We were lucky to catch up with Lisa Marie Carroll recently and have shared our conversation below.

Lisa Marie, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Naming anything – including a business – is so hard. Right? What’s the story behind how you came up with the name of your brand?

Team TLC is the name of my business and it holds multiple meanings. After being licensed for about 20 years it became apparent that I needed help to continue to grow and one of the first steps I took was to ask my husband, Tim Carroll to get his real estate license and then I recruited a long time friend in the business to join me to help me handle the lead volume I couldn’t handle. Soon the team began growing and we needed to come up with a team name. This process is much harder than one would think! We came up with all kinds of interesting ideas but finally agreed on Team TLC, representing our initials in our names, Tim and Lisa Carroll. What we loved even more about the name is it represents us well, because we believe our clients do deserve TLC (Tender Loving Care) in the home buying and selling process. We go above and beyond to provide the best, most professional and personalized service to our clients so they feel the love and feel special, because to us they are. Our business has been built on repeat business and referrals over the years and our clients truly do mean the world to us!

Lisa Marie, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I got my real estate license back in 1993 just as I graduated from University of South Florida with a degree to teach special education. This year marks my 30th year as a Tampa Bay realtor! I have been helping buyers and sellers in our area for many years and have helped thousands of people over the years. Each person and situation is special and requires attention to the needs of the client and I love making the process smooth, stress free and fun while getting buyers the best deal and sellers the most profit. Building Team TLC, which is officially called Tim & Lisa Carroll, Team TLC – Mihara & Associates, Inc, was one of the hardest, yet fulfilling processes I have ever been involved in and I strive to have the staff and realtors on my team that best represent my mission and core values of helping clients achieve their goals, which in turn helps us all achieve our goals. Unfortunately in our industry of real estate, the requirements to become licensed are very easy and many people get licensed to work part time and really do not know how to best help clients achieve their goals, causing a lot of undue stress along the way. This is one of my biggest issues with our business. I don’t like to see people getting poor service when they deserve professional service. You will never see us taking listing photos with our cell phones to save money on professional photographers, drones and videographers, because that does not serve our clients well and would go totally against our brand. One of our core values is “Only the best will do…. Period” and another is “Clients come first.” We want to be the trusted brand when it comes to professional realtors and work hard every day to make sure we are serving our clients the way they deserve!

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

There was a time when I thought I had to do it all for it to be done right. I did not realize how much this was holding me back, until a light bulb went off and I began building my team of staff and realtors to help me best serve my clients to the level they deserve. I think a lot of people want to do it all to make sure its correct, or to keep all the profit and not share it with staff or other agents on the team, but what I realized is that I could no longer serve my clients because I was just spread too thin. Do not get me wrong, building a 20 person team of successful agents with 4 staff members is not for the faint of heart! It has been difficult at times, but it also has allowed me to have some personal time in my life again. I was struggling to find time to take care of myself, my family, relax and enjoy life and I was having a hard time getting all the work done. Building the team has made me realize that there is such power in a great team. And with that comes freedom to have a personal life and enjoy some time away from the business to focus on family, health and fun. It is a hard thing to learn and give up that control, but once you do, you see how much better everything becomes, from the client experience, to profits, to personal time.

Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?

We focus on growing our clientele by loving our past clients! We love to have special client appreciation events and have 3-4 each year. We do giveaways and send our clients thank you gifts and “just thinking of you” gifts, birthday cards/gifts and really focus on making them feel special, because to us, they are the most important thing we have in our business. Referrals and repeat business make our “world go around” and make it so enjoyable. To continue to build our clientele, besides focusing on past client appreciation, we also find other ways to connect with sellers and buyers in the marketplace and really enjoy creating local content on our youtube channel and our website, through community guides, neighborhood tours and blogs about our community. We love to give back to our community and do charity work each year as well. I think giving back by providing information to potential clients is a great way to meet and connect with likeminded people.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.TampaTeamTLC.com
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh5xgUajluQE3er_ymARrgA