Executive coach Bill Hart joins us on the Modern Lending podcast to impart some knowledge unto us on what he does. His latest video Get off my Lawn made me laugh out loud and we will touch a little on this vid!

In this snippet of the Modern Lending Podcast…

• Video will help you change the trajectory of your career
• The same headspace you get with a person will be filled by video
• Put in some thought to how you show up on your video
• It doesnt take much to put out content

Episode Transcribe

[Alec] What’s up friends and professionals? We are live again! Happy Thursday! Another live Modern Lending Podcast coming at you. I so appreciate everybody that pauses a little bit of their day to hang out with us live. I know I get a ton of views and a ton of downloads on this stuff as it all rolls through the podcast world. But man, just the fact that you’re taking a minute to hang out with us live, I hope it doesn’t disappoint. Today, really excited, man. Even in the green room before this went live, I’m so pumped to bring on executive coach, Bill Hart. Now this guy has such a passion for leading our industry, our great professionals, our salespeople into new territory, pushing boundaries, making people feel uncomfortable by doing it himself which is what I love so much. I love people who are practitioners, who are in the space and being like, “Come with me, come into this world.” And here’s the story. I wanna show a quick video before I bring him on about why I had to have Bill come on and connect with us. First of all, I wanna show a video that he put on in about six years ago called, Mikey, what was it called? Yeah, “I feel like I know you”, so let’s pull down the overlays, I wanna play this video and then I’ll bring on Bill. Wait for it, here we go.[Bill] I feel like I know you. That’s the result of watching somebody on video that you may never have met. And I can tell you this firsthand because my video blog, which I’ve been doing for a few years now as a direct result of reading Gary Vaynerchuck’s book, “Crushing It!” a couple of years ago really sold me on the idea of video. And it’s always been a comfortable thing for me and it’s an easy way for me to do my blog. Rather easier than typing. What I do find, though, is that when I’m out speaking to an audience, it happens every time. Somebody comes up and says, oh yeah, that thing you talked about or, man, that thing, and you know this, right? In social media, there are lurkers. You may be a lurker! Meaning you’ll read it, you’ll view, but you don’t hit like, you don’t comment and you just view. And what I’m realizing is there’s so many more people out there that are watching my stuff than are actually commenting on it, and the end result is they tell me, “I feel like I know you.” So, here’s the thing. The vast majority of people that view my videos are in the sales or sales[Bill]leadership business. And think about how much of an advantage it is for you when somebody that you’re calling on, someone would wanna build a relationship with, someone that you’re trying to do a transaction with, feels like they know you? Why aren’t you doing video? It’s so easy. This is my iPhone. I shoot all my video on my iPhone. I could use my Nikon D5100, set it up on a tripod, it looks fantastic. But you know what? I can knock this video out in three minutes, post it in five, and it’s done. Why aren’t you doing video? Do it. People know what you look like when they meet you at Starbucks. They know; get over it. Do video.[Alec] This is what I’m talking about. I saw this and then it was from six years ago, six years ago! This guy was bringing real talk to the industry, and so let’s not wait any longer. Let’s bring on Coach Bill Hart and rock and roll. Yes, sir. Why aren’t you doing video? By the way, how is it that you don’t age? I went to your YouTube channel. You haven’t aged in a decade, bro! I need secrets.[Bill] I don’t have one. I’m pretty sure I’m aging. You don’t hear me when I get up off the floor. I’m groaning and grunting more than I ever have. So the nice thing is when you go gray early, you look like that for a protracted period of time. So there’s that.[Alec] Well look bro, Bill, I’m so happy you’re here. First of all, I know you saw my message after that video because I was like, dang it! One of the things I’m personally impatient about or sad about for myself is I didn’t start playing this game like you’ve been until a year and a half ago when I really got serious and I realized, holy crap, there’s opportunity here and I’m missing it. And yet, there you are in 2014 being like “Make a video” and poking people in the face. And it’s my favorite thing ever. Yes, what’s up Chris? So, man, take me back for a second, ’cause I have so much stuff to talk to you about. But I went and YouTube[Bill]dove your channel. Kind of like I do all my stalking right before, I wanna see everything.[Bill] Nice.[Alec] And you’ve got 10 years of video content in your YouTube channel. How did you get on that trend back then? What pushed you into this world?[Bill] Yeah, so I mentioned it in that video, it was Gary Vaynerchuk’s first book, “Crushing It!” and back then he was challenging people to start doing a vlog. Like a vlog was a thing, right? It was a video blog and so that’s what I did. It was just much easier for me to record video than it was to type. So I had a website, the same website that I have now, coachbillhart.com, but back then, it was all my videos would just scroll through and that was the way that you would consume content and it was all because of Gary V. So that’s where it started, man. I went and looked this morning and you have it. But I went and looked at the very first video that I did intentionally, which was different than a camera sitting in front of me, giving a talk in front of an audience. And it was me talking about one of my clients and I was talking about two products that don’t even exist anymore. I was talking about Talk Jet, which is my old interview series that I used to do with realtors that I did for 20 years that were used by lenders to create relationships. And it was Eyejot, which was sort of an I’ll[Bill]fated effort to get into BombBomb’s space, which they now own. So that was my very first like, hold the phone at the end of my arm.[Alec] We’re gonna show it, we’re gonna show it.[Bill] Nice![Alec] ‘Cause I want people to understand whether you were afraid or not or insecure or not or whatever it was, you still put the camera in front of your face, you held it with your hand and you contributed a message to the world. And that was in 2000, what you say, nine?[Bill] 2009, yeah.[Alec] 2009![Bill] Yeah.[Alec] I’m jealous, ’cause I know[Bill][Bill] Did you even have a driver’s license in 2009?[Alec] That’s fair. Come on, bro![Bill] What?[Alec] I’m not that young.[Bill] Oh, okay.[Alec] I’m young, but .[Bill] Fair enough, fair enough, yeah. That’s where it started, man.[Alec] I wanna play it, I’m gonna play the video. I’m gonna play the first video, you were talking to Josh Mettle, you sent a message out. Let’s hit it up, Mike. I want people to see the first time you jumped out in 2009.[Bill] Josh Mettle in Salt Lake City, Utah, is currently closing 25 to 35[Bill][Alec] Good[Bill]looking man, by the way, Josh Mettle.[Bill] The majority of those purchase transactions. And when I asked him why that was, he said there are two primary reasons. There’s a lot of things that he does well, but number one, he said it was Talk Jet. It enables him to send out something each and every month that allows him to connect with his realtors and builders about something that is deeper than just rates or programs. Number two is he sends out a weekly, weekly video email through Eyejot. Check it out at www dot E[Bill]Y[Bill]E[Bill]J[Bill]O[Bill]T dot com. The beauty of this is it’s a two[Bill]minute or less[Bill][Alec] All right, I got the cut sign. But this is good stuff, dude![Bill] To connect with his real[Bill][Alec] This is the real talk! This is you just holding the camera and sending a message, and there’s so many people out there who are terrified of that. Mainly for some of the reasons like the shaky camera and the things that you didn’t, you were like, we’re just going live, we’re just gonna do this thing.[Bill] Yup, yup. So that’s the first thing I noticed is the shaky camera. It’s like, oh, that’s horrible! And my lighting wasn’t good and I’m standing in my backyard and I’m using an iPhone with no microphone. There’s a lot of stuff about it that wasn’t great, but at the end of the day I jumped in and that started my process of committing to video. I’m telling you brother, this just for me as a coach, this changed the trajectory of my career because it used to be that my visibility, my brand was created when I was on stage at Sales Mastery in Palm Springs, back in the days when it was in Palm Springs. And because I had worked with Todd Duncan and Building Champions out of partnership with Duncan, that was my branding opportunity, so everybody knew me from Mastery. Well, Todd, appropriately gets into coaching and we no longer have that partnership and I’m not invited to show up on stage anymore and I totally get all of that. But that’s when it hit me that I could just control this on my own and so I don’t know; if you’re a loan originator right now, Alec, and you’re used to walking into real estate offices and doing lunch and learns, which God forbid, can we please just put a fork in that and never ever call that that anymore? But you know what I mean?[Alec] You gotta rename it,[Bill] Right, there’s a lot of clever remakes on that. But I just think, lunch and learn, seriously? This is so 1995, come on, let’s do something different. Anyway, whatever it is you were doing live with people, whether it was at a Starbucks or a restaurant or a golf course or their real estate office, we can’t do that right now. Most of us around the country, you can’t do that right now. But what we can do is what you’re doing, Alec, and you do it masterfully, man. Your stuff is really, really good and I think I told you privately, so I’m just gonna go on a little sidebar here, but I think I told you privately what you’re doing is what I actually coach my leadership clients to do and I call it gravitational pull marketing. It’s like you make yourself so interesting with the loanDepot brand that my guess is you actually end up having conversations with people because they feel like they know you. Am I right?[Alec] Yeah, and it’s so funny, Bill; we all have our own journeys on this and I love hearing yours because the comment you made that I think everyone either heard or maybe I want them to hear again, which was this video game changed the trajectory of your career. And I really want people to hear that because to your point, we’re under a whole new set of guidelines and restrictions. We can’t do what we used to do, we can’t operate our business the way we used to do our business. And by the way, I’m seriously thankful. I’m seriously thankful because the whole time we were doing business as usual, the local mortgage professional was getting crushed and beaten up and they didn’t know it. Or they did know it or they didn’t care or they didn’t know how or why or what was going on because the entire country, all of us as human consumers, have gone internet[Bill]first, have gone digital[Bill]first, and that’s not where the local pro tends to be. They tend to be down in their community behind a real estate agent. And all of a sudden, now that’s not where the customer’s starting. And to your point, if it changed the trajectory of your career, it’s definitely changed the trajectory of my career and I want that for so many other of the great local mortgage pros out there who are really experienced, really talented, really capable. And I want it for them too. And that’s why I wanted to bring you on and I wanted to have you give a chance to share your story because you’re still producing content. And it’s fantastic. It’s fantastic messaging.[Bill] Thanks, man.[Alec] You’re still driving yourself forward and I wanna play “Get off my lawn” at the end here, ’cause I literally cried laughing hysterically. I fell out my chair on the ground. I was so happy about it. I was just like, thank you for sending Bill to send this message.[Bill] Nice.[Alec] So you’re coaching people actively in this process today, you’re pushing people out of their comfort zone into video. Share some high level stuff about what you’re bumping into, what’s been your experience, how are people responding?[Bill] Okay.[Alec] Share a little bit of that.[Bill] So, here’s the biggest thing that people run into with video is they don’t like the way they look and they don’t and they don’t like the way they sound.[Alec] 1,000%, 1,000%.[Bill] So I have some bad news for you. That’s the way you look, that’s the way you sound.[Alec] Thank you everybody.[Bill] Later, bye[Bill]bye. Sorry, I mean look, you can throw filters on and little bunny ears, and blips and eyes on Instagram and filters, but come on, here’s the thing. When people meet you, they see you. In my head, I’m probably 38 years old and have dark hair and no wrinkles. So when I watch a video, I’m like, “Is that my dad? How’d that happen?” But at the end of the day, what I realized is that little bit of pain, Jim Rohn famously said my favorite quote of all time, “We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.”[Alec] By the way, Niki online is saying, that’s the truth. That’s the truth, just nailing the truth, yeah.[Bill] Right? So, here’s my point as a coach: it’s gonna hurt either way. You’re either gonna experience the pain of not doing it, the pain of regret, or you’re gonna experience the pain of just stepping into it and doing it and what I know is Dave Savage is probably the one that taught me this the best with his whole thing with Mortgage Coach, it’s like, look, do 20 TCAs. If you’ll do 20 total cost analysis, just do them to the friendlies, do them with your family, do it with realtors. By the time you record 21, you’re cool with it now. So I would say the same thing; the best advice I could give somebody, Alec, is just start doing this with your friendlies. You don’t have to push it out onto social right away if you don’t want to. Do one and send it to Alec, send it to me, let us give you some feedback on it. Send it to people that you work with and let people call you out on some of the things that I’ll talk about here in a minute about, your background I mean, Alec’s background didn’t happen by accident, correct?[Alec] Nope.[Bill] Yeah, well neither did this. And if you saw that video I did nine years ago, I was in my backyard. I’m in my backyard. I still shoot in my backyard and nine times out of 10, my dog Lola is running around in the backyard somewhere in the background, I should say. And I’ve kind of just gotten over that, like, whatever, I don’t care. So yeah, that’s what I would say is the biggest enemy for most people is I don’t like the way I look and I don’t like the way I sound.[Alec] But you know what’s crazy? Is there’s such a disconnect mentally because I’m sure you bump into this when you’re coaching people. I’ll sit down with somebody and be like, “Do you love to meet face to face with your customers?” And from a local professional perspective, many are like, “Absolutely, it’s my bread and butter. I go to closings, I love it. I love sitting down with them upfront and do the prequel because I can see them, they can see me, we build rapport.” And I’m sitting here like, hello? Like, can you connect? Do you see the, the thing that’s the connection? Like you can do it, but you can’t, this is not; it’s crazy, the disconnect![Bill] Right? Yeah, a 100%. So, go ahead, finish your thought.[Alec] No, I just, it’s all the things that you get face[Bill]to[Bill]face physically. There’s still that similar transmission that’s happening now. It’s not the same, it’s not, you’re not[Bill] I think you’re right, but here’s what I think. This is just my opinion, I’m not a psychologist so I don’t know, but here’s what I think. I think I have a marker that’s not working. It’s gonna make it so much easier if you can actually see this, so just stand by here. I think that we all have a box in our head. So with Alec, I’ve got a box in my head and if you and I hang out someplace and we[Bill][Alec] Mine’s a lot smaller, A little tiny box.[Bill] But if we have a live meeting, I think my brain says, yup, check, I hung out with Alec. Here’s what I think though, and I recorded a video on it somewhere out there. I think that the same box in your brain has the check mark in it when you meet via video. I believe that with all my heart. And so here’s what I know when I watched your, was it yesterday you did the video about how you’re showing up in Zoom?[Alec] Yeah, and I’m yelling at everybody ’cause I got all fired up.[Bill] So good though, you guys. Look, if you’re watching this right now and you’re saying, “Well, my house is a mess and I don’t like it, so yeah, I never turn my camera on”, well, you’re essentially not showing up. You’re just not there for the meeting. So what I would ask you to, here’s what I would encourage you to consider when it comes to Zoom. There’s so many different permeations of video, right? I can do BombBomb, I can push video out onto social, I can be on a Zoom call; there’s so many different ways to utilize video. But Kristen Marino, a woman on my team who is at home, like everybody else, little kids; we connected on a Teams called other day. There’s another place where we can meet. We connect on the Teams call the other day and she’s got this beautiful, clean background with a pattern behind her, and I’m like, “Wow, nice studio!” And she said, “Oh, you’ll love this”, and she pulls it back and it’s a shower curtain. And behind her is her garage with exercise bikes and equipments and cans of oil and just all kinds of crap. All she did is she got a ring light and a shower curtain and her husband put it on a bar behind her and she’s like done! So you guys, stop it, find a place to create a little studio right now ’cause it’s what we need.[Alec] And I was ranting on yesterday, Bill, and you’re nailing it. It’s not about this and the mic and this stuff isn’t about me. This is about me to you.[Bill] Totally.[Alec] If other people matter, then you need to show up in such a way they can hear you and see you so that they can engage you. ‘Cause it’s not about you, it’s about them and their experience. And I’m watching people, great people, actually get destroyed by this medium.[Bill] Oh, absolutely.[Alec] Their authority, everything’s coming down because either they’re not willing to learn it, which I don’t think is the truth, I just think no[Bill]one’s telling them.[Bill] Agreed, so let’s tell them, right. Let’s tell them. So, look, you guys, like get past your inner critic. If you’re making notes or if you can just register this in your head, if you’re driving or whatever; you gotta get past your inner critic.[Alec] How?[Bill] Yeah, well, you jump in, right? You just jump in, you start doing it. If I was coaching you, I’m doing this for clients right now, I’m not gonna let you off the hook. You have to do a video, I don’t care what the topic is, send it to me via text. This doesn’t need to be overproduced, I just wanna see a video from you. And then let me critique it because I love you, right? I’m not gonna hammer you because it’s gonna make you feel bad. I’m gonna tell you, hey, this angle is not good. Looking up somebody’s nostrils, bad idea. The fact that you have a ficus tree behind you and a blank wall, it looks like you’re in an Al Qaeda video and you’re gonna have your head cut off. Let’s give some thought to our background, our lighting, our microphone, what you wear. I’m dressed up today. I’m a T[Bill]shirt guy.[Alec] You look good.[Bill] Thanks, brother. I’m wearing an actual golf shirt with a collar. Think through what you’re producing. So we can go there when you want, but I wanna help people with, what camera do you use, what microphone do you use, what tripod do you use, What are you using for headphones? That stuff matters, but you don’t have to go crazy with it. You could producing video today.[Alec] No kidding, with your phone, but I wanna hit one thing and then I want you to go, ’cause I know you have props and I wanna see the props, I’m big on props. But one of the things you said that I want everyone to hear again is the power of having a coach, because no matter what I say or Bill says on this podcast, you’re hearing it, and you’re like, “Absolutely, I know the truth. I know I have to be doing it, I know I need to be doing it”; and yet we still don’t do it, we still don’t execute, we have a thousand excuses, and this is where the coach comes in to hit you on the head with love and hold you accountable and give you encouragement. If you’re struggling and you’re not able to push through this, hire a coach. If you think this is this important that you are missing out on the digital gold rush, the chance to get in front of humans at scale, if you realize you’re missing this, just call Bill. Find a coach and be like, “Okay, I’m ready, help me.” Because I do think we need help. I do think that if all of a sudden you can’t just be like, “I heard this and now I’m in, I’m starting a podcast”, or whatever. So I just wanted to hit that note, Bill, sorry.[Bill] I appreciate it.[Alec] ‘Cause it’s true.[Bill] So, let me make a comment about coaching, I appreciate you calling that out. And what you need to hear from me is I’ve actually not taken any new clients on. I’m really not, with rare exceptions. If it’s somebody who’s interesting to me that has an interesting story, they’re at an interesting place, they really wanna build something, I’ll have a conversation with that person because that’s fun for me, right? That doesn’t jack with my time block right now, but I’ve got a very small group of primarily senior executives and executives and very, very high producers. And that’s fun for me cause I’ve done this for 17 years, but by all means, reach out and I’ll refer you into my company. We’ve got a lot of great coaches and there’s a ton of great companies. You just need somebody to come alongside you, but what I was gonna say about coaching, Alec, is Coach Tom Landry at the Dallas Cowboys, very famous coach, probably up there with the John Woodens of the world, famously said years ago, a coach is someone who helps you to see what you don’t wanna see, that helps you to become who you’ve always known that you could be. That’s really what effective coaching is in my mind. In my opinion, you don’t need somebody to coach you on their system. I just don’t think that’s necessarily the thing to do. My conviction is, my experience is a coach should come alongside you and help you gain clarity on what you want. Like where do you wanna end up? What does that look like? Give me that dream house. Let’s figure out how to build it. Then come alongside them and help them to do that through ideation and accountability. But I just feel like when coaching is so formulaic, it’s like, “Oh right, I’m gonna learn the whatever[Bill]method.” Cool, if that’s what you need. But my experience is most people don’t. That’s just a little too prescriptive in my mind.[Alec] Thank you for sharing that. Good insight, great insight. Alright, so let’s break down some of the props you got. What’d you bring? What’d you bring to the loft today?[Bill] Well, okay. So, let’s talk first of all, about the camera. Now, that video that you saw was probably on a, what did they call, flip camera; do you remember the flip camera?[Alec] Yes, absolutely.[Bill] So the flip camera was a, it looks like a ring doorbell. If you go outside and you look at the first generation ring doorbell, that’s what a flip camera looked like and it had a USB, remember a little 90 degree USB, and you’d plug it into your computer. That’s probably what that video was shot on, so that’s what it started on. Then, all my stuff was iPhone after that and it still is except for a brief window, where I talked about in that video you showed where I was using a DSLR and the beauty of the DSLR, a digital single lens reflex bad[Bill]ass camera, Pentax, Nikon camera; is you’ll get that soft background with the depth of field and it’s like, oh, that looks like film, man, that looks really good. But here’s the problem with it. The problem with it is by the time I get everything fired up with that camera, I’ve committed too much time. So, the iPhone to me, absolutely, or the Android, if any of you actually have Androids, I don’t know what that’s about, but whatever.[Alec] I always tease it and they get really mad, so be careful.[Bill] Well, it’s the vast majority of the market share is why, so, but iPhones are like, dude, they’re simple, they’re intuitive. You remember the old ads slogan, they used to have an Apple, it was like, it just works.[Alec] Yeah.[Bill] It does. So that’s what I use. I use the forward facing camera for obvious reasons. The camera’s facing me so I can see myself in the frame.[Alec] It’s not obvious, I have people asking so break down why you have the camera facing you so you can see it.[Bill] Great point, so that’s on the 11 plus, those are the rear[Bill]facing cameras and they’re fantastic. That’s the whole reason that I have this camera is it’s killer for that kinda stuff. But when I’m shooting myself, I use the forward facing camera because now I can see myself. If I reverse it like that, if you can see that, now I can see myself. Now, one of the little known things that it just drives me insane, you guys, know where your flippin’ cameras is. On this phone, the camera is here. So there’s nothing worse, Alec, than the person saying, “Hey, let’s grab a selfie!” and that person is looking over here like. It’s like, hang on, the camera’s over here. So know where your camera is. Why is that important? On video, right now I could be looking at you. If I looked at you on my screen, I’d be looking right there. Does that not look like I’m not making eye contact with you? I’m not making eye contact with you. So what you’ve learned to do, what I’ve learned to do is I’m looking at the camera. So in that way, Alec, when you see it, it feels like I’m making eye contact with you. I think that’s really important.[Alec] That’s a wonderful[Bill][Bill] Yeah, that’s what I would say about the camera. The other thing is I recorded the video once, called “Audio and video matters.” Now, think about it, you guys. I do this with golf instruction videos all the time. So I’m an avid golfer, improving, enjoying the process. I’m voracious in terms of going to YouTube to find tips to improve. So every once in a while, I’ll bring up a guy and they’re typically in England or Ireland and he’ll be 14 feet away from the camera, steam coming out of his mouth ’cause it’s England or Ireland, it’s cold. And he’ll be saying, “So, what I want you to do is I want you to grab the club and I want you to hold it like this.” And I could barely hear this guy. And then I’d bail away from the video because the audio is so bad.[Alec] Of course.[Bill] Your audio with that mic, which I think is new for you, is ridiculous. You sound like a disc jockey and could make money doing voiceovers right now.[Alec] Yeah .[Bill] So, if you don’t wanna spend that kind of money, here’s what I’m gonna ask you to do. I’m gonna send this to you ’cause I don’t have the name of it in front of me. It’s a Shure, S[Bill]H[Bill]U[Bill]R[Bill]E. And this mic on Amazon is under $200 and here’s the beauty of it. So here’s what you need to see. There’s the mic, little condenser mic, really bad ass microphone. This little wind guard is designed to protect from the the wind noise when you go outside. Here’s the beauty of it. You plug it into the end of your iPhone, now check this out. It angles, whoops, when it doesn’t fall out. It angles 90 degrees so that that microphone now when I’m recording is pointing right at me. I don’t know if you can see that, but it’s pointing right at my mouth. I use this for all of my videos and the “Get off my lawn”, this is the mic and I was probably six feet from it. This thing was on a tripod attached to a ladder. That’s the way I shot that video in my front yard. By the way, we’re gonna show that one later But I want people to understand the mic matters. Now, if you don’t wanna spend 200 bucks,[Alec] No, no, hold on.[Bill] If you’re known, you’ve got one of these dangly white headsets.[Alec] Right here, guys.[Bill] Here’s the beauty of this. When you use this, Alec, that’s the microphone right there. And when you’ve got that in your ear, your microphone now is right where you want it to be.[Alec] Yep.[Bill] So it’s actually really good. If you have nothing else, at least do that, it may not be the prettiest presentation. And the last thing I’m gonna share is the tripod that Dave Savage referred me to a year ago. And invariably, when I get a referral from Dave, it’s always something good, whether it’s person, equipment or a website, it’s like, “Oh yes, I need that.” So this thing, and I’ll send you both these links. So is that okay? Can you post them somewhere so people can find these later?[Alec] Yup, absolutely. Yup, can you hear me?[Bill] Can you do that? Why can I not hear you?[Alec] I can hear you.[Bill] You can’t hear me?[Alec] No, I can hear you.[Bill] You can hear me?[Alec] Yes, absolutely.[Bill] But I can’t hear you.[Alec] So, I think Bill’s… Mikey, throw the link up back in for the Shure portable iOS microphone. I wondered why he wasn’t hearing me.[Alec] This guy right here knows what he’s talking about. And so this is the mic that you all should buy for your phone if you care about having good audio. And I’m telling you, Bill’s dead[Bill]on. Having reliable, good audio in this medium is absolutely crucial because if you don’t have it, your audience can’t hear you.[Bill] How about now?[Alec] Yeah, you’re loud and clear with me.[Bill] Sweet. So I don’t know what just happened.[Alec] This is the name of the microphone right here on the screen for everybody that we plugged in.[Bill] MV88, yup. Yup, this one I don’t know the name of, but maybe you could find it. So this is just the easiest tripod in the world and it becomes a selfie stick. No, I don’t use that very often, but every once in a while, if you stabilize it against your hip, it’s actually a great way to shoot if you’re outside or something, a brilliant tool. And at the bottom, obviously it opens up and it’s got a button here in the front that’s Bluetooth that allows you to, this is a very minor thing, but it’s gonna help you later in terms of editing. You can start and stop through the handle the video. So you don’t have that weird… hey, I just wanted to tell you that thing! You can eliminate those things in the beginning and the end. So those are my props.[Alec] Beautiful, and by the way, it’s so simple guys. And I’m trying to give you a little bit of grace here. You don’t have to have the $300 Shure mic. You can have your iPhone and your headset[Bill] Totally.[Alec] And a stupid selfie tripod that you can find on Amazon for however many bucks.[Bill] Totally.[Alec] So I wanna show that video that you made with the ladder and the Shure mic and this is one of my favorite videos of all times, so let’s queue up Mikey. And let’s play “Get off my lawn.” And then I wanna understand from you where the inspiration is.[Bill] Hey. If you’re in the mortgage industry and you’re experiencing record months and personal bests, quit bragging about it. You haven’t done anything to deserve it. you just showed up. You don’t see me standing out here saying, “Hey, it’s a sunny day. I did that.” I didn’t do it, I just showed up. If you wanna brag about something, build something special right now. Build a better team, build purchase business, create your leads and track them convert at a higher rate. If you didn’t do anything, you’ve got nothing to brag about. Get off my lawn.[Alec] First of all, where did inspiration come for this? Where did it come from? Were you just watching the whole thing and just losing it?[Bill] Yes, yes. Because I get so much input every day, like all of us, and so much of my feed, my social feed is in the mortgage industry, I just keep seeing people saying, “Hey, record months, record months, record months! We’re amazing, this is incredible!” And I’m like, “Okay, you have to stop. This is not you. You happen to be in the business, good for you.” And I thought I’m gonna go grumpy old man on this. and then I thought I’m gonna channel my inner Clint Eastwood in “Gran Torino.” Now, he does it with a shotgun, if you remember. Actually an M1 carbine. But yeah, I just thought, why not? I have the gray hair, I’ve earned the right to do this and so I’m just gonna say what everybody else is thinking, and so here’s my point. Don’t miss this. If you’re in the mortgage industry, I am not saying to you don’t be excited and feel blessed by this opportunity. Be excited, feel blessed, but stop bragging about it, right? Brag about something when you build something special. Like I said, if you build a team, if you’ve got a diversity of lead sources, I had a guy show me his, he showed me online the other day, pulled it up on the screen on a Zoom call. He said, “Hey, here’s my pipe” and what he was excited about was the volume. What he didn’t realize was I’m looking at it and it’s a circle, it’s a pie chart and it’s 93% refi. What? What?! Dude, you’re gonna have a “Thelma and Louise” moment where you’re gonna go flying off the cliff going when the market shifts, because it’s like, wow, nobody’s counting. I don’t know what happened, what happened to the business? So that’s what I’m saying, use this opportunity. Dude, pay down debt. Pay down debt. Don’t spend money right now. That’s a really bad idea in my opinion. Wherever you are in this business right now, now is a wonderful time to get control of your finances, pay down debt, start saving some money, invest in things like this. Invest in video, go to Kyle Draper service where now I’m using it, you’re using it too. I think where all I do is I just literally record the video and for whatever it is, 400 bucks a month, they now produce my videos. They know how I edit them, they know how I create them, they create little graphics for me around the video messaging. So there’s “Get off my lawn” graphics now that go along with that video message, they upload it to YouTube. Invest in that, invest in mortgage coach. Now’s the time to say, I need to double down on my professionalism so that when this market shifts, I’m one of the survivors, because what we know for sure is right now, it’s like there was an earthquake in the San Fernando Valley this morning, for those of us in California. When there’s an earthquake offshore and a tsunami is gonna hit, the water gets sucked out from the beach, weirdest looking thing. Then the tsunami comes in. Folks, I’m here to tell you the water is getting sucked out of the beach and you need to be taking advantage of this opportunity right now. I’m not saying doom and gloom, but I am saying what I see with the people that I’ve coached over the years, they use opportunities like this to build teams, build infrastructures and build systems that will serve them longterm. So now you have a sustainable business. That’s the message.[Alec] And by the way, if anybody needs a reminder of the seriousness of what Bill’s talking about, you just have to have a little bit of memory and go back to 2018 when things were gonna be really bad.[Bill] Yeah.[Alec] I mean, people forget Q118. It was ending.[Bill] Totally.[Alec] Retail companies were selling, banks were shutting the retail arm down, major builders were selling their retail arm. I had mortgage companies in Southern California just closed. A bank just to be like, nah, we’re done with mortgage and just shut it down. Not sell it, just close. And the warning signs were everywhere. And margin compression was gnarly, there wasn’t enough volume, and everyone was realizing, holy crap, this is happening, and now we’re in this environment and people’s memories are so short. Do you remember you were almost out of business? Do you remember you had no volume? And you were going back to school or something? And now, Bill, I love the warning ’cause I think people aren’t paying attention ’cause we’re busy.[Bill] That’s exactly it. That’s the thing; is because I’m so busy I don’t have time to think about this thing. Which is why I recorded the video that aired yesterday called “The tale of two bike shops.” I don’t know if you saw that or not, but the message was wow, one bike shop near me went out of business last year pre[Bill]COVID because they didn’t, I don’t know the specifics, but obviously they didn’t capitalize on it. They weren’t there to capitalize on it. Another one I walked into is like, holy crap, these people are selling $5,000 bikes all day long,[Alec] Yeah, all day.[Bill] What’s the difference, right? What’s the difference? So if you’re in the mortgage business and I’m talking to you, like I’m talking to you right now, I’m not kidding. Get control of your finances, start saving some money, start paying down debt and take 5% of your week, every week, 5% of your week and invest in your infrastructure. Now’s the time to start tightening things up, looking at the systems and the tools and the structure that will serve you longterm when this market shifts, ’cause it’s going to shift at some point.[Alec] So I wanna do a micro pivot to another topic here because it’s in the same vein, but it’s super relevant. And it ties back into the overarching theme we’ve been having a discussion about, which is the power of video, digital connections, social media, putting yourself out there. And you have a video pinned to the top of your YouTube channel. And it’s a video that you produced about two years ago, maybe a little bit around two years ago, and it’s still making an impact. And I’d love for you to describe what just happened with it. It’s an older video and I want everyone to just take a pause, stop doing emails for two seconds. Just listen to the impact of this event from a two year old video and pay attention to what that could mean for you in a video you did two years ago that could be living on your YouTube site. So, what’s the background of the video, Bill?[Bill] So well teed up, great job. So, if you just Google, you don’t even have to do a YouTube search; just Google “Shoulder taps”, “Bill Hart shoulder taps.” So the shortest version of the story I can tell you is my wife, Toni and I are at California Pizza Kitchen, we’re sitting across from a woman who’s sitting there waiting for more people to show up. And eventually you can see her daughter and two grandkids show up. And it just hits me that, look, I’m not preaching, so I’m gonna talk about God here, but just whatever your belief system is, here’s what happened to me. On my mind, I’m starting to think, “You need to tell her how lovely she looks” and this woman’s probably 65, 70 years old. I don’t mention anything to Toni. Toni gets up, walks out, assuming I’m walking right behind her. And as I go by, I just kind of leaned down and I said, “Hey, if nobody’s told you today, you really look lovely today.” She tears up and she says, “That’s something my husband would have said. And he passed away a year ago.” I’m tearing up, she’s tearing up. She stands up, I hug her. That’s it, I walk out. Toni’s like, “What happened?”[Bill] You’re crying.[Bill] Right? I’m like, “I gotta tell you this story.” Anyway, so my wife, who is always amazing to me, she brings so much more to my life than I would bring on my own; she said, “You oughta share that story.” So, I share that story. Now I have shaved my head for a friend who’s going through cancer, so when you see the video, you’ll see me with a shaved head and a Rodan + Fields T[Bill]shirt. For those of you that know anything about Rodan + Fields, it’s a skincare company. My daughter does very well in that and I just happened to be wearing that T[Bill]shirt that day. But it’s got a lot of legs because of that. I have R+F people reaching out saying, “Love the T[Bill]shirt, nice work!” Well, here’s what I didn’t expect, you guys. You’ll see on YouTube it’s got, I don’t know, 23,000 views or something, which is a lot. What I didn’t know is I loaded it originally and organically on Facebook. And if you see it on Facebook, it has 20 million views. 20 million views. So every week, as a matter of fact, nearly every day, I get an email from somebody and sometimes it’s just a little innocuous, “Hey, loved the video, thank you.” But sometimes it’s like what happened yesterday, and this is the woman that’s the director of marketing for Travelzoo; talk about random. And she said, “Hey, we’re doing an event in California, looking for a keynote. What would you charge for a 45 minute talk? We just think that contract.” Like, what? That happened simply because I had a message, which we could argue is like, well, that probably isn’t the ideal business message. Agreed, but it’s one that’s just living out there, it resonates with a certain group of people, I think it shows my personality, I think there’s an approachability that comes through that. So I really wanna encourage you guys. A lot of people really struggle, Alec, with content and the idea of what am I gonna talk about? What’s valuable to people? And I so just wanna encourage you to just peel that layer away and just say, life. Life is what you talk about. Now I happen to, because I’ve been doing this for 10 years, I have this ability to marry stories with points that I wanna make in business. I’m a coach, that’s what I do. I use analogies and metaphors all the time. But you guys, go follow people like Denise Donoghue, the Mortgage Nerd. Go follow people like Dan Keller in Seattle, Keith Collins in Sacramento, Ryan Hills, just outside of Seattle. Start following people that are producing content that is not always talking about seller buy downs and interest rates and 203 Ks and it’s like sometimes they’re just having a conversation about, “Hey, I was just talking to somebody the other day who’s a little frustrated with their house right now ’cause they’ve been on lockdown for four months. And they’re actually thinking they’d like to have two home offices.” Interesting conversation to have. You guys, talk about life. Talk about the things that occur to you. Had a friend of mine just post Joe Wilson the other day on LinkedIn. I don’t know if you saw this go by, Alec, it’s a good one. But he said his, I think it was four year old or two year old just came bouncing in in the middle of a video. It’s like if right now, you had a little one just come bounce in on your lap and he said, “I don’t know, there was a time where I probably would have, or my dad would have been frustrated by that and push him out of the shot. And maybe it’s time to embrace that and just bounce him on your knee and know that that’s reality right now, and it’s everybody’s reality.” People would understand that. So share about life would be my message. That’s my “Shoulder taps” message.[Alec] By the way, it’s probably the best message we could end on because when you talk about content, if people get fired up, if they realize what you’re saying is right, Bill, and they’re ready to get out there; the more that they hear you and realize humanity has a part in marketing because it’s not about marketing anymore, it’s about human connection.[Bill] Totally, man.[Alec] And so the fact that this is a great example of a piece of content Bill did ’cause he felt his humanity get drawn out, his spirituality get drawn out. He put it out into the world and now, two years later still, there’s ramifications coming down, there’s ROI on it. And I know for a fact, Bill, you never made that piece to get ROI. Your ROI was not even[Bill][Bill] No way.[Alec] You just said “I gotta put this out because it matters to me right now, and it could matter to somebody else.”[Bill] Exactly.[Alec] And all of a sudden that humanity touches other humans. We’re all humans![Bill] That’s it![Alec] Willing to work with you! Humans are gonna take your consultative service. They’re going to use you. We’re all humans. And so you have humanity with the marketing and then you realize that it’s not about marketing anymore. It’s about human connection, and Bill, you’re a master at this which is why I wanted to have you up here just sharing your viewpoint, sharing those videos. Because even on the “Get off my lawn” video, you can see that you’re doing it with love. It’s a funny video and you’re aggressive in it. Like you’re like “Get off my lawn”, but no[Bill]one would ever see that and be like, “Oh, Bill’s aggressive.” No, they’d feel like Bill is leaning in to teach me something here.[Bill] Cool.[Alec] And that’s[Bill][Bill] Mission accomplished, yup.[Alec] So Bill,[Bill] Yup?[Alec] we’re at the 45 minute Mark. I always kinda liked to round down with this comp, to hear your thoughts on this question. If you have sitting in front of you, which I’m sure you often do, a brand new originator to the business and next to them is a 30[Bill]year veteran of the business, very established, pipelines full; and they’re both local pros sitting down in front of you and they’re here to get a message or a consultation or advice. What do you give them in the minute, two minutes you got with them to send them out? What are you saying to them today in this timing, in this moment?[Bill] Wow. I would probably have two messages right now, and that would be get in front of your business. Get in front of your business. To your point, if you’re just busy all the time, it’s like can you picture the cash booths that they use on game shows with a clear Lucite phone booth with a fan on the bottom and there’s just cash and it’s like, how much money can I grab? So get in front of your business. And I think, most importantly, and I don’t think this is talked about enough, build your database and feed and water it like a book of business. If you’re relying on web[Bill]based leads and some other relationship and MSA, a group of realtors, then you’re always at the mercy of somebody else. Build your database. The people that I know that have been in this business a long time and do really well, have five, six, 8,000 people in their database. If you’re a loan originator right now and you killed it last month and you have 275 people in your database, you’re visiting the mortgage industry. You’re not in the business.[Alec] There it is, guys and gals. There’s the advice. There’s the nugget at the end. Bill, first of all, my last pitch for you, guys, just go follow Bill on social media. One of my favorite things to tell people when they’re like, what should I do? I’m like first go follow a bunch of people who you think are doing cool shit. And all of a sudden you’ll be like, you’ll learn through osmosis, you’ll get inspired.[Bill] Totally.[Alec] So go follow Bill, go hang out with what he’s doing. Bill, thank you for hanging out and spending time with me today, dude.[Bill] My pleasure, brother.[Alec] I really appreciate what you’re doing for our industry, man.[Bill] Thanks, man. Appreciate it, Alec, love what you’re doing. Keep doing it, you are an example to other executives in this industry right now of how to be relevant and interesting, so keep doing what you’re doing. I’m watching every day.[Alec] I appreciate you, Bill. All right, Modern Lending podcasters, thank you, guys, for hanging out with us today. If this brought you value, like, subscribe, share, and if you’re watching this in the future, please hit me up with a #bypassed. It lets me know you’re watching this later in your life. . Have a wonderful day, everybody. I’ll see you guys on the internet.