Many REALTORS® believe that Real Estate is a transaction-based business. Those are the poor ones.
The rich ones know that Real Estate is a relationship-based business.
If you want more clients, you need to interact with more people, more often, and you need the right skills to develop trust and rapport with them.
The most successful REALTORS® project these four distinct attributes, all at once:
- Professionalism
- Confidence
- Friendliness
- Authenticity
What about you? Ask a close friend or co-worker for their honest opinion, and if you are not clearly projecting all four of these qualities in your interactions, consider how you could improve.
I would say that most agents are weak in at least one of the four. When you are honest with yourself, and you work to improve your core competencies, you’ll be surprised how quickly people become drawn to you.
Professionalism
In Real Estate, you’re a true professional if you continuously work towards improving your knowledge and skills, and you conduct yourself at all times with the highest possible level of integrity.
Being honest isn’t always easy, but it’s an absolute necessity if you want to develop a reputation as a Trusted Expert. Telling people whatever they want to hear is the polar opposite of being a true professional. Your clients are looking to you for expert guidance, so you’ll frequently need to employ a high level of tactfulness!
Tact is the art of telling the truth, while still considering the other person’s feelings.
Tact involves many things, including self-awareness, emotional intelligence, diplomacy, courtesy, and of course, …honesty.
Confidence
The more knowledge you gain, and the more skills you develop, the more confidence you will exude. However, even if you feel confident, you need to determine if that confidence is coming through in your voice. Ask a friend for feedback.
Be careful not to overdo it! People are attracted to quiet confidence — not boastfulness.
Here are a few tips to increase your confidence level:
- Always make eye contact with whomever you are speaking with.
- State your opinions with conviction. To do this with sincerity, you need to have a thorough understanding of whatever subject you’re talking about! If you are weak in any area of your Real Estate business, make a conscious effort to increase your knowledge and skills in that area.
- Prepare and practice. For example, if you’ve got a newly developed listing presentation and you haven’t practiced it thoroughly, you’re probably not going to sound very confident. I’m a proponent of the Deep Practice method:
- Practice small chunks at a time. For instance, rather than practicing your entire listing presentation all at once, just practice one segment;
- Repetition, repetition, repetition. Do it quickly, do it slowly, do it differently. But keep repeating the action;
- Be mindful and notice when it goes well. Then, celebrate success.
Friendliness
Whenever you are in situations where you’re talking to people, whether on the phone or face-to-face, it is vital that you come across as a friendly person, especially with Amiable and Expressive communication styles.
This applies to email messages, also! You don’t need to overdo this but throw in some ‘friendly’ in your writing, especially near the beginning of your relationship.
When I say, “don’t overdo it,” what I mean is, if you want to maximize your potential, you can’t JUST be friendly. You need to balance your friendliness with the other three essential attributes.
I’ve seen some REALTORS® who can survive on friendliness alone! But they usually max out at about 20 deals per year. Your natural friendliness is a wonderful trait, so use it, but if you want to increase production, you need to improve the other three attributes.
By the way, I think of myself as a naturally friendly person, but I’ve been told by friends that I sometimes come across as grumpy and disinterested.
This feedback has helped me to have better self-awareness, so I’m more conscious about this part of my persona—not only in work-related situations—but in social situations, also.
Self-awareness is the key to self-improvement. So, ask for feedback, be conscious of your delivery, and make adjustments as necessary.
Authenticity
When you study sales techniques, being “yourself” is not something that is talked about much, but it is highly effective in any relationship-based business.
You should always be looking for ways to better connect with your prospects and clients.
This is why I hate scripts. No matter how smooth you think you are, your prospects can feel when you’re reciting from a script. This is an entirely different experience from simply being a genuine person and following your gut.
Being genuine can’t be faked. If you’re honest and you have your clients’ best interests at heart, why do you need a script for anything?
Besides, it’s much more fun and satisfying to be yourself and speak to your clients in the same way as you would a friend.
Conclusion
In case you’ve never heard this before:
People do not particularly like salespeople.
So, don’t be a Salesy Slickster.
Be a friendly, professional, confident, authentic provider of valuable information and expertise.
