first started talking about your framework how the ROI. And I just heard that from a client yesterday. They joined a larger chamber in our area and felt like they didn't get the ROI out of it.

But you question if they gave it enough time, back to it takes time to cultivate these relationships and to have a give and take. It can't just be a take.

Sarah Hubbard (25:54.052)

Well, I always, chambers are kind of like gym memberships. How much did you attend? How much did you give? That is the basis of a chamber. mean, my whole networking career started in a chamber of commerce. So I'm very intimately aware of how they operate. You know, it may just also not have been the right fit. That community may not have been the right fit for your business. So there's a lot of ways to look at that, but gotta have a mindset and intention. And if there's any way,

Jennifer Kok (26:00.257)

Right?

Jennifer Kok (26:15.223)

Right.

Sarah Hubbard (26:22.787)

I'm a part of a networking group called Provisors. They send out a headshot list of everybody that's going to be at that meeting the night before. Not every networking group does that, but I can drop that headshot list in and tell me who should I, the top three people I should talk to based off of my goals of hitting this much in revenue or, you know, I want to speak on more stages, whatever it is that you're looking to do, but you have to be clear about it to get a little bit better direction.

Jennifer Kok (26:43.468)

Right.

Jennifer Kok (26:46.775)

That's awesome. Okay, so then the A is about authenticity and curiosity, if we could add curiosity to the A.

Sarah Hubbard (26:51.479)

Yes. Yeah, so authenticity, I share this story in my book and I'll share this with you. I have a fertility journey and I had multiple losses. have a three year old son now and he came into this world through IVF. But during that whole journey, I'm aware of my heart on my sleeve kind of chick. I know a lot of people are not, but I showed up through all my networking efforts during that. And it wasn't like I was a Debbie Downer. I wasn't sitting there in the corner being like, this is the worst thing ever.

Somebody would ask and be like, it's a rough day today. It is, it's not great. I'm feeling pretty crappy right now. We're here. You know, I'm letting everybody else kind of lift me up a little bit. You have to share a little bit of yourself. If sharing your whole story is great and you're comfortable doing that, awesome. If sharing just this much about yourself in a true authentic form aligns with you, I encourage you to please do that because that's what's going to attract your people.

That's what's going to attract what you want. And the word is getting thrown around all over the place with AI right now and authenticity, but just be yourself and don't be afraid to let it shine because all of us have magic in us. Introvert, extrovert doesn't matter, but if nobody knows that it's there, nobody knows how to connect with you outside of a business level and you have to make it a little personal. Just even if it's a smidge for those of you that aren't seeing what I'm doing with my hands.

a smidge personal, you have to be able to share that. And sometimes that takes a few times. I'm not saying you have to let it all fly on the first meet. But with my IVF story, I had a really complicated delivery, pregnancy, the whole thing. I had meals at my door for 42 nights from my community because of just being honest about where I was personally and professionally in life. From other mortgage lenders, from real estate agents that weren't even my referral partners yet.

So there's a lot of magic that can happen when you just let the little bit of who you are. And the curiosity piece, we talked about this a little bit before, you have to be curious about other people. We all have stories and journeys. There's a ton to be learned from business owners that are seasoned, that are just starting on their journey and somewhere in between. And there's a lot of times they have tried something that didn't work for their business, but you're thinking about trying it for your business and you want to avoid all of the pitfalls.

Jennifer Kok (28:57.634)

Right.

Sarah Hubbard (29:14.797)

so that you don't have to do it. But you can't do that if you're not curious about somebody else. And you can't learn that.

Jennifer Kok (29:19.615)

Love it. Okay, and then that takes us to precise messaging, which we kind of touched on, and that's a little bit of this elevator pitch and being so crystal clear on who you serve and what you do.

Sarah Hubbard (29:24.909)

Mm-hmm.

Sarah Hubbard (29:29.985)

Yep, I would just also just say that there's a prompt that is in the show notes here. Leave out the word anybody. You have to be very specific and you have to pretend you're talking to a 10 year old. There was a point in time where I think people use really like jargon words that I would use in my industry because they thought it made them sound really credible. It just takes 10 times longer for somebody to understand what you do. So that is not I don't think that's a badge of honor in my personal opinion.

it's just gonna take me longer. when I hear people stand up and say, I'm looking for anybody who wants to buy a house, that doesn't give me something tangible to grab onto and say, hey, you need an introduction to Jennifer or hey, you need an introduction to so and so. And people are like, well, I can do a lot of things. Your business all has cycles. So talk about it with the cycles that you want to attract in your business at that point in time.

Jennifer Kok (30:23.223)

Yeah, and that's something I talk a lot with my clients. And there's a lot of fear around that because they feel like they're alienating people. And it feels counterintuitive if I don't say I can work for everybody. So my favorite line is, be everybody's cup of tea, be someone's shot of whiskey. Because that gets remembered. And then that takes us to our last P, which is purposeful.

Sarah Hubbard (30:38.047)

Yes. Yep.

Sarah Hubbard (30:43.597)

Purposeful follow through. So this is where everybody drops the ball and doesn't see ROI in their networking efforts. You can't meet somebody once, have a great conversation, add them to your automated email list that goes out once a month, once a quarter, whatever it may be, and then expect business to come from that. It's never gonna happen. There might be like one luck that like pops out where it just happened to line up just beautifully.

Jennifer Kok (30:45.197)

I love it, yes.

Jennifer Kok (30:50.701)

Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (31:10.755)

you have to continue to pour into the people that you want into your network. If they can fuel your business and you want them as a referral partner and you match their energy, you're going to reach out to them a little bit more often, maybe every two or three weeks. And a reach out is a phone call, a text, hey, I heard this podcast, you should listen to this. I read this book and thought of you, hey, I saw on social media, you had a softball tournament with your daughter. How was it? You have to add a little bit of that personalization.

But just like you would follow up with prospects in your actual business of closing business, this has to be treated the same exact way. Whether you're reaching out every two weeks, three weeks, I mark my clients or my referral partners A, B, Cs or nothing. A's are, they're really great humans. They align with me. I can get business from them very quickly. I need to be in touch with them often. B's are, you're great. Our businesses sort of sometimes have some overlap, but not often.

I'm going to probably be touching base with you personally every quarter and then C's are, you're lovely. Our businesses are like not aligned whatsoever, but now you're probably going to get something personalized from me every six months. And there's a no designation, which means it's just a no for me. They can still be in your database. They can still get your automated stuff, but they're not going to get any more of you specialized. You're still going to see them in your community. So it's important to keep a good face on, but it's just not going to be any more of what's specific to you. If you aren't nurturing the people,

that you are connecting with, you are going to get forgotten faster than you know what to do with. So I spend an hour of my week and yes, you are following a list and people have always said, how do I add value? I don't understand. Well, in the conversations where you're having with people, if they're readers, if they're listeners, I'm both, but I can't read as much with a three-year-old anymore, so I do a ton of listening now. All of that stuff are really simple ways to start the conversation.

Jennifer Kok (32:43.649)

Yeah.

Sarah Hubbard (33:06.743)

was thinking of you, would love to grab coffee, send me some dates at work, or let's go grab a drink. It doesn't have to be overly complicated. It can be very simple. But if you are not staying in with these people, the ROI will take far longer to come into fruition than anything else.

Jennifer Kok (33:23.659)

And I like your system. You need a system around it, because you're going to forget them as well. And I like your ABC system and just trying to create some type of mindfulness or put it in your CRM system or whatever to remind you to do that. So we talk a lot about when it comes to intentional networking that we are adding value to them. We're reaching out. We're sharing podcasts that we heard or books. We make it all about them.

Sarah Hubbard (33:38.327)

Mm-hmm.

Jennifer Kok (33:51.405)

Is it ever appropriate to send somebody an email and say, hey, I'm looking for three new first time home buyers that need a mortgage? Do you know anybody? Where do you fit that into your program?

Sarah Hubbard (34:03.535)

That's a great question. And I was actually just asked something similar to this on another podcast that I was on. I think it's appropriate. And the reason why is because we are all here to close business. Why you even showed up to said networking event was to expand your network to get business. That is what we are here to do as professionals. Otherwise it's considered social hour, which again is lovely, but that is not what we're here to do. So you're

The wants to know how they can help serve you and if you can get very specific in the ask and that's how you want to do it is through an email. By all means, go for it baby and make it just sound like yourself is the only thing I'm gonna encourage you to do. I talked to a lot of real estate agents and they see a lot more buyers than I do and on a very regular basis in regards to our worlds of what we do. But if they think that I'm...

fine on my pipeline or I'm not looking for any new clients because I haven't been clear enough about that ask. There's no better way to do it than what you just said.

Jennifer Kok (35:06.478)

Awesome. Well, you have been a wealth of information, and I feel like every introvert out here, out there listening is like, OK, I can do this. I can do this. So tell, you can do this. And it's more important than ever. think, like we've talked about, now is the time to get relational and go back to doing business the good old fashioned way. So tell us about your book.

Sarah Hubbard (35:16.203)

You can, I promise!

Sarah Hubbard (35:30.561)

Yes. So the book is called The Intentional Networker. I also run a networking group here in Denver area and I started to add a Zoom aspect to it because I felt like there was a gap between when you're just starting in business to when you actually have traction and seasoning in your business that a lot of people start taking from you versus you putting yourself into rooms that challenge you and to continue to grow. You need to be able to continue to grow if you want to have, you know, bigger ROI, whatever it is that your goals are.

So the intentional networker came to fruition because I was talking to people, have this framework, and it also simplifies down business card etiquette. And how do I say these? I'm a big person of tangileness. Think of it as your networking buddy is in your back pocket is what this book is about. It's punchy, it's informative, it's exactly how I talk, it's real, and it's just tips and tricks that you can take with you to improve your marketing aspect of networking.

is really what my goal was with this. And there has to be intentionality right now. We can't be all the things for everybody, even though we really maybe want to be, you cannot do all of that. And this helps you get a little bit more dialed in with how to do that for where you are in that season of business. And the intentional network is just about, it's industry agnostic. I have a huge abundant mindset. I think if we get like-minded people in the room,

that are 10 years in the business, 15 years in the business, and five years into business. There's a whole lot to be learned from all of us on all angles together. So I bring in speakers that add value to people that can implement things personally and professionally right away. There's an open networking component of it. We don't track leads. We don't do any of that stuff. But we have to collaborate together in order to get to the next level in our businesses.

Jennifer Kok (37:19.625)

I love how you're putting a lot of clarity for us around networking. So I will be sure to share all the links to your AI prompt that you're giving us, which I appreciate that so much, the book, and how to get a hold of Sarah so that you can learn more about being an intentional networker. Thank you so much for sharing your expertise and your journey and what you've learned along the way. There's a good saying out there that when we make our mess our message, good things happen.

Sarah Hubbard (37:46.179)

I love that. That's a great saying. But thank you so much for having me. It was a real pleasure.