How One Simple Shift Can Instantly Triple Your Real Estate Lead Conversion Rates!

It’s ironic, frustrating and sad at the very same time…

…agents wasting thousands upon thousands of dollars

…endlessly chasing poor quality leads (people who are actually avoiding you)

…all to convert a measly 1-2% of those leads!

The worst part is 1-2% conversion is actually pretty good, considering all the garbage that agents are calling “leads” these days.

How would you like to convert 5-10% of your leads, in some cases even more?

Well it all starts with the right mindset and focus.

Real estate is all about building relationships…client relationships…networking relationships…COI relationships…that all lead to a growing real estate practice and more closed business year after year.

Seems pretty straightforward and on the money, right?

Then why do so many agents miss the single most important part of the lead generation/lead conversion process and screw up the development of real relationships with social media and various other technologies?

It’s because agents lean so heavily on technology to do their “relationship building” for them. It’s as though agents think they can “automate” the development of quality relationships.

Maybe if we were robots…

(Here’s a thoughtful article on this subject that will definitely make you think. It’s by David Byrne titled, “Eliminating the Human”)

…but humans are a little bit different than robots, aren’t they?

Can you really develop a quality relationship with an email drip campaign?

Can you build a relationship with auto-posted tweets to your Twitter account?

Can you “outsource” your social media and expect to be seen as “authentic?”

Don’t get me wrong. I love all these things.

I love quality marketing that drives people to call or text for info, or opt-in to your email drip campaign. I love it when our clients generate 100-150 leads a month with our MVR technology. I think technology is amazing!

Then there’s “social media.” I love the social media movement. I think it’s the next great frontier of potential “relationship building.”

The issue I have is agents are chasing all these things, while leaving out the most crucial elements…the basic fundamentals of success in real estate.

Again, it’s all about relationships. And relationships are with those people (human beings) who KNOW, LIKE AND TRUST YOU!

All the tools, all this technology, all these amazing social media outlets…they all do one thing and one thing only. They speed your ability to communicate.

Quality marketing makes your phone ring…giving you the ability to what?

Communicate.

Forms that get people to opt-in to your email drip campaigns do what?

They give you the ability to communicate.

Your Facebook page with 5,000 “friends” does what?

(5,000 friends…whatever! No one has 5,000 friends. BUT…where else would you go to exchange messages with people you didn’t like in high school?)

They all speed your ability to communicate.

MVR lead generation that brings in 100-150 warm inbound lead calls every month…what does it do?

I think you get the idea. It speeds your ability to connect and communicate.

The point I’m making is that the key is not the technology. Yes. They’re great. In fact they’re amazing and powerful tools. But that’s all they are…tools.

I like the way Scott Stratten (social media guru and viral marketing genius) puts it, he says, “You are your company’s CRO (Chief Relationship Officer). You are the one who has to take all this ‘technology’ and all these amazing platforms and take it to the next level.”

If you’ve got 5,000 friends on Facebook…how many times have you connected with someone of influence and invited them out for coffee?

If you’re a Twitter fanatic…how many times have you reached out to someone you knew could influence greater reach for you in your community?

If you’re on LinkedIn with 500+ “connections”…how many of those relationships are you nurturing, building and developing?

Worse yet, if you’re using MVR and generating 100-150 warm real estate leads a month, how many of those people (human beings) have you engaged, initiated a warm easy-going dialog, and began building a relationship?

With the various social media platforms…be authentic, be real and take it to the next level. Relationships are not digital. They’re one or more real live human beings having a conversation or meeting for coffee. Take it there.

With your lead generation, polish and perfect your scripts. Internalize them and make them a part of you…so they’re natural. When you engage an inbound MVR lead call you’ve got to know what to say and how to say it.

Then, you need to bring more value to the table for that person. Be a value creator. Be a servant. No. Be a Super-Servant with a genuine servant’s heart.

Again, it’s all about building relationships. And relationships start with real live conversations. Start having them. Perfect your skills and read books on communication. These are core fundamentals.

Lastly, I’d like to recommend a book that was first published back in 1937. It’s a book that is even more applicable today. It’s a book that can and will change your life. It’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” by Dale Carnegie.

Get it. Read it. No…read it 2-3 times and then apply it to all that you’re doing as an agent…marketing, prospecting, lead generating, your social media platforms. Then, once you’ve seen its impact, shoot me an email telling me how much it’s meant to you.

It’s time to get back to the basics. And you can’t get more basic than people do business with those they KNOW, LIKE AND TRUST. That’s a relationship!

My word (or words) for the day!