The Truth About Why Commercial Real Estate Agents Hate Cold Calling
In commercial real estate agency, many salespeople dislike cold calling immensely. It is this dislike the holds many people back from the opportunities that cold call prospecting provides.
It is a fact that commercial real estate is an industry based on relationships built over the long term. This means that you do need to know many people throughout your local territory. The only way you’re going to do that is through personal contact, and a cold call prospecting system is part of the process.
So here are the many problems that we strike with salespeople and call contact:
- Not knowing what to say when the call processes underway
- Lacking the discipline to find the time to make the necessary direct calls each day
- A genuine fear of rejection when it comes to the conversations and dialogue across the telephone
- Lack of organisation when it comes to finding the people to contact each and every day
So you do have a choice here. As I said earlier, the calling process can help you make and create a radical change to your career and industry. You can struggle on with what you are doing at the moment, or you can address the issue and improve your skills.
The fact of the matter is that the call contact program does require specific personal skills and ongoing practice. It takes about three or four weeks to become very comfortable with making the necessary telephone calls and talking to a lot of people. It also takes significant organisation to find the right people to talk to in an ongoing way.
A reluctance to make the calls is simply based on the mindset of the individual. Through practice you can break through the negative attitude and feelings that you have about making calls.
So who will you contact and on what basis? It should be said from the outset that you will need to understand the local laws and legislation as they apply to the ‘do not call register’ in your location. When you are telephoning individuals at their personal residence you will need to adhere to the legislation and the rules that apply when making lots of personal telephone calls. Failure to do so will incur severe penalties.
In commercial real estate agency today we have a distinct advantage when it comes to making business to business telephone calls. Most of the people that we work with occupy premises and properties as part of a business structure. This then says that you can telephone the business, the manager, or the director in charge as part of a business to business calling process. This is distinctly different to the personal call that gets tied up with the problem of the ‘do not call register’.
So the message here is that significant opportunity exists in our industry and our market place providing we make contact with the right people in the right way. If you are struggling with your database, your listings, and your market share, start to use the telephone in a correct way to capture new contacts and clients to work with. It is a personal discipline that can radically improve your commercial real estate business prospects.