This episode features an interview with Margot Ettedgui, General Manager at Financial Triangle. Margot discusses the power of social media, her advice for content creators, and cracking viral sensations.
This episode features an interview with Margot Ettedgui, General Manager at Financial Triangle. Also known as “The Real Queen Margot”, she has gained thousands of followers for her educational yet humorous content on TikTok and Instagram. She is recognized for her viral content and unconventional loan programs for investments and developments.
In this episode, Aaron talks to Margot about the power of social media in business, her expert advice for new and seasoned content creators, and how to crack the code of turning everyday topics into viral sensations.
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About Margot:
Margot Ettedgui is the General Manager at Financial Triangle. She is also known as “The Real Queen Margot” and has gained thousands of followers for her educational yet humorous content on TikTok and Instagram. She is recognized for her viral content and unconventional loan programs for investments and developments.
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Guest Quote:
“There’s always content to be made. Everyone always has their own unique perspective. And you can create on that, you know what I mean? And there’s different ways to create on that. There’s podcasts... there’s acting and singing. There’s so many things, and you can really infuse yourself. And that’s how you really stand out. This is The Standouts, right? When you infuse yourself, and your personality into what you do ,and you really embrace that, make it a lifestyle and leverage that, it’s game over.” - Margot Ettedgui
Time Stamps:
* (00:01) Intro
* (00:28) Margot’s business journey
* (05:04) Importance of social media trends
* (09:05) Mortgage insights shared on social media
* (11:55) Advice for aspiring content creators
* (13:01) Impact of social media on business
* (17:05) Juggling workload with creating engaging content
* (20:26) Business challenges from social media success
* (27:39) Margot’s inspirations
* (33:12) Spotting trends on social media
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Connect with Margot Ettedgui:
https://www.financialtriangle.com
https://www.instagram.com/therealqueenmargot
https://www.tiktok.com/@therealqueenmargot
https://www.youtube.com/@therealqueenmargot3760
Connect with Aaron:
https://www.tiktok.com/@aarongrushowhomes
https://www.linkedin.com/in/423/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_SSHGREChuBaU6u_USIIEg
https://www.instagram.com/aarongrushowhomes
https://aarongrushowhomes.com/
Follow Estate Media:
https://www.linkedin.com/company/estatemediaus/
Aaron Grushow: [00:00:00] Today on the Standouts, a pioneer in the world of lending and mortgages. She's managed to accumulate millions of views on social media, grew an incredible community. And with that, a great personal brand. Margo. Ted Gee, thanks for joining me. Thank you so much for having me. Of course. A true standout. You really are.
Aaron Grushow: Thank you. Um, would love to give our audience a. Tidbit about who you are as a person. Yep. What you've done until now, bit about your journey.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. So I started in the mortgage industry about six, seven years ago or so. Um, and social media wasn't really a thing seven years ago, I think for, for service providers and, um, self-employed individuals to kind of create a personal brand that, that really wasn't a place for that.
Margot Ettedgui: It was very much more the traditional method. Um, and through networking and traveling in the beginning, I found myself to like, [00:01:00] have a hard time to understand how I was going to constantly be able to network, constantly be able to build my pipeline, um, without like a proper marketing channel. Mm-hmm. And, uh, being like a young female joining a space like mortgages.
Margot Ettedgui: I don't wanna say like it was easy to stand out, but it was easy to find a different angle than the rest, right? Uh, I think the finance space is quite a traditional place and um, I really watched a lot of the big real estate shows, real estate agents. Kind of take form into being like celebrities. This was at the beginning of Million Dollar Listing.
Margot Ettedgui: Right. Um, and for me, I found that angle that I was like, I would love to be that. I would love to do that. But there was such a big competition in real estate and I thought the only way that I would be able to work with those real estate agents and work with those clients and those properties was if I offered something like Financ.
Margot Ettedgui: I thought that like the product [00:02:00] money was such a easier product to sell than selling multimillion dollar homes. So I wanted to kind of like work that space first. Um, and my first few transactions were very much like young entrepreneurs, people that needed creative lending. And so that kind of sparked my niche and I guess creativity for the type of angle that I could take, like in my career.
Margot Ettedgui: And I wanna say, You know, obviously the pandemic really accelerated all things content creation. Mm-hmm. Um, and I had a really good thing going, you know, in the first five years of my career with a really nice stability. Then come, came in the pandemic and that's when I had to kind of figure out what am I gonna do to make a difference, you know, and like really try to continue my business.
Margot Ettedgui: All my business kind of stopped over. Which was really interesting. Yeah. Um, and social media was just a place that I was able to put the information and knowledge that was in my brain out on the platform and have people know that I'm an [00:03:00] expert at what I do and kind of build that trust in relationship.
Margot Ettedgui: So, um, it really kind of just started in 2020, the content side. Um, but I really just always kept that mentality of, look, I have nothing to lose, everything to gain, and let's just put stuff out there and see what works. Yeah. And adapt from there.
Aaron Grushow: That's a great mentality to have. Yeah. And it's clearly worked out.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. How would you describe your content to someone who's never seen a video of yours?
Margot Ettedgui: I would say it's the perfect combination of education and entertainment. And there's now been a phrase called edutainment. Yeah. So I would say it's kind of like edutainment style content. You know, when I started creating content, it was because of the pandemic.
Margot Ettedgui: I felt like the concept of marketing fully changed. And even me as a consumer, when I would receive emails and marketing emails specifically, right. I was like, this is so boring. I feel like everyone's really trying to push and sell me. Yeah. And this was a time where really people didn't wanna feel like they were being sold anything.
Margot Ettedgui: Mm-hmm. They wanted an escape. They came to social [00:04:00] media to like take a break for a little bit, right? Yeah. And so for me, I was like, how do I. Fun for me to make and fun for a consumer and or someone that wasn't expecting to learn about real estate or finance, want to learn more. Um, and again, because I always stuck with that.
Margot Ettedgui: First idea of making sure that I was having fun, making it and viewing it. Yeah. Um, that's kind of how I really pushed on making sure that like, it was fun for fun, relatable, and easy to consume, I think would really be the best way to describe it. So I've gone, you know, from different things, whether it's a very famous, uh, audio in a song or an audio that people know well, phrases in movies that I like to recreate, whether that's Harry Potter or Jurassic Park.
Margot Ettedgui: And I kind of bring, um, something that's popular to the mass. And something that's not like financing and try to blend that together to make it digestible.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. Um, I mean, you, you kind of touched on it, but don't be offended when I call mortgages a bit mundane. It really is.
Aaron Grushow: I mean, yeah. [00:05:00] Um, and yeah, I'm just like curious how you've been able to create these viral videos out of such a topic and you kind of touched on it. Mm-hmm. You know, leveraging trends. Yeah. How important have trends been in your success?
Margot Ettedgui: Trends have been, I think a hundred percent of my success. And, and I've always told people, and I did a lot of talks on this, whether it was clubhouse or whether it was, um, panels, I've spoken, you know, digital mortgage conferences in Vegas and so on and so forth, and I've always said, Um, in order to go viral, you have to think like a consumer.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Um, and so for me, my success has always been because I have consumed 70% and created about 30%. That has always allowed me to stay on top of the newest trending audio stay on top of what is viral and why certain things go viral. And a lot of why things go viral. And I'm sure you know, this is timing.
Margot Ettedgui: Timing is everything. And so if you. If you don't capitalize and leverage on trends in the moment when they are trending, [00:06:00] yeah, then it's hard to kind of, you know, really let that take off and such a mundane product like financing. You know, it really needed something that was super trendy to be able to like have the two click off together.
Margot Ettedgui: Right. Um, because for me, even when I was just watching educational finance stuff, I was like, this is just boring. I don't wanna watch it. Yeah. Um, so that was, for me, the first thing was like making sure that my content could really, uh, be appeased by the masses. Yeah. And, and have more people learn about it and, and not think that it's boring.
Margot Ettedgui: Try to find a different angle to it.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Yeah. You touched on, so. Sorry.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah, I was wondering if we could, Margaret, this is great. I was just wondering, we could, and maybe you were about to ask this, Erin, if we could hear an example of, um, what you're
Aaron Grushow: talking about in terms of leveraging, that's mm-hmm. Yeah.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah, totally. Um, I'll just
Margot Ettedgui: ask that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was gonna say, you rephrase the
Aaron Grushow: question. Can you give us a bit of an example [00:07:00] of how you've leveraged trends, maybe one of your more successful videos where you've done
Margot Ettedgui: that? Yeah. Just recently, two weeks ago, I had a VI video, hit a million views on Instagram, and uh, I pretty much just took, and again, it really is consuming.
Margot Ettedgui: I was, I am on TikTok. That's usually where I find the trends first. And when I see a viral video, I analyze every aspect about how that went viral. Hmm. How many videos are on that audio? How many accounts have gone viral with. How many different types of content has been used with that audio? So I do a lot of what I call trend research.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Um, and then I just, I quite literally sometimes recreate and, and there's nothing wrong with that. I think, you know, when it comes to content, you have to be inspired by other creators, right? So I think the best thing to do, uh, is to really look back at certain creators, how they went viral, recreate it, but put your own spin on it.
Margot Ettedgui: So sometimes I would see like fitness creators go viral on a certain audio that I really liked. I liked how [00:08:00] they filmed it. I liked the frame, the positioning, the characters, and I would just be able to see that and change it into a context that makes sense for my niche. I know maybe that sounds a little bit confusing to explain, um, but it could be as simple.
Margot Ettedgui: You know, as a, yeah. As finding, for example, like, you know, welcome to Jurassic World, and that just being like an investor, seeing a property for the first time mm-hmm. It takes time for your brain to start to think in that kind of weird way. Yeah. Because, uh, the, it's difficult for me to explain that. Like you said, you
Aaron Grushow: kind of have to be consumer first.
Aaron Grushow: Exactly. And
Margot Ettedgui: yeah. Yeah. Exactly. The more you consume, the more you can understand how to put your touch on it. In the beginning I was just consuming and just thinking, oh, these are great videos. These are fun videos. Now I'm very much more strategic with it. Yeah, I see a viral video immediately I will send it to myself in a chat, and when it's time for me to create my content and batch content in an organized fashion, I look back at all those [00:09:00] videos and I will quite literally try to recreate them.
Margot Ettedgui: And I mean, you know, you can try to say, oh, but you're just copying other. Well, not necessarily we're being inspired by other creators, but we are putting our own context, our own niche, our own education onto that. Yeah. And I think it's for everyone to find their angle on how they wanna do that.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah, yeah.
Aaron Grushow: No, there's definitely a balance there. Yes. Yeah. Um, so if I'm, you know, brand new to the space, I wanna start creating content. How much time do you think I should be spending consuming versus just starting to create? Should I put more strategy into it or should I just, you know, get the first piece of content out there?
Aaron Grushow: Or is it a balance?
Margot Ettedgui: Um, I think that's a great question. I think in the beginning you need to be consuming way more than creating Yeah. And there's nothing wrong with that. And again, it's because you have to be on top of what are the consumers wanting right now. Yeah. Trends are, are very short-lived on the internet.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. And what went viral a month ago is not gonna go viral anymore. Exactly. You know, if you tried to recreate that sometimes. It, it really is. And then once your [00:10:00] brain starts to understand what goes viral sounds, you're gonna be able to, uh, detect those things faster. You will not have to consume as much, and you'll be able to create more.
Margot Ettedgui: But I think people, you know, confused by, oh, scrolling on social media. Versus trend researching and analyzing what goes viral. Yeah. So you have to understand the distinction.
Aaron Grushow: You have to be like an active watcher. Yes. And yeah, active watcher really analyze. Yeah. Mm-hmm. That's exactly it. No, that's, that's all great.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Um, I'm curious how your actual business has changed and evolved since you became, you know, such a well-known face. Yeah. In the content space.
Margot Ettedgui: You know, um, it's funny in the. In the beginning it was a lot more just direct consumers, so clients asking to be pre-approved, which I wanna say a good 30% or 30 to 50% of the leads that I received through social media are direct consumers uhhuh, which is great because these clients are coming already with.
Margot Ettedgui: A wanting to work with me, right? I didn't have to pay Zillow for leave, right? I'm [00:11:00] not having to cold call and convince them to work with me. They've seen all my videos. They want to work with me. They feel like they can trust me from what I've put out there on my digital resume, so to speak. So that's a really great way that has changed my business.
Margot Ettedgui: But I wanna say further, more than that, which has really made the biggest effect are the industry professionals that are on social media. I think people think in the beginning, I need to create content to get. Do you have everything a little bit further than that too? Who can feed you leads? Who are industry professionals that are already kind of qualifying clients?
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. And have clients to already send you. Right. So I think with social media, because of what we can do, when you start to generate a lot of views, You have developers that start to reach out. You have real estate agents that need help getting views on their listings, right? And so on and so forth. And then you start to build a really nice, uh, sphere of influence.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. That starts to feed you consistent leads. And, um, that has been a huge change as well as of course, you know, the opportunities that we get, [00:12:00] whether it's speaking at conferences, uh, being put on shows and podcasts and. It's, it's opened a lot of doors. Yeah. And it's a lot of, um, organic marketing that you, you quite literally can't pay for and get the same type of results cuz it's just not as organic.
Margot Ettedgui: It's not genuine. Right. So that has been a huge change in my business and, uh, has allowed me to really live very freely because, you know, if I don't feel like creating content or I feel like traveling or whatever the case is, there's always a consistent flow coming in because of the content that's out there on the.
Margot Ettedgui: Definitely. So that's pretty, pretty
Aaron Grushow: incredible. Yeah, it's it's pretty crazy. You, you never know who's watching your content. Exactly. Like you truly never know. I've had celebrities. Yeah. I've had, like you truly never know. And there's clearly an argument that platforms like TikTok are very young. Yeah. You know, you're not.
Aaron Grushow: In the face of your ideal clientele, but truly, you never know. Like we met through social media. We did. Yeah. Um, I'm, I'm trying Can you [00:13:00] remind me exactly how it's what we met? I think it was on a livestream.
Margot Ettedgui: It was a livestream, yeah. So, you know, again, because it was consuming Yeah. On TikTok, more so in the beginning.
Margot Ettedgui: Uh, I landed on one of your TikTok lives. Yeah, yeah. I saw you talking about real estate and you know, I, I had obviously that mentality of the old school networking, so immediately I didn't care if I had literally 99 followers to my name. Yeah. I was like, you're in real estate. I'm in mortgages. We're the same age.
Margot Ettedgui: Let's just connect and do business. Um, and I took that old school networking approach of, Hey, let's connect to offline. Yeah. Let's make stuff happen. Within that same week, we got on a phone call. We really saw, okay, we have a lot of similarities and common. Um, and then we kind of were able to form a group with other educational creators and, and it's kind of took off from there.
Margot Ettedgui: But it all be all because I really was just consuming content Right. And researching and found other people in my industry that I wanted to collaborate with. Yeah. And there you were.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Lead generation. Yeah. Networking, brand exposure. Yeah. So much, you know, and
Margot Ettedgui: [00:14:00] collaboration, I feel like today is so important.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. You know, just as important as it is to build your community and your followers, it's just as important to leverage on other followers and communities that have the same like-minded interests and want to, you know, combine. So, and the power of collaboration, uh, and content has really changed our industry as a whole over these last, I wanna say three, four years.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Huge, drastic change. No, definitely.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. What does a day in your life look like? How are you balancing content with, you know, your mortgage business?
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Um, I like to be very organized when it comes to creating content because for me, my priority is of course my business. Yeah. Um, so I guess a typical day in my life would be I wake.
Margot Ettedgui: Scroll on social media to see what's going on, what's hot, what's being trending right now, what kind of news I need to be on top of, to maybe create on that. [00:15:00] Um, and I work with a lot of international clients as well as a lot of non-traditional, and we do pretty much nationwide at this point. Yeah. Um, so in the beginning it's a lot of international calls.
Margot Ettedgui: Uh, a lot of east coast stuff, west coast stuff, you know, it's, uh, it's all over the. And, uh, really at night as we're all kind of wind down and try to recreate whatever viral videos I watched. Yeah. And prepare all of my content, whether it's at night and on the weekends. Mm-hmm. Um, so that everything is ready on all of my channels to be able to post pretty much on its own.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Um, because it's the worst when you're in the middle of the day and you forgot to post and you're, you know, you have to be consistent in order to really hold that following. Um, so like a typical day would really just be wake up. I work out in the morning. That's kind of like a really key part of where I get a lot of my ideas, just kind of let everything out.
Margot Ettedgui: Um, I work extensively. There's for, for me, what I do is not a job. It is a full-blown [00:16:00] lifestyle. Yeah. You know, I, um, Because I love that financial freedom of being able to work anywhere or travel anywhere. I have to be on 24 7. Right? Right. Whether it's creating content on the weekend, it's always about mortgages, whether it's talking to people, it's about mortgages.
Margot Ettedgui: Right. So, um, I've just kind of absorbed it as my lifestyle. Yeah. Uh, every day is extremely different. Yeah. So it's why it's kind of hard to answer that. But because of that, I have totally taken that opportunity and created content on what a day in my life looks like a week in my life, and, And I think it's important to do so, so people do know what it's like.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah,
Aaron Grushow: yeah, yeah. So quick down here.
Margot Ettedgui: Be careful you're, you're spinning a
Aaron Grushow: lot, a little. Just if it's all, I will stop spinning. That's okay. Um, yeah. I'm a bit jealous of your freedom to really travel and work on the road. You know, us real estate agents kind of have to be on the ground in the areas where we're.
Aaron Grushow: Um, but you mentioned you have a lot of international clients. Mm-hmm. I'm curious how they feel about your content [00:17:00] stuff. Are you building relationships with international clients from your content? Some,
Margot Ettedgui: the English speaking countries? Yes. Yeah. Naturally the algorithms will hit, right? Right. So that that does work.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Um, you know, international clients, For me, whether you're international or a domestic client, you are going to want to work with me because of the person that I am. Mm-hmm. And that is very much content creator, young entrepreneur, type of person. Yeah. Um, so I typically do work with people that. Uh, value that, you know what I mean?
Margot Ettedgui: Because if they wanted to work with someone that was private and mm-hmm. So on and so forth, they probably wouldn't wanna work with me. Gotcha. You know, unless, of course I do have clients that have been in my network for many, many, many years and just don't care that I do content. Um, but I'm very proud of what I do and, and if a client doesn't wanna work with me because of that, then that's fine.
Margot Ettedgui: Right. Yeah. I think every, every agent, uh, should really focus on the type of clients that wanna work with them because of [00:18:00] them. Mm-hmm.
Aaron Grushow: What type of challenges do you face in the content creator space, or I'm sure you have peers in the lending world who see your content and maybe think it's kind of a, a weird route to take.
Aaron Grushow: Has that happened to you? Have people kind of looked down upon what you're
Margot Ettedgui: doing? Yeah. Actually really funny that you say that. Um, I'm trying to think if I should even say this story, but we don't need to name names. No, I'm not gonna name names, but I feel like if, if someone saw it like, oh fuck. I know.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. I. Say your name. Um, last week I was in New York. Uh, I was filming content with, uh, the Sirhan agents. Okay. And, um, I was introduced by the agent that I was filming with to other agents in the office. Mm-hmm. And another agent who was, uh, of an older generation. So the more traditional type Right. When I was introduced to them and they said, oh, this is so and so.
Margot Ettedgui: She's a mortgage broker. She has a very large community on online. She's got over, you know, 350,000. The [00:19:00] immediate reaction was, oh, that's impressive for a mortgage broker. I was like, oh, it's kind of a backside comment. It's something that I get quite often. Yeah. Like kind of looked at like, oh, okay. That's, I guess, you know, freaky you.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. That's impress. Um, which is kind of weird to me, you know, that people just like don't understand Yeah. That you can build a community Yeah. With something so mundane like mortgages, I guess. Right? Yeah. Um, and I was like, do I take that as a compliment or is that a backhanded comment? Wasn't too sure how to handle that one.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. But I also feel like if they don't understand, like that's too bad for them. Totally. Because I have seen all the success that it's brought. Right. And, um, at the end of the day, I'm so proud of what I do. So to me it's kind of, I get to prove them wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Because then as soon as they take a look at it, they're like, okay, like this is, this is popping off.
Margot Ettedgui: Like this is real stuff right here. Um, so yeah, for me it's um, it's almost, it, it gives me fuel, you know? And they kind of are like, don't, don't take it seriously, or they think [00:20:00] it's a joke. Yeah. I mean, I literally tell 'em like, call me in five years, tell me how your business is doing, and we will compare our pipelines and then we'll talk, you know what I mean?
Margot Ettedgui: So that's kind of how I look at it. I'm very confident with, with what I do, and. Yeah. I tune out all that noise.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Yeah. No, that's, that's great. Yeah. I mean, what you've done is truly a testament to what you can, you know, create in Yeah. In the lending space and even untraditional worlds. Yes. Where you may not think there is content to be made.
Aaron Grushow: Like Yeah. There is content to be made. There's always
Margot Ettedgui: content to be made. Yeah. Everyone always has their own unique perspective and you can create on that. Yeah. You know what I mean? And there's different ways to create on that. There's podcasts, there's speak in front of the camera and teach you something.
Margot Ettedgui: There's you. Act and, and sing. There's so many things and you can really infuse yourself and, and that's how you really stand out. Yeah. Right. As a standouts. Right. When you infuse yourself in your personality into what you do. Yeah. And you really like embrace that and make it a lifestyle and leverage that, it's game over.
Aaron Grushow: I love [00:21:00] that. Yeah. I love it. Yeah. So what do you think is the future in, in. Contents in, in sort of the mortgage industry and, and educational content in general. What's the future of that look like right now?
Margot Ettedgui: You know, right now, um, it's, it's a great question. I see a lot of people, obviously starting podcasts.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Trying to create longer form content. But I don't know that that's necessarily the immediate future in the sense that, um, people still very much have a very short attention span. Right. You know what I mean? It's getting shorter by the day. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, when I try to, I, I'm ver I analyze content.
Margot Ettedgui: Unlike anything. I mean, I'm sure you've seen me do that, right? Yes. And so I'm, I, I analyze everything and I still see, and I still notice at the end of the day, the numbers are the numbers and short form content. The shorter the snappier, the funnier, the more entertaining superior like it, it performs of superior over everything [00:22:00] else.
Margot Ettedgui: Now I do see that longer form content is allowing. Uh, creators, service providers, whatever, to really kind of, uh, stretch on the knowledge that they've put out there. Yeah, which is great. But I don't necessarily know where the future is going because I feel like it's broadening up so much. Mm-hmm. That it's difficult to pinpoint where it's going.
Margot Ettedgui: What I can tell you is that, at least in my space, and for me, what has always worked is still really working. I've thought about creating longer form content I have in the past. I didn't see it affect my business more. I saw it taking a lot more time, and for me, the thing that attracted. To content and attracted me to be able to be consistent with it is how easy and short and fun it was for me to make.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. And uh, for me at least, if it takes too much time away from what we do as a professional, that's where things get a little bit dicey. Mm-hmm. So I don't [00:23:00] know that long form content is necessarily the way. Yeah. So I don't, I don't know that I can fully answer that question or if it's gonna be used in this video,
Aaron Grushow: but yeah.
Aaron Grushow: No, that, that was, that was great. I, I completely agree with you. Yeah. I mean, look, if anyone knew exactly what the future was like, yeah. I guess it wouldn't be called the future, you know? Like we, we, yeah. I think you're onto something with short form.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. But I, it's here to say for sure everyone is starting podcast and YouTube channels
these
Aaron Grushow: days.
Aaron Grushow: Well, I think there's don't, there's ways to leverage time though to watch it. I don't get it. Yeah. There's ways to leverage the more longer form content by breaking it up, you know, doing the whole content loop, which I think is what makes, you know, longer form great. But yeah, I think, like you said, our attention spans are so short.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. And they're getting shorter and shorter and
Margot Ettedgui: shorter. So I also think it depends what you wanna accomplish. Yeah. Right. So I think like for. For me, I would think if I start to do [00:24:00] more and more and longer form and longer form content, which then takes away from what I do on a prof professional side, uh, it could be as if I'm kind of like.
Margot Ettedgui: Just becoming a content creator. Right. And not becoming more like a business professional. So for me, I still need that balance. Right. And I don't wanna take away from it. Yeah. Um, but there is a natural evolution, I guess, to content. Yeah. That some people start with short form and then work their way to longform.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. And that is incredible. But you have to be organized and you have to be ready to understand that it's uh, it's a totally different game. Completely different short form and long form. I mean it, we're talking production, we're talking budget, we're talking cameras, we're talking lighting. And so it just depends what it is that you're trying to
Aaron Grushow: accomplish.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. I think as a, as a professional, um, you know, in, in the lending space, the real estate space, the barrier to entry Yeah. With short form has mm-hmm. Has been so beneficial. That's, that's it. Cause it does not take that much time. That's right. To create a 15, 32nd video.
Margot Ettedgui: You know, time is so [00:25:00] important for us.
Margot Ettedgui: Exactly. Time is of the essence. Time is money. Yeah. And, That for me is too, where I'm like, I, I still think for the professionals the short form will be what's best. Yeah. Um, at the end of the day, I do think that maybe like podcast style content Yeah. Chopped into short form Exactly. Is really great as well.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Um, so, so I do see that being very beneficial. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome.
Aaron Grushow: You're clearly a standout. Who are some standouts that you've looked up to, that you admire, draw inspiration from, whether they're in your industry or completely other
Margot Ettedgui: industry? Yeah. Um, one of the first people, one of the people, one of the first persons that I saw, uh, creating content about mortgages on TikTok, and that's kind of how I was like, oh, you can do that.
Margot Ettedgui: That's interesting. Uh, his name was that mortgage guy. Yeah, Scott, be. And, um, I've always been inspired by his content because it's exact, it's exactly what I do. It's, it's, as soon as I saw it, [00:26:00] I saw it for the first time on my phone. I was like, that's exactly what I wanna do. Yeah. And now we create similar content about mortgages, but completely different types of mortgages.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. And that's where I was like, oh my God, this is great because I can be inspired by how he's doing it, but I can take a completely different angle and approach on what I'm talking about. So that has been really great and inspiring for me to. There are very few people right in that mortgage space that are doing that.
Margot Ettedgui: I mean, I can't even name one other mortgage creator that I consistently follow, see and am inspired by, unfortunately. Um, and hopefully that will change and that's something that I try to change by creating content. Yeah. About being a mortgage broker to inspire the younger generation to, you know, if you are thinking real estate, maybe think mortgages first because like you said, you have more freedom.
Margot Ettedgui: You don't have to physically be Oh yeah. Responsible of the emotional purchase of the house or this, or. It's all just, okay, you need the money, no problem. We'll, I'm in, I'm in Greece, but I will email you the wire and da da da. And it's done. You know? So that's been really great. And in terms of other [00:27:00] creators, um, I get inspired by a lot of lifestyle creators.
Margot Ettedgui: I think what they do is very interesting. Mm-hmm. Because they take an approach on everyday life
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. And create content. That's you implementing that style into your content
Margot Ettedgui: today. Yeah, I, I find it to be, yeah. See, the things that I like to watch, I try to like use that as inspiration. So there are content creators.
Margot Ettedgui: Her name is like Lauren Giraldo. She's a very big lifestyle YouTuber. I like watching her things. Mm-hmm. I think Graham Stephan is also doing some really incredible things in terms of like longer form content. Um, so yeah, I do keep my eye out on, on certain people that I really like to watch and I try to translate that into my own version.
Aaron Grushow: But yeah. Love it. Well, Margo, this has been awesome. Yeah, thanks so much. Please let my listeners know where they can find you online or Yes,
Margot Ettedgui: anywhere. If you're ever looking for my content, you can find me at the real Queen Margot on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and anywhere else you [00:28:00] consume social media.
Margot Ettedgui: Awesome. Yeah. Thanks so much for having me. This was awesome.
Aaron Grushow: Of course. Thanks for being here. Yeah. Cool. Anything you grab? Sweet.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah, follow ups. Um, I'd love to hear if you have a favorite video that you made, either a favorite video that you made or a. A video that made you see what you were doing kind of differently?
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Okay. Do you want him to ask the question or,
Aaron Grushow: yeah. Yeah. Do you have a favorite video or just a video that really stands out in your mind that you've created?
Margot Ettedgui: I think there are like probably two videos. Uh, first one has to be my most vi like the first time I went viral. Yeah. Right. The first time I hit a million views overnight.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. And it was the simplest video in the sense. I remember watching a creator's video and thinking that audio is really funny, and that context is really funny. I like the audio. I like how he filmed it. I wanna do that, but. Talk about [00:29:00] mortgages, and I quite literally remember the message being like me teaching Gen Z about mortgages.
Margot Ettedgui: Mm-hmm. Super simple. And it went absolutely viral. And that's when I realized like, okay, there is a way for me to tap into the younger generation and help them be inspired by an industry that they would've never seen. Yeah. By using trending audios. So I think that's kind of where it clicked for me. Yeah.
Margot Ettedgui: To really stick on that. And then I think the second, um, video that really stands out in my mind that really made a difference, uh, was my. M most viral video after that one. I've, I've had more viral videos after that, but I was able to collaborate with my dad. Mm-hmm. Who's my mentor. I work with him. Uh, he's the CEO and I'm the general manager.
Margot Ettedgui: And we created a video about reenacting what it was like in my mind when I made the decision to join the mortgage industry from fashion to mortgages. And we used a scene from the Wolf of Wall Street. Okay. I think I. One. Yeah. Yeah. When he is like, you know, [00:30:00] show me a pay stuff for $72,000. I'll quit my job right now and I'll work for you.
Margot Ettedgui: And um, and it took off, it did like 2 million, you know, very quickly. And I was like, oh my God. Like this is really great. I can really collaborate with other people, um, and tell stories. That's really where I was like, click. Yeah. I can tell stories through other stories that I love, like movies. Mm-hmm. And, and bring.
Margot Ettedgui: Uh, my Hollywood esque director vibes into the mortgage industry. Right? And that's when I was like, people really, uh, gravitate to it. They love it, right? And, and when you see that people like it, you wanna create more of that, and that helps you understand, uh, the next direction that you need to take in your content.
Margot Ettedgui: So for me, just really throwing out ideas in, especially in the beginning. In the beginning we were posting, I don't know, like three to five times a day. Yeah. Just to understand what time is best, what time is crazy, volume is, you know, everything. But that helped so much, that really helped allow, uh, me to get to a point where now I can create one [00:31:00] video a month and still have the same results because I'm doing it with absolute precision and quality.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. Rather than just throwing stuff and seeing what hits, you know?
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Um, but the quantity, doing the quantity created the
Margot Ettedgui: quality. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. A hundred percent. And, and that's why I think in the, You just can't be afraid. Right? You have to try everything within your niche. Don't get crazy.
Margot Ettedgui: Don't try to spread too far out. And I remember it wasn't until I had about a hundred thousand followers that then I started creating like travel hack. Yeah. And other things, right? Yeah. But I still tried to always tie it into what I did, right? So it was like, travel hack, use a credit card and that can help you buy a house.
Margot Ettedgui: You know what I mean? And try to like tie everything together. Um, yeah, so that for me was like a really big click in my mind was really just like capitalizing on that. Awesome.
Aaron Grushow: Two more
Margot Ettedgui: questions. This one, next one I'm about to ask Aaron, you can say no or you can say no to this. It's a little more granular since y'all been [00:32:00] talking a lot about content creation and like on specific for analyzing things.
Margot Ettedgui: I was wondering, um, this might be trade's. So you can say no. Um, if there are any tools or websites that you might use to help you as you're doing Not trend research. No. I mean, I know a lot of people do, but for me it really is just consuming.
Aaron Grushow: There's, you know, coming from the marketing
Margot Ettedgui: background, there's all kinds of, yeah, no, and I, I've heard of so many people using all those tools that I've, I've never, I've never, oops, Sam,
Aaron Grushow: the only one I.
Aaron Grushow: Sometimes look out as, uh, I don't even know the name of it. I just have it bookmarked. It just shows the, the trending songs and sounds in real time. Um,
Margot Ettedgui: but see, like for me, I don't even think that that's even,
Margot Ettedgui: like, I, I call bullshit on that. Yeah, no, I, I completely agree. I bullshit on that. Like, for me it's like you have, it has to be like, What the kids are doing right now. You know what I mean? And if you're not, and if you can't [00:33:00] see the video, see the audio, see how many da, there's so much more than just the sound.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah. It's so much more than just the sound. Yeah. It's the accounts. It's how many, it's, it's, is there, is there 30,000? Is there 600,000? Is there a million videos? Duh. You know, it's, there's so much to look at. Mm-hmm. And I don't trust. Tech for that. And that's why I'm like, consume as much as you can because you are, you're totally right.
Margot Ettedgui: You start to think like the algorithm and outthink the algorithm. And that's what I used to tell people was like, you wanna go viral? You wanna crack the code? You have to think like it and crack the code. Yeah. Can we do a favor? We have the answer. Can we get the question? Oh, oh shit, I went on that one.
Margot Ettedgui: We're keeping that something really good. So just Yeah, it's true. Talk enough about like the algorithm
Aaron Grushow: and stuff. Do you use any tools to stay up to date with, with trends? I know there's some websites that, you know, will show popular songs or, or trends. Do you like subscribe to that stuff or is it really just, you know, you focus on on consuming?
Margot Ettedgui: Do you want me to answer [00:34:00] that now? Let's do it one more time. Yeah, sure. So it's like a clean, clean, you don't have to ask the question again. Yeah. But I'll go ahead and answer we'll at him and then Yep. Yep. Personally, I don't use any softwares. I don't like to trust technology on this kind of stuff.
Margot Ettedgui: Mm-hmm. Because it, it also has to. What you like and what you are seeing in real time. Yeah, and for me, like there's just so many components that I like to look at, uh, be that makes a video viral, right? Not just the sound. I wanna see the sound, I wanna look at all the accounts under that.
Aaron Grushow: Sounds Yeah. What, what the associated videos
Margot Ettedgui: are with that sound.
Margot Ettedgui: Right? Yeah. And for me, it's not just about like, uh, trying to get the quick fix on trying to go viral. Mm-hmm. It's really understanding how the algorithm is thinking. Yeah. And trying to penetrate that and cracking the code. Right. And so if you're, for me, TikTok is like the most direct, fastest way to get the fastest trends.
Margot Ettedgui: That's really where I think the source of a lot of it comes from. Right. And so for me, if. Think like the TikTok [00:35:00] algorithm and outthink the TikTok algorithm. You crack a code, you'll find your way to like go viral every time you want to, and that's really only by looking at every single aspect as to why videos go viral, not just one aspect.
Margot Ettedgui: It's very important. Awesome. Did you have a little more re Yeah, I was thinking I wanna throw Margot off, or I dare you too. I've had four shots of espresso. Try me. I dunno. Cause I have an idea for a question. It's not quite there, but, um,
Margot Ettedgui: okay. Here's a question. This is a bit more granular, it's a bit more basic, um, like me, but, uh, So obviously you bashed, it's from what it sounds like you bashed your content. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Um, what would you say is your ratio of like the videos you're recording versus what you decide to release? [00:36:00] Oh, okay. Okay.
Margot Ettedgui: Pop off Aaron. Maybe the question's just like, how much extra work are you doing and what actually makes it past
Aaron Grushow: the cutting room? That actually gets out. Yeah. Okay. How much time and effort goes into creating one of your videos? And I know you batch your content, you create a lot. Mm-hmm. Are you releasing everything that you make or are there some videos where you're like, uh, I don't know if this one's gonna do well?
Aaron Grushow: We'll probably hold off
Margot Ettedgui: if I make the effort to create the video I'm posting. You're posting that video? Yeah. Because I consume, and then when I see something I will send it to myself. Typically in, within the TikTok app, I'll like in, I'll have a direct message with myself. I do the same thing. Yeah. Right.
Margot Ettedgui: So, and then when it's time for me to create. Usually it's on the weekend because I really like to not be rushed Yeah. With my creative process. And I'll kind of break it down to [00:37:00] which videos are gonna take the longest mm-hmm. For me to do. Mm-hmm. Whether it's, I'm having to make, I'm having to act out a bunch of different characters, so I gotta change outfits and scene cuts and this and that.
Margot Ettedgui: Um, and then there are much shorter ones. Some videos can take me an hour. To make, those are gonna be, you know, there's the 30 seconds, maybe there's like six different scenes. I'm acting out three different characters. Yeah. Something like that. And then there are videos that quite literally I can get done in 15 seconds and edit it within another five minutes and you know what I mean?
Margot Ettedgui: So there's a variation of that. But for me, really being organized in, um, creating on specific days and having them ready and having a really organized system for content mm-hmm. Is great. Recently, I've actually used notion to keep myself more organized Yeah. On what I'm creating, what I'm editing, what I'm posting, and having a basic content calendar mm-hmm.
Margot Ettedgui: Allows me to like, customize everything at my manner and not have to use all the different apps and options that are out there. Yeah. You know what I [00:38:00] mean? Um, so yeah, that's kind of how I, I like to do it in an organized, batched way. Some take long, some take short. It just really depends. Depends the audio right?
Margot Ettedgui: Depends what we're filming. Um, but anywhere between 15 seconds to an hour, you know? Um, so that's really why I like to do that on the weekend. Great. Yeah. That's great. Um, yeah, that's it. Is there anything that you've wanted to talk about in the interview, Marvel, that we didn't get to? Um, maybe like the type of mortgages that I do.
Margot Ettedgui: Cause I feel like all we said was like mortgage, but we didn't actually like Yeah, yeah. Email. Like, why my shit pops off kind totally of thing. Yeah. Um, that's the question. Why does your shit pop off? Yeah. Right. Exactly. No, because like half the videos that go viral is because I'm like, oh, right. Like I do mortgages with no income documentation and that goes viral because we're like, oh, it's 2008.
Margot Ettedgui: All right. Right. You don't. Um, so I don't, I [00:39:00] don't know if you want to, let's do it. Ask, yeah, like a version of like, yeah. Why do you think your mortgage content is performing better than the rest or something like that, or, yeah. You help formulate the question. Um, yeah, I think, um, so gimme some context here, Mar.
Margot Ettedgui: So if part of this has me with the type of mortgages, yeah. So I do mortgages. Self-employed individuals who don't wanna show their tax returns. Foreigners, we touched on that. So that in itself they're like, whoa, you can do foreigners. K. But like, I would wanna say like 99% of my content that like is really taking off is because they've never heard of that being an option.
Margot Ettedgui: Well, I mean, maybe just the question is, is like something like what you're doing is unique not just from the content, but from the actual focus of Yeah, just the subject matter in the first places of interest. Mm-hmm. So the content that you're doing is interesting. Why does the, the, the type of [00:40:00] mortgages, tell us a little bit more about what those are Yeah.
Margot Ettedgui: And why they're even of interest in the first place.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Yeah. And why your shit pop up. Yeah, precisely. Okay. So your content clearly speaks to people. Yeah. Um, but mortgage lending, that's a pretty like broad topic. Yeah. What specifically about mortgages do you discuss what, you know, specific type of mortgages?
Aaron Grushow: Are you mostly like involved in, in working
Margot Ettedgui: with? Yeah. So, you know, again, when I was researching mortgages on social, It was a lot of, all the basic mortgages that everybody already knows. The first time home buyers, you know, people buying their regular homes. Yeah. And I was like, saturated. Exactly. I was like, well this is gonna be saturated and it's gonna get saturated quickly.
Margot Ettedgui: And um, and that's not what I specialize in, in my brokerage. So I really wanted to highlight what it is that we specialize, what has always made us unique. And so I thought maybe let me bring that to social media that will help me stand out and be. And the type of mortgages that I [00:41:00] do and I talk about on social media and allows me to go viral because of, uh, because of people not even knowing that those products exist, are the non-traditional, uh, lending products that I do.
Margot Ettedgui: So I really have always specialized with working with self-employed individuals and entrepreneurs who. Let's face it, make a ton of deductions on their tax returns and don't necessarily qualify for, uh, as much as they would like to if they show their tax returns versus maybe showing business bank statements, personal bank statements.
Margot Ettedgui: Um, in some cases I work with. 80% of my pipeline are investors. Mm-hmm. That because they're self-employed, because they're investors, because they're making so many deductions, they don't even wanna show any sort of income documentation. Gotcha. They are buying real estate with the purpose of generating income, and a lot of the private lenders that I work with, um, really will base the qualification off of the income of the property that it will generate.
Margot Ettedgui: Mm. Over the last few years, I feel like, because I have [00:42:00] started to create content on that, a lot of other brokers started to figure out, ah, she's going viral, talking about no income documentation, loans, we're gonna do the same. Cool. Well done. That has now gotten a little saturated. Yeah. So I, again, have always been on the forefront for, uh, speaking to lenders all the time, making sure that I have the most unique lending products.
Margot Ettedgui: Mm-hmm. Uh, for investors, for foreigners, for young entrepreneurs. And, and again, my first. Was a like Disney child actor. Okay, there you go. And that's how it's, and still to this day, I'm working with major movie directors around the world. Mm-hmm. And, you know, celebrities that are just, they need creative type of financing, right?
Margot Ettedgui: Yes. And so, because I wanted to work with creatives, Uh, I thought I needed to really focus the type of creative lending that I do, and I really think that has kind of accelerated the, the success in, um, in the videos performing as well as they do because it, it, it creates a lot of engagement. Yeah. A lot of people asking questions.
Margot Ettedgui: Is that true? Wait, that sounds a lot like 2008. And then I [00:43:00] get to educate them on the differences, so on and so forth. So I think that really is what makes my content, my type of mortgages unique, different, and allows it to. Pop off as
Aaron Grushow: we say. There you go. So if you're a, a content creator looking to buy your first home, I can help to call.
Aaron Grushow: Yeah. Love it.
Margot Ettedgui: Yeah, pop it. Perfect. Cool. Great. Cool. Yeah. Now I can!