Attracting the best realtors is an interesting thing, in that its very premise requires changing your prospect’s mindset so drastically that they make a major life change, and once successful, ensuring that they never have their mindset changed in a similar fashion in the future.
This presents a challenge, because you are dealing with precisely the population of people whose minds were once changed in the first place. So how do you go about winning both of these competitions? It is all about creating the belief that you as a real estate brokerage offer a competitive advantage in the marketplace, and that working anywhere else would leave them at a disadvantage.
That’s wonderful as a strategy to attract the best realtors, but how do you actually go about creating that belief?
- Attracting the best realtors requires training not only on the mechanics of the business (writing contracts, negotiating offers, etc), but focus also on how to gain more business. While almost all offices will offer floor time and open houses to hungry new agents, these methods are outdated when it comes to optimizing your presence among today’s web-savvy buyers.
- Having a committed, proven, and effective strategy for agents to boost their business with online marketing will help you differentiate your brand from the competition.
- Be a leader in technology. In an ever increasing technology based marketplace, not only are buyers and sellers starting their searches online, but agents looking for a place to hang their license are as well. Taking advantage of premium placement on agent recruitment sites like AgentBranch.com are a great way to stand out as a leader in technology.
- Give agents the right incentives to stay. This might be the most important of all. Recruiting new agents is only half the battle, as your new recruits are just as likely to leave you as they were their last employer. There is no one catch all solution to retaining agents though, it is more about understanding what motivates each individual
- Will your newly recruited top producer be more motivated if he is given an equity stake in the company if he meets certain thresholds of production, or would he respond better to having a higher split on each transaction? Will your new licensees perform better if given freedom to market how they see fit on a higher split, or provided with lead generation on a lower split? Answering these questions correctly for each agent is key. At the end of the day, successful brokerages will make all of their agents as successful as possible, and in so doing, will help preserve the highest possible retention rate.