Help New Agents Avoid These Three Critical Sales Mistakes

A Broker’s recruiting strategy if done well, should attract some experienced real estate agents, but much of your agent growth is likely to come from agents who are brand new to real estate or who have little experience.  Your goal with these new associates is to get them up to speed and make them productive as quickly as you can.

After decades of coaching and training brokers and their agents, Weichert understands the most common challenges new agents have. As a broker, you can provide the coaching and training these agents need in order to avoid the common pitfalls associated with learning our industry and make their entry into the real estate world more rewarding and productive.  Here are three of the most common mistakes that new real estate agents make and how you can coach them through.

1) Giving Up Too Quickly

 

In the movie “Cool Hand Luke”, Paul Newman’s character famously utters the line: “What we have here is a failure to communicate.” He wasn’t talking about new real estate agents, but he could have been.

New Agents often take the words “not now” or “in the future”, as indications that there is no sales potential there and they let the contact simply die. But experienced agents and brokers know that lead nurturing in real estate can take weeks, months, or even years to come to fruition. And if you’re not front of mind when a customer is finally ready to move, they will move without you. Successful agents have built a solid lead funnel and steady book of business by leveraging years of consistent follow-up and outreach with their contacts and their local community.

It may seem obvious in 2019 to mention that social media can be one of the best ways to follow up and stay front of mind. Despite the current generation’s comfort level with web 2.0 and technology, new real estate agents still generally need coaching on what tactics on these portals will help them build their personal brand without seeming overly spammy. Follow up on social media also has its own set of rules, often depending on the platform you are using. But one rule applies to all of them: no outreach should be ignored or neglected. These little interactions, done in a timely manner, are the bricks they will use to build a real estate career.  As author Jim Rohn wisely observed, “The fortune is in the follow-up”. 

2) Forgetting to Make It Personal

New agents have such a comfort level with all things digital it can sometimes be hard to get them to fully understand and embrace the power of the personal. The power of the personal is at the core of the Weichert philosophy, from our network of owners that know and help each other to our recipe for a successful real estate agent.

New agents need to make sure they build and nurture their personal brand in both online and offline activities through both personal and digital interactions. As a broker your job is to give them the tools that they need to develop their brand while being consistent with the message and brand of your brokerage.

While digital tools are great to efficiently stay in touch through social media, email and texts, encourage them to get out there and be nose to nose with potential clients. Door knocking, phone calls, open houses, participation in community events and seminars. These are all ways for new agents to have their face seen, make eye contact, shake hands, have real conversations and be memorable. Keeping it personal should be at the core of you and your agents’ communication philosophy.

3) Not Using A CRM System

There is no reason why new agents can’t get right into the habit of using the brokerage CRM tool to its fullest potential. An effective real estate CRM can be a big help with staying front of mind, helping new agents organize their contacts and keep in touch with buyers and sellers and other real estate professionals in their ever-growing sphere of influence. Conversely, it’s important that you offer this technology to your agents to help them be as productive and efficient as possible. The Weichert CRM system, for example, provides a central location for storing current and prospective client information and advanced tools for planning and follow-up on open houses ensuring you make the most of those contacts. Other elements include marketing automation that allow agents to send branded emails to select contact lists with minimal time and effort. The mobile app extends this convenience even further, allowing for updates and notifications to happen wherever they are.  As a new agent builds their database in the CRM, all sorts of marketing tools and templates will be at their disposal. The work they do now to build these lists, will pay dividends for years to come.

Effective Agent Coaching Is Key

The best way to make sure your new agents are productive as quickly as possible is to have a proven training system in place that coaches them past these and many other initial pitfalls. Perhaps the single strongest benefit of being a Weichert Franchise are the proven systems we provide to brokers. These have been developed and refined over decades, so you don’t have to develop them yourself. All you have to do is plug in. Becoming a Weichert Affiliate gives you access to effective coaching programs, marketing tools, and a CRM system that supports lead generation. As a Weichert Franchise you have a complete, turnkey system that provides your brokerage with the tools and training that leads to growth. 

For more information about how affiliating with Weichert can help build your brokerage, call us today at 877-567-3350 or contact our team online.

Original content posted on https://www.weichertfranchise.com/blog/help-new-agents-avoid-these-three-critical-sales-mistakes/

If Open Houses Aren't Generating Leads, You're Doing It Wrong

As digital advertising becomes more and more essential and appealing to real estate agents to grow their business, many have stopped more traditional practices like holding open houses. The promise of quick and easy leads from online sources leave agents feeling like these more personalized experiences aren’t necessary. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. When done correctly, open houses can increase an agent’s overall brand equity, be a powerful source of leads and still be the vehicle to move a significant percentage of your listings. Not to mention, in the age of online and tech focused competitors, more personal tactics like this can really set you apart. The key is to understand the correct way to prepare, host, and follow-up from each open house to extract the maximum benefit.

The Preparation

An open house that is quickly thrown together without planning and marketing will yield disappointing results. If you want to maximize your traffic and exposure, you need to look at it as an “event” not an item to check off the list. Take to the streets with flyers and door hangers and promote it online. Get the word out to potential buyers, as well as neighbors with friends who may know potential buyers, that this is their chance to see the home. We recommend starting about a week before the event on digital sources and you should post pictures and related material on your social pages daily, leading up to the event. Think about how you can make this an experience for those who attend. It is important to keep track of all that needs to be done which is why agents should have a clear-cut system in place to stay organized throughout the process.

The Open House

Let’s say you’ve done all your preparation well; there is still significant promotion to be done the day of the open house. Be sure that all of your signage is out and visually attractive to capture the attention of people in the neighborhood. This is great low-cost advertising–even to those who do not attend! Seeing your open house signs week in and week out goes a long way toward building brand in your community and ensures you get the call when a consumer is ready to make a move.

If the house is empty for a few moments, hop onto Instagram, Facebook Live, YouTube Live, and/or SnapChat to show people who couldn’t make it what they are missing. For those that do come through, make sure you have them sign in to capture their name and contact information, so you can follow up with them later. Make sure you ask them if they are working with an agent. If they are there to buy, there is a good chance they have property to sell as well.  Make sure you welcome each guest and walk them through the home if you can. Make the most of their interaction with you–show off your knowledge, your professionalism and attention to detail. This is real estate marketing 101, but as a broker, it never hurts to remind your agents of the basics.

Tech savvy brokers and their agents may even consider running digital ads the day of the open house, concentrated on a geography around the home. New advertising technologies such as “Geo-Fencing” and others, can target people on their mobile devices when they come within a radius of your event!

The Follow-Up

In addition to getting the listing sold, it is a primary goal to capture new buyers/sellers that aren’t already working with an agent. As soon as the open house is complete, it is important to follow up with the buyers that passed through the property within 24-48 hours of the event. A good real estate CRM is essential to this activity to keep follow-up organized and efficient. Even if someone is already working with an agent, it is important to follow up with them to get their insights about the property and learn what they liked or disliked so you can keep that in mind for your marketing efforts.

For many brokers, organizing a comprehensive system of training, activities and supporting tools to help their agents make the most of every open house can seem like a daunting task. But when you team up with a brand like Weichert, all the work is already done for you. All you have to do is plug in and use the resources.  From checklists and suppliers for materials to scripts, tips, and marketing templates, Weichert associates have access to everything they need to make these events successful. Weichert even provides the CRM to help manage and organize pre-event invitations and follow-ups.

Weichert believes in the importance of personal connections and developing meaningful relationships with clients. Embracing face-to-face strategies like open houses are a key to doing this. It’s these types of strategies that generate human connections that will feed your sales production and create a pipeline of business for your brokerage for years to come.

For more information about Weichert and their suite of real estate marketing tools and systems go to www.weichertfranchise.com or call us at 877-567-33350.

Original content posted on https://www.weichertfranchise.com/blog/if-open-houses-arent-generating-leads-youre-doing-it-wrong/

From Conversation to Conversion – Strategies that Work

Much of our energy as real estate professionals goes into figuring out how to get in front of more clients. How to be involved in more transactions in our markets, and how to get that first call when someone is looking to buy or sell.

Equally important, however, is what you do with that call or conversation once you manage to get it. In 2019 let’s remember, too, that many of those conversations aren’t on the phone. They occur through social media, email responses, text messages, LinkedIn connections, Facebook messenger, etc. And each comes with their own set of protocols, expectations, and best practices.

Here are some thoughts from the experts at Weichert Franchising on both old and new strategies for making the most out your opportunities, however they come to you.

In 2019, Consumer Attention Spans Continue to Shorten.

 

Most people will recognize that this has been going on for most of the last decade as the generation raised in all things digital has come of age. This phenomenon has set the bar for responsiveness in the real estate industry ever higher and expanded the number of ways in which effective brokers and agents must respond.

Response time is King – Studies by NAR and others have shown that conversion rates drop significantly  when lead response takes over 5 minutes.  With over 50% of new home buyers reaching out through online inquiries, systems for reaching an agent require a responsiveness that many brokerages are not prepared to handle.

One way to compete, is to team up with a resource that is equipped to receive and respond to leads in a way that meets today’s expectations. Weichert has always placed a value on consumer responsiveness. Even in 2002, when it set up its first national call center, it knew this was critical to the sales process. This service is an advantage to both its company-owned and affiliate offices. Today, this fully integrated lead system continues to attract leads through its online advertising strategy and web presence, respond quickly to inquiries and then qualify them before passing them to an agent. Our national call center responds to all calls, queries, emails and forms that come in through the Weichert.com website within 3 minutes. During this processes these leads are professionally screened and routed to a live agent. With our newest technology, lead information can be populated directly into the Weichert CRM for immediate access by agents to manage. Systems like this insure that no lead opportunity is lost in the journey from lead to client.

Leads Don’t Just Call or Email Anymore

In all kinds of sales there is an old adage, “think before you dial!” With so much opportunity coming in through social media and other digital and mobile sources, the adage certainly needs an update, but the idea is the same. Working leads through social or mobile sources can take some time to bring them to the point of committing to a phone call or even giving you’re their contact information. It could take 8 or more attempts, so persistence is important. On this journey, an agent’s ability and willingness to provide genuinely helpful advice and information will help establish credibility and trust. Agents should be mentally prepared for these interactions, just like a phone call, respecting both the channel of contact, as well as the nature of the outreach.

This means coaching your agents to have good social media profiles, response scripts if they need them, a CRM to record contact activity and mobile connectivity to respond and provide service promptly. A franchise partner like Weichert helps brokerages with the right systems, technology and coaching to compete.

Being prepared to handle both traditional phone and email requests, as well as social and digital leads puts your team on the path to a conversion strategy that leaves no lead behind. No matter where the lead comes from, your agents should always have one goal in mind – asking for the appointment. 

How Does Your Conversion Strategy Compete?

How much are you investing to attract leads? How quickly are your agents able to respond to leads? Do you offer them a way to track their contact activity? Do you have online content to help them nurture social and online leads? It can be daunting to try to pull it all together on your own, but a franchisor such as Weichert can offer your brokerage a one stop shop to help your agents compete. Bring your local expertise, plug into our systems and enjoy the results. If this sounds like something you would be interested in for your brokerage, contact Weichert Franchising today at 877-746-8807 or go to weichertfranchising.com for more information.

Original content posted on: https://www.weichertfranchise.com/blog/from-conversation-to-conversion-strategies-that-work/