Episode 94: Learn to Fail and Do It More Often With Anny Draginova
The Profit First REI Podcast
July 4, 2022
David Richter
Summary:
Everyone aspires to be a millionaire, but only a very few motivated dreamers succeed in doing so. And in this podcast episode, we’ll tell you the story of a successful immigrant who owns several 7-figure enterprises. Yes, you’re right, we’re talking about Batch Service’s very own Anny Draginova. Let’s take a glimpse at Anny’s journey and how she got started in chasing her very own American dream.
Key Takeaways:
[1:51] How did she get involved in the real estate investing world?
[4:35] Why did she get attracted to real estate?
[7:09] What products do they have and what other products are they launching next?
[11:47] Early money lessons she learned vs. how she thinks about money now
[13:58] What did reading Profit First and implementing it help her in her business?
[19:45] You can over complicate your KPIs by the gecko.
[21:31] What’s the biggest contributor to Batch’s success?
25:12 Don’t be afraid to fail and get uncomfortable with that because it’s going to be a consistent failure and you’ve got to be okay with it.
Quotes:
[12:04] “Lessons about money for me is trying to figure out what’s happening to the money.”
[13:03] “Having that habit of consistency is, I think, the biggest thing.”
Links:
Anna Draginova’s Profile-https://instagram.com/annydraginova?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
Batch Service’s- https://batchservice.com/
The Go Giver by Bob Burg-https://thegogiver.com/
Tired of living deal to deal?
If you are a real estate investor or business owner who is tired of living deal to deal, and want to double your profits, head over here to book your no-obligation discovery call with me. Either myself or someone from my team will hop on a short call with you to get clear on your business goals, remove any obstacles holding you back, and map out a game plan to help you finally start keeping more of the money you work so hard to make. – David
Transcript:
Anny Draginova:
Get out there and don’t be afraid to fail. Like that is the biggest thing. It’s and get uncomfortable with that because it’s gonna be consistent failure and we have to be ok with it… I think that’s the biggest advice I can give someone is learn to fail and do it more often.
Speaker 2:
Welcome to the Profit First REI podcast, where real estate investors, master financial management, eradicate entrepreneurial poverty, and learn to be profitable from day one. Now for your host David Richter.
David Richter:
Hey everyone. Welcome back to another special edition of Profit First for real estate investing the podcast here. We’ve got Anny Draginova, and I am excited today because she has done a lot of awesome things in real estate and is honestly changing a lot of lives. Like she leads multiple seven figure businesses. If you you’ve probably heard of them. Batch leads, batch skip trades saying there’s like a bunch of them in that series that she has, and that she works with a lot of great investors out there. And that’s providing a lot of good data, a lot of good leads, a lot of good things for the real estate investing community. So I love it when people are providing that value and getting that out to the world. And she’s a part of a lot of other groups that I’m a part of too. So I usually, if ever I’m have someone on, I usually say, you know, like if they’re a part of another group, I can tell, like, are these the real deal? Because people talk, people talk behind the scenes and Annie and the company that she works with, her brothers and everyone there real deal, they know what they’re doing. They know how to help people. So Annie, super excited to have you on today.
Anny Draginova:
I’m super excited to be on. And thank you. Thank you for having me.
David Richter:
Yeah. Yeah. No. And thanks for, thanks for being on here, but I would love for you to maybe go into your story a little bit, like how’d you get involved in the real estate investing world, like where’d you come from? I know you’ve got a great story. So why don’t you tell people a little bit, you know, that are listening right now?
Anny Draginova:
Yeah, absolutely. So kinda the way the journey started, I’m gonna just fast forward, really quick, just cause it’s kinda a long journey. in construction we went to and from, and we went into, wholesaling, we went into wholesaling because, and it was our assumption that we could have a bigger profit margin. if we were in wholesaling and then we quickly realized that that’s a business on its own and it’s a different beast to tackle. It’s not as easy as, as flipping, or at least as I found flipping because of our construction background. So from then on, we went full force into just wholesaling because that took up all of our time. And it was very quick for us to understand and realized that didn’t realize that there was very few platforms and tools that wholesalers investors and just pretty much the entire real space, needed and the ones that were out there, they were fairly outdated.
Anny Draginova:
and it took about like five or six platforms to be able to, to accomplish one task. So the efficiency of that just there was there wasn’t any, so we kind of set out to, to improve that for ourselves. And we quickly realized that we weren’t the only one that struggled with it. We created a product and that product turned into a business and we’re here today after one product, it was a second or third of fourth, then we just launched a fifth product. so just kind of got the ball rolling and it’s just wherever we see a gap in the market, in the need for the consumer, it’s pretty much the software that we it’s do, that we are biggest in the real estate space that is just owned by investors as well. It’s someone that actually does the work. So, so I get it. Yeah. I get the struggles. Yeah,
David Richter:
That’s awesome. And I love that. I love, I love people that actually do the work and have done it and been in the trenches and then, you know, and still in the trenches and still, you know, utilizing their own software, you know, like they, that’s where I feel like a lot of people, they’re just like you trying to fix a problem in their business. And then it’s like, wait a second. Like, I think this will help a whole lot more people too. And then, then you’re changing their lives too. So I absolutely love it, especially when you’re doing it yourself. But I do wanna ask, so what, what got you started in real estate? So you started us off, I know down the road, but like why even real estate, what was the, what was the attraction of real estate for you?
Anny Draginova:
The attraction of real estate? we, well, there’s a few things. the construction side we were working with actually the government and it was a very transactional business. It was $60, $30, a 20 as far as like the invoicing goes. So the back end was very, just tedious. And man, at least for me at the time, and I didn’t know how to better scale it. And we started doing projects for the city that were a little bit bigger, a little bit more intense as far as the, the amount of construction that needed to go around. it was pretty much doing low income housing, improvements. And then we ran into one house that was pretty much a tear down that we had to build back up. So we saw that we saw how awesome it was to kind of get that from nothing to actually have a finished home.
Anny Draginova:
So we started doing, new bills from new build. We got into actually buying and selling and it was, it was honestly for me, I know there’s a lot of people out there that they, they wanted to build that wealth. And for me it might just be a little bit easier. I saw my brother in real estate and I was like, well, I’m coming too. Like, wait for me. That’s awesome. so yeah, so I wanted to learn real estate just because he was it. And it’s just someone that he’s just someone that I’ve always looked up to and still, still due to this day. And I, I wanted to be like the cool kids, I guess.
David Richter:
That’s awesome. Well, so many people start that way too, like with a mentor or with someone that they respect and, you know, they want to get out of their rat race. They see other people that they respect getting outta theirs and it’s like, yeah, I wanna do this. So I love that. I love, love that you had that role model too, you know, that you could look up to and say, here we go. Like, yeah, I wanna do what they’re doing and do it better, you know, because I’m sure there was sibling rivalry. I’m sure none of that goes on inside the company ever.
Anny Draginova:
Honestly, we’re pretty, we’re pretty good — There is. But, I can hear him actually in the back he’s this wall shares says is shared between, both of us, but, he’s definitely just the person I’ve always looked up to. Yeah. Do we, do we bicker and fight? I’m sure everyone, right. Everyone out there does it’s it’s part of being, being related.
David Richter:
Yeah. Yeah, no kidding. So then you, you said, you mentioned you have four products, you’re launching a fifth one. Why don’t you just mention what those are real quick? What are the products that you have and what’s the one that you’re launching currently?
Anny Draginova:
Yeah, so we have, we have, batch kept tracing, which batch tracing is the first one that we, we started with it is a skip trace provider. just to kinda keep it simple. Mm-hmm <affirmative> we are able to pull from a distress property list. We’re able to give a able a user, their phone numbers. that is the first one that the was leads. I didn’t know how to manage them. we, we tried a platform, it was doable, but not great. So we set out to create a better one. so it is batch leads is an all in one marketing platform for investors, brokers and agents. and what that does is it allows you to actually put your list, import your list or pull list from the platform itself. you’re able to sort it organize it, for other marketing channels.
Anny Draginova:
whether you decide to cold call, text message, SMS, whatever, kind of your marketing route is it has the ability to do that. batch batch dialer is, is a what exactly what it sounds like it’s a outbound dialing platform, for cold calling. And then the fourth one we have is batch driven. Batch driven is, driving for dollars app, that we have out there. It allows people, to door, knock, drive for dollars, or just have their team drive for dollars. you’re also able to direct mail and text message through it as well. And then the fifth product. it’s not very, it’s not a product that is for, I guess, our space, the real estate space, but it is, I think a big data provider, we’re talking about bigger, bigger businesses. right now obviously our products are in a niche within a niche, right? It’s it’s real estate, but it’s specific to, wholesaling or investing. So we’re trying to get outside of the niche and the niche. so that’s what batch data is. Batch data is the fifth product that we just launched two weeks ago is the website is when it went live.
David Richter:
Awesome. There you go. So there’s the products. I know that they help a lot of people and I just wanna get out there and get this out there so people can know exactly when, cuz we’ll point ’em to where, where they can go to find this info for if they need one of those. And are they independent of each other or do they all, you know, like do, if you have one, do you need the other ones or like, can you ALA carte these or put ’em all together? What do you, what do you think?
Anny Draginova:
well it kind of just depends on your business needs and, and kind of where you’re looking ahead. could you have all of them? Yes. Do you need them? No. Do you need them to get started? Probably not honestly. if you’re wanting to kind of just get, you’re just getting started. my, my suggestion would be batch leads or batch driven, to kinda get started because you’re able to market to specific, sellers. You’re able to pull list, generate leads that way, the quickest. and then batcher is obviously if you’re wanting just to increase marketing, you’re wanting to have that, outbound platform, outbound dialing platform, to reach more sellers or, investors quicker. but you don’t need them together. you, there are plenty of people that use every single one of the products. but it’s once a person is able to scale their business, that is when they start adding on more and more products. But to start off with one of those two is, is gonna be sufficient
David Richter:
To get started. Awesome. Yeah. Yeah. No, I love that. That’s very cool. So I love that you’re providing me that you got into real estate cuz of your brother and then you know, that mentorship and that guidance there and then now that’s spawn other businesses and just helping a lot more people. So let’s talk about the money side of things then since it’s a Profit Firsti podcast, let’s talk about first. I like asking this question of most people that, you know, like what lessons did you learn about money maybe or early lessons versus where you, how you think about money today and what it means to you?
Anny Draginova:
Lessons that I learned about money in the beginning. for me it was honestly trying to figure out what was happening to the money. Hmm. I had no idea. You were at least in the construction space when we were still doing and flips. I was sending, I had no idea how much I was paying a contractor versus how much utilities were versus how much I was paying for hard. And in between that, all I was able to see is money in money out. And one of the first I biggest, and I think the biggest mistakes that we made was okay, rewind really quick. My, my background is accounting. I know about accounting, but bare minimum. My mistake was not hiring anyone or not hiring someone on faster and paying attention to the money trends daily. Well, not daily. I wouldn’t say daily at the time, but monthly and being consistent with it, having that habit of consistency is I think the biggest mistake that I’ve made, which is something that we’re definitely we’ve fixed going forward. And it’s, it’s part of my, my, my routine now it’s, it’s, it’s a habit that we’ve built.
David Richter:
Awesome. I love that. Yeah. Yeah. That’s where I feel like a lot of investors, they aren’t consistent in a lot of different things. <laugh>, you know, leads, it could be leads, it could be the sales, it could be the rentals, whatever, but I think it, I think you hit the nail on the head there that most are when it comes to the money side, inconsistent, like what are we doing with this? Where does it go? You’re a big fan of Profit First and of that, just that methodology. You, even, if you pick up Profit First for real estate investing, you’ll see Annie’s name on the back. She wrote one of the, one of the glowing reviews here, which I’m extremely grateful for. She was one of the early advanced copy release that she got to, read beforehand. So she’s a big fan of that. Can you kind of talk about that? What did reading Profit First in doing that and implementing it? How did that help your business and how did it help, you know, like with consistency or clarity, confidence, whatever it might have helped you with.
Anny Draginova:
So to kind of begin or kind of go back really quick on saying I had no idea where money was going, what was actually happening with it? when we initially implemented first and it’s, it’s kind of a lot of work in the front end and I kind of, I, I wanna share that with people because it is, it is difficult setting up. I wouldn’t say difficult it’s it’s time consuming, but once you get that, it gives you so much more time in your day. It gives you that clarity that I was telling you about how much is going for whatever. Like, however, you’re wanting to set it up for your investment or for your business. however, you’re wanting to allocate those funds. you’re able to see what portion of it is still there. Just with a quick glance. You didn’t have, you don’t have to have this like full on financial system going on when, you know, 10% of, of whatever is going into your marketing or however much you’re wanting to allocate, you know, how much your marketing budget is and you know exactly where you stand, just when you open up and it’s an app on your phone and we all know this and the simplicity of that and the clarity that I’ve gotten.
Anny Draginova:
It’s, it’s probably the biggest things that I, I wish I would’ve changed early on. Hmm. And when I say early on, I mean probably day two,
David Richter:
Right
Anny Draginova:
Day one. Yeah. Day one, not so much. Cause you’re still trying to get things going. But day two is the first thing that I would’ve implemented. just knowing how much you’re allocating for tax. You’re not scrambling when comes around or, how much I’m getting paid or how much everything else is. It’s and again, it’s, it’s kind of how we started when you asked the question, what was the biggest mistake you’ve made and how did you think about money before that? This is the first thing that I, that I wish that I knew.
David Richter:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s what we hear from a lot of investors too. It’s like, we’ve got, we’ve got the marketing down or we’ve got the, you know, the lead flow, we’ve got this, that or the other thing, or there’s webinars for everything in between, but there’s nothing for this, you know, like until that book came out and until there was this system and it’s like, okay, how do you manage this? Simply like everyone. And if there was, it was like how to do taxes or how to do, you know, like how to do these different things and self-directed IRAs, which is all great. It is all great. But how do you actually manage the money in your business that’s flowing in? Cause I feel like, yeah, cause you work with wholesalers, you work with those and it’s like, this is active money. You know, this is money coming in all the time. So really understanding.
Anny Draginova:
And, and one of the other things is, is everyone talks about KPIs, KPIs, KPIs, which it’s, it’s so important in your business. Yep. Figuring out like cost per lead. Everyone is talking about in any industry, what is your cost per lead cost per contract cost, cost per contact. However you wanting to, to figure that out when you don’t know the front or the back and how much you’ve actually spent in it, how much your marketing actually is getting that number. It’s, it’s very, it’s pretty difficult. And at the end of the day, I’m sure a lot of people are actually guessing because they don’t have this first, set in the back end and they, they don’t have the ability to actually figure out what their cost, their actual cost is. Right. Because there there’s backend costs that, that go into it. For instance, here’s a good example. If I’m spending a hundred on direct mail, is it actually hundred that’s costing you to generate one contract? No, there’s more because the platform itself has a monthly subscription. Well, that monthly subscription is also part of marketing, which people don’t really, think about. They just look at what is their marketing spend for that month. Right. So that cost, that that KPI comes directly from this Profit First, mentality.
David Richter:
Yeah. Yeah. I love that because that is you gotta <laugh> you gotta know your numbers. Like that’s the first thing and it’s yeah. I even put this in the book. Data is keen, right. Data is keen or queen. So, you know, you gotta have that data. You gotta have that at your fingertips.
Anny Draginova:
Absolutely.
David Richter:
Yeah, absolutely love that. I absolutely love that saying because it is it’s and the KPIs and really knowing where you stand and being able to, to utilize that guess <laugh> you hit the nail in the head again where like just shooting in the dark, like that’s what it is like, okay. It worked last month. Hopefully it works this month than not really taking the time to analyze is this really what’s bringing in what we are and is it really this system? And is it really, you know, this process for whatever. So now I love that that’s absolutely gold. if you’re just listen to that, just knowing those numbers really dialing in, getting to where, you know, the people who I know who make the most money, know their numbers, they know them very well. And that not only that make the most money, they keep it as well too.
David Richter:
There’s yeah. People that we’re a part of in masterminds where we know they know their numbers and we know that they’re actually keeping it too and able to, to utilize it for the fun stuff. You know, like that’s what Profit First should give you is that fun stuff, you know, it should be able to give you that freeing, you know, that freedom to actually enjoy the money that you’re making. So now I love that. That’s great. So let me talk about, you know, let’s talk about that a little bit, KPIs data. Like what in the business do you have specific KPIs that you teach or like, what are those things obviously cost per lead cost per contract, but like, do you have specific things that you track or that you say these are the five things that you need to make sure that you’re tracking inside of your business as a real estate investor?
Anny Draginova:
as far as us teaching, we have recommendations in our platform for sure. but at the end of the day, it is pretty much cost per contract. If you can, you can overcomplicate your KPIs from the get go. Yeah. my suggestion is it simple start with those three to five, whatever you think that you really need cut it down in half.
David Richter:
Hmm.
Anny Draginova:
Cause if you’re going cost per call, that’s great. That’s super awesome that you have that number, but if you don’t know how much your contract costs, because you’re spending 30 hours figuring out your cost per it makes it, it doesn’t doesn’t do you any good as far as scalability? so if there’s one number is your cost per contract that you need to know, how much does it cost me to make a contract in the second one is what is actually, what is average contract rate? Cause if you’re a contract amount, if you know that a contract costs, you let’s say $2,000 to get, and you’re only making three on it, you, you know, you have to figure out something to make a little bit bigger of a, of a profit on it. Cause you have other expenses as well. You have, salaries and overhead that you’re not really considering that. so those two numbers are gonna be the two numbers to, to kind of look at and look at closely.
David Richter:
Yeah. Awesome. I love that. Keep it simple. I think that’s something that you say we see sometimes behind the scenes working with people and it’s like, they show us what they’re tracking. I’m like, what in the world? Like you have 37 things on here. Like how do you even know if you’re doing well here? And who’s putting all this data in there, you know, it’s like, we gotta make sure that you have the highest and best data. So absolutely love that. That’s great advice, Annie, as a high powered business owner and successful with batch, what do you think is some of the, the biggest things that have contributed to the success of badge and to the success of like your real estate investing journey so far?
Anny Draginova:
one and I’d say the biggest thing giving back to my network. one of the biggest things is, and one of my favorite books is, how to see besides Profit First, is, the go giver. Yes. the go giver is something that it’s, I honestly, I reread it every year. and it, you get, you get, you get to pull a different nugget out it, every single time. And for me, it’s being able to come into relationship, partnership, whatever its, and like what can help you, and then grow that way, catering to that because the, of the day, we could have 30 products have products. It doesn’t matter. But if we don’t have the network to get out there for, for the help, for the mentorship, for the guidance or even, when you get stuck, you, you just wanna call someone and be like, Hey, I know that you’ve went through this. How did you get out it like that bottleneck, whatever it is. so it’s definitely my network. There’s there’s no, there’s no doubt about it.
David Richter:
I think there was two great nuggets from that number one being a part of those networks and you know, finding your tribe, finding those people that have those like values, vision, and like getting around those good people. Then that second one may, that was, that was you hit the nail on the head again there with the, that providing value to them first seeking, how can I give to them? What, what, how can I provide that value? And that’s, and I love that you said the go giver that’s by Bob Berg. If you wanna look that up on Amazon or whatnot, totally recommend that book game changing book, as far as just giving and the giving cycle too, you have to be able to give. Yeah. But you also have to be able to receive too. I mean, it’s a, it’s a full loop and he breaks that down in that book and I absolutely love it, but I think what you said there going into those events and going into those masterminds or mentorship even, or whatnot that you know, how many times do we hear mentorship?
David Richter:
Oh, how can they help me? And I’m giving them money, but it’s also, how can I help them though? Like what are their goals? What are they doing? It just puts a different spin on the world when look at it from that perspective. So I think that was, that was big time right there. So you’ve provided a ton of value here. Just have a couple last questions. Do you have just any more general advice for the real estate investors listening to this? You’ve given some great stuff here. Is there any last minute thing that you’d be like here do this one thing at least.
Anny Draginova:
so one of the biggest things, one of the biggest struggles I see in people is they get, we talk about is thes get caught up in it. One of my favorite, I guess, quotes or saying is, yeah, right. So we, we need to actually taking action for any of this to actually be, be viable. we need to actually not just learn what these mentorships and programs and books and absolutely everything and videos that we’re watching actually saying, it just it’s the knowledge isn’t gonna do it. It’s we need to actually start taking action. people get caught up in, well, what, what logo should I use on my business card? What font is my business card? it it’s it’s things like that. That actually don’t, I take it can contribute to your for sure do. Now when you’re getting going now, not when you’re starting off the, the font on your business card, whether it’s bolds, Orlin does not really matter, get out there and don’t be afraid to fail. Like that is the biggest thing it’s and get uncomfortable with that because it’s gonna be consistent failure and we have to be okay with it. Yeah. And I, I think that’s the biggest, the biggest advice I could give someone is learn to fail and do it more often.
David Richter:
I love that. <laugh> I love take action. Just go out there, do something from this podcast that will make this podcast a success for us. Do take some action that you’ve heard from this podcast, cuz that’s what it’s about and taking that consistent action. And if there’s one thing I heard there it’s make offers, I think that’s the biggest thing as a real estate investor make offers, offers, offers, offers. It doesn’t matter the font, like she said, like all these things that we think we, that you care about, but no, at the end of the day to see the bottom line, make those offers, get out there, get in front of sellers, make those calls, do what you need to do and get those offers out. So absolutely love that. Absolutely. So then Annie, last question here. Huge value dropped here. How can our Lister base hero give you value back? Like what, where do they go for batch leads? Do you want ’em connect on social? What do you want to, how would you like the value back?
Anny Draginova:
Yeah. honestly just, my social media is just my first name, last name. Not that difficult to find. I’m fairly available as far as if anyone does have questions, and our platforms, can be found. All of them can be found if you could just go to batchservice.io you’re able to find all the platforms from there. and then you can kinda out what is the best one for you? but if anyone questions or there’s on this podcast, I would love to connect my social. again, my first name, last name.
David Richter:
Awesome. There you go. So Anny Draginova and then you’ve got also batch service.io. So batch service.io. If you wanna look into that, can’t recommend them enough. I only have people on here that we believe in and like what they do in the service that they provide and that they’re actually doing it too. So that’s incredible. I love the stuff that you dropped here today. Annie. I think there was a lot of great value. Thank you so much for being on the Profit First REI Podcast.
Anny Draginova:
Thank you so much for having me. I’ve had a blast.
David Richter:
Thank you so much for listening to today’s show. If you found this episode valuable, could you do me a quick favor? Could you give us an honest rating within iTunes and be honest, you could say whether you liked it or not. And obviously with iTunes, the more reviews and ratings we have, the better it is for other people that are searching for a Profit First and a podcast. So we’d love to be ranked on there and that’s thanks to your help. So we would really appreciate that if you would like to go give us a rating. Also, if you’re looking to connect with us further, I would highly recommend checking out our Facebook group Profit First for real estate investors. And that’s literally what it’s called. So you can type in Profit First for real estate investors and you’ll be able to find <laugh>, you’ll be able to find our Facebook group right there.
David Richter:
So come join active real estate investors who are supporting each other and growing their businesses and profits together. That’s what that group is all about. The link should be in the description below. And if you’re interested in working with us in implementing Profit First in your real estate business, we offer coaching and guidance. So if you wanna work with someone who’s actually Profit First certified and who works right now currently with real estate businesses, you can actually go start your application process by going to simpleCFO.com/apply or just go right to simpleCFO.com and there’s an apply button right on there. If you wanna actually start your Profit First journey with someone who can actually walk you through those step by step and help, you know, and grow your cash flow. Thanks again for joining us for another episode of the Profit First REI podcast. See you next episode.
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