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Jim Padilla: The 90/10 Sales Fallacy Killing Your Growth (and How to Fix It)

By October 28, 2025Real Estate Pros Show

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Show Summary

In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, Jim Padilla shares his inspiring journey from a challenging childhood to becoming a successful entrepreneur and sales expert. He discusses the importance of optimizing sales systems, focusing on customer retention, and the common pitfalls businesses face. Jim emphasizes the need for realistic projections, effective behavior management, and the role of AI in sales. He also highlights the significance of tracking the right metrics to ensure business growth and success.

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    Jim Padilla (00:00)
    And we’ve tried a dozen different AI strategies. And we had an outbound appointment setter, voice automated, that was calling these leads as when they registered for webinars. And we were getting an 11 % pickup. And of the 11 % pickup, we were getting a 22 % completion rate. So that means of the 11 %

    80 % of those people were hanging up before the first 11 seconds. Right? Which means, and what we were figuring was that most of them felt either duped or they’re just not quite ready to talk to an AI person yet, because they felt like, how dare you hand me off to this robot? Right? But of the people who went beyond the 11 seconds, we were getting a 67 % booking and show up rate, because they loved the concept. Most of the world ain’t ready for it yet.

    Kristen (00:23)
    you

    Right. It’s not personal enough.

    Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m Kristen and I’m here with Jim Padilla, who is the owner of Gain the Edge. It’s a sales acceleration expert platform. We’re going to talk about it. I can’t wait to get into kind of how you can optimize your sales teams. So thanks for being here, Jim.

    Jim Padilla (02:34)
    Yeah, thanks for having me. Really looking forward to the conversation.

    Kristen (02:37)
    So I’m really excited to get into the practical part of this where we can talk about optimizing sales, kind of where sales teams fall short. Let’s start with kind of your personal story and how you got to where you are today.

    Jim Padilla (02:50)
    Yeah, well, ⁓ really my childhood is kind of where it all started. I was born to teenage parents and my dad took off. My mom responded to a really rough situation in life with a lot of fear and rage and anger. And I I bore the brunt of a lot of that. So, you know, a lot of abuse ended up in foster care on streets and gangs as a teenager and in jail by 19. And I spent most of my

    childhood just really learning how to read the room to determine who’s friend, who’s foe, where’s a threat, where’s an ally, and how do I win the situation because I needed to win the room. That was how I stayed safe. And, you know, little did I know that over the next, you know, 20 years, so that this would make me millions of dollars by teaching other people how to read the room, assess threats, get people to let down their guard and trust you enough to want to give you a credit card.

    Kristen (03:22)
    right.

    Jim Padilla (03:45)
    Because at the end of the day, that’s really what sales is. Most people feel threatened that they don’t want to be sold something because they don’t know what that actually means. And so since they don’t know what it means, they want to keep you out there.

    Kristen (03:45)
    Yeah.

    Absolutely. Well, I mean, that’s so inspiring that you’re able to take that, you know, negative experience kind of growing up in so much uncertainty and channel it into your passion that actually, you know, obviously pays for your lifestyle and you can build an empire with it. What got you to the point where you wanted to start your company?

    Jim Padilla (04:17)
    It really was necessity. As you can imagine, the childhood that I had, it led to a lot of really bad decisions. And so, you I had a couple of marriages, I was bankrupt twice. I just did a lot of stupid things. And so I was at a place where there was no wage out there that could compensate me for what I needed. So I needed to earn as much money as I could. And the only way you could do that was either by selling or having my own business.

    Kristen (04:42)
    Wow, that’s really inspiring. So kind of how did you step into that entrepreneurial role? What were the challenges there? What is the mindset you had to have going into that?

    Jim Padilla (05:41)
    Largely, I think most entrepreneurs feel this way often. I literally had a hundred jobs by the time I was 25. Our kids are grown and married with kids, they’re their own now. But we’ll drive down any street in Sacramento and they’ll be like, oh yeah, I used to work there. They’re like, there too? You know, because I’ve been everywhere. every place I went, was like, oh, we could do this better or we could do this different. Like, can you just shut up and do your job? You know, and I didn’t work that way.

    Kristen (05:56)
    Yeah.

    Jim Padilla (06:07)
    And so I got fired or quit a lot of places.

    Kristen (06:10)
    Yeah, but it’s also, mean, as an entrepreneur, it’s very valuable to work for other people and kind of see how things are done and exactly what you said, kind of think about how you would do it differently. I think a lot of people have this thought that if they want to build their own business, they have to just do it right away and they don’t want to work for somebody else. Can you kind of talk about how, you know, having those jobs actually might have helped you?

    Jim Padilla (06:34)
    Yeah, well, it’s really important to be able to see how things are done wrong. So it’s not always the positive example. Although, if you’re aware, you can find in any scenario things that are working well and things that aren’t. So you can find the things. And it’s really more about taste, I think. There’s certain things that are about effectiveness, but I’ve found that most of it is about taste. You see people doing things and go, wow, I want to do that in my company, because that makes customers feel really good.

    Kristen (06:39)
    Yeah.

    Jim Padilla (07:00)
    Or then you do these other things like, I don’t want to do that because that makes team feel really bad. so when I started building out all my sales systems and as we recruit sales teams, our whole sales system was built on, we took all the stuff out that made salespeople uncomfortable and put all the stuff in that support salespeople. And then lo and behold, they start winning.

    Kristen (07:20)
    Yeah. And what are some of those things, like what were some of the things you identified that makes salespeople uncomfortable?

    Jim Padilla (07:26)
    ⁓ Hardcore quotas, ⁓ know, every sales office you walk into has got a whiteboard and you’re on it somewhere. And while I get the competition aspect, I’m all down with it. Only your top, top, top people produce like that. Everybody else just feels pressure, unnecessary pressure. And so we don’t, know, we track and we make things visible and we make things gamified and competitive. But we try to do things that enhance the human.

    versus the things that just challenge them and beat them up.

    Kristen (07:56)
    What’s the alternative to that to keep people productive?

    Jim Padilla (08:00)
    It’s you have to have the accountability but the accountability can be done privately it doesn’t always have to be done on a board and make somebody feel stupid and You can show them what’s going on and people know everybody knows if you’re working in a sales office virtually or otherwise You know who’s winning and you know who’s not so you don’t need it on a whiteboard right

    Kristen (08:18)
    Absolutely. Cool. like, so you kind of built that into your business to create a better environment. Tell us about Gain the Edge, kind of what specifically you guys do.

    Jim Padilla (08:29)
    Well, at our core, we recruit and develop and optimize salespeople and we build all the systems that make them great. Overwhelmingly, most industries seem to think right now, especially in the online world, that like a 20 % conversion is good enough for, you know, for cold traffic. And I just don’t understand that because that means 80 % of your people aren’t buying. What do you do with the rest of them?

    And so we build systems from everything from the front. you first say hello to a company, which is like for anybody watching this, probably this is hello for you and I. And until the time you come through and buy and are done buying, right? We don’t ever believe there should be a one-off purchase. Everybody, when they come in, they should come in because you know them so well, you serve them so well that you led them to an opportunity where they said, this is amazing, this is home. I want to keep buying with these people.

    then whenever the time comes where they leave your world, that’s when the transaction’s over. The journey ends at that point. So we design everything that connects the full system. So it’s not just technology, it’s human system, it’s tech systems, it’s everything that is engaged so that your sales team and your company are working harmoniously as a revenue generating, wealth generating machine.

    Kristen (09:45)
    I mean, that’s awesome. And what are some of the, I’m sure you see repeated mistakes that other companies are making when you start working with them. What are some of those things?

    Jim Padilla (10:29)
    The really the biggest one to start with is that most people something that I call the the 90 10 fallacy Most people are spending 90 % of their effort energy and resources on the front end every company I know is you can listen just stick around for a few minutes and you’re gonna hear them say where’s our next lead? Where’s our next opportunity? Instead of designing your world so that the hundreds or thousands of people that are already in your world on your list in your Facebook You’re not serving them

    because you’re always trying to get more people to add to the list. What about the people who’ve already trusted you enough to say, okay, you have something for me, I’m just not ready to buy yet, show me something more. And if 90 % of your resources are on the front end, then that means by default, you only have 10 % of your resources to put on the back end. The problem is 90 % of your sales come from the back end. So you have a massive disconnect. So if you’re gonna live on the 90%, give me a click, give me a new lead, then you’re gonna.

    always live there because you’re not going to be developing the back end and the stuff that’s going to make you wealthy.

    Kristen (11:29)
    Right, you need that, mean, yeah, you need to keep the customers, you need to still build that repeat business, you know, but I think that’s a thing that a lot of people get into. They just want the new clients, they want the new accounts, whatever it is, it’s chasing those numbers rather than the velocity itself. Is that kind of, right?

    Jim Padilla (11:50)
    Yeah, totally.

    I think a lot of people, number one, it’s stunning to me how few companies actually track their metrics. And then if they are, they’re tracking vanity metrics or they’re tracking what other people are telling them to track. And when you really understand your business, you just need to learn how to track the numbers that your business wins with. You don’t have to worry about what the industry does. You need to worry about what your company does.

    Kristen (12:12)
    Right, and how do you kind of build out those projections? Do you see that a lot? People have unrealistic projections or just incorrect?

    Jim Padilla (12:21)
    Yeah,

    and you know, that’s actually a word that I don’t resonate with because ⁓ who says what’s realistic? I today, anything is possible. Anything is possible. I see 24 year old, you know, deca millionaires who are crushing it from their garage. I’m just I’m never ceased to be amazed at what’s going on in the world. ⁓ So I think realistic, as Confucius says, is the most ⁓ readily traveled path to mediocrity.

    Kristen (12:29)
    Sure.

    Jim Padilla (12:47)
    And so I don’t have time for realistic. I’m very delusional in my world because I think everything’s possible. But what I see more often is that people aren’t projecting anything or you’re just projecting what you can do. And this is this is really where I think the mistake is. Usually we make projections based on what we think we are physically capable of. Right. I’m a five foot eight Puerto Rican from the Bronx. My physical stature is only so big and I can only touch so many things and do so many things. I’m talented and I’m smart.

    but I can only do so much. But when I think of what I can impact, I think of how many people can I impact who are gonna impact the things that I wanna impact. How many team, how many opportunity with stuff. So it’s not about what I can do, it’s what I can affect to get done. And when you think that way, now you’re not thinking about what your limited skills are, you’re thinking about who am I gonna be a year from now and who else is gonna be in my world a year from now.

    so that my goals and objectives are based on that instead of what I can physically do today. And most people just keep repeating Groundhog Day every day, every month, every year, and wonder why five years later they haven’t developed much more than 10 % growth or whatever standard is.

    Kristen (13:56)
    Right. And can you talk about how these systems and operations could benefit real estate investors directly?

    Jim Padilla (14:06)
    Yeah,

    really it’s all about behavior management, all of it. You you’re in the financial world, you probably know who Dave Ramsey is to some degree, and he gets a lot of very controversial follow up and feedback. I’m a Christian and I love Dave to his degree, but I also know and he says that he doesn’t teach what’s going to make you the highest interest rate and the greatest return. He teaches what is most likely to keep you effective on the behavior plan.

    so that you don’t do stupid things with debt, right? ⁓ He’s not saying debt is bad. He’s saying for the most people, debt can kill you because they don’t have a plan. And business is no different. And so if you know that there’s, again, most of your people are gonna be on follow-up, then do you have world-class follow-up systems? Do you have a strategy, a philosophy, and a process? Do you have something that guarantees that you and your team are going to consistently be valuable and relevant?

    to the people who may not buy today, but wanna buy tomorrow, next week, next month, next year. Because if not, they’re gonna buy from somebody else who happens to show up that way. They’re gonna buy some from our clients because we make sure that they do show up. And they show up with intention, with service, with relevance, with value and authority so that people go, man, I wanna buy from you. So those are the kind of things. It’s like everything we do. It’s like, how are you positioned? How well are you known?

    Kristen (15:15)
    Absolutely.

    Jim Padilla (15:27)
    What are you doing to make sure you stay visible and relevant? What are you doing to make sure that people understand what your mission is about? What kind of causes that you support and what you do? Because all of these things are what people buy into.

    If the only thing you have going for you is the fact that you’re a realtor, you’re going to be struggling.

    Kristen (16:26)
    Absolutely, I mean, this is all, I mean, I think this is all very beneficial for people to kind of apply to their own businesses. I would love to talk about the opportunity with AI and kind of, there’s a lot of information being thrown around, people are a little nervous, scared of it. How do you implement that into what you guys do?

    Jim Padilla (16:43)
    Yeah. We have our philosophy on AI that actually is really about we just add it to our problem solving philosophy. There are so many amazing, talented people on the planet right now that come through your feet every day that they’re all good at what they do and they can all solve problems to various degrees. And so it’s super easy to just like opt into this and subscribe to that and go to the next free webinar. Next thing you know, you’ve got 100 people you’re following and you’re not even sure why.

    AI is exactly that same way. It’s like there’s a solution every day, probably every minute right now, a new AI company, a new AI app. And they all look really cool. I get totally, I’m like, man, this would be cool. Let me figure out this one. Let me implement that. So you need to be really clear on where you’re trying to go, what’s going to help you get there, what are you struggling with today, and what’s going to help you solve it today. And everything else you got to tune out.

    Kristen (17:35)
    Yeah.

    Jim Padilla (17:36)
    Right. And so if you can just focus on the things that are going to help you do the thing you’re going to do today better and don’t buy the hype because even though it’s AI, everything takes longer and costs more than you think it was going to, including AI. Give you one example. We have a campaign that we are working with with a client and we’ve been infusing a lot of different AI scenarios. So we have appointment setters, ⁓ call closers and bookers and

    running with thousands of leads a month.

    And we’ve tried a dozen different AI strategies. And we had an outbound appointment center, voice automated, that was calling these leads as when they registered for webinars. And we were getting an 11 % pickup. And of the 11 % pickup, we were getting a 22 % completion rate. So that means of the 11 %

    80 % of those people were hanging up before the first 11 seconds. Right? Which means, and what we were figuring was that most of them felt either duped or they’re just not quite ready to talk to an AI person yet, because they felt like, how dare you hand me off to this robot? Right? But of the people who went beyond the 11 seconds, we were getting a 67 % booking and show up rate, because they loved the concept. Most of the world ain’t ready for it yet.

    Kristen (18:30)
    you

    Right. It’s not personal enough.

    Yeah.

    Jim Padilla (18:55)
    So then you just have to be really, really clear and understand what’s the marketplace. So doesn’t matter how cool you think the idea is, matters, is the market ready for it? And then what happens when they’re not, right? So we actually had humans in place so that when somebody hung up at that 10 second mark, somebody called them or texted them right away just to let them know, hey, we just want you to know we’re just super busy. We did not want you to be delayed. That’s why we did this. How else can we help you? Right? So we were able to get a lot of them back with that, but you have to pay attention. If you don’t know the numbers, if you don’t know

    your metrics, again, what key metrics do you need to be paying attention to for your scenario? Because everybody’s is different, but you need to make sure that everything you do can be trackable on a dashboard. So you can be, everybody knows, you’ve got transparency too. This isn’t working, why isn’t it working? Or this is working well, and ask the same question, why is it working well? Don’t just go, it’s working, we don’t need to fix it, because that could be totally lucky.

    Kristen (19:46)
    Probably is. I mean, that’s a good point. So I think a lot of people, you know, they have their result that they want from the sales or the marketing or whatever it is. And that’s all they look at where it’s like, okay, well, we’re only getting this many closes, but I think you’re really smart to look at it segmented and kind of seeing where in the cog it goes wrong.

    Jim Padilla (20:07)
    Yeah,

    for sure. you know, I was telling you earlier, we work with lot of investor companies, we work with a of family offices, people who are doing really well. And when they’re looking at acquiring a company or rolling companies up, et cetera, they bring us in so that we can systematize the scalability of the company so that they can increase valuation and get a better payoff on what they’re gonna buy, acquire, sell. And…

    I think that’s something that people need to look at. You can’t just look at what intelligence is in play, but what is predictable. You need things in place that are going to allow you to be able to predict what’s going to likely happen tomorrow, next year, next month. Or if the volume increases because the market, who knows? Let’s just say the interest rates drop back to 2005 levels next month just because political climate says we need to do this.

    Are you actually prepared to handle all of that? And do you know what it would mean if you just increased your ad spend by 500 %? What would that do to your volume? If you don’t even know what that stuff is, you’re guessing and you could break your business. So you always need to be thinking about this stuff. What will happen if and am I prepared for it?

    Kristen (21:12)
    Great.

    Absolutely, and I think that’s you mentioned something specific that I think is a good point, know, just raising ad spend sometimes just isn’t enough. Like there is kind of a ceiling there, right? You need to keep adjusting your strategy.

    Jim Padilla (21:31)
    Yeah,

    yeah, and you have to because, you know, Mark, good old Mark has never made it easy to, you you can’t just sit and forget it. You’ve always got to be testing. have they done with the algorithm now?

    Kristen (21:44)
    Absolutely. Well, I think you’ve given such great advice and a really good direction for people as they’re building up their sales teams and maybe where they’re going wrong. Can you tell people where to find, gain the edge, and work with you?

    Jim Padilla (21:58)
    Yeah, well, we have I have actually have a resource I’m going to share with you is called we call it the three step sales advantage. And I encourage you to take it up on this because this applies to any industry. And there’s a lot of people that do a two step process. You said an appointment and then maybe you have a closing conversation or opportunity. But what’s missing, what we call the third step, is the journey between the two points. And that

    includes any points. If you’re going to do a conference and then talk to people later, those are two points. If you’re going to show a house and then follow up with somebody, those are two points. If you’re going to acquire a house and then fix it and flip it, you know, there there’s contact points and it is your duty and responsibility to narrate the journey between the two points, because if not, they’re going to do whatever they’re going to do and they’re going to think whatever they’re going to think. It’s your job to make sure that they do as much as you can.

    Possibly can control it do everything that you need them to do between the two touch points whether it’s a day a week or a month You have to control that journey so that you show them what should happen What to think and how things will look when they come with you and so this training will help you knock that out It’s a really quick 30 minute training, but really excited about how we did it We’ve gotten some great great results from it, so we’re give that to you ⁓ And then I’m gonna also drop in here one thing for you guys is my cell phone number

    Kristen (23:14)
    there.

    Jim Padilla (23:23)
    because we just want to help. really, want to partly, want to, I’m a little bit greedy. I want to know what everybody’s doing. And so if you drop this, you text this in transparency, it’s a ⁓ group line. So my team can get to it, which is important because if not, I’m a bottleneck and you don’t want that. know that a team will likely see it before I do, but I promise I will also answer it. So any questions you have about conversion, about metrics, about recruiting a team, anything that you’re doing.

    Kristen (23:30)
    Okay.

    Jim Padilla (23:53)
    just reach out and text me and we’ll get you an answer or a resource or an introduction. We’ll make sure you’re not struggling. So that number is 916 area code 587-1946. And just throw whatever you got in the line. We’re here to help.

    Kristen (24:11)
    love that. And website for Game the Edge?

    Jim Padilla (24:13)
    Website Gain the Edge is gain, G-A-I-N, actually you can do this,GTENOW.COM. And that forwards to our Gain the Edge Now website.

    Kristen (24:24)
    Amazing. Well, thank you so much, Jim. ⁓

    Jim Padilla (24:27)
    For sure, I appreciate it. Good to see you. I’ll also make sure there’s links to our YouTube channel because we’ve got hundreds of videos there that can solve just about anything you need in sales stuff. whatever we can do to help out.

    Kristen (24:38)
    Amazing. Well, thank you. And everybody listening, please take advantage of that text line. Please take advantage of that course. ⁓ I think that there’s a lot here that can really accelerate your business. thank you for listening. Hope you got a lot of inspiration and we will see you back next time.

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