Latest / Mortgage Marketing Radio / Turning Setbacks into Success [Voice Note]

Transcript

Turning Setbacks into Success [Voice Note] · Mortgage Marketing Radio

• 0:00
  Hey, my friend Jeff Zimfer. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Mortgage Market
• 0:15
  Radio podcast. Coming at you with another voice note. Here are Friday, January 24th, getting
• 0:21
  this out late on the weekend. It was a very busy Friday recording, actually hosting
• 0:26
  a coaching call, doing a live webinar, a sales call, preparing content and new classes
• 0:33
  for the members and major classes community. But what's been on my mind this weekend on
• 0:37
  today's calls is, you know, we just had an honest and frank conversation about the current
• 0:42
  state of the market. And I wanted to share with you some of the thoughts and frameworks
• 0:48
  that we had that will hopefully inspire you and perhaps guide you into the coming days
• 0:54
  and weeks of the beginning of this 2025 season. And so what I'm thinking about is how do
• 1:00
  we turn setbacks into success? So we're in a bit of a challenging market. We're in what
• 1:05
  I'm referring to as a transaction recession. Overall volume is down. There's some headwinds
• 1:11
  right in terms of interest rates and mindset around buyers around activity and engagement
• 1:17
  and different things like that. And we talk a lot about mindset in our community of mortgage
• 1:22
  professionals. And I was having a conversation the other day with somebody about the incredible
• 1:27
  story of, so Chiro Honda, hopefully I'm pronouncing that correctly, trying to do my best Japanese
• 1:32
  there. The founder of Honda. And simultaneously, I've been talking about these three frameworks
• 1:41
  in a transaction recession, right? What do we do? What do we do when there's going to be
• 1:46
  some lag time between our activities and the results that show up? And that's usually
• 1:50
  the case, right? There's there's lagging indicators and activities. So I'm thinking about
• 1:56
  what I call the three C's that's C as in connection conversions. I'm sorry, connections,
• 2:02
  conversations and conversions. So I talk about the three C's framework connections, conversations
• 2:08
  and conversions. And it's a road map, I think, for thriving in tough times. And I want
• 2:14
  to relate the story of, you know, so Chiro Honda, a man who turned failure into a billion
• 2:20
  dollar successory. If you're not familiar with the story of Mr. Honda, he faced multiple
• 2:27
  setbacks. I'm going to give you the short version of the story. But the bottom line is this
• 2:30
  is that Honda's first factory was destroyed in by bombing during World War II. And he decided
• 2:40
  to accept the circumstances, the situation. It is what it is, right? And he decided to rebuild
• 2:48
  his foundation. So what's the lesson? The lesson is, you know, Mr. Honda could have let
• 2:53
  external forces derail his plans, much like today's market forces, you know, high interest
• 2:59
  rates, negative narrative that's out there in the marketplace. Or right, you can take action,
• 3:05
  you can reframe that you can change the meaning of that. And you can actually prepare yourself
• 3:09
  to succeed and benefit. So if that wasn't enough of a setback for Mr. Honda, setback
• 3:16
  two came when a devastating earthquake flattened his second factory. So think about this, he builds
• 3:24
  up a factory, World War II bombing destroys it, he rebuilds, and then a devastating earthquake
• 3:29
  flattens and destroys his second factory. What's the lesson? Lesson is resilience, persistence.
• 3:38
  And that's of course the key to survival long term. Keep showing up, keep taking consistent
• 3:45
  action despite the chaos. The breakthrough came when Mr. Honda had an idea to create motorized
• 3:55
  bicycles to address post-war transportation needs. So think about that. He adapted and pivoted
• 4:05
  to the current market conditions was resourceful and solved the problem. And that problem was
• 4:12
  the transportation needs in a post-war situation that had all the challenges and issues you
• 4:20
  can imagine post-World War II with all the bombing. So solve real problems for people to
• 4:26
  create opportunities. Focus on what your clients and your partners need most right now. And
• 4:32
  our conversations today with my coaching community, my agent classes, there was a lot of discussion
• 4:36
  around how to help referral partners, real estate agents solve problems, how to show up and
• 4:41
  be of service to not be of sales. And so you've got to figure out what are the problems
• 4:47
  that your key agent referral partners are struggling with and what are the problems in mass
• 4:53
  in general that you can be known for in helping agents solve. Let's bring this back to the
• 5:00
  three C's. What do we do in these challenging times when there might be some devastation?
• 5:07
  There might be some headwinds, there might be some right difficulties in the current market.
• 5:12
  What do we do? Number one, the three C's, connections. Here's what Honda did. He partnered
• 5:17
  with others and he leveraged relationships to overcome resource gaps. Specifically, what
• 5:25
  he did was he sent letters to over 18,000 bicycle manufacturers, handwritten personal letters
• 5:39
  to 18,000 bicycle manufacturers. So here's the situation. The country is on its knees,
• 5:46
  post-World War II. And Mr. Honda needed investment to produce these new scooters as he
• 5:53
  called them. These motorized bicycles. And at that time, of course, World War II post investment
• 5:59
  was almost nonexistent. Again, though, Honda found a way. It may seem incredible, but here's
• 6:04
  what he did. It's estimated that he wrote an inspiring letter to 18,000 bicycle shop owners
• 6:11
  to ask for their support to rebuild the country and invest in his new invention. Yes, that's
• 6:17
  correct. Hand wrote 18,000 personal letters, email, internet, long way off. So when you have
• 6:27
  a strong enough reason, you'll find a why to make it happen. Here's where it gets interesting.
• 6:33
  3,000 bicycle shop owners responded to his letters and formed strategic alliances with Mr.
• 6:39
  Honda and helped him see how he could increase their bike sales. So basically, what he does,
• 6:45
  he's reached out to all these bicycle shop owners, right, makes a plea to them to help rebuild the
• 6:49
  country, right, needs to have an alliance, a collaboration, a partnership, 3,000 bicycle shop owners
• 6:54
  respond and they help together come together, leverage Honda's idea for motorized bicycle to see
• 7:03
  how they could increase their bike sales. So it goes without saying, he got more than enough
• 7:08
  of money he need to build his new scooters. So from these extremely challenging circumstances,
• 7:14
  Honda was able to become one of the most pioneering companies in the world and it's still the world's
• 7:19
  largest motorcycle maker. It employs over 200,000 people worldwide and has revenues of over 10
• 7:25
  billion a year. How was it made possible? Luck? No. Good situation, good fortune? No. It was made
• 7:34
  possible through one man's sheer determination in the face of almost unimaginable odds.
• 7:40
  Can you imagine what he must have gone through, sleeping in his small workshop with no money?
• 7:44
  He sold his wife's jewelry, right, or how about seeing his factories destroyed two times,
• 7:50
  even a third time. All in all, his journey to success took 17 years. We don't often hear about
• 7:59
  the journey. All we do is see the person standing on the pedestal, getting the metal, getting the trophies.
• 8:05
  But it's so crucial to understand. And why I love this story is because
• 8:11
  Sochiro Honda was just an ordinary man, but he had a dream and he never, ever, ever gave up.
• 8:19
  And I want to remember bringing that front and center back to you is what is your dream for this year?
• 8:23
  What is your vision for 2025? Do you have that clearly mapped out? Have you really made a personal
• 8:30
  connection to what your vision and plan is for 2025? And are you willing to go the extra mile,
• 8:37
  to create the connections, to find the partnerships and leverage relationships,
• 8:42
  to focus on being a problem solver, the network purposefully at events online, on social media,
• 8:49
  hosting events and classes. The reason why you want to focus on connections is to create conversations.
• 8:56
  That's what Mr. Honda did. He created conversations with those bicycle shop owners.
• 9:02
  He created new conversations about transportation needs with this product. Where can you create new
• 9:06
  conversations where you can help your referral partners, your clients solve problems,
• 9:10
  whether it's through seller buy downs, it's through some of your unique products,
• 9:14
  it's through some of the training and coaching and marketing and classes that you might offer
• 9:18
  to real estate agents. Initiate conversations around these areas by which you can help solve problems
• 9:26
  and offer solutions that address current challenges. Be willing to team up and be a real partner
• 9:31
  with your referral partners to help them solve problems. Lastly, final step,
• 9:37
  conversions. If you make enough connections, if you have enough of the right conversations,
• 9:42
  you will get the conversions just like Mr. Honda, 3,000 bicycle shop owners out of 18,000 handwritten
• 9:50
  letters. How many calls do you need to make? How many means do you need to have? How many events do
• 9:55
  you need to host? Track and follow up relentlessly. Every conversation can lead to a closed deal.
• 10:01
  You better be using a CRM, a database management system to be able to track conversations and follow
• 10:06
  up and schedule tasks and reminders for yourself. Leverage obviously, marketing automation, AI for
• 10:13
  your outreach, whatever it is that you can do. Remember, just like Honda, this is a season of
• 10:19
  testing. Persistence and creativity will pay off for you. I promise you. Focus on the 3Cs,
• 10:25
  connections, conversations and conversions. Turn challenges and opportunities.
• 10:31
  I'd love to hear more about how you're applying the 3Cs. If you're listening on Spotify,
• 10:37
  you can leave a comment there. If you want to follow me on Instagram, go over to Instagram,
• 10:40
  Jeff Zimper. Let me know that you heard this episode. I'd love to hear your feedback and thoughts.
• 10:45
  And what are the 3Cs that you're focusing on? How are you helping people solve problems?
• 10:50
  If you want to learn more about how we help agents solve problems by becoming a resource of
• 10:54
  content, inspiration, and education through my agent classes,
• 11:00
  click the link in the show notes to go learn more about my agent classes. See the success stories,
• 11:06
  how our loan officers are helping to drive the 3Cs, connections, conversations and conversions,
• 11:13
  that's helping them win in the current market. I appreciate you tuning in. We'll see you on the
• 11:18
  next one. Bye for now. Okay, that's it for today's episode. Before we wrap up, I just wanted to
• 11:24
  remind you about my agent classes. You're proven system to double your agent referrals in just 90 days.
• 11:30
  Imagine never having to co-call again instead building real lasting relationships with top
• 11:35
  producing agents who want to send you business. With done for you presentations, marketing automation,
• 11:41
  weekly coaching, it's all designed to make growing your business easier and fun.
• 11:46
  So if you're ready to take control of your agent referrals and grow your income,
• 11:49
  visit mortgagemarketing.pro or check the link in the show notes. And while you're there,
• 11:53
  don't forget to check out the success stories from other mortgage pros who've already seen
• 11:57
  incredible results. Thanks for listening and I'll see you on the next episode.