Applying “The Art Of War” To Your Real Estate Business (Part 2)

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In the last post, we began talking about applying The Art Of War to your real estate business.  This post will cover the next 5 chapters, following the same format as the prior post.  If you haven’t read the previous post, you may want to start there.

Here we go!

Chapter 4: Tactical Dispositions

“Security against defeat implies defensive tactics; Ability to defeat the enemy means taking the offensive.”

Security against defeat is needed in any battle.  However, here you are fighting not to lose.  When it comes to defeating the enemy, we are fighting to win.  Think about that for a moment and you will see there is a difference.  It seems subtle at first, however, the more you ponder it, you will see the difference is worlds apart.

Let’s look at security against defeat as your passive marketing.  It is your business advertising for clients. The issue is you can spend money and see results, but too many do so without tracking the actual ROI (return on investment).  Here is a prime example:  Everyone in your market is marketing through Zillow.  They are buying up zip codes right and left.  You decide you are going to get in the game and begin throwing money at different areas.  The leads start flooding in.  You close a few deals and think: “Well, I spent $1500 a month and closed 2 deals, if I spend $4500 a month, I could close 6.”  The problem is you haven’t tracked it to see what zip codes are profitable for you, and which ones are dogs.  So some of your leads may be costing you more than the profits you are bringing in.  There are some zip codes where leads can cost $500 per lead!  You need to pay attention to your ROI and make sure that every dollar you spend is returning at least $10 in profit at a minimum.

Ability to defeat the enemy means taking the offensive, and this is lead generation through prospecting.  Here, you are being proactive and aggressively going after leads.  These leads could be expired listings, For Sale By Owner, circle prospecting, probate, and absentee owners, just to name a few.  Your cost per lead in this model is much less, and thus your profitability is much higher.

Profitability is the goal.  In order to achieve it, our businesses should be prospecting based, and marketing enhanced…not the other way around.  The lack of profitability is the enemy that needs to be defeated.

“The consummate leader cultivates the moral law, and strictly adheres to method and discipline; Thus it is in his power to control success.”

What is your moral law?

Each and every one of us is a leader, whether we have a team of agents, single operator, or we are on a team as a buyer or listing agent.  The moral law refers to our mission statement, our unique selling proposition, and the culture we create for ourselves and our teams.  This moral law needs to become so ingrained in every member of the team so that our clients see our dedication to this law, and see that we extend that conviction to them and their transactions with us.

Method refers to our processes and systems.  Have an operations manual in place if you don’t have one already. Think of it this way:  If you do any task more than once, it needs to have a system.  Systems will allow you to scale your business, increase profitability, and limit errors.

Discipline is our focus and commitment to our systems, our team, and our clients.  It is also our commitment to our calendar.  If you are not already in the habit of time-blocking, it is a must!  If it is not on my calendar, it simply doesn’t exist. Guess what?  I am not perfect with it…but the habit improves every day.  You need to have this type of discipline in order to succeed at a higher level.

Chapter 5: Energy

Energy is referring to the use of creativity and timing to build momentum.

“The control of a large force is the same principle as the control of a few men:  It is merely a question of dividing up their numbers.”

This is most applicable to those of us who have teams, or are looking to build teams.  Scaling a team is once of the best ways to leverage your business.  Every aspect can be scaled from lead generation for buyer agents, seller leads for listing agents, all the way up to creating expansion teams to take over neighboring markets.  The key is to hire talent.  You as the general can not be in all places and all things to every soldier in your army.  You need to find the right lieutenants to lead each sub group in your army.

That is why you will have a lead admin, lead buyer agent, lead listing specialist, and so forth.  Depending on what your ultimate goal is you may even replace yourself as CEO.  It can all be done.  However, it takes finding the right talent and making sure your timing is correct.  The worst thing you can do is expand and scale when your core foundation is not strong enough to support the expansion.  Keller Williams is now rolling out their expansion model for teams, and it is very in-depth as far as making sure you have the right talent, and making sure your timing is correct.  Feel free to reach out to me to learn more about this, I am happy to help.

Chapter 6:  Weak Points and Strong Points

“Whoever is first on the field, and awaits the coming of the enemy, will be fresh for the fight; whoever is second on the field, and has to hasten to battle, will arrive exhausted.”

Make preparation one of your strongest points.  Prepare before you prospect.  Go through your affirmations.  Visualize the expired or FSBO picking up the phone and inviting you over for an appointment.  Have your numbers loaded the night before.  Get to the office early and have a role play session before your calls start at…8 AM!  Be first on the phones!

Once you secure the appointment, prepare your market stats.  Know the comps inside and out.  Visit the active listings before the appointment if possible, to truly explain to the seller what their competition looks like, and share you’re already formulated plan on how you plan to beat them.

Oh, and make sure you arrive 15 minutes early so you can clear your mind and focus on getting the contract signed…not apologizing that traffic was horrible.

“You can be sure of succeeding in your attack if you only attack places which are undefended.”

Is Everybody in your area calling the same 5 expired listings? Great, think about what that means.  Most likely, the market is a strong seller’s market and most of the inventory is selling.  Go door knock or circle prospect the hot neighborhoods with the least days on market.  Most likely, not many agents are doing this and the results will be fantastic.  So far is 2016, in our market, we have booked almost as many listings from Just Listed/Just sold efforts, as we have from expireds.  Guess where we are focusing our efforts?

Chapter 7:  Maneuvering 

“The difficulty of tactical maneuvering consists of turning the devious into the direct, and misfortune into gain.”

No matter what business you are in, there will always be obstacles.  Sometimes these obstacles are regulatory, sometimes product, sometimes people.  Real estate is no different.

Can you say TRID, anyone?

Stay on top of regulatory changes.  Find the loopholes that will be a benefit for your clients.  TRID is a perfect example.  Everyone panicked when the changes were about to occur.  We aligned ourselves with lenders who already had implemented new procedures and systems to streamline the change.  In doing so, we used this to our advantage on both listing appointments and buyer consultations.  Most agents wanted to duck their heads in the sand and not bring it up, because they didn’t understand it.  We pounced on that when we competed with other agents.  On a listing appointment I would say: “Mr. and Mrs. Seller, I am sure John Smith with ABC Realty explained how the lending rules have changed and have shared with you their checklist to make sure once an offer is received, the lender for the buyer is up to speed on these changes and it won’t delay the sale of your home, correct?”

Crickets.

“Sign here.”

“Now a soldier’s spirit is keenest in the morning; By noonday, it has begun to flag; By evening, his mind is bent on returning to camp.”

If we are strongest and have the most energy in the morning, it would make sense we tackle our most difficult task of the day then.  For most agents, this task is prospecting.  Let’s face it, most people don’t love being on the phones, getting rejected 90% of the time, for 3 hours.  So conquer this in the morning, when you are strongest, and preferably, with other strong, like-minded agents who will be a good support system for you, and you for them.  Track your results and see if you find improvement, as most of our coaching clients have.

Chapter 8:  Variations In Tactics

“Hence, in the wise leader’s plans, the consideration of advantage and disadvantage, will be blended together.”

It is important to take decisive action as a business leader.  It is as equally important to always consider the worst case scenario of each action you take, so that you may be able to correct course quickly if need be.

Sun Tzu said: “Whether in an advantageous position, or a disadvantageous one, the opposite state should always be held in your mind.”

You know that $1500 you just allocated to Zillow to bring in more leads?  Let’s say it’s a flop after testing it for 3 months.  Are you going to then figure out what to do?  Hopefully, you already thought about it, before committing the funds, and the emotion is now removed.  All you have to do is execute your contingency plan for those funds and move on.

That agent whose DISC profile came back as the perfect listing specialist?  Turns out he can’t close a car door without struggling, let alone The FSBO you sent him out to see.  Good thing you have your 90 day probation period clearly explained in your contract with him, right?  Wait, you do have a contract signed in the first place, right?!

Okay, your eyes are probably getting tired from reading this much information, so this will be a good place for us to take a break until our next post, where we will wrap up the remaining chapters.