Today on the Listing Agent Lifestyle we're talking with Wendy Bell from Ottawa, Canada, and Wendy is both a broker of a Keller Williams office in Ottawa with 160 agents, and she's also as her personal production business that she works with her sister.
So that gives a neat opportunity here to talk about both scales and we had a really great conversation going through each of the Listing Agent Lifestyle elements, starting with her top 150 or in her case, the top 180 she has with her sister, and we calculated her return on relationship and how we can bring that number up.
Then we talked about the whole philosophically different approach to Getting Listings and what I really see as the last information advantage we have as real estate agents and the opportunity available for us.
I really enjoyed this conversation. We covered a lot of ground and I think you're going to get a lot out of it.
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Transcript: Listing Agent Lifestyle Ep034
Dean: Wendy Bell.
Wendy: Good morning. How are you this morning?
Dean: I'm so good. How are you?
Wendy: I'm excellent too. Thank you. It's a sunny day here in Ottawa. Warm but not too hot, so it's a perfect day.
Dean: Well, perfect. I'm actually in Toronto.
Wendy: Good. There you go. It's perfect there too, I was watching the news this morning, watching the weather. Both of my kids live in Toronto, so I always love to see what's going on in their world before I start my world.
Dean: That's funny. Where are you calling in from?
Wendy: Ottawa.
Dean: From Ottawa. Perfect, nice.
Wendy: Yeah. From Ottawa.
Dean: Welcome. I'm excited to spend some time with you. Tell me what's going on?
Wendy: What's going on? Well, as you know, in Canada things have changed quite a bit in the real estate industry over the last of a while. With the inability to do call expires, so many private sellers are now mere postings. Almost every single one that comes up in Ottowa is a mere posting, so you can't approach them other than perhaps ... Well what we do is we go and preview the house and see if they want some help buying something. Just generally, the internet provides so much information, people feel they don't need us. My sister and I work together. We have worked together for probably 15 years.
Dean: Oh nice.
Wendy: When I opened up the KW office in Ottowa, I knew I would need some help on the real estate end to continue with my business because there's travel and all that, and training, lack of focus. That's the 15 years behind me. Now I'm ready to take a step back and rebuild my business.
Dean: The last 15 years you were building up the brokerage, building the company. Got you.
Wendy: Yes. Exactly.
Dean: Nice.
Wendy: I brought in some new partners.
Dean: I just had lunch with Glenn McQueenie.
Wendy: Oh did you?
Dean: Here in Toronto. He's been a good friend for boy, probably 25 years now I've known Glenn. He opened a big Keller Williams here.
Wendy: He does. He opened his office, there were three of us that opened our offices about the same time, two in Ottowa and one in Toronto. Glenn was the first in Toronto. Glenn was the first in Toronto, I think. We've been in the trenches a long time together.
Dean: Good.
Wendy: He's a good friend.
Dean: Now coming back. Now coming back, this is your ... The world's changed in that 15 years since you were away.
Wendy: The world has changed.
Dean: Okay.
Wendy: You know what? I'm 15 years older too.
Dean: And wiser.
Wendy: I've been in the business for 30 years. I've been in the business for 30 years. When I first got in the business, you could call expired, that's how I got most of my business to start expired.
Dean: Yes.
Wendy: Now it's very different. We have to bring extra value in my opinion to our past clients.
Dean: Well, it's really interesting, we must have started out at the same time. I started in 1988.
Wendy: Yep, I'm 87, I'm one year ahead of you.
Dean: There you go.
Wendy: July of 87.
Dean: But I've often talked about this, especially this year looking back and reflecting on ... 30 years ago, we had all the information. We were the only way that somebody could get information about real estate was through us, right?
Wendy: Right.
Dean: We had the catalog-
Wendy: We had the key.
Dean: And that was the bible for them. Yes exactly. Now all that information though of course now is available to everybody, accessible. We need to identify ways to get ahead of that. Everything is moving faster. It's important now, there's still an opportunity for us to have an information advantage, but the information advantage that we can get is this portfolio of future sellers and future buyers that we can generate. What I mean by that is, with this whole Listing Agent Lifestyle approach, I'm really shaping a listing-centric approach to the future that really it's the most important thing right now that you have an ability to get listings, to find people who are going to sell their house and choose you to do it.
Wendy: Good, because that's what I like to find, that's what I want to do.
Dean: Right. Absolutely. Part of the thing what we do, is look for people who are going to sell their house ahead of the time that they're going to do it. Most of the time what people are really focused on as real estate agents is they're looking to find the right now business, the people who are looking to sell right now. That's why when we sort it out, that people would call expired listings, the morning that listing expired. They'd be this ... Everybody banging on their phone or on their door trying to convince them to re-list their house with them. You could have success with that because it was literally a numbers game. Now of course that's taken away, but the same thing would happen with for sale by owners. Always looking for people who are in the market right now.
The advantage that we've been able to do, to create is by taking an approach of educating people with the information that they're going to want prior to them putting their house on the market. When you think about it, the genesis thought of anybody who's thinking about selling their house is always on some level. "I wonder what houses are selling for right now? I wonder what my house is worth." By doing that there's been a little bit of distinction. Most people when they take that kind of approach, they'll put out the "Find out how much your house is worth." Type of offers. Where it's very isolating to them. Where it puts them in the spotlight and in a way that is ... They're looking for people who want to list their house right now. As soon as people ask for, tell me what my house is worth, then they immediately get phone calls from the agent trying to close them on an appointment or get them to list their house right now, right?
Wendy: Right.
Dean: The approach that we've taken with the Getting Listings program. I'm not sure, how familiar are you with the things that we do? Have you been to GoGoAgent to see all of the things that we have?
Wendy: Well I haven't seen all of it. I haven't seen all of it. I've seen ... That's really part of the reason why I reached out because there's so much there.
Dean: I know, 30 years of stuff. That's the thing, we always try and narrow people into a plan, so that you know what to execute. I know that your main thing is you would love to get listings. Most people are, that's the number one element in the Listing Agent Lifestyle is you've got to have a systematic way to get listings. We focus on choosing an areas and then offering a free July 2018 report on Yorkville, condo prices. If I live in Yorkville, in Toronto, in a condo, that would be a valuable piece of information for me.
What often gets lost on people Wendy is the subtle difference between an offer that most people are making saying, "Find out how much your condo is worth." Which is kind of like putting people ... They have to reveal themselves in a way. It almost feels like they're saying, "Identifying themselves as, I want to find out how much my condo is worth." Almost like feeling that they're having to admit that they're thinking of selling kind of thing. But the difference in offering a free report on Yorkville condo prices, that is a different thing. That is ... "I get to voyeur in on the market data, not open myself up to a real estate agent telling me subjectively what they think my condo is worth, so that they can convince me to list it with them. Does that make sense?
Wendy: I guess it's a little under the radar. It's like a push and a pull.
Dean: Yeah.
Wendy: The push would be sending another card that says, "Find out what your condo is worth?" That means the agent has to get in touch with them, go and see them, blah, blah, blah.
Dean: The report-
Wendy: They don't want an agent.
Dean: The report feels like it's already done. It doesn't feel like I'm obligating myself by asking you to do some work for me specifically.
Wendy: I understand that. That makes sense.
Dean: That difference is what gets the higher response rates, so now people who are in the earliest stages of thinking about selling their condo ... It's safe for them to respond, because now they can feel, "Oh I can get this data." Which is what I want, but I don't have to feel like I'm obligating myself, or putting out there for you to come and examine my specific house right now.
Wendy: They don't have to talk to a scary realtor.
Dean: That's exactly right, because they know that the scary realtor, the thing they're scared of is that they're going to try and get me to list my house right now, and I'm not ready yet. I'm just thinking about this. I'm just thinking, "Some time it might be nice to move out of this condo and move into a bigger place or move into a house. You get people to respond that way. Now what you do get is within that pool there are people who are ready to sell their house right now. It's not that you're only getting people who are later, you're also getting people who are later. You're getting a broader selection. What you're doing now is you are building a list of people who own condo's in Yorkville, it's on their mind that they're thinking about ... They're probably a higher likelihood to sell than the general population.
That gives you now the opportunity to know that, that person is my secret, silent, future listing inventory. It allows you now to do the thing that will position you above all the other realtors who may be competing for that listing when it comes time for them to sell. That is to find a buyer. Now you don't need to have their listing to find people who are thinking of buying a condo in Yorkville because now we can start advertising for and looking for buyers who are looking for homes in Yorkville by advertising and offering a free guide to Yorkville condo prices. Where now we can frame it, for the sellers we position it as a free report on the condo sales.
For the buyers, we position it as a buyer guide to all the information about the condos in Yorkville, where you could have a map of Yorkville of where the buildings are, and information about how many units are in the buildings, and what the amenities are, and what the average prices are, and the condo fees, all the things what's included in the maintenance things, along with the information on all the condos that are for sale right now in Yorkville. You're getting on one hand, all these people who are thinking about potentially selling their condo and you're finding people who are thinking about buying condos in Yorkville and that become your secret inventory. That becomes your opportunity to really be a market maker, because you have access to information that nobody else has. Nobody else knows who these people who live in the condos right now, that have not yet listed. Nobody else knows who they are and nobody else knows who these buyers who are just starting the process of looking for a condo in Yorkville are. You've got this great little secret inventory pool here to draw from.
Wendy: I guess what started me ... Well, I've known about you for a long time Dean. I followed you and I followed Joe Sells. For a long time, but never really bought into the entire ... I don't mean bought in, but jumped into the entire program.
Dean: Sure. Yeah.
Wendy: I was listening to a podcast, the one you did with Rob Caruso. I was laughing all the way through it. He discovered all the things that he should be doing, with just what you're talking about. All the condo sales and the leads that he has and the condos that he wasn't taking advantage of. I've been also listening to your podcast on the Listing Agent Lifestyle Academy, the three sessions you did. That just repetitive stuff that I listen to on my drive into the office. It helps me understand what the program is about and what the goal is. We already put out the Most Interesting Post Card, we did that to our top 180, actually. We've got top 180 because it's both my sister and I together. We did it in a farm area as well. We walked a farm. We have a farm of about 700 homes that we've just really started to become knowledgeable in. I've done some landing pages, adjusted some in for the area that we're doing our farming in. There's a lot of things to get going and make it all work, right?
Dean: Yes. Well, it’s all building blocks. The very first thing. You did the right thing in terms of you've got your top 180. How much of your business right now comes from repeat and referral business like that? In your after unit from your top 180?
Wendy: I would say, well my referral units would be about 34%, my past clients, 41. That's a hefty number. That's a hefty number.
Dean: Those are numbers. Here's the thing, what would that be in terms of the way that we set this up for our metrics is to be able to show you a standardized metric of how you're doing compared to what other people are doing. I'm assuming that you're saying 34% of your business is coming from referrals, not that you're getting ... We calculate your return on relationships. We take your 180 or your top 150, whatever you've got there. Then we provide the number of transactions you did from repeat and referral into that number to get a yield from your return on relationships.
Wendy: Right.
Dean: How many transactions would that be that it would be that we can calculate your return on relationship?
Wendy: Not high enough from the 180. When we look back, we had to really go through our numbers in preparation for getting into the program. We did 29 deals last year, my sister, and I. Also we had 22 that were referrals or past clients.
Dean: What we would do-
Wendy: That's a very low percentage in the 180-
Dean: We would take that. It's not too low. When we look at it, let's do the quick math here. 22 divided by 180 is 12%. If we look at that right now we would say that your return on relationship is at 12%, 12.2. That gives us now a frame of reference to go from compared to other people. With a standardized metric like that, our gold standard is that we're looking for a 20% annual yield from your relationship portfolio. When we look at that, what that would mean for you with ... When we say your top 150, we're looking for 30 transactions from your top 150 or it would be 36 transactions from your top 180 that you guys have because you're combined. That's reasonable. That shows you what the expectation is and what's possible. We've got lots of people who are at that level. How many ... Did you make the further distinction of the repeat versus referral, like somebody introducing people to you?
Wendy: Repeat clients, past clients, of the 29 deals we did, we did 12 were past clients.
Dean: Then 10 were referral.
Wendy: Yeah.
Dean: That's great.
Wendy: Four were family and three were miscellaneous.
Dean: You got a nice mix there. That's good to know that your people are referring you and what we want to do now is we want to make that.... We want to orchestrate that, so that we want it to happen more often. When we look at it right now, what would be your communication program with your top 180? If I'm one of your top 180, what sort of ... How often am I hearing from you? What am I hearing from you?
Wendy: You're getting mail outs from us periodically. Usually at least one every couple of months. I know we don't call our past clients enough. We don't touch base personally with them and email just doesn't cut it.
Dean: Yeah, you'll find email can work. What we'd love to see is more personal one on one communication, which is equally effective by email. What you're talking about with email is sending a broadcast email to everybody. I agree with you that, that's not the same as reaching out to one person. One of the things that we look at first of all, you're going to see a bump right now just by sending the World's Most Interesting Post Card because every month we're going to be ingraining that pattern of just a quick note in case you hear someone talking about this, which is exactly what we want to have happen. I'm going to be very interested to watch what happens over the next year. You just mailed out one so far?
Wendy: Yeah, just one.
Dean: So just getting started with that. That'll be nice to watch what happens. Now the other thing that would be one of the very best habits that you could ingrain is what I call Market Maker Monday, where on Mondays is you think about, "What are we doing this week? Who are we showing houses to this week? Who are we going over to see about selling their house this week or what's going on in the world in the news this week that might be a valuable outreach to somebody?" But how it might work is let's say that you're showing townhouses in a complex called River Run. You think about all of your clients, your top 180 that you know. Think to yourself how many of them live in River Run if any of them do. That will look and scan your environment.
Now one of the most valuable things you can do just as a sidebar to this, is we have a video in GoGoAgent that talks about creating a Google map layer for your clients. You can export your data from GoGoAgent, from your CRM and create a Google Map overlay, which will drop a pin on the map of where your top 180 live. You can visually see where they are. Let's say that you're showing houses in River Run and you see that you've got a client that lives there. Now to send an email to them on that Monday that you're showing houses this week and you say, "Hi Patty, I'm showing townhouses this week in River Run to a couple from Toronto. There's only a couple for sale in there right now. Have you heard anybody talking about selling their townhouse, we may be able to match them up." Just a short personal, expecting a reply email that is only sent to them, not a broadcast, but it's just sent to Patty. That kind of email is just as effective as a phone call in that they know that you only reached out to them.
Now odds are that if you do that 50 Mondays in a row here, that things are going to happen. You're going to start seeing that just doing that, it makes another touch point, but it also presences for people that you're active and all the different kinds of people that you're helping. By the way, in addition to your top 180, if you were running our Getting Listings program in River Run and you've had people who have asked for the report of River Run house prices. You would drop a pin on those people too. Or even though they haven't listed their house yet, you can say to them, you can say, "Hi Kim. I'm showing townhouses in River Run this week. I remember looking up your townhouse when I sent you the River Run report a couple of months ago. I'm not sure what your plans are, but I thought I'd check in and see if maybe I could tell these people about your house?"
Wendy: Cool. Again, it's a bit passive and under the radar. You're not pushing somebody to say, "Come list your house with me, so I can show it."
Dean: No. We're not saying to list your house. We're saying, "I've got a buyer. I've got somebody." That's the thing that is the most valuable. When you're competing for listings, that everybody is getting lined up and they're saying, "This is what we'll do once we list your house." All right. "We'll do this, we'll do virtual tours. We'll do this. We'll put it on the web. We'll do all this whole marketing plan that you have." But what you're saying is you're by-passing all of that and you're saying "Look, I started looking for the buyer for your house 180 days ago."
Wendy: Right. I heard you saying that over and over in the recordings.
Dean: I know. It's the ongoing thing. That's really the only information advantage that makes a difference right now is if you know who's about to buy in any neighborhood. You also know who's about to sell. That's the last frontier of information advantage that's available to us.
Wendy: Right. Most of our clients too we notice, they're obviously getting older like we are. They're not moving the same way that they did when they were younger. We need to tap in or we'd like to tap in to even their kids. When it's time for their kids-
Dean: That's what I was going to say. It's a funny story that Julie Matthews, who's a realtor I used to develop all the things with here in Winter Haven. When she sent out the World's Most Interesting Post Card the first time, she had one of her clients on there was one of the very first people to respond to the Just Listed cards that we did. Almost 20 years ago we created a Just Listed card that said, "Do you know what your neighbors at 22 Greystone did last night?" The mailman who was delivering the post card called Julie up to come and sell his house.
It was the best thing ever because at that time he had a new girlfriend and he was getting married. They both had houses to sell and they bought a house together. At that time they had a 13 or 14 year old girl. When Julie sent out the World's Most Interesting Post Card to him 12 or 13 years later, the first person that was referred to him was the mailman's daughter, who was now 26 or 27 years old buying her first house.
Wendy: That's a great story.
Dean: The post card responsive, the mailman appreciating the mail, right? It's just funny.
Wendy: Right. Well we haven't had any response yet, but we just ran it last week. We'll wait and see. Then I think I've heard that it probably takes five or six months before really that sinks in and soaks in.
Dean: What you're going notice is that even though our intention, and we know that we're going to be sending one every month. People don't recognize a pattern until ... You can't make a pattern from one data point. For them, they just got this post card in the mail from you. They don't know that there will be another one next month. They don't know that the pattern is going to be just a quick not in case you hear someone talking about this. The instruction is always going to be, "If you hear someone talking about that or text me and I'll give you this to give to them." It's that pattern, the value of that pattern being established in people's mind is that when they do hear conversations about real estate they're going to think about you more often.
The odds of that then leading to the final step, which is that they need to introduce you to the person that they had the conversation with, that's going to raise the odds because we're making it so easy for them to respond so that they get to be the star, they get to give their friend something valuable. That makes a big difference. You're going to notice that even though it's usually not as overt as, "I got your post card and you asked about first time buyers, and I heard somebody talking about that." It's going to be all the adjacent conversations around it, they're going to ... Somebody is talking about buying an investment property. That's going to trigger because it's adjacent to the conversation that you mentioned on the post card. The whole effect of it is going to be ... This is where and why I love to have these standardized metrics that we know that right now, your return on relationship is 12.2, so that now we measure a year from now and we get that to 22.2, that's an improvement. That's a bankable result. That's what we're really-
Wendy: It's measurable.
Dean: That's what we're really looking for, not just anecdotally. I think it is clever. The only thing that matters is did it get the result?
Wendy: I think it's an investment. It's an investment, postage and all of that time, having it printed. You want to know what your return of investment is for sure.
Dean: Absolutely. This is where I always get people to start with that, because in the big picture you for your 180, maybe you're spending, you might spend $250 a month to mail all 180 of them. You've got a $3,000 investment for the year in that. I imagine that Ottowa is very similar to Toronto and prices are not certainly Toronto prices, but your average commission I'm sure is a multiple of $3,000.
Wendy: For sure. Yeah.
Dean: You look at that as the ROI is a big, big win, which is kind of cool.
Wendy: Can you just go back a minute to the Market Maker Monday-
Dean: Yeah.
Wendy: What do you actually do with that again? I've heard you talk about that, but I'm not getting entirely what it's about.
Dean: Here's the thing. You're right now in everything that you're doing, there are certain things that are doing that provide perishable opportunities. Where you have very specific things going on. When you are showing houses, you've got somebody, you've got the catalyst thing that is going to change somebody's life. You've got a buyer, a real buyer who's out actually looking at houses this week. You’re selecting right now, currently from the available inventory of homes to show them.
Wendy: Okay.
Dean: What I'm proposing here is that in addition to that, you condition yourself to not only look just in the MLS to see what's available, but to look and see for yourself ... That's why this map is so handy. If you had a map that shows you where your top 180 live, then it would stimulate your mind to say, "I'm showing houses in this neighborhood, which are maybe all built by the same builder, or it was all similar types of homes." It's maybe on the next street over or something, if you're saying that to them, "Just wanted to let you know, I'm showing houses in River Run this week, and there's only a couple on the market right now. Have you heard anybody talking about selling their house? We may be able to match them up with this couple from Toronto." That you're-
Wendy: Yeah, I get that, that makes a lot of sense. I did get that, is that basically what Market Maker Monday is? Just looking at what you're doing for the week-
Dean: Exactly right, that's exactly right.
Wendy: And trying to match people, matching people.
Dean: Yep. You're trying to be a market maker.
Wendy: Right. Got it.
Dean: You're trying to create something that doesn't exist. You've got the advantage because you know, that this person ... Especially if you're doing the Getting Listings program in a particular neighborhood and you've got a buyer who's looking in that neighborhood. For you to be able to go to those people. If I'm showing condos in Yorkville and I had 10 people respond to my offer for the report on Yorkville condo prices. I'm showing in a particular building.
I'm showing at 100 Yorkville and I see that two people in the 100 Yorkville responded for my report. I just happened to be showing one of the condos in 100 Yorkville. If I say to that person, if I say to you, if you responded. If I say to you and say, "Hey Wendy. I'm showing houses this week in 100 Yorkville and it's the only one for sale right now. I don't know what your plans are, but I thought I would check in with you because I remember looking up your townhouse when I sent you the Yorkville condo price report a couple of months ago.
Wendy: Right. That makes sense.
Dean: Now that is such a better communication to have with a future seller, than "Hey Wendy, just checking in. Did you get my report? Did you like it? Yeah, are you getting the newsletter? Is there anything I can help you with?" None of that. It's so stupid to make that kind of a call.
Wendy: That doesn't go anywhere anymore. It used to.
Dean: Yeah, see only ... If every time Wendy Bell calls, she's got a buyer, then even if they're not ready right now, when it comes time if next year, now's the time they're thinking about it. They've gotten two or three of these emails. They're like, "We've got to call Wendy. She's always got buyers."
Wendy: I've always got buyers, right. Well that's another issue though too Dean. We really don't get very many leads off of our listings folder. We get listings, but we don't get a lot of leads off of our listings anymore. People hop onto Realtor Dossier. They send an email, they don't have to provide any other information, they just send an email and you never hear from them again. We have to find more buyers, we have to get more proactive with finding buyers.
Dean: Yeah, I think that one of the best things we can do for that is finding category buyers. Instead of trying to find a buyer who's looking to buy this specific condo right now, let's find someone who's considering buying a condo in Yorkville, so that now they can see and compare all the buildings. They can compare the amenities. They can compare the prices, all the stuff that would be good facts for somebody considering moving into an area. They will respond to that. Now you know because they asked for the guide to Yorkville condos. Now you know that they're a buyer for Yorkville condos. That becomes the pull of your market maker activity. That becomes, you've got this one pool of buyers now because you've got this mechanism to find buyers without requiring that you have listings specifically.
Then you've got the Getting Listings program that you're running to find people who are future sellers in Yorkville and you're doing that. Now you can do that for a neighborhood, you can do that ... We've done it in Winter Haven for lakefront homes. We've done it in South Beach for oceanfront condos. We've done it in Cape Anne with oceanfront houses. We've done it with view homes in Paradise Valley, mountain view homes in Colorado. What would be the categories that if you were going to take a CAT scan of your marketplace and say, "These are the things that are the most popular things. This is what people are looking for in Ottowa."
Wendy: Well, that's a good question. I really can't answer that off the top of my head, but based on what I know, you've got your first time buyers that are looking for their first home in one of the suburbs, probably.
Dean: Yep, right.
Wendy: Second time buyers, the move up buyers, those people are moving up to another house from their first time home, moving up into something else.
Dean: When you narrow it down now, you're thinking about what would be ... This is how the very first thing that I did. I grew up in Halten Hills, just outside of Toronto. One of the very first things that I did was I did a Guide to Halten Hills real estate prices because people were moving from Toronto out to the suburbs and commuting into the city. I'm sure that, that same thing happens in Ottowa. What would be one of the suburbs that's the most popular suburb of Ottowa?
Wendy: Barrhaven, Barrhaven is very up and coming and growing.
Dean: Barrhaven. There you go. If you were to look at that and have even on that level a guide to Barrhaven real estate prices. That somebody who's looking to move out to Barrhaven that it would be a really valuable thing to have in their toolbox. They want all the information. They can see all the homes for sale, everybody has got access to that. That doesn't give them any insight or comparison or an organized way to know that this is a topographical ... This is a map of the area. These are where the condos are and this is where the townhouses are. This is what the semi-detached homes sell for. This is what the smaller single family homes sell for. This is what the four bedroom homes sell for, to give people a sense of answering the question. "Well what do I get for my money in Barrhaven.
Wendy: Right. You would do that on landing pages, you would create landing pages?
Dean: I would, yeah. Absolutely.
Wendy: Then boost it through AdWords or something?
Dean: Yes, that's exactly right. Or even on Facebook for sure. On AdWords for sure, but also in print. There are people looking in print. Do you have Homes magazines in your area?
Wendy: Yes. We do.
Dean: In there, this is where these category things really work well in those magazines because you're not ... It's almost difficult to advertise listings in those magazines because you've got such a lead time. The deadline for the magazine is one day. Then the magazine isn't out for three more weeks and the listing has sold.
Wendy: It sold, it sold by then.
Dean: But you can always advertise the guide to Barrhaven real estate prices, that's something. That's an evergreen thing.
Wendy: Cool. Good ideas. Great ideas for buyers, yeah.
Dean: That's the most important.
Wendy: Yeah, I think finding the buyers and then obviously getting listings will build the business back up to what it was. I started off in Markham with Tom Shea, do you remember Tom Shea?
Dean: I do. Yes.
Wendy: The Family Trust. The Family Trust. I worked with him, I was his executive assistant for a little while. Then he kept saying, "You better get your real estate license." So I did. And the rest is history.
Dean: That's so great. You're on the right track. You've got your ... Just looking down the list at our Listing Agent Lifestyle elements, number one is getting listings. I would start with that campaign. Now you said something at the very beginning of our call that you had sent out a post card to 700 homes. Did you send the Getting Listings Post Card or did you send World's Most Interesting Post Card too.
Wendy: Oh no, the World's Most Interesting Post Card, yeah.
Dean: That's not what that's for. Don't send that to people you don't know. Send that, that goes to your top 180. Every month you continue with that. What you want to do now is the Getting Listings mailing. The 700 homes that you chose, the farm area. What is the commonality there? Is it a named area? A named neighborhood?
Wendy: Yes.
Dean: What's-
Wendy: It's called Longfield, it's called Longfield. I did set up a landing page. I set up a landing page for Longfield's home targets in Longfield.
Dean: Okay. Perfect. That's where you want to start now. Take the Getting Listings Post Card. You'll offer the free July 2018 report on Longfield house prices. That will be the start now of your future inventory of sellers here. I always love to see when you start doing this and you start to see that, that list now is building and building. There are all these people that you know about that nobody else knows about because the only reason somebody would respond to a post card like that is if they're in some way thinking about moving up, or moving out, or selling, and they're curious about what their house would be worth, but they don't want to call a real estate agent just yet.
Wendy: Right. That's great. That's why we're having this conversation today.
Dean: I love it.
Wendy: To put me on the right track, to make sure we're doing the things we should be doing in the right order.
Dean: Do you have any listings right now?
Wendy: Oh, a couple, but nothing really very excited.
Dean: I got you. Have you calculated or gone through the exercise of figuring out your listing multiplier index?
Wendy: I do have a very low-
Dean: Have you heard me talk about that?
Wendy: I've heard you talk about it. We have a really crummy listing multiplier index on our listings, very bad.
Dean: That's a-
Wendy: I think actually, we give people too much information.
Dean: Well, that could be. Part of the thing is leveraging them. That every listing turns into another ... Into multiple transactions you see in the forum, the GoGo Lander forum you see people in there, our clubhouse leaders, as we call them are over three and approaching four as their listing multiplier index, like 3.5. Imagine that every listing you take, then turns into three additional transactions, that's a wonderful outcome. Once you start getting listings, we really want to start leveraging that so that we're looking to get as many transactions as we can from each listing.
Wendy: Well what I said was we provide too much information. We send people on our listings, we have a hanger there that says go to www.123MainStreet.com and that's where there's a lot of information. I think what you're suggesting is and maybe correct me if I'm wrong. But I think what you're suggesting is a brochure box maybe, with other listings in it.
Dean: We still want to get people. We use something on your GoGoAgent dashboard on the landing pages, we have one that we call an Instant Open House. That model that we use is really a landing page for that listing that is a lead generating listing landing page. When people go there, they leave their name and email address to get more information about that property. When we do that and we put the info box flyers up there or the sign writer like what you're talking about or both. You can generate 20, 30, 40 people who will go and leave their name and their email address for your listing. Now we've got potential buyers, somebody who you know that they're looking in that area. That becomes a great foundation then for your buyer’s prospect list.
Wendy: Right.
Dean: Do you keep a list of buyer’s prospects that you stay in touch with in some way?
Wendy: No. Not really. No, I wouldn't say.
Dean: One of the things, the next thing if we go down the list, you've got the Getting Listings program. We've got your listing multipliers. We've got your getting referrals, so you've got the World's Most Interesting Post Card and Market Maker Monday. Then the next thing we talked about was converting leads. You must have people who have inquired about listings or inquired about something that have not bought a house. You must have email addresses or inquiries about ... Of unconverted buyer’s prospects.
Wendy: Probably if I looked for it, yes. Probably.
Dean: One of the best magic tricks you can do and it's kind of fun is you gather up all those people who have come in and left somehow their name and email, and send them an email that just says, "Hi Wendy, are you still looking for a house in Ottowa?" And that's it. Just send that email and you'll be amazed at what happens, because you're six months into the year now. You've probably had people that maybe inquired early in the year or last year, a long time ago. Just gather them all up and send them that email and you'll be amazed at what happens. You'll be amazed that people go, "Yeah, we're thinking about it now or once the kids get back in school." Whatever it is, you'll reengage with those people. Then it will be a very valuable thing that at least once a week you do a Market Watch email with updates on, "Here's what happened in Ottowa in the last seven days."
Wendy: Actually it'll be interesting, as an office I had our administrator tracking sales and conditional sales when people say, "Nothing is selling or whatever." We have our administrator doing that and we post it on how many sales happen, how many conditional sales. It just makes you think about, "Oh I guess it's more than I thought."
Dean: You're right. Exactly.
Wendy: Yeah it does work. Yeah it does work. That's a good idea. That's a great idea, that's why we're talking.
Dean: Absolutely.
Wendy: I appreciate that.
Dean: How many agents do you have Wendy in your-
Wendy: 160. 160.
Dean: Wow, that's great. Now imagine, the thing about it is imagine these things being done collectively. Imagine if you're doing a Market Maker Monday collective thing for everybody. If everybody is thinking about, "Here's what I've got this week." To really keep it within your Keller Williams family there. That maybe if there's some mechanism that you create ... "I'm showing houses this week to these people." People are looking in this, that everybody could look through their top 150 or their people that maybe they're talking with somebody that's got a condo in Yorkville that they're just about to put on the market, but nobody knows it yet.
Wendy: Right, that'd be great.
Dean: Yeah, you think collectively you've got ... This is one of the great dual situations that you have. You've got your own personal business that you can apply these things to, but you've also got 160 agents that you can have an influence on too. Collectively that's going to have a big impact.
Wendy: For sure. For sure it would. We have a closed Facebook page that would be really easy to do that every Monday, really simple.
Dean: Right. That's all very exciting.
Wendy: Yeah, it is. It's very exciting. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me today. You've given me some good ideas and good direction. As I said at the very onset of the call, there's so much in your program and your program is very similar to what we teach at KW. The training at KW teaches a lot of that. But just specific, drilling it down a little bit. I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me.
Dean: It's been delightful. Thank you.
Wendy: Okay. Thank you.
Dean: Do you have any questions, Diane at the office can help you with anything, point you in the right direction to where ... If you want to get that, the Getting Listings Post Card all set up, she can help you with that for sure.
Wendy: Right. She's been very helpful already. My assistant Jenna has been in touch with her several times as we started sending-
Dean: Awesome.
Wendy: Things out. She's been really helpful.
Dean: Good. Awesome.
Wendy: You have great staff there too. Yeah, thanks.
Dean: Thanks so much. Thanks Wendy, have a great day.
Wendy: All right. Thank you. You too.
Dean: Bye.
Wendy: Bye.
Dean: And there we have it, another great episode. So much ground that we covered there. I can just imagine the impact of Market Maker Monday philosophy making its way through 160 agents in her office, the impact that, that could have overall. I can't wait to see and watch how that unfolds for her. If you'd like to continue the conversation here, you can go to ListingAgentLifestyle.com and download a copy of the Listing Agent Lifestyle book. If you'd like to be a guest on the show, you can just click the Be A Guest link and we can get together and build a plan for you to build out your Listing Agent Lifestyle. If you'd like to take part and join our community of agents who are striving towards and applying all of our systems, come to GoGoAgent.com. You can join us for a free trial for 30 days, no credit card required.
Come on in, see what we're all about. We've got programs for getting listings. We've got programs for getting referrals. We've got programs for multiplying your listings, converting your leads and finding buyers all wrapped around the easiest tools that we have for you to multiply your business with landing pages, and auto-responders, and voicemail, and text marketing. All of it included in your GoGoAgent membership along with a wonderful CRM that holds everything together and a membership community where you can share ideas and get ideas from other agents all over North America. All over the world, actually we've got agents in Germany and the UK and Australia all applying and striving for this Listing Agent Lifestyle. Check it out, GoGoAgent.com and I will look forward to talking to you on the next episode.