Ep# 45: How Agent Liz Johnson Built a Tribe of 176 Referral Partners

In today's highly competitive mortgage industry, building profitable relationships with the real estate agents is essential for success. However, finding effective ways to secure agent relationships can be a challenge. With so many mortgage loan originators vying for the attention of real estate agents, it can be difficult to stand out and establish meaningful connections. Our new case study featuring loan officer Chris Cogill is a must-read. Chris has closed a remarkable 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals. And in this case study, he shares his proven strategies for building strong relationships with real estate agents and leveraging those relationships to drive more business. To get your hands on this resource, head over to LOKestudy.com and download your free copy of the case study today. You'll find actionable insights and practical tips that Chris used to close 36 million in funded loans from agent referrals and how you can too. Don't miss out. Go check it out right now, visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today. Welcome to Mortgage Marketing Radio. And brought to you by the Mortgage Marketing Institute, your number one source for truth in mortgage marketing. Hey, listeners, Jeff Ziffer. Welcome to this week's episode of Mortgage Marketing Radio. We're back and as I promised, we'd be mixing that up a little bit, taking a pause from our series on the one thing book, talking about time blocking, managing your time. If you haven't checked out the one thing book, I encourage you to do so. Go back and check out a couple of the previous episodes. If you want to get better control of your calendar, your time, be more productive, get your one thing, get clear on what your one thing is. So this week, my special guest is a real estate agent, not just any agent. This lady is a dynamo, Liz Johnson. She is with Keller Williams, in Washington state. And the reason why I wanted to bring Liz on is because she has a unique approach to engaging with her sphere of influence, her past database, her sphere of influence, to really create a community, a following a club, a tribe, dare I say, a tribe of loyal, raving fans, followers that are engaged and that are proactively seeking referrals for her real estate business. And this is relevant to you as a lender listening because there are some great opportunities for you to team up with your realtors in your local area. The first thing I suggest you do after listening to this podcast is check the show notes and get Liz's book at amazon.com. Her book is called Perk Your Sphere, How to Reward Those Who Reward You. And Liz is a fun, vivacious, as a self-described, obviously realtor, cop's wife, former cop herself, combat veteran, mother, entrepreneur, amateur chef, wannabe, rap video dancer, shoe addict, and a gay man trapped in a woman's body. And we'll talk a little bit about that on the podcast. So if that doesn't intrigue you to want to listen to more, you definitely need to. But not only that, Liz is also a highly successful real estate agent now selling over 100 homes a year. And she does it without cold calling, admittedly does not like cold calling, doesn't like making those past database calls and saying, Hey, now's a great time to sell by no anybody. She wanted to approach it a little bit differently. And so she's created this different groups or tribes. As I said, that all have different activities and a gamification element to actively participating in Liz's groups, her most valuable partners groups as she calls them so that these people are actually always on the lookout for referrals for Liz. And a competition of sorts winds up taking place in who's going to be her top referer for the month or the quarter. So it's a really interesting concept and it's why I wanted you to show up, listen with an open mind, you know, listen to this and you may say to yourself, well, you know what, that's not right for me or maybe what I want you to do is listen for the learning lessons. Listen for the unique approach she has to prospecting, I would dare even use that word prospecting, staying engaged with your past database, your shared influence, and then bring these ideas to your real estate agents, heck, share this podcast with your agents, share the book for sure. Maybe consider launching one of these groups for yourself, for your agents, team up with an agent and do this. Most importantly, just listen to what Liz has to say, let it soak in, marinate for a while, get her book. It's a very quick read, it's less than 50 pages and she breaks down her process or system for purking your sphere, right? How to reward those that have rewarded you and hopefully you find the concepts and strategies as enlightening, as I have, such to the point that I wanted to share it with you, she is getting a 17 to one rate of return on this program compared with an industry average rate of return of about four to one. So if you've at all thought in the past that, you know what, I need to get better at networking, engaging with my past clients, my sphere of influence, so I become more top of mind. So you are the first person they think of when it comes to buying and selling real estate, getting alone, listen to the podcast. And if you like it, let us know, always email me info at mortgagemarketinginstitute.com and without further ado, let's bring on Liz Johnson. Hey, Liz, welcome to the show. Hi, thank you for having me. It is my pleasure and I wanted to have you on because you came by way of me from a mortgage loan officer who I happened to coach and she was telling me about your book, perk your sphere, how to reward those who reward you. So just to kind of set up our conversation, obviously, you know, through the intro, I established that you are a real estate agent and one who is highly successful, selling now about a hundred homes a year, but you know, I wanted to bring you on to talk about this concept because you have a unique approach to, you know, kind of farming and mining your sphere for referrals and to grow your business. But Liz, you weren't always a real estate agent, were you? No. You know, in your book, which I definitely recommend everybody get, called perk your sphere, we'll tell you how to get that, Amazon, of course, is one source. But you know, you've got two versions of your bio and I really like, well, I got to go with the fun one if you don't want. So you are a realtor, a cop's wife, a former cop yourself, combat veteran, thank you, mother, entrepreneur, amateur, chef, but I really like this one where it says, where was it here? A gay man trapped in a woman's body, Liz, should we talk? We could, like you said, like a man trapped in a woman's body and then some woman would be like, hey, I'm like, oh, no, no, no, I'm like a gay man, like I like other men. Very nice. So quite a long and winding road to get to, you know, you being a real estate agent, but how long have you actually been a realtor? Since 2004, so I'm into my 13th year now. And you are with Keller Williams? Yes. Great. Not always, I started with a different company from 2004 to 2007. Got it. And I like your website. Liz keeps it real, right? That's it. Yes, thank you. Yeah, Liz keeps it real.com. So for those who want to learn more about that, of course, we'll put links to all this in the show notes, how to get her book or website, all that stuff. So let's, let's start from how did you, you know, evolve to this and we'll unpack kind of the process. I highlighted a lot of stuff in your book, but was there an epiphany or was there just like you're banging your head against the wall one day going because I know you're talking your book. Okay, you don't like making, well, you say you hate making cold calls. Yeah. So take me on the journey of how you got to, you know, coming across, okay, there's got to be a better way. So when I first started in real estate, I got introduced to Bethany right away. And so I kind of implemented that program from the get go, like sending out something in the mail once a month and writing a handwritten note every now and then and, you know, trying to call and all that kind of stuff. And then I got introduced to Carol Williams with a 33 touch and I implemented that. And that had always worked pretty well for me kind of carrying me through the market crash. I mean, I didn't do anything phenomenal, but, you know, I closed here was about 16 homes that year or something like that. Maybe last, I don't know. You're first year, you close 16 homes? Oh, no, my first year I closed 14 homes, but I was also pleased to detect it at that time. And then anyway, so fast forward that I'm in maps coaching and my coach at the time had pointed out because I was cold calling and then much to my sugar and I did not like it. But I was cold calling and my coach had pointed out with how many I was closing and how many people I had on my database that I should never have had to cold call at all that I had enough people in my database if I was properly reaching out to them that I would have closed double what I closed without ever cold calling. And I was like, oh, okay, whatever. And then a colleague, competitor, friend of mine, he wanted to meet to go over because I do online farming too. He wanted my formula for that. So he's not that close to the competitor. So I said, sir, and I met with him and I told him the secret sauce. And then he goes, well, I have a little nugget for you, you know, to thank you for that. I've got something that I think, you know, you could rock. And he told me about this program and it just made my eyes glaze over because it was so complicated. And I was like, I'm not doing that. But it was the next day after that that I had this coaching call where my coach pointed out again, you know, like you're sucking at your database, what is wrong with you? You need to figure something out. And that's when the light bulb epiphany moment was like, okay, I just heard about this program. It was super complicated. But maybe if I actually listen this time, I can break it down and simplify it for me. I'll make it more, you know. And so I called my friend back up, Jeremy, I was like, okay, now I'm going to buy you lunch and you're going to tell me about your program and I promise not to glaze over. And yeah, and so I took notes and I decided what to keep and what to throw. And then I put it into practice. So that was I think in December or January of 2000, well, January 2014, I spent some time, you know, crafting a launch for it like an eight by eight and, you know, figuring out how to implement it. And so I launched it in March of 2014. Okay. So let's pause there. This came out of the your coach prodding you to get better ROI out of your database, your sphere of influence, which I think is a for those listening loan officers and agents. The like was something that we all can relate to. So summarize for us then what the program is, what's intended to do. Okay. Well, so even calling my database was a struggle for me because I, you know, it's easy to call the person who closed on the house they purchased through you a few months later to say, how's the house going? You know, did you ever, you know, redo the kitchen like you said or that kind of thing? I struggled with calling people like who's rental I had sold four years ago, like, hey, what's up? Because like, why are you going to call, right? Right. Like there's what do you, I mean, I guess it was self-serving people. Yeah, I just felt weird. And I know you're supposed to get over it and blah, blah, blah. And but this program, the way it's set up is there with the proper launch, which I discussed in the book. And I say, don't do this unless you're going to do a proper launch, but with the proper launch, you're setting them up to understand that because they have done business with you and referred you so many times that you are going to reward them because without them, you would not have a business and, you know, you're very thankful and grateful and blah, blah, blah. And so with that, then I do, I guess the summary of the program is I do a monthly giveaway and sometimes it's a thing and sometimes it's an event. Well, and before you go there, what I want to do is put this in the context of what this is intended to do is to keep you connected and engaged with your past database, your sphere of influence in a unique way that makes them feel special. And I like in your book, what you point out is this is not, hey, I'm going to send you a bunch of gifts for referrals. Right. Yeah, yeah. That cannot be your launch. You can't be like, I'm going to buy this stuff for you because I'm bribing you to get me referrals. And I want to highlight that because I think too often, and I know you've probably seen this, people just rush in and they want to get right to, oh, I get it. Sure, just, you know, referrals gifts, you know, no, no, that doesn't work because that's not, right? That's creating a culture. Exactly. And that's what I really want to highlight first as we get into this is you are creating something unique and special and you, if you don't feel, because I get from you that you do feel kind of, you know, connected, thankful, grateful, right, to your, to your members of your group, to your past clients, et cetera, that you do want to make them something feel special. It's not manufacturing. Oh, yeah. No, I really do. I mean, like, I was just in Mexico with my husband at a five diamond resort and like living the dream, literally, I, like, drunk of these months, and then I can have these days every now and then where I'm like, leaving this, the day spa in my neighborhood and getting into my Porsche, and I'm like, oh, shit, this is, this is my life, but this is, I can't really leave that. And so you're thankful to your clients and, oh, every day, every day, I think, you know, I'm not super religious, but I think God and I think people for, you know, believing in me and trusting in me with the biggest investment. You have an attitude of gratitude. Yes. I might not quite have a servant's heart, but I do have an attitude of gratitude. It's great. No, I really am. It's really genuine. I really am like, if it weren't for them, I would be not doing this. Sure. Okay. So let's bring it back, front and center. So your program is designed to create engagement and points of connection and make your, you know, the people that are members of this group to feel special and keep you top of mind as they're agent. Right. Yeah. Top of mind, either consciously through like, hey, you know, Becky, are you coming to tonight's paint night still, just, you know, calling to check in, I can't wait to see you, or even subconsciously where they got one of our giveaways, some of you mentioned this not too long ago. We did these bags that these women go nuts over, these 31 bags. I am not, this is the gay man trapped in a woman's body part. I don't get it, but they lose their minds over these bags. And we've given them away. And people are like, I think of you every time I pick up that bag, and they use it like further like work. Oh, cool. So people are listening and they're hearing like, you know, bags and gifts and some of the guys are like, all right, I'm out. Stay tuned, guys. Hang in there. I want to give. We're giving golf gifts certificate's way for Father's Day. Yeah. And there's, there's, there's like, there's like microbreweries and pubs involved in ourselves. We are growlers. That's right. That's right. There's something for everybody. So I wanted to put this in the context of, you know, the intent here is to create this referral-based business model. Oh, I know what it's going to say. The ROI you're getting on this is like, what, 15, 18 to one? Well, I put in the book 15 to one because how the book became the book was my new Maps coach. I took it like an 11 month break off coaching and then I decided to go with a different coach because I had a different set of issues. And she pointed out I was getting a 17 to one rate of return. So for everyone dollar, I spent, I was getting 17 back and she thought that was like phenomenal. I was like, oh, cool. And she goes, no, no, no. The goal in our industry is like three or four to one and you're getting 17 to one. So in the book, I said 15 because I didn't want to over promise the program so new that I don't know how long I don't, you know what I'm saying? I just wanted to be a little modest about it. The last check I did of it, you know, one to one. Right? Well, I don't. My biggest pet peeve, what you'll learn about me is my biggest pet peeve is people that over promise and under deliver. Yes. So I'm very careful not to do that. Right. Right. Well, and so I know I'm continuing to kind of set this up, but I think it's important because in a book, you quote, you know, Maya Angelou, who says, I've learned people will forget what you said, forget what you did, but we'll never forget how you made them feel. And you also talk about branding in there as well, which is near and dear to my heart. And so for those listening, I want you to think about this as I now have you unpacked kind of the mechanics of how this works, Liz, I want you listeners to think about those two things, the brand that you're building, the experience you're giving your customers your sphere of influence. This is on social media as well. You know, what type of feelings you create is that whole customer experience thing because that's what's going to allow you to stay top of mind, not that you necessarily shared a market update or something like that. But for people, people feel special. They feel involved. They belong to something, you know, that's unique and different. Okay. Enough set up there. I hope. So let's mechanically, I always talk to my wife. I say, look, but tell it to me like I'm a three year old. Okay. So I'm a guy. So let's make it simple. One of the mechanics of this, what do you, what do you call this thing? And I know there's different names for it, but you call it like, hey, it's the cool kids club. It's a private group community. Break it down for us. Yeah. Well, like I was sending somebody that gave me a referral and I said, I need your mailing address and your email address because I'm including you now in my perks program, membership club where you'll be entitled to exclusive deals and gifts and events. Hey, I hate, I don't want, you know what you talk about interrupting, but I'm going to keep interrupting. When do you have that conversation about, oh, I also have this right members club? It comes up all the time in different ways. Like, so I'll put teasers out on Facebook, just in my general Facebook, like, oh, look at us having fun at our MVP, paint night and people will comment, what was that? How come I didn't get an invite and I go, oh, because you've never given me a referral. I mean, I'll say it nice. Sure, sure. But do you make it part of your, like, listing presentation or something like that? Yes. It's a very small part of it, though. It's an afterthought when I'm kind of going over every, every pretty much one that move around. I'll kind of do that as some to close on. Like, so when you choose us, you'll become part of our MVP program and you'll also be elevated to all star status immediately when you sign the contract and that entitles you to, you know, blah, blah, blah. Right. You know, if anybody's ever chosen us specifically over that, but it's not so much that it wins you the deal. It's what happens after the transaction closes. Yeah. Yeah. If it wins us the deal, great. I mean, nobody's ever said, because like I asked, like, when I've competed on this thing, it's like, why did you choose us? And nobody's ever said, oh, because you have, you're going to give us Starbucks for six months or you're going to, like, it's never been now. Right. And by the way, let's get this out of the way, you know, the white elephant in the room for those listeners, the sectionate of respa, which I know you talk about in your book, but you've vetted this out quite extensively. Do you want to do you can comment on that? Um, I, because the haters will hate and they'll say things like you can't do that. You can't buy business and you're not buying business because you're not bottom line as respa is about a respa violation is rewarding a closing or a funding. So that's like, why we have to be careful with closing gifts, they can't be that expensive or they have to have the branding on them or whatever. This is rewarding the behavior. So like this girl, Justine, that I just told him your address, she, uh, Facebook message me saying, Hey, you got to get in touch with my friend, Jennifer. She wants to buy up here and sell her current house and I was like, okay, great. Um, as soon as I got in contact with Jennifer, Justine got her rewards. Now, if I bombed yesterday's appointment with Jennifer, then Justine still gets her rewards because she did her job. That was my fault. If I bombed the appointment, Jennifer was like, I don't like that Liz check. I'm going to use Rob or something. You're rewarding for a referral, not for closing transaction. Right. And I see a lot of agents making that mistake where they'll send a thank you card like the day they get the referral and then four months later, they'll send the referring person a gift for because it closed and they don't care if it closed or not. That's not their problem. That's not the intent. Right. Yeah. The intent is, Hey, you, you know, you're an awesome agent and I want to refer somebody to you that you might be able to help, whether they go with you or not, that's not a my control. Right. Okay. All right. Cool. So rest was down out of the way for those that are curious. Right. It's the bottom line is you cannot reward a closing or a funding. Right. So, so and you call it the MVP, which by the way, people that's not most valuable player, that's for your group Liz, that's most valuable partner. Yes. And what I like that you say in the book is that, you know, look at your market. And by the way, lenders can do this as well. And that's why I wanted to bring this on a few lenders listening. Number one, this is a great book for you to buy and share. Give it to your top 10 agents. Number one, first thing you should do, no doubt about it. Yes. And then have lunch with your agents. And second thing is start looking at how you can add this to your own business. But you, I love it because you talk about structuring the group, the types of gifts, the name of the group based on, right, your market. And you have some like examples of like high end luxury homes versus blue collar peeps. You want to talk about that? Yeah. Well, yeah, but also with your branding. So it doesn't necessarily have to be with the market of where you live or whatever. But like, I'm not really a sports girl, but most of my clientele is I calm blue collar with money. So they, you know, live in an upper end home, but they drive in F 350. Is that a pick up drug? Yeah. They're not driving their savings, but yeah, they're driving a Ford pickup, you know, a $75,000 Ford pickup. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was Raptors, yeah. Yeah, something, something, you know, crazy like that. But they're usually modest people that just they work hard and they've saved up money and you know, they're making good money. And, you know, I used to be a cop. So a lot of my database is that and they're manly men and even their women are manly. Yes. No. But do you know what I mean? Yes. So I'm not with a sports theme with all stars, MVP, and we also have winter circle. That I just started that when we were writing a book last year. Right. And so it's still kind of evolving. Okay. So you come up with a name for your group? Yeah. That matches your branding and that or matches your people. Sure. You know, if you're like in the book, I say if you're a luxury agent, maybe you have your, you know, group called the, you know, gems like with the diamond level and sapphire or whatever or something like that or. Yeah, but I like something, you know, the inner circle, right, or whatever, right, rewards. Yeah. Yeah. Lots of companies that you'd point out in the book do this as well. So Starbucks rewards programs, all that fun stuff. Yeah. All right. So we're getting a name for a group. And then so you're talking about a launch system that you go through because I think that's important when you're rolling this out here, and it starts with an actual, this, this little thing we call a paper physical letter. Right. This is now what's funny about this? Do you run into this? Do you ever talk to, well, I don't have the address, right, for my people. Right. You call them and you get it. It's really science right there. I always joke with people, you know, they're all, because you, it's funny. I could get this from you too. You're all like, well, you know, I want to put people on like this automated email, drip campaign and, you know, but I can't get my database in. I'm like, you know what's the best CRM in the world? The phone. Right. Pick it up. It's not. It's not rocket science people. Right. And here's the thing. Here's a good litmus test. If you don't feel comfortable calling them for their address, maybe they don't belong in your program. Exactly. Maybe they're not the people. Like I had 1,500 people in my database at the time we started this, and I started, and I only put 170 people in my cool kids club, my MVP program. So let's talk about that. What's the criteria? How do you decide? Well, to each their own, but my criteria was anyone who I've done business with and then like with an asterisk that I still liked and would want to do more business with, because we all have those people that when they close, it's, don't let the doorknob hit you where the good Lord split you. They did not make it into my club, but yeah, people I closed business with that I enjoyed. People that have referred me or people that even tried to use me, like maybe I listed their house during a bad time in the market or even a great time, but then they had to pull their house off the market because of life, you know, something happened. But somebody that they've shown some in some sort of way shape or form that I'm the realtor that they would use or refer to, like I think it was Bafini's mayor campaign, you know, am I the person that you would refer to a friend or a family, I can't remember the script, but you know what I'm saying? They've shown in some way that they would refer me or use me. Okay. So that's the criteria. Yeah, I've got good friends. I've good friends that I know that aren't in my program. Sure. Because they haven't, they don't refer me. Right. Which is fine. So we have, we create our list, we identify who the people that should be on it. You can start small. Maybe if you want to 25, 50, whatever's going to work for you or even 10, if you're like a brand new agent or lender or whatever, and you don't know that many people, you can just start with 10. You don't need to, you can say the first 10 people that answer up for this giveaway and you might have only bought two because you know, the odds that the, the ratio of people that don't answer up, they don't need to know that you don't know that many people. Yeah. Okay. So the letter, the introduction letter goes out. Uh-huh. Right. That's step one. And basically it just announces, what does it say? Does it say congratulations? You're selected or what does it do? Pretty much. I can't remember the exact verbage, but it was like, I want to invite you to be part of this program. I think there's an out in there like if this is something you're not interested in, you know, and I go into how there's no obligation, you don't need to do anything. This is a long overdue thank you for your business and all your referrals and stuff. Right. I like that language, by the way. Long overdue thank you. Yes. Well, it started out with, I think I've, like, I've done a crappy job staying in touch with you and, you know, giving you proper thank yous for your continued support referrals and I'm going to make it my business now to stay on top of these things and, you know, go out of my way to find you items of value and events that I think you and your family might enjoy and go again into there's no obligation, blah, blah, blah. It's just a value added service that I offer to my, right, select group of, of whatever you call, most valuable partners. Partners. Yeah. And then I sent an identical email out because some people, you know, mail gets lost or just throw it out or, you know, and then, but you have to do both because some people your email didn't go through, they changed jobs and I didn't have that email address. And then here's the kicker you have to call, but it's a great call to make. It's not, hey, do you know anybody that wants to buy or sell real estate? It's, hey, did you get the letter I sent in the mail or the email? I would say when I made those calls, it took a few days, when I made those calls, I want to say about 70% of the people were either, oh, I didn't open that yet or I saw something but I wasn't quite sure. So I put it aside. I saved your email, but I haven't read it yet. And then I got to explain it. A lot of people were really confused, even though I thought I wrote a beautiful letter, of course, but it gives you the opportunity to reinforce again that there's no obligation, you know, it's just. So I'm curious out of that, do you get people who opt out? You know, I had another agent that just implemented his system and he called me about that because what do you do? And it was a voicemail and I called him back, we played phone tag and never connected, but I couldn't remember. I know it was only three years ago, but it was, I think there was a couple of people that just said like email back like no thanks. And so I just didn't add them, but I didn't have any further conversation. Oh, why not? Do you hate me? Right. Like, whatever. Yeah. Don't take a personal move on. Yeah. I mean, a lot of people, and I mean, this is just on a side note, like how many people have we met and, you know, they go, oh, you know, my cousins are real-ter, I'm good. And then, you know, a year later, they're like, hey, can you come list my house? You know, like, what happened to your cousin? Yeah. So, yeah. Okay. So it happens where somebody's been, I've been somebody's real-ter. I had one family that I would have had them in Winner Circle because they did multiple deals with me, but now one of their close family members became an agent and they don't use me anymore. And I don't take it personally. You know, you got to support your family and whatever. Okay. And it is what it is. The fourth step in your kind of launch process is create some type of community around your program. And it looks like you typically create a closed Facebook group for that. Yeah. The important about that is that is not where the giveaways and stuff are announced. Right. I need people. I only do it through email. That's, I say, that's the number one question that pops up with my program that people email me or message me or whatever. Why not just Facebook? And the point of that is I want them subconsciously to have a happy feeling in their heart and mind when they see an email come in from me because it might not always be happy good stuff. I want them to see a market update or asking for business in some other way or something. So I want their subconscious to, when they see my name and the from line in their email that they go, oh, and not unsubscribe. Right. Like you say, you want them to get used to opening your emails. Do you see much activity then with the members on the Facebook group, like, you know, do they chat amongst themselves and everybody? No. No. I'll say, you know, if we're grading different parts of my program on a scale one to ten, I'm probably just like a four, a three or a four on my Facebook group. It's, I mostly use it like, hey, we've got a good one coming up. Remember tomorrow's the first or like April is like, it's not April Fool's joke. Check your email. Okay. So it's announcements about upcoming events and giveaways and stuff. Yeah, but I'll be mysterious about it. What I'm going to post though, like, we have this winter circle now, which is like the top 25, the 400 people give or take in the MVP program now, the top 25 are the ones that you see their names over and over again with referrals, like, they are your biggest raving fans. I'll probably put on that page, hey, winter circle people, save the date, July 21st, we're going to the Mariners terrace level again. Those are $150 tickets that I'm getting for $50 a piece. Yes. And you mentioned that in the book as well, right, so that you can often time to get great deals, pricing on different things, either because you're buying, right, in quantity or you're leveraging like Groupon and living social and things like that and maybe just kind of repackaging. Like I know one of the things you do is a paint night, which, by the way, guys, I've done that. And it's really just a great excuse to have some drinks and go out and paint. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's, it's a big hit. Everybody loves it. And it's fun as hell, man. You come back with the painting. Yeah, yeah, no, it's crazy. It's camaraderie. Like, no, I've got people in my group that are friends. Right. And their only commonality is that I'm their realtor. Interesting. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah, you're driving this social engagement. What's cool is you're taking it offline and taking it, um, taking it, yeah, offline, right from online. Yeah. Because I mean, face to face is always the best form of, you know, bonding and creating relationships. Yeah. So if I can be in a room for two hours, drinking and trying to paint, then that's awesome. It's just, yeah, you're creating an experience. It's fun and you're right, cutting connections and all that stuff. Um, what are some of the, um, you know, roadblocks or things people should be aware of that you ran into that you'd look back and go, ah, remember that learning lesson? Yeah. Well, I think the biggest learning lesson is there in the beginning, it's a little rough. Um, like that's been another question that's come up with people that have just launched this. Like, hey, you know, not people are really answering up. And I tell them it takes two or three, four months for them to get used to what's going on and get with the program. Okay. Um, and so then you asked for making those calls like once a month as well for those that are in the group. No, not really. Okay. I mean, I'll call like, because it creates engagements. So like, um, tomorrow's, I do my giveaway in the first. So tomorrow's June 1st, we're going to do June's giveaway. I'll blast the email out to all those people and then they either email me back or they'll text me or call me and say, hey, save me one of those. Put me down on the list if you're not out because I only buy so many things. I, they're not endless quantities. Um, and then that's why I say, okay, great. Um, do you want to come by my office this week? What day would you be by or do you want, do you want to meet up for coffee or for lunch? Um, oh, what about happy hour? Okay, I can do that on Thursday. Yeah, that's great. Let's go here. So then there's the conversation. Then there's even face to face time. Sometimes with things getting so busy, I haven't been able to get face to face. Like, for, uh, may we did, uh, Manny Petty gives certificates to one of the local nail salons. Missed that. Yeah. Right. Well, it's from other's day, treat mom, you know, or treat yourself if you're a mom. Sure. Anything. Um, and I stuck a deal there because I told the nail guy, the guy that owns a salon to go, nobody's really, I shouldn't say nobody, but somebody's either going to bring their daughter or their mom or their sister. And these are people that don't normally come here. So now you have an opportunity to get new clients. Absolutely. And so yeah, I got a good deal on that. But a couple of those I had to put in a mail just because our schedules couldn't meet up, you know, but we had a conversation. Right. That's the key in your one again, top of mind. And it's not all about, you know, hey, that's a great time to run. Right. No. And they'll even when people pick up their gifts, sometimes are like, oh my God, I owe you are referrals so bad. Yeah. It's been like eight months. And I'm like, I know, get on it. Yeah, right. Get on it. That's a key point. You don't mail them the gift, right? No. So I try to get gifts that are too big to mail because that's been like, that was my first thing. The first time I did a gift certificate or I was shoot, I'm not going to be down there anytime soon. Can you just stop in the mail? And I don't want to be like, no, the whole point of this is my program to get face to face with you. So I just did that. So I was hesitant. Mother's Day every year we've done something like jewelry that I got at a severe discount or whatever this year, I struggled with getting the many pennies because they're gift certificates and people would want them in the mail. But we did 15 of them and only three or four went in the mail. The other one's got picked up right to stop by people's houses because I was going out to that neighborhood anyway for something else and got it. Yeah. Do you with some of your events or do they involve children? Oh, yeah. Yeah, like not paint night, obviously. And we did a date night at a bar, right, so we didn't have kids there, but yeah, it's appropriate. Oh, photo shoot. Right. That's a good one. The family photo shoot. Hey, by the way, I was going to mention too. I don't know if you've ever seen this done where it's a, it's a doggie day photo shoot. Everybody bring your dog and get the fun crazy photos with your dog. Some people brought their dogs. There you go. Yeah. I'm like, bring whatever family you want. Yeah. And so again, to our point earlier about your brand and your market, it may be a bowling party, right? It may be a depending event, maybe I'm curious on just a real quick question on the date night. Yeah. How do people respond to that? Well, I only have done one and I keep wanting to do it again, but it's like there's so many other good things to do, but we did it in November of 2015 and because I've heard of like agents renting out movie theaters and you know, having people come like on that night for that movie. And that overwhelms me like that gives me severe anxiety. I think like, oh, my God, what if that's not a movie somebody wants to see? What if that's not a night that works, you know, so what we did was we bought, you know, the at Costco, you can buy the regal cinemas tickets, the two pack and they're discounted. So I bought a bunch of those. I, one of our local breweries, we struck a deal where any drink they got was five dollars. I got tickets. So when I only got charged by how many tickets got turned in. We had them meet us there at the bar to have a drink and they got their movie tickets with a little cute brochure. We made of all the movies playing across the street and the times. I assumed everybody was going to show up, maybe have one drink and then ditch and go to the movies. Nobody ever went to the movies, they all stayed and hung out and like made new friends. And I left because I was only there from six to eight and I let everybody keep having a good time, but they could use the movies any day they wanted and they could go see any movie they wanted, one of the slums that was at regal at any time. Yeah. So to me, that was less stressful and I'm also the girl that gets stressed out at the thought of one big client appreciation party that some of these agents do where they invite every single client ever to like a big venue. That I'm not saying I'll never do it. I'll probably do it at some point, but maybe after I get a prescription for Xanax or something, I'm just like that overwhelms me, but these little parties where people are volunteering that voluntarily saying yes, that's something I want to attend, like paint night or date night or whatever, that to me is more manageable. Yeah, so it's more or more manageable and the frequency as well probably helps instead of one thing. And different people. It's always different people. I shouldn't say always. I have some people that like all my events and want to partake, but sometimes the dates don't work and okay, well next time or you know, but I get to see a different group of people in a more intimate setting because it's not having you know, 400 people show up to some big hall I rented or whatever. And you know, of course, you have a progression upwards program right for your top tier players. Yeah. Winner's circle, like for example, and these are the people who are the most frequent or furs and you can kind of do the more exclusive engagements for them. Yeah. That's cool. Exactly. So, all right. And that's still a work in progress. Yeah, well, it always is, right? And it's like you said at the beginning of your book, which is this can't be or I'm going to try it out kind of thing. Oh, yeah, that's when your time out roadblocks are like, I wish I would have known. So and I started to say like it's a start. It's a little bit of a slow start to your database gets used to what's happening. The other thing is, is there is a lot of times where I just wanted to quit and not do it anymore because it's exhausting. I'm not going to lie because it's like, what are we going to give away next month? Oh, yeah, we're doing this. Well, they haven't, they haven't even shipped yet. What are we going to do? Oh crap. We can't just not do your giveaway that month. You told your people that you're going to do this every single month on the whatever of the months. I did the first one of the guys decided he's going to do the second Tuesday of the month because that will never be a holiday. And yeah, you just can't decide I'm too busy this month to figure out a gift or I'm too busy. Like, I don't want to do that event now. I don't feel good. Like the date night, I just had surgery. That's why I was only there from six to eight. That's all I was authorized to be out of bed for, but I had to rally. Yeah. Well, that's commitment. Well, yeah, I mean, but that's a thing like realtors, we have the worst reputations for being flakes. Lenders, I think you're more okay, but speaking of that, yeah, real quick of the lender. Now you've teamed up with your lender on some of these events, right? Yeah. Not a lot. Yeah, that's so much. Yeah. Well, this sounds terrible. I'm not, I'm not one of the, I don't have like one title company I use or one lender I use or I'm kind of all over the place. I like to match people up by personalities. I get it. You're a three-card agent. I am. I'm like all over, but you know, I just, I don't know. I'm not very loyal in that way. We need to change that. Don't say that on this podcast. I know. I'm sorry. I'm keeping it real. But no, it was like, it's just been a little awkward where like, like winter circle last year, one of my lenders that I love helped, you know, helped out with that. But I couldn't invite one of my lenders who is definitely winter circle. I do all his personal stuff. Like, I've listed his personal home and helped him ride it home because this other lenders they're spending money on and that would be so awkward. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let me ask you this. So what do you think for lenders listening, you know, if they got your book, if they read through it, if they just, let's just say all they did was introduce the concept, maybe even share this podcast with their agents. You as a top producing 100 plus homes a year agent, how would you respond to that coming from a lender versus what you normally say? Oh, I would think that's awesome. One of the things I do tell all my lenders, one of my lenders did, this is how he became one of my lenders. It was like the pimp move of all moves. He, he been trying to kind of get my business. I'm like, dude, don't ask me to go to coffee with, I don't have time to go to coffee. You know, we're Facebook friends and stuff and we used to banter all the time. And so one day he texts me, he goes, what are you doing tomorrow between one and three? And in my head, I'm like, I'm not going to coffee with this guy, Jesus. And I go, I don't know why. And he goes, I have a buyer for you. She's proved up to 250 and she's going to sit down with you for a buyer consultation any time tomorrow between one or three. So would one or two be better? And I'm like, huh, okay, two. And so I met at the office, she was there. We had a buyer consult in his conference room. Like he handed me a buyer on a silver platter. It wasn't like, oh, call this girl or, oh, I gave this girl your card. She should be calling it. Like he set the appointment and was there and it was kind of amazing. So it's referrals, it's leads. Yeah, I mean, he gave me a great lead and when that, and I said, I'm mad at him, it goes, why? I go, because now I got to like add you to my rolodex of lenders, because nope, I don't want any referrals to this closes. I want you to see for real that we're going to close on time and be in communication. I've only got like a minute left, but let me ask you that. So then did he keep sending you referrals? Yeah, he just gave one of my buyer's agents a referral yesterday, but we also have given him a lot of business. Yeah, yeah, of course. And we know it's never going to be even. It's always, realtors always have more referrals for the lender than the other way around. Sure. You know, you would agree with if it's all about adding value to you, right, in whatever form. If that's ideas like this and other resources, like if somebody had shared, you know, back in the day, you know, Bafini info for it with you, right, that helped you. Oh, wow. Yeah, actually the best way for a lender to handle this is to get in touch with their database, because my lenders that introduced me to Bafini, they gave me about five or six deals a year before they moved away because they would call their database and be like, Hey, how's the house working? I go, oh, well, Susan's pregnant with twins. We're going to have to sell this house and buy another one. I'm glad you called. So then they give me that listing referral, and possibly the buyer, but they were calling to see, you know, do you need to refide? Do you need to get a bigger house or downsize? And so because they were staying in touch with their database, they were able to give leads, not just to me, they were giving other agents five or six deals a year too. That's awesome. Cool. Well, listen, I know you're busy. And you've got more business to do. So once again, for those that are listening, lenders, share this podcast with your agents, get Liz's book, what's the best place to get your book? I'm Amazon and Kindle. Okay. So it's Perk, your sphere, how to reward those who reward you. The website if you want to check Liz out is, Liz keeps it real.com, correct? Yes. Yes. We have a Facebook group and Facebook page for the book as well, Perkish Fair Mastermind is the group. Where people collaborate and Perkish Sphere, rewarding blah, blah, blah is the Facebook page, where we'll announce events and stuff. Yeah. And I think what's great about this, hopefully, it sparks some creativity, some thinking. And you know, you customize it to your own preferences, but you know, take these ideas and run with them because, you know, 18-to-1 return helped you sell upward, you know, getting it to 100 homes a year and stuff, clearly it has made a big impact for you. Yes, for sure. I don't cold call. Beautiful. Well, listen, listeners, thanks for tuning in for this week's episode. As always, we appreciate you. If you haven't subscribed yet, please do so. Leave your comments, ratings, five star would be nice if you feel we're up to it. And once again, I appreciate you guys, Liz, thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me. You bet. Everybody take care. We'll see you on the next one. Bye for now. Thanks for listening to Mortgage Marketing Radio. One more truth in mortgage marketing, get more free training and resources at Mortgage MarketingInstitute.com. 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 if that you're in a place in your business where you simply need more purchased loans, you need to fill your pipeline with purchased business. Just face it, agents are still a solid pillar of business and sources of purchase business for you. Well, good news. 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