Even though I often warn our agents to be aware of the language they use with their clients, that they don't use industry buzz words that all agents understand but clients who don't live in this industry may not. However, I just got caught doing the exact same thing with our agents. I learned that I might just as well have been speaking Chinese for the last few years.
Recently we have added the copyrighted Complete Agent Development program, Momentum to our ongoing services for our agents to get free training in their practices. I have to confess that I love this program. It is very complete and really gives agents a clear path to operate their businesses in an intentional and proactive manner and moves away from the spontaneous and reactive state most REALTORS and small business owners find themselves.
While leading a class on Buyer Lead Conversion I discovered where I was at a disconnect. As I was explaining that the course led us through a very effective Critical Sales Path system with scripts moving the client through the five stages of you must move them through. When the look of deer in the headlights reflected back to me I asked, who was currently using a critical path system? When no one was, I asked who has ever heard of one – again the same results. Out of eight classes around the state I only found a few who knew or were using this process, and all of them came from a professional sales background. This was a wake up call, where my message had often been poorly communicated by me, including when talking with our agents about the design of our Listing Presentation we create each year for all our agents. I would speak about how it was designed to follow a Critical Sales Path approach, overcoming objections with Silent Sellers throughout with attention to all four of the DISC profiles. What this taught me is that I was trying to explain a tool for them in a language that negated the message.
So my next quest is to now teach it, but before doing so, to explain why you want to know it. What's in it for you to know? To get an image in your mind, if you are at all skilled with playing checkers or chess, this is much of what it is like. It is doing a "move" now that is setting up the "move" several turns away from now. It is like you are doing a play where you know the story and script but your client doesn't and you lead them to where THEY WANT to be by your questions.
Why do you want to learn this? Let me explain my very first year selling homes was in 1983 where we enjoyed 19.6% interest rates. You can imagine no one who was living in a home paying 6% mortgage interest was moving to one with 19.6%, so we had to target renters. We would send out letters to apartments that said, "If renting made sense your landlord would do it." We then told them if they made X amount of income and made an appointment at our office and bring a check stub and rent receipt we would pay them 50.00. We later learned that 25.00 worked just as well. When they came in they couldn't be more skeptical they assumed it was a scam or something like a time share. I would book 7 appointments a day and when you sat down with them I would ask for the rent and check stub and cut them their check immediately, once done you could visibly see them relax.
From there we started the critical sales path, we did a warm up to create a friendly environment. We did a needs and wants analysis, a financial assessment then showed them the differences between renting and owning. At the end of the hour they were getting excited! They came in for the 50.00 and had no interest in being in the home market, but now they realized they could and were excited. I then took it away from them, told them to go home and think about it, ask family, accountant, etc, but offered an opportunity for them to lock up the price and location of a home with a "lot deposit" that would last for 48 hours. If they decided no, come pick up the check and no harm, no foul or they could just do the paperwork on their new home.
This approach, this sale path, this checker board, took people who had no interest in a home walking in the door to giving a check to hold one in one hour. 7 per month wrote an agreement, with about 4-5 that actually qualified and closed. I am not suggesting that exact thing is what you would use, but the critical path approach allows you to serve your client by helping them move through all the stages of the process the most efficiently in an intentional and proactive approach. This will lead to, not only more closing for you, but more referrals. Clients do not refer to agents just because they like them, they refer to experiences with systems they like.
I look forward to going into detail with you in upcoming classes.
