Staying in Business
Been teaching a lot. I see the distress on the faces of my students in my classes. Especially those who have been in real estate less than 10 years who never were trained in true sales skills and most specifically prospecting. When I ask how many new leads do you need a week to keep your business growing, NO ONE KNOWS!
Let me quote from REAL ESTATE RAINMAKER® by Dan Gooder. You need 25 prospects in your database for one transaction. 10 transactions equals 250 prospects and 50 transactions equals 1250 prospects. Yes, if you are marketing to your sphere and past customers, that helps, but you need new business all the time.
How can you generate that many?
1. Wear your name tag. When you are at a store getting a cup o’ joe, and someone asks you how real estate is, what will you say? How about telling them that you would love to get their email address and send them updates on what is going on in the market place. That is at least one a week.
2. Hold Open Houses – not just Sundays, but Thursday evenings, so people can stop by on the way home from work. Think about holding an open house preview for the neighborhood one hour before the public open house. The neighbors can see how you handle yourself if they ever need to sell. Have lots of statistics of what has been happening with prices, at least for the last 5 to 7 years. Many homeowners have not gotten the memo that their home is not worth what is was a short 6 months ago.
3. Use your virtual tour product to create Just Moved Buyer videos. Include 8 shots of their new home and one of them in their new home. Send it to them and let them virally send it to their sphere of 100 friends and family. If you use RealEstateShows they will have different ways to contact you and be able to see your other listings.
4. Mine FSBOS and Expireds. 79% of FSBOS end up working with a REALTOR® it should be YOU! Remember once a FSBO lists their home they become a BUYER. You could refer them or sell them a home as well.
5. Join networking groups on line and off line.
6. Create videos of the areas your service and send it to your sphere to remind them why you all love living where you do. A student of mine, Rocky Akins from Weichert Real Estate Alabama, created one with Photostory. He put to music a poem he had written about why he loves living on the Gulf Coast, complete with his own photos. He sent it to his sphere and past customers and he received two listings as a result.
7. Set up a group of vendors who you refer business to. In turn, they will refer business to you. Pili Meyer, a national trainer has a great product called The “Member Service Network Kit”. It provides a step by step method for establishing a network of professionals. If you follow the method, you will not only increase your business with buyers and sellers by providing them with the names of the network members, but you will increase your referrals from the network.
The kit contains the step by step method, sample letters to send the network, and a sample telephone dialog. In addition, the kit contains business card booklets to contain the cards of the network members. Click here for more information from PiliTalks.com
This is just a short list, I am sure you can think of more, do you mind sharing?
