Hour of Silence

Today’s message is on an hour of silence.

Here is what I mean by that..

I read an executive report that other day that someone gave me and it talked about how companies across the nation had discovered something exiting. They discovered that if they incorporated an hour of silence into every business day where they did not answer the phone, they did not speak to each other, all they simply did is work and focus on the paper work and piles of information on your desk.

They found that stress was reduced.

They also found that they are completing in one hour what it would normally take 3 hours to do with interruptions and they found mistakes decreased significantly.

Just an interesting thought don’t you think? What if in your office, what if for yourself you instituted an hour of silence everyday?

Now maybe that means throughout the day or maybe that simply means for you getting to work early, before anyone else is there. I do this at my office. I am typically at my desk at 6am. Often Mallory comes in at about 7am even though she doesn’t have to be here until 7:30. That gives me a full hour.

There are no ringing phones, no one talking to me and usually there is no one emailing me. That gives me an opportunity to organize my thoughts and get a jump start to my day.

Interesting thought, one hour of silence everyday!

Make it a great day and I will talk to you soon.

If you are a real estate agent or broker that is looking to for more insight and direction on how to get more listings, sell more homes to your investors, and work with more buyers, then this podcast is just for you!

Lead Follow Up

Today we are going to talk about lead follow up. What I want you to remember is that probably about 70% of your business is going to come from your lead follow up.

I had at least 5 agents yesterday admit that while they are prospecting and they are working, they are not consistent in their lead follow up, which is really a shame. Because if you think about it, why work so hard and then not follow up?

What I would encourage you to do today is clean house on your leads. I find often people don’t call their leads because they have too many or too many bad ones.

Once you clean them up now time block in your schedule everyday to call them.

I know it’s great to come in and do your prospecting first, but if you are extremely challenged with your lead follow up, you may want to call your leads first thing in the morning and then move into your prospecting.

Ideally, you should block at least 30min to an hour a day. If it’s taking more than an hour, maybe you have too many leads and you may want to tighten your criteria for what you call a lead.

Also you may want to block 30 minutes one or two evenings a week and 30 minutes on a Saturday morning. Remember, your goal is to convert them as soon as possible and convert them aggressively. “I am calling to find out if you are ready to get your home on the market and get it sold. I have a little bit of time next week, how about Thursday?”

Move them forward now; leads are not like fine wine they don’t age well.

On this episode of the Elite Agents Podcast, Debbie De Grote and Pete Mitchell discuss several ways to get listings without having to cold call. Listen in and put several of these strategies to work for you in your business.

If you are a real estate agent or broker that is looking to for more insight and direction on how to get more listings, sell more homes to your investors, and work with more buyers, then this podcast is just for you!

What Are the Best Sources of Quality Buyers?

What are the best sources of quality buyers? Direct referrals from past clients and people who know you!

So how do you get them? Try calling your database and asking for them because typically when we call our database they often do know someone who is thinking of buying.

Sign calls are a great source and a good motivator to get out there and prospect so that you can get listings.  A sign usually can create an additional deal with a buyer or another sign if you work it properly.

Another good old-fashioned feeder is open house. Choose your open house wisely and then work it effectively to maximize your time invested.

One of the best methods at open house to capture their information is to talk about the fact that you are an aggressive prospector and you always have properties in the queue that are being prepared for sale that have not yet hit the market, and that you can help them beat the crowd to some of the best properties in town.

Tell them you need their contact information so that you can reach them quickly if something terrific appears.

Remember when you talk to centers of influence people when you are out and about and they ask are you busy your answer should be, “Yes, but I am never too busy to work with another terrific client, who do you know that I can help today?”

Of course there are many other sources of online buyers and other marketing you can do.  Fast, free, and efficient is the good old tried and true of referrals or direct connection with decent prospects.  We know if they are calling on a sign or out at an open house they are possibly more motivated to do it now vs. someone shopping online.

Ideally you will have your funnel of ready now and then your list of future prospects that you are communicating with systematically until they are ready to do something.

How to Influence and Close Prospects

We are going to talk about for a moment how to influence and close 98.2% of the prospects you meet. This was one of our most popular webinars all year.

Here’s a thought for you. Have you ever lost a listing even though you knew you were the very best agent for the job? Frustrating right? So why did they really choose the agent they chose? It probably isn’t the reason they gave you.

Wouldn’t you like to know what is the secret to winning more clients more easily? Well, maybe you need to simply increase your sales versatility because you may not be aware that 50%-75% of the business you lose is because you failed to establish appropriate rapport with the customers.

And you know that 75% of most buyers or sellers interview or speak to more than one agent before making a choice. That’s exactly why we need to work constantly on improving our sales versatility.

I am going to give you a few very quick tips:

It’s amazing what our results can be when we stop thinking about ourselves and instead make it 100% all about them!

And then really, really listen to their answers and adjust your strategy to fit their needs and goals.

Converting Buyers

Are you frustrated with the buyers you have?

I just got off a call with someone who said, “I have such a problem converting my buyers. I work with them for 4, 5, 6 months and sometimes they still don’t buy.”

Yes that does sound like a problem.

Why do some agents struggle to work and close their buyers? I made a short list of reasons.

Maybe you will spot something that you’re guilty of that you can work to correct so that you can close your buyers more rapidly.

Reasons for slow or poor conversion:

Each Monday review your buyer lead list and prioritize them – who are you going to get under contract in the next week and what actions are you going to need to take to do so.  Then stay on top of them until you get it done.

If they aren’t good buyers have your heart to heart talk and then if they don’t come into line fire them nicely and move on.

10 Things Not to Do to Your Administrative Assistant

We have been talking about hiring an administrative assistant so here are 10 things not to do if you want them to stay and be happy:

1.     Don’t skip meetings. They need your help and direction.

2.     Don’t multi-task while you’re meeting with them. It makes them feel frustrated and unimportant. 

3.     Give them 100% of your focus.

4.     Don’t under train them and then have unrealistic expectations about the progress they should be making.

5.     Don’t confront or criticize them in front of others.

6.     Don’t constantly call, text, and email them throughout the day. Whenever possible save your thoughts for the next meeting. Certainly try not to do too much of that after hours.

7.     Don’t expect them to skip their lunch and their breaks or they are going to burn out.

8.     Don’t expect them to read your mind and then be annoyed when they cannot.

9.     Don’t expect that they are going to be prospectors. That’s probably not their profile. However, you certainly could expect that they ask for referrals.

10. Don’t store up all the stuff that you don’t like or are frustrated with and then dump it all on them at once.

Talk to them as things move forward, help them grow, train them, give them your attention, and give them your support. Be a little bit realistic in your expectations of how long it takes when you hire someone, to have them fully ramped up into the position.

How to Hire the Right Administrative Assistant

So often I hear agents say to me, “I am completely overwhelmed. There are so many projects that could make me money, but there is just so little time to do them.” Often they will say, “I have hired people in the past, but it was a disaster.”

Staff turnover or having the wrong person in the role can be exhausting and frustrating.

That’s exactly why this is such an important topic!

When is the right time to hire additional help?

For the typical agent it’s about 25+ deals, or when you find that you are drowning in details and can no longer pursue new business the way you should.  You may be able to get by for a while with a transaction coordinator or a part time assistant.

You might even be able to share them with someone in your office.

When we are hiring someone to do the things that we don’t want to do, we have to be careful that we are not hiring our self because if we hire people with our personality style and core strengths they are not going to want to do the things you don’t like to do or won’t do them well.  Then you are right back to square one!

Therefore it’s going to be very important to develop a profile, a wish list if you will, of what you want in your perfect hire.  A few things to consider: male or female, age, commute distance, licensed or unlicensed, and just how much experience you are willing to pay for. 

As you develop your list really think about what you need them to know how to do. What skills? What personality? Have them take the DISC test and then review it with them to validate the results.

Take time to screen them, test them, check references and conduct more than one interview no matter how desperate you are for immediate help.  When you bring them on have a clear training plan for them and understand it takes time.  However if you discover quickly that you made a bad hire then take action right away to avoid wasting time and money.

If you need some additional resources on hiring, training and retaining email me at [email protected] and I will send you a few free reports that will be helpful.

During this interview, Debbie asks Pete about the 5 biggest mistakes that real estate agents make on their website - and what to do about it.

If you are a real estate agent or broker that is looking to for more insight and direction on how to get more listings, sell more homes to your investors, and work with more buyers, then this podcast is just for you!

Debbie De Grote and Pete Mitchell discuss:

If you are a real estate agent or broker that is looking to for more insight and direction on how to get more listings, sell more homes to your investors, and work with more buyers, then this podcast is just for you!