Hi, I'm Patrick.
I've owned businesses since 1988, and I'd like to sit across the kitchen table from you. Here's how I got here.
No hassle. No pressure. No commitment.
Trucks first, then real estate.
After about twelve years in trucking, as a driver, a truck owner, and a manager, I was ready for something different. In 1988 my twin brother asked me to join him in real estate. Within a year or two, we started our own company, Smith and Smith Real Estate Professionals, with two desks facing each other. It grew to offices in California and Washington.
Two agents, two roles.
Back then, real estate agents handled both sides of every deal. My brother drove a four-door car, and I drove a two-door sports car, so I couldn't get buyers into mine. He started meeting the buyers, and I started meeting the sellers. Nobody else in our market was doing it that way, and pretty quickly it became normal. In May 1996, we were on the cover of the premiere issue of Broker Agent Magazine's Sacramento edition.
The marketing I couldn't trace.
Around 1992, we were spending a lot on marketing. We even paid a company to follow us around for a week. After a year or two of tracking, I couldn't point to a single dollar we'd made from any of it. So we cancelled all of it and started a relationship program instead. By about 1994 it had become the 21-Day Touch: a mailer, then a visit, then a call, each 21 days apart. And I told every client the same thing: "I'm serious. My job is to do such a fantastic job for you that you can't help but tell others about me."
I wrote it down.
I put what worked into a book, A Guide to Relationship Marketing: 5 Keys for Gaining More Customers. I first wrote it in the late 1990s and have kept updating it since. There are a lot of Patrick Smiths out there, so I wrote it as Patrick K. Smith. It's available on Kindle.
Learning to work from anywhere.
In the 2000s I moved from local buyers to working with investors, with a team of five behind me. That's when I learned I couldn't do it alone, and that with the right people and systems, I didn't have to be in the office. I worked from Germany for about a month and from New Zealand for five weeks. Around 2019, at 64, I sold my house, bought an RV, and spent about six years driving around the United States, running my business from wherever I parked. Some days that meant a truck stop, an antenna, and a couple of hours of work. It was so freeing.
Why My Biz Suite.
In 2013, stuck at home, I started planning a way to teach owners the tools I'd used to grow my own company. It began as a consulting company and has had a few names since. I tried a lot of tools along the way, and by my own estimate I spent around $100,000 on ones I didn't use or that didn't work. I don't want that for you. About three years ago I got heavily into AI, and it changed how I help owners. What didn't change is the order: the human touch comes first. I want you to be able to compete without spending an insane amount of time or money, and I want to stop people from being taken advantage of.
I once talked with a financial planner who had a quote of almost $12,000 to set up and $3,000 a month for ads, and no way to tell which leads came from them. I told him to build the tracking first, and spend on ads after. That's the order I believe in.
What I believe.
Human touch first. Technology serves people. Every client starts with a real conversation, not a form.
Experience over theory. My advice comes from decades of running real companies, and from mistakes I'll admit.
Time is the asset. The goal is to give you your time back, not to give you more tools.
Good fit matters. I work with friendly, open-minded owners who have a budget and a direction.
Clear scope, no surprises. What's included, what isn't, and what extra work costs are all written down.
Meet Qanuk.
I rescued her from a shelter in Sacramento when she was two months old. She was born there. They told me she'd be an Alaskan Klee Kai, a miniature husky. She was white, so I looked up Inuit names for snowflake and found hers. When her coat came in at about four months, I did a DNA test: 49 percent Pomeranian, 40 percent husky, and the rest a mix. She's traveled about 13 states with me, and she was a fantastic companion on the road in the RV. She's never met a stranger. On a walk, she'll sit down and refuse to move until I let her say hello.
My Biz Suite works hand in hand with Tech With Heart Foundation, which provides the education side.
Tell me what's keeping you up at night.
Let's build a business worth more.
Let's sit down and talk it through. I'll listen first, and we'll see together whether I'm the right guide for you.
No hassle. No pressure. No commitment.