Landon Murie is an established expert in the field of marketing for property management companies and real estate agencies. After owning his own property management business and growing it with SEO and internet marketing, he decided to use this knowledge and skills to start helping other property managers and real estate agencies. He loves to help others learn about how they can utilize the latest SEO trends and tactics to get more leads online. On his companies Youtube Channel, you can find him sharing informative and “over-the-shoulder” strategies geared toward property management marketing.
What inspired you to get into property management marketing?
In 2015, I was trying to figure out how to grow my company and get more property management leads. I dove in pretty deep into researching both SEO and online advertising. Through this research and practice, I grew my company from 0 properties to over 150 in under 2 years. This really helped me understand my passion for both SEO and marketing, and I realized how many other companies across the US needed this help, so I started offering some services for others. This quickly started to snowball and we were getting more clients every month. This quickly turned into our company Goodjuju!
How long did it take for you to become profitable?
Since I started out almost on accident with minimal investment, the first client that we had made us profitable. After this, I did need to invest in other systems and resources, but we never lost the profitability. We have continued to scale from there.
When you were starting out, was there ever a time you doubted it would work? If so, how did you handle that?
Yes, I remember being frustrated a few times near the beginning where I realized that I needed more clients to be able to turn this into a legitimate business. Slow growth in the first 2-3 months made things frustrating, but I was quickly able to handle that by getting more reviews online, building out more of my website, and focusing on brand recognition and trust so that other property management companies would feel more comfortable when working with us. We offered great marketing and SEO services, but until our online branding reflected that, it was harder to get new clients.
How did you get your first customer?
I actually got my very first client with cold email outreach believe it or not. I would basically look at different property management companies online that I could see needed help. I’d send them an email and let them know that we could help them with a free analysis and had some companies take me up on that.
What is one marketing strategy (other than referrals) that you’re using that works really well to generate new business?
With the cold email outreach strategy, we have had some really good success reaching out to companies that we find online who don’t currently have a good SEO strategy. This is responsible for probably 80% of all of our current property management company clients. To show an example, Red Wagon Property Management is a property manager we reached out to with an email and they were interested. Since then, we have helped them increase their online traffic by over 30% in just a few months. We also found a Bakersfield Real Estate agency, Ascend Real Estate and Management using this strategy.
What do you think it is that makes you successful?
I think most of my success would be owed to getting a little bit obsessed with Goodjuju’s growth at times. Being an entrepreneur is not for everyone. Sometimes I have opportunities to go do something fun or just relax, but I feel I have been really persistent in being totally focused and in the zone a lot regarding new strategies and opportunities to help us grow. Sometimes that can negatively affect other aspects of your life, and it’s tough to find a good balance.
What has been your most satisfying moment helping property management companies?
Personally, when a company lets me know that they are getting more leads and traffic. Also, when someone leaves us a review online to share with the rest of the world how they feel about our services. Definitely, a great moment that makes some of the struggles worth it.
What does the future hold for your business? What are you most excited about?
I’m excited to see where the whole journey goes! When I got started earlier this year, I couldn’t have imagined we would have almost 20 monthly SEO clients. My goal would be to have around 40-50 other property manager clients, and I’m excited to see how things grow from here.
What business books have inspired you?
I would say “Start with Why” by Simon Sinek.
What is a recent purchase you have made that’s helped with your business?
For Goodjuju, it’s been critical that we started hiring freelancers to help us with content creation both for our agency and for our property management clients. Content creation is time consuming, and by outsourcing a lot of this it has allowed me to focus on growth.
What’s one thing you would tell other entrepreneurs in any industry?
One thing that people could really benefit from is finding a niche and to focus on it. For example, with Goodjuju, instead of trying to do SEO for any business type, we focused just on property management SEO and this has helped us to become specialists for the industry. Other property managers are now much more likely to work with us than a normal digital agency because they see that we focus exclusively on helping property management companies. It goes a long way in building trust and authenticity and will increase your ability to get more clients in that niche, further positioning your company as the experts.