Commercial Real Estate Agent Listing Conversion Rules
In commercial real estate agency, the listings that you have for sale are the lifeblood of your future income opportunities. This then says that you must have a good supply of listings and you must know what you are doing with them. The generic approach does not work. Get specific in your listing marketing processes.
When you have a listing for sale, the following facts and questions will help you with improving conversions and commissions:
- Where is the enquiry coming from for the particular property type today and how can you get more of it?
- What does the client know about the local property market and would some re-education be useful?
- How can the listing be re-packaged to attract more inquiry?
- What contacts in your database do you have now that you can direct to the listing?
- Who can you talk to again and get back to the property in another inspection?
- Can you get an offer on paper to start a negotiation or educate the client?
- Have you considered contacting all the local business community and property investors directly rather than rely on generic advertising to create inquiry?
The secret to converting a listing to a sale is largely ‘belief’ driven; that belief is on the part of the agent. Understanding that you have a great property and a client to serve helps the entire process. That’s why the exclusive listing process is just so important for you as an agent. Perhaps I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t overly commit much if any of my agency efforts to an ‘open listing’. Why would you? So many other agents are jumping across the listing and the client; confusion ‘reigns supreme’ as they say. Marketing consistency goes out the window with open listings. The client is confused and you have absolutely no control on the listing stock. That’s not the way to build market share!
If you are new to the industry I know that you may need every listing that you can get so ‘opens’ may be an alternative to get started; I do accept that fact initially, however make sure you change your focus and move across to presenting and pitching your services for ‘exclusives’ as soon as you can. That will require some confidence and market knowledge on your part so that the client will see that you are the best ‘agent solution’.
You cannot rise to the top of the market on the back of ‘open listings’. That’s a fact that should be remembered.