Welcome to The OT

The conversation centered on essential strategies for achieving success in real estate, such as lead generation, referral partnerships, and effective team management. Mike Dooley and his colleagues shared valuable insights on how they prioritize referrals, utilize data to pinpoint effective lead channels, and foster strong relationships with referral partners. Collaboration and leveraging resources were emphasized as key to turning small ideas into significant outcomes. They also stressed the importance of using a comprehensive home buyer guide in listing presentations and incorporating ‘value squared’ slides to clearly demonstrate the benefits to buyers.

The discussion further delved into the complexities of building and leading successful real estate teams. Mike highlighted the necessity of establishing the right framework, maintaining flexibility, and granting autonomy to team members. Setting clear goals, providing ongoing support and coaching, and nurturing a strong team culture were also underscored as critical components for success. Additional topics included coaching agents to prioritize buyer’s agency and safety, ensuring time management and accountability in sales, and the vital roles of leadership, personal growth, and team development. Mike and his team emphasized the power of embracing new ideas, collaborating to bring them to fruition, and acting on even the smallest concepts to achieve remarkable results.

**Introduction**

In the dynamic world of real estate, building and leading a successful team is both an art and a science. Keller Williams agent Mike Dooley has mastered this balance, particularly in the competitive Arkansas market. This blog post dives into Mike’s approach to real estate, focusing on his team’s structure, lead generation strategies, and the importance of value propositions, all while leveraging Keller Williams resources.

**Real Estate Business and Team Structure**

Mike Dooley, an experienced real estate professional, operates a thriving business in Arkansas. His team’s success stems from a carefully structured organization that emphasizes both agent compensation and value proposition. Mike’s journey in real estate is marked by overcoming challenges that many teams face, particularly in lead generation and market adaptation.

**Lead Generation and Team Operations**

A cornerstone of Mike’s strategy is a strong focus on lead generation through referrals and open houses. Mike stresses the importance of staying local, encouraging agents to concentrate on their own regions rather than expanding too quickly. His team utilizes the “command inbound referral tool” to pinpoint top sources of leads, which has proven essential in maintaining a steady flow of business.

**Streamlined Operations and Value Proposition**

Efficiency is key in Mike’s team operations. He has implemented a system where columns are added to their closing sheet to track vendor partnerships and home inspectors, ensuring no detail is overlooked. Mike also emphasizes the value of agent compensation structures that align with a strong value proposition, ensuring that team members are motivated and clients are satisfied.

**Real Estate Marketing Strategies**

Mike’s marketing approach is both innovative and effective. By leveraging Keller Williams’ vast resources and focusing on personal branding, his team has seen significant success. Mike prioritizes “first touch conversions,” utilizing video and social media to warm leads and establish trust early in the relationship. Additionally, his team has found that rotating leads and prioritizing hot referrals significantly boosts their conversion rates.

**Leadership and Career Growth**

Mike is not just focused on business growth but also on the personal and professional development of his team. He sets clear career paths for his agents, providing opportunities for growth and encouraging a family-oriented culture within the team. His emphasis on leverage allows agents to expand their businesses while maintaining a healthy work-life balance.

**Adapting to Market Conditions**

Mike is acutely aware of how market conditions impact team growth and retention. He reflects on the challenges of managing a mega-agent office, where connectivity and purposeful culture building are vital. His plans to open a new office that integrates his team with Keller Williams agents underscore his commitment to fostering a collaborative and growth-oriented environment.

**Habits, Accountability, and Success in Sales**

For Mike, success in real estate is closely tied to effective time management and accountability. He prioritizes calendar management, breaking down tasks into 15-minute chunks to maximize productivity. Regular one-on-one meetings ensure that team members stay on track and maintain focus on their goals.

**Conclusion**

Mike Dooley’s approach to real estate is a testament to the power of structured team management, strategic lead generation, and effective marketing. By focusing on value propositions, local expertise, and leveraging the extensive resources of Keller Williams, Mike has built a team that thrives in any market condition. For real estate agents looking to replicate this success, the key lies in understanding the importance of structure, strategy, and continual growth.

**Call to Action**

Are you ready to take your real estate team to the next level? Connect with Daren Phillipy for insights, strategies, and a roadmap to success. Whether you’re starting out or looking to refine your approach, Daren’s experience and expertise can guide you on your journey. Contact Daren at (702) 706-4949.

Transcript:

All right, guys, thanks for showing up to this week’s OT and I’ve been super stoked to have Mike Dooley here today. He is very well known at Keller Williams, and he basically runs all of the South real estate. Is that pretty much right there. Oh, yeah, you

got it. You got it right. And you must just

little side note, I’m a BYU Cougar, and we did play against the Razorbacks a while ago. Um, I think, I think we were really lucky that year to be able to beat you guys. So I’m sorry about that.

Yep, my brother in law, Braggs, though, what he went to the game. He used my tickets to go there, and he said, the nicest fans and nicest people in the world. He still brags on it. So when everyone, when you guys, are coming here, he’s telling anyone and everyone, be nice to them. They’re awesome people. But we were actually in a Disney cruise in Ireland and England with my two girls. Life by design, but I hated missing the game.

Well, rise and shout, that’s that’s the facts we sometimes we don’t show up playing on the field, though. Well anyway, that that being said, Mike, you are based out of i benningtonville, Arkansas. Is that right? Correct

home office of a small company called Walmart. You guys might have heard of it, so I

love it. And and you, you’ve got a ton of business down down there. You did 236 sides in the last 12 months, and just under 100 million in volume. And tell me a little bit about your team structure. What is your structure look like with your organizational chart and stuff like that?

Yeah, yeah. I’m a sales guy, so we always round up 100 million. You know, no one likes that 99 number, you know. So you guys know that little bit of puffering. I can do that between 99 and 100 but you know, really, I’ll tell you, as I’ve evolved eight years in real estate now, I’ve only ever been at Keller Williams. I, like a lot of you, I’m recruited a lot, all the time, and it’s just like, You know what? I mean, there’s no other place. And Ozzy and I had the blessing of meeting at KW cares, can, you know? And so it’s like, it’s like, you know what, there’s no place like home, and that treats you like we do. But I’ll just say, Yeah, our team, we have my wife who in here, you know, or a zoom land has their spouse or their partner, or someone in their real estate business, the goods and bads about it, but I launched Yankee Candle at Walmart’s The last thing I did before real estate. So I started real estate Valentine’s Day, 2016 and who’s with me? With your spouse says, Wait a minute, don’t real estate agents not make money, you know? And my wife is like, wait a minute, this is a 1099, job, isn’t it? You’re, you’re highly paid executive. But you know what? I just realized I wanted to be my own boss. I when I launched Shanky candle, an amazing, great company, but I was doing the sales, the marketing, logistics, everything as you we all do as real estate agents, right? We find ourselves, Last Saturday, my wife was cleaning out, buyers or sellers garage because they had a few leaves and trash in it. We’ve all known that we closed the day before. You know, we’re cleaners, we’re everything. But she joined me six years now, so we’ve been in real estate for eight years. We have the duly Group team. So she’s an agent on our team, and a traditional, traditional agent, if you will. I do have and something I do want to share as you, as far as a team, right now, a lot of teams are probably hitting, hitting, to be ancillaries, to be all these other things. And I just want to share this one thing I did. I have nine companies if I had to do it over again. And this is your own truth, but my truth, I would have waited on that. So just something I want to tell you, as far as a team, I would have waited till I was over 200 or $250 million so that base creates your ancillaries and really covers your expenses, kind of like a market center. Think of your cappers, but you asked about team, and let’s stay on stay on task, right? So you got the real me in sometimes, but we have Director of Operations, and that’s actually my sister who works with family. She’s been with me for eight years, which is pretty cool, and she’s in Florida, so I have the blessing of providing an opportunity there. She’s been TC, she’s been EA, she’s been Chief of Staff, she’s been all of those things. We have a TC, we have an LM, and then both of those divisions have cyber backers. So LM has a cyber backer, TC has a cyber backer, and then we have a director of marketing, and then I have an executive assistant, and she’s kind of in the team, but she’s all things Mike Dooley, if you will. So I’m also op of a market center. We have 331 agents. We do about a billion in our Market Center. What else am I missing from the team agent count? And you know what? I’m okay telling you, I think at the beginning or the end of last year, about 13, we’re probably around seven right now. And who’s gone with me, where they’ve lost a few agents maybe the last four or five months? Raise your raise your hand. Or is it just me? Yeah. Yeah, the marketplace right now is interesting, isn’t it? So some of that is, I’ll tell you, it’s a ying and yang. My wife really wants to be a small team. I’m, you know, have an amazing, great coach, and I want to, actually, we’ve gone through Eos, which is traction, if you haven’t done that. And I want to be 99 agents in 10 years and do a billion dollars in my real estate team. That’s where we’re going. But my wife and I, ying and yang, aren’t in that, so she’s, she’s at the point now where we want to go smaller. So we’re kind of just balancing through that. And I’ll just tell you what it really means to me is, are we talking about our value proposition properly? Are we having our agents make enough money. As you know, that’s what it is. It’s like, hey, if they’re making enough for their family, there’s never a conversation about splits and value and all that stuff. If they’re winning at a high level, then we’re all winning. So that I actually look at me as a leader, saying, Okay, do I have those things in place? And I would ask you, are you going through the Career Visioning? And I’d look at some of our agents, maybe that we lost. We didn’t do the Career Visioning, we didn’t do the right onboarding, we didn’t do the right hiring, we didn’t have expectations conversations. And I don’t blame the agent, I blame us in that gap. So just something to think

about. Love that Mike, well, you know, and and you said, one of the things that I’ve been learning as I do these OTS every single week is there’s a consistent story. There is no doubt, to find a really successful team, you build it where you need the help, not go and get the help to create the business. And so that’s what Gary taught us in the mrea book. And it sounds like you keep your team busy. So tell me, what is it that you do to create leads, to keep a team of seven plus active and giving them what they want?

Yeah, and I’ll tell you, whoever says leads is perfect, just so you know, and be alright with this. I wrote this word down, and I want to share it with you as Grace. I really want all of you to write that down. Maybe let that hang with you today, and this week, it’s easy right now to beat ourselves up. You know, you got all this stuff flying at you, NAR stuff, you know, expenses, fees, all this stuff just flying at you. Give yourself grace. A lot of our business, though, is, is soI, even our agents. And I’ll tell you something I’ve done over the last eight years is I’ve chased things, okay, op city, rise, we’re going to go really deep here, you know. And I look at it and Gary says something all the time him and jfab is on. Always say this, hold a finger up if you will. Like this four, we’ll we’ll do five to be cool. And you guys can High Five the screen, but it’s really four sources. So this is a perfect time for you guys to look at q1 because q1 just finished, and I call that a correction of error meeting. So look at where your leads came from, from q1 if you really dive and go deeper in the four, and that’s kind of why I gave you that example about ancillaries, is if you’re just spread out, well, you’re not going to be good at anything and be the master of nothing. So we’ve really figured out last year we had 59 referrals come in. So thank you. That’s a blessing. That’s also, see, I’m paying it forward to you, but what happens when you do that? It comes back to you in 10x doesn’t it? Referrals, blessings, love, hugs, high fives, all the things. So I always believe in the atmosphere to get it out there. So our market center, here’s something I want to give you. Last year, got 500 referrals. So I got 59 I’ve been about 12 to 15% of the market center my team has in the business. So just so you know, though, if I have the right systems and tools, I should get a lot more of those 500 wearing my team hat, not my op hat, right? You know. But if you think about that. So I want you to think about I have a marketplace, though that’s saying to me. And I want to give you guys a couple tools and tactics in a matter your size. You need to be thinking about this. And I use this all the time. Our command inbound referral tool, if you look at it, it will tell you the top places, and the top five of them are all in our own region. So, just so you know, when I go, Oh, I gotta get in California. I gotta get in all these places. No, I don’t within my own region and my own home. All the deals are coming of those 500 with the top five sources. So you act about it. So soI referrals, open houses, I would say, really are the three strongest. I would say last year we had more and more op cities bleed in. We had realtor.com some of those. We don’t do, actually, a lot of paid leads. We do have a couple, and I’ll tell you, so Google Local Services. Now, we did have barrevity. Now, you know, being op and, okay, this is a transparent just being out there, you know, I love them. We’re buddies, but being the OP, and obviously, when that increase came for our friend for our tech feed, I said, You know what? How am I an OP? I’m not in in our tech, and I’m not investing in our tech. So January one, I moved over to command. So we’re fully in command, so we’re running command ads and all that stuff. And I’ll tell you. So there’s really, if you look at it, and I know they put together two pagers, and I’m looking at my two amazing team leaders. I saved that to my phone as a picture, whatever someone asked, what did they do? I can’t tell you everything they do, and I’m by no means a genius or an expert. I just text that picture and say, look at all the things it does, and it has the comparison side by side. But I’m even starting to add my own pipeline in command, and it’s pretty cool. So that’s that’s been helpful. We do a little bit of commercial, so I do a little bit of development. So asked about teen makeup. I’m a lead generator, if you will, but I don’t really do a lot of the deals. I do about five at a time, but it might be I’m negotiating right now $3 million storage in it. That’s kind of fun, but I just like staying in the game, and I want to stay relevant. Let’s, let’s

talk a little bit about because you dropped a ton of bombs, and I can see a lot of people are taking notes on this. So a couple things I want to figure out. When you said we’ve got four and this is you said the first quarter, we go and look at what’s winning. What’s not it’s the red light green light thing. Tell us the process of, what do you do to actually find all the leads that you’re doing and make sure that you’re spending your time where it should be spent.

Our amazing staff and team is coding those in command, but I’ll tell you probably, like a lot of you, and they have a closing sheet, and they’re really getting better at honing in. We’ve added this just this year alone. We’ve added, actually, who our home inspector is. So think about from a market center perspective. If you didn’t know that, we always say, Okay, who was the lender? So that way when we go to ask for a preferred partnership or vendor program, we could say, Hey, you were 33% of our business. So we’re starting to add those columns too, to start to say, oh, who was our home inspector? Can anyone on the screen or anyone in your market center say, Hey, I had 17 deals with you, Mr. Mr. Home Inspector with my team? No, we can’t. So we’re going deeper at that. So that correction error meaning is not only about business, just so you know, it’s about life. We also, I want to challenge our people to look at their calendar. So for instance, if this was an hour and you want it to be two hours as you kind of look at q1 Well, good. Well, that’s getting value. You need to change that. But if you had a meeting that you went to and it was reoccurring every week and you cancel it every week, should that be on your calendar? No. So I’ll give you a tip, another little tip here in recruiting. So you do that for your team. Remember, I said I wanted to go to 99 agents. I actually, in the beginning, did 90 minute coffees. Who’s with me who goes to Starbucks is a 90 minute coffee meeting on stuff. I don’t do those anymore. My first meeting is a 15 minute call. Within those 15 minutes, I can find out, are we a cultural chemistry fit? So think LP, Mama and real estate, right? I’m finding out, what’s their motivation, you know, where are they working? What are they doing? And then I can have the coffee meeting. It actually gives me more time back in my day. So that q1 when I’m doing a correction on my calendar, I’m looking at that too. How was my time spent? And that’s really important.

Love, love, love that. Um, last thing I want to talk about, and the the leads portion of it, you spoke about your your referral partners. And obviously the KW is command for the the referral platform you can’t touch, it’s so amazing. How, how do you capture as an How do you warm those leads? Keep on top of mind and get those agent to aging referrals.

Yeah, I, by no means, just so you know, nothing that I do is really rocket science. Afterwards you go, Oh, okay, I get that. You know, I actually, whenever I see someone say, hey, northwest Arkansas or Bentonville, I actually go click one step further. I look at their Facebook and I say, Who am I a mutual friend with? Just so you know, I probably have an 80 plus percent conversion on referrals. How many times you’ve seen those groups that are like, I want someone in Las Vegas, and you don’t win it, because I go a step further. I find out who their mutual friends are, and then one of those people is a great friend of mine, and I’ll text them and say, Hey, will you tell your buddy I’m a great agent, and I get that deal every single time, and that seems small. And here’s one other thing I do. I record a video, a quick video on my phone. If you look through my phone, you’ll see 5000 videos. I record a video myself and I DM it to that person as a video. How many times do you get text? How many videos do you click on everyone? Those are just two small things that a high conversion. Now, just so you know, I don’t really do any of the deals, but I’m just that first touch. So if you’re saying, hey, how do I get the 100 million? How to get to get to 200 million? Well, you have to figure out what you’re good at. I’m not actually good at doing any deals. I shouldn’t be on any deals. I don’t have good systems about that. I remember, I got nine companies stuff flying me all the time, but I’m good at that first conversion. Then, boom, I get it into our team. And now I will ask them if they’re like, hey, it’s going to be a million dollar. Property. Why might get that with the right person too. Sometimes, this is another question that gets asked a lot. Do you have a lead rotation? We have that in command when we’re doing some of those leads. But sometimes, if it’s a hot referral, I want to make sure that I get more of them. As you know, it’s not about nice and who you like and fairness. So if a Kansas City person gave me one and then they go, Oh, don’t use that. Mike Dooley, guy had a crappy new buyer’s agent on his team. Well, you don’t want that experience for you or for them or for the client, right? How many times has that happened to you where I see on those groups, I don’t want a big team, because that’s what happens. They’ve had a bad experience where they’ve just given it to a brand new

person. Love it. Love it. Well, let’s, let’s put a bow on that. Move on to listings when you’re running a team. We all know that that leading with those listings. What do you do to capture listings? What makes you unique? Yeah,

and I’m actually sitting in my office right here. Who’s Who’s seen this magazine? Matt does it just so you know who’s listing is this on the cover? Must be mine. Yep. So just so you know, do I bring this with me? Yes, I would just say too. And our team does, and we have multiple copies, is we actually talk about our marketing. And I think that’s if you look at our conversion, I think NARS says 76% of the time they go with the first agent. I would say on our team, it’s probably 95% of the time we talk about our marketing over and over again. We share our social media. Please look at it, the doula group, you know, and check it out. And hey, R D, this is what I love about Keller Williams. If you love something, use it. Make it yours. Make it great, right? I actually have, we have a $5 million listing right now. I would please, please go ahead and share it on your pages. See if you can get a referral from it. I would love it. If you help get the buyer and you want and I can pay you commission, that’d be great. So I think it’s our marketing. And I’ll tell you, when I went on that $5 million listing appointment with my wife, see how many people you say I’m a team and you go on the listing point by yourself. Are you any different than it than the other single agent who went there? No, just so you know, if you are a single agent, that’s great too. Is there someone else in the market center, your team leader, your PC, that would go with you? For sure. How many times do you go on listing appointments together? I think that’s a strategy. We do all the time. We help win at a high level. We say, Hey, we’re a team. We’re all going to be selling your property, and we actually go together. That’s the win. But our marketing is really, really huge, and we talk about that. Some of that advantage is my wife and I both were in corporate America, and we talk about that a lot. You know, I launched Shanky candle. I weave that in, but I’ll tell you the Wall Street Journal. Are you thinking differently? We ran an ad in that $5 million property. I know necessarily, you might not sell the property from that, but it’s a lever now that I can tell anybody and everyone, this is the kind of marketing that we do when we list properties.

So So you do, you you do some of your marketing. So you can tell the story. Is there something else that you do that you’d say is unique when it comes to your marketing, if that’s I

would say, I use the power of Keller Williams all the time. I say, Well, you know, you go on 330 websites. I say that all the time, I have 331 agents in my office that I’ll be able to get this to immediately. We do a billion dollars in real estate. One in 10 transactions in Northwest Arkansas is done by a Keller Williams agent. Then I go on to say it, hopefully you guys are saying this, one in five transactions in the United States is done by a Keller Williams agent. So I’m going to get your property out to 175,000 agents immediately through kW LS, which syncs to the MLS. And that’s a win for all of us. So do you think I’ve said those things a couple of times. Yeah, listing

presentation right now. Yes, you could list my house. Well,

I was gonna say, so, you guys know, I don’t always remember a little trick we all get nervous. Is that, is that true? We all do it happens. You know, when I’m talking to Gary, I’m not like, you know, hey, like, on it. I’m a little bit nervous. Sometimes, you know, talking to Mark King, he’s like, you know, I know them well, but it’s like, hey, we all get nervous. I actually jot down on my little pad three or four things before I get there, maybe even in your car, your truck, and I say, I want to make sure I hit these things. And I think that’s just a win and comfort. We all think about that in bold, but it’s just a small thing that I do all the time.

Love it. Love it. Let’s talk a little bit about leverage. You you’ve got you’ve got seven agents, you’ve got a large staff, and I’d love to learn a little bit about what you do to lead them and help them get what they want.

Yeah, great question. I would put it back on you guys, something to think about that I think happens a lot. This happens in the market center and in teams, is knowing your career path. So just so you know, when I said I want to go to 99 agents and $1 billion why am I also saying that over and over and over and over again? It’s so my staff and my organization and my team knows we’re growing. We’re going to be larger. They’re not going to be stuck in that role. So something that I want to think about, this is also why I like having nine companies sometimes, too. And you remember, you guys all have that also because you have the market center, you know, a lender. You know that stuff is, I want to say you can provide opportunity when you’re in our world. So, for instance, our marketing person started, so I, I taught principles of real estate at the University of Arkansas. I don’t right now, if you look at balancing all the things, but I miss it. But so the one of the people was my student, then she became an intern, then she worked at my sign printing company, then now she became a marketing person in my duly group real estate company. So she had four career paths. How many people do you know that are able to do that? And you want to make sure you tell that story, because people want to know they have the opportunity to make more money, correct, right? As agents, we don’t want to go, oh, okay, I made 100 and that’s all I ever make. I have a ceiling. So you need to think about that ceiling. So if I think about leverage, I want to provide opportunities. I also say there’s 24 teams in my market center. So stat, you guys should know, and working with your team leaders in your Ops is what that looks like if you look at opportunity.

Love it. You. You said something I thought was super cool. Your your director of sales was in the room when we were chatting, yeah, you said that Mick was your first hire, and he’s kind of your main guy. Now tell us, how do you get someone to join your world and then keep them in your world? I think that’s one of the big challenges when you’re running a large team. How are you able to do that with me? I

I’d say one thing is, it’s not about me, if you will. It’s about us and all of us. So what I mean is checking in with him. Hey, how we doing? What are you thinking? And we were talking about this before you guys join our team, and I said at the beginning, it’s kind of shrinking a little bit. He wants a little bit that he’s a good post. So I think sometimes, as the visionary and the rain maker, you’re just going, sometimes you need to just stop and just say, Okay, let me check in with call it agent one, you know. But one thing that was cool, and I want you asked, this is where I want to go to this. So when he was leaving corporate America, also that became a lead generation for me, because I did that, that he did that, then I can tell other people that, because they have high business acumen. What do you miss in agents today, high business acumen sometimes, right? You say, Oh, I don’t want to take new people. Well, you’ll take, would you take Steve Jobs? That was never in real estate? Of course you would. So, just so, you know, it’s something we battle through, and I talk through all the time, is, I just want a talented, high business acumen person, I can teach them real estate. It’s not really that difficult. You can’t teach sales negotiations. People know how to do that. The widgets are different. But for him is when we met, we met at Starbucks. He actually brought his son with him, and his son was reading a book and was at the same table as us. There was a little part of my brain that had this corporate mind, and I was like, Well, that was kind of odd, you know? Then the me said, You know what? What kind of team, what kind of company do I want to have God family business? God family business. So how can I say that not be that? So I actually love it that he brought his son reading a book, because we said we’re going to be a family team. We’re going to be a family company. It’s about family. Just so you know how many times you’ve lost a deal, and you’re going to tell me, your family doesn’t know you lost a deal? Of course they do. They live the roller coaster transaction with you all day, every day. So that’s really helps me go, You know what? This is, what we’re going to be about. So it’s helped framework who we are as a family and a team. So now, when I’m talking to somebody about joining, I said, Do you like kids? And if they say, I just say, hey, that’s awesome. But just so you know, on a teacher work day, we might have 12 kids in our office that are coloring stuff, they’re reading stuff, they got iPads, they’re doing things. We’re a family company. We’re not saving lives. So it’s just something about to know who we are. So I think that’s important as it really helps me know who we are. But he frames it. It’s not about me framing it. We’re framing it together. And I think that’s what’s important.

Love it so and there is no doubt in the market that we’re dealing with right now. There is a ton of talented agents that are struggling, and there are a ton of, you know, the the the economies people are looking for, for options. Brady sandal says in luxury, he said he’s gone to lots of different places outside of real estate to add to his team. What does it sound like for you when you’re speaking to someone who is in the corporate world that you’re saying, Man, I’d love to have that guy in my world. What does that approach look like?

Well, one thing you want to know right down, and what you want to write this down, is no ceiling, just so you know most corporate jobs, you’re making two to 5% you always have a ceiling. Usually in our world, you want to work harder, you want to work smarter. You want to do whatever. You have no ceiling. How many times do we know people that are doing a billion dollars in real estate, a billion with a B?So some of these companies, just so you know, are making our revenue, from a revenue perspective, are making $30 million a year. So Name one person at corporate America that’s saying, You know what? Like, I work at Kraft Foods. I love it. A great company where I’m like, Hey, next year, I want to negotiate my contract. I want to go from making 200,000 to making 30 million. What does that look like? We know in our world you can do that with having the right framework on your real estate team. So no ceiling is really important, and people just want to have flexibility. So I use this other term too. I say you’re your own CEO. So just so you know, on our team, you’re your own CEO. So when we do goal setting, and we do it in October, my wife, obviously, she, she’s, she’s a rock star, and is pushing. She did 80 units last year. She’s crushing it, right? But someone else on our team might say, You know what I want to do 30. Well, that’s great. That’s their CEO, and that’s their goals. She doesn’t have to be my wife. See what I’m saying. So you’re your own CEO. We say that all the time. So someone likes working nights, weekends and open houses. So actually, go to this too. Hold your finger and hold this three. When I’m coaching with our agents on our team, they’re going to have three levers. So we think about a 135, and figure it works out really easy. So you’re going to have open houses, maybe on pay per click, and they’re going to have Soi, well, good. They have their three. They’re their own CEO. Not every agent is going to have their own three. So I think this is another thing. If you think about a team, we all don’t need to have the same levers. If you have a really good, diverse, great team, we’re working in other pots now, even though your team makeup might be the top four, you might have part of your team that’s doing something else underneath. Love

it. Love it. Let’s talk a little about so you just cut back on your team. You had a larger team. How? How do you approach that? Because you’re doing it for on purpose. So I’d like to know why you did it, but then tell tell us how you did it. Yeah,

and please do not. There’s no hopefully, there’s no thing on it says, perfect in a box, right? Look at yourselves, all of us, just so, you know, I fail three or four times a day. And I think, like I said, I have we had the wrong people for them, and me, some of them have exit. Just so, you know, that hurts. Who’s been broken up before it does. But I would tell you, I use this thing. I call it failing forward fast. I don’t spend nine, nine days on it. You know, where I go? Oh my gosh. What could I have done? Whatever, you know, I spent a little bit of time on, and say, Hey, let’s not do that next time. Here’s what I would do differently. How do we onboard them? One of those things. But I think we’re just going deeper into those people, and then we’re just going to layer on. Because I think you get in this growth mode sometimes, and when you’re a larger team, you think, Oh, I’m a market center. And as you guys know, I’m op too, so I’m kind of thinking both, right? You’re thinking like, hey, growth. But I just think you don’t, you don’t build it as well. When you want to do a team, it’s kind of layering. And I do a seven layer cake, I just do it better is asking better questions. And I think we let some of the people come in that was not a cultural win, win, win for me and them. Great people. I love them. They’re still at the Market Center. I want them to win. They’re just not we’re just not winning together. You know, you always say you think about divorces, right? Happens half the time. You still want to love the person. You want them to do great, but I think it’s just better. So if I had to give you exact questions, onboarding got to have that career visioning process. You got to ask really good questions. And I think future pacing them. I think that’s something else I’d have you guys write down. What does it look like? So for instance, I had a one on one with my agents, and they’re like, Well, I’ve never thought about a big vacation. Well, you know what? I should have thought about this when I had someone on our team just saying, you got to think big. I’m always thinking big. So if they’re only going to think to their own, they’re going to put a ceiling on themselves that I’m never putting on them. Well, then we got to help them punch through, or realize that maybe the wrong fit

love that. So I’m going to go back a little bit you. Did you do set a standard and let the team know? Hey, this is the deal. If you don’t hit this number or hit this whatever it is, or do you do a one on one if they’re out of culture? I want to know about that, because I know there’s a lot of teams they’re in that spot and it’s hurting them. Yeah,

great, great question. We have gone through this a lot, a million times, you know, we’ve heard people say, Oh, you gotta do two deals a month to be on our team. I’ve heard that 97,000 times, just so you know that’s very hard when you look at it. And I don’t want to obviously put any limiting beliefs on you guys, but for me, my own team. So what we realized is that there’s a roller coaster. So we’ve actually made it for a quarter. And Jesse hitzler, if you follow him, I love him. He’s like, Hey, you’re going to work out five times a week. Well, here’s what happens the first week you do four. You feel like you’re a failure, you’re in your own head. So that’s why he likes quarters, or he likes months, saying, Hey, I’m going to work out 18 times in a month. It gives yourself grace to see why I say grace. So that’s why we like four or quarter, which is 16 deals. Our average price point on our team is about 467, it’s a great living for them. I heard Jay papazon say this one time. He said, If you can have someone on your team making 75,000 or more, that’s the happy spot. That’s really where they can put more in their target basket. They can give more. They can give more to kW cares. So that’s something we’re always thinking about. So last year, our team income average for our agents was 133,000 So somewhere in there. So that’s a great number. So they’re making a good living.

Love it. Love it. Well, let’s, let’s, what did you learn in the last 12 months? Leading it, leading a team.

I can, I can read. My goal is to read 52 books. I can do all these things that I want to invest in myself, motivate myself, it you can’t motivate other people. So, just so, you know, I think that’s something to think about. That’s really, really hard. It’s like, all right, I gave them the path to do it, I showed them, I held their hand, I went on the listing appointment, and they’re not winning. Just, just so, you know, I think that’s something I’ve learned the last 212 months. And I wanted more than other people wanted. So I think that’s something that I’ve been going through in the last 12 months, and just understanding, keep investing in myself the right people are going to keep showing up, but some of them are just not going to be on the journey with us. There’s a stat that 13% of people stay in real estate in their third year. That’s a stat that I just think about saying, Well, how do we increase that? Because I love the industry, and I love what it’s done for me and my family, and my family, and I want that to be higher and better, but you want the right people changing lives.

What did you learn over the or what? What do you need to learn over the next 12 months leading your team?

This is tactical, but I think you know, you can hear social media, but I actually think YouTube, podcasting. I think if you look at the our most of our market centers, our teams, our agents, I think when I started, I heard a stat that said 56 years old was the average agent look around the rooms. It’s much younger than that today. So if you look at how our buyers are consuming information, how our clients are consuming information, I have to get better at YouTube, at podcasting and that, which is a it’s tactical, but I want you to think about it. When someone says, Hey, what’s your SEO? What’s some of those things, I just have to be versed in that. So that’s something I want to get better over the next 12

months. Love it. Love it. Well, this is a really important question. I’m going to real to set the the table for all of those who have questions. Now you’re going to want to raise your digital hand, and we’ll take them in order. But before we get into the first question, we have a really important thing. We need to cover best donut out there. What’s the best donut out there? As far as

I’m an old school creature habit. This is a glaze regular one.

Krispy Kreme from from Arkansas.

I’m not sure if they are they are here, though. Well,

I’m sorry that was the wrong answer. I didn’t mean to Mike. I did tell you I started my juicing today, and I would really use, I could love a bear claw from friendly donuts. But there you go. See Jay. Jay understands what I’m talking about. You

know you can get you can grace, right? Yeah,

you glaze there, and then right across the street is great pizza and wings. Jay believes that it’s, it’s the place next to him, but it’s across the street anyway.

Ozzy, honey. Max

sunset pizza. Ozzy, I’m ready for your question, bud.

I have two questions. One, I’m going to spot up right here, Mike, and with this first question, which is, every year you had the KW cares, annual drive, where you really rally the whole company. And you know, that’s very moving. My first question is, why do you do that? Why do you you know you’re already a busy individual. Why do you focus so much on kW cares with that? And number two, the second question is, you have nine businesses. Mike, which one’s your least favorite and why?

Great, great. I’ll start with the positive, obviously. Just so you guys know 2020 happened, and I just told myself, I’m going to say, yes, what I meant as a charity needed help. Maybe they’re like, hey, I need 20,000 I didn’t have 20,000 maybe to give every charity, but I might give them 2000 and I might teach them a skill. A lot of the charities didn’t know how to do Venmo or cash pay or all these things, so I taught them something. So I just learned, I’m going to say yes, and I thought about me in my own life. I have been blessed. But you know why I’ve been blessed is because I’ve gone to things like this, I’ve gone to mega camp, I’ve gone to family reunion and family reunion and mega camp, I mean, Vegas, I love it, but you’re gonna spend five grand. Most of our associates couldn’t afford five grand, so I said, we gotta give them a family reunion, or mega camp or something like that that’s in their living rooms. So I launched this event. I said, Hey, I’m blessed. I’m in Gary’s group, but I know all these friends, I’m gonna text them and I’m gonna tell them, we’re gonna do our own four. Family reunion or mega camp one day only for those people that can’t afford family reunion or mega camp, and we’re going to do it for 10 bucks. And you all, everyone can come up with 10 bucks. I think it’s changed a little bit. I think it’s 15 bucks now, but I’m going to have one day and just so you know, I have no way of knowing. I thought about this in the middle of the night. I just have the idea. And this is what I love about our company. I pitched the idea, and they’re like, love it. Let’s see what you can do. They didn’t say, you know, we just, I just asked friends, and I did it. Every year, we’ve raised about $350,000 to kW cares in three years. So we’ve raised almost a million dollars for kW cares. And here’s what I want to pay it forward to you. 10 bucks is all I thought about. See what I mean. We don’t realize that, you know. And Gary says, obviously you underestimate what you can do in five years. So 10 bucks turn to a million dollars for kW cares. So it’s just an idea. So whenever you sit on an idea, don’t sit on it. So that’s what I would tell you, tell your team leader, tell your OP tell everyone, if you have an idea, you might be able to come together with more people and say, how do we make it bigger? How do we make it better? And that’s the number one incremental kW cares event in the in the world, or in a country right now, in North America, just from that one tiny idea that started in 2020, so that was a million dollars incremental the KW cares. They never had that revenue. You asked about worst companies I actually capture marketing, which I actually am just able to I’m actually divesting. I’m letting it merge with another one. So that’s open house, signs for sale, signs, name tags, all that stuff. I thought was a great idea, but it’s got 10 staff members. It’s every a machine cost $150,000 I thought, How great would it be to be in my market center, and that’s what I call a lot of noise. So I’m really glad to give that guy, and I’m looking Matt, did I give you a referral one time? Or no, I thought maybe through Tony Baroni, I might have given you one in Sebring. I have a aunt that lives in Sebring. She lives start with an A. Is there something in Sebring that’s with an A of all people golf and all that stuff. But anyway, I thought it was coming. It’s in the mail. Yeah, it is. It is. But keep it coming. I have three ants, and I keep moving to Sebring. But I’ve been many times to 24 Hours of Sebring. My dad, his favorite thing, he’s been like, 19 times.

Alright, let’s go ahead. Great question. Oz, I love it, by the way. You see anybody want to take over his machine or something? Sounds great. Sean, go ahead.

Yes, sir. So biggest question I want to ask, so how did you go from what was the biggest piece that took you from literally zero to literally 100 this past year in eight years. I mean, we watch a lot of agents be in this business for that much time, and obviously not get to 100 million, you know, to 200 300 transactions. So what’s been that biggest ramp up piece that got you from there to here. Now,

I’ve actually been going down the last two years, which has been just so you know. And I want to tell you guys this, or pay it forward, in some ways, is having the nine companies just been distracted. I just hadn’t been great at anything, doing a lot of things, you know, being op, which has been a blessing. That’s a full time job. When they originally they were like eight, two hours a week, as you know. And it definitely is not that. But I would say too, is actually a couple things luck, just so you guys know, you all have to have luck, but it was a blessing to have a great coach. So when I looked on stage my first year, I went to 13 trainings that were all outside my area, and I saw they all had maps coaches. My Maps coach said, Hey, what’s our goal for the first year he came up with, and I can’t remember how we backed it down, but 82 million was my first year goal. So here’s what happens in our system and in real estate, we say, Hey, be lucky if you cap. How many times have you heard that? So I didn’t know I came from. I was launching a kick candle when I came into real estate. No one ever got in my head and said, be lucky if you cap. He said, Well, how much money do you want to make? You know, we did the economic model. We work backwards, and I actually hit 47 million. So I actually have been really blessed to do a lot of real estate from the get go, because I never had in my head. Someone never like brainwashed me and said, be lucky if you a cap and all that stuff, and I just thought bigger. So I just said, How much do I want? And I’ve reverse engineered that all the time. I’m actually disappointed in myself that we haven’t 200 million or 300 million. And I’ll tell you a lot of that is distractions. So I would tell you guys here, I think the real estate team and the real estate business has the highest total margin dollars in anything we do, and I really believe that. So you’re starting to see me go deeper in that and in the market center. So here’s the three things. I’m focusing on, commercial real estate myself. So I’m going to probably do 10 deals, you know, but they’ll average a million dollar deal. So 10 million being a really good op, and then running a really good team. Um, it’s kind of my three things. I’m focusing so I’m divesting things, or just distractions, getting noise out of my life. Gotcha. Well, thanks, man. Appreciate that. Great question. Great,

great question. Sean, and for all those who are not kW, an OP is an operating pencil principle, they’re the ones who own the Market Center or the brokerage that they run the team out of So, alright, Matt, go ahead. It’s nice to have Matt. Matt is an OG OT. Go ahead, Matt,

anyway, I met you at a Cohen event years ago. We sat together. That’s what

it was. I was like, it looks so familiar. Yeah, we

Yeah, we’re and you found out we’re in the elevator and you’re Avon Park

anyway, yeah,

so my question is, what I’ve been I’ve had a lot of conversation with my agents about being confident and knowing you know things to say about the narset, right? So where is the potential in maybe recruiting in that change, like I see that there could be. And I was wondering how you could take advantage of

that? Yeah, great question. That’s been tricky for me. You know, State of Arkansas is kind of funny they came out. We actually have a law by agency law in place that’s been for three or four years. So it’s kind of settled it down in my state, if you will. But one thing that I’ve just done is I just said, Hey, there’s stuff that’s always going to be flying at us in real estate. Don’t let that be part of your head space. Don’t let that, you know, just so, you know, it’s always been negotiable. Let’s work through this together. But I haven’t really just, I’ll tell you as an OP, I haven’t hit that head on. You know, there’s been some that have been out there, been in the forefront. I’m a little more cautious because it hasn’t passed. So I don’t know if that helps you or not. I’ve mostly been the one not being out there. So sometimes I can be cautious, or sometimes I’m out there, but I’m not, I’m not going to be a good answer for you on that, basically, because it hasn’t been my expertise. What I have been doing, though, is the open house that Gary and them had, and valued square I’ve been really just saying, Hey, do you want to learn about it and sending them the valued square into the open house? That’s what, that’s what I’ve been doing. We actually had 71 people show up in my market center to valued square and to the open house. So maybe, maybe not, a great answer. Maybe I was a wall, wall, wall on that. Sorry, but I think

that’s a great answer. I mean, obviously I’m not going to, I’m not out there saying I’m the expert. I’m not even I’m just trying to train my agents and then seeing how I can, you know, maybe make them excel, so then I attract more. I was just trying to get my head around that, but using, leveraging the things that we have in our company to invite them to other outside agents to participate in, that’s a great idea. Yeah. And

I’ve been using this, though, to remind my team, especially, to get buyer’s agency and safety. We just had our meeting today. And I remind people, I was like, hey, every deal that’s bubbled up to me, you know, they did. They met the person at the house. They didn’t have a buyer consultation, you know, they weren’t a business person. So it’s, I’m using, I guess this, maybe this would go to it. I use it as coaching in a day to say, hey, when you meet with a doctor, he doesn’t say, Let’s operate on you today. You’re going right in. Let’s ask some questions. Let’s do some blood work. You know, what is your family history? So I actually use that as an example to say, this is a good opportunity to say, let’s have a business consultation meeting with the client. So I actually have been using that as a good opportunity to say, Hey, we got to get that buyer’s agency, and we call that our loyalty agreement. And I can’t take credit for that. I think it’s Jen Davis that says that, and I love that term loyalty agreement, and that’s worked.

Thank you, of course.

Yeah, great scene. I remember it was actually, isn’t there a partner? Isn’t it? Two guys, a bigger guy, okay, but it was right. I remember we were in the elevator again, see? I remember, yep,

just little side note on that in our stuff. I know here in Vegas, our one of the things that we really lean into is is we’re working with all of our classes that are broker, speaks or teaches. He’s involved in working on framework and having those conversations. And we’re really working on our skills there and then, like you said, value squared, and being really knowledgeable on on what the lawsuit and the settlement really means, and not be afraid of it. You got the skill and you have the framework to be able to to navigate to those questions. There shouldn’t be a reason why you shouldn’t be able to make the money that you want to make. I

want. I don’t want to let Matt down with our question. I was going to say one other thing we’re doing was taking the value squared slides. It has a lot of great content in there. We’re actually putting it into our buyer presentation. So that’s something else that it’s already a tool out there we’re integrating to show the value of a buyer. So that’s something else that’s just tactical, that I think integrated your agents don’t need to, you know, sometimes they might fumble around, or whatever, you’re giving them a tool, so that way they have it. And I don’t mind putting a spot, but I show you, you. Uh, this is kind of what one of them looks like. So see, it’s just, just so, you know, when you go on an appointment, you know, you think about agents. Well, this is pretty right? It’s pretty easy, you know. So I would just highly recommend, what is your listing and your we always think about our listing presentation. That’s the home buyer guy that’s called

Great, great question, Matt Ivy. Let’s go.

Okay, so I kind of want to bring it back to you a little bit, if you don’t mind. And you know, being that you you’re kind of doing a lot of different things. I’m curious on your habits, like, what do you believe your daily habits that contribute most to your success? Because, as you know, with kW, it’s all about right, consistency and habit. So my

calendar and just so you know, obviously, you know, I’m blessed. Could I wake up at 10? For sure, all of you could, you know, I wake up my kids, I take my youngest to school, and I actually in the market Center. I’m the one turning the lights on and unlocking the door. So I just think that small little thing is I’m setting the standard for saying, hey, so think about it, number one team and op, and I’m the first person here turning on the lights. That’s a small little thing almost every single day, but it’s running my calendar. So a lot of times you think about it, people that are starting at nine and 10, I’ve already been up since, you know, I think my alarm goes off at 557, I’ve already been up for three, three hours, just so, you know, multiply that times 240 days, which is kind of your working days, if you will. How many more hours do I have than them? So everything I do in a lot of things is 15 minute chunks too. I don’t know about you guys, I’m add also too. It’s like people are talking to your calls or texts. I usually like to do things in 15 minute chunks, and I think that’s helpful in my calendar. I just know myself, and if I put an hour chunk, I’m usually not going to do it. Okay. So hopefully I just say number one is the calendar. I think that’s really, really huge. And also, here’s something else I do. Well, I do a lot of videos. I should show you guys. You know, if you look at look at my phone, it’s all videos. I actually don’t usually text people. I Video TEXT them. So if it’s a client, it’s an agent on my team, it’s a team leader, whoever it is, they can see my face. They can see the emotions I’m talking to them, even on group. I think that’s something else that’s been a skill that I’ve really, really honed and has been helpful. Okay, because now you think about AI and all those things, it’s like, oh, is this a person? Is this automated? When they get a video of me texting, like, oh, it’s Mike. It’s a video. It’s, it’s one to one, if you will. You know, yeah, I think calendar is really, really important. So like I said, I everything is driven by the calendar. Okay,

all right, that’s one. Now, I heard you say you had a director of sales, so I’m not really sure if you can answer this, or if maybe you can, then we know accountability is very key in the game. So who’s who or what standards are. Do you have for accountability, making sure that your agents? I mean, I know you. I think you said one on ones, if I remember, recall,

yep, yep, and they have four on ones and have one, three fives. But I’ll just tell you, like you guys, it’s not perfect. Just just be alright with it. You know, whenever I hear someone say it’s exact science every Tuesday, we’re not, we’re not that great at it, but we want to just continue to build on it every day, and that’s what we do. So it’s 16 units is kind of the standard for a quarter, you know? But we’re just talking through those as a team. But really, we’re not thinking about that. Hopefully you heard from my first year goal, it’s like, Hey, what’s your goal? So everyone we actually our VA every day at 9am sends two scorecards as an agent activity scorecard, and then our company scorecard. So how many pendings do we have? And you probably have that. I don’t overthink that, you know, we just kind of look at it. I can get a pulse on the team and on the company, how we’re doing. Okay,

do you do you have your agents come in every day? I mean, is there like a place they come in and check in and do a huddle every morning, or is it all by

I’m in a little bit of transition. So for five years, we had a mega agent office. Now I actually my Market Center, one market center that I own. I have seven offices, and one of those going to be our new mega agent office. It’ll be ready april 15. So I’m pretty excited about that, but yeah, so the team, I would tell you, though I don’t know where our viewers are in time. If I had to do it over again as kind of op and team and all that stuff, we had a leadership that we weren’t necessarily aligned. We were growing. If I was that team leader, I ought to figure out a way to keep the number one team in the market center, and they didn’t, and we had to get a mega agent office, and we had to do that that provided just, just connectivity issues, I think, you know, between our team, because I like leveraging the Market Center, there’s a contract class, just so, you know, I’ve never done a deal in the end, ever, ever, I. Just so, you know, I’ve never done it, I don’t want to do it. I’m not good at paperwork. I’m not good at the TC. That’s their job. That’s what they really do. Well, I’ve never done it. I just, I’m good at getting it under contract, and, boom, I send it to them, and I don’t even go to closings a lot of times. So, just so, you know, I missed that connectivity. I think that was a miss.

Got it. Well, I appreciate your time. Thank you. Great question

and and you’re right, Mike, when you have a mega agent office, there is a little bit of that disconnect and the culture you have to build yourself, that you have to really be purposeful to to tellorize that market center or that, that that office, if you’re outside of the market center.

And I meant to say my new one is going to be both. So it’s going to be 8000 square feet, but it’ll have my duly team on one side, and then I have Keller Williams throughout. So we’re in the same place, and I think that be the best of both worlds, because we’re growing. So I need a future place for more agents. So it’s going to be a win. In my opinion.

Love it. I love it. Well, Mike, you’ve, you’ve dropped lots of knowledge bombs on us, lots of nuggets. So grateful for you and everything that you shared with with us before we go. Is there anything else you’d like to share before we get the best way to contact you for referrals?

No, I just think you poor indicated who cares. I would too remind you to maybe in your market centers or your teams or places you live, also give people grace. You know, you hear some of those stats about foreclosures going up and people having tougher times you don’t know what someone else is going through, sometimes a high five or a hug or something like that, might go a long way. We’re all busy. I would just challenge you that way, that we’re all humans, and we need each other. And this is what I love about Keller Williams, is we’re a family. And I tell people this one of the first times I saw Gary, he Millie, his dog on his lap, you know, we were like this, you know, and he’s hanging out. It wasn’t a guy in a three piece suit with charts on the screen. He was just a guy. So just so, you know, we’re all people, so I would just challenge you, let’s all be leaders in that way. We say, God, family business, I just challenge you in that way. And I think that’s important. Love

it. Love it. So if they’ve got, if they’ve got a someone’s got a referral in Walmart land, what’s the best way for them to send, send that to you or contact you for other things. Yeah,

I just think, anytime you think Arkansas, we can get you placed flawlessly. 479-616-HOME. The reason I share that is I want you to think about that’s a strategy. So that’s a phone that goes into our office at hand, and our agents answer that it’s, you know, all of them brings them at same time. But all my social handles are real. Mike Dooley, anytime, but happy to help you guys.

Perfect. So it’s 479-616-HOME

Yep, perfect.

Well, Mike, you’re the best man. Loved having you love having you guys all attend. Make sure you go if you want to see a recording. Jump to the Facebook group, and you’ve done it.

Thank you guys. Appreciate it. Have a great day.

Thank you, Mike, you’re awesome. Man. Appreciate you.