In This Issue...

• Timely News From a Champion
• Handling the Referrals You Receive - Correctly!
• Approach Your Referral Sources - Properly!
• Personal Performance - At A Higher Level!

Timely News From a Champion

We are making Real Estate Champions history this month.  I don’t think in the history of real estate training that so many time-tested, proven, and cutting-edge training products and services have been delivered to the marketplace at once.

Last week I announced the arrival of The Champion Real Estate Team™ Book and your response has been amazing. It was so huge on Saturday that we had to go to the warehouse a few times to keep up with the demand.  There’s still plenty of books left for those of you who haven’t grabbed a copy yet. You can get it here.

This week we are releasing a brand new training program that I’ve built and recorded with one of the brightest business minds in Real Estate today.  He’s a great friend, client, and now one of our Team Performance Coaches. We both agree that this new training program is the perfect storm, because right now is the perfect time to do your business planning for 2008! I have titled it "The REALTOR^®'s Ultimate Business Planning Kit™". This program will take you through the planning, producing, and the pulverizing of your local market competition, having an immediate impact on your business this coming year and beyond. Come see the case study we’ve put together for you showcasing the results achieved from using these strategies here.

This program is the culmination of years of coaching agents to build strong businesses that are cash generating machines.  Given the exact tools, strategies, tactics, adjustment points, systems, planning, and tracking the results can all be repeated with ease by anyone. We not only take you through building a business plan, we take you through building a legitimate business that most agents only dream about. In truth, you will learn to be a businessperson and differentiate yourself from over 95% of the agents in the business.

At the cost of a lot of blood, sweat, and tears (and many sleepless nights) we finally arrived at an amazing program that deserves to be called the REALTOR^®’s Ultimate Business Planning Kit™. If you don’t believe me, all you’d have to do is ask my wife, Joan. She can tell you all the challenges, mistakes, and frustrations I’ve had to get to this point, as she’s lived through them with me.

My friend, I don’t want you to have to go through the pain that we went through to build our practices into true businesses. It just isn’t necessary when someone else has blazed the trail ahead for you.  Take the easier route and not the trial-by-fire-and-pain route most agents take.

Now is the time to start planning 2008 and the rest of your grand future. You need to be executing your business plan in the 4th quarter of this year to guarantee that your first quarter of 2008 is on track. Don’t wait to tear off the month of December on your calendar before you start thinking about 2008.

Our clients at Real Estate Champions are already done with their business planning process for 2008. Are you? If not, now is the time to become one of the people that will make their success happen in 2008!

Click here for more on this awesome new program.

To your achievement of success in life,

Dirk Zeller
CEO
Real Estate Champions, Inc

P.S. Keep reading this column each week, as there are more unbelievable announcements to come. There is one announcement before the end of the year that will blow the doors off the training and coaching of real estate agents. I guarantee you won’t want to miss it !

"What Would Owning a Master Coach's Blueprint Help Your Team Become?"

The Champion Real Estate Team™

Sequels to movies usually stink! Don't you agree?

They hardly ever live up to the original in the series. Book sequels however, are often better than the original. It seems that authors tend to evolve in their ability to convey their strategies, ideas, and concepts such that the reader tends to benefit more from each book in a series.

"This Book Takes You to the
Next Level of Success"

Well, today I'm proud to announce The Champion Real Estate Team™. It's the follow-up sequel to my greatest work to-date, The Champion Real Estate Agent™.

The first in the Champion Book Series™ laid the ground work of the advanced real estate agent tactics that 20+ years of blood, sweat, and tears produced.

"Packed with How-to's, Systems, Strategies...
That Will Transform Your Business"

The Champion Real Estate Team™ takes you to the next level in Real Estate Success - the one I believe (as well as many other Real Estate Experts) is the key to a successful future if you're in Real Estate Sales... the Real Estate Team!

This book is really a step-by-step blueprint of how to establish a well run team. It is packed with how-to's, systems, strategies, processes, and ideas for implementation that will transform your business. Having personally established one of the first multi-assistant teams in my region, I have seen the evolution of real estate teams for over fifteen years. My experience in applying these strategies in the initial stages of my business, along with the hundreds of other agents' team practices I have coached in the last nearly ten years, has created this book.

Come Join Me for a
Personal Book Tour Here

 

To your achievement of the next level of success in life,

Dirk Zeller
CEO
Real Estate Champions, Inc

P.S. The book is now in stock!!!

Handling the Referrals You Receive - Correctly!

Once they’ve asked for and received a referral, most salespeople stop and wait for the magic to happen. In fact, this is when Phase 2 of the referral-generation process kicks in. Follow these steps:

1. Thank your referral source, immediately! Say thank you the moment the referral comes through, and say thank you again when you follow up with a hand-written note. 

2. Determine the nature of the referral. To increase the probability of a successful first call you need to determine level of lead you will be dealing with. Slot the referral into one of four referral tiers:

              C Level - This is really a cold referral. Your referral source has provided you with the name and phone number of a potential prospect but doesn’t want you to use his or her name to create an opening.

              B Level – This referral is lukewarm. You have the prospect’s name and phone number and permission to use the name of your referral source to open the door, and from there you’re on your own.

              A Level – This is a warm referral. You have the prospect’s name and number.  You have permission to use the name of your referral source as a door opener. Plus your source has given you time to ask questions about the lead that will improve your odds of connection with the prospect on the first call.

              AA Level – This is the whale in the referral fishing game. With an AA-level referral, you have all the resources that you have at the A level, plus the insider’s edge because your referral source agrees to contact the prospect in advance of your call to introduce you.  This advance contact will pave the way for a welcomed first call. It also can lead to a lunch or face-to-face meeting where you, your referral source, and your new lead get together to transfer the relationship into your hands.

   To significantly increase your conversion odds, when receiving referrals spend a few minutes with your referral source to learn the answer to the following questions:

                 * How do you know this person?
                 * How would you describe your relationship?
                 * What type of a personality will I encounter?
                 * What are a few of this person’s personal interests?
                 * What organizations does this person belong to?
                 * Is there anything that you can see that we have in common?
   

   Get more than the prospect’s name and number.  Ask questions and go the extra mile to move the referral lead up to a higher probability of conversion. 

3. Thank your referral source again, offering your assurance that you’ll provide the same level of quality service that your referral source has received from you in the past.

When handling referrals, take these steps:

1. Qualify the lead and determine the odds that your investment of time and resources will result in a commission check.

2. Develop only qualified referrals into client prospects. When working with referrals, agents often feel compelled to work with every lead, regardless of the person’s qualifications of willingness to commit to an exclusive agency relationship. I believe this is an error. Ask yourself: If this person came from an ad call, sign call, open house, or any other lead generation system, would I pursue the business given the person’s qualifications and commitment? Don’t change your standards, expectations, or code of conduct simply because the lead was referred to you.

3. Thank and reward your referral sources for every single lead. Too many agents reward referral sources only when the leads they provide produce a return in the form of a commission check. To me that is a huge mistake. If you train friends and associates to think that you only value referrals that result in closed deals, you run the risk that they’ll start trying to prescreen leads, passing along only the ones they think will result in sales. Reward and acknowledge each and every referral you receive.

4. Keep your referral sources informed of the lead’s progress. Especially if you’re faced with the need to drop a prospect, let your referral source know what’s happening. Explain that although this time the match didn’t work out you sincerely appreciate the recommendation and are honored by the referral. Try to avoid the gory details as you walk the tightrope, sparing yourself from wasted time while preserving the strength of your established referral relationship.

If you're tired of wasting your time with wishy-washy buyers, and would rather have a system that takes you completely through the entire Buyer Conversion Process so that you maximize your effort and time, you've got to check out...

Convert and Commit the Buyer...
...Every Time!™

With the vast majority of agents in North American doing more transactions on the buyer side than the seller side, we need to now make sure that we are converting on every possibility we have in the marketplace. Every viable lead that is created must be converted to íncome producing closed transactions. This program is conservatively worth an extra $100,000 in gross commission income for you! Don’t miss your chance at mastering control and commitment of your buyer’s prospects.

The 'Convert and Commit the Buyer... Every Time!™' Series will teach you how to:
	• Get Control of the Buyer Appointment from the Start • Only Work With the "A" Leads – Use a Buyer Qualification System • Qualify Like a Master Buyer's Agent (Save Tons of Time) • Champion Agent's Buyer Interview - 41 Questions that Will Save You at Least 41 Lost Transactions Wasted With Lookie-Lou Buyers • Use a Master Coach's "Exchange of Commitments" Conversion Tactic • Master the Art of Dealing With Non-Qualified Prospects • Handle Objections to Getting the Appointment (BUYER SCRIPTS) • Explain Agency to a Buyer (SCRIPTS) • Handle if the Buyer Wants Representation (DIALOGUES) • Explain the Exclusive Retainer Agreement - Lock Them In (SCRIPTS) • Handle Objections to Signing a Contract - 10 Scenarios (SCRIPTS) • Find the REAL Reason Behind a Buyer's Objection • Plus much more, including 62 pages of tools, handouts (the same ones Dirk uses), scripts, and dialogues you can use as your own.
You'll receive:
	• Dozens of Buyer Worksheets/Forms for Buyer Conversion • Complete Buyer Counseling Interview • Dozens of Scripts to Increase Buyer Conversion • Prospect Interview Worksheets • 4 CDs - Audio Training • 1 CD-ROM Workbook

I Want to Learn How to Get The Listing on the First Appointment Every Time!

Approach Your Referral Sources - Properly!

Marketing for referrals with mailers, calendars, recipe cards, and other outreach and appreciation efforts is nowhere near as effective as prospecting for referrals by making personal calls and requests.

The hard truth is that most consumers stand a far better chance of finding a poor agent than a great one. Once you can personally convince them that you’re among the best in the field, referrals will follow.

When cultivating referral sources, realize that most people who send referrals your way do so for a variety of reasons, but above all, they recommend you for the following two reasons:

• Friendships and trust. People like to help people they like and believe in. Take time to get to know those in the platinum and gold levels of your database and to let them get to know you. Share the vision you hold for your business. Let them catch your enthusiasm and buy into your dream. The result will be a vested interest in your success and the desire to help you achieve your goal.

• People want to be champions. Each time you deliver superb service and an excellent outcome you create clients who are willing to champion your business. What’s more, based on your exemplary performance, you create clients who know firsthand that by recommending you to others they’ll become champions in the minds of their friends and family members.

It’s never too early to begin building referral relationships. You can start during the first meeting or phone call with any prospect, using a script such as this:

“Fred, I build my business primarily based on referrals from clients.  The benefit to you is: my focus will always be to give you the best service possible. The reason is: I want to earn the honor to talk with you in the future about who you know that would benefit from my service.  The only way I deserve to have that conversation is based on the job I do for you.  I know that if you are delighted with my service, you will want to help me and your friends out.”

When approaching referral sources, keep a couple of important rules in mind:

• Rule #1: Respect the referral process. When you’re asking for referrals, you’re entering the hallowed territory of another person’s treasured relationships. In ancient times, people would go through extensive purification ceremonies before stepping onto holy ground. Asking for referrals is almost that special.

Don’t ask for referrals by simply adding a throwaway line onto the end of another conversation by saying, basically, “Oh, by the way” before you ask for a business referral. That tactic minimizes the importance of the referral, rather than raising it to the high level of honor and respect it deserves.

A quality referral request should take at least five minutes; ten may be even better.

My friend Bill Cates, the “Referral Coach” and author of the book Ultimate Referrals, advises that you advance your referral request with the statement, “I have an important question to ask you.” This will force a pause, build anticipation, and set the tone for a meaningful conversation.

• Rule #2: Ask for help. If you’re soliciting referrals you are, in fact, asking for help. So say so. The trouble is that egos get in the way and won’t let the words out of most agents’ mouths.  “I need your help” or “I value your help” are powerful keys for opening the referral floodgate.

• Rule #3: Ask permission. In particular, ask permission to explore your client’s contact database ­– not by rifling through computer files but by learning of and gaining access to associates you might be able to serve. When asking for permission, use a script like this one:

“I’m delighted that I’ve been able to serve you. I was wondering about others you might know in your life that would also benefit from my service. Could we explore for a few moments who else we might be able to serve?”

The final question in the script is an important one. Too many agents ask for referrals and then leave all the burden of thinking up names on the shoulders of their clients. The truth is your referral sources don’t want to work that hard.  They’ll work that hard with you, but not alone.

• Rule #4: Get specific. Don’t just make a general request for referrals and leave it at that. Saying, “Do you have anyone you might like to refer to my business” is sort of like a department store clerk who asks, “May I help you?” The automatic response, 90% of the time or more, is “No, just looking.”

Sharpen the focus of your request by leading clients into areas or niches in their lives where they have day-to-day relationships. Ask them about potential referrals among the families in their church, people they know through their children’s soccer team, prospects they’ve met through school affiliations. If you they are members of association or groups, pull out the member roster and spend a few minutes talking about the names on the list.

Personal Performance - At A Higher Level!

One of the mistakes that agents make in building a team is not monitoring their personal performance.  The lead agent will often set production goals for the team to achieve.  They, however, often fail to break those goals down to show what they are going to do.  It’s easy to leave the production goals in a group and never hold yourself accountable to the individual level of listings and sales you need to make to accomplish your overall goals for the team.

• What level of performance standard are you holding yourself to?
• How many listings do you personally need to commit to taking?
• How many sales do you personally need to commit to making?
• How much prospecting will you do monthly, weekly, and daily?
• How many books will you read, CDs will you listen to, seminars will you attend this year?
• How many hours of role playing will you do monthly?

It’s easy to look at others to raise the production in the company, but what are you willing to do now?  What are you willing to commit to in the future?  Your focus on your personal performance will be one of the best things you can do for the growth of your business.  Having set personal production standards for the whole team to know and watch, says clearly, “I am not above the rest of you.  I expect the same out of myself as I do each of you.”  It allows the team to hold you accountable when you are not performing as well.  A slip in your personal performance will cause devastation in your team.

Champion Team Rule – Your individual, personal productivity is the most valuable asset in your business.

While you might have ten buyer’s agents who bring in more gross revenue that you, your productivity is still more important.  The most important reason why that is true is all ten of those buyer’s agents are watching you.  If you allow your performance to slip, it gives them permission to slip, as well.  You now have eleven people who feel that it’s acceptable to not meet the pre-determined standard.  It’s not just one (you) but all eleven people.  When you have 100% of your sales staff feeling that it’s ok to not achieve production results, disaster is right around the corner.

If you'd like more information on how you can build your own real estate team, get your free copy of "The Champion Real Estate Team™ Guide"... here.

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