Today's conversation is one that has been on my mind and we have the absolute perfect guest: the Rockstar Agent team leader who is really just the living embodiment of what we're going to get into today. Which today's topic is all about multi-channel layered branding. How do you position yourself so that in your local? Marketplace online and offline social media search engines and Beyond everything like literally everything people are like I Just see you everywhere I Just love your marketing. You guys must be really good at what you do because I believe that the agent of 2023 coming up this next year is going to have a really, really strong, even more recognizable brand in their local.

Marketplace And I think a lot of agents and teams have become overwhelmed and exhausted by his social media and all these other things that could be a part of their marketing stack and should be. But they become so all-consuming and so today's conversation I Want us to kind of zoom out and look at what are you building? What is the overall marketing machine? You're building the layered marketing machine in your local Marketplace that positions you as that dominant agent or dominant team with whom buyers and sellers desperately want to work. So welcome to this week in marketing. My name is Jason Pantana I'm your host and today I'm the moderator of a conversation with Rockstar team leader or co-team leader.

She'll tell you all about it. Christopher Far Group Northwest Krista Thank you so much for jumping into the show and having a conversation with us today. How are you great? Thank you for having me! I Really appreciate it. Well I'm I'm excited for this conversation.

So Krista give everybody watching or listening. just kind of some context for you and Aaron and your team and what y'all are doing. Yep, so Aaron and I married almost uh, 18 years. We've been in business together those entire 18 years.

not always in real estate, but some sort of business. So we do have a little bit of background there, which obviously has led into real estate. Um, Aaron's been in the business five years. I Just hit my four-year anniversary.

Um, when he was in it one year he was just overwhelmed. so he asked me to get my real estate license and join him. Little did he know that when I joined him, I wasn't just going to help him, but I was going to bring him more business through something that I feel like I was good at. which was marketing.

So he grew from I believe 24 transactions in his first year. when I joined him, we jumped up to 72 transactions in our second year and 93 in our third year. Last year was our fourth year, 151 total transactions in 2021. So uh, we now have myself.

Aaron We have five other agents and we have a marketing coordinator Laura who are all on our team and it's not just Aaron and I it's it's a team thing. So I Do believe and we'll talk about this more. The far Group isn't just Aaron and I it's it's all seven or eight of us at once. Yeah, and just because I know some of the backstory of your team I Find it fascinating that most of your teams team members that is, how do they find and make their way to joining your team? So literally everybody but one person we're working on her but everybody that is a part of the far group.

they're all past clients so they had an experience with us either buying or selling a home and you know over the course afterwards after the transaction was over, they continued to follow us, communicate. we stayed in touch and eventually they asked if they could be a part of of what we were doing in. Spokane Yeah, I think that's such living proof of wow. something you're doing is working and I think there's probably two things I would put my fingers on to say these are what are special.

one. you all deliver an exceptional experience to the consumer where people are like this is different than working with others. Um I think about the best businesses on the planet some businesses Pride themselves and say we don't even Market ourselves because the experience speaks for itself and I think that's part of it. But the other thing I think is your superpower and sort of our purpose today is you are really freaking good at marketing and what? I respect and love about your marketing is you don't Market in just one way, you're all about the multi-channel way And so I'll give some context as we dive in here because I am excited about our conversation.

Um, I'm a major believer in multi-channel marketing. I've talked about it on this show before about why multi-channel marketing works. There's actually human psychology that actually explains why multi-channel marketing is so effective. um, and basically without going into tremendous detail.

It's called The Frequency illusion just for our listeners and viewers. And what the Frequency illusion in a marketing context says is that when a consumer is exposed to your marketing, messaging your branding here and there and over there, across multiple mediums, multiple channels, what it does is it creates an illusion that they are actually seeing your marketing more frequently than is actually the case. We've talked about that lots of times and so by doing email and postcards and the other stuff, it actually makes all those things work together in tandem in Harmony and it creates a better cost per result and it creates more awareness and more familiarity. So that folks say I See you everywhere So with that verbose intro first question I want to talk about with you is just kind of tell us where and how does the far group Northwest Uh, do marketing We obviously social media.

Um, you know that's something that we're good at. but it's not just social media? And now after the whole Instagram crash a couple of weeks ago I Truly truly believe that we need to think outside of the screen. Um, and we do that in so many different ways. Um I Gave you a list earlier today I Don't even have it.

but um, we've done movie theater ads. We're on a billboard. we sponsor our kids sporting events. We have signs up at local sporting facilities in Spokane that have a QR code.

We have postcards. Uh, we have a lot of Swag We have a lot of things like a candle with our name on it. We have keychains. We have lock boxes with far group.

Um, this is an amazing list. Did you say the movie theater one? I Think that was the first? Well, it's a video or a static picture prior to the movie. Like in the ads like it, it runs, you know, 20 minutes before a movie. So okay.

so literally anything locally, whether it's on a screen or off a screen physical. Whatever you have truly Diversified your marketing and positioning your brand and who you all are as a team and what? the culture and Community you're building is literally everywhere. So that was the point I wanted to get to Is your marketing literally everywhere? Um, I'm gonna put you on the spot here. And what kind of a budget does that require? And you don't have to give me a hard number? just kind of some sense of what does that look like.

I Mean it's expensive, but our motto is you have to spend And that's been our motto even before. Real estate is the only way you're going to make money is to spend money. So I mean it could be up near a hundred thousand dollars? Maybe more? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know it's it's funny. I was spending time this week um, at an event and I was spending some time in particular with a couple of really, really Mega team leaders.

like just thousands of sales each. And it was so funny how similar their businesses were and their businesses both began with excessive marketing and branding. I mean they were doing Billboards radio sponsorship, all the big stuff. and I'm not saying like, go drop money that you don't have.

uh, we typically recommend that whatever your adjusted gross commission is. So basically, after you pay out splits, it's ten percent of that should be your annual marketing budget, which is right where you are. That's about what it should be. Um, exactly.

Actually, you're probably under spending based upon that assessment, just a little bit. But yeah, you know it's close enough for jazz. But the thing of it is all these teams. they do this because I was one of them Said this to me we were actually sharing an Uber or going to a dinner together and he said my whole premise was if I could brand our team where we had trust and consideration with the consumers locally.

So much so that the buyers and sellers were like oh yeah, they're yeah, I'll work with them and that the agents would see value in that too. and say I want to be a part of a team that has that level of influence in the community, Then it's a win-win for everybody. It attracts new recruits. It attracts buyers and sellers.

It reinforces just the value proposition of your brand to the consumer and to the agent. And so I see that working similarly similarly for you all too. Yeah, that's exactly how it is for sure. Okay, now this is kind of just a follow-up question, but I want to just hear more from your Vantage Point Why in your opinion or experience, do you think branding in particular is so important? A lot of teams focus on lead gen.

There's nothing wrong with it. but I want to hear from you. Why is it all about branding and positioning I think it's so important? Like like you said, I See you everywhere Aaron was we were at an event last night. Aaron was in the bathroom in the bathroom next to a guy in the urinal like Aaron Farr you know, oh I see you every.

He literally said that like I see everywhere and Aaron's like I have no idea who you are but that's awesome, right? There's like can I help you sir Like you said recognition. The more you see somebody, the more you're intrigued by them. Like who is the who are these people? We see them everywhere. Who are these people that are joining the far group and why are they joining them? So it's almost like you're creating this curiosity that leads them to you.

And once they're to you, that's where you get to nurture them and have and build that relationship with them. whether it's online, whether it's in person, whether it's through all of our marketing goals. but I think branding is so important because there's a level of relationship and um, trust behind that brand. It's not just you see a sign in somebody's yard, which we see a lot of those, right? But when you see a far group sign, your mind is triggered to oh, the client experience.

Oh, you know I've seen them everywhere I saw their video I Saw them at the movie theater. So I think that there's a level of trust behind your brand. Yeah, so know you like you trust your business. and certainly that frequency and familiarity turns into some sense of wow.

they're legit. I See them everywhere I I Love that. And I would also say like when you think about marketing, just in general, marketing serves two major functions. The job of marketing is build a brand, so brand awareness and generate leads.

The question is what comes first, the chicken or the egg? Do you generate leads first and then brand to them? Or do you brand and attract leads? And I would say it's kind of a reciprocal answer. It doesn't matter, whichever one you do first, the other one follows, You can lead, generate, and then position your brand to nurture or brand and attract leads. Either way, you're doing marketing and so there's no wrong way to do it. It's about choosing a path that suits you.

However, I Got to say, like having a brand having influence having Authority it's got lots of residual effects. I Also, think like for your team I'm willing to bet there's some level of retention built into having a strong, recognizable brand because it makes their business easier to function because they can lean on the backbone of the far group in their marketplace, right? Exactly. We've had team members that have joined us recently. You know they go through a coffee stand and they say oh, you're with the far group, You know we don't.

We don't know them, but they know us because they've followed us. Or they've You know they've just come to know like who the far group is and who's a part of that group. So yeah, it does exactly. Of course, what do you think is like a major obstacle or the major obstacles that prevent lots of other agents or teams from really achieving that? I See you everywhere.

status in their businesses? Um I Think it's fear. Number one: People are afraid to put themselves out there because of what other people might think of them. Um, that's something you know a couple of businesses ago I Learned people's opinions don't pay my bills right and if I'm doing the right thing and I know that um, what I'm doing is going to help at least one person, you can't say the wrong thing to the right person. So by by putting myself out there not being fearful of what other people think, it just helps me build our brand without the fear of of other people's opinions.

So I think that's number one is that people are afraid of what other people are going to think about them. Number two, they're afraid to spend money. you know, agent like people can be cheap and I don't want to make anybody feel bad. but it's like if you just put your for sale sign in somebody's yard and you think you're going to bring in all of this business, you're not.

You're not like, what are you doing besides the side, what are you putting out there? are you putting out, um, content videos? Are you making yourself known through postcards? Are you door knocking? All the things right? So it's just it's lack of um, willingness to do something really scary even if it's monetary. Um, and I just and I think people don't know what to do I I don't know what to do You know and it's easy to copy people I do it all the time if somebody like, don't read the wheel, if somebody else is doing something that works and you see that, do it. Maybe change it up a little bit, make it more you if it's not, and just and do it. but there's it's.

just people are frozen in fear like I don't know I don't want to spend all the money I don't know what to do I don't know if it looks good I don't know how to create anything and so they just don't do it. Do you think some people do it? but they don't do it long enough and they abandon the effort prematurely. Yes, that too. And when we whenever we do anything, we do it for a year.

if we're set, if we're doing a farm, if we're doing a billboard, if we're doing a movie theater, we're going to do it for a year. Or we've sponsored this really crazy event at the Pumpkin Patch for five weekends. We sponsored the live music. we got a booth, we had our branding everywhere and we're like, okay, we're gonna give it the five weeks because that's what it ran and we're going to reevaluate.

Was this good? Did this bring us leads? Did it get our brand out there? Were we exposed? Did we have conversations? so give things six months to a year? At least at least if something. If you don't see fruit after a month, you're giving up too early because everything takes time and if you're just starting to do it, if you've if you've not put yourself out there at all, it's going to take even longer. You have to do things long term and you have to think in that long-term game. Do you also think that people can? Because like you mentioned, a lot of like, really valuable insights? Um, first one being your Vibe attraction tribe.

At the end of the day, a lot of people are afraid to put themselves out there, but by putting themselves out there, they're actually attracting people who want to be around them. And so you don't really have mystery clients in the same regard because they've already subscribed to who you all are as a brand. I Thought that's a great Insight I Definitely think the money is a factor. There are certainly some lead sources and you talked about this.

There are some types of marketing channels that are just more costly than others or they're more time consuming than others and so something I've noticed is a lot of. Agents Don't get to the layered marketing approach because they don't get past the first layer because either it's very expensive or it's very time intensive I Don't know if I'm making sense or not, but have you seen anything like that where folks can get kind of fully immersed in one little thing and they could like blinders go up and they don't see everything else that they could be doing? Absolutely yeah, like it's It's as easy as putting a sticker on a lock box. And if you think that one sticker on a lock box is what's going to bring you all the business. No, it's the key chain.

No, it's the it's the yard Stakes that you put out with your branding all over it. It's the Facebook ads that you run with your branding on it. You know it's not just the one thing. It could be five things that bring that one lead to you and get your brand out there.

I'm gonna go controversial for a second. I think I think and I Can't wait for the sound bite of what I'm gonna say because it's going to get taken away out of context. Um I think a lot of Agents um are really really involved in social media marketing as they should be. I think social media marketing is absolutely critical.

but I think because it is always changing. um, we're always trying to do better at it. It's a lot of pressure. It's a lot of work.

Making videos is hard and time consuming. I think it's really easy for it to kind of subsume all the bandwidth you have for marketing. and I think a lot of Agents fail to see all the other little things they could be doing to position their brands around that content strategy and really lifting it up and bringing it to life. I Don't know.

does that sound controversial? When you think it's gonna be, it's gonna. it's good because it's going to be convicting to some people and that's okay. just be hiding behind my computer screen at my house all day. Maybe I do need to get out there and do the other things that are going to bring me business because what happens? You guys, if Instagram goes away again, like, where's your marketing, where's your marketing, then we're seeing algorithms change.

We're seeing platforms basically abandon their core competence to compete with the new emerging threatening platform and things like that and it's like it is. I'm not saying we don't keep up I would be you know, against my own statements and comments that I make on a routine basis. however, social media marketing. if you look at the way it functions and this is just me and you chatting a little bit, you know it's kind of like mining for gold.

you know? I Don't know if that makes any sense where when you mine for gold, you end up with an entire rock quarry of a whole bunch of not gold just to find a little bit of gold. And it is truly gold. But if that's all you do and you fail to see all the other things around you, that were opportunities, you might be again putting up blinders and not seeing what else you could be doing as part of your marketing mix. I'm not saying abandoned social media, not at all I'm just saying maybe we have to make sure we look at it as a marketing channel and not the end-all be-all because social media marketing algorithmically speaking is not necessarily only looking at people's interests based on where they are.

In other words, most the people who see any given post or like it or comment are not in your local. Marketplace And that's okay. There's agent, agent referrals, and a lot of other perks that come along with social media marketing. But even if we optimize every post by making hyper local content, we location tag it, We do all the right things.

It still gets consumed by a lot of people who aren't in your local. Marketplace Whereas like postcards are like a surge in scalpel, they're precise. I Send them exactly to the addresses I have in mind of the homeowners in my Marketplace and so I've been talking to a lot of my coaching clients about this. Hey, we got to start putting some money behind our content on Social to actually direct the attention in our local.

Marketplace How do I create your brand Under the Dome and your Marketplace using your social media and all that other stuff along with it. but I Don't know what do you think are some of the benefits and drawbacks of Social? I Mean the benefit is that you can you record one video thousands of people with one video, right? I Mean that's a great. um, that's a great way. but you can also send one email out to your email database at the same time.

so it's just like okay, you can do both. You can do both. I Think social media is such a Time sucker that you get sucked in and I'm so guilty. um that you end up wasting.

You end up wasting two or three hours of your day saving other people's videos that you can create. Um, when you could be doing other things maybe host an online homebuyer class like make social media to your advantage. Don't put it to your disadvantage by wasting your time trying to get content ideas when you can be. you know, using your time better.

I Think it's just a Time sucker. It reminds me of an agent. Um, because have you ever seen agents where they get a client? They're like I got a buyer typically like a newer agent and then they like blinders go up and they're all about that client and then the client like shows them they gotta look at 100 houses, They write six offers and lose or whatever and it's just like this. They're all about that client.

but the expression is lots of irons in the fire where you've got to figure out how do I as an agent? make sure I'm not so following this particular one person into the corner of their decision that I'm actually serving all my clients. How do I keep myself open-minded to see all the other opportunities around me and I think our marketing I Don't know if that made sense, but I think our marketing is a lot the same way. Where how do I make sure that I am keeping a wide view of all the opportunities to position my brand that can lead to a stronger brand that attracts more business, retains agents, and all the good perks of just having a strong brand and marketing effectively. How do I stay open-minded to all of it and not get sucked into the one thing that potentially is great.

but it's not the end-all be-all I Don't know. That's just my thought. Yeah, okay, it's not Yeah. All right.

So y'all are branding everywhere. Um, you're doing online offline. We're doing I think you're doing Billboards I Think you're doing movie theater ads I think you're doing swag and gifts and events and social media and video. And well, we're doing Hulu Netflix commercials now too.

So we're popping up for 30 seconds on Hulu and Netflix when people are watching TV So see and I like our brand isn't far our like. we are our brand and we can't forget that either. It's not your color. It's not your logo.

It's not your font. It's not your market update like you are your brand. and if if you're just putting something out there that's a static post of a market update like I Believe that people are more attracted to the person more than they are the brand. So if we're talking about branding like you are your own brand.

So the more that you put yourself out there, whether it's through a commercial or doing a live video or talking about a house that you're looking at like people are attracted to you. not your fonts, not your colors, not the way your Instagram nine squares look when they go to your page. Yeah, and I think those things have their place like you talked before about. Association Where oh, that's the same team that does this and they see like oh, it's there and it's there and it's there.

But I do agree, it's super easy to think that it's all about I Gotta choose the serif font or whatever it is and like those are just my new small little details. They matter, but they're not nearly as significant as who you are and and putting your likeness on display because this is a know you like you trust your business and that should be intrinsically part of your branding play. Yeah, all right. so final question and you can answer this with as many answers as you want.

Okay, totally yours here. We are nearing the end of 2022, moving into the New Year. The Market's adjusting has adjusted. We'll keep adjusting.

What's your best marketing advice for agents and teams Right now? The best thing that people can do is to start creating content obviously for social media. But look outside of that like where are people going? What are people doing? Where can you go to put yourself in a position where you're having more conversations with people in person? Because at the end of the day as we go into 2023, people are interviewing buyers and sellers agents. and if they don't know you, if they don't like you and they don't trust you, they're not going to pick you so. I I Really truly believe like our goal as a team is to go out and have more in-person conversations.

Um, and obviously you know our whole thing too is just client experience. So making sure that our clients have like the best red carpet experience from the time they meet us through the transaction and even after the transaction that we are still top of mind to them because those clients turn into referrals who turn into referrals who turn into referrals. So that's that's so good. I've been calling that the referral coefficient um, Project Lines did the math in his own database and he found that the average lifetime value of one customer is a hundred fifty thousand dollars over a life over the life of that relationship.

and I'm like wow, Yeah, agree. 100. this is what I like though about marketing and branding is that it goes back into reinforcing. It's a great experience.

This reinforces that experience. It keeps your clients kind of under the nest of what you're building and it builds a community. And so I I'm just such a fan of what y'all are doing. I Think you are one of the hottest emerging teams in the US Um, your team is super bought into what you're doing.

You're crushing it in your local community. You have the sales to back it up, all signs or growth and I just I Love it! Thank you for coming on and sharing and thanks for kind of going with me on a different sort of perspective where we didn't make it all about just social media. Instead, we made social media part of what it's all about, which is positioning and marketing your business to be the dominant agent or team in your Marketplace and you're the one. You're like.

you're all are the living proof of that. So thank you so much. Krista Uh, where can they connect with you online? Yes! so we are on Instagram it's far dot group and W um that's pretty much the same handle across every channel. So far dot group NW Thank you! Hey, all right I Love it.

Super grateful for this conversation. Hey, we'd love to hear your feedback. What do you think? What are you doing to position and Market your brand literally everywhere. What are the top marketing channels or tactics that'll bring you the best return? Let us know in the comments so we can get a really good brainstorm going on.

And if you're new to the channel, make sure to tap that big red subscribe button and hit the little Bell right next to it so you can get notified whenever we publish new videos just like this. So until next week, this is this week in marketing hahaha.