This is part of the ongoing series “Finding Success in the Basics”

If you are out prospecting and marketing you will be bound to run into someone personally or virtually who has an interest in real estate. This is where your skills and knowledge will come into play.

Being a real estate professional is really all about presentation, presentation of you, your company, the process, buyers choices and sellers choices. The better you are at presenting or, telling the story, the more successful you will be.

When you meet someone for the first time:

How do you look…are you dressed the part? What do you say? Are you ready with a 20 second commercial or sound bite about what you do or offer? Do you have a hand out, take away or brochure? When you hand someone a thing….do you just shove it their way or do you present it?

At open houses:

How do you present the home? What information do you have at the ready? What questions do you ask?

On Floor:

Are you ready to answer a question and immediately follow up the answer with a question of your own? Do you convey confidence in your voice? Be sure to lead them in a direction. If you like what you are hearing you might say, “sounds like the next logical step is for us to get together, is this afternoon good for you or would tomorrow morning be better?” These are not sales techniques rather business tools to help them take the next step to achieving their goals.

Listing presentations:

Do you have a listing presentation? (you should) Ensure its quality reflects who you want to be perceived as. A dog eared binder may lead them to believe you are not neat and organized. Be sure to ask questions through out your presentation, you don’t want to lecture them into submission. Don’t forget “feature/benefit” I would like to put a lock box on the house….here is how it benefits you; easily track all showings, ability to follow up on all showings, allows showing the house when you are away etc…….Do you have an extra key available or would you like me to have one made for you? Your listing presentation should only last 12 to 18 mins and be designed to tell your story and answer questions like; Can I trust you? What experience do you have? What will you do for me? How do you get paid? What happens next? How do I know if it is working. Many of these questions are not even asked, but are unshared concerns that you need to address.

Buyer presentation:

Some of you will say “What?” Yes, do a presentation for all of your buyers. Don’t be a pop tart. Don’t pop into the car to show houses just because they call and tell you they want to see one. First things first. Make sure they are safe and you indeed want to work with them. Meet strangers for the first time in your office. When you set the appointment tell them you are not going to look at houses right away but would like to spend some time learning what they want first. Tell your story, just like a listing presentation. Perhaps tell them about the county or surrounding area if they are new. Talk about the process and how you fit into it. Don’t forget to use visuals.

In closing:

Your presentation should always tell a story, whether it is an 18 min listing presentation or a 30 second introduction.

Remember 8th grade English class, your story should have an opening, a body and a close.

You and your materials should always look sharp.

Involve as many of the senses as you can, visuals, questions/discussion, things they can touch

Know your area stats, this will lead to confidant speech which gives you credibility

And always, always ask the right questions to lead to the next step;

After what we have just covered do you feel comfortable with me listing your home?

Sounds like you have a great house, next step would be for me to take a look at it, is tomorrow good for you or would Friday be better?

It does not sound like this open house would work for you however here is a list of some possibilities. Why don’t you drive by these and let’s get together later this afternoon or would tomorrow after work be more convenient?

The presentation is not the destination; it is only one stepping stone along a path in this new relationship, called a customer for life.

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This is part of the ongoing series “Finding Success in the Basics”

Since you can’t talk someone into buying or selling a home (Unless you are Tommy Hopkins) the best you can hope for is to be in the right place at the right time. This often makes you feel like you are trying to be everywhere at once.

Prospecting is the basic tool that can make you or break you in this business. In short, it is your ability to go into the world and create business. You might not be real organized, you might not have the best presentation in town, you might not be the most polished…but if you have the ability to bring in large numbers of leads, much can be forgiven, learned or hired out.

I used to tell my daughter that she had to eat some vegetables. She could pick one that was always off limits, she chose broccoli, but she had to eat some. Prospecting is a lot like that. You don’t have to do it all, but you do have to have your recommended daily allowance to succeed in real estate. The good news is prospecting does come in a lot of flavors:

FSBO (aka Unrepresented Sellers)

Withdrawn & Expired Listings

Circle Prospecting

Geographical Farming

Social Farming

Professional Farming

Floor

Open Houses

Sphere of Influence

Door Knocking

Cold Calling

Your goal should be to build a system and a habit that allows you to talk with 10 to 15 people per day about real estate, the more of these that are new to you the better. There is always a lot of chatter about having all of your business come from referrals….sounds great but if you are new to real estate, new to an area or new to the idea of taking your business seriously that is hard to do. Prospecting will not only identify those who have needs now, but will also grow your data base with people who will need your help in the months to come.

What is realistic; your income should double each year for the next 3 years and between year 3 and 5 you should hit your stride. Agents are always looking for the one thing, the golden nugget, the grail to success…..this is it. If you prospect persistently and consistently you will as Mr. Spock often said “live long and prosper”……in real estate anyway, he was smart like that!

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This is part of the ongoing series “Finding Success in the Basics”

The foundation of any long term real estate business is your data base. Without it how do you know…..who to call, when to call, what to talk about or what the next step is? How do you keep track of the person you just talked with, that will become a serious buyer next summer when their current job contract is over?

Pizza Hut knows more about their customer who is buying a $5 pizza then we know of our customers who are going to be investing $200,000 or more in a house. Try it, call them, Pizza Hut knows who you are, what you bought last time and is prepared to offer the same, plus offers suggestions to upgrade your delivered dining experience.

As an industry we have been in the habit of only working with a buyer or seller who has a need in the next 90 days. Statistics are showing us that today’s consumer begins their adventure of buying or selling a home as much as 2 years in advance.

No longer can we manage a business like this from the shoe box or rolodex.

We need a program that keeps track of:

1) Basic Data:

a. Name

b. Address

c. Phone number

2) Info Beyond name, address and phone:

a. Birthdays

b. Anniversaries

c. Kids names

d. Pets names

e. Job information

f. Hobbies and interests

g. Notes from last conversation

h. Next step

i. Next contact date

j. Pictures

We need this program to perform these functions:

1) Print mailing labels

2) Mail merge letters

3) Alert us to important dates

4) Remind us to follow up

5) Group contacts into categories to make searching easier

There are a lot of programs out there to use. Some are referred to as a CRM (click for Wiki) program (Contact Relationship Manager). I would go so far as to say using something is better than nothing. You can also over complicate this whole issue, if you asked 10 people for an opinion you will get 10 different answers. Write down what you want it to do…do some basic research….choose and move forward. Try to strike a balance between price, functionality and ease of use. (Some of these are like the human brain…most only use 3% of its ability) Here are a few that my agents have used successfully:

Act http://www.act.com/

Outlook http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/default.aspx

Goldmine http://www.goldmine.com/micro.aspx?id=4398

Top Producer http://www.topproducer.com/

Howard and Friends http://www.howardandfriends.com/

In closing, pick something that will have support well into the future, has the ability to export your data so that you can move later if you need to, and most of all…easy to use. You don’t want to become a programmer…one of my favorite sayings…don’t be a geek, know a geek. This should be a tool that works for you, not the other way around.

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For those of us who were involved in these changes a few years ago….this comes as a bit of a surprise. It appears that the revisions to WA States real estate license law has now been brought before our state legislators and is now ready for the Governors signature.

Though this was a hot topic 2 or 3 years ago many of us thought this had been stalled and set aside. It is time to start letting our agents know that this is now our future. Like many changes of this nature there will be some who are happy about the change and some….not so much. This has been a long time coming. Our industry has changed a lot since RCW 18.85 was last addressed.

Below are “Just the facts Mam” I’m sure there will be a lot of discussion about how this will affect our industry, our agents and the consumer.

Three levels of Broker:

Designated Broker
Managing Broker
Broker

New Licensees for Broker:
90 clock hours to sit for the Brokers exam
First renewal additional 90 clock hours

Managing Broker:
3 years as a Broker
90 clock hours of instruction (specialized classes)
Pass an examination

Designated Broker:
Licensed as a Managing Broker
Registered by DOL as a Designated Broker
Designated Broker may act as such for more than one firm

Renewals:
30 hours for each 2 year renewal
15 hours may be carried over from previous 2 years

Non licensed people may provide referrals to licensees provided their compensation is not contingent upon receipt of compensation of the licensee.

Licensees (all three flavors) must be fingerprinted and have a background check conducted. The Director may institute a schedule by which this information is renewed on a regular basis.

If a Broker is in a position to supervise or exercise control over other Brokers they must be licensed as a Managing Broker.

During the first two years a new Broker must have a “heightened level of supervision” provided by a Managing Broker.

Licensees must now provide a copy of singed documents to their principles “within a reasonable time after signing”. (instead of at the signing of those documents)

A salesperson will now be considered a Broker and must take a transitional course prior to their first renewal after this goes into effect.

Target date June 2010

Link to WA DOL pdf

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I’m making this post so that my new blog does not look so vacant. It will also give me something to work with as I learn the new software.

I’ve come a long way in the last few weeks, that actually started more than two years ago. When I started my first website and blog, Ozzie, the guy who helps me with the web side of life, told me I was asking my website to do too much. www.FranklyRealEstate.com was being tasked with too many missions, going in too many directions, trying to be too much to too many people to really be effective.

Last week I met with Ozzie (www.Graphicaldata.com) to re-set my entire web presence. This new blog is one piece of the overall web that I’m trying to cast. Over the next few days I’ll share my blog building experience. Some of you may have run across www.FranklyRealEstate.Blogspot.com. I can tell you that building a blog has a bit of a learning curve. Especially in this case because I’m now hosting my blog on an outside server.

In coming posts I’ll roll out my adventure:

Choosing WordPress

Choosing Thesis: Please check it out……
Thesis Demo Page
Check out the Thesis live demo here.

Choosing Dreamhost (Go to www.dreamhost.com, learn about their program and if you go forward be sure to put the word Frankly in the promo code box to get a free domain name + $10 off)

Stay tuned.

PS Please be openminded as you check back to this site. It may look a little strange from time to time as I learn what WordPress and Thesis can do.

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