Thursday, April 29th @ 10:00 a.m. Central

Stop Selling and Start Recruiting!
Presented by: Jonathan D. Nicholas, CRB Master Instructor

As an Attendee of this Webinar, you will learn:

- Why Well-Meaning Recruiters Fail on First Contact
- How a Simple Shift in Call Focus Generates Opportunities
- Four Distinct Recruiting Behaviors – Which One Are You?
- When Sales and Recruiting is a recipe for Sabotage
- How to Make a Culture Connection with Your Prospect

During this 70 minute webinar, Jonathan will guide you through a quick preview of content from the upcoming Midwest CRB Chapter’s Course: The A.R.T. of Recruiting: Attracting & Retaining Talent. If you haven’t registered for the CRB live delivery course to be held in Illinois, and you would like more information prior to registering; this is a great opportunity to hear from the course author direct.

To watch this Recorded Webinar – Press Play on the Player below:

Stop Selling & Start Recruiting

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Please join us for another informative CRB Council Webinar!

Title:  Clicking With A New Generation of Agents

Date:  April 7th, 2010

Time: 11:00 A.M. Central – Please adjust for your time zone

Hosted By:  Jonathan D. Nicholas, CRB Council Master Instructor

It is estimated that nearly 60% of the National Association of REALTORS membership is now comprised of Generation X and Generation Y.   So when did this happen?   It is a reality, yet brokerages all across North America have yet to adapt and are operating under the status quo of bygone decades.   Is your brokerage guilty?  Are you delivering on the expectations of these generations, and generations to come?

In order to be successful now and in the future, brokerages must begin implementing new strategies.  A much needed paradigm shift is required when considering your brokerage model, compensation planning,  professional development track, and your recruiting and retention plans. 

In this 60 minute webinar, Jonathan Nicholas will be sharing critical insight on adapting to these changes including:

• Common disconnects between multi-generational associates
• The new brokerage mindset
• Delivering on the most important expectations of GenX and GenY
• Supporting the NextGen in a collaborative brokerage environment
• Never forget, it is about THEM

This webinar’s content, taken from hundreds of personal interviews and focus group surveys, will provide you with foundational keys and best practices for your brokerage’s future success.   Don’t lose these dynamic and productive individuals to your competition.  

To take part in this webinar, please enter your email address into the registration widget below:

Clicking With A New Generation of Agents

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Attend the Webinar!

The CRB Council is hosting another informative webinar, please join us by registering using the widget below.

Title:  Marketing 2.0:  Print Vs. Internet

Date:  March 25th, 2010

Time:  1:00 P.M. Central – Please adjust for your time zone

Hosted by:  Jonathan D. Nicholas, CRB Master Instructor

Industry gurus and marketing experts are touting that “Print is dead!”  Is this really the case, and how does this apply to the real estate industry?  In today’s multi-generational society, knowing where to spend your marketing dollars for the greatest return is critical to your success.  In this 60 minute webinar, Jonathan Nicholas will be sharing marketing insights on this timely subject. 

The webinar will cover: 

• Where to spend your marketing dollars for lead generation success.
• How to develop blended marketing campaigns for today’s multi-generational consumer base.
• How to target and engage your perfect potential client.
• Using Multi-media marketing platforms for greater success.
• Learning from succesful marketing organizations outside of the real estate industry.
• When print is the absolute best choice for reaching the consumer.

Over the last year, some brokerages have completely eliminated their print media budgets.  Was this the correct strategy?  Join us on this informative webinar to find out.

Please register by entering your email address in the widget below:

Marketing 2.0: Print VS Internet

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Perhaps this emphasis arises from trainers, marketing gurus or well-meaning consultants.  You’ve most likely heard the cliches shared around boardrooms and classrooms such as, “The minute we’re out of the lead generation business — we’re out of business!”  That is true.  I won’t argue the point, but stay with me as I want to shift the emphasis to another, more important, part of the equation. 

Lead generation budgets within company’s marketing plans allocate billions, if not trillions of dollars annually.   Just in the real estate industry alone, billions of dollars are spent by real estate organizations, and their agents to promote, advertise, and market their services with the hope that a lead will be generated.  All of those dollars invested are doing exactly what they were meant to do — drive and generate leads.   I couldn’t even begin to estimate how many leads are generated on an annual basis within any sales organization.   I would have to guess that within the real estate vertical, hundreds of millions of leads are generated annually.  Yet when compared to actual transactions closed, the industry is doing a poor job of creating transactions, and returning an acceptable bottom line on the dollars invested.

This is not a new problem.  So why do we continue to perpetuate it?  Is it tradition?  Does it just come with the territory?  I can recall some twenty years ago that a real estate organization became aggravated by the ratio of transactions created to the amount of dollars spent on generating leads through print advertising.   They knew that the phone was ringing, but deals were not being written.  The management of the organization decided to conduct an experiment to find out where  the leaks were in their process.   For a period of 90 days they surveyed all  incoming calls  for their name and address, prior to transferring the call to a sales associate.   At the end of six months they researched all names and addresses and compared them to the recorded deed transfers that had taken place during the same time period.  

I don’t have to tell you the end of the story because you can probably imagine the outcome.  Bottom line, over 90% of the incoming calls generated were not converted to closed business.   The company had spent the money, invested their marketing dollars wisely, but failed to realize that their sales staff had major skill gaps that ended up costing the company hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost opportunities.   This case study is still relevant today.   As long as we concentrate on lead generation, we will have miserable bottom line results.   Sure, go ahead and generate leads, but you need to also make sure you’re converting the ones you are generating. 

The best companies have already figured this out.  They’ve reduced their advertising dollars, and they have shifted their budget to invest in developing their sales staff’s conversion skills, and the implementation of technology to ensure higher levels of conversion.   What if you cut your lead generation budget by 40, 50, or even 80%?   Are you having heart palpitations just thinking about it??  It truly is a paradigm shift.   Shift your focus on increasing the rate of conversion.  This is the key to greater profitability.

It is no secret that most industries fail in this regard.  Within the real estate industry, for every 100 leads generated, only 10 are being followed up on.  That means that the money you spent to generate the leads was for only 10% of the leads generated.  Those are very expensive leads.  You could buy leads and come out better in most cases.  What is even worse is the level of conversion.  Out of every 100 leads generated, less than 2% are being converted to closed business.  What is wrong with this picture??  It is no wonder that we have sales associates grumbling about bad leads.  Obviously they’ve not been taught how to convert them.   In fact most agents don’t know the difference between an online lead, or an offline lead, nor the different approaches on how to properly convert the two. 

We spend millions of dollars in online lead generation technology for very dismal results.   Lead generation is important, and lead conversion is great — but the true measure of success is found within the middle of the two: lead management.   What does your lead management strategy look like?  How are holding your organization accountable to proper conversion standards?  Do you offer certification or training in this regard.  What systems have you invested in to make sure that you organization can convert 10, 15, or even 20% of it’s incoming leads to closed business?

There is a strategy that is working for companies all across North America.  It only takes a shift in focus and your mindset to make it all work.  Then add great lead management technology and training support into the mix, and you’ll come out miles ahead of your competition.  Want to know more?  That’s another article — or a phone call.

The Problem with Lead Generation

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The commercial entitled “Parisian Love” is not only ingenius in its simplicity, but heart-warming and emotional as well. It is easy for the viewer to get caught up in the emotion of the video. Thus the success of the video; it draws you in and makes you feel as if you are a part of it. You might even find yourself wondering if perhaps it couldn’t be you searching on Google?

Knowing how accessible video is, I’m still amazed at how many are not utilizing video in their marketing efforts. The overwhelming hidden message in this Google video is the simplicity, ease and in-expense with which it was produced. There really is no excuse for not utilizing video in your marketing. Video is easily produced, it is cheap and the technology is readily accessible to the masses.

In fact, the Google video probably didn’t even require a camera, as the majority of the commercial utilizes screen recording technology. You could recreate the video in a matter of minutes by utilizing Tech Smith’s Camtasia Studio, Screen Toaster, or Screenr.

What’s holding you back from utilizing video? Take a look at the Google commercial and see how you could apply the same type of video to convey messages to your audience. Could you utilize screen shots of slides, pdf, or online images? How about capturing client testimonials, or descriptions of products and services? It is all easily produced. Put your creativity to work, and let me know your ideas.

Here’s the video below.

Video Marketing: Take A Cue From Google

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Just as there are agents and companies who gain business in spite of themselves, there will also be agents and companies that enjoy sporadic success by spontaneously and half-heartily jumping into the social media mix.   If for no other reason, they’ll experience an increase in business because they are touching, engaging and communicating with their sphere of influence within social networks such as Facebook.   It is no secret that, in general, the real estate community does a poor job of staying in front of their past clients and customers.   Add a little Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter into their marketing mix and voila — a transaction or two!

The antithesis of this approach is having a system and process that can consistently render desired results.   The social media process is  a simple five step process that will deliver upon the expectation of  more leads, more clients, and more raving fans.  The process isn’t easy, and it certainly isn’t a magic formula or a silver bullet.  It requires thought, dedication, energy and time.

Here are the five steps of the social media process:

1.  Develop Content

2.  Drive Traffic

3.  Engage Consumers

4.  Create Clients

5.  Cultivate Raving Fans

Each of these five steps contain several sub-steps of social media activities.  For instance, for the purposes of this article, let’s take step number one:  develop content.   In order to develop content you first need to create a central destination for all the content — a container for your words of wisdom, customer advice, REALTOR insights and special reports.   There is no better content management system than WordPress. 

A WordPress blog will become the center of your social media universe.  All your actions, feeds, posts, tweets, white papers, articles, etc., will orbit and gravitate to and from your WordPress blog.   However good content will be required to engage consumers.   You don’t want to market  and drive traffic to a destination that has no value or content.  

Consider all the great advice, knowledge, expertise, and  insider secrets that reside between your two ears.  You probably have years of information that needs to come out in the form of 200 to 300 word articles, how-to’s, advices, etc.   You might even have some nightmare transactional experiences that could serve as great “case-studies” to educate potential clients on what not to do.  Likewise, there’s no doubt that you’ve also solved problems, navigated the deal-killing antics of others, and negotiated brilliantly.  All these can serve to communicate your value and worth as a great agent or company.

Grab a notepad and pen.  Spend a good forty minutes to an hour thinking through Buyer, Seller and Transactional problems.  Write down topics, titles and or bullet points that solve those problems.  Each of these can provide the foundation for a great resource.   To make it easier, why not segment the audience a little further:  investor, first time home-buyer, vacation home buyer, For Sale By Owner, urban, high-rise, high-end, etc.   Each of these segments have their own challenges.  Cover these in your list. 

Once you’re done with your list, begin outlining three to five points for each topic.  Before long you’ll have an exhaustive list of content.   Schedule writing and development time into your time-blocked schedule, or hire the help of a freelance writer or virtual assistant, if needed to bring your resources to life.  The completed articles can then be cut and pasted into your WordPress article platform.

I recently had the pleasure of speaking on the social media process to a wonderful company in Upstate New York, RealtyUSA.   Merle Whitehead, along with Mark Re, Al Picchi and others from the RealtyUSA leadership team are making sure that their organization is on the leading edge of social media by providing the tools, education and resources necessary to equip their associates to serve the needs of their clients and customers.   The slides from the presentation are below. 

Feel free to provide feedback, and/or your experiences and challenges with the exciting marketing opportunity called social media.

Social Media: Driving Dollars to Your Bottom Line!

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It seems that everyone has the wrong focus: lead generation.   Every conference you go to, every tech guru that you hear is espousing the secrets of lead generation through a myriad of online vehicles.  Social media, social networking, Adwords, fan pages, targeted traffic, new P.R., and host of others.  

Here’s a couple of rules that apply to this industry problem:

1.  Before you embark on a SEO or website traffic strategy — get your content in order.  Content is king and if you don’t have great content — why waste the money on a marketing strategy!

2.  Even more important:  why buy more leads with a marketing strategy?   Why don’t you wait until you’ve mastered the lead conversion process.  If you master this process, you don’t need as many leads.

So how many leads are actually good leads?   If you listen to your agents, they will tell you that all the leads you give them are crap!  Rightly so since the overwhelming majority of agents do not know how to interact with an online lead.  We’ve never taught them the difference between an offline lead and an online lead — and why they need to be treated entirely different.   So no wonder they throw the leads back at you and complain.  After all they called the lead and asked them when they wanted to look at real estate — to which the lead replied – ”I’m just looking!  Leave me alone!”    Have you ever considered requiring training and certification for your agents BEFORE they can receive their first lead?

If you want to take you lead management strategy to the next level, don’t even distribute raw internet leads to your associates.  Savvy firms have realized that this is the equivilent to flushing $100 bills down the toilet.    Out of 100 raw internet leads, most companies are lucky to convert one or two leads to paid business.   Sadly, the odds are stacked against the company since only 50 of the 100 leads are even responded to by their agents.   Right off the top, 50% of the leads that you’ve paid dearly for with marketing dollars and expertise is wasted!   Most companies are only working with 10% of the entire lead pool.  Why?  Because most agents abandon 80% of the remaining 50 percent they responded to.  

The firms that experience the highest conversion rates scrub and incubate leads prior to distributing to their associates.  Then after distributing the leads, hold the associate to a high standard of accountability.   Perhaps it is time to re-think your lead distribution and management strategy? 

At a recent conference hosted by Century 21 Real Estate, LLC., I had the pleasure of presenting many of these facts to their top leadership from across North America.   I’ve included the slides from my presentation for your review below.   After viewing the slides, let me know how your company is winning the lead conversion battle.

Lead Management: Cash Cow or Mad Cow?

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In the 1990′s surveys of real estate organizations revealed that most brokerages were only retaining about $150.00 per transaction.  It was an alarming statistic that served as a reminder that brokerage models would need to adapt in order to survive changing trends.  Today, most brokerages would enthusiastically embrace the ability to create that type of profit per transaction.   Over the ensuing years, brokerage profitability has further declined.

In 2003 a leadership meeting was held by a midwestern regional brokerage.  The topic of the meeting was profitability and ancillary services.   At the meeting, it was announced that the profitability per transaction had sunk to an all time low of $ -92.00 per transaction.  Yes, that is negative $92.00.   However, this horrible fact was quickly glossed over when it was announced that ancillary services profit from mortgage and title transactions was in excess of $300.00.  Therefore all the attendees had reason to celebrate that the net profitability of the company was around $200.00 per transaction.    This almost sounds like the questionable fiscal management policies of our U.S. Congress.

Why can’t a brokerage make a fair profit without the subsidy of ancillary services?   It can be done.  It is not a dream, but a reality in those firms who have the financial management accumen, systems and accountability to bring a profit to fruition.

Are you budgeting your profit?  If you were to buy an investment property — you’d only buy it if it would return to you the income that you felt was needed on your investment.  You might expect a 8%, 12% or 18% return on your money.    Why wouldn’t it be the same in real estate brokerages? 

The bottom line is that less than 10% of all brokerages are actually managed by business minds with sound financial principles.    It takes a CEO mindset to create a profit.  You have to plan for it, keep your eye on the numbers, and track each and every financial and market indicator. 

Below is a presentation that I recently gave at a gathering of the top leadership from Century 21 Real Estate, LLC.    The slides from the presentation are available for your convenience.   Please let me know your thoughts and how your brokerage is faring in this challenging market.

Are You Running A Non-Profit Organization?

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Maybe you’ve always considered yourself to be a “live free or die” type of broker like Scott Senter, CCIM, GRI. Running your own brokerage is what you do, and you’ll do it until you’re ready to hang up your spurs. “I run a second-generation family business, and there’s nothing anybody could offer to get me to sell,” says the broker-owner of Senter, REALTORS®, in Abilene, Texas.

But the reality is that today’s tumultuous economic times have triggered deep soul-searching among many brokers, even those who never thought they’d be in the market for a suitor. Brokers who’ve recently gone through a sale or merger say there’s a lot to consider when positioning your business under a new corporate umbrella. 

For example: What are the benefits of merging versus being acquired outright? If you sell, would you prefer to retire or transition into sales—or do you want to retain a leadership role? What kind of payout are you looking for?

Your answers will help you find a new business structure that works best for you and your bottom line.

Scouting for a Sale

To determine whether it’s better to merge with another company or sell, you first must examine your personal and business goals, says Jonathan Nicholas, ABR®, CRB, CRS, GRI a brokerage consultant and speaker who heads The Company CEO Inc. in Winnetka, Ill.

Brokers who merge often do so because it’s a quick way to grow their market share. “Perhaps a broker is weak in a contiguous area or ZIP code or is looking to expand into another area,” Nicholas says. “Or you might want to take out your competitor because you’re constantly competing in the same niche. In those situations, you may accomplish more by joining together.”

Brokers who sell outright, meanwhile, often have decided to hang up their management hat altogether. “Probably the main reason many brokers want to be acquired is that they’re tired and don’t want to run a company anymore,” Nicholas explains. “They’re not having the fun they had when they got into the business and were selling real estate, and they want to get back to that.”

That’s the situation that Eileen O’Grady Newell and Millie Rosenbloom were in before they sold their companies in 2007.

For years, Newell split her time between selling real estate and managing 15 associates at her parents’ company, O’Grady Realty & Builders Inc. in Chicago. But management was never Newell’s true calling, and when it became clear that her aging parents would be handing the business over to her, she started contemplating a sale. “I was spending so much of my time training salespeople,” Newell says. “And as a smaller company, we just didn’t have the technology support that we needed to stay competitive.”

For Rosenbloom, former broker-owner of The Habitat Co. in Chicago, the decision to sell was based on her observations that the real estate market was about to slow dramatically. “I knew home owners were going to struggle and lose their properties. I also knew there would be fewer transactions, but the same overhead costs,” Rosenbloom says. “I realized that unless companies consolidated, it would be hard for brokers to make ends meet.”

Do the Prep Work

Before reaching out to other brokerages, Newell and Rosenbloom each made lists of what they considered most important in a new business arrangement. Both wanted to continue working from the same location. Newell also knew that she wanted the acquiring company to have a similar culture. “Corporate places can be kind of cold and not have that family feel, which we prided ourselves on,” she says. And Rosenbloom wanted to retain as many salespeople as possible.

Before finding the perfect match, there were setbacks. When Newell first began contacting Chicago companies, several simply told her they’d send an information packet within a week, which she considered a weak gesture at best. A manager at a different brokerage breached the confidentiality of their conversation when a salesperson from the company called to ask whether the rumor that she was selling her brokerage was true. “I was almost ready to close my office because I wasn’t willing to bend on the type of company I wanted to be acquired by,” Newell says.

Finally, she contacted Koenig & Strey. She sent an e-mail message to company president Doug Ayers, who responded within half an hour. “He said, ‘Let’s meet and have a discussion.’ It created a much better feel,” Newell says.

Rosenbloom’s first attempts also were rocky. She started by approaching her business partner, who led the property management division, with the opportunity to buy the company. When he declined, she undertook a detailed analysis of her company’s market share, its office locations, and the neighborhoods in which her sales associate were most dominant. She then approached three competitors who she thought would be the best match. “One was in chaos,” Rosenbloom says. “The other was too new and didn’t have the right market profile to be a good fit.” The third company, Baird & Warner, was just right. The brokerage had offices in the areas her sales associates covered, and Rosenbloom could continue to work from the same office.

Today, both Rosenbloom and Newell are top salespeople at their respective new companies. “I was a very good salesperson,” says Newell, now a broker-associate at Koenig & Strey GMAC Real Estate Chicago-O’Grady Office in Chicago. “But I didn’t know how good until I focused on sales exclusively.”

Still in Charge

Though many brokers leap from management to sales, others remain in a leadership role when their company is folded into another. That kind of arrangement can benefit the acquired broker, the acquiring broker, and the sales associates that are being absorbed into the larger company.

“Many brokers who’ve built their company want to get out of the business when they reach retirement,” Nicholas says. “Their strategy is to go to the new company and, for a couple of years, still manage their salespeople while getting a cut of production. Gradually, the salespeople get used to other managers and resources and to the new culture.”

That’s important, because many acquisition agreements state that for every sales associate who leaves after the acquisition, the acquired broker’s compensation drops. “The sales associates are the broker’s assets,” Nicholas says. “If the new company loses them, it’s losing the value of the deal.”

Audrey Edelman, CRB, CRS®, avoided that predicament when her Ithaca, N.Y., brokerage was acquired. Retirement was in sight, and she started thinking about her company’s future. But above all else, she wanted to make sure her sales associates would keep their jobs and remain happy with a new brokerage, so she stayed on when her company was acquired. “I started my company on my own 20 years ago, and I love the sales associates and staff,” she says. “I met with Merle Whitehead, head of RealtyUSA, five to six times for a great many hours in the year before we decided we were comfortable with one another. It was clear that he philosophically had the same feeling about his staff as I had about mine.”

Edelman joined RealtyUSA in January 2005, retaining an ownership stake in her office and remaining its principal broker. “The plan was for me to stay on for several years to see how it worked out,” she says. “Merle said, ‘Let’s leave this as it is as long as you want.’ As the years passed, we built another, larger office together. I hired all the staff, affiliated the sales associates, and even decorated.” During that time, not a single one of Edelman’s original sales associates jumped ship.

After Edelman hired new managers for both offices, she took on a new role with the business. Today, she’s a broker-associate with Audrey Edelman RealtyUSA, and says she couldn’t be happier.

Time to Scale Back?

Some broker-owners who are plodding through tough times conclude that shrinking their operation is better than being acquired or merging. Dan Rider and his business partner, Rebecca Dickson, decided last year that big changes were needed to make their Nevada company, Dickson Realty, profitable again. In March they sold their five Lake Tahoe offices while retaining operations in Reno, Sparks, and Truckee.

“We discussed whether we should merge or be acquired,” says Rider, the company’s broker-owner. “But Rebecca and I are both in our mid-40s, and we feel like we have a lot of miles left. We’d also like to leave a legacy for our children. It felt like a better decision to consolidate and dial our operations back a bit.”

Why did they single out the Lake Tahoe outposts? “The resort market has been hit really hard,” Rider says. “We sensed it was going to be a longer recovery for that market. With just our Reno, Sparks, and Truckee locations, we’re profitable again. We’re feeling pretty happy with ourselves.”

Keeping an Open Mind

One Denver broker, who requested anonymity, parted ways with one of his business partners last year and now is left with a company half of its original size. Now he’d like to jump-start what remains of his business, and he’s feeling out all of his possibilities.

Everything is on the table, including the remaining owners’ role at a new company, whether to do a merger or acquisition, and whether his company will retain its current franchise affiliation.

“We think there’s strength in numbers, and if we can double or triple our size in one fell swoop through a merger, that makes sense to us,” he says. “We also might go with an acquisition if that works out best for everybody involved. If we merge or are acquired, I’d like to have some leadership role—if that’s the best thing for the company. And if the franchise affiliation isn’t of value going forward, it would be dropped.”

He initiated discussions with three of his competitors in early 2009, but he feels no urgency about making a decision. That’s a good thing; although mergers and acquisitions are sometimes done quickly due to pressing financial circumstances, it’s never wise to act rashly in these situations. “When we sort out the right opportunity,” says the broker, “that’ll be the right time frame to make a move.”

Whatever your plans are for your company’s future, brokers recommend keeping your options open. “Listen to everybody who approaches you,” Edelman advises. “That way you’ll know if the right opportunity comes along.”

Make Sure It’s a Good Match

If you’re considering joining forces with another company, consider these six tips.

 Focus on culture. A culture clash can devastate the best-laid plans. “In one instance, two really old independents merged,” says Jonathan Nicholas, ABR®, CRB, a brokerage consultant and speaker who heads The Company CEO Inc. in Winnetka, Ill. “One was a high-end company. The other was more of a general middle-class office.” When the two companies moved into the same office, the high-end sales associates felt as though they’d been merged with a company from “the other side of the tracks,” Nicholas says. “The merger never truly took. The acquiring company was able to keep only about 30 percent of the salespeople it acquired.”

Prove your worth. If you don’t have the financial records to back up your company’s value, you’ll lose money in any transaction. “We’ve always made it a priority to have very good accounting,” says the broker of a small Denver company who’s investigating merger and acquisition opportunities. “That’s made our evaluation process relatively simple.”

Build your intangible value. Create value that will make your brokerage worth more than just its pending sales and listings. “We’re an inviting target for a merger or acquisition because of our placement in the Denver market,” says the Denver broker. “There’s intrinsic value to our location, and you can’t put a number on that.”

Field all offers. “When I owned my company, people came to me all the time with offers, and I listened to every one of them,” says former broker-owner Audrey Edelman. “It helped me build a frame of reference for what was available.”

Pore over details. “Look at the amount of cash you’ll receive up front and the payments you’ll receive over time, along with the solvency of the person you’re considering doing business with,” Edelman says. “If you’re an integral part of a company that’s doing well and you walk out the door the day of the affiliation, your company will be less valuable.”

Trust, but verify. “It’s very important that you trust the person you’re going to be with,” Edelman says. “If someone comes along whom you trust and are comfortable with, that’s the time to do business.”

G.M. Filisko is a freelance writer for REALTOR® magazine. You can contact magazine staff at narpubs@realtors.org.

Reprinted from REALTOR® Magazine Online September 2009 with permission of the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®. Copyright 2009. All rights reserved.

Mergers & Acquisitions: Finding the Perfect Suitor

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Not only email, but social media, texting, blogging and everything else that technology has brought our way.   How do you keep up with it all?  When do you raise the little white flag in surrender?  Can you honestly read the first paragraph and nod your head yes?  Is technology adding to, or taking away from your income? 

Recently I spent the day with a colleague who utilizes technology and tends to stay on the forward edge of innovation.   This person was having some difficulty with their mail server and Outlook email client.  I sat down to access the problem and was greeted with the following:  4,763 emails in their inbox, 772 emails in their unread mail and about 99 folders set up to theoretically keep everything organized.    Now I realize that this is an extreme case of email overload, but I wonder how many of you might be fighting your own email battles. 

My personal goal is to keep my inbox to no more than 30 emails in it at any given time.  If I’m travelling, it might expand up to 100 or 120 emails over a 24 or 36 hour period.  However as soon as I’m able, I weed through the emails and organize my inbox back down to the manageable 20 to 30.  How do I do it?  I’m glad you asked.

When it comes to email management, here are some rules that I live by:

1.  OHIO – Only handle it once.    Don’t let an email linger in your inbox.  Either act upon it, delete it or archive it.   You can act upon it by replying, forwarding or creating an action item.   After you dealt with the email, you can delete it or file it away in organizational email folders.  These folders can be labeled by business, client, vendor, associate, legal, personal, newsletters, etc.

2.  Set up rules and email folders to automatically file away frequent emails such as newsletters, jokes, friends, family and business emails.  Once the new email arrives, the rules will filter through your inbox and automatically move the email to the folder that you’ve assigned it to.   Set up folders with names such as:  new ideas, follow-up, planning, phone calls, to-do, delegate, etc.

3.  Use the UNREAD email inbox instead of your email inbox.   Once you begin filing away emails through filters and rules; you won’t have as many emails in your inbox, but you also won’t be aware of emails unless you change your email checking habits.  Instead of consulting your inbox folder every few moments, you’ll have to get used to clicking on the unread mail folder.  

4.  Invest in a good junk mail filter, not an off the shelve version, but a server based solution such as Barracuda or Postini.   You’ll notice the difference right away.  There’s not a system that I’m aware of that will get rid of every junk email, with the exception of the verfication systems that send an email back to the sender to verify their contact information such as SpamArrest.   Last month I was doing some server maintenance and found over 6,000 spam emails in my Barracuda filter system.   I’m convinced that the extra investment pays off.

5.  Stop being a slobbering dog.   Of course I’m talking about Pavlov’s dog.  We are so trained to listen for the chime of an incoming email.  Every few moments, we inadvertently stop what we are doing to see who just emailed us.  After all, we wouldn’t want to miss out on that lottery notice, or a new offer for some hair growth supplement.   Turn this notification off in your Outlook by clicking on Tools > Options > Preferences > Email Options > Advanced Options and unclick “play a sound when new mail arrives.”    Increase your productivity by silencing the notification.

During a four hour visit with my colleague we  were able to  clean up Outlook and their inbox.   Only 42 emails remained in the inbox.  Success at last.  What’s your story?  How are you taming the inbox tiger? 

Email Management: 5 Rules to Taming Your Inbox

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©2013 . All Rights Reserved.