For the past several years, social media, online marketing, SEO, PPC and Google Ads have been the hottest trends in marketing. People have certainly made a fortune off of these marketing services (most notably those charging for doing those services). However, I think that these marketing channels, which I will refer to broadly as “online marketing” has actually done a disservice to most professions and especially to Realtors.

For years, Realtors had to cut their teeth with door knocking, cold calling and direct mail. Then came social media and a new brand of Realtors that decided door knocking wasn’t fun (which it isn’t) but that posting sexy pictures next to an Aston Martin was (which it is), so they would prefer to do that and just add a #Realtor on their post and wait for the business to come to them. Well, I work with hundreds of Realtors and while few of those Realtors with 5,000+ followers on social media may be doing well, the majority of them are struggling. Many Realtors are losing their ability to connect with potential buyers/sellers on a meaningful level. They have forgotten, or never learned, how to actually sell. They are great at taking pictures and building a “brand”, but they are awful at converting that “brand’ into business.

And before I go further, let me first say that I 100% believe everyone needs to be on social media. It is cheap and it is an extremely valuable tool in order to build a business. In fact, if you are not on social media, it is just a matter of time before you are out of business. The main distinction, however, is how you are using social media. Are you leveraging it, tracking your results, quantifying what types of posts lead to actual listing appointments, etc.? Or, are you just counting how many followers you have and likes you get on a picture? I recently heard a speaker say that he could care less how many likes he gets because the mortgage company will not accept likes but they will accept cash.

So – what should every Realtor be doing (in addition to having an online presence)? Every Realtor needs to know how to pick up the phone and make phone calls. Note that I did not say text messages. Every Realtor needs to spend a majority of their day on the phone call people.

I have noticed that most people do everything they can not to call people. They text, send emails, DM’s, IM’s, Tweets, and Snaps. You want to know why? You can’t hide while you are on the phone. You have to talk to people. You can’t craft a clever email. You can’t not respond if you don’t like what the other person says to you. It is uncomfortable. You will get rejected. Someone will yell at you. We can avoid all of the unenjoyable experiences if we stay safely behind our computer screen. We don’t feel the rejection and we don’t feel embarrassed or vulnerable. The problem is, we also don’t create any lasting relationships or actually cultivate real business.

My guess is that each person has a minimum of 100 contacts stored in their phone. If you are doing what you should be doing, you probably have many more contacts stored in a CRM, excel spreadsheet or maybe just a box full of business cards you have picked up over the years. In fact, I bet that if you went through your emails, phone and different contact databases you could very easily come up with a minimum of 500 contacts. Now, what would happen if you picked up the phone and called all 500 contacts?

I think (actually, I know because I do this regularly), that if you call these people for no other reason than to check-in and see how they are doing, you are going to generate business and build your referral network very quickly. However, you are not calling to get business. You are calling because you genuinely want to check-in and see how they are doing and see if there is anything you can take off their plate. You may call an old colleague and learn that their having issues with their roof. Maybe you can make a recommendation to a roofer that you use. Now you have built good will with your colleague and a roofer who will become big fans of yours. Maybe you have a contact from your child’s school, and they tell you that their kid is struggling in math and you happen to make a recommendation to a tutor. Now, that parent, who probably has other friends, is going to tell all of their friends about the amazing Realtor who helped out their struggling child. I think you can pretty easily see how this could lead to future referrals.

Is this easy? No. You have to take time out of your busy schedule to sit down and make the phone calls. You may also have to spend time developing relationships with potential referrals sources that you can refer to other people (though this is obviously very helpful). This is not easy, but it is simple, and it takes little to no money. It just takes determination and discipline to get yourself to make the phone calls.

You cannot do this sort of thing online. Yes, when someone says they are looking for a recommendation for a plumber you can tag your plumber or put their phone number in the post, but it is not the same. You don’t build the same type of relationship. And, building relationships is the name of the game as a Realtor. I hate to break it to you but according to the National Association of Realtors, there were 1.3 million Realtors in the United State as of 2018 and that number is going to continue to rise. That is a lot of competition. And, it should also come as no surprise that there are not too many things you can do differently to help your buyer / seller do that the Realtor next door can’t do.

All Realtors can put the property up on their local MLS, they can take great pictures, use a drone, and host an open house. Everyone can do those things. Those are really the easy things to do. However, most Realtors aren’t willing to do the hard work to actually build a strong network and to have a dedicated army of loyal and raving fans out there promoting you. And yes, social media does allow people to see you, but they don’t necessarily know you or feel connected to you. But, if you take a few minutes to give them a phone call, just to check-in, I promise they won’t forget you. That 5-minute phone call is worth more than all the likes you get on the photo of you on vacation in Bali with the tag #realtorlife.

Justin Stivers, Owner

The Probate Law Firm

305-456-3255

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www.probatefirm.com