Lighting A Fire: How to Keep Real Estate Agents Motivated

Real estate is both a rewarding and challenging profession. Associates are constantly learning and are highly knowledgeable about local community issues and the national economy. While every transaction is unique, helping people achieve their dream of home ownership is a gratifying experience that never gets old. The passion your agents have for the real estate industry is why many home buyers and sellers choose your company over your competitors. Just like a high-performance engine needs an occasional tune-up to continue performing at optimal level, your agents also need some regular coaching and encouragement from you to stay motivated and achieve the best results for your brokerage.

Get To Know Your Agents

As a successful broker, you probably have a team of agents with diverse personalities. While a pep talk during an office meeting may fuel the enthusiasm of some agents for weeks, others respond to a one-on-one conversation with you about their individual business plans and revenue-based goals. You or your manager should regularly schedule a time to meet with each of your agents personally to discuss their current clients and transactions that are in progress. This also provides the management team an opportunity to learn more about them and their lifestyle. Understanding your agents helps know how to best to motivate each one of them and lend your experience where needed on deals that are in progress.

Acknowledge Their Strengths and Accomplishments

Recognition is one of the most effective methods of motivating your team. Everyone wants to be appreciated and respected, especially younger, or new to the industry agents. These agents in particular will need encouragement as they experiences the normal initial disappointments and exceptional real estate agents, while gently coaching them toward best practices.  Make a big deal of their first sale, and let them know they have a safe, professional home within your brokerage.

setbacks of the selling process. Let them know you recognize that they have the potential to be

It is also important to let your experienced top producers know how much you appreciate them. Reliable agents who always do well can too easily be taken for granted. Allow them to mentor junior agents, as a sign of how much you respect their abilities.

Your Real Estate Team is Doing Great! What’s Next?

 You became a successful agent. Then you went on to build a successful team within your brokerage. The trend toward the growth of real estate teams within a brokerage is growing. In a 2018 survey, NAR found that a full 26 percent of respondents were members of a real estate team inside a brokerage. Of those who were not, a full 39% have considered joining or starting one. While teams can vary in size, the NAR study found that a typical team is 4 people and most members (80%) are licensed agents. Do you wonder what the next level of success is for you and your team? Perhaps you are ready to open a brokerage of your own?

It turns out that experienced, and successful team leaders have been developing many of the same skills and overcoming many of the same challenges that are required to be a successful brokerage owner.

Some of these include:

1. Attracting and motivating agents and other team members.
2. Designing roles and responsibilities within the team based on the strengths and weaknesses of team members.
3. Delegation of work, and management touch points.
4. Setting a vision for the teams activities
5. Creating a positive work environment
6. Deciding what technology and marketing tools the team will use.
7. Designing processes for efficient and fair distribution of work in the team.
8. Creating training programs for new team members
9. Negotiation of fair commission splits with the broker of record and your team.
10. Creation of an overwhelmingly positive experience for buyers and sellers.

In many cases, strong team leaders can apply the skills they have learned in team development, to form their own brokerage. With so much overlap between creating a successful team and being a broker, the transition may be less painful than many team leaders imagine. And on the other side of that transition, truly lies unlimited growth potential for you, your team and your business.

What is Involved in Becoming My Own Broker?

Broker requirements do vary from state to state and there are many online resources for getting specific requirements in your state. In addition to obtaining appropriate licensing, there are a number of things a new broker will need to navigate.

1. Select a physical location for your new office.
2. Decide whether you will be independent or affiliate with a national real estate franchise.
3. Develop a business plan, with a heavy emphasis on your recruiting plan.
4. Decide on the tools you will use and the marketing approach.
5. Work out a budget for expenses and obtain financing if necessary.
6. Develop your own digital home online with a website, branded social profiles, etc.

An affiliation can offer a lot of support in making the transition, including a full roadmap of proven processes and tools that can be plug and play for the new broker. But perhaps even more valuable will be the personal coaching and guidance that brokers receive as part of the Weichert system. Our team consists of genuinely experienced real estate professionals who guide you through proven processes that have helped hundreds of Weichert franchisees be successful. Through one-on-one coaching sessions, well established training programs, regional coaches, management conferences, and a network of supportive peers, we can help team leaders bypass the pitfalls of starting a brokerage and help you continue your path to growth.

From Team Leader to Brokerage Owner with Weichert

Not every team situation is a good fit for the transition to a broker, but if you are focused on even more success for you and your team, Weichert may be the solution you are looking for.

For more information please visit https://weichertfranchise.com

Original content posted on https://www.weichertfranchise.com/blog/your-real-estate-team-is-doing-great-whats-next/

5 Ways To Leverage Your Network

One could argue that as a real estate broker, you are only as good as the people you surround yourself with. That being said, it is not only important that you build a strong brokerage filled with talented and motivated agents, but you need to cultivate a larger network filled with respected professionals with a wide variety of knowledge in diverse business areas. While most brokers have accumulated a good set of contacts over the years, it is important that you know how to leverage that network to get the most out of it in terms of leads, referrals, and insight. With some careful planning and a well-rounded strategy in place, you can easily squeeze a remarkable amount of value out of the network you have already built. Here are some proven methods of doing just that from the experts at Weichert.

Collaborate to Create Content

Everyone knows that in the digital era of real estate, content remains king. Rather than making all of your content completely about your brokerage, you can expand your reach by including appropriate network partners in your content. Partner with other local professionals, charities, small business owners, and complementary real estate professionals (ie. Lawyers, title companies, home inspection, etc.) to create hyperlocal infotainment style content that helps both businesses to grow, showcase expertise and capitalize on one another’s following. For example, you could partner with your preferred home inspection company to create a blog post about the top 3 things to look for in a home inspection. Or create a post on the best local restaurants for “date night” and partner with the owners or managers of those restaurants to build the content. Typically, those businesses that you partner with will be more than happy to promote your content on their own websites and social media, resulting in greater brand reach, and awareness.

Pay It Forward

Being generous with referrals helps to grow your own referral business exponentially. Have you ever had someone do a favor for you or send you a referral without being prompted to? Didn’t you notice how compelled you felt to pay back that favor? If you take the lead by sending referrals to people in your network that you trust and believe in, you can bet that they will be likely to return the favor. Be sure to keep your eyes peeled on social media platforms like Facebook which will make it easy for you to tag and refer the other business owners in your network. This rule of reciprocity is powerful and will help you to stand out in any networking group you belong to.

Attend Events With A Purpose

It’s easy to attend networking events and stick to people you may already know. While it is good to further develop the connections that you have already made, you should also push yourself to form new connections and look for opportunities to make additional connections within your existing network. Develop a good “elevator speech” about what you do that doesn’t make you sound like every other real estate professional in your market, clearly communicates who you target, and defines the value you provide. Also, make sure to ask the new people that you meet what type of referrals they are looking for so you can keep them in mind when looking for ways to pay it forward.

Look Outside Your Market

 

Social media is an excellent source of other real estate professionals and entrepreneurs that you can connect with to exchange ideas and solve challenges that arise as you grow. One easy way to connect with other like-minded professionals is to look for groups on Facebook and LinkedIn that focus around topics that can help you to grow, as well as, offer you the opportunity to share your own expertise. Additionally, there are plenty of real estate groups out there that can offer referrals and relocation business which can be profitable if you’re able to act quickly.

Leverage a Brand’s Internal Network

One of the best ways to take your networking options to the next level is to consider affiliation with a national brand like Weichert. While networking may not be the first thing you think of when considering joining a franchise, it can quickly become one of the major benefits of affiliation. A brand like Weichert for instance, brings with it the family-like camaraderie of other experienced brokers, trainers, and a huge infrastructure of coaching and lead generation that is part of the power of our internal network and our many real estate divisions. Our internal network can translate directly into sales opportunities through our international relocation company, our national lead generation network, our network of Referral Associates, online chat boards, as well as the relationships you develop directly with other Weichert brokers across the country through some of the many management conferences and events that Weichert facilitates.

At Weichert, we understand the power of networking because we’ve always taken a people-first approach to supporting every member of the team. To learn more about how Weichert brokers are empowered to develop and leverage our network go to www.weichertfranchise.com.

Original content posted on https://www.weichertfranchise.com/blog/5-ways-to-leverage-your-network/