Ep# 118: How this Loan Officer Went from 0 to 85 Million in Just Three Years With Personal Branding-Final

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Go check it out right now, visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today. Welcome to Mortgage Marketing Radio. Brought to you by the Mortgage Marketing Institute, your number one source for truth in Mortgage Marketing. Hey listeners, Jeff Zimper, thank you for tuning in. Hey, is this your first time here? Let me give you a special shout out and welcome. I'd love to connect with you personally. So how do we do that? You can find the multiple places on the inner webs. You can go to my Facebook group just for the Mortgage Marketing Radio podcast. Go ahead and hit me up there in the group and come on in and join. We've got additional content and networking and cool stuff happening inside the community over at the Mortgage Marketing Radio podcast. So check that out. Secondly, this podcast is brought to you as always by our primary sponsor and that is the Mortgage Marketing Pro membership and community. What is that? Who is that for? Well, that is for loan officers. Should it be you who's interested in getting serious about going to the next level in their business, getting serious about finally succeeding with some predictability with real estate agents, attracting real estate agents, getting more referrals from real estate agents, building your personal brand amongst your local real estate agents to rise above the noise and get chosen as the go to lender in your local market, not only that, but also the Mortgage Marketing Pro membership is for those loan officers that are looking to level up their personal brand online with social media and video marketing and Facebook and ads and your Facebook business page and more. We've got a complete souped in that system and entire platform to help you take the online offline to build your engagement with local real estate agents and go consumer direct and become a modern originator. How do you learn more? There's an eight minute video over at mortgagemarketing.pro that's going to give you the entire overview. Check it out if you're interested. That'll give you all the deets and I'd love to see it inside there. We also have our own private community just for pro members where we go deep with weekly coaching calls and additional exclusive content only for our pro members. So check that out if that's in your area of interest. Anyway, so that's that. Let's get into this week's special show with our special guest, Alex McFadden. I'm so thrilled to finally bring Alex to the show. I've been watching him from afar for some time. He's built an incredible brand for himself up in Vancouver, British Columbia area. What you get with Alex is professional mortgage advice and a pug. That's right. A pug. You know, the dog, the pug. You got to hear Alex's stories incredibly compelling and give you some quick facts just as a setup before we get into this week's episode. So in 2015, basically Alex started over from ground zero, started from scratch in his market. No referral partners. No business. No nothing. And in 2018, he helped over 204 families purchase a home for the tune to the tune of $85 million. Folks, three years. That's a three year trajectory from zero to 204 families helped 85 million. You want to know how we did it? Tune in to this episode. So Alex decided to go all in. I do his reservations and decided to put a brand includes his dog, which is a pug. And now actually has two dogs, Ernie and Jacks and you hear a little bit more about them. But what a brand. He's built online Instagram. I'm putting links to his all his socials in the show notes, which you can look them up on Instagram for sure. The mortgage pug. Right. That's where you'll find him on Instagram. You'll find him on YouTube. You'll find him on Facebook. And what you'll hear from his story is that he's focused on the long game and he's focused on creating education, creating engagement with his community, his local community of both real to referrals, but also his local community of potential home buyers and sellers and all that kind of stuff. And I mean, look at the results speak for them for themselves, right? Three short years, 85 million in production, 204 units. You got to hear this guy's story and how he's doing it. There's a lot of a ha's and takeaways in this that you can borrow and utilize for yourself. Here's the thing. Don't try and copy. As Alex says, be you, be real and make it fun, right? That's what Alex does. He makes it fun. And it's a lesson in personal branding and becoming a modern originator. If you want to leverage video, digital content and all these different platforms so that people are attracted to want to work with you, that the price sensitivity goes way down that there's no selling. And literally you've built what is, is, you know, the ultimate goal that I think we want to check out to you saying, Hey, man, I need to buy a house, saw your stuff following you for a while. You know, you're my man. Right. Let's go make it happen. If you're driving, come back and listen to this the second time, go follow Alex, check out. See what he's doing and see what you can borrow and learn from Alex and the mortgage bug. So with that said, let's get into this week's show. Alex, welcome to the show. Hello, Jeff. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it, my friend. From far up north across the border, man, what is that? Listen, I can see, I can see the border from my house. That's how far away I am. I'm like five minutes away. Good. You're nice and close. You're nice and close. All right. So for the listeners who want to know who is Alex McFaden, tell, by the way, did I pronounce that correctly? It's a bad, but that's OK. That's OK. Hey, man, my last name is Zimfer. So trust me. All right. So tell us who you are. You know, quick background. Why do you love loans? And then we'll get into it. Man. All right. So obviously, you know, my name now at this point right now, most people don't even know my name. They're starting to figure it out. Most people know me as the mortgage plug, which is my brand, if you will, my handle. And it's kind of funny how it's morphed into that. Where people happen, their phone is the mortgage plug. Why do I like loans? I don't know that I like loans to be completely honest with you. I like the opportunity that serving these people, these families and achieving goals, whether be our partners or the families. I like that side of it. I like the problem solving. I like the marketing aspect. I don't necessarily care much for the actual loans. I don't know if that sounds crazy. But I say that it finds something like, what? Do you like what I mean? You know so much about it. Now, I actually enjoy the other aspects. So hopefully that answers your question on that. I think you asked who I am. That's a big thing. Well, obviously, I'm from way up here in Canada, way up North. I'm not sure if you had too many people on the show from that. I've been licensed since about 2011, but I had only had brief period where I was doing kind of a pseudo sales role. I didn't even know what I was doing left the industry, came back January 1, 2015 after a major health incident, and came back with a vengeance, joined up with a team, left a team nine months later, started my own thing, and started my own team six months later. And here we are today. Okay. So did I hear you correctly? You came back into the industry in 2013? I came back in 2015. 2015, sorry. 2015. All right. So real quick, give us 2018 numbers, units. What did that look like? 2018, $85 million of a billion, $204 for people that we helped or Twitter for units, whatever way you want to look at it. No, thank you. Thank you for that correction. I got to learn to say that because it's actually more accurate. Well, it's kind of funny because the technical definition, we say units or deals or files or whatever, but we just try and shift our mindset by saying that, and I thought it was really corny at the start, but I truly believe in that mindset, focus chip, and even just saying it, just saying it out loud is impactful to the way that you feel about what you're doing, right? 100% man. Absolutely. It's an interesting topic. I've been focusing on that a lot lately, but you're right. It's like, how do you see yourself? Are you seeing yourself as doing a unit, doing a loan, or are you seeing yourself as helping a family? That shows up in how you communicate and everything you do. No question. And to your point, so you're asking a little bit of our numbers, you know, the funny thing about it is I'm going to that right now is I'm looking at my business and breaking apart pretty in a lot of detail right now, doing a little bit of a review of you all. And I don't track my numbers a ton, especially not throughout the year. I prefer not to. I mean, I get a general gauge as to where we are, you know, week by week, but I'd prefer not to look at, you know, what we're closing, I look at my activities, and I look more on exactly what we're doing that's jeering those results because I can't always control the outcome. You know, our business has been phenomenal. We've doubled every year since 2015. So when from 10 to 20 to 40 to 85, you know, our goals this year are not to actually double. My focus this year is to actually improving my team process and grow. And we'd like to improve by about 50% up to 125 for 2019, especially in a more challenging market that we're facing right now up here. Okay. So this is awesome. And I want to pause for a second. You're just to highlight for those who may listening may have not noticed in 2015, you started from ground zero, right? Correct. Zero volume. And in three years, you hit 85 million over 214 families helped, 204. Sorry. Yeah. That's a pretty fast growth, man. I appreciate you saying that. What is the focus on something you get there? Yeah. Good, good lesson right there. You said a couple of things that are actually are really learning gems. You're talking about the numbers. And I think this is a huge, huge, huge lesson. I don't want it to go overlooked is you said you can't control the outcome. So you focus on, essentially, you said this controlling on the activities. That's what you control. Yeah. That's pretty special when you're starting because when you're starting and you're learning, you don't know about, you know, how people are going to perceive you. What type of information you're sending out of receiving. What's going to get funded? What's not going to get funded? You know, I imagine it's the same in the US as just in Canada. We've gone through so many rule changes in the last three years and guideline changes that are mine spinning all the time. And so I can't always control that. I can't control if someone's going to skip off on me one place or another, but I can control primarily what I'm doing day to day. Now, like I mentioned before, my goal is not necessarily to double this year because now, based on what we're doing, we know what we can do. And at this point, we're starting to focus a little bit more on that efficiency. Now we're starting to break down a little bit more detail. Okay, how can we control that outcome a little bit more? Because you can't always, like you can't always control the outcome. You can always control your action. Control the controllables. Don't worry about what you can't, right? Control the controllables. That's good. Why are you focused on controlling the process? Are you just looking for to deliver even a higher level of customer experience? 100%. For me, why is that the priority though? I want to understand why that's the priority. Well, I mean, for years to date right now, majority of our business comes from partners in the industry, traditionally, real estate agents, financial planners, you know, through social media, friends, spear, that sort of thing. But I mean, that's a lot of work and there's a lot of chasing involved and there's a lot of educating and a lot of it. It's just a lot of work, you know, and we all know that our databases is very valuable. So in my opinion, if you focus primarily on that experience, whether it's for your partners, your clients before, after, during, then those people are likely to want to continue to work. I mean, this is not rock science. Like they'll work with you more in the future. And I've already started to feel that in my business at this point. Now as we move in and next year, enter year five, this is when I anticipate this will likely take over. And if they remember how good that experience was before, why would they ever go anywhere else? So we invest a lot of time, a lot of energy now going forward and before, but especially now, Intel experience so that, hey, listen, I don't have to be quite as much of that brown work to keep our base, our bases are database. That's how we continue to stay consistent. All the extra outsourcing and all the extra lead generation, whether it be through whatever manner is now, like, nice thing on the cake, really at the end of the day, does that make sense? No, 100% make sense. So what you're trying to do is really, or if I can use the word organically, organically grow your business by delivering a kick ass customer experience, that's going to get people talking about you, keeping them loyal, building a fence around them, essentially just rupt proofing your business. Yeah. There you go. There you go. And it's so true. I mean, again, I'm repeating what almost anybody would probably say about this who's been in the industry for a period of time is that, you know, serving and taking care of your past clients is a significantly easier sale than taking on someone you that doesn't know you. It's each, you know, whenever someone calls, like, hey, Alex, I need help with this. Like, can you do it or can you not? It's not like, hey, you know, I want to go check out this lender, this lender, this lender, this lender. It's like, Alex, you do it for me, as opposed to them, you know, hustling around. And then it's just a batter of taking care of them again. And that's easy. What's an insight into maybe one area you've highlighted as a process that you're definitely going to improve on? What are we going to improve on? So we believe that whatever highlights is customer communication, so client communication and what's going on here, what's going on there, how's that happening, what's happening, the different ways that we do it through videos, through text, through email, we want to just get better at that consistently. So we're going to focus on our strengths and we're going to continue to operate in those parameters. Once we've hammered our strengths down and we feel super confident, then we'll start to work on our maybe something that's not quite as strong that we can pick up a little bit. But I truly just believe that, and this has been, you know, how I built my business so fast is I try not to worry too much about what I'm really not that good at. I mean, obviously, I'll be aware of it, you have to be aware, but I try to focus on what I'm best at. So I say to people like, hey, listen, if you, if you are just terrible face to face with people and, you know, you just awkward and you're not good at it, then don't go networking, don't go to networking events, don't do that kind of stuff like who cares? Get on the phone and dial, dial on the phone and just get better than anybody else on the phone. If you're great when it comes to, you know, like do a social media, then then brush social media better than anybody else out there and just be so good at it and get, get the best, because it's only if you're at the top and if you're, you're one of the best people, will you actually stand out in that sea of hundreds of thousands of other people, right? So focus, focus on your strengths, which is actually something that I was counter to to what I used to believe. I used to believe, okay, I'm not very good here. I should probably get better there because it's always like a carrot, like I'm not very good at that. Maybe I should do that too. We're always kind of trying to reach out to that. The reality is let's just get really, really freaking good at what we're good at and be the best. Otherwise, why the heck is someone calling? Like why? Why should they call you really at the end of the day? Like again, it's not, you know, something that anyone here has in store, the thing is this pocket hasn't, hasn't heard before, but let's just be better. Put more energy. Put more time. I bet anybody listening to this right now can look at what they're doing and they, what they think they're good at and realize that if they just put a little bit more time energy or thought into that, they can do better, which would result in a better experience for their clients, a better reason for their partners to reach out to them and they would feel damn good about it, even if it, if it costs a little energy. Yeah. 100%. It's kind of like that 1% improvement concept. If you go with the exact math is on that, if you get, if you get like 1% better every month or something, you're, it's a 37% improvement at the end of the year. Okay. So, let me ask you this then, what are, what do you consider yourself? Let me take part one and then part two first, part one. What did you identify that you perhaps weren't great at and you needed to outsource that or delegate it? Technical side of the process, I understood it, but I wasn't good at doing it. I don't have a long enough attention span to, I mean, I had to learn it, right, let's say the underwriting aspect. I know the process is a little bit different up here than it is in the U.S. like I don't have a underwriting or processing center or anything like we do with everything, start to finish. So, I learned how to do it all. I understood it and I learned it better than anybody else, but I wasn't really great at it. I didn't enjoy it. I didn't like all the detail. I'm not being back for it from that. Just on what I'm best at, which is of course, my experiences is advising when it comes to clients is like having those communications, uncovering opportunities, that's what I'm good at. In addition to that is I love marketing, I love building relationships, I love doing videos, I like doing all that kind of stuff, so it shows in what I do because I enjoy it. So, I got better at that. Yeah, and that's a nice transition into what you are great at, which is what kind of brought us here together and you're kind of what's put you on the map for a lot of people is you're branding, you're marketing, you know, the mortgage pug, which is kind of taken on. So let me ask you this. Did you think that you know or did you think that the whole mortgage pug thing would become what it is today? No. No. So give us a little backstory. For those that don't know, you'll see links in the show and I'll put images on the blog page and all that kind of stuff to add to his website and all that stuff. But how did that whole thing with the dog start? He was already my dog, already a big part of my life. It sounds so corny, but like he was like the resident dog that whenever any of my buddies they talked about me instead of asking like, how are you doing? How's your wife doing? It's like, well, the original dog, his name is Ernie. Well, time out, time out. What do you mean original? So we got number two. We got number two. We got number two. We got two now. We got two together. Yeah, we got two. They're both still around. Oh, yeah, they're both alive. We got a succession plan in place. Oh, good. Yeah, it wouldn't be like, hey, how are you doing it? It's like, how's Ernie? How's Ernie? Where's Ernie? What's he doing? Why isn't he here with us? He's one of those creatures that he's got such a ridiculous personality and at the time that I got him, I think pubs are kind of more of a fad now, but when I got him, it wasn't so much yet. So it was kind of like this weird creature that no one could figure out that snorted around and this is kind of, you know, in your grill. So anyways, long story short, people would always remember me for that anyways. And then, you know, again, sorry, into 2015 about nine months in, and I was like, I got to rebrand myself. I got to stem out what I got to do, something different. And my wife said, why don't you use, should be saying it for months, why don't you just use the dog, be a pug, pug mortgages or something, she would sail at the time when I was like, that's terrible. Like, nobody's going to take a piece of it. I'd walk in, you know, and I got a client who's nine million dollar property and they're going to look at me and be like, it's been a mortgage from this pug guy. No, no. And she's like, oh, care is like, she didn't really, you know, know her much. Just do it, just do it. I think no chance. So anyways, flashback, one of my co-brokers or someone in my company went and got a picture of my dog, sent it to the marketing person for the company, came back, had this post said something like mortgage pugger, hashtag mortgage pug on it. And she's like, I want you to post this stuff on your Facebook wall. Go post it now. See what happens. So I was like, no. Okay, fine. So I went did it. And it was just, it like, I would say viral per se, but it was, it was a hit. Everybody liked it. I really loved it. They're like, oh, this is great. I love your brand. That love what's going on. You know, it's so cool. And so anyways, yeah, just sold me on it. I was like, let's go. Let's do it. What do I got to lose? I mean, at the time, obviously, I wasn't doing it out of business and I was looking for something unique. And I'm like, you know what? If that many people like it, then maybe that can focus on this younger crowd that gets it, right? And so, so yeah, that's kind of where it started off and then it kind of took a mind of its own. And we didn't really know what to make of it. I went and got a logo made and some other stuff. And, you know, really, it just kind of started up as using him and my images. So having that, trying to focus on what we're trying to create, which is a little bit more of a fun environment. Marge just don't have to be scary and boring and dry like a bank. Let's have some fun with it. We've got this goofy little animal here who just focuses on being around people. Let's have some fun, right? Let's have some humility. We can take it serious. That's what I'm here for. The dog is meant to distract you in the meantime. That's really good stuff. There's a lot in there because you, you, you, you, you did have some, some reservations about it, right? Which is understandable. I think anybody would because you were like anybody when they're talking about, you know, having a brand and standing for something, then there's a concern, well, what are other people going to think? They're going to quote judge me, you know, but good news is you got through that really fast. Do you tend to them? Is your, is your target market, you know, of the younger market? Yeah, that's a great question. You know, initially when I started getting into it, my primary focus was first time buyers and move up buyers. So young families, that was a lot of what I was targeting at that time. And so yeah, it definitely helped because no, having the dog there, a lot of people, you were, were into it. I always tell people, I'm like, listen, are there people who loved it? Yes, where are the people who didn't like it? I had people who didn't want to work with me because of the cool thing about that is that eliminated people that I don't want to work with anyways because they've fun attitude. They're going to be stressful and frustrating and it's like good, good, good riddance. And I hope you have success wherever you just are going, right? And so yes, there was, there was some controversy, there was a lot of questions. I had some trepidation, it took me a little while before I fully, fully went into it. And then you know what? I just dove right in. Is there's no point of doing something unless you're going 100% all in. So everything from, you know, posting videos. So I post, you know, when I started, it was like a back in, you know, 2015, 2016, I started posting monthly videos, just educating people because I primarily just wanted to focus on a couple things. One, you know, the first time buyers and move up buyers and what did I know about them is that the information is difficult, confusing to understand and take in and nobody is out there really explaining it in a way which is easy to understand. In addition, I had a lot to learn. So I learned it. Then I put it up to the public and I just had a video with me in my pub. So that was how we started. So and like I said, for those listening, you have to go over to the blog page or check the show notes for it for we've got links to like all your videos because you've got quite a library. You've got a YouTube channel that's just, it's rock and man, I love that. It's stacked up with, like you said, I think you started with videos like 2015. Right? Yeah. Yeah. So if you go back and whatever, you know, we, this is a hot topic right now, the video thing. You know, I've been obviously hitting this for a few years and it's a hot topic. But if you go back and watch my first videos, man, they were bad. Like I looked awkward, uncomfortable, not sure myself. Welcome to the club, man. Right? So yeah. Yeah. So that was, I mean, just like anybody else, it was, it was the way it is. But we just, we started looking at that and saying it's working because I kept learning more and more. I kept educating more and more and then I became, you know, like, you know, people would look for my information or really, like, realtor's, hey, you put another video on this or you put another video on this, clients would, my past clients would be like, are you putting out a video on the change of the rate? So you put, you know, whenever there's any major events, yeah, yeah, of course it's coming to your inbox. So now I have to do it. In addition, we just said, you know what? Let's do a video once a week and then any, any major event that occurs and that was kind of like through 2017 continued through 2018 and then we started adding in things like, you know, live videos, interviews, awesome for you to do this podcast. But if I had the capacity right now, I would be able to do it as well. And it's just about education and that's it. Right. Right. 100% education. And it's interesting to hear the response from the audience, referral partners alike is that there's this expectation and dependency now they look forward to your content. Oh my God. That's the holy grail, you know. Oh, no question. They were like, you know, when is this video coming? Can you teach me how to do this? Can you do, you know, whatever I've done now, probably about 10 presentations. I'm actually speaking at the bomb bomb conference if anybody's going up in Colorado, which is going to be awesome. I don't even know how they invited me, but I'm excited to watch and listen to all the other folks who are doing video stuff. If you're not going, I think there's like 14 tickets left, whoever gets on board, you should be there. Oh wow. Any social media or video related in real estate or mortgages or insurance, that's where you need to be. Anyways, that was a good plug. No, that's a good reminder because I've had Steve Passenelli on the podcast and that's I think in May and Denver. Yes. Yeah, I'm going to put links to the show notes. We had another podcast where we talked about that as well. And I plan on being there. God willing. I'm going to after this. I'm going to go buy my ticket. So, all right. Cool. All right. Where's that going to go? I want to think about this. So you started with the dog, the pup. What are both of their names again? Ernie. Oh, Ernie and Jack's. Jack's with adopted. So we didn't have a choice in the name. So those were the two dogs. We built them into our brand. It just became our focus. And then everything that we do around that was built in. Okay. What makes people feel good? How do we make them feel good? I know there's some people who have some pretty cool processes and then we're learning from them and so forth. But it was just in our mind. It's just like, is this going to help people? Is this going to make them feel happy? You know, let's continue to. That's like our North Star that's guiding us all the time. Is that kind of humility and that fun, right? Yeah. Well, you've got a thousand followers on your Facebook page right now. Your YouTube channel. I mean, you're building an audience, right? And that's the key. And you're making it fun. Oh, I was going to go back to, for the younger people, they do find the information, you know, confusing and the home buying processes, challenging and all that kind of stuff. So you're definitely leading with education and content on that. I was going to ask you, can you do you have a sense? And this is, I hate the question right of like, hey, you're like the ROI tracking deals from social and all that stuff. But what have you noticed in terms of the, do you get organic business coming to you? 100%. So, brand recognition. So I'm, I'm most active on Instagram, then Facebook. I post everything on YouTube, full disclosure. I haven't spent the time to build a subscriber list. It's kind of like my dictionary right now, or sorry, it's kind of where my library is. It's probably right now. That's the next, that's the next step right now is now that I've got all this content. Let's start mapping that up and getting people on there, which is what I'll be key on later this year. But with that being said, you know, specifically what is my ROI? Yeah, I'm sure I could look at people and say like they got me from Facebook or here or there or whatnot. But what I actually know that it helps me is my existing relationships become stronger, the people that connect with me. I try to connect with everybody on this screen or through my business page or whatever. And they just see my face consistently. And as they see my face over and over and over and over again, they're going to consistently think of me. And so what happens is it's a long game for me. Like I don't do online, I don't do online leads. I don't do anything like that. But I mean, it's the same effect as like going out consistently in public. If I'm consistently going to like a community event or a gym or something of that age or all the time, and I'm talking the same people eventually, they're going to be like, oh, Alex, we have to ask Alex about that, right? The same thing, but I'm just in front of that same group of people and more online, which is exactly where you want to be, you know, at the end of the day, where they are, be where they are. So yeah, I do. I probably get between three to five contacts a week through social media and some capacity Facebook Instagram linked in now. Well, the thing I want to point out about those contacts, correct me if I'm wrong. But I know this from interviewing other people that are on a similar path as you is there's like zero selling on those contacts. There's much reduced price sensitivity. And it's pretty much when they reach out to contact to you. That's like, I've been consuming your content. Hey, I'm ready to go. 10% all the so I get agents who reach out to me all the time. They want to work with me. I mean, I probably get a new like I did just got off a call about an hour ago from a new referral from a new agent that I've never worked with before, because she's saw my stuff on a regular basis and she trusts that I'm an authority in the field, which is like, listen, there's no hiding anything here, guys. I'm not selling you on anything. Yes, I want you to use me for your services and I want to support you in your journey. But there's no selling like no selling like I don't have to go up to somebody and be like, hey, I want you to work with me. I just don't do that. I hate doing it. So it's just more or less like, hey, listen, this is the content. This is what I do. This is what I where our information is. If you like this, my only ask would be that you you talk to me when it comes time to to buy property or refinance or invest or something of that nature because I've given you that value up front. So if you could, you know, chat with me about it. If it's not the right fit, then I'll honor that and you go where you need to go. And that's it. No sales at all. So I noticed you'd also do if you have a regular scheduled Facebook live kind of program. So yes, I had a regular scheduled Facebook live from last June through December and my objective actually going into 2019 was to continue that and now I put up on the podcast. In lieu of doing that, I put my focus. I moved my focus a little bit just to start the year on my team because a big, big focus for me again as I discussed this year was to get back into focusing a little bit more down on our system process. We did let go of a member we brought two members in. So I had to focus on my primary objective so I continue to do my standard videos. I can continue to work on my team. We will be ramping back up and getting back into that as well as a podcast and a regular scheduled live going into the second half of 2019 this year. We're doing very, very well with what we have at the moment. So we're quite happy with the current results of the actions. And so at this point right now, that would be that would be like icing on the cake. That's the objective to get there. Yeah, that's awesome. Actually, I want to make a point because your question is probably pertain to what were the results and answer your question that was more about me. Maybe it wasn't, maybe it wasn't, but I want to talk about that. Yeah. If you are, so think about it this way. If you're, this is good for a local area. So if you are in a local area and you're in what city are you in? I'm in Vegas. Okay, so you're in Las Vegas. Then what I would recommend is if you were someone who wants to create an influence in that area, then what you would do is you would figure out what it is that people care about. There's two sides to that. One, figure out what people actually care about what they're looking to hear. But more importantly, to do the live interview with the people that you want to work with, that's really where you want to go with it. So figure out how you're giving them value. So listen, Mr. Life Insurance Agent or Realtor Financial Planner, wherever it is you work with or a business person. I want to give you a platform. I've got an audience of the X amount of people that are watching a consuming audience of regular day. Let's do a 30 minute show and I'm going to give value to all these other people. And I'm going to help you get your business out there in exchange for that. You don't ask for anything. You don't ask for nothing at all. And these people naturally, they're more likely to want to work with you. And in addition, you're creating value for them. Right. And you're connecting yourself with a lot of local influencers and that's got a whole ripple effect and all that stuff. Everybody sees you. Yeah, no doubt. Are you trying to become the digital mayor of your kind of town area? Yep. 100%. That's the job of it. When I get the hell, man. From a distance. That's awesome. Okay. In the last few minutes we have, I also, so it's funny. You know what? So for those listening who are apprehensive about going all in like you have on a particular channel, a brand or whatever, give them a quick coaching session. Help them get over and understand. Let me, let me, let me have to this way. This is actually a better setup. I've talked to, I'm sure you've heard it. I've talked to a number of LOs. I'll give you a real life example. Somebody says to me the other day on a coaching call, well, I'm not on Facebook and I really don't plan to be. Or I've been in this business for 18 years and I've never needed social media. So tell me why I need social media. All right. Alex, you tell them. So here's the thing. On a coaching call, you might have a little more challenge. But I tell people don't do something that you're not going to do. If you're not going to do it, don't bother with it, right? But what I did say before, which is first thing that anyone does is when they get a referral, they got a recommendation is they're going to look you up either on Google or on Facebook. So you got to be somewhere. You got to be seen. You got to be visible. Listen. If I get a real estate agent's contact information, first thing I do with my client sends me their name, is I'll Google them up. And if I don't find them, I'm going to start asking some questions. And if I start asking questions, I'm looking for opportunities to refer to that client as somebody else. And not because I don't want to. Of course, I'm not going to try and take away a relationship or anything of that nature. But I'm going to wonder to myself, is this person a really full time? Do they really have a business? It's like having, you know, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, if your name was in the yellow pages, did you actually have a business? It was out of your garage, right? Could you be legitimate? You're not legitimate if you're not online. First of all, second of all, just pick one place, one place. I don't care what it is. Pick one and just do it really well. One. And in addition to that, whatever you're doing, make sure it's real to who you are. Don't try and be the mortgage pup. Don't try and be the mortgage goat. I don't know what it is. But just be you, man. Just be whatever you are. People who like you for the last 18 years, they're going to still like you as long as you're acting like who you are and yourself. It's just like anything else. It's a progression. You got better and better and better. The second thing I always say to anyone is that the social media stuff for me, like here's the thing. The social media stuff for me is really at the end of the day. It's a complementary. Okay? So you have to be damn good at what you do. You have to be focused on what you do and be the best at it and know that you work as far as you can. Otherwise, that's all fluff. Because I see guys come, like they're like, you know, mortgage people and all this kind of stuff, like coming up all these followers. Great. It's not doing anything because once you get the people or you're capped to the information, you're not doing anything with it. You're not doing a good job or you're not showing up. So you got to be really good at it. It's kind of like having like big muscles or steroids. It's like what you can't push the weight. So what's the purpose? You know what I mean? So that's one of the big things I say to people is get really good at what you do. Have your process figured out or at least focus on that one thing and then start hitting your social media with that one thing. Make sure that everything that you do provides some form of value. I don't want to hear you selling. Like don't sell it. You know, just like that. If people don't, if you don't open the first, say 10 seconds of a video, if you don't capture their attention in a way that's interesting to them and helps them. And they don't want anything to do with you and they'll probably too know for the rest of your videos. One bad video is equal to everything else or one bad piece of content. How do you get good? How do you flex your social media muscles? How do you stay sharp, stay, you know, in tune to, you know, be a sort of content marketer? The people that are listening to this right now are trying to get better at their business. They care. So they're going to get better no matter what, whether it's for me or someone else. But they're spending the time and the energy to listen to something which might benefit their business. So they're already a step ahead as far as that's concerned. It's the same thing in any part of your life or business. So what you want to do is you want to focus on listening to podcasts, reading information. There's so much out there. It's insane. Like go look at, you know, all a podcast social social media marketing world or something like that I think was called. And he's got so much content out the yin yang. And it's just listen to half of it and implement a little piece. That's a good way to start. But you better get better. No, 100%. Actually, I just got back from that conference. It's one of the best ones I think I've ever been to. I wanted to go to that. I wanted to go to that. The other thing I would say is just like anything else, man, you just have to keep doing it. You have to keep practicing. Like I, like I said to people, I strike out all the time. Like all the time on so much stuff. But I'm just constantly trying and trying and trying new things. Like I got videos that I spent so much time on and I'm like, oh man, like five people watch that. What the heck? And then I'll have like this silly post of me in my dog or something. And it'll be all over the place. It's like, ah, what are the people want? But stay in tune with what people want and just stay focused on doing the task. Like keep doing it. Keep doing it. Keep doing it. Because if you're just giving up because someone didn't pick it up, then you're obviously not ready to move forward. And you said something earlier as well as you're in it for the long game. And that is this game, right? Creating a brand, building an engagement in an audience of trusting people following you on social media. That doesn't happen overnight. It takes time, man. So we started this episode of that. I'm taking over your job for a second. I was kind of this episode talking about mindset. Yeah. And I tell people that when people ask me like, what's, you know, what might make you successful? It's because of real tears. It's because of social media. Like, none of that stuff, man. It's because in my mind, I know that what at that point, where I know that it's so hard, and I'm like, I want to give up or this is, you know, for the last six weeks, I've been working like 12, 15 hour days. And I'm like four years into my career because of various different things. And I know that I could have give up at 10 hours or eight hours or six hours every day. But I keep hustling and pushing and pushing and pushing and pushing to be better. And then I rise to come to the crop list. I'm the guy to call. I get the, you know, the file is complete. Now I'm back at a point where I can come back down to earth because I put in the work and I put in the time. So your mind will generally tell you to stop doing something. It's scary to do the, you know, the video was scary to go talk to someone. It's scary to screw up a file. It's scary to get a crappy phone call or call a client and say, hey, listen, like this, this didn't work out and it's my fault. Like, you know, do those things. But, you know, at the end of the day, the only way you can do that is if you focus on keeping your mind focused on the task at hand. And what you're trying to achieve, what your goals are. I'm going on a little bit of a tangent. So I'll kind of slow it down here a little bit. It doesn't have to be overly complicated. Understand what you're trying to achieve, how you're going to get there. And just keep trying, keep pushing. When it gets hard, that means you've got to keep going. You can't stop at that point. It's the point when it gets hard is which is basically your body's telling you stop. That's the point you have to go further. That's why they have those crazy marathon runners. And there's only one out of a million people who can do it. Because those guys turn that part of their brain off and just keep rocking. That's what it takes to be successful in anything. Yeah. And before we close that, I also want to make the point is that you're still active in your local market. I notice you do like first time home buyer seminars. What do you call that here? Here's in home buying. What do you call that? We do beers in home buying. Yeah. We do that usually three, four times a year. I do a couple of other seminars. Very active. Yeah, I sit down. And you know, I've heard people talk about is it worth sitting down with a new agent or more experienced agent or anything? I'm not too big for anything. Like I said, down with the guy yesterday, it started three weeks ago. I'm like, great, let's sit down. Let me help you out. Let me put you in the right path and help you out. And I think as soon as you think again, you're too big for a $50,000 loan versus a $800,000 loan, then you've got problems. Interesting. Good. And that all comes back to mindset. You're in it for the long term. And like you said earlier, you love helping people. It's helping families. It's not doing units. And you know, you're making a positive difference. And I bet you believe as well. And I totally understand and get that you don't like the mechanics, let's say, of doing loans. But I'm going to venture to guess you believe that your advice makes a difference in somebody's life. Oh, 100%. Yeah. 100%. Yeah, I know the mechanics don't get me wrong. Like I understand what's happening, but I just don't enjoy doing it all. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Know your land, stay in your lane. That's awesome. All right. Well, listen, we're going to put links in the show notes. Alex McFadden and the mortgage pug. So if anybody wants to just, if you're on your phone right now and you can't wait, you can Google add and bring it up. Any other suggestions for where people should connect with you? Instagram, right? What's your handle? Jeff. Find me on Instagram. Honestly, I don't let everybody on my personal Facebook page. I get a lot of letter requests on there. You can follow my business page. You can follow my personal page. Send me a DM if you want to. That's usually the best place to get ahold of me. And any questions you have, I'll be happy to get back to you. Awesome, man. I can't say thank you enough. I know it's been a while for us to finally get this going, but I'm glad we did. Right on Jeff. Appreciate it, brother. Thank you, Batman. And listeners, there's always thank you for tuning in. If you like this episode, please let us know how to share the love on the interwebs. You know that. Give us a little review wherever you're listening to this. And we thank you for tuning in. As always, we'll see you on the next one. Bye for now. Hey guys, what's up? Real quick. You've heard about the mortgage marketing pro membership before. And you just want to quickly remind you of that. You're in a place in your business where you simply need more purchased loans. You need to fill your pipeline with purchase business. Let's just face it. Agents are still a solid pillar of business and sources of purchase business for you. Well, good news. Our mortgage marketing pro membership helps loan officers like you close more loans without the hassle of chasing agents or cold calling. Done for you, agent classes, expert training videos, a marketing automation platform that automates the entire process for you. Everything you need to build your personal brand in your local market. Attract and convert agents into referral partners. 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