We Are Selling with Lee Woodward
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We Are Selling with Lee Woodward
144 - Prospecting Predictable Listings with Stephen Whiting
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Unlock the secrets to a formidable real estate lead generation strategy with our special guest, Stephen Whiting, CEO of Street Text. Get ready to transform your approach to social media ads as Stephen shares insights on how this cutting-edge platform simplifies Facebook and Instagram ad management for real estate agents. Discover how you can generate your leads without the hefty fees associated with lead services. We explore the power of harnessing existing databases, targeting specific areas, and using remarketing strategies to build lasting client relationships. It's time to make lead generation not just a task but a sustainable strategy for continuous growth.
Tune in for a conversation filled with actionable insights, and don’t miss the brief mention of my new book, "Claiming Doors," which has already captivated 400 readers!
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Hello and welcome back to the podcast we Are Selling. My name's Lee Woodward, the author of the Complete Salesperson course. Today's podcast prospecting predictable listings, building your own pond from the social opportunity that we have from the Facebook and Instagram marketplaces. Today's international guest is Stephen Whiting, the CEO, founder and director of Street Text. Street Text is a real estate dedicated templated platform partnered with Meta, to work in Facebook. Generate leads of your own pond, retargeting of your own marketing and data, and take you into full control of your lead generation without paying others for leads from access to the data you already have. Today, it is now possible to connect your back-end database to the front-end target marketing top of funnel in Facebook. So if I clicked on one of your ads, one of your promotions, it would retarget me and say Lee Woodward, who's been in your database for 12 years, just clicked on. Should you move or should you renovate? Seven times? And because you're targeting my street, the streets around me, to whichever radius you choose, as you understand, coding your area, everybody else who's on Facebook in those streets at that time can now become a brand new lead.
Speaker 1:After studying service area for over 30 years, I'm so passionate about today's audio as a solution, a cost-effective solution for our agents to generate their own leads and, as mentioned, paying astronomical money or 20% referrals for your leads is crazy. We've all got access to the pond. We just need the platform to do it and the steps and the understanding, which is why I've built a short course featuring today's platform called Claiming Social Doors. I urge you to do that short course. It's two videos and a podcast. It's in the show notes, but that could be the game-changing moment for lead generation and, from my managers, leaders and principals listening to this audio right now, take this seriously. This could be a new position and department, the only lead generation department you will need in your real estate practice business for property management, sales and commercial. So let me share some highlights with you from Claiming Social Doors as I interview the incredible Stephen Whiting. He joins me now, stephen. Welcome to the podcast we Are.
Speaker 2:Selling. Thank you so much, Lee. I am very excited to be here today.
Speaker 1:I'm very excited I could get hold of you. You're in a very busy world and we might start with. What is Street Text and how did it start?
Speaker 2:So, as you said perfectly, Street text makes it unbelievably simple to generate leads using Facebook and Instagram. We have made it as simple as just a couple of clicks, so we have taken out all the complexities. If you've ever run an ad on Facebook or Instagram before, there are a number of pitfalls that can go wrong or creative issues that can go wrong. But we have basically taken all of the, if you will like, the best learnings over the last 12 years and millions and millions of dollars of ad spend and we've crafted them into these perfect templates and ads so that, as an agent comes in, even if they've never run an ad, before they log into the platform, they discover they see all the templates they can run for their listings or, like you said, to generate leads.
Speaker 1:they push a couple of buttons and within a few hours, leads are showing up. So StreetTex is the technology and technique of lead generation for real estate marketing. And you only do real estate marketing, don't you?
Speaker 2:That's correct. Yeah, so in the US and Canada, most agents, if they're looking for leads, they're relying on sort of the bigger companies that are selling them leads companies like Zillow, for example but they're paying a fortune for it. The challenge with that, of course, is that not only are they paying a fortune for it, those fees are only going up. They're becoming more competitive. And Zillow, since they're in control, they get to decide who gets it. When they get it, they can cut you off at any time. Right, many, many years ago we read a book called Predictable Revenue. We had sort of the vision that we could turn ads into predictable revenue for real estate agents and we fundamentally believed we could do it for our business and their business, and that was sort of the origin of what started what StreetTex is today and that's exactly what it does where you can put a few dollars in. On the other side of that, you can generate 15 or 20 times that ROI. Then you can take that investment, invest it back into your lead gen and so forth, and to your mechanic analogy now it's just about tweaking the process. So as a real estate agent, you're saying, okay, the ads are working, I'm generating leads, this is great. How can I get a little bit better with my follow-up? How can I get a little bit better with my system? So what are some other tools that I can plug in to help create an you know, even enhance experience for my, my leads, or even follow-up post?
Speaker 2:I'm sure you talk about this a lot, but post a client, make sure that they don't forget about who you are.
Speaker 2:What does the remarketing look like? What are you going to do to keep that relationship ongoing, to make sure that they're going to continue to refer you more business? And so we really focus on creating this predictable revenue stream thanks to lead generation. And, if you will, the last thing I will just add to that is that, when you go back to the Zillow example, zillow has a ton of homebuyers and sellers on it all the time, but every single one of those people shopping on Zillow as just one example in the US is also on Facebook and Instagram, and so, as a real estate agent, if you're using tools like ours and techniques like ours, you have an opportunity to get to those same people first, earlier, and you can generate them as a lead at a fraction of the price that you pay later on to a company like Zillow. So in essence that's what we do, and we help agents make sure that they own a much bigger margin and part of the business going forward.
Speaker 1:Absolutely brilliant clarity of why this company exists. Stephen, one of the reasons I agreed to do the interview was you have been around 12 years. A lot of startups come in, they grow, they sell, they're gone, but you've been through the ups, the downs, the ups and then second downs to still be standing. I know a lot of your competitors aren't. They seem to have faded. So today's interview is a really good example of the agent themselves.
Speaker 1:You've got to be the person who knows how to generate your listings, your leads. Getting your name out there is very different to just being the last moment of the grand final when someone said there's the ball and you're like, oh, who are they? What are they? And they go. Who are you? Oh well, I'm the person who has been selected to call you. But there's no relationship or frequency of contact, building trust there that allows the conversion to happen. And I think keeping your name in a marketplace is a skill.
Speaker 1:And one thing we teach at the Complete Salesperson course, stephen, is when you post, is it ego or info? Because there's a difference and people are sick of seeing someone in front of a soul sign saying how good they are versus should you move or should you renovate? What's going on in that area? What's been some of the breakthrough ads or the learns you've had from? Okay, I'm posting this specific ad. I'm targeting this specific type of person. What can our listener if they go onto the platform and sign up for this in their free demonstration or free account? What's been some of the breakthrough in the best ads of street techs?
Speaker 2:A lot of the best performing real estate ads today are many of the same things that would work in other marketing, even your print marketing or your mail marketing, if you think about it. Example is one of the very first ads that we ever ran. It's still around today. It's taken a number of tweaks, but it's around. How much is your home worth? I'm sure in Australia that is a big concern for home sellers as well. They're wondering how much equity they have in their home.
Speaker 2:You know we have other ads that talk about. You know what the market is doing because that's on top of mind. If you have listings, listings generate an enormous amount of leads and if it's done right, you not only get obviously that and I hope I'm using all the right words for the Australian market but the listing or the home you have under contract to sell obviously can generate an enormous amount of other homes that you can sell in the future as well, right? But then talking about the education component, this is where, when you leverage what we refer to often as remarketing similar word as retargeting, but one of the huge learnings is that when you're generating or meeting somebody on social media, there's a very good chance that that person has never heard of you before. Right, you need to. You need to stop for a moment and think to yourself. You know when that lead comes in, you can reach out to them immediately, and you should. But keep in mind it's a little bit like making a proposal to someone that you've just met, right? Would you? Would you like to marry me? I've just met you, and so you have to keep in mind that when that lead comes in and they're cold, what we call cold or you want to warm them up, and back to that educate component, we have built out a number of those resources already, or agents can leverage their own, but we have a platform built in where, as soon as that lead comes into your system, our system will then begin to market to them on an ongoing, immediately basis. And all of a sudden, if it was you, lee, that we were advertising as far as this person's concerned, you're everywhere, but you're educating them, you're helping them, you're teaching them, you're showing them things. So by the time you ever walk into their house or have a conversation with them on the phone, they feel that they already know you.
Speaker 2:And so that's the one of the other secret ingredients, I would say the lead generation is. Is that where some people have done it well? I guess maybe one of the missing ingredients? Like if you're making a cake, you can get all sorts of different cakes, but if the ingredients are perfect, you can get a cake that not only tastes great, but so it's like the leads are coming in and it's like, oh, they're all there, but it also the whole experience of it is just so much better because you've actually warmed these leads up as well. So that's something that we've added throughout the years not just getting a lead, but like what does that experience need to look like, and what kind of content really will educate and warm them up to make that an easier conversation as well?
Speaker 1:Warming up the data is a great skill and, as you were speaking about, what's your property worth, it's the simplistic view of questions. Questions get answers, statements get judged and I think a lot of people in marketing are just statement, statement, statement versus the question is beautiful, and I agree with you on this point of this remarketing. And seeing the product and clicking on the product is beautiful and I agree with you on this point of this remarketing and seeing the product and clicking on the product is phenomenal.
Speaker 2:I would say that where some of our agents go wrong is that they do love that our system will warm up and they do love that our system will reach out, but then they don't make the call, then they don't actually pick up the phone or send the text message, or even pop by the house, if you will.
Speaker 1:Just explain how our agents get to modify or just plug and play those. And again, what's another example of a great template doing well out there.
Speaker 2:I would say one of the genius things that we did right at the beginning was that we started recognizing that certain images and certain copy or text in an ad would do very well, and so what would happen is, as agents were spending money on ads, we would create these templates of all of the best performing ads. And so, to your exact point, if you log into Street Text and you connect to your Facebook and Instagram account which is very easy to do and you're going to launch one of our ads, you're really putting your best foot forward, even if you've never run an ad before. Launch one of ours, use it pretty much as verbatim, don't make too many tweaks or changes, and use it as a benchmark as you go forward, but it'll probably do very well. Like if I was to bring up some of our ads right now, but, as an example, like if I just hover over one of our property listing ones, there's about 14,000 agents right now that are using this ad actively right now and across all of North America, they're generating email leads and phone numbers for about $4. So we aggregate all of that data together as an example, and we have tons of different templates, and I would imagine in Australia and we have some Australian customers, so I actually know this to be true already, but we don't have nearly as many as we should.
Speaker 2:But a lot of our ads focus on the, the big things or the life events that are happening in people's lives, which is going to be the same in North America and Australia. So, for example, some of the best performing ads of late have actually been what we call a downsizing ad, and that's basically just when someone is looking. You did you know before this call you were describing the size of your home and that you had many kids in there. Now they've all left. Maybe you don't need such a big home Now you did still, but maybe you know a lot of people don't, and so they're interested in in a maybe a smaller home, a smaller footprint. So those ads perform incredibly well. As an example, some of the other ads that are like doing incredibly well, as I mentioned, is just like the changing equity in the market right now. A lot of people are very, very interested in that.
Speaker 2:So, as an example, but the point is is that we take all of those and put them into these templates. So you get to log into street text, you get to scroll the page of these ads, you get to see one that you like. You click on it. All of the text is already there. We do have the ability for you to customize it or even use AI to enhance it, so you can make it more your own. But I wouldn't at the beginning. I would just follow what we do. You'll put in an image local to your market, you'll pick your targeting and then you hit deploy and that's it. It is that simple. And then what will happen is our ads will deploy, but it won't just deploy the ad for you. What's going on behind the scenes is we're deploying that ad. We're deploying an entire automation behind it so you know whether you're using text messages and emails. All of that system is built into our platform so it can ongoingly nurture and reach out to the lead, and then all the stats or anything that's happening with the ad. We then show you what's going on inside of Street Tech so you get to see exactly how well that ad's performing If a lead comes in, exactly how much that lead is costing you If they've clicked on another ad. You get to see the journey that those leads are taking. But yes, that's what we've done. We've templated.
Speaker 2:When you launch an ad, you actually want to ideally launch two to three ads that are identical and when they run, we call it a three ad split test. What the system will do is it will find the best performing ad. So if I only launch one ad, facebook's going to do its best to find the right people. But if I launch three, I'm giving it three times the chance and after about 500 impressions for each ad, the lead price can be very different. One ad may be generating leads at $20, another ad at $15, and the third ad at $5. But unless I had launched three, I would never have got that last added $5. I might've been stuck with one of the ones at 20 or $15 a lead.
Speaker 2:So in street techs these ads can keep running. So, for example, let's say you you know in your market and you've run these ads a few times and you go. You know what. I'm just not willing to spend more than $15 a lead.
Speaker 2:If my ads ever hit $15 a lead, I want them to automatically shut off. Maybe I'm gone, maybe I'm on vacation, or maybe it's while I'm sleeping. I just don't want if it hits that, I want my ads to shut off. So our system can do that, can automatically pause it for you, but our system can actually also relaunch that ad for you while you're also sleeping and, if you allow it, it can even use some AI-generated creative in both the image and the text to help ultimately drive that lead price down.
Speaker 2:So these are some of the other cool features that are built in that you would never find if you were launching ads on your own. These are all designed to help, obviously, you get better performance, but also just save you a ton of time. As fun as it is to launch ads and as easy as we've made it. When you're busy and you're a busy agent and you've got some ads at work and you just want to have a lead price, you might want this ad to keep running in perpetuity, but if it hits a certain lead price, you want our system to redeploy it and start the process all over again, and then all I would do is hit deploy and that's it. The system will build everything it needs to get this ad up and running and it'll be running, you know, just in. Sometimes it can take a few hours, but it launches pretty quick.
Speaker 1:Well, stephen, thank you for incredible information, and our podcast doesn't end here. In the show notes, I've actually put the short course that you and I have just done with the actual screen demonstration and getting hands-on to the system called Claiming Social Doors. So that's our new short course that is available. There is also a link there for anyone to start their own free account, but I urge you to watch the short course. It's the information you need to understand this incredible lead generation process. And I've got to say, stephen, I got really excited when I did the interview and the screen work with you and, after working in service area for so long, I actually believe the Street Tech's platform and claiming social doors will become a position in a real estate business and that's why we've got our title today of Prospecting, predictable Leads.
Speaker 1:We all need to have our tools of trade, warm up the data and these return leads that come back after two years and suddenly they're reconnected with you. That's where the listing is and for those listening to this right now, you basically just drop the pin on the streets where you want to be. You're targeting those and for those listening to this right now, you basically just drop the pin on the streets where you want to be. You're targeting those and the connection of what this platform does is all based around education-based marketing and, as you know from attending the Complete Salesperson course, when you post, is it ego or info? And this is why education-based marketing is so important. So make sure you do the short course Claiming Social Doors which is in the show notes. Stephen, great interview. Thank you for sharing your story and putting as much time as you have into the preparation for today's program. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2:Thanks, Liam.
Speaker 1:And that concludes another podcast, for we Are Selling and if you haven't done so, the book Claiming Doors is now available. We've had over 400 copies sell in its first release. That is also in the show notes and I'll look forward to seeing you next week.