Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Boo (province) Zamek. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Boo (Province), thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.

Miami has no shortage of real estate agents, so it’s important to set yourself apart. At first this stressed me out. I thought, do I need to launch a gimmicky marketing campaign to make myself stand out? Do I need to learn how to “finesse” the truth to align with what my clients want to hear? I had visions of me making a spectacle of myself in order to force people to remember me. It just didn’t sit right.

I finally realized I can be successful in real estate simply by being authentic. So I developed a two-part approach.

First (part one) I just get to know my clients. Everyone has a story. And the more you listen to people, the more you learn. So as I meet people who are thinking of buying or selling, I get to know them and establish a relationship.

This is easy, fun, natural and fulfilling for me and for them. One hundred percent of the time I end up making a new friend. This genuine connection makes the rest of the process much easier.

Second (part two) I offer “unreasonable hospitality” (that’s the title of a terrific book!). This basically means I give them white glove service on steroids. But that doesn’t mean flooding people’s inboxes or blowing up their phones. It means giving them only what they want and need. Valuable, useful resources and information, when and how they need it.

It also means being discreet and trustworthy. There is a lot of private information that’s revealed to agents during the home buying process. If the clients want their personal info shared, they can and should share it. I love to introduce people to one another, but am careful to keep private info private.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Like many real estate professionals, real estate was not my first career. Prior to this I had worked for many years as an entrepreneur in Miami. As anyone who’s launched a startup business will tell you, launching and growing a business makes you pretty hearty.

My first startup was a digital media company called JustAskBoo, which I launched in 2005, before we had social media. It was a digital platform that served as a connected users through a community bulletin newsletter and online interface.

I operated the company for 14 years before I sold it. It was a wild ride and not easy, but it was a lot of fun and made me a good business person. It taught me how to bounce back, how to provide unmatched service, how to manage people’s expectations, how to think on my feet, how to find creative solutions to complex problems, and countless other important things that have proven to be useful and valuable in real estate.

By the time I entered the real estate space, I had established myself in the local business community and had a nice springboard to work from.

Real estate is not easy. If you want to be successful you need to be ready to hustle and get beat up a little. But compared to the startup space, it’s pretty civilized! So for me it was an ideal transition.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

I love Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point. In the book Gladwell describes three types of people who can make change happen. The first is mavens, who are knowledgeable about things. The second, salespeople, who are able to convince others by selling an idea. And the third is connectors, who distribute information and ideas by connecting people to each other.

I am definitely a connector. In fact, I have made a life and a career by being a connector.

I never did have all the answers (I’m not a maven), so my first startup, JustAskBoo, was a little misleading. My users weren’t “asking Boo.” They were asking me to connect you to my vast network of people who had the answers. Collectively, they were in the know. Together, they had all the answers. And they loved to share their resources and help each other whenever they could. I just created a safe, easy way for them to connect. My job was to be the social glue.

I sold the business several years ago but even still, people love to tell me their stories and how valuable JustAskBoo was to them.

Now as a real estate agent I don’t think of being a connector as a way to snag clients. I still use my social network to connect people who can help each other exchange resources. I LOVE to put people together who can help each other, even still. Not with an ulterior motive, but just because it’s fun. The benefits to everyone involved are endless.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Throughout the 14 years that I owned and operated JustAskBoo, our biggest hurdle was our technology. The tech was the very heartbeat of our business. But the technology we needed didn’t exist at the time, so we had to innovate. We designed and developed a complex , proprietary tech platform from the ground up.

At one point we raised private placement capital from angel investors in order to build a new system that was attractive, functional and easy to navigate. I selected a local design agency to create the designs, and a web developer to build the back end.

While they worked, my team spent several months promoting the platform. We created a marketing campaign to generate excitement, and even threw a big party at an art gallery shortly before its unveiling. We had been doing a ‘countdown to the launch’ with daily promotions to create buzz and our users (and investors) were anxiously waiting the big launch.

When it came time for the beta test, the designer said the artwork wasn’t ready and asked me to be patient. With each day that passed, no artwork came. For a while she made excuses, but the more persistent I became, the less responsive she became. Eventually she stopped responding to me. I had no website and my designer had ghosted my developer and me.

At the time, simple build-your-own website solutions didn’t exist. So we were stuck. The developer and I sat for hours and hour and pieced together the best makeshift site we could, in order to launch on schedule as promised.

We launched, with a whimper. The website was mediocre at best, and it reflected poorly on all of us. Our readers were disappointed, our subscribers were bewildered, our investors were dumbfounded, and my developer, my team and I were beside ourselves.

As founder and owner, I knew I was responsible for this catastrophe. We lost advertiser clients, our existing clients lost money, we lost momentum and engagement, our investors lost faith in us – it was devastating. If I had spoken up earlier, I would have had time to find a new designer and start over. But I didn’t want the conflict, so denial prevailed.

At this point I thought seriously about dissolving the business and walking away. But I knew that was the wrong thing to do. Just as I was responsible for what happened, it was up to me to rebuild and regain the trust of all our constituents. Over time we got back on track with technology and designs that actually worked. And I learned some important lessons. In real estate I am much more cautious, and I while I don’t enjoy conflict – at all – I am willing to do what it takes to advocate for my clients, even if it means speaking up when I might not want to, in order to get things done.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.compass.com/agents/province-zamek/
• Instagram: @justaskboo.realestate
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/boozamek
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/boozamek/

Image Credits

Image CanvasRebel1 and CanvasRebel2: Aubrie Andrea Photography