Read by More Than 30,000 Agents

2. Two Great Opportunities for Obtaining Referrals

There's been a myth floating around the real estate industry that prospecting is something you only need to do for a while, and then an abundance of transactions will just start flowing to you easily. But it's very rare to find an agent who experiences this unless they're in the middle of a fairly hot market where they're working.

As long as you have transactions closing in your area that you're not involved in, and most specifically transactions where you didn't even know the principals were interested in buying, selling, or leasing until they began working with another agent, you have even greater opportunities to continue to perfect your prospecting.

Prospecting can take many shapes and forms nowadays, but the most typical forms of prospecting involve cold calling on the telephone, knocking on doors, and mailing. And at the same time some of the best residential agents are doing an incredible job of finding solid new prospects on the Internet, and for these agents this has proven to be another very valuable form of prospecting, too.

But the majority of agents depend on the more traditional forms of prospecting, and the amount of money they make in their businesses is proportional to the number of solid, quality leads that they produce. And at the same time, so many agents continually do a very poor job of prospecting throughout the year in their real estate businesses.

But why is this so? Why do so many agents only prospect when they experience a slowdown in activity and feel that their back is finally against the wall in needing to produce new business? Part of this is because they're lazy, and part of it is because they don't recognize how much money they're costing themselves by continually dropping out their prospecting.

Oftentimes I'll ask agents, "How much money do you think you'd be making if you prospected 10-12 hours a week for every week you're working?" And typically most every agent I ask this question of feels that they'd at least double or triple their business if they began prospecting like this. But on occasion, I have had a few agents tell me that they'd only increase their business by about 50%. But typically these agents are already top producers themselves, and they're regularly doing a fair amount of prospecting right now every week.

One of the problems here is that typically many agents already feel busy, but they're busy doing unproductive activities. They're not out hustling new business...they're spending much more time shuffling papers around and not talking with new people. They're staying inside of their comfort zone, and it's costing them a lot of money.

In addition, one of the biggest mistakes that agents make is prospecting until they feel busy, and then dropping out their prospecting. This leads to cutting oneself off from any great new business unless it just falls on your lap from other sources. And becoming reactive instead of proactive in developing one's business is a place where no agent should ever go. The consequences to your income will simply be too devastating...

So if you're an agent who knows that prospecting is a great way to develop new business ask yourself, "How much money would I be making if I prospected 10-12 hours a week every week I'm working?" And if you like your answer, just go out and get the prospecting done.

And in closing, there's one additional subject I need to address. That little voice that goes off in the back of agents' heads sometimes that says, "I'm so busy right now that I don't have the time to do my prospecting." If and when this voice arises ask yourself, "If someone called me right now and asked me to make a presentation to list their $5,000,000.00 property, would I somehow still make the time available to do it?"

And if your answer to this question is, "Yes," you definitely have the time available to get your prospecting done!

Click here for downloadable E-books and live audio interviews with top-producing real estate agents. These interviews are with industry experts who show you exactly what they do to continually make hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars a year.

2. Two Great Opportunities for Obtaining Referrals

When agents begin working in real estate, they're often focused on finding anyone who could be a prospect that they can begin working with. And if an agent doesn't watch out, this can transition into the only way they go about developing new business for themselves. The problem here is that if the agent doesn't learn how to ask for referrals, he or she can miss out on a tremendous opportunity to develop new, quality prospects to begin working with.

Asking people for referrals seems like a simple, easy thing for agents to do. But if this is the case why do so many agents not do it? Part of the reason may be they simply forget to ask for referrals, and another part of the reason may be they feel discomfort in asking people for referrals.

With this in mind I'd like to tell you about a couple of situations when your clients and prospects may be in the ideal emotional state to give you referrals if you just ask for them...I mean if you're going ask for referrals, doesn't it make sense to ask for them when your people are the most likely to want to give them to you?

Here are two ideal situations where you may want to ask for referrals:

1) Immediately after you've just closed a transaction with your client

In this situation, the warm fuzzy feeling that everyone is experiencing sets the tone for maximizing your probability for obtaining referrals. It's sometimes as if the angels can be heard playing their harps far away in the distance. Any difficulties along the way in closing the transaction are often forgotten, as well as most if not all of the personal differences you may have experienced with the client, too. Everyone feels more peaceful, relaxed, and happy at this exact moment in time.

So make sure you utilize this moment wisely.

Invite your client to a celebratory lunch or dinner. Then somewhere during the meal, when you feel the moment is right, say something similar to the following:

"I really enjoyed working with you on this transaction. And the truth of the matter is I'd love to work with more people who are just like you. So who do you know who may be looking to buy, sell, or lease real estate at sometime in the future, who I can begin building a relationship with?"

And if you've timed your moment correctly, you have a great chance of obtaining at least one referral from your client in this situation.

2) Immediately after a client has backed out of closing a transaction.

In this situation, there may be some feelings of guilt that the client has about having wasted everyone's time. So again, it's all about setting the proper mood at the right moment to have the client be very willing to mention one or more referrals to you.

So if you can take the client out to lunch or dinner once again, this would be a great way to set the tone for the moment. If not, being able to talk with them face-to-face in a quiet setting will be very helpful also. And once you've done this, you may want to say something like the following to them:

"I understand this transaction wasn't right for you, and that's OK. What's most important is that we do what's truly in your best interest in all situations here. But I would like to ask one favor of you. Is there someone you know who I can begin building a relationship with, so that when they're ready to do their next real estate transaction, I can be the agent who represents them?"

Again, if you've timed your moment correctly and set the right tone, your client is likely to feel that giving you a referral is something they definitely want to do.

Click here if you'd like more information on my one-on-one coaching program to take your real estate productivity to the next level. One-on-one coaching is available for both real estate agents and company management.

Click Here for More Testimonials

Subscribers to my E-newsletter receive FREE online training. My training course is designed to take you to the next level in your real estate sales career regardless of where you are currently at in your career right now. If you're not currently a subscriber to my FREE E-newsletter and you'd like to subscribe and receive my FREE 7-Day Online Real Estate Training Course, click here.

If you arrange for me to lead a seminar or training for your real estate company you qualify for FREE coaching! Call me or email me for more information.

Please forward this E-zine to anyone you know who is interested in becoming a better, more productive real estate agent.

To subscribe to Jim Gillespie's 
ADVANCED REAL ESTATE SUPERSALES E-ZINE
 click here
and send a blank E-mail.

To unsubscribe and bring tears to my eyes follow the directions below.