How Jenn Grandjean rebuilt her TikTok to over 20,000 followers using TikTok Live

Jenn Grandjean00:04

So prospecting should be the focal point of your business because if you’re not prospecting, lead generating, you’re not gonna have a business in 30, 60, 90, a year out if you’re not doing that consistently. Yes, there’s some fear of making phone calls. Yes, there’s some, oh, what if it doesn’t work out?

00:20A lot of it comes down to just that confidence and the limiting beliefs that we hang onto that help hold us back. I’m a very, very heavy prospector. I built my business cold calling. Vulcan7 has saved so much time, and not have to think about who am I gonna call next, or preparing lists or anything like that.

00:36Just the platform makes it so user-friendly, and it just helps you dial through all the things. But if you’re not prospecting, if you’re not lead generating, you’re not gonna be making money in 30, 60, 90 days.

Loida Velasquez01:02

What’s going on, everyone? Welcome back to a brand new episode of Vulcan7 Coaches and Mentors, where we bring you some of the best coaches and mentors in the industry, and they bring you some of their tips and strategies so that you can implement them in your business immediately. So with that being said, if you haven’t caught up on our previous episodes, make sure to check them out on our YouTube channel, or listen to them on your favorite streaming platform.

01:29Now today, we’re gonna talk prospecting, we’re gonna talk social media. So without further ado, I wanna bring on my guest, Jenn Grandjean. So Jenn, welcome.

Jenn Grandjean01:37

Hey, how you doing?

Loida Velasquez01:39

I’m doing great. So for everyone that’s watching that maybe is not familiar, go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself and maybe your background.

Jenn Grandjean01:46

Yeah, absolutely. So I have been in the real estate game for over a decade, probably about 12 years now, and started off on a team. I’ve pretty much done every single role in real estate that you can think of. So anything from admin assistant, to listing specialist, to operations manager, to on small teams, big teams.

02:03Started a boutique team, to a solo agent, to growing my own team. So currently right now I have got a team of about 10 people, including agents, admin staff, marketing director, things like that, that’s local. And then I also run a national team as well with almost about 50 agents right now.

Loida Velasquez02:22

That’s awesome.

02:23So for everyone that’s listening, there might be agents that are just starting out. There might also be agents that are ready to start growing a team, or even taking their business to a much higher level. So with that being said, what did your business look like for you in the beginning when you barely started?

Jenn Grandjean02:39

Yeah. So when I first started, I actually did join a very large, successful team. They were awesome, taught me so much, just kind of threw me in the fire, which I really appreciated. So that’s kind of what life looked like for me. But I stayed kind of in the route of, I was an admin assistant, transaction coordinator, listing specialist.

02:57So I was on a team in that capacity, and then it wasn’t until, gosh, probably six-ish, five, six, seven years in that I decided to go solo agent and completely do it on my own, because I’d been watching and training agents to do this a ton over my first few years in real estate and realized, hey, I’m missing out, so I need to jump in there and take a chance on myself.

03:22So that was kind of my transition into being a solo agent and then growing a team.

Loida Velasquez03:29

That’s awesome. And even like when you mentioned earlier, there’s so many different things that you have done in your business, and something that I see all the time is agents that want to get experience, so they’re like, “You know, I wanna go the transaction coordinator route, maybe start solo, maybe join a team.”

03:47So currently in your business, what does that look like?

Jenn Grandjean03:51

Yeah, no, that’s a great question. So before I created the national team that I have now, my advice to new agents would’ve been, “You know what? You should probably join a team,” because that was the route I went, right? And that is something that was good for me at the time, but what I didn’t realize was there are ways where you can build your own business, especially if you’re partnered with me or you’re on my Hype Squad.

04:14What I teach agents how to do is to build a personal brand from the ground up. So it doesn’t matter that you don’t come from that background, it doesn’t matter if you have sales experience or not. If someone plugs into the Hype Squad, they’re able to, if they want… Again, I think there’s a place for everyone, no matter what it is that you want or how you wanna build something in real estate.

04:33But what my encouragement would be to newer agents is that you can do this on your own. There are places that you can go. There’s resources. That’s why I designed the entire team that I have, the courses, the resources, documents, all the things. It’s designed for people who either are newer and wanna get their business started from the ground up and not take the detour of a team and then leaving down the road, or people who have hit a certain ceiling in their business and they maybe can’t figure out what that next level is or how to leverage and just take it to that next step.

05:05Also a really, really great place for people here. So that’s kind of, in a nutshell, my journey, and what I used to tell people is joining a team. But now it’s all set up so that someone could be successful from the ground up.

Loida Velasquez05:20

That’s awesome. So you mentioned the Hype Squad?

Jenn Grandjean05:23

Yes. Okay, so the Hype Squad, yes. That’s my national team. It’s not official. It’s not its own brokerage or anything like that. But the Hype Squad just means you’re within my organization, and you get access to all of my stuff for free. So ’cause I create courses, I have online courses.

05:39I use Discord for my coaching and training and housing a lot of the resources and documents that we create. We have over 70 different documents that are systems and processes. Anything from lead generation ideas, to scripts, to social media, to Canva templates, to anything you can think of, systems, processes.

05:58So that’s where I house all of that, plus host our team meetings every single week, and people get group coaching twice a month and one-on-one coaching with me once a month. So if you’re a part of the Hype Squad, all of that comes for free. If you’re not a part of the Hype Squad, that’s totally cool too.

06:14I have some paid group coaching and one-on-one coaching programs as well to help people out.

Loida Velasquez06:20

And where can people go to get more information on all of this?

Jenn Grandjean06:23

Absolutely. So I have a link in every single social media platform you can probably think of. The main link in bio there, you can go to my website, estateofjen.com.

06:33You can visit any one of those. My Linktree has all the links that you could ever want pertaining to real estate.

Loida Velasquez06:39

Awesome. And we’re gonna make-

Jenn Grandjean06:41

Specifically, though… Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Specifically, though, my main account would be TikTok. So estateofjenofficial on TikTok, estateofjen on every other social media platform.

Loida Velasquez06:49

Okay, perfect. And I was gonna say, we’re gonna put all of your links in the description box below anyway. So for anyone that’s watching, you can go and find Jenn pretty much anywhere and connect. Awesome. So when it comes to prospecting, I know that you mentioned branding. Pretty much anyone, whether they’re solo, can do this on their own.

07:08So the agents that you do coach, what do you teach when it comes to prospecting, lead generation?

Jenn Grandjean07:14

Yes. So prospecting, especially if you’re a newer agent or… well, any agent, prospecting should be the focal point of your business. Because if you’re not prospecting, lead generating, you’re not gonna have a business in 30, 60, 90, a year out if you’re not doing that consistently.

07:29So a lot of what I coach my agents on is, well, first and foremost, is truly having self-confidence and determining what are your limiting beliefs, what’s holding you back, and how do we get you through those? Because that typically is the first starting point. Yes, there’s some fear of making phone calls.

07:46Yes, there’s some, oh, what if it doesn’t work out, or what if I don’t like it? But really, if we get to the root of why do we not do the things we know we need to do for our business, a lot of it comes down to just that confidence and the limiting beliefs that we hang onto that help hold us back.

08:02So as far as prospecting goes, I’m a very, very heavy prospector. I built my business cold calling, and I actually didn’t even have something like Vulcan7. I didn’t have a power dialer doing it. So I know that if I can do it hand dialing, man, I have seen people on my Hype Squad and beyond be very, very successful with a power dialer.

08:21Saves so much time, and not have to think about who am I gonna call next, or preparing lists or anything like that. Just the platform makes it so user friendly and it just helps you dial, dial, dial through all the things. But if you’re not prospecting, you probably don’t have a very big business.

08:37And so we talk a lot about how to stay lead generating, even when you get busy, even when you have deals on the table. How if you’re not lead generating, you’re not gonna be making money in 30, 60, 90 days, so.

Loida Velasquez08:50

Awesome. And then you said, obviously your TikTok account is the main account where people can find you.

08:55So social media is also a big part of your life. And is this something that you also teach agents to do, or can you talk a little bit about that side of things?

Jenn Grandjean09:05

Yes. So social media is huge. It’s one of those things that I try to be on the cutting edge of tech and try and stay ahead of the game because I believe that AI and tech is not gonna replace real estate agents.

09:18I believe the real estate agents who know how to use those tools are gonna replace the people who don’t. And so that’s why I’m using Discord, which a lot of people or companies don’t know about, and that is super user-friendly and is changing the game. So social media, yes, I am helping my agents completely build out their personal brand.

09:37I have a marketing director who’s absolutely amazing. She helps as well, and is always in the Discord in our private office helping out the agents that want to learn, “Okay, how do I build a personal brand? What do I even do for that?” It’s not just about selling real estate, it’s about you have to have a brand that people wanna subscribe to, and they have to see you everywhere, the marketing rule of seven, right?

09:56So we teach all of these. We teach tried and true principles and concepts about marketing and sales, but then combine it with a modern approach so that you’re utilizing resources and social media platforms that actually make sense, where you’re gonna capture the largest audience and then actually convert.

10:13Because it’s the people who have been doing this for 40 years and don’t understand, they think that TikTok is just for dancing videos, that they’re gonna get left behind, right? Or they built up a business big enough to where they don’t have to utilize modern strategies, right?

10:27But is that how you’re gonna build a business today? Probably not. So we like to combine things like, yes, cold calling, that’s a tried and true strategy. But then also, what if you were putting out social media videos and you were gaining a big following about this, and then you were able to direct those people if they say, “Hey, not ready right now,” say, “Hey, no problem.

10:49Let me text you my social media profile,” and then they can see how many followers you have and how professional you are, or whatever it is, whatever image, whoever you are in business and how you run things. But if you have all of that set up, and you have a nice website, and they see your face in the community.

11:03Just all of those things we try and tie in together so that they work together, not that you have all these separate lead generation strategies, but they all are cohesive and they help each other, and therefore creates this personal brand that people wanna work with, especially, obviously, whoever your ideal client is.

Loida Velasquez11:20

Exactly. And I’m glad that you brought up that you used to do cold calling, and you’re obviously an expert at doing that, because nowadays I feel like a lot of agents sometimes get shiny object syndrome. They see maybe successful agents blowing up on TikTok or Instagram and think, “You know what?

11:36I’m just gonna stick to that. The calling, it’s so old school, it doesn’t work.” So for anyone that’s watching that maybe they are looking to take their business to the next level and wanna focus on one thing, or how can they divide their time between prospecting on the phones and also incorporating social media?

Jenn Grandjean11:53

Absolutely. I love this question. So I like to break things up, my activities or my lead gen strategies, into prospecting buckets and marketing buckets. And usually prospecting tends to be more short game, marketing tends to be more long game. So you don’t wanna put all your eggs in one or the other basket, right?

12:12Especially not all in the marketing basket. And social media can be short-term. Maybe you get lucky, maybe the first post you make about the fact that you’re in real estate now, you get somebody that says, “Oh yeah, I’m ready to go.” Like, “Okay, you sound great, let’s do this.” But the chances are you gotta build out, and really that’s more of a marketing tool for a long game to build relationships with people and then eventually have that be something where you’re generating clients, unless you have money to throw at it, right?

12:41So marketing I think of as time and money. Prospecting is activity, pure activity. Sure, maybe it costs you a little bit of money to get a Vulcan7 account, but in general, prospecting is an action that you take that you can track specifically that says, “I made 200 calls today, I spoke with 20 people, and I set one appointment.”

13:00That is a prospecting activity. And especially if you’re new to the game, or your business is slow, the prospecting activities and lead generating activities that you wanna be doing is that. Marketing, yes, but just know that, okay, if you’re heavy into the social media and all of that, that’s gonna be more of a long game.

13:19So if you start and stop and start and stop, it’s not gonna be very effective. You’re not gonna build those relationships. But honestly, the same thing goes for prospecting. If you were any business and you were open for two days a week, do you think you’re gonna have that great of a business or that many sales?

13:35Absolutely not. No. You can’t be open just two days a week to do lead generation. It has to be every single day. And by the way, two to three hours of cold calling or lead generation, that’s a part-time job. That’s all you gotta do to have a pretty darn successful real estate business. But it’s the people who can sustain it longer than two to three months when they don’t get instant gratification

13:57that stick with it, that actually end up winning, because it is the first few months that are the hardest, and that initial motivation wanes. But if you have the stamina to keep going and keep doing it, there’s no reason why you can’t have a successful real estate business regardless of your skill set or what you start with, because real estate’s a numbers game.

14:15And as soon as you know that and you capitalize on it, you can get anywhere you wanna go.

Loida Velasquez14:20

There you go. I feel like we should drop the mic because everything that you just said was just so perfect. So if you’re watching this, make sure to rewind and re-watch it because everything that Jenn just mentioned is exactly what the truth is.

14:31And yeah, I feel that a lot of agents, right when they’re about to break into that peak of that next level, they give up. Or just like the instant gratification, they think it doesn’t work. “I’ve been doing it for two months, it doesn’t work.” And it goes back to skills. How often are you doing it?

14:46How many people are you talking to? How committed and dedicated are you to this? Because this is more like a long-term game. So with that being said, now I wanna transition to obviously your social media. We are both a part of the Content to Close Summit, which is really exciting. So tell us a little bit more about what you’re gonna be talking about in that summit.

Jenn Grandjean15:06

Yes. Okay, so the Content to Close Summit, I’m super excited about. It’s February 21st through 23rd. I will be a speaker on the first day, on the 21st, and then I will have a live session on Friday, the 23rd. So my topic is Embracing Your TikTok Live Era, so I’m gonna be talking about how to utilize TikTok Lives, what to say.

15:25My handout for that is gonna be some ChatGPT prompts about ideas to discuss and talk about because I know… Believe me, I get it. When you’re literally by yourself and it’s quiet in the room and you’re just supposed to be in front of a camera talking about literally anything, I was afraid, too.

15:41I had fears and limiting beliefs around, like, “Oh my gosh, what do I talk about? I don’t know what to say next,” and, “Are people gonna like me?” And I don’t know, “Is this actually gonna work?” So I can tell you right now, I had built my account up to 60,000 followers for… It took me two years for TikTok to get up to 60,000 followers.

15:57I got banned for, I literally don’t know why, so I had to restart literally everything. I lost everything. That was my biggest social media account. I built that account back up to over 20,000 followers now in under six months, and I am telling you, I got really serious. Honestly, it was the best thing that could have happened.

16:14I mean, it was devastating at the time because that was literally my main lead generation source. But it was the best thing that could’ve happened because I decided to go just full throttle into, I’m gonna do TikTok Lives, because that’s actually what helped me grow the first time. But I was doing it half-ass.

16:29I wasn’t doing it full, I wasn’t doing it every single day, I wasn’t doing my lead generation every single day. And it truly is lead generation. And so I would love… I’m not a gatekeeper. I want people to know, hey, this stuff is working. This is what’s working for me. TikTok Live is a slept-on tool and resource to legitimately generate solid leads because you’re building relationships with your community and the people that are following you, and it helps you attract other people, it helps you boost your content.

16:55And so, yeah, TikTok Live is one of the best things I do for lead generation.

Loida Velasquez17:00

Awesome. And what I’m gonna be talking about is how to leverage AI and ChatGPT also, but on the YouTube side. So I’ve been growing that for many years, and just like you said, I treat this, and anyone that’s watching, any social media platform, you gotta treat it like a lead generation system.

17:15Because that’s exactly what it does. If you treat it like a business, you’re gonna get results like a business. And imagine if you don’t have to be making calls 24/7, and eventually you have these platforms feeding you leads, or you’re getting people reaching out to you. That just makes it so much easier.

17:32So Jenn, with that being said, once again, thank you so much. Please remind us where people can go and find you.

Jenn Grandjean17:40

Absolutely. So on TikTok, my favorite platform, you can find me @estateofjenofficial. Every single other platform you can think of, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, X, Pinterest, Facebook, all of it, is Estate of Jen.

17:53And my website, you can go to estateofjen.com, find all my courses. You can join my free Discord channel, which I freaking love. There’s hundreds of people in there that you can network with, connect with. If you end up joining the Hype Squad with me, which would be awesome, you get access to my private Hype Squad area where we do all of our, like I said, meetings and coaching, and all the resources are there.

18:14I’ve got courses available. If you’re on the Hype Squad, you get them for free. If not, no big deal. They are on the website that you can purchase there. So, so many different resources for you guys. I put out a lot of free content because I believe in real estate agents. I think there’s a space for everybody.

18:29So if this is your energy, if this is what you’re about, check out all my stuff, the free stuff. Or if you wanna schedule a call with me, you can do that to ask about the Hype Squad or any coaching programs I have.

Loida Velasquez18:39

Awesome. There you go. So thank you, Jenn, once again, for all the great value. And for everyone watching, we’ll see you on the next one.

18:47Bye.

Jenn Grandjean18:47

Bye. Stay hype.