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Patti Brotherton has been a licensed Realtor for 24 years. She was named #1 in the nation in residential sales; and in management she led several offices to #1 status in both California and Florida. Her Coldwell Banker office in 1998 averaged $10,000,000 in production per agent and was named #1 in the nation for her size category. Patti holds numerous awards and commendations for her performance in sales. She currently does individually designed one-on-one agent and manager coaching with her own firm, PAB Performance Partners, to help others reach top success levels.
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All brokers or managers can give their respective offices a boost in productivity no matter what the current market is like. Even the most productive offices can do more. There are many ways to do this and perhaps you are already doing much of what we are going to talk about, so then you can think about doing it a little bit more or with a different twist to get even greater results. Managers always talk about basics with agents; these are the basics for steady office revenue generation for managers. There are many elements to increasing productivity in an office and though there are many steps to be taken, it is not necessarily a step-by-step process, but many actions can be done concurrently.

Establish credibility

A leader must build credibility all the time. You need to remind your agents where you came from, what your background is, that you remember what it is like to sell, and talk about successes that you have had from time to time. Your agents want to know that you are successful. They will listen to someone who they feel has empathy for their situation and knows how to rise above it. Most important is that you let them know about the passion you have for this business. It is your career!

Share the vision

Tell your agents your vision for your office or company at the beginning of every year. Write it down. Let them know where you want to take the office. Let them be a part of it. During the year tell them where the office is in its progress to reach its goal for the year. Keep them informed. Tell them all the time that together they can reach the goal. Tell them that you will help them in any way you can to reach the goal. Tell them what's needed to reach that goal-maybe it's upgrading office equipment, maybe it's new marketing ideas. Be committed to your vision and your agents will be too.

Analyze the picture

At the beginning of the year, hand out an office survey to find out what the agents are thinking about the company or office. Do it at a sales meeting and have them give it back to you at the end of the meeting. You will get their honest response when you give them little time to think about it. If you have already been holding one-on-one's with your agents over their business plans, you will already have a good idea of where they stand on items such as the condition of the facilities, the advertising program, office systems, office staff, training programs and the general market conditions. You need to also look at the market place itself. Who is making sales in your area? Where are the buyers coming from? How many of your listings are in the immediate vicinity of your office? What is the makeup of the buyers-are they first-time buyers, second home buyers, retirement home buyers? When you analyze the market and share this information with your agents, it will also build your credibility in their eyes as you are setting the example of wanting to know all you can about the current market to help them.

Dive into the community

If you haven't already gotten involved in some sort of community organization. Make this the year to do so. You want to let your agents know that you totally support where they work and will let the organization you join know about your company-the worst that can happen is that you get referral business for your agents. This will also lead your agents to get involved in more community programs.

Train

After your one-on-ones or the office survey, you are going to know what training is necessary for the coming year. Depending on your office and the maturity of your agents (whether seasoned or new to the real estate field), you should plan your training strategy. No matter what agents say, you should do something on the basics at least once a month. Some want something particular like negotiating skills, and schedule those as well. Keep the sessions fast paced and not more than 45 minutes, but at the same time and place monthly. More frequently if you have alot of new agents. You will be surprised by the number of people attending these sessions when you have asked for their input.

Recruit

This is a given in every office. Every broker/manager knows that to immediately increase revenue all you need to do is bring in some producing agents. Easier said than done, but true nonetheless. It takes patience to do a good recruiting job. To make it easier on yourself, break the job down to three calls a day and see how many appointments you can get in a week. Going for the steady, midrange producers is a great target because you don't have to give away the store to get them, but they are also generally the most loyal to their current company. Another good group to target is the agent who has been in the business one year. They haven't really started producing yet, but they are on the verge. This is a great group to go after. They are flattered that you are trying to recruit them, they know contracts and have gotten their feet somewhat wet, but they don't have ingrained bad habits. This group will bring you money fairly quick and you don't have to pay them the very top splits. It's a win/win.

Market

You can boost productivity by helping your agents with their individual marketing programs as well as some ideas for the entire office. Every year if you come up with your program for the year or theme, the agents will be excited that you are doing something different to add more revenue. It doesn't have to be a lot, but it has to be more than you did the year before or you will produce the same results, not better results. Here are a few ideas:

• Make up one new page about the office for their listing presentations
• Help the agents update their resumes.
• Write a letter commending each agent on an outstanding year for their presentation book.
• Redesign the ads for a fresh look or new theme for the year.
• Design a postcard program where you emphasize your theme by month for 12 months and the agents can buy the cards for their individual farming.
• Have one big office promotion sometime during the year; e.g., Open House Extravaganza, or Office giveaway, a mass farming one month by every agent in the office so that your entire market place is covered, etc.
• Mailings during the year to your feeder market-the place where most of your buyers are coming from.
• Mailings to your past office clients telling about the results of the office

Raise the average price

One sure way to boost office productivity is to raise your average sales price in the office. Look at where you can have your agents farm that will bring your average sales price up. Work with agents on how to farm those areas. Have agents hold open houses that are higher in price; not all open houses have to be on Sunday or Saturday. Show them how much more money they will make by selling properties a little higher in price. They are always surprised. If you get several agents doing this during the year, your office average price goes up and everybody wins.

Develop an atmosphere of success

You need to lead your office to higher productivity by telling them weekly how great they are doing. Get the message across constantly that the office is doing better. If they believe it, they will achieve it! You can always find stats where your office is doing better than the previous year. Maybe it's selling more condos, or more 3 bedrooms versus 2 bedrooms, or more volume rather than units. You can always find something! If you don't have good stats one month, say nothing. But, my guess is that you can always find something to brag to them about. They want to hear good news. Give it to them!

Set standards

Some people should not be in real estate. Office productivity can be diminished by allowing agents to remain in the office without adding to the success of it. Everyone in the office must contribute! You can set the standards every year, and make sure everyone knows what you expect out of them in production. You must adhere to your decision. If you expect something of someone, they will rise to your expectations; however, if you don't enforce your standards, you will have defeated the whole purpose.

It's hard to let agents go, but if you do because of your standards, the entire office will benefit. Your existing agents will know that you expect them to contribute to the success of the office and they will understand when someone has a career adjustment out of your office. You will grow as a leader in their eyes. Also, new agents that you add will feel good that they meet your criteria for becoming part of your team. It really benefits everyone by having standards and helping agents achieve them.

Organize your office

Take a good look around. Is your office cluttered? Are forms and contracts readily available and easy for the agents to find? Every year, take a look at your office as if you were coming to it for the first time. Could you find everything you needed to make a sale? Take a listing? Is it clear to the agents who does which staff function? Some offices are extremely organized, others seem to get out of whack as the year goes along. There have been many studies done that prove if you have an organized office, your agents will be happier and produce more.

Watch the big things

Boosting productivity means staying focused on the big things - more sales! Pay attention to what will help your agents make more revenue. You need sales. You need a good average sales price. You need agents who produce. Concentrate on those things first. The paper clips will take care of themselves.

That's the bottom line in real estate. Success in this profession is a matter of paying attention to the big things and the little things. You have to keep the big picture in mind constantly. And you have to realize that success with the big picture is often determined by meticulous attention to the very specific needs of agents and consumers. When you can come up with workable, human solutions that build directly toward your larger goals, have patience, you have a winning formula.

Patti Brotherton
PAB Performance Partners
Toll free: 877-498-9072
www.eproven.com