Stan Bishop Consulting

12/11/2023

To kickstart the year on a high note, I'm sharing a comprehensive 30-day action plan designed to lay the foundation for a year of triumphs. These strategic steps will empower you to navigate the ever-evolving real estate landscape, maximize your potential, and achieve unprecedented success in 2024.

Here is your action plan to implement for this December

Week 1-2: Reflect and Set Clear Goals

Reflect on 2023:
Take stock of your achievements, challenges, and key learnings from the past year. What worked well, and what areas can be improved? This reflection will feed your strategic planning for 2024.

Define Clear Objectives:
Set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) goals for the year. Whether it's increasing sales, expanding your agent base, or adopting new technologies, articulate your vision for success.

SWOT Analysis:
Conduct a SWOT analysis to identify your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. This analysis will help you capitalize on your strengths, address weaknesses, leverage opportunities, and mitigate potential threats.

Week 3-4: Develop Your Action Plan

Technology Integration:
Explore and integrate new technologies that align with your business goals. Whether it's adopting virtual tour platforms, leveraging AI for data analysis, or enhancing your CRM systems, staying tech-savvy is key in the competitive real estate market.

Marketing Strategy Enhancement:
Revise and elevate your marketing strategy. Leverage social media, content marketing, and video content to engage with your audience. Consider targeted advertising and collaborations to expand your reach.

Systemized Recruiting Process:
Strengthen your recruiting effectiveness by implementing personalized communication strategies. Create a plan for regular touchpoints, whether through in-house efforts, leveraging outsourcing solutions, agent appreciation events, or one-on-one coffee appointments.

Educational Initiatives:
Dedicate time to continuous learning. Identify relevant workshops, courses, or industry conferences to attend. Staying updated on market trends and honing your skills positions you as a knowledgeable and reliable resource for your clients.

Financial Health Check:
Conduct a thorough review of your financials. Ensure that your budget aligns with your business goals, and explore opportunities for financial growth and stability.

As you embark on this 30-day action plan, remember that each step you take brings you closer to a year of unparalleled success. Stay committed, stay focused, and don't hesitate to reach out if you need guidance or support along the way.

Wishing you a fantastic start to 2024 and looking forward to celebrating your achievements throughout the year!

05/01/2023

May 2023 - Monthly Pursuit w/ Stan Bishop Consulting

Looking at historical numbers, May, June, July, and August are the busiest selling months for homes. For this reason, I’m including a list of activities to help you take advantage of the current market opportunities. Remember, the quicker you decide on an activity and then implement it into your business, the bigger impact you will have on reaching your goals.

Also, consider connecting with me this month to discuss any of your current challenges or concerns. I’m always here to help and I wish you much success. To schedule an appointment just call me at 904-237-2933 or click this link: https://calendly.com/StanBishopConsulting.

6 Activities to Increase Your Real Estate Business

Sales Contest: Agents are motivated to compete for prizes and recognition. A friendly competition that focuses on activity, not just outcome will spark enthusiasm in your brokerage and help increase your future closings.

Call Night: Agents who feel comfortable making phone calls are more likely to succeed than agents who don’t know what to say when prospecting or how to overcome objections. Encourage your agents to participate in office training where they can learn by role-playing scripts with other agents in the office before getting on the phone to make phone calls. This is a great way to lead by example as the broker and show your agents how to build a successful career.

Community Events: Getting involved with the community can be impactful in many ways. First, it helps build a brand awareness of your brokerage within the community which helps your agents build confidence when promoting your brokerage to their prospective customers. It’s also a great way to network with other business owners and build relationships. With the right marketing approach, you can generate leads who are looking to immediately buy or sell.

Home Buyer Seminars: By putting on educational real estate seminars like first-time home buyer classes or investor courses and inviting the public, you are significantly more likely to be seen as a trusted advisor by your community. These seminars allow you to showcase your knowledge and leadership skills to the public and your peers.

Lead Generation Systems: Having a predictive lead generation system where you know for every dollar you invest, then you will generate at least 2 dollars or more is a way to scale your brokerage. Agents are always looking to increase their database by adding new leads and it’s a terrific way to help jumpstart your newer agents starting their career.

Recruiting Events: Now is the best time to focus on recruiting since we have seen recent real estate market shifts across the country. Any time there is a market shift, agents are looking for ways to help maintain or grow their business by finding new methods and possibly changing brokerages. Get out there and tell your story about why you are in business and how you like to help agents succeed. A good way to start is by focusing on calling the cross-sell agent you are currently closing deals with and thanking them for helping your agents secure the closing. Use this opportunity to invite them to an agent appreciation event for all the agents who’ve closed a deal with your brokerage this quarter. Agents love to get together to celebrate their success at the local hot spots.

The "Discovery Call" is for anyone wanting to learn more about my program. For my existing coaching clients, sign up for this month's coaching call below. You can also email me at [email protected] or call me at 904-237-2933.

07/01/2022

And just like that, the first half of 2022 is over. Now is the time to start evaluating your results by comparing what you had planned to accomplish versus what you have actually accomplished. To help you with this process, I’ve included a Mid-Year Step-by-Step Business Evaluation process to follow. The evaluation itself should take less than a day to conduct. The biggest challenge usually is gathering the necessary information to evaluate your business.

Let’s plan to connect soon to discuss your successes and accomplishments along with the challenges you might be facing and how we can strategize to overcome them.

Mid-Year Step-by-Step Business Evaluation

1.) Review business objectives and goals year-to-date

2022 YTD Production results compared to goals
2022 YTD Listing results compared to goals
2022 YTD P&L results compared to goals
2022 YTD Recruiting results compared to goals and future plans
2022 YTD and future lead generation sources and ROI
2022 YTD and future office meetings, training, and events
2022 YTD and future social media and marketing campaigns

2.) Ask effective questions

What did we achieve?
How did these achievements affect our company’s growth?
What were the biggest challenges we faced?
What were our best lessons learned?
Where are we spending money and not receiving an ROI on that investment?
Were there any expenses we didn’t budget for YTD?
What is our effectiveness in recruiting and retention efforts?
Are there any support staff or resources that are missing?

3.) Celebrate successes achieved- It’s essential to understand what is working as much as what is not working. The goal is to keep doing the things that are bringing you positive results. Make sure to congratulate staff and yourself for the activities that have produced these successes.

4.) Identify the objectives and goals missed- This is where you will want to develop a strategy to achieve them by the end of the next quarter. Make sure they are broken down into easy procedures to follow and assigned to someone within the company for implementation.

5.) Review business objectives and goals for the remainder of the year- Discuss the strategies to follow moving forward based on the lessons learned YTD. Study and follow market forecast models based on where the market is going for the remainder of the year. Understanding the market trends will help give you a competitive advantage and keep your brokerage ahead of the competition.

BONUS INFORMATION

In addition to reviewing your company's business metrics, you should also evaluate your agents' production. Start by using the 80/20 rule when reaching out to your agents. Schedule 1-on-1 coffee or lunch meetings with your top 20% producing agents to conduct their mid-year review face-to-face. For the remainder of your agents, conduct a phone or zoom for their mid-year review.

Compare the following metrics for your agents' performance based on their planned goals versus their actual results:

2022 YTD Commission Income
2022 YTD Sales Volume
2022 YTD Transactions Closed
2022 YTD Listings
2022 YTD Marketing/Lead Generation ROI
2022 YTD Sponsorships

During these meetings, provide your agents with recommendations on how to reach their goals that they are not achieving. Find patterns of habits, training, lead sources, and other opportunities that you think will help them get back on track to accomplish their goals.

I look forward to connecting with you soon. Have a great week and I wish you much success!

04/01/2022

April marks the beginning of the 2nd quarter of 2022. Now is the time for your 1st quarter review for both your brokerage and agents. By reviewing your brokerage and agents' results, you will be able to make strategic decisions that will have more impact on your business this year as these decisions will have more time to be in place. By performing these quarterly reviews, you will have a better understanding of your brokerage performance and a better connection with your agents.

I’ve included the steps below to follow for your brokerage and your agents' quarterly review.

1) What are your successes? List all the business plan metrics that your brokerage and agents met. Hopefully, you and your agents accomplished transaction, revenue, and profit goals.

2) What do you need to improve? List all the business plan metrics your brokerage and agents did not meet. For example, you might list that you did not meet your brokerage recruiting goal and your agents didn’t meet their listing goal.

3) How do you solve it? In the example above, you could implement more recruiting calls, recruiting events, and/or recruiting marketing to help solve your brokerage’s recruiting goal issue. To help your agents improve their listing goal, you could recommend attending a brokerage call night training where you teach agents how to use scripts to prospect for listings by calling FSBO, expired, sphere of influence, farming, investors, and past clients.

4) What do you plan to accomplish next quarter? List the major objectives that you hope to achieve and how you plan to achieve them. For your brokerage, this could be training, events, technology, lead generation, staffing, and/or marketing solutions. Your agents might be working on similar objectives as your brokerage along with designations, license status, and/or local/state/national association leadership positions.

I hope this information is helpful and I look forward to our next connection. If I can be of any assistance, please do not hesitate to reach out. Have a great week and I wish you much success!

03/01/2022

Springtime marks a new beginning. As a broker, use this time to plan a contest for your agents to increase their activity and productivity.

Below is a list of items to help you implement your next brokerage agent contest.

1) Systematize your contest - There should be a clear policy and procedure including a checklist to follow so that you can repeat these competitions throughout the year and the years to follow.

2) Build a budget - If you are giving a prize to the winner then you will need to budget for the prize. You may want to include a budget for marketing and advertising also.

3) Set a start date - I recommend having a spring, summer, and/or fall contest. A good start date for your spring contest is March 20th, 2022, the start of spring.

4) Decide the length - The ideal time length for a contest is 60 days but make sure the competition lasts for at least 30 days but no more than 90 days.

5) Pick a theme - Find something that fits your brokerage’s culture and community. The contest could be sport-themed, holiday-themed, or production-based.

6) Make it winnable - Some contests are good for production-based. However, a great contest is one that anyone can win by achieving activities like attending training, meetings, and/or sponsoring agents into the company.

7) Promote the contest - You definitely want to announce the contest at your monthly office meeting. Make sure agents understand the rules and make it a fun presentation.

8) Track the results - Make sure you announce the results at each office meeting and the winner during the meeting. This will encourage agents to show up to the meetings to see the results.

Additionally, I’ve included an article from NAR’s website 10 Great Sales Contests.

https://magazine.realtor/tool-kit/leadership/article/10-great-sales-contests

I hope this information is helpful and I look forward to our next connection. If I can be of any assistance, please do not hesitate to reach out.

09/17/2021

Networking Tips for Conventions and Training Workshops

1) Start with a plan and goal to get the most out of attending the event. Think of what you hope to accomplish, who you want to meet, and what you’re looking to learn.

2) Research the people you want to connect with before the event and let them know you’re hoping to meet them there, if possible.

3) Have a way to share your contact information like a business card or better yet, your mobile business card.

4) Practice your introductions so that you don’t have to think about what to say. This helps you concentrate on the other person’s introduction, allowing you to learn their name.

5) Upon arriving at the event, make sure to thank the host and the person who invited you.

6) Avoid congregating with only people you know. Find someone new to introduce yourself to.

7) Upon learning someone’s name, use it a few times in your conversation. This will help you remember it.

8) Ask questions, avoid just talking about yourself. You’ll learn more about your new connection and have something to use in your follow-up.

9) Try to introduce your new connection to another attendee. It’s a great way to make another new contact.

10) An event is not a place to just try to collect as many business cards as possible. Instead, make a few meaningful connections.

08/12/2021

Working from home sure has its perk! 🤩

This is the surprise I had today from my 11 year old daughter when I took a quick break from coaching small business owners.

I ❤️ helping others and it’s a bigger joy to see anyone I’ve helped, especially my children passing it forward. 🤗

11/23/2020

NAR Brokers and Agents, please be aware of some changes coming after NAR and the Department of Justice agreement regarding MLS Rules. Two major changes regarding making info on buyers’ agents’ compensation publicly available in the MLS and creating a definitive rule that buyers’ agents can’t represent their services as free should be finalized shortly.

See the article below.

NAR has reached an agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice to develop rules that more explicitly state what is already the spirit and intent of NAR’s Code of Ethics and MLS Policies regarding providing information about commissions and MLS participation.

07/17/2020

Brokers and Agents using DotLoop, make sure you check your settings. Effective July 17, 2020, Dotloop will be permitted to share aggregated transaction information with Zillow and other affiliated companies, going back to January 1, 2016. This means that if you currently use Dotloop, your transaction information will be shared with Zillow unless you notify Dotloop you do not want your information shared with its affiliates. 😳

Agents that use the Zillow-owned platform will be required to opt out of a new data-sharing policy if they don't want dotloop to share their data with third-party affiliates like Zillow

05/28/2020

Congrats to all the brokerages who made the list for the top residential real estate firms in over 160 different metropolitan markets based on the REAL Trends 500 Brokerage Rankings. I wish you much success!

https://www.realtrends.com/market-leaders/