Results are everything when it comes to growing your market share and new business activities in commercial real estate brokerage. From that concept, you need to understand how things are changing and improving over time.

(N.B. these ideas are also sent out to regularly to our friends in Commercial Real Estate Online Snapshot to help amplify brokerage results…. Get your access here)

Your progress matters

You do need to track your progress as a professional individual broker or agent. Failure to do so will impact into your progress in so many different ways.  Understand what is happening around you with property activity and then adjust your processes so you can move on the opportunities of the market for your town or city.

Key indicators

So exactly what should you track and how should you do it? You need to track the things that matter to your real estate business across a number of segments. Those segments will typically be:

• Size of Database – over time you should be creating a database that is comprehensive and locally relevant. That database has to grow in both size and quality, and should include all of the right people that can or will be potential clients for you over time. Understand how your database is growing and adjust your prospecting efforts accordingly.
• Client List – ultimately you need plenty of clients to help you grow market share. Those clients should return to you over time with a variety of property needs and challenges, providing they remember you and trust you as a local property expert. As the property specialist you can be there to assist your clients in the right way both professionally and locally. Differentiate your client list from your prospect list. The clients pay your commission, so the focus here is to convert more prospects to clients over time. Client conversion is the name of the game. Understand how you can take your shortlist of high value prospects and revert them to clients through specialized services.
• Exclusive Listing Numbers – you can have plenty of listings locally, but the exclusive listings are those that really matter when it comes to market share and commission conversion. Adjust your presentation and pitching processes so that exclusivity is at the centre of your recommendations and listing activity. Make sure that you are converting vendor paid marketing funds as part of each and every exclusive listing. As they say, ‘You can’t sell a secret’.
• Time on Market – understand how long on average it takes to sell or lease exclusive listings today. The equation doesn’t apply to open listings given that the process of marketing for open listings is so random. Look at all of your exclusive listings and track the time on market progress for locations and property types. Make adjustments to those listings that are been on the market for a long time and are not attracting enquiry. Make recommendations for price adjustments or promotional change to your clients.
• Referral Business – some of your good clients will offer plenty of referral business over time is you ask for it. Ask the right questions at the right time so that you can connect with new people needing professional property assistance locally. The relationships that you have now and the contacts of others that you are introduced to, will help you build referral business. Every successful property transaction should be a referral opportunity.
• Repeat Business – look at how you can offer a variety of services to all of your good clients. A single property transaction today can be moved in the future through a variety of sales, leasing, and investment opportunities. The services that you can offer should be tuned to the market conditions and the clients that need you.
• Commissions per Transaction – when you look at the commissions that you are converting now and have done so over time, you will see an average earning that applies per transaction to both leasing and sales. Get that number to escalate over time so that you are converting a higher level of commission per transaction. The way to achieve this growth and result is to focus on better quality properties and clients as part of your marketing and prospecting methods.
• Commissions per Client – some clients are better than others, and the way to determine that criteria is to assess the volume of commission that you are achieving per client per transaction currently. Clients have a value to you when it comes to immediate commissions. Other clients have future opportunity to you over time. So you will need to differentiate how you will be working with the different clients based on commission growth and opportunity; put that strategy at the centre of your business plan. Look at the value for each client in your database, and segment some of those clients into the categories of location, property type, and commission potential. Create a VIP list so you can drill down into the list of opportunity and the high quality clients that you serve or could serve now.

So there are a number of things that you can do here to track your progress in commercial real estate brokerage sales and/or leasing. When you know the numbers, you can adjust your prospecting and presentation processes for better results. Always qualify the people that you talk to, and do so before you spend too much time and resources in servicing them.

Be real and relevant

Relevance will always help you convert more business with the clients that really matter in today’s property market. Position yourself relevantly as the professional that investors and business people need locally. Concentrate on the better listings and the quality clients in your location.