Unlocking the Secrets to Lead Generation: Strategies That Drive Business in the Real Estate Market

Mike Mills (00:00:12) - Here we go. Hello, everybody. I'm Mike Mills with Mike Mills, Mortgage and finance and all kinds of things that don't make sense, But you can Google them if you need to. This is the Texas Real Estate and Finance podcast. This is number 52. So we're blowing and going through these things every week. But today I am welcoming a friend of mine, Elliot Dodson, to the program. He is a realtor in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and has been doing this. It's been a little over almost five years, not quite four years, a little over four years. And today we are going to chat about the reality of our market and what it actually takes to continue success. And so let's just jump right into it. I'm going to bring Elliot on in. We'll give him his claps and cheers. So? So. So what I want to chat about today is, you know, we're we're in a market right now where we went from one of the hottest markets in real estate that we've ever seen really in the history of real estate because of the money printing that was going on and interest rates near zero.

Mike Mills (00:01:16) - And, you know, it was insane, which is when you got in and then to or right before that, I guess kind of. But and then all of a sudden we're flipped over to now we're struggling just to, you know, sell, get buy to sell a house or two. And, you know, I wanted to talk to you because, you know, we talked about this before we started here. But part of the reason I wanted to bring you on was because I wanted to chat with you about the reality of what it is selling. Because we hear these days, especially and, you know, not to knock anybody in particular, but there's a lot of coaches, you know, real estate coaches, mortgage coaches, you know, certain types of experts on how to sell and what to sell and social media and all this stuff. And, you know, a lot of times everybody seems to have all the answers. And yet, you know, are they selling or are they making it work? You know, they're going to tell you how to do it.

Mike Mills (00:02:05) - But but can they do it kind of a thing? And I wanted to chat with somebody because I've been watching kind of your progression and how you've moved through doing stuff. And the reason I see you is because you do a lot of social media stuff. You, you know, you, like me, are kind of going through the social media journey trying to figure out how all this stuff works and, you know, keep yourself top of mind in front of people. But part of the you know, the reality of it is, is that, you know, saying telling people how to do it and saying, you know, the best way to do it versus actually doing it or can be two very different things. So so that's what we're going to talk about today. We're going to kind of get into the nuts and bolts of your journey, what you've done, what you've tried, what has worked, what hasn't worked, what you've learned, all that kind of stuff. So awesome. But let's start with tell us a little bit kind of how you went from your life prior to real estate to now full time realtor.

Mike Mills (00:02:57) - Where did you how did we get here? You want the long story? Yeah, we got time. We got an hour at least. So what you got?

Elliot Dodson (00:03:03) - So I have worked in all kinds of different sales jobs, different industries, food and alcohol beverages is what I got started in right out of college.

Mike Mills (00:03:13) - Were you like a bartender? Were you selling to.

Elliot Dodson (00:03:15) - Restaurants, selling into bars, grocery stores, restaurants, all that kind of stuff.

Mike Mills (00:03:21) - I owned a restaurant for with a business partner for seven years. And so and I was a bartender all through college and stuff, so I'm very familiar.

Elliot Dodson (00:03:27) - Yeah. You know. You know who I am. Yes. Right. Yes. Yes. So I was one of those guys. Really fun job. Didn't pay a lot of money. Nope.

Mike Mills (00:03:34) - Got a lot of perks, though.

Elliot Dodson (00:03:35) - Yeah. I mean, drank. Drank a lot of beer. Happened. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but moved on to oil and gas sales. Paid a lot of money.

Elliot Dodson (00:03:44) - Wasn't super interested in it, right? Yeah. So I moved on to technology sales, worked for Hewlett-Packard. Okay. Worked inside sales on the phone.

Mike Mills (00:03:54) - That's a tough gig, man.

Elliot Dodson (00:03:55) - 300 people on the sales floor. It was very kind of eye opening. Yeah. Working in a serious corporate culture. Yeah. Um, made a lot of great relationships from it. Met a lot of cool people, but obviously it was just a product that I could not stand behind in terms of just get really passionate about selling. Yeah. And.

Mike Mills (00:04:16) - And you're slugging away on the phone. Yeah. Eight hours a day. And that's, that's tough.

Elliot Dodson (00:04:20) - And I knew that ultimately at the end of the day, I wanted to be in front of people, right? Like, that's where I excelled. Yeah. And so what I ended up doing, I had somebody in my social circle that was actually in wholesaling real estate. Okay? And so basically, if you're not familiar with wholesaling real estate, it is, you know, calling on the phone the spam calls that you get saying, hey, look, I can buy your house for cash, right? Right.

Elliot Dodson (00:04:43) - So I had a guy that had his own company that was doing it within my social circle and I was like, Man, this might be an opportunity for me to make a little bit more money. I can keep my job here and just kind of explore this option, right? What ended up happening was I started working at about ten hours a week doing this, making more money in wholesale real estate than I was at Hewlett-Packard. Right. And so you're like.

Mike Mills (00:05:05) - Well, what am I doing here?

Elliot Dodson (00:05:07) - So I had been I had been at at HP for about three years. Okay. And decided I was like, okay, it's time for me to grow and, you know, take the leap, take a risk and go all in with this. And so I went in with both feet into this wholesale real estate gig. And of course, as soon as I did started working 40 hours a week, the deal started running dry. Right.

Mike Mills (00:05:31) - Now, when was this? This would have been this.

Elliot Dodson (00:05:33) - Would have been 19, 20, 19. Okay. Early, early 2019. I think I actually started the job like in the very end of 2018 when you.

Mike Mills (00:05:42) - And I'm just curious, when you said that the deals ran dry, what do you think the reason for that was? Is that because I don't know if the.

Elliot Dodson (00:05:47) - Leads just got bad or what actually ended up happening with it. I feel like I was all of a sudden I was making more phone calls and just wasn't getting people on the phone. Right. I mean, this was, you know, knocking on doors and having people sign. A contract on the spot. Yeah. This is like wanted to sell their house.

Mike Mills (00:06:05) - That's hustling, man. Again, that is grinding work that is not just like, you know, glamorous real estate life.

Elliot Dodson (00:06:11) - And and the reality is is that. When everything kind of started to go south with that. My cousin, who is Spencer, his wife is Amy Carnell, who you've had on the show before.

Elliot Dodson (00:06:26) - Um, they actually, you know, own their brokerage. She's a broker. And they were like, you should just, you know, get your license. And if you're good at it over here, then you can probably be good at it, you know, once your license. Yeah. And so I think I got my license and like, I went through all the classes in like nine days. Right? Like, flew through it. I was like, okay, let's do it. Did it took like three weeks to take the exam? I was luckily one of the people that took the exam the first time passed it. Okay. Um, and so then I had my license and I was like, you know what? What now what do I do now? Yeah, right. And because those.

Mike Mills (00:07:02) - Classes really prepare you for how to become a realtor, right?

Elliot Dodson (00:07:06) - I'm actually in training right now, and that's just a ton of fun, so, um, but know it to. To your point, it really doesn't know.

Elliot Dodson (00:07:15) - Um, you know, the reality is, is that I had already equipped myself with proper training, with wholesale real estate to do the things that I needed to do to excel from the standpoint of.

Mike Mills (00:07:27) - You developed, you develop the the skills and the work ethic that you needed to sell real estate.

Elliot Dodson (00:07:31) - Right, right, right. And so what ended up happening was, was I was somebody who was like, okay, I don't want to go back to corporate America. I've got to make this work. Right. I'm I'm not going to stop. Right. And I tried everything. You know, you get thrown the book at you once you, you know, hit the hit the ground running.

Mike Mills (00:07:50) - Trial by fire.

Elliot Dodson (00:07:51) - You get with your brokerage and they're like, okay, you can do for sale by owners. You can do calling expired. You can do open houses. You can do, you know, door knocking, whatever you want to do. And I did it all to get started. Um, and I think that there were several things that I would say worked and there were some things that didn't work for me personally.

Elliot Dodson (00:08:10) - I'm not saying that they don't work for somebody else. Yeah, for sure. But I think I actually realized real quick that I didn't want to be on the phones. Right? And so I started calling for sale by owners. I started calling expired. Didn't like it.

Mike Mills (00:08:22) - Yeah, because you kind of.

Elliot Dodson (00:08:23) - I was like, I've done this. Yeah. Yeah. And started doorknocking build a little bit of traction there, started doing open houses, got traction there. I was somebody at my brokerage at the time, which was front real estate that, um, utilize the next door app to get business. Okay. And I found.

Mike Mills (00:08:43) - Are you still using that?

Elliot Dodson (00:08:44) - I don't to this day because we became more saturated. The sponsorship model and the paid model, that next door has got a little bit harder to navigate. And I think that their platform didn't display as much of what I was putting out beforehand.

Mike Mills (00:09:00) - Um, I've wondered about that.

Elliot Dodson (00:09:02) - So it was, it was, it was very, very early on and it was just something that, like I saw as a way to Geo Farm without having to pay for postcards on a monthly basis or go out and just door knock my neighborhood.

Elliot Dodson (00:09:15) - I could just put an ad out on next door and I ended up getting like 3 or 4 deals from it, like right away. Wow. Okay. And so that really kind of kickstarted my business. Um, I remember whenever I first got started, I started working with a lot of lease people, uh, because I saw it as, okay, hey, if you want to rent here when your lease is up, you'll use me, right? Well, that's also just putting your eggs in a basket for a year, however much longer term. Yeah. And so I will never forget walking into Amy's office one day and, you know, kind of in a sour mood about some lease situation. And she was just like, if you keep going down this road dealing with these people, you're not going to make it because you're not going to be able to pay the bills. Yeah. And. It kind of just lit a fire under me. And that's whenever I really got out of my comfort zone.

Elliot Dodson (00:10:13) - I was like, okay. They're not going to just walk me through this. It's it's really going to have to be.

Mike Mills (00:10:21) - It's all on you.

Elliot Dodson (00:10:22) - It's really going to have to be me. Yes. And so I started reaching out to everybody I knew. I mean, you know, the people that get embarrassed, they're like don't want to reach out to the people that you know, know me, like me. Trust me already. Those are the people that you need to. Yeah, Yeah. Because literally those are the people that are going to go to bat for you if they're not going to be the person that is going to transact with you. Yeah. So I basically started saying, you know, hey, I'm hungry. I'm ready to go. Yeah. I've learned a lot. How do we get started? And people kind of started responding a little bit to it. Yeah. All the while, I'd gotten this next door business. When I got the next door business and I started shouting this stuff out on social media.

Elliot Dodson (00:11:07) - Now all of a sudden, these people that have been reached out to by me that maybe didn't respond. Now they're seeing me do business and they feel a little bit more comfortable, like. Right. Oh, okay.

Mike Mills (00:11:18) - He's he's legit.

Elliot Dodson (00:11:18) - Yeah. Yeah. It's not like he's just reaching out to me for his first deal. Right. And so from there, I mean, I'm a really somebody who will say the work that you put in right now really will come into play three, six, nine months from now, depending on which play you try to go with. Right, Right, right. If you're going to open houses and you're doing open houses, then, you know, you might have somebody that's going to walk in and is going is looking to buy that house right that second. And they don't have an agent. You're I mean, that's that's slim to none that those people are going to walk in. Those people are going to buy that house. They probably have an agent. Right.

Elliot Dodson (00:11:55) - Right. So follow up is key there. And I feel like I'm just I'm kind of just completely talking here now.

Mike Mills (00:12:02) - No, no, no. And I think it's great because like really and truly, the the the again, the reason I wanted to talk to you about all this stuff is because I've seen you do and try a lot of different things. And and the thing is, is is people have this they have this they have this thought process that they think, okay, I'm going to do this thing right next door. I'm going to do next door. Right. Right. And then they have some success with it, maybe. Or more often than not, when people start stuff, they don't have success with it. That's correct. Right. And so then instead of figuring out either how to do it better or figuring out a more efficient way to handle whatever it is you're doing, or maybe taking what you've learned in that circumstance and applying it in another place. It's almost like I want to say they quit, but they definitely just like, Well, that's a waste of time, you know what I mean? And it's like, well, I mean, it might be, but you also learned something from doing that.

Mike Mills (00:12:53) - You're growing, you're continuing to grow. And you know what really happens? And it gets hard. And you've experienced this now because you have a wife and you have a child and you're, you know, you know, when you carry the burden of like, I don't there's not an opportunity for me to not have success because if I don't, I'm letting down these people and I can't That's not a choice. Like, that's not an option. So I'm going to figure it out one way or another, right? And so when you have that mentality, you have to figure it out. There is no there is no alternative. There is no well, darn, I gave it my best. I'll just sit here on the couch and hope it all works out like you can't.

Elliot Dodson (00:13:28) - There's your fire right there.

Mike Mills (00:13:29) - That's exactly right. So. So the fact that you try stuff works, doesn't work. Try something else works, doesn't work. And you're going through this. This is all growth. All of that stuff is growth.

Mike Mills (00:13:41) - Right. And you said, which I loved earlier, is that you had to get out of your comfort zone, right? You had to put yourself in a place. And, you know, even in the situation that you were in with the with the brokerage and the family and, you know, connection and all that. I'm sure in the back of your head because most people I think it's it would happen is you would go to your you would say to yourself, well, I'm here in a safe place. They're going to help me not look. It's they took they did a great job. They helped you in a lot of ways, right? Absolutely. But but they're also not going to hold your hand, right? They're not going to be like, oh, no, no, here's all the business here. You do, you know, And then you had that realization when you're like, wait a minute, now this really is like, I'm on my own here. You know what I mean? I got to figure this out.

Mike Mills (00:14:23) - And once that trigger kicks in and you're like, okay, so what do I have to do now to make my business successful? Well, the first thing I have to do is whatever it was that I was too afraid to do or too scared to do or didn't want to do, I got to go do that, right? Because I've got to try something else. This isn't working or that isn't working. I have to go try something else. But again, plan B is never to just stop because that's not an option. Right, Right, right. So when you start experiencing these different things that you're trying out and I think that's real world, you know, a real life experience as opposed to something somebody read in a book and said, hey, this is the way you should do it, or I saw so-and-so do this. So when you were doing all these things, you know, what did you take from each one of those? Like, what do you feel like you learned from next door? What do you feel like you learned from doing the open houses? Like what was some of the lessons that you took from that?

Elliot Dodson (00:15:10) - Well, I think that I mean, obviously persistence and consistency is key, like no matter what, because whatever, if I can if I just do it one time and expect to see all the results in the world, you know, and I expect to get ten deals from it.

Elliot Dodson (00:15:26) - Right. It's I mean, it's just not going to happen. It's just not reality. You're living in a false sense of reality.

Mike Mills (00:15:31) - And you're going to fail every time if that's your expectation.

Elliot Dodson (00:15:33) - And you might do it ten times. Yeah. And not get anything from it. You might do it 100 times and not do anything, you know, not get anything in return. It's just. The consistency of it at the end of the day and altering maybe how you set things up or how you say something, right? I mean, communication is key in this business and I've had to learn, you know, hey, look what is not working because this has worked for somebody else. Right, Right. Somebody else is doing this and they are capitalizing on it. Yeah. And if I'm not, what am I doing wrong? Right? Instead of saying, this doesn't work, I'm going to quit. Right. I think that that's the biggest lesson. And I think that realistically, stepping out of your comfort zone.

Elliot Dodson (00:16:17) - The way. The best example that I can give is to this day, whenever I do open houses. Okay, I'll run an open house, I'll pull up ad campaigns, I'll pull, I'll make flyers, I'll go and knock on 100 doors. Two days before the open house, all inviting all the neighbors to the house every single time. The first door that I knock on, I'm always scared shitless. Yeah.

Mike Mills (00:16:41) - Yeah. Every single time.

Elliot Dodson (00:16:42) - It doesn't matter how many times I do it, I am always just like my nerves are through the roof. Yeah. And but then.

Mike Mills (00:16:49) - After you do the one.

Elliot Dodson (00:16:50) - I do. The one. You're fine. It's fine. Yeah. Even if it's. Even if it's a terrible experience. I will never forget walking up to this one door. And I had done this at this point. This was probably the 20th time I've done this right? And I walked up and I just gotten out of the car. You know, I've, you know, jamming out.

Elliot Dodson (00:17:10) - I'm psyching myself up and, you know, and I get out and I go and I knock on this door and it's a you know, it's a good looking house. And, you know, I'm anxious to talk to this guy. And this guy walks up to the door, he's on his phone and he literally slams the door in my face. And I am inviting this individual to an open house. That is it.

Mike Mills (00:17:28) - That's it.

Elliot Dodson (00:17:29) - You're not selling him anything? Nothing. It is. Hey, you're invited to an open house. Love to see you come through. And he slammed the door in my face. I was pissed off for a second, Right. By the time I got to the next door. All good? Yeah. Yeah, You know what I'm saying? And realistically, too, my thing is, is that guy might have just been having a bad day. Whoever he was on the phone with. Probably bad conversation. Yeah. Yeah. Nothing taken out on me. It had nothing to do with me.

Elliot Dodson (00:18:01) - Yeah. And I think that people get caught up in the sense of like. Oh, there, take. This person's taking this out on me. It's. They're not. You know, it has nothing to do with you.

Mike Mills (00:18:12) - Well, I've. I've said this a few times doing this before, but this is something I tell my kids all the time because we play, you know, sports and involved in whatever. And so I love sports in the sense that it's a great it's a great lesson teacher for life, right? Not because I think my kids are going to play in college or I mean, if they do great, whatever. But we do it because there's so many lessons you can take that apply to real life in sports. Absolutely. And one of those that we talk about all the time is the fact that, you know, and not to mean it the way it sounds, but nobody's watching you. Nobody cares about you. Okay? Your mom and I care about you. We think about you all the time.

Mike Mills (00:18:49) - Okay? But I don't think about you 100% of the day. I think about you 25, 30% of the day. Maybe what she's doing. Where she at? Where is he? What's he doing? You know, watching the game or whatever, Right. So when you're out on the field and you make a mistake or you don't go, you know, for a ball or you don't whatever, because you're worried that that something's going to happen. Okay, well, okay, so what? So what if it does? All right, You made a mistake. You screwed up, okay? Nobody remembers it. You remember it. And your entire world was crushed in that moment, and you were embarrassed in front of 100 people or whatever it is that you were doing. Right. And you feel terrible that you made this mistake. You let your teammates down. All these emotions are going on in your head, right? But that's the theater of your mind because everybody else is watching where the ball is at now or watching their kid.

Mike Mills (00:19:36) - Right. Right. And that's the reality of that situation because I embarrass my daughter one time because I came in, she was sitting with all of her friends before it was either a basketball game or a volleyball game and at high school. And she said something to me along, you know, I was asking her a question and she's like, Oh my gosh. She's like, Don't. You're so embarrassing. I'm like, Nobody's paying attention to you. Okay? And all of her friends were like, Oh, you know, it's like you're, you know, you're you're not that important. I don't mean that in a negative way. I just mean that you got to get out of your head because you're thinking that everybody's seen you like that guy slamming the door in your face and you walking away going, Man, he must really hate me. What did I do? Am I wearing the wrong stuff? It had nothing to do with it. He was just in a bad way at that particular moment in time when you're when your paths crossed, Right.

Mike Mills (00:20:22) - And you just felt the brunt of it. And guess what? It happens sometimes. Move on. There's nothing you could do about it. He's not thinking about you anymore, nor should you be thinking about him anymore. Right. And and that's really the crux of what sales is, which is what is what holds a lot of people back, I think, is that you have to do things that the result may not be what you're looking for, but once it happens, it's the fear of what's going to happen that's way worse than what actually happens if you fail. Right. And and I think that, you know, for a lot of people, that fear is what keeps them from going to knock on that door or from picking up the phone and calling their friend and saying, hey, look, I'm really trying to sell some real estate out here. If you know anybody, you know, if you have any friends or family that are looking to buy or sell, you know, give them my number.

Mike Mills (00:21:07) - I'd really appreciate it. Now, you can have that conversation without that being the only point of your conversation, right? Sure. You can pick up the phone and be like, Hey, Billy, what's been going on? Has a family doing, you know, I saw the kids on Facebook the other day, blah, blah, blah, have a conversation and be like, Hey, man, by the way, I'm just checking in with everybody, all my friends and family. If you guys know anybody trying to buy or sell love to love to help out people, but otherwise, you know, hope you're doing great. See you soon kind of thing. But that's a it's it sounds like a simple thing to do. Why do you think that's so hard for people to actually do?

Elliot Dodson (00:21:35) - I think that the people that especially a lot of agents that enter the market here whenever things are red hot. Yeah, right. During Covid is that you didn't have to sell to be good at your job.

Elliot Dodson (00:21:47) - Right. Right. And you didn't have to be good at your job to sell. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, seriously. Absolutely. And so now that it's kind of just turned over on a dime. Yeah. I mean, and. And I can't even say that I'm not one of these people. I don't want to feel like I'm selling somebody on selling their house. Sure. I'm reshaping the way that I think about that in the sense of I am helping put in front of this person an opportunity, right. That they may not have known they had. Right? Yes. Right. Yeah. I'm not I'm not selling you. I'm just giving you the option. Putting something real in front of you. Yeah. And if you decide to go that direction, great. Right. And if you decide to go that direction, not use me. And it helps you better your life. Yeah, that's that. That's great. But I think that that's a lot of people are still looking for that instant gratification of what they're they're doing now that all of a sudden they have a little bit of money or they've made a few sales and you know, okay, well, I want to put my money over here and try to do this and then it doesn't work, right? Because this is a this is very much a pay to play space.

Elliot Dodson (00:22:54) - Yes. I mean, if you're not paying for ads or you're not paying for, you know, any kind of help, especially on social media. Yes. Then you're. Probably not going to perform as well.

Mike Mills (00:23:06) - Yeah, you're going to have a hard time.

Elliot Dodson (00:23:07) - But yeah, I think that the problem that people have is just the instant gratification that they look for from what it is that they're trying to accomplish. And the fact that now they have to sell is the biggest problem that a lot of agents have right now.

Mike Mills (00:23:22) - Well, don't even like it sucks because I don't even like the word sell. You know what I mean? Because absolutely, like you.

Elliot Dodson (00:23:27) - Said, I don't either.

Mike Mills (00:23:28) - We're not selling, right? You can't. I can't walk into a room and go, Do you need a loan? Do you need a loan? Do you need a loan? Like nor can you go, hey, you want to buy a house, you want to sell you. I mean, I guess you could go knock on someone's door and say, Hey, do you want to sell your house? Right.

Mike Mills (00:23:40) - But I mean, there's so many circumstances that have to be a play. It's not like, hey, do you want a vacuum cleaner? Right? I mean, it's it's way different. So but I think, you know. If you take the word sale selling out of it, if you just pull that away and just go, you know what? What we're doing is we're giving information, like you said, to two people to say there are opportunities for you should you need them or should you want them. Right. If you're in a place where you're trying to move or you're in a place where you want you think you might want to sell your house or maybe because. If you make a video on, you know, social media or something, or you send out a postcard or whatever the case may be, and you ask somebody if they want to sell their house, okay, they're not going to get that postcard and go, You know what? I think I do want to sell my house, right? What they're going to do is there was a seed that was in their brain already.

Mike Mills (00:24:32) - Right? They had thought their neighbor had just sold. And you're like, man, I wonder what they got for their house. And, you know, I don't really like it here. That neighborhood, they're gone. Whatever life goes on, right? I use that analogy a lot when working with other agents where they'll send me a lead, right? And I'll call them or I'll text them or whatever, and I don't hear from them maybe that day and then the next day, you know, you've got to have a little bit of a follow up because what happens with people is life gets in the way, right? They sit down and they, you know, whether it be they go to Zillow or whether they call you and just say, hey, I was thinking about maybe buying something. I need to see what my capability or whatever. And then you're like, okay, call this person or talk to him, you know, get get your stuff worked out. Well, then between the moment they hang up the phone with you and the moment that I reach out to them, whatever that may be in that time period, there's a million things that could have happened, right? Their kid came home from school sick there.

Mike Mills (00:25:23) - You know, husband got in a car accident. They're, you know, their neighbor, you know, is Dr. got loose and they're chasing them around the neighborhood. And that thought, whatever it was they were considering, it just it goes away now. It doesn't mean it's gone forever. It just means it's not top of mind in that moment, right? Correct. So all you're doing when you're sending the postcard, when you're making the phone call, when you're putting the video on social media, all you're doing is is taking a seed that was already in someone's brain and reminding them to open up that cabinet again and be like, Hey, remember you were thinking about this thing? And they're like, Oh yeah, I need to call so-and-so or I need to look at that, right? But if you don't do any of that stuff, if you don't send the mailer, if you don't make the phone call, if you don't make the video or whatever the case may be, then that seed is still there and that person's mind and the first person or the most familiar person or however you want to couch it that comes across there, they're they're they're world.

Mike Mills (00:26:14) - They're reality in that moment. It's going to be the person that they're going to reach out to. Absolutely. Because it was already there.

Elliot Dodson (00:26:19) - Absolutely. I can't tell you how many times. And I mean. Obviously I'm no expert by any means, but this this happens to me too. I mean, where I will get on Facebook, I will get on Instagram and see that somebody bought a house with somebody else. And I sit there and I kick myself over. Like I literally had a conversation with that person. Three months ago. Yeah. And they told me they didn't want to buy a house. And then they just bought one. Right? But is that their fault? No.

Mike Mills (00:26:50) - Is is is not your fault necessarily?

Elliot Dodson (00:26:53) - I wouldn't say that it's necessarily my fault, but at the same.

Mike Mills (00:26:55) - Time, life circumstances, work life.

Elliot Dodson (00:26:57) - Circumstances. Yeah, they.

Mike Mills (00:26:59) - Happen. And you can't be bitter about it. And that's.

Elliot Dodson (00:27:01) - Exactly. Yes, exactly.

Mike Mills (00:27:03) - That's the other part, too.

Mike Mills (00:27:04) - And I get that. I see that in my world, in lending. I see that obviously with the realtors all the time is, you know, you helped a client two years ago, one year ago, whatever. Maybe you sold them two houses, maybe. Who knows, whatever the circumstances. And then they go by with somebody else or they list their house with somebody else, or they send their their brother to somebody else. Right. And then you see it on social media because look, whether you're looking at your your listing that got sold or you're looking at your friends that you're with on Facebook and you're going to figure it out, it's going to pop up at some point. Sure. Right. And then you see that and then immediately, which is normal. Everybody's reaction. It's like, what the hell, man? Like, why didn't they call me? Why didn't they do what? I was there. I helped them. What went wrong? Why was it bad? Why wouldn't they? Instead of going, You know what, I don't really know what happened because obviously, whatever the circumstances were, they didn't want to use me at that point.

Mike Mills (00:27:56) - I didn't have a bad transaction. Now I'm sure there's some where they sell their house and they didn't call you and you're like, Yeah, well I understand.

Elliot Dodson (00:28:02) - Right? Oh.

Mike Mills (00:28:04) - Yeah, yeah. You know, that happens. But. But just like me, you want to do their loan. Yeah. Okay. I mean, you know, things were a little sideways on that one for whatever reason, but. But it's just like the bitterness that people hold on to because someone doesn't use them or doesn't go with them. It's like, what? What purpose is that serving you like? It's not doing you any good, so why waste your time and brainpower and brain space on being pissed off at somebody because they didn't call you.

Elliot Dodson (00:28:28) - Use it as fuel to reach out to 10 or 15 more people, right?

Mike Mills (00:28:33) - Absolutely.

Elliot Dodson (00:28:34) - You got to go through that. If that is going through your headspace at that point in time. Yeah. That you are bitter. Yeah. Be bitter. Yeah. For 60s.

Elliot Dodson (00:28:42) - Yes. And then go reach out to ten people.

Mike Mills (00:28:44) - Yes. Yes, that's exactly right. I mean, you have to have that mentality.

Elliot Dodson (00:28:50) - Seriously and in and you might not even get somebody out of those ten people but at least you went and did it. Yeah. You did something about the bitterness that you felt.

Mike Mills (00:28:58) - Well, I want to ask you something to I want to get to the social media stuff. So we're going to get there. But but I also want to ask you something, because we haven't I haven't seen you in a little bit in person and I've seen some videos or whatever. Well, you know, not as not in a weird way, but you look good. Like I'm serious. I mean, like, I feel like you've you've, you got your you're in good shape now, right? And not that you were in bad shape for sure, but we all go through these little me just as much. We go through these little moments. I'm curious, based on what we've been talking about, um, often when I talk to people that have been maybe not the healthiest in their life at one point and then got healthy, you know, over not overnight because nothing happens overnight, but over a period of time, their work life in their physical life kind of mirror each other a little bit.

Mike Mills (00:29:43) - So. So I'm curious, what did you did did something happened? Did you, like decide one day or what was because we all look during Covid, everybody was like sitting around the house, you know, feeling sorry for themselves, having a few too many drinks.

Elliot Dodson (00:29:56) - So anybody that knows me knows exactly how I'm about to answer this. Okay. Um, I have not picked up a drink since 2022.

Mike Mills (00:30:05) - So you stopped drinking A sub.

Elliot Dodson (00:30:07) - Drinking?

Mike Mills (00:30:07) - Okay, that's.

Elliot Dodson (00:30:08) - Great. I've cut alcohol out of my life, and I work out 5 to 7 times a week.

Mike Mills (00:30:12) - Now, on the alcohol piece, was it. Did you quit because you felt like if you don't mind talking about it, did you quit because you felt like you had a problem or did you quit just because you knew it was incredibly unhealthy?

Elliot Dodson (00:30:24) - No, I quit because to be honest with you, I made a conscious decision that I felt like this year was not going to be the same as it's been in the past few years with work.

Elliot Dodson (00:30:34) - And I felt like I needed to make a conscious decision to really focus on work and that alcohol could haze that. Yeah. Um, and so, you know, I'm somebody who, if work was tough one day I was going to grab a drink after work, you know if. You know, for those of you who don't know, I have a two year old child. If I was struggling at home by myself because my wife was flying, you know, I might put her down and have a drink. Right. So I had all these reasons lined up to have a drink and I didn't want to use that as a crutch anymore. And so I just made, again, just a conscious decision to take it out of my life because I knew that. It wasn't going to do any harm. It was only going to do good. Yes. And I am got to say, I've never been more clear minded. I feel great. You know, business is going really well. Yeah. Everything that I wanted to achieve from that decision is starting to come into place and I am going to be somebody that says, I will thank God for that decision first.

Mike Mills (00:31:40) - Yeah, that's awesome, man. I, I love to hear when people come to some realization because it's. You can't tell other people how to live their life. Right. You just can't, you know, And and whenever somebody is like, well, I decided like I decided to stop drinking. Well, a lot of people that make that decision will then go about telling everybody else, you need to do this. And you need you should you should also do the same thing because it's look at me and this. And the truth is, is that you're not going to that's that's never going to work, okay? All you can do is figure out how to be the best person that you can be and whatever that looks like in your world, right? Be the best version of you that exists that you can find and then hope that whatever you're doing serves an example to those that are around you that see the transformation. Absolutely. Because when people start to see it, because again, I noticed it only in that from video scene.

Mike Mills (00:32:37) - And then when you walked in today, I was like, Damn, it looks good, man. You know, just because, like, you look like you look healthy and I don't mean good, like, man looking sharp, I just mean, like you look healthy and appreciate it when you see people that have made that that conscious choice. And you know, it didn't happen just by like, oh, you know, I just stopped eating, whatever. Usually it's a very difficult decision and something that had, again, out of your comfort zone, you had to do something that was a crutch that is drinking bad. No. Okay. But what I will tell you from my personal experience as well is about there's been a year or two. Maybe I didn't stop drinking completely, but I stopped drinking during the week. So Monday through Friday. Yeah, I don't touch it and I'm not rigid about it in that if I'm going somewhere with somebody and they want to have a drink. Okay, fine.

Mike Mills (00:33:26) - You know, like, I mean, I'm not going to be.

Elliot Dodson (00:33:28) - There's some one.

Mike Mills (00:33:28) - Offs. Yeah, yeah, I'm not going to be difficult about it, but it's not going to be a regular part of my life. Sure. And then on the weekends, because, you know, my wife and I sit down, have a glass of wine or whatever. I'll have a drink on Saturday or Friday or whatever. But even today, like somebody came to my house last night, we were we're in the middle of like baseball stuff. And somebody was over. We were talking. We were up to like 2:00 and I was out. I was actually out mowing and like, I mowed 9:00 in the morning. No, no, no. So, like at 8:00 at night, they'd come over earlier and I was out at like 8:00 at night, still mowing and getting my house ready because we have people coming over later today. And and so I came in, my wife and this person were talking and so I sat down and they were having a few drinks.

Mike Mills (00:34:04) - I was like, oh, I'll get a drink, you know, And then next thing I know, it's 2:00 in the morning. We've been talking about stuff all night long. And then today I'm waking up and like, Why did I do that? Like, oh, my head is killing me. But, but like, the pain is worse, obviously, as you get older because you feel it, right? Much harsher. Yeah. But I'm curious with the workout side of things did because a lot of times with alcohol or any anything that you're using as an outlet, it could be food, it could be, you know, whatever you want to call it. You have an outlet that you're trying to get your stress out, right? So I'm trying to push this stress away. This is my outlet for it. When you take that away, when the alcohol goes away. Right. You're not doing it anymore. Is that where the workouts really helped replace that? Because now that stress and anxiety and all that stuff that you maybe were using alcohol to try to get rid of, now you're pushing it out through your workouts.

Elliot Dodson (00:34:54) - I mean, it's a good question. And to be honest with you, I would say no. Okay. Just because I was somebody who could I was somebody who could drink, you know, until midnight, 2:00 in the morning and wake up at 7:00 and go and work out. Yeah. Um, and so the workout mentality was still there for me.

Mike Mills (00:35:16) - Okay, So you never really lost.

Elliot Dodson (00:35:17) - You never. I never lost it now. And I mean, I don't I don't want to get into it too much, but I had a I had a a workout plan that was an 84 day plan. Okay. That I had started four times and I could never finish it. Okay. And I familiar with that. And I and I think that I had gotten to like day 60 was like my record, right? Getting like two months. And obviously there were days where I didn't work out whatever. Yeah, but. I would always, like get hurt at the gym or I get sick or something happened on vacation and I'd lose it.

Elliot Dodson (00:35:57) - And then I'd be like, okay, I've been gone too long. I need to start over. Yeah, well, I finished the workout plan. And so to be honest, that was that was really I mean, that was very rewarding for me because I was like, I've done this so many times. Yeah. And when I say this, like, this has been years. Yeah. You know, the years that I've done the same workout plan. And so now I'm finally doing different workouts than I've been doing. And my body really hurts really bad. But it's a good hurt. It's always so rewarding now. And I mean, whenever I would go to the gym just because. Just because I was like, I just should. And like, that's what I should do now. I'm excited to go to the gym. I wake up, I roll out of bed and I'm like, I'm happy to go.

Mike Mills (00:36:43) - Well, I think this this very much relates back to what we were talking about a minute ago, about the persistence.

Mike Mills (00:36:48) - And the consistency is like, again, I think a lot of people, if they were in that situation, you had this workout you wanted to complete, It was 84 days or weeks or whatever it was, and you just can't get through it for whatever reason, right? Because life happens, dude. It happens to everybody all the time. But when people fail once and then they fail twice and they fail the third time, they're like, I'm just going to quit. I'm not going to be able to do this. Like I was stupid to think that I could blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And your mentality was, okay, I just got to start over and I got to start over, you know? Got it, got to start over. But you just kept doing it and kept doing it. And you created this, this habit or this mindset of, okay, I'm going to do this one way or another. I'm going to keep trying. I'm not quitting. Right Again, I'm not going to quit, Right? I'm going to keep trying.

Mike Mills (00:37:31) - I failed. Okay, fine. Try again. You know, it's the what is it? The Michael Jordan thing where he's like, you know, I took 85 game winning shots and I missed 60 of them. Right? You know what I mean? Before I got to the 20 or whatever. I mean, you're going to fail. Like you're just going to fail. It's okay. But it's okay. Like, it's fine. That's life. That's how you learn. You don't you don't win all the time. Like, have you ever met somebody who, you know, came from like, really great family that had good, decent amount of wealth, Right. And, you know, had good schooling, never had any real trauma of any kind in their life. Right. How would you describe those people?

Elliot Dodson (00:38:09) - Arrogant. Entitled? Yes.

Mike Mills (00:38:13) - Their character seems pretty low, right? Yeah. Yes. And I think that the struggle, the failure, the mistakes, the all of the things that you go through that we're all embarrassed to talk about because we don't want to admit that we failed at something or we don't admit that we tried this and it didn't work.

Mike Mills (00:38:28) - And, you know, that's what makes you who you are. That's what makes you a stronger person. And to run away from that kind of stuff and never have to deal with that kind of thing is is is not ultimately detrimental for you? I think. Absolutely. Um, so switching gears just real quick on the I want to get into the social media stuff because, you know, you and I both have have been on this journey to some extent and learning as we go.

Elliot Dodson (00:38:53) - Almost together, it seems like.

Mike Mills (00:38:55) - Yes, yes, yes. So I want to know, like you started, did you would you say that you started with next door like that was the first place or. No. When did you actually start thinking like, okay, social media is a route I need to go?

Elliot Dodson (00:39:07) - So, um, so the CRM tool that we used it front, um, integrated really well with Facebook. And so what I started doing was I started because I didn't have any listings. I was trying to get business right.

Elliot Dodson (00:39:19) - I would try to put a fun spin on different listings in different areas or different listings for a different day, you know? And so that could be like, you know, $400,000 Friday or, you know, just a.

Mike Mills (00:39:33) - Hook of some kind.

Elliot Dodson (00:39:34) - Yeah, $2 million Tuesday.

Mike Mills (00:39:36) - And you were going to see houses that weren't your listing.

Elliot Dodson (00:39:38) - Know what I was actually doing. And again, like this is very early on this was before reels even like became a thing before TikTok was the thing, right? And I basically would link my website to these listings. Okay. And I would basically just kind of like blast them out. I put a fun catch caption on there. Okay. And just like a.

Mike Mills (00:39:57) - Picture or something of it.

Elliot Dodson (00:39:58) - Right, Right. And but but with the clickable link. Right, right. And so then what that did was, was people that were interested, they would click on that link, would be prompted to put their information in. And now all of a sudden, they became a lead to me.

Elliot Dodson (00:40:11) - Correct. Which I got quite a bit of business from. Yep. That space your.

Mike Mills (00:40:16) - Database. Yep.

Elliot Dodson (00:40:17) - Yeah. And and so that's kind of I mean, I would say that Facebook more than anything was really how it started. I don't even know if I really had much of an Instagram at all. Yeah. Before I got into real estate. Yeah. So to be honest, I think I was like, almost kind of scared of it. Like, I was like, I don't know what this is like, you know? And obviously it's blossomed into something really great. I mean, I'm not somebody who has just a ton of followers, but I love using the tool. I use it all the time. And, you know.

Mike Mills (00:40:46) - I think that's a terrible metric for people to measure themselves on how many people are following or whatever. Because if if if you're being honest, I mean, this is I should say this is how I look at it. Okay? I look at Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, all of those things just as a tool to stay in front of the people that I already interact with that are already know that I already see I'm not.

Mike Mills (00:41:08) - For me personally and everybody does a little differently. I really am not trying to get strangers from social media, right? I'm not. I'm trying to interact with the people that I already know and just remind them that I'm around. Yeah, that's really it, right? So how many people like something or comment? Or post or whatever. Like it doesn't matter to me now, like you just said with your Instagram, I think you enjoy it a little bit now. I do, yeah, me too. Like, I kind of like doing some of the weird shit that I do like. I enjoy it. So. So I think that plays a role. Like you got to kind of like it, you know, and you get to a place where you do. But I don't think you should try to measure yourself based on how many people follow you.

Elliot Dodson (00:41:45) - Well, and I think that I think that, you know, realistically where we get, you know, kind of convoluted with this perception of what Instagram needs to be, is that.

Elliot Dodson (00:41:58) - People. People view things in different ways. They're like, Oh, you didn't get that many likes, you didn't get that many followers, you know, or you don't have that many followers. I think it's about the content and more more than anything, I mean, personally, I believe it's about the watch time. Yeah. You know, I mean, if I can get a ton of watch time on my stuff and I mean, granted, if somebody wants to reach out to me that's moving here from New York, California, and they just sold their shack for 2 million bucks and wants to come and buy it, you know, nice, nice estate here. I'm good to help them, right? For sure. But like you, I would rather reach the people that already know me, like me. Trust me. Right. On a regular basis. Yes. Then just try to actively get strangers. Yes.

Mike Mills (00:42:43) - They see you. They all they have to do is see whether they spend time watching necessarily or they move past.

Mike Mills (00:42:48) - But your face is in front of them on a semi-regular basis. Because whether, you know, it's always funny to me and I know there's always exceptions to this, but the ones that will say will, you know, I don't there's no I don't need to do social media. It's like it's not necessary. I'm like, it must have been.

Elliot Dodson (00:43:03) - In the business for 20 years.

Mike Mills (00:43:05) - Yeah, most of the time I'm like, Man, okay, like, I get it. You know, it's not for everybody, but that's where the eyeballs are. So whether you, whether you like it or whether you think it has a valuable benefit or whatever the case may be, it doesn't matter to me because the the largest, most profitable, most revenue generating companies on the planet are all over those places because they know that that's where the attention is. Right. If this was and I say this all the time, if this was 1995 and I told you, I said, Hey, Elliot, I can give you a minute and a half commercial on Channel 21, local TV, you know, during whatever, you know, this particular show, Growing Pains or whatever the hell it is.

Mike Mills (00:43:47) - Right. And you don't you don't need to pay for anything like it's free. Would you take that? Absolutely. Of course. Heartbeat in a heartbeat. And now you're talking about you have thousands to millions of eyeballs that are focused on these apps on a day to day basis. Like, that's why we all that's why people get pissed off driving around the street because everybody's looking at their phone in their car because they're checking their Instagram. This is what people do, okay? Whether good or bad, whatever you may hate, it doesn't matter. It is what it is. So you either learn how to adapt within that space or you can be miserable at home by yourself and not sell anything like in. And don't get me wrong, I know and I'm sure you know people out there that have success that aren't ever on there. Okay. Absolutely. But those numbers are dwindling. Yes. Quickly. And the ones that I know that had success and have been in the business for a long time that are maintaining their success, are starting to adapt and they're starting to try.

Mike Mills (00:44:43) - It may seem awkward. It may look like, oh, I know what that is, but I'm also at the same time I'm like high five. Like, good for you for just trying, you know what I mean? Because we all started in a place where I'm still awkward. Like we're all we all get to this spot.

Elliot Dodson (00:44:57) - Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, I look at myself on camera and I can't stand it, right? Um, but I am definitely somebody who sees people trying on social media. Yeah. And I'll be honest, like, I mean, very brutally honest. It's bad. It's not good, Right? But you're doing it.

Mike Mills (00:45:18) - You're trying.

Elliot Dodson (00:45:19) - You're doing it. And that I can shake your hand. I can pat you on the back, you know, And honestly, I'll probably be that person that does like it and does comment on it. Yes. And does keep you motivated because you've got to keep doing it.

Mike Mills (00:45:34) - Yes. Yes. And it isn't.

Mike Mills (00:45:36) - And I think where the where the generational disconnect happen, how do you forget?

Elliot Dodson (00:45:40) - 3333 So I have to think about it now.

Mike Mills (00:45:42) - I'm about ten years older than you. But, um, but the generational gap thing that occurs where you see people maybe my age, maybe a little older when they do try to post stuff online, often it's, Hey, call me today, here's my number. I'm ready to serve your needs. Right? And look, at one point in the history of time in advertising, that was an effective strategy, I guess. Yeah, but these days it's just not. And you have to give value. You have to give information and you can't feel like you're constantly selling.

Elliot Dodson (00:46:13) - And you've got to do it in three seconds.

Mike Mills (00:46:15) - Right? Yeah, you got to do it really, really fast. Yes, That's the hardest part. Like when I when I do my little walks every morning or whatever, and I've got a system down that I do it now. But the really and truly, the hardest part is taking everything that I have to say and shrinking it down to a minute and a half because it has to be in a minute and a half.

Mike Mills (00:46:33) - I know. And it's it's hard. I mean, it takes time because I'll record it all and then I've got okay, I got to cut that. But I got to make sure it sounds like it didn't I didn't cut that piece out because I got to get it to that point. Now, at least with like with TikTok, I can take my full whatever was on my brain, I can take the full thing and put it there because they have a lot more flexibility on time, length or whatever. But if you want to do a reel on Instagram or Facebook. It's. It's. It's 90s. Oh, yeah. And there's a hard cut off. And if you want to do a YouTube short, that's even harder because it's 60s. Yeah.

Elliot Dodson (00:47:04) - The videos that I typically put together are. Anywhere from two minutes from from, from the start, which is very short for me to like six and a half. Yeah. And yeah, it's, it's tough to trim, but, but I'm also finding that and again, this is adaptation.

Elliot Dodson (00:47:26) - Yes. This is learning trial and error. Right? This is this is a perfect example. I now, If so, and for those of you who don't know, I'm. I like to think that I'm decent at doing house tours. Okay. I'm sure there's great there's really good people out there that I look at and I'm like, wow, that's amazing. I like to think that I do it a little bit differently and that and that I'm somewhat good at it. Yes. But also look now at those as like this does not have to be one video. Yes. This can be seven. Yeah.

Mike Mills (00:48:00) - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Elliot Dodson (00:48:01) - This does not need to be one day's worth of content. This I can put this one out and then four days later I can put out a different clip that no one saw in that first one. And it's the same house. Yes.

Mike Mills (00:48:14) - Well. And also that first clip or that first one that you sent out. 200 people maybe saw it.

Mike Mills (00:48:23) - Maybe. Maybe you're right. And when I say saw it, you get the number like, oh, 300 people. But that could have just been you know, they.

Elliot Dodson (00:48:29) - Absolutely.

Mike Mills (00:48:29) - Rolled right by it. So don't think that oh, well, I already put this out. It's no like most people didn't even see it. Like, it's fine. Put it out again. Right. Right.

Elliot Dodson (00:48:39) - Yeah. Yeah. Put a put it, put it on a different, put a different sticker on it. What am I trying to say. Um, whenever, whenever it goes on your Instagram. Yeah.

Mike Mills (00:48:49) - Right. Like the title or the instead.

Elliot Dodson (00:48:51) - Of instead of. Yeah. Yeah. Change up the, the title of it. Yeah. And throw a different picture as your, as.

Mike Mills (00:48:57) - Your is your, is your.

Elliot Dodson (00:48:58) - What.

Mike Mills (00:48:59) - Seed frame or whatever. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Elliot Dodson (00:49:01) - And just and it can be the same video.

Mike Mills (00:49:04) - How do you I saw that you tried something a little while ago that actually was actually dug into a little bit.

Mike Mills (00:49:10) - I don't remember where I saw it, but you had done. You had it was like a it was it like a blog post or something. But there was a a website that website's the wrong word. There's a company that would I don't know if you still use them, and I can't remember what they were called, but they would give you like a platform like you were the Grapevine, Texas, you know, whatever. And they had like a blog post and they had but the concept because when I saw it, I was like, that looks. And I don't remember specifically what it was that you'd put out. But yeah, I kind of was like, that doesn't seem like, you.

Elliot Dodson (00:49:39) - Know, right.

Mike Mills (00:49:40) - But then so I dug a little bit and I was like, Oh, this is like a service that a company provided. And again, this is all I want to know about it because I had called my boss was like, Hey, this is actually kind of brilliant for new agents that don't want to do.

Mike Mills (00:49:52) - They give them this like turnkey kind of platform. And I'm sure there's it wasn't.

Elliot Dodson (00:49:57) - No, no, no. And again, this is I'm I'm sitting here and I'm reacting this way because I'm not using it the way that I should. Yeah.

Mike Mills (00:50:06) - Yeah. So you still.

Elliot Dodson (00:50:07) - Have so this is this is this is a perfect example of me talking on here about what you should do and me not doing.

Mike Mills (00:50:15) - Exactly.

Elliot Dodson (00:50:16) - Okay. So I feel like I'm basically getting called out. Yeah. No, no, no. But no, no, no, no. I know exactly what you're talking about. And yes, it is it is a unique way to be basically the digital mayor of your town. Yes. Okay. Yes. And it is a service that costs a lot of money.

Mike Mills (00:50:32) - Okay. Well, of course.

Elliot Dodson (00:50:34) - And yeah. And so, um. Yeah, I just to be honest, I think that it was more of the time behind it because it is long video. Yes, like like long form content.

Elliot Dodson (00:50:53) - Yep. And so. I am somebody who edits all of my own work. And that took a ton of time. Right? And so considering the fact that you are already kind of doing that in some form or fashion with this, it might be something that you could easily look into and excel at. As to where, for me, I was just like. I don't know if this is something that I necessarily want to do.

Mike Mills (00:51:17) - Well, it wasn't for me. It wasn't a like, I want to do that. For me, it was the concept of the offering to a realtor was impressive, right? What I mean, it was like it was that was the part where I was like, Man, this is kind of sharp because.

Elliot Dodson (00:51:30) - Obviously it got.

Mike Mills (00:51:30) - Me. Yeah, if you can get enough of a of a turnkey situation where you take the stress out of all the difficult parts because again, we talked about this before, but just to kind of go through our conversation before we started and aired this, you know, I do this podcast because I will do it because it's easy, because I can invite you in, you know, scheduled out a couple of weeks in advance.

Mike Mills (00:51:53) - You come in, we sit down, we just talk. There's no script. We didn't plan this. There was hey, here's a couple of questions we might go through, but we'll just take it wherever it goes, right?

Elliot Dodson (00:52:02) - We probably gotten two of them.

Mike Mills (00:52:03) - Yes, maybe. But. But I enjoy this, right? It's a it's an easy thing to do. And it creates content and it puts it out. Right. Well, the part where I fall short and in the beginning I would tell people like, hey, I'm going to do this, this and this. And then I had to take it out because I was just like, I never get to it. I never get to the time where I cut the reel out, where I cut the because when you do a podcast like something like this and this is anybody that ever think that they want to do this, okay, it's there's a few pieces that go into it. It's really not that hard. Okay. If you don't put too much thought into it, right? If you're not too worried about, oh, I said this or I shouldn't have said I don't care.

Mike Mills (00:52:41) - Right. The hard part is, is the promotion of actually using it because very few people will sit here and watch this. Oh, hey, Tiffany, I don't even see you pop up there. Very few people will sit down and watch this for an hour. Okay? Very few people will go in their car and this and this for an hour. Okay. I'm not Joe Rogan. I'm not, you know, like I'm not there's not people trying to hear what I got to say. But what people will do is if I take this and turn it into a three minute video or I take it and turn it into a 92nd reel or a 32nd reel. It'll do well. It'll do really well. Okay.

Elliot Dodson (00:53:17) - Absolutely.

Mike Mills (00:53:19) - And that's like everybody's like, Well, yeah, of course. Absolutely. Why don't you do that? All right. Well, a couple of reasons. Number one is I do mortgages. You sell real estate. Right? Right. So we actually have like our job that we're trying to do on a day to day basis.

Mike Mills (00:53:32) - Plus, I have a family. You have a family. We have to set aside time for them. Right? Right. So you're left with a few hours in the day to do all the things that you want to do. Okay. And so when that happens, because the only reason I'm doing this is because I'm trying to do loans, right? The only reason you're making videos on houses because you're trying to sell real estate. Right? Right.

Elliot Dodson (00:53:51) - People can tell really quick or I'm going to give you a really good idea of how my operation works. If you see me posting on social media a ton, I don't have business. Right?

Mike Mills (00:54:04) - Exactly.

Elliot Dodson (00:54:05) - If you don't see me posting on social media, I'm busy. I have business.

Mike Mills (00:54:10) - Right? Because it's a time consuming thing. It takes time, right? You edit your own videos, you go through and do all that stuff. Well, taking this hour long video, going through it and marking out segments and I've tried to pay people to do this and it's it's not that it doesn't work because I've had a few people that did a good job.

Mike Mills (00:54:28) - I've had others that can't and they don't know how it is for you. But I get, I mean, emails and phone calls, messages on DMS constantly like and everybody wants to do it and they're like, I saw your thing and here's what I can do and here's the sample. I even people just, Oh yeah, I already did it. Here you go. I'm like, Oh, cool. All right. And I try to reciprocate and I ended up paying a few of them to do things or whatever. But. But like you, it's not that I'm a perfectionist necessarily. It's just that.

Elliot Dodson (00:54:55) - It's hard to.

Mike Mills (00:54:55) - Delegate. Yes, it's. Well, it's hard to get it the way that I want it to be. Right. Right. Because I have an idea of what I want it to look like when it comes out. And I don't even mean like the the captions. And I don't even really mean that. I just mean what I'm saying and what the message is that I'm trying to relay in that in that situation.

Mike Mills (00:55:12) - And then they never tend to come out that way. Right? And so when I pay somebody else to do it for an hour long podcast, well, they're going to just clip out whatever they think is relevant or whatever they want to put out and whatever sounds the best. I want to put out what I think is relevant because it's my content, right? So that means I have to sit down and I have to go through, you know, I will after this. I've done it for the last four where at least I've had I have the videos now editing them and putting the, you know, the YouTube tag on the front and on the back and turning it into reels and all that. It's a whole other thing. But to sit down and go through an hour and go, okay, we talked about this in that segment. We talked about this in that segment, I'll save that video. I'll save that clip and I'll save that clip. So I have the clip saved, but now I have to pass it off to someone else and go, okay, now I need you to put in the captions.

Mike Mills (00:55:54) - I need you to put in the music. I need you to put in the the frame changes from my face to his face and back and forth and. And then I need you to put in the the the subscribe now card at the end and the clip in the front to get the hook and all the stuff that's necessary to make a good video. Yep. That's hours of time. I know if you don't do it on a regular basis, even if you have templates built where you're trying to plug stuff in, it takes forever. And that's the thing that I think, you know, when it comes to when you really get into posting on social media on a regular basis, that's the part that you're like, Oh shit, I didn't realize it was going to take this much time.

Elliot Dodson (00:56:27) - I have heard. From numerous sources that the secret source for social media, if you really want to get plugged in and have your you know, you start showing up on a regular basis on as suggested reels and all that kinds of stuff.

Elliot Dodson (00:56:45) - Yeah. 90 to 120 days consistent. Yes.

Mike Mills (00:56:49) - Every day.

Elliot Dodson (00:56:50) - And I cannot I cannot do it. It's like my 84, 48, 84 day workout plan. Yes.

Mike Mills (00:56:56) - I just got to keep changing.

Elliot Dodson (00:56:58) - I try. I keep trying. And I think that the longest I think I've gotten is 44 days. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, and I'm somebody. I'll try. I'll try the, you know, hey, look, I'm going to green screen behind me. I'm going to talk in the camera. We're going to go over this article, you know, and I'm going to talk about why this matters and why the real estate market is crashing. Right? Because that's what people want to hear, that the real estate market is crashing. Right. It's not. So I understand what the hooks are, right? It's not it's not that I don't get how to get there, but like you just said, it's the time. Yes. And I already have, especially whenever I'm busy.

Elliot Dodson (00:57:41) - A full time job, correct?

Mike Mills (00:57:43) - Yes.

Elliot Dodson (00:57:44) - So to be able to try to do things and again, like you said, do them the way that I want them to be done. Right. It's very difficult. And I know people who are doing it at a very high rate and excelling and, you know, they continue to put content out. It looks like, you know, and every other post is under contract, just so just listed. I'm like, Man, how do you do it? And I can guarantee you any of them. And they figured out how to run a team and how to run it efficiently.

Mike Mills (00:58:16) - Yeah, Yeah. You have to have people to help you do it. Ultimately, at the end of the day, I mean, I think that the creation of the content and the ideas of what you want to do, I think has to be your own. I think you have to. Oh, absolutely. You've got to be yourself like whatever you are and not try to be something you're not.

Mike Mills (00:58:31) - You know, that's what I tell anybody that ever asked me. I'm like, just be you. Like, you know, I joke when I do my little walks or whatever that few people see every once in a while. But, you know, I talk about UFOs and I talk about ancient civilizations and I talk about fasting and stupid stuff. But I don't just talk about mortgages. I don't just talk about interest rates. Don't just talk about finance. I try to mix it up a little bit because that's the stuff I'm interested in. Like, that's the stuff I find fascinating, right? So if I find it fascinating and I try to present it in a way that's not, you know, wacko, crazy or whatever, then anybody that relate, yeah, anybody that would relate to it would also find it interesting. So, so if you try to put something out there where you're just trying to create this image of yourself, like you're this mortgage expert or you're the real estate expert or whatever the case may be, and that's not really what you're either passionate about or what you feel like you are or whatever that that comes across.

Mike Mills (00:59:23) - Like they can tell, Oh yeah, you know what I mean? They see that video and they're like, Whatever, you know? Okay, so you're just trying to sell me a house, you know what I mean? Yeah, but if you just be yourself, I think it's so much more effective. But then the hard part is be yourself, create your own content, but then to keep consistent and putting it out and the editing and the constant posting and there was a I think you would like one of the episodes I did a little while back, there was a realtor in Burleson. Her name is Kasey Spears. I bring her up all the time and because I'm very impressed by her, she runs a team with her and her husband and they've had a couple people come in and out of their brokerage or whatever. I think they have a couple of people employed now, but she is so system based that her process and system, she has it on lockdown like and I sat here and you know when you started talking in the beginning you're like man I'm just talking the whole time that you know, I even know like I sat here with her, I asked her, like two questions and she just was like I told her at the end, I was like, I feel like I just sat in front of a fire hose or a fire hydrant and just got nailed because but it was all great, man.

Mike Mills (01:00:23) - Everything that she was saying, I was like, Oh my gosh. Like, I need to write this down. I need to go back. And like, it was it was really like, I don't say this very often. It was like I was inspired. I was like, Damn, I got to get my shit together. Like, this chick has it figured out, but she has like 400 property management. Like she runs a property management thing where she rents and, you know, owners. She's got 400 properties that she runs with her husband and her son. And she does I don't even know I'm going to mess the number up. Let's say it's 20 million, $30 Million in real estate a year. Right, as well. And all of it, when we talked about it, I'm like, how do you because everybody hates you talked to realtors that do property management. They all hate it. They're like, this is terrible. She's like, look, it's not fun. She's like, But I created a system.

Mike Mills (01:01:06) - I have software. I have a process. When people come on, I have onboarding, onboarding, all this other stuff that it basically runs itself. If you can just hit a few buttons and do what you need to do. Yeah. And she says and I get 20 deals from it a year. You talk about residual income. That's what it is. That's my residual income, right? I sell, I manage the house. When the owner, the investor comes to me and says he wants to sell it, then I sell it to somebody else. So I'm the listing agent and then it's already got a tenant in there if you want to keep them. If you don't up to you, somebody else comes in and buys it. And then I get to relist these houses every, you know, out of the 400 houses, I list about 20 of them a year. That's cool. And she did it all from just her system and her process and coming up with ways to make sure that she did it the same.

Mike Mills (01:01:47) - Yeah.

Elliot Dodson (01:01:47) - And that's where I don't excel. Yeah. And again that's shot right now. Right right right. And it's but I've got to be honest with myself, you know what I'm saying? Like some people might be like, oh, I'm. I'm figuring it out like and yes, don't get me wrong, I'm definitely doing what I can to figure it out. But I do also know that, like, if I were to get to a point to where I can start hiring people to plug them in and do certain jobs, yes, eventually I needed a director of operations to put together the systems and everything in place.

Mike Mills (01:02:18) - That's, you know, thyself, right? Yeah.

Elliot Dodson (01:02:21) - Because. Because I know I'd. Because I know ultimately, at the end of the day, it's not something that I'm going to want to do. Yeah. Like, I would love to be the guy that's the face of the team and only does marketing, promotional stuff and advertising. And, you know, I'll step in for a few deals every so often, right? You know, if I need to.

Mike Mills (01:02:40) - Yeah. Because that's the part you like to do.

Elliot Dodson (01:02:41) - That's that. That's what I want to do. So I know where we want to go. It's, it's just about the journey, getting there and we'll get there.

Mike Mills (01:02:49) - Yeah, yeah. It takes time. It's. It's like there's no, like I said in the, in the promo that we did, there's no magic pill for any of this stuff. Right? There is no, you know, I had a colleague call me not too long ago and you know because mortgages, you know, there was a period of time we were like the canary in the coal mine because our stuff fell out of the floor really, really quick when. Yeah, because people were still sucking on the whole refinance stuff because you were doing 3% cash outs and all this kind of stuff. And when that went away, a lot of mortgage people went away and a lot of people were struggling and, you know, meet me included. You know, it's not like I was like, oh, yeah, I'm still blown and gone.

Mike Mills (01:03:26) - Like we all business got cut in half. But he called me and he was like, you know what? What should we be doing? What How are you doing this? And what are you doing there? And I'm like, Look, man, there's no like, I just get up and I go to work and I and I do the things I can do. I reach out to clients. I call people back. I, you know, mind my leads that I get. I keep track of them better. I'm I'm doing more. I'm putting stuff online because that's the marketing avenue that I'm trying to go down. I'm trying to do social media stuff. I'm like, there's there isn't a man if you just do this, it's going to solve all your problems, right? You know what's going to solve all your problems. That right there on your shirt. Right. That's what solves your problems.

Elliot Dodson (01:04:04) - Well, and I think that the biggest thing that I want to point out as we kind of come to an end here and to a close, is that, you know, realistically, if you're going to try new things, don't try them in abundance in the sense of like, don't say I'm going to call for sale by owners and expired and do open houses and Dornoch and do you know mailers and you know, next door app and call my database and call my past clients like do not do that.

Elliot Dodson (01:04:32) - Focus on one and do it every single day. And realistically, I think the biggest lesson that I learned, if anything, when the market changed was that everyone wanted to be an Instagram realtor. Yeah, everybody did. Because it's what was sexy online, what I did. I went the other way. I zigged when everybody else zagged, and I started picking up the phone and calling everybody that I knew again. Yeah. And now we're in a great place. And I understand that social media is still going to be a fabulous outlet to try to drive business, and it's one that I need to do to stay relevant. So I'm definitely doing what I can to stay relevant in that space. However, at the end of the day, what has always worked? Tale as old as time. Calling your clients, picking up the phone, reaching out to people directly versus trying to get the phone to ring, right? Yeah, we all want the phone to ring. Yes. But if you're going to sit back and wait for it, you might find yourself out of this business.

Elliot Dodson (01:05:40) - Yes.

Mike Mills (01:05:42) - Well, man, I think that's a great place to wrap it up. I really appreciate you coming in. This is a fun conversation, and I hope anybody that hears this gets a little bit of inspiration from it. Just that, you know, you just got to work. The bottom line is you got to work. And there is no magic pill and there's 100 different ways to do it. Nobody's got the you know, the only way that works and I think, you know, like you said, you just got to try and stay consistent with it, whatever method you're trying to go down. And, you know, it'll if you do that, I think in most cases, you know, you're going to be successful. It's going to work out. So. All right, brother. Well, thank you for coming in. Thanks for everybody that stuck around. And we'll see you next week. Thanks for having me, sir.