Front End Offer Vs. Back End Reputation

Get to the leads….

Get to the leads…

Get to the leads..

A lot of my business comes from new leads. Like most sales people, I post properties online, people click on it, their info is emailed to me and I give them a call.

It’s the front end offer. You see it all the time — a commercial about a new car, a knock on the door from a solar company salesman, or a banner for a $.99 burrito. It’s a ‘numbers game.’ The more offers that are put out into the market will return a higher number of sales. The stats say that if I don’t get back to them within 7 minutes, then they are likely to move on to another offer. Most sales people know this. Even if your product sucks, a high amount of offers will result in sales.

It’s kind of like playing a carnival game. They always look so easy. How hard is it really to toss a softball into a basket 6 feet away? Or Pop a balloon with a dart? There’s so many I must be able to hit one. Even tossing a ping pong ball into floating dishes gives me a chance.

But we all know the carnival games are rigged for us to lose more often than win. It’s a ‘numbers game.’

A few weeks ago, a gentleman named Allen contacted me through Linkedin. He told me we was moving from Canada and needed a place to live in San Francisco. This was the first time I was contacted through Linkedin to find a place to live. So at the time, all I thought was cool, but no big deal.

So through email, I told him about the properties we would be seeing. He told me he wanted to find a place right away since he was starting a new job and didn’t want to waste money on a hotel for very long. So a few days ago we finally met up for a tour of apartments. As we walked around, we got to know each other a little better. So I asked him, how did he find me on Linkedin. I told him he was the first to contact me through Linkedin. He told me he looked through Yelp and Zillow reviews and then looked me up.

I felt so honored! I felt honored for all the clients that have taken time to leave a review of me. Reviews that lead to trust. Going back to having a good product and a process that leaves the client with a positive result.

So with the New Year starting today, you better believe that there are many sales people with ambitious New Years goals. They will ‘pound the phones.’ They will present more online offers. They will not take ‘No’ for an answer.

So expect them to hit you with offers — for about 6 weeks. Until burnout happens and their energy burns out.

But this encounter with Allen has reinforced a valuable lesson that I will be bringing into 2019. The lesson for me is to not focus on immediate results. It is to focus on getting better at the back end of the business just 1% at a time. Interview 1 person at a time, write 1 story at a time, and react one day at a time.