After following his work for years, I recently became a student of coach and marketing expert Dean Jackson, who introduced me to idea that every business has three parts: a before unit, a during unit and an after unit.
Roughly, the before unit refers to bringing people into your business initially; the during unit is the delivery of experience; the after unit is the relationship you nurture long after the transaction. In the business of real estate, we can see these units represented as earning new clients, showing and selling them homes, and then encouraging repeat business and referrals.
This has become a formula I use to analyze every business I come into contact with.
Analyzing Amazon
To use an example with which most of us are already familiar, let’s analyze Amazon. What do the before, during and after units look like for Amazon? The before unit includes targeted ads, traditional television commercials and print advertising. This is one corporation that has mastered both old and new media. In my view, nobody does it better.
The retailer’s during unit is second to none, because there are no checkout lines, no pushy salespeople and an almost infinite selection. I can pick up my phone, make a couple of touchscreen gestures and have anything I want at my door the next day.
The after unit is just as amazing to me. Who can resist personalized emails about things you care about based on your purchases and search history?
It’s plain to me that Amazon has it going on in all three units.
The Big Brand Real Estate Franchises
Now let’s look at businesses a bit closer to our industry home. What do the before, during and after units look like for the big brands? I’m talking about the Re/Max, Home Services of America, Realogy and Keller Williams of the world.
The before unit for all these companies includes tremendous brand recognition. The logos, multichannel advertising and worldwide name recognition make for formidable before units, which is where the true value of all of these franchises lies.
The during unit, however, is ill-defined at best. The client experience is 100% dependent on the quality and experience of the agent involved. The agent’s performance is dependent on the quality of the leadership in their independently owned franchise office. In most cases, the agents are true professionals. In other cases, not so much.
The after unit is also agent-dependent. I am sure there are exceptions out there, but in my experience, the after unit at the big brands is an afterthought.
The Mom-And-Pop Shop
How does the typical mom-and-pop brokerage stack up? Traditionally, the value of these firms has also rested in the before unit. Local reputation, market share and name recognition are their traditional strengths.
As I see it, there is generally nothing intentional going on in the during unit of the average mom-and-pop brokerage. Fortunately, most of the owners of these firms are true professionals with years of experience. However, there is generally little time in their calendars devoted to developing the next generation of real estate agents.
Likewise, the after unit at the average mom-and-pop tends to get little consideration. Like with the big franchises, the after unit experience is dependent on the individual agent or broker involved. The relationship-focused professionals find a way to stay in touch, and the transaction-focused agents will never see the value in an after unit investment.
The Better Brokerage
Thanks to all the computer and communication technology we currently enjoy, any real estate brokerage can create a before unit that can compete with both the big brands and the mom-and-pops by doing the following:
• Establish a clear and consistent brand and statement of purpose in the market(s) being serviced.
• Foster an environment where it is understood that relationships are more valuable than transactions.
• Execute a daily social media presence that boosts name recognition and, ultimately, market share.
• Create content that is of immediate use to a buyer or seller, and that is delivered in the right way at the right time. The web is great, but a printed brochure to take home can still be incredibly effective.
• Build a client-centric website that illustrates exactly what they can expect from the firm and the agents associated with it.
The better brokerage’s during unit should be designed to support the sales team with materials that promote a consistent brand experience from one client to the next. For instance:
• Document a buyer-focused consultation experience that every agent can promote and execute.
• Create a seller-focused experience for all to employ at listing presentations.
• Offer world-class training opportunities, and be sure to make the completion and annual review of them non-negotiable. Spell it out in the independent contractor agreement.
• Provide a complete productivity and technology package that simply works.
Excellence in the better brokerage’s after unit may be the easiest to achieve. I credit virtually all of our early success to consistent execution of our after unit strategy. Our focus has always been on creating new relationships and nurturing lifetime relationships with people who already know, like and trust us. It’s simple, but most don’t do it.
My idea of the better brokerage after unit includes:
• Personalized monthly items of value executed and mailed on the agent’s behalf and paid for by the brokerage.
• Branded pop-by gifts, anything from koozies to water bottles to pens and more.
• Client appreciation events paid for by the brokerage.
• Financial encouragement for any agent who wants to hire a personal business coach.
• Ongoing support for each agent’s personal goals and objectives.
It’s really not rocket science; the better brokerage model is available to all of us. The trick is to start by analyzing the before, during and after units of our businesses.