Maximize Your Prospecting Skills

Welcome to Mike Ferry TV. My name is Tony Smith. I am excited to come in and spend a few minutes with you today. Here we are on April 10th. Congratulations on the second quarter of 2023. Has your first quarter gotten off to the start that you wanted? I sure hope so. If it hasn’t, what else is there to do about it but move forward today? It is our time. This is the time of year. If you take full advantage of all the things going on in the market, all the things Mike Ferry has been asking you to do, the reduction of Real Estate agents mentally and physically. The little changes in the market that are taking place. If you pay attention, this is the best time you may have had in years to grow your own personal Real Estate business. But we have to pay attention. Okay.

What are prospecting skills?

Today we’re going to talk a little bit about one of my favorite topics, prospecting for listings. Mike asked me to share a little information with you today, and I’m hoping that prospecting for listings is a major part of what you do. You know, Mike was saying, starting in September of last year, we started this little shift in the market in a pretty aggressive way, and he mentioned that normally we have maybe 10% or 15%, maybe 20% of the agents in North America spending a major portion of their time listing the property. That number alone scares me. But then Mike went on to say that if he’s been looking today and he said that only 5% of the agents in North America are spending the majority of their time on listing the property. Gosh, what does that mean?

“that only 5% of the agents in North America are spending the majority of their time on listing the property”

 

That means 95% of the agents today are spending all their time working with buyers. Right? Is there any wonder why there is an inventory shortage? Yes, I understand there’s an inventory shortage and sales might be down in your area from last year and the year before. But the truth of the matter is it’s a supply and demand issue. And if anyone understands supply and demand, you have to at some point, start questioning, if there is a decent demand for homes, and there’s been a still a very strong demand for homes, and the supply of homes has stayed reasonably low in most parts of the world. If the supply is low and the demand is still pretty good if I’m in any kind of business at all, wouldn’t I want to provide what people are demanding, which means to supply them with great homes for sale? Why would I spend all my time with buyers when there are a lot of buyers and there’s really no supply?

You know, you think about during the epidemic and some of the things that happened in the last two or three or four years, wouldn’t you like to be one of the companies that owned one of those manufacturing plants that made those little chips? Or how about toilet paper, right? Does anybody still have a closet full of toilet paper that they bought in 2020, or 2021? Right? Supply and demand. Your job is to supply listings. Or at least I hope so. Okay, so I made some points.

Sales Prospecting Techniques

If you want to prospect for listings, there are a few starting points that I want you just to consider for yourself right now. First, what percentage of your business in 2023 will be listing sold versus buyer sales? What percentage? If you don’t decide what percentage of your business will be listing sold versus buyer sales, you’ll end up gravitating towards buyer sales just by nature. You have to decide.

1 – How much time each day is spent listing a property? 

I wrote down how much of your time each day is spent on listing a property. How much of your time each day is spent on listing a property? The first point I wrote down, we recommend that you spend 70% of each day on listing property 70% of your time. If you work an 8 or 10-hour day, you should be spending 6 or 7 hours a day on listing a property. Things like of course, prospecting, lead follow-up, the skills of prospecting, perfecting your Listing Presentation, prequalifying the sellers, previewing property, understanding the market stats, and how to deliver it. 70% of your day needs to be spent on listing a property. How much is being spent? Now if you don’t spend the time, what good is all the information about listing a property? So I’d ask you, first of all, to maybe tool or retool your schedule and set it up in a way that the majority of your time is spent on listing a property.

2 – How much of your listing business comes from buying it?

The second point I wrote down, this is a tough one for many people. You have to decide how much of your listing business comes from buying it. B-U-Y. Buying it. How much comes from waiting for it? And how much time comes from you going out and earning it every day? Now, we don’t say that it should be zero spent on buying it and zero spent on waiting for it. Right? But we want to make sure that the majority of your time is spent on going out and finding business every day. So I’m going to ask you a tough question. If you look at all the listings you’ve taken in the last well so far this year, all the listings you’ve taken in the last 18 months, how many of them came from buying it? Buying leads off the internet. You know, buying listings can be reducing your commission. It’s a way to buy listings, lower your commission, buy leads off the internet, big advertising campaigns, mass marketing campaigns, and mass mailouts. How much is spent buying it? How much is spent waiting for it? Of course, you’re going to wait for those. When a great listing comes in from one of your past clients, of course, you’re going to accept it. But if you’re just waiting for them to come to you, it’s slower than it should be. Right? How much time are you spending? And then really, honestly, how much time are you spending going out and actually earning the business for listings? Important point.

3 – The importance of prospecting in current market conditions

I wrote this down. The market is dictating now. This is where it really gets tough. The current market conditions are dictating that you find a two to a three-hour window of time in the morning that is distraction free for prospecting. Okay, so the market now says you need to have a two to three-hour window minimum. Distraction-free. 100% dedicated to prospecting. Do you have a window of time? Why do I say in the morning? Because we have proof that it’s better in the morning. We have proof. Mike Ferry has been doing this for almost 50 years. He has proof that the hardcore prospectors, the ones that do it the best, the ones that make the most money at it, figure out how to do it in the morning. 100% distraction-free. Right? If you can’t get in a space of time where your prospect for listings without distractions, without that cell phone, without email, without people coming in your office all day long, without texting. If you can’t get a distraction-free window for two to three hours a day, you’re going to miss the boat on how much you could get.

Pro Tip: Grade your preformance each hour

 

I put down here a pro tip. If you really want to get into this, grade yourself each hour. If you’re going to prospect, let’s say you’re going to prospect for three hours a day each hour, I would ask you to take a couple of minutes and grade yourself because this is how we know if you’re doing it right. Grade yourself on energy and enthusiasm. How did I do? From 8:00 AM to 9:00 AM, this morning prospected with energy and enthusiasm. Grade yourself on efficiency. Was I prepared? Did I make contacts one after the next? Was I doing research or did I just straight go through the job? Grade yourself on sticking to the scripts. Did I stick to the scripts this last hour? Did I follow through? Did I repeat and approve their answers? Did I close? How how did I stick to the scripts this hour? And then I put asking for the appointment and handled objections. Grade yourself hourly on how well you did on really closing for the appointment and handling any objections you received. If you could do that each hour and you could get high scores in those four or five areas, wouldn’t you be a better prospector? We think so.

4 – Stop wishing things were easier and focus on making yourself better

I made this thought. Stop wishing things were easier and focus on making yourself better as a strong listing agent. Okay? We have to stop waiting for things to get easier. This is a normal market. This is normal. This is the way it’s going to be. Don’t wait for it to change. You have to work on making yourself better as a stronger listing agent. How strong have you been in your scripts and role-play practices this year so far? Have you perfected your Listing Presentation? Have you really worked on it and improved on your lead follow-up skills and techniques? If you focus on making yourself better instead of focusing on what isn’t, you’re going to be so much stronger.

5 – Lack of self-improvement causes self-doubt

I put this down. A lack of self-improvement causes self-doubt. Boy, if you’re not constantly and aggressively improving, it causes self-doubt. Do you have a solid self-improvement plan when it comes to listing properties right now? Believe me, when you do, your confidence goes through the roof and when you don’t, self-doubt creeps in.

6 – Control what you can control

I wrote this down. There are only three things you can really control. There are only three things you can really control. You can control your actions, you can control your reactions and you can control your mindset. Those are the only three things that you have complete control of. Are you taking all the right actions for listing the property? When someone doesn’t respond well to your call, how do you react? When a listing appointment falls apart, how do you react? When you lose an opportunity, how do you react? When you list three properties, how do you react? And then are you taking all the time to control your mindset? You know, for those of you following along, we just came out of Mike’s Mindset March. Your mind should be stronger than ever if you played the game for the month. I hope you did.

7 – Recommit to your goals

I made this note. Recommit strong weekly, monthly, and yearly goals for listings taken. You know, oftentimes we’ll ask an agent, What’s your goal? How many listings are you going to take? “I don’t know. As many as I can get.” Well, that doesn’t work. What is your weekly goal? Are you have a goal to take one listing a week? Do you have a goal to take two listings a week? Do you have a goal to take two listings a month? Recommit to strong listing-taken goals. Boy, if you’re going to take two listings a month, I’d put two lock boxes in the center of my desk. I’d have three or four Pre-listing Packages sitting right there ready because I’m going to do that this month. Recommit to the goals of how many listings you’re going to take.

8 – Examples of Prospecting: Use your sources

I put down the next sources. Okay. We have a report on every possible way to find a listing. Find it on our website. Okay. But the truth is, we need you to have four sources, five sources, and maybe even six or seven sources today. Question How many active permanent sources of finding listings do you have going today? You know, we’ve got Expireds and FSBOs, Past Clients and Center of Influence, Just Listed, Just Sold, absentee owners, for rent by owners. Right? We’ve got probates and trust. How many sources do you have that are very proactive to find a business? You may need six or seven. If you only have one source, you’re a one-source business. What if that source gets quiet? You’re kind of out of business, aren’t you?

9 – Importance of prospecting space

And then I wrote this down. Your mental and physical environment must be set up so that prospecting is the major issue. How clean is your desk? How strong is your prospecting cockpit? Do you have the scripts and dialogs posted in front of you? Are you standing up? Do you have a headset on? Are you prepared the night before? Are you creating a strong physical and mental environment? That prospecting for listings is your primary purpose in life? I’d ask you to go back and look at it.

10 – Follow up is as important as first contact

You must follow up on leads like you’re supposed to. You’ve got to learn to follow up on leads like you’re supposed to. We recommend that you follow up on leads two and three times a day. If you have a lead and you don’t follow up, can you really be disappointed if somebody else lists it? You can’t be disappointed. This is not the window of time for that. Okay? Now, we also recognize if you’re not on track right now for your listings-taken goal, it’s okay you have some time, but you have to get on track quickly, don’t you? What kind of extra effort needs to be involved?

12 – Make changes to reach your goals

Do you need to set up a couple of Saturdays a month of prospecting? Do you need to commit to one evening every week of additional prospecting? Do you need to join us in one of our Live or Virtual Prospecting Clinics? Do you need to join us in one of our Productivity Schools where we can really enhance the scripts and skills that you use? What extra effort are you willing to put forward in the month of April to get your listing-taken train moving in the right direction?

Listen, we know that in many parts of the world, 60% to 70% of the business comes in the second and third quarters. Well, here we are in the second quarter. Okay. So are you going to take full advantage of Q2 and Q3 of 2023? We sure hope so. Thanks for your time.