The Faithful Agent

Building a Successful Business While Balancing Family & Faith with Shannon Gillette

March 30, 2023
The Faithful Agent
Building a Successful Business While Balancing Family & Faith with Shannon Gillette
Show Notes Transcript

Building a business can be daunting in the best of times. As believers we can feel added pressure to share our faith and often don’t know how to balance it all.


In today’s episode we’re joined by Shannon Gillette, a top realtor, tv personality, and co-founder of a successful non-profit. Shannon has mastered the use of social media and video in growing her business while staying focused on sharing her faith with others.

Three Things You'll Learn


  • New agents often stumble by trying to be all things to all people. We explore ways we can be intentional with our time and find balance.
  • Staying grounded in our faith when we experience success can be daunting. We discuss how to fight against pride and use the opportunities we are given for God’s glory.
  • Trusting in God’s plan for our lives can sometimes run counter to the things we hope to achieve. We talk about how to take a step back and reevaluate if our desires are really in alignment with our mission as Christians.



ABOUT OUR GUEST

Shannon is one of Arizona’s leading residential real estate professionals, with more than 17 years of experience. She is recognized and admired for her extensive market knowledge, dynamic negotiating skills, strong work-ethic, forward thinking marketing and her unparalleled service. Her innovative use of technology and video have earned her a well-respected reputation, not only with clients but amongst her peers throughout the industry. She maintains an impressive five star review rating and for Shannon, finding a client’s dream home is not her job, it’s her passion. Shannon began her career selling new homes for the nation's largest builder and quickly became one of the top new home sales consultants in the Country.

Shannon has an impressive social media following and has been named as one of the top Realtors in the Country for her use of Instagram and video marketing to sell homes for top dollar, earning numerous awards for her achievements. She has appeared on many industry magazine covers, national shows, podcasts and is a highly sought after industry speaker and coach. She now leads one of the top Real Estate teams in the Phoenix East Valley. She also is a host for the American Dream TV show, featuring local lifestyle and real estate airing locally on Fox.

Shannon grew up in Chandler and has an intimate knowledge of the Southeast Valley of Phoenix neighborhoods. She is actively involved in the local community, volunteering within her Church and is the co-founder of Purpose Movement, a local non-profit that helps serve those in need in Maricopa County. For every home closed, she makes a generous donation to help people in need. She resides in Queen Creek with her husband, three boys and three dogs.



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Welcome back, faithful agents. We are so glad that you joined us today we've got an incredible guest for our first ever official, faithful agent podcast episode. Shannon Gillette is here with us today. And we are so excited to get to introduce you to her to learn from her to learn more about her story to be joyful and learn about her challenges or struggles with all the things that the Lord has been kind in her life. We're going to do that today. Stick around, it's going to be amazing. But before we jump in, Tyler, you're real proud of your Christian joke today. I can just see it on your face, buddy. So I hope it's good. To ruin the Bug's Life. Oh, man, give me give me what you got, buddy. Let's hear let's hear a
little words in my mouth. Yeah, okay. This is absolute judgment passed in our first ever faithful agent podcast joke. What is the real estate agents favorite scripture? What is in general real estate agents favorite scripture? The Great Commission.
Hey, that's actually pretty good for sre. And that's amazing.
Or me. Come on.
No, no, no. All right. No, that's good. That was great. Man. I actually liked that joke. Okay, Shannon.
Once you guy first of all, I'm so honored to be here. How cool is it that you guys created a podcast to talk about our faith? Like this is so cool. I've been on a lot of podcasts but never one like this before. And I've also never I've not I've never really had a Christian joke, but I would say where's the best place to get ice cream? At Sunday school?
Yeah. That's good. SHANNON I get man. Yeah, excellent. That was most X. You can stay shed and you can create delivery. So that was that was good. Okay, so after having choked I gotta tell you a storyteller. After having children. I actually went into full screen. Let me read it after having children. Adam and Eve started getting a lot of questions from their kids about why they no longer lived in Eden. Adam had a simple answer. Your mother ate us out of house and home. Nice bunny. Long and funny.
Well, you know, struggling we're not going to blame Eve because as we've established,
I know it's not good biblical truth. I mean, Adam,
the wow, you confessing that you didn't drop good, biblical.
Why? First, first and last ever faithful agent podcast, Tyler Jada will carry on. All right, let's dive into this. We are genuinely excited to share this with us. She lives one of the top 15 teams in the Phoenix east valley. Most of her business is from Instagram and YouTube. We're gonna get into that. She is the TV host of American Dream TV, which airs on Fox and the Travel Channel. She is married with three kiddos and leads a mom's group in church, which I love that Shannon, because that's real life. And that's amazing things. Thank you so much for joining us. You were sweet. In the words that you shared with us earlier. We are excited that you're here. Just kick us off. Shana, tell us about your business, your life, what's been going on recently, how you got to where you are now give us kind of a brief, you know, Intro to who you are,
as well, thank you so much, again, for having me. And that was such a great intro. And it we are in the business of serving people and serving others. And I know we were talking about before the show stars, I don't know how somebody can be in this business and not have their faith because this is very stressful. It's seven days a week, there are a lot of moving parts in a real estate transaction. And how cool is it that we all have the blessing to be able to serve people and one of their biggest purchases, their home that they raised their family in or you know, have the opportunity to sell somebody's biggest asset in their home. So I truly I mean, my prayer every morning when I wake up is just that I can be God's hands and feet and help serve people and not be afraid to share my faith. You know, I've been blessed with a with a large Instagram following. And that's one thing if you follow me on Instagram, you'll see that I'm a mom with kids, or while I'm a mom with kids, obviously all moms have kids. Married, we like to travel we're really involved in our church. You know, yesterday at church I posted on my Instagram story of the the worship band playing and I'm not afraid to share my faith because it's really important to me. And you know, I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for God.
Amen. That's amazing. Yeah, I mean, I think in Tyler know, you're going to ask some questions about it too. But I think one of the challenges for Christians in the real estate space, we talked about it. We had this conference this past week, as we mentioned you Shannon, and one of the challenges we talked about is in this real estate space that we live in. There's so much pressure Hear to say, you need to make this about you. Right? You need to talk about how great you are, you need to talk about how good you're doing. And you talk about X, Y, and Z. Add on top of that, right? This social media space where it's like you need to share about how amazing your life is all the time. And as Christians, it's like, whoa, hold on our our lives, we are called to be counter to what that looks like, right? And how difficult that is. We are, I think, in so many ways in this culture, as believers told to sit down and shut up. I don't care what your opinion is, you need to agree with what we want. And and it's difficult, right? How have you seen Have you felt like there's been any pushback about you, being open about your faith on social media with such a big following? Or how have you seen it maybe be a struggle or the blessing.
It's not always been easy, but I feel like God has given me this incredible platform that I feel so undeserving of, you know, to, I never thought in a million years that I would want to be one of the top Realtors in the Phoenix east valley and you know, have so many people follow along every day, you know, my journey every day, because I'm posting on my Instagram story. And I think a lot of realtors, they want to be for everyone. They don't want to offend anybody they want every single client that calls they are just for everyone. So they don't really lean into their personal brand. And I truly feel like the realtor or the lender with the best personal brand is going to win the business in the future. Because we are in the days of no like and trust. So I tell agents all the time, you know, write down three or four things that make you you besides being a realtor, and lean into your personal brand, and your Instagram should show your personal life, right. So for me, my faith is is the most important thing in the world to me. So why wouldn't I share that on social, but not in a way where it's all in your face every day? Hey, believe in Jesus, you know, just little things like behind the scenes at church or at Mom's group or, you know, my morning devotional or favorite scripture, things like that. So if people follow me, they they know that I'm a Christian, and I have so many people reach out to me and say, Shannon, you know, you inspired me to start going to church, or you inspired me to be more open about my faith. And that's huge. You know, even if what if I can, you know, impact one person that follows me, it's, it's all worth it. But I think agents, that's kind of my first piece of advice is to lean into your personal brand and not be afraid if you're not for everyone. I'm not. I'm not the rules are for everyone. I'm sure some of my posts might make somebody feel like, Hey, I don't want to work with her. But But yeah, it's been so cool. And it just such a blessing.
Man, that is that is fantastic. That's such an encouragement. I mean, the last thing that you said there about maybe sometimes some people don't want to work with you, we the image came up this past week at the faithful agent talking about the image of a magnet, where as a as a believer, as a faithful believer, we're going to draw people in to the Spirit, the Spirit is going to draw people in to us. But at the same time, there are people who are completely opposed to that and will be pushed away. And I just want to encourage you and your boldness in that, because what the first conversation we had on the phone, you know, Shannon was so intentional about saying anytime that I have the opportunity to have a microphone, or I have my platform on social media, or any venue that share my faith, because this is all good things come from the Lord. And this is what he's blessed me with. And I want to be faithful to steward that well. And that's just such an encouragement to so many. So just keep rocking it girl. And then but my question for all of that is, you know, you're obviously we read your baseball card stats, you've been super successful, the Lord's been so faithful to your team, and you're so confident in your faith. And I just I would love to hear your testimony to how, you know, somebody might look at you and say, Man, you've you've accomplished so much, you're so successful, like it's easy to be bold, and to be confident in those three or four things that you said make you you, but what would you say to the listener who's just getting started and is really distracted by being all things to all people and just trying to grow their business and they're afraid to step out into the light as a Christian,
I think you have to trust in God that He will provide right like we work in an industry where we don't have any guaranteed income, we it's not guaranteed we're going to be able to feed our family off of this income, right? So everything that comes in is from God. So if you're bold in your faith and not afraid to share it, I mean, God will honor that and I'm just it's it's been so cool to me, too. You know, sometimes I post some things I'm like, Oh, this is probably really gonna offend somebody but man, I serve right an audience of one so I just, you know, have to be faithful in that and God's been so good. And I think also this business gets very busy. See, it's a seven day a week constantly chasing that phone call, like, Hey, can I go see this house? Will you list my house? I think agents that, you know, are doing this full time, they have to be very intentional with their calendar. So I mean, church is a non negotiable to me. I've, I've always led a moms group at my church since my kids were newborns. And that's a non negotiable to me. Because if it's not in your calendar, and somebody calls up and says, Hey, can we go look at houses Sunday morning, you might say, oh, yeah, sure. And now amongst gone by, and you haven't gone to church, or you haven't gone to your small group. So being very intentional about having that on your calendar of whatever is important to you. And your faith is so important, too. And also, being a mom with young kids in this industry is hard, too. I have a lot of moms that reach out to me, they're like, how do you do it? Man, it's just so much. But being very intentional with family time and date night, and one on one time, I have three boys. So I do like one on one time with them. And you know, living by that calendar and removing the things that are a waste of time, like I don't watch traditional TV, you know, just being very intentional with every minute of my day.
Hmm, that's really good. I mean, I, we talked about, or we've talked many times on this show, too. If we are faithful to the Lord, He will give us the business we're supposed to have, right? I mean, it's just that simple. It doesn't mean that we're all going to have a massive business doesn't mean we're gonna have a teeny business doesn't mean we're gonna have a big Instagram following, right? It could be small, it could be huge, who knows what it is. But if we're faithful, the Lord will bring whatever he chooses to bring right for you. So far, it's been a big Instagram following, right. It's been a big business. And I think that you're nailed it spot on with agents who just try to chase every piece of business that comes, I don't care, I'll do what I have to do to generate that business. And I was having a conversation with someone actually earlier today, out in Idaho, and they're struggling with their business. And I was encouraging him, I was helping him trying to help him get some ideas on how to get his business restarted. And but then I just encouraged him, I said, you know, here's the encouragement, though, at the end of the day, this business is important, don't get me wrong. But it pales in the comparison of the importance of just knowing Christ, right, and people around you knowing Christ, because he talked about how, in this low period in his business, which has been hard, he has never felt more humbled, more gracious than you know, than he ever has been. He's almost six years old. And the Lord has just been working on his heart, and sanctification. And the beauty of that, even in this challenging time, and recognizing that at the end of the day, and this is hard, I'm gonna say it. But it's really hard for me to live this out. If if I were to be living out my faith, and my business fell apart, and my family came on hard times, but yet the Lord was glorified and honored in that, praise God for that, right. And I think if I'm honest, for me, personally, I think a lot of agents, I tend to act the opposite. The Lord knows my heart, I need to go get business, right, I need this to work, I need to be xy and z, and we have all these expectations that maybe shouldn't exist. And I think that's difficult. How do you Shannon in, in, living in a space where you have a big Instagram following you, you're a TV host, right? You've got all of these external challenges and factors that exists and probably more of a of a temptation, temptation, not saying you're You have that but more of an opportunity just become big, well known, you know, and all this stuff. How do you fight against pride? How do you resist? You know, maybe what the world is trying to offer you? Like, how do you stay grounded in your faith when you're in a position like that?
Man, it's difficult, right? Because just looking at the Instagram platform, you're supposed to be posting selfies of yourself and your success, like just soul just close. So it's difficult because you have to show you know, I get a lot of business from Instagram. So you have to show that you are selling homes and and it's tough because some posts may come across like oh, look what I did. This is awesome. I'm so it's so difficult. But I think just waking up every day and having that, you know, being intentional about being God's hands and feet. How can we serve people and serving our clients well, and being somebody that they can trust and helping guide them and never pushing them to buy a home? And I mean, I've had many clients where, where we pray together, like is this the right house and just treating everybody how you want to be treated. It all comes around and trusting in God. And I actually started my career in New Home Sales. I sold new homes for eight years and my husband and I didn't have days off together. I worked you know, sunup to sundown, like in this new home sales office. I miss my oldest son's first steps because I was in my new home sales office. I will drive to work crying sometimes, because I had more of a guaranteed income there. And sometimes God has us go through very challenging times where maybe our business isn't great and we are struggling financially. And I look back on those eight years of just hating my job and really feeling like this isn't where I'm supposed to be. But I didn't want to trust in God and quit that job and trust that God will provide in the resale world. But finally, one day, I'm like, Okay, I can't do this anymore, I quit my job, which was more of a traditional kind of like a corporate job. And I told myself, if this resale thing doesn't work out, I could always go back to New home sales in a year. And how cool like to, for God to have given me this platform and be one of the top agents in, in my town, it's just something I would have never ever dreamed of. But to go back to what you guys mentioned in the beginning, I mean, every podcast I'm on every stage I'm on, I will always bring up my faith, I even will write on my notes, like, I'll draw a little cross at the top of my page, just to remember to somehow mention that I'm a Christian, because you just never know who's listening. And it's just such a blessing to, to, you know, have all this, but I just want to use it. However God God wants me to.
Amen. That's, can we press into that a little bit? And how I mean, I feel like I resonate so much with what you're saying, and in wrestling through a big transition in life. And there's I know, there are people listening that are maybe at that eight year threshold where they're like, I don't know, what do I need to change? What do I need to do differently? And how did you wrestle down that decision to? You know, obviously, how do you pray through it? Where did you seek counsel? Like, how did you ultimately take that leap of faith? I mean, because we can simplify it down to just jump and just, you know, trust that God will provide because he will and God is faithful. But, you know, I'd love to hear your testimony and how you made that, that jump. Yeah, so
I became a Christian in my early 20s. I didn't grow up in church, it was all new to me. And I think back in those days of me, struggling, you know, in this job that I didn't love, because I was there for the steady income. I think I cared way too much about material things. We lived in a big house, we drove great cars, we I literally was in a job I hated to pay for material things. So we finally were like, Let's sell everything. Let's sell our big house, let's move into a little house and sell all of our fancy cars. We had these used cars, I had a used minivan. And we lived in a small house, and I was able to quit my job, because we didn't have to live for like these material things anymore. And it was so humbling to go through that and realize that my family, you know, being with my kids, having days off with my husband is more important than any big house or any nice car.
Yeah, I think one of the challenges that I that I see a lot Shana that I personally have, and I've talked about on the show before too is, you know, we live we are in an industry where you see people around you that are doing things and you know, working constantly and gone constantly and you're never seeing their family, but they're achieving this great level of success, right? And their apps, at least for me, there absolutely is a temptation to say, Man, I want to be like that, like I want to have that success. I want to be able to go to these conferences. I want to, you know, to do all these things. And I quickly have recognized and I've talked about before, but I quickly, not quickly, it took me a long time to recognize let's be honest, the reality that I was using the wrong scoreboard to determine whether I was doing well or not right, my scorecard. My scoreboard was was I making money that people knew who I was right? Was I selling a lot of homes, and not that those things are inherently wrong. But it was me chasing after what the world was getting. Right? And not saying, Lord, like you've talked about, but Lord, what do you want for me? Right? If I'm faithful to you, you will be faithful to me, he's going to be faithful regardless. But if I'm faithful, you'll provide the business I should have. That can be a huge business, that could be a small business, right? But you will take care of me, you promised that you will do that. And so instead of chasing what the world is offering, which is what I most often want to do, if I'm honest, being still being faithful doing what's put right in front of you, right? How do you wrestle with that? Right? Do you wrestle with that? How do you keep yourself from being stained by the world and chasing those things that they offer? When you could say, you know, you probably could go do more, you could probably some more, you could go on more stages, whatever, whatever, and leave your family behind. But that's not a good thing. Right. So how do you manage that? How do you wrestle through that?
I think one thing is for I was a solo agent up until 2020. I was very much like, I can do it myself. I don't want to pay anybody to help me. I can get it done faster myself. But in 2020, I brought on my first agent on my team and now we're a team of nine so asking for help. And the cool thing about our team is we actually all share the same faith. We pray together before meals and meetings and share prayer requests with each other. So It's such a cool team. And it's been tough because, you know, our team is highly sought after a lot of agents would love to join our team, which is amazing, we have a great culture. But that's something that's really important to me is having that team where we feel like a family where we can help each other. So then I can go out of town with my family, and my clients are still taken care of, and I'm not trying to work every single minute of the day, I mean, I have not mastered this in any way, I still probably work way too much. But cutting out the things that are a waste of time in my life, like how I mentioned TV getting up earlier, being very intentional with my calendar, you can get a lot done and asking for the help. So now I have a VA that works full time for me. And she helps with a lot of the tasks that I was doing myself before like building my YouTube thumbnails or uploading my YouTube videos. So having a VA having a team, where I'm not just by myself and trying to juggle all my clients, that's been huge. But then also giving back to the community is a core value. And it's actually required to be on our team that you're actively serving your community, not just giving money away, but serving. So my husband, I started our own nonprofit called purpose movement. And we work a lot with the foster community, kids living in foster care. So our team is also out together serving the community for Christmas, we took over 300 kids living in local group homes on a shopping spree for Christmas. And, you know, I think that's really important to be giving back not only, of course, tithing to our church, but for every home, we sell and close, we're giving back into the community to make a difference that same communities where we sell homes, and we're also making a difference for for people, you know, in need. So that all that all has helped. But it's definitely not not easy, because real estate is a very demanding job.
Yeah, and I love to and just as an encouragement to our audience, you know, everyone has different capacity, in terms of the amount of work they can do the time they can spend, right? Every family has every nursery husband and wife, every family has different boundaries that are set for them, or they set their own right. Like, when I think about for me, for example, you know, I try to be real careful and intentional with my hours and cut them off typically at five. And some people say, Well, man, you're not working enough. And I my response to that was this is what my wife and I have agreed on. Right? And this is what we agree on is right for my family. I know other faithful men and women who work wait more than that. And they're like, this is what my husband and my wife and I have agreed on is right for our family. That's awesome. Right? So I just encourage our audience, if you hear someone like, man, you're working a lot, I need to work more, or man, I need to work a lot less. Well, that's, that's so arbitrary. You know, figure out between the loved ones in your life, like, what is it? What am I called to do? And how long is it going to take me to do that? Right? I mean, that's really the right question there. Go ahead, do Sorry. Go ahead.
Oh, I was there's also seasons right. So I right now we're in a really busy season, but we try to always kind of have travel is really important to our family, because that's when I can really be out of town. And I want to help everyone. So when my clients like if you go to this house, will you list my house, can you come over tomorrow, if I'm not physically here in town, it helps me be like, lean on my team, they will take care of you. So we traveled for 60 days last year, and that's awesome. sold over 100 homes. So God definitely provides. So there's there's a fine balance, though, because some people may just not put in the hard work and just expect deals to fall from the sky on a silver platter. You have to put in the work. But you have to be so intentional with what you're doing throughout the day. Because you could feel like you're working really hard, but not really getting much done. So that's why I'm just getting up getting up an hour earlier than you normally would. And, and scheduling. And sometimes I if it's a busy week, I have to schedule in certain nights of the week that I'm eating dinner with my family because sometimes I'm showing homes at night. But you know, it's tough one day, I hope to figure it out.
Yeah, that's great. It's a journey. It's a journey. I mean, just running your race well for you know, with the prize being his glory is a race well run whatever that looks like along the way. So well done. Good and faithful agent in that. So you know, I'm so glad that you dove into your team and the dynamics I wanted to get to that at the end because it was something we had talked about before because we speak a lot in our on our show about knowing who your who is and surrounding yourself with an inner circle of people that are equally on fire for the Lord or people that challenge you having mentors in place and then doing the same type of discipleship for the people around you so that the Great Commission as the joke and the original joke, but the Great Commission can can be fulfilled and the kingdom can grow and it can serve. But it's really difficult to do. You know, I think we think about that as you know an initiative and you know, as Christians we want to surround ourselves with people like that we want to build a business with other believers immediately around us. And I don't want to speak for you. But I think that you're what I'm hearing in your your conviction and carrying your cross daily. And running your business as a faithful agent has created a brand that has not necessitated you to like screen people out of the job or your team that don't know Jesus, because it's very apparent that that's what you stand for. And so you're drawing people to your team, I know you shared, you had an opening, and it was highly coveted because you've been so successful. But when you carry your cross daily, and people see that you stay aim to serve Christ and what you do only people that are going to want to do the same, we're going to be drawn to that. So I guess the question and all of that is, as you've leaned in and grown your team from a solo agent to nine now? I mean, how do you really navigate you know, making sure you have the right people on your team? And again, it sounds like you have an incredible group. But I think a lot of people are envious of that and jealous. So can you just in a good way, sorry not to use that word, but he's done a great job. So just share Wait a
minute, taller, we're Christians, we don't sit and obviously,
you know, that's, that's a lot of a lot of like, the big goal as a solo agent is to one day, maybe have a team what you get, as you get busy and have that inbound business, you need a team to help you you can't do this alone. But I think number one is having core values for your business, whether you are a solo agent or a team leader, writing out what are your core values, and having core values that are so strong that you're willing to lose money over I mean, integrity is our first core value. And not all agents have integrity as a core value, right? This is sales. And that is so important than ever and doing the right thing, even if it means losing money. And that also goes to when we go to List homes, we do more listing marketing than anyone in our town. I mean, we're doing a professional video for every home, we list even a $25,000 mobile home that we listed, we did a professional video commercial, that mobile home had its own website had all the ads, because our sellers deserve this and not taking the shortcuts, because of the price point and treating everybody the same. Because no matter if it's a $25,000 mobile home or a $3 million estate, that is probably one of their biggest assets. And nobody's wanting to sell their home right now for fun, they're selling their home because they need to whether they need, you know, they've had a family change, or they need something bigger or smaller, or they're moving out of state, it's a big deal for somebody to trust us with selling their home. So having those core values in place with treating people well. And serving them, even if your will if you are losing money over that, I think is so important. And when I opened up a spot on the team, because I really like to keep the small but mighty team, you know, I just currently don't have any desire to have some big huge mega team of hundreds of agents. But when I opened up one spot last year, I had close to 100 agents apply. And in order to kind of market the fact that we had an opening on the Gillette group, I did a video of like everything about the Gillette group. And in the video I mentioned, we pray together as a team. So you know, it's not to say we only hire Christians, but it you know, they hear that and it's like, they have to be comfortable with that, because it's it's really important to all of us. And we all serve together. I mean, Sharon was the first agent I brought on my team, she says, we go to the same church, that's how we met, she serves on the worship team and I brought row every time she's singing and put her on my Instagram story. So I really like to have that family where we're all close, help each other out and, and be there for each other because you know, I keep saying it. But this job is not easy is especially in this new shifting market. They say you're you have to just to sell as many homes as you did last year, you have to put in 30% More work this year, because there's less less deals out there.
Yeah, yeah, I love that concept, too. I was actually tell him, a friend of mine the other day, he had a concern, he had gotten pretty far in the process with potentially bringing somebody into his into his world into his business. And he realized she wasn't a believer, and she was going to be in this leadership position. So he was saying, What do I do? You know, I can't just flat out say you didn't get the job, because I realize you're not a Christian, you know. And so I just encouraged him, you know, I had a potential agent one time. And as we're going through the interview process, we had met twice. And this was after the second meeting, just was pretty, pretty certain she wasn't a believer, I didn't know. You know, I'm pretty certain she wasn't believer, quite certain that she disagreed with me on a lot of moral issues. And so I just called her and I said, Hey, before our next meeting, I just want to let you know who we are. You know, we're a group of Christians. And this is what we do together. This is what we believe is what we talk about. Right? And we love if somebody disagrees, we still love them. But I just want you to know I don't know if that fits you or not, but I want you to be fully aware of who we are. And then you know, before we do our next round of interview, you tell me if you feel like it's still a good fit. Next, as you call them said, yeah, no, it's not a good fit. Thank you for sharing Yeah,
I think that's a great idea and having your core values, but also minimum standards. So when you're on social or on video, you're in a fishbowl, right? You're, you're really showing who you are as a person. And on our minimum standards for our team, like, they can't post certain things on social media, like you'll never see me posting drinking alcohol or things like that, like, we're just very intentional about showing a very classy professional brand, which hopefully, you know, inspires people. But everyone has their own brand. And that's what I want people to think of when they think of the Gillette group that we're a very trustworthy team that serves our community that treats our clients well. And, yeah, I mean, just that brand of trust.
That's great. What would you say is maybe some of your best advice for someone right now? Who's looking to grow their own business?
Like a realtor looking to grow a team? Yeah, sorry,
to grow their business, grow their team grow, or just make their business better, but be some of your advice to them? Yeah,
I think, you know, we always touched We already touched on a lot being intentional with your calendar. But I think it's important to really figure out what your what your hourly rate is, that was something that was huge. For me, I hired a coach a few years ago, which was just a game changer for me, because again, I was very much like, oh, I don't need a coach, I can learn, I can just listen to podcasts or watch YouTube videos to learn. But having that mentor or coach that can help you, like guide you through these big decisions is so important. And having somebody else look in on your business to give you that advice, but you know, figuring out for me what my hourly rate was, and then deciding what can I delegate and ask for help on. So I can then use my time better, like instead of, you know, making a YouTube thumbnail for an hour, I can then use that time to build my business and maybe talk and get in front of more clients and things like that. So that was huge for me. And I really feel like it's hard to be a solo agent right now. So whether you lead a team, or maybe it's time for an agent, to just join a team to have those resources, and the community and all that I think there's just so much power in teams, and then you have the help if you want to go, you know, take the weekend off and be with your family, you don't have to worry that your clients aren't being served. And, and somebody's available to help them.
That's really good. So love what you just said real quick to the agents listening the easiest way that I've ever found to figure out your dollar per hour. You make money when you lead generate, estimate how many hours a week you spend lead generating, multiply that by 50 weeks or whatever, how many, whatever weeks, you're gonna work. So let's say there's 200, How much money did you make last year? Let's say $200,000. And divide those numbers. So there Yeah, it's $100 an hour, right, whatever that looks like. And so that's the easiest way for you to figure it out. And it helps you make wise decisions. I love you talked about this Shannon reach out to us. If any agents wants to learn more about what that looks like, Shana, what would be some of your best advice for someone who maybe is struggling in their faith right now? What are some ways that you would encourage them to yeah, let me just leave it there. What are some ways you would encourage them?
I think who you surround yourself with is really important. We've all heard it, you know, the five people you're around your five closest friends, like you just you become who you're around. So just, it may be time to cut certain people out of your life where you guys, you can still love them, but maybe you're not hanging around them if they're not a good influence. So surrounding yourself with really good people. I think being just committing to your face, whatever that looks like for you. Whether it's instead of listening to music while driving, listening to a sermon podcast or listening to worship music or committing to go to church every weekend, maybe joining a Bible study at at your church and waking up and and doing a devotional like I love, obviously, the Bible app and all the free devotionals out there too. Even if you're only spending a few minutes, just starting your day off like that, I think is really important. Because there's an enemy that doesn't want us in church or reading the Word. So we are easily distracted in this industry with shiny objects and pushing God to the side and you have to stand firm and make that a priority and think of maybe going to church. Think of it like it was a $5 million listing appointment. You're not going to cancel on that seller. So you shouldn't cancel on God, you know, yeah, it's not easy. Like you know that we talked about the moms group mom community so important to me. So if if somebody's listening in their mom with young kids, getting into a moms group, whether it's mops.org or finding something at your church and having that community outside of real estate is so important, because real estate will take over your life if you let if you let it so every other Wednesday I'm there in this mom community where I can take off my realtor hat. Nobody asked me how the market is or what I can do for them, I can just be normal and talk about kids and, and go to play dates and things like that. So that's been really, really cool and really has helped me grow my faith and also, you know, serving the community and, and serving at your church. So many people say they're too busy to serve at their church, you're not too busy to serve at your church, you know, even if it's one once a month greeting or serving in the kids ministry, like just get out there and serve God be intentional with being in the Word, and I think your business will, will thrive. And God will will provide you're not going to be missing out on any deals if you if you take a few hours off of work.
That's right. Yeah, that's right. That's great. How do people connect with you, Shannon? What's your Instagram handle? Or how would they get ahold of your team if they want to send you a referral or something like that?
So I answer every single DM I receive over on Instagram, my Instagram is at Shannon underscore Gillette.
Sweet. That was easy. Toddler, get on Instagram. That's my takeaway for you, buddy. See, see if anybody will message you. Maybe you'll get a big following? Probably not. We're not that interesting. Shannon Gillette, thank you so much for joining us. Audience. We hope that you were as encouraged as we were reached out to her. She's got a huge heart and especially if you got anybody heading that way. You know, it's important to me when I send out a referral to make sure they're going to be loved the way that I would want them to be loved and Shannon's team will definitely do that. So Shannon, thank you for joining us and agents. We will see you next week on the next episode of the faithful agent