Over the last few weeks, I’ve been fortunate enough to spend time sharing with and learning from some of the best minds in the industry who I’m lucky enough to call friends. So, I wanted to share some of my biggest takeaways from these events.

First, if you were at one of these events, THANK YOU! I appreciate you taking the time to show up, get involved and give back to the industry.

So, what events am I talking about? And what were the big takeaways?

Building Systems In Your Business

CRS Camp New England – Portsmouth, NH

First up was CRS Camp New England in Portsmouth, New Hampshire put on by the amazing Gary Rogers and Darlene Sodano. This was a “BarCamp-style,” peer-taught event with some of the largest producers in the Northeast US. The most interesting part was that these rock stars kept talking about all the systems they’d put in place for their businesses.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not surprised that the top agents use systems in their businesses. Heck, I’m all about putting systems in place in my businesses. What struck me though, is that they all attributed their various successes to how they systemized their projects. The success didn’t always come from it being a creative idea, even when it was. It wasn’t that they happened to hit the right market, or that it was part of something they have done forever in their businesses.

They all talked about how the key was to systemize and offload every piece possible so they could spend more time working directly with clients. So, whether it’s lead generation, lead nurture or following up with your power list, it’s all about putting systems in place that effectively do the work for you while you’re focusing on clients.

This topic was prevalent at all of the events, but specifically at CRS Camp.

Would you be interested in a guide for systemizing your business? Let me know in the comments below if this is something you could use.

Be Personal: Let Your Character Shine

Agent Rise Summit – Madison, WI

The next event was the Agent Rise Summit put on by Neil Mathweg in Madison, Wisconsin. This event was awesome and had too many takeaways for me to hope to relay them all to you. There was one that stood out among the rest, though. All of the best strategies people were using were personal.

As we move further into the world of technology, people seem to be tuning out more and more content, especially if it feels even the slightest bit like advertising. However, people also seem to be incredibly welcoming toward personal content, especially when it’s helpful.

I’m starting to feel like we need to question a lot of what we’ve previously been taught or thought we knew about marketing in the last 10-20 years.

Let me give you an example. For a long time we’ve all sent bulk email campaigns that are heavy on graphics or maybe have a banner image at the top. However, this doesn’t look anything like a personal email you send. So, unless people love the content you’re sending and are accustomed to it, it’s much less likely to get opened, read and responded to.

Accordingly, we’ve already moved a lot of our email campaigns to “text” versions, and are doing some more testing before switching the rest.
Keep in mind, email is just one example. Whether it’s email, text, chatbots, or direct mail, it should all feel personal!

For Every Meeting There Are Actually 3 Meetings

NAR Annual – San Francisco, CA

Last but certainly not least was NAR San Francisco. This is an event I’ve been going to for 10 years and it never disappoints. While there were countless incredible conversations and classes, my favorite takeaway was from a Leadership class put on by my good friends, Paula Rocco Monthofer and Maura Carey Neill.

This is something many of us probably knew already, but it was framed in such a way that I realized it’s a much larger concept than it might seem at first.

For every meeting, there are really 3 meetings. The meeting in the hall beforehand, the actual meeting, and the meeting in the hall after. Often the meeting before and after are more important than the scheduled meeting itself. This alone is impactful but let’s take it to the next level and apply it to other parts of your business.

Listing or buyer presentations are rarely won because of the presentation itself. Don’t get me wrong, a good presentation helps, but all the work to position yourself beforehand and your follow-up after the presentation are far more important.

How about the work you put into delivering a great buyer experience? Is your most impactful work the showing process itself or how you prepare clients beforehand and work with them to close on the house after?

More often the work before and after is what really makes the difference. So make sure you’re putting in more work to prepare and follow up than you put into any activity itself.