We Close Notes is a real estate investment firm that grows from the power of social media. Investors today need to keep in mind that the marketplace will be moving towards social media. This is one of the lessons that were imparted to everyone in at the Podfest Multimedia Expo 2018. Promoting products and services is also marketing and if you’re not doing that, then you are going to be left behind by everyone else. Podfest Multimedia Expo 2018 also focused on what’s new for Facebook Live and YouTube. This event was the perfect place for people who want to start their podcast or for those who want to expand their podcasting community.
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Podfest Multimedia Expo 2018: Seven Lessons Learned
We headed down to the 4th Annual Podfest Multimedia Expo and had a really good time down there catching up with some new friends. It was a really, really good event to attend. First and foremost, whenever I go to an event, I always want to go somewhere that I’m going to learn something. I’m going to expand my business. Don’t get me wrong, I love going to events. It’s nice to go and catch up with people. It’s nice to see new faces, see old faces, because we do so much marketing and online, we have a good following. It’s always nice to catch up with old friends, but it’s always nice to expand your network too and find out what we’re doing well at and what we’re not doing well at too.
We had two events to choose from. We can either go to a Distressed Mortgage Expo taking place in New Jersey that Marc Gold and our friends are putting on. Hanging out with probably 200 friends and family, considering that probably three-fourths of them are already students or vendors of ours. Go to an event that we’ve never been to before. It’s not real estate focused, but it is business focused on where we see the business is going for us. I think we’ve made the right choice by going to Orlando. A lot more people look like they showed up, but we were pleasantly surprised to see over 350 plus people at the Podfest Expo. 300 plus people in a room on a Thursday night, which was the pre-event, was really nice. A lot of great networking. We’ve made a lot of new friends, a lot of new faces, and really look forward to seeing a lot of people going by.
Whenever I go to an event, I always try to expand my business in one form or fashion. I’d say that Chris, the gentleman that put on Podfest, did such a tremendous job with the event. Definitely a labor of love. His wife and the partners did a really great job with it, first and foremost. Well run, right on time for the most part, some longer days, but I see what they were going with a lot of the great aspects of things. It really, really helped us in our business. For those of you who known me and follow me for our real estate stuff, this event is going to help us with several things going forward.
Podfest Multimedia Expo 2018: We’re all in the media aspect of things especially in today’s economy and today’s society where social media is so much easier to have access to.
I thought I’d make a quick little list and go through some of the most positive things that we took from going to Podfest. For those of you guys that are like, “Why am I going to watch this? I don’t run a podcast.” You do, or you don’t. You probably listened to podcasts and realize that about 50%people listen to around six podcasts throughout the week. I think that’s on a lower scale. I don’t listen to too many podcasts. I listen to a few here and there, but we don’t sit there and spend time listening to everything because we’re constantly working on a variety of things. There are things to keep in mind. First and foremost, I’m a big believer that we’re all in the media aspect of things, especially in today’s economy and today’s society where social media is so much easier to have access to. That’s one thing I’ve always kept in mind. We run basically WCN Media. It’s the way to look at it with all of the things that we do, all the webinars, all the videos, and the trainings that we do. We’re more of a media company than anything else.
Yes, we’re a real estate investment firm first and foremost. That’s where we make our bread and butter, but we also have that media aspect and we treat it that way. I think a lot of people don’t. I think you need to keep that in mind that in today’s market, in today’s economy, if you’re not promoting and you’re not marketing, you’re behind the eight ball. In choosing not to, you’re going to get passed over very, very quickly and very rapidly by others. That was our biggest thing going into Podfest. I didn’t really know what to expect. I haven’t been to one before. First time that Steph and I have attended something like this. I found it rewarding stuff. Steph really got a lot of stuff out of it as well too. We’re on some very long days, but we got some really great things.
The one thing I was surprised of more than anything else is how overwhelmingly friendly Podfest was. I absolutely was blown away by how friendly everybody was. I’ve always thought that the Note Community is really friendly, which it is. The Podcast Community might even be friendlier in a variety of ways. One, we had so many people doing so many different things. There are people doing podcasts from real estate, to legal, to travel, to history, to comedy, living with herpes, some motivational people, how to do podcasts. One guy has a podcast just talking to Amazon’s Alexa. There’s a variety of ways. It’s just amazing and I’m blown away by the amount of different types of podcasts. Typical event, about half of people were doing something and about a half people who are looking to get into podcasts. I was talking to people, I was asking, “Do you have a podcast?” They said, “I want to. I want to have one, or I’m getting ready to have one.” I ask them, “How long have you been working on that?” “I’ve been working on it for a while.” If you haven’t started one, because it’s relatively easy to start a podcast, we found that out a variety of ways.
It’s actually relatively easy to start a podcast. Especially what we do, we had it very relatively easy. We’re very blessed, I believe, is one my points. We’ve got somebody with Feed Your Brand and Tom and Tracy Hazzard to do some really great stuff for our podcast. All we’ve got to do is literally get it and throw it out there. There’s a lot of people in the community. They’re doing a lot of that themselves. That’s probably why they’re struggling more so than anything else. One of the big things that we found out for the most part is those podcasts that are doing at least two or more episodes per week are having a lot more success than those doing it once a month or once a week. That was something that we feel pretty blessed, the fact that we do these regularly. We rarely do have less than two a week. Usually, we have more than two a week. We’re pretty excited about that.
The event was also a split between podcasts and they also have a YouTube track. People use YouTube for their media or to share their video podcast. That was a really valuable workshop that I went to. I really, really enjoyed that. I got some great pointers that we’ll be using in our business and in our marketing to help promote our episodes across the board. I got the chance to meet with Roberto Blake. He’s a guy that does a lot of stuff on YouTube. If you’re doing any type of video, check him out. He’s on marketing, what he shared and has become a YouTube sensation. I look forward to spend some more time with him. The real estate, like I said before, I’m pretty surprised that there are not more real estate investors or real estate shows there. There was a chunk of realtors. There were a few investors. They had a specific real estate breakout. There’s only about twenty people there. The three presenters were Tyler Sheff, who runs the Cash Flow Guys, very humble, the real deal. Rod Khleif does a motivational and a multi-family podcasts. Rod’s got the biggest out of anybody in that room. He had a couple of million viewers, a million downloads, which is great. They’ve been doing it for quite a few years. We were pleasantly surprised that we were ahead of most people in that room with our views, our downloads, our likes, and our audience. The fact that we’ve actually been sponsored, that we got a couple of sponsors, is an underlying request that a lot of people do.
I want to do this, but how do I get sponsors? That was the big thing that I think we were very pleasantly surprised is that if you’re putting out content, if you’re giving information without the intention of trying to monetize every little thing, you’re going to have a lot faster success versus somebody who’s like, “I’m going to start something, but I want to be sponsored from the get go.” It doesn’t work that way with podcasts. You have a lot of people out there doing shows that are just out into the abyss and waiting to see people respond back. Pleasantly surprised that we’ve got a pretty good audience. I want to thank all of you again for listening or watching. We’re a part of our extended Note family, but we were pleasantly surprised that we are pretty far out, just really good things. Marketing; Stefanie LaHart from Boomtown Marketing in LA did great presentation on some marketing. We took some great pointers from her presentation. There are some subtle tweaks that we’re going to be. We already made a few changes and some stuff going back, fixing some new thing, a few things that we’ve done before, pretty easy things to adjust. She did a tremendous job of handling the marketing for the event. This lady was all over the place and just did a fantastic job. We look forward to talking to her about some things and possibly have her on Social Media Day.
We found that a lot of people were scared of using Facebook Lives to promote their podcast. That was a good breakout. Christy Haussler from Key West did a really good breakout session on Facebook Live. If you’re looking to start something, start honing your skill doing Facebook Lives. You’ll get a lot better. I know that we have gotten better over time with everyone that we’ve done, especially leading up to the launch of The Note Closers Show Podcast. I was surprised that Christy did a 30-day Facebook Live thing and is going to be started back up. I would figure somebody who was speaking on it would’ve probably been doing it consistently and just made it a part of their business going forward, but she did a great job. She provides some really great tools that we’ll be using in our business to help us co-launch or co-stream across the board.
Number one, great community. Two, its flip of using YouTube was a big one. Three, real estate track, us being in the right track there. Four, monetization. Five, marketing. Six, using Facebook Live. Seven is that we just need to stick to what we’re doing. Don’t get me wrong, we can always learn from other people. We always learn what people are doing good or what people are doing bad at. I think we’re on the right track with things. Steph and I had a conversation about that. I really believe we’re on the right track with this. We look forward to this being a great way to connect with our audience on an almost daily basis. We love to hear from you. If you enjoy what you’re listening to, please let us know. If there are things you’d like for us to target, please let us know. If there are things that we suck at, please let us know so we can fix it. We are really excited about the path of where this podcast is going. The tremendous email blasts that we’re getting from people, keep it up, and enjoy being able connect with everybody on a daily basis. It really keeps us rock and rolling. It gives us a great feedback to go on.
Podfest Multimedia Expo 2018: We always learn what people are doing good or what people are doing bad at.
I can remember watching Gary Vaynerchuk when he had the Gary Vee show. He was begging for people to comment and share back questions and answer stuff like that and how much media has changed since he really was doing that stuff. We feel very blessed that we do have a great community of people who are on Facebook, putting on our real estate circle who do a really great job. I honestly don’t think it’s a long work in process. Honestly, there are some things that you have to put in place with the music and things, but you have to look at one of the things that we have to look at. I look at this on a daily basis. What am I spending my time on because I want this to be the most effective use of my time. We only have 24 hours in a day for the most part. A lot of times we have less than when you have families and other obligations, but you have to look at what’s to be your most effective use of time. Getting the word out to your database, and that’s why the podcast was an easy transition for us since we’ve already been doing Facebook Lives for so long. Keep that in mind.
One of the biggest things that we learned is that you got to spend some time with your stuff after you film it. Spend a little bit of time working on things to make sure giving some quality and editing into your stuff really goes a long way in the long-term success. I have to give a shout-out to Tom Hazzard, it was great hanging out with the guy that produces our podcast for a couple of days and get a chance to know him a little bit better and gave me a chance to pick his brain on some things and same sessions and having the same points. It’s a point that’s something good. It’s good to be like-minded like that. I learned a couple of things as other people were doing with their podcasts or to promote their business. I’m like, “That’s genius”, and wrote it down. You’ll see some cool things coming in and taking place here for the most part. That will really help us knock things out of the park going forward on some things. If you aren’t listening to us on iTunes or Stitcher and you’re just watching us on Facebook Live, you definitely want to go out and check out and subscribe to the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher because there’s things we’ll be doing on the podcasts that you won’t see on Facebook Live. Some things that we’ll be doing to those episode, make sure and see who’s all listening. I get some text messages and voice messages from people that were in New Jersey for this expo, because it was a decent event.
It was nice to really meet some new connections and useful pointers on some things. Got to hang with William Hung from American Idol, was there as well. He’s got a podcast and he’s working through. One of the interesting guy, I think he realizes infamy, where his fifteen minutes of glory are at, but he’s doing a great job of expanding and going from there and doing some other things as well with his stuff. It was interesting going around and talking to a lot of the vendors that were there. There were several podcasts hosts. There are some people that were there to help you get interviewed. For those of you that are serious out there that have been interviewed by their podcasts, that’s a great way to help you expand your knowledge, expand your circle of influence for those that are actually doing deals on a regular basis. I know myself, I know Dan, Aaron Young, quite a few of us who have appeared on other people’s podcasts and we enjoyed that. It’s an easy thing to expand your audience and your market reach by talking with other people that have other audiences. That’s one thing that we’re going to be seeing a little bit more of here. They get it on a few more shows with other people.
As always, we took a bunch of business cards. As always, we connected with a lot of people on social media, people that are rock and rolling and excited at some of the points, back and forth of the comments from people. We met a couple of fans. It actually was nice to sit around tables, people that are like, “I listen to your podcast.” Which was pretty cool, considering especially that they weren’t really necessarily real estate investors, which I found interesting. People say, “I’ve heard your show. It’s a great show.” I will tell you that the PopSockets that we had out there was one of the big hits. A couple of big marketers that were there were like, “That might be the coolest marketing piece I’ve seen,” which is pretty nice. We have Will Mencarow from Paper Source joining us, which will be really good. We have Maureen McCann join us as well. We’ll be talking about the ten things that I love about notes . I got a little surprise I am not going to tease you guys too much, but we got some really cool stuff that we’ll be talking about. I think you guys will be very pleasantly surprised and some things like that. As always, we have a couple of events coming up that you may want to take a look at. We have Note CAMP 5.0 taking place in less than 60 days. Pricing for that goes up to $197 from the $149.
NoteCamp.Live is where you’ll get tickets. We’re stoked about the 30 plus speakers that are going to be part of that. We’ve got a good chunk of new speakers this time around compared to last time, but really, really excited about Note CAMP Live. As always, we have our next virtual workshop taking place March 9th through 11th. That’s just under 30 days out as well. That is going to be a big, big thing. We’re going to do a special for those that are listening and watching. If you sign up on for the virtual workshop, we’ll throw in Note CAMP as well. You get a two for one. You plus two events can be a reason of knowledge out there for you. We have our usual Note Night in America. If you’re listening on iTunes, Stitcher, you’ll be able to catch those as a special episode on iTunes. For those who are watching, we have been doing the Note Night in America as special episodes on our podcast as well. You can catch up under the NNA’s. We’ll be discussing the 50 Reasons, 50 Shades of Freedom and what you need to be doing to find that type of freedom out there as well. Join us, that’ll be a lot of fun.
Podfest Multimedia Expo 2018: If you’re thinking about doing a podcast or launching a podcast, do it now. Don’t wait, go do it now. Go film it.
If you’re thinking about doing a podcast or launching a podcast, do it now. I think that’s the most obvious thing that we heard from people is don’t wait, go do it now. Go film it. Start doing it because you’re only going to get better at what you’re doing by doing more episodes and crafting your content, crafting your expertise, and launching it. Honestly, I know many people aren’t, but that was the biggest thing. You have a lot of people like, “I want to, I want to.” Then do it, go film it, get it out there and do it. Don’t overthink it, keep it simple, and you’ll be a lot happier in the long run because you did start. That’s one thing I look at it now. I wish we’d started six months earlier or nine months earlier. We’ve done a great job. I think we can do a lot better, and we plan on doing a lot better in the long run.
That’s about all I have for our episode, hopefully you find it valuable. If you’re heading to the Podfest, they have it next year, I don’t know exactly where it’s going to be, probably back in Orlando I think, but it’s well worth going to quite an event. We look forward to that event. One thing that’s positive as well too is we met quite a few people from here in the Central Texas region, also San Antonio, some great guys, great gals, and we look forward to networking with them and helping each other up as we grow our podcast. This episode is based on what can we learn, what can we do better? Definitely a lot of tweaks to what we’re currently doing, but we’re pretty excited. These tweaks will add much more value and a quality to our content, because I don’t think we’re a cup runneth over with content according to everybody, which is great. A lot of people struggle for content that we do not. Have a great day. Go out and make something happen. We look forward to seeing you all at the top.
Important Links
- Podfest Multimedia Expo
- Marc Gold
- Chris
- WCN Media
- Feed Your Brand
- Roberto Blake
- Cash Flow Guys
- Rod Khleif
- Boomtown Marketing
- Christy Haussler
- Gary Vaynerchuk
- Gary Vee show
- Tom Hazzard
- Will Mencarow
- Maureen McCann
- Note CAMP 5.0
- NoteCamp.Live
- Note Night in America