Prospecting & Marketing Synergies

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Write a detailed scientific summary in English for a chapter entitled “Prospecting & Marketing Synergies”
in a training course entitled “Database Mastery: Nurturing Leads for Long-Term Success” about the topic “Prospecting & Marketing Synergies”.
The summary should summarize the main scientific points, conclusions,
and implications of the topic. The summary should be accurate and concise.

       File content PDF (relevant part):

lead generation❓❓: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC. 17
Power Session 2 Prospecting
The Lead Generation Puzzle

Prospecting Reinforces Marketing

Prospecting can be easier when led by marketing. Marketing can provide the reason for your call or visit, and in fact, prospecting after marketing can dramatically increase the odds of getting business. It can “warm” up a purely “cold” call. For example, after mailing an inexpensive postcard to a neighborhood announcing a home that was recently listed, you could call or visit residents and open the conversation with:

AGENT: “Good day, my name is and I’m in real estate. Did you receive the postcard I sent regarding your neighbor’s home that is for sale? Do you know anyone who might be interested in this home? It would be my pleasure to provide the answer to any of your real estate questions.”

Marketing Supports Prospecting

Marketing validates you—it creates recognition and reputation. People may see your signs or fliers before they meet you and feel like they already “know” you. Therefore, you want your marketing of yourself (your branding) to call
attention❓ to you and attract people to you. People will form impressions of you
quickly, so your marketing should represent who you are and the professionalism and customer value you bring to every aspect of your business.

A great example of how marketing can really work is the branding of The McKissack Team in Denton, Texas. Pictures of Jimmy and Linda McKissack featured them giving a “thumbs-up.” After a while, random strangers in the grocery store, video rental store, or doctor’s waiting room began giving them the thumbs-up. It took a few times for Jimmy and Linda to connect the dots and realize their brand marketing was a success. You will learn more about all aspects of marketing in Lead Generation 36:12:3 Power Session 3: Marketing.

18 LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC.
Prospecting Power Session 2
The Lead Generation Puzzle

Cost versus Time/Effort of Prospecting and Marketing

Cost Versus Time/Effort

Prospecting Marketing

Cost Minimal Could be unaffordable

Time/Effort Maximum Minimal

Prospecting takes more of your time and effort, but can cost little to nothing because it involves making phone calls and visiting people. Marketing, on the other hand, can reach more people in less time, but there is a cost component, which can be high depending on quality and quantity of materials, as well as how often they are distributed.

Don’t fall for the myth “I don’t have the money to lead generate.” Invest your time in prospecting and lead with revenue. You can start prospecting today with a list of people and your phone.

LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC. 19
Power Session 2 Prospecting
The Lead Generation Puzzle

Exercise Assess Yourself: Where are you now with prospecting and marketing? Directions: Answer the following questions and fill out the grid.
1. How much time each day, week, month, or year do you devote to
prospecting?

2. How much money do you spend on a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly basis on marketing?

Prospecting Versus Marketing

Daily Weekly Monthly Yearly

Amount of Time
Devoted to Prospecting

Amount of Money spent on Marketing

  Mins          Mins          Mins             Mins

    Hrs            Hrs            Hrs               Hrs

$$ $$

Is your lead generation program prospecting based?  Yes  No

Time: 5 minutes (10 minutes with facilitated discussion)

20 LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC.
Prospecting Power Session 2

Prospecting:
The Critical
Puzzle Piece

Myths and Truths about Prospecting

Hopefully, your interest is piqued and you are curious to tap into the power of prospecting. Let’s begin with some myths that may be preventing you from reaping the benefits that come from prospecting.

In The Power of One, you learned a basic lead generation myth that if you do a good job, people will just come to you. Your reputation is an important foundation for your business and, certainly, some people will be attracted to you and find you because of your reputation and your marketing efforts. However, not enough will and not soon enough to build or sustain your business. This is a passive approach that may be unreliable, no matter how strong your reputation.

Myth 1

Prospecting = Cold Calling = Rejection

Truth

Prospecting = Meeting People and building❓
Purposeful Business Relationships = A Strong Real Estate Business

“You can be the brightest, smartest,
most well-educated real estate person there is, but if nobody calls you, it just does
not matter.”

GENE RIVERS

THE RIVERS TEAM

TALLAHASSEE, FLORIDA

On a KWRI MAPS free coaching call on prospecting, an informal poll was taken of the 162 people on the call. The poll revealed that approximately 78 percent of them prospect less than one hour per day. One reason they gave was they didn’t know what to say. The other reason was that they see prospecting as cold calling.

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

Most people forget that prospecting has eleven letters and, instead, treat it like a four-letter word. For many real estate agents, the mere mention of the word prospecting conjures images of sitting at a telephone and calling complete strangers for hours on end, only to face rejection, insults, and slammed receivers. With this kind of thinking, would you think that you would enjoy prospecting? Of course not.

Adopt a new mindset about prospecting. See it in a new light and get excited about doing it at the highest level. Nikki Ubaldini, KWU Master Faculty Instructor, puts it best. “When I teach lead generation,” she notes, “I say that the P word, prospecting, is not a dirty word. It’s not just picking up the phone. It’s getting involved in networking groups and in volunteer situations. It’s making a point to meet people every single day.”

Prospecting is more than phone calling strangers. Sure, cold calling FSBOs and expired listings can be a successful form of prospecting, but you will learn other effective ways of prospecting in upcoming Power Sessions, like holding open houses, hosting seminars, knocking on doors in a neighborhood, and visiting past customers.

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

Myth 2

Prospecting means contacting people you don’t know.

Truth

Prospecting means contacting people you know as well as those you don’t know.

Most people have a limiting belief that prospecting is only about calling strangers. In fact, a prospecting component is included in all Keller Williams recommended action plans for Mets (8 x 8, and 33 Touch.) As part of each plan, and to achieve maximum results, you are expected to call and/or visit those on your action plans a certain number of times in a given period. Therefore, prospecting is a critical element in building and growing relationships with those you know—past customers, Allied Resources, and Core Advocates. Action plans and the different categories of people you know are defined in The Millionaire Real Estate Agent and are further discussed in Power Session 3: Marketing, and Power Session 4: Leveraging a Powerful Contact Database.

There are many examples of very successful agents who, in the beginning, grew the number of Mets in their database to a sustainable level, and now only prospect to their Mets. For example, Dick Dillingham, a very successful agent
in Plano, Texas, and Dean of Keller Williams University – Faculty, grew his database of Mets from 300 to more than 3,000. He decided to focus only on Mets and generate business from those he already knew. In the growth phase of your career, it is recommended you build your database by prospecting to those you don’t know as well as those you already know.

Be like Forrest Gump. Have blind faith. Do it like you don’t know any better.

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

Myth 3

Prospecting is what you do to launch your business. Only new agents have to prospect.

Truth

Prospecting is what you do to keep your real estate business running and growing. You should never stop prospecting.

You never stop prospecting because you always need new leads coming into your business. It keeps your skills sharp and your awareness of the market high. You are always looking to add people to your Met database. (Refer to Power Session 4: Leveraging a Powerful Contact Database) At the start of this course, you read about Bill Watson and his relentless, consistent prospecting—Bill
Watson’s Perfect Day. You’ll recall Bill’s commitment to prospecting, “I can’t
ever stop. It’s just what I do.”

Prospecting Statistics

According to the “National Association of Realtors Profile of Home Buyers
and Sellers,” only 22 percent of sellers and 12 percent of buyers already have an
agent they will use. That means there’s plenty of business for you to go after.

The prospecting activities you choose will affect how people choose you. For example, prospecting to people you don’t know (FSBOs, expired listings, visitor to open houses, etc.) will yield some fraction of the overall total buyers and sellers in the market. However, many more buyers and sellers who have done business with you in the past, or who know you through your network (your Mets), will choose to do business with you again, and may refer others to do business with you. These are all viable prospecting options for you.

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

Take a look at more statistics on how buyers and sellers choose an agent from
“The National Association of Realtors Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers.”

How People Choose an Agent

Buyers Sellers

1. Use the agent who contacted them

2. Use the agent referred to them by friend, relative, or neighbor

3. Use the same agent they used before

4% 4%

40% 38%

12% 22%

Now let’s look at the exact same statistics defined in a different and more powerful way—that is, related to prospecting. Based on who you prospect, and how often, people will end up choosing you as their agent.

How People Choose YOU Based on Your Prospecting

Prospecting To: Buyers Sellers

1. Haven’t Mets
   (You contact people you don’t know)

2. Mets
   (You contact people you know and ask them to refer you)

3. Past Customers
   (You contact them and ask them for repeat business)

4% 4%

40% 38%

12% 22%

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

Five Benefits of Prospecting

Prospecting is an investment and commitment to your business. Smokey Garrett, owner of the Garrett and Nguyen Realty Group in Arlington, Texas, reflects on the importance of prospecting: “Even if you have a closing and you make a lot of money, it’s not from anything you did that day. It’s from the investment in prospecting. I feel better at the end of the day when I’ve made my contacts, because my job is to make contacts and to generate a certain number of leads.”

Prospecting is critical to your business for the following reasons.

Prospecting:

1. Is inexpensive and yields immediate results

2. Puts you in control of filling your pipeline of leads

3. Increases your confidence and skill

4. Yields quantity leads which yield quality leads

5. Keeps you in direct contact with the market and protects against market shifts

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

1. Prospecting is inexpensive and yields immediate results

As we have discussed, lead generation through prospecting means calling or interacting with people face-to-face. Sure, some costs are associated with these techniques—phone service, gas for your car, etc.—but these are minimal compared to the cost of maintaining an effective marketing-based lead generation program. Your time has a value attached to it as well, but prospecting remains one of the most dollar-productive activities a real estate agent can engage in.

In addition, marketing alone is typically a sit-and-wait game. With prospecting, when you reach someone over the phone or you meet with them in person, you immediately get a sense from them if they are interested in the service you can provide. The people you reach will have a conversation with you, answer your questions, or ask you not to contact them again. Either way, you have taken the opportunity to make a connection and gather information for your database. You will know immediately if this contact is interested in real estate services from you now, or you will have a sense about their potential as future business.

2. Prospecting puts you in control of filling your pipeline of leads

The very nature of prospecting is about starting and building relationships, converting Haven’t Mets to Mets, and cultivating Mets for present or future business.

What are your monthly and annual production goals? Do you know how many leads you will need in your pipeline to meet those production goals? (Refer to Power Session 11: Living Your Goals for more direction on goal setting.) When you get into the habit of setting production goals and tracking your prospecting activities and conversion rates, you will know when you need to ramp up your prospecting. Prospecting puts you are in control of your pipeline. With marketing, you have to wait to assess the effectiveness of your efforts, and you don’t know the size of your pipeline of potential business.

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

3. Prospecting increases your confidence and skill

Because prospecting is a contact sport, so to speak, you regularly have the opportunity to hone your people skills and your art of persuasion. You are able to practice and perfect your scripts and dialogues. You’re able to get your own groove and tap into your strengths. You will also easily identify where you can improve your techniques through further training and practice. You will undoubtedly make some mistakes along the way, but with mistakes comes progress.

mokey Garrett, knows the value of time on the task. “When I started out I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t know what I was saying. But I don’t think you can really become successful in this industry
without just going and doing it. No matter how many scripts you
practice and how many things you do, it is not going to replace you being at that door or you being on that phone and communicating with the customers.” He continues, “I wasn’t very good at first, but I was motivated to succeed. I didn’t wait until I knew how to call on people; I just did it and made mistakes, and learned from them.”

Jama Fontaine, of Jama Fontaine & Associates in Albuquerque, New Mexico, was rookie of the year her first year even though she didn’t know anyone in her new city. She began her business prospecting through open houses of other agents’ listings. She discusses confidence: “A lot of people that I ended up doing business with my first year were shocked when they found out that I was rookie of the year because they thought I had been in business for a long time. That just comes from confidence.”

Do you recall the lesson of the clay pots told in The Millionaire Real Estate Agent? As the story goes, a ceramics teacher divided his class into two groups. One
was to spend the semester creating one pot of superior quality, and they would
be graded solely on quality. The other group was to produce a large quantity of pots, and they would be graded on the total weight of the pots they created. As it turned out, the group that made the large quantity of pots ended up with the best quality pots as well. Why is this? Because they learned from mistakes and improved their production skills and methods with each pot.

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

4. Prospecting yields quantity leads which yield quality leads

The story of the clay pots illustrates that art and skill are developed through practice, but it also validates that quantity leads to quality. Consistent prospecting to reach a large population of potential business can lead to better quality leads. And quality leads are ones that have a higher likelihood of turning into closed transactions.

Bill Watson has this advice about the quality of leads: “If you’re a real prospector, if you are talking to 20, 30, 40, or 50 people a day, you don’t need to worry about weak leads. If you are not prospecting every day, you grasp on to whatever you possibly think is a lead because you’re attached to it. You can’t be attached to it if you’re going to be successful. You have to be prospecting
enough so that if the lead is a weak lead, you can disregard it because you know
you are going to have better quality leads as a result of your prospecting.”

5. Prospecting keeps you in direct contact with the market and protects against market shifts

The reason that agents will hang on to a customer who is worthless is because they have a scarcity
of prospects from a

lack of prospecting.

Worrying about what your real estate market is up to and where it’s headed? If you’re prospecting every day, you’ll be one of the first to know, and it won’t matter.

There will always be people buying and selling, or those who will do so in the near future. And with prospecting, you’re always in direct contact with these people, answering their questions about the market and assuring them that you have services to help them. This direct contact with buyers and sellers also yield invaluable intelligence on current market conditions. Prospecting agents are often the first to know the market is shifting and can act accordingly.

Top-producing real estate agents do not overly worry about inevitable market shifts, and in fact, they actually even see the opportunity in them—an opportunity to gain market share.

LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC. 29
Power Session 2 Prospecting
Prospecting: The Critical Puzzle Piece

Five Benefits of Prospecting

Directions:

1. Write down a recap of the five benefits in your own words.
   Exercise

2. Prioritize them for yourself—which one matters to you the most, second, etc. Write the priority number (1 thru 5) in the box to the left.

3. Discuss in small groups why you chose to prioritize the benefits the way you did.

Five Benefits of Prospecting







Time: 5 minutes

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Three Steps to Prospecting

Prospecting involves starting a conversation, keeping it going, and asking for business. The three steps are:

1. Approach

Every contact begins with one person starting a conversation. You control the conversation and ultimately the outcome if you make the first step.

Have the right mindset to approach

1. Be proactive—don’t wait for people to come to you

2. Be willing to break the ice

3. Be friendly, caring, and most importantly, be real

4. Be curious about them and their concerns

5. Be ready to give positive feedback

6. Be confident in your pace and posture

7. Be ready to connect

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Three Steps to Prospecting

Approach and make contact

In the neighborhood:

AGENT: Hi, my name is and I know we see each other every now and again driving around the neighborhood.

In the coffee shop:

AGENT: Hi, I couldn’t help notice that you’re reading that great book.

How are you enjoying it?

After a mailing:

AGENT: Hi, ! This is of Keller
Williams Realty. I’ll just take a moment of your time. Did you receive the that I sent?

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Three Steps to Prospecting

2. Connect

The connect step is important to develop rapport with the other person. Think of this step as warming them up to you, while at the same time finding out some very valuable information about them. This process should take no more than a few minutes.

Be a giver: Always come from contribution

When you come from contribution, you always have a purpose for doing whatever it is that you are doing. whether❓ you’re knocking on doors, sending out mailers, or calling people—no matter your script or message—what you’re really saying is:
“I can help you get what you want.”

Coming from contribution means caring about the customer and having genuine concern for solving their problems and meeting their needs. Truly coming from contribution will automatically warm every contact.

Takers … Givers …

Talk Listen

Withhold Offer

Look for the easy way out Take pride in their work Respond when they’re ready Respond quickly Expect you to follow them Offer guidance
Wing it Prepare

Expect service Give service

React Anticipate

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Three Steps to Prospecting

Approach every call as a “service call” rather than a sales call. Act as a high-end concierge offering customers things they need and the things they don’t know they need. For instance, for someone relocating to the area, provide
testimonials from other customers who relocated from the same area—
someone they can immediately relate to.

How to connect after approaching

1. Ask for their name

2. Show you care—show gratitude and offer compliments

3. Be curious about them

4. Introduce the topic of real estate

Ways to be curious

1. Ask open-ended questions

2. Ask about them, their life, their interests

3. Connect with FORD

F

O R
D

This conversational technique will help you learn a lot of vital information about someone when you talk with them the first time, and it will also provide a comfortable structure for subsequent calls.

Mary Harker, a successful agent and owner of The Harker Five Star Team in Dallas, Texas, is a master at connecting with people. “I make lots of calls, and I don’t call them and say, ‘who do you know selling a home?’ I ask them about their family. I ask them about their two-year-old. I care about what is important to them.”

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Three Steps to Prospecting

Ask open-ended questions and listen carefully to the response. Remember the adage: “People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.” One of the best ways to show that you care is to listen. Wait for the person to respond to your question and be a part of the conversation. Even Pat Hiban, a top agent in Ellicott City, Maryland, reveals that he has to remind himself to “zip it up” and wait and listen for the response. Gary Keller once made the statement, “I never learned anything while I was talking.” Listen to their answers and comments, and remember to write down what you learned and your impressions after the conversation is over.

When you do introduce the topic of real estate, remember to offer something rather than ask for something. You quickly add warmth to any contact with this approach. The call itself may begin with an offer (e.g., to send a neighborhood newsletter), or it could be to follow up on an item you already provided (e.g., “Did you receive that brochure I mailed out the other day?”) Either way, you know exactly what to say when the conversation begins.

“If you give somebody something, they often feel compelled to give

you something in return.”
BRUCE HARDIE

THE HARDIE GROUP

SPOKANE, WASHINGTON

LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC. 35
Power Session 2 Prospecting
Three Steps to Prospecting

Approach and Connect

Directions: Practice the skills of approach and be curious.
Exercise

1. One student will volunteer to play the role of the agent, and one student will volunteer to play the role of the customer.
    Agent: Control the conversation by asking 5 questions and finding out as much as you can about the potential customer.
    Potential Customer: Answer the questions, or optionally, challenge the agent by being reserved in your answers or by asking questions back.
    Observers: The rest of the class will observe the role-play and provide feedback on better questions to ask, or better ways to ask the questions.
    Next round the student who played the potential customer now becomes the agent and another student plays the part of the potential customer.
    Continue until all students have a chance to role-play.
   Optional Directions:

2. The class will be divided into groups of three. One person is the agent, one is the potential customer and one is the observer who provides feedback.
    Agent: Control the conversation by asking 5 questions and finding out as much as you can about the potential customer.
    Potential Customer: Answer the questions, or optionally, challenge the agent by being reserved in your answers or by asking questions back.
    Observer: Observe the questions and answers and provide feedback on better questions to ask, or better ways to ask the questions.

Sample Opening Questions:

What do you like about the neighborhood you live in?

What was the last book you read and what did you get out of it? What is one of your goals for this year?
Describe a really fun vacation you had.

What do you enjoy doing when you’re not working?

Time: Allow 2 minutes per role-play, for a total of 6–10 minutes

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Three Steps to Prospecting

3. Ask

Many agents are very successful at approaching and connecting with people. They may have gotten into the business because they enjoyed this aspect so much. However, it’s the asking that is so critical. Every occasion should be concluded with the simple question,

“Are you or someone you know thinking of buying, selling, or investing in real estate in the near future?”

There are many scripts you can practice that will help you get to this question, but ultimately this is the one you need the answer to. Remember that asking is a numbers game. If the answer to your question is “No,” don’t despair. You may have to get through a lot of “No’s” to get to each “Yes.” In fact, every “No” is the path to a “Yes,” and if you ask more times, you will get “Yes” more often.
If you don’t invest much in the answer, it will make it easier to ask. And remember that even if a person says “No,” they may still give you a referral.

Dianna Kokoszka, CEO of KW MAPS at Keller Williams Realty International, says, “I always asked my question at least five times in the conversation. Each time my question is worded in a slightly different way. Guess what? I almost always get them to respond with a ‘Yes.’”

LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC. 37
Power Session 2 Prospecting
Three Steps to Prospecting

How to Ask

1. Ask for their business—an appointment❓ or referral. Clearly state what you want or need.

AGENT: I’m available and would love to show you that house that you’re interested in. Would this afternoon at 3:00 p.m. work for you or would 4:00 p.m. be better?

AGENT: Please let your friends and family know that I would be honored to help them with all of their real estate needs?

2. Thank them for their consideration whether their answer is “Yes” or “No.”

3. Get permission to follow up with them.

AGENT: I’ll call you again the next time a home becomes available in your neighborhood. Is that okay?

AGENT: How would you like to be kept updated on the real estate market in your area on a regular basis?
Great! We’ll touch base every 2–3 months with an update and to see if you know of anyone who may be selling. Thank you.

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Three Steps to Prospecting

4. Get their contact information.

Remember that a true prospect is one that you have contact information for and permission to contact. Many top agents believe you only need a name and phone number to begin with. Always put the contact information into your contact tracking software and put these leads immediately on a marketing action plan. Refer to Power Session 4: Leveraging a Powerful Contact Database to take full advantage of your database.

Remember, that it is more important for you to get their contact information than for you to give them yours. Why? When you have their information, you have control over when and how often you contact them. If not, all you can do is wait for them to contact you. That’s not what prospecting is about.

AGENT: It’s so nice to meet you! Just in case there is something for me to send to you, where would be the best place to send it? If it was a little more urgent and I needed to call, what would be the best number to reach you?

Note: Reference KWU’s MREA Scripts Catalog: Lead Generation for additional scripts.

LEAD GENERATION: PROSPECTING ED 1 REV 2– © 2015 KELLER WILLIAMS REALTY INC. 39
Power Session 2 Prospecting

Notes

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Prospecting Power Session 2
Three Ways to Connect

There are three ways to connect with people with the purpose of finding potential leads. You can do just one, like making phone calls. Or you can do a combination of two or more. You may want to visit homeowners in a neighborhood, in addition to hosting an open house in the same neighborhood, for example.

1. Calling

2. Visiting

3. Attending and/or Hosting Events

There are so many ways that you can get in front of people in real estate. The key is you have to simply get in front of them. You have to take the time and the effort to do it.

Whichever method you choose to connect with people, the secret is to do it consistently for a long time. “When I first started in business,” says Mary Beth Harrison, of Keller Williams Elite in Dallas, Texas, “I got all my clients from phone calls and hosting open houses. I did not have a computer so I kept track of everyone I met on 3 x 5 cards. If you were one of my contacts, I called you until you told me I could not call you again, until you had bought a house, or you died.”

It matters less what you do and matters more that you do.

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Power Session 2 Prospecting
Three Ways to Connect

1. Calling

Most agents have little trouble using the phone to tend to current business—to service existing customers by exchanging information. However, some have reluctance about prospecting by phone. Now, more than ever, preparation is your friend. Knowing who to call, when to call, what to say, and being ready to call will reduce any call reluctance you may have.

Getting Comfortable with Calling

Know who to call

Know when to call

Know what to say

Be ready to call

Know Who to Call

4. Expired Listings

5. FSBOs

6. Referrals

7. IVR Inquiries

8. Website Inquiries

9. Mets (as part of 33 Touch), including past and current customers

Many great prospectors are very particular about who they call and in what order. Those who choose to go after the quickest business call expired listings and FSBOs first thing every morning.

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Three Ways to Connect

urt Buehler, of Buehlers & Associates in Flower Mound, Texas, like many other agents interviewed, calls the different types of leads in a certain order. “I call expired listings and
for sale by owners in the morning for an hour, and then I call around just listeds and just solds. The just listeds and just solds are very warm phone calls and very easy phone calls. I say, ‘We just listed this home. Do you know any friends or relatives who would be
interested in living close to you?’ Or I say, ‘Let me tell you the value of the home so it may help you determine if this is the right time to make a move.’”

Other agents have a different approach. Gene Rivers of Tallahassee, Florida, and Martin Bouma, of The Bouma Group of Ann Arbor, Michigan, for example, regularly prospect to their past customers for repeat business and referrals. Martin also calls his current sellers each week. “This has turned into a great prospecting tool. Our sellers tell other sellers about our calls, and it drives expired listings to us,” says Martin.

1. Expired Listings and 2. FSBOs

Many agents call expired listings and FSBOs because these types of people are often the quickest way to business because they have already expressed their need to sell. They may not be the easiest, but with planning and practice, they can be a great source of leads. If you are interested in calling on expired listings and for sale by owners as a lead generation strategy, please refer to Power Session
8: FSBOs and Expired Listings for more specific steps and scripts.

3. Referrals

Referrals are a rich source of business, and as a matter of fact, many agents have built successful businesses around referrals. Remember the statistic from earlier, that 38 to 40 percent of buyers and sellers use the agent who was referred