Welcome New Client Tom Nickley

John: How did you hear about us? 

Tom: I heard of you guys through many different channels actually. I had done a couple webinars with Jeff Manson. I did my first interview with him and Frank last July, and I did another one last month. I'm also part of Lars Hedenborg's coaching group, and he sings your praises all the time. We're pretty involved with different Mastermind groups and Facebook groups around the country, and everybody has great things to say about you guys.

John: So what motivated you to give us a call, or take a call from us? 

Tom: Emily's kind of been pressing me for months to do it. We've been building our business. We just got into real estate about 18 months ago, and I've seen a lot of early success. I like the fact that you guys focus on building the database and staying in contact with the database. I think the technologies that you guys use is something that we want to start early on, rather than be reactionary a few years down the road. We really want to start building that part of our business, because we know that there's a tremendous amount of opportunity with the past clients. We think you guys are absolute rockstars. We do a lot of research before we do something, and I can't see anything out there that comes close to what you guys do for database.


John: Summarize where you're at with your business. What are your goals moving forward? 

Tom: Been in the industry for 18 months. I started a team last September and did a total of 62 transactions last year. At this point, our business is moving along. We've got five buyer's agents. We're going to do 150 transactions this year, and we're shooting for 300 transactions next year. That was one of the reasons why we're joining with Vyral. I think that is the way for us to exponentially be able – you know we've got some lofty, aggressive goals for our business and I certainly think that Vyral will play a vital role in getting us to that 150 this year and 300 next year.

John: Do you know how many people are in your database?

Tom: Between past clients, Permissions Inc, and Real Geeks, I would guess about 2,500 at this point.

John: How many of those people would you say would be in your direct sphere? People that you know and know you. 

Tom: I would say that's probably on the smaller side at this point. I'd say about 100 to 150, only because we are so new in the industry. We haven't done a great job of building the database part of it. Basically, our past clients, people we've sold already, make up that group at this point.

John: Are you doing anything to market to the database, or any lead sources, right now? 

Tom: Yeah, absolutely. We actually have a raving fans club set up. Everybody in our database gets a monthly market snapshot through Top Producer. We do monthly mailers and direct mail 12 times a year. We also have this system where we send out surveys after closing. We send out letters throughout the year, and we're going to give out pies at Christmas. So yeah, we've got about 30 touches at this point. We're planning on getting that to 60 touches, and you guys are going to get us almost there with the bi-monthly video emails.

John: So far, how do your marketing efforts seem to be working for you? 

Tom: Well, it's actually pretty awesome. I can't say that it's a direct result of our marketing at this point, because we just literally in January put in the marketing for the past clients, but I think we are getting a fair amount of referral business at this point. I just think that Vyral will really help us start tapping into creating more of that as we go forward.

Emily: I think that the marketing is something that we've been a little bit lax on so far. Most of our feedback comes from the surveys and our referrals, which are great. We do have some things that are working with the marketing, but we haven't seen a lot of inbound coming from that yet, so we really need to step it up.

John: Any thought to send out videos and do email marketing yourselves? 

Emily: No!

Tom: Absolutely not. We're all about the delegation. I look at the decision to join Vyral as a no-brainer, because what you guys are going to do for $550 is like we have a full time marketing firm. We have a lot of great ideas, but we also know that we're not experts when it comes to doing the things that you guys do. So, even early in the game, I think it's a no-brainer to have you guys do it, rather than do this on our own.  We would just put it on the back burner. Even helping build up the Zillow reviews and past client reviews – that's something we planned on doing. As easy as that sounds, when you're busy building a business it's just something that continued to get pushed to the back burner. I think the marketing you guys do will send waves through what we already put in place.

John: What results are you expecting? What does success working with us look like to you? 

Tom: We pride ourselves on staying in touch with our leads and our clients more than anybody. We've got a pretty aggressive way of following up with leads. So, I think that success with you guys would be being able to keep up that personal contact with people, and getting people to essentially raise their hands by clicking the videos. I think it's a really high quality touch, and I'm extremely confident that we will have the systems in place to maximize on that. I don't expect a magic pill, but I do think that what you guys do, combined with our follow up systems, will create a strong presence and even more legitimacy. I think creating legitimacy is what you've got to do in real estate. I'm extremely confident that signing up with you guys is going to help us accomplish that.

John: Anybody besides Lars and Jeff that we need to thank for your business? 

Tom: Greg Harrelson screamed your praises. Really, anybody in Lars's group, anybody that is part of Vyral, screams your praises. Any time you guys come up on a Masterminds Facebook group, everybody says it's a no-brainer. I think you have done a good job servicing people across the board. It's astounding that people are 100% all in with what you guys do. I think you guys deserve that thanks for the business, because you've got a heck of a presence in the real estate industry.