IAM103 – Top Producing Real Estate Agent Provides Solutions for DC Area Clients

Dan Rochon is an Associate Broker in VA, Broker in MD; Operating Principal/ Owner of the Keller Williams Realty office in Alexandria – Kingstowne, VA; Owner of Rochon Investments, LLC; Owner and Co-founder of www.GreetingsVirginia.com and Owner of other Joint Ventures as well as a real estate principles instructor at Moseley Real Estate Schools. As a real estate sales agent, Dan and his team are consistently top producers in their marketplace and provide solutions for their clients. Through their investment company, Dan and Traci Rochon have been investing in residential and commercial real estate ventures for more than the past decade.

• CEO Hack: Meditate. Slow down to speed up.
• CEO Nugget: (1) Lead Generation (2) Organizational Building (3) Leadership / Look for surrounding yourself with the right people
• CEO Defined:  Open up the doorways for the people that I lead and clear the pathways and take a stand for the greatness within them

Website: https://www.greetingsvirginia.com/
Other Site: https://rocksolidrealestatecoaching.com/

Transcription:

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Intro 0:02

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

Gresham Harkless 0:27

Hello, hello, hello, this is Gresham Harkless from the I AM CEO Podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Dan Rochon of Keller Williams, Rochon Investments, and GreetingsVirginia.com. Dan, it's awesome to have you on the show.

Dan Rochon 0:40

Hey, Gresham, hello.

Gresham Harkless 0:41

Awesome. And what I wanted to do was just read a little bit more about Dan so you can hear about all the awesome things that he's doing. And Dan Rochon is an Associate Broker in Virginia, Broker in Maryland, Operating Principal, and Owner of the Keller Williams Realty office in Alexandria – Kingstowne, Virginia. He's the owner of Rochon Investments, LLC, and he's the Owner and Co-founder of GreetingsVirginia.com, and the Owner of other Joint Ventures as well as a real estate principal instructor at Moseley Real Estate Schools. As a real estate sales agent, Dan and his team are consistently top producers in their marketplace and provide solutions for their clients. Through their investment company Dan and Traci Rochon have been investing in residential and commercial real estate ventures for more than the past decade. Dan, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Dan Rochon 1:31

Yes, sir. Hello

Gresham Harkless 1:33

Awesome. Let's do it. So, the first question I had was just to kind of hear a little bit more about your CEO story. And what led you to start your business?

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Dan Rochon 1:40

Well, I got it, I got started in real estate sales about 11 years ago. And when I initially began in the business, it was really just too, just really as a real estate agent at the time to help people solve their problems and to help people to achieve their goals.

And I was fortunate enough to have had a relative amount of success. And that initially, to be able to have the opportunity to become the Operating Principle to Keller Williams Realty here in Alexandria Kingstowne. And today, it's really just about helping our agents to be the most productive to succeed in the business of real estate sales, which is really, really, I'm really grateful for the opportunity to be able to do that.

Gresham Harkless 2:19

Yeah. And, obviously, you're rocking and rolling, you're doing a bunch of different things. And a lot of people are in the real estate industry, but you seem to have obviously been successful and been able to kind of not only be successful but also kind of share that with other people to help them be successful as well, too.

Dan Rochon 2:33

Yeah, I mean, it's just not all success, though. I mean, it's I've definitely I've had some setbacks in the business, but I've definitely I've had some opportunities to grow in the business. And I've been fortunate enough to be able to know about the basics of real estate, the financing, the neighborhoods, a school, homeowner, homeownership issues, there are such things and really what I'm most happy to be able to do is to be able to take everything that I've learned personally and selling 1000s of homes to be able to then teach that to other real estate agents so that they can sell more homes so that they can be more productive. And so they can, they can really just earn a consistent income. And that's really what I do today.

Gresham Harkless 3:11

That makes perfect sense. And yet again, that opportunity to kind of pay it forward, so to speak. And so I wanted to drill down a little bit and ask you, I guess in here a little bit more about what you're doing to help out these real estate agents and how you're helping and serving the clients that you work with.

Dan Rochon 3:24

Sure. Well, if we're talking from an agent perspective of how we help the agents, it's really about providing them with, advanced agent education. We have a local education here with our brokerage with Keller Williams here in Alexandria. We also have regional education events where we bring in some of the top trainers just in the country in the world, really. And then national education events as well. I'll give you an example. We brought in a nominal trainer last week that we flew in from Cleveland, Ohio, a very skilled and she was able to show our agents. Her name is Pam O'Brien. And Pam was awesome.

And Pam was able to show our agents how they could build a real estate sales team and the steps from A to Z to do that. And she was also able to say okay, well, if you don't want to build a sales team, that's okay, here's how you can go out, you can be the very best solo agent. And here's the methodology that you can do that. So, that's an example of the type of training that we bring in, I would really say that we're a training company, and we're a technology company, and we've got some of the best technology in the business as a part of our organizations. I'm really, really happy to have that as well.

Gresham Harkless 4:28

Yeah, and I'm sure obviously your team probably as to because technology seems to be in every industry, no matter what it is that you're doing. And obviously, the training sounds like you're empowering the people that are in the real estate agents, which kind of goes on into the actual clients that they work with as well too. That'd be correct.

Dan Rochon 4:43

Absolutely. It's technology, it's data. I mean, we're in a data-driven industry right now. I mean, we're in a data-driven world. It's if you look at what Amazon's doing you look at what Facebook, Google you look at what everybody's doing, everyone collecting this data so that if you're a business owner and you're not focusing on the data, then you're probably doing your business a disservice.

So, our business, it's focusing on technology. It's focusing on having the right data so that our agents can make the right decisions to be able to serve their clients. And it's about training agents so that they can be most successful. So, yeah, I'd sum it up in those three areas, for sure.

Gresham Harkless 5:23

Awesome, awesome, awesome. And now I wanted to ask you for what I call your secret sauce. And this could be like a differentiator, what kind of sets you apart? So, what do you feel is kind of like your secret sauce Dan?

Dan Rochon 5:33

My secret sauce, if I would say I had a secret sauce or a superpower, it's emulating others it is I study success. And then I diligently take specific, measurable, achievable, repeatable, and timely things of successful people that I can understand, and then I replicate them. It's about having the right relationships that I'm able to find people that I call people of excellence that's either somebody that's in a similar position as I am or, in a position that is what I aspire to be.

And I understand is that what is their mindset. What are their behaviors? How do they spend their time? What's their physiology? Did they work out, they go to the gym, what's their environment like, I define that from those that are in front of me that I feel as though if they're really just nailing it, and then I emulate that in myself, and then I teach and lead others to do the same.

Gresham Harkless 6:30

I love that. Yeah, people have success. And I always hear and remind myself that success leaves clues. So, as you said if you're able to kind of be around those successful people study what they do, like you said, whether they're working out or meditating, whatever it is that they're doing to be successful if you can try to emulate that as much as possible that can, you know, increase the likelihood of you being successful.

Dan Rochon 6:48

Yeah, not only just successfully, please service failure.

Gresham Harkless 6:51

It's true.

Dan Rochon 6:52

So, it's, if they're both leaving clues, I'm going to do my best to understand that those have gone before me, and we're all humans, someone's gone before all of us. So, let's just take a moment and just sort of understand what is it that does make people successful. And what is it that sets people back as well?

Gresham Harkless 7:10

Very true, very true. So, awesome what I wanted to do was switch gears a little bit and ask you for what I call a CEO hack. And this could be an app or the book or even a habit that you have or some of those success clues that we kind of talked about, that make you more effective and efficient as a business owner.

Dan Rochon 7:27

Gresham, I'd have to say meditation, I mean, if of all the things that I do, I would, I would suggest that I'm a pretty hard charger, I'm sure that those that are listening to this podcast right now are if you're interested in CEOs, they're doers, and I'm certainly a doer in life. And what I find is that when I'm able to meditate on a daily basis, then I'm able to bring my mind to a place where I can just understand that we're all just, we're all connected.

The entire human existence is connected with each other and understands that people do the very best that they can possibly do, given the circumstances and the tools that they have. And when I slow myself down, to be able to understand this, that I'm able to be able to more easily connect with people, I'm more easily to serve others and really be able to be the most productive. So, it's sort of counterintuitive, a little bit slow down to speed up. But that's, I would say, That's my one hack that we share with you.

Gresham Harkless 8:24

Awesome, I love that. Yeah, slow down to sleep and speed up. And sometimes when you go, go go, you can sometimes forget that you can be even more productive and efficient if you take time to meditate and take time to slow down, as you said, so now I wanted to ask you what I call a CEO nugget. And this might be a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. Or if you can jump back in a time machine and give yourself a piece of advice. What would that be?

Dan Rochon 8:46

Well, for me in real estate sales, I would say that every business is gonna have three components. So, it's going to be lead generation, organization building, and then leadership and they build upon each other. So, when you're looking at, for example, my real estate sales business is about to lead generating for listings.

If I was to step back 11 years ago, when I started as a salesperson, I would have given myself this advice, I would say, Dan, yes, continually generate business listings for people that you can help to solve their problems that you can help them achieve their goals yet simultaneously that lead generates for talented people to surround yourself with.

And so it's really about understanding that the things that allow for us to succeed are the thoughts that we're going to have, they're the people that we're going to surround ourselves with. And when I have chosen to take time to really purposefully look for others to be in business with look for the right people to be in a relationship with look for the people that are going to inspire me that are going to push me that are going to help me find solutions, then I'm able to be the very best person that I can be.

And so I would say instead of just looking for the business as I did earlier, my career it's really just about it's about surrounding myself with the right people, and that's, that's what I would share with anybody that's either new to business or maybe already in business or are looking for a more successful life.

Gresham Harkless 10:07

I love that. And it's kind of understanding that different aspects of the business as you mentioned. And understand. It's not just about the quote-unquote, sales directly, but it's also about, you know, creating that environment so that you can be even more successful as the business starts to grow. So, I love that CEO nugget. But I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And we're hoping to have different quote-unquote, CEOs on the show. So, I wanted to ask you, what being a CEO means to you.

Dan Rochon 10:31

So, I was going to coach one day, and the lady that was bringing me through coaching me was asking me about the relationships that I have, and the relationships that are most important, and I shared with her the relationship I have with my wife, Traci, and my daughter, Maggie, or she'll tell you, Margaret, but her and I are still arguing over that.

So, I was telling her about my relationship with my daughter, Maggie, and she was coaching me to allow me to understand what was most important to me in my relationship there. And what I understood and when I came to acknowledge was that it was my relationship with Maggie was really just to make certain she's eight years old now is really just to open up the doorways in front of her so that she can have anything on a life that she possibly would want.

So, if she wants to go to Harvard, my job is to make certain that she's set up to do that if she wants to be a CEO, my job is to make sure she's set up. If she wants to be a housewife, or personal trainer, or whatever it is that she wants, my job is to open up those doorways. So, Gresham I share that with you because I look at my role as a CEO similar as my role is to that.

And it's really just to open up the doorways of those that I lead to take a stand for the greatness that those people possess and make certain that I'm clearing the pathway so that they can achieve whatever it is in life that they dream of have, and then is making sure that I have the right people in the right seats. So, as a CEO, I envision that the job is really just to clear the pathways and open up doors in front of those that I lead.

Gresham Harkless 11:57

That's powerful. And I love that definition from that perspective, as well. So, Dan, I truly appreciate you taking some time out of your schedule. What I wanted to do was pass you the mic so to speak, so that you can let us know anything additional and also how best we can get a hold of you and get in touch with you and hear about all the awesome things that you're doing.

Dan Rochon 12:13

Sure, absolutely. So, if you're a real estate agent, and you are in the Northern Virginia area if you're in Maryland or Washington DC, and you're looking to be able to sell more homes or in a more consistent income, then I encourage for you to visit our real estate website rocksolidrealestatecoaching.com. That's rocksolidrealestatecoaching.com.

If you are in the market to buy a home, sell a home or invest in real estate, I invite you to visit www.greetingsvirginia.com. That's greetingsvirginia.com. And you'll see a lot of great information on how to get your home sold, and how to put it in the best possible position to get the highest profit in your pocket. And those are two great resources, Rock Solid Real Estate Coaching for agents, and greetingsvirginia.com for consumers.

Gresham Harkless 12:55

Awesome. Thank you so much, Dan. And we'll have those links in the show notes just so that anybody can follow up with you and connect with you again, I appreciate you so much for everything that you're doing. You're killing it and I appreciate you.

Dan Rochon 13:05

My pleasure.

Outro 13:07

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co

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