Would you like an easy and high ROI promotion to get referrals from your sphere?

Many agents partner with local businesses and host an annual event for their past clients, family members, and friends… for little cost or even for FREE!

Here’s an example from agent Josh Neumann.  Every winter he hosts an event to bond with past clients and fill his lead pipeline called “Movie Morning Madness”…

Josh told us this event is done in January or February and gets him all the referrals he needs for the rest of the year.  Here’s how his system works in his own words so you know how to implement this strategy in your practice…

Each winter, as the temperatures drop to single digits (at least where I’m from!) and after the holiday hustle has settled, I host a movie morning at a local cinema.

STEP 1: Reserve The Local Cinema

There’s a small theater in my local community that lets me reserve a private showing for my clients and their friends and family members.

I’ve picked the movie two different ways:

1. Agree to purchase a set number of tickets for a current running film at the “matinee” or daytime price for each attendee, or…
2. ‘Rent a movie reel’ from a major studio (or the theater itself) and pay a set price regardless of how many people attend.

This usually works out to $150 to $500.

In addition, each guest can help themselves to complimentary popcorn and soda at the concessions for a very nominal fee.

The entire event only costs me $400 to $600 — even though my clients think I’ve dropped several thousand dollars for them.

In reality, I can even get the event for FREE by working with local businesses as “sponsors”.  When you’re getting RSVP’s, simply ask each person if they own a local business or if the place they work would like to be a SPONSOR for the event.  Two or more sponsors could easily cover the entire cost to host any event, and they’ll get several special mentions in front of everyone who attends (more on that in a minute).

Side Note: This movie event works for me — but here are some more ideas for hosting an event for clients…  a wine or beer Tasting Party, Fashion Show, Family Picnic, Comedy Club outing, Sports Clinic, Art Show with a local gallery, Opera or Theater, or New Automobile Preview at a local dealership.  See this real estate marketing article to read more about these other events ideas.

STEP 2:  Send Out Invitations

I send out the invitations a few weeks ahead and do a follow up RSVP phone call.

Even if they can’t make it, this makes a great ‘touch’ opportunity at the end or beginning of each year.

Here’s an INVITATION TEMPLATE you can use:

(Click the image above to download this template.)

MAILING OPTIONS:  This invitation can be mailed as a postcard, included in your Christmas Cards, or inserted in your real estate newsletter.

STEP 3: Host The Event

After I’ve made all the arrangements, and people are showing up on the day of the event…

I hand out raffle tickets as guests enter the theater and do a giveaway prior to the start of the movie.

Remember:  This is a great opportunity to allow clients to promote their own companies amongst each other, and also a way to get other local businesses to donate meals, services, and money to pay for the event.  Give away great prizes and make this a fun time for everyone!

DON’T MISS THIS: This pre-movie raffle also does something else for me… It focuses everyone’s attention before the movie begins so I can THANK everyone for their business and ASK for future referrals, while their family politely smiles right next to them!

Every year this is a HUGE success.  My clients are thrilled by the whole experience — feeling as though I did something special just for them — because NO ONE else in my market does this.

Then, they tell all their friends, family, and neighbors about the event that they’re favorite REALTOR® hosted.  I encourage them to invite more people for next year’s event!

What do YOU do to differentiate yourself and bond with your clients?

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Did you ever take physics in high school or college?

I cringe when I hear the word.  But if you did take physics, you might have learned about an amazing concept called “Critical Mass.”

What is “Critical Mass” and what on earth does it have to do with real estate success?

“Critical Mass” occurs when an object or process in motion reaches such a momentum that it continues at that momentum…even increases that activity for long sustained periods of time – even forever!

And did you know that your real estate production can hit a point of “Critical Mass”?

It’s true.  In fact, after teaching more than 22,000 agents how to get breakthrough production and lasting profits in real estate…

I Have Never Seen a Real Estate Practice Achieve Long-
Term Success WITHOUT Reaching Critical Mass™…

Yes, it’s that important.  Let me explain further…

See…about 12 years ago…when I was working with small groups of agents, I coined the term “Critical Mass™” to explain the dynamic of growing such a strong “marketing momentum and personal market share” you actually start to generate 70%, 90%, even 100% of your clients from your created marketing momentum.

But more than that…I discovered a way to make your production continue to grow and grow almost automatically year-after-year no matter what happens with the economy.

Picture your real estate production like a small snowball in your hand.  If you take that snowball and start rolling it down a hill, it will start growing bigger.  And as it grows bigger it will start to take on its own momentum and start rolling itself.

And as it starts rolling faster, it also starts to get bigger…and bigger…and bigger.  And as it gets bigger, it starts to roll faster…and faster…and faster.

Do you see what’s happening here?

At some point your snowball reaches a point of “Critical Mass™” where its accumulated momentum will keep it rolling and rolling and rolling.

So what happens when your real estate practice starts reaching Critical Mass™?

Amazing things start to happen…

Your production will multiply, and continue to grow for as long as you practice real estate, because you’re creating your own momentum…your own personal market share – it’s a mathematical certainty as you’ll soon see…

You will never cold prospect again…never face the humiliation and frustration of cold marketing – nearly all of your clients will come to you the easy way: by referral, word of mouth, and repeat business…

You will work half as much and stress a fraction of the amount you do now…and in the process you’ll make multiples of your present income.

Why will all these good things happen?  Because..

You Will Spend Your Time Only On the Most Productive
Real Estate Activities:  Working With Clients,
Closing Deals and Getting Paid!

Imagine if you could wake up each morning, and, instead of dreading your day cold prospecting or wondering where your next client is coming from, you relish in a steady flow of clients who want to work with you and only you.

It’s not a pipedream.  It’s not a fantasy – agents are doing it today.

But there’s a small problem.

See, most agents never reach Critical Mass™.  They lurch from one bad effort to the next, because they never learn about the concept, or how to get there.  So they either quit the business, or give up and sadly assume real estate needs to be a constant struggle – jumping from one marketing fad to the next.

And many of those who actually reach Critical Mass™ get there by accident…or take 10 to 20 years to reach that point.

Well, I’m here to tell you:  You don’t have to be a victim of ignorance.  You don’t have to struggle and strain or take 20 years to finally “make it” in real estate.

You can “short-cut” your success by 90% or more if you simply build your own personal “Critical Mass™” momentum and market share.

Which brings me to our little formula for building Critical Mass™ in your practice…

It’s a simple math calculation for building any size real estate practice you desire…a calculation that will reveal to you the exact size of your “house list”…your personal market share required to reach Critical Mass™ in real estate.  It’s my…

Critical Mass Targeting System™

Follow along carefully, because this is the most important little calculation of your real estate career.  I want you to understand the dynamics here as well as the simple math.

Take out a piece of paper and follow these 3 easy steps…

STEP #1: Write down the number of real estate transactions you want to achieve to reach Critical Mass™ in your real estate practice.

Critical Mass™ is a different number for everyone.  For some agents, it may be 15 transactions a year.  For others it may be 40.  And for others it may be 400.

Another way to calculate the number of transactions you desire is to back into it. Simply take the “net income” you desire, and divide it by the average NET commission you make per transaction (that’s after all expenses: broker split, marketing costs, employee expenses, office rent, auto expense, etc.).

For example, if you want to make $200,000 and your average “net” commission (after expenses) is $5,000, then your Critical Mass™ number is 40 transaction sides ($200,000/$5,000 = 40).

As a side note (and food for thought): the higher the average price of homes you sell, the fewer you need to sell to meet your Critical Mass™ income level.  But you already knew that, right?

STEP #2: Write down how long the average person in your area owns their home, and multiply that number by #1 above (the # of transactions you need to reach Critical Mass™).

National home ownership average is about 5.5 years.  But to be conservative, let’s assume its 7 years in your area (you can use 6 or 8 or 10 for that matter).  Check with your local MLS or REALTOR^® Association if you’re not certain – or just assume for now.

For example, if the average homeownership period in your area is 7 years, multiply 7 times 40 transaction sides (from #1 above).  7 Years x 40 = 280.

THE RESULT: In our example, you will require 280 homeowners on your “house list” to generate 40 transactions EVERY year (your Critical Mass Target™) – Remember, this doesn’t include the referrals they could send you.

It’s just the number of direct transactions that will come from this group (and you can check your math: 280 people divided by 7 years = 40 deals per year will come from this group).

But HOLD ON!

Those 280 are your goal ONLY if you get ALL of their transactions.  Let’s be reasonable: You won’t get all those transactions.

Regardless of your efforts, some will go FSBO.  Some will go to “Uncle Charlie.”  And some will go to another agent.

That’s why we now need to adjust for your “Personal Market Share™” with that group to get your true Critical Mass Target™.

STEP #3: Divide your “house list” number (from #2 above) by the estimated “Personal Market Share™” you have with those folks – to get the “actual” number of people required on your house list.

What do I mean by “personal market share”?

Market share is the propensity of these people to think of YOU FIRST (and final) for real estate services before any other agent

How do you figure your personal market share %?

Over time (a year or so) you’ll understand your market share because you’ll know how many transactions came from your house list or target farm.

And remember, marketing to that group over time will have a cumulative effect, and actually increase your market share with them.

But for now, I know our agents using Service For Life!® harvest between 30% and 80% personal market share with their “house list.”  So let’s work an example…

Continuing with our previous example, let’s say you have a 30% market share with your folks.  That means you should divide your 280 people by your 30% market share:  280/.30 = 933 people.

So if you have only a 30% market share with your house list or target farm, you’ll actually need to have 933 people on your “list,” not 280.

But what if…because of your relationship contact systems – like our Service For Life!^® members – you actually harvest 50% of those people?

280/.50 = 560 people.  You now need only 560 people to harvest your 40 transactions every year (not including referrals they could send you).  You just cut your list size almost in half!

And what if, because of your relationship contact systems, you actually harvest 80% of those people?

280/.80= 350 people.  You now need only 350 people to harvest your 40 transactions every year (not including referrals they could send you).  You just cut your list size by one-third again!

Do you see the “dynamic” that’s happening here?

The SIZE of your list required to reach Critical Mass™ depends on the QUALITY of your list.

And the quality of your list is controlled by YOU.

The higher the quality of your list (i.e. the closer the relationship), the fewer people you need to reach Critical Mass™.  The fewer people required means lower marketing costs and higher profits for you.

By the way, I’ve seen agents create house lists larger than 700 in their very first year – and they closed an extra 20 to 50 transactions just in the process of building that list.

And remember, the “Critical Mass Target™ number does NOT include the referrals you could harvest from these folks – it’s just the direct transactions that will come from that group.

Many of our Service For Life!® agents actually add up to 40% more business from the referrals they generate from their house list.

Question: WHO will be the agent representing these people when it’s time to buy or sell?

Answer: The agent who’s created the closest relationship with them.

• The agent who has nurtured the relationship.
• The agent they can trust.
• The agent who’s demonstrated their competence over the years.
• The agent who brings regular, welcomed value.
• The agent who has differentiated themselves from every other agent out there!

Don’t fall prey to the thought that you need to carpet the area with your one-time contact – this is about more; this is about QUALITY RELATIONSHIP.

The only thing that’s missing for you is…

How Do You Get Your Personal Market Share™ with
Your House List as HIGH as it can Possibly Get?

How Do You Make Yourself the ONE Agent Your Market
Thinks Of Before Any Other Agent Comes To Mind?

The Answer: You need a consistent contact system that involves them.  Gets read and shared.  Automatically builds a deep relationship worthy of referrals, word of mouth and repeat business.

A tool that brings your prospects and clients value so they’re subconsciously forced to reciprocate and do business with you.  A tool that bonds them to you like family.

Doesn’t it make sense?  It’s intuitive but most agents nod their heads and do nothing to increase the quality of their house list each month.

Let’s have some fun.

Today I want you to dream a little.  Whether you’re a new agent or veteran top producer…I want you to calculate your Critical Mass Target™ for your own practice.

I want you to see how greater success with less stress and strain can be a mathematical certainty – and how your production can continue to grow automatically, year-after-year…regardless of the economy, competition or interest rates…if you just follow a simple strategy.   Here’s the easy exercise:

Step #1: Write down the number of transactions you need each year to be at “Critical Mass™” in your business:  __________. (Example = 50)

Step #2: Write down the average length of home ownership in your area.  Check with your local MLS, or if you already have an estimate, enter it here (nationally is about 5.5 years):  __________. (Example = 7 years)

Calculation #1: Now, MULTIPLY Step #1 by Step #2.  (Example: 50 x 7 = 350).  This will give you the number of people needed on your house list (or farm) to generate your “Critical Mass™” number of transactions (IF you get ALL of them), not including referrals they could send you.

But remember, you won’t get all of those transactions – so we need to make a small adjustment for your “Personal Market Share™.”

Step#3: Estimate your “Personal Market Share %” you can expect when marketing to this group:  _______ %.  (Example: 30%)  If it’s a cold list (like a new farm) it will be quite low.  If it’s a well-nurtured house list of past clients, friends, family, acquaintances – it’s going to be much higher – even as high as 80% or more.

Calculation #2: Simply divide your results from Calculation #1 above by Step #3.  (Example: 350 / .30 = 1,167)  This will give you the number of people you’ll need to build on your house list to reach your Critical Mass Target™ at a 30% Market Share.

Now, let’s do something called “Sensitivity Analysis.”

Let’s assume you had a great “Relationship-building” system (like Service For Life!^®) working in your practice…

What if your Estimated Market Share % went to 40%?  Divide your results from calculation #1 above by .40.  What did you get?

What if your Estimated Market Share % went to 60%?  Divide your results from calculation #1 above by .60.  What did you get?

Did you notice that, the better your Market Share %, the LOWER your Critical Mass Target™ becomes?

A lower Critical Mass Target™ means you spend less time and money marketing your services.  You work with higher quality clients – friends.  And what you don’t know is that these people REFER others just like THEM!

Want to know a secret?

Most agents never think about Critical Mass™ or “Personal Market Share™.”

Rather than create a “Strategic Approach” to building their business, they force themselves to constantly prospect…or just hope and pray that clients will somehow, some way find them.

Not you.  Not any longer.  We’ve just completed an important step in targeting your success – and believe it or not, most agents never even get this far.

We’re starting to fill in the blanks in making your astounding success a “100% Certainty.”

Stay tuned for more articles about how to build the size and quality of your house list.

[Ed. Note: Craig Forte has built 4 multi-million dollar companies in his 35-year career, including a successful real estate development and brokerage company. He is author/publisher of 11 books and courses in real estate, and has taught more than 22,000 agents how to create breakthrough sales and profits. His most recent course, "The Ultimate Real Estate Success Secret™" has been acclaimed as one of the most reliable, step-by-step ways to grow your production 33% to over 400% each year.  As an Agent Inner Circle® Member you can receive his course and 2 other powerful resources absolutely FREE just click here.]

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There is no shortage of distractions for how to get new business today.

Many agents are focusing on short sales, REO’s, Social Networking… looking everywhere for clients except right under their nose!

Linda Simmons, a Top Agent from Alabama, explains how the lion’s share of her business comes from referral and repeat clients.  In this short video Linda shares how she does it and how you can use the same strategy to get a steady stream of clients in any market.

Plus, if you want to learn more about how the top agents in the world harvest an endless supply of referrals from their database…

CLICK HERE to register for our upcoming webinar training.

Today you’re going to learn three things:

1. A great way to generate quick commissions (and sell your listings faster) with a great buyer marketing strategy,
2. How to create a “Power List” that brings you consistent clients year after year, and…
3. How to understand your Return on Investment with your marketing.

So let’s get started…

PROFIT MULTIPLIER #1: New Agent? Just Relocated? Need to Generate Commissions FAST?

First, find an agent with several active listings. Tell them you have a number of “buyer” marketing strategies that will sell their listings in a fraction of the average market time. Offer to implement the 4 “buyer magnet” systems I taught you from this real estate marketing article for EACH of their listings. You manage everything for the agent so they’re out $0 and no time.

Second, implement the strategies, agree to take the buyer calls and qualify the leads, and sell them a home. Work out a commission split, and you’ve now got a marketing system working to bring you buyers, and even a few great listings.

Plus, you’ll look like a marketing wizard in your office and agent community (not to mention you’ll automatically be building your own “Power List” for increased referrals, word of mouth and repeat business).

If the listing agent refuses your offer (some people will step over dollars to pick up dimes!), move on to another agent who’s got some business sense.

Remember, the strategies from this real estate marketing article will also help sell your own listings faster by acting as active “buyer magnets”.

PROFIT MULTIPLIER #2: Create a “Power List” and Make Them Your Primary Market

You already know that the NAR research says 74% of all real estate transactions occur from a relationship – they know the agent or are referred from a trusted source.

Here’s something you don’t know: If you built a “Power List” (database of personal contacts) with 300 people (homeowners), and the average home ownership period is, for example 7 years (nationally it’s 5.5 years), then 42 of those people will buy or sell every year – good market or lousy market.

Holy cow!  Is this getting your attention?

600 people on your database and it’s 84 transactions every year from that list. 900 people and it’s 128 deals a year – and so on. And don’t forget, that doesn’t include referrals they could send you – it’s just the number of direct transactions that come from that group.

Now hold on. Before you start thinking you just hit “easy street”, there’s something you need to understand. These are not just “random” people. I’m talking about people who know you or know OF you.

The higher the “quality” of contact on your list (i.e. the better they know you), the more responsive they’ll be to your regular contact. This means the more inclined they’ll be to think of YOU FIRST when they think real estate.

I call this your Personal Market Share™…

So the “operative” question is: WHO will get all those deals?

ANSWER: The agent with the highest Personal Market Share™.

The one who’s stayed in contact (at least once a month, every month), deepened the relationship, provided on-going value to their list, and demonstrated they’re a true professional committed to the relationship for the long haul and worthy of the client’s business over any other agent.

Are you willing to become that agent…the one who captures 74% of all transactions, holds such a high personal market share they generate huge income regardless of market conditions?

You are?  OK, good because next I’ll show you…

How To Build Your “Power List”

Building a Power List is easy if you put your mind to it.  Here’s the best way to go about it…

STEP 1: Start with all the people you know and create what I call the “Big List”.

STEP 2: Put every new and old client on the list.

STEP 3: Put leads you generate on your list.  Many successful agents make it a point to add 2 people a day, and soon have 500 contacts their first year (and got 10 to 20 deals just by putting people on the list).

STEP 4: Also, the other parties to any transactions you complete go on the list (hint: their agent will forget about them, so they’ll easily be yours when they buy or sell again).

STEP 5: Create “strategic alliances” with professionals who have clients that could be yours and get a “host endorsement” of your services: accountants, insurance brokers, etc. Consider reciprocating by introducing them to your clients as well. The credibility of the existing relationship is transferred to the endorsed person.

Final note: purge your list every 6 months to remove lower quality people. Within 12 to 24 months you’ll have a small, highly motivated group of people sending you consistent business month-in and month-out – something I call building “Critical Mass™” in your business (see Step 3 of the 3-Steps system). That’s what I mean by “Personal Market Share”.

How Often Do You Contact Your “Power List” ?

Now that you’ve create a “Power List” you must plan on monthly contact to make any inroads. Commit to monthly or don’t even start.

The Direct Marketing Association reports that the optimum contact time is every 21 days. There have also been studies out there that say for every month you forget about your Power List, you lose 10% of them – another reason for monthly contact.

Finally, the NAR reports that the “average” contact program takes between 8 and 12 months to “start” working.  (Side note:  We’ve cut that time in half with Service For Life!^®, but even if it takes 10 months to start the “market share engine” producing, that’s still a great deal, considering most agents never get it going).

PROFIT MULTIPLIER #3: Know Your Return on Investment

If you understand where you get the most return for your marketing dollar… you’ll know exactly what to invest in to increase your income.  Sounds pretty simple, but most agents don’t know how to track their numbers.

Here’s how to understand how well your monthly marketing system is working for you… and I’ll use a simple example.

Let’s say you want to send 300 Service For Life!^® issues out each month to your Power List. That’s going to cost you about $0.91 to $1.29 per issue (let’s call it $1.20 because that’s on the higher end and will make the math easier). So you’ll spend about $360 a month for the mailing, including having the newsletter written for you.

That means you’re investing about $4,320 every year to contact 300 people 12 times each, or 3,600 contacts. Now, I know that might sound like a lot of money, but let’s get some perspective here.

Let’s run some quick numbers…

Of those 300 people, you know statistically that about 42 transactions will come from them (300 divided by 7 years average home ownership period = 42 transactions EVERY year).

If the average home price is $200,000, that gives you a co-broker commission of $6,000.  Subtract out home marketing expenses and a broker split, and you’ll probably net about $4,500 from that commission.

Does it make sense to mail to your Power List every month?

Well, look at it this way: If you get only ONE of those 42 transactions, you’ve broken-even ($4,500 commission against $4,320 to send for a year).

But after all that marketing, do you really think all you’ll get is a ONE measly commission out of 42 transactions?

Here’s what’s more likely to happen…

First, ask yourself: Who will generally get the lion’s share of those 42 transactions? The agent who’s cold prospecting over dinner time or pestering people in the grocery store line, OR the agent who’s demonstrated their competency, brought great value, created a family-like relationship, and “been there” when it was time to buy or sell?

Are you getting a hint?

I have agents with small databases of 300 “quality” people who “net” more than $300,000 per year using that very system (and it’s their only marketing).

That’s a whole lot more than just one transaction out of 42.

Problem is, most agents quit before they get any traction – “instant gratification” takes priority over sound strategy. It’s a shame, but that’s good news for agents who “get it”.

When you consider the ROI in your marketing, you now have a benchmark to know when it’s profitable and/or unprofitable for you.

To learn more about developing and harvesting endless commissions from your Power List, go here.