Ep. 11 - Personal Brand Secrets: Why Being "Vanilla" Fails

Being “good at real estate” is not enough anymore. If you feel the market shifting, leads getting harder, and marketing getting louder, this conversation is the reset. We hang out with Marcus Green, a long-time real estate entrepreneur and leader, and get practical about what actually wins: grit that outlasts the slow seasons, and a personal brand that makes the right people choose you on purpose.

We dig into why the old playbook of being neutral and “appealing to everyone” now makes you invisible. Marcus breaks down personal brand as identity, not a logo, and how your values, consistency, and the way you make people feel become the real marketing strategy. We also talk about learning with intention: how to stop drowning in books, podcasts, and tools and instead learn the next thing that helps you take action. That includes a real look at AI in real estate, why an AI-supported agent will have an edge, and how leaders should be investing time to understand what is coming.

Then we zoom out to the Whole Enchilada idea: building a life where faith, family, leadership, adventure, and giving all move forward together, without settling for “balanced” mediocrity. We talk loyalty, vulnerability, giving yourself grace, and why giving back often starts with time and mentorship, not just money.

If this hits home, subscribe to the show, share it with one agent or business owner who needs it, and leave a review so more people can find these conversations.

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to the Real Mike Dooley Podcast. I'm Mike Dooley, nationally recognized broker, bringing you real conversations, real strategies, and real insights into today's real estate market. Hey, hey, everyone. We are here, the real Mike Dooley, and we have the famous, and I don't know what state to say you're from, but I know native of Utah, but I know now we're dabbling in Arizona. You're all over the world, but uh I guess you claim Utah, right?

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Yeah, I do claim Utah, and I'm in Utah right now. It's uh it's early February, and I'm disappointed to say there's snow snow as I'm looking out my window. We've had a a not a good, not a good snow year, but Utah's a great place. We love it.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

Well, I I've heard a lot of those places are are having to dump in manufactured snow right now in some of the the lifts and ski places and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

Yeah, it's a bit it's been one of our lowest winters on record, I think, but but it is what it is.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

Well, it's funny. The rest of the United States, like even us, we got dumped more than we've ever had. It was like two feet or something. It took like kids were out of school for four days. It was like Monday through Thursday, and my daughter's like negotiating and saying, Why even go back Friday, you know? And I had to tell them, well, you're gonna get that day back no matter what. So you want it on do you want your summer to go shorter? I was like, Do you want it on the back end? They're like, ah, that makes sense, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Got good dad teaching movement there, give them some perspective. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 1:34

Well, we're we're hanging out, and I'm gonna give, if you would, I'll just give a few things from my perspective, but I love you let the audience know. And then you know what? I just love hanging, spending time, and I feel like we've got to know each other more and more over the last couple years. But when I was reading through my notes, 20 years, that's pretty amazing. Uh, I know there's a stat out there that says the average agent, only 13% of them make it three years. So you you beat that record.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

By a long shot. Um I don't know. I don't know if it's a good thing or bad thing, but we've we've been in this business for a long time.

Entrepreneurship Family And Mission

SPEAKER_00 2:07

I just hit my 10th year, which is wild and crazy, you know, and it's it was funny. Uh my wife was talking to me about it. You know, she's been in eight years now. This has been the longest place I've ever been at as a career. When I worked at Kraft Foods, I had seven jobs in seven years, and I lived in five places. So it's like I was getting new jobs all the time, but I was with the same company. And that's what I love about real estate, and I know we're gonna get into it. You have right now mortgage, title, VA company. Uh, I know I was thinking about, I was trying to get it together at GGG. I don't know if you call it like that, but the giving organization, I was like, there might be a cool way. What is it, Four Sixes Ranch? Oh, yeah, when you block Yellowstone, we can figure out a way for your hat or for your brand because I know we're gonna talk about personal brand today. Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. You want to let the audience know a little bit, um, just kind of 30,000 foot, you know, to let them know who we're listening to, who we're learning from today. And it's such a blessing. Thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

Oh, it's uh certainly my pleasure. And Mike, I've I've every interaction I've had with you, I've just been so impressed with who you are, what you're about. And I I know we're talking about branding today, and and just like without you even like portraying a brand, I mean, just who you are as is uh as a man and a human being is pretty incredible. So I'm just I'm honored to be here. Thank you for having me. Just uh my my least favorite thing to talk about is myself. So I'll give the quick snapshot of it. The the best part of me is is my wife and four daughters. I'm uh a girl, a very proud girl dad. Uh my oldest uh is 21 and my youngest is 13. Uh everything I do is for them. Um and then I am a serial entrepreneur, even though I've been in real estate and a realtor now for 20, this will be my 23rd or 24th year, I think, in the business. Um, I just I love building businesses. Uh my personal mission vision statement, uh, without going through the whole thing, kind of has three buckets to it. One is I call myself a bridge builder. The thing I really find a lot of passion in is helping people see their ideal future self, get clarity on where they're at now, and helping them build a bridge between the two. The second bucket is I'm an empire builder. I love building companies for the opportunities it provides, both to my family, my employees, my partners, and the community. And then the third bucket in my personal mission vision statement is I'm an adventurer. I love adventure. I don't have the next adventure of some sort on the books. I go a little, a little crazy. So those kind of three buckets wrap me up as who I am as a person.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

So cool. And I know how giving you are. I know you're actually going to be uh speaking uh in March uh in Kansas City, which is pretty cool. St. Louis and Kansas City. So we're excited to have you. So if anyone's listening, this will come out. They'll have to come see you live if they like. I know our last person, no pressure, Cody Gibson, sold out.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

So I know that's gonna happen for you too. Uh Cody's been known to be my opening act, so um which I know you're both in Arizona too, right? So yeah, yeah, no kids. Is it competing in market centers? Uh yeah. So I'm I I actually he uh purchased the market center that my team operates out of. So even though I own uh several uh KW franchises, the ones I I don't own any any in Arizona. So my team operates out of uh Cody Gibson's office in Arizona. He's he's been a great partner and and become a great friend for me. We've not only inside of business, but outside of business. He's just a good man.

SPEAKER_00 5:24

That's great. I know he's an adventurer and do all that stuff and and similarities there too. I know and Kristen Cole's in there too. You guys have some really great, great people in there. And I think I saw him on social media your oldest daughter got married, right?

SPEAKER_01 5:37

Yeah, yeah. Abby uh got married a couple weeks ago, and uh, so I've I now a dad of a son by proxy, a son-in-law. That's one way to get it, I guess, right? Yeah, no, it's been it's been so fun, so proud of them, super excited. It's it's just like a fun stage of life to see my kids evolving. Uh, my second daughter last night, uh uh uh she got um a letter from our church assigning her to a service mission, and she's going to they don't they don't know where they're going when they say they want to go. And she found out last night she's going to South Carolina for the next 18 months on a on a service mission for a church. So it's like this just fun, exciting time of life to see my kids kind of making these choices of what they want to do and how they want to spend their time, which is awesome.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

I think she got the lottery, that's a pretty good spot. I know there's other places that obviously you're doing it to give and to serve, but you know, it wouldn't be uh if you're if there's other places, you know, and maybe she's Alaska in certain parts of the year, she's like, you know what? South Carolina is a great place, and that's ever growing. And you have to hook her up with the Peter now there and there.

SPEAKER_01 6:45

So yeah, no, that'd be that'd be awesome. I'm I'm excited for her. I'll be greedy.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

That's one thing we don't talk about enough, and I love about our community, uh, just you know, Kella Williams, and a lot of people are listening and listening from a lot of different brokerages and a lot of different business people. But one thing that I think about just real estate and Kelly Williams or just in general, I'm always like, oh, I know a person. You know, you get great people throughout the country uh that you spend time with uh all the time. Now I'm a two-daughter uh dad, and I don't know about you. When I first had my first daughter, I was sports my whole life. You know, my brother and I did sports my whole life, so we're always around it, you know, watching it, playing it, whatever it is. So when I kind of had a first, they had the baby reveal, you know, where you do the blue and the pink thing. There's a second of me that I was like, I was kind of a little bit bummed. I was like, well, there goes my call it sports life, if you will, you know. And it's funny, my 13-year-old is a nuts sports fan. She goes to everything with me, raise her back. Yep, we did the College World Series together. We did uh Arkansas played Duke in San Francisco. We went to that together, and that was the I think Elite Eight or something like that. So she's she's a basketball player right now, but today she's gonna have her knee looked at. She had an MRI, she might have an ACL tear or something like that, which is just like, uh, I'm so bummed for her because she's been playing basketball since five years old. But I want to go into that though, adversity, you know, and you think about we're talking about personal brand, but just business, you know, and you talk about you're an empire builder. I think a lot of people, if they were the outside in, I literally was just thinking about this. So this podcast is right where I film, is right next door to a coffee shop. So I was in the parking lot and I was walking to go grab a coffee real quick. I met someone in the parking lot that I know really good. Patrick, great guy. He's in commercial uh insurance. And we trick, I was like, oh, I need to send you some leads, send you some business. And it kind of came together. Then I went inside, I saw Brad, and I was like, oh, hey, he gave me a hug or whatever. Then I was getting a coffee, and the guy right behind me was Josh, who does uh he's an attorney and does all our commercial uh closings. And I was like, Oh, I'm gonna buy you a coffee. And people will see that, and this is where I'm gonna go into, and they'll go, Well, that's luck. You know, and I was like, no, that's that's more than 10 years. I've been in real estate, but I've been in business my whole life, you know? And that's business building, and to your point, um uh empire building. I would ask you too, if you think about that, what things so if someone was gonna start right now, if they're listening and they're brand new, they're in Dubai, I have listeners from Dubai, and I say Dubai, Arkansas. Uh, we have a Paris, Arkansas, and Texas, Arkansas. So I would just say we're all over the world. But people that are listening and they think about you and they see all the success that you have, all the companies and all the things, and they're like, well, that was easy. But you know, obviously, as I know, we know it's 20 years of building going backwards. What's one of the first things that you would do if you're thinking about starting a company or getting into real estate or mortgage or some of the things that you're doing?

Grit And Personal Brand First

SPEAKER_01 9:47

No, I think that's a great question. And it's it's an interesting time, even though I've been doing this for for over 20 years now. Um there it's a different world right now. It is uh a different economy, a different market. Uh, and the way the consumer is showing up uh is different. The needs of the consumer are different, the decision uh making patterns of the consumer are different. So, in a lot of ways, I have I obviously have some advantage because I've got 20 plus years of experience, but in some ways I've got a disadvantage because I have 20 plus years of experience. Now I could bring, I can bring the business skill set with me, but if I'm too bought into how business was done, that can actually work against me. So the the couple of things I would I would really encourage, particularly newer people to get into the business is number one, is you've got to have grit. Uh, this is something I think that uh you you don't just a lot of people say they're tough, but then I ask them, what was the last tough thing you had to go through and how did you handle it? And and frankly, most people they don't handle tough things well, and you have to put yourself in situations to grow grit. Like it's like a bank account. You make deposits into a grit bank account because you've got to be willing. There are parts of this business that are so fun, and there are some parts of this business that you just gotta have to grind it out until it becomes part of who you are or the momentum's there. So I'd say number one is is uh find grit and just be tenacious and consistent with it. Because uh I'll take a tenacious, consistent person over a talented person all day long. Uh, and then the second thing that uh is really relevant right now, which I know you're really focused on, is what is your personal brand? Like who who are you? What do you represent? How do you make people feel? Um, and this actually it it doesn't it doesn't sound like it's um this new incredible idea because we've talked about brand forever. But frankly, when I first got in the business, the what agents got canceled to be is be very neutral, be very vanilla in your marketing so you appeal to everybody. And that does not work today. If you are vanilla, if you are neutral, you will appeal to nobody. Like people will think you're kind, people will will think you're you're good to be around, but they're not going to be committed to who you are and what you provide. So it's better. It used to be, you know, take your branding an inch deep and a mile wide, and now it's take it two, three inches wide and go a mile deep, and just be so clear on who you are, what you're about, and what you live and how you make people feel, and that's where people get attracted to you. People will commit to that, and that's that's the that's the path forward. Grit and excellent branding.

Learn For Doing Not Consuming

SPEAKER_00 12:24

Well, I don't know if you follow Roy Baden or everything they're doing to brand builders, and I love the first time I heard him speak. I I actually paused on there too, and I don't know if you did too, where they were like, okay, Dave Ramsey, he's debt, and he kind of went through like Brene Brown, and he kind of loved, you know, Lewis House, and he kind of talked about all these people and said their one word. And I thought about it for a second, and I was like, well, wait a minute. They own all these other companies and all those other things, but they went, well, you just said they went deep and they had a brand, and their brand could translate to those things, but they were the industry expert on that one thing. And I love that you said that. I think when I first started my career, I was probably like shallow in things, you know. It's like I had all these things, staging company, all these things, but it was like fit making 50 bucks a month or losing money, you know, and it's like, oh, wait a minute. Maybe I slow down and think about it. When you build this personal brand to your point, now you've done that, they're like, oh, I want Marcus Green to be part of my organization because you have this brand, they know what you stand for. Also, when you're making business decisions and partners, and I heard Gary Keller say this one time too. There's not one business that he has, he doesn't have a partner. And I thought about that for a second because a lot of times when I was growing up or starting businesses or habit, it was like, oh no, I'm gonna do it all, but then you're the lid, you know? So for personal brand, how how are you educating yourself? So I think that's good to say, okay, I'm new, I'm listening. Uh, how are you doing that? Is there certain influencers or people that you're following to be able to gain knowledge in that area? Or how are you start studying or learning?

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Yeah, no, I thought I love this question. And and I think that that has been become a big part of my identity is to stay curious. Um, and so I am I'm a lifelong learner. I think that's that's my responsibility to my people. You know, there's several within all my companies, there's several hundred people that are counting on me to create the solutions for tomorrow. And if I if I have to create the solutions and the pathway forward for tomorrow, I can't be thinking in today. And so uh a lot of a lot of what I'm doing, and and this has been something I've learned over time, is is when I was younger in my career, um, you know, I'd go meet with uh a Mike Dooley and we'd hit it off, and I'd be impressed with with someone like you and ask you, what books are you reading? What do you follow? What podcasts are you listening to? And then I'd immediately go read those books and listen to those podcasts. And that served me well for a long time. However, the challenge we live in today is there's uh there's a thousand books that are all great that I could choose from. I don't have the I read a lot, but I don't have the ability to read a thousand books. There's 10,000 podcasts that probably release great episodes today. I don't have time to go listen to all the podcasts. So uh one of my favorite principles of the six personal perspectives is learning for doing sake, not learning for learning's sake. And so one of the things that I think really uh will accelerate person forward is taking a step back and getting to know thyself first and saying, okay, what where do what are my strengths? What am I already good at? And and where do I want to go? And for me to get there, what is the next thing I must learn? What is the next thing I need to understand so that it will help me do something differently? As I do something differently, it will become a habit. When it becomes a habit, it becomes part of who I am. But if you can, if you can ask that question, say, okay, like for example, using a real estate agent's business, they're saying, I've done really good at serving the clients that that naturally come to me, but I'm finding that there's less of those opportunities. I would recognize, like, I need more leads. Okay, why aren't I getting more leads? Is it because I'm not good at lead generation? Or I haven't even I haven't even uh organized my database yet. So I maybe might maybe my next thing I need to learn is how do I organize my database so I can tell a better story? But if I if I if I internally reflect that first and say that's what I need to learn, then I'd go seek the experts of who I'd go to you as my my real estate leader, my team leader, and say, who in the office is is really, really good at managing their database and telling the brand story through the database? I want to buy them coffee. I want to take them to launch. And so for me, that's kind of been the this magic formula that instead of trying to consume everything is I've been really purposeful about trying to consume the right thing. So, like, and this is still true for me, 20 plus years in the business right now is I know that that AI, an AI supported agent in business will win in in the market tomorrow. Uh an agent that does not learn how to capitalize on AI will lose. My responsibility is to understand AI at a higher level than anybody inside my organization. So it gets a lot of my time and energy right now because I'm doing the same thing that that I'm following the same principle that I just articulated that I think other people should follow.

SPEAKER_00 17:14

About how long you think you're spending in AI a day.

SPEAKER_01 17:19

Um right now, um, because I'm uh going on tour uh and speaking a lot, like this is one of the things I'll be talking about in in uh your area coming up shortly. Is I'm right now like three hours of of curious, not not not app not applying AI, but I'm two to three hours of like understanding it, understanding its nuances, pushing its limits, coming back and pushing it against my my filters. Like I I'm a student of that right now. So like my my mornings are allocated to number one is I I study faith, a faith-based principle first. I always start my day that way, and then I move right into this principle of okay, Marcus, what's the next evolution of you? What do you, what do you, what do you, what must you learn to become the version of you that your people deserve?

New Platforms Without The Hype

SPEAKER_00 18:11

I've started this kind of podcast too, talking about people see it's luck, or maybe they're like, oh, they've built this empire, you know. What I just heard, and I I wrote mentally wrote this down. So it's 240 working days or so. Obviously, you know, someone like you is spending time with its important faith, family, and all that stuff, is even three hours a day, 240 hours, you've got to call it a thousand hours or so, you know what I'm saying? A year. So if I today look up and I'm listening to this podcast and I'm spending 20 hours a year in AI, fast forward, you have a thousand hours already on me. You know what I mean? So if you look at a competitive set, just saying, okay, if you want to be a future leader or future person, and this leader is spending a thousand hours, what does it look like? And I heard you say too, you want to be the smartest person in your organization. So when they come to you as a thought leader, they're not like, hey, you know what, Marcus, I love you. You're a great guy, but I'm actually going to go to this other thing. They're no, they're seeing you as a thought leader. And I think that's something else I think about anyone listening to is you are are you considered being a thought leader in there? So you have to invest in yourself. And there's something else that you said that I love those brilliant. Gary Keller, I also heard him say this one time too. Sometimes people will get a whole book and they'll read through it. He does exactly what you're talking about, the six personal perspectives. He'll go through and he'll say, okay, let me look at the beginning. It's page 20, has this one thing that I need to learn? I'll read that chapter, then I'll understand it, then I'll put the book back on the shelf. So I think that's brilliant in that way, too, is saying, okay, how do I, am I learning for the future? Am I learning now? You know, and I think too, he also says this too: progress over perfection. I think I find myself too, and I don't know if you do too, where it's like, oh, I I can't understand this AI. It's not working. But it's like, no, let me just keep breaking it, let me keep trying, let me attempting it. And I know you've been great at this as a personal brand, is prompts. You know, I'm starting to think that too, is just going one of the things, are you as a personal brand? I didn't set you up for this, so sorry if not. Are you looking into Substack any? Is there new, not necessarily Substack, but any of them? Is there new platforms that you're thinking about? So, like right now, if you're playing in Facebook, Instagram, is there other ones that are on the horizon that you're either reading or thinking about?

SPEAKER_01 20:24

Yeah, that that that's a great question. And it's, you know, there's something about being an early adopter of things. And I also I think we all know that person that is so on the tip front of technology and the new thing that they never stick with something long enough to actually let it work because the the world we live in is that cool new thing today is going to be replaced by the cool new thing tomorrow. And so for me, I I'm I'm actually very careful not to get caught in that trap because it's easy to get sucked in. People are hoping you get sucked into that trap. Is for me, I will go back to what problem am I trying to solve? What problem do I need to solve? And then it's not what tool is gonna fix it for me. Number one is I take responsibility, it's my job to fix the problem. And then I have to I have to take inventory. What what skill, what knowledge, what habit, what resource, person, technology do I have available? And so I'm I'm not on the on the forefront of every new thing that's coming out. What I am doing is is saying, what problem am I trying to solve? What tool is most capable for solving that problem with me right now? And then part of my thinking time is is making sure that I've got someone on my board of directors that is on the forefront that is breaking new things and trying new things because they'll come to me and say, Have you tried this? I'm like, I have not. Tell me about it. And then in my mind, what I'm doing, they're telling me about it from like I'm learning about it and they're excited about it. And in my mind, what I'm doing is does that solve this problem better than what I currently have? That is it proven he's saying that it can, but is it proven that it can it can solve this problem? And what I'll do is either discount it or I'll I'll put it on a shelf and say, Okay, I need to watch that to see it because I have a proven track record. I'm gonna let somebody else prove it before I'm gonna apply it to the problem. Because if I go put all my eggs in that basket to try to solve my problem with that, and it's not the right solution, I've actually gone backwards on the real problem I'm trying to solve.

Brand Is Identity Not A Logo

SPEAKER_00 22:26

That's so great. I love that. I had a mentor say no a little bit about a lot. And what I just heard you say is you know the name, you understand it, someone's doing a little bit more research, spending a little more time, and then you'll go deeper when you need to. I think that's brilliant. Something else that I was gonna go back to, something you said that I love. If you think about being a personal brand or an influencer, I challenge people to go, okay, in all my companies and all my businesses. So say someone's just a uh right now, they're a single real estate agent and they're gonna build and build where you're going, where I'm going, is grab your your five favorite clients. So look at your last year or last 24 months. Who was your five favorite clients and why were they your favorite clients? You know, so maybe they had similarities. They had daughters, they liked being outside, you know, and you gravitated to them. And then also, you know, they were a business person and they were buying investment properties and you really honed in and said, I like them. Well, to me, if someone's going, and I don't know if you have a process like this, and I'm thinking about too, for the real Mike Dooley, this show and all that stuff, who would my audience be? So, for instance, you're you're my audience, and I want to learn from it. I want to be, I want to be a great dad like you are. I want to be in faith. I want to be, and people say sometimes faith and business don't go together. And I disagree with that, as in, well, that's not the people necessarily that want to be in business with me or I want to be in business with. There's so many business people in the world, too, right? You can pick your tribe. But I'm thinking about a personal brand, and I'm going, okay, those five clients or those five people that are following those five ages that started with me. Well, what do I like about and want to do? And then that can help curate, create my personal brand. So my show, Andy Peters, was one of the guests, too. And I think you think about people, you know, what a great dad, what a great husband. He's doing some of those things. And I would, you know, you put those things in the category, you're in that category, and I kind of go through it's like, okay, what do I want my audience to have sometimes? Is some of that is a great business person, but you know what? It's not first. You might not, you might I'll go empire builder, but that's along with everything you just said. Dad, adventure, it all comes together. You get all of it or none of it, right? Yeah. That's kind of the beauty. I think I didn't have a question in there, more just a statement, but I would say if you're thinking about your personal brand, and you you talked about this too, and I know Craig Zuber and Jordan Fried and smart people have talked about the 10-year letter. And I also, when you were talking, I was like, oh, whenever I meet someone new, I say, hey, you don't have to go through the crazy process of this necessarily, which I think is awesome and great. You should. But if you were going to give a 30-second version, I tell people, where do you want to be in 10 years? Where do you want to be in 15? And then what you said earlier is work backwards. Yeah. And you're going to work on that one skill. So one of the things is I plan to be in Arkansas and Florida. You're in Arizona and Utah. Well, I got my Florida license. Well, that was one easy step I can do. I didn't go straight to buying a Florida beach house. Yeah. That will be in a 10-year plan, but I took one step, one chunk, and I chunked it down.

SPEAKER_01 25:20

Yeah. I and I think the I think the question I would ask with that is where do you want to be in 10 years? And and who who do you want to be in 10 years? Because where ties, I think the the asking it from a where standpoint, it ties it either geographically or measurable in a certain net income or or or something along those lines. Um but I think the evolution and when we talk about personal brand, it's like, well, well, who are you? Who who are you now? And who is it you want to become and why? Why do you want to become that? I think you I love that you keep saying personal brand instead of brand just branding, because the the the beauty of that is, you know, if if someone looked at my my uh my world uh organizational chart, not not the organizational chart for each of my companies, but just all my companies, it it shows the logo for each one of those companies. Unity home loans, amicus titled, killer Williams Success, Keller Williams St. George. Like you could see the logos for all those. And it would be easy for someone to say, oh, that's the branding for that organization, but it's not. It's just a logo. Like, like I could change the color, I could change the name of the company, but it doesn't change the root of it all is who I am. The the people that work inside those organizations work there not because the logo looks cool or there's a you know a cool brand statement on the wall. What it really works down to is do they see a pathway to a better version of them because of the work that I'm trying to do and promoting them forward? If I'm not the right leader and partner for them, then they should not be part of my organization. If they can see a pathway to a better version of them, then it makes sense. And I I take that very personal, personal branding, down past each company individually, down past each company's PL individually, is back to down to who am I, what do I stand for, and what is my responsibility for the people in my world?

SPEAKER_00 27:12

Uh it's not like I said, it's not a logo, it's not a name. You're part of the fabric. So it's actually, and I think it's Roy Vaden that also says this. He says, You serve your best served the person you once were. So 20 years ago, and I I love that you started that in the beginning, as I mean, you've been in a lot of different meetings and different things. We find ourselves now, as our organization is so big, we're thinking about legal, we're thinking about compliance, we're thinking about all these things where maybe in the beginning we just went. We broke stuff, you know. Now we're still breaking stuff, but we're a little bit slower. We're like, we're almost instead of like crashing the ice, we're like, okay, let me chip away a little bit of the ice in certain areas. I would say though, if you think about it, that's how you build an empire, because empires have fallen, haven't they? You know, by the wrong leaders or the wrong people having that fabric. And I wanted to ask you, you know, and kind of going to personal brand, I want to know too a little bit about your podcast. So if people want to follow your podcast and they love everything you're saying, where do they go ahead and find that?

The Whole Enchilada Life Framework

SPEAKER_01 28:14

Yeah, uh, so my podcast is The Whole Enchilada. Um, and the whole premise behind the whole enchilada is this is um I saw early in my career some of the people that I aspired to be like from a business perspective, um, as I dug into a little bit, other parts of their lives were in shambles. Um, and as I kind of looked at that, I was like, well, do I have to choose between being a phenomenal business person and a great dad? Do I have to choose between those two things? Do I have to choose between being an adventurer and and a great employee or a great leader? And and I think the world is kind of either set up to say you have to choose, or they they have this idea of like living a balanced life. And I'm using their quotations on that because they somehow this idea of a balanced life has become like it's okay to be mediocre across everything. Like you can just a balanced life means you're pretty good at this and you're pretty good at this and you're pretty good at this, but you're balanced. And I don't like that either. So the idea behind the whole enchilada is this is that I do actually believe, and it's a journey I'm on. Then in this is I'm inviting people to go on that journey with me. It's not me saying, I've done this, look at me, uh, you should do what I've done. This is I'm on this journey of how do I how do I live my most elevated life in uh as a Christian? How do I live my most elevated life as a dad? How do I live my most elevated life as a leader? How do I live my most elevated life as an as an adventurer? Like if I'm purposeful about each of those categories and I and I can envision who I want to become in each of those areas, then it is a matter of working backwards to say, how do I how do I utilize my time to move all these forward? And which ones are out of and watching which ones are out of balance, uh using the principle from the one thing of this, this counterbalancing act. If one of them comes out of whack, like say that I'm I'm pulling off of my faith, I'm not spending enough uh time in in prayer or reading or or those things. If I feel like that's out of whack, then I need to give that more time and energy to get it back up in part. It's this game of I'm never everything's never in perfect balance. But how am I constantly moving all these things that are important to me forward and living, I've only got one life to live. That's what that's one thing that every single person on this planet has in common is we have one life to live. We don't know the we know the start date, we don't know the end date. Um, but it's our I I feel like it's our God-given responsibility to maximize this one life that we have to have to live. Um, and that's the whole premise buying the whole engelata. So I'm inviting people that that want to go on that journey with me to to plug into the community.

SPEAKER_00 30:52

And that's on Apple, Spotify, website, everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 30:55

Yep, you can you can uh find on on every platform. You could also go to theholengelata.biz and join the network. Um, the network gets my weekly email called the green sauce, which where I'm sharing like what am I studying this week and why is it important and how am I applying it? Um, and so if you're interested in joining the network, go to the whole enchilada.biz and uh you can follow me on uh best place to follow me is Instagram uh at MarcusGre Twe for the whole enchilada.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

That's awesome. Well, I was thinking about when you're talking to, and I feel like this the people can't maybe see my hands, but I'm kind of doing a crane operator. I've never uh driven a crane, I need to, but I feel like our lives are kind of like that too, where it's like sometimes it's just I got the joystick forward, I'm spinning in a circle. Yeah. So sometimes it's like to your point, oh, wait a minute. And I don't know if you have this too. Sometimes I'm spending more time with my 13-year-old than my nine-year-old. I even have that piece in a balance saying, okay, sometimes between my wife and I, Cody, our schedules, she might be with a nine-year-old more, I might be with a 13-year-old more. You're kind of balancing going, okay, well, let me let me let me change that balance a little bit and just get interested in the things that they're doing. And it's so funny, just um, I don't know if you see this, just from our kids and our people. Uh, I actually had a call with Gene Rivers today. Brilliant, smart guy. I, you know, same same category. I feel like Andy and you, he's kind of figured out he loves his kids and talks about it, you know, and he has this whole enchilada. He he needs to be on the podcast if he hasn't been. And he kind of talked about this and he said this to me. He said, Yeah, Mike, you know, you guys are building a great brand and you're doing all these things and doing great things. But he said, Hey, along the journey, who's been with you and your organizations for 10 years? Like who's been on your journey? And I paused for a second too. And he just said, if you think about it, sometimes you are you're you're moving all around to help different people and you're you're you're a giving person. You're like, okay, I'm gonna help this person. But then people that have been with you 10 years and have had that loyalty and stuff, what does it look like? So I actually asked my MCA, and I think we can probably pull it out of our reports, but I said, Hey, can I get a report today that shows me who's been with me 10 years? But I started going through my brain, I was like, oh wow, these people are loyal. And I think about the personal brand and everything that you're saying too. We started in the beginning of this. Who's gonna be with me 10 years, 20 years, 30 years? Who's gonna be in the old uh the green sauce, like getting it right? Because it means they're going through that same thing all the time. Yes, there is cheese, there is red sauce, there is other kinds, but this is for the green sauce people.

Loyalty Vulnerability And Self Grace

SPEAKER_01 33:29

Yeah, I think I I think I've got I was gonna go on. I think an important piece of that too, Mike, that that I didn't grasp for a long time is you think about the people that have been with you for 10 years, is they've seen the the best parts of you and they're loyal to that, but they've also seen a lot of mistakes you've made over 10 years. Um, they've seen you take drawing turns and and they've chosen to stay with you despite of that, right? And I I think that's important with this the world we live in is when we see other people's brand on social media, we think it's it's perfection. Well, I can't do that because I struggle with this, or I can't do that because I haven't learned this, or I haven't closed this number of transactions, or you can the the your brain will come up with a list of a thousand reasons why why not. But the the thing I tell people as a serial entrepreneur is I've made more mistakes business-wise and probably more mistakes personal-wise than than most people. Um, but because I I see this future version of me that I want to be so badly, uh, and I owe it to my family and other people, that people, people see that grit and that side of me of he's trying. You know, they I'm sure sometimes under their breath they say, oh man, bless his heart. He's doing that wrong, but he's trying. And I think that goes a long way that that in a world where where everyone else looks perfect, is give yourself some grace along the way because everyone's carrying a burden somehow. Some people are sharing it, some people are. Uh, but those people that have been with you a long time, you know, be open with them, be vulnerable with them, and it actually increases your their loyalty and and they'll be more vulnerable with you, which gives you the opportunity to be a better leader and solve problems differently for for them. So I I I I love that you brought that up from that loyalty piece, but um, I I just I felt like I needed to say something there of like, man, I just give give yourself. We're so good at giving other people grace that don't forgive to give yourself some grace through this process as well.

SPEAKER_00 35:27

I I was in a course, I love that you said that. I don't remember where it was somewhere, and they talked about vulnerability. Might have been Jay Papazon. He was talking about be vulnerable, be be humans. I found myself too, I've gone through help journeys where I'm trying to stay, stay at 185. It's it's not easy. You know, you're at you're at basketball games, you're at cheerleading, you're all that stuff. What's easy to do? Grab Chick-fil-A or grab something like that. So I've I've had videos where I've been breathing heavy or coming back from a rucking or different things, and I've just done a video. It's been on my heart. I read something or listened to something and I've shared. And my wife sometimes is like, whoa, you're really breathing heavy on that video. And I said, Yeah, I I could have not, I could have made sure it was polished and looked like this brand, but I'm human and I want to show them, hey, I'm I'm I'm rucking and I'm doing other things, but I learned something because sometimes I find if I don't share it then, I'll look up two weeks later and I never shared it. So like this is on my heart. Let me go ahead and share it or just you know put that out there too.

SPEAKER_01 36:26

I wanted to make sure right there is your personal brand, right? That that is who you are. It's it's what what are you feeling and and how do you make other people feel? I mean, if you have to whittle it down to this, it's it's what am I trying to what am I trying to become? How real can I be? Am I am I authentic to myself? And then how do I make how by me being that person, how do I make people feel? Am I am I helping people along their journey? I I love that. Like keep doing it because I think that's where you connect with people for sure.

Giving Back Through Green Group Gives

SPEAKER_00 36:54

Uh one thing I wanted to make sure we definitely talked about because you're doing a lot of things, and this this podcast can be nine hours, but uh giving, you have your charity organization. I think too, I think um and we were talking about this earlier. I can't remember what was what it was, but it's like giving to our people a knowledge, giving to our people an opportunities, you know, and ownership, all these things, but you're also doing it in charity. If you would, I wanted you to talk a little bit about the charity. I think that's that shows if if you think for me, if people think of the empire, you know, and they only see that. Well, they don't see the whole enchilada. I might use that seven more times today because I love it. I, you know, we were debating about the name or not, just so you know. I it's fantastic because I get it now, and I'm glad we talked about it because I get it. But it's like the whole enchilada is not only just the empire building and not only the dad, but it's also you're showing you're you're paving the way for your four daughters too. What does it look now that your future grandkids and so forth? Your new son is no in our family. We we build big businesses and we earn, but we also give.

SPEAKER_01 37:58

Yeah, I love that. It's it's been interesting because I launched uh Green Group Gives. So my my real estate team operates out of Arizona. Um, we we uh I lived in Arizona for several years uh and and built my my team down there as well. And uh so we're we're called the Green Group, and we launched Green Group Gives, um, man, probably probably 2011, so maybe 15 years ago. Um, and the you know, to to be perfectly honest at that time I was a lot uh less mature in my career, and a lot of that was uh ego-driven to launch Green Group Gives of like, I want to be able to show that we're doing these things. And and we made a big splash and a lot of noise about the things we were doing, and we were doing good things. Um, and I it over time I've actually now Green Group Gives is like the silent uh part of my organization. It's it's part of who we are. Um, but a lot of what uh Green Group Gives does is behind the scenes and giving and showing up, and a lot of that is uh giving my time uh to the next generation of leaders um and and things like that. Well, but the one of the things I love about it is Green Group Gives, the logo is G G G, is when my my girls were little too, I I I teased them a little bit that it actually stood for Green Girls Give, which are I have four daughters. And so uh same thing. I wanted to I wanted to teach them that it's important to give back them your time and and energy. Um and I I think it's easy to get consumed in winning. We're all we're all uh you know high driven. We want to win, we want to provide, we want to hit our goals, and that's great. And it's we're always looking out front of who can help me get there, who can get me there, but it's important to look behind you too and say, well, who's who's behind me and and how are they struggling and and how can I help them? It's just as important for someone else to pull you forward, for you to pull the person behind you forward with you. Um, so yeah, that's that's what green group gives is all about.

SPEAKER_00 40:04

You said something, and I don't know if you said it, uh knew you said it, but you said something brilliant that I really love, and I heard this one time. We can actually, as all humans, we can give a million dollars. And it's actually what it means though is not necessarily write a check for cash, but sometimes as depending on where you are, you could mentor someone that you could you could do a teaching on something. You know what I'm saying? The giving is not necessarily in the dollars, but I love that you said, hey, this is the framework for anybody, is a concept, and talking about it is how do you give of your time? As you know your level now too, you know, someone might want to coach with you, and you're like, ah, it's a hundred thousand a year, might not even be enough for your time. So if you think about that and giving, and I think sometimes people in our own world don't realize how strong we are as far as um, and it's not a not an ego thing, but as far as education and business and business building, that someone else would pay thousands, and I know we're doing it. You're coming to our region and we're grateful for it. You know, we feel like we're getting a win. Don't don't tell you that, right? Just so you might be like, oh, we need to raise these prices. Yeah, but I think to the piece and giving that people will need to know if they're starting out new or their different levels is your time. One of the things I did in COVID in 2020, and I never even realized this. Most charities didn't even have a Venmo. They didn't know how to actually collect money differently. They understood how to receive cash at an event, but now we were not face to face. So sometimes just teaching organizations to create a Venmo and how to do things on Zoom, that was one of the things that I started doing is a way to give. So giving differently uncreatively.

SPEAKER_01 41:42

Yeah, I love that. And and don't don't discount like your value. Like uh a month ago, um, I kind of just teased it out in my my congregation with uh the the young man. I get an opportunity to kind of work with some of the young men in that organization, and I I do the these goal setting retreats that I get paid to go do for people business-wise. And I was like, I'm gonna do one for these young men and just invite them in my home and see if I can get them focused. And my wife was like, So what are you thinking? How are you gonna do it? And I was like, I'm gonna do a four-hour event on a Sunday afternoon after church and just tell them to come over. My wife was like, They're not, these young guys are not gonna come spend four hours at your house after sitting in church for two hours on their day off. And I was like, She's like, You shouldn't do it less. And I'm like, no, you can't, you can't, you can't do it good enough in in less than four hours. I'm only gonna do it for four hours. She's like, we'll see. And you would have been blown away how many of these young guys showed up at my house and uh you know, to the point where we were out of chairs, people were sitting on the floor and and listening. And it was it was one of my favorite meetings I've done in the last couple uh several months because these guys were thus all of a sudden like seeing a new version of themselves. So, like, even think in giving back, like, don't just think of like if there was one, if I would have showed up the same, if there was one person that showed up as like who's somebody you can take to coffee. That is that is giving and it's true, as form. And a lot of times it'll go more than a$20 Venmo to to some local charity or something like that. I'm not saying don't do that, but giving time and energy and your expertise goes a long way.

Where To Follow Referrals And Closing

SPEAKER_00 43:18

Well, now all those young men, you spread planting all those seeds that they can actually spread throughout their community. I think about that YouTube butterfly effect, and that's really you know something that's occurring there. Uh so cool. I would just a side story on that that I love. I taught for four years at the University of Arkansas, principal of real estate in the business school. And still today, actually, Brett is his name, just joined my team this week. He's 25. He was one of my students four years ago. So he's always, you know, hey, Professor Dooley, what are you doing? And you've so as a personal brand, we actually forget who we're impacting. So I think that's for anyone listening to people are watching you. How are you showing up? What are you doing? What are you saying? I think that's something that I forget a lot of times because you're just moving. So sometimes in sharing that, I I want to be mindful of your time too. For the audience, I want to let them know where you said Instagram is the best spot to find you, right?

SPEAKER_01 44:13

Yeah, Instagram's uh great. I'm on Facebook, Instagram, um, I'm on LinkedIn, but uh my primarily the majority of my content is is Instagram um and Facebook. Um and then if you are interested in like really getting into this crazy mind of mine and knowing what I'm studying and where I'm focused and why it's important, uh be sure to join the network uh at the holderchalada.biz and and you'll get my weekly green sauce. Um and uh that will show you hopefully that will inspire some new thought for you as well.

SPEAKER_00 44:45

And if anyone's listening and they're in real estate, right, they want to send their referrals to Arizona and Utah, you'll definitely take those. I I know every time it pops up on Facebook or I see it, you know, I'm like, St. George, you know, I'm throwing that over. And I uh my parents' best friends for my whole life. Uh they have a place in St. George, and also we have a client here that has one in St. George. It's beautiful, isn't it? Oh, St. George is gorgeous. If you haven't been, come on out, we'll we'll show you a good time. And people forget the weather. I think they think sometimes at Utah they have snow, but it's really close to Nevada, so you mostly have Nevada weather there, right?

SPEAKER_01 45:21

Yeah, southern Utah is. I mean, that's a beautiful thing about Utah is you get into the highest beautiful peaks up north, and then down south you were in Red Rock, beautiful desert, Grand Canyon. I mean, it is it's a unique state. I I'm maybe a little partial, but I think it's pretty incredible here.

SPEAKER_00 45:38

No, it it is beautiful. We took our sprinter van and we did, you know, all Grand Canyon, Utah, Moab, all over in Zion and all that. And Cody and I were like, oh wow, so beautiful. We're yelling at the kids. Look, they're like on their iPads hanging out. We're like, we got this big sprinter van for you to look at all these windows, but we were just, you know, loving it. It's just an amazing, beautiful part of the country. I want to thank you for being here. I also want to thank our our sponsor, Mutual Omaha Mortgage. Thank you for sponsoring uh the real Mike Dooley and hanging out with us. If you guys like this content, go ahead and make sure you follow Marcus, but go ahead and share, like, and do all the things. But thanks for joining the real Mike Dooley. That was a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_01 46:19

Thanks, Mike. Thanks for having me. And you know I'm gonna call you Professor Dooley now.

SPEAKER_00 46:24

Uh I like it. I need to change my Instagram handle to that or something.

SPEAKER_01 46:28

Thanks, my friend. Appreciate you.

SPEAKER_00 46:31

Yes, great seeing you. And I'll see you in a couple weeks. Thanks for listening to the Real Mike Dooley podcast. Subscribe, share, stay real. I'm Mike Dooley. Until next time.