Page 90 - Social Media Marketing

70 Walk Like a Giant, Sell Like a Madman

assistants allow you more flexibility in scaling your workforce up
or down depending on how busy you become.

For more about virtual assistants, refer to Chapter 19, "Scaling
Your Business with Virtual Assistants."

Hire the Best You Can Get

Today (and I admit this is fairly advanced for a salesperson) I have
my own in-house CPA. I know a lot of people will say, "I will never
be able to afford an in-house CPA." Well, if you think never, you
never wilL (It never crossed my mind that I would sell 300 or 400
houses in one year, either.) One of the very few areas where I was
smart enough, or lucky enough, not to make major mistakes early
on in my career was in seeing the potential of income properties. I
used to own around 300 investment properties. I couldn't possibly
have handled that many properties without help! I had a property
manager to find tenants and collect the rent and my CPA to do the
tax stuff for me. I also had a crew and a supervisor in charge of
handling the maintenance and repairs.

I also hired an in-house attorney. I didn't hire an attorney because
of litigation or lawsuits. Attorneys bring much more to the table than
just litigation skills. I hired an attorney to help families facing fore-
closure and work with banks on foreclosed properties. The attorney
can talk to them about all the legalities, like assignments and for-
bearance agreements. He eventually obtained his real estate license
to make him more qualified for dealing with my clients. I was able
to teach him what I knew about real estate and use his knowledge
about the law. The combination of the two helped me develop a
very large profit center at Ralph Roberts Realty: buying and selling
foreclosed homes. Now, I could have been intimidated taking on
an attorney with so much knowledge and talent, but instead of be-
ing intimidated, I harnessed his gifts and created a lucrative profit
center around him.

Once everything was running smoothly, I took it a step further.
I hired an in-house controller to help direct my financial dealings
and career in generaL I put together a personal advisory board