Five Keys to Your Strongest 2016!

Three years ago, we launched the Coach’s Playbook and our updated program with the Five Keys to Success in Real Estate system. Since then, we’ve added Peak Producers training and our Wednesday Wake Up and Tech Savvy Thursday training sessions live and via Go to Meeting to offer everyone the opportunity for that “kaizen” or continuous improvement in your business that Gino Blefari spoke about at our latest Business Conference.

So, now that football season has started in earnest, it’s time to start thinking about 2016! Of course, it’s an undeniable truth in our business that transaction activity will be slowing down over the next couple of chilly months, so how do we continue to make the most productive use of our time to make our business profitable? So, it’s time to again remember those FIVE KEYS TO SUCCESS! Your management and coaching teams are available to help you do the planning and preparation you need to kick off 2016 at full speed.

First, you’ll want to MASTER YOUR STATS. You can use that information as the basis for planning your action for 2016; then hopefully you’ll find a stat that allows you to differentiate yourself in your market; and finally you may note an area you can focus on for improvement. We recommend looking not just at your sales volume or gross commissions, but digging into your average side price, your average days-on-market, and your average commission percentage rate, with a goal to average at least 3.0%!

Once you’ve captured your stats, you can CREATE YOUR ROADMAP, a detailed business plan with an updated mission statement, target market, cash flow budget, and marketing plan. The ideal plan will break things down to show you THE ACTIVITIES YOU NEED TO DO EACH WEEK to build your business for the long term based on repeat and referral business. Remember, people with written plans—and who track their progress regularly—in any endeavor, are many times more successful than those who have no plan or tap their head and say “It’s all up here!” Your management and coaching teams will be there to help you through this process during the 4^th quarter.

Also, you can spend some of the cool season MASTERING YOUR PROCESS and making sure all your technology tools, your CRM lists, and your presentation, service delivery, and negotiation approach are all in fine tuned working order and up to date. Our regular training on systems and business skills are a great opportunity for you to add more arrows to your quiver!

And—most fun of all—you can PERSONALIZE YOUR TOUCHES by contacting all those friends, clients (remember, there’s no such thing as a “past” client, they’re either active or inactive!) and potential clients to spend some of that face to face time at the top of the pyramid of the 7 Levels of Communication to build your referral based business. Don’t forget that wonderful “What can I do to help you and your business” conversation opener!

Finally you can make the habit to PRACTICE ACCOUNTABILITY by completing your business plan and implementing an agenda to keep you on track DAILY so you can make 2016 your strongest year!

David M. Hassler

VP, Professional Development

The Word for the Day--Every Day!

Recently, I listened to one of Brian Buffini’s coaching tips on Prioritizing Your Day and I realized that that single tip, if we can all remember it, can make every one of our days far more productive, less stressful, and thus more profitable in our business and more enjoyable in our lives! Buffini’s Peak Producers Training Program focuses on building our business by focusing on referrals from our Sphere of Influence, so his suggested prioritizing starts with People. Current clients of course would come first, but if we think about who among our sphere is most important/helpful/responsive, ie, those we might consider our business advocates, and focus our time on them first, we’ll enhance our success. Of course, prioritizing this way can also help us realize on whom we should spent less time!

Buffini goes on to say that once we prioritize the people we want to focus on, we then can prioritize the actions we need to perform to optimize our ongoing service relationships with people, showing our professionalism as well as our appreciation for their business and their referrals. So, what will we do to interact with those important people when we engage with them?

Then, once we have set our priorities of people and actions, Buffini says, we can then more easily prioritize our time. And knowing the impact of proactively working with our key people, we should be more aware of the need to protect and make best use of our time.

Finally, he concludes by noting that prioritizing has two dimensions to it, that of focus and that of boundaries. Keep in mind that focus will be difficult if not impossible if we don’t set boundaries! Buffini reminds us that we should spend our time and energy on the people who deserve it, not just those who only need it! Of course, our business is serving client needs, but we’ve all had those energy sucking clients, friends, or that kindly agent down the hall who loves to chat without asking us if we have a moment, so Buffini suggests a few of the tips we’ve covered in the Playbook before: don’t answer your phone, turn off the dinger on your email device, (oh, no mine just rang!!) close your office door at least part way, and maybe offer that friend/agent a chance to chat later once you finish your tasks. All good ideas, and much easier to implement if we remember the goals of prioritizing and setting boundaries: to enhance our business, reduce stress, and enjoy life and family more and more!

Have you set your priorities for today . . . for next week . . . next year?

David M. Hassler

VP, Professional Development

The "3P's" Home Selling Process

Our friends at GoodLife Realty down in Austin Texas—the folks who specialize in working as those Paperless Agents—have put together a great and simple approach to presenting and differentiating themselves from the competition when it comes to winning listings in their market. They share with prospective clients a “3P’s” Home Selling Process that has a few neat wrinkles that can separate us from the crowd. The 3 “P’s” they focus on are Preparation, Pricing, and Promotion.

Preparation, of course, deals with the specifics of the individual home and getting it ready to compete in the marketplace with the goal being to position it to be the very next one to sell in that neighborhood. The three elements of preparation are Repairs, Staging, and Cleanliness.

Repairs may be needed to correct problems or deferred maintenance in order to compete for full market price against the competition. If repairs can’t be made, then the price will need to be adjusted accordingly.

Staging is also crucial for achieving a timely and full market sale. The goal is the have the buyer be so comfortable they feel like they could move right into the home—just as they might feel walking into a brand new, perfectly staged model home. Professional stagers can bring a high level of expertise to the process—at a relatively low investment to the agent—while also allowing us avoid having to say those things that a homeowner might find . . . well, a bit too direct! Yes, I loved that fluffy pink toilet seat cover your grandmother made, but I think the stager is right and it needs to go!

The final element of Preparation is Cleanliness. The seller will need to make sure their home is fully ready for its debut under the lights! No actor would step onto the stage without their makeup and costume being in perfect order, no matter how great their acting skills, nor how well they had memorized their lines. We can help our sellers by making sure they understand what this kind of Cleanliness really means to the value of their home: they won’t achieve top dollar if the house doesn’t look top dollar!

The second “P” is Pricing, and that will of course depend on how much the seller can do in terms of Preparation, since Pricing and Preparation go hand in hand. Homes that are in poor condition, or are poorly positioned, cannot command a full market price and are doomed to languish on the market and most likely sell ultimately for less than what they might achieve if they had been positioned correctly up front. On the other hand, homes that are positioned and staged perfectly, yet priced above the market—remember, market price demands perfect condition and preparation to begin with—will also languish and often sell for less them optimum. The concept of “Let’s see if anyone might make an offer at this (knowingly overinflated) price—we can always lower it” is usually a recipe for that disaster as the home sits in limbo. The key to pricing is to place the home at the correct market price—“in” the market— given its preparation, so it sells on a timely basis at the highest price for that context.

The final “P” is Promotion. This is where we can begin to get creative and include things like Facebook Ads, YouTube videos, and maximizing Search Engine Optimization so the home will be found by the increasing percentage of buyers who discover their new home online. Professional photography can be a huge plus—again, at a relatively low investment for the agent—given so many buyers are staring at their screens and making decisions based on those photos. The key is to get that surfer to click and save and ask for a showing on your new listing!

So, don’t forget, the best marketing strategy for any home is pricing it right to begin with so that it’s “IN” the market, not out there in overpriced or poorly prepared limbo! Remember those “3P’s” and set yourself apart—and help your client to the best price they can get.

David M. Hassler

VP, Professional Development