Category Archives: Prospecting

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CS: Prospecting – Preparation for the Cold Call

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The Clarity Series is a series of posts all on one subject.  This particular subject is prospecting.  While the context is commercial real estate, these steps and principles can be applied to any sales.  To read the introduction of this series, click here.  To read an overview of the entire prospecting system, click here.  Thank you for reading!

If you are like most salespeople, cold calls are the low point of your day.  You don’t like them.  You know that top producers cold call all the time. But you aren’t exactly sure what to say.  What you need is confidence.  Confidence comes from preparation.

iStockPhoto

iStockPhoto

I remember my first cold call.  I had just earned my license.  I was calling the owner of a small office/retail stand alone building that had a for sale by owner sign.  I was clueless about what to say.  I remember sitting in my office and staring at the phone.  It was a like I would be electrocuted if I picked it up to dial.  I had these thoughts running through my head:

  • What if he answers?!
  • I’m not going to know what to say!
  • I’m going to sound like a complete idiot.
  • What if he asks me about my fee?

In Part 1 of this post,we discussed the purpose and the philosophy of cold calling.  To review, the purpose of the cold call is to get a meeting.  That is it.  The philosophy that I teach and coach my clients is that you want to connect and add value.  You do not want to use scripts or try to manipulate.

Just like anything else, cold calling needs a system that marries solid preparation with an understanding of the anatomy of a call.  This post deals with the preparation.

Cold Call Preparation

Preparation really means putting your P.I. hat on.  What can you find out about your prospect before you call?  Remember, you goal is to quickly connect with your prospect and land a meeting.  Ideally, you can do this in just a few minutes.

I recommend that you take 2-3 minutes before you make a call and see what you can find out about your prospect.  There is way too much information out there not to.  Your goal is to find something quickly that you can use to establish common ground.  Remember, cold-calling is a numbers game.  Don’t spend too much time researching your prospect.  And don’t spend too much time on the call itself.

Google

This is somewhat of a no-brainer first step, but too many of us don’t do it.  Search for the name and city of your prospect.  By including the city, you are more likely to quickly find the correct person.  Take a few seconds to scan the links.  Click through on one or two and see what you can learn.  Have they been in the news lately?  If so, you can reference that article when you call.  Have they been in any financial trouble?  This can give you a clue to possible motivations to sell, etc.

LinkedIn

google search bo barron

One of the links that will likely come up in the Google search is the prospect’s LinkedIn profile.  This is what you want to find.  On their profile, you can learn where they went to school.  Especially around NCAA tournament time, their school is often an easy way to build rapport and connect.

linkedin profile bo barron

You can also see their work history.  Is there a common company that you both worked for?  Have they had a position in an industry that interests you?

You can also see if they are a connector.  A connector is a person that can be a gateway to get in front of many other people.  Connectors can be much more important to you and your business than one particular deal.  If you find one of these, purpose to build a lasting relationship.  Give lots of value for free.  Their friendship could lead to scores of deals in the future.

how I'm connected to Tony Robbins

Maybe the most important information you can find on LinkedIn is if you have any common contacts.  I would veer from my numbers game mentality of cold calling here.  If you are calling a whale (think Gordon Gekko), it may be worth slowing down if you discover you have a mutual friend.  Attempt to get an introduction from that common connection.  An introduction is much more effective than a cold call as the clout and rapport of the common connection can rub off on you.

Website

LinkedIn can also lead you to the prospect’s website.  If you find that site, you are looking for one thing – their purpose for being in business.  If you can find a mission statement, core values, etc., then you have valuable intel you can use to craft your opening statement when you call.  I will get into that in the next post dealing with the anatomy of the call.

Keep in mind that these tasks can be delegated.  I know a guy that has his assistant run through these steps.  On his cold call sheet for the day are not only names and numbers, but information his assistant found through a little online research.  Remember what you are worth.  If you have a team member to whom you can delegate this step, do so.

Now I would love to hear from you about how you prepare before a cold call.  What do you do?  Or what is something that I have left out?  Leave you comments below!

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CS: Prospecting – The Purpose of a Cold Call

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The Clarity Series is a series of posts all on one subject.  This particular subject is prospecting.  While the context is commercial real estate, these steps and principles can be applied to any sales.  To read the introduction of this series, click here.  To read an overview of the entire prospecting system, click here.  Thank you for reading!

via iStockPhoto

via iStockPhoto

I may have told this story before.  About a year ago, I was riding with a couple of guys through rural Kentucky.  As we drove through this one-stop-light town, we passed a Dollar General Store.  Because I was clear on my specialty and had built my database, I was able to look up the owner.  Before we were out of that small town, I was talking to the owner.  What started off with, “Hi, sir.  My name is Bo Barron and your Dollar Store in Perryville is not on fire,” ended with me in his office the next day.  Cold calling works.

The subject of the cold call is a big one.  I expect to break this up into at least three parts – the purpose of a cold call, the preparation of a cold call, and the anatomy of a cold call.  In this post, I want to address the purpose of a cold call and my philosophy of a cold call.  This first part will be a bit more philosophical.  The next posts will get into how to practically pull off a cold call

The Purpose of a Cold Call

The purpose of a cold call is very simple and there is no debate.  It is to get a meeting.  That’s it.  It is not to spend 20 minutes on the phone.  It is not to build a lasting relationship.  It is not to make the sale.  The purpose of the cold call is simply to get a meeting.

I had a guy who worked for me for a time.  Cold calling was not his favorite thing.  When he would call, though, he would make a new best friend.  These would be 30+ minute conversations.  He would have two of these in a day and think he cold called for an hour.  No!  Cold calling is a numbers game.  These calls should be short.  The more calls you make, the more meetings you will have.  The more meetings you have, the more proposals you will make…and on and on.

I want you to build lasting relationships with your clients and prospects.  I want you to know about their kids and their dreams.  It simply should not happen on a cold call.

My Philosophy of a Cold Call

I am going to give you the secret script to wealth and riches.  Regardless of what you are selling, if you use this script, you are golden.

Wrong!  I can’t tell you how many of my coaching clients have asked me for scripts.  Scripts don’t win in sales.  Connecting wins.

Many of you have probably read How to Master the Art of Selling by Tom Hopkins.  This book is full of great sales tactics, closing techniques, and scripts.  I have read this book and use it as a resource.  You should too.  It is one of the best.  However, it was written 33 years ago for the previous generation.  It suggests that if you know the right words to say in any situation, you will always make the sale.  I disagree.

Sales is not manipulation.  Sales is about connecting and providing something of value that makes someone’s life better.  A cold call is the first touch of that process.  You need to have a plan for the call.  You need to prepare for that call.  You need to have great questions ready.  You need to be ready to listen and adjust.  You don’t need a script!

My next post will deal with preparing and the anatomy of the cold call.  But before that, what are your thoughts about scripts?  How do you try to connect with someone on your first call with them?  Please leave your thoughts in the comments.

And on the note of comments, this Clarity Series on Prospecting has been generating some great sharing of information and has led to conversations off-line.  I encourage you all to keep leaving those comments and engaging with each other!

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CS: Prospecting – How to Write a Prospecting Letter

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The Clarity Series is a series of posts all on one subject.  This particular subject is prospecting.  While the context is commercial real estate, these steps and principles can be applied to any sales.  To read the introduction of this series, click here.  To read an overview of the entire prospecting system, click here.  Thank you for reading!

iStockPhoto

iStockPhoto

In the previous posts for this Clarity Series on Prospecting, I wrote about how I prospected on dollar stores in KY.  After choosing my geography and specialty, and then building my database, it was then time to start contacting people.  This post is a slight revision on a previous post I wrote titled The 3 Benefits of a Well Written Prospecting Letter.  It fits perfectly here.

In my next post, I will go over the anatomy of an effective cold call.  But I prefer to warm up that call.  Writing a letter is a fantastic way to do that.  Determine how many prospects you plan to cold call a week.  That is how many letters you send the week before.  Twenty was my number.  You can certainly do more.

Sending letters has had 4 different types of results for me:

  1. It hits the trash immediately.
  2. They see my name on the envelope before it hits the trash.
  3. It is opened and read. 
  4. It motivates the reader of the letter to call me first.

You have to assume that at least 50% of recipients are not going to read your letter.  They just won’t.  And that is fine.  All I’m trying to do is warm up my initial cold call.  When I call those who actually read it, my ratio for getting a meeting goes up.

On average, they would call me first about once a month.  70% of those calls turn into listings – that is our close rate when they call us from the letter.  That is a huge number for the cost of paper and a stamp.

I want to share 2 things in the remainder of this post:  why send a letter, and how to increase your open and read rate.

3 Reasons/Benefits to Sending a Prospecting Letter

  1. Letters warm up the cold call – This is obvious, but it works.  Not only do I have a higher success rate in getting meetings with those that read the letter, it gives me something to refer to right off the bat.  “Hi Mr. Smith.  I’m Bo Barron and I’m calling to follow-up on the letter I sent you last week…”
  2. Letters force you to follow-up with a call – How is that, you say?  The letters force me to call because I tell them in the letter that I will be calling in about a week.  This is built-in accountability.  It gives you your first opportunity to follow through with integrity – or drop the ball.
  3. Letters force you to be intentional and systematic with your prospecting – This is a huge benefit for most.  To send out a certain amount of letters a week means you must have your database set up.  It means you are intentionally signing X number of letters a week.  It means that you are planning ahead.  It means that you are differentiating yourself from 95% of the rest of the brokerage community.

Now that I have covered why to send the letters, let’s discuss how to get more people to actually open and read the letter!

  • Handwrite the envelope – Studies show that more people open mail that is handwritten versus printed.  I generally had my assistant do it.  She has much better handwriting.  Once a week, 20 letters appeared on my desk.  I signed them and gave them back to her.  She addressed the letters and sent them.  She logged into my cloud-based CRM system and scheduled the cold calls to the recipients.  I made the calls.  Clockwork.  Simple.  Effective!
  • Write a scannable letter – This is a scannable blog post.  I utilize simple sentences.  Short paragraphs.  Lists.  Bullet-points.  A friend of mine runs a local Packages Plus business.  He was sharing with me that studies have been done on increasing the read rate of a letter.  The second most likely thing that is read in a letter is bullet points.  I will tell you the first in a second.  Use them.  That is where your most important information belongs – written in a benefit statement for the reader.
  • Keep the letter short – Anything longer than a page is way too long.  Three-quarters of a page is what I think is best. You have about 15 seconds of eye-ball time.  After that, you lose their attention to something else.  Short and simple works best.
  • Talk about them – Don’t send a letter all about you.  They don’t care.  They care about themselves.  Talk about what is happening that affects their property – their bottom line – their lives.  If you don’t do this, you are wasting your time.
  • Use a Postscript – That’s right – the P.S.  The postscript is the single most read thing in a letter.  Therefore, put the most important thing in the postscript.  I suggest to you that is where you tell them you will call them.  If they read nothing but the postscript, and you tell them you are going to call them, they are much more likely to then read the letter.

I have a couple more thoughts to leave you with.  First, systematize this process.  If you are prospecting on similar properties, there is a good chance that you can use the same basic letter over and over.  If not, take the time to customize the letter to the owner.  Your close rate going from call to meeting will go up.  Take the time.  It is worth it.

Second, delegate everything you can.  I initially wrote the letter.  My assistant would print out 20 a week.  She would lay them on my desk on Wednesday.  I would sign them and give them back to her.  She would then address the envelopes and send them.  Then she would log in to ClientLook and record who was sent a letter.  Finally, she would schedule my calls for the following Tuesday.

Note that all I did was initially write the letter and sign them each week.  Everything else was done by her.  When I show up on Tuesday, my call list is already waiting for me.  Delegate everything that anyone else can do so that you can focus on what only you can do.  Systematization at its finest!

Most of you will not do this.  Some because you are lazy.  Some because you don’t know where to start.  Some because you won’t pause long enough to build your database in the first place.

I challenge you to try this for 90 days.  I think you will be blown away with the results.

Let me hear from you.  Have you used prospecting letters before?  Did they work?  What would prevent you from doing it now?  Please share your comments!

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Clarity Series: Prospecting – 5 Steps to Build a Database

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The Clarity Series is a series of posts all on one subject.  This particular subject is prospecting.  While the context is commercial real estate, these steps and principles can be applied to any sales.  To read the introduction of this series, click here.  To read an overview of the entire prospecting system, click here.  Thank you for reading!

So far in this series, we have discussed what it means to choose a farm area or geography.  We also discussed the value of specializing.  The next step in implementing a killer prospecting system is to build your database.

iStockPhoto

iStockPhoto

In 2004, I got out of the Marine Corps and moved home with my family.  The next day, I started working with my dad in his CRE brokerage business.  As we would be driving around town, he would share with me the histories of the properties we drove by.  He knew everything.  He knew who owned the property.  He could tell me what they paid for it.  He could tell me how big they were.  We would pass some properties he had sold multiple times.  He defined encyclopedic knowledge of a market.  I remember thinking that I would never get there.

Building a world-class database is how you get there.  And you can do it in months.

Your purpose in building a killer database is two-fold.  First, you want to personify the kind of encyclopedic market knowledge like my dad has.  Second, your database is your road map – your foundation – to consistently finding and winning business through prospecting.

Here is how you do it!

5 Steps to Building Your Database

  1. Be crystal clear about your geography and your specialty – This guides you in finding the properties and owners that you will be prospecting on.  My database was built on dollar stores in Kentucky.  You are shooting for 400 – 600 properties.  Does your market have 1,300 multifamily properties?  How many does it have with 100 – 250 units?  Get it down to 400 – 600.
  2. Choose a CRM to hold and manage your database – There are many to choose from.  You can go the traditional desktop based direction with ACT!, REA9, RealHound, or others.  I chose to go the cloud-based route and used ClientLook.  If you’d like to read more about why, click here.  If you are using Outlook to manage your contacts and prospecting, stop immediately.  It is not a CRM.
  3. Find the properties – Your goal is to know everything about every property in your specialty and in your market.  Depending on where you live, this could be easy.  It could also be fairly tedious.  I used the Site To Do Business (STDB).  This is a super-powerful platform that provides site analysis and demographic tools.  You can also define a geography and then search for businesses within that geography.  It then spits you out a list.  It takes maybe 5 minutes.  STDB is available to CCIM designees and candidates.  If you are in the CRE industry and aren’t involved with the CCIM Institute, you should remedy that right away.  There are other tools that you can use in larger markets to include CoStar, Xcelligent, ProspectNow.  There are many other options. Your local PVA office can also be helpful.
  4. Find the owners – In my experience doing this, finding the properties is easy.  Finding the owners is difficult.  Kentucky is a freedom of information state.  Once we built our database of dollar store locations, my assistant went county-by-county (there are 120 in KY) getting the owners of record for each property.  This took about a month.  Where you live will determine how difficult this may be.  If a company like ProspectNow, LexisNexis, or REIS covers your market, pay the fee.  You could get what you need in days instead of weeks or months.  If you live in a freedom of information state, check your Secretary of State website.  It should tell you the members of LLCs.
  5. Maintain your database – Once you have it built, maintain it.  Pay attention and track all the transactions of the properties in your database.  Keep it up to date.  This will allow you to remain the market expert in your specialty.

John McDermott is one of my favorite guys in the CRE industry.  Here is his list on what should be in your database for each property.

  • Property Name
  • Property Address
  • Property Photo – you should take this yourself.  STP!  See the property.  See the people.
  • Property Condition/Class – A,B,C
  • Property Tenants
  • Property Rents (current & market)
  • Property Features including deferred maintenance
  • Owner Name(s)
  • Owner Address
  • Owner Phone Number(s)
  • Owner Email – if possible

Final thought – I believe and preach that anything that can be delegated should be.  You need to focus your time on the tasks that only you can do.  Building a database is an exception, however.  You should do most of this yourself.  To become a market expert, you actually need to learn the properties and the people.  There is no better way than getting on the property.

So we have now covered geography, specialty, and building a database.  The remainder of this series will deal with how to use the data to find and win business.

What are your favorite tools to finding properties and owners?  Please share with us in the comments section.

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Clarity Series: Prospecting – Geography and Specialty

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The Clarity Series is a series of posts all on one subject.  This particular subject is prospecting.  While the context is commercial real estate, these steps and principles can be applied to any sales.  To read the introduction of this series, click here.  To read an overview of the entire prospecting system, click here.  Thank you for reading!

photo from iStockPhoto

photo from iStockPhoto

In 2010, I bought the family commercial real estate brokerage business from my dad.  That week, I had 3 closings.  It was great timing.  All of them were Single Tenant Net Lease (STNL) deals.  I experienced in a new way broker’s remorse.

Broker’s remorse is that feeling of exuberance a broker feels once a good size deal closes.  It is followed 5 minutes later by the feeling of, “Oh crap!  What next?”  In commission sales, it is like you are unemployed between closings.  After those deals closed, I looked at my pipeline and panicked.

I had nothing else happening.  I had zero clue when my deal would hit.  I had not been prospecting and I was paying for it.  I also had an epiphany.

The only deals that were getting done were STNL deals.  Until that day, I was a generalist.  On that day, I chose my specialty.  I prospected on 405 Dollar stores in the commonwealth of Kentucky.

Question:  What is your specialty?  (If you paused or couldn’t articulate it in 20 words or less, then you don’t have a specialty.)

Top producers in commercial real estate are specialists.  This is known and proven.  So, when you are crafting a prospecting system, you must start with these two steps:  geography and specialty.

Geography

Now remember – when you are prospecting, you are asking for the business.  Your geography is simply the physical area where you will be doing so.  Let me give you some examples:

  • A STNL specialist who prospects nationwide.
  • A multifamily specialist who prospects within a 20 mile radius of a certain city.
  • An industrial specialist who works a specific industrial area within a city.
  • A tenant rep who serves her client wherever they go
  • An advisor who specializes in a certain, defined neighborhood.

In my case, my geography was the commonwealth of Kentucky.  I had to go that wide to have enough inventory of Dollar Stores.  Ideally, you want a minimum of 400 properties to call upon in your chosen geography.

Specialty

You can be a geographical specialist.  The number one broker of the number one CRE firm (by number of transactions) in New York City is Bob Knakal.  Bob is a geographical specialist.  He can show you on a map which blocks in the city he works.  In fact, his entire office is set up this way.  Each broker has their own territory.  They know everything about every property within that territory.  Or they get to go work somewhere else.

I was in Chicago last week training some brokers in our office there.  It is a top 3 office in our company.  One of their top 3 guys was explaining to me all the success he has had since he specialized.  And his specialty is a specific neighborhood.  He owns property in that neighborhood.  He is a peer with the owners he is calling on.  You can’t go 2 blocks without seeing one of his signs.

More common, however, is a product type specialist.  You can go with the major food groups – multifamily, retail, office, and industrial.  Or, you can go more of the niche route and focus on STNL, medical office, sale-leasebacks, self-storage, and on and on.  I know a great broker who specializes in marines.  Another who does charter schools.

The key to remember is that you know what you are, and you know where you pursue deals.

To make this decision, ask yourself the following 3 questions:

  1. What kind of deals do I like?  Or what kind of properties do I like? – Different product types have certain characteristics that you may or may not like.  For instance, I don’t like industrial properties.  They don’t fit my eye.  I don’t like being in industrial parks.  It would not be a good idea for me to pick this as a specialty.
  2. What are you good at?  Do you have more experience in one product type or another?  You may love multifamily.  You may also hate numbers and underwriting.  If that is the case, you may be more suited for something simple like STNL.  Know what you are good at!
  3. Where is the transactional velocity?  You may love marinas.  You may be great at those kinds of deals.  But if you are intent on working Nebraska…see my point?

If you can find a specialty where the answers to these three questions intersect, then you may have found your sweet spot.  Once you have this, the next step is to gain encyclopedic knowledge of your specialty.  That will be the focus of the next post.

Until then, I challenge you to state your specialty publicly in the comments section.  I will ask you again.  What is your specialty?

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Introducing the Clarity Series: Prospecting

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Clarity is an elusive gem.  When you have it, you are a rock star.  When you don’t…

Don't I look smart? My wife thinks so!

Don’t I look smart? My wife thinks so!

A month ago I was playing guitar in the praise band at the church I attend.  I’ve done this since I was in high school.  For the first time, I noticed that I was having a difficult time making out the chord charts.  This had never happened to me before.  [And Peter, I’d love to jam with you sometime.]

I had a particularly hard time distinguishing between a B chord and a D chord.  If you play any kind of instrument, you will understand that getting confused and playing the wrong chord in the middle of a song is bad.  It gets noticed.

So, for the first time since high school, I had my eyes examined.

I had the puffs of air blown in my eyes (I just about fell backwards out of my chair – warn a guy!)  I had a retinal scan.  Then I had the experience where the doctor asks, “Which one is clearer…1 or 2.”  At the end of the tweaking, he showed me what my vision was like.  Then he showed me my vision with corrected lenses.

I was blown away!  I had no idea how clear vision could be.  Now, my sight is not that bad.  I have a mild astigmatism.  The glasses help when I read, and they help with the stuff far away.  However, I am wearing them all the time.  I love the clarity.  Plus, my wife thinks I look smart!

Clarity is such a powerful thing.  It allows you to act with direction and focus.  It gives you the ability to maximize your efforts and your results.  Clarity of purpose allows you to say ‘no’ to good things and ‘yes’ to great things.

I am introducing the Clarity Series.  Let me explain what the Clarity Series is.

  • To this point, my posts have been random in nature.  I write about Next Practices in Life, Business, and Commercial Real Estate.  However, there has been no rhyme or reason to my posts.  They are basically whatever hit me at the time. 
  • The Clarity Series will be a series of posts on a specific topic.  You will know where I am headed and what to expect
  • I am starting with the topic of Prospecting.  I chose this topic because I believe it is the single most important factor that differentiates top producers from everyone else.
  • I’ve written about prospecting many times, but this will be an orderly and systematic approach.

The Clarity Series: Prospecting will have a beginning and an end.  If this is well received and adds value, I will take on other topics.  I am thinking that ‘creating presence’ would make a great next topic.  Please use the comment section to suggest other topics.

I previously wrote a post about the 8 Steps to a Killer Prospecting System.  This Clarity Series will break down each of those steps in much more depth.  Please keep in mind that the context here is Commercial Real Estate.  However, these steps are applicable to anyone with a product or service to sell.  The 8 steps are as follows:

  1. Define Your Geography
  2. Choose a Specialty
  3. Build Your Database
  4. Send Something in the Mail
  5. Make the Dang Call
  6. Have the Meeting
  7. Make the Presentation
  8. Secure the Business

Now is your opportunity to share with me your thoughts.  Would you add a step to this process?  Are there specific questions you have with any of these steps?  Share with me these questions in the comments section, and I will do my best to address them.

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What is WOW and 5 Steps to Make it Part of Your Business

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My wife has an angelic voice (right now she has laryngitis and is confined to a whisper).  She is a beautiful Southern girl.  Before she gave it up to marry me, her dream was to go to Nashville and be a country singer.

WOW!

WOW!

I don’t like country music as a rule.  The main exception to this is I liked the Keith Urban music that she would play.  One year, as a gift to her, I took her to a Keith Urban concert in Memphis.  By this time, I knew his music.

My first observation of that concert was that it was my wife and me and 15,000 17-year-old girls.  I felt completely out-of-place.  Then he started playing.  The songs that I thought were good were suddenly outstanding.  I found myself wondering why the same songs were so much better live.  I was completely blown away.

I think there were a couple of reasons.  First, I play guitar.  I appreciate talented guitar players.  Keith Urban might be the best guitar player I have ever seen live.  I did not expect this to be the case.

Second, the energy in the place was off the charts.  I found myself moved.  I did not expect this either.

Third, the sound and lights coupled with the excellence of the live delivery shocked me.  Urban and his band were awesome musicians.  They played with passion and authenticity.  I could feel the emotion and the connection they had with the music.  Then you add the lights and multi-media experience, and I was loving it.  I completely didn’t expect that.

A couple of months later, I ran a mini-marathon (it didn’t feel mini!).  You know what I listened to for about 2 hours?  Keith Urban.  His concert completely exceeded my expectations.  It gave me goose-bumps.

That is what WOW is – goose-bumps.  I’m still not a country fan, but I will listen to his music anytime.  I’ve had an experience with it.

In his book Platform:  Get Noticed in a Noisy World, Michael Hyatt begins that you must start with WOW.  So how do we know what WOW is?  It is constantly exceeding the expectations of your clients, prospects, customers, volunteers, etc.  It is delivering goose-bumps.

So let’s consider how you can apply the concept of WOW to your business.

How to Apply WOW in Your Business

  1. Be Intentional – you don’t succeed in the WOW category on accident.  How many hours of planning and practice did Keith Urban and his band put into that concert?  Purpose to exceed your clients’ expectations.
  2. Put yourself in your clients’ shoes – Have you ever tried to think like your customer?  What is their experience like when they call your office?  Or walk into your waiting room?
  3. Understand their expectations – You can’t be purposeful about exceeding expectations if you don’t understand what they are.  Ask your clients.  Write down what you think.  Involve your team.
  4. Examine every aspect of your business – What I am talking about here is looking at every point where your business touches a client.  Or you can take it a step further and consider how you can exceed the expectations of your employees or team members.  Think about business development, customer service, leadership development, HR, IT, follow-up, etc.
  5. Define the win – You need to be specific about what WOW looks like.  I read a great book called Mr. Schmooze (it is way better than what the title suggests).  In this book, the author uses the term elevate.  Ask yourself constantly how you can elevate the experience of your clients – how can you give them goose-bumps.  Write it down!

These are next practices!

Now ask yourself – do I deliver WOW on a daily basis?  What would your referral business look like if you did?  Share in the comments below how you could do this in your business!

 

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The One Secret to Winning the Business Every Time

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When I started in the Commercial Real Estate Business, I knew that the listing presentation was important.  Very important. I wrote and rewrote.  I practiced and then practiced some more.  I would record myself and play it back while I was driving.

iStockPhoto by hidesy

iStockPhoto by hidesy

It was canned.  I would give that same presentation to an elderly couple wanting to sell their land.  I would give it to a bank looking to relocate a branch.  I would give it to the owner of an office building that needed to lease space.  It didn’t matter who it was.  I had it down.

I would talk about the experience of our company (this was important because I had little experience at the time.)  I would talk about successful transactions we had closed.  I would talk about my Marine Corps service (the only thing I had going for me at the time.)  I would talk about how young and hungry I was.  It was all about me.  This, I believe, is what the normal CRE listing presentation looks like.

Through much reading, coaching, and mentoring, I learned there is a much better way.  I was taught the secret.  Before I give it to you, let me tell you a story.

Not too long ago, I received an opportunity through a referral from a CPA (if you aren’t pursuing relationships with CPA’s, smack yourself and start tomorrow.)  Instead of preparing a canned listing presentation for the client’s portfolio of properties, I simply scheduled a meeting.  All I did in that meeting was ask questions.  I didn’t talk at all about me, our company, or my experience – zip.

By the end of that meeting, I knew a few things I didn’t know before.  This prospect was tired of the management and unpredictable net income of multifamily property.  I knew that the prospect wanted to simplify.  I knew that the prospect wanted to be able to hold me accountable throughout the listing.  I knew that communication was extremely important.

I then took that information and crafted a client-centric, customized, benefit driven presentation.  I explained how selling these properties could eliminate the hassle of tenant turnover, dealing with management companies, and fluctuating income.  I showed how a shift to Single Tenant Net Leased properties would essentially produce stable mailbox money.

I explained our commitment to transparency and accountability.  I showed how I could give the prospect 24/7 access to our activities through our cloud-based CRM system, ClientLook.  I promised our commitment to regular communication.  I won the listing over our competition at a higher fee.

If you haven’t figured it out, the secret to winning the business is the Needs-Analysis Interview.  There are many versions of this interview that you can find. I’m not going to plagiarize any of them here.  I am going to give you keys that must be present for this to work.

  1. You have to be authentic – People can tell when you are blowing smoke.  If they care about communication, and you promise it to them, you must be committed to delivering.  If not, they are going to tell all their colleagues.  In the story above, I discovered the prospects highest needs, and then fed them back in a custom listing presentation.  This only works if you are being authentic.
  2. You have to care – Discovering the needs of your prospect is all about putting their needs before your own.  It is about them.  It is about taking the time to craft from your capabilities the solution that meets their needs.  It is about making a difference in solving their problem or helping them capitalize on an opportunity.
  3. You must seek their pain points – You could also say that must understand the opportunity they are trying to seize.  Are they trying to simplify?  Are they trying to pass down a legacy of financial freedom and wealth?  Are they trying to get out from under a mountain of debt and stress that is wrecking their lives?  What is causing them pain.  Learn this and you will be able to earn the business.
  4. You must understand their highest interests – Is maximizing the value their highest interest?  Or is it speed?  How important is visibility to that tenant?  Will they give on price to get the lease term they want?  You can not go to battle for your clients if you don’t know what their desired outcome is.

So I challenge you.  The next opportunity you have at new business, stop.  Don’t go blazing in with your canned presentation.  Schedule the needs-analysis interview.  Let them explain to you how to win their business.  Learn to ask questions and listen, and watch your business explode.

I’d love to hear some stories of how you have used this secret to win business?  Or how do you plan to implement this into your business this year and beyond?  Comment below!

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The 3 Benefits of a Well Done Prospecting Letter

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I previously wrote a post on The 8 Steps to a Killer Prospecting System.  Step 4 in that process deals with the use of a prospecting letter.  In my business, we sent just 20 letters to Dollar Store owners every week.  Then we called them the following week.

iStockPhoto from cosmity

iStockPhoto from cosmity

For the past 2 years I have used this system religiously.  It has had 4 different types of results for me:

  1. It hits the trash immediately.
  2. They see my name on the envelope before it hits the trash.
  3. It is opened and read. 
  4. It motivates the reader of the letter to call me first.

You have to assume that at least 50% of recipients are not going to read your letter.  They just won’t.  And that is fine.  All I’m trying to do is warm up my initial cold call.  When I call those who actually read it, my ratio for getting a meeting goes up.

On average, they will call me first about once a month.  70% of those calls turn into listings – that is our close rate when they call us from the letter.  That is a huge number for the cost of paper and a stamp.

I want to share 2 things in the remainder of this post:  why send a letter, and how to increase your open and read rate.

3 Reasons/Benefits to Sending a Prospecting Letter

  1. Letters warm up the cold call – This is obvious, but it works.  Not only do I have a higher success rate in getting meetings with those that read the letter, it gives me something to refer to right off the bat.  “Hi Mr. Smith.  I’m Bo Barron and I’m calling to follow-up on the letter I sent you last week…”
  2. Letters force you to follow-up with a call – How is that, you say?  The letters force me to call because I tell them in the letter that I will be calling in about a week.  This is built-in accountability.  It gives you your first opportunity to follow through with integrity – or drop the ball.
  3. Letters force you to be intentional and systematic with your prospecting – This is a huge benefit for most.  To send out a certain amount of letters a week means you must have your database set up.  It means you are intentionally signing X number of letters a week.  It means that you are planning ahead.  It means that you are differentiating yourself from 95% of the rest of the brokerage community.

Now that I have covered why to send the letters, let’s discuss how to get more people to actually open and read the letter!

  • Handwrite the envelope – Studies show that more people open mail that is handwritten versus printed.  I generally had my assistant do it.  She has much better handwriting.  Once a week, 20 letters appeared on my desk.  I signed them and gave them back to her.  She addressed the letters and sent them.  She logged into my cloud-based CRM system and scheduled the cold calls to the recipients.  I made the calls.  Clockwork.  Simple.  Effective!
  • Write a scannable letter – This is a scannable blog post.  I utilize simple sentences.  Short paragraphs.  Lists.  Bullet-points.  A friend of mine runs a local Packages Plus business.  He was sharing with me that studies have been done on increasing the read rate of a letter.  The second most likely thing that is read in a letter is bullet points.  I will tell you the first in a second.  Use them.  That is where your most important information belongs – written in a benefit statement for the reader.
  • Keep the letter short – Anything longer than a page is way too long.  Three-quarters of a page is what I think is best. You have about 15 seconds of eye-ball time.  After that, you lose their attention to something else.  Short and simple works best.
  • Talk about them – Don’t send a letter all about you.  They don’t care.  They care about themselves.  Talk about what is happening that affects their property – their bottom line – their lives.  If you don’t do this, you are wasting your time.
  • Use a Postscript – That’s right – the P.S.  The postscript is the single most read thing in a letter.  Therefore, put the most important thing in the postscript.  I suggest to you that is where you tell them you will call them.  If they read nothing but the postscript, and you tell them you are going to call them, they are much more likely to then read the letter.

Most of you will not do this.  Some because you are lazy.  Some because you don’t know where to start.  Some because you won’t pause long enough to build your database in the first place.

I challenge you to try this for 90 days.  I think you will be blown away with the results.

Let me hear from you.  Have you used prospecting letters in the past?  What worked well?  What didn’t?  Comment below!

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A New Year and a New Look!

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iStockPhoto

iStockPhoto

2013 is here and I couldn’t be more excited.  One of the most exciting things is the redesign of my blog.  I will tell you up front that it is a work in progress.  However, let me take you through some of the differences:

  • WordPress.org – If you don’t blog, you may have no idea what the difference is between WordPress.com and WordPress.org.  Wordpress.com is the free version where WordPress hosts your blog for you on their servers.  Wordpress.org is the self-hosted version of WordPress.  The big difference is that on a self-hosted site, I have much more control over the look and capability of my blog.  I’ve been putting off the switch for a while.  The new year was the time to jump in!
  • New Theme – I have left my first theme behind – Standard.  I am now using the Genesis framework with the Focus theme.  I’d love to hear what you think about it!
  • New Products – This is a soft announcement for some products that will be available in the coming months.  I am working on 3 ebooks.  One will be offered free of charge in exchange for you signing up for the email list (all those who have already signed up will receive this ebook as well!).  The other two will be sold at a great value.  The topics of the ebooks are achieving a virtual office, how to increase your income with a killer prospecting system, and how to becoming top of mind by developing your presence.

So this is simply a short post to give you an idea of what is to come.  Please give me your feedback on the look and feel of the site.  I want to hear the good and the bad.  This information will be very valuable as we continue to tweak the site.  I would also love to hear your thoughts on the ebook topics?  Would you be interested?  Would you like different topics instead?  Comment below!

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