All right. So I'm putting you on the spot. So uh. last year I sold nine Houses Yep.

I did uh, seven million dollars in sales and I am at Uh Two. Closed and no escrows right now and it's almost July First Yep. ring, ring ring hello hey Tom this is Lisa with Channel Realty how are you? hey Lisa What's going on? Well listen Tom I'm reaching out because I know that you are a super successful agent in the Greater Boston area I Know last year you had an amazing year and we've got a really great opportunity that's opened up as our lead generation has really increased heading into the summer. Market Something that I've been hearing from Agents much like yourself is that if you only had more opportunities directly face to face with somebody who's looking to buy or sell in today's market with the rates where that where they're at, that that would be beneficial to you.

Would you be open to a conversation about how this could help you? Are you recruiting me right now? Is this like a recruiting call? Potentially If I can have. If I have some options that will help you increase your business, earn more money, and potentially have a little bit more fun, Would it be worth five or ten minutes now for my listener I was literally sitting there thinking about what would it be like to have had seven paychecks and be sitting here in June having a conversation with my wife and kids about summer plans I've only have two closings I have no listings, I have no escrows and and I just that just that I was just staying in that and you're like and that's just an opportunity opened up, leads, appointments. It's hard to say no to that. What are the most? What are the most common objections you get with a line like that like or an opening statement like that? Has there ever been a time when you heard myself or someone else you respect I Hope you respect me.

You're watching my show. You must. Has there ever been a time when you heard someone look at you directly in the eyes and say I am talking to you, You need to do this. You just didn't hear it, you just didn't hear it.

But maybe just after a couple nights of sleep or maybe having some conversations with friends all of a sudden you realize hey, she or he was talking exactly to me. Well that was a moment that you and I had say hello to my friend. Lisa Chinati uh it's like third or fourth time on the show ish ish. February of this year I was standing in front of several thousand of our clients and I was saying to them this is going to be a hard year now.

Everything about real estate in a good Market or a bad Market is hard. But we are now in a cycle called high interest Rate incredibly low inventory mixed with 60 70 percent of the people that have a mortgage have a three on it to start and forty percent of Americans have no mortgage at all. Translate that to your numbers around the world that this is going to be a hard work. And if you have the audacity to think that you're not going to have to work harder, make more phone calls, be more disciplined, apply more effort every single day, then you're going to struggle in this market.

And you my friend said what while I was saying this Uh, I mean the Journey of it I had I'm going to go back a little bit further. I'm going to go to October Go Yes, Yes! in October and I remember you saying you've got to make your calls. You've got to do this. You've got to do that.

And there were pieces of the you've got to do this. You've got to do that that I took away and implemented yes, always the very personal ones. Um, more about like personal development and less about professional development. And in October I was listening under the lens of I don't do that anymore I've achieved a certain level I've hit a certain point and that doesn't apply to me anymore.

Yes. and so in February at the elite event oh I I think it was like the second day and I don't remember what the exact moment was and I don't remember what the exact verbiage was, but it was a giant o four letter word moment. lightning rod bang. Totally.

it was just it was the way that you said it or something about it and I was like holy cow, that really does apply. And if I don't internalize this and if I don't take action, I'm gonna be in trouble. So give the listener context right, you have this wildly successful team Ridge right? Gennady Real Estate Group At that at that point in February how many agents did you have on the team I think it in February it would have been like 70 to 75.. Okay, so still by most people stretch like a that's a good size office.

That's a good size team, right? It's an enormous team. It's a good size office. Yep, and the point that I was trying to make and for you listening it is acknowledging it again. We're in a cycle right now.

Real estate's only about two things: population growth and Cycles We've got no issue with population growth pretty much in most you know, countries around the world Like we're we're having more and more kids, more and more people moving. The challenge we have is we have this challenging cycle and what I was trying to express to you and then I want you to unpack what you did because that's really the magic here is that if you're not willing to do the extra effort correct, right? If you're not willing to say this is for me I Get memed all the time now Lisa Like you know literally had a anyway a couple days ago someone like you know every time Tom Ferry says make my phone calls and like I think they have like three bottles set up and they were like and they're like we know we know we're supposed to make our but you know like I love it. They're making fun of me for saying if you don't work in this environment, you're going to be in trouble and I'm just speaking the truth. What did you personally start to do And let's talk about the sort of reimagining of your schedule, your work life like what you have to do.

so talk to us. Well so it was I think understanding that there are still I So I was coming at it of the lens of I pay people to do all of these different things right like they're sales people I have people that do recruiting for me I have people that do all these different things and typically I think that they're better than me. yeah which is why they have these jobs and so I was drunk monkeying that like I don't have to sell I don't have to recruit I don't have to whatever. But this goes back even further from the the business owner perspective of understanding that in my business my my first level client is my agent yes and how I really move the needle in the company is through increasing my first customer yes which is Agents yes agent count help them sell more houses and bring in more people right? Yeah and so it was this Epiphany that make your calls maybe doesn't call the buyers and call the sellers but make your calls is make sure you're growing your your company, Make sure you're keeping Yes where our Baseline income comes from Healthy and sustainable right? So and again for the person listening that was that was beautiful it is I'm not saying to you cold call I'm saying to you when you shake the tree somewhere in apple Falls but if you're hungry and you're not shaking the tree that's on you always and forever yeah my young son Stephen who you know uh said to me hey Dad what would it take for me to be on stage and I said you haven't done anything yet he's like oh oh my God I said well you're a lucky supper club like whatever Spoon Club like last name I don't think so kid, what are you gonna do what are you gonna do to earn that spot and he said to me what would I have to do I said you have to make 200 outbound calls a day and book eight to nine appointments every single day as an Str for my team and even then I'm not sure if three months warrants even one second on that stage.

Maybe in two years When you've now done a hundred thousand dials, you will now have the emotional intelligence to understand. He's been doing it every single day, right? Good for him. You took on that same challenge. So you went from a very busy executive schedule meetings and trainings and got a minutes and working with managers and looking at spreadsheets and all these great things that have helped you run this great business.

So now you're spending three hours a day on the phones every single day. Please unpack that for us. What does that mean? You're on the phone Three hours a day? Well so a few things I think part of this kind of thing has been a journey in leadership for me. Um, and it's been kind of understanding.

I have totally changed my thought process about what it means to be a leader and I've changed my thought process about how people kind of hmm what my whole company thinks about what I do. So the first thing that I did was I committed to doing my power hours on the floor with my agents. Yes and so I moved out of my office and I sit on the floor probably five hours a day at very least right now in the Middle with all of my agents and we're laughing and we're joking and I'm airpods in or headset on in my CRM from the recruiting perspective, right? right? But even starting before that I role play five days a week on my drive to the office. I've got a great group of role play partners and we're role-playing recruiting scripts yes, um and then getting to the office and really being very intentional.

much like an agent with buyers and sellers about understanding who to call, what conversations to have, nurture campaigns, and the Cadence of conversation and you know, phone calls, text messages, emails, social media like Outreach and all of that kind of stuff to the end goal of booking strong appointments with people who are going to be aligned with where we can help them right with what we're doing right? Um, and just holding myself really accountable to my own Kpis. So in February you had 72 to 75 agents. As we sit here and record this, it's almost the end of June going into the second half of the year. How many agents do you have in the business now? So we have 115 onboarded and congratulations, thank you and I just got note that I had had a first interview last week and Jason back at the office managing the ship for me.

just met with two more and they are starting on Saturday Congratulations Yeah! so super exciting how long in your uh time as an owner time is a team leader. Had you been fantasizing about having 100 plus agents, it has been this like elusive Milestone and I have spoken to like I've got my accountability group every Monday Wednesday Friday and I would say like I'd get to like 100 and then I dip to 90. right because of the way that normal attrition happens and I'd get to 105 and then I dip to 85. or I'd get to like 99 and then I'd dip to 95 and it was I Think you and I have been talking about it for probably the better part of a year.

Yes and then I would get there and I could never quite crack it. Yes, so it's been a long time. Yes, yes. So how does it feel to be at that number now? I mean do you get some sense of reward? Yes, but um, then I'm always like that's not good enough.

Well we talked about in that session a couple times ago, which was like, well, at this pace, where could we be if you maintain this right, So so I'm not asking you to make a public Declaration on the podcast I Think you should acknowledge that what you've done has been remarkable. It is a thank you I think for anyone listening it is Wow. Okay, so I'm an experienced veteran in the high end on the west coast where things have been a little complicated and challenging. but I'm not calling even my past clients, let alone right doing it two to three hours a day, right? And then we.

We have friends that we know in the industry that do that And they seem to be outperforming the market. There is that correlation right now of of just velocity work ethic making the calls. whatever you want to call, it's all of that. So so what were the biggest mistakes you made doing it? Looking back, if you had to start over again, what would you have done to accelerate results faster? Let's talk sort of tactically about just you know all things attraction because that's really what we're doing.

We're going direct to Consumer Direct to Agents. It could be Fizz post expired. It could be past. clients could be circled Island could be eight million other things.

It's all the same what would have sped it up? What were some of the early mistakes So the first was not spending enough time understanding the script for the Avatar that I was calling and the So on the recruiting side, right? Every agent has a different an agent on a team might be an expired, they didn't have a great you know experience on another team. An agent who has had decreasing production is a different Avatar versus the brand new into the industry agent right? right? And so same thing with calling buyers and sellers being able. if I hit a a seller from a cold call with an expired script, it's not going to work No right. And if I try to hit a first-time buyer with a move up size or move up fire script it's not going to work right.

So being really clear on who I was calling and and just to point out and just one generic script across all. Also will only work now and then. Correct. So always rule number one is Know Thy Customer 100 Who am I contacting What are their pain points? could you use or have you use things like chat GPT to say let's create an avatar So real estate agent in New England who last year sold 15 homes is now sitting at three halfway through the year.

What are the pain, emotion, feelings? What are the conversations they're having inside their head about the business And let Chachi PD go And it's like can you You convert that into three opening lines and five opening Like have you done any of that stuff So I did I didn't go to the last step I did do. What are the pain points and what are some of the emotions? Yes, and that just ties into how do I get them to engage, right? right? The basics: How do I speak directly to their pain and into their heart and head? Yes, right and get them to it Because if I'm cold calling you, yeah, I'm just starting with a conversation. It's really hard to want to talk to me if I'm not speaking to something that's current in your existence. Imagine if you could sit down over the course of three days with 82 different agents and team leaders who combined sold more than 6 000 homes in the last 12 months where they broke down in detail how they generate a steady flow of listings in this market.

Everything from the marketing they use the checklist to get it done and organize and be consistent, the scripts and dialogues, the follow-up strategies, the tools and more to implement them. That is my promise of this year's success. Summit In this environment, you can no longer be asking yourself how instead you've got to find plays that work and simply run them race to Tomferry.com Book your reservation, make sure that you absolutely position yourself Above and Beyond in your Marketplace truly becoming the market of one. All right.

So I'm putting you on the spot. So uh, last year I sold nine houses Yep, I did uh, seven million dollars in sales and I am at Uh two closed and no escrows right now and it's almost July 1st yep, ring, ring, ring hello hey Tom this is Lisa with Channel Realty How are you? hey Lisa What's going on? Well listen Tom I'm reaching out because I know that you are a super successful agent in the Greater Boston area I Know last year you had an amazing year and we've got a really great opportunity that's opened up as our lead generation has really increased heading into the summer. Market Something that I've been hearing from Agents much like yourself, is that if you only had more opportunities directly face to face with somebody who's looking to buy or sell in today's market with the rates where that, where they're at, that that would be beneficial to you, would you be open to a conversation about how this could help you? Are you recruiting me right now? Is this like a recruiting call? Potentially if I can have. If I have some options that will help you increase your business, earn more money, and potentially have a little bit more fun.

Would it be worth five or ten minutes now for my listener I was literally sitting there thinking about what would it be like to have had seven paychecks and be sitting here in June having a conversation with my wife and kids about summer plans. I've only had two closings I have no listings, I have no escrows and and I just that just that I was just staying in that and you're like and that's just an opportunity opened up leads appointments. It's hard to say no to that. What are those What are the most common objections you get with a line like that, like or an opening statement like that? So the first is, you know I'm happy where I'm not a happy where I'm at I'm not open to an opportunity and I think one of the mistakes that I see even my own recruiters when we're not role-playing enough through it make is that they're like, okay, right? It's just like the seller who's not interested right now.

Yeah, how do you get Beyond So we would call that the smoke screen No, right? right? Because no one says oh my God I'm desperate. Thank you so much for calling. Let's get started right? Never. But they say yeah I'm good right now I Love my broker like everything's fine because that's just a you know I don't want to actually say I'm so far behind right? No, no.

so how do you go beyond that? So it's a lot of just. it's fascinating because we're here at this Phil Jones event kind of talking about questions. yes and it's a big part of it. And it's kind of reading the the tone of the person on the other side right? and being able to ask a question, you're happy where you're at.

It's amazing. You know how do you find navigating this? Market Some of our agents have really been struggling and you know or whatever kind of tone you open up with whether it's mad or frustrated or just like really low energy and the more that we can ask questions and then get them to lead us down to ever it. I Know if I've pulled up your stats Yes, you sold 9 million last year? Yes and you've only closed too. Yes.

I Know something's wrong for sure I Just need to get you to open up. Yeah, and you can't just go. Hey look I know you're only at two clothes and you know you suck like you, right? So it's there is I think so much empathy required right? and sort of emotional intelligence to have that conversation without disclosing I Know you're in trouble because because the truth is, you always have to put yourself in the other person's shoes. They might be the the husband of a high-powered you know, executive and the fact they did nine deals last year meant absolutely nothing.

right? And it's just play money for them, right? So it's it's really the it's the empathy. it's listening. it's exploring um and getting over that hurdle because it's no different from you know you and I are like oh my God we need an outfit for tonight's you know thing we're going to Dave spell tomorrow I was racing them all and someone goes hi, can I help you we go all set. No, we're just looking right which is what everybody does.

You got to get over that. So that was very nice. What was the hardest part in the in the ego of a CEO of a company to go from? you know, the shiny office, the big desk, uh, all those spreadsheets to out on the sales floor with your team making phone calls. So it was twofold.

the first is the drunk monkey and I lived with this one for a while which is my agents don't want to see The company grow, right? Oh yeah, and I think that, how do you get over that story I mean it's understanding I think when you've got the right people, one of the things that we talk about within the company now is that we're we're in Partnership Right and right. Our partnership enables us to both do big things and the bigger the company gets, the bigger it helps us help our agents become yes, and they've become some of my biggest cheerleaders, right? Which has been really kind of fun, right? Um, and so the first part was getting over that drunk monkey that they're not going to want to see it. The second one was they're gonna think I suck on the phone right? and like yes I get that I get that right? Like right? Legitimately, that was the other one I actually don't mind I love sitting out there because I think it enables us to kind of. We joke right? and sometimes like they'll hear my side of the conversation and I'll hang up the phone and I'll mother.

He only sold two houses and he's telling me life is good and I know it's not right and the Agents laugh with me and we joke about it right? Um, but that has opened up. Uh, I think I sometimes got stuck in the I'm not approachable yes kind of. Yes Vibe yeah, especially when you sit in the office and even though my walls are glass and you have like three screens in front of you and you're you know, knee-deep in your spreadsheet trying to analyze some you know, data point right? and like so not exactly. It's not exactly inviting for people like hey, got a minute right? Yes, but so it's created this just like really open.

Yeah, great thing. but I think one of the other things that I didn't anticipate that would come out of it that also helped move the company forward is I was hearing some of the conversations that was that were happening from the agents. Bingo um so it became really great coaching opportunities. yes um, not just about their scripts which is I think sometimes what they thought that I was just going to be sitting there listening to them and that in the first couple of weeks everybody was kind of nervous to make calls around me.

You just found fascinating for sure. Well, intimidating right? Same reason of the intimidation Just In Reverse right? But then is it like as we were as I was sitting out there and I could hear people talking about transactions or talking about like struggles that they were having and it opened up these really cool group discussions and it I think has kind of helped our retention? Yeah I think it's helping recruiting I think it's helping our deal stickiness I think it's helping us get more offers accepted. It's creating like this really cool collaborative, um culture I Get it. I Get it So it's hard to.

It's hard to sit with someone that doesn't have a strong reason or motivation to do something and say to them: Knock on doors, make phone calls, do open houses, buy leads, send an email, check in with your past clients, throw a party, do anything right. Just do smoke signals right? Yep, how? how have you at this stage of your career continued to light the fire? And what advice do you have for the listener who might be like okay I get it like I've seen her on stage and oh my gosh, but you know she's always. You know I just I Just the last couple years have just been hard. it's been, you know? I I ran a million miles an hour.

You know now it's a different hard and and we get it like I Get it. You get it. You get it. Like you don't have some level of emotional energy fire in the belly.

It's hard to do the things that are uncomfortable. So what advice do you have? What have you done and what advice you have for the listener to to just ignite the fire again? So I think for me I a big Epiphany that I've kind of had also through this first half of the year is that I need to always kind of be doing something different. Yeah, and I think if it I think when you get stuck in the monotony of it or just kind of seeing it as I'm always working with Buyers or I'm always just listing the same thing over and over I think that that's where it gets really tricky I think if you can kind of look at it and say is there an extra skill that you're layering on right Is it moving the needle? um part of kind of what you and I have talked about is the what's beyond real estate and that really I think is it was a great conversation that we had last week. Yeah, um because it's going.

It's pushing me already to see beyond it. um in a different way and so being able to see much bigger picture has been like game changing and there's a lot that I think is still going to unfold with that. oh yeah, we're not talking about that yet on the show though, we're not. Yeah, no no, but we will say that that I said to you I've had three moments like that in my career as an advisor, as a coach Mentor or whatever.

whatever and I knew that that conversation was the third one when we had it. Yep, it will I in that conversation. Like the emotion is real, yeah, like and I don't often feel that. Um, so the emotion There Will Carry Me Through right to the end, right? Um, and I think after that conversation, whole new pivot on it, right? So but finding that that one thing that it was like this is gonna the same thing we talk about with our agents.

what's the why right and I I think being able to understand that it changes over time. So I'm going to say to the listener who's like what's the grand reveal like we'll share when it's when the timing is right. But here's the context right for you. What Lisa said is exactly right.

Jay Abraham My mentor and friend forever would say every business right it's I Forget who said it first and it'll come to me is every business is about Innovation and marketing right. And the second you stop innovating, doing something new right, you get stale and the second you stop marketing, you go to business. So it's that constant Battle of new innovation. but the right in from you know the right Innovation choosing the right next new right.

So so ask yourself, when was the last time you added something new to your business that you knew was right? You knew it was going to bring value to the consumers, You knew you were going to do more business. and you also knew that you had to learn a lot to get there right, that you couldn't just implement it right, that you would have to go through the J curve and that whole experience to get to that level of success that you wanted. Jay would say to me all the time every 18 months you have to ask yourself, how am I disrupting myself Yeah, how am I disrupting my own business Because trust me, there are thousands of agents in your Marketplace that are trying to figure out how to take you out. Not in a bad way, but they just want every transaction that you're doing right.

They want like and you know it because the person watching and you know it because you looked at others in your market and said put a bullseye on their back. Let's go right? So if you're not innovating right, but innovating with the right purpose, innovating with the customer in mind. In this case, the customer is your agents right and you might say the customer is. You know my buyers and sellers so that's one.

But but the other thing is going back to like tick tock tick tock. Life is short. What's my real Legacy going to be right? That was kind of the dialogue like okay, you're successful right? And you know you and your husband and your daughters like you guys have created this magical life. But you're also very young, right? So so what's next And and not for the person listening.

What's next? Go lead the industry. What's next that will give more purpose to what you're doing. more like transcend Beyond Like of course I'm gonna make my phone calls or of course I'm gonna do this because I'm doing this for that right? That's when it starts to connect the dots. That's where I go back to my other Mentor Mike Vance and his partner.

Diane Deacon They would say every one of these amazing companies we've ever worked with like the the founder had something that was beyond just the widget of what they were selling. or Walt Disney you know, creating theme parks, he just wanted every kid to smile, right? So so working 37 hours a day meant nothing to wall because it was about all these kids smiling right? and how many kids are there? Well, there's a couple billion. so I got to get to all of them, right? So and that I think is what we're talking about here, right? Yep. so so as we wrap this up almost, uh, it's almost July I'm gonna challenge you on December 31st 2023 how many agents will you have in the business Happy productive Selling Houses and rocking minimum 175 The ideal world is is 200 and I think some of it's going to be the seasonality for sure for sure, but this is five to 200.

I Love that number. And this has been an interesting year because in years past, any any recruiter would tell you that it's more the end of the year when agents want to make a move. But what we've seen through the pandemic and certainly through this year is the sort of the agent migration patterns have changed dramatically. That it, it's it now.

it's just like I'm ready. Let's no: I don't have any listings I don't have any escrows like there's still that element of of when most people would make a move, but you're seeing it a lot more frequently now. I'm not recommending that you switch companies I'm just letting you know like that's more the migration pattern today. So 175 to 200? Yeah, totally.

I Love it. All right. Closing thoughts for the person listening and just do it action right. like it's a your own way and taking action on whatever it is and starting small, it doesn't have to be.

Going from doing no phone calls to doing five hours a day of phone calls. And the small incremental change of no phone calls to an hour a day of phone calls is enough to move the needle. Yes, and I would say the reminder of the the Great Study that says when you drop somebody in a forest and they find themselves intentionally lost, you're putting them in a place where they don't know where they are. 90 95 of the people will walk aimlessly in circles, usually based upon what leg is right or left dominant or what leg.

the right and left is smaller than the other, even by like a millimeter And they will just they will go in circles. They will find themselves saying this: I've been here before I've seen that tree and they're just walking aimlessly circles, circles and I I liken that too. How many people I know in the industry? how many CEOs have found themselves? You know sales people Business Leaders Like you repeating the same year over and over and over and over. And when you do the research on this and you look at the studies, what they all say is that the people that weren't that aimlessly walking in circles, they're not bad people.

they're just walking in circles, right? The other ones had a reference point. They said uh, get the sun setting over there I'm gonna walk that way the sun is rising over here I'm going to walk that way that appears to be the tallest mountain. that line of trees seems to be more significant, so there's a pretty good chance that there's water there. and if I find the water, I can follow the path.

They had a point of reference. they had an intention, a purpose, a goal that was super important to them and I would make the argument when you look at the stats on the Mls's today, which I'm going to reveal at the summit this year that a lot of people are going to freak out because the Delta between the rich and the rest got much more extreme this year than it ever has especially on the listening attraction side. And and I would make the argument it is. a few people have a reference point, a direction and a reason why they're going there.

For these people lost in a forest, it was very obvious survival. these people walking in a circle. They also wanted to survive, but they just kind of kept doing the same thing over and over again and never got that clear direction of where I'm going and then started marching their face off to get there. So I take the combination the two and ask yourself what are you gonna do Thank you always for being on the show.

Thank you for making your public declaration 175 to 200. Here we go, what's yours? Let me know in the comments and I Can't wait to see it! This year's Summit See you soon.