Ep 196 – The Intuition of “Knowing When”

Today’s High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents features Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips on the intuition of “knowing when.” Josh lists a number of instances where “knowing when” is key, and Alex relates the importance of having good rapport with clients. Josh addresses the urgency of the buyer and the seller, and Alex talks about leveraging the vendor’s fear of loss as their advisor. They discuss timing and buyer motivation, and helping vendors make the decision to accept the right offer.

Josh demonstrates motivational dialogue to an owner for driving urgency, he emphasises the need to have confidence in the advice you present to your clients, and Alex adds that you must be prepared to answer all queries with data, case studies, and conviction.

Why Increasing Fees Brings Market Share

How much time do you spend in determining pricing for your services? In this week’s Coaching Tip I’ll tell you how increasing fees brings market share and show you the massive bearing that your pricing structure has on your profits.

Simply presenting your fees in better ways allows you to earn more for doing the same work you’re doing now. Most agents base their fees around what the competition is doing, but if only one agency can be the cheapest and it’s not going to be yours, then how are you going to win?

I’ll tell you why cost, quality and speed are all critically important, and how to make sure your customer knows exactly what you can do for them. But first, you have to understand what it is you’re offering and how to price for that value.

You know the customer will question your fees, so I’ll give you some dialogue to bring the objection up first yourself and explain why your services present them with the best value. Present the numbers and specify the services you provide. This is how you’ll charge what you’re worth and be worth what you charge.

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

Ep 195 – What to Measure and When

In this High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents, Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips discuss what to measure and when as Josh begins with strategy measurement and adjustment. Alex talks about how measuring keeps you accountable and details his use of accountability sheets. Josh talks about lead sources and the importance of getting the right number of face to face appointments every week. Alex then states the number of appointments he does day by day throughout the course of a week and points out that you really have to do 50 appraisals just to sell ten houses.

Alex reveals some of the ways he stays focused in order to hit his goal numbers, and Josh illustrates the danger of coming to the 28th of June and not having met your goals for the financial year to emphasise the need to know your numbers each and every week.

Driving Urgency in Non-Competitive Markets

One of your jobs as an agent is driving urgency in non-competitive markets. My Coaching Tip this week will help you see where and how you can create competition under any market conditions because you won’t always have lots of people at every open home.

One key way to drive competition is to get buyers to the home during a photo appointment. I’ll show you how this sets the stage for compression selling. You could also have a second buyer show up to each buyer appointment to build an even higher sense of urgency.

It’s handy to have a tape measure with you so buyers can see on the spot whether their appliances and furniture will fit. Getting them engaged in the logistics this way moves you closer to making the deal.

I’ll explain the importance of understanding the buyer’s level of urgency to leverage negotiations, why off-market is everything you do apart from launching a property, and how to get the right buyers in and set the right price to sell the property as soon as you launch.

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

Ep 194 – Mastering Winter Markets

This High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents features Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips on mastering winter markets by listing ahead of the curve, and using on- and off-market propositions and a make-it-happen mindset April through July. Alex offers insights for helping vendors make better decisions based on market trends throughout the year. Josh notes the advantage of building your pipeline up to 90 days ahead and understanding the client’s situation, goals and expectations using hypotheticals.

Josh suggests the use of off-market to delay or express properties to market depending upon stock. Alex addresses the mental preparation of the seller to make the decision that they are moving. The discussion ends around how “off-market” is understood and used effectively.

Building Spring Momentum

It’s time to start building spring momentum right now. In this week’s Coaching Tip I’ll tell you why you have to think 30, 60, even 90 days ahead to see the opportunities that can become available to you.

Start by writing out a list of people you think will do a trade or transaction this year. When you have clarity around their reason and timeline for moving, then you can focus on the type of property they want to buy and the amount of money they want to spend.

As a great agent, you need to prospect ahead of the curve. Pay attention to news articles about finance, elections, and other events that will affect the markets over the next three months.

I’ll tell you some of the things you can be working on with clients well ahead of the sale, and show you why the urgency of the buyer is important right now to the possibility of getting a pre-commitment before going live to market.

Getting one, two, or even three pre-listings ahead is key to building spring momentum. Seize the opportunities to do trades and transfers with customers you’re meeting today. Doing the simple things really well is what will get you to where you want to go.

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

Why you need to be obsessed with underserved reoccurring customers

I want you to imagine this one person, sitting in the room, at every meeting you have, listening intently and watching your every action. They are the customer, and they can’t believe how poorly the industry is serving them. There’s a massive upgrade required to thrive in this business, and it starts with workflow.

Workflow matters, and it’s the answer to some of our biggest industry challenges. I’m not interested in the small self-serving stuff; I’m talking about significant structural reform, that if we get it right we future proof our businesses, have customers that demand to pay more and play to the strengths we don’t even see we have.

It’s called the four-dimensional customer, the buyer, the tenant, the landlord and the seller. Too often there are walls between our departments, where we are obsessed by the portion of the work we’re paid to do, rather than the overall experience we provide to the customer.

Here’s a basic. One customer served well leads you to your next customer. Sitting in your business you have a subscription model for revenue – it’s called Property Management, it’s consistent, produces amazing income, and looks after one the most valuable customers – the reoccurring customer – the Landlord.

Here are the challenges the Landlord faces:

  • Growing their portfolio
  • Knowing what to do with their portfolio to ensure it performs (asset maximisation)
  • Knowing what equity they have across their portfolio including their principal place of residence, so they know when to buy next
  • The normal life events in their personal life that force them to sell and buy a new principal place of residence

Current thinking – don’t let the sales team near the Landlords as they’ll try to sell the investment properties which will reduce the size of the portfolio. Financially reward the salesperson for Property Management leads, but don’t reward the Property Management team for sales leads, in fact, don’t discuss workflow at all and completely underserve the customer.

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Let’s take what we’ve always done as just that – the way we currently serve the customer. What would happen if there was a better way to help the customer in new and exciting ways that produce tangible value for all involved?

Here’s how. Let’s hold a workflow meeting, just like they do at Amazon. When a customer orders a book online they expect it to turn up; they don’t care about the departments or whose job it is, they want the book delivered. Our customers are no different. We bring the whole team – sales and PM together, to talk about customer problems and how together we can solve them.

Every time your agency lists a property, could we speak with our business development manager or the property manager and get them to search the PM system for any Landlords that live in that street or surrounds, or an investment property we currently manage in that street or surrounds, so that someone either the BDM, PM or salesperson can call the client to advise them of the listing, invite them to the open, advise them of the sale, and see what impact it has on their portfolio?

Given that could we opt our Landlords into a Landlords first program where we advise them of new investment properties that are coming to market that they could buy? A closed loop that prevents the leakage to first home buyers, and instead offers our existing property management to our existing Landlords first?

Landlords could access their newfound equity to grow their portfolio. It’s a simple idea, increasing the size and frequency of spend by one of our most important customer types.

We could also see our Landlords about where they live, to give them an idea of its value. How many of our Landlords live in the area you service? And how many have had a market appraisal on the home they live in?

The size of the opportunity is so great; it’s worth the pain of change. Think if your agency has 1000 properties under management, that’s 1000 Landlords, that’s 2,000 residential addresses you have under your control. Play to your strengths. If you could have your team working together, pulling in the same direction, with a clear strategy, measurement and coaching to adjust, we might win this race to achieve even better fees and dominate the markets we already serve rather than continually having to chase new one off customers.

This article first appeared on Elite Agent: https://eliteagent.com/why-workflow-works-wonders-josh-phegan/

Narrative and Initiatives

Energy drives peak performance for everything that happens inside of your business. As CEO you’re the one who gives that energy or takes it away. In my Growth, Leadership, and Management Tip this month I’ll help you get clarity on the narrative and initiatives of what it is that you’re doing.

Sometimes what you need is a different narrative. Right now your narrative might be about pushing for more buyer appointments, or doing annual checkups with past clients, or getting as many appraisals as possible in a month. But what are the specific initiatives you’re putting into your business?

I’ll give you some initiatives that work, explain how to put them into action, and list the positive outcomes you’ll have as a result of implementing them. Your job will be to build momentum on a consistent basis to lead to the outcome of getting your people really focused about the initiative of the day.

It’s up to you to set these initiatives and get people focused on your narrative around what success looks like for your company. The more consistent you are, the more consistent they will be and the more successful your business will become.

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 193 – The Case for Lifting Fees

Today’s High-Performance Podcast for Real Estate Agents features Josh Phegan and Alexander Phillips on the case for lifting fees. Josh questions how much time agents spend each year really thinking about fee proposition and Alex states his belief that vendors are more interested in an agent’s negotiation skills and ability to get the job done for them than the fee. Josh illustrates some aspects of the science and psychology of selling, specifically around setting expectations for fees, options, and results. Alex then looks at fee structures that offer options based on services provided.
Josh describes a negotiation with a developer for an open agency agreement vs. an exclusive to explain why the way you present your information and putting options on the table is critically important.

Logical vs Emotional Management

You’re handling every campaign either emotionally or logically, and you need to know which. My Coaching Tip this week is about logical vs. emotional management where I’ll explain the difference and help you move towards a more logical approach.

Logical management of your stock is all about the numbers: How long on market, how many inquiries, how many inspections, how many second appointments and how many offers. It’s about days on market and what should be happening by a set point in time.

I’ll illustrate why you need to know exactly where you are and where you should be during a campaign. I’ll also help you think about how to present information to your vendor about their property in context so they can make better decisions.

Your job as a real estate agent is to be logical in your approach whilst understanding the emotional context of the process. This is what our clients employ us to do. Always have a solution for every next step. This will ultimately get you to Sold.

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