Do you have the Success you Deserve?
October 8, 2008
Graduates of our Integrity Selling course learn a very important principle in the world of sales: You always get paid what you think you are worth. It’s how the great sales people in real estate always earn the top dollars - because they believe they are worth them and won’t settle for a second-rate pay for the first-rate service they provide to their clients. The principle of “getting what you believe you are worth” is usually applied to commissions, but lately, with our clients, we’ve been taking this to a whole new level:
Are you achieving the success you believe you deserve?
Avoiding the Industry Disaster
August 27, 2008
Just how close is the real estate industry to duplicating the disaster achieved by the airline industry? Contrary to popular belief, neither industry has been challenged by serious technology developments that have created “alternatives” to their essential model. People still fly on planes. Most consumers work with agents. Yet anyone who has had to deal with either industry lately knows that REALTORS are coming dangerously close to recreating the airline industry’s sub-lawyer-sub-car-salesman reputation.
For REALTORS, it shouldn’t take much to avoid that fate. But we must act now.
Six Cool Ideas to Boost Agent Productivity
August 25, 2008
Why do some agents make more sales than others? What makes some agents capable of creating sales when others struggle for a single lead? Contrary to popular belief, it’s not a cool web tool or a more expensive marketing plan. Almost always it comes down to a single, consistent factor, no matter what company or place in the country:
A great manager.
More Meaningless Marketing
August 21, 2008
When I read this headline this morning, I immediately thought of that Britney Spears song, “Oops! I did it again!” Once again, another real estate company is reporting some “numbers” designed to get people - consumers, agents, Martians - to gasp. Seems like their website has generated some few millions of “leads” to their agents. You know, buyers who go on their website and ask for more information. It’s another orchestrated PR campaign to get the public to say, “Wow! That’s a lot! It must mean they are really good!”
Too bad, then, that it’s just another example of totally meaningless marketing. What’s worse: Generation X and Y know it.
Five Reasons REALTORS Are Losing Market Share
August 20, 2008
Amongst the growing list of reasons some REALTOR firms are losing market share today, there’s no lack of ‘blaming the consumer’ causes. Brokers and agents who repeatedly target the “market” or the “economy” as the culprits are just substituting politically-correct keywords for “the consumer” as the problem. Buyers won’t come off the sidelines. Sellers are unreasonable and won’t price their homes to market conditions. Lenders won’t offer credit easily. The usual suspects of the downturn are either consumers or third parties working together in a full-blown conspiracy to destroy the real estate industry.
Perhaps we could find a few simpler reasons?
Recruiting and Retention: The Right Stuff
August 17, 2008
When an industry suffers from a problem for decades and still hasn’t figured it out, it’s likely focusing on the wrong issue. Real estate’s “recruiting and retention” problem has consumed millions, perhaps billions of dollars in wasted time, energy and effort. It’s apparent that all of the “symptom” solutions and snake oil in the universe won’t solve it. So let’s try something else: Challenge the premise.
What if there wasn’t a recruiting or retention problem in the future?
What Makes Brokers More Broke?
August 13, 2008
Today I was talking to a broker who uttered, yet again, the tired old cliche that sets my teeth on edge. The one phrase that makes me wish I’d taken the blue pill. That same old phrase that - regardless of the test of time, history, facts - it seems like everyone is doomed to utter it until we finally destroy the real estate industry for good:
“Well, it’s all about the agents.”
Resistance is Futile
July 22, 2008
In the 19th century, the Luddites were a group of workers who refused to accept the introduction of machinery into the process of textiles. So threatened did they feel by the mechanical looms that they often resorted to violence and destruction. At worst, they burned entire factories; at best, they resisted every advance of the industrial revolution with marches, pamphlets and the passage of restrictive laws. Eventually, however, the Luddites came to learn an important lesson:
Resistance is futile.
Stop Endlessly Recruiting
July 15, 2008
Imagine if real estate brokers and managers could stop endlessly recruiting. It’s not a dream; it’s a definitely reality for modern companies. Yet for too many brokers, it remains a far off possibility - unfortunately.
To stop recruiting, brokers would have to address a big question: Why do they recruit in the first place? Some would say because they were “told to” by other brokers, or trainers, or people-in-the-know, or their franchise. Few would say, “I recruit because I’m currently running my company at 100% efficiency and my agents are using their maximum capacity and the market opportunities warrant our adding more sales force capacity.”
Why Technology Matters
May 17, 2008
If you’ve ever wondered if your technology strategy really makes a difference, a article from the archives at RealEstateJournal.com should make the point. Titled Amid Slump, Real-Estate Agents Hang Up Their Blazers, authors Hagerty and Athavely provide a glimpse of a real estate industry filled with $37,600 average-income agents. Their brokers fare not much better, trying to carry the expenses of 20-25% agent over-capacity. Looks like another year where one out of four agents call it quits.
Before you start jumping for joy, thinking that less agents in the business will mean less competition for you, reconsider: Less agents means better competition from those who remain. Working the boom market is not so hard, with a heartbeat and a license, many inexperienced agents beat the odds. But sticking around through tough markets requires serious players. The competition will be well-trained, well-financed and most likely, well-versed in the technology that keeps them competitive. Talk about tough times!
That’s why technology matters more than ever. When markets tighten, competitive advantages are critical. Enhanced technology skills provide competitive advantages across every segment of your business: prospecting, leads generation, communications, marketing, transaction tools and client relationship management. Every one of these areas can benefit from technology that saves time, cuts costs and expands opportunity to maximize the market. And with incomes for agents and brokers dropping with the market, technology mastery becomes more critical than ever.
Real Estate Sales 101: Say No to Bad Listing Deals
May 15, 2008
Here’s a really simple idea for REALTORS who are struggling to sell “overpriced listings.”
Just Say No!
Call it the Nancy Reagan Rule of Real Estate: Some listings are “bad” for you - kind of like certain kinds of substances are bad for you. But sometimes, we REALTORS just get on a “listing high” when we get a homeowner all geared up to sign on the dotted line. After pouring our our hearts in a listing presentation, filled with facts and figures and advice, we become momentarily vulnerable to a moment of insanity called “I’m gonna get this listing!” And that’s when we all-too-often shoot ourselves in the foot.
Every REALTOR “knows” better than to take an overpriced listing. But they need to start “doing” better if they want to survive the downturn. Here’s a simple economic fact: the buyer of any product sets the price. Period. No ifs, ands or butts, unless you’re a one-of-a-kind painting or bejewelled egg. As long as there are “other options” in the marketplace similar to your product - other computers, MP3 players, airline seats and houses - to choose from, the buyer sets the price.
Selling Homes to Generation Y
May 15, 2008
Here’s a real dilemma for real estate companies today: Can their agent successfully build relationships with the next generation of real estate buyers? Right now, honest brokers would have to answer a “qualified maybe at best” if we were to take a look at what they’re doing to prepare their agents for the 45 million Generation Y buyers starting to enter the housing curve.
Let’s start with some data: Generation Y is in their 20s. Graduating college, these kids are the new first-time home buyer. No, it’s not Gen X anymore; there are a few X’ers who still won’t get out of the house, but the bulk of newbie buyers are Y’ers. What do we know about them? First, they are highly networked. They have grown up online, playing online games with friends thousands of miles away, online. Their social circles are highly structured – they went on “play dates” that mom setup with their friend’s mom – and they only make new friends by “adding” them to their official page of friends online, at MySpace. They have had a cell phone since they were 10 and they don’t make calls on it. They fully expect IM to replace email and think voice mail is what Edison used to tell Watson to “come here.” They get a constant flow of information by text message – updates from friends, weather, movie times and sports scores – and they don’t “check” the internet because they are always connected to it. Speaking of the dial-up days of the internet is like remembering the Pony Express.
Real Estate Managers Can Boost Sales Easily
May 13, 2008
What if there were three little things every real estate manager could do to change the “slow” market? Rather than accept that housing sales are down because of “the economy” or “stingy lenders” or Martians, maybe a few simple steps might make a world of difference – or at least a neighborhood of difference.
The first thing Managers could do is start wiretapping their office phones. You don’t need a government warrant to pick up the extension in the other room and listen in to the kinds of conversations going on between your company and consumers. More sophisticated offices may even have a phone system that records call traffic – which would make this idea even better, because you could play the calls back to your staff and agents. What do you think you’d find if you started listening in on the calls to your office? If you’re honest, here’s what you’ve just answered:
- My agents aren’t asking consumers for their names, phone numbers and email addresses.
- My staff speak too fast and sound too disinterested in the call when they answer the phone.
- Nobody knows how to transfer a caller to an agent’s cell phone or conference the two lines together.
REALTORS’ Deal with the Devil
May 12, 2008
After recently taking REALTORS to task for advocating more “government backed mortgages” and looser credit limits as the way out for the real estate industry crisis, I thought perhaps I was too harsh on the industry. It’s possible that most REALTORS don’t realize that every time they argue for the government to subsidize un-credit-worthy taxpayers that they are really arguing that the government steal money from the existing homeowners - through taxation to bail out Fannie and Freddie everu so often. Maybe most REALTORS were just too shortsighted to understand that every increase in taxation hurts their future source of business - the future seller who becomes the future buyer. And since most REALTORS only last about 18 months in this business anyway, maybe most REALTORS really don’t care about this stuff, since they are only focused on where they can get a commission in the next 45 days.
Then, something frightening was quoted in the Wall Street Journal on Friday, May 9th, page A3 and I realized that the REALTORS have made the ultimate deal with the devil. In an article by Ruth Simon and Nick Timiraos entitled “Mortgage Firms Cool to Principal-Cut Plan,” no REALTORS are mentioned. There is a proposal by the U.S. House of Representatives that was passed this week that calls for:
…mortgage companies to reduce the principal on troubled loans. In exchange, the Federal Housing administration would pay off the current loan and issue the borrower a new FHA-backed mortgage.
Real Estate Sales: Are the Wrong Basics Back?
May 9, 2008
After another week on the road teaching some sessions and having lots of fun with my students, I’m happy to report that there seems to be a consensus amongst the (remaining) real estate professionals in the country: The Basics are Back.
You know, things like prospecting, following up on visitors to your open house, being organized, calling customers back, even reasonably pricing properties (Ok, that one really isn’t back but we can pretend it is…). Sales, my friends. Good old fashioned sales. That’s what everyone is “suddenly discovering” is missing in the business.
It’s no surprise: not to those of us who’ve been around a bit. Remember, according to the research, 60% of agents leave the business within 18 months; and 90% of the agent population turns over every 5 years or so. Now, if you do the math, that means that a significant proportion of today’s real estate agents (and managers) have been in the business for under 5 years. And many joined the business when it was HOT. So they’ve never “had” to sell before. Nope - no need to prospect or give the courtesy of a follow up to anyone when you can stand in front of a listing and get multiple bids on your listing within hours. An entire generation of agents “grew up” during the boom, where the only criteria for success were a pulse, a license and an offer form. Ok, maybe an agency disclosure somewhere and possibly a sticky-note with the dates of closings on it. But certainly not sales skills. Who needed to sell when the properties sold themselves?
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