You Sell Homes. Your Brand Sells You with Karen Hall

[00:00:00] Karen: it's kind of funny how people don't even understand that marketing and branding are two totally different things. So it's funny how you, have a seminar and you're like, okay, well did you know that marketing is things that you do to market a house or to promote a house or to promote yourself?

[00:00:14] Karen: But branding is what other people decide that you're gonna be known for.

[00:00:18] Karen: And it's just like crickets.

[00:00:26] Suneet: Welcome back to the Reside Platform podcast. I'm your host today, Sunni Agarwal, and today I am chatting with Karen Hall, leader of the Fox Trot Company. Karen's helped tons of military families. I can't wait to talk about that with you, Karen. Brian s homes and she's built a brand that's all about service, trust, and giving back, and she has this a hundred heroes program that we'll talk about that's given back. Million. Is that right?

[00:00:56] Karen: Million 80 just in one year.

[00:00:59] Suneet: Okay. All well, how's it going? Thanks so much Your.

[00:01:07] Karen: So I got my real estate license just as a realtor in 2004, so pushing 21 years now. I actually I was there about seven years. Grew it into, I walked out of there and was like, this is not how real estate needs to be done anymore for my own independent boutique brokerage. And ran it as a regular, like brokerage for a while.

[00:01:24] Karen: And about a year and a half ago, we burned it all down, got rid of all the agents and started over. 'cause we wanted to go even deeper into the niche and launched as a whole new structure with a team that's just focused on serving heroes. So that was about a year and a half ago on Veterans Day.

[00:01:37] Suneet: Wow. Awesome. So talking about the heroes, you've helped hundreds of military families get through like a very stressful thing. What was your inspiration behind wanting to work with the military?

[00:01:52] Karen: my husband was in the Army. My dad was in the Navy. My father-in-law was the JAG of the Air Force, and we got out of our last military assignment, came back to the DC metro area, and that's what we were gonna buy our first house. And it was terrible. Like, this is not how people should be treated when you're buying a house in general, but especially not in the military.

[00:02:10] Karen: It's just a whole different world. Went out and got my real estate license and knew nobody in Virginia. I knew nothing about real estate, but I knew military and I knew that it was different. So just day one I just went all in. Literally I started out with a bright yellow impact yellow, they call it H two Hummer, and had like graphics and my name all over.

[00:02:30] Karen: It was military specialist. Featured on NPR Radio because they saw it and they hunted me down and they're like, who's this girl? Like small girl driving giant Hummer with the graphics all over it. And so just went from there. I actually helped create the MRP course that NAR has now. So I've just been entrenched in it from day one and it's, you know, people could look at it now and say, I'm kind of removed from the life of a mill spouse or, you know, military family member, but it's just.

[00:02:57] Karen: Is all I do day in and day out for two decades. So it's just specialization, you know?

[00:03:03] Suneet: Yeah. I love that. You know, a lot of agents wanna shy away from VA buyers. What do you say to people who claim you can't win with a VA loan? What do you say to that?

[00:03:14] Karen: I say, let me show you how, there was, a Facebook post one time, I think it was probably about a year and a half ago when some agent was, had a plight because they were trying to actually win for a family member with a VA loan. And they're like, I can't do it. And I just put in the symbol there like, Hey, just shoot me a DM and I'll, send you like my list of how I win.

[00:03:32] Karen: They shut down the post 'cause there was like 150 agents that just piled in and was like, send it to me. Send it to me. And I just copied and pasted and emailed it to every single one of them. And it's just, it's like a military saying, but it's all about how you brief it. I just literally sent it in a cover letter of why it's actually better than a conventional loan, honestly.

[00:03:50] Karen: So.

[00:03:50] Suneet: Love that. So with that niche. That you're so deep into,

[00:03:56] Suneet: let's say that I'm an agent or a team leader who wants to niche down, but let's say that I'm afraid to because I might miss out business. What do.

[00:04:06] Karen: dunno about the other markets, but in Virginia, I'm not even sure if it's Northern Virginia or our whole state or commonwealth. We have 22,000 realtors. And even the conversations I'm having with realtors right now, how are you supposed to stand out? Why is anyone gonna choose you over anyone else?

[00:04:22] Karen: And. You know, as if Jack of all trades, master of none is not a cliche statement. Being a generalist, you have like, it's not because you're professional or you're a great negotiator or any of that. Like why are they gonna choose you when everybody knows a realtor? But if you are absolutely an expert specialist in anything that's word of mouth, and then you get all kinds of referrals and reputation

[00:04:46] Karen: that build your whole business, like 98% referral is my business, which.

[00:04:51] Karen: Some people will tell you if they claim 70%, they're lying. I can show you my CISO account. But it's all by referral. And some of the clients I've had for repeat clients for 18 years now,

[00:05:02] Suneet: that's huge. With your branding around that, like what's a mistake that you see real estate pros make when they're trying to build that brand?

[00:05:11] Karen: oh, you're hitting my hot button because I'm so passionate about branding and marketing and. I'm like, dude, if I see Walmart logo with a house, a roof line, a key, be authentic. So many realtors we like to tell people, what we do, but we don't tell people who we are. it's like in social media, people are gonna connect with who you are. It's like I was CrossFitting for a while. I had more business at that gym because I just went and I was a CrossFitter.

[00:05:38] Karen: I would be in transactions. I think it ended up helping five people there sell, buy, or sell a house. But we never talked about it at the gym. It was just, they connected with me because. They knew something about me that they connected with. Same thing with the military or any niche. I'm not out there wearing all the roof lines and all this kind of stuff.

[00:05:55] Karen: So Foxtrots kind of amazing because it's literally given the, brand of personality and warmth. But we were at home real estate before this, and I still had people sending me at symbols all the time. We're like renovating our office and we threw out like 15 at symbols because everyone would text me all the time they saw 'em.

[00:06:13] Karen: And now I get. Oh, oh, there's a fox in my backyard, or there's a fox when I went walking and people were sending me foxes. So it's just be authentic and, and give people a reason to connect with you, not because you handle keys and open doors.

[00:06:27] Suneet: And foxtrots also like a military thing, isn't it?

[00:06:30] Karen: Exactly. It's just another company. So Alpha Bravo, Charlie, Delta, echo, Foxtrot. It's just part of the military.

[00:06:36] Suneet: Clever. You got foxes up there and military. Clever. That's so smart. I love it. So you said, you know, keep it authentic, but how do you keep that brand authentic as you scale and grow?

[00:06:52] Karen: Quality control, it's standards. Standards, I think. I am a big stickler for standards. It's funny 'cause some people they'll talk about me behind my back and like, she's so intimidating. She's so scary.

[00:07:04] Karen: And I finally asked somebody why, and they said, well, you'll give somebody a shot at asking what their standards are. You know, what's your deadline? What are you gonna do to this? But I'm gonna hold you to it. You can pick it, but I'm gonna hold you to it. And same thing for myself. But I think it's just, you know, holding standards and to the point that you.

[00:07:23] Karen: You become known for that. You know, our listings is the same way on all of our listings. We pay for professional staging in them. You know, we have a specific photographer, we are known for our marketing. So now people are actually seeking out our listings because they know there's gonna be a standard to it.

[00:07:38] Karen: It's gonna be a nice property. So it's every little thing we like to say. Smallest details matter most. So when smallest details matter most in absolutely everything you touch, you've gotta stick to that.

[00:07:49] Karen: because our business is so heavily referral and because they're military, I've had some, you know, marketing companies in the past that it took 'em a bit to realize that.

[00:07:58] Karen: Our clients are, often in a skiff or a secure facility where they don't even have their phone or they're not usually in this country. So I have tons of clients in Japan and Germany, and Belgium and Hawaii, and California all over the world. You can't just pick up the phone and call them. They're like, oh my God.

[00:08:14] Karen: It's a national emergency. Like what is happening? But you can still have standard activities like, you know, consistent posting on social media, like reaching out to people, connecting with people, not just posting, but consistent connections with people. So I make my agents, you know, you have to be interactive with a certain number of people every single day, DM people and be a part of their lives.

[00:08:34] Karen: So you can still have standards and your own personal standards that you're known for in your image and everything.

[00:08:41] Suneet: Yes. That's such a good answer. Tell us about the hundred hero stuff I'm not really like sure what it is. I think I know, but then what you've done with that.

[00:08:54] Karen: Yeah. homes for Heroes is a big national, I think it's a nonprofit organization. You can look up and see how much money they're actually giving back to heroes each year. the punchline is we gave back more and one year than they did, and they're in national nonprofit,

[00:09:07] Karen: so we just started out, like I said, from day one, I specialized in military. I dabbled a little in homes for heroes. I'm not one to stay within boxes and boundaries and rules, especially when you talk about designing marketing pieces. So I was like, no, this is not for me. But I like the idea of giving back.

[00:09:23] Karen: We say our heroes are our mission and how better to say, you know, thank you than with gratitude dollars that they literally get back on closing. And so we just created our own gratitude program. We called it a Hundred Heroes Project because it's our goal to give back to at least a hundred heroes every year.

[00:09:40] Karen: And a project just makes it sound more like people are part of something. We just have, you know, absolute branding geniuses on my team. They're like, hunter Heroes project. Where's it gonna go? but we also include teachers and nurses, so it's military, police, firefighters, teachers and nurses.

[00:09:55] Karen: Because I. You can not pay me enough to be in a classroom for an hour and no one acknowledges, you know, nurses and teachers, at all. So any of those guys, we give them back 25% of whatever our commission is on closing day, buying a house with us. It's kind of amazing what the new changes of how commissions and things are structured.

[00:10:15] Karen: Unintended positive consequence it's turned almost into like a commission assist program where. A buyer is maybe asking for the seller to give them a certain number, and the seller comes back and they're like, well, I'm not willing to give you a credit to cover that amount. So we go back to our client with options.

[00:10:30] Karen: We're like. Hey, I can apply your hero rebate and it would reduce the amount that you owe, or we can ask more and I can give you a larger credit. So we had that recently. I was able to give my buyer three options of how they could apply their hero rebate to offset, you know, the sellers not paying the entire commission, credit.

[00:10:48] Karen: So that has been absolutely amazing for heroes too.

[00:10:51] Suneet: Yeah. Such a cool program. And how have you been doing that?

[00:10:55] Karen: Probably about 10 years now. It's been featured on like Military by Owner and a whole bunch of other, blogs and programs and things. The USAA is a big company within the military. They do banking and insurance and they used to have their own program called Movers Advantage Program. They ended that program at least probably five years ago.

[00:11:14] Karen: And all of a sudden I started getting calls from Heroes in Kentucky and California and all over the country that. Really wanted the program. So sometimes we're able to even find realtors in other states and markets that will kind of still give the hero, a similar credit. So

[00:11:30] Suneet: Dude, you.

[00:11:34] Karen: I'm working on a bandwidth issue that my Coach EE is helping me with. So.

[00:11:39] Suneet: yes. You could scale that.

[00:11:41] Karen: Yeah. And then sellers, we just reduce the listing commission. So it offsets it.

[00:11:46] Karen: But Yeah.

[00:11:46] Karen: we averaging about, we've been running about 35 million in production a year, so it's running about 80.

[00:11:54] Suneet: That's so cool. So that must help with the referral business, huh?

[00:12:00] Karen: It does. Everybody knows a realtor, so you know, people will tell, oh, you should call my friend Julie and you should call, you know, call Dave or this, that and the other. And people are like, yeah, okay. Like all realtors are kind of created equal. I know a handful, but the second they're like, no, they gave me back $6,000 on closing day.

[00:12:19] Karen: Or, no, this was the only way my family was able to buy our very first home. Now that, they're calling me and instead saying, Hey, can you help me? Like James said to call you, can you help me please? It was just a game changer. And it's funny 'cause for years I kind of had that scarcity mentality where I was in a bad spot of, you know, oh, did they know about it?

[00:12:40] Karen: Did they hear about it? Do I offer it? Do I have to offer it? Because it's a lot of money. The second I switch to abundance. And just started blasting it everywhere and I'm on a mission to give away money. 'cause I realized the impact it has. That's when I went from, you know, $8 million a year in sales to 35 million.

[00:12:59] Suneet: Wow. That's so neat, man. I really like that. That's so cool. So with referrals, you know, for the, our listeners who maybe aren't ready to create a program like you have, what are the simplest thing that our listeners can do right now to deepen their relationships with potential referrers?

[00:13:21] Karen: Yep. It is absolutely just creating a program. I call it a VIP program, because you just have to make it programmatic. It's so simple that no one does it. I've spoken about it all across the country. Agents have hired me to create their programs for the whole year for them. you know, the first thing is give yourself a quiet space to write down who your people are, and it's not past clients, even for somebody that's starting out.

[00:13:44] Karen: It's anybody who knows you, loves you, trust you, and we'll refer you business. If you ask them, they don't live in the world where it's okay to share people's phone number. It's shocking. I know. But write down who these people are. Make a list. It could be 10 people, it could be a hundred people. And then you plan out the entire year.

[00:14:02] Karen: The whole year. We do it in December, so one just way of reaching out to them every single month. Now, the way to kill yourself accountable is you put in the calendar the date. That you're going to touch them in some way. It could be a handwritten note, it could be a card. It could be a gift that you mail something small.

[00:14:19] Karen: But you write on your calendar the date you're going to do it, and the date that you, whatever the homework is to get it done. So if you are mailing lottery scratchers, you have the date that you're mailing it, but you also have it on your calendar when you're going to buy the scratchers hand address the envelopes, or whatever you're doing with it.

[00:14:34] Karen: But you have to have it in there every, every single month.

[00:14:37] Suneet: So you mean have a plan, huh?

[00:14:39] Karen: Have a plan, but it's sticking to it because it works after three months. I know I've coached agents all over the country. After three months they're like, oh my God, I'm so busy. This is amazing, and I'm gonna a home inspection and I'm gonna a consult. And oh, what's okay if I didn't get around to it? And then what happens two months later, it's crickets.

[00:14:56] Karen: And they're like, where do everybody go? it's a hundred percent that if you want the one hack. Is, it's better to do at the beginning of the year, but to send all of your VIPs, as I call them, the gift in January is like a letter from the heart about why you're in real estate and what it means to you, not who, like all the whats, with a miniature wall calendar and that date that you're gonna reach out to them is on the calendar for every month.

[00:15:20] Karen: And they will watch that, I guarantee you, because it could be a, couple weekends in October and they'll be like, Hey, I know you're, you're coming around or you're sending me something. Do I need to be home? Do I need to have like a neighbor ready? And if you know that they're expecting, you'll not miss it.

[00:15:36] Suneet: Yeah. Right. I love that. I love that. And so. You are using follow-up boss to help with this, right?

[00:15:43] Karen: Yeah, any of my agents, they have to go in there and they just use the tag of VIP for that month. So we don't, and we try not to change it too much, over the year. But I just go in there and run a list of okay, all the VIP tags for, you know, March 25, we pull up the smart list and crank out the mailing labels, and that's how we're doing it.

[00:16:02] Karen: So that works out really well. And then we're also, because our, clients are a little different where they're incoming and then it's more about when they're gonna arrive. They're committed to us, but they may not be arriving for 60 days or, you know, five months. So, we'll, we kind of use those stages as well of, to talk about when they're arriving and when they're gonna start looking at houses.

[00:16:20] Karen: So with both of those.

[00:16:23] Suneet: Good. How are you using AI to help with?

[00:16:27] Karen: AI is not my forte, but someone on my team is, call him the chat GPT handler. And I'm so grateful that his Chat, GPT is not on payroll because she would be so expensive. She's like, we run everything through there, but even, before you even do like a marketing piece, as, like I say, 98% of our business is referral.

[00:16:46] Karen: The 2%. Is a postcard campaign that we knock out of the park. So we have mastered the design, the message, the value proposition, and the audience. So we do a postcard campaign to target military sellers, which I don't think anyone else even has on their radar. And to give you an idea, we'll mail out 12,000 postcards.

[00:17:04] Karen: I'll get three listings out of it. One run.

[00:17:07] Karen: we used, AI last week. We had a postcard that came to my house and I refrained from judging it online, but it was horrible. And, we like ran that through and then ran one of our postcard designs through and just kind of got scores on them, or suggestions for edits or suggestions for tweaks.

[00:17:21] Karen: I'm hiring right now. So I literally ran my, I did my stab at job description and then ran it through, you know, AI and I'm gonna post that later tonight. So we try to always say that it's a, force multiplier. You know, it's not to replace anything that we're doing, but it's to either make it more efficient or just make it way more effective.

[00:17:39] Karen: So,

[00:17:40] Suneet: yes. Good. So you've been doing some speaking and on some cool stages. What message are you inspired to share with the real estate industry through speaking?

[00:17:53] Karen: I did a heavy circuit a few years ago. I did, Inman, I did NAR at the Boston Conference. I did, CRS at their national conference. I did a bunch of local and state ones. It's usually what people want me to talk about is that VIP program, like creating the referral business. Then marketing and branding.

[00:18:11] Karen: it's kind of funny how people don't even understand that marketing and branding are two totally different things. So it's funny how you, have a seminar and you're like, okay, well did you know that marketing is things that you do to market a house or to promote a house or to promote yourself?

[00:18:26] Karen: But branding is what other people decide that you're gonna be known for.

[00:18:30] Karen: And it's just like crickets. So I get pretty passionate about branding, you know, marketing or anything serving the military, but especially niche marketing. I even got to talk to John Rhoda, for his group. Just about the importance of, again, niche marketing and being a specialist, especially if you can target a group of people or a community and build a community around people that have to move.

[00:18:54] Karen: You kind of get to benefit of building your own market. It doesn't matter what interest rates are doing. It doesn't matter what inventory is or this, that, and the other, you know, military similar to, divorce groups or states or anything like that, of a category of people that have to move no matter what.

[00:19:11] Karen: So if you can just go all in and specialize in that, then you kind of weather out the storm of even a changing market. So we talk a lot about that too.

[00:19:19] Suneet: I love it. That's a lot. So is that what your book is about?

[00:19:24] Karen: So my second book, I did a first book that was just kind of a general real estate guide. My second book is got, it's all written, I just have to get it published, but it's actually focused on, military home buyers and sellers.

[00:19:37] Karen: Someone challenged me, a few years ago, and they're like, Hey, can you just write down like the most common questions that people ask you over and over?

[00:19:44] Karen: Because in 20 years you get a lot of repetition. So it shocked me. But I actually came up with 50. We sat down, I wrote all the answers to these 50 questions and we actually did a massive video day. So I went all out with a videographer and rented an Airbnb and all this kind of stuff, and I filmed all those and we turned 'em into a masterclass.

[00:20:06] Karen: So. That's kind of running on, YouTube is just segments that people could read, you know, especially the one about VA assumptions is very popular. And then military by owner.com is a prominent, website for home searchers, and she's more heavy into blogs and anything. So she actually, she offered to pay half of this.

[00:20:23] Karen: And I'm like, no, no. I'm just gonna own these videos. Thank you. But she recycles those all the time on her website. Anytime she'll get someone to write an article, she'll tie one of my, video blogs in there, micro segments. So I'll kind of get tagged by those once in a while and I'm like, oh, this is why people are asking me about rentals or whatever it is.

[00:20:42] Karen: So.

[00:20:42] Suneet: How do you do both the other education products and your business?

[00:20:48] Karen: Ah, that's a good question. That's probably why the book has been written for a couple months and I need to get it published. But I'm very excited about that one because even early in my career when NPAR or NPR Radio, they found me by the Hummer and then they came back and they're like, can we just follow you around for a day?

[00:21:09] Karen: How is it different serving. The military versus civilians. And I was shocked that that was even an unknown. Right. But they followed me around the whole day, did a recording and all this kind of stuff and an article on it. So I think I'm pretty passionate about the relief and the service that you can bring to someone when you just understand, you know, me just saying I get it.

[00:21:31] Karen: And they're like, thank goodness, like. This is amazing. Like I really don't have to stumble through explaining, you know, what an LES or BAHI speak their language. I speak in military time, and it's just a whole different world and opportunity for an agent to just serve a different demographic, but it's self-serving.

[00:21:48] Karen: I, I genuinely don't know how a realtor survives in the market, just being a generalist, you know. Specializing in like a geographic area. We've got some agents, mega teams in my area that were beast, like absolute well machined in the last two years. I know that they're down 70% production and. Owned a city before and a county.

[00:22:13] Karen: it's a tough business, but our way of doing business is completely different. Where you're not touring houses with people, we're usually doing site unseen tours and we train on that and it's so efficient for us and we can serve so many more people that now local people are reaching out and they're like, I sight unseen tours.

[00:22:33] Karen: This is amazing. How do I get one of these? Joe Rodriguez and a couple other people are wanting me to train their people on how to just do those. it's just a different way of doing business. It's working with very decisive people with high standards that are motivated to move.

[00:22:48] Karen: It's not a, let me think about it for a couple years. It's shelter. It's not the American dream that they're looking for and. So you go all in on knowing that and they know you get it and it's just an instant connection. So

[00:23:01] Suneet: She so good. So good. Right now.

[00:23:06] Karen: I'm excited about, getting myself out of the trenches I don't know who it was Sun that introduced me to, by your time back. The book by Dan Martel, and I think it was basically written for me that was just a book written for me. I don't know why everybody else is buying it. I started tracking my activities and my energy and my time and how I'm using my minutes.

[00:23:28] Karen: So, and now I'm in that phase right now of, oh my gosh, I'm wasting my days. I am wasting my talent. I am not moving my company or my team or whatever it is forward because I'm not. Using my expertise and my time and talent. So I'm so excited now because yesterday I sat down and made a list of what are all the things that, you know, an admin or an executive assistant can do for me?

[00:23:50] Karen: And what is that now going to allow me to do? And it's help more people, serve more people, be a better leader. So that is in the works and it couldn't get here fast enough so

[00:24:00] Karen: you know, so many individual agents, team leaders, you know, business owners, company leaders. I don't think we realize the things that we're spending our minutes on. We feel busy and I knew I was busy and I knew I was tired, and I knew I was like in a hamster wheel.

[00:24:15] Karen: But now I literally look at my day and go, I just wasted eight hours or 10 hours. I'm working like 15 hours, but at least eight or 10 of it is just on emails and text and.

[00:24:28] Karen: Things that we went and picked up our new sign panels, they were wrong. I had to go back and drop them off and be a Karen and get them back, you know, reorder them.

[00:24:36] Karen: So,

[00:24:37] Suneet: no. Someone else can do that.

[00:24:40] Karen: so now I am, I'm very excited because it's almost like I earned clarity for what the business could look like and the team could look like and how I can be as a leader. You know, in ironically structured my entire team. Based on leadership, we structured the team like an army battalion. So, you know, everyone on my team and what we're gonna grow into, they see me as like the commander and, you know, span of control.

[00:25:05] Karen: It's, all that, that we profess like you can only effectively manage three to five things, any individual. So literally we structured the whole team like this, which. I mean, it's worked for the Army for hundreds of years. I don't know why other organizations are not using it, I don't have any time to be a leader, you know?

[00:25:21] Karen: So I'm excited about fixing that.

[00:25:23] Suneet: Love that. So if somebody wants to reach out to you and learn about all the stuff you got going on, or send you a referral or do some homes, the hundred Heroes Program or a VIP program, where do they learn more? Where do they see your masterclass or where can they connect?

[00:25:40] Karen: Yeah, so everything can probably be accessed on Instagram. I'm just Karen M. Hall on Instagram. Happy to dm. YouTube also has, I need to add on Instagram, but I'm happy to DM it. I have one channel for realtors and one channel for military home buyers and sellers on YouTube. So the masterclass is on there.

[00:25:58] Karen: But the easiest way to find me is I literally have the website meet karen.com, which is. Great for referrals too. I'm like, just go to meet karen.com. So we send 'em over there. They got a little slider so they can see their, gratitude dollars. It's got a link to, request a copy, the first book, and it has a link to masterclass all on there.

[00:26:17] Suneet: Karen, you did so fri well

[00:26:21] Suneet: today.

[00:26:21] Suneet: That was awesome. I really appreciate having you on. And everybody listening. Reach out to Karen that what she had to say was, incredible. Like, I'm gonna go check out the website too If you got something out of it, and I hope you did.

[00:26:35] Suneet: In fact, I know you most likely did. Click, share, subscribe, like do all that stuff. Share with a realtor friend or any friend who needs to be inspired or maybe get some great business ideas from Karen Hall. You know, we have, I. Well over a hundred episodes of other great guests, great value and actionable tips.

[00:27:00] Suneet: Go check them out and see you on the next episode of the Reside Platform podcast