Many agents struggle to get anywhere with their goals, businesses and results because they are qualified victims; they know what to do but their negative mindset gets in the way. How can you identify if you’re a qualified victim? How do you move yourself up to being a qualified champion?
What is the difference between focus and awareness? On this episode, Spencer Combs talks more about the process for overcoming limiting beliefs and other stumbling blocks to our success.
Any bus will get you there if you don’t know where you’re headed. -Spencer Combs
Three Takeaways
Why more real estate training isn't the answer
You can know exactly what to do but if you don’t have the right mindset, the right thoughts and the right knowledge, you just won’t move.
It's what we know, but DO NOT do that's our problem
When we know what we need to do but we never do it, that information is useless. We have to bring what we know and what we do together in order to become unstoppable.
3 ways to identify victims in your life
There are three behaviors that can quickly help you identify the victims around you. Victims blame other people and even the market for their challenges, they constantly criticize others, and justify why they aren’t making progress.
In order to get unstuck and get over our own victim mentality, the first thing we have to talk about and get clear on is the accountability. We have to take complete responsibility for our lives if we want to change them. We have to focus on what we want more than what we don’t want, and align our beliefs with where we want to go. Lastly, we have to be flexible and focus less on the vehicle for getting results and more on the destination and the ultimate goal we have.
Guest Bio
Spencer is a Coach, speaker and founder of Spencer Combs Resources. He also serves as Director of Operations for the Jeff Riley team in Columbia, SC. Go to http://www.spencercombs.com/ or http://productivitystreet.com/ for more information. Join Spencer every Tuesday night at 6pm EST for his Facebook Live.
Rockstar Agent Marketing Toolkit - Featuring our favorite scripts, tutorials and quickstart guides to marketing strategies like Facebook Live, door-knocking, remarketing advertising, open houses and referrals. Get actionable ideas and tactics you can use in your career right NOW.
The thing that constantly holds us back from getting better results in business is mindset, and the influence it has on the actions we take. How do we connect the right mindset to the tactics and actions that will move us forward? How do we identify what we’re missing, and how do we implement that piece into our lives? What are the 4 types of agents, and how do you move towards the zone where you are most effective? On this episode, coach, speaker and author, Spencer Combs shares on how to go from victim to champion, he also shares why more real estate training isn't the answer, how to identify victims and why what we don’t do is what holds us back.
Most of us know what we should be doing, we even know how to do it but we won’t take the action, and it’s almost always because of an incongruence in beliefs. -Spencer Combs
Three Takeaways
The 4 Categories Most Agents Fall Into
Unqualified champions are people have the mindset but not the mechanics to get things done. Unqualified victims don’t know the mechanics and don’t have mindset. Qualified victims know the mechanics but have a negative mindset. Qualified champions have the mindset and mechanics so they are able to get into action.
The 2 most dangerous words in the English language
Saying “I know” is very dangerous because it stops us from learning anything or taking the steps to get better and go towards our goals.
The power of clarity and chunking
The first step is getting clear on what it is we want to achieve, and then looking for people who have already achieved it, and starting to break down the chunks of action we need to take to get there.
No matter how much motivation, drive and real estate training we have, if we don’t actually have a detailed and broken down action plan, we won’t be able to grow our business. In order to get to that action plan, clarity is key. We have to find someone to model who is doing exactly what we want to do, and then breaking down the actions that will allow us to do the same. One of the most powerful ways to get traction is to put ourselves into a rhythm of regular planning. Ultimately, when mindset and mechanics are congruent, action will take place.
Guest Bio
Spencer is a Coach, speaker and founder of Spencer Combs Resources. He also serves as Director of Operations for the Jeff Riley team in Columbia, SC. Go to http://www.spencercombs.com/ or http://productivitystreet.com/ for more information.
Rockstar Agent Marketing Toolkit - Featuring our favorite scripts, tutorials and quickstart guides to marketing strategies like Facebook Live, door-knocking, remarketing advertising, open houses and referrals. Get actionable ideas and tactics you can use in your career right NOW.
Many agents have a really difficult emotional adversity to being rejected by new people because they take the rejection personally, but the truth is, a new person’s resistance is a natural reaction. What mindset shift should you make about this so you can persevere in prospecting? How can we go about putting ourselves in front of new people and then getting them to know, like and trust us? On this episode, Dale Archdekin talks about the have mets and the have not mets and how to overcome the fear we have around that.
Accept that a stranger is going to be naturally defensive and skeptical of us. -Dale Archdekin
Three Takeaways
A stranger will naturally be defensive and hesitant toward us. Don't allow that to hold you back.
From childhood, it is ingrained in us not to trust or talk to strangers, and when you’re a salesperson that’s an extra layer we have to break through. But don’t let the natural resistance deter you from talking to new people.
How strangers respond to us initially is not about US - it's about them
When people are skeptical of us when they first meet us, we shouldn’t take it personally. They are rejecting their concept of a stranger salesperson. Remember, if a person doesn’t even know you yet, it’s impossible for them to actually dislike you.
Everyone who knows, likes and trusts you was a stranger at some point
The people you worked with and delivered a great service to were also people who didn’t know like and trust way back in the beginning. You would have never gotten to that wonderful place with that person if you didn’t go through the tough part of front which is a their natural resistance.
The truth about every meaningful relationship in our lives is that those people started off as strangers and they didn’t know, like and trust us immediately. As a salesperson, whenever you talk to somebody new, you will run up against resistance, rejection and a bit of adversity. This resistance isn’t about us or anything wrong with us, and if we actually bring value to these people, they will also become people who know, like and trust us.
Guest Bio
Dale is a Realtor and founder of Smart Inside Sales. Go to smartinsidesales.com for more information, email dale@smartinsidesales.com or find them on Facebook.
One of the reasons many agents struggle to close on prospecting calls is that they haven’t mastered the basics of the call like introducing themselves quickly, and learning what the prospect’s true motivations are. How do you practice these aspects? Why is action more important than knowing everything? On this episode, Dale Archdekin shares what he’s learned from training agents and teams on prospecting and conversion.
There are 3 different stages of the script, who you are, where you’re from and what you’re doing on the phone call. -Greg McDaniel
Three Takeaways
It's not what you know, it's what you DO that counts
No amount of training and learning what works will change anything if it’s not put into actual action. What matters is doing, and even if you don’t know everything, that’s what helps you grow. In prospecting, it’s often about getting out there and just doing it, getting the practice, learning and getting better.
The value of real, live-fire practice
It’s not just about roleplaying, it’s about actually going through the foundational aspects and demonstrating them in real time. It’s about mastering aspects of talking to a lead, objection handling, and working the lead through to a closing. Getting used to this in practice means it will feel more natural on an actual prospecting call.
Why you shouldn't practice in your leads
Don’t practice on your leads because they are getting more and more expensive, and you want to be ready when you get on the phone with them.
If you’re already experienced at the basics of a prospecting call, role play is just a warm up, but a lot of agents still need to lay the foundation of the basics of the call. If you want to get better at cold business, practice your calls, from the opening to the close, from introducing yourself and stating the purpose of the call. It’s all about getting the most important question of the call answered and you get there by mastering all the pieces of the call.
Guest Bio
Dale is a Realtor and founder of Smart Inside Sales. Go to smartinsidesales.com for more information, email dale@smartinsidesales.com or find them on Facebook.
Rockstar Agent Marketing Toolkit - Featuring our favorite scripts, tutorials and quickstart guides to marketing strategies like Facebook Live, door-knocking, remarketing advertising, open houses and referrals. Get actionable ideas and tactics you can use in your career right NOW.
One of the 4 pillars of a successful and sustainable business is after sales follow up and building a referral-based business. If we haven’t been good at our client follow up, what are the steps we need to take to rectify that? How can we evaluate whether our activities are giving us a return on time? What’s a simple system for building more relationships? On this episode, Theresa Barnabei continues to share insights on becoming successful in business, and this time we focus on generating referrals.
Real estate is not a rocket science business, it’s a highly evolved people business. -Theresa Barnabei
Three Things We Learned
The early indicators of ROI
Production isn’t the only indicator of whether we’re getting a return on investment. There are initial indicators that tell us how well we’re doing. Use the acronym TEEM- Time, Energy, Effort and Money. Take a look at the time, energy, effort and money you’re spending on any one of those things, and evaluate if you’re getting a return on investment.
How to get back in touch with past clients
If you have not stayed in touch with your sphere, write an apology letter. They entrusted us with a life event and falling out of touch with them is unacceptable.
How to get more business
If you want to do more business, you have to get to know and like a lot more people. People will do business with people they know, like and trust. In order for people to get to and like you have to get to know and like them.
If you do a good job of keeping in touch with the current clients you have right now, at least half of those clients will come back for repeat business in 4-5 years. It’s all about staying in relationship with these people and getting to know them beyond the transaction. You want to be the person they think about and refer when real estate comes up. The goal of after sale follow up is basically continuing to get to know and like people.
Rockstar Agent Marketing Toolkit - Featuring our favorite scripts, tutorials and quickstart guides to marketing strategies like Facebook Live, door-knocking, remarketing advertising, open houses and referrals. Get actionable ideas and tactics you can use in your career right NOW.
Guest Bio
Theresa is a real estate business coach, educator, author and speaker. She is the founder of Flight Of Your Life Success Coaching With Theresa, TBConsults and Black Card Service. Go to http://www.multiplyyourrealestatebusiness.com/ to get a free copy of Theresa’s book “Multiply Your Business: 10 New Marketing Realities For The Real Estate Industries.”
There’s always a new training product, free webinar of eBook that promises to boost our business. The problem is if it’s out of our comfort zone, we just won’t stick with it long enough for it to work. What are the prospecting and lead generation strategies you should always start with? How do we work towards activities that are more out of our comfort zone? What are the 4 things we need to pay attention to in order to build successful, scalable businesses? On this episode, author, speaker and real estate coach Theresa Barnabei shares on creating a successful business on strategies and activities we can do consistently.
Never abandon what you do successfully. It is usually what you’re most comfortable doing. -Theresa Barnabei
Three Things We Learned
How to connect with people as an extrovert
Being an introvert in real estate doesn’t mean we can’t connect with people. We can still be a bit more extroverted when it suits us and our businesses. You can be introverted but still shine in getting people to know, like and trust you.
How to switch from a selling mindset to a serving on
When people are prospecting and lead generating, they tend to have a mindset block. They think they are selling, and because of that they will struggle to get on the phone and have conversations with people. It’s important to switch the mindset to one of serving.
The best way to choose a prospecting method
If you want to be successful in business building, figure out what’s in your wheelhouse that you see yourself doing, that you can get excited about. The things you’re comfortable doing will be the easiest to commit to. Then from there, you can stretch yourself into activities that are out of your comfort zone.
There are 4 things we need to pay attention to in order to build a business that can scale and keep producing results. First, it’s the time we put aside for ourselves and our loved ones, then it’s taking the time to build business through prospecting, executing on the transactions we have, as well as after sale follow up. Prospecting can be a challenge when the required activities feel difficult for us to do. If the activity is not in our comfort zone, we’ll procrastinate, drag our feet and never get it done. Overcome this by focusing on the things you are confident and comfortable doing. Because you’re consistent with it, it will consistently deliver results.
Rockstar Agent Marketing Toolkit - Featuring our favorite scripts, tutorials and quickstart guides to marketing strategies like Facebook Live, door-knocking, remarketing advertising, open houses and referrals. Get actionable ideas and tactics you can use in your career right NOW.
Guest Bio
Theresa is a real estate business coach, educator, author and speaker. She is the founder of Flight Of Your Life Success Coaching With Theresa, TBConsults and Black Card Service. Go to http://www.multiplyyourrealestatebusiness.com/ to get a free copy of Theresa’s book “Multiply Your Business: 10 New Marketing Realities For The Real Estate Industries.”
The start of a new year provides an opportunity for us to set new goals. While a great opportunity, this can feel overwhelming. How can we achieve every resolution we’ve set for ourselves? Is there a way to level up more than one dimension of our lives at a time? On this episode, we speak with a master of goal setting and achieving, Morgan Oaks. Drawing on his personal experience, Morgan advocates a holistic approach to elevating your life.
A third-party view is critical: find someone with the nerve to tell you when you’re doing something wrong.- Morgan Oaks.
Three Things We Learned
Taking a holistic approach to goals
Far too often, the third parties we employ to help us with challenges we face only concentrate on one area at a time. For example, business coaches do not consider your relationships, in the same way that relationship counsellors do not take into account your business issues. The reality is, as a human being each of these areas plays a significant role in your life. Make sure you’re always aware of this.
The importance of exercise
Exercise is one activity that can help you level up almost every dimension of your life. In addition to the obvious benefits for physical health, it can also assist in reducing stress and maintaining focus. As we emphasize, when you achieve new levels of fitness, you experience a sense of victory. The feeling of achievement is carried with you, even after you leave the gym.
How to achieve in multiple areas of your life
Find singular, helpful tools that help you meet multiple goals at once. This does not require fully realizing each of your goals at the same time, but speaks to a process whereby you can achieve small victories. Meditation, for example, can help you slow down and enjoy the moment- and help you be more productive afterwards.
There is no better time than the start of 2019 to start adopting routines that will help you find success in every aspect of your life. Routines like exercise go a long way in helping you achieve goals in terms of both physical and mental health. The ability to meet two goals with one activity should never be discounted. While you may see the categories in which you place your goals as distinct, remember that they are all important to you for a reason.
Guest Bio
As a chiropractor, transformational speaker and high performance coach, it’s safe to say that Morgan Oaks has a diverse range of talents. Morgan points out that one of his greatest motivators is never feeling that he is getting enough out of what he’s doing in the moment. By thinking that way, he is always pushing for more and trying to best achieve his goals.
Rockstar Agent Marketing Toolkit - Featuring our favorite scripts, tutorials and quickstart guides to marketing strategies like Facebook Live, door-knocking, remarketing advertising, open houses and referrals. Get actionable ideas and tactics you can use in your career right NOW.
When it comes marketing, it often feels like we have to constantly step our game up in order to succeed. When it comes to new strategies, why is podcasting a front runner? How do we balance what the audience wants with what we’re interested and what we want to talk about? On this episode, we discuss some key points to consider when it comes to crafting content to grow your business.
Even if the audience comes, if the content doesn’t help you sell more houses, you will get burnt out on it a lot faster. -Matt Johnson
Three Things We Learned
Why YouTube is better for growing an audience
YouTube is so much better at serving up your videos to people who are looking for stuff in your area or on your topic, and serving you up as a recommended video than iTunes. To get started with podcasting, create community-oriented, events-based videos, keep them short and put them on YouTube and then drive people there.
How to craft content that the audience actually wants
One of the biggest mistakes people are making with their podcasts and video content is wanting to do something that’s fun for them and still grow an audience but those two things are actually incompatible. People either don’t care about the topic or they’re already getting the content from someone else.
Why focusing on a niche is important
No one is interested in just one thing, so to make highly focused content you have to cut a deal with yourself to sacrifice certain things you would want to talk about to deliver what the audience is interested in. The more focused you get, the more people understand exactly what mental bucket you’re trying to fit into, the more likely they will be to come to you for that specific thing.
As business owner, creating content is not an art form, it has a purpose and that is to get more people onto your calendar that want to meet to buy or sell a home. You want to get more business, and if you build the audience and it doesn’t translate to that, it will be disappointing. Your content creation has to actually put money in your pocket, or else it will feel like a waste. The more focused you are in your content as it relates to your business purpose the more likely you are to have success.
One of the ways we can truly build a life of freedom is to jump into investing. Do we have to have been in the business for a long time? What is a basic deal we can set up? How does investing empowers us? On this episode, Zach Beach shares on how he went from bartender to 100 investing deals in under 3 years, and how we can do it.
A basic lease-purchase deal is a net lease with an option to purchase at the end. -Zach Beach
Three Takeaways
The profitability of lease-purchase deals
A lease-purchase deal gives you 3 paydays as an investor. First you get the non-refundable deposit, and then the difference between what you pay on expenses, and what you’re collecting for rent, as well as the principal pay down.
How lease-purchase deals benefit the customer
A lease-purchase deal is a bridge to homeownership and an opportunity for people to become mortgage ready. Buyer’s get to lock in their price today. As an investor, the benefits aren’t just financial. You get people who will take better care of the home than a renter.
Why building relationships is key to investing
Investing in real estate is more of a give and take, and open conversation. You have to be a lot more personable because it’s all about building a relationship from step one all the way to signing the contract.
As an agent, you already have the lead gen tools, prospecting and relationship building skills mastered, so why not add one more arrow in your quiver through investing? It will give you one more way to help people so when you meet a prospect, the conversation doesn’t just have to be about buying or selling. It gives you a lot more value and it can change the rest of your life by helping you build wealth.
Guest Bio
Zach is an Entrepreneur, Real Estate Investor, Real Estate Coach and Marketer at Pre Property Solutions. For more information, go to http://prepropertysolutions.com or connect with him on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/zacharyrbeach/.
To download Pre Property’s free ebook on investing, go to http://freesrecbook.com
When something goes wrong in our lives, how we bounce back from it depends on how we handle the fall out. How do we get ourselves unstuck from wallowing and feeling bad about ourselves? What steps can we take to get out of the low? What can you do to change your mindset? On this episode, Jeff Coats shares on his book, the lessons he learned from his time in prison, and how he’s applying it to his life and business.
You can take control of your life by setting and accomplishing your goals and being dedicated to those goals and yourself. -Jeff Coats
Three Takeaways
Acceptance should come before any action
Before we can take any action towards making a change in our lives, we have to accept the situation, accept that something is not working, and accept the part we played in making it happen.
How to avoid wallowing for too long
When something isn’t going well, we go through the grief cycle. While it’s easy to get stuck in that for too long, we have to force ourselves to get out of it quickly. The faster we start taking action towards recovering, the faster we’ll be back on our feet.
The importance of taking responsibility
Usually when things don’t go our way, our first reaction is to blame it on someone else, but what we should do is take responsibility. You have to admit to yourself that you have a hand in the failure. If you’re not getting any results, see your role in it and then do something about it.
The results we get in our lives will always reveal if we’re taking the right actions and nurturing the right mindsets. So if we’re not getting what we want, we have to tweak what we’re doing and thinking. We play a huge part in what happens in our lives, and the good thing about being responsible for our failure is that we are also responsible for our successes if we turn things around.
Guest Bio
Jeff Coats is an entrepreneur, speaker and author of Res3t: 8 Principles Guaranteed to Change Your Mindset In Order to Change Your Life. Jeff was incarcerated at the age of 14 and sent to adult prison for 17 years. Released in 2011, he quickly became a successful real estate broker. This book covers his story (and the stories of others who have succeeded against all odds), told through the perspective of a life philosophy that emphasizes changing your mindset to change your life. Drawing from his own experiences, Jeff has introduced 8 principles for living a better life—a life that puts you on the path to achieving your biggest goals. Go to https://www.res3t.com/ for more information and to buy the book.
Many agents get tripped up because they think all the posting they’re doing on social media is automatically going to generate business. The truth is we also need to work on bringing our relationships from social media to something deeper and less transactional. What do we need to have in place in order to bridge this gap? How can we get better at celebrating our successes? On this episode, we talk about our wins at the end of 2018, and how we can set ourselves up for a successful 2019.
Social media has created a “need it now” mentality, but you have to pay the patience game in real life. -Gene Volpe
Three Takeaways
Why attention doesn’t bring business
Social media has created the impression that attention equals dollars which isn’t necessarily true. It can be true, but only if you build a bridge between the two by having really good conversations and strong relationships.
The power of reaching out between transactions
The more we are secure and confident that we are worthy of being referred and introduced, the more it gives us the ability to get out of our own way and ask for it, and reach out and give value in between transactions.
How to celebrate wins in an effective way
It’s one thing to accomplish something and feel the satisfaction, it’s a whole other thing to actually celebrate it properly, whether it’s with a drink, a meal or doing something you enjoy. There is something powerful about a physical ritual with a substance that you’ve tied to success. It means you have a visceral and physical way to celebrate that accomplishment
The thing about this business is you’re not going to call someone and just have them ready to pull the trigger immediately on buying or selling a house. You have to build a relationship with them so that when they do reach the point where they want to buy and sell, we’re the ones they want to work with. We have to use systems and conversations to keep those relationships warm over time, because eventually they will pay off. The key is having more conversations in the real world, and leaning less on social media.
Being disorganized isn’t just a flaw, it is actually a symptom of a much deeper problem - an affinity to chaos. What traits are telltale signs of this problem? How can this chaos factor be traced back to chaos when we were younger? How can we overcome this? On this episode, real estate coach Angela Kristen Taylor shares how to uproot and overcome chaos in our businesses and lives.
Control issues are tied to not having anyone you could trust in your childhood. -Angela Kristen Taylor
Three Takeaways
Symptoms of the chaos factor
Being easily distracted, having a love for organizational tools but never being able to put them into action. Never filling up planners Disorganized thoughts in notebooks, writing sideways
Being late, double booking and complete and total disorganization, and being busy but never accomplishing anything.
What happens if the chaos affinity is not addressed
If you don’t deal with this and you still manage to succeed, you will self-sabotage yourself because you’ll still have that thermostat for chaos. That means you’ll constantly find ways to self-sabotage yourself, and create chaos in your life in some way, shape, or form. So no matter what you achieve you will destroy it.
The root of control issues
Control issues and not wanting to give up any control is something that can be tied back to childhood. If you did not have anybody in your life as a child that you couldn’t trust, to show up and do what they said they would do, you’re not going to believe anyone has that capability except for you.
Having chaos in our lives and businesses goes back to having a childhood where we felt like we had no power or control and we were at someone else’s whim. It’s one of the reasons we choose to go out on our own in business, but also the same reason our lives and businesses are chaotic and disorganized. If this goes unaddressed, it affects how you treat yourself, how we treat others and our whole lives. To overcome it, we have to actively work on ourselves, and dig down to the bottom of the source of the chaos so we can nip it in the bud.
Guest Bio
Angela is a real estate coach and the founder of Master Agent Life. Master Agent Life is the culmination of everything she learned as a real estate agent and everything she learned trying to become the best version of herself: mentally, physically, and spiritually. Go to https://www.masteragentlife.com/ for more information and for access to a helpful video, and a resource on lead generation ideas.
We’re not always going to be in the best headspace for prospecting, but it’s a necessary activity to our survival. How can we get ourselves pumped for prospecting, or build habits that make sure we never skip it? What do multiple objections tell us about what the prospect is feeling? How can we get to the root of solving the problem? In today’s episode, we’re joined by Gene Volpe and Aaron Wittenstein for another edition of the East Coast/West Coast smackdown, to talk about lead generation and FSBOs and showing our prospects that we relate to them.
If you’re not regularly prospecting for business, you’re not going to be able to get the money you want. -Aaron Wittenstein
Three Takeaways
When a prospect says they’re considering the FSBO route
That’s not an objection you’re going to get them to change their mind on over the phone. Ask them that you want stop by to get a feel for the property, and then stay in touch with them on a regular basis after that. 4-5 weeks in, when the process isn’t going well is the point they’ll consider getting an agent.
What objections tell you about your prospect’s thought
If you get a lot of objections at once, you’ve done a bad job of explaining what makes you different and better than other agents, so they don’t see the value of working with you, vs. working with somebody else.
How to reveal the root of an objection
Lead a prospect down a set of questions around their frustration. When you go deep and really talk about the nuances of their problem, it shows you understand what it would mean for them if you solved it.
Very often, the gap between a prospect's objections and them deciding to work with us is asking the right questions, and showing the value we hold over another agent. If we can restate and frame their problem in a way that nobody else does and shows that we understand the problem or have a unique spin on it, they’ll assume we have the solution they need.
The way customers treat us is a reflection of the way we treat them, so when we commodify them, they will do the same to us. How do we start prioritizing rapport and relationship over transactions and deals? What kind of collaborative marketing relationships should we be on the lookout for? How can we generate at least $100,000 worth of business from our sphere? In this clip, author, coach and mortgage officer, Scott Groves, talks about the one way we can maintain our value to the market.
If Realtors and lenders are setting up their referral situation as some type of pay-to-play, I think in some way that attitude gets conveyed to the client. -Scott Groves
Three Takeaways
Why we should go to prospects with a relationship, not a transaction in mind
If you treat people like a commodity, don't be upset when prospects treat YOU like a commodity. When you’re doing your business in a relationship style, it automatically bleeds through to the way clients feel about you and how loyal they are.
The world is moving toward cooperative and collaborative marketing.
There’s always room for us to partner with local business who also want to be in front of our target market and actually share the cost of marketing.
If you're famous with 50 people, you can make a million dollars next year.
Before you go investing in Facebook, Instagram and other marketing tactics targeted to new people, make sure you’ve tapped out your sphere and the people that already know you. Reach out to 10 people on your Facebook friends list a day and you’ll be surprised to get a lot of business out of that.
If we make our prospects feel like we’re transactional or too focused on the deal, they won’t have any qualms going out to find a discount broker. To avoid this, we have to build a relationship, and show that we’re in it for the long haul. It’s also necessary to deepen the relationships we have with the people who are already in our sphere before we reach out to the market cold and invest in marketing and advertising. Make yourself famous with your close circle, so you’re the first agent to come to mind and then work your way outwards from there.
Guest Bio
Scott is a nationally recognized loan officer & coach. He is also the author of the book “Lead Generate: 61 Days to Double Your Pay”. For nearly 20 years he has been providing quality mortgage products, coaching, and management to his clients & collaborators across the country. By fostering close relationships with real-estate agents, buyers, and loans officers - Scott has built a career out of providing exceptional value. His business philosophy has always been a simple creed: do the right thing for the client and serve his Community. Helping clients find mortgage solutions, growing loan officers both personally & professionally, and assisting professionals grow alternate source of revenue his primary focus. Go to meetscottgroves.com for more information.
Find his book on Amazon.
Genuine connections remain the lifeblood of any successful business, but most people are only using social media to get attention. Why is it so important to make our marketing build relationships with people? How do we use new developments in social media to deepen our existing relationships? On this episode, we continue last week’s conversation about getting back to the marketing basics, which is building and deepening relationships instead of being transactional.
The only thing that can’t be kicked down the road is an interpersonal relationship with somebody. -Greg McDaniel
Three Things We Learned
How we can leverage YouTube
On Instagram most people consume videos without sound unless it’s really juicy. YouTube is the opposite people go there to consume content you want to see and hear at the same time. If we want to publish content that needs people to hear and see us, YouTube is the best choice.
How social networks shift with time
As a social media network gets more popular, there’s a curve where it’s shiny and people are open to connecting with new people. And then as people try to sell us something or bots enter the picture, we start to shut ourselves off from new connections.
The importance of building new relationships by deepening existing ones
When we think about all the new tools and things that are changing in marketing, our first inclination is reaching out to new people using these tools. What we should actually be doing is reaching out to the people who already know, like and trust us and then leveraging them to get in front of people who don’t know us who can get introduced to us by the people we know.
For most people using established social platforms, talking to new people isn’t something they aren’t interested in because of just how many people are out there trying to sell to them. Social media has become a place they communicate with people they know. If we want to rise above this, get people to spend time with us online, and eventually get into our real world, we actually have to connect with them right from the start. The more we can shift our intention and attention to building relationships first, the less we might be blocked out by people for being a stranger. What people remember is how you make them feel, and social media can be decent for getting that started if we leverage video, but the connection will still be necessary and that’s what we should be driven by.
As we head towards the new year, it’s time for us to refine our marketing and gear up for dominating and growing our business in 2019. How do we market correctly to the people who actually identify with our brand archetype? What lesson can we learn from the mind-blowing Payless “Palessi” campaign? On this episode, Gene Volpe joins us talk about some marketing strategies we can employ in 2019 to get more results and connect with more people.
We leave a lot of money on the table of the cutting room floor of content we’re already creating. -Greg McDaniel
Three Things We Learned
A recent change in Instagram’s algorithm
In the past, our follower-following ratio was a huge determinant of how highly we ranked on Instagram. It determined how important people think we are, and how good they think we are at our jobs. Instagram has made changes and now it’s not as important.
How to boost our door-knocking with the online space
We can use door-knocking as the beginning of a campaign to retarget the people we see online. The race is getting as much valuable information on your prospect as possible and that means having something valuable, so they are willing to give you their email addresses so we can retarget them.
Why we have to be careful about how we market
All attention is not good attention, all publicity is not good publicity, unless we want to be polarizing. Real estate agents don’t convert on polarization, they convert on trust and credibility so we have to be careful not to take too many marketing risks.
Any marketing strategy going into 2019 has to have video at the top of the list. There is no way to get more followers or grow our business without it. Facebook advertising is still relatively cheap so that’s another tool we have to include in our battle plan. We have to have a presence on Instagram that shows people who we are and gives them something to relate to. If we market to people who identify with our brand archetype, we will see way more results.
The ability to be a connector is very useful and can help us grow our businesses. How do we find valuable ways to successfully connect with people who can help us level up? What are some of the mistakes people make when they try to reach out to people? How do we find the intersection between what we’re passionate about and what’s valuable to other people? On this episode, we are joined by Justin Zimmerman and Internet Marketing Party founder, David Gonzalez to talk about how we can use connections to build stronger businesses.
You can’t just do something you’re passionate about. You have to find something that solves a problem for someone else. -Matt Johnson
Three Things We Learned
The connection between advice and context
Advice always has to be seen and thought about in context of the person giving it and receiving it. If a solopreneur is being advised by a person with a multimillion dollar business, it’s important to know that the advice is in the context of a large business and it might be very different to the advice the solopreneur needs.
How to test your passion in a certain area
Most people think of marketing in the short-term. When it comes to making a better decision, it’s important to ask ourselves if an idea or strategy is something we’d be happy and comfortable doing for the next 3-5 years. Imagine doing only that and nothing else and be very honest with yourself about whether that’s something you can see for yourself.
A primer on how to connect with successful people
When you’re trying to connect with someone, create a context so that you can have an opening in conversation that isn’t just asking something. You can contact just about anyone if you do it in the right way and they get value out of it.
The secret to being a super-connector is finding a way to talk to people that will actually bring value to them. The biggest mistake we make when we’re reaching out to people is that we don’t understand that value is the currency that drives those relationships forward. Reaching out to “pick their brain” won’t be good enough. We have to deploy whatever assets we have, whether it’s intellectual or social to make them want to engage with us.
Guest Bio
David is the founder of Internet Marketing Party, go to https://internetmarketingparty.com/ for more information or check it out Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pg/InternetMarketingParty/posts/.
Most agents don’t want to talk to For Rent By Owner prospects but they are actually an untapped source of quality leads that are still open to talking to us. Is the dynamic of the call different since they aren’t getting hounded by multiple phone calls? How do we use FRBO leads to build long-term relationships? On this episode, we talk about how to generate high quality leads through For Rent by Owners.
FRBOs are open to having a conversation with you, as long as you’re inquisitive and there for their best interests. -Greg McDaniel
Three Things We Learned
Why FRBOs are a win-win
Whatever answer you get from a FRBO is a win-win. First you’re building a relationship. Secondly, you can help them rent out the property. You won’t make a lot of money but you will build a relationship with someone who can bring in more business in the long-term. If they say no, go in for the real kill and ask them if they are interested in picking up another rental property.
Why FRBOs are less resistant than other leads
There’s a lot less resistance with FRBOs than any other lead type. Their minds are already in the real estate realm so you don’t have to start or restart a conversation with them.
The power of follow-up in the FRBO strategy
FRBOs, if done right, are going to create long-term business opportunities with multiple leads. But if you’re going to talk about a long-term strategy, the fortune is in the follow-up. We have to stay top of mind by scheduling our communication and reaching out.
If you want to build a portfolio of investor clients who are always looking to buy, even when the average consume is scared out of their minds FRBOs offer that opportunity. They will still want to jump into the market even when it’s shifting and they are already thinking of buying and selling so it’s easier to build rapport. Right now is the time to lay foundation because no one is calling them right now. If we can think of it as long-term business, these relationships can be very fruitful.
As we head into 2019, it’s important to prospect for now business, but to also lay the groundwork for future business. What does it take to do both? How can you use market data to stay in touch in a more specific way? How do you create content that helps us get more contacts? On this episode, RedX head of content, Justin Zimmerman, joins us along with agent Ray Stendall to talk about staying relevant, valuable and sharp as the industry shifts.
The criterion for a good agent is someone that can really represent and explain what is happening in the market at that time. -Ray Stendall
Three Things We Learned
Multiple contact produces more detailed data
You really have to test the market out in the area you prospect so you get an idea of the nuances and unique characteristics. That means calling more than once, and calling at different times.
How to create content that’s worth bookmarking
Identify the big problem your market is facing, come up with simple outline structure with a hook to get people interested, and an introduction to establish your expertise.
FAQs vs. SAQs
Frequently asked questions are usually asked by someone who doesn’t know much about the inner workings of transactions and real estate. Should-ask questions are more of industry insider’s knowledge, what a high level agent should know. Create content for both.
The heart and soul of NOW business is being disciplined and consistent in getting on the phone, knowing your scripts and being relentless in your follow up to get people to an appointment. Once you’re in that appointment, you have to line up your tools so you can bring value. One of those tools is our market knowledge and expertise. It is the last bastion of value for real estate agents in an age where we’re being squeezed.
Guest Bio
Justin Zimmerman is the director of content development at REDX and a content strategist with a background in real estate. He started off in real estate at 24 and built a software that took local MLS housing data and transformed it into a format easy to understand both by buyers and sellers. This helped him gain a competitive advantage in a profession where the average age was 47.
His software was so successful that he started training other agents to become Certified Market Advisors and went from being a simple agent to managing 51 people.Today, he uses his real estate and marketing knowledge to help agents create content that eliminates the need for prospecting and builds a strong database.
Read about how to become a listing machine here.
Ray is an agent and the founder of Elegant San Diego Homes. Go to https://www.elegantsandiegohomes.com for more information. Get FREE access to Ray’s tracking sheet for daily prospecting email info@elegantsdhomes.com.
Some people look at things like Facebook ads and video content related to our listings as doing more than what’s required. What is the difference between being active and passive when it comes to selling a home? What is our role as agents in getting a home sold? What determines whether a home gets sold and how much control do we have over it? On this episode, we talk about what every agent worth their commission should be doing and why this stuff makes a difference.
The underlying idea that if we just deliver great service everything will take care of itself is a reassuring lie. -Matt Johnson
Three Things We Learned
Why the best product doesn’t always sell the most
We tell ourselves the lie that the best product is what sells most but this is usually never true. The product that gets to first in our minds wins. The listing agent who dominates the neighbourhood wins, even if they suck.
Why you have to think of the home as a product
Crappy pictures that don’t show off interesting and compelling photos of the features of the property won’t sell the home. You want to make sure people have a good first impression of the home because no matter how good you are as a salesperson, if you can’t make the house look good on the MLS, you’re wasting your time.
How to set ourselves apart
Getting as many potential buyers into the house at the same time in the shortest period of time is one of the things we can do to set ourselves apart in the market.
Being passive in marketing a listing is basically putting it up on the MLS and just hoping someone sees it. Anything you can do to create buzz is going to be active and that means putting on your marketing strategist hat and working with the seller to put that house in the best position as a product and so when you do put it on the MLS it attracts the right people. That’s part of what we’re being paid to do. Not doing this means we just won’t sell anything, no matter how good we are.
If we’re thinking of freeing up more of our time, chatbots are a great way to automate our marketing efforts, but we have to be careful not to turn them into virtual answering machines. What are some of the ways people are misusing chatbots? How do we build rapport, and find the people that are worth talking to and who is really motivated? On this episode, marketing expert Zach Hammer shares how we can get the most out chatbots.
Don’t think of chatbots as automating communication. Think of them as a way more effective landing page. -Zach Hammer
Three Things We Learned
People are misusing chat bots to automate conversations that people aren't interested in having.
Just because chatbots make it possible for us to to automate conversations, that doesn’t mean we should put every single conversation on them. We shouldn’t automate conversations people don’t have or even want to have in the real world because we won’t get results.
Why you don't need all the bells and whistles on chatbots to be effective
Having success in chatbots is about simplicity. If we can take an existing landing page and put the information collecting sequence in a chatbot, we can drastically increase conversion. It’s simple and effective.
You can use Facebook targeting to exclude other real estate agents from your ads
Have available a ready list of interests that will indicate someone is a real estate agent. These could be thought leaders, books they read, things they watch and podcasts they listen to.
In the audience section when you’re setting up an ad, there’s a part that has the option to exclude. You can exclude by interest and filter out 80% to 90 of real estate agents.
The biggest mistake being made in the realm of chatbots is over-complicating them and overthinking what we can do with them. Chatbots can be leveraged as drastically more effective landing page. If you replace your landing page with a chatbox sequence designed to collect the same information, upwards of 70% of people convert. This can allow us to really reach the people we want to and talk to them on a more relevant level.
Guest Bio
Zach is the founder of Real Estate Growth Hackers. He is a real estate marketing consultant, productivity coach, author and lead gen wizard. See a Chat Bot in Action & Get a Free Welcome Bot Template at bit.ly/reubots.
One of the biggest mistakes we can make is being too general about the local areas we serve. How do we go from a more general local area to a hyper-focused area? How small should our local area be? What are the three things we need to do to put this strategy to work? On this episode, Dan Lesniak is back to talk about how to get more out of the areas we serve.
Look at segments in the market and pick the ones you want to target and then come up with a way to position yourself to add more value. -Dan Lesniak
Three Things We Learned
Why this is a perfect time of the year to maximize our business
This window of time just after Thanksgiving is still far away from Christmas that people aren’t tied up in holiday stuff yet and enough time before the New Year that you could still make an impact. And it’s not so far enough from 2019 that you’re still focused on 2018. So it’s a great time to maximize and optimize.
How to find out more about ads on Facebook
You can now go onto someone’s Facebook page and on the left hand side click info and ads and see all the ads they are running. You can counter their strategy with your own or get some ideas. You can even show it to sellers on your own page so they see all the marketing work you’re doing, and how you would market their home.
The importance of choosing your local area wisely
Gary Vee advises us to use social media to become the mayors of our local area. Where people go off course is choosing an area that’s too big to try and be the mayor of. We have to make sure we pick an area that’s small enough for our strategy to work and still big enough for us to actually get business out of it.
In real estate one of the most powerful things we can do is showcase our knowledge of a local area. It instantly positions us as experts. To achieve this, first we have to segment the area we would want to serve, next we have to target our marketing towards them, and then position ourselves by adding value.
Guest Bio
Dan is the founder of the Orange Line Living Team, and author of The HyperLocal, HyperFast Real Estate Agent. Since beginning his career in real estate in 2011, Dan Lesniak has quickly become one of the top producing real estate agents in the country, helping hundreds of buyers and sellers complete over $250 million in sales. He utilizes his unique experiences and backgrounds to create programs for clients that reverse the risk in real estate. The Orange Line Living Team that Dan has founded has specialists and systems in place to make the entire spectrum of the real estate process as seamless as possible for clients.
Dan is hosting the Hyper Fast Sales Bootcamp. Go to http://hyperfastsalesbootcamp.com to book your tickets. Use this promo code to get an exclusive discount: REU25.
Instagram is the perfect medium for showing off beautiful listings. People come on platforms like Instagram to be visually engaged. But how can you advertise a home that doesn’t quite look like it would attract any attention? What kind of content doesn’t belong on the platform? And what is the one question you should ask yourself before you hit “publish”? In this episode, Dustin Brohm talks about the #1 mistake agents make on Instagram and what you should do instead!
If you can’t get clients yourself, you have no longevity in this industry. - Dustin Brohm
Three Things We Learned
Don’t post flyers and brochures
Flyers and brochures aren’t formatted for Instagram, and unless users zoom in, the content won’t be readable. But people usually scroll down when they see something that doesn’t grab their attention, and if you constantly post brochures that nobody is interested in, your audience might unfollow you.
How to make photography work for Instagram
You can make photography work for Instagram even if the home you’re trying to promote doesn’t look top notch. Instead of posting photos with the house, post photos with a nearby park, neighborhood, or other attractions that give your audience an idea of how beautiful the location is.
Nostalgia is an attention grabber
Photos of old toys, amusement parks, or anything that brings back memories from your audience’s childhood will draw attention to your social media content.
Instagram is all about grabbing the attention of the viewer. But if you flood your feed with content that gets ignored, there’s a dangerous side effect: the algorithm and your audiences learn to ignore you. On social media, it’s better to invest your time in fewer but quality posts than to inundate other people’s feeds with information that not even you would be interested in reading.
Guest Bio
Dustin Brohm is a Realtor in Salt Lake, Utah, the host Massive Agent Podcast, and a national speaker and trainer. He is a marketer at heart that used technology to make his brand a client magnet in his area. In the present, he shares his knowledge about digital marketing, advertising, and branding on his podcast and at speaking events.
You can find out more about Dustin here.
Not all agents enjoy prospecting, and some of them aren’t even good at it. What happens when your strength is building relationships as opposed to cold calls? How do referrals work, and why do people give referrals in the first place? How can you flip the script and make the referral be all about how your clients benefit from recommending you? In this episode, Chad Durfee talks how he build his business on relationships and referrals.
Not everyone is going to refer you. So the trick is to identify the potential referral centers. -Chad Durfee
Three Things We Learned
Don’t make the referrals about you
When you ask about referrals for your own interests, it’s very hard to get them, Instead, you should flip the script and make referrals about clients and how them referring you makes helps their sphere.
When you get recommended, you have a big advantage over other agents
Working with referrals is far easier because the trust is already there. Plus, if you’re referred, there isn’t the risk of having your work taken away by another agent who has convinced your client that they can do a better job.
Your clients want to validate their decision of working with you
People seek to validate their buying decisions, and one of the ways they do this is by sharing what services or products they purchased in order to receive feedback. As agents, we have to be aware that in the first days after a new client works with us, they’re in doubt about their decision, so they need feedback from other people. This is the best time to start the conversation about referrals because your client wants their family to give them an opinion about his agent.
Your clients will only refer you if they believe your expertise will make them look good in their social sphere and increase their status. When you deliver an excellent customer experience to a referral, the client who referred you will be seen in a favorable light as well. To make the deal even sweeter for the client who refers you, and to encourage a stream of referrals, encourage your current client to sign a thank you card and send it to the person who recommended you. This way, the client who sends you the referral will feel flattered and encouraged to make a recommendation in the future as well.
Guest Bio
Chad Durfee is the owner of Referral Consulting, Inc., where he teaches individual agents and teams how to put systems and processes in place to maximize their referability.
He created the Referral Academy Mastery Program, R.A.M.P., to teach others how to not only keep their clients for a lifetime but also spend fewer hours on prospecting and more time actually closing deals.
If you want to find out more about Chad’s programs, click here.
Successful teams are built on the shoulders of hard-working agents. But what kind of agents perform best in a team setting? Should you look for top agents or newer agents that need training? What role does having a system in place play in reducing costs and delivering an excellent customer experience? In this episode, Dave Pannell talks about how he leveraged his team to close over 100 deals per year.
The people I surround myself with is my market share. -Dave Pannell
Three Things We Learned
Not all agents are team players
You have to bring in people who want to be part of a team and respect the team’s rules. Many agents choose real estate because they want to do everything by themselves, but this isn’t possible in a team setting.
Why agents need to have a system to plug into right after they get hired
Don’t bring agents on just because you have more leads that you can handle. Bring new agents on when you have the systems in place where you can just plug people and they know what they need to do on a daily basis. This way, there’s less time spent on teaching the agents what to do.
Why we shouldn’t look to build a team with only top agents
The most stable real estate businesses are based on people who want steady, slow growth, not on rainmakers who might leave the team at some point.
One of the biggest mistakes team leaders and business owners make is searching for agents who were just like them in the beginning. But you have to recognize the fact that top agents don’t usually perform well in a team setting, and most of them will end up starting their own team at some point. What team leaders should look for are people who have a more modest goal and are uncomfortable with the idea of working by themselves but can still make consistent sales.
Guest Bio
Dave Pannell is the broker and the CEO of Cities Real Estate. He has served in The U.S. Marine Corps, and in 2005 he started his real estate journey.
Today, he leads a new breed of agents that take advantage of technology and digital marketing to generate leads and close more sales.
You can find out more about Dave here.