Reasons Why You Need To Be Prepared For Changes With Marketing Channels

Hey, it's Mark Podolski, the land geek with your favorite niche real estate website, thelandgeek.com and on this week's Roundtable podcast, we have almost all the usual suspects. Sands, Tria putting in the reps. Harris, we've got the Zen master. Breathe in the mailing, Breathe out the marketing. Michael Zaino. Mike, how are you?

Great. Feeling calm and ready.

When I call you Michael, do you feel like you're in trouble?

Yeah. That kind of hit me hard.

Yeah, it's like when. When you're a kid, like, what's your middle name?

Ralph.

Yeah, Michael Ralph. Zano. What was. What was the deal with parents saying your full name? I never did that. Did you guys do that with your kids when they get in trouble? I just, you know, I did not, and.

But yes, that happened quite a bit, and he just regressed me, so I don't know how I'm going to perform the podcast.

Well, I'm going to go around to the intros, and then hopefully you'll be back in adult form. But, Scott Bossman. Dude, Buddy, the nightcap og how are you? I'm great, Mark.

Glad to be here.

Good to see you. We've got the technician, Eric Peterson, and he does not have any smoke coming out from the backyard. I'm always on Traeger alert. Is the Traeger fired up right now?

No, it's not.

Not today.

All right.

Speaking Friday, Dueling Traegers. Like dueling banjos. We've got. I love it when you call me Big Papa Tate. Litchfield Tate. How are you doing?

Really well. Yeah, happy to be here and happy to spend some of Scott Todd's money. Recently, he joined Eric and I on the. On the fun and pull the trigger after hearing us talk about Traegers for a weekend straight. And so we're happy for you, Scott. Welcome to the family.

Thanks, man. I just got alert that my Traeger just shut down, so might be time to go eat something good.

Well, that brings us to you, Scott Todd.

He can't talk right now. The professor got a rib in his mouth.

In my mouth. About to be like Eric.

That's right. So, Scott, you ordered a Traeger. I'm going to order a Traeger, which means bossman and Zano and Terea. I think Terea has a Traeger. Yeah, she does. So Tria has a Traeger. We all have to join the Traeger family.

And the good thing about this is it won't be a fad like the peloton was for most of you guys because you actually from this.

Is that a smoker? Is that what it is?

What do you mean?

I don't get it. Mark, Mark, Here's. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. You and I stood in. In the hardware store in California where we were introduced to the Traeger grill, and then you went home because you couldn't. You couldn't take a flight because of the plane and whatever. Like, you went home. I could have swore that you would have, like, had that trigger delivered by the time I got home. And I got home on Sunday and I bebopped into the dealer on Monday. And I'm like, this is the one I'm looking for. He's like, I have one in stock. I'm like, great. Do I take it home? Do you deliver? He's like, I'll deliver it. I'm like, when can you deliver? He's like, tomorrow. I'm like, let's do it. And I'm just really shocked that you haven't joined the family yet. What are you waiting for, man?

Honestly, the reason being is I have two grills right now. I have a built in grill that's gas. I have a Weber grill on the tank. If I get a third grill, what do I do with the other two?

You give them away.

Okay, but how did I call 1-800- Got- junk?

Well, you could use this marketing platform called Facebook Marketplace and have somebody come down, tell them you got a grill. They'll come down, they'll pick it up. They'll probably show up in a pickup truck with a rib out of their mouth. And you know, they'll probably be Eric, but may not be. And then you just say, hey, can you take this away from me? And they're like, yeah. In between bites, they're like, yeah, I can do this. So it's gone.

Two questions. One, can I add the link? And two, does it come with Eric's recipes?

Yes, it does, actually.

Absolutely.

Eric has a whole app called the Trigger app.

Yeah, it's really easy, Mike. Even you could do it.

I don't get one.

It is amazing what this thing can do. And by the way, today's podcast is not sponsored by Traeger. Today's podcast is sponsored by flight school. Learn how the next 16 weeks can transform your life. Go up that mountain of land investing with Scott Todd being your Sherpa. He's going to take you up there quickly, safely, efficiently. In fact, that flight school tuition is not going to cost you anything. Guaranteed. You're going to make back that money 180 days or less. You got nothing to lose, everything to gain. Start building that passive income without any headaches. Learn more. Go to landgeek.com training Eric Peterson. What's our topic?

I think it's time for the tip of the week.

We're done.

We just had our sponsor. We, we did the banter.

Is it over? We're doing it in reverse. Remember the Seinfeld one? Was that a dumpster fire? I still didn't get. No one really made any comments about that.

It must have been fine. So our topic this week, you know, something I hear commonly from our coaching students, and we see it in the Facebook community as well. You know, initially, it seems really easy to market your properties in Facebook marketplace, but as you do more and more of that, it gets more and more complicated. Facebook is constantly changing the way that they're, you know, monitoring marketplace and putting people in jail and all this different stuff. And then, you know, we talk about other platforms that are free like Craigslist, and you, you know, that's another one where it's always changing, right? And if we're relying on these free platforms to, to market our properties in a way that doesn't cost us much, what happens when we lose an account or things change? How do we, how do we pivot and quickly find ways to, to work around the problems that we have? So that's our topic today.

That's a great topic and it's timely. If you go on social media, you'll see all these marketers complaining about 90% of their business was coming from Facebook. And then iOS 14.5 comes out and it's all gone. All the analytics are gone. Apple's blocking it. So they're really hurting Facebook's business. And the moral of the story is these small businesses are getting hurt, but they knew this was coming. And it just goes to show you, you can't be dependent on one marketing platform. You need to have your marketing fundamentals down. You need to know your customer. You need to have your messaging. You need to have a way to develop a relationship with them, say, via email marketing. But I'm completely agnostic when it comes to which platform you market on to get leads. So it's a really great topic. So we're all going to experience this, whether it's Facebook's changing, Craigslist is changing. The lands are shacking up their prices. And Scott Todd has to start landmodo.com to even out the playing field so that, you know, we can afford to market on these platforms. So, Zed Master, what are your thoughts? What do you start to do and how do you prepare for changing marketing channels?

Right, so. Right. So I think one thing that you touched upon is don't get comfortable. Don't have your eggs all in one basket. You know, you're getting leads from. I guess we're talking about Facebook right now. We're getting leads and leads and leads. And life's good. And don't just settle in and get comfortable. Be prepared. So have multiple channels that you're marketing on. I think all of. I know all of us here are doing that, and I hope everybody who's listening to us is doing that. Not putting everything into one channel and just, you know, thinking, this is great because you just said it. It could change. So, I mean, there are some other obvious things I could say, but I know that the other. Other people here are going to. Everybody else is going to bring them up. But I would say at the very beginning, don't get comfortable. Don't. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Don't just think, hey, this is great. And, you know, you know, think it can never change because it does constantly change. And you need to have multiple platforms that you're working on. I mean, right from the beginning, we can, you know, you have Craigslist, you. Which still is viable. I just think it, you know, things sometimes are more difficult to deal with it at times, you know, but anyway, you have Facebook and you have Land Moto and there's other land sites if you want to go that route. So you have multiple angles that you could go to. Just at the beginning, I'd say don't get comfortable. Don't rely on one head Avenue.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I remember back in the day when I was using ebay as my main marketing platform. I mean, not to age me, but when I was using ebay, I did not have gray hair. So that's how long ago it was.

You don't have gray hair now?

No, I do. Oh, I do. So, dude, buddy, Nightcap OG Scott Bossman, what are your thoughts?

I think, you know, this. This business comes down to volume. Volume with mailing and volume with marketing. So you need to think of ways in your business to get as many ads out there as possible. Like Mike said, I mean, you need to cast the net far and wide. You need to think of different strategies, not use only. I mean, we know, we all know land investors who use only Facebook. Now, they may have multiple accounts, but what Happens if Facebook shuts down. So more ads, multiple platforms. Experiment a little bit. I was on ebay the other day. I think people are going back to ebay. I'm seeing more listings on ebay than I have recently. I myself, I had a more expensive property recently. I listed it with an MLS listing agent for 200 bucks up front. There's going to be a $200 fee at close, but it's sold for cash, and we're making a very good profit on that property. So there are different strategies out there. Continue to experiment with Craigslist. Obviously, the land platforms you need to reach far and wide.

I agree with everything you said. I wonder if the irascible Eric the technician Peterson has his thoughts on these platforms.

Yeah, I think. I guess I'll. I'll go the route of kind of digging deeper into the platforms you're on. Certainly what's been said is extremely valuable. It's really important to not have all your eggs in one basket, if you will, but to find a way to make that platform still work for you. So, you know, the other thing I think about is with our coaching students or with, you know, kind of new investors, they don't necessarily have a ton of money that they want to put towards marketing. So they're really focused on these free platforms like Facebook and Craigslist. And so how do we make that work? Even though, you know, maybe our account got shut down, we got put in Facebook jail, or our ads aren't being seen enough, or whatever that issue might be. And an obvious answer is, you know, just have more accounts. But while it's obvious, it's not an easy thing to accomplish. You know, you can purchase accounts. You could get them from family members. You could try to create your own. But no matter which route you take, that process isn't necessarily as easy as it sounds. Um, but it's one that could be pursued beyond that. You know, we got to get creative. We got to think about, like, all right, Facebook Marketplace works, and it works under these conditions. How can I. How can I make that happen without my account? Well, there's other people that have Facebook accounts. How can you interface with them? How can you take advantage of someone else's account that might live near a property that you own, and maybe they can help you market it in some way or place your ads and filter the leads to you? So sometimes we just have to think about it in a different way.

I love it. And when you're talking, it reminds me of Scott Todd. So when you're creative with your marketing. You know what the core piece of that is when you're running into roadblocks? A burning desire to sell the property. If you have that burning desire, you will be able to think more creatively and utilize Eric's strategies. You won't just throw up your hands in the air and be like, well, I guess Facebook is dead, right? You'll go deeper into it and you'll think more creatively. But that burning desire has to be there. I love it when you call me Big Papa Tate Litchfield, where are your thoughts? Really?

Like what everybody said, and I agree with it entirely. I mean, at this point, if you're, if you're, if you built a one legged marketing machine, you really need to evaluate what you're doing and realize that you are teetering on the edge of disaster, right? Because all it takes is a quick update or an algorithm change and you can be in a world of hurt. So start preparing for that. Because these updates, they happen, they're going to continue to happen. And it's your job to adapt and adjust as needed. But it also stresses the importance of building your own buyers list, right? Building your own buyers list of people who are constantly interested in what you have for sale. And that's something you can own. Nobody can take that away from you. And we stress the importance of sending out your deal of the week all the time. I firmly believe on it because it makes us a lot of money. We sell a lot of properties simply by sending an email a couple times a week. And you can have the same results as us. But the trick is you got to work on building it. You got to work on, you know, communicating well with your buyers list and helping establish that sense of credibility with them. Once you've done that, you know, they'll continue to buy from you for decades or longer. As long as you give them credit, good deals and have fantastic customer service, they have no reason to go elsewhere. So you got to prepare for it. You got to know it's coming, it's around the corner always. And the good investor is trying to stay ahead of that.

I love that. We should do a roundtable discussion on how you nurture your email list because it's been a while since we talked about it. And I love when Scott Todd mentions the word Fibonacci. Which leads us to the brain, the professor. Scott Todd, what are your thoughts on marketing?

The thing is that it's always changing, right? It's always changing. Marcus, you mentioned when I started doing this, ebay was on its way out it was going over the cliff, and Craigslist was on its way in the swing there. And then Craigslist got a little cold and. And Facebook got hot, and Facebook will get cold and something else will be. And as everybody mentioned, you just have to keep. You have to keep moving your feet, right? Like, you gotta keep trying different things. I personally am not a fan of, you know, buying accounts. I've never bought an account. I know people that do, and look, they're doing what they feel like they have to do. But the thing is, is that, you know, when to me, whenever you're dealing with marketing and you're going against what the platform wants, then you start to teeter in, like, a gray area. And I don't really like the gray areas. Okay. Like, it's not my favorite thing. And I've done it with posting domination. But, like, buying account with Facebook, to me, seems risky. And here's why. See if we all have, like, two accounts on Facebook or three accounts on Facebook. One of the key metrics that Facebook likes to report to the shareholders because they are a publicly traded company, is the number of users that they have. Can you imagine? One day they say, we have 14 billion users. Isn't there only 7 billion people on the planet? Yes. That's why Facebook is in an aggressive mode to keep killing these fake accounts. It's not even fun. We did it with Craigslist. We'd have these accounts, but Craigslist didn't report out the number of users that they had, but we'd have multiple accounts. And the thing is, that's what they're doing is they're squashing it. Right? And so the lesson there to me is this. Be careful what you pay, or you're going to get what you pay for. You might win for a while, but eventually a free platform is not truly free. And marketing is not necessarily an expense. It's an investment. You make one sale on a. On something, man. Think about the return that you have. You know, I'm going to. I'll just talk about Land Moto for a second. You know, Land Moto platinum membership is less than $500 a year. Okay? You make one sale on land Moto, I guarantee you're going to make more than $500. Okay? And all you need is one in the entire year to break even. And if you're marketing regularly and you're in that platinum and you're getting the maximum exposure on it, I think you'll get more than that. But that said, what if you only Got one. What's the worry? And I think that that's the thing, is you have to look at it and look at your ad cost and your advertising costs and not get emotional about it. I think that's what separates the pros from the non pros, the amateurs, is at some point, it's not a emotional decision anymore. It's strictly business. And you're making decisions not on emotions, but strategically.

I couldn't agree more. I love the fact that you mentioned marketing is an investment, not an expense. And when we have boot camp, which we have boot camp coming up.

In.

About three weeks, that virtual boot camp, when I go through the marketing segment, I do talk about if you have a free account on Landmoda, you're not thinking about marketing correctly and walk everybody through it and they're like, oh, yeah, you're absolutely right. It's like, would you want the worst location in the mall? Well, yeah, it might be cheaper rent. There's a reason it's cheaper rent. No one's walking by your place. Right. But people don't think like that. And you are paying to get exposure. You are paying to get to get leads, whether it's on a paid platform and a free platform. You're still paying either way. And you've got to make smart investments. You've got to know the analytics. You've got to be able to determine, okay, if this platform's not doing well for me, I'll do this platform. I think Scott Bossman was like, hey, more ads, more places, be everywhere. And then start looking, where am I getting the most of my leads? And then put more of your attention there. And to Mike Zado's point, don't put all your eggs in one basket. And at Tate's point, the one platform you do own is your email marketing. And Eric Peterson, of course, had the greatest points and even brought up the topic. So I think I've touched upon everyone. Yeah. Which leads us to our tip of the week. A website, a resource, a quote, a book, something actionable for the art of passive income listeners to go improve their businesses, improve their lives. We've got the Zen Master coming up again. Two weeks for this.

I've been waiting for this moment, waiting for this moment just to see Scott Todd's reaction. I've been waiting for this moment. I am so excited. So I don't know if anybody knows, but recently there has been a TikTok account created by the Land Geek guys, and we are putting out free content. We're actually going to be giving away a property on there. We got a lot of good things happen on there, Mark. So we also have a challenge from Scott sun to have a thousand followers by Christmas. I think we're going to, like, quadruple that. We're already getting a ton of views. We're going to put good content on there. It's just another way we want to help our community. Thanks. Gonna go get a TikTok account.

Scott.

Dud.

No.

I have a tip, by the way.

Yeah.

Which is. That's a good tip. So I just upgraded. First of all, I got the new iPhone 13.

You already have it?

Yeah, I already have it. And it's fantastic. The screen's fantastic. I've got Verizon. I've noticed 5G is actually slower than LTE, so I went back to LTE. But even if you have an older iPhone, in iOS 15 update, they have this thing called Focus. It is phenomenal. I was like a dopamine addict, constantly checking email, habitually checking email. Now with Focus Mode, I check it twice a day like I always intended. No more reacting. I'm as calm and peaceful as Oogway in. Was it Panda? Was it Kung Fu Panda?

Oh, yes, yes. What does it shut off? Notifications.

You can shut off. Well, notifications is a whole other thing in Settings too. So you can do a notification summary, but when you're in Focus mode, you can have Focus mode for personal. Focus mode for work, you can do. It's like do not disturb on steroids, and you can choose which screen is your opening screen. So when I'm in Focus mode, I don't see anything. Social media, there's no badges, there's no email. It's just beautiful. It's all the apps I never would open anyways on my screen. And then when it's time to actually check something, I can proactively do it on my own time, which I'm doing twice a day. And I'm just serene and calm. It's amazing. As Mike Zainab would say, for me, it's been a game changer. Scott, Todd, what are your thoughts.

During Focus Mode? Are you still able to go and look at your email?

I can absolutely. I can proactively go in and I can search for my email and then I'm in my email. But otherwise, what I would just do, I would just see that I have a new email on my screen and I would just be like a ferret on a double cappuccino, just reacting.

All right, which comes first? Mark going back to his normal routine. Or 1,000 TikTok users for the Landgate guys. You guys want to do over under on this one?

Anybody?

Anybody want to hit me up on this?

Like, I don't know how many followers they have now.

Oh, how many followers you have, Bossman.

Could you give us the metric?

I like that.

That was like.

I'm offended that this is even a. A bet. There's no way I'm falling off this wagon. I'm on the wagon.

We have. So we have five videos that we posted. A few have over a thousand views, and we have 81 followers. So we haven't. Haven't been hitting it that hard.

So we need over 900 more followers.

Yeah.

Okay, so 900 more flowers or I fall off the wagon. I habitually start checking email again like a drug addict. Eric Peterson, are you betting on me? Are you betting on the nightcap guys? The TikTok guys?

I think you're gonna stick with it.

Thank you, Tate.

I think you'll stick with it just because it's automated. Like, it happens automatically, and therefore you don't really have to think about it. But if it was left up to you, I'm going with the TikTok boys.

100. I'd go with the TikTok guys if it were up to me, 100%, but now it's not. It's automated, and I would literally have to go in and take it off for me to get back.

Do you not see all the apps? Like, when you get your screen, it's like just a picture. There's no apps? Nothing?

No, I mean, I see apps, but there's no badges. So Voxer. No badges, Messages, no badges. There's no badges. It's just blank. I have to actually go. I go in at 10 and 3 and check everything, and I actually put it on my calendar. Those are my two times to check email and respond.

What about Vox?

You taking me or are you taking the TikTok guys?

Here's the thing is, I've seen you do this before, like 10 and 4, you know, and I don't know. They got 81 people on TikTok. I think I. I think you might creep out. I think. I think that you. I don't think they're gonna get to a thousand by the end of the year, so I think I'm gonna have.

To go with you. All right, it's on.

I don't know. We'll see.

Podcasts will put us at a thousand.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, that's right. If you're listening to podcast Help the guys out. And also go in the Mighty Networks group or the Facebook official group and encourage me to stay proactive as opposed to reactive with my relationship with email. It would really help.

What about voximok? Is that twice a day?

Voxer is a little different because as I forgot who mentioned notifications. So I get a notification summary at 8 and 6, and so I see the notifications at 8, because usually there could be something time sensitive with Voxer, or I might be a little just. I might be waiting in line and just want to hit you guys up with a thought or whatever's going on. And we got a lot going on in Boxer personally and professionally. So Boxer is different. I don't feel like I'm habitually, you know, checking Voxer and getting a dopamine hit from it.

That's.

That would be more like, in lieu of just calling you guys, I would hit on Voxer when I can.

Okay.

It feels different to me.

Good point.

For sure.

Yeah.

But otherwise there's no Vox or badges, so I don't know I got a vox until I check email and do all that. But if there are some things going on and we're in a conversation and I'm in it, like, I'll just. I'll stay in it. I won't just flake out unless I actually have to do focused work, which sometimes can happen. Believe it.

There you go. That's how you get rid of the noise.

Maybe. Maybe.

Wait, is this inside baseball? What noise?

The Boxer noise that he hates.

I never get that. Absolutely. I put my phone on. On silent anyways.

But you still get that, Scott. You don't just shut it off.

I don't know how to shut that sound off unless I go to vibrate.

Oh, I don't even get that sound. I just look at it.

Yeah, but Scott, just go to. Just go to. Just do the focus mode and then check it like email two, three times a day.

Now I know why you don't love vox. So you got the.

You're getting a beep, beep, beep, beep.

Beep, beep all day long.

Who. Who's voxing you all day long? I know it's not me.

You.

I won't do it.

You.

Box you only four or five times a day.

It's not all time. It's not all day long. But like, you know the. The worst part? The worst part is when it's a group message like the coaches and everybody's chiming in. Did it, did it, did it, did it, did it My wife's like, who's. Who's doing that to you? I'm like, it must be Mark.

I don't know. Okay. You know there's a little thing on the side of the phone. You just silence it.

Maybe.

I think that's the solution. Anyways, I want to thank the listeners. Please follow rate, review the podcast, send us a Screenshot support@thelangic.com we're going to send you a signed copy of Dirt Rich. You guys ready to do this? 1, 2, 3, let's. Freedom. Bing. All right. What T shirts, Mike?

Oh, you guys had some inside track on T shirts. Is that not for the banter? I don't know.

Oh, man. Do we have two minutes to talk about this, Tate, or you gotta jump?

Yeah.

You'll leave me hanging for two weeks?

This is kind of a life changer.

You leave me hanging for two weeks.

Take. Come on.

I guess I can make some time for you. So I got. I bought a couple shirts and now some pants from a brand called Vori V U O R I. And while we were in Newport, they had a flagship store over there, and I was wearing mine, and I was feeling comfortable because it's like the softest T shirt you'll ever put on. And I was like, mark, feel this. And he's like, that's it. I need this. I need to wrap my body in this. And he went and got one, and it's game changer, man. Like, they are literally the softest T shirts I've ever worn. It's like a. I don't know, I guess you'd call it like a Lululemon type thing.

Half the price of Lululemon, by the way.

Yeah, they're awesome.

All right, thank you.

Nice.

And, Mike, you'll. You'll appreciate the fact that they're anti odor.

Looks like they do the Peloton. They do the Peloton apparel?

Yeah, they do some of it. Yeah.

Yeah. I thought Rowan did the Peloton apparel.

All sorts of brands do it.

I dusted off my Peloton shirt the other day after my hundredth ride.

Nice.

You know, not bad. I got to get back on that peloton. I've been doing Peloton yoga. Does that count or no?

It counts somewhat.

Yeah, it's good.

All right, well, whatever. All right, thanks, guys.

See you.

See everybody next week.

Thanks for listening to the Art of Passive Income podcast.

Are you ready to learn how you.

Can start building a passive income without renters, rehabs, renovations, or rodents? Schedule a free consultation at thelandgeek.com forward/training Let freedom ring.