David Diack Explains Documenting Business and Sharing his Biggest Take away

How long have you been doing this? Did you coincide it with starting up your essay business? Or is this something that has just recently come along since, you know, you've got to the level now where you're talking about this more? And when I say document, I mean documenting online, document on Facebook, documenting on, you know, Instagram, going lives. You do it very, very well, you and your business partner. But when did this happen and what was like the sort of the idea behind.

Yeah, thank you. So, I mean, look, I'm a very reserved person personally. Like you probably would say a lot about what we do in business and how the business works, but very little about me. And you know, something that I struggled with for quite a long time just to sort of say, put myself out there, if you want to call it that. Right. But you know, at the same time, like we're building a business, we're like, we always say we're two steps in front of the people that are starting and there's people that are two steps ahead of us still. So as we're starting our coaching and training company, we said, you know what, let's just share the highs and the lows and everything that happens and just be real with it because the more real that we find that we can be, it's just us. This is what happens in our week. One minute you've got an amazing deal happening and it's all spended. The next thing you know, you've got an issue with a guest, it's caused a big problem and a kerfuffle, I mean, even today. So I mean, these things happen and it's important to share it, but not just share the fact that, you know, this is what happens. It's like this is what I've learned from it and if we could just share that upside and say, well, this is what I've learned or what you can learn or how you could do it different, then people get value from that and it helps them move forward in their journey.

So you mentioned there about the new coaching company. When was the coaching company for people started?

What we've done really well was we systemized immediately as we started the business and we spent a lot of time investing in sort of like structure and so it was smoother. And then we brought in a team of virtual assistants based in the Philippines. And once we managed to master the art of bringing in the right people to manage the right systems, our big just blew up.

So 2016, two years in, you've absolutely got the systemization absolutely down to a t. And then you've got people that you're now helping. So there's two years worth of, like, really big growth there. What was your biggest takeaway when you were growing? What was being your biggest takeaway in these last two years from you being there with Matt, getting your first key from the estate agent to now where you've got, let's say, 65 units, which is intense. What's been your biggest takeaway and what sort of advice could you pass on to anybody else who's at that stage?

Example number one is it's all built on relationships. I am how we are now with everybody that I meet, whether it's with our cleaning team, whether it's our maintenance team, agents, you know, whoever it might be, my clients. Like, I'm the same with every person. My goal is to reinforce our relationships and always be improving them. Right. Because business is built off the back of that. So that's been key for us with investors as well, in the sense that we've been able to grow at a good pace because we're very approachable, we've got good relationships, we're transparent, which means that we can have the kind of conversation. Now, I would say that the main thing, if you're coming off of a training and you're like, what do I do now? The easy thing is to go out there and say, well, I think I can achieve this nightly rate. This is what I want to get and this is what I think will work. And I'm going to go and get an apartment and do that and not spend enough time on the planning and analysis side. Now that's where my business partner, Matt Ward, comes in, because he's like, I'm the kind of person that's like. We call it, like, front end, that we're going to do all the deals and speak to people and stuff. And he's the one who's like the backbone behind the business, who keeps the structure there, ensures that we've planned it all correctly, ensure we've analyzed it in enough detail. And that's what I could say to every single person who's considering starting. Don't just go off of a whim, go off of facts like research the higher season, low season, the companies in your area, businesses that are being built, redevelopment that's going. There's so many factors you've got to consider. And I would even say reach out to them and speak to them before you even go and get your first unit and start working out what they want, when they want it, what their budgets are. It's a lot of work, don't get me wrong. But it can solve a huge problem. And what it will do with doing things like that is it gives you the confidence to be able to go out there and conversate with agents about what you're looking to do as a business. At the same time, you can have the same conversations with investors because you've done your due diligence and got your research and results right.