WEBINAR: The Savvy Agent’s Sphere of Influence

87% of buyers would use their real estate agent again. But only 24% of sellers actually do….  So what happened?

In this webinar, we focus on helping you bridge this gap with strategies to help you manage, maximize, and maintain the relationships that can power a successful real estate business: your sphere of influence.

Here’s what we’ll cover:

How should you organize your list?
What tactics work best?
What kind of messages best engage your sphere?
Where do sphere ads fit into your overall strategy?

When your former client doesn’t call you….

When I talk with our customers and I ask how they feel when they find out one of their former clients is working with a different agent, and didn’t even reach out – the phrase I hear the most is “punch in the gut.” It’s really heartbreaking. But if it’s happened to you – you aren’t alone.

This is the crux of our conversation today. It shows that after the transaction is complete, a lot of agents drop the ball. Clients they ALREADY HAD didn’t work with them again.

But if you go into real estate groups like Lab Coat Agents or Digital DNA, the top question asked is “What CRM should I use?” so you know you need to manage these people. But we found many agents look at CRMs for lead nurturing, not for managing their sphere of influence.

This is the difference between transactional thinking and relationship-building.

Your real estate business isn’t about one sale. It’s about a relationship, and that relationship has value beyond a single transaction.

You get paid by commission. This commission is the culmination of a lot of hard work: marketing your business, securing the client, promoting the property, negotiating the sale. So it stands to reason that you value on that client based on the commission you earned on the transaction, right?

Wrong.

We actually built a Lifetime Value (LTV) Calculator to help you know just how much a client is really worth to you. It’s a free tool, and the link is on the screen for you. Simply enter the values for your business and hit “calculate”. Play with the numbers to see which inputs really matter.

This is going to change how you view your client and how you view your investment in staying in touch with them.

So what is the right balance of tools?

We organized it by what you can do where….First, there are the activities you need to just sit and do. Then there are the activities you gotta get out and do. And then here are the automated activities that support both those other forms.

If you stick with just one of these columns, it’s not going to work. But if you mix and match, they actually power each other up!

So here are some tools to help you with the nurturing activities you’re going to take on at your desk.
The first is a timer.

It’s not an app, it’s not a piece of software or a subscription. It’s a timer. Set 30 minutes to do a task at your desk. One task.

• Write emails. Don’t check Facebook.
• Check Facebook. Don’t write emails.
• Make phone calls. Don’t check email or Facebook.
• Write note cards. Don’t check email, Facebook or your phone.

Speaking of phone calls, if you find that you are short on time and just want to do a quick check in, you might want to use a tool called SlyDial. It has a somewhat nefarious name, but in truth, it’s just about controlling your time and making a connection in a time efficient manner. you call the SlyDial number, then put in your contact’s number and you’re connected directly to their voicemail.

So Facebook IS on here, and the reason is that it’s where engagement happens. But it’s easy to get lost on Facebook. It’s a big of a rabbit hole.

So make lists. Go into your friends and create specific FB lists, perhaps one is all family and one is all close friends and then one is your inner sphere…. let it reflect how you organize your list elsewhere. That way, you can view that segment of your FB connections and engagement with them in a meaningful and purposeful way. This is really something I learned from Katie Lance, who is truly the expert on using social media for real estate. She wants to stop the random acts of social media and says that you should be directed and engaged. Don’t just go through your list and like all the posts, but take a moment to write something. Your comment is a way of connecting and reminding people you are paying attention to them and you see what is important to them.

All of these take place at your desk – whether your desk is at an office, in your bedroom or at the coffee shop. These are the “Sit down sphere tasks.”

Events for an agent’s sphere of influence — some ideas

There aren’t really ”tools” we can recommend for these in-person events, but Adwerx customers do some very cool things, and I wanted to share some of them.

The first event idea you’re welcome to “steal” is a Cuddle Party. Don’t let the name freak you out – it was a 2-hour event where an agent invited here sphere to join her at her local animal shelter to play with the kittens and puppies. They shelter approved, of course, and not only was a great way to connect with her people, but some animals found homes, too!

One of our customers is an absolute rock star when it comes to networking events. He has a huge database of local professionals and hosts networking nights at local restaurants. At no point does he mention real estate. But so many people find recommendations and opportunities through his events, he’s’ become indispensable – providing value for his network.

The pumpkins are nice little things that another Adwerx customer does –- every fall, he fills his pickup truck with pumpkins from a local farm and delivers them to his past clients. He says you can never have enough pumpkins in the fall, and people love them. There was one year when he was ill and couldn’t do it, and he actually got calls from people who were worried about him and wondered why they didn’t get their pumpkin!

And the last one is something that happens in my little town, where a local real estate firm (not an Adwerx customer) hosts a family movie event one a month in warmer weather. It doesn’t look like this – they project the movie on the side of a white building downtown that has a great lawn – but the feel is very much the same. Clients of the brokerage get free popcorn and treats for kids. And because it’s such a draw, the other merchants promote it as well!