Real Estate, Schmeal Estate -- How's Your Golf Game?

This week, I spoke with two different AHF agents who had drastically different experiences with something we did system-wide, and I can't help but share...

Last week - when a Forbes article came out announcing Denver as the city with the best deals in the nation in terms of housing, we sent a quick note and link to every prospect in our system.  With the exception of the prospect's name being inserted, each email sent was identical and went out on the respective agent's behalf to their respective list of prospects. The funny thing is that one agent said he hardly got any response at all, and the other agent called me to say it was the best response rate he had ever seen for a "blanket mailing" (and they were all very positive responses with two of those responses resulting in an appointment being set!)

Why in the world was there such a difference in response rates?  That prompted more digging...

• Now keep in mind that the two agents I spoke with each have a list of between 1300 and 1500+ prospects in their database who have at some point in time expressed an interest in searching for a home.
  
• Both agents have been using our real estate prospecting system for about the same number of years, and have built their list of prospects at about the same pace.
  
• Both agents were within 10% of each other in terms of the median home price that their lead list is searching for...
• Neither of the two agents have a website, and rely predominantly on our system for their marketing/prospecting.
• The biggest difference I found was that the two agents lived in slightly different areas, and therefore served different cities, but that couldn't have been it... Afterall -- they're both in the greater Denver metro area.

Then I found it:

• The first agent mostly relied on auto-emails, and drip email followup to maintain his relationship with his prospects.  He was quick to respond to his prospects when they had questions, and demonstrated exemplary knowledge of the area whenever possible.  
• The second agent used all of the same auto-generated marketing tools our system provides, but in addition:
  
  • He made a point of writing a personalized email to each and every one of his new leads that didn't give a phone number. 
    
  • If he found them on Google, he'd comment about it, and he'd follow them on Facebook or Twitter whenever possible. 
    
  • When they gave a phone number, he personally emailed them, and called them within an average of a few hours of them signing up. 
    
  • I could tell from his contact log notes that he was going out of his way to get to know his prospects as people. In fact, a lot of the conversations that appear to have gone on had nothing to do with real estate!
  • Instead of number of bedrooms & bathrooms a prospect is looking for, I saw notations of how many kids and kids' names. (In one case, I saw name of a family pet!)
    
  • I saw birthdates and anniversary dates entered in customer profiles.
  • I even saw annotations about whether they're golfers, coin collectors, or outdoor enthusiasts...
  • The only thing I saw that this agent had been doing that actually cost any money was sending thank-you notes to customers who gave an address via snail mail.
  • Needless to say - the other stark difference between the two agents is actual production. Can you guess who is the bigger producer (by a ratio of nearly 4 to 1?)

They might not admit it, but your prospect's favorite subject is themself.  Whether your prospect list is 15 people, or 2000 people, no level of automation is a substitute for a good old-fashioned conversation. What can you do to engage your prospects in conversation and find out about one of their passions today?