Today is just a coaching session between you and i hey welcome back to the podcast. I hope this is finding you doing insanely great. I want to have a one-on-one conversation with you. I don't know if you know this, but i'm an investor in tens and tens and tens of companies and in doing that, i've been very fortunate to sit down with a lot of different startups, and you know companies that were well on their way past.

Maybe a series a or a series b or a series c and sit down with the founder and ask a bunch of questions to try and determine if this person's willing, you know or if this person is the right person. I should say to bet on. I found after doing call it. You know, i don't know 45 000 coaching sessions that there's a bunch of questions that you can ask a founder of a business to really help them.

Uh create a clear path towards the outcome that they want for their business and i know maybe, as you're listening to like wait a minute, i'm not a startup. You know i'm an experienced real estate professional, i'm in the mortgage business, i own a tech company or i'm i'm in the service business or whatever, whatever it is that you find yourself doing or maybe you're listening this and you're 17 years old and you're you're thinking Screw college, i want to go build something. Well, then this is going to be the right episode for you, because what i want to do is ask you a bunch of questions, the same kind of questions that i ask all these men and women that say hey. I want to pitch you on my product or my company or when i'm sitting down with one of the highest producing, you know: team leaders or an individual agent or a ceo of a mortgage company or an escrow company or a real estate company um.

So, let's go with that: let's, let's go with today is just a coaching session between you and i, and you know, if you're like you know, on the subway in new york or you're, you know on an airplane or you're listening this on the treadmill. I would really encourage you not just to listen. I know i can be wildly entertaining and make you laugh a little bit and that's always great, but what i really want you to do is answer the questions, because all the magic isn't creating certainty. All the magic is having that clarity, the the knowing that this is what i'm building.

This is what i'm doing this is where i'm going and that's where providence occurs. So so, let's talk about it. The first question i ask people is um: how long do you plan to be in this business right? How long do you plan to be in this business? This is even you know whether i'm talking to a founder or you. How long do you plan to do this and what's fun, is i have clients, maxine gallons who's, 83 years old and having a wonderful time, doing millions of dollars a year in gci in her real estate practice with her daughter and their team down in la jolla? California, and if you asked maxine 10 years ago, how she would say, i'm going to do this forever, because i've made this business, something that i can do forever.

I share it with my daughter. We've got this great team. I dance three hours a day which she does katie dance is like three hours a day and her best pal is mary murphy who started dancing with the stars. If you know that show so she'll dance with her and she'll go to dance competitions, big shout out to maxine the point is she said: i can do this forever, because this is a lifestyle business for me.

Well, if i'm an investor, that's probably not something! I want to invest in because i'm looking to ultimately get a return. I want someone to build their business scale. It sell it. Take it public, do something right create a trigger.

Otherwise it's not a really good investment, but for you, as a business person, it's important. I think you answer that you know: do you have an end date in mind? Do you have a you know how much of what and by when, and i don't care if you're 19 and listening to this or you're, you know 93. What is the exit plan? How long do you plan to do this then? Just as just a reminder, i'm just going to say this to everybody listening in the real estate space specifically - and we see this in every industry right. So it's not just real estate, but i'm going to give you a real estate data point that should speak to whatever industry you're in the top 25 of agents in the mls are currently gobbling up market share and today, if you're in the u.s they're doing about 73 of all the volume and therefore all the commission revenue is going to the top 25 percent.

We know the top 1 percent is doing like 17 of all the sales volume and therefore all the revenue. Now it doesn't matter what industry you look at if you go to the mortgage space, you see it with all these big monster companies, the rockets of the world, etc. They're gobbling up market shares so clearly they. You know whether, whether you're looking at portals where it's like zillow acquires trulia probably should have acquired realtor.com, maybe should acquire redfin.

All these big companies have figured out there's going to be two or three major players in the space and then there's going to be a ton of let's call it cottage industries. Smaller businesses either get gobbled up or they you know, carve out their niche and they do okay and they generate some. You know some substantial revenue, but it's like there's costco and there's sams and then there's a bunch of other ones right think think about it. There's uh netflix and i don't even know i'd, probably say netflix and apple and then there's a gazillion other ones.

Hoobity doobity, you know uh whatever you know, you know all the names. My point to you is this: in business you want to be first or second or third, or you want to figure out. What's that cottage space that that i can control in terms of the niche like, i may not be the biggest, but i could be the best at this as an example - probably need to put disney plus into that mix as well, because they're they're clearly killing it. But again you're a business owner.

That's why you're listing this? How long do you plan to do this and then do you understand that it's kind of in this game you try and become one of the biggest the best in your marketplace, and it could just be being the most successful in your town could be the most Successful in your office could be the most successful in your brand in your region, but someone's going to do it like someone's going to do it and the question is: is it going to be you if it's going to be you if you have that kind of Ambition you're going to love this show if you're like. I just want to sell a house now and then check out this one and go to another podcast like not not not, kill me forever, but just like go to another one, because this is really about doing something big. Then i want to remind people, just as i mentioned startups and portals and publicly traded companies they've now figured out over the last decade or so that trying to build a business based upon real estate agents, giving them business is probably a bad idea. Instead, they're going direct to consumer and whether it is the postcard that i received at my house recently in dallas, buy better betters a mortgage company, that's now a mortgage and real estate business and by the way, i'm not a fan.

So i probably shouldn't be talking about them. They should be called worst, not better. In my opinion, sorry, if you're part of the better group, but here's what they're doing they're basically saying we don't have a really great value proposition. We have no uh massive degree of separation for consumers as to why they should use us so we're gon na use the race to the bottom strategy called give the real estate commission away for free.

Yes, your commission away for free, so they use their mortgage company. You know it's another hook right: we've seen these discounters in the marketplaces before my point to you is they're marketing they're using modern marketing they're using guerrilla marketing. All these major companies are putting lots of money, millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars in to get the consumer to contact them directly and one person might be listening right now. That is saying gosh.

I haven't even called my own past clients and sphere ian who bought a house. You know a couple years ago here in dallas and his agent never followed up on him again afterwards, like the disconnect is so obvious right. This is like you're like wait time now. You got me nervous and you haven't even asked me the real questions yet you're, just giving me some data points, but here's what i want you to get every industry is full of the rich and the rest.

I'm in the coaching business, there's three or four of us that have what i would say: larger businesses and then there's thousands of people that refer to themselves as a coach and they have 11 clients or eight clients or whatever it may be right. It's the same thing in every industry. You go into my question, for you is which one do you want to be? Do you want to be a part of that super elite group? That does something really special at scale that helps a lot of people and therefore builds massive enterprise. Value has a saleable asset has something that people want and they're coming after you and saying hi we'd like to talk about buying your business or having you join us or hey.

Can you, you know, engage with us in some kind of joint venture marketing campaigns, because you built this monster thing or do you want to just be another small fish in the marketplace? Now i don't care either way. The question is: what do you want? I want to help you get more of what you want, so i hope i'm. I hope i'm touching on some of the things that are going to maybe stoke the fire of your ambition. So let's go back to the questions and i actually was thinking about i'm going to pull out of my notes here, the six or seven questions i ask every founder: yes, you can imagine that tom ferry has a script.

Yes, of course, i have a script right because i don't want to like forget right. So let me put in my notes real fast here. No editing uh, it is my investment questions. Yes, here we go ready.

So here's the questions i asked and i'm gon na go into the very specific questions. I want you to ask so i say to people number ones right so hi. My company is called the hooby doobie ding ding online app solution whatever and i'm like. Oh, that sounds fantastic, explain the problem you're trying to solve in your business as if i was a six-year-old and the fascinating thing is most people can't do it.

They go uh. Well, what we're doing is we're connecting to the blockchain and we're forking out this. You know crypto and i'm like i'm a six-year-old. I have no idea what you're talking about.

If you can't explain what you do in its simplest terms, the problem in the marketplace that you're fixing, then i'm pretty certain - you have a hard time - scaling yourself, marketing yourself separating yourself from the competition to truly be effective. To have people literally say i choose you, because that message resonates with me. Does that make sense question number two. I ask them when this business is fully baked, what category will you be in and how big will it be? So when your business is fully baked when you've built, you know the the cake is done, the pie is done.

The house has been built, the castle's been built right. I want to know how big can it be, and what category is it in? Are you? Are you truly if you're in real estate, are you in real estate? Are you in housing? Are you in the transaction business and the transaction business includes housing, insurance, escrow and closing services mortgage all the pieces of the puzzle? What business are you truly in what category? It's a fun question to get people to think third question i ask people is how large is the tam now tam's a phrase we use all the time, it's the addressable market, how big is the addressable market so, for example, in the u.s we're on pace to Do more than six million home sales this year from a residential standpoint, not including the new construction, but 6 million equals 12 million transactions by side sell side which then equals how many loans which equals? How many title orders, how many escrow orders? How many closing services like so it's a really enormous market when you take housing, it's 17 of the gdp of the u.s, we're talking about a lot of money. So how big is the 10, but you might answer it this way: hey tom! I live in garland, texas and if i took a 20-mile radius of the area, i got a flower mound. I work all these little parts of town right and and in that marketplace there is 15 000 transactions being done.

So if i just stayed there, that's the addressable market of the area that i serve where a friend of mine that maybe is building a national company might say well, there's 1.6 million agents we want to be in the 28 largest metros in the us and we'd. Like to have about a hundred thousand agents in those areas, so the addressable market's 1.6 million, but a hundred thousand are really what we're going after see. These are the questions. I think we need to be answering, as we think about the future of your business and where you're going and - and you might be saying wow - these are bigger questions and i'm still trying to figure out how to get more listings and get more sales yeah, because You're dealing with the micro issues of your business and not looking at the macro of your business, i'm trying to get you to look at the macro of your business.

This is either going to be the best podcast i ever do in or the worst and i in either way. I'm totally fine all right number four. This is the question i ask again you're a founder. I just talked to one i can't say the name of the company uh russian gal super brilliant.

I mean crazy, brilliant building this extraordinary business. I can't give any details, so i asked this question: is your model different than other players in the space? If so, what are the differentiating factors, and how do you know that? It's true, because it's one thing for us to say, but it's entirely different for like consumers to say i tried a and i tried b, a was so different, so special it was faster. It was better, it was cheaper, it was more organized whatever whatever the value prop is so again, the question is: is your model? Is your real estate business, your mortgage business, your tech company business, your you know, isa. Business is your model different from other players and if so, what are those differentiating factors? So i go back to even like the early days when i started my company 19 years ago um.

So you all know that my dad has been in the space forever. My dad's, like one of my heroes, he's a mentor we work together forever and dear. You know, dear friends, right almost like more friends than father's son, if that makes sense, but i remember being one of his top coaches and helping him build that business to you, know tens of millions of dollars in revenue and when i made the decision to to Start my own business. I remember sitting there thinking to myself all right.

What am i, what am my differentiating factors like? What am i going to do? That's different or special, because i've got this last name and the last name you know, could help or hurt, depending upon how people felt about it and that's: okay, my dad was kind of the don rickles or almost like howard stern, probably the more modern version like He made fun of everybody right like he just attacked the audience in a loving and fun and jovial way. But what happens is people who love him or hate him right? So i was like okay. So if i just come out with my own last name, some people are gon na love me and some people are gon na hate me just because of his name, but i did not want to ride on his coattails that wasn't a differentiating factor for me. So the first thing is, i named my company success strategies institute, which was a stupid name, but i was trying to separate myself from the competition quote unquote, so that was one thing naming it branding it.

We went through that whole process. Maybe you've done the same, but then the second thing i asked myself was when i reflect back on my talents and my clients and the things that that we did together. What was it that was different. So as a coaching company right, i'm asking myself these questions and i'm like well there's basically three camps of coaching companies - and you know this because you know you've been around for a while.

So there was the the cold call prospecting camp. My dad was the leader of that revolution. There was brian biffini and joe stump, who basically took a bunch of stuff from a guy named jay abraham. One of my mentors called work by referral and they created the referral camp and both these two camps made each other the enemy, which is, by the way, a really good business strategy.

When you have a dragon to slay an enemy to rally, your troops around, that's actually really good in business. It's like avis coming out and saying we're number two we're number two. So we try harder right, so so number one was their enemy and they were going after them. Domino's pizza, every business does this right.

You know it if you're a top producing agent. You were like number eight in the office and you're like i really want to get phyllis she's number one. What a phyllis is there? Anybody named phyllis anymore. It's like phyllis diller.

Would you have no idea katie at 25 or 24, who phyllis you, should google who phyllis diller, is right, very, very funny, woman from a million when the world was black and white? That's when she was around all right so back to this right. So there's these two camps, there's like the prospecting, cold, calling camp, then there's the buy referral camp and then there was another camp and i would just call them the marketing camp and it was like my buddies at hobbs and herder and all these other businesses that Were like you got to build a brand, you got a beautiful brochure, so each one of those three had sort of their distinct way that they were doing business and they used that as their degree of separation. The challenge was, there became a bunch of marketing people that were doing it and a bunch of referral people that were doing it and a bunch of people that were talking about prospecting. So they had to continue to innovate, to try and create.

What is that thing about us - and i remember, sitting there thinking well at the time i was coaching 16 of the top 100 agents in the world. I was just with steve murray, who created the original list, um real trends, the wall street journal back. Then it was the top 100. Then it became the 500.

Then it became a thousand and 16 of those people were my clients, and i did this sort of deep analysis and you might want to be thinking about this. Don't listen to my story and be like. Oh that's. His story.

Think about the story as it relates to you. I said i did a deep analysis. What did all my clients have in common and what was different about them, and you know what i discovered all of my clients did some prospecting work some referrals and did marketing, and i thought but nobody's talking about that everybody's categorizing people into these groups. This is the marketing group.

This is the by referral group, and you know right as i was starting my business and there was the re.net group, the the early social media, tech, kids, that were all playing in real estate. Talking about how it was supposed to be - and you know wasn't about massive numbers of followers - it was about being at a cocktail party. Some of you remember all that jargon right. So this fourth group, but i looked around and said you know what i know if you're really good it's about knowing yourself it's about knowing your customer and it's acknowledging that the cardinal scent of any business is to put all your eggs in one basket, and i Wrote down no wrong way to generate a client, no wrong way to generate a client, no wrong, and that became the beginning.

The genesis, if you will of the mantra of my business, that we said look, you know you can prospect, you can work referrals. You can do marketing, you can do tech. You can do all that because we can help. You do all those things and we actually recommend you do all four.

That makes a well-balanced sales and marketing business, and that was it and just like that, i started getting hired over and over and over because people were like yeah. I kind of didn't like the fact that if i went to this one, i had a cold call and this one i couldn't really do marketing or talk about tech, because people that do referrals they don't do that kind of stuff which back then that's what they Were saying and the guys that were doing all the marketing the gals drawing on the market were like? We don't need to do any of that stuff, because marketing makes all that stuff superfluous. It doesn't matter right and the tech people everything should just be on twitter. It was so um myopic does that make sense and by the way, use that word over and over again anytime, you can use a negative label to express your competition, not by being demeaning in any way shape or form, listen to what i'm saying here, but instead, Like, oh, you want the myopic approach, you want all the eggs in one basket approach.

Well, we believe it tom ferry, there's no wrong way to do it, so we serve all these customers to do all these different things, and we believe in this blended approach and just like that we had a degree of separation, a unique factor. What's yours, i'm renting and raven here what's yours right, so what i'm saying down with you know a founder i'm asking like! Why should i why? What are you going to be that's special and different? You with me on this versus just another widget another website, another app that does kind of more of the same, and yours is red and theirs is purple. So that's your degree of separation, people that, like purple like us, i don't think so. No knock on seth! God and i love purple cows - all right number, five who's on your cap table.

What i want to know is how much money have you raised? What's your monthly burn? What's it cost you to run the business and and how much money are you spending and then what do you forecast for breakeven and profits, which those are all great questions for you, because who's on your cap table now cap table, meaning who are the investors in Your business and the vast majority of people want to talk to them in real estate. They say well, it's me, i'm like, oh okay, so it's all your cash. How much money did you put in to start your business? Oh, i made a sale and then i used some of it and then i made another sale. Then i used something like the traditional bootstrapper.

If you will, how does that compare to compass? How does that compare to exp? How does that compare to uh long and foster before they were sold or home services of america, or now re max as a publicly traded company? Really all these monster brands? How does that compare does that? Is that the right move, if you're in this business and you don't have capital to grow? No, i'm not saying to you that you should go out and get money partners, but i am asking you to acknowledge if you're building a business, it requires capital right. It requires capital, it means, i think, about my friend greer allen, who started an unbelievable company called boomtown and greer. Did the typical entrepreneurial move? I'm not recommending this for you, i'm telling you a story as an example. So listen up, he refinanced his house pulled some cash out and started his business because he knew if he was going to build a world-class sales automation machine and serve thousands of clients all over the u.s and canada.

With these extraordinary websites and solutions and drip marketing campaigns and everything else that they do at boomtown, he knew he was going to put some capital up to build. This thing think about it. I'm just asking you questions before i even get to the good stuff. I'm just giving you these like bonus, questions all right.

There's one last question that i asked and i just got to get to real fast here then i say tell me about your management team right, your engineers, your sales, your marketing team, who's in charge of revenue. I go through all that stuff and then all i really want to get to is the bonus question. So tell me about your team, and you know you know, probably, as i felt when i started 19 years ago, when you're like who's your manager team, i'm like well my wife's in charge of the money um and that's her job and she's really good at it. And steve almani, my co-founder steve's in charge of sales, i'm in charge of content, coaches creation, doing events, and i was like wait.

This is stupid. I've like 14 jobs - and i know that's how you feel. I know when i say to you: who's in charge of tech you're like me, who's in charge of hr you're. Like me, who's in charge of innovation me who's in charge of testing.

Me marketing me. Your website me every asset, you're branding, going on appointments, negotiating deals. Closing contracts me me me me me, that's a scary proposition as a business person. That's a business, i would never invest in now.

I'm not busting your chops, i'm getting you to think. Remember. Go back to what i said. The top 25 of the industry are doing 73 of all the volume.

Therefore, all the commission, what are they doing that you're? Not they? They all have teams right, there's no doubt about that, and teams could be ready. Two licensed assistants: they use transaction coordinators, they've got virtual assistants, meaning they're not doing it as a one-woman band. You have me they're not trying to spin all 14 plates that it takes to be successful in business by themselves, because plates are constantly dropping and crashing and you're you're prioritizing based on what's urgent, not what's important. So we know that doesn't work, but the question that i get to when i ask this question is so then: what's your management methodology, what's your management methodology, so here we are, i don't know what month it is, but you know we're maybe 60 or 70 days Away before the end of the year, and and i talked to executives and team leaders and ceos and and budding rock stars that sell 52 homes their first year in the business following our methodologies and then the next year, they do 30 because they slow down to Speed up and they start putting people in place, so they can actually scale the growth and and repeat it over and over again and every time i say: what's your management methodology like how do you govern? How do you run the business? How do you make decisions? How often do you meet right? How does this? How does the sausage get made? It's kind of a funny little example: right, like you want to talk about like sausage right, it's like you, throw all this stuff in, but it comes out and we every single time the tube comes out the right way and we spin it this way versus that Way like it's, how does the sauce get made like? How do you guys run this thing and i'd ask you, as you're sitting here going wow? This is kind of a heavy, interesting conversation and i got way more to go with you is.

How do you manage your business? How do you run the business and who helps you do that and who do you report to and who reports to you and what data do you look at and what numbers do you look at and what are you tracking and measuring, and why are you tracking Measure and then what decisions you make about that ian and i my producer the other day we're like literally sitting in the conference room here in the office in dallas and what we're doing we're like. Okay, here's all of our shows. Here's all the historical data, like viewers numbers head count how many people are subscribers, we're looking at the data and then forecasting to the future, and then we know like every month as courtney produces. You know all this data for us like? Are we on track or off track, and that's just that's just one little piece of the business called content right, that's before sales and marketing and everything else and events and our coaching clients, but see.

I know if i have the right management methodology in place, then, when i meet within, we can discuss the things that are most important. I'm making sure that i'm providing him as a leader, the resources he needs to go and do the work that he needs to do so he feels successful. So his team is winning, so the business is winning what's your management methodology. So i ask all those questions and it's really fun right, because by the way all they ever want to do is go.

Let me tell you about my product, here's what it does and it's really exciting. Let me give you a demo and i'm like i don't give a about any of that stuff until i understand all of this, so here's the questions. I want to ask you, because all that was just a bonus. So i want to ask you this question.

First, what business are you actually in think about it? Are you in housing? Are you in shelter it's funny when i talk to um like some of the big economists in the country, they'll all say: well, the shelter industry should do really well during inflation because um, you know. Obviously, home prices are going to continue to improve and you know people always need you know a roof over their head. They call it the shelter industry where we might call it housing. What business are you really in? Are you in the first time, buyer business? Are you in the multi-family unit business? Are you in the agent to agent referral business? What business are you actually in? Are you in the business of helping your sales agents be more successful? Are you in the business of providing five client experiences for your customers? What business are you actually in then? I asked number two: how big is the tam? What is the addressable market for you in your in your area, how many transactions are being done and what percentage them are you doing it's so interesting again, i go back to this question i think about, like my clients, dj and lindsay, who will do they? So this was a couple days ago.

They had 971 real estate transactions in escrow. They had already closed a little over 1900 for the year, so they do call it. 3 200 300 transactions as a real estate brokerage run as a team right. So we're all excited about this because 3 000 transactions back in the old days.

It was like man. If you could do a hundred transactions a year. You were a rock star and now you know a thousand is the new 100 or when people say to me. I did 100 million dollars in volume, i'm like congratulations, that's awesome! A billion is the new hundred million.

Like you know, the game just continues to change and evolve. So we're talking about this and the reality is in the marketplace, is that they serve even at 3200 transactions they're like at four or five percent market share. But that means like there's a couple. Other companies that are like 10 market share 12 market share.

How much do you want? What are you building? Because that's the third question: what are you building so think about this, for you like you're, listening this right now and thank you for being a listener, and you know listening to my crazy desire for you to have an enormous business, whether you want one or not. So you're, you know, i appreciate you, what are you building? It's the same question that when i came home and talked to my wife, i'm like honey. Let me tell you what i want it's like 19 years ago, i'm like okay, there's no wrong way to generate a client right, we're going to we're going to be the best at going deep on all these different verticals of marketing lead generation, we're all these world-class Coaches she's, like what do you want them, like 150 coaches around the world, helping our clients - and i had this like very clear vision if you will not vision like more like walt disney walt disney? If you, if you read any of the early books on walt disney or actually even steve jobs, uh not see if you've seen me bill gates, bill gates and walt disney and oprah, and so many others what they did is they asked a question that they needed To answer, and that became the vision, their business, so so my wife right went to walt disney elementary, my parents, my mom, was a mouseketeer right. My dad swept a broom.

If you will mike ferry, swept sweeping a broom. Imagine that at walt disney back when he was like you know, 18 or 19 years old when walt builds his business, the original disneyland project, it was predicated on answering one question: what if all the horses jumped - and there was no chip paint? Now you can google that phrase because it'll come up all over with walt disney and here's what happened. He took his young daughter to an amusement park back in the day and he was like this is a horrible experience. He's like the trash cans were full.

I i put her on the merry-go-round and not all the horses jumped and most met chip paint and he's like what. If there was a amusement park where all the horses jumped perfection, everything was done the right way and there was no chipped paint. It was well taken care of. It was a beautiful experience that was the origin for what became walt disney, that walt disney world, i should say, or disneyland the original one in anaheim, where bill gates very famously asked himself this question: what would the business be like if all computers ran on our Operating system think about the enormity of that question.

What would the business be like if all computers on the planet ran on our operating system? Well, that did make him the richest man on the planet and, of course, many have now taken over that uh. That position, but because he built microsoft from something that he didn't even own dos that he ended up acquiring like they took that and they put it on steroids and then they built their entire business saying. How do we get our software into every computer? Hey dell? Here it's it's almost like the cranberry sales person. This is going to sound funny, but think about this.

You know the cranberry sales person like you walked down the grocery store. Have you seen this? It's like they're, like? Oh, you got apple. We got cranberry. Okay, we got cranapple here we go like the cranberry sales guy is devastating because there's crayon everything you with me on this bill gates had the same mindset, but why that was actually a comedian.

Who'd actually did that entire skit. So, just for the record i didn't make that up, but i i saw the committee doing i was like that is so good. I'm gon na use that one day in a podcast and i finally did um that should be by the way. That's the opening.

That's the opening of the podcast just for the record. It's not it's not actually this moment in time. That's what i want on instagram, that's a real! By the way, um, we got ta figure out who the comedian was uh, but here's the thing because they asked the right question. They were able to get this like.

Okay. This is what i need to build, so i ask agents all the time. What are you building? What are you building like? Why are you you're working? I don't care what you say if you're a residential real estate agent you're in the mortgage business you're like it's 24 7. man, the phone is ringing all the money's made before 8 o'clock and after 5 and on the weekends like that's just.

It is what it is now it doesn't mean you have to do that, because you can build a team that supports you to have more of the lifestyle that you want right. Keep scaling yourself scaling your brand scaling, your trust scaling your process. We can do that, but that's the game, right housing isn't a monday through friday, eight to five thing. What are you building? If you have the answer to the question like the problem you're trying to solve, which i'm getting a little ahead of myself um the problem? You're trying to solve then all of a sudden like the decision to have a crm that becomes a discipline, not a verb or a or an adjective or whatever.

You would call a product right, a noun, i should say um. Then it's like having your crm is like something that we have to do, because it's a building block towards getting what it is. We ultimately want. So when i said i want 150 business coaches i was like well, then, of course i need to synthesize my process.

I need to hire a a head of coaching. I need to hire recruiters for coaching. I need to hire trainers for coaching. I need to hire coaches that are going to coach the coaches.

I need to create curriculum, so they can go deep. I need them to cross-pollinate ideas, so i don't have one coach who's amazing at this, and another coach is amazing at that they need to be sharing all these ideas and resources, so they can support each other, then i'm like well, of course, then i need to Build a software program, a degree of separation. I need to go to video first, so i'm a video guy, like all these things, became natural, obvious and automatic to me, because i was clear on what i want and then at the same time, when people come to me and say hey, we should do this. I was like that sounds great for you, but it doesn't line up with what i'm trying to accomplish it's a great idea.

I love it. Thank you keep doing that but, like i was building a business kind of like a side, hustle fun project and then very quickly, as i was finding myself a little too entertained by this business, because sometimes that happens, you all know what i'm talking about. You get a little obsessed about an idea and i'm like this could be really rad. We could have our clients do this and i'm like, i woke up, wait a minute.

This is a really great business and the addressable market is giant and it's a big money maker. It just has nothing to do with where i'm going and i took the business and i called the buddy and said you should do this. Here's the relationships, here's the contacts and, if you decide to really take and run with it i'll, be your first investor, see when you're really clear on what you're building you make decisions like that, you don't try and do eleven thousand things at the same time, which Is why most people fail so question number one: what business are you in question number two? How big is the addressable market question number three? What are you building in question? Number four is: what's your exit, which is kind of the question. I started this whole thing with: what's your exit, how do i get out? How do you get out right today? The number of teams i'm talking to out as an example, they've gotten out of production, so they built this like like this iconic individual, who became the beacon of hope in their marketplace, the most recognizable, male or female, whatever husband and wife team, and then they realized That they ran out of the most important resource time, so they brought in a couple sales people and then a few more sales people.

Then a few more sales people, then all of a sudden they found themselves answering got a minute got a minute got a minute. All day long and they thought wait a minute - i've got to go through that j curve moment. Do i maintain where i'm going and hire a sales manager, or do i pull out and go to a leadership role and it's a decision there's no right or wrong. In this i'm just giving you the example where all of a sudden they stop listening and selling real estate, and instead, they put all of their concentration on their management team on their sales team on their client care.

Experience on making sure that the company is innovating and i'm not even saying they own the brokerage they're just running the business now they've moved from tactician to manager to owner right going back to the old entrepreneurial myth. The e-myth, if you haven't, read it, you should read it tonight, but every one of them said this is. This is part of my way to eventually exit the business. So one of the things that was interesting uh last week we were in nashville with um top 300 300 of our top team leaders and their partners, and you know ops managers, and then we had like 70 people from around the world.

That are a part of this special little group that we work with, and - and we were talking about this - like that, you know, how do you make that leap, and do you make that leap? Should you make that leap? The interesting part is on the second day when i had my my buddy steve murray, former uh owner of real trends, has now sold that business to housing, wire exited out of the business. You guys get that he exited out of the business now clayton collins and the guys at hw they own it. He was talking about valuating, a real estate, agent's business, and he said if your business is predicated on you, it's worth less, because if you die what happens and if i give you a bunch of money and you leave and you stop selling houses, the business goes Down he said so, you know you would sell it for less. That would be your exit strategy like the same thing if all of your business was predicated on your past clients and sphere, which means it's all relationship based which i'm not saying against just hear me out.

The argument is if your entire business is predicated on you and you getting a referral because they know like and trust you. What is that business worth? The answer is a lot from the day-to-day revenue generation standpoint, but almost nothing as a saleable asset. Let me say it to you again: almost nothing as a saleable asset. What steve said was: instead the businesses, the teams that are selling, because there's a lot that are selling these days.

The reason why they're selling is because they've set up a marketing and lead generation machine right that, whether it's facebook or zillow or ding, ding or google, or direct mail or open houses, the machine is generating new customers every single day and now what's happening, is venture Capitalists are now looking at the size of an agent's database and saying over the next five years, how many transactions would be produced from this database, and it actually gives them a step up in value. I hope you heard what i just said there like. That's a super interesting insight right but again it's not predicated on their own past clients and sphere. So i say that to you because i want you to answer like when are you going to exit like? When are you done and if you say never cool or think about this, maybe your exit is hey.

You know what like i named. I don't know if you know this. I have two boys one's 22. one's 20.

uh michael ferry is my older son. Well, my dad's mike fairy. You don't think that wasn't by design. Of course it was yes was i honoring my father.

Absolutely yes, right he's my hero. I love him. I named my firstborn after you right and then i was like. Oh my my son, my younger son, stevo right.

I named him after my best friend, steve armani, co-founder of the business right. So so both got equal honor, but i was thinking like. Could a personality-based business like mine, sell? The answer is, of course we you know. We get those kind of inquiries all the time what's interesting is i thought you know what, if what, if mike ferry, who basically led the revolution of discipline and real estate, you know an icon in the space.

If you know who he is, you know what i'm talking about and then myself coming in and then what if the next mike ferry could come in right, but you know i have 171 coaches. I've got six other speakers. I've got lots of people that smease subject matter experts in our business, but what? If maybe you turn the business over to your kids? I mean look they're smoking, weed, they're, doing nothing, they're playing video games, they're 28 and you're, making 800 000 a year 400. 000 years a real estate professional, bring them into your business and then slowly over time, give them stock.

You can exit they take over winter winter. Chicken dinner happens all the time in our industry, but you got to answer the question: what's your exit now beyond? All of that, a few more questions and i'll give you some homework and i'll. Let you guys go uh. Who is your customer? Who is your customer is something that not enough of us are thinking about, and i know you you say no, i think about my customers.

I want to love them. My past clients insert. I got that, that's not what i mean the avatar right, the avatar, who is betty, the buyer and sam the seller, and you have written up on your wall, betty, the buyer and i'm making this up. You know she's uh, she's, 28 years old, right she's.

You know x, y and z, and what happens is when you create these avatars of who your ideal customer is you begin to attract more and more of your ideal customer? That's what i mean like you're, building a business, i'm building something who's, your ideal customer who do you want to work with? Who are you for and who are you not for it's a very important distinction? I tell people like the example is today. You know because you're one of my followers that you know having a google my business page is a really good idea in your business and and people say how much personal stuff uh do. I put into my gmb, for example, on the photo section i'm like look. If you ride harley davidson's and you have a harley davidson tattoo - and you don't show your tattoo and your harley on your google, my business page, you are missing out on a clientele, a base of customers that are so loyal to that brand.

That they're, like i'm, choosing you just because you write a harley, that's how it works. If you want a visla dog right and that or a rhodesian ridgeback is one i just saw recently. I was like well that's a beautiful dog. They like would hunt uh lions, like that's elephants, like some crazy.

You know dog from a million years ago, not the ones you see in the park today at least we hope not, but here's the thing if you have a dog like that, and you didn't put them on your google, my it wasn't a part of the the Mix of your brand and who you are and what you're about you have to understand that, like consumers will literally say, agents and lenders they're all the same, but he's got a visa dog she's got a rhodesian ridgeback, i'm using her here's 20 000. It happens. Every single day, who is your customer and then the second part, is, and who are you it's like um? I don't know if i've ever talked about my podcast, but you've all done this before you've heard this example uh. I was 19 years old in san diego at a brian tracy seminars about to turn 20..

So it's like july, 17, 1991 um and brian tracy. You remember that name like old, like rock star um. He was he was like my like outside of my parents. He was like my first mentor, my dad's like you're, not listening to me, but you'll, listen to this guy.

So so i meet brian. I start you know listening to his audio cassettes and taking notes and listening to it on my old headset. When i drove my honda, 125 cc motorcycle to work and listening to brian tracy on like the walkman, you guys with me the cassette version like old school listening this guy all the time and then i get invited to go to one of his three day conferences. So by the time that i met him, he had basically helped indirectly, as a mentor does indirectly.

I like tripled my income from making like 60 000, like 180 thousand dollars when you're 19 and you're making 180 000 a year, and you already have a fake id and your own condo, like you kind of think, you're killing it right like i certainly did. I was walked into this room and they were all old like everybody was old. They were like 40, you with me, but i was 19. right.

So i'm like look at all these people like who are these people, so i i walk up brian nice to meet. You, of course we talked over the phone and you know thank you so much and my dad and blah blah and thank you for all the cassettes and i've listened to everything and i've tripled my income and inevitably during the conference. He calls me out, and he said tom stand up, i stand up and i'm looking at all these old people and uh, you know kind of nervous and he says tell them what's happening. I said well, i've you know, went from making sixty thousand dollars to 180 thousand dollars and um.

You know listening to brian's advice and i follow his formula and i do this. I do that and then about, and he was like you know, yay right, congratulations, tom and then he says to me: tom stand back up and i was like okay and he's like you're my mentee right, i'm like yep. He goes you need to get married now. I'm sitting at this conference by the way with the girl that i was dating, and i wouldn't even look at her because this was only a date.

This was not a forever thing, so i was like oh okay, he's like you need to get married, i'm like what i'm 19 brian. What are you talking about? He said kid you're rough you're, like a you're like a piece of coal, and you need some positive pressure to one day become that diamond. I remember him saying that as clear as day and i was like okay. I know that metaphor too.

That's great! What are you saying, brian, like you need to get he's like you need to get married? Here's what i want you to do, go back to your room tonight and in your journal, write down everything you want in the ideal spouse. I'd never heard that exercise before i've been married 28 years by the end of this month. I met my wife one month after doing that assignment one month. After doing that assignment, i was like dark haired, preferably italian, this color skin this mindset, this parental situation.

I wrote everything about other women that i respected mary hardish. He was a real estate agent in a in balboa island who was kind enough to let me live there when my parents kicked me out. I you know my mom, like my grandmother. Elizabeth wesley was a rocking real estate, professional in huntington beach, who drove a trans, am in like 1978 like smoking.

The bandits you with me on this, like she was so just just full of life and energy, and i thought about all these women that totally i gravitated towards like yeah, someone like that in my life would be awesome, and one month later i meet my wife. Now i didn't, like you know, have a script in front of me at the time saying. How do you feel about this? How you feel, but that actually did happen, though, but that was on the second date when i brought my cheat sheet and i pre-qualified yes, literally pre-qualified took me a year and a half of follow-up and then i got married right, but i knew exactly what i Wanted long story short, who is your customer? Who are you trying to attract when you are for everything, guess what you attract? Everything and everything gobbles up your time takes your emotion away, takes your heart and soul away, instead of saying, i'm really good with these kind of people. This is what my business is all about.

I don't need to get 8 million people. I want to get 8 000 or 800 or 80 a year of the right people. That's a really powerful exercise for you to be thinking about with your business. Now i wrote down under that.

What problems do they have and how do you solve them? What problems they have and how do you solve them? Because the moment you can say i really specialize in people that own a house that want to buy an investment property. I specialize in mature couples that own houses that are trying to figure out the transition of their life, or i specialize in people that live in this territory. This part of town, this geography, this price range. When you make that declaration of this is the specialty.

Then you have to say what are the problems that they have and how can i solve them in a unique way, so i become the obvious choice: that's business. It's not. I've got a business card and it looks just like seven thousand other agents. There's no uniqueness.

In that there's no, why do i select you and yeah, you can say well, they select because of my beaming personality and my fantastic looks. How scalable is that like really how scalable is that you, and i both know the answers? It's not, then again, i'm just reminding you what are you building so the last thing i wrote down before i give a little homework is: what are your unique factors and we've talked about it throughout, but what do you do better special different and how does it Line up for the analytical, how does it line up for the you know the high d of someone on the disc profile or the high eye who wants you, know energy and excitement and let's go like? Are you for that person? You know? Do you have the spreadsheets for the you know, the the all s or c who wants to just look at the data and the numbers? The engineer like? What are you unique factors? Do you do it faster better, more efficiently? Do i get them six percent more?.