Unlocking Success: Insights from Vince Caropreso’s OT Meeting

In a recent OT (Office Team) meeting, top real estate producer Vince Caropreso shared his invaluable insights on building a successful real estate business. For those looking to elevate their real estate careers, Vince’s strategies offer a wealth of knowledge. Here’s a detailed look at what Vince had to say and how his methods can help you achieve your goals.

Introduction and Purpose

The OT meeting’s primary goal is to enhance agents’ skills by learning from top performers. By following the Millionaire Real Estate Agent book model, agents can achieve faster growth. Vince Caropreso, a standout producer from Hanover, Maryland, joined the meeting to share his experiences. With 169 units sold and $66 million in volume over the past year, Vince’s success speaks for itself.

Team Structure and Expansion

Vince’s team comprises 10-11 members, with a central hub in Maryland and support staff, including a full-time in-house marketing person and a virtual assistant for backend systems. His team structure also includes four full-time agents in Maryland, one in Pennsylvania, and a new agent. Vince’s expansion into Pennsylvania is a key topic of discussion, highlighting the need for effective systems to manage and feed leads to his growing team.

Mastering Lead Tracking and Internet Lead Sources

A crucial component of Vince’s success is his robust lead tracking system. He uses a CRM and additional tools to track leads from inception to closure, monitoring key metrics like cost per lead and ROI. Vince’s internet lead sources include Google Pay-Per-Click and social media marketing, while Zillow usage has notably decreased. He emphasizes a balanced approach, with 40% of leads coming from internet sources and 60% from database referrals.

Effective Follow-Up Systems and Long-Term Lead Management

Vince’s follow-up system categorizes leads into 90-day and 20-26 months timeframes, focusing on long-term nurturing. Automated systems for emails, texts, and personalized mail-outs play a significant role. Vince also highlights the importance of client events and personalized services to maintain relationships, as only about 10% of leads are ready to act immediately.

Accountability and Efficient Systems

Accountability is a cornerstone of Vince’s team culture. Weekly and monthly meetings, along with systems like the 411 and cash call, ensure agents stay on track with their goals. Vince stresses that a strong culture and personal connections are vital for maintaining accountability and performance. Automation is key, with 90% of processes streamlined to ensure consistency and efficiency.

Expansion and Market Share Tracking

As Vince expands into Pennsylvania, he faces the challenge of managing multiple markets. Tracking market share is crucial to gauge performance and growth, even in down markets. Vince’s strategy includes finding the right person to lead the Pennsylvania team and leveraging repeat referrals. Recruiting and building a larger team are essential for supporting his business’s growth.

Recruiting and Building Team Culture

Vince places great importance on recruiting agents who fit well with the team’s culture and are committed to achieving real goals. He describes the process of transitioning agents from showing assistants to buyers’ agents and eventually to listing agents. Building a strong team culture and focusing on personal and professional development are key components of Vince’s approach.

Final Thoughts

Vince also touched on practical aspects such as tracking market share using local and state data, addressing gaps in goal planning by adding more agents, and utilizing CRM systems like Lofty and Salesforce for lead generation and follow-up. He emphasizes the importance of personal growth and finding a balance between work and life.

By incorporating Vince Caropreso’s strategies and insights, real estate agents can enhance their practices, achieve their goals, and drive significant growth in their businesses.

For more tips and insights from top real estate professionals, don’t miss our future OT’s Every Thursday at 11:30 pst on Zoom.

Transcription:

All right, guys, thanks so much for showing up to this week’s OT. Only team, Zoom mastermind, super stoked to have Vince here on on the OT. Just a reminder the purpose of the the OT is is, I know a lot of times agents say they are limited to the knowledge that they have within the building that they work their brokerage out of. And the purpose of the OT is to be able to expand your office, to be able to have access to some of the best producers in all of all of the country. And we always make sure that we talk to teams that are doing at least 100 transactions, that are following the model that the mrea book Millionaire Real Estate Agent book, because following a model helps us, get us, get us to where we want to go faster than doing a trial and error. And so when we talk about big teams, even though you may not be a big team yet, or you are a big team, hearing what other top producers are doing and having that higher level conversation, that’s really what the OT is all about. And so Vince was introduced to me by a guy named Shaq. Uh, he chased me down. He’s a team leader in Maryland. He said, You’ve got to have Vince on on the OT. And so I’m going to go ahead and try to say his name. Vince carpresso. Is that right? Perfect. Vince para um, anyway, he’s, he’s from, uh, from Hanover, Maryland, which is the center, central part of Maryland, uh, Baltimore area. He said he pretty much covers most of the state, except for the west side of the state. Is that right? That’s correct. Yes. The last 12 months did 169 units and $66 million in volume, and he’s super awesome and super excited to have you. So thank you for being here. Vince,

absolutely. I’m looking forward to

it so cool. Well, it should be fun. Let’s go ahead and start. You tell us a little bit about your org chart. What does your org chart look like? How many people do you have on your team, how much admin, all of that kind of stuff. Okay,

so right now we’re running right around 1011, total on our team. We have our central hub is in Maryland, where we have our lead transaction coordinator marketing department. We have a full time in house marketing person does all of our social media, print marketing, all of that. And then my wife, who is my EA, slash, whatever we need to get done, so to speak, right? And then from there, I have a lead agent who is doing is mainly is switching to becoming our trainer. So he’s handling all the training and stuff for our team as well. He’s going to kind of switch over to just doing that. And as far as operationally, that’s all we have, besides a VA right now, a virtual that helps with a lot of back end and system things that we need. As far as agents, I have four full time agents in Maryland. I have another full time agent that started in Pennsylvania last year, and one full time new agent. So and then I myself, I’m, I’m running and managing the team. I’m pretty much out of production. Yeah, that’s, that’s

super cool. I’m super cool. I’m super excited to talk to you a little bit about that and and one of the things I do when we spoke earlier, I do want to talk a little bit about your expansion team and how you expanded into Pennsylvania, and what that that looks like later on, on the leverage portion of that. So I love it. Let’s, let’s talk a little bit about weeds, and we spoke a little bit earlier about about the areas that you get your business, because if you’re fully out of production, you gotta make sure that everybody is fed and getting what they want in in your world, or else they bounce right. And so you said, you said, you track everything. Tell us a little bit about what do you track, and and, and what information do you pull from your tracking to be able to make the decisions to create the leads that you

do? Okay? So I guess we’ll start off with the with the lead sources themselves, as far as what I do with that, so both our CRM, as well as a separate system that I use to track all of our numbers, track the amount of leads they come in, that come in, and then can track them through the whole process, as far as what happens from the first from when they first come in, all the way to close, right then I know my cost per lead is, and what my my ROI is, obviously on each individual lead source. So that is just tracked by the amount, you know, from the time they come in and go through the process. As far as tracking on the agent side to make sure they’re doing their part, I’m tracking how soon they respond, how many phone calls, how many texts, how many emails, our system tells us everything all the way up to the response time, so we know how they’re being. People

love it. Love it. So you said you talked a little bit about you your internet leads to, yep, where do you get your internet? What sources are you hitting? So

this year, that’s starting to change a little bit where I’m actually getting ready to drop one off right now for a little while. But a lot of Google Pay per click. And then we also do a lot of social media based marketing based around our listings and things like that used to do and realtor.com we do a decent amount of realtor.com Zillow, pretty much drop that off completely used to be a big lead source for us. We don’t do it any longer, so it’s mainly as far as internet leads, or there’s really nothing else outside of that. There’s a few little small sources, but the main ones are realtor.com and the PPC. We do a lot of paper play, what? What

percentage of your business comes from your database, database versus the internet leads?

6040, actually, we’re almost, we’re, we’re starting getting a little higher that so 60% repeat referral, repeat, you know, our database, 40% internet leads. You know, basically on our team, the way we have it set up is basically after about, you know, if you don’t have much of a database, users internet leads to grow that, you know, get some sales, grow, grow your database. But after about four to five years, most people on our team can’t even handle any more leads because their database has grown so large. They’re, that’s how they’re, you know, they’re, they’re growing their business from that point forward.

So then let’s talk about this, because we know the time frame of an internet lead. I remember speaking a few years ago, they spoke about the the lifeline of when someone comes into your world on an internet lead to closing a transaction. A lot of times, people think it being just a couple of months. The research says that the ones that I’ve heard 22 months yours maybe lot less, maybe more. What does that look like? Or what follow up system do you have to be able to stay in contact with that lead gen. Could you tell us a little bit about what that follow up system looks

like? Actually, it’s funny about that. There’s an interesting point when we look at our lead so when they come in, they either are typically in the 90 day time frame or 20 to 2426 months. Wow. It’s usually one or the other, a little bit of in between, but a majority of them is either now or it’s almost two years. Is what it’s what

percentage would you say is now versus two years?

I’d be throwing a number out there, but you get out there, it’s very low. I’d say 10% or less.

So 10, about 10% are like, I need help right now, the majority, and honestly,

right now, I feel like it’s drop. It might be even less, but yeah, that’s that would be the most that would that it’s probably a little bit less than that. But yes, yep.

So you have to play the long game

Absolutely.

So let’s, let’s talk about what is the long game look like for you? Because I know that has to do with your database, but you’re still keeping them close. What is your long game look like when it comes to your your internet leads specifically,

okay, so it we have different categories within the database, meaning, you know, if you as a consumer, are responding, you’re interactive. We’re having good conversations. We have different levels at what as to how we’ll serve them, or what we’ll invite them into our world. And so obviously, it’s our automated systems which include emails and texts and videos, videos writing more and more to now. But then we’re also doing quarterly mail outs. If the conversation has been really deep and we feel really strong about it. We do some of the personal touches, birthdays and different things as we get to know them and try to touch them to through social media. And then we also have a few client events a year where we’ll invite everyone versus just our past client, or a list events, if that makes sense, yeah, you know. And then we’re always providing value very, very specific to their property, what, what their equity is, what their buying power is, if they sold their house, that they were selling that sort of thing. So it’s really taking the time to go a little deeper than just sending them what everybody else is going to send them, as far as emails and information. So, so

a lot of this stuff is automated through your systems, in your database. Do you have an ISA? I can’t. I can’t remember if I heard you say that you had an ISA.

We do not, but I’m literally putting that out tomorrow.

Okay, so who’s doing? Who’s making those phone calls? Then is it the agent? I know you’re big into systems, who’s doing, making those phone calls? The agents perfect. So that’s an expectation for them to be able to make those phone calls and be speedy on that phone call. Is that right?

Absolutely. Yeah, they’re required to respond within three minutes. We have our weekly accountability calls. They give me what their goals want to be for the year. They’re not my goals. They’re their goals. We have a system in place that tells them how many calls and how many conversations they need to have to hit their goals, and if they come. Admit to that, then they receive the leads that they don’t and they don’t get leads.

Well, make guys move, move a little bit faster to to make sure commit to that, right? Yeah, we’ll talk a little bit about about that accountability, a little bit is there anything else you want to talk about, maybe when it comes to your systems, when it comes to following up with your clients, working your database and things like that.

Yeah. So we actually have two dash two system. Well, we have way more than two systems, but our two main CRMs, so we have our main system that everybody works through, that that triggers lots of different actions within my team, my marketing team, based off of where they are in the process. If they’re just looking, they’re looking to buy the next 60 to 90 days, or, obviously, if they’re a past client, the marketing team, it’s all about data, right? So the agents are trained to get a lot of information when they speak and engage with with the leads, especially once they’ve met them and kind of brought them into the system. So the follow ups are, you know, besides the obvious pieces, it is regular follow up calls, even though they may be buying, you know, two years from now, yeah, they’re, they’re still touching base with them to see how they can help them. They’re calling them with, you know, to see how they can help them and offer them value, right? Value is the word of the year, right? But I’ve been doing it for 20 years, right? But that’s one of the big things that different. Yeah, a lot of times we end up chasing the new person that just called and said, Hey, want to buy a house now, and that follow up never happens. So between the phone calls the marketing department sending out personalized stuff, holiday mail outs and drop off to their property and things like that, just really staying in touch. We get a lot of phone calls that say or a lot of responses. We just have on our team meeting today where somebody called, he’s been talking to him for two years, and they were like, Chris, look, we’re still not ready, but I promise you, no matter what I’m calling you, we’re not going to use nobody else. And he’s never met him, it’s just having the conversations and staying in touch and being personable with

them. I love it. You said something that I’m interested in. You said you have drop offs from time to time. Yep. What are those drop off drop offs look like?

So it depends on where they where they are on the process. We have Popeyes and stuff like that that we do, you know, for our clients and things like that. And we’ll include those as well, just to let them know that we’re thinking about them and things like that, and the very big they’re very basic, nothing special, to be honest

with you. Tell us that nothing special. I want to be specific. What are some of the things you drop off.

This is where it’s bad. I have to get my marketing department in here, right? But let me think of a most recent

one. Well, see, that’s great. You’re you’ve leveraged all of that out. I love it. You’re like, I don’t think, no, they get something, and

they’re trying. It’s my daughter. She graduated college of marketing, and that’s what she does, right? So I know I can trust them, but the one they did right now,

Stacey, get in here right now, I gotta talk to you.

Yeah, unfortunately, she’s out delivering Popeye’s today, so I can, or I would, she’s right across the hall. So, yeah, I mean, it’s literally little things like, I know, she was doing something with a honey, this, this, this one was a, was a, was a cup with some honey and tea and a spoon. And how we appreciate them. I don’t remember exactly, but it’s very basic, nothing special that you haven’t heard. The difference is we actually do it right? I love it, right? I

love it. I love and, you know, I think this is a key. Is you? You just saying something that simple of honey tea, drop off. I mean, literally, you could drop anything off. Have a little cute, little something you go to go to Hobby Lobby, or Michaels, or whatever. That’s all you need to do. It doesn’t. It doesn’t. I’ve heard people dropping off, you know, filter, air filters, you know, a whole bunch of stuff, but as long as you’re reaching out and coming from contribution, it makes a massive

deal. That’s the bottom line. Yep, we’re just doing it right.

Best answer of the day, by the way. Let’s talk a little bit about your listings. I know you said 6% of your business is on the listing side, and being out of production. I think it’s super interesting. How, how do you have a business of 60% of your business where you’re not going out and doing that the listing presentation, what does that look

like? Number one, in order to that’s a tough one to overcome initially, right? The bottom line is, our culture is very, very strong. I know my people. I I know how they’re trained. I know how they’re going to react, and I just know where they where their heart is right, because it’s a sales business, and it’s going to make you feel if you don’t know your people and you’re not close close to them, you’re going to have a hard time giving that up once you know you have working with you. Notice I didn’t say for me, with you and I, we go through a process. And I used to stumble on this a little because I want to take it. I’m going to go back originally. My first one or two, I had them do presentations to me. I went on listing presentations with them. And to see how they handled it. Now I have a person, Chris, who does the training for me, right? So he makes sure that they’re hitting all the metrics, explain it the way I would explain it, the way I want it explained. And once you have that level of commitment and trust, and it’s easy to do, as far as myself and how I hand that off to you, if you’re my friend, it’s it’s an honest, easy answer, and that is, I’ve been doing this for a long time. I’ve gotten to a point where I spend most of my time growing my business and and and trying to provide the most value for our clients through our business. You want someone who is working out in the field full time with their full focus on serving the client, and I’m not that person. I set them up for success to be able to do that, but they’re going to do a better job to me. I’m here. They’re 10 feet away from me, but the bottom line is they’re going to provide better service to you than I am. And I don’t know that I’ve ever that. I know I’ve lost anybody because of

that. Yeah, you said, you said, surprisingly, people don’t push back. They trust, they trust your process. Which is, which, which is key. And my guess is, because you run majority of your business off of referrals and your database, your systems and your people have to do be doing a great job. And we’re coming around.

They’re seeing the business. They come to the events here. They see how the office is set up. You know that we’re running a true business operation, right? And I’m here. I’m paying attention. If there’s ever a problem, I’m a phone call or yell down the hallway. It’s not like I’m totally disconnected. I’m around. I’m just not gonna, I’m not gonna provide the best service to you one on one, because I have bigger pieces that the team is a whole that requires my time and energy. You know, you try to call me on a Tuesday like I said today, and we’ll talk about that in a minute. But minute. If you call me this morning at nine o’clock, I’m not returning your call till four o’clock. I’m not able to I don’t have five minutes, so yeah, that’s it. Love it. Love it.

Tell us a little bit about you went you decided to get out of production. Why did you decide to do that.

The number one piece, I mean, personally, of course, is to be able to have better control of our time, right? That’s why we want to be able to get people to do have a little more free time, control my schedule. But the biggest, the besides the personal piece, which is that, and that’s obvious, is the fact that the amount of energy that it was taking to really grow the business to the level that I needed to. I was not able to do both at 100% and exactly what I just said, my clients weren’t getting the service that they really needed to get from me, and my business was just getting by. I weren’t I wasn’t able to dig deep, have these conversations and and do what I need to do to grow to business and be as valuable to the people on my team. So I’m not able to serve my clients. I’m not able to serve my agents and my team at a high level, doing both. It was just too much. So

how are you able to have the guts to do that? How did you because, I mean, that’s, that’s, this is my baby. I’ve been working this for 20 years, and all of a sudden I got this idea of, I can’t serve two I can’t serve two masters. I can’t chase two bunnies. And, of course, The Millionaire Real Estate Agent book talks you, talks about how to go seventh level and really remove yourself from that. What? What did you have to do to be able to get your mindset right, to step away?

So the one piece that you always want is, are they doing what they supposed to? Are they following up the way? So yeah, and having the system right now, within a click of a button, I can see what everybody’s done today, down to how many text messages they sent. Like, I know everything that’s going on, right? So there is none of that. Hey, how’s your week going? Oh, it’s going great, you know. But they’ve only qualified people this week, right? Because I found it, you know, at one point I had a system where they could manually input, and then I found people, they were stretching a little bit, you know what I mean? So I have a system where there’s no way around it now. So knowing you have the actual facts as far as what’s going on with your business, and number two, it’s, quite frankly, is culture and accountability. I meet with them, spend a lot of time with them every week, and I know where they are, both personally and professionally. So we’re a family, you hear that, but we, we, we are a family. So I know who I have working, you know, and that has both, that’s a win, that’s a win. It’s known as a challenge, you know. And we’ll get into what my challenge is from that as well.

So are they part of the Italian family?

Some of them, yeah, especially my son, when I was my son. So, of course,

yeah, I know I was just about, I was just thinking of my in laws. Just came to that, oh, I don’t want to go down the path. Let’s talk a little bit about let’s go talk about leverage. You know how Vegas was settled. Let’s talk a little bit about leverage. And I asked you what, what were like your superpowers and things that you’ve actually uncovered. You’re like, I didn’t realize that I was actually really good. In these areas until I could took a step back, talked to a couple of other really big teams, and found out, oh my gosh, I’m actually pretty good in these areas. Tell me a little bit about your leadership and leading those the people on your team. What are you good at?

So one of the biggest pieces, or the biggest piece that I’d say sets us apart is definitely the accountability piece. Very, very good. Like I said on Tuesdays, that’s all I do all day. I meet with 90% of my team. I meet with my someone. Meet with once a month, all of the sales agents I meet with once a week. Okay? The importance of that is number one, to see what they’re what, you know, we do the 411, and and the cash sheet. Me guys use that, but that helps keep the conversation going. It also allows them to hold themselves accountable, because they’re coming in. The goals that we said at the beginning of the year, were their goals, not, not my goals, right? Find out how they’re doing. Are they winning? Are they struggling? Why they may be struggling, or if they’re winning, why are they winning? Because then as soon as that helps us bring that back to the team. The other part of that, and I didn’t realize, if you asked me for years ago, I didn’t think I had it, but I have it more than I realized, is empathy, right? So sometimes you need to, you know, we’re all people, and sometimes you need to truly understand what’s going on in their life. And that’s where those four one ones come into play. Sometimes, because, to be honest, if you’re going to run off on numbers and metrics alone and take that piece out, then you’re possibly losing great players, or you’re not coaching to the right area in their life that they may actually need help. I can’t there’s many times I’ve sent somebody in. I’ve had some of my team and said, Look, I can’t give you. We can’t give any more leads. In fact, we’re going to take everything you’ve gotten here recently away. I need you to go see this person and talk to them about this, to figure this out, because it’s something personal in her life. I can’t help right now, they come back and and there’s some of the top agents in our brokerage of 400 a 400 agents on my team, right? So I’ve just found that actually spending the time doing the the accountability, having a deep conversation, understanding personally and professionally, allows me to grow as well, because I know what their struggles are, because I did lead generation. But when you’re not living and dealing with what they’re doing, doing day by day, and the struggles they are now, like, let’s face it, right now, they’re working a lot harder than they were a couple years ago, right? So if you keep just pushing them to grind, pushing the grind, pushing their grind, and don’t connect with them on a personal level, you can start to lose that. And even, you know, our even though things are a little bit tougher right now, our culture is great and we’re growing, if that makes sense. So,

so if I love this, and I think this is where so many teams struggle with with this portion of that accountability, because you’re being pulled everywhere and and for you to be able to hold people accountable and and have that as a almost family type experience, would you kind of go over the step of what? What is that? That accountability meeting. You said you’ve been holding them every single day. You said, I use the 411, I use the cash, yep. Um, step us through that accountability, that accountability meeting. Is it a half an hour? Is it an hour? Is it 15 minutes? Is it in person? Is it on Zoom,

okay, um, typically, I’d say the average is about 30 minutes. Okay, of course, numbers, I’m around 21 or two based off of like, for example, the one who, he’s Chris, he’s involved in training as well as production, right? He’s slowly, he’s slowly switching over to just training. So we have a conversation and do an accountability, informal, on, on, on production. And then also, then a second piece. As far as training, sometimes his takes, usually about an hour, right? Because we’re covering a lot. But then I’d say your average agent, average person’s 20 to 30 minutes, is what it is.

So do you start off with a 411 Hey, let me see your 411

Yep. So the way it works is they, they create their 411 it’s in Drive. So before they walk in, I’ve pulled it up. They’ve already filled it out. It’s in our Drive file. They come in with it as well. We sit down right here. We go over it. They go over there. We I’m sure most of you heard of the 12 week year, right? So now we’ve kind of switched up one on one to yearly goals, or only talked about quarterly. And otherwise we’re just talking about the monthly, weekly goals, and that’s it. They they have different categories. They’re talking about their what they’re doing for to to hit, for their production goals. What are else they’re working on to help grow their business, and then also financially, making sure they’re hitting their financial goals. And then, of course, their. Personal life, and then when you, when you when you go through that. A lot of times, I have some thoughts in my mind based off of what they’re doing or comments they made, but I usually keep it to myself. Try not to say anything. Let them go through it, because in the cash sheet, cashy usually brings out a lot of how they’re feeling right. It talks about their their attitude, what they’ve learned this week, what struggles are they having? What are their wins, that sort of thing. Let them go through that, and then I feed off of that, if that makes sense, to find out where they are mentally.

So let’s talk about so for those who are listening, they’re not familiar with the 411 and the cash call. So the 411 basically takes the annual goal. It’s a sheet that you’ll learn if you read the Millionaire Real Estate Agent book, not the Millionaire Real Estate Agent book, but the one thing book talks about the 411, and if you’re at Keller Williams, it’s basically Gary Keller’s business plan for a billionaire. And it basically takes your annual goal and breaks it down into monthly and weekly goals and weekly tasks. And so you start every single every meeting asking for that 411 if they do not have the 411 updated, or in the drive, what do you

do? They don’t show up?

Okay, perfect, perfect. And so that tells you a lot if they don’t show up or if they don’t have it done. That shows you the engagement of that person. Is that correct?

Oh, yeah, I do. Occasionally, somebody had a crazy Sunday and Monday. They’re like, you know, put three or 400 contract pulling my hair out. I’m not ready to be honest, but I have a couple things I want to talk to you about. If they’re doing good overall, I’ll allow that anybody I mean, it might, might happen once a year. It’s not common at all.

So So I love this, because many teams struggle with this meeting. They don’t know what to do and what to bring and the structure you said the things that when you spoke to other really big teams, they said, This is what you’re great at. And you realize that too, is having that 411, and having a process or a system to bring them through, and then from that, you bring them to the cash call that cash call A stands for knowledge, yep, right. A stands for attitude. S stands for skills. That’s right. Thank you. And and H stands for habits. Yep. And you go through that and you ask some skill from one to 10, how? How high are you on your skills and stuff? Is that? Is that? How you use the cash call?

Well, they’ll talk, let’s say, for example, skills. They’ll talk about, sometimes, to be honest, if you’ve been an agent, well, you might come like, look, I have three of these things. I haven’t learned any new skills this week. That’s fine. Or here’s a new skill I learned, I think we need to bring it to the team. Or here’s a skill that I feel like I realized in some of my numbers, I’m really struggling when I need some help here. So you can go multitude of ways. It can go from where they’re winning, where they’re struggling, or where they can bring value to the team, any of those aspects. You know, I love

it using the 411, and the cash call, cash form. I call it the cash call in a meeting. That’s all you really needed. Uncovers almost everything, all the problems, where you can now take that last part and coach them up on it. Is that right? Absolutely,

yeah. And I think we’re a lot of people struggle. Is the cash call, especially if you’re newer on the team, people struggle with it. They’re like, this is weird. You’re like, I’m telling you all my personal stuff, all my personal financials, like, everything. But the more they start to see progress through that, then they get more comfortable. So you can get past, usually the past 60 days of people really being engaged in, buying in. They don’t really have a choice. It’s the standard. But you can tell whether somebody’s really buying in or they’re just telling you what you want to hear after the first couple of times, right? But when you start seeing people hit their financial and personal goals, because at the end, that’s why we’re doing it, right, and you see it on paper, and you know they are, that’s where you create the culture and keep happy people that you can trust,

yeah, no doubt. And this, this relationship that comes from the cash call and the 411 you said, before we spoke, we spoke, or before, before we came on. You said, I have a lot of people, though, if they leave my team, they’re leaving the business, because I retain my agents, and I, my guess is this meeting that you have once a week. Is the reason why? Absolutely, 100%

um, since 2014 I we don’t. We’re not a revolving door. Most of the people that come stay, but the few that haven’t, only one is in the business, the rest of them all got out of the business. Everybody else has

stayed. Really, really amazing. Alright, well, let’s go ahead and move on to this. Just I’ve got three or four more questions, and we’re going to open up to the group, just a reminder. Write down your questions, raise your digital hand, so we can make sure that you guys can ask the questions that you want. You’re welcome to start doing that now and then. We’ll, we’ll, we’ll get to that after these next few questions. So what have you. Earned over the last 12 months leading your team

that I should have been building a bigger bench all along. What do you mean by that? So I kind of run what you hear the conversation of the SEAL team, right? I have a SEAL team, very high, productive, very, very big goals, very committed, like you name it, we have it, but when your market’s down 40% they can only do so much, right? So as I’m continuing to grow, overhead is growing and things like that, you may not be able to get the same amount that you were getting out of them before, right? So that that’s part of it. And then the other one to help. This is two things, but I think these kind of go hand in hand. The other pieces, and this actually came directly from care Gary, was to track your market share. And what that’s done for my team, because it’s been a little bit tougher, is we’re still gaining market share exponentially in this state and region, if that makes sense. So even though it’s struggling, we may not be hitting the numbers we want to hit. We’re still winning. Make sense? Yeah, for sure, Gary said it’s just two years ago, and I came back and said this, we’re going to start tracking. And yeah, it’s tremendous. It’s a mindset piece, and it really, really, really helps. It also allows you as an owner, to know how you’re doing, right? Because you know your numbers may be less than they were before, but if you’re still growing market share and growing then when things pick back up, you should, you should explode, to be honest, right?

That’s right. That’s right. What do you feel like you needed to learn over the next six months or the next year, what? What adjustments do you feel like you need to be making?

Yeah, I’ll be. I have two things could I couldn’t separate the two, and you’ll see why they’re important in no particular order. The first one is just making the recruiting piece. Because I don’t have a recruiting my son’s is is learning to help with it. He’s doing some more training. So incorporating that into what I do on my daily, my, you know, my one, one to three things that I focus on every day, that has to become one of those, right? Just because if I added 30% to my to my team, then I’d be hitting the same goals that I want, that I hit last year, or about whatever, right or I’ll continue to and from there, I’ll continue to grow by that amount. The other one, which is a bigger challenge and I’m learning, is how to as we’re starting to create some operation larger operations positions. Because I don’t know if I mentioned I just started Delaware too, so just got licensed in Delaware. So I’m trying to launch an office in Delaware as well and manage Pennsylvania, which is only 10 months old now, and Maryland and everything’s growing. How do I get the people that I’m coaching teaching to think like I do? That’s been a tough one at the at the higher level decisions, right? I said that you always have this culture and the same environment as you grow, because that’s harder, the bigger you get, that’s harder, right? So they they make some great decisions, but then I always have this little piece. I’m like, Yeah, but I would do it this way. So what it is, I’m just learning, I’m actually going to an event in June that really specifically helps with this? I’m flying out to Seattle to help with this, so that I learned to communicate well, so that they literally continue what we’ve created based off of standards and culture, so we can, you know, so that we continue to have this success.

Would you mind sharing what event that is that’ll help you with that? Okay, you don’t have to.

There’s a specific reason for that. Yeah, not at this point.

Yeah, no problem. I get it. So let’s talk a little bit about expansion before I get into I got one more question for you. You expansion to Pennsylvania, and you said you’re now expanding into Delaware. Tell me a little bit about how does someone expand into two different marketplaces? What requires you to do it? What’s the drive behind that? And how are you able to do that logistically?

So I did it the hard way, but I did it because, you know, the bottom line is, we got tired of referring so much business to southern Pennsylvanian dollar, yeah, we’re looking at numbers, and we were given how a 3040, a year, and we’re like, alright, what we going to do? So myself, not I’m not saying this the best but the best method, but it worked myself and Chris on my team, we got our PA license. It’s very easy to do. It’s reciprocal. No big deal. I didn’t take one class, and we ran an hour up and down the road, up and down the road. So we started getting some transactions going, then I actually found a bold coach that actually wanted to join my team, and we’re just going from there. She joined me last year, just finding the right person. Otherwise it was Chris and I and my team just supporting it on referrals and repeat. You know what I mean? Wasn’t, wasn’t marketing at all. Uh, nothing like that. It was just strictly repeat referral. That’s, you know, just that part of the database. And because it just wasn’t, the commissions were higher, they were selling the price points lower, and we so we kept it. Then once we found the right person, I put her in a position to start leading that team up there, little by little, and that’s been, she’s been full time since June. So

how do you find that person? To

be honest, they found me. Tell me about it. She had just heard how I operate, the standards on my team, the culture and the accountability, and heard that I was looking to expand up there, and she wanted to meet with me to see if we were good fit. How’d

she hear about it

through I so I belong. So our brokerage here is not in Pennsylvania, so I’m part of the brokerage up there in Pennsylvania, and she’s was tied into the group up there, and that’s how, just being in the brokerage, somebody talked about it, and just, yeah, just word of mouth kind of thing, wow. Love it.

Love it. Love it. Love it. Okay, so you’re Italian. I’m sure your mom was an amazing cook. Best Italian meal.

Every Christmas Eve, we I do a thing called the Feast of Seven Fishes, and part of that is a seafood spaghetti sauce. The main ingredients octopus. Most people that know me, they look for my pictures and my huge, four foot octopus that I cook every Christmas Eve. So I’m going to say that, and it includes octopus, scallops, mussels, shrimp. Think that’s everything, as far as as far as as far as far as seafood in the spaghetti sauce. So that’s my favorite outside of that. And the normal standard is a is a would be a really good chicken parmesan,

seafood spaghetti. Never heard of it. Sounds amazing. And, yeah, sign me up for that. When we covered, Christmas is not too far away. Be here

before you know it. I’m

inviting myself.

You got it? I think I couldn’t be able to come. I think they just come for that though. To be honest,

I love it. Yeah, you are getting Parmesan. Chicken. Chicken Parmesan for Christmas. Alright, so let’s, let’s open up to the group. We’ve got a couple of hands raised. We’re going to go ahead and start with Ozzy, and then we’ll go with Ivy. And then anybody else who has questions, raise your digital hand. And we’ve got about another 15 minutes with with Vince. So go ahead. Ozzy, do your thing. Hey,

Vince, thank you so much for sharing and your generosity. Super appreciate it. My, my only simple question here would be, is about tracking market share. How do you do that? What’s the mechanics behind tracking market share?

So my the VA runs in numbers in the MLS based off of our sales and the we actually use the local county, our main, main area, right where we do majority, a good portion of our business, and then the state, okay? So we do a percentage of buyers, the percentage for sellers, and a percentage of the total sales, so we know where we’re winning in both areas, both listings or buyers, as well as total total sales, if that makes sense. So we look at the amount of settlements or closings that we had compared to the market share. Gives you that percentage. Perfect. Thank you. Makes sense.

Awesome. Thanks. Ozzy Ivy, you’re next.

Well, once again, thank you, Vince. I love it and love everything that you said. So I have a few questions real quick. One is and it kind of popped into me when you were talking about goal planning with your agents, and I immediately thought of the gap. So what happens? I mean, how do you incorporate? Are you looking at your goal and then incorporating what your goal is, or what happens when you do your goal and you don’t have enough aid and there’s this gap,

then you need to add more people? Yeah, so that’s right. I

mean, I just My first thought was that, and

that wasn’t. And I guess one thing I didn’t talk with, it’s really, really important, and it’s super important, really. So I grew the business to a certain point at 2019 give or take, I was in pretty good shape, working about four days a week, full time, mentally, working seven days a week, of course. And I was kind of good where I was at. But then my son decided to, he wanted to get in the business. Now my daughter’s in the business, so now that’s pushed me to want to grow. And that’s a big piece that I actually left out the conversation. I was in good shape there. So now I need to grow to the next level to help make a bigger opportunity for everyone, right? So that’s a big piece. And I got off, what did you ask me? What was the first part of that question? I.

I was just wondering, like, what would happen like, when you have a gap, right? Because if you’re you mentioned how you were goal planning right with your agents. And then my as a I ran Rick and Terry’s team for a long time, so immediately I thought of, well, what happens when there’s a gap? Yep,

well, up until this past year, I’ve never had Okay, usually they were exceeding where I needed to be personally, if that makes sense, and then that allowed me to go buy other businesses and buy other investments and do other things, if that makes sense, right? It didn’t show up until this year, when I went to be honest. I can’t expect them to do anymore. And, yeah, I should have been hiring a few more minutes, right? Let’s be honest, right? There’s still top producers. They’re doing great, but they can only do what they can do. So yeah, that’s all. It was never an issue until now. And now is where I realized, Okay, I just need to be I need to have the bench. The bench needs to be growing

all the time, right? And then. So if we’re leaning into the recruiting piece of it, where, I think that’s what you said. You were starting to build that so maybe we can hold off onto that question, because then my next question would be like, where would you anticipate finding these people? Right? Because you’re one of your key things is, I want to make people think like I do, right? So obviously you want to find people that think like you do. Well,

that is, in that piece is when you’re start talking about operationally and management wise, okay, making business decisions, right? The number one thing is they have to fit culturally, period, right? And the culture is the number one piece. And outside of that, as far as the recruiting piece, that’s always a challenge, as far as the best way to do it right now. I met with some national teams so far this year, which Dan and I talked about earlier. They’ve given me some tips. So I’m going to try that based off of metrics to go after some some agents that are in the market. I’m big. One piece we haven’t touched, and we’re not going to get on that path right now, is systems. I’m a huge, huge systems guy as well. So I have a lot of a lot to offer, even an experienced agent based off with between the leverage, the systems and the accountability. So what I found is, I met with people the value that we actually offer. We actually offer a lot of value. And it’s not just print on paper as when I understand, you know, the the answers I’m getting from people when I meet them is like, Wow, you really offer a lot. You actually going to do it? Is the question I get. So I had them meet with the team and talk to them and find out that it is real. We actually do offer a lot for those that are on our team. Okay,

all right, that’s awesome. And then I don’t know if I missed this piece, and thank you, by the way, what is your standard on the team? Because I heard, you know, and our standards, and I was like, did I miss that? What is the standard? I mean, are you submit? Other words, I’m taking it. Are your agents split buyer and listing, or are they doing both buying and listing? Which model first come

on the team? If you’re if you haven’t been at this day, if you’re new, if you’re new, if you’re new, you start off as showing assistant, earn the ropes. Then from there, you become a buyer’s agent, then you can, then you earn the right to be the listing agent.

Okay, end up working. Okay, okay. And so what is the standard on the team? Then,

in what aspect? There’s a lot. We have lots of standards.

Oh, okay, um,

let’s say, if

you’re a buyer’s agent, what would the standard be? What would you need to close in the year to stay on your to stay on your team?

It depends on what your goals are, okay? So

it is goal oriented. Okay? Now

we like, for example, we do we I don’t take part time anymore. That’s a lesson learned. Okay, you have to be full time. I will tell you that, right? And we, if you want to talk about, and I’ve never, honestly never, thought about this, if you took, if you’re asking more question of what, overall, our standard, which is more of a culture, the big one that that comes out in conversation the most is you have to have real goals. Do you come here and see actually want to make 100 grand? Why? If you don’t have actually interest to that, then you’re not a good fit for the culture, if that makes sense.

Okay, yeah, it does. So then let’s let me backtrack it real quick, just real quick, and then I’ll let someone else ask, because I see Matt raised his hand, how long would a showing assistant need to be in order to graduate, I guess, right, to a buyer’s agent.

I’ve had them do it as quick as 90 days, and had ones take a year, okay? Years by pushing it honestly, it really depends how quick they pick it up. You know, you know what I’m saying. Somebody was maybe in the industry, or understands industry, because if they’re brand new, they don’t understand or know anything, right? The biggest thing is, I want to know and make sure they’re comfortable in giving the answer. They’re telling somebody I don’t know the answer. I’m going to get you the information, very basic stuff, but until you can trust them to be out there representing your name the team. Because I take the team very seriously. You know, it’s not about me. I mean, it is about me, obviously, but it they’re affecting everyone on the team. If. They don’t represent the team well, and they have to prove to us that we can trust in them to do that

awesome. And I may reach out to you later in regards if that’s okay with you. In regards to the model I’d like, I wouldn’t mind seeing that model someone starting off a show as a showing assistant, and how the compensation where, I mean this is not, you know, the thing for it. If you don’t mind me reaching out. Okay, perfect. Thank you. I appreciate you. Thank

you. Absolutely,

always awesome. Matt, you’re up.

Um, so I might have missed it too. But did you tell you? Tell us what CRM you use and then piggyback on that, like, how much of those you know you pop bys and all that, how much of this of your stuff is automated and compared to not or maybe you put, I don’t ask my

question on a made. Okay, so first off, we use lofty and Salesforce and sales. Salesforce is a custom platform that I had built up specifically for our team by the by Salesforce directly. So they built it for us, and that’s what the marketing department you know, we can customize everything to, you know, what type of team event we have, do those people come? What type of wine do they like? I mean, it’s very, very customizable and very, very specific, and that’s the level we get. For example, a wine event, did do are they? Do you invite them? Yes or no, did they come? Yes or no, what type of wine do they like, you know? So we, that’s why we use that level of a system, so we can provide that personalized service. And then on the other side of the initial lead gen, lead generation side, we’re using lofty and what was your second question,

just how much of it is, like automated like, do you have follow ups and things like that? So you said you talked about Popeyes and all kinds of stuff. I was just curious about how much you know is the system was telling you to do that, or was like, I don’t

know. I’m a Systems guy, so everything system, everything’s automatic. So for example, I just got off a 401 and somebody had a question, so it’s on the top of my mind. So for example, if you settle with us, you close with us. Popeyes are based off of their last name, so certain months of the year they do certain letters, if that makes sense. So after they close, they get marked off. If they’re they’re done for, you know, three times a year, so every four months. So the one we were just talking about was, what, February, June, October, whatever, something like that. So it’s put in the system, and then it just notifies the, you know, the marketing department knows for next month they have this amount of Popeyes. They order that many supplies. They build them, and they deliver so, yeah, everything is, for the most part, automated. All the follow ups, everything, with the exception of, obviously, if you’re having a personal conversation with one on one with with a person based off of their situation, they’re putting manual input follow up or calls or things like that. Or they see something on Facebook where somebody had a baby or maybe something negative happened their life. They’re said. They send in a message over the market and send out a gift or a card or whatever so. But even our whole transaction process, if you ask me, probably 9795 90% of our processes are off. And that’s come from me as well. That’s something else. Those are my two things. Accountability and systems is where I find that what my strengths are.

Thank you. Yep, awesome

question. Matt, appreciate it. Vince, you’ve been freaking so awesome, and I’ve got a couple of direct messages talking about about how great you were. If someone wanted to send a referral to Maryland, we’ll just call it the whole state, or Delaware or Pennsylvania. What’s the best, best way for them to be able to reach out to you and send that referral?

It’s a phone number they can you can call or text 41034, 4800, okay. Or 41030433844800,

perfect, okay,

or that. I mean, you can send me a message through Instagram if you want, if that’s your thing, Vince carpresso or email is okay, just don’t expect the response right away. That’s why you know if, if I see referral in there, it’ll stand out. Just make sure it stands out and then. But it best to make sure you text that number as well. Days like today, perfect example, I haven’t checked my email yet today, except for you, I had to go in. Go and find something for you to jump on this call. Right? I’ve been doing accountability since 715 so there’s just times I don’t get to it and I want to respond right away. So

I love it. So so phone number and Instagram is your best, two best ways to reach

I can we can do email, Vincent, teamcarpresso.com, absolutely, just a combination of the text and email would be preferred,

as long as they send you big, gigantic referrals, right? Doesn’t

matter. It’s all about the relationship.

Dude, you are so good. I love your attitude. I love your leadership. I’m grateful for your your your kindness and sharing with, with with all the agents that are and. Not only on Zoom, but able to to see this later on in the Facebook group, and thanks for being a part of the Facebook group too. Any last words before we bounce? Nope,

I was waiting for everybody else, but for me, no, I don’t, I don’t think, I think we’ve covered everything. One thing, I guess, a big thing from this past year, I make sure I have all my notes here. I’ll be honest and just look. I covered everything. But one thing with me is, I like to chase the growth, you know, always looking for something bigger. But I did learn in reading The Happiness Advantage last year that book, yeah, right. I’m going to bring that up because it learned. I learned to slow down a little bit and just enjoy, you know, because it’s not about wanting things. I just want to keep growing and keep as long as you get caught up in the well, if I do that, then that’ll be good. If I do that. Well, guess what? If you’re a person I like me that never You’re never satisfied, right? So that learner and my wife is much happier too. We bought a RV, and I enjoy life a little more, right? Just to say, hey, you know, I don’t need to always be chasing that, if that makes sense. So that’s been a big one. Love it.

I hear it’s important to keep keep her wife happy. Yes,

absolutely. Or happy wife happy life, right? Wisest

words of all of this, ot today, awesome guys. Well, thank you so much for being here. Can’t wait to see you guys next week. And just little side note, cross your fingers and do a lot of praying. I’ve got I’m wrestling at Nationals tomorrow. I’m super hungry. I gotta make way some really scary guys. Just hope that I don’t come back crying and,

yes, don’t hurt yourself.

I’ve gotten my stitches all taken care of too. So we’re we’re all good, but cross, cross your toes next week that I come back with something worth something, otherwise we’ll be talking a little humble pie. Alright?

Thank you. Vince,

absolutely good luck. Dan.

You guys are awesome. Thank you.