When I first got into real estate sales, I copied other agents and simply hoped for the best. I figured that I would do the same things they were doing, but better. I would return calls faster. I would do a better job negotiating. I would give better client service. All of this, I thought, would lead me to more home sales. Maybe you've followed this same path in your business, too.
What I finally realized is that it's extremely difficult to outwork your competition if you're doing the exact same things they are. Why? Because there's a lot of competition.
I decided to change this. I didn't want to work any harder. I wanted to work smarter. We've all heard the saying a million times, but we don't always follow it.
I began to track everything my business did. For example:
I tracked the number of leads generated with each advertisement.
I tracked the number of referrals I received.
I tracked the number of appointments I set with those leads and referrals.
I tracked my conversion of those appointments into home sales.
I tracked the number of home sales that fell apart because of financing or inspection issues.
As my business grew, I tracked these numbers for each of my agents, too.
I was trained as public accountant, so tracking numbers was in my skill set! I learned many things from tracking the numbers. First of all, I learned that what you measure, improves. Simply by tracking these numbers in detail, I made progress.
However, tracking allowed me to quickly spot problems within my business, too. I was able to forecast when a drop-off in home sales was coming. We've all been through the peaks and valleys in this business, right?
One great month, followed by a slow month. This happens because we stop generating new leads and referrals during our great month. We stop setting appointments with prospective new clients because we're too busy. "Signing new clients can wait because I've got to close this sale ..." Ah ... no, signing clients can't wait.
I could always see the drop in home sales coming because the number of leads generated for a given period of time dipped. The drop in leads resulted in a drop in sales.
This made me notice certain trends within the business. I'll share just one of these trends with you here. That trend was the percentage of leads that eventually became home sales.
Let's say that, on average, you generate 100 leads a month and you typically sell around 4 homes each month. This is a trend that you can leverage going forward because you have a very good idea that you'll convert 4 percent of your leads into sales.
So if you want to bump your monthly home sales to eight, you'd have to increase your leads each month to 200. Or if you wanted to shoot for a huge transformation and sell 20 homes per month, you would have to generate 500 new leads every month.
Using tracking information, I slowly began incrementally increasing the number of leads I generated each month. The new leads ultimately were converted into home sales at the same percentages previously established by the business. I simply continued this process until we averaged around 25 to 30 home sales per month.
I finally learned that I really could work smarter within my business. You work smarter by tracking every single detail within the business and using the information you pile up to your advantage. In the above example, the number of monthly leads was the driver of sales. I leveraged this data big time in my business.
So ... two very important questions for you:
1. What are you tracking in your business? If you're not tracking things consistently, you're making a very big mistake.
2. What percentage of leads become home sales for you? Do you know this number?
What I finally realized is that it's extremely difficult to outwork your competition if you're doing the exact same things they are. Why? Because there's a lot of competition.
I decided to change this. I didn't want to work any harder. I wanted to work smarter. We've all heard the saying a million times, but we don't always follow it.
I began to track everything my business did. For example:
I tracked the number of leads generated with each advertisement.
I tracked the number of referrals I received.
I tracked the number of appointments I set with those leads and referrals.
I tracked my conversion of those appointments into home sales.
I tracked the number of home sales that fell apart because of financing or inspection issues.
As my business grew, I tracked these numbers for each of my agents, too.
I was trained as public accountant, so tracking numbers was in my skill set! I learned many things from tracking the numbers. First of all, I learned that what you measure, improves. Simply by tracking these numbers in detail, I made progress.
However, tracking allowed me to quickly spot problems within my business, too. I was able to forecast when a drop-off in home sales was coming. We've all been through the peaks and valleys in this business, right?
One great month, followed by a slow month. This happens because we stop generating new leads and referrals during our great month. We stop setting appointments with prospective new clients because we're too busy. "Signing new clients can wait because I've got to close this sale ..." Ah ... no, signing clients can't wait.
I could always see the drop in home sales coming because the number of leads generated for a given period of time dipped. The drop in leads resulted in a drop in sales.
This made me notice certain trends within the business. I'll share just one of these trends with you here. That trend was the percentage of leads that eventually became home sales.
Let's say that, on average, you generate 100 leads a month and you typically sell around 4 homes each month. This is a trend that you can leverage going forward because you have a very good idea that you'll convert 4 percent of your leads into sales.
So if you want to bump your monthly home sales to eight, you'd have to increase your leads each month to 200. Or if you wanted to shoot for a huge transformation and sell 20 homes per month, you would have to generate 500 new leads every month.
Using tracking information, I slowly began incrementally increasing the number of leads I generated each month. The new leads ultimately were converted into home sales at the same percentages previously established by the business. I simply continued this process until we averaged around 25 to 30 home sales per month.
I finally learned that I really could work smarter within my business. You work smarter by tracking every single detail within the business and using the information you pile up to your advantage. In the above example, the number of monthly leads was the driver of sales. I leveraged this data big time in my business.
So ... two very important questions for you:
1. What are you tracking in your business? If you're not tracking things consistently, you're making a very big mistake.
2. What percentage of leads become home sales for you? Do you know this number?
About the Author:
Rob Minton, who reinvented this real estate sales business to sell 269 homes to a limited number of clients, has written a very practical book on how real estate agents can sell more homes For a limited time, you can download this entire book for free by visiting Renegade Millionaire Strategies for Real Estate Agents
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