In order to have a sales or property management team that achieves great results, a great coach and effective coaching methods is an absolute necessity.

Think of a sales or rental department as an elite sporting team. Each member has their specialty position and skills, and as such, the coaching methods used to ensure their success should be tailored to their individual functions.

Too many principals implement training based on general sales or property management needs, where they should be focusing on individuals’ strengths and weaknesses, and the skills that these people require to excel in their specialty area.

For example, would it be beneficial for Jarryd Hayne to spend all his time training to make the big tackles and hard hit ups? Of course not, because he doesn’t play in the forward line. It would, however, be ideal to use those training methods for a front rower such as Petero Civoniceva.

Is it really a good idea to implement a standard training regime across the whole sales team? Or would it pay to take the time to identify each member’s role, and their strengths and weaknesses, and then tailor training to suit their individual needs.

The reason that players in a sporting team are chosen to represent their country is because they are the best player for that position. The winger is quick, the forwards are tough and the fullback is agile.

In a sales team, the best lister is confident and empathetic, the best seller is great at negotiating and the support staff have an eye for detail. Therefore, tailor training to enhance these skills. Make them market leaders in your area.

Consider joining strong members of your team with other strong members. Cameron Smith & Cooper Cronk are good players in their own right, but as a duo they form a force to be reckoned with. Likewise, band together a star performer with a weaker player in your team. Just as Darren Lockyer can make anyone look fantastic and inspire his team mates to perform, the weaker player will be driven to lift his game.

Another mistake some principals make is not ensuring the sales team sticks to their core market area. In a slow market, it is easy for sales staff to take on listings as business outside of their local or specialty area.

Roger Federer is the greatest tennis player of the 21st century, but he would probably get slaughtered if he ‘laced up the boots’ and ran onto the rugby field. As the old adage says ‘Stick with what you know and what you do best’.

But how do you put this training into practice? By conducting a simple training needs analysis. Sit down with each member of the team and discuss with them what they think their strengths and weaknesses are and what they can do to improve. Then implement training to suit their needs.

It can be something low scale like role playing scenarios they have trouble dealing with, or specific skills based training to broaden their knowledge of their core area. With the introduction of compulsory CPD, the popularity of skills based training has decreased dramatically. But as any proactive coach will tell you, training is the key to producing great staff that get results and remain a cut above the competition.

Just as all elite athletes aspire to be the best and represent their country, does your sales staff aspire to be the best and represent you?

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Well another year underway. This year I’m going to define my goals both business and personal and set about achieving them. I’m writing a business plan to keep with me in the office and review monthly.

This year I’ll be adopting a new approach. I’m taking advantage of an online system to help follow up on leads and to keep in touch with clients.

Last year I saw myself making lots of phone calls to keep in touch and thought this year I would mix phone, text and email to help keep me in touch with my clients (both existing and new)

I’m looking forward to a great year and wish that all the young agents have a fantastic and rewarding 2010 as well. Lets make the most of it.

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In a market such as the one in which we find ourselves today, agents need to have a rapport with their current clients to be able to work with them in achieving the highest possible sale or rental price for their property. They also need to look to past clients for future business.

Real estate is possibly the industry which most relies on referral and repeat business to ensure continued success.

How do we make sure that the clients and customers we deal with today will come back to us in the years ahead? The answer is relationship banking.

Think of the relationship that you have with a client as a bank account. To keep that client happy you need to ensure that there are always funds available in that account.

To do this, deposits must be made. Things like returning phone calls promptly, providing detailed feedback and going that extra mile for your client are all forms of deposits.

Once the account is in credit, you have built a rapport with the client and they should now trust you with the sale or management of their property. If necessary, you can now look to make withdrawals from the account. If you need to adjust the price, arrange an inspection after hours or if we make a mistake and leave the living room light on after an open house inspection, we possibly have enough credit to cover this.

While dealing with their vendor, an agent provided a comprehensive weekly report outlining how many inspections had taken place, what prospects there had been for the property so far, and what kind of prices these people were gravitating towards.

The agent also made regular contact with the vendors to make sure they were satisfied with the job he was doing. After their property had been on the market for six weeks without having any offers that met the vendors’ desired target, the agent met with them and discussed reducing the price in accordance with what the public thought the property was worth.

The vendors agreed immediately, not only because of the evidence that was presented to them, but because the relationship bank account was in credit due to the deposits the agent had made throughout the marketing program.

The relationship account can never go into overdraft! To guarantee a strong affiliation with the client, the account must always remain in credit. It is easy enough to ensure this by making positive deposits and limiting the need to make withdrawals.

Should an account go into debit, the agent runs the risk of performing to a lesser standard than expected of them, or losing the business all together. Not only does this mean a loss of income, but it also leaves the agent vulnerable to criticism and bad references to the clients’ friends and family and therefore no referrals.

A past client of mine was relocating to Queensland from Wagga. Being an elderly lady with no family in town, she found it hard to obtain boxes to use for the move.

I had a relative in town who managed a retail store, so I arranged for a short period of time for the boxes to be kept. At the end of the week, I collected them and took them to the client who was absolutely astounded at the gesture.

Such a small thing which took me one phone call and half an hour of my time meant so much to her and added a huge deposit to the relationship bank account.

In return, a subsequent three listings were referred to our agency by her. It is that easy to be a master of relationship banking!

As with bank accounts, over time you will receive interest so long as you keep boosting the account with deposits. This interest is seen by way of repeat and referred business.

Relationship Banking Via Your Database

It is imperative to maintain an up-to-date database of all past clients and keep in regular contact with them.

There are a variety of ways to do this. Some agents will give clients and customers a bottle of wine or some other gift once a property sale has settled, but there are far too many that don’t follow up after this.

All agents should make contact with past clients at least every 12 months. And it should be something a little more personal than a mass mail-out announcing that you have ‘Just Sold 1 Smith Street – Looking for Similar Properties’.

It could be something simple like a Christmas card or a lotto ticket or gift voucher on the anniversary of their purchase. By doing this, not only are you keeping the account in credit, but when it comes time for them to sell or buy, your name will be the first they think of.

The worst feeling as a real estate agent is to open up the real estate section of the local paper only to find that a property you sold 12 months ago is back on the market but with a different agent.

Why didn’t the vendors come to you? Was the service you provided them less than satisfactory?

The truth is that you probably did a great job as their agent at the time, but have lacked the follow up needed to get the repeat business. The competitor agent probably got lucky and just happened to cold call the vendor while they were contemplating selling.

You cannot rest on your laurels and wait for business to walk through your door just because you think you did a good job last time.

Every highly successful agent is also a great communicator and relationship banker. They understand the importance of maintaining a positive balance in the relationship bank account and that to be proactive is the key to repeat business and maintaining the relationship bank balance.

Not only will maintaining the accounts go some way towards getting repeat business, but it will also lead to referrals from these past clients.

Almost everybody has a friend or relative who currently have, or are considering putting, their house on the market. So if you have sold 30 properties in the last year, you have 30 past clients who know at least one other person each considering selling.

If you have maintained the relationship bank accounts with these past clients, they are going to tell their friends and relatives what a great agent you are and you will most probably get a call from them and the chance to list 30 properties without knocking on a single door!

On the flip side, if you have not maintained the account, your balance will be whittled away with bank fees and charges, and your past clients will not even think to tell their friends and relatives about you because you have simply done the job you were paid for and nothing more. They see you as an ordinary agent, not an extraordinary agent.

Your past clients and customers aren’t the only source of referrals. Everyone you have regular contact with is a potential client, as well as a potential referrer.

Therefore, we also need to make sure we are maintaining a positive relationship banking account with these people. They could be your hairdresser, community leaders, your children’s school teachers or restaurant owners. The possibilities are endless, but only if you keep the account balances in credit by making regular deposits.

Any referrals that you receive should be appreciated, and as such you should demonstrate your appreciation. There are strict penalties under the Property, Stock & Business Agents Act (2002) for inducing clients and customers through a third party, however a bunch of flowers or a nice bottle of wine to someone who refers you business is not classed as a commercial inducement arrangement.

By rewarding the referrer, you are making yet another deposit into that relationship account!

Relationships really are the new currency of the real estate industry. Relationship banking is creating growth and profit through caring and connection and is long lasting with endless possibilities to produce results. It is a skill that the majority of agents do not fully use to their advantage, but for those who do, it creates real wealth through long lasting associations.

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As an ex-elite athlete I was taught to only be affected by things within my control. i.e not getting angry because it was raining during an open house. What I have found over the last year is that more and more young agents are being affected by things outside of their control and it is completely throwing them off their best game.

My advice to everyone is to stay focused. Don’t let things like a buyer falling over because they cannot get finance alter your positive attitude. It is really important when times get tough that you aren’t distracted.

Stay focused on what you know best, stay focused on what is directly affecting you & stay focussed on your goals.

We cannot change whether interest rates go up, we cannot change whether the government passes new legislation- so get on with what you do best!

My 2 cents for this week. Have a great break everyone.
See you bright and early in the New Year.
Braden

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I enjoy asking people this question because it often takes their mind back to a really happy moment in their life & normally the experience isn’t something that has come directly from a company as such. It’s normally something a staff member has gone out of their way to do.

I’ve experienced a lot of great customer service over the years, but there is one customer service experience that I’ve had that just stands out head & shoulders above the rest.

We were holidaying in Whistler, Canada and staying at the Delta Whistler Hotel to enjoy our first ever White Christmas .

My wife Annette & I wanted to make everything just right for our daughters Natasha & Katelin, so we made sure that we booked a room with an open fireplace so Santa Claus could come down the chimney.

I must say that the whole town of Whistler was like something out of a Fairy Tale, but what happened back at our hotel needed to be seen to be believed.

Everything was decorated magnificently, the restaurant had a beautiful miniature Christmas display that was breathtaking & kept Natasha & Katelin mesmerized for ages.

On Christmas Day they had one of Santa’s helpers downstairs giving out presents & they even put on a special show with Barney the Dinosaur (who was bigger than The Wiggles at the time). We were all having the time of our lives.

But the best part about our whole experience was something special that one of the staff at the hotel did for us.

We were down in the foyer, heading out to dinner with friends, when all of a sudden 3 blokes walked into the hotel with a huge Christmas Tree. It was obvious that they were guests of the hotel & that they were taking the tree up to their room.

The tree had only just been cut because there was snow dripping off the branches onto the foyer carpet & was so big that they had difficulty getting it to fit into the lift. It was really funny to watch them squeezing up against the tree so they could all fit into the lift & get the doors to close at the same time.

Seeing these guys struggling with the tree made me realise that we didn’t have a Christmas Tree in our room. So we walked up to the Concierge & asked if they knew of anywhere that we could get a tree or even a branch of a pine tree for our room.

He said they didn’t know where to get a tree or a branch but he’d see what he could do.

We then went off to dinner with our friends & didn’t think any more about the tree…until we got back to our room from dinner to find a fully decorated Christmas Tree, with lights flashing, lighting up our room.

We were blown away…

It was the icing on the cake for our White Christmas holiday & I’ll never know how they got the tree in our room or where it came from.  And, if you think about it, the hotel probably had lots of Christmas Decorations sitting in a box in storage or they could have taken the Christmas Tree from somewhere else in the hotel,  but none of that mattered in our eyes. All that mattered was that they went to the extra effort to do that for us & it made us feel special.

And because they did that for us, we’ve told lots of people about this experience & won’t hesitate to stay there again in the future.

How to have customers raving over your service?

Now in analysing the experience, when booking our holiday we had an in-built expectation for a certain level of service from this company, but in the end it was the great customer service delivered by one of their people within the company that left the greatest lasting impression.

As a real estate agent, your clients will all have differing opinions about the level of service they expect from you & your company, whilst it is vitally important that you deliver on your promises, doing that little something over & above is the thing that will have your customers raving about you.

There are lots of things that you can do to impress customers.

There are lots of things that you already do that probably go unnoticed that you can be made to appear more obvious to your customers. You need to leave footprints or evidence of service in your day-to-day activities. (eg. the hotel cleaners don’t just put a new toilet roll in the holder, they fold the end of the paper to make sure the customers know that it’s new.)

If you want to generate more business,I recommend that you have a brainstorming session with your team about customer service.

Ask each member to share their best customer service experience & what made it the best ever customer service experience for them.

Then come up with a few simple ideas about leaving evidence of service or doing something above & beyond what the customer expects. And then start implementing them one after the other into your business.

Remember your customers like nice surprises. So make sure they are simple, easy to implement & come as a complete surprise to the customer.

Please feel welcome to share the best customer experience you’ve ever had underneath this article.

Alternatively, if there’s something that you currently do that is totally unexpected & WOW’s your customers GenYre readers would love to read them & get some fresh ideas.

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