Right now, I am going to challenge you to answer the question: "Are You Open For Business?" Most entrepreneurs will answer the question "YES!" without hesitation but with some deeper thought and analysis after today's call, some might change their answer. You know you are open for business, but do your clients and potential clients answer that question about you in the same way?
During a coaching session this past week, an agent who is in the early stages of "re-imagining her business", said to me "I'm not sure that doing that level of transactions and volume can be done in my market." I went on do the math, compared her current business to what is possible if she implemented what we discussed, and then went back into my archives of "stories and metaphors" and explained my thoughts using my "Are You Open for Business?" metaphor. She commented after my explanation how much this "reframing" changed her view. I explained to her that "Sometimes you have to get out of your own way and look at your life and business in a different way". Because it had such an impact on her, I want to share it will all of you today.
Imagine that you have a storefront cafe in a good location walkable for people in the neighborhood. When potential customers walk by, they see that the lights are off, there is no placard outside welcoming guests with a whimsical statement or special of the day, tables are not set up outside and there is no sign of life. In essence, you've got the "closed" sign up but in reality you are inside waiting for customers to stop in. To your dismay, your business is not growing and you see customers that have dined with you in the past eating at the new cafe across the street. The only people that dine with you are those that know you well enough that they know you are inside. Compare this to a real estate business. It would be when a broker rarely sends email marketing campaigns, there is sparse social media content creation and limited, if any, client follow up or scheduled touches. I told her "Put yourself in the public's and your past clients' shoes, would they actively reach out to you if they weren't 100% sure that you "were open for business"? You can't expect them to be loyal when there are brokerage options that are consistently market their business well?" Now keep in mind this agent has a solid business and has grown it through pure skill. Her growth started to plateau because many of the marketing systems, business strategies and systems were not in place. She was unwilling to settle for her business being stagnant and she knew there was more business out there for her to go get. My point was made.
I went on to help her re-imagine her business if she did do what she needed to do to flip the "Closed" sign to "Open for Business". There is no question that if a few marketing strategies are executed consistently over an extended period of time, your business will be impacted with positive growth. Try some of the following strategies which are low cost, easy to implement and will have a positive impact:
- Send specific neighborhood quarterly stats to your clients. Have you considered creating neighborhood tags within ActivePipe? By doing this you can target your clients more specifically. When using email marketing as a strategy (which should be everyone), spend some time breaking down your list into categories. Do not SPAM your entire list with emails that do not matter to them.
- On Instagram, follow @sothebysrealty, @sothebys, @sothebysjewels, @sothebyswatches, @sothebyssneakers, @sothebysstyle, @sothebyswine and share content, specifically the reels that you love and find really interesting.
- Follow the @jamesonsir blog and repurpose on your social media.
- Build out an email newsletter created by your brokerage and share to your "tags" that would benefit. JSIR agents look specifically for IMAGINE and other templates provided by marketing.
- Build out a "touch" strategy to stay in contact with your TOP 100.
- Execute a Real Estate review process on the anniversary of each of clients' home anniversaries. Have you signed up for our NINJA installation in October?
- Do you have a Birthday strategy for TOP 100? (My best marketing ROI strategy when I sold)
- 3 social media posts per week on Facebook and Instagram minimum. 2-3 stories posted per day.
- On your next listing, get creative and upgrade your marketing. Elite level marketing of your listings can equally benefit your personal brand.
- Instead of just scrolling through your social feeds, take the needed time to comment on "noteworthy" posts your clients drop on their feeds.
I just gave you 10 simple ideas that are low cost, easy to implement and as a whole, will have a big impact on your business. There will be fewer transactions (my guess is 10%) in 2022 and 2023 (20%) compared to 2021. On the other hand, if you had the "Closed" sign on your door in 2021, you let a lot of opportunity slip through the cracks. If you make the necessary changes to your business, you'll be able to make up for the difference the market shift created to the overall number of transactions. It starts with marketing and business systems. Would you hire someone to market your property that can't market their own brand and business?
So, in wrapping up, I have to ask you: "Are You Open for Business?" Now go think about that question.
For those of you on my email list, you'll get the recording, notes with links to supporting articles and podcasts and tomorrow morning. If you'd like to subscribe, just email my team at [email protected] and they'll add you.