Working with Friends vs Working with Strangers

With whom would you rather work?  I know, I know.  You probably just blurted out ‘Friends! Of course!’  That’s a natural response, one that is in line with conventional residential real estate thinking where your goal should be to build a 100% repeat and referral business within three years.  If you’ve ever been to a real estate sales training program or seminar (picture: Brian Buffini), what you probably learned were techniques for adding lots of people to your corral of friends and then extracting business from them.

But I just read an excellent (and short) blog post from our friend, Kirk Eisele (who I just invited to pop in here from time to time and contribute a post or two), that brings clarity to my own discomfort with that approach. (Stop now and read it HERE, then come back)

True Confession:  in my own real estate career I didn’t do a good job of converting my friends into customers.  I didn’t want my friendships to be about my business; or rather,  I was not good at keeping friendships about friendship while injecting my business into them.  The idea of constantly talking with everyone I know about real estate was not my style.  Allright:  I sucked at it.  And I always saw that as a failing.  Kirk’s post helped me see it not as failure but as honest recognition that I am a marketer at heart.  Of course, you already knew that.

I guess this explains in part why I fell in love with Help-U-Sell.  This is a marketing driven business system.  It is real and tangible and can be packaged and presented (marketed, sold) to consumers who quickly come to the logical conclusion that Help-U-Sell is a good idea.  It is NOT personality driven.  It’s not about who you know and whether they support your business (though we all need all the friends we can get), but relies on a solidly different and better apprpoach to the business for success.  Help-U-Sell is for Marketers . . . and for Connectors who can learn to market.

This is not to belittle the Connectors.  With quite a few notable exceptions, most of the successful real estate salespeople held up as models for us all are Connectors.  Some of our best Help-U-Sell brokers are Connectors.  But ALL of our Help-U-Sell Brokers are Marketers.  It goes with the territory.

The simple fact that you’re building a business based on sound business principals (as opposed to building one based on who you know) makes the business more valuable.  Richard Cricchio has built one heck of a Help-U-Sell business in Hawaii and though he is the voice of real estate in his weekly radio show, if he were to sell his company to a qualified candidate who follows the same plan, the company would probably not skip a beat.  If his business was built on family, friends, neighbors, past customers and clients, anyone buying the business would realize that once Richard went away, so would the business.

Back to that initial question I asked:  With whom would you rather work? Friends or Strangers?  Let me blur the lines a little:  how about Friends or Strangers and Former Clients?

I’ll take the latter every day.  Strangers and former clients make the decision to work with me based on the efficiency and effectiveness of my program.  Of course they have to be comfortable with me, but they don’t make the buying decision because of our long and rich history together.  On the other hand, my experience working with friends and family is, honestly:

they usually expect a deal,

one that usually impacts my income.

At the end of the transaction, though everyone is all smiles, somewhere in the back of the the Friend’s mind is the nagging question:  ‘Did he really give me a good deal?’  Meanwhile, that stranger I just converted into a client and a sale is delighted over the great service and low fee I charged.

Differentiation: Four Key Metrics

As a Help-U-Sell broker, you rarely have to deal with tie-breakers when it comes to listing. Usually when the seller hears your superior offer and is satisfied that you can and will deliver, he or she is ready to sign.

But there are metrics you can introduce into the conversation whether you are competing with others for the listing or not, that will boost your credibility and differentiate you from the rest of the pack.

Average Days on Market. That means from listing to pending status. How many days of marketing did your average listing endure last year before buyer and seller agreed on an offer?  That’s powerful information when you compare favorably against your peers. If your average days on market is 57, and the MLS is 85, that means you are 28 days faster (better) at getting your listings sold than your competitors. That’s huge! But even 10 days is worth crowing about. And here’s a clue: you will almost ALWAYS beat the MLS on this and the other three metrics. It’s just the nature of ‘average’ – your individual average should be better than their aggregate average. In fact, if it’s not . . . well you probably have a big problem in your business.

Average Sale Price as a % of List Price. On average, are you getting your sellers 97% of List Price in a sale? Or are you getting 95.3%? If your average Listing Price is $255,000 and your average price of a sold Listing is $253,000, you’re getting 99.2% . . . not too shabby! Now run the same calculation for the MLS. If you discover that the MLS average is 94%, you’re able to tell your sellers that you usually get your clients more than 5% more for their property than your competitors! Which is probably MORE than they are paying you! Now that’s powerful!    And, once again, if you aren’t better than the MLS in this metric . . . well, you’ve got a bigger problem.  By the way, it’s important that you count only Listing Sides here; comparing your average Listing Price with your Average Sale Price (including buyer sides) skews the results.

Per Person Productivity.  Take your total number of closed sides for last year and divide it by the number of licensed people in your office.  If you had 62 closed sides and 3 licensees, your per person productivity is better than 20 closed sides per year.  Now, compare that with the MLS. You’ll be shocked.  That average will probably be in the 6 to 10 closed sides per year range.  Now, think like a consumer for a moment.  Who do you think is going to do a better job of protecting your interests, of staying abreast of changes in the industry and finance, of solving notty problems when they arise in a transaction:  the guy who does 7 closed sides a year or the one who does 20?  Want to blow that 200 agent mega-office out of the water?  Use this metric.  You’ll beat the pants off them every time.

Fallout Rate.  Of all the sales you made last year, how many fell out of escrow?  Calculate it as a percentage and then compare that with the MLS.  Your figure might be 10% and the MLS will almost always be higher, and sometimes significantly higher.  If the MLS is 16% you can demonstrate to a seller that they are more likely to make it to closing with you than with a typical broker.

Put it all together and what does it sound like?

‘Mr. & Mrs. Seller, last year it took me, on average, 57 days to get a listing under contract.  It took the MLS – which is every other broker – 85 days, which is almost a full month longer.  So when you list with me, chances are we’re going to get this process over with quicker.  I also got my sellers, on average,  99.2% of their Listing Price.  In the MLS right now they’re only getting 94%.  So I’m getting my Sellers more for their properties than they are actually paying me!  The average agent in my office closed 20 deals last year.  In the MLS, the average was 8.  I know that’s hard to believe, but it’s true.  Who do you think is better equipped to handle your transaction and solve problems when they arise?  Thank you.  Finally, last year only 10% of my sales fell through.  In the MLS it was 16%. Put plainly:  with me, you’re going to sell faster, for more money, with less likelihood of falling out of escrow, AND you’ll have the expertise of some of the most productive people in the local market making sure everything goes as planned.’

Slam Dunk.

Now:  DO IT.  Get out your calculator, log into MLS, and run the numbers.  And tell me what you find: I’m itching to share.

Using Zillow To Give Your Reputation A Boost

Hey! Check this out:

Here is an agent using Zillow Reviews (and she has plenty) on her Facebook Business Page. Pretty cool, huh?! Would you like to do this? It’s easy.

The first step is to get a bucket full of good reviews.  Go to Zillow and log in to your Agent account (of course, if you don’t have one of those, you’ll need to sign up, but it’s free).  Click on the down arrow next to ‘My Agent Hub’ and select your profile.  Just below your picture there, you’ll see a star and a link to ‘Request A Review.’  Click it.  Now, look below the form and click the link to ”Send Multiple Requests At Once’.  You’re now at a form where you can enter the email addresses of all your former clients!  Quick and easy.  I’d suggest you reword the actual request – what’s there is pretty formal.  But click the send button and give it a couple of days for results.

Those reviews will show up on Zillow and will be available there for everyone to see when they are trying to decide which agent to call.  Very powerful.  It gets even more powerful when you respond to the review, like Ken Kopcho did here:

(Great Job, Ken!)

Now, when you have your handful of great reviews, go back to Zillow, log in, Click the down arrow next to ‘My Agent Hub’ and select ‘Widgets/Facebook Apps.’  There you’ll find a link to ‘Real Estate Apps for Your Facebook Page,’ and the second one of those will put a new Tab on the front of your Facebook Business page, like this:

That new Tab will take your visitors to that wonderful page of reviews you saw in the first image. By the way, did you notice the other Facebook Apps Zillow has for you?  The Listings tab, Local Info tab and the Contact Form are all pretty cool and might also belong on your Facebook Business Page.

I learned this in about ten minutes on a Zillow Academy webinar this morning.  You really should check this out:  Zillow Academy.

So that’s it:  quick, easy and effective.  I’ve heard from so many of you that the Zillow Premiere Agent program produces LEADS, but I’ve also heard over and over that it is the agent with lots of wordy five star reviews that gets the call.  Now you can put some of that great power to work for you on Facebook!

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