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The Art of Building Relationships Through Strategic Podcasting with Dave Dubeau

• Ed Mathews

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Ed Mathews:

Greetings and salutations. Real Estate Undergrounders. It is Ed Mathews with The Real Estate Underground. Thank you so much for joining us again today. With me is Dave Dubeau. Dave and I met gosh it's got to be two and a half three years ago where he was kind enough to appear on one of our early podcasts, and since we've gotten better at it, I figured I'd ask him to come back, and he has generously given us the opportunity to meet with him again, and actually it's one of the things. As a marketing geek, it's something that really piques my interest is what Dave has going on, and it's something I hope that you'll get a lot out of it as well. With that, Dave, Welcome to the show, and thank you.

Dave Dubeau:

Ed, thanks so much. It's a pleasure to be here again and, yeah, it was a pleasure having you on my show as well. Truly my pleasure, yeah.

Ed Mathews:

And for those folks who haven't discovered you, you're based in what I affectionately refer to as God's country, out in British Columbia, but I was wondering if you could just give us a little bit of background on who you are and what you do.

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, thanks, ed. So yeah, I am up here in the great white North in British Columbia, canada, born and raised up here, actually spent almost 14 years living in Latin America, 10 of those years in San Jose, costa Rica, and then in 2003, dragged my poor Costa Rican family wife and two little kids, kicking and screaming to Canada and settled down here. People go why? Tropical paradise, frozen, hindered land? Why would you do that? Just because I think Canada is a lot better place to raise your kids. So that's what we decided to do, and I had to start all over again from scratch because I had a language training company in Costa Rica that wasn't going to transfer too well to British Columbia. So I saw one of those infamous late night infomercials you too can get rich in real estate with little or no money down. I said perfect, that's about what I got, plus no credit. I started with the creative strategies, did a bunch of creative type deals like Ron LeGrand and that sort of thing.

Dave Dubeau:

And eventually, one way or the other, got into single family homes, lease options, then got into multifamily and along the way, my passion is really around marketing and it became around marketing for capital raisers. So for the last dozen years or so, ed, that's been my main focus. I realized a while ago, unlike you, I suck at operations. I'm not keen on dealing with toilets and tenants, so these days I help people to raise capital and for myself with my own real estate investing. It's more on the passive side From time to time, partnering with some of my clients, usually in multifamily deals.

Ed Mathews:

Gotcha. Yeah, it's an interesting background you have and it's eclectic, and I think one of the things that guys like you and me benefit from is we've worn so many different hats that it gives us an opportunity to help a whole lot of people.

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, we've been around the block a few times.

Ed Mathews:

And it also makes us a little bit old way older than you are my friend, yeah, we'll see, we can trade birthdates after the show.

Ed Mathews:

I'm just saying I got you beat there and I have daughters, so this started to go gray a while ago. All right, in terms of where you are in the marketplace. Obviously you're not an operator. You don't aspire to be one. You let other people have the 2 am phone calls and the stress right Exactly One of the things that you do, and it's something that I've used your method multiple times over the years in terms of raising capital for our projects, and so I'm curious if you could walk us through your approach in terms of how you create relationships and the services you're providing these days to help investors meet new accredited investors and also to build relationships, serve them and build relationships.

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, well, long story short, the method I use and that we work with clients with is using a podcast as a lead generator for investors. Now we do it quite a bit differently than a lot of other real estate folks and syndicators. Most of us in the real estate space tend to have podcasts that are all about real estate and I don't know about you, but my initial foray into this was, hey, I'm going to start a podcast, I'm going to follow along with what all the other smart guys are doing. I'm going to start a podcast. I'm going to try and interview the Grant Cardones, the Robert Kiyosakis, the Ed Mathews of the world. Try to get all these influencers on my show hopefully grow a big audience and hopefully some of those people in the audience will be my ideal avatar as a potential customer and hopefully some of them will figure out how to click on a link and book a call and all this kind of stuff. So there's a lot of hoping and not a lot of happening Right and a lot of work behind this.

Dave Dubeau:

I started my podcast back in 2018, doing it that way and had the normal weekly show and all that kind of stuff, and then, at about two and a half three years ago now, I was listening to a podcast and this gentleman said hey, you know what my podcast is different? The way I do it is, instead of trying to grow the audience, I focus on who my guest is and I try to talk with people that I want to do business with and start the relationship that way. And that's where the light bulb went on for me. It was like okay, hey, instead of trying to interview all the bigwigs, why don't I directly interview the kind of people that I want to work with my marketing agency, which are capital raisers? Why don't I interview them directly, shine the spotlight on them, feature them, create that rapport? Because, again, a good podcast is the interviewer is doing less of the talking and the guest is doing most of the talking and then just start things that way. So that's what I started for myself about three years ago and at this point we're recording this April of 2025.

Dave Dubeau:

So about a year ago, I had the epiphany hey, you know what? This is working really well for me and my business. I think this would work really well for syndicators who want to connect with high-income, high-net-worth people, accredited investors so, who are accredited investors? A lot of them are different kinds of folks, but big, broad strokes Ed, you tell me if I'm out to lunch here. But accredited investors typically are successful business owners, successful entrepreneurs, successful professionals like doctors and dentists and accountants, successful C-suite executives, the kind of people you used to work with in Silicon Valley. Those kind of folks, and a lot of these people, are really interested in getting publicity and getting marketing and getting their face out there. So having a podcast and inviting them to be a guest on your show is a win for them because they're getting free PR, free marketing, free exposure, and it's a win for you because you're able to connect with that person on a non-salesy kind of way and massage the conversation towards investing.

Ed Mathews:

Does that make sense, ed? Total sense, and it's brilliant. I appreciate that. As a marketing geek, I'm kicking myself that I didn't think of it.

Dave Dubeau:

Some smart guy smarter than me, thought of this, came up with this idea. I'm just running with it in this particular niche, with syndicators, fund managers, capital raisers. That's what you do. So it's pretty basic and big broad strokes. You start a podcast that appeals to your ideal target avatar as a guest on your show. So we've got a couple of categories that we do here.

Dave Dubeau:

We've got some of our clients who are really locally focused, geographically focused. So we've got a client, tim. He's based in Phoenix and he wants to connect with local Phoenix people because, kind of like you, he likes to meet with people face to face and have coffee and that sort of thing. So his show has nothing to do with multifamily syndication. It's called the Phoenix Prosperity Podcast. So it's about professional, personal, financial success. That's what the theme of the show is. So we invite local Phoenix business owners, executives, professionals, to be guests on Tim's show and Tim gets to connect with them that way and start. So it's basically how it works Start a show that appeals to your ideal investor, find a bunch of them and invite them to be guests on your show and then convert those conversations into capital conversations, which is usually a second meeting after you've had that interview.

Ed Mathews:

Sure, yeah, it's interesting because one of the things that drove me to start this podcast was I wanted to meet guys like you and build a relationship and hopefully at some point some of them might become friends and friends. It was interesting in that if I cold called people, they may or may not return my call. You run into Fortress voicemail and I think if you made 20 calls you might get one or two callbacks maybe.

Ed Mathews:

Yeah, if you're lucky Perfect world, right, yeah. However, when we sent an email to Dave Dubeau or somebody else who's tremendously successful and said, hey, we have this podcast where a whole bunch of people listen to us. Would you like to appear on it? The success rate exploded and, yes, I would love to get to know you, I would love to speak on your platform and hopefully reach a handful, if not all, of your audience and 150 some odd episodes later. I've met some amazing people like you, and that's why I started this selfishly and then, once I got those people on, I got to ask them all the questions, like hey, I'm learning here, so let me ask you a whole bunch of questions on how you do what you do, and that way, the people that are listening come along and we get to have this conversation around. All right, you're very successful and I believe in modeling. I'm not into reinventing the wheel. I'm into copying what other successful people do and making it work for us.

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, that's smart, exactly.

Ed Mathews:

Yeah.

Dave Dubeau:

That's the whole idea. It's a shortcut to the good old know and trust factor that people need before they're going to invest with you. And here's the cool thing that we've discovered, like you and I, podcasting is old hat. We've been doing it for years and we think everybody gets it. But it's amazing how few of these super successful people have actually ever been invited to be on a podcast before we have one client, we got him a guest who runs a billion dollar fund, billion with a B. Guess how many times the guy had been invited to be a guest on a podcast? Zero. This was the first time.

Dave Dubeau:

So now he gets on our client Matt's podcast. And this guy is super successful, is a little bit nervous, he's out of his depth. He's excited. He's a little bit nervous, he's out of his depth, he's excited, he's a little bit scared. So what a wonderful way to start that relationship, because Matt put him at ease, got the guy to relax, let him know it was just going to be a nice conversation and ended up having a wonderful interview with this gentleman, created that connection, went out to coffee, went out to lunch and built a relationship very quickly. 100% thanks to that podcast Would Matt have been able to reach out to that guy and cold call him and get him to go out to coffee. Probably not be a lot harder, but it was super easy because he created that no and trust factor through the podcast?

Ed Mathews:

Absolutely, and so when you bring these folks on, what is the basic premise? What are you trying to learn about them? Yeah, so what?

Dave Dubeau:

I'm trying to do is give them a platform to strut their stuff. It's all about the guest, it's all about you know what. So here's the flow of the show. So we start off talking about the guest's business or profession, right, because typically these are very successful people. So they're doing something a little bit different than maybe some of the rest of the people in their field. So we try to find out what is their secret sauce, what do they do differently or what comes easier to them than some of their competition, so really spotlighting their unique value in the marketplace, so to speak. So again, that gives them an opportunity to brag themselves up without bragging themselves up with just talking about what they're up to.

Dave Dubeau:

Then we ask a few questions around okay, you're a busy professional, how do you balance work and personal life? So get a little few little tips and ideas around that. And then we go towards the financial side of things. If you're interviewing a doctor, say, it's Dr. Smith. So, Dr. Smith, sounds like things are going amazingly well with your practice. You're very busy, you're one of the top in your field and a lot of busy doctors like yourself. They're making very good income right now, but they want to keep that income high into the future when they don't want to work so hard. So what are your thoughts about that? Are you thinking about any sorts of ways of creating passive income for yourself and your family besides what you're doing for work? So just I'm not specifically saying hey, Dr. Smith, what do you invest in?

Ed Mathews:

Have I got a deal for you?

Dave Dubeau:

It's just opening up the conversation on the interview. So Dr. Smith might say, whatever, I'm dabbling in stocks and bonds, or I've got a financial plan, or I'm fooling around in crypto or whatever the heck they say they're doing, we're just talking about it, and then the magic actually happens after we stop the interview, ed. So we've stopped the interview, we're still on Zoom with Dr. Smith. You're going to let Dr. Smith know when the episode's coming out and all this kind of stuff. And then, just very casually this is what I've worked on for years right, kind of casually. So, Dr. Smith, congratulations on all your success with the practice. It sounds like it's going really well. Now you mentioned that you're also starting to dabble in stocks and bonds. Let me ask you this how do you feel about the kind of returns that you're getting with those investments, the security of those investments and the stability of those returns? Is that something that you're 100% happy with, or is there maybe a little bit of room for improvement? Guess what? The answer is 100% of the time, ed.

Ed Mathews:

No, I'm not comfortable.

Dave Dubeau:

There's always room for improvement. I don't care who you interview. You could interview Warren Buffett. He's going to say there's always room for improvement. Okay, that's cool, Dr. Smith.

Dave Dubeau:

So we're doing something really interesting with other busy doctors just like you in the alternative investing space in real estate, specifically in apartment buildings, and the great thing is we're getting them very solid double digit returns on their money. It's very secure, backed by real estate, and there's a massive shortage of affordable apartments in the country, so there's supply and demand in there and we're able to get them amazing tax breaks on their personal income at the same time. Is that something you might be interested in taking a look at? Boom booked them into a follow-up discovery call. Start the ball rolling. Then they're probably not going to cut you a check for a hundred grand after that first call. That's not the goal. The goal is to get that conversation going, see if they're interested, maybe get a bit of a warm commitment, that sort of thing, and then put them on your VIP prospect list and keep following up with them, offering them opportunities as they become a bit. Does that make sense, Ed?

Ed Mathews:

It does. And yeah, it's interesting because I get the question all the time when I'm meeting with. A lot of the folks that I work with are, like you said, they're successful entrepreneurs, they're executives from either folks that I know or folks that are friends of friends, kind of thing.

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah.

Ed Mathews:

And the other part of it that I really enjoy with them is in meeting these people is that one of the first questions. There are, by and large, type A personalities. Right, they're very capable people and they're highly organized and they manage their time extremely well, and so the first question I usually get is why can't I do this myself? And the answer is you can, and if you'd, I'll gladly help you with that. And they're always surprised, and and that's how I've mentored, oh geez, dozens of people without really a formal.

Dave Dubeau:

We have kicked around the idea of starting a course, but we haven't that's a whole other business model, for sure this is more me being, me working with them to help them get you know, and then I'm gonna assume that once they see what's actually involved, some of them change their mind almost all of them do yeah in, in fairness, they wow.

Ed Mathews:

This is an 80 hour a week job.

Dave Dubeau:

That's the beauty of that thing, exactly. So that's the value you bring to the table for sure. Yeah, so that's basically the whole idea in a nutshell. Pretty simple you create a podcast that appeals to your ideal investor as the guest and as the audience. That's another bonus. We had another client that recently one of his audience members reached out to him and he ended up investing $75,000 with the client it was just from as an audience member built that up and then it's finding and inviting your ideal avatar as a guest on your show. As you mentioned, it's so much easier to get through the gatekeepers and get to people that you otherwise wouldn't be able to if you're providing value. First, I call this leading with a giving hand. You're giving them the spotlight right, then you get them on the show, you have a nice interview making them look good and feel good and sound good, and then you massage that into a follow-up discovery call yeah. So that's basically how it works in a nutshell discovery call.

Ed Mathews:

Yeah, so that's basically how it works in a nutshell. Yeah, I find that when you initiate a relationship to create that awareness, if you serve them without any sort of underlying hey, I'm going to sell you something someday you just do it because some people that's the relationship you become friends and not business partners, and that's okay too. And when you do that, you make friends, which is fun and nice. But also a lot of those people begin to see how you operate, they begin to build trust in you and then, at some point in the relationship, you earn the right to do business with them, and then it becomes a decision.

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, and what we try to do is exactly along those lines that we just had to speed it up a little bit right. So we're definitely not going for the juggler trying to get them to invest day one, but we do want to lead the conversation in that direction as quickly as possible, because the way we do the podcast, it is definitely a direct lead generator for the business.

Dave Dubeau:

And, but you're creating that relationship and you're serving them first, which is oh exactly Lead with a giving hand, make them look good, make them feel good, make them shine. We even go to the next step, which is after we've finished the interview. We take it and we create social media content for the guests so they can really strut their stuff. Everybody's on social media these days, so we'll create three or four reels, those short form little skinny videos with the subtitles on them. They can put that up on their Facebook or their LinkedIn or their TikTok or whatever they're doing. We'll create LinkedIn articles for them.

Ed Mathews:

We create social media posts for them and it just helps them to get the word out about being interviewed and, selfishly, it also helps our clients get more eyeballs on their shows at the same time, sure and give those people the insight into oh, I'm being interviewed by Dave and Dave's a really good guy and he knows what he's talking about and there's a kinship that gets created Exactly, yeah.

Dave Dubeau:

That's what it's all about.

Ed Mathews:

Okay. So I'm always interested in entrepreneurs like yourself and what gets you out of bed on Monday morning, because at some point, one of the things I discovered in my travails in Silicon Valley is at some point the mortgage is paid, the college tuition is all paid up, retirement is chuck full and going to throw off plenty of money, and nevertheless you get out of bed on Monday morning. So there's a purpose there, and so I'm curious in your mind, you're a tremendously successful person. What is your purpose? What gets you out of bed on Mondays?

Dave Dubeau:

Curiosity. I think, yeah, I'm a curious person. I love I one of those very fortunate people. I actually love what I do Marketing and figuring stuff out and overcoming obstacles and dealing with problems. Sure, it's a pain in the butt, but it keeps me going and it just provides that spark. Because I see a lot of folks that are getting towards retirement age and I don't envy people that sail off into the sunset and just kick back and play golf all day. I'm not into golf. I've got a few hobbies, but not enough to keep me busy full-time. I cannot imagine retiring. I don't want to. My wife and I have a wonderful lifestyle. We take three or four pretty large trips every year going internationally. I can basically do what I want to do when I want to do how I want to do it right now. So why wouldn't I keep going? It's just fun.

Ed Mathews:

Absolutely, and you're someone who is a mentor and a coach to a lot of different people. But I'm always curious about the mentors in your life, over the course of your career, and so I'm curious what is the best advice you ever got and who gave it to you?

Dave Dubeau:

Bes advice I ever got is counterintuitive, Ed, and I don't know if it was the best advice, but it was the advice that stuck with me and just ticked me off the most. And it was actually from my father, many years ago and being his age now, like he was about my age. When he gave me this advice when I was younger, it was when I was packing up my bags to go start a business in Costa Rica and he took me aside. He said, son, I love you dearly, but you don't have what it takes to be an entrepreneur. I've tried it. I failed at it. I've got buddies who are successful at it. I know them, I know you. I don't think you've got it in you. And that ticked me off so much, Ed, that I said I don't think you've got it in you. And that ticked me off so much, Ed, that I said screw you in my mind. And I went and did it anyhow. And that carried me through a lot of tough times when I probably would have thrown in the towel just because.

Dave Dubeau:

I had to prove my old man wrong and to give him credit. Five years, six years in, when I was making a good go of it in Costa Rica, we had a conversation. He said I admit it, I was wrong, I take it back. So that was. I don't know if that's. That doesn't really answer the question. That wasn't good advice, but it was. It ticked me off, that's okay.

Dave Dubeau:

It's when I always I love detractors right, and especially ones that actually care about me, because when they are maybe you're not that good at this I'm like thank you.

Ed Mathews:

Thank you for letting me. There's the spark ID Right, exactly, exactly. So let's talk about the other side of it, right? You alluded to it. I think we learn from our mistakes far more than we do from our successes, and so I'm curious about a mistake, something that you, a decision you'd love to have back, and what did you do? How'd you recover from it?

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, lots of mistakes, ed, lots and lots of them, that's for sure. One that kind of pops out real estate wise. When I was in the rent to own business I had a potential tenant buyer who ended up doing a deal with and my spidey senses said don't do it. But the greed gland kind of kicked in and the numbers looked really good and I did it anyway and of course it bit me in the butt and they trashed the house. They had five kids. It was a disaster. It took months to get it cleaned up and back on the market and I was busy with others. Anyhow, it was a very expensive lesson. The big lesson was there Trust your intuition more If that little voice is naggling you for it. I can't explain exactly why some people that are religious are saying that's God talking to you. Other people say it's the universe. Other people say it's your. All your senses are kicked. But whatever it is, pay attention, right, pay attention to that.

Ed Mathews:

Yeah, that's good advice. And the other one is my wife is rarely wrong. When we meet somebody and she's not sure about the person, yeah she's. And I'm like, oh, he's great, I love it. And almost always, nearly always, she's right and I'm like, yeah, this is your wife's situation.

Dave Dubeau:

It's far bad yeah.

Ed Mathews:

So I've learned yeah, exactly, I now pay attention to that, but spent my thirties going back with mea culpa. The other thing that I'm always curious about is how do you sharpen the saw, what book is on your nightstand, either physical or virtual, and who are you paying attention to these days?

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, I, right now I'm revisiting an oldie but a goodie. It's called the ultimate sales machine by a gentleman named Chet Holmes, and I got the updated 2.0 version because Chet passed away about a dozen years ago now, unfortunately, but his daughter has taken the helm of their company and she kind of given an updated twist on things, which I find very interesting. But yeah, that's a good one. Ultimate sales machine.

Ed Mathews:

I read the original. If memory serves, that was the gentleman. He was in the print industry and he came up with the concept of the dream 100 and yes, okay, yes, he did excellent book. In fact, it's sitting up on my bookshelf in my office. Yeah, I've got the original. But try the original it's. It just made the list and we'll put it on the show notes as well. Last and certainly not least, I'm curious about success. What does that to you? How do you define it in your life?

Dave Dubeau:

Yeah, you know what the older I'm getting head. Yeah, money is important, but it's definitely not everything. I think it's providing value, as corny as that sounds, but like serving other people, whatever that looks like for you in my business is providing quality services that actually help people. That's very important to me, not just taking the money and running and getting away with the minimum, it's also getting involved in the community. So I relatively recently joined Rotary and part of that association, that organization, so that feels good to get in there. It's not all. I'm not trying to make business connections or anything like that. It's really good to get in there. It's not all. I'm not trying to make business connections or anything like that. It's really just to give back. So the older I get, the more important those kinds of things become.

Ed Mathews:

That's fantastic. Yeah, there's something about contributing that warms the soul, right it does.

Dave Dubeau:

It does. It's not. I've spent a lot of years just being selfish and thinking about Dave, and it's nice not to be thinking about Dave all the time.

Ed Mathews:

Yeah, exactly. So when not talking about real estate, what do you like to do? How do you spend your?

Dave Dubeau:

time. My wife and I love traveling, so we're off to. Where are we off to? Next? She's off to Italy next week and then I'll be joining her in France in a couple of weeks and then we're off to Portugal in September and then Mexico in December, and all over the place. So yeah, traveling is a big thing. When I'm not traveling, I like to take, if I can, I like to take like little mini close to home getaways in the summertime, actually spring, summer and fall. I enjoy kayaking. I'm up here in British Columbia. There's lots of lakes and rivers and fun stuff like that, so I just throw the kayak on the vehicle and get out of Dodge, go, get out in nature, kayak a bit. I really enjoy that and enjoy skiing in the wintertime. So we've got some great ski hills close to home.

Dave Dubeau:

Go skiing every once in a while Wonderful.

Ed Mathews:

So if people want to learn about you or your consulting business or anything else about Dave Dubeau, what's the best way to do that?

Dave Dubeau:

You know what I would love people. If they're interested in learning about how to use a podcast to generate accredited investor leads, go grab a free copy of my book. It's at 20accreditedinvestorsbook. com Again, the number 20accreditedinvestorsbook. com Again, the number 20 accreditedinvestorsbook. com. If you're watching this, you can see that behind me. Yeah, trade in your name and your email address. Get a copy of the book. You'll be in my environment, you'll be in my ecosystem, you'll be hearing from me and if you want to have a chat, you can just reach out that way.

Ed Mathews:

Fantastic, dave. Thank you so much for your time today. It's a pleasure to see you. My friend Continued good fortune and we'll take this offline and keep in touch.

Dave Dubeau:

Thanks so much, Ed.

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