Create Your Own Disney World | Justin Stoddart

Get more clients
Create an incredible client experience, even amidst challenging circumstances
Get your favorite clients to come back AND refer you more of your ideal clients in the meantime

Show Notes

You'll walk away with three tactics that you can apply to grow and improve your business IMMEDIATELY.
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Creators and Guests

Host

Justin Stoddart

What is Think Bigger Real Estate?

The road to success for real estate agents is well-marked. The road to significance is not. Here, we help you to Think Bigger than just your business. We inspire you to seek success AND significance, income AND impact. We do that by interviewing the biggest thinkers and highest achievers in the real estate industry, extracting the secrets to having it all.

Justin Stoddart 0:01
So the big question is this. How do we those of us in the real estate industry with crazy amounts of ambition? How do we think bigger than the building of our own empires? How do we simultaneously see success and significance, income and impact? My name is Justin Stoddard. And this is the Think bigger real estate show.

Justin Stoddart 0:26
What's up my friends Justin Stoddart, here, today, I'm going to teach you how to create your own Disney World. For those that know me, and have followed me in any way, know that this last week was a bit of a dream come true for me. I've always dreamed of being in a spot where I could go attend a great conference great event and bring family members with me to enjoy the beauties of that particular space with those that I love the most. And this past week, I did that it was amazing. My wife and soon to be 16 year old daughter came with me. And they played well, I worked and then we all played together, it was fantastic. But because these business wheels are always turning and always looking for ways that I can add value to my clients. I was studying what Disney has done. I think there's nobody that would argue that Disney has become one of the most iconic and recognizable brands in the world, to where clients keep coming back. Some people follow them almost cult like, well, they've got Disney tattoos, they commit all of their vacations and free time to either consuming Disney or attending Disney. It's pretty wild. And for those of us that want to create a type of business, that attracts the kind of clients that delivers the kind of experience life changing experience for some people, and wants customers to keep coming back over and over and over again, then today, I have a treat for you because we're going to study together, what it was like at Disney World and what allowed me to really take from that experience, and now help you to apply to your business. So I'm going to share with you my screen here, we're gonna go through this together here. Over on the right, you'll see some pictures of me and my wife and sweet daughter, as well as some dear friends and people who we got to spend some time with while in Disney World. And it was it was such a good experience. The very first principle that I want to cover is how is it that Disney gets more clients? I don't know anybody that isn't interested in having more clients very infrequently do I come across an agent that says turn off the spigot? I don't want any more clients now or ever. I'm good. Occasionally it happens. But I would imagine that if you're like me, you're always looking to grow. You're always looking for ways to add more value to clients. And so we have to ask ourselves, what is it that Disney does to always be getting more clients because I'll tell you this, I was inside their park, and it was an off month. I didn't know this coming in. But September is actually a great month ago to Disney World in Orlando, Florida. If you're okay with getting wet, you can see the top picture there. We have some serious ponchos on the first day we had some amateur ponchos, some some kind ladies on a bus said you guys have any ponchos we're gonna give you some of our ponchos. Because it's going to be wet. Now We'd only been there for the first day in the morning. And it was it was not rainy. It was it was it was nice. But all of a sudden it started to rain and it started to like monsoon, we can hardly believe how much rain we were getting. And this the thing that I realized is even in an off month, right kind of their off season when it's super rainy, the park was still packed, there were still lines on all the rides that we wanted to go on. So the first principle that we have to learn from Disney is that they are always selling what now people might think like I'm too busy to have new clients right now. But we have to realize that there is always room for more people, there's always room for more clients. So I'm going to put here always be adding

Justin Stoddart 4:06
new clients now otherwise. Another way to look at this is if I were to look at your day today, this morning, between the hours of nine and 11, which I believe are key lead generation times were you actively engaging with new potential clients. Because if you were not the reality is 90 days from now you're not going to have new clients. Now fast forward October, November, December, December 22nd. If you don't want to get paid on that day, a few days before Christmas, then you did what you were supposed to do today which is not have conversations new clients. Now you might say like this perfect because I actually want to have Christmas. I don't want any new clients that month. My guess is you would still want the income coming in. Even if it's you're off with your family and you have enough business coming in to where you can be maybe assigning that to another agent while you're going skiing with your family. Right or maybe on a tropical island with your family. My guess is you would still like those escrows, closing on December 22. So my, my, my statement to you my invitation to you is, and it's something that you already know, is it, I really need you to get really serious about being in conversation with new people all the time, it really is no mystery. Why some people have a lot of clients and some don't have a very big book of business, a very big business is because some people are just very committed every day to be in conversations with people about real estate, period. If you're not doing that, you're not getting appointments, if you're not getting appointments, you're not getting contracts, you're not getting contracts, you're not getting closings. It's very simple folks. closings, contracts, conversations, or appointments and then conversations can even below that, we might see it a tension, right. But we always have to be adding new clients, which means we always need to be always be in Convos conversations with people about real estate. Okay. Now, here's something interesting that I observed from Disney. Again, it was an off month, it was September, almost all the kids are back at school. And it's super rainy. And yet they had the entire theme park decorated. Like Halloween, they had pumpkins everywhere. And they had the entire week, they would have in the evening hours, at least on Friday nights, they would have Trick or treat. So they would close the park down to people that hadn't paid extra to be a part of that particular experience. And as a result, they were selling tickets to locals and to other people on how they could come in and have a Halloween experience at Disney World. My question to you is, are you always thinking about ways that you can be getting new clients, people who might have no reason buying or selling right now? Are you finding new ways to get clients? Maybe they're taking some of the equity out of their home? And they're buying another home? And maybe they're buying a vacation home or a rental property? But my invitation to you is are you always looking for ways to be getting new clients because you might you might think that you are packed. But I'll tell you what, Disney Worlds still sold a lot of people tickets into their park, when the lines were already very full. When we were excited to see only a 60 minute wait to go on that ride. That's not bad. Let's Let's get in there. Because their client experience is so good. What they're delivering is so good. They realize that it's okay if people have to wait just a little bit to get on those rights because it can't be duplicated anywhere else in the world. Now this is a great segue into the second topic, which is deliver such a high client experience that even admits difficult challenges. People still have a great time. Now when I say difficult challenges, what I'm talking about with regards to Disney World, is you can see us eating ice cream in the rain. We had serious like I said poncho is on because if you didn't, there was nothing dry on your entire body. Nothing dry on your entire body. Because it was that wet.

Justin Stoddart 8:16
We had at one point were walking through the park. And we had water over our ankles almost up to our like partway up our calves. It was that much rain coming down like it was serious. There's lightning in the air. Right. And even amidst those challenging circumstances, Disney is still delivering they knew that it was going to be rainy. They sold Disney ponchos. Right? The show must go on. I actually talked to a friend of mine who works at Disney and I said, Does this place ever shut down? He said Never. Unless there's a hurricane that day. They'll shut down for that if there's serious safety concerns in the park. But beyond that, Christmas Thanksgiving, it's always open. There's always he said and even he said here in Florida, we had a hurricane. And the day of the hurricane it was closed the next morning had a whole crew coming in cleaning up the trees. And then right after them were all the staff because they knew that there were going to be people back in the park. So even if it's very challenging circumstances, they're still delivering a very high client experience. Now leading up to this I had a client reach out to me to say Disney World. She said surprise and delight. And that's exactly what we experienced, is that everybody in that park has a theme, right? You don't see employees walking around just in regular street attire. Like it is a theme park because there are people who have who have themes, right? They're there to deliver an experience, almost as if you're in the movies, right that even with crazy rain, even with long lines, they've still have found a way to deliver a great client experience. So how do you deliver a high client experience even amidst challenging circumstances? I'm going to say communicate expectations. Always what I mean by this, when we would step up to a ride, we knew long before we stepped into that line, how long it was going to take us to get to the front of that line. They just had it down to a science, they knew there was going to be 45 minutes until you got on that ride. And when I know that, I'm I'm not that upset when it takes 45 minutes to get on that ride. Now, when I am upset is when I'm like, Oh, that looks like that line is not very long. And it's 45 minutes, I thought it was gonna be 15 minutes. So the more that we can communicate clear expectations, always. It's amazing how much better people's experience gets with us. We have to always be communicating client, or expectations that help people to know what they're in for. Now, you and I both know that there are changing circumstances when a massive monsoon came in, and there was lightning in the air. Right? They communicated that fact at one point we were getting ready to watch in Indiana Jones stunt show where the gentleman who who pretends to be right, Indiana Jones, and they came in right after the show would start it's only a few minutes in. And all of a sudden, they come in and they kind of make a big scene. Oh my goodness, Indiana Jones is he's down. And we're all kind of like wait, what is this really what's happening? And they said, unfortunately, there's a lightning storm within seven miles, we've got to turn the show off. We're so sorry. Please come back those. Those are our extenuating circumstances that they didn't, they had an idea that they might come. But the way that they communicated, it kind of left us with a little bit of surprise and delight, like Oh, my goodness, this he really hurt. Right. But it was just part of the show up part of a way for them to deliver some sort of surprise, even though the circumstances were not ideal. And then afterwards, we were able to go down in that time and have an individual interaction with Indiana Jones, right wasn't actually Harrison Ford looked pretty close to what Harrison Ford would look like. And in that process, we were surprised and delighted that we got such individual time with kind of the star of the show. Now another way that I thought was fascinating in in how they went about kind of surprising and delighting when I was a kid getting on a roller coaster was in going through a roller coaster line was nothing more than kind of working your way through a series of gates, right. And there was it was just a line. And at the end there was a roller coaster. Right? That was pretty cool when I was a kid, but they've made the uncomfortable parts. Part of the experience. Okay, so I'm going to I'm going to put that down here make discomfort. Part of the adventure. What I mean by this, we went on the ride called Avatar, if you if you ever get a chance to go to Disney World, it's worth the wait. I did get a little little sick to my stomach, thankfully not too sick to my stomach. But it was it was a pretty crazy, right, but in the process of standing in line, waiting.

Justin Stoddart 13:18
It's not just a boring line. It's the backstory of the Avatar. So you very quickly effect from the second that you even can even see that the end of the line, it's the entire area that you feels like you're off on that planet where Avatar was, was created, right? Like there's just this whole feeling of I'm in a place, I'm somewhere special. And in addition to that they had in as soon as you start going through kind of the tunnels instead of just alliances actually tunnels, you can start to see and remember the backstory, like the whole lab, right, like lab coats and, and machinery. And this must have been where the soldier who became an avatar, like how he like where he must have slept and and how they got here and some of the broken down equipment from the Army Rangers that where they're kind of pilfering the land. Like it's just reminds you of it. So all of a sudden this, this 60 minute experience of what it would normally be very uncomfortable, became part of the story became part of the experience. So how do you apply this to real estate? Well, you and I both have been in this industry long enough to know that not everything's gonna go as planned, right? There's going to be potentially somewhat denims some inspection issues, some appraisal issues, there's going to be some things that are going to come up in financing with rates changing and rate locks and escrow and finicky sellers are finicky buyers like we just know that some of the these things are going to come up on every single transaction. If they didn't, they wouldn't have need of us They would only have need of an algorithm, right? So be grateful, be grateful for these uncertainties because that's what keeps algorithms from completely taking what we do for a living, they need us. But how do we make it to where it's not such a discomfort on the client, I would encourage you right now, to think of some of the most recent items of discomfort for your clients. And I want you to ask yourself, What could I have done during that time to create a story out of that, to maybe give them some, some, some pre emptive preparation for that? How can I prepare them and I will just give you one example, maybe to that when people are going to be looking at a lot of homes, there are agents who will prepare a little kind of snack basket, like water, and treats right to where we know that we're going to be looking at a lot of houses, today, we're not we're gonna be traveling all over the city. And in preparation for that, we've actually given you a guide, we've given you some some water with our branding on it, we've given you some snacks, we've also have stopped like a time and then we're going to stop it, I'm gonna treat you to one of the one of the kind of the best donut places in the northwest, right kind of whatever that looks like, there's gonna be a focus, some intentional effort around taking what would be a total discomfort and turning it into something good, something interesting something part of the client experience. And so that's an inclusive view, again, think about the areas that you know, that are going to be uncomfortable for you and your clients. And you're going to, you're going to create some sort of client experience around that you're going to make it to where it's part of the story. And you're going to tell them upfront that hey, it times, here's some of the areas where we may have some problems. And it may not be that fun. And just you know, it might get a little bumpy through here. And then at those times, be prepared to surprise and delight them with something interesting. Okay, so make it part of the adventure, make it part of the backstory, don't act surprised when surprises come up, because you and I both know that they always come up, deliver a high client experience, regardless of what the circumstances are. Okay, the final point that I want to cover here is get clients to come back and refer their friends in the meantime. So my, my friend Brad, his job is to sell the Disney Vacation Club. What that means is that you have people who are on site, and they're looking for their ideal customers. Now, an ideal customer does exactly this and ideal customer. They stay on property, they spend a lot of money on property. They are at Disney for a longer period of time. These are people who are ideal customers. So they're looking for ideal customers, okay, they know who are their ideal clients. Now, I was not their ideal client, I stayed off property off Disney property at a

Justin Stoddart 18:13
at a less expensive venue than some of the other places that I could have stayed at. Right? The frugality inside me and my wife, the practicality had us do exactly that. And so I wasn't their ideal client. So they weren't they weren't heckling me. They weren't harassing me. I say that all kindness. But but but they were definitely had their eye on who are the big spenders, who are the people that are all at Disney have the Disney tattoos. And we want to commit them to keep coming here year over year over year actually by a fractional ownership property on site to where their vacations are here. Okay. So I want you to think about that. All too often. We don't know who is our avatar, we think everybody is and therefore nobody is. But when you know who is your ideal clients, you can really cater your efforts to going and not only creating a magnificent experience for them, but you can also cater your efforts around finding more of them. And as securing them as long term clients and customers. Oftentimes we'll have this conversation with agents who have a database of 1000 people I say, Do you have a prioritized? It's like, well, not really. I mean, yeah, it's prioritized alphabetically, that's not prioritized. Right? Inside of that database. There are maybe 10%, maybe 20% of the people who will be your raving fans. They will refer you they will use you. They're not going to try and mess with your fee. They know that you're worth it and they're willing to pay for you. Those are your ideal clients. So are you properly prioritizing all your efforts to give them such a high level exp perience and to give them such value, that they come back, they commit all of their efforts to working with you again, and any conversation about real estate, they're there, they're pointing it back to you. Okay? Because if you're not doing that, the reality is you're showing up kind of average to those people. If you're not putting focus on them, really focus on them and really giving them incredible value than what's then then you're not really differentiating yourself, you're not really giving them an experience that's going to wow them and bring them back over and over again. So once you know who are your ideal clients cater your experience to generating loyal long term, high value, relationships. Because, again, if you're serving the same ice cream to everybody, it has to be vanilla. But if you can find out who are the very most important people in this database, then you can give them like a hug and does Ben and Jerry's types of type experience, okay, so you got to cater your experience to those people. In short, guys, I want you to forget, maybe let me just start with this. For those of you that are listening to this on the podcast, I'd encourage you, if you're not yet a member of the successful real estate agents, Facebook group, go do that. Now, you're really missing out on a number of resources that we make available to you there. If by chance, you've also are listening to this and you've not yet received your personalized referral score, which is a report telling you exactly how much money is available in your sphere that you're currently missing out on. And the first steps to go tap into that, that I would encourage you to join the group and or reach out to me DM me say, hey, I want to know my referral score. Super powerful diagnostic tool I've created, it's free to you, gonna give you some amazing feedback. And that will allow you to really know with clarity, what are the next steps. So with that being said, again, I want to wrap up the three major things that I learned from Disney from being at Disney World Number one is to always be getting clients. Always there was always room worst case scenario, you refer it out to somebody else. But you have to have dedicated time every day to be in conversations with people about real estate, so that you can find people that you can help if you're not doing that you're setting yourself up for failure 90 days from now. Okay. Point number two is to deliver such a high client experience, even if it's difficult challenges, be prepared for what will go amiss, and deliver value even amidst that you'll come out a rockstar. The last one is to get clients to come back and refer their friends by knowing who is your avatar and catering your experience around those people, not just the squeaky wheels, who are demanding attention, but you may never want to work with those kinds of people again.

Justin Stoddart 23:06
So I want to thank you so much for tuning in to this special exclusive training about how to create your own Disney World. I look forward to being in contact with you soon. Have a great day. If you enjoy this episode that I have a very special invitation for you. I have created a private Facebook community called successful real estate agents where the focus is going beyond success having both a successful business and a significant life. If you're not yet a member. Go sign up now.