8 Metrics of Growth I learned from 7000+ Coaching Calls with some of the nation’s highest performing real estate agents

I was fortunate enough to coach some of the best agents in the industry for an amazing coaching company in the real estate space, Tom Ferry International. Over the years, I started to uncover what made some agents massively successful versus others that continually struggled. I could tell you all the obvious things like mindset and goals and all that stuff but that would only be talking about 10% of the story. What I really want to give you is the nuts and bolts of what really made the top performing agents tick. In my mind, when I think back to over 7000+ coaching calls 8 things really stuck out to me.

So here we go…

If you don’t follow the money, money won’t follow you

Agents are taught form the beginning to track deals. It is a what most are rewarded on and in the public eye, it is the easiest way for someone to tell if you’re a high performing agent. I have 10 deals in escrow so I am fine. Those are scary words to a coach. What is your break even point? Where do you start to pull ahead? Do you know what your monthly hard costs are? How many months of that do you have in reserves? One client once told me, I am not worried, I have $100,000 in the checking account. “What does that mean?” I asked. What I meant was how long will that last? Is that all you have? What about advertising? What about…. The questions can go on an on.. My point is, is that knowing the account balance is only 20% of the solution. In a Tony Robbins podcast, Tony said a great line that I won’t forget. “If there is money in the business account, the business will find a way to spend it.” You have to account for EVERYTHING.

Great sales people are found not made

By far one of the most crippling truths for team leaders. We can’t fix people. Most people are either performers, or they are not. Don’t get me wrong, I have always been in the personal development space and I love it. You know at 8 years old whether your kid(s) have a shot at professional sports. Sales is really no different. People either love and know how to sell or they don’t. Don’t get caught in the trap of figuring that out while they are working with your clients. Another quote I heard recently was “People will leave you the way they joined.”

Focus ALL your energy with people who are already destined to scale your mission. With your ability to scale theirs, growth will follow.…

Teams that only focus on the front side of the funnel have a short shelf-life

It can be easy to focus on the business you can buy. Social Media, Real Estate Portals, Referral Networks etc… When that is the only source of business, two things happen. The team won’t sustain itself. The team will suffer turnover. That being said, I am all about advertising. Half of my professional career has been in the Ad Space. When there is no focus however on the long term business, IE a geographical farm, your sphere of Influence and your professional network market and consumer dynamics change, leaving the real estate agent out of control with their growth. I still think paid sources are an amazing pillar of business, but maybe think of those as another way to introduce people into your sphere.

Invest in people and people will invest in your goal

Team leader A convinces everyone to follow his/her goal. Team Leader B focuses on his/her team member goals and then recruits enough agents to satisfy the bigger team goal. Team leader B wins all day long. Money without fulfillment will cause your agents to look elsewhere. If an agent is on your team is making a consistent $175,000 per year, don’t assume they are fulfilled. What about health, taxes, savings, debt, marriage, kids… Are you helping them dent that part of their life as well?

Tracking is 10x more important than you think

I’ll give you the simple formula.

Spend — Leads — Conversations — Appointments — Contracts Written — Contract Executed — Closed

How much do you have to spend to get a lead? How many leads do you need to get to a conversation? How many conversations to an appointment? How many appointments to a written contract? How many contracts written to an executed contract? How many executed contracts to a closed deal? The top teams have this figured out in each phase.

Why do you want to know this? Predictability to success and to the goal is what tracking will yield. Do WHATEVER IT TAKES TO GET TRACKING DOWN. But my team doesn’t like to track, they are too busy…. You need to find new team members, it is that important.

People follow vision not the commission split

People join teams for the following reasons:

• They want to be a part of something bigger
• They want to do it together
• They believe they can hit their goals easier with you
• Your systems and processes (leverage)
• Your model (you have already proven success)
• Leads
• Lower stress

I could come up with 7–10 more items before I even hit commission split. If you make the team all about the commission split, that is all your team members will ever negotiate.

When it becomes about the money, it is normally too late

When they do bring up the commission split, normally it is a means to rationalize a deeper issue they have. Help them solve that issue and the split will be irrelevant. Remember, the only way to get a raise in this business boils down to 3 factors:

• Increase your average sales price
• Sell more homes
• Increase your fee to your clients

When they negotiate the team split, that isn’t a raise. That money has to come from somewhere…. The team’s net profit. How does that make sense from a growth perspective?

They outsource everything

There are some things you should innovate, there are other’s you shouldn’t. Almost everything we spend money on has to do with time. You buy leads to shorten the time to a closed transaction. You hire agents to give you more time to get more deals. You hire operations staff for more time… All of it is about time. Average agent look at all this as debt. The successful ones look at it as leverage. In the future, I’ll write another post about leveraging virtual talent. I’ll give you a quick tip. A Strong VA can do A LOT more than you think they can. They can change your entire life.

All that said, today we are launching the public beta of Kingston Lane (defined as: the software works but please be gentle) and we are offering a FREE version for you to check it out.

>> Now I need your help:

1. Sign up for a FREE version of Kingston Lane. Check it out. Take it for a spin and I know you will love it.
2. Give us feedback and ideas (be kind, but whine and complain) so we can build additional push button solutions to solve your daily pain points.

If you are in the real estate industry in any where in the world, you should sign up for a free Kingston Lane account now.

I would love your feedback on it. Tag and/or follow me on instagram @steveolson_ or email me at steve at kingston lane dot com

About Steve:

Steve Olson is the President of Kingston Lane and an award-winning veteran of the Real Estate industry. Steve’s holistic experience in the industry comes from his success in real estate sales, team and brokerage leadership, and coaching and training the highest producing team’s in North America.

Steve and his real estate teams have sold over a thousand homes across markets, across price points, and across geographies. At one point, Steve’s team was ranked #5 in all of Arizona for most number of transactions. Most recently as a mastery coach with the Tom Ferry organization, Steve has personally conducted over 7,000+ coaching calls to some of highest grossing real estate agents in North America who were collectively selling more than $1 Billion in real estate annually.

Steve brings a wealth of online and digital marketing, and direct response marketing background both in his real estate experience and during his time as an ad executive with Clear Channel Radio. Steve thinks and works like a true industry leader as he not only thinks and builds cutting-edge strategies, helps agents and teams with platform mastery, but he also uses it as a practitioner in his own real estate business every day.

Not only is Steve a real estate sales and marketing whiz, he is also an expert in direct response marketing and marketing funnel strategies. A die-hard Pearl Jam fan, you may have seen play drums in one of 10 countries or when he performed at the Super Bowl XXX halftime show with Diana Ross.