Do You Have Confidence?
Going back many years, Saturday Night Live included a regular sketch called “Daily Affirmations.”
It was a spoof of self-help television programs that aims to motivate people. The “host” would look at himself in the mirror and say, ”I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and doggone it, people like me.”
For those in real estate, motivational, uplifting messages can be helpful. We often mistakenly tie our self-worth to our production.
But the real way to have confidence is to actually provide to your clients a concrete service you believe in.
Know what you are selling!
How well can you market a property if you don’t know what the property has to offer? What schools will the buyer’s children attend? When is the trash picked up? Who built the neighborhood? What do you know about the immediate area’s current market?
If you know things like this very well, you can begin to understand why someone would pick the home. This is something concrete.
If you don’t know the answer to a question, don’t fake it. Tell them you will find out — and do that within the day. Nothing reduces confidence more in yourself or by others if you provide incorrect answers, only to need to correct them later on.
Your clients need to know that when you say something, it is true.
Work on a committee with your local Board of Realtors.
Few things keep you tuned in to the market more than being with other agents from time to time.
With so many agents working from their homes or remote offices, we not only lose the human touch, but we miss out on information that would be helpful to our clients.
Serving on the board of directors of my Board helped me to see things in a broader frame rather than my little world. One committee in particular, Professional Standards, which covers the Code of Ethics, has been a mainstay for me to keep abreast of what is expected of us by my peers and the public.
Statistics
While the point of this site is to diminish the importance of production in favor of a client’s needs, it is undeniable that it plays a part in your own self-confidence.
Check out your ranking amongst other area agents. You may find that you are in the Top 1% in some category. Do you sell more listings in a particular neighborhood? Sold more doubles than anyone else? Sold more condos than any other first year agent?
There is probably some statistic that will not only verify your legitimacy to others, but help to build your confidence. Then you build on it.
An important thing to consider is to remember to compare apples with apples. If you are a solo agent, only compare yourself with other solo agents, not teams. Twenty homes sold by a solo agent is actually a much more impressive statistic than thirty homes sold by a team of three.
Again, the point of this is to build confidence, not an empty marketing ploy.