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Investing in Yourself: The REPP 2024 Conference · The Spiro Podcast: Managing your Real Estate Photography & Videography Business

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Coming up on this episode of The Spiro podcast.
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that's why it's so important to hear from other people
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and have a network of people,
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regardless of if it's at a conference or not,
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like getting around other business owners that are doing the same thing and hearing
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what they're doing and their goals.
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A good way to remind yourself, Oh, like you actually own this business.
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This business was started to give you some sort of benefit,
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whatever that initial goal was.
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And it takes a lot of active effort to make sure it stays that way,
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Welcome to the Spiro podcast.
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Managing your real estate photography and videography business
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with your hosts, Todd Kivimaki
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and Craig Magrum.
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Hi, and welcome to the Spiro podcast,
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Managing your real estate photography and videography Business.
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Spiro is a software platform that's designed to really help
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you manage your day to day business and help you scale it up as well.
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I'm Craig Magrum.
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Welcome to another episode of the Spiro podcast.
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Along with me each and every week,
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owner and founder of Spiro and our co-host Todd Kivimaki.
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It's another beautiful fall day.
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Well, almost fall here in northwest Ohio, Todd.
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Yeah, true.
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Almost officially falls this weekend.
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And it's crazy. It's going so fast.
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I know we say this every week.
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I'm just at this point trying to figure out how I slow or
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you can never slow it down, but how I just enjoy more in the in the between
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and you know, because the whole busy season is like,
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okay, when I get when we get done with busy season, we'll have some time
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and then you get into off season, it's like, wait a minute,
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it's like I have less time than what I had during busy season.
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So that's
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that is what I'm trying to figure out right now.
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Craig But right, good to be back on this week and
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always good to be here with you.
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Yeah.
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This week's episode we've got a special guest.
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We'll introduce him in just a second.
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But before we do that, let's dive into Spiro updates.
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What's what's going on with the software, Todd?
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Yes.
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So these are probably by the time you're listening to this,
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if you're listening to this when it launches,
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these are going to be in a day or two.
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But this is what we've been working on, and it's one of our goals, again,
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that we want to be more transparent with what we're working on.
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So we've heard that from you and you all are important to us.
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And so we want to make good on us saying we're going to let you know
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what's coming up. We do it here on the podcast.
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Also, you might get it a day or two week early
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if you are on our Spiro Super user group on Facebook.
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So if you're a spiro user, just search Spiro super users.
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And I post this a little bit earlier on there,
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and when we know we have something coming up,
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you'll be the first to hear about it on that Facebook group.
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But for this round of updates, one thing that's coming is admins
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being able to save credit cards for your clients between
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all three of the credit card systems that we're currently processing with.
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So some of you might say I already have this, but
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others on Stripe or Square, you don't have it.
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So we're going to unify those features and you'll be able
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to save that credit card again, the goal to be easy for your clients
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that use the system, charge the money so they don't have to put a credit card.
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And each time the next one this was highly requested.
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This will be on demand importing of media from your Dropbox folders.
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So we're going to give you a button that you can click and Spiro will go out.
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It will scan your Dropbox folders for new media and it will bring it in
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on demand.
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The heartbeat of that is another option that's more automatic
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where you can set
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the number of days that we import media after the shoot.
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Right now, we stop after the first delivery email sent,
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and I know some of you do a two or three stage delivery where you might send
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four plan after photos and then you might even send video after floor plan.
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So you can set that you want to import
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everything in Dropbox two days after, three days after.
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So I'm excited to have that flexibility in the system as well.
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We have seven new reports coming, so I'm not going to cover all these,
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but they're going to give you insight to your business.
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So client performance, your products, so
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services, bundles, order, page performance and many more.
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So seven of those are coming up.
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Again, I cover all of those seven I leaked, all seven leaked,
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if you will like it's some big thing
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but I like it to sound important, right Craig Right.
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I told all seven in the group of video I did there, so go check me out in there.
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Another one.
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This was your guys's idea. This is fabulous.
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Optional and this is optional, but terms for when your clients download.
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So many of you have told us that we all know the clients have to have to
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checkmark that they agree to your terms and conditions before they place an order.
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Nobody reads it right And and by the time they get to downloading your images,
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they're like, Hey, I'm going to use these everywhere.
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And I believe every publication, I'm probably going to sell them for money.
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All right.
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You're like, Whoa, wait a minute, you can't do that.
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So we're going to give you a second
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set of terms that will pop up on the download page
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where your client has to agree to that if you want that option.
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But that's going to be in there.
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We're going to display coupon discounts on invoices,
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other various UI you and UX fixes, and then a few things to the download page
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where you can put branding on the top of the images.
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And then lastly, this is more of a UK thing I've learned, Craig, that in the UK
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there is a little bit of a difference between the way agents and companies work.
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Sometimes the agent doesn't actually want to be
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on the property website displayed, they want it to go back to the company.
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So we're going to give that option as well.
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And maybe for US users that that's sometimes helpful with builders
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is the way I thought, you know, our company at Wow would use that.
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We do have some builders that they want only the company on the property website,
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not necessarily the agent or the person that ordered the the media from you.
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So yeah,
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another use case, that apartment, you know apartment complexes rent other things.
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- Things like yes, - good idea. Good idea
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so excited.
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And just lastly those are all because of you,
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because of your communication to us, we love feedback.
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We love hearing from you.
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There's a lot of ways to give it to us.
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Email hello@spiro.media The Pink Chat Bubble.
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When you're logging to Spiro, that's the bottom right hand corner.
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And then also our feature base board when you're logged in the spiro,
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I've linked it for you in the upper right hand corner, says Feedback.
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Go put all your feedback on their vote.
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For others feedback.
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We take it from about the top down and
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we love hearing from you the feedback super important to us.
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Absolutely. Yep.
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And we appreciate that speaking about feedback in the Spiro Super Users
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group on Facebook, Todd, we record these these podcast episodes on Fridays,
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but on Thursdays at 4:30 Eastern, you host a new video
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series, we'll call it a live series called Tech Talks with Todd.
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How did yesterday's session go?
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Yeah, it went good.
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So that's the first and third Thursdays.
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We're out at 4:30. Yes, the first and third.
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It went good. It's good.
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It's a nice group on there. Come on in.
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If you have something specific, you can ask that.
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We talked about some updates coming up.
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I realize there was a guide that was needed.
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You all needed a guide on how to how your agents can download video on an iPhone.
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There's a couple of steps they have to take. I made it this morning.
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I posted in there.
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So that's the goal of that session
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is that I can spend more time with you guys directly.
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So one thing that I missed from starting out a couple of years ago is
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literally it was it was me in this room and then I had Craig
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come in and I got to spend a lot of time with all of you.
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And just naturally, as you grow and you guys are going through this
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in your business as well,
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like your first agents really know you, but as you grow a team,
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you have to figure out how to still stay connected with your clients.
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And that was that's the goal at that time.
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You know, you guys see me sometimes in the chat messages and you know,
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if you email me and ask for me, of course the team will send it to me.
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But that is a time like one on one, like I'm there, I'm live
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and I want to connect with you guys because what you do is important.
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You know, we have a real estate media company as well, but we want to know
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how the software works with your company because not all companies are the same.
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Right
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Okay, Good deal already.
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- Well, should we should we dive in - one more kind of shameless plug because.
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All right, we have to pay for this podcast about Spiro.
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Anyways,
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we Nick Kellis, it’s terrible Justine cut that out
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or just put a sound effect that goes wonk wonk wonk
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Then go ahead, Craig.
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I was going to say, is that that awkward pause you were talking about?
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Yes, it is.
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It is.
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Justine, just let this fly because this is everybody's
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going like, what are you talking about right now?
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Justine is our editor.
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For those of you that you might are wondering what's going on.
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Yeah, and I could I can confirm with you, Craig,
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and confirm and then Eli when he comes on, I'm really like, this is real life, too.
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So this isn’t a show.
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I'm really, really this messed up in real life.
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But what I want to say, long story,
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long is Nick Kellis on our team with customer success.
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He does a demo every week on Wednesday.
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So if you're curious, like, I'm not using it now,
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I want to see the flow of it. I want to see what it does.
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If you would like to see a live demo, Nick is every Wednesday
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at 4:30 Eastern, so just email us, chat with us.
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We'll send you the link.
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We do that in a zoom so that you can talk and interact.
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But he does that every Wednesday at 4:30.
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Yeah.
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Excellent. All right.
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Thanks for mentioning that.
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Yeah. Already.
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Now we've been down a couple of different squirrel and rabbit paths here.
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Todd. We got to get back on track.
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So we talked about the fact that it's fall and we're headed into conference season.
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So this podcast, again, we've, we've talked about this before.
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We're really trying to focus on the business of real estate photo and video.
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Right? Lots of great resources out there.
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On the creative side, you don't get what equipment to use, all of that good stuff.
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But we really want to see you have a successful business
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and one of the best ways you can do that is to invest in yourself,
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not just in your business, not in your equipment,
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not in your knowledge
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of how to shoot real estate, but really in how to run your business.
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And there are some fantastic conferences out there,
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and we want to talk about one of those, especially this week, Todd.
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Yes, we do.
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So this is one and you all know him and we're going to
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we'll introduce him here in a second.
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But this is one that I got to be a part of last year for the first time.
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And it's just phenomenal, like just the excitement, the energy
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and then the family feel is is just amazing.
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And that's one thing that that's one of our core values, is we are family at Wow.
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And so anywhere I go and I see that core value and I see how people
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just want to help each other and how they're excited and celebrating wins.
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It's just contagious and that group of individuals
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on the team, on Eli's team and then that surround him is fabulous.
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So this is coming up here.
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We'll get all the details, but we're going to bring on Eli Jones to the podcast.
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Eli, welcome. Good to have you on here today.
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Thanks for having me.
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I'm always excited to chat with you and Craig both.
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Now, Eli, just as a little background, just give us a
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do you want to give us a little backstory as to how you got into real estate
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photography and, and maybe progressed through the years to what you're doing now
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Yeah, I mean, it's kind of a boring story,
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I think is how it seemed, how most of us get into this business.
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My mom was a real estate agent for like a six month period of time, and
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I had a camera and I shot some, you know, frankly, terrible real estate photos.
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But 12 years ago, you could get by with terrible real estate photos.
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And so, agents started calling.
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And yeah, I grew a group business called Norman
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Young with a great team that runs company daily.
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And I get to spend my time on my business REPP, which is where we
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I think most people know me from, where we help
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other real estate photographers grow their business. Like Todd said, I think
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it's an interesting industry we're in because I see it as something
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that has a lot of potential and I think everybody listening to this
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knows that because you have a business that's been built on that potential.
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But generally the photography industry is not known for that, and I think that's
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because a lot of the times, the things that photographers are taught
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and that they prioritize don't really help them grow their business.
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And so our model's been completely the other side of it.
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Of course,
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we can teach you the photos and stuff, but the main the main thing that's really
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make a difference in your life is the business side.
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So I love what
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Todd you and Craig, do here on the podcast as well, focusing on that side of it.
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Awesome, I love it.
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I know both of our goals
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really align as we were kind of talking a little over a year ago.
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I just need to to line with those goals.
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So there's a conference coming up and why don't we just jump right in?
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So you want to tell us all when, where
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and what, when, where and what we can expect?
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Yeah.
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So it's November 15th and 16th.
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It's in Las Vegas.
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REPP 2024 is the conference name.
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And I'll just jump back a little bit to when we first
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did a conference in Miami for the first time in 2022,
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I had seen a lot of other people host conferences for their businesses
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and I was like, Maybe that's just something that's required.
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And so I kind of begrudgingly was like, All right,
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we're going to spend a bunch of money, get people out there and see how it goes.
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And my attitude towards conferences completely shifted after the first event.
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It was I know was my conference.
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I'm kind of sounding like I'm just promoting it for that sake.
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But I left and I was like, We got to do this every year.
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It was super cool to get people
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from our community up there sharing what they learned.
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I learned a ton.
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I was sitting there listening. I'm like, Why don't we do this?
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at Norman and Young.
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And so ever since then it's been a thing.
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We did it last year in Vegas as well, and that's just a really cool event.
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It's like, like Todd was saying, we are
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the business
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side of things and it's not just the boring numbers.
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It's like the attitudes you have,
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the things you're doing, the way you run your business.
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That's what really matters in your business.
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And so that's what we focus on.
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I think the joke was made last year
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that it's the only photography conference where we don't talk about photography,
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and that's probably the best way to intro it.
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Obviously, that's a little bit of a joke because there are elements of it
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you have to talk about to grow a great business.
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But that's the event.
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It's a two day event. We have a ton of great speakers.
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Todd, thankfully, is one of them will be sharing again
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and yeah, we're excited to make it happen again this year.
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Awesome.
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And this is at this year it's at the park, MGM.
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Yep., The Park MGM
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and how can give us the website?
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Eli Just so if, if, if listeners have not registered yet
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or want to find out more what's the website where they can find out more
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REPPlaunched.com/REPP2024
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and it's R-E-P-P 2024.
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Perfect and we will link that in the show notes below so you guys can just click
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right to it.
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Now jumping in about the conference.
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So the the format of the conference is that
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you have other speakers and that's pretty similar to most other conferences.
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But the unique thing and the neat thing about this is these are
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this is almost like
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real estate photographers teaching other real estate photographers, correct?
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Eli Yeah.
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I mean, there's nobody on that stage that doesn't currently run a real estate
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media business.
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And I think that's pretty important
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just because we like it to be as tactical of an event as possible,
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where you're learning from people that are doing this this year.
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And so it's a bunch of people who, you know, daily run real estate
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media company, that's that's people who have
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solo operations that have really maximized what that looks like
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growing a company that's just you and not scaling a team
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because it's not for everybody.
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I think anybody who scales would would agree with that.
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And then we have people that have built amazing teams.
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And so, yeah, it's a combination thing.
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Just because we say
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it's all about the business doesn't mean we think there's just one path
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for growing a business.
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I mean, ultimately the business, in my opinion at least, is something you build to
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work towards your goals, whatever those may be.
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So yeah, great range of people
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that are doing this right now and own business is doing it.
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Yeah, that's so interesting.
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That's something that I believe in
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as well and Craig and I have talked about earlier
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episode around the beginning of year, but a business is a coach.
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He taught it to me one time that a business is
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a profitable enterprise that runs without you.
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And I think that's and there my Friday
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morning Brian is missing something but basically that works for you
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I box it again but you guys are getting used to my
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my my problems here.
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But basically it's it's it it's something that you create that meets your goals.
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And I know that was one thing that I always felt guilty about.
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Like I started this little business and it was my baby and I,
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I did it first because I was excited about it.
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I wanted to make money.
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Of course, I was hoping that I could profit from this.
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And then it started to grow.
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And as it grew, you have people that come to you
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that are on your team that ask you what direction do you want to go,
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and that direction is guided by what you want the business to do for you.
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And sometimes I'd feel guilty if I be like, Well, wait a minute,
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I'm really just here to serve the business.
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And then I had to remind myself that I started
17:49
the business to serve my needs, so I'd have to go back home.
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I was married at the time, like, Hey, Jessica, what?
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Like, I really need to know kind of what what our goals as a family.
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And, and so it began that it started to feel guilty for me to actually
18:03
make decisions that benefited me and, and but that's the reason why you start.
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I don't know.
18:09
Eli, did you ever hit a point that where you you had that conundrum
18:12
where it's like, wait a minute, is it okay to benefit myself with my own business?
18:18
Yeah, I think maybe not directly, but something I definitely had was
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you forget why you started the business and that doesn't become
18:26
a part of your daily.
18:27
So it's, you know, when you first start the business,
18:29
you're not you don't have any clients to think about.
18:30
You don't have any team to think about. It's just you.
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And so you're pretty clear with, like you said, Todd, you want to make money
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and you know, there's some other stuff involved.
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You're excited about the industry and those two goals are there,
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but then a lot of businesses might included.
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I mean, two years, three years in, it's like, where did any of those goals go?
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And now you just kind of exist to serve your clients, which is important.
18:48
You have to serve your clients well.
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Obviously they won't be your clients anymore,
18:52
but there's a big element where I think you start the business for one reason
18:56
and then two years later
18:57
or four years later or whatever it is, you end up going, What did I just build?
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And sort of to, you know, wrap into what we were talking about?
19:04
Basically, that's why it's so important to hear from other people
19:07
and have a network of people,
19:09
regardless of if it's at a conference or not,
19:11
like getting around other business owners that are doing the same thing and hearing
19:14
what they're doing and their goals.
19:15
A good way to remind yourself, Oh, like you actually own this business.
19:18
This business was started to give you some sort of benefit,
19:21
whatever that initial goal was.
19:22
And it takes a lot of active effort to make sure it stays that way,
19:27
at least for me.
19:28
It just quickly becomes like you just are you have a bunch of bosses basically
19:32
in your clients and you're not enjoying your job and say, What the heck is this?
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So yeah, I think it's really important to whatever those goals are.
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Have clear goals for your business is kind of the main point.
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that is so true and really keep you aligned
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with the fact of the reason why you started and, and
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then the other thing I love you mentioned is the support system around you.
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So knowledge and support I've learned, you know, when, when I started, you know,
19:57
I was 20 something
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and when you're 20 you think you know everything and can do everything.
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And some of that's good because I was dumb enough to think I could do it.
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So I kept going on.
20:10
But some of that was really bad.
20:12
When your ego gets ahead of you and you start
20:16
and you hurt relationships or you make decisions that
20:21
that hurt you in a way of like, Hey, I need to rely on my team now.
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And that's why I have them.
20:27
So putting people around you super important.
20:31
Craig I know you have a good example as to so you were at a conference
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a couple of years ago with us and it was a room of photographers,
20:38
you know, much like what we'll see out at REPP
20:40
in November and Craig, what what did you gain?
20:43
Because I think this was your number one thing that you took away
20:46
from going to the conference and not what the speakers were.
20:49
And those are all great and not what the food is or the Vegas life.
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But what did you take away from that, Craig?
20:56
Well, let's see if our brains are aligning on this.
20:59
What I think what what I took away was the fact that I wasn't alone, right?
21:03
So I had initially built my own small company, and Eli,
21:08
I was more of that boutique type of real estate photographer.
21:11
I wasn't really interested in scaling a team.
21:14
I had been in management before and I realized that I like to be
21:17
hands on with my work.
21:19
So I only had one other photographer as I built my business
21:22
and that was enough for me.
21:24
I enjoyed my smaller number of clients but was able to provide
21:27
a living for my family.
21:29
But I did feel kind of alone and out on an island by myself, right?
21:33
I knew that there were other real estate photographers, you know, across the world,
21:38
but you don't have much of a chance to really get to know them
21:41
or talk shop with them.
21:43
I mean, yes, you can do it somewhat online, but being there in Vegas
21:47
at that PMRE conference, I realized we all have the same stories.
21:52
We have the same experiences with our clients, with with the sellers
21:56
and, you know, just nightmare stories and funny stories.
22:00
And it's like, oh, yeah, we all kind of experience the same thing
22:04
and we're in the same industry and okay,
22:07
what do I do that might help somebody else?
22:09
What is somebody else doing that might help me in my business?
22:12
And so I just I enjoyed connecting with with other people in that room,
22:18
hearing their stories and just picking up some new, new ideas that otherwise
22:22
I might not have gotten because I didn't get to know them as a person.
22:26
There's one.
22:26
There's there's one thing to say about meeting people online.
22:31
You know, we have these real estate photo Facebook groups and
22:34
and others, and you can interact with people and share ideas there.
22:38
But when you're sitting across the table from someone, look at them,
22:41
you know, eye to eye, face to face, getting to know them as a human being
22:47
that just can't be replicated online.
22:49
So I just for me, it was it was that one on one in-person
22:54
getting to know other real estate photographers in the business
22:57
and realizing, yeah, I'm not alone in this.
23:00
We were aligned with that.
23:01
Craig That's what I was thinking about,
23:03
just thinking about, you know, a specific conversation where
23:05
we're actually talking to an individual and he was kind of at the end of his rope,
23:09
you know, he had, he had come
23:10
he was really frustrated with his business and he felt like he was on an island.
23:14
And it was a mean it was only him.
23:16
And he goes online and then it acted as the opposite
23:19
as to where it's like I see everybody else or I'm 70% up, I'm 100% up.
23:24
I'm I did 50K this month.
23:26
And, you know, he had all of that as pressure on himself and he's gone.
23:30
I just don't think this is for me my business isn't any good.
23:33
Like I don't know what to do.
23:34
Like, I'm probably going to go back to this other thing.
23:36
And, you know, it's it was encouraging because in that just small group
23:41
that we're talking about
23:42
in all places of Vegas, where you think like there's you know,
23:45
there's this community that comes together and people are like, oh, no, you can do.
23:49
And there's ideas that are bounced off encouragement
23:51
and that really sat with me and like that was really just cool
23:55
to see the community picking up the community, right?
23:58
Eli One thing that I've always, always, always
24:01
looked up to you and just thought was really amazing that you had this foresight
24:05
was the ability to build a community and now you've built, I don't know,
24:11
a very large I don't know.
24:12
It's probably the largest, I guess stats don't matter.
24:15
And if you guys, for those who don't know Eli like he's never
24:19
he'll never talk about what he's done
24:21
because he's just that he's just that good of a person.
24:24
He's not like here to brag, but I'll brag on him
24:27
a little bit like he's got this humongous community.
24:29
He saw it many years ago and he's like, Hey, I'm going to build this community
24:33
around this knowledge and lifting people up.
24:36
And so, Eli,
24:37
I'm sure you have some just stories over the years where it's just like,
24:41
man, that was I saw this is how we started and this is what it came from or this
24:46
success story of a community member.
24:48
Does anything stick out from you, from maybe the conference or over the years?
24:52
Yeah. I mean, you know, the first thing I'll say,
24:55
I think I heard something that feels true to me,
24:57
which is a lot of entrepreneurs solve their own problems.
25:00
And so Norman and Young and building a photo business
25:03
like I didn't have a problem with real estate photos,
25:05
that was just the business in front of me.
25:06
But rap's really been the business that solve the problems that I had.
25:10
And so for me, I really felt the same thing.
25:12
Craig just mentioned it.
25:13
It's easy to feel alone because the hard part with this business
25:16
is if you do meet someone in person, they're most likely a competitor.
25:20
If you met them in the same market or anything.
25:21
And I think it's a great idea to get like I know our competitors
25:24
we’ve had great conversation,
25:26
you hold back 1% regardless of how much you believe that, right?
25:30
It's like there's still a little
25:31
I don't I can't say the client's name here because I'm going to take him, you know?
25:35
And so for me, it was that as far as stories
25:38
go, I mean, one of my favorite from the conference is and
25:41
I think she's been a guest on the podcast, but Colleen Kidd, Colleen and Tim. Yes.
25:46
So I didn't know this at the time.
25:48
Part of this. I knew part of it. You'll see why I didn't know it.
25:50
She came to our conference the first time in Miami,
25:53
and I could tell by the way, that her and Tim walked in the room
25:56
that they were very new to this
25:57
because their eyes were like twice the size of everything else.
25:59
As we're talking. Right.
26:00
And so she was there and we got to chat with
26:03
there was a really small group that first year, which was awesome.
26:05
It was like 40 or 50 people.
26:06
And she was like, I'm new to this.
26:08
I've done 1500 dollars in revenue.
26:11
And just talking to them, you kind of tell that she was going to be successful
26:14
and she had that like energy to her and just the attitude
26:17
they were going to make it happen, like there was no stopping them.
26:20
So anyway, the
26:20
conference was, well, the next year we're planning for the conference again.
26:23
This first time we're doing it.
26:24
Vegas Repp 2023 and we're trying to put together speakers and Colleen.
26:28
Since then, Colleen and Tim, their business had exploded like they
26:31
had gone from zero to well over a hundred K not run rate like revenue.
26:35
They collected $100,000 well within their first year
26:38
and they were growing, well, past that and trying for a lot more.
26:42
So we invited her to be a speaker because my thing is like,
26:44
you know, you can look at someone if someone's been in business
26:46
ten years like me, it doesn't mean all of our ideas are good.
26:48
It just means we've been doing it a while.
26:50
And so you learn a lot from the people who have like Rocketship up recently.
26:54
So Colleen was like, All right, Colleen, Tim, we got to have you guys speak
26:57
so they said yes.
26:58
And during her talk last year, she was like at the first conference,
27:02
you didn't tell anybody this.
27:03
The first time she said it was on the stage.
27:05
I was sitting there the first time she
27:07
she was thinking and she said, I'm going to be here as a speaker next year.
27:11
She didn't ask to be a speaker.
27:13
All she did was put her head down and just work.
27:16
And they built an incredible business and we invited her.
27:18
It wasn't she didn't plant any seeds.
27:21
And so that was super cool to share.
27:22
And so since then, she's grown a business that I think is bigger than Norman
27:26
and Young now, which is like the most inspiring thing of all.
27:29
Yeah, she's going back as a speaker, so that's like one of my all time
27:32
favorite stories.
27:33
That's awesome.
27:34
her energy is infectious and just her enthusiasm.
27:40
They're they're just fun to be around.
27:41
And the way that they come between Colleen and Tim, they converse together
27:46
when they're together is just great.
27:47
So love that success story
27:50
of kind of switching gears just slightly because I think it's it's super valuable
27:56
and some insight that you have that is is super important is
28:00
can we go over just to backtrack, we kind of talked about tiers of business,
28:04
and there's different tiers and all of our listeners are at all right.
28:08
You know, a different point. And again, that's okay.
28:11
So if if you're listening today and you hear a tier and you're like,
28:14
Oh, I'm at this bottom tier, that's okay, because we all had the start there,
28:18
you know, we all started with a business and,
28:21
you know, it took me, you know, Eli talks about ten years.
28:24
It took me 20 years to get here.
28:26
So that's just your timeline.
28:29
It's your business.
28:29
But the thing that I love and the insight you have, Eli, is just these tiers
28:33
as businesses grow and this is kind of impromptu.
28:36
This wasn't discussed before, so I'm kind of putting you on the spot,
28:39
but can you take us through those tiers of what you see?
28:42
Because you coach a lot of real estate students
28:45
and you have a ton of success in your and your community with that.
28:49
What are the tiers
28:50
you see
28:51
just so our listeners can connect with those
28:52
and then maybe how they get to the next tier?
28:55
Yeah, good question.
28:55
I mean, they can, you can break it up a lot of different ways.
28:58
Here's generally how we do it that I think hopefully can give you
29:02
some context about what's new because one thing I'll say before I jump in is
29:05
you don't want to go and this is what I did wrong.
29:09
It's basically how I know everything that I know now is the stuff I didn't do.
29:12
I'm sure Todd, you can associate with that as well.
29:15
So I would go, okay, I'm
29:18
doing $5,000 a month and this guy is doing 60.
29:22
What is he doing? And I want to do that.
29:25
And that's good.
29:25
I mean, you want to look up to the people that are above you,
29:27
but you don't want to mistake the things that work for them now at their scale
29:32
with where you are.
29:33
And so the way we kind of break it down is when you're going from 0
29:36
to $8000 a month roughly, it's only client acquisition.
29:40
That's like what you got to work on and you got to keep it really simple.
29:43
Don't try to do 100 different client acquisition methods,
29:46
you know, just keep it with one.
29:47
We talk about the Instagram method a lot.
29:49
Just whatever it is for you, pick one, stick with it.
29:52
When you start to get to 8 to 15, K is kind of the next year.
29:56
You could bring it in a little sooner.
29:57
Just depends on your individual business, but
29:59
that's where you start really having to work on your systems more
30:03
because you're starting to get maxed out as a solo operator.
30:06
So if you picture yourself,
30:07
you know, maybe you've been there, maybe you're wanting to go there.
30:09
Picture yourself doing 15,000 a month if your average order values 250.
30:12
I mean, that's a good amount of shoots. You're pretty busy.
30:14
And so the bottleneck is not, Hey, how many clients can I get?
30:17
It's how many clients can I fit in my business at that stage?
30:21
And so you start to refine your business and that's more systems focused 8 to 15.
30:24
When you get to eight,
30:26
the referrals really start to take over if you're doing it right.
30:28
And so you actually can afford to kind of,
30:30
you know, let off the gas with client acquisition.
30:34
And then,
30:34
you know, at 15 K is the pivot point for a lot of people.
30:37
If you want to scale your business and you're
30:39
you're want to build a team, that's one of your goals.
30:41
15K is a great time for your first hire If you do it too much later than that.
30:45
Yeah, you can definitely get to 25K by yourself.
30:47
In most markets, it's just really hard to hire when you already at 25K
30:51
because you have like your brain is fried and you have no time.
30:55
And so that's kind of the next stage.
30:57
I don't know if that's the breakpoints you're looking for.
30:59
Todd, but that's kind of how I think about it from a from an overview.
31:02
Yeah, and that's super helpful.
31:04
And that's all that's, that's tested like,
31:07
that's a ton of people, a ton of years that Eli looks at this data from.
31:12
So it's important to know that that's a good path to run and it's a proven path.
31:17
And, and the thing is, is our left brains can be very active sometimes
31:22
and we get tired.
31:24
You know, you might make your first 6k month and 6K is a lot of money.
31:29
You know if you're looking at like, oh, I used to make 4k a month
31:32
or 5K my previous job and I'm making 6K now.
31:35
Well it's one it's a little bit different because that's top line revenue.
31:40
But two this is where I saw my head and I forget what the number was monthly,
31:44
but that's when your head starts to go a little bit and you're like, okay, great,
31:48
I've got this thing off the ground and I'm not taking anything away from you.
31:52
It's it's not many businesses, not many people will take the
31:56
leap of faith and then get a business a 6k a month.
31:59
But that is kind of the point to where you have to just
32:02
keep driving forward and you have to keep pushing through.
32:06
And you can't let your ego, if you will.
32:09
And again, I say that from a place of love in my heart because I love you guy.
32:12
You know, like I saw myself do that.
32:14
It's like, don't let your ego get in the way right now.
32:16
And there's other points as well.
32:17
And I have to do this every day.
32:19
Like, I can't let my ego get in the way, you know,
32:22
because sometimes I look, I'm like, okay, this is kind of cool.
32:24
Like I'm really happy with what I did.
32:26
And then sometimes your brain tells you and this is a Eliism, but a though air,
32:31
and you have a thought air and you're telling yourself that you're,
32:35
you're unstoppable and then you and
32:38
then you make some lapses and you know, things can happen.
32:41
So if you're at that 6K point, just keep pushing through there.
32:45
Keep on your client acquisition and and try to drive it to that.
32:50
Again, that number was about a 15k a month.
32:52
Eli Is that what the first point is or.
32:55
Yeah, that's if you hired too much before then you probably haven't forced yourself
32:59
to be as efficient as you could.
33:00
So you're going to scale kind of a mess.
33:02
And then if you hire too much later, you're going to sloppy hire.
33:04
And that's like the worst thing because then
33:06
your clients are like this person, is it we all have heard those stories.
33:10
Maybe you heard these two Todd and Craig, but I did for sure of
33:15
people being like, Yeah, I'm using you, Eli, now,
33:17
because that last guy is scale this business and it just didn't go well.
33:21
And so you get those seeds in your mind, like things like, is it possible to scale?
33:24
And the reason they said it just didn't go well is because the person did it wrong.
33:27
You don't want to be the person that does it wrong by doing it sloppy
33:31
and by not training properly.
33:32
And you just you want to give yourself the most
33:36
chance
33:37
of success by saying like, Hey, when is the best time to hire you.
33:40
Don't hire too soon, you don't hire too late.
33:42
And so, yeah,
33:43
I think 15K is like a sweet spot for bringing on that first team member.
33:47
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
33:49
And that first team member is, is is a is whom?
33:53
What were they doing your business.
33:55
My opinion is that it always is going to be photographers.
34:00
I think what a lot of people do is they become good at photography
34:03
and they think that because they do all these things
34:05
a certain way, like that's why their clients like them.
34:07
And so they go, I know what they're doing to hire an admin
34:10
and they're going to do the back end, so they're going to talk to the clients.
34:12
The problem is, if you fast forward a little bit in your business,
34:15
you very quickly need another photographer and then you're just like gone
34:18
from the business because in theory an agent can call the admin not get you.
34:23
And then that admin could book a photographer,
34:24
not you, and you're cut out of the loop.
34:26
And I think you want to be cut out of the loop eventually, but not too early.
34:29
So our roadmap that we recommend is you hire photographers
34:32
until you have four or five photographers and you keep that admin role.
34:35
I think the admin role is the most important part of the business.
34:38
So that's what we recommend.
34:40
Yeah, I think that's so
34:42
smart and wise and you have to remember
34:45
that you start this business and people relate to you
34:49
and some of what they're buying is you and you can take yourself out.
34:52
Just do it further down the road like I can tell you, I don't know
34:56
that any of our new clients in the past three or four or five years at Wow,
34:59
even know who I am, they I could show up in the office.
35:03
They'd have no clue who I was.
35:05
They would know Craig, They would know Pam, Chris, Joy They know Steve.
35:09
They would know Whoever answers the phone wether Brittany or Besa or Tina,
35:14
you know, they know all these people.
35:16
And that's a different that's a whole different game.
35:19
And don't get ahead of yourself because you really need to be in there.
35:23
And then at least one thing that we found is when you're that young,
35:27
you don't have procedures, you don't have guides,
35:31
so you don't have the ability to get your staff
35:34
to do what you would do because you just don't have the training.
35:39
And that's okay.
35:40
It took us a lot of years to build that training
35:42
and we still think about how we can add to it, how we can improve it every day.
35:47
So just take your time, follow
35:49
the steps photographer first and then that's the greatest.
35:52
I agree as well, because then you still stay connected to the business.
35:57
it seems hard to it's, it's an interesting I mean, to use the word thought air,
36:00
it's an interesting thought air because you're like,
36:02
oh, if I could just have this admin work, I'll be able to do way more is like
36:06
Todd said, you have to think in the correct steps at the right time.
36:10
It's really important because Todd's business is big, right?
36:12
I mean, you can't do what Todd does now when you're not
36:15
where Todd's revenue is because it's not the right order.
36:18
And I think that's the thing that I tried to do wrong so much.
36:21
And I, like my first five years were sure yours were both of us as well.
36:26
Just so stupid.
36:27
It's like a lesson on if you could do the exact opposite, what you would do.
36:31
And so like
36:31
that's one of the big ones for me is why repeat that is just
36:34
doing stuff in the wrong order.
36:36
Because I'm like, This is what big business do.
36:37
I should do that. So now you're not there yet.
36:39
The next step is important.
36:41
You don't jump to the top of the staircase.
36:43
That's just such good insight.
36:45
So with all of this information that you're taking in daily and again,
36:49
looking at many different businesses,
36:51
what are some things we use this term Thought Air
36:53
And I really love this.
36:55
I use this in daily talk.
36:57
I use this and think about like how what is something that I'm thinking now
37:01
and it's kind of one of those things
37:02
like you don't know what you don't know, but and again, put you on the spot here.
37:05
Eli But what are some of the biggest thought airs you see
37:09
with photographers coming in or even experienced photographers?
37:13
The biggest one I would
37:14
just say is, is people saying my business is different.
37:18
And a lot of different variants of that.
37:19
Oh, my clients wouldn't like that.
37:21
Oh, this doesn't work in my market.
37:23
Just a lot of stuff.
37:24
And it is a good point
37:25
that one of you brought up at the start, which is you get around
37:28
people that do this and you realize all the businesses are the same
37:33
and that's a really important realization.
37:34
So the first year I'd seen
37:36
people do this at a conference and I'm like, I'm going to do this.
37:38
And so I had everybody closed their eyes.
37:39
I was like, Raise your hand if you feel like I'm talking about you.
37:42
And I just talked about a real estate media business and like everybody
37:45
with their eyes closed, their hand raise and you open your eyes. You're like,
37:47
Wait a second, You know, every business around feels exactly like me.
37:51
And so if you can if you can get away from it's like,
37:55
you know, there's big things you can pivot around if you can get away from.
37:58
My business is different.
37:59
It opens up so much because you don't have to rely on yourself.
38:03
You can go ask what other people are doing and you can actually trust that advice.
38:06
If you know your business is the same, you're going to seek out others
38:10
more aggressively, right?
38:11
You're not just going to stay in your own world.
38:12
And for me, that was so big because I thought that, you know, I
38:16
listen to business books, I go to events, I do stuff in it,
38:18
and I would still always be like, Yeah,
38:20
but mines a photography, business, it's different
38:22
and it's just such a silly thing.
38:24
I look back, I wish I could,
38:25
you know, punch myself through the screen or back in time, you know,
38:28
and that's the biggest one.
38:29
So yeah, my business is different
38:32
is the primary.
38:33
I mean, the second thing I would say is, is people just it's like that
38:35
little meme where the guy's digging and he stops like right before the gold.
38:39
The people who do well in this business, they just keep digging a little bit
38:42
after they feel not happy or like it's not going to happen.
38:47
And that's hard because it doesn't feel good.
38:49
But everything that you want is on the stuff is on the back side of the stuff
38:52
you don't want to do. It's called I Like.
38:54
And so that'd be my to
38:57
Todd, that phrase that you'd like to say just what Eli just said.
39:02
Maybe you think of it, if it was easy, everybody would it. Mm.
39:07
Yeah I that's one that I run through in my head a lot just like okay.
39:11
And I have to do that because there's some,
39:14
there's these feelings that hop about, you know, here's my feeling clogged again.
39:18
So I see scared, anxious, you know, all those things come up
39:22
and you have to keep telling yourself,
39:25
if it was easy, everybody would do it.
39:28
You know, it's interesting that this
39:29
this topic popped up and we're talking about this because
39:33
I listened to just a a quick daily video.
39:36
It's Darren Daily and I listen to him on my way into work
39:40
and he talked about making decisions typically when
39:45
there's a decision that you don't want to do, if there's an option that you don't
39:49
want to do in a decision, that's typically the one that you need to do.
39:54
Yeah, you're like, oh, it's it's cold outside the day.
39:57
I'm not going to go run, you know?
39:59
Oh, I, I, I'm, I'm going to start dieting tomorrow
40:03
or I'm going to make client calls tomorrow or follow up calls or I'm going to build
40:08
that procedure for the team tomorrow or I don't have time the day.
40:12
Like that's typically the one. It's I got to thinking about that.
40:15
And I was like, That is so true because our our bodies and our minds,
40:20
they have those feelings and those negative feelings
40:23
and quite honestly, who who is comfortable with those negative feelings?
40:26
Like nobody like you're not built for that.
40:28
You know, that's that's
40:29
we were built with these emotions, this fight or flight instinct.
40:33
And I just thought that was so interesting.
40:35
It got me to do the dumb I've got this AB board here, this plane board
40:39
in the office, and I sit at this desk, you know how many hours a day?
40:43
And I'm like, Oh, I should really do that point board.
40:45
It's got this little app and I finally did this stupid thing today so so
40:49
Darren Daily, thank you for that got me to do
40:52
one of them and I'm going to I'm now I'm going to have to come back
40:55
and just just
40:56
this is accountability this is another thing is like I'm going to tell you
40:59
how many times I did the playing board next week on the podcast.
41:03
So if it's not like two or three times a day, times
41:06
five or six days, like you all give me a hard time.
41:10
And so but that's, that's
41:11
another thing, like kind of selfishly into the next topic, accountability.
41:15
What do you what have you seen that do
41:18
in your life, Eli, In your students lives?
41:21
Is that important? Is that something we should be thinking about?
41:23
You know, we're just our business.
41:25
I own my business. I'm the owner of my business.
41:27
What do you believe about accountability?
41:30
I think accountability is like a spectrum rather than a yes or a no thing.
41:34
So I think it's just a question of how accountable you're.
41:37
And there's different types of accountability.
41:38
So there's, you know, there's accountability
41:39
yourself, There's an external accountability.
41:41
And so I think the more you're accountable in where however
41:45
you want to define that, the better it's going to go for your business.
41:48
So like you get around people who are doing
41:51
what you're doing and you talk with them, that's a form of accountability.
41:54
There's discipline with your own schedule and your own life.
41:57
I mean, that's a form of accountability.
41:58
I don't think there's anybody who's been more accountable and less successful.
42:01
And so,
42:02
yeah, I think I think that's a big part of it.
42:05
Yeah.
42:06
And that's one of the cool things, again, just just to go back to this community
42:10
at the conference coming up here in November, you're going to be in the room.
42:14
You know, like Eli said, he went through, he described the real estate
42:17
photography business and everybody raised their hand like, that's me.
42:21
And that's kind of cool to be in that room.
42:24
And then you're going to get there, contact.
42:26
You're going to put them on Facebook
42:27
or you know, you're going to follow them or get their contact information
42:31
and that is a group that you can really grow with
42:34
and that can lift you up when you need it and can you can do the same for them.
42:39
So I think that's something that's really
42:41
just the older I get, the more that like this
42:44
the idea of community
42:46
- is so important to me - and sometimes maybe this will resonate with you.
42:51
It's a mistake that I made is I thought of myself as an introvert,
42:55
especially when I was first starting my business and the thought
42:59
of joining community to an introvert is extremely scary.
43:03
You're like, I don't want to do that.
43:04
Like, you know, when you first walk into an event,
43:06
you're like, Wow, Like, there's all these people.
43:07
You don't know any of them.
43:09
But I would encourage you think about this.
43:10
The thought for me and for people, I would imagine you two agree as well
43:15
once you have a community, the thought of not having it is way scarier.
43:19
And so I grew slowly when I started my business
43:23
because I let I'm an introvert, you know, prevent me from doing stuff
43:27
that would have been hugely beneficial.
43:29
So of course, when you get around people that are what you're doing
43:31
and they're ahead of you, they're behind you, they have different
43:34
marks, you're going to do better, you know?
43:35
And so for me, it was I don't like joining because I don't like that
43:39
feeling when I first walk in, I'm like, where do I sit?
43:41
Who are these people?
43:43
It's like anything you go to a class for the first time,
43:45
you know, you go to a new whatever, and you're like that
43:48
and then two days, then you're like, This is the best thing ever.
43:50
Like, that's where that accountability comes in a little bit.
43:53
Like you need to be accountable yourself and know that that's true
43:55
and just push yourself because then it takes it from there.
43:58
You know,
43:59
one of the things about disciplined is like when you take small steps
44:02
to get disciplined, you all of a sudden find yourself way more disciplined.
44:05
And so it's the same thing with this.
44:07
Like you just got to take a step
44:08
and then before you know it, you can't imagine life without that.
44:11
And so what Todd said about connecting with other people and,
44:14
you know, this is talk about the start the value at an event specifically
44:18
is not all it is not you know, the whole part of it is not on the stage.
44:22
A lot of it is the people you talk to, the four phone numbers you get.
44:26
Every conference that we've done in every conference that I've been to,
44:29
I know somebody from that that I talk to that I've gained a lot from.
44:33
And so you should go in with that as well, which I know, again, for an introvert,
44:37
scary, really easy to do when you just spend two days with people.
44:41
And my favorite thing we're doing this year is I like this for for me
44:45
as a quote unquote recovering introvert or whatever you want to call it.
44:49
I went to an event recently and they they like directed us
44:52
all by a table to a table based on revenue.
44:55
And that's where the connections came from,
44:57
because I'm not someone that just goes around and just wants to meet people.
45:01
And so for me, that was really cool.
45:02
And so that's something we're going to do and that's a good way to like
45:04
break the ice. You just have to talk to people.
45:06
Yeah, I love that.
45:08
That'll be great.
45:08
Craig I mean, that's something I know resonates with me as well.
45:11
But you know, because you and
45:14
yeah,
45:15
what you just said you Eli.
45:17
Yeah, I'm not the person to go up to a group
45:19
and insert myself into a conversation.
45:22
It's like that at the realtor events, you know, in my market, you know,
45:25
big social gatherings.
45:27
I'm the wallflower, but I look for the individuals
45:30
that I've gotten to know over the years, and I can talk with them one on one.
45:34
My strength is the one on one conversations.
45:37
That's where I really can connect and feel a little bit more confident.
45:41
And and that's kind of how I built my business.
45:43
You know, in this market,
45:45
we have other business
45:46
development specialists that take a totally different approach.
45:49
You got to find your strengths, right, and build your business on that.
45:53
And and you can do it.
45:54
We all have different gifts and talents in all of those
45:57
different gifts and talents can be used to build a business
46:01
that will reflect you and will resonate with your clients. So
46:05
so, Eli, switching back to the conference here,
46:07
so two day conference again, it is the 15th and the 16th of November
46:12
and it is in Vegas at the MGM or Park MGM
46:16
and excited to be back again this year.
46:19
So I don't know if you want to give us a high point.
46:21
I know there's a lot of speakers and a lot of individuals, but I don't know
46:24
if you just want to hit a high point of kind of what
46:28
the speaker and kind of what we can expect from them.
46:31
Yeah, I mean, I can run through some of them, so Colleen
46:33
And Tim Kydd, we talked about
46:34
they'll be back speaking Todd you'll be speaking a couple of people.
46:38
If you're familiar with my content at all, you probably heard me mention Kevin
46:42
Salgado built an incredible business to 50K a month in like a year
46:46
and a half from scratch in a new market where he didn't know anybody.
46:49
He had just moved from California to Tennessee.
46:52
And so he'll be there.
46:53
Cam Bankercove will be there.
46:56
I was mess up his last name.
46:57
Sorry Cam, if you're listening.
46:58
Anyway, he's a seven figure.
47:00
Real estate media business, great guy, built an awesome team.
47:03
Scott Golmet another guy that's, you know,
47:06
newer to the business but his smaller team now.
47:09
And he's great. Just a bunch of people.
47:11
They come from different perspectives too, which I think is good.
47:13
Some of them want to have big teams.
47:14
Some of them want to be maximized solo operators, and there'll be some cool
47:20
things that were that the speakers talk about, like Cam,
47:22
for example, is talking about how to use a podcast
47:27
to this depth basically.
47:29
So he'll be talking about that, I believe.
47:31
I mean, Colleen I think is talking twice
47:33
because we need Colleen talking as much as we possibly can,
47:37
but I believe we'll be talking about the head shop pop up
47:40
she does to get it like there's there's different angles.
47:43
And so something Colleen
47:44
actually said she posted on our Facebook group was you get to go and you know,
47:48
you said this going second go Todd Every business is different.
47:50
We all have I think it was you Craig, got to give the right credit.
47:52
Every business, like people have their strengths.
47:55
And so what Colleen said that I really liked was you go there
47:58
and you know who you are.
47:59
You get to pick, Oh, I resonate with that person.
48:01
Oh, I resonate with that.
48:01
With that idea, that idea. And you get to like,
48:03
you know, in a good way Frankenstein your business together.
48:06
And so that's where I think a lot of the value is in the perspective.
48:09
But yeah, some really great people.
48:10
And here's the cool thing.
48:11
The way we do it, none of them are paid.
48:14
These people love to teach because they've been taught
48:18
what they want to pass it on.
48:19
And so it's a great group.
48:20
People who are I'm a big fan of the book, The Go Giver.
48:23
It's a great group of people that are that are go givers, I would say.
48:26
And yeah, I'm just proud of that group and their willingness to do that.
48:32
Eli what's the author's name of that book The Go Giver?
48:35
Oh, that’s
48:35
A wonderful question.
48:36
Um, let's see if I can find it real quick.
48:39
But it's a great book.
48:40
It's a, it's a fiction book, it’s Bob burg
48:44
and I am not known.
48:46
I don't read for fun.
48:47
I don't read stuff. Right.
48:49
So you got to find me reading like an autobiography or something.
48:51
This is like the one fiction that I will recommend.
48:55
It's just really good.
48:56
It's a story that is how I built my business. Basically.
48:59
It's what I try to do.
49:01
It's very cool.
49:02
Well, we'll put a link to that book.
49:04
Yeah, we'll put a link it to that book in the in the show notes.
49:08
Awesome.
49:09
So, Eli, if we have listeners out there, so the event will be great.
49:12
It's fabulous.
49:13
You all should try to make it out there and you should really try.
49:17
And for those of you that either
49:19
make it or not, but are just out there and they kind of feel that, you know,
49:23
they don't feel as though their business is like any other business.
49:27
And maybe they have some of these thought airs
49:28
or maybe they're still even processing and they need they need some help.
49:32
I mean, you have a fabulous
49:35
platform, a fabulous environment, coaching environment for them.
49:39
Can you give us just little just a little information on that?
49:43
If someone's looking and they feel stuck, they need accountability.
49:47
They need some guidance with their business, what can REPP do for them?
49:52
Yeah, I mean, I would say the first thing is not to pay us or anybody anything.
49:56
I would go start with, you know,
49:58
if you're here listening to this, you know, real estate media.
50:00
So my stuff on Instagram is not going to ultimately that helpful
50:03
because it's for newer people.
50:05
YouTube, I post a lot of longer form content
50:07
breaking down how I would scale different businesses, common things.
50:10
So what I would recommend is you go start watching that
50:13
and make sure you just like what I say and you resonate with me.
50:16
If you're like, I don't agree with anything,
50:18
it says like, there's probably not a lot
50:19
we're going to be able to do because we have different ideas for
50:22
what we see this industry being and what you can do with it, right?
50:24
So first step is honestly, just go watch my videos on YouTube.
50:27
@ItsEliJones, you can find me on there.
50:30
And then if you want to talk with a team
50:32
about a specific problem, you're having a roadmap.
50:35
The cool thing about the way we do it is we don't just sell a course
50:38
because courses are one size fits all and used to do that
50:40
and there's nothing wrong with that.
50:41
It's just we found that we can get a lot better results for people
50:44
if we coach them.
50:45
And coaching is that, you know, one on one relationship
50:48
and so you can find info about that on my YouTube as well.
50:51
But start with the stuff on YouTube and just make sure you're
50:53
hey, this is helping get some value from that first.
50:57
Yeah, that's and I'll pitch a little bit more
50:59
because you guys all know me and just from and this isn't a hard picture,
51:04
but this is just what I saw last year and, and last year.
51:07
I'll just rewind and completely transparent.
51:11
That was just at the point.
51:12
So Eli is is a partner in with Spiro and that was right
51:15
after we agreed and we we had some long conversation.
51:18
He flew out to see me
51:20
and then I went out to meet him and the team, Jared and Kenny,
51:23
and we had some good conversations and realize that we aligned.
51:26
And then he invited me out to the conference.
51:29
And so I was kind of there as just a fly on the wall for the first year.
51:32
And I will tell you guys that just the again, the family feel,
51:38
but the way that the program and Eli's training
51:42
has given people a track to run on and be successful, just it was so cool.
51:47
Like literally Eli would never say this because he's too humble,
51:50
but like, people are like, Eli, you've changed my life. Like, I.
51:52
I was working a job I hated, and now I have my own thing, my own business.
51:58
I've grown.
51:58
It supports me.
51:59
I'm hiring other I'm supporting other families.
52:02
That is all.
52:03
Just like the best thing in the world.
52:05
And Eli is humble enough. Like, that's not the only way to do it.
52:08
You can learn there's many other ways to do it,
52:10
but he's put together great resources and a great community to do that.
52:14
So, you know, kudos to you and thanks to you, Eli.
52:17
It was neat to be in that room and hear those stories.
52:20
And those success stories are always just so uplifting.
52:23
Yeah. And thank you for that.
52:25
It's it's I've never had more fun doing what I'm doing now,
52:28
and that's a big part of it.
52:29
So it's it's super fun to see people running with it.
52:32
It's an awesome industry.
52:33
You know, there's a lot that can be done if you do it right.
52:36
Yeah.
52:37
Okay.
52:38
So just just as a wrap up here and again, this is kind of on the hip, so
52:41
I've thrown you a lot of curveballs a day and you talk about the industry.
52:45
What do you see for the future of the industry?
52:47
Kind of to wrap up here what you think?
52:50
You know, we've had some big changes in the U.S.
52:52
as far as commission this year.
52:53
We have interest rates all over the place.
52:55
Like what do you think the industry
52:57
of real estate, photography and media will be?
53:00
A good question. So I get that a lot.
53:03
That question from people who are just starting
53:06
and they're thinking about it because they're like worried.
53:09
And so I guess I'll take it from the angle of this.
53:11
I felt that way when I started.
53:12
This is 11, 12 years ago
53:15
photography and
53:16
photographers are kind of like thought of as going away.
53:20
But what I think is really happened in the industry is people have phones.
53:23
You know, these things should we shoot stuff on this professionally.
53:26
Right?
53:26
And so there's this attitude or idea that the industry is
53:29
is not headed in the right direction.
53:31
I've just seen the opposite with real estate media
53:34
specifically over the time I've been in it.
53:36
And so the trajectory has been more and more media options that we can provide
53:41
our clients, which is better for our business, higher average order value.
53:44
And I think a lot of that is driven by just the way
53:47
real estate is sold has changed and it continues to change.
53:50
You know, ten, 12, 15 when you started, especially Todd, agents were like
53:54
you had to go to the agent to find the house.
53:56
And now we have Zillow where you go to Zillow
53:58
and then find the agent, you find the house and then the agent.
54:00
And so that trajectory continues.
54:02
I think, you know, more and more people are buried in this all day, which for us
54:06
as as content creators in a very specific niche, I think that benefits us.
54:11
So I've seen it get better.
54:12
Average order values go up, more opportunity in the industry
54:16
and so I'm super excited about it.
54:18
What exactly that looks like, I don't know.
54:19
But the cool thing about being in business is that's your job.
54:21
You react to the new stuff
54:23
and you take advantage of the opportunity and you ride the wave.
54:26
And so I think the wave is building in my mind right now,
54:30
which is not something I would have said when I first started out.
54:32
I've been like ten years now.
54:33
I'm probably not going to be doing this, probably not going to be a thing
54:36
and just not being the case.
54:37
So very, very positive, I think, for the future.
54:40
So interesting.
54:41
I agree 100%.
54:42
You know, there's a a bright future ahead.
54:45
And technology is always going to be that thing.
54:48
And no matter what
54:49
business you're in, you always find people that try do it themselves.
54:53
Of course, you know, so you all say, you know, it's like,
54:56
oh, you know, realtors shoot with their phone.
54:59
It's like
54:59
no matter what industry you go to, people are going to try to do that thing.
55:03
You know, think of the last thing
55:04
I remember what I was looking for, but it was this
55:08
oh, it's this silly example, but like cornhole boards.
55:11
So at church we have this cornhole tournament coming up and like,
55:13
I've been obsessed about cornhole because I'm terrible at it.
55:16
I don't want to go and stink at, you know, this tournament.
55:18
That's not it's a silly thing.
55:20
And again, you have to know my brain.
55:21
But I was going to buy a cornhole board board set.
55:24
I'm like, I'll just build the thing.
55:27
It's like, Well, wait a minute, Todd, You don't build anything.
55:29
Why do you think you're going to build a cornhole board set?
55:32
So I just bought the set, you know, So it's like,
55:35
- yeah, every industry, - all three of us can probably a plumb a toilet or a sink.
55:39
It doesn't mean we don't call a plumber, you know, And it doesn't mean
55:41
we wouldn't start a plumbing business either.
55:43
It's just when you pick something, you get good at it.
55:45
You always hire the professional.
55:47
That's how we are as humans, I think, especially the building agents,
55:50
we're bringing it back to that which are the ones you want anyway, so.
55:53
Yeah, exactly.
55:55
Exactly. So.
55:57
Good deal. Well, Eli, one more time.
55:59
If somebody is interested in signing up for the conference, where.
56:02
Where can they find that, that link.
56:05
Yeah, it's Repplaunch.com/repp2024
56:08
And if you find follow me on social media, you'll see me
56:12
yapping away about it more than likely, but Repplaunch.com/repp2024
56:17
awesome.
56:18
All right.
56:18
There you go. Our guest again, Eli Jones.
56:21
And Eli, thanks for taking time out of your schedule.
56:24
We know you have a lot on your plate, so we really appreciate it.
56:27
Thank you.
56:27
It's always a fun time and a good chat. So appreciate it.
56:30
Yeah, awesome to have you on today and always good to talk through and see
56:34
your angle of the industry as well.
56:35
So thanks for your time.
56:37
Of course. Thank you.
56:39
All right.
56:39
Well, Todd, any any parting or closing thoughts from you?
56:43
Just go. Do I just go?
56:45
I'll just, you know, again,
56:49
buy the ticket.
56:50
It's it's a write off.
56:52
If you need an excuse, take your wife to your significant other.
56:55
Go out to Vegas. It's a couple of days.
56:57
Enjoy I take the leap of faith and Craig, I might try to drag you there next year.
57:02
So we'll see on that.
57:04
All right. All right.
57:06
sounds good.
57:08
All right.
57:09
Well, guys, thank you so much for for watching and listening again this week.
57:12
We hope we hope you've gotten some value out of this, as always.
57:15
And we just really appreciate you.
57:18
You know,
57:19
it's a privilege and an honor for us to be able to to just connect with you
57:24
and hopefully be a small part of your success in your business.
57:27
So thanks for watching. Thanks for listening.
57:29
That's going to wrap things up for this week.
57:31
As we always remind you, just take some time out of your day.
57:35
Be thankful for the blessings in your life.
57:38
Make sure you take a breath. It's good for you.
57:40
Have a great week.
57:41
Thank you for joining us for the Spiro podcast,
57:44
managing your real estate, photography and videography Business.
57:48
This is a production of Spiro and wow video tours.
57:52
You can find out more about.
57:53
Spiro is real estate, media, business management software at our Web site.
57:57
Spiro.media.