Her First: Reinventing What it Means to be a High-Achieving Woman

Sue Richey & Building a Local Brand That Scales Online with Courses

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We sit down with Sue Richey to dive into how she built a thriving local property management brand, scaled her business through smart marketing, and expanded her reach nationally with digital education.

Learn More About Sue:

Time Stamps:
 00:28 Sue Richey's Background and Expertise
 02:54 Business Growth and Evolution
 09:26 Building a Local Brand
 22:04 Marketing Strategies and Future Plans

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Episode 089: Sue Richey

Michelle Pualani: [00:00:00] Welcome back to the Her First podcast. We're excited today to have a very special guest. Sue Ritchie is here with us today. And without further ado, I'm gonna get right into her background, her expertise, and what she's bringing to the conversation today. And then we're gonna take you through a little journey of her business growth, the success that she's been able to accomplish, and how you can learn lessons and take away those vital opportunities to implement in your business, in your path with.

Content creation and digital presence. So Sue Richie is an experienced real estate investment and property management expert with over 30 years of helping landlords, investors, owners, and tenants buy, sell, and manage properties. She's currently principal, broker and co-owner of Richie Property Management, a very successful residential property management and real estate firm that she co-managers with her husband.

Craig and that provides personalized and comprehensive services to more than 1000 landlords and investors [00:01:00] In Northern Virginia. Sue oversees real estate sales operations. Business development and strategy and marketing for the full service property management company and helps a talented team of agents with sales and rental transactions throughout Northern Virginia and DC as a licensed realtor since 1998, and an investor herself, she's developed deep expertise in managing a wide array of residential properties, building a reputation for strategic insight, leadership, and commitment to client satisfaction.

Not only that, but she's author of Purchased a Profit, a book she authored in 2023 that serves as a comprehensive guide to understanding the ins and outs of managing rental properties. She has a devoted following on YouTube, where thousands rely on her guidance. Expertise and advice on managing and investing in properties.

And she teaches a couple of popular online courses called Property Management Mastery focused on everything an investor needs to do after they buy that rental property [00:02:00] and getting great tenants focused on everything an investor needs to do to secure the best tenant possible. What an amazing. Example of a prolific offering and service set to be able to take and leverage your skill in a particular industry and niche into other alternatives and other opportunities.

So welcome Sue to the conversation today. So excited to have you.

Sue Richey: Thank you so much. I'm excited to talk to you all. You guys are great. Great. Digital marketers. I had the pleasure of working with Joanne on a couple of these projects and, it's been quite a journey, so it'll be fun to share. 

Joanna Newton: I always love having my clients on the show. I've had an opportunity to have a few people on here. Um, Diane Gahar is one of them, and you can guys can go back and check out her episode. She's a psychotherapist and has a. actually do two episodes with her. One more talking about her business and one more talking about like mindset and habits and, and all of that. I'm excited to talk with you today, learn about like really how you've grown your business and what you've [00:03:00] done. Why don't you share with our listeners a little bit more about what your day to day looks like? What, what do you do all day?

Sue Richey: Yeah, well it's a little bit of everything, right? And it's, it's kind of evolved actually into. A much more focused role now. I think in the beginning, like any entrepreneur, you do everything right. And when, when we started, and, and this is also a little bit of a, unusual, I mean, there's plenty of husband and wife owners of businesses, but I think that's been a learning journey for us also. you know, in the beginning we, we're doing everything from setting up our company to, Selling houses to renting houses to learning and all of that. But I think now my role has evolved to, as we built the company and, and brought in a great team, it's really evolved into a much more of a marketing role.

And that's the stuff that I'm really passionate about. And it's the stuff that I've learned about myself that I really need to have a creative outlet There is a creative side of me and it kind of, you know, when you're doing the things. needed to be doing what you do best and what you love because then you're gonna succeed.

Right? And you need to put everybody else in those seats too. So that didn't really answer your [00:04:00] question, what we do. can give you some background, I guess, on our company too, but I think you're, the intro kind of laid it out pretty darn well.

Michelle Pualani: Yeah, I think it's important that we can recognize as. Business owners that things will change. They will evolve, they will grow, and your interests and passions and abilities will grow and. In the beginning, Joanna and I talk about this, is that sometimes you gotta be scrappy, sometimes you gotta figure it out.

Sometimes you gotta learn the tech. You gotta do the thing that maybe you'll eventually e either be able to outsource or hire for, but at that time, sometimes that's part of that learning stage. And the more that you can learn that thing, the better you'll actually be at outsourcing or managing someone in order to do it.

Sometimes I think people start in business they try to outsource too early and they. Kind of lose through that process because they don't know exactly what their expectations are for that task or the operation that they're trying to have someone else do. So thinking about, you know, where you started versus where you are now, I think that you're a beautiful picture [00:05:00] of how we all kind of want to operate through business in terms of, okay, we're a practitioner in this moment, but eventually we wanna leverage that into.

A book into speaking engagements, into digital products, into those things that maybe are a little bit more passive as opposed to very heavy, intensive time and energy or resources upfront. Can you tell us a little bit more about that journey on how you've been able to leverage into all of those things and where you are now versus then? 

Sue Richey: that's a really good question and it's interesting 'cause recently I just was on a panel at uh, my alma mater, which is Virginia Tech Go Hokies. it was a women panel. I was invited to be on it. It was Collegiate Women in business, and there was a panel of four of us and a variety of I was the only entrepreneur on the panel. one of the questions we were asked was, how do you empower your team, your employees to, do, you know, what does that do? And we all know that, you know, letting people and helping people instead of just telling everybody what to do or doing things for them, like giving people the. The opportunities and the freedoms to, to make their own [00:06:00] decisions, to make mistakes, to do all those things. those are only going to help them. They're going to, they're gonna feel the confidence and, and things like that. That was a hard thing for us, for me to do because, let's back this up. You start as doing everything yourself.

You make a lot of mistakes, but you own it, right? You know, that you're, you're figuring it out and you're learning how to do all of the stuff, the tech, I mean, it's all cool, but there's only, you gotta sleep sometime, you know? And so I think, as you grow and as you have done these things, and my name is on the door, right?

Like Richie Bra, it is there, it, it's a little hard to let go. way past that now. But that was, that was part of the journey for sure. I think there's so many lessons that I've learned. I mean, there are things like, you know, just being resilient, the figure out how to do it thing.

I always say that it means we hire people. I wish there was a category called the The figure it out. Factor, because I don't know how you interview for that, but being resourceful and learning how to just do it instead of just like, what do you want me to do? Or how do I do this? And asking people, you know, that's, I'm sidetracking, but that's [00:07:00] like such a huge thing for any entrepreneur.

But, it's been a journey of, us doing everything to bringing a couple of people on. More people on, you know, before it was just doers. Recently in the last, well it's five years. Seven years, we brought on more directors. So that's enabled us to kinda do what we do best. And that is help to grow the company, help to create better processes, help to market it better, not do everything.

'cause then you're just spread so thin that there's only so much capacity anybody has Right. That any entrepreneur, has. So you have to figure out How to grow and grow the right way. And, and I always say like the growing for the sake of growing is not what we wanna do.

We wanna grow the right way. You know, in the beginning you kind of take on any client, you realize pretty soon that I don't want this person. And it's such freedom to be able to say, you know what, you're not right for us and we need to mo part ways and move on and pick people who we know. Support what, our mission is, what we believe, how we treat people, how our employees are treated. And you know, it's helped us grow to the point where, where we are and bring [00:08:00] in. people and have an enjoyable part of the day. Because let's face it, real estate is sexy. Right? But property management can be challenging. And, we have good clients. We don't get a lot of people complaining and They call when things aren't working right. And our people are constantly dealing with problems. So the, the better relationships we have and the better clients we bring in and tenants we bring in Happier everyone is, but I just, you know, as I said in the beginning, I think the other part of this is just learning about yourself and learning what you really like to do, and how do you find people who can do the other parts better than you, who know more than you, who know more about marketing than you know what I mean?

And you learn from those people and you, you can outsource and I've learned to do all of those things. It's been hard sometimes and it's, it's been great sometimes.

Joanna Newton: It is so important to realize that like your life as an entrepreneur is constantly. Evolving. when you're starting out and you have no team, you're doing it all yourself. That's like one thing. And then you get to hire and then you actually, as a, human, you have to grow and change and evolve [00:09:00] and make those little adjustments.

And I think sometimes as an entrepreneur, when you're stuck, you can. Easily say, oh, well I'm stuck where I'm at because I haven't hired this person, or because I am not capable of why, or the market sucks, or the software is bad, or, or whatever it is. But you might need to actually evolve, like you as a human might need to evolve the way you think to get to that next level. know, one of the things that you've been really good at is growing a brand on a local level. so a lot of people when they think about growing a brand, they think about national presence and, being top of the Google search for their keywords and, and all of that. But there's something different about growing a brand in a local community.

So you are the go-to name and person in that area, and you can build A huge and successful and profitable business in a specific geographic area. Now, we've talked a lot on this podcast [00:10:00] about that, like more high level national brand growth, right? Like finding your niche. But that niche is not necessarily a, a location that niche is focused on like a type of person or personality or, Job description or something like that, but you've been able to really create a name for yourself in your local area. Can you talk about some of the strategies that you did to build that, from scratch to being kind of a go-to name in your area? 

Sue Richey: managing and selling real estate, it's going to be local, right? Real estate is very hyperlocal. The markets are different. Everything's different. I mean, we can only serve clients that are here. And that's to say there are many national companies, like in many industries, that are taking over kind of the mom and pop types of markets.

But in this industry, I've seen them, flop and I've seen them really not provide the kind of service that you want. Because at the end of the day, what we're doing is we are taking care of people's real estate assets. We like to think of ourselves really as the. real estate advisor, like a financial advisor is to their clients.

That is what we're [00:11:00] doing. We're managing somebody else's real estate, and, and this is probably a pretty big of their overall financial portfolio. So it's, it is hard to do that without some level of personal touch, which is something that these, the larger national kinds of, they lack, you know, they have people across the world and we have virtual people, but they're not managing people's properties. People who are local, who know them, who speak to them, who talk to them about their, family, and their, you know, that's what people want still, people still want a human touch, right? So for us, building our brand, I mean, it always started with part of the community and we have. You know, even before it was intentional, that's just what we did.

We, we were, we've always been very big on volunteering we always told our kids, you know what, no matter what you do, you gotta give back. I have been the board chair for our local YMCA for many, many years, and I was involved, I. My husband was in the Rotary Club for so many years. We were in variety of other kinds of volunteer organizations, and we did a lot, and we did.

We took leadership roles in those and people got to know us, and so it wasn't like [00:12:00] we were there just to grow our business. We were there because we cared about it and, and oh, by the way, we own a property management company, and people remember that, and there were lots of referrals that came from that. We obviously did a lot of other intentional business sort of networking and groups and, and that layered over time. You know, people knew who we were. You know, we would go to things and Oh, I've heard of your company. I've seen you. Yes, I've to. So I know so and so, and I love being a connector in the community.

That's fun for me. And it's just fun to know what other small businesses are doing. So that was a huge part of how people know us. I mean, Washington DC is a big area, but it still feels small even in our, Virginia side of dc. I think that's, um, it's so important that we, know, are present in the community, but also being a local kind of a, still a small-ish business, even though we're not quite small anymore, that for our clients is important.

We had some guy walk into our office the other day. He said, I want, I had a big com. I want someone who really. knows me, you know, and knows my home and knows what I'm doing because I'm across the world going [00:13:00] to be going across the world. but I do think that for me, you know, you mentioned I, you know, I started a couple courses. I wrote a book. there is still a bigger audience and there's so much knowledge that I have gained over the last 20, 30 years in management in real estate and investing that I. Wanna share with more than just what we have here, which is why I decided to do the courses and share this with people beyond the people who live here and in my area.

Michelle Pualani: So often I feel like we miss that interpersonal relationship and. Importance when it comes to building our businesses. A lot of times we get stuck on kind of the numbers and the metrics and okay, we have to reach 10,000 people to be able to convert a thousand people, to bring in a hundred people into a program.

And we start thinking about them in terms of numbers instead of. Faces. And so what you're speaking to is really building those personal connections, showing your face, remembering people's names, connecting with them, being interested in their background, their families. I mean, it's kind of [00:14:00] sales 1 0 1 is to get to know people, to understand them, to be able to build that rapport and connection.

I think when we're in the digital space, a lot of times we neglect that opportunity to really be able to stand out and make a difference and an impact in people's lives, right? Because that's why we're doing what we're doing.

We wanna educate. We want to. Impact. We want to improve. We want to help benefit the people that we work with. when we start focusing on the larger digital strategies, or these marketing strategies kind of from a high level, we start to lose the names. We start to lose the faces. We start to lose the people.

And the reason behind. What we're doing. So it's important, I think, to come back to that and have a good reminder to think about who am I engaging with? How can I build the rapport? How can I create that community? And it sounds like you've done a really great job at that from a local level. You know, as you're moving into the digital space, as you're starting to connect with larger audiences, how do you see yourself?

Moving that interpersonal relationship. And how do you see yourself [00:15:00] being able to connect with people in that way? You know, via your YouTube, via the content that you're creating and via the work that you're doing now online.

Sue Richey: Yeah, I think that's gonna be obviously more challenging than, than having local people. I've had calls from people in Idaho and asking me if I can help them write their leases and, and I'm like, well, I don't know Idaho. I. Landlord tenant law, I can't really help you, but I had a conversation and, for me, I, I try to very hard to answer people and I read the comments and I, see what people are asking and I try to make content around that. because, you know, just being able to help people is, is about listening, right? But that broader scale, that's really the way I'm going to be able to help addition to creating other kinds of for example, or, or, other material that could help investors or landlords or whatever. But, know, because it's, tough on that level and I haven't quite figured that out yet, to be quite honest.

I mean, I, I am hearing what. Our people are going through questions are people that we get asked problems that come up, and [00:16:00] I am sure that that is what is, you know, other people are dealing with. But, you know, in terms of engagement, it's still to be determined. I mean, still figuring it out, but I think like what you said about just. Not thinking of people like numbers. You know what we say to our team all the time? as a, as a property management company, we, it's very easy for us to just be a commodity. anybody can fix, call somebody to fix a toilet and fix this and then get a new appliance. how do we show up better than that?

How do we, how do we, communicate if there's one thing that's going to make us stand out, it is going to be that. people have to like you too. They have to feel like you care about them, So no matter how big you are, that's always, just gonna be

Joanna Newton: Yeah. And that's the challenge as you scale too, right? Like if you. Build a name for yourself because of that high touch, just super good service, great communication and all of that. As you expand, how do you actually, grow with that? I'm personally dealing with a relationship right now with [00:17:00] a company I've hired where they aren't communicating. things aren't getting done, but I'm not being asked for what I need to do the things. Right. And as someone who has an agency and helps people and all of that, like I try to have ensue. We're even more on top of our stuff than when you worked with us. But like, we try to have really good systems so everybody knows what's happening and what we need and, and we try to be super, super clear with us.

'cause, 'cause you're right, no matter what you do. Not anybody, but lots of people could do what you do at a high level. And the big difference is what's that communication? What's that interpersonal relationship? how are you actually mapping out the journey of, of your client? are you giving them a great experience because then they're gonna wanna come back, they're gonna wanna work with you again. If all of that is seamless, 'cause lots of people can Build a website or manage a property or, you know, provide a coaching service. I think it takes a lot of thought to create that really, really strong customer journey and [00:18:00] experience, in that world.

Sue Richey: It does and I, I think we've had to. As we've grown, build more systems internally, as you said, to communicate amongst each other because when that flow breaks down from a new client coming in to going to get their proper leads to our managers, it's very easy to break down. Communication, then problems happen.

So we've worked really hard on internal systems, but also on those external systems. 'cause while we want the personal touches, sometimes it gets crazy busy. But as long as we have something that's communicating, they're getting educated, they're getting my videos, they know we're thinking about things.

We're very proactive in what, you know, in our approach with, with what's going on right now with the tariffs and how that's going to impact The cost of repairs, cost of appliances, cost of a lot of things. We've been, you know, and in our area too with federal jobs getting cut, we were quite honestly. Surprised we haven't seen or heard of a lot more calls from tenants saying, I'm sorry, I don't have a job anymore. I can't pay my rent. but whatever is happening, we're trying to stay ahead of it and it's trying to communicate ahead of it. And I think that just [00:19:00] shows that, you know, what we are more than just, You know, fixing things. we're looking

at this as a bigger scale. We're trying to protect you. We're trying to protect a lot of the things that could go wrong, those, and just keeping you informed. But yeah, you grow bigger. Not everyone, not every employee is going to communicate the same way.

Some will love to chitchat about your favorite baseball team. That's my baseball team. And they'll have these great conversations and others are a little bit, you know, a bit more formal or they're a bit more of this. So that's your personality. But as long as. They're doing a good job, we'll, we'll add things into to kind of supplement. 

Michelle Pualani: what you're offering is very important from like a security perspective as well. You know, a couple of things you just mentioned can really make people feel uncomfortable or. In a place of unease, right? Not knowing sometimes what's gonna happen. And I actually sit on the committee for a local organization.

It's called the Women's Legacy Fund. It's part of Community Foundation here in our St. Luis Obispo County. we provide large grants to nonprofits and organizations that support women and girls in our community. [00:20:00] And we recently had a presentation by one of our nonprofits and they were speaking to how they help.

Those who do not have homes at the time, and find them placements and get them into homes with, you know, single mothers, their families, and these other resources, and kind of like wraparound resources and support and services that they offer. And so when you think of tenancy, when you think of someone's place.

To live. That is such a point of security and importance that goes way beyond, you know, just the business. So bringing in that, again, personal touch and ability to care and have compassion and just open the line of communication. I think so often, especially again as coaches, creators, digital business owners, we are behind a screen.

We're behind a camera. We don't always have those people in front of us we forget that we can open up a line of communication. I've heard a lot of business owners and have worked with some that have struggled with a client issue or something about, you know, them engaging in their programs and it's amazing the things that you [00:21:00] can remedy, solve, or deal with.

Quickly and easily. If you talk to someone, if you get them on the phone, if you just open up the line of communication, and like you said, listening. Listening is such an important part of business marketing and how you're showing up is if you're listening, if you're aware, if you're tuned into what their needs are, you can meet them.

We have issues with deliverability in our business. Someone doesn't get a package. Or they've ordered something incorrectly or their loyalty points didn't apply, right? And so they're reaching out to us and by immediately opening up yourself to be in good customer service and respond to their needs and be aware of what it is that they want, and hearing them, it solves the issue so much quicker.

And it alleviates the financial tax on your business in managing that customer because you don't have to do a return. You can do something else instead. So I think it's really important to be smart about that communication and be intentional about how you're opening yourself up to communication and not being defensive, showing [00:22:00] up with the care, showing up with the compassion.

And I think you've really demonstrated that. So when it comes to, you know, how you're communicating, how you're showing up, can you tell us just a little bit more about your marketing strategy? So you have this YouTube presence, you have a local presence in the community, you're networking with people. Now as you start to grow and expand, what's the intentionality behind that and kind of how are you showing up in your marketing on a, in a consistent kind of weekly, daily way?

Sue Richey: Yeah, that is something that you know as a one man woman, marketing department. I was doing so much that it burned me out, you know? And I was trying to figure out what do we do now? 'cause as you grow, like in our business, there is natural attrition. the more you grow, the more number of properties you just have to replace every year, regardless.

I mean. This isn't about doing a bad job. People move back, people sell their houses, people decide, you know, maybe they're gonna give it a shot and try to manage it themselves. There are a lot of reasons, but generally most management companies can say they would expect 10 to 20% they have to replace every year for those [00:23:00] reasons.

Sometimes it's not a good fit, whatever. you've got to do that just to break even. So as we've grown, that means the number of properties I need to replace has grown, which means I need to really step it up. And so for me, in the beginning we really didn't do much marketing at all because we had a lot of referrals coming in from people we knew. then I supplemented that with, with YouTube, which I really love creating that content and that has really helped a lot. only on locally, but you know, elsewhere. our business development manager will go meet people and they're like, oh, I've been watching Sue's videos. And it helps obviously for us, it shows our expertise and authority and the subject.

Right. I really am want to do more things that are. bit more forward thinking. Now, AI is not as forward thinking as it might have been a while ago, but there's still a lot of people figuring out, how do you use this? I use it in various ways in my business, but for me, a lot of what I'm doing right now is learning and trying to figure out what to do.

Do I use a direct mail strategy? Do I more content develop? Like what else do I [00:24:00] do to find the people that I need to find? one group that we get a lot of. clients from are the foreign service. Those are folks who are here in Washington and they go abroad, get through for their job, and they're gone for several years, and they may go to a different post or they may come back. That's a big client. We have a many, many foreign service clients, and how do we tap into that group? We, we do support, financially support, an organization. through them and we go to different events, but I, I think from, you know, I really to look at more ways that we can be, you know, we obviously we're on social media and when think and we're posting content and, but I wanna be more intentional about targeting the right people.

And I haven't done much paid, many paid ads, You know, we've been successful in driving leads. We need to step it up. So I'm, I need to step that up too.

Joanna Newton: I love that you're sitting here as a very successful business owner, right? Accomplishing all of the things, being an amazing local presence, having a profitable business, doing all of those [00:25:00] things, and sitting here saying like, what's next? I need to step it up. I need to mix it up and do things differently to get to the next level, because I think too many times, and I talk to entrepreneurs all day, every day, many times. I get it. It would be really nice. We think, well, I just wanna like post three times on social media. I'm gonna make a bunch of sales and then my product or my service is just gonna. Sell, sell forever, like I think sometimes. And we want that to happen 'cause that sounds really nice. But also I think that a lot of social media accounts like entrepreneurs online who are like, I work one hour a day from my boat.

They, they like make it seem like it's. Possible to just like set it and forget it, and your business is just gonna like make money for you forever. But truly, when it comes to our marketing strategies, we have to grow, we have to evolve, we have to change with the times. Like think about now, you know, TikTok will probably never go away, right?

But as an [00:26:00] example, if your strategy was all TikTok, all of a sudden it's. Getting banned, not getting banned, getting banned, not getting banned. TikTok right now is your only sales channel and you're not doing something to diversify just in case, then you're doing something wrong, right?

Because as an entrepreneur, we need to be looking for what's next and, and what's coming, and. One of the things you mentioned earlier in our conversation were these larger companies, right? That have been, that could be competition to you. So there's large property management companies that can come in and sort of take over.

I know this is a big problem in like Southern California, like one company owns like. All of the property in a neighborhood, and it makes it like really challenging for either one, for people to get apartments, but also two for other people to come in and have, um, have any stake in that market. Can you talk a little bit of how you've, you've sort of combated that challenge in your business?

Like bigger companies trying to kind of come in and, and take over while [00:27:00] still keeping your own market share?

Sue Richey: Yeah, I mean, honestly, we get a lot of people coming to us from those companies, so not doing a great job. I mean, they're just. They have a property manager that's located in Cincinnati or something and they're managing this property and that, can it be done? Yeah. Can it be done great? No, I mean, am a good to great kind of girl, you know, like, this is a, I love that book. we can do anything good, I don't wanna be good, you know? And so for us it's, it's, it can only be about letting people know that. we are here. You know what, we are experienced landlords too. Craig and I own, you know, other real estate too. And we, we, our team manages some of it and other, some of it's elsewhere. We get it right. We get it from, like real people we get it from the side of being a business owner and managing a bunch of property, but we also get it from personal, from personal experience. When our stuff breaks, we feel it. Yeah. When I have to spend five grand and replace a h or more and replace an HVAC system that. That hurts. I get it. And then that is a, [00:28:00] big part of the other thing that we really want people to understand. Our team, we've gotta have empathy. We've gotta understand that every day that somebody's home is vacant, it costs them money, you know? And I think that, I'm not saying that these big companies do or don't do this, but. I remember one company in our industry that they weren't here, they were somewhere else and they were trying to do everything so automated and just like literally have no people. like, good luck. Good luck with that. But I mean, you know, maybe that, maybe that works one day, but. I still like people. I mean, I, I like talking to people. I, our team likes talking to people, you know, I just, I don't want a business like that. And, and if, if we stay where we are and we don't grow and we have great people and we, we, our team is happy, I'm good with that. 

Michelle Pualani: as you evolve and grow in business too, your priorities change, right? What you want to give to the world, how you wanna serve your clients, and just the way in which you govern your business. I think when we're getting started, kind of where we started this conversation, when you're doing everything is because you don't know exactly what you want.

And that's okay. That's part of the [00:29:00] process. It's part of trial and experimentation, and you're figuring out why you're in business and how you wanna show up, and what's the service that you provide. Is it gonna be this, is it gonna look like that? What shape is it gonna take? How are you gonna engage with people?

And what is the community that you're building? And I think a lot of those unknowns can be scary and overwhelming for a lot of people, but just realizing that over time you'll start to become. Feel more established in what you're doing, which will create more groundedness, more confidence, kind of more empowerment to show up confidently.

You know, creating the content feels good because you feel solid in your expertise and how you're talking about it, because you've done it so many times and sometimes that just takes repetition. Sometimes that just takes putting in the time, putting in the work and, and. Doing the things that don't feel good to you to know that like, okay, that's not the direction we wanna go.

This is where we're gonna head. This is our path. And so it's important to recognize that from the beginning and not give yourself too hard of a time. If you're feeling like I don't have that [00:30:00] assuredness, I don't have that sense of grounding in what I'm doing. I'm still going, being pulled in all of these different directions.

So I know you have a successful platform on YouTube. Can you talk a little bit more about kind of that growth strategy and how you've been able to accomplish that strong reach? then what is that YouTube channel and where can people find you?

Sue Richey: Yeah, I mean, I think when I looked at, you know, how can I deliver messaging? I mean, I could have just, we have a blog and we use a lot of our videos, but it was a little bit of a challenge for me. Like I wasn't somebody who was scared of making videos, but the videos I make today are much better than the videos I made five years ago. I figure, you know, for me it was if I did it. Everything. And yes, I can post a lot of this content in other places, but if I did many things just surface, I would never really get good at one thing or go deep in it. So I, I liked that, the idea of that. And before I kind of touch on this, it's funny though, Joey, that, that you said. I like that. You know, you do that. Even though I said I have no idea really what I'm doing, what else I need to do, because I'm always like experimenting in it. I'm not just the [00:31:00] shiny object. I wanna keep, you know, the plate spinning with things that are working, but then looking for new things, you know?

So I appreciate that, but I always, I still feel a little bit like, I'm just figuring it out, but I guess that's okay because if you think you have it all figured out, you probably don't. so with YouTube that it's just been fun for me. I like the engagement. I like sharing the things that I learn and that can help people.

it's been good. Obviously, you know, it's, it's a huge search engine. People find it, I mean. We're definitely getting found with it. So it's that in that way it's helping as well. Uh, YouTube channel is, is called Richie Property Management. And, um, you know, it's all things landlord and, problems and investing and whatever.

I'm always looking for more topics, so I'm always asking, what do you wanna hear about?

Joanna Newton: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show today, sharing a bit of your story. This has been really a great conversation about really what it takes to scale and grow a sustainable business. I think a lot of times people come into business looking for that, that super quick win, or that I'm gonna make money and [00:32:00] retire, but there's actually joy in building a community. Building a network, building a business, sharing your knowledge with others through platforms like YouTube or a blog or any of those things. And I really enjoyed learning from your expertise here and how you've built that business and how you. Keep it, you know, sustained. And then how you get it to the next level.

if you're listening to this and you wanna learn more about property management or just connect with Sue further, definitely go check out her YouTube channel. We will link it in the show notes and while you're there, subscribe if you like to her, but then find your way over to the her first podcast too. Subscribe to our episodes and we hope to see you in the next one.

Sue Richey: Thanks so much for having me.