It has been said that the two most important things in our business are “getting hired and staying hired.” The first part is pretty self-explanatory. The second is a little trickier.
Many factors go into staying hired: providing good service to the client, marketing their property hard, monitoring competing properties and keeping the client updated on where the market is headed…That’s just a small sampling of the many things that brokers have to do to stay hired!
In my opinion, the single most important thing that will keep you hired is telling the client the truth about their situation. This gets challenging when things aren’t going well. For example, the client bought the property at the top of the market and, due to current market conditions, they won’t be able to get anywhere near the rental income that they had hoped the property would realize. Or perhaps they are trying to sell a property, but the demand for the type of property they have is not very strong.
In tough economic times like these, we see situations like this fairly often. What do you do when one of these situations arises and you end up with an upset, frustrated client?
I was at a seminar recently and one of the participants was asked that question. He works in another field, but had a client who fit that description. He paused and answered that he told his client the truth. He said that the client only believed about 10% of what he said, but the respect and trust that he gained from the client because of his honesty kept him hired for over 30 years on a very lucrative account.
I have a friend who is one of the top sales people in his region and product line. I asked him if he had a story on this subject. He said he closed a big deal early in his sales career, when he was selling computers. He was working late into the night to get the equipment installed properly for his client. However, the previous vendor was not helping him remove the old equipment. He put off calling his client because he didn’t want to tell him the bad news about the previous vendor’s lack of cooperation.
When the proverbial stuff hit the fan my friend was taken off the account by the owner of his company. He said that as hard and embarrassing as the experience was, he never made that mistake again. In fact, when he became a sales manager later in his career and he sensed a similar situation arising with one of his salespeople, he would insist that they get a meeting with the client immediately and face the music.
One thing I know about tough situations is that not knowing the truth is the worst part. Most people are relieved when they finally hear the truth, even if the news isn’t great, because they finally know what they are facing and can begin to deal with it.
Have a great weekend,
Ro