Another fantastic AREC conference has just whizzed past and as usual, a lot of value has come out of the two-day conference.

AREC had three key themes that really resonated with me this year and seemed to be continuous across the breadth of the 32 speakers.

Number 1: Teamwork makes the dream work

It is becoming increasingly apparent that to become a top agent you can’t do it alone, without burning out and sacrificing your personal life completely.

Alexander Phillips (PPDRE and REB’s Top Agent for 2017), Taney Jain (Reliance Real Estate), Megan Jaffe (Ray White, Remuera) and Brendan Pomponio (Belle Property, Dee Why) all spoke about team structure, developing workplace culture and having the right support in place to generate both the GCI, turnover and/or volume of stock required to be in the top echelon of agents in the country.

Having the right people in the right roles is crucial to running a well-oiled machine and I couldn’t agree more. Whether it’s administration, marketing, prospecting or buyer work, having a team member who specialises in one aspect of the business contributes to growth and efficiency significantly.

Expecting to get ‘specialist’ results from team members who have no expertise or experience in a particular field or recruiting for a ‘jack of all trades’ is completely unrealistic and will probably deliver a poor result for the business. This is one reason many of our clients choose to collaborate with an external party like ourselves to deliver expert and specialised advice around their digital marketing, and I’ve seen the same across other business tasks such as compliance, HR and administration.

With the right partnership, ‘outsourcing’ can be a more cost-effective solution, delivering better results without the hassle of motivating and managing additional employees and the liabilities that come hand in hand with that.

Number 2: Conversations and conversions

Real estate educator, Tom Ferry’s two-part talk focused on the touchpoints required to ensure you are leveraging all the opportunities available to you from a lead generation perspective. All touchpoints are important when it comes to building rapport with new and existing clients.

With the average Australian only selling their home once every 8 years equating to a long customer lifecycle in the real estate industry, it can sometimes be hard to attribute the work you are putting in from a marketing perspective to actual business conversions.

Was it really worth having that billboard in town? That community sponsorship? Those monthly text messages, letterbox drops, DL cards, glossy pre-listing kits, videos, social media posts? Are they really delivering a return on investment for my business? Are they converting to leads? I think we really need to start thinking of conversations as conversions.

We all know real estate is a numbers game so the more conversations you are having with people the more business and leverage you will receive – hands down. Every conversation you are having with a potential seller, buyer or person in your neighbourhood is working towards building your profile so that you are the one they think of when it comes time to sell or lease their property. So, if there’s a way to leverage that with additional touchpoints, then why wouldn’t you?

Number 3: Trust is key

We probably all realise by now that trust is a huge factor in influencing people to list and sell their home with a real estate agent. Tom Ferry’s data from Google’s research really solidified this for me. 49% of people surveyed by Google showed that ‘trust’ is the most important aspect when choosing a real estate agent.

Google Synopsis (Source: Tom Ferry Presentation, AREC 2018)
What’s important to you when selecting an agent?

  • Trust – 49%
  • Experience – 15%
  • Negotiate – 13.2%
  • Personal Reference – 11.8%
  • Work Fast – 8.4%
  • Brand – 2.5%

Michael Sheargold, real estate coach and leader of the Real Estate Results Network (RERN) also touched on the fact that real estate agents are one of the least trusted professions in Australia, ranking 28 out of 30 just above Car Salesman and Advertising people.

Trust was also discussed and attributed to the success of multiple other speakers at AREC such as Gavin Rubenstein (ranked number 1 in the Ray White group) and Dolly and Jenny Lenz (Agents to the stars in New York) who echoed these sentiments.

So how do you build this elusive trust? Peter Fuda (business coach to top CEOs worldwide) identified the following elements that contribute to building trust:

  • Credibility – Do they believe you can do it?
  • Reliability – Do you do it?
  • Intent (motive) – Do I believe your motive?

One of the key factors we can control from the outset is how we build credibility. This comes in with showing your clients what you can do and here’s where social media and digital marketing can play a huge role.

Being able to showcase not only your results but feedback from past clients and case studies is invaluable. Whether it is through Google reviews, social media content, case studies, testimonials or video and a professional online presence. All these items will undoubtedly attribute to your credibility with current clients.

Reliability and intent, well, unfortunately, you’re on your own on these. However, Peter Fuda did leave us with some gold nuggets about ‘getting in a game you can win’. In other words, establish your client’s expectations up front. Don’t assume you know what they want and expect from you. Ask the right questions, get the right responses and get in a game you can win. Peter suggests using the following questions:

  • What would make this the best relationship/partnership/collaboration you’ve ever had?
  • How would you know?
  • What would you see?

Well, that’s a wrap on my key takeaways on AREC, we’re already getting to work on looking at how we can put the amazing AREC insights into action and looking forward to seeing what next year will bring!

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If you are looking for social media for real estate, property or interior design our digital marketing experts can help you bring your brand’s story to life.

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