I know. You were interviewed and sold on the company’s training program. You thought that was the main criteria for your success. But, if it were true that the training program guaranteed success, all those agents who went through it would be selling up a storm. They’re not. So, here are facts and fallacies about what a company training program can do for you.

Because my start-up business plan, Up and Running in 30 Days, has been a best-seller, the editors there asked me to update it again with a fourth edition Since real estate is changing so dramatically, I wanted to update the potential or newer agent (or even you experienced agents), with the major trends agents need to recognize. This excerpt explores the important trend of company training.

Three Major Concerns with Most Company Training Programs

As a National Association of Realtors Educator of the Year, I certainly support training. However, my observation is that few company training programs today fill the bill of what I judge to be valuable training. There are three problems with company training programs:

1. They aren’t taught as ‘training’. They are taught as ‘education’ (someone tells you all he/she knows, so you know what the teacher knows).

How you’ll know: If the instructor spent almost all the time talking, and you spent little or no time in role playing or in action plans, it really wasn’t training to prepare you to sell real estate. You know a lot, but, what can you DO?

2. They aren’t centered on sales. They’re centered on the technical aspects of our business (new agents conclude that memorizing laws and filling in blanks in forms are most important to their success)

How you’ll know: Look at your training manual. Which is the largest part?

3. They aren’t driven by a business-producing start-up plan (and new agents need order and priorities to decide how to put that training to work every day)

How you’ll know: Were you given a prioritized lead generating, business-developing plan to put to work in your office every day? Did you have to make a daily and weekly schedule and analyze and evaluate it?

Bottom line: What were you taught, what experiences did you have, and what models were you given that prepared you for the day-to-day job of managing your real estate career?

Question: What did you wish would have happened during that training that would have helped you succeed much faster? Let me know. I’m right in the middle of doing my fourth edition of Up and Running in 30 Days!

The Value of Being a Salesperson

 I learned the value of becoming a salesperson–a really, really good salesperson, because I learned I could help people do what they wanted to do–and just needed someone to facilitate that.

If There Were No Salespeople

Where would we be without sales skills and salespeople? Here are some of the notable people today that you don’t think are in sales–but who have really, really good sales skills (and have to have, to get us to embrace their ideas):

Madonna (she may not be the best singer, but, boy, does she know how to sell herself)

President Obama (he must be able to sell himself and his programs)

Warren Buffet (help people embrace his investment ideas)

Bill Gates (Sell Microsoft and its products)

What Salespeople Do–and Why You Should Be Proud to Call Yourself a ‘Salesperson

As my first ‘boss’ in real estate said, ” If there were no salespeople, few/no goods would be bought” (except those that are absolutely needed). In fact, as Bob pointed out, the economy would come to a grinding halt. Look at what’s happening in our economy today. People are just starting to spend money again, and salespeople should be there to help people see the benefits of buying.

Sales Skills are Artistic and Not So Easy to Master

Now, there is a movement against using anything with the connotation of ‘sales’. Yet, there is nothing wrong–and everything right–about the art of sales. Using properly, sales helps people see the benefits of buying whatever they are considering.

Poor Sales Hurts the Consumer–Really Hurts!

As a long-time real estate salesperson, I saw buyers and sellers actually stopped from purchasing or selling because their salesperson was so inept. That meant the customer lost hundreds of thousands of dollars down the road! In fact, 99% of the mistakes agents I observed salespeople make were not in forcing, manipulating, or lying their way into getting someone to do something not in their best interest but rather

stopping a buyer or seller from doing what’s best for him/her because the salesperson had such lousy skills

Become a Blazingly Good Salesperson

If you have some reticence at the word ‘salesperson’, tackle that reticence right now. You aren’t just a licensee; you aren’t just an agent; you are a sales professional. You discover prospects (lead generation). You uncover prospects’ needs; you help prospects investigate new possibilities; you help prospects prioritize information and properties; you negotiate on their behalf. Those are all sales not agent skills. Agency is just a license. Sales is a skill and an art. Become  an artist of what you do!

If It’s Not Knowing Lots of Stuff, What Is It?

Practice and performance. So, what in the world can a pianist teach you about getting higher performance? A lot, I think.  Why? Because pianists play better by learning new skills–not learning about how the piano is tuned…….

Without new skills, we just keeping working harder, not smarter. The really bad thing about continuing to beat your head against that ceiling, is that it hurts more and more. You spend more energy just trying to accomplish the same thing.

 Too Much Energy, Too Little Results

 Worse yet, we bounce off that ceiling and hit a new low every thing we get up the energy to try to break through it. Not only that, the last few years have been discouraging for many in real estate. Don’t give up on yourself! You do have the talent, the skill, and the determination to succeed at a much higher level again.

 All Performers Hit ‘Ceilings of Achievement’

 As a long-time performing pianist and flutist (I spent the first thirty years of my life playing and teaching music), I had to learn how to constantly change up my playing for the better. In these next few blogs, I’m going to share what I learned as a musician that will change your  performance dramatically—for the better.

 You Aren’t as Good as You Can Be—I Promise

 I just did a talk for our area’s Women’s Council, on how to have a much better ‘next year’—how to smash through that ceiling of achievement. (Title: Everything I learned about Achievement I learned from Tickling’ the Ivories—also the title of my latest keynote).

 As a four-year old, I climbed up on the piano bench and figured out, by ear, how to play “Sue City Sue”—with bass notes, chords, rhythm, melody—the whole shebang. I was acclaimed as a little kid. However, as I got a little older, I found that playing by ear just wasn’t getting me to be a better player. Here’s what I did to get to concert artistry level, and earn a bachelor’s in piano performance—and how you can translate these performance principles to your real estate business.

 Get from ‘By Ear’ via your Talent to Conscious Systemization

 As a musician, I know that no one can play very well when they try learning only by hearing (playing ‘by ear’). To progress past a ‘whiz-bang, aren’t you wonderful’ amateur level, musicians must learn to read music, get a great teacher, and learn to practice perfectly. Generally, their teacher/coach will teach them how to practice, and provide the best editions of music. They will teach them a specific system. The better the system, the coach, the music, and the practice, the higher the performance—the sky is the limit.

 The First Time You Do Something Isn’t As Good as it Gets!

 What does that mean to a real estate professional? Most of us started selling or managing ‘by ear’. Some of us were talented, and that carried us pretty well for quite a while. But, then, we hit our ‘ceiling of achievement’, and found we were working 24/7 and expending way too much energy—and money. The way out:

1.  Grasp systems (the best systems you can find)
2. Follow processes and checklists
3. Get a great coach
4. Practice as perfectly as you can

 Practitioners—Watch Those Actions, Not Just the Words

 Unfortunately, we real estate professionals don’t realize that we are judged on our performance, not our knowledge. So, when you get all antsy because you think you need more classes, stop and think about your performance level, not your knowledge level. Spend more time evaluating your performance, and pay someone to coach to you get better (all performers, whether musicians or golfers, do this, by the way). Critique your systems, and keep refining them because they will subconsciously affect your performance levels.

 If I had a piano, I’d demonstrate these points (I do use the piano in the keynote!).

 What Do You Want to Work on This Year—from ‘By Ear’ to Systematic?

 Do you have some business plan goals for yourself this year to raise your ceiling of achievement? What do you believe is most valuable for you to work on?

Remember, if you’re a newer agent, you’ll be tempted to hang back, keep your fingers off the keys, and wait for something different–or better–to happen to you. Don’t get tempted! Put to work these performance principles and see yourresults improve dramatically.

Question: What do you wish you’d had as training to help you ‘see’ success early in your career? What would you change about your training if you were creating it?

 What should you expect from a training program?

What to Look For: Five Critical Points

If you’re looking for effective training to get your career started fast, or re-started, you need to choose a training program that has these features:

            1. The objective is fast productivity, not just knowledge. When you interview, ask what the objectives of training are with that company. If it’s just knowledge, run the other way! You will know a lot, but you won’t be in business very long!

            2. The training program has business-producing expectations and goals.  For example, if you expect to make money fast, your training program needs to help you learn to set prospecting goals and attain them. That doesn’t mean lecturing in class. That means you have an activity plan and are working in the field during the class duration. That also means that you aren’t in class all day.

            3. The training program is built around a business start-up plan. Ask to see the company’s business start-up plan for you. If it isn’t sales-producing, it isn’t a real start-up plan.     

4. Sales skills are practiced by the students in class. How can you expect to be competent with clients if you haven’t gained competency and confidence in the classroom? Clients are very discriminating these days. They expect agents to know what they’re doing! During the interview, ask for a description of how the students spend class time. If the manager says the students listen all the time, pick up your materials and go to the next interview. You need skills training; you don’t need to know everything the instructor knows.

5. Expectations for achievement in sales developing and packaging are clear. Is this a college-level training? In college, students are expected to perform during the course. If you’re not expected to practice outside class, and get your sales packages together (like listing and buyer presentations), then this isn’t a real training. It’s just a time-eating event. Wouldn’t your consumer expect you to have a high level of competence? Then, your training program must deliver.

Armed with these 5 critical expectations, you can choose a training program that is dedicated to assuring you quick results, high sales skill, and confidence with consumers. Why settle for less? 

Question: What went wrong with your traiming? What do you think should have been in your training program?

Want to see that kind of program–and a sample of what it looks like? Check out Advantage 2.0. Click here to see more.

Although there are as many approaches to the real estate business as there are people, there are certain qualities that are common to successful real estate professionals:

 1. High personal initiative. Do what you know needs to be done even if no one else is doing it!

2.  Tenacity. Studies show most salespeople give up after the second ‘no’. Yet, most customers only say ‘yes’ after they’ve said ‘no’ 5 times! Never give up.

3.  Risk taker. Doing it before you have all the answers–taking risks–is a big part of starting your career successfully.

4.  Accountability to yourself. Plan your week and work your plan. No one else will do it for you in the real estate business.

5.  Reliability to others. The consumer rates “trustworthiness” as the most important attribute they need in a real estate agent. Keep your promises.

6.  Willingness to learn. In this warp-speed changing business, being a life-long learner is critical to success in a real estate career.

7.  Enthusiasm. Would you buy anything from anyone who wasn’t convinced himself  that the product or service was important to you? And could convey his excitement and enthusiasm?

8.  Handling rejection. Absolute faith in your own convictions and your own self-worth helps you weather those thousands of ‘nos’ and keep going to get a ‘yes’.

9.  Creativity. Doing it like we’ve always done it just won’t work in this changing environment. Try it differently. Put you into the sales equation for great success.

Help me Out.

I’m preparing a new edition of my book for would-be and new agents, Become Tomorrow’s Mega-Agent Today. What characteristics should I add?

Here’s the rest of the list of 10:

1. Starting the business part-time, with no ‘drop dead’ exit plan from your other work. I know. I started part-time, but, within three months, I realized that I could not serve my consumer honestly when I had to run to another job. The truth is that you just don’t care much about the consumer if you’re not committed and working a real estate at least 50 hours a week. If you have to start part-time, give yourself a deadline to become full-time. Managers, don’t hire without that dead-line in writing. You’ll be wasting your time training and coaching.
2.  Not getting a commitment from your manager that he/she will consistently and frequently coach you to a game plan. If your manager can’t rise to that level of commitment, how successful to you think your manager intends you to be? (Side note to managers: I believe you need to be 100% committed to your agents, or else the likelihood they will fail is 100%. Use a precise, consistent, proven game plan like the 3^rd edition of Up and Running in 30 Days to put your agent to work, and coach your agent with Managers: Putting Up and Running to Work, now in its 3^rd edition to match the new, expanded agent’s start-up plan.)
3. Thinking that the best commission plan is the best place to work. As the old song says, “Nothin’ from nothin’ is nothin’.” You need to sell lots of real estate—lots and lots of real estate. Choose the place where you think that will happen. New agents who figure out they only have to sell three homes a year to pay those fees are thinking like losers.
4. Not investing in the business until they ‘get successful’. When would that be? Why do you get to be successful without an investment? With that attitude, how are you going to compete with those great agents—and how are you going to meet those amazingly high consumer expectations?
5.  Going into the business to see if they like it. I’ll bet 50% of new agents don’t really go into the business to make it a career. They go into the business to ‘try it out’. If that’s your attitude, how do you expect your manager and your company to be 100% committed to you, when you’re 25% committed?

A Great Manager Plus a Great Plan Plus Accountability = Success

Harsh words above, but true.  If you want to succeed, find a great manager who will coach you and hold you to a start-up plan. Find a manager who will tell you the truth—even when you don’t want to hear it! Find a manager who is 100% committed to you, and you will be one of those 50% who survive their first years, and go on to great careers.

The Frank Sinatra Syndrome: Doing it ‘My Way’

We all want success easily. We all want to ‘do it our way’. And, if we’re honest, in our quest for easy success, we’ll all done dumb things. That is, we realized they were dumb—after the fact. So, just because I’m picking on new agents here doesn’t mean I haven’t done many more than just ten dumb things! I’m listing these here, though, to help you avoid the mistakes I made as a new agent, and the mistakes I’ve observed thousands of new agents make over the years I’ve managed, trained and coached.

Some Mistakes Cost us All Lots of $$$$

Some dumb actions don’t cost us much, but, when an agent fails, it costs money to everyone—agents, offices, and consumers. It’s estimated that it costs a manager $15,000-30,000 for every agent hired who fails! So, that agent isn’t a profit-center, she’s a cost center! In addition, an agent who fails spends at least $5000-15,000 just in ‘subsidized living’ and real estate expenses the first three months in the business. Finally, the consumer loses, because the agent is out of the business before serving the consumer.  

Heads Up

New agents don’t come into the business to fail. But, they don’t realize the effort and skill it takes to succeed. In addition, there are increasingly difficult challenges for new agents:

1. The gap between consumer expectations and agent performance is widening quickly and dramatically. New agents must have better training, coaching, and commitment from their brokers.
2. The market in most areas has become more challenging, so new agents can’t get those ‘easy sales’.
3. The committed, career-oriented agent is taking much more of the market share.

It’s estimated that 50% of new agents fail and get out of the business in their first year, and 75% are out in two years. That seems to me a huge waste of resources—and a huge contributor to that expectations gap I listed above. We need to stop that attrition now. So, new agents, I’ve created a list of the ten dumbest things I’ve seen thousands do to fail themselves right out of the business. In this blog, we’ll investigate the first five:

1. Thinking that there are lots of ways to start the business. There aren’t. Real estate sales is sales, and sales is a numbers game. (Up and Running shows you exactly how to work those numbers to your benefit).
2. Thinking they don’t have to lead generate, because they’ll “do it differently.” Don’t talk to people consistently and in great numbers and you’ll be flipping burgers before you know it! (Not that there is anything wrong in flipping burgers, but you won’t be “selling real estate”.
3. Thinking that their manager or office or the Internet will supply them leads. If that were the case, your commissions would be much smaller.
4. Thinking that this business is about tasks and technology. It’s not. It’s about people relationships.
5. Treating the business like a ‘next’ business. It’s not about finding and selling a customer. It’s about finding and keeping the customer for long-term referral business.

How many of these dumb things have you done? In truth, we learn from our mistakes. It’s not what we do wrong. It’s what we continue doing wrong. I wrote Up and Running to cut your ‘mistake time’!

In my next blog, we’ll investigate the remaining mistakes. What did I miss?

I wish I could give you a tight, proven formula. Yet, there are variables that make specific formulas difficult to pin down.

Success by the Numbers

 I set the expectations for the Up and Running in 30 Days business start-up program based on my experience on the number of contacts it takes to get a lead, then a sale. But, it also depends on several variables, as explained in Up and Running:

1. Type of contact–how warm or cold is it?

How much trust has been established? The warmer the contact, the more trust is already there. So, it takes less contacts in a ‘warm’ target market (like people you know or past clients) to convert to a lead, than to a ‘cold contact’. For example, the Internet marketing companies say it takes 200 contacts to equal one sale.

2. The agent’s sales skill, competency, and tenacity.

How good are you at opening sales conversations? How good are you at finding out needs? Asking insightful questions? Listening? Guiding the conversation with focus toward a goal of moving the sales process forward? The better you are at sales skills, the easier you’ll find it to sell–and the better your lead and conversion ratios.

3. The market–buyers and sellers are more hesitant to ‘turn themselves in’ today.

Sales skills come back into play here. It’s not a market where people just fall all over themselves to buy and sell real estate. You have to have skills, tenacity, and competency.

How can you tell the numbers it takes?

Track your numbers for each target market and track your conversion rates. Now you know the specific work it takes for you to generate a lead, create an interview, work with buyers and sellers, and get sales results. Armed with those numbers, you can customize a program like Up and Running.

The problem: Most agents work way too few lead generation numbers and sources. In fact, they have so few, it’s impossible to extrapolate ratios. That’s why Up and Running and the four -week regeneration plan in the On Track to Success in 30 Days System (for seasoned agents) have such big numbers–it’s an insurance plan.

Getting to the Finish Line

Grab your tenacity, get armed with your business generation plan, and get started. Set your goals and keep your accomplishments. Analyze them. Work your best sources of business with consistency. Polish your sales skills. Now, you’ve positioned yourself for success!

About Those Standards

Have you heard the saying, “it’s the pot calling the kettle black”? Okay. I confess. When I was a new agent, I put anyone in the car who would go with me to look at houses! I had no qualifying questions, and I certainly didn’t have any standards for buyers! My motto was

if they got tired before I did, I sold them a home. If I got tired first, I didn’t.

Even with that lousy motto, I sold 40 homes my first full year in real estate–and really tuckered myself out!

Better Too Many than Too Little

Yes, you’ll get practice putting everyone in your car. And, as a coach, I’d rather have you put too many people in your car than not enough (read Up and Running to find out how many you must put in your car to reach your personal goals).  We can always help you qualify better. But, if you’re not willing to take a risk and try selling someone a home, it’s hard to get you to do that!

Develop your Standards as You Go

If you’re a natural salesperson, you’ll dive right in and worry about the rest later. If that’s ‘you’, just start creating your standards and develop them through your first year in the business. Up and Running has suggestions, checklists, and qualification questionnaires to help you do better faster.

No Standards–No Big Successes

Having been a top producer, and studying top producers and surveys of top producers, I’ve discovered that absolutely no top producer has low standards. Why? They just don’t have time to fool around with those who won’t or can’t buy. Make that your long-term goal, and you’ll keep getting better and better clients.

Regurgitating Information Isn’t Communicating

When we enter real estate, we take courses in finance, escrow, title insurance, and building inspections in order to talk to strangers (potential customers and clients) with authority.  After all, if anyone asked us a question, we would, we would be embarrassed if we didn’t know the answer—and we start talking our way right out of a real estate career.

Sometimes it’s better not to know too much!

Why?  Because people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

Listening Shows You Care

How do you show that you care about others?  Ask them questions; listen to them.  People want to be listened to, understood, and empathized with.  Instead of learning facts and figures to dazzle prospects, the most important skill to hone is listening.

Listening Skills are the Most Important Communication Skills for a Real Estate Professional

To become a good listener, practice the following skills that effective listeners have developed:

Listen for inflections, pauses, the pace—the “music” of the talk rather than the “words”

Actively acknowledge the talker (e.g. “yes, okay, hmm”).

Repeat what the talker said to be sure you correctly understood it.

Ask for more clarification of what the talker said

Avoid jumping to conclusions and talking

Are We as Good as we Think We Are?

Generally, people assume that they are good listeners.  But, in truth, most people just listen carefully enough to get the gist and long enough to get ready to talk.  They’re thinking about what they’re going to say rather than listen effectively.

Recently, I was teaching a large group of managers how to apply counseling techniques for use with their agents.  One principle of counseling is that to solve the problem, we must get to the root of the problem.  Often the agent’s problem isn’t really a problem but a symptom.

During the class, I showed managers a proven counseling process that worked.  Then I asked the managers to use this process, which required them to demonstrate all the listening skills in the class.  Although they resisted taking the time to probe, listen, and clarify, the managers acknowledged that the process worked.

Following the process, they restrained from offering a pat solution and, as they probed further, discovered that the problem was different from what they had first assumed.  Their initial solution, had they offered it, would have been wrong.

Take the Time to Get Below the Obvious

The same holds true for you with your customers and clients.  They have problems, objections, and beliefs.  You must take the time to find out exactly what is on your customers’ minds and in their hearts to help them meet their needs.  Effective listening is the most important communication skill to develop for a successful real estate career.

My fun flashcards and scripts, Objection Busters, shows you how to listen for what’s really going on. I also provide some specific scripts. More important, though, I teach you the process of handling objections, both for buyers and sellers. Check them out.