Talk to any trainer, coach or real estate leader, and they will tell you that real estate is a long-term career, that 80 percent of all new licensees get out in the first two years and that 80 percent of those that are left never make it past five years in the business.
These are the stats that were given to me when I first took a real estate course in 2002. I spent the first 12 months eating through my savings account and — 25,000 marketing dollars later, I still had no closings.
I was not the rookie of the year, although I wanted to be.
I realized two things that year and every year since:
1. I had to stop trying everything and try one thing long enough to see results.
2. I had to decide who I was going to align myself with and stick with them through thick and thin, and be loyal to my silent mentors.
Eight months later, I had my first closing on a house valued at $208,000.
Goal and customer loyalty
The 18 months it took to get to my first closing was the best thing that ever happened to me.
I learned to get focused, be specific, define a niche, be consistent with my marketing to that niche and to stay loyal to my prospective customers who may or may not even know who I am yet.
Coaches will tell you to stay the course for 12 months to see results; I will tell you to stay the course for 24 months to see real results.
My third year in real estate, I netted $250,000, which was low compared to the goals I had written down, but I was certainly happy with the increase.
I can attribute most of the rise in income to being focused on a geographic area, but specifically to picking a very narrowed domain name that targeted the customer I was trying to attract.
Stop being everything to everyone and be a specialist. Define that specialty with a domain and market it.
Your first thought when someone tells you to just focus on a micro area of a county or city — a specific neighborhood, for example — is that you will end up missing out on all the other customers who don’t fit into or live in that neighborhood. That is just not true, and the only way for you to truly believe me is to try it yourself for 24 months — I challenge you!
The power of the domain
I think one of the most revolutionary and positive business enhancements is the end of the dot-com world and the increase of more descriptive domain extensions.
Those including things like .blog, .auto, .hotel, .sport, .kids, .book and for real estate agents, .homes.
There is no mystery for the customer trying to figure out what your site is about, what your services are related to, or what area you service.
It’s all about the customers, what they are buying and where they are buying.
So if you are looking for that one thing you can enhance your business with in 2017, it’s to get specific starting with a domain name that will quickly attract the buyers and sellers you want.
Learn more about DotHomes here, contact the director of domain sales Robert Purdy (dothomesinfo@homes.com), or request your domain here.
Cheryl Spangler is the principal broker and co-owner of FORBZ Real Estate Group. You can follow her on Twitter or LinkedIn.