Secrets to Building Your Personal Brand on Social Media with Arjun Dhingra

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Go check it out right now. Visit LOKestudy.com and download your free copy today. Hey, listeners, what's up? It's Jeff. It's them for welcome to the latest episode of mortgage marketing radio podcast. Are you doing well? How is 2021 treating you so far? How are you treating 2021? Are you staying on track? Are you on target? I hope so. I'd love to see you guys join us in the Facebook group for the podcast. You can go to Facebook, type in mortgage marketing radio. And that's where you can find our private group, just for podcast listeners and relevant industry providers and thought leaders, if you will. And I'd love to see you in there. Just to number one, to check in, say hello. And number two, we've got some really cool things planned to help you guys in the new year, with certain skills that you want to learn, certain technology you want to adapt and put and consider putting in your business. Some best practices. We're going to be doing some lives in there. So featuring some special guests and stuff. So it's just another place, I think, if you're looking to go deeper or continue the conversation from here from the podcast, go check that out. Facebook, as a matter of fact, URL, I'll bet you, if I type it in, Facebook.com, I'm doing this real-time live. It's been a while since I tried this. Oh, so go to Facebook and search for mortgage marketing radio. And you will be presented with, if you're not yet a member, be presented with a couple of questions. And once you've successfully answered those questions, you can join, by the way, the URL I was looking for, it's facebook.com slash groups slash mortgage marketing radio. We'll put it in the show notes to make it easy to click. I was tough to get through, huh? All right. So my special guest today, somebody who I've been admiring from a distance, not only because he's a fine handsome young man, but also because his content is off the hook, off the shizzle. That's right. I'm talking about Arjun Dingra, who is in San Francisco Bay area. His brother was previously on this podcast, Neil. You may have heard of him. You may follow Neil. I suggest you do as well. But really dig Arjun in terms of what he's done, and regarding a personal brand. And some of the pivots and shifts he's made, both pre and post COVID. One of the things you'll hear him talk about, and I know you guys probably face this as much as any of us do, and that is this is being put into a commodity. And what you'll hear is Arjun talk about up in that Bay area, by the way, if you're not aware of the Bay area of California, hyper, hyper competitive, one of the most competitive markets in the entire country for real estate mortgage. And his point was he was, he was noticing the consistent trend towards being commoditized and simply having to deal with the, what's your rate question? And it's a question we all face, but I would argue that they up in the Bay area are probably a little bit more persistent, indignant, if you will, about asking that question and trying to lead the conversation, especially when you get some Silicon Valley, you know, execs or, you know, engineer types, you know, that are making a lot of money and all this kind of stuff they feel like, you know, they have the power. But what Arjun has been able to do is create a personal brand that changes the conversation, changes the positioning for him, changes how people see him through his content that he's provided so that he can minimize and mitigate and reduce people wanting to engage on a price conversation, instead they're engaging on an advice conversation. And that has led to some pretty significant success for Arjun and his branch and his team and his company and all that up there. So if you don't yet follow him, I strongly encourage you to follow him. We're going to put a link to his Instagram profile in the show notes, get this. He has 132,000 followers on Instagram. That's right, 132,000. That is deserves another, that deserves a James Brown right there. That's incredible. So you can hear about how he did that, what his strategy was around that, how he engages, how he's built a network of real estate agents and consumers to follow him. We're going to break down his number of sources of business, his structure for creating content, recording and putting, putting it out there and being able to manage all that as well as running a busy mortgage practice. And I think to take away from this conversation, if you're looking to level up your social media game, get a little bit more understanding about a personal brand, what it means and how you can identify what yours is, this would be the conversation for you. And then of course, before we close out, once again, it's no surprise whenever I interview top producers, they at some point in the conversation talk about helping agents, educating agents to create a differentiation for you as a loan officer. And one of the ways our June does it is through content, video content, educational classes, events, moving his content for teaching agents online, right, to a virtual setting like a Zoom or whatnot. And so here's the thing guys, have you heard by now? You know that I help you do that. We have an entire educational platform, a library of turnkey done for you classes that are zoom friendly, ready to go with all the relevant assets to help you promote it on social media. Facebook image, the Instagram image, the Instagram story image. We are giving you the emails. We're giving you the talking points, the PowerPoints, the speaker notes, the handouts, the giveaways, the transcript, a video tutorial of me, right, train the trainer showing you how to teach this class over Zoom. I mean, what's your excuse? Want to go check it out? Do so. Go to mortgagemarketing.pro where you can learn more. Watch a brief video I put up and you decide if it's for you or not. Question is, how are you going to consistently get in front of agents in that value, right? That's where I can help you. All right, so without further ado, let's get into this week's show. Are you going to welcome to the show? Hey, brother, thanks for having me on, man. Long time coming, man. I should have had you on sooner. Yeah, for sure. It's all right, man. I mean, you've had, you've had my brother on in a number of other good friends. So I've been a big fan of the podcast from my father. Your brother, he just, he just wore me down. He begged me. He's like, no, I'm just kidding. He didn't. He can be persistent. So, so what are the odds of that? You and your brother, Neil, for those listening, both in the mortgage business, I mean, was that just by chance? Kind of, I mean, you know, we, we fell into the bit, the industry kind of by accident, you know, in a hot market in 2001, 2002, right around the time, we were all getting ready to leave college. Yeah. And I had some friends that were from Las Vegas, we were all up in Reno, myself, my brother and another partner who joined us initially. And some friends that were in the industry down in Vegas and these guys were doing really well. And this was before the last big run up in the market. And we all got and got curious, we're kind of helping them a little bit from afar, you know, doing some like legwork and getting paid per application and picking up paperwork and hand sign 1003s. I mean, this is, I'm really myself here, but we just kind of decided, you know what, let's, see if we can do this all on our own. And that was, when it was very easy to open up an office and become fully licensed, you know, a fax machine was involved in one piece of paper and the secretary of state was on the other end and the rest was history. So we did that. We did that and started an office all together, kind of all operating in different lanes. The three of us as partners, but yeah, it was, I guess the odds were not, not high for that kind of an outcome, but that's the way, that's the way it went down. Well, wasn't that also the competition, I might be wrong on this, less at that time, or are there less people chasing the same business? Totally. There were, but it quickly flooded because the barrier to entry was next to nothing. Yeah. With real estate on, you know, on the brokerage side as well as the lending side. So there were brokers popping up right left and center. It was clearly a hot sector that was carrying the economy, almost too hot from the get-go. But yeah, it, you know, it initially might have felt like there was in a lot, but that quickly changed and we felt competition on all ends and everyone thought it from each other. Yeah. That's, that's very interesting. It's similar to like, you know, everybody knows you never, you don't wake up and say I want to be a loan officer, but it was similar past to me. We were talking before we hit record my previous, you know, background doing presentations for Tony Robbins. Yeah. And I had to stop traveling on the road and stuff. I, you know, had to make a decision. What was I going to do? Right? Obviously, I wanted to be in sales and one of this like upside of income. And, you know, I was just looking at, hmm, mortgage and real estate. And of course, I knew real estate and, you know, the usual emotional attachments that comes with like when you bring up real estate agents, right? We know it's a mixed bag. There's good bad enough. But with the loan officers, the one thing that always struck me, I was like, year after year, we go back to these offices and I'm like, man, these guys were just making money. Yeah. Over and over again. And I'm like, year after year after year. And so that for me was the genesis to why I got in the industry originally. But you are doing some pretty amazing things from what I can tell on social media, man. I've been following you for a long time. Your contents off the hook. Thank you. So give us a sense of here we are recording this. We are January 2021. What did last year look like for you for units and volume? And by the way, you should tell people where you're at as well. Yeah. So I'm part of a team essentially with, you know, with others. I mean, I do my own production out here, but really is more based around sales and business development. So it's hard to pinpoint an exact number in terms of units and volume because we're actually telling that now since some of it feeds to different teams. But, you know, I've been in the industry for 20 years, you know, talking about where I came from and how we all formed our little partnership myself, my brother and, uh, and another partner. But I've been in the Bay Area market because I came out here maybe about two or three years into our, into our, you know, launch of our, of our, you know, partnership to expand our office and, and our reach and presence. And I'd wanted to, you know, move to the city. So I moved to San Francisco around that time and I would go back and forth between both markets. But I've been in the, in the Bay Area market now for about 17 years on and off, dominantly working with either first time buyers, entry level buyers, uh, or individuals that are just finally looking to crack the market. Um, but that's my, uh, that's my space and, you know, and, and who I've been, who I've been primarily catering to. So you're out there sourcing business for yourself, for your team, both, yeah, both both, yeah, um, but, you know, that's a very competitive market out here. And, you know, 2020 was a very interesting year in terms of what it's, what it showed everyone that, you know, there's been all this talk and your podcast has obviously had so many people that have been preaching the same thing. There's a very similar undercurrent, which is that, you know, you've got to have a brand, you've got to be putting out something that's personable, that's authentic, that's relatable, that's going to reach people at scale as opposed to just kind of sitting back and letting this go by as some kind of phase that you're maybe just, you know, not comfortable with or you're like, ah, it'll pass, you know, that everyone trying to do stuff online, that's not really a big deal and it's still going to come down to hosting open houses and knocking on doors and networking the old fashioned way, which sure there's a time and place for, but if 2020 taught everybody anything, it was that you can't be silent online anymore. You know, if you didn't have a brand or something that was running for you or had some, some legs behind it, you got really stuck and you're scratching your head wondering how am I going to get around this? But you noticed others who were online and who were voicing their, you know, voicing their business and putting things out that they didn't miss a beat. If anything, 2020 was a year of exponential growth in terms of volume and transactions and relationships created and forged and same in the lending space as well. So I think that's, that was the big takeaway from last year and we're obviously just going to continue doing more of it here into 2021 and beyond. Yeah, it's a good point and reminds me of some of the classes that I was teaching last year, particularly during the height of like the lockdowns and all that stuff, which was basically beating that drum of, you know, how everybody has an excuse of why they haven't done the pivot, if you will, of like getting on social or using video or whatever. And so the point of that was, I think what you're trying to illustrate is that's the only choice we had. All you had was your mobile phone or your computer, you don't, you couldn't be people face to face anymore. So the, to your point, it's like survival of the fittest is, is not the whole truth. It's survival of the most adaptable. Those are actually when and so the question I think we're, we're leading to here is have you adapted because I'm sure you're seeing everybody listening to this right now or watching some of the changes that happened because of COVID aren't necessarily going away, you know what I mean? In terms of expectation for the ability to connect with people online virtually to look at a tour 10 homes virtually instead of in person, you know, the whole digitization of the mortgage per all that kind of stuff, it's accelerating all because of COVID. Mm-hmm. In every industry, right? I think you look at the medical field. How many, you know, initial consults did they start doing now online and virtually that's not going to change? Why would you ever go back into a doctor's office for an initial consult or a chat like this when we could just sit at home and do it? A doctor can now knock out 10, 20 of these in a day versus having people physically come in and fill out all that paperwork and then sit there just an conversation that we could have had digitally. And I'll tell you what, now here's a real world example of that, that, that, you know, this, this concept of being a fading winner. I lifted that from Tom Ferry, but the point he's making is people are still winning to a degree, right? These fading winners, meaning you've been around the business long time, you're still, you're great at dealing with people, you just haven't have a nice customer database. So you're still kind of winning, but you're fading away because you're seeing a relevancy every year that goes by that you don't adapt your communication style to the preference of people, right? And the great example I have for that is speaking of the medical field, I was researching a couple of different clinics here for a, a treatment, if you will, and I, you know, was communicating with these folks on Facebook, on their Facebook messenger, right? And I'm asking you about their treatment and dosages and all this kind of stuff. And they, and I said, well, can I just do a phone consult? And they're like, we don't do phone consults. I'm like, what? I'm just chatting with you on messenger, you know? Yeah. Right. But immediately it's just like, well, I'll find another place that does because why do I need to drive 20 minutes of cross down, sitting at doctor's office for an hour, just to go through the same list of BS, they're going to ask me where it could be done over, over a zoom, you know what I mean? So to your point, I mean, there's some things that have happened in the wake of COVID that just aren't going to change because, you know, every, either the, the industries or the businesses or the people themselves individually have recognized that we can, we can scale now, you know, using some of these technologies and these platforms. And these are more efficient ways to operate. So when did you, and we're going to dig a little bit deeper into your social and some of the content you're putting out there? But when did you, you know, recognize and really get on board with, you know, the content that you're putting out on social because your Instagram is on fire, man, and then we're going to put links to all your stuff in the show notes. But when did that happen? So it, I always had a, a presence on social media, but it was never one that was actually featuring or pushing a personal brand and tying it back to business. I like everyone else had a, you know, a Facebook page that I kept in touch with college buddies on and, you know, would, you know, try and date through or, you know, connect with people. And I have a martial arts background that's international. So a lot of the, you know, guys that I would compete against and coach with and the friends that I have in various countries that it made the world a lot smaller. And then having a LinkedIn presence was just something you had to have as any kind of professional. It's kind of like a website. You have to have it or you don't or if you don't, it's a little bit odd now and you're kind of a dinosaur that way. So I had presence in all these areas, but I never really fully connected it with my, with my professional life. It was very personal and it spoke to me. It spoke to only the personal sides of me, you know, what I do in my personal time, my martial arts background in coaching and formally competing and then also with my family. And that was it. And about two years ago, my brother who basically had no social presence jumped in and basically did what everyone's doing now, but he skipped all the BS that the rest of us spent 20 years having a presence with and he just put it all together. And that was really inspiring, but he and I attended a Gary Vaynerchuk conference who Neil ended up landing a collaboration with there. I was at conference. Were you at that one? When he addressed Gary from the stage? Yeah. In 2021, yeah. So we went, we were there at that one in Miami and then, and then that was it. You know, we just kind of recognize that we need to be, this is where we have to be. And this is where we're going to scale. This is where we're going to really leverage because we both had felt I especially being in the barrier market, which is super competitive that I had become absolutely commoditized. You know, categorically commoditized, I mean, that was it. And people were only seeking me out and asking me, what's your rate? And that's it. I knew nothing else about me, all of which I knew were far better and more redeeming qualities than an interest rate, but I only knew that. No one in my audience knew that at all. So I went through some iterations. I went through some exercises I worked with a branding company to develop what actually is a personal brand. I went through that exercise, which is a process in and of itself. You just don't all of a sudden wake up and start putting out content because you can't do that, but it's very obvious when you're doing that. So I wanted to have something behind it and have it be a lot more intentional and strategic. And that's what I've been doing, and it's a constant evolution, of course, we're still doing. And how long ago did you make that shift to have a brand and start putting out content that connects to your brand and, you know, how long? Probably two and a half, almost three years ago now, I'd say, it's been. Right. And what changes can you report that have happened relevant to the, hey, what's your rate? How's it now versus before? Well, and this kind of ties also into the question that a lot of people ask if they're contemplating whether or not to have an online presence is what's the ROI on that? What, you know, bottom line, what is it going to do for me, which is the wrong way to approach it? You'll just only be left disappointed that way. So for me, I actually, instead of focusing on the end game, it really helped shore up the middle, which was solidifying relationships. It helped cement my reputation in a lot of circles. It helped me leverage and network. So the relationships that I had with either past clients, future clients, prospects, you know, rather than me telling you, till I'm blue in the face, what is good about me and why you need to work with me, I just needed to show it and I needed to be able to tell it in the form of either a story or some form of content or some type of, you know, some type of a writing, whatever it might be in copy, whatever it could be, and show that and it would end up solidifying relationships that I had because rather than telling people about it, they would see it. And then it would add instant credibility. It would cement the relationship. It would further my posture, you know, along in those, in those, in those dynamics, whether it was with a real estate agent or a client. And so that's where really the dividends kind of really came in. It opened a lot of doors. And then I found that in networking this way, as opposed to physically networking, which I've always been a big fan of and there will always be an element of even post-COVID, whatever form that might be. But I can shake hundreds of not thousands of digital hands, being online as opposed to, you know, trying to actually physically do it by attending this luncheon and that luncheon and hosting an event, which all of which are fine and great. You should have an element of that in your mix, but this was just really where I could scale up. So that's where I've seen the return. That's where I've seen. And of course, it's resulted in net, you know, in some gains bottom line here, net net. Who is, I'm on your Instagram looking at some of the posts and the, you know, the content of those posts. Who is your content on Instagram, ideally targeting or attempting to grab interest from? So that's a great question tonight. And I'm very clear about this and I sometimes talk about it, whether it's in my stories or all alluded to it. I've got two audiences I speak to and my content goes towards one lane or the other. One is the real estate community, agents, brokers, people within this space, investors to talk about either how I'm doing, how I basically affords the brand online and how they can also do it as well, talking about current market trends, updates, things that are actually relevant to that audience. And then more importantly, the other audience that I speak to is the consumer audience. The people that I want to actually connect with and help and assist. And that's really where I'm most passionate about. So it's preaching financial literacy. It's helping people make better money decisions as a debt manager around mortgages. And not just exchanging paperwork for rates, but really bringing about a more holistic approach to it. And so those are my two audiences that I'm speaking to online. And on the same profile, right? Yes, on the same profile. So have you ever heard this or thought this is like, because I'm wondering some people probably would think that to combine content for the two, you would think that the content would be vastly different for the two audiences. And how do not? Because there's always going to be a, oh, sorry, go ahead. How do you keep both interested, you know, and I mean, if you're, if you're riding the realtor lane and the consumer lane, because your content for realtors, you know, obviously in some cases may not be of interest to a consumer. Sure. I try and create some relevance, even if it's a small amount back to it in terms of why I feel it's important to speak to consumers in a certain way. And that'll maybe be a message or a piece of content, you know, aim that a real estate agent. But a consumer could see that and also see, well, that might actually be very helpful for me in helping choose a realtor or the types of real estate professionals that I align with. You know, are they speaking this type of a language? So there's always a tie, but, you know, oftentimes the content is clear cut for one audience or the other, but it still always, it still all falls under financial literacy, marketing, real estate related type of information, you know, under that umbrella at the end of the day. More importantly, it helps me keep things dynamic. So I'm not saying the same things and preaching the same type of message. It gives me the opportunity to kind of keep my audience on its toes and also me to stay on my toes and in coming up with stuff that's relevant and helpful and useful to both of those audiences. Do you notice a trend, I assume you look at some of your analytics in terms of you counts and things like that engagement, do you notice a trend in terms of is there a type of content or a topic or topics that seem to have gotten the most attention? Definitely. Anytime I include my daughter, who is almost two years old because she's adorable, and I'm just, of course I'm saying that because I'm, yes, I will vouch for that. She certainly is. So if I include her in any piece of content, the engagement is through the roof. You know, it just, and it trends better in Instagram since it seems to like it. So they push it out as does Facebook. But really, I think if it's, sometimes it's hit or miss, you just don't know, but I've found that information, obviously the visual pieces that include her, of course, tend to do well. Well, your photography is amazing, by the way. Oh, thanks. It's a preset. So, you know, just for people out there, you don't have to have the most fancy camera and the most fancy crew to do stuff. It could be any picture that's taken, but if you've got a good preset on it and you can, you know, put some touches, I call it Cologne. You just put good, good Cologne on it. It'll smell good, you know. It's a preset on your camera, your phone, what? I just use the, I use a silver preset through Lightroom, yeah, then anybody can have access to it. Yep. Well, it's funny because I'm just looking at, to your point, about this picture is with family or personal stuff. I mean, one of those almost 6,000, you know, views or, love, sorry, likes of that, videos get, get really good views as well, like you've got this one video, Arjun versus Big Banks. So I suppose that's a conversation of why an independent lender versus a Big Bank. Yep. No, so that particular piece of content, it was kind of aimed specifically at my market because this is a very big bank market. So whether it's brokers or direct lenders work a little bit more independently, who have a little bit more space to be creative, they tend to get drowned out by the large banks because agents here, you know, some of them have Big Bank Syndrome where they just like their clients being affiliated with a bank. It's part of their brand and that panache, if you will. But I try and crack that because there are a lot of strategic advantages to working with me as opposed to a large bank, especially in the wake of COVID, considering how selective they've become of a client they choose to work with. So really, it's about, you know, going back to the pre-set and whatever, it's applied to all the piece of content because I wanted a certain consistency in the aesthetic and the feel and the theme, despite the different types of content that I put out, I wanted a certain feel to it. So, you know, much like an interior designer would say, like a certain feel, the emotion that's elicited when you walk into a home that's had a professional touch, I wanted the same type of feel with my feet. So you instantly recognize it as you, yeah, definitely are achieving that. Are you posting your own content? I am, yeah. So I work with a branding specialist in an actual agency, they actually implement the execution of it. The content strategy itself is on me, the themes are on me, you know, what we're going to do, which audience we're speaking to, the copy that's written, and of course, the response to every single DM or comment that's always done by me, they actually just handle the physical posting and the editing of the pieces because they'll edit all my video content as well, but I'll have them slap on the pre-set and make sure everything fits. And I really outsource this. I'm not outsourcing my actual content strategy, you know, or the actual content creation itself. That's what takes the longest. Yeah, it is. And that's just something that's not, some people are able to do it, you know, my brother, for example, who's a master, I don't know how he does it with as busy as he is in running our branch and the boring that he puts through, he does all of his own posting and editing, which I would now, I don't have the capacity for that. So I just outsourced it, but I've got a great company that I've worked with now for two plus years and they do a good job and that's what they're good at, you know, you want to move the things that other people are good at off your plate and allow them to help. Yeah. Should I put you on the spot and ask who that company is? Yeah, absolutely. I didn't know if I was allowed to throw them a shout out here, but a brand T-Jick up in Seattle. And to talk, to speak of the power of social media, I found the CEO of that company, Young Guy, super, super go getter, and I just liked his vibe, but he had posted a video vlog of vlog itself on mortgage reports, which is a blog that I subscribe to and I saw it and I reached, and he was talking about an actual mortgage concept and I said, who's this guy talking about mortgages? So I looked him up, I found him on Instagram, I wrote him a direct message and I saw that he coached people in the space of social media and this was over two years ago. He wrote me back right away and the next thing I knew we were friends and I was working with his company and he's come down to San Francisco quite a bit. I've met him up in Seattle and we collaborate on a number of ideas and he's had me on a guest panel up there and I've had him on one down here for marketing. Yeah, it just shows you how small the world becomes when you actually tap into a lot of these platforms and use them because people are a lot more collaborative than you think. People will know how you and I got connected here, right? It's a small world that way. What's your content planning or postings or creative schedule? Because I very well know and I'm sure you can relate to this that sometimes it's hard to figure out what to post and then to do it consistently. So how do you structure that into your plan like a week or a month? Definitely. You have to be intentional about it because as you said, you can find yourself like with writer's block or creativity block or posting block like what are we going to talk about this week? So you have to set aside the time. You have to treat it like it's an actual facet of your business instead of just this thing that you'll get around to if you have time because that'll show up in the content you put out or actually not put out and you can tell that if somebody's just not consistent with it. That's the time that set aside, generally Sunday evenings or first thing on Monday morning, we're all actually collaborate with Brandtijik, we get on the phone. We kind of set a theme for the week based on what's going on and you have to, again, this is part of being intentional. We look at what's happening in the news, what's happening in the macro markets here that people want to hear about or they want to get feedback on it, they want information on not just what I think is important. I have to reverse engineer the content to meet what is a consumer most curious about or what is a real estate agent most curious about given the times that we're in. By setting that theme for the week and knowing which audience we kind of want to speak to, I've got to set schedule of our sequence of video photo and then some type of quote or inspirational meme, if you will, that ties back to real estate but is a little bit more personal to me. I never do the same thing two times in a row. You'll notice that if you look at my feed, it alternates every single time. If you scroll from top to bottom, each one of those three lanes will have the same form of content in it, whether it's a picture or a meme or a video. So I don't see it from that and I do that one because it keeps me honest with having to be creative and not do the same type of content two times in a row. But it also keeps my audience on their toes and I find that it can be a little bit more refreshing in dynamic as opposed to drowning out my content because, oh, you know, here's this guy posting the same type of picture again or the same type of content or the same type of video over and over again. So it just helps to mix things up and, again, keep things more dynamic. Yeah, yeah, very interesting. And in terms of the photography, how often do you do like, you know, batch photos where you'll book out two, three hours of the photographer? Exactly. That's it. I think you got to be conscious of your own time right and be realistic. It's not something that you can do every month. So if you block out a session, even there's so many good local photographers and video photographers in everyone's market now that are looking for work. And it's a hot space now because I know everyone's trying to get online and do similar work here regardless of what industry does. So I'll book out, I've got a photographer go to that I use here in the city and I'll book out a day, you know, once a quarter and we'll just go outside and shoot or shoot at a specific place. I'll bring a number of changes of outfits. So it looks like we did several shoots and I'll just create as much of a block of photography that we've got that I can pull and use for various, various platforms, various pieces of marketing. What have you? Same thing on the video front as well. Yeah. What's your number one source of business? I would definitely say it's from my past, my past clients because obviously, you know, you've hoped to have created or you would have hoped to have created a book of business or, you know, a database of clients that you've assisted over the last 20 years. So really it's going back to people that I've served in the past and being very intentional about coming up with solutions that can help them. So in a lot of the content, I refer to myself as a debt manager similar to a wealth manager. So I'm helping people manage and be very intentional and strategic about their debt. So a wealth manager, we all have got one whether they're managing our retirement accounts or it's money that we've got set aside, they check in with you. And I think that's kind of a lost art in our space because everyone is so transactional and moving quickly. Yeah. Do you actually characterize yourself as a debt manager when talking to people? I absolutely do. Like, and I tell them, you've got your wealth manager that manages your money and you need a debt manager that helps you manage this debt or be intentional about your other debts and using this debt to kind of help either wipe those out, consolidate whatever it might be. So there's always an opportunity when it comes to a mortgage because a mortgage is a weapon and at the start of COVID, I started putting out content that said that, use your mortgage as a weapon to go on offense here against COVID and take control of your own financial future as opposed to waiting for whatever form of, you know, assistance or help may be coming down the road. And you're still employed and you can still qualify, you can, you can do some things to set yourself up to write out the storm because the average homeowner was sitting on, and still is sitting on so much equity nationally, that, and that money's just sitting there doing nothing. So if you're needing any locks, so you have cash reserves, if you need it, yeah, whether it's pulling out money to just have a cash reserve or it's wiping out debt that you don't want to have hanging around now, you just want to simplify, you know, get your financial house in order, so to speak, was a big theme that I used months ago, but those opportunities are always there. So to type back to your original question, you're like, that's where a lot of my business comes from. It's helping pass clients with opportunities in a market that's quickly appreciating and moving very fast. So how do you cultivate that? What's a couple of ways you stay in front of them? Like email, calls, anniversaries, home, yeah, all those touch points and everyone, you know, anyone that's in the lending spaces inundated with all forms of platforms and technologies that can help, but, you know, using agent legend, that's a, that's a platform I use for texting and emailing and dropping a note to clients at various key points or, you know, certain timeline or certain benchmarks within the timeline. And then of course, just general outreach, you know, I'll set calendar alerts for myself despite how much volume we may or may not be doing that, you know, I need to make these calls, I need to still make these emails and still keep up that personal touch or a direct message via Instagram to certain people at key moments and, and just keep it very personal still so that it's not as automated as possible. Are you doing any paid traffic ads, is that kind of stuff? No, other than the occasional boost to my, my current content, you know, just to get it out in front of more people for it's a relevant amount, I did start employing. So we're, we're starting here in 2021, so more Facebook ads themselves to reach current home owners as well as prospective home buyers in the market would be just because there's so many people on there and I've heard about great success with it. So I'm trying that out now, but it's been primarily just touching my own networks, my own circles and spheres of influence and then of course, past clients. Dude, I just looked at this number, I didn't realize this, you had a 132,000 followers on Instagram? Yeah, I didn't realize that's where it's at now, but yes. That might be the biggest number I've known for somebody in the mortgage space. Well, you know, it's not, I mean, don't throw me too many kudos there, you know, a lot of it is through a lot of collaborations, I know that's still that's huge. And you know, shout out campaigns and whatnot, but there's ways to grow audiences. But you know, the size of the audiences is the most important thing. I tell anyone who's, you know, looking to start like, do I need tens of thousands? No, you could have 500, you know, an audience of 500, but if there are 500 people that you're reaching and you're genuinely connecting with and you're providing them with immense value in the way of the information you pass, but that's time will serve. So size of the audience, not so much important, but really just what you're actually putting out engagement. And you get that. How many hours would you say, give me a break down on how you structure your time engaged on social media? Because I know you know the game. It's all about, you know, commenting, engaging, liking, not posting, ghosting. So what is your day or your week look like to manage your presence there? So I've got, you know, my mornings are generally intentional about what we're doing that day. Obviously, there's my beginning of the week meeting that kind of sets the theme for the week in which audience, as we want to speak to, what type of relevant information or market data that, you know, needs to be highlighted or touched on. Every evening, from then on out, I'll definitely try and spend at least an hour whether it's one platform, Facebook, LinkedIn or Instagram and try and mix it up. Just seeking out stuff that I genuinely want to comment on or, you know, throw some gratitude behind whatever it might be, not just liking, but actually writing something because it's genuine. It's sincere. It's not so generic, but I will put in about an hour every evening doing that and that's something you can kind of, I hate using the word multitasking because I feel it's so overused and it actually now, if anything, COVID has taught us, it's not really real. You can't multitask, but nothing really gets done with it. But I will multitask while doing something, whether I'm, my mind's turned off watching a little TV or catching a game, you know, over these last several months now that sports is back and I'm a big sports fan in general. So I'll do that, you know, and spend my time there. But every day, after that beginning of the week meeting, I will spend some time, probably 30 minutes to an hour, which is what I can afford now in the constraints of my business. Being intentional about seeking out more information, you know, and learning from others. I'll try and absorb more content from other people in my space, other peers, colleagues, people I respect, see what are they, who are they speaking to, what sort of message are they coming across with, is it tone deaf or not, and try and learn from others, and then use that, you know, within my own strategy because it's not just about what we're doing, but you can, you can learn so much from what others are doing and doing well with. Oh, sure. Yeah, that's why you make sense to follow people who are doing good stuff. Yeah. All right. So you said your normal and source of business is past clients. What's, what's the next order there? I mean, it's, it's definitely my social presence now. The real estate agent community and the relationships I've been able to kind of crack into and turn into something that's actually, you know, a relationship where we're actually going to conduct business or transact together has really, really exploded in the last year. So whether it's from the events that I put on and then having the presence and then also, you know, commenting, engaging and helping prop up their content and really being collaborative and, you know, being everyone's being a fan of everyone and back and forth. That way, agent relationships have really broken down and, you know, that's helped me create more, more business in that space than I did, you know, being able to physically network to be honest with you over previous years. So I want to unpack that a little bit for people who can't necessarily connect the dots. How do you get agent relationships and business in your case? Let's just use Instagram. How has that evolved for you? So you don't want to necessarily feel like you have to reinvent the wheel too much. Just remember that these platforms are going to help you scale it, whatever that might be. So in the past, you'd think of, I got to make realtor calls. I got to show up at their office and drop off flyers. There's 50 agents in that office, so I'm going to make 50 flat. Whatever it is you were thinking about, just translate it over here on this side. And you've got, you've got your thumbs and you've got an inbox for these people. You can access them just as fast and just as easy and for free. But how? I mean, are you just like liking people and then commenting, following? I was just going to get into that. So I think it goes more than it's all good, man. It's more than just liking because likes are now not enough, especially if you're trying to track an agent or forge a relationship with someone who's getting a lot of likes. They're not going to know if I liked them or the other 500 or 1000 people, which one it was. But they may see the comments and they'll, they may not see a DM if it's somebody who gets a lot of that kind of traffic, but they'll see the comments or other people will see the comments. Some things consistently, your name, your message will start to resonate and trend and people will kind of circle back like, who is this guy? I see him commenting on every agent that I know. So if you're a lender, putting in time to where, you know, just market as metrics set a goal, you know, 50 agents, I'm going to reach out to and send a genuine direct message through. Not a generic one. I'm going to write Jeff, loved, loved your post today on this market update you put up. Super cool. You gave me some inspiration. I'm going to do the same thing. And not just, hey, you know, that was awesome or, you know, just an emoji, which we can be, you'll see it because we're trying to go through it so fast, put in the time and be genuine and if you'll do that, I think you'll find you'll get a lot more warm response from people and that's ultimately going to open doors for you. Are you selective like, you know, in terms of the agents you try and engage with there? I can be, but really it's more, I'm more market driven. So I'll just pick a certain market and then I'm targeting agents in that market because the Bay Area where I'm at is so big, obviously, so there's San Francisco agents, there's South San Francisco agents, there's Peninsula agents, East Bay agents, you know, North Bay agents, wine country agents, whatever it is. So I'll, I'll just kind of hone in on a specific market and that's where I'll focus and drive deep into. So for engagement with real estate agents, you know, to the point about it's the second largest source of business for you agents via social is Instagram kind of like your main focus. Instagram and Facebook, I'd say, I think, I think LinkedIn definitely helps me solidify my reputation because people may circle back there, but I think I find that LinkedIn is definitely, at least for me personally, been a great place to collaborate and meet up with more industry professionals and other people from ancillary industries outside of real estate, like how you and I connected, you know, I'm seeing that, but Instagram and Facebook can definitely be that place where we can, you know, kind of get right down to it as if it was a coffee shop visit, you know, or that we met up there. I've always felt with with with LinkedIn, you just made the point there about collaborating with colleagues. I've always felt with LinkedIn, the challenge with it is that it's not locally focused like Instagram, like Facebook, you know, we can really use the hashtag and use a bunch of different tools to be able to build a local following a local audience, you know, definitely. That's what I see as the limit because you know, we all only have so much bandwidth and it's like, what's, I've said this for a long time, I still wonder if it's 100% true, but you know, that you can't be great across five different platforms. I mean, case in point, look at Clubhouse now, right? Right. So Clubhouse is now blowing up and then, you know, and I'm getting all these paintings from people to come on there and I'm just like, my God, I just don't have the time like to just randomly hop on Clubhouse, you know, it's another thing now, right? It'd be another big thing on your plate and we've already got enough to make a choice. You've got to make a choice, you know what I mean? Where you're going to focus your time, otherwise you're spread too thin and nothing happens. Having a presence is important, you know, like we just talked about to your point on LinkedIn, you need to have it, you know, it's like having a website, you've got to have one, otherwise you're just, you're so outdated. I mean, who are you? If you don't have at least a LinkedIn profile, but you know, where you spend your time marketing and where you spend your time engaging and seeking and putting out stuff, that is where you have to be a little bit more selective, unless this is your full time role at whatever company you're at or it's your job. But for most of us, we're all wearing different hats throughout the day, you know, as originators we've got, we've got client, you know, client interfacing to do it, then we've got our problem solving and we've got our actual pipeline management and we've got our marketing efforts. I mean, it's, there's so many different aspects of the business that you're getting pulled into and you have no control over so it's hard to be great on every platform, as you said. Are you doing much with anything live, be it IGTV or? No, I'm not, you know, and that's a change I want to make this year in doing a little bit more live because there were some people who had a lot of great success with it. My time was just primarily spent with, you know, some content that was going to be, you know, going to be used for that day, being either the theme or the market, you know, the market moment or what have you and that's where it would come into. But no, not as much live, but I think that's again, that'll be a change that I make this year. Once again, we're going to put links in the show notes to all your social feeds, Instagram courses, you know, you're a strong point for you. And the IGTV videos over there are like really awesome and really dumb, for sure, lots of lessons to learn their people. So you need to go follow our June over there and we're going to put the link in the show notes. Okay. And give them some love, give them some comments. Right. I'll send it back. And Jeff, man, thanks for all the stuff you put out, man, this podcast and the collaboration you know, amongst the real estate and the marketing and lending community, you know, you've helped make the world smaller, but you know, the stuff that you put out and these collaborations with people has been so useful to all of us, you know, that listen to it and watch and we get a lot out of it. So, so thank you for all you put out, man. I appreciate it, man. It's a passion project, you know, sure, so don't start a podcast because you think you're going to make money. You know, I mean, even Joe Rogan didn't start like that. No, he didn't and look where it went for him. So that's a big guy. Who knows nowadays? All right. With the remaining minutes we have left, I do want to, I'm on your website. Yeah. A couple of things stood out for me about your website. First of all, it does not look like a mortgage website, right? So kudos to you, which is awesome. That's intentional, I think. The branding on it is awesome, like the skyline view of the Golden Gate and the city behind it. But you said something earlier when I asked you about the real estate agents and sources of business. You mentioned events you put on and maybe this is a two-part question, maybe I don't know, but you have agent university on your website. You may or may not know. I'm a big believer in events, online, offline, educational platform for real estate agents. But it seems like you do a lot of teaching real estate agents, is that right? I try to. And it's, you know, whether it was, you know, through a live event or now, you know, virtual, we've got one that's going to be coming up here in Q1 this year that I'm super excited about with an all-female panel called the social boss lady. It'll be featuring six high-powered Instagram profiles that. And the actual people behind those profiles, of course, that'll be doing, yes, it'll be live. It'll get you some information on it so we can get it up. But yeah, so that, you know, that to show how people are walking the walk, but to inspire that community. But I did a great, that was well-supported and it was a charity event as well. Last year live event in San Francisco and it was called the social realtor. And it featured a panelist or panelists from around the country. I didn't want people from, from my market, I wanted people with outside perspectives, but the people within this market could draw from and take from. So I brought in two realtors from outside markets. And one lead gen specialist is probably one of the best in the country at what he does. And also Brandtigic, the company that I use with a lot of my content strategy and execution. And it turned out to be a great event, but, you know, it was predominant. It was all agents that came, we had about 50 plus agents that came, and then also put up a recording of the event on YouTube. But agents got a lot out of it because it was small shorts, you know, to the point questions for each of these panelists to answer and then an open form Q&A. But putting out value and events like that is not difficult to do. And as a lender, you can give back to the real estate community itself so easily without asking for anything in return. And in fact, I made a joke at the beginning of the event that I know all the agents that have attended this event are all going to be saying, oh shit, this guy's going to hit me up for business now. And it started calling me and harassing me and I told him you will not hear from me once and I held true to that. I didn't call up one of those people saying, hey, when are we going to do a deal together? It wasn't about that at all. That relationship will come, you know, and for a lot of agents they've got existing relationships right now for all these agents. So I think if you're a lender that's trying to crack that, just be more than what you already know they're getting from their lender. If they've got a lender that kind of does their deals great, deals can be done by anyone at the end of the day, you know, you just know that yourself, you've got belief that you can do them better. But how are you going to get yourself in that position? And the way you do that is by giving agents what they're not getting, which is an ability to, you know, create a brand or the ability to learn more about how to be online, their other lender is not likely doing that for them and their broker may not be doing that for them at all. Their broker is likely just giving them stock generated, corporate content that they put out about why this broker is great and why our concierge services are great. It tells you nothing about that agent. So if you help these agents by either putting on events or creating some stuff to where they can get more out of it, you will become infinitely more valuable to that agent than their existing lender. And before you know it, you'll have a working relationship with their and it'll break down some wall. So it's a real advantage that I think people don't take advantage of. And you think we could do a virtual version of that these days? Totally. Yeah, I mean, I'm going to do my first virtual event this year. So ask me in a month and I hope it goes well. I'm sure it will, but just because the panel is going to be fantastic and they've all got a great following. But yeah, I think you can now take events virtual and people have been doing it successfully. It's obviously difficult to get people to show up in person, but it also makes drawing that event that much easier. So you run out of excuses if you're a lender to put on an event like I've got a rent of venue and I've got to go get all the wine and the hors d'oeuvres and how are we going to do this and get a PA system and I need to buy a new suit, whatever it is. You don't have to do any of that stuff now. You can skip so many steps and kind of get right to it. I think people will come up with an ever roadblock or resistance or limiting self beliefs that they want to get in the way because I've talked to lots of loan officers about that about teaching classes via Zoom, which is one of the things I help all those do to get agents. But then you hear that, well, you know, I don't like Zoom or I'm, you know, I mean, all the frigging excuses that get stacked up is just like, you don't like money, right? Just to face it. So true, yeah. So true. Yeah. But you have on your website, aging university, that's, that's cool. So you know, educational videos there. Yeah. You also have mortgage 201, which I think is fantastic the way you've changed the labeling of that instead of 101 because you're already so smart. Not, it's not for me, it's because my audience is smarter, you know. I figured there's a lot of basics that people get online and that was the inspiration for calling that 201. Consumers get, you know, a baseline of information, whether that's good or bad, they're coming to us having been either talk to by their friends who have gone through the process or doing some independent research online and going on Zilla, whatever it might be. So they've got a baseline. It may not be the right baseline and there may be some things we have to deconstruct there, but I call it 201 because I'm going to take, you know, maybe what you've got there is a frame of reference and let's sharpen it, let's clarify it, let's, you know, correct it, if you will. And I hope you just get some of this information out. And again, it's all for free. It's just value stuff that we want to put out in the way of home buyer education and more importantly, financial literacy. Yeah. All right. I'm going to lastly, I guess throw this concept at you because you're pretty savvy and when it comes to digital and social media, you know, this whole concept of consumer direct. And I'm just asking you because I'm really curious on what your thought pattern is around this. I see or hear, you know, this, this, this message of you got to go consumer direct. You got to go consumer direct. And that's one of the reasons why I always ask. I mean, almost anybody having the show like you and others, what's your number one source of business? And I don't know that I've ever heard consumer direct is your number one source of business for anybody who's been around for some period of time. But I guess the question I'm getting to is, you know, this whole discussion or debate about the relevance of real estate agents. And there's some, some underpinnings of noise rumbling about forget the agents just go consumer direct. What do you, what do you say to that? What's your response? To the agent or to the consumer that say that message that, you know, going consumer direct is the way as a loan officer to succeed in 2021, yeah, consumer direct. You know, I think it's that might be a little bit more of a challenging question than it, than it sounds initially. I think you can have a healthy blend of the two, but these platforms have made it so much easier to go consumer direct as a loan officer before the only way you could go consumer direct. If you're starting fresh, you know, squit, you know, from ground zero, you don't have a past book of business. You don't have a database to market to. You've just kind of got your own circle of friends and whatnot. So consumer direct might be a more challenging proposition to you at that point because then you're thinking, I got to hit up all my friends and family members and sell to them. Like if you need my services, I'm the guy you should call. So am I going to get it out of guilt or am I going to get it out of because they really want to work with me. They just want to throw me a boner and help me out or because they feel some obligation and then we're going to fight about it. You know what, Thanksgiving next, I mean, it could be tough. It could be really tough. So there may be, you know, somebody starting out might have to leverage relationships first to kind of build that up and then take their message consumer direct or you could use these platforms and actually reach out to people that you don't know at all by just creating content and creating messages and creating authority and coming in not so tone deaf but as somebody who is genuine and has an understanding of what it is that they're talking about. Consumers can then find you that'll that'll tee up the opportunity that'll open the door, you know, that's your, you know, it creates an opportunity there to to walk through and then forge an actual relationship and then ultimately put a potential transaction. So you can go consumer direct now in this current era, whether you're starting from Ground Zero or you, you know, have been doing this business or you've been in the industry for a long time by using the platforms and using them effectively. But it takes time and it's going to take a lot of deliberate intentional work where you're being genuine and reaching out to people on a one-to-one basis but then you can create a little bit of momentum that way and go consumer direct. So I don't think it always has to be based on relationships with referral partners. I mean, that's a very healthy mix and of course you want that. But as a lender, you're not, you know, for them to say, well, you better have a lot of real-to-relationships otherwise you're not going to make it. No, I don't think that's the case. I think, you know, surely you want some of that and that would be healthy to have and you might have some existing ones that you want to continue to further and just strengthen those bonds. But you can go consumer direct using these platforms. It's not like how it was in the old way when we didn't have these platforms or we weren't utilizing them to their full strength and ability. But I think that's where the opportunity lies and people can hit it 24 hours a day. Yeah. No, I agree with you. You know, the way I sum that up is I'm using this phrase now, a hybrid loan officer, which is to your point is it does make sense and it is helpful to have a blend of sources. I remember, I don't know if you remember, Dan Kennedy, one of the old school marketing mentors always used to say that the worst number in marketing is one, right? This is one. If you only have one source of business and that goes away, it becomes disrupted or whatever, all of a sudden you're dead in the water. A hybrid loan officer, I'm starting to like pretenderize this concept for you listeners out there. The hybrid loan officer is one who does have a hand in referral partners but also has a hand in the consumer direct because it's just like you've proven in our conversation here today, you can source business from there. The last point on that is which you actually articulated a moment ago was the reason why I still believe in referral partners is it's the lowest cost, typically lowest amount of effort if you're working with the right people and highest ROI if you will and quickest way to get to the business then if you're trying to go consumer direct. So that's why I believe you need to have both. You need to have both, yeah, definitely. And again, to the earlier answer, these platforms give you the ability to really scale both of those lines. Like you've done on Instagram, man. Yeah, you can reach so many referral partners and potential colleagues that could become a referral source for you so much faster than the old fashioned way. I mean, I don't know how long it would take to, you know, attend as many networking events and lunches to form a group of 100 agents that have me top of mind that know who I am. I know who they are. We know intimate details about each other in terms of our personal lives and how our business is operate. That could take a year if not two years to create and develop. Not to mention, I'd spend a lot of money on overpriced coffee doing that, but, you know, these platforms, I hope you can help you really leverage that and that's where the secret sauce is. I should have asked you this earlier, but so you don't try to move like after you've engaged with a realtor for some time on Instagram, for example, I know some people proactively be, you know, kind of, hey, we should get together and chat or grab a Zoom or whatever. Do you do that or do you let them do that? I kind of depends. It's going to be situational, right? If the opportunity kind of comes up or we find out that we've got a lot more in common, maybe some mutual friends or we worked on opposite sides of a deal and there's an opportunity there and you take that opening. What we live in the same area or we work in the same area, then it can be easy to do that. Maybe an in-person coffee or that, but I don't feel this need where pre-COVID, really pre-COVID was kind of like, COVID was the additional pivot point, the platforms and being on social was one, but COVID kind of made it so that you don't have to do that because more than likely, people have a little bit of an adherence to wanting to meet in person anyways or they're a little bit more reserved about it just for health reasons, so that's your out. You don't have to do it anymore, you know, like, okay, we can either hop on a quick Zoom or we can just keep furthering our friendship and relationship in its stage of infancy just through these platforms and having, you know, exchanges and whatnot. So again, it's another opportunity to scale, but I don't feel the need to have to do that every single time. I'm a little bit more selective about it. And again, you know, to your, to tie it back, also to your point about or your question about these platforms and being good on all of them, I don't feel the need to have to be everything to everyone, you know, seeing a real estate agent out there because it's just, you know, it's not, it's not worth the effort and it's also a big drain. Yeah, for sure. All right, well, I can't let you go without talking about Taekwondo, man. All right, man. All right, for this lighting here, man, this room was a good one. Sun's going down in San Francisco and you're, don't worry about it, man, it's all good. So I don't want to get it wrong. So you, you tell me you are the, tell us, tell us your role with Taekwondo team USA. So I used to compete on the national team, I've done Taekwondo for 30 plus years, but I used to compete on the national team and then I retired in 2014. I also was coaching that year as well. So I was doing both. I was competing and coaching, which was a heavy load. But then now I'm just full time in the coaching. I still keep up with training and working out because it's, it's a great workout, but I now coach the coach, get to co-head coach the national team, partner friend. And you won some medals if I recall, right? I did. I was fortunate enough to break through twice in 07N in 2014, which was a huge honor and a real, you know, a real high point in it. Yeah. So what's the greatest part of being involved in that? Either personally or obviously coaching, that has another aspect, but what, what, what like gets you right in here about that whole thing, you know? I think on a personal level, it's the challenge, you know, or the race with yourself to try and get better. And then, you know, the first time I did it was like, it was like this dream and this, you know, you forward feeling that it happened in 07. And then I took a few years off of competing, I still kept up with training and whatnot. And then I went again in 2012 and I didn't, I didn't have the same success. And even though I'd prepared just as hard, if not harder, I worked hard, I didn't take anything for granted, but sometimes things don't go your way, but it was, it ended up being an invaluable lesson. And I relate that to kind of the market crash for those that were in real estate or in lending. You got knocked off and then you start questioning and asking yourself, was I really any good? I'd get lucky the first time or, you know, what was it? You know, you have those doubts and then kind of like a rocky three moment when you got beat up so bad and then you had to reconfigure his team and get with the right group and retrain and do it, recalibrate, but in a different way and then set himself up for success. So the second goal metal actually meant more because of what it took to get back there and the work that it took and also kind of overcoming some of those emotional barriers and doubts and roadblocks there. Your two time world champion. I am, yeah. Congratulations, man. That's awesome. Congratulations. A degree of commitment. It was. It is, yeah. But now I get to do it, you know, with the athletes I coach and helping them and passing off some of that knowledge and and and watching them, you know, transform and go through that evolution of being an athlete that maybe has a dream or maybe doesn't know how this is all going to come together and then seeing a finished product. And it's not always about the wins and the losses, it's about that that process and that improvement. Yeah. And where they end up and that for me is the great joy that I get and I'm enjoying coaching a lot more than I did competing. It was a separate feeling but helping, helping guys out more and being a part of this is something really special and something I, you know, have a great honor and doing it. I don't take it for granted. But it parlays into my mortgage space as well too because I'm a big advocate for my clients. I fight for them. I like representing first time home buyers because I feel they're underdogs in any market because of cash buyers or all the things that can be so daunting about this process. So I wear the same hat. I just use different language because we're not hitting anything. It's not violent, but yeah, that's for me, that that really helped in my social strategy and kind of making that personal brand between this part of my life and this part of my life and forging the two. Nothing worth talking about. Well, I have a personal connection to it at my son at 13, got his black belt. Amazing. Good for him. Exactly. I wish he would have continued on, unfortunately, he didn't. That's okay. I mean, there's lessons he'll draw from because that was a major commitment and for a lot of youth, that's the, I mean, that thing ends up being kind of the largest time block of commitment that they had to put something into and really adhere to in terms of the schedule and then come out the other side. So there'll be lessons he'll draw from that for the rest of his life whether he realizes or you realize it. So the thing that I loved about that is his master, master Lee, I don't know if he was fifth or seventh or whatever, but you're up there as well, aren't you like a fifth or more degree? Six. Six. Yeah. I attended when he had to go and do the things you do to get that next, you know, ranking of the fifth or six or whatever. And literally, like these guys came in from, you know, Korea and all this kind of stuff, right? Yeah. And the panel to judge and I mean, like didn't speak English, you know, none of that kind of stuff. And like he had to do to perform and you know this very well, but it just, it's just mind blowing to see it. And this guy, when he got that, he is definitely in his late 50s. And it's just amazing, right? The physical feats that you have to do to, to, to, right, to be able to perform. Yeah. It's a lifelong commitment. It's, it's, yeah. Of course, like you said, the values that he learned and this guy was such, such a beautiful human being. Like he could very heart, very hard speaking English, right? And so what did he call him? He called him handsome, handsome Jack. That's what he'd always say. You know, his name is Zachary. He's like handsome Jack, you know, it was awesome. So I just think I'm just always impressed by people doing achieving physical feats, you know. I'm, I'm equally impressed by your son that he did that. So that's awesome you did. I love it. Well, I was impressed by watching Tom Brady last night too, you know, being free and up. I love watching the greats do it. I was rooting for him. I had a feeling they'd do it. I really did go into it because they've been beaten twice and Tom Brady, Tom Brady's won the really, you know, to not really be had, you know, I mean, he's such a competitor and he's so locked in and he makes everyone around him better, which is the definition of a leader and, and, and many respects. So that was fun to watch, both those guys, you know, Breeze and him, but good for him. I hope he can pull it off next weekend. I'd love to, I'd love to see Tom win another one, just as a fan of the game. Now we're bringing all the haters listening out, you know, listening to my podcast. They know I'm a patriot. It's well, patriots. Somebody said it to me earlier. They're like, I didn't know you were bucking your stand. I'm like, I'm not, I'm a Brady fan then. And, you know, just love to see that he's, he's crushing it. I can, I'm a cowboy fan of Diary one, but I can appreciate greatness and that's Tom Brady. And my wife wants to miss you again and Tom Brady's a Michigan guy, so that's, you know, there's the tie. There you go. All right. All right. We're going to put all the links in the show notes to everything. People follow him. Do what he's doing. If you want to level up your social media game, so Arjun, thanks very much for being here. Appreciate you, Jeff. Thanks for having me on, brother. We'll see you soon, man, in person. Yeah. And Lister and Jean are to do. If you like this episode, please let us know. Leave a review. Follow the links in the show notes and we'll, 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 I 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. 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