What Realtors, Brokers and Associations Want in 2014

In the movie Jerry Maguire, Jerry had told his only client at the time, “Help me help you!”, he genuinely wanted to know what he could do to make sure his client was happy to meet his expectations. This week I sent out a message to my community to find out what wanted in 2014.  They consist of Realtors, broker owners, and association executives/staff.  This list of feedback will serve as the backbone of the content I create in 2014 in which I will deliver as blog posts, how to videos, and webinars for my community.  Join my community by entering your email address at the end of this blog post.

This week I sent out a message to my community to find out what wanted in 2014.  They consist of Realtors, broker owners, and association executives/staff.  This list of feedback will serve as the backbone of the content I create in 2014 in which I will deliver as blog posts, how to videos, and webinars for my community.  Join my community by entering your email address at the end of this blog post.

Here is the feedback from the survey of what Realtors, Brokers and Associations Want in 2014.

1. Getting through the clutter to reach potential clients. People get so much information. How can one biz stand out?
2. Consistently maintaining and updating my database to stay in touch with clients. There are so many programs out there, plus what our company offers and it is frustrating to try to have everything in several places.
3. Getting info out there via Facebook, etc.
4. Good leads, not the bogus ones you usually get in a “pay for” company. I would rather have 1 actual lead a month then 50 that are worthless.
5. Need to manage my time better and be willing to delegate
6. Marketing to Realtors so that they will want to take my CE classes.
7. Developing a system – a system – that can be adhered to and successful.
8. Consistent Organization
9. I need help getting getting more customers to respond to me- I receive leads – contact them – then don’t hear back from them- I do ask – I need to be able to handle rejection better-
10. More consistant marketing and a good assistant.
11. Systems for prospecting
12. Flow chart with task details and review plan so I can quickly evaluate success and non-success,
13. Effective ways to get seats filled for non-CE real estate education events
14. Contact management. social media
15. systems
16. I need to get more organized. This survey makes me think about what I really need to do for 2014. I need someone to review all the social media and software to make everything work the most efficient without duplication. I probably need a virtual software person but then I need to know all my current social media places..lol.
17. Lead generation
18. Better marketing and communications
19. Getting people to look at your website
20. Help doing techythings: programming RingCentral numbers, setting up website, FB business page, etc
21. An assistant
22. As an owner/broker, recruiting is the toughest thing to make time for. An new exciting way to reach agents would be wonderful.
23. Great video listing presentation.. I use an iPad if you feel that will make a better presentation the a computer.
24. Distinguishing ourselves as true Exclusive Buyer Agents when all the traditional Realtors claim they are “buyer agents” and have listings. We don’t have listings.
25. System on staying in touch with past clients.
26. How to balance the needs of the different populations of our board – Big and small brokers, providing equal value.
27. Considering a coaching program, I am getting back in to sales in a new state. Licensed for 20 years but out of active selling for 2014.
28. Video.
29. Better time management, prospecting.
30. More listings.
31. A Business Plan Mentor.
32. Prospecting methods and lead generation.
33. Better systems to manage a real estate team.
34. Online marketing presence.
35. All my answers relate to how Doug can help the REALTOR association executives by presenting an NAR program.
36. The knowledge of how to bring on an assistant.
37. An easy follow up plan for attaining listings. a one stop on CRM, follow up, syndicating listings, and sellers reports system. Any thing to help focus and organize
38. Motivating business plan.
39. Proper prospecting – how to give value to farming area, how to pick a farming area,does networking work?-how to improve to get referrals.
40. Lead generation consistency.
41. Doing the obvious. Instead of more new super duper stuff. Perhaps, its the reminder of doing the basic simple things that move the ball closer to the goal line.
42. Member participation, involvement
43. Converting leads to actual clients, especially from social media.
44. More and better use of videos
45. Communication with members. Timely content without having to create it.
46. Utilizing mobile technologies
47. An effective accurate way to poll the members who are not involved in the association as leaders or on committees.
48. How to evaluate which email & social media avenues are worth maintaining!
49. I don’t want to grow my business any more. I just want to streamline.
50. I need to be more organized in keeping track of and contacting my customers & clients.
51. Finding the right tools for specific purposes – help me save time and money in communications, planning, marketing,…
52. I would like to get a response from my webpage.
53. Getting me more speaking gigs.
54. I need to be more organized. I am using a CRM, however not anywhere near its full potential. I am not staying in touch with the prospects or past clients like I need to do.
55. Getting back on track after accident 19 months ago has kept me grounded.. My friend good to hear from you again.
56. More Listings.
57. I need a new website. I am currently using a point 2 agent website. Examples of real estate websites that I like are Ellidavis.com and thesoldsolution.com.
58. efficiency… how to use all these great tools…. and especially how to use the ‘free’ versions or less expensive options… i.e., constant contact is just too expensive until you’ve built a really big list… there are other options – but how best to get started using.
59. Follow up.
60. More focus, follow up and systems.
61. Creating a SINGLE cohesive presence.
62. Organization, systems
63. Better communicating the value of the education being offered to our members throughout the year; including new member education which will in turn create more excitement from our members.
64. More referrals.
65. I feel like we are really struggling to attract members to GRI classes. Participation dropped off last year and is really slow to start this year. Our typical emails aren’t doing the job anymore. People are probably blind to them now, and having the pro dev dept harangue us to push out more and more emails as we get closer to deadlines definitely isn’t working! Also, as we’ve moved our domain and email over to Google, we would appreciate some nifty tools and apps to make it work better for us!
66. Closings and money.
67. More lead generation.
68. Just doing it. I believe I can — but, then, implementing seems like a scary proposition. I don’t know why — I’m known as “the Professor” at my Office; but, in my business, I feel I could be and should be “more.”
69. Contact Management and follow through with existing clients.
70. Remain focused on goals/activities and not getting distracted.
71. Social Media.
72. Keeping in touch with my Sellers.
73. Team building, staying focused – so many ideas – finding someone else to implement my great ideas!
74. 1. Habit: Doing more of what I know to do more 2. Leverage (landing a good PA) and 3. Clarity (to guide all other decisions).
75. Twitter.
76. Short cuts for doing things on the computer that usually take a long time, or new information about things most people don’t know.
77. Financial Formula’s for success.
78. Marketing to get new leads.
79. Be more organized with my database.
80. Listing presentations when up against other agents…don’t know what happens, but seems like you are truthful about price and then lose it to someone who inflates the price
81. Need to talk to more people. My pipeline seems to have gone dry.

After reviewing the feedback I would like to point out some key points that will have a tremendous impact on what my community learns and what they impact.

#1 Prioritize the result before the tactic

If you want more social media, more online marketing, and more video in your business that automatically sets you up for failure.  Why?  It’s because that makes you more concerned with tactics than it does results.  What I really think you want is more qualify leads, more repeat and referral business, and decrease the amount of time you spend with clients all which are specific quantifiable results.  Then you choose the most effective tactics based on your existing skill sets, resources, and passion to excel.

#2 Prioritize leading over lagging performance indicators

A leading indicator is a measurement of how many high return activities/events were performed in a given time period.  For example, how many prospecting calls were made in one day, how many appointments were set, and how many agreements were signed  A lagging indicator is the end result after all of the activities were performed.  The might include customer satisfaction, conversion rate on contracts to closings, or how many sales were made in a given period.  While all of these are extremely important the priority goes to the leading indicators.  Why?  It is because activity breeds results.  If you know the conversion rate from online visitors to leads on your website (lagging indicator) but aren’t driving traffic (# of blog posts/videos/emails sent to list) then the conversion rate simply doesn’t matter.

#3  Systems integration

We as business owners must have a customer relationship manager, a website, a follow up system, a and a transaction coordinator.  But most of don’t have a visual process map that outlines the start to the end of a transaction.  If you were to hire a virtual assistant or another team member they wouldn’t have any idea where to plug themselves in which requires more time spent training, higher chance of error, and more frustration on both parties.  I’m going to be highlighting some key systems and business processes in future blog posts so stay tuned for more.