Looking to gain more real estate sales? Follow these authors’ tips

Our first impressions are no longer made face to face, said author Dan Streeter.

“Nearly every new introduction Realtors® receive is through an online environment or referral. Often times, even before a client reaches out to us, they have viewed our digital impression, which is essentially reflective of a realtors personal brand. Remember, your LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter profiles represent a giant digital billboard that is on 24/7/365. If you don’t manage your digital profile, you are missing sales even before you have a chance to be introduced to the potential client,” added Tim Brown, Streeter’s co-author.

Streeter added that every second of every day, Realtors® are gaining or losing trust. Many times, we gain or lose trust through means that the Realtor® cannot control, he said.

“The difference between a great Realtor® and a good one is in the details. The small things that you can do every day to ensure that with every step in the sales process you are gaining trust,” he added. Streeter made some suggestions to take your real estate career from good to great:

• Dress one level above your customer
• If you send an email over two paragraphs, follow that email with a phone call
• Respond with a sense of urgency to internet and phone leads
• Change your voicemail daily, and even personalize your voicemail based on the client who is calling you
• Listen five times more than you speak to a client
• Return voicemails before the end of the business day, and emails before midnight
• Most importantly, the home, generally speaking, is fluid and follows a process. Give clients information before they request it and inform them about upcoming steps in the process and what to expect as the process moves forward.

Twenty years ago, when people went to make a home purchase, homebuyers knew very little about the process of securing a mortgage or the home buying process, said Brown. “This led to a tremendous amount of information asymmetry, essentially, the Realtor® knew a great deal more about the process of home buying. As a consequence, Realtors® and mortgage loan officers were akin to ‘the man behind the curtain,’ essentially, Realtors® could get away with being more focused on the transaction than on the relationship,” he said.

“Today though, Realtors® must focus on the relationship. Homebuyers have enormous choices in terms of choosing a Realtor®, a variety of ways to sell their home and an immense amount of information to guide them along the way, much of which contradicts what their Realtor® might advise. It’s that trusting relationship that turns a transaction that many people consider to be a commodity to be an experience that home buyers and sellers remember forever,” added Brown.

Streeter said that the first rule of sales is that people buy from people they like and trust. “This rule of sales will never change. How we build that trust follows a simple formula. Communication plus urgency equals trust. When you communicate well and act with a sense of urgency, you build trust and likability with your prospects or clients.”

In this day and age, Brown said technology helps us amplify communication and accelerate urgency and activate trust more efficiently and effectively than ever.

“How we choose to manage this change will be the fundamental reason for our success or lack of success,” he added.

Tim Brown and Dan Streeter are the co-authors of Old School with New Tools: The Extra 5% That Takes You to the Top of Your Sales Game and Keeps You There.