How I Doubled My GCI From $150k to $300k In One Year

Stacey Springer:  It was a big commitment. Remember, we drew the circle and you just kept going bigger, and as far as an area, I would be the only agent in that area. Sometimes I'm still like, "Okay, that's not true. That just can't be true." You pretty much let me pick my area, and then couple that with having an accounts manager, my very own accountability person because I need that very bad, Jaclyn can tell you that. Accountability was a big missing piece at the time. 

Tim Chermak: This is The Platform Marketing Show, where we interview the most creative and ambitious real estate agents in the country, dissect their local marketing strategy, and get the behind the scenes scoop on how they're generating listing leads and warm referrals. We'll dive into the specifics of what marketing campaigns are working for them, how much they're spending on those campaigns, and figure out how they have perfected what we call the Platform Marketing strategy. This is your host, Tim Chermak. I'm the founder and CEO of Platform. I love marketing and I talk too much, so let's dive in. 

Tim Chermak: Hey guys, it's Tim Chermak. Welcome back to another episode of The Platform Marketing Show. I'm joined today by Stacey Springer. Stacey is a realtor near Columbia, Tennessee, just about an hour south of Nashville. Far enough away from the big city to feel like it's somewhat country living, but close enough to where it's convenient. Stacey, welcome to the show. 

Stacey Springer: Hey, Tim. Thank you for having me. 

Tim Chermak: Let's start off with some really cool news to share. Stacey just let us know today, she shared with Jackie, her Platform account manager, that after looking over the final numbers, her business has officially doubled since she joined Platform. Stacey, that's incredible. You were sharing with me that prior to Platform, and these are rounded approximate numbers, but you were right around the $150,000 number for GCI. Now, looking back at the last year, your first full year with Platform, you grew from $150,000 to over $300,000 in GCI. 

Tim Chermak: I think that's especially noteworthy because if your business was already at $150,000, it means that you were already a successful realtor. Things, they were already going really well. It's one thing if you, let's say, double your business going from $40,000 to $80,000, technically that's still doubling, but it's a lot more impressive and a lot more life changing when you go from $150,000 to $300,000 because you were already starting with a pretty impressive number. First off, just congratulations on that. That's awesome. What would you attribute, Stacey, to seeing that big of growth in basically just a year? 

Stacey Springer: Obviously, it's been all about Platform. I think really just the recognition that when people would see me out, the first thing was really not, “I see your videos,” it was more of, “Man, you're really killing it. You're really busy.” Platform just has this way of putting you out there to where you actually look busier than you are. Not that we're not busy, but I thought that was really cool right out of the gate, people just started to recognize me as just a realtor. 

Stacey Springer: That was one of the things when we started. Yes, we had some success, but I was still meeting people out that thought I was still a dental hygienist, that didn't know I was a realtor. I was like, “Man, these people. They need to know I'm a realtor.” That was a big part of joining Platform, was just to get a platform out there where people would see my face and even know that I was in real estate. 

Tim Chermak: Wait. If I just heard that correctly, you said you were a dental hygienist before?

Stacey Springer: Yes, 21 years. 

Tim Chermak: Okay, that's absolutely crazy. I think three of the last four people I've interviewed on the Platform podcast used to be a dental hygienist. I don't know what the odds are of that. 

Stacey Springer: That's crazy. There's a high burnout rate in that career. 

Tim Chermak: That's a pretty crazy coincidence. Maybe Platform needs to start targeting our ads just to dental hygienists because maybe they'll just sign up for Platform right away. That's actually a crazy coincidence. I can't even remember who the recent people were. I know that one of them was Veronica Bradley, but there's a couple other that recently I've interviewed on the podcast who are dental hygienists. That's just a wild coincidence. Okay, cool. 

Tim Chermak: It sounds like Platform just helped you get your name out there to your sphere and people in the community in such a way that it made you look way more successful than maybe you were at that time. Obviously, that makes people want to work with you because people want to work with someone that they deem is a successful realtor, who looks really busy. 

Stacey Springer: That's exactly how it happens.

Tim Chermak: Obviously, you were already pretty successful even before the Platform Marketing program. Let's be honest, if you're making $150,000 a year as a real estate agent, most real estate agents wish they could be at that level. I think still today, according to the NAR, the average realtor in America makes less than $50,000 a year. People hear all these stories of, “I know an agent who makes $100,000 or $200,000 or $300,000,” but it's a survivorship bias because no one talks about all the agents who make $40,000 a year. 

Tim Chermak: If you were already at the point where you're doing $150,000 in GCI, you already had a pretty enviable business that a lot of agents just wish they will someday get to that level. That was your starting line with Platform. Now, looking back at this last year, you actually did $300,000+ in GCI. That's a really cool feeling to get there. I know that obviously real estate is seasonal and a lot of agents will do a lot more business in the spring, summer than other months. If you average that out over 12 months, hitting the $300,000 number means that you're actually averaging $25,000 a month times 12.

Stacey Springer: That's crazy. That's not dental hygiene money. Sitting in a cubicle for nine hours a day, I could never go back there for sure. 

Tim Chermak: That's phenomenal. I just love hearing these stories when someone grows their business that much because it changes the financial reality for families. It means you can take more vacations, you could maybe buy a nicer car, it means you can give more money to your church if you're passionate about that. There's all sorts of things you can do when your income changes at that scale. That's really cool. 

Tim Chermak: I want to rewind and go back to, I think it was October, 2021. I actually have a random story of how you got connected to Platform. Most people, when I asked them, “Hey, how did you first hear about Platform?” It's because they clicked on one of our social media ads, they clicked on a Facebook ad that we're running, or maybe they had a referral from an existing Platform realtor, but you have a pretty interesting story and that actually my Dad who lives in Columbia, Tennessee, my Dad is I think 80, 82 years old now, he somehow met you and your husband at, I don't even know what it was, at a golf event? 

Stacey Springer: Do you want me to tell the story a little? 

Tim Chermak: Honestly, I don't know the story other than that he somehow met you and then he's like, “You've got to talk to my son, Tim.” My Dad really doesn't even understand what Platform does, but somehow he found out you were a realtor. 

Stacey Springer: Yes, and I was hoping you could fill in the gaps because it's blurry for me too.

Tim Chermak: Okay, this'll be fun then. 

Stacey Springer: My husband, Mark, is also a realtor and we had just invested in a billboard there in Columbia near Graymere Country Club, which is near where your Dad, he's a member there and so are we. We thought we would target that area with a billboard, so that was a big thing for us at the time. We wanted to couple that with a songwriters event at the country club because Mark is a country music songwriter. We were just going to have the billboard and then have this big event. We sent out these formal invitations. 

Stacey Springer: Where they are setting up the sound, and in walks this older gentleman way early, like he was really early, and he sits down at the table. I go over and share a business card with him and strike up a conversation and just right off the bat, he was just super cool. In a few minutes, he said, “Real estate, huh?” I said, “Yes, sir.” He said, “You may need to talk to my son. They have this marketing thing and they work with real estate agents.” I said, “Oh, really?” I'm just thinking, “Okay, this is just another marketing company. We've seen so many of those.”

Tim Chermak: Just a totally random guy who's like, “Oh, my son does marketing. You should talk to him.”

Stacey Springer: I told Mark about that later. I believe, Tim, that he called me. He followed up with me from having my card and was like, “I think Tim's going to be coming through,” or maybe Emily was in town, I can't remember. Long story short, he got us together. You met Mark and me at McAlister's in Columbia. 

Tim Chermak: That's right. I remember that. I had a grilled cheese sandwich, I remember. 

Stacey Springer: We just were so intrigued by what you had to say. Honestly, I know this will probably go out to people that are thinking about joining Platform and also to people that's been with it a lot longer than me. At the time being, yes, I had some success before, or did have some success before, but that $300,000 GCI is that mark where, okay, we'd played catch up and I'd gotten some things paid off, we were thinking about building a house, and then in comes Platform. It's a pretty big investment. We shared that with you that day, and it was just a bigger investment than we anticipated. 

Stacey Springer: Not trying to jump ahead or steal any of your questions, but while I'm thinking about it, it was a big commitment.  Remember, we drew the circle and you just kept going bigger, and as far as an area, I would be the only agent in that area. Sometimes I'm still like, "Okay, that's not true. That just can't be true." You pretty much let me pick my area, and then couple that with having an accounts manager, my very own accountability person because I need that very bad, Jaclyn can tell you that. Accountability was a big missing piece at the time. 

Tim Chermak: We still have people call us all the time that when we tell them that we only work with one agent per area, we're market exclusive, because no other company does that. Not Ylopo, not Curaytor, not BoomTown, not Sync, none of the other big real estate marketing programs offer market exclusivity the way that we do. Often, I think agents don't believe us. I think they think that we're lying that we do that. That's funny that you bring it up. It’s like, “What's the catch?”

Stacey Springer: That was huge. That's really what drove us. You leave there honestly thinking, “Okay, if we do not jump on this and someone else does, I would totally die if someone was doing this in my area now and I was sitting back watching them do it.”

Tim Chermak: It was really fun for me as well. I remember that night. We met up at a McAlister's Deli, which people don't know what McAlister's is, I'm pretty sure it's a chain. It's the same as Panera. It was close by my Dad's house and we got to meet in person. 99%, probably 99.99% of every agent who has ever signed up for the Platform Marketing program has signed up because they got on a phone call with us. We're obviously a remote company, so it was really fun for me to get to actually meet you guys in person and go through the sales spiel and explain what we do in person. That was fun. 

Tim Chermak: The reason I was in Tennessee was, if you remember, I was driving up to actually surprise my Dad. I think we may have met up on a Thursday or Friday night, I can't remember what day it was, but I was there because I was taking him that next day to go see the premiere of James Bond, No Time to Die.

Stacey Springer: Yes, I do remember that. 

Tim Chermak: That was that viral post on Facebook of us. I got us matching tuxedos and we went to opening night of the new James Bond movie. That's why I was even in town and he had no idea that I was doing that. Anyways, it worked out that we got to meet up in person. That was fun. 

Stacey Springer: Yes, and that was very special to us too. We also thought, “If we're getting to sit down with the CEO of a company, that's pretty special as you grow knowing that you get in on the front end of something like that.” If we liked what we heard, then that's always a good thing to be on the front end of something, especially something you believe in. We thought it was special too. 

Tim Chermak: You may not even remember that I told you this, but I remember when we left that night, I said, “Hey, you can let me know if you want to sign up. I just want to tell you that because I know this area pretty well because my Dad lives there and I know what type of markets that Platform agents often are just really successful in, you are going to be a case study client if you do this. If you sign up, I will probably be interviewing you someday on the Platform podcast as a success story.” Here we are. 

Stacey Springer: Here we are. There's no one there really that has a social media presence in Columbia. I'm not even sure of the population now in Columbia, probably 40,000, 50,000. There's some great agents there, but none of them have a real presence like I hope I'm going to be able to do.

Tim Chermak: The area is continuing to grow because it's really situated in a unique spot where, you said it's probably 40,000, 50,000, something like that. When you're in Columbia, Tennessee, it feels like a small town, but you're only a 15, 20-minute drive and all of a sudden, you're basically in the Nashville area. I feel like people from Nashville that maybe can't afford to live near downtown Nashville are going to continue moving out to the outer suburbs like Franklin and then eventually Columbia. Columbia will probably continue to grow because it gives you the proximity to the big city. When you're in Columbia, it's like small town kind of country living. 

Stacey Springer: Yes, it's growing tremendously. The big battery plant is going in there and it's huge. I don't know if you've been down recently, but lots of jobs coming, just tons of growth, tons and tons of growth. Very excited. 

Tim Chermak: You signed up towards the end of 2021. Obviously, I'm sure you probably didn't see immediate results until some point in 2022. Just to add some context to this, in case someone's maybe listening to this six months from now or a year later or whatever, because people's memories fade, 2022 was a very difficult year for real estate agents. About halfway through the year, the Fed started jacking up the interest rates. Interest rates essentially tripled in the course of just six months in 2022, where there were a lot of buyers where it’s like in January, I would have qualified to buy a $400,000 house and by June, July, they could maybe only qualify for $200,000, $250,000 because mortgage rates just went up so aggressively so quickly. 

Tim Chermak: For almost every other real estate agent in the United States of America, the year 2022 is very difficult. Most people would have said, “My business went down in 2022, not up,” and yet yours actually doubled in 2022. I think it makes it that much more impressive that not only, Stacey, did your business double, but you doubled in what was a really tough year. What is it specifically about the Platform strategy that is seeming to resonate in your community? Was there a particular ad or video or post that you've done that this specific ad seemed to do really well? 

Stacey Springer: Backing up to it taking a year for me to see it work, and this gets into a long story, and you told us that night that it would take six months and it did, I just wasn't sure if this was working. To be honest, looking back, I was just not implementing it. I don't think I understood the whole concept. I struggled with that a little bit, of just thinking I was so busy in taking care of my clients and not realizing what filming the videos and the listing videos and then the retargeting. It took me a while to even understand the concept. We had this whole thing of since I do live in such a rural area, I'm even more south of Columbia is where our home is, we have a 64-acre farm near the Amish outside of Columbia, so I struggled for a while just finding my area. 

Tim Chermak: You personally have 64 acres? 

Stacey Springer: Yes. 

Tim Chermak: I am jealous. That's awesome. 

Stacey Springer: We live around the Amish community. It's so beautiful. We're on a river and we have our little lake there. It's our refuge. We love to live there and work in Columbia, but we love that escape in the afternoon to our little farm there around all the Amish. Anyway, so we have our farm there, but I was actually raised in Wayne County, which is about 90 miles south of Nashville on the Tennessee-Alabama line. Mark moved to Nashville to be in the country music business. He had a lot of contacts and had lived in the Nashville area, and then we moved somewhere in between. 

Stacey Springer: The whole first six months to a year with Platform, I'm like, “Where do I target? Where do I hone in on?” I knew I wanted it to be Columbia because it was so up and coming and growing and no one there was doing it, but I found myself, because of Facebook and my friends in this county, I'm stretching myself from the Alabama state line to Nashville. I'm okay with that, but it took a long time for me to get the concept and to realize that I needed to be filming and getting listings there in Columbia, therefore to grow that Columbia market where I want it to be. That took a while. I don't know if that helps anyone out there, but I know everyone doesn't just live in a metropolitan area where there's a lot of people. 

Tim Chermak: You truly have to focus on a particular area if you want to develop that reputation as being the expert there. You can't just film videos in different towns and different counties and say, “I specialize in all of these counties.” When the public hears that, what they really hear is that you specialize in nothing, that you'll go anywhere. It's okay to do business in this county or that county or this city or that city, but you should have a real focus where 80% or 90% of my marketing is focused here because this town is where I want to be viewed as the expert. If you get some business outside of that, then that's icing on the cake. 

Stacey Springer: That's really where we are now. That's where I'm targeting. A lot of that was just my fault of not understanding and focusing in on that. I still yet had the success that I've had, so I'm really excited about honing in more on the Columbia area coupled with its growth that I just can't imagine what this is going to do. I really haven't even had the biggest bulk of my business from Columbia.

Tim Chermak: I was talking to Jackie this morning, and for those listening, Jackie is Stacey's account manager at Platform. It's like her personal marketing manager that oversees all of her campaigns and gives Stacey some coaching and accountability on which marketing campaigns we're going to do next and all that stuff. 

Tim Chermak: I called Jackie to get a snapshot of where things at, what has Stacey been most effective with, because I knew I was going to be interviewing you this afternoon on the Platform podcast. What Jaclyn told me is that, “Hey, I think the most effective thing that Stacey Springer has done is just listing videos. Whenever she does listing video tours and we put some budget behind those ad campaigns, she's getting 30,000 views, 40,000 views, 50,000 video views.” When that many people in an area are seeing your listing videos, you just start to develop a reputation in the area of if you're going to sell your house, you definitely want to work with Stacey because look at all this exposure that she's getting your house. 

Stacey Springer: That's exactly how it happens. Some of my favorite videos, you asked that earlier, which ones have really gotten a lot of attention, several come to mind. Of course the pool jump was really cool. That got a lot of attention, just that I'd be willing to do something like that and put myself out there. I think that's what Platform does too, it just keeps you real and people start to see your personality. 

Tim Chermak: Just to explain for maybe someone who's listening to this and they're like, “Pool jump? What are you talking about?” You had a listing and the home had a pool in the backyard. We basically started the video with essentially you doing a cannonball into the pool. Obviously, you filmed that last after I'm assuming you'd probably walked through, film the whole house, but when we edit it, we start the video with you doing a cannonball into the pool wearing your clothes. 

Tim Chermak: It just grabs people's attention because when they're skimming Facebook and they're just casually scrolling through their newsfeed on either Instagram or Facebook and they see a video from a realtor who's jumping into a pool, that's not what you expect to see when you're scrolling through your feed. It grabs your attention for that crucial split second and you're like, “I'm going to watch the rest of this video because this has hooked my attention.” 

Tim Chermak: As a marketer, as a realtor, because really, if you're a real estate agent, you have to think of yourself as a marketer, you're a marketer who just happens to specialize in marketing homes. By jumping into a pool like that, you grab people's attention and you earn the right for them to watch the rest of that video. 

Tim Chermak: Houses come and go. That house may have sold in a week, it may have taken a month to sell, maybe it sold in a day, I don't know, but houses come and go. What people remember is you, the realtor. That's what we want to have happen is whether that home sold right away, if you're in the video, people are actually going to remember Stacey Springer. They're not going to remember the particular specifics of that home, whether it had hardwood floors or quartz countertops or a big fenced backyard or a pool or a master on the main or whatever, but they're going to remember Stacey Springer. When they ever think about selling their house or buying a house, guess what realtor they're going to call? 

Stacey Springer: Super cool and so brilliant. You see a lot of other agents just showcasing the homes and doing it another way. It's just like you said, it's just the homes and you forget those. Just putting your face out there and developing that relationship, what am I trying to say? Just where they see your face.

Tim Chermak: That sense of familiarity where even if they don't actually know you, they don't personally know you, there's this phrase I've seen, it's a para social relationship where they feel like they know you because they've seen you so often pop up on their Instagram or their Facebook newsfeed, they've seen your videos. You have no idea who they are, you've never met them, but because they probably see you popping up with all of the retargeting ads that we run, summer photos, summer videos, they actually, in a sense, feel like they know you. If they see you at a local restaurant or coffee shop, they'll actually walk up to you and be like, “Stacey. You're that realtor.”

Stacey Springer: That's what I was trying to describe. Yes, you just have that to happen all of the time. You do feel a little bit famous. I walked in a nutrition store the other day in town and the young girls in there were like, “We thought you were coming here to do a video on us.” I was like, “No,” didn't know they knew me. That's a cool feeling. That's exactly what I was trying to explain. It's crazy how that happens. 

Tim Chermak: You've definitely had success with the listing videos. You mentioned the pool jump video. Are there any other listing videos that have stuck out that they got a lot of views? 

Stacey Springer: Currently, I think Jaclyn told me that, I'm selling this Shoal Creek Canoe Run, a canoe place here, and I got in a canoe in the river and to film the video. I think she said we were up to 130, 140 shares. It's because the canoe place has 10,000 followers. The whole canoe, kayak community that's a part of that Facebook page, they're sharing it. It's done really well. I haven't sold it yet, but the weather needs to change to do that, I think, but tons and tons of calls and shares, which is so super cool. 

Tim Chermak: When someone shares your post on social media, they're like doing your advertising for you.

Stacey Springer: Yeah, exactly. I guess this would be a bargaining ad, throwing the t-shirts out. I don't know if you've seen that video. I have these t-shirts made with our logo on the back with our team logo on the front and rolled those up and got one of those big slingshots for the basketball games because we're big basketball people. 

Stacey Springer: My husband wrote a song years ago called This is Our House. It's a real kick butt song. We would play it over the loudspeakers as I was going around the gym throwing out or slingshotting these t-shirts out. That was super cool with Mark singing and writing the song and just being there in your community at your school doing that. That really was a great retargeting campaign for our local community there. Going into this, I wanted to own my hometown where I live as well as Columbia. I think showing that we're involved in showing the school spirit, that was really big. That was a real fun one. 

Tim Chermak: Again, it shows that you're actually connected in the community. You're not just a realtor selling houses and you're always talking about yourself and new listings or open houses or all the typical things that most realtors talk about on social media, you're actually living your life, you're in the community that you sell houses in, like you're involved in the schools. As you mentioned, you guys are big into youth basketball there. People know that, “Cool. If I work with Stacey to buy or sell a house here, I'm working with someone who's an expert on the community and they're a champion of the community, they're involved in the community, and they just happen to be a real estate agent.” That's a really important distinction that if your marketing can show that, that you are actually involved in the community and that we just use your ads to promote that fact, that's the ultimate marketing.

Stacey Springer: It just creates a level of trust too because they see they're interacting and get a little feel of your personality. Just in that little video alone, people learned a lot about us that maybe they didn't know because we haven't always lived there. 

Tim Chermak: Are there any other ads Stacey that pop out, maybe like photo ads, photo retargeting ads that you've done that have gotten a lot of engagement where someone stopped you in real life and they're like, “I saw such and such. That was a great ad?” 

Stacey Springer: Oh my goodness. There's so many, I'm just trying to think. The ‘80s windsuit thing? Oh my goodness. I totally look like I did in the ‘80s. I got this blonde wig and my sister and I had this big, permed hair. I got her senior picture, it looked more like her. Anyway, side by side, it looks just like a time warp, like I totally went back in time. I wore this wind suit that Heather Mutz shared with me. It was the traveling wind suit. I think two or three of us used that same wind suit and mailed it to each other. 

Tim Chermak: She actually sent it to you? That's funny. 

Stacey Springer: Yes, and someone had shared it with her and then I was like, “Mail me that.” Heather mailed that to me and I created the same ad with that same windsuit. That was a lot of fun. It got a lot of comments, oh my goodness.

Tim Chermak: Again, if someone's listening to this and they're just like, “What the hell are you talking about?” There's this Facebook ad that we came up with at Platform where we told our clients, “Hey, get a neon 1980s stereotypical windsuit, like a fluorescent neon windsuit like you associate with peak 1980s culture, and then take a photo wearing that wind suit.” The ad caption of you wearing that 1980s outfit will be, “Reason to work with Stacey as your realtor, she'll fight harder for you than people fought against wind in the 1980s.” It's just a stupid, dumb, lame joke, but it's just so funny seeing people dressed up in an actual ‘80s windsuit with that ad caption. 

Tim Chermak: Again, it's just another example of it's funny in a cheesy way, but like jumping into a pool, people want to know that the real estate agent they're going to work with seems down to earth. They're, of course, professional. They know what they're doing. They understand the real estate trends and all that, but you also want to feel like they know how to have fun and they don't take themselves too seriously. 

Tim Chermak: If you're scrolling your newsfeed and that pops up on Insta or on Facebook and you realize, “This is actually a local real estate agent. That person looks fun. I guess if I have to sell my house or if I have to buy a house, I might as well work with someone who has a little bit of a sense of humor. They seem like they might be fun to hang out with.”

Stacey Springer: They scroll down through there and they see your listing videos. Who doesn't look at the amount of comments and shares and likes on something? The retargeting ads, that's a really cool strategy. 

Tim Chermak: You have doubled in the last year from $150,000 to $300,000. How long did it take you Stacey to really feel like it was working? When you and Mark would have conversations after you signed up, was it 90 days in? Was it six months in? How long did it really take to where you guys could be happy and know that, “Okay, we signed up for this marketing thing and we're glad we did?”

Stacey Springer: Again, in all honesty, I did not take it seriously at first. I did not put the work in that I needed to for whatever reason, so I feel like I was really delayed in understanding. Mastermind was in December in Naples. It took about a year. By that time, as you said earlier, interest rates were going up. There was a little fear about what's going to happen in 2023. It's the end of the year and you're evaluating everything. Yes, we had doubled our income, but we also started building a house. You have this fear of these rates and the talk of the rates going up. Immediately, I think what people do is you start to think, “Okay, how can I scale back?” 

Stacey Springer: Honestly, going into Mastermind, I've heard this before on some of your podcasts and at the Mastermind, we were seriously thinking about maybe not recommitting to that in 2023. We were like, “Let's go to Mastermind. Let's just go and see if this tells us if we should continue or not.” Although I had seen all of that growth, fuzzy ROI really resonated with me there. That's what happened, I just didn't know the name for it. I couldn't put a finger on all the growth and I just couldn't realize it because, like I said at the beginning, I just put my head down and a year and a half later, I looked up and it's doubled. It's crazy. 

Stacey Springer: We go to Mastermind and, of course, everything we left there, it's fired up as we've ever been. We're totally convinced when you said that so many people are looking to scale down, this is when you do the opposite. That made so much sense to us. We came home and we decided that's what we were going to do. 

Stacey Springer: We even did the whole loan thing. Although we were at $300,000, we had a lot of things planned out. We had paid a lot of things off, so we didn't wanna get in any kind of cash flow issues with the things we had going on. We did the whole loan thing so that we could pour into this first quarter and then hopefully look up this summer. I have so many leads coming in. I've hired an assistant. I'm looking to get a buyer's agent because there was so many coming in that it was taking over my mind. I was like, “I need to be out listing. I need an assistant that works these buyer leads and someone to go show these houses.” I'm really excited about what this summer is going to hold front loading this first quarter. 

Tim Chermak: It's funny that you worked the whole year, 2022, your business slowly grew and grew, but you didn't even realize until after the year was over early that you looked back at your finances and you're like, “Wait, our business literally doubled.” You were just working so hard and you were so busy in 2022. Keep in mind, this is her first full year with Platform. You basically signed up the very end of 2021. You're like, “Wow, we actually doubled. I didn't even realize that.” That's cool. Is there any difference Stacey between the ratio of how many buyers versus how many listings you worked with last year? Is it 50/50? 

Stacey Springer: No, I work more with the listing side, especially last year. I wish I had that in front of me. I definitely have more listings than buyers. The whole buying side is new to me. 

Tim Chermak: Has it always been that way? Was it that way before Platform? 

Stacey Springer: Yeah, it was always that way. I think that's attributed to just the big sphere that Mark and I had going into real estate. We were just fortunate enough to know a lot of people. We immediately got busy with our sphere and people that we knew and knew us early on. I was fortunate enough to have listings and get listings and Platform just grew that. The whole buyer leads coming in through Platform is just unbelievable. How warm and kind those leads are is just, if you've ever done any other kind of lead gen or buying leads, it's like pulling teeth, and this is so easy. 

Tim Chermak: Have you paid for other lead sources before, whether it's Zillow or any other company? 

Stacey Springer: I have not. Maybe I have but not a big investment or anything like that. I just dabbled in that. Again, I was having some success with listing, so I didn't really go that route. Although I did dabble in that from time to time, but they were so difficult when I did. 

Tim Chermak: When you look back at how you grew your business, Stacey, you mentioned fuzzy ROI. I think in your case, understanding what this phrase means is really important. We always try to warn agents when they sign up, “Now, what'll probably happen is your business is going to grow, but you're not even going to realize it's growing.” Usually, when an agent becomes really successful with Platform, it's because you find yourself just getting way more referrals and we activate your sphere more strongly than you have in the past. It's easy to actually miss that your business is growing. 

Tim Chermak: I think most agents think when they sign up for a marketing strategy like Platform, they think that, “It's bringing in cold leads, new strangers who are going to call me. I have to follow up with these leads.” You assume that there's bucket A with my sphere and bucket B with all these leads from marketing. We always try to say no, that's a false distinction. 

Tim Chermak: I don't view lead generation as being synonymous with marketing. I think the best way to grow your business is actually just getting way more warm referrals from your sphere. You are just a perfect case study of what that looks like in real life because you went the whole year 2022 and you didn't even realize how much your business had grown until you looked over your finances at the last year and you're like, “Oh my God, we literally doubled our business and we didn't even realize it.” That is a case study in fuzzy ROI. That's what we talk about when we say fuzzy ROI. 

Stacey Springer: Yes, and that's what I mean when I keep saying that I didn't get it. I think I tried to complicate it or I just couldn't realize it was that easy and then that it was happening. It took me that long. It was nothing that Platform wasn't doing or that you weren't making it clear. It was just exactly like you said, I was of that mindset that it had to look a certain way. I'm the poster child for fuzzy ROI because it literally took that long for me to get it, and going to Mastermind and the whole lighthouse approach. It just all culminated to a huge understanding, which makes this even more fun now. 

Tim Chermak: How was your Mastermind experience? Did you enjoy it? Did you get to meet any agents that maybe you had knew just via social media in the Facebook group? I know it was your first Platform Mastermind.

Stacey Springer: Yes, it was. It was a great experience, a much needed trip at the end of the year like that. That, more than anything, and then just to be so surprised to gather so much knowledge and more understanding and to meet Jaclyn. Podcast, you asked early on if I'd been on any or heard any. The first podcast after I joined that I heard was Heather Mutz. She really resonated with me and meeting her there was really cool. We just hit it off. I think she come up to me at the pool and we so, so hit it off. After Mastermind, I asked her if she would help guide me or just be someone I could talk to on a monthly basis. Heather and I have started a call every month. I just pick her brain and we've developed a friendship. Met Heather there and that was really cool, and Jaclyn. It was just another life changing experience because we stuck with Platform and I'm so glad that we did. I think it's really going to pay off hopefully this summer. 

Tim Chermak: It sounds like it already has, if your business has doubled. 

Stacey Springer: It has, not to sound ungrateful. It's just so cool to think about where we can go from here when we finally get it.

Tim Chermak: At this time last year, you were just dipping your toes in the water like, “Yeah, we signed up, but I guess we'll see what happens.” You weren't necessarily confident yet that you knew it was working. Now, this is your first full spring, summer where you're going into it knowing the Platform is working so you're investing that much more into it. I was going to say, who knows? Maybe your business will double again and you'll go from $300,000 to $600,000, but I don't even know if you have that many hours in the week to handle that much business.

Stacey Springer: I don't either. Got an assistant though, so we'll give it a shot. 

Tim Chermak: Like I said, you are perfectly situated to have a business that's growing for the long term because so many people are moving to Tennessee. I know that there's no state income taxes in Tennessee and you have this perfect situation where you have the country living, but you're basically only an hour away or less from the big city. It's actually similar to Heather. Heather out in Texas is near Hondo in Medina County. They're the same setup where it's 45 minutes-ish from San Antonio, but when you're actually out in Medina County, it's absolutely rural. You are not in the city. 

Stacey Springer: Very similar situations that we just want to pick her brain. We've developed such a cool relationship. 

Tim Chermak: Obviously if you were at the Mastermind, you got to see Heather get inducted into the Hall of Fame this last year for Platform. 

Stacey Springer: Yes, super cool. 

Tim Chermak: Alright, Stacey, I want to ask one more question while I have you on here. If there was an agent listening to this who recently signed up for Platform and maybe they're two months in, maybe they're four months in, but they somewhat recently signed up for Platform but the results haven't yet kicked in, they haven't really seen a return yet, they're cautiously optimistic, let's say. They want it to work because obviously that's why they signed up, but they haven't yet seen the results. With your experience in mind of how it all happened for you, what would you say to encourage that person who maybe signed up a couple months ago, but they haven't quite seen the results yet? 

Stacey Springer: First of all, just to let them know, they absolutely made the right choice and it's worth every penny. I would say, looking back, listen to your account manager, do what they say, trust them, and trust the process. I feel like it goes without saying, film the content consistently. That's what I've tried to do starting the beginning of this year, is just to be consistent. Just be consistent on filming content and probably go to the next Mastermind and use PlatFam, the Facebook group, to reach out to people. I found that to be really encouraging to get on there and see other people's struggles, their highs and their lows. Just in a nutshell, film or video content consistently. That's what I was not doing at first and it was still happening, I didn't realize it. It still remains to be seen with this consistency that I've given it this first quarter to see how that turns out. That's really my advice. 

Tim Chermak: Awesome. Create content, don't wait to start filming videos, go all in and create content right away because the sooner you do that, the sooner you will build a brand there and start getting all those phone calls and all those referrals. You mentioned attending the Mastermind too, that that was really important for you, probably psychologically or emotionally just to get in a physical room and be in the same room as other people working with Platform because it helps you realize, “These are real people. I can actually talk to them. They're not just people in a Facebook group. These are real humans I can hang out and grab dinner with or lunch with or drinks with and I can put a face to the name,” like meeting Heather, for example, in person and all these other people I'm sure that you met. 

Tim Chermak: Since you brought it up, for the first time publicly, I'll share the dates here for the Mastermind in 2023. Technically, Stacey, you are the first to know. It's actually going to be a Thursday, Friday this year. Historically, we [fusion] Mastermind Friday, Saturday, but a lot of clients asked us, “Hey, could you do it Thursday, Friday? That way we can enjoy the full weekend afterwards.” I thought, “That's actually a really good idea.” It's going to be Thursday, Friday this year. You'll actually fly in probably Wednesday because we'll start 9AM, Thursday morning. 

Tim Chermak: It's actually going to be November 30th and December 1st. It's still the first weekend in December just like it was last year. Technically because we're going to start on Thursday, so the Mastermind will be Thursday, Friday, it'll be November 30th and December 1st. Being it'll be in Naples, it's going to be at the Naples Grand. Again, the same resort we were at last year. You can stay the whole weekend there because you'll have Saturday and Sunday as free days. Those will be the dates for the Mastermind this year. 

Tim Chermak: I'm really excited because we almost have all the speakers booked already that will be sharing. I'm just extremely excited because the speakers we have this year are people that even I would want to learn from and I've somehow got them to agree to give a Platform Mastermind talk so I'm really excited. We actually have a problem right now of we have enough speakers where I'm like, “I don't know how we're gonna fit everyone in to give these workshop talks.” They're really good, really high level, practical speakers too. I am really excited. We'll be sharing more specifics ASAP, but if you're listening to this podcast, I guess you are the first to know. We'll see you at the Platform Mastermind. 

Stacey Springer: I'm so excited about that. You're going to have to get a bigger room. You're going to have to open the walls and expand, I think, this year. 

Tim Chermak: That's the other thing, is the room we're going to be in is actually on the main level there and it has a private balcony deck actually overlooking the pool. It's going to be a super cool vibe at the Platform Mastermind. I will see everyone there. Stacey, thank you for your time. 

Stacey Springer: Thank you, Tim.

Tim Chermak: This has been a really great episode. Again, doubling your business from $150,000 to $300,000 when you are already successful, already at the $150,000 mark, is just incredibly impressive because you already had a good thing going and have increased that by a hundred percent in your very first year of Platform too. That's the other thing, is many people will say their first year, they kind of grew, they knew it was working, but it was really the second full year that things took off. If you had that much results in your first year, I'm really excited to see what happens this year in 2023 for you. 

Stacey Springer: I am too. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. Thank you for all you do. I'll go hug your Dad for you, maybe. 

Tim Chermak: I was gonna say, it sounds like I owe [less] a referral fee. 

Stacey Springer:Yes, you do. 

Tim Chermak: All right, cool. Thanks, Stacey. Guys, we'll see you on the next episode of The Platform Marketing Show.