Lisa Gray

679 POSTS 0 COMMENTS

Lisa is an accomplished marketer with years of expertise in direct response marketing, digital marketing, data analytics and business development working with both B2C and B2B.

5 podcasts for the burned-out, stressed-out, ready-to-quit real estate agents

Sep 23, 2019

You know those times in your business where you seem to hit the groove? You cruise blissfully along, engulfed in it, with heightened awareness, and everything just seems to fall perfectly into place.

“Hitting on all cylinders” is what some call it. Whatever the label, it may last a day, a week or even longer. But it does end, and with it comes the let-down.

Some agents get stressed, others paralyzed. Both are symptoms of burn-out from the ups and downs (especially those dratted downs) of life in real estate.

Thankfully, help is easy to find — encouragement, insight, and tips from others that can propel you back to at least a semi-groove state.

You can visit a counselor, talk to your coach, read one of nearly 130 million published books, watch an inspiring video or listen to motivational podcasts.

Which is the perfect segue into our offering today: 5 podcasts that we think can lift the funk.

Tony Robbins Podcasts

“Why live an ordinary life, when you can live an extraordinary one?” Tony Robbins asks in one of his most famous quotations. If your life is feeling rather ordinary right now, take a cruise over to Robbins’ podcasts and turn it all around.

When it comes to dispensing motivation, nobody does it better than Tony Robbins.

Worth a listen: “If you’re ready for a major breakthrough in your business, hungry for change and you’re hungry for growth,” we recommend learning “momentum shifting” in “From Home Business to Billion Dollar Fitness Empire.” (Skip to 52 to jump right in).

Also, check out “Fear will Destroy you or Drive you.” Fast forward to 4:09 to skip the intro.

The School of Greatness — Lewis Howes

Once upon a time, a New York Times bestselling author built a wildly successful online media company, becoming known as among the “5 Internet Gurus Who Can Make You Rich.”

Easy for him to say, right?

Howes promises, however, to help you “learn the wisdom, skills, and tools to write your own story” and he does that through his weekly interviews with someone sure to inspire.

The Dangers of Overpricing Free Report is available on ProspectsPlus.com under the Free Report tab.

Worth a listen: Rise Above your Circumstance (forward to 2:28) and Set Yourself up for Success (skip to 1:45).

Invisibilia (from NPR)

Invisibilia is, according to publisher NPR, a podcast that “discusses the invisible concepts that control our behaviors, including beliefs, assumptions, cultural norms, and emotions.”

Slickly produced and professionally narrated, Invisibilia is most definitely easy on the ears as it captures the listener’s imagination.

They promise to “help you learn new things, or they take a common concept and present it in a new light, so you walk away with a completely different perspective.”

And, a new perspective may be just the answer for the burned-out, stressed-out, ready-to-quit real estate agent.

Worth a listen: If you think you have problems, you’ll love this! The End of Empathy

Aware Broadcasting – The Ziglar Show

The late Zig Zigler is still known as “America’s most influential and beloved encourager and believer that everyone could be, do and have more.”

He and a couple of partners, in fact, invented the modern sales seminar, traveling the country, teaching salespeople skills they didn’t know they needed.

Zig Ziglar motivated millions of people for many years, and The Ziglar Show continues his legacy by teaching you how to be the best you can be.

The next time you feel rejected by a client or prospect, think about Ziglar. His first book was rejected 39 times before finally being published.

His son, Tom, and Kevin Miller host the Aware Broadcasting podcasts, offering up enough motivation to get you back to lead generating like the real estate Rockstar you are.

We recommend “Find your motive or abandon the effort.”

Burnout to Breakthrough

Not as slickly produced as some of the above, but Dr. Eric Shuemake offers up some brilliant tips to deal with burnout.

Tip number one? Don’t quit – redefine your business. “Only do the things that only you can do,” he suggests.

We recommend: “What is Burnout Costing You?” Not just in money, but in time, health and quality of life?

And, Don’t Forget: Take a Listing Today

Actionable strategies to get you out of the office and taking a listing today. Brought to you by ProspectsPLUS! A popular episode is “How to Up Your Game & Scale-Out.”

Download the “Chop Your Mortgage” Free Report and use it in all of your marketing (direct mail, emails), and on your website as an opt-in.

The Chop Your Mortgage Free Report is available on ProspectsPlus.com under the Free Report tab.

Make sure you stay top-of-mind with the people that matter most!

Need help targeting the perfect niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list too l to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!

PLUS: When you have time…here are Free killer tools to help your success this year!

1. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here

2. “Get More Listings” Free Online Webinar

“Get MORE Listings & Begin to Dominate Your Market!” Free online webinar. Learn the 3-7-27 strategy for explosive growth, why 95% of agents have less than 20% market share, and how to become the agent everyone competes against. – Click Here

3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Get More Listings, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence. –Click Here

4. The Free One-Page Real Estate Business Plan

Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan. – Click Here

5. The Free Online ROI Calculator

Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! –Click Here

Want to make more money? Consider one of these real estate niches

Sep 18, 2019

If you follow the annual “The 1000” list from RealTrends, you may wonder how those agents make it so big in real estate.

In our opinion, the list tends to be a bit misleading, with team agents often listed as solo and vice versa.

Then, there’s Ben Caballero, always ranking number one in the “Individuals by Transaction Volume” category.

He is most likely an excellent agent. But he is not your traditional “solo” agent, as the category implies.

He “oversees a team of 22 people” who helped him sell “$2.2 billion worth of homes in 2018,” according to BusinessInsider.com.

For the purposes of this blog post, however, he makes all that money by specializing in a real estate niche. He sells only one type of home, which happens to be first on our list of profitable real estate niches.

New Home Sales

Caballero “only sells new-construction residential properties and he only works with volume builders, or companies that build several hundred homes per year — sometimes up to 3,000,” according to BusinessInsider.com’s Katie Warren.

He and his team sell, on average, 92 homes per week.

The niche is competitive and requires a bit of education before pursuing it. There is additional paperwork and, often different contracts than you’re accustomed to.

Financing may be tricky, and if the buyers don’t have an agent, your job description grows exponentially to include assisting the buyers through not only the purchase process but helping them choose a lot, floor plan, options and more.

Some builders require the agent to come up with a marketing plan, track and follow up with leads and develop relationships with title reps, lenders and others.

Some new home sales agents are employees, with employer-offered health insurance benefits, retirement plans, paid time off and bonuses.

Obviously, Caballero is proof positive of the amount of money it’s possible to make in this real estate niche.

The Luxury Market postcard is available in the postcard section under the Luxury Market Series.

If you’re curious about who is hiring new home sales agents and the job requirements, check out some online job boards, such as at Indeed.com and Monster.com.

Luxury Homes

When discussing lucrative real estate niches, luxury home sales is sort of a no-brainer. High-end homes are more expensive so commission checks are bigger. If you can develop a decent volume, you’ll be all set.

Knowing you want to specialize in luxury property and knowing how to go about it, however, are two different things.

First, you’ll need to truly understand your target audience. What are their needs? How do they differ from buyers and sellers of lower-priced homes?

Then, you’ll want to know how to reach the affluent. Marketing to them isn’t the same as marketing to other real estate consumers.

Finally, consider micro-concentrating within the luxury home niche. Choose to work with certain luxury clients, such as those who share common interests (belong to the same country club, work in a certain industry).

The Picture Yourself Here postcard is available in the postcard section under the Millennial Series.

If you plan on specializing in listing luxury property, check out this video from Michael LaFido.

Focus on a Generation

There are currently four generations of Americans who are most actively involved in buying and selling real estate.

Our youngest cohort is Gen Z, born between 1996 and today. This means that the oldest turned 23 this year. Believe it or not, these “youngsters” are buying homes. And, as the generation ages, more will be jumping into the real estate market.

Next in time are the millennials, born between 1977 and 1995 (they are between the ages of 24 and 42 in 2019). They number 83 million, more than the baby boomer cohort.

According to NAR, millennials are currently the largest group of homebuyers in the U.S. at 37 percent. That’s five percent more than baby boomers.

Forget the moaning and groaning over how “broke” they are. Yes, many have student loan debt. Many others, however, are finding ways to pay down this debt and acquire a decent credit rating.

Millennials, on average, boast an average FICO® Score of 665, squarely in the “fair” range according to Fair Isaac. The older of the group have the best scores and purchase more expensive homes.

Next comes Generation X, born between 1965 and 1976. They’re often referred to as the “forgotten generation,” ignored by the media and marketers.

These folks, in our opinion, are those the savvy agent will pursue. Why?

They are in their peak earning years, they (by and large) need larger homes and they typically have a home to sell. Plus, they have experience with real estate so they don’t require as much education and hand-holding as the younger generations.

Finally, we take a look at baby boomers. Born between 1946 and 1964, this group is now between the ages of 55 and 73. Since the most common age to retire is 62, many of the members of this cohort are still working and make up the nation’s highest wage earners.

Since NAR studies show that the average real estate agent is a woman in her 50s, this may just be the ideal real estate specialty. Marketing is so much easier when you have something in common with your target audience.

Get more information on how to market to Gen Z and millennials at the Center for Generational Kinetics’ website. Target boomers more effectively by reading up on them at KEAP.com (be aware, though, that the author got generational birthdates wrong) and SmallBizTrends.com.

There are also a number of baby boomer-specific blogs that are worth a look:

nextavenue.org
boomercafe.com
sixtyandme.com
The Too Much House postcard is available in the postcard section under teh Life Event Series.

Send the Too Much House postcard from the Life Event Series to a targeted list of Baby Boomers.

Need help targeting the perfect niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list too l to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!

PLUS: When you have time…here are Free killer tools to help your success this year!

1. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

2. “Get More Listings” Free Online Webinar

3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

4. The Free One-Page Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Free Online ROI Calculator

Stop wondering how you’ll get business in 2020 – Get serious about your database

Sep 16, 2019

Imagine what life would be like if you could stop cold calling, door knocking or chasing after FSBOs – or at least cut down on those activities.

Ditching the more distasteful aspects of your real estate lead generation routine is possible, if you vow, right now, to chase after referrals, and get serious about your database.

Warm calls are so much more pleasant and knocking on doors where people are happy to see you beats the alternative.

Make building better relationships with people you already know, the center of your 2020 marketing plan.

How’s your sphere of influence?

Agents who have been in the business for more than a minute tell horror stories about friends and even family members who “forgot” that they were in real estate and listed their homes with another agent.

In fact, NAR statistics say that “The typical REALTOR® earned 13 percent of their business from repeat clients and 17 percent from referrals from past clients and customers.” (The study doesn’t explain what they mean by “customers.”)

Look at those numbers – they’re pathetic, aren’t they? Especially when NAR surveys say that nearly 90 percent of real estate consumers say they would use their agent again in the future.

Past clients know you and, hopefully, they like and trust you. Shouldn’t agents be getting more than 17 percent of their business from referrals from them?

We get it. Agents have a ton of irons in the fire during the typical work week and keeping in contact with their SOI typically ends up as a low priority.

What would happen, though, if you moved it up on the list? Made those warm contacts (instead of contacting strangers) a priority? You’ll end up top-of-mind with your sphere when someone mentions buying or selling a home.

The Barking postcard is available in the postcard section under the from the Sphere/Farm Animal II Series.

Step 1 to get your real estate business on the referral track

Organize your database. Yeah, doesn’t sound like a whole lot of fun, but it’s necessary to keep you on track.

If you already have an organizational method, you’re one step ahead. If not, let’s create a simple one.

Start by grouping your contacts. There are many ways to group them, so choose labels that make sense to you. Some suggestions include:

Hot leads (people you don’t know yet)
Cold leads (again, people you don’t know)
Sphere (or “family,” “friends” “ladies I play tennis with” “past clients”)
Vendors

Feel free to create subgroups, if it will help you to stay organized. Some of these may include:

Immediate family members
Extended family
Closest friends
Acquaintances
Neighbors
People you met through your kids

The All Ears postcards is available in the postcard section under the Sphere/Farm Animal II Series.

Thanks to the folks at TopProTraining.com for some of those ideas. Check out their list for more.

Kim Hughes at KimHughes.com suggests that the next step in setting up your database to help you succeed should be to go through all of the leads, checking the information you have on them and adding anything that comes to mind.

At a minimum, Hughes says you should have the contact’s full name and the name of immediate family members. Naturally, you won’t have family member info for some contacts, such as leads.

Pick up the phone and start calling people. Start with folks you know, like past clients, relatives and friends.

Tell them you’re updating your database and want to ensure you have their correct contact information:

Verify that the addresses, both snail and email, are current.
Best phone number to contact them.
Birth date is an important one (folks LOVE getting birthday greetings). The birthdate might be a tough one to ask, but tell them you like to reach out to people on their birthdays. You don’t need a year, so that may make the question “Hey, when is your birthday?” a bit easier to ask.

Get ideas for these conversations at TheRealEstateTrainer.com.

Listen carefully to their end of the conversation for any tidbits you can add to their spot in your database – “something such as an upcoming surgery, new baby or vacation,” Hughes suggests.

Then schedule a follow-up call, or a reminder to send a gift or flowers, depending on what they’ve told you.

This is a project that, although it needs to get done sooner, rather than later, is one that can be done in chunks. Hughes brilliantly recommends starting the organization process with your past clients.

But do schedule those time chunks and vow to stick by the schedule. Before you know it, you’ll have an organized, clean database, making your real estate lead generation a snap.

The Fall Maintenance postcard is available in the postcard section under the Content Card Series.

Send out the Fall Maintenance postcard from the Content Card Series to your Sphere and Farm.

Need help targeting the perfect niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list too l to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!

PLUS: When you have time…here are Free killer tools to help your success this year!

1. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

2. “Get More Listings” Free Online Webinar

3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

4. The Free One-Page Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Free Online ROI Calculator

5 Ways to Make Sure You Finish Strong This Year

Sep 11, 2019

With a little over three months left in the year. Right now is the ideal time to go over your current years goals and make sure you have everything in order to finish strong. The following review should help keep you on track and ensure your success.

Review your numbers

Don’t wait another day to get a handle on your year-to-date numbers, if you haven’t already.

Figure out what you need to do to accomplish your goals with the time remaining. Figure out how many closings it will take and how many listings are needed to achieve those closings?

Work the math to see how many new contacts you need to make, to get the number of appointments to secure a listing, based on your closing ratio. This will tell you the number of listings needed to realize your goals.

Once you have this number, break it down to its simplest form. How many new contacts do you need to make weekly and daily? Then create a daily schedule to meet these goals. Make a commitment to stick to this schedule and not allow anything to throw you off track.

Leverage the opportunities to connect

This time of year is filled with holiday gatherings and neighborhood invites. And the holidays make it super easy to reach out and connect with your customer base and farm.

Autumn marketing postcard for agents — The Hello Autumn postcard is available in the postcard section under the Holiday Series.

Take advantage of all the opportunities to connect with everyone throughout the season with Fall, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas Holiday Postcards.

Don’t forget to layer and add to the effectiveness of your postcard marketing with a phone call.

As you head into the holiday season, call every existing customer you have, and wish them a happy holiday. Be sure they know you’re on top of anything related to real estate and are the expert resource to turn to for all of their real estate needs.

Ask for referrals

Before you hang up – ask for the referral. I know it is uncomfortable to ask someone for what feels like a “favor”, but remember you are doing them a favor by providing expert help to someone they know.

I personally enjoy the opportunity to refer a great restaurant, hairstylist, repairman, or health professional to someone I know. The reason for this is because I know how difficult it is to discover great resources. We’re all searching for the “best of the best” and love sharing this information once a business is discovered.

The people in your customer base are no different. Allow them the opportunity to become the provider of a great resource. Most people will forget to make a referral unless something or someone jogs their memory. Be the person to jog their memory while on the phone with them!

Don’t leave your marketing to chance.

This time of year it’s easy to get busy. That’s when things like marketing and prospecting fall through the cracks or take a back seat. Put a plan in place today to make sure you have marketing systems active and scheduled through the end of the year, so you stay top-of-mind all the way through the season.

This plan includes showcasing your Just Listed, Just Solds, and Open Houses for the greatest impact, exposure, and results. Remember, if you did an especially impressive job of getting that new listing under contract fast or at a great list-to-sale price ratio, add that subheading to your Just Sold Postcard! This information can be the differentiator in a competitive market making you stand out head and shoulders above the rest.

Set aside 20-30 minutes each week to review what changes you need to make to your current marketing plan based on your previous week’s activity. Then get your order out for whatever Holiday postcards, Just Listed/Just Sold, or Open House postcards you need to send that week. Knocking out your marketing at one time each week gives you a lot more time to prospect, present and close – the three things closest to your bottom line.

Commit to the extra mile

As they say, it’s never crowded along the extra mile. With three months remaining, this is an ideal time to push beyond your commitment goals a bit. If your goal is to make 10 phone calls a day, consider what would happen over the next month if you pushed that goal to 15 calls a day?

Here’s a goal to add to your list that will provide long-term success and make things interesting, commit to adding at least one new person to your prospect list each day regardless of what it takes. This means if you’ve made 15 phone calls and some neighborhood cold calling, yet still don’t have a new person to add to your prospect list, you keep going until you do.

If you only committed to that goal for the next three months, it would result in over 90 additional prospects by the end of the year.

The truth is the bottom 80% of agents in your industry won’t be doing any of these things over the next 90 days. Many will look at how far they are from their goal and give up. Many will do the basics and continue to live commission check to commission check. It will be those of you who strike out and stay laser-focused who will end up on top this year, crushing your goals and kick-starting 2019 with passion.

Where do you want to be in three months? The top 20% or bottom 80%? What you do in the next three months will make all the difference in how your year ends and the new year begins.

Kick off your year-end goal countdown by ordering at least 100 Holiday postcards to send out to your Sphere and Farm!

Make sure you stay top-of-mind with the people that matter most!

Need help targeting the perfect niche of buyers or sellers? Use our mailing list too l to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!

PLUS: When you have time…here are Free killer tools to help your success this year!

1. Become a Listing Legend Free eBook