The 10 Keys.
Create a Community
Have a database of everyone you know and put everything you know about them in it (including a bad back, a dog named Fido, etc.). Additionally, subdivide it into different categories. Pay particular attention to the most important people in your professional life, people that have given you referrals. Know everything you can about the people that make sure you eat. We have two databases free of charge to you. Start a list of everyone you know somewhere, anywhere. This is the single most important and impactful task a new agent has to build their business.
Grow Your Community
Become intentional, structured, and disciplined about adding people to your Community.
Join something, get involved in the community, help local entrepreneurs, such as restauranteurs, grow their businesses too… Every time you meet someone new, add them to your database.
Know Your Community
Stay in touch with your personal community with a monthly newsletter, no matter what. This frames you in their minds as their real estate solution, their “friend in the real estate business."
Ask Your Community
Ask your community for referrals. Make sure you have a good referral dialogue as well as something that can add specific value to someone's life. For example, “Because of the changing market, I have a challenge that maybe you can help me with. We are struggling to find homes to sell in certain price ranges and areas. Would you happen to know a friend who is interested in selling their home? We could probably get them top dollar for it in a short period of time and help out some of our clients that are looking for homes.” Always frame and present your referral question as an offer to assist someone and/or their friends. And always ask for seller referrals.
Ask for buyer referrals and all you get will be buyer referrals. Ask for seller referrals and they will give you both.
Thank Your Community
The people who give you referrals are simply stated, important. Express your gratitude and appreciation for the critical role they play in your life.
People love to be valued and appreciated.
Have a gratitude program, an automatic, systematic, and preplanned way to acknowledge and honor the most important event in your career, the privilege of receiving a referral.
For example: Movie Tickets. When you receive a referral, put two movie tickets in a handwritten note and make sure they receive the tickets the next day
Focus on Getting Clients
Schedule 1 to 2 hours every working day to do NOTHING but work on finding someone to work with. Do NOT schedule over it.
“The only income-producing activity for a real estate agent is prospecting. Everything else is just paperwork.” - Dennis Degnan
Call warm leads, reach out to your tribe, contact expired listings. Fresh Start and weekly Key Training will give you lots of ways to improve your prospecting strategy.
Focus on listings. Every business has a magic land, a place where it is simply easier and faster to make money. Our magic land is sellers. Seller-based activity is somewhere between 600% and 1200% more efficient and effective per-hour.
Have a Dialogue
The magic moment of the real estate business is when someone says, “I am thinking about buying (or selling) my home."
If you say to them one of the following dialogues, you will get the following results and you will get paid this percentage of the time if they do something in the next 30 days:
● 0% - “Well if you see something that you think you might like, just give me a call.”
● 5% - “I am going to email you some houses and call you on Tuesday at 2 o'clock.”
● 51% - “Here's what I would like to do for you, put together a list of the top 10 best buying opportunities in the area you described and swing by and drop them off on Tuesday at 2”
There are other dialogues you will learn to get that in-person appointment before showing a home to a buyer. The point is to get the appointment. If they say yes and you are in their dining room on Tuesday, you are going to get paid 51% of the time.
Get the appointment, get the appointment, get the appointment.
What about the guy who doesn't want to “do anything for at least a year?” This is where my suggestions might differ from the norm. I don't care when someone wants to give me $5000, now or a year from now. Get the appointment now.
In this appointment, I might be able to objectively create urgency, suggest alternatives, and have someone move forward more quickly. If I walk out of that appointment as the “family realtor,” I am going to have a client, get paid, and maybe get a year's worth of referrals in the meantime.
Do A Presentation
Professionals use professional tools. Have a visually appealing, attractive, and professional presentation. When you are in a $300,000 listing or buyer agency professional representation presentation, there is $9000 or more on the table. Put your best foot forward with a world-class services proposal that clearly demonstrates your expertise and experience and frames you as the best choice, the right choice.
Add Value
This is perhaps the most philosophical of the 10 Keys.
Valuable, able to create value, trustworthy, worthy of trust.
Sometimes, adding value to someone is simply listening to a story about their broken heart, an unfortunate and tragic passing, or a child who has lost their way.
Make a commitment to add 20 minutes to every appointment to allow people an opportunity to express themselves. Listen carefully, be calm and compassionate and emotionally available. Suit up, show up and be your best self.
Remember that they are far more interested in you as a person than they are in your charts and graphs. Be patient, tolerant, loving, and kind in all your dealings with clients. It is the foundation and the wellspring of lifelong relationships, world-class friendships, and an endless source of referrals.
For Example: Don't tell FSBO how wonderful you are. Offer them something that they will value... a CMA, free staging service, a free virtual tour, answers to any questions. It works a lot better than asking to come over and tell them how wonderful you are. They don't care.
Be an Entrepreneur
What is the difference between someone who has a job and someone who is self-employed? The name of your boss. Who wants to have a boss, even if it's you?
I believe that accomplished real estate professionals are not employed or self-employed. They are business owners and business owners have:
● Business plans, tactics, strategies that are well reasoned, carefully considered, and effective
● Profit and loss statements
● Budgets
● Spend less than they make
● Save money and have cash reserves
Business owners have a special set of responsibilities, obligations, and privileges. They do the right things, the right way for the right reasons.
This is a simple list. Success in real estate is actually simple, it is a series of habits. I did not say it was easy, but it is simple. There are no new fundamentals, and most wisdom is ancient.
"It is not hard to make $100,000 a year in real estate, the second time. Actually, it is easy, because now you expect it and now you have the habits." - Tom Hopkins
Key agents tell me stories that excite me so much that it keeps me up at night, stories about children going to college, families having health insurance, people who have elevated their lives in ways that were beyond their imagining, all because of Key Realty.
Our profession can provide you with economic stability and financial freedom. It can ensure that you get to every one of your children's baseball games, have money to travel, pursue other interests, and have great relationships with your loved ones.
