In This Issue...
Words of a Champion
Dirk Zeller
CEO
We all feel challenges in our lives. These challenges can manifest themselves at work, at home, with our health, in our spiritual life. These challenges are often accompanied by discouragement. Discouragement can often happen when we survey the difficulties that lay before us. We can de-motivate ourselves because of the gap between the reality of where we are and the vision of where we want to be.
The first thing that usually happens when we find ourselves in that place of challenge and discouragement is that we don’t think clearly or rationally. We are often in such a frenzied or frustrated state that we lose all objectivity. This loss of objectivity causes the evaporation of clarity. Often we will not do what would be wise, which is to seek counsel from a trusted advisor. We usually do the opposite, which is to run and hide.
The second thing we do is to separate ourselves from strengthening relationships. We create a distance between the outside world and ourselves. It’s like we go and hide in a cave hoping that things will change. Make sure that you stand your ground with the people who can strengthen you. Stand your ground with your friends, your spouse, and your children. If you have a coach, call him/her immediately to help you move through the challenge and to help hold you accountable to the actions than need to be taken. Most people will tend to want to be alone, and that is the worst thing they can do.
There is a Greek saying “You will break the bow if you keep it always bent.” Some of us live under constant stress and tension. The bow never gets unstrung and relaxed. Are you putting yourself under relentless pressure? We will all break under that level of pressure. We must give ourselves time for rest and refreshment. Each person has his/her individual need level for rest and refreshment. I will often tell our clients that it’s essential to learn your “rhythms of work.” Your “rhythms of work” are how long and how hard you can work before burnout hits. When discouragement and frustration overcome you, and you just want to crawl into a ball, that is a sure sign that your tanks are too low. We all need to know our “rhythms of work.”
We must also realize that the physical tank will fill up much quicker than the emotional tank. When our emotional tank gets low, it takes longer to fill up again because the filling valve is smaller and slower. However, our body can recharge rather quickly with rest. A solid, restful weekend will usually refill your physical tank. Our emotions and our mind take much longer to recharge. A person might need a week or longer to feel emotionally rested and re-centered in his or her life.
Be sure to protect your emotional tank. Don’t let anyone else control the level of this tank. We often will let our clients take control of these values. If we turn over the value controls, we are in for a train wreck.
Lastly, don’t get lost in self-pity. Self-pity can cause you to cultivate a victim mentality. It can say to you that you can’t do any better. Self-pity will lie to you about everything. It will lie that your skills and abilities are not good enough even after a big victory. Self-pity is a pathetic emotion. It is an emotion that will drain your emotional tank rather than fill it. Self-pity is like being face-to-face with a Bengal Tiger. That tiger desires to claw us to shreds. Self-pity wants to get into your mind and do major damage.
Make sure that you stop the challenges and discouragement at your front gate. Don’t separate yourself from your trusted advisors. If you don’t have some trusted advisors seek them out. If you seek you will find.
To Your Achievement of GREATER success,
Dirk Zeller, CEO
RealEstateChampions.com
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Building Credibility and Trust
Selling and sales techniques go through evolution and sometimes revolution. Evolution is when we evolve and change slowly over an extended period of time. We experience revolution when our customers demand a change in approach quickly to be better served.
Whether building trust is a new key concept in the sales person’s lexicon or not, it has come about through evolution or revolution; I am not completely sure which one. I do know that building credibility and trust are essential elements in the sales process in order to develop long-term sales relationships. Building credibility and trust is more important than ever before in real estate sales. Sales needs to be viewed as something we do with or for someone, not what we do to someone. That’s a very key distinction.
There are two basic sales models and sales customers that have evolved over time. They are transactional selling and relationship selling. For too long, sales and, especially, the real estate sales arena were transaction based. We provided the conduit of access to the information and the properties. We secured and facilitated the closing of the property. The service usually ended at the conclusion of the transaction. That is not an effective model to create a long, successful business from, but we controlled the information, access, and fee structure.
The pendulum started to swing rapidly as our control started to slip away. When we lost exclusive access and other factors, the speed increased. In order to remain viable, Agents needed to establish a more relational selling approach for their survival and success, so we moved to a relationship model of sales. In fact, I would contend that we have over-corrected in many cases; that the use of relationship to an extreme is rampant in many Agents’ businesses; that the relationship is the reason for doing business, not expert guidance and high credibility that leads to high levels of trust.
My evidence of this outcome is the high competition for commission dollars and the fees we charge. According to a Harris Interactive and Real Trends report, 62% of sales professionals feel pressure to negotiate commission; 81% said it was because of the competition. When all we have is a relationship with a prospective client, it’s not enough to sustain our exclusive position as their Realtor®. It’s not enough to protect our commission and value. The fact that we are a nice person and send them a calendar each Christmas is not enough to position ourselves as the expert – someone they will always use to represent their interests in real estate acquisition or sale.
The buzzword in real estate sales in the early 2000’s had been “relationship selling.” We were being taught to bond, connect, find common ground, soft sell, let the customer lead, and many other phrases and acronyms that we speakers and trainers can think up to get our message across. The over-correction into extreme levels of “relationship” sales or “consultative” sales is just beginning to be seen in our sales performance. This is because the marketplace made it so easy to make a sale at that time. For some Agents, this over-correction had allowed them to feel better about themselves in a sales career. I am not trying to offend anyone here, but it has also created a new breed of wimpy salespeople where the relationship is everything, and the skills of selling are inconsequential. Which, in a market that has turned, has proved to be detrimental to their career.
Rather than focusing on building the relationship exclusively, I would encourage you to focus on building credibility and trust. The process of building credibility and trust should make up about 40% of your sales process, followed by identifying their wants and needs, which should represent 20%. Don’t mistake this new focus of building credibility as a way to get around having to develop sales skills, as most did with relationship building. There is no substitute for Champion level sales skills. We need to sell the prospect on our credibility and trust through a knowledge and expertise platform.
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Dealing with Time Consuming Fires
Time-consuming fires are the hot issues that result from the emotional turmoil involved in many real estate transactions. Sometimes they require calm and caution; other times you need to put on a fireman’s hat and start dousing the flames of a delayed closing, emotionally frustrated buyer or seller, problem co-op agent, or slow moving inspector, appraiser, or loan officer. Let the following rules guide your responses:
- Rule #1: There is no closing issue that can’t wait an hour. When your transaction hits a snag, don’t let it dramatically change your day’s schedule. Wait to resolve the issues during the time you’ve blocked for administrative tasks.
- Rule #2: A frenzied reaction only adds fuel to the fire. More often than not, when one closing party gets riled it’s because someone else in the transaction is riled – and hysteria is catchy. Aim to serve as the calming influence in the transaction. If the problem arises two hours before your predetermined administrative time slot, inform the parties that you have prescheduled appointments that you can’t change, but that you will be able to take action when you get out of the appointments in two hours.
- Rule #3: Fires often burn themselves out. Rather than jump into the mess, give the issue a bit of time to simmer down. Remember that your prospecting and lead follow-up tasks are appointments to which you have committed. Sticking with your daily plan may give the issue time to cool or even resolve itself.
- Rule #4: Don’t wait for a three-alarm fire to call for the pump truck. If the fire becomes hot, suit up your broker right away. Before the transaction flares out of control, ask for help. The longer you delay, the more effort you’ll spend getting the situation cooled down.
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7 Steps to Becoming a Champion
The goal of our company is to create Champion Performers. One day I was working on the thought, what is a Champion? What does it take for someone to become a Champion? What makes some people Champions and others not?
I came up with seven key concepts that Champions adhere to. See how many you put into action regularly. I would encourage you to post these and work on them daily.
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A Champion realizes there is a price to pay. To be a Champion, in any area of your life, there is a price to pay. The price is either in time or resources. You have to be willing to invest your time and resources, or both.
To be a great salesperson you have to invest your time practicing scripts, dialogues, listing presentations, and buyer interviews. You must prospect regularly. You must invest your resources of money in training, coaching, audiocassettes, and seminars to give you the tools you need but don’t have today. Are you willing to pay the price?
To be a great parent you have to invest time with your children. Your time investment is the price you pay to bring your children to full maturity. You also invest your resources of money, emotions, and knowledge. Are you willing to pay the price to be a Champion parent?
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A Champion is ready, and willing, to make the sacrifice that is necessary. All success requires sacrifice. A Champion will access what is necessary and put forth the effort of sacrifice, plus a little bit more. The key is aligning the right sacrifice needed for the situation. Many Agents will stop short of what is needed.
Some Agents will sacrifice much more than is needed and are on the road to burn out. Remember, you can kill a fly with a bomb, but it’s really too much energy and sacrifice to use when a fly swatter would be just as effective, and also more efficient. Are you currently making the right amount of sacrifice to be a Champion?
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A Champion has the skill to focus in the moment. The most successful people have the power of focus. They are intently able to do what needs to be done, even when the world around them is falling down. They put aside the distractions and put into action the top priorities for the day. They take things to completion before moving onto the next activity. Do you have the skill of focus that you need?
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A Champion accepts nothing less than excellence. For a Champion, great is not good enough. That does not mean they are paralyzed with perfectionism. There is an element of diminishing return beyond excellence. A Champion knows that fine line between perfectionism and excellence. To execute with excellence the fundamentals is enough to be world-class at any endeavor. To execute excellently your prospecting, lead follow-up, listing presentations, buyer interviews, objection handling, planning processes, cost analysis, and leadership will create an income beyond your imagination. The question is, are you exceptional in all these skills, or just good? Are you maybe even below average in some of these?
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A Champion realizes it’s not what happens, but how you react to it, that counts. A true Champion has as many slumps, challenges, or struggles as the average performer. The Champion has deals that fall out, difficult sellers and assistant problems as well. The difference is the span of time they let it affect them. They understand their reaction is more important than the situation. If you control your reaction, you have a chance to control the situation. If you don’t control it, you have no chance.
The more someone is a Champion, the shorter the span of time they let adversity affect performance. The deal falls out, and some Agents take a month to recover, others a week, others a day. The Champion Performer lets it affect him for less than an hour. They move on to what they can control. You can control your prospecting, your lead follow up, and your ability to practice the skills you need, if you focus on them.
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A Champion is intent on self-improvement and creates inner pressure to achieve the desired result. The ability to seek improvement is reserved for only the most elite performers. Most people are not born with that desire of self-improvement. It is either instilled through relationships or circumstances. If self-improvement is spurred by relationships, you are around the right people. It means that you are proactively improving yourself. If self-improvement is sought because of circumstances, you are reactive. You are seeking improvement because of a problem or challenge you are facing. When the problem is resolved, you will stop your self-improvement. Are you constantly investing in self-improvement? Are you reading books, working with a coach, or attending seminars? Do you have the skills today to be a Champion Performer? If not, where are you going to get them? Who could help you get there?
The truth is, no one has all the answers. Your job is to search for the answers that will craft the life you desire. Where are you searching for the answers? I can tell you it’s not contained in nightly TV.
- A Champion always has a game plan and thinks and works on their plan. Most people just take what life gives them. They have no real plan to accomplish more, achieve more, and acquire more. You have to have a plan to achieve what you want out of life. How is your plan? Does it need work, or even to be written for the first time? Take the first step and write down a series of goals for the next year, three years, five years, and ten years. You have to know what you want.
Back in the 1950’s they did a study of a group of recent Yale graduates. They asked each of them if they had goals for their future. They also asked them if the goals were specific and written down. Only 3% of these graduates had specific written goals.
They did a follow up study years later. The researchers found out that the 3% that had written goals had achieved much of what they wanted. They evaluated the net worth of the Yale graduates in this study as well. They found out the net worth of the 3% was more than the net worth of the 97% combined! You have to have a plan and work on it regularly to become a Champion!
I would encourage you to re-read this article daily for the next thirty days. You should set some specific goals around each point on a separate sheet of paper. If you don’t have the skills necessary to execute all seven points, I would encourage you to seek wise counsel. There is a Proverb that says, “Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisors they succeed”. Do you have advisors in your life? Do you seek their counsel on important matters? A Champion seeks wise counsel.
If you are determined to become a Champion Performer, if you need help with a plan, the skills, or any of the other steps to become a Champion, the very first step is call us at Real Estate Champions. We will offer you a complementary coaching session if you truly desire to become a Champion. You can reach us at 541-383-8833. Becoming a Champion Performer is a process that we have applied to hundreds of people. We have created hundreds of Champions. The truth is everyone deserves to be a Champion!
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