Time Efficiency and Absolute Standards in Using Your Time as a Commercial Real Estate Broker

In commercial real estate brokerage, the way that you use your time will have a lot to do with the outcomes that you achieve.  Any spare time has to be specifically focused on business generation and client contact.  Success in commercial real estate is largely built around the relationships that you have with property investors and business owners.  The database that you create should track and measure the conversations and meetings that occur with these groups.

Here are some ideas to help you focus your spare time on the right things in the right way.

1. Connecting with new people should be a priority for every agent and broker.  Make it a target to connect with a certain number of new people every day.  The process of doing that may involve cold calling or door knocking the local area and the local businesses.
2. Check out the local planning approvals board or office regularly.  Look for the upcoming new property developments that may have an impact on the supply and demand of future space.  As part of that process you can look into the historic records of development approvals.  Some of those properties previously approved may have been taken to the design and construct phase, with the finished building now requiring leasing or potential sale.  Most property developments occur for a reason.  That reason is usually based on capital gain and income improvement.  Look for the owners of those properties so that you can connect with them for the right property activity at the right time.
3. With any high quality exclusive listing you will find plenty of reasons to talk to new people locally.  Take any new listing personally to the marketplace using a number of different strategies such as brochures, door knocking, direct mail, and e-mail.  Any brochures that you do send through the mail or with a covering letter should always be directly followed up with a telephone call.  In saying that, I go back to the point that you must connect with many new people in an ongoing way.  Your marketing process should support that strategy.
4. A direct mail campaign will always help you build market share and prospect opportunity.  Far too many agents see the simplicity and convenience of the direct mail campaign as an easy way to canvass the market.  Sending out a lot of letters without direct follow-up the tremendous waste of money and time.  The direct mail process does work however each and every letter sent out needs to be followed up with a direct telephone call; that is the job of the agent or the broker.  The agents and brokers that adopt this process achieve far greater conversions and growth of market share.  Put yourself into the marketing process and don’t take any short cuts.
5. Write an article or an editorial relating to your local area; you can submit that written material to the local newspapers and also publish the information on the Internet through a blog or a website strategy.  There are plenty of things to write about when it comes to property activity within a town or a city; in that way you are showing the market that you are a professional property expert when it comes to the location and the property type.  As a case in point you could look at writing about the changes to the local development plan or zoning, changes to the road and highway network locally, or the supply and demand factors that apply to the commercial and retail property industry.  There are plenty of things to write about and you can do that in your spare time or perhaps one evening per week as part of a personal and professional marketing process.
6. As a final note, it is worthwhile considering the ways in which you can distribute your business card locally through the community, the property owners, and the business proprietors.  In commercial real estate your business card is perhaps the most economical and powerful marketing tool that you have.  In most cases you will find that your business card is more likely to be retained by people rather than discarded, as in the case of direct mail or brochures.  Make it a personal goal to get at least 15 business cards distributed every day to new people.

So there are plenty of things to do when it comes to utilising your spare time efficiently and directly.  Take every spare moment of the working day to connect with the right people in the right way.  Top agents do that all the time and understand the value of connecting with new people in a meaningful way.  As a property specialist in sales, leasing, or property management, you have an array of specialist services that can be communicated and provided.  Everything in our industry comes back to marketing and the number of people that you know personally and directly.