Last Updated on May 22, 2019

Straight Talk: Do you really care about the quality of your leads? Or better yet… should you care about the quality?

In a perfect world, every lead that you get from any source, would convert to commissions. Of course, that just doesn’t happen.

Quantity of Leads vs. Quality of Leads:

So that leads us to the age old question, if I can’t get perfect leads, do I even want the leads? The short answer… YES, of course! You just need to focus on the correct follow-up strategy. First, let’s talk about improving the quality of your leads – then, we’ll discuss how to get them and what to do with them.

Many people will discuss how they only want to get the highest quality leads into their pipeline. This leads to two issues. First, if all, if your leads quickly convert, then it doesn’t leave anyone in your pipeline in the future. That seems great on the surface, but without a pipeline, are you really building a sustainable business? Building a pipeline is the absolute lifeblood of your business.

On the other hand, generating low quality leads can lead to an exhaustion problem. Too much follow up, not enough business. So is there a happy medium? There is.

Let’s be honest, you can buy leads from the major portals, and some will convert and some won’t. But what you probably don’t realize are those leads come in at an average of $100 for a buyer and $300 for a seller. That’s right, I said $100 and $300. But the real issue… They are SHARED leads (unless you are paying a crazy high amount per lead, and in that case it’s usually 4-5x that).

So – how do you get your own, unshared leads flowing into your pipeline?

Step 1- Choose Your Bait

The Types of Ads (Bait) That Work:

The Bait you use with any type of lead generation matters. But what exactly is Bait?

Bait is the way you get people to interact with your ad, and more importantly, give you a piece of information about themselves. For example, bait could be:

• Educational Flyers
• Free Resources
• How-To Videos
• List of Homes
• … and More

In real estate, there are two types of bait. There is seller bait, and buyer bait. But how do they differ?

Buyer Bait:  

You could use a free report to bait buyers by focusing on their wants and needs:

• “10 Mistakes First Time Homebuyers Make”,
• “4 Quick Ways Renters Can Buy Today”,
• “7 Secrets to Financing Your First Home”
• and so many more.

The easiest example of buyer bait for our purposes though is a list of homes. Now, not just “any” list of homes. A list of homes under the median price in your area is nearly guaranteed to generate leads. This will not only get names, phone numbers, and emails, but will also generate leads that actually want to talk to you.

Your ‘Freebie’

A great example of a buyer list of homes ad is contained in this link (don’t worry it’s free to download and will copy directly into your ads manager. Of course, you have to HAVE Facebook Ads set up before this will work. You can access it here):

CLICK HERE to download this ad directly into your Facebook Ads Manager

Seller Bait:

Seller bait simply speaks directly to the person selling instead of buying, by using the targeted bait. Some awesome examples are things like Home evaluations, upsizing or downsizing, and even those people who are in a situation where they have few options (divorce, job loss, job transfer, or missed payments), are all great options to generate leads. Using types of Ads that drive people to Powerful Reports will greatly increase your lead engagement as well and help you to generate the highest quality leads possible.

Examples of reports to bait sellers might be:

• “Free Home Value Analysis”
• “28 Step Home Marketing Plan”
• “Sell Your Home For Top Dollar”
• “4 Ways to Stage Your Home for a Quick Sale”
• And so many more.

Note from the Agent Inner Circle editors:  If you’re a Service for Life subscriber, you can download over 20 reports that are ready-made, and have perfect copy for you to use in your business right this second. Want to know more? Click here.

Getting quality leads is of course the goal… but, no matter what you do, you’re going to get leads that just won’t pan out. Finding that happy medium between the two is how to build a long-term strategy that will propel your business from where it is now, to where you want it to be.

Step 2: What to Do When You Have The Lead

So now that you have the lead, what do you do with it? Well, really there are two real strategies you need to have in place. One for short term follow up, the clients/customers that want to take immediate action. The other for long term follow up, the ones that may be months, or even years away from making a purchase of sale. The longer term follow up is much more informational and “soft touches” rather than being a hard sell, while the short term follow up is trying to get therm to take immediate action.

Strategy 1: Short-Term Follow-Up:

Being available for immediate follow up is necessary. In some, but VERY few cases, someone is ready to do business today. If we want to be realistic about it, these are the hottest, most infrequent, and highly unlikely leads out there. In 99.9% of cases, a single call/text/email won’t yield results. Will you get lucky one in a million times? Of Course! But don’t bank on it!

Strategy 2: Your Long-Term Strategy:

So what do we recommend to our clients, and friends? We say to generate as many leads as physically possible within your budget. The most important part of generating leads is the follow-up strategy, not the actual lead, and until we can accept that as an industry, some people will continue to think that the quality of their leads isn’t what it could be.

The whole idea here is that most people will eventually buy a house. The stats say that most people will work with the first agent that contacts them. If you set up the follow-up strategy properly, you’ll be the agent that has been following-up for weeks, months and in some cases years! Who else are they going to choose?!

The best follow-up strategy involves a consistent monthly contact, something that your clients value and come to expect each month (they’ll subconsciously start to view YOU as consistent and reliable!). Service For Life! Is a “done for you” marketing tool that helps end the stress & struggle of getting a steady flow of quality clients, referrals, repeats and great word-of-mouth for your business – all in ONE tool. Join the agents that have been using Service For Life! as their marketing secret for years- click this link and then “Join Today.” https://www.serviceforlife.com/

Step 3: Get Your Leads to Convert:

When it comes to leads, having a strategy is probably the most important part of your entire business.  Part of that system starts with asking the right questions when you get a lead, which allows you to immediately qualify them for the short or long-term strategy, and place them in the proper place on your follow up plan.

Understanding that not every lead is created equal is an important part to running a sustainable business. But more importantly, understanding that running the right types of campaigns, having the right follow up in place, and using the proper tools, templates, and scripts in your business will help you excel over your entire career.

Want more information about converting online leads? Read this article: https://agentinnercircle.com/4-things-convert-online-leads/