1. Fear of making the wrong decision

You will hear them state the need to talk with someone they trust to stall the process. They might say they need to talk with their parents, spouse, friend, brother, etc.

2. Fear of making any decision

You will generally hear them say, “I want to think it over.”

3. Fear of change

They will talk about slowing down; about staying in their present home even if it is a 750 square foot home and they are expecting their third child in a few months.

4. Fear of being cheated

They are asking for confirmation that you will do what you say. They may also be holding you responsible for a previous experience that was bad.

5. Fear of looking bad to others

This is an ego or image problem that is often linked to overpricing a property. They don’t want the neighbors to see that they listed their home so low.

6. Fear of acting without sufficient thought or knowledge

These are the people who want more information. They will often want that additional information sent to them, so they can avoid “the close”.

While there are a few objection handling techniques that will work to alleviate these fears, the best overall technique is reduction of risk through guarantees or reassurances from you that they are making the right decision. Since many of these six are a smoke screen that can’t easily be identified in order to clean them away, don’t concentrate on your service, cost, or scripts to handle the objection you perceive to be there. Focus on reassurance that their decision to move forward with you is sound; that their fear or worst case view will never happen. You can also ask them questions to try to pinpoint their fears. If you don’t, you might feel like Don Quixote chasing after windmills.

Number of contacts
Method of contacts
Quality of the prospect
Quality of the presentation

When you begin working on any one of these, you have taken the step to becoming a Champion Agent. Once you have raised your level of the performance in each of these areas, you can call yourself a Champion!

Number of contacts

Whether we like it or not, real estate sales is a full-contact sport. Too many Agents are trying to devise ways to avoid making personal contact with people. We use massive mailing programs to raise our image and “build our brand”. We develop elaborate websites and e-mail contact systems, so we can hide behind the computer every waking hour of the day. Some of us do this because we don’t interact with people well. Some of us do this because it is beneath us to “prospect” for business. Others do it because someone told us this is what we need to do.

In the end, the number of contacts matters. My definition of a contact is probably different from most people. I define a contact as talking to someone over the age of twenty-one about real estate. This person must have the capacity to buy or sell or be able to refer you to someone who can. A contact can be face-to-face or over the phone. A contact, for the purpose of my definition, is not an Internet e-mail address or a mailing piece you send. It can only be face-to-face or phone-to-phone. You can make a contact at an open house, during floor time, at the grocery store, or at your child’s soccer game, provided you really make it a contact by discussing real estate and discussing referrals.

Life is a series of numbers or, in essence, a numbers game. It’s the number of t-ball games you make or miss or how many and how frequently you have a date night with your spouse or significant other. You can have numbers in your life you don’t like. A few years ago, I had a cholesterol count of about 200. For those of you who don’t know, that’s not a good number. I could ignore that number or work to change it. I decided I needed to take action to change it. I needed to change my diet and increase my exercise patterns. Fortunately, I didn’t have to go on medication, but that is an option if it gets out of hand again.

Numbers matter in life and in business. One of the ways to know the health of your business is to know your sales ratios. By knowing your sales and conversion ratios, you can determine your income before the year, quarter, or even month begins. One of the most powerful things we posses is our sales ratios, but only the Champion Agent knows what they really are.

Within the first year of my real estate practice, I understood my sales ratios of contacts to leads, leads to appointments, appointments to representation contracts, and contracts to closings. Because I clearly knew my ratios, it allowed me to create a plan that I could follow to earn what I wanted to earn.

The reason that such a high percentage of our clients at Real Estate Champions earn what they want to earn is because we teach them that contacts matter and your sales ratios are king. A word of caution – because you tracked them once doesn’t mean you stop tracking them. You must embrace tracking your sales ratios for the rest of your career. Your sales ratios will usually improve because your skills will improve: your ability and skill to ask for referrals, to ask for appointments, to conduct Champion level Buyer and Seller interviews. A Champion Agent should see regular improvement in their sales ratios if they are working on their sales and business skills.

There is one exception we are seeing now to that rule. The sales ratios can change negatively or adversely if the market changes adversely. You might see, as some of our clients have, the number of contacts to create a lead go up and the number of leads to generate an appointment go up, as well. In some markets, the number of appointments rises because the Sellers are unwilling to do what is necessary in terms of price to be competitive.

You might have to walk away, as some of our clients have, from a few more listings. When that happens, you have to have an attitude of acceptance and a commitment level to do what it takes. Jack Welch, the famous retired CEO of General Electric, has six rules to business success. One of the rules is “face reality as it is, not as you wish it to be.” A Champion Agent has that attitude and commitment. When the marketplace dictates sales ratios will change and things will get tougher, they deal with the reality of the marketplace influence on their business. They realize and accept the influence and increase their number of contacts to reflect the new sales ratios that will enable them to reach their goals.

The second segment of this definition is that we need to “seek with a vision of success.” Webster must have worked in a real estate office before. He knows how other Agents can try to pull you down or away from prospecting. You could even have Brokers who try to belittle you because of your prospecting. Webster was saying, get your mind to think positively, expect good results, focus on that, and you will succeed. Don’t let others negatively influence your vision of success.

The question isn’t should you or shouldn’t you prospect; the answer is “yes.” The options of what to prospect is wide open. There are unlimited sources to prospect for the generating of new leads and appointments. Being able to sort through the more competitive sources verses less competitive sources, reactive sources versus proactive sources, the possible sources and the probable sources to find your niche is critical.

I have included a chart to better illustrate the many options we have with regard to prospecting sources, categories, and competition level in those categories, and the controllable influence we have on our business success through prospecting.

REAL ESTATE BUSINESS SOURCES
Categories, Competition, Controllability
More Less
Competitive Competitive

Reactive Sources

Possible sources of their current or future direct business

* Open House Contacts
* Ad & Sign Calls
* Internet Contacts

Probable sources of other’s current or future direct business

Referral leads from other agents *
Referral leads from “referring businesses” *
Referral leads from “personal relationships” *

Proactive Sources

Possible sources of their current or future direct business

General/Cold Calling *
Specific Activity/Warm Calling *

Probable sources of their current direct business

* FSBO’s
* Expireds

Specific groups that are sources of their direct future business

Geographic/Demographic Farms *
Spheres of Influence *
Past Clients *

Specific groups that are sources of other’s current and future referral business

Past Clients *
Spheres of Influence *
Geographic/Demographic Farms *
We have the option to select more competitive sources to generate our leads. These more competitive sources mean that we are not usually the only Agent who knows about this prospect’s desire to buy or sell. They have revealed it to others. Those more competitive categories are open houses and/or sign calls, Internet contacts, even floor time. These are general sources for future business. To make the assumption that you are the only person or Agent who knows about these people’s desire to move is folly. People who are considering a move visit more than one website to request information, attend more than one open house, and call on more than one ad. To think otherwise is delusional. Other competitive sources that are excellent are FSBOs and expireds. There, we will be competing with the top level sales-skilled Agents in the marketplace. We have to possess Champion level sales skills to compete and win clients in these two categories with consistency. There are always a few exceptions to the rule. Those who operate in the world of commission cutting come to mind. To engage in commission cutting to attract clients doesn’t take a high level of any skill in sales or marketing. These people can attract the business of some FSBOs and expireds. If you enjoy competition, FSBOs and expireds are excellent options. I was created for competition. I enjoy competing, whether it’s business, athletics, or even games. If you are not that way, highly competitive areas will not bring you joy and satisfaction.

The less competitive options are referral leads from other Agents, personal relationships, and referring business. A referring business could be your mortgage organization, Insurance Agent, or Home Inspector. All these sources are less competitive because these people aren’t referring their business to twenty, ten, or even (in most cases) five Agents in your marketplace. Other less competitive sources would be geographic, demographic, or psychographic farms, spheres of influence, and past clients. Again, the number of Agents working the same people that you are trying to serve and secure to clients status is very low. Geographic farms are the most likely of all these sources to have multiple Agents working an area.

Some of you may be wondering why I put cold calling and warm calling in as less competitive. It’s because very few Agents actually do them. There are even fewer Agents who do them now since the advent of the “no call’ list. We all know what cold calling is but warm calling is merely creating a more targeted list and possibly sending a door opening marketing piece. An example of an effective strategy with little competition is sending a marketing piece to a non-owner occupied property and making warm calls to them after a big run up in real estate prices and then a softening in the marketplace.

I am personally not a proponent of cold call prospecting – calling down a crisscross directory for business. That is really the definition of cold call prospecting. Agents, and even sales trainers (especially the “magic pill guys” and “referral gurus”), usually try to categorize anyone who is a prospecting proponent as a cold call proponent as well. I sometimes get painted with this broad brush, but it’s not true. Even calling your past clients and sphere needs to be called what it is . . . prospecting. You can easily be in favor of prospecting and against cold calling, as I am. I am not against cold calling because it doesn’t work . . . because it does. I am against it because the return investment is too low. The margin between your effort and your results is not large enough. There are much higher-probability lead generation sources for your prospecting effort.

When evaluating the sources, you also must evaluate the ability to create the business or react to the business. If you spend your time in the proactive sources, like past clients, sphere of influence, farms (if you call them as well), FSBOs, expireds, and cold or warm calling; these are proactive ways to generate business. We can track the numbers and return on investment from our effort.

With the reactive sources, we are less in control of creating our desired outcome. In reactive sources, you don’t know the volume or time frame of the leads as completely. With an open house, for example, you don’t really know whether two people will show up or twenty. With the Internet, we have no idea the number of leads or when they will come. These are clearly reactive sources for prospecting and leads. The same is true of referrals from Agents, referral business, and personal relationships. With all of these, the timing of when and how frequently are uncertain.

The last option is the evaluation of the possible verses probable sources. A possibility is something that happens 50% of the time or less. A probability is something that happens 51% of the time or greater. The mark of a Champion is investing your time and effort in an area where the odds are better. Increasing your effort, time, energy, and expertise in past clients, sphere of influence, FSBOs, expireds, referrals from other Agents, referral business, and personal relationships will increase the results that you will receive. Investing less time in the possible sources will bring us a greater return if we re-invest the effort in the probable sources instead.

Evaluate the total sales volume and number of sales on a year-to-date basis and against the previous year. This will allow you to see where you have been and where the marketplace is trending.

• Is the number of homes sold going up or down?
• Is the total volume increasing or decreasing?

Evaluate the number of listings taken. Remember that real estate is supply and demand influenced. The amount of inventory is the supply segment of the equation.

• Is the number of homes for sale up or down?
• Do buyers have a greater selection than this time last year?
• Is the number of homes for sale rising or falling compared to this time last year?
• Is the mix of inventory for sale the same in town homes, condos, and single-family residences? Is it the same percentage of the overall market as this time last year?
• Is there more inventory in certain geographic areas than this time last year?

If you track the inventory of homes for sale and sold homes, you will have a great wealth of information.

An example is when; earlier this year I led a coaching call with a client in San Diego who is a Champion Agent in that marketplace. The inventory levels have changed rapidly in that area; the marketplace in San Diego has seen rapid increase in inventory of homes for sale in the last year. That has caused the media, consumers, and even Agents to portray gloom and doom across the marketplace. While the days of the home selling within twenty-four hours of listing, with multiple offers, over-asking price, and with escalator clauses is gone, the marketplace is still a great one.

Champion Rule: When inventory of active listings increases, most people panic.

The average Agent will have a fit when the inventory increases. The reason is that it signals a change in the marketplace. The media will pick up on the inventory increase and start broadcasting the change as gloom and doom or the “bubble bursting.” This further increases the consumer’s negatively against the real estate marketplace.

When my client and I compared the current numbers against the previous year’s numbers, there were some startling facts that were contrary to the gloom and doom prognosticators. Inventory had increased by 68% in his service area. Certainly, the increase in inventory would influence the marketplace. At the current rate of growth of the inventory, the marketplace would eventually have price and value corrections.

The list price to sales price in the marketplace, however, was still solid and respectable against historical standards at 96%. Now, against a marketplace where everything was selling above asking price, it was a change, but against the long-term view, 96% is a good number.

The days on the market average for homes that sold was sixty-one days. What that told me is that a home priced competitively would sell in a reasonable period of time. The truth is sixty-one days is not a long days on the market number.

The sold properties monthly is what really clarified the picture. The sold properties were within a few homes either way each month for the last eighteen months. When the marketplace was explosive, there were about the same amount of sold properties per month as there were right now. The sales had not dropped in his market area.

The net result was that homes were still selling. The sellers were still getting close to their asking price in a reasonable period of time. The key is that the seller could only achieve a sale through being competitive on their price. With the high inventory levels, compared to a year ago, there is more competition but the competition that is there has not position itself competitively via price to win the game. The truth is most of the Agents are doing their Eeyore impression. The media and most consumers are wrong about the marketplace. My client is one of the few in the marketplace who has the correct view of the overall picture.

Evaluate average sales price this year versus last year.

• Is it going up or down?
• Is the marketplace depreciating or appreciating in value? Don’t waste your time tracking that on a monthly basis. It is too short a period of time to detect a trend. Calculate this statistic on a quarterly basis.
• Is the inventory aligned with the demands? We need to know if we are experiencing a net gain per month or net loss in the inventory levels.

Evaluate the percentage of appreciation for average sales price last year versus this year.

• Is the appreciating percentage decreasing or increasing compared to the same time last year?
• Is the marketplace gaining or losing strength?

To be a Champion Agent, you must have greater marketplace knowledge. I find that, through marketplace knowledge, an Agent can increase their credibility and trust with a prospect and client.

If you set a goal to make ten contacts a day, and on Monday you do ten, Tuesday three because of an office meeting, Wednesday another ten, Thursday eight, and Friday you did four because it was beautiful outside and you wanted to play golf; was that a good week of prospecting? When most Agents are asked that question, they say yes. The truth is that week repeated for a year would be the equivalent of fifteen weeks in the year of zero prospecting or almost four months. Now how do you feel about that week?

If you have some name recognition or market presence, a little prospecting will generate explosive growth. Established Agents and Champion Agents receive more benefit from prospecting than new or low producing Agents. The reason is your sphere of influence, past clients, and other sources know that you are busy. They are not expecting a call because of the volume of business you do. When you do make prospecting calls to them, it carries more of a “wow” factor.

This is also true in the more competitive forms of prospecting. If you have good market share in an area, and you decide to make calls to expireds or FSBOs, you will hear frequently from the prospects that they see your signs everywhere. You can parlay that position into a huge advantage in securing a listing presentation. Don’t make the mistake that most Agents do when they achieve a little or even a lot of success. They stop doing what brought them to their success. The time to increase is at hand; do not cut back.

My friend John Gualtieri shared this statement with me a few years ago, which I quickly wrote down. “On the road to success, you have to chop wood and carry water. When you become successful, you still have to chop wood and carry water.” The need for your daily prospecting doesn’t change when you are a Champion!

To be disciplined in setting goals is to sit down with paper and pen and make a list of things you want to acquire, attract, or accomplish in the next several years. Earl Nightingale said, “The problem with people is not achieving the goals we set, it is actually the process of setting them in the first place.” We are all goal-seeking organisms. Your subconscious mind will work on the goal you give it until it is accomplished. However, you must first set this vast powerful computer in motion by setting the goal.

To achieve a well-rounded, joyous life, we need to be working toward our goals. When it comes to goals, the journey is almost better than the destination. Success was defined by Nightingale as the progressive realization of a worthy goal. You become successful once you set the goal and work toward it. Success is not found only at the attainment level but also in the striving for attainment level.

You need goals in all areas of your life. It is not good enough to set your sights on your business or commission earnings or transaction sides. You need goals in family, spiritual, physical, financial, and mental areas of your life. This is the only way to achieve balance.

Organize your goals in all areas based on priority. Put the most important ones on the top.

Our overall goal for our life should be to be a continuous goal setter. We need to become so focused and clear on what we desire that every hour and every day we are doing the things that are moving us in our direction of choice and toward our goals.

Studies have shown that you will save ten minutes in execution for every minute that you invest in planning or goal setting. What an incredible return on your investment of time. How often would you invest in an opportunity that allowed you to put in a dollar and got ten dollars back?

Seven Keys of Goal Setting

1. Your goals must be specific, detailed, and clear. You must invest the time to put them in written form. There is a direct link between your writing the goal, seeing it being written, and burning it into your subconscious mind. The goals you desire must be specific, not vague. To set a goal to be rich or be happy will not draw you to it. Well-written goals are like magnets – they will draw you to your desired result. Your goal must be concrete and tangible. Highly defined goals are attained – fuzzy goals are forgotten.

2. The goals you set must be measurable. How can one truly measure happiness? You have to be able to analyze and evaluate your progress and your results in a tangible way. Many people have a goal of being rich. You need to know specifically how much money rich is. Your need to know the specific time period you want to achieve it by. Now that’s a goal.

3. The best goals have deadlines. They have a time by which you need to accomplish them. They also have interim steps along the way that can be monitored. These sub-deadlines or schedules are critical to success. There are no unrealistic goals; there are merely unrealistic timeframes.

4. Goals need to challenge you to capacity or beyond. They will stretch you and mold you into a new person. Jim Rohn wisely said, “It’s not the money that makes the millionaire successful; it’s what he had to become (as a person) to earn a million dollars.” If you took the money away from that millionaire, he would make it back twice as fast as before, because he learned the skill to make it in the first place.

5. Your goals need to possess congruency with your values and beliefs. Your goals also have to be harmonious with each other. Let me give you an example: I want to lose 40 pounds, but I also want to eat Dreyer’s Rocky Road ice cream every night before I go to bed. One of these goals will need to give way to the other. They are not congruent with each other. There is no way I can achieve both at the same time. You cannot achieve goals that are actually contradictory.

6. Your goals must have balance between your personal life, family, financial, spiritual, physical, mental, and business goals. Just as a wheel needs balance to rotate properly, we need balance to get anywhere in life.

7. The largest most difficult goal in life is to define your purpose goal. We all have one goal that is at the core of our being. Our life moves to greatness when we decide upon a definite purpose or focus for our life.

I can speak from personal experience. When I determined my “core purpose” was to make meaningful impact in the lives of all the people I come in contact with, my perspective changed dramatically. My enjoyment of my day to day “work life” increased. Fortunately for me, I get to live my “core purpose” daily by helping people such as you reach their fullest potential and joy in life.

• Rule #1: There is no closing issue that can’t wait an hour. When your transaction hits a snag, don’t let it dramatically change your day’s schedule. Wait to resolve the issues during the time you’ve blocked for administrative tasks.

• Rule #2: A frenzied reaction only adds fuel to the fire. More often than not, when one closing party gets riled it’s because someone else in the transaction is riled – and hysteria is catchy. Aim to serve as the calming influence in the transaction. If the problem arises two hours before your predetermined administrative time slot, inform the parties that you have prescheduled appointments that you can’t change, but that you will be able to take action when you get out of the appointments in two hours.

• Rule #3: Fires often burn themselves out. Rather than jump into the mess, give the issue a bit of time to simmer down. Remember that your prospecting and lead follow-up tasks are appointments to which you have committed. Sticking with your daily plan may give the issue time to cool or even resolve itself.

• Rule #4: Don’t wait for a three-alarm fire to call for the pump truck. If the fire becomes hot, suit up your broker right away. Before the transaction flares out of control, ask for help. The longer you delay, the more effort you’ll spend getting the situation cooled down.

If you allow yourself to be swayed by a Seller’s need to start higher than the property should be priced, you set yourself up for a costly error.

No matter whether you’re selling real estate or any other offering, pricing must reflect what the market will bear, not what the Seller needs to net. Your pricing deliberation should focus only on the value as determined by your CMA.

As an example of the type of situation you want to avoid, I have a friend who had a home for sale where I live in Bend, Oregon. He selected an Agent who clearly demonstrates the “get the listing at any price” mentality. The result: His home was for sale at a price at least $200,000 over market value. Every Agent in town knew it was overpriced. His Listing Agent knew it too, but he was more interested in the for sale sign than the sold sign. He was hoping something good would come out of this poorly priced situation.

The only way they would win the bet is if they found a two-suitcase Buyer – a Buyer with one suitcase that is full of money and another suitcase that is full of stupid! No one would come close to his asking price for a long time to come, if ever.

You can bet his Agent didn’t arrive at a price $200,000 above market value based on research or analysis. He listened to his client’s pricing input, which was based on what my friend wants to net in order to buy another home for cash, so he has no mortgage. Does the prospective Buyer of his home care what he needs or wants to net? This is truly a ridiculous approach, but it’s all too common. Most people who want to start high and reduce later are motivated by the need to net a certain amount. The sad thing is the approach is nearly always counter-productive. Aiming too high rarely works.

The only time you can afford a “start high come down later” Seller is in a market environment where prices are rapidly appreciating and inventory is low. Even then, be sure you’re working with an owner who really wants to sell; otherwise you’re apt to waste time while your client tests the market’s pricing tolerances.

Following are a few scripts you can use with the “start high” crowd of Sellers.

* To learn why the owner wants to sell and what role price plays in the decision, ask:
“Mr. Seller, is your motivation to get your home sold greater than your motivation to achieve a certain price?”
This powerful question will unlock the Seller’s motivation vault. Going back to the example I shared previously, my friend’s motivation to obtain an inflated price exceeds his motivation to sell. As an Agent, I’d categorize him not as a Seller, but rather as a home lister or market tester.
* If Sellers are stuck on their own profit motive, work to shift their mindset to a Buyer’s point of view by saying:
“When we go out looking for a home for you to buy are you, as the Buyer, going to be concerned with what the Seller needs to net? Don’t you think that other Buyers are going to feel the same way you do?”
If necessary, add:
“Then we can all agree that what a Seller needs to net truthfully has no real connection to the actual market value of the home.”
One caveat: This script works well when housing inventory is normal or when an oversupply creates a Buyer’s market. It is less effective in a Seller’s market where housing inventory is in short supply. The greed of the Sellers in that market drives everything.
Coming in on-the-button
That headline probably tips my hand and reveals my preference, so I’ll just say it clearly: I personally believe on-the-button pricing is the single best pricing strategy – though too few Agents use it.

Most Agents pad listing prices by adding 5% to 10% to a home’s current market value. This strategy is detrimental because even though Sellers realize the overpricing is meant to provide a negotiating allowance, they begin to hope to receive at least some of the padding in their own pockets. They rarely share that fact with their Agent, but it’s a true underlying expectation and a real downside of padding. The upside is that padded listings create a real pricing advantage for homes that come on the market priced at their fair market value.

Homes that are listed at market value stands out from the competition. Compared to all the overpriced options, they strike Buyers as a value. This leads to traffic and a high number of showings by other Agents. It also leads to a high increase in new business opportunities for the Listing Agent, who meets numerous prospective clients as a result of to the home’s ads, signage, and online posting.

Let’s start with the bottom line first: The whole purpose of a prospect presentation is to establish your competitive advantage. In the least time possible you want to communicate what makes you different from the more than 1.2 million other licensed Realtors in the United States. You want your prospects to see exactly why they should hire you, what’s in it for them, and why they should proceed with confidence to sign your listing agreement.

Most agents spend the presentation explaining what they will do for the client rather than focusing on the results the client can expect the agent to deliver.  Newspaper ads, website pages, home magazines, dazzling flyers, and a lineup of other marketing items are tactics that, in truth, nearly all agents use in the normal course of business. They are not competitive advantages. In fact, you must assume before a listing presentation that every agent will promise a near-identical marketing plan.

So why will they hire you over the others? They’ll hire you because they see what’s in it for them. And what’s in it for them is the set of benefits they will receive as a result of your proven competitive position.

Defining your unique competitive position

To differentiate yourself in the field of real estate sales you need to create, define, and consistently convey a competitive position that positively distinguishes you from your competition.

By knowing and exploiting the difference between your products and services and those of your competitors you will attract more prospects, win more clients, grow your market share, increase your revenue, expand your profits, and, eventually, weaken your competitors.

To pinpoint your unique competitive position, answer these questions:

                     *  Are there key statistics that set you apart from your competitors and provide you with a clear point of difference?

                     *  Do any of your Big Three statistics create a unique competitive position?

                            1. Average list price to sale price

                            2. Days on the market

                            3. Listings sold versus listings taken

                     *  What benefits or values do consumers receive only when they deal with you?

                     *  Do you have dominant or strong market share in a geographic region?

                     *  Do you specialize in a particular property type, such as small plexes or a certain style of home?

                     *  Is your market share success tied to a particular price point?

                     *  When representing sellers, do you achieve quantifiably higher sale prices?

                     *  When representing buyers, do you achieve quantifiable savings in sales price, down payment, monthly payment, or interest rate?

Your answers don’t need to lead to 20 unique competitive positions. You only need half a dozen reasons why the consumer – whether you’re presenting to a buyer or a seller – should choose over everyone else. Focus only on advantages that will matter to your prospect. Keep in mind the old sales adage: “It’s easier to sell someone what they want to buy than what you have to sell them.

Proving your excellence: You don’t get paid for second place

A Fortune 500 CEO who doesn’t increase revenue will watch the stock price plummet. A quarterback who throws for lots of yards but doesn’t win games will be benched or traded. A Realtor who doesn’t get listings sold or find and secure the right home for buyers will leave the business.

In the real estate world, results are the name of the game. Anyone can make money in a marketplace where everyone wants to buy and sell, but only the excellent agents will thrive in a competitive marketplace.

Agents lose control of the listing presentation when they allow the sellers’ agenda to take over the discussion. I have listened to agents who have lost control to the seller in the first five minutes. The problem for most agents is once they lose control, they don’t have the skill to wrestle it back.

The sellers’ agenda is simple. They want to know what their home is worth.  They want to know what you do to sell it and what you will charge for your service.  And for sure, they want to know what they’ll put in their pockets when the deal is done.  If the sellers cause you to orient your presentation to the order of their interests, you won’t walk out with the listing.

If you talk about the price of the home and your fee structure before you’ve built trust, credibility, and value for your service, you’ll lose every time.  Don’t ever follow the seller’s agenda!

Setting the Agenda Early-on

The most powerful technique is to have an actual order or agenda you follow.  Then type it out to hand to the seller, saying:

“Mr. and Mrs. Seller, I have found this presentation order to be most effective for my clients like you.  It allows me to present to you the important facts, marketplace strategies, and benefits you receive as my clients.  In addition, there will be plenty of time to answer all your questions, so you are completely comfortable with your decision.  Would it be all right with you if we follow this agenda for our meeting?”

Keeping On Track

When the seller brings up a point that would cause you to abandon your presentation plan, pick up the agenda sheet and ask:

“Would it be all right to discuss that when we get to this point in the presentation?”

Your agenda might look like this:

1.      Review agenda for the meeting

2.      Visual inspection of the property

3.      Discuss clients’ goals, needs, and expectations of me

4.      Discuss my professional credentials

5.      Determine listing price

6.      Complete the paperwork, so we can begin serving you

The last item needs to be on your agenda.  It alerts the clients in advance that you are going to close.  In fact, etch all six items in stone; don’t move them or rearrange them. You have to build trust, credibility, and value in that order, or you will lose.

Asking For the Order

After you have overcome seller concerns or objections, ask for the order.  In sales terms, this means ask the prospects to do business with you.

At the end of a presentation, a typical salesperson’s close is something like, “Well, what do you think?”  It’s obvious to me why the typical salesperson sells very little.  Winding up with a question like, “What do you think?”, is hardly asking for the order or closing.

Closing is making a definitive statement about your conviction that you are the right person for the job, and they should take action now.  A good closing statement goes like this:

“Mr. and Mrs. Seller, based on your goals, needs, and expectations, I am confidant that I am the right person to handle the sale for you.  Let’s get started now!”

As you say, “Let’s get started,” you slide the listing agreement in front of them.  Hand them the pen to sign with and smile.  Most importantly, shut up!  Don’t utter a word.

Bringing the Presentation to a Natural Conclusion

Following any major sales transaction, people feel a bit of uncertainty, a feeling of, “What did I just do?”  Pre-empt fear by addressing and controlling concerns.

Before you leave the meeting, recap what steps will happen next and what you will be doing for your clients in the next 24-48 hours.  Then reassure them that they made a great decision, that you look forward to serving them and working with them, that the goals they set will be achieved, and that they selected the right agent for the job.