A real estate lead is only as good as your ability to follow-up and engage. We hear experts tell agents over and over to forget about developing leads until they have a follow-up system. With a set of rules and best practices in place the process can be simplified, standardized, and the success rate greatly improved.
For the purposes of this article will assume you understand lead response time is absolutely critical to the success rate. Consumers and your clients expect a rapid response time to all inquires, this is just a by-product of our information driven lives. You must respond as quickly as possible.
Next, you must clearly define and categorize all leads by their quality. That may mean hot, warm, cold, or dead. By establishing a sorting criteria you will be able to focus on worthwhile, promising leads.
In addition to rapid response times and having a clearly defined sorting process, here are five rules and or best practices you should consider when following up with your leads.
- Complete the same follow-up actions for every good lead until you have made contact and had a thorough conversation. For example: Day 1 = a phone call and a follow-up email. Day 2 = a phone call and a text. Day 3 = send a email.
- If rejected for an in person meeting, offer to send them information on the market or set them up on an auto-prospecting home search. Don't let one "no" be the end of your efforts. Rejection is part of being in sales and you should not take it personally. Many times people are not rejecting you rather they are just not in the buying stage of their process. This is when patience and persistence is critical. Stick with it knowing that if you bring value to the equation you will earn their business.
- During a phone conversation if your lead asks you to send an email because they are “too busy", reply with "when is a better time to call back?". Some leads will ask you to "just email them" so be aware if a lead is taking advantage of you and avoiding any commitment on their end. You might also say, "before I send you any more homes for sale I'd really like to meet in person (or have a telephone conversation) to make sure I'm the right agent for you."
- Have a purpose for calling/emailing other than “following up". For example, on a phone conversation mention something about the neighborhood they were interested in. In an email, attach a buyer's questionnaire to spark their interest and show you are here to help.
- Maintain contact with a good lead that turned cold but don't invest too much time. For example, keeping a prospective lead in a branded email campaign just for a couple months can be a big return on a little investment.
Do you have a follow-up rule or best practice you swear by? Share it below to help your fellow Breakthrough Agents!
