Derek Justin

Great journeys always seem to start with a fork in the road.

I was going through a transition with the job I’d had for a long time, and I felt this nagging thought.

I just knew there were valuable skills out there that I could use to work for myself from home.

I took a course on how to blog and build WordPress websites. I was watching a lot of YouTube videos and just teaching myself.

Then my buddy came over, asked what I was working on. I told him I was building websites and he laughed because he’d just talked to a car repairman who’d said he needed one.

Long story short: I sold that guy a website for $1,200 — and I never looked back.

I wanted to get more clients, but it was taking a long time to get my sites ranking high on Google. That’s how I found the Local Marketing Vault. I needed to learn how to do digital ads.

Money loves speed. I needed to reduce the time between someone paying me and then getting value from me.

I learned how to get customers FAST for business owners. I took on my realtor friend as a client and got her 78 leads in two weeks. That was 2017.

Today, my business focuses solely on getting leads for realtors and helping other digital marketers scale their business faster.

1. Learn a valuable skill like lead generation

2. Work your ass off to get your first clients

3. Let people down — that’s what forces you to improve

4. Choose one niche to focus your energy on

5. Master the process of getting them awesome results

6. Create an internal “flow” to increase speed of delivery

   
   

What shot me from 10 clients to 87 was learning how to build my internal system.

When I switched from SEO to lead gen, I assumed everything was going great because people were getting leads WAY faster.

So it was like, “Cool, here’s the leads.” But I had no idea what the client did with them after I sent them.

I signed up for a mastermind that taught me how to build out systems so that everything in my business flows seamlessly.

I hired a team to generate leads for my agency, handle the sales and client success, and to automate fulfillment like running the ads.

We got the process flowing so well that 3-4 people could manage 50 clients at a time.

How did we do this? By learning how to do the unsexy parts of business like tracking sheets. We tracked data to figure out how long it took our clients to get the result they wanted. This made all the difference in improving their experience with us.

Creating that system flow means that other people can come in and clearly understand what we sell, who we sell to, and HOW we get it done.

If you’re stuck at a few clients, I would look at how messy your internal process is.

Isn’t Everyone + Their Mom Doing Digital Marketing Today?

Yes — it’s saturated with people who have 1-2 clients. Not a lot of people scale past 10 clients.

If you want to grow a real business, you’ve got to be able to say, “We work with these people, we get them these results, and here’s how we’ve perfected that process.”

People have this false belief that choosing one niche is going to limit them. But that’s only the case if you’re mediocre at what you do.

I chose to work with realtors. There are over 1.8 million realtors in the US alone. I’ve mastered the equation of how long it takes to get them awesome results.

Now, if a plumber came to me wanting the same service, I have to learn his customers, his offer, his hook; I have to write new copy, write unique emails, and learn what ads perform best.

Master one niche, then you can collapse your fulfillment process so it runs like a machine.

I’ve intentionally built automations and systems to “collapse” delivery. That transition from prospect → client → onboarding → ads running can happen in days instead of weeks.

For people just starting their online business, I would do the Grant Cardone method — get underpaid so you can get overpaid.

Get a bunch of people through your door, provide them with real value, and then up your prices as you get better.

I did some research in the beginning on what other marketers were charging for realtors. Then I’d just be honest with people, tell them I was still figuring this stuff out, and accept less than the average marketer would.

I focused on that niche and eventually created a few different plan options from $97 / month all the way up to a $1,997 / month VIP package.

If you want to win in business, you need to get over your fear of putting yourself out there.

Don’t be afraid to talk about your business with people you already know. That’s how I got my first SMMA clients.

As human beings, we want to help each other.

So, I’d just talk to my friends and family members and say something like,
“I’m doing this thing where I’m helping realtors get more clients.”

Talk about what you’re doing on your Facebook. Tell people who you’re helping.

Those who know you and like you are going to want to help you because it makes them look good.

And if you’re unsure of what to say, here are my exact scripts!

Most of us spent years in school and then working for somebody. We’ve been trained to have someone else dictate our time. Then you become your own boss and you’re on your own.

If no one is your boss, make your calendar your boss.

When I was prospecting on my own, I did nothing but that from 10-12:30 on Monday to Thursday. I wouldn’t leave my chair or get a snack or look at my phone.

Schedule your priority tasks and your meetings, and do nothing but what is scheduled in that slot.

The reason most of us are here in entrepreneur world is because we like to figure things out on our own — and that’s the slowest path to getting where we’re trying to go.

If you haven’t heard it enough yet, money loves speed.

Learn from someone who’s done what you’re trying to do, and follow every single step.

If you’ve chosen to learn a skill through a program like LMV, you’ve got to trust the person that’s leading you. That means following every step until you’ve mastered it and gotten the result you want.

If someone gave you their recipe for their world-famous pie, don’t tweak the recipe and then complain when your pie doesn’t taste like theirs.

For New Entrepreneurs

1. You have to be your client first. Get yourself leads. Get yourself booked calls, then sell that to somebody else.

2. Collapse fulfilment. If you can promise someone a result in a short and specific amount of time, that’s easy to sell.

3. If you want to move slow, go alone. If you want to progress faster, learn from those who have done it. I’ve joined so many programs, courses, and masterminds because I want to learn what works.

   
   

If you’re committed to the journey of…
being in the best shape of your life
earning more money in better ways, and
having meaningful relationships
then join others like you in our community!