Hello, hello and welcome back a new season of the Women Rocking Real Estate podcast. It is now Season 5 of the show and I cannot believe I’ve been talking into this microphone for 4 years. I look back and I’m actually surprised I’ve kept going. I am not going to lie, it has been hard. Creating what I hope is good content takes so much time, so much effort and so much energy. But the thing that keeps me going is honestly the feedback I get from you listeners. The reviews you leave, the messages I get and the things people tell me make it all worthwhile. Knowing that I am having any sort of positive impact on people out there is just so rewarding. So thank you to each and everyone of you that leaves reviews and reaches out. It means the world to me and everyone who listens should thank you for taking the time leave those reviews because they are the reason I’m still going.

Alright before we dive into today’s episode, one quick update. Doors to my Attract program are officially open, so if you want to learn how to get more business from your sphere, earn more referrals and get found by complete strangers who want to work with you, this program teaches you step by step how to use a content marketing strategy across your website, Youtube and your social media channels. You’ll learn how to create all of the content you need and on all of the platforms you need to be on. No more cold calling, no more door knocking and no more harassing your friends and family for business. Stop hunting and start attracting clients on auto-pilot instead. You can find the details in the show notes if you’re interested.

Alright, today’s episode is perfectly aligned with the topic of attracting leads. I’m going to guess that there’s not many of you listening that don’t want more business and if you’re thinking that doesn’t apply to you because you couldn’t handle more business, then there’s a mindset shift you’ve got to make. Everyone should want more business, because getting more business does not have to mean more work for you. It can just mean more income and freedom for you you know? So If you have more business than you can handle, the answer is not to not want to get more business, the answer is to scale your business so that you can make more money and still get to enjoy the life you’ve been working so hard to build. Flip your script in how you think about your business and make attracting even more people a priority. So if getting more business is a universal desire, over the last 8 years of mentoring realtors I have noticed there are 10 common mistakes that get in the way of it and keep agents stuck at the same level in their business. So that is what today’s episode is all about. Helping you stop making these mistakes so that you can finally start building the business you desire and get off the up and down commission coaster for good.

#1 – They don’t have a lead gen strategy

Alright, the first mistake that agents make when it comes to lead generation is not have a strategy for how they’re going to generate leads at all. A lot of agents get into this business, but haven’t really thought too much about HOW they’re going to get business, let alone put a plan together. They often just start doing random ‘things’ hoping that they’ll turn into business, but that’s not a way to build a business. Before you do anything, you need to think about how you’re going to get business. You need to research the various ways, create a plan, commit to that plan and you need to consistently execute that plan day in and day out. So how are you going to get leads? Are you going to door knock? Are you going to cold call? Are you going to do open houses every weekend? Are you going to do warm outreach and contact everyone you know asking for business? Are you going to create a content marketing strategy? Are you going to run paid ads? Most of you are going to need to do a combination of a few different strategies. One on its own usually won’t generate enough business to sustain you, so you’ll probably have to implement a few. Once you’ve picked a strategy, the next mistake that many agents make when it comes to lead generation is that….

#2 – They expected lead gen to be easier

They expect it to be much easier than they were expecting. When we go into things expecting it to be easy, we set ourselves up to fail when it’s not and I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but for 95% of agents, lead generation is not easy. There are a myriad of things that make it hard; all of the strategies require a lot of time and a lot of work to work; some of the strategies can make you feel very uncomfortable and some of the strategies are expensive. And that’s why I love the proverb that ‘everything is hard before it is easy.’ Go into everything expecting it to be hard and if it’s not, fantabulous what an unexpected surprise. But stop hoping things will be easy and for goodness sake stop searching for things that claim to be easy. People love to sell you things as being easy, but the easy button doesn’t exist, it’s all a fugazi. It’s a marketing tactic and I’m probably guilty of using it myself. But the sooner you stop looking for the easy route and just get to work doing the hard stuff, the easier it will get. So whatever lead gen strategies you choose, accept that they’re going to be hard. Door knocking can feel humiliating, cold calling is exhausting, open houses take over all your weekends, content marketing can be time consuming and uncomfortable putting yourself out there. They almost all suck, so pick your poison and just double down on doing them day in and day out.

On my Accelerator coaching call this week, one of the ladies in the group – Katie shout out to you, she’s like the epitome of a star student. Whatever I teach her she just goes and implements and does it really well and she gets results. Well this week she was talking about a video that she created that took her 3 weeks to film, edit, etc. It was a massive amount of work, but she did it anyway. It’s only been live for a couple of weeks and she’s already gotten 5 buyers from it. 5 buyers! In just a few weeks! Is that worth the effort she put into it? Absofrickenlutely. So remember, great things come from hard work when it’s done right.

#3 – They rely on others to generate leads for them

Moving along, the third mistake agents make with lead generation usually stems from the second mistake. Because a lot of agents find lead gen hard, one of the ways that can feel easier, is to get your leads from someone else, either through buying online leads or by joining a team that provides leads. However, relying on others to get leads long term, instead of learning how to generate your own and creating systems and processes to do it consistently is a critical mistake. It’s ok in the very beginning of your career to do this to get your feet wet and get some deals and experience under your belt. But after you’ve done about 3-5 transactions, it’s time to pivot and focus on generating your own business. When you buy expensive online leads, they are usually fairly low quality leads and you end up spending so much of your time chasing them, only to have most never amount to anything. Because they’re so expensive, when they do turn into a transaction, you end up making very little money and it’s simply not a sustainable business model long term. Similarly, when you get leads from a team or your broker, there’s usually have a fairly significant commission split, but because they can be quite consistent, you end up spending all of your time working those leads and having no time left to focus on growing your own business. Sometimes these teams can have a toxic culture, but you become trapped and can’t leave because you’ve grown accustomed to the steady business and you can’t afford to start over on your own. Bottom line, if you’re getting most of your leads from someone other than yourself, it’s time to start focusing on building your own business. And when you do that, don’t make mistake #4, which is not investing enough TIME into lead gen.

#4 – They Don’t invest enough TIME into lead gen

This mistake takes a few different forms. First and foremost, agents don’t create a schedule around lead gen. They don’t set aside time in their calendar every day to focus on lead gen activities. They procrastinate, they make other activities a higher priority, they don’t track their efforts and they give up on the strategy too soon because they think it’s not working. They essentially don’t implement a strategy consistently enough and for long enough, for it to work. I see this a lot with tactics like door knocking and cold calling. Agents don’t do it consistently because they hate it and I get that. The problem is that they don’t replace those activities with something else. Pick a strategy that you’re going to use and then do it consistently every day for 3 hours and for at least a year before you give up. If you dedicate less time to it than 3 hours a day and for less time than a year, then you cannot say it didn’t work. Every lead gen strategy will work if you do it consistently for that long.

#5 – They don’t grow who they know

Alright, regardless of what lead gen strategy you decide to double down on, I want you to remember that the fastest and easiest way to build your business is always going to be by growing who you know. Never lose sight of your network as your number one priority. We can get very caught up chasing shiny objects and doing things that do nothing or very little to grow our business and in doing so, we’re take precious time away from focusing on growing who we know. Some agents are lucky and come into this business with a huge sphere of influence and therefore referral source and can build a thriving and consistent real estate business from it alone. Others have got a sphere, but it’s not huge and therefore there’s not a ton potential leads and because it can take 5-7 years for repeat business, they don’t have enough leads from just their sphere to sustain their business. And then there’s those of you that have no sphere. Maybe you’ve recently moved to a new area and you don’t really know anyone yet. Maybe you’re more introverted and have a smaller network. Although it will be harder, It doesn’t mean you can’t be successful in this business, but here’s the bottom line. If you want to be in real estate, you need clients. If you want clients, you need to meet more people and if you don’t have a PLAN for how you’re going to do that, then it simply won’t happen. You’ve got to be intentional about it and make it happen, instead of just assuming it will happen on its own and waiting around for that. So not growing who you know is mistake number 5. Mistake number 6 is not nurturing those relationships.

#6 – They don’t nurture relationships

This can take two different forms. We tend to do one of two things when it comes to relationships with people; we either ignore our relationships by not nurturing them with contact and connection or we actually damage our relationships by always trying to get something from them. We view our sphere as leads instead of as people. We focus on trying to get business from them, instead of just connecting and building rapport and providing value. Essentially we use them and people aren’t stupid. They know when they’re being used and don’t fool yourself into thinking they don’t see through the tactics we get taught to use. Build relationships with people from a place of giving instead of getting. Focus on giving value to people everywhere you go, in every way you can. Listen more than you talk. Ask questions, show genuine interest in their lives, pay attention to the details and show appreciation. But do stay in touch with people and have a plan for how you’re going to do it and when you’re going to do it and then track it so that you can prove you actually did it.

#7 – They Hunt instead of focusing on just getting Found

Alright while you’re focusing on growing who you know and nurturing those relationships, you are going to want to grow your business outside of your sphere of influence and the next mistake agents make is hunting randomly for clients, instead of just focusing on getting found by buyers and sellers already in the market. If there were 100 people in a room and only one of them was looking to purchase real estate, what’s a more efficient approach? Wandering around the room introducing yourself randomly one by one to each of the 100 people asking if they’re the one looking to buy? Or standing on a platform with a megaphone and telling everyone that if they’re interested in buying, they can find you over at table 6 and then letting them come to you? Ima gonna go with option #2. It’s just logical isn’t it? Now if you’ve set yourself up for success and have made sure you’re going to be the one they find and you’ve still got time on your hands, then by all means knock yourself out and go knock on some random doors. But don’t be a dufus and do it the other way around.

#8 – They don’t create a proper sales funnel

Ok now that I’ve convinced you that getting found is the way, the next mistake agents make is not having a strategy for how they’re going to get found. You need a mechanism for new people to know you exist. Then you need a strategy for nurturing those people until they’re ready to buy or sell or know someone who is. Then you need a strategy to convert those people OFF your website and YouTube and your socials and ONTO your email list. Then you need a killer drip campaigns and sales presentations to convert them into a client and lastly you need a strategy to serve that new client to such a high standard that you’ll knock their socks off ensuring loads of repeats and referrals. This entire process is your sales funnel and if you don’t have a strategy for how to build and execute one, you’re not going to get found and you’re not going to convert leads into loyal clients. So how are you going to build awareness in your market when people are searching for an agent or real estate related content. Again the key word here is ‘searching’. If your answer was post more on social media, that’s not where people are searching. People are searching on Google and on YouTube and that means you need a website with content they can find and a YouTube channel with content they can find. How are you going to nurture people once they find you? That’s where your content on socials come into play. How are you then going to convert people off your website and YouTube and your socials an onto your email list which is really the only asset you actually own? That’s where lead magnets and opt-ins come into play. And lastly, how will you convert them into a client? That’s where your newsletters, high-converting drip campaigns and sales presentations come in. All of these pieces of the puzzle are your sales funnel and not having one is the eighth mistake agents make with their lead gen. The 9th mistake, is creating the wrong content for your sales funnel.

#9 – They don’t create the RIGHT content to attract, nurture & convert

The first thing agents do under this bucket is relying too heavily on social media content and ignoring website and YouTube content. As I’ve said on repeat in this podcast, you’ve got to create content on evergreen, search based platforms first and then repurpose that content on your social media. When you create content on social media, it has a very short lifespan and then disappears down in the feed and won’t ever be found again, unless someone explicitly goes through your feed. But they’ve got to find your feed in the first place. On the contrary, when you create content on evergreen platforms (like your website and YouTube), it gets found forever when people search for it. In fact, it can sometimes get found more often, the longer it has existed. The effort that you put into creating that content, lives on forever. It’s like an evergreen tree, it stays green all year round instead of dying off.

Not only does the content have to be on evergreen search based platforms first, but it’s got to be content that people are actually searching for and the only way to know what that content is, is to research it. There is zero point in creating content that people aren’t searching for and don’t care about. There’s also zero point in creating content that has already been created a million times and that another agent is already getting found for that content. You’ve got to find holes and gaps in information in your market and then fill those holes and gaps with YOUR content. This is exactly what I teach in my ATTRACT program. The strategy itself is relatively simple, but how you execute it is anything but. And if you don’t do it right, it won’t work and it will be a waste of time.

#10 – They rely too heavily on Organic traffic and not enough on a paid ads strategy

Alright last, but certainly not least….the last mistake that agents make with their lead gen (and this one is a doozy) is that they rely too heavily on organic marketing and not enough on a paid ads strategy. There are very few businesses in this world that can survive without advertising and real estate is certainly no exception. People will try and sell you all day long on just using organic marketing – because that sounds lovely. Of course you’ll buy a program that will teach you how to build a real state business for free. Who wouldn’t want that? It’s not to say that it can’t work, but it takes a really long time. Longer than most people will be able to survive in this business. So if you want to not only survive but thrive, you need to expand your awareness beyond your sphere and beyond what organic reach will give you. You need more people to know you exist. You need to saturate the market to be noticed in a very noisy sea of other realtors and a paid advertising strategy is the quickest way to do it. With one caveat, it’s got to be a strategic paid advertising strategy and this is where the mistakes start again. If you drove by a park bench with an ad on it for some service that you have zero need for, would you even pay attention to it? Not likely. We notice what we need. What if on the other hand you needed a divorce lawyer and you had found a bunch of super helpful videos from one. If you then saw a bench ad, would you notice it? Probably. What if you then got a postcard in the mail from them, would you notice it? Yes. Print advertising on its own requires a lot of money for it to work. But when it’s combined with a search based content strategy, it amplifies the impact dramatically. So don’t invest any money in print advertising without a content strategy and paid ads putting that content directly in front of the people who need it.

If you can eliminate these mistakes and start implementing strategies that actually work, you’ll never have a problem generating leads for the duration of your career.

If you want my playbook for how to attract leads and make sure you’re not making any of these mistakes with your lead gen, doors are now open to my Attract program where you’ll get my 9 pillar content strategy that includes everything you need to create a robust content plan across your website and YouTube and your social media channels. You can find details in the show notes.

Alright if you are enjoying the show, I’d be so grateful if you’d leave me a 5 star rating on Spotify or if you listen on Apple podcasts, you can actually leave a full review there. Thank you so much to everyone that has left me reviews lately, I read every one of them multiple times and I so appreciate you taking the time to leave them.

That’s it, don’t forget that everything is hard before it gets easy.

Until next time.