Guys, this is my first time doing this, so we’ll see how it go. I’ve never had a. On the show at the same time before. So again, we’ll see how it goes. Eric Simon is the founder and CEO of the broker agent, LLC, a comedic media brand focused on the entertainment of real estate professionals. You probably know him simply as the broker agent on Instagram and other social media platforms.
We also have with us, Matt Lionetti, who is a real estate agent and content creator from Toronto. Shout out Canada. Matt has built his business on social media by utilizing humor into his marketing as well. He believes showcasing his personality is the best way to connect with potential clients. Matt’s approach is unconventional to say the least together.
They host the over asked podcast, described as real estate agents with mild social media fame who pick the brains of industry giants. Guys. It’s a pleasure. Welcome to the run GPG podcast. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you. So I never, I never know how to start it off, you know, but I think we could change mild social media fame.
Social media fame now, right bank? No. Yeah. Well, you’re a three over 300,000 followers. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. Oh, you’re over 300 K now. Yes, I didn’t do a self-congratulatory post. No. Oh, we don’t. We don’t believe in getting balloons and, and you know, every thousand we don’t celebrate milestones like that.
Well also, Eric, I don’t know if you know this, but you’re now officially two time guest alumni. And you share that with Ryan and James Harris. You’re in good company. That’s great company. Thank you. I appreciate the invite back and I know you guys are naturally competitive. So what does it mean to have that distinction overlap?
I mean, it’s great. It’s great to, you know, be the catalyst that brought Matt in here. It’s great that, you know, Matt is a part of my podcast and now he’s a part of the show too. So, you know, me helping him along the way with his career is probably one of my greatest honors. I wasn’t aware of that statistic.
I’m pretty upset now, too. Yeah. Very few on that list. Ryan Serhant James Harris, Eric Simon. So well done earlier, not wearing they’re merged instead of our March. I know. Well, I had to do a, I just got this one in the mail actually, so thought I’d give it a shot. It actually brings up a good question. How did you guys connect and how would you describe your partnership?
Is it a partnership. More of a boss employee type relationship, but no, it’s a partnership. We connected. I just started sending him stuff. Like I think a lot of people do, I did your agent spotlight and I think that’s where we kind of hit it off. Yeah, I had a, I wouldn’t call it a program, but I had, I had people submit content.
And then once a week on Wednesdays, I would promote agents that were posting funny marketing videos. Matt had a bunch of funny skits, so he signed up for one of the agents spotlights and the engagement that those got on my story. And then also my feed were incredible. So people loved him. And then they also saw on his profile that his content was aligned with mine because he was posting hilarious stuff.
So we just kind of kept in contact after that. And so to start the podcast. Cool. You know, I think, well, both of you guys are a good example of how you can grow a brand with humor and Eric, in my opinion, you know, Kind of credit you with starting that movement, that humor and real estate kind of a niche there, but have you thought about the role you’ve played in inspiring agents that aren’t funny to create cringy content?
Have you thought about that to create cringe content? I mean, I that’s so true. I talk about this all the time and I’ll let you get to your question was directed at you. I’ll let you get to your shtick in a second area where you say you’re the greatest and you completely, you know, sound. It sounded me, like you’re saying universal music.
Okay. I always say this, that Jimmy Ivy knows real estate. It’s a bow. People think now you kind of like, there’s a lot more people doing funny content and like quotes funny. Like it’s, they’re trying to kind of find their lane. I think what both of us have been kind of saying from the start is like, you don’t have to be funny.
You have to be what you have to do, whatever works for you. So like, there is a lot of people trying to be funny and it just turns out to be cringey because I believe that like a humor skit, if you’re not a hundred percent dedicated to that scale, It’s going to come across as uncomfortable for you and the viewer.
Yeah. So I think I’d agree with that. Like, you know, always, you know, like what’s worse, like being cringy or not creating content at all. And it’s a good question, you know, like you guys do a good job of shouting out the good content. I’ve heard you guys do that, you know, and you reshare, you know, really good submissions, but like what is worse cringey content or not posting it all.
I dunno, probably not posting it all cringey content. At least if you’re a realtor, you’re getting your name out there. And there’s so many people that like cringey content, especially in the real estate space. If you look on real estate, Facebook pages, most of the content there, and most of the listing videos are kind of crunch, but people get a kick out of that, even if it’s just like under the guise of humor, if it’s clearly a joke.
Isn’t funny, but people know it’s a joke. They still share it because it’s something different than the traditional, like stale listing video. So I think anyone that’s still trying to be funny, even if they’re not funny, the attempt is appreciated and I think not appreciated towards me. I just mean like, I think the audience appreciates it and you know, anything that’s out of the norm, I guess for real estate is probably a net net pause.
I cut you off. How do you feel about being the founder of funny, real? I don’t know if I am, but I mean, it’s, it’s been great to see over the last five years, kind of the switch in marketing from the sales guru, entrepreneur hustle life, Gary V style content. I think calling that out at the very beginning and noticing that that was the least relatable.
To see on social media. I think seeing that evolve has been awesome and I’ve noticed it just because, you know, Matt has sent it to me and you know, this guy, Derek, Gregory’s agent in Florida who posts funny content. There’s so many agents out there now that are realizing that humor and marketing is the best way to go viral, the best way to get engagement, the best way to get shares.
So I’m happy with it. It’s great. And it’s great for me because I get more. So, you know, my goal is to lift up other agents also and help, help grow their following because it gets content from my page and then it increases their business as well. So, Yeah, a hundred percent. You do that too. So shout out to you guys for that.
And I’ve set this post about us. Yeah. Shout out you guys, I’ve said this before. I think one of the reasons why you guys resonate so much with, you know, the boots on the ground agents is that you’re able to articulate exactly what the everyday agent is thinking and feeling as the experience, you know, their day to day wins and losses as an agent, right?
So in a lot of your posts, you’re saying exactly what they wish they could say to some of their clients and colleagues. Would you agree with that? Yeah, that’s kinda what I totally confirmed. That’s showing comparatively kind of what I I’m try and do with a lot of my stuff, because I think like funny, cause it’s true, humor is some of the funniest kinds of humor.
So I like to do that a lot. And like there’s so much that we go through that is just like, it’s almost unbelievable. Some of the stuff real estate agents do and, and it’s on such a broad scale. It’s crazy to think. How relatable the industry is all over the world. Like there’s things that just don’t change all over the world.
And I think that’s why it kind of resonates so well because there’s a lot of things. I mean, totally when we’re doing content, like I message Erica. Because he’s in the states and I’ll be like, Hey, do you know this reference? Like, do you get, because I want to make it relatable to everybody. So I’ll always message and be like, Hey man, do you know the Teletubbies?
I have like, of course I know that Telecare, gypsy LA. It’s lined up right behind me. I always have like references and then like there’s some times where he’s like, no, I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. And then I know, okay, that’s, that’s going to go over people’s head, but it’s cool to see how, how similar it is all over the world.
Yeah, sales is sales, right. Dealing with people and personality types and all that type of stuff. Communication it’s universal. So let’s move to talking about, you know, growing a brand and your content specifically, like how did you grow your individual brands? Like what tactics did you use to grow and scale in the beginning specifically?
Eric. This is your bread and butter right here. He’s he’s yeah, I’m just giving you the opportunity to go first, but I’ll lead it off. Well, Instagram back in 2015 was way different than it is now. So a lot of my. Like growth tactics. We’re following unfollowing, liking a bunch of photos going through the popular, like realtor hashtags, and basically doing anything I could to get my name out there.
So I’d gotten real estate, Facebook groups and post all my memes. So basically any way I could get my name across the broker agent, I would do I’d go on every single podcast, networking events, anything possible, and that it was really effective because the broker agent was a powerful name. So I think having a name definitely helps like.
You know, you don’t want to just have like a generic name, like Stanley San Diego realtor or something, but having a name that sticks out is really good for branding and then having universal branding across all platforms. So I was lucky enough to get it on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tech-Talk YouTube, and have like universal logo and just be posting everywhere basically.
So yeah, that’d be the beginning. Tactics were way different than they are now. Now I’m commenting on a bunch of Instagram posts. Using hashtags, I’m posting three or four times a day. I’m posting eight to 10 Instagram stories. I don’t really know where to start with the tactics. I don’t want to go on like a 20 minute monologue with it, but I think at the beginning it was just getting the name out there and posting way edgier humor than almost I am now, because I just wanted to get noticed that.
And I think that was really important for starting the brand is you got to have pieces of content that go viral or, pieces of content that catch people’s attention and that’s different from what everybody else is doing. Yeah, that makes sense. Matt, you grew up following pretty quick. I believe on social media.
Yeah. Yeah. Pretty quick. Eric always says it’s it’s he always said, you know, no thanks. Yeah, no, of course he, he definitely helped with. Process of growing the following, but, and I have people who kind of call me out, just, I don’t know if you know, Brendan Shaw he’s like Joe Rogan’s best friend. He kind of got his start because of Joe Rogan.
So Eric’s Joe Rogan is what I’m saying. No, so, but I always just say, you know, like, he definitely got my content spread to a lot more people and I got way more eyes on it, but. The content still has to be good and what people want to see to get the follow and stuff like that. So it’s been good teamwork.
And, yeah, it grew pretty fast. I started doing the videos about a year and a half ago and that’s been really good. Like it, of course it’s not just me. Like his content is hilarious and he’s been really good at adapting to how these social media platforms evolve. So he was just doing kind of, I don’t know if it was horizontal video, but it was kind of lower quality.
Like skits and music videos. And now, because the reels are the most popular thing he’s doing reels and those are absolutely crushing. And he’s following the trends of what’s going on in social media. So when you’re building a brand, you have to go where the puck is moving also. Right? So for me, starting Instagram in 2014 or 15 with the broker agent, that was kind of like the newer platform, like the tech talk of today.
But you got to do that. You have to learn it. And I know a lot of realtors are reluctant from. Or reluctant to adopt these new platforms because it’s a lot to take on to be like, I don’t want to learn Tik TOK and vertical video. I don’t want to run Snapchat when that came out. I don’t want to do podcasting, but in order to get your name out there and expand your brand, you really have to.
Yeah. So that’s been done a good job at that. His content speaks for itself. If I didn’t exist, he’d be crushing. Yeah. Thanks. I appreciate it. Not I, well, also I think it’s important to note a lot of people. Yeah. Caught up with followers, which I am too, but it’s way more important for, to have engaged. With whatever amount of falling you have, like even Eric, he’s got over 300,000 followers, but his engagement is insane.
Like there’s some pages have millions of followers and they get, it’s not necessarily a fake following. They’re just not engaged with their content at all. They followed way back when, like, when Eric started his page, it was way easier to get a follow up, I guess, with, with hashtags and stuff, but to be able to maintain.
That audience and actually have them engage still. Like most people, I feel like when they drew their pages way back when I always say people, I feel like they just forgot that they followed the page and they don’t even know they’re following it anymore. So I think that’s what Eric did such a good job of is he has that unreal engagement some days worse than others.
Yeah, of course. And those are the words, the algorithms, the algorithms, but also to go back on your original question, David, about Brandon. The consistency of posting for me has been something I’m actually proud of. And I rarely say that about myself, but I mean, for six years I’ve been posting every single day.
You know, sometimes we’ll take off the Sunday cause I’m too hung over to think of something to post. But other than that, it’s like two or three times a day on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Instagram stories, like it, it’s got to keep going. So, you know, from a branding perspective, even if you’re not getting that engagement or that reach in the first couple weeks, I mean, it’s a long process.
Like this has taken a long process, long time. How do you gauge in, you know, or how do you measure engagement? Right. So typically it is, you know, comments and I’ve heard you guys talk about that, you know, Get it, you know, you guys are good at engaging with your, your audience in, in comments, but, do, are all comments good for the brand?
Like, for example, like, do you guys get hateful comments and how do you deal with those, you know, like a comedian with hecklers? Like how do you deal with negativity? Depends. Sometimes I call them out, which is probably the worst thing you can do is cause that’s what they want. But I feel like if they set me up properly, I’ll light them up to the point where they all delete their entire thread of comments.
And that’s what I love. If I can just, you know, you don’t want to go toe to toe with me. I’ll, you know, I’ll just delete your post. I’ll delete the whole post. So, it depends what the comment, like if the comment is like, crude or offensive. I just delete it, but like it’s not ever going to stop me from posting.
And I don’t think it should for anyone because I don’t know anyone, any extremely successful person who’s commenting negatively on someone’s Instagram page. No, or worse than comments. Almost not getting engagement is almost worse than at least. Saying something rude because then you can clap back. And that’s another way that people could, like your brand is by you actually like saying something funny back or, but yeah, sometimes you don’t want to draw attention to it, but I don’t know.
Negative comments. Yeah. And bad publicity is better than no publicity. That’s right. I feel like there’s like a, a couple of different philosophies. Some ignore it, some love it, you know, engage with the haters and keep going, you know, conversation going. But I find it funny what people get offended at these days.
And have they take so much time to like go there and fill out a comment about, you know, I dunno your mustache. You’re like, you know, like, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s shocking to me. And did you have any content recently that’s gone viral or controversial, you know, what’s been a successful from that standpoint recently.
I know, Matt, you know, your Drake real was pretty. Yeah, I got a lot of shares and tension, right? Yeah. For me it was the Drake and it wasn’t neither were controversial, but I would say Drake and the M and M station. Real kind of blew up and that was this all nice stuff. People really got behind me on those ones.
And that’s another thing, like I think, we don’t get as much hate as I think some people would think we get, most people who follow us and support us are really nice people. It seems like sometimes, sometimes the only hate is like, I, I will be mean to people in the comments and like I put on kind of an image of not necessarily being, but just like being.
Kind of like a cynical, sarcastic person. So I think a lot of people, I wouldn’t say aloof at all, actually. Let’s go with a little, yeah, sure. So I think some people try to replicate that voice in the comments to me, or it’ll say like funny stuff to me in the DMS, but also when I promote, whether it’s like a template platform or the podcast or merchandise.
There’s always going to be people that are saying like, oh, you sold out now or, oh, you, you know, why are you promoting stuff where you’re trying to sell stuff to us, even though it’s stuff that’s like completely on brand and, you know, partnerships that will actually help real estate agents. But I think anytime you start to monetize or you start to actually, you know, Someone like an action to swipe up.
Then sometimes people get a little upset about that, but what are you gonna do? Yeah, it’s, it’s a, it’s a free app guys. Yeah, you can unfollow. It’s free. We posted so much free content, so much funny free content, like every now and then you could just, you know, buy a hat or something, right. Yeah, I’m sure it’s now keep the lights on.
Yeah.
No, I didn’t want to focus on negativity necessarily. I was just curious about it because, you guys got the love, you guys, you know, people love your content. And then every once in a while you get that, that negative comment, people are always asking, how do you deal with that? But, you know, there is these new platforms, right?
Like ways of sharing live content, you know, we’ve got clubhouse, you know, the IgE lives, Spotify green room. Live content seems to be king right now. Like what are your thoughts on that? I’ve heard Eric say that like specifically that you do them, but you feel like you’re too self-important when you do them.
So what are your thoughts on the live content? I think there are benefits. Like w whenever I would do it, I used to do a couple, every couple of weeks I G lives and they were cool. What I would do is I would just like, get on and be okay, who wants to chat type deal. So I wasn’t just talking about myself the whole time.
So just get on and like, just bring up whoever wanted to talk. And we’d just talk for like five, 10 minutes and people seem to like it and engaged. You got me followers. Rose questions. A couple of leads came out of it. I think it’s good. I think it’s really cool to pair the live with like a podcast, but if I’m on Instagram live, I feel, I do feel like I I’m trying to be self-important and I do feel like why the hell would people want to know what I have to say?
Where am I going to just start making real estate jokes or something, but it is important. It’s a really important skill to learn. And we were doing it in clubhouse. I like the audio version because it was. Less pressurized. There’s other people in the room. It sucks because you can’t see people’s reaction, but I think that’s sort of like live podcast conversation.
Style is great, but it lives as far as growing your account and getting people to know you is extremely beneficial. It pushes your content to the top of their page. If people interact with your IgG lives, they’re more likely to interact with your content. So overall it’s great. And people that could pull it up.
More power to them. And I would like to start doing it. I think now that there’s IgE live, where you could have multiple people on, we are going to start doing stuff like that. And I think that just makes it more fun. So it’s not just like you having a conversation with your followers. Yeah, it’s a good point.
I started doing it more on the, the corporate feed and, and to your point, you know, it, you know, as a lighting rate, as a camera angle, good, you know, what do I look like? You know, you start thinking about that stuff. And then I realized people don’t really look at that stuff. They’re kind of just tuning in because it’s, it’s different.
And I feel like. You know, especially with the, you know, live video, you gotta be engaging right away. Otherwise people just leave, you know? But I started doing it on a corporate feed. It made a big difference and I found out like the more you do it, the more comfortable you get with it, you don’t really care what you look like.
I think self-awareness was the word I was looking for. Not self-consciousness but we can cut back in here. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We’re back. But, but I also think having sort of some sort of activity that you’re doing during a live, like for realtors, if you’re showing an open house or a property or describing something, and there’s an actual point extremely effective, and then it’s also visual.
But if it’s some guy just sitting on his bed and you know, like someone who creates beams like me or something, and I’m just reading. You know, comments and it’s just like, why I’m not like a hot girl. Like he wants to see me do that. You know, I got to set up. Gotta set arms on you though. Yeah, I got, I got biceps, but yeah, that’s a Python’s rockets, guns.
I thought you guys were doing good with clubhouse.
As soon as like we saw less people, we are less interested. We had a couple of really good rooms. The first couple of weeks I’d say we started and we were on, it probably saw two or three weeks. We’re on it. Like a lot going hard. We did. Tom ferry. We did some other cool rooms and we put on some of our own rooms.
Some were good. Some were not built our followings a lot in that two to three week time period. And then, I don’t know, we just kind of saw a drop-off as things started opening up and we just, haven’t been all hop on every, maybe couple of weeks just to see if there’s any kind of rebirth. But, I don’t know.
I, you know, there’s still value there to be had of course. But we found after a while, it was a lot of the same people who just wanted to get up to talk. And they really had no business talking, talking about, you know, social media strategies and they have 197 followers. It’s like, you know, whatever. Yeah.
That’s a good point. Okay. Here’s a question. What advice would you give an everyday agent that wants to create a specific following a group or a personal brand? Because it’s going to sound so cliche, but having some sort of niche, you know, if you’re a real estate. You need to dig into your personality and whatever you’re good at.
So if you’re good at video or you’re good at creating graphics or you like baseball or something like that, like also connect yourself with people that have similar interests to you. So just being Joe Schmoe agent, that’s posting this. Type of content that everybody else is posting. Isn’t going to do it.
I mean, it’s so oversaturated. We love saying that word right map. We should actually have a shirt that just says oversights or saturated over asking oversaturated or saturated. So yeah, just, you know, showing your interest and showing what you like to talk about. I think that’s what connects people because.
The, the first move that people do not, when they’re looking for a realtor is, you know, you look at their Zillow reviews, you look at their website and then when you’re Googling and you also look at their Instagram, you look at their social media and if you’re between two or three agents and you go on their Instagram and you’re like, oh, this guy’s, that connects fan on the connects fan.
I want to work with this. It’s a little hockey reference for the next hour. Thanks. You’ve had two hockey references on this so far to where the puck is going. I noticed that and I didn’t mention it just said the Canucks. I adapt to situation. That’s what I do. That’s he’s a chameleon chameleon. Exactly.
But it’s so true though. Shirt showing confirm shirt. As soon as I niche down on my marketing, my business definitely got broader because you just like Eric was saying you attract like-minded people and you kind of, you don’t have to do all that. Like my first couple of years in real estate, I was running and chasing people who are never going to work with me in the first place.
I think another thing to know for agents is you don’t have to be. Prim and proper, I watched so many agents like, Hey, like my incredible clients. I love you guys. So it’s like off with that. No, you’re not actually like that. I know what you’re actually like, I’m not saying you have to go swear and do all this.
Like, do what’s you, but like, It’s just like there’s. So I just watched some agents. I’m like, you’re so lame, you know? It’s like, you don’t have to be so lame about things. You can just be real every time you hop on their Instagram. Sorry. I was just hopping on here real quick guys. What’s up, got a busy day.
Gonna do 15 showings and got 17 listing appointments. 15 listing appointments. Yeah, they, oh, and they always enhance what they’re doing. We’re seeing their schedule. Why would you even post that be a little more real? I think people more than ever can see through your book now. Yeah. Agents become like actors and actresses of agents.
They portray characters that they think they should be on social media. And I mean, that’s how I. At the beginning too. It’s a real estate agent. I never did it on social media. Cause I was like, I’m not showing any of this. I’m not even, I don’t go on people know I’m sitting in open house. Don’t come say hi, don’t come near me.
I don’t mind. I don’t want to interact with, so I think a lot of agents that when they get into business, they see other agents on social media that are successful that do actually have those sales. And they’re like, well, I gotta emulate this somehow. So I’m just going to be. You know that person and a shell of myself basically.
And then eventually they just kind of wiggle out of it and they’re like, all right, well, that didn’t work because that attracted no. Exactly. That’s what happened to me. I always say this too. I got into real estate because I thought I had a good personality. And as soon as I got in, ironically, I lost all my personality because I was trying to be someone else who was successful and it didn’t work for me.
And people saw through it and I got nothing like nothing happened. I couldn’t couldn’t understand why, you know, I’m doing this exact same thing as this guy. He’s making millions. Why aren’t, why aren’t I getting even two listings? Because I could see and listen, authenticity matters and people will always call you on your right.
And I think, you know, you’re making a good point. Anything overly polished people don’t resonate with that, you know? Cause people aren’t overly polished in their everyday life anyway. Right. So. No. All good advice. All good advice. So I want to talk about your real estate business specifically. Like I never asked this question to you, Eric, how did you get into real estate?
Go grab a coffee, go to the bathroom. No, but I don’t want to get into too many details about your business, but I never really asked how you got into the business and then I’m going to follow it up with you, Matt, how you actually got into the business. So I worked at the laugh factory comedy club right after college and I was doing social media for them and then quit after.
And then basically I was just making vines, which is that six second video app, you know, kind of pre tick-tock had no niche or anything. I was just trying to make it on vine. I had like four followers. So it was, yeah, I wish I could go back to vine days and do that consistently and then became like a Logan Paul YouTuber or something like that.
Yeah, I think I really could have I miss vine. I actually miss fine, great. Six. Oh man. I would accommodate, I had some really good ones and I didn’t know how. Post it, I didn’t know about hashtags and different light. Now you actually do a vine strategy ebook. So then a girl I knew kind of from college was working at Hilton and Hyland, which was a luxury, luxury brokerage, which is a luxury brokerage and Beverly Hills.
And it was just like, Hey, I see you’re not doing anything. Can you come be the receptionist for a couple of. And I was like, sure. That’s, you know, I got to make money and I became the receptionist and I really liked the people in the office. I liked all the agents. I liked their personalities. I like being in Beverly Hills.
I was like, damn, all these people are driving Bentleys and Ferrari’s, this seems like a good business to get into. And I hit it off with everybody. And then I got hired as an assistant to David Kramer. Who’s one of the top agents here in LA and got my real estate license, became a buyer’s agent. And, you know, I never intended to get into real estate, but I think I just really liked the people, especially in my office and kind of similar to Matt.
I was like, well, I have a good personality. That seems like it’s one of the prerequisites for this at least like in this brokerage. And so that’s how I got out. Cool. And Matt, how did you get into real estate? I was a touring musician before, and I was just kind of sick of always traveling, making no money.
I think me like a lot of people, I was watching million dollar listing. I was watching those real estate shows as they were like huge. They’re just on like the real come up. We’d never seen anything like million dollar listing before. So I was watching bad. I loved that show and, I just always thought as I started kind of up.
Further away from music. I was like, well, maybe like I could do real estate. I didn’t really have, I didn’t go to college or anything like that. So I didn’t really know what I was going to do. And then I remember it like perfectly. I was in Florida and I was in a cab talking to my cab driver about real estate.
And then in that moment going, you know, taking the cab to universal, I, it was like, I’m going to be a real estate agent. And then I knew as soon as I got back, I was going to look into doing my courses. And I was that I met, my friend’s brother-in-law was, is a, is a high, a luxury agent in Toronto. So I started with him and yeah, never looked back.
I know the answer to this from Eric’s perspective, but for you, Matt follow-up to that is, has the specific play on humor led to more business. Yeah, it has. I’m seeing it more this year than ever. It’s taken awhile. It’s not like, you know, I posted a video and then just got a ton of business in the next couple of months from that video.
It didn’t really work like that, but I’m seeing a lot of it now. This has been my best year, although the Freddie mercury video last year, I mean, it was a pretty good return. I did a couple deals from it. And when you really break down. Like that video cost me about $500 and I’ve probably made. From that video alone.
I tracked it back about 50 to 55,000. So it’s a pretty good return on dressing up like an idiot and spending 500, you know? So like when I started seeing stuff like that happened, I was like, okay, I need to like really double down on this because I hate door knocking and I hate cold calling and I pretty much hate the everything about the business except, you know, making people feel good when they get a house.
I like that. And I like making. Laugh. So I was like, if I can do just that mostly then let’s do that. And now it’s been, you know, I’m getting higher end clients. So my price range has gone way up. And I think people are really starting to see the value in, in the listing videos, especially because they’re seeing the engagement and the views and what, you know, how many eyes you can get than just a traditional run of the mill real estate.
Yeah, I think it’s all a part of branding. Right. They get to know like, and trust you regardless. Right. So I think that’s why it leads to more business. Okay. This question is for both of you starting with, Eric, what did people expect when they meet you? I’ve always wondered that, you know, they see your content, they reach out to you, maybe the DMU, you know, email, you, they want a listing presentation.
What do they expect when they meet you? They definitely don’t want a listing presentation when they meet me. And they just, they, they want to talk to a normal human. I think, at conferences that I love going to conferences because they meet me and they’re like, oh, I could hear it in your voice, your content, because I am exactly who I am in my captions and in my posts.
And they could kind of see my thought process, not while they’re talking to me, but I think they want to. Someone that is like them. That’s a casual agent and that isn’t that kind of unattainable real estate professional that speaks at conferences like a, you know, Ryan Sirhan or a Tom ferry, or, you know, people that are like these incredible speakers and they’re incredibly successful.
And I look up to both of those guys. When they meet me, they’re like, oh, I relate to this guy. Like this guy was not crushing it in real estate. And he’s basically just voicing the grievances of most real estate agents. And that’s what I give off. It’s not like I’m cracking Zillow jokes while I’m talking to them, but I, you know, I get drinks with people and they’re like, oh, I like that guy, Eric.
Like that was, that was fun. Or they think I’m gonna, I think most people like it, but, I think they just expect. You know, they, they expect me to be a normal relatable person. And I think that’s what I try to be. Matt. What do people expect when they meet you? Have you thought about that? Yeah, I think similar to Eric, I’m really like, I’m a really kind of chill, boring kind of person, like a lot.
I love like my outlet is doing these videos and stuff. I think sometimes people might think. Maybe expecting more of like a, off the charts, Chris Farley type. We’re always on lack kind of like through the roof type of personality, which that’s definitely part of my personality, but like for the most I’m just very, I think normal and I think mostly that’s what people, people see like Eric.
And then in terms of clients, I think clients now know exactly what they’re going to get. They call me. Knowing how I am, and I’m not competing really with anyone anymore. In terms of like listing appointments, like when I get a listing appointment, it’s because they want to work with me. So that’s been a really cool thing to see with, with these videos.
That was wondering if you guys actually had, had met in person. Nah, cause I mean, we started, we started doing the podcast, like mid pandemic. Well, I actually, which leads to, you know, let’s talk about the podcast, the podcast. Tell us about it. What is it? You know, why did you start the show? Where’d the name come from?
All that stuff. I think we were having, so Eric had broke news network with benefits. And then he started asking me to do like little, little cameo skits, and then we were just communicating a lot. And then that led to, oh, we should, we should do something. You know, let’s figure something out. And then we did like an interview one day.
He thought he had, COVID. So he couldn’t get into the studio from broke news, that work. So he did like a podcast style interview with me, him and Ben. And I went well. Talking we’re like, well, you know what, if we did a podcast and we got like, you know, cause Eric and I are super, I think relatable, like you was just saying in the last part, like relatable, normal, everyday people.
And we love the contrast of like a super normal person talking to like luxurious Ryan ser hand. If we keep telling people where relatable they’ll think relatable. Yeah, exactly. But we love that contrast of like, you know, we’re just like, Luxurious people. And that contrast of like us and the humor and mixing that with like these top producing luxury people.
So it started so fast too. We were just like, I think at end of November, 2020, we were like, Hey, let’s do a podcast. And we’re like, okay, let’s, let’s do that. And then I was like, I wonder if we could get like Jordan Cohen and Ryan ser and as the first two guests. And it actually happened. So then we’re like, oh, this is incredible.
And then we needed a name and I, of course, out of the Navy. Yep. Yeah, I thought of everything to do with the podcast. Eric wanted to call it, no contingencies. What does over mean most of double connotation? So over ask of course means, you know, you are over asking questions, you’re being too inquisitive, but also over ask, you know, from a real estate perspective, as you’re writing an offer, that’s over ask and it’s timely because we are in a sellers market.
But also I thought that, there’s a, a comparison, the, part of my take podcast for Barstool. They it’s just two average sports fans that know a lot about sports. I don’t know that much like a ESPN analyst or something like that. And they have all these huge, athletes on and I kind of like, that’s what we’re doing.
We’re just like, okay, we’re both normal agents. And we’re trying to have like huge top producers and sales gurus, and, you know, real estate coaches and stuff on, and kind of ask them questions from a normal real estate agent’s perspective. So I think that’s what we’re trying to do.
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You guys have a good chemistry. Do you feel like you have played a part in blowing up, you know, Ryan ser Hantz brand because of your. Yeah. Well, I told him that I told him that right on the show actually. Yeah, I don’t think he’d be any, I don’t think you’d have is broke his new brokerage, the location.
I don’t think you’d have that. Or big money. Energy. Yeah. So yeah. We’re going to have shirts that say big, funny energy or big, funny energy. Smart. Who would your dream guests be? Have you thought about that? Do you have a dream guest? Oh, we’ve had. Been very fortunate with the guests we’ve had already. I mean, we’ve had, like I said, Jordan Cohen, Ryan Serhant and Reed seal you Mansky Maya Vanda from selling sunset, real estate.
What I mean, I would love to have Gary V even though he’s not like a real estate agent, I think he would just bring cool perspective, to. Or just someone like random who’s like famous, like Kendall Jenner. Yeah. She definitely come on. Come on, have a hundred people. You haven’t connected with Drake yet since you’re real, have you?
I think everybody tagged them. I’ve got over 500 tags. No Drake. Eric and I were talking about this. We, I think I need to scale it back. Maybe not do. Celebrity with a hundred million followers may have easier chance of 800001.2 million. I think that’s kind of the sweet spot. Once you call them out, then you can get them.
We want to have Arianne from the bachelor. There’s a lot of bachelor and bachelorette. Contestants and like the actual bachelor and bachelorette that now all have their real estate license. And that’s kind of, it’s a fun story. We had Caitlin Clemons on who’s in Canada, and it’s cool to hear how they’re switching.
They’re not switching their branding, but using their large followings now for real estate. So I think we want to get a bunch of those people on than other dream guy. I mean, I don’t know if we’re going to have a Tom ferry on here, Tom. Ferry’s awesome. We’re excited about Tom having Tom Perry on. He doesn’t know.
He doesn’t know it yet. Any surprises from podcasting, any surprises that you weren’t expecting? It’s a lot of work, right? Podcasting. And I say it’s a lot of work. We’re still navigating that. I think we’re getting a handle on it. And we’re, you need to be kind of three, four steps out.
And we’re realizing that like, which I think we are most of the time, but there’s been a couple of weeks where w w we are just like a little, you know, scheduling, cause we still have full other businesses that we’re both running.
So, the scheduling and stuff, but yeah, it’s a ton of work, but it’s very fun. It’s very fun working. It doesn’t feel like work. So I don’t mind coming home. From showings or doing stuff, you know? Cause it doesn’t really feel like work. I think the social media aspect of it is fun too, because this completely different content than what I’m used to posting.
So trying to actually, you know, download the video that we just recorded and then find a clip that’s engaging and then coming up with the caption and then coming up with a text for that caption and making it into an IgE TV and then sharing that IGT V to my page and Matt’s page and figuring out how to get the most swipe ups possible.
Like, I really liked that strategy aspect of the social media. Cause that’s what I do. And I’ve always been trying, you know, whatever I’m promoting something and now it’s actually promoting something that’s, you know, just further real estate content. So I think it’s, it’s really fun to do, but yeah, it’s extremely time consuming and we also don’t want to like have a bunch of huge guests at the beginning before we have an audience.
I think a Ryan, her hand, my Vander Maricio but only 10 people are watching. It’s like, okay, then we got to have them back on again. So we’re trying to spread out. We got to have like filler guests and we won’t tell you who those people are. It’s usually just Matt and I actually felt filler episodes each other.
Another one of those are coming together. Yeah. Let’s talk about the merge drop the merge drop. How’s that going? Yeah. Actually very successful first couple of days in terms of sales, not in terms of our margins, but, we’re, we’re still trying to figure that part out, but yeah, we’re losing money on cheese, I guess these weigh like 90 pounds.
If you’re trying to support us, please don’t buy the mugs. But it’s good. There’s been great variety. Like all every design has done well. So we’re happy about that. We were kind of trying to figure out what’s too much. What’s not enough in terms of design because you don’t want to have an entire gap store on there where there’s just too much to choose from when they leave.
So like, I think we started with the right amount of, like variety and it’s been going. Yeah. We have like a broker agent key logo, broker agent logo, mat signature saying you take care, which is actually selling. Yeah. I don’t think that was going to sell. And I don’t know. We’ve sold 10, 15 shirts that say that.
I think it’s the font. It’s cool. Yeah. It’s got that. You know, that retro font it’s really cool. Yeah, exactly. And then the showing. It’s showing confirmed one that I’m wearing, those are doing well. And then of course the overpass March, but yeah, like Matt said, we want to do like a slow rollout and then Wednesdays, we sell houses.
We’ve sold like 30 of those already. Where can, find, the merch store? Where do you want them to go for that? The broker agents store dot. Okay. It broke agent store. It we’ll make sure we put that in the show notes, et cetera. So people can go through and click there. Okay. We’re going to wrap this up.
We’re going to, we’ve got two final questions for you guys. The first one, I’m going to throw it a Matt, if you could have dinner with any three people in history, past or present, who would they be and why? Okay. Freddie mercury, Kendall Jenner and, and Kendall Jenner, man, you must mention her every episode.
I love Kendall Jenner. So does my wife, we were we’re big fans of the Kardashian clan. We think they’re fantastic people. Yeah, we love them. Okay. Freddie mercury, Kendall Jenner and Steve McQueen. That’d be an interesting dinner table and then me and my you take care of now shirt. Nice. Eric, same question, three people for dinner, Gary V a, which is cliche.
But I think that if I sat down with him for an hour, he would help further monetize the brand and give me a lot of good tips on how to keep this thing going. So that’s from a business strategy perspective, John Daley golfer, because. He’s a legend. He likes to party crushes the ball. Think it’d be fun to have drinks with tell some crazy golf stories.
And then, probably Derek Jeter, just cause he’s my favorite athlete of all time. That’s kind of like the more, you know, stoic, you know, less off the wall type of athletes. So I mean, no one in real estate, I don’t know who also Conor McGregor, how can I forget Conor McGregor that’s for, can I, can I change out Derek?
Yep. So it might be a little boring. I love Derek Jeter, but I don’t, I don’t know if that dinner would be fun, but I would love to have dinner with Derek Jeter. Just saying three people. I’m changing Kendall for Connor McGregor. Yeah. Okay. Although I love Kendall. Yeah. Okay. Who you change? Who you changing for Derek Jeter?
It would be some somebody in crypto that could give me insights on what’s going to happen the next two weeks. Not like an Anthony Pompe, Leanna. Guy. That’s just constantly pumping it, but some like insider whale that is just like, this is what’s going to happen in two weeks. We’ve got a bonus. We call it, shut it down.
Eric has played this before, Matt. It’s your first time. I can be two options to shut one down, essentially picking the other ones. So it could be food could be fashion, could be music either way. It will keep you on your toes. So for example, if I said pizza or Cal zone, you would pick. So you’re shutting down pizza.
That means you pick Cal zone. Oh, oh wait, no Cal zone 70 down Cal zone. Right. So that’s how it works. Okay. Got it. Makes sense. Okay. So we’ll start easy, Derek. We’ll start with Eric clubhouse or Instagram clubhouse. So I’m shutting down clubhouse, right? So you picked IGS shut down clubhouse. Okay. Hammer per shadow.
I D I would shut down. I don’t need either, but prosciutto when I used to eat red meat. Yeah. The only correct answer is Eric’s answer, which is shutting down ham. Yeah. Pick prosciutto. She does amazing, incredible. It is good, but I don’t have a dog now. I have a dog named per Shuda. That’s true. No, but it wouldn’t be a good dog name.
That would be a good dog. Okay. Here’s the parachute Adidas or Nike? Ooh. Picking Adidas, Matt Adidas picking Nike. Interesting. Okay. Shut down. LeBron permanently get rid of all the sponsors. Well, there we go. That my next question, surprisingly, Eric was MJ or LeBron, bro. That is such a hard question for me.
Hard at all, Matt, this is not a hard, shut it down quick. I love LeBron. After watching the last dance, I have a whole new respect. So I’d have to shut down the broad and for you guys, that’s the only correct answer. Yep. Down on LeBron. Okay. Here’s $1 million listing Los Angeles or million dollar listing, New York Lawson.
Shut that one down. I’m going to shut down New York. My boys are all in Los Angeles. Who are your boys? Maricio James and David are all on Los Angeles. I thought our boys were Ryan, sir. I love Ryan, Sarah and too, but. You know, I love New York got me into it, but I prefer seeing the properties in LA. I think there’s more diversity.
I agree with that. I actually prefer seeing the LA properties. So should I change my answer, but I love Ryan Fredrick and all them. Yeah. Well, I was just going to sit with the next one was . Sorry, shut down. Altman. Yeah. Shut down. Pixar. And, Eric knows. Oh man. Yeah, I like that. He likes him. Yeah. James Harris or Josh Flagg shut down.
Josh. Flagg shut down. Josh flag because James Harris is probably going to be a podcast guest soon. So just out of pure strategy. Yeah. Smart. Run DMC or NWA shut down NWA and DMC. The SSX tricky soundtrack. It’s tricky. Remember that snowboard? It’s tricky. I used to play that all the time, but I was sick and that shut down song.
Shut down. Run DMC though. Okay. It is sick though. A dog or cat. Oh, shut down cat. Yeah, that’s the only correct answer as well. The cat name per shoot off because he can Netflix or YouTube shut down Netflix and get all my podcasts. All my news know we’re not posting the over ask podcast on Netflix. So business and distribution and politics and news, YouTube.
Shut down YouTube. Y, so you could watch 50 shades of gray or whatever that news. Exactly. That’s what I want to watch. That’s what I want to watch. Okay. Gender. I don’t drink. Shut down. Both. Shut down. Jen, bought call date, and then shaken or stirred a shutdown stirred shut down. Stirred. No, that’s incorrect.
Shaken, oxidizes the alcohol. So we’ve got to shut down shaken. Pabst blue ribbon or bud shut down. Pabst blue ribbon. I don’t drink, but when I did shut down, Pabst blue ribbon, perhaps you seem like a pea vomit inducing man looks like no. Cause well Matt, because it PBRs like the, you know, the hipster 10 speed kinda beer.
He’s saying I’m I look cool. And you don’t know the exact opposite, actually. It’s like an IPO. You’re like an IPA guy, you know, you just. Drink an IPA at some share a speakeasy thinking you look cool wearing like a fedora. Okay. Yeah. I’m Jason Mirasol okay. Exactly. Here’s the things I’m yours. Last one here.
Work hard or play hard, but down, I guess now at this point, play hard. Shut down. Play. We’ll play out in a couple of years, but we want to work hard to play hard. Exactly. Actually now I would shut down work hard because if, even for the rest of my life, if I had to do just one or the other. If we had already put the work in.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And that would shut that down. Work hard and play. Yeah. Yeah. I’m not trying to be 95 years old working out. I ain’t telling the real estate when I’m 60 will say when I’m 32. No, he’s out one year. Yeah. See ya. It’s you’re tired. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing guys. There you go. That was, shut it down.
That was the bonus round. Great. Thank you very much guys, for joining us today. Give us a real workshop. Gravitational branding, how to become one of the most recognizable agents in your marketplace with spending very little or without spending a dime. If you’re not following these guys, you need to hit them on their IgG and hit subscribe on that podcast.
I assume you’re on all platforms. Is that true? Confirms re-ask podcasts. Great stuff. Always a pleasure guys. Where else do you want the people to find you Instagram? Find us on Instagram and we’ll take it from. At the broker agent at that real estate picks at over as podcasts, the broker agent.com, the Brocade and store.com.
The brokerage and book.com. They can find all that from Instagram. What we’re saying, Twitter at the broker agent tech, talk at the brokerage, understanding this my personal Instagram and click the link to. Find everything. We’ll put everything in there. We’ll put it all in the show notes. And on the page, Derek, we get a lot of traffic in the show notes anyways.
All right guys. So you guys take it.
