Justin Stoddart
Hey welcome back to the think bigger real estate show. I am your host and I am fired up today about who I have with me here in studio to teach you all about Instagram. She’s dynamic and has done some amazing things in the real estate industry and the body building industry. Do me a favor show us your guns real quick. Check this out. Anyway, so she has built a following both for her business as well as for her bodybuilding career. And so I’ll get into introducing her here in just a second but I just want to remind you at thinkbigger.realestate you can sign up to get notified every time there’s not only a new episode, but also at the end of the week, I send out a summary of all the key highlights and action steps. So be sure to go to thinkbigger.realestate to get signed up for that so you don’t miss out on amazing stuff like we have today…Here…Miss Stacey Dearth. So, Stacy first and foremost, thank you for being on the show today.
Stacey Dearth
Thank you so much.
Justin Stoddart
I love Stacy. She’s fantastic. We get the great privilege of working together here Old Republic Title and let me tell you a little bit about her: a former top real estate agent in Arizona, where she actually led a team of 13 agents, right?
Stacey Dearth
Yeah, at one point we were 13 deep.
Justin Stoddart
Goodness. So,Top Producing agent. In addition to that, with all of that going on, she’s also a mom of two beautiful children. And she has her IFBB Pro card. If you don’t know what that means it’s the International Federation of Body Builders and she’s a professional, actually training to be back on stage here pretty soon. Hence, I made her do the unsolicited or the solicited, I should say, bicep flex there. So you can actually follow her on Instagram at @thatsassytitlegirl for her title and escrow business and then also @themusclemommy. You’ll see more about her bodybuilding career, so you’ll be able to see that she knows what she’s doing. She’s a pro in many areas of life. And we’re excited today to bring you tips and tricks that you need to be knowing all about Instagram.
Justin Stoddart
So I’ll just kind of preface it by saying this that more and more eyeballs are on Instagram, less and less eyeballs are on email, if you as a real estate agent are counting on the fact that people are reading your newsletter, either receiving it in the mail, or receiving it in their inbox, and that they’re consuming it entirely. I think you’re missing out. Would you agree?
Stacey Dearth
I would absolutely agree.
Justin Stoddart
That there is more and more attention being given to the social mediums in particular Instagram. And it’s a place where you need to be not only do you need to be there, present, but you need to be there correctly. Let’s talk about what are what is one of the biggest maybe pet peeves or mistakes that you see real estate agents making when it comes to their Instagram account.
Stacey Dearth
You know, I think we as real estate agents, and I can say we, since I spent 13 years doing that, I think that we are so pushing to market the properties that we have. And so you know, it’s like get the property, get the property out. And so we’re trying to sell we’re trying to sell our properties on Instagram and social media and really I think that what we should all be focusing on is making connections on Instagram. So, you know, instead of instead of putting out, you know, this is the latest and greatest property, which is great, and we need to do that. We also need to be making connections, we need to be letting people in to the real us who we really are because people want to buy from people that they know and they trust them they like, and if they don’t know us, trust us like us, then they’re not going to buy anything from us, right.
Justin Stoddart
I love it. You know, I see people I’ve actually gone to Realtor, not news feeds, it’s their tiles or their profile. Is this what you call it?
Stacey Dearth
And yeah, so they’re their profile. So the grid with the grid there. Yep.
Justin Stoddart
And all you see is houses, houses, houses, houses, and I think maybe real estate agents feel like that they have a following and Instagram and so they’re good at like you said sell houses through it. And that’s going to end even their clients like great our houseThis feature there, but that house is one of so many. And there’s no human connection. I know when I see that I’m not drawn to want to stare at it, right? I’m not drawn to want to, like scroll through it for very long. Whereas when there’s people and there’s, there’s kind of unique circumstances in settings that gets interesting, right?
Stacey Dearth
Absolutely. I think, you know, you absolutely still need to put your listings out there. I used to like to put my listings kind of on my story and highlight them. Anything that was jaw dropping would go in my in my feed as a permanent tile there but, you know, I think that more importantly,I’ve sold houses directly from Instagram. I posted a house one time and someone commented, Oh, do you have anything else in that area? Yes, as a matter of fact, you know, I can absolutely didn’t know the person hasNever met the person I we connected via direct message, got him hooked up with the lender got him pre qualified sold him a house. Did I sell that house on Instagram to that person? No, I didn’t. But what happened was I made a connection with him. He had been following me. He had been following along he felt that he could trust me by what I had put out there and therefore he reached out. I sold him a house. I didn’t pay for that marketing was free marketing.
Justin Stoddart
Yeah, you know, but the key was that your entire profile wasn’t filled with houses, right? It was it was occasionally in there. Absolutely. But you were more selling the fact of who you are as a person. The and I think you said it best when you said the miss the biggest mistake that real estate agents make when it comes to Instagram is that they’re trying to sell as opposed to connect correct you connect with people then you can you can help them which includes a sale right at times. Absolutely, without the connection, the people aren’t drawn to you. And you’ll have their attention for that long as opposed to an extended period of time, where you can actually then serve them and help them which is selling. Right. I love it. So, second tip, maybe, that you could give us. And it’s something that I’ve seen a weakness in my Instagram game. Right, right. We just pointed this out, talk to us a little bit about engagement, why that’s so important.
Stacey Dearth
You know, I think so many of us were so busy, and we carve out, you know, 30 minutes of time to do our Instagram. But what’s happening is we’re posting and we’re leaving, and we’re not engaging with other people. And so many times, people will, you know, reach out and it’s happened to me before I’ve made a comment on someone’s page or about their story and they don’t respond back. That doesn’t feel very good, right. When you respond back to people, when you engage with them, then they feel like they’re making a connection. Once again, we’re back to that connection again. And now you have this friendship or whatever it is, but you need to engage with people you need to respond to them. You need to if they’ve written you a question or they’ve written a response, respond to them, engage with their posts say that’s amazing. That’s, you know, I saw a post yesterday that was a Portland realtor had put out a little tidbit about what you could have in the Portland city limits, you know, you can have three chickens. If you don’t like chickens, you can have dubs or pigeons, or pygmy goats, or whatever it is. And I was like, Yes, I want chickens. And so I responded to that, um, you know, and made a comment on their page, but just trying to engage with them now, I would expect that they respond back, right, we’ll see. Right? Not yet, but we’ll see.
Justin Stoddart
But, um, but yeah, that’s, you know, those are things that you need to reach out to people and make them feel that connection with you. I think it’s like I’ve made the analogy before that social media is like a party right? If you show up at the party, and all you do is talk, and don’t ever listen, or people ask you a question, you turn around and walk the other way, you probably would not get invited back to that party. Right. Absolutely. And what I hear you saying, is it part of being a good party attendee and getting invited back and having that crowd of people around you that want to hear what you have to say. It’s asking, listening, engaging all of that, which again, I think a concern that I haven’t and others have, I’m sure is it how do you not let social media take over your entire day? There’s agents that are social media rich, but money poor, right? Absolutely. So you’ve done both where you’ve been a social media influencer, and you’ve had a great business. So is there some tip that you can give Do you post time block I’m going to post at this time, and then I’m going to come back later on and engage to where it’s not like filling every, every minute that you could probably be out face to face or voice to voice connecting with people.
Stacey Dearth
You know, I think that’s something that I’m a huge time blocker. So it’s just like everything in life, right? You know, it’s it’s all about your daily schedule. And so for me, I do it all at the same time every day, like I work out at the same time every day. I post at a similar time every day. Now, I might add to my story throughout the day. But I’m always interacting with people, when I get up in the morning, and I’m having my coffee, that’s when I’m scrolling, interacting with people doing a post if I can, you know, I might do it when I’m eating some lunch. And I do it a little later in the day. But if we can be consistent, and when we’re doing that, it becomes our comes becomes a regular schedule. It’s just like working out, you know, you make an appointment with yourself, like I’m going to work out at four o’clock today. And I’m going to get there no matter what, like that’s an appointment with myself, right? So that’s what you have to do with social media, but you need to, you need to keep it time blocked, don’t get carried away. We don’t need to, you know, read all 608 comments that somebody left on some conversations, they were having about some post, you know, become involved but not overly involved.
Justin Stoddart
I love what you said it’s it’s this multitasking time that I would have already spent sitting and enjoying your coffee for example, you’re using that time to school and I think one key thing is this has given me advice on how to grow a following is that I can’t just be reactive Lee responding to the people that are reaching out to me, right? Correct. The people that I want to follow me actually to reach out to them and engage with them because everyone else is in their own little silos. I’m posting content and I’m responding to people that respond to me, the only way to grow that silo and one way to grow that is actually reach out to other people that you genuinely have interest in, in genuinely commenting on their stuff. Right?
Stacey Dearth
Correct. So no ulterior motive, but like, I value what you’re doing here. I like what you’ve said here goes back to these genuine relationships, that this is a way to connect with people, not a way to sell people. And I think you know, genuine that really hits it. I mean, you know, I see so many times people make comments on on my page or or others and it’s just a this you know copy and paste. Yeah love your post yeah love your pup what do you what do you love about your post you didn’t even look at my post you know what I mean? So feat genuine Let it be specific about what you’re commenting on or what you’re responding to, you know that’s what’s going to go far for you it’s it’s not the the canned responses or you know the heart, heart heart XOXO whatever it is easy to be genuine and I think you’ve really hit the nail on the head there.
Justin Stoddart
I love what what Stacey shared here today and they really are compared to what she knows kind of very basic tips, right? We hope that this has been kind of at least a good starting point for those of you that are involved in Instagram or have an aspiration to be more so here in the Portland market. Anyway, we’re going to be taking Stacey on tour she’s gonna be doing Instagram classes in different locations. So stay tuned for that in the meantime and encourage you to follow her again her handles are @thatsassytitlegirl and @themusclemommy. So go find her there and you can learn some more advanced stuff just by following her, engaging with her and genuinely thanking her for the value that she’s given. I’ll put a little plug in for my own Instagram handles here since we’re in that mode right, @justinstoddart and @thinkbiggerrealestate the two that I’m interested in engaging with people as well. So, if I’m doing anything right there, you like what I’m doing, just go ahead and thank her because it’s her fault.
Stacey Dearth
You’re so you’re doing a great job, Justin.
Justin Stoddart
See, I’m coachable. So anyway, it’s been a total pleasure having you here today. I’m going to ask you, Stacey, the signature question of the show,which you are a big thinker here right? This big TB back here does not stand for my initials. I’d love to maybe one day be synonymous with thinking big. But you’re you’re a big thinker, right? You’re doing things not only are you doing great things in business, but in your personal life, right, leading up a beautiful family. You’re a professional bodybuilder, like how does Stacey Dearth continue to not stay content, nor to not get into kind of small thinking? How do you continue to be a big thinker to expand your own possibilities. Teach us what you do.
Stacey Dearth
You know, I think I’m a learner of life. Like I love learning, I love learning about anything and everything I like to read. There are so many people out there that are so much smarter than me that I love to learn from podcast, you know, reading blogs, whatever it is, but I feel like for me in life I if I can keep learning every day if I can learn something new every single day and share that with other people. That makes me bigger.
Justin Stoddart
I love it. And what a great platform to do that on right where you can learn from people and then share it to your your people like Instagram becomes a great platform to do what you just said helps you be a big thinker. So I encourage you to go do what what Stacy’s teaching us here, right is be a big thinker, even leverage Instagram to enact that great advice that she just gave. So thanks everybody again for tuning in to this episode. Big thanks to Stacie Dearth. Go follow her, give her some love, thank her for being pouring so generously into the think bigger audience today. And we are excited to hear your feedback on that. And my final request, what you’re used to hearing, three simple words… Go Think Bigger!