Latest / Mortgage Marketing Radio / What I Learned Spending Two Days With Alex & Leila Hormozi

Transcript

What I Learned Spending Two Days With Alex & Leila Hormozi · Mortgage Marketing Radio

0:00
Hey, welcome to this week's episode of mortgage marketing radio podcast.
0:15
I am your humble host, Jeff Zimfer.
0:17
Appreciate you tuning in.
0:19
We are today October 2nd Wednesday, October 2nd.
0:22
Welcome officially to the beginning of Q for Q for 2024.
0:28
Hey, I got some news for you.
0:31
I don't know if you're aware of this or not, but guess what?
0:34
91 days until 2025, 91 days left in the year, and that makes as of the recording of this,
0:43
if I'm correct, 58 working days.
0:47
If you take out holidays and weekends, 58 working days as of October 2nd, 2024.
0:52
Where has the time gone?
0:54
More importantly, what have you done with the time?
0:57
Perhaps even more importantly, what are you going to do with the time that's left in this year?
1:01
What is your plan?
1:03
You basically got 58 or so days, right, to build your plan for momentum,
1:09
to grab market share to enter 2025 with the wind at your back instead of starting from ground zero,
1:17
scratching your head, wondering how you're going to capture market share,
1:21
grow your business, grow revenues in 2025.
1:24
Now, if I know you're a listener to this podcast,
1:26
you're already on the ball with this and thinking about it, I hope.
1:30
But what I wanted to do today is unpack some of the key learnings and lessons
1:34
and takeaways that I recently learned attending a two-day onsite workshop
1:39
with Alex and Layla Hermozzi.
1:42
You may be familiar with them, acquisition.com.
1:45
They are obviously big time leaders right now in the content marketing space.
1:51
They run a company, a portfolio of companies, that last I check,
1:54
I think it does 250 or 500 million a year.
1:58
And so if you don't know who Alex and Hermozzi is, go to YouTube,
2:01
look him up, go to Google, look him up, some incredible wisdom and content there.
2:04
As I look over my shoulder here is the author of several books,
2:07
including $100 million offers, $100 million leads, et cetera, et cetera.
2:17
So you invest $5,000 and you spend two days onsite at their headquarters.
2:23
And there was, I think, $100 million in some odd.
2:27
It was $150 million maybe, people in the room, so you do the math.
2:31
It's a pretty good take for the day, yay.
2:33
And you wind up sitting with their staff who have different positions
2:40
from their portfolio company.
2:41
So they'll have their CFO from acquisition.com itself.
2:45
They'll have various marketing specialists from companies that either directly create
2:50
Hermozzi's content or other portfolio companies content.
2:54
So they'll have subject matter experts, operations, hiring, right, technology, et cetera,
2:59
from all these different disciplines so that you can glean the experience and expertise
3:06
from these various roles within the acquisition.com portfolio of companies
3:10
and apply some of those learnings to your business.
3:13
So I wanted to unpack some of my key takeaways from that.
3:15
But before I do, I have got a win of the week to come at you as well.
3:19
Once again, coming from Glenda White out in Texas, what's up, Glenda, shout out to you.
3:25
Win of the week, she hosted our class called Winning the Byer presentation.
3:30
She held it yesterday on October 1st.
3:33
And here's the funny thing about it is nine people registered, but 22 showed up.
3:40
And immediately before leaving the class,
3:42
she set four appointments with realtors and she already has people registered
3:46
to attend her very next class, which is going to be delivered over Zoom.
3:51
So one of the strategies, of course, if you're thinking about 2025
3:55
and grabbing market share is increasing your brand awareness.
4:00
So shout out to you, Glenda.
4:02
You're obviously a superstar keep rock in that.
4:03
And by the way, if you want to learn more about what we do,
4:05
you can go to mortgagemarketing.pro to check it out.
4:08
Grab a call with me.
4:10
And we'll see if it's a right fit for you.
4:11
But we're helping originators, right?
4:14
Move from being seen as solicitor and vendor to partner and peer.
4:17
We're helping them scale their reach with real estate agents.
4:20
And we're helping them scale their production and referrals as well.
4:24
Mortgagemarketing.pro.
4:26
Hey, also, before I forget, shout out to my good friend Greg Sure.
4:30
Greg, what's up? I got the shirt on today.
4:31
If you're listening, hashtag all of us, mortgage movement.
4:35
Hey, man, you got to come and watch the video or whatever.
4:37
This is YouTube, Instagram.
4:39
I'll make sure I try to create an Instagram.
4:40
Real out of this hashtag all of us.
4:42
If you don't know Greg, follow him on LinkedIn.
4:44
Greg, S-A-G-E-R, Greg Sure.
4:46
Super, super cool, dude.
4:47
Great leader in the industry.
4:49
All right, so back to my content, let me put on the glasses.
4:53
So I can see.
4:56
And I want to unpack.
4:58
There was a few different things we talked about.
4:59
But today I'm just going to focus on this one thing,
5:02
what they called at acquisition.com headquarters.
5:04
They called value detractors.
5:07
How to make your company less unvaluable.
5:10
So I want you to think of yourself as a company, right?
5:12
Because you are a company.
5:13
Whether you're just a solo person, you're a team,
5:15
you're listening to this, you're a leader,
5:17
ranch manager, regional, whatever it is.
5:19
There's many risks in business.
5:22
We focus on these five.
5:23
And I may or may not cover all five of these,
5:25
but the five are key man risk, key customer risk,
5:30
single channel risk, market risk, and data risk.
5:34
Let's go through a few of these.
5:36
Key man risk.
5:38
What is it?
5:39
The company needs you to grow.
5:42
Period.
5:44
Now, for many people listening, right,
5:45
if you are the mortgage originator, carry in a bag,
5:48
and you are what you kill, right?
5:51
You hunt deals, right?
5:53
And you bring them in.
5:55
That is just what it is, right?
5:58
The company needs you.
5:59
Like if you stopped doing your activities tomorrow,
6:03
over the next two, three, 30 days, right?
6:04
Whatever it is, those activities that you're doing,
6:07
with the deal flow stop, in many cases probably.
6:10
So I want you to think about this contextually,
6:12
though, it's just not, not just think about this,
6:14
hey, man, what can I do right now?
6:16
And maybe there's nothing you're hearing in the moment,
6:18
when you're like, oh, that doesn't apply to me.
6:19
I want you to think about what it is
6:21
that you really want to build.
6:23
What is it that you want to build, right?
6:25
You want to build something that isn't 100% dependent upon you?
6:28
What is it going to take?
6:30
More importantly, who do you have to be
6:31
in order for that to happen?
6:33
To become that person who attracts the right people,
6:37
to build the team, to build your sources of business,
6:40
your infrastructure, et cetera.
6:41
So think about that as we go through this.
6:42
But the key man risk is the company needs you.
6:45
It's dependent upon you to grow.
6:46
Why does it matter?
6:48
Because it's core function dependency, okay?
6:52
Many people, many business owners, right,
6:55
if you will, quote unquote entrepreneurs are stuck.
7:00
They have, the business is truly just a high paying job.
7:04
By the way, if that's it as a mortgage originator,
7:06
it's a high paying job, but it's feeding your family.
7:11
It is paying the bills.
7:14
It is building your financial future,
7:15
allowing you to invest in other things
7:18
for your overall goals.
7:20
There's nothing wrong with that.
7:21
By the way, there's nothing wrong with having a high paying job.
7:23
Maybe you don't want to build an entity
7:25
that is not dependent upon you.
7:28
And that's cool, right?
7:30
So, if you want to change that though, right,
7:37
how do you change it?
7:40
You've got to break your role into several roles
7:44
and hire out.
7:45
So your role right now as an originator has several roles,
7:48
right, there's rainmaker, there's marketer,
7:51
there's salesperson, there's social media person,
7:54
there's class host and facilitator.
7:58
There's probably some level of operations,
8:01
some level of related to support, customer service,
8:06
engagement, there's pre, during and post activities,
8:10
pre-sale, during sale and post-sale,
8:13
post-sale quality control follow-up, things like that,
8:16
long-term nurture, database reactivation,
8:18
like a lot of different moving parts, man.
8:20
So shout out to you guys and gals
8:22
that are doing the role, right?
8:25
But if you want to think about diversifying yourself,
8:27
so it's not solely dependent upon you
8:29
or you can more focus on the tasks that you want to do
8:33
such as being the rainmaker
8:35
or being the deal structure person.
8:37
I mean, I don't know, right?
8:40
You've got to think about how can you,
8:41
what roles, what activities that you do
8:44
could you start to plan for hiring outsourcing, delegating?
8:49
So for many of you, that begins with an L.O.A.,
8:52
loan office assistant to handle some of those duties and roles.
8:54
I think that's smart, right?
8:55
That's a good place to start
8:57
because you want to be able to free up your activities
8:59
to do the key roles, right, in your business.
9:03
And so this is just more so food for thought
9:05
to think about is there an opportunity to place down the road
9:10
for you to start to break your role into smaller roles,
9:15
outsource higher out and all that kind of stuff.
9:17
And if it's an L.O.A. to start with or an assistant,
9:20
like you've heard it said before,
9:22
if you don't have an assistant, you are the assistant.
9:26
And most people, including myself, wait too long to hire.
9:32
So hire sooner than you think you're ready
9:34
for the right role.
9:36
But don't delegate the role that you're
9:40
ideally suited for and equipped for
9:43
or the role that keeps the lights on and puts food on the table.
9:47
Delegate for the role that keeps you away
9:49
from the main thing so that you can continue to grow.
9:54
Does that make sense?
9:55
Okay, the next risk is of these risks.
9:59
Remember, we're talking about value detractors,
10:04
many risks in the business, the key five.
10:06
The next one is the key customer risk.
10:08
A few customers determine the fate of your business.
10:13
What is it?
10:15
Maybe, you know, it is your business is based
10:17
on a small collection of referral partners,
10:19
half a dozen or whatever, or one primary source of business.
10:25
If any of your sources of business left tomorrow,
10:30
would your revenue drop by 20% or more?
10:34
So most of you listening, I know,
10:36
you're probably your main sources of business
10:37
are things like pass client database,
10:40
agent referrals, maybe financial advisor referrals,
10:43
various things like that.
10:45
The worst number in marketing is one
10:47
because if that one source of business ever goes away,
10:51
you're dead in the water.
10:53
So what's the key takeaway?
10:54
Key takeaway is diversify.
10:56
Start to add those additional layers of sources of business.
11:00
And this isn't to say that we stop
11:02
and no longer pay attention to the sources
11:07
that are producing for us.
11:08
That's not saying, hey, bail on realtors.
11:13
Right, you don't want to kill the golden goose.
11:16
What this is saying is if you've got the bandwidth
11:19
to be able to add another source of business
11:25
without it jeopardizing the main current source
11:29
then it's something to evaluate.
11:31
But the mistake a lot of people make is
11:32
they're going to add something else, a bright, shiny object.
11:36
Right?
11:37
And all of a sudden, what happens is that
11:39
other primary source of business
11:40
that was feeding them suffers.
11:44
Mistake, you've got to make sure
11:48
that as you're pursuing that additional source
11:50
it doesn't sacrifice and burn the ships on the other one.
11:52
Does that make sense?
11:54
Okay, cool.
11:55
So let's keep going here.
11:57
Another channel risk.
11:59
Most customers, I think we already talked about.
12:01
Most customers come from one source.
12:03
It might be an extension of my notes here.
12:05
Okay, here's another risk to your business, data risk.
12:08
Knowing your numbers or not.
12:11
Knowing your numbers or not or KPIs, right?
12:13
To keep performance indicators.
12:15
Why does it matter?
12:17
Because if you don't track it, right?
12:18
Well, you probably don't care.
12:20
You've heard it said maybe that what gets measured improves.
12:24
What gets measured gets managed.
12:26
See, one of the things we also learned
12:28
at this two days with Hermosi is that
12:30
most people think they need more leads.
12:33
That's like so common.
12:34
Like I need more leads, right?
12:35
Leads leads leads leads.
12:36
I need the Glen Gary leads.
12:37
Glen Ross leads.
12:38
And that is actually more often than not, not the case.
12:43
As a matter of fact, there's an exercise we go through
12:45
during the two days where we basically do a breakdown
12:49
on conversions, math conversions.
12:53
To take a look and see what your conversions are.
12:55
Because for many people, the conversions are,
12:56
it's not about, it's not about more leads.
12:59
It's about more conversions, right?
13:01
And to optimize for that.
13:02
So before you make the decision about,
13:04
oh, I just need more leads.
13:05
Let me throw more in the top.
13:07
Take a look at your data and look at what are the conversion
13:09
rates for the existing leads that you're working.
13:13
Does that make sense?
13:16
Is that's going to be the case for most people?
13:19
So when it comes to leads, right?
13:20
Depending on the source of the leads,
13:21
conversations, getting on the phone with you,
13:23
whatever that source is,
13:25
different lead flow or channels you have for leads, right?
13:28
It's looking at what percentage of your business
13:30
is coming from a single source.
13:32
It's looking at what is the show rate?
13:34
Like if you're scheduling calls, meetings, appointments,
13:36
whatever, what's the show rate?
13:37
And can that be optimized or improved?
13:39
And then of course, what is the close rate?
13:41
So usually people focus on leads as like,
13:44
that's what I need.
13:45
But the highest return on your time and money and effort,
13:49
where is that really going to move the needle and grow sales?
13:53
And I would beg to argue that for most people,
13:55
it's increasing the show rate and the conversion rate
13:57
versus working the existing leads you have.
13:59
Not true for everybody, but take a look at your own business
14:01
and evaluate that for yourself.
14:05
But knowing your numbers, right, can't manage it.
14:09
Take a look at conversions, take a look at conversations
14:11
to apps, take a look at apps to contract,
14:14
contracts to funding, right?
14:15
Take a look at referrals to conversion,
14:17
take a look at who shows up for meetings and who doesn't, right?
14:20
Take a look at how much you get shopped.
14:23
Take a look at how many times you have,
14:26
I just earlier today, I was on a webinar
14:28
and one of the loan officers said is,
14:30
I'm tired of the realtor,
14:32
me pre-qualifying the deal with the realtor
14:36
and then realtor sending the loan over to Buddyboy,
14:39
other lender.
14:41
I'm like, well, whose problem is that?
14:45
Whose fault is that?
14:47
Is that your fault or their fault?
14:49
I'm gonna say that's your fault.
14:51
Why are they sending it to another lender?
14:53
There has to be a reason.
14:55
All behavior is goal oriented.
14:58
All behavior is goal oriented.
15:00
And that's just a lack of, I think, proper alignment
15:03
with values and expectations and partnership.
15:06
And that's also going back to, right,
15:08
something one of the earlier things we talked about here
15:11
is sources of business, right?
15:19
Single-channel risk.
15:21
So key man risk, key customer risk,
15:24
we talked about data risk
15:27
and we talked about, I believe we talked about
15:28
single-channel risk as well.
15:30
So hopefully that's helpful just some talking points
15:32
some things for you to think about as you go through
15:34
this into 2025 and planning out your strategies.
15:39
And I think the last thing I'll share with you is,
15:41
what we spent a lot of time in the first day
15:43
with the at the Atty Alhors Acclermose event on site
15:45
was identifying the key constraint
15:48
or constraints in our business, right?
15:50
Because one of the things that her mosey stressed was that
15:53
most business owners, most business owners work
15:56
on a lot of things in their business,
15:57
but most of them work on the wrong things.
15:59
Like not the actual thing that's going to move the needle, right?
16:02
The number one main primary key constraint.
16:04
What is it?
16:07
And you need to identify that.
16:10
And smart businesses, what they do is they invest repeatedly
16:16
build great businesses by allocating more resources
16:19
to solving the constraint over and over.
16:23
And by the way, you will only grow up to your constraint
16:27
and no further.
16:28
So that's why it's so important that you identify
16:30
what is the constraint?
16:32
And then you allocate the proper resources
16:33
to solving the constraint.
16:35
And then you do that over and over and over again.
16:36
So you have one constraint, you'll solve for that.
16:38
There'll be another constraint, right?
16:39
But you've got to choose those things
16:41
in order of priority and importance
16:42
of what is the most important constraint
16:44
that comes back to your business surviving, thriving,
16:49
and continuing to grow, okay?
16:52
So that said, hope you enjoyed this quick little episode
16:56
just between you and me.
16:57
And once again, if you,
16:59
one of your constraints is more referrals, right?
17:01
From real estate agents more consistently
17:03
without cold calling chasing, begging, you know,
17:05
paying for leads or being treated as a vendor
17:08
instead of a partner.
17:10
You wanna now not be seen as a solicitor?
17:11
Well, maybe leading with education,
17:15
attracting agents at scale,
17:16
becoming five mile famous in your backyard
17:18
might be a good strategy for you.
17:20
You've heard some of the success stories
17:21
here on the podcast.
17:23
You heard the one I just shared
17:24
at the start of today's podcast,
17:26
getting in front of 22 agents all at once
17:28
for appointment set with zero effort.
17:31
And that's just the beginning.
17:32
Hey, mortgagemarketing.pro.
17:33
We're looking for a few good loan officers.
17:35
If that's for you, go check it out.
17:36
We'll see you on the next one.
17:37
Bye for now.