Why should you start a company or have a business? Making money should not be an entrepreneur’s primary goal or only reason. Property management growth expert and founder/CEO of DoorGrow, Jason Hull, talks about four reasons for starting a company or having a business.
Many entrepreneurs mistakenly think the goal is to exit and retire early. However, if you follow my four reasons, you won't want to leave because you’ll be giving up something that's really important to you.
[02:20] Money: Doesn’t always make a successful business owner happy but miserable.
[03:09] Four things are probably more important than money for having a business.
[03:19] Side Effects: Being a big bottleneck or cutting operational costs.
[04:36] Jason’s four reasons for starting a company.
[04:47] Reason #1: Fulfillment: It should be a vehicle to give you fulfillment in life.
[05:30] Reason #2: Freedom: It’s what you achieve, why you want to be entrepreneurs.
[08:04] Reason #3: Contribution: Businesses should solve real marketplace problems.
[10:31] Reason #4: Support: It's a vehicle to create contributions and change the world.
[10:55] Business Model: Resources, money, staff create contributions, make difference.
[12:17] Why not start a business? For most people, it’s safety and certainty.
“There's something more that entrepreneurs need to be focused on than just making money.”
“If you have these four things and you're in alignment with these four things, you then have a business that you love.”
“The reality is there's nothing in your business in the long run that you have to do. There's nothing. You can offload any pieces of the business that you don't enjoy.”
“Entrepreneurs—we really want to make a difference in the world. We want to contribute. We want to feel like we're adding value.”
Welcome, DoorGrow hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker. DoorGrow hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses owners and their businesses. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show.
I'm going to do something a little bit different. Usually, I interview people, first of all, because that makes me feel a bit more secure. It's just a comfort thing. It feels a little bit weird to just sit here and talk all by myself, but my team has been pushing me to do this for years. You need to create your own episodes just you talking, sharing some of your ideas. That's really what people want to hear, and so here it goes.
This episode may be one of the most important pieces of content or information that I've put out into the marketplace. We're going to be talking today about what I call the four reasons. These are Jason Hull's four reasons for starting a company or for having a business. This is something that is just formulated in my mind over the last decade of running a company and coaching business owners, just realizing and seeing that there's something more that entrepreneurs need to be focused on than just making money.
There's something more that's important because I've had so many. I've talked to thousands of property managers, I have hundreds of clients, I've spoken to a lot of business owners, I've been in a lot of different masterminds and programs. One of the things that I've realized is that there's something a bit deeper that a business owner needs in order to have a successful business than just making money. At some point, money is no longer really an issue, but they could still be miserable.
One of the things that I've noticed is that instead of money being the primary goal, there are four things that are probably more important than money. These are the four reasons for having a business. What I've noticed is if you have these four things and you're in alignment with these four things, you then have a business that you love. If you're out of alignment with these four things, then you have a job that makes you somewhat miserable or maybe very miserable. You then are basically the biggest bottleneck in your business, you are the most critical employee in your business, you will be more and more frustrated, and you'll want to escape.
A lot of entrepreneurs mistakenly think the goal is to exit, the goal is retirement. Here's the thing, if you have these four reasons, you don't really want to retire because then you give up something that's really important to you.
The other side effect of having these four reasons is that your operational costs when it comes to staffing is usually cut into a fraction. Usually cut maybe down to a third of what most property management companies or most businesses spend on staffing costs, which means you'll be able to get about three times the output from team members because you'll be in alignment with these four reasons. That means that they can be in alignment with these four reasons. Let's get into the four reasons for starting a company.
Reason number one, the primary reason, the most important reason to start a business has to be fulfillment. Fulfillment is the primary goal or reason for a business to exist. It should be a vehicle to give you fulfillment in life. You're going to be giving up the majority of your life on this thing. Probably the largest portion of your day goes to your business or towards your work. Probably the largest portion of your week goes towards your business or towards work. You should be getting something in return, besides just trading your life and giving your life away in exchange for dollars.
You should be getting life, you should be enjoying your life, and you should be getting fulfillment. That's primary goal number one. Primary goal number two, the second reason for having a business needs to be freedom. This is why we become entrepreneurs. We want to achieve and get more freedom. You can make more and more money as your business grows. Most businesses do, but most business owners have less freedom and less fulfillment in their day-to-day. They become more and more a slave to their own business, and the business is then their master.
As entrepreneurs, we want more freedom. That's usually why we want more money. We think, man, if I had more money, I would have more options in life and that should be true. If you have more money, it should give you more options in life, and you should then have more freedom. Most business owners usually within the first year of their business, a very short period of time, they have very little freedom and very little fulfillment.
The thing is with fulfillment, reason number one, if you're doing everything in the business wearing every hat in the business, you can't really be in a state of fulfillment. You also can't really feel like you're free because you're doing things that you really don't enjoy doing. I find a lot of entrepreneurs and business owners mistakenly think that there are certain things they have to do because they're business owners.
What's really odd is this is different for each person, but it's some sort of conditioning. Maybe it's things they learned growing up, learned their jobs, or they've just decided they can never hand off certain pieces. A lot of business owners hold on to things that they don't have to do.
For example, if you hate accounting, but you feel like I have to do all the accounting in my business. Maybe you hate sales but you're like, I have to do all the sales in my business, or I hate talking to people and connecting with people, but you are talking and connecting with people constantly. Really, the reality is there's nothing in your business in the long run that you have to do. There's nothing.
You can offload any pieces of the business that you don't enjoy. The problem is a lot of times, entrepreneurs will offload the things they do enjoy, which give them fulfillment and a sense of freedom. Then they hold on to the things that take that away, that are really minus signs in their day instead of plus signs energetically.
The third reason for having a business is contribution. The goal of a business should be that it solves a real problem in the marketplace. That's a contribution. If a business doesn't solve a real problem in the marketplace, then it's basically bullshit. It's snake oil, it's stealing people's money. I find entrepreneurs—we really want to make a difference in the world. We want to contribute, we want to feel like we're adding value.
One of the reasons I'm inspired to work with property management entrepreneurs is you have a real impact. Most property management businesses suck. I'm sure you're like, yeah, that's true. If you look at your market, you know it. You know that this is true. Most property management businesses suck. It's not because these business owners woke up in the morning and said, man, I want to have a shitty company today. I want to start a business and have it suck. We'll get back to why so many suck at least one part.
Good property management business owners, their business solves three of the biggest challenges in real estate. What are three of the most complained about things in real estate probably? Probably number one, landlords. You just hear lots of people complaining about landlords. They get a bad rep. Number two, a lot of people complain about tenants. All these renters, they're the worst and you hear people complain about them. You also hear people complain about rental properties.
Good property managers are the superheroes of the entire real estate investing industry and they make all three of those things better. Nobody else does that. DoorGrow hacker, property management entrepreneur, you deserve to get paid well if you're one of the good ones. That's a real contribution. That's why businesses exist to solve a real problem in the marketplace, and you deserve to be compensated well for that. That's reason number three.
Entrepreneurs, we want to contribute and make a difference. We feel like we're doing something good in the world, and that feels like fulfillment to us to be contributing and benefiting other people. The business is a vehicle for fulfillment, it's a vehicle for freedom, and it's a vehicle for contribution for the entrepreneur. The fourth reason is so important that if you don't have it, you can't really have the first three, at least not fully.
The fourth reason for having a business is support. Having a business, it's a vehicle to create contributions and change the world. There's probably no better vehicle that could exist. Charities aren't even as effective or as efficient. Entrepreneurs have figured out a model, which is a business, which allows them the resources, money, the staff in which they can create contributions and make a difference. In order to do this and have more freedom and have more fulfillment, you can't be wearing every hat as I talked about earlier. You need support.
Having support in the business means that you have an awesome team. It means that you are able to offload all the things and the hats that you don't want to wear. You find people that enjoy doing those things, that will be better at it than you, that you can trust, that share your values. When you're supported, then you're going to feel like Iron Man in your super suit. You're a normal person, but you have this magical increased super capability because you have a team, which gives you more time, gives you more ability. You need support.
Here's the cool thing. If you have these four reasons—you have fulfillment, you have freedom, you have a contribution, you have support—then that means that you can have team members that also have those four reasons. Looking at these four things, what's interesting to note is that most people on the planet do not care about these four things more than they care about a higher priority. A higher priority than these four things for most people is safety and certainty.
This is important to recognize, especially as a property manager. Safety and certainty are the highest priority for most people on the planet. They want to feel safe and certain. This is why they don't go start businesses. This is why they're willing to give up and not have fulfillment, freedom, a sense of contribution, or even a lack of support in their day job. This is why the standard American employee often just complains about their boss, lives for the weekend, and wants to go out and drink. They're just trying to escape their life.
If you are in alignment with these four reasons then you can build the right team around you. When I see those, a lot of entrepreneurs are not in alignment with these four things. As they expand and break past the first sand trap of maybe about 50, 60 doors, and then they get into the next sand trap of maybe 200–400 doors, where they have a team, usually they have the wrong team.
Why? Because they are not in alignment with these four reasons. They're doing the wrong things. They're showing up as the wrong person that's less happy, has less fulfillment, less freedom, less contribution. They are not going to feel supported because they're doing the wrong things. They're going to build a team of people around them that supplement their miserableness, and so these people around them are also not going to have a sense of freedom, fulfillment, contribution, and support.
The operational cost on those types of team members is usually going to be three times higher. What I mean is if you have a team member that has a sense of fulfillment in the business, they feel fulfilled in their day-to-day, they feel like they have autonomy and freedom, they feel like they're making a difference in benefiting people, they feel supported by you, and they feel like they get to support you as the entrepreneur, they are going to give you three times the output I find. A-player team members, really great team members, will give you three times the output of a typical employee, which means that's going to significantly decrease your operational costs.
This is the most expensive thing in business is staffing. That resource is the most expensive. If you want to be a profitable company, you want to be one of the good property management businesses, and not be one of the sucky ones, a lot of times the reason they're sucky is because their operational costs are too high.
They don't have a really good team because they aren't really showing up as a really great boss. They are miserable and their team is not very happy. Their customer service levels drop because they can't really support people as well because their operational costs are too expensive so they're not able to get as much done.
One of the most common questions I get is, how many staff members should I have per the number of doors? Is there a ratio that's right? There are so many variables that come into this that it's an impossible thing to answer. You need a lot less staff per door if you are in alignment with these four reasons and your team members are in alignment with these four reasons.
Hopefully, this concept of the four reasons is helpful. This is the foundation of my philosophy as a property management business coach. With my clients, this is my primary goal. I reiterate this on our coaching calls that we have each week. I reiterate this in my one-on-one with clients. My goal is to get you more and more in alignment with these four reasons. I have processes and ways of helping people do that, that maybe we'll get into on a future call.
Basically, we want to see what are the plus signs in your day-to-day, what are the minus signs? How can we become really conscious of that? I usually use time studies to do that. I have a specific process for taking clients through to identify that, how to figure out how to feel safe to offload. In order to do that, you're going to have to create the right culture so that you have people that share the values that you can trust with people, trust with your clientele, and not just people that know how to do the job. Cultural fit is more important. We can get into that more, maybe in another conversation.
Anyway, if you want to get in alignment with these four reasons, you feel like you're out of alignment with them right now, reach out to me and reach out to my team at doorgrow.com. Check us out, join our Facebook group, doorgrowclub.com. You can go to doorgrowclub.com. Apply and join our Facebook group if you are a property management entrepreneur. Let's see if we can get you more in alignment with those four reasons.
Life's too short. You should be enjoying your day-to-day life. I want you to have a job and a business that you don't want to escape and retire from. Because if you did, you would be giving up one of your main vehicles for fulfillment, freedom, contribution, and support in life. You want to keep that. You then can choose how much you want to do in that business. I want you to always be able to hold on to the things that give you freedom, fulfillment, contribution, and support.
Anyway, with that, I'm out. Until next time. To our mutual growth everybody. I'm Jason Hull, and I hope that you found this beneficial. If so, leave comments, give us a review, and some feedback. I would appreciate it. Thanks.
You've just listened to the DoorGrowShow. We are building a community of the savviest property management entrepreneurs on the planet in the DoorGrow Club. Join your fellow DoorGrow hackers at doorgrowclub.com. Listen, everyone is doing the same stuff—SEO, PPC, pay per lead, content, social direct mail, and they still struggle to grow.
At DoorGrow, we solve your biggest challenge: getting deals and growing your business. Find out more at doorgrow.com. Find any show notes or links from today's episode on our blog at doorgrow.com. To get notified of future events and news, subscribe to our newsletter at doorgrow.com/subsribe. Until next time. Take what you learn and start DoorGrow hacking your business and your life.
Looking for a system that will help you automate the entire residential leasing process?
Today’s guest is Abi Wasserman from ShowMojo, a complete leasing automation platform that handles scheduling coordination and showings. Abi explains ShowMojo as automating everything that happens in the pre-leasing experience, from the moment a property is available and hits the market to the moment a prospective renter is moving forward with an application.
[02:24] ShowMojo: What it is, what it does, and how it's different from other options.
[04:14] Touch Points: Automated communication confirms, follows up leasing process.
[05:22] Property managers fit business needs and leasing processes into one platform.
[05:50] Other Options: Some companies do showings or open houses differently.
[06:29] Independent Experience: Know calendar availability for each team member.
[07:58] COVID Pandemic Hold: Starting to get back to first normal, busy leasing season.
[08:48] Walk the Talk: What to do when renting property to somebody site unseen.
[10:21] With so many property management tools, why choose ShowMojo?
[13:30] FAQ: Focus on syndication, customers, security, and platform comparisons.
[17:00] Determining Factor: ShowMojo’s success is because of relationships.
[18:40] Pros and cons of occupant, self, and accompanied showings.
[23:54] Common Problems: Time wasting calls? Use the automated ShowMojo phone.
“Your platform should allow you to be able to customize your needs, stack appointments up together, calculate drive time, and take that into account in between showings.”
“That's going to turn into maintenance nightmares for you down the road or a tenant nightmare for you down the road because they haven't seen the property.”
“The first place that somebody sees a difference with the way that ShowMojo operates, is really in that prospective renter experience.”
“That prospective renter experience is important for them, but it's also important for you.”
Jason: Welcome, DoorGrow Hackers, to the DoorGrowShow. If you are a property management entrepreneur that wants to add doors, make a difference, increase revenue, help others, impact lives, and you are interested in growing your business and life, and you're open to doing things a bit differently, then you are a DoorGrow hacker. DoorGrow hackers love the opportunities, daily variety, unique challenges, and freedom that property management brings. Many in real estate think you're crazy for doing it. You think they're crazy for not because you realize that property management is the ultimate, high-trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income.
At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management businesses and their owners. We want to transform the industry, eliminate the BS, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win. I'm your host, property management growth expert, Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow. Now, let's get into the show. My guest today is Abi Wasserman. Welcome, Abi.
Abi: Hey Jason. How are you?
Jason: I'm fantastic. I'm doing really well. How are you?
Abi: I am good. Thank you for having me on. I appreciate it.
Jason: I've been wanting to get ShowMojo on the show forever. They've been on my hit list for a long time and I finally just gave up. Then suddenly, you showed up on my calendar, which is awesome. I’m glad you came.
Abi: I have a magic touch. It's like we have mojo or something, I don't know. It might be in our name.
Jason: Yeah, maybe. Some ShowMojo. Abi, maybe give us a little bit of background on ShowMojo, if you could. Then maybe we can chat about what it is, what it does, and how it's different from the other options on the market.
Abi: ShowMojo is the leasing automation platform. We have been around for over 10 years. My understanding of how DoorGrow got started originated out of this need for the property management industry, started from an entrepreneur and an entrepreneurial mindset. Our founder and his wife who owned property management units saw this need for automation to exist in their life. To stop them from taking away from their day-to-day life and what time was getting spent with the kids or at family dinners, those tasks, those phone calls, those emails, that coordination that typically comes with the leasing process, that pre-leasing process. What was bothering them and not conducive to that family time, it ended up turning into ShowMojo and this scheduling coordination. Eventually, self show as well but the entire leasing automation platform that is ShowMojo.
Jason: Got it. I think ShowMojo really pioneered on the market the scheduling sort of aspect. Then it looks like Rently copied that. They had the lock boxes and now ShowMojo’s got the lock boxes, too. Then you've got Tenant Turner and they seem to have a similar product. Why don't you explain for people that have no idea what ShowMojo is? They aren't aware of these. What it is and then maybe we can get into the differences.
Abi: I like to explain ShowMojo as thinking about automating everything that happens in that pre-leasing experience, from the moment that a property is available and hits the market, to the moment that that prospective renter is moving forward with an application. What our platform and what ShowMojo does is it empowers that prospective renter to really self-drive their way through a prospect-driven leasing process. It allows them to really empower that process from start to finish, giving them that immediate touch, that immediate response that they crave when they're trying to schedule a showing.
Giving them that automated communication throughout the process. Making sure that they have confirmed the showings or giving them the ability to automatically reschedule a showing. Giving them automated communication on the back end of that. Following-up after a showing. Following-up with the application process after the showing. Really making sure that there are just all of those touch points, and giving property managers that customizable platform in it where they can fit it their business needs, their processes, how they do leasing and not making a property management company have to fix their processes to a platform mix, if that makes sense.
Jason: Yes. Could you give us some examples of how companies might do it a bit differently maybe?
Abi: Some property management companies, for instance, will do great showings especially as we move more out of this pandemic, there are property management companies that will do great showings or open houses. Maybe they'll do clustered individual showings where you only want to go out to a property maybe once a day and you want to cluster your showings together where you've got five back-to-back showings. Your platform should allow you to be able to customize your needs, stack appointments up together, calculate drive time and take that into account in between showings.
Know what calendar availability is there for each one of your team members, crosscheck maybe a third-party calendar like Google or Outlook, be able to send those invites back and forth between those calendars easily, and make sure that each one of your team members can also have that independent experience. If you and I were working together and you were showing a few of the properties and I was showing a few of the properties, we have independent schedules. Maybe we even both show one property and our times overlap, but the platform can still take that into account.
Jason: I love the idea of group showings because it really would collapse time for the property manager. It could put so much work on their plate, but the tenants are often willing to move around your schedule and to do things that you want them to do because they're really trying to get into a place. If you can get 10 or 20 people to show up to a particular unit, even if you're just having them—if they're pandemic-scared—go through one at a time and they're waiting outside, that allows you to increase the perception of demand, it allows you to just get a bunch of applicants right away, and then you can go through screen and figure out who we should put into this place. I know property managers that they do one open house, one showing. They get plenty of applicants and then they get the thing rented out.
Abi: And that is the case. I think one of the things that I've seen most recently as we've come out of this pandemic hold, which I think we've been in for a good 16 months of this, I don't know what's going to happen with my vacancy because of the pandemic. Now, we're coming out of that holding pattern where moratoriums are lifting and things are starting to get back to our first normal leasing season, busy leasing season. Now, what property managers are seen all over the country (I think) is that they're putting a property on the market and they are getting immediate applications, site unseen, where they will put a property on the market and they’ll get 10 applications for it.
I also have those conversations with property managers who want somebody to walk that property. You don't often want to rent to somebody that hasn't looked at that property because that's going to turn into maintenance nightmares for you down the road or a tenant nightmare for you down the road because they haven't seen the property. I didn't know that this was here. I didn't know you expected me to change my filter. I don't know where to change my filter. I never saw that. There's so many things that come up.
Even with the market being the way that it is where you've got 10 applications coming through, then how do you set up the showings so that at least you're getting your top five applicants through that property and down the line through your application process?
Jason: Right. It's Russian roulette, you're playing a dangerous game if you don't have people view the property. How does the ShowMojo compare, because I know there's a lot of tools out there. I see this question pop up in the DoorGrowClub, our Facebook group constantly. People are asking it on our mastermind all the time. Which tool are you using and why? Everybody has different opinions. How can you help people make the decision to choose ShowMojo over something like TurboTenant, Tenant Turner, Rently, all these different tools that exist out there?
Abi: You know me and you know I've been around a really long time. I've got friends that work at other companies. Whenever I'm asked these questions, whenever I’ve been asked at a different company and against a competitive company there, my goal is never to sling mud. My goal is always to just talk about the differences or where I feel we have an advantage or how we do it and I like the way you do it. I will say that the first place that somebody sees a difference with the way that ShowMojo operates, is really in that prospective renter experience.
With ShowMojo, when a prospective renter goes to schedule a showing, the experience for them whether it's on a desktop, whether it's on their mobile phone, it is all happening on one screen. They don't have to sign up for an account with ShowMojo. They don't have to pay a fee. Even if they're validating their identity with a credit or debit card, we're not charging them a fee for an account with us. They don't have to remember a username or password.
I don't say this because I think that it's a bad user experience to do that. There are a lot of sites that I will sign up for recurring business. But when I'm renting, I don't really want to do that until I’m filling out an application and logging into a portal. I don't want to give anybody but that property manager my contact, like login details. I'll give you my contact details, but I don't want to do that. That's my preference as a renter because I have been one for too long because I can't do the math right now. As I get closer to my 35th birthday, I can't do math on the spot.
I know you and I both have one coming up, if I remember that correctly about us both, we have one in I think the same week. But that prospective renter experience is important. Making it as easy for them to actually schedule that showing is critical. You also, for the property manager, if I'm a property manager, I want to own that rental lead. I don't want them signing up for an account with the service that I'm working with and then owning that data. I want to own that rental lead. I want them to be my rental lead.
I don't want them seeing properties for somebody else's company. I want them being cross marketed properties that I have on the market. If something changes within my portfolio, I want them to be notified of it. I don't want them being dripped with other properties from other property management companies. I worked very hard to get those people over to my website or to get them to my listing. I want to own that data. That prospective renter experience is important for them but it's also important for you.
Jason: I'm curious about what are some of the questions that prospective users of ShowMojo tend to have when they're coming to you during the sales conversation?
Abi: A lot of the questions will circle around the syndication network that we have, whether if they are new customers, will it compare to what I'm doing with my software provider? If they are switching over from a different platform, does it compare or does it exceed what I already have? Oftentimes, it exceeds what they already have or it is an even match for.
Jason: Let’s explain syndication for those that don't know what it means.
Abi: When we have listings through ShowMojo, what we do is we will push them out to internet listing sites. Things like apartments.com, Zillow if a customer is paying for it, rentals.com same thing as Zillow, realtor.com, Zumper, those kinds of ILS or the listing sites to get additional visibility and rental leads back in for our customers. With ShowMojo, we automatically respond to those leads pushing them over to get them to schedule a showing, but it's typically the same as or greater visibility than wherever they may have been coming from before.
Jason: Got it. One of the strengths of ShowMojo is really good syndication.
Abi: Yes and the email response and the communication afterwards.
Jason: What are some of the other questions that people have when they're curious and vetting ShowMojo as a provider for them?
Abi: I would say it probably will come in where the lock boxes and self-show is concerned and how do we handle security, how do we handle preparing for fraud because it doesn't happen frequently. It's going to happen in the property management industry. It's a factor of doing self-show and doing lock box showings. It's more of those questions of how do we prepare for it, so outside of the normal tech things that our team does by searching and preparing and preventing known scammers from being able to schedule, we don't advertise any of our listings as self-show or lock box showings.
We don't distribute codes until the showing has been confirmed with that prospect or we have the additional step where they have to actually confirm their location is at the property. They have to use location enablement on their cell phones. We also follow up after every showing to make sure that that prospective renter has locked up and left the keys at the property. If they don't then we notify our customer of that. We have multiple different checkpoints in place for our customers on that side.
Jason: Got it. Now, is that different from other providers when it comes to lock boxes?
Abi: There are some providers that are very forthright about how much self-show they do, even advertising through video the entire self-show process on their customers’ websites. I'm not sure where that checkpoints are in terms of checking back up with a prospective renter, so I'm not sure where the follow up process is necessarily with other companies.
Jason: What do you think is the determining factor for people to go with ShowMojo then? How are you closing these deals, Abi?
Abi: I would say number one, because of relationships, like I always do. At the end of the day, it is a more customizable platform to fit property managers’ needs. It is cost effective, and we have a lot more bells and whistles to really be able to, so it ties back in with that customization but we have more bells and whistles to really fit it to the existing process. Customizing it from that first moment that they interact with the listing to the moment before moving forward with an application. Without going through a full demo, it's everything from cost to benefit and that value and between.
Jason: Cool. ShowMojo sounds like a really awesome tool for property managers. Some are a little bit nervous about the lock boxes and self-showings, so what's your perception on who decides to do that and who decides not to? Because it seems like there's two solid camps there. I could never do that. It's too risky, and I love it and it's amazing. It seems very polarizing, I notice, whether or not to do lock boxes.
Abi: I would say we are definitely fans of in-person showings because there are questions that you're not going to be able to… Number one, the first thing is that you're not going to be able to show occupied units. You're never going to be able to show occupied units on a lock box showing. The obvious benefit to doing a company showing says that you can stay pre-leased, and show occupied units, get them leased before they even go vacant. You can also answer questions that you're not going to be able to answer during a self-show. You can get a feel for those prospective renters. There are a lot of benefits to an accompanied showing.
Jason: I'm curious about the pre-lease situation, how to ShowMojo handle the existing residents of the property and make sure that's communicated, because that's usually seems to be one of the most difficult sticking points with trying to do showing. Sometimes they're really resistant to having people come into their place. The communication back and forth. Then you're trying to negotiate times with them and with prospective renters. That communication gets a little cumbersome. Does ShowMojo try to facilitate that?
Abi: A couple of things. One and I've had this conversation recently, so that's why I say a couple of things. I would have ordinarily just started with showing acceptance, which is where you can put in the residence information and they have to accept the show times or reject them. But the reason I say a couple is because I've had this conversation twice in the last couple of weeks. The response from the property manager was the same. That won't work. They will reject it every time.
I said okay. Then in my brain, the way that I creatively think about this, is it goes back to the way that calendars are set up and ShowMojo. There is a way to set up a specific time window for each property. That is the only time that that property can be shown. I said, okay, well then, great. If they will reject every time, then you don't necessarily need to do showing acceptance with them. What you need to do is you need to say I will be showing your property, because you've given notice. Tell me what day of the week and what time frame will work for you for the next 60 days or 30 days or whatever notice they’ve had to give.
Block it out for that recurring week notice. Maybe it's Friday from 2:00–5:00 are their window that you are allowed to show their unit. Then that way that is the only time that the showings will get booked for that property. Either way there is an option in ShowMojo. Chances are there's a way to accommodate it. There's the showing acceptance where you can put in the residence information or the owners, if its owner occupied. You can put in the owner acceptance too. You can put in there showing acceptance or you can block out the certain time windows for the property, so either way.
Jason: Sometimes it's easier to tell people that it’s going to happen, instead of asking for permission.
Abi: Exactly.
Jason: I like that. But the showing acceptance thing, that's pretty cool. This software has been around for a while. It really was I believe the first on the market that really did the scheduled showings model. It sounds like they've been optimizing and innovating since then and adding features. I think that is the niche that it's quite customizable which I think is appealing to property managers. It sounds like you have really good syndication. You also have the lock boxes thing. Anything else anybody should know about ShowMojo?
Abi: If you've got questions, if you're thinking that it could do something, I wonder if it does this, odds are it does. We've worked with real estate listings. There's ways to do maintenance checkups. We use ShowMojo for our own demo scheduling platform. When somebody comes on our website to schedule a demo, we use ShowMojo for that. The way that it can be customized to fit whatever needs you have, it is endless. We just rolled out occupant-led showings.
If you're actually having a tenant do a showing for you, a renter, with some of the people that may have been under more lock down restrictions. I know that sometimes you move towards the things that you have to do. I can sit here and rant and rave about ShowMojo for a while.
Jason: That occupant-led showing is an interesting idea. I talked to the property manager and he had (I think) 1000 tours or more at a conference. He said that his company never did showings. He said, we just pay the occupants to show the property and we give them some sort of kickback if it gets rented. They’re incentivized to sell the place.
Abi: That's a great idea.
Jason: The biggest complaint or challenge that you hear in leasing is just the time wasting phone calls. This is just such a time suck for property managers. You have people calling up and saying what's the square footage on this listing that I'm looking at right now, that has the square footage on it. Stuff like that. Does ShowMojo facilitate phone calls or work well with the solution that does?
Abi: We do. We have our ShowMojo phone which is automated, that's included with all of the way that we do things which allows prospective renters to always get schedule a showing link or view all of the available listings and a gallery. It also will determine if somebody's running late for a showing and cancel it if they're running too late and follow up to reschedule. But we also have live answers available to our customers that are additional, but very affordable, very cost-effective.
They can turn it on or off at any time but it's with our call team and they will answer basic questions just like you mentioned if it’s something that they missed in the listing detail, they can schedule showings. If somebody calls to follow up on an application, they can answer that question. If it’s a potential owner, they can answer those questions. They can take messages and forward them over to the team. It’s something that they can turn on outside of office hours if they want to have their team handle it during office hours and have somebody else answer outside of office hours. We do have the ability to help with that.
Jason: Where's the call center team based out of?
Abi: We have virtual call centers, but they're both US and out of the US space. Odds are, if you call during daylight/evening hours, you're going to get somebody in the US and then outside of that, 2:00 AM, you may not get somebody in California.
Jason: It’s a 24-hour thing.
Abi: Yeah.
Jason: All right, any questions I missed?
Abi: I don't think so. I don't like to control the flow. I feel like we had a good chat. I feel like it was good.
Jason: Cool. How can people find out more about ShowMojo?
Abi: You can always come to showmojo.com and connect with us there. If you want to send me an email, you can also always reach me at abbey.wasserman@showmojo.com. You can reach us on our website. Find us on LinkedIn and all that fun stuff.
Jason: Cool. Well Abi, I appreciate you coming on the DoorGrowShow. We finally got ShowMojo in the books.
Abi: Thanks for having us.
Jason: Now I can point people to a podcast episode when they ask me about ShowMojo.
Abi; There we go.
Jason: All right. I appreciate you being on and I'll let you go.
Abi: Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.
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I appreciate everybody that's tuned into this or that's been paying attention to us on iTunes or on YouTube. Be sure to like, subscribe, give us positive reviews. We love all that kind of stuff if you got value from this. Until next time, everyone, to our mutual growth. Bye everybody.