Top Priorities for a Commercial Real Estate Broker

If you have chosen commercial real estate as a career, it is essential that you set your priorities and focus your actions on critical tasks.  There are many diversions and pressures when it comes to being a commercial real estate agent.  The priorities that you set and the actions that you take will help you stay on task and grow your market share.

Many agents struggle with staying on task, and that then directly has an impact on their commissions and market share.  The top agents in the industry know how to focus their efforts on the things that matter.

Here are some of the critical priorities to be considered and merged into the actions of a commercial real estate agent:

1. Budgeting – Given that the commissions in the industry can be large and also infrequent it is essential that you budget your business activities and living costs.  The budget that you set will help you stay under control professionally as you build your client base and property activities.  The top agent needs listings and most particularly exclusive listings.  Exclusivity only comes when the clients that you serve respect your skills and relevance as a top agent.  From the very start of your career focus your efforts and presentation skills on exclusivity.  Practice your skills and grow your marketing efforts.
2. Market share – It is critical to understand the elements of the property market and how they are moving at any point in time.  There will be opportunities for you to capture in sales, leasing, and property management.  You may be focusing in one or more of these market segments as an agent.  Choose the market segment that works for you, and then understand the competition that you are up against; understand your market share so that you can grow that business base over time and through specific strategies.  If you don’t know your market share, it is hard to develop strategies and results.
3. Skill development – Professional skills for an agent are a big part of growth and opportunity.  When you analyse the industry and the property opportunities for your town or city, you will soon see specific skills that are required.  They can best be summarised as prospecting, negotiating, inspecting, property knowledge, and documentation.  Taking those important skills, create a professional development plan for yourself that can be implemented through practice and training over time.  The top agents of the market understand this focus and will be refining their skills continually through deliberate effort.  If you want to compete with the top agents, your skill development strategy should be on par with the top agents.
4. Marketing – At a personal level, you should be marketing yourself locally on a daily basis.  The process of marketing should be quite specific and direct; get in front of new people every day and connect in a professional way.  Your business card can be your main marketing tool to be distributed to new people throughout your local area.  The process of one on one contact becomes critical and important for an individual agent building market share.  The only way to create this one on one contact is through cold calling and door knocking the people in the local area that have an interest in the property type and the location.  Your job is to find them, and that is where prospecting and marketing comes together each and every day.

From these four simple things, you can see the priorities that really do need to occur at a personal level for agents in a continual way.  Over time these four strategies will help direct and maintain your success as a commercial real estate agent.  Put these four elements into your personal business plan and take action towards them every day.