Danny spoke at this year’s Flip Hacking Live event! His presentation covers lead generation for real estate investors and how the market is shifting. Are you staying on top of it? This is the audio from the presentation, but you can watch the video on Flipping Junkie’s YouTube channel, check it out in the link section of the show notes.
How many people are sending direct mail? When that potential seller gets your postcard or letter, what do they do? They go online. The next thing they know, they can’t find you online. If you’re not online, you’ve just missed a lead. If you are online, but not optimized, then they’re seeing you beside your competition. You competition has more reviews than you, and looks more accessible to the seller. If you were in the seller’s position, who would you pick? It’s pretty obvious you’d go with the one that has the better reviews.
That’s why you can’t just have a website anymore. You have to have a fully optimized, built out, lead generation machine. There’s no way you can compete with your competition if you get a website, set it up, and then do nothing with it. It’s an on-going thing.
You need a website online that’s credible, trustworthy, and that builds you recognition. Danny and Melissa have generated thousands of leads and deals through their website, but it didn’t happen over night. It was a long road to building their website and grow their ranking. Search engine optimization takes time and practice.
If you’re not at the top of page 1, you’re missing leads. But how can you get it to rank that high? Keyword research is the first step. As a real estate investor, it’s obvious you need to rank for keywords like “sell house fast”, or “sell my house for cash”. Those keywords are what all of your competitors are using as well. So how can you beat the competition when it comes to ranking?
You have to set realistic expectations for yourself. You’re not going to rank for these keywords in the first month. You’re just not. You have to constantly keep working on your website, you have to be adding content that’s going to keep helping you rank, and you have to be patient. SEO can take 6 months to a year to start showing progress in Google. That’s a long time, but it’s worth it. Why?
SEO is the cheapest was to generate leads. How much does it cost to optimize your website? Time. That’s it. You have to invest the time into building it right, but once it starts ranking you’re going to start getting in organic traffic that converts.
The next step, after you have your SEO set up to start getting you organic leads, is marketing. PPC, or Pay Per Click, is a pay to play marketing strategy but it works. Danny uses a combination of PPC platforms, but the one that performs the best is Google AdWords.
Google AdWords places your ad, website, or landing page as a search result that appears above organic results. So if a seller is searching the phrase “sell my house for cash in San Antonio” and your AdWords campaign matches that search, you’re going to appear as 1 of the top 3 results on page 1. Why? Because you paid for that spot.
Now, yes, PPC can get expensive. But the cost per deal is worth it. If you’re spending a few thousand running an ad and it gets you a deal that nets you tens of thousands, is it worth it? Yes! Because you put yourself above the competition who doesn’t have the time or the money to run ads.
Starting to get a taste for online marketing? We don’t blame you. It’s worked for Danny and Melissa, and it can work for you too. That’s why Danny hosts weekly webinars to teach you about the latest online marketing strategies that work. You can get your free seat by following the links in the section below!
Hillary and Marco got married and became pregnant in 2015. In an effort to build the future they both wanted their family, they both quit their jobs that same year. Since then, they have built their real estate portfolio and build a wholesaling company that closes numerous transactions each month. With a team of six people in Hilco Homes, they look to grow strong in the new year of 2018!
Marco and Hillary got their start like most investors do. They were looking for a way to generate an income for their growing family and needed something that worked. Having already known the business, they decided to go for it and start their real estate investing journey. Hillary started studying up on everything she could. She read all of the books she could find on real estate investing and dove in. Marco helped her with some concepts, and together their wholesaling team was born. Now the two are unstoppable!
“I’m learning the best that I can,” Hillary says, “But Marco has 10 years on me.”
They had two major focuses.
1 - Marco and Hillary wanted to generate cash flow, or a passive income. This consisted of getting houses to rent. Marco points out that, even though the rent is paying for the house, that’s not a huge passive income for a family to live off of.
2 - Marco and Hillary needed an active income. This came to them through wholesaling houses. While they were building up their rental properties business, the two focused on finding wholesale deals to keep their lifestyle afloat.
Their wholesaling houses team started when a gentleman named Juan contacted Marco and asked for guidance in the real estate investing market. He was let go of a previous position and was looking for a job in the real estate market. Marco taught him how to bring in wholesaling deals with the profits being split between the two 50/50. The rest is history! Juan became a part of their team, and everything grew from there.
“We refined all of our systems and processes,” Hillary says, “It’s all about finding the people who work best with us.”
Their wholesaling houses team is up to 7, including their virtual assistant, and is still looking to grow. “We’re bringing on an eighth next week,” Marco says, “It’s a constantly evolving thing. Some people work out, and some people don’t.”
What are some of the lessons learned from hiring and letting people go?
Marco and Hillary have the idea of not hiring good people, but hiring great people. “We don’t just want to hire to fill a seat,” says Hillary.
Hiring high quality team members will only strengthen your wholesaling houses team over the long run. In the past, they required that applicants submit a resume, but have recently changed that policy. Seeing the pen and paper resume as an “out-dated system”, Hillary has decided to do video resumes instead. Marco and Hillary ask that applicants answer 3 questions in their 2 - 3 minute video submissions.
“I feel we’re a pretty good judge of character,” she replies.
If an applicant makes it past the pre-screening questions and video application, then they move on to a full interview with Juan. At that point, if Juan thinks this person is qualified and a good fit for the company, then they get moved on to Hillary for the final interview. This process has taken Marco and Hillary a few years to work out, but they’ve found it’s the most successful for finding people to add to their wholesaling houses team.
After meeting his mentor Josh Rudin started buying and flipping houses 6 years ago when he was 19 years old. He went through a lot of negative experiences and learned from them and grew in the process. Now he’s making positive cash flow and doing flips. He primarily focuses his flips in 4 cities near Victorville, Ca. He hired a project manager double his age to handle all his deals and having the help has given him the time to focus his efforts on finding deals and even traveling the world.
My name is Josh Rudin, I am 25 years old, and I grew up in a small city called Agoura Hills, CA in the suburbs of Los Angeles. The way I got started in real estate is my dad introduced me to a mentor he had heard about through a friend. Every Tuesday my mentor was holding meetings at Red Robin. He would bring a board game every day called the millionaire maker by Laurel Langemeier. The point of the game was to grow your balance sheet. I learned about assets, liabilities, income, and expenses and how to account for every dollar. The game really opened my eyes to a whole new way of thinking. One day I told my mentor I want to start doing this in real life. He let me know I am ready and that I need to be up at 4 am Saturday because he is picking me up and taking me to an area he’s been intrigued with the growth. That Saturday morning after driving for 2 hours we had made it to the “High Desert”. We would drove around all day asking questions to locals and writing down addresses of vacant properties, so we can really understand the market and the area. After a few months of driving out there almost every weekend I decided I feel comfortable with the area enough to make my first offer. It was accepted and at age 19 I owned my first home. It was one of the best feelings I have ever felt. Ever since then, I have slowly grown my business to where I am now, buying over 10 houses a year for the past couple years.