Ramping up Productivity

We live in a world where the year never stops. Seasons and holidays keep rolling by, and consumers won’t wait – they want results Right Now. So my Coaching Tip this week is about ramping up productivity.

It all starts with what time you go to bed and then get up in the morning. I’m going to tell you how to own your morning and get the most out of your day by setting intent. And I’ll give you three things you should address on a daily task list.

You’ll get some simple phone hacks that will make your phone time much more productive, and a few other productivity hacks to help you stay focused on doing the activities that really count.

The secret is building systems that promote great workflow. I’ll outline the communications plan in our business that’s really ramping up productivity. And I’ll show you how getting up just one hour earlier every day can result in incredible revenue gains.

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s Coaching Tip, and I look forward to seeing you here again next week.

Ep 226 – How to Break into New Markets

In this High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents, Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips discuss breaking a new market whether it’s a higher-end, a volume market, or a new geographical area. Alex tells how he breaks new markets and price points, he notes mistakes agents often make and advises appealing to the right demographic. They look at lead generation and Josh advises not being too choosy about which clients you’ll work with. Alex tells how he avoids getting nervous over handling extremely expensive listings and advises learning to adapt appropriately to the property you’re dealing with.

Josh warns against letting your insecurities get in the way of the deal and relates a case of an agent presenting the right story to win a hesitant vendor over. He advises not being afraid to go after markets and focusing on building great customer relationships.

Picking Markets – The Indicators To Watch

As an agent, you’ve got to learn some basic indicators to choose the right markets at the right times. In this week’s Coaching Tip I’ll give you tips on picking markets, and indicators to watch so you understand what’s happening in your marketplace.

It’s critically important for you to be an agent for all markets – the low end as well as the higher end, with an even mix of listings and price points in between. The customer you serve now may be connected to other potential sellers, buyers, landlords and investors.

Ultimately you’re in the trading market to help people trade properties they have and buy something better. If you can make them feel safe, and sell a clear vision around what it is that they want, you will win their business.

It’s all about picking markets that really move, paying attention to trends in those markets, and knowing the crucial indicators to watch. These skills will rapidly amplify your results on the inside of your business.

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s Coaching Tip, and I look forward to seeing you here again next week.

Customer Obsession.

You either focus on the customer or the competitor. One will use your services and pay your invoice; the other won’t. The real estate industry is a fast-moving, highly innovative space. The challenge is most of what we call innovation is the duplication of what competitors do in the marketplace.

The fastest-growing companies in any industry are the ones that can identify unmet, unidentified and unsatisfied needs of the customer and satisfy them.

As human expectations evolve with technology, we now buyer brands, products and services, because of what they enable us to do. Harley Davidson riders buy the bike because they buy freedom and the appearance that people in small country towns are afraid of them. When you use Uber, you gain the speed of the transaction.

Most agents compete on fee, and it’s a race to the bottom. The best in any industry compete on value – they compete on what they do for the customer. Market leaders in any market stay close to the customer, identifying the significant opportunities to create a competitive advantage. Let’s look at a few ways to scale the human touch.

Customer focus groups
One of our clients held a property management forum. They invited 28 first time landlords into a room to find out about their experience and what challenges they had. The challenges weren’t unique, but they were liberating. Simple things like how do I know I’ve bought the right property? How do I have a better relationship with my Property Manager? What’s essential and non-essential maintenance? When do I increase the rent and by how much? What are the notice periods?

Then something interesting happened. A Landlord asked, when should I buy my next investment property? How will I know? This lead the facilitator to ask a simple question, by show of hands how many of you would like an equity check on the home you live in? All 28 hands went up. Six months on from that forum 14 of the Landlords are now in the market as a buyer, three have sold their existing homes and bought new ones. The biggest market to serve is the one filled with your existing customers.

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Research departments
Finding out why customers decided to use you is the most valuable form of research. Imagine an independent research team selected five vendors and conducted a 1-hour interview with them. Simple questions like how many agents did you interview? How long was your relationship with the agent you chose before you selected them? Did you negotiate on a fee or did you proceed at the fee quoted?

When you do high-quality research like that, it allows you to tailor your pitch with real data. Data-driven decision is what drives the speed of the businesses momentum.

Feedback – the good, the bad and the ugly
Most look for feedback in the wrong places. When you lose a listing, you often call the vendor to find out why. They let you down gently and never really provide useful feedback. Instead, you lose confidence. The shift to interviewing customers and asking one simple question changes the game, what made you decide to use us?

The answer to that question becomes the opening dialogue to all future presentations. They’ve just revealed the secret sauce.

Jobs to be done methodology
Technology is forcing a shift to re-imagine what’s possible, by understanding all the jobs the customer gets done in and around the transaction. Simple things like preparing the home for sale, through to disconnection of utilities. We’re making great progress with firms setting up concierge services. The only challenge is I link concierge with a hotel, that organises tickets to a concert. One of our UK clients, renamed that department to the moving team. They do everything related to moving, and it’s had a marked impact on internal and external customer recognition.

Service lines
The big opportunity is to go deeper with your existing client, finding out their needs and how you can serve them with vertical or horizontal integration. One of our clients has 18 different service lines in their business. The size of the opportunity is so great; it’s worth the pain of change. Most agencies are made up of residential sales and property management. Their’s plenty of other opportunities like marketing, strata, insurance, projects, commercial – retail, industrial, commercial, finance etc.

If Steve Jobs had asked the customer what they wanted, they would have said a bigger CD wallet. They never had the vision of the iPhone. When the iPhone hit, we all learnt about needs we didn’t even know we had. And it’s the same in your business, stay close to your customer, they don’t even know their problems. The more you can develop and understand those customer problems, the faster you can differentiate in a meaningful way and create a lasting competitive advantage.

This article first appeared on Elite Agent.

Ep 225 – Predictions – how do you work out market trends?

This High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents features Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips on predicting markets. Josh begins with an overview of sources agents usually use, and Alex shares some of the things he looks at to predict where the market is going. Josh notes reasons why a seller may want to wait, and how a skilled agent can bring them to market earlier. Alex adds his approach for discussing a market forecast with clients to help them make a timely decision. They discuss the importance of understanding the customers’ needs and reason for the sale, and what that customer wants from their agent.

Josh offers examples of tragic events that impact the market and the effect that can have on supply and demand. They discuss knowing what your vendors are reading, how that can shift their faith in an agent, and how to communicate with them about it.

Digital Tracking of Consumers

It’s time to reimagine what’s possible with social media as your primary lead source, and in my Coaching Tip this week I’m looking at digital tracking of consumers. It’s a brand new world where our obsession with social makes this kind of consumer tracking possible.

We’ll discuss the value proposition of using a weekly email newsletter as a number one lead source for you, and how you can use this to build real customer relationships. I’ll also tell you what kind of content to put in your newsletter so people will read it.

We’ll talk about live chat for your website, and how to discover and use customer intent to develop newsletter content. I’ll also list the 3 reasons people will unsubscribe from your newsletter and explain why you should follow up with those people.

Digital tracking of consumers is about not losing customers when they need you most. We’ll look at building a quality database to help you use email to first connect with customers in the digital world, and then have better conversations with them face to face.

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s Coaching Tip, and I look forward to seeing you here again next week.

Ep 224 – Bringing that Positive Energy to everything you do

Today’s High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents features Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips talking about bringing positive energy to everything you do. Josh notes how negative we can be in our own heads, and Alex offers tips on maintaining high energy and positivity. Josh tells how he uses positive task orientation to set aspirational goals and suggests ways to “kill your ANTs” (Automatically Negative Thoughts). He also explains “playing from centre” to avoid extreme reactions to winning or losing.

They discuss the importance of surrounding yourself with positive people, Alex offers tips on getting back on track after a setback and re-setting quickly, and Josh advises going for that word “Next!” and simply moving forward.

Driving your Competitive Nature

Sometimes it’s your competitors who actually get you to step up. In this week’s Coaching Tip I’ll tell you how driving your competitive nature helps you to play at your best and be a great agent.

You know you rise to a higher level in those moments when you’re in direct competition with another agent. What if you could always be at that level? I’ll show you how to build and use your natural competitive nature by focusing on what you do for the customer.

Everything you do needs to lead to a great customer experience. This is how you differentiate yourself from other agents and win the business. I’ll explain the importance of responsiveness and why it’s so important to customers.

We’ll also talk about driving your competitive nature as an internal competition with yourself, and not letting the fear of what your competition is doing paralyse you. Stay focused on the customer and get the basics right, and your business will scale.

I hope you’ve enjoyed today’s Coaching Tip, and I look forward to seeing you here again next week.

+•-

As a business owner you’ve set up incredible platforms for success, but how do you get people to use those systems? In my Growth, Leadership and Management Tip this month I’ll tell you how to use Plus-Dot-Minus to lift engagement and use of your existing tools.

Plus-Dot-Minus lets you list the top key initiatives that will give your business traction and move the needle the most. Then you’ll rate the people in your team on which skills they’re best at, and who might get better with a little help.

I’ll step you through the process and offer examples you can apply inside of your own business. You’ll learn to spot patterns of deficiency and implement initiatives to change behaviour and improve performance.

The problem with most businesses is that they’re chasing too many things too often. Plus-Dot-Minus will get you clear on the things that will really make a difference. Know your strategy, measure results, and adjust what you’re doing to reach your target.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this month’s Growth, Leadership and Management Tip, and I look forward to seeing you here again next month.

Ep 223 – Fear of the Competition? Or winning with your USP?

In this High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips ask, are you pitching to customers or competitors? Alex weighs in on whether agents react more to what competitors might be doing, or to how we can solve customers’ problems. Josh suggests that agents tend to ask for feedback at all the wrong times, and tells how his own company conducts feedback calls. He also relates how to use this information to adapt your pitch, and to understand how your unique proposition actually fixes the customer’s problem.

Josh notes that a great agent understands client needs. Alex outlines reasons why a customer would choose to use him beyond just the numbers. He also tells how to be resilient by always having leads, and to keep going whether you list or miss the client.