There’s a lot B2B salespeople can learn from the world of real estate.
Market fluctuations, technological disruptors and cutthroat competition — Realtors have seen it all. And the best of the best never flinch.
But like any other industry, closing the deal gets more complex as the ticket price increases. Agents who are actively selling multi-million dollar properties certainly know a few things that the rest of us don’t.
Here are 4 foundational lessons from the world of luxury real estate that can help you crush it in your own market.
Lesson #1 – Be the smartest in your market
You spend hours and hours each week pitching, emailing and following up. But how much time do you spend learning?
Luxury agents like Gary Ashton, Owner and CEO of the #1 RE/MAX Team in the world make knowledge their advantage. Gary has sold million-dollar homes to former senators, CEOs, even the GM of the Tennessee Titans. With the slogan, “Don’t sell without intel!”, Gary and his team of real estate rainmakers make it a point to know more about the market than anyone else.
“Knowledge is what makes our agents more valuable. Buyers want to learn but they don’t want to spend time learning,” says Gary. From the kinds of clubs, schools and communities their prospects want to be a part of, to the specific type of high-quality Italian tiles in the kitchen — superstar sellers like Gary make sure their buyers can learn anything they want to know without having to figure it out themselves.
Lesson #2 – Become a community catalyst
When you make learning a habit, a funny thing starts to happen. You get to know more and more of the movers and shakers in your community.
The more your network grows, the more value you can offer your leads. Whether that’s in the form of sending an insider tip in one of your follow ups or simply introducing your prospect to someone who can solve a specific problem for them, human connection offers the kind of value prospects never forget. Showing your leads that you’re connected to your broader community helps them see you not just as a “salesperson”, but as someone who truly has skin in the game.
Case in point: When Gary met his former partner Debra Beagle, she had reached approximately $9 million in revenue on her own as a solo-agent, simply by working her sphere of influence (SOI). Today, Debra and Gary have leveraged their community connections to become the official real estate team of the Tennessee Titans and Nashville Soccer Club.
Lesson #3 – Be empathetic
While the validity of the old adage “more money, more problems” is still up for debate, the fact is, everyone has problems. Some of us just have more expensive ones.
No matter who you’re selling to, remember they’re still human. You owe it to them not to “geek out”, “gush”, or “blow smoke”. Confident people want to do business with confident people. So keep it cool, calm and focused on how you can solve an immediate problem for them.
In many complex transactions, simply knowing the nuances is a crucial value-add. Not everyone understands the weight of a $5 million decision. As their rep, it’s your responsibility to walk in their shoes and show them you get it: there’s a lot on the line. Ask yourself, a few simple questions to see it from your prospect’s perspective.
- Who else is involved in or impacted by your prospect’s decision?
- What do the other stakeholders need to know?
- How will doing business with you benefit everyone involved in the sale?
- What does your prospect stand to lose if those benefits don’t come through?
In luxury real estate, your prospect’s deepest fears and desires could come from any variety of life events: growing a family, landing an important job in a new city or trying to lead a national football team to Super Bowl status. In B2B, it might be making the decision to uproot their team’s entire workflow and try a new CRM. Either way, it’s a heavy burden to bear.
Be the one person who truly gets it and they’ll remember you as a friend, not a commission-hungry “rep”.
Lesson #4 – Trust your process
At the end of the day, these tactics are nothing without a system to hold them up.
If you truly want to become the kind of sales challenger who always closes and never gets commoditized, you need a consistent process for learning your market and connecting with your leads. Rockstar agents like Gary and Debra use a simple, focused CRM to centralize and organize their intel, run their lead follow up and monitor their team.
Because timing also matters. You need to be the last one standing when all the other reps have given up. Whether you’re using high-tech lead tracking tool or a simple spreadsheet, make sure you have a repeatable process to help you close more deals in less time and become the kind of salesperson top-tier leads need you to be.
David Lawerence
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