Justin Stoddart: Well, this is it. This is the end. This is the final episode of the Think Bigger Real Estate podcast. After nine years and almost 500 episodes, I'm closing it down. Now today's episode, I'm gonna share with you why. I'm gonna share with you what's led me to this. What's led me to say I'm done. And I'm also gonna share with you what I've learned. Why this has been so impactful upon me. and some of the things that I've heard from other people about how this has impacted them. And last but not least, I'm gonna tell you what's next that is even more exciting than where we've been. This is gonna be such a fun episode. I'm excited to have you be a part of All right, my friends, I'm coming today holding a cup of Smurfs. Now, this is a bit of nostalgia, right? I loved the Smurfs when I was a kid. I still have a son who loves the Smurfs. And as I went to choose a cup out of the cupboard today to say, which one should I use for the last episode? I thought, you know, one that brings a bit of nostalgia would probably be appropriate. So. Here we go. Let's dig in. Today we talk about the past nine years. I want to begin by sharing with you first my gratitude for those of you that have listened in, whether it be religiously, whether it be sporadically, maybe not at all. Maybe this is the first episode you're hearing. Thank you. Thank you for your attention. know attention ⁓ is one of the most valuable things that we can give anybody today. And I would say that the the lead up or the only thing that's more important than that is your trust. You've entrusted me with your mindset. You've entrusted me with your training and I'm grateful for that. So thank you first and foremost for being a big thinker. Being somebody who, as I define a big thinker, is somebody who wants not just a successful business with statues of themselves that can be hollow. Thank you for being somebody who also wants a significant life. And that is what the Think Bigger movement has been all about, is to not just have a successful business, but to have someone who can think bigger than their real estate related business, and actually have a business that actually allows them to create significance. Significance in their family, in their faith, in their friendships, even in their fitness. All of these things are... what makes a great life, an abundant life. And so I wanna thank you for being a big thinker and for being with us on this journey. It's been a blast. I've had so much fun, not just with my co-host, but so much fun with all of the guests that I've had. If you've been a guest on my podcast, thank you. You poured into the audience and you all supported me. This podcast has changed me. When I started this nine years ago, it was a little project to see if I could use this to get some... clients in my local market from the title industry. I thought, well, if they won't take my call, then maybe they'll agree to be on a podcast. And while that worked, this became something much, much bigger than that. This became my connection to an ecosystem and a world that was much bigger than the one that I was living in. In fact, we've all heard the famous adage that you are the sum average of the five people that you spend the most time with. and I realized that I wanted to raise that some average and that a way for me to do that was to spend 30 plus minutes every single week with a big thinker. And so it's impacted me for the good. Because of the impact of this show, I wasn't able to stay in the position where I've been. And I would just encourage you to think about it. I'm not talking about any specific career, but just in life. If you are staying where you're at, I would... I would encourage you to consider that maybe there's greater opportunity and greater happiness ahead of you by getting outside of your comfort zone. There's no growth ⁓ outside of the comfort zone. I'm there's no growth in the comfort zone and there's no comfort in the growth zone. I heard that recently. And this podcast has been very much that for me. Having tremendously influential people poured into me and say yes to be on my podcast. has made an impact, has had an impact upon me. So as I look to the future, I want you to know that I'm not abandoning what I believe about thinking bigger. In fact, just the opposite. It's created a foundation for the way that I think. And for that, I'm extremely grateful. And as I think back about the many, lessons, some of those are exactly that, is that you actually can have it all. One of my favorite songs of all time is Jason Mraz's, It All. And it's actually those words come from what I once first heard as like a ⁓ wedding toast. May the best of your today be the worst of your tomorrow. In other words, may life only get better and better. I love that song. And I believe that that can absolutely be a reality. Not that every day is gonna be a little better than the next day, but you can be better every day, even during challenging times. And so again, I see the think bigger ⁓ movement, the think bigger philosophy ⁓ having created a foundation for me that moved me out of where I was at into kind of a bigger blue ocean. For those that wanna know my journey now, during that time I authored a book called The Upstream Model that's had a significant impact upon me and upon my opportunities and upon my brand. And has really led me to the work that I love now, which is actually building technology. I'm not the coder, right? ⁓ But I lead a company that is aligning what consumers want with what professionals want, which are recommended referrals. And so all of that has come because I stepped out of my comfort zone to start a podcast. So for that, again, I'm just extremely grateful. And that's a bit of my journey. ⁓ I've learned so much from so many of you. And maybe I'll write a book at some point about the things that I learned from the Think Bigger Real Estate podcast. But I wanna share with you what's next for me. Because there is something really big that's next. You know, what I realized in the world in which we live is it's essential to have a singular problem or one primary problem, or one, I should say, let me begin with this, one primary avatar or person that you're serving. not a, not a one human individual, but one type of person that you're solving one problem that you're solving for and one solution that solves that problem. And one real message that, that tells people how it is that you solve that. So again, one avatar, one problem, one solution, one message. Okay. And what I realized is that this think bigger real estate podcast had become very much a part of my brand. And ⁓ it didn't necessarily completely ⁓ align with, it wasn't misaligned, but it was just a slightly separate message from what I had learned where I could have the greatest impact, which is how to build a relationship-based business in today's world that does not get commoditized, but that instead goes in the other direction, which is it scales. You can actually grow and have a relationship based business that is scalable, right? That you don't have to choose, am I gonna have a relationship based business or am gonna have a big business? You can have both, right? And my work in authoring the upstream model brought that to light. So if there's one thing that I wanna be known for in the business world that's in alignment with the work that I do, it's how to have a business that's built on referrals, right? And ⁓ I'm actually here to announce today, that the next chapter for me is the built on referrals podcast in which I will be sharing multiple times a week lessons that I'm learning about how to do exactly that. How to have a business that is both scalable and eventually sellable that is still relationship based. And ⁓ that's very important to me at a time in an era when. when so many people are focused on the attention economy. Listen to many of the big names. And what I think many of them are missing is that we go chasing attention because we don't have trust. So again, I'm here today again to thank you for not just your attention, but for your trust. And to have a business that is built on trust allows things to move so much faster and be so much more efficient than having a business that's just built on attention. Now again, I play the attention game as well, right? Part of the podcast is that. So I'm not saying that you don't need attention, but the more trust you have, the faster you can go. It's actually a great book called The Speed of Trust. When people trust you, they don't have to go slow. They can go fast. The same is true in your life. You're surrounded by people that you trust. You can go fast. And so that's much of the work that I wanna do as we move forward into an era where people are more distrusting of everything around them, right? including was that real or was that not, right? Was that fake? Was that AI? Was that not? People are looking more and more to trust. Now I'm definitely not a Luddite. I don't believe that we should all stay away from AI, the farthest thing from that. I think we should embrace it. And I think that those people who have trusted relationships and can accelerate the pace at which they deliver value through today's technology with trust in place will be so much farther ahead. So I'm about embracing the trust economy and having again a business that is built on referrals that scales not just through your relationships but through the relationships of other trusted professionals. And for those that haven't read my book, The Upstream Model, a quick summary of that is that there are professionals right now in your community that are not competitive with you, they're collaborative with you, they're in different industries and they're identifying ⁓ ideal clients for you right now. And meanwhile, you're out spending all kinds of time, money, and resources to go prospect into these people and market into these people, whereas all you really need to do is build the trust of a handful of professionals who are just upstream from you and everything changes. And I believe wholeheartedly that, again, while we are trusting more and more to technology, that we need to be surrounding ourselves with trustworthy people. who can lead us to the right technology. In fact, I'll give you an example. Today I was talking to a garage door company. The technology platform that I now leads serves 70 professional categories, all of whom serve homeowners. I talking to a garage door company just recently, and they said that Angie's List has teamed up with ChatGPT to give them information. They said, we get out to the house and people have an idea of what a garage door should cost because Angie's List gave it to them. And that garage door cost is oftentimes less than what we can even get at wholesale at our. highly negotiated pricing. ⁓ so it's a world in which people need to go to trusted sources. so ⁓ moving forward, my brand is gonna be completely aligned with how to have a referral-based business that allows both your business and your life to scale. So built on referrals. In fact, builtonreferrals.com is where you'll find it. You'll find links to the first episodes. We're already underway. And again, what you can expect from me is multiple times per week, me extracting out lessons from the very best referral professionals in the world. And then an occasional maybe monthly bonus episode in which, maybe more often, which I interview a professional who has mastered a referral-based business. And I'll be highlighting that professional. And again, this is, the podcast will be for professionals who serve homeowners. Which again, the technology platform that I lead Pro Insight, that's what we do. And so I'm gonna be immersed in that. teaching principles of how to collaborate with these other professionals in an upstream manner in order to get much further faster. As they say, if you wanna go fast, go alone. If you wanna go far, go with others. And I'm gonna be helping you go far for the things that I learned from others about how they're working with others. So with that being said, builtonreferrals.com, come find me there, say hello, and be prepared for content that's gonna really be completely in alignment with all the work that I'm doing. as well as it's gonna give ⁓ me the ability to help you in a much more tactical way. I would hope that this, that the principles that I leave behind when it comes to thinking bigger, which is a successful business and a significant life, my life will be the sermon on that right now. And of course I'll be bringing in principles about that into the other podcasts where appropriate, having the right mindset around that because that's who I am now. But I aspire to be the sermon, not give the sermon. ⁓ And we'll be moving very strongly forward into how to, again, have a business that's built on referrals. Not just referrals, but built on referrals. That's the foundation. So I can't wait to engage with you there. I can't wait to double down on even more content. It's gonna be even more valuable than ever before. I'm really, really excited to share with you what's next. It's gonna be super exciting for me to have ⁓ this new platform. that's in complete alignment with who I am and with the real difference that I want to make in the lives of many, many people. So with that being said, thank you again and let's stay connected and I look forward to helping you in even bigger and better ways. Talk to soon, my friends. And maybe one last time, let me just say this. These final three words, you know what they are. Go think bigger. Talk to you soon, my friends.