How I turned my last online lead into a transaction

Hey all, We are nearing the end of our Fix What Matters Most series and I wanted to devote the last week to fixing the one thing that could turn any agent's business around--having a simple plan to turn leads into transactions. Even if you haven't been following our tips on converting with your website or generating traffic, ANY agent can purchase leads through one of the lead aggregators. And while it may not be a very cost effective way to do business, if you are good at converting leads to transactions, you can make it work. If you ask the agents why they have trouble converting leads to transactions, they will say it's the leads. "Online leads are junk" they will say. And that's understandable. We like to protect our ego. But a lead is simply the name and contact information for someone who was searching for property--the same way they were when they stopped by an open house or called on a yard sign. The problem is that most agents use a one-size-fits-all approach to their followup. Step 1 Call/text/email the lead Step 2 Pepper them with questions to qualify them Step 3 Set the appointment Sound familiar? But leads come in all shapes and sizes--or "phases" if you'll follow me. There are three basic phases of the buying cycle. And for the purposes of this discussion, sellers are buyers as well. Of course they aren't buying a property, but they are buying an agents' services so they will go through the same three phases. First, everyone starts with the information gathering phase. Nowadays, this happens almost entirely online. Look around, see market stats, do home searches, read blogs, see agent reviews, etc. In other words, gather as much information so that when it comes to actually finding a property or an agent, you basically already know what you want. You just have to search. Real estate customers in this phase of the buying cycle don't think they need an agent to help with this phase and certainly don't want to feel like they are getting sold. This is the same phase you were in the last time you made a big purchase. Maybe you went to the furniture store to buy a sofa and a salesman approached you as you walked in the door. They asked "What can I help you with today?" "Nothing, I'm just looking around", you replied. On the surface, you just lied to that salesperson (hence the phrase "buyers are liars"). You came to the store to purchase a couch and of course you will probably have some questions that he CAN help you with. But not now. You were in phase one of the buying cycle. You didn't want to be sold at that moment and you wanted a few minutes to look around, gather some information and at some point you would be ready to ask questions and find the sofa. Interestingly, this phase works the same way in real estate but instead of "no thanks, I'm just looking", you will get "I'm two years out from doing anything", "I'm already working with an agent", "I'm just playing around online" or my favorite ""I was just looking for my brother-in-law". Although the words are different, oftentimes they mean the same thing--"let me look around and I will get in touch when I'm ready". The second phase is the home search phase (for buyers) or interview agents phase (for sellers). Consumers have an idea what they want and now they just have to find it. Historically, this is how agents always connected with their leads. Open houses, duty desk times, and sphere of influence marketing all generated phase two customers. Because they already recognize their need for an agent and are ready to get down to business, agents can approach them fairly aggressively. Agents can ask qualifying questions and go for the appointment right away. Famously from Hollywood, there are even the ABCs of real estate. A-Always. B-Be. C-Closing. Phase three is the escrow phase. This is contract negotiations and the closing process. As you can imagine, most agents don't have any trouble converting phase two customers. Afterall, that's what agents have been doing for decades and most traditional training revolves around how to do it. Unfortunately, those methods centered around generating phase two customers have all but dried up since the internet came around and allowed lead aggregators and agents who are on top of their game to capture leads before they ever get to the home search. If you aren't one of those agents already capturing 2-3 leads per day from online sources on your own, then you should check out Pipeline Pro Tools. You need only to check and see if we have availability in your area first. Click here. If we do, you could be generating leads today for dirt cheap. No long term contact. It was important to lay this groundwork before we move forward into creating a simple plan for converting these leads but that's exactly what we are going to talk about next. Stay tuned, Levi Jones Guerilla Realty This email was sent to dsoldit.blogpost@blogger.com . You probably joined our list by signing up for one of our amazing free tools, free guides, or you wanted to be notified when we announce new stuff. 99% of everything we do for agents is totally free, no strings attached. The other 1% is even better. Don't let our updates make you mad. If you don't like them, do us both a favor and unsubscribe. Our stuff isn't for everyone.  Unsubscribe | Forward this email to a friend