Once you have mastered your core presentation, many agents find it helpful to create a success portfolio. A success portfolio is a pictorial journal of your past success stories. One of the best ways to envision a success portfolio is to imagine yourself interviewing a photographer or an architect. Both of these professionals almost always have a success journal that shows off their talents, for instance a photographer may include photos of different scenes, lighting, models, and backgrounds, while an architect may include elevations, interior and exterior drawings, and most importantly completed projects.

Likewise many top real estate agents carry with them a success portfolio which may include photos of homes sold, past flyers and marketing campaigns, pictures of clients in front of homes purchased, brochures, website samples, advertising slicks, open house invitations, and most importantly quotes and pictures of satisfied clients.

Some progressive agents are now even using their portfolio as their listing presentation. Carolyn a Luxury Home Specialist from Georgia says, "I want to impress upon my clients the fact that I get things done, I'm not just talking in a vacuum. When I say something it happens."

Consider if you organized your success portfolio around the same discussion points as your listing presentation. You could then follow the lead of elite agents who use their success portfolio as a stand alone tool, or to augment their formal listing presentation. Let's take a look at how one superstar introduces the portfolio into his presentation:

Success Portfolio Introduction

If you don't mind what I would like to do is show you some of the homes I've recently helped families buy and sell here in the area, and some of my most successful marketing pieces. May I show you my portfolio?

Have you ever noticed that you learn faster by listening to a story rather than just receiving hard facts? This may be one reason why as children we aren't just told not talk to strangers, we are told the scary story of little red riding hood and the big bad wolf. Stories are powerful; they resonate, sticking to our long term memory like a pasta dinner to our ribs.

Master presenters are master storytellers. Statistics, numbers, trend lines, markets, and opinions can be interesting, but when they are wrapped up in a story related to real people in real situations the data comes alive, it resonates. No longer is the discussion an abstract analysis of what may or may not happen. Instead it becomes a real life lesson in what can and will happen, the ups and downs, the triumphs and tragedies of what happens to real world buyers and sellers within the often unforgiving real estate market. Let's take a look at three real world stories from top agents using their success portfolio as a starting point:

Price

Jeremy, a six million dollar producer from Chicago tells this story while showing a collage of pictures centered on a two story waterfront home he sold for over a million dollars.

"The couple that sold this home had a tough time, but we eventually were able to get their home sold just before the husband was transferred. The problem was that against my advice they priced the home above the top of the market. Unfortunately when the Realtors in the area looked at the property on tour they pegged it as overpriced, and the home sat on the market for a couple of weeks without any showings."

"So I took the time to call every agent who had seen the home on tour to get their feedback. All of them told me that they felt the home was overpriced, when I took this back to the seller, after another week of waiting, they adjusted the price. Within three days the home was sold."

Product

Sarah, a nine million dollar producer from Northern California always tells this story while showing pictures to emphasize the importance condition improvements can have on a sale.

"Last year I took a listing which needed some cosmetic work … here are some photos of the home. The sellers really felt like they could just sell the home "as is" and let the new buyers pick out the carpet and paint. So we priced the home to sell, and even threw in a carpet and paint allowance of $5000 for any full price offer. After a month even though we had a ton of showings because of the low price, we received no offers."

"My recommendation to the sellers was to go ahead and paint the home which would improve the curb appeal, and carpet the home in an earth tone color. This is how the home turned out … . Take a look at these pictures … . The home sold a week later at the same market price but with no allowance."

Promotion

Tony, a veteran from the Florida market who consistently sells over five million dollars a year likes to show off the growth of his marketing campaign over the years he has been in business.

"I've been in the businesses for a long time, and in the beginning what I thought would sell homes was traditional marketing in the newspaper … here are a few of my early marketing pieces. They worked, but I like to be more aggressive with my business so I started doing a tri-fold brochure mailing to my entire service area every three weeks featuring all of my listings, and targeted mailings to families who I know can afford to purchase homes in the area. Tell me what you think of these pieces?"

By building a success portfolio it will allow you to weave a story into every main point of your presentation. Long after clients will have forgotten the percentage of listings sold in their neighborhood they will remember the story of the lady who refused to budge off her demand to only be paid in gold coins (one of my true stories).

What if you don't have any stories? If you're a new agent who hasn't yet accumulated some anecdotes about the trials and tribulations of your own clients you may consider borrowing some from your office mates, or your managing broker. Of course when you present your portfolio just make sure to point out that each story relates to something that happened within your office, not necessarily to you.

Published: November 7, 2006

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Jim Remley is a speaker, author, and consultant. He is also an active real estate broker in Southern Oregon where he owns a network of six offices. Jim won the Rookie Instructor of the Year award in 2001 from Realty-U, the largest network of real estate educators in the nation. He was the winner of the 2002 Pacesetter Award, and nominated for the Real Estate Instructor of the Year Award during the first quarter of 2003. To learn more about Jim, please visit ProPerformer.com or e-mail him at .