More than 350 real estate professionals headed to the Peabody Hotel in Orlando, Fla., to attend Sell-a-bration® 2011 Feb. 8 – 11. The annual CRS educational event began with a cavalcade of workshops highlighting specific real estate tools, technologies and strategies that savvy REALTORS® are using to get ahead.
In the session Video Will Earn You More with Less Effort, Raziel Ungar, CRS, touted the best approaches for employing video in agents’ marketing strategies. Video is one of the most powerful tools REALTORS® can use, he said, because “people like to try before they buy.” Beyond that, high-quality video helps agents market their properties — and themselves. Ungar encouraged agents to produce specific neighborhood and community tours, client testimonials and how-to tutorials that engage potential clients while helping establish REALTORS® as trusted local experts. After all, “To become [recognized as] the hyperlocal expert, you must be in the content creation business,” he said.
Deb Madey, CRS, tackled cloud computing in her morning session. Unlike traditional applications, which reside locally on a desktop or laptop computer, cloud-based applications reside on the network itself. “I run my business almost entirely in the cloud,” she said. By using cloud-based applications, REALTORS® gain on-demand access to the tools they need when they need them, and these solutions are often cheaper than traditional computer-based applications, Madey said. Furthermore, REALTORS® who keep their business-critical data in the cloud needn’t worry about potentially catastrophic hard-drive crashes. But she cautioned REALTORS® to take care to use only those cloud-based applications that employ strong security features in order to protect sensitive client and business information.
If Dale Carlton, CRS, had one message for attendees of his morning session on photography strategies, it was this: bad property photos can kill your listing. “Your property photos are much more important [to the successful sale of your listing] than the first potential buyer who comes to see it,” he said. Carlton recommended several rules for taking top-notch photographs that will show off a home best. Among them were:
• Follow the rule-of-thirds: frame photos properly, both horizontally and vertically; don’t waste photo space with plain walls, ceilings, etc.
• Take proper angles: property photos taken at an angle tend to show it off best.
• Master your camera’s specific settings: use aperture, ISO and shutter speed settings to your advantage.
While the New York City real estate market may not be representative of many other markets across the country, Patrick Lilly, CRS, said that the lessons he has learned working there are applicable to any REALTOR®.“You need to be willing to change and grow. If you take that mindset, you will prosper,” he said in his session, Succeeding in Rapidly Changing Markets. “There is always opportunity, no matter how bad your market is.”
During the real estate boom, many real estate industry experts advised agents to focus on a single niche market. But Lilly advised attendees who rely on only one or two sources of income to diversify their business practices. For example, REALTORS® might look into expanding into new construction, leasing, condos or different price points. The idea is to make yourself relevant to the market that develops around you, he said.
An afternoon workshop panel moderated by Denny Grimes, CRS, compared traditional and cutting-edge approaches to winning clients and closing sales. Panelists Kristan Cole, CRS, Ron Kubek, CRS, James Nellis, CRS, and Jason O’Neil, CRS, seemed to agree that a healthy mix of old and new approaches are most successful. For example, O’Neil said that although he relies heavily on customer relationship management (CRM) systems and other technologies, the time he spends driving around his market area and talking to residents and potential clients is the primary driver of his success.
Sell-a-bration® emcee Brian Copeland, CRS, kicked off day two of the event with a key thought: “Availability is the new economy.” In other words, agents who work hard to make themselves approachable and friendly are much more likely to attract potential clients and referrals than those who don’t.
With that sentiment in mind, Copeland introduced a point/counterpoint session moderated by Deb Madey, CRS, that focused on the best techniques agents can use to reach clients. She explored the merits of traditional marketing versus more modern technology-based approaches with the help of two REALTORS® who work opposite ends of that spectrum. Diane Traverso, CRS, defended the merits of traditional marketing strategies, particularly advertising in print media. She typically runs a half-page ad in Home Source magazine, which she said has helped her reach homebuyers looking for property in her market area on the New Jersey shore. Further, “My sellers or potential sellers like to hear that their home is going to be advertised in a print publication as well as (on the) Internet,” she said.
But Amy Smythe Harris, CRS, said she has built her business success on technology. She does not practice many tried-and-true real estate practices, such as office “floor time” or door-to-door in-person marketing. In fact, “70 percent of my leads are generated through social media,” she said. But the key to either approach may be for agents to select strategies that fit not only their own personality and professional approach, but also the needs of clients in their specific market area.
The quality of a REALTOR’S® website can make or break their business. Panelists on the Best REALTOR® Websites panel, moderated by Shane White, CRS, shared their top strategies for building Internet destinations that work.
“Our website is our job interview,” said panelist Laura Duggan, CRS. She believes video is one of the most effective features agents can include on their websites, because “with video, you can really capture the essence of who you are.” She advised REALTORS® to keep their welcome videos, client testimonials and market updates short and punchy — approximately 60 seconds is ideal, but no longer than three minutes.
Panelist Sam Miller, CRS, maintains niche Web pages focused on individual communities in his Knox County, Ohio area. These community pages provide helpful content about the local area — he has created a unique page for each community he serves — and he links this local content to (and from) his other Web pages. This type of interwoven approach not only delivers valuable content to potential clients, he said, it also boosts his sites’ prominence on the Web (also known as SEO, or search engine optimization).
In the Buyer Power Panel, moderator James Nellis, CRS, walked panelists through some top strategies for communicating with potential homebuyers. “If you have a client who consistently calls you, that means you have systems in place that are not working” when it comes to customer relationship management, Nellis said.
At a time when the Internet has made it simple for consumers to find homes for sale, the REALTOR’S® main business has shifted, Nellis suggested. Today’s buyers look for agents who can deliver specific market information and trusted consultation throughout the home search, purchase and transaction process, he said.
Bobbi Howe, CRS, moderated an afternoon panel session of young CRS agents who have found success. Panelist Maura Neill, CRS, acknowledged that it can be a challenge to convince older clients that she is qualified to handle their home transaction professionally. But as she has gained experience, that problem has largely faded away. “I have a lot more confidence in what I know and how to explain it to clients,” she said.
When it comes to deciding which tools are best to help REALTORS® connect with potential clients, Neill offers some specific advice. “The way people reach out to you is the way that [you should] reach back to them,” whether it be via email, telephone, text message or Facebook post. That approach ensures that agents are communicating with their clients in a comfortable and familiar way, no matter what their age.
Although Jeff Turner, president of Web development and consulting company Zeek Interactive, may be known for his high-tech acumen, he opened his keynote presentation by saying: “We spend too much time talking about technology.” His point, he explained, is that mastering a host of individual technologies does not lead inexorably to success. Rather, agents should focus on those “technologies that enable you to have the best conversations.”
Turner, a renowned expert on emerging technologies, said good conversations are based on good listening. And while tuning out noise and listening specifically to hear comments that reinforce one’s own opinions can be valuable, Turner encouraged attendees to focus on listening to learn. By training their listening skills in both their business and personal lives, agents will be better able to tune into their customers’ needs. “The closer you get to your customer, the better you hear,” he said. “You have to have the desire to dig deeper. You have to want to learn. This is hard, [but] the good stuff is always hard.”
Day three of Sell-a-bration® began with a specific focus on something every REALTOR® worries about: their money. Tax expert Chris Bird told attendees at his morning keynote session that thanks to the tax cut extension passed by Congress and signed into law by President Obama in December, there is no need for REALTORS® to take drastic action to sell assets in an effort to protect their tax liability in 2011.
Congress also raised the lifetime gift tax exclusion from $1 million to $5 million, effective for 2011 and 2012. Bird’s message to high net-worth individuals was to step up their monetary gifts to their children or others over the next two years in order to take advantage of this policy while it is in effect.
And although the last few years have been tough on many REALTORS® around the country, Bird said he has “seen an uptick in real estate, and an uptick in enthusiasm in the real estate community.” An improving market presents the perfect opportunity for agents to save more money for retirement. After all, “You can’t retire on income, you must retire on assets,” he said. Specifically, Bird suggested that agents who have a SEP IRA account should roll it over into a 401(k) account, which they can borrow from in case of emergency.
In a morning Listing Power Panel session, moderator Leigh Brown, CRS, advised agents to focus their efforts on creating Web content that will be highly visible to clients looking for agents who boast a specific set of skills. For example, she said, “the [search engine] keywords that are driving people to me [are] ‘experienced short sale agent.’ ” To reach these leads more effectively, Brown hired a ghostwriter to draft articles about short sales which, once posted on her blog, helped boost her website’s prominence to search engines (SEO).
In his afternoon panel session, moderator Nate Martinez, CRS, made a compelling case for agents to turn at least some of their business focus toward foreclosures. That’s because 14.75 million homes currently have negative equity, while four million of the mortgages on those homes are over 50 percent underwater, he said.
Closing session keynote speaker Pam Ermen, CRS, focused on the rocky economy’s impact on real estate. “I see economic factors as early warning systems that tell us and our clients what to expect,” she said. REALTORS® must be able to comprehend and explain how economic forces, such as unemployment, foreclosures and mortgage rates, impact their local market. “It’s not our job to tell them what to think. It’s our job to give them the information that makes them capable of making good decisions.”
Audio files from nearly all of the event’s workshops and education sessions are available for purchase online at www.crs.com/Events/287?cid=SABAUD11.
Also, mark your calendars for Sell-a-bration® 2012 at the Arizona Grand Resort in Phoenix, Jan. 19–21, 2012.
Published by The Residential Specialist, May/June 2011
