The Autopilot Approach to Raising Capital with Yakov Smart – EP 366

The Fastest Way To Build A Six Or Even… Seven Figure Real Estate EMPIRE! 

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If you’ve been following the podcast, it should be no secret that my favorite real estate topic is raising capital. And today’s guest is considered one of the leading experts in the industry when it comes to attracting high-net-worth investors and raising capital online.

Yakov Smart is the leader of the Investor Attraction Academy and the author of Disrupting LinkedIn. He’s also shared the stage with Samantha DeBianchi from Bravo’s hit TV show, Million Dollar Listing, and is a highly sought-after authority who helps real estate entrepreneurs build out their automated funnels for attracting new investors.

In our conversation, Yakov shares the story of how he built his credibility and authority to become a world-class fundraiser, explains why now’s the perfect time to grow your network (even if you’re not looking to do a deal right now), and he’ll show you how to use social media to build meaningful, authentic relationships–without selling your soul.

Key Takeaways with Yakov Smart

  • How Yakov uses LinkedIn to build automated fundraising machines.
  • The power of the one-to-many webinar for fundraising.
  • Why LinkedIn is the very best platform for recruiting high net worth individuals.
  • The do’s and don’ts of reaching out to high net worth investors–and Yakov’s proven eight-step process.
  • How so many investors leave money and opportunities on the table by failing to communicate with their lists or guide their investors.

Yakov Smart Tweetables

“If you have a bigger network of investors, even if people don’t invest with you on the first deal or the first syndication, your probabilities of doing bigger raises go way up.”

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Josh Cantwell: Hey, guys, welcome back to Accelerated Investor. I’m your host, Josh Cantwell. Today, I’m going to be talking about my favorite topic in all of real estate, which is raising capital and specifically raising capital on autopilot from high-net-worth investors from LinkedIn.

So, today, I brought on a guest to help me talk about this topic. His name is Yakov Smart. He is considered one of the leading experts in the industry when it comes to attracting high-net-worth investors and raising capital online. He is the author of a book called Disrupting LinkedIn and is a sought-after authority by top real estate entrepreneurs in the U.S. and Canada to help them build out their automated funnels for attracting investors.

He has shared the stage with Samantha DeBianchi from Bravo’s hit TV show, Million Dollar Listing. He’s a resident of Scottsdale, Arizona, and is a proud leader of what he calls the Investor Attraction Academy. You can also check out his webinar on how to build out one of these funnels at FindMoreInvestors.com/webinar.

Today, we’re going to talk about, number one, this specific system for attracting high-net-worth individuals, specifically from LinkedIn, and then building out an automated funnel. We’re going to talk about, number two, the one-to-many webinar concept; number three, why LinkedIn is the number one platform for recruiting high-net-worth individuals; and number four, why investors don’t communicate with their list or guide their investors enough. You’re going to enjoy this Accelerated Investor episode with me and Yakov Smart. Here we go.

[INTERVIEW]

Josh Cantwell: So, hey, Yakov, listen, I’m so excited to have you on our show today on an Accelerated Investor. Thanks for carving out a few minutes for us.

Yakov Smart: Hey, thank you for having me. Excited to be here.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, absolutely. So, listen, you’re a leading industry expert on how to raise capital from investors, high-net-worth investors, do it online, do it on autopilot. You have a webinar that teaches that in different programs and those kind of things. But what I’d like to do is we kind of introduce you to our audience is really get to know a little bit more about you personally. What are you working on today, this week, next week? What kind of passion projects are you working on that you’re really excited about?

Yakov Smart: Yeah, great question, Josh. So, when it comes to passion projects for me right now, it’s growing my business, scaling up, being able to work with more people. I mean, for people that don’t know us, we work with capital raisers on finding investors and that’s all we do. So, I think and we’ll talk about the state of the market and a few other things, but I think now is actually a great opportunity to be planting those seeds, building those relationships. And so, we’ve got some great strategies and systems for that. And right now, personally, we’re growing a Facebook community as part of that and is doing everything I can to expand our reach and really impact more people.

Josh Cantwell: I love it. And as you do that, obviously, the market’s evolved. What, if anything, concerns you? Or what, if anything, are you watching in the marketplace today, whether it could be deal flow, it could be the Federal Reserve, it could be interest rates, it could be just new construction? What are you watching that concerns you or that you’re really keeping your eye on today as an experienced capital raiser? What are some things about the marketplace right now that you’re excited about? Or what are some things that maybe you’re seeing some cracks a concern for?

Yakov Smart: So, I’ve got a unique perspective on it. So, with what’s happening, I think, there’s going to be great deals available. Whether it’s now, 12 months from now, 18 months from now, there’s going to be great deals, there’s going to be great opportunities, especially if there is a real downstream and a real recession. That’s just inevitably what happens, right?

So, I think now is absolutely the time to be going out there and cultivating those relationships. I think a lot of people are scared. I think a lot of people have taken some bad losses in the stock market. And I think to go out there, anyone who wants to raise capital, go out there and market yourself and start building those relationships and say, let people know, “Hey, there is another way. You don’t have to suffer with the stock market and inflation. You can actually beat this stuff in a way that’s safer with higher upside.” It almost sounds too good to be true, right?

So, getting those conversations with people, also, I think it’s a great time to be having those one-on-one conversations or one-to-many webinars, a great opportunity to do that and just educating people. So, maybe you want won’t have a deal for the next six months, but you know what? If you have a bigger network of investors, even if people don’t invest with you on the first deal or the first syndication, your probabilities of doing bigger raises go way up.

So, I think, it’s like the movie Jaws. They saw the shark, “Hey, we’re going to need a bigger boat.” So, I think now, people are realizing they need a bigger boat, they need a larger pool of investors, no matter how big their pool of investors already is, no matter how much they’ve already raised.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, I love it. So, tell us about how, as you got started with raising capital and then you’ve evolved over time, you’ve done an amazing job of raising money, you become kind of an industry-leading expert on this, specifically working with high-net-worth individuals and investors. Tell us specifically, how did that, let’s say, that credibility build for you? And how did that recognition in the marketplace happen for you? What did you do, the building blocks to actually build the reputation that you have now that you’re hosting these webinars, raising a lot of money? What are some things you thought you’ve done over the last couple of years to kind of block after block, thing after thing that’s allowed you to kind of build the reputation that you have today?

Yakov Smart: Yeah. So, I got my start in, I would say, on the online world back 2014, 2015, messing around, doing things like podcast, blogging, all these different things. My first online product was actually an e-book for college students, and I did succeed in college because I was in college, was like, hey, I’ll make some money that way, which made a little bit of money. But more importantly, I got the experience and I got the reps.

When I started my business in its original iteration, we were working with business owners, teaching lead generation, teaching online marketing, working with a number of business owners primarily focused on LinkedIn. One thing that was really monumental for me, I wrote a book on it. This was back in 2016, 2017, before a lot of people even knew LinkedIn could be a viable marketing tool, right? They saw it as more of a resume platform.

And then, I was very much in the event space, learned how to do webinars, all that kind of stuff, just because I kind of had to, didn’t have anyone to do it for me. And then 2020 happened and that was a huge shift obviously for a lot of people. And I started having capital raise or syndicators reaching out to me and saying, “Hey, I know you’re known for this stuff right here. Do you think it can be applied to finding investors?” And I said, “Well, why not?”

So, I kind of took a deep dive into this space originally just doing little courses, info products, stuff like that. You’re putting content out there and then really evolved the past couple of years in something that’s much more turnkey where we actually set up the automation, the key systems for people because I think a big part of the challenge is what exactly do you say to get your foot in the door. Imagine you’re a complete stranger. They’re a high-net-worth individual. You’re not going to pitch them a deal out of the gate.

But what do you say to get your foot in the door so they actually pay attention when there’s so much noise out there, especially on social media? So, really, honing in on that. And it’s evolved to the point where right now, we look at things a lot more holistically. It’s not just LinkedIn folks. It’s about having this online platform, being able to get people in the door and then educate people, get them bought into you, but also get them bought into your opportunities, because a lot of people make it about the deal. I really don’t think it’s about the deal as much as it is about the person, and also, what’s in it for them, right?

So, a lot of people say, “Hey, we got the best deal. We’re going to raise so much money.” And they’re disappointed because it’s a lot harder to do versus if you’ve already got the relationship and they’re what we call deal ready, that’s where the magic happens, if you will.

Josh Cantwell: No doubt. I love it. We’ve been really successful. We go into raising for a deal over subscribing because we built the relationships ahead of time with either the one-on-one Zooms or the one-to-many webinars and educating people. And then when the deal comes, I love telling people and educating them about a deal or a hypothetical deal and they love it. They’re like, “Okay, when are you going to have a deal?” I said, “Well, I don’t really have anything for you to invest in right now.” And I know that when the deal comes in the future, they’re going to be one of the first ones to hop in.

So, let’s peel back the onion a little bit for a second, Yakov, and just look at, okay, if they want to register for your webinar, everybody on this podcast can go FindMoreInvestors.com/webinar. And Yakov, obviously, we don’t have a full 60 or 90 minutes to cover everything, but if they go there and register, FindMoreInvestors.com/webinar, you’re going to walk them through a couple of steps.

So, let’s just peel back the onion on these steps from a high level as much as we can cover on this podcast. What are some of the things they would learn on that webinar? What can we reveal to them to give them a little bit of a taste? So, walk us through some of those steps.

Yakov Smart: Yeah, definitely. So, one of the biggest things that people are getting started with this stuff is what we call paradigm shifts, right? So, thinking about things a little bit differently because a lot of people think about social media and they’re thinking about, okay, I need to figure out something to post and then people reach out to me, but I don’t have time to figure out what to post. I don’t really know. I tried posting something, but it got two likes, it didn’t really happen for me. I’m not a content creator. This technology stuff is a little bit intimidating, honestly. So, what in the world do I do, right?

And one of the things that we talk on the webinar is how can you use social media as a relationship-building platform without selling your soul. So, what does that mean? You don’t have to do a lot of these things that are super– yes, it’s good to leave your comfort zone, but at the same time, you don’t have to do a lot of these things just because you see other people doing them because a lot of people that are doing them are doing them successfully, first of all, right?

So, we talk about this concept of using social media, using LinkedIn specifically for this is one of the best tools to build a targeted list of high-net-worth individuals. Old school way to do it is you go in, you buy a list, you pay a list broker $10,000 to $20000. This data, it’s up to date, it’s available in real time on LinkedIn. And you can build this, you know what you’re doing in a matter of minutes, right?

So, fishing in the right pond is kind of the first big paradigm shift. And I’m big on– for people, especially when they’re starting out in their marketing platform and investor attraction, big on direct messages. Why is that? Because the conversation gets delivered directly. You’re not leaving. It’s a chance of some algorithm whether or not the person sees the message and you’re going to get a higher open rate than emails because there’s an intimacy that happens in direct message.

Now, that’s both a power and responsibility because that can be abused. If you’re sending these long-winded messages, you’re pitching people out of the gate. First of all, it’s illegal, not SEC-compliant. You don’t want to be doing that, right? But instead, the message is an opportunity to get your foot in the door for people to start building their relationships, start planning the seed, and get them just curious enough to want to know more. That’s where the first message comes in, right?

So, once people get going, just to think about it as a system, you’ll imagine, let’s say you reach 100 new people per week. Because I think part of the challenge for most people out there trying to raise capital, they’re just not reaching enough people with their message, not with the right people, if you will, right? And just posting something and leaving it to chance doesn’t mean that you’re not going get there, but if you’re systematically and automatically sending 100 messages a week that are feeling personalized, and out of those 100 messages, let’s say anywhere three to five people actually end up booking those intro calls per week and that happens systematically without having to give it any additional effort, once you’ve got it down, then that’s really where you build a strong foundation.

This is what I always tell people, right? The different levels of investor attraction to the first foundation is can you book those handful of calls every single week, especially if you’re just starting out with list building or finding investors beyond your current network. Now, there’s also strategies for reactivating your current network and webinars, all these different things, but at a foundational level and at what we talk about on the webinar is this possibility of having a targeted list of new people to meet, just like you would at a big conference or event.

But being able to do this from the comfort of your own home, have it run on autopilot and be booking meetings each and every week, not to pitch a deal right out of the gate. Just like you said, Josh, you start building a relationship, invoking curiosity, because a lot of people, especially people in this world aren’t aware of this, like people don’t know what a syndication is, right? A lot of people don’t even know what passive investing really means. And they’re making decent money and they’re sitting on decent money in retirement accounts. So, it’s that first step in having the conversations and reaching more people.

Josh Cantwell: I love it. So, the paradigm shift coming from making relationships, posting the direct message, the posting of direct message, people on LinkedIn, which is a very professional platform, more professional video, more professional posts, and then ultimately taking that direct message on to a possible one on one, maybe through a Calendly link and that kind of thing to a one-on-one call, maybe a Zoom, a cell phone call, and then getting to know them.

And look, whether you’re doing 506(b) or 506(c), even if it’s 506(c) and they’re high-net-worth people and you can pitch a deal right away, you can generally solicit. We all know that that doesn’t really work. You have to build the relationship first. So, I even tell people when I’m on the phone and I know they’re highly accredited and I know they’re worth a lot of money and I know I could pitch them right away, I still tell them, “Hey, the SEC requires that we have a prior existing relationship before I show you a deal.”

So, if it’s okay with you, I’m going to ask you a lot of questions about your net worth and what you’re investing strategies are, what your timeline is. You’re investing for college, retirement. Are you just trying to get diversification? I really need to know all these things about you to see if you qualify to invest in something like this.

And then people realize, like, okay, great, Josh isn’t going to just jump on and sell me, pitch me right away. So, there’s a lot of pressure that comes off. And number two, I find that more people, the more they talk about themselves, the more they’re selling themselves on me, right? Because the more questions I ask, I tell everybody, “Look, he who asks the questions is in control.” Look, I don’t have to tell anything about myself. I don’t have to say anything. Maybe a quick little pitch intro, talk about some of the deals I’ve done just so they know that I’m legit. I’ve done a few things. Maybe that takes me two minutes. The rest of it really is about them. It’s about the relationship building.

And I tell them the SEC requires it so that they know these questions are really there to help build this relationship. And then I could show you maybe a past deal, and then maybe we have a relationship and I can show you a future deal flow. It all starts with– but the question, even around all of that, Yakov, which I love what you’re talking about, is you’ve got to be active at the front end to make those hundred direct messages, those direct connections, maybe book three to five calls per week. That creates a top of the funnel, right?

Now, what happens from there, because I can only follow up so much on one person, but there’s a lot of follow-up automation that has to happen if I’ve got hundreds of people or dozens of people in my funnel. So, tell us what they’re going to learn on your webinar. What kind of follow-up stuff works?

Yakov Smart: Well, email marketing is a big thing, and a lot of people in this space, we even raise a lot of money, are missing the boat on email marketing. They’re sending a monthly newsletter or a quarterly newsletter to people on their list, whether or not people have invested with them. We have to think about list segmentation, right? You want to speak a little bit differently to people who’ve already invested with you because the goal there is to create more referrals to create repeat investors versus the people who haven’t invested yet. It’s a little bit of a different conversation versus the people, maybe they saw the podcast or they opted into something. They haven’t got on the phone with you. The goal there is to get that intro call scheduled, right?

So, overall, with email marketing and keeping in touch with people at segmenting the database, doing it one to many, because let’s face it, we’re all busy. We’re not going to remember to follow up with everyone one on one. That’s why we have different scenarios. That’s why we have autoresponders, right? And it’s going to sound crazy to some people and I can impact this a little bit, I recommend emailing your list at least once a week, not once a month, not once a quarter, at least once a week, especially when you don’t have a deal because one of the worst things you can do is they got on your list, they had a call, and then six months later, they haven’t heard anything from you. Now, deal alert. Deal alert.

Josh Cantwell: Who’s this guy? Where’d this email come from. People opt in for so much stuff, they forget what they opted in for. So, if you wait once to follow up with people, they’re going to be like, “Oh, this is just spam.” And then you’re like, “You know, you actually opted in on my website.” You’re like, “I don’t remember. I opted in on 20 websites.”

Yakov Smart: Yeah. It’s got to be a stickier relationship, right? So, just think of it this way. Let’s say you’re sending 52 emails a year. There’s 52 weeks in a year. And the other guy is sending a monthly newsletter. Let’s say, that’s what they’re doing. One person’s touching the person 12 times, the other person’s touching the person 52 times, plus when you have deals, you’re doing deal alerts, you’re doing additional touchpoints.

Even if the email doesn’t get open, they’re still seeing your name, they’re still seeing the subject line. So, it’s a reminder to the subconscious. So, that’s a really big thing. Having those backend systems as well is key. And also, thinking of it as a customer experience rather than something transactional where yes, I got this person to wire 50,000. Awesome, right? Instead, customer experience, repeat business referrals, and really being the person guiding them along the journey, that’s really key.

A lot of people in this space take what I call a broker approach where they’re just like, “Oh, I’m going to pitch deals to people and I’m going to raise money and sell, sell, sell.” That’s cool, that’s awesome, but the long-term approach and I think the people who are the most successful in raising capital and getting oversubscribed deals, they have more demand and they have supply, right? And that starts with being the guide and being the person indoctrinating these people into the way to think about investing, what to look for, and having that relationship based on real trust.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, I love it. I love the words you use, being their guide, right? I was a financial advisor from 1997 to 2004 and we were taught to get clients not to sell products. You wanted to build your client list. It didn’t matter if they had small money, big money. You never knew, first of all, what kind of money they had or what kind of money they would come into. You also didn’t know who they knew, who they could refer. So, it was really at the beginning stages of building a financial planning practice, we would call it, just like a medical practice or a dental practice. We were all in the client acquisition mode.

Some guys would buy life insurance, some guys would do an IRA rollover. Some guys had a million bucks in a stock account, whatever it was, we didn’t care. We wanted clients, but because then, we would guide them through the process of really helping them manage their money and building out a full financial plan. You can’t do that in one or two meetings. You can’t write a full financial plan and execute a full financial plan in two weeks or four weeks. But you could get a client and you’re helping them and then you’re kind of selling them, if you will, on the long-term relationship. I’m going to guide you through managing your finances.

I’ve subscribed to that since 1997 because that’s what I was taught when I was 22 years old. Now, I’m 46 and I’ve learned that I want to guide people through the process. And Yakov, I’m sure you’ve seen it, you have guys that come in and they give you a $50,000 investment upfront. A couple of years later, they’re into you for $1.5 million because you’ve guided them through the process of learning about depreciation, cost segregation, GP/LP splits, internal rates of return. There’s so much you could teach somebody if you take the long-term approach.

So, I would encourage everybody to not only sign up and go through Yakov’s webinar to learn some of the things you’re learning now. But just like your real estate investments have a long-term approach, your relationships with investors have to be long term and you have to take that capacity of I’m going to guide them through it. Now, Yakov, what about, just curious your thoughts on text marketing, text messaging. You mentioned email marketing. I’m a huge proponent of email marketing at least once a week, obviously, text messaging as well. You could build automation systems that would allow for text. I raised a ton of money via text. What are your thoughts on that?

Yakov Smart: I’m a big fan, especially when you already have the relationship. I’m not a fan of cold texting if they don’t know you and just hoping you put a deal in front of it. If you’ve already got the relationship, especially when it’s crunch time to raise a deal, absolutely. And then having those texts have an action, where they can either text back or they can go to a website or they can watch the webinar, review the pitch deck. So, that’s all big. And you can automate a lot of the texting stuff as well, I think.

And I think, SMS marketing is so intimate, text message marketing, because we all have smartphones, we look at our phone, and we text our friends and family. So, it’s an honor and a privilege to be in people’s text threads so don’t abuse it. I wouldn’t overdo it, but short, sweet to the point, and yeah, especially when there’s something time sensitive, and I’m letting people know that. That’s key. But again, for lead generation, if it’s a cold list, I wouldn’t text people.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah. I’m not a big fan of cold list really at all. It’s just like there’s a lot of warm bodies on Facebook, LinkedIn especially. Why not? So, I’m curious, when you say automation, autopilot, what does that mean to you? What does it mean to have an automated system? Is it just email marketing? What else goes into it besides that?

Yakov Smart: So, email marketing is more or less on the back end. On the front end, it’s an automated system for getting people in the front door, getting people to say, “Yeah, I’m interested,” getting people reaching more of the right people, right? So, that’s automating the direct messages through LinkedIn. Not in a way that they look automated, where they still feel and look personalized but being able to automate that at scale.

Also, I’m big at webinars just like you are. And when we work with people, we set up what’s called an evergreen webinar funnel. So, imagine having an automated presentation 15 or 25 minutes typically. It’s an introduction to you, introduction to you, your investment thesis, what you’ve done, how you work with people so that you can create that trust one to many, right? So, now, someone’s coming into your world, they watch this webinar, they know a little bit about you. They’re bought in. It’s easier to have that person be deal ready, be bought into who you are.

So, being able to do that and have that on autopilot or let’s say you go to a conference and you meet someone, you’re like, “Hey, let’s set up a time to chat. And by the way, before we recorded this presentation or recorded this training, I’m going to send it to you too. It’s about 15, 20 minutes. Could you take a look?” Awesome. Now, they watched the webinar. Now, a lot of those questions that they might have out of the gate, it starts to appear a little more sophisticated. Even if they’re not, you’ve answered those one to many. And the great thing about that is you record it once and you leverage it. It’s a true marketing asset.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, no doubt. One of my favorite, I would call him, old-school marketers is Joe Polish. You’re probably familiar with Joe. And Joe used to say marketing is sales in print. So, instead of feeling like you have to sell, you just want to do a better job of marketing because marketing is going to get people predisposed, predisposition to doing business with you.

And so, like you said, if you’re sending out one email broadcast a quarter, you’re like, I don’t want to email my list too much, so I’m not going to send it out. The reverse is also true, where if you’re sending out maybe even two emails a week and it’s educational, it’s respectful, you’re honoring their time by keeping something short, something sweet that they can consume quickly, that marketing is selling for you without actually asking for the money. It’s building that credibility. It’s building that trust so that when you do get on the phone with them and now you have a deal, they’re deal ready, like you said. And now, it’s just a matter of, hey, do you like this deal or not? Are you liquid or not? Do you want to do $100,000 or $500,000, whatever? That’s really where you want to get to. It’s fantastic stuff.

Now, you mentioned your start and you were already in digital marketing. You did that all the way back 2014 and you kind of pivoted from some of the things you used to do into specifically raising money. If somebody had the perfect funnel, the perfect follow-up system, what do you think are some characteristics or traits of the perfect system? And I think this is pretty much what you teach in your webinar, like how to build the perfect automated system? But what are the maybe three to five must-haves? You mentioned LinkedIn direct messages. What else? If you kind of packaged it all up in a summary, what are people going to learn when they’re on the webinar? And what does that perfect system kind of entail?

Yakov Smart: So, the very first things, you’ve got to be getting new people in the door each and every week, and ideally, without you having to manually do it, that’s where the LinkedIn direct messages come in, right? Ideally, you also have a holistic strategy where you’ve got at least one other lead source, one other channel. It could be taking the direct messaging approach on Facebook. There’s some different ways to do that, that we talk about in our program. It could be, you’re going to be on X amount of podcasts every month. There’s a number of different strategies, but you’ve got to have investor attraction happening every week, especially if you’re starting out. It takes more energy to create that momentum and getting more investors in the door, right?

Once you’ve got investors in the door, we teach a two-step call process. You know what questions to ask, get people comfortable, get people familiar. Also, if we’re talking about a perfect automation, you having a great onboarding process where they fill out a form, they feel like they’re part of a club, maybe they get a gift. This is all a system. It sounds like a lot of work and it can be to set it up. But once you have this down, it’s a system. You can delegate this to people or you can have automation, do a lot of it, so that you’re well organized.

And then on the back end, it’s having email marketing, having follow-up. I’m also big from the financial planning space, this is where we got this from. So, Josh, you’re familiar with this. Having a meeting with the investor not to pitch them a deal, but at least once a year, “Hey, let’s review where you’re at, where you’re going,” almost like a financial review. And of course, that’s a great opportunity to strengthen the relationship and to ask for referrals.

And doing things like investor appreciation events, that kind of stuff, too. So, it’s something where you want to build it one step at a time, of course. And at the same time, there’s so much room for improvement when most people are raising capital to implement some of this stuff. Again, you’re not going to implement it in 24 hours, but over the months and years to come, you have to stop. It just compounded. It’s massive.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah. Yakov, I love what you just said because this system that you just described, just kind of wrote down eight steps, right? So, the direct messages at the top, number one. Number two, take a holistic approach. Number three, have a two-step call process. Number four, have an onboarding form. Number five, a gift. Number six, email marketing follow-up. Number seven, one meeting a year. And number eight, an investor appreciation of that.

I’ve been running a very similar system since 1997 because I wanted it in a totally different space. I wanted it in financial planning. And so, I’m going to tell my audience, “Look, this only works 100% of the time. It only works 100% of the time. You just have to do it.” And I realize there’s building blocks. You’re going to maybe start with the LinkedIn direct masters. Maybe you got to write some autoresponders, get on some podcasts. Those are all building blocks.

Once you build it, if you build it the right way, like a concrete house, it’s never going to fall down. It’s always going to provide shelter. It’s in this case, always going to provide leads. And so, if you’re looking for that full system and get all the detail, go register. We’re going to wrap up with this, so FindMoreInvestors.com/webinar.

I teach some similar things, but I love to hear multiple approaches. So, if you’re following me and you’re following what we do, great. Follow Yakov’s stuff as well because you want to hear from multiple experts to really dial in whatever system is going to work for you. Fantastic stuff. Yakov, any final kind of parting shots, words of advice, things you’ve learned along the way?

Yakov Smart: Yeah. Biggest thing is, again, that one step at a time, it can sound overwhelming, like, okay, I get it. There’s a lot to do. How am I going to do it? Maybe, they’re juggling other things, family, other commitments, just one step at a time. And again, just remember kind of the bigger vision. You start implementing some of this stuff, especially that very first step of getting more people in the door, having more conversations. That’s square one.

It’s not about going out there and creating a super fancy website. It’s not about hiring someone to do 50 blogs for you. All that stuff can come in the future. At the very foundation is, are you having conversations with new people every week? Are you talking about money? And are you planning the seed and building the relationships whether or not you have a deal?

Josh Cantwell: Oh, I love it. It’s fantastic stuff. He’s the author of Disrupting LinkedIn. His name is Yakov Smart. Thanks for being here today on Accelerated Investor.

Yakov Smart: Thank you for having me.

[CLOSING]

Josh Cantwell: Well, guys, there you have it. Listen, man, I love talking about raising capital. And like I said, I wrote down those eight steps that you’re going to learn when you listen to Yakov’s webinar. And look, if you’re not an expert at this, great. You’re probably an expert at something. Maybe you’re an expert at acquisitions, you’re an expert at asset management. So, if you’re not an expert at raising capital, then you need to find someone that can specifically help you, someone that can specifically help you build a funnel. That’s exactly what we talked about today.

So, if you’re not an expert, jump on his webinar. Make sure you listen to that. I’m sure there’s some sort of program or some sort of offer where he can do a funnel for you, or there’s a program you can buy to help learn how to build out your funnel. I know you guys have learned a lot from me. I love to listen to other experts that have a similar approach because it’s great to hear from multiple experts. And so, definitely check that out at FindMoreInvestors.com/webinar.

If you enjoyed the show, make sure you subscribe, number one. Open up your phone right now, your Google phone, your Android phone, your Apple phone. Smash down on whatever you’re listening, whether this is Audible, whether it’s iHeartRadio, whatever it’s called, whether it’s Apple Podcast or Spotify. Smash down on the Subscribe button right now. Number two, open that phone up and rate and review this podcast. That would be enormous for me because that’s how we share until we get into the algorithms. That’s how we expand the community.

Also, don’t forget to join our private Facebook group at FreelandVentures.com/Facebookgroup. You can go to FreelandVentures.com. You can find the link there, and then go join our Facebook group. If you enjoy the show, thank you so much for being here. It means so much to me to engage with you, to be with you, to bring this amazing content to you. It’s so much fun for me. So, thanks for letting me come into your mind, your ears, your heart today. And I’ll see you next time. Take care.

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