Your success as a real estate agent depends on your ability to get clients and close deals.
But where do these clients come from? And how do you make sure they’ll come back to you for future transactions? In this article, we’ll explain where to find new clients and how to impress them so they send you referrals and choose you for their future deals.
But first, we need to make sure you’re ready to serve your new clients. So let’s start by making your business client-ready.
Getting Your New Real Estate Business Client-Ready
Here are three things you should do before reaching out to any new potential clients.
Step 1: Get Your Real Estate License
To represent buyers and sellers in real estate deals, you must hold an active real estate license, issued by your state. Getting licensed is a fairly quick process in most states, taking only a few months. You'll need to take your state-approved pre-licensing education, pass your real estate exam, and find a broker to supervise your work.
Step 2: Know Your Market Inside and Out
To properly represent your buyers and sellers, you need to understand your local market. Clients respect agents who have current market details at their fingertips. Make sure you can answer questions like:
What are the average sales prices for homes with one, two, three, and four bedrooms?
What are the average sales prices by foot for different neighborhoods?
How much inventory is available for homes at different price points?
What is the current list price to sales price ratio?
How likely are homes to fall out of contract?
The more you know about your market, the better you can guide your clients to solid decisions.
Step 3: Establish a Credible Online Presence
Most prospective clients will Google you to confirm that you’re a legitimate agent before agreeing to work with you. So setting up your online presence is a critical step in establishing credibility as a new agent. Start by:
Creating business profiles on Google and popular social media platforms.
Posting content to your social channels.
Where to Find Your First Clients
Most new agents get their first clients from their existing sphere of influence. Your sphere is a list of everyone you know: friends, family, colleagues, friends of friends…everyone. These people already know you and trust you. So it’s easier to convert people from this group into clients. Here's how to land your first clients:
Document the names and contact info for each person in your sphere (a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) database is the best way to keep track of all this).
Contact them all personally to let them know that you are accepting new buyer and seller clients.
Ask if they know of anyone looking to buy or sell in the area and offer to reach out to that person to provide some industry insider information that could help them.
Your sphere isn’t your only source of new leads. Find other ways to generate leads as a first-year real estate agent.
How to Earn Repeat Business and Referrals
Aim to serve your clients so well that they recommend you to all their friends and choose you to represent them in their next purchase and sale. The more leads you get from referrals and repeat customers, the less time and money you have to spend generating your own leads.
If, for example, you help a first-time buyer purchase a starter home, you can help them upgrade to a family home in a few years (getting paid for both the sale of their old property and the purchase of the new one!). Then you can help them into their “forever home” a few years after that. And maybe they'll even buy an investment property or two along the way. And if all goes well, they'll ask you to help all their local friends and family with their real estate transactions!
Before long, your pipeline is always full of buyers and sellers ready to make a move.
To earn repeat business and referrals, focus on:
Being available to your clients.
Communicating with clients regularly, even if only to say that there are no updates.
Negotiating to get your clients the best price and terms possible.
Staying top-of-mind with past clients so they remember to contact you. According to the NAR, 86% of buyers found their agents useful, and yet the typical agent earns only 16% of their business from repeat clients and 20% through referrals. This shows that agents are not staying in front of their clients after the deal closes.
Take the First Step Toward Landing Real Estate Clients Today!
Are you excited to start working with home buyers and sellers? Take the first step toward building your new real estate business by enrolling in your online real estate course today!