Interview with Dave Conklin – Founder of GetMyHomesValue.com

By: Michael Dunlop     Topics: Blog

Interview with Dave Conklin – an very successful Young Entrepreneur from the Real Estate Industry. Lots of great tips and advice here. One of our most impressive Young Entrepreneur interviews for a while I think.First off – can we have a little background information on you – Where you live? How old you are? What motivates you? What inspires you?

I live in Lancaster County Pennsylvania, I’m 29 years old.  I’m motivated by watching my four children (two sets of twins – 12 and 3) grow and become valuable members of society.  My inspiration comes from my spiritual journey.  I believe that we are all here for a purpose, have expectations from a higher power, and that we’re supposed to live in the way that Christ did.  While I certainly screw up all the time, I try to never judge anyone because my inspiration is to be more like him.
1) Dave, You are chief Internet marketer and technology architect (and a co-founder) for the GetMyHomesValue.com website – tell us about the site and how it came to get started?

You know, that’s actually a really crazy story.  The whole website came together completely by accident.  I was working in the real estate business with my future partner Rory Wilfong and we got a phone call from someone who offered to sell us leads.  It was going to be extremely expensive, so we decided that I would create a lead generating website and we would see what we could do with the leads.  We launched the site and it started generating inquiries from all over the country.  In theory, this sounds great, but we didn’t have real estate licenses anywhere outside of Pennsylvania.  We realized these real estate leads were extremely valuable to people, so we got together with Steve Young, the person that we ran all of our mortgages through, to figure out what to do.  So over the years we ended up generating all kinds of
leads and having thousands and thousands of customers nationwide.

 

2) I understand that your business model is to generate real estate leads for real estate agents – and the agents pay you a monthly subscription fee to introduce them to people who want to buy or sell. Currently the media tells us that property values are going down across large parts of the USA. What is your opinion on this and how has it affected your business? What are you doing different to stay ahead of the game?

We have actually created an entire suite of services for real estate agents.  This has helped us to stay ahead of the game because when a real estate agent subscribes to our service, they not only get real estate leads, but they also get a website, a CRM tool, and a full-blown educational center where they can learn about the Internet consumer and how to best turn the people we introduce them to into dollars and cents to go in their pocket.

There’s no doubt that the real estate market has definitely seen a rough patch.  The one thing that we keep in mind though is that there are still many markets that are increasing in value.  So, I would say that the one thing that we’ve definitely done is moved out of the markets that experienced a severe downgrade in home values and increased our marketing in areas where the housing market is still superb.
3) How do you go about recruiting clients (agents) for your leads? (Face to face selling? Telephone? Online Advertising?)

We use a lot of online advertising as well as telephone to recruit real estate agents.  We have a call center of approximately 30 people.  They spend their time calling real estate agents in markets that are pretty hot for us, telling them about the service.  In addition, we have a lot of marketing that goes out over the Internet and encourages agents to sign up for more information via a phone vall.  A large percentage of these people actually turn into customers.
4) What makes GetMyHomesValue.com better than the many other online lead generation services for Real Estate Agents out there?

I think there’s a few things… the most important being our Verilink service.  When a lead comes in to GetMyHomesValue.com, its information is scrubbed by an automated API. The leads that actually come to us and have a thumbs up from the API receive an almost instantaneous phone call from our verifiers explaining how the service works and how they can get their free home value.  If the customer then decides that they would like to speak with a real estate agent, we actually do a three way call and connect them right there on the fly.

There are many companies that have the ability to integrate such a high-tech solution.  We’ve seen our customer retention numbers go through the roof since we’ve implemented Verilink.  We feel that it’s a win-win for the people who want their home value, and for the real estate agents.
5) To date – what has been some of your biggest challenges in business and how have you overcome them?

I think finding great people is one of the most difficult things to do.  Our mission statement is “Be Remarkable.”  If you’ve read any of Seth Godin’s books, you hear about what it really means to be remarkable.  It’s going above and beyond the expectations you have for yourself and from others.  It’s doing things that you totally wouldn’t be expected to do for someone else.  It’s stopping when you see some elderly woman mowing her lawn in the hot sun and helping her out. You know, unfortunately, we have really come to a time when there aren’t a large percentage of truly remarkable people in this world.  However, I will say this: those who understand “remarkability” and truly make it a part of their lives are amazing people.  Those are the people that I choose to surround myself with and want involved in my companies.

The other thing I think is managing our online reputation.  For example, we have had tens of thousands of customers over the years.  Let’s say for a moment that we had a 99% satisfaction ratio from our clients.  This means that if you made 99% of 20,000 people happy, you still have 200 unhappy people out there.  I am pretty happy with a 99% customer satisfaction ratio, and I think others would be as well.  But that 1% that we weren’t able to satisfy for one reason or another are the ones who will go online and openly talk about you.  So that has certainly been a struggle for us as well… trying to take care of the few people that are out there who are “unsatisfiable”… if that’s even a word.
6) Dave, At the bottom of one of the emails we exchanged – it says: “If you don’t risk anything… you risk even more” I really thought this was spot on advice – can you explain your own philosophy on risk?

Yeah… this is something that I definitely live by.  When I started this company I had absolutely nothing.  And I mean nothing.  We had no investment capital from anyone else and I was making a move to leave real estate and develop this whole new entity.  My wife was certainly a bit shaky about the whole idea.  I’ve always been in sales or marketing and typically had a commission based income, so it didn’t really bother me that much.  But the bottom line was this… if nothing changes, nothing changes.  In other words, if you wake up every day and never ever try to do anything different then you need to expect that you’re going to wake up the same exact way, to the same exact circumstances every single day.

I drive through the city I live in and see the people there.  While I’m sure some of them have had a rough start to their lives… many of them don’t even realize that if they would just step out of the box they trap themselves in everyday and take a risk, something absolutely amazing could happen to them.  The more risks you take, the luckier you end up being.

7)  I heard that GetMyHomesValue.com and your business had been selected as one of the top 500 fastest growing companies in the country by Inc Magazine. How did this come about? Any tips for getting recognised by magazines like Inc?

Yeah, we’re pretty excited about this.  Well, this particular magazine is strictly based off of gross revenues.  They look at your growth in gross revenue over the course of four years, and the highest percentage are marked first and then it goes through 500.  There is also an ancillary list of another 4500.  For 2008, we are actually the 16th fastest-growing real estate company in the country.  I believe we made number 368 on the regular list.  Being recognized by other magazines is certainly something that’s possible for any company.  Really, it’s all about being aggressive.  We’ve been mentioned in Business Week, Inc., and other magazines as well.  And it’s really all about being extremely aggressive… did I already say that?.  I recommend that you get a list of the upcoming themes that the magazine will be focused on.  Then, some press releases that have that spin to it.  Send gifts, e-mails, and make phone calls to the editors.  If nobody knows you exist, nobody knows you exist… so make it happen.

8) I have also been looking at www.rorysteveanddave.com – Real Estate Coaching from Rory, Steve and Dave. Looks an interesting concept. Can you explain what you offer and the way you think that will progress in the future?

You know, we’re constantly meeting real estate agents who have absolutely no idea how to sell real estate.  These people think that they’re going to make a lot of money, drive a beautiful car, and not have to work hard for it.  I have seen so many agents go, “if I just sell one listing a month!”.  Here’s the problem: most of those people can’t even sell one listing a month.  Not only that, but they’re only setting their sights on one listing a month, therefore it’s likely that they’re going to earn much less than what they anticipated.

RorySteveandDave.com has been a way for us to really get out there and tell our side of the story in real estate.  Rory alone was able to make in excess of $350,000 a year in real estate commissions… his approach works, but it’s aggressive.  A lot of people aren’t comfortable being aggressive, and to those people I recommend not being in real estate.

There’s also going to be a book series coming out called “Lazy, Scared and Stupid”.  The concept of the book series is going to be that if you’re failing in any area of your life, it’s because you are either lazy, scared, or stupid.  Lazy meaning that you just don’t want to get up and make it happen.  Scared meaning that something is holding you back… and it’s fear related.  Stupid, simply means that you’re uneducated in the area and you need to be more educated.  This blog is going to be used as the kickoff for that book.

9) Is there anyone that you look up to and model yourself on? (You can name more than one)

Yeah, there are definitely a few people.  One would be my mother.  I don’t think she has a selfish bone in her body.  And any time she comes off as being selfish, it’s always related to spending more time with you or being more involved in your life.  She would literally do anything for me or my family.  She’s the kind of mom that you can call at 2 a.m. and say “Hey mom, want to go get a cup of coffee with me?”  She would jump right up out of bed and be here in minutes.  She also has more integrity in her thumb than most people do in their entire body.

I’ll still find myself often looking up to Steve Jobs.  The guy’s story is just amazing.  And I think what I like most of all is his ability to innovate.  That’s what I pride myself on being… an innovator… and I don’t even come close to this guy.

10) Do you have any favourite business related or personal development related books that you can recommend to other entrepreneurs?

1. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell
2. Purple Cow, Seth Godin
3. The Google story, David A. Vise and Mark Malseed
4. The Bible

11) What is the best advice you have ever been given?

To be remarkable.  Whether it’s in the way that you parent, the kind of spouse you are, the way you clean up the trash, or the way you run a business.  Go above and beyond.  Just be better than what anyone would expect.

12) What advice would you give to a Young Entrepreneur starting their first first business?

Sales comes first.  Without revenue coming in the door, you don’t have a business.  Often, in my opinion, the person who is the expert puts himself in a position to do sales.  Unfortunately, in most industries, that’s absolutely impossible.  If you truly want to grow… massively grow… you must have someone who focuses on sales, and someone who focuses on supplying the customers with a product or service.  Many people will start off as sales people in your organization with a high commission… you just have to find the right person.  And if somebody isn’t willing to do just commission, they probably aren’t confident enough in themselves… or your product, so you wouldn’t want them anyway.

13) What do you like best about the Internet?

Not to sound like Google or anything, but I love that all of the world’s information is available at your fingertips.  If I want to speak with someone who’s in China and speaks Chinese, I can use Google translator to do it.  If I want a new hairstyle, I can type in hairstyles and find a bunch of them. There’s literally no limit to it.  In addition, its made business much easier.  There are no longer any geographical boundaries to business.

14) What do you like least about the Internet?

Well, all the negatives that come with it.  The stalkers, the bad reviews from competitors, stuff like that.  It’s entirely too easy to say horrible things about someone and have it spread all over the Web instantaneously.  And once it’s there, you can never take it back.  I think there are good things that have come from all of that, but the ability to say horrible things about people that are completely untrue is a little unsettling.

15) Have you any plans (personal or business) that you can share with us about your future plans / goals / lifetime goals? 

We actually launched a company called ProspectMX last September.  The growth of this company is going at an even quicker rate than GetMyHomesValue.com did in the beginning.  We are providing the same Internet marketing services that we’ve been doing internally for years to companies all over the globe.   That is slowly becoming my new main focus, and I’m extremely excited about it.

Wow, lifetime goals.  I would like to become independently wealthy and devote my life to missions, speaking, and charity work.  Hopefully, I’m on my way there.  We’ll see what God has in store for me.

For more information visit:

ProspectMx , GetMyHomesValue AND RoryStevenandDave