Agent-to-agent referrals are a key part of every serious real estate agent’s business — especially as markets slow from peak activity and business slows for many. We recently released our third annual referral report “Why Agent-to-Agent Referrals are Key in 2019” where we surveyed more than 1,200 agents about their referral business, use of social media and the qualities they value in referral partners.

Below are key findings from the report.

The number of agent-to-agent referrals received remained steady in 2018 from 2017. 25% of agents received between 6-10 referrals, and another 19% of agents received between 11-25 referrals last year.

Referral fee earnings were strong in 2018, with some agents earning more than in past years. The number of agents earning between $20,000 and $50,000 in referral fees increased to 20% last year from 17% in 2017. The number of agents earning between $10,000 and $20,000 in referral fees decreased to 17% from 25% the previous year.

Referral networks can pay off. The majority of agents surveyed belong to a referral network. 29% of these agents attributed more than 20% of their overall inbound referrals received to these networks. And 23% said that up to 20% of the referrals they receive from their networks result in a closed transaction.

Social media remains relatively untapped as a source of referral activity. 51% of agents said they’re not currently using social media to generate or submit referrals, while 25% said they’re using social media to actively generate referrals. Another 23% said they’re using social media to both actively generate and submit referrals.

Agents rely mainly on third-party referral networks, brokerages, coaching and association directories for referral partners outside their market. 28% of agents rely on their referral network to find partners outside of their local market, and 23% say they search their brokerage, coaching, and/or association directories when looking for a partner.

Agents have many ways of finding referral partners when needed. In addition to the sources referenced above, agents said they use designation groups (e.g., GRI, CRS, ABR), networking events, cold calling, Zillow reviews, LinkedIn, and many other methods for finding a partner when needed.

Responsiveness and reputation are top qualities in a preferred referral partner. As in past years, agents named responsiveness (44%) as the top quality they look for in a referral partner. Reputation (22%) was second, followed by personal relationships (9%).

Agents care about success and customer experience. 57% of agents said referral partners who have a high chance of closing the deal is most important when placing referrals. But they also place high value in the overall experience the agent provides their referred clients.

In summary, relationships, follow-through, and reputation are top of mind for those agents looking to ramp up referrals in their business. They’re constantly looking for ways to build and maintain relationships, consistently following up with past clients, and building their reputations by adding value with every transaction.

Download our report “Why Agent-to-Agent Referrals Are Key in 2019” for a full look.  

The real estate industry is filled with entrepreneurs – every individual agent is the CEO of their own business. With over two decades of experience as a broker, owner, operator and investor, Dave Garland, Managing Director at Second Century Ventures helps members of the real estate community turn their ideas into reality.

Three years ago, Dave was tapped to oversee the National Association of Realtor’s venture capital division (Second Century Ventures) and NAR REACH® – a program that provides exposure and guidance to startups that are building technology for the real estate industry.

Our VP of Marketing Lisa Fettner sat down with Dave to discuss the impact of technology in real estate and tips for finding your inner entrepreneur and launching your own technology solution:

• Dave believes that the best companies truly understand the problems they are trying to solve. And, the best problems to solve are those that have to do with making a process easier – in the transaction, communication, customer service, etc.
• When it comes to starting a new business, the ability to easily describe the benefit you are trying to provide is a huge first step. Additionally, you must truly understand who is going to buy your product or service. Who are they? How well do you know them? If you can identify and understand your target consumer, know the demand and go out and test your product, then you have something that can be scalable.
• Change in the tech and real estate industry is inevitable. The big question is how adaptable to change are you? Dave shares that he is seeing more technologies that are working to make the transaction more efficient vs. replacing the agent. He adds that the best agents and brokers are embracing and adapting new information and technologies into their day-to-day systems. Agents that know how to funnel their leads and leverage technology to meet the demands of their customers are becoming top agents.
• Communication is the #1 pain point that companies are trying to solve for agents today. Agents need to be able to effectively communicate their brand, value proposition and who they are as an individual when meeting face-to-face with a client – it all starts there. At a brokerage level, technology is impacting how brokers efficiently interact and feed information back to their agents (e.g., CRMs, transaction technologies) to better serve their clients.
• Lead generation and management is another major way technology is influencing how agents do business. Agents must have the right systems in place to properly manage and monetize the influx of leads they are generating or buying in a timely manner.

At the end of the day, a good real estate business is built on relationships. The best potential lead or “thank you” an agent can get is a warm referral, but it’s also critical to build relationships with other agents and real estate practitioners. The key to a sustainable business is building a brand on the ability to accept and give referrals.

Click above to watch the full interview and learn more at nar-reach.com.  

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

Written by Lisa Fettner

Being an agent can be a lonely job. Unless you’re part of a team or have an assistant, you are completely responsible for the success of your own business. While a career with no limits can be exciting, it can sometimes be as much of a blessing as a curse.

In addition, most agents don’t earn a traditional salary, and it’s often hard to use some of your hard-earned commission money for the resources and technology that can potentially help you earn more money.

However, the reality is that there simply aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything you need to do to manage your real estate business. In order to truly achieve your goals, you’re going to need help.

Identifying where, when or how you need it can also be challenging. Given below are some ideas to help you get started.

Track your business: Think who, what, where.

• Who: Who was it — a buyer? Seller? First-time buyer? Downsizing seller? Doing so identifies your niche and unique position in your local market.

• What: What did you have to do to close the deal — a simple phone call? Multiple presentations? Long-term drip campaign? Identifying the actual activities and costs to complete the transaction helps you determine the actual cost to your pocketbook — and your time.

• Where: Where did that lead come from — a referral? Online lead? Identifying and tracking the source of your business helps you determine where and how you should be marketing for new business in the future.

Identify your value: What are you really earning/per hour? Does the answer surprise you?

• Look at the “what” section of your business tracking. What items could someone else have done? What were the tasks that you absolutely had to do, or loved doing the most? A REALTOR Magazine article shares great insight on how to calculate your worth. First, look at your annual income minus business expenses, and then divide it by how many hours you worked. Doing so provides you with your hourly rate. You can also apply this metric to determine the cost of each of your transactions.

• Run “aspirational” numbers to help determine what you should be doing differently to be more successful. If you want to earn a six-figure income, how much income do you have to earn, or how many hours do you have to work in order to do so?

Spend to grow and make your life better: You have to invest in your business if you want to grow — but figure out what you need and are willing to do before you hand over a credit card or hire someone.

• Identify those tasks — for example, data entry — that someone else can do for less than your hourly rate. Some people find “busy work” restful and therapeutic, but many of us hate it. When you run the numbers, you’ll find that it makes more sense to offload that work.

• Identify where your “holes” are. Are you only calling those very expensive leads you purchased one or two times, or three days after they hit your inbox? Lead gen management companies have entire licensed teams on staff to instantly call and manage your leads.

• Technology is a wonderful resource, but only if you use it. There are a lot of smart and useful tech tools available to agents today. Not all of it is right for everyone, so it’s important to find the ones that fit your budget, work style and audience. For example, don’t invest in automated texting chat bots if your client base is older and prefers phone calls over texts.

As an agent, you’re the subject matter expert to your past, present and future clients. Be proud of that fact and recognize your value. By identifying the tasks and roles that only you can do and using other resources on the others, you’ll be able to work smarter and take your business to the next level.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

Twenty years ago, Valerie Garcia started answering phones at a real estate office. She quickly fell in love with the industry and agents, and even got her real estate license. However, her true passion was being behind the scenes – teaching agents how to use and adopt new technologies/tools.

Today, Valerie is a speaker, consultant and encourager with over twenty years of experience in real estate education working with a number of industry brands all over the world. Fun fact: She has spoken on every continent in the world except Antarctica!

A few years ago, Valerie left her corporate position to follow her passion and start her own consulting business with a strong focus on speaking, content creation and storytelling. Whether it’s speaking on stage, in a board room to a team or presenting to a client in their living room, Valerie helps real estate professionals improve their speaking skills and build confidence so they can successfully tell their story.

Our VP of Marketing Lisa Fettner sat down with Valerie to discuss how you can find your voice and tell your authentic story.

• Marketing in today’s world is noisier than ever and tactics that may have worked fifteen years ago just don’t stick anymore. That’s why Valerie created a workshop, called The Modern Campfire, to bring people into small groups and teach them how to use storytelling in their business.
• Valerie shares that the biggest challenge for those who want to speak on stage is understanding what authenticity means to them and figuring out how to be comfortable with themselves.
• Valerie notes that there’s no shortage of speaking opportunities – at events, your local news station, conventions, etc., – what’s difficult is deciding you have a message. What are you good at? What do you like to talk about? What are you passionate about? You must establish that and then put it into words.
• If you’re new to the speaking world and a bit camera shy, Lisa and Valerie recommend trying a Facebook Live or podcast to get more comfortable.
• A major benefit of speaking at events and telling your story is that it can generate more referrals for your business. By becoming recognizable to a broader audience, you naturally stay top-of-mind.
• For those interested in becoming a speaker, Valerie recommends you find your voice, become comfortable with who you are, know who your audience is and determine the story you want to share.

Click above to watch the full interview and learn more at valeriagarcia.com.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

With over one billion users worldwide, Instagram has quickly become one of the most popular social platforms for brands to market themselves. For real estate professionals, Instagram has become a great way for agents to promote their listings, offer a peek into their open houses, highlight restaurants and shops in desirable neighborhoods and much more.

Our VP of Marketing Lisa Fettner recently interviewed Anne Jones, Broker/Owner at Windermere Abode in Tacoma’s Old Town neighborhood. Anne first started playing around with Instagram and video back in 2011 – and today, her account (@tacomajones) which offers a glimpse into life in Tacoma (e.g., charming homes, small local businesses, beautiful scenery) is well known amongst the industry with over 8,000 engaged followers.

Below are tips from Anne on how you can use Instagram to find your brand voice and generate more referral business.

• Consistency and knowing your brand’s voice is Anne’s key to success on Instagram. When she joined the social network, she looked at who was following and engaging with her account, she asked what they wanted to see more of and built out her content from there. She also recommends looking at other accounts both in and outside the real estate industry for creative inspiration and ideas.
• Anne describes social media as the modern coffee shop and explains that as an agent you have to figure out where your clients are spending the most time online (e.g., Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) and then focus on engaging on those platforms.
• Instagram has also become an effective way for agents to generate new referral business. When an agent is researching online to refer a client who’s moving to another part of the country, they could look at your Instagram page to see what your personality is like, what neighborhoods you focus on, your pulse on the community and market, etc.
• For agents who want to become more active on Instagram, Anne suggests being consistent with your content, using Instagram stories to engage your followers and make sure you have a great bio description and website link at the top of your profile.

Click above to watch the full interview and follow Anne Jones on Instagram at @tacomajones.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

Whether it’s running a charity 5k, serving lunch to the homeless or simply fundraising for a cause close to your heart, having a social giving strategy in your business is a must. It’s also an easy and fun way to motivate and inspire your team while giving back and connecting with the local community you serve.

Our VP of Marketing Lisa Fettner recently interviewed Caroline Pinal, co-founder of Giveback Homes – a community of real estate professionals who are committed to creating social change by helping build homes for deserving families around the world.

ReferralExchange has had the pleasure of working with Giveback Homes over the past few years to develop our own giving plan which has included local build days with our employees in California and fundraising for projects in Nicaragua and Puerto Rico.

Below are tips from Caroline on how you can easily integrate social giving into your real estate business.

• Treat your giving strategy like your business plan for it to be impactful and successful. Saying you are going to donate to a cause once a year is not enough, you must put pen to paper and make it happen.
• Getting active in your local community can help build your network and clientele. Caroline shared that sometimes Giveback Homes members will reach out to one another if they have a referral in another city or state, and at closing each agent will donate to a build project. That’s double the social impact.
• Step one of creating a giving strategy = finding your cause. Once you’ve determined that, do your research and due diligence to decide which organization you should partner with. It’s also important to clearly set your giving goal so you can quantify your impact and celebrate those milestones and success.
• Incorporating giving into your business strategy can be overwhelming, but Caroline encourages agents and brokers to start small (start today!) and let your giving efforts and goals grow year after year.

Click above to watch the full interview and learn more at givebackhomes.com.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

Digital advertising and retargeting have become an increasingly popular tool for businesses to ensure they get their product/services in front of the right people at the right time. If you’ve ever checked out a pair of shoes while online shopping, you may have noticed that ads for those shoes have suddenly started following you to other websites.

Our VP of Marketing Lisa Fettner recently interviewed Chris Leithe, VP of Sales & Customer Success at Adwerx to discuss how agents can use retargeting to build their brand and business.

Below are tips from Chris on how you can use ad retargeting to boost your brand and reach the homebuyers and sellers you want to work with.

• Consistency is key – keep the imagery (e.g., headshot) for your ads consistent. It’s important that when someone sees your ads, checks you out on Facebook or visits your landing page that they recognize YOU.
• Make sure your ads have retargeting (i.e., you will see the ad again on other platforms), behavioral targeting (i.e., targeting people who are in the market to buy or sell) and geo-targeting so that you are advertising to the right city and markets you service.
• Re-targeting ads to your database is an easy way to stay top-of-mind to your current network and sphere. Adwerx helps agents retarget through their sphere, listings and zip codes they service.
• Creating ads that are consistent will boost your brand and make you more recognizable. The more you stay top-of-mind, the more people you follow around, the more likely people will remember you.

Click above to watch the full interview and learn more at adwerx.com. 

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

Whether stuck in traffic or on the treadmill at the gym, chances are you’ve listened to a podcast at least once. In today’s digital world, they’re more popular than ever and according to 2018 Edison Research, “monthly listeners grew from 24% of Americans 12+ to 26% year over year.”

Our VP of Marketing Lisa Fettner recently interviewed Bill Risser, VP of Digital Strategy at Fidelity National Title and Founder/Host of The Real Estate Sessions Podcast to discuss all things podcasting.

If you’re considering starting your own podcast, below are a few tips from Bill to keep in mind:

• Starting your own podcast is easier than ever. Bill recommends the podcast hosting site anchor.fm as an easy solution for agents to get started. All you need is your phone and the Anchor app – it’s really that simple.
• Create a website for your podcast and use social media to drive traffic back to it. If you interview a guest on your podcast, ask them to share and promote it to their network to expand your reach.
• Tap into your specific market knowledge and create content through podcasting by consistently sharing unique tips and best practices.
• Keep your podcasts short and sweet. Bill recommends keeping them 5 to 10 minutes in length and producing them once a week or monthly – it’s all about being consistent.
• Search key words in your podcast app (e.g., real estate, real estate marketing) to find related podcasts for inspiration.
• When starting your own podcast, it’s as simple as getting started and sticking with it.

Click above to watch the full interview.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

The real estate business is unpredictable. One minute you’re riding high with three signed offers and the next, you’ve lost a major, career-making deal.

In today’s market, it’s more critical than ever to leave no stone unturned by strategically managing your referrals and leads. As an agent, time is money and spending it following up on bad phone numbers and email addresses is not the best use of your energy.

If any of the below scenarios apply to you, it may be time to rethink how you manage your referrals and lead flow to take your business to the next level this year.

You’re generating more leads from your online marketing than you or your team can handle.
It sounds like a good problem to have, but buying or generating hundreds or thousands of leads each month can be overwhelming and a total waste if you don’t have an efficient process to manage them. 

The leads you purchase don’t always have the correct contact information.
We’ve all gotten them before: bad phone numbers and email addresses like britneyspears21@hotmail.com. Pure junk. Having a system or service in place that can help you track and weed out the good from the bad can save you a significant amount of time and money in the long run. 

You don’t have time to properly follow up and evaluate your lead flow.
Prioritizing and managing when and how many times you’ve contacted a lead can be chaotic and frustrating. Implementing a process that will inform you of which leads are real, right and ready to transact will ensure you don’t miss those hot leads who are ready to transact right away.  

You have leads, clients or contacts who don’t match your price range, specialization or market area.
If you generate leads outside your market, have a family member relocating to another state or a friend that wants to buy outside the price range you specialize in, you can still help them by connecting them with a trusted agent in your network.

You are retiring or going part-time, but would like to continue generating income from your network.
Just because you’re retiring doesn’t mean you can’t continue assisting the database of clients you’ve grown over your career with their real estate needs. Utilizing your referral network not only allows you to assist an old client, but also earns you a referral fee at the same time—it’s a win-win. 

You have personal referrals you want to place with a proven agent.
As an agent today, you must be the local expert with global connections. Your clients and sphere expect you to be the “go-to real estate resource.” Being part of a nationwide referral network enables you to do just that.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, contacts and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.

Written by Lisa Fettner

Nearly every agent has experienced the frustration of dealing with third-party/online leads. While they can be an incredible source of business, there’s no denying that online lead generation is out of control.

In many cases, a prospect is simply researching information about their property or is at the very start of the home buying or selling process. And, when coupled with the fact that they search on multiple websites who then sell their contact information to multiple agents, a not-so-great prospect could actually turn into 30-plus not-so-great leads. It’s no wonder that even though nearly 100 million internet leads were generated in 2018, only 1.5% of them actually closed.

Sifting through these low quality, low-converting leads can be distracting and time-consuming. That could be why many prospects report that they never receive a response to their request. Agents are simply too overwhelmed by the volume of leads that don’t pan out. This can lead to missing some real opportunities.

Before buying leads, it’s important to know what your end goal is. Do you simply want to do more business, increase your average deal price or expand into a new market? Be realistic — converting prospects in a new price point or market area will be more difficult than leads located in your current area of focus. You also need a strategy for contacting, tracking, nurturing and evaluating your leads so you can determine which ones generate the best return on investment.

Below are some tips to help tame the flood of data and get your lead management activities under control:

Do a personal assessment: What makes sense for you to do versus someone else? What do you like to do? Yes, you can make every call and send every email yourself, but is that the best use of your time? Are you neglecting work that only you can do to follow up with these leads? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, consider outsourcing some of the initial lead contact and sourcing duties.

Make technology work for you: Most evidence shows that leads need to be contacted right away, and that often isn’t realistic if you’re in the middle of a listing presentation or showing a buyer a home. The good news is, there are many great tech solutions to help you. Customer relationship managers (CRMs), email automation and companies like mine and various others that filter/nurture raw leads for you can all take care of the initial contact and qualification. Just be sure to identify what features and functionality you need before you purchase anything.

Make your schedule work for you — and your clients/prospects:Allocate blocks of time for different tasks, especially recurring ones. Exceptions will sometimes need to be made, but controlling your schedule helps you stay calmer and more focused.

• Offer clients or prospects specific time segments versus open-ended responses. You want to be responsive, but not at the expense of your sanity. There’s nothing wrong with providing time options that work for you. You can always make an exception if need be.

• Identify your prospect’s preferred means of communication (e.g., phone, email, text) moving forward.

• Include your service-level agreements (SLAs) in your client presentations. Let them know when you’re available to show properties, how quickly you’ll return their call, text or email, etc. Buying or selling a home is stressful, and managing expectations helps keep everyone organized and calm.

• If someone is out of your preferred area or price point, refer the lead out. You’ll still receive a referral fee, and chances are a local agent will do a better job than you could.

Do a quarterly assessment: Sometimes it takes a while to determine whether a lead-gen program is successful, so reviewing your lead generation business quarterly is usually sufficient.

• Overview — Analyze the type of prospects you received, where they were in the sales process when they contacted you, price point, area, property type and the overall conversion rate. Consider rating their level of intent (e.g., A, B, C) to prioritize them.

• Compare — Some lead sources might be more expensive per lead, but convert better than a cheaper one. Or, the average price point could be higher on one lead source than another. Allocate each lead as “revenue/lead” to determine which sources make sense for you to continue purchasing.

• Don’t be afraid to pull the plug — If a specific lead source isn’t working for you, stop. You can’t build a house without a foundation, and if the leads you’re receiving aren’t right for you or aren’t converting, it doesn’t make sense to continue.

• Were the leads worth your time? — Assign yourself an hourly rate and use it when analyzing your revenue/lead.

Streamlining lead management helps you more quickly identify who is most likely to transact and needs help immediately. This can increase your productivity, your peace of mind and ultimately your bottom line in growing and maintaining your real estate business.

Want more time to build relationships that grow your business? ReferralExchange verifies your leads and referrals, nurtures and gives them back to you when they’re ready to transact, and matches those clients outside of your area, price point or property type with three great agents.