You're Losing Clients and It's YOUR Fault... Here's How to Fix It

What if you could generate consistent referrals without spending big on ads or fancy events?

Access my FREE COURSES here

In this episode of The Faithful Agent Podcast, host Garrett Maroon shares powerful, real-world strategies to build a thriving real estate business through meaningful client engagement. Whether you're just starting out or looking to refresh your approach, Garrett breaks down cost-effective, relational tactics that help agents deepen trust, boost referrals, and stand out in a crowded market.

He covers everything from handwritten notes and video texts to simple, low-cost client events—all rooted in the idea that relationships, not transactions, drive success. 

🧠 Key Takeaways:

1. You don’t need a huge budget to build a referral-based business.
2. Real estate technology often tries to remove agents from the process—don’t let it.
3. Video texts are a game-changer for personal, scalable communication.
4. Handwritten notes are rare, impactful, and deeply appreciated by clients.
5. Client events can be done simply—think donuts, coffee, or Amazon gift cards.
6. Gifting doesn’t need to be extravagant to show appreciation.
7. The 36 Touch System helps agents stay top of mind all year long.
8. Prioritize relationships over reach—people refer who they trust.
9. Simplicity is the key to consistency and longevity.

⏱️ Chapters:

• Intro – Building Relationships for Success
• 00:40 – The Power of Repeat & Referral Business
• 01:05 – Why Client Events Don’t Have to Be Expensive
• 04:41 – Engagement > Extravagance
• 04:54 – The Impact of Handwritten Notes
• 06:13 – Relationship-Building Through Personal Touches
• 06:40 – Introducing Garrett’s Free E-Course
• 07:05 – Selling Homes Efficiently: The Playbook
• 07:13 – Video Texts: The New Gold Standard
• 09:07 – Building Real Connections with Clients
• 09:14 – Creative Ways to Engage Clients
• 10:11 – Personalization in Gifting
• 10:52 – Coffee Meetings as Connection Points
• 12:02 – The ROI of Relational Investment
• 12:22 – Building Your Perfect 36-Touch System

⭐️ Rate & Review:
If this episode challenged or encouraged you, leave a 5-star review and share it with another Christian agent who needs to hear this message.

Resources & Opportunities:

📩 Join the Movement:
➡️ Pre-order Garrett's Book - The Balanced Breakthrough - HERE

Want to Sell More Homes While Honoring God?
Download my free guide REDEFINE THE WIN to learn how to implement my PDA Formula so you can build a more predictable and profitable business that actually aligns with who you are - get the guide here - https://www.210collective.com/redefine

📞 Want to be in Business with Garrett and Christian agents around the globe? Schedule a call with Garrett to learn about the 2:10 Collective on the eXp Realty platform
🔗 https://calendly.com/garrettmaroon/210collective

📩 Send Garrett your Hampton Roads & Richmond, VA buyer/seller referrals:
🔗 7572662876

📲 Follow Garrett on Instagram for more insights and encouragement!

🔗 https://www.instagram.com/garrettmaroon/

Transcript

0:00

The real estate industry is trying to replace us. With over $40 billion invested into real estate technology in the last decade, there's just one simple goal, remove the agent from the equation. So if your business is built on Zillow or Pay Per Click or Facebook leads, you are renting your business from a company that could change their algorithm whenever they feel like it, and they already have, and your business is gone. But if you maximize the relationships you already have to build and grow your business, that's the only true way to actually own your future in this industry. So here's five proven ways to generate clients without cold calling. Now, before we even get started, I want you to know that at the end of this, I'm going to tell you how you can get my free e-course that I normally sold for $997 that's going to teach you exactly how I sell 50 homes a year under 40 hours a week, exclusively by repeat and referral business. If you want to grab this totally free, make sure that you stick around. I'm going to tell you how in just a minute. Five proven ways to generate clients without cold calling. Number one, client events. Now, I've heard it all said before, that client events are too expensive, they're too complicated, I'm never gonna be able to pull it off. Well, here's what I wanna tell you, that's a lie. There's a way to do these easy, simply, and have an amazing result. My team does four client events every single year, once a quarter, March. June, September, December. We're seeing all of our people all at once. And guess what? We did one Saturday as I'm recording this. We did one last Saturday, had 130 people show up. Guess what it cost me?$300. That's it. Because here's the reality of client events. It doesn't need to be something crazy, huge, expensive. It needs to be something thoughtful and fun and geared towards your specific database. So let me give you an example. I used to think it was all about having a band. uh a bounce house, having the live music, having the live caterer, having all of these pieces. And it was really expensive. I was averaging around $5,000 per event. And guess what it wasn't doing? Moving the needles significantly in my business. So I decided, what if I cut that cost significantly down? What would happen? So I changed my approach and I started to spend less money with more intentional events. And guess what? My business continued to thrive even though I went from $5,000 to around $800 per event. All you need to do is make it simple. You want to be the host. You want to be able to engage people. But if you're so worried about all the pieces running together, it's not an effective client event. You're there to see people and engage with people. So let me give you some ideas. In June, we always ran out a local ice cream shop. We say, hey, can we come from 11 to one? Will you shut it down to everybody else? and we'll pay for everybody to come and have ice cream. I literally sit outside, people walk up, we pay for their ice cream, they put it down on a tab, we pay for their ice cream, and I get to engage with them. It cost me 800 bucks, I split it with a mortgage lender, $400. Always go to a mortgage lender and split that cost in half. You don't need to do anything crazy, you don't need to have a big business, you might even be brand new, I guarantee you there's a mortgage lender out there. You might have 10 people at the event, 20 people at the event. we average around 125 people at these events. And it still only cost me $400. In the fall, we do a family photo event. I rent a local pavilion at a local park, cost me $100. I hire a photographer who's in my database already to do family portraits, $450. And then I go grab donuts and coffee and we show up 930 to 1130 at this pavilion. Our friends come, our database comes, they bring their families. They grab a donut, they grab coffee, maybe a little bottle of water. They go get a family photo and then they hang out with us and they go enjoy the rest of the park. Simple and easy. Cost me $300. In December, we do a Christmas lights drive through where they drive their car up. We hand them a list of the best lights, give them some candies, give them some reindeer ears, give them a little mad lib because we think it's fun and we want to engage. Give them some hot chocolate. Boom, they're on their way. We have 40, 50 cars drive through. and it's four to six p.m. on a Tuesday. It's easy, it's simple, it's inexpensive, but it's showing up and our people love it. That was the eighth year in a row we've done the family photo event and all of these families, many of these families that keep coming wouldn't have a photo otherwise they have a photo because we offer them this free family photo event. Client events don't have to be hard, they can be simple. And when they're simple, it means you'll execute. And when you execute it and you understand what it is that your database needs, you can make them inexpensive. Always split with a lender and actually engage your people. It's the best way for you to see all your people all at once. Okay, number two, handwritten notes. Now you've heard all of these things before, the question is not whether you've heard them, it's whether you actually do them. So here's what I want you to do. Did you know that less than 0.7 % of mail today is a handwritten note? Less than 0.7%, I've got some right here that I'm literally working on right now. Here's why this matters. You've all gotten those notes in the mail that were written by a computer or written by somebody else or printed off or whatever. They even have the label on there that wasn't handwritten. What do we do? We open that over the trash, I tear it up, I throw it away. Here's what I want you to do. Think of five people. Maybe it's the five most recent people from your database that you saw. Maybe it's five people that bought a home with you most recently and you haven't engaged with them. Maybe it's someone that you thought, man, we had a great relationship but I haven't talked to them in a while. Think of those people, just five people. All you're gonna do is hand address the label. I don't want you to buy a label. I don't want you to stamp on it. If you hand write their address, they will open it. You think of the last time you got a handwritten note, I guarantee you, you opened it and read it if it was hand addressed to you. So you hand address it to them. And inside the note, all you have to do is say something simple like, hey, Jim, just wanted you to know I was thinking about you. I hope that you and the family are doing really well. Look forward to seeing you some of our events. Or whatever you want to say. Hey, I just want you to know how much I appreciate you and your friendship and support of me and my business. If I could ever serve you or any of your friends thinking of buying or selling a home, I'd love to help sincerely, Garrett. Something simple and easy, five handwritten notes, and then your goal is to do five a week, just five a week, right? In that amount of time, you're gonna get through 250 handwritten notes in a year, less than 0.7 % of mail. Today is a handwritten note. Yours should be much higher than that. Okay, before I keep going, I want to remind you, you can grab my free e-course right here in the top of the comments. In the show notes, you can go grab my free e-course on how I've sold 50 homes a year and under 40 hours a week, exclusively by referral. I'm giving it all away. Normally costs $997, but I want to give it to you for free. Go grab that link today. It's going to make a difference in your business and going to show you my entire playbook. of I've sold 50 homes a year and under 40 hours a week and I want to give it to you so it blesses you in your business. Go grab it today. I hope it makes a difference for you. Number three, video texts. It's not enough to just make phone calls. It's not enough to just send text messages. I don't know about you, but I don't even like being on the phone. And most of my database doesn't wanna be on the phone either. But here's what I do know, an average text gets seen, 95 % of those get seen within the first five minutes. So I know they're gonna see my text. Well, why a video text? Because I also want them to see my face. In a world of AI, we've gotta humanize ourselves. They wanna know it's a real person. on the other end. So I send them a video text 20, 30 seconds. It doesn't need to be long, but I use their name individually, sending them a video text, whether it's a couple or whether it's an individual. Why? Because they want to hear their name. They want to know it sent directly to them. It's personal that way. So here's how I would do it. Something simple like, Hey, Jim was just thinking about you and your family. I hope that your new year is off to a great start. I would love to see you some of our events this year. And as always, if I can help you or your family with anything real estate related, I'm always here to help. Thanks so much my friend, have a great day. Something simple and easy like that, boom, you record it right in your phone, you boom, you send it right in your phone. It doesn't need to be fancy, it just needs to be real and authentic. Video texts get a lot of engagement and remember, whether they respond to you or not, they are paying attention, they are engaging. Literally just last month, I got a client who I sold a house to nine years ago and for nine years, I ran my entire playbook on him. He said nothing. the entire time. But guess what happened? When it was time for him to sell his home, he came back to me and said, Garrett, I'm so sorry I haven't been responsive, but brother, will you please help me sell my home? He's paying attention. They're paying attention. It's about the consistency of the care that you're offering. Send them a video text, whether they send one back or not, whether they respond or not, doesn't matter. Show up for your people. Hey, just checking on you. I hope that you're doing great. Whatever you want to say, make it simple, make it easy. Write simple scales. Complex fails, so the simpler it can be, the more likely you will actually execute. That's what I want for you to do. Send those video texts. All right, number four of how we generate more clients without cold calling, Amazon gifts. Now we've all heard, do pop buys, go drop off a gift and do all of these things. I've done those, I did those for years and I'm not saying they're ineffective because they are absolutely effective. But if you're like me and you're trying to protect your time, here's what I found has been incredibly valuable, sending Amazon gifts. So here's how I do it. I pick 10 clients a month, my gift is going to be less than $10 per month. and I send them a gift. order them something on Amazon. I go look on their social media and see maybe what's relevant. Maybe they had a kid who had a birthday and I wanna send them something or whatever is relevant to them. Maybe it's a book. Maybe they had a baby. They're about to have a baby. Whatever it is, I aim for less than $10 per gift. I order it on Amazon to be sent to their house, right? So now it saves me a significant amount of time. I screenshot what I bought them. I text it to them and say, hey, my friends, I was just thinking about you guys. wanted to get this for little Susie whose birthday it was. I'm sorry I missed it, but wanted to get her something. It should arrive in a day or two, right? I send that text over and they are over the moon that I was thinking about them, right? So number one, it's a great touch there. Number two, when the gift arrives, what do they say? Hey, thank you so much. That was really thoughtful of you. Who doesn't like coming home and seeing an Amazon gift on their porch? We all do. Amazon gifts been a game changer for us from the Popeyes. shifting to Amazon gifts. Let Amazon do the heavy lifting. You pay a little bit extra, but you send out a personal thoughtful gift. That's going to make a big difference. 10 per month. That's how we do it. It makes a big difference and it'll make a big difference in your business too. And finally, the old school client coffee. Now we've heard all of these things before. I'm not telling you something you've never heard. It's whether or not you're actually doing these. My job is to make it as simple as possible for you to actually go execute. So here's what I want you to do. Aim for just two, two every single month. sitting down with one of your past clients or maybe a current client sitting down for coffee, breaking bread with them. Maybe you don't drink coffee, maybe you go get tea, maybe you have breakfast, maybe you have lunch, maybe you're so busy or you're working another job and this is a side gig for you, maybe you say, hey, can we do a virtual coffee? I'd love to connect with you and just hear how you're doing. Can I send you a $5 Starbucks gift card? Can I grab 15 minutes on your calendar? I'd love to hear how you're doing. Sitting down face to face, breaking bread with someone is the best way. for you to create and develop and engage a deeper relationship. And when they consider you a close friend, because they will, as you're building these relationships, what do we want our close friends to do? We want them to win. They will start telling more people about you. So what do you do? Sit down, face to face, grab a coffee, two a month, that's 24 a year, and it's gonna make a difference in your business. So, if you want to own your future in this industry and stop renting it from companies like Zillow, then you must start investing in the relationships that you already have today. So, 5 proven ways to generate clients without cold calling, client events, handwritten notes, video texts, Amazon Gifts, and coffee. Make sure you go grab my free e-course right below in the show notes so you can start building out your own perfect 36 touch system that's gonna help you sell more homes by relationship. It's my gift to you. I wanna help you win and succeed in this industry. I get it, I'm an agent too. So I hope you'll go grab it. And remember, the best way for you to own your future is own and invest in the relationships that you already have. God bless, I hope you build an amazing business. Reach out to me if I can ever be a support to you.