In selling it doesn’t matter the product or service, there are certain skills and processes you must have to be effective in selling anything. Don’t think for a minute the top real estate agents in this industry don’t master their sales skills and sales processes daily. They take the time to sharpen the sword and understand the impact this time spent has on their real estate business success. Let’s have a look at the most important sales skills an agent needs today!
Sales Skills All Real Estate Agents Must Have
1. Managing your own time – Most agent's time is dictated and controlled by their buyers and sellers. Very few Realtors© exercise control of their own time. When the client says jump the agent normally responds with "how high"? Most agents put in a hard and long day and find at the end of the end they really didn’t get the results they were looking for. Working smarter and managing the highest and best use of your own time is a critical sales skill in real estate.
2. Engage in conversations with people – Every day you need to be able to engage in conversations with either people you know or don’t know about possibly buying or selling real estate. These conversations with people are the root of our database and key to our real estate success. Every day these conversations lead to you adding someone new to your database that don’t have an agent of choice. These people may buy or sell but just as important is them knowing someone else who might be and referring them to buy or sell with you. Get out there and have conversations every day in real estate.
3. Strong lead follow up – When someone gives you their name, phone number, email it is a customer trying to give you an opportunity to list something or help someone buy something. They are literally handing you the opportunity to earn their business and if served effectively you earn the commission. It amazes me the mindset of agents not wanting to “bug people” or the number of clients that said they never heard back from any agents. The discipline and skill of having strong lead follow up in real estate is another area where many agents can improve greatly.
4. Qualifying the buyer or seller – The ability to identify the "looker" from the buyer and the seller from the dreamer is another incredibly important sales skill for any real estate agent. My mentor taught me “Wade, learn how to lose them Tuesday before they use you and drop you on Saturday.” The power qualifying questions are as simple as “WHY?” “WHEN?” and “HOW? Cash or credit?” The answers to these simple but powerful questions are the secret to qualifying success.
5. Presentations – This is show business and your ability to wow and awe someone to buy or sell with you is key to your success. Having the ability to present to your audience and make them laugh, cry and feel is an incredibly powerful sales skill and something I just loved to master myself. Sales is storytelling and people love stories. Are you an engaging powerful storyteller or are you just someone that just talks, talks and tells? Master your presentation and storytelling skills and watch what happens for you and your business.
6. Handling objections, stalls and conditions – Knowing what to say and how to respond to basically twelve of the most common public responses is another powerful sales skill in real estate. Anticipating what they will say and respond to you and being able to respond with something that changes how they feel about how they think is such an important skill and process. Here are the terrible twelve most used objections agents will hear from clients. 1. We are going to wait 2. We aren’t sure 3. Will you cut your commission? 4. We don’t want a for sale sign 5. We are going to list with…. 6. We are going to try selling ourselves 7. We want, need or have to have $ _______ 8. We don’t want to put more money into 9. How much real estate do you sell? 10. How long have you been an agent? 11. Why didn’t you show our home when it was listed before? 12. You’re a new agent.
I encourage you to take the time to really work on these specific sales skills and processes. Putting in the time to polish these skills will help take your business to a whole other level, I promise. Where are your skills and processes lacking from the above list? Take action and finish 2018 strong and have skills and not rely on chance or luck and be market and economy proof as an agent!
Strength and courage,
Wade
