When it’s busy, when you’re busy, when you’re overwhelmed, when you’re dealing with clients and you can’t even see straight – how do you organize your real estate lead generation so that it gets done even when you’re insanely busy?

How do you keep that momentum going so that you don’t suffer from or affected by the feast and famine mode, especially the famine mode.

So last week you guys asked me how I organize my contact creation, my lead generation so that I don’t get overwhelmed or get insane. That is what I am going to share with you today.

How to organize your lead generation, your real estate lead generation, especially the content piece of it, so that it gets done no matter what is going on in your life.

You should not be working 20 hours a day and only getting 4 hours a day, that should not be our lives.

We should not be on 7 days a week, we need to have a break, but often times what gets compromised when we take this break is our actual lead generation.

So today, we are going to walk through how I do it.

How I stay organized to keep that content creation going. You’ve seen me go live every week day in August and you’re seeing me live every day at 10 am.

• How am I doing it?
• How am getting this done?
• How am I coming up with the topics?
• How am I not overwhelmed?
• How am I enabling myself to actual get it done and not come up with excuses to not get it done?

Does that make sense?

Let me first tell you a little bit about today.

Strategies, tactics and tools

We are going to talk about strategies, tactics and tools.

Those are the 3 pieces we are going to talk about and this is all related to organizing your real estate lead generation, specifically the content.

For me, in my real estate business, in my Leads and Leverage business -my lead generation centers around my content.

What I mean by my content is the questions I can answer. That was the same thing when I was in real estate, same thing as a team leader, same thing in sales, as a broker, same thing here in Leads and Leverage and it’s going to be the same for our Cork Trek wine business.

It’s all about helping people solve a problem, that means that everything I am doing is helping people see their next step and helping along in their journey and I have talked about that a lot.

Strategies, tactics and tools those are the 3 things…..

Strategies

First of all, when it comes to strategies all of everything I do, lead generation whether email, snail mail, Facebook post, open houses, phone calls etc. those all revolve around content.

I need to know what I am going to say, what I am going to do, how I am going to act, etc. This does not involve memorizing scripts at all.

This is not about script objectives, this is about helping, giving and serving. When you help people, you become conjoined with them, you become entwined with them when you’re helping them because you’re helping them on a mutual journey which is about them and that’s what this all is.

So when it comes to content creation the content you’re creating is the stuff that’s going to go into your emails, into your blog post, into your snail mail.

It’s going to go into your newsletters if you do newsletters.

It’s going to be apart of your phone calls.

It’s going to be a part of your open houses, a part of your door knocking.

It is apart of everything.

Instead of going out and trying to pitch your services, how about you go out and serve, actually serve.

Here is what you want to do.

You need to know what do your prospects, your clients, what do they need? 

Here is what I mean by that. You need to always be on the watch. So this is what I would do. I would watch for questions I got directly from people while talking face to face, if someone is actually emailing me questions, especially in real estate, because they often email.

Yes, sometimes it’s what’s the price, what’s this, what’s that etc. What is the underlying question in “What’s the price?”

They want to know if they can afford it.
They want to know how they can afford it.

There are a whole lot of questions in there, just look beyond. But I look for questions whether I get them directly, via email, via text, or in person or I overhear.

I don’t know about you but if I work in a coffee shop or I am in line at the grocery store, I swear when I hear the words “selling a house, buying a house, real estate, etc.”

My radar goes crazy. I’m listening, but I don’t look like I am, but I so am.

You don’t have to interrupt their conversation. What I want you to do with this when you overhear that, start taking notes, use your phone and record the questions, write it down.

If it triggers something write it down, “Why are they listening to their neighbor when they need to talk to a Realtor?” “Why are they on Zillow?” all sorts of things.

I am always looking out for questions, whether they are directly or something I overhear, I am looking for questions in Facebook groups, local and different groups etc.

When you see or hear a question, how can you solve it?

You need to figure out how to solve it, and sometimes answering it directly isn’t what the consumer wants, they want you to answer it indirectly as well.

So what I mean by that is you need to solve it so that, for example:

You guys wanted to know what are things you could do to get more leads then I moved into how I organize myself, how I do this. I am going to be doing a lot of videos for you from that one question.

So when someone says, “I don’t know how I can afford XYZ” what are somethings you can do? Could you actually introduce them to Dave Ramsey or whichever financial person you follow?

Could you introduce them?
Could you teach them how to budget?
Could you give them resources?
If they need to repair their credit, can you give them resources to help them with that?

All of this stuff.

I have trained my brain to always be searching out questions, thoughts, statements, ideas that I can use for content, things that trigger responses from me, things that drive a passion in me.

I want to be able to help in areas that I feel are important that you need help with. It’s the same way as it was in real estate with things that are important.

I didn’t want to give the same answers in the same way, that everyone else was giving or give the same information that Associated Press was giving or that they find on Zillow or Forbes or whatever else boring crap that no one actually listens to.

They just repeat verbatim and hello have you actually listened to that advice? You need to actually need to give them something real, give them something real and help them.

You need to train the brain to actually see the content everywhere to what is going on. 

Here is a simple thing in your own home. It’s coming upon fall, fall is coming and there is a lot of stuff people need to know or could do to prep their home for the upcoming winter.

You should start thinking about that now and that is a journey piece you can help them with.

• Is it about the trees?
• Do they even know who they could call about the trees?
• Do they know what to do if they have to fertilize their lawn?
• Can you find them a YouTube video?

Literally take them to point where you feel like they know nothing and give them the resources.

This is huge. Bring in people, talk to your local nursery and do a video interview of what can they do right now.  What are the top 3 things people can do to ready their yards for winter? You need to train your mind to always be searching for things, content people can use.

You have to train your brain to always see all of this content everywhere. 

Tactics and Tools

The next thing we need to talk about; I was going to talk about tactic than tools but I realized in the tactics I talk the tools so we are going to do tactic and tools together.

Alright the very first thing I use and I think it is the absolute best software, app, whatever you want to call it, however there is a piece to this you need to know.

I think it is the best one on the planet for this kind of thing.  

It is called Evernote and I know some of y’all are like I can just use Google Docs but here’s the thing with Evernote.

I can use it on my desktop. I can use the same app on my Laptop. I can use the same exact app on my iPhone. I can use the same exact app on my iPad.

I realize so far it’s like Google Docs and can do the same thing. I can use the same exact app on my Apple watch too.

Now, let me tell you something about this. With Evernote, every piece of it is searchable.

I know Google Docs is too, however when you’re out on the web or you’re watching something or you’re reading something you can get plugins from Evernote to save the entire thing to your Evernote.

You can do all sorts of things you cannot do in Google Docs for this piece. It’s great for gathering research and it’s easier than Google Docs.

There are many different ways to use Evernote. You grab whole pages, snippets all real easily.

Like I said, there are a million and one ways you can leverage it. I use the Snippet tool on Chrome. I have it on my desktop, laptop, iPhone, iPad and watch.

Here is where I find it very, very, very, very handy as a real estate agent and I am betting you will too.

Before I would use my phone and make sure the Evernote app was on there and I would say, “Hey Siri open Evernote” and I would use the record option. I would have it record it for me and I didn’t have to touch anything. Now I can do that from my watch. Love that! Boom, boom and I am done!

If I am driving along and I have a thought or I see a sign or something triggers an idea or a content piece, I can record it into my Evernote and I love that. So when I am driving and I think of something or I am out I use Evernote from my watch or my phone to record it and talk to it.

I am constantly throwing ideas into “notebooks” in Evernote so I will grab entire articles to read or if I see a headline, then I will put my own notes as to why or how it inspired me because that is the piece I want to write about, what it did to me or whether I agree or disagree.

If I feel there much more to it then what the article writer shared or they didn’t go enough into this or if it’s another one that says use a Realtor, how lame and stupid is that, I would actually write about that stuff.

You need to share. You need to be out there and you need to basically tell them the truth instead of just trying to get the sale. 

When I watch videos especially on YouTube, I am always throwing links and notes about the video and links to the videos into Evernote. It’s like my gathering place for everything.

Then what I do once a month. I go through my Evernote, my big compilation of stuff  and I pull exact thoughts that would be good for articles, emails, snail mail, whatever.

I will pull that and put it into Google Drive as a spreadsheet. On that spreadsheet, I put that sentence or headline in there as well as 3 to 4 bullet points about that content.

What about this do I agree or disagree with?
What about this do I think they need more of?

So once a month, or you can do once a week, go through and you can pull questions and 3 -4 bullet points with it.

I make sure I have at least 20-30 different topics or questions in there each time I do it. What I find when I pull a topic, often the topic is bigger than an 10 – 15 minute training, video or email, so I end up splitting it up. This video is an example, okay?

The other day in “How to Keep Your Facebook Page Happy and Active while Running Your Real Estate Business at the Same Time” I walked you through and you asked me more questions about that topic and one of those questions was, “How do I organize it all and make it happen?”

Thus today’s video talking about organizing. Another question you asked me about was batching so I will be doing a video on that, another question was time blocking, we’re going to be doing a video on that, so I’m going to be walking you through every single one of these.  

That is the same thing that is going to happen to you.

You’re going to see a topic and realize I actually need to go deeper into this piece. You can do a overview then go into the piece so that is going to happen with question.

If someone ask, “How do I know if I qualify?” and your answer is “I don’t know. Go talk to a lender.” That doesn’t help anybody. They already know that is an option but they haven’t done it for whatever reason. Why?

Because they don’t want to waste the lender’s time or they don’t think they’ll qualify or they don’t want to be embarrassed.

Why not give them key things that will help them?

One thing I noticed which is super interesting.

I was watching a video on YouTube. I am fascinated with people who sell everything and buy a boat and live on the boat and travel the world. Now, we’re not going to do that, not interested in doing, but I am very fascinated.

We’ve already done our RV travel, so I am done with that but I am fascinated by why they choose to do it, the work involved, etc. so I was watching a channel last night, watching one person’s video and it was called “What You Should Know About Boat Loans” and I am like I will never need a boat loan, but this video was really great. He was explaining insider stuff, he was explaining the difference in loans,etc. Not the verbatim crap we usually hear about loans. It was really interesting and I could relate.

This video was triggering thoughts about real estate and I was like if people talked about the little nuances and actually taught them why if you’re going to apply for a mortgage why not apply for this credit or this credit or whatever, not just tell them but show them. It was really great how he did that. I thought this is great, this is a really good video.

When I am organizing myself and my questions and my bullet points in the spreadsheet, this help me see at a glance how much content I have and they give me options each day just incase on a particular day I am not feeling a certain topic, I’ve got twenty to choose from.

You know me and my soap boxes, when I am really passionate about something or it’s got me, that’s the topic I want to talk about that day. It’s usually because one of you guys have either said something or come to me and asked a question or I see you struggling with it in other groups so that is why I love having that spreadsheet.

Not only that, it’s just like, I know you’ve heard the phrase “That if you really want to exercise in the morning, you need to make sure you set yourself up for success.”  You create your environment, right? So when you create that environment, your gym clothes are there, your shoes are there, your water bottle is there, basically you don’t give yourself an excuse to go back to sleep.

It’s all there, you don’t have to go gather anything, it’s there for you. It’s the same thing here, and I will go into detail on this the batching video I will teach you. 

Set Yourself Up For Success

Here’s the thing, you need to set yourself up for success. You need have a variety of options and answers for you.

Evernote. Google Docs. Google Spreadsheets, specifically. It’s free and it’s easily accessible.

You can always use IFTT and connect your Evernote to your Google Spreadsheets which is kind of cool.

The third thing I use is Google Calendar. I use Google Calendar and the dreaded phrase here, time blocking. I time block. Once a week I have 1 hour a week scheduled for my content  batching.

What do I mean by that? I schedule every single Friday after my live ends that I do with you guys. I schedule for one hour to plan out for the next week so I know exactly what I am going to say Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I plan it out, I pick my topics from the spreadsheet so the work is already done. I just pick it out.

When I talk to you about the process I go through to create my content, to organize, batching and the checklist, the process I go through to repurpose content – I am going to talk through some of the checklist I have created myself that help me know the pieces.

I actually have this on my live stream checklist that I go through so I know all the pieces are getting done, all the pieces I need to do, that all the pieces are all there so when I sit down to actually batch at the end of the week, and I am batching next week stuff.  My content’s already done. I am just picking the 5 things I am going to talk about next week, that’s it.

That’s what makes it so easy. You have everything in Evernote and it’s going, all your content, you have your spreadsheet going and you’ve been putting your bullet points down so you already know what you kinda want to say.

Then you have your calendar and you time block.

So I outline my topics for the following week and I do live streams every weekday, that’s right now in August.

I may keep going because this is really fun! If I have more time in that hour, I keep moving ahead, at least laying out the topics for the next week. I time block my content creation after my 10 am live with you guys, it’s time blocked on my calendar.

I even have the pre-live stuff blocked so I know, I need 30 minutes to put together, to make sure my outline is correct, make sure all is in place, and it’s ready to go. I just need 30 minutes to get my head into the space with you guys.

I time block my content re-purposing. In other words, I time block and I stick to it. I know without a doubt the number one thing I need to do every single day. If all else fails, I need to be on here with you at 10:00 am, Monday through Friday. That’s what I know because that is my domino for all the rest of my business day, all the rest.

The courses I create inside Leads and Leverage, all the stuff, this is my domino. I know that I made it that way.

I will do a video on re-purposing, on how to re-purpose your content because if you do a video for Facebook you should be able to that on YouTube, in your email. You can use it in a blog post, in a snail mail or newsletter.

In other words, you are creating something once and using it multiple times and I will walk you through that in the next few videos.

I want to make sure I covered everything.

Again, if you’re on YouTube or IGTV, I will put the link inside the description for you, so that you come over to the original video and get these resources.