Many people who have a license to sell real estate actually dislike the profession. They don't like 'sales' in any way, shape, or form. Here are several reasons why they starve; they don't want to generate their own leads.

Often, they believe that they can get a license, show up, and get paid. Wrong, it's a job and one must work at a job to get paid. Real estate is a high pay for hard work and low pay for no work profession. This is why a large percentage of licensed real estate salespeople are starving to death.

Many licensees are not sold on themselves. You see, in real estate, we sell three things and always in the same order: Self, Company, Product or Service. If an agent is not sold on themselves, then how can they expect anyone to buy them, their company, or their product or service?

They fail to get the knowledge they need. This one chaps my lips the most. Never in my 34 year real estate career has there been more good, available information on how to activate a lead generation system. ABR, CRS, e-PRO, and GRI, to name a few, add to that national and local association, company, and university offerings!

Here are 23 Basic Steps of a Solid Lead Generation Program:

1. Be the positive influence everywhere you are.
2. Stand up, stand straight, and stand out.
3. Smile, it's your biggest gift.
4. Never share your problems with others, half don't care about them, the other half are glad you have them.
5. Accept that wisdom is power -- not money or knowledge. Wisdom is the knowledge of how to make, spend, save, and share your money in abundance.
6. Plan to succeed, agents don't plan to fail -- they fail to plan.
7. Define your, purpose make it your Brand and mold all you do around it.
8. Don't sanction incompetence in self or others.
9. Discover how the center is the new edge.
10. Omni-Task: multitasking is one dimension and doesn't fit with today's world. Omni-Tasking puts you in the center and revolves real time around you.
11. Put every goal, strategy, and task (personal and business) in your contact management system. It will allow you to Omni-Task.
12. Schedule and assign a start and stop time to all your (personal and business) tasks.
13. Work five scheduled hours a day.
14. Never be late for an appointment, it tells the other person that they are unimportant to you.
15. Play a little every day.
16. Refer negative people to other negative people. They love to cluster.
17. Listen to others instead of talking about them.
18. Understand and accept the Law of Reality: If A lies to B -- A will lie to me. Substitute any other phrase for 'lies to.'
19. Own your mistakes.
20. Wear your association, company, and personal brands boldly with honor.
21. Tell everyone what you do for a living and how much you enjoy it.
22. Walk, breathe, and carry yourself with power.
23. Never forget to thank someone every day.

Published: June 7, 2005

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