As one of the very first website owners on RealGeeks, Greg is always finding new ways users can monetize the platform.
"The money I've invested in RealGeeks has by far outperformed any real estate I've ever purchased," he says, and he believes this should be the case for every agent.
According to him, the biggest issue agents are facing is that they're too focused on generating more leads rather than building business out of their current database.
"We're spending money to generate more, and we're losing more money because we don't convert more."
So how do you identify and take advantage of your current opportunities?
In today's article, Greg shares the mindset that helps him & his team identify opportunities within his RealGeeks CRM, underlining the importance of strategic engagement over the relentless pursuit of new leads.
As always, if you'd like to chat with Greg himself and have him go through your backend to optimize your workflow, join RGMastery.com, his private coaching community for less than $200/month and no contract fees.
It's not that Greg thinks that generating new leads is a pointless task - is that in this pursuit, many agents forget about the low-hanging fruit within their own database.
"The key to success is not always more leads; it's how effectively you convert the leads you have into tangible business. The potential in your existing database is often overlooked gold."
What's more, Greg believes that even in generating, the goal shouldn't be to "generate" a lead, but to convince them to go with you rather than another agent.
This is because cold calling is dead. Not as a practice, but as a concept.
"No lead is truly cold today - most adults in the US are part of someone's real estate database. And they're receiving information from several websites," he says.
So, if from now on you assumed that the people you talk with are already in the know about what's happening in the market, how would you approach them?
Your goal should be to stand out from the type of messages they're getting.
For example, instead of sending out the same Market Report your database is already getting from 3 other agents, what if you sent out a video of you breaking down that market report in an interesting way?
According to Greg, you should look at RealGeeks, as an air traffic control tower for your leads.
If you go to an air traffic control tower, you'll see the following: dozens of dots on the wide screens representing planes, and air control managers focusing only on a few of them.
Which ones are getting most of the attention? Those that are landing, and those that are taking off. That's when most of the action happens.
And the same goes for your leads.
Your goal should be to:
RealGeeks provides dozens of tools to aid in this opportunity identification process.
Greg can help you set up most of them at RGMastery.com, but here's one of the most important ones: Advanced Search Filters.
These customizable buttons on your dashboard allow you to set rules and generate lists of engaged leads, such as those favoriting a property or opening a Market Activity report.
This is what you do:
All of these individuals are engaging with your content one way or another - they're changing altitude in the sky. This means they might be ready to land, and as a traffic control manager, it's your job to communicate with them.
The pilot doesn't reach out to the tower - it's the tower that first makes contact when they know a plane is close to landing.
Now, what happens with planes that are midway between South Carolina and California, steadily flying at an altitude where there's no risk of collision?
Well, the control tower still knows exactly where they are on their journey, and they keep in contact to make sure things are running smoothly.
For these leads, you'll set another Advanced Search Filter that will show you a list of the people who haven't interacted with your site in the last 30 days.
Then, you'll kick off a re-engagement campaign. It can be as simple as a link to the Top 10 Listings that have hit their community.
If you want to add a personal touch, you can make a video breaking down this list, and encouraging them to click on the link. Once they're on your site, they'll be much more likely to interact with some of these properties.
And if you have some more information on your leads, you can go more granular with your approach.
Greg suggests to text specific properties with a link to some of your leads, with a simple message like:
"Hey, I don't know if you saw this new property that appeared in your neighborhood – was wondering what you thought about the kitchen on this one?".
Then, you monitor the responses you get. If they don't engage, you don't need to pay extra attention to those leads. Just keep them in an automated sequence to make sure they're always receiving something unique from you, that makes you stand out from your competitors.
If, however, they do engage, it means that they've decided to change altitudes. That's your time to reach out, offering access to specific properties, and giving them instructions to land safely at their destination.
"We lose hundreds of millions of dollars worth of volume annually out of our databases because we did not identify quick enough, and when we did, we did not reach out," Greg warns us.
By working from the understanding that your leads are constantly being warmed up by several people in your industry, you shift your approach to make your messaging more memorable. And by monitoring your database like planes in the air, you're able to identify opportunities as soon as you notice movement in the right direction.
Pair that with Speed to Lead and instant access to properties, and you'll make sure no deal slips out of your hands again and lands in the wrong airport.