Databases can’t be bought; they must be built, and it’s up to you to do it. Josh Phegan explains how a modern take on a system that worked for his grandfather can help you successfully track your buyers and sellers.
There’s no doubt my grandfather, Arthur Phegan, was a smart man. Way back in 1972 he categorised his sellers by the month in which they sold their property and tirelessly filled lines of notebooks with their details.
At the start of every month, he’d whisk out the book for the same month from the previous year and make his anniversary calls. Mostly it was just to touch base, but sometimes he’d get another listing and then diligently write their details in a new notebook for current vendors. When they sold, he repeated the process.
Simple, right?
So why now, with a plethora of brilliant technology at their fingertips, do modern agents struggle to maintain a current, categorised database they can mine to produce amazing results?
If my grandfather could maintain a ‘fit’ database 44 years ago, you can too. Here’s how:
MINDSET
Just like humans, databases don’t become ‘fit’ on their own. You have to decide to go all-in and work hard to yield results.
Fitness can’t be bought. So make the choice and own it.
CATEGORISE
Without categorising your buyers, sellers, landlords, past clients and others, you will continually be forced to prospect as you did when you first started your real estate career.
Why prospect individual by individual when you can mine entire groups of people simultaneously? What categories should you use?
Buyers – All buyers start in this field and receive marketing such as automated buyer alerts.
Buyer hit list – Any buyer that has caught your eye by doing something special, be it bidding at auction, making an offer or seeking a contract, gets moved to this category.
If they do these things you know they’re ready to buy now. You have an opportunity to take them to your upcoming properties and help them generate emotional attachment so they make an offer soon after the new property hits the market.
Potential sellers – These are people you know who own a home but you haven’t had a face-to-face meeting with yet.
Better known as the market appraisal, this meeting works like a traffic light and lets you assess who’s ready to sell now, who will be soon and who is going to take a lot of work to get them to market.
Seller hit list – Following a market appraisal, your goal is to generate listing presentations and those clients are logged in this field. You know they’re ready to go to market and much of your energy should be targeted on this group.
Some agents work with categories such as hot, warm or cold sellers, but when would you ever walk into your office and think, ‘Today I’m going to focus my efforts on my cold sellers?’
It’s just not going to happen. You need to be clear about your categories and market specifically to them.
A simple but key skill I’m instilling in the agents I coach is to take ownership of mail redirection for both their vendors and buyers.
This generates you key information such as where your vendors are moving to and where your buyers have come from.
Perhaps your buyers need an agent to sell their current home or, if they were renting, does it present an opportunity for the property management division to secure a lease agreement?
Other categories – It’s also vital to include your landlords in your database, as well as key people who refer sales to you.
A CONTINUOUS ROUNDABOUT
No client should stay in the one category forever. Buyers become hot buyers, sellers become vendors and vendors become past clients and referrers.
Ensure your database maintains its ‘fitness’ by keeping it clean, current and working for you.
