Ever felt the magnetic pull of a brand that just oozes sophistication? Our latest guest, Chloe Powell - a real estate maven, takes us behind the scenes of her transformation from a simple Canva creation to a luxury brand powerhouse. She's not only reshaped her image but revolutionized the way she mentors and markets in the property game. As she shares her journey, you'll learn how to harness the power of video and why sipping tea at her exclusive networking club could be your next golden opportunity. Her diverse career leap from medical research to marketing maven is a testament to the seamless marriage of sales and strategy.
It's time to unravel the real estate industry's obsession with social media frequency and why it's not the holy grail of career advancement. Tune in to discover the art of cultivating genuine connections rather than chasing the next 'like'. Our guest demystifies lead generation, encouraging self-sufficiency over dependency on paid prospects. Learn how a culture of knowledge sharing can elevate a team's dynamic, and why the most significant success metrics might just be hiding in your social media strategy.
Wrapping up, we reflect on the delicate dance between our online personas and the person behind the screen. Authenticity isn't just a buzzword; it's the foundation for meaningful interaction and trust. We share tricks for radiating genuineness on camera, and glimpse into the future of marketing, where podcast partnerships and storytelling reign supreme. But beyond techniques and trends, we're reminded of the importance of self-care, grounding, and embracing life's quiet moments. So, take a beat, listen in, and let's navigate the balance of ambition and inner peace together.
Ever felt the magnetic pull of a brand that just oozes sophistication? Our latest guest, Chloe Powell - a real estate maven, takes us behind the scenes of her transformation from a simple Canva creation to a luxury brand powerhouse. She's not only reshaped her image but revolutionized the way she mentors and markets in the property game. As she shares her journey, you'll learn how to harness the power of video and why sipping tea at her exclusive networking club could be your next golden opportunity. Her diverse career leap from medical research to marketing maven is a testament to the seamless marriage of sales and strategy.
It's time to unravel the real estate industry's obsession with social media frequency and why it's not the holy grail of career advancement. Tune in to discover the art of cultivating genuine connections rather than chasing the next 'like'. Our guest demystifies lead generation, encouraging self-sufficiency over dependency on paid prospects. Learn how a culture of knowledge sharing can elevate a team's dynamic, and why the most significant success metrics might just be hiding in your social media strategy.
Wrapping up, we reflect on the delicate dance between our online personas and the person behind the screen. Authenticity isn't just a buzzword; it's the foundation for meaningful interaction and trust. We share tricks for radiating genuineness on camera, and glimpse into the future of marketing, where podcast partnerships and storytelling reign supreme. But beyond techniques and trends, we're reminded of the importance of self-care, grounding, and embracing life's quiet moments. So, take a beat, listen in, and let's navigate the balance of ambition and inner peace together.
Speaker 1:
We were talking about all the pretty things, because you walk in and it's pretty like two pieces like blue suit with these silver likes not sparkling, but they sparkled Heels. In terms of like pretty. Your brand is so pretty. Why have you put so much time, love and energy into building and curating your brand?
Speaker 2:
Well, I think when I first started, I came from a different career and I wanted to basically show myself as expertise and I think with that comes, you know, you need to look luxurious or you need to look put together At least that's like in the back of my mind at all times Like good marketing really does help sales and drive sales. So when I first started I was like okay, well, I got to create a name, I got to do this, I got to do that. So I started. My first logo was from Canva. It was not good. Then I had something to make it for me and then I got a brand photo shoot done and then I started using all of that and this was before.
Speaker 2:
Like people were actually like posting anything online and then my stuff came out and it was at the retreat at Cool Springs. It's like you can't hire it anymore, but I think the owner of Luckets owned it. So it was like restoration hardware at the Wazoo, like beautiful, and it just looked different and I think that's what helped me like stand apart from everyone else because I was new, but I looked like I knew what I was doing. And then online I actually trained myself like how to do real estate by doing the videos, because I didn't really know like real estate, like I had bought and sold my own houses but like didn't really know the ins and outs of like all the legal jargon on the contracts and everything. So I learned all of that, I trained myself by doing the videos and then now I train all my clients how to do all these things and that's I mean.
Speaker 1:
But you should train your clients on how to do all the things. Which clients, which things?
Speaker 2:
Like people and I think that having real estate advice or real estate knowledge is very powerful, because that's how you can grow wealth Like everyone should have. I always say everyone should have a realtor in their family, because they teach you what to do. They teach you whether something is a good or a bad investment, whether or not you should make that step, or maybe you should hold out for a few years or something, but I don't know. I've always been a lover of pretty things. I love the finer things in life, but I also like getting a bargain, and I know like we have a secret society that I'm forming with another friend of mine and it's afternoon tea club. So it's like you know, think of it's not a secret anymore.
Speaker 2:
Think of like a networking event. That is more feminine energy, because I feel like most of the real estate agents I see online are very masculine. Even the women are like trying to be like a boss ass bitch type of energy. And I'm like that's never been me. I've never been a cool kid, I've always been the weird one, or like not weird, but just you know different, and like I've never really cared what anyone else thought of me. So I think it's okay to do that, it's okay to be who you are. I mean, that's what's great right about all of us and that's what's great about good marketing, because you can be who you are.
Speaker 1:
I'm not concerned about the secret society that you started.
Speaker 2:
It hasn't started yet, but it's happening.
Speaker 1:
Is it going to be like a networking thing? Are you allowed to say that, but are you?
Speaker 2:
allowed to share. Yeah, it's a networking thing. It's fight only, but feminine, low commitment, not intense, not BNI-ish, no offense no shame Well you can't say BNI, because that's like oh, is that? Yeah, I think it's like. You know people like the BNI. I personally am not a BNI person. You used to be president of mine.
Speaker 1:
It's like very intense, though it is intense, that's a good word, I think you have to wake up so early. It's like a tight committed middle.
Speaker 2:
It's not a word. Usually at 6 or 7 am, I don't wake up that early. I'm a sleep person, I'm not an early pricester.
Speaker 1:
Why do I see this event networking event that you're why do I see it like an Alice in Wonderland type thing? Before you guys go into a hidden garden.
Speaker 2:
Well, someone always says. Actually, one of my realtor friends from North Carolina just sent me a Bridgerton cake mix and there's one video I did like a few years ago of me in a Bridgerton outfit.
Speaker 1:
Oh, how cute.
Speaker 2:
And so now everyone knows me as the Bridgerton girl and they sent me Bridgerton stuff.
Speaker 1:
You rock that thing for this.
Speaker 2:
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1:
I love that. Okay, so what job did you come from? You said that you started a different job where it was yeah, so I started work when I was like 15 years old.
Speaker 2:
I was a medical assistant and then I wanted to go to medical school to become a doctor. I essentially could not pass the test. I tried multiple times, so I decided to get my master's in biotechnology and while I was doing that I worked for the Army studying blast traumatic brain injury and did animal surgery all day long.
Speaker 1:
That is one heck of a work history.
Speaker 2:
And then I did sales and consulting.
Speaker 2:
For about six years I was like director of innovation, director of growth for multiple companies and that's a pretty visual piece of your-.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I mean I was helping companies Like, kind of well, I did sales, I did consulting, but then I was helping companies like figure out how to get more sales through marketing, because I think a few years ago people didn't really understand that like Sales and marketing were really close together. I mean I think now, even now, like people like you know big brands like from the science industry, from tech, from like government agencies, they don't agree that like the sales and marketing should be combined. They're still in those outdated mindset where it's like, okay, well, sales needs to do this, but sales can't do their job if they don't have the marketing or the resources behind them, you know, to tell the message, to help them with copywriting, to help them convey the message to the end user. And I think that that's why I really like Real Estate, because really Real Estate is marketing. It's like the biggest marketing experiment you could probably do what you're so good at. I'm still learning, you know it's hard to do everything.
Speaker 1:
You'll always keep learning that right.
Speaker 2:
Yeah.
Speaker 1:
Do you ever like stop learning when it comes to marketing and sales?
Speaker 2:
I don't think I would be satisfied if I was just sitting at home and I knew everything. I think it's nice to have something that always changes.
Speaker 1:
So what are some of your secret tips?
Speaker 2:
I mean, I think that you don't necessarily need to post all that often anymore. I think, really, once you have built that community, people will reach out and message you and, like I'll post in my stories. People will message me and then, like the last month I have not been as cohesive, I have not been as consistent as I would like, but yet last month was the biggest month of my career and I didn't post that much, you know, and that's my biggest driver from social media. So I've proven that. Like okay, well, you don't have to post that much. I mean, yes, for growth you do, but you can also do it with speaking to your audience directly and then converting them from there.
Speaker 2:
I think a lot of people think it's just posting videos and pretty pictures from the talks that I do. People don't understand that. It's like an actual strategy that you have to use. You have to have a way to convert them, like follow up with them, like either on email or like some sort of DM. Follow up, like people use many chat, but that's the way that people are converting. Now you know you have to get them off of Instagram or off in the conversations, because that's where relationships happen.
Speaker 1:
I agree and that seems so obvious. Where's the disconnects? Why aren't most people seeing that?
Speaker 2:
where it's just like a just blasting their social with like stuff, homeless things and well, I think there's a disconnect with realtors overall because they are they're taught from the very beginning that they need to pay for leads and I think that they have a trouble. They have a fear mindset right their scarcity mindset mindset where they think those leads are going to go away if they don't keep paying for them, and they don't know how to control their situation, create their own opportunity and create their own leads. They think that, you know, some people don't want to make these changes, you know, but ultimately, in the long run, you have to create a marketing platform that beats Zillow at what they're doing. You need to be able to create the strategy that converts people, creates those relationships, uses relationships and ultimately converts them into real sales volume. And I think people are just scared. They don't know how to do it or they don't understand that they need to be doing this for the future, otherwise they're not going to be. They're not going to be doing this for long.
Speaker 1:
Tell me this is true or false. I'm not a real estate agent never have been but I've worked with a lot of agents and my overall feelings are a lot of agents get into the real estate world and they join teams. It is in the best benefit for the team leaders to not teach them how to fish but rather just give them the fish. That way you always kind of stay there. But maybe this is completely wrong. But you always stay there because you're reliant on those leads coming in.
Speaker 1:
And then I've also heard from agents where they're like they promised me so many leads. They didn't deliver those leads, and so now I got to go figure out how to fish. Is that an accurate analysis or not?
Speaker 2:
so much I mean it definitely is the case with some teams. I know a few teams that do it like that. They pay for Zillow, they pay lots of money for ads and everything. They do give their team members those leads. But I mean it's of the best interest for the team leader to teach their team members how to convert right. It's really not of the best interest of the team leader to teach them how to create their own leads, because once they have that, they can leave. So you have to create a team environment that makes them want to stay. So I think that's provided with culture and everything. I do see a lot of. Well, there are some people I can think of who do that and the only thing that they struggle with is turnover because they are teaching them, they're educating on how to do that.
Speaker 2:
If I was going to run a team, that's what I would want. I would want them to learn how to do everything that I do. But how do you keep them? And I think that's it's also hard because most agents are controlling and we want to do everything and like handing it off and delegating is difficult. So it's definitely it's something that I think a lot of agents don't do is like educating anyone Like I mean.
Speaker 2:
Hardly any of them want to collaborate or share their knowledge. Or if they're sharing knowledge, they're not going deep, they're just giving like the surface level, like freebie stuff, which those aren't the people I want to surround myself with. The people I want to surround myself with are the people who are able to mentor me or able to help me, and you don't have to be part of a team to do that. But there are the people who are successful, aren't scared of sharing how they are successful, but the people who are scared of sharing they may look like they are successful but they're not really. They're just putting money at a problem essentially, and that's what I see.
Speaker 1:
Saying that money will run out.
Speaker 2:
I don't know. That's one question I see that I always think about, like when I got into this industry, I'm like, okay, well, real estate is very much award centric. It's everyone seems to be like, oh, I'm the top 500. I'm the top 100. I'm the number 1% in this area. But I'm like, well, I really wish I could know how much money you made at the end of the day. Like, how much do you spend on marketing? How much did you spend on paid leads? How much did you spend on online advertising? Because I mean, I look at where my clients come from and my spend is so low because, you know, 58% of my business comes from social media and the only it's really my time and energy and I'm not really paying professional content unless it's part of my listings, but it's a very low cost compared to like paying 10,000 plus per month for a zill, at least you know, no-transcript. I think people need to ask themselves are the awards really worth like spending all this additional money?
Speaker 1:
Yeah. I don't know you've Really fine-tuned a skill set, though, when, when it comes to content creation, which a lot of people not just agents, but overall business owners they don't want to spend their time and energy Learning and mastering and practicing which is fine, because then you're paying somebody else to do it for you, but Now you're paying. Yeah, I'm with your money or your time.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I mean, it is really difficult. I don't think people understand how difficult it is to actually create content, and also create content that converts and then actually has a strategy behind it, I think it. So we feel like we have to post. Sometimes I feel that as well, but I Don't know. I feel like it's necessary, like you have to be on social media now, whatever platform that is for you, you know do you help other agents?
Speaker 1:
Do you have I felt like I've seen a master class or something that you put together?
Speaker 2:
to help guide. Yeah, I just taught a Out of retreat in Virginia Beach. We had like 40 women there, Not too shabby, and then I have a. I really am not trying, I don't really want to sell a course. That's not what I'm trying to be. I'm not trying to be like a coach or anything. I really just like my bread and butter is always gonna be real estate, but I like sharing because I know at the end of the day my colleagues will be better off because of it.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, you know and you guys all work together. Oh yeah, an agent doesn't do a transaction by his self or herself. Yeah, we're always collaborating with other people to get a deal done.
Speaker 2:
I mean, someone told me I could charge three thousand dollars for the course I taught and I was like, yeah, but I Don't know, I just I don't want yet. Yeah, eventually, and I can live on an island or something, but it it's just, I think that's imposter syndrome or something too. That's why I said yet.
Speaker 1:
Because when somebody's got a skill set and they're really like at the top of their league and I just haven't recognized it yet, yeah, it takes a while and they're like you know what? I could serve more people if I can, yeah, package this up and really Do it in a certain way.
Speaker 2:
But I think everyone's selling a course now and they're not exactly like the people that actually should be selling courses. I was just talking about them.
Speaker 1:
I can't stand it when we were actually talking about college professor when the college professors are teaching about running a business and like have they ever ran a business? No, they should not be teaching these. Yeah, it's specifically for other photographers. They should not be teaching these photographers how to run a business, because all the advice they are giving that I'm hearing you tell me is Crap and it's actually gonna be the reason why you're gonna fail. Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 2:
No, but it's so true. Half of these people have never done these things.
Speaker 1:
And they're like this is how you do it, maybe, and I'll show you the way.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, or, and then sometimes you pay for the course because you're like kind of curious of what they're like selling, and then it's like terrible.
Speaker 1:
You're like this is chat GPT.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it is, but this time it is, though. I mean, I know some people who run courses and that's how they did it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:
I know because they teach. They teach you how to create a course by going to chat GPT. But I think that also leads to asking the right question. I think consumers are starting to become a little more savvy when it comes to I hope so at least. What is your experience? You know, like you're teaching about ABNC Mm-hmm, how did you learn this?
Speaker 2:
I mean? What do you mean? Like the consumer, like the clients, or, and everything I'm talking about?
Speaker 1:
like course, producers, like the people that are purchased, I think that they're starting to get a little more aware. Yeah, and they're starting because they've been burned so many times that they're like Okay, I'm not purchasing anything in any other chat GPT courses. And so they're starting to say, okay, you know, chloe, if you're selling me a course on how to do this, how did you learn it? Mm-hmm. And so when you can step in and say, well, I built it from nothing to hear, using social media, I sold this much.
Speaker 2:
You know what I'm saying. Well, yeah, so I mean, I Like I can see what you're saying. It's it's definitely interesting because I do think people it's weird because sometimes I meet people in person and they're like completely different than they are in social media. Tell me more, and well, it's like they have this persona right. And then I think this happens a lot with the course creators it's like they're one person in real life and then they're one person online and then you meet them, there's a disconnect and, like recently, I was at a panel last summer and so there's a panel before me and then I went, I did a presentation with one of my colleagues and During the panel you know they're all like superstars on social media, like 10,000 plus followers and everything.
Speaker 2:
And After the pan, like after the panel, some guy asked in the audience Well, how much business have you converted from Instagram?
Speaker 2:
And it was like crickets, like Really like zero. And then I looked at my friend that I was doing the presentation, where then I was like we so in our presentation we had like a pie charts and we had like the graph saying how much like we had converted from social media and we don't have. I think at that time I had like 3000 followers or something and she has like 1200 followers or something, and we went up next and we were like, look, we started with this information because we knew you would ask this question this is how much money we've done. Now we can move on to actually how we did it and people were amazed and it just teaches you that, look, you need the proof, you need to show people what you have done, and I think a lot of people aren't or missing that authenticity with it, because I see time and time again there's all these videos that like, oh, I made like $1 million in my stand store and I'm like the stand store, it's like the new link page. Yeah, it's interesting.
Speaker 2:
So it's how old I am. So it's basically like a Kajabi or some sort of you know click funnels thing, but it's like on a link in bio page looking thing and so they'll be like that. But it's like okay, well, you sold like a million dollars worth of this thing but, like you know, it's just stupid courses. Or like it's like oh, I generated 500 leads, but you didn't tell me that those leads were real estate agents. They're not actual clients or buyers and sellers.
Speaker 1:
Like real estate agents will buy anything you know you got to dig into the data is what I'm hearing Like when somebody says something to be like okay, tell me more about these numbers that you're presenting. Oh yeah, I will say you've got a different persona in person than your social media. Oh yeah, you're. You're a lot more like happy and like giggly, and because I did a little mini shoot with you before I don't know if I personally shot it or one of my team Okay, so I didn't get to really talk to you.
Speaker 1:
So, just like our interaction, I'm like you have a very bubbly, like, easy to connect with, which you've got a beautiful Instagram, but maybe there's videos that I just didn't see but, like when you start talking, you've got a very like like. I don't know, it's a very thin again, but very like, easy to like love.
Speaker 2:
Thank you, that's good. I can take the compliments all day. Keep them coming. But I think that's also when my previous work I would test people like put them in front of a camera and see like human computer interaction when we're working in front of a camera. But when we're working in front of a camera by ourselves we lack that emotion, right? That's why you see Glenda Baker, she always is talking to someone, because that's why she's so animated For me. I'm sitting in a room by myself. You know it's hard to have real emotion when you're talking to a person or without a person, like just a camera. And it's funny like we used to analyze like facial expressions and everything and you can tell the difference between like a real smile versus like a fake smile and the like fake smiles only with like these eyes.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah. So the real one is with the eyes.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
But you know, with Botox and everything now, you can't even tell.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I'm sorry. Those are like really good insights because I think somebody who's watching this they can take that and they're like trying to move into video, they're like. So when I first started, I actually took a picture of one of my good friends and it's so weird, I would actually. I taped it right there by the. I don't know if it really helped much, but I had to pretend like I was actually talking to her. So then it was just like hey, girl, so today, like because that's how I would talk to her, yeah, and this was, like you know, 10 years ago.
Speaker 1:
But the more you practice, if you're going to be doing video by yourself, you don't have another human to have a conversation with, which that's a piece of advice I give. Get your friend to sit there on the other side and just like talk to them and do a setup like this, where it's not in your face, it's just capturing you, naturally conversating. But in the beginning it was just how do you like if I'm talking to the camera and it's kind of like this and it's very monotone, but I'll try to pretend like I'm excited, you can see and feel that. Oh yeah, just like, if you can, just don't do that Like talk as a viewer having a conversation with somebody? Oh yeah, because we can pick up on the how it goes really fast and then it kind of goes slow, oh, and then it's a journey, isn't it?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1:
Okay, so moving on, talk a little bit about marketing, talk a little bit about your story. Looking into the future, where do you see yourself? We briefly mentioned possibly a podcast collaboration, but you can or cannot expand on that, I'll leave that out to you. But where do you kind of see yourself moving into the next five, 10 years?
Speaker 2:
On an island.
Speaker 1:
So she's selling a course for $3,000.
Speaker 2:
I, you know I have talked I think we talked to the people closest to us when we're framing that question and for me, I feel like I want to work as hard as possible in the next five to 10 years and retire early, that's. And before I always wanted to be like the number one agent. I wanted to be like the number one at everything. I was very driven to succeed. But now I'm like okay, how can I create the life where I've worked so hard for everything that I want? We don't need much Like?
Speaker 2:
I think once you have heard us hit a certain income, you realize like, well, you know, as business owners, we know the value of a dollar now, but you recognize that, hey, we don't really need that much to actually live. How can we increase our quality of life? And for me, I think I would rather have a better quality of life for a longer period of time and building that right now. So how can I like leverage team members, create the team that I want to create, not something that you know, maybe other people have created before but suits me and who I want to be? How can I create that so that I can be in a different country living my best life in Europe, or live in the.
Speaker 2:
Caribbean right. So how can I do that in the next five to 10 years? And so that's really what I'm focusing on right now is what is the best strategy to get there so that I can live my best life, and how I want to live in the next like 50 or plus years, hopefully.
Speaker 1:
Like 50 to 75 plus years. And then my last question. That's beautiful, by the way. I love that because it's not like more and more and more and more for the reason, but more of like focused energy because I've got-.
Speaker 2:
Oh yeah, I want to relax, I am stressed In a pretty cute way.
Speaker 1:
My last question is if you could give one message to your potential clients, future clients, prospects, what would that message be?
Speaker 2:
Hitting me hard with the question oh my gosh. I think it's important for people to know that you're exactly where you are supposed to be, that we don't have to be where everyone else is trying to be. We don't have to be where everyone else is on social media, because it's so hard to just get caught up in what everyone else is doing. It's important to just sit back and be who you are, but also just not take everything for granted, like you're going to be okay, you know, and that you don't have to buy or sell a house right now. You can wait.
Speaker 1:
You don't hear that from us agents.
Speaker 2:
No, I think there's so much pressure on everyone right now for everything that we do, and a lot of pressure comes from social media, and I just wish sometimes that we were back in the days where we didn't have our cell phones, we didn't have so much attention on us, and that we could just have more time to ourselves, and that's what I want everyone to know Just take your time and have a little peace with the world.
Speaker 1:
I love that. Thank you so much for being on the podcast and sharing your beautiful, contagious self with our audience.