Welcome to another episode of Coaching Moments With Ryan D’Aprile from D’Aprile Properties!
In this episode Ryan and D.J discuss the need for community and going back to physically showing up in the office. They also discuss the value of the agent
and what the future of retail may look like. Next, Ryan makes a comparison between today’s market to the one in 2008 and gives tips on how agents can behave now. Last, Ryan and D.J. discuss the importance of the correct marketing campaign for an agent’s business.
If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube!
Ryan D’Aprile can be reached at 312.590.6416 and ryan@daprileproperties.com.
This episode was brought to you by Real Geeks.
Transcript
D.J. Paris 0:00
Would your production actually go up by simply going into an office every day? We’re going to discuss that. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. Their agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now onto our show.
Welcome to keeping it real, the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Parris. I’m your guide and host through the show. Today is our monthly series called coaching moments with Ryan de April. Now if you’re not familiar with Ryan, or if you’re new to our show, Ryan comes on every month to give our listeners and our viewers a coaching moment and a coaching session. Let me tell you about Ryan Now Ryan D APR is a progressive thought leader focused on providing for his agents and his staff at deeper properties. His strengths are as motivational skills coaching style and dedication to training. He has 14 offices throughout Chicagoland he’s also in Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, and Florida. depot properties focuses on high customer service, managing and executing their agents marketing and transaction management for them so that agents can stay focused on what they do best their business. And if you’d like to take your career to the next level, or if you’re just not getting the attention you need check out D APR properties, visit D APR properties.com D A p r i l e properties.com. And again, they are in Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, Florida. And of course, Illinois. welcome Ryan once again to the show. Thanks,
Ryan D’Aprile 2:42
TJ. Appreciate it.
D.J. Paris 2:43
When Ryan and I were just talking before we started, I was telling him I got back from the Zillow and Industry Forum that I was very fortunate to be able to attend and Ryan’s like, hey, let’s let’s save all this for the for the show because I I wanted to I was doing what a good host should not do, which is giveaway all of the conversation beforehand.
Ryan D’Aprile 3:05
But I noticed you seemed like like it was almost like shifting and like earthmoving for you and so kind of like well, that emotion here for all of our listeners, right? I
D.J. Paris 3:17
was, I am energized. I want to I want to tell you, I had a very fun experience because and I think this is still relevant for me. I had just the weirdest coincidence that my sister, who is a chief marketing officer for a pet food company called candidate, just in the weirdest of coincidences also happened to be in the same small town in Southern California that I was at for the Zillow conference. And she does not live in California, nor do I. And we were both there at the exact same days for different conferences two miles apart. So she was able to come see mine and I was able to come see hers. And I was so excited to see my sister present the CMO of target was introducing her and then did a q&a with her. So this was a roomful of very, very powerful chief marketing officers. And after the Zillow conference, I went and saw her speak. And I got energized by that as well, because the big focus of that there was a branding conference. And the big focus was on ongoing trends that consumers are most interested in, which include things like being mission driven, being a company that has something that they believe in, that is about creating good for the community or for the world. And I was excited about that. Because I’m trying to realize I’m realizing that that’s what agents, especially the millennials, and Gen Z. That’s what they’re looking for in a brokerage, having a firm that is about more than just doing a real estate transaction. But I wanted to shift all the way back to something that I know you are very passionate about. And this is a topic we didn’t get into because Ryan stopped and he’s like, don’t let’s not wait for the show. So this So it’ll be something that’s new. And I love this because I know this is a passion of yours. And so I was in this this conference with all of these broker owners. And so we ended up chatting with them. And these are people that run brokerages. And I was saying to them, because the model that we have at our firm is a bit more of a hands off model. And so physical offices aren’t that important for my model. But I was curious what other brokerages who are more traditionally focused, you know, were thinking about for office space, and most people were saying, Yeah, agents really aren’t coming in anymore. And I agree with that same with our at our office, but what I was curious to get your take on is I was hungry to be around other people in person, that because for the last couple years, you know, that was very difficult, really impossible in a lot of ways. And I thought it was so nice to be able to touch, you know, other people shake their hand, you know, hug them, if they were friendly, if we were friends, be able to just be in in community. You know, Zoom meetings weren’t aren’t really cutting it for that sort of intimacy. And I think I know that you have a lot of thoughts around around agents offices, and I’m curious to get your thoughts about where you see that headed, because the easy answer is, no one’s coming back to the office, we’re all working remote. And that’s just the way it’s going to be. I’m not so sure. And I’m curious what your thoughts are.
Ryan D’Aprile 6:28
I’m pretty sure that I think the trend will reverse. You know, even myself caught my eye, I found myself working from home over these past two years, and kind of almost lost my way a little bit. And I’ve been talking a lot of my agents and saying, Guys, I’m getting back to the basics. And what I mean by that is, I’ve been going to our offices, I’ve been leading office meetings, I, if I’m working, I’m not working over headquarters, I’m working out of an office. I’m in our Naperville office right now. And it is incredible to see the need for community, amongst a company A company, I saw Simon Sinek say your company is your tribe, it’s your people that your group. And it is and we all came to this organization based on our values of who we are as holding each other up being vulnerable, talking about where we are how we’re feeling, and how do we kind of work with each other. Now, there are times we’re in offices completely empty. Other times where it’s acids and elbows, as I like to say, I this morning, I walked in Naperville, there was a closing going on, there was six agents in like the bullpen. And there was two executives meeting in another room as a leader and another agent, you know, in a recruiting meeting, talking about joining the organization, the office was packed and was alive. And it’s it’s my Apple Watch died. It’s 230 or so. And it’s dead. But that doesn’t mean the office isn’t needed. And there might be that one particular agent says I just got to get out of my house this morning. And I have to find somewhere to work where there’s nobody around me. And I do a lot of I do a lot of recruiting and I do a lot of recruiting for our all of our companies and a lot of the people’s even loan officers that are kind of working from their homes, they kind of feel lost and a bit they they lost the camaraderie they it’s not like, Hey, I got to come to the office, and I gotta sit here and I’m gonna work here Monday through Friday nine to five. But I don’t think if you have a place for somebody to station, I, you might have a very fine company, it’s just a completely different culture from the organization that I run, and that my people are looking for. And, you know, they’re looking for that camaraderie, they’re looking for that getaway, they’re looking for that environment, you know, and every company provides different things, you know, I’m not going to be the real estate company, that’s, you know, you know, having a party every single night or every single month and all that I serve a lot of agents that you know, I want to work want to make money, I want to do my own thing I want to I want to be myself, I want to be with my family. I don’t want to be doing this. There’s a lot of different companies out there, they there, they all do it the right way because it works for them. There are companies that are you know, 100 base 100% commission based companies that are completely virtual, there are the multi level marketing companies where, you know, they’re they’re recruiting and they’re virtual and then there’s other ones that they got offices, whatever works for them then there’s real estate companies where you know, they’ve got a party going on every single feels like every two weeks they’re having a party and they’re doing something and and so it comes back to like what you said that Chief Marketing Officer for target said you know, your brand and your identity and and what are you in? It’s key to to know who you are I asked, you almost felt like I lost a little bit of that. And now that I’m getting back with the agents, and I’m in our offices, and I’m talking to my agents, side by side, it’s like, This is who we are. That’s right. This is what we are, this is what I, this is when we were right, keep doing, this is what I’m doing wrong, get back to what you are doing. Right. And that all came from physical environment and being here and learning in real time from them. Whether it’s a big beautiful office, or it’s a satellite office, we have somewhere, it’s still an office, it still works, it’s still somewhere to kind of come have your community be with the people, and then go on with your day.
D.J. Paris 10:35
I think I think there’s something that is is hard to replicate virtually, which is the getting to experience the energy of of, of a busy office, or just people being busy in an office, you know, making phone calls, you know, you walk by and someone’s making, you know, not that everyone should be making cold calls, because of course, some for a lot of people that’s that’s not in their, their what they want to do. But to watch somebody do that might just inspire someone else to go, Hey, how’s that working for you? Does that work? And then oh, yeah, it works, you should try it. You know, just even getting exposure to other ways of doing things is hard to do virtually, unless you’ve set up a structure where people are sharing that and in person, they could just walk by, and I’ve been to your office, your head office here in the city, and I and it’s bustling with activity, and that’s really exciting and fun. And it there’s an energy there. So I think I sort of think they’ll be more, there was a lot of talk at the conference about offices going away in the sense of having as many desks or as many private offices and being more lounge driven, there was a lot of, you know, hey, we want a fun place where people can hang out and learn and, and still work. There’s,
Ryan D’Aprile 11:51
there’s, there’s, there’s in between, right? I actually did the lounge at one time. And people were like, I need a place to have a conversation. I needed a little privacy. I want you to he kind of got to have to find a happy medium. It can’t be all you know, yeah. All or nothing. So it’s nice, long dresses to talk to me, but I got a call I gotta make. And I can even just sit in a workstation where there’s little things up, it’s gives me a lease enough privacy that I need to have, or, or a little telephone booth that you have, or maybe Yeah, but I think you know, it, it’s no, no thyself, right, know who you are, and what works for you, I do know that everybody gets into ruts, I know that everybody gets in patterns, you know, it’s, it’s easy, these kinds of things to do that, you know, something over and over again, that might be the wrong thing to do. And the nice thing about an office is you’re gonna be around other professionals that might dialogue with you. And sometimes you realize Jesus was the basics that got me here. And so basically, I gotta get to, there’s a post I shared with our agents this morning, we have an internal group page, and I, I like to email and post something that’s meaningful to me that I can relate to them that’s meaningful, and, and it’s by Victoria Erickson, author of edge of wonder, consistency, consistency is an underappreciated form of intentional magic, disguised as a mundane doing, as a god setting kick ass saying, What a great saying, and I think to be consistent, sometimes you need a professional environment to go to professionals around you. Yeah. And I think it’s really easy for these multibillion dollar organizations to talk about, these are the trends. And these are the shifts, but there’s macro, there’s micro, and there’s, you know, there’s theory and is reality, and I just still, you know, there are Lone Ranger’s and there are packs, right. And so a lone ranger might be able to thrive and work from home and not to anybody. Um, but there’s a lot of us that we’d like to run in packs. And it’s nice to have that, that space that place to drag to that office to come to and I’ll tell you, I wouldn’t be doing it if I wouldn’t be having on it didn’t make sense. Yes, I do have offices that some days are completely empty, but man when I needed my needle, but remember a vertically integrated right to get real estate, get mortgage got title, we got all of these different things and these offices and putting them to use as well. Yeah,
D.J. Paris 14:29
I think I think everything you said just just makes a lot of sense. And I think too, if there are any broker owners, listening who are maybe contemplating what the future of their physical space, their office offices, may be, I would say ping your agents. Now this is a great opportunity to run a survey and especially an anonymous survey and say, hey, you know, if we were to do if you’re thinking about it, if we were to do away with the office, how would you feel about that? Not how would you feel about it today, but really think about it for the next year. It was not available to you? And if and would you like to do more events, you know, and I always say, like your city, like, you got to know your customer. And the customer dictates dictates the terms really. So I think great opportunity. And if you are an agent, you ask
Ryan D’Aprile 15:14
those things, sometimes you want to the more events, they do the events, and not many people show up. So it’s kind of it’s a little bit of a questionnaire that it’s kind of observing, and then kind of just swimming downstream going and going with it. And it’s, you know, it’s a very interesting business. It really is a very interesting business. And it’s, it’s a business, it’s kind of cannibalize itself, the real estate brokerage business, I should say, um, and, and then but but, but it has to give a lot. And so there’s given take with everything, there really is a give and take with everything. And, and I think the real estate brokerage business has some adjusting and fixing to do for itself to make itself a healthy business. Again, and again, you look at some of these companies, they’re now public, and you see they lost a half a billion dollars last year. Yeah. Everything but somebody lost the half a billion dollars, and that was their investors. You don’t I mean, that’s the stuff that’s going on. And, and and the value that they add is probably tremendous and great. But it comes with a cost. And I think there was a reckoning, going to be coming, I think in in the brokerage business, the model, which maybe we could segue into what you saw over the Zillow conference, right, but of how that you know how that works, and what we see, but I do, I am adamant that you know, what we do, and what we provide in terms of marketing and transaction management and office space and coaching. And technology is a huge value. It has a price to it, though, you know, and people that pay the price benefit from it, and they actually earn more money from it. And I think they get more enjoyment out of it.
D.J. Paris 17:05
Yeah, I think technology it’s so interesting, we’re getting to a point where tech used to be behind lock and key. You know, the only people that had access to information about buying or selling a home were agents, and agents no longer are the barrier to that entry point. Right? It’s It’s on every website with an IDX data feed. Most notably, Zillow is they get 200 million unique visitors per month just from the United States alone. And if we put that in perspective, what there’s 350, or I think 350 million people in the United States. So just about everybody assume let’s just assume that’s everybody is using Zillow. And the technology that’s available for free on Zillow instantly is better than any business’s IDX website where people can browse or any individual agents website. So, you know, you I started to think at this conference, and I’d love to get your thoughts. At some point it’s going to be, I think, the disparity between the technology that agents have access to maybe through their MLS, or through the different third party vendors, they might be using. The disparity between how technologically advanced, let’s just talk about the MLS, because that’s one thing that we don’t have control over where we belong to an association, they provide an MLS solution, a software solution that you may like, or you might not like, but you’re stuck with it. Whereas, you know, consumers can go on Zillow, Zillow is a tech company. So they’re able to, that’s what they do, bats are able to consistently optimize that experience for the consumer. At some point, you know, the available tech that the consumer is going to have, is, is going to be better, faster and easier to use than what agents have. And so I I’m curious to see sort of how that impacts agents and what your thoughts are about how that texts can just going to keep getting better for the consumer and keep getting more personalized. Whereas, you know, MLS technology that agents have really can’t keep up with with that level of progress. And I’m curious if you see that as an issue or a good thing for agents,
Ryan D’Aprile 19:16
I think for probably over a decade now. The consumers already had better technology for us. And I do know now going on, I think, what 17 years 2008 1415 years. The data of the inventory of homes, what’s available, all that stuff shifted over to the consumer 15 years ago. Yeah, already. So I guess my opinion on that is if the access To the information was the key differentiator of a real estate agent or not an agent? We would have been put out of business 14 years ago. Yeah. So that’s, and I’ve been saying that, since I’ve been 32 years old. And, you know, I’m 46 now. And I’ve been looking at this stuff, and I’ve not seen it change yet. So yeah, the consumer, you know, goes to all these different websites that are out there, out here. Here’s a great point, I was chatting with one of our agents the other day, and one of our agents is, it’s a large $10 million listing. Okay. And she will be the second brokerage. Right, they’re changing companies. And I was advising her on information that the consumer was asking about marketing. Okay. And they had interviewed while they went with another real estate company prior to us, right, which was a national real estate company. And then they are interviewing us and three other organizations. One’s a small, small, independent, there’s us, we’re a regional player, right? And there’s two large international, right, or national real estate companies. And I was I was advising around this. And I said, What’s the pain point? What happened to the individuals? Right, exactly, yeah. They had two offers on the previous property. And both fell through during inspection. And I will tell you, I know who the agent is. And sort of my eight, right, we know this particular agent, I’ll tell you this particular agent, and I love our business. I love our agents. This one particular agent has probably one of the sharpest tongues you’ll ever meet. Okay, and we’ll put you in your place sooner than you even know how and like, how did that person do that to me, right? We know individuals out there like that. This independent brokerage compared to our brokerage, I said, there’s no difference. And that’s who the listing agent wants. Now, we’re now we’re shifting gears, and we’re looking at our competition, the one man chap, us and the national real estate company. Do you know when I list this particular home, the day we push a button, if you’re in Singapore, or if you’re in Johannesburg, Africa, you’re going to see the listing? Yeah. And so the marketing of that home is really kind of irrelevant. And the reality is real estate is hyperlocal. And who’s going to take care of you during this transaction, you have a $10 million property that fell through twice, you’re changing brokerages after a year of being on the market. That’s a lot of time. That’s not stress. It’s a lot of anxiety, a lot of carrying costs with that kind of property. Right. And the question is marketing data, the consumer seeing the property? I don’t think so. I don’t think so. It’s consultation. It is prepping the home. It’s prepping the sellers. It’s meeting with the buyer’s agent and the buyer. It’s negotiating the contract. It’s meeting with the home inspector who may have an ego and working with that home inspector. And when there’s questions working with in Illinois with his attorneys, the two attorneys, what are the attorneys learned to do in college or in law school? What do they learn to do TJ? argue the fight? Yeah, they’re taught to fight. What a real estate agents have to do. We got to get between these attorneys and stuff fighting. We’re trying to make a deal go here. So a lot of emotional intelligence that gets involved in here. And everybody sees these things. You went to this conference, you are jacked up, right. The world is changing. The industry is changing.
Maybe, maybe, but the consumers had better data, I think than we’ve had for 14 years. Yeah, real time. And they come to us over and over again, because of the relationship we have. Because of the emotional intelligence we provide. And because we’re above, I’m a real estate agent by trade. That’s what I am when I buy a property, or I lease one of my properties. I don’t do it by myself. It save a commission. I don’t have the time. And when I’m negotiating with somebody directly a particular landlord, I don’t want to talk to them. I don’t want them to hear me. I want to hear my voice tremble. I don’t want them to hear my emotion on it. I want to be able to have a direct conversation with my leasing agent. Why what exactly I want, then let him go to battle, and then come back to me and debrief me. Like, if it wasn’t a valuable service, I wouldn’t use it, I would just do it myself. For God’s sakes, I own a real estate brokerage with 14 offices, property and leased property, I have somebody come to stay in between me,
D.J. Paris 25:19
I did the same thing when I bought my condo here. And I’m more, it’s more obvious why I would as I have not a practicing agent, however, I could ask any of the 800 agents in our company or anyone in our management team, what should I do in this scenario, and they would give me great advice. And yet, I chose not to do that. Because I know that it’s that old adage, a doctor, it’s like a lawyer who represents himself in court has a fool for a client, right? It’s that that old sort of joke that is true, it’s like a doctor shouldn’t treat themselves but But what I’m and so I think you’re right, because in Zillow said said this, they said, despite the fact that, you know, this tech keeps evolving, and we’re considered the forefront leaders of this, still 90 some percent of all real estate, residential transactions go through a realtor. And why is that? Because they don’t need, you know, in the 90s, in the low 90s.
Ryan D’Aprile 26:11
And by the way, it was in the low 90s. In the 80s. Yeah, exactly.
D.J. Paris 26:15
And I am I met this is many, many years ago, about 10 years ago, I just started in this industry. And I met with a friend of mine whose husband is a CFO of a massive online, fine finance company. I’ll just kind of leave it at that. And he turned to me and he goes, Yeah, this is really not a good business to get into right now. Because tech is just going to erase the importance of a real estate agent. And and this is a guy who knows things and I said, Oh, I hope you’re wrong. And he goes, Yeah, I don’t think I’m wrong. And here we are now, 10 years later, and yeah, he was wrong. Because the right the emotional part of the journey can’t this can’t be really automated.
Ryan D’Aprile 26:56
This is the kind of stuff that shifts are real estate agents business, sometimes the negative, you went to this conference, it was mind blowing, right? And I’m like, let’s talk about this here. Because it was just like, a little bit late. You texted me the day before, right? Yeah, you this was unbelievable. The industry is changing. Like, what’s there? Is that true? Dietsch, right, we were talking about All right, so it’s kind of like, and then so that’s what I’m like to you know, we’re gonna see all the stuff. And I always tell everybody, the only thing is going to disrupt your business is you and understand the value of you and who you are. And that’s what they’re hiring. And that’s what they want. That’s the value. The data is accessible. It’s out there and Zillow has a platform. And they access the data from the MLS. They put it they have some artificial intelligence and your destiny yet they do a lot of amazing things. You’re not Zillow. You’re not I’m not another real super I’m who I am. I’ve disabled properties is who we are. This is who we want to be. We’re not trying to be another real estate brokerage. We know who we are. We know what our value proposition is. Sometimes I’ve lost that. Right? And sometimes I forgot that. And sometimes Oh, my gosh, I’m trying to be the person who will no I’m not. I this is why I miss what I like. There’s, there’s space for this, there’s value for this people value it. And that’s what we all have to give back to with our individuals is what is our value proposition you said to me, or I said asked us on the and podcast. And so when asked now, what was the question about Amazon?
D.J. Paris 28:28
So yeah, so I was we were having conversations with with some of the Zillow people, and my sister was there as well. My sister works in retail with with pet food. And I said to her so 40% of her business, is these independent of pet food stores, not the big chains, the small mom and pop shops. And I said, Dana, do you think those mom and pop shops will will be will even be around in 10 years? And she’s like, I don’t know. I’m worried about that. I’m not worried about the chains. I’m worried about the mom and pop shops. And I was think about Amazon. And so we started talking about Amazon with Zillow and my sister and I said, most of us or I shouldn’t say most of us, I am hooked on on Amazon, I buy almost everything through there that I don’t need to see in person, which is 95% of my purchases. I still go to the grocery store, I still run errands and I do things but I I do most of my shopping on online. And I’m worried about what that’s going to look what retail is going to look like in 10 years. Are we are we you know, what’s the landscape of reach of retail is going to be as important as it is today? Is technology going to kind of eliminate some of these smaller, you know, small businesses. But it’s scary. I’m scared about that. Not so much for real estate, except on the commercial side, I guess but but I’m curious what’s going to happen to small businesses as a result.
Ryan D’Aprile 29:48
So here’s how I feel about it. So you see do all your shopping on Amazon. Right? Okay, I don’t do any my shout against Amazon. Let’s not use me as an example. I’m before a six year old, over the hill, not a millennial person. So, um, do you have a pet? I do? Have,
D.J. Paris 30:11
I have a little tiny dog who’s currently right underneath this mine, this microphone sleeping. But she’s she’s, she’s almost 14. So she’s old lady. All right.
Ryan D’Aprile 30:20
So we have a, we have a, we have an 11 year old girl. And I say that she was my fourth daughter. You know, I love this girl more than anything, right. And she’s a part of the family. I have an 18 year old daughter. And then I’m 15 and 14, although these are pretty tech savvy girls. Um, we live in Western Springs. And there’s a shopping center behind us called the Garden Market. And in the Garden Market, there’s a Marianas, and a whole bunch of outlet stores. And this is a store that we go, and we buy her pet food from. And when my 18 year old wants to get something for our dog, which they want to do every once awhile, or they have like a little dog bath. It’s kind of fun, right? Because usually like a five black box warehouse, my 15 year old, I’ll tell you, my 18 year old could take me and you both down when it comes to technology. Sure. And technology advancement, right. But my daughter doesn’t go on Amazon and trust me, they have all their credit cards, they got all our shit, right? It’s overtaking my wife night. But my daughters will get in the car. And they’ll buy a new collar for Izzy at that store, or a different leash, or they’ll go buy her favorite dog treats of shirts available on Amazon. But that’s not what they do with it’s not the patterns, not the habits there, it will change obviously has changed, it will continue to change, but to say to an extreme that will be over with and there won’t be a value or a niche. I don’t think that’s the case at all. Um, you know, and Amazon’s a behemoth but I think Amazon is also behemoth, because they got AWS. Yeah, you know, I mean, Cisco is like, you know, one of the biggest clients to AWS to AWS now, AWS, which is Amazon. But that made that the billion dollar, you know, you know, technology company that’s selling cloud services, right? In fiber optics and another division, and whatever else, it’s, it’s more than, you know, a dog food or toothpaste I get quickly from here. And you know, and I look at the phone, Jesus 20 text messages, sorry about that, and come back into the call. You know, so, you know, embrace the future, embrace the change, but careful on the reaction on all of it. Because I watch Amazon and you know what I see when I see Amazon, when I say I watch Amazon when I’m walking down my street, I see the Amazon trucks. Do you know what I see?
D.J. Paris 32:58
Its ups? Yeah, yes. Yeah, their delivery system? Yeah, it’s a delivery
Ryan D’Aprile 33:02
system. It’s it’s absolutely delivery system. And there might be the individuals that say, by 90% My product for that delivery system, and good for them. But you know, I have I have, I have three daughters, they got a lot of friends. And a lot of younger friends. And I go to the grocery store, I still see it packed to people. When I go and buy gym shoes, I’m still going out Saturday afternoon, and I’m going to the gym shoe store. I’m not, I don’t want to put a label package back sticking, maybe the younger generation will be different. But I haven’t seen my kids do it. My daughter still goes to Sephora, or Sephora, or whatever a makeup store is right to do with the makeup and and they go and they do these traditional things. Sometimes like I was telling you on the call, it’s like, Man, I don’t know what to do on weekends, because my girls are out of sports or grown. And I’m twiddling my thumbs and it’s 30 degrees outside, so I’m not going to go golfing. So what am I going to do? I want something experiential. Yeah, I’m going to go to the PGA store, I guess. And check out a wedge there versus the same wedge I could buy on Amazon. Or I’m going to go to Oak Brook. And I might look for a new pair of shoes and grab lunch and a glass of wine at lunch. And I don’t think I think obviously, the change has come to change will continue to change. But a pendulum always has to settle in the middle, it will swing one way here or swing the other way there. But eventually it comes in the middle. And there’s room for everybody. And there’s room for everything.
D.J. Paris 34:31
I think your point about experiential experience, experiential sort of opportunities are really something that our listeners can can take home because we’re all hungry for having a Aden immersive experience. And agents can can take advantage of that like to give let’s give a couple of ways you can do that. Number one,
Ryan D’Aprile 34:54
Let me chime in that for a second. And that’s like a lot of things that like different businesses to do and is coming to our brokerages. Ours is an Office meeting a workshop that’s another another’s is a party, an open bar, you know, there’s no right or wrong. It’s just like, What experience do you want to fit into who you are? And it comes it comes down to that and and for the real estate agent, right? And like you said the experience and that’s, that’s being the friend of the consumer being there and talking through it, let them go through the motions, I cut you off, but I wanted to chime in on that, because that’s why our office spaces. We have them and we’ll continue to have them because it provides that.
D.J. Paris 35:40
Yeah, I was I was one of my friends, Melanie Everett here in Chicago, she built her entire now she has her own brokerage she built her entire practice up this is pre pandemic, of in her whole real estate business doing in person. Events. For first time homebuyers called sell you want to buy a condo, and she just had her first in person event a couple of days ago, since the pandemic. And so it’s two and a half years of only doing them online. And I thought and I didn’t know she was doing one in person or else I would have coached her if she would have said Not that she would ask me for coaching. But if she were to say, Do you think I should go back and be like, everyone’s on Zoom, do it on Zoom. And, boy, I saw pictures from her in person event at some restaurant. And it was absolutely JAM PACKED standing room only because peep just like me, I went to the Zillow conference, it was so nice to be there in person. So yeah, these in person experiential events, I think we’re hungry for it more than ever, right now. So you have as an agent have this opportunity to bring your sphere closer together and do something fun that no one has been able to even do for a first several years and you have this opportunity. You know, maybe it’s even just volunteering and saying, Hey, who wants to help me go spend an afternoon helping, you know, in a less fortunate, you know, community, those are experiences that people are hungry for right now. And even just getting together and hanging out or idea sharing. There’s something people are sick of, of being online. I know i
Ryan D’Aprile 37:08
i In that’s the pendulum coming to sell back in the middle. And I know a few years I was talking about office spaces are going to go away and all that other stuff. And and they have you know, I have a friend who works at HSBC, and they got rid of 70% According to him 7% of their office space. When I was walking my, my my dog two days ago, I was walk past a new neighbor of mine. And I said how are you? I’m okay, I start going back to work. Where do you work? He says Sears Tower. So that’s cool. He goes, Yeah, and kind of bomb they go, why? Because I gotta go back three days a week. We gotta go. We got to be there three days a week. And I thought to myself, get ready, buddy. Because it’s going to be five year from now.
D.J. Paris 37:46
Yeah. It’s almost paying that bill.
Ryan D’Aprile 37:49
Well, not only that, I really think you might see, oh, I did that. Who am I to give predictions? I think you might see a commercial real estate boom, here in the next few years. I think we may see a recession. We’re going through a real estate agent recession, which we have, you know, you know, there’s a lot to talk about, we talk about the next one. But when there is no inventory, and there’s not stuff to buy you guys who are listening to this podcast right now, you all should be incredibly proud of yourself. Okay, I was in this business in 2008. This is same exact environment in 2008. Except for in eight, there were all sellers, no buyers, and 22. There’s all buyers and unknown sellers. So we are in a real estate agent recession, there is no doubt, I think we’re probably four to five months through it. I think and is probably pretty clear. I think you’re eventually going to start seeing industry papers and whatnot. It’s sick, calling it a real estate agent recession, because that’s what it is. But it will change and this will pass. And then I think then you’re gonna see an economic recession. I feel like that’s going to happen. But it’s okay. You have to have these economic cycles. And then it all comes back. And the pendulum eventually comes back in the middle. And you know, if I was a young buck, corporate America, 27 year old guy, last thing I want to be doing is working from home, you I know why I want to be promoted. I want fired. I thought I want to see my boss that hey, man, here’s what I did. Or woman, here’s what I did. This is what I’m doing. This is what’s going on like that those human instinct those natural, that’s not going away. And so we’ve had an extreme two and a half years. It’s not normal. The world is not going to go that way. It’s going to sell back in the middle in my opinion.
D.J. Paris 39:36
Yeah, I think I think agents have this unique opportunity. Now we’re, you know, if they, if you have the free time, which of course is always a challenge for agents, is you have this opportunity to go visit people in person I was talking to this is a little bit of a different way of doing that, that I’m about to share. So I met I met a an owner, a brokerage owner. Who’s in the South? She has 2000 agents. And they had 15 offices? She has, she asked all of her agents, hey, I’m thinking about getting rid of the offices. What do you guys think? And so most everyone signed off on it saying, I don’t really use them, it’s no big deal. So she says, okay, but I’ll make you a deal. I don’t want to do this just to save money. Because that doesn’t help you the agent that helps me the owner, and I work for you guys. So she’s like, I promise if you if you want these offices to close, and I want you to really think about it, and we’ll just let sort of everyone vote on it. I will take the money that I’m saving on that, and I will spend it on you. And what does that mean? I’m going to come visit, you know, the same locations, the same areas, and we’re going to do lunches and we’re going to do fun events we’re going to do in person events. And I’m going to take that money and put it back into you. And she said she wasn’t sure how that was going to land. She wasn’t sure for agents who wanted to go have lunches and hang out. And, and sure enough, she’s like, Yeah, okay, we she’s closed all but two of our offices. So she has a couple places where people can still go and use. But she goes, I’m having so much more fun that I’ve she’s been doing this since 2003. She’s like, I’m having so much fun going around and meeting with my agents, seeing them in person and doing this. And so this idea of having experiential, you could do that inside of an office too. But she’s just reallocating resources. And I think agents kind of do really fun things like that now where agents can do in person events, they can go visit their clients and drop things off at their front door and maybe even get invited in which we couldn’t do for so long. This is just a great opportunity. When right now there’s a lot we can’t control. Like you were saying inventory, right? Every agent I know is frustrated because their buyer clients, of course, can’t find anything. And yes, we’re all dealing with that. But fundamentals are what win the game, right. And that’s something you can’t control. But what you can control is caring about your your your sphere and getting more in touch with them and helping them and being there to get being there to guide them. And you can do that in person now. And I think it’s I think you’re right, I think if agents can kind of weather the storm and it is a tough storm right now I totally get it. It’s feast or famine if you’re a listing agent versus a biocide agent, right? But it is, but you know what, and we I we’re starting to see Exodus, where we are starting to see people leave the industry because, you know, they’re just not able to practice anymore. And if they were, if they were able just to just eke it out and work with their, their sphere, and say, we’ll get through this, I’m with you. That’s really all that a client ever really wants is somebody that goes I’m on your side, I get that’s tough right now we’re gonna get through it. I’m working for you. And and, you know, I think this is a huge opportunity, you were saying you doubled down in 2008, with your marketing, whereas everyone else was easing off the gas, saying, I don’t know if this is a good time to be promoting my business when I can’t service my clients, and you double down and you said it was the best thing you ever did.
Ryan D’Aprile 43:00
Yeah. And then that’s why, you know, you know, I was, I was meeting with somebody and I can’t recall, but that’s why, you know, we do the marketing for our agents is I kind of want to take that decision out of their head, right? And be like, hey, it’s, it’s all about, like, what I read to you early, it’s all about consistency. It’s that, you know, it’s that it’s that magic that’s out there. It’s It’s not rocket science, it’s about being consistent. An agent is like somebody running for an office, you know, what’s your campaign? What’s your marketing campaign? And is it direct mail? Is it digital? Is it email, it’s, you know, all those things combined with, you know, pressing the flesh, right, connecting with individuals and, and I really think social media is best for r&d, research somebody that you’re and then develop a relationship with them, more so than marketing. Right? If I could show you my newsfeed, it’s going to be the same 50 People that Facebook has decided, these are the people that you want to see, I have my 4.3 1000 friends on Facebook, I’m some of them, somebody sells something to me. And I’m not seeing it because there’s like 45 or 50 people that I see, because that’s what Facebook says I should see and I’m not gonna be able to do it. But there’s other ways to getting to me, there’s direct mail, there’s digital marketing, and email marketing and, and then there’s also just connecting me and me asking me, Hey, how you doing? How’s lens, how Samantha, how are the girls, what’s going on with your life and so on and so forth. And that’s kind of individual that I’m going to transact with when I am that the decision making maker and a purchase?
D.J. Paris 44:35
You know, I’ve lived in the I bought a new development a year ago, a little over a year ago. Do you know in that entire year, the number of now again, new address, you know, not an established address that people can just, you know, send mailers to, to how many real estate, postcards or mailers I’ve received in that year zero and I You think now? Yes, of course, you could make the argument, you’re probably not going to move any anytime soon. And yeah, that’s true. I’m not
Ryan D’Aprile 45:06
matter. But what are you know, for people? Who are, of course, that’s every year, you know, for people who buy something that’s called the referral. Yep. And I
D.J. Paris 45:15
mean, even if all you did was send a congratulations on this new home that you bought, or that, you know, or just, hey, I want to introduce myself, you might not know me, I’m so and so I hope you’re enjoying your new place, I’m going to stay in touch with you. Because I know you’re probably going to be moving at some point in your life, and I want to earn that business. And you know, whether you say it that directly or you say it more subtly, I’ve gotten zero, there are 46,000 Real estate agents in the Chicagoland area, not one of them thought to send to send a postcard to a new address. And yeah, I didn’t get it, but you can’t do everything. But like nobody’s doing that. I was shocked. I am not one of my agents, either. Nobody, I
Ryan D’Aprile 45:56
have an agent that was on another agents team prior to joining us, joined us four years ago, maybe maybe three and a half years ago. And she’s been in the business since the late 2000s. Okay. And, you know, three and a half years ago was essentially a buyer’s agent for another agent and didn’t brand herself at all. By the way, it was at a really, really big real estate company, right? That’s really well known out there. But she wasn’t, she wasn’t the company was, but she wasn’t. She sold $44 million dollars worth of real estate last year, $44 million worth of real estate, with the correct campaign put around her, there was a monster, a nice monster, like a nice, cute monster inside this person. Right? That is now just completely dominating. But the marketing consistent activities are consistent. And the results are not consistent.
D.J. Paris 46:55
Yeah, and I think what what you do is so important for agents, which it’s really a unique value proposition to what I’ve seen at just about any other firm, I can’t even think of an alternative. And we have hundreds of firms here in the Chicagoland area. But you’re the only one I know who actually automates the marketing for the agents. And I’m sure there’s other people that do it. But yeah, but the fat. But here’s what I love about it, I equate this. So the reason I was a few minutes late to jumping on this call is I was coming back from the gym. And the only reason that I get to the gym, I’ve struggled with it my whole life. I’ve said it a million times on the show people are sick of me talking about it. But it’s because I have a trainer, because having a trainer. Yes, she’s extremely skilled, and she’s awesome. And I’m not trying to denigrate all of the cool things she does or diminish them. But the main reason I use her, aside from the fact that she’s super knowledgeable and really good at her job is it keeps me accountable. I don’t have to think about it. If I have to think about getting to the gym, I don’t do it. I just don’t I’ve struggled my whole life. And it’s an expensive thing to do. But it gets me to the gym, and you were just saying consistency. i i Now, you know have muscles for the first time in my life and like it doesn’t really matter, who cares. But it’s just consistency and results. And results just happen. And I no longer have to think about it. And so I think what you offer is so important because agents can’t be good at everything. And they have to run that entire business. They just can’t do it all.
Ryan D’Aprile 48:19
Look, you have any Yeah, exactly. And again, there’s a value proposition for everybody out there. And you even have like, Listen, you know, I have agents that get recruited away, too, right. And sure your agent is talking a while ago. And this particular just like the technology is really cool. I could create a Canva I could create a postcard, I could create a brochure from this thing. And and I just let it be. And I said to myself, well, yeah, that’s what we have our admins here doing for you. Do you want to be on a computer creating that stuff? Or do you want to be out with your network and selling real estate? And so everybody’s got to go on their path and journey and do it but like, that’s cool. We have all those things there. I just don’t put them in your lap. Because Is that what you want to be doing? Or do you want to be doing that administrative work? Of course, it’s out there. It’s been out there since you know, the start of of the web browser for Christ’s sakes and the evolution of a couple of these companies and whatnot. It’s always been out there. I just think somebody’s got to do it. I’d rather be a salaried employee who’s not responsible for out going out and making a kill, right to make a living, and what you need to be trained on right for your muscles like you refer to, it’s not marketing. It’s not the marketing and all that stuff. That’s all done for you. It’s we have the tools here. You can go do it yourself. But while I have a classically trained graphic designer who could do all that stuff for you, with the technology that’s out there, why don’t we get you engaged? Why don’t you brand you in your community? Why don’t we get you engaged? Why don’t we show you how to hold yourself accountable to netting with all these particular individuals and watch that $10 million business becomes $20 million worth of business. And now do the math and do the math and $10 million of additional production. You know, that’s a that’s that’s a lot of payola.
D.J. Paris 50:16
Yeah, I think it’s a great place to wrap up. I think you know, what we’re what we’re really talking about our I always call it like the John Wooden, sort of key to success. If you if you look up John Wooden, we read his Wikipedia entry, I can’t remember how many think he won seven NCAA championships for men’s basketball in a row, I think he ended up winning nine out of 11, or nine out of 13. He’s considered the winningest coach in NCAA history. And his whole thing was not about talent, although of course, he recruited talent, it was all about consistency and practice, it was everything was you’re going to shoot 500 Free throws a day, we’re going to track it, we’re going to see how you’re doing every single day. So that when you get to that foul line with you know, one second left on the clock, and you have to make that clutch free throw, you’ve you’ve you’ve put in 100,000 reps, and you’re probably going to sink the shot. Because otherwise, you know, we leave it up to emotion, we leave it up to how you feel in that moment, without having the consistency behind you of just putting the blinders on and going I’m just making another free free throw shot. You know, you’re more likely to succeed. And, and he He’s famous for saying he never looked at the scoreboard. And you know, what I’ve noticed about top producers is at least the one not not all of them. Of course, everyone’s different. But but the majority of top producers I talked to have no idea what their rank is. They don’t even really know how much their overall production is day to day. They’re just know that they’re busy. And they’re just like, oh, I you know, a lot of times I say, Oh, I just saw you hit 50 million they go did I? Oh, okay, awesome. And of course, they have a general idea. But just they put their blinders on and just get to work. And they don’t focus on the outcome as much as the discipline and the discipline ultimately gets you there.
Ryan D’Aprile 51:51
Yeah. Yeah. This was great. DJ, I appreciate you having me. I enjoy that. So I missed you last time. And I apologize. I, I was on our spring break with our family. And I completely missed the call. And I missed the scheduling. So sorry about that.
D.J. Paris 52:04
No, no problem at all. We get it. I mean, you’re running multiple companies with hundreds and hundreds of employees and a family and of course, all the other things that you do. So we appreciate your time. You’re, you’re a busy guy, and we were so grateful to have you on the show. So I want everyone to who might be in the Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, or Florida market. If you’re interested in exploring a firm that does help take some, you know, everyone talks about coaching and training, right? Every firm uses that as and you you guys do a great job, you actually have real coaches. And you do that. I don’t know that that’s always the most interesting differentiator for what do April properties offers agents, because I think you know, that buzzword of training and coaching just gets thrown around by everybody. And it’s hard to sort of understand who really provides it you guys do. But I think the idea of automating marketing is for me, I’m a marketer, I know how important it is. And that’s the thing that most agents struggle with, I think most firms offer some level of coaching, some are better than others. But this idea of automating marketing, oh my gosh, I just see that is such a great thing. So if you’re an agent, and you’re struggling in that way, or if you do want better coaching, or both, check out the April properties, they’ll they have a ton of people that would love to chat with you and tell you more about what they do. And by the way, they don’t just do real estate agent stuff. They also have a loan officer company. So they have Midwest lending, they have their type your title company, you have all sorts of different employees, you have a design firm that’s in, in your offices, as well as you know, lending and just lots of lots of other services. So check out Depot properties.com, they would love to chat with you and talk about how they’re a bit different than soon.
Ryan D’Aprile 53:45
And by the way, we may have a we might have a CRM that might be available to the public. So I still kind of working on those little things. But that might be soon as coming out as well.
D.J. Paris 53:55
I’m excited for that. Because I like CRMs that are designed by agents versus tech companies, because tech companies can build a CRM, and then they have to have the users use it and say, how is this working. And then they usually go back for version two, which tends to be better you you’re an agent focused company that happened to get into the tech space. So I always think that those tend to just get built better from the ground up. So we’ll definitely be chatting about that as that rolls out. So for everyone else who’s listening, thank you so much for being on our show. Check out April properties again, da p r i l e properties.com. They’ll be love to talk to you about what they offer. And also we want to thank our agents for our agents are well, I want to thank my agents. But for everyone listening all of our listeners and viewers, I want to thank you for supporting our show, please support our sponsors support our guests like Ryan, checkout Depot properties.com. And also, please tell a friend just that’s the only thing we really ever asked tell one other agent about our show, tell them you know, show them our website or show them our podcast and have them check out an episode see if we can get more more people to listen We would appreciate it. Thanks, Ryan and we will see everybody on the next episode. Thanks, TJ
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