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We just finished a consulting project with CabinRugs.com and the owner was appreciative enough to let us publish this short review and interview about the consulting process. 

What were your challenges in starting a new brand?

To start off, I’m a big picture kind of guy so the little details are always hard for me to map. I knew what I sort of wanted the brand to look like but I didn’t know what to do to make it happen. You guys made is so easy to understand the complexity of brand development. 

What did you learn during the brand discovery?

I learn that its so much more than a logo and that the branding strategy needs to be aligned with my marketing strategies on Google and Social Media. 

Would you recommend BrandLyft to any future clients?

Yes! You all are wonderful guides. 

CabinRugs.com is the home of the largest collection of Cabin, Native American, & Southwestern-Inspired Rugs online. 

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1. Having a poor followup

One of the most important things in any type of sales journey is the follow-up. A Lot of agents have the ability to generate or purchase leads, but that doesn’t do any good if you don’t go through a very good follow up process. Most sales never happen on the first contact, to begin with. Some try a few more times and move on to the next one. Some give up after just one attempt. Then there are some that don’t even reach out at all. I hear many excuses from, “I don’t have enough time or I forgot.” to other excuses that most of the leads from that source aren’t really that good anyway. 

Yet they continue to pay these lead sources thinking this is the best way to get deals because they sometimes actually come across one that they contact and it turns into a closing. You should never purchase leads until you have a strong follow-up process in place so that you can help increase your conversion rate. A great follow up process not only can help from day one but more so over time as it helps you build up an incredible database. This can potentially turn into much higher conversions because you will be nurturing your potential clients with a follow system that is educating them with information and answering questions and concerns that they may have about buying or selling a home. The formula isn’t a secret. It’s simply follow up, nurture and gain a client for life. 

2. Depending on a single lead source

You should never depend on one flow for your lead source. The most obvious thing that should be on an agent’s mind is “what if that source goes away” or “I can’t afford that source anymore”. This will put you in a bad spot. You should always be working with multiple sources. Here are a few that will help. 

• Referrals 
• Your Database  
• Organic leads from your social (always have a landing page link on your social post) 
• Paid Facebook & Instagram ads (this way it’s your exclusive leads only)

If you work all four of these the right way with a strong follow-up system, you should never need to depend on any single source for leads. Minimize black swan events like the COVID-19 situation from affecting your pipeline and lead flow. 

3. Not branding themselves

Branding yourself is the most important thing you can do to have a long successful career in the real estate industry. You are a brand. Your brand is your reputation. People make decisions sometimes based on brand alone. Too many agents and loan officers put too much emphasis on the company name over their own names. It’s never been more important than ever to promote your own name and brand. You should be remembered by what you do and offer, not necessarily what the company offers. If you decide you need to change companies one day for different reasons, your personal brand needs to be so strong that most won’t even care where you went. They only care that you are still there for them when needed with the same great experience and ready to help. So, think about all the ways you can brand yourself with all the current things that you do. Social posting, running your own lead ads, videos, Facebook group, just to name a few. A famous comedian once said, “Be So Good That They Can’t Ignore You”.

This is my story on how I spent 8 years in the mortgage industry. I got into the industry in 2010, right smack dab after the entire economy collapsed. I know your thinking, wow, this may have been this worst time ever to get in. Well, you’d be right. But, I didn’t necessarily think that way when I decided to get in, because I thought it was a great opportunity going against the grain. I was actually working at the time as a credit repair agent on the side from my regular job and already had a few loan officers as my referral sources. One day I was sitting with one of the loan officers and we were going through some of her credit repair clients when she just casually said: “You should get your license to do mortgages”. I told her no way because I really didn’t even understand much of the industry at the time. She assured me that getting the license was the hardest part, but after that, I would love it. Once she showed me the potential numbers for income based on the commissions, and that’s all it took, I jumped right in. Within a few weeks, I was taking the training and was getting ready for the big exam. She was right, and It was as tough as I thought it would be but I passed. 

So this was the time after the crash and many loan officers were moving around trying to find their so-called home company to originate loans. It was normal during those times for loan officers to move around to different companies to find the best one that fit their needs. I finally landed with a great group in Atlanta. I joined a team within the brokerage so that I could learn from some of the best in the industry. During those 3 years with the team, I took more applications than some loan officers take their whole career. I am not going to lie, it was brutal. Working seven days a week. Working on builder accounts and working with re-sale agents. It was a grind, but I am blessed to have gone through it to see so much of the industry inside and out. 

Our team then moved to a different company that better suited our needs for more options and programs. During the switch, I decided to go out on my own. I had learned so much from having a mentor and all the great team members around me from the past 3 years and just soaked it all up. So, my journey began on my own and it was definitely tough the first year. I did all the things that I had been previously doing on the team, but without all the contacts. I pushed and pushed and then into the next year I started learning about social media even more and figure out how to run ads. I also, started with videos and posted a few at a time to see if it would help. As I slowly ramped up ads and video along with several routes weekly visiting agents, I was able to breakthrough. I started to grow and finally was able to get an assistant to help. As time went on I had agents and even loan officers coming to me and asked for help with social media and doing some videos. I really enjoyed it and actually started doing videos with some of the agents. I eventually added another team member and was on a great path for more growth with everything that I was doing. 

As time went by I started to realize that my heart wasn’t truly in the mortgage business itself. I learned what I had always loved, which is marketing and coaching. I was at crossroads to where I had to decide my future. Was it to keep pushing and grow a big team or decide on doing what I love and making it happen as a career? Even though I didn’t know if I was even going to make a living, I knew that if I helped enough people that I would be fine. 

“Making that decision was scary but empowering at the same time. I knew there was more to give from me than just growing a team and making money. I have always tried to live my life to reach for my full potential.”

During my last two years as a loan officer, I always said that I wanted to build a lead machine so that I didn’t have to keep chasing after agents or other lead sources. Well, I finally made it happen here at our marketing agency. But the kicker here is that now that I am on the other end of this. I see that in today’s market, leads are not enough. You must have a great follow up on your sales journey in order to increase your closing ratio. Some agents and loan officers either do not even get to all their leads and most only try once or twice. This is our mission here at BrandLyft, to help loan officers, builders, agents, and brokers polish their sales journey, increase leads, and improve meaningful conversations with those leads that lead to conversion. 

Here’s a story for the books! Back in 2015, I had just sold a small business and it left me looking for a new opportunity. I was approached by a friend of mine that showed me some of the opportunities in the insurance business. She explained all the different ways to help families and how it could be a very lucrative business if you apply yourself and put the time in. I was very interested, but wanted more information and wanted to meet some of the people in that organization that had been killing it. I always like hearing it from the top producers. Come to find out, the company was actually a marketing agency that provided leads, coaching and many other things to help it’s team members grow their own business. The only thing I had to do was get a license. Well, here I thought that would be manageable, but it was actually troublesome for me. It took me three times to just pass the state licensing test.  Now that I had my license, I thought I was ready to go to the top. I was “gung ho” for sure.

I started studying up on the products to offer and practiced scenario numbers on my laptop. I finally jumped out there and started purchasing leads that the company offered and actually got a few deals here and there. I continued to dive into all the training calls and went to as many company meetings and conferences that I could possibly attend. Over time I kept running into colleagues that were making the kind of money I wanted to make and I would always ask them more and more questions about what they would do to close so many deals. As always the answers were basically the same. Read, be on all the calls, go to the meetings, know your products and schedule appointments and repeat. It took me a while for it to sink in that that’s it. I finally gave in and it worked.

During this time period, I consumed every business and sales book I could get a hold of and went to every meeting that I could go to and attended all the conferences. I was on most of the company calls each week. I was a sponge. This was an incredible process for me as I was learning and growing at a faster pace than ever before in my life. I quickly started booking more appointments than I could actually handle. I was running on all cylinders and loving it. I was getting deals and it was consistent. I knew I was gaining more and more momentum because I had totally transformed my mindset with all of the reading and being around like-minded people that had a passion for winning. 

How it happened

During the time I was all-in on transforming my mindset. Every week, I received another set of leads and called everyone up and set up my normal route for the weekend. I set out that Saturday to hit several appointments and I noticed one of them was in a very affluent neighborhood in Atlanta. As I pulled up to this particular home, I understood it to be a multi-million dollar house. So, truthfully I said to myself that there is no way these folks will buy anything from me. I was assuming that they already had everything covered or had their own financial guy that took care of everything. I knew that this home was just going to be practice for I thought to myself, “ I should still go ahead and go through my routine and see what I can offer them”. It was an older gentleman and we sat in his living room. I had my laptop out going over a few scenarios based on his age and what coverage amounts he was looking for. I gave him a few numbers almost hesitant to even say the premium amount because I had never even looked at a number like that before.

I finally got it off my tongue and he didn’t even flinch. He paused for a minute and then asked if I could meet him the next week at one of his businesses, which was basically a horse boarding farm about 45 north of his house. He told me he was going to have his business partners there as well to possibly look at a policy to cover each one in case something happens to any one of them. So, I agreed. Still, at this point, I didn’t think too much about it. I figure once all of them hear the pricing, they would just get their financial advisors to get the same thing. So, I went on out the next week telling myself again that at least it’s good practice.

I arrived at the farm and sat down with all three and about an hour later I had quoted out for all three and the main business owner looked at me and said: “Write it up, let’s do it”. I sat there going through the application for each one and then got the check for each one and was quickly on my way out. I told them I would be in touch in just a few days with more information to give them about each policy. Then I headed back home and as I was driving, I realized what I had just done. I did some quick math in my head and realized that I was about to get $20,000 in commissions from this one deal. I was blessed to have this opportunity but also realized that I could have easily not closed this deal because of my mindset going into it. Even when your mind is not in the best place, deals can still happen. It doesn’t always happen that way and that’s why it’s so important to get your mind right. 

Lesson

The lesson in the story is to never judge a book by its cover. We have all heard that before, right? This particular experience was a big breakthrough for me in my life and sales journey. Always be ready and have the certainty that everyone you encounter will be an opportunity in one way or another.

Shawn Greenway, CEO

What is wrong with Zillow and many other online real estate marketing solutions? There are many things wrong with them. In this article, we will highlight the user and agent frustrations when it comes to real estate marketing online. 

I spent 8 years as a Mortgage Lender and I was right in the center of the Zillow vortex myself. I had agents asking me to co-op with them on Zillow because they felt that it was the best source for leads. I actually gave in to it and spent money in order to get leads. Even then, I always thought it was crazy to spend money with a company that was charging agents for leads on their very own listings. 

Zillow, as well as Trulia and Realtor.com, are one of the most popular real estate marketing solutions online. They have become the Google of Real Estate. Zillow alone lists information about millions of homes for sale and rent across the United States and Canada. Users can search for a home in any area using different categories such as prices, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, square footage, type of home, and other amenities. It’s an awesome tool for consumers but an absolute headache and nightmare for brokers and agents.

These websites are built to be easy to use and navigate however the process ends up being longer and more strenuous than calling a real agent or brokerage. Most of these real estate websites are traps for weak leads all for the purpose of making revenue for the necessary “Evil”. Many Real Estate agents fall for these services and with so many options of services to pay for from zip codes to live transfers, they make it seem like it is the easiest and cheapest way to get leads pouring in. 

One big problem is “The Zestimate”. Both the buyers and the sellers LOVE  Zestimate. The Zestimate works off an algorithm that uses the surrounding area to determine a property’s value but doesn’t account for the condition of the surrounding area or the subject property that is getting valued. This inaccuracy leads to misinterpretation of the actual properties being sold all because of Zillow’s slothful algorithm and lack of consumer support.

Zillow is just an algorithm that does not know anything else aside from the data being fed to it. A true real estate agent and a broker will know their neighborhood and properties like the back of their hand. These agents and brokers will guide you through every step of the way until you get the quality home you want and deserve. 

Buyers love Zillow and there is no shortage of people going to their site daily. People love the accessibility, they love the pre-foreclosures, they love easy to search, and they love “the Zestimate”. But there is another way people can view homes in their community and that way is to build your brand. Anybody can be their own brand you just have to be involved with your community online and offline. This way buyers and sellers can come straight to you and have a more human experience when making a life-changing decision such as buying the home of their dreams.

The Online Beast is constantly fed by agents and lenders that allow them to grow. Some the same people that gripe about Zillow turn right around and pay their next bill to them. Some look at it as a necessary evil for their online presence. I believe a lot of that thinking is because they do not trust in their own efforts to grow a brand or to set up a system of their own to attract clients. 

If Zillow continues to grow, you will eventually see them eliminate some agents in the industry. I honestly believe that it will cause teams to continue to grow in order to have the revenue to continue their lead cycle as they become more and more dependent on the outside sources that they depend on. After all, Zillow has the database and the system. 

My final thoughts. What if Zillow goes away tomorrow, what would you do then?

Ecommerce has been growing for the last decade. Online sales have jumped up nearly 20% within two years, and are only going up. If you’re starting a business and selling a product or a service, an e-commerce site is essential in order to expand your business.

There are tons of options available to you whenever you decide to get an e-commerce website. This article will highlight the top 5 things to consider when choosing an e-commerce platform and some extra tips on how to increase your online sales.

1. Cost

The first thing you should consider when searching for an e-commerce platform is the price. Whether you’re a small business just getting started or an already established brick & mortar business moving online, you need to know the exact cost of your new online shop.

The best platforms all have a monthly fee. Depending on the type of platform you get (self-hosted vs. hosted) the costs may vary. You should also consider the processing fees that will be associated with the platform. You should also consider how your customers will be paying. Some platforms don’t offer the ability to pay via third-party vendors (such as PayPal). If your platform does not have the necessary apps or plugins for checkouts, the customer may become irritated and abandoned the cart. Try to weigh the pros and cons of each to get the best for your budget.

2. Integrations

One of the biggest factors in choosing an e-commerce platform is the apps and plugins available on it. Most platforms will have plenty of tools for you to run your business. Your business needs to be top of mind when deciding on the plugins that will work best for you and your business. When looking at different platforms, think of what tools you’ll need or already use for your business.  Here are some of the most popular types of plugins that you should look out for:

• Accounting plugins to help with sales, taxes, revenues, and profits
• Email marketing tools to help you keep in contact with your customers
•  Sales platform that helps you reward your customers for using your products
• Apps to help with shipping your products
• Apps for reviews
• Analytics tools to help track your data
• Seo tools to help rank your site

3. Mobile Friendliness

Nearly 70% of searches are done from mobile devices? This percentage is only going to increase as phones become more powerful and available to more people. Often those searches continue to the add cart and first-time users purchase because of the availability of having a phone. Shopify has an excellent app that is also user-friendly so you can see everything happening on your e-commerce in your pocket. This means it’s important to look for platforms that are mobile-friendly and allow customers to easily access your website as well as make a purchase on their mobile device.

4. Customer Service

Arguably the most important part of any business is customer service. The experience provided by traditional brick-and-mortar businesses are based in a physical store, they have more control over how smoothly their business runs.

E-commerce is similar in the front end. You can control everything from top to bottom you just have to figure out how. There are many blogs on how to run an e-commerce store to help you get the best out of your business and maintain it.

On the back-end of each e-commerce platform, it’s mainly apps and plugins. The front end should be the main focus because it is the only thing the customer sees. Your product page should have professional photography as well as a good description underlining why people should buy your product or service.

Another thing that your product page needs are plenty of reviews. Search if there is an app for reviews on the e-commerce platform you are looking at or any other apps and/or plugins for customer service and checkout. The checkout must be quick and as painless as possible.

5. Scalability

All business owners hope their business will grow in the future, but you may not know how much and how quickly. Nonetheless, it’s important to look for a platform that will scale along with your business.

You don’t want to pay for features and storage that you’re not using when you first start out. You also want to keep up with higher demands as your business takes off. Choose a platform that you can scale to your business size and that won’t charge you extra fees for doing so.

Conclusion

Choosing an e-commerce platform can take some time, however, once you know what you are looking for you are well on your way to building your online business. We recommend Shopify because it is user-friendly, reasonably priced, has many apps, and is scalable. Shopify has everything you need to grow your business and more.

1. Blogs increase Seo

No matter the size of your business, posting regularly gives your potential customers more reasons to click. You can help them stay there too, with the help of a call to action. .For example, if you’re a Gym company writing a blog post about building muscle, you might add a call to action at the end saying “If you still have more questions, get in touch and we can help!” You would also link that blog to your contact page and close.

“Customers will look to you as a reliable resource for information in your industry, then come to you to buy.”

ake sure you use 1–2 keywords that match the intent of your ideal reader. Use those keywords in specific parts of your post; page title, a section header, the body of the blog post, and the URL. If you’re generating content at least once or twice a week, that’s one or two more keywords for a given topic.

2. Advertise Your Brand

A blog allows you to show more personality to your business that your audience won’t see through sales & marketing techniques. We maintain a blog for one of our clients, a Gym Business in local to Calhoun. We identified a customer persona we would assume when writing content:

•  Inform without being demeaning
•  Use quotes from staff to show direct, extensive knowledge
•  The human body is weird and funny, lean into that & produce
•  content that others will relate to
•  Use “I” and “you” statements,

a conversational tone leads to higher interaction. This type of content allows you to show the passion you have for your business and industry. Passion is contagious, and your blog’s readers will feel the excitement too. Blogging also gives others a vision of your company. And any Q&A’s your audience may have.

3. Blogs Show Competence

If you’re showing up on search engines as the number one place for Accounting, for example, that’s great! Users see your name and might even click on your website. However, many people are searching for specific accountants: How do I get a tax accountant? Where should I start looking for a financial accountant? Blogs will help you niche down into the right location on the web.

A blog post allows you to answer commonly asked questions. They give evidence that you know what you’re talking about. business does in more specific terms than an about page.

4. Blogs Make Great Content

Quality blog posts give you great content to share on social media. Think of your blog as the heart of all of your content marketing efforts. It’s great for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, email newsletters, e-books, and more. Blog articles are also ideal to share in email newsletters. This gives you a broader message to share.

“Blogs can show your business has more personality and there are many more pros to them.”

On a blog, you can be a lot more yourself than anywhere else on your website. You can answer questions and respond to comments. If sharing on social media, this opens your company up to even more opportunities to connect to your audience.

5. Blogs Build Audiences

Customers who read your blog are 90% more likely to click on your website. That improves your website’s search engine optimization (SEO) making your website more likely to rise to the top of Google. In addition, the more you blog, the more traffic you get. There are no guidelines for blogging, but you should have a strategy in mind so that you’re posting regularly.

blogs can serve many purposes:

•  To increase Seo and Reach on searches
•  To help advertise your brand
•  To show that you are an expert in your industry
•  Blogs make great content to share with all your audiences

“We give you insights on your company and go the extra mile for your business goals”

A Brief History ⚡️

BrandLyft launched with the simple mission: To help the brands and entrepreneurs in our area connect with their customers and implement business strategies to grow beyond. What started as a local business consulting and social media management agency, grew to the hustler-driven business consulting & marketing agency you know today.

Contact Us

If this Article was informational, get in touch & find out what custom software solutions we can create for your business.

Email: [email protected]

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