In This Issue...
Words of a Champion
Dirk Zeller
CEO
“In this world nothing is certain except death and taxes.”
The truth is change is also certain as well. I am going to briefly address the changing marketplace and how to take advantage of it. I urge you to read the whole message because I am making a big announcement at the end that could change the course of your business and life.
There are signs of marketplace improvement that we must express to Buyers. There are positive changes to pass on to Buyer clients and prospects. We saw last month the percentage of distressed sales fall below the 50% mark for the first time in 6 months. Only 45% of the houses sold were distressed, which according to NAR are properties sold either short sale or foreclosure. That is a solid change for the positive. We have also seen a number of positive articles written in national publications announcing market improvement. In fact, on May 28th there were positive articles in USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and New York Times. I don’t think that I have seen that happen in years.
The USA Today reported that repeat Buyers in April were 60% of the Buyers in the marketplace. That means that if that trend continues we should see improved sales in the mid-range and higher for many marketplaces. It’s time to use that information to get the Seller to price more competively, especially the move up Seller.
The Wall Street Journal reported an increase of sales by 2.9% for April, with an annual rate of sales projected at 4.68 million sales. In 2008 about 4.9 million sales happened with NAR projecting a 10% drop this year in sales, which would be only 4.4 million. We are 7% ahead of the projected pace for the year and down only 5% from last year…not 10%!
The New York Times reported positive signs in the Northeast with an 11.6% increase in sales as well as a strong rise in the west of 19.4% rise in sales verses April of 2008.
Change is happening all around us and it is for the good. Change also brings opportunity as well. I want to share some changes that I am instating and a rare opportunity for a few Agents.
The first half of the year has been a whirlwind for me personally. I have never been so in demand as a Speaker traveling at a frantic pace. There have been few precious days or even weeks where I have not been on a plane somewhere speaking to some group. While it’s a delight and honor to be wanted and needed by so many, it has not been fair to my family. Many of you have heard for years about my children, Wesley, now 7 and Annabelle, who is 4 today; two incredible miracles in my life. I came home a few weeks ago from a long road trip and decided to stop the insanity. I made a decision to cut back my schedule away from home. My kids are too important for me to be gone, even as the real estate industry comes calling as it has in droves the last year.
I decided rather than be on the road and speaking I would increase my investment of my time in my children and in another passion I have in working in Agent’s businesses helping them grow exponentially. For many years I have only coached about 10 Real Estate Agents and Teams at a time. The turn over has been almost non-existent so I have taken on a rare and fortunate new client every year or so. I am going to expand my personal coaching clients in the next 30 days. I will be working with 7 additional Agents and Teams. You don’t have to be a big Team or number one in your market to qualify. Most of my clients are in the top 5 in their marketplace but few were there when I started coaching them.
Here are my requirements to be considered. You really have to want to do better in business and life. I am not talking about hoping…I mean desire/passion to grab the brass ring of life. You have to be coach-able. Willing to take advice, counsel and coaching and take action. Finally, you must be willing to invest in yourself and feel you are worth it. Too many people don’t feel they are worth the investment of their dollars and time in their most important business asset, which is themselves. The truth is you can find someone cheaper to provide, what they call, coaching to you, but you won’t find someone better, more effective, better track record of success, more experienced with a deeper well of knowledge to draw from to help you change and seize the opportunities right in front of you that your are missing.
The average, for a new client, income increase is in excess of $200,000. You read that correctly, increase as in more than they made the previous year!
If there is something inside of you that says I need to check this out, that’s easy. Call my office and ask for Tami. She can send you more information and set an appointment for us to have an initial consultation to determine our compatibility. This offer is on a first come first serve basis. When the spots are gone they are gone so call our office right now. 541-383-8833. If you are reading this at night, call and leave us a message to reserve your spot before it’s too late!
To Your Achievement of GREATER success,
Dirk Zeller, CEO
RealEstateChampions.com
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Overcoming Call Reluctance
We are all faced with call reluctance at one time or another in our sales careers. We all know that we need to prospect and make calls daily to generate new business. However, knowing and doing can be two entirely different things. The fear of calling can be a career ender for many sales people.
Let’s take a look at what most Agents do when call reluctance hits. Most Agents take the worst possible action…they avoid the calls. Are you avoiding the calls when call reluctance hits? The problem with that plan of action is that avoiding something out of fear only teaches you to fear it more.
Taking this plan of action only makes the challenge larger and harder. Your call avoidance only intensifies your anxiety, which leads to greater reluctance and greater avoidance. We have all lived this pattern, leading us farther down the slippery slope of call reluctance. How do you break this pattern of destruction? There is a five-step strategy to overcome call reluctance:
Strategy #1: Take Stock of Yourself and Your Skills
Most people who are chronic call reluctance sufferers are their own worst enemies. They are experts in all of their own faults and shortcomings. They see only their weaknesses, not their strengths. To be successful at prospecting over the phone, we have to have a clear sense of what we can provide to the prospect. Until we have a clear understanding of our value, we will never achieve comfort in prospecting over the phone.
The overcoming step is to evaluate what you have to offer the prospect. Take inventory of your skills and abilities. Understand your track record of results. Review your list of satisfied clients and the reasons why they’re satisfied.
- List the things you can do for the prospects.
- List the qualities that make you the person they should work with.
- List the specific benefits of your services.
Always have these lists ready by the phone. This way you can easily review them before you begin to call. You will also be able to use them during your call to convince the prospect to work with you.
Many of us are challenged because we see making a call to a prospect or even a cold opportunity as an unwanted interruption. By using this list, you can change your mindset to see that you are giving the prospect a valuable opportunity to be served by you. We need a new perspective of opportunity.
Strategy #2: Set Realistic, Achievable Daily Goals
We can easily get ahead of ourselves. By setting a daily goal that is realistic, we can create momentum. People who are challenged with call reluctance often believe that they need to make 20, 50, or even 100 calls a day to make a difference. Since they can’t do that, they avoid even starting. Start with a small number you can commit to daily. We have seen Agents double their businesses in a year by making 5-10 contacts a day. A little goes a long way. Prospecting is like Brill Cream: a little dab will do you. It just has to be used every day.
Set manageable goals for each week, and then break them down into goals for each day. If you are struggling to hit the daily goal, break it down to each part of the day or even each hour if necessary.
Make it into a game. How many calls can I make before lunch or before my next appointment at 10:00 am? Make the target achievable. You want to achieve the feeling of accomplishment. When you achieve the goal, reward yourself. We call it celebrating the victory. Part of being effective in calling is learning to reward yourself along the way. The mouse wouldn’t work as hard to get to the end of the maze if the cheese wasn’t there. The reality is that we are no different. You have to create small rewards along the way.
Strategy #3: Control Negative Self-Talk
We all have an internal voice. Sometimes, that voice is our biggest fan and encourager. Other times, it feels like that little voice is chaining us to a cement block and pushing us into a deep river. That internal voice can challenge us for good or bad; it can criticize and chastise us, as well.
For those of you who are challenged by call reluctance regularly, this negative self-talk can be particularly aggressive. It can become almost hyperactive when you are preparing for a sales call. When you go to pick up the phone, the negative self-talk turns up the volume and intensity.
“They are going to reject you.”
“Why would they use you instead of these other Agents?”
“Maybe there is another way to do this.”
“I should really be handling the problem transaction.”
“I need to do more research before I make this call.”
Meet the challenge of the negative self-talk head on. If you do, the voice will get quieter, and after a few dials, it will go away completely.
If you are really struggling, write down what the negative self-talk is saying. By having it down on paper, you can refute what is being said in your mind. The only way to repel the voice is to create the responses that defuse the arguments. It’s the difference between your thoughts controlling you, or you controlling your thoughts. You are in charge here.
The difference between you and the mouse is that you can change. The mouse will go back forever and look for the cheese. You know better than that. Take the steps to go a different direction for a newer, better opportunity.
Strategy #4: Visualize the “Perfect Call”
We often begin each call by envisioning rejection. We begin each call with the thought process, “I hope they’re not home.” Mentally, we are poorly prepared. Even if they are present, we may not be. Do you visualize them hanging up the phone in disgust, or is there a voice telling you they are happy to hear from you? We often have a horrible movie playing in our head. Those negative images are making the calls more difficult to execute.
We can create the outcome before we ever pick up the phone. Those negative visions create self-fulfilling prophecies. We get caught going through the motions without the results we desire. There are two key reasons we end up short of the outcome we planned for:
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The “negative visions” generate stress, and the mental stress blocks performance. We are preoccupied with the stress. We are waiting for the other shoe to drop, so we can be right. Henry Ford said, “If you think you can or think you can’t, either way you are right.” You will create the outcome you visualize.
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The “negative visions” are a rehearsal. The more you run the negative through mentally, the greater the probability of reproducing it in reality. Remember, practice doesn’t make perfect…only perfect practice makes perfect. All practice does is make it permanent. The mouse practiced going for the cheese even when the cheese was taken away.
We must visualize ourselves talking on the phone with confidence. We must have a “bring it on” attitude. We must visualize ourselves handling the objections efficiently and effectively, and we must visualize ourselves setting an appointment.
Strategy #5: The One-Call or Ten-Minute Strategy
It’s really easy when you are in call reluctance to envision hours of calling and toiling on the phone. You believe that you are going to have to bear hours of rejection to generate one measly lead. Then you figure you might as well give yourself the day off, and you can make it up tomorrow.
Resolve, before you give up for the day, to make 10 minutes worth of calls. The truth is any of us can make the calls for just 10 minutes. When you have completed 10 minutes or a certain number of contacts, like two or three, you are free to quit guilt-free. You have “bought” your freedom for the day.
You have taken a big step to breaking through call reluctance. Do the 10 minutes and know you are progressing out of call reluctance.
The other thing you will discover is that the hardest part is behind you. You can tap into the momentum you have just created. I guarantee that the next dial will be easier and not feel or look so intimidating. You have started to control the negative self-talk. You can choose to continue on. This is the best commitment you could make and keep for yourself.
Call reluctance is real for every salesperson. There is no one who doesn’t suffer from some form of call reluctance. If some claim they don’t ever have it, just realize they must have deeper psychological problems to deal with. Apply the five steps today and work to overcome call reluctance.
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Time Management - Attack the Problem in the Correct Order
Champion Rule: We usually attack the time management problem out of order.
Being successful at anything is about determining the steps we need to take to be more successful and putting those steps in the right order. If you think success is a one step process – think again! We can have the right steps but apply the wrong order, and we will not achieve the result we want. The steps and the order must both be correct for change to occur with efficiency. In time management, most people start trying to change without taking the proper step of evaluation.
We have been taught to plan our work, and then work our plan. That approach sounds reasonable, but it leads to failure without taking more essential steps before we plan our work. Most of us start with planning our work or start planning our tasks. I have a few phone calls to return – we list those. I need to make these marketing pieces or put a sign or lockbox up at my new listing today. The truly productive individual starts at the opposite end from where most people begin. They start by working to determine where their time actually goes. They don’t begin by planning – they begin by exploring where their resource of time goes. Once they know where their time goes, then they work at managing the time to increase the amount of time in DIPA (Direct Income Producing Activities) activities.
They focus on lowering the PSA (Production Supporting Activities) that they do in their business, and then they work to increase and compartmentalize their discretionary time in the largest amounts possible. These blocks of discretionary time are grouped together, so the individual achieves the largest value from their time invested in personal enjoyment. This whole process starts with recording their time. There is really a 3-step process to this:
- Recording your time
- Managing your time
- Consolidating your time
The most successful people acknowledge that time is the limiting factor to their greater success. The limits of anything in life are determined by the most valuable and scarcest resource. In achieving greater success in life, that scarce resource is time.
I talk about the four probabilities of success being knowledge, skill, attitude and activities. The ratio at which we increase any of those four is in direct relation to our success. To be able to increase any of those four takes one thing – time.
We must have more time to increase our knowledge. We must have more time to practice to increase our skills. We must have time to increase the activities we do that generate a higher probability of income. Changing our attitude takes time invested in thinking, planning, reading books, listening to motivational CDs, and attending seminars. This all takes a greater control of our time than before. The scarcest resource in life is time.
Time is the great equalizer of life. As a resource, it is unique unto itself. We all possess the same amount of it. With all other resources, we have unequal amounts. Some of us have more money, more skills, greater knowledge, more energy, or even better looks. We all have exactly the same amount of time, which makes time unique.
The other unique characteristic of time is it doesn’t follow one of the tenants of the law of supply and demand. One of the key tenants of the law of supply and demand is that when the demand goes up to a high level, the supply will increase to meet the demand. When Ford comes out with a home run of a car like the Explorer, when the demand for Explorers is significantly higher than they can produce, they increase capacity. They increase the supply to meet the demand. Ford goes to around the clock shifts. If that doesn’t work, they change out other manufacturing plants they have to build more Explorers. That is the way it is with all resources except time.
We cannot rent, borrow, hire, or buy more time. Even a heightened level of demand will never increase the supply for us. It is also finite and perishable; we can’t store it for the future. We are all marching toward the end of our day. The end of our day will come and be gone forever. The path where we marched and what we did is the true value. Time will always be in short supply.
In most resources, there is a substitute. But with time – there is no substitute. We can substitute more knowledge to achieve a greater result. With the greater knowledge, we can accomplish a more significant result. A Sales Person with a solid sales process and sales skills can create a higher rate of return than a less skilled individual.
We can substitute money or capital for labor. Most Real Estate Agents understand this one well. They spend a fortune on marketing to avoid the labor of prospecting. In the end, there is not substitute for time.
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What is Your Business Philosophy?
What is your business philosophy? Do you know the answer? You should be able to write it out and articulate it clearly. Whether you know it or not, you do have an answer. Your standard business practices and procedures for what you do make up your business philosophy. It is the guidelines you follow for daily business.
One part of your business philosophy should encompass your value per hour, which is the amount of money you are worth per hour. What are you willing to do to earn the money you make per hour? It could also encompass your average commission check. If you understand your value per hour and your average commission check, you can determine the type of people you are willing to serve. Some Agents may not be able to help people in a certain price range because of their hourly wage or average commission check amount.
If you have developed and understand your business philosophy, you are better equipped to qualify potential clients. When the buyer does not give you the exact answer you need, you can refer him to another Agent in the office or drop him because he does not meet your philosophy.
You were not put on this earth to help everyone buy or sell a home. There are people you cannot help. There are people who, as much as you try, really do not want your help. Although most Agents will continue to work with them, hoping to win them over, my philosophy was wishing these types of clients the best of luck and sending them on their way. You should consider doing the same thing. Often, these people actually believe they know more about selling and buying than Agents do. Now why would you want to spend your time trying to prove to them that their reality is false? You are going to lose either way in that discussion. Wouldn’t you be better off to throw them back like an undersized fish? Let someone else catch them and waste their time. The truth is that fish is not going to grow much more once you put it in your bucket, or do I mean car! This strict philosophy does not make the people who don’t fit your business philosophy bad people. It does not make you a bad person, either. It just makes you a businessperson who expects a reasonable profit for the time you are investing.
Once you are clear on your philosophy of what a client is and what you expect from them, you do not have to deal with people who do not conform to your philosophy. You need to concisely define your world of business. This definition will enable you to better select the people to serve. We have all selected the wrong people, spent large amounts of time and money working with people we should not have, and felt awful afterwards. In some instances, we were never paid or appreciated for our efforts. You will feel much better turning them down before you invest your time, energy, and money in a losing cause.
Knowing the client you are looking for before going out to search for clients will enable you to find them. There is a law of life called the law of attraction. That law clearly states that you will have a tendency to attract what you are thinking about and looking for. For example, if you were thinking about buying a black Jeep Grand Cherokee, and you went out driving, it is amazing how many your mind will find on the road. You may never have noticed them before, but because you are contemplating a purchase, you see them everywhere.
Do not get frustrated if you are having difficulty finding clients who meet your business philosophy. You will ultimately attract the well-defined client you are looking for. Why not create a strong philosophy and definition of your clients, so you will start to attract those types of clients? You will also learn to quickly dispense with those who do not meet your standard or philosophy, so you will be able to invest your time wisely to find the right clients for your business.
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