Luxury Clues

Six Ways to Attract More Real Estate Clients by Providing Stellar Customer Service

Almost all agents want their clients to have a great customer service experience. The difference between good and great is often minor. If you want to upgrade the experience your clients have, here are six suggestions.

1. Connection is the name of the game
More than anything else, your clients want you to hear their needs and be responsive to those needs. This means asking questions about what matters to them, exploring how they live their lives, and never trying to run your own agenda. When it comes to a great customer experience, making your clients the center of your universe is a winning strategy.

2. Start on time and end early
Men and women differ in their attitudes toward time. Men are more likely to feel they have limited time and are more likely to become angry when appointments run late. To address this difference, always tell your clients your appointment will take 20-30 minutes longer than you anticipate. By allowing extra time, you avoid having to apologize about traffic or other delays. You also seem more efficient. Best of all, your clients are delighted to finish early.

3. Demonstrate you understand their smallest needs
Before taking buyers out to view property, determine what types of drinks and snacks they enjoy. Have these available. If they are Starbuck's fans, pick up their favorite coffee drink and have it waiting when they walk into your office. If your clients have children, give the kids a coloring book or some games to keep them occupied during your appointment.

4. Be a conduit of information
Whether your sellers are relocating or you have out of area buyers, be a resource for neighborhood and Chamber of Commerce information. For relocating sellers, personally contact several relocation agents. Interview each agent to determine who is most competent. Send the agent digital pictures of the sellers' present property. For buyers, create a welcome kit packed with information about local vendors, schools, places of worship, recreational activities, etc. In either case, update your clients a minimum of once weekly in terms of new listings, sales, and changes in interest rates.

5. Collect available virtual tours and burn them on a disk
This is a time saver for both you and your clients. Rather than taking your sellers out to see the comparable sales, give them a CD or a travel drive that shows competing listings. For relocation buyers, sending them a CD packed with virtual tours will dramatically reduce the number of homes you will have to show. It will also help you refine your search parameters more quickly.

6. Focus on the customer experience, not the outcome
Let go of any attachment that you have to outcome. When your focus is on obtaining your goals rather those of your clients, you will not provide a stellar customer experience. In contrast, when clients realize you only want the very best for them, you create the type of experience that converts them into raving fans who will refer you business for years to come.

Posted by Bernice Ross, If you liked this post, please subscribe to our free real estate newsletter for the latest tips and strategies for building your real estate business

How Much Would You Make in Commissions if You Were Working in Australia

I have just spent an amazing five days at Real Estate Connect. I'm sitting in the lobby of the Palace Hotel with Glyn Morgan who is the CEO of Professionals Group--a 325 office real estate company based in Austral-Asia. Glyn has love the conference. I asked him what the biggest differences are between Australian real estate and U. S. real estate.

Glyn says, "The biggest is in the commission structure. An agent in Australia earns on average 2.4 percent (that's for both side of the deal!)

Because there is no multiple listing service, you own the entire transaction."

So the bottom line, they make about as much as we do, but have to manage both sides.

I'll be going to Australia and New Zealand later this month--look for more posts about what's happening down under.

Posted Bernice Ross, CEO RealEstateCoach.com  author of the #1 Selling Book at NAR 2008, Real Estate Dough Your Recipe for Success

A Simple Business Plan for Real Estate Agents that Really Works

Are you still operating without a business plan? Sadly, over 90 percent of the Realtors in today's market lack a business plan. What stops most people is that they feel overwhelmed by the process. Given how tough today's market is, you do need a plan. The plan below uses a simple 3-2-1 approach that will keep build your business and keep it strong for years to come. Here's what to do:

 Each day before you leave the office, answer the following three questions in writing:

 1.  What are the three most important activities for me to complete tomorrow?

Every day, look at which of your clients is “closest to the money” i.e., who is most likely to close a deal. Next, write down three activities that will move you closer to your next commission check. Complete these three activities first before tackling anything else for the day.

 2.  What will I do today to generate a minimum of two new leads for my business?

Make generating and converting leads your top priority every day. Failure to generate leads today means no new business tomorrow.

 3.  What is the one thing I will do to care for myself and my family?

Lack of self care makes you unattractive to the highest quality clients. More importantly, the whole point of working is to have a quality life. When you short-change your family time, you short change the most valuable part of your life. 

Having a written business plan is one of the best strategies you can implement now to help your business profit tomorrow.  

Posted by Bernice Ross, CEO www.RealEstateCoach.com-the Place You Go to Make Real Estate Dough!

Thirteen Coaching Tips to Help You Thrive in Today's Tough Real Estate Market

It is not a question of if you will experience situations that will test you; the question is when will they occur and will you be prepared to deal with them. You also need to address HOW you handle a situation where your best is simply not good enough. How can you prepare yourself to better handle these situations? Here are some suggestions to help you grow your effectiveness at handling challenging situations in today's tough real estate market. Please note these are not tips and techniques to grow your business--they're about your mindset--the ultimate secret to winning in any situation. 

 1. Self care. Taking great care of yourself is the only way to stay in top mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual condition. Working from this place will make coping with any challenge easier.

 2. Know yourself. Giving your best is subjective and personal. Being able to observe and acknowledge when you are giving your personal best at any specific moment is an essential skill.

 3. Allow your best to grow over time – ignore the desire to defend that you are doing your best and you can’t do any more. No matter how good you are, there’s always room for improvement. Also, small improvements over time add up to big changes in overall effectiveness.

 4. Support – coach, friend, mentor—anyone who encourages you to be at your best, even when it’s painful. Being at your best requires a solid base of support.

 5. Partnership – working directly with someone when you come face to face with a situation allows you more resources than tackling it alone. Just make sure that you and your partner are aligned and working toward the same outcome.

6. Regularly train yourself to grow and improve. Waiting until the last minute to get trained is a good way to magnify the size of any challenge you face. Start your training early and maintain it for an extended period of time.

 7. Mental toughness – learning how to handle a tough situation is like learning any other skill. First gain awareness, then practice, and finally, use feedback to improve. Again, start doing this BEFORE you need to use it.

 8. Give yourself permission to exceed your abilities without having the need to beat yourself up. Each of us is our own worst critic. Exceeding your abilities is much easier when your inner critic is on holiday.

 9. Make a list of 10 significant situations where your best wasn’t enough and describe how you handled the situation. Write down what worked for you and what didn’t work. Keep this list handy and refer to it when facing challenges.

 10. When faced with a challenge where you have few strengths or abilities, minimize any consequence of failure. Take small steps that you can easily deal with and avoid taking huge risks.

 11. Express gratitude often to your self and others who support you to grow. Pushing yourself beyond your limits is a sign of courage and a willingness to grow.

12. Stay present. Every day is a new day – what may have been easy yesterday might prove challenging today and vice-versa. Use what you have available today, not yesterday.

13. Laugh. Pushing your abilities will undoubtedly make for some incredible stories and comedy.

Posted by Bernice Ross, CEO RealEstateCoach.com and MCC (Master Certified Coach) Need a real estate coach? We have group and individual coaching at all price points--you don't have to face this nasty market alone. Visit us at www.RealEstateCoach.com to get the real estate coaching and training you need today to succeed tomorrow. 

Create a Positive Mindset No Matter What the Real Estate Market Does

Maintaining a positive mindset in today’s turbulent economic environment is more challenging than ever. What will happen if the financial bailout doesn’t work? How will people buy homes when lenders have limited funds? How many more people will lose their jobs? As a result, how many more will face foreclosure?

While we cannot control what the markets and the government do, the one thing we can control is our mindset. One of the most powerful ways to create a positive mindset is to control your environment.

Buckminster Fuller, the inventor of the geodesic dome, once said, “Environment is stronger than will.” Even though you intend to change your thoughts and actions, if you don’t address your environment, you will be unable to create sustainable change. For example, if you listen to the negative news around you, your environment will support you to attract negative events. Psychologists call this self fulfilling prophecy. What you concentrate on and what you expect to happen generally does happen.

Daniel Ariely, the author of Predictably Irrational, conducted a study where college students listened to several elderly people describe the difficulties they had walking. After the students finished the experiment, Ariely measured how quickly the students walked through the hall leading away from the lab. The students who heard the negative descriptions actually took longer to walk through the hall as compared to the control group.

Another experiment with elementary school children demonstrated the power our thoughts have on our physical environment. Elementary school students filled two bowls of water. When they walked by the first bowl, they told the water that it was “bad.” When the walked by the second bowl, they told the water how good and wonderful it was. When the water was examined under an electron microscope, the water molecules in the “bad” water were ragged and ill formed. The molecules in the “good” water formed beautiful, well defined patterns. Consequently, never underestimate how much your environment can influence your real estate success.

Many of us attempt to use will power to accomplish our goals with little thought given to the role our environment may play. Sadly, without a supportive environment, will power eventually runs out of steam. Our projects or great intentions die on the vine.

Ultimately, successful people manage both their thoughts and their environment. Success does not come from will power alone; your environment is equally important. While establishing an “ideal” environment is an on-going process, here are four simple strategies to get you started.

1. Surround yourself with like-minded people
Choose friends that fully support your goals as evidenced by their thoughts, comments, and actions. For example, if you are interested in losing weight and one friend keeps encouraging you to eat dessert, avoid eating meals with this person. This is one of the reasons that groups such as Weight Watchers and AA are so successful—members find support from others who are going through the same experience.

2. Clean and upgrade your existing environment
Start small, whether it’s your bedroom, office, or even your car. If cleaning your office or your desk is too overwhelming, then clean at least one area where you can work. Next, commit to keeping this area clean. To experience the effect this has on your productivity, work in the clean area for an hour and then work in one of the chaotic areas for an hour. Normally there will be a substantial difference in your productivity.  

3. Turn off the negativity
Listening to negative comments from others can quickly destroy your positive attitude. Turn off the news, stop reading the paper, and run from those who want to focus on how bad things are. If you can’t escape a negative rant, you can ask, “Please tell me one thing that went right today.” If the person says, “Nothing is going right,” you can point out that they have their health, a roof over their head, clean water, good food, etc. If you catch yourself falling into being negative, stop immediately and identify at least five things that are right about your life.

4.  Join a mastermind group
An excellent way to upgrade your environment is to join a mastermind group or some other group of highly successful people that meet regularly to help grow their business. Jack Canfield talks about how he didn’t start making lots of money until he changed his peer group. According to Canfield, if you take the average income of your ten closest friends and/or colleagues, you can accurately predict what your earnings will be. Upgrade your peer group and you will upgrade your income.

Creating a supportive, positive environment is critical factor in achieving real estate sales success.

Posted by Bernice Ross--do you need help understanding how to use Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn in your business? If so, email me personally at Bernice@RealEstateCoach.com to learn more about our social media webinar series that will unlocks the secrets of social media success. 

Ten Reasons Why Real Estate Agents and Brokers Should Own an iPhone

On January 1 I began my transition from PC to Mac and from Palm Treo to iPhone. I loved my Treo, but as I have learned to use my iPhone, it's a very different web experience. While my Macbook Pro continues to befuddle me (I need to get to the Apple Store for user lessons. I've already crashed the machine 3 times including once were it took customer support 30 minutes to walk me through the fix). Here are ten reasons to consider purchasing an iPhone even if you have to maintain a second phone for lockbox access.

1.  You have your tunes with you everywhere. The 300 series BMWs allow you to use your iPhone/iPod to hear tunes in your car. Beats having to carry around a bunch of CDs and constantly fool around with the CD player when you're driving.

2. When you surf the web, you see full web pages, not some strange excerpt from the site that is virtually impossible to read.

3. If you get lost, there's an application that finds your location and then you can plug in where you want to go by walking or on foot. It then charts out the correct path.

4. The battery life is about 3X greater than it was for my Treo. I can take calls, surf the web, listen to music, and still not have to charge the phone at the end of the day. My Treo required daily charging just from talking on the phone and downloading my daily emails.

5. Pictures on the iPhone are comparable to those taken with $300-$400 digital cameras.

6. MobileMe downloads your iTunes, your photos, calendar, and email automatically when you plug the phone in to your computer to charge or synch. Unlike the Palm that just gives you letter and number names on your photos, your photos are organized by date and event. It makes searching and uploading photos and music extremely simple.

7. The iPhone makes social networking easy when you're in the field. When you have a few spare moments, it's easy to make a post to Twitter using one of the iPhone applications such as Tweetie or Twitterific. It's also an easy way to stay up on other sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn. 

8. Play YouTube videos with ease on the iPhone--they chew up your battery, but they sure look good (sometimes faster and better quality than my cable service on my tablet PC).

9. Play fun games such as Solitaire, Monopoly, or run your own chocolate shop and improve your business skills.

10. The iPhone applications are tremendous fun. Get one that looks as if you are drinking a beer from your phone (iBeer), check out your mood by using your touch screen, or help clients decide to move (or not move) to your area with Lethal, a great application for real estate. Lethal provides you with the crime statistics, likelihood of car accidents, longevity stats, and what kinds of risks (i.e. health, disaster,accidents) exist in various areas. For example, the likelihood of having a car accident in Austin is 33 percent higher than in L.A.

Bonus reason--you immediately are seen as being tech savvy if you own an iPhone.

Posted by Bernice Ross, CEO of www.RealEstateCoach.com and author of the #1 Selling Book at this Year's National Association of Realtors--Real Estate Dough, Your Recipe for Real Estate Success. 

Ten Top Tips from Real Estate Connect 2009 to Build Your Real Estate Business Now

Last week's Real Estate Connect was packed with terrific information. Here are ten of my favorite tips:

1. Represent international clients. Agents who have international clients make, on average, 50 percent more than other agents. If you have an international client, there is a 50 percent chance they will actually close a transaction.

2.  2009 is the year to go with video. Adobe has a program that allows Google to translate video content into searchable data. Invest in a flip video camera or one of the web cams to post on top of your computer. Add video clips to your blog for higher search engine ranking.

3.  Get involved with social networking. A great place to start is LinkedIn.com. From there, try Facebook. I just did my first posts on Twitter today and received good wishes from quite a few people I know. (My Twitter is "bross"). These are important tools for being involved with the next generation of buyers and sellers.

4.  Best tip for handling a seller when they give you a "zestimate" (A price determined by Zillow's online evaluation tool that is off, on average, +/- 7.5 percent). Tell the sellers that you give "exactimates" based on knowledge of each home you used in your pricing model. Zillow relies on static data in computer databases without any means of comparing the hundreds of factors that influence price.

5. 85 percent of all real estate web visitors go directly to listings. Make sure that listings and sold prices are easy to access on your website. Make your listings more attractive with a well produced video tour of your community and multiple pictures of your listings.

6. Translate your listings into 13 languages for just $6.99 per listing at www.Immobel.com. 

7. Reduce your phone bills and have video conversations using Skype. It's a great way to connect with friends and family and the basic program is free. It's particularly useful when you want to have a face-to-face conversation with a relocation client. 86. Two other cool video applications include Eyejot and Tokbox.com. Tokbox was the one that was the most popular since you can have up to 36 people on the same video feed. Use these tools to send highly personalized messages. If you're scared of the camera, break in with www.12secondtv.com. You can only leave a 12 second message, but it's great for a birthday or other holiday wish.

8. The way to succeed online today using social media is to "embrace your DNA" according to keynoter Gary Vanderchurch. He shared what he did to sell wines from his store. Here are the stats: Billboard--170 orders; direct mail 302 orders; radio 240 orders, Twitter-1,700 orders. The first three advertising media cost considerable amounts of money while Twitter is free. The key is to engage in the conversation and not to do informercials about you.

9.  Xobni.com (which is Inbox spelled backward) is a plug-in for your Outlook that lets you see all of the conversations you have had with a single individual, much like you would do on Facebook.

10. My personal favorite from Glenn Cohen, the former CEO of Foxton's, a major discount brokerage that didn't make it here in the U.S., "Discount brands don't work in a down market." Exactly what I said in Waging War on Real Estate's Discounters way back in 2005.

Bottom line--be transparent, give clients what they want, stay connected using video and Twitter and prosper in 2009.

Posted by Bernice Ross, author of Waging War on Real Estate's Discounters and Real Estate Dough, Your Recipe for Real Estate Success.  Subscribe to Bernice's free weekly newsletter RealClues and get even more tips every single week.

 

Free Legal Advice from Attorneys about Real Estate, General Litigation Issues, & Our Chance to Rate Them!

I just came across a really cool social media site that provides free legal advice from licensed attorneys. Real estate professionals are constantly bombarded with questions about foreclosure, bankruptcy, and a host of other issues. Unless you have a license to practice law, many of the questions clients ask are inappropriate for us to answer. This new site. www.Avvo.com is a tremendous resource for finding good attorneys in your area. Like many of the sites that are now starting to rate real estate professionals, this site provides strong feedback about the competency of attorneys in your area based upon a variety of sources of feedback.

Since this was started by the folks who started Expedia, it has a number of the same functions that would see on Expedia or Trip Advisor. Candid feedback is the name of the game.

Even more importantly, however, both you and your clients can pose questions to the attorneys. Those participating often have dialogues about the answers to sticky legal questions. While not every question gets answered, the site had a wealth of information regarding legal matters, especially in the areas of foreclosure, bankruptcy, divorce, and other real estate related issues.

What I liked most of all is that we finally get to rate attorneys--finally, you get to be the judge!

Posted by Bernice Ross, CEO of www.RealEstateCoach.com and author of the #1 Selling Book at this Year's National Association of Realtors--Real Estate Dough, Your Recipe for Real Estate Success. 

The Ghost of Thanksgiving 2005

This is the column that ran in RealClues Thanksgiving week 2005. Unfortunately, I had no idea how accurate my predictions would be. Be sure to read to the end for some positive news about current indicators:

     

From Thanksgiving Week 2005:

 

The buzz at NAR was that even the most heated markets are now slowing. Inventories are increasing at a dramatic rate. Could the next buyer’s market be just around the corner?

     

A buyer’s market is our industry’s worst nightmare. Unlike a seller’s market where there is limited inventory and what is listed sells quickly, a buyer’s market is one where there is too much inventory and very little activity. Worse yet, while sellers cannot under price their property in a strong seller’s market, in a buyer’s market, overpricing is the kiss of death. Imagine a market where prices are going down 1.5 percent per month. (This was the case in

Southern California

in the early nineties.) You work hard to obtain a price reduction and then the market takes another nose dive even before you can post your price reduction to the MLS. Your sellers become increasingly more desperate and often blame you because no matter what you do, their property doesn’t sell.

     

If we are actually entering a buyer’s market, expect dramatic changes in how you will be doing business. Here’s a list of things that you may be saying “Bye-bye to” in the very near future.

 

1. Multiple offers

When there is too much inventory, buyers rule. Instead of receiving several offers at once, you may be waiting months before you see a single offer. When the seller finally does receive the offer, it is often substantially less than the seller wants to net.

                

2.  Short market time

In a buyer’s market, you have to work to sell your listings unless you have an unusually desirable property listed at a low price. Agents, who have become accustomed to selling their listings without marketing, will be struggling to come up with marketing plans that generate buyers.

 

3.  Discounted commissions

When there are too many sellers and not enough buyers, builders generally take the lead in paying increased commissions. The trend generally starts with builders offering mortgage buy-downs, free up-grades, televisions, and other benefits. When sales slow, builders raise the commission rates that they pay to agents. When owners of resale listings become desperate, agents advise their sellers to match these incentives. Instead of a competition to see who can undercut commissions the most, the exact opposite happens. The competition becomes about who can offer the best incentives to motivate agents and buyers to see their listings.

       

4. Weak business models

The strong market coupled with extremely low interest rates has been very forgiving of poor business models. In the last major downturn, only the very strongest companies survived. Many of these exist today only because their mortgage and title business carried their companies while their real estate businesses hemorrhaged money.

     

5. Flipping

Flipping comes to a grinding halt in a buyer’s market. No more painting a property and then selling it for a huge profit. Remodeling slows down dramatically. The market shifts to professional investors who search for bargains. Their strategy is to acquire distressed properties and hold them for long term rentals. They may sell in the next seller’s market or hold these properties as part of their portfolio. At the height of the last buyer’s market in Los Angeles, there was 60 months of inventory on the market. There's no profit in flipping if it takes months or even years to sell your product.

   

6.  Lenders making aggressive loans

Lenders who have made 100 percent loans may very well be out of business when there is a dramatic increase in the number of foreclosures. The same may be true for banks who have secured business loans with real property. Many owners have refinanced their properties in order to buy cars or pay off credit card debt. When these owners have no equity and are unable to pay an adjustable rate mortgage rate increase, those with marginal credit may simply decide to give the keys back to the lender. 

      

7. Brokers and agents who don’t track and evaluate ROI

In a down market, knowing your numbers is critical. Since there are only a limited number of transactions, marketing costs soar. Agents and brokers who fail to track which advertising vehicles are effective, will soon find their profit margins dwindling. In the case of brokerages, if the owner is not profitable, the agents may soon be searching for a new place to work.

    

The amount of inventory on the market is the best indicator of what will be taking place in terms of future sales. It always leads the shift in the market. The good news about 2009 is that much of the foreclosure inventory is being either worked out where people can stay in their homes or sold. As inventories decrease, prices will flatten. Eventually, they may begin to climb again. Hold a positive thought--2009 may be better than many people think.

 

Posted by Bernice Ross, www.RealEstateCoach.com --Home of the Real Estate Dough training and coaching programs--the most comprehensive, innovative solutions available today for increasing your real estate business--If you want to start making more dough, don't wait--order today at www.RealEstateDough.com

 

Your "Little Black Book" of Luxury Resources

When people used to keep their personal contacts in a "little black book," they seldom were eager to share them. The concept was that this contact information was private and special.

Today, we no longer carry "little black books." Instead, our contacts exist in online databases. To take advantage of this trend, you can create the equivalent of a little black book on social networking sites such as LinkedIn.com. The best thing about this solutiono is that it actually helps you grow your database.

In the past, creating and maintaining a strong referral database was a constant challenge. You had to rely on mailers or word of mouth referrals. Unless you designed something unique, you were possibly mailing the same person exactly the same materials that another agent is sending. Furthermore, the phrases that say, “I’m never too busy for your referral” or, “Oh by the way, if you know of someone who is thinking about buying or selling a home, I definitely would appreciate your referral” have been so overused that they are no longer effective.

In contrast, LinkedIn.com is one of the quickest ways to expand your referral database. Their motto at LinkedIn is “Relationships matter.” This site is an excellent best business-to-business way to connect on the web. Currently there are more than 19 million experienced professionals in this network. That's quite a big little black book.

When you join LinkedIn, you create an on-line profile that summarizes your educational and professional accomplishments. Your profile helps you locate others as well as helping them locate you. For example, once you post your profile, the system notifies you of other people who share the same associations that you do. This is a quick and easy way to locate old classmates, former colleagues, as well as to expand your current referral network

To use LinkedIn to build your luxury referral database, invite the people you know to become members. As you meet new luxury buyers and sellers, invite them to become members as well. Once they join, you then have access to the people who belong to their LinkedIn network as well. 

LinkedIn also has a place for recommendations. This means that anyone who is in your network can view testimonials posted on your behalf. This is a great way to build on-line credibility as well as to expand your referral database. For example, ask past clients to join and to post a recommendation on your behalf. When your past client posts the recommendation, it appears on both your profile and your client’s profile. Thus, if a friend of your past client is looking for a real estate agent and sees the recommendation, there’s a high probability that you will receive that referral with little or no effort on your part.

LinkedIn system also makes recommendations about other people that you may know. For agents, this translates into a wealth of potential referrals, both locally and nationally. By connecting, you now have the ability for others in your network to refer business to you. This is especially useful if your contacts have left the area and still have friends and family where you work. Alternatively, you can also refer business outside your market area as well.

If you’re not linking up your clients with LinkedIn, you’re missing one of the most important opportunities today to generate referrals, post testimonials, and grow your on-line credibility.

Posted by Bernice Ross, www.RealEstateDough.com Look for Bernice's New Book--Real Estate Dough, Your Recipe for Real Estate Success--352 pages of the best real estate tips, strategies, and insider secrets ever! Don't wait--order today to get the edge on tomorrow!

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