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Realtors© Are You Living Above The Line In 2023?

realtors living above the line in 2023?I love reading the comments on my blog articles or listening to agents’ responses in coaching sessions. You know I do. But every once in a while, I’ll see or hear a comment and I can’t help but shake my head. “Thanks Wade, but what if I’m a new agent? Or “Great info but how do I use this if I live in ________?” Or “That’s not the way that we do it around here.” I wonder if these people are truly seeking solutions, or… Are they looking for excuses? “Well Wade, I’m new, this doesn’t really apply to me.” Yes, it does! “Well Wade, my market’s different. I’m not sure that would work here.” Yes, it will! Use your ingenuity!

One of my favorite books, The Oz Principle by Paul J Kelly talks about living above the line and living below the line. The Top 20% of real estate agents wake up every day and choose to live above the line. They take 100% responsibility for themselves, they value and love themselves, they choose and own their choices and seize the opportunities they are given. The other 80% of agents live below the line and deny anything they do wrong, they blame others, create and make problems even bigger than they are and respond dramatically to everything they come face to face with. I always ask myself and my kids when we are tested, are we living above the line? Or living below the line today?

News flash #1: There are no “minor leagues” in real estate. You’re in the big leagues now. If you’re new, that just means you have to work much harder and maintain your focus that much stronger. You have a lot of legwork ahead of you — systems to put in place, your business plan to create, marketing plans to develop, sales skills to refine, training to attend, books to read, etc.

News flash #2: Your market isn’t that different from everyone else’s market. Even if your market has some unique characteristics, you can always adapt what you’ve learned or what others are doing to fit your market and/or clientele. But whatever you do, you cannot allow yourself to make excuses for underperforming. Don’t Regret Your Inactivity If you allow yourself to make excuses, you’re only setting yourself up for mediocrity. Instead, commit yourself to training, learning, doing. Five years from now, you’re going to look back on the next two years of your life and say one of two things: “Wow, I really kicked ass and gave my business the jump start it needed.” Or Ughhh! I wish I’d done more to put myself in position to succeed in this business.” Doing Something Is Always Better Than Nothing. Agents who succeed are the types who put their thinking caps on and are willing to adapt. They hear about a successful strategy and adjust it to fit their market, their business model, their level of experience in the industry. Nobody ever said you have to copy a strategy in its entirety. Pick and choose what works best for you. The point is to DO SOMETHING. The next time you catch yourself coming up with a reason why an idea won’t work, flip the script and instead focus on how you can adapt it to make it work best for you.
Don’t make excuses. Find solutions. Live above the line!

Strength and courage,
Wade

2023 Mid Year Review For Real Estate Agents

2023 mid year review real estate agentsI cannot believe how quickly time flies and the first half of 2023 has come and gone already. It’s an excellent time of year to do a mid year review on your real estate business and assess what you did well, what you can do better and more importantly what’s next for you and the second half of 2023. I strongly encourage you to set aside an hour or so – on a weekend or during your normal weekly planning time – and do a mid-year review on your real estate business. Use this time to reflect back on the first six months of the year and make adjustments to your real estate goals for the remainder of the year.

10 Questions to Ask During Your Mid-Year Performance Review:
Looking Back…

1. Key Accomplishments. What are all of the great things I got done over the past six months? What goals did I achieve? What things am I most proud of accomplishing? Which of my goals did I really miss the mark on?

2. Relationship Development. What new relationships did I develop? Which of my existing relationships did I significantly strengthen? Which relationships may I have overlooked or not given enough attention to?

3. Learning. What opportunities to learn new things did I take advantage of? What were the things I learned most about myself? What were the things I learned most about my business?

4. Mistakes. What mistakes did I make? What mistakes could I have avoided? What mistakes provided me with the most significant development and learning opportunities?

5. Time Management. How well did I manage my time? Have I been focusing my time on the most important things in my life? Are there any significant “time wasters” I need to reduce or eliminate from my life? When am I most productive? When am I least productive?

Looking Ahead…

6. Top 3 Work-Related Goals. What are my top three work-related goals for the remainder of the year? Why are those goals important to me? What habits and processes do I need to adopt to support those goals?

7. Top 3 Personal Goals. What are my top three personal goals for the remainder of the year? Why are those goals important to me? Who can I share these goals with to help hold me accountable to achieving them?

8. Relationship Development. Which relationships will I focus on strengthening and developing during the second half of the year? Who do I want to meet and get to know? Who can most help me achieve my work-related and personal goals?

9. Learning and Knowledge. What areas of learning do I most need to focus on? What new skills do I need to develop? What skills do I need to strengthen? What things do I need to “keep current” on? What one skill, if mastered, would have the greatest impact on the achievement of my goals?

10. Habits. What time management habits do I need to develop and strengthen? What three habits, if developed and sustained, would have the greatest positive impact on my work life and personal life? What habits do I know I need to drop or replace?

Set yourself up for ending your year strong and run through the above questions and review them regularly the balance of the year to remind yourself of what you want out of your life and what you want out of your business. Have you done too much and burned out? Am I out of balance? Am I out of motivation? Have I fallen short? The exciting news is that we have the choice when things weren’t what we hoped in the first half of the year to choose to make this the first day of the rest of the year of what you really want in business and life. I dare you!

Strength and courage,
Wade

Realtors© Are You Wasting Your Most Precious Commodity?

realtors wasting most precious commodityRealtors© Are You Wasting Your Most Precious Commodity?

Once, a king and a lazy man named Haria were very good friends. One morning, the king said, “Why don’t you do work to earn some money?” Haria said, “No one gives me job. My enemies told everyone that I never do any work in time.” The kind king said, “You can go into my treasury and collect as much wealth as you can, till sunset.” Haria rushed home to tell this to his wife. She said, “Go and get the gold coins and gems now.” “I cannot go now. Give me lunch first.” After lunch, he took a nap for an hour. Then in the late afternoon, he picked some bags and went to the palace. On the way, he felt hot, so he sat under a tree to rest. Then, two hours later, he got up to go but saw a man showing some magic tricks. He stopped to watch for an hour again. When he reached the palace, it was already time for sunset. The palace gates had been shut. So, Haria had lost a golden chance because he had not learnt the value of time.

I see and hear so many real estate agents who are putting in long hours and long days but don’t seem to be reaping the benefits of their labor. How many of you are maximizing your time each day? Are you truly using every second to its fullest potential? Time is precious and the truth is we don’t have much of it. Are You Wasting Time? Most people in this economy are wasting time. But what happens when the market takes a turn? It’s not a matter of “if”, but “when”, because it always does. Will you be the one with all the money? If you don’t start the working immediately in the real estate market, we know that somebody else will.

4 Popular Agent Workplace Timewasters, and Tips to Reign them in.

2. Interruptions. One study says people can waste up to two hours per day of productivity based on interruptions. One reason for this is it can take around 20 minutes to get back into a work groove after your flow is interrupted. Of course, sometimes distractions are welcome (admit it!)—whether it’s a team member asking for your input, to talking about a TV show. And while interruptions will happen, the trick is minimizing them, so they don’t kill your work productivity. Tip: Put your head down for set periods of time—25, 50 or 75 minutes—whatever is a realistic stretch of time to accomplish a task. If you’re in an office, close your door. If you’re in an open space, wear headphones, or set up some kind of “Do Not Disturb” signage around your desk area. Other common tricks are to turn off email and instant messaging; close all the browsers, apps and docs you’re not using. Also, don’t think you have to drop everything when a co-worker asks for something. Try lines like, “Set up some time for us and I can give you my full attention” to a simple “Can you give me a minute, I’m in the middle of something.” This might change some of your team members’ interrupting habits as well.

2. Socializing with co-workers. This is a double-edged sword, as stated by different studies. The Salary.com survey says 43% of their respondents blamed interacting with coworkers as the main reason they missed doing work. However, there’s an upside to this social interaction. Other studies have found coffee room chats and serendipitous conversations can increase productivity through the exchange of information, ideas and problem-solving strategies, and the quick emotional boost that comes with making meaningful connections. Tip: Think about socializing as you would managing a project. If you find yourself in an unplanned conversation, give yourself ten minutes to talk rather than letting the conversation go on too long. Sometimes, you just must exercise discipline and walk away from a group conversation. Or consolidate your social interactions.

3. Unclear priorities. It happens too often: Individuals find themselves working on tasks they discover aren’t the highest priority. When agents are disorganized—either because of poor communication or no prioritization. Tip: If you’re not sure what you should be working on, ask. Ask yourself if you are confident the activity you are working on is what matters most to the business today. Always remind yourself of the high dollar productive activities in real estate always get done first!

4. The Internet, social media, and personal emails. There are a few dynamics going on here: Dropping in on Facebook and other social media during the day is the new water cooler break. Let’s be honest, we all check out something on the Internet that isn’t work related—from news articles to shopping. Do we even need to explain email? We have a personal life, folks! Tip: Instead of nickel-and-diming your time by browsing the Internet, checking your social media sites and responding to personal emails, set aside a designated time, say 10-15 minutes twice a day for these activities. You’ll save time from all the restart time that goes along with frequent quick interruptions (see No. 1). Plus, it’s a good discipline practice to increase your focus and overall productivity.

What’s your favorite or most plaguing time waster—and what do you do about it?

Strength and courage,
Wade

Real Estate Agents & Outsourcing In 2023.

real estate agents and outsourcing in 2023What you need to know about real estate agents and outsourcing in 2023

Let’s face it, running a successful business as a REALTOR has so many more moving parts then in the good old days. Now with increased competition, cell phones, the internet, more paperwork, home staging, infinitely more marketing strategies and countless other additions, what one person can not only keep abreast with the needs let alone do them all? At some point if you want to progress and move your real estate business to the next level it is critical to let go of some mundane but necessary tasks so you can focus on the high dollar real estate activities like acquiring and servicing your clients and planning and implementing your business strategy. A number of years ago a book came out that completely changed my life. Timothy Ferriss’s 4 Hour Work Week. A friend of mine had given me the book and right away I laughed and tried to toss it back to him and said it was the most unrealistic idea I had ever heard of. I humored my friend and started to read it and this book has ruined me for the ordinary. The idea of being able to outsource so many activities in any business to so many different places was foreign to me. The whole concept of virtual assistance and outsourcing was so new and

foreign to all of us. Today these businesses and services are some of the fastest growing and most productive online businesses in the world.

What Can I Outsource in My Real Estate Business? Let me give you just one example in detail of what can easily be outsourced. You are a new or existing agent. You are looking to create or rebrand yourself with a logo, a slogan for your business cards, letterhead, website, real estate signs and have no place to start. What about this?

www.99designs.com This is where you find over 265,000 graphic designers virtually creating designs for anyone around the world for a fraction of the local graphic designers in your home town. You can have them create logos, web pages, business cards, mobile apps, banner ads, book covers, presentations and any other art or illustration you require for your real estate branding. What’s even better is you can view the portfolio pieces of these designers, submit your requirements, get free mockups from numerous designers, choose your favorite designer, hire them and pay for your purchase while sitting in your pajamas on the couch sipping your favorite coffee.

It would take me all day to go into detail of the various areas in your real estate business you can get competent, yet reasonably priced online assistance so I will just throw out a quick list of places you can start.

Just Some of the Real Estate Activities Prime for Outsourcing

Update information in Real Estate programs (including Real Pro, MLX, equator, Top Producer, and MyKW)

Prepare Marketing flyers and info packages

Prepare Marketing reports

Research Property information

Settlement checklists

Listing maintenance on various Multiple Listing Services

Entering leads for buyers/sellers/referrals

Schedule appointments and Property Tours

Connection and disconnection of utilities

Search HOA’s and request them information

Follow up on code enforcement violations

Social Media Management (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn)

Obtain Testimonials from Past Clients

Contact trustees to find out auction info

Due Diligence Follow up, lead Follow-up

Answer calls and emails from agents, buyers and leads

Customized Marketing & Business Solutions

Additional Administrative Tasks

Web design and SEO

Internet research

Presentations

Translations

Blog maintenance/updates

Data entry

Transcriptions

Brochure design, spec sheets, flyers, postcards, etc.

Accounting and bookkeeping

Maintenance for online stores

Customer service over the phone or through email

Some Sites to Begin Your Outsourcing Quest

www.myoutdesk.com (Real Estate Specific)

www.elance.com

www.guru.com

www.teamdoubleclick.com

www.freelancer.com

www.odesk.com

www.ebrokerassistants.com

www.fiverr.com

Again the options are unlimited. You can hire virtual assistants on a per project basis or on a full or part time basis. Also with outsourcing help available around the world there are options to have very competent help full time for a very reasonable cost.

Quit stressing yourself out trying to do it all on your own and use the resources above to take a load off so you can once again see the bigger picture and have the time and energy to work on it.

Strength and courage,
Wade

The Optimism Factor In Real Estate Agents

optimism factor real estate agentsWhat is the optimism factor in real estate agents?

Every leadership study I’ve seen that ranks the characteristics of great leaders and entrepreneurs puts optimism right at the top of the list. Is optimism something you are born with or something you learn? If we were to measure ourselves right now, we would find varying degrees of optimism amongst us as a group, but we would all have some. If we can have it, we can develop it further. Certainly, some individuals seemed to be naturally better “wired” for optimism, but don’t be fooled – we can all learn to be more optimistic. Optimism is a feeling that things will work out. The optimist is not a fool looking at the world though “rose color glasses”, without regard for external forces that may get in the way of their plans. They take responsibility for what they can control and accept that they are not in control of everything. They understand how their thinking influences their expectations and that they may not always get what they want, but they will always get what they expect.

 

As the captain of your ship and owner of your business, are you prepared for the task of leading yourself and your team (if you have one) into the challenges of the New Year? This month we give some thought to optimism in leadership. I have a few strategies that you can use right away.

 

  • Avoid negative environments. Make every effort to seek the inclusion of positive individuals into your team. Avoid the professional complainers.
  • Celebrate your strengths. The key to high achievement and happiness is to work to your strengths, not correct your weaknesses. Focus on what you do well.
  • Take care of your spiritual and emotional wellbeing by reading material that inspires you daily.
  • Manage or ignore what you cannot change. When faced with setbacks, identify what you can change and proactively try to find ways to do something about it. Be inspired by Benjamin Franklin’s words: “While we may not be able to control all that happens to us, we can control what happens inside us.”
  • Learn to reframe. This involves deliberately shifting perspective and looking for the hidden positive in a negative situation, the proverbial silver lining, especially when you experience setbacks, and choosing to put a positive spin on events. Seek the valuable lesson in every problem or difficulty – remember there are no mistakes, only lessons. Every experience is a positive opportunity for growth and self-mastery.
  • Dispute your pessimistic thoughts. Dispute negative pervasive thoughts by identifying your irrational thinking and replace it with more reasonable or rational thinking.
  • Adapt your language and outlook. Consider how a simple shift in the language you use can make a difference in your outlook: Do you frequently say: “yes, but….” in response to suggestions from colleagues? The “but” automatically negates anything you have said in the beginning part of the sentence. A simple shift to “yes, and…” will make a positive difference.
  • Become aware of your stance in business meetings. Are you known as the “devil’s advocate”, the one who is quick to shoot down others’ ideas? Jumping in too quickly to negate an idea can derail the creative process. Often valuable ideas are the result of an initial “crazy” thought. Practice being more upbeat, practice speaking last, and see what happens.
  • Focus outside yourself, on important people in your life, on pursuits and projects that fire you up. Bertrand Russell once said that the quickest way to make ourselves miserable is to continually focus on ourselves.
  • Nurture a culture of optimism. Expect people to succeed, and even when they occasionally fail to achieve what they set out to do, encourage them so that they can tackle the next challenge. A simple: “I know you’ll do better the next time” can have very positive effects.
  • Focus on the task to be accomplished rather than your negative emotions, such as disappointment or fear, and see the possibilities within the task.
  • Don’t take setbacks personally; take responsibility but recognize the influence of external factors on the situation. Redefine situations in terms of their external causes.
  • DeCatastrophize and ask yourself: “What’s the worst thing that could happen, and can I live with it?” Then focus on doing everything you can to minimize the fallout.
  • An optimistic belief in yourself and your capabilities to positively impact situations, even ones that appear negative, fuels success. Try gently moving your mind into positive, optimistic thoughts whenever you find yourself feeling negative, depressed, or in despair. The rainbow is there; you just need to see it….

Strength and courage,
Wade

What Do The Top Real Estate Agents Do? ( Part 2 Of 2 )

what do the top real estate agents doWant to know the painfully simple, relatively obvious yet almost universally ignored “secret” to what the top real estate agents do versus the average or struggling Realtor exists? Ready for it??? Choice! Yup… that’s it!

The rich agent woke up one morning (before he was rich) sick and tired of mediocrity and decided to think, be and live bigger than they have been up to that point. The top agents have the same 24 hrs, 7 days, 52 weeks but the difference is what they do with them that create the gap.

What the Rich Real Estate Agent Does and You Should Start Doing

1) Organize the Chaos – Top agents are incredibly organized and systemized or if they are not, like me thank you very much, they hire and delegate the organization and systemization of their business and embrace it! I can personally tell you that someone or something else organizing and systemizing for all of you that struggle in this area is so incredibly freeing.

2) Faith or Fear – Top agents operate from a faith and not fear mindset. They just “know that they know” that they will succeed and constantly move away from anything anyone that holds them back. They have belief in the unknown and run their business by faith vs. fear like most agents.

On a scale of 1 to 5, 1 being poor and 5 being great, ask yourself what your faith in yourself and your ability is. Are you a 1 or a 5? Do you believe that you can do and be more in real estate?

3) Take a Risk – The Rich agent is a risk taker and true entrepreneur. They move on and continue to evolve and create more and more momentum in their business. Whatever the top agent thinks will leap them to the next level and become bigger than they execute on and fail more. They embrace failure at everything they act on with a mindset of not failing but like Edison “9,999 times I discovered what didn’t work.” Execute more and fail quick!

4) Make a Plan – Top agents always have a plan, a clear distinct path of their journey in real estate. They know where they have been, where they are now, where they want to go next and how to get there, step by step.

Are you a fanatical planner? Create a strategic plan and be fanatical about your numbers. Track and measure everything. Success at a high level is simply just math. Do you know the markets numbers? Do you know your numbers?

5) What’s on Your Mind – The rich agent has a better psychology and always operate on a higher-level mindset. Your personal psychology is what you say to yourself and how you move your body which in turn impacts your attitude and effects your actions and behaviors which ultimately lead to your results and success in your real estate business.

What do you say to yourself all the time? What do you think about most? Do you make good decisions? Are you thinking about how you are going to make a dent in the universe? Control your space and environment with training, reading, listening and choosing intently who you hang around. So many top agents spend time prior to their day with gratitude exercises, affirmations, reflecting on things that made them happy the day before, reviewing their goals and taking time to visualize their future focus. Do you have that daily routine in your business?

6) Make a Bigger Net – Top agents constantly focus on growth and cast a larger net. Growth is plain and simply lead generation and having multiple sources bringing in a steady stream of buyer and seller leads for your business leads to growth. So how many streams of lead generation do you say we need Wade? Here are the numbers to measure your business by. 1-3 ways of lead generation will leave an agent struggling. 4 – 6 ways of lead generation will put you in a good agent category. The rich agent and top producers have more than 10 ways of lead generation feeding their business. Remember the money is not in the leads, the money is in the conversion to appointments!

Here are the top sources for lead generation:

Database

Farming

Open house

Direct Mail

Expired

FSBO

Advertising

Zillow, Realtor, Trulia

Facebook

Video

Email

Text

Google Pay Per Click

7) Leverage Everything – Top producing agents use leverage with everything in their business. They 3D test everything.

Do I Do it?

Do I delegate it?

Do I just dump it?

Track and measure, track and adjust and reset your goals quarter by quarter. Remember someone or something else doing it 85% as good as you would do it is leverage. You only have so much time and have to figure out how to do more in less time. A top agent plain and simply does less and does it with excellence because they have surrounded themselves with people and systems that pick up in all the areas that they are not gifted and in their sweet spot in business. So now you know the common gaps between the rich and top producing Realtors and all the secrets behind their success and what it is they do more of than the rest of us. My hope and prayer for you and your business is now to choose to be more and choose play at another level in your life and stop thinking so small. You have the map and the plan now the decision and choice is yours.

Strength and courage,
Wade

What Do The Top Real Estate Agents Do ( Part 1 Of 2 )

what top real estate agents doEver wonder what the top real estate agents do to be at the top? I attended an event with a mentor and friend Tom Ferry and was intrigued with the information he shared on what the Rich agent (top 5%) does vs. the struggling agent (95%) and that the struggling agent simply needs to know what the Rich agent does and do more of it to reach the same level of success. Have you ever wondered what the top 5% of Realtors do to get to this mastery level in real estate? Are you looking for momentum? Are you wanting a quantum leap? Is your desire to play bigger and live bigger than you are?

In this 2 Part blog post I will share with you the most important secrets of what the Rich agent is doing and what you need to do more of to experience it all. In Part 1, I share the 10 biggest gaps between the Rich agent and the common agent in their real estate business. As you read through the list take account as to how many of these are you doing and how many of these you are not doing. Also, rate each item on a level of 1-10. Level 10 is doing something consistently, daily and at a mastery level of skill. Level 1 is the opposite or not doing it at all.

So here are the top 10 common gaps.

1) Organized Database – The top producer has taken the time to sort, qualify and systemize a database with valuable sales and marketing information on each and every prospect. They in fact have 3 organized databases…

A) Sphere of Influence

B) Agent Referral

C) Lead Generation Prospects.

Do you have an organized database? 3?

2) Consistent Contact Of Database – The Rich agent has a daily time block (power hours) for sitting down and calling their database. Touching base and deepening their relationships and letting them know they are here to serve. Then before ending the call asking “Of all the people you know, who do you know that might be moving next?”

Do you have a consistent daily power hour(s) for contacting your database(s)?

3) Marketing Your Database – The top agent delegates or implements themselves an engaging consistent marketing strategy to their database(s) such as personal hand written notes after calls, newsletters, valuable information pieces, small gifts and tokens of appreciation, statistics, birthdays wishes, house anniversaries and on and on and on. “So Wade, what is the magic number of marketing items for your real estate database?” My answer to you is… the bigger the net, the more fish you catch. Meaning the more you add value to the database the bigger your return.

Are you actively marketing to your database(s)?

4) Geographic Farm – The mastery level real estate agent has implemented a farm lead generation system into their business. I am not talking about chickens and pigs but a specific geographic area that is experiencing over 6% turnover and creating a perception that you are the expert in that farm and potential clients would be foolish not to invite you to discuss their real estate business with an expert like yourself.

Do you have a geographic farm lead generation program in your business?

5) Open House Conversion – The Rich agent doesn’t do an open house for the sake of open houses, they do them at the mega open house level and focus on the lead conversion of their open house and NOT the lead generation. Are you displaying 20 open house signs around your open house? Do you have engaging value proposition questions to convert the lead into a buyer appointment? Do you do open house for the sake of open house or do you open house for lead conversion and buyer appointments? There is a difference you know.

Is it time to work on Open house conversion with you and your business?

6) Online Lead Generation94% of consumers are going to the internet first. The top agents know they need to be continually lead generating for appointments and why not have a strategy where all the fish are, like the internet? Are you using Zillow, Trulia, Realtor, Google Pay Per Click, Boomtown or Tigerleads? These are just some examples to create more online lead business.

Is it time to invest in online leads and generate more appointments with buyers and sellers in your business?

7) Niche Lead Generation – We have all heard it is better to be known as an expert at something than just average at everything like most agents. The top level agents are known for their niche and expertise. They focus on lead generation in their niche online and offline. Consumers look for the expert and not for the everyday agent.

Do you market as an expert to a specific niche? Is it time for you to consider niche lead generation for your business?

8) Listing Appointments – The rich agent is the agent with all the listing inventory. The have the home inventory in listings and the people inventory in names and contacts in their databases. More names mean more appointments. More listings mean more spin of buyers and sellers.

What number of listings are you carrying? Are you creating enough listing appointment leads to build your inventory? Is it time for you to implement listing leads and listing appointments?

9) Listing Appointment Conversion – Most agents take the time to create listing seller appointments but the money is not in the appointments but in the conversion. Top agents have the tools and systems in place to generate a high conversion rate on their appointments.

What kind of pre listing package do you have? What type of listing presentation do you have? What is your listing appointment conversion rate? 7 out of 10? 9 out of 10? Do you know how to engage and sell the benefits of a potential client doing business as a seller with yourself, with your company and to get them to do it now? Is it time for you to work on your listing appointment conversion for your business?

10) Buyer Appointments – The rich agent has a steady stream of buyer appointments. Their lead generation systems online and offline are allowing them to qualify hard their buyer leads and set up for buyer appointments.

Do you have a steady stream of buyer leads to be able to pick and choose to work with motivated and qualified buyers only? Do you have a pre buyer package? Do you have a buyer presentation? Are you signing your buyer to buyer agreements and not rolling the dice each and every time? Do you think it is time for you to create more buyer leads and a buyer agreement conversion method into your business?

Take the time to really assess your own business and the gaps you have that are holding you back from experiencing a mastery level in your real estate business. I encourage you… don’t just sit and wait for something to happen with your business… take action and create a quantum leap in your business. Start with one gap at a time and build from there. Is it time to stop living small? Is it time to close the gaps?

Feel free to email me any questions you have on how to close “your gaps”… I am here to help and serve. Make sure you come back next week when I share more of the things the rich agent does that you need to do more of.

Strength and courage,
Wade

10 Mental Strength Exercises for REALTORS©

10 mental strength exercises realtorsFor so many years I enjoyed the gift of coaching my three children’s sports teams and I found myself as a coach referring to the kids about their mental toughness. Coaches and sport commentators freely use the term mental toughness to describe the mental state of athletes who persevere through difficult sport and life circumstances to succeed. As a player, coach and even a real estate agent we all are faced with difficult circumstances and our mental toughness plays a huge part to our sport and our real estate business success. This week I want to share 10 mental strength exercises for Realtors© to help us with our mental toughness during those difficult times.

10 Mental Strength Exercises for REALTORS©

1. Establish goals. – The human brain is naturally predisposed to reach for and achieve goals. And not just one big goal, such as I want to lose 50 pounds. Also set more manageable short-term goals such as I want to work for 30 minutes without checking my phone or I want to reply to all my email by noon today. With each goal you achieve, you’ll gain more confidence in your ability to succeed. You’ll also learn to recognize when your goals are unrealistically ambitious and when they’re not challenging enough.

2. Set yourself up for success. – Becoming mentally strong doesn’t mean you have to subject yourself to temptations every day. Make your life a little easier by modifying the environment. If you want to work out in the morning, leave your shoes next to the bed at night and sleep in your gym clothes. If you want to eat healthier, remove the junk food from your pantry. When you set yourself up for success, you won’t exhaust your mental energy trying to resist the urge to sleep in or to dig into a bag of potato chips.

3. Tolerate discomfort for a greater purpose. – Discomfort can lead people to look for unhealthy shortcuts. Rather than deal with a problem, they reach for something that provides immediate emotional relief—drinking a glass of wine or binge-watching their favorite show, for example. But those short-term solutions can often create bigger long-term problems. Practice tolerating discomfort by reminding yourself of the bigger picture. Push yourself to work on your budget even though it causes you to feel anxious; run on the treadmill when you feel tired—don’t escape the discomfort. The more you tolerate discomfort, the more confidence you’ll have in your ability to do difficult things.

4. Reframe your negative thoughts. – Strive to develop a realistic yet optimistic inner monologue. Reframe catastrophic thoughts, such as “This will never work” with “If I work hard, I’ll improve my chances of success”. You can’t eliminate all of your negative thoughts. Everyone has rough patches and bad days. But by replacing those overly pessimistic thoughts with more realistic expectations, you can stay on course and equip yourself to manage the bad days.

5. Balance your emotions with logic. – You make the best decisions when your emotions and logic are in sync. If all your decisions were emotional, you wouldn’t save for retirement because you’d be too busy spending your money on what makes you happy right now. But if all of your decisions were logical, you’d live a boring life devoid of pleasure, leisure and love. Whether you’re buying a house or thinking of a career shift, consider the balance between your emotions and logic. If you’re overly excited or especially anxious, write down a list of the pros and cons of moving forward with the decision. Reviewing that list will boost the logical part of your brain and help balance out your emotions.

6. Strive to fulfill your purpose. – It’s hard to stay the course unless you know your overall purpose. Why do you want to earn more money or hone your craft? Write out a clear and concise mission statement about what you want to accomplish in life. When you’re struggling to take the next step, remind yourself why it’s important to keep going. Focus on your daily objectives, but make sure those steps you’re taking will get you to a larger goal in the long run.

7. Look for explanations, not excuses. – When you don’t perform as well as expected, examine the reasons why. Look for an explanation to help you do better next time, but don’t make excuses for your behavior. Take full responsibility for any shortcomings. Don’t blame others or the circumstances for your missteps. Acknowledge and face your mistakes so you can learn from them and avoid repeating them in the future.

8. Do one hard thing every day. – You won’t improve by accident. Purposely challenge yourself. Of course, what’s challenging to you might not be to someone else, so you need to analyze where your comfortable boundaries are. Then pick something slightly outside those boundaries and take one small step every day. That could mean speaking up for yourself when it’s uncomfortable or enrolling in a class you don’t feel qualified for. Push yourself to become a little better today than you were yesterday.

9. Use the 10-minute rule. – Mental strength won’t magically make you feel motivated all of the time. But it can help you be productive, even when you don’t feel like it.

When you’re tempted to put off something, use the 10-minute rule. When you eye the couch at the time you planned to go for a run, tell yourself to get moving for just 10 minutes. If your mind is still fighting your body after 10 minutes, give yourself permission to quit. Getting started is often the hardest part. Once you take the first step, you’ll realize it’s not nearly as bad as you predicted, and your other skills can help keep you going.

10. Prove yourself wrong. – The next time you think you can’t do something, prove yourself wrong. Commit to doing one more pushup at the gym or closing one more sale this month. Your mind will want to quit long before your body needs to give up. Prove to yourself you’re more capable than you give yourself credit for and over time your brain will stop underestimating your potential.

I trust these ideas can help all of us with our mental toughness and be able to help guide you in your difficult times personally and professionally. I hope this year is your best year yet!

Strength and courage,
Wade

Winning The Listing Every Time In 2023.

win the listing every time in 2023Want to know how to win the listing every time?

Do you feel like you’re losing the listing more often than not? Do you find the sellers in a sellers’ market are interviewing more than one agent now to see what really is the highest price? Here’s what I tell all of my coaching members … whether or not you win the listing is based on ONE main factor… Your listing presentation. Mess up the presentation, and say good-bye to the listing. Rock your listing presentation, and say HELLO to a new listing! Some of you are saying right now… “a listing presentation”? Wade the 80’s called and they want their listing presentation back. Yes! A listing presentation. Every time you don’t do one you rob yourself of the greatest gift in real estate and that is the client after seeing what it is you do can now advocate and share with other people what it is you do and what makes you so different from the rest of them! How important is that?!

So today I thought I’d share some of my best tips to improve your listing presentation so you can finally WIN the LISTING. Beat the competition. Have them tell your story and what makes You different from the rest.

Pre Listing Appointment
#1. Practice!! Spend some serious time on what you will say and how you say it. Be planned and prepared and not overwhelmed and ineffective. Don’t practice on the client!

#2. Send a short video letting them know how excited you are to work and meet with them.

#3. Deliver a pre listing appointment package to their home before you meet. (Your bio, team members, steps to selling, marketing, testimonials, your personal stats, how you find buyers, personal guarantee)

#4. Pre appointment listing questionnaire call. (what price are they thinking, who else are they interviewing, expectations, past experiences, confirm the appointment and time, recent improvements, current mortgage)

Appointment
#1. Know your customer – research them before you meet them. Google them or check for them on Facebook. Connect with them quickly and get them to like and trust you more by knowing a bit about them when you meet for the first time.

#2. Know the market, neighborhood, culture, and community. Have a really good idea of all the things the neighborhood offers, drive by the home before the appointment and find out all you can about their market area.

#3. Make sure you are in the right mindset – visualize speaking with your customers before meeting them. Get prepared and get ready to bring passion, energy and enthusiasm to the meeting and presentation.

#4. Tell the story “I’ve been on 62 appointments and 58 people chose to work with me.” Share what others have felt when first meeting you and what they found it was like working with you after the process. Share examples of how you’ve helped customers in similar situations.

#5. You only have 22 minutes (attention span of average adult) to answer the questions… Why you? Why your firm? Why now?

#6. Don’t tell me… Show and sell me. Visuals and presentations have a far greater impact than just words!

#7. Close 3 times! One of my mentors Floyd Wickman said ask for the order not once, not twice but three times and increase your odds of getting the business every time.

#8. Don’t sell the steak but sell the sizzle. Every time you present always explain the benefits to them and not just the features. We buy the sizzle and not the steak!

#9. Explain to them the benefits to them of your listing presentation before getting started. “Mr. and Mrs. Seller let me take a few minutes to show you how I work There is a myth out there that all agents and all firms pretty much do the same thing and that is the furthest thing from the truth! When you see what it is I do, you then are able to hold me more accountable to the marketing of your home and be able to call me on anything you see that hasn’t been done or done to your satisfaction. How does that sound to you folks?”

#10. It’s Show time! You only get one chance. Make it your best presentation you can every time and don’t risk your fate and lose the business.

Bonus Tip….
“Seller wants to try it at their price.” Mr. and Mrs. Seller the issue of stigmatization with your home is something we need to avoid. When a buyer notices the first reduction then they just wait for the rest of the reductions. When the seller sees the listing has been on the market for more than average days then they wonder what is wrong. To avoid this we will place the home on the market for the first 3 weeks exclusively and we will market direct to the local agents and all their buyers to see the response. Then we will meet and review the response we get in the first 3 weeks to decide where we will come out to market on MLS in week 4. How does this sound to you?

There you have some tips and effective strategies on how to win listings in today’s market place and how to compete on a higher level and win the listing every time. Take time to share in the comments one thing you do that really helps get the listing every time!

Strength and courage,
Wade

Realtors© Mastering The Art Of Small Talk

realtors mastering the art of small talkWhy Realtors© mastering the art of small talk is so important

A friend of mine shared with me how he really struggled with social gatherings and events. He just didn’t have the gift of “small talk” and didn’t know how to do it well. The problem was he specialized in luxury real estate and his client base was high net worth individuals who loved to gather in social circles. He was always being invited to social functions and fundraising events but dreaded having to work so hard at making conversation with these people. He shared how he discovered a simple and powerful technique that changed his “small talk” dilemma for life which in turn dramatically impacted his business for the better. A simple acronym called F.O.R.D. which stands for Family… Occupation… Recreation and Dreams. Whenever he came face to face with a client for the first time and one of those awkward social “small talk” moments. F.O.R.D. came to his rescue.

1.) Family – Where did they grow up? Where is their family now? Do they have any siblings? Do they have any children? Now focus on their answers… ask more questions… sit back and listen.

2.) Occupation – What do they do for a living? How long have they been in that occupation? What did they do before? Now focus on their answers… ask more questions… sit back and listen.

3.) Recreation – What do they do for fun? Hobbies? Passions? Something they always wanted to try or do? Now focus on their answers… ask more questions… sit back and listen (beginning to see a pattern here?)

4.) Dreams – What is on your bucket list? Your dreams? Goals? Aspirations? Now focus on their answers… ask more questions… sit back and listen

This simple but powerful tool called F.O.R.D. would help engage his clients, deepen his relationship with them and show he cares. This powerful technique then sets the stage for him to share what he does for a living and causes the other party to be receptive. It is also a powerful “confidence booster” to shine amongst people rather than dread the whole experience.

Small talk has earned a bad rap, because to many people it represents meaningless and trivial conversation. But it doesn’t have to be that way. A recent study published in Communication Research has found that those who engage in any of seven types of quality conversation experience increased well-being and happiness, alongside a reduction in their stress levels. Small talk has its benefits as well; a 2021 study published in the Academy of Management journal found that, despite the distraction caused by engaging in small talk, “employees who engaged in more small talk during their workday reported increased positive social emotions, which translated into greater [organizational citizenship behaviors] and well-being at the end of the day.” Here are some more ideas for how to make small talk but increased well-being and positivity aren’t the only benefits of small talk. Engaging in small talk can open the door to interesting and meaningful connections—if you are aware and listening. These tips can help take the stress out of small talk and create a quality conversation:

1. Get your mind right. If you spend the week anticipating and worrying because you know you will feel uncomfortable, you’ve set yourself up for failure. Remember why you are going—to celebrate a friend on their special day, to meet others who share your interest or to connect with your coworkers.

2. Decide who you’d like to meet before you go. Look at who else will be there and plan to meet those who might share something in common with you. This might be someone who knows a mutual friend, a fellow baseball fan or a business owner living your dream.

3. Read a lot. The more you read, the more trivia or facts you pick up that can turn into conversation material. It can be online or in books and journals, but it can help drive a conversation with someone you don’t know much about.

4. Be interested in things to be interesting. I find people have nothing to say because they don’t seem to have any interests. That makes them uninteresting. However, people with hobbies and interests always seem to have a topic or an opinion to share, and they can use that as a launching point to get someone else involved in the discussion.

5. Make a game out of making small talk. Trick your mind into making it seem easier and more fun by playing a game with yourself. Commit to at least an hour. Plan to meet at least five people. Challenge yourself to learn two new things. This mental shift can help tame the anxiety and make the conversation more fun.

6. Relax and be present in the conversation. Rather than try to plan what you will say next, relax and focus on what the other person is saying. Listen. Be present in the conversation and the other person will notice. They will feel appreciated, and the conversation will flow naturally.

7. Take responsibility for meeting others. Don’t wait for others to approach you. Say hello first. If you always expect others to make the first move, you’ll be disappointed. And the more you do it, the more comfortable you’ll be. World renowned communicator Dale Carnegie said “The world’s greatest conversationalist, is someone who says little or nothing.” Isn’t it nice when someone says to you I feel like I could talk to you forever or I feel like we have known each other for some time now.

Strength and courage,
Wade