Posted by David Bennett
Fri, 30 Jun 2006 13:15:00 GMT
Real estate biz won’t survive on referrals alone
Part 1: Business strategies to stay afloat
Friday, June 23, 2006
By Bernice Ross
Inman News
(This is Part 1 of a two-part series. See Part 2.)
Is your business built exclusively on referrals? If so, you may soon be struggling with your production and wondering why.
A couple of years ago I had a conversation with an owner of a major firm who coaches his agents who do at least $20 million in production each year. We were discussing which business models were the most effective. He told me that his experience was that those agents who relied exclusively on prospecting without developing future referrals worked two to three times as hard as those who used the "by referral" model to generate new business. On the other hand, when there is a market slowdown, agents who exclusively use the referral model often lost up to 80 percent of their business. The reason for this is that the referral model relies on a third party to generate leads for the agent. In other words, the agent does not have direct control of whether he/she receives leads. The agents who had the strongest, most consistent businesses, however, were those who integrated traditional and Web lead generation strategies along with a strong referral database.
Any agent who wants a successful, sustainable real estate business must incorporate some system of referrals into his/her business model. The challenge for our industry is how to create new sources of referrals during a time where there may be fewer transactions being conducted. Traditional marketing strategies that focus on the agent are falling by the wayside. Today’s consumer only cares about "What’s in it for me?" Personal brochures, postcards with your pictures on them and other marketing materials that focus on your success cause today’s consumer to look elsewhere for representation. More than anything else, clients want their agent to care about what matters to them and to their family.
All successful referral businesses are based upon personal connection. The most widely practiced referral approach is to hand out your business card. You are then supposed to ask if the individual is interested in doing business with you or if they know someone who is thinking about buying or selling a home. This approach puts the cart before the horse. Today’s consumers expect you to provide them with service before they trust you enough to handle their most important asset – the sale or purchase of their home.
To build this trust, you must be able to build strong connections. In fact, even when you receive a referral, it’s still up to you to motivate the buyer or seller to do business with you. You can build a strong connection with referral leads by following the steps below:
1. Curiosity
Our society engages in competitive talking. We are so busy trying to get others to hear us that we interrupt each other incessantly. If you want to convert more leads into closed business, the first step is to put aside the need to share your story. Instead, be curious about each person you meet. Ask leads how they got started in their careers. Ask about what they like to do for fun. Discovering what matters to others and truly listening will dramatically increase your conversion rate.
2. Communication
If you want others to think of you as a brilliant communicator, listening is the secret. Instead of rambling on about your accomplishments, when you say, "Tell me more" or "What happened next?" your willingness to hear them will distinguish you from virtually every one else that they meet. When you paraphrase what they say or write it down, you send a strong message that you care about them and value their opinion.
3. Commonality
Attraction is based upon commonality. The moment you say, "I’ve done that" or "I have eaten there," your shared experience or commonality forms the basis for building connection. In coaching, the principle of attraction says, "Like attracts like." People are attracted to work with others who share similarities.
4. Congruency
Being "congruent" means walking your talk, doing what you say you will do, and being consistent. Congruency creates trust. On the other hand, being incongruent, (promising what you don’t deliver, being unreliable, or misrepresenting or hiding facts) is the quickest way to destroy trust.
Ultimately, when these four "C’s" are present, connection, rapport and trust result. If any of these four factors is missing, however, the referral may go elsewhere.
While these factors are critical in working with someone who is a referral, how can you generate your own referrals without depending on someone else to do it? To learn more, read next week’s column.
Bernice Ross, co-owner of Realestatecoach.com, has written a new book, "Waging War on Real Estate’s Discounters," available online. She can be reached at bernice@realestatecoach.com.
Posted in Real estate biz won't survive on referrals alone
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Posted by David Bennett
Fri, 30 Jun 2006 13:11:00 GMT
Power network your way to ‘endless referrals’
Part 2: Business strategies to stay afloat
Friday, June 30, 2006
By Bernice Ross
Inman News
(This is Part 2 of a two-part series. See Part 1.)
If you rely strictly on a "by referral" model for your business, you are at the mercy of others in terms of when you receive referrals. If you want to take control of your lead generation, say goodbye to passive referral techniques and say hello to "power networking."
I recently spoke in San Luis Obispo, Calif., and had a five-hour drive each way from Los Angeles. I stopped by a local bookstore and purchased an audio CD program called "Sales Success." It contains 14 one-hour CDs from a number of major speakers, including Zig Ziglar, Tommy Hopkins and Jim Rohn. While I found plenty of useful tips from each of the CDs, the one program for me that stood out was Bob Burg’s (www.Burg.com) "Endless Referrals." Given that there are so many speakers in the real estate industry who have comprehensive "by referral" programs, I didn’t expect to learn much from this particular CD. I was 100 percent wrong.
Burg walks listeners through a proven system that puts them in charge of building "endless referrals" through networking. Many real estate agents claim that they network. They go to events, hand out their card and hope that someone will call them. Many others attend events and hope that someone will remember that they are in real estate. Of course, they are too reluctant to mention the fact that they want business. Surprisingly, according to Burg, people who pass out their business cards are not using networking effectively. Those who are reluctant to talk about what they do are at least partially on the right path. Nevertheless, this approach is also ineffective.
Burg begins the program by asking you to identify your personal sphere of influence. This includes everyone that you know. Most people know about 250 people. If you attempt to write a list of those you know, however, you will have a hard time generating a complete list. Burg’s approach is to go to the phone book and begin with the yellow pages. Who do you know that works for an airline? Who works as doctor or dentist? Go through each of the categories and identify as many people as possible who come to mind. The second step is to go to the white pages. Who do you know whose last name starts with "A"? Repeat the process all the way through the letter "Z." Next, use the same approach with first names. Each of these people also knows 250 people. Clearly, there are enough contacts from this one simple exercise to do a huge amount of business. The question is how to convert the people in your sphere to people who refer you business.
Burg uses the example of joining the Chamber of Commerce and attending a networking meeting. Instead of doing the standard business card exchange that usually results in no business for you, Burg suggests that you plan on meeting five or six people over the course of the meeting. He recommends that you watch the room and pay special attention to those individuals who seem to be a center of a group. These individuals are often those who have the strongest influence. Burg suggests waiting by the area where they are serving food or drinks. Sooner or later these individuals will stand up and walk to that area. When they do, put a sincere smile on your face and introduce yourself. Ask for their card, but do not offer to give them your card unless they ask for it.
Burg outlines a series of 10 questions to ask. Each question encourages the person to share information about themselves and their business. For example, if a person sells widgets, a great lead-off question is, "How did you get into the widget business?" This gives a chance for the person to tell you about their history. You can also ask, "What advantages does your company provide in comparison to the services that your competitors provide?" This allows them to sell you on their services. Now if you hear they are hiring new people and that they will need to help them find housing, do not jump in and try to close them. According to Burg, this is the biggest mistake that you can make. Instead, your only function is to ask the questions. Because you take the time to discover what is important to each individual, you will stand out from everyone else whose sole focus is to obtain more business.
Once you have asked Burg’s key questions, the most important question is this: "How would I recognize when someone is a good client for your services?" This is the most critical question to ask. Burg’s philosophy is that you earn the right to receive referrals when you have established trust and have demonstrated a willingness to help others build their business with your referrals.
When you call people and tell them you are working on building your business by referral, your focus is on you. In contrast, Burg’s approach succeeds because it’s based upon providing service and building a connection based upon trust and giving back. According to Burg, this is the secret of "endless referrals."
Bernice Ross, co-owner of Realestatecoach.com, has written a new book, "Waging War on Real Estate’s Discounters," available online. She can be reached at bernice@realestatecoach.com.
Posted in Power network your way to 'endless referrals'
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Posted by David Bennett
Thu, 29 Jun 2006 12:18:00 GMT
Fifteen minutes can be the difference between a deal and no deal
By Bob Corcoran
If 15 minutes pass before you follow up with a lead, that lead’s vital signs will begin a slow and steady decline.
The peaks and valleys of the heart monitor will become less and less pronounced. The silence between the beeps will grow longer, until finally, within 24 hours, you get a flat line.
The words code blue are followed by CPR and drugs, but to no avail. Time of death is pronounced and another opportunity is set for burial.
Speed for Leads
Speed is important in many professions. In sports, no doubt. The medical field? Life depends on speed. And yes, real estate. Granted, it’s not a life or death situation, but if you plan to make a living in real estate, a key component in the lifeblood of your business must be speed.
And where speed is most essential in real estate is in the time it takes to follow up with leads.
If you take anything away from this article, take this and remember it: a lead is only as good as your follow up.
National Association of Realtors (NAR) has found that if you call a lead within 15 minutes, you have an 85 percent chance of actually connecting with that lead.
But here’s an even juicier NAR statistic: 74 percent of homeowners use the first agent they talk to. 
Feeding Speed
So the question is, how do you add speed to your follow up? Here are some options:
• First make speed, and specifically the 15-minute rule, a priority starting with yourself and then with your assistants. Talk about it at meetings, put up signs near the phone, on computers and in the hallways.
• E-mail auto responders. Just make sure the auto response message is written in a way that comes across as human and not robot-like. Write something like this: “Hi! Thanks for your message. I’ll call you soon. In the meantime, click here for my newest free report on ABC neighborhood.” or some other kind of news or freebie to engage them with your company.
• Interactive voice response systems (IVR). These systems are fantastic—they capture phone numbers and even how the lead heard about you. We set up IVR systems for our clients and train them on how to use them effectively, and some have reported getting up to 4,000 leads a month with their IVR.
• Phone. Yes, in the 21st century, the phone does sound old fashioned next to IVRs and e-mails, but it has been proven to be most effective way to convert leads into business. Yes, it’s more difficult, but nothing beats a human response and a human voice. Remember, ear-to-ear leads to face-to-face. And to stand out from the competition, answer your phone on the weekends, most agents don’t.
Proceed with Leads
Once your response strategy is in place, assess how you proceed with those leads. Do you have a system in place that coddles them and makes them want to stay with you and do business with you?
I can’t count how many times I’ve heard this from agents: “I don’t know what happened. I was working with them and then they listed with another agent.” I then ask for details and invariably they’ve let a lull occur. They say, “Well, I mailed them a card a couple of weeks ago.” You must stay in touch—either in person or by phone. You don’t sell anything to anyone by not talking to the person.
Why is it some Realtors struggle to sell five homes in a year and others sell 100? Two words: Lead management. Ask yourself if your lead management is helping you achieve your sales objectives. If not, it’s time to invest in one that does.
Take a few minutes now to examine if you have enough speed in your business. Use some of the tips here to add more speed with better service to keep your business healthy and out of the ER.
Bob Corcoran is a nationally recognized speaker who is founder and president of Corcoran Consulting & CoachingSM, (CorcoranCoaching.com), an international consulting and coaching company that specializes in performance coaching, and the implementation of sound business systems into the broker’s or agent’s existing practice.
You can reach him at 800/957-8353 or info@corcorancoaching.com
Posted in Why Most of Your Leads Are Dead Before You Even Call Them
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Posted by David Bennett
Wed, 28 Jun 2006 14:13:00 GMT
Around Aug. 18, 2004, Richard L. Cole Jr. and his wife, Barbara, looking to retire to a small town where there’s plenty to do, moved from suburban Philadelphia to The Villages, the 18,000-acre development straddling Lake, Sumter and Marion counties in Central Florida.
On that August day, the Coles helped make up the 1,890 people who move to Florida every day [see “The Arithmetic of Growth,” left]. “The roads were crowded,” Richard Cole deadpans.
They’ll stay that way. For a half-century, Florida has trailed only California in net migration, averaging 3 million in population growth during each of the last three decades. This decade will bring the “largest absolute population increase of any decade in Florida’s history” — another 3.6 million, reports Stanley K. Smith, director of the University of Florida’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research. In just four years, Florida will pass New York as the third-largest state.
So who are all these people flooding into Florida?
Some groups stand out for their distinctiveness: Finns moving into Lake Worth, Nigerians into Tallahassee, Vietnamese into Orange County and Russians into Broward. But immigrants from abroad make up only 26% of Florida newcomers. And while a Hindu temple in southwest Broward or a mosque in Central Florida signals a diffusion of sources, the nations that contribute the largest numbers to Florida’s growth are all from this hemisphere — in descending order, Cuba, Mexico, Haiti, Colombia and Jamaica.
The U.S. territory of Puerto Rico falls between Cuba and Mexico in the ranking of immigrants’ origins. Some Puerto Ricans are retiring here from other parts of the country, says Florida State University emeritus professor Morton D. Winsberg, author of the “Atlas of Race, Ancestry, and Religion in 21st-Century Florida,” scheduled for release this month by the University of Florida Press.
Most newcomers, however, still resemble the Coles. Tim Chapin, a FSU urban and regional planning professor, says new Floridians tend to be the “usual suspects” — Rust-Belters getting out of the cold.
Yet while the broad outlines of in-migration trends remain somewhat the same, a more finely detailed look at migration to Florida reveals nuances that are reshaping the state’s population and economy. The following trends emerge based on interviews with Winsberg, Smith and others and information gleaned from the U.S. Census Bureau and Internal Revenue Service.
By 2030, 25% of Florida’s population will be Hispanic, up from less than 17% now, and one in four Floridians will be over age 65.
Who’s Coming? 
• Trend: Hispanic Migration
The predominance of the state’s largest Hispanic group — 688,000 Cubans — waned from 55% of the state’s Hispanics in 1980 to 31% in 2000 as Mexicans and others moved in. From 2000-04, four Florida cities were among the 10 U.S. cities with the fastest-growing Hispanic populations, according to a new Brookings Institution report: Cape Coral/Fort Myers saw a 55.4% jump in Hispanic residents; Naples/Marco Island, Lakeland and Sarasota/Bradenton all saw increases of more than 38%. By 2030, a fourth of the state’s population will be Hispanic, compared to one in six now, projects Stanley K. Smith, director of the University of Florida’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research. Miami-Dade’s Hispanic population will be around 70%, while The Villages will have only 15%. Central American newcomers tend to be less well-off than Brazilians, Venezuelans, Colombians and Ecuadorians, says FSU professor Morton Winsberg.
• Trend: Hispanic Jewish Migration
By 2004, the Hispanic Jewish population in Miami-Dade nearly doubled from 5,300 adults in 1994 to 9,500 adults, says Ira Sheskin, director of the Jewish Demography Project at the Sue and Leonard Miller Center for Contemporary Judaic Studies at the University of Miami. He found three of 10 adult Jews in Miami-Dade were foreign-born — 12% of them come from Latin America. Among the Latins, 29% were from Cuba, 18% from Argentina, 16% from Colombia, 15% from Venezuela.
• Trend: Diverse Origins
A noticeable number of Bosnians have moved to Jacksonville, making them second only to Filipinos among foreign-born nationalities in the 2000 Census. The inflow stems from refugees placed there through local sponsoring churches by Lutheran Services Florida. Such pioneers often lead to what demographers call chain migrations. The agency also places Somalis, Bosnians, Sudanese and Vietnamese around Tampa and Orlando, says Joy Margolis of Lutheran Services.
• Trend: The End of the African-American Decline
One hundred years ago, blacks made up 44% of Florida’s population, a share that dropped as more whites migrated here. The percentage of blacks appears to have bottomed at 14% in 1990. FSU professor Morton Winsberg says Orlando is one of only four Southern cities — the others are Atlanta, Charlotte and Dallas — favored by American blacks for relocation. Indeed, a recent Brookings Institution report shows that the black populations of Tampa, which increased by 14%, and Orlando, which jumped 18.4%, were among the 10 fastest-growing black populations in the country from 2000-04.
Why Are They Coming?
• Trend: Jobs, Jobs, JobsBEBR’s Stanley Smith finds that for people under 55, jobs are the major draw to Florida, which routinely leads the nation in job growth. “What it boils down to is economic opportunity,” says FSU professor Tim Chapin.
Where Are They Coming From?
• Trend: Restless in Florida
The leading point of origin for migrants to all but a handful of Florida counties is another county in Florida. For instance, the top four counties contributing to the growth of booming St. Lucie County in 2004, according to the IRS data, are all to the south. Miami-Dade through Martin sent St. Lucie 9,037 that year, or 25 per day.
The pattern repeats throughout Florida. “Our No. 1 state of origin for a number of years, and by a significant margin, is Florida itself,” says Gary Lester, vice president for community relations at The Villages, a Central Florida development. Take New Yorker-rich Miami-Dade, for example. According to the IRS, for the most recent years available, 2003-04, the total moving from Manhattan and the other New York boroughs into Miami-Dade was 4,350 — 12 New Yorkers a day. The total from Broward moving into Miami-Dade over the same period? 14,347.
• Trend: Ins and Outs
IN: Of the top 10 states contributing new Florida residents in 2004, three are in the Sun Belt — Georgia, California and North Carolina. Virginia is 11th.
OUT: Those leaving Florida like the Sun Belt too: Georgia has been the top out-migration state for four decades. New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Jersey are the Northern states among the top 10 destinations for people leaving Florida.
• Trend: Corridors
The historic patterns — Northeasterners migrating down I-95 to Southeast Florida and Midwesterners down I-75 to the Gulf Coast — are blurring but still hold true.
• Trend: Suburb to Suburb
Miami-Dade is one of the rare Florida counties in which a Northeast urban core — Manhattan — is still the leading out-of-state point of origin, according to IRS data. Most Florida counties’ leading out-of-state sources are suburban counties like Suffolk and Nassau counties on Long Island in New York.
Where Are They Coming From?
• Trend: A Northward Drift
“The frontier of the aged population is clearly moving into North Florida,” says FSU professor Morton Winsberg. Take Richard and Barbara Cole. Once members of the administration of former Pennsylvania Gov. Richard Thornburgh, they chose Central Florida’s rolling hills and shade trees over South Florida’s sand, palms and congestion, even though they had a residence in the “touristy” Keys. “We were looking for a place that’s home,” says Richard Cole, a retired lawyer. Miami-Dade and Broward are showing absolute declines in the number of white, non-Hispanic elderly, Winsberg says.
The exception is a continued strong Jewish retiree migration to South Florida. Interestingly, the Jewish population of Boynton Beach in Palm Beach County has reached 37,000, up from 9,300 in 1987. “There’s more Jews in Boynton than there are in St. Louis,” says Ira Sheskin, director of the Jewish Demography Project at the Sue and Leonard Miller Center for Contemporary Judaic Studies at the University of Miami. Overall, Southeast Florida will continue to grow, but not as fast as Central and North Florida, diminishing its relative political strength in Florida. Midwesterners have become less of a growth contributor to Florida as more opt to retire in the West, Texas coast and Arkansas.
Are They Rich or Poor?
• Trend: the Link between Income and Destination
There is plenty to ponder in the IRS data on the income levels of people moving in and out of Florida. For those moving to Florida from outside the state, the trends seems to indicate that lower-wage people seeking service jobs are migrating to the state’s major urban centers, while higher income retirees prefer less developed, more suburban regions. To wit:
4 Overall, most in-migrants make less than the people who already live here. Only Virginia, Maryland, Minnesota and the District of Columbia send people to Florida whose median adjusted gross income — as defined by the IRS — was higher than that of people already here.
But if you compare in-migrants’ incomes with the incomes of people leaving Florida, that trend develops wrinkles.
In Florida’s most urban counties — Hillsborough, Pinellas, Miami-Dade, Duval, Broward and Orange — in-migrants tend to earn somewhat less than those leaving. The gap ranges from a couple hundred dollars to a couple thousand. Conclusions are difficult to draw but could reflect arrivals’ pursuit of job opportunities and the classic sprawl pattern of departers leaving for more affluent counties beyond the urban cores.
In most other counties in the state, however — including almost all the faster-growing suburban counties —in-migrants tend to have higher incomes than the people moving out of those counties. The gap is particularly noticeable in quick-developing Flagler and St. Johns counties in Northeast Florida, where those moving in have median adjusted incomes $9,000 higher than those leaving. That dynamic appears to be pushed particularly by out-of-state people with good incomes, perhaps high-income retirees. The counties that encompass The Villages retirement community, for example, show a pronounced higher-income-in, lower-income-out disparity.
How Long Will It Last?
There are questions about the migration flows into Florida, particularly the rates of ebb and flow. Over time, repeats of the 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons could affect migration. High housing prices could deter growth. In some markets, “even our corporate transferees, and even some at the executive level, aren’t able to purchase homes with the amenities they want,” says Glenda Philpot, statewide senior vice president of corporate relocations for Sarasota-based Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate.
The state will undoubtedly grow, adding to its importance in the House of Representatives and presidential elections. Additionally, as we grow, we’ll be growing older — fast — which raises a senior center full of implications [“The Age Wave,” December 1999, FloridaTrend.com]. One in four Floridians will be over 65 in 2030, says BEBR’s Stanley Smith, while the proportion of the state’s population in their working years will fall fast too, to 58% in 2030.
And then there’s the question of where to put the projected 25.5 million people we will have here in 2030. Florida governor, growth fan and in-migrant Jeb Bush, commenting on the need to engineer solutions to the impact of growth on the ecosystem, says: “I don’t think God created Florida with 17 million growing to 25 million people in mind.”
Vital Statistics
Sources for income, population and age charts on following pages: Woods & Poole Economics Inc., Washington, D.C. Copyright 2005. Woods & Poole does not guarantee the accuracy of this data. The use of this data and the conclusions drawn from it are solely the responsibility of Florida Trend. Population data include military stationed in Florida, college residents and inmates. Jobs data measure full- and part-time jobs and proprietors and include farmworkers. Property income includes rent, dividend and interest payments. Transfer income includes Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance. Unemployment data are from the Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation
Posted in Good Migrations
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Posted by David Bennett
Wed, 28 Jun 2006 12:18:00 GMT
Leading brokers, industry consultants focus on “back to basics”—growth, leads, technology and the human touch—as keys to future success during first annual RISMedia Midyear Power Broker Forum
By Beth McGuire
There are three areas brokers must focus on if they are to continue to thrive in the years ahead: horizontal growth, vertical integration and technological enablement. That’s according to some the nation’s brightest and most successful real estate brokers and consultants who gathered in Washington D.C. yesterday to discuss such strategies at RISMedia’s first annual Midyear Power Broker Forum.
The forum titled, “How to Make Things Work: Grow, Integrate, Enable,” and held in conjunction with the National Association of Realtors Midyear Legislative Sessions, was attended by more than 220 real estate professionals and brought together leading brokers Mark Stark of Las Vegas area Prudential Americana Group, Realtors; Authur Sterbcow of New Orleans-based Latter & Blum Realtors; and Shel Detrick of Oklahoma-based Prudential Detrick/Alliance/SW/Classic Realty. Industry consultants Richard Sommer of HomeGain; Joe Kazzoun of Clareity Consulting; Jim Sherry of Innovative Solutions and Chuck Del Grande of Presidio Merchant Partners also joined the panel.
“Right now we’re at the end of the old market and the beginning of the next market,” said Ed Krafchow, of the huge firm Prudential California/Nevada/Texas, who co-moderated the event with RISMedia Publisher and CEO, John Featherston. “There is a systematic change happening in our industry and in order to make things work, we need to get focused on our business and know what it requires now to be profitable in the future.”
Consultants agreed that a combination of the three, key must-haves are needed to ensure profitability: horizontal growth, or growth in new markets or by acquisition; vertical integration, or expanding revenue streams by bolstering ancillary services such as mortgage, title, insurance and escrow; and technological enablement—how in a sea of technology options with only more on the way, to choose the right products for your business, gel both growth initiatives and position your company for optimal future growth.
It was noted, however, that these strategies are for naught if you are not using them with the ultimate goal of creating value in the consumers mind and providing them with good, old-fashioned face-to-face service.
“I am different today than I was on August 27,” said Arthur Sterbcow, the broker from New Orleans and the Gulf Coast who lost 24 of his 28 offices in Hurricane Katrina. “We had more technology than we knew what to do with. But if there is one thing that demonstrated the future of this business from that disaster is that people are the fundamental core of this business. Technology kept us afloat, but it’s worthless without the agent who touches people’s lives. That trust surpasses everything.”
Sherry explored the subject further, putting the onus on brokers to relieve the pressure of completing the mundane daily tasks that take away from what should be their singular job of client interaction and listing and selling. He referred to the concept as “non-traditional horizontal growth.”
“We are an industry willing to suffer a slow death of sameness rather than risk change,” Sherry said. “I want this industry to gather enough chutzpa to offer a model that the consumer wants, not what we want to feed them.”
He added that absorbing the client tasks should be an important priority for brokers.
Preparation for future change such as preservation of the MLS system, new business models and evolution of lead generation companies were also discussed.
Responding to the question, “What do brokers need to do about lead generation issues,” Richard Sommer said, “We should do what the consumers want. Consumers want information, they want their property marketed and they want to complete the transaction. We’re going to see some major changes in the next few years, and we have to provide agents with all the tools they need to succeed and part of that is offering multiple forms of services.”
He added that building business though partnerships with lead generation companies is one way to do that and that brokers he sees as leading the charge on the lead generation front are those who are experimenting with several different business models, not just one singular approach. “Brokers are learning,” he says. “They are trying to figure out their core competencies and what value they bring to the consumer; they’re looking at several models—HomeGain, HouseValues, Google—they see the trend that consumers are going to multiple sites for housing information, not just one source, and they are responding to that.”
What keeps brokers up at night?
For leading Oklahoma broker Shel Detrick, it’s agent retention. “We go for quality, not quantity when it comes to agents,” he said, adding that training and reinventing his agents are high priority—no part-timers allowed.
“Being as flexible as possible,” answered Mark Stark, the Las Vegas broker to the same question. “It’s important not to get stuck on one idea just because it’s yours. You have to make sure you look at all the facts and then move forward with the right strategy.”
Brokers also saw the concept of a commercial-based listing service as a potential big threat to the industry while consultants reiterated that like other new challenges that have threatened industry structure in the past, the idea of consumers having full access to listing information at will poses another new set of opportunities.
Posted in Surviving the Sea Change
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