Communicating with Personalized Focus

How you communicate with those clients, though, will be yet another distinguishing factor on whether or not you reach top producer status.

O’Connor, for instance, will maintain communication with some clients for two years before they ever purchase a property with him; thus, in order to keep track of his various clients (and their statuses), O’Connor divides his clients into three categories: A, B and C.

“A Clients,” O’Connor says, are people whose home is presently listed, or are buyers looking to buy immediately; those clients might be contacted two or three times a week. By contrast, “B Clients” are active in the market or have an active listing, but want to be contacted only when there’s an offer on their property, which might mean one contact every week or two. And finally, “C Clients” are those that are just looking around or “testing the waters.” They want to be contacted only if the agent has a listing with specific property details, or have a listing in a certain neighborhood. O’Connor may only reach out to those clients once every month or every other month.

Hausman is similarly organized, keeping all of her clients’ info on a Google Drive file and assorting the clients into specific categories, so she knows what information to send to them; whether it’s email newsletters, new listings or other assorted information about the market, Hausman will send her clients anything they might want to know about.

Salm also communicates with his clients, though he is careful to personalize his messages and avoid bland, general communications that do not relate to his clients’ needs.

“It’s definitely best to keep it personalized,” he says. “I rarely do any pre-formatted e-blasts or anything of that sort. People really appreciate the personal touch and follow-up. That said, as your client list grows, it’s more and more time consuming to reach out to everyone individually, but well worth the time expense. This business is all about relationships, so it’s extremely important to cultivate them, otherwise someone else will.”

And finally, consistent with her direct, word-of-mouth approach, McKenna makes it a priority that her clients are always hearing her voice, whether it be through phone calls or text messages. And like O’Connor and Hausman, McKenna keep copious notes regarding her clients.

“I keep a log of every single person [not represented by another Realtor] that has contacted me about a listing and post it on my wall,” McKenna says. “Every day, my assistants and I look at it together and try to find a match for them with our current listings. The clients don’t even know that I’m connected to them in this way, but I am.”