The real estate industry seems to change at lightning speed. We are constantly being bombarded with new technology and ideas to advance our business. Sometimes the overwhelm of keeping up is enough to just throw up your hands. In this week’s episode we interview national speaker and best-selling author, Marki Lemons! Marki tells it to you straight on why she became a tech expert and how she managed that even though she wasn’t a tech “natural”. Marki shares some of her favorite tools and tips for social media and a thriving online presence. We get into her niche, farming, social philosophy and find out what social media apps she quit this year. We hit so many topics in this fun chat with Marki! You can find Marki at www.markilemons.com and @markilemons on social!

The following is a rough transcript provided by Otter.ai.

0:01
And then people just like you and then when they think of real estate they think of you and then they want to work with you.

0:06
We want to talk to people the way in which they searched the internet so that we can be found for free okay Pete Barbary books if any hits me girl you back on be at home. The entire winner quickly realized I love children did not like their parents. That was not fun to be you’ll see a real tearing up a real tearing up Realty

0:36
Hi, y’all welcome to hustle humbly. It’s Alyssa and Katie and we are two top producing realtors in the Baton Rouge market.

0:42
We work for two different companies where we should be competitors. But we have chosen community over competition.

0:47
The goal of our podcasts is to encourage you to find your own way in business to stop comparing yourself and start embracing your strengths.

0:54
Hi, Alyssa. Hey Katie is episode number 179 Okay, and we have a guest today

1:00
we do love a guest This is a great guest she’s vacant finger look,

1:04
YouTube’s gonna be like I love this. Okay, so hi, Marcie. Please tell the listeners who you are. And a little bit about I guess where you are, who you are and what you do.

1:14
Yeah. Oh, right. Well, I’m your girl Marquis lemons, Raul, real estate, keynote speaker six time international best selling author. And this will be the first time publicly that I’m saying this. I am the moderator for Drive with NAR, the podcast of the realtors magazine, which is something brand spanking new. And the way they described me as prolific so we’re gonna take that and run with it. Oh, I

1:44
love it.

1:46
I teach Realtors how to earn up to a 2,482% return on their marketing dollar leveraging social media and technology. Oh my gosh, that is

1:58
such a specific number.

1:59
It’s a very specific How did you get that number? Yes, tell us.

2:03
We had done a Facebook live video and then decided to put a $20 ad spend behind it. And it closed over $54,000 and gross closed income based on the $20 ad.

2:19
Wow. Looks a huge deal.

2:23
So this NARS podcast, what is it going? Is it going to be a weekly thing? What is it? Are they focusing on certain topics?

2:32
Yes, so it’s to bring more visibility to members of the National Association of Realtors, not necessarily those who are avid volunteers, but the everyday practitioner. And there’s one podcast every single month, basically focused on the subjects that we as realtors are celebrating things like safety month Fair Housing advocacy. And so pretty. Pretty excited. Plus, I also have a podcast social selling made simple. I think we’re on our 100 and 30th episode of that. So moderating one, and hosting another one. I’m guessing on others. That’s right. Yes, Dean and guesting on others Yes. Voice must

3:18
be tired at the end of the day. Oh, no.

3:21
You know, I’m the person who received a checkmark and failure to exercise self control every single quarter of grammar school. No, I don’t, I don’t get tired. I’m actually very thankful for the opportunity to leverage my voice because I was consistently in trouble. I still get in trouble. A balance your

3:44
biggest asset. That’s what is your biggest asset? A way to lean into that? That’s yeah. Okay. I saw you years ago at a boat at our local board speaking. And then we both saw you again recently, just a couple of months ago. And I’m like, we have to have Marki on the show. I love that Your talks are so far reaching and topic and and so technology focused and social media focus, but I do feel like you make it digestible for the listeners and whoever you’re teaching, because we know those audiences are very varied. Right? Can you tell us some of your like, I guess what are your philosophies about technology and agents like what do you feel like is a is important for agents to know about technology?

4:33
When I started thinking about technology, I want to get a few things clear one, I have not an early adapter to because I’m 52 years old, I am 5.2 I tell people the fifth edition second volume of myself. I was not born or raised with technology. The reason that I use social media and technology is because I’m an entrepreneur. I will looked at what the trend said. And I knew that it was going to be the best thing for my business period. So it wasn’t something I wanted to do. It wasn’t something that comes natural to me, it is something that I forced myself to do. Consistently telling myself to get out of the way, because I’m looking at the numbers. And here’s what the numbers tell me right now. People tell you all their business in real time for free on social media, right, all the things that when I came into real estate, you know, I’m paying for different lists to tell me this different information, I’m actually getting that information and substantially more for absolutely no cost, because I’m hanging out where my spear or my target audience is spending a large percentage of their time. And all I need to do is show up and listen.

5:57
Mm hmm. It’s very, so when we were talking about having you on the show, I was telling Katie, something I found so fascinating about you is that most people who are talking to realtors about technology and how to use it, and you know how it can help your business are in their 30s. And I come from an office that is very established, it’s been around for 100 years, and some of our top producers have been there for decades and decades. And I see the struggle they have at times, within bracing, embracing all of the technology. Some of them don’t have to because they have run their business the same way for so many years that they just have their certain network. But then, you know, some are trying to get into this as a second career and grow their business. And I think those are the ones that I feel I have a soft spot for because I don’t know how to help them seep into it when they have never, like when you decided, okay, I have to do this for my business. There’s so much technology like where did you even start? How do you take that first step into saying, I’m going to embrace technology?

7:14
Well, it actually started with the 2006 profile of buyers and sellers from the National Association of Realtors. So I was looking at what was the percentage of internet users in 1995 versus the percentage on the day that I read that report. And that number have gone from 2% to 80%. And we’re like, oh, and this in its infancy, right. So I’m like, oh, that’s 78% increase. And then I’m thinking with the end in mind, I have a retirement date set, right. And I’m like, Oh, if I want to get there with ease, and communicate, not have to reinvent myself consistently, I better embrace these tools right now. I would say it’s also about your circle. So there are a couple of people who were in my circle at the time that were willing to embrace technology. And essentially, for me to be cool and hang out with them. I needed to embrace it to one is ready Taylor. And he’s generated multi million dollars, right with urban intellectuals. And then there’s a young lady actually, we’re taking a road trip. Her name is Anita Clinton. So the people I was hanging out with were also encouraging the utilization because they understood its power. So it was the report. And the people I was with one thing that I’ve never shared. So there’s two things you’re getting out of me today, who I was at a point because my husband’s not an entrepreneur. And I was I think it might have been a low point. That’s what we will call it. And I’m like, Well, I don’t I can’t come home and talk about business. I can’t talk about real estate. I couldn’t talk about it. But it’s like talking to a brick wall. Right. I actually joined the Polsky Center, which was the Center for Information at the University of Chicago. And as I’m learning the social media and technology, they’re allowing me to teach the social media and technology. So I knew that I needed to change my sphere even more, to be around more tech driven people to be able to embrace it. So not only did I joined the Polsky center, I became one of their top rated instructors at the Polsky center. And it really it changed a lot and I think the reason I’m talking about it because someone yesterday said they were renewing their subscription and I’m like, Oh, I haven’t been over to the Polsky center in years. Well, there you go.

9:54
I was not expecting your answer to be well, I started by Hanging around with techy people who let me hang out with them and learn. Like I love that

10:05
makes total sense to me. When I listen, I started hanging out, I was a big social media adopter, and she’s like, can you show me how to make stories? Can you show me how to like, make a highlight button on my Instagram. So if you’re around someone that can already do those things, it’s just easy for them. It’s not like you’re joining a class or making a big deal out of it. But you’re right, they’re doing it. So it’s easy for you to do it. Because they can just lean over and be like, hit that button. There you go, yeah, you’re on your way.

10:30
And also just seeing her, how she implements it things that would have made me feel very uncomfortable, because I didn’t understand it. But when you hang out with someone that’s like, yeah, I just do this, I just do this, I just do this, it becomes very natural, right? And then it’s funny because it all goes back to mindset. It’s a mind one

10:50
that it’s 100% mindset. And I can say this, because I am a seasoned, I’m seasoned in age and in the industry, right? We have a large percentage of substantially older people who don’t like change. And as a result of not liking change, they will forever be stuck. I consistently now surround that now let me be clear, I’m not going to party with them. But I have an all star lineup of 25 to 30 year olds who are consistently educating and teaching me something new. If I looked at the people who I follow about Instagram, they’re substantially younger than me. So you have to accept learning from younger people. If you don’t accept that, then you’re going to be stuck. But I wanted to come back because I don’t think that I answered the question completely. When I started using social media and technology, there weren’t as many options as there are today. Right? Right. So Instagram wasn’t even out. So we were using Facebook, LinkedIn, and Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube. It was real simple, man. Okay. What I would tell someone today is they must have a business plan. They need to understand who their target audience is. And you need to be on the platform that your target audience is on. So everybody comes in and they do what the other realtor is doing. This is not one size fits all. You do what your target audience is doing. So last year, I made a business decision. I deleted Snapchat, tik, Tok, Twitter, and clubhouse. And as I tell people, every last one of those platforms is still even today a viable platform, right? You can go and connect with like minded people, you can generate leads, you can put people into your customer relationship management system. However, those are not the ideal place that my target audience feels comfortable in disclosing their information. So I want to go and hang out where my target audience is hanging out. And they talk freely so that I get to know them better.

13:13
Okay, tell us because I know from the class, who is your target audience, tell us about your niche.

13:20
So what my target audience is female 78% Female 80% of my engagement comes from women with the number one age bracket being 45 to 54. Oh, yeah, see, I have grown woman discussions and I don’t I tell a grown woman, you know, adult aged children data husband want fewer responsibilities. So we have real grown women discussions, because I know my conversation resonates with who my target audience is. So when I say some things, you know, men might not like it. younger females might not like it. Well, they’re not my target audience. But my target audience I know they’d like it. Because by the time I get through, talking to them in the DM, by the time they get through sending me gifts, right there on the subject, like, I’ll give you an example. I think I was about 45 years old, and I went to get fitted for a bra. And the reason was because I had these two lumps right here right the pushover Well, you don’t have to have pushover if you went right size bra. So I go in and I’m thinking I am a 38 double D No, I was a 36 G. Okay. Oh my so let me say this. I went rush shopping for like 30 days. I mean, online, offline and restore because I needed to try multiple 36 Because it was no way that was humanly possible. Do you know how many women whispered in my ear? They’re finally wearing the right size bra.

14:59
They’re like You inspired me.

15:01
Thank you, you’re fired me to go get fitted girl, I got rid of that lump. Or they send me broad discount because they can tell. Right? They can tell why I have on because some of them. If you were like a low cut, you can see they have Leysin frill going on here. They know those bras like No, no the line of bra. So I’m having disc intimate, in a sense, right discussion, public discussions that lead to a lot of offline conversations. Sure. I think that because that’s what grown women talk about ads, right? Exactly. Right. Or readers. I joke about it all the time. But I know my tribe, we all and that we all a very large percentage of us either have bifocals, or have readers. And we understand the pain of not being able to see some stuff.

15:56
It’s always I love it, that it’s

15:58
like this little everyday things that make you relatable. And then people just like you, and then when they think of real estate, they think of you and then they want to work with you.

16:07
And how do you feel like that has impacted your business as you got off of those platforms, and really hones in on that particular age group are that they’re female, or that this these are the people I’m talking to? Well, how has that impacted your business?

16:21
Well, my business, let me say how it’s impacted, because I had to have a honest discussion with myself. My business has not grown substantially in the past 12 months. Okay, but I took 94 days of paid time off. So am might have grown 10% I wanted to grow 30%. But I took 94 days of paid time off and had three surgeries over 65 days.

16:51
Right. Right. Right, I think that’s still a win, just the fact that just the fact that you grew during that time, I grew.

16:59
And I took a quarter of the year off for self care, alumni. So and let me say this, and I was able to have open, honest discussions around why I was taken off. And as a result, I have even more relationships, because I was willing to be vulnerable and help women in that same age bracket with a chronic disease that most of them did not know that they had until I publicly talked about it.

17:36
Right, right. And I think that’s the beautiful thing about real estate is that there isn’t a one way to be successful, you know, you can take whatever your strength is, which is going to be different than mine is different than Katie’s and vice versa. And that is how you build your business based on who you are as a person and what you’ve gone through in life. And who gravitates towards you because of that.

18:01
Yeah, yes. Okay, let’s go back to being online. I love this thing. You said secret agents don’t get found. Okay, how can agents be found online? What What would you say is important when they’re optimizing their profiles? Like give us those little quick tips are like, Well, how do we okay, you say I gotta be found online. But how?

18:22
So the first thing is, they have to be consistent. A lot of agents want to be one hit wonders. No, you don’t. One because you’re going to be overwhelmed. And you’re not going to give great customer service. So the whole viral thing, there’s a lot of cons to doing anything viral, what you want is to be consistent. I use google.com forward slash trends a lot. And the conversation even this past year has changed substantially. And the first quarter, everyone wanted to know what this contingent What does pending mean, right? Now everyone wants to know about one getting a job in real estate investing, right, which is crazy. But more importantly, they want to know about is the real estate market gonna crash? What is the real estate market now? So because google.com forward slash trends is free. What I recommend is that at least once a quarter, real estate agents sit down and they go and they find out what is trending. Here’s what we want to do. We want to talk to people the way in which they searched the internet so that we can be found for free is called SEO search engine optimization. So what you will not catch me do like and I haven’t done this in probably a decade. I do not speak about trending subjects. I got a lot I like to say about Deion Sanders, but I’m not talking about Deion Sanders is like whatever the trending subject is. I I’m not talking about it because people who want real estate services, that’s not what they’re searching for. I want to be found for what it is that I do what I know like the back of my hand. So I stay away from commentary and trending subjects. But let me do let me say this. Even though I did not say anything about Deion Sanders, what I did do is I practice gratitude. I’m reading the book, the miracle now, every year I watched the movie, The Secret. Okay. So in that what I stated was that I was elated about wrong people who make their own decisions, not bringing harm to others, right? Because I’m really thankful for for grown folks, right, who aren’t causing harm. But then I went into the Serenity Prayer, right. And I said, the Serenity Prayer is available to anyone. Because we all want to take control it we are powerless, right? So I tied it back into something that speaks to who I am, even though I’m know in my mind why we’re saying it. And we don’t want arguing when we argue with strangers, when you write a brand that you have built, people seeing me online, arguing with people, but then I’m attracting that back to me. I’m not trying to attract that either. And I got married, my husband has a handful, I made a decision that I would save all of my arguing energy just for him. So I don’t argue with

21:38
you. It’s really

21:41
like I’m saying my argument energy for him, right? So he gets it. But why would I give that same high intense arguing level to somebody I don’t know, I love. So I save it.

21:59
You choose where you’re putting your energy where you have a limited amount of resources within you and you are choosing where to put those things? Well,

22:08
you’re also being so intentional with the conversations that you have online. And I think that’s really important. It’s not just a matter of being viral and having a bunch of eyes on you. But what were you saying? What? How is that conversation going to continue? Like, what conversation? Are you starting? What are they going to show up in your DMS and talk about like, you don’t want to have a pop culture argument. But you might want to talk about what people are talking about in the real estate world. So I think it makes perfect sense that you’re intentional with what you put out so that that’s what’s coming back in.

22:39
Yes. And I believe in the law of attraction. And I also believe in karma. So I’m clear about what I put out. And if I’m having a petty moment, because I have some petty moments, I’ll say, Oh, I’m having a petty moment. Or sure, once a year, I give Facebook what my gripe is, you know what, what I don’t like, but I’m intentional. This is my annual complaint post. Right. And these are the things I’ve been holding on to it for a year. Okay, go right now. I’m gonna let it go. Let it go.

23:14
Hey, Alyssa, Hey, Katie, what do we mentioned almost every episode, email template, you’re right, we sure do. And after every time, we mentioned an email template, do you know what we get

23:26
emails asking if they can have copies of the email template,

23:29
send me a copy of that template? I would like that, that sounds great. And you know what the good news is, you can get all of our email templates from our course, email templates, one on one, tell the people about

23:41
it, our course has all of the email templates you would need to send to your buyers and your sellers and your clients that are buying and selling at the same time. Exactly. To get through every step of the transaction and giving them information that they need for where they are in the transaction. It’s great, because you never forget to tell them something. Yeah. So we’ve already done all the work for you. Yeah, we wrote them and you can personalize them. Yes. And just feel organized, knowing that you have all the information where it needs to be.

24:10
And if you purchase email templates, 101, you do get lifetime access. So occasionally, we like to go in and make updates based on the market or if we find a new best practice. So we put that right into the template and you get that updated straightaway.

24:23
It just goes straight to your core. Yes.

24:27
It’s already there. It’s just already in there. You don’t have to worry about it. We’ll email and we’ll say updated. That’s

24:32
great. Where can they find these email templates? You

24:34
can find the email templates at email templates with an S one Oh one.com

24:40
email templates. One Oh, one.com. Yes. Head over for reviews and all of the specifics. Wonderful. Okay, enjoy.

24:51
Okay, you talked in the class that I saw you and so much about Canva tips and you have a direct line. I feel like 2k Ambus. So as an agent who uses a lot of Canva, I mean, I remember when it came around years ago, I remember my friend in my office who started using it, because she was selling like an organic herbs situation, she was using it for graphics for something totally unreal estate related. I don’t know a realtor now, who doesn’t know what Canva is. But tell us how you got so embroiled in Canva education and what some of your favorite Canva things are.

25:28
So when I think about Canva, I come back, my undergrad degree is in Hospitality Management out of the School of Business, I then went and earned a master’s degree in marketing. So my background is 100% sales and marketing, I always thought of Canva as being easy to use to help me with sales and marketing period, I’d had no idea. And it was free, right. So I had no idea that over a decade, they would build a company valued at $26 billion. That is with the beat, right? So when I think about it being a free tool that was easy to use, and I’m thinking sales and marketing the whole time. To me, Canva was just a natural fit, because everyone wants all this money to flow to them. But they don’t understand marketing, to attract the sales, right then put in your customer relationship management system. Right now, that $26 billion is based on the fact that Canva did one thing well, they gave away a lot of lead magnets being the free platform and the tools inside of it. What a landing page. Well, every real estate professional, right to me should have landing pages and lead magnets, period. If not, you put yourself in a position to always have to buy leads, okay, if you want to have a consistent income. So as real estate professionals, we should think sales and marketing, we should have a bunch of landing pages with a lot of lead magnets, I want to bring this back to the the google.com Ford slash trance, talking about what people are searching for and what they need. So this year, I came up with a new publication, I have six figures and 12 months for real estate agents. But I came up with six figures in 12 months for loan originators. Because I came into the industry from the loan origination side of the business. My books are designed in Canva. Now I have 31 publications on Amazon, six of the books that I am associated ciliated with our international bestsellers, the ones that I published were all created in Canva. Okay, when I think about all the tools, when we that we’re investing in, you can create a lot of them inside of Canva. So I did a Canva class at the realtor Conference and Expo. And right now I have 92 people enrolled in my power your lead generation with cancel course. With that being said, you could get rid of wire stamp for your email signature, you could get rid of Link bio, for landing pages with all of your links, they have website inside of Canva. Now, you can do all of your branding, you can remove the background from your pictures and from your videos. And they have a new tool inside of the system, which is called Text to photo. So now they have aI inside of the platforms. But it comes back taking all of these tools, right, we need to create lead magnets. And now because Canva has the robust website editor, you can have your web site, and I’m going to give this little tip that my students have received over the last couple of weeks. You can take your Google Forms or landing page connected to your Camfil website in order to collect those leads. So we’re creating the website and the lead magnets inside of Canva. It’s amazing,

29:21
okay, for someone who’s like lead magnet landing page what I don’t even know what any of this stuff is. Walk me through a practical application of one of these, like, where did where did it start? Kind of just like how did you get the people to even ask for the thing and what’s the thing? I know what you’re talking about, but hey,

29:40
so let me give you I’m gonna give you I’m gonna give you what I taught on Tuesday night. My son Skyler is a second generation realtor. He got his real estate license on December the 26th 2020. So coming up on that big anniversary. He became a real team member on January the fourth 2021 And on January the sixth 2021, I had him to do a Facebook Live interview for a program in the state of Illinois. What we did before that we had 1800 People watch that Facebook live video, we know that 300 people clicked on the link on Facebook to get more information. That link took them over to a Google form where we asked for their email address, first name and last name. When you think about a landing page, it also has an auto responder, anybody who went over and clicked on the link, and gave their information instantly received all the information on a program that was providing buyers with a $40,000 forgivable grant on their student loan debt. Okay, so we create the landing page, the spreadsheet, and the auto responder, all inside of Google for free. We create a beautiful giveaway inside of Canva, that to that auto responder delivers it to the person. And then we go on a free platform, talk about it, but include a link back to the Google Form. And so we’re doing it for everything. Now, the way Campbell websites comes in is that we would link it back to the Campbell website. And then the Campbell website, links to the Google Form, which was just sitting there, it just looks prettier. Now, which is a functionality that really just became available in the past year. Okay. But we were already doing a bunch of Google Forms. So now we just make them look pretty, right? We were already doing them. But let me say this, whether you were going to use the Camfil website, we’re still going to create the header, the header for the Google Form inside of Canva. So we’re using to me, my 2023 prediction is that every realtor needs the premium version of Canva, every last one of them. And they all need a robust Customer Relationship Management System.

32:24
Like a really good email list to be able to communicate your information that you have to send out. Yeah, I mean, check all your people.

32:35
Yes, I’ve made a lot of money off of having a great customer relationship management system.

32:41
Yeah. Have you tried them all? Did you? How long have you been on the one you’re on now?

32:46
So I’m on two now. Okay. The two that I’m on are for two different reasons. Let me say this. I started with this spreadsheet. And over the years, I’ve used Infusionsoft that was very confusing and very expensive to use. So it was an ideal fit for me. I then went to Active Campaign went to Active Campaign because they’re located in chicago and provided face to face training. Then I went to MailChimp, I think MailChimp is what a lot of people don’t know is an email marketing system. But you can have some customer relationship management systems in there plus your landing pages. Right now the two systems that I use, is I use Kajabi for one of my businesses, and then as an agent wise agent.

33:38
Oh, I’ve used wise agent before.

33:41
Yeah. So those are the two platforms now but Infusionsoft Active Campaign. MailChimp, and then now two platforms Kajabi and wise agent.

33:54
Okay, what do you pay for wise agent?

33:58
Wise agent, here’s, it’s actually negotiated the franchise that I’m affiliated with has a national agreement. And then my franchise owner because we have four offices. Yeah, we just announced the number four offices. He negotiated premiums with them, and then I have my own affiliate agreement. Yeah. I have. Yeah. So like, disclaimer, I have my own affiliate agreement with wise agent. So my foreclosure short sale courses are exclusively available on wise agent or through my private membership group.

34:34
Okay, very cool. I love it. Okay. What are some of your tips for agents to keep up with the industry as it changes? Maybe not necessarily tech, but just the industry in general? How, how can agents kind of stay up to date?

34:47
Well, going back to the google.com forward slash trends, right, so searching for real estate searching for realtors. Also, there’s a tool called Feedly F e Ed l y, which is a RSS syndication feed. RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication. So once you have developed a niche, you want to follow that niche. So if you’re in luxury real estate, I’m following those thought leaders in luxury real estate, to see what they’re talking about. So there always needs to be an authority, right, that go to person for what it is that you profess that you’re an expert of. So for me, I’m following Chicago realtors, I’m following the National Association of Realtors, I’m following the real estate business Institute for a couple of reasons. One, because I’m a member of those organizations, I have their credentials, but I also sit on all of their boards. So I need to understand what is going on inside of those organizations. So when articles pop up, I’m getting those articles a way to get those popups would be through google.com, forward slash alerts. But then in Feedly, in the way I described Feedly, as a kid growing up, on weekends, my grandfather would go on, he would buy three newspapers, the Chicago Sun Times The Chicago Tribune, and the Chicago Defender. And he’d come home and own a coffee table. He’d break these three newspapers down, I was getting the comics. My grandmother was going to get business and like the food section, he was going to take the sport. And then my mother was going to read like the covers, right. So we took this news, these newspapers and broke them down. Well, now when you think about a Real Simple Syndication, you only get the feed for the information you want. In one place. That’s very

36:49
helpful. Yeah,

36:51
pick the things that you need to follow.

36:54
That’s it. The same way we deleted twitter, snapchat, Tiktok. And clubhouse is the same way we need to unsubscribe to emails, and it’s also the way we should filter the information that we’re learning. If not, you’re gonna get

37:09
over was deleting those apps hard for you? Or what did it feel good?

37:17
Twitter was hard because I had been on Twitter since like the beginning. So since 2007, so that one was hard. The other ones were not because I was becoming more and more overwhelmed and how I was going to participate on them. And so when I tell you I went in, deleted the profiles took the apps of tick tock was after the fact tick tock was the one that you kind of gravitate, gravitate back to but tick tock is a huge time waster. Let me just say this. So every time I was over there, it was never for me learning some it was never for me, right? It was about me to laugh and then an hour later and I’ve done nothing, but I’ve cracked up right? refuse. I refuse to put it back on my phone. And if someone sends me something, you know, you can go watch that one clip and then I’m gone. Yep. Okay, that hear

38:12
about tick tock while we’re on it did because because it’s so easy to go viral. And you know, a lot of younger demographic, is there. Is there a way for a realtor to effectively have a tick tock strategy? Or is it still kind of hard to find your people there? Like what what are your thoughts about if they wanted to use it? Is it something that can be done? Well,

38:34
according to Glenda Baker, I think that she leverages Tik Tok, and she also leverages Instagram in her business, I definitely believe it’s a viable business, too. The only reason I don’t use it is because it’s not the preferred location for females aged 45 to 54. So of course, I always get this one woman and I have to clarify my language with people all the time. There’s a plethora of 45 to 54 year old women hanging out on tick tock preferred location and tell you all they business is a totally different comment. So are we over there? Yeah, generally for the giggles All right over there sharing and helping people build and telling all our personal business? Not so much. So I’m clear it’s a viable to but as an entrepreneur, how are you going to spend your time right, how are you going to generate leads? And I would like to know how many realtors are generating leads as a result if you can show me close transactions, then let’s go for it. But now the question is, how often are you also building your customer relationship management system for future business? Right I got I got some questions around it. I will likely say that the all The amps doing a very good job would be a younger audience.

40:03
Sure. Yeah. And then it’s is it providing value while being entertaining? You know, that’s a hard thing to do. I’m not I don’t think I would have the personality to be entertaining on Tik Tok. But if I say something in an Instagram story, that’s just providing a quick nugget of value. That’s more my area. But then there’s some really funny people that can provide value and be entertaining at the same time. So it’s just kind of who you are, I guess. Yeah,

40:33
yeah. So yeah, I think it’s, I think is a valuable tool. I don’t think it’s the preferred location for my target.

40:41
Yeah, I mean, it makes sense. Okay, what about farming? Do you do you farm? What is? Do you still have a system? Or have you farmed? We get a lot of questions lately about how am I going to find my people? How am I going to find the leads? Because you know, the market is shifting and changing. I gotta look for them. Are you? Are you a farmer?

40:59
I let me say this, I’m not still farming, because we have like 310 agents and 20 of them are recruited. But do I help my agents in developing their farming strategies? Yes. So when I think about farming, what I’ve told every agent, there are three things, we’re always going to look at. One, we have to go and look at our MLS numbers, I need to understand what is the current rate of sale, I want to know what that price point is. I want to know the barriers to entry, and said community. And I need to understand the absorption rate. So for me, it’s it’s not an emotional decision, it is a business decision. So when we take a look, then that’s the area we need to farm. And if you’re in a marketplace that has a robust MLS that has predictive analytics tools, I want to take a look who’s likely going to sale there. And that is the area we focus on. When realtors are either coming into the business or decides that they’re going to farm instantly they think they’re gonna do it where they live, or in close proximity to the office, that might not get you the best return on the time invested. So I have a look, and sometimes the perception of the community. So there’s a community here in the city of Chicago called Beverly. And then there’s a community adjacent to it called Mark and park. Beverly is Beverly honey, okay. And so they’re substantially more agents who want to do business and Beverly because it has a higher price point. But it also has more barriers to entry and fewer sales. So it would be a lot easier for an agent to come and enter into the Morgan Park area. When we’re breaking the numbers down, I have seen agents who just don’t want to go into the Morgan Park area, even though it will be more financially beneficial to their business based on the perception of the community. Wow. Well, shame on you and your business. Everything to me is about being an entrepreneur running a business, the rate of return because I have a retirement date in mind. Right Actually, I haven’t written down that. Oh, my date is July the 31st 2032. And I will be financially eligible for retirement whether I decide to retire or not.

43:43
Great. I love that.

43:44
I’m so excited. Love that. Well this is a big fan of retirement talk.

43:47
I am Yes. And it takes it takes a lot of action. You have to be very strategic. You have to be mindful so I’ll give you when I think about mindful I was in my bedroom looking at the app a new pair of Burberry boots came up and I’m looking at these boots these boots are hot I’m like oh I’m gonna get these Burberry boots and then he hits me Are you back gonna be at home the entire winter because I’m traveling for work right and I want to focus on where my winter house is going to be likely close that app right on down I’m not Brian them boots the boots serve no, I’m not gonna even get the weather boots. Right so if I can’t wear these expensive but boots, I don’t need to know that Nope. Start with the end in mind.

44:38
You have investment properties.

44:41
We do not have any investment properties other than our principal residence because I can’t get anyone over here to help me with them. So we inherited we both had inherited real estate we sold all of our inheritance because my husband does not want to have anything to do With property management, and I would need to have some help. So no, but we are heavily invested in stocks of the business’s passive income. And we have our principal residence that has a lot of equity in it.

45:14
Perfect. I love it. I always like hearing different how different people plan, you know,

45:20
oh yeah, we invested in a startup. I have a high ticket ecommerce site business. I have my publisher and I get just get something today but I am grandfathered in at Keller Williams. I’m an exit. So I still get profit share and residual income. So I have a total of 13 streams of income.

45:40
Wow, Whoa, that’s a lot.

45:42
That’s a lot. That’s amazing. Okay, how did you become a real estate speaker? What? What was the route? How did that start?

45:51
So I actually started an education back in 1993. So I work for Chicago public schools I was came in as a a day to day sub, and then somehow received a full time provisional sub, so I was assigned a second grade ESCA class, quickly realized I love children did not like their parents, that was not going to be for me. When I graduated from grad school in 1996, I started teaching on a collegiate level and I taught Hospitality Management at Northwestern Business College. What I realized from that experience was, I did not have enough practical experience to teach adult learners. So I told myself, oh, you know what, Marquise when you turn 40, you’ll have enough practical experience, you can come back into the classroom and teach adult learners. And six, my mentor Frank Williams, who’s been a real estate educator. Now, as long as I am old, he’d say, Hey, baby down, I think you should become a licensed pre licensed instructor and a licensed continuing education instructor. And I’ve been one every since 2006. By 2009, I was a real estate educator of the year because I had the past. Look, I had the life experience and the past teaching experiences. And when I was just sitting down, thinking about what I really wanted to do, how I wanted to do it, what is going to be the highest and best use of my time, it was real estate educator pivoted to real estate trainer pivoted to Speaker pivoted to keynote speaker. So to me, it’s essentially the same skill set. The difference is, I would say, stage appearance, the ability to tell a story, right? So I started working on developing that skill set to help me and now I’m a real estate keynote speaker. It’s not just nowhere else to go from here. Yeah, but at the end of the road, and I’ll refuse to pivot into another industry. I love I love the industry. I’m in I am a realtor. I’m an avid volunteer, major donor President circle. So I yeah, I this is it right? But it’s not going to there’s nowhere else to go. I published I have a clothing line like this is this is this is kind of it. So let me say this. When I came back to the board of directors for the Chicago Realtors couple of years ago, it was with one goal in mind to mentor the next generation. So my focus over the last couple of years has been how do I mentor, the next generation of Realtors, whether that’s to come into education, whether that is to publish there’s so many opportunities that exist inside of our industry. How do I motivate and inspire them to do one of them? And that includes my son, who’s a second generation realtor.

48:55
What was he nervous about getting into the family business?

49:00
Oh, no, he claimed this at the age of seven. Oh,

49:04
he’s like, I know. I know what I’m doing. Yeah, he

49:07
wanted to be a realtor at the age of seven. I I’m not gonna say forced him. I encouraged him to go to college. And so we had to do he goes to college. I support his entrepreneur endeavors. That’s how we ended up Yeah, to

49:23
you. But he while you’re traveling, since you do still sell real estate and you obviously traveled quite a bit to speak. How is that handled within your team? Like, how do you how do your clients, are they in touch with you while you’re gone? Like what do you do?

49:38
Now? Everything is referred to one of the people who are recruited. That’s yeah, that’s it. That’s all. I’m not here. I’m not here and when and I spent 100 nights a year on the road. So my priority becomes the people who aren’t coming to fly and to see that means then I would violate my fiduciary responsibility. At least to a client, and that means have an undivided loyalty to them. I don’t have undivided loyalty to them. That is why I refer them to someone who will give them undivided loyalty. So if we were to look at just referral income, I earn roughly about $60,000 a year just on referrals. Yes, great. Yeah. So I’m referring, I’m referring all of that business out. Because when that Uber drivers show up at my front door, I’m out of here. And no, I’m not having discussions while I’m on the road. I’m not, I’m not gonna stress about it. If I see that the agent is becoming overwhelmed, I referred the business to someone else.

50:38
I love that. Yeah, that’s a good system. Very good. I got um, I feel good. Do you have I know this was very helpful. I feel like it just also helps open the mind to this whole. There’s so many dynamics in real estate, you know, from being able to be an educator, a team leader, a broker. And so your story is different than, than anyone we’ve really interviewed, but very helpful. So this was perfect, very

51:06
good Marquis to bring a toast. Do you have someone that every episode we toast to someone, so either someone who’s helped you in your career, someone you’d like to celebrate their success? Someone you know, who’s maybe even struggling that needs like a shout out, but we always toast to somebody?

51:27
Well, it’s a lot of people. Okay, so if I’m going to talk about someone who motivated me who’s done something absolutely fabulous, right? We’re going to toast to none other than V. Frank Williams, who is my mentor, who changed my life. He reached out to the Chicago Realtors at the time. And he said, Look, Deb Lopes. She was the director of education. He says, I don’t even know if baby doll can teach, but put it on the schedule and give her an opportunity. I have been teaching now with the Chicago Realtors since March of 2006. And I will say that it is all because of Frank Williams. He single handedly changed the trajectory of my career. Oh, I love that

52:16
so great. How did you meet Frank? Like how did you know him?

52:20
Oh, so that how did I know Frank? Well, Frank knew me. My family owned Chicago second oldest black restaurant. We’ve been in business since 1954. Frank was a great instil is a client Frank’s magnet was on the wall at lamb. So I would see his magnet all the time, I decided that I was going to come out for the board of directors of Chicago realtors, within a year of becoming a real team member. And Frank interviewed me my first, second and third time. The third time was the charm. So I tell people to keep coming back. But after the second time, I didn’t get it. I looked at him and I said we need to do lunch. And he took me under his wing. And he told me exactly what it was that I needed to do how I needed to do it. And here’s the joy. We just submitted Frank to receive the NAR, I’m throwing this out here Fair Housing award because he more than deserves it. And just to be online with him. He said, You’re gonna get me straight. Because you know, I don’t know nothing about this technology. I said, we don’t get it together. And so to have the opportunity to ever be able to do anything for him and acknowledge Him is what I’m going to do because he did not have to help me. And essentially, he made me his competition. Because we were competing for the same jobs. Yeah, for a period of time. He didn’t have to do it.

53:46
That’s real community. Competition. That’s perfect. I love that. Thank you for sharing with us about Frankie. Sounds amazing. So cheers the phrase, here’s the frame. Thank you for being here today. We really appreciate you taking your time. We Oh share with us how everyone can find you. So where do the people I know that you have so many resources for agents, so tell us where they can come find you.

54:08
Well, anyone who spells My name correctly will find me ma RK ILEMONS I am the only Marquis lemons in the world. My website is Marquis. lemons.com. Perfect. Wonderful. Love it.

54:25
Okay, well, let’s take Do you have your phone take a picture.

54:27
Yep. And she got

54:29
I got a picture already.

54:30
I have a phone Hold on. Yeah, I’m gonna take a quick we’ll do one more just in case you never know what’s gonna happen. Okay, give us a good smile, girl. All right, we got it.

54:42
You got it. And let me say this. This is my latest Award, which is Chicago agents charitable Service Award. So I was voted out of 44,000 votes to be Chicago’s most charitable real estate agent.

54:56
That’s amazing.

54:58
Is the Chicago Board of free Realtors how many realtors?

55:01
Oh we’re right under 18,000 members but we’re not the largest board in the Chicagoland area Main Street organization of Realtors here so they’re about 38 38,000 Realtor members in the Chicagoland area and this surrounding suburbs.

55:19
That is while

55:21
Yeah, everyone’s a realtor and I know we have 4000 here and we feel like

55:26
real tearing you via rail tearing you via rail too. Yes.

55:32
That’s a lot of realtors girl. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you wonderful day. Yeah, we appreciate you so much.

55:41
Okay, bye. Thank you so much for tuning in to the hustle humbly podcast. Let us know who we should toast to for the next episode. Be sure

55:49
to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at hustle humbly podcast. If you have an episode, topic or question please email us at hustle humbly podcast@gmail.com

55:58
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast and leave a review. See you next week. Bye. This is the goodbye