Building Long-Term Business Growth | CRE Secrets Podcast with Aviva

0:00Thank you for being on Commercial Real Estate Secrets. First off, congratulations on day trading attention, hitting New York Times bestseller. The book was amazing. It's very well deserved. Thank you so much. Premise. I own a commercial real estate brokerage in Denver. It's called the Warehouse Hotline. We do warehouses in Denver. I have been running your playbook for seven to eight years. I'm going to post-produce this whole podcast and give you the proper introduction, do notes on it. But I want to take these 30, 25 minutes to just dive in and extract value. I have six questions, four minutes for each question.

0:42Are you ready? I am. Okay, let's begin. In 2019, you told me to hop on TikTok and I did. It's paying dividends now, four and five years later. What should we be doing today that we can expect to pay dividends in four and five years? That's a great question. So things like TikTok, so the premise of Day Trading Tension, the new book, is there are overpriced and underpriced behaviors in marketing, in everything, in business, in life, but there are things that are higher value and there are things that are quote-unquote waste of time or not as good of a deal. I wrote the book right now because there's actually no answer to your question.

1:26Meaning every so often a platform comes along and it's so big and people don't see it yet. And that's when I scream all over social. And I've done that obviously with, you know, Snapchat and TikTok and YouTube shorts and many other things. So the answer directly of platform underpriced attention that will pay off the next two, three, four years, it's not currently active. What is active is practices within the platforms that can extract more value than the competition. So let me use this analogy because I want everybody to understand. If there's three pumpkin pies on the table and there's only two of us and both of us want to eat as much pumpkin pie, we're both probably going to get at least one and a half pies.

2:18Maybe one gets two, maybe one gets one, but we're gonna get pie, right? That's what happens when a platform's underpriced. That was TikTok. Right now what's happening is there's 18 people in a room and there's 12 pies. And by the way, if you're the most clever of those 18 people, if you know the best moves, there's no reason you can't leave with four of the 18 pies or a fourth of one pie. That's the analogy. Right now, we're in a place where everybody has to be better at the content they make. You know, for you, for example, what I would be going ham on, if I bought your company and we became a piece of it, we became partners.

2:58And today's day one. We just closed the deal. It's the Monday. Here it is. Monday, June 3rd. We just became partners. You made me a nice cup of coffee as I walked in. You said, all right, partner. You're Gary fucking V. Let's explode this business. What are we doing? I would say the first thing we're doing is we're creating a doubling down on the podcast because it's our point of entry to make content. But we are obsessed with LinkedIn. Obsessed. And we're obsessed with LinkedIn ads because not only can we make content, but once the content does well organically, we can run ads against it towards the kind of people we want to attract.

3:39whether it's looking for supply, the deals. Does your family own a warehouse in Denver? Or filling it, right, the demand. You know, are you looking for a warehouse in Denver to expand your business? So I would say LinkedIn and believe it or not, YouTube Shorts is very interesting to me because YouTube's the second biggest search engine in the world behind Google. And I really do think content on that platform titled right, like literally Denver warehouse lease, Denver, we could be very clever there. So from a marketing standpoint, and then really something I didn't talk about the book, I would, if we're just going to the analogy, I would get our search stronger, our SEM, like our ads, you know, like search engine marketing, like not organic, but like if somebody types in buying, you know, a Denver warehouse, I'd like to see where we sit on our Google AdWords.

4:35that's more intent-based selling than it is, let's say social media marketing, but it would be on my mind. You told us to hop onto Google AdWords, you know, five, 10 years ago, and we have just dominated as a result. So thank you. And Aviva, I want to jump in on that because I want everybody to hear this. I work out every day now. I got a lot 10 years ago is when I started. Five years in, I was so much stronger. It was like profound. I was like, oh my God, I'm so strong. What I do today versus even 24 months ago blows my mind on curls, on benching. And so when I hear you crushing on AdWords, I want to remind you that there's a bigger delta than you even can comprehend.

5:25You could probably drive down your costs and up your leads by getting your game tighter. So I just want to make sure you hear that and I want to make sure the audience hears that as well. I appreciate that. I have a full-time overseas assistant who is remote. How am I setting her up for success in helping me create authentic content at scale? That's a great question. So she is an assistant to the content you mean? She is just my personal executive assistant. But she also helps with content? Oh yeah. Oh, I love it. Good for you. Okay. Well, there's two ways you help. Is she like literally making the clips and like making the stuff?

6:13Oh, yeah. Okay. So then the way you set her up is giving her more ammo, right? So more podcast episodes, more woman on the street, more, the more you do. I'll give you a good one. Something you should definitely be doing is green screening. so I'm going to actually do this in real time Denver where that's awesome alright just typed in Denver warehouses

6:49great so there's a article from the Denver Post on February 18th warehouse in Denver's Lincoln Park being turned into music venue right yeah screen shoot you talk now you talk of like you and you know what i'm talking about with green screen you've seen it from me and others right you so one of the ways you can help her is giving her more ammo including you doing quote unquote a little bit more the green screen is incredible the fact that you can talk about like here is a use case for what we're seeing in the lincoln park area and just in warehouses in denver in general a lot of you think of it as just like fulfillment centers, but there's so much more you can be doing with it.

7:30So I like that because really on that, you're putting her on third and a half base. She just, once you do that video, she just needs to clean it up a little bit, potentially maybe thumbs thumbnail, uh, helping you with copy, but you've put her on third and a half base, which is much further along than if you just give her the raw footage of this and say, go. So I always think about how do I put my team in a position to succeed by giving them more. Okay. I love it. I love the accountability. Yeah, exactly. Like I love where I'm proud of you that you saw where I was going. I think when we build infrastructure as leaders around ourselves, admins, creative partners, anybody, we're always like, how do we get this better?

8:15And the answer is always, it's on you. You know, everyone's like, how do I get Ronnie to do better? I don't know, like it's on you. like your communication to Ronnie John's sitting here on my team right now I gave him like yesterday I did a voicemail I wanted an ad for Wine Text by the way everyone listening sign up for WineText.com best way to buy wine on the internet my dad would be very happy you know I wanted people and I voice memoed a minute and five seconds I was like try this so I'm also guiding creative strategy you know and it's a yin and yang like he did something prior to that by himself that I did not guide that I liked.

8:54I told him that. So it's positive reinforcement. That's good management. Something that I think comes natural to me. But oftentimes, even for me, I also don't want to just say it if I don't believe it. So you got to manage authentically, but never hold back. I think sometimes people hold back on positive reinforcement because they don't want their employees to get big heads. I remember my dad used to do that a lot. He was scared that they would ask for a raise if he gave him positive reinforcement, which really screwed up the culture. I'm being serious. You know, it's like real stuff. So yeah, accountability, like more on you, spending time with her, talking to her for 30 minutes a day or a week, depending on your life.

9:32I'm just like shooting the shit about like what's on your mind, what's going well, what's potentially could be better, asking her how you can help her. So asking is an answer to your question. I laugh about your father's business. My family business, my grandfather was from the Soviet Union. family business. So I laugh because it's just, there are a lot of parallels and I've learned a lot from you about that. So let me ask you, we have a podcast, Commercial Real Estate Secrets, and I've got a list of my top 100, 200 prospects. How am I engaging my prospects on the podcast in a jab, jab, jab, left hook, right hook, excuse me, fashion?

10:17No, ironically, Day Trading Tensions' original title was Jab, Jab, Jab, Left Hook. One more time, I want to make sure I really understood that. I have the podcast. I have my top 200 prospects. I find it awkward to be like, hey, be on my show and convey that eventually we would like to work with you in your warehouse in Denver's in Denver. How am I giving them the Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook? I love this question so much. It's okay that you would like to do business with them. But don't put them on your podcast with the expectation that that's what they owe you. Give without expectation. But understand the serendipity may work itself out.

11:06That's the key. The reason I wrote Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook, the premise for everyone who's listening is everyone on social is struggling because they just wanted things. They were selling the whole time. And so I was like, give, give, give, and then ask. And don't mix your give and your ask. So what you asked there was, hey, Gare, it feels a little bit yucky, or I don't know how to make this work for my stomach. I feel like because you were mixing them. Right? You were mixing the ask and the give. Just put them on. Okay. And yes, of course. Like to me, the way I would do that is after you have a lovely podcast, whether you do it then because you feel like you hit it off or you do it in the future this is how I would do it.

11:50So let's say you're on my podcast we'll reverse roles. Let's say it really went well we just hit it off we laughed about our grandfathers from Russia we laughed about our kids went to the same school we laughed about both being into some sort of watching Bridgerton because you know a podcast can go anywhere right? If it goes well no different than like a first date where you ask someone out for a second date or no different than like you met somebody in fifth grade and you both had a nice time on the playground. You're like, you want to come over to my house and be friends? Like you, I think if it went well, especially if you did it in person, which I highly recommend.

12:24Okay. Right? Especially because you're in the same market. You're being very, you know, I'd highly recommend doing it in person. If you do it in person, it goes well. Literally, like after your banter of the show, you literally are saying, I'll do it with you. I'll be you. You be, I'll be like, I mean, that was a lot of fun. Like, obviously, you're aware that this is what I do for a living. Like, if you ever need anything, please let me know. Hope you have the best day. Like, always around. Thank you. That's it. Literally simple, like, hey. Or if it didn't go, like, as smashing well, it's kind of professional, didn't seem like the opening there was, I would literally wait six months to a year and reach out via email and be like, hey, maybe even a year.

13:06hey it's the one year anniversary of our podcast together um thinking back to it was a lot of fun having you on hope everything's been going well how's that uh development thing you're doing down in you know downtown uh just to remind you maybe wasn't even on your radar this is what i do um would love to you know grab a drink and talk business if there's anything around i just think those are very respectful ways but when they don't reply or they don't reciprocate it doesn't even run through your head as if anything went wrong. Because you didn't put you, of course, you understood that you may be able to do business with them on the back end.

13:43But, you know, the punchline is you really are okay. You put them on the platform without actual expectation that it would 100 % lead to business. Okay, I love it. Now I want to navigate, you have a book coming out in July, Meet Me in the Middle. I am eight months pregnant with my first child. Wow. Amazing. I know. How do you manage a family while still being a thought leader in your field? By not beating yourself up and giving yourself grace to go through what you're going through, both amazing, like what you're about to go through, and even challenges. You know, a lot of people, I've been getting a lot of emails lately about people grieving.

14:29Yeah. You know, like, unfortunately, you know, I'm getting older. So some of my friend groups or some of the people that have been following me for a long time are also getting older when you get older one of you know there's a lot of great things that come along with it wisdom appreciation perspective but there's also challenging things which is you start getting into those life cycles where you start losing loved ones and my answer has been give yourself grace like like how do i somebody with the other day was like how do i keep crushing my business it's been doubling year over year but i just lost he lost his mom and dad in a six-month period for separate reasons i just said brother you it's okay if you don't like you might be cliche and like lean into your work and you might triple but you're gonna it's not sustainable and you're gonna have to get that pain out at some point um so i would say to you if you like you know first child being the mother you know fathers have different variables than mothers you know this child's in you i always tell my all my buddies who struggle that their kids like the mom more than them.

15:29I'm like, bro, they were in them. I'm like, there's only so much we can do as dads. They're like, we're in them, physically in them. Like, I always find that fascinating. Of course, there's a different thing with your mom. Like, you grew in there. So, you know, for me, I look at it as, if I'm, again, if we're best friends since grammar school and we're like just talking on the phone, I'm saying to you like, hey, just fucking enjoy this first year. you have no, first of all, you have no idea how you're going to feel. Right? There's all that stuff, right? Is it easy? Is it hard? Postpartum this, like support from other, like there's just like, it's real life.

16:07Sure. You know, it's real life. I think giving yourself grace that this next year, who knows what it's going to be. But I want to be 70 and look back at that I gave it my all for the child more so than the business. But don't also, if on the second day of the child's life, if you're like excited to grab your phone and like email a client, you're not a horrible mother. Like you're, you're a human being that is lucky that they're passionate about what they want to do. And like balance comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes. So my answer to you is give yourself grace. Okay. Yeah. Uh, meet me in the middle.

16:44That's, you know, I, I, I'm very excited to read the book because I have a feeling you're going to bring light to all ages with this one. Yeah. The BeFriends thing is, you know, for everyone who's listening, I have this Pokemon meets Sesame Street IP called BeFriends. And, like, it's a real fun mission. You're right. I really, some of the stuff I've been able to do as a human being for 15 and older, I'm now on a journey to do for three and older, four and older, five and older. And so, you know, these characters are fun. This kid's book is really fun. I'm really excited about it. And the premise of Meet Me in the Middle, it's all about emotional.

17:20It's back to this. Find the middle. Find the middle. Don't get too hot. Don't get too cold. Don't get too blue. Don't get too red. You know, you know, find the middle patient pig and eager eagle is the story. And, you know, patience is remarkable, but complacency is not. Eagerness is amazing, but sloppy, you know, non-strategical go forward at all costs is also not good. And so finding balance is the key for sure. Hey, as a mentor, OGV friend, I am having the time of my life. It's a blast. And thank you because myself, our community, we're just having, like I said, we're having the time of our lives.

18:01So thank you. And I'm excited to push it onto the next generation. And Oakley's going to be an oak monster for Halloween for until she has an idea of anything else. So thank you. Thank you. All right. My last question. How do you present a holistic version of yourself while choosing not to include your kids in your content? That's a great question. So, you know, I first of all, I don't think. Let's break down your question. So obviously I share a lot. I'm very out there. And as you know, I I don't really share my personal life. I think that personally I think that over the next decade or two that will become more common I think we're in the era right now where people are really sharing a lot and I don't think they realize what happens when you share your entire engagement you know and like when you give people when you give the world things it's theirs not yours right so i think that there's a lot of things that people haven't gone through yet in their lives and i also think that people mistakenly use their children and their relationship to get more likes and attention and i don't think they think of the back end you know when and i hear this from friends now because i've been talking about this for a long time and i've got some friends now who are like wait a minute like i'm getting stopped by people in the street and they're saying hello to my five-year-old child and it's a little creepy and a little weird and definitely the kid is starting to react and i'm like yeah this is what this is what i was talking about like you can't be mad at them you're blasting out unlimited content of little connor and they that becomes interesting to people and they want to say what's up to little connor and like you know it's very it's very you know it's one thing when a celebrity acts in films and then when they're out and about people are coming up to them with their kids and like yo i'm with my family and we've all knew that right like all of us have heard that i remind my friends i'm like those people are not sharing their family yeah they're just known so i feel no pressure to be holistic to my audience, I feel pressure in providing value to my audience.

20:32And value, you know, I don't, I don't think of it in the, I don't put holistic or fully 360 or full transparency. That's not how I think about it. I think about what's worked for me and why I think it's worked for my audience is I think about like, why is this post good for them? Yeah. I think that's really worked for me. I think people think about why is this post good for me when they post. And I think that's what led people to relationships and children and dogs because they get likes. And that's what they want. I think about it differently, which is like, why would somebody see this? And why would that be good for them?

21:12And me posting a photo of being on a fancy vacation or have an expensive watch or a private plane or a pic of my relationship or my kids or whatever it is, I don't think that that's valuable. I really don't. In a very deep conversation on this, you could say that it's escapism. You could say it's intrigue. I can get there, but it's not high value. It really isn't. As a matter of fact, I think oftentimes it just makes people unhappy. be. Like when you see somebody on a private plane, you react like I can't be on a private plane. When you see someone with like their family on a grassy grove and maybe you're in a fight with your spouse right now, you're like, like my life sucks.

21:57And I just, I think that people are not thoughtful in what their content is doing to the other side. That's profound. And as someone who's just been struggling with that, with how my relationship posting my future child, it makes a lot of sense. It's like low blow content. And the whole point of producing content is high level content to provide value for the recipients, which... And by the way, I don't mind lightweight content, but I'd rather you post a picture of potentially, let's just talk about this. I'd rather you take a photo of like baby formula on your, like spilled on your notes for work and you talking about like Sundays you just have to laugh when you're balancing two things versus now you're doing something where you're like head nodding to other moms being like, yo, this shit's hard, right?

22:55Versus what I think a lot of people are doing which is like, this is just gonna get a lot of likes because Oakley looks so cute. But like, what is that really doing? I think it's a conversation people need to think about because you're really sharing with the world. Yeah. It's not like you're sharing with your three best friends from high school or your family. You're sharing with the world. And it's intense. The world is intense. Yeah, the world is intense. And you've got to be accountable that you put it out there. When people are like, I can't believe these people. Well, you put it out there.

23:30Yeah. Yeah. Accountability. And we're not empathetic. Like when someone leaves a nasty comment about, like, I'll give you an example. Cliche thing that happens in society. Person posts their kid, they're a year old. A lot of kids, as you may know, like, they all grow up so differently. Some talk earlier, some walk earlier. I saw this the other day. Actually, this is a real life example. Somebody made fun of someone's kid because they were like 15 months old. Oh no, it was the first birthday picture and the kid's completely bald still. No hair. Okay. And it's like, the comment was pretty nasty, right?

24:04Like, you know, when's your kid gonna grow hair? Like, what the fuck? But do you know what my reaction was when I read that? As I do what I do for a living? I say to myself, we don't know if that's a person who's now on four years of not being able to have a child with their spouse. Empathy. Empathy. Like, why would somebody say that? Let me give you the preview. They're hurt. Why are they hurt? Maybe they lost their child. Maybe they had a miscarriage. Maybe they can't conceive. Maybe their spouse just left that. Like maybe they had a bad childhood. Like, I don't know. So these are the things I think a lot about.

24:46Gary, thank you. I really, really appreciate your time. I appreciate you being on the podcast. And I appreciate everything you do for myself and our world. So thank you.