This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Antoine Martel. Antoine is the 23-year-old who started investing in college and went from $20,000 in the bank to retiring his parents in less than two years. He did it through creating turnkey opportunities in real estate. In fact, in just a few short years, Antoine’s company, Martel Turnkey has amassed a portfolio of over 100 properties and has sold over $10 million dollars’ worth of cash flowing real estate. He’s also the author of the popular real estate investing book, A Millennials Guide to Real Estate Investing.

The biggest reason I wanted to have Antoine on the show was not so much about how to invest in Turnkey real estate, although we’ll touch on that today, but because he is a great example that with a little ingenuity and looking at things a little differently, you can create a great business, at any age. I’m excited for him to share his wisdom and everything he’s learned to this point in his entrepreneur journey.

www.MartelTurnkey.com

Instagram @martelantoine ​

Antoine is now 24. He’s been an entrepreneur his whole life, finding ways to make money in high school – even importing things from China to sell. He started investing in real estate in college. He and his family went to an investing seminar where they taught them how to analyze and manage real estate. He immersed himself into the teachings and did a lot of the work to get everything off the ground because his parents had full time jobs.

They started trying to flip houses in California, but couldn’t make things work for the cash they had. So, Antoine started researching how to buy property in less expensive markets out of state as well as networking to meet and learn from people doing it. He moved all his college courses to night classes so he could spend his days focused on building the business.

He found a lot of people investing out of state and buying single family properties either through turn-key or creating their own teams on the ground. And or course, the prices for the homes were much less.

Through research, Antoine found Memphis, TN to be a good market and started there. He built a team, had his parents invest, and the deal went according to plan. He then graduated and took 6 months to focus on making it a real business.

Now, Antoine had the full day to focus, including the evening and by December of that year, they had 10 homes in Memphis.

They then begin to have people reach out to them asking them how they are doing it and wanting to be able to do it. That is what got Antoine into doing Turn-keys and then selling them to their contacts. They now do over 100 homes a year, 8-10 per month using the model and selling to investors all over the world.

What’s the biggest myth about investing in real estate that you want to put to rest?

• Turn-Key has gotten a bad rap. A big player in the industry got a huge lawsuit because they were doing things illegal. But there is a lot of great companies out there.
• Like anything, you have to do your homework, but you can find great, solid partners.

At the 12 min mark, Antoine goes through his process of how he finds and invests in a property…

• Antoine purchases a house with his money.
• They then rehab and fix it up with their teams.
• Then they market it professionally.
• They get everything set with a tenant.
• They have vetted property management companies they then use to manage it.
• Once everything is set, they put it on the market to investors. It is fully bundled, ready, and cash flowing for the buyer.
• Antoine’s company also helps the buyer with financing and introductions to the property management firms, etc.

What are the criteria that you look for in a property?

• 3-bedroom, 1 bath 900-1200 sq ft.
• Can accommodate a couple, or small family.
• Focus on specific neighborhoods in markets – specific zip codes.
  • They do this because they do B and C class properties.
  • These properties are not in a downtown core or high wealth areas
  • Focus on blue/white collar areas that average $40-50k per year.
  • Within a 15-20 min drive to downtown.

Why is it better to invest for cashflow?

• Cashflow provides you income every month vs. the up and down roller coaster of flipping.
• To buy an apartment building or turn-key property is much easier and better over the long run.
• You also get the tax advantages of depreciation and the ability to do 1030 exchanges when investing for cashflow and holding over time.

At the 21 min mark, Antoine talks about buying property out of state…

• It all comes down to your team.
• You should take it slow and do your homework.
• Start with one property.
• You will have to manage your new team early on to make sure they stay on budget and do what they commit to.
• Once they’ve proven it, then it easier to scale.

Talk to us about how you market your business...

• Content heavy
• Blogs and articles on things like Bigger Pockets, LinkedIn, etc.
• Blasts each week to their list from networking and growing from their website.
• An Instagram video post every day. Podcasts.
• Just starting webinars
• Never stop networking with all that you can

What are the demographics of your market?

• 25-45
• Steady job
• Have $20-50k in savings to invest
• Married, potentially kids

What are some of the keys that you have found to consistently succeed at a high level?

• Taking action.
• Don’t be a full time seminar goer who never does anything with what you learn in the seminar.
• Antoine when to 1 seminar and took action and stuck with it. The results speak for themselves.
• Never stop getting better at what you do. You can always improve.

What advice would you give millennial entrepreneurs?

• Don’t make excuses for yourself.
• People will respect you for taking action at a younger age
• Don’t worry about what people think – concentrate on knowing your craft and being great at what you do. It will show through.
• Your youth is an advantage.

What’s been your biggest failure in your business and what did you learn?

• Getting too confident.
• Don’t get too confident and think that you can go outside your process or system that you have proven to work.

At the 38 min mark, Antoine shares some trends he sees coming in real estate…

• The market is going to take a hit. The economy will have a downturn.
• There are a lot of people flipping luxury homes and not leaving much margin or room for error. If the market correct, just 10%, they’ll be underwater.
• The Airbnb model is going to suffer. A lot of people are now making their income solely off of Airbnb and when the market corrects and people are spending less to travel or traveling less, this is going to hurt them and that income is going to be hit.
• The value of the Airbnb property will suffer as well.
• Be prepared always for a downturn

Best Quote: Don’t be a full time seminar goer who never does anything with what you learn in the seminar. Learn and then take action on what you learn.

Antoine's Misfit 3:

1. Take action! Learn test, learn test, and don’t be afraid to pivot.
2. Look at your resources (time, money, knowledge) and make sure they are aligned with where things are at in the market cycle today. What can you start off with today? Match your resources to where they fit best in a market.
3. Systematize EVERYTHING! Every week, make it a goal to systematize something in your business.

This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Frank Ieraci. Frank started out owning a successful marketing business, but after a few years, realized that there was a great niche in helping clients grow their business through maximizing the power of LinkedIn. He did very well and grew an even larger business, but after some time, realized, that even though the results he was delivering for clients were excellent, the business couldn’t scale unless he found a way to automate his manual processes.

He figured it out and created one of the top LinkedIn marketing software solutions out there today, ClickedIn. ClickedIn is used by everyone from small one person businesses to large enterprise organizations, even groups like entrepreneur magazine.

With Frank’s background and experience, it was only fitting that I ask him on the show to discuss what he’s learned on his entrepreneur journey and his secrets on how use LinkedIn to help maximize the growth of your business.

www.ClickedIn.io

Through year end 2019, ClickedIn is offering a 14-day free trial of their software for $1. You can sign up right from the website.

Frank has been in marketing for over a decade. He started out in the SEO, AdWords, and social media space, but quickly saw how saturated the market had become. About 7 years ago, he sold off that side of his company and decided to focus solely on helping people grow their business through LinkedIn. During that time, he built a personal network with over 7.2 million connections.

Frank started out as a consultant helping clients get leads through a unique, but manual process. He guaranteed the service and had a lot of success. A few years ago, he had his “light bulb” go off and had an idea to build a software that mirrored what he did manually to help even more people around their world grow their business and that’s when ClickedIn was born.

Why LinkedIn?

• It was an untapped market
• LinkedIn is a B2B platform so you can target much better
• You can get a better 1 on 1 interaction on LinkedIn which makes the conversation much easier.
• It allows you to get that direct relationship.

Did anything surprise you about LinkedIn as you started to work with it and build ClickedIn?

• The quality of the conversations you are able to have – they are so much better than other platforms.
• You can do it without ad spend.
• You can book and get meetings with potential prospects much easier.

At the 9 min mark, Frank talks about ClickedIn and some of the nuances of LinkedIn and how it works…

• ClickedIn allows you to target your exact best match or prospect.
• It then communicates with a new connection for you based on messaging you create, but is smart and has an AI component that recognizes positive and negative responses.
• LinkedIn has specific rules for all users.
• LinkedIn wants to see a healthy ratio of connections sent out to acceptance.
• LinkedIn caps a user at 110 connections per day.
• LinkedIn also monitors page views to make sure you are not spamming inside the platform.
• LinkedIn allows you to export only a certain amount of your connections and to get all the data, you need to have a paid account.

A lot of social media marketing and automation services have been shut down, how have you avoided that with ClickedIn?

• The companies getting shut down are Chrome extensions and the social media platforms can see you are using them just from the URL in the chrome extension when you login.
• ClickedIn is a fully web-based platform, no extensions. When it connects, it looks the same as you do sitting at your desk. The software also follows all of the LinkedIn rules and terms and conditions.

How can someone maximize the reach of their LinkedIn profile?

• Think of LinkedIn as your digital resume.
• Have a professional photo. LinkedIn is not Facebook or Instagram, people are looking for business opportunities, so you need to look professional and like the executive that you are.
• A professional photo and banner have proven to help increase conversion rates.
• In your title section, put at least 3 key words of what you or your business is about. These help you rankings in search on LinkedIn.

At the 17 min mark, Frank talks about how he uses ClickedIn almost exclusively to grow his business and the best practices he’s learned about messaging and connecting with people in LinkedIn…

• First, know your audience. Know exactly who it is that you want to target.
• Social media is not about the number of connections you have – it’s about the quality of connections you have.
• Make quality your focus and then be very genuine in your messaging. Be yourself and who you truly are.
• When messaging, don’t go in for the sale on your first message.
• You do need to understand that people will want to know, “Who are you and what can you do for me,” but start out by engaging and giving before you ask for anything.
• Try to make things more conversational and temper your aggressiveness.

What are some of the most important things you’ve learned in building a software business?

• One word “PATIENCE!”
• You must have patience in building software because you are constantly improving things and adding new capabilities – and you have to deal with things not always working.
• You are constantly in a mode of testing, fixing, releasing, etc.

Besides patience, what you have you learned about yourself through your journey?

• You must learn to develop a ‘never quit attitude.”
• To get comfortable with the unknown
• Thrive in the face of challenge.
• It is so gratifying and rewarding to see what you’ve created help people.

At some point, you reached a breaking point, a time when you were on the brink of quitting. How did you overcome it?

• A lot of curse words
• It comes back to the whole reason why you started. The why.
• Nothing great ever comes easy and the bigger the obstacles you can overcome, the bigger your business can be.
• There are always a hundred reasons why you can give up and many times only one to keep you going. Always be looking for the one to remind yourself why you started your business and keep you moving forward.

Your best one piece of advice for a new entrepreneur starting out?

• Stay aggressive
• Stay focused
• A lot more are rooting for you to fail than succeed – tune it out.
• Refuse to quit – don’t give yourself another option.

Any trends across marketing or social media you see coming?

• Stay in tune with the guidelines and terms on the platforms because they are changing.
• Stay true to you through any change.
• Focus on the right approach and the conversation.
• Always make sure you are refining and be diligent about connecting with your target audience.

Best Quote:  Social media is not about the number of connections you have - it's about the quality of connections you have.

Frank's Misfit 3:

1. Refuse to be in the position you are in now.
2. Never quit or give in.
3. Stay aggressive and be patient.  Never be satisfied.

This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Kris Ward. Kris is an entrepreneur and founder of Shadowblast, a leading marketing agency in Canada. She is the author of the best-selling book and philosophy - Win the Hour, Win the Day. The systems Kris has developed and teaches help entrepreneurs not only better grow and run their businesses, but flourish in their personal life as well.

These systems were proven and put to the test when Kris went through a very tragic time in her life. You see, Kris is a widow. Her business was thriving and she had a wonderful life with the love of her life until her husband, John, passed away from cancer. The diagnosis came out of nowhere and was grim. Kris was determined to make the time they had left together the best she could. So she put work aside and immersed herself into John and making their last moments together the best she could. It was during this time, that her systems around Winning the Hour and Winning the Day were put to the test.

As Kris says, “My team did an excellent job following what we had put into place and I am forever grateful for them. They followed our best practices and the business ran smoothly without any issues.” Clients didn’t even know she was absent. It’s these principles that I am excited for Kris to share with you in this episode to teach you how to go from overwhelmed and overworked to thriving on your terms in life and business.

www.WintheHourWintheDay.com

Podcast: NOW Your Business

Kris was in business for over 4 years in her marketing agency when she found herself being overworked and had to find a way to make things easier. Her husband, John was her biggest fan and supporter, but she felt like she was letting him down with the time she was spending away.

She had always pushed back in “time management” because she was highly productive and did a lot more in a day than most people did. But she made the decision to really study how she could do even more with less and started to put some strategies in place. As Kris says, “It’s strategy vs. systems.”

And she did it. She went from working around the clock to working about 6-7 hours a day. It was just a couple years later that John was diagnosed with cancer. Just the doctor’s visits, chemo, etc. alone was time consuming, not to mention the emotional toil it took. Kris made the decision not to waste their time. They traveled and did a bunch of things together to make the most of their time and because of the strategies and systems of Win the Hour, Win the Day, she was able to work only 2-3 hours per week – for 2 years. And her business still thrived.

Her clients were shocked when they found out. They didn’t even know she was out and began to ask questions about how she was able to do it.

So Kris started helping people find “time empowerment.” She got rid of 80% of their “to do list” and 100% of their guilt.

“So many of us think that grinding it out is part of the entrepreneur journey when it’s not. Your passion and your work should support your life, not consume it.”

What’s the most important lesson you learned about life from your husband and going through what you went through together?

• The definition of what a problem is has changed completely. You find out what matters and what a real problem is takes on a new meaning.
• Ask the question, “Is that REALLY a problem?”

What mind shift must happen to take back control of your time?

• Any powerful change comes from a mind shift.
• It doesn’t happen from just finding some secret or strategy.
• Many of us have never been taught to respect or understand the foundations of time.
• We don’t look at our “Time Bank Account” and fundamentally, we are building everything we do on a flawed structure.
• Seeing the issue is the problem for most.

What is the issue people don’t see? Where do they falter?

• People don’t really understand or see their calendar as their “Time Bank Account”
• You don’t put things in you do every day, you put the external things.
• You hit the day thinking you have 8 hours to do everything in with your external appts., but you are not taking into account everything else you need to do – which may show, you only have 4 hours to do everything in.
• The one thing you cannot buy more of or change is time.
• We use a calendar as a reactive thing, but don’t use it as a GPS to navigate our business or our day – which is the foundation of the problem.

At the 14 min mark, Kris gives a great example of how we fight for our limitations instead of removing them…

Tell us about Win the Hour, Win the Day, and the Freedom Formula

• Focus. Studies are showing even more about the impact of not focusing or multi-tasking. It is almost the equivalent of being on drugs when it comes to impairing your productivity.
• You cannot shine a flashlight on two things at the same time. You must get serious about how and where you focus.
• To get better - Start with your creative work first in your day. Your first hour of work is incredibly important.
• Break things down and work backwards of what needs to be done to reach your outcome or goal.

At the 20 min mark, Kris shares the truth about “to do” lists…

• Get rid of 80% of your “to do” list by getting ridding of your bad habits. A to do list is really a list of rotating emergencies for most people.
• The biggest mistake people make is thinking a “to do” list is a plan or strategy when it is not. It cannot be truly measured.

What is the right way to plan to be productive?

• You have to work backwards to plan right. We do it in our personal lives all the time, but not in business very much.
• This is how you can create real plans and then systems around them to make a business go so that it can work on its own.
• Next, having a calendar that you know how much time you have for what you want to do makes you effective.
• You can then measure your progress by the steps from working backward and scheduling the tasks needed to reach to outcome or goal in your calendar with the time really have available.

At the 26-minute mark, Kris shares her thoughts on times of day we are more productive…

• Studies show we are more productive in the morning after sleeping. The science bares it out.
• No matter what you think, your brain is more tired later in the day.
• Do your creative work, first. You will see a major difference.
• Do more mundane, autopilot type tasks later in the day.

What is the #1 thing people can do starting right now to make the biggest difference in their productivity?

• Respect and really use your calendar as the tool that it is and can be for you.
• Put what you do in day in it and see what time you have left.
• Don’t fill it up and make busy work.
• Just be realistic about where you time goes and not as a diary for what happened yesterday.
• Put the things you do each day week in and out in your calendar at the times you typically do them. Standing meetings, specific tasks you have to do each week and so on. You’ll be amazed at what time you actually have left for real work.

Top tips on how to market a product or service?

• Be careful of having disjointed messaging. It needs to be consistent – the same message.
• Be careful not the change your persona or represent yourself differently for different audiences in social media. You don’t have to do that. Be how you are. Remember the “social” in social media.
• The idea of social media is to get to know, like, and trust people. If you are different online than you are in person, it will catch up with you.
• Be careful not to “present” – talk to people instead of presenting to them.
• Don’t over think it. Be you.

At the 41 minute mark, Kris talks about how to better automate your business and have it run for you.

• It doesn’t require the time and money that everyone thinks it does.
• Outsource obviously
• It is not just about strategies and systems, but keeping them as simple and easy to follow as possible to get the outcome desired.
• You do need a team around you to do it. But you can outsource a lot of it if you are willing and a little creative about it.
• Ask, “How do I do this once and make it duplicatable so it can be passed on and done by someone else?”

What is something you think every entrepreneur should know?

• Business should be fun.
• You should not have to sacrifice your life for your dreams.
• You don’t have to “pay the dues” in the traditional sense.
• Your goal should be create the systems to replace and reduce your hours not increase them.

Best Quote: So many of us think that grinding it out is part of the entrepreneur journey when it’s not. Your passion and your work should support your life, not consume it.

Kris's Misfit 3:

1. Lighten up and have fun, no matter what you do – business should be fun.
2. Don’t’ get caught up in the “busyness” and lose sight of the passion you set out to put into the world for what you are doing,
3. You are business athlete and you need to take care of the machine – your body. It’s the most important machine there is. Eat well, exercise, sleep right, etc.

Hello Misfit Nation! Welcome to another edition of "Lessons for Hannah!" In November of 2016, we introduced a new format that we are putting alongside our regular episodes called “Lessons for Hannah.” Hannah is my daughter and one of the main inspirations for the Misfit Entrepreneur. I wanted to have a place where she could go and learn from her daddy and his Misfit friends throughout her life….even after I am gone. If you haven’t listened to the first episode of "Lessons for Hannah," I urge you to as it gives some more background and tells the amazing story of how Hannah came to be in our lives.

"Lessons for Hannah" are short, very useful, and sometimes comical lessons, that I have learned which I want to share with you and give to Hannah to help in your lives. Because I want Hannah to have these for her life, I’m going to speak as though I am talking directly to her. These episodes are a lot of fun and if you think there is a lesson that we should include in these episodes, please don’t hesitate to send it over to us at support@misfitentrepreneur.com. We’d love to share it.

This week’s Lesson for Hannah

Hannah, Today I want to talk to you about happiness and joy. What it is, why it’s important, and most importantly how to find it and keep it in your life.

First, what is happiness? It’s a peculiar question isn’t it? Everyone talks about finding happiness or being happy, but no one ever stops to define what it is for themselves. And make no mistake, happiness means something different to everyone.

The dictionary defines happiness as “the quality or state of being happy and good fortune, pleasure, contentment, and joy.” I love the last one – joy. To me “joy” is a different type of state. When you have true joy, you almost feel like you are surrounded by goodness. Maybe that is where the old phrase “feeling like you are on cloud 9 comes from.” At any rate, you must define what happiness or joy is for yourself. My joy comes in multiple forms. It comes in the love of our family for each other. It comes in the incredible blessings in all areas of our lives from God. It even comes at mile 18 of a marathon. The way I keep my feeling of joy is to remind myself of it every day through gratitude and taking the time to be grateful for this amazing life and chance we have to make our impact on this world.

But, I can tell you this. After many years of studying the mind, how it works, our conditioning, and how we become who we are, I can say this for certain - I cannot make you a happy person.

It's simply not possible for someone else to make you a happy person. Oh, someone might be able to make you happy for a short time or in a moment, but true happiness, lasting joy must be found within.

It is up to you to decide whether you are happy or not. Every day I get up and do that by reminding myself of how blessed I am and to show gratitude for it.

There are several things that affect our ability to be and remain happy. And I just showed with my example of my daily gratitude routine above, they are all within our control. Everything from our mindset, to how we react to the things that happen to us, to what we tell ourselves is all in our control.

Let's start with what we tell ourselves. What we say to ourselves and about ourselves both internally and externally has a profound impact on us. Literally, what we think about ourselves becomes our reality. ​

Consider this. The person you talk to more than any other in your life and throughout your whole life is yourself. What are you saying?

If you believe you are not worthy of things in life like success or not worthy of being happy or say things like "I'm not good enough..." or "I’m terrible" or "Nothing ever goes right for me..." guess what is going to happen in your life. Exactly that. This happens because our beliefs are what manifest in our lives. If you believe in your mind that "Nothing ever goes right for me," then your mind will make sure things do not go right and look for everything that happens or can happen to back that up. Always remember that what you tell yourself becomes reality. And you have control of what you believe and tell yourself. It is your choice. So, if you want to be happier or find lasting joy, start by believing and speaking truth to power in your life to yourself.

The next thing we have control over is the way we react to the events that happen in our lives. No matter what happens, we have the ability to control how we react to it and choose to perceive it the way we want. The trick is stopping ourselves from just reacting and making the choice. When something does not go your way or goes against you, you can choose to allow it to make you unhappy and ruin aspects of your life, or you can choose not to let it do so. You can even choose to perceive it as a great opportunity to better yourself, learn, and grow. It is up to you, but how you deal with the challenges that come your way affects your happiness, and you have the power to choose how you respond to them.

Lastly, my personal belief is that the things that happen to us actually happen FOR us. Everything we go through gives us an opportunity to grow as an individual and become a better version of ourselves. Even the things that seem and feel absolutely terrible when we go through them help us to become stronger, give us an opportunity to learn more about ourselves and our capacity to endure, and bring about meaningful changes, if we look for them. Tragedies give us this opportunity as well. It is how we respond to tragedy that defines how we move on from it. Make no mistake, the hardest thing to do is find happiness and gratitude in the darkest of times, but it is there if you want to find it.

Regret is a terrible thing and waste of your focus, thought, and emotions. Everything that has had to happen to get you where you are right now had to happen exactly as it did. Everything that happened in our lives up until we held you in our arms in that moment in China had to happen exactly as it did or we may not be a family.

In fact, the chances of you, or any of us, even being alive at this moment in time are so infinitely small; it is almost impossible to even fathom the number. And for you to have life at this moment in time, means that trillions of people that could have been, are not. Instead, you are here in their place. Cherish it. Make the most of it. Let go of regret and embrace the incredible opportunity you have to choose to be happy, to fill your life with joy - and then make it so.

Hannah, and anyone listening, it comes down to this. You have a choice every day to be happy and find joy or deny it in your life. My hope is that you choose to find the happiness and joy that exists all around you every day - the world will be brighter for you having done so. ​

I love you, ​

Daddy 

Best Quote: You have a choice every day to be happy and find joy or deny it in your life. My hope is that you choose to find the happiness and joy that exists all around you every day - the world will be brighter for you having done so.

Misfit 3:

1. Define what happiness and joy mean to you and for you
2. The person you talk to more than any other in your life and throughout your whole life is yourself. Are you saying the right things?
3. You have a choice every day to be happy and find joy or deny it in your life. Choose wisely.