Open Day Prospecting
With the completion of this module, the participant should be able to / or have done:
Know that buyers are an important source of listings.
Know the five stages of prospecting through open days.
Know how to greet visitors at open days and ask them to join your buyers system.
Know how to phone back people who come to an open day and find out about their circumstances as buyers and vendors.
Know how to run a buyers system.
Know how to carry out ongoing follow-up with buyers.
NEW: Watch this new video first:
Know how to progress buyer relationships to vendor ones.
Know how to offer potential vendors a pre-listing presentation.
Know what to offer in a pre-listing presentation.
Prospecting – Open Days 1
Knowledge and skills taught in this session:
- The importance of prospecting among buyers and an introduction to the five stages of prospecting through open days.
Remember to get your workbook out and follow through in it, as you complete the lessons online. Do the work, complete your daily planner and do the exam questions.
Prospecting among buyers and the five stages of prospecting through open days.
Information that leads to listings is right under our noses. That information is our buyer contacts.
There are five stages to open days prospecting. These are:
Greeting. You greet each person who comes to your open day and ask them if they’d like to join your buyers system.
Follow-up call: After the open day, you ring each person back to establish contact and find out the person’s circumstances.
Buyers system: You put the buyers on your buyers system.
Ongoing follow-up: You make contact on an ongoing basis to establish a relationship with the person as a buyer and a vendor.
Pre-listing presentation: You offer the person a pre-listing presentation.
Prospecting – Open Days 2
Knowledge and skills taught in this session:
- Explanation and demonstration of how to greet people who come to an open day, finding out a little about their circumstances and asking them to join your buyers system.
Remember to get your workbook out and follow through in it, as you complete the lessons online. Do the work, complete your daily planner and do the exam questions.
How to greet people who come to an open day.
For prospecting purposes, an important part of an open day is the fact that you are on show to potential vendors.
You should stand at the front door with a brochure in one hand, covering the hallway. Do not let anyone through – even if three people arrive at once, you have a duty of care to the vendor to make sure you get information from these people. A suggested welcome is:
“Hi and welcome to another open day. My name is Peter Gilchrist. Before I give you this brochure on the property, I would like you to sign in for security reasons.”
You should offer visitors two levels of sign in, depending on whether they wish to take up your offer of joining your buyers system. (This is discussed in the next session.)
Scenario one You ask:
“Tell me, are you folks on our blue ribbon buyers system?”
“No; tell us about that.”
“Being on our blue ribbon buyers system means that we’ll send you new listings as they come on the market before they’re actually advertised. You can receive either a loop to your phone or an e-mail telling you a property is for sale. As well as that, we have previews from time to time, where we invite buyers to new listings throughout the week. Once again, this is before they come on the market properly. Does that sound like something you’re interested in?”
If they are interested, hand them a form to fill out with their name, address, phone number, what they are looking for and so on.
Scenario two
“No, we’re not, and we’re not interested, thank you.”
“Fantastic. If you wouldn’t mind signing in here for security purposes.”
After the visitor has signed in, you say:
“Now listen, as you go around the property, note the three bedrooms are on the right-hand side, the living areas are on the left and upstairs, there is a large games area and a separate bathroom. Make sure when you get out the back door you notice the wonderful barbecue and the garden shed. I look forward to hearing your comments on the way back through.”
Serious questions
The sorts of questions you could ask are:
When do you hope to be in your new home by?
Which part of the year do you folks hope to move in by?
Which stage of the home buying journey are you at?
When do you want to be settled by?
Do you have a home to sell?
Some slightly less serious questions are:
Where are you from?
Have you looked at many houses?
Have you seen anything you like yet?
What else have you seen today?
Why are you moving? (main reason)
Have you a deadline to be moved by?
What is your main criteria for a home?
In terms of buying and selling, is there anything I can help you with?
Role play:
Exercise:
Role play the greeting, using the scripts above.
Prospecting – Open Days 3
Knowledge and skills taught in this session:
- How to phone back a person who has attended an open day.
Remember to get your workbook out and follow through in it, as you complete the lessons online. Do the work, complete your daily planner and do the exam questions.
The follow-up call
How to phone a person who has attended an open day.
The purpose of the follow-up call is to establish contact, obtain feedback on the home, and find out what the person is looking for in a home and where they are at in selling theirs.
“Hi Mr Smith, it’s Peter Gilchrist speaking. You attended an open day of mine up in Maori Hill on Saturday and I was hoping I could spend a couple of minutes finding out what you thought of the property. Is this a convenient time for you?”
“Yes, it’s fine.”
“One of the things the vendor relies on us for is feedback about how people who come through the open days found the home. How did it suit your requirements, sir?”
“I would say it wasn’t particularly good for us. It only had two bedrooms.”
I would then launch into something along the following lines:
“Look, one of the things I find in real estate after being in it for a few years is that probably 95% of people who come through an open day don’t actually buy the house they come to see. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions to see if there is anything else we have that might suit your needs?”
If they say
“No, we are not interested in looking at the moment”.
Then you say
“When would you be looking to shift?”
Or they say:
“Yeah, no worries”.
In which case you head straight into question mode.
“You told me you wanted something over the next three months. Perhaps you could give me an outline of the sort of home you are looking for.”
………
“Great! Thanks for that. Which areas would you look in?
Role play:
Exercise:
Role play the follow-up call, using the scripts above.
Prospecting – Open Days 4
Knowledge and skills taught in this session:
- How to run a buyers system.
Remember to get your workbook out and follow through in it, as you complete the lessons online. Do the work, complete your daily planner and do the exam questions.
Open Days
The third stage in prospecting through open days is to put your new contacts on your buyers system. Enter their details on your own computer and also on the company system, so that they receive mass marketing material. Note that you should do this with All buyers who contact your office.
You must give buyers:
A list of everything that is for sale through you and your company.
Every new listing as it comes into your office.
Invitations to previews; that is, homes that are listed on a Tuesday but opened to buyers on a Wednesday or Thursday before being advertised in the paper.
“Dear Mr Smith, Tomorrow at 5.30pm, I will be previewing a new listing at 12 Brown Street to my Blue Ribbon Club clients. It will be open for just 45 minutes but it’s an ideal opportunity for you to see this property before it goes to the general marketplace on Saturday. Love to see you there.”
A full list of all the open homes run by you or your company.
Role play:
Exercise:
Role play the follow-up call, using the scripts above.
Prospecting – Open Days 5
Knowledge and skills taught in this session:
- How to make ongoing contact with buyers and develop a relationship with them as vendors.
Remember to get your workbook out and follow through in it, as you complete the lessons online. Do the work, complete your daily planner and do the exam questions.
The booklet Peter refers to in this clip is available for download in the exercice box at the bottom of this page
Ongoing follow-up
How to make ongoing contact with buyers and develop a relationship with them as vendors.
Phone up and say:
“Mr Smith, we have several products that may be of use to you. Are you looking at auction properties at all?”
“Yes, we are.”
“Well, we have a pamphlet available on how to buy at auction. Would that be of use to you?”
“Yes, it would.”
“Great. I’ll get it into the mail for you right away. Expect it in the next couple of days. It’s been really nice talking to you.”
Just leave it at that. Put the booklet in the post and make a note in your ‘bring up file’ to phone them back in four days. If you haven’t already been out with them by then, phone them and say:
“I sent you the pamphlet How to Buy at Auction. Did you receive that?”
“Yes, we did.”
“What did you think of it? … That’s great. I’ve also put my hands on a pamphlet on how to make offers on properties. I’ll put that in the mail to you as well.”
Again, another phone call. At this stage, you are looking for opportunities to break out of the buyer cycle and into the vendor cycle. They will eventually come, I guarantee you.
“Tell me, do you mind if I ask you (this should be done in the first phone call obviously ??not sure what you mean here. That you should already have asked them this? But if so, how does it fit in here?) if you have a home to sell?”
“Yes.”
“Can I ask where it is?”
“I live in Waverley.”
“That’s great. Have you done any work on getting your home on the market?”
“No, we are not going to do that until we find a property.”
“That’s wonderful.”
Other appropriate contacts include:
Advice on how to purchase a property.
Advice on the house they are looking at. For example, you could say:
“If you find something that you like and you like the way I work, I’d be glad to come and look at it as an independent person and give my advice on it.”
Sending the following pamphlets and forms:
How to make your best offer.
How to buy at auction
How to present your home
Buyers guide.This pamphlet helps buyers write down what they are looking for in a property. It covers such things as how far they want to be away from their home means? how far they want to move?, how much money they have, how much money they will have after selling their home and what resources they have to put into a new home
Homes we have seen. This is a single sheet on which buyers record the details of homes they have been to. It should have your logo and photo on it. Many people will be carrying these around when you get back in touch with them.
Sending your personal profile and company profile.
A list of the services your office provides.
Role play:
Role play the follow-up call, using the scripts above.
Click here for a to-do list and ideas for calling back buyers
Prospecting – Open Days 6
Knowledge and skills taught in this session:
- An outline of what’s in a pre-listing presentation, and a demonstration of how to phone a person and offer them one.
Remember to get your workbook out and follow through in it, as you complete the lessons online. Do the work, complete your daily planner and do the exam questions.
The booklet Peter refers to in this clip is available for download in the exercice box at the bottom of this page
The pre-listing presentation
Finally, you can offer buyer-vendors a pre-listing presentation.
This consists of:
Giving information about the market, for buyers and sellers.
Explaining options for marketing and selling the home.
Offering an appraisal to arrive at a market value.
Outlining things that will improve the home’s saleability.
When you offer this, you Must stress throughout the call that you are aware the person isn’t ready to sell yet. Otherwise, the person will feel pressured. Also make it clear that you are doing this at no obligation or cost.
Here is the script:
One of the things our office can do is a pre-listing presentation. I realise you’re not ready to go on the market yet but the presentation has four bits to it that you may find of interest.
The first is, if you’re happy for me to come and look at your home, I can give you some information on the market that you’re buying and selling in and tell you what’s been happening out there over the last 12 months.
The second thing is, I can show you your options for marketing and selling your home. There’s a lot of talk at the moment about auction and set sale, by negotiation, these sorts of things. I could take you through those so you’re in a better position to decide how you’re going to sell your property.
The third thing is I can do is an appraisal to come up with an indicative price, which may alter what you are looking for. It may mean you can buy higher or it may mean that you have to cut back a bit. But it would certainly be worth at least knowing about it now.
The fourth thing is very important. I can tell you anything I think needs doing around your home. An interesting trend in the real estate industry in the last 10 years is that finance has become easier to get. When you find a home, the chances are, if you’re competing for it, you’ll have only a couple of days to put your best offer in, and you may decide to go cash and sell yours. That will mean you’ll be in a hurry to get yours sold. Now, anything that needs doing that may substantially increase the price you’ll get may take time. What I suggest is that I point out some of those things – and I’m very good at that; it’s my job. That would help your home sell faster and realise more money. I’m sure that would be a help to you as well.
Are any of the things that I’ve mentioned of use to you? … Great, I’ll be in your area tomorrow. Would 4 or 5 o’clock be better for you?”
Role play:
Role play the follow-up call. Offer to give a pre-listing presentation using the scripts above.
Exercise:
The additional material below contains helpful and extended information on today’s activities.
Although not required to be completed before proceeding to the next day we highly recommend them.
CLICK on each activity to begin
Scripts and dialogues on buyer qualification
Scripts and dialogues on working with buyers