Systematize, Track & Visualize: How to Leverage Trello In A Real Estate Business w/Misty Soldwisch

I am honored and excited to have our next guest on Real Estate Team Builders, Misty Solwish. And she is dubbed as, I don't know if we gave her this name or she gave herself this name. It is the Queen of Trello. And when I look at Misty and all that she has achieved in her business journey, she runs a kick butt business out of Des Moines, Iowa and sells a lot of real estate. But the thing I love most is that her business is a system of systems. And Misty, you are going to just geek out on all things Trello today. But before we do that, give like the, the, the reason why people would want to pay attention. So not your whole journey but like the punchline, where are you at today in your business? How much, how many homes are you selling? You know, just tell us a little bit about yourself and your business.

Yeah. Hey Lars. Misty soldwish. I'm with Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Innovations in Des Moines, Iowa. I've been in the business for 21 years. I've been a broker owner for 14 years, a team leader for nine years. We've averaged around 400 to 410 homes the last couple of years. We've jumped ahead this year. So the plan is to be like around 450, 462.9 million in GCI. I have a very client services inside sales driven team. I am not involved in the day to day sales but really, really love systems and I'm really passionate about systems and marketing and so yeah, I mean we have a lot of great agents but get a lot of business done and it's thanks to really having a lot of details in the way we do things.

Yeah. And when we, we I think just gave like you a little seed of Trello and of anyone that we've been involved in their business at any level. You have run with it to the point where you are easily like the subject matter on Trello. So talk about maybe start out a little bit high level with Trello because some, some people I'm just like, just implement Trello. And they're like well I don't know how to do that. And I'm just like, well you should have someone on your team that their brain thinks like that and if you don't, you're screwed is essentially what I tell them. But what is it about you and the way you view your business? When you saw Trello you were like this is it and we're going super deep on this platform.

Yeah, well, first of all, I have to clarify, I did not proclaim myself the Queen of Trello. If I was going to proclaim myself the Queen of something, it would be something far cooler than Trello. But it is great. I mean, I have really run with it and I do joke like it's, it's very easy for me to visualize things in Trello and not every team leader or business owner is going to have that ability. But certainly someone that really likes to organize thoughts and organize information should have that ability. But you know, Trello is a project management website that organizes things into boards, lists and cards. But what I really love about Trello is it's so flexible and it is so visual. And I think where people get tripped up that aren't very familiar with it is if they're looking at boards that don't have all the visual components that you can have. Because if someone's used to more spreadsheets or they're used to more having things on documents, it's very easy to convert it into Trello in a way that can make sense. It's just understanding the best way depending on what you're trying to use it for.

Yeah. And at this point, I mean, is there really anything in your business that's not run on Trello? It's almost 100%.

Every single aspect of the business is run on Trello. And, and you know, there might be like we use a lot of things that tie into Trello. We use a lot of email to board features, we use a lot of Google, like Google documents, you know, drive forms, all of that integrated into Trello. But it's all with the hub of Trello being where you, how you organize it all.

Yeah, so, so let's talk about that because we, we chatted before we hit the record button and one of the things you wanted to talk about as a business owner, you made the decision like what's going to be my hub? Like where, where's the hub of information going to be for me? And so talk about that decision when you saw Trello and you had no board set up and you probably have like 50 boards set up now, like how did you, why and how did you go about the decision to make Trello like the hub of everything for your business?

Well, and I will say also like a really important thing about the way I use Trello is I use 100% the free version. I do not, I do not pay anything to use Trello. I know a lot of people that do do the paid version and use some of the advanced features that I don't Use. I haven't found a need to though. I really like every few months, really look at what they, what they offer for the paid version and I'm like, nope, we're good, we're able to do things this way.

All right, I have to stop right there because we want to pay for stuff. Like I think it is like in ingrained in us, like, hey, if there's a way to pay for it, I'm going to pay for it. So here's someone running a $3 million business, 450 transactions, like over 25 team members probably right? With all your salespeople, around 20 to 25 team members. That doesn't pay for the main architecture hub of your business. Just think about how powerful that is. So the challenge here is to do not pay for it. When they try to sell you the Business Pro version, whatever that thing is called, just say no to it.

Don't feel like you have to because there's lots of workarounds. That's not to say that in the future I wouldn't change that. It's worth it to me too. So I hope they're not listening but, but it is very easy to use it without having to do the paid version. So what we started out with was transaction management because we had been using Top Producer for many years and a system of checklists and so that was the first thing that we used as well as just a roster of our agents and then we kind of ran with it from there. I think those were the samples that I had when I first was introduced to Trello. But it was interesting because it really took my admin team, you know, three or four months of just kind of looking at it and like, I don't know, we'll see how it works. And I had to just say, you know what, we're just going to jump in and do it. And so, you know, started out with just more checklist driven boards but then we really expanded it and so I think the important thing to know is like you can use it for, in place of manuals, like learning information manuals. That's a really big piece of how I use it. When a new agent onboards onto the team, they get their own board and it has some self guided studies, it has some links to. We use Loom to do a lot of like screenshot videos, teaching them how to do things and then they use the Trello card to put their notes and their questions. We just make it really visual and, and lay out a board for everyone that joins the team. Of what they need to learn and what kind of checkpoints they need to hit to get to the next level. We also use Trello for meetings. We use it as our agenda. And then where we put action items and results and tag who's responsible for different items. We use it to organize our open houses. There's checklists of what kind of things need to be done beforehand, but then there's also checklists for the agent to take care of when they're there. One thing we found really helpful for our salespeople is putting a link to the card for action items in their calendar so that they don't have to log into Trello and see all of the different things. They're able to just click, get right to where they need to go, do a checklist, upload a photo, and they're good. We also use it like for our listings for our transactions. We have an action board of live listings that are in progress, live transactions that are pending. But then we also have resource boards for both. So that there's just not. It's just really key to really know what is this board used for and start splitting it up so that you don't have too much on one board. Because that's where people get overwhelmed when they're learning the process.

Yeah. And there's one. So agent onboarding I think is. I think even cooler than anything you just mentioned is. I don't know what you call it on your team, but it's almost like your agent achievement system.

Like every agent has a business tracker board. So we use. We use that as a hub for like our manual, like our employee manual, basically, like our policy manual. We use it as a link to all the resources of the different things they used. But then we also use it for tracking their goals, tracking their business track, tracking their notes from their meetings with us. And not just for this year, but we have links to prior years and all of that. So every single agent has that information so that they always have accessible where they're at in the business and what kind of things we've talked about to help them be coached to do the best they can.

Yeah. And even on a daily basis when you're. So you have accountability in your business, as every good team leader should. And if you don't, you're not. You need to. Every day that your agents have the ability to simply email. Right. Because of the way. What is it called? Intrello.

We have a daily activity record that every agent does. It's a Google form that they fill out that basically says what they accomplished for the day, the results of the appointments that they either set or met, and just some general information. We use the email to board feature so that when the Google form is filled out, I get a copy of their email, my director of sales gets a copy of the email and then it goes straight to their board as well. So that information is tracked on their business board. Um, that's been a really huge thing. We went from like in the past we used paper versions, things like that. Um, but it, it makes it so I have a virtual assistant that tracks, you know, their, that they're getting all of their daily activity records completed and it's a good place for us to reference what they talked about.

Yeah, that's awesome. And talk to me a little bit about, you know, so when you were in Top Producer, so what. Talk a little bit about like what the world looked like. You mentioned Top Producer and you probably had spreadsheets over here or your agent. So talk about like life before Trello and what it looks like now. So you're able to. I'm almost attempted, you know, it's a podcast, so it's audio. Although we do post on YouTube. I am going to ask you to share maybe a few screenshots of literally just screenshots of maybe your agent onboarding and your agent business tracker just like as wide as you can to get a sense of the different cards. Just so we can show those in the show notes. But talk about, you know, why maybe going backwards a little bit. What was the real motivation? How does, how much more efficient are you now versus Top Producer and all the disparate, like everything was all over the place.

It's amazing. I mean it's because we're able to use one hub as the resource for everything that's happening in the business. You know, we are very hands on in our transactions and you know there's like right now I think there's 67 pending transactions. And you know we have an extremely visual in having labels used, covers used of photos, using custom templates that we've created four different task lists and then always having everything with the transaction referenced in that card. So it's just really using all the different features that they have available in linking. In our Trello card we have a link to our CRM that we use, we have a link to our Google Drive and then it just, it just makes this a really great visual hub that we have organized in a calendar format so that it's very, very easy to look. Okay, here's what's happening this week. Here's what's happening next week. And be able to organize that thought. We do the exact same thing in our listings. But then like our inside sales team, they have a Trello board that basically outlines their own personal tasks that they need to do on a daily basis. And it also outlines as a, an inside sales team what they need to get accomplished so that individuals are able to claim team tasks based on what their workload is for the day.

Awesome. And I don't know. Have you read the book checklist manifesto?

No, but that's why planes do not fall out of the air.

Yeah, you do not need to read the book checklist. So. Yeah, so like Misty said, the reason planes don't fall out of the air and the reason why most of the time when you go to the hospital, you come out like better than when you went in. And they can do these complex, like open your chest up and like dissect your heart and fix stuff inside of it and then put you back together and make sure you don't have any, you know, infectious whatever coming out. It's simply because of checklists. So when, when I say you know and Misty talks about a business as a system of systems. A systems is a series of checklists and you've taken it. So maybe go go your team outside of inside Sales, you provide a differentiated service to your buyers and sellers. Talk that through. Like, what would. How do you make sure that every seller gets the pre list packet or every. Like, since you don't go on appointments, how can you make sure that your agents do things the way you want? Like this is the opportunity trellos to make sure that you as the team leader, that your vision is realized in your business through a series of checklists. So let's just unpack that a little bit. What does that look like for you?

Well, I think it's important to realize, like sales agents don't necessarily think like operational minds do. And so, so it's doing as much in the system as you can and then having them put their personalities into the relationship with the client. So you know, when there's a new listing opportunity, my client services inside sales team has a, has a system that they follow that to set up the appointment. And then my listing coordinator has a Trello. She gets it all set up in Trello as a new listing opportunity, does a checklist to make sure that that client gets these key pieces of information no matter what else is happening, no matter what the workload is of the agent. That's going to be meeting with them, all of that. And then it's just looking at what are all these different things that we want to make sure that they get that's part of the system, not dependent on one person deciding whether or not they do it that day.

Yeah. And I would say, you know, so how many years ago were you in production? When did you last sell like a bunch of homes in a year?

Well, when I was last actively meeting with like new client opportunities, I mean, it's probably been about six or seven years.

Okay. And I'm just imagining like if, if as a team owner, the reason why most of us are not able to get out of production is because we never really spend the time to, to build the business and work on systems. What, what advice? Before I get into like specific advice you would give someone in terms of how to roll this out, what advice would you give someone that struggles with, you know, focusing on the non urgent important tasks like building systems and spending time on Trello, like going back to when you implemented it, did you block out like time blocks? Did you have a main right hand person that was alongside you as you implemented Trello?

I think that one thing that I'm really good at is I'm good at seeing what I want the vision to be for how the system works, doing a very small example and telling someone, okay, I've given you a little bit and then I want you to run with it and then I'm going to come back and look at it and tell you if you're doing it that way. So no, I never blocked out like massive periods of time to do it.

So almost like, I forget who said this, it wasn't me, but I guess I'll claim it almost. It was Michael Hyatt, the guy that focuses on productivity and life planning and all that. He said 1080, 10. So he said as a business owner, it's like, hey, you, you really only have time to focus on the front 10% of a project and then you might meet, you know, for a few minutes here and there to get the 80% done with a key person and then come in and put your finish finishing touches on it. So that's a good recommendation for something like this. You do need a key administrator to help you build this out and then just 10% to give them the vision. You know, take a screenshot of a board or a sample board and then let someone else run with it and build it out and, and kind of take it from there. So let's let's end with this, you know, let's put you in the business coach hat where you're talking to somebody that they're a complete crap show in terms of systems and they don't have Trello implemented. They're maybe in spreadsheets for client care. And you know, they've changed CRMs three times in three years because everyone promised to do what, you know, client care and all that stuff. How would you guide them to roll this out? You know, how. What advice would you give them step by step to roll this out?

Well, I think that it's really, really easy for people to get caught in the trap of I'm so busy and I, you know, I'll do it when I have time, but I don't have time because I'm so busy. I mean, that's a conscious, maybe unconscious choice that you're making. If it's truly important to you to progress your business to another level, you're going to put the things in place. It's either you taking the time or you hiring someone to take the time and really like putting that vision in place. And I think that's like, that's the big differentiator of people moving their business to a different level. And it's, it's not, it's a lot of people like move their kicking and screaming because they have a lot of fear of losing business. But ultimately you have to let that go in order to get to the next phase.

Yeah, and that's an awesome point. So there's different. I feel like in real estate B school we almost measure growth in, you know, let's say your business stays at 400 sides. It's only going to be 400 sides. But if you only measured growth in your business by the number of homes you sold, then you might be disappointed every year versus like man, this business has been more streamlined, more profitable. You know, we've implemented these two big systems in the last year. So I love that it's almost measuring your growth by something other than just more home sales.

And I think that's the tricky. That's such the trap of real estate though, because it's the prestige of the numbers and volume and all that. But that really doesn't matter if you're not profitable and if you don't have a life, that stuff doesn't matter.

Yeah. And when we talk about systems like this is the essence of it, you know, before we hit record, you mentioned what are the things you're doing over and over that you want to simplify and so maybe end with a little bit again with your business coach. Hat on. What are the like the first three functions of. Let's take a small team doing 100 transactions, the team owners doing half of them. They've got a couple agents and an administrator. What are the first three boards you would have them implement?

Listing coordination, transaction coordination and operational processes.

What do you mean by operational processes?

Just basically a board that has any process that you're doing over and over again, just a recording of it, a note of it, something that logs how it's done. Uh, the. It's very, very tough for a team leader when you've had a great admin that leaves and you have no information about anything that they did. It's really challenging that every single thing that's done on your team in your business is documented. So an operational processes board is perfect for that.

Awesome. So give me an example of like two or three operational processes.

What is the system for sending your updated database to your newsletter provider? What is your system for sending out annual calendars to your client database? Things like that.

You can almost.

How do you order signs?

It's operational processes, but you can almost organize it. Like marketing. Sales.

Exactly.

Listing, you know, buyers that. So like, what's your system for running a team meeting? What's your system for ordering lunch for, you know, when you do your.

Anything that you do like that. And so that will be a great place to note logins, note what sites note. Like if you order like we have branded bags that we use for our buyers and sellers, like, where do we order them from? How much did the class last time? Things like that.

Yeah. And that's a really good. The example you give. You know, if, if you. In like, let's say in five years, you have three different administrators and you have not documented anything. Your business will never grow because the administrator comes in and they're literally trying to figure out like what the business is. And it's not even a business if you haven't implemented those processes.

And that's so common in, in small real estate businesses too. And so it's just really having that disc plan and making it really important. Like we are going to spend time on this and. And you know, you need to get X done by X date.

Yeah. And one thing you're awesome at, and if you can, if you go to Misty's stuff online, there's only like a handful of folks I sort of stalk and see what they're doing in terms of their branding and marketing. I've got to imagine that. Do you have one marketing board or do you have multiple market marketing boards?

I have a projects board with my marketing manager. And so it's basically any project that I have an idea on. We kind of run through the phases on our projects board.

Okay, so that's so getting your. Your. Let's say you do a physical newsletter, would that be in your operational processes board? Because it's just ongoing and it happens all the time. Perfect. Okay, so your operational processes board is anything that you do every day, every week, every month, sort of thing. Awesome. Yeah, awesome. Cool. So if you can send me screenshots of the five boards that you think are most cool. Just a physical screenshot as wide as you can go, you know, and just show the cards and the lists. And so a board is the whole screen. The lists are the columns and the cards are the little squares just for listeners when you actually click on these. And those should give you some inspiration to take action. At least start with the three boards that Misty mentioned. The listings board. So that is a listing is signed all the way till it's under contract, right?

Yes. And we have it broken down further, but where you start is just listing signed.

Yeah. And then your contract to closing or your transactions that's under contract to closing, and then your operational processes. And then I would love to see your agent business tracking or your agent onboarding as well, just to give a sample of what they look like.

I'll also do one thing that we implemented this year that has been awesome is we do our daily sales huddle as a Trello board. And each there is someone new that's a leader every day. But it's very visual. It gives them a guide. And it's been a wonderful opportunity for people to show their leadership skills and for different people to be leading that. And the Trello board has really made it easy.

Awesome. That is really good. And you can tell that once you. Once you wrap your head around this and you have a team member that is really understanding the power of helping you build this out, it is like endless. Right. I mean, you. Anything you think of now, it just goes on a Trello board somewhere, right.

Automatically.

Right. It either is an existing Trello board, like it's a card in a list in a board, or. Or it's a new board.

Yeah.

And how about. Okay, so this is a question. I'm with this. How about personally, how do you have Trello boards? Like, what are the top three personal Trello boards that somebody should implement?

I use Trello boards for organizing my Christmas presents. Like, I take photos of my kids presents. I put it on a card. I have a list for each of them. That way if I wrapped it, I already know what it is. I use it for organizing vacations.

Awesome.

First I have like a, just a, like, oh, here's all the things I want to do. And then I start like organizing like the different things and then I share like the information about where we're staying and our travel accommodations and all of that. I use it for organizing parties a lot too. I use it for like the food, the activities, and different ideas.

That is awesome. Yeah. So this has to be inspirational. Someone who, you know, succeeds in life and succeeds and crushes it in business. So we will look forward to those. Those images. I will definitely share those with the listeners. And yeah, my, my advice for someone listening is you have to honor something more than the next sale, you know, so when you book out a little bit of time in your calendar to work on your business, this is like literally the stuff you need to work on. And treat that calendar appointment as if it was. I almost was going to say like your kids recital, but people honor listing appointments more than they do their kids events sometimes. So I would say treat it like a listing appointment and you will watch your business take on a life of its own. Any parting words, Misty?

Yeah, I mean, I think it's just making that decision that this is the business I want. It's not. I'm not just looking at the media. I'm looking towards what I'm trying to build because I. I'm truly committed to what I want to grow to. It's really easy to say that and then just keep doing your thing and that's never going to get you out of that day to day grind.

Yeah. Awesome. Thanks so much, Misty.

Thanks.