Sales Scripts - Prospecting Emails

I've been getting some questions about prospecting emails so I've compiled a few that might be helpful.

Prospecting Email Samples
Please cater these emails to your company and your territory… Several Industries can apply

Example 1 – for when the market tightens…

Hello Mr. Curtis,

As you already know our market has shifted considerably. A large percentage of Realtors and Title Companies will not survive.

I am grateful to say that the ABC Title is a leader in financial strength giving policyholders over “1 billion dollars- or insert appropriate amount here” in protection, and also provides valuable tools and resources to help Realtors be more successful.

With the disappearance of so many of your competitors I would like to help you capture as much of their market share as possible.

I am committed to help my clients not only maintain their success but to continue to grow their business by 10-15% over the next 6 months, despite the fluctuation in the market. Obviously, I won't know if we can reach this goal together until I sit down with you to better understand how you run your business and how I can help you build your business.

The best case scenario is this: I will provide enough value to your business to increase your closings by 10-15% in 6 months and in return you allow me to close a percentage of your directable transactions.

The worst case scenario is that our combined efforts do not result in an increase in your business and you proceed as usual.

I have time available to meet with you on Tuesday August 3rd or Wednesday August 4th in the afternoon. I will need just 20-30 minutes of your time so that we can have a dialog about your business and explore possible ideas and solutions for increasing it.

Please let me know what time works best for you. You can either email me back or call me at 515-xxx-xxxx.

Sincerely,

John Repp
ABC Company


Example 2

Hello Kay,

Thanks again for meeting this morning, and I apologize for the confusion. I have attached the photos we took so that you also have a copy of them, and I have sent them on to Sam Smith with Broker Associate Magazine. I am so excited that you are going to be the "Cover Girl", it is very well deserved, as I know you are a great role model to my mother and I as well as many others in the real estate community.

I would like to take you to lunch as I mentioned this morning. Please let me if you are available next Friday (the 20th), or another time that would work better for you.

I recognize, and appreciate your loyalty and friendship with Ginger at Security. I want you to know that I am also here to help you as well with any of your title or business needs. I would love the opportunity to earn your business as your #2 or #3 title person, and to do what I can to continue to help your business excel further.

One of the goals that I have set is to help successful agents like youreself to increase your busniness 10% to 20% over the next year. I believe that with a little better understanding of what you do now to be successful, I can help you increase your revenue and the amount of time you have to enjoy all of your CAR and board activities, as well as your grandkids a little more. Together I think we can achieve this goal.

Thanks again, and I hope you have a fabulous evening.

Susy Title
USA Company

Real Estate Investors Invade California

Here's a press release we just put out... important information - timely, enjoy.

If the real estate market is in a meltdown, California real estate investors haven’t gotten the memo. In fact, residential real estate investment activity has grown over 65% in the past year alone.

Walnut Creek, CA, August 28, 2008. According to an analysis of current California real estate statistics, residential real estate investors are the most rapidly growing population of buyers in California. RightNow Consulting announced today the results of a research project analyzing purchasing activities of California residential real estate buyers. Preliminary July 2008 residential property data reveals that the percentage of residential purchases by investors has risen from 6.74% to 11.41% since July of 2007. This represents a 69% increase in year over year proportional activity.

Despite fewer financing options and lots of bad publicity, investors are taking an aggressive stance. “We wondered whether investment activity might have increased in California given current market dynamics, but were truly surprised by these results,” says Dan Miller, CEO of RightNow Consulting. “Not only did the percentage of residential purchases by investors increase, but so did the number of investor transactions, increasing 16% from July 2007 to July 2008. Given that California median home prices continue to slide – down 3% from June and over 33% from July of last year according to CAR statistics – the dramatic increase in investor activity is surprising.”

By any measure, the increase is an encouraging nod to the perceived long term value of California real estate. Despite the doom and gloom, for investors and home buyers still sitting on the sidelines, favorable interest rates and price declines might push the California real estate market towards a recovery a bit sooner than expected.

[Research Methodology: Total monthly index records searched ranged from a low in July 08 of 67,329(preliminary data) to a high in July 07 of 160,275 inclusive of refinance activity. Refinance activity was removed, and non-owner occupied percentages of total purchase activity were calculated using property data provided by First American Core Logic. The final analyzed data set consisted of non-owner occupied purchases (excluding corporate owned properties) and included all CA counties, extracted from indexed property transfer records monthly from July 2007 to July 2008. Purchase transactions which did not require financing were excluded. Data analyzed and compiled by Laura Compton of RightNow Consulting.]

Branding your self - Niche Marketing

Most title companies and title agents I’ve spoken with have not taken the time to really put down on paper what they will do to “specialize” or how they will service a particular niche differently. The differences may be subtle but going able to articulate those differences are very important to building a niche brand.

As you read through some of the examples below – be sure to ask yourself the following questions, in doing so you’ll get a clearer idea of what niche you might want to go after.

• Could you create a division in your company specifically to serve the needs this niche?
  How would you operate differently?
• Who in your operation has the skills to services a particular niche? Or even more broad, what are the skills required to service this particular niche if any?
• What services and adjustments would be necessary to achieve success?
• What would you call it?
• What kind of sales and marketing effort would best attract these clients?

A few examples worth talking about given current market conditions and should help to illustrate this concept of developing a niche.

Top Producers: Let’s say you have been noticing the national trend which suggests that top producing residential real estate agents (those in the top 20% of production in their market) are gaining more and more share of individual markets. This trend also shows that top producing real estate agents have increased their share of the market over 160% during the past twelve months). Creating a “Private Client Services” division that is more in tune with these high volume targets and clients can enable you to be the company of choice for this niche.

Reverse Mortgage: Rapidly growing in volume and expanding in product type, the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage or HECM is a great source of business. Over 100,000 have closed in the FY 2006/2007 according to HUD, and these are likely to grow at the current rate (over 35% growth in the past two years) or higher given the aging of the baby boomer population. Isolating this business as different and unique, serving its customers specifically, and branding that effort separately from your core products and services will give you a high return. Everyone might be closing reverse mortgages, but who is serving the needs of the clients in such a way that they become recognized as the provider of these services? Who is marketing themselves as the reverse mortgage expert? Might as well be you.

Loan modifications: If you have mid sized mortgage bankers in your area, chances are they are performing loan modifications in order to stem the foreclosure tide. Although the national lenders have contracts which handle these limited title searches on a nationwide basis with title information service providers, there are opportunities at the local and regional level. Be sure to talk to your banker to see if your bank is actively performing loan mod’s in their servicing department and if so, get their title work.

Credit Unions: One of the fastest growing locally sourced high quality areas of refinance transactions. Don’t overlook the multitude of Credit Unions, many of which out produce community banks at a rate of approximately 2 to 1 in certain markets (CUNA Stat.)

Private banking and private mortgage services: The Private Banking and Wealth Management department of national, regional and local banks represent the majority of deposits in the United States owned by wealthy clients. Many of these people own lots of commercial and residential real estate and their banker can approve commercial mortgages as well as refer residential refinances and purchases. None of your competitors call on these accounts and your upside in terms of deal sizes and frequency is unlimited.

Pre-foreclosure/Short Sales sales: Teach real estate agents to handle pre-foreclosure transactions, becoming the local expert in this rapidly growing market segment. In certain parts of the US, over 20% of all residential transactions are predicted to be “short sales” over the next year or two. Even if your area is less affected by this issue, it is still a great way to get introduced to real estate professionals around a hot topic.

A little time spent asking yourself questions about how you'll "specialize" in a specific niche might just be the next step to winning more accounts and adding to your bottom line.

Do's and Don'ts of Sales and Marketing - Part 4

Leadership and Management - Driving Results from the Top Down


Do

• DO Make sure everyone in your operation knows the goals (Open, closed, clients, revenue)
• DO Focus on individual targets - offices can't give you business, individual agents or LOs can.
• DO involve everyone in your organization in the sales effort with specific action items, tasks and goals
• DO make sure that everyone in your organization knows what differentiates you from your competitors - You're customers should be able to finish the sentence, "I use you because...." and your sales people should be able to help your customers articulate that
• DO make sure each person knows what their role is in achieving the goals

Don’t

• DON’T assume each person knows how to sell or ask for business
• DON’T pay for customer service reps….incentives should be based on mainly new business

Short and Sweet. Happy selling!

Do's and Don'ts of Sales and Marketing - Part 3

Execution - Sales Activities that Drive Results: here are some very specific tactical things that you should pay attention to...


Do

• After an interview with a target, schedule/calendar a plan for the next follow up – don’t leave an appointment without setting the next one


• Make 1 hour of outbound phone calls daily to targets and other prospects of interest
  (if you think about it this is only 12.5% of a 40 hour work week. Make it mandatory for yourself or for your reps. (you can make between 15-25 calls in an hour – if you use 5 call blocking)


• Interview broker managers every other month to get speaking engagements and other opportunities


• Sit with Closers while they make customer phone calls (they will not do it otherwise). Help create 'message' – empower them to make warm calls (not cold) – in fact here are 5 areas to call: Orphaned Clients, Lender in the middle, Non directing Agent, Best clients to ask for referrals, Cheaters


• Internal public relations – regularly/daily inform your Closers of all sales activities
  I have seen reps live and die by their ability to communicate with their closing/branch teams. It will be very difficult to over communicate what you’re doing as a rep to gain new business. It’s very easy to under communicate


• Ask for the sale. Ask for the appointment. Ask for the next step. Don’t rely on “accidental” results. (Know and) ask for what you want.


• Learn to Listen

Don’t

• DON'T deliver anything if you can convince an EO to do it. Get EO to set drop off appt with agents.


• DON'T spend time creating marketing flyers; or limit it to one hour a month.


• DON'T spend more than 30 minutes on your email per day.


• DON'T do lunches, unless that is the only way to get a target to talk to you. Quite coffee houses are better. Best case scenario, get them to meet you at your office.


• DON'T join committees or task forces that have little or no exposure to top producers, unless it is your first year in title sales, and even then be choosy.


• DON'T talk too much. Know when to shut up. People like to hear themselves talk...ask questions that get your prospect talking and let them go...continue to ask follow up questions to show that you are engaged.


• DON'T Sell the same way to every person. Be skilled in reading others, and then make sure you can flex your style to best suit your prospect.

In sales it's all about the execution - make sure that you're DOING the right things with the right people.

Happy Selling!

Do's and Don'ts of Sales and Marketing - Part 2

Planning and Strategizing - Make it happen...don’t be happy with accidental results!

Do

• Know what activities are most productive for YOU and understand your activity ratios...they may be different from other people on your team. Most top producing sales people can tell you their highest gain activities (things they do that pay them the most amount of money). In our business those activities typically are:
  Asks (referrals and for orders directly)
  Face to face appointments / interviews
  Conversations with prospects
  They can also tell you that metrics like, “I need to set 10 appointment to have 7 show up” and constantly tweek those metrics.
• Set goals and create a daily activity plan to achieve them...look for incremental successes to celebrate, not just the final “close”. Spend 10 minutes at the end of each day planning your strategy for the next day. Ask yourself how much different your days would be if you spent just a minimal time the day before planning what you’d like to do. Someone said, not having a plan is planning to fail… I think they’re right.
• Measure and track your progress and results, know where you are daily so you can tweak and adjust your plan. Don’t over do it (but I really meet great sales people or marketers that overdo tracking), typically it’s the other way around. Make it simple and just track the four things I mentioned above on a daily or weekly basis. The simpler the better.
• Have a daily contact and interview goal: minimum 2 per day.

Don’t

• Wake up without a defined plan/strategy for your day – based on our recommendations for what to DO – this goes without saying
• Go a single day without any selling activity. Keep your skills sharp and your pipeline full by making sure that every day has purposeful selling activity included.
  Literally, if we’re not living for getting new clients and doing something everyday that puts us in a position to get a new client we’re missing the boat

Do's and Don't of Sales and Marketing - Part 1

I constantly get asked to describe the do's and don'ts of sales and marketing for our industry. As easy as the question may sound the answer I've discovered is somewhat complex. I've divided the the answer into four areas or four parts each having a brief list of what we consider at RightNow, the do's and don'ts of sales and marketing:

Attitude and Demeanor - Acting and Dressing “The Part”: this is about how to “be”, behaviours and attitudes that will positively affect, or detract from your sales results.

Do

• Think and act positively. Negative self-talk will only reinforce negativity. Good sales people are by nature positive and this attracts (Law of Attraction) positive results.


• Make sure your outer appearance matches your inner self...always dress professionally and make sure you look polished. Appearance matters, whether we like it or not – marketing and sales people are the “face” of your company. Don’t be afraid to set expectations or standards about how you want your companies image portrayed in the market place.


• Constantly evolve your skills, mindset and perspective. Read voraciously, “interview” other top performers in other industries, try new things, recognize stagnancy, try and be ahead of the curve when change is imminent. Don’t be afraid to learn and keep learning, sharpening your saw (if you’re the president of a title agency on this call, ask yourself when is the last time you made a cold call or when on a sales appointment with a new prospect – hopefully it’s been recently, if not schedule sometime to make some calls this week


• Be accountable to YOURSELF first. Remember this... “If it is meant to be, it is up to me.” You can only be accountable if you have committed to measurable objectives. Get clear on how much you want to make, how many orders you want (the results), then work backwards to the activities you need to do to get those results and hold yourself accountable to the activity that you can control.
  

Don’t

• DON’T get stuck in price wars-it is not about price, it is about perception of value. This is easier said than done, but with few exceptions when we can demonstrate value to our customers, they are willing to pay more – and at the end of the day they’re not paying anyway…)


• DON’T “buy business" or get stuck in that sandbox. If you’re in TX – P53 pretty much lays it out for you. Find ways to add value through your knowledge or tap into the knowledge of your company and it’s employees to create mutually beneficial relationships in an ethical way.


• DON’T believe that anyone is off limits…everyone cheats! This is all about assumptions. Assumptions about our prospects without actually asking or finding out for sure leads us to inaction. It’s typically us looking for an excuse not to do something out of our comfort zone so for example instead of asking and hearing no, we assume a target is off limits and don’t ask.


• DON’T do it ‘because everyone else is doing it’ Otis spunkmeyer cookies… need I say more


• DON'T Work for someone else. Create the mentality that you are “self-employed” regardless of whether you have a base pay or not, and plan and work your day/month/year as if no one but you were responsible for the results you achieve and the money on your paycheck

Next we'll dive into Planning and Strategizing do's and don'ts

Happy Selling